Review of the game, Tavern Master

Greetings, readers. I’ve not done a game review in a very long time. So, here are my thoughts and my review on an independent game called Tavern Master. The game, from 2021, released by Untitled Studio and Whisper Studios, is a game set in Mid-evil London where you are the proprietor of a tavern and inn. The characters look a lot like Lego people, but it is simplistically fascinating. I have caught myself playing it for an hour or two at a time before. 😉 

You begin with a small, unfinished building. First, go ahead and complete the building, hire three servers and a bartender, name your tavern and your set to proceed to your first day in business. The tavern’s prestige score and weather dictate how many daily patrons you’ll receive. You start with beer and water, however after doing research [ click on a tab], you can get beverages, food, bathrooms, inn rooms and a guard. 🙂 

Your guard is vital! If you don’t hire one, eventually a thief will come in the cloak of darkness and rob one or more of your barrels of liquid profit. Like in any other business game, the whole object is to turn a profit. The higher levels your staff reach, the more coins per day they want. If you don’t pay them enough, they could get sad, angry and then quit! Also, keep an eye on your customers. If they wait too long for their drinks, they might storm off! 😦 

Eventually I hope to have enough staff and money to add a washroom and inn rooms. I have already done so in a mode called, ‘sandbox’. Here you have unlimited money and available space to expand. right now, this game is on sale on Steam gaming for $7.49 U.S. It’s 50% off during the Steam spring sale! 😀 

I give this game a very high rating of 8/10 stars. It’s very enjoyable and its sister game, Blacksmith Master, is coming out soon. Until next week, have a great weekend, take care, do an act of kindness, and as always, happy reading. 

I’m going back to basics

Greetings, readers. There must be a middle ground between the Amish lifestyle and the lifestyle I currently live. My day begins with coffee or hot chocolate. I then imediately head to my laptop and begin playing games on Steam. I’ll either hop a virtual train, airplane or manage my made up Pittsbugh Parrots in my made up baseball league. Morning reality meter = 40%.

The afternoon gets a little more realistic. This is the time when shopping, chores, laundry and other tasks are accomplished. I like to wake up slow and have an easy morning, alowing my body to get all the back spasms or other minor bodily issues out of the way. Let’s make certain that I am a functioning human being before I set foot out the door. Also, if I’m going to meet someone at a cafe or Panera Bread, the afternoon is the best time. I’m the most awake and the hungriest. Afternoon reality meter = 80 to 100%.

The evenings are when I mostly go back into my own little world. I’m either having company over for lite supper or I’m back to the computer games, YouTube or a movie on Netflix. As a writer, I am always checking out other folks’ ideas and stories. I say to myself, “Now why didn’t think of that plot line, or, Oh shucks, I could have wtitten that so much better.”

At what I call my ‘wind down time’, I hop into bed, turn out the lights and listen to music on Spotify. Almost always, I find myself playing tunes from my teenage years or earlier. Maybe I want those years back??? Nah! I’d just have to live it all over again, perhaps making different or God forbid, worse mistakes. Yikes! Evening reality meter = 65%

I truly wish that I had the willpower to get rid of most of my electronic divivces and live a simpler life. You might say, “Sounds like you’re having fun to me.” You would be correct. However, my productivity as a citizen is embarrassing low. I feel like a lump of coal, not even worthy to be put in the fire. If I found gainful employment, and wrote stories or a novel and my off hours, I believe that my productivity and overall health would improve. As a matter of fact, right now I am listening to nature sounds as background noise. So soothing!.

Well readers, will see if I can obtain the goals I have set. Can I get a job and/or write that best-selling novel? Time will tell. Until Friday, take care, have a great weekend and as always, happy reading.

It looks like it is 50 degrees, but it is only 19

Greetings, readers. Sitting here in my chair by my living room window gazing out at the construction site and the Days Inn behind it, the sun and blue sky make it appear as though it could be a nice warm day. In reality, it is only 25 degrees F. When I left for coffee this morning at 7:30, it was a balmy 19. Tee-shirt, hoodie, down coat, knit hat, and gloves was mandatory outer wear. Even as a child I hated getting dressed up like a polar bear just to go outside without catching pneumonia. Yes, readers, appearances can be deceiving, for the high is only expected to be 32 degrees at 3:00pm.

As I’m dictating, clouds are thickening. According to the weather forecast, this was supposed to be a “partly sunny day.” I suppose this still qualifies. I know sometimes at camp in Maine, it can be cloudy in the morning, yet the afternoon can be sunny and beautiful.

On to another topic, which I will call mini technology grrrr, last evening I was looking for a baseball game for the laptop which is mostly an app for iPhones. I found it, but do you think I could download the damn thing? Finally I had to stop to go to sleep. I will try again another day. The game is called 9 Innings Baseball and when I play it on my iPhone it is awesome. The graphics are unbelievable. Yes, readers, you know me, I am a big kid at heart and love my baseball and football games, a.k.a. simulations. Some of them are so complex you need a PhD just to operate them. I’m not certain if it will happen in my lifetime, but one of these years I think a Star Trek type holodeck will be invented and you could magically appear in any baseball stadium or local ball field you want, and enjoy watching any two teams you can imagine. Boy, I hope that does happens in my lifetime. If I’m ever lost, you would know where to find me.

Finally, prayers go out to anyone affected by the cold snap from Canada to central Texas. Two words for you people … bundle up. Please remember to check on family and neighbors, and don’t forget the elderly and the homeless.

Speaking of the homeless, next Wednesday’s blog entry will be on this topic. I think it will be a good post. Until then, take care, have a great week, love one another, and happy reading.

Out of the Park Baseball 18 is a hoot

Greetings, readers. About a month ago I purchased from Steam a really good-looking baseball video game. I watched the trailer, and thought to myself, that’s for me. The price was right, and I love sports games, so I clicked purchase and downloaded it. My fun was just beginning.

Obviously I was going to take a good look around the game to see what it had to offer. I quickly learned that the graphics when playing a game are something from the 1990s. That, my readers, is this game’s only downfall. OOTPB18 more than makes up for the bad graphics with every conceivable statistic you could want and several game modes you can choose from. You can be the manager of the team or the general manager and hire and fire as you see fit. You can play a season from any year 2017 all the way back to the beginnings of baseball, including the Negro leagues. I’m not certain if all the correct players are there since the Negro leagues were before my time, but I imagine that they have as many correct names as they could find, with all appropriate statistics. There is an on-line mode which someday I will try out and all major league teams have their own appropriate farm systems in place. lt is such fun to watch the Portland Sea Dogs – the Boston Red Sox AA team – play a season.

Now, for my favorite part. You can create your own league. When I saw this, I went bananas. I spent an entire evening putting together my new league. The NABL, or North American Baseball League. I have two teams in Mexico, one in Cuba, and yes, Montreal has a team again, the Montreal Mounties. With me being from Pittsburgh, you just know I had to have a team representing my home city. The Pittsburgh Steel Hounds got off to an 8-2 start and have fallen on hard times since. I tried to renegotiate a new contract with my best player and when he didn’t respond, I withdrew the offer, intending to make it better, but to my surprise and utter disappointment, he, “will no longer negotiate with this team.” Now I know how George Steinbrenner felt.

Another cool feature is the daily news page, complete with newspaper, all the leagues’ activities, team injuries, and standings. It’s your whole league in a nutshell. This is what I do when I get up in the morning; I check my team’s page as I sip my morning coffee.

Also, there is a fantastic feature called real-time simulation. When activated, the games will be played at true-to-life speed. You see just the box scores in this mode, which in itself is intriguing. If there is a pitching change needed in any of the games, there will be a pause of a few minutes. That is how real this game is. If you choose to view the game, it will speed up again.

This is one of those games that I am going to discover something new about a month from now. It is never going to get old to me. Me and my North American Baseball League will be very happy I’m sure for many seasons to come.

Here is my final score, no pun intended. Graphics: 4 out of 10. On-line mode: bravo, lets give that a 10. Statistics: 10. Ease of Operation: 9. Features: 9.5. Bringing the final score to a 8.5.

A side note for you. Because of my fall last week I have a follow-up doctor’s appointment tomorrow morning. I didn’t want to take another personal day, but I also don’t want to damage the foot if there is something wrong that can be taken care of now. Rebecca will have another blog up tomorrow, and I will be back next week, hopefully for both blog days.

Until then, have a great day, take care, and happy reading.

From Rebecca: My day so far, May 4, 2017

Hi, Joe’s readers. I would have started this blog entry earlier, but I had to wait for Microsoft updates to process. After my husband Darren used the computer this morning, it downloaded updates when he shut it down. When I turned on the computer early in the afternoon, it installed those updates – for an hour and a half! I’m not used to updates taking that long. I read a book for a while, Borderline by Nevada Barr, until Darren started playing a video game, God of War Ascension, and I started watching him.

Darren is still playing while I write this. He is occasionally getting his butt beat but is holding his own. Lots of hand-to-hand combat with a few puzzles here and there. I don’t play many video games myself, though I used to when we first dated and early in our marriage, but I love watching Darren play. Sometimes I can see things that he misses, especially for the puzzles, and then it feels like I am doing it too.

I slept in this morning, since Joe is taking a personal day today and I didn’t have to go into work. (I love being able to do the blog from home!) When I woke up, Darren and I spent some time together. We watched The Price is Right while he ate lunch and I ate breakfast. We watched a bit of the news, then I turned on the computer to do this entry, and then waited for the update.

Later this afternoon, Darren and I will clean the apartment. We clean as we go and keep it tidy for the most part, but every other month or so we do a more thorough job. One will take the kitchen and the other will take the bathroom and vacuuming. It takes about 30 to 45 minutes to do, which isn’t bad. We used to do it every month, but we don’t get to it that often any more. We probably should though.

I will finish the night with the CBS lineup on television and a check on the internet. Everyday at some point I look at the sites Tor.com, John Scalzi’s Whatever blog, Carrie Vaughn’s Filling the Well blog, Facebook, Twitter, and the web comics Questionable Content, Gunnerkrigg Court, and Girls with Slingshots. I look at other sites sometimes, like PBS, but those are my favorites.

So, that’s my day off. Cleaning, blog entry, internet, video game, television, eating, and my sweetie, Darren.

Joe will be back next week with posts. Until then, as Joe would say, take care, enjoy May the Fourth Be With You Day if you are a Star Wars fan, have a great weekend, and happy reading.

Review of My Summer Car

Greetings, readers. For the past week and a half or so I have been fighting with my laptop to try to play a game on Steam called My Summer Car. This game was produced by one person in Finland, Johannes Rojola, and the graphics are awesome. The language is Finnish with English subtitles. It is set in 1995 and the cars are from that era. I’ve seen numerous YouTube videos dealing with this game and they are loads of fun to watch. However my five and half-year old Asus laptop just won’t play the game correctly. I can play the game but the mechanics of my laptop won’t let me do it correctly. I believe I’m having frame rate issues. The game just won’t run smoothly at all. I’ve tried changing the settings on the options menu to the worst possible graphics and screen size. That helps ever so slightly, but still not enough to really play the game. If anybody can tell me how to solve my graphics problem, it would be greatly appreciated. Leave me a comment here or on Facebook.

Here’s how the game is supposed to go. Your parents are away for the summer and you have the house to yourself. You have a shell of a car, basically the chassis, with all the parts in your garage. You have to assemble them one by one, including tightening all the nuts and bolts. All the while, birds, mosquitoes and pesky phone calls do their best to distract you. The most annoying creature in the game is the overnight cuckoo bird which never stops. If one or two bolts are not tightened completely, they will shake out and your car will die.

You have five meters on the top left of your computer screen which are urine (yes, you have to go to the bathroom in this game), thirst, hunger, fatigue, and dirtiness. You can die of fatigue, hunger and thirst, but not dirtiness. You always have to keep track of these meters, and eat and drink beer, water, or milk to keep the meters low. You have a sauna for cleaning, which is really cool, and a bed to sleep in for fatigue. When you are good and refreshed you can hop in the van, drive to town, and purchase items such as beer, pizza, sausage, milk, and the much needed mosquito spray. Later on, when your car is almost ready, you can purchase motor oil, coolant, and other such things at the same store.

Now, for the funny parts. One of the two main sources of income are that you are the septic man. You take a phone call saying that some neighbor’s septic tank is full, you drive the septic truck to that place and empty the tank. I believe you get 2,000 Polish marks. You can also chop wood at the barn and use your tractor to deliver it to whoever calls and requests it. Each job gives you a varying amount of money to buy your food, drink, and other supplies. This leaves you very little time to work on your car, which is the main goal of the game. On the weekend, when your car is finished and rally ready, you can race if you want to, or on Saturday evening you can go to the pub next to the store and get drunk on beer or vodka and eat polish sausage. Again, let me remind you that one person made this game; it is incredibly detailed.

My favorite aspect to this game is the boat you can take around the lake, and the island which was added in an update. You can visit the island with its small working cottage, and also you can dock at the town to buy groceries. It reminds me very much of rides in my boat around Bear Spring Camps. I don’t know where this gentleman got the sound-bite for the boat engine but it is spot on. Bravo.

To give this game a final score, I’ll have to rely on the YouTube videos I’ve watched of my friend Squirrel playing. Paul seems to be an expert at this game. Here are my final ratings:

Graphics: 8 out of 10

Modern game look: … okay, but it is set in 1995 and the game interaction is very retro, for example – the shopkeeper has hardly any facial movement when speaking. We’ll call it 6 out of 10

Things to do in the game: … I could literally spend all day playing this game. 10 out of 10

Total average score: a good solid 8.

For anyone who plays games on Steam, I highly recommend this one. Ready, set, go have fun.

Until next time, take care, enjoy the warmer weather, and happy reading.

One hour of sleep does not cut it

Greetings, readers. I don’t want to call myself fortunate today that Rebecca’s husband is under the weather and therefore she has to leave early, because Darren could use some help with a family chore. However, I am grateful for the early stop time.

I had an extremely rough night last night and I am working on a grand total of one hour of sleep. Way not enough. Traci had an issue and she needed my assistance. Her call came at ten minutes until 4:00. By the time I got back to the apartment at 4:15, I was up. You know how that goes. Your brain goes into crisis mode and when the crisis is over it is hard to shut the it down again. So I turned on the computer and checked out Facebook. Not much going on at 4:30. I wanted to play music but couldn’t without disturbing the neighbors. I couldn’t use my earphones because at the moment I am suffering from a severely clogged left ear. I am hoping it is the usual ear wax issue I have about once a year, but this is an unusually bad case of it. I may have to go to my family doctor to get my ears sandblasted, as I call it.

I was going to make this next topic a separate blog entry, but because I played it this morning, why not just tell you now? The other day I purchased from the PlayStation store a rather cheap two-year old video game, which is NASCAR racing. The graphics and physics are excellent. Steering the car is a bitch. The first time I tried to make a lap on the Daytona Speedway I came off turn four and plowed into the wall. And yes, I was turning the joystick to the left; nothing happened. This morning before Rebecca showed up I tried a few short races. I actually got better. One race I didn’t finish last – I finished next to last. NASCAR ’15 is a winner.

Finally, on March 1st ’17, State College experienced its first thunderstorm of the season. Caring about my electronics as I do, off went the PS3 and television. I don’t want any power surges around here.

As I get ready to sign off, I am looking to the rest of my day. I’m going to have a nice long nap while Traci has an appointment, then I shall visit her around 5:30 in the afternoon. That seems to be our pattern now. I think it is a wonderful time for a visit. We listen to music and talk about our day. By the way, I shall let you all know when the wedding date and venue have been arranged. We’ll be sending the “save the date” notices when they are made and ready to be mailed.

Until tomorrow, I wish you a good day, take care, and as always happy reading.

Many topics to talk about, including American Truck Simulator

Greetings, readers. We are finally back. Yay! After a week of working on the blog by myself, Rebecca is here once again to help me. Obviously, I can write the blog by myself, but after all this time I just feel more comfortable with my editor friend by my side to catch any little mistakes I might make. She already caught one from my last blog entry.

Not that I’m going to title this hodgepodge whatever, but I do have several topics to touch on. So here we go.

First, I’ve been thinking about this question: Is the National Football League fixed? There have been rumors that since the early 2000s, the NFL has been “steered” in certain directions to allow the powerful teams to make the playoffs. The stronger the teams in the Super Bowl, the better the ratings. Or, at least, that is the NFL’s way of thinking. Let’s take this past Super Bowl for example. The great Peyton Manning,  perhaps the best to ever play the game, is all but certain to retire. I would have been shocked if Denver lost. Carolina quite frankly looked pathetic, though Denver’s defense did play a great game. What also makes me wonder, is that I saw part of a YouTube Top Ten List video, pointing out that the New England Patriots won the Super Bowl just months after 9/11. What are their colors? You guessed it, red, white and blue. Is this hard-core evidence that the NFL is fixed? No, but it raise my eyebrow. Add in that this team has been proven to cheat since then and the NFL has barely spanked their wrists.

Topic number 2. Recently, I’ve been enjoying, on YouTube, reruns of the 1970s sitcom Maude. It is a Norman Lear spin-off of All in the Family and is it hilarious. There is one interesting thing. You would never see that show being produced new today. Maude’s husband, Walter, played by Bill Macy, is a strong-willed proud man that did not like his wife to work outside the house. Add that to the fact that he was a drinker early in the series, and you can imagine some of the arguments they got into. Maude, also strong-willed and very liberal, would also argue with all the other characters when she thought it was necessary. The only episode I did not care for and will not watch again, was the ground-breaking Maude’s abortion episode. Was it well done? Absolutely. It is just that my own personal religious beliefs made that episode a chore to watch. That is not the case with the rest of the series. Most evenings I will sit with my snack and have out-loud belly laughs. Norman Lear can do that to me every time, whether it be All in the Family, Maude, Good Times, or The Jeffersons.

Topic number 3. All I need is $100 and I will never want a car again. Today, I want to tell you about perhaps the best video game I have ever seen. It is called American Truck Simulator. People who play Euro Truck Simulator 2, and make videos for YouTube, have been talking about the new game for two years. Where is American Truck Simulator, we all said. When it came out on February 3rd, we found out why it took so long. On the up side, the level of detail on the maps is incredible. There are three trucks to choose from and you can drive in California and Nevada. Arizona will be added soon. The few people who are giving this game a thumb’s down bring up the question, after two and a half years of development, why are there only two states? My answer to them would be this: You try producing maps with those kinds of graphics, fabulous detail and clean game play, and we will see how long it takes you. How long will it take to complete the lower forty-eight? Probably about two years. Can I wait? Hell yes. This game also has the potential, if the manufacturer desires it, to include Mexico, Canada, and Alaska. All I need to do now is get a steering wheel and pedals to clamp to a table, so I have better control of the steering. The left and right arrows on the keypad make for marvelous wrecks. I must admit, I am getting better at it with the arrows, but I’m going to see if I can’t scrounge $100 together and get one of the cheaper gaming wheels. As for the most expensive one, which is $299, that is out of the question.

Lastly, a quick note about the weather. Yesterday we had snow, ice, and slush. It was not a good combination to go out in. I needed to take my girlfriend to her follow-up doctor’s appointment. Yay, us, we did not slip and fall.

Well, you are all up to date. We’ll have another new blog entry for you, possibly as early as tomorrow, though if not, then definitely on Friday. Take care, have a good day, and happy reading.

This morning I had a minor health issue while playing my new video game

Greetings, readers. I’ve never enjoyed talking about my cerebral palsy and all of its side effects. But this morning something happened which really had me concerned. I had slept in a wee bit and had taken my meds later than usual. I then settled down with some coffee for a few hours of my new game, WWE2k16. After the first 40 minutes, even with that annoying screen shake toggled off, I felt a seizure coming on. Everything started to go black, I felt shaky, and I instinctively grabbed both chair arms and held on for dear life. It didn’t last very long, I must say, since I was able to ward off the actual seizure. I immediately turned the game off, shut off all the lights in my apartment, and did what I do best, took a nap.

When I awakened at 11:15, all was normal once again. I’m really going to have to watch myself when playing this game. I can play MLB baseball indefinitely with no issues. I think in this wrestling game, the flashing lights of the arena and all the simulated pyrotechnics are just a little bit too much. From now on, I’ll play for an hour or so and then take a break. I am really enjoying this game and want to get better at it, but to do that I have to play. It is frustrating when I have to stop all the time because of my condition.

I first saw this game on YouTube, being played by a gamer who calls himself CMPuLs3 (pronounced c.m. pulse). His channel is excellent and his wrestling videos are introd by the actual WWE champion, Seth Rollins. Way cool! I want to thank CMPuLs3 for getting me into this game and making super cool videos, especially the James Falcon series.

I’ve written to this person on Facebook, asking him for any help on how to play the game for people with bad hands. Luckily, and to my surprise, the game will play computer versus computer, so I can watch and at least learn the moves. Next, I need to know how to do them, quickly enough. I’ve played four matches now. I am 0-4, with an average losing time of 8 seconds.

How cool is this? I created my own character called Thunderbolt Jimmy Storm, paired him with Stone Cold Steve Austin, and we are now a tag team tentatively called The New Foundation, working our way up the ranks to hopefully take the title.

Lastly, it is a rainy day here in State College and I might have to keep the gaming machine off. That is probably a good idea considering what happened this morning.

Until Wednesday, when we’ll be back to a normal week, take care, have a great weekend, and happy reading.

My new addiction, WWE2k16

Greetings, readers. Ever since I watched a couple of YouTube Videos about this PS3 game, I knew it wouldn’t be long before I got my copy of it. Back in the day, I was a huge professional wrestling fan. This game has rekindled my love of the WWE (World Wrestling Entertainment).

First off, I bought the game via the Playstation Store, not a physical copy at Wal-Mart or Best Buy. The download time was literally six hours. Yes, the game is that complex, with wrestlers, arenas as well as lots of un-lockable content. Also, the graphics are stunning and spot-on in their realism.

Players have the ability to practice in all different types of matches, such as one-on-one, tag-team, ladder matches and extreme rules. During practice mode, a player can decide to have the match in any of the big pay-per-views. The Royal Rumble, Wrestlmania, Summer Slam as well as weekly series such as Raw and Smackdown are represented in every detail. Voice talents of Michael Cole and Jerry Lawler, Jim Ross, Lilian Garcia and others add to the intense realism.

Does the game have things to work on for next year? Not many…., but yes. First, though the announcing is exciting and true, it is way too repetitive. Next – and this would be better if it could be toggled off – when a wrestler is put in a submission hold, the entire picture on the TV screen shakes. Not good for people like me who suffer from mild seizures. 😦 Lastly, for my bad hands anyway, the controls are too complex. I lost my first match in 5 seconds. One missed command, my opponent’s finishing move and it was “One!-Two!!-Three!!!”

My final score for WWE2k16 – 8.5 out of 10. 🙂

Until tomorrow, take care, have a great day and happy reading.