Zombie Wayne!
Well, here I am back in work, albeit tentatively. Our house over the weekend was a plague house. I managed to get off lightly with a head cold (that still won't bloody go), Delyth was hit by something that sapped all of her energy (she's back to her usual hyperactive self now though) and Elin, having already had the cold, got a 24 hour vomiting bug and was up all Saturday night. Dafydd seems to be the only one not affected by anything, though even he has a cold and pretty liquid nappies yesterday!
So here I am, still feeling crappy but not feeling ill enough to phone in sick without feeling like a fraud.
I had my payslip on Friday too, along with a nice letter explaining that I (meaning the entire workforce) was really, really great and fabulous and great and fantastic and I wouldn't be receiving a loyalty bonus this year but don't worry, because I'm great and fabulous and fantastic and great and also the pay reviews were being pushed back to later next year but on the bright side, I'm great and fabulous and fantastic and everything will be fine as long as we continue making fantastic games.
Given the current economic situation, none of this is a surprise and none of it remotely bothers me, I'm only glad it's not my P45 which is what a lot of people in this industry will be getting for Christmas I think.
I'm really getting into Mass Effect. The whole thing does feel like they wanted to do KOTOR 3 but didn't want to pay for the Star Wars license and that's not a bad thing. It's a fantastic setting and really, quite immersive. I'm considering getting the PC version simply because, the 360 console and the copy of the game I have is on loan from work for a couple of weeks which is not long enough to really complete it. Plus, I really REALLY can't play shooters with a bloody thumbstick. A couple of things have tickled me about the game. I say 'tickled' because whilst I find them a bit daft, I wouldn't say they spoil the game atall. Firstly is the notion that a naval officer and elite galactic warrior would agree to run half way across a space station to talk to NPC x and convince them that NPC y - a complete stranger - really does love them and that they should give them a data disk to prove it, etc etc...
Secondly, I love the idea that one of the crew is hanging around in the vehicle bay of the ship, offering to sell his Captain equipment. They do reference this in-game but the answer and reasoning is far from satisfactory.
Finally, the Mako ATV. Utterly indestructible. Can fall from a great height and crash land without harming itself or it's occupants, can climb virtually vertical surfaces like a spider and come crashing down the other side, taking a hell of a beating without gaining so much as a scratch. Then a couple of blaster bolts knacker it completely.
Then there's the Codex. I managed to heal the Mako once using the Y button. A nice blue bar dropped down to zero and the Mako was mostly fixed. Since then, nothing. Sure it gets healed whilst it's on the Normandy (great name for a ship, btw) but I can't seem to use the Y button to heal it out in the field anymore. Okay, so I refer to my Codex. Pages and pages and pages and pages and PAGES and PAGES of information on politics and species and history and technology and equipment that I don't need to read and probably never will (much as I'd like to), but absolutely nothing on fundamental game mechanics. It's no use, I'm going to have to read the manual :D
I'm losing interest in Heroes series 3. I think a lot of people are. What was initially a fantastic and intriguing show has become a bit of a repetitive slog. I first realised that something was up when, flicking through the TV mag, I noticed that it's episode 7 out of 21 and my immediate, subconscious reaction is, "oh, god! Is that all?". There's a lot to like in series 3, but there's an awful lot more pointless padding. Far too little is happening slowly to far too many characters. I can't help feeling that it'd be much punchier as a 6-episode mini-series or something...
So here I am, still feeling crappy but not feeling ill enough to phone in sick without feeling like a fraud.
I had my payslip on Friday too, along with a nice letter explaining that I (meaning the entire workforce) was really, really great and fabulous and great and fantastic and I wouldn't be receiving a loyalty bonus this year but don't worry, because I'm great and fabulous and fantastic and great and also the pay reviews were being pushed back to later next year but on the bright side, I'm great and fabulous and fantastic and everything will be fine as long as we continue making fantastic games.
Given the current economic situation, none of this is a surprise and none of it remotely bothers me, I'm only glad it's not my P45 which is what a lot of people in this industry will be getting for Christmas I think.
I'm really getting into Mass Effect. The whole thing does feel like they wanted to do KOTOR 3 but didn't want to pay for the Star Wars license and that's not a bad thing. It's a fantastic setting and really, quite immersive. I'm considering getting the PC version simply because, the 360 console and the copy of the game I have is on loan from work for a couple of weeks which is not long enough to really complete it. Plus, I really REALLY can't play shooters with a bloody thumbstick. A couple of things have tickled me about the game. I say 'tickled' because whilst I find them a bit daft, I wouldn't say they spoil the game atall. Firstly is the notion that a naval officer and elite galactic warrior would agree to run half way across a space station to talk to NPC x and convince them that NPC y - a complete stranger - really does love them and that they should give them a data disk to prove it, etc etc...
Secondly, I love the idea that one of the crew is hanging around in the vehicle bay of the ship, offering to sell his Captain equipment. They do reference this in-game but the answer and reasoning is far from satisfactory.
Finally, the Mako ATV. Utterly indestructible. Can fall from a great height and crash land without harming itself or it's occupants, can climb virtually vertical surfaces like a spider and come crashing down the other side, taking a hell of a beating without gaining so much as a scratch. Then a couple of blaster bolts knacker it completely.
Then there's the Codex. I managed to heal the Mako once using the Y button. A nice blue bar dropped down to zero and the Mako was mostly fixed. Since then, nothing. Sure it gets healed whilst it's on the Normandy (great name for a ship, btw) but I can't seem to use the Y button to heal it out in the field anymore. Okay, so I refer to my Codex. Pages and pages and pages and pages and PAGES and PAGES of information on politics and species and history and technology and equipment that I don't need to read and probably never will (much as I'd like to), but absolutely nothing on fundamental game mechanics. It's no use, I'm going to have to read the manual :D
I'm losing interest in Heroes series 3. I think a lot of people are. What was initially a fantastic and intriguing show has become a bit of a repetitive slog. I first realised that something was up when, flicking through the TV mag, I noticed that it's episode 7 out of 21 and my immediate, subconscious reaction is, "oh, god! Is that all?". There's a lot to like in series 3, but there's an awful lot more pointless padding. Far too little is happening slowly to far too many characters. I can't help feeling that it'd be much punchier as a 6-episode mini-series or something...