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Gaming guide creator Prima Games is shutting down
Prima Games, the company that's been creating physical video game strategy guides for the past 28 years, is shutting down according to Publisher's Lunch. Prima's publisher DK's CEO Ian Hudson sent out an internal memo saying it was an "extremely difficult decision" and one that was made due to a "significant decline" in the video game guide sector per reports by Publishers Weekly. No more guides will be coming out of Prima Games, and its doors will officially close this coming spring.
Adafruit builds Raspberry Pi-powered light painting rig, takes trippy photos
Taking long exposure photographs at night and painting within them using an iPad may be old hat, but building your own light painting rig? That could earn you some serious geek cred, and according to Adafruit, it isn't even all that hard. In a new walkthrough, the team fashioned such a contraption using a Raspberry Pi, a python script with under 60 lines of code, some open source software and a handful of electronic components. Not satisfied with the typical light wand, they decided to spice things up with a circular fixture built from PVC pipes and a hula hoop to hold the ribbon of LEDs. After being attached to a bike and paraded around at night, it created the 3D effect in the masterpiece above. If you're itching to make your own works of art, check out Adafruit's tutorial at the source link below.
The Daily Grind: Does livestreaming make you more or less inclined to play an MMO?
Livestreaming and video game, er, videos, are all the rage these days. Whether it's through YouTube channels filled with game "playthroughs" or Massively's own livestreaming endeavor, technology advances have made it possible to experience your favorite games without actually playing (or purchasing) them. While this can be a boon to folks who never have enough time to play all the interesting games coming out, it can also take away from the experience a little bit by relegating a form of participatory entertainment into something more akin to the passive experience you get via viewing films or television. From a business perspective, widespread adoption of livestreaming could conceivably affect game sales, especially as the video quality gets better and gamers grow into real-life responsibilities that eat away at their free time. Today's Daily Grind is all about enjoying video games vicariously. Does livestreaming make you more or less inclined to invest time and money into gaming? Every morning, the Massively bloggers probe the minds of their readers with deep, thought-provoking questions about that most serious of topics: massively online gaming. We crave your opinions, so grab your caffeinated beverage of choice and chime in on today's Daily Grind!
Age of Conan video walks players through new Tarantia Commons zone
This has been a really big week for Age of Conan. They released Update 5, "Gangs of Tarantia", which has introduced new zones and content, but more than that, completely reworked some of Age of Conan's existing game mechanics. The amount of written content that Funcom has put together on these changes is substantial -- in fact we linked to all of it in our post on Update 5 earlier this week. Funcom can write all they want about the new changes to the game, but when it comes down to it, actually seeing these places they've described may have a stronger impact. With that in mind, Funcom released a video tour of the Tarantia Commons zone today, narrated by game director Craig Morrison.Tarantia Commons is what he describes as "the urban underbelly" of the capital city of Tarantia, a place Morrison says is "wracked by gang warfare and civil unrest." In other words, there's always a lot going on in Tarantia Commons and the video walkthrough shows this, revealing how players will choose which side to take in riots -- either aid the city guards or stick it to the man with fellow rioters. The riots then trigger other events. Specific quests become available and certain bosses spawn, depending upon the general state of chaos in the streets of Tarantia Commons. There are two warring gangs in the new gameplay area, The Wharf Rats who exist at ground level in the streets of Tarantia Commons, and The Crows whose area of influence shows off a different aspect of the game: rooftops. Interacting with The Crows above Tarantia Commons gives a different perspective on the city, with some impressive views of the zone. Of course there's content on the outskirts of Tarantia Commons for players to experience as well, including a leper colony where NPCs will lash out at you, intentionally trying to infect you with disease. As an added bonus, or spoiler depending upon your point of view, the walkthrough also shows off a boss encounter and the tactics he'll employ against players. If you're on the fence about returning to Age of Conan to see the new content, this Tarantia Commons walkthrough might just be the tipping point. We've got a video embed for you after the jump:
Show and Tell: Surviving Civilization Revolution
This week is a bit of a departure from the regular Show and Tell format, but if you think about it, we're not really making much of a turn. We've celebrated the products of all sorts of fandom in this space, but there's one devoted group we haven't addressed: the writers of guides and walkthroughs and FAQs of all sorts.Maybe you've looked a few things up now and again: a short cut, a question about deleting a save, or a hint when you were stuck. Guides are freely available, and there are all different sorts ... and most of them are written by just plain folks. So why are we bringing it up? The folks at WiiHD recently put out a preview of sorts for the recent release Civilization Revolution -- a preview that includes vital game information. There's no Civilopedia in the DS version of the title (for the uninitiated: the massive information files common in Civ games). Even veteran Civ players might miss the information in the new handheld for its descriptions of unit capabilities, terrain types, and resources. Luckily, fans have swept in to fill the void. WiiHD isn't the only site working to provide information to new (and old) Civilization Revolution players. We've got a list of a few of the guides after the break, and we offer our hearty thanks to the people who work to put them together. That's really all this week is about: the people who take the time to help others with their gaming. Next week, we'll be back to the stuff.%Gallery-14922% Show and Tell is all about your stuff, so long as it's Nintendo-related. We love to see your collections, your crafts, your frosted creations, your t-shirts and swag of all sorts. Just snap a few pictures, tell us what's up, and send it all to showmeit [at] dsfanboy [dot] com. We'll take care of the rest.
Patch 2.3 on WoW Insider
Did you hear that? A sound like thousands of voices crying out in joy? It was patch 2.3-- the first content patch in a long time is coming to World of Warcraft today.If you're a WoW player, you're probably already straining at the bit to get the chance to play Zul'Aman, put stuff into your guild's bank, or get your Engineering up and build that new flying machine. Fortunately, our sister site WoW Insider, the mavens of all things Azeroth, has you covered. We've posted a huge guide to everything patch 2.3 over there, and you can find even more on WoW Insider's tag page for patch 2.3. No Hunter dead zone? New UI improvements? Wondering what Blizzard did to the old pre-60 instances? It's all there for your perusing pleasure while you're waiting for the realms to come back from maintenance this morning.The world (of Warcraft) will never be the same. Now if only they could figure out a way to make those Shamans happy...
I know selling leveling guides isn't new, but who in their right mind would BUY one?
So, I'm sitting here today, looking for news to steal, I mean report on. When I see a blog post about an Alliance powerleveling guide. It's an innocuous one-sentence post that says, " I found a World of Warcraft Leveling guide that includes everything you need to power level any Alliance character." Following the link brought me to a site that claims: "World of WarCraft leveling is both an art and a science. It is an art because getting to the next level requires much creativity." To help you unleash your chained-up creativity there's a link to a leveling guide. My first reaction to that line was side-splitting laughter. Leveling in WoW requires creativity like playing Whack A Mole requires a Masters in Fine Arts. Now, I love me some leveling guides. I inevitably hit those weird spots where a zone is too low-leveled and the one next to it is too high-leveled. Having a site that listed zones appropriate to my level range was a boon leveling up. There's one, small difference between the links in this paragraph and the one above it: mine are free. His is not.I've got two, hopefully easy questions: what sort of a snake oil salesman sells these guides, and who in their right mind would buy something that a quick Google on "world of warcraft leveling guide" should provide for free? What do you think? Is there any way in Azeroth you'd ever buy these things? And if so, I've got a lovely bridge for sale over the Hudson River for sale.
More raid boss strat guides than you can throw a ret pally at
Raiding is a coordinated dance of precision, strategy and not having anyone go afk unannounced. Not that I have done that. Ever. No, really. Ok, that one time, but it's not like we couldn't recover from the wipe in time to try again, right?Anyway, the first time you attempt a raid boss, it's great fun seeing what the event has in store for you. But after that first time, it's incredibly irritating to wipe out time and again. There are strat guides for boss kills here and there about the Internet, but I found one site that collects them all in one place.For every raid target in the game, BossKillers.com presents strat guides three different ways: they have an extensive strat guide written for their site; they have links to other popular strat guides for that boss; and they also have links to kill movies for each boss. For their own guide, it covers each phase of the fight including diagrams showing player placement, class roles with notes for different specs and gear requirements along with recommended buffs and consumables. If you don't agree with the strat, check out the many others they link to. Still having a problem visualizing the fight? Click on the many movie links they offer.So next time you get ready to raid, you'll have no excuse to be unprepared for the big fight. If no one went afk unannounced.
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Adventures in Beta: Blood Elf Paladin, 6-10
When I returned to my blood elf, she was ready to go kill some Wretched and arcane patrollers in the wreckage of the Blood Elf starting area. The whole Ruins of Silvermoon area is very confusing. It's a city, but half of it is overrun by enemies, so you can't really figure out where most of the questgivers are supposed to be. As I swung away at magic-zombies and machines, I discovered that I was sort of enjoying playing a paladin. The whole system of seals and judgments was pretty cool, and my big problem with my long-dead human pally - the lack of a viable pulling spell - was solved by mana tap. I was going out of mana a lot less than with my shaman, too. I had to keep reminding myself, "You can't play one of these in the expansion - you'll get bored around 30-40 like with all your other alts, and you'll have to deal with other blood elves like 'Onmyknees' and 'Sefhirotth.'"
Adventures in Beta: Draenei Shaman, Level 1-5
A couple weeks ago, I won a beta key. Pleased at getting to test out the expansion content, I happily waited for my key. And waited. And waited. Finally, on Wednesday, I received my World of Warcraft: Burning Crusade Beta Key and installed the expansion. Then uninstalled the expansion. Then uninstalled my regular WoW, reinstalled it without patching, installed the Burning Crusade and patched that. I saved re-patching the live WoW for later, in case I began crying. Finally, at 2:30 in the morning, I logged on and created my first character (my 60 main had yet to copy over.) Because I am lazy and want to see how the Horde and Alliance integrate their new classes, I chose to roll a draenei shaman. Also, I've never really tried to play a shaman or paladin, so it would be an experiment for me as well. I picked the "cute" draenei face, the Princess Leia buns that show off the the weird ear-tentacles draenei have, and some curly horns that looked slightly like racing stripes. And I was off!
Levelling Locations: 21-30
Previously in the Levelling Location series: 1-10, 11-20. At around level 20, things start to get really interesting. A lot of classes gain some particularly exciting new abilities at level 20, such as the druid's catform or the shaman's ghost wolf. Most of these will become invaluable for the remainder of your levelling time. Also, at around level 20, it's time to move on from the 'starter' areas. There are several places to quest, with plenty of variety, though you may find quests more spread out than previously. Also, if you're on a PvP server, things can start getting nasty as you venture into contested territories and zones with towns for both factions. Unfortunately, ganking (being killed by higher-level players) is the order of the day -- grit your teeth, stay off the roads, and you'll soon be big enough to visit some revenge on your tormentors.
Blackrock Depths Strategy Guide
For all of you out there looking to pick up your key to Onyxia's lair, or if you're just hunting for the head of Golem Lord Argelmach, WoW Vault has posted a comprehenside strategy guide for plumbing Blackrock Depths. The guide is very well-written & detailed, and covers quests for both Horde and Alliance, so be sure to check it out before you head in.Repair-Bot schematic...here I come!
