PixlBit

News:

Mark started playing Civilization Revolution today, so I did too. It was recently added to backwards compatibility on XBO, and I had it digitally from when it was a Games with Gold freebie. I have the physical copy too because I played it when it came out in 2008. This is Sid Meier’s Civilization for the consoles. It’s streamlined and simplified for a controller and, I guess, a younger audience. Graphics are more cartoony in style.

 I got hooked on it for a good long time. Mark and I played one-on-one multiplayer. Then I played alone against the A.I.  . I love this game, but it’s still pretty complicated, not that you have to get all that deep with it. I could almost do without the combat in the game. I just like building cities, watching them grow and exploring the map. Often another culture will threaten me and I have to switch to a war economy and defend myself. It can get kind of annoying. Why can’t we all just get along?

Memory:

I'm thinking of Quake III Arena on Dreamcast in 2000. It was ported from PC and is just a straight ahead multiplayer competitive FPS. There’s a kind of story where you play the maps against bots, but it’s not really the thing to do. Mark and I played this a lot, one-on-one with bots. That’s the way we always played multiplayer on console back then. Quake III Arena plays very smoothly and fast making it really fun. I’m told that there’s still a community playing this on PC today.

Photo:

Say hello to team life from Skylanders: Spyro’s Adventure.

Camo, Zook, Stump Smash, Stealth Elf

Camo is half dragon, half plant. He was hatched at the base of The Tree of Life. He can accelerate the growth of fruits and vegetables to the point that they explode. Camo uses this for practical jokes and defense. Master Eon noticed this ability and made him a Skylander, and also his personal gardener on his days off.

Zook is a Bambazooker, a kind of sentient bamboo. Zook was the only one of his kind to realize he could walk. He carries a tube that shoots exploding thorns, acts as a telescope and as a digeridoo. He can also summon certain plants and fungus as a protective shield. Fred Tatasciore voices him.

Stump Smash was a magical tree that found himself logged by trolls. All that was left was two wooden stumps for hands. He chased the trolls away by smashing his stumps together like mallets. Master Eon heard and made him a Skylander. He can also spit acorns and make them grow really fast in order to entangle enemies. Kevin Michael Richardson, man of innumerable voices in animated TV shows and video games, voices him. Some of his roles that jumped out at me were: Tartarus from Halo 2 and Jabba the Hutt and Groot in several different shows.

Stealth Elf, at an early age, found herself in a wild woodland seperated from her parents. There she met a stumpy tree creature with the skills of a ninja. She became his apprentice and soon mastered the ways of stealth. Master Eon saw her and she became a Skylander. Now she defends the world and also looks for the reason for her abandonment as a child.