Bubbles
Crisis averted: Metroid Prime has been found. It has also been played, thanks to Lee's brother loaning me a GameCube controller. I had forgotten just how much I love that controller. The way it sits in your hands, the feel of the stick, the sound of the shoulder buttons. The shoulder buttons! Dear R'hllor, have better shoulder buttons ever been made? I say nay!
Last week I introduced Zach to Half-Life 2. He now claims it is his favorite game ever, a title that had previously been held by FarCry 3. We also played Metal Slug 3 and Baldur's Gate: Dark Alliance on my XBox one... err.. original XBox.. whatever. I'm on my third New Game+ in Rogue Legacy. I think it may be time to quit. I've heard of some people doing NG+6, but I'm not sure I have it in me. I really want to play Shin Megami Tensei IV, but I don't have access or funding for a 3DS at the moment. After watching Chandler play some Skyrim on his 360, I decided to load it back onto my computer and started going through some mods. Holy shit, that breathed new life into an already awesome game and made me completely fall in love with it all over again. A shitload of new spells, tweaked skill trees, and graphical overhauls have helped pull me back into the game hardcore. If I had to pick my favorite mod, though, it would have to be "Realistic Lighting." It's fucking brilliant. It now makes going into a cave actually feel like fucking going into a cave. If you don't have torches or some other light source, you are screwing yourself. You no longer see traps from a mile away, and hiding in the shadows really feels like hiding in the shadows since the enemies have a hard time spotting you, too. I had to laugh at myself when I foolishly picked a lock to a door I couldn't see and a wolf jumped out at me from the cage I had just released him from. I also really like the "Immersive Saturation Boost" mod that almost doubles the saturation on the colors in the game making it MUCH more vibrant and not so washed out and bland looking, though not to an unrealistic level. I have the mod that adds into the game the need to keep yourself warm and avoid exposure from the elements, but I haven't activated it yet. Then there's SkyUI, which I feel is absolutely mandatory for anyone playing on PC. It replaces the UI for inventory and such with one that works better with a mouse and is much more robust, offering features like search and filtering. The UI for Skyrim works okay on consoles, but it just makes no sense with a keyboard and mouse. I wish there was a mod that fixed the dialog and crafting UIs also.
Lee and I saw Pacific Rim opening night. I thought it was great, I thoroughly enjoyed it, but it's definitely not a movie you want to think about. Just enjoy the ride. It's not nearly as dumb as Transformers, but it does have it's silliness. "Oh hey, we built these giant robots made of metal and shit to fight these monsters, but they aren't working too great. I know, let's shut down the robot program and build a big cement wall, that'll stop the monsters!" Lee and I are going to see it again tomorrow with Chandler. A few weeks ago, I started watching True Blood for some strange reason. I love vampires, and I like Alan Ball, but I never watched the show. I thought the first couple seasons were alright. There was lots that reminded me of Vampire: The Masquerade. "Oh look, there's celerity, oh, he's using dominate... was that auspex?" Then season three touched on some vampire politics stuff, and I liked that a lot, but it was pretty minor. Now I'm in season four and the show has officially become dumb. Really, really dumb. I kinda knew it would. I could feel from the beginning. I was always right on the edge, but I stuck around because I liked characters like Bill, Tara, Eric, Lafayette and Terry. Now in season four, I hate where almost every one of them have been taken. Tara's story arc makes sense, but I still don't like it, and Lafayette's and especially Eric's are just dumb. Dumb. I don't think I can describe it any better than dumb. Hell, I'm even okay with Sookie being part fairy, I was buying that for some reason, but almost all the rest of the show is just dumb. Except for the opening credits, which are total badass. Thanks to Lee bringing it over, I finally watched Azumanga Daioh. I enjoyed it as much as I knew I would, which is to say I loved it tons.
We played A Game of Thrones the board game today at Firefly. It was glorious as always, and I brought House Martell to victory with the aid of Lee as the Tyrells. Baratheon sent their ships north, leaving King's Landing open for attack without sea support and basically handing me the victory. If that hadn't have happened, Baratheon may have won... that or Stark would've used his power of the Iron Throne to claim victory for himself if there was a tie. It's kind of strange the amount of times I've seen that game end with Stark sitting on the Iron Throne.
Last week I introduced Zach to Half-Life 2. He now claims it is his favorite game ever, a title that had previously been held by FarCry 3. We also played Metal Slug 3 and Baldur's Gate: Dark Alliance on my XBox one... err.. original XBox.. whatever. I'm on my third New Game+ in Rogue Legacy. I think it may be time to quit. I've heard of some people doing NG+6, but I'm not sure I have it in me. I really want to play Shin Megami Tensei IV, but I don't have access or funding for a 3DS at the moment. After watching Chandler play some Skyrim on his 360, I decided to load it back onto my computer and started going through some mods. Holy shit, that breathed new life into an already awesome game and made me completely fall in love with it all over again. A shitload of new spells, tweaked skill trees, and graphical overhauls have helped pull me back into the game hardcore. If I had to pick my favorite mod, though, it would have to be "Realistic Lighting." It's fucking brilliant. It now makes going into a cave actually feel like fucking going into a cave. If you don't have torches or some other light source, you are screwing yourself. You no longer see traps from a mile away, and hiding in the shadows really feels like hiding in the shadows since the enemies have a hard time spotting you, too. I had to laugh at myself when I foolishly picked a lock to a door I couldn't see and a wolf jumped out at me from the cage I had just released him from. I also really like the "Immersive Saturation Boost" mod that almost doubles the saturation on the colors in the game making it MUCH more vibrant and not so washed out and bland looking, though not to an unrealistic level. I have the mod that adds into the game the need to keep yourself warm and avoid exposure from the elements, but I haven't activated it yet. Then there's SkyUI, which I feel is absolutely mandatory for anyone playing on PC. It replaces the UI for inventory and such with one that works better with a mouse and is much more robust, offering features like search and filtering. The UI for Skyrim works okay on consoles, but it just makes no sense with a keyboard and mouse. I wish there was a mod that fixed the dialog and crafting UIs also.
Lee and I saw Pacific Rim opening night. I thought it was great, I thoroughly enjoyed it, but it's definitely not a movie you want to think about. Just enjoy the ride. It's not nearly as dumb as Transformers, but it does have it's silliness. "Oh hey, we built these giant robots made of metal and shit to fight these monsters, but they aren't working too great. I know, let's shut down the robot program and build a big cement wall, that'll stop the monsters!" Lee and I are going to see it again tomorrow with Chandler. A few weeks ago, I started watching True Blood for some strange reason. I love vampires, and I like Alan Ball, but I never watched the show. I thought the first couple seasons were alright. There was lots that reminded me of Vampire: The Masquerade. "Oh look, there's celerity, oh, he's using dominate... was that auspex?" Then season three touched on some vampire politics stuff, and I liked that a lot, but it was pretty minor. Now I'm in season four and the show has officially become dumb. Really, really dumb. I kinda knew it would. I could feel from the beginning. I was always right on the edge, but I stuck around because I liked characters like Bill, Tara, Eric, Lafayette and Terry. Now in season four, I hate where almost every one of them have been taken. Tara's story arc makes sense, but I still don't like it, and Lafayette's and especially Eric's are just dumb. Dumb. I don't think I can describe it any better than dumb. Hell, I'm even okay with Sookie being part fairy, I was buying that for some reason, but almost all the rest of the show is just dumb. Except for the opening credits, which are total badass. Thanks to Lee bringing it over, I finally watched Azumanga Daioh. I enjoyed it as much as I knew I would, which is to say I loved it tons.
We played A Game of Thrones the board game today at Firefly. It was glorious as always, and I brought House Martell to victory with the aid of Lee as the Tyrells. Baratheon sent their ships north, leaving King's Landing open for attack without sea support and basically handing me the victory. If that hadn't have happened, Baratheon may have won... that or Stark would've used his power of the Iron Throne to claim victory for himself if there was a tie. It's kind of strange the amount of times I've seen that game end with Stark sitting on the Iron Throne.