Show Me Your Poker Face! Poker Night at the Inventory (1 AND 2)

Titles: Poker Night at the Inventory 1 & 2
Genre: Card Game (Poker)
Developer/Publisher: Telltale Games
System: PC, Mac OSX (both games), PS3, 360 (Poker Night 2 only)
Release Dates: November 22, 2010 (original), April 23rd, 2013 (2)

Poker... with characters from various video games and other big franchises... well, now that's something to think about.

Poker Night at the Inventory puts you against four notable characters in a battle of cards, Texas Hold 'Em style (with the second game adding Omaha Hold 'Em in the mix). The first game features you going up against Max from the Sam & Max series, Strong Bad from Homestar Runner, The Heavy from Team Fortress 2, and Tycho from the Penny Arcade webcomics.

In Poker Night 2, you opponents this time are Brock Sampson from the [adult swim] animated series The Venture Bros., Claptrap from Borderlands, Ash Williams (not to be confused with Ashley Williams of the Mass Effect series) from the Evil Dead movies, and Sam from Sam & Max. GLaDOS from the Portal series also makes an appearance in this game, serving the role as the dealer.

The cast of Poker Night 2. 

The general gist of Texas Hold 'em poker is this: each player is dealt two cards, turn by turn each player can choose to call the amount the previous player put out or raise in order to earn more money. Players can fold if they feel that their hand is inferior to that of the others.

After all bets are done, the first three cards of the river go out, and the process repeats until there are five cards out on the table. The player with the best hand wins the pot.

And just when you think the game is all about money, you best think again. Each character has a special item that you can obtain which can be used for another game.

In the case with the first game (and probably the second), each of the character has a special item that they can put up as part of the bet, and if you win the bet, that item is yours. In the first game, obtaining a special item will grant you bonus weapons and gear in Team Fortress 2.

Winning more poker matches allows you to unlock extra tables and cards based on each character's series. In Poker Night 2, they made special areas/maps for all 5 characters.

If you're looking for something fun and/or want to learn about playing poker without using real money, then both Poker Night games are a choice for you, and both are $5, with pre-ordering Poker Night 2 (on Steam) will grant you the original Poker Night free of charge.

Thanks again for reading!
-Anthony-

Ground Zeroes And A Phantom Pain

Today's blog will be rather brief, as it is about something which is new information in regards to the latest in the Metal Gear series.

Title: Metal Gear Solid V (5): The Phantom Pain

Genre: Stealth, Action, Third-Person Shooter

Developer: Kojima Productions

Publisher: Konami

System: Playstation 3, Xbox 360 (other systems pending)

Release Date: TBA

Over the last year, there have been two major teasers that led up to Metal Gear Solid V's reveal at this year's Game Developer's Conference. It was initially announced through two separate games: "Metal Gear Solid: Ground Zeroes" and "The Phantom Pain". It is also the first game to utilize the FOX Engine.

The Ground Zeroes trailer serves as the prologue for the game, which takes places after the events of the previous game in the Big Boss story line, Peace Walker. In the full trailer, it is shown that Big Boss has been a coma for nine years. How and why has yet to be known.

Trailer from GDC 2013:

Now to be fair, I've never played any of the Metal Gear games (unless counting the demos for Snake Eater 3D for the 3DS and Metal Gear Rising: Revengance count in any way), but I've always been interested in the series in itself for some reason. My guess is it's just the gamer instinct or something.

Anyways, more stuff will come in the following weeks and months until it's release, so until then enjoy the trailer!

-Anthony-

Day One in the Dark - Darkstalkers That Is

Title: Darkstalkers Resurrection

Console: Playstation 3, Xbox 360

Genre: Fighting

Developer: Capcom (originals), Iron Galaxy Studios

Publisher: Capcom

Release Date: March 12th - 14th, 2013

9 times out of 10, I usually don't purchase a game on the first day it's out, whether it be a physical copy or for digital download, but since I've never played any of the Darkstalkers games, it was worth my while to download it one it's first day out.

Darkstalkers Resurrection is an HD port/compilation of two games: Night Warriors: Darkstalkers' Revenge, and Darkstalkers 3 (the second and third games of the series), the prior of the two making it's first appearance outside of Japan. In addition, like with Street Fighter III: 3rd Strike Online Edition, both games have been made to have online playability.

Between the two games, the cast consists of 18 playable characters, with most characters being based on some form of supernatural entity, such as vampires, succubi, and even zombies as some examples.

Morrigan Aensland, a succubus, is one of the playable characters in the game, and she is one of the most popular of Capcom's characters. She also appears along with other Capcom characters in  crossover fighting games.

In regards to characters, since this game is a compilation of two games, certain characters are only playable in either game.

Exclusive to Night Warriors:
Donovan Baine
Huitzil
Pyron

Exclusive to Darkstalkers 3:
B.B. Hood
Jedah Dohma
Lilith
Q-Bee

So you're probably thinking "how can play both games?" You can press "Select" (on a PS3 controller) or "Back" (on a 360 controller) and switch between the two games.

The menus for both games consists of the following:
- Single Player (play through a series of matches against the CPU in Arcade Mode or learn each character's moves)

- Multiplayer (play online with people, watch replays, and set matchmaking options)

- Ranking Boards (view the online rankings for the online portions of Night Warriors & Darkstalkers 3)

- Awards (view any in-game achievements)

- Vault (see concept art, pictures, and videos of all of the characters)

- Help & Options (learn what the controls are and change volume and control output)

- Playstation Store/Xbox Marketplace (view/purchase any downloadable content)

In order to unlock the art in the vault, you must earn points which can be done through leveling up and completing certain in-game achievements (as shown in the Awards section).

In online multiplayer you can save your replays, and just like with Street Fighter III: 3rd Strike Online Edition, you can also upload replays to YouTube as well. Here's an example:

Because these games were release back in the mid 90's, output for using each characters moves are different from today's current fighting games like Tekken Tag Tournament 2 or BlazBlue: Continuum Shift Extend, so they included challenges to show some techniques that each character can use.

Seeing that it has been too long since Darkstalkers has had any actually games since Darkstalkers 3, the reason for Darkstalkers Resurrection is to see if there is enough interest in making a new Darkstalkers game. With enough people this can be possible, but it's ultimately Capcom's decision.

To wrap things up, Darkstalkers to me so far has been an interesting experience, especially since it's something that I got on the first day. I've been enjoying it so far and will continue to see what I can learn from this classic fighting game.