Toronto Thumbs

Holiday Ideas
Batman: Arkham City Collector’s Edition

While there have been decent super-hero games over the years, the majority of them tended to be lackluster and, frankly, steaming piles of dung. In 2009, Batman: Arkham Asylum took the gaming world by storm, surprising the hell out of a lot of us. Expectations for the sequel to be something akin to nirvana were not unjustified. Rocksteady did a fantastic job with the first game in the series; this year, Batman: Arkham City arrived – and it is going to seriously kick the crap out of you (in a good way) when you play it. So why is it in a Holiday Ideas post? Well, if you want to up the ante, you might want to try hunting for the collector’s edition.

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Holiday Ideas
UbiWorkshop

This entry is not necessarily about an item so much as it is about a bunch of awesome people who craft awesome items. I’m referring to none other than the folks at UbiWorkshop.

It should come as no surprise to any of our readers that I am absolutely mad about the Assassin’s Creed franchise. I tried to put my finger on why it is that I love that series so much, and one of the most important reasons was because of the creation of the world around the main characters. There is a lot to be said about the ability to thoroughly lose yourself in a world (folks who really read Tolkien know exactly what I’m talking about).

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Holiday Ideas
Alienware Aurora

I have been sitting with essentially the same system for about two years now. A decent Q6600 and a nice motherboard and 8 gigs of RAM have only really needed a topping up by a GTX 460 (768M) to keep up with the current stock of games. Of course, this means that I am not playing at the maximum settings – which makes me cry sometimes. Then, I find out about the machine that I’m about to address, and the word seppuku dances across my mind. Thanks, Alienware!

As I have mentioned in print and in person, gamers are tough to buy for due to the fact that they probably already have the latest hardware. Of course, this is not entirely accurate. What I should have said is that gamers probably already have the latest hardware that they can afford. Most of my friends that are gamers are not really rolling in money; so what happens if someone were to come into some cash from grandparents or find a hidden bundle of cash under their mattress? Ladies and gentlemen, let me introduce you to the Alienware Aurora*.

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Holiday Ideas
SteelSeries DESMO

Gamers can be a tough bunch to buy for. Unless you really know the person well, choosing a game that they might like is a questionable venture – especially when you factor in the likely possibility that they have bought the game already. Hardware is also a tough choice, as most bleeding-edge gamers will already own whatever you think they might want. Steelseries has an answer for that, though: the DESMO.

A while back, I reviewed the SteelSeries Scope, a set of eyeglasses promising to reduce eyestrain, thus improving one’s gaming experience. By the end of the reviewing process, any doubts I had about the effectiveness of this product were cast aside; I have been using them in my first-person-shooter adventures ever since. Not content to sit on their laurels, SteelSeries (and their intrepid partner GUNNAR Optiks) created the DESMO, a new set of digital eyewear that seems to promise an even better experience than the Scope.

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Holiday Ideas
Future Shop

The second holiday idea in our ongoing series is about a place to get items, rather than it being about a specific thing. I’m sure some of you are thinking about a word that starts quietly and ends with a fever*; this is not the case. Read on and find out why!

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Holiday Ideas
LG N1T1

Over the next few weeks we will be sharing some of our ideas about holiday gift-giving with you. Whether it is something that we have already played with, or something that we want – we will throw some of these at you and see what sticks. Well, maybe we won’t throw the actual items, but you know what I’m talking about. Today we will be talking about the LG N1T1; what’s that? Well read on, my good people…

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Toys
Kre-O Transformers: Bumblebee (and a Contest)

This is another post for those of you that like to get your holiday shopping done early; or maybe you just like buying cool toys (we don’t judge*). In any case, this is a pretty neat set that I had a lot of fun putting together, taking apart, and putting together again!

I haven’t played with LEGO in a long time; not the LEGO that I grew up with, anyway. Recently, I have been using Duplo more than anything else, trying to teach my kiddo that it is okay to build things that aren’t shown on the box – not that there is anything wrong with sticking to the plan, of course. Modern building sets are much different than they used to be. On one hand, they have such highly specialized pieces**; going free-form is challenging in a good way – working around the super-specialized pieces can really help to stretch your noodle. On the other hand, there are a lot of tie-ins to movies and such with recognizable vehicles – it is just a different level of fun! Since the big dog’s patent ran out, other folks have moved in to fill in the gaps – and that’s where Hasbro’s Kre-O comes in.

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Toy Story
Hot Wheels Video Racer

Click the pic to watch some test footage of this car!

While the Holidays are still a ways off, we thought that we would start tossing out some ideas to our readers before the real rush sets in. You will see some articles over the next while about some neat toys that we have been playing with lately.

I’m not sure if miniature cars held the same position of prestige in memories of your childhood like they do in mine. Back then, die-cast dinky cars were the best thing going; along with LEGO, you could pretty much create almost anywhere in the world. Once you had fun with those, there we’re the track sets that let you play with the concept of the inclined plane in loop-the-loopy ways.

Fast forward to the now, where cars are no longer made out of metal. How do you recapture the glory of the old days? Well, Hot Wheels may have hit upon the solution: recapture by capturing!

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Friendly Fire
Bridging the Gaming Gap

The Heavy does not approve of children or girly-men playing his game.

The pleading voice came through loud and tinny through Steam’s voice chat: “But Rituro, I’m mature!”

I sighed. Once again, my little brother was making a desperate pitch to convince me that he should be allowed to play Team Fortress 2 so we could play together. His latest argument -much like his previous ones- focuses on the definition of the “M” rating that accompanied Valve’s seminal online shooter: if one felt mature, surely they were mature enough to play an “M”-rated game, right? Wrong.

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Holidaze
Our Thoughts On 2010

The end of the year is nigh and we have all played many games; both good and bad. We at Toronto Thumbs decided to share some of our thoughts about what we have enjoyed (and not enjoyed) over the course of 2010. For the most part, there are a number of categories. Even though some of us could not find games that fit each section, we still gave our all in those that we could.

Since I am lazy, I am going to update this post and keep it current. Be sure to stay tuned!

• Introduction
• Dana Russo’s Thoughts
• Jayson Young’s Thoughts
• Kat Armstrong’s Thoughts
• Mike Croft’s Thoughts
• Rituro’s Thoughts
• Jorge Figueiredo’s Thoughts

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