Monthly Update - Winnie June 2015

Monthly Update

Hoo boy, I am slacking in the blogging department.  In my defense, things really have been busy lately.  I’ve got plans every weekend in June, through the first weekend of July.  This last weekend, I was busy all day Friday, Saturday and most of Sunday.  My time management just hasn’t caught up to my newfound busy status.  

The most important thing to happen in my life was that I became an Uncle!  My older sister Emz had a baby, a tiny and beautiful girl named Winnie June.  Unfortunately, she lives thousands of miles away, so I am unable to visit her at this time, but it's the thing I want to do most.  It will happen eventually.  For now, I’m just glad my niece is here, and I am happy to let the new parents have some time with her on their own.

On the gaming front, Jane and I have continued to progress through the Blackwell series.  So far, we both really like it.  We’re about halfway through the third game in the series, Blackwell Convergence.  With every episode, the production value improves, and by now we’ve got better acting, writing and graphics.  Not to mention that the plot is contiguous and it is growing more intriguing with every release.  So far this one is the best yet, and I hear really good things about the next game in the series.

On the Television front, I started watching Farscape.  Only fifteen years late.  The show was put on by Jim Henson productions and it shows in the many imaginative alien designs and puppetry.  So far I'm enjoying the show, and I hear it gets better as it goes on.  

I think I’m going to keep this one short, but I’ll have more in the near future.

-D

Monthly Update: June, 2015

Happy June everyone!  Unless June is an unhappy month for you, so in that case, "HAPPY JUNE EVERYONE ELSE!  And you too."

So updates from our gaming worlds it is now that we're on to talking about.

Within the realm of Dungeons & Dragons, I've come to the realization that I need to work on describing environments that the PCs are in when there are no descriptions prewritten from the module.  Sure I've got maps and whatnot, but for when the PCs are traversing along a well traveled road from morning to night through the grasslands of Faerûn, I need to do more than say "After you wake up, you continue traveling south along the road.  (Sound of a die rolling). . .The weather throughout the day is fairly windy and (die rolling). . . is uneventful.  You make it to about. . .here on the map by nightfall."  I also need to do a better job at describing enemies rather than by their name.  "A twig blight scuttles out of the bushes and goes after Dagnar."  I also feel that I should have a random name generator up because the few people that I've given names too have been "Joe" and "Bobby."

But Conklederp reminds me that people keep coming back so I must not be doing that bad of a job DMing descriptions.

I managed to finish Silent Hill on the PSP late last month.  It was about as stressful as I was expecting and after just over nine hours, I was able to see the fruits of my fingering labors.  There will be an article later in the week or the beginning of next week, somewhat akin to the Dead Space articles about my experience with the game rather than directly about the game.  It did come out 16 years ago after all.

I've also managed to progress a bit in Radiant Historia on the 3DS although I still find that I'm overthinking things as far as time travel and parallel universes.

In the PC gaming arena, Conklederp and I have been playing the proverbial fecal matter out of The Elder Scrolls Online: Tamriel Unlimited.  Last week alone we clocked in around 17+ hours traversing the vast swaths of High Rock and portions of Hammerfell.  I don't know if we will keep pace this week as I have a lot of real world work I have to finish.

Lastly, there are going to be some changes coming up this month that DRoBOTTS and I have been working on for just about the last month.  We're both happy to see this happen (no we're not monetizing and no we were not bought out for 4.7 million after a tense bidding war between PC Gamer and Gamespot), so stay tuned for more vague updates.  I'm sure you'll enjoy our cryptic ramblings as much as we've had creating them.



~JWfW/JDub/Jaconian
I Oughta Get Going

Monthly Update: May 2015

Happy May, or I guess "May the 4th be with you."  I'm sure y'all've already checked out the Star Wars: The Force Awakens trailer #2 by now and even if you have, it wouldn't hurt to watch it again. . .for the 47th time. . .this week.  There're also apparently some new pictures up from the movie which may or may not contain spoilers.  Ye've been warned. . .arrrr. 

Reaction to Konami cancelling
Silent Hills.  Decency people!
(Public posts means I don't have to
black out names).

Aside from that, it's been an interesting month in the Land of Gaming where apparently a fair amount of people were pissed off at one person or another for any reason or another.  There's been the Silent Hills cancellation, and Valve allowing modders to charge for use of their mods in Skyrim (but only if they want to charge) then nixing that idea after less than a week. On Friday however, and on a happier note, (so technically May) the splinters from Rare who created Playtonic have started a Kickstarter for their game Yooka-Laylee (which is, as of this writing, 412% over their target goal of $270,041 and it's been less than 12 hours since their email announcement).  And there's Rare's announcement that they've been working on something that's been a lot of fun for them that will be announced at E3 next month.

But that's all well and good for the rest of the world, but what about little ol' me?  I've been keeping pace with course work which has left some time for putzing around with a couple of video games, this time across multiple platforms.

I've gotten back into playing the Atlus time travelling multiverse fantasy game Radiant Historia, which originally came out on the DS back in 2011.  The game can be a bit overwhelming with multiple timelines and people/items/skills that you might need to learn in an alternate timeline before continuing with your current timeline.  At the moment I'm only transitioning between two separate outcomes, but I have  feeling that things will begin to branch off in the next chapter or two.  Thankfully you have the ability to speed through conversations that you've had umpteen times before and the music is good as far as JRPG soundtracks go.  I'll stick this one out until the end, barring any 4 Heroes of Light graves that I manage to dig myself into.

On the PC gaming front, I'm finishing up Borderlands (the first game) and I recently started Mass Effect 2.  My first off is that Borderlands is a great FPS with a crappily weak story.  Mass Effect 2 is a great story with too much online emphasis about who Shepard is going to doink.  Who Shepard (male or female) ends up with relationship-wise and what is unlocked in Mass Effect 3 based on your relationship choices from the previous two games seems a bit overwhelming on top of trying to save the galaxy.  It's almost like in order to experience the "full" game, you have to have a separate save file for each decision regardless if you have the option of using a paragon/renegade response; basically like in Radiant Historia.  And then there's Miranda, who apparently is nude with painted on clothing that is frequently emphasized by the camera panning or holding over her gluteal maximal region.  I know body paint's a thing, I saw a video about it once.

Lastly, and back to handheld, is Silent Hill (1999) which I'm playing on the PSP, influenced from all of the Dead Space posts last month.  Presently my biggest complaint is that the game screen doesn't take up all of the PSP screen that it should be able to.   There is an empty black space around the entire gaming-viewing window when it looks like the viewable window could have been stretched out diagonally in both directions by a couple of more pixels.  I've actually been conversing with Dr. Potts textually while playing and it's very reminiscent of 1999 when we were living in the same abode and would frequently talk to each other about where we were at in our respective games.  It was nice.  I should probably also check to make sure he has an unlimited texting plan, or I'll just revert to Google's Hangout app which Chreekat inadvertently introduced me to last week.

Leading up to the December release of Star Wars: The Force Awakens, my unofficial plan is to finish Star Wars: Dark Forces and start another of the Star Wars games that Humble Bundle bundled together a few months back.  There might even be a "Why A Star Wars Game?" post somewhere in there as well.

Oh, and D&D has now reached a "regular basis" status for which I am very grateful.  Maybe a post in there about this as well later in the month.  Although I should probably get everyone to sign a release form, but being the DM, I can always make up some threats.

~JWfW/JDub/Jaconian

A Feast of Friends

Monthly Ramblupdate - May 2015

Friends, Romans, Countrymen, lend me a better introductory phrase!  I need only to get started, and I will proceed on a ramble of most ramblonic ramifications.  According to the online Etymology Dictionary, the word 'ramble' comes from a dutch word meaning the 'nightly wanderings of an amorous cat.'  I think this is hilarious, especially since we use the word so much.  I really love etymology.  

Alright, what's up?  Well, on this very day I am going to start a garden at a local community garden.  I'm pretty happy about that.  I really love gardening, and since I don't have a yard, or even a porch, it will help get me outside.  Of course, the weather is heating up, 90 degrees this week, so outside is kind of a shitty place.  Still, it's worth it.  

In other news, I'm looking forward to playing an adventure game with my best girl.  We've picked out Blackwell Legacy,  which is supposed to have a good story.  I'll let you know how it turns out.  She's also a big fan of Mario Kart, and to that end, I've been hunting around for a used Nintendo Wii and copy of Mario Kart Wii (6?).  Granted, it's not Mario Kart 8, which is really a fantastic game, it's not a Wii U either, but it's a much cheaper alternative, which fits my budget.  I spent $100 on Magic Cards last month, and I really need to take it easy on spending.  

Yes, Magic the Gathering has devoured my brain.  I play it regularly, I even started a Magic Online account.  Magic Online is clunky, but it's nice to have a digital way to organize my cards.  The game has a learning curve that could wrap around the world,  but I finally feel like I'm catching up to todays standards.  It helps that I started listening to the Limited Resources Podcast.

Oh, that's right, I've been consuming other media as well.  I'm currently reading 'Never Let Me Go" by Kazuo Ishiguro.  He writes a lot of British stuff.  This book is the most unusual genre fiction story I've ever read.  It's the sort of book that is really easy to spoil, so I'll try not to.  There is an air of mystery that pervades early on and carries through the whole book.  However, there is also a powerful sense of sentimentality, but I wouldn't say it was sappy.  I recommend this book, though it may not be quite what you're used to, if your into Sci Fi and other nerdy things.  Nonetheless, I really do recommend giving it a chance.  

On a more sci-fi front and center note, Jane and I just finished up "Other Space" a sci-fi comedy released by Yahoo.  Yes, even Yahoo has TV now.  But Other Space is really funny, and actually tends to contain at least one legit science fiction plot point in every episode.  It's a bit like a live-action Futurama.  I recommend it and I hope it gets picked up for a second season.  The first one is kind of short.  

Hmm, yes, I think this may be all the nerd fit to print.  Looking forward to Blackwell Legacy and Nintendo Wii!  Hasta Pasta,

-D

P.S.  I think the entertainment world is long overdue for a sitcom about hens and roosters.

Monthly Update: April

Chief Medical Officer's log, earth date 4/5/2015.9:04.  Nice trip to San Francisco.  Visited the Academy of Sciences.The planetarium presentation on the interconnectedness of all life on earth was cool.  Also an Albino Alligator named Claude.

Played Mario Kart 8, was a lot of fun.  Tough game but seems like lots of room for growth.  Very impressed at resolution on the Wii U controller.  Seriously considering Wii U purchase.  Also played card game called 'Bang' that was pretty fun and available online.  In the meantime, on the gaming front, I've also played Mario Kart 64, Star Fox and Turok.  Looking into Magic Online.

I also saw a really cool play called 33 Variations at a local theater.  The story follows both a Beethoven scholar whose body is progressively shutting down from symptoms of ALS, while trying to complete a final study on Beethoven's composition 33 Variations on a waltz by Anton Diabelli.  Concurrently, another set of actors perform the story of Beethoven, Diabelli and Schindler as Beethoven struggles to compose his variations and Schindler struggles to keep him in his sponsors good graces.  It was a lot of fun, I have a soft spot for Beethoven's cranky, crazed genius, and the principle and supporting actors were fantastic.  Not to mention the play was performed with a live piano player.  There were also bits of music theory that I found really exciting, having enough understanding to be interested.

On the subject of artists and performers now past, I wanted to say something about Leonard Nimoy and something about Terry Pratchett.  I almost feel I've missed my window.  But... well, I suppose that's not really possible.  Anyway, it turned out Leonard Nimoy was even more of a badass then I ever realized.  And I also realized that Spock is very much the mascot of Star Trek.  Or maybe Kirk is the mascot, dancing around to keep us entertained, but Spock was the heart and soul.  He was the best character in the original series, bar none.  He was an example of how Star Trek would try new things.  He was an alien, he was biracial, he adhered to a bizarre and mystic code of logic.  He had psychic powers.  He was insufferable and yet he was deeply compassionate.  He's everything Star Trek was about.

It's hard not to make it all about Spock.  Nimoy clearly dealt with that his whole career.  Since his passing, I've learned that Nimoy was a Yiddish scholar, director, writer and photographer.  I'm thrilled that Jaconian and I were both able to see him speak at a Star Trek convention.  Twice.  During those talks, I learned that Nimoy did a one man stage show as Theo Van Gogh, exchanging letters with his Mad Genius brother Vincent.  You might have heard of him.

Terry Pratchett I knew less well.  I've read only The Color of Magic, the first book in the Discworld series.  I would like to say, however,  that when I read The Color of Magic, I felt a certain sense of coming home, as though I had been there before, and I had been reading Sir Pratchett's work since childhood.  And if I had to use just one word to describe his writing, it would be delightful.  Perhaps now is as good a time as any to return to his work.

Looking forward, I'm not sure what to expect.  I'm settling into my new apartment, as is my cat, Enkidu.  He has been very playful of late, and that's been fun to watch.  I'm struggling with my laptop connection to my TV, something went wrong and now my laptop screen turns off when I hook in the HDMI cable.  This is really frustrating because I was excited at the prospect of playing Steam games on a big screen.  The Nintendo 64 still works, and my girlfriend really likes Mario Kart, so I may seeing more of that in my future.  Until next time,

-D

Monthly Update: April 2015

Whew!  Actually, I don't know why I said that.  I just finished writing another post for later in this fine month of April.  A few weeks of April are going to consist of long delayed articles about Dead Space that will span everything from before the Aegis VII incident and everything leading up to the events in Dead Space 2.  One of the articles has been sitting on the back burner since late 2013 even, but now I have found the right time to release everything.  Because nothing says April like Easter and Easter is when Jesus rose from the dead, like um, the necromorphs. . .because you know, Unitology is a religion. . . moving on.

Aside from this past week, I actually haven't been able to give a whole lot of time over to playing video games and with this current week coming to a close, 16 units of accounting schoolwork has started up again, so after the first couple of weeks, I will be going back to my sporadic posting schedule.

Conklederp and I did pick up another card game called Gloom, which was recommended to us from one of our friends.  We inadvertently bought the Unwelcome Guests expansion before first acquiring the stand alone game, so now we have more cards than we know what to do with for a game that neither of us have played, but it's a game that can be played with two to five people so I'm sure that Conklederp and I will give it a go before inviting others to join in.

Sadly, Dungeons & Dragons has yet to happen again due to scheduling mishaps, but this is something that tends to happen when you are trying to schedule between six people.  Maybe I should start killing off PCs?  An offering has been sent out so hopefully they will take the bait and by bait I mean invitation.

Lastly, Conklederp and I finally finished in setting up (mostly) our office / retro video game room.  I am still having issues with the SNES as it will display tinted color bars that scroll down the screen indefinitely.  Originally I thought it was due to a 1990 console to a 2011 HD TV, but I still get the color bars on an older tube TV.  The N64 and Game Cube run fine though.  The only N64 game giving me trouble is F-Zero X, which will automatically reset anywhere from three seconds to about two minutes in.  I'll have to look into that.  The point though, is hopefully I'll be putting out some more posts in the coming months looking back at the last 20 years of Nintendo video gaming.

We'll see you later in the month.



~JWfW/JDub/Jaconian
Like Anything Was Possible

Miscellaneous Mid-Month Update

Hello hello, my adoring public.  Pause for the sound of crickets.

I'm just hopping on a borrowed internet connection to comment on my recent absence.  I've had a few recent changes that have hampered my ability to post.  I went from a slow job with plenty of time to use the internet, to a new, fast paced position with virtually zero internet time.  In addition, I moved, and I haven't gotten my internet  connection worked out at the new place.  AT&T sent me a broken modem, so now I need to find time to have a technician come out and check everything before replacing the modem.  On top of all of that, I have a new girlfriend companion - party member, and we are keeping our weekends busy.  In our downtime, I've unpacked my nintendo 64 and played some Star Fox, Turok and Mario Kart.  It's good times, and my gal-pal has great nostalgia for that system.  

In addition, I'd like to share some links regarding the newly late Terry Pratchett and Leonard Nimoy.  These are important and rad creative people, and I would be remiss if I didn't say a little something on this blog.

But these will have to wait.  For another near-future sample sized internet connection.  Until then,

-D

Monthly Update: March 2015

"Lousy Smarch weather!"  I can't help but think of "Smarch" whenever I see the month of March. although I guess that could be somewhat appropriate with the East Coast buried under a few meters of snow and us the Pacific Northwest being burned alive with average temperatures of 55° F, which is warm for February for us.  But onto why we're really here!

In February, we saw the Humble Bundle people put up a massive Star Wars game bundle with 11 games, none of which have I ever played before.  Later in the month I'll actually go into what makes a Star Wars game fun for me to play versus some other science fiction so be prepared for that one later in the month as well as for people to rip me a new one for not being über Star Wars canon knowledgeable.

I've also gotten back into Dungeons & Dragons (As I mentioned last month) and I am presently really enjoying the game.  For our group, I'm DMing and we've managed to get in two sessions, about every other week, but as with every D&D group ever, scheduling is always an issue.  I know that I said I would do a write up last month, but I may actually get around to it this month after I complete my final schooling electronic paperwork assignments for the month.  And I still need to get back on that painting wagon again, but I'm hoping for some nice detail brushes to come into my possession soon.  

On a similar note, I uncovered a D&D story that I wrote back in 2002-03 and I am going back, rereading and converting everything to a 5th Edition model.  The nice part about this is that I am figuring out some story elements that I sort of flubbed on or just ignored to make the story work and it's a lot of fun to go back into this world/story that I concocted.  I'll tell you what, it's somewhat nice to know that my storytelling capabilities didn't completely suck 12 years ago.

I've also decided to put Dragon Quest VI on the back burner for a bit as I just seemed lost with the story.  I don't know if it was because of intermittent play or because I am genuinely not as interested in the story as I want to be, which might be a fault in itself; forcing myself to play something because I feel that I'm supposed to like it is probably not the best way to play a game.  So now I'm going back to Radiant Historia, which I started very briefly I don't know how long ago because I love the concept of the game and the short amount of time that I did put into the game, I recall loving what I was experiencing.

Ah, and I also started up Borderlands after finishing RAGE, which both need articles of their own, which may or may not happen (see paragraph #3).  I am afraid though that it will turn into another Skyrim, which I always seem to be learning something new about once every few weeks.

Lastly, Conklederp and I will be attending the RePLAY orchestral video game concert up here in Portland in a few days so as I may have said (see paragraph #3), there may be an article at the same time.

JWfW/JDub/Jaconian

This Thing Is Too Precious To Ever Sleepwalk Your Way Through This.

P.S.  And then there's the whole Elder Scrolls Online going free later in the month and becoming Elder Scrolls Online: Tamriel Unlimited.  And I thought I read somewhere that the game is not considered canon?  I may need to look into that.

Frmonthly Frupdate: Frebruary 2015

First, let me show you this ridiculous and hilarious animated gif of Mario going completely berserk ala "the Night Santa Went Crazy" by Weird Al.  I got this from BrandonDeSanta in the Retro Video Games google+ group, though I don't know if he's the one who made it.  You can just watch that and laugh for a while if you like.  This is just one of the gems I encountered over the past month.  

I consumed a lot of Sci Fi this month.  The best of which was a movie called 'Predestination', based on a Robert Heinlein short story called 'All You Zombies.'   I don't want to spoil it for anyone, but I definitely recommend the movie.  I was pleasantly surprised and impressed.  I will be reading the short story... shortly.  Beyond that, I watched two Keanu Reeves movies:  Constantine and Johnny Mnemonic.  Constantine is great, a very stylish and well-shot movie.  I'm kind of a sucker for God vs Devil possession movies and action adventures. Johnny Mnemonic was kind of hokey and dated, but still lots of fun.   Additionally, I read Neuromancer by William Gibson, which is sort of a sequel to Johnny Mnemonic.  The common link is the character of Molly, who is awesome (and called 'Jane' in the film version for some indiscernable reason). I've got the book version of Johnny Mnemonic coming soon.  Fun fact:  Johnny sold his childhood for a measely 80 gigs of memory. 

I read a couple other Sci Fi novels:  Kindred, by Octavia Butler, a time travel story about Slavery.  It was a harsh read, but well written.  Also, Wind up Bird Chronicle, which wasn't straightforward sci fi, just very strange like most Murakami.  But I really like Murakami for his strangeness. 

In Gaming news, I beat Starseed Pilgrim.  FINALLY.  It was pretty cool.  I was tempted to start over again from the beginning, but resisted.  I really, really like that game.  Next, I revisited Six Days a Sacrifice, of the Chzo Mythos by Yahtzee Creshaw, and managed to beat it quickly.  I enjoyed that series, and the final game ties together a lot of thematic points and characters.  It's not perfect, but I appreciate the effort.  Playing that game has got me in the mind to play more point and click adventure games.  We'll see what the future holds!

In other news, I'm looking forward to a move in February.  The plan is to get my own apartment at a more convenient location.  Should be fun!

-D 

P.S.  Another Funny animated gif, gotten from Google+ user Miss Electro Head

Monthly Update: February 2015

If you're a frequent reader of our site, you may have noticed the fall off in posts towards the end of January.  The last couple of weeks have been taxing on me as coursework has begun to pile up and finding time to both play games and write about them has dwindled to a level that makes posting twice a week very difficult.  Thus, I have decided to cut myself back to posting once a week (Monday or Friday), but not including the MIDI Week Singles that has become a fun staple that both Dr. Potts and I contribute to on a whomever-has-an-article-written-and-ready-to-go-come-Wednesday basis.  Actually, I might post twice a week if I'm feeling up to it and am overly talkative.

That being said, I have managed to put in a fair amount of time with Theatrhythm Final Fantasy: Curtain Call on the 3DS that will garner at least two posts this month.  I also started up playing Dungeons & Dragons again last week, which will hopefully turn into a weekly or biweekly event.  That DMing experience will also earn itself its own article, probably mid month.  This revised interest in D&D had also got me thinking again about painting miniatures, something that I haven't done since July 2011.

Around mid-January, Extra Credits put out a couple of videos about making your own video game and their recommended steps to going about that arduous process.  These series of videos got me motivated about using RPG Maker VX Ace to make a game in the same way that listening to Robert Rodriguez talk about making movies convinces me that I could shoot, cut and score my own movie.  It's simple things like starting out small and not trying to make Final Fantasy VI on my first attempt are more important than churning out a masterpiece and getting bogged down on my first attempt.  All good points and based on their most recent video (part 3 in this game making series), I've realized that I should still scale back my plan just so I can get the mechanics of using the program down.

And then there was that Super Bowl MLLXVXLIX that happened last Sunday as well.  Now, I know it's stereotypical for someone who plays video games, D&D, paints miniatures and cross stitches pixel art to either not know or care about the NFL (or to go to a Star Trek convention instead. . .1999 I think it was), but after the 49ers were eliminated during the playoffs, I sort of turned my brain off and until the middle of last week, I had forgotten all about the Super Bowl.  Plus, without expressed consent from the NFL, I'm not supposed to talk about or give any kind of recap about the game.  Besides, who was I supposed to root for?  The Seahawks eliminated the 49ers so I can't cheer for them, and the Patriots have that whole deflatinggatenonesense going on, but more importantly is that I've never been a New England (team, not the region) fan so I don't plan on aligning myself with them at the present date.  I also don't feel that I should hoorah for the Seahawks only because they're a West Coast team and are closer to Portland than San Francisco, or because 90% of the football fans in the Portland metropolitan area are Seahawks fans.  I ended up picking Seattle.

So that's what happened last month and what is looking to happen in the upcoming/presently circumcised month of February.

~JWfW/JDub/Jaconian

The Works of My Gods Receding Now

Monthly Update: December 2014

Yeah, yeah.  I know November doesn't have 31 days in the month, but I'm just too lazy to "design" a banner for all the other months that don't want to conform to the non-universal standard of 31 days per month.  I vote going back to 10 months with ~40 days a piece and call it square.  Who needs July and August anyway!?

Before we get to the wonderful land of video games, I obviously have to mention the release of the new Star Wars teaser and, the full Jurassic World trailer and that the final film in The Hobbit film trilogy will be released in just over two weeks.  I'm excited for both, although I am a bit apprehensive since I don't want to be hurt by The Battle of the Five Armies the same way that I was hurt by Return of the King.  I just can't take it anymore.

So there's been quite few AAA games released this past month: Dragon Age: Inquisition, Shadow of Mordor, Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare, Halo: Masterchief Collection, Farcry 4, Little Big Planet 3.  Some would not consider Assassin's Creed Unity so much a game as it is buggy work in progress that sold for $59.99.  Grand Theft Auto V saw it's XBox One release with the PC (pov sex) release early next year.  Granted, I'm not interested in all of them (cough-cough Call of Duty cough-cough) and some others.

Then there are the games to be released in December: A Game of Thrones: A Tell Tale Games Series. . . and that appears to be it, at least all that I'm interested in.

But these are all games that I haven't played.  Sure I'd love to play Shadows of Mordor (is it one shadow or multiple because I can't keep the name straight), but I'm not 100% sure my system would be able to handle it's meaty man-flesh requirements.  But enough about our faults and more about what we've been up to.

During the last month I figured out that Dead Island: Riptide didn't want to function well on my computer, I was able to get RAGE to function well on my computer, and I am now three pieces shy of constructing the Staff of Chaos in The Elder Scrolls: Chapter One: Arena.  I briefly toyed with the idea of booting up Civ. V in honor of Thanksgiving, but that turned to not after finding out that RAGE worked; I'm a sucker for a well constructed fps in a post apocalyptic world; although J.K. Stiles and Mutant Bash TV can go suck on a curb for all I care; janky bastard.  I also started up Dark Souls and have determined that I need to create another character, for the fourth time; it all boils down to trying to figure out what the hell is going on.

This month, I'll be looking forward to Steam's Winter Sale, which will probably be coming on the heals of their Fall "Exploration Sale" which ended yesterday (December 2nd).  I've got some leftover money in my wallet from selling cosmetic stuff in TF2 and some gift cards that I bought myself from Game Stop.  Which is horrible in a way because I already have a massive backlog of games (which I have talked about on occasion) that I have yet to play and not some little three hour game, but massive honkers like Dragon Age: Origins, Fable, Baldur's Gate I & II, Dead Space 2 & 3, Batman: Arkham Asylum & Arkham City, Dark Souls, Bioshock Infinite, Final Fantasy VIII, The Elder Scrolls: Chapter II: Daggerfall, as well as ginormous wallabasses that I haven't even finished yet Final Fantasy VII, Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion &  Arena, FEZ, Torchlight II, Path of Exile, RAGE, Anodyne, Castlevania: Lords of Shadow, Braid, The Call of Cthulhu: Dark Corners of the Earth, BIT.TRIP Presents, Runner 2: Future Legend of Rhythm Alien, and the first Fallout game.  Oh, bloody hell I forgot Fallout(s) 2 through Fallout: New Vegas which I haven't touched yet.

I haven't even mentioned games on my 3DS and PSP that are still waiting to be completed/started/finished/begun/Double Double Animal Style with a Strawberry Shake.

And yet, there are still more games waiting to get in the queue just on the horizon.

There is no hope.



~JWfW/JDub/Jaconian
God Help

Movely Update - Movember, 2014

I am a banana!

Greetings, Poetry Lovers!

It turns out there is a new trend, started by actor Topher Grace, of re-editing the Star Wars prequels. I watched one called 'Return to the Dark Side' but I didn't think it was anything special. It actually re-affirmed my distaste for the prequel trilogy. The same sorts of questions came up, like why he needed to include R2 and C3PO, or how it is that Jedi can show so much emotion and not get called out on it. Also, I still don't like Hayden Christensen in the role. I always imagined Vader was a grown adult and not a whiny kid. Ah, well, c'est la vie.

In the previous month, read a few Lovecraft short stories, but otherwise did not celebrate spookiness. I did, however, dabble in weirdness, which often overlaps with spookiness - Lovecraft being a fine example. For reference: Don Hertzfeltd recently did a Couch Gag for the Simpsons. This guys work is a lesson in strangeness. I'm not the first to say the Simpsons is way past its prime, and I won't be the last. But having Hertzfeltd as a guest was really refreshing, for it's utter and total weirdness, and even a touch of melancholy. Give it a watch, and then maybe check out some other work from Don Hertzfeltd.

I first encountered Don Hertzelftd's work at Spike and Mike's Twisted Animation Festival at the Crest Theater. After countless bizarre, disgusting and offensive cartoons, came Hertzfeld's 'Rejected.' And it was the funniest thing I had ever seen. I guess I was just in the right frame of mind for his clever strangeness. Years after, I still love to recite 'I, am a banana!' it was great to see his work again, and in true form.

In other news, my first assignment at the University Temp Agency has come to a close, so now I get unpaid days off until they find a new one. It shouldn't take too long, because the University temp agency has a great reputation. I was just getting used to where i was working too, there's definitely a sense of loss. I guess those are the knocks at temporary employment. My postings might drop off a bit because I may not have as much downtime at this new position. We'll just have to wait and see.

I started using google + because Facebook was kind of getting me down. And mostly I've been joining different interest groups, like bicycle commuting, retro gaming, indie game developers. It's been a pretty cool source of new and interesting things, like this kickstarter.

Further news... no? okay.


-D

Nubarron, the adventures of an unlucky gnome

Monthly Update: November 2014

Happy November!  It's both Movember and NaNoWriMo, both activities that I think would be interesting, but I never remember until a few days into November and then I tell myself, "Ah, maybe next year."

So Evolve's Big Alpha weekend happened this last weekend, and all the excitement about that experience I will post about on Friday as there's simply too much to post in a monthly update article.  So onto other things!

Conklederp and I received the board game Pandemic from Coolman and his coollady because we got married (how cool is that!), but I already talked about that part.  Recently though, Conklederp and I got a chance to play that game and ho-boy was it fun.  Well, about as fun as potentially letting the world fall into a cesspool of disease and dead bodies can be.  

After watching the Table Top episode from Season 1 that covered Pandemic, we gave the game a try, although later realizing that I didn't shuffle the Player deck correctly, but that's what first playthroughs are for anyway.  What both Conklederp and I love about this game is that all the players are working together against the board.  If one person wins, everyone wins, but there is only one way for the players to win: finding cures to all four diseases.  There are, however, three ways for the board to win: running out of Infection Tokens, maxing out the Outbreak meter and/or running out of Player Cards.  In our most recent playthrough, while we did find cures to all four diseases, the world was pretty ravaged by disease, but at least they're curable now.  To date, we have a 66% success rate with this game, but even losing is "fun."

I also opened a shop on Etsy.com to sell/showcase cross stitch patterns I've designed over the years.  It's called ExorStitch.  You know, like The Exorcist and cross stitch.  It was Conklederps idea and I love it.  So head on over if you or someone you know is into cross stitching and likes to make semi-unconventional patterns for people you like/don't like.  It'll be a hoot.

In the video game department, I finally got around to finishing the Dead Space mobile game, which will earn it's own article later in the month.  But in short, it was a fun game that did things to the player that I haven't seen since Eternal Darkness, and I was happy.

The rest of the month is looking to be not too different from October, except instead of witches and zombies there will be pilgrims and poultry corpses along with native peoples that end up slaughtered by the millions.  You know, maybe I'll finally give Sid Meier's Civilization V a go.  I did give the game a start earlier in the year (or was it late last year?), but I think I started a set scenario as opposed to a new game so I left panicking that I would leave the world decimated and without hope.  You know, like losing a game in Pandemic.

In the newer games department, I haven't played Sid Meier's Civilization: Beyond Earth although I love the concept.  I haven't played Shadow of Mordor although I have only been hearing good things about this Skyrim meets Assassin's Creed creation.  I haven't played Destiny as I don't have the appropriate console.  I haven't played The Evil Within because it's new and expensive, but I do have the demo and I'm looking forward to playing that on a dark and stormy night.  So you know, Portland.  I also haven't played Borderlands, the Pre-Sequel since I haven't played any of the games in that series and I feel that I should at least have played the first Borderlands.  I could probably now start in on Bioshock: Infinite now that I've finished the first two games in the series.

You know, some people out there in the gaming community might call my lack of playing anything released within the last year as being lame (if that insult is even used in the gaming community), but I won't be listening to them anyway, because I like cheese.

~JWfW/JDub/Jaconian

I Like Big Shiny Things

Moonthly update- Octubre

Not a Dragon, exactly, but you might call him a...Wyrm?

Welcome to October, the Spookiest of Months!  

No, I have no plans to dress up and party hearty on Halloween.  But that may change between now and then.  I don't place a lot of stock in Holidays.  Call me Scrooge or Grinch if you like.  I think I just haven't developed traditions of my own as an adult.  Also I've never been all that into costumes. But I'm not completely without seasonal cheer.  I may just carve some pumpkins, which is always fun. 

Because it's October, I think I’ll dust off that Lovecraft Collection Jaconian picked up for me a couple years ago.  Have you ever read Lovecraft?  If you have any interest in American Gothic Horror, you pretty much have to read Lovecraft.  He’s like the awesome sequel to Edgar Allen Poe.  Seriously, he's like the Terminator 2 of American Horror.  Between Poe and Lovecraft, pretty much every Classic Element of American Gothic Horror is brought to life.  Seriously, he’s that good.  You’ll find it familiar.  It will comfort and terrify you.  At least that’s what it does for me.

I would also like to indulge in some horror games.  At least try, if not beat Amnesia: The Dark Decent.  Others I can revisit, such as Six Days a Sacrifice and Lone Survivor.   On the other hand, it also looks like this October is Dragon Month, given our two Dragon Themed posts so far in October, with more planned for the near future.  I've also got a Dragon Themed Magic deck in the works.. This previous month I have been playing Magic: The Gathering – buying lots of packs, building decks, sorting cards.  This marks one of many returns I've made to this game.  It seems like about every five years now. 

Also, I have continued playing Starseed Pilgrim.   I love this game, I've gushed about how much fun it is to figure out how to play it.  But now that I've figured it out and gotten through a lot of the game, I've discovered that it's frickin' hard!   I've confirmed that it has an end.   And I think I'm near it.  But geez louise, this game is tough!  I can only go further through tenacious obsession!  Painfully crawling my way up a hill.  Sysiphus, eat your heart out. 

 I’ve got a new job, with lots of down time, which has led me to write more posts.  Of course, I'm always nervous composing this stuff at work.  .... shiver!  There's a horror game for you, sit at a desk for eight hours, but you never know when boss man will suddenly appear and catch you surfing the web! Ahhh!

-D

Monthly Update: October 2014

Madd MS Paint Skilz Yo!

It's that time of the month again, and I'm pretty sure I've used that opening before. . . but you know what?  Neither do I.

This is going to be a hectic month.  First off, Conklederp and I are getting married on Saturday (11th) so some of the posts early in the month might be sporadic, depending on how much I am able to get accomplished ahead of time.  We are presently (at the time of posting) preparing to make our way to Nor*Cal tomorrow, with our goal being ultimately in the south (by California standards) and we'll be back about the middle of the month.  Goodtimes shall be had by all and yes, "goodtimes" is a legitimate word.

I spent a good amount of time during September playing both The Elder Scrolls: The Arena and Path of Exile.  It would seem that the Diablo type of play that is PoE is more enticing and engaging than what I found with DOTA 2, which makes me a little sad that I'm not as interested as I was hoping to be with the free-to-play MOBA, but I think solo game playing is too ingrained in my system.  I did play a session of PoE with Chreekat for an hour or so a few weeks back and since then I haven't seen him on Steam playing PoE, so I'm hoping that I didn't tarnish the 37 hours he's put into the game, but it looks like he was on yesterday.  I on the other hand, have only quested for a paltry 26 hours.  Oh the humanity!

And this just in, I am a Steam Stalking Creeper, but no, I still haven't played Minecraft in any of its many iterations.  Line me up to be stoned.  Again.

What the hell!  While writing today's post, music from Dead Island: Riptide (composed by Pawel Blaszczak) has come up a couple of times and it's a lot better than it has a right to be.  Now I've never played Dead Island: Riptide, yet anyway and I'll get to it eventually, but this soundtrack (acquired through the Humble Deep Silver Bundle) is really good.  I'm tempted to even say that it's "beautiful," but. . . you know what?  No buts.  The track that just played, "Let it be Haven," was indeed a beautiful simple piano piece.  There I said it.  Cue the onslaught of hate.  Maybe, but probably not.

Let's briefly take a look at October.  I restarted schooling a couple days ago so I'll be trying to get ahead for the first couple of weeks seeing as how doing school work during a honeymoon so video gaming and said activities will not be as prevalent as normal, at least for the first half of the month.  Game-wise though, October will probably be fairly similar to September with PoE, Arena and I might even delve into Fallen Earth, which I just spotted as being an open world free-to-play post-apocalyptic adventure game.  If I'm able to find time that is.  Although in the next week, I'll be hoping to play another round of Mansions of Madness with our friends so I'll have more tales to tell upon our return.

So have a happy October and I'll see y'all when I'm around.

~JWfW/JDub/Jaconian

Instrumental

Monthly Update: September 2014

Happy September everyone.  Bloody hell this year is flying by, or maybe it just feels like that for me as I'm getting hitched next month.  Yes, I am looking forward to the wedding and I am very excited for it, so don't go ahead thinking that I am one of those "ball and chain" types.  

On other fronts, the Summer Reading BINGO is progressing nicely.  I am currently trudging through Cormac McCarthy's Blood Meridian on audiobook and I say "trudging" in the most sincere form of the verb.  I am not 100% sure where the story is going which is understandable for me as I am finding out that unless I am paying full attention to the story, I'll end up tuning out for a bit and come back when I realize I don't know what is happening.  So it's now article writing, game playing, reddit browsing for me while listening to the disparaging tone of Mr. McCarthy's prose, but instead it's sitting quietly awaiting the next description of the happy-g0-lucky times of mid-late 19th century Texas.  But yes, I am enjoying the book.

In paper form, I am reading Robert J. Sawyer's Flashforward which received a season of TV viewers on ABC back in 2009.  If you're not familiar with the story, a mysterious event happens that causes the population of the world to lose consciousness for just over two minutes and during those two minutes, people experience their lives 21 years in the future.  In turn, those who are not alive 21 years in the future experience nothing.  What I'm finding interesting is after the event, the beginning of each chapter (so far) begins with newspaper-type snippets about the worlds reaction to the event and while some are mundane such as reporting on the death of a news anchor or a continued car pileup due to the event, others are more intriguing, "After a record number of applications were filed in the last 24 hours, the United States Patents office has closed until further notice, pending a decision from Congress on the patenting of inventions gleaned from the visions."

Flashforward is not a long book, coming in at only 317 pages and it did not spawn additional books in this world so I feel that by the end, I will still have plenty of questions, such as, "Why don't I own the TV series on DVD yet!?"

Moving into the realms of video games (finally!), I have started again playing The Elder Scrolls: Arena thanks to a link posted by "Roger" in my Daggerfailed article from last year.  The links are to downloadable copies of Arena and Daggerfall but have all of the DOS commands prewritten so all I have to do is open the application and the game starts up without having to type all of the DOS commands that prevented me from being able to play Daggerfall.  In Arena, I also learned how to open up the world map (Shift+M) and fast travel to other locations as travelling from one city to the next closest would take about 3 days (0n average).  Apparently being able to fast travel in a flat world without any form of topography (trees don't count) has made the game infinitely better.  I will most likely put out a Second Impressions in the coming weeks, now if I could only master swinging a sword with the mouse.

So PAX Prime happened this last weekend.  I might have said something about absolutely not missing PAX again, but due to the general lack of funds due to a false criminal identification (#PeopleWithIncrediblyCommonNamesProblems).  The only presentation I was able to catch was a talk that Hironobu Sakaguchi gave about the "Past, Present and Future of RPGs," but it looks like that presentation was not archived/saved on PAX's Twitch channel.  Ah well.  It was, I felt, more of a retrospective on Hironobu Sakaguchi's career at Square(soft/Enix) and a brief look at a mobile game in development (Terra Battle) at his current studio, Mistwalker.

In semi-PAX related video game news, Gauntlet was showcased this last weekend and it seemed like the remake of the 1985 Atari game received some favorable press.  What surprised me the most about the game was that it is rated M.  Personally, I've never viewed Gauntlet as an M-rated franchise.  From the gameplay footage though, it looks like they're taking a Diablo approach to dispatching enemies as well as what happens to their entrails.  I feel like I can be an old fuddy-duddy about this because the decision doesn't affect me either way.  When I was a kid (mid/late 80's) I loved playing Gauntlet, but having the M-rating is going to limit the demographic that will be able to play this game, which essentially is a massive dungeon crawl with an annoying life timer.  I don't feel like the game needed to go for an M-rating, but that's just me.

Oh damn, I almost forgot.  Last week Nintendo unveiled their New 3DS, which coincidentally is the name of the system: "New 3DS" and "New 3DS LL" for the larger version that we've seen with the 3DS XL and DS lite XL; although that might just be a Japanese thing.  There are some much needed improvements to the system such as an added C-button type joystick to the right side of the system, improved 3D effect that causes less blurring, improved battery life, a micro SD card slot and two more shoulder/trigger buttons.  What they need to improve on is the life expectancy of the hinges, but that's just me being paranoid that the hinges on my 3DS are on the verge of breaking as they did with my DS lite.

So, welcome to September!

~JWfW/JDub/Jaconian

Close Your Eyes and Believe