A Little Bit of Neglect: Animal Crossing

HOW MANY BITS, MERCER? 3/8 BITS

When I purchased my 3DS originally, it was so that I could buy and play Animal Crossing: New Leaf. I'm not sure what I expected, really, or if I thought that it would be able to hold my attention any longer than the other Animal Crossing games, but now I find myself playing it mostly out of guilt. I know, that sounds crazy, but guilt is a very real motivator for me—even when things are supposed to be fun and, well, games.

A Little Bit of a Mess (and a LOT of nerdiness): PAX East

HOW MANY BITS, MERCER? 0/8 or 7/8 depending on my mood.

The time is upon us, children, the time of year when little nerdlings all along the east cost get uppity and antsy and angry because PAX East is 167 days away, and tickets are almost already completely sold out. If you didn't get tickets yet, hurry quick, because only Friday and Sunday passes are currently still available and even their availability is low.

The reason I say hurry is for one simple fact: PAX East was the best experience of my whole past year (other than getting married).



Yes, people complain about the availability of PAX East passes (which I will also do here a little bit), and boycott it (for valid reasons, for the most part)—but truly there is not another gaming convention that can beat it. Most arguing and volatile parties agree—PAX East is a great way to draw commonalities between people that otherwise would be more likely to flame a stranger than shake hands and play Cards Against Humanity with them. Maybe I'm stereotyping a little bit, but I speak from a place of experience. When I went to my first PAX East with my friend Walt and soon-to-be-husband Jerry last year I had no idea what to expect—I was nervous about the hordes of people, anxious about lines, and worried that I wouldn't be "legit" enough for Walt's tabletop friends to like me. Man, I was so wrong.

PAX, despite being a totally garbage user experience for buying tickets is AWESOME. Not only did I get to hang out with all the people in the world that I love most, I also got to meet new friends, play new games that hadn't been released yet and run a Light Weight RPG campaign with people that I never thought I'd get around a tabletop all together. PAX was (and will be this year) a safe haven for all nerding types—whether they be fully-closeted or out cosplaying as a Brony, a Little Sister, or Grim Fandango. Everyone was friendly, talkative and generally accepting, which also seems to be a far cry from what I've experienced from my fellow gamers in the past. I mean, who doesn't want to live in a society with rules like these, even if it's only for three days:

Long and short of it is—PAX is awesome, and worth every red cent you spend to go. Do it at least once in your life if you care about video games, yourself, freedom, or FUN. It is just that good. I mean, heck, look at the sweet haul of goodies I got for tabletop just on my first day:

Now, on to the bad—you did see that I mentioned 0/8 bits up there, right? Buying tickets for PAX is a total mess. Not only are there scalpers up the wazoo who buy tons of tickets at a time and resell them for prices 5+ times more than they purchased them for, but Penny Arcade's servers for the site go down almost immediately every time, apparently. I experienced it first hand this year when trying to purchase tickets for Jerry and I (and for Walt later, which I forgot originally because I am a huge jerk). Penny Arcade announced that tickets would go on sale at midday the next day, and I (like thousands of others) logged on to the site at 11:55 to make sure I got the treasured three-day passes. Unfortunately, due to traffic I assume, the PAX East Registration site went down and neglected to inform me (when I was able to refresh) that tickets were on sale at another site. I checked Twitter and realized the error and immediately jumped into queue on ShowClix, the service PAX used to sell tickets this year. After sitting in queue for about 30 minutes for the three-day passes that I had selected at the start of the process, I was kicked out and informed they were all sold out. While I understand that maintaining a server is difficult, I felt that there was more that could have been done to tell people on the actual PAX East site proper that there were ticket sales happening elsewhere—the fact that it wasn't updated until around 12:30 after three-day passes sold out was a bit of a farce and a disservice to loving fans.

Whatever, I got the tickets in the long run and myself, my biff Walt and my hubby Jerry are all going for yet another round of awesome game-filled fun this year. And I can. not. wait. <3 p="">

A Bit of Mail: Loot Crate

HOW MANY BITS, MERCER? 8/8 BITS

While I know that this blog is meant to about video games, I figure every once in a while a something-nerdy-by-proxy is allowed to pop up. We're all nerds here, right? Equal opportunity nerdy-thing-lovers? Even if you aren't, this is my blog and what I say goes. So hmph.

Loot Crate, for those of you that haven't heard about it, is one of those subscription box services like Birch Box or Bark Box. But it's for nerds. Their site labels them as "Epic Geek & Gamer Gear Delivered Monthly!" which is basically exactly what they are. As someone who has never been a fan of "pay and we'll deliver it by mail" things, I was pleasantly surprised.

A Bit of Balance: Adult Gaming

HOW MANY BITS, MERCER? 0/8 BITS!

Ugh, adulthood. Goodbye to the days of "Which game am I going to play first?" and a resounding hello to "Do I really have time for that right now?" Every day I find myself questioning how best to schedule out my plethora of hobbies: Alright, I'll read for an hour, hula hoop and watch Doctor Who for an hour, then I'll play Pokemon while Jerry showers and maybe get a chance to schedule in an ARAM with Walt. 

No one wants to live like that, but it is how many of us overstimulated adult gamers choose to do it. It's tiring and, for me at least, the provider of a just the right amount of guilt to reconsider if my lifestyle really is worth the effort. It's a far cry from when I spent hours in my basement playing World of Warcraft with whatever boyfriend I had at the time but, ostensibly, it is better.

A Bit of Handheld: 3DS vs 2DS

HOW MANY BITS, MERCER? 6/8 BITS




So, some of you may not know this but I am a walking contradiction. In one of my older posts (several, actually) I mention that playing a DS is not "really" gaming. Let it be said: when I was younger, I was an asshole. I still maintain that console and PC gaming is a more immersive and complex experience, but I have been spending more time on my 3DS as of late given the recent release of Pokemon X & Y and the less recent Animal Crossing: New Leaf.

A Bit of Exploration: Obduction

For those of you who haven't heard the news, Cyan, Inc. the super-sick creators of awesome games like Myst and Riven are coming out with a new game: Obduction. Despite the fact that the name does admittedly irk the spelling nazi in me, I will not be kept from playing (and preaching about) it. From my understanding, anyway, Obduction is meant to be an amalgamation of Obfuscation and Abduction—at least that's what I take from its Kickstarter page.

A Bit of a Casual Return

Yes, friends, foes, countrymen. I have returned. I know, I know—how cruel of me to neglect something so harshly and then return semi-triumphantly years later.

The fact is, kiddos, people change. I forgot about the blog and every time that I was reminded of it I would think Oh, yeah, I probably should try to revamp that thing huh? And, just like everything else, it got caught in the riptide of my life—graduate school, new jobs, books to write, men to marry. But I'm BACK. Yes, yes—the posts are old and towards the end of the whole endeavor I got kind of lazy, but this time I am coming back with a vengeance.

Keep your eyes peeled for newly updated posts, better design, and sweet, sweet content!