Just Include Everyone

Heads up, there are spoilers in this article for Star Wars. So if you don't like spoilers don't read this and don't read the link to the article. Okay, now I read this article: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/star-wars-force-awakens-rey-toys_568bef03e4b0b958f65cf2c7?utm_hp_ref=women&ir=Women&section=women&

After reading it, I found myself rather annoyed again. I say again, because I had this reaction when there were complaints all across the board about the fact that there were no Black Widow and Gamora toys or merchandise anywhere to be found with the Marvel lineup. To refresh your memory a bit about why that bullshit happened here is an article from The Mary Sue: http://www.themarysue.com/invisible-women/

Even J.J. Abrams knew this was a problem as shown here: http://www.ew.com/article/2016/01/09/jj-abrams-star-wars-force-awakens-rey-toys

Oh come on. No Rey, really?

There are so many reasons this annoys me; the big one being that it's boys and girls asking where Rey is. The other is I was one of those young girls. I found a love of comic books thanks to one of my uncles who is a huge comic book fan. I even remember the first comic book from his comic collection that he let me read that got me hooked on comics. I loved Star Wars and I loved Star Trek thanks to my grandmother who was a huge science fiction fan. Video games were things my brother Rob and I discovered on our own through our friends, but I loved those too. These were things I grew up with, that mean a lot to me, that are part of my childhood and that came with me into adulthood where I love them still.

The other thing that bugged me is this mentality among some people of oh the women and the girls don't matter even though in this day and age there is so much proof that more and more women/girls are playing video games, reading comic books, and loving things like Star Wars and Star Trek. There's also the "surprise" that so many people wanted merchandise of Rey that really bothered me. I mean, really? They're surprised that people wanted to buy toys and other merchandise of THE main character from the movie? Right, and I'm surprised that they know that ONLY boys like Star Wars. Yes, that was sarcasm.

I'm just going to go out on a limb here and say that not every girl is about Disney princesses. Yes, some are and that's great, but some of those very same girls love Star Wars too. To sit there and imply that they don't is not only ridiculous, it says a lot about how little they respect the fact that girls and women are also nerds and geeks.

It brought me back to days growing up in my home town where some of the meaner boys and girls in my class would tell me disdainfully that video games weren't for girls or that I was weird for liking Star Wars and Star Trek. There were also times where I would buy comic books from the used book store/comic shop or go into the comic book shop across the street and I'd have a few guys act like I had come into their bedroom at night watching them sleep like a creeper. I'd also get a couple that would see I was buying comic books (something that I wanted to do in peace, I mean fellas really you were rude) and it would treat me like I was a contestant on Jeopardy and grill me with questions challenging my comic book knowledge basically implying I had to prove that I was worthy enough to be in their domain. People who do that seriously need to grow up.

It's not a good feeling to feel like you're being excluded simply because of your gender especially from something like Star Wars that's meant to be for everyone to enjoy. This thinking that girls and women don't belong because "it's for boys" is a total crock. That's not how things are now. There are so many girls and women who are into comic books, Star Wars, video games, and all the wonderful nerdy and geeky things that are out there. It's not okay to say they don't matter or they don't belong. They DO belong just like all the boys and men belong so that everyone can share their love of something they feel is truly amazing be it Star Wars, video games, cosplay, and more.

I've found that as an adult, there are less people telling me I don't belong because I'm a woman. Instead they ask me what I think of this or that comic, or ask if I've played a certain video game and if it's worth buying and that makes me feel great. It gives me hope for my daughters who are also into a lot of the same nerdy and geeky stuff that I am; hope that more and more people won't worry about whether or not something is "for boys" or "for girls" and just celebrate the fact that they truly enjoy something and share it with others. We need more of that and less "surprise" that there are girls and women who are nerds and geeks that love all this awesome stuff too. Just include everyone. The kids today seem to understand that, why can't these people?

Assassin's Creed Syndicate and Jack the Ripper DLC Totally Worth It

I just finished my first play through of Assassin's Creed Syndicate and the Jack the Ripper DLC and I feel this is one of the best games in the Assassin's Creed series. Why do I feel that way? Well, let's get started. Set in 1868 London, you don't get to play as just one assassin; you get two. Jacob and Evie Frye who are twins and assassins. Each has their own special skills that you can upgrade as the game progresses. For example, Jacob has some impressive brawler skills and Evie has a very handy stealth skill known as chameleon where she can blend in and become invisible. For the majority of the game you can switch between them in the menu system quite easily depending on who you want to play as. There are missions as part of the story that are specifically designed for Jacob while others are designed for Evie.

The Frye Twins, Evie and Jacob.

Both Jacob and Evie are likable main characters with differences in how they do things. Evie wants to hunt down the remaining Pieces of Eden to stop the Templars while Jacob wants to help their city in a more straightforward way without the mysticism, which does bring up their sibling rivalry during some cut scenes, but it's done in a way that is meaningful and shows that in spite of their differing worldviews they do love each other. Guiding them along the way in the various missions is fellow assassin Henry Green. Henry Green became a favorite of mine because he was this interesting person who was great at handling arguments between Evie and Jacob with such graceful diplomacy. I also loved the interaction between him and Evie because it was sweet and it was clear that they were both fond of each other which was why I found the collecting all the pressed flowers around London for Henry side quest so endearing, because it leads up to a wonderful moment between the two.

This is Henry Green and he's fantastic!

Victorian London is impressive. I mean, there are some truly beautiful scenes in the game that show tons of details right down to the background people. There is a lot to see and do in the game that can keep you busy for hours. There are side missions where you can take over different gang boroughs and then you have a gang war where you have to eliminate the gang leader of that neighborhood adding power to Jacob and Evie's gang The Rooks. There are also Templar hunts where you find and assassinate them from a variety of locations.

One of the many gorgeous views in Assassin's Creed Syndicate.

Another impressive view. 

Some of the side missions I really liked were the ones with Charles Dickens, Charles Darwin, and Alexander Graham Bell. They're fun to do and add a little extra something to the story. You also get some very cool assassin's tools to use courtesy of Mr. Bell like voltaic bombs which when dropped shock people with some massive electricity. That's right. You get an electric ball of doom which works great when you're fighting a mob of enemies. There's also some side missions with Queen Victoria.

The main story isn't too shabby either and it is interesting to see how Evie and Jacob handle the situation in their own unique ways. I did find that I played as Evie more because I loved her stealth abilities and I enjoyed the heck out of her weapon of choice; the sword cane. I also liked Evie herself a lot because she is this intelligent, independent woman in a time when women were not really allowed to be and she can handle her own in a fight and be totally ruthless. I also loved that she looked like a real person; not an over the top sexual fantasy ideal. I also felt that this made up a little (not a lot, but a little) for the whole "women are difficult to animate" fiasco and found that I enjoyed the heck out of the game running around London playing as Evie. 

Evie is awesome!

Evie kicking ass. 

That's not to say I didn't love Jacob too. His fighting skills are equally impressive with his weapon of choice, brass knuckles. I also had a fan girl moment when I recognized the voice actor for Jacob as Paul Amos (that's the actor who plays Vex; one of my favorite characters on the show Lost Girl folks) and that just added to the fun for me. I even took Jacob to some of the Fight Club areas to earn some cash (yes, I took Evie too) for the various crafting and upgrades needed and it was so much fun to play.

Jacob goes to town at the Fight Club. 

That's not to say there aren't any flaws in the game. There were a couple that drove me crazy. Let's highlight the Queen Victoria missions, because that's where I noticed this particular problem. I know that there are timed missions in Assassin's Creed and they can be insanely frustrating. For the record, I hate timed missions. It adds a lot of pressure. All of the Victoria missions were timed which had me swearing a lot, but none as much as the second mission in the series known as Drive for Lives. I HATED Drive for Lives. I hated that mission so much; not only did I swear in all six languages that I know, I thought about finding the sadist that designed this mission and throat punching them repeatedly. It took me at least five tries until I got this done. For starters, the insane challenge of getting a wagon full of lit dynamite across the bridge and into a safe area in 80 seconds was just not going to happen because while the carriage driving controls aren't terrible; they're not great. It felt like I wasn't going very fast at all even with the boost and carriages can't take a corner when you're hurtling at a high speed. Then there was the factor of it felt like every single carriage that ever existed in 1868 London was blocking the path and the bridge completely along with the enemy carriages trying to stop you. I was determined to beat that mission out of sheer pride by the fifth time. I finally did it, but I was pretty angry by the end so I had to take a break from the game for a bit.

Operation: Drive for Lives. Pure Evil. 

Free run still gives me problems occasionally. There are times where it's okay and then there are times where all of a sudden be it Jacob or Evie, I'm sticking to a wall when I didn't want to or climbing up something when I'm chasing a target which can be rather annoying especially when some of those chases require that I be stealthy. Those issues aside, I enjoyed playing the side missions and the main missions a lot. There's also a fun surprise mission in the game that is worth checking out when it appears.

Once I finished the main story, I started up the Jack the Ripper DLC. This puts the Frye Twins in London twenty years later with Jack the Ripper terrorizing London. Jacob has disappeared and Evie arrives in London from India having received a letter from her brother asking for help in dealing with the Ripper. It's refreshing to see Evie as a middle aged woman so well done and the fact that she's still kicking ass is completely awesome. Evie's learned a few new tricks, the big one being the ability to strike fear in enemies. This introduces a couple of new assassin's tools, fear spikes and fear bombs which come in handy during a fight where the challenge is you can't kill or harm anyone as they're non lethal.

Evie older and still amazing.

The side missions and main missions for this DLC are done quite well with a mix of all out brawls and some where you have to do a bit of sleuthing. There are some places in the story where you do get to play as Jack the Ripper and it's done in a subtle way that isn't too in your face about everything and doesn't detract from the story. Most of the events take place in Whitechapel of course, but you are free to explore and get all the side missions done if you wish. Evie really shines here and I loved playing as her again. I do admit that I missed Jacob however, and wished I could have played as him here as well. Another thing I noticed was a rather irritating glitch that happened every time Evie was driving a carriage. There would be a lag spike and the game would stop in places and then start. Luckily, there weren't too many of those carriage chase scenes so I still enjoyed playing the game. Overall, the game is fantastic and so is the DLC. There's tons to explore, even more to do, and I enjoyed it as much as I enjoyed Black Flag, perhaps even a little more than Black Flag. Assassin's Creed Syndicate and the Jack the Ripper DLC are totally worth it and worth playing through more than once. 

2016 Gaming Is Looking Great

 First of all, Happy New Year dear readers! I'm still working through my backlog of games, but it's hard not to get excited about the upcoming games for 2016 especially after watching the featured video on the Geeks Are Sexy website about all of the great games coming out. I'm pretty excited for Persona 5, Final Fantasy XV, and The Last Guardian to name a few. It looks like 2016 is looking great for us gamers. You can check out the awesome video here: http://www.geeksaresexy.net/2016/01/03/198036/

Fallout 4: The End Of The World Never Looked So Good

I just finished my first play through of Fallout 4 on the PS4 and my overall impression is that it was amazing. I truly had fun playing it especially when I got to run around in power armor. We'll get to all that in a minute. First you start with the usual creation of your character. You can play as male or female. I chose female and let's just say the hairstyle choices were interesting. Again I ask, why were there several types of bald? At least there were some long hair choices, but I went for a fancy updo. There are a lot of choices for the face also and you can add scarring if you want or different facial features.
Once that was done, I started the story and the world seems like it's a nice place, you even get a cheerful talking robot by the name of Codsworth out of it. Then the Vault-Tec rep shows up at your door informing you that you and your family are approved for entry into Vault 111. A few minutes later a news report warns of a nuclear attack forcing you and your family to rush to the vault and as you're waiting to go in a nuclear bomb detonates in the distance causing even more panic. The platform you're on then lowers everyone into the vault and everyone is put into cryosleep. Years later, events cause you to be awakened and then your adventure in Fallout 4 begins.

Entering Vault 111

Things are not as your sole survivor remembers in their little town. Signs of war, desolation, and destruction are everywhere. You do run into your old pal Codsworth and he becomes your first companion. This also gives you a tutorial on the game controls and the crafting aspect of it i.e. rebuilding settlements. The controls are fairly easy to manage and you can go back and forth easily. Of course the big thing is to loot everything everywhere you go because salvaging things like metal and copper are important to building many things such as water pumps that give you purified water or radio beacons for recruiting settlers.

The old homestead isn't what it used to be. 

After the tutorial is out of the way, you're instructed to head to Diamond City as part of the main story quest. Of course, you can explore other areas as you go which leads you to new characters and companions one of the first after Codsworth being your canine companion Dogmeat. There are 12 companions in all to find in Fallout 4 as you progress in your adventure. There are also 4 different factions that you can join and do a ton of quests for, but bear in mind that as part of the main story you are going to have to pick one and this affects your relationship with the remaining factions. 

Just a sole survivor and their dog.

There's a lot to do in Fallout 4 with the various faction quests and radiant quests. There are also side quests from various cities and settlements which can keep you busy while doing the main story quest. Factor in the quests that you can do for your companions and there's at least 100 hours of game play or more. There are a ton of dangers while exploring the world of Fallout 4 like Queen Deathclaws, Super Mutants, and Raiders just to name a few. The SPECIAL (Strength, Perception, Endurance, Charisma, Intelligence, Agility, and Luck) system is here too and it's quite streamlined in the way your abilities are managed and each skill requires a higher rank to unlock as you progress via the perks chart. 

Taking out some raiders.

The power armor was a great plus for me because it's like running around in a tank and kicking lots of ass and it was awesome! And while I liked the first power armor set I found, the best one to me was the X-01 power armor I found while doing  a quest and it was a complete set too. This thing could stand up to all kinds of things even suicider Super Mutants. Walking away from explosions virtually untouched in the X-01 power armor was all kinds of amazing. 

One of the first power armors I found.

Behold! The X-01 power armor in all its glory!

There are glitches of course, but not a lot. I only experienced a couple. One was with being stuck in the elevator in one building and the only fix was to reload my last save and start over. There was another one where I was floating above the ground and the game froze completely. Again, reloading my last save seemed to do the trick. Another thing that bothered me was all the radiant quests mainly from The Minutemen leader Preston Garvey because after a while they become tedious especially with the kidnapping ones when it seemed like the same NPC settler got kidnapped three times. I started to think that perhaps they were getting kidnapped on purpose just to screw with me. I also wish there had been a way for the factions to work together against the scary villain instead of forcing you to pick one and depending on your actions, the other factions would become your enemies. I wish there had been a varied path with some options instead of you had to be on this set path and there's no other way around it.

That being said, I enjoyed Fallout 4 a great deal. There's lots to see and do, tons of things to build, and plenty of adventure to be had. It's worth checking out and definitely worth having in your gaming collection.

The Holidays Are Upon Us!

So I have been busy knitting for Christmas and my birthday is coming up. In the downtime, I've been enjoying Fallout 4. When things die down a bit (see after Christmas and everyone is stuffed from all the pie) I'll be posting more Mother Gamer posts. We'll start with Fallout 4 yay! That will be followed by some backlog gaming posts. I still have Assassin's Creed Syndicate and Destiny to play.

I hope everyone is enjoying the holiday season and has a wonderful time with their friends and family. Until next time everyone. :)

Backlog Gaming Review: Assassin's Creed Unity and Dead Kings DLC Vive La Revolution!

I waited to buy Assassin's Creed Unity because of all the glitches and problems the game had upon its release that I kept hearing about. I'm glad I waited because it seems they addressed and fixed many of those glitches. There's a ton to see and do in Unity besides the main story such as side quests, puzzle quests, murder mystery quests,  and co-op missions that you can play with friends or privately. I liked the character of Arno Dorian (much more than I liked Shay in Rogue) and it was interesting to see a lot of his interactions with his friends and a variety of historical figures like Napoleon Bonaparte and Marquis de Sade.

Introducing Arno Dorian

The viewpoints in 16th century Paris are stunning, showing off a beautiful thriving city with a lot of people. The scenes with the Revolution were also interesting to see and interact with because of the people and I found I would stop and just listen. This also had me remembering all the French I learned as I listened to various conversations. At times having a lot of people could be frustrating when having to chase a target for a mission or spy on someone because they would get in the way causing a mission to fail if you didn't get to where you needed to be in time. There were also times where the controls would be a little wonky and Arno would grab a wall when I wanted him to just run or jump. It didn't happen often though so I didn't mind too much. I also didn't see the point of the game having four different types of currency. I'm not kidding. You had the livres, (what francs were first called) sync points, creed points, and helix credits. I felt this all could have done with just one currency. Instead you have money to buy stuff, the sync points and creed points are used to upgrade gear and skills, while the helix credits you use real money to buy things via UPlay. All of it is completely useless. UPlay is not only pointless, it just screams of greed. The game really only needed one currency and nothing else.

A spectacular view of 16th Century Paris

 I do understand that Arno's tale of revenge with the Assassins vs. Templars has been done before, but I found I did like the story for what it was; an entertaining adventure with some pivotal history and interesting characters in it. Yes, they did take a few liberties with some of the historical aspects, but it flowed really well and was done in a subtle way that made all the events mesh well together. I liked the character of Elise also, and I wish there had been a few more main missions with her because she offered a different point of view and also showed that not all the Templars were power hungry insane people. There's also the factor that she and Arno together were intriguing and they made a great team.

Elise and Arno 

There are several different ways to do many of the missions which I found to be fun. You could either sneak in a window or disguise yourself as one of the soldiers and just walk right in the front door. The AI for the enemies is more aggressive here so I found myself relying heavily on smoke bombs often. At some points it got a little frustrating especially with the final memory sequence because I had to be a certain distance from the target to finish the mission. There were a couple of glitch issues such as a location on the map for a quest not showing up and an odd one where Arno got stuck in a wall and it looked like he was swimming on the wall. Those were the only technical problems I ran into which isn't too bad. Overall the game itself is fun to play with lots to see and do. There's even a mission with a hot air balloon that's very cool.

Hot air balloon over Paris is awesome

Once I had finished up the main story of Unity, I started the Dead Kings DLC. This happens a week after the events of the main story and in Franciade (now Saint Denis) and Arno  runs into the Marquis de Sade once again who wishes for Arno to help him find the manuscript of Nicoleas de Condorcet which is rumored to be in the tomb of Louis IX. Arno agrees to help him in exchange for a ship to take Arno to Egypt. After that you get to explore Franciade and while not as big as Paris it's just as beautiful and there's lots to explore above and below.

A bird's eye view of some of Franciade

Arno runs into some tomb raiders who happen to be working for Napoleon Bonaparte and we see him once again throughout the area. Napoleon is looking for something in a Precursor Temple. While we all know what that could mean Arno does not, but he knows that whatever it is can't be good. He also befriends a young boy named Leon and they work together to figure out exactly what it is Napoleon is after. There are a lot of side missions here too along with some murder mystery quests and a few more co-op missions as well. There are even a few take over the enemy fort missions that are fun to do as well.

Some of the missions could be a bit frustrating because a lot of them were in the catacombs and it could be very hard to see with how dark some of the areas are. I had to use Eagle Vision a lot just to be able to see where I needed to go. Luckily there were only a couple of places that were difficult to see in. You also get some new equipment that is pretty awesome like the guillotine gun basically an axe and a grenade launcher melded together. While not the stealthiest of weapons, it's a ton of fun to unleash all that firepower on your enemies.  The lantern on the other hand, annoyed me. Yes, the catacombs are dark and yes you need a lantern, but it seemed a lot of the puzzles relied heavily on the lantern and it was a bit clunky and tedious. I mean having to use a lantern just so I could scare away roaches to jump on a ledge was a bit much. 

The Precursor Temple was interesting to explore with a few lighting puzzles and brazier puzzles. The scenes with Arno and Leon chatting together were nice because it showed Leon gradually getting Arno to see that there is always hope and even caused Arno to change his mind about a few things. With the main story and side missions Dead Kings is only a couple of hours, but it's a couple of hours worth playing. 

Arno in the Precursor Temple

Overall Assassin's Creed Unity (which includes the Dead Kings DLC for free) is a solid game and it is fun to play. There's a lot to see and do on your own and plenty to do with your friends via co-op missions. It's worth checking out because of the fun of the missions and because of the fact that the main character is actually pretty likable.

Note: I played this game on the PS4.

Backlog Gaming Review: Assassin's Creed Rogue, Not Perfect At All

*Note: There's going to be some spoilers in this review, so if you haven't played it yet and don't like spoilers you may want to wait.*

Next in my gaming backlog was Assassin's Creed Rogue. I was curious about the story because it is told from the Templar perspective via the assassin turned templar character Shay Cormac. It started out promising enough and then it was a long frustrating adventure in disappointment. There were just so many issues that I had with this game among the story and mechanics. 

Shay Cormac, the protagonist of Assassin's Creed Rogue

Shay starts out as an assassin who seems full of promise, but is brash and quick with his temper. We see Achilles from AC 3 as a much younger man and he seems a little more aggressive here because of all the anger he has inside him from losing his family. He has high hopes for Shay however and things seem to be going fairly well until a trip Shay takes to Lisbon to get an artifact, yet when he took it he discovered it wasn't a normal Piece of Eden but an artifact that kept the world together. When Shay removed it, it caused a huge earthquake that killed a lot of people. 

Of course Shay was angry and there is a huge fight between him and Achilles about it because he was convinced that Achilles set him up. In fact, Achilles had no idea that would happen and it makes things worse when he doesn't believe what Shay has told him. This is when Shay leaves the Assassins and joins with the Templars. The game is all about Shay's story in this moment and what he does to try and stop the assassins from getting more artifacts that will essentially destroy the world. 

This is when the frustration, issues, and annoyance with the game come into play. Let's start with the ship controls. Yes, we're in the Americas again a la AC 3 which drove me up the wall with all its issues. I didn't mind until I tried sailing The Morrigan. This was clearly a copy and paste of Black Flag (which I loved) and I could forgive that if only the ship controls hadn't been so damn clunky. I couldn't understand why they were this clunky and awkward when in Black Flag they were practically flawless. There was no excuse for these controls and it made me miss Black Flag and the Jackdaw which was a much better ship.

The Morrigan, woohoo clunky sailing

Then there are the battles that involve running. It got pretty old fast when Shay would constantly be trying to climb buildings or trees when I didn't want him to. The controls for combat were clunky as well, plus there were moments where the game would freeze or Shay would be hanging in mid air for no reason at all. A few times I would get a black screen and the game wouldn't load at all. With all those issues, I truly don't understand how AC Rogue got all these great reviews from others and makes me wonder if we had played the same game, because it is not perfect at all. 

Shay never doing what I want him to do during battles

The story started off interestingly enough, but then it just flops around and makes me despise Shay. I understand the story shows you that there really is no good or bad on either side and that both are flawed although they both claim to want the same goal of peace. I thought Connor was bad in AC3, but Shay is a whole new level of emo asshat. For someone who claims he doesn't want to kill innocents, kill others, and wishes the assassins and Templars would talk to each other he does a lot of killing of his former comrades and practically no talking at all. It's a lot of yelling bravado about how he wants to protect the world which is all well and good except for the part where he hunted down his fellow assassins and murdered them. I will never forgive the writers for him killing Adewale who was one of my favorite characters in Black Flag. 

At the end it's not even satisfying when you realize this is all over a misunderstanding on behalf of Achilles who didn't believe Shay until the end when he sees for himself and realizes that he was right about the artifacts and telling the truth about what happened in Lisbon. There's the usual final battle and of course Shay kills his best friend who still believes in the assassins to the very end. Achilles is the only one left and of course Haytham Kenway (poor Edward Kenway would have hated to see that his son joined the Templars and became a total jerk) shoots Achilles in the shin making sure he'll never be able to get in his way again, but we know how that turns out later. 

Here's the thing, Shay does question some of the things the Templars do as well and yet he still stays with them. Yes, the assassins aren't perfect but so many of the Templars are evil sadists and he thinks he's going to protect the world with them. Really? Rogue just ignores so much of the already established lore and gave me a character that wasn't likable at all and in fact made me want to shove him off a cliff at so many intervals. Even the side quests with taking over gangs wasn't enjoyable because of the frustrating game play mechanics. This was as disappointing as AC 3 and that says quite a lot. So this isn't worth it at all. You can just skip it and get the back story with Unity which I will be playing next.