posted by admin on May 23, 2013 (7 hours ago)
Blacksmith and propmaster Tony Swatton documents the creation of a replica Final Fantasy VII Buster Sword in the latest episode of the Man at Arms web series. Cloud Strife himself would be proud of the results.
This isn’t some cardboard-and-foil job that you’d see at an anime convention; the finished product weighs around 80 pounds, and Swatton burned up three portable drills during its assembly. Swatton proves the sword’s impracticality by “wrecking” his back and arm while attempting to wield it, but stick around until the end to see the blade taste the flesh of unsuspecting soda bottles and fresh produce.
Swatton previously produced replicas of Minecraft‘s diamond sword and the Kingdom Hearts keyblade, among other bladed bits of nerdery.
Man at Arms builds 80-pound replica of Final Fantasy VII’s Buster Sword originally appeared on Joystiq on Wed, 22 May 2013 21:30:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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Source: Joystiq
posted by admin on (7 hours ago)
It’s not that there are too many indie games; it’s that there aren’t enough hours in a day to play all of them. The Joystiq Indie Pitch curates the best indies to play now and watch out for in the future.
What’s your game called and what’s it about?
Our game is called Jamsouls. We took inspiration from the famous tale of Pandora’s Box to create crazy battles between naughty evil creatures in a vivid and colourful arena!
How have sales and visibility been on XBLIG? Is $1 a good price point for Jamsouls?
XBLIG has poor visibility compared to other games featured on the Xbox Marketplace. We feel that the platform is dying slowly, and that Microsoft is not really interested in this indie scene anymore, which is a shame.
We chose the price of $1 because we wanted the game to have maximum exposure. The price of 80 points is very reasonable for anyone wanting to try the game out.
Continue reading The Joystiq Indie Pitch: Jamsouls
The Joystiq Indie Pitch: Jamsouls originally appeared on Joystiq on Wed, 22 May 2013 21:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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Source: Joystiq
posted by admin on (8 hours ago)
The NFL will receive $400 million from Microsoft over the next five years, according to an Associated Press source. The partnership was announced during Microsoft’s Xbox One unveiling yesterday and will see NFL content coming to Microsoft’s next-generation console.
As for the NFL side, fans will see Microsoft branding on-field during live games starting this upcoming season. Coaches and other team officials will be provided Microsoft Surface tablets, with the possibility of further technological innovations coming from Microsoft throughout the longevity of the deal.
The Xbox One will have interactive features integrated during broadcasts, including SmartGlass, group Skype calling and fantasy stats available during live NFL games. Recently, Amazon announced a limited edition version of Madden NFL 25 bundled with a free DirecTV NFL Sunday Ticket subscription.
Report: Microsoft’s NFL deal valued at $400 million over five years originally appeared on Joystiq on Wed, 22 May 2013 20:30:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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Source: Joystiq
posted by admin on (8 hours ago)
Magic the Gathering: Duels of the Planeswalkers 2014 almost has enough development mana to be summoned onto the battlefield this summer, preceding the release of the new card set in late July. We’ve been given the opportunity to bring you a first look at a new card that will appear both in the digital and paper-based versions of Magic 2014: Savage Summoning. It also happens to be green, which itself happens to be the best color. Dissenting opinions in the comments will be Trampled.
Some tips from the developers:
Savage Summoning is an instant that has a couple important uses. When you are playing against a deck that has creatures attacking you, you can use it to surprise their attacking creature with your own instant-speed (flash) creature. Because your creature is cast at instant speed, your opponent will need to commit to the attack and could be accidentally running their best, but smaller, creature into your surprise. And because your creature is getting a +1/+1 counter, it’s likely to be big enough to defeat the attacker and live through it.
When you are playing against a deck with counterspells, Savage Summoning becomes an important threat. Because it makes your next creature spell uncounterable, your opponent with a counterspell in hand needs to counter the Summoning because they won’t be able to counter the creature spell. Because it’s an instant, you can cast it at the end of your opponent’s turn, which means the mana they spend to counter can’t be used on your own turn, when you can cast the creature spell as normal.
The post Magic 2014: Duels of the Planeswalkers — Savage Summoning card revealed appeared first on PC Gamer.
Source: PC Gamer
posted by admin on (8 hours ago)
Here’s how technology works in Crusader Kings II as it stands right now: You set the focus for your entire realm to Farming, Legalism, and Tactics… then you ignore that screen for the next 400 years unless you click on it accidentally. The Old Gods (and the accompanying patch that everyone will get for free) is attempting to change that by making technology a more active system. The final dev diary goes into a little more depth on how this will work. You’ll find the video version above, and some analysis below.
The best way to describe the new system is this: Duke-tier rulers and up basically serve as the fonts of technology for the world, and their advances will trickle out to neighboring provinces over time. These fonts are fueled by tech points, which you will be able to spend to purchase an advance in each of the 18 newly-consolidated technologies. Unlike the base game, you won’t have a random chance to discover the next level of a tech over time, and tech focuses are out.
The way you generate tech points is based on buildings in a province and the liege’s skill. Martial skill will generate more Militatry tech points, Stewardship generates Economic tech, and Diplomacy will advance your Cultural tech. The spread of each tech can be seen in the newly-skinned data layer, demonstrated above. Because if there’s one thing we grand strategy players love, it’s more data layers.
The other tidbit we got that hadn’t been previously spoken of is the addition of “Steppe” provinces. Much of Eastern Europe will now be considered part of the Steppes, allowing Altaic and Magyar culture rulers to build the new Steppe Warrior Lodge and Steppe Riding Grounds improvements. These will ensure that their levies are more dominantly composed of mounted troops, as they were historically, since the default troop boosting buildings tend to be infantry-heavy.
As a bonus catch, it looks like the Steppe pagans are getting their own holding portrait art, instead of using the default pagan ones.
The Old Gods releases next Tuesday, and we’re fairly sure we’ve extracted as much possible info as we can at this point without actually playing it. If you’re hungry for more, sink your axe into our announcement interview, breakdowns of the first, second, and third dev diaries, details from the developer livestream, and the most in-depth Q&A about the expansion in all of existence.
The post Crusader Kings 2: The Old Gods final dev diary details overhauled technology system appeared first on PC Gamer.
Source: PC Gamer