benhaskett

I had some hesitations, but still ended up shelling out $175 for it. Noting that The Witcher 3 included lesser versions of everything above just in the standard game (paper fold-out map, soundtrack, art book, DLC, and stickers), I still couldn't pass on this. It's Dragon Quest!

Twinkie, for what it's worth, I did figure both out, but I had to look them up online. I thought the trickiest thing about the garden was that it had to have a tree as part of it. I couldn't get a planted tree to grow anywhere except my base, and though I channeled water to my base, it was too low underground. I had to go off-base, to the south a little bit, where there was a pond and tree. I walled the area off (plus a door and light source, of course), placed some plants, and that's what did it. I just wonder how anyone knew to do that... The rule about things needing to be within two squares of each other... that makes sense and I understand that now. I think my water was a square below the main level, and a one-block-high staircase led to the door, which would make it three blocks total height, thus why the room didn't register... Thanks for clearing that up!

OK, I'm absolutely loving this game, but I feel like I'm missing important information sometimes. Twice now, I've progressed only because I looked it up online. 1. In chapter 2, you have to make a watering hole. It gives you clear instructions for how to do it, but they're way more strict than they let on. It was, I believe, that you need a stool, a washtub, 10 units of water, 2 pots, a chest, and a light source. All of the other buildings without blueprints thus far have been super open--in other words, so long as you meet the criteria, it can look however you want. So I made the building however I wanted. And it didn't register. I moved things around, put this here and that there, still with no luck. Eventually, with help from guides, it was revealed that the entire building must be directly over sea level, and that the water in the room has to be in the center. I had my 10 units of water against the back wall, and it was built two units above water level, so a set of stairs led to the pool. Anyone else run into difficulty with this? 2. At the end of chapter 1, it reveals one of the challenges to be building the Cantlin Garden, but unless I missed something, it doesn't state what that is or how to go about building it anywhere at all in the game. I had to look it up online, but did anyone become privy to that information? Thanks in advance for any insight. Again, I'm loving the game, but these two parts have had me hitting my head against a wall. Ben

Awesomeinblue, thanks for your help! I forgot to respond, but I'm well into chapter 2 now!

Possible spoilers: Can anyone help me out? I have no active quests, and no one offering any quests. Rollo wants to be mayor, Larouche wants me to lay off the advancements, and the blacksmith, another guy, and the warrior are here too. The only thing is that Primm tells me I should come up with a recipe for something meaty, but I'm not sure how to progress that--she says there's a ghost chef in the desert, but I already found him, exhausted the conversation options, and now he's gone. Anyone know how to proceed?

Hanging around Cantlin, building stockades and beating giant scorpions. Love it so far!

Hello, all! King Zenith, good to see you as well! Indeed, I flew a little too close to the sun with DQ IX and fell off the wagon--played way too much of it. I played and enjoyed the heck out of VI when it came out a bit later, but didn't blog through it. Hehe, I had to lay that to rest. I think I'm back for good, as DQ VIII has seriously rekindled my love for the series. After many attempts, I finally beat Dhoulmagus. He was HARD. I will say that I have no patience for grinding--maybe that has something to do with it being on a phone? So I powered through the fight at level 27 (far lower than I faced him when on the PS2, although I'm not sure what people are usually at when facing him). Lesser panaceas for Yangus and Jessica, Hero and Angelo on regular heals. Lots of Kabuffs and such, with Oomphs supporting Executioners and Flame Slashes. I also took a moment to work up to Rank C in the Monster Arena so that I could shave some of his health off with Talos and two of the three golems. In the end, only Yangus stood victorious, lol, claiming all 12,000 experience points for himself... That's great to know about X--I will definitely seek that out and try to play it. I sincerely hope the powers that be consider an English PC port... As for other mobile games, here's hoping we get II and III... I played V and VI too recently to want to play it again.

Well, holy crap. I hadn't played a DQ game in... quite some time. VI was the last one I played, and that's when it was re-released on the DS. Still haven't touched II or III yet. But I recently got a new phone and saw that VIII was available for purchase! I had already played the game before, but I couldn't resist picking it up a second time, only because I was curious how it would handle on a mobile--it works great! Yeah, it's a little awkward for me with one hand, but, man, the shortcuts! Auto-run, zoom and sabre cat hotkeys, no waiting for the alchemy pot to cook, maps available by default, etc. It's all streamlined in various subtle ways that make this really easy to play on the go. And auto-save is a huge boon. And now I see that IV is out for phones too! Can someone catch me up on the going-ons of the DQ series? Are more coming to mobiles? Any chance II or III will come to mobiles? I'd love to not have to pull out an NES or GBC to finally play those games. Also, what about X? Did that ever come out in the 'States? Did I miss anything else?

Thanks for the interest, you guys! The game is actually 8+, and is not a pencil and paper RPG at all! (Just a board, bits, and cards) For the sake of ease of play, I purposefully developed Baldrick's Tomb with the idea of distilling the roguelike down to its essentials: each floor has only one large room, I have done away with level building and even equipable items, and I've taken a page from Dragon Quest where you only lose half of your treasure points if you die (as opposed to the roguelike staple of permadeath). This has made it easier for all sorts of people to enjoy who normally might be intimidated by roguelikes. The game's artwork is also very much kid-friendly. There are classic enemies such as mimics, kobolds, and golems, as well as gentlemen Scottish werewolves and boxing rats. The game is very evocative of a roguelike, despite its compromises. In our play-tests, kids as young as 6 have been able to play easily--also, it's "Child Geek Approved" on Father Geek! ;D Here's some artwok that will appear in the final game (graphic design is not complete yet): The four characters: Here are some monsters: Hope y'all like what you see!

Hello, everyone, It has probably been over a year since I've been here--I've been busy busy busy working on something, and I'd like to share it with all of you now. The last time I was here, I was trying to spread some awareness about a little board game that I had put together. Well, since then, it's gotten a couple of reviews, seen a couple of revisions, and just recently, scored a publishing deal with a small company called 5th Street Games. It has been an interesting challenge, trying to find a happy medium between the trappings that make roguelikes unique and what makes a competitive board game fun. But I've had a year now to really tighten things up--I was heavily inspired by Chunsoft's classic Mystery Dungeon series Torneko, Shiren the Wanderer), and I'm very pleased with the results! The game is called Baldrick's Tomb, and it has four heroes traveling down to the bottom of cursed dungeon, where the insides are forever churning and rearranging. True to roguelikes, the contents of everything are a mystery, and randomly generated. You will fight monsters, trigger traps, but also use powerful scrolls and find gobs & gobs of treasure. The publishing deal brings with it a ton of great changes. First, the game has been tightened up in all areas. If you watch the video review below, all of the issues they discuss have been addressed! Players draft their own skills, are never stopped by traps or monsters, and now have all sorts of new and interesting ways to interact with the game! Also, the game's visuals are getting a full make over, with art by Erin Fusco! Currently, Baldrick's Tomb is on Kickstarter. I'd be thrilled if any of you would be willing to take a look at it, and if it seems like something you might be interested in, I hope you might consider backing it: http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/5thstreetgames/baldricks-tomb-the-roguelike-board-game If you'd like more information on the prototype version (the game before 5th Street picked it, you can check out these links: An interview with The Game Crafter: http://news.thegamecrafter.com/post/26331153910/undine-studios-inducted-into-hall-of-fame A video review from The Gamers' Table: A written review from Father Geek: http://fathergeek.com/baldrichs-tomb/ The game's BGG page: http://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/126340/baldricks-tomb Thanks very much for your time!

LordBaramos - You're absolutely correct about the price, unfortunately. The game costs about $33.50 to make, and I just rounded up to $34.99 to make it more of a normally-priced product. Yeah, because everything is done one-at-a-time and never in bulk, the price skyrockets pretty quickly. This definitely means that The Game Crafter is not good if you're trying to make an income for yourself, but if you're like me--I primarily made it to bring to a new game night type of thing that I started doing with my brothers--then it's perfect. You're also right about luck -- before I started working on this game, the list of board games I had played really only included the "besties" (life, monopoly, yhatzee, etc), and then Catan. People started pointing me in a bunch of different directions after I started poking around the board game hobby sites and discovered that games could be more than that. I just recently picked up Dominion, which is probably the best game I've ever played so far. I plan on picking up Small World soon and then possibly Ticket to Ride. Anyway, thanks for the response. If you have any other awesome board games that you know of, please let me know so I cen check them out! Aw, thanks Dwaine! You're awesome!

Hey all, been quite a while since I posted anything here. I've been delving into the world of board games lately, and recently came across a PoD board game company. So I put a little something together that I wanted to share. Or, rather, I guess this is a plug. The game is called Baldrich's Tomb, and it's a roguelike board game for 2-4 players. A lot of the game's inspiration came from Chunsoft's Mystery Dungeon series, with games like Torneko and Shiren the Wanderer. https://www.thegamecrafter.com/games/baldrich-s-tomb There's a few videos on there of me demoing the game. If anyone out there likes board games, I would love to know what you think. Thanks for taking a look at it!