https://youtu.be/m_HIofD-nNA

A video version of a large chunk of this blog post

1. Gwent (1 day, 5:50:44): Around May I found out that CD Projekt Red had changed the rules around the Gwent Journey, so that journeys were no longer time-bound. This meant I no longer felt pressured to play every day in order to progress. Freed from feeling forced to play, I once again caught the Gwent bug and, as you can see, it became my most-played game. The addiction was also facilitated by playing on my phone (although that time is not captured here). Eventually, around September, I had to stop when the heft of the phone was giving me RSI issues. I had moved on to other games on my PC, so I took a break from Gwent. The developers announced that the game only has one more update coming, so we’ll see if the community around the game remains. That will dictate how much I continue to play Gwent because, after all, a multiplayer game is no fun if there isn’t anyone to play with. I expect I’ll get readdicted some time in 2023. ( Last year 23 minutes)

This year I played a LOT less; partly because I wasn’t home as much as I was in 2020 due to the COVID mitigations. Also, it was partly because I focused on programming with older Advent of Code challenges. Last year I wanted to make a list of games and go in order, but that fell apart when I got stuck on The Witcher 2 and stopped following the list. First up, a video of the games I played this year. Second, the text version of what I said in the video. Right before my Game of the Year selection, a graph of this year’s gameplay.

I used to have a Team Fortress 2 server on CentOS 6 with Virtual Box. Now that I’m using KVM/QEMU/Libvirt, I wanted to set up a new one. Also, Valve somewhat changed how they worked a few years ago and I wanted a clean slate. I started with a VM with 40GB. It’s not supposed to take that much, but I remember last time it took much more than the 10GB I’d given the VM and I don’t want to have to increase the disk size again.

2015 turned out to be an incredible  year for videos games for me. That’s a good thing because I was playing for the Extra Life charity to raise money for Johns Hopkins. I’d heard about it when the Giant Bomb guys spoke about it, but this year I had a reason - Johns Hopkins had saved Scarlett’s life twice! I’d experimented with recording myself playing video games when Dan started his Let’s Plays and used Camtasia. But there was no way I could justify paying $100 to record myself playing games. Then I discovered OBS which was, in typical FLOSS fashion, impossible to figure out. But then I found XSplit which had recently gone to having a freemium model. Once I learned what all the terminology was in XSplit I was able to go back to OBS - which I did because they actually catered to Linux in addition to Windows. The most fun moments have been when people have stepped into my Twitch or Youtube Gaming channels and chatted during the game. It brings back the social aspect that I grew up with back before everyone had internet.

Team Fortress 2 (33 hours):

https://youtu.be/uF9N-mD_3UY?list=PLEJrELYLxNgWsp76cFb5sqedFrKP9qQLw

I’m a seasonal Team Fortress 2 player. Although I play it here and there at any time of year, I tend to really play a lot during October for the special Halloween missions. This year Valve was busy working on a new mode that was released earlier this week so they released a community-made Halloween mode: Invasion. It’s the first time I’ve spent any money since I spent $2.50 to get a bigger backpack a few years ago. Overall, the new modes were a lot of fun and I’m glad that Valve has gone from what should be the basic level of video game company support- supporting community mods- to allowing the best of the best to make money by sharing in the profits made during community events.

Civilization V (18 hrs):

Mesa Bros

I noticed Dan was on my borders right when I started having the Cho Ku Nu, my special unit. Having played civ and RTS games with Dan, I figured it was strike or be struck. So I went to war. Unfortunately, Dan fights better than AI and because of the terrain features, it became a war of attrition that favored Dan. After a stalemate war, I offered peace and Dan accepted.

Poker Night 2 (8 hrs) - I find Poker Night 2 to be a bit harder than the original. Not sure if they upped the AI or changed anything about it, but I find it a lot harder to win Texas Hold ‘Em in PN2. Luckily, this game also includes Omaha Hold ‘Em and I have been doing a lot better with that game. While I enjoy Samson, I find the Banter to be a little lacking compared to the original. I think the developers did a better job of defining the player’s relationships with each other in the previous game and that led to somewhat better banter. Still, it’s fun to play Poker without worrying about real money and it’s a lot of fun so I’ll probably put some more time into the game later in the year.

Costume Quest (7 hours) - I completed the main Costume Quest and then continued on to the DLC. The game continued to be charming and I enjoyed playing it as well as the simple story arc of the brother and sister realizing they didn’t hate each other that much. Gameplay-wise the game is not too forgiving when you make a mistake. There aren’t any items to use for healing so any mistakes in the Mario RPG-like mechanics (hitting a button on a certain timing to empower your attack or reduce an attack against you) could lead to losing an encounter quite quickly. I think it took me about 5-8 tries on the final boss of the main game to get just the right combination of add-ons (which increase HP or allow you to retaliate when hit) and costumes to make it through to the end. It also doesn’t help that the enemies appear to level up with you. That is to say, if there’s enemy X at the beginning of the game and you come up against him later, he has more HP and hits harder. That’s a bit different than the mechanic used in most of the Squaresoft RPG games I played in my youth. That said, there aren’t really any consequences to losing a fight. As far as I can tell, you don’t even lose candy when you lose a fight. You just end up right where you were before and you have another chance to start the encounter again or move away to change the costume equipped.

In addition to the game I played this month, I’ve decided from now on to  include a running total of the top games to see if/how they change with time. For example, when I wasn’t paying attention, Saints Row: The Third made the Top 7.  (Which, raptr, is a weird number.  Usually these things are multiples of five)

First of all, a quick reminder that my Game of the Year doesn’t necessarily have to come out in 2012.  Because I don’t have the time to dedicate to video games, the price premium of buying it new rarely makes sense to me.  So my Game of the Year will be my favorite game that I played in 2012.

As I compiled my list I realized that I played a lot less games in 2012.  I may not have played a lot less hours (I haven’t bothered comparing the totals with 2011), but I definitely had a lot less variety.  A lot of that has to do with the birth of my daughter this year.  Only as the year has gone on have I been able to carve out some time here and there to play story-based games.  In addition, I resumed pursuing my master’s degree in the fall, right around the time I was able to have a bit more time to myself.  I didn’t have any gameplay at all in March, September or October.