So, I’ve been absolutely horrible about updating this blog, chiefly because I’ve been swamped with family, school and work. It’s not going to get any better in the near future, as I’ve decided to fully pursue academia and head towards not only getting degrees, but actually becoming a professor eventually. Yeah, I know. I’m probably crazy. What do you mean you know that?
I’ve got the next three months off from any school work, as I transfer from Columbus State Community College with my Asssociate’s Degree to Ohio State University, where I’ll pursue my Bachelors. This gives me some down time to catch up with a lot of games unplayed for a while, as well as catching up on reading for pleasure, and getting back into tabletop gaming.
I’ve missed tabletop gaming. There’s just something about getting together with a bunch of other like-minded people, making up stuff as you go along and having fun. Last week I met up with a group of guys from the Ohio State tabletop club and played in a game of D20 Future. It was a great deal of fun to play in, although gameplay is suspended while the other guys end up heading home for Crimble. I can’t wait till I get back into that, and I’m planning on running a couple of games soon myself, now that I’m back on the horse.
I picked up the 4th Edition of Dungeons and Dragons (including the PHB2) and I’ll be reading through that in the next few weeks. There’s a lot of hot debate as to how 4e changes things, and there are some things that strike me as not my cup of tea, but a lot of people are playing it now. If I’m going to want to play games, I’m going to want to play what others are playing, so like it or lump it I’m probably going to be playing some 4e. 4e still seems to be entrenched heavily in miniatures usage (no shock there), but there seems to be much more of a MMO PVP feel to it. Maybe reading it through will change my mind. I’ve never been a big D&Der, much preferring to play other game systems that are not level-based. There’s a whole essay involved there, so let’s ignore it.
I’ve started running a Star Wars d6 game via Google Wave. Oh, how I love that system by West End Games. It’s such a great system; it’s easy to pick up and play and brings the whole Star Wars feel to the table. I can remember playing some great games in the past with my regular gaming group back in Scotland, and I’m hoping to run the game a lot in the coming years. The kids are at the age where they can get into RPGs now, but there’s something about playing with a group of older players. Using Wave to play means finding ways to handle dice rolls, but it’s a promising medium for playing a non-immediate threaded game with multiple players. I may even post reports on the game here as a sort of summary of the story as it occurs.
Most of my computer gaming has been limited to my iPod Touch, as I’ve had little time to sit down and play for longer than a half hour at any time. I’ll have more time in the coming weeks, and I want to complete a lot of other games I’ve got going before I start any new ones. I recently picked up Left For Dead and Mass Effect during Steam sales. While I’ve yet to play L4D, I managed to squeeze in a couple of hours of Mass Effect and can heartily give it two thumbs up. I’m looking forward to plunging back into that, although I need to boot into Windows on my Mac to play it.
The kids convinced me to play some Rogue Galaxy on the PS2 the other night, and it took me a little while to get my bearings with the game because it had been a while since I had last played. I’m at 40 hours in, and only at Chapter 8, so I’ve still got a lot to do. I want to complete the game by the end of March so that I’ve got that out of the way. I also need to complete Tomb Raider: Legend, Psychonauts and Ratchet & Clank: Deadlocked on the PS2. I seem to have a bad habit of starting games and not finishing them. I need to fix that. Too many games, not enough time, and none of them will play themselves…
Tags: dungeons & dragons, star wars, mass effect, pc, ps2, tabletop gaming, rpgs, roleplaying
Tags: PC Games, Tabletop by Teh Bagder
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