Warhammer 40K: Boltgun (PC) Review

Originally this was not the game I had planned on playing next for First Person Fridays (one of my streams I do weekly for Extra Life), but things both good and bad changed those plans. On the downside, the publishers who sell the game I was originally goning play are now on my shit list for their behavior around a very public murder and for the foreseeable future you will not see anything by them being added to my work: stream or review. But on the upward swing, my buddy Max Powers sent this my way, and how could I say no to a buddy? Having put the game down, yeah it was a great time for the most part, if not a perfect one.

Thank you, but we are not done.... Extra Life 2025

UPDATE: It seems I posted this prematurely... because Extra Life itself had NOT posted the totals from the week... well now they have and you may want to sit down.

As a total for the year (so far) we have raised:

$10,552,585

EVERY GAMER who took part in game week and everyone who donated to help these sick kids should be PROUD OF THEMSELVES. Thank you all of you! Now back to the original post.

Hi everybody. How are you doing? Gameweek has just ended and while I am STILL tired 2 days later, I can honestly say it was a great time.

For those of you who have no idea what I am talking about, Extra Life did things a little different this year. Where as over it's long and storied history, the charity culminated in a single Game Day where gamers would play for 24 hours straight, this year a full week was dedicated so gamers could take full advantage and pick whatever day works best for them. You can see our event across several vods that currently live on our twitch page and will ultimately (for the most part) be moved to our Rumble channel so they can live for more then a week. (Yeah, that's a real issue... thanks twitch.)

But what is Extra Life, I hear some of you ask. Well to explain, lets set the way-back machine to a younger time when gaming websites were booming and I personally had found myself treating one as my online home called "Sarcastic Gamer." If you were there, it was exactly what you would have expected from a community site of the 2000s: it had a forum for gamers to talk, joke, share gaming discoveries, and it even had a podcast or two for weekly radio-style shows, and I absolutely loved all of it. But it was not always happy news. The founder, "Doc", was the one who would drop the biggest bombshell for as long as I was called it home... the day Victoria passed away. Who was Victoria? Well Doc was a friend to her family, so he knew her personally before she lost her fight with cancer in Texas Children's Cancer Center. I still remember driving into work and listening to that podcast as it had downloaded the night before, and those tears still haunt me.

But from this heartbreak came Extra Life, an event to give her legacy meaning and to thank the hospital for their efforts to help this girl in that fight. And of course the community took to it like fish to water. We would spend the next few weeks to raise money for the hospital, then do what we all do best to push it to the end: a 24 hour gaming marathon. I am still honored to be have been a part of that very first Extra Life in 08, but it wasn't enough for any of us. We would do it again in 09, an 2010, and so on... and here we are now. Sarcastic Gamer is gone, Doc has moved on to work with Children's Miracle Network directly, and the event itself has gone global through them... but we are still here, doing what we love and using that hobby to help the kids who need it most. 

And as I noted, at the very beginning, Gameweek for this wrapped up yesterday, Sunday November 16th. Personally I am grateful to be able to help out with this and to do my part. Personally I play for Boston Children's Hospital.

Looking back over the year, I can not say this was an easy one, though. I had to take roughly a month out of the situation due to medical reasons which frankly took me down hard enough, for two separate hospital stays, the latter ending with several days at my folks place to recover. Nor can I honestly say that was the only issue I've had this year... in fact I would argue 2025 was my year of Hell. BUT we still managed to bring in $400 ourselves for the event, no small amount for a small community like this. And I would like to thank you all for that.

But we are not done with this year. Extra Life takes donations year round, so if you would like to help us help the kids, we are still going through the end of the year.... you can expect the same twice-a-week Extra Life streams I've been doing for a while now... and we will be on Twitch for a little while longer since the Extra Life page will be active through December and links directly to the service. Thank you for any help you give now or in the future... the kids need it and I am humbled.

Thank you again - Megabyte: Head Archivist of the Red Sector

Extra Life 2025 October update

Hi everybody! The time is flying! Soon we will all see each other, getting together at friends' houses or at a local hobby shop or even just online. But the time is near for Extra-Life game.... week? Yeah, that's right. This year there isn't a single day but a whole week where gamers will choose to play, and we are no different.

But if you don't know what Extra-Life is, well perhaps we should start there. Extra-Life is an international charity event held every year where gamers pledge to play for 24 hours (straight if they can... in pieces if not) to help raise money for the hospitals of the Children's Miracle Network. We have been working all year to bring in what we can (or even donate ourselves). To help these kids, and each one of us have done so in the name and for one specific hospital in this network. I myself play for Boston Children's Hospital as I have for MOST years of the event. And I don't say "my history" for a reason that I am honored as Hell to be able to say: I've been here since the beginning. Since before this was a CMN event, but instead one held with only a few weeks notice by a single (sadly now defunct) gaming site who wanted to something special in the name of a young cancer victim to help their hospital help more kids in her situation. But the site does a much better job telling Victoria's story then I ever will so if you want to hear how all this started, you can check it out here.

So where does that lead us today? Today the event has gone international with gamers from all over signing up, selecting a local hospital where everything they raise will go, and playing like hell to help the kids who need it most. Seriously, how awesome is it to help out like this using our hobby? Truly one of the best things ever, which brings me to our own little related announcements for the big event around here. 

First and most important, our own marathon will happen on:

SATURDAY: NOVEMBER 15

As we said earlier in this post, we are just a few short weeks before things begin and gamers will be playing 24 hours for the kids during the week of November 8th through the 16th, and we have picked our day, too. For us, that Saturday, starting at 8 AM, we will be gaming nonstop until 8 AM the next morning. It's brutal every year, but rewarding and I can't wait to join you all there. And join is the word since I plan to have several online games ready to go, starting with a continuation of our current adventure in Phantasy Star Online! All are welcome to join, and I can't wait to see you all. I may also sneak a few extra streams Friday while we get ready before resting up for the big event.

And we will be doing so from Twitch for ONE LAST YEAR. You see, I've never really had strong faith in the platform, but it's been shaken all the more watching how much they clearly do not care for their own community over the MANY garbage stories content creators came back from at Twitchcon this year. To that end, I made a decision: I myself am leaving. I've already had to make a rumble channel for this page so the videos of our sessions to help kids AND celebrate the various franchises I personally cherish will live on instead of Twitch killing them in a week.

But when to leave was the real question. If you are on our Discord (and you can reach it either in the site socials above or right here, you might have noticed a poll where we asked our community if we should leave Twitch before or after the marathon this year, and the community wanted to stay. So for one last year we will do this on Twich and we hope to see you there. I will have a much shorter post the night before, so if you forget all this, don't worry.

But now we get to the big question for YOU. How can you get involved. Well, it's never too late to join in, so why not sign up now? Just go the extra life site and follow the directions to register for an account, then it's time to ask people to help you help the sick kids... easy as that.

Of course not everyone feels they want to play themselves, and none of us can do this without those who donate to help us help the kids, so doing that is always welcome too. If you look in the about section of my twitch page, there is a panel that will take you to my team page where you can pick anyone on the Red Sector team to donate under the name of. Any help you can give is more then welcome and we are more then thankful for it.

SO once again, thank you for joining me and I hope to see you on the big day! From all of us here at the Red Sector, thank you.

- Megabyte

Alone in the Dark 3 (PC) Review

And now we close the book on a classic PC game trilogy, but can we really call it all classic? Probably not, as I can not claim to have even really liked the previous title. Still the first absolutely was amazing, and I walked into this hoping to get close to those highs again... Well, I'm not sure we did that, but we definitely moved in the right direction for it.

PSYCHO-PASS: Mandatory Happiness (PC) Review

This game is an exceptionally moment for me. It was niether chosen because I was continuing a franchise, nor by the dice. Rather, this game was chosen by timing. In addition to my gaming hobby, I am also taking time to watch various shows and movies while I do my daily exercises, and this game takes place during the first season of the anime series Psycho-Pass. I have seen it before, but since I now have season 2, I chose to rewatch it, and this game would be played between seasons. I now put my mouse down and... well, I can't say I didn't enjoy the story, but I don't think everyone should bother with it.

Phantasy Star IV: The End of the Millennium (PC) Review

As I put the controller down, we have reached a turning point of this franchise. For those of you who join me on Twitch, I have been on a campaign with this series, to both celebrate it in it's own right and raise money and awareness for Extra Life by playing literally EVERY US release of it. (I do this every Wednesday night.) And now we have finished the classic era.... and man did it go out with a BANG!

AI: The Somnium Files (PC) Reiview

Gonna be honest, this was not a game I was hyped for. I picked it up at some point as part of a steam sale which is how a lot of my backlog was built up. However it looked interesting enough so when the dice rolled it up, I was intrigued. Turns out, this was for good reason even if it comes with a bit of a downturn for the studio behind it. Come... step inside.

Extra Life 2025 September Update

Hi everybody! It's been a few months since our last talk but time is flying by as we get closer and closer to the big marathon in November. I have to admit, I am looking forward to it as I always do. But I have this bad habit of getting ahead of myself here. I don't even know if you are new here or have been keeping up with Extra-Life!

For those of you who are new here, Extra-Life is a charity event that I have been lucky enough to participate in since it was started in 2008. Back then, it was a lot smaller affair, and one sadly born from the pain of loss. From my own perspective, I was at the time a happy member of the Sarcastic Gamer community, spending time on the forums and listening to every podcast that came out talking about an overview of the gaming stories of the day. But one day that podcast would be one of the hardest things I would ever listen to. The founder, fondly known around the site simply as Doc, literally broke down and cried mid-stream as he had just gotten the news that a family he was friends with had lost their daughter, a young girl named Victoria, from cancer. But he would not leave her legacy to end in tears. Instead, he came to us collectively with an idea.

To thank the hospital for their efforts, he rallied the site to have an event where for 24 hours we would all get online and play games as a fundraiser for this hospital. Needless to say, we were all in... site-wide. It wasn't a big event, but it was a successful one. And we were already hungry to do it again. it became a tradition of the site for a few years before Doc would leave, joining the team at Children's Miracle Network... and he took this event with him. No longer limited to a single (and sadly now defunct) website, the event could now expend to more hospitals, with more participants helping more children! And I have been incredibly honored to watch it grow through the entire process. But it's not fair to not let the event tell the tale for itself, so you can check out the about section here for their own take on it.

Today, Extra-Life is MASSIVE and has collectively raised well over $132,000,000 to help these poor kids who need it most, and it is truly an amazing thing to take part in and as I noted at the beginning of this post, I have been honored to be able to be there for since the very beginning.... and it's time for you to jump in too! So how do you do it? Well that's the easy part!

If you are a gamer, sign on up and get in here with us! You don't have to play video games, but really anything nerdy is good for this. Just get on the Extra-Life Website and click that signup button! The site will guide you the rest of the way including how to setup your own page, link any streaming channel you might wish to use for it, and even what team you want to play on. However the most important choice you will make is the hospital you are playing for. One of the unique points of this charity event is that what you bring in goes specifically to the hospital you are playing for. I myself an playing for Boston's Children's Hospital, but you can pick any hospital in the Children's Miracle Network you wish. With that in motion, you will have access to tips, tricks, and tools to help you kit up for the event, so time to get going and bring in what you can to help those kids. And all your efforts will culminate with a 24 hour marathon we all always look forward to in November.

In previous years this was date would traditionally be the Saturday of Daylight Savings in November, creating an actually 25 hour marathon, a lofty goal to play through indeed. But there was a problem with this: one weekend for every Extra Lifer can be a pain for many people's schedule. I should know. with family events almost always coming on the same weekend, it made tough for me to make it, which is why I was always thankful for the often used "rain date" the following weekend. But this year is different. The organizers have decided to try a new solution by letting us as gamers pick our days, defining a game week instead of a single day! This year, "GAME WEEK" will start from Saturday morning on November 8th and run all the way through Sunday night on November 16th. You pick when you put in your 24 hours to celebrate what we could do for these kids (as well as a final push the marathon represents). We here will have to pick our day still, but I will be updating here when we do.

And speaking of, that brings us to the other way you can partake in this event. If you can't or don't feel like you should be playing yourself, you can always donate under the name of your favorite gamers to help the hospital they play for. As noted above, I myself have chosen to play for Boston Children's Hospital, and if you would like to help me (or any other member of my team) thank you so much. We really can't do this without you. You can reach us three ways:

1. Look us up on the Extra-Life page: I am including this one first simply because it can be used for anyone you want to show support with, but in the page header, there is a "search for player" bar. Use it to find literally anyone you want to back.
   
   
   
2. Donate on our streams: When I stream, it is always for this event, as one of the two reasons for it: getting pictures for reviews on this little space online and (more importantly) to draw attention to this event so we can get more players and to offer an easy way to help us help the kids if you so incline. And while the reviews are why you never see me on screen (video, picture, anything really), you can find the panel below in the about section of the stream page. The donate button there will take you directly to our page where you can donate to anyone who is a member.
   
   
   
3. Click the button below! At the bottom of this message, I will leave a button to reach our team page as well. Feel free to use it if you just want to get there without any hoops.

As for when you can catch the stream, I finally have set a solid schedule for streaming games. Wednesday has remained the same, but I have reserved Friday nights as well, if for a different more action built franchise. In both cases we celebrate the gaming past, even as we try to help kids have a better future:

• Phantasy Star Wednesday: This has not changed, but every Wednesday around 7 PM, I am playing my way through the entire Phantasy Star franchise in order of release. Currently we are making our way through Phantasy Star IV, but it won't be much longer before we make the jump to the first MMO in the series.
• First Person Friday: Yes the games we play on Friday, beyond the franchise, will have a theme, as this is arguably where a lot of my favorite games live, but we are starting with one of the big Granddaddy of them all with Wolfenstein. As I write this, I have finished Spear of Destiny and our next stream will be to start our adventure in Return to Castle Wolfenstein.

But on that note, I think its time for me to get going as I have gotten very long winded today. Please join us for the fun and helping kids who truly do need it the most.

Thank you for listening,

Megabyte

Wolfenstein 3D (PC) Review

For many guys my age, this is where it all began. With these titles, they had their first taste of the new and exciting world of first person shooters, and we fell in love with it! Still that was over 30 years ago now (the first Wolfenstein game came out in the year of 1992) and the genre of similar games inspired here would grow and expand what they could do exponentially since. Hell even this team blew the tech side of this out of the water the very next year! Which begs the question to many today: Why go back and play such an old game? Well if you are like me, the memory of a truly legendary franchise alone is worth revisiting, but for anyone else is it worth it? Enthusiastically I have to say "YES! It ABSOLUTELY IS!" but... maybe with some tweaks.

What are those tweaks you ask? Well in the past 3 decades we have seen even the very key combinations we use to play games change dramatically from these ancient times. And to that end with iD having long ago released the code for these games as open source, gamers have taken the time to build new versions of the engine you can use to give the old games some quality of life updates without changing the core game. I put a link to the one I used in the system requirements below, but you are welcome to use any that suit you better.

And finally this is a dual review because if you buy this game today, you get both Wolfenstein 3D and Spear of Destiny as a bundle, complete with a menu to select which one to launch at startup. They are no longer separate. The links below will take you directly to the one you want to read.

• Wolfenstein 3D
• Spear of Destiny

Shadowgate II (PC) Review

I have to admit, I've been lucky so far. Most of the time when I pick up a game, good or bad, I can at least see the people making it loved what they were making. Up until this moment I could point and laugh at the clear examples where this was not the case in the AAA world of gaming and the grilling the team got for their efforts. I knew that at least for what I was playing, the devs loved what they were making, even if they whiffed at doing it. I can't say that this time. This game just feels like modern day slop both in how it plays and how it treats the previous title it claims to be a sequel to.

Alone in the Dark 2 (PC) Review

After completing the original Alone in the Dark, I was expecting more of the same this time around. That is not a bad thing however, as I would describe the first title as an aged classic: it shows it's age, but the game underneath the creaks and cracks is still as good as ever and something anyone interested in the game history should give a while. But this would prove both true and false at the same time. The game is more of the same mechanics, but trying to support a style of game that just doesn't match that.

Machinika Museum (PC) Review

Once again a relic that's been in my backlog has made it's way forward after years in the dark, presenting something rather unique compared to my usual fair of game to try. But the intrigue of what was in here kept my attention when the dice called it forward. And I can't say it was a bad call. This is what for me would be a very comfy game, and I'm glad I got a few hours with it. If you are like me and enjoy a little bit of technical tinkering, you might just think so too...

Thimbleweed Park (PC) Review

This is one of those games that has spent years waiting for it's day in the sun. In fact, it was one of the first games I got when Epic Games started giving away free games every week. But was it worth the wait? Well, I can't say it really was, unfortunately.

Tomb Raider Legend (PC) Review

I have very little contact with this franchise. Outside seeing the first movie in theaters back in the day, I really had not done anything with it since playing the demo of the first game on my old 486. And while I enjoyed myself playing that demo, I had other games I wanted to play more so my interest never went any further then that. Then came the summer sales this year when I got this little title for about $1, curious what I had missed. I wanted to like it, I really did, but the big warning came up. When I have a hard time deciding whether to play with a controller or my mouse, it's usually a bad sign. It was here, and I'm glad it was so cheap, cause much more and I would have felt cheated.

Extra Life 2025 July Update

Hello everyone and welcome back to the Extra-Life updates. As we rush towards November and the big event, things have been, well... rather hectic here at the RedSector. Some reasons very happy... others, well... let's just say it's also been a very rough month over here.

But I am getting ahead of myself. If you are first hearing about Extra-Life with this post, all I can say is "Welcome in!" At the most basic level, this is a yearly run charity event where gamers gather, pick a children's hospital to play for, and all donations made in their name go specifically to there. Run by the Children's Miracle Network, we do our best to use our hobbies and help these kids throughout the year, and yes I said hobbies. Most of us use video games, but there are table-tops and board games. Card games and RPG games around a table with buddies. Basically if you can imagine it being a nerd's playtime, it probably fits in here.

However, the big day we all look forward to is in November when we get to celebrate with the major push with a 24/25 hour gaming marathon! I'll be honest, it's one of the big days I personally look forward to each year since the event began, and every year it has only gotten better each time. From it's it's humble beginnings drawn from a rather simple appeal to do something in the name of a young lady who lost her life to cancer, to the absolute behemoth of an event, I've had the absolute honor of watching this event grow to what it is from the inside. But I'm not exactly the best to explain that story. I leave that to the team at their site.

Still to focus on the past few months we have definitely had some personal highs and lows which have limited what I can do to draw to it... perhaps more extreme then I have ever seen happen for me. I have not been able to do the streaming I wished to for this event this month due to both medical and family reasons: My family tends to take one week a year to go on vacation, which limits a lot of what I can do streaming wise that week, but so does being sick to the point of going to the emergency room. (No I am not about to give details. to that, but having been there a few times this month, my schedule was pretty much killed.) I am still recovering some as I write this, but yes, I am ok and hoping to get back to my usual schedule soon... kinda.

I have every intention of continuing our adventure through the Phantasy Star series as soon as I can get back to it and on our usual schedule, but I may be increasing the rate at which I stream for this event before we get there, and not just through a random game of the week. While that was fun, I would like to share the adventure of what I'm playing with you all on my own, and to do that, streaming may become more of a "when I'm playing, we're here" like I used to do. This may be a development in progress, but we will see how things go. But the confirmed schedule is as follows as soon as I can get back to it:

• Wednesday - Phantasy Star Day: As much as I love this series, I think my experiment to try to push it into Saturday as well wasn't flying so well for me... so I think we are returning to a weekly adventure here. We are still working on Phantasy Star 4 and in fact very early in the game, but we will let the game breath a bit more between runs. Generally this will be an evening stream around 7 PM Eastern, but as of right now I don't want to set an exact time while everything settles.
• Drop in at Random: I wish I had more I can say, but where I plan to stream pretty much "whenever" I don't think a plan for Saturday is going to work any longer. Rather what I am hoping to do is to pop on the stream when I'm playing so people can just "join in" if they think what I'm playing is interesting. At the moment I am getting ready to start Shadowgate 2014: Not a new game for me, but I haven't played since it launched and I know it has had a LOT of updates since. If you want to join in the fun, please feel free to do so.

Of course joining me for a stream or two may be a fun way to see what Extra Life is all about, it's even better when you can actually get involved directly, and that can be done a few ways:

• Become a participant! As always, the best way to help these sick kids is to step into the ring and play yourself! And it couldn't be easier to do. On the Extra-Life website, there is a sign up button which will guide you through the process, including the ability to pick which hospital you are playing for or even the team you want to join up with if you choose. From there it's a matter of collecting donations, and the site has ideas for that as well! The only detail after this is gameday itself, but we will get to that in a moment.
  
  
  
• Donate in the name of your favorite player! If you don't think you can play or just want to back someone else playing, that is important to. After all, if it wasn't for donations made in the name of these players, we wouldn't be able to do what we have over the past 16 years and still will do again! Here you will also have a few choices.
• If you are looking to support a different gamer's efforts, you can find them easily enough with the search on the header of the Extra Life page. Whether an individual or a team page, there will be a donate button right there that will make the process easy.
  
  
  
• However, if you want to help us directly, I have to personally thank you for much the same reason. The process is the same, but I can supply you with a direct link to the Red Sector Team Page below. (We also have a link in the about section of my streams)
  

Once again, thank you for any help and support you offer to help these sick kids, but before I go, there is one more thing to cover: Gameday. To explain what it is, Gameday is the 24 hour marathon that highlights EVER Extra Life player's year, but until this year, it was always a single defined day on the webpage. Those who could not play on the big day (myself usually included) would pick a rain day to play instead. This year, there is no one Gameday. There is a Gameweek. I have not yet picked my own day, but Gameweek is from November 8th through November 16th and you can pick any one to join in the fun! When I have a date you will know, but it's gonna be a blast whatever day you (or I) pick!

But on that note, I have to thank you all and head out. You will hear from me again soon. Have fun out there.

- Megabyte

The Catacombs Pack (PC) Review

Now here is a franchise I have been looking forward to getting myself into for a long while. For most people, the name iD brings up images of fighting demons on a Martian base, or maybe Nazis in your bid for freedom from one of their prisons. Or maybe even being a kid on an inter-galactic adventure to save the world. But the developers behind these games did not start here. Before they were iD, they were already writing games and this collection gets a bit closer to their start. As such, I felt the need to delve back into history and see more of their original work. And while I was (for the most part) not disappointed, I do have to say, it is a starting place and clearly they only went up from here.

Now before we begin, there are many games in this bundle and as such the games will each be listed here to give you a quick way to reach any of them.

• The Catacomb
• Catacomb 3D: The Descent
• The Catacomb Abyss
• The Catacomb Armageddon
• The Catacomb Apocalypse
• The Catacomb (1989)
• Bonus: Dangerous Dave in "Trophy Trouble"

Alone in the Dark 1 (PC) Review

This has been yet another franchise I have been waiting way too long to get into it, if not without good reason. To be honest, I am known for hating tank controls. Seriously, if a game uses fixed cameras and pushing up on the controls made your character go in the direction they are facing rather then up or away from the camera, I bowed out. But I always had an interest in this franchise despite that. It's direct connection to the works of H.P. Lovecraft always made it stand out to me, so when a remake of the original was announced, I decided that was the sign to start moving through the franchise. So I took the time to start my adventures with Edward Carnby.

Now before we begin, this entry surprised me by the fact that it did not ship alone. When I fist loaded it up, I was offered a menu with two games: Alone in the Dark and Jack in the Dark, requiring me to split this review between them. To this end, the links below will let you jump directly to the one you want ot read, but the bugs and final score will before the whole package, not just one game.  

• Alone in the Dark
• Jack in the Dark

Necrophosis (PC) Review

I have been waiting a while for this one. Earlier this year Dragonis Games dropped a demo to show off what they were working on, and I was instantly hooked. So I put the game on my wishlist, eager to get to the main game. Now as the game has been out for a little while, my schedual around game series has opened up to let me pop this into my PC. And while it was shorter and perhaps easier then I would have liked, overall it did not disappoint. Where it mattered, this game delivered.

Phantasy Star III: Generations of Doom (PC) Review

As we continue our journey through the classic franchise in the name of Extra Life, we finish another entry from the Sega Genesis era, and probably the one that both has the least fans and the least audience to have played. This is not without good reason, however as it is also clearly the outlier that it takes little time to see was not even originally supposed to be a Phantasy Star game. Still, does it deserve the reputation it has? Or is all the hate just because this game is so different. Well, it may get harsher then it deserves, but... that doesn't change this is the lesser game of the set.

Gato Roboto (PC) Review

It is no secret to anyone who knows me that I really like my metroidvania games, and I'm a fairly big fan of cats, so when I saw this game putting the two together in what seemed like an adorable and lethal combination, I knew I had to try it. Sadly you don't like everything you try.. and this is one of those times where the game just didn't reach the standards I can even begin to recommend when there are so many better games in the genre.

Beyond Shadowgate (PC) Review

When I was a little kid in the late 80s, my little brother and I, like many other kids, loved playing Nintendo. Enough so that our parents would not only get us a few games once in a while, but even a subscription to the now immortal Nintendo Power magazine. And it is in here we would learn many of the tips and tricks I did actually use to beat several of those games, but for me, it would do something more. Within the first few articles was a guide to find your way through the first part of a little title known as Shadowgate. I read through this guide top to bottom untold amount of times, excited to see the arcane tricks of the castle it wanted to show everyone how to survive. Enough so the game was a birthday gift that year...

I fell in love with this game as both a puzzle game that could be tough as nails and my first taste of horror gaming, and I even learned to speed run it before speedrunning was a thing before putting the cart away forever. But I never forgot the living castle and made a point to play every new entry in the franchise I could get my hands on, and even the 2014 remake. Now, nearly 40 years later, the perfect storm has happened and the original team who wrote the first game got together to make the sequel they were never allowed to way back then. It was worth waiting for. Welcome back to Kal Torlin!

Extra Life 2024 May Update

Hello and once again welcome to our regular updates for Extra Life! If you do not know what Extra Life is, welcome to the site. (Seriously I make a point to keep a post about it on the main page so you've gotta be new.... nothing wrong with that, in fact the welcome is VERY heart-felt... welcome indeed.) 

But to answer the obvious question about it, Extra Life is a charity event that takes place every year. Run by the Children's Miracle Network, they handle all the details so we can focus on what we do best! If you want to join, the process is VERY simple:

1. Go to www.extra-life.org and sign up! The process is very easy. Just click the big sign up button and follow the directions. You will even get to pick what hospital the donations you bring in helps directly. If you want to join or follow team, you can set this up on the site too.
2. Adjust anything on your page to look how you want and tweak the message as desire.
3. Get out there and get donations for the kids! You can do this in several ways, be it streaming with a link on your page, getting a gaming night at the local hobby shop, or even just doing a doner drive. The site itself will offer advice on things you can do. (Maybe even put a little in yourself if you believe in putting your money where your mouth is.)
4. Finally in November there will be something known as "game day." This is when we get together as a community and celebrate what we were able to do with a 24/25 hour gaming marathon. This is the biggest night and highlight for many gamers in the entire event, self included. For most of us, this will be on Nov. 8th but schedules can be adapted to with rain dates (something I usually have to do myself... family related).

And that is about all there is too it. If this sounds good to you, then I assure you, it is worth your time to play. I myself have been here doing this since year zero when it was a single gaming website trying to help a single hospital in Texan in honor of a single young lady who lost her fight with cancer despite all everyone's best efforts. It was an honor then and it remains one now.

Which brings us to what we are doing here. Right now I am staying a pretty standard coarse with 2 weekly streams, although times I stream may be changing.

• Wednesday: now at 7 PM eastern, we are taking a weekly run at the venerable Phantasy Star franchise, playing each in the order of release. Currently we are heading ever closer to the end of Phantasy Star III: Generations of Doom as we make our way through generation 3. It's been a great time so far so feel free to join us every week!
• Saturday: Still at 3 PM we stream a random game with the idea of never showing the same game twice. If you are interested in seeing anything and everything over time, please feel free to come on over!

And of course in both cases all my gaming is done to support Boston Children's hospital. If you would like to help me help the children there, me and all the kids we help would all be eternally grateful, and you can do so right here on my own Extra Life page or in the about section of my twitch page which you can reach here or via the link in this site's menu!

Thank you for any help you can give and even just showing up and hanging out! We can't do this without you.

- Megabyte

Opinion: I am completely done with Nintendo

Those are words I never though I would say, but here we are. I also never thought I would consider Nintendo not just a terminally old-style company, but something I now straight up despise. But I'm getting ahead of myself. For those of you who do not want to read, Nintendo has finally done it. I already planned to skip the Switch 2, but I'm basically packing up my original Switch till the day I can hack it and play the games I already have for it on my PC where they will play better anyway. Nintendo can officially fuck off.

Diablo IV: Vessel of Hatred (PC) Review

I will have to admit now, I didn't plan on picking this for myself. Rather, I have a brother who is a huge fan of the series. Not that I objected to it, but I just got a vibe that, much like the main game, Blizzard's asking price was going to be way too much for me to be interested. So when it up on the Winter sale, I decided was time to pull the trigger and get started. And while I did enjoy myself, I really am glad I got it then and not at full price.

Jazz Jackrabbit 2: The Christmas Chronicles (PC) Review

It's usually a bit exciting to reach the end of not just a game, but an entire series and say "yeah, I finished it" but I knew that wasn't gonna happen here. The Christmas episode for Jazz Jackrabbit 1 set about what I expected from this game: with a very short session that does little new but draped in snow... yeah, that's exactly what I got.

Outlast 2 (PC) Review

Having absolutely loved the first game and it's DLC, I was honestly very excited to get back to Red Barrels' horror series. And while I can't say it's the best they have offered us, that doesn't make it bad. In fact this is yet another masterpiece in it's own right. Just not in comparison to what came before. 

Deponia 3: Goodbye Deponia (PC) Review

And here we are. After a trilogy of titles we have reached the original ending of the Deponia Saga. I will not lie to you and tell you I was a big fan of this, but this is one of those rare cases where the story alone is enough to want to see how it ends... and.. wow... yeah... step inside.

8-Bit Adventures Anthology: Volume 1 (PC) Review

This has been a set of games I have been looking forward to playing for a good long while. After all, the collection includes both the first game I ever completed (and my first taste for horror gaming ever) and a second horror title I would have been all over had I known it even existed in my younger years. Add to this nostalgia blast that the OG development team finally got to make a direct sequel to their most famous game in the collections and there no way I couldn't play this set... so was it worth a visit down memory land and what might have been? OH.... oh yes it was....

Now please note that since this is a game collection, each game will get it's own review with a shared overall and bugs section. If you want to zero in on just one, please select the game from the list below.

• Shadowgate
• DejaVu
• Uninvited

Extra Life: February Update

Hello everyone and welcome again as we take a moment to stop and look at what is going on in the realm of Extra Life! For those of you new here, welcome aboard! If you don't know what Extra Life is, it's a charity event where gamers  come together to use our hobby to help sick kids in our local hospitals. If the idea of playing video games to help sick kids sounds like the perfect win-win to you, well, you're not alone. (Hint, I'm here with you.) So how does it work? Well it's very simple:

• Go to www.extra-life.org and sign up for an account. Be sure to pick the hospital you wish to play for.
• If you wish to join a team, find the one you wish to join up with. (Or even start your own!) Please keep in mind, a team's members can all play for different hospitals. It's just the team who will play together.
• Get out there and take donations. You can do this by streaming, hosting events, or just reaching out to people. The Extra Life website may have even more ideas.
• If you can, why not put a little of your own cash on the line too? After all it's for a good cause. 
• In November, get ready for all your efforts to culminate with a 24 hour gaming marathon.

Sound simple? It really is, and we are moving through the steps ourselves as our team starts to gather. As we speak I am running two weekly streams to raise awareness, raise some donations, and have some fun, so please feel free to join me! (All times are Eastern timezone)

Phantasy Star Wednesday:  Recently it occurred to me there are many series of games that deserve to be celebrated in their own right, and I decided I wanted to take this up, and started with an RPG series near and dear to me. As such Wednesday evenings I am taking a few hours around 6 PM (not absolute, life has a way of making things interesting) to crack open the series as we make our way across every single game within the series that came out in the states. Currently we are playing Phantasy Star III, and fairly early in the game. It's gonna be a blast so come on in!

Variety Hour Saturday: If a bit more randomness is your flavor, you may want to join me on Saturday afternoons! We start a bit earlier then Wednesdays (based on when I can get there, but usually closer to 3 PM), and games we play will differ every week. Basically if I am playing a game on my own that I haven't shown before, we will spend our time there. If not, I will literally pick a game at random from my backlog to show you all, and i we finish early, any extra time will go to whatever I am currently playing.

As noted above I am playing these to share the joy of the games, raise awareness of the event and maybe even to help my team raise some funds for the big event, so please come join us and maybe even come be part of the assist these kids could really need.

Now if you are wondering who's running Extra Life, that honor would go to The Children's Miracle Network. They handle all the details behind the scenes and their site will explain where everything goes as they support about 170 hospitals internationally.

If this all sounds good to you, consider this an open invite, both to join me on the streams and and get involved more directly, because that is kinda how I see it. See you out there, and game on!

- Megabyte

Warhammer 40,000: Space Marine 2 (PC) Review

I know so many players who the moment this was announced were already ready to throw money at the screen. Maybe too many as I honestly expected to be playing just about nothing else for months between everyone I know who wants to play. But at the same time, my only real concern was being trapped in a single game for far longer then I would like as I do love my variety. The game itself already looked great. In fact my only real delay was that as a rule I wait a month to play anything with a major publisher behind it. (Don't blame me, blame how many games release as broken messes.) However, once I decided the game had enough time to bake I was in.... and for once, the AAA world made something I shouldn't have even waited that long on.

BROTHERS! TO BATTLE!

Doorways: Old Prototype (PC) Review

And we finally have reached a point where in order to show off something new for Extra Life over the weekend, I had to roll the dice over my backlog. It has been a while, but the dice were kind and offered an handful of titles that looked pretty good for the most part. And when this one came up, I was intrigued. After all, I do still have to play the main games, so a little window into what's to ultimately come sounded pretty good. Well the window was certainly small... but through it I can see some real potential.

Phantasy Star II (PC) Review

We have come full circle with the first Phantasy Star game I ever played. I did not play this on the Sega Genesis like so many others, however. Back in that day, I was much more of an SNES fan, so I missed this game until I had left consoles for PC entirely for a streak. Back then, I had stumbled on a CD-ROM called the Sega Smash pack which I picked up with the intention to play with Altered Beast more then anything else. But this game was also on the disc, and I fell in love with it the moment I started playing. So is it everything I remember it to be? Well, it's still pretty good, but... let's talk on it.

Jazz Jackrabbit 2: The Secret Files (PC) Review

After the first game (and it's Christmas shareware episode) I can not say this is a franchise that started on the right foot with me. Between being way too zoomed in to run at the speeds the game wants you to and "clever" level design that served more either bounce the player around to take damage or send them a ways backwards, it just did not feel like a good game. However, it seems Epic Megagames learned from their mistakes the first time and released something that, while not spectacular, is certainly MUCH better this time around. Come on in.

Outlast: Whistleblower DLC (PC) Revew

As soon as I finished the first game, I knew I was coming back for more. It would be serendipitous to make this choice as gog put the whole series on sale, however, and a twist of fate I was NOT going to say no to. Now another chapter is complete, and this series is on an upswing! Come inside!

Deponia 2: Chaos on Deponia (PC) Review

It has been a LONG time since I played a Deponia game. Back then I had not yet reached a point of giving series I was in the middle of priority to continue, and to be fair, I'm honestly not 100% sure I would have had I been in those early days. But that did not mean a sequel would be bad... would it? Would it? Well... yes and... no.... kinda... you know what? This time, it actually is kinda complicated.

IT HAS BEGUN!!!!!!

No I do not care how old this reference is... it fits the way we do this every year and now, we may truly begin. The Red Sector now has a team page on the Extra Life site, so yeah, our hat is officially in the ring. I still have a little tweaking to do since there is little customization on the page itself, but functionally we are up and my quest to show off games you might see on the big day continues.

This will take the form of two weekly games, though the times may vary (I'm sorry, I work and I have rather chaotic schedules for the most part:

• Celebrating the Series (Wednesday nights): Generally this will be at night after expected work hours, but I am making a point to highlight a single franchise at a time for a weekly game to both celebrate the ability to use these games to help sick kids as well as our past in gaming. Right now we are getting ready to wind up the second game in the Phantasy Star series (appropriately named Phantasy Star II) and you are welcome to come with me as we finish it up and get ready for round 3.
• Variety hour (Saturday afternoon/night): This was the original weekly game I began when I decided to stream during the year and show off games for the big event... and the rules haven't changed. Every week, we start with a game I have never played (my backlog or demo... I let the dice choose). If there is time after, we may take on a game I'm working through. Today we will be opening the demo of BioForge, a game I have zero experience with outside of testing to make sure my capture setup was ready.

And we will be getting to that second stream shortly after I post this entry. So come on in! Lets have some fun! You can find us on the above team page OR on the side panel where team member's twitch pages are listed.

Thank you for your time, and again, lets have some fun out there. - Megabyte

DanganRonpa V3: Killing Harmony (PC) Review

If you've been with me during my gaming journey you know I have enjoyed my time with this franchise. The previous two entries were both amazing, mixing the perfect blend of detective investigation and pure anime-esque madness to be something special. Even when I wondered if they could capture lighting in a bottle a second time, I had to ultimately say, yes. But this time? It looked like it just might pull a hat trick with the trilogy. At least until the very end.