Dota Blog up, running soon

So I decided I'd make that DOTA blog. There aren't any hero guides up on it yet but I have the setup and I'll get a few of them on the list tonight. Follow it if you play Dota!

http://2minutedotaguides.blogspot.com/

DOTA

I don't have much time right now so I can't give a game review but I was just wondering if you guys think a DOTA blog would be cool? Having played dota for years, I know all about the heroes, item builds, strategies, etc... but there is always something more to learn, especially for people who don't play as often.

I figured I could start a DOTA blog where I blog different heroes and how I prefer to play them, different match ups in lanes I like, and overall strategy in general

lemme know what you think!

Start out with some soccer

For my first game review, I'm going to be talking about hattrick. It's an online soccer managing game that I've been playing for about 5 years now on and off. It has roughly 1 million users and overall is a pretty well run game.

How it works is you sign up for a team at the start, then it usually takes a couple days for you to get your team and boom, you're right in the midst of a league that's probably in the middle of the season (because you will have taken over someone's spot in a lower league who quit the game). Anyways I recommend reading the rules because it tells you a LOT about how the game works, tactics, coaches, player stats, etc.

So you'll want to look at all of your players and determine where each player fits best. Obviously a player who is excellent in scoring will be better than a player who is poor in scoring but you should check all their stats because sometimes while one player may be Excellent in scoring, he could have poor passing, playmaking, and other skills which can still be useful for a soccer player.

Once you see what position each one is best at, you put them in your positions and play! There is a league game every Sunday and a friendly game every Wednesday that you will have to setup (simply go to friendlies and publish an ad or invite some people to play you).

Anyways to rate the game:

I would probably give hattrick a 7/10.

I found it to be entertaining for a few years but it kind of can get stuck in a point where you don't want to play anymore because it runs real time (so you only have 2 matches in a week) and you can get bored, or you just simply run out of time to set a friendly up and you let your team lose training. However, there are definitely ways to avoid this. The forums are very active there and you can always talk to other players, scout for players on the market, try and figure out better formations, etc.

My only other really negative comment is that unlike some other games, the tactics are very limited. You can set your players in a formation and tell them to play "to the wing" or "offensive" but you can't really set them more detailed than that nor play them anywhere on the field.

If anyone plays hattrick please leave your own comments below about what you think.

Introduction - Online games

So since this is my first blog I'll go ahead and just start off by introducing myself.

My name is James Magest, and I'm an avid computer game player. My major is computer science so I think it fits me well.

Over the past few years of my life I've moved around from large video games to small online games played by only a rare few. Some of the games are business related, some are sports managing, and some are just good ol shoot em up style games.

Anyways I'm going to go ahead and be blogging about various games throughout the months and how to succeed in them/how I've failed in them.

Hope you enjoy!

-James