Fwd: Wizard101 Gift Cards Available Now!

Sent from my iPhone

Begin forwarded message:

Subject: Wizard101 Gift Cards Available Now!

For immediate publication

---

PLANO, TEXAS - April 30, 2009 - Online entertainment company KingsIsle Entertainment, Inc. has announced a gift card program for family-friendly hit game Wizard101® (www.wizard101.com), which recently surpassed two million unique users who have registered to play the game. 

Starting today, $10 prepaid Wizard101 gift cards are available in 7-Eleven® stores nationwide. Purchasing through local outlets offers friends, family and fans of the 3D virtual world of Wizards and spell-casting more options for unlocking advanced game content. 

"Wizard101 gift cards give our growing community more flexibility and parental control in their purchases – beginning with a way to purchase advanced game content in a store," said KingsIsle CEO Elie Akilian. 

The $10 price point makes Wizard101 gift cards an affordable birthday gift, allowance treat, or a fun surprise for the in-game pet collector. With the new gift cards, players who don't have a credit card will have more independence in the way they spend small increments in the game, whether they decide to unlock new areas of the game or purchase equipment and accessories for their Wizard101 characters, such as wands, treasure cards and holiday items. 

Each card offers a limited edition collectible pet available upon redemption from one of four special sets: Protectors, Assistants, Adventurers, and Heroes. Pets from these sets will give players better powers such as increased accuracy, defense, damage, and a special spell card that can be used during duels. 

In addition to the special abilities listed above, the gift card pets will be available in colors, patterns, and clothing that cannot be found anywhere else in the game. The first set, Protectors, are available now. Each month beginning in May, a new set will become available to gift card purchasers upon redemption. 

---

 

Last Day to Name the Turtles!

This is it kids! Today at midnight it all ends.

Click this link and make any final entries.

peace.

Housing Item of the Day--Lynx Stargazer Picture

Today's Housing Item of the Day is a total art heist off the wall of the Myth School.



GASP! Kingsisle! Ohh how you have dropped us. When we started this game, you were secretly training us on how to be good citizens: walking on the sidewalk, helping others in their time of need, developing a 401k . . . . Now look at us, art thieves. Oh well, Professor Drake probably didn't like the "day dreaming" part of this art piece anyway. He WANTED you to steal it, yeah yeah. He WANTED you to, yup.



You know, this does bring up something about looting a detail from the world and adding it to your house. It's no longer there in the game! I kind of like some of these items being there in the world for me to look at. hmmmm, no fear, after the patch on the test realm today, I will no longer own these objects. They shall be free.

*gong* I think I just learned something about impermanence *gong*

Or maybe that was just indigestion. hmmm

Happy Dueling!

Two Down Time Messages

These just came across the wire for you

Wizard101 Test Realm Downtime

Beginning at 9am Central US time on April 30th, the Wizard101 Test Realm will be offline for approximately four hours. During this downtime players will not be able to log in to the Test Realm, and are invited to continue to enjoy playing Wizard101 on the Live Realm.

Players will experience a loss of items and experience in the Test Realm after this downtime. This does not affect your characters in the Live Realm in any way.


-----------------------------------------

Wizard101 Live Realm Downtime during Regular Maintenance Window

On April 30th, Wizard101 the game will be offline during our regular maintenance window of 3am to 4am Central US time. During this downtime, players will be unable to log in to the Live Wizard101 game, and players who are in the game will be prompted to log out.

During this downtime, the billing section of the website may also experience brief interruptions in service.

So if I had put a lot of work into making a cool house with tons of decorations, now would be the time to photograph it so I could remember how to put it back together again someday. Fortunately all I did was throw a brain jar on the ground with a couple of other things . . . as you all know.

Happy Dueling!

Housing Items of the Day--Small Fern and Large Cypress Tree

Today I am doing my part to green the world by . . . playing a computer game . . . no, that doesn't sound right. Um, well today's housing item of the day is the Small Fern from Alicane over there on Firecat Alley.



Elijah popped up and surprised me. He had also recently acquired a housing item, so we decided to do Elijah's housing item of the day: The Large Cypress Tree from Lord Nightshade.



So this is friendly saying, do your part! Plant it forward and all that. :-)



Seriously, that would rock to plant an actual tree today. You should talk your parents into that. GO!

*EDIT* OOPS! One other matter that I need to do in the next 20-minutes (or at least that's what the e-mail tells me). This one is specifically for Shy, but everybody else too. I got this e-mail from a friend today and was told that if I didn't send this to six people, that an innocent unicorn would die. I will not allow that to happen. Pass it on!



Happy Dueling!

The Dream Team is on to Krokotopia! (and pet show)

Earlier this morning, The Evil Twin and Isiah Taleslinger brought Wizard City to a close and earned their Wizard City Protector badge by defeating Lord Nightshade. Merle was both overjoyed and deeply disturbed . . . as he was the two other times I finished this part of the game.



I was just as overjoyed as I always am to put this part of the game behind me. This time through it has just been fun. There's nothing like waiting for the seventh pip to cast an orthrus from a low level myth caster like Isiah to one hit Lord Nightshade.



OH, btw . . . speaking of pets, I don't think I've introduced you all to Kyle Skystaff's new friend. I traded in Kyle's Orthrus for this fine fella since orthrus is now a myth only pet. Kingsisle rocked the trade for me. THANKS PROFESSOR GREYROSE!



BAHHHHHHH! (Kyle says, "come on baby baxter, let's go nuke some stuff")

Housing Item of the Day--Unicorn Statue and Life Pedestal

I decided to give you a two-for-one today since you've been so good. Both of these items come from Lady Blackhope.



I just have a couple things to note here. I really would have liked to have a gajillion unicorn statues on my lawn. Seriously. But, you can only have one it looks like.



Second thing to note is, why is that ordinary looking pedestal called a "life pedestal"? It's kind of bland actually, and to make things worse, you can't even put anything on top of the pedestal. Wouldn't that unicorn have looked AWESOME on top of that pedestal? Heck, I'd even like a brain jar on top of it. Also, if you notice, the pedestals directly outside Lady Blackhope's place look like "life pedestals." Change requested! (This is the test realm after all . . . .)

I do love that unicorn statue.



I got my tank top, I got my statue . . . I'm ready to frolic.

Happy Dueling!

Two Must-Watch Housing Threads

Now, I'm still going to be doing my "housing item" of the day thread despite these links (because it's fun and cool, yo), but I think you all really need to keep an eye on these two threads (note you will have to log into Wizard101 Central to view these):

Free Furniture Items: Items you can just snag from around the world.
Boss Drop Furniture Items: Items you get from farming bosses.

Those are going to help you when housing goes live for sure . . . because I know you all want 20 unicorn statues out front of your houses like I do.

Happy Dueling!

The New Dream Team is Getting Together!

I've talked about The Evil Twin and Isiah Taleslinger before, but I just wanted to update you on their progress. Wizard City happens so fast and with such ferocity that it's hard to keep a good pace when two-boxing until you hit Firecat alley where the kill 6 quests start to really manifest. At that point it becomes a huge benefit to be killing in a group of two or more to speed things up.



It also helps The Evil Twin out a lot since most of the boss mobs in Wizard City appear to have their resistances to death magic boosted from the last time I ventured through. But, on a little guy like Alicane Swiftarrow, death magic still rocks the house.



Isiah and The Evil Twin are just about ready to hit Lord Nightshade and progress on to Krokotopia. I think I may skip Colossus Boulevard this time around and come back to it later.

btw, side note, I am playing these two on the live realm, but I've noticed on the test realm that they've boosted the speed on the casting animation of a lot of spells. Anyone else noticed that? The life imp spell is definitely a lot faster.

Happy Dueling!

Housing Item of the Day--Brain Jar

Today's housing item is the Brain Jar.



I found this "thoughtful" piece of furnishing in Lord Nightshade's room. It appears to be a one time only item that appears on a desk in his room. How do I know this? I killed Lord Nightshade with Thomas Lionblood once and there was the jar. I killed him again, no jar. I brought in Kyle to help kill Lord Nightshade a third time, and there was no jar for Thomas, but there was for Kyle.



Happy Dueling!

Housing Item of the Day--Brown Blooms

I had heard rumor of something dropping from wormguts for player housing on the test realm, so I thought I'd go confirm it.



Brown Blooms from Worm Guts! It's our new housing item of the day. :-)

Fwd: Free Gold on the Test Realm

Sent from my iPhone

look for Benjamin the Leprechaun all over Wizard City in the TEST REALM. Talk to him to receive 50 000 gold!

Enjoy testing out the housing features with this free gold, and remember what happens on the Test Realm, stays on the Test Realm! :)

Playing W101 from my hotel room

HEY! I got to sneak in a half hour of play this morning from our hotel room. Good stuff. The fire elves were feeling the evil twin's thunder from all the way within the Holiday Inn. BOOM!



I'm off for more education about Autism. This has been really valuable. Definitely been a good experience.

Happy Dueling!

Sparse the next couple of days

Well, my wife and I are off to go to a two-day conference on healing autism. I don't know if I've ever noted this before by my son (you know him as Kyle Skystaff) has high-functioning autism. We found out when he was two. He's now five. Autism has become a HUGE word in our family the past three years because, well, now it affects us. Three years ago I didn't even really know what autism was to be honest. Pretty much the extent of my knowledge on autism could be summed up in two bullets.

• Rain Man.
• A kid I grew up with who didn’t say much.

Now I'm fully armed with all kinds of knowledge because after the diagnosis, that word, "autism," becomes a daily, sometimes hourly, thought for the rest of your life. Everything changes. Your relationship with spouse. Your relationship to all your kids. Your relationship with other people. Everything now has that additional filter or idea in it.

What's it like for me? Well, two and a half years ago, it was like raising a human that was pretty much as close to raising a wild animal as you can get. this kid was on sensory overload, not talking, and doing just downright strange stuff.

Then when we looked closely at his digestive system, we discovered that there was a gut-brain connection for Kyle Skystaff. So we put him on a special diet to help avoid certain chemical reactions in his gut. We killed off his regular flora of critters in his digestive system and introduced a new flora of critters through some special pro-biotics (this is an ongoing war). Then we hit him with some vitamins, some supplements, and special stuff to help nourish his mind. (You should see the list of instructions my wife left with nana while we're going to be away here.)

We also sat down with our local educators and started getting him some special education. His pre-school experience has been full of speech and behavior therapy.

We also started dealing with Miles differently. There was less frustration, guilt, and confusion. There was more understanding. There is more love.

How is he now? Well, he's much less like a wild animal now. He's more polite than his sister. He's still struggles with finding the words. He still has sensitivities to sound and light. He's still autistic.

My wife is also due to have our third child in July. Because of Miles condition and because there's a higher chance that this kid might be autistic as well, we're erring on the side of caution. We're doing things a bit differently with this new child and hopefully it will have a positive effect.

I'm hoping this two-day conference will arm us with even more information so we can keep striving toward making a difference in our kids' worlds.

Thanks for reading and have fun in the spiral! I am bringing my laptop along (as long as my wife doesn't object), so you may hear from me the next couple days or you may not.

Happy Dueling!

You Gotta Get Yourself Some Columns!

YOU GOTTA GET YOURSELF SOME MAAARBLE COLUMNS!















Seriously, some design choices just don't go out of style.

It just screams, "Who lives there? I bet he just drove up in a rolls royce!"

YOU GOTTA GET YOURSELF SOME MARBLE COLUMNS!

Housing Preview!

You should definitely drop by West Karana and see some more of the pictures that tipa snapped last night. I haven't even checked Wizard101 Central, but I'm sure the place is booming with pictures and information.

I played a little bit on test this morning and even ran into my friend Kevin Emeraldhead there!

So I snapped a few pictures of the run through and uploaded it to youtube. I'll do a more detailed run through later when I have time and my software agrees to work with me again.



And now seriously, I need to go get ready for work. LOL!

Happy Dueling!

Test Realm Opens to Preview Housing in Wizard101

The wait is almost over! Get your sneak peek of housing now! Here's the press release:

Test Realm Opens to Preview Housing in Wizard101

To our Subscribers and players who have made a Crowns purchase in the last 30 days, we invite you to test out some of our new features on the Wizard101 Test Realm.

We will be looking to you to test out the following additions to Wizard101:

· Housing - Housing and housing item vendors can be found in all the worlds of the Spiral. Decorate your house or your Dorm room!

· Voiceovers have been added for Marleybone, MooShu and Dragonspyre

· Tips will appear to alert you to any items you have received as a reward.

· Run Speed modifiers can be found on Crowns items and as boss drops.

· Markers can now be placed that will allow you to recall back to a marked location.

· New messaging for Dungeons when you enter and if you log out while inside.

· New messaging for Quest drops such as 'Collect Armor'.

· Boat and Balloon rides are now optional.

· Friend Requests show more information about the character.

· The ghosts have fled from Firecat Alley and Triton Avenue to be replaced with different creatures.

If you see any issues with these or other features on the Test Realm, please use the Bug Report button in the game to let us know.

For more information on how to participate in the Test Realm, please see our Sneak Peek Page.

WHAT?! Balloon rides are now optional?! But won't Mr. Personality get lonely now? This is horrible news. I'm loading up test to verify! GASP! HOW COULD YOU DO THIS KINGSISLE!

*walks off in a huff*

Seriously though . . . there's a lot of cool changes in this patch don't you think? Well, except for making ballon rides optional.

*walks off in a huff*

You're the Next Contestant on Name That Turtle!

That's right folks! You all are the next contestants on . . .



Unless you've been living under a rock (which you soon WON'T be living under a rock anymore), then you've probably heard a great deal about player housing coming to every world of the spiral. What better creature to sell a house than one who carries his house on his back!



The only problem being that THEY DON'T HAVE NAMES, YO! Do you know what that's like to be nameless in a sea of blue names? I don't think you do! I don't think you do! Well, maybe you do. Nah, probably not . . .

In any case, readers of the Friendly Necromancer shall be naming the Moo Shu Turtle!

Vanna, can you reveal the game board for the players please?



Just type in your information and submission above AND THE PRIZES YOU'LL WIN! WOW!



The first qualifying submission of the chosen name for each world will receive a very rare housing item for your new house.

All qualifying submissions who suggested the winning name will receive 101 Crowns.

GRATZ!

And now, legal stuff . . .

No purchase is necessary to participate in this contest.
All submissions are the property of KingsIsle Entertainment.
All submissions are subject to approval.
The account for the submitter must be in good standing.
Only the first submission of each name will be counted as the original submission.
The first submissions for each name that are chosen will be contacted by email and will have 3 days to respond to the email to claim the prize. The winner will be chosen by KingsIsle Entertainment and the winner will be notified through the email address associated with their Wizard101 account. By submitting your suggestion, you understand and comply with these Regulations. Winners chosen from our fansites must provide a valid Wizard101 account name in their contest submission.

OH, and btw . . . Kingsisle is in no way associated with the Wheel of Fortune as I just conjured up their pictures to spoof them in spoof-like fashion with much spoofing at the mouth.

NOW!

Go check these other sites and make your entries there as well!

Wizard City Turtle: Wizard101 Main Site
Krokotopia Turtle: Wizard101 Central
Marleybone Turtle: West Karana
Dragonspyre Turtle: Wizard101 on Twitter!

Happy Dueling and Best of Luck!

Malistaire's Defeat, starring Elijah, Michael, Tara, and yours truly

Elijah Stormheart introduced himself to me over on Wizard 101 Central a few weeks ago. Since then I've come to know him as a kind of networking genius. Basically, he's introduced me to a lot of his friends and they all seem very awesome.

Elijah actually networked me with another cool cat that I've been chatting with over on youtube, Michael Firecatcher. This was a fortunate event!

Then Michael had us port to his sister, Tara, and Boom! Party of four!

We hatched a plan, or an egg, and decided to fly the dragon over to Malistaire's pad and film the whole event! Both Michael and Elijah needed to complete The Great Spyre instance to finish the game; therefore, it was a perfect excuse.

So, without further delay, I present you with Malistaire's Demise starring the four of us.



And per my usual style, there's a lot of goofiness in there as well. :p

Watch that video in High Quality mode if you can because it's so much nicer.

Happy Dueling!

Turtles are fun!

Turtles are SUPER FUN! And you all want to know everything there is to know about turtles, don't you? No? Well try a few of these turtles on for size.


Rolling Turtle

Turtle Shot

Turtle Pool


Hey, I know! Post your high scores below while you continue to muse to yourself, "What is it about turtles lately anyway?"

It's easy to see what turtle is Tipa's favorite turtle over at her blog West Karana.



Bowser is another famous turtle, right? Well, I guess technically he's a koopa. But some think a koopa and a turtle are the same thing. I'm not sure, but the last time I checked, not many turtles were growing wings or throwing their shells at me. Maybe I haven't been as observant as I should be at the zoo?



Either way, I also have this wonderful video for you to watch. Jellyfish definitely classifies Bowswer as not only an oil tycoon, but also I distinctly hear them say "turtle" in this song:





And last but not least, who could forget these guys?



Have you hugged a turtle today?

Happy Dueling!

Calamity Where are you Pants?

Well, we all showed up in Pixie Area 1 of Triton Avenue as requested.



ONE PROBLEM. No Calamity. Apparently we filled the realm full to the gills and even Calamity couldn't get in to the area. Some people even waited a full two hours or more to meet her. whoops. It was like trying to meet a band at a local CD shop and the business owners not knowing what they were in for.

I asked Professor Greyrose about the situation and she basically told me that this was a pilot test for Calamity. Basically she ran out of cards on a different area of triton avenue than the one advertised (Since she couldn't get in) and managed to break her friends list and trade function while she was at it.

So, patience. patience. I'm sure Calamity will show again.

It was rumored that the rare card was merely an Orthrus treasure card. /shrug

I shall never know, but what I do know is that I added a lot of cool people from Wizard101 Central to my friends list while I was hanging out there.

Thanks for the fun, all!

Happy Dueling!

PvP Tournaments

Wizard101 Central has been hosting pvp tournaments for a little bit now, and they have a solid system for keeping you hopping. Yesterday was my first shot at one of these tournaments. Or I guess I should say, yesterday was my first flop at one of these tournaments.



Donna Pixiesong, a fellow savior of the spiral, as the screenshot shows, soundly kicked my butt, which I also feature in the screenshot.

Also in the screenshot, I'm saying "can't wait to hear about it." What am I so excited to hear? I'm excited to hear about Donna's other fights! She had three of them lined up, all through tournaments from Wizard 101 Central apparently, and she was supposed to go on and face another reader of this blog, Outrageous Autumn! (You'll have to be logged in to see Autumn's profile)

Autumn has just been lurking here and not commenting yet. But I have high hopes she'll come say hi especially since this blog post is about her cup o' tea. She's one of the two PVP Tournament Masters at Wizard 101 Central. She contacted me personally back channel and invited me to join this tournament! That's OUTRAGOUS, Autumn! :-)

NO, seriously, you can tell Autumn and Alex Jaderider put a lot of work into making these fights happen and they do so with a lot of love. Love for kicking people's butts, and love for bringing people together for butt kickings. They are a bit like this guy:



Ok, they're not anything like that guy. These are FRIENDLY DUELS . . . with cards and cute monsters, well, except for that orthrus that chomped on me.

OH! So how was my fight *shakes head* I mean duel? Well, my duel with Donna kind of went down like this. Donna started off her rounds early by putting up shields, I responded with some poison to take them out. Then I got hit with a boosted orthrus. That hurt. More shields were played. I tried to respond again with poison, but it fizzled and the card got buried and the other 2 I had loaded never surfaced in time because another orthrus showed its two heads and took out my only myth shield I had up with the first head . . . and then the second head had lunch. I salted myself beforehand. DELICIOUS! Salty Necromancer on a stick.

So, you want to join these duels now so you can have Salty Necromancer on a Stick? Awesome! I'm gonna give you the way you get your foot in the door. Just click on the PvP tab at Wizard 101 Central and then just follow the links. All the information you want is right in that location.



Happy Dueling!

Calamity Boompants Tomorrow!

Two twitter messages came through about Calamity Boompants today.

1- Wizard101: Calamity Boompants will be on Pixie Area 1 tomorrow from 2-2:30 PM CST with rare treasure cards for you! Come see us!

2- Wizard101: Meet with Calamity Boompants in Triton Avenue near the waterfalls on Friday, April 17th from 2:00 - 2:30 PM CST for a *rare* treasure card!

So, putting one and two together, Triton Ave, Pixie Realm, 2-2:30 CST . . . be there or be square, and that'd be square without a treasure card from Calamity Boompants, yo.

How ya' like me now?

. . . goin' on, feelin' strong . . .

(sorry, couldn't help myself from making a Beck reference)



So yeah, Isiah is looking pretty awesome right about now. Gone is the skittles look, and here is the look of him sporting a dragonspyre helm and the Amaranthine Staff (both of which I passed to him through the shared bank). Now that's some twinking! (you may have to use the gamer slang dictionary to understand that term if you don't know it)

Next up will be moving the evil twin through a few Wizard City quests so I can get both Isiah and the evil twin on the same page for krokotopia.

Happy Dueling

crown clothes post patch, no damage minus? nice.

Well the patch last night didn't seem to change the "health" on the items as was advertised:

"During this downtime we are addressing the issue with players who found their Crowns items were not granting the health bonus that they previously gave."

But instead took away the damage minuses! This is a step in the right direction!

Here's how the warded footwear looked previously:



Here's how the warded footwear look after the patch:



Step in the right direction? What are your thoughts on this?

Where you been, Friendly?

Man, I haven't been logging into the game a lot the past couple of days.

Why? Why you ask?

sigh. I've been playing in the arcade over at Wizard 101 Central. FREAKING ADDICTING!

Speaking of the arcade . . . I've been wanting to smack this fella across his anime-blackjack-right-cheek for dealing me hand after hand of 15-17. srsly.



I mean, look at this guy. That smug little grin. I had the first place spot on this anime blackjack game, but then lost it. Also, unbeknownst to all, I had the first place by a long run but the Wizard 101 Central website timed out on me and I lost my high score. Yes. I was playing that long on that stupid game. NO, you aren't allowed to laugh at me.

Do not fear my friends, I am still here!

Happy Dueling!

Attention! Crown items update incoming!

This announcement just came across the wire:

Wizard101 the game will be offline on Thursday April 16 starting at 3:00am Central US time and lasting for approximately one hour.

During this time players will not be able to log in to the game, and players who are in the game at that time will be prompted to log out.

During this downtime we are addressing the issue with players who found their Crowns items were not granting the health bonus that they previously gave.

Thanks to all our players who alerted us to this discrepancy.

So does that mean that crown items will be getting a boost to their health or is this a bug? /shrug . . . I'll keep you posted as to what I find out.

Twitter News: Orthrus!

This just came across the twitter wire!

Wizard101: Cast an Orthrus today! If you're a level 48 or higher myth wizard, find out how by logging in to Wizard101 and talking to your professor.

So, anyone cast an Orthrus today? hmm?

This is a test, only a test

Oh wow! I think i just set my Blog up so i can send text messages to my Blog from my phone. Test test test. Yay! You guys should be afraid. Very afraid. Muhahaha!

Housing Information from GamersInfo.net

I was hunting around a bit for information and came across this article from GamersInfo.net about player housing.

I smell GDC information on this one, but I'm not 100% sure.

This was the paragraph that seemed to have just a touch of unique information from the other player housing articles I've read:

"Place your items wherever you like; there are no hooks to restrict placement. Have too much stuff but don’t want to get rid of it? Just stick it in the attic. Love your Marleybone Island but really want one in Moo Shu? You can purchase as many as your pocketbook can manage, but only one can be active at a time. Open your home to friends or keep it closed and decorate in private. It is your home after all."

The key word here being "no hooks." This may not mean something to someone who hasn't played an MMO with housing before, but to me this screams of awesomeness. Let's take player housing in LOTRO for example. When I was playing LOTRO, I bought a simple house that was very modest. You walked in and there was a front entry room, a staircase, and one room upstairs . . . and that's it. Within that house were maybe 4 or 5 large wall hooks and 4 or 5 small wall hooks. There were also a few floor hooks. So, when you went into this style of house, everyone had their pictures in the same places. /yawn. If there truly are no hooks in player housing as this says, then WOW. This will beat LOTRO housing options hands down.

I can't wait to see what it's like.

Happy Dueling!

Fix coming to all you ice wizards!

Not to fret! The game will be updated later tonight to help you with your level 48 quest!

Wizard101 the game will be going offline Tuesday April 14th at 3:00am Central US Time for approximately one hour.

During this downtime we will be fixing issues with the level 48 Ice School spell quest, Friends Panel portraits and some misdirecting arrows in the Quest Helper.

At the same time, Wizard101.com the website may experience brief interruptions as well, but know we will back up shortly.

12 April 2009 Announcement! Patch time!

YAY! Get ready for a super fun patch tonight! This time it's no April Fool's joke. Level 48 spells are going LIVE! Make sure you check out the patch notes page. TONS of good information there.

Who wants to be my "best friend." LOL.

Here's Professor Greyrose's note:

Wizard101 Downtime and Update

Wizard101 will be offline starting Monday April 13 at 3:00am Central US time and will be offline for approximately 2 hours. During this downtime we will be adding lots of new features to Wizard101 including a Quest Helper, a new spell for each school, new pets, a new shopkeeper and more! For more information, see our Patch Notes Page.

Test Realm is going Offline

During tonight's Downtime we will also be taking down the Test Realm until further notice. Keep an eye on the Ravenwood News page for more information about the Test Realm in the future. Thank you to all our game testers who helped us out by logging in and testing items on the Test Realm.

Sunken City / Nightside video

Ok, so . . . as promised back in this thread (which will soon be edited to include this video as well, sorry for cross-posting), HERE is the Sunken City Nightside walkthrough! And just for kicks, I used only Scarecrow, blades, traps, and maybe one wand attack. :-)



And then after you watch me in the Sunken City, you can watch Tarzan and the Sunken City of Atlantis.

*gives tarzan yell*







HAPPY DUELING!

RIP Dave Arneson

Most people have never heard of Dave Arneson, and most people have never heard of Gary Gygax. Well, most people under the age of 20 or maybe even 30. But I've heard of both of them because I grew up on a silly little game called Dungeons and Dragons. OHHHH. Now you've heard of that, right? Of course you have.

So Dave Arneson and Gary Gygax are the fellas who came up with the Dungeons and Dragons game back in the 1970's, and I'd have to say, really, all RPGs in general owe something to D&D for their origins. All of you young wizards out there, thrusting yourselves into dungeons and using such things as "hit points" or "health," have no idea that Wizard101 and all RPGs owe a lot to the roots laid down by these two fellas. You want high health on your character? Well, Gygax and Arneson invented the concept of health on your character! Get it? Good.

That's why when I saw today in this mainstream news source article that Dave Arneson died, I knew I just had to post a quick note here. I didn't know about Arneson as much until last year when Gary Gygax died, it was then that I became more aware of the story of the TSR game company. I didn't really feel remorse when these two died, but a lot of people did. They grew up on this stuff, you know? And it's the same for me in some respects. I do remember pouring over these large books of rules and inventing dungeons for my friends to die in. Here's the cover of one I kept from when I was a tween.



It's quite a hilarious piece of writing to read now, but I spent HOURS on this stuff and it was fun to design your own adventure based on the rules of this game. OH, people still play D&D . . . I just grew out of it.

Eventually when I was in my early 20's I was without a job living in the upstairs apartment of a guitarist that I use to play drums for. It was kind of a sad and very poor time in my life. Well, I traded all my early editions of my D&D books to him in exchange for rent for a month. That was the Monster Manual, the Dungeon Master's Guide, The Players Handbook, Dieties and Demi-Gods, the Monster Manual II, and a really super rare book of traps. By that time I hadn't played the game for a few years, so they didn't really matter to me. But now . . . now . . . I kind of wish I had them again just to take a look at them and laugh a bit at a few memories I had with my friends as we played that game.

Oh well . . . I can look at games like Wizard101 and remember the magic all over again. It's all still there in one way or another, just a bit more colorful and in your face than it use to be when all you had were some manuals, some dice, and a story teller in front of you.

Thanks to Dave Arneson and Gary Gygax for making up their game! Thanks for the really happy distraction.

Happy Dueling!

Another MASSIVE hit courtesy of Ronan Jadeheart

First, it was Alex Pearlrider/Jaderider with a 5.5 million damage hit with a Wild Bolt spell. Now, Ronan Jadeheart is reaching to beat that score. This attempt? 4.4 million with Wild Bolt as well.





Gratz on the huge hit! Keep reaching for the stars and getting those amazing numbers!

Happy Dueling!

Daily missive: two screenshots and a halloween video

HELLO READERS!

I got a couple things for you to see today.

1) MIND BLAST!



2) You know you're being powerleveled when you see a stormzilla about to eat a fire elf.



3) Sure . . . I feel like exposing my geeky side to you today. I'm comfortable with that. You? Well, you just get to sit back and enjoy my 80's club dancing impression (man, my hair has really grown out since then) to Halloween dance music. If you haven't figured it out yet, I'm pretty much insane, and my family pretty much goes along for the ride. This past Halloween I created a monstrosity for our front lawn. Here's a clip of that for your enjoyment.



Happy Dueling!

Isiah, tasting the rainbow

Isiah, the now 10th level myth wizard, is hitting the runway here in Firecat Alley with his brand new ensemble entitled "Taste the Rainbow."



Isiah swears he is not color blind, but instead, colorific. The subtle color tie-in for this attire is a dark blue undercoat; however, that is the extent of it. The yellow clashing against the purple and dashing against the orange wizard shoes with white knee length tube socks (or are those tights? /gasp!).



Isiah definitely captured the color essence of his name sake and, once again, making the old new again.

Found more GDC fodder on player housing!

Aha! Tried to sneak past me, didn't you? Oh, curse gaming . . . no, I don't mean literally "curse" it, I mean CURSE.COM!

Just found this little tidbit over there.

There's not much new information from the other GDC articles here, but I like how the reporter put this paragraph:

Players will be able to have a rather large plot of land, and build a house on it, houses are then easily customizable with an almost endless amount of options. Each item in the house can be moved, spun, twisted, and molded to conform to the layout and design the player is trying to achieve.

There's also this really cool ground level picture from the Krokotopia housing.



I'm seriously thinking that krok is where I might want to take up residence.

Happy Dueling!

Ah! Love.

So I had Isiah Taleslinger out yesterday doing quests. I think my plan here is to get The Evil Twin and Isiah up to Krokotopia solo and then really start grouping them up. The second laptop has been getting a lot of use from my daughter lately. She's been frequenting a website known as Cartoon Doll Emporium. (Warning young males. Do not let your mothers and fathers see you on this website. Be careful. You don't want to give them a heartattack. Be kind.)

So I'm quite alarmed by one particular game over there.



You see, you basically laser boys with your eyes to get them to follow you around like a love ghost. My daughter is particularly fond of this game.

Anyway, I stop contemplating what this website is saying to my daughter about love and brush it off because I've got some solo questing to do! I start running Isiah around and find this great shot of Bartleby in the midst of a quest. Who knew the question mark was in his eye socket? crazy stuff. There's just one slight problem. (see arrow)



LOVE STRIKES AGAIN! Jeremy Dragonrider apparently has no date and needs one. MAN! I can't escape this love thing! Well, I'm not ready for that kind of commitment, and I don't think he's asking me on a date anyway.

So I run Isiah over to Triton Ave to clean up some quests. I get about five done when all of a sudden in the midst of slaying a banshee, this happens:



Poor Wolf. I feel bad for him. I felt like saying, well at least Wolf has a crush; Jeremy Dragonrider is still back on the dating circuit. Poor Wolf.

So, spring is in the air I think. I have a lot of words on love that would probably bore the pants off you . . . and since we want you to keep your pants on, I shall not bore you with my love theories. (Even though you haven't really lived until you've sat through me expounding on the color wheel of love. ahem.) We'll save it for a wintery day when it's too cold and you must keep your pants on or freeze to death. yes. That sounds good.

Happy Dueling!