So is digital distribution the next best thing? Instant gratification is quite convenient. I wish more companies would put up their old games for download (for a reasonable fee if they insist). Its funny they have nothing to lose and money to gain. I mean especially with how the economy is. Nintendo’s stance on this is very irritating. If they hadn’t noticed just because they sell some of their old games for the Wii people still want to play it on their PC. Lucas Arts has been the same way except they don’t sell any of their old games. It makes no sense. If they put a really small old game up for download, people will pay for it. I really wish there was a legal way in obtaining these games like Monkey Island and Quest for Glory.

The companies that I have had experience with:
Blizzard: They offer Warcraft 3 and the Expansion Frozen Throne, Starcraft and Diablo II. A little bit pricey for 6+ year old games. And they really should offer their older titles like Warcraft 1 and 2.

Steam: I bought Commander Keen 1-5 for $4.99. Its lame that the huge and bloated steam program is required to download their games but the price was good. They have a big selection but I saw nothing else I’m interested in.

Good Old Games: I bought Earthworm Jim 1 and 2 for $5.99. They have a decent selection which is getting better every week. They are very committed to being DRM Free which is a big plus. They also throw in any extra goodies they can find with your purchase; like pdf manuals, backgrounds, icons, soundtracks. Good old Games is the best option in my opinion.

Speaking of Quest for Glory, I was able to find Hero’s Quest 1 SCI, Quest for Glory 3 and 4 as well as Kings Quest 4 at the used game store Fun Unlimited in Logan, Utah. Which was very exciting. The Quest for Glory 4 cd was scratched but I got them for the license anyways. I never expected to find them all in one place. Since AGD released their QFG2 Remake, now I’m only missing Quest For Glory 5 which is going for $40-50 used. I also got Dungeon Siege 1, which is quite fun to play multiplayer for how simple it is.

I have been playing a lot of Warcraft 3 recently, thanks to Blizzard’s digital downloads. I beat the campaigns for Reign of Chaos last night. So now I’m on to the Frozen Throne campaigns. Now I know why WOW is the most popular MMORPG these days. Blizzard actually spent some time making interesting races with backstories. Its not the best plot but it keeps you interested. The heroes really make Warcraft 3 stand out from other RTS games. Though they should make more of the settings changeable in game like the population limit (90 for regular and 100 for expansion). You can up the food limit to 300 in the the constants editor in the Frozen Throne Map editor. But they really should have done that in game. I know their idea is to focus on smaller squad based battles. But who doesn’t want epic battles some times. Most of all the maps have really limited gold which I find very frustrating. When your heroes, and armies are finally ready you attack the enemy only to find empty bases because they ran out of gold. So thats another thing to change in the map editor. I understand once you get better at it then it would be easy enough to beat the enemies before all the gold runs dry. I guess I’m used to long epic battles like TA, TAK, Supcom so it takes some getting used too.
A really fun multiplayer hero based multiplayer map for Warcraft 3 Frozen Throne is called Defense of the Ancients. You can get the map with really hard AI opponents at Dotahomer’s DOTA AI You control a hero whose job it is to defend your town and destroy the enemy’s. There are tons of heroes and items to chose from so you don’t get bored. Its a little lame that DOTA only has one map but you get used to it.

Well I have to say I found the ending of Last Scenario quite disappointing. Enough so that I didn’t actually finish it. I just watched someones terrible recording on youtube to see the ending. (They clicked through all the dialogue so I had to try to pause it on every dialogue box. Youtube’s seeking is terrible so you can only jump to certain checkpoints in the file. That’s probably because of it having a .flv container. But it was extremely annoying. Why else would I want to watch the ending of a fan rpg that has shoddily recorded oldschool graphics? Its not like its footage of FFXIII or anything)

It starts out and I found Hilbert the main character kind of annoying, and naive following a standard plot. But then everything gets thrown out the window and your traveling around the world as a Special Ops team (With you armed with a bow). You find yourself caught in a long series of events. And all these events have to do with every kingdom you set foot in falling to chaos. Assassinations, political intrigue, the works. Through all this you get acquainted with the 8 playable characters and their troubled back-stories. This is one ambitious fan project. Unfortunately the ending just doesn’t deliver. Around 25 hours of playing and around level 65 you get to the end of the storyline. The final storyline boss is in a cave that you use your airship to get to. But the boss is just too strong and there is no way to buy the sacred orbs that heal your entire party in a battle. So you have to level your character. And then level. And then level. Oh yeah and then level some more. I tried with my party at level 75 and it wasnt good enough. (I probably could have fought smarter but it was just to annoying for me to bother.) Why would I want to level up to the max. Level 99 i think. It is probably very doable at around 85 with all the ultimate weapons. (You always find better weapons then you can ever buy.) There are extra dungeons to go to get those ultimate weapons but they have no story just fight lots of monsters. Then you go to the next area. It just didn’t keep my interest. So if you actually want to finish I would suggest to try to do more leveling up before each next plot segment.

This game is quite linear- almost always only one way to do everything. This game is heavily inspired by the final fantasy series. You always have to have airships. The magic is somewhat like materia but it doesn’t level up. You only have to attach spell card to the player and then they know the spell. An annoying thing was most spellcards come with modifiers. Like this offensive spell takes away a % of your health and strength. Quite annoying. Sometimes the modifiers helped so your character has useless spells equipped just for their effects.

Some things I found lame. Like you have 8 playable characters at the end of the game but you can only battle with 4. And you can only switch the party at save points. The rest of the party is just useless and just give up if the four battle characters die.
You cant change what type of weapons your players have. For instance Hilbert has a bow and thats your only choice. You can get better bows but thats it. So basically the different weapon types have absolutely no meaning. Bow, sword, axe, staff, throwing daggers, crystal, staff, spear they all act the same. Just the various types of bow have a higher attack then others.
The monsters are also not very exciting. And the game follows a very scripted pattern(for how crazy the plot is) Go fight monsters. Get treasure Fight big boss monster. Get more treasure. Rinse and repeat. I guess thats a over generalization of most RPGs but not unfounded. Up ahead I see a save point and a door. That means save and heal before the boss and then your most probably free for a while. Many monsters are lame like walls and books.

Well i cant deny that it is a interesting game. I didn’t put up a link because I never found an official site for it. Maybe this was the last fan project the guy did. I would not surprised if it is. (The scope is huge for a fan game. It even has it’s own board game. But I never bothered playing more then 2 or 3 times). So just google Last Scenario and you will find it.