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By heide, June 12, 2010 11:56 am

I played a handful of more races in Forza 3, and wound up spending most of the money I’d accumulated in order to get that achievement for owning at least one car of every manufacturer (unfortunately the expensive DLC ones count), so I won’t be getting that Shelby Daytona Coupe anytime soon. Ah well.

I also went back and started playing Project Gotham Racing 4 again. I got frustrated with it a long time ago when I couldn’t beat the invitational event for the Impreza 22B, but I put some more time into the career mode and enjoyed it a lot. I eventually got back around to that same invitational, and after what felt like 20+ tries, finally won that damn Subaru. It was well worth it though, as it’s probably one of the best cars in its class for the game.

The drifting-related events were still frustrating me a lot though, especially the Time-Vs-Kudos ones, so I wound up dropping the difficulty down to easy soon after. That made a lot of the more straightforward races a bit *too* easy, but I just wanted to have some fun, and as I made my way up the rankings some of the Master-level events were still a bit close. Those A-class cars are a handful to control. I eventually hit rank 1, and although there are still a bunch of other ‘arcade’ events to do, I think that’s all I’ll do in PGR4 for now.

I’m kind of a bit tired of racing games now, so I think it’s time to get back to other genres for a bit. Next up, finishing Bioshock 2…

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By heide, June 5, 2010 9:04 am

But that’s not all that’s new…

There’s a flood of new racing games, and I also picked up ModNation Racers for the PS3. It’s much more Mario Kart-like with the arcadey handling, twisty tracks, shortcuts, random powerups, etc. The big hook for it is that you can customize things though, and there are already plenty of them (mostly well-known characters of course) being shared online. For your racer and vehicle, it’s purely cosmetic, but you can create tracks as well and I’ll have to check a bunch of them out.

Single-player also seems to suffer from the unfairness of becoming a target for attacks 10 feet from the finish line, dropping you back three places. Fortunately you can spend boost power on shielding yourself, but the timing is tricky. The AI is tough, and the passing requirements for unlocking items for modding are even tougher, so completing the single-player campaign isn’t going to be easy. Unfortunately, online has its problems too. Lobbies have to fill up from scratch with every new race, meaning you often only get half the full complement of 12 racers. And you have to go through annoyingly-long loading screens as you toggle back and forth between the online race, the ModSpot, the race, the ModSpot…

I also picked up 3D Dot Game Heroes out of curiosity, and it’s pretty much a clone of Zelda: Link To The Past, except in a 3D voxel-like presentation. There’s kind of a cheeky self-awareness to it all, but otherwise it hasn’t really had much of an effect so far, so it pretty much remains a Zelda-alike. I’ve only done the first temple (of six) so far, which is pretty much just part of the tutorial.

And as if I didn’t have enough racing games already, I wound up picking up Gran Turismo for the PSP when it was set at a new ‘classic’ pricing on PSN. It definitely feels like Gran Turismo, but I’m still struggling with the controls a bit. Using the dpad leads to fishtailing like crazy (though it’s better for minor adjustments to straighten yourself out), and with the analog nub I find myself lurching around corners trying to find the right amount of steering. Maybe it’ll just take time to adjust after playing Forza 3 so much lately.

The challenges are pretty much like the license tests of previous games, but the passing requirements are pretty fair and I’ve managed to get at least silver on all of them so far, and a few golds. No reward cars though, just cash. Other than that, you just pick a car and track and race a random selection of AI cars. (There’s a ‘drift mode’ too but I haven’t tried it yet.)

It’s not entirely what I’d hoped for, but it might be fun in small bursts, and it’ll get me a head start in GT5.

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By heide, June 5, 2010 8:52 am

Wow, there’s a whole bunch of new stuff to catch up on.

I picked up Blur for the 360, since it looked interesting and I’m winding down on Forza 3. It’s basically like a Mario Kart-style racer, with powerups you pick up and fire at other racers, but on realistic cars and tracks. You can also use powerups to block incoming attacks instead. So far I’ve found the single-player game a bit frustrating since it seems like so much depends on random luck; I can come in second place one race, and then 18th the next, and I can imagine it getting frustrating trying to hit the specific advancement requirements.

In online multiplayer though, Blur is a blast. It doesn’t even really matter where you eventually wind up placing, with 20 players in total there’s plenty of action going on no matter where you are. There’s a level-based progression system that unlocks new cars and ‘mods’ that affect the rules slightly, and I’m up to level 13 (of 50) so far.

While picking up Blur, I noticed that Picross 3D was out. I played the hell out of the original DS Picross, so I had to pick this one up. It’s the same basic idea, expose the image within a grid by carving out unwanted blocks, but this time it’s a sculpture in a 3D block. The information you use is fairly different though, as you’re only told the total number of blocks to keep in a given row, how many groups the blocks are broken into, and not all rows are numbered. There’s a fairly lengthy tutorial that explains it all though, and I’ve perfected the Easy puzzles and just started in on the Normal difficulty.

And it’s not so new, but a fair bit of stuff has happened in EQ2 as well. I played my illusionist around the Everfrost area for a while last weekend, getting him 5 levels and burning up all the saved-up vitality xp. My mystic cleared out a bunch of the monster-farming quests in his log and then in the weekly group we went and finished off the Golden Efreeti Boots quest. Or the rest of the group did, anyway — I screwed up and missed a turn-in when we were in the Temple of Sol Ro, and then got wiped out by a level 70 dragon while trying to get back to it. I didn’t want to waste their time, so I told them to forget it and I’ll finish it myself at some later point, when everything’s lower-level.

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By heide, May 28, 2010 7:06 am

I just got around to changing my Xbox Live gamertag and shall now be known as HalibutBarn instead. MS has been rather oversensitive lately about ‘inappropriate’ names, so I figured I’d better change it before I suddenly wind up suspended for being a drug reference or something.

I finally started Bioshock 2 a little while ago, and this time I’m playing on Hard and going for the achievement for not using any Vita-chambers. So far the main struggle has just been to avoid running out of ammo and money, which are in scarce supply. Otherwise, it’s still a pretty familiar-feeling game and that’s perfectly fine considering how good the first one was. I’ve only made it to Pauper’s Drop so far, but I’ve fought one each of a Big Daddy and Big Sister, and the fights were fairly tense. The Big Sisters in particular are going to be tough, being as quick as they are.

In EQ2, we’ve mainly just romped around Everfrost some more for the last couple weeks, finally reaching the NE and NW corners and finishing a handful of quests, including the HQ for Tobrin’s Mystical Eyepatch. I also did a bit of soloing on my own to clean out some of the simpler quests and pick up collection items.

The city of New Halas was also finally released, and I immediately moved my shaman there to be with his barbarian brethren. It’s a really nice city too, with almost everything within fairly easy reach (the dock is a bit farther away though) and the tradeskills all clustered near the bank. The housing is really nice, and I finally upgraded from the starting apartment to a five-room house, which feels a bit sparse even with 160+ items in it now. I also started up a new dwarven warlock character, but haven’t gotten very far into the Halas newbie zone with him yet.

And I’ve played a bit more of Forza 3, but I’m not as enthusiastic about it as I was before, as now I’m pretty much just trying to grind credits and fill out the event chart. Maybe I’ll look at something like Blur next…

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By heide, May 10, 2010 12:23 pm

On Friday we had an impromptu last-minute gathering to do the Amphitheatre of Pain ring event in Zul’Drak, and that got me the last few quests I needed for the Zul’Drak quest achievement. That just leaves Icecrown to go now, though it’s going to be the hardest since it’s mainly group quests left, and as the highest-level outdoor zone in the game, they won’t be duoable like all the other zones.

I also played my mage a fair bit and got him up to level 39. I’m currently doing quests in Dustwallow Marsh, but it’s an annoying place for a mage since you get attacked by roaming crocs and spiders constantly, when as a mage I prefer to launch fights from afar.

I finally got FUEL installed and working now that they’ve added more serial keys on Steam, and spent a little while doing a few races, roaming around the open world, and playing online a bit with a friend. It was fun for a little while, but I can see how it could get a bit boring and repetitive. Fortunately it was only $4.

And speaking of racing games, I completed a handful of series in Forza 3 as well, putting me partway into the R2 championship and at driver level 40. I’ve also rediscovered the Impreza WRX STi as one of my favourite class C cars, as it made the Fujumi Kaido point-to-point races much easier.

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By heide, May 2, 2010 10:58 pm

Children’s Week started in WoW today, so I went and did the quests for it on my primary characters. It’s too bad that it takes three years to get all of the rewards for it — it’s the first time for my current main character and the warrior still only has two of the pet rewards now.

Back in Forza 3, I finished off the R3 championship series. After a bit more experimenting, I discovered that I can leave the difficulty on medium and just turn traction control on for the higher-end cars. And, as usual, I did a handful of other miscellaneous series, mostly in the R3 and S classes. The Lambo Miura Concept ’06 is possibly my favourite S-class car now, as it launches easily and is crazy fast. It’s a bit sluggish in turns, but it doesn’t go out of control, at least.

And I finally put some more time into the current major RPG on my back — Dragon Age. I’ve done the initial swamp area and the battle at Ostagar, and am now wandering around trying to raise support for the fight against the darkspawn after being betrayed. I’ve already picked up a bunch of companions, including Morrigan, Alistair, the dog, Sten, and Leliana. So far I’m sticking with Alistair as my ‘tank’, and Morrigan and the dog as damage-dealers, as I don’t have a decent healer yet.

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By heide, April 30, 2010 11:10 pm

Not much has been happening in WoW lately, just the usual dailies, though tomorrow I’ll be guaranteed to be able to purchase the Chef’s Hat, at least.

In EQ2, our weekly group was postponed until tomorrow due to one member being sick. I worked on tradeskills a bit more, provisioning and woodworking in particular. They’re about the only useful ones since it’s hard to keep up with our class levels now so equipment and spells aren’t much use, but any food or water is better than none, and the woodworking stuff is all unique. I also used my ebon cluster to resume the Bone Bladed Claymore quest and now I have to kill 1000 sentient monsters. That’ll probably take a while…

I got back to Forza 3 for a bit, starting the R3 championship and doing a few other series in the meantime. I find I have to turn on traction control and bump the AI down to easy for the R3 races though, as they’re hard to control otherwise. I’m kind of unenthusiastic about it at the moment though.

Our EQ1 group on Tuesday went and visited the Lake of Ill Omen for a daily quest and then popped into Mistmoore, where we got mobbed and wiped. We haven’t really been following ‘proper’ pulling and crowd control techniques, but they’re less important now and we’re just out to have fun anyway.

And finally, I messed around with Hearts of Iron 3 a bit. I played as Panama and turned off fog of war and just sat back to see how the rest of the war would unfold, and it didn’t quite go as expected. The USSR attacked Germany but got stomped, losing everything even way past Moscow; the US tried landing on the NW tip of France but failed to break through after years of fighting; Britain was barely involved in the European war and went around conquering Africa and South America instead; and Japan was stopped short by Nationalist China, so they never got around to taking over the rest of the Pacific.

HoI3 has a bit of a bad reputation among the strategy game purists, and I haven’t even delved into the mechanics properly yet, but it’s fun to goof around in it so far. I’m tempted to start a game where I try to turn Canada into a nuclear power before anyone else…

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By heide, March 10, 2010 11:29 pm

Yes, it’s yet more catching up…

EQ2: I missed a week due to being out of town, but last week we managed to finish off Deathfist Citadel, getting me a few nice chain upgrades and level 45 along the way. We’ll probably be off to either Everfrost or Feerrott next. Not much else to report since I haven’t been spending any spare time in it like I used to.

WoW: As usual, most of my time was in WoW and I’ve done zone quests up through most of Icecrown now, with a lot of the remaining ones being group quests that I’ll need help on. Faction-wise, I’ve gotten to exalted with the Argent Crusade, Sons of Hodir, and the Horde Expedition, with some nice upgrades from them. I’m still working on the Oracles and Wyrmrest Accord, and just started working my way through the Argent Tournament as well. I don’t really like the jousting, but the rewards are nice and I’ve got a tedious-but-reliable method for beating it.

I finally hit 450 alchemy and picked up the rest of the trainable transmutations, though I still have a bunch of other recipes to learn via discoveries. I also hit 450 in cooking and fishing, and picked up a bunch more fishing achievements. I managed to get the giant sewer rat from Dalaran, but that turtle still eludes me, though…

And I’ve also started working on the Loremaster achievements again. I still have a ton of quests to do in Outland, but I’m starting with Azeroth since everything there might change with Cataclysm. I’m working on the Eastern Kingdoms right now, and after going through Silverpine Forest, Hillsbrad, and Arathi Highlands, I only have 43 more quests to go in EK.

Forza 3: I caught up on the DLC packs and fired it up for a bit, completing a few more series, but I’ve still barely made a dent in the total list of events. I also discovered that I have to bump the difficulty down to ‘easy’ for the R2 events right now; they’re just too fast to keep control and fight the AI.

Dragon Age: I finally gave Dragon Age a proper start, picking a dwarven rogue and going through the dwarven noble origin, with a bunch of politicking and backstabbing that the dwarves are apparently infamous for. I’ve now just arrived at the Grey Wardens camp at Ostragar, where the main story will presumably start.

Borderlands: And we managed to squeeze in some time in Borderlands, getting to New Haven and doing the quests there and a bit past it. I’ve picked up the Secret Armory of General Knoxx DLC, but that won’t really be usable until we hit the end of the main plot.

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By heide, December 28, 2009 1:15 pm

Yeek, I’ve been falling way behind with the updates…

Not much has happened in EQ2 since the holidays have interfered with most everyone’s plans. We finished up some Butcherblock quests and picked up the starter quests in Zek, and then worked on the first stages of the Glowing Black Stone quest. My illusionist alt is currently level 30 and working through the BB quests as well.

I played through Pixeljunk Shooter over a couple of days. It’s short, but pretty good, reminiscent of the old scrolling shooters like Zeppelin and Fort Apocalypse. Your main goal is to rescue scientists and collect diamonds, but to get to them you have to manipulate various fluids and gasses by shooting passages that let them flow around, interact with each other, and so on. I’ll be looking forward to a sequel.

I played a bit of Europa Universalis Rome: Vae Victus. Since I’m still new to the EU series I started out with the Pictii, a minor province in the Scotland area. Unfortunately it’s a rather slow way to learn, as it takes quite a while to get the funds, population, and civilization rating to actually start expanding, and I kept getting overrun by barbarians. I started another game as Carthage, which is much more advanced, but haven’t done much with it yet.

I picked up DiRT 2 for myself over the holidays, and played through all of the rookie-level events. It is, of course, much like the original DiRT, except that the rally raid mode seems different (point-to-point, whereas wasn’t the original’s on circuits?), and there are no hill climb events. The difficulty seems inconsistent, too — I can do certain events like rallies on casual and beat the pants off the AI, but raids and rallycross on casual are only just barely beatable.

And last but not least, a friend got me Borderlands for xmas and that’s what I’ve primarily been playing the last few days. It’s basically Diablo crossed with an FPS, and the variety of weaponry you can find is tickling the loot whore in me. So far we’re level 16 and have done most of the first couple starting areas.

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By heide, December 13, 2009 10:45 pm

Falling behind on these updates has become a bit of a habit…

EQ2: On Thursday we had our regular weekly meeting and finished off a lot of the quests in Butcherblock, hitting level 29 in the process. I also worked on the Frostfell event quests, getting a bunch of crafting recipes, stuff for the house, and holiday wear, and also hitting level 30. It’s back to AAs for now though, as I’ve still got a lot of sub-30 quests to finish. A smaller group of us also went and finished off the Dwaven Work Boot and Greater Lightstone quests over the weekend.

Forza 3: I finally resumed playing this, hitting driver level 21 today and finishing a bunch of other events. All but two of the event series are unlocked now, but I’m still playing along in season mode and still have two more races to go in the A-level championship series. I’ve got a pretty good stable of cars now, including a few gifted ones from Turn 10, a few I bought myself (including a WRX and an NSX), and a few from driver level awards. I still need an S-class one, though.

Diablo 2: Yes, the old favourite is back again. A 1.13 patch is in testing, which means a new ladder season is probably coming as well, so I spent a bit of time in it tonight to see if I could complete the Insight runeword before the ladder season ends. It’s a ladder-only runeword, so it would be nice to have at least one of them made before it ends and then I can use it on my non-ladder characters. No such luck tonight, though — I’m still missing the Sol rune and a good weapon to put it in.