Day 05 – Favorite items(s) in game

(This is the fifth post in my 21-entry daily series: 21 Days of Blogging)

Even though there are a number of RPGs on my favorite games list, I don’t really recall that many favorite items.  I guess when I play RPGs, story, quests, and puzzles are more interesting to me than specific items.  That said, I can name at least a few items from non-RPGs:

• Favorite Weapons
• Tribes 2: Spinfusor - In truth, I was useless with this weapon except at close range.  However the distinctive sound and action of this disc firing weapon made it one of my favorites anyways.

• Fallout 1 & 2: “Rockwell CZ53 personal minigun” – This wasn’t the most powerful weapon in Fallout, but it was up there for damage and great for fighting big parties.  Additionally, the animations associated with this weapon were (if disturbing) always satisfying.  You didn’t just kill the bad guys, you demolished them.

• Non-Weapons
• Unreal Tournament GOTY: Translocator – This item can actually be used as  a weapon, but its primary purpose is movement.  With this ‘gun’ you shoot a disk across a short to middling distance and the press the alt-fire key to teleport to the current location of the disk.  This powerful game item allows you to access any location you can shoot the disk to.  If you’re skilled you can even stair step up to a location which can’t be reached on a single teleport jump.  However, you retain all of your momentum when teleporting.  So, teleporting upward too many times usual equates to a splattered squishy death when you finally land.

• Enchanted Realms / Wizard Wars: Castle Bottle – I don’t have an official name for this item.  It is an item that I implemented in the Enchanted Realms MUD many years ago.  It was based on a magical item described in the book “Wizard War (Chronicles of an Age of Darkness 1)” by Hugh Cook.  The item itself is an indestructible bottle with  two magical rings on the rim.  If you place one of these rings on your finger and twist it, you are instantly teleported to a castle.  The castle is linked to the bottle and is designed to be impenetrable and inescapable.  You can use the castle to store loot and food, as well as a place to rest or recover from battle.  Twisting the ring a second time teleports you back to the current location of the bottle.  This feature made it great for solving puzzles.  i.e. Drop the bottle to the bottom of a otherwise unsurvivable fall or toss it through the grates of a locked room, then twist the ring twice and poof you have bypassed an obstacle.  The object is further made useful by the fact that there are two rings, so two users can make use of the bottle in tandem.  This made for an interesting number of interactions and puzzle solutions.

I’m sure if I strained my brain, I could come up with a few more, but I’m afraid that I’m over-busy today and need to get rolling on some game work.