(Note that from now on I'll be putting time references for the different sections. That way if people want to skip a section, or want to quickly find one, you can do so.)

- Game Watch : Hearthstone: Heroes of Warcraft

Game: Hearthstone: Heroes of Warcraft
Type: Collectable Card game
Developer: Blizzard
Distributor: Blizzard
Platform(s): PC / Mac / iPad (rumored eventually Android)
Players: Multi-player duels over Battle.net (1 on 1 to start, but this may change someday to include other forms of play.)
Release: For North America; Late 2013, beta in summer. Release in other countries after NA launch.
Cost model: Free to download. Free to play. Boosters and Forge competition for low cost. (Though the numbers may change it is currently an estimated $1 per booster for 5 cards, and $3 for a Forge deck, of which 15 cards are kept.) Note that boosters can also be won for free.

What is it? Hearthstone is a digital collectable card game set in the Warcraft universe. It will incorporate aspects from the original Warcraft strategy games, World of Warcraft, and even the World of Warcraft comics. It will be free to download and play. You can build and tune decks, build up your collection with boosters (either won for free or purchased), participate in a sealed deck challenge called the Forge, and even create or enhance cards though crafting.

Why is it important? Collectable card games are few and far between, even if we don't limit the search by only looking at digital format. The fact that Blizzard is making it should give it a much higher chance for having a dedicated team of individuals behind its creation, as well as word about the game spreading.

What makes the game design special? Blizzard is not only putting it's usual level of polish on the game as a whole, but they are taking advantage of the digital nature. Everything you do will be highly animated and exciting to watch and hear, and even the cards themselves have been mentioned to have very special rare versions which have some animations running on them. Blizzard is also introducing the Forge, where you enter a sort of sealed deck competition, building a deck from random choices. There will also be crafting, which will, in theory, allow you to create cards you are missing or to enhance cards you have collected. (Very little is known about crafting at the time of this writing.)

Why is it going to pwn? With Blizzards level of polish and attention to detail Hearthstone should be truly entertaining to play and watch. With their level of commitment and huge piles of money from other games, there should be plenty of money to invest to make sure the game both launches smoothly and is supported for years to come.

Why could it fail (game design)? Collectable card games are very tough to balance. If there is an imbalance in a core feature the game may easily die due to lack of interest. Also, Blizzard is not allowing for player trading. While this will remove any concerns regarding a real world imbalance caused by people buying/selling cards, it does take away a huge aspect of casual collectable card games. Blizzard is also going for a more simplistic, and fast play, design for the game. This overall core philosophy may limit how the game plays strategically and this may be too casual of a style for the hardcore collectable card game players, creating a game which is only loved by the very casual players.

Why could it fail (developer)? Blizzard has huge piles of cash, so we won't need to worry about any funding issues long-term or not enough money to do proper testing and balance for launch. However, due to the free to play model Blizzard may eventually follow a micro-transaction model that players don't agree with, thus losing players due to disagreement on how they are making money off of Hearthstone.

Personal opinion / thoughts: Hearthstone is the first digital collectable card game I've really truly gotten excited about. There have been a few others over the years I've talked about, but their designs at launch have been disappointing in one way or another. They didn't seem true to the kind of collectable card game play style I was looking for. Blizzard seems to have truly nailed all of the aspects I'm looking for. Blizzard is also the first to truly take advantage of the digital nature in terms of animation, collection, and even modifying the cards. They have gone very minimal / simplistic in play, keeping things quick and easy to recognize, yet the depth of deck tuning and building still seems to be in place. Will Hearthstone be the digital collectable card game I've been waiting roughly 20 years for? Time will tell. Beta should start in about a month, and I'm sure we will know much more once it does.

An otherwise sad, slow, and lonely feeling week interrupted by an appreciative email from a Blizzard forum moderator.

I have played 8 hours of the newest Tomb Raider, and although I've not finished yet I ramble about my thoughts. It re-starts the series in a great way and has all of the iconic Tomb Raider features. There is a ton of great story, solid action, but very few tombs. Though a bit of a departure from a standard Tomb Raider game it all makes perfect sense as a re-start and shows great promise for the series moving forward.

Braving what may have been insane crowds I decided to see Iron Man 3 opening weekend. If you are a fan of the series I highly recommend it, but if you haven't seen it yet you can listen to my rambly thoughts and decide for yourself.

Despite getting two new games this week and seeing an awesome movie, I have some sad times and struggle my self-worth, and again question if recovery will ever be possible.

I finished Hitman: Absolution and have a few closing thoughts on that. The levels were pretty open compared to previous games, but, typical for Hitman, they kind of expect you to run them a dozen times and learn the scripted patterns of the targets. Voice and script was great, but really dragged down by poor animation quality in the pre-rendered scenes. Overall I'd still recommend it for any Hitman series fan.

Another mark of time has come and gone; the Steampunk convention I found years ago. As I decide not to visit I ponder my youth long ago when I could go to conventions, and I am saddened by my wishes of youth not coming true, as well as the sense of loss I feel by continuing to not have something I've been longing for.

I finished the expansion to Dishonored: The Knife of Dunwall. As I said before it's an excellent expansion very worth playing through.

And, I ramble a bit about my new headphones I had to get to replace my broken ones.

The end of an emotionally terrible week comes to a close. As it does I no longer know if this path is clear. I wonder if any path I've taken has helped at all, as none of the last 14 years of school have seemed to make any difference in helping me find a job. I know what I like to do. I know what I'm good at and I enjoy. But those are only done by a very small number of people, and I have no idea how to get in to those jobs, if I even could without four year and higher degrees. And now I feel more lost and unsure about my future than I have in quite a while.

I saw the premier of Defiance. It was pretty good. Set slightly in the future it's a tale of how 8 races try to get along on a transformed Earth in the city of Defiance. Will it last? I don't know. It seems a strange blend of old west and soap opera character interaction. I think it will get a few seasons before anything is seriously changed or it's canceled, but time will tell.

The week started ok, but then became sad, and ended with the certainty that I may need to consider dropping my class, and the uncertainty of if any of the past 14 years of school have helped at all.

Another sad and lonely week. I think more and more lately I am pondering how much has not changed over the years as we approach the end of yet another Fail year.

Again, I'll have a class this next quarter on Tuesdays, so I likely won't post the Epic Fail week until mid afternoon PST.

I talk about my thoughts StarCraft 2: Heart of the Swarm's single player campaign. I discuss differences from the previous SC2 game, as well as thoughts on the general feel of the multiplayer community and why I don't expect to be playing very much online, if at all.

And in the close I do a retro review for Hitman: Absolution. Some things seem to have changed for this time around, and it wouldn't surprise me if those changes were to be more welcoming to new players. I'm not done yet, only about 5 hours in, but I think I'm deep enough to have seen everything in the single player campaign that's new. There is also a new play type called Contract mode, and I haven't tried that yet.

Another sad and lonely week. Table Top day failed, and this was the first Easter I didn't celebrate possibly ever.

As a side note, I'll have a class this next quarter on Tuesdays, so I likely won't post the Epic Fail week until mid afternoon PST.

Hope everyone is having a good bunny day!

I talk about some early impressions on the announcement and news surrounding Blizzard's Hearthstone: Heroes of Warcraft. It looks like it could be the collectable card game I've been waiting for all these years.

And in the close I have some thoughts about StarCraft 2: Heart of the Swarm. Multiplayer seems unfriendly, but there are some levels that get you avatars and stickers. And the single player campaign seems interesting. In the next weekend of the Neverwinter and Defiance beta I didn't really discover anything new I hadn't seen before.

For those who don't know a "tech demo" is a pre-programed thing in terms of characters and the scene doing a set thing, think of it like actors doing a scene from a movie, but it is rendered right then as you watch by the graphics card / computer in question (so think of it like a play you see live). Apparently this was done on a single GTX 680.

How soon could we see a game with this much detail? Well, that's hard to say. That's a lot of art assets going into that (time programmers spend to create what we see), so it's unlikely to happen "soon" because of the amount of work it would take. But the fact that someone could make something this detailed right now, WOAH. (Note that it likely wouldn't be quite this detailed running as a game in real time, as games take a lot more computational power than pre-set scenes.)

Another cycle of school closes, and again I feel like it's not helping and that I'll never find a career.

I played through Dead Space 3: Awakened downlodable content and found it to be a perfect (for me) blend of action and story.

The NDA for Defiance dropped on March 22nd, so you can finally hear my thoughts on the 2nd beta weekend that happened on March 8th-10th.

And in the close, which I will likely make its own section in the future when I do it, I talk about my experiences with my new iPhone app to help me track calories and be less fat / unhealthy.

Still recovering from being sick. While my life is much better than it was when I started this terrible journey, lately it still feels like everything I've lost will never be recovered, and more and more lately I can't help but feel sadness at the loss of... me.

Yeah, I'm still predicting in maybe 15 years PCs and consoles will merge into a single unit, but we are still a long way off and consoles just dominate sales numbers these days (compared to desktop).

Edit: I wonder if this has to do with their Shield project. It could be the developers that would otherwise be working on console chips have been moved to Shield. If so IMO that's a mistake, as Shield is an untested market, while consoles continue to gain momentum every year. The handheld market has never been stable, and Shield being something which requires to 'be bound' to a PC makes it even more questionable in terms of adoption rate.

This week I am horribly sick, and when I start to recover I feel very sad and scared about my future.

I was starting to feel a bit better about things, but being displaced for most of a night quickly puts me back into a very sad place.

Depression is letting up a bit, but I'm still very sad, and still very 'homesick' for all the basic things I no longer have.

On a side note, I've been feeling lately that there is less and less difference between the rank 3 and 4 systems. While there is a pretty decent price jump, there isn't really a performance jump like I'd like to see. With the next generation I may make some tweaks and the pricing spots may change a bit and we'll see things like the rank 4 change to dual GTX 680 and the rank 5 go back to being a bit more redonculous with triple GTX 680. (Yes, I created the rank 5 system for those who could drop 5k on a system and not even blink. Yes, that was due to people requesting such a system.)

Depression continues to get worse, and an incident with a tire causes me to lose another $175, ruining any chance of having money for extra / unplanned for fun or to put into savings.

Most of the week is still super sad and depressed feeling, but the sad times seem to finally be going away as things start coming together at the end of the fail week.

But looking at the reactions of players and looking at things from a role playing standpoint - and granted this is likely a smaller number than those who would not react like this - and thinking about what kind of potential hatred I could face in game, it makes me wonder... if I were playing my female drown in game and someone ridiculed / attacked me for it, is that racism? They would be hating me for something my character is born as, something in terms of role playing she could not control for. (Would they consider the possibility that her mother was raped by a drow and she is only half? I doubt it.) Would it be classism towards me as a player because I did choose to spend the money on the founders pack while others didn't or couldn't?

I will likely ponder this further and ramble about it on podcast 95, but it made me think... People are jumping to conclusions and attacking others for making this purchase. Why is that? Why do they not see it as someone supporting the idea of something that they may love? Is it because doing things like linking and talking about a game are seen as support, and founders packs are seen only as "developers being greedy"? Is it because players feel others should only be recognized for accomplishments and buying something isn’t an accomplishment?

Back when I was young and doing pen and paper gaming gamers didn't attack others for having all the books, they were like 'can I borrow that? K thxs'. They certainly didn't think well of that person, 'good job supporting those developers', but it was never the kind of direct attacks against people I'm seeing in response to those buying founders packs.

I suppose 'haters gonna hate', but it strikes me as curious so many are so quick to jump to the attack.

Sad times this week as I feel extra lonely and sad, and like things I accomplish always fall apart as I continue to try to get rabb1t's ramblings back on iTunes.

As a side note iTunes no longer seems to be hosting rabb1t's ramblings on the iTunes store. If you are already subscribed you should still automatically get the new podcasts, however, I will need to change the feed thingy so that iTunes sees it in the future, so at some point you will need to adjust your subscription. I have instructions on the page, as well as in the podcast, on how to do that so you don't miss anything.

With my podcast being dropped from iTunes and the new coffee shop connection becoming unstable it feels like everything in my life is falling apart, and again like anything new I accomplish in these homeless times eventually goes to poop.

As a side note iTunes no longer seems to be hosting rabb1t's ramblings on the iTunes store. If you are already subscribed you should still automatically get the new podcasts, however, I will need to change the feed thingy so that iTunes sees it in the future, so at some point you will need to adjust your subscription. I will let people know the status of that on this index page as well as in the podcasts themselves. In the mean time I will be duplicating the old and new info to help ease people over during the transition.

Still feeling very sad, alone, isolated, that nothing I'm doing is changing anything, and that I am far closer to death than I should be.

Been feeling very sad about death the past few days. I guess I am slowly balancing back to ok, but sad times seem extra sad lately.

I suppose since this life is all I have known, once I am dead I won't worry, and thus if there is or is not a reincarnation afterwards where I will again live and perceive I shouldn't worry because when I am gone I will cease to be, and thus no longer living would not bother me, much like how I have no memory of my being before I was born.

But I do. And it makes me sad. And it's hard not to with all the sad things in my life.

This week I feel very sad and insignificant, and like even if I do ever recover, or better still live a happy rabb1t life, I may still never be seen as important or truly have an impact on people's lives.

Technology: Nvidia Shield is a handheld gaming system running on Android OS. It has a 5" multi-touch screen with 1280x720 resolution (aka 720p at 294 dpi), making it a sharper screen than phones and other mobile devices out there of its size. It features a quad core CPU and a GPU with 72 cores, making it a decent advancement on chips used in phones and tablets, and even a bit above many used in netbooks. It features a full sized controller with the standard number of buttons you'd find on a controller for a console. It features built in speakers, and HDMI out so its output can be sent to a regular monitor. It features WiFi for connectivity. While it is unstated how much built in storage it will have there is a micro-SD card slot. It's possible this could serve as the main storage unit while built in storage is fairly minimal (I'd guess maybe 8 to 16 gig.)

Timing: The timing on this is a bit odd, since Nvidia is basically going "surprise". They are supposedly targeting a Q2 time period, which means April, May, or June, some 3-5 months from now.

Why could it fail: With a surprise announcement it seems like this is a bit premature. Every handheld, in fact every gaming system, will live or die based on its games. Nvidia is a graphics chip manufacturer. They don't even make the cards themselves. They are reliant on 3rd party manufacturers to make the cards. This means they are providing the specs, the CPU/GPU for the system, and that's it. They will be 100% reliant on 3rd party developers to make games. (Unless they decide to open up a games studio.) With no support from game developers the system will fail. The target market for the system is also a bit of a mystery. While noone would argue portable systems with better controller types tend to do better, there are several curious things about Shield. It has a touch screen, meaning they may be targeting touch gaming. If so, touch gaming may be odd with a controller attached. Many could feel that it just gets in the way. With a full controller they may be targeting the 'hardcore' audience and looking at console type games. Console like games historically have not done well on handheld platforms because they are either very stripped down versions of the full game, or simply bad ports.

Why could it succeed: With Nvidia basically being an unknown in handheld gaming the market is wide open for game developers to embrace the system. If the right games are made that take advantage of both the power and the controls, it could really do well in the handheld market.

Final thoughts / opinion: Unlike Sony or Nintendo where people know there will be anywhere up to half a dozen titles at launch which come with every launch, Nvidia's Shield has exactly zero titles people will expect to see. Since there is no attention being called to must have games specifically being made for Shield my guess is there aren't going to be any at launch, and if there are it will be a very small number. With the cloud technology they announced at the same time (Grid) it looks like they are targeting a few things for this launch. It looks like they will be targeting Nvidia GPU users by allowing people to stream their game from their desktop to the Shield and play from somewhere other than at their desk. I find this very curious because I don't know anyone who would rather play a desktop game from somewhere that isn't their desktop. Everyone I know who, say as example, would sometimes like to play from a bigger screen, already have an HDMI out to that screen, wireless headphones, and a wireless controller, and they already do that. It also looks like they may be targeting Android gamers. I really don't know anyone who would go out and specifically buy a Shield who wants to do Android gaming. My guess is they already all have Android phones and don't need another device.

Price is also going to be an issue. With the tech they are showing I'm going to guess they will have a very difficult time keeping the unit under $250-300. In fact, a launch price of $300-350 including a free game or two would not surprise me at all. It looks like a premature launch trying to garner attention from fans and news agencies, while main development of games and production of units ramp up for a more solid launch around the holiday season.

Personally I think size will also be a major issue. When people think portable gaming they think, well, portable. They like to put a unit in their pocket, even if it's a tight fit, and for the unit to be easy to carry. The Shield is pretty big; as big, if not slightly bigger, than a full sized controller. While carrying that isn't impossible for most people, carrying an item as big as roughly both your hands clasped together is far more inconvenient than something that fits into your pocket.

It will really come down to games more than anything else. With a design somewhere between a phone and a console it is unclear who the system is targeting. There will need to be games which support both, and which are more than just 'you can play this on Shield in addition to your regular Android device or PC'. If it never goes beyond that people will never see why they shouldn't just play the game on the Android or PC system that they already own. And if the games are little more than ports from consoles, again, people won't see a reason to play a version that is less desirable than they could play on their console.

Time will tell if Nvidia can make Shield a success, but I really think it will come down to game developer support and getting the cost down (into the sub-$200 range.)

Another sad end to another sad year. So little is changing as time goes on.

Sad Holliday times are sad for me. Hopefully everyone else is having a good Xmas time.

Feeling extra lonley, fat, and sad, but a few betas and a disruption in my routine due to school ending keeps me fairly distracted.

Things seem extra sad, lonely, and I feel very unattractive and fat.

Please note that there is now an archive page for podcasts 1-50, as a single page was getting ginormous.

Things seem extra sad with the instability at the restaurant, tires draining all my money, and the holidays approaching.

Things slowly return to normal, but there is bad news for my tires.

The laptop returns. Whuuut?!?

Now that my laptop is off for RMA I have to reacquaint myself with the old netbook. Slow days and waiting begin.

More system troubles, but at the close of the week I'm preparing to send off the system to go through the RMA process. The week ends on a hopeful note for a change.