Category Archives: Video Game

SpartanNerd…Catching Up…

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Has it really been three years since I posted anything?

This means that throughout Corona…throughout the last several MTG releases…Throughout the ending of MOTUC and the new Masters of the Universe lines that have come out. I have written zilch.

Well, it isn’t because I stopped being nerdy. Believe it or not, online teaching and also attending classes took all of my energy out for this project.

So here’s a few new things that have happened.

Masters of the Universe.– As the Classics line ended, I began to realize I just didn’t have enough space anymore. MOTUC items are pretty large. And I got lots of joy especially from my He-Man and Battlecat and also Skeletor and Panthor. But also the Griffin was one of my favorites. Vikor. But some of the others…I decided I could part with them. And then I decided when I saw the price I could fetch to go ahead and sell my core items. All I have left is Vikor and my custom Battleground Teela. I sold it all in May 2020. For $600. I use that money to re-invest in MOTU Mega Construx. I have the Castle Grayskull and basically every item they have released in that line. A downsize in square footage, it is easier to get these just by walking into a store. There are other advantages.

Sorry about the backdrop-less pic. This is a very large item. Kitchen table will have to do.

I decided early on that the MOTU Origins figures look too crappy…I don’t like the colors. And the Masterverse figures on first reveal, I thought “That He-Man looks “gutsy.” Meaning, the way the belt is that pale color yellow, it blends in too well with He-Man’s skin color on his belly. It looks like he has a gut. The other figures, the one that came out with the new CGI Anime line, do not appeal to me at all. I hear fans (Scott Neitlich) accepting what is going on apologetically, that this line is meant to appeal to the kids. But kids just don’t watch the cartoons anymore. Trust me. I know. Middle school teacher. So they are messing around with beloved source material and creating something “corrupt.”

I have picked up some of the MOTU Minis, and the Hot Wheels.

Magic the Gathering- For something that took up so much of my life and my children’s time, this has become a much rarer treat. Since the COVID-19 lockdowns, there haven’t been as many tournaments. We pretty much decided that SpellTable pretty much stinks. Arena isn’t a strong alternative. Now some tournaments have returned, but we have to drive a long way to get to them. Mostly these are Commander League events. And we haven’t really paid into the leagues on account we can’t reliably attend. Just the same, we have played EDH some. But the thrill of the old Modern tournaments is gone. I have done a few drafts and sealed. But it is doubtful that we will go and draft Double Masters II this weekend. That is $50 or more. To play maybe three rounds. Which I will have to drive a distance to get to … meaning I can’t stay out late in my old age driving home sleepy.

Oh yes…Secret Lair. At first I bought it all. I bought the super bundle…the one with the cats and the goblins. The Walking Dead. After awhile, I realized that this isn’t sustainable for me. They have churned out so many Secret Lairs, each with an enticing value usually, but then if you start adding all that up, you better be rich if you are a completist. I figure the Wizards/Hasbro weren’t achieving their bread and butter anymore on packs because people stopped playing. And Commander is so popular, but you can play virtually any cards you can find competitively even, that they had to capitalize on that crowd the best they could by dangling lots of shiny, pretty, artsy, and seemingly charitable carrots in front of them. So I certainly had to start pacing myself on this one. The last one I got was the Dracula one. I got my kid the pixel art lands. These things…they take forever to arrive. All the shipping delays and production delays that have plagued the past couple of years…Which brings me to the next big one.

Playstation 5. I got the money together for this…in fact some of the money from my MOTUC collection, plus some gifts, etc. I had the funds in hand right before Christmas 2020. And went to buy it, only to find…THERE WERE NONE. ANYWHERE. When did I finally get mine? OCTOBER 2021. Used! I am grateful…it has performed like a champ! You wouldn’t know. It didn’t come with a proper stand, so I had to get a third party one, which was supposed to charge the controllers and add extra fan-power. But none of that seems to be working. Still, it stands very well. The best two games for me have been Horizon: Zero Dawn, Horizon: Forbidden West, and Gran Tourismo. But I have lots more games. Spider-Man, Terraria, Mortal Kombat. I paid for the streaming services, but haven’t hardly used them…which brings me to

DISNEY+. Since this launched, I bundled with HULU (Which I already watched) and this has been what I have watched on TV. I have hung on to NetFlix for Stranger Things and Masters of the Universe: Revelation. (More on that on a different day.). The Mandalorian has been a terrific show! Obi Wan was pretty good. The Book of Boba Fett might as well have been season 3 of the Mandalorian. I haven’t watched anything else much on the service, though.

Comics- I have moved back into collecting these. I picked up IDW’s “Best of” TMNT books. I am looking to get a frame to display them in.

I have been collecting all of the IDW Transformers books…this was actually how I got back into collecting comics. IDW decided to reboot the franchise, and I felt it was a good “jumping in” place. Highlights of this have been “Shattered Glass” and “King Grimlock.” The main story kind of meandered a little bit. I was introduced to a bunch of characters I didn’t know or had forgotten. I also got into “Beast Wars”… which was admittedly NOT MY CARTOON. Unfortunately, IDW passed on the license, and all of these stories have come to a wrap up, which has seemed very rushed. But my love of getting the covers and important/valuable books has become rooted again. I collected up all of the “Batman/Catwoman” story, got back into Spider-Man and Ghost Rider. But I have dropped DC for the most part. In fact, almost everything they have been publishing in any form is tripe that panders to anyone except the classic fan. I thought “The Batman” was a much slower slog than it needed to be. My next problem is the amount of room this hobby is taking up…

Gundam- I built my first Master Grade…EW EPYON. I am still applying decals. But this has been a terrific project! I eill post pictures when I finish.

It is good to be coming back to the blogosphere…an I hope to have a review tomorrow!

SpartanNerd Follow Up…Terraria

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(This entry is a follow-up on an article you can find here!)

I’ve finally done it!  Beaten every boss and maximized my character, as well as earned all of the NPCs.  The problem with Terraria…there isn’t a specific goal.  You just…play….

I suppose I can consider that I have beaten the game.  I have already begun a few new worlds.

Here’s what I have learned…

It took me a long time to beat “The Wall of Flesh.”  But after I did, WOW, the game got a lot more fun!  My continual defeat to that boss had me put the game down for about two months.  My character could kill any other creature he would encounter or summon.  But in order to advance, killing the Wall of Flesh is very necessary.

The mechanical bosses are very difficult (Except for the coolest one, “The Destroyer.”)  “The Twins” beat me over and over.  And I had a hard time coming by “Lenses” late in the game…an item essential for building the “Mechanical Eye” needed to summon the Twins.  The way I eventually beat them was by rigging a transporter…I built a boss arena right in the middle of the Hallow, Purity, Jungle, and Crimson biomes in my world.  I preserved a single Crimson Altar right in the middle of the arena.  I rigged a transporter that would take me to the nurse…I would be healed, and then zip back to the arena!

The “Solar Eclipse” and “The Steampunker” are essential to getting the strongest and best items.  “The Clentaminator” is a very nice machine for shaping your world how you want it to be.

I found some very nice weapons and made some as well.  However, the strongest weapons and items aren’t necessarily the best.  I made “The True Night’s Edge” and “The True Excalibur.”  But the “Murderous Death Sickle” is the best weapon I found.  It launches copies of itself that spin through walls and hit any enemies around it.  And you can fire multiple copies..so you are surrounding yourself with powerful hitting energy!  Virtually no enemy on the game except the bosses can withstand this weapon.  And the bosses don’t stand long!

As for wings…I crafted both the Angel and Demon wings.  Neither seemed as good as the Fairy wings.  I also have the sparkly wings, and I haven’t decided yet if I like them as much as the fairy wings.

I still can’t mine the Jungle Temple Bricks.  I have spent minimal time finding spoilers.  I finally broke down and learned how to mine the “green stuff…”  I had a BEAST drill, but it just wouldn’t do it.  So I have the best drill now, the Drax,…which can.  (The green stuff is “Chlorophyte”.)  But even the Drax can’t bust the Jungle Temple block.  The internet says a “Picksaw” is required…a rare item drop from beating The Golem.  I have beaten him five times, and he hasn’t dropped the Picksaw.  😦   What makes Golem so frustrating is the rarity of the “Lihzard Power Cell,” an uncraftable item rarely dropped.  YOU CAN beat “Plantera” and take his jungle key to a new world, where you can unlock the temple and just steal one or two from the chests inside, then bring it back to your world.  But this feels like cheating to me.  Either way, I’ve done it in order to summon the Golem…and he always drops something really nice.  But he hasn’t dropped the Picksaw yet.

Following are a couple of pictures of my game!


My world is quite large and detailed.  Note that I have been “purifying” the world.   You can see my “Boss Arena,”  That square thing right at the underground level.  I designed the arena around a Crimson Altar, so that I could summon a boss here easily.  It is easy for me to see whether or not it is daytime or nighttime…most bosses have to be summoned at night.  Before I cleansed it, a little of the Crimson, Purity, Hallowed, and Jungle all converged at the arena…this caused a variety of enemies to always spawn in the arena.  I also have two machines.  One generates hearts so that my character can easily heal during a fight, the other is the transporter, discussed above.

Eventually I figured out that it was best to build the houses for the NPCs in the sky.  The Harpies and Wyverns are occasionally a headache.  But during Blood Moon and other events, the NPCs are always safe.  The most interesting part of this plan is that there is a Mushroom Biome incorporated into the Sky City…to accommodate the mushroom man character.  This biome eventually became a money generator.  I would harvest the mushrooms and sell them to NPCs and then buy stuff.


Here is a close-up of my Sky City.  Notice the transporter…If I had a mechanical item selected in the access bar, then you could see a long wire leading off to the arena, which is strategically a good distance from the Sky City.  It was challenging to build, though.

And the picture below is of my character, named “Teddie”, is fighting the Golem.  You can see I put the heart generator machine nearby so I could constantly heal.

Terraria has been a terrific romp into a kind of game I never played before.  The game designers evidently also push out special holiday bosses and biomes.  The two month break I took evidently had an Easter theme…but I missed out.  But I will keep my eyes pealed.  If the game designers do that, I will continue to be engaged in this deep, new, and yet nostalgic game.

10 PRINT…"Top Ten Video Games I Miss"

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10 PRINT “Ghostbusters 2”

20 PRINT “Airwolf (NES)”

30 Print “Hot Wheels Turbo Racing”

40 PRINT “Batman (1989 NES version)

50 PRINT “Mega-Man 2”

60 PRINT “Super Mario Bros. All Stars”

70 PRINT “Metal Gear Solid”  (one of my top games ever!)

80 PRINT “Xexyz”

90 PRINT “Vigilante 8”

100 PRINT “Spot (NES Puzzle game featuring the 7-Up Cool Spot)”

Some of these games I know I could find and play if I tried hard enough.  But Spot is probably lost forever apart from emulation.  I played Ghostbusters 2 and Airwolf for hours as a kid…I probably shouldn’t have.  But I sort of miss them.  I have never to this day beaten Mega Man 2…We have a copy for PS2…It isn’t quite the same as playing it on a NES…having to remember the passwords and cracking the little codes.  I also never beat Batman…I made it to the Joker at the end TWICE…But he killed me both times.  Hot Wheels was one that I loved because of all of the stunts.  Vigilante 8 was BOSS!

SpartanNerd’s list of greatest video games!

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Greatest Video Games ever!!!

Following is a list of the SpartanNerd’s most influential games.  These games are always with me!  I never seem to forget many details of a good game.

(I thought about making this a top ten list, but it is too hard for me to judge a favorite.  Sort of like my feelings about music.)

First of all, what systems have I had access to over the years?  NES (my first system), SNES (in college), PS1 (In high school and college), and PS2 (now.)

CAN YOU NAME THE AREA?



Super Mario Bros.–  Did you really think this list was going to start with a different title?  SMB is just about etched onto my soul.  I wasted hundred of hours playing this game as a kid.  And its true sequel in my heart has always been Super Mario Bros. 3.   I still think SMB 2 is a good game, just not of the same “quality” as the other two.

And the game CARTRIDGE was gold!

Zelda 2:  The Adventure of Link–  The first game I ever cried over.  We rented it.  Of course I didn’t get far in the three days I had access to it.  But this was my first foray into RPG gaming.  I loved the sword fights…and the side quests.  And that giant rock stood in my way, taunting me. “Get the hammer…Get the hammer…”  I would be an adult before I got the hammer…..(Incidently, the hammer is super hard to get, but an important quest in leveling Link up enough to finish the game.)

Low rez turtle.  High rez fun!



Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles–  This game is just HARD.  I have beaten it several times.  But I have lost plenty of times as well.  There are jumps that are almost impossible to pull off, then by the time you get to the airport, your turtles are getting beaten, and there are instant kills everywhere.  Then the epic Foot Clan headquarters, where you fight your way through underground tunnels, probably unnecessarily, because the Technodrome appears in a RANDOM LEVEL.  If you beat all this, the Technodrome inside has truly tough enemies, and you are forced to take damage from them in small (albeit colorful!) confined spaces.  If you make it to shredder, two physical hits will kill you.  And if that ray gun hits you, too bad.  The games that came after this one were good, and great for multiplayer fun, with far superior graphics and characters recognizable from the cartoon.  But not the same epic difficulty of this one.

I remember using a map like this a lot in Zelda: A Link to the Past.



Zelda: A Link to the Past-  I played through this one in college using a walkthrough during break time between studying.  I loved it!  Not as old-schoolish as the NES games, but still full of interesting side-quests.  And great graphics as well!

Metal Gear REX, the final boss

Metal Gear Solid–  This awesome game is one of the first “stealth” games I played.  You pretty much have to stay hidden from the enemies…and there is a fair amount of strategy to this…You can even catch a cold!  (“Where is he?  ACHOO! “Shoot to kill!)  Then you get a big boss fight at the end…And a plot twist.  Wow!  Also, one of the most interesting mini-boss fights is against the Psycho-Mantis, where you can’t hurt him at all.  You have to unplug controller two, plug controller one in its slot, and then you can bypass Psycho-Mantis’s powers!

So many choices in images…This one tells all about FF7

Final Fantasy VII–  I still own this one, and play it…My wife got me a copy of it ($85!)  about 10 years ago because I missed it so, and somehow my original copy got sold/given away by the “family members.”  This is probably the deepest game ever made.  I remember the propaganda put out about it “Possibly the GREATEST GAME EVER MADE”.  They would say that, wouldn’t they.  But it is probably true.  No other game has such a large universe.  No other game had such a complex system of customization for your characters.  No other game made you care about the story…made you follow the story…engrossed you in the characters lives.  This game has the infamous “Aeris sacrifice,” where you lose probably your favorite girl in the game and CAN NEVER REVIVE HER!  And so you trudge on closer to that moment when you know she will be lost to you forever, knowing the game just gets better after she’s gone, but mourning your loss…She was a great healer and magic user…And you flirted with her until she went on a date with you…Waaaaa!  (Funny note:  You can cause the date to be with other characters….one of my brothers, whose name starts with a “J” managed to score the date with Barret…. And he wasn’t using a guide or anything…)


NO PICS OF THESE LAST TWO…DON’T WANT TO SCARE THE KIDDIES!

Mortal Kombat II–  You saw that, right?  The roman numerals…made it more epic!  MK2 is my favorite of the early Mortal Kombat games…It had the same rusticness of the original, but more or less doubled the fantasy material.  More characters, levels, and finishing moves.  I beat MK1 at the arcade…But never MK2.  I have only beaten that on a console.  MK3 is a joke to me.  And the modern MK games are fun, but just aren’t the same as the originals.

God of War 2–  I guess I see GOW and GOW 2 equally.  I think they are great!  Kratos is such an awful character, you can’t help but follow him.  It’s kind of like Conan the Barbarian, or Breaking Bad.  Kratos chain swords weapons are perfect for hacking and slashing, and that is something else to love about these games.  They use a modern template, but have laced in SNES-style sensibilities.  The bosses are tough.  The puzzles are confounding.  And you want to know what happens next.  I don’t have a PS3 or PS4.  But if I ever get one, I guarantee I will complete the trilogy.  I have played these games on the hardest levels and beaten them, to where I have leveled Kratos into a God of War for real.  If only I could have my Kratos take out your Kratos, that would be perfect!

So there you go!  The SpartanNerd’s favorite games.  If I get a lot of hits, maybe more lists will come in the future.  This is my 75th post.  Thanks, readers!

Honorable mentions…Mega Man 2…Batman (NES)….Quake 2…..Doom 2…TETRIS

Shadow Era: Call of the Crystals and Dark Prophecies review

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My introduction to Trading Card Games, (TCGs for those not nerdy enough to know,) was actually not Magic: The Gathering, World of Warcraft, of Pokemon.  I knew OF these, but did not play them.  Then one day I got the itch to start playing cards.  I had been playing poker and such as that on the computer, and somehow came across a Macworld article about Shadow Era when I was doing research about cards.

I began to play Shadow Era, which was still in beta testing mode.  I jumped in apparently after the second big update was pushed out.  I had a hard time figuring the game out.  I mean, I read the rules, and sort of knew what to click…the game lights up the available cards, and in about two weeks I had it down.  Before we knew it, I climbed the ratings ladder up to near 200.

Then, I would get knocked back down every time they updated the game.  This happened sort of frequently.  What struck me the most was that they were still evolving the game as people were playing it!  My favorite card then (and now!) is Majaya, but poor Majaya started out as too good of a card, then they weakened her too much, until finally finding the right balance…..

You see, I can’t really explain this game without just talking about my experiences with it.  Basically, you have your cards, you draw a hand, make a sacrifice, which becomes your “mana pool” (to use a Magic term, Shadow Era calls it Resources)  and you can play your cards with the resources you build up.  Only certain cards go together, so Human and Wolf  cards won’t share the same weapons and armor, etc.

The creatures you play in this game line up with their hero’s card type.  So Majaya can play “Shadow” creatures.  Boris, on the other hand must play Human creatures.  DarkClaw must play wolves, etc.  These creatures are called “allies,” and can attack.  Your hero, in my case Majaya, can’t do much of anything except use Shadow Energy, which builds up every turn….

So there you have it….You are confused already….But this game isn’t confusing.  Just hard for me to explain.  It is really very deep.

I ordered some of the physical cards last year….They had sort of a “kickstarter” thing going on, where you could pre-order the cards and you would get bonuses.  This was the GREATEST VALUE EVER.  These physical cards were great, and perhaps I will review them one day, but they sent two whole sets of foil cards in addition to all that I ordered!  And slowly but surely, I received even more stuff, both by mail and on my Shadow Era digital account.  I still have a ton of “Shadow Crystals” to spend, which brings me to the next point.

This game can drain your real money, for digital goods.  It is a FREE game to play, but if you want better cards, you have to either grind against the AI, (boring,) or fork over the cash for shadow crystals, which you can use to buy digital cards.  So warning there!  But this isn’t sooo bad.  In fact, it makes it more like the card games you can buy at the store!

Shadow Era was my jumping on point.  After I started playing this, I introduced the boys to the correct way to play Pokemon, then we went on to try YuGiOh (didn’t like so much) and Magic the Gathering. (Love it, but stink at it!)

So, get on over to this site and start playing!  They just recently released their first expansion to the game, called “Dark Prophecies.”