Not Quite American

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Faster Than Light (FTL) is getting a free content update!

Posted by Sam Eskenazi on November 11, 2013
Posted in: News. Tagged: Faster, FasterThanLight, Free, FTL, Games, gaming, Light, Than, Update. Leave a comment

Haven’t been this excited for an update to a game in along time; FTL is getting a complete update, filled with new events, gameplay and a new sector, and it’s all free! Props to the developers for making it free – honestly, it’s going to re-drive the hype train and get more sales, so it’s pretty smart anyhow.

Here’s the link, and be excited as I am!

I really feel sorry for the team who had to suffer this player.

Posted by Sam Eskenazi on November 1, 2013
Posted in: League of Legends. Leave a comment

League of Legends is a fun game, right? It’s fun! It’s hard, it’s gruelling and difficult, but fun!

Except for the people. Yeahhhhhh… The people.

This person wasn’t on my team, but I got the joy of them in all-chat, and I also got to enjoy the after-game chat, which I’ll copy and paste here.

Try and figure out who was the toxic player!

SavienTraliard: suffer cancer son of a crackwhore
Aldrahill: whooooa dude
Aldrahill: dayum
SavienTraliard: from deep in my heart
Faustficker: huihuihui
Aldrahill: huehuehuehue
blackomet: xD
Aldrahill: mad is the appropriate term
SavienTraliard: if somone already died in your family , it makes me even happier
Aldrahill: calm down man!
SavienTraliard: suffer cancer
Aldrahill: and tihnk about what you say to a human being man xD
Aldrahill: take a deep breath
Aldrahill: go masturbate
SavienTraliard: u die
Aldrahill: think of loved ones
Aldrahill: caaaalm
SavienTraliard: world is a better place

There followed a lot of French and German from the other team, all equally terrible I’m sure!

Another post for FrontTowardsGamer: This time, it’s a Prison Architect Review!

Posted by Sam Eskenazi on October 25, 2013
Posted in: Articles. Leave a comment

Looking to writing for these guys a fair amount in the coming months, so here’s another piece, a review for the fantastic game “Prison Architect”.

Paradox Interactive doing a livestream about the upcoming expansion for Crusader Kings 2!

Posted by Sam Eskenazi on October 22, 2013
Posted in: Crusader Kings 2, News. Tagged: CK2, Crusader Kings 2, gaming, news, Paradox, Paradox Interactive, PI. Leave a comment

Paradox Interactive recently teased an upcoming expansion for Crusader Kings 2. It leaked about an hour before the livestream that’s going on right now, however!

The expansion is called “Sons of Abraham” and is an overhaul of the Catholic religion, the Catholic church and the Pope system, and tons of stuff more. It also comes with a huge patch update that changes a lot of base features of the game!

Tune in here right now

Here’s the Dev Diary for it as well!

Edit for Updates: Wheeew they’ve added Jews to the game! There are now three different sects of Judaism in the game; we can now play as Jews!

Edit again: 18th November is the release, with the usual Dev Diaries every few days until then.

A guide to Ezreal I contributed to Front Towards Gamer!

Posted by Sam Eskenazi on October 18, 2013
Posted in: Articles, League of Legends. Tagged: fronttowardsgamer, gaming, leagueoflegends, lol. Leave a comment

Hey all!

I contributed this article to FrontTowardsGamer! Nice guys over there, and I’m looking forward to posting a lot more articles and guides over there soon, so stay tuned!

Pirates of the Burning Sea – The fantastic MMO you’ve never heard of just went on lockdown.

Posted by Sam Eskenazi on October 10, 2013
Posted in: News. Tagged: burning, gaming, lockdown, of, Pirates, Portulas, PotBS, PvP, sea, SOE, the. 2 Comments

Pirates of the Burning Sea – currently being developed by Portulas Games after having been let go but Sony Online Entertainment (and thus the dissolution of Flying Lab Software) – is an MMO with fantastic promise. It’s also sadly been a failing MMO for some years now. A lack of player population, somewhat due to being quite a niche game but also due to rather newb-unfriendly game mechanics that drive off new interest.

It’s also been a game I hate to love, and return to it very frequently. About two weeks ago, I succumbed to my addiction once more and rejoined the game.

I’ll be making more posts about this fantastic game (seriously, it has the best PvP I’ve ever played in any game) but for now the important news is that it’s currently gone on lock-down

This game has a very limited player base, but at the moment it appears that a good portion of them have had their security information compromised. The extent of this issue is so grand that Portulas Games are having to completely re-design their website from scratch, as well as completely shut down their game for the foreseeable future.

I imagine the game won’t be down for too long, but this is still quite immense! An actual entire community of gamers who play a niche game, many of the more skilled players all know one another and come online every day. And then, suddenly, the game, site and forums are just… gone.

I can’t find anyone else having any kind of discussion about the game! No one seems to be talking about it; I can’t even find a subreddit for the damn thing!

So, if you play the game – or have at least heard about it… – leave a comment and talk to me about the game!

Shame too; I had just spent the night convincing a group of people to install it at the pub! All my efforts wasted…

SivHD currently streaming all day to raise money for Save the Children. Not long left until reaching the $100000

Posted by Sam Eskenazi on September 8, 2013
Posted in: League of Legends. Leave a comment

SivHD (a LoL streamer and YouTuber), and 39 other LoL streamers, are currently streaming continuously all day to raise money for Save the Children!

All donations are matched by a multiple of 8.333, so the $7 Million goal by the charity across all the streamers  is almost there!

I’m not affiliated at all, but I only just found about it, donated some money and just thought I’d tell everyone else!

Here’s SivHD’s steram: http://www.twitch.tv/sivhd

‘Total War: Rome II’ – Reviews say too complex?

Posted by Sam Eskenazi on September 3, 2013
Posted in: Articles. Tagged: CAplz, Creative Assembly, gaming, Rome, too complex, Total War: Rome 2. Leave a comment

I pre-ordered ‘Total War: Rome 2’, partly for the discount, and partly because I want to play it the damn second it comes out.

Sadly, I’m working a full day today, so I have to get home before I can play it (plus I’m right in the middle of an Empire Total War campaign as united Provinces… Those Indians are going to get damn well settled by some Dutch).

So, naturally, I’ve spent all day reading reviews and discussions on the subreddit /r/totalwar, and other forums.

A lot of articles and reviews have been published that give the game a less than stellar review because the game is “too complex” or “too complicated”.

Imagine what happens if Creative Assembly listen to these people? This is a Total War game, this isn’t meant to be accessible to a small child.

I want to feel challenged! I want to be confused and frightened at first, then slowly become powerful as my knowledge of the game grows, until I eventually reach the zenith of my power and the might of the great Romans comes crashing down upon all the known world!

I don’t want my damn hand held.

As an example, look at Civilization games. As they’ve been released they’ve become steadily more and more accessible – perhaps even easier. This has been seen to be an attempt to market the game towards slightly younger gamers, as too much difficulty will push younger people away.

This would be a terrible fate for any game series, as to rob the complexity of a game simply to make it more accessible to younger people is simply destroying the game itself.

A very important point on the Civilization series however is the fact that Civilization’s “dumbing down” was done pretty intelligently – the complexity of the game was somewhat reduced since the earliest iterations of the game, but in later editions what’s mostly happened is the in-game information and the encyclopaedia has been expanded and made more understandable.

For this to happen to a Total War game would be quite sad, however. There’s no real limit to when it can stop; does CA reduce the effectiveness or moral? Remove naval combat because it’s usually quite fiddly? Hell, let’s just make it so the game holds your hand the whole way!

I’m not saying that CA will certainly make the game suitable for a child and rob all the joy of a Total War game by its next iteration. Instead, consider this post more of a morose and alcoholic gamer’s grumbling diary entry – not too dissimilar from the raving of a man wearing tin foil for a hat, writing about his hatred for his government.

It’s not a warning, either. It’s a silent plea, with the hope that the underlying message of the post joins the collective voices of the Total War gaming community, in begging the company to please not make the game too easy…

… Please?

AAR of Hrolf de Normandie: Raiding

Posted by Sam Eskenazi on July 17, 2013
Posted in: Uncategorized. Leave a comment

Hrolf decided to sail to Ireland first, to crush those Irish Catholic scum.

ck2 2013-06-17 12-03-39-465

An easy battle passed; the pitiful Irish forces were torn asunder easily enough, leaving Hrolf to raid as he pleased!

Whilst looting, one of the many women in his entourage clamoured for Hrolf’s affections… How could he resist? He was an aspiring Viking after all!

((… I forgot to take a screenshot of that…))

Whilst further looting, Hrolf’s chancellor (the supposed heir, until Hrolf has sired his own heir) has apparently plotted to kill him! Such evilness will not be tolerated!

ck2 2013-06-17 12-59-45-275

This will not do! Off to the jailhouse, Hrolf decrees!

On to more important things, whilst raiding the wealthy hills of Dyfed, Hrolf’s reputation as a fearsome Viking raider was cemented in the stories of his men; all who knew him thought of him as a great and fierce raider! Hrolf’s father, and indeed the Gods, would be proud.

ck2 2013-06-17 13-08-38-065

Sadly, living in these evil heathen lands has cursed Hrolf with an affliction!

ck2 2013-06-17 16-53-01-846#

Of course, the great and mighty Hrolf was healed of his illness in no time at all; the Gods were never going to let their favourite Viking raider be laid asunder by some petty Christian illness!

Hrolf was so busy raiding he had completely forgotten to pay attention to the lands of Holland. The old Norse-betrayer, the Duke of Holland, has lost his lands!

ck2 2013-06-17 17-03-21-608

Evidently, the abominable Christian King of Lothargianiaianiaani-something-something revoked it from him, and gave it to a sickening priest, giving a man of their White God far too much power for any true Norseman to stand.

Thus, Hrolf has made a resolution. He will take the dukedom of Holland for himself; it is clearly the only logical conclusion. He will leave his namesake lands till later; this is for the Gods.

US Government now accepts LCS as on par with other sports such as NBA, NFL and the NHL!

Posted by Sam Eskenazi on July 12, 2013
Posted in: League of Legends, News. Tagged: LCS, League, Legends, of, USA. 1 Comment

Big news for League of Legends and hell, even bigger news for E-Sports as a whole – LCS is now considered on par with other frequent sports competitions held in the USA!

Not just is this a great thing for the movement of E-Sports forward as a whole, but practicly it means that LoL players can now get Visas if needed to play with teams in the USA.

This recognition is another movement forward in the endeavour that has existed since E-Sports as a concept first began – to be considered alike to professional sports like Football, Basketball and the like.

So, great news for LCS and great news as a symbol to E-Sports!

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