My Video Game Side Quest: Social Media

    I have mentioned many times in this blogcast about how I first joined Facebook. I was only trying to get publicity for my store by creating a page for it, only to be forced to form a page for myself first. The rules had changed after I had read an older book, I guess. I didn't even try to get friends for a few months, after a disappointing birthday message from Facebook. One of those friends invited me to join a game he played. Since I wanted to be nice, I tried it out, even though it wasn't the type I usually liked, sports. Specifically, Golf Clash. (I would later realize that he got an in-game bonus whenever he invited someone to join the game, and they accepted.)  After that, I finally started trying out various games. Of course, the first one I chose on my own was Bejeweled. Their version wasn't exactly the same as the one I was familiar with, but I played for a few weeks before I decided to drop it. I would try out a bunch of other games, abandoning them for one reason or another. I quickly got rid of this weird diner-based matching game, once I found out it was from China. I would go on to find other games, most notably the "Candy Crush" games. I even looked into the game Chats that Facebook had with some of the games.  That feature slowly faded. At my height, I had around ten games that a cycled through. Then the shoes began to drop.

    I hit a wall on one matching game. Try as I might, I couldn't get through this one level. I was all but out of special resources, and I saw no way out to push through. So, I deleted the game. I deleted another game after I accidentally reset it back to the beginning. There was no way I was going to start over, so the block breaking game was history. A third game got deleted after it began to freeze up. While I was getting the daily check-in bonuses, I couldn't actually play the word-building game. I was gone too. One game that I really, really loved was SongPop 2 (don't ask about the original). I was taken down when Flash support was ended. I was in the middle of getting ready to say goodbye, when the game was taken down earlier than I expected. At least I managed to get that game back later. (See a future post.) Even Golf Clash was affected for a few weeks by a dispute with Facebook. I was froze out of the game while things were sorted out. The game came back, but left the platform shortly afterwards. (I managed a way to play this game too. Again, later post.) 

    With all of the upgrades that Facebook has gone through, many of the games I left behind aren't even mentioned in my History any more. Only the four games I still play daily are left. I've mentioned the three "Candy Crush" games before, and I will feature them in a separate post soon. The only remaining game left is Cookie Jam. I don't remember how I got attached to this matching game that is quite similar to "Candy Crush." It has similar themes and rules, but the game has always had features unique to themself. In fact, "Candy Crush" has been implementing some of those features, or something close to them. In some ways, Cookie Jam is a better game with their newest features. I find myself playing for longer periods than I do with any "Candy Crush" game. I just seem to rack up longer winning streaks in it. In fact, I sometimes feel that Cookie Jam lets me win. That's how easy it gets at times.

    Facebook isn't the only social media site that has games now. (The games are a big reason why I prefer the site over the mobile app.) LinkedIn added games over a year ago, but I don't really play them. They just feel like digital versions of traditional pencil-and-paper games. In fact, I actually do many similar games in puzzle magazines. Classmates.com is adding games, but the few they have can be found elsewhere. Even Apple News has digital versions of classic newspaper puzzles, as well as few of their own design. These games are usually locked behind a paywall, so I ignore them, but the emoji-based one is similar to puzzles I've made. Small world, I guess.

My Video Game Library: Backstreet Billiards

    I've always been partial to pool. There was something about the colored balls and geometric shots that thrilled me. I was disappointed that I never got a toy pool table like one my cousins got for Christmas. One of my great aunts lived in a house that once was a pool hall. Another relative had a pool table in their attic area. I only got to go up there once, and I never got a chance at the table. Considering how young I was, I couldn't have done much anyway. I started watching 9-ball pool matches on ESPN my junior year of high school. I was just amazed it was on television, but then ESPN didn't have the best variety of sports to choose from back then. The restaurant next to my high school had a table, from what I heard from those who had went there. I only went once, to pick up an order for another student, so I never had a chance to play. I think both colleges I went to had pool table in their rec areas, but I didn't know anyone to help me learn how to play.

    That's why I was very happy once previews started to show up about the first pool games for the PS1. I think there was one on a demo disc, but I didn't like it too much. I was leaning to another game that kept getting previews, Backstreet Billiards. I didn't know which one to get, until I saw a billiards magazine on a shopping trip to Lexington. They were reviewing pool video games, and they rated Backstreet as the slightly better option for the PlayStation. Slightly better graphics and gameplay. That was the one I asked for Christmas.

    The game had two primary options, Story Mode and One-on-One. In Story Mode, you were going after the pool shark who ruined your father's life. You went around town, beating various opponents at pool to get information, while collecting token to increase your stats. (To be honest, I don't think the stats added anything to the game.) As each one was defeated, the bosses, and their pool rooms and background music, would be added to the other mode as playable opponents.  However, after the fourth boss or so, the game stopped. There was a scratch on the disc I didn't notice, and it was causing the game to freeze. My mom returned the game to Walmart.  She got the money back, but they didn't have another game to replace it. I had to wait about a month until my birthday trip to the Huntington Mall to find another copy.

    I played it that evening after the trip, using the saved data on my card to continue. I made it to the next to last boss, when I faced a new problem. I had just picked up a new token to raise one of my stats. However, I had chosen to raise that stat previously using another token that could be used for one of two different one. The new token would push that stat over the max, thereby freezing the game again. I had to start the game over from scratch, making sure to use the tokens correctly so that it wouldn't happen again. I had maxed out all my stats just before the seventh, final boss, and beating Story Mode. 

    My favorite part was One-on-One. There was something about the special tables and music that just hit me the right way. I mostly chose 9-ball, occasionally going with 8-ball if I wanted a change. There was even a snookers table for playing straight billiards. I didn't know enough about the rules at the time, so I barely played that one. I'm thinking there was a two player mode as well, but since I didn't have anyone else to play with, I just used the game's opponents. I couldn't tell much of a difference in gameplay among them, although their stats and styles were supposedly different. I would usually end a gaming session with a few rounds after everything else. I'm fairly sure that I played this game for fun more than any other, as opposed to just grinding away to get every possible challenge in the game.

    After the I lost my games in the flood, my outlets for pool dwindled. I found some online games over time, but done exactly matched the mechanics and graphics of Backstreet. I got a few pool books for my store, but reading is never the same as actual playing. I least I got caught up on the history and rules. As ESPN started to get the rights to more pro and collegiate sports, the need to air pool across their family of networks slowed down. I don't know if they still have the matches anymore. At least at I time I would watch them. Other sports networks have aired pool as well, including a dedicated channel in the upper, upper reaches of my cable box at one time, but it is never at a time I would watch.  I still want to play, but I have yet to get my chance. 

My Video Game Side Quest: Browser Games

    When I got out of playing on consoles, I eventually found my way to computer games via browser home pages. See, I didn't yet have a computer, yet I would need to go online for my store.  I would have to look up books as well as print off various pages This is beyond standard searches and stuff. From the late 2000s to mid 2010s,  I would go to the Floyd County Public Library in Prestonsburg to do this, as they had a better policy on printing at the time. (Since then, the current management has taken up a much stricter policy.) Also, the library was a great place to wait while I was getting car maintenance and my mom's appointments. After I finished what I absolutely needed to do, I would usually wind up with some extra time. At the time, the library's default browser was Yahoo, and I noticed the 'Games' tab. I would sometimes try a few games out, just to wait.  However, there was one game I wanted to try that wasn't there. 

    That game was Bejeweled. I had first read about it in Games Magazine (now known as Games World of Puzzles Magazine), and I wanted to try it out. It was one of the first three-in-a-row games, if not the first to catch the public's attention. Yahoo didn't have it, but MSN did. I would switch out browsers to play it, in the non-combative mode. Just matching until no possible moves were left. I would play a few other games if I got bored. They had an interesting 9-ball pool game. It had tricky mechanics, but it was the only place I had for pool.

    Well, the library got remodeled, and the computers moved to a different room, as well as replaced with newer models. The browser also changed to Google, and I joined Facebook and started playing games there instead. I also finally got a computer, meaning I'd only have to use the library's computer for print jobs or goofing off while waiting. Yahoo had gotten rid of its games tab, and I never really liked Microsoft. I basically stopped playing browser games, even on my own computer.

    But things would change.

    Google doesn't normally have games on its home page. Normally. Occasionally, the doodle will have a link to a game randomly. Whenever there is a game, it is something unexpected with abstract rules or uncommon themes. The most notable of these was an RPG that was in conjunction with the recent Tokyo Summer Olympics. You played as cat competing in certain sports, while also completing various tasks. I googled hints in solving some of these challenges, while making sure not to delete my search history to keep my progress going. Finding out there was a house I overlooked that kept track of my achievements was great, even if I had already finished almost the entire game. I still check the doodle to see if there is anything to play. Just recently, YouTube has started to have small, casual games available, beyond what there is to download on GooglePlay. I haven't look too much into this yet, but I've seen many of these types of games elsewhere.

    Late last year, I noticed that Yahoo had brought back its games tab. (Yahoo is still my mom's go-to browser.) It doesn't have the large selection it used to, but I still checked some out. At first, after trying out a few games, I settled on a mahjong tile-matching game. Now, I am greatly familiar with mahjong, although I have never played, but I had seen others playing something similar. I had also seen the ads. While I didn't always beat the game, I did win enough that I got bored with it. I then moved on to jigsaw puzzles. I loved jigsaws when I was a kid, but I lost them all to floods. Yes, many of the images are cursed enough to suggest they were generated by AI, but I still like them. The puzzles got easier once I noticed that I could focus on just the edges. The rest of the pieces would vanish, until the border was done. Then, they would come back, with the right third on one side, and the rest on the other. And the pieces would show up in the same places with each puzzle. This allows me to finish a puzzle in about five minutes, or less. I started out at 8 x 6, but I have since moved up to 10 x 8 most days, or 12 x 10 if I've got the extra time. I've also started to do the daily Candy Crush Crushable brainteaser since February. (More on this in a later post.) I either solve it immediately or I need multiple tries and hints to get it done.

    I have even started to check out the games on Bing, Microsoft's update of MSN. For the most part, I have only checked out games that are similar to ones I've seen in ads elsewhere. I've only played a fruit merger game on a regular basis, and that was an over a month ago. Bing still has the same 9-ball game that they had years ago. I tried to play it again, but the mechanics are just not quite to my liking. Still better than other pool games I've seen. 

My Video Game Library: Tonga

    Even by my standards, Tonga was weird

    I would never have ever gotten Tonga if I had never played it on a demo disc. It was just that weird-looking, but it was innovative in ways that were beyond many platformers. You played as a pink-haired guy who ended up on a tropical island being invaded by evil, magic pigs.  Years before Angry Birds. Along the way, you defeat the pigs by learning new skills and unlocking special weapons. The game also had sections rendered in a "3-D" effect, allowing you to go 'into' the background as it were at times. While the game was basically a platformer, it had many RPG elements as well.  Achievement missions and side quests that you had to perform to beat the game. I never did get all of them completed. Some of the side quests were just a little too hard for me. One of the missions was to return a lunch box to a character. Unfortunately, lunch boxes were also power-ups used to restore health that you kept until needed. I accidentally used the wrong box, and I couldn't reset the game back to before I used it. I didn't complete the mission correctly, but I still got the credit when I finally met up with him.

    There is reason why I am being a little vague about Tonga. I started playing the game at a time when my grandmother was in the hospital for rehabilitation. My mom would spend the evenings with her, while I stayed at home. As such, I played a lot of games later a night, so the memories of some of the levels are slightly surreal. It didn't help that some of the levels were already weird. One section involved saving a village from the pigs and restoring their water supply. Once done, the water returned to a fountain being filled by streams of water coming from the mid-sections of male statues. You can guess where exactly on your own. 

    The original game was highly rated, and successful enough to garner a sequel. Tonga had a longer game, but only faces five evil pig bosses, instead of the seven in the original game. There was just enough new material added that the sequel didn't feel like a straight rehash of the original, but not enough to warrant keeping the game line running. Like the first game, while I beat it, I didn't get every achievement. 

    I really liked both games, but it is has been so long  since I played them that I can't remember more details. I don't think I replayed them much. I just had to replay certain levels multiple times just to move on to beat the game, although I feel that I had a slightly easier time with the second game. 

    I just wish that I had played it a bit more.

My Video Game Library: Legacy of Kain: Soul Reaver

    During the mid to late 90s, I got a little goth. Not all the way wearing black all the time, but goth nonetheless. I blame it on my bad emotional state at the time. Anyway, when I played the first demo of Legacy of Kain:  Soul Reaver, I was amazed.  The story was deeper than I imagined.  The gameplay was so interactive. Technically, the game was a sequel to Blood Omen:  Legacy of Kain. I barely knew of the game and never played it, but it didn't look like the type of game I would be interested in. Soul Reaver felt different. Just the two levels that had demos showed a great mix of combat and puzzles, as well as an intriguing backstory. You play as the vampire Raziel, a lieutenant to Kane, the head vampire who has taken over the land in the first game. Before the game starts, you were killed for having developed wings to fly, and have been in the underworld for a long time before being revived by this Elder god. Upon returning, you go out to defeat the remaining vampires, while trying to avoid vampire hunters out to kill you. You have to shift from the physical world back to the spirit world at times, both to regain power as well as to solve some of the puzzles. After gaining new abilities by defeating the vampire bosses, you defeat one last lieutenant to end the game, before setting out on a new quest.

    I replayed this game quite a few times to get the most out of it, which was a little strange for me. There was just something about going back to solve the puzzles faster and defeating all of the bosses while exploring the many locations in the game. I don't think I even had to use many tips, or cheat codes which were available. (Okay, I did use one once for one of the replays, but only because I messed up something and I wasn't able to defeat one of the bosses. I wouldn't have been able to complete that run without it.) I really got the most out of that game.

    There was a Soul Reaver 2 released soon after. The first game was so large, some portions had to be saved for the second game.  I never got it.  I think I may have skipped it because I was so busy opening my store that I just forgot about it or something.The was also a sequel of Blood Omen starring the original Kane as well, but that was another game I didn't want. I can't even remember if I knew about the game at the time. (I did some research to make sure I remembered everything correctly for this post, as well as many of the others in this series.)

    In 2003, Legacy of Kain:  Defiance came out.  It was the first PS2 game I got after the flood destroyed my entire Playstation collection. Although it was supposed to be a Christmas present from my mom, I was the one who had to buy it from Walmart. It was also the only time in my life I had to be carded for anything, as it was rated Mature. (Note:  I was over thirty at the time, with a touch of gray on my goatee if the cashier had noticed. Still, I find it kind of great that I looked almost ten years longer. I still think I could pass about five years younger, or more, in certain situations. I have yet to be in any other situation that required ID for age limits.) The game combined the two protagonists into one game. Levels shifted from Kain to Raziel.  Each character maintained most of the powers from their previous games, gaining and improving them as the game progressed. Finally, through some sort of time travel, the two met in a final battle.

    And that's where the game lost it for me. At the start of the fight, you were one character. Then just before winning, you shifted back to the other one to finish the game. No spoilers here, but the winner was not the one I preferred. You then went to battle the final boss. The fight was just button pushing. Literally. After knocking out a few tentacles, that would grow back, you had to hit buttons on the wall behind the tentacles in a certain order to win. No real strategy involved.  You didn't even need your special powers to win. The game ends with an uncertain, but somewhat hopeful, future. Maybe. I would go on to buy a guide for this game, because I was sure I had missed something while playing, because I finished it in less than one weekend. I hadn't. I tried replaying the game, using some of the bonus codes for new modes, but I didn't feel it was interesting enough to even finish the first level with any of them.

    I still like the series, but the way it ended was just anticlimactic. There were talks about new games in the series, but nothing came about for them beyond updated versions with some tweaks. I'm not even sure if I would go back to the games if new ones were out. 

My Video Game Side Quest: Demos

    If you weren't sure about whether or not to buy a game or system, there was really only one option back in the 80s--demos. Many places had systems set up so that one could try out a game or two for certain systems. The first one I ever tried was in the early 80s. I went with my mom on Saturday morning to South Mayo Tire to either get the tires rotated or the oil changed. Instead of waiting downstairs, we went upstairs to the electronics department where they had some video game system demo. Of course, I went to play with it. I was having troubles with it though, probably because I was holding the controller upside down, (I have always been a little ambidextrous, doing things offhandedly, so I had the directional buttons on the right and the action buttons on the left, which was backwards.) After a few minutes, my mom forced me off, even though we were basically the only people up there. I spent the rest of the time watching a Smurfs cartoon I don't think I had seen yet. She never took me back, going elsewhere for maintenance when I was there. South Mayo Tire may have gotten rid of its electronics section a long time ago, but it is otherwise still in business. 

    Other stores had demos too.  The ones I remember most were the original location of Lowe's in Pikeville and the Sears at the Huntington Mall. The latter one may have had a Phillips CD-i with the cursed Zelda game port on display. I don't remember ever playing any of them. Video game stores also had some demos up, but I never played them either, as they were usually at distant malls where I didn't have all that extra time to play games.

    In the mid/late 90s, when I was unemployed, I would make trips to Prestonsburg just to break the monotony. One thing I did was go to Walmart and play Super Mario 64 on the GC demo for a few minutes, usually after I lost a few lives. I thought it was fun combining my takes with others to beat the game. There were other system demos up, but I never tried those. I would wind up playing other games at GC demos in Paintsville and Norton. (Walmart has since opened larger, Superstore locations nearby at both spots.). Today, you can't find demos at Walmart, at least locally. Some gaming stores might have playable demos up, but I so rarely go into them and I rarely have enough time to play when I do go.

    I had another way to demo games in the 90s. The Official US Playstation Magazine used to have a demo disc in every issue.  Similar to the disc I got with my PS1, the discs had previews and playable levels to a number of games each issue. These discs were the main reason why I bought one almost every month. The mag even had a mini-guide for many of the playable demos, so you could complete them. Some of the levels could be replayed as many times as you wanted.  Others ended as soon as you lost all your lives, and you couldn't replay it until you reloaded the CD. A few were on a timer, ending after ten minutes or so. I replayed one game multiple times to see as far it went, always losing my lives or hitting the time limit, before I finally finished it, only to get an ending saying you needed the full version of the game to see more.

    While I didn't play every game, or watch every preview reel, I played most of them. In fact, some of them were more enjoyable than some of my full games. For a few months after the 2003 flood, those demos were all I had to play until I could buy more new games. Yes, strangely enough, I had saved most of the demo discs, as well as getting newer ones. 

    Ultimately, the magazine was cancelled, so I had no more new demos. A few other free discs had been available at places, but I never tried them as I was afraid of their dubious nature. Nowadays, with most games being digital, such demos would be hard to come by anyway, even if I had a newer system. I think I remember seeing something packaged with some of the few gaming mags that are still left, but I don't know if any of them were demos. 

    The next few posts will be about the games I only bought because I loved the demos so much. None of them were typical of what I would have normally bought, and I might not even considered them unless I had had them as part of a demo.

My Video Game Library: Q*Bert?!

    When scheduling posts for my latest series, I tried to plan it so that any of the side-quest posts on Mondays would coordinate with the following regular on Wednesdays somehow.  For instance, when I had the side-quest post about gaming magazines, the following regular post was about a game I picked up due to reading about it in a magazine.  Last week, I talked about guides, and the next post was about the game I needed guides that most for. My next side-quest with tie very closely with the next few games.  However, since I want the side-quest posts to precede regular post immediately, and since I don't to have regular posts on Mondays, I am left with a quandary.  I either have to cover games I didn't want to or come up with some other tangential topics to cover.  These posts were supposed to occur nearer the end of the series, but because some of the side-quest posts had to be split up into two parts, I am forced to put one of these 'filler' posts up today.

    Technically, my first ever 'video' game was Q*Bert. The board game. One Christmas, some relative got me this. Probably a second cousin or great aunt or something.  The game board was a tray in the bottom of the box.  On it was the pyramid from the first level of Q*Bert.  Each block of the pyramid had a hole in it to place a peg before the start. One player was Q*Bert, hopping from block-to-block grabbing the pegs.  The other player controlled the bad guys trying to stop Q*Bert, moving in their own ways. (The actual rules may have included more players controlling the bad guys, but since I only had my mom to play against, this is the only way we could play.) The goal for Q*Bert was to get all the pegs, and staying away from the enemies. He even had the flying saucers on the sides for a one-time escape. The other player won by preventing Q*Bert from getting the pegs. I can't remember anything beyond this.

    I lost almost all of my board games in the 1986 flood, save Trivial Pursuit which I had taken with me. I got many of them back. For obvious reasons, Q*Bert was not one of the games still available. (I would end up losing them almost all again in the 2003 flood, save for most of a small portable chess set.  As of yet, I still haven't gotten any of them back.)