The Mental Attic

On Monday we had our first set of gaming contestants make their way through the perilous and demanding course that is The Beast, using all their skills to accrue as many points as they could. Twelve competitors became eight, then five and then the remaining and best two, Kain from the Legacy of Kain series and Mega Man X from the eponymous series, met face to face for Level 4, with X using his superior movement to beat the ancient vampire and claim the title of Beastmaster, earning 10.000 of whatever currency they use in his 20XX time period.

But as this week closes and another looms, new challengers emerge from the shadows of the gaming industry and the internet, ready to face the Beast and join Mega Man X in the grand final for the title of Ultimate Beastmaster. More importantly, unlike our first competitors, which were chosen by myself for the competition, this week’s challengers have their own sponsors. We shall see if these blogging heroes have a keen eye for Beast conquering talent!

On another note, and before we introduce next week’s lineup, is the desperate need for conversion rules for those gaming competitors who are not from the action or adventure genres, those who don’t jump, punch and fly in their own games. The Ultimate Beastmaster is open to all of them. A particular case to look at are Fighting and Point & Click adventure characters, the former not doing much climbing and the latter often doing a lot with a single press of a mouse button. So how do we treat them? Here’s how:

Fighters:

• Max running speed: the fastest they move across the fighting stage in their respective games, including special abilities that include movement. Example: Wolverine’s Berserker Barrage from the Marvel & Capcom games.
• Jumping: the longest and highest jump from all their games will be considered as their max, including those ridiculous screen high jumps in the Marvel vs Capcom games.
• Grapples, holds & throws grant limited climb and shimmying. Principle is similar, grab onto something and shift weight, just instead of yours it’s someone else’s.
• Weight: Character build will increase the speed of the above stats. Dhalsim will be faster than Zangief.
• Speed: Some characters are faster than their build would suggest, such as Bob from Tekken. Their fighting speed, will also adjust their athletic values for competing on the Beast.

Point & Click Adventurers:

• Cinematic conversion: if they can do it in a cutscene, they can do it on the beast. Excludes anything relating to an item’s use, such as an ingame potion, curse, special piece of point & click future tech, etc.

With those rules set, it’s time to meet our new gaming athletes and their sponsors!

• Guybrush Threepwood, Mighty Pirate
  • Game Series: Monkey Island
  • Sponsor: The Lawful Geek (me)
• Ezio Auditore da Firenze
  • Game Series: Assassin’s Creed
  • Sponsor: The Lawful Geek
• Bob
  • Game Series: Tekken
  • Sponsor: The Lawful Geek
• Lara Croft (Reboot)
  • Game Series: Tomb Raider
  • Sponsor: The Lawful Geek
• Kratos
  • Game Series: God of War
  • Sponsor: Luna from GamersUnitedGG Blog
• Crash Bandicoot
  • Game Series: Crash Bandicoot
  • Sponsor: Chris from OverThinkerY
• The Boss
  • Game Series: Saint’s Row
  • Sponsor: Chris from OverThinkerY
• Rufus
  • Game Series: Street Fighter
  • Sponsor: Chris from OverThinkerY
• The Prince:
  • Game Series: Prince of Persia
  • Sponsor: Chris from OverThinkerY
• Jigglypuff
  • Game Series: Pokémon
  • Sponsor: Nathan from Hurricane Thought Process
• Nathan Drake
  • Game Series: Uncharted
  • Sponsor: Nathan from Hurricane Thought Process
• Kirby
  • Game Series: Kirby
  • Sponsor: Drakulus

OverThinkerY’s building up a large roster, so I had to meet his team with my own picks. The rest of our sponsors are on the conservative side, watching how one of their athletes performs before, hopefully, committing with greater numbers! Let the best gaming character win the title of Beastmaster and come one step closer to beating all others in the finals, for the glory of the Ultimate Beastmaster.