*mALX secretly fills her coal hods from Decrepit's bank stores, and lines her cooler with his snowballs*


http://i.imgur.com/vcvddlP.jpg

In Minecraftia, my avatar did no construction beyond minor lighting improvement experiments on the Plateau's underdeveloped west end. Much of what he did will likely be altered if and when that area becomes more defined.

He went on several length branch-mining expeditions, none of which unearthed a single diamond. During the last he dug into one of those abandoned mineshaft complexes that never seem to end. At that point he ceased mining and went exploring. He did well enough for some time, torching innumerable shafts. I was fairly worn out when out of the darkness SPLAT, he was hit by a thrown Potion of Slowness. Not seeing the witch, and knowing a Potion of Poison was likely to follow, he beat a hasty retreat and decided to explore a different section of the mines. He'd not gone far when he got jumped and poisoned by a cave spider. Being near a cave spider nest was more than I was willing to cope with. He retreated once again and decided to call it quits, working his way first to the less stressful self-dug branch-mines and then home.

Nice pics, Decrepit


How kind of ye to drop in and give us the 411 of what´s happening in your gaming life

I'm playing the Star Wars Battlefront beta. It's ok. Looks pretty. Not sure they should be calling it a beta since the game is released really soon. More like a demo. Content-wise, it's more like an alpha. Alpha demo?

Very very basic, even for an FPS game. Nothing like the original Battlefront games at all - no classes, no AI support troops, no bases to spawn at. If you've played a Battlefield game before, then this is like a simplistic version of that.

Everyone has near identical weapons, all shooting red lasers. You don't even need to reload, there's just a cooldown if you shoot too many consecutive shots. You can usually manage to kill one or two people before having to wait a few seconds.

The full game is definitely not worth the £50 asking price, especially since they said the single player campaign was an afterthought.

If I've said it once I've said it 1,000 times - they'd have been better off doing a HD re-release of Battlefront 2.

I remember back when it was first announced, there was some discussion about it over at Bethsoft. Some people were so optimistic, arguing with everyone predicting a re-skinned Battlefield game.

Personally I always preferred Battlefront to Battlefront 2. Battlefront 2 felt too player centric. And I was never much of a fan of the starship combat and the like, just felt so inferior to Rogue Squadron. It reminded me of the lousy on-foot sections they added into Rogue Squadron 3: Rebel Strike.

Playing Middle Earth: Shadow of Mordor. Played it on the 360 when it came out last year, just picked up the GOTY edition for Xbox One over the weekend.

Absolutely love it. Great visuals, great gameplay, just challenging enough to keep things interesting without getting boring. Been playing for 11 hours and I've only done 2 story missions - there's just so much to do!

After reading McB's ravings about it, I noticed that the Assassin's Creed franchise is on sale at Steam. I bought and downloaded the first AC. I recall getting it for the XBox a number of years back, and being so disappointed that it had no subtitles, so I had no idea what was being said.

But at this price, I figured, what the hell.

It's not properly a PC game, but rather an XBox game (or PS3, or whatever console you're on). Other than that, it's pretty good. I found the horses rather crappy to look at, but the animation is spot on, and they are like big puppy dogs!

I know it's a penis game, but I really don't have an issue with that. I can play it either way.

Tribes: Ascend

Oh Akatosh, it's so good. It also has a massive learning curve, so it's masochistically good.

Seriously, get this game. It's free and on Steam.

I started watching The Clone Wars again a few days ago. So now I am in a Star Wars mood. I tried installing KOTOR 1, but I am getting a CRC error. I went to Gog and found KOTOR 1 & 2 for $19 US. Now I am downloading them both.

I thought about the updated version of KOTOR 2 that Steam has. But the only thing that really interests me in it is the up to 5k resolution that is built in. But that does not make up for having to use Steam. I will just look for HD and Widescreen mods. If there are none, no big deal.

Got both working in 1920 x 1080. I had to use Flawless Widescreen with Kotor 1. You have to run it first, and select the Kotor profile. With it still running, start Kotor 1 itself and go to the graphics options to set the resolution there. 1920 x 1080 won't be there the first time you try. But change the resolution to something anyway. Exit the game, restart it, and 1920 x 1080 should be there the second time. If not, go for a third time. Sadly, you have to do this every time you play the game.

With Kotor 2 I found some fixes that seem to work without having to resort to Flawless Widescreen. Here is what I did:
Start the game and set it to the highest resolution available.

Exit game.

Run the Universal Widescreen Patcher. Select the Kotor2 profile, and where the game is on the computer, and put in the resolution you want (1920 x 1080).

Go to your Kotor 2 folder and open swkotor2.ini file.

Find the two lines for Height and Width and change them to 1080 and 1920 respectively.

Copy the Widescreen UI Fix to the Kotor2\Override folder.

Done!

I´m also a bit in Star Wars mood now and I reckon I´ll soon fire up Rebellion again!

I am continuing my Star Wars games extravaganza. I dug out my old copy of Jedi Knight: Dark Forces 2. But I could not get it working. So I bought a new copy from Gog.com. I did get my old discs for Jedi Knight 2 working. While I was at Gog, I also downloaded Jedi Academy.

I even have a copy of Republic Commando that a friend gave me ages ago that I installed. I never really played it much, and after reinstalling it and trying it out, I remembered why! It seems like a pretty mindless shooter, even compared to the Jedi Knight games, which are just basic FPS's with lightsabers and force powers tossed in.

So for past few days I have been alternating between playing Kylie Katarn in Jedi Knight 1, and Arianrhod in Kotor 1.

Republic Commando was pretty much just a mindless shooter, but it was super fun since you were a clone trooper and there was little to no jedi shenanigans going on. Droids are pretty scary when you actually have to go toe-to-toe with them.

Also in a Star Wars mood, I tried to play a bit of The Old Republic. Unfortunately my internet is terrible and I was lagging quite a bit so I got frustrated and logged out. I really enjoy the game, the dialogue is classic Bioware and works really well. Looks like my Sith will have to sit around a while longer until I get a better internet connection.

Arianhod's screen seems to be a lot clearer; but not sure if that is my eyesight or the graphics in Kylie Katarn's shot, lol. The blue face looks really interesting, what is that about?

Because of SubRosa I have fired up yet another session of Star Wars: Rebellion. Naturally I´m on the Alliance side

The Kylie Katarn pic is from Jedi Knight 1, which is about six years older than KOTOR. So the graphics are much inferior. I am using a mod to play a Twi'elk in KOTOR. They are in the game as NPCs, but you cannot play as any alien race. The mod uses the same models and textures from the game to make it a playable race.


You rebel scum!

It has mods? I think my son had it on his 360 (? Not sure if it is the same one), so never knew it could be modded. I love the idea of playing blue-faced though, lol.

Kotor 1 and 2 have tons of mods. Jedi Knight does not have very many though, except for skins for multiplayer.

I was digging in his room to see if I could find out which of the games he had; but ... dear gods what a mess he has in there! I don't know how he finds anything! I gave up looking, ran out of there like a rat jumping off a sinking ship! Never go back ... NEVAH !!!!

In Minecraftia, my avatar completed only one significant building project at the fortress . . . a one-stall donkey/mule stable with attached tiny corral across from the horse stable near the ascending ramp to the Upper Plateau. It is for the moment unoccupied, we not having found any donkeys in the wilds that can be safely brought home. The horse stable was also graced with an attached corral of more generous proportions.

An attempt was made to bring more sophisticated lighting to the northwest end of the Plateau. Results are tentative at best and will likely undergo at least minor modification as that area because more developed. At present it houses our sole Cocoa Bean farm, the entrance to a minuscule underground mushroom farm, and auxiliary crop fields. The Plateau's southwest end is its sole surviving totally undeveloped area, looking much as it did when the world was new 27 Feb 2012.

My avatar returned to his 'new resource' branch mines some 2,100 blocks from home. He erected a Nether Portal there, entered the Nether, then dug an underground passage from the new Portal to the one linking to the Hill Fort. The distance between those two Portals in roughly 200 blocks!!!, making a journey to the new branch mines a far less taxing endeavor.

No particular point this image of the Lower Terrace timber farm complex except to show off SEUS shaders during inclement weather.


In the kingdom of Daggerfall my avatar had a number of adventures detailed in the appropriate forum.

These are really nice, Decrepit! Especially that last one, it even has ambiance!

Has anyone ever played Age of Decadence? Gog has it for $30 US, and it looks interesting.

Not me, but my game budget is spent for the year on the PC, Fallout 4 and ESO; (so not tempting myself by looking it up, lol).

I have the money. But I am kind of booked up with games right now with Persephone in Skyrim, and all my old Star Wars games. But it I have put it on my list of games to try out some day, along with Sword Coast Legends, the two Shelter games, Satellite Reign, and the Shadowrun games. Fallout 4 is coming soon too, but I don't plan on buying that right away. I'll let it sit out in the sun and simmer for a while before I try it (and let them fix the bugs like Deathclaws flying backwards). The same as I did with Skyrim. There are so many games, and no time to play them all!

I've been feeling that same thing. I've never played NV on the PC yet, really wanting to try it before Fallout 4 comes out. And since it came out, I always want to play Fallout 3, lol. I love it as much as I loved Oblivion. And I'm really into ESO; there is too much to do in it for it to ever get boring. So I'm kind of choked up with games I am dying to play at the moment, and that doesn't even include wanting to mod in Skyrim and Fallout 3.

It is like there is too little time and too much to do.

Glad I'm not the only one being swamped by games. Assassins Creed Syndicate out today, Halo 5 next week, Fallout 4 shortly after that, ESO Orsinium expansion on the way and I STILL have plenty to do in there anyway. Phew.

Currently balancing my time between ESO and Dynasty Warriors 8 Empires. Love the Dynasty Warriors games, and this one doesn't have an English dub to cringe at so it's even better!

So I've been playing Assassins Creed: Syndicate. It's not bad. Better than Unity.

Set in Victorian London, you play as Jacob and Evie Frye, twin assassins who are trying to take London back from the oppressive Templars.

You can switch between each character at will, and both have their own characteristics and unique style. Jacob is better at straight up fights and taking damage whilst Evie is more stealth-focused. Outside of gameplay, each character brings their own style to the story, with Jacob being more carefree whilst Evie is a much more tactical thinker. Personally I prefer Evie - her combat style is my favourite and I like her more as a general character too.

Both characters have a separate skill tree, but share items such as crafted weapons and gadgets. There are a ton of weapons and outfits to craft and discover, which adds a nice touch of customization.

The game has been good so far. Not as good as other AC titles, but that's to be expected when they bring out a new game every year. The missions are fun, but it's the setting that really shines through. They've done a great job of recreating London, which isn't surprising since most of the buildings in the game are still in use today.

There are also lots of historical folks wandering around too. So far I've met Charles Dickens, Alexander Graham Bell, and Charles Darwin. Can't go two feet without bumping into someone important, it would seem.

I love games based in ye olde England of yesteryore....


That´s why I enjoy DarkChiron´s LP of Sherlock Holmes - The Awakening. I don´t like the Cthulu parts but I love the early episodes where it´s all in old London

How does the Save system work? Can you save anywhere at anytime? Or is it the usual console system of only being able to save and load games at certain points?

There's no option to save or load your game manually. It autosaves whenever you pick up an item or resources, craft or upgrade something, when you fast travel, and when you advance in or complete a quest. When you boot up the game it picks up right where you left off.

Haven't quite finished AC:S yet, but I've put it on hold to play Halo 5: Guardians.


I love the Halo games, and Halo 5 is superb so far.

I can't say much about the story without spoiling stuff, but the gist is that Master Chief and Blue Team (fellow generation 2 SPARTANs) have gone rogue, and Spartan Jameson Locke and Osiris Squad (Gen 4 SPARTANs) are sent to bring him in. Things aren't all black and white of course, and there are other things going on.

Visually, it's absolutely gorgeous. The details on each character and item are great, and the landscapes and vistas are unbelievable. The cutscenes are breathtaking. 343 is doing a fabulous job of continuing Bungie's visual style.

The characters are all interesting, with some new faces mixed in with the familiar. The members of Chief's Blue Team will be recognizable to anyone who has read into the Halo lore, and the game does a good job of explaining who they are without breaking the pace.

Gameplay wise, it's slightly different from the classic Halo experience. First of all, you play as two different characters (similar to what Halo 2 did). You play as Master Chief and Blue Team, or Locke and Osiris Squad. This allows you to get both sides of the story as it unfolds. The NPC squadmates are really helpful in combat, and will follow your lead rather than charging in blindly.

The combat is much more modern than previous installments, with more movement and verticality to the levels rather than straight up shooting. You can just charge in if you want, but there are plenty of other options with higher ground and flanking areas. The gunplay is snappier and the combat moves along at a good pace, which is an improvement on Halo 4 where you often found yourself bogged down with enemies for ages.

The enemies themselves are nice and varied, especially the Prometheans. The game makes you think and actively engage your foes rather than emptying endless assault rifle clips into them. It's very satisfying.


Haven't tried multiplayer yet, but I'm looking forward to it.

Master Chief!!!


http://hdwallpapersfit.com/wp-content/uplo...papers-free.jpg

These are my favorite Master Chiefs!

That´s.... like Godzilla with two squirt guns. Couldn´t they have given him real guns?

I've been playing the Halo 5 multiplayer today, and as expected it's a lot of fun.

There are two parts to it - Arena and Warzone.

Arena is the more classic Halo style games such as Slayer and SWAT. It works really well and they've done a good job with balancing the matchmaking. After playing 10 games in a playlist you get a 'Playlist Rank' and afterwards you'll be put into matches with players of the same rank. From lowest to highest it goes Bronze, Silver, Gold, Platinum, Diamond, Onyx, Champion. For example, I'm at Onyx rank in the SWAT playlist, so I'll only be up against other Onyx rank players in the future. Your rank will change to reflect your skill, so if you keep getting better then your rank will go up, but if you keep losing it might drop.

Warzone is the new game mode, and one I'm very much enjoying. Two teams of 12 players, supported by AI troops, must capture and control enemy bases. Once all enemy bases are captured you can destroy the enemies power system and win the match. During each match, AI enemies (Covenant and Prometheans) will spawn randomly and you get bonus points for taking them out. One minute you'll be fighting enemy players, the next minute you'll all be fighting a Promethean Knight.


The customization system is also brand new for Halo (It's the same as the Mass Effect 3 multiplayer unlock system). Rather than unlocking specific weapons or pieces of armour, you get requisition packs. These packs can be unlocked by leveling up, performing well in matches, or bought with in-game points or real-world currency (you get plenty of points per game though so you don't feel as if you're missing out by not handing over real money). Each 'Req Pack' gives you a random assortment of gear, ranging from permanent weapons and armour to single-use vehicle spawns or power-ups.
Honestly I prefer the customization from Halo REACH and Halo 4, but the requisitions still work well.

What's the word on Forge, my man?

I always thought he was one of the cooler X-men...

The word is "soon". Forge is going to be released in December. Not sure why. Looks super duper though.

They've completely redone it. Smoother controls, better object handling, and over 1600 objects to build with. This blog post explains it all.

In Minecraftia, my avatar devoted almost to whole of his time to resource gathering; branch mining at diamond level and going on several grand soft-clay expeditions. He amassed enough clay to fill over an entire single chest with blocks. Unlike his old practice he has decided to leave the blocks soft until needed.

During one such expedition he stumbled on the second Mooshroom biome he has seen, and the first he set foot in. It would be difficult bringing a breeding pair of Mooshrooms back to the Hill Fort but not, I think, impossible. We're not sure there's any great need to have them at the fortress. Infinite mushroom soup would be nice, but he's got food coming out his ears and soup is easily crafted.

My avatar's Daggerfall adventures are detailed in the appropriate forum.

Here is some good news for Mirocu. Paradox Interactive just bought the IP for the World of Darkness. So we might be seeing a new Vampire: The Masquerade video game in a few years.

Blimey!!

Between Kotor 1 sessions, I started playing Jedi Academy yesterday. I am having a lot more fun with it than I expected. The voice acting is one reason. Jennifer Hale does the female protagonist! And they let you play as a bunch of different races. I recognized the Twi'lek, Rodian, Zabrak, and Master Plo Koon's race (don't remember the name of that one). Naturally I went with a Twi'lek. They have always been one of my favorite Star Wars races.

Jaden and her X-Wing (it could use a spiffier paint job)

The engine room of her crashed shuttle

I really love her pants and boots

Oooh that looks fun! It's not often that you get to play as Twi-leks in Star Wars games (Though I'm more of a Togruta man myself). A Jennifer Hale female protag too? It's bound be good then, she always does a great job.

Woot! An X-wing fighter! Jaden looks great, skin tone, outfit, all of it!

Just as an FYI for the Fallout fans out there. Gog.com has Fallout 1, 2, and Tactics on sale for $10. Not $10 each, but for all three together.

Bugger.

I only have two dollars from my grandma´s trip to da States in the ´70s


There´s also the Fallout Anthology but I reckon it´ll cost a bit more than ten bucks..

hazmick: Twi'leks are my favorite Star Wars race, followed by Togrutas (thanks to Ahsoka).


Acadian: The X-Wing is still one of the best starships ever built. Like the F4-Phantom, the classics never go out of style.


mirocu: Don't laugh, I've bought games on Gog for less than $2!


Today I beat Jedi Academy like a bad stepchild. In spite of being basically a shooter game it was a lot of fun. The beginning has a feeling of innocence which I really liked, as you take your new Padawan through their first lessons, and onto some training missions with your Master.

Jaden has upgraded her armory

She's got quite a pair

Summoning one of her lightsabers back to her hand

Setting explosives

The Jedi Academy

The Raven's Claw

Love the colors! Both Jayden & her kit as well as the motley crew at the academy. Telekinesis to recall one's light sabre is convenient indeed - yay for the Force!

BWAAHAA!








I love the look of that crashed shuttle, not overly clean; but not dirty without cause either. She is pretty, and I love the greaves and boots too! I looked up Jennifer Hale's voice acting, she is Awesome!








I found them! Since you reminded me about the light sabers, I am trying to find the vids I bought my son; he had the whole Star Wars collection of vids. - not sure if I even have a way to watch them anymore, it has been a LONG time since I've seen a VHS tape, lol.

I was laughing about those boots sticking up in the air,

Those are some pretty big explosives, lol.

This was my favorite screen, because of the interesting expressions on everyone's faces looking at the speaker; and even not having played the game I thought that looked like Luke Skywalker! This game did well with the characters!

The Raven's Claw, wicked name for a wicked looking spacecraft!

Awesome shots!

Acadian: If I had telekinesis - from the Force or a mutant power - I would use it to play with my cat by making her toys move around!


mALX: Jennifer Hale is one of the very best voice actresses there is. Not only does she have a lovely voice, but she can do different accents as well. So does a great Corellian accent as Bastila in Knights of the Old Republic, and a French accent as Aayla Secura in The Clone Wars. I think the only other voice actress who can really hold a candle to her is Laura Bailey.

A few years ago they released all the Star Wars movies on blu-ray. That is how I watched them last week.



Since I am finished with Jedi Academy, I went back to playing Kotor 1 full time. The acrobatics I have to go through to get it to play 1920 x 1080 is a pain. But I am still having a lot of fun with it. I am about halfway though, having finished Taris, Dantooine, Tatooine, and almost wrapped up Kashyyk. Only Manaan, Korriban, and the Star Forge to go!

The vid I watched on Jennifer Hale had like 30 different video games' character voices that she did, sometimes several completely different voices in the same game! She has an amazing ability to make her voice different for each character, yet all have that great tone/timber - never harsh or strident; two things I really don't like to hear in a female voice. Even as villain she sounded pleasing to the ear. Really great voice! I am most def a new fan of hers, thanks for mentioning her name in that post! I don't think I knew of her till you did.

Her repertoire is HUGE; but the only thing I can actually remember hearing her in is ESO; she is the voice of Lyris Titanborn - one of the few voices I am not thrilled with in ESO - not against the voice, but the dialogue itself.

http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0354937/


She has also acted in some shows I know I must have seen her in: Big Bang Theory, The Office, Just Shoot Me, etc. I just have to rewatch them now that I know I'm looking for her role in them.