Cosmic Star Heroine

Posted by John Klein III on March 22, 2019
Posted in: Fun With YouTube, Games. Tagged: , , , , . Leave a comment

Thanks to PlayStation for hosting the trailer for this game!

I’m obsessed with adding all the games I’ve ever wanted onto my wishlist on psprices.com.  The other day I was trying to remember two other games I really wanted to play on the PS4 and one of them was modern takes on Chrono Trigger.  That game turned out to be I Am Setsuna, which is still roughly a $40 game.  As I was looking for that title, I kept seeing people recommend Cosmic Star Heroine.  Setsuna gets the emotional weight of Chrono Trigger but Cosmic Star Heroine picks up the game mechanics and such from Chrono Trigger and Phantasy Star.  Which I’ve heard of Phantasy Star but never played it but I was tempted by the Chrono Trigger inspiration.

So I am Setsuna was still an expensive game but when I looked up Cosmic Star Heroine, it was only three dollars!  Down from $15.  Which I’m in a real, buy any three dollar game I come across.

Which I did end up buying Atomic Ninjas for the Vita, as it was also $2.99, it will be a game I can never play but at least I have that peace of mind that I’m getting those six games I foolishly missed out on, so that’s nice.

Cosmic Star Heroine was only three dollars, but I still didn’t want to buy a game I would later regret purchasing.  I read several subreddit threads regarding the game and those who loved it, love it (naturally), and those who didn’t like it, didn’t stick with it or liked Chrono Trigger so much that this game was a pale imitation of the older game.  So I wasn’t sure so I kept reading more reviews.

I kept reading about how complicated the battle mechanic is.  There are moves you can only use once, and once those moves are all used, you have to take a rest action and that restores those moves.  Each character gets at least one move which they can keep using, but it is a weaker move.

I read how fun the game can be.  So I reached out to someone who I know loves JRPGs, and that was Rob of PlayStation Access.

I was not expecting Robert Boyd to respond to my tweet!  Cosmic Star Heroine is created by Zeboyd Games, a two man game creating team.  The other man is Bill Stiernberg and they made Cthulhu Saves the World and two Penny Arcade games.

So he reach out, which I feel bad I didn’t hashtag his game like I hashtagged Chrono Trigger.  I have to live with that.

I bought it, couldn’t play it for a night and then was able to get to the two hour mark.  I did the opening sequence, got to our spaceship, went to the first planet, Rhomu, and now have returned to the spaceship.  I have the main character, Alyssa, her buddy, Chahn, and our tech guy, Dave.

I also did a search of the game’s trophies and found this great guide from PlayStationTrophies.org:

https://www.playstationtrophies.org/game/cosmic-star-heroine-ps4/guide

They really have the best guides.

So all of those missable trophies bum me out as I’m trying to make sure I don’t look at it too much but I also don’t want to miss a trophy either.  Reading the guide’s introduction, I found out there isn’t any post game stuff, so that’s pretty disappointing too.  So everything has to be done before the final battle as there is no free roam.  At least the game tells you to make a backup file so that’s nice.  The game’s hints are very funny and really adds to the overall impression.

The game is roughly 15 hours and that seems to be at the game’s longest.  I’m also not playing on the hardest mode but the second one, which seems to be Normal (Heroine) and I’m liking it.   Hard mode is Super Spy and then there is the hardest mode.

There is a trophy for doing the first fight on the highest difficulty but the game is nice enough to make it so you can change that setting at any time so I went from the highest of four to the second one, which feels like Normal.  There are not any other trophies that involve beating the game on any particular difficulty.

Overall, I’ve been enjoying my short time with the game, I do feel the itch to get back to my other games those games are not going anywhere at the moment.

.  .  .

I feel pretty satisfied with my time with Peggle 2, I got all of the trophies I figure I was going to get.  I attempted some more additional trials but those trophies are an all or nothing situation.  I was hoping to get the trophy of beating a level with more than 12 balls but it is complicated to even get that to work much less at the very beginning of the level.  I can do it in a trial but the game doesn’t count trails or multiplayer.

I have the game so I can go back and play it whenever I would like.  Which I might just make it a game I chill with after a session.  I like how it doesn’t take long at all to load before I can start playing.  Unlike Lego Movie 2 that has a ridiculous (a word I can never spell on my own), that has a two minute loading sequence, you have to press X to continue the game, press X to accept the notification to not turn off the game when you see Unikitty’s face, and all of that lead another two minute loading sequence as we see Emmet falling into whatever level you want.  So before you turn off the game, make sure you are in the world you want to be.  A couple times, we will land and realized we were done and had to jump to another planet and another two minute sequence.  It just adds up and it kills my buzz when I think about starting the game after playing another one.  There is a total of four X presses but I can’t think of what the other two are.  X to continue, maybe another X to confirm the save file (of which is there is only one), Unikitty’s face and not to turn off the system, and maybe just another X to confirm we’ve read the message?

Which, we are on our final planet, the Classic Bricksburg from Movie 1, we just started it.  We got Movie 1 Lucy so we officially have all of the characters.  We just have to get the 25 purple bricks of the world, some are behind quests and others are just floating about.  From there, we have to finish the Syspocalypsestar planet, which should be fun to build 20 buildings and do all of those quests.  I’m curious to see what it all looks like as we’ll be putting the buildings down ourselves so everyone’s Syspoclypsestar should look different.

We’ve just been so busy that we haven’t had a chance to play in a couple nights.

.  .  .

I’m excited to find out what the free games in April 2019 are going to be through the PS Plus!  We’re getting close to the end of the month!

 

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Turtle Soup Show Episode 194

Posted by John Klein III on March 19, 2019
Posted in: Journey's Journey, Podcasts, Websites. Tagged: . Leave a comment

http://turtlesoupshow.com/episode-194-josh-gropin-and-the-black-hole-boys/

Episode 194 of Turtle Soup is immediately one of my favorite episodes of the show!  Not like the previous number of episodes were subpar, but this was just raised to the top so quickly for me!  I’m pretty sure my enjoyment of the episode all comes from Eric and Ryan reviewing proper issues of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Adventures (47 and 48) which it has been a minute since they reviewed issue 45 and 46 back on April 3, 2017!

http://turtlesoupshow.com/episode-149-ninjara-and-dem-demon-ass-darlins/

Took some searching but I found the episode!  Well, that explains that!  Almost two years ago!  They reviewed several specials and miniseries but not the proper series.  Episode 150 is the episode they review Movie III.

I’m such a huge fan of Chris Allan and Stephen Murphy’s (Dean Clarrian) run of Adventures, from issues 23 through 70.  My second favorite run would have to be Gary Carlson and Frank Fosco’s run of Image Comics Ninja Turtles, 1 through 23.  I’m so happy that IDW is reprinting the Image run and going to give the series a proper conclusion.  I want to get those trades once they come out!  The first one is out in August!

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1684050197?pf_rd_p=1cac67ce-697a-47be-b2f5-9ae91aab54f2&pf_rd_r=9V5MAT9SN549H3HTCBF4

I might have to put $30 aside for it!  It comes with the first 13 issues, which I love the concept of that, so the second volume will be the second half of the series and then it will follow up with a cheaper three issue volume (which ideally comes with all of other TMNT Image appearances) and then I can have the entire Image run on my shelf in three books.  I did add all of the TMNT Adventures to my wishlist but that is from Volume 7 to the latest and final Volume 16, so it is all out there now.  They don’t seem overly expensive with 16 being only $14.

So ten volumes, so that adds up pretty quickly!  Maybe next year.

.  .  .

Eric and Ryan cover a lot of topics over the course of the 2 hour and 15 minute episode (and 15 seconds!)

They stopped short their run of Mirage titles as these were the last proper issues of Archie in 1993 so the next few episodes are going to finish the Black Hole Trilogy and a couple other issues.  So I’m super excited!

I can’t stress enough how great being a Patreon supporter for the podcast.

https://www.patreon.com/turtlesoupshow

We just got our rewards too!

Eric really outdid himself this time!

Ryan’s face is a coaster and the other picture is a sweet arse magnet!

One day, I want to be on the ten dollar tier but we just moved into a house and bought a 2017 Suburu Forrester so fun expenses have to be cut back a tad.

They put a callout for all of their correspondents to reach out so I’m hoping typing this article gets me to record a voicemail as there is a story I really want to tell for the show.

The episode is just chock full of side content and quick moments of hilarious comments.

There are references to John Mayer’s Room for Squares and a fun story about how Mayer arranges his concerts which seems very smart for a guy who such a songbook like his.

There is a fun moment where Ryan’s microphone is causing him troubles as they have to pause the show.  I like when Ryan starts trying to explain to those who can’t see him and then he realizes no one besides his co-host gets to see him, which has happen on a few occasions.

Ryan tells this story about Josh Groban that gives the episode its title.  I’ve never tried to pretend to be someone else, even jokingly, to try to get some loving but neither has Ryan but maybe it might be a fun experience.  I kept thinking of how Bryan Johnson of Vulgar, Tell ‘Em Steve Dave, and Comic Book Men fame had a long standing and one sided feud with Josh Groban.  That’s really all I now of Groban.

Ryan makes a fun Spinal Tap reference and modifies it for Cyclops, who gets no sex or drugs, though Cyclops has rarely had trouble getting sex.

I like how Ryan was thinking of Juggernaut’s origin but got it confused with the Summers boys but Eric got that sorted out and even remembered Vulcan!

Great email question about appreciating the Turtles in a different light than when they started the show so many years ago.  That’s how I feel about my love for Leonardo as I always go for the leader types but the Image run really put Raphael in the front seat for me.  That run such a great ride!

Eric’s birthday was coming up (it has since passed) and besides milestone years, birthdays are just not the same thing once you are in your 30s.

Eric first brings up the topic of wet t-shirt contests but the episode ends on a killer discussion about it.  I’ve never attended one and it just seemed like a thing movies did but I want to say I barely remember it from any movies.  Like it was a concept that I heard about, got a mental picture of, and that’s been good enough.

Then they finally get to reviewing issue 47 and Ryan butchers inker John D’Agostino and he apologizes for being a dumb English speaker and then has to correct himself again as he’s a dumb American speaker.  The episode is just full of quick asides like that that really punch up the episode with comedy.

That quickly gets a brief mention how they are alright but not alt right that made me laugh harder than I was expecting.  By then, I was lock in on the show and was already thinking of relistening to it (which I rarely do with any podcast these days) and if I was going to relisten to it, I’ll write a long article about my adventures back into the episode.

There is a panel in 47 where it looks like cops are fighting straight at Sarnath’s butt.  Now that we have moved into a proper house, I have my comic book question within arm’s reach but the closet has boxes in front of it so for the time being, they are still denied to me.  I want to be able to start following along as I wasn’t able to really do that with Uncanny X-Cast but I can do that with the turtles.

There is a camera man name Squint in the issue that Ryan glosses as Squint-antino, which is almost as funny as Eric’s Don’t Peek-at-choo joke from earlier in the show’s run.

The color choice to make Sarnath so black that he’s blue like Clark Kent’s hair, which was a real thing back in the 90s!

I love whenever the guys can work in “Did you say Clang?”  It is up there with whenever they reference “that’s what they told me/her/us,” “Movie III,” and “that’s a little too Raph” which that final one gets played with a bit this episode too.

Master Splinter comes off a little high or relaxed this issue with how all he can muster to what he’s witnessing is an “interesting” and later, an “indeed.”  Which transitions into a story of Ryan seeing a possum that if he was high, would have freaked him out as it looked like a skull coming at him.  I should write that Ryan reviews 47 and Eric gets 48, so the first hour is heavy on Ryan’s point of view but Eric peppers the show with comments too that are equally funny.

They even reference the Oans from Green Lantern comics.

Fun exchange and tribute about how Murphy goes all the way back to issue one, which adapted the Eyes of Sarnath episode into the comic’s first three issues to tell this latest adventure.  Which is pretty great that he did that.  Adventures was really great at keeping track of its own continuity.  I like those first 22 issues of the series, but it didn’t get legendary status until Allan shows up for 23.

I like how they talk about how Sarnath has two missing eyes but has his third eye but he is still blind so stating he has one of his three eyes implies he has a third of his vision but he is still at zero vision.

A tad dark exchange occurs about fathers blinding children and at least those kids had a dad that shouldn’t have made me laugh but it did.

April tries to warn the Turtles about the cameras but Mikey keeps repeating that he’s a ninja.

Some fun discussion about how, without his bandana and elbow and knew pads, how naked and odd lucky Raphael looks.

What was Raphael going to ask Ninjara?  I don’t think he was going to propose marriage but maybe just to say his first “I love you” to her or to try to put a label on what they are doing.

At roughly the hour and twenty three minute mark, we start reviewing issue 48!

Ninjara looks foxy, all day!

The above is the page they discuss how it is more words than art, which reminds them of a Bendis layout.  Donatello really does know a lot about black holes.

Ryan explains what it means when we see oxygen masks in fighter jets, it means there is no life support systems.  Like in Star Wars, with Tie fighters and x-wings, those ships don’t have force fields either, so the pilot fights harder in battle.  They also can’t warp out of a fight either.

Some discussion about which side of the vehicle should the gas tank be on.  I like it when it is on the driver’s side, so I just get out and start pumping instead of having to walk around the vehicle.

The guys really brought the comic book references in this episode as Eric was describing what aliens look like, he mentions Jim Lee’s X-Men and Dark Horse’s Concrete, which I hadn’t thought about Concrete in years!

Eric and Ryan’s love for Stump and Stick and Cudley the Cowlick always comes through whenever those characters show up.

I’m not sure to address them as “Eric and Ryan” or “Ryan and Eric,” I’ve been trying to track how others do it in voicemails and emails but I think most people simply go with “guys” or “Turtle Soup Boys” or names like that.  It made sense with Rob and Brian of Uncanny X-Cast fame as it was the one syllable name followed by the two syllable name so I try to follow that with Eric and Ryan.  Either way sounds fine though.

Both issues have a Mutanimals back up, issue 48’s features a new brand of mercenaries.  One of them has the Punisher skull not on his shirt but on his dick.  The 90s were an interesting time.

The episode starts to wrap up around the 1:53 mark with twenty more minutes of bonus content left.

The guys discuss Kevin Eastman’s latest project, Drawing Blood and Ragdolls.

https://www.newsarama.com/44114-kevin-eastman-studios-may-2019-solicitations.html

One comic is an fictional autobiographical story of a guy who earned success with a giant juggernaut of a hit franchise in the 80s and decades later, trying to create a new passion project.  The other comic is about the actual giant juggernaut of a hit franchise, which is super meta.  Which I like the idea of how he must have came up with the parody of his life comic, started having to draw images from the fictional comic, then realized he might as well just completely draw the fictional comic as well.

Ryan’s friend Jonathan posted on Facebook how he was inspired by Eastman’s project to create a side podcast where he reviews episodes of Turtle Soup.  Which I had that exact idea to create The Uncanny X-Cast Legacy podcast where I review each episode of Uncanny X-Cast, and I actually started some work on the first episode but then I realized how silly that would have been but I still think about it from time to time.

After the sweet new song, we get into more about wet t-shirt contests.  Growing up in hot Yuma, Arizona, I’m surprised wet t-shirt contests were not a thing but I can see why those were not a thing post-2000.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wet_T-shirt_contest

Above is the page that they were reading off from.

Which I completely get the notion of reading a Wikipedia page and rabbit holing down and across so many different pages.

One such rabbit hole I went down was for Cetacean Stranding :

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cetacean_stranding

Which is crazy how often it happens.  I thought it was more of a once a year thing but it seems to be happening all of the time and not just one rogue whale but entire pods of whales.

Which led me to the concept of Whale Fall :

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whale_fall

As I had never really given much thought to what happens to dead whales.  They have so much oxygen in their lungs that by the time their carcass hits the ocean floor, entirely new ecosystems can be created!

Pretty much, I’m a big nerd for ocean life as our oceans are as unexplored as space!  We just can’t get to so many locales still and so we’re still discovering things about our own billions year old planet, which is both impressive and frightening.  What is out there!

I forget what reddit page I was on that introduced me to the concept of Danvers State Hospital :

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Danvers_State_Hospital

Which is a real mental institute that inspired Batman’s Arkham Asylum.

Danvers State Hospital was build according to the Kirkbride Plan :

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kirkbride_Plan

Which actually had batwing inspired style floor plans that sprawled outward from the center.  Which seems super smart as people associate bats with mental stability.  Which I’m sure was super fine until Batman came along.

There are still some of these institutions that are in used today.

So yeah, these were all of the thoughts I had based off of Episode 194 of Turtle Soup!

I did leave a voicemail so we’ll see if we make it to Episode 195, I’ll let you know if I do.

Peggle 2 : Magical Masters Edition

Posted by John Klein III on March 17, 2019
Posted in: Games. Tagged: , , . Leave a comment

My phone notified me that psprices.com was trying to get my attention.  Which I’m glad it did!

Amongst the 46 games I had on my wishlist, Peggle 2 was on sale from $14.99 down to $2.99, and I had to buy it!  Especially as it was the Master Edition, that comes with two additional DLC sets.

My beautiful wife and I were addicted to Peggle 2 on our phones and I beat it completely and I was looking forward to one day owning it one day on the PS4.  I downloaded it and then lost two quick hours as I just kept playing the levels and doing the trials.  These are different Masters than I remembered from the phone app, so it feels like a brand new experience.

I’m obsess with aiming for purple pegs and then for orange pegs.  Purple are bonus point pegs and orange pegs are the ultimate goal in the game.  If you hit a green peg, then that makes it so you can use the Masters’ abilities.

Peggle 2 is one of those games where I just want to do “just one more” and then I end up having done six more.  A hard game to put down.

On the PS4, there are objectives that each puzzle offers, one is always to hit all of the pegs, one is usually score x amount, and the third is specific to that puzzle.  So I always aim to get rid of all of the pegs but I’ve read that you can replay puzzles to just get the objectives you miss on the way back, it isn’t like you have to do all three at once.

Thanks to YouTuber Orofin PlayStation for hosting the above video!

I’m currently on Luna, the Zombie’s group of puzzles.

I probably won’t get the platinum as some of those trials are pretty hard but I’ll definitely be playing the game for quite some time.  Sorry other games!

Peggle 2 is super relax but also super addicting.  I also have a hard time finding the purple pegs and have to move closer to the screen but after the first few times, I stopped doing that and just play the game.  I really should change my tactics so I aim for the green pegs to unlock the powers earlier in the level to get higher scores but I like using them to clean up the orange pegs instead.  That’s what my second lap through the levels would be.

Getting all of the pegs was one of those things I tried to do on my own through the phone app as I want to say the game puts a star or some other signifier that all the pegs were eliminated.  But it will be nice to keep track of that in the PS4 version of it.

I do like how the game has multiplayer but no multiplayer trophies, so that’s a relieve!

I need to get into a habit of checking psprices.com every Wednesday and seeing what is on sale but being mindful of waiting until the afternoon of the last Wednesday of the month so I don’t buy a game that is free for the next month.  Though most of my games are either brand new or were already free through PS Plus, and they haven’t made the same game free twice yet.  I also have to make sure I always have more than $20 in my PlayStation wallet as one day, I will buy the Arkham Knight Season Pass, I’m just not sure when that day will come.  Maybe after completing Spider-Man and Beyond : Two Souls?

.  .  .

I was also tempted just to grab Ms. Pac-Man as it always sits at $3.99, but it once went as low as $1.99 but maybe I’ll snatch it next week as I’m willing to buy any game that is under five dollars, even the Vita games that I will probably never play but I want that peace of mind.

Referring to peace of mind, I kept regretting not downloading all of the free games through the PlayStation Plus service and I finally shared that regret on reddit and a nice redditor, dre702, asked if I had kept my subscription service during those years.  Which, of course, I hadn’t, so I didn’t miss out on any of those games and I wouldn’t have kept paying $60 for a service I most likely never would have taken advantage of, but if I did, I would have had so many free games!  But at least I’m no longer haunted by that thought.  I also may never had a proper PS Plus membership until the PS4, but was given free games off and on like after the network went down those horrible 23 days in April and May of 2011.

.  .  .

In other gaming news, we finally got the Statue of Liberty unlocked again in Lego Movie 2!  We also cleared everything in the Sorting world and now we’re on the Ceremony world.  But I bought Peggle 2 and was a real jerk (not really) about not playing Lego Movie 2 that night.  Walker Dennis was sick and when we’re sick, no games for us.  Dems the rules.

After that, we tackle those bonus worlds, which have half of the number of quests and hidden purple bricks, so that shouldn’t take too long.  Then we have to take on the Syspocalypstar planet and build those 20 shops and then complete those 20 quests and that’ll probably be our final trophy unless something unexpected happens.

https://happythumbsgaming.com/2019/03/lego-movie-2-the-video-game-trophy-achievement-guide/

I was on a daily search for a Lego Movie 2 Trophy Guide and Happy Thumbs Gaming was the first to release it, as far as I could get.  The boss fights were all hidden trophies and there was one other hidden one involving gold that we got the night before I found a guide.

We’re eagerly anticipating the Lego Marvel Trilogy, I just have to find a spare $60, so we won’t get it when it is brand new but we’ll eventually get it.  I’ve been using it as an excuse not to buy expensive (like $20 and more) Lego sets, which Walker seems to be understanding well enough.

.  .  .

I keep thinking of the games I still have out there that I want to finish or complete more on such as Heavy Rain (I started a second playthrough), complete my first playthrough of Beyond : Two Souls, finish Ultimate New Game Plus on Spider-Man PS4, and complete Batman : The Enemy Within, I’m on the second episode of that.  I also redownloaded Black Ops III, so I want to at least give that game another twenty minutes to see if I can get pass the first level of the single player campaign.

Comixology Free Comics 3-13-2019

Posted by John Klein III on March 15, 2019
Posted in: Free Comics. Tagged: , , , , . Leave a comment

https://www.comixology.com/free-comics

Comixology has three new comics to enjoy for free this week!

Spider-Man / Deadpool (2016 – ) # 1
X-Men : Age of Apocalypse # 1
X-Men (2004 – 2007) # 188

A savings of $5.97!

I heard good things about the Spider-Man / Deadpool comic, mostly two funny characters being funny.

I didn’t review the first issue of Age of Apocalypse but I did review issues three and four of the series.

https://shadowandflamewithmagik.com/2016/05/29/x-men-age-of-apocalypse-volume-one-issue-3/

https://shadowandflamewithmagik.com/2016/05/31/x-men-age-of-apocalypse-volume-one-issue-4/

Now that my comics are in the same building I live in, I’m super tempted to get back into reviewing comics again, I even found my scanner but I’m not sure it still works.  I do miss comics, especially new ones but I’ve been so out of the game that I’m not sure if I’ve been out for too long.  Comic Book Queers Legacy still gets me hyped for current X-Men comics so I know Marvel is still producing quality there but it has been so many years that it’ll take a lot to catch up.  But maybe I’ll just not catch up and just review old comics.  Something to think about at least.

X-Men 188, I reviewed the heck out of!

https://shadowandflamewithmagik.com/2014/11/10/x-men-volume-one-188/

I loved the Mike Carey / Chris Bachalo run so much!  Such a great run and amazing creative team!

 

 

Playing the March 2019 Free PS Plus Games

Posted by John Klein III on March 11, 2019
Posted in: Fun With YouTube, Games. Tagged: , , , , . Leave a comment

I’ve given Call of Duty : Modern Warfare Remastered and The Witness a try.  I enjoyed MWR more than I did The Witness but I may not have given The Witness its fair due.  I got three puzzles in (and did the Easter egg was connecting the Sun and the gate) but then I was lost on what direction to follow.  Which I’m glad I never paid for The Witness, but if I had paid for it, I probably be attempting to finish it still and get my monies worth.

What I liked about the first three missions of MWR was how I didn’t need to be the star of the squad, others could do the harder work and the grand standing and I was super happy with being support.  Until someone told me to do something, then I was more than happy to do my part.  I wanted to redownload Black Ops III and see if I can take a back seat to the action in that game.  I can’t remember if I had a squad or not in that game.

I got to the Charlie Don’t Surf mission, and got inside the big office building and just got bombarded by enemy fire.  I tried several different strategies but done of them work.  I was hiding in back rooms for cover and then I tried to rush the waypoint to trigger the checkpoint, and I tried several times to take it slow but I’m clearly not meant for First Person Shooters.  I might still try Black Ops III again, it won’t hurt to download it again.  I didn’t get that far my first time around.  It was still clearly the first mission and a giant corridor of sorts but I was trying to rush it and shooting away but I need to slow down and see if I can get into a supporting role for the squad.

So not bad for two free games, but I’m not smart enough (or not patient enough) for The Witness and I clearly am not good at FPS.  But I had fun, and that’s what matters.

.  .  .

Walker Dennis and I have become super addicted to Lego Movie 2 The Game.  We beat the main storyline, which didn’t take us too long.  We figured out how to open relics so he went on a real tear unlocking items, characters, and equipment.  He’s mostly after characters.  He had the Status of Liberty unlocked but then the game went wonky and I had to download the previous night’s game file and overrode his brief progress when he was in Harmony Town.  He had unlocked enough items to earn the trophy for unlocking 100 items and he had a slew of characters.  At first, he seemed like he was fine that the three missions he unlocked had to be redone and he seemed like he was fine that we had to unlock the characters again.  Until he noticed the Statue was missing.  I hadn’t seen it so I wasn’t sure which statue it could have been but then I bought him Emmet’s Thricycle Set.

He started pointing to the Statue of Liberty and that’s when I realized which statue he was talking about this entire time.  As a patriot, I feel pretty lousy that I lost him the Statue of Liberty and we still haven’t unlocked her a second time but that’s the only character he really wants.  Which I get wanting to reclaim lost progress but it is completely random.  At least when we unlock items, if it is a duplicate, we get a piece of gold and if you unlock five pieces, you get a super gold relic that guarantees a new item, character, and piece of equipment.

By buying that set, Walker Dennis now has four Emmets, three of whom are from Lego Movie 2 and one is from Lego Dimensions, essentially from the first movie.

Originally, I wanted to get him the Introduction Queen Watevra Wa’Nabi Lego set from the second movie as he at one point, really wanted the banana guy, Banarnar but Walker wanted a $15 set over the $20 set, so I was fine with that.  Maybe after payday, I’ll get him the second set.  One gets a lot of value out of the above, as you get Queen Watevra Wa’Nabi in her horse form and extra pieces for her block form, plus a Lucy and Sweet Mayhem and that misdirection princess character. 

We also have our eyes on the Ultrakatty & Warrior Lucy set, but that one is $30 (I had originally thought it was also $20) but that might be some time from now.  It comes with yet another Emmet so that kills my buzz but Walker loves creating Ultrakatty in the game as his preferred vechile and I think it’ll be nice for him to have it in real life.  If he got all of the sets, he would have three Lucys in total (one from the Lego Dimensions starter pack).  Which feels like too much.

At one point, we had our hands on a Spider-Man Scorpion set but the idea of him having three Spider-Mans killed my buzz too.  It was only $20 and Walker was being a tad naughty at Target, so that just added to reasons for not buying it.  I do like the idea of a Lego Scorpion though.  We had also just saw that episode of the 90s cartoon that introduced Scorpion to that series.

Thanks to YouTuber Hien Biggerstaff for hosting the series!  He’s missing episode nine we’ve been enjoying watching the series this way as part of our bedtime routine.  Episode nine is the third part of the Alien Costume trilogy but it seems to be scrubbed from YouTube, which I get, I suppose.

I got pretty used to hearing the voices in a higher pitch and with that weird border.  It didn’t take long.  We just finished Part One of Hobgoblin which Walker knows The Green Goblin so that has been weird for him to see an Orange Green Goblin (which I tried to get him to at least think of him as simply The Orange Goblin but he wasn’t having it).

Which reminded me of the time I called it the Twelve Person Sinister Six in Mark Millar and the Dodsons’ Marvel Knights Spider-Man storyline from 2003.

I’ve been trying not to play Lego Movie 2 without Walker but once we beat the game, I figure it was fine for me to go back to some of the planets to get all of the purple master pieces as those are trophy goals.  I have all of them in Apoclypseburg and Asteroid Field with Systarian Jungle being our next goal.  He helps when we go back but then I just finish it up as it does get a tad boring searching for floating purple bricks and doing the quests.  Well, the quests are boring but searching for the searching ones can be a bit of a grind.  So over the past two nights, we do the quests and then I go back to clean up the rest.  But if he doesn’t play initially then I don’t do it so I won’t attempt Jungle until he is able to play with him.  Which we rarely play on school nights so it might have to wait until the weekend again.

.  .  .

In the meantime, as it doesn’t take too long to get those bricks, I have finally started playing Batman : The Enemy Within!  Which I have been really enjoying.  Mostly, I play Lego Movie 2 and then if it isn’t 11pm yet, I’ll try to play TellTale’s second (and last) Batman game.  Once it gets to a save point, I check the time and keep playing until the next save point.  It isn’t easy being a responsible adult gamer.

I was initially going to try to ship Bruce with Lucius Fox’s daughter, Tiffany.  But I missed a chance to lie to the Wayne CEO lady after I wanted to make sure Bruce lied to everyone when it was an option, but then I missed that one and then missed a crucial one later with Tiffany that forever broke their relationship.  Then I ran into “John Doe” in the back of the room and I’m still not sure if I want to make John Doe an ally or set him up for his villainous future.  The game already took Lucius in a different path than I was expecting.

I do so love that it carried all of my decisions from the first game over, as there are several reminders of the routes I took already during the first season.  I really want more Riddler too!  I’m sure the game strikes a good balance between Riddler, John Doe, and whatever else the plot requires as I’m sure there will be subplots and more Bruce time as well as more Batman time.  We have four full episodes left to see how it all unfolds.

March 2019 Free PS Plus Games

Posted by John Klein III on March 4, 2019
Posted in: Fun With YouTube, Games. Tagged: , , , , . Leave a comment

With the free games only being PS4 games, it is going to be much easier to sample these games!

Thanks to redditor, Po_TatoThe3rd for making the official announcement on reddit

Call of Duty: Modern Warfare Remastered and The Witness are your PlayStation Plus games for March from PS4

We are getting Call of Duty : Modern Warfare Remastered and The Witness as the free games in March!

They gave us Call of Duty : Black Ops III for free back in June 2018.  I tried to play it, I’m not much of a First Person Shooter.  Whenever I tried, Walker Dennis really wanted to try as well.  We were equally as good but I just didn’t get a hang of it and haven’t gone back to try it.

I’ll definitely be trying these two games as I’m committed to the idea of downloading and playing them.

I’ve been sold on The Witness since PlayStation Access has gone on about it for so long, and I’m all for an open world puzzle game.

Typing of PlayStation Access, here is their breakdown of the free games :

They got Rob to host the video!

Seeing footage from Modern Warfare, reminds me that they have covered it in a few videos so I know at least a few things that happen in the game but that’s okay.  I’m way late on every PS Plus free game.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Call_of_Duty:_Modern_Warfare_Remastered

The remastered was released on November 4, 2016 and the original was released on November 5, 2007 on PS3.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Witness_(2016_video_game)

The Witness was released on January 26, 2016.

Here is PlayStation Grenade’s video of the two games :

With only two games, it is probably easier and quicker to make these videos.

Here is Platinum Chasers’ video :

Call of Duty : Modern Warfare Remastered is a 5/10 Difficulty and takes around 15 – 20 hours, and no multiplayer trophies, so that’s great!  He mentions a veterans mode, which would be the highest difficulty so I’m mostly likely out of the platinum but I’ll be surprised if I can even get three trophies.

The Witness is a 6/10 Difficulty and takes 15+ hours.

Apparently going forward, new Call of Duty games are going to be multiplayer exclusive so I won’t be getting any of those, unless they are free.

.  .  .

I deleted For Honor as I could not get pass Gudmundr, the level’s boss in Knight Chapter Six.  I looked for tips and all of the tips were regarding the second and third stage of the fight and I barely hit him in the first stage.  I tried to skip to Vikings but the game wouldn’t let me.  So that’s that for the February games.  I was tempted to give Hitman Season One a proper chance but the month is over and I got way into Spider-Man again.

I just got to the beginning of Act Three.  Took a minute for the first mission to start but everybody has escaped the Raft and I’m heading towards the police station now.  Silver Sable’s crew have made me priority target number one.  Which was weird when I had to go through Central Park during Act Two and seeing where their base was prior to it becoming a base.  I have all of the bases to do, besides the one Kingpin base I had to do for the story.  So I have to look at the map and see how much fun that is.  I’ve been waiting for Act Three to see what it is like with all of the criminal element still being an option.

I’ve also only completed one Research Lab and that’s all I’m planning on doing unless Walker Dennis wants to see me do another one, or he starts one that I have to finish.  He wants to see and play as Miles so those are good stopping breaks for me when I’m playing at night.  I haven’t come across one in a while.

I keep meaning to play Batman : Enemy Within but I got side tracked by Spider-Man but I really want to play it as I bought it.  It has been a full month and I didn’t even start it.  I want to finish a chapter whenever I play it and those are usually two hours but I should try to do at least an hour but I don’t want to rush through it either.

.  .  .

Someone on reddit posted a link to psprices.com and it took a while but I put all 47 games I want on there to see when is the best time to buy them.  Well, 46 games as come March 5, I’ll have The Witness.  I can’t believe that even some $40 games go as low as $14.99 so if I see a game under five, I should just buy it.

Currently, Burnout Paradise Remastered is $5.99 as is Brothers : A Tale of Two Sons, and that’s as cheap as those get.  But I know I won’t be getting to either of those games anytime soon so that gives me pause.  Ms. Pac-Man is $3.99 but it has gone down to $1.99 in the past so I’ll wait for that too.  I love the game but I do worry that I’ll be no good at it on the PS4, for whatever dumb reason my brain has made up to stop me from purchasing it.  Squares for the VITA is only $4.99 and I do want to get those VITA games I foolishly didn’t download one of these days but buying a game I can never play for five dollars, seems a bit much.  Plus, once I buy one of those, I really have to consider buying the rest.  These mind games of mine!

I also knew the new free games were going to be announce so I wasn’t really being tempted by anything at GameStop but now I know the March games, I can better prepare.  I want to buy games but I’m stopping myself at price points and recognizing I don’t have time but once day, I will have the time.  Anyone else have these problems?

Maybe if I treated myself to another $20 PlayStation Card, I’ll feel more comfortable making a decision.  I have $30 in my PlayStation wallet and $30 in a GameStop gift card but I can’t commit to buying something.  What I want to do is use the GameStop card to pay for half of the LEGO Marvel Collection (Avengers and Marvel Superheroes 1 & 2) which comes out mid-March, as that game is $60 but comes with all of the season passes, so there is high value there.  Especially as I was tempted by the $65 version of LEGO Marvel Superheroes 2 that game with all of the season pass content, so this is like getting two free games and all of their content for the price of one!

BUT!  We bought Walker Dennis the LEGO Movie 2 game and we don’t really need two active LEGO games.  Maybe once we complete that game, the Marvel Trilogy game would have gone down ten dollars and I can justify it then.

https://www.gamestop.com/collection/gamestop-sale

GameStop is doing their Tax Refund sale right now and I wanted to be tempted to buy two shirts (a matching large and small shirt for Walker and me) but I couldn’t get excited for the two PlayStation shirts they had at the moment.  But buy one and one half off is a good deal.  Buy one Pop Vinyl character and get one half off was also a good deal but we couldn’t find two (or one) that we wanted.  We are excited about the forthcoming Ghostbusters characters.

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07NSPLJPJ/ref=ox_sc_saved_title_2?smid=ATVPDKIKX0DER&psc=1

Amazon states the Firehouse and Peter will be $30 and that seems pretty reasonable.  I just want to see how big it is.

 

Free Comixology Comics – February 26, 2019

Posted by John Klein III on February 27, 2019
Posted in: Websites. Tagged: . Leave a comment

https://www.comixology.com/free-comics

Comixology added four new comics to their Free Comics section!

Howard the Duck (1976 – 1979) # 1
Avengers Icons : Tigra # 1
Hit-Monkey # 1 (of 3)
Super-Villain Team-Up / MODOK’s 11 # 1 (of 5)

A value of $7.95!

I really wish they would include the Free Comic Book Day comics, maybe not on May 4th (be with you) but like a month later, for those who don’t have a local comic shop or an event near them.  I plan on taking Walker Dennis to Great Falls to Kelly’s Komix.

https://www.facebook.com/KellysKomix/

We usually end up there weeks later and they are still handing out free comics so I’m hoping we can get there on the day and enjoy the event like we should.  There’s no place in Helena that hosts an event now that Hastings is gone.  I was hoping the library or White Knight, the game store in town, would host an event but they don’t.  I believe the Lewis and Clark Library at least tries to showcase their comic book section on the day but that’s about it.

Great falls is a three hours round trip so we’ll probably hit the mall and see what else is happening that day.  The roads should be better by then.

I just checked Lockheed’s chronology :

http://comicbookdb.com/character_chron.php?ID=1888

Apparently Marvel just released The Merry X-Men Holiday Special so I’ll look for that while I’m there.  Well, cover dated February 2019, so it probably (and hopefully) came out in December.

I also checked Ultimate Kitty Pryde’s chronological list :

http://comicbookdb.com/character_chron.php?ID=3155

She hasn’t appeared since Ultimate End 5.  I thought there was a chance she’ll get a mention in a Miles Morales comic as they were teammates in the All New Ultimates.

.  .  .

The theme of these free comics (I’m not sure if there always is a theme) is related to Hulu’s recently announced new show :

https://www.flickeringmyth.com/2019/02/official-synopses-for-marvels-howard-the-duck-hit-monkey-m-o-d-o-k-tigra-and-dazzler-show-and-the-offenders/

That’s right, Dazzler is coming to animation again!  She’s joining Howard the Duck, Tigra, Hit-Monkey and MODOK!  They are the Offenders!  I’ll probably the show a proper chance.

February 2019 Free PlayStation Plus Games

Posted by John Klein III on February 19, 2019
Posted in: Fun With YouTube, Games, Songs. Tagged: , , , , , , , . Leave a comment

So of the four free games I could access on the PS4 for February 2019, I have to say the one I really gotten into is For Honor.

Gunhouse was fun, I’m not sure if I really got into the mechanics of it.  I’m sure if I kept updating the weapons, I’ll eventually get better at it.  The art style was pretty fun and the game was overall entertaining.  I just kept thinking of playing Rogue Aces.

So then I started playing Rogue Aces and the training modules were fun but then came the tutorial for bombing a city and I was doing decently with that.  The hardest part was getting back to my base to reload.  I was getting the hang of it but it was a bit more work than I was willing to do at that time.

I did all of the work to start Hitman First Season, I downloaded all of the episodes.  I went to the demo for Hitman 2 and made sure I had the legacy pack downloaded over there.  I went back to the Complete First Season and did the initial story segment (like three minutes) and then I saw the yacht.  It looked like more of a time committed than I was willing to give on that day.

Which brings me to For Honor.  I did all of the work to make sure I was a member of the Ubisoft Club, which thankfully was one of my six passwords so I didn’t need to click “forgot password” or anything like that.  I saw in the club that I could download something for free if I had Steep so then I downloaded that game and was confused by I still couldn’t download the item.  So I had to actually play the game and access the club through Steep.  I was only slightly disappointed that there wasn’t a free item in Steep for owning For Honor.  Steep was a free game in January that I never got around to attempting.

Walker Dennis was a pretty big fan of Steep, he mostly liked seeing the guy fall down.  But he also enjoyed snowboarding and hang gliding too but the falling down was pretty rewarding.  I need to go back and attempt some of the easier Steep runs.  I got Silver in a few and Bronze in a few more but then I went back to For Honor.

For Honor has been a lot of fun!  I’m glad the fighting mechanism wasn’t as crushing as people said it was.  Or they commented that once you got it, you got it but I’m not sure how anyone would not get it but then again, I didn’t get either Rogue Aces or Gunhouse.

I’ve been doing the Single Player Knight storyline, I have Chapter Six of Six left.  Then I’ll do Viking and Samurai after that.  I’ve been playing on Normal and having a fun time.  I’m not finding all of the Observations or the Breakables, but I do want to make a point and get all of the Observables, as I like learning the story.  I haven’t bought anything with silver, but I know one of the trophies is to buy all four heroes in a class, so I will do that.  I was tempted just to burn through it with the Knights but I figure I’ll see which of the three classes I like the best.

With real money, I did buy For Honor Dynamic Theme 1, for $2.99.  I was just looking forward to my next game session and that’s when I realized I was going to be committing to For Honor for a while and I’m now trying to match my themes with my main game.  There was two of them, but I didn’t like the second one that was portraying a giant battle of the three classes.  I preferred the simple image above with one from each class.

I turned it to Easy for Walker Dennis to try it as he wasn’t thrilled with Spider-Man’s theme being gone.  Either the game wasn’t as bloody as I remembered or they turn it way down.  That or he was only hitting them with the light attack and not the heavy attack but he was doing pretty well.  Then I got uncomfortable with him playing it and had him stop after two or three minutes.

We’re in the course of moving so I hadn’t had much time to play but For Honor has been a fun game and I’ll probably keep playing it until I’ve gotten through all of the story missions.  I think, if my skills carry over to Hard, I’ll attempt Hard but I haven’t really mastered parrying yet, it feels like I do parry but I also miss sometimes too but maybe by the time I have another six chapters in with Vikings, I’ll have it down to a sweet science.

.  .  .

This past weekend, we took Walker Dennis and his cousin to see Lego Movie 2 and we all had a pretty great time.  I keep having the Queen Watevra Wa’Nabi “Not Evil” song stuck in my head.

Thanks to YouTuber Chuyperron 25 for hosting the video.

My beautiful wife keeps getting the Everything’s Not Awesome song stuck in her head.

Thanks to YouTuber ToyBox 23 for hosting the video.

The third song that I really enjoyed was Gotham City Guys.

Thanks to YouTuber aranha verso for hosting the video.

Ironically, Catchy Song was not all that catchy for me.

During the film, there were times when I was thinking about the upcoming game and how would we even “play” the movie as there is a few action sequences but not that many.

We did buy the full game so I’m just waiting for Tuesday,February 26 to come out and then we have to wait for the Easter Bunny to give the game to Walker.  We did catch a playthrough of the first level and the game does look fun.

Thanks to Gamer’s Little Playground for hosting the video.

It is a more complicated game than Lego Dimensions but it also seems like instead of having characters with abilities, we’re just making items that do those abilities.

I keep thinking about how I don’t feel like I myself am ready to move onto a new Lego game as I feel like I still have Lego Dimensions goals.  So also for Easter, I want to get him the Fantastic Beasts story level, as that’s the last story pack he’s missing and I like the idea of owning all four of the portal variants.  Then I want to get him the Beetlejuice fun pack as I still regret not buying it at Walmart that time I could easily have bought it.

So funny how Walker kept talking about Lego Dimensions during the film.  During the Gotham City Guys song, Beetlejuice showed up and Walker couldn’t help himself but comment on it.  He was just so excited during the film.  We are definitely buying that film when it comes out.  It will definitely benefit from a second viewing as there are so many references that it is hard to notice them all in one viewing.  Also, the story itself needs to be watched again knowing what we know at the end.

Walker’s favorite scene was the one when we learned Rex Dangervest’s proper backstory.  Massive Spoilers when you click the video.

Thanks to NATE 28 MeMz for hosting the above video.

But his favorite moment was seeing the Back to the Future DeLorean and the TARDIS.  He was so excited that I missed the Terminator reference and the Hot Tub Time Machine reference.  At least I got to see Bill and Ted’s Phone Booth.  I looked for the above video myself but then I noticed the sequence in another video Walker was watching and that boy knows how to find videos on YouTube.

There was no direct references to Dimensions, which I figured there wasn’t going to be but characters from the game show up in the movie like Gandalf.  They do quickly address the Lego Batman Movie in an exchange and we’re back to the film.

.  .  .

I also committed to not playing Spider-Man on the PS4 during our move.  Walker got into the spirit of things and agreed to pack up his Legos, including his Lego Dimensions figures and bases.  We kept the game out and the box is accessible but he seems committed at this point.

But Walker has really gotten into Spider-Man these past few weeks.  I did buy him that Carnage Lego Set so now he has a Lego Miles Morales.  I also bought him the Titans Heroes Miles.

Now I’ve been regretting not treating myself to the Titan Heroes Scarlet Spider but if I come across one, I’ll snatch it up now.

We’ve been wanting to rewatch Spider-Verse for a while now.  We’ve been getting by on watching Sunflower by Post Malone and Swae Lee.

Thanks to Post Malone hosting his own video.

Then we added “What’s Up Danger” by Blackway and Black Caviar, to our playlist too.

Thanks to Viral MEDIA for hosting the above video.

Now Walker goes around saying “Hello Danger” all of the time, no matter how many times I correct him about the actual song title.

So he wanted to play Spider-Man PS4 and I didn’t have a problem with that.  I had forgotten that we left Spider-Man in his underwear so we laughed about that and then Walker changed the suit to the Infinity War suit.

Sort of nice that we live in this age where I can did a search for “Spider-Man only scenes in Infinity War” and get a supercut of just that.

Thanks to YouTuber Something Something for hosting that video.

Walker was happy to not have to sit through a two hour movie for seven minutes of footage.

I can’t believe Lego Movie 2 was nearly a two hour film, but Walker had a great time and never got fussy.  Unlike Aquaman that had him either restless or bored during portions of it in the middle of the second act.  He’s excited for the next Spider-Man movie, as I told him we’re getting two this year, Avengers Endgame and Spider-Man : Far From Home.

Thanks to TomScott1703 for hosting a video of all of Spider-Man’s scenes from Civil War.  I wished I thought of that two weeks ago when Walker was bored through so much of Civil War just waiting for Spider-Man to show up.  But once he does, he’s in that movie for a fair bit.

He didn’t want seem to want to watch Homecoming but did watch Amazing Spider-Man 2 and was with it for most of the time.  I’m hoping to get the Toby Maguirefilms for Easter as Amazon has the trilogy on BluRay for $30, and it comes with digital codes!

https://www.amazon.com/Spider-Man-Trilogy-Limited-Collection-Blu-ray/dp/B06XZ588HB/ref=sr_1_2?keywords=spider-man+trilogy+bluray&qid=1550611914&s=gateway&sr=8-2

The first Garfield movie is also only ten dollars on Amazon, both BluRay and with digital code

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B008QZ5PY2/ref=ox_sc_act_title_2?smid=ATVPDKIKX0DER&psc=1

So it’ll be nice to get both of those and be caught up on our Spider-Man collection.  If not, I’ll probably buy it some time later as after Easter, it is safe for me to buy myself inexpensive items until November.

I’ve been thinking of Easter a bunch lately.  My wife just wants the second Fantastic Beasts film on BluRay, Crimes of Grindelwald, as she missed out on watching it when it was in theaters.  Plus, she has the first one and I think it’ll be cute to get her that one while Walker gets Fantastic Beasts for Lego Dimensions.  It will be a theme Easter of Fantastic Beasts and Spider-Man and Legos.  I’m sure we can find eggs of all three of those.

.  .  .

Walker was just swinging around on my New Game Plus file and noticed backpacks on the map.

Thanks to Sick Critic for hosting the above image.

I’m not sure what made him want to find them all, maybe as he has his own backpack and can relate to Spider-Man on that level but he wanted to get catch them all.

He has a Hot Wheels backpack but I can see us buying him a Spider-Man one for Kindergarten.  It is odd that a poor high school and then college student could afford to buy 55 backpacks but we just have to go with that.

In 30 minutes, I had found 27 out of 55 of them, but I also had to find the satellite towers too to make it easier.  I wasn’t going to activate the satellites and leave the map as hazy as possible but here I am activating them and getting backpacks.

Walker is also taking my phone and taking pictures of the contents, even though the images are not going away anytime within the game.  So I’m going to have 55 images pretty soon on my phone.

The very first one we found was the Spider-Plushie one and from there, he wanted to see them all.  I had already found the menu from his first date with Mary Jane, as that was a story moment.

Here is Walker’s picture of the plushie.  I have 26 other images of various success rates.  The clock used to be on the wall until I took all of the nails out of the walls.  Now it just sits there.

One fun aspect of this is that Walker knows how far away 27 is from 55 and is appreciating the amount of work it is to get all of these.

One of these days, I have to fight Shocker and change the night mode to day mode, it would make finding the backpacks easier.  But instead of doing that, I played For Honor instead.  There is a game store a block up from FEAST that has a spider-plushie in it but it is closed at night so we couldn’t see it in the game.  Which is super fun to see stores keeping regular hours in the game.

Thanks to redditor TerraFlaeKSFL for taking the selfie and telling us where it is and the name of the store, Gamer’s Paradise in Chinatown.

Look what I found in Chinatown 🙂 from SpidermanPS4

Which I hadn’t really thought about but it makes total sense that FEAST would also be located in Chinatown with Martin Li owning it.

I did have the thought of just loading the finished file or any of the DLC files so Walker could see all of the contents of the bags but this way is more rewarding and fun.

Walker wanted to see Spider-Man hang upside down so we had to find an overhang to make that possible and then Walker wanted me to hold him upside down and take a picture of him looking at Spider-Man being upside down but I couldn’t both hold him and take the picture.  My wife tried her best but by the time she was in a decent position, I was losing my grip and the tv picture didn’t show up well in the photo either.  We just have too many boxes but we’ll try it again in our new place.  It was sure cute at the time though.  Of course, I had him in the position and then he had the thought to have a picture taken.  He’s a heavy 38 pounds right now and I’m not getting stronger as he gains weight, which I thought would be the case but I have to start lifting weights as I don’t want these days to be numbered.

Now I really regret not taking the extra 15 minutes just to do the Shocker fight.  It was pretty hard the first time around, I died several times, as it took me a while to figure out how to web sections of the wall and throw them back him.  The auto-saving was pretty generous but I’m not sure if that holds true for New Game Plus and Ultimate mode.  I did do so much better with the Kingpin fight, but Shocker is really the first boss you come across in the game.  Then the game takes a break for an hour before the next big showdown.  Maybe I’ll try it tonight if I can find those other backpacks.

When I was playing, my main priority was listening to J. Jonah Jameson’s podcasts and barely cared about collecting backpacks or landmarks (public or secret), I just did them for the costumes and moved on.  Oh, and I cared about getting the newspapers too.  Turns out, you store them so even if you don’t see all of them, they are in your collection, you just have to manually look at all of them to get the credit for all 53 newspapers.

Comixology – Free Comics – February 7, 2019

Posted by John Klein III on February 7, 2019
Posted in: Websites. Tagged: , , , , . Leave a comment

https://www.comixology.com/free-comics

Free Comics that Comixology are offering this week :

Solider X (2002 – 2003) # 1
Darkhawk # 1
Cosmic Powers (1994) # 1
Sleepwalker (1991 – 1994) # 1

Darkhawk and Sleepwalker would be two comics my buddy Greg would have loved back in the day.

It looks like Marvel offers free comics every month but that changes as well.

I’m not sure what Cosmic Powers 1 is but it also came out in 1994.  Thanos is on the cover.

https://marvel.fandom.com/wiki/Cosmic_Powers_Vol_1_1

Such a great creative team!  Ron Marz, Ron Lim, Jimmy Palmiotti, TOm Vincent and Ken Bruzenak.

Thanos killing people, looking for a distraction.  Classic Thanos.
Solider X, I actually read and recall it being pretty good.  The art is rough by Igor Kordey but that’s what the title required with its realistic take on war.  I remember liking the supporting team of Irene Merryweather (skin change and all) and Spider-Man’s Robbie Robertson being added as well.
Shoot, Deadpool killed her in Despicable Deadpool 292.  Well, that’s unfortunate.
Well, at least Stevie Hunter is alive.
At least as of X-Men Gold 9, she was elected to Connecticut’s 3rd Congressional District in the House of Representatives. 
.  .  .
No real gaming updates.  I’ve downloaded all of Hitman Season One, I had to quit the prologue and downloaded the rest of the chapters within the game as well as the legacy pack.  I haven’t started the Hitman 2 demo to see if I can play One in Two but I believe I have all of the parts necessary but I’ll confirm that tonight.
We’ve been grabbing minikits in Lego Dimensions and having a good time there.
I threw five dollars for the preorder of Lego Movie 2 at GameStop so we can get the special Emmet and Stuck Star set.
Walker Dennis is super excited and probably just pay for the whole thing next payday.  He knows it is an Easter present so he should be chill about the wait time.  Well, as chill as any five year old that knows a present is coming but I hope he sort of forgets about it.
So this might mean we are done with buying Lego Dimensions items if he can move onto the next game.  I’m not sure if I’m ready to move yet but I could easily be ready for it as well.  There are several other Lego games I want to get.  It could be fun to get a new (but not to us) game after getting the Platinum in a game.  The GameStop clerk told me that there will be an upcoming collection of Marvel Avengers, Superheroes 1 and 2, which I can only imagine will cost way too much, especially as the Deluxe Edition of Lego Marvel Superheroes 2 is still a $75 game.
That’s the one I want but I also wouldn’t mind buying Avengers, playing the heck out of that one and seeing the latest game come down in price as time goes by.  Lego games are massive time sinks which is what makes them so much fun.
In Spider-Man PS4, I got to play for a little bit, and I’ve decided I’m just going to do the main missions, and not even bother with the towers or anything else, unless I come directly across the tower or the crime.  I really like how not having the towers activated means the map has holes in it.  The police don’t bother me and crime still shows up as a red dot.  I think I’ve done two of them, thus far.  I’ll probably have to go back and do the Financial District as that’s where the Ghostbusters house is but I’ll wait until Walker Dennis tells me he wants to check that out.
In the game, we just celebrated Aunt May’s five hear at FEAST and I’ve met Mary Jane and the Demons, so I have a very long way to go.
My plan is to take a slight break from Spider-Man to try out the free PS Plus February games, I just have to find the time to do it.

February 2019 Free PS Plus Games

Posted by John Klein III on January 30, 2019
Posted in: Games. Tagged: , , , , , . Leave a comment

They announced the free games for February 2019!

For Honor (PS4)
Hitman : The Complete First Season (PS4)
Gunhouse (Cross-Buy with PS4 and Vita)
Rogue Aces (Cross-Buy with PS4 and Vita)
Divekick (Cross-Buy with PS3 and Vita)
Meta Gear Solid 4 : Guns of the Patriots

Not a bad line up, games I haven’t really heard of besides in passing.  I’ve never been much of a Hitman guy, the games seem complicated with all of the options one has for stealth kills but I’ll give it a try.

I was trying to hold out until someone was nice enough to link to the games respected pages but that doesn’t seem to be happening.  Easy enough to do through the website though.

Got to store.playstation.com
Click PlayStationPlus (under Featured)
Click Free Games (also under Featured)

You can’t select all but you can add them separately and then purchase all at once.

According to this thread:

ps+ free games for February from PS4

Fellow redditor RingmasterJ5 is telling people a handy trick :

RingmasterJ5

RingJ5

154 points · 1 hour ago 

PSA: By owning Hitman Season One, you can upgrade all the levels into Hitman 2’s engine for a major visual and slight gameplay upgrade, but the process is somewhat obscure.

  1. Redeem the season on PS+.

  2. Download the main “Hitman” app that it comes with, the level files shouldn’t be needed.

  3. Launch the game.

  4. When prompted, redeem the “Legacy Pack” on the main menu.

  5. Download “Hitman 2 Prologue” for free on the Playstation Store, along with all the “Legacy Pack” files.

And that’s it, feel free to delete the original “Hitman” app.

I’m sure it makes more sense once it is live and available to do.  It just seems a tad complicated.  Like, how is that demo able to hold so much information, usually demos are barely the size of the demo but it must work as others are commenting that it works.  Also, the trophies are available for the first game, through the demo, which also sounds odd.

But by doing this, you get to play Season One with better graphics, so it might be worth trying.  I’ll attempt it and see how it all goes.

There is some discussion regarding how the Season One has more content than if you do the above trick, which is what I can only imagine was the way.  I haven’t heard of a company that just lifts a game and dumps it into the sequel, besides Pac-World having the option to play basic Pac-Man in it.  From another thread, all of the main levels from 1 are in 2 but none of the bonus content per level is there.  So I might just stick with the proper Season One game for the proper experience.

My plan is to pause Spider-Man and attempt the four games available to me.  For Honor doesn’t sound like my type of game, it has a single player campaign but it is mostly a multiplayer game.  Gunhouse is a tower defense game, which I’m pretty sure I’ve never play so I’m not sure that’ll be for me.  Rogue Aces sounds like a fun airplane fighter game like the old Red Baron game on PC.  Which I only got to watch my father play and he wasn’t really good at it but refused to let me play.

But this is the same guy who was upset that I was able to play with relative skill the 7UP Spot game from back in the day and he couldn’t.

.  .  .

As usual, here are the videos from my peeps.

PlayStation Access

I’m surprised they went with Nathan for this video as Rob is such a Metal Gear Solid fan but Nathan only reviews the two PS4 proper games so that’s that.

PlayStationGrenade

I do like how his videos are mostly reviews of the games.  Hitman was his 2016 Game of the Year, so that’s pretty impressive.  The Complete First Season means that it comes with additional DLC and a few costumes too.  He makes all of the games sound pretty fun actually.  Gunhouse is about saving towers full of orphans against insanely designed bosses.

These two videos went up so fast!

Platinum Chasers

On the trophy side of things : For Honor is a 5/10 Trophy Difficulty, but I’m just going to stick with the single player mode as I don’t really do Multiplayer.  There’s a few glitch trophies too.

Shame Hitman doesn’t have a Platinum but that happens from time to time.  I like that it is a 3/10 difficulty, as I’m a tad concern with the stealth elements.  I do like using stealth in both Spider-Man and the Batman Arkham games.

Gunhouse doesn’t have much information except that only five people completed the trophy list.

Rogue Aces was more popular Vita game and has a platinum.  I’ll play this one and it looks kid friendly too so I’ll see if Walker can handle the controls.

.  .  .

According to this website :

https://www.dailystar.co.uk/tech/gaming/755831/PS-Plus-February-2019-Free-Games-Good-and-Bad-news-for-PlayStation-Plus-users-this-Feb

Following the announcement, a representative for Sony told Polygon that after February 2019, the monthly PlayStation Plus lineups will consist only of two free PS4 games.

Which is a real shame, as I was hoping to at least get two games from the early PS4 days of 2013/2014 as I’m sure there are plenty that can be offered.

It is nice that the PS3 is going out with a bang with Metal Gear Solid 4, which I played and got pretty far (I bet I wasn’t even half way through) but I just couldn’t connect with it.  Now, I’ll be all for playing it and giving it a proper try.  I’m hoping playing these games will give me a great appreciation for different genres.  I can be more than just the action adventure gamer that I know myself to be.

Also worth noting, is that the cloud saves of games is being expanded from 10GB to 100GB, which seems pretty nice.  I wasn’t nowhere near my 10GB but now I don’t have to worry about it at all.

.  .  .

I’m getting old dad status and haven’t gotten much further in Spider-Man.  I’m still in the middle of Silver Linings, I just got the mystery investigation started.  So now my map is open, so I’ll knock those out and any crimes that come along the way.  Getting the map cleared unlocks the Into the Spider-Verse costume.

Which I wouldn’t mind completing the game in that suit.

Also, Insomniac released two new Fantastic Four themed suits, and for free too!  I would have gladly threw another ten dollars their way to get a proper DLC pack with further content like levels but getting it for free is fantastic!

Walker Dennis isn’t a fan of either of them, as he prefers the classic red and blue or the underwear costume.  So he’s an odd duck.

Once again, thanks to Polygon for such great pictures!  I wish I could play them together on the same line but WordPress seems to be fighting me on that.

https://www.polygon.com/2018/9/8/17831834/spider-man-game-ps4-costumes-comics

.  .  .

I also got him a Lego Spider-Man playset that came with the Spider-Mobile and Green Goblin!  Target had the shelf tag listed for $20 but then it turned out to only be $10.

Now he really wants Miles as he’s a huge fan of Into the Spider-Verse.  Which most likely the BluRay + Digital Code will end up in his Easter basket too.

The only set I saw that came with Miles also came with another Peter Parker Spider-Man and he really doesn’t need two.  Actually now that I have both pictures next to each other, it looks like a modified Spider-Man, which is nice.  I guess one of them can be a bad Spider-Man, that’s what we did when he ended up with two Captain Americas from the Titan Hero line.  So now his Avengers can fight Thanos and Evil Cap.

I get why they want to make sure a person gets a traditional Spider-Man but if I wanted to get my son a set that features Doctor Octopus too, then we’ll have three traditional Spider-Mans and I want to say the basic suit was the same in all three sets.

Both of these sets are $30 each, which is disappointing but they each come with two vehicles so I can see the value there.  Miles by himself is $12 so I might as well get a set that he comes with.

Then again, $30 and then we’re done with Legos for a while, so that’s not a bad deal either.

.  .  .

I’ve been having to come to work early, so I haven’t been allowing myself to stay up late.  I’ve been feeling pretty good as I’m waking up feeling refreshed and not groggy at all.  But I’ll find a balance again as I’ve been missing my gaming time but I’ve been so tired come 10:30pm these past few nights.  So Tuesday/Wednesday nights are no longer going to be game nights for me.  It was a pretty good run though.

.  .  .

Walker Dennis has gotten all of his Lego Dimensions characters he’s going to get for the time being.  In a short span of time, he got Emmet, Green Arrow, Starfire, and Marty.  He still has 66 gold bricks to spend, which makes me want to get him a few more characters but it’ll have to wait until Easter, as he really has plenty of content to play with.  He really wants Benny and Unikitty to complete the Lego Movie set and he really wants Doc Brown as he’s a huge Back to the Future fan now as well.

Heck, even Chad Wild Clay and Vy Qwaint (and Daniel too!) got into the Back to the Future rhythm so that time out perfectly.  I’m not sure why they went that route but they sure did.  Once Joseph Banks showed up originally, I shook my head as he was a clear ripoff of Doc Brown but then it all paid off.

I also showed Walker the time Marty and Doc Brown showed up on Jimmy Kimmel, which is a tad awkward to watch but Michael J. Fox and Christopher Lloyd were great sports about it.  It made me want to rewatch Interstate 60 which I’m always up for rewatching but also overdue in rewatching it as it has been a few years.  Too many years.

Such a great cast and written and directed by Back to the Future co-creator, Bob Gale.  I actually got to see this at a panel at San Diego Comic Con in 2002, my last year attending it, I got to see test footage of Doc Ock’s arms as a lead up to Spider-Man 2.  Gosh, 2002 was a different age.

Yes, that’s Amy Jo Johnson’s back.

Great commentary track too with Gale and Marsden.