New Track titled Voodoo Ritual

This is a new tune I worked on with my bass player friend named Dennis Tabor. He's a great bassist with a lot of style. His bass playing on this track just makes everything sound so heavy. So much low end with also great melodic trebly tones thrown in there as well. The main riff is a simple power chord riff but the chorus is this clean toned chord. Then there's solos on the theme. It's simple but I like to think we did a good job. I think the clean part makes it sound metal af. You can hear the track https://soundcloud.com/user-294063763/voodoo-ritual. Enjoy!

Grimoire: Manastorm is a fun spellcasting Unreal Tournament

So I was looking around on the free to play game section on Steam and I found this game called Grimoire: Manastorm. This is an fps (first person shooter) game made by Omniconnection where you play as wizards and cast spells to kill your enemies. Pretty great idea already. Replace guns with a bunch of spellcasters and you have a super fun experience. The game is in early access on Steam.

From my initial experience and only having played the game for maybe twenty minutes I can say this is one of the most fun free to plays I've tried out on Steam. I haven't had this much fun on a free to play on Steam since Nosgoth was out.

The game's free version only comes with the fire and earth spellcasters. The fire mage is freakin' amazing. They give you one of the coolest mages ever for free which is pretty awesome. When you burn people as a fire mage it is so satisfying watching their hp drop. It makes me feel like the pyro from Team Fortress. I love it.

The other class you get free is the earth mage. His regular attack speed is super fast but weaker than the fire mage but he can heal himself I noticed. You can cast a spell that creates a tree and when you stand near it your hp recovers at a moderate speed. He's definitely a support mage. This game has supports like in Team Fortress or Overwatch.

The game features abilities like a moba (like Heroes of the Storm) and all the different mages' abilities can be countered so its possible to survive any situation theoretically and given the proper skill and effort. One thing to note is that you can teleport too. This makes the game crazy fast a la Unreal Tournament and Quake, great games to be inspired by. It brings the Skyrim (the first person view of the mage with the fireball or manacrystals in their hands look exactly like Skyrim) style mage into the twitch shooter environment. Its the best idea I've seen in a game in a super long time. The fact that this game puts together ideas and is inspired by so many other games is probably what makes it so fun. Add to that the unique idea of shooting spells instead of guns. How clever and unique.

The one thing that could be better is the graphics. However, you don't need high end graphics in a twitch shooter. As long as the environments are creative enough and fun to play on everything's cool. I'm going to keep playing this game. I'm interested in seeing how big the community becomes for it and how long the player base will keep on it. I think the game has a lot of potential especially if they create more interesting spellcasters.

Heroes of the Storm's Stukov is the coolest support in the game

Tonight I'd like to talk about Heroes of the Storm's latest new hero, Stukov.

Here's his backstory: 

"In the 25th century of Earth's history, the United Earth Directorate Expeditionary Fleet was dispatched to reign in the Terran Colonies of the Koprulu Sector. Over time, these expatriate colonists that were once loyal had wavered in their allegiance, threatening the fabric of government which had been sewn across the galaxy. Of the formidable commanders tasked with this imperative endeavor, Vice Admiral Alexei Stukov was second in command.

During the violent campaign in that system, developments ensued that would eventually cast Stukov in a traitorous light to his superiors. Having been found to be in violation of a direct order to destroy the powerful Psi Disrupter, Stukov was subsequently executed for his disobedience. Unbeknownst to the UED at the time, their ranks had been infiltrated by a powerful shape-shifting alien entity that sought to sow confusion about the importance of Stukov's mission. After his death, Stukov's corpse was later recovered by the Zerg, who sought to infest human leaders and mutate them into leaders of their own colonies. As the first of their attempts to blend their genetics with that of humanity's, the once lifeless husk of Stukov was reanimated into something at once both more and less than human.
The infested Admiral known as Stukov has now entered the Nexus as a formidable melee support, ready to spread his healing pathogens and deadly disease across the battleground." (heroesofthestormgamepedia.com)

And also you should also know his abilities.

Bio-Kill Switch

Cooldown: 16 seconds

Activate to detonate all of Stukov's Viruses. Each Healing Pathogen heals its target for 500 health, and each Weighted Pustule does 100 damage and Slows its target by 70% for 2 seconds.
Can be cast while channeling Lurking Arm.

Q

Healing Pathogen

30 Mana Cooldown: 10 seconds

Infest an allied Hero with a Healing Pathogen that heals the target for 240 Health over 4.5 seconds. Healing Pathogens can spread to a nearby allied Hero every 0.75 seconds, and a single Healing Pathogen can spread to each allied Hero 1 time.
Can cast it on self, and spread to self.
Cannot spread to targets to whom it has already spread.

W

Weighted Pustule

50 Mana Cooldown: 10 seconds

Hurl a pustule that impacts all enemy Heroes in its path, dealing 20 damage and Slowing by 5%, increasing to 50% over 3 seconds. Deals an additional 80 damage upon expiring or being removed.

E

Lurking Arm

60 Mana Cooldown: 8 seconds

Channel at a target location, creating an area that Silences enemies inside and deals 144 damage per second to them. Deals 50% reduced damage to non-Heroes. Does not cost Mana while Channeling, and lasts until canceled or interrupted.

R

Massive Shove

50 Mana Cooldown: 20 seconds

Extend Stukov's arm. If it hits an enemy Hero, they are rapidly shoved until they collide with terrain, taking 200 damage. Stukov gains 50 Armor while shoving an enemy.

R

Flailing Swipe

100 Mana Cooldown: 80 seconds

Swipe 3 times in front of Stukov over 1.75 seconds, dealing 50 damage to enemies hit and knocking them away. Each swipe is larger than the previous.

Alright now lets talk about his kit. He's technically a healer but his melee damage is pretty strong and attacks moderately fast so you can defend yourself for a while before retreating to fellow teammates. His q key (Healing Pathogen) is a super strong heal once activated with d (Bio-Kill Switch) which will increase the healing by a ton. Its a super strong heal. The kill switch has a long cooldown but if your teammates are smart and don't get hit all the time your heals will always be enough.

One of the strongest tools for Stukov is his e key (Lurking Arm). It silences enemies. This is probably his greatest asset as a support in the game. The fact that he can silence enemies and do it often and its not an ultimate ability is astounding. You have to channel the spell so once you move the silence is automatically turned off. However, if you can cast lurking arm when your enemies are out of position or trying to run away you easily pick them off. Its become one of the coolest and strongest abilities in the game right now. It's super effective!

Weighted Pustule (w key) is a great way to slow enemies to give your dps allies the chance to finish them when they have low health. Its not very strong and the slow is better overtime. Still not bad though.

My favorite ultimate for Stukov is Massive Shove. It has a super short cooldown of just 20 seconds and it pushed an enemy as far as an enemy will go until they hit something like a wall, tower, or other part of the map. He extends his zerg arm super far, sometimes going almost across the map. Not only does it look super cool but it helps get your team in a better position for team fights. If this ultimate is used effectively the enemy team will be one less player during team fights, giving your team the advantage until that enemy hero runs back.

I would say that Stukov is a good healer that can also dish out good dps while also dishing out great utility and crowd control (the silence, slow). Because of this he's become one of my favorite heroes. His play-style can be a bit tricky at first but once you play a few games with him you start to learn that he's most effective when you're always in good positions. Positioning is key with this hero so you can't just run out in the middle of a random fight and hope to come out killing everybody. He's kind of like a healer specialist in a way. He's very unique, and super fun!

Not to mention he's from one of my favorite Blizzard games, Starcraft II. When I found out he was coming to hots (heroes of the storm) I knew he would be some kind of interesting character but I didn't think he was going to be a healer with such a cool kit. Its about time they added a new support hero and I'm glad they did a great job with it. Not to mention his squid skin is just awesome!

For the Queen!

Garrosh Hellscream is coming to Heroes of the Storm

Everybody's favorite villain from World of Warcraft's Mists of Pandaria is coming to Heroes of the Storm. He's expected to hit the ptr on July 31st.

Heh, greetings. Blizzard has revealed that Garrosh Hellscream, son of Grommash Hellscream and former chieftain of the Warsong Clan, will be the next hero added to Heroes of the Storm. The studio said on Twitter that he'll be playable at the ChinaJoy conference next week, and it aims to have him on the HotS PTR for the week of July 31. (pc gamer )

A lot of players on the forums online are actually pretty disappointed with Garrosh being the next new hero in hots. The main problem is that the game is getting another orc. We already have a lot of orcs. It would've been a lot cooler to get some other Warcraft race character, particularly a Dranei hero of some sort. But even like a night elf would be amazing. I think hots definitely needs a dranei in the game. Maybe like a dranei warlock or something? That would be something.

I'm already stacking up my gold from doing quests daily. When Garrosh comes out I'm going to hopefully be able to purchase him with in game gold right away. I won't have to wait a super long time like how I did with Stukov. Stukov is a freakin' great character by the way, I've been really enjoying him.

Anyways, despite the haters on the forum I'm super excited for Garrosh Hellscream. I was still playing WoW (World of Warcraft) back when he was leader of the Horde so its cool to see a familiar face. We will have to wait and see how his play style fits into a moba. Should be good.

For the Horde! 

Two guitar videos

Thought I'd share some old guitar vidoes I made back when I lived in the dorm at college. These were done in 2011 and I was young, slim, and still a guitar player haha. The first one here is Eric Clapton's solo on Strange Brew from the Disreali Gears album. That was the first solo I've ever learned. The second one here is Randy Rhoads' iconic solo from Crazy Train. Two pretty good classic rock/metal solos. I'm thinking about getting back into making videos and posting it on YouTube.

Enjoy!

Making limited time work as a passionate gamer (that loves Blizzard)

I was thinking about ideas for things I could write about and this idea popped up in my head. How do you create time to play video games and how do you manage your gaming time in order to get the full gaming experience? Pretty interesting question that would vary for every passionate gamer. Here, I'd like to go into details of my gaming time management and what games I focus on playing.

First, when do I play games? Life goes fast and you only have so much time within a given day. That's why I like to wake up early (10am, I know that's late for most people lol) and that's pretty much my prime time gaming spot for the entire day. I do sometimes play late at night (12am-3am) as well but not all the time due to my roommate needing sleep for work. So when I wake up at ten I get ready for the day, maybe eat something small, grab some water or iced tea, and then hop on the computer. I'll usually game from then on until I need to go to work. Lately I've been going in around 330pm so that gives me about a good five hours. Those five hours are spent wisely (on the right games), at least I like to think so.

Okay, so first things first I like to start off by playing some Heroes of the Storm matches. I always do the quests for gold because I always want to be ahead of the curve when a new hero comes out. I always want to have enough gold to buy them right away upon release. It's a super fun game and I'm really great at it as well so it doesn't feel like a chore just to do quests, akin to doing quests in World of Warcraft. After I finish the quests I hop off quickly and move on.

Then, there's Overwatch. I still play Overwatch frequently but not as often as last year. Now I play for just a little bit and then I like to move onto other games. Lately, I've been playing dps heroes (mainly Reaper with mariachi outfit) in Quick Play so I've just been practicing my aim and not really focusing too heavily on competitive at all. I'm waiting around for Doomfist to be released before I play more competitive. I think the game will be more interesting then. So yeah I play a few rounds and then stop playing.

Here's a curve ball for ya. I recently started playing World of Warcraft again and I've already leveled to 110 (max level currently) but the game's really only just beginning at that point. Finding the time to play has been super difficult as I'm already on a time budget as it is. I think I've found the solution. I should focus on pvp for the time being. I pretty much only played wow back in 2013 just for pvp so I can do it again. It doesn't require hours and you can farm pvp gear which will still increase my item level. Problem solved. But still fitting this game into my schedule is really pushing my time to its limits.

So World of Warcraft is just a game that I might maybe play within those five hours but a game that's more likely to be launched is Diablo 3 Reaper of Souls. Ever since I bought the necromancer dlc the game has become much more fun to me. I already played the game a lot before and I have every character to max level and I can do some pretty high torment levels on my barbarian but the necro has just reignited the fun switch for me. I typically don't play this game often either. I just log on, do a few rift runs, farm a bit, test out all the skills and abilities all the time, and that's everything I do for now. I've been trying to farm more set gear and increase my toon damage but as you know it's all just a grind. A fun grind, like doing a five-o down a handrail on a skateboard!

Playing just Heroes, Overwatch, and Diablo 3 can take up the entire five hours but sometimes I'll play other stuff other than those games. These are some more curve balls.

Honorable mention to Team Fortress 2. I love TF2. Honestly, its probably the best first person shooter game I've ever played. Everything about it is amazing and once I start playing its hard for me to stop, even though there's no real incentive to keep playing (like lootboxes) other than just for the love of the game. I've been meaning to play it more but sometimes Overwatch takes that fps game slot. I can't play both in the same day (or if I do I have to play tf2 a lot more) because too much fps gaming gets repetitive to me.

The next two are games that I don't really play competitively or anything, just for funzies. I started playing Starcraft 2 again but I'm so out of practice that I can barely remember the units (especially the new legacy of the void ones) or even the buildings that require other buildings to make units. Its all coming back to me now and I've even been playing zerg and protoss. The last time I played competitively (on the ladder) I only played terran.

And then there's Warcraft 3 Frozen Throne. This game is just so cool. It reminds me of Heroes of the Storm but much more difficult to play. I'm enjoying the steep learning curve this game has. I think I can learn to play pretty well if I just keep messing around with it here and there but it would take me a super long time before I could start wrecking people in 1v1's. For now I've just been practicing 4v4's. Its fun, casual, and I'm learning how the game mechanics work. I'm only about 12 years late on this one guys!

That would pretty much cover any given day with a five hour time slot. Sometimes I'll get an extra three hours late at night if my roommate is up  so in total I could possibly have eight hours in total. That's a lot of gaming time for any person but when you're passionate about games and you love the multiplayer experience its not like a job, its a chore of love.

I should also mention that when I'm playing most of the time I'm chatting with my friend Sean from Wisconsin on discord, my Warcraft guild, my friend Eric, and gaming friends that I met through my brother. They're all super chill people and talking to them makes the entire experience more meaningful.

Sometimes after these long sessions I feel like I was time hopping with Chromie! 

Overwatch competitive is in a bad place right now

Overwatch competitive is in a pretty bad spot right now. Players have reached the tipping point because of competitive mode. This season (season 5) placed players lower than their sr (skill rating, measurement number of how good you are) than previous seasons and its become a grind to go back to last season's sr and then to also exceed that and push to the next ranks. It's become incredibly difficult. Players have become more stubborn (one trick ponies, only want to play certain heroes, never switch off to counter enemy compositions). Not to mention the fact that players have become so incredibly toxic.

The most toxic thing that's happened to me is this one time I lost a match (in comp of course) and this guy yelled on the mic "you guys all fucking suck!". He was yelling at the top of his lungs so it was painful to the ears with my headset on. What a dick. Its fair to say that Overwatch is probably Blizzard's most toxic game. I can see why. Players just want to win. Every loss hurts them (my precious sr!) and winning is the only way to verify that they're "good".

Let's not forget the lower level ranks which are severely difficult to rank up through. At the bronze, silver, gold levels you have pretty much no control over anything but yourself. Players are insta-dps lockers and when you ask them to switch most of the time they'll just stay whatever hero they first picked. It's become infuriating as a support main myself. Its come to the point where I don't play too much competitive. In fact, the only Overwatch I've been playing is the ptr. I've been having a lot of fun playing Quick Play with Doomfist on the team. I'm still pretty much healing but only because nobody picks healers too often.

I've actually developed a new philosophy to the game when it comes to what heroes I should play. Next time I play comp I'm going to only pick heroes that are needed. So if somebody already picks a healer I'll go dps or tank. I've come to the conclusion that being a one trick pony isn't the most effective way to develop a good team. You gotta play what the team needs. I like players that wait until everybody has made their character choices and then says oh well I guess we need a tank and then picks one. Those are the players that are the best Overwatch players.

Anyways, because of the problems and toxicity in competitive Overwatch has gone to a boring, salty, and toxic halt. Until Doomfist comes out I don't see myself playing too much comp, if ever. I think the game is probably at its worst footing right now ever since launch. It could possibly even become a game that people stop playing because competitive just isn't fun anymore. Well, why not just play Quick Play you say? That wouldn't work because competitive is the only game mode where players actually try to use their heads and work together as a team. All the other modes are just filler for competitive in this game. Plus, Quick Play just isn't a fun game mode. Usually you only get one healer (if even that) and its all based on dps comps with maybe one tank (again, if even). Its super lame.

This all makes me super sad because I love the game dearly but I fear that if Blizzard doesn't do something the game might just disappear.

Just like Tracer blinking away....