Hot Heart

Camel Up Won a Spiel de Jahres award, I think. It won some award at least. Not a bad little game, all told. You have a six-sided die for each coloured camel, numbered 1-3 and two of each. Those dice go into the pyramid dice shaker and the little mechanism allows you to turn it upside down and plop one out at a time. The aim is to try and bet correctly on a variety of things. There's using a card to call first place as well as last place (more points to whoever's first, fewer for later correct bets and penalties for incorrect ones), there's claiming a tile for which camel will come 1st or second in each 'leg' (once all five die are revealed, leg ends), there's initiating the rolls themselves and then there are special tiles for +1/-1 movement. The camel movement has a quirk to it because they can stack and then if a camel moves, any above it in the stack also move. Using the example above, there's a very good chance that green will come first in that leg (because of the +1/-1 tiles, whatever is rolled, the camel will go to blue's space). You can already see the white and blue dice out, meaning those have moved, so if either the yellow or orange camel move next, they'll take green with them, who will stay on top. Otherwise, if green happens to move first, yellow or orange might stack above it and claim first place. Which means there's a bit of tactical bidding and assessing the odds and what to do with your one action per turn. Anyway, long story short, I WON WITH MY SKILL. Also had a go at Heroes Wanted with all five of us and no 'rookie setup', doing the bootleg DVD/conveyor belt/explosions scenario and I'm not sure they like it even after becoming more familiar. I certainly dig it, because it's got these really deep, interesting tactical elements that most won't appreciate after just one play. It all comes down to not just your hero's powers and abilities and the villain's but also what other players do. For example, one player took Master Hedgehog who is pretty fearsome for messing with other heroes by giving them injuries and generally throwing off their rhythm with poke attacks. Fortunately, I didn't suffer too much because I happened to have a hero (Ultimate Beard!) whose mutant power allowed him to lose injuries but also the Ultimate part meant I received an extra mutant power card. So even though Master Hedgehog did mess with me a bit and even KOed me (bastard!) for 4 points and 1st place on a headline (3 more points), I could recover and managed to fight back at one point. Things didn't go so well for Leather Rocket, however, who was mercilessly picked on by the hedgehog and with no way to heal injuries. He wound up with five injuries which meant +5 damage he had to defend each time he was hit (typical card defence values are around 4 each and you start with six cards which also double as your attacks). Thing is, being unfamiliar with the game (it's really one you have to put in a good few games, I think), neither did too well out of it. Master Hedgehog was getting points for KOing a hero but missing out on damaging the villain and KOing minions, while Leather Rocket should've just got the hell away from him (you have a card that lets you move 4 spaces!) and avoided all those injuries which completely destroyed his game. I guess the real lesson is that PvP is good as an area control move but not sole point-scorer, because I thrived once the prickly bastard moved away and got to focus my efforts on damaging the villain and KOing more underlings, which eventually won me the game (and I really wasn't expecting to win!) The hero powers really should shape your approach, but you've still got to diversify a little alongside that. Just another thing you learn with experience. So, yeah, I really enjoyed it, but maybe that's because I've already had that moment of clarity when everything all clicks into place (I think the guy who came second had one near the end) whereas for most it takes a while to absorb it all and the games can take a good while because of it.

So, I managed to win Watch Dogs for cheap on eBay. Also from eBay, got my hands on AC: Black Flag and Need For Speed Rivals. Three PS4 games for a total of around £55. Yay.

I'm guessing the bounties might refresh daily? Not sure if they'd get you high enough. I've also earned Kill Orders or something, not sure if they're currency for stuff.

I've been in the new bit. The Queen's weapons are all pink. SO PRETTY.

Your best bet is to keep a saved search on eBay and find someone looking to sell their copy for cheap. That's how I got mine, and it just so happens they hadn't done anything besides remove the shrinkwrap. Dean's mostly right though. Unless it's a real popular game that gets loads of expansions, they tend to hold their value or increase. [redacted] should stay pretty valuable, for example, and likewise, I know my copy of A Study In Emerald should be well sought after in Europe.

He's cheating on us! Deeeeaaan, ban him! BAN HIM!

Had a go at Assassin's Creed Arena the other night. It's a good game, but not a great one. Works well with solid mechanics and captures the video game elements quite nicely. Funnily enough, it's based on the multiplayer mode. So... it's a board game based on a video game, in which a company is simulating history as part of development of a video game. So meta. The idea is to either assassinate targets or carry treasure back to your 'base' (your corner of the board). You have a hand of cards, most of which should be dual-purpose; either daggers for playing to match the health values of your targets or for moving that number of spaces (values between 1-3). These cards might have extra conditional abilities such as drawing extra cards if you end your movement on a blue square. Other times you might have weapons or other tools like disguises to move undetected or concussion bombs to clear guards away. What makes it a little trickier is that your hand of cards is also your health, so you have to be careful not to run out at a bad time... or just figure the net value of killing a target versus losing 1VP (if you die during your turn) is worth it. Further complicating things are the guards who patrol those routes depending on their colour. If one is 'nearby' a building with a target (at one of the corners) then the target cannot be assassinated. You can either wait, and hope they move away or try and kill them at the same time. In addition to that, every time you're spotted while moving, you discard a card; with a guard's line-of-sight being down each street to the next dot. On the plus side, you can jump over their heads with no ill effect. The tougher guards and higher value targets are closer to the centre, and as you can see, the red guard will always be nearby so you'd need to kill him, too (and he has 4 health on his own, meaning at least 2 cards with daggers are required). Plus, if you decide not to move, you can 'hide' instead and draw cards but will receive fewer cards the closer you are to the centre. To bring in a more random element, each turn starts with an 'event' card being drawn which might move guards based on a die roll, spawn outer city (white spaces) targets or introduce animus glitches. Just so happens that one guy nabbed a high value treasure and then the 'no PvP allowed' glitch came up on the next turn. Oh, yes, you can attack each other. Though that can be risky if they have some counterattack measures (I did warn the other guy...) Overall, it's a simple, easy to learn game that has a light mix of strategy and tactics. Though, as with any game with random elements, be prepared for that luck factor, both good and bad. For example, I managed to get onto a blue target right away but became stuck there as all the other guards congregated nearby and then other event cards meant a couple of occasions where I had to discard a card for each, so I spent a few turns having to hide and do nothing else. Or a friend needed to move but had a hand full of weapons, smoke and concussion bombs. And that brings me to the cool thing in that it does a decent job of presenting the theme. You feel like an assassin negotiating the city, lying in wait for a target or just dashing in recklessly for that last push to the 15 VP winning total. There's a rhythm to its mechanics and some fun little moments tucked in there. I enjoyed it and I think more casual players might like it and even play more often. Well worth what I paid for it at any rate.

Ha, for me there was a, "Why are there so many with yellow health bars?!"

I forgot that was a thing. So did a lot of people.

The Lone Ranger?

Oh, man, did an event during a Patrol where a thing needed protecting (a Haz-something?) and it was me, a lowly level 4, and a level 20 dude. Got to wipe out a huge chunk of the last spawn with my super and just about survived to complete the objective before dying to some tougher survivors in the last mob. Then us two awesome Guardians waved at each other and danced to celebrate. Even that was fun. Can't wait for some proper co-op stuff. Also, I'm noticing some nice little touches. - On a story mission, I was hanging about, shooting dudes rather than progressing, and a dropship appeared in the sky; I'm presuming it's a random thing but still cool. It shot at me as it passed overhead too. Not cool! - If Ghost is talking to you through your... helmet(?) and then you press the sensor bar button to bring up the objective stuff, the audio of his voice switches to reflect the fact that he's popped up in front of you. - Look up when it's raining and you get little drops of water on your visor (just another of the cool visor effects you've probably already noticed).

Won an auction for Watch Dogs on PS4, so yay, should be getting that sometime soon.

Playing this 'Destiny' game on PS4. You've probably never heard of it.

My friend got his PS4 and Destiny. He might ask to join the clan -- not sure if I can invite him -- if so, he's Level500Boss.

Was checking through my LE contents last night and it seems there are a few redeemable codes hidden in things like the Arms and Armament Field Guide as well. They might already have been part of that massive code dump earlier in this thread, but it's a nice little touch.

http://forum.pressxordie.com/topic/617-last-crap-movie-you-saw/?p=132525 In short: utter crap. My friend said he couldn't form an opinion or rate it because he's not sure what he just watched. Understandable, but to me that just means it was a waste of time and money.

Oh, well, this is agonising. My copy of Destiny arrived super fast but I have no PS4. I got totally psyched after watching this video of the Venus Strike on hard. It actually reminded me of when you got to the high-level stuff in Resistance 2 co-op, which I loved. Except this time there are fewer people so it's not quite as chaotic, plus, you know... powers!

Got my review of A Study In Emerald done. It is not an easy game to explain.

My PS4 should hopefully arrive by the end of the week. Potentially next week but they were pretty quick last time. Funny thing is my friend just discovered a cheque for £334.17 that he hadn't cashed in and was eyeing up PS4 deals. Saw the Destiny one for £330. Coincidence? No, destiny!

I was actually thinking Warlock. And it looks like the group already has a mix of Hunters and Titans mostly. Obviously, I'll try them all but for clan purposes, I'll go for that.

Claimed for my free PS4 (through a distributor's loyalty scheme related to work) so I figured I might as well get a shiny new game. Also picked up a year's PS+. I actually don't know what the base console includes, but I'm guessing like a short trial, so yeah.

The tough raid thing sounds awesome if it's like Halo co-op on Legendary. Plus, I think it saves your progress with that leader, so you don't have to do it all in one sitting, just get to a checkpoint. Ya, so I ordered the LE of Destiny. Now I guess I'd better actually read up on some stuff and figure out which class I want to play. Gave TItan a go just to get stuck into the beta but it was a bit zzz, even though I was the lifesaver for teammates during that tough/long mission. Might get better as it levels though? Suggestions?

Sod it, no point waiting a couple of weeks so went and claimed for my PS4 now. Woo, 'free' PS4! So... is it worth getting the limited edition of Destiny? I'd probably want the DLC, so being able to get that and the game for £80 along with any extras seems like an okay deal.