Ups and Downs

I must say, the highlight of my month has got to be seeing my pseudo-nephew running up to his mum, arms out in his little jacket and hoodie and giggling his little head off.

That tops off the long and exhausting month I've had.

Twas the first tuesday of the month and I'm on my way to work.  I hadn't had a good start to the week, just from work, but I receive a considerably long message.

It started off with "If you are receiving this text it's because I consider you a close friend".  That's a nice thing to say.  While I have hardly seen Stacey in months, and much the same beforehand, it's nice to know that she considers me a close friend.

The message then goes on to tell about how she was admitted into hospital on the saturday beforehand on Severe Anemia, contrary to the double dose medication she was taking ("I came in with a [Red Blood Cell] count of 57 when it should be about 120") and after a few tests, she found she had Cancer.  By the end of the week, we knew it was Stage 4 Lymphoma.

Happily when I went to see her, we had a few minutes to ourselves and she explained it out to me and said that given the various cancers there are, this would be the one you'd settle for because there is a finish line.  It just takes time to get to.

But the fact that a good friend has gone to hospital?  That's a fucking shock to the system.  And it happened not long earlier too in march, because another close friend was hospitalised with Arrhythmia, an irregular heartbeat condition.  And the other day, I found out that she has to continue to take medication for the rest of her life in case it causes some more significant damage.  I haven't seen her yet, but it has always been difficult to get a meeting together with her.

And slowly, but obviously surely, it has really burrowed itself into my head, and thrown a wrench into my work which has its own vicious cycle.

It hasn't all been bad this month.  As of the time of this writing, Jenny will be here in 4 weeks, and we've been getting our shit into gear.  I'm going for my provisional license on Monday, which was a wonderful day of flipping out on myself.

I had gotten my finger out and checked out when the closest booking was.  However, I had left it a bit late.  Turns out all all the driving instructors in North Brisbane were booked out until the 4th June.  So I'm panicking, and figure "Lets try South Brisbane".  Nope, their earliest was the 7th.

I'm panicking more, because I'm a little embarrassed that I don't already have it, (I've had my learners for 5+ years) but I was more flipping out because I've left it too late, I wouldn't be able to get my license before Jenny gets here because there aren't any available bookings and I wouldn't be able to drive her around, it'll all be Public Transport and favours. (Which costs an arm and a leg)

So I looked further out.  The earliest I could get was at Currumbin on the 15th May.

First question I asked myself was "How the FUCK am I going to get to Currumbin?"  I checked.  It's not easy.  But it's available, so I filed it away and searched for the next best thing.

Which turned out to be Caloundra on the 18th.  I checked the public transport, and it's easy enough: Take a train to Landsborough Train Station, and there's a bus going up "Steve Irwin Way" which would plant me right in front of the Transport Depot.  Done.  It's a 2 hour trip, 3 if you include the walk from my place to Bald Hills station, but it was possible.

But heeding advice from the customer service lady of the QLD Transport Dept, I checked the monday afterwards for any cancellations.  "There are always loads of cancellations, so be sure to check like twice a day."  Luckily, there she was: 30th April, Caboolture.  Very easy to get to, closer to me, and all I have to do is get there and take the test.

It's going to be hard fought, because after today and yesterday, it's going to be a rainy day on that Monday.  Goody.  I'll just take things slower than usual and get through the day.  Hopefully without Hypothermia since I'll be walking through the rain on getting to and from there.  And trains never fail to have the Air Conditioning blasting.

So that's my personal life up until now.  Otherwise, Tuesdays have been booming with people coming in and having fun, then Friday nights are getting much clearer with the game Champions (I really should read the rulebook for that) and D&D... I've already blogged about.

Then there's Jenny.  Fuck I can't wait for her to get here.  We're in the process of sorting out the Schedule.  Jenny made a list of things we plan to do in the 10 days she's here, and now we just have to organise it.  The only thing that unchangable is the Saturday Night Dinner.  So far, we're up around 50 people so she is feeling a bit humbled, especially by those coming interstate to see her. 

Thank you everyone.  I really appreciate it.

Changing Methods

My D&D group is getting a little difficult as of late, mostly because we're starting to really spread apart.  Aaron is on the Southside of Brisbane, Scott and I are still in one place, and Richard is up in Townsville.  In the past, we've made do by having our D&D set placed down in front of a Webcam to allow Richard to join in.  We haven't had a problem, except for Richard not listening too often and Aaron finding it really difficult to get motivated to cross town since he's the only driver out of the three of us in Brisbane.  (Which shall soon change, but still)

Aaron has been pushing for an alternative by playing over the internet through D&D Insider, which provides a program that gives us everything we need in computerised form.  Health tracking, a playing grid, player graphics, etc etc etc.  It's all well and good until I have to fork out money for it, which I would rather not do because I'm saving for Jenny.

My suggestion was rather than using D&D Insider, use Vassal.  Eventually we want to play the Iron Kingdoms RPG system, which is significantly different to D&D itself and more like the Warmachine/Hordes game, and I think Vassal will be perfect for it since the Module already supports the majority of the game, the Module developer just needs to apply a few things once the books come out and it'll be ready for play.  Hopefully.

The only other thing we have to worry about is voice command.  Because rather than having to type it out, it's simply easier to just say what you're doing.  There are a few options with that, the first of which Aaron suggested was Skype.  I've got Skype, he has Skype, I don't think Richard has Skype, and Scott Definitely doesn't.  The alternative to that is MSN messenger, which I'm fine to use, but whether Aaron is even able to we may never know.

Though I do remember last time I used MSN Messenger, I kept getting messages from Bot Spammers saying "Come visit my webcam".  Hmm.

I am keen to do Vassal for the IK RPG so we can fight something mad, such as a Dire Troll or a Juggernaut.  If we can build up ourselves enough, we could even try and take on a Colossal or a Gargantuan, which would be awesome.

Expanding Horizons

I spent just last Saturday playing Talisman with Scott and Dick. Normally it would have been a session of D&D, the last for the story arc until Aaron figured out what he wants to go with the main Arc, however Aaron didn't even turn up.

But sitting down for Talisman also included some excitment, as we had one of the expansions available, "The Highlands" which adds an additional corner piece to the game. Scott and I will be getting more and more expansions as we go, because the game builds that way, with regular fresh new experiences.

Today I looked up Crysis 3, a game coming out in the future, probably next year, and something Occurred to me: They wasted an opportunity with Crysis 2.

I liked Crysis 2, it was a fun game that only faulted when you got quick Energy Regeneration and Extended Stealth. The combat was exciting and can swing in either way, though I do admit it was quite fun sneaking around everyone and occasionally dropping mines onto the backs of Ceph Devastators.

Aside from the single player, there is the Multiplayer which offers a good set of features for someone who is into that sort of thing, along with DLC's to support it, providing extra features and new maps.

Sadly, there aren't any DLC's for the Single Player, and I find that to be a waste.

Crysis 2 has a lot going for it. It has a good story, it's graphically wonderful (Even on the PS3 version, plug that sucker into 3D Telly and it gets pretty fkn awesome), and it plays really well. But there isn't just one story to follow. Even in Crysis 1 there were two stories, following Nomad and everyones favourite englishman, Psycho.

The story of Crysis 2 follows Alcatraz who takes over Prophet's mission, to a successful point too. Now while that story may be wrapped up rather well, surely there is more to the entire thing? Who is left of the Squad? What of Nomad and Psycho? Had they fought similar battles in different places? What about the lead up to Prophet today? What was he doing and how did he get a Nanosuit 2?

Now as someone who isn't a developer I can only imagine how much it would be worth putting in effort into making and providing expansions, but shouldn't it be one of those things thought of in advance? I hope they have with Crysis 3.

That and 4 Player Cooperative. That'd make it an Xbox sale for me.

Choosing your own Adventure

I had a large collection of Choose your own Adventure books as a kid, shoved under my bed in a box and told that I should read them. I was told that they were my brothers favourite books, so I should read them. I gave a handful a go and just got frustrated and said "nuh, I dun like em". Though there was a book that I did like, the SORCERY! books, where it was a RPG book where you made your own Character Sheet and rolled dice to get different results, and/or chose what you wanted to happen. I always seemed to get stuck in the sewers with the monster though. (See Picture)

Now I play a game called Tactics Ogre: Let Us Cling Together. It's a Turn Based Strategy Role Play Game. (Say that five times fast) It has one of the best Video Game stories I've come across, particularly the areas that the story branches out. The story starts off fairly straight forward, you rise to power under the wing of a lord and are sent off to do a mission which twists at the end of the chapter, allowing the player to choose what future they want. One leads to staying loyal to your lord, the other marking you a criminal. Then the story branches out again before moving towards a similar, yet still very different, final chapter.

Recently I finished "Deus Ex: Human Revolution" again. Now I like the game, it literally turned up right when I had the mood for the same style of game, a game that has multiple methods of completion from mission to mission. The problem therein is that from Mission to mission is how the games story plays out. Yes it has small variances, such as "If you don't kill X, you will have this happen to you" which is cool.

However, there are a few areas that the game falls a bit flat in and have been covered by a lot of people, but I'm going to point out the gripe that I'm leading up to and that's The Very Ending.

You can get four results for the end of the game, each showing different things happening. But to get to those points you have to fulfill a few things. First of which is Reach the Last Level. Second of which is speak with the three Leaders: Hugh Darrow, David Sarik and Bill Taggart. Third is to defeat the boss. Then you get led into a back room and given four options to summarise the game, or less depending on who you haven't talked to.

...

Actually, I'm probably lying there. I think you have to generate a good standing with the afforementioned characters. But as you play the game, you have various mini-missions which are like tests. You can fail them, or you can pass them and something will happen later on in the game with regards to them. I know I failed a conversation with a one character while he was at work and while I got what I wanted, he got fired and he attacked me as I left my apartment much later in the game.

Mass Effect is another game with a "choose your own adventure" aspect to it, but recently caused a Nerdrage over it's third, and last, iteration of the franchise. The premise of the game is that you're leading a defensive force against a terrible threat to the galaxy, and you spend the game building up reputation as a Good Guy or as a Badarse, and depending on how well you go, you get an ending based on your career. So you can get a few different endings from each game. On top of that, your character can roll over into each successive game, so any effects you had in the previous game rolls over into the second, and same with the second to third.

The Nerdrage for Mass Effect 3 is apparently a little more than what I thought. From what I know, the problem was in the very ending of the game, where rather than follow the signature pattern of multiple epilogues, they gave one set epilogue and that was it. There were no changes based on your career, it converged into one static event, and that was it.

Personally, I was disappointed to hear that as I consider the multiple endings a Signature Feature. And many others obviously agree with that, some to the point of suing the developers for False Advertising. While true, as their major advertising campaign was "Make your Ending" or something like that, I would consider that extreme. There was also a petition which requested the developers change the entire last chapter, which I consider just as extreme. Sure, amend the ending to show the consequences of the players actions, but you don't have to change an entire chapter for that.


So what are the chances of a game taking on some, if not all, of these features? Creating not only different endings, but completely different middles as well? As a developer, making a console game of this size would take an immense amount of time and effort. But you know what? It's a nice thought.

Speed Gamer

When someone plays a game from scratch, they run through the game rather comfortably. You trundle about firing off your gun at the various enemies that come into your view, and mow through quirky bosses who have this idea that you'll never figure out how to pump enough bullets into them while they do their darndest to shoot you down with nearly no effect in the end.

The other day I read an article about John Romero's upcoming MMO Shooter, where he was getting a bit tired of the Bullet Sponge games. When he mentioned that, the first thing that came to mind was Marcus Fenix actually expanding and then sweating bullets. And it's rather spot on. Halo, Gears of War, Borderlands. All of them are what you would call Bullet Sponge games because you just get hit over and over and over then walk it all off.

I'd been getting bored with my Xbox lately. I had finished Deus Ex Human Revolution again, and while I had fun being stealthy and sneaky, and I really enjoyed that final boss (even though I had powered through it because I was so well upgraded), I didn't have much more to do after that. I tried to play Borderlands for a bit, but lost interest in that again rather quickly. And scanning through my other games, I had nothing else I really wanted to play. Halo, Gears of War, Rainbow Six... I just didn't have any interest in playing them. I had Kingdom for Kieflings and ran through that in about 7 hours gameplay... and that was it. Was rather disappointed that there wasn't anything more to the game than "Build yourself a Town", but I knew that was all it was going to be.

But after loading up my computer, the first in a LONG time, I checked out the games on there. I had quite a few games, most of which came from a pair of game packs that were on discount at the time, namely the ID SUPER PACK, and a special edition Portal 2 pack, which was a number of Indy games that had DLC features based on Portal 2. Because I like both Portal 2 and most ID Software games, I picked them up.

So this left me with a few games that I didn't have before, but also a few games that I DID have before, but had never finished. So I downloaded and installed Quake, from the 1996 era. Now that's an old game, almost 16 years old as I discovered (22 June) and while I have played it several times over, I have never actually sat down and played the full game. So that's what I decided to do.

It was like riding a Fiend again. Though you don't really ride fiends, you just dodge them as best as you can while they jump about like madmen, and if you're lucky and there's two or three of them, they'll start attacking each other. And it wasn't quite the same as riding fiends, because I found out how to turn on the Mouselook, which changed the game significantly for me.

But the overall experience, was running around like crazy trying not to get cut in twain by Death Knights, blown up by Ogres, and electrified by Shamblers. That last one is hard to fucking prevent, too. Bastard usually pops up right behind you while you're on low health, goes "ZAP" and you're done.

But running around and trying NOT to get hit by bullets in a fast paced game really made my head spin when I put Quake down for a bit so I didn't get sick of it (and didn't have fucking nightmares that afternoon) and loaded up Borderlands. And the only thing I realised is that this game, which I had thought was a fast paced game of it's time, heck it even compared the experience to the offspring of Quake and Diablo, felt extremely sluggish. Sure, the guns fired off like mad, the effects were much prettier, but Jesus christ did it take forever to circle-strafe someone. It was a strange experience and I quickly turned back over to the 1996 shooter so I could continue to dodge Shamblers chasing after me, and escape the Vores Fire Pod attacks. (Fucking homing bastards they are)

This hasn't turned me off Borderlands 2, though. I won't be playing Quake forever, I'll be happy just to finish the games two mission packs, and there's no motivation to be perfect or anything. (No Achievements, y'see) Borderlands 2 is also making itself very appealing, aside from the obviously awesome Teaser Trailer.

The developers at various interviews and panels have said various improvements will be in Borderlands 2, such as a greater narrative, more customizable characters and vehicles, more varied weapons, and improved AI and NPC's. On top of that, there's a fifth character Class coming which is particularly exciting, and then there's the prospect of their DLC's, of which will be expansion packs rather than some piss poor overpriced game feature.

But the question still comes up though: What if the game were more like Quake?