KDice and Dice Wars

KDice has now replaced most of my normal computing functions: programming, Skyping, web surfing… they’ve been kicked out. Based on an equally fun and addicting game Dice Wars, it’s been melded with Risk and made MMO.

Now, both games are pretty simple. There’s a Risk-like map, divided into territories and based on hexagons (DW’s are randomly generated). The goal of the game is world “kdomination” (as KDice’s site puts it), which is done rather simply. You’ll notice that instead of Risk’s “Armies” on each territory, there’re dice. These function like armies, but better: you’re not limited to 3 attack dice, only to the number of dice on your territory (minus one). It automatically rolls the maximum amount, and if your total is higher, they’re moved to your newly-conquered territory. Lose the roll, and your dice pile gets whittled down.

Now, it sounds simple enough. But all these dice beg the question: where do they come from? Well, every connect territory gets you one die to distribute. So if you have 6 adjacent lands, you’ll get 6 dice. 5 connected and one off on the other side of the map? 5 dice. Too bad you don’t get to distribute them; the computer does it randomly. To quote the How To part of the KDice site:

You cannot choose where your new dice will go. Dice are randomly distributed across your territories. Sometimes you’ll get just one or two dice sprinkled on every land, yet other times you’ll sprout a huge stack out of nowhere!! It has to do with luck.

A Brawl to Die For

In case you didn’t hear yet, Super Smash Brothers Brawl (Wii) has confirmed online play (WiFi, technically…). The site has more information than you’ll find here, but anyway…

There are two ways to play. Both ways, you can fight a sandbag while you’re waiting.

First off, just against friends: you register your friend’s Wii with the Wii Nubmer, and then you can check their status, play, etc. Don’t know if you have to re-do this, or it comes from the directory in the Wii Message Board.

You can also play against random people on the internet. No names/Wii numbers/anything are shown; you might as well be playing AI, except they are real people.

Among other things, they have also confirmed the final control schemes. Yes, schemes. There are 4. Along with the usual “names” system (You know, from Melee?), each name also has personalized button configurations.

Wii are Corrupted

Ugh. This has to stop. With all of the excitement around Corruption and Brawl and other big-name games for Wii, I stopped to look at Metroid in particular. I’m not impressed.

While the gameplay does look good (the first two were already great), I admit, the game itself isn’t living up to what I expect. Twilight Princess, a launch title, had what I consider “next-gen” graphics. It harnessed the power of the Wii (though there’s not a lot, compared to the others), and delivered a rather stunningly advanced game. I was surprised by how un-cartoonish TP ended up. But Metroid…

The graphics haven’t gone anywhere. You compare Prime’s graphics to Corruption’s… it’s the same, almost. Sure, there are halos and glows and such… light effects. But the models haven’t evolved at all. It’s exactly where it was. I’m still going to get it, but I was hoping for a little more. Retro Studios, you disappoint me.

And then there comes the Metroid Preview Channel. New videos, only about a third of which are gameplay. Rather disappointing. And worst of all… no demo. I think many people expected the Wii online to match, or emulate, XBL. But so far, no luck. Only two games have online play (though several more have been announced). Aside from the Internet and Shop channels, there’s really no use. No demos have been put up. Nothing you really want to mess with.

Somebody, surprise me!

E3 (Nintendo Conference)

Yeah, so, after reading cipher’s opinion of the Nintendo conference (and posting my comment), I realized that I couldn’t just “not watch it.” I mean, this is the Nintendo press conference at E3! Yeah, I missed the live stream, but Gamespot still has all of the conferences up for viewing. So I’ve decided I’m going to watch them all. The Nintendo and Sony one today, Microsoft’s tomorrow.

First off, I just gotta say, wasn’t as big a let down as expected. Could’ve used a bit more, uh, interesting news, but whatever. It’s worth watching, as long as you skip the stupid “praise for the Wii” videos they show between announcement chunks. Anyway…

So, big news for Wii. Fifa ‘08 (definitely getting this) and NFL ‘08 are both confirmed online play. I don’t know about the gameplay, but at least they’re getting something done over there.

They also announced Mario Kart Wii (working title), which does away with the stupid “double dash” feature. A new “Wii Wheel” debuts with the game. And online? Yeah, it’s got online. Not just racing, of course. Remember battle mode? Yes, that is online too. And it’s got enough control schemes to be utilized by new players and vets alike.

Brawl’s biggest news, though, was the release date: December 3rd, 2007. I don’t know about the rest of you, but suddenly, I stopped caring about anything else at that point. Cue the fanboys! I just home GameStop or Play N Trade starts selling their pre-orders soon. Today would be nice.