Regular columns from the GH team
Well my Polish campaign in Medieval 2: Total War (with the Stainless Steel mod) looks to be wrapping up in a way I didn’t really want…Hungary, Novgorod and now Venice have all found savory bits to lop off my increasingly small empire and I fear I may be knocked out of the campaign soon. Witness some of the below shots.
It’s been an eventful year here at GrogHeads.
We’ve expanded almost everything we do – more articles, more pictures in our articles, more traffic in the forums, more podcasts, more events at Origins, waaaaay more games to give away at Origins, more advertising partners to help us keep the lights on, more video features, and more members of our forums.
But none of that does much for us without you, the reader, to join us for the ride, and for that we are the most thankful. Our readership stats have gone up aross every metric: clicks, reads, time on the site, and reach with our social media.
So what’s coming next year?
Well, we’ve got a handful of things to work on. First, we’re going to updating some of our merchandise options, with new shirts and new products. We’ve got a podcast series already out there, and a new video series, too, but we don’t do much with live video, and we’ll look to start experimenting with some of that.
We’ve got some ideas getting more involved in the wider gaming community, too. We already plan, sponsor, and execute a bunch of events at Origins each summer, but that really only reaches the Grogs that can make it to Origins, so we’re going to look into some plans that can help reach our Grogience where you live and play – at your FLGS and smaller conventions. We’ve got some ideas about how to tie that into our social presence, too, but that’s admittedly a bit of a science project.
Finally, we’re going to start experimenting with some new graphics updates on the site to go along with some new (Gus!) and reborn (GARPA) columns we’ll be putting back into rotation.
As with everything we work on – these are moving targets. We’re going to try something, and if it works (The GrogCast, #TBT ads) we’ll keep doing them, and if it doesn’t (Tuesday Screenshot, How To Make It In The Game Business) we’ll cut it out.
Most importantly, though, we’re going to try to have even more fun this coming year than last year, because ultimately that’s what this is all about, right?
Chat about it below, or in our forums, or hit our FaceBook page >>
As soon as I learned that the Pike & Shot: Campaigns engine was the same one used by the Battle Academy games, I knew I would be drawn in. I love those games for their simplicity and also for the sense of urgency their turn-based structure creates. In some ways they create a sense of tension usually reserved for playing against other humans, either digitally or in person in a board game. Pike & Shot is exactly the same, with the added bonus of covering European conflicts that are generally lacking in game coverage from the late 1400s to the late 1600s. If you include fan made scenarios and campaigns, Pike & Shot Campaigns covers warfare all the way up to the American Revolution and the American Civil War.
It had been a while since I had fired up Pike & Shot: Campaigns to look around, but I quickly downloaded literally dozens of fan made scenarios, including ones based on the 16th century Italian Wars, the early 18th century Great Northern War, a Gustavus Adolphus campaign and many more. I then started the first tutorial mission. It was one of four in the the tutorial campaign portraying the struggle of 17th century Transylvanian Boyars against the forces of the Holy Roman Empire. Digest that for a moment, I’ll wait… Continue reading
I continue with my Polish campaign…the year is now 1313 and to get to this point I had to trample the Lithuanians and Kievan Rus while playing nice so the Holy Roman Empire wouldn’t do the same to me.
In between, Hungary and Novgorod got all uppity and are trying to wipe me from the face of the earth. At this point it’s not exactly a two front war as much as it is a battle against two advanced, pissed off enemy powers.
The Stainless Steel AI is putting up a good fight, more so on the campaign map than on the tactical map, but I am finding myself being smacked around nonetheless. See some of the below images to find out exactly how I got to this point of questioning my nation’s independence and even it’s existence in the next few turns. If I annoy one more power…that may be the tipping point and then I’ll be fully on the defensive. Continue reading
With the darkness and cold this time of year, I need some comfort food and some comfort gaming as well as beer. My ultimate comfort gaming series is Total War. It just makes me feel good. And one of the best Total War games is Medieval 2.
Combine one of my favorite series with one of my favorite installments of that series and it just doesn’t get much better…unless I add one of the best mods for a Total War game…Stainless Steel! I recently installed Stainless Steel v6.4 after having issues with it for years and settling for v6.3. It works like a charm now, runs extremely smooth and I haven’t had one CTD in about 15 hours of play. Not sure what finally clicked but I’ll take it.
If you have loved the Total War series even a little, you owe it to yourself to try Stainless Steel v6.4. If you enjoyed Medieval 2, run, don’t walk, and grab it right now. You’ll need a copy of the Kingdoms expansion as well. Here, have this link. It has everything you need to get started. Continue reading