Can’t Quit You

Dear Blog,

I miss you.  Do you miss me?

Call me…we’ll talk…patch things up.

We’ll see more of eachother.  Return to what we used to have

Luv,

H00LiGAN

 

I’m in yer Blogz, commenting

Not much time to post lately.  Work keeps me busy during the day, and toddler/wife/up-coming baby keep me busy at night.

So all I can really manage at this point is the occasional comment on other people’s blogs.

 

Back to My Roots

Hello again, everyone!  Thanks to my forced Twitter hiatus (grrr), I will once again have to rely upon the good ole blog in order to communicate my meager brain ramblings.

So here’s my plan: most likely I will stick to weekly updates, recapping my week in gaming and random mish-mash thoughts.  If something interesting comes up, I will blog about it.  Sound simple?  You betcha!

Coming up this week, Lord of the Rings Online: still truckin’, FreeRealms: launched and loaded, Fable 2: finally got it and The-Beta-Based-on-My-Favorite-Board-Game: TBA.

 

Twitter No More

Curse you, Corporate Fun Police (aka work d-bags whose sole purpose is to block all remotely interesting internet content).

I am now blocked from Twitter at work and will no longer be able to interact with my fellow gamers on a daily basis.

Back to blogging I guess…

 

Obviously

Defender of Truth, Justice, and Pie!

Noble and true, you are the hero other heroes aspire to be. You are a natural leader, selfless and kind, who will put the lives of others above your own, and are steadfast in your pursuit of justice.

Take the quiz!

 

Curmudeoning: Disposable Graphics Cards?

Lately it seems like a lot of the blogs that I visit on a regular basis are having trouble with their graphics card failing.  And it looks like I’m close to joining them.  What I can’t put my finger on is why so many and all at the same time?

It could be that today’s games are pushing the latest wave of video cards to the limit and causing them to burnout faster.  Faster/more processing, more heat (from all parts), more electricity; you name it.

But it can’t solely be the games.  Some bloggers rarely touch a game with heavy graphical loads, and their card is still failing.  Could it be the complexity of today’s video cards?  Some of these puppies are huge with loads of memory, giant fans, and their own venting.  As with anything, the more complex they are, the more there is to go wrong.

A decent graphics card is not cheap.  At $200 a pop, your average gamer is not looking to replace their card every year, but at the rate they’re failing, it’s beginning to become more common.  My current card, a GeForce 8600GT, is less than a year old.  I do NOT want to replace it already, but if I want to play my MMO’s I have no choice.

So what is the real issue?  Is anyone else noticing this trend?

 

Spellborn, Meet Fork (You are Done)

So that’s it for me and The Chronicles of Spellborn.  I gave the game as much time as I could and it didn’t even come close to hooking me.  There are several little things that I like about the game (art style world/lore), but it’s missing that one big thing to separate it from the rest of the pack.  Combined with what I see as two big negatives, Spellborn doesn’t have what it needs to pull me away from other well established MMO’s.

The first thing that really bites me the wrong way is the combat.  Apparently Frogster decided that they needed to do something different with combat.  And so the “combat reticule” and “skill deck” were born.  Unfortunately, this just makes the combat feel unnecessarily twitchy with cool downs thrown in on the side.  It just doesn’t mesh well for me and I don’t see the point when a boar can hit me with its snout from 10 feet away.  If the combat doesn’t work and the combat is 80% of the game, then the game is not for me.

Last night really showcased my second big issue with the game: the turdling population.  Every MMO’s has them and World of Warcraft has the cream of the crop…until I found Spellborn.  Four times…four times in 3 minutes I had the same person call me a noob.  First of all, Duh!  I’m level 4 in the starting area of an open beta!  What did he expect?  Then he proceeds to kill the mob that I had already tapped.  Good thing that I’M the noob.  Congratulations to me, quest complete!  Following some more noob calling and swearing, he ran off, wishing he could PK me.  I thanked him for being a donkey and put him on ignore.

Not wanting this moron to be the final example of Spellborn’s population, I checked the zone chat.  Oh my…I’m out of here.  So I think that Acclaim should thank one Mr. Omoru for personally helping me to decide not to play Spellborn and not give them any of my money.

I will now be moving on to Runes of Magic for my part time play.  For a similar experience, RoM will not cost me any money; unlike like Spellborn which will cost me a still fluctuating amount of money.

 

Limited First Impressions: The Chronicles of Spellborn

This past weekend saw the beginning of the Open Beta for The Chronicles of Spellborn^TM North American release.  Being at work when the news went live, I rushed home in order to download the client and try out the game.  Unfortunately, there was a huge rush on the beta and Acclaim had closed the registration by the time I got home.  Needless to say, I was not a happy camper, and this cut down on my play time for the weekend.  The next road block in my play experience was the over camped starter area.  This limited the progress that I made (a whopping level 4), because I just couldn’t find anything to kill and nothing to kill meant zero quest progress.

Seeing as I couldn’t get too deep into the game, I will just offer up some quick hit thoughts on what I DID see.

Pros:

• Character creation: I like being able to make my character look like I want even down to equipment.  Facial/hair options seem fairly limited, but there are a nice variety of starter clothes/gear/colors to begin with.  I image there are ways to change your look inside the game also.
• Graphics/Style: I really like the graphics; they look sharp on my PC without taking much of a performance hit.  I also really like the art style, but I can see it not working for everyone.  They come across somewhere in between the cartoony World of Warcraft style and the semi-realistic Lord of the Rings style.  To sum it up, they’re different, and in this glut of MMO’s, different can be a very good thing.
• Climbing Ladders: Yes, you can climb ladders like a real human being!  Okay, it’s not much, but it adds a little something to the game for me.
• World/Lore: It’s still fantasy, but it’s a different sort of fantasy.  It is obvious to me that the developers went through a lot of trouble to come up with an original world and lore base.  I am actually interested in exploring the faction relationships within the game.

Cons:

• Subscription Options:  Huh, wha?  It’s nice that they have a lot of options, but everything is in Free-to-play-speak.  Ten dollars will buy you 1800 Acclaim coins which will buy you how much game time?  I think that I’ve to the conclusion that the Silver Membership is the best value/wisest choice, but the whole thing smacks of Microsoft Points.
• Free-to-play-Kiddies: All MMO’s have their share of immature turdlings, but F2P MMO’s seem to have more than their share.  As soon as I figure out how to get out of zone chat (Pete @ Dragonchasers figured it out, just need to find that thread), I’m gone.  Hopefully, post-level 7 will weed out the tourists and kiddies once the pay model kicks in.
• Tutorial: Meh.  If I had never played an MMO in my life, the tutorial would be fine.  Otherwise, I did not learn a thing in the tutorial that I did not already know or wouldn’t have figured out.  It just seemed like a waste of time.

Jury is Still Out:

• Combat: At first, I hated it. Combat seemed like it had way too much needless movement. Now, I think it has way to much needless movement, but I’ve figured out the best way to do it. Hello Mouse Look! I now spend almost all of my time with mouse look toggled on and targeting has been so much easier. I also sped up the mouse turn speed and now combat no longer sucks. The question is whether it will stay in my good graces or fall into the Age of Conan category.
• Classes: Since I haven’t gotten past level 4 with my warrior, I have no idea if the classes are any good. They sound good in theory, but until I can get more time in with each class and actually advance out of the starter area, I have no idea how well they play.

So that’s all I’ve got so far.  I am hoping that with my day off tomorrow, I can get some time in Spellborn while no one else is playing.

 

A Tale of Two MMO’s

It’s been a while since my last post, but to be honest, I just wasn’t motivated to write anything.  But I’m back now and thought that I should update everyone (aka no one) on my gaming.

Still Shamanizing in Warcraft

First of all, I definitely feel as though I’ve found my one true WoW class. The shaman can really do everything that I like to do.  I can melee, wear decent armor, heal a bit, and most importantly, throw lightning bolts!

I also feel as though I’ve found my favorite zone: Howling Fjord (replacing Darkshire).  I love the theme and music of the Fjord.  Let’s go through my Awesome Checklist: Vikings: check, Pirates: check, Undead: check, Story: check, Mating: check, Highlands: check, Bagpipes: check, Ninja: awww, so close.

Muadeng the “Snap, Crackle, Pop” Shaman is now level 72.  It’s a real shock to the system when you hit the non-enhanced leveling curve of the 70’s, but fortunately Northrend makes the experience enjoyable.  Last week I was able to run Utgarde Keep with the help of my <Aftermath> guildies: Scarybooster, Silo, Neferati, and Elessar.  This was my first trip into UK and my first instance run in literally years.  So I was a little flustered at first and just kept hoping that I didn’t mess anything up.  By the end of the instance I feel as though I had my spell rotation and totem drops down correctly.  The Ingvar the Plunderer fight did confuse me a bit though.  I did up with a nice Hand upgrade and quest rewards, so I was very pleased with the end result.  Now if I can figure out what Stone Keeper Shards are for.

CoW Fellowship

This week was disappointing as we were not able to get enough bodies together for our weekly group and a run at the Great Barrows.  But it was better to not get ahead of everyone as the game is so much more enjoyable with a regular group.

Yesterday was also patch day for the big Book 7 Update.  I didn’t get to dive in all that much, but I did gain almost 3 levels thanks to the new experience tweaks.  I am also interested in taking my Rune Keeper out in order to see what the new Elf/Dwarf starting experience is like.  I’ve always disliked that particular starting area so I am glad to see it get an overhaul.

Part of me feels badly that I am not devoting more time to LotRO right now.  It’s a game that I enjoy very much and has a lot of content in it.  But WoW still has its hooks into me and a guild that I quite enjoy being a part of.  Sure there is that part of me that wonders where I will fit into the guild at end game, but the journey there has been very enjoyable.  Also, from day 1 of LotRO, I’ve had an issue finding a good kinship.  The Casualties of War Kinship is great, but it is empty most of the time.  I think that whenever I make it back to LotRO full time, I will have to make it a priority to find a solid kin for my main.

Stop Talking

So that’s it for now.  Lots of MMO-ness going on and not enough time for all of it.

 

Night of CoW Fellowship: Weathertop

We did it.  Weathertop has been re-taken from the hands of the orcs and goblins.  And to be quite honest, they didn’t put up much of a fight.

A full fellowship of CoW’s was present last night: Eostemir, Syrna, Fairley, Joli, Naaja, and Cirwyn.  Naaja and Cirwyn, our two Loremasters, made it so that we hardly ever had more than one enemy in our faces at a time.  If we did Syrna, our steadfast Guardian, was there to pick them up.  Fairley and I (Eostemir) were then free to pick off any stragglers, and Joli the Minstrel kept everyone in the fight.  No one fell the entire night.

Honestly, I am not sure whether the instance was just very easy or we were on top of our game.  It seemed like we were well coordinated even though we were not speaking all that much.  I was also expecting more elite mobs, but instead we were just attacked by several mobs at once, leaving the elites as the occasional boss/sub-boss.  The most exciting part of Retaking Weathertop was the troll boss at the end.  The massive amount of “moral” it had made my Champion smile.  I was finally able to flex my muscle a bit before the troll fell in battle.

Next week, the fellowship will take on the Great Barrows.  This will be another big moment for me as I have wanted to tackle the Great Barrow since the game launched.  And with this group, I’m sure that we will succeed.