The Honeymoon Adventure - Day Two - Calgary Zoo Three

Yes it has been a little while since last we heard of the honeymoon story, but with all the time on my hands, why not continue telling you of one of the greatest adventures I've ever had? Let us continue our adventure through the Calgary Zoo with part 3.

The last piece of our adventure took finished at the end of the Canadian Wilds. Now we travel into Destination Africa. At this point in the day, it had been wet out earlier and was beginning to get rather rainy. What a great time to head inside to see some creatures in the warmth of not being rained on continuously.

Meerkats, just like Timon in Lion King!

The journey into Africa was pretty cool I must say. Being a person with not much interest in travelling around the world all that much, going to the Zoo is a pretty cool place to see animals you would never be able to see otherwise.

I had a turtle once, but this is an actual tortoise pretty sure we don't naturally have tortoises around here.

I mean sure, you could look up pictures online or even videos on YouTube, but let me tell you, it's just not the same as seeing the creatures in person actually living and breathing in front of you. They let this tortoise out of his enclosure to walk around among the public for a while to get a little bit of exercise. Carley was super excited about seeing him so close up and following him around for a little while.

Carley was captivated by what we saw next.

It was at this point we saw one of Carley's other favourite things ever. For anybody who knows Carley, you probably know she really likes turtles. One of the first things I gave her when we started dating was a box which I had made into a turtle because she told me how much she likes them. But there's another creature she also likes a lot which isn't mentioned as often.

Yes, Giraffes are actually real creatures, and yes they are actually super tall.

Surprise! Carley really like Giraffes! I'm pretty sure she could have continued to stay there and stare at them for a few hours, but unfortunately there were still many more animals to see before the end of the day.

I bet you never would have guessed these hippopotamuses were right under the water next to the giraffes.

Can you believe how big those things are? Not only did I find it amazing how big hippos are, but apparently they're quite good at hiding in plain sight as well. From above the water, you couldn't even tell that they were there! The only reason I found them was because I walked down the steps up to the glass in attempt to see if there were any fish or anything in the water. To my surprise, there were two giant hippopotamuses hanging out having a good snooze.

Ooh, look at the big kitty!

Next on the animal tour was The Lion King. Alright, we didn't watch the movie, but instead we saw real live lions wandering around. I wouldn't want to run into one of these without a wall between us. I'm wary of house cats, but this seems a little bit too big to be living in someone's house. I have heard that Lions are not actually all that fast and don't tend to chase down their prey quite as much or as far as other predators in Africa... but as a human being, I still don't think I would want to see one of these coming in my direction no matter how far away it is.

If you've never watched Zaboomafoo, then you're totally missing out.

After the lions we got to see a bunch of pretty cool Lemurs. They had like five different types all in one enclosure which pretty much felt like you were walking into some sort of tree-house type thing. While we were there we learned that Lemurs are actually really smart and we were warned not to stay too long on the platform which was the only entrance into the enclosure. The workers told us the platform was electrified at night, but during the day it is not, and the only thing keeping the lemurs in the area during the day was that they didn't realize the platform was not electrified during the day, hence why we weren't supposed to stand around on the platform too long. In retrospect... I should have taken pictures of the entrance into the area as well, it was very cool and unique. I guess to see it, you'll have to go visit the Calgary Zoo on your own.

The last mix of creatures in the Destination Africa area.

I didn't manage to get any pictures of Ostriches or Zebras... because there weren't any to be found while we were there. We did go through one last building which included gorillas, alligators, and even an aviary of birds! I do love birds, but I didn't bother taking any pictures of them because birds just don't sit still for very long. At this point we decided to stop for food in the area where it was pretty much a fast food cafeteria.

Honestly some of the best fast food I've ever had.

I never thought I would be making the claim that fast food at a zoo would be some of the best food ever, but it seriously was pretty good stuff. Nice big drinks and well-made food. Also a very seemless and easy way to go through and order food, then pay at the end of the line after receiving the food you've ordered. It was a very nice experience and I would happily go back and eat there again. The only downside to the large drinks is that because they, along with many other places in Calgary, have started using paper straws... which get a little bit soggy after a while of sitting in liquid. But hey, if that's my only complaint about the place, then I'd say it's pretty great.

That covers the African part of The Calgary Zoo. Come back next time as we continue into one of the most beautiful gardens I've ever seen and then into Eurasia.

~ Kyle Welykholowa

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Age of Wonders -- Keepers Scenario 6 - Part 9

A quick livestream to finish off scenario 6 before moving on. I know I need to (want to) do more livestreaming and I promise it will be coming soon. I think the biggest problem keeping me from livestreaming more often right now is the anxiety of going through the process of advertising and making commitments and then WHAT IF I LET EVERYBODY DOWN??? That's definitely something I need to get over though. Honestly, I should probably just do more streams where I don't put myself through the torture of advertising beforehand, but rather I just turn on the stream and go.

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This campaign and more can be found on my Age of Wonders page.

Check out more of my stuff!
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~ DaemonVirus

=== PC Game Review -- Human-Powered Spacecraft - Story Clicker - 8 / 10 ===

Human-Powered Spacecraft is a game I got on sale on Steam for $0.59. In my never-ending quest to play through all the games I've acquired over the years (or at least try), I sometimes find new ones that are on such a good Steam Sale, that I just can't refuse them.

I'm honestly really not usually a fan of clicker games. I've wasted so much time trying to kill time on my phone with clicker and other idle games that it's really hard to come up with good reasons to get new ones; especially ones you have to pay for. While browsing through Steam, I came across this little game on sale and thought I'd go ahead and give it a try because I really liked the art-style and it looked like something a little bit different than what I had experienced before.

There are multiple different "levels" in this game where more and more upgrade options are unlocked at each stage with a different "goal" of progressing to the next stage. It isn't really anything huge to talk about; click, make money, upgrade, click, make money, purchase whatever the game wants you to purchase to start the next stage.

You end up having a couple ship problems including a fire, asteroids, and aliens sucking energy from the ship, finally concluding with a rogue computer trying to enslave you into forever powering the ship by peddling to generate electricity. The only real challenge to the game comes at the end when you have to figure out how to use the electricity-sucking alien to help you fight back against the rogue computer system.

That's... really the whole game. I have nothing else to tell about it. It's not an endless clicker where the game keeps on going forever and ever, there's a bit of a story to it. It's just a nice and short experience. I would love to be able to say this game is a good value, and at a sale of $0.59, it's very hard for me to say that it isn't, but when I seriously think about how much this game cost vs how long it entertained me, the $:hour ratio actually isn't that great. The total gameplay time for me was maybe an hour at most.

Verdict

Gameplay: As you may expect from a clicker game... you click and upgrade.

Sound: The music and sound design is very nice, I don't have any complaints about it at all. Right from the get-go I was sucked in by the great music rather than being driven away by annoying sounds and awful music.

Art: I like pixel art as a graphic style. I imagine pixel art must take quite a bit of time to design and draw and I think it has a lot of character that's simple, yet pleasing.

Replayability: You can't. Really... once you've beaten the game once (which took maybe an hour of gameplay at most), I don't know why anybody would want to subject themselves to that sort of pain and tedium again. It was fun to play once, but I have absolutely no desire to do so again.

SCORE: I really wanted to give this game 5/5 because I did find it more enjoyable than all the other FREE clicker games out there, but unfortunately it was too short for me to be happy with the end result. 8 / 10 will be my final score for Human-Powered Spacecraft.

~ DaemonVirus

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Sidetracked Development

Hey everyone! We've had a little bit of a... development last week and now not only am I super far behind on blog posts from months ago, but I'm also incredibly sidetracked from where I want to be right now. All is not lost though! At this point, I need to keep myself busy and what better way is there to do so than by resetting myself and getting back to work?

So for a little bit, my posts may be jumping around a tad more than usual with some being current events and some being past events, but I'll be sure to keep all the proper pages updated so that correct timelines can be followed for anybody who wants to read from start-to-finish all in one go. Now that I'm done with the most important final class I have (which means I can officially apply to have the certificate I've been working towards for the past couple years), I can finally put more focus back into the blog that I have loved so dearly since it began.

Between work and child-entertaining, I've got a lot to do, but I think I can fit in a little bit of time for those important hobbies that keep be sane. I have a plan, a vision, a goal, a desire, to make this into a wildly successful site along with everything else I do and I can only make that happen with YOU.

Don't be afraid to keep up with IntroNerdedLiving, there's something for everyone here! I'm always looking for suggestions no matter where the comments are done. Please like, share, follow, and whatever else you have time to do if you enjoy anything that I do on this here blog. You can look forward to the continuing story of our honeymoon trip, game reviews, YouTube videos, and more!

Whether you tell me in person or via text, it means a lot to know that people read and keep coming back to read more.

Stay tuned for the next edition of IntroNerdedLiving. ^_^

~ Kyle Welykholowa

=== PC Game Review -- Ancestor's Legacy - Real-Time Strategy - 8.5 / 10 ===

Hello everyone, welcome to my review of Ancestor's Legacy, a real-time strategy game for the PC. I was lucky enough to get this game free for the weekend during a time when I actually had enough time to put into it to gain a proper opinion of it.

The first thing I would like to mention, is oh my god, the artwork is absolutely STUNNING. There's something about hand-drawn artwork that really catches my eye in games; that's not to say that artwork is what makes or breaks game, but rather good artwork in a game is the icing on the cake. Yeah, it's weird that I would start with something that isn't all that important in the grand scheme of things... but artwork like this really isn't seen often enough in my opinion.

So let's get into the meat of things: The first thing we're greeted with when starting the game is a pretty sweet fight scene that makes you think you might be playing some sort of third-person fighting game, weirdly there's like no context to this which is a bit confusing right off the bat. Then it transitions into a bit of a tutorial on how to command units and how to start playing the game.

So at this point, we've seen a guy killing people, gotten a bit of introductory gameplay, and we're thrown into some more beautiful artwork with a nice narrated voiceover telling us the story of what's going on and why it's happening.

Now we get into another tutorial scenario where we learn more about the mechanics of the game. So what's this game all about? Ancestor's Legacy is all about squad management; we're not dealing with massive groups of units doing tons of different things all at once. With a maximum squad limit of 10 squads, we're maybe fighting over two, POSSIBLY three different locations at one time.

The gameplay relies heavily on a combination of unit counters and terrain management. All foot-squads have the ability to make two different types of traps; either a trap which slows enemies down and makes them unable to run away, or a trap which instantly kills some of the units. Much of the gameplay revolves around managing what looks like fields of wheat or tall grass where the players are unable to see into unless they have at least one squad inside the field. Some squads have the ability to spot traps at the cost of not auto-attacking, though in my experience the traps are only effective in certain situations which realistically are NOT in the early part of the game.

When not fighting around fields and trees and traps, there is a struggle to be had over what I would call "village points" which are points which must be captured which then earn resources as the game goes on. These points are quite important in the early- to mid-game, though I could see how they would fall off in the later game if there's a buildup of resources and not much fighting because both forces don't engage to the point of death. Without more time in the game it's a bit hard to say really.

From what I was able to experience, the single player campaigns are well done and well driven... but after only a short time, I started to feel like the whole experience was quite slow. I'm sure there are many more fun scenarios to play with much more things going on, but honestly I found myself getting very bored of the campaign mode due to how slow it was waiting for units to move across the map, especially during the end-game where you know you've won the scenario but it's now a matter of actually finishing off the enemy units.

It was at this point that I decided I would make my overall judgement on the game based on the multiplayer aspect as that would obviously have to be the part of the game which would need to hold up over time to make it work the purchase. As fun as single player games are, why wouldn't a person want to test their mettle against another human player to see if they have what it takes to out-smart and out-maneuver a real live opponent? Now I didn't exactly have the experience to get myself into a bunch of live multiplayer games (though realistically, I do play a lot of RTS games.... so I don't know why I would be uncomfortable with dying and learning to play a game like this...), so I decided to test my excellent prowess against a poor soon-to-die computer AI opponent... this was an awful idea.

If you watch the livestream footage of me playing this game, you'll get a very good idea of how I was feeling throughout my experience. One one hand, I did enjoy the competitive skirmish multiplayer sort of thing... but on the other hand, I have strong feelings against it.

I first decided I would play as the Slavs who are supposed to have strong archers including horse archers, which sounded like a pretty fun time to me; my opponents I would set to the Saxons who I had been playing against in the campaign mode, so I figured it would be a bit of a familiar experience that I wouldn't be playing against all sorts of new units that I hadn't seen before. I also decided each side would start with a hero... unfortunately after bashing my head against my opponent for probably at least two hours I finally had to give up based on... the Slavs, who only start with basic swordsmen in the early game are much too weak against the Saxons who start with access to slingers as one of their first units.

As it turns out, having a ranged attack is quite important in the early portion of the game because on the low amount of resources available in the early-game, constructing traps is much too expensive as an attempt to fight back against the enemy. Let me explain it this way: One group of swordsmen get pelted by the ranged slingers until they get in range, the slingers then run away unobstructed because there's no ability to keep them in place. As the Slavs, if you make another group of swords men... you'll then find yourself in a two squads of swordsmen against two squads of slingers, which as you may guess, means you're getting hit from afar even more than before; once again, if the swordsmen engage the slingers, the slingers run away with little more than a scratch. Alright, so that didn't work, instead I would try making the trap which would cause the enemy squad to be unable to run away; in the early portion of the game, this means either the enemy squad STILL gets to run away because one group of swordsmen isn't enough to kill the opponent fast enough before they regain their ability to run away.... or they miss the trap altogether. Oh... and then there's the problem that you're also now one squad of swordsmen against TWO squads of slingers, meaning one group can run away while the other happily throws their rocks at your group futilely trying to chase them down.

Okay, so let's try a different strategy: I then decided to try starting out with one group of swordsmen to assist the hero capturing the first village, then going straight into horse archers! This was probably the closest strategy to really being effective, but once again the Slavs fell behind in power because of the extra resources required to even get into a fighting position. No matter how hard I tried or what I did... going after different villages first, trying to avoid the enemy, trying to harass them... it all turned out the same; the Saxons pulled ahead each and every time in every scenario I attempted.

Could it be that I'm just playing the faction wrong? I tested this theory by switching factions with the computer AI and continuing to play on the same map. This time I played as the Saxons and had my enemy as the Slavs; yeah... the game lasted a little bit longer with the computer playing the Slavs than when I was playing them, but the sad reality is that at no point did I actually feel threatened by them. The Saxon faction didn't just feel overpowered in this matchup because I was playing the wrong way, it was in fact because the Slav faction just has such a weak start in comparison that they really aren't all that threatening at any point.

Verdict

Gameplay: I'm still torn on how I feel about Ancestor's Legacy, but I do think there's a lot of potential to it which is why it's still on my wishlist to keep an eye on and see how it progresses.

Sound: Sound design in this game is great. There are lots of good sounds for each unit including voices, movement, and fighting. The bit of single player experience I got was fully voiced over for the story bits which made it very nice to listen to.

Replayability: The campaign felt slow to me and got very boring quickly. I would work through it if I had the time, but probably not all in one go. The multiplayer (vs AI) experience was a much more fun game mode, though I did find (after MUCH experimenting), that I had quite a large concern that the different factions may not be well-balanced.

Bonus: A little bonus in this game that isn't found in other games is the ability to go into a third-person sort of view where you can see very well designed fights with each unit in the squad doing their own thing. This is a much higher level of detail than what I have normally found in other RTS titles which some people may find to be quite an enjoyable addition.

SCORE: I've given this a lot of thought and I am in fact giving Ancestor's Legacy a score of 8.5 / 10 due to being a very well-designed game. I do have my worries about it which is why it's not getting the highest score, but it does have a lot of promise which could be easily patched into balance with future updates.

~ Kyle Welykholowa

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Age of Wonders -- Keepers Scenario 6 - Part 8

We're so close now I can taste it. Maybe we'll finally finish all the hours we've planted into this scenario and be able to move onto the next one without having to restart once again! :D

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This campaign and more can be found on my Age of Wonders page.

Check out more of my stuff!
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~ DaemonVirus