日常生活

Since Gears of War didn't turn out to be the awesome "board game that we play every weekend" I've kept searching for another game to play. (Really, I've been pushing to play GoW again, to at least beat that first annoying level, but the others won't comply. What do?)

I noticed Ad Astra was on sale and figured we should give it a try. I didn't really know what the game was about and after having seen a quick review on the game on Youtube - after I had ordered it - I didn't think it would be very good. (But hey, it was on sale..)

My brother, a friend and I tested the game yesterday and as it turns out, Ad Astra is actually a lot of fun to play! There's a lot more strategy in this game compared to many of my other games (which are mostly just all about killing stuff). Travel to various planets, gather as many resources as possible to score more than the others and eventually win the game. For some reason that setup worked out just fine with us. Maybe we're getting too old for mindless mayhem? Grah, the horror!

The tokens, or pawns, are all pretty neat. A few of them look a bit fragile and the ships are a little skimpy for my liking, but all in all, they're very nice looking.

Both my brother and the friend commented that it would've been interesting if there were a way to attack the planets in an "intergalactic war kinda way" somehow.

I suppose there's still room for some mindless mayhem, after all. :-)

One of my brothers bought the game Rock Science and the three of us broke it in yesterday. It's a trivia board game with a Rock-theme and we quickly found out that neither of us is a Rock Scientist. A lot of the questions were super hard (or rather, they're about bands that neither of us listen to). To move your marker (which is a cool guitar pick) you have to answer a question correctly. Or - and this is what got us around the board - you "bet" that the player answering the question can't get it right (which happened about 90% of the time, even on the easier "Poser" questions).

Yeah, we suck.

Eventually I completed a lap around the board, just shy ahead of the others, winning the game. Woop! But rather than feeling victorious, I walked away from the table full of shame, feeling like a poser. Not worthy..

There are some additional rules with the game, such as a drinking game variant, which I'd like to try out some time. (Not that I see how that would make things any better)..

A while back the money ran out on my account and I have been on another of my "sporadic" breaks. My plan to reach level 85 on my paladin was put on hold, once more. I only got to about 71 when my account was frozen from the lack of funds, and I haven't been bothered to reactivate it again. Truth is, I have decided enough is enough. I'm quitting, finally.

Game Over.

It's been a good few years and you will be missed, but I suppose I've finally come to the conclusion that it's time to move on... I tip my hat to you, WoW. :-)

First impression: "WTF Steam?"

I got home from work and started installing the game. Six hours later, it's just about ready to launch. Six hours. What. The. Fuck. It feels like the DVD didn't contain anything else than an initial pre-install program asking for the key which, once entered, turned over to Steam and downloaded the game. Seriously yeah, I think I downloaded the fucking game and the DVD was just a facade...

*clicks PLAY*

(A.k.a. To be continued)..

Edit 11.30am: I accidentally attacked a man instead of talking to him and the entire village of Riverwood came out to get me. Fuck this - restart from previous save..

Edit 1.00pm: Experiencing a lot of glitches, a lot of them to do with either my character's model or lightning of the world around me. I fell through the floor in a cave, and the screen went haywire, flickering. Loading a previous save didn't fix the flickering so I closed the game.. Hopefully when I restart the game will be back to "normal".

Edit 5.15pm: I could continue (thankfully) without too much trouble, even though glitches appear here and there all the time. A few screenshots:

A lot of these glitches happen when I tab in and out of the game, but they also randomly happen when stepping through doors to new areas/buildings. It has also started crashing, kicking me out of the game, forcing a restart which is quite annoying.

Despite all the bugs I'm facing, I think it's an alright game but there's just too much to take in. There are so many things to pick up, and you can only carry so much, and I have no idea what things are useful. Do I need a cooking pot? A broom? (I actually got 2 of those). And all the clothes that I strip of the dead bodies I leave behind me...

I haven't really figured out how to use magic yet, but I'm getting quite skilled with a bow, so I'm thinking I won't be needing it. Yet...

I got StarCraft II a while back and it's really rather sweet. The single-player campaign is pretty interesting; I'm currently on my second playthrough (started on casual and are now working on normal).

Rather than campaigning though, my focus have mostly been on custom games, such as tower defence or tug of war. Having a blast playing with my brothers and some friends. Heaps of fun!

We've played a few 2v2 and 3v3 matches but I suck pretty bad at those so I generally avoid them. (It's no fun losing all the time..)

Yesterday Blizzard revealed WoW's fourth expansion to be Mists of Pandaria and it looks pretty interesting. A lot of players were upset by the news of the new playable race pandaren, but frankly I'm looking forward to it.

The pandaren brew beer for fcks sake, they can't be any less than awesome!

Everytime we start playing a new game there are always some rules that we miss. Rather, that I miss - I'm usually the first one to glance through them. GoW:tBG was no exception.

Three of us started out on Friday, gathering up all the pieces from the box, setting up the first stage and taking the first plunge through the Locust swarms. After a few unlucky turns, near-dead and hardly off the first map-piece, I realized that we had missed a couple of rules that would have made it easier on us. After some yelling at me we decided to start over.

The next time we set off things turned out better for us, but we still faced a lot of resistance as we pushed forward through the swarms. We got up to about halfway through the map when one of us had to break up early on account of work on Saturday morning. We decided to leave the table overnight and come back the next day.

When we came back on Saturday we still faced a lot of resistance, and my brother started to lose his patience when we realised that there were more rules we had missed. Come on, this is the first level, it can't be this bloody hard...

Turns out no, it's not really - we (ok, me) are just stupid and very unlucky with the rolls. We decided to restart once more, but my brother had had enough, so our friend took over the role of both their characters, while I grabbed the last char we hadn't played before then, meaning we were now 4 "players" instead of 3. That ought to even the scores some, right? Right? Nope. Still hard as all hell.

We went at it for little over an hour (or maybe two) when my brother returned to the table announcing he wanted to play Magic: The Gathering. I groanded a bit, but agreed - it had taken us too long time to get nowhere on the first level. It's a hard ass game...

Come Sunday, I decided to try play it solo. The amount of starting monsters on the map changes depending on how many players there are which made it pretty easy to get through each room; either killing the Locust or skipping by them, rushing to the end objective of the map. It took me less than half an hour to kill the last of the Locust and beat the level. For serious and like a baus.

I actually think it's a great game and having played Gears of War I & II on the 360 I think the transition from digital media to a board game captures the feel of those games pretty well. It's just very luck-based with the dice, but there are ways to turn them in your favour.

I like how your life is slowly regenerating over time (like in most modern day shooters), instead of as in say, Castle Ravenloft, where your life pretty much just drops all the time. ;)

I'm insisting on another round next weekend to get through the first level, hopefully further than that, because I know we can do it....we have the technology...

Edit October 9: No.

We haven't touched a board game in a while, the weekends being occupied by Magic: The Gathering. I've been meaning to change that, and have been looking for something new and fresh. I stumbled upon Gears of War: The Board Game. Buying it on Friday.

It looks pretty sweet, kind of reminding me of Doom: The Board Game except it's full-on co-op against an "AI", like Castle ravenloft (meaning not one person will be stuck playing the DM; cards determine how enemies react). Brilliant, really.

Looking forward to playing it. :-)

(Click image for video)

There haven't actually been a whole lot of adventuring for Borkedhorn in the last few weeks. I've felt less and less inclined to log in, for various reasons, one being sucking at healing in instances after I reached lvl 40 (because I don't get my gear upgraded in a fast enough fashion *sadface*).

In an effort to push this little project forward again I've decided to skip healing entirely, along with the instances. I've re-speced retribution, and I'll just quest my way up towards level 85. Let's see how far I get this time around...

Edit September 4: Borkedhorn dinged 58 last night and slipped through the Dark Portal. It's moving forward, to say the least, but for how long... :-)

Edit September 11: It's actually going quite well. Borkedhorn turned 66 and is currently residing in the Blade's Edge Mountains. Questing has been really smooth so far, save for a few snags. (Some elite mobs still hit like a truck and can be hard to take on by yourself).

It's a shame I've waited this long to level an alt (well, another one - technically Moriam is an alt) because once you put your mind to it, it goes pretty fast.

I'm starting to feel a little sad about this "project", because reaching level 85 with Borkedhorn will very likely mark the end of the game for me. At least, that's sort of the plan. I might change my mind about that though, as I've done so many times before, and end up just taking another break.

With the rumors of a Pandaren-expansion coming up, I would have to return for a peek when it's released, at the very least...

Edit September 18: With turning 68 "Borkie" grew tired with Outland. He flew back through the Dark Portal and jumped on the nearest zeppelin to Northrend. Next stop, Howling Fjord!

I'm thinking about creating a sort of backlog to where Borked has been. I have an addon that snaps a screenshot at various events (such as leveling) that I might make into a little album. Could be interesting. :-)

I recently beat Super Metroid on the SNES (via emulator on the HTPC....with cheats...) and when I found out that Other M picks up where Super Metroid ended I decided I'd take a peek.

It starts out a bit cut-scene-heavy, but they are soon replaced with all the more action as Samus blasts her way through the levels of a "Bottle Ship" (whatever that may be).

I haven't really played any of the "Prime" titles, so controlling Samus in 3D is a new concept for me. The controls were a little odd at first but the transition from 2D to 3D works really well and it doesn't take very long getting used to.

Samus will auto-aim most of the time, as long as she's somewhat facing the foe, which makes it much easier to deal with enemies. I also like how, instead of enemies dropping items, Samus utilizes a Concentration technique to replenish health and ammunition. It's a bitch to use when you're in a tight spot, but you don't have to go out of your way to collect a few extra missiles, should you need them.

I've played around two hours and so far it's been a pleasant experience. :3