Man, school has been BUSY this quarter! 3D modeling takes a longgg time.

I have barely had time to game, and zero time to make any videos. 

I just ordered a Blue Yeti mic so now my voice will sound good! Hopefully later this week I can start a video series on System Shock 2 that I have been thinking about. I would play through it while I talk about interesting facts about the game. 

I have never played it before but I heard it's very good and worth playing. I may try streaming it all if my internet doesn't feel like being too much of a sloth. Here's my channel and I will post a schedule if I can find the time. http://www.twitch.tv/lighteffect

I really need to get going on my YouTube channel, I've been slacking. This summer it will hopefully take off for sure.

Only another month or so and then summer break!

Spec Ops: The Line was great! Thought the shooting was solid fun and the story was very thought provoking. I went through the whole game wondering if I should kill or not. Very much worth playing. I still need to write a review for Bioshock, but I really want to play through it again before I do. Oh well, time to get farther in Tomb Raider!

Games I Have Finished:

Bioshock Infinite

Sleeping Dogs

Spec Ops: The Line 

Games To Beat:

Tomb Raider (Currently Playing)

Hitman: Absolution

XCOM: Enemey Unknown

Tom Clancy's Splinter Cell: Conviction

Deus Ex: Human Revolution

Dishonored

F.E.A.R. 3

Giana Sisters: Twisted Dreams

Just Cause 2

Max Payne 3

Metro 2033

Torchlight 2

The Witcher 2: Assassins of Kings

So this is just like pokecharms gaming log and I felt like I wanted to do one too, that way it will hopefully force me to be more active on here and write more reviews! So here we go! My que will start off small but don't worry, I will ALWAYS have a new game to play, whether it be current or not.

Games I Have Finished:

Bioshock Infinite

Sleeping Dogs

Games To Beat:

Tomb Raider (Currently Playing)

Spec Ops: The Line (Also Currently Playing)

Hitman: Absolution

XCOM: Enemey Unknown

Tom Clancy's Splinter Cell: Conviction  (I'm actually mostly finished with this one.)

Deus Ex: Human Revolution

Dishonored

F.E.A.R. 3

Giana Sisters: Twisted Dreams

Just Cause 2

Max Payne 3

Metro 2033

Torchlight 2

The Witcher 2: Assassins of Kings (I need to finish the first before I start this)

I've started a few but only Tomb Raider and Spec Ops will be finished anytime soon. I am going to force myself to do a video review on Bioshock Inifinite. I am looking forward to Far Cry 3 Blood Dragon, so if I don't finish Tomv Raider by then it may have to be put on hold because seriously, there's going to be dragons that shoot lasers, how can you not like that?

On Twitter, Carolyn tweeted about how she did not like the concept of characters leaving conveniently placed audio logs throughout games. I (finally) started playing Tomb Raider and as soon as I found the first journal left from one of the other characters, I felt like it was way out of place.

Why would they leave parts of their journals laying around? I do enjoy getting backstory and insight from the characters, but it just felt so weird. I sort of felt that way during Bioshock Infinite with the Voxaphones, but I ignored the feeling for the most part.

I never really thought about it before Carolyn had brought it up. Lot's of games do the audio log style of giving you info. The original Bioshock did of course, and Dead Space also did it, but tons of games also just have things to read everywhere. Plenty of games do it well but is it something developers should move away from? 

I don't think I'm tired of it yet, but what about gamers who have been gaming for longer than me? 

Columbia is a beautiful city and your first moments there are wonderful, but of course that changes quickly. One thing after another happens to you throughout the game, taking you all aorund the city to some pretty memorable locations with an equally entertaining and memorable story.

I played it on PC and boy does it look good cranked all the way up. I played with a controller though, so all you computer elitists can start yelling at me now, but I enjoy games a lot more that way. 

The shooting in this game feels great, better than the other Bioshock games. You also get to ride around on the rails in the sky and jump on foes which is really fun to do! You are never punished for falling off the world and you can never mess up jumping on or off the sky rails. 

Elizabeth is the best video game character I've ever seen. Not only is she voiced spectacularly, but her AI is programmed to interact with all the little things you do. If you are running through a level, she will run too. If you are slowly looking around for items, she will go explore, or sit down, or stand there with her arms crossed waiting. It makes her seem so real and believable that it is easy to care about her. You never have to worry about protecting her in combat, so no babysitting in this game! She also likes to throw you supplies during combat to help out, or point out items for you. I thought she was amazing.

The overall story kept me hooked the entire time. All you know at the beginning is you have to get this girl (Elizabeth) and bring her back to pay off some sort of dept. But everything is far more complex than that. 

I would recommend playing on Hard if you play a lot of FPS games, or else it might be too easy. Other than that, I would recomment this game to almost anyone, though the story and themes may be too complex for some. Amazing game and I'm ready to start it over to see if I missed any details in the story! Go play it!

There's just something addicting about buying games, especially when they are such good deals! I managed to grab all the big newer releases that I wanted to play; Far Cry 3, Sleeping Dogs, Dishonored, and so on...

Here's the list:

Binary Domain

Civilization V + Gods and Kings Expansion

Dark Souls: Prepare to Die Edition -Wish developers would spend more time on pc ports... But I grabbed a mod that unlocks the framerate from 30 and now it looks smooth and lovely, along with being completely brutal and fun.

Dear Esther

Dishonored

Dota 2

Far Cry 3 -Have played through the intro so far, and it's very fun! I've been streaming it here:http://www.twitch.tv/lighteffect

FTL: Faster Than Light -Gameplay is TENSE, the chance of dying and having to start over makes you think hard and cautiously, very addicting.

Giana Sisters: Twisted Dreams

Half Life Complete -PC essentials

Legend of Grimrock

Max Payne 3

Natural Selection 2 -Very challenging multiplayer, commander position is hard to master and without good commander you have no chance.

Sleeping Dogs

Spec Ops: The Line

S.T.A.L.K.E.R. CoP + SoC

Thirty Flights of Loving -Played through once and watched a friend play, very interesting but still confused by it. More playthroughs! Also only 15 minutes long.

Tom Clancy's EndWar

The Witcher 2: Enhanced Edition

Xcom: Enemy Unknown -Also only played through intro but is so far fun and has great and tense battles, as characters can die forever!

So my New Years Resolution is to do reviews on as many of these as I can! Should be getting my new microphone soon so videos should be coming too! Also I am going to stream as often as I can, internet speeds here at college are insane!

Twitch.tv -http://www.twitch.tv/lighteffect

Twitter for knowing when I stream - @NJLightEffect

So I'm not sure what to think about itreally. I liked it, but I don't know why. The first thing that popped into my head at the end was that it reminded me of Pulp Fiction, the randomness I guess, but I really cannot say how I feel about it.

The way it told the story was like nothing I have seen before. I was only in one scene for no more than 20 seconds before jumping to a new one, the flow was always moving forward, but never confused me. This is a game I am going to need to play again, if not multiple times to make sense of it. Watching a gameplay of it may or may not give you the same feeling, but I will upload my playthrough and link it here for you. If anyone else has played it I would love to know your thoughts on it.

Here's the playthrough!https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3Uq4ZpPMRkE&feature=youtu.be

So I've been playing through Crysis 2 and I'm almost through the game and now it keeps crashing and I can't figure it out =( It's not pushing my cards to full load or anything, it runs fine and then randomly just freezes and crashes. I wasn't really enjoying Crysis 2 anyway, the AI is just aweful and the story is meh. Also, it may just be me but I find all the voice acting super annoying. Kevin gave it a pretty good review but it has dissapointed me compared to the original Cryis.

Other than that I have been playing a lot of League of Legends with friends and some Halo 4 on the Xbox but not much else. I do have plenty to play and plenty to review, so if anyone wants to look through my games and ask for a review then add me on Steam! LightEffect

I was going to review Crysis 1 and 2 but technical probrems got in the way, so I need to pick something else!

Also for fun, here is a video I made 4 years ago with Halo 3. It's pretty bad but funny how bad it is, so enjoy! =D

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YI-SIVd2edI&list=UU2Dbutub6g3gT4cxYoh-ANA&index=30

The time is finally upon us. It is time for a new adventure, one that many have already gone on, yet still new too many. Though it may not stand as high as the LOTR, The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey has arrived, and after sitting through the action packed 2hrs and 46min, is worth seeing.

The Hobbit is about a young Bilbo Baggins (Martin Freeman) and the adventures he had. After a flashback of the Dwarves and how they lost their mountain home to a dragon, Gandalf (Ian McKellen) arrives at the Shire and invites Bilbo on an adventure. After meeting the thirteen dwarves, one of them being Thorin (Richard Armitage) the leader of the group, Bilbo then decides to join them on their quest to take back the mountain from the dragon, Smaug. This adventure takes them too many locations, some old and some new, along with meeting familiar faces, as they make their way to their ultimate destination.

I saw the movie in 24 frames a second, so I wont be making any comments on that, but I plan on seeing it again in HFR (48fps), and will write another review about it.

Story and pacing in the movie felt good, even though it took a while for the adventure to actually begin, after the flash backs to the dwarves and the long dinner sequence in Bilbos home. The direction by Peter Jackson makes this movie feel very much like the other LOTR movies. This one doesnt have as serious of a tone as the LOTR did, and you dont connect as well to the characters at the end of this movie as you did the first of the other trilogy, but all are likable. I have not read the books so I do not know how well it is following it, but I felt like there was a good amount of detail and background story to keep me unformed of what is going on and what is to come.

Visuals in this movie are just as good as the trilogy. The Shire is as cozy as ever, Rivendell looks gorgeous, the woods are woody, dark caves feel tight and wet, and one scene in the mountains is very intense. The sets for this movie are so detailed you could live in them. Bilbos home is cluttered and full of many things that make it feel like the cozy little home that it is. Large locations are equally as detailed, like one in the caves full of wooden bridges and platforms, Orc items scattered all over. Its hard to not give away too much. The one thing I would have to say about details is the amount of CGI used. Now, I dont dislike CGI, but I did enjoy all the very real battles in The Lord of the Rings. Nothing is more real than having those lifelike costumes on real actors. Most every enemy was CGI and sometimes it lost its believability, as most characters looked real but were obviously not. Battles looked great but you could tell they were not real and one part where everyone is falling just looked out of place to me.

That said, one of the best characters in the movie was Gollum, the completely CGI creature hiding in the depths of the caves. His performance was amazing; his characters emotions were so well shown through his voice and even better his face that you wish he was in the movie longer. He was probably the only CGI that really worked well in the movie. All of the actors in this movie did such a good performance, making every character believable and easy to connect with. Freeman was the lost Hobbit who just wants to be home, McKellen remains the great wizard he always was and continues to be so in this movie, and all of the dwarves had their personalities, though you never really connect with any of them other than Thorin. I hope they expand more on the dwarves but I do look forward to seeing them all change throughout the next two movies.

Let us not forget about the music, as it plays a huge role in all of these movies. Some similar music is used, but to great effect, as it bring back memories of the other movies. This feeling helps you dive into the movie and feel like youre back at home in the shire. All the music is spot on and helps your emotion response to the different scenes. As I wrote this review I played some Lord of the Rings music in the background, specifically the music heard when we see the Shire.

This is one of those movies that you dont want to end. Even after the almost three hours you have been sitting there. Everything was done so well, just like the previous trilogy, the whole world and all of the lore felt so real that I was instantly drawn into the movie until the very end. You arent left with much of a cliffhanger, other than knowing there is still more to the journey. Although it may not be as great as LOTR trilogy, it still feels right at home in the series. I highly recommend seeing this movie whether you have seen the Lord of the Rings or not, as it is a treat that everyone should experience.

So a friend told me to grab a copy of this game to play with him. Turns out it really is pretty awesome!

The game is a WWII shooter where you play as either German or Russian forces with a main focus of online play. I first went through the tutorial and instantly could tell that this game aimed to be more realistic than other FPS games out there. Movement felt like you were actually running rather than floating across the ground. The default keybindings were confusing so I will have to spend a little bit changing those around. The shooting felt solid as well, each gun was realistic from the bullet drop to the point of your machine gun exploding from over heating. You have the ability to angle your gun depending on how far away an object it, so you can still aim directly at the target while compensating for distance and bullet drop. There is a cover system that works well so far. You push a button and you hide behind most walls or ledges. You can peak over the edge, aim down the site which also puts your head over the edge, or you can blind fire which only puts your gun and arms over the edge of cover. I have yet to have any bad problems with the systems which is good.

Graphics in game look lovely, making the atmosphere in game add to the realism. You feel like you are in a war movie and that helps you play that way. You don't play this game like CoD or Halo or any of those, you hide in buildings and cover each other when moving around. You feel like you are fighting in the war and it really looks that way.

Online matches are like most others, deathmatch, capture bases, stuff like that. The only one I have played so far is a attack/defend game where one side is trying to defend a building while the enemy team is rushing in, much like a real battle in the war. There is a squad system, where you can pick to be a squad leader, machine gunner, marksman, support, and a few others I can't think of right now. There is also the commander, who can call in mortars and other abilities like instantly reviving everyone on your team. Each class has different default weapons that you can later change once you upgrade and unlock more weapons. Only certain number of each class is allowed in each squad, so teamwork is needed. Maps are of medium size, or at least the ones I have played, and are all half destroyed towns or warehouses. They have been structured well for the attack/defend games.

So far this game has impressed me but with only a few hours played I have yet to try everything it has in store, like the single player campaign, which seems to be mostly for you to practice for playing online.

There are plenty of discussions out there about FPS games, specifically Halo and CoD. These games come out regularly, every year or close to it. Each one has it's changes to multiplayer gameplay and new campaign thats supposed to blow you away, but everyone keeps telling them they haven't innovated enough and that they just copied last years game and made it look prettier. But really, how many ways can you shoot someone in the head?

I have played Call of Duty since the first one came out on the computer. I never realized how big it was until late into CoD4, but I feel like that is when all of this criticism began. The first game was amazing, getting the war experience down better than any other game at the time. The game was fast paced, had an engaging single player, and a great multiplayer.

What do you do when you have something good and people want more of it? You give them more of course. They continued to perfect the gameplay and made more games, but of course everyone looks for innovation. Innovation is a good thing in games, new ideas keep things fresh and interesting but how can you keep making something better forever? Can it really be done? Eventually graphics will be life-like and you won't be able to tell the difference between game world and real life. Shooting that guy in the head and watching his brains blow out behind him will be as gory as it possibly can be. What do you do next?

This goes along with what Call of Duty is, a game where you are in a war and you shoot people. How are you supposed to innovate that every year. Shoot people with bigger bullets? Better looking guns? There are only so many ways to point a gun at someone and shoot, so why do we keep asking for innovation in a game like this? CoD is doing what it does best and they have no reason not too.

Halo has also been said to be just like the other versions and does nothing new, but I feel that it is similar to how CoD is. Halo is a different shooter game than CoD, being that you are a giant super soldier in a sci-fi universe with aliens. This means the game has guns that may never exist, aliens, futuristic vehicles and so on. The game may not be very different from previous versions, but what do you expect it to do? These games have things that work, so to be completely new they would have to be completely different games, and then people would be mad at it for not being a Halo game. Same goes for CoD, if they really innovate it won't be like any other game in the series.

So why do we keep criticizing these games for their lack of innovation? If you want a new gameplay experience, then play a new game that isn't Halo of CoD. These games are trying to perfect what they already have, and they know there are people out there who want the updated version of their favorite games. So if you really have an idea to make these games new and different, while still being the game everyone expects them to be, speak up, because otherwise there are many other games out there that we can all play and enjoy for being different, because they really are.