Working On The Backlog

I've spent the greater part of the last week working on my ridiculous backlog of games.

• Metroid: Other M (Wii) - After waiting nearly two weeks for my Wii to return from repairs, I dove right into this game. I've been a fan of Metroid for about fourteen years now, so when this game was announced, I was ecstatic. I finished the story content at around 9 hours and collected all of the items around the 12 hour mark. It's a bit on the short side, but that's quite a lot of content for a Metroid title. Unfortunately, this game is the weakest in the franchise. The narrative is rather weak and the item collection is a joke. For those out of the loop, you start the game with all of your power ups, but you're ordered not to use any of them without authorization. It fits the narrative: You intercept a distress signal and you're there to assist a platoon that is attempting to recover survivors. Running in, Plasma Beams blazing, dropping Power Bombs all over the place isn't exactly the proper way to handle the situation. However, it gets ridiculous at times. A rather notorious example is when you're traversing Sector 3, a replica of what could be considered Norfair (Basically an environment for organisms that thrive in high temperature environments) without the Varia Suit. After exploring this region for what seems like ages, you are finally given the authorization to use your Varia Suit (which, if you think about it, doesn't make sense. What's the point in not authorizing a purely defensive mechanism?). Final Verdict: 2.5/5
• Shank (PSN / XBLA) - Not much to say about this game. Brodude and Dynas showed it to me and I was genuinely intrigued. When the game was released, I tried the demo and didn't like it. I had no intentions of buying it citing excuses involving the "clunky" control mechanics. However, since my little issue with PSN not accepting my new debit card (I've still been too lazy to call either Sony or my credit union), I've resorted to buying PSN cards. Castle Crashers was released a week later, so I bought a $20 card for that and had the extra money left over, so I bought it against my better judgment. After sitting down with the game, the "clunky" controls I complained about weren't very "clunky" at all. After analyzing the controls and getting a feel for the game, I quickly learned that Shank was not a game that relied on relentless button mashing. If used properly, you can bob and weave through your arsenal of weaponry and create seamless combos to take down even hoards of foes with ease. Final Verdict: 3/5
• Scott Pilgrim vs. The World: The Game (PSN / XBLA) - What to say about this? When I first saw the trailer for the movie, I thought it looked unique, but I had no interest in it. At the end of July, I'd officially become obsessed with the Scott Pilgrim universe. When I learned of the game: a homage to old school classics like River City Random and Double Dragon with music performed by the chiptune band Anamanaguchi with 32-bit sprites, I knew I needed this game. There's not much more I can say. Just download the demo and give it a try. Final Verdict: 5/5

The next games I plan to work on include Mass Effect, Castle Crashers, and Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic.

Revival

Long time, no see.

I haven't felt passionate about posting information regarding FFXI because, well, everyone that read the blog communicated on me on a daily basis. However, with FFXIV on the horizon (Less than a week), I thought now would be a great time to revive the blog.

I was initially going to wait on FFXIV until the PS3 release until I was told that old members of YuckFou, including our founder, would be jumping into the fray. I was genuinely excited. No offense to Auriga, Anduril, or the Lakshmi 10k, but my happiest days of FFXI were back during the dark ages when YuckFou was not only alive, but active. However, the master plan seems to be falling apart. Everyone, with one exception, has bailed on the idea of playing at launch for one reason or another. However, that hasn't stopped me from wanting to play the game. Outside of a few issues that SE commented on and plan to remedy for the retail release, I love the game.

Now, the fun part will be juggling both at the same time. I'm already failing in this regard. I know it's only in Beta, but I feel a bit guilty for neglecting it for FFXI. Though, you could argue that I have a legitimate excuse with the level cap increase and all.

Anyway. I'll wrap this up. May the Twelve be with you.

WHOA NELLY!

REVIVAL IMMINENT.

CHECK BACK LATER.

Busy! Busy! Busy!

Between work and school, I haven't had much time to do, well, anything, but I am attempting to make some progress.

For those wondering about work, I am enjoying it. It is a lot better than my old job. There is a very strong relationship between the employees and the employer here, and that is pretty nice compared to my last job where the employees were treated horribly.

School is coming along... I am quite ready for this semester to be finished. The semester will be over in about four weeks. After that, I'll have a small break before having to jump into the fray again for a summer semester. Once the summer semester is over, I will be ready to graduate with my associate's degree. I am looking forward to it! I plan to work on finding a better job over the summer. Hopefully there will be a place that will be willing to hire me considering how close I am to completing my degree.

As far as video games are concerned, I stopped playing XIII. I just sort of lost interest. I still intend to finish (and get the platinum), but right now, I am not up for it. I also bought Little Big Planet, but I have not played it much at all. We should play together sometime!

In Final Fantasy XI, I have been pretty bored. For the last couple of weeks, I have logged in only to find myself logging out shortly afterwards due to having nothing to do. After I obtained my new avatars, I felt there was little purpose to continue playing. For the time being, I've been leveling White Mage. I got an invite to a colibri party last night and managed to go from 37 to less than 1k to 41 in a matter of about two hours. Pretty nice.

To-Do List

Went out and camped Chonchon today. No competition at all... Got the drop on my third attempt.

Next on my agenda is to go after the Cassandra's earring and the Helenus's earring. Also, I really want a Sarissa. You guys can make that happen, right?

...

No Mumorpuger Means...?

I've been quite busy as of late. I canceled my WoW subscription because I was out of money. Now that my super check has arrived, I have not had a desire to resubscribe. Why? A number of reasons.

For one, I have been increasingly busy with real life lately. I was terribly behind in statistics (As Jil puts it, the "Devil's math"). However, I have caught myself up with help from my instructor, but this only means that I'm falling behind in my other classes. This week will prove to be a little busy as I scramble to get myself back in the routine of things. This should be easy enough, as I have said once before that I'm taking math and science (with a little bit of Accounting thrown in) this semester.

Second, my goodies arrived. I used my super check to buy a few things I have been wanting. I believe I have spoiled myself... but considering the drama I put up with in this family, I think I deserve something nice... so I bought a HDTV (Samsung 32" 720p), Final Fantasy VII: Advent Children Complete, The Legend of Zelda: Spirit Tracks, and Assassin's Creed II (despite ragequitting Assassin's Creed I because of the enemy AI and repetitive mission structure). Advent Children Complete was quite enjoyable. The additions were worth it and the story is actually coherent if you've played through the original (I had to play Crisis Core and Final Fantasy VII back-to-back to really get the original version of the film). Overall, I felt that the original version was incomplete. It seemed as if it relied too much on Crisis Core (Which I do not even think existed when the original film was released). Spirit Tracks is a great game. If you have a DS, I highly recommend it if only for its wonderful overworld theme. And, of course, Assassin's Creed II is great. It really was what the first game should have been. It's just a shame I'm a bit too busy to play it at the moment.

Perhaps what is one of the biggest factors of my inactive WoW account is Blizzard's oh-so-wonderful method to level caps. You see, unlike Final Fantasy XI, which kind of coaxes you into buying the expansions... WoW forces you to buy them if you intent to level up past the level cap. Think of it this way: You go to Maat for G1-G5, and he asks for $30-$40 each time you want to break the level cap.

So, yeah. I'm mumorpuger-less at the moment and I am enjoying it. Now that the new TV is here, I can actually get around to playing my games. I can't wait to start on Eternal Sonata!

Hmmm.

School started last week. This will be my last year at this community college, so I will have my associate's degree in business administration soon! To make this year even better... all I have left are science, math, and accounting classes. This semester is pretty laid back... this could be because I'm finished with all of the English courses required for my degree, so that means there's a serious lack of essay writing. In fact, I will not have any papers to write this term! Huzzah! This semester features my first accounting class. As most of you are aware, I intend to be an accountant when I "grow up," so I'm relieved to find out that, not only is accounting interesting, it's actually fun. However... I did somehow lose about $2000 while balancing my first "account." My only real issue this semester is the dreaded statistics class. I barely passed Statistics I with a B last semester. Statistics truly is the devil's math to be the first math course, since first grade, to cause me to make less than an A.

On another note, my grant check is coming in the mail soon (hopefully this week). Planning on getting a nice HDTV so I can actually enjoy my PS3. I'm using a tiny SDTV right now, so I've been putting off playing games like Eternal Sonata until I have a TV that can display the game in its full glory. Also, with the spiked interest in Uncharted 2, I decided to watch a review of the game. My only regret in watching the review is that the game looks so awesome that it blew my mind so hard that I was awestruck for about thirty minutes. So, yeah, with Uncharted for $23 at Amazon, and Uncharted 2 for $55... I have to pick these two games up. Also, I need a bluetooth headset. And, I can't forget preordering Final Fantasy XIII. I'm sure many of you will laugh at me, but the big game I'm looking forward to this year isn't Final Fantasy XIII, it's this. Yes, I know. It's just a remake, but the original version was one of my favorite games.

Oh, and about WoW... I'm level 52 as of writing this.

Overdue Post!

Adapting to WoW has been... quite exhilarating. So, here's a little gallery of my recent misadventures!

Here's an image of me getting mauled by three Alliance Druids in a PvP battleground.

Sometime later, Disco and I went adventuring in Stranglethorn Vale. Actually, that's kind of a lie. George and the others said it was a great place to level starting at 30, but it ended up being an awful place full of mobs that were too high for us... This is when I learned that a Rogue companion is great until things get a little... dangerous:

On the topic of leveling, Blizzard implemented a new feature some time before I started playing. It's called Dungeon Finder and it allows you to choose you role (Tank, Healer, DPS) and places you into a queue. Once a party of five is formed, you are transported to an instance (either random or specified). What's great about this is that players across all servers are entered into the queue, so finding a group takes minutes, sometimes even seconds. In fact, often when I opt to tank, I find a group instantly.

Now, tanking in WoW is pretty fun. While, overall, single target tanking is much simpler, WoW tanking is quite a change of pace. For instance, a lot of instances have me "AoE tanking." That is, tanking multiple mobs at once:

It's pretty interesting. That yellow/orange stuff on the floor is an AoE effect I have called Consecration. This deals Holy damage to all enemies standing on the field. This coupled with a buff called Righteous Fury, a buff that increases hate generated from Holy based attacks, makes AoE tanking a breeze!

Another thing, people expect a lot of tanks. This was a bit of a surprise at first. For example, in a single instance, I find myself single target tanking, AoE tanking, buffing, backup (sometimes even main healing when I have lazy healers) healing, a little DPS, and even pulling. It's pretty fun!

Oh yeah, we managed to get Dynas to play WoW with us! He's playing a Tauren Warrior. I decided to pay him a little visit. Here's the first thing he saw when he gained control of his character:

Probably About as Cool as a WoW Screenshot Can Get

Our first gank! (Of a level 8 Priest) >_>

Something Has to Be Said

You guys are boring!

My New Life

World of Warcraft has been great for me. I cannot believe I was so harsh towards this game over my Final Fantasy XI career.

This game is just... fun. I love how Blizzard handles time sinks in this game. The time sinks are there, but Blizzard implements it in such a way that it is not really as noticeable. For instance, I love traveling in this game. Especially when it comes to zeppelins. Instead of waiting ten minutes for it to arrive, about three minutes for it to take off, and three minutes for the ride itself, the waiting time for using it is about five minutes even if it takes off as soon as you arrive to the station.

Also, after exploring, you unlock flight paths that makes returning to areas much easier.

Needless to say, this game is great.

Yep, I'm Done.

Before the month is over, I'll be canceling my content IDs. I'm just not enjoying myself in game anymore. I do not find enjoyment out of anything these days. Not even the idea of leveling a new job or starting a craft interests me. So, I'm going to go on a hiatus, officially starting in January (I still intend to log into the game on occasion until my account is closed).

In the mean time, I need to get all of the items I borrowed from Flint back so I can send it to his delivery box. Also, if anyone wants anything that I own, you're free to borrow it on the off-chance I do decide to play again.

And no, don't worry, I'm not going to become a George. I'm not going to abandoned the ventrilo.

To-Do List: Part 1

So, I have started to tackle my To-Do list, which currently consists of:

1. Trine (PS3)
2. Okami (Wii)
3. Fire Emblem: Radiant Dawn (Wii)
4. Portal (PS3)
5. Final Fantasy XII (PS2)
6. Final Fantasy II (GBA)
7. Super Mario RPG (Virtual Console, SNES)
8. Zelda II (Virtual Console, NES)

The goal is to finish as many of these as possible before I head back to school on the 11th of January. Okami and Fire Emblem were started last year and I intend to just finish those files and call it a day.

I am currently playing through Trine. Trine is a brilliant game created by Frozenbyte that

features three unlikely heroes (A fail wizard, a thief, and an idiot knight) that have their souls bound

by "The Trine." The game is a puzzle platformer with some minor RPG elements thrown it. It is

reminiscent of The Lost Vikings for SNES/Genesis/GBA/Other consoles (It was ported to a bunch of them).

Maybe It's That Time...

As of late, I've been getting that feeling. The same feeling I had a little over three years ago. Yeah, I am starting to notice that I am losing interest in Final Fantasy XI. And fast.

I have started noticing that I am not truly playing Final Fantasy XI anymore. It really has become like a job for me. I don't even log in for fun anymore. I am caught in an endless cycle of events (Sky/Sea thrice per week, Dynamis twice per week, and Salvage five times per week).

So, here's my idea. And I know that everyone's stomachs will lurch, but I've been talking with George about sending me a friend recruit trial request for World of Warcraft and giving that a serious try. If I enjoy the trial, I'll most likely stick with it. If that idea fails, I will probably return to Final Fantasy XI and cut out all events save for Dynamis.

To-Do List: Prologue

Since I'm free until January 11th, it is time for me to get started on my to-do list also known as the video games I've bought in the past year or so that I haven't had time to sit down and play.

First thing's first, I'll be finishing Trine 100% (aka I want my Platinum Trophy)

In Other News

My literature final includes an essay question.

An essay in the final after writing a research paper.

My instructor must be delightfully mad.

I Hate My Family Sometimes...

So, I rented Star Trek on Blu-ray the other day. We only have one HDTV in the house, so I took my PS3 into the living room. I robbed the DVD/Surround System's HDMI cable because it wasn't really being used outside of watching DVDs.

My brother-in-law discovered it today, and went on a rant (that woke me up, no less) about how I was screwing with his stuff and how he had to "fix it" (Which took a whole minute). I am no longer "allowed" to keep my PS3 in the living room now because I used the "HD cable used for [his] 5.0 surround system in HD."

That's right, he's pissed because the PS3 was hooked up with the only HDMI cable that was going to waste by being used by a standard DVD player when it takes less than a minute to switch the cable between the DVD player and PS3. I mean, it'd be different if the HDMI cable actually contributed to his surround setup, but the way he has it connected, it doesn't.

Also, he pays for an HD package with Directv but uses standard yellow/red/white composite cables.

I was originally going to keep the PS3 in there because I plan to reactivate my Netflix account (The PS3 is a Netflix streaming device now) so the whole family could enjoy it, but I don't think I will now.

In conclusion:

No, I'm Not Dead

I'm aware my presence on ventrilo and in FFXI has been flakey for a while (well, about three days or so, but that's like an internet year, right?). School work is bogging me down. Not much left for this semester, though! This week will be my last week of work, then finals next week (Well, technically, my online finals are this week, but the brick and mortar finals are next week).

Plus I've been playing PS3 too much.

Tijet's Favor

I've been trying out the new favors since the update. In fact, I made a post about my experience being the support in Nyzul Isle.

Some people have discovered that if you can reach around 318 summoning skill, you can enter a new tier for the buffs. This includes Diabolos's Favor giving 4MP/tic at max potency. However, it seems the only way to reasonably reach this skill level without dumping millions of gil into gear and devoting my life to camping Ix'DRG is to merit summoning skill. This seems like a good idea. I'm finding Avatar's Favor fun to use, and the merits would give me a boost in the boost and buff department (Being able to reach a 3 minute duration on Hastega would be lovely).

Anyway, enough with the rambling. Here are some screenshots of me hard at work using Diabolos's Favor in sky: