Recent Blog Entries

Listen, EME, we get it, closed beta test. Its cool, we understand how much work you have to do to get the game ready for launch. We know the PVP system is only partially implemented. We actually really enjoyed stomping the shit out of the two guilds who declared war on us, we didnt enjoy when the server reset and the stats were reset, only to have us lose the wars via them getting one kill. But hey its beta. A few of us got unjustly ganked by capped level players who didnt have anything el…

Back in June, I mentioned how highly impressed I was by Bethesda’s demonstration of The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim at E3. So much so, a game I hadn’t heard about prior jumped to a day-one purchase and won my vote for Game of E3. Not only did the game look gorgeous, but Bethesda promised a scope that seemed unrivaled by any other game. Now, no game is ever as long as the developers claim, and Skyrim is certainly no exception. Still, for myself and numerous other gamers, the region of Skyrim ha…

What happened indeed.

At a little before 3pm EST on Friday the 10th, Chrian messaged me on Steam. I looked at his message, wondering why he was sending me one, usually he waits, with perfect timing, for me to start watching a movie or tv show, to fire up a game either on steam or on another service, then sends me several cryptic messages, usually involving minecraft, ragns being ragns, or some equally strange topic, but it never fails, its always during something. He told me, with his little …

I’m gonna level with you all.. As someone who loves being immersed in well-written and satisfying stories, I had a really hard time working on this review of Gears of War 3. It’s not that the Gears franchise is necessarily lacking in the story department, it’s just that it’s hard to hear over the clamor of a chainsaw cutting through the logic required to tell a coherent story. Still, there’s no denying that the conclusion of the Gears saga was one of the most anticipated games of this past y…

Whether it’s the fact that Ocarina of Time is the only game I own multiple copies of (four), or the fact that I spent the first twenty days of November celebrating its games and characters, or the fact that text messages and e-mails notify me with a familiar “Hey!” or “Listen!” respectively, I have made no attempt to hide what a huge fan I am of the Legend of Zelda franchise. It should come as no surprise that I have been eagerly waiting for the release of Skyward Sword for the Wii since the i…

Arkham Asylum was praised as one of the best superhero games ever produced (can you think of another that comes close?). Naturally, its sequel, which was touted as a bigger, better, more expansive game has been eagerly awaited by the multitude of players who played the first. Since it is a sequel though, there are a few important questions. Does Arkham City live up to its predecessor? How does the experience translate to a wider world? Is it worth picking up? Still, the real question rema…

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Sonomaa (BG): Why are you deciding to charge now, when the game is only 50% to where you wanted it to be at launch? It seems awkward that we're going to be pa…

Game remakes can be a double edged sword. On one hand, faithful fans of a game or franchise will often pounce on the opportunity to replay an updated older game they have fond memories of. On the other, companies risk alienating their fans by making the fans feel they're more concerned with milking every penny out of a game by releasing new iterations with minor changes every few years. Two games that are very deserving of the recent high definition rerelease they received are the PS2 master…

When it was unveiled over a year ago at E3 2010, Kirby’s Epic Yarn was the unexpected game that captivated me. The trailer that depicted a colorful world where Kirby and many familiar faces appeared to have been trapped too long in a fabric store was simply adorable. While I was able to evade this game’s charm for a time, the aura of cuteness continued to claw at my mind with sugar coated fingers until it was simply too irresistible to oppose.

Before I begin, let me say this: Kirby’s Epic Ya…

Everyone has their summer traditions. Some people go fishing or camping. Others go on family trips. Me, I beat Mega Man X-X5. This summer I decided to do something new, and after completing my yearly ritual, picked up the Mega Man Zero Collection for the DS. That coupled with the recent announcement of the cancellation of Mega Man Legends 3 inspired me to show the Mega Man universe some love.
It has been one-hundred years since the Maverick Wars of Mega Man X concluded, and Neo Arcadia, a…

Given the dearth of games that have captivated my attention, this summer has given me an opportunity to work on the backlog of games that had piqued my interest but I had not been able to pick up due to the constraints of life. Chief among them was Darksiders, a game that many have heralded as a darker, moodier Legend of Zelda. Considering my love for the Zelda franchise, this seemed like the perfect game to satiate my yearning for Skyward Sword.
Darksiders takes place in a world where Ange…

As you've likely already ascertained from the harpsichord janglin' in the background, it is time for another edition of MASTERPIECE ISLADAR, wherein I shall constructionate words with other words and make a thing for you to read. Gather 'round, little potatoes, pour yourself a snifter of grown-up juice, and prepare for the aforementioned, but now about to be actually-mentioned, word parts...
It is unfortunate that while being an administrator for BlueGartr affords me privileges far beyond m…

The world views them in roughly parallel ways; deplorable mutants who earn their keep by offering gruesome solutions to problems beyond the ken of most mortals. Viewed as degenerate subhumans by a majority of the populace, they are often befriended by circumstance or out of sympathy from equally reviled misfits. Their trade is esoteric and unwanted, a mat…

Since BG has opened the floodgates with this new-fangled blog thinger, I've noticed a disturbing trend. While the blog entries have been both entertaining and informative, an important demographic has been entirely ignored: me. All these game reviews and whatnot are great and all, but really, how is the audience supposed to make an informed judgment on a thing if they don't know if Isladar would like it? More importantly, does Isladar like it? We can't let this shit be subjective. We can't …

This is a different game you've played before. In the thought process of making a Gears of War clone, Inxile Entertainment and Bethesda had the idea that few have been able to get coded properly. "Let's use swords and bows instead of guns and chainsaws!" Thus is born Hunted: The Demon's Forge.

In Hunted you play as E'Lara, who I will simply refer to as Elara. You can also technically play as Caddoc, but nobody is going to play as him. Elara is a scantily clad elf chick, and in this univers…

[Note: The following paragraph is intended for humor and is not meant to be taken politically. Please remove panties if jokes that touch on politics cause said panties to end up in a bunch.]

In his 2011 State of the Union Address, President Obama complained of a deficiency in the scientific progress of students in America. This should come as no surprise. In 2007, Valve released Portal, their surprise blockbuster which, in its climax, tasked the test subject Chell with killing GLaDOS, a com…

June is an exciting month. NBA fans have the end of the playoffs, brides have weddings, fathers have their day, and children have the start of summer vacation. For gamers though, June means E3 (at least since it moved to June in 2009). Considering the importance of this week for the gaming community, I’ve decided to do a special write up to share my opinions on what we’ve seen in LA (and because I now have a soap box to spout my opinions, so take that!).

(Warning: this is going to be especi…

So the May version update has passed - the first major version update in 5 months, heralding its veritably vast myriad slew of additions and adjustments, or so the dev team says.

Now, I'm sure we've all heard this somewhere before, and we've seen how its turned out for so many years...
It used to be that our biggest complaints as the playerbase would remain largely ignored by the development team, only to be responded with vague answers such as 'we'll look into it' and 'sorry, PS2 limitations'…

In 1999, Nintendo and GameFreak released the first 2 Pokémon games. Paired with a cheerful anime and plethora of merchandise, Pokémon quickly claimed its spot as a children's phenomenon. Over the past 12 years, Nintendo has continued to release Pokémon games. While the majority of the franchise has continued to remain rooted in the original age demographic that made it successful, the games have continuously managed to evolve and captivate those who originally made the franchise successful.…

TERA: The Exiled Realm of Arborea



Aion was several things: beautiful, different, and a welcome change to our normal MMO grind flavor of FFXI and WoW. The problem with Aion is that the grind turned out to be the entire game, one that left this terrifying taste in many of our mouths. I've spoke with former Aion players who shudder at the thought of another Korean MMO. They run back to FFXI in Abyssea easy mode or flock to WoW to be disappointed in Cataclysm, all the while saying 'A…