The Blogtastic Blogfest That Is Getmeoutofthis.net!

First off, in my new world order, all scholars must place their journal articles online, and get their heads out of their asses, which are in the past.

Secondly, man, I’ve been stupid busy, haven’t I? A long time since I posted. Shame on me.

Anyway, what’s been going on? HOMEWORK.

Also, Fable 2.
Now, there’s been some mixed reactions to Fable 2? But my reactions are almost completely favorable. This is a fun game. It’s not the deepest or most complex, but, besides the game ending bugs, I guess, the game is very polished. The world feels very alive, and you can do some neat things. The combat isn’t all that hard, but if you take it as an excuse to make yourself look like a badass, you can have tons and tons of fun with it. It really is quite a bit of fun. I highly recommend it if you like fucking around in an open world and action RPG combat mechanics.
I have some reservations, though. Although I think it’s interesting, what they’re trying to do with the expressions as open-world conversation mechanics, it makes my character seems even more mute than most mute RPG protagonists, which is really kind of frustrating. It also makes it impossible to form any kind of real bond with any character, making the whole marriage and having kids thing kind of… empty. I married a girl into a lesbian marriage, but it’s so empty, really. She gives me items, I give her money and sex. But I don’t really like her. She just is, you know? Compared to how I feel about the puppy, which is by far one of the strongest parts of the game as far as making you care goes, it’s absolutely nothing. I shouldn’t care more about my dog than about my wife, should I? I dunno.

I also finished Forumwarz Episode 2 since last I blogged. It was completely and utterly worth 10 bucks. Seriously. Go play, go enjoy, go invest. The thing that really interested me about the whole experience was the fact that I was actually thinking about the story by the end. I spent a whole night at work thinking about what all the plot twists right at the end of the episode meant and how they were going to affect episode 3. I think that’s really high praise for a vulgar, roughly-humorous game about internet culture parodies, you know?
In any case, I got more gameplay fun out of a lot of, say, XBLA $10 purchases, so go buy it. Yes.
I’ve also been playing my new Camwhore. Man, Camwhores are easy mode, aren’t they? They have serious healing capabilities. It makes fights with them much less healing-item intensive. It’s pretty nice. It’s also nice that they do play a bit differently than Emo Kids. I was kind of worried that everyone would play mostly the same. Certainly makes me want to try a Hacker more, now.

The end, I guess. Time to go relax or some shite.

Happy Secret of Mana Day!

No, wait…

Happy Spend Lots of Money Day!
I spent a whole lot of money today. Would you like to see how? Okay.
Guitar Hero Rechargeable Battery Pack. I was tired of always having to buy batteries for my Wireless guitar when we need to get our Rock Band on. $15.
1000 Wii Points. I needed Secret of Mana on Virtual Console! I’d also like to get World of Goo, but I’m holding off for now. $10.
iPod Touch (2nd Gen 16 Gig Variant). I gave up on searching around town over and over again and just bought it from Amazon. Approximately $300 (!!)
I also went out to eat, but that doesn’t count. I’m also probably going to buy some more Microsoft Funmoney for Rock Band songs tomorrow. (I like the song, not the album, Dr. Feelgood and I want it. So I will have it.) Also, I’m not working much this week. This week is not good on my bank account! But I don’t much care! I’m not going broke, and I’m having fun and getting shit done. What more can I ask for? If I want nifty toys to help me stay stable while I graduate, fuck, I should have them. I deserve them. But still…

Bank Account Gets Wacked!
or some joke like that!

But no, seriously, you know what game is still awesome? Secret of Mana is still awesome. We played for three hours and it did not get bored, though I think Jonathan and I were intimidating Spaeth, since we could play through the beginning of this game in our sleep and he had never played before. We got to the second Mana seed! I’m all excited about playing through it some more. I hope we get to. Either way, it was worth the money to actually get to play one of my favorite games of all time with three players, as it was meant to be played.
The thing that really blows my mind about the game, though, when I actually think about it, is the fact that I have put enough hours into Secret of Mana to have beaten it countless times, and yet I have never beaten it. I always tend to burn out about the time I get Flammie. I really don’t know what it means that I’ve never beat one of my favorite games of all time, but… well, I’m not really too worried about it. I love it. It’s mine. MINE!
Anyway, we’ll see how far the adventures of Kiljoy, Sprite, and Noa get. Either way, I had a really great day. Tomorrow is going to be really quite busy, but after it, I’m pretty well home free for Fall Break, which is exciting. Wish me luck.

You know, I had the idea that, if I ever want to make a “Real blog” (Which means, I guess that this ISN’T a real blog, which is completely wrong. I mean, it’s a Blogtastic Blogfest, right?) where I actually write things people would want to read, I could make a gaming news site, wait for it, that only deals with browser-based games. So I could keep everyone up to date on news with all these browser games I play, and give me an excuse to play so many more of them. Except, you know, I don’t even have time to play what I play now. So… I guess that’s a flaw in the plan. Still, there’s only going to be more and more of these things, and it’s something niche enough that it might get an audience? I dunno. It’s probably a stupid idea.
In any case, though, it’s a new month, and I’ve kind of gotten into the habit of saying what I think about the month’s IoTMs, so I think I’ll do that, and I want to ramble about the latest Forumwarz Ep. 2 announcement as well, so I’ll do that too. But first, IoTMs.

Both of the IoTMs are kind of boring this month? But I picked up both anyway. I’ll start with Twilight Heroes, where the thing on tap is the Letter Shirt. This is a really straightforward piece of equipment, just giving decent bonuses, but that turn length reduction is the main selling point, I think, since it offers a bigger reduction at higher levels than the intensely powerful Xentrium Breastplate. That’s the main reason I got it. So basically, it’s one of those IoTMs that I talk about not normally getting, where it’s just power and no interesting stuff? But it was sort of too powerful to pass up, given that I want to help the game and that my current goal is farming. Just like Wolley’s Index, this is helpful for farming. So I got it.
The thing that really pointlessly excites me about the letter shirt, though, is the “personalized flair.” I mean, it’s really kind of simple and stupid. I can basically put any letter or a question mark on the picture of the letter shirt. People, when they look at my equipment, can see my chosen letter. It’s really simple stuff. Yet, I find it really fun. I like the idea of being able to personalize things, and fiddle with them to entertain me. This being the month after the perfect-for-that Zorromir’s Double Tower Shield, I wasn’t expecting something to throw a little bone to players who like that kind of thing (such as me) any time soon. It just makes me happy that I can pick a letter and come up with some stupid reason why my shirt says that that day. Ryme, if you give a shit about my opinion? More stuff like this, please. It’s just more fun with no gameplay impact, and that’s just fine by me. Still, more than a letter would be nice, though. Heh.

Over in KoL, we have the Disembodied Hand. This is described as the “Mad Hatrack for Weapons” and while it does equip your equipment like the Mad Hatrack, this is a completely different beast. The Mad Hatrack is kind of, in a lot of ways, the ultimate familiar. It becomes just about anything you can ever need ever, and has many great options for various effects that don’t require it to be at full weight. The Disembodied Hand is basically a pumped up attack familiar. It doesn’t do a whole lot more damage, from what I’ve seen, than a normal attack familiar. However, it does give you the effects of any enchantments on the weapon you give it. That’s the real benefit there, not being a really good familiar. Even that is kind of a situational benefit, though. There aren’t a lot of weapon enchantments worth giving up your familiar for. Still, if you were wanting extra damage, this is probably your best bet right now. And there are some neat things you can do with, say, giving it a Witty Rapier at the beginning of a run, since the hand can equip any weapon regardless of stat requirement. Or maybe something like the Club of the Five Seasons or an Immense Cyborg Hand to really crazily increase your damage at the early levels to make battles even more easy peasy and let you run more +Monster Level? Or you could, say, give it a Haiku Katana or a Bottle Rocket Crossbow if you have a ton of extra money or IoTMs on hand to get extra uses for those skills every battle? I mean, there are uses. I don’t know if there are any game-breaking uses? But it’s not useless, and it’s going to be a fun time when I do my 100% run. Still, I mean, I couldn’t recommend this to like… everyone? It’s not a perfect familiar. But it’s nice.

Okay, so, now that those IoTMs are out of the way, let’s talk Forumwarz. I got two things to say. Thing one is that I wish this poster was something I could use. I mean, I don’t feel like I have use for a poster? But I think that’s pretty completely in every way great. But that’s not really game-related. Just wanted to say it.
The Trout that is Evil posted an update on their little dev blog about the last unannounced feature in Forumwarz Episode 2. That feature is, basically, adding loot drops. I mentioned earlier how it was sort of a disadvantage to the game that they don’t have any loot in a more “active in the game” sense in previous stupid blog post. (I’m even going to link it, like you care to go back and check) This really seems to be a great and potentially hilarious vector for that sort of thing. Having to collect the equivalent of those stupid broken-into-chunks .rar files is a great idea, and the whole “oppressive DRM” concept for explaining why you can’t make infinite copies of them is also a relevant and functional narrative justification. Plus, you know, they’re a vector for serious internet humor. I fully trust these guys to write hilarious shit, find and make awesome image macros, disturbing videos, and sound clips, and who knows what to find. Plus, since you can equip them, I am hoping that they affect your attack messages in combat, making that whole “none of the items really do entertaining things in combat” complaint I had in that last blog post disappear.
Anyway, I already pre-ordered Episode 2 (How can I pass up free lengthening of my E-Peen for something I know I’m going to buy anyway?) and I really can’t wait for it to hit. All of these tweaks to the formula just seem like exactly what they needed to make an even more well-rounded experience out of what was already a pretty damn good experience. I really can’t wait.
I just hope I come up with the time to actually play through it. Damn.

When I play an RPG or game that has the almost becoming cliché little slider of good to evil, I am almost always a complete goodie two shoes or whatever the current term for that might be. I try to answer as I would actually answer, and that normally involves being, well, as nice as possible to those I’m trying to get help from and those who are watching my back in battle. It’s almost a rule for me to do so in these games.
I’ve made my first exception to that rule, and that exception is Sonic Chronicles. The dialog is, you know… it’s like talking with Sonic’s million and a half friends. I mean, I freely admit I am a furry, but “furry” and “Sonic fan” does not have to overlap, and I am not a Sonic fan. I don’t really care about all of these characters besides, I dunno, wanting to pick the ones I think look cute or whatever. I am not the person the Codex (!!) in the game was made for, a encyclopedia of Sonic lore like in Mass Effect. (No, seriously, the fact that this exists still blows. my. mind.) I don’t give a shit about these characters.
That’s why it’s so great that the game does what it does. Any time I am talking to the character, you have basically four options. Two are the ones I would use most often in any other RPG. You can be supportive and helpful, or you can ask for more information. The other two are one of the reasons why this game is really quite great, even if you aren’t a Sonic fangirl or boy. There is always a “Yeah, yeah, let’s just do it” option to end conversations as quickly as possible, if you don’t want to deal with them at all. Then, finally, there’s the “Sonic is a narcissistic asshole” option, in which you can basically insult every character you come across in the game. Don’t like Amy Rose? Constantly taunt her about the latest lame thing she says. Don’t like Knuckles? Constantly point out how useless he is at his job. Now, I’m early on in the game, so don’t quote me on this, but it really seems like these decisions don’t affect the game much at all. You can mostly just pick them to make yourself happy and have fun. And it’s really great. It was a damn great decision for people who might pick this game up out of loyalty to Bioware and not because they have any sort of affinity or love for it.

The gameplay itself is fairly solid too. It’s a bit Mario RPG mixed with Osu! Tatake! Ouendan! style mini-challenges to hit special moves and dodge enemy attacks. You really have to pay attention. There is also an element of, get this, Skies of Arcadia in it. Your party has very small amounts of PP to use special attacks, and you can’t get by some enemies without using them. You defend to regenerate these points for more attacks, much like how you would charge over and over and then spam attacks in Skies of Arcadia. Well, when I played it, anyway. The overworld exploration is… okay? I wish I could use the D-pad to move as well as the stylus. It doesn’t work as well as, say, Phantom Hourglass. But it works. It’s also kind of odd how… weirdly janky the graphics can look at times, but I’m not one to hold that against a game when it’s not horrible enough to make your eyes bleed. There’s just some out of place pixelation at times.

Anyway, those are my first impressions. Aren’t you impressed?

So apparently, when you get busy, you don’t really blog much. Huh.

No, seriously, I feel like I’ve been so fucking busy… I’m handling it alright. I will continue to handle it alright. But bleh. The last thing I feel like doing is so many things that I feel like I should be doing. It’s enough to keep up with homework and whatnot.

Anyway, let’s catch up, shall we?

Rock Band 2: It’s more Rock Band. The end.
Well, okay, I can write more, but that’s basically it. All the little tweaks were very welcome. I’m all for the lowering of the vocal difficulty, because I can now always play expert without it being completely un-fun. The Rock Band 2 track list also has some great stuff, as well as some horrible stuff. It’s much more hit and miss than the first one? But the hits are so great, I don’t care too much. Anyway, it’s still completely fucking fun times. Seriously.
I’m also glad I got off my ass and got a replacement drum set on the way again. The blue pad is completely broken on mine, and apparently they’re ending their super nice and actually useful customer support at the end of the month, so… best get fresh stuff while I can, eh?

Dragon Quest IV: It’s really good Dragon Quest.
Maybe it’s just that I never really gave a more “modern” Dragon Quest a try (the most I ever did was try to play the GBC remake of III and found that the game thought I was lonely) but I am finding the game completely fantastic. Yes, it’s kind of simplistic, but it’s really more… minimalist. It gives you the bare minimum of everything you need to get the story, to figure out what you’re supposed to do… I haven’t yet really felt lost. If I don’t know what to do, I just talk to everyone, and they’ll tell me a place I should go look at, and I’ll go look at it, or whatever. Anyway, it’s really neat. You should play it. It’s what I’m going to do after I’m done writing this update.

Let’s see, what other games… well, I beat Strongbadia: The Free, the second Strong Bad Cool Game For Attractive Parsons episode. It was even better than the first. Funny, with some interesting little fun puzzles… I was completely entertained. It made great use of the entire cast, as well, which didn’t happen quite as well in the first. The next one is going to be band-themed, apparently. I can’t wait. It’ll be sweet.

Other than that, it’s just been fucking constant busy-ness, you know? I’ve been doing more interesting things in my internship at least… she started giving me computer editing, layout, etc type tasks, and asked if I liked those, and I’m like “hell yes, I’ve been doing this stuff forever, I’m good at it, and I like it.” So hopefully I’ll get to keep doing similar stuff. And my classes are… classes… the most exciting thing that’s happened in them is that I’ve worked ahead on my creative stuff, and wrote a short story and a fairly solid prose poem, both of which I think are pretty decent and I can’t wait to get workshopped. So that’s good. It’s always good to be doing creative things.

But yeah, life is busy and boring. And boring. And busy. Bleh.

So the Rei who Beats All (listen to him on the latest Retronauts! He’s the guy you don’t know.) slipped me a free code for Fable II Pub Games, since, you know, he was giving them out and I’m like, well, okay, sure I’ll try it.
I’m having so much fun with it.
It makes me question what’s wrong with me.

I mean, okay, I understand that gambling is exciting. I mean, just think of how much money casinos must make in a day. It’s mind-boggling. I get that people like gambling. I never expected me to like gambling so much. I mean, I don’t know… I don’t like Poker or anything like that… Blackjack is interesting for like… 5 minutes… and yet this game, which consists of a slot machine, a press-your-luck card game, and a weird combination of roulette and craps, is completely enthralling me. I keep poking at it, trying to figure out how to play well. I’ve learned enough to have actually gained gold above the initial stake the game gives you.
But I mean, I played a Slot Machine tournament, for fuck’s sake. A game that literally consists of me pressing A 100 times, and then it tells me if I won or not. And it was entertaining. I won a unique Fable 2 item! It was an Apple Pie. I can now eat an Apple Pie, apparently.
I think the game must be hitting a sweet spot with me. I would never spend my actual money gambling.  It’s very easy to talk myself out of it by looking at my money and saying “You can buy a game with that” or whatever. I never play gambling minigames in video games, either, because it makes me worry I’ll have to go grind for more money, and I don’t want to do that. This hits a sweet spot. I don’t have to grind for money. Hell, I don’t have any money to risk, really. At the same time, there is something to gain by playing in a game I will probably end up buying. The rewards are obvious, and the risk non-existent… and I can play.
My favorite game, by far, is Keystone, the Roulette/Craps variant. “But wait!” you say, “Fortune’s Tower involves cards!” I know! It’s weird to me, too. But Keystone is just so much fun. Fuck if I know why. I just place random 1:1 bets every throw and see what happens. But I really enjoy it.

Gah, seriously. I just feels so wrong to be having so much fun with it. I don’t get it. I don’t!

In other news, fuck but my right foot and knee hurt.

So, uh… does anyone know what time it is?
Gods, I love my job.

Anyway, I’ve been feeling like shit! Yaaaaay! But I’ve been getting my stuff done. So that’s good. Also, it’s new IoTM time, I suppose. Let’s take a look at them…

In Twilight Heroes, we have a three-piece equipment set! I have the whole set, but I’ll be honest, the only piece that really thrills me is Zorromir’s Double Tower Shield, since the Battlecry ability is just plain fun. Basically, I get to make up any battlecry I want for my character to shout when I charge into battle. Right now, my battlecry is “I’m in a murderous rage, apparently!” The overall set bonus might be worth it, too, if I was actually fighting hard enemies, but I dunno. I’m not the kind of person who knows such things. I’m pretty happy with the battlecry, though. I’ll probably pick up another shield for later resale, to earn more stars and spread the battlecry love, but not the rest of the set.

In Kingdom of Loathing fronts, we have the Haiku Katana. This thing is pretty sweet. I mean, I don’t guess it’s bleeding edge? But if there’s one thing I prioritize, it’s healing, and thus I love the Spring Raindrop Attack. Haiku State of Mind is also just a complete and utter lot of fun. Since I buy things for fun more than for utility, this was kind of an instant no-brainer, thanks to that. The thing I wasn’t expecting was how good the just base enchantments on it are. I’m in a Pastamancer run right now, but since I’ve picked this thing up, I’ve basically be able to run as a muscle class, with its bonus combined with my stainless steel skullcap. I don’t know if it’ll keep up to the higher levels, but if nothing else I’m sure I’ll pull and use this sword whenever I’m grinding for stuff, to create MP for buffs and shit, and I’ll probably be dual wielding this and the origami riding crop during low-levels of a muscle class run. I kinda wish that would make sleazy haiku, though. Heh.

Anyway, I’m tired. I need this semester to be over. Wait, what? What’s that you say? It’s the second week? Ah hah hah hah hah!

Today, I filled out my graduation application…
…incorrectly.
Seriously, there are like 4 things to write on the form, and I screwed up one of them. Sigh. Oh well, I’ll go fix it tomorrow. I’m sure it won’t be any kind of issue. But still, man… so close to graduation. Crazy. Shit. I’m making myself all worried about it.

But seriously, let’s talk about serious things. Like how I’m replaying Earthbound.
Hey, did you know I’m replaying Earthbound? It’s true. I haven’t replayed Earthbound since my “I have to get the Sword of Kings” playthrough where I didn’t get the Sword of Kings. Every time I’ve tried since then, I burn out around Threed, or maybe Fourside. But this time, I’m at Scaraba, and I am having a blast. Why am I being so successful?
1) Talking TIme gave me tips to make the game a hell of a lot easier and less grindy.
2) I discovered the Slime Generator. Holy. Crap. What was wrong with me, not using this before? It, by itself, lets me complete battles without taking damage. It’s amazing. Makes me wonder what else I’m missing in this game.
3) I’m, um, playing it on my PSP, so I can play in bed and at my computer and all over the place easily.
Those are my secrets to success. Yay! But seriously, Earthbound is such a fucking clever game. The only way this replay could be better would be if I could roll it directly into Mother 3.

I also played through Strong Bad’s Cool Game For Attractive People: Episode 1: Homestar Ruiner today. And it was FANTASTIC. Exactly what you think of when you think of a Telltale game made by the Homestar Runner people. It comes fully recommended if you like Homestar Runner and thought the Sam and Max episodes were pretty neat.

It strikes me that I’ve done nothing really impressive this summer… but you know what? That’s okay. I’ve been having a pretty darn good time. I should enjoy it while it lasts. So much about all this I’m going to miss when I finally get to move on, you know? I need to move on… but I’ve always disliked change… and I’m always going to be sentimental…
But eh, who knows what the future brings, right?
Who knows.

Let’s start with IoTMs, shall we? First off, the KoL item, the Cotton Candy Carnie. Now, when I read what this did, Potato + Whelp, I was very excited just by that! Could it be? My two favorite familiar effects in one? There was no hesitation snapping it up. I was kinda sad when it was a Carnie, though. It makes sense, however. I just finished a run and started a 100% Hardcore Disco Bandit (For Advanced Cocktailcrafting) with him, and already I think he could easily be one of my favorite familiars. He potatoes, as advertised. He gives HP and MP at the end of battle, Whelp-style, as advertised. However, when you’re mostly full on HP and MP, he instead gives you healing items to use later, which is an awesome little tweak to make him even more awesome. He’s currently named Homespun, but I’m looking for a better name… it is kinda growing on me, though… anyway, I’m real excited to see how he plays out over the course of this run. I’m also looking forward to hopefully having a few less turns to play this run, due to the Hardcore nature. I’m feeling kinda burnt out, especially since I want to play Digital Devil Saga (which I’ll get to later).
I also want to make a quick note about my 100% Star Starfish run I just finished. I see why he’s one of the best non-IoTM familiars. I was overflowing with MP the whole run.

Over in Twilight Heroes, the IoTM is Wolly’s Index. This is… not a very exciting IoTM. No in-game content, just a really powerful effect. I normally pass up IoTMs like this, because I’m not interested in pure power. However, I picked this one up. Why? Well, because I have, over the past months, become a dedicated farmer. If that’s really what I’m going to do until new content hits, I might as well work to be the best at it I possibly can be. And that means picking up all relevant farming gear. +20% Item Drops is insanely relevant, since the highest accessory other than it is only +10%. (Well, and the Hero’s Cape, but me getting one of those isn’t happening, unless I can go back in time and convince earlier me to buy one.) So I picked one up, and I’m going to do my best to get one for investment, too, cause it will eventually be in high demand. I’m also kind of pleased that this sort of… well, I might be reading too much into it, but this sort of suggests that Ryme is dedicated to giving a Hero’s Cape equivalent to the playerbase every year (Well, with weaker effects than the MP regen, but that’s perfectly fine) which I kinda agree with. (though I was admittedly hoping for a permanent cape-type something in the Wok of Stars. Everyone wants a cape, right? Even if it’s not as badass as the Hero’s Cape?) It gives two benefits, one being that the Hero’s Cape is, by far, the most powerful IoTM, and it keeps everyone on a near level playing field while not forcing him to come up with something else that might surpass it. The other is that it had to be crazy easy on Ryme to make this IoTM. Especially after all the programming that had to be done on the plaid couch, I’m glad he could take a break and still please people. I think 1 month of break out of the year is a good idea. Don’t want him getting burned out!

So I’ve been playing Digital Devil Saga, since I picked it up from Rei since he’s, I dunno, liquidating everything he owns to get to PAX. Talking Time and Persona 3 also have gotten me all… in love with MegaTen, so I’m kinda slowly but surely picking up what I missed during the PS2 era. This game is a decent bit different from other MegaTen games, because there’s no recruiting demons and fusing them. Instead, each character is a demon, and then can take on “Mantras,” which correspond to various easily recognizable MegaTen demons stuff, and teach them their skills. Then each character has a growing number of slots to equip moves, and passive bonuses, and stuff that they learn from these Mantras Final Fantasy Fiveishly. (Though instead of equipping two categories of movies, you equip a certain number of moves total) It’s been a lot of fun, and I’ve been enjoying it, and am going to play more of it after I finish this long overdue huge-ass blogpost. I hope I beat it. It seems shorter than other games in the series (which I consider a benefit) which seems to be because there’s a “Digital Devil Saga Part 2” out there, which I may pick up if I beat this one. Anyway, it’s something to keep me happily distracted until the more awesome DS games come out in September. This and the upcoming cornucopia of awesome XBLA releases should keep me happy.

So Talking Time was talking about this anime called Xam’d: Lost Memories. They then linked to the opening, which I watched. The music was awesome and it looked interesting! So I grabbed the first couple of episodes and tried them… and really didn’t like it. But man, that song was awesome. So I looked up the band, which is called Boom Boom Satellites. They’re a JRock band with one album, and honestly, the whole thing is listen-able to me, which is very rare. There’s much better music out there? They’re not going to become one of my favorite bands? But they’re pretty good. Feel free to try them.

Last night, we had out first session of Essner’s campaign. Impressions! He did quite well for his first time, I think. HIs encounters were a little weak, but I think everyone but Jonathan wasn’t expecting “Sten the Potent” to fucking murder everyone with his trusty knife, The Stabernackle, quite as much as he did. I enjoyed playing Warlord, as I expected. It’s a pretty great class! Commander’s Strike is just a lot of fun, and I still get to heal with Inspiring Word (and now, Aid the Injured, my level 2 Utility power) and… yeah. I really like the class. I think we are going to have a crazy amount of healing, though, since Spaeth is making a Healing-focued Pally while multi-classing Cleric. If I had to make some comments, I’d make the comment that Essner was railroading us quite a bit. Do I do that? I don’t know. I try to come up with situations where they can’t help but get into my battles, but I don’t like… tell them to do this or that… but who knows, I probably do. I felt very railroaded. It didn’t really impact the fun for me, though, until he didn’t let Rachael yell at the asshole at the end and give her a piece of her mind… but eh, even then it wasn’t too much of a big deal, and I can only assume he’ll take what he learned into his next session. I’m eager to play again. Of course, that means I need to do more scheduling. Ugh. Worst part of this, let me tell you.

Before the DnD session the other day, though, we went to Champions Games, (Man, I think that’s the name. I’m doubting myself now. Something like that.) the game store run by a cool guy I used to work with named Shane. I really hope he manages to make the store work, cause it’s much closer to what a game store should be than the bleh places that always fail around here… but Cape is just incapable of keeping a game store going, so who knows. But we went in there and bought more little DnD miniatures, because they’re pretty neat and because I’m much more comfortable getting them in the little theme bags for decent prices he has them in. I got a bag of Soldiers, mostly because there were these two bad-ass guys with tower shields, and this long-haired maybe -female letting out a battle cry and holding a flag, which I thought was very badass, and I wanted to represent Rachael Sparklewhisper. I also got the bag of Lycanthropes for Essner. Essner got a random box (cause he’s weird and likes random better. There were a ton of miniatures in the box! But it cost more than my two focused bags of stuff, so I’m not planning on ever getting one) and a bag of goblins, cause we fought some goblins last night and wanted them to use. Anyway, they’re all cool, but I do think we’re quickly approaching the like… threshold of how many we’d ever need. Which makes me wonder what I’d buy when I go in there after that. Cause I want to buy things and help Shane out, but if I don’t need anything? Who knows.
Anyway, while I was there, he had all these little sheets to preorder various roleplaying books that were coming out, and I noticed a DnD 4th Edition supplement I didn’t know was coming, which is Martial Power. More ability, feat, and path options? Yes please. I might actually physically pick up a copy of that. (Whereas some other supplements coming I am interested in, but will probably use various… dishonest methods to acquire, such as this upcoming Adventurer’s Vault.) That makes, um, two DnD books I see me buying in the future (The other being the Player’s Handbook 2, for all the other classes, such as Bard, which I want… though I don’t see it on the 2008 release list, which annoys me. Oh well, it says March. Maybe for my birthday) along with the screen thingy, cause it’s not too expensive and I’d rather look at helpful information instead of Dragon Strike information (we’ve been using the Dragon Strike screen. Heh.)

I continue to have strong urges to buy expensive electronics. I was thinking about getting an iPod Touch for awhile, and now I’m all serious about buying an MSI Wind. Mmm… I should probably resist, but… it’s been awhile since I bought a new toy like that. Hmmm… eh, I’ll probably keep resisting. Who knows.

Whew, that was a fucking long one, wasn’t it? And now I’m done, and can play Digital Devil Saga. Huzzah!

So. The Electronic Three. The EEE. The E3. It was so not exciting! Well, I mean, I’m glad I don’t have to pony up for a PS3 to play FFXIII, but it was mostly not exciting. What was exciting, though, was watching all the big press conferences with all my Talking Time… I was going to say friends, and then I was going to switch to peeps, but that’s lame… so friends. My Talking Time friends. A chat room was made, and it was enjoyable making jokes at all the marketing speak and such going on. I had a good time. Nothing really earth-shattering was shown in these presentations. The big notes are like… Rhythm Heaven on DS this year? OMG. And, like, the FFXIII thing, I mean, I don’t really know. Nothing big was announced. I mean, I will probably get the Wii Animal Crossing, but everyone could guess that was coming and I knew I’d get it. I’m not looking forward to typing letters with the Wiimote, though. It might be faster to point at the screen? But it is a pain. In. the. ass, and I hate it.
Anyway: E3? Uneventful. You heard it here last, folks.

Anyway, the thing I really wanted to talk about, though, was how well my recent game purchases have been working out. Civ:Rev and Chocobo Dungeon are both not games I can play for huge periods of time straight. I can only dungeon dive about 3 to 4 times before I want to do something else, and playing more than 1 game of Civ:Rev just sounds crazy. Still, I was worried about having two new games in the house at the same time, thinking that one would fall to the wayside. That hasn’t been the case, though! I find once I tire of one, next time I want to game, I play the other, and then back again. It’s working out well. Good for me!
They’re both pretty good games, though I could recommend Chocobo Dungeon better if it was 30 bucks, but apparently a DS remake was announced the day after I bought the game? So that would be that OH WAIT SQUENIX TAX. Still, it’s a fun Mystery Dungeon game with the jobs. I just unlocked Scholar, which I am told is “easy mode.” That’s good. I like easy mode. That’s why I like Pokemon Dungeon more than Shiren. That, and because I have a high threshold for still liking and putting up with extremely kiddy games.
Civ:Rev I probably couldn’t recommend on the consoles for $60 bucks, even if you want a dumbed down Civ experience. Knowing you can get so much more and just set it to easy in Civ4 on the PC for the same price just makes me hesitant to recommend it. But on the DS? It’s pretty darn great. Good price, same gameplay… not having a minimap is completely stupid, but otherwise the game is spot-on. If you want an on-the-go Civ, I wouldn’t hesitate.

But yeah, so… that’s what’s been going on! Shocking, I know. Hopefully we’ll be playing DnD again this weekend, which means I should probably put the finishing touches on my notes soon… we’ll see… Also, you know… Dark Knight. It should be a good, if lacking work and thus funds, rest of the week. I think I’ll get to that rest of the week now.