I think it's called 'Early access' on Steam, and it's part of the game preview program on Xbox. So it's sort of a beta, sort of a partial release. I don't like calling it a beta since you have to buy it, and it'll be playable until the full release in June or July.

Reminds me of that quote from Oceans 13 about the soft/grand opening of the casino

I remember when they opened the Flamingo. One day it was closed, the next day it was open, end of story.

I've been playing the tactical RPG, The Banner Saga.

Very much enjoying it so far. Good mix of storytelling, tense combat, and fantastic artwork. The story in particular is really interesting and enjoyable.

The basic gist of it is that you control different groups of people who are making their way through the world. There are Humans, Varl (Giants), and the Dredge - evil metal atronachs that are the main enemies you'll be facing.

Outside of combat you'll be faced with various problems and different ways to solve them. Every choice you make will have an impact somewhere down the line. For example, one of my Varl warriors lost his life trying to save a cart of supplies from tumbling down a cliff. Perhaps I could have saved him, maybe I would have lost more warriors if I chose a different option. It really makes you consider your actions, especially since the loss of even a single warrior could cripple you from a combat perspective.

The narrative perspective also changes every so often, so there isn't one specific protagonist. Currently I have two groups of people - One is mainly made up of Varl returning home, and one is made up of Human refugees trying to escape the relentless Dredge. Both groups have very different strengths and goals, which keep things interesting.

Got some screenies here too:

Combat

Travelling

Conversation

Hazmick, thanks for sharing! Looks fun!

I'm still slaving away at Banished. Population now circa 400! I thought things were going well, and in most aspects they appear to be. That said, just this morning I discovered that I significantly underestimated the number barns needed to store crop yields, wool, leather, herbs and the like. Every settlement barn except those in our two newest market nodes are crammed to the rafters or nearly so. The scary thing is that most of our nodes are utilized to the max, with almost no undeveloped space available to plop down additional barns, unless I build them within dedicated forest nodes, which I hope to avoid. I managed to find room for another six or so, but their locations aren't always ideal.

When I started plotting out my most recently completed nodes (combo forest and market abutting each other) I thought myself ahead of the game, with few supurfluous citizens to move there. I couldn't build fast enough to keep up with population growth. By the time those nodes were more or less fully developed and manned I again had more laborers than is necessary and need to start plotting more nodes pronto.

For fellow Banished players, here is the save file for my settlement as it was when I exited the game this morning, 14 Jan 2016. Winter, year 61, population just over 400. You'll note that I have an excess of laborers/builders. Note also that our active mines and quarries are lightly manned. That's because we rely on trade to supply the bulk of our stone and coal, and to a lesser extent iron. Not sure whether I want to continue on with rapid expansion or slow down and fine tune what I have to hopefully better avoid scenarios like my recent discovery of inadequate barns coverage. Too, I'd be interested to know if the settlement as it is now, with a bit of tweaking, will trigger a death spiral? If so, have I established safe guards to ensure it survives?

Sounds and looks to be an interesting game. Enjoyed the captures.

Work on settlement expansion in Banished is halted until I decide in which area(s) I next want to expand.

In Minecraftia, the Autarch has been busy. He at long last tackled the daunting task of roofing the Keep, spending much of Jan 15 and on into the 16th slaving away at it. In the process two new interior floors were added, along with a tiny open-air observation deck at top.

The new 7th floor is, for the time being, devoted to Nether Wart growth. The Autarch has no real need for another Nether Ward farm, the one next to his chicken pen being sufficient. But we didn't want the floor to stand empty, and our potion room is two floors below. The 8th floor contains four 'guest' housing cubicles. Neither floor is finalized or fully detailed.

Here is an overview of the Hill Fort as of 16 January 2016, with the Keep roof in place. It too is apt to undergo modification before I am content with the results. Also seen are the horse and mule stables with attached corrals on the Lower Terrace, along with improved lighting in that area.

What a neat painting (or tapestry perhaps) on display of your Decrepit Champion and his ward Vilja!

In Banished, the settlement saw further expansion. It now numbers over five hundred citizens! It has seven or eight Trading Posts. Traders arrive so rapidly I've taken to ignoring them unless we're running low on the several materials we trade our excess firewood for.

In Mineraftia, the Autarch went on two grand clay expeditions, mined netherrack in the Nether (where else?), harvested his tree farms, and fine tuned the Keep roof. Here's the Keep tower showing one minor roof modification, the other two not yet having occurred. (They can't be seen from this camera position in any case.)

I originally planned to replace the entire Minecraft paintings file with game-centric 'artworks' drawn mostly from various RPGs I've played over the years, but me being me abandoned the project with eight or nine paintings to go. Part of my dilemma is that some of what I want to do calls for actual drawing/painting skills, which I totally lack.

I've been playing Ark on the XB1 a lot lately. The game is very deep with several levels of tech that are hard won through leveling up and spending points. It's combat based but you gain xp from a wide range of things such as building structures and taming animals.

The dinos all have strengths/weaknesses and those will define their use when tamed. For instance an Ankylosaurus is excellent for collecting stone and metal. The Utah Raptor is fast and dangerous but can't carry much so it is useful for recon/hit and run tactics.

It is one of the best games I've ever played and well worth the $35 you'll spend on it. The full release will cost more so if you are interested jump in now. The online play is unforgiving but believe it or not every single player isn't always a kill first eat you corpse later type. You will run into tons of these type players though so forming/joining a tribe for protection is important.

My Banished settlement hit potential hard times the other day. All of a sudden its food supply, which had been pinging 60k-plus with crops sometimes left partly unharvested in the fields, dropped drastically. If memory served they eventually hit a low 11k in storage. No one starved during this period, or went hungry. But the writing was on the wall. Something had to be done.

I was in the midst of creating a new market-node at the time, so made it more agriculture centric than was originally conceived. I also enabled some existent but dormant fields left unattended when we had too much food rather than too little. (Not that that's a problem, except that one eventually runs out of places to store it all.) Between those two measures things eventually turned around. With a food limit of over 70k we're back to letting crops rot in the fields . . . for now.

During my 2014 Banished run I put no emphasis on markets. Indeed, that settlement had no more than two or three, none of which were sited for best utilization. This play-through is if anything market node centric, with most everything planned around them. Only the oldest parts of the settlement lack markets. Even there I was able to shoe-horn two, though a number of homes and facilities remain outside their radius.

We suffered another few fires. Thankfully all occurred very near wells. That didn't save the buildings in question, but seemed to keep fires from spreading. In only one case did fire spread, and then to only one home.

We had several bouts of disease. None proved overly harmful thanks to a wealth of hospitals scattered throughout the settlement. At best we lost one citizen to disease. The rest recovered and returned to work.

We had a number of pasture infestations. With an empty pasture held in reserve, infestations were corrected pronto with little to no lost of animals.

We had field and orchard infestations. Field infestations are no biggy . . . just rotate crops and wait out the year. Orchard infestations are a pain since one must start over from scratch and wait years for the trees to reach maturity.

The settlement is in its 96th year (or thereabouts) and has a population of well over 600, possibly 700. (I forgot to check this morning.) Everyone is healthy and happy. Much of the map is filled. Much remains to fill.

My chief concern is that a goodly number of homes are inhabited by old folk. Will I have the reserves to replace them when the time comes? We shall see.

Here's the village save file as of early morning 24 Jan 2016. It starts with the viewpoint hovering over the combined market/forest-node expansion I worked on much of the day yesterday. You'll also see a number of unbuilt market and forest-node indicators plopped down in the middle of nowhere. Those are food-for-thought only and not to be taken seriously. Their eventual placements are apt to be quite different from what you see.

Creep in the Keep:

The Autarch was in his mob-drop storage room, putting away bones gathered during a recent trip to his skeleton-spawner XP/loot farm. He stopped in front of and opened his upper bone chest. The sound of footsteps continued on another few steps. We at first dismissed it as an acoustic quirk. All Keep rooms, indeed the entire fortress, are adequately lighted to prevent mob spawns. None should appear there. However, we got to thinking on a recent subtle change to the map room necessitated by a lighting anomaly that appeared after installing the Keep roof. That change was thoroughly tested, or so we thought. Still, something might have been overlooked.

To test our theory, the Autarch walked to the other side of the room. Footsteps continued on some paces after he stopped. The Keep was invaded! By what? The absence of any sound save feet pointed to, but did not confirm, that the mob in question was the very one we least wanted to confront where valuable goods are stored; a creeper. It could do much harm to the structure and/or the Autarch's possessions.

There was no guaranty that the mob, whatever it was, was on the map floor. Better there than the floor immediately above us, which houses the Autarch's potion facility. That thought in mind the Autarch climbed the ladder to his Potion Room. Nothing. Up he went to the Map Room. There it was, as we feared . . . a creeper. The Autarch rushed it, landing a solid blow that knocked it back against northeast corner. He rushed it again, but could not take in down before it exploded, blasting a hole in wall, removing all decorative items in the immediate vicinity. Some of those items lay scattered throughout the floor. Some resided on the ground outside the Keep. Some vanished. Our losses turned out to be around five green hardened clay blocks, circa four red bricks, two armor stands, one complete set of armor, the helmet from another armor set, some wood blocks, a painting, an item frame, and a few torches. Thankfully, replacements for these were either on hand or easily made.

Repairs complete, the Autarch went over the floor block by block to find where the creeper spawned. To our surprise, it was not at the floor's north side, where adjustments had been made, but rather its west side, which hasn't been altered since built. One block's light-level dropped to seven. (Most but not all overworld mobs spawn at a light reading of seven and below.) We both scratched out heads wondering how we missed it. To complicate matters, the room's west side mirrors the east. Yet east side light levels remain safe. In any case, an additional torch resolved the issue.

Earlier the Autarch carved out an underground passage between the Hill Fort and his skeleton spawner. He repaired his primary diamond armor, bow, and silk-touch pick.

In Banished, the village expanded by another combo forest/market node. Its population now surpasses 700 and might be nearer 800. I find it hard to believe that things have gone so well. Since day one there have been no starvations, freezes, or death spirals. No tornadoes, praise the Nine. All fires were easily contained thanks to sufficient well coverage. Diseases were easily contained thanks to hospital coverage.

My first village suffered two death spirals by the time it passed the 100yr mark, one so devastating I backtracked to an earlier save to avoid complete catastrophe. I launched that old village to view it in light of what I've learned this play-through. It contains some good design to be sure, but much that is cringe worthy. It's chief problem, as I see it now, is that a great many citizens have to walk excessive distances to find food and warmth or drop off / pick up produce. Is it any wonder the village suffered more than its share of starvation and freezing?

I sometimes think to cease expanding my current village to see how it handles the almost inevitable death spiral. In the end I'm too much of a coward.

Well, after reading an article that tore apart the story of Fable 2(which it richly deserves) I got all nostalgic over the game. Traded in some crappy sniper game that I wasn't going to play, so I didn't even need to spend any actual money on it.

Sure, the story's terrible, but outside of the story, it's actually a very fun game, and I've been having a lot of fun playing it. Though it has gotten a little weird.

Fable 2 was the final decent game before the series crashed and burned. Fable 3 was a terrible excuse for a game and is the only game I've ever literally given away.

Howdy folks, it's been a while.

the Fable games were fun, but 2 and 3 I just rented, blitzed through, slaughtered some villagers for fun, and returned without going back.

Currently playing ESO, though Skyrim, Fallout 4, and a little French game called Wargame have been recently played.

Howdy, mr Coin!

Good to know you haven´t lost your gaming abilities

It's been a rough day in Banished. Started in on another village expansion but am not overly happy with it. It doesn't help that almost no trader showed up at our many trading posts with stone. To top it off, a fire broke out in a market node, destroying the market, a trading post, one home, and the brewery. Much of what little stone we had in storage went to rebuilding those rather the expansion.

We're in the enviable position of having more food than we know what to do with. Too many crops go unharvested come autumn. It also looks as if we may need a few more woodcutters. We're not hurting for logs. My current cutters simply can't chip 'em into kindling fast enough to meet demand. We're nowhere near a firewood crisis, and some of our deficit might result from the burned market and trading post (where much firewood was stashed). I'll keep an eye on it and make adjustments if necessary.

Our next expansion might be tailor centric to help clean out an excess of wool in our various barns. Then again, those barns are likely to fill up with coats. Ya just can't win.

For the first time ever the village population shrunk. Not 100% sure why, but suspect it has to do with lack on stones slowing down housing expansion. There's no cause for alarm . . . yet.

Heh, I did the same thing with Fable 3 that I did with DA2 and Skyrim; kept checking all the pre-release info, and decided not to buy them based on what I saw. I'm rather glad that I did really.



Ah, I find Fable 2 far too much fun to blitz, and blitzing it just means you miss out on most of the fun stuff.



Well, I actually did end up spending some money on Fable 2, to get the dlc. Not off of Xbox Live of course, that would have cost me more than £11. Instead I picked up a preowned copy of the GotY edition for £3.49. Even got a better condition disc and the manual into the bargain

Restarted to play a character focusing on magic, just to see what it's like, and to sample the dlc.

Been playing the beta for The Division. Not as bad as I thought it'd be.

Setting seems fun, everything looks nice. Combat and character controls are a bit clunky, but not bad once you get used to it. Enemy AI is abysmal. 'Open World' is nonexistant - Set in New York but you can't go inside any buildings that aren't related to a mission. Also, despite it being marketed as an MMO you won't actually see any other players outside of the PvP zone.

Honestly they could've just made a good single player shooter instead of an average multiplayer one. Not sure it's worth the price of a full game, but I'd consider buying it in the future when it's cheaper.



On the subject of the Fable games - I loved the first two, and enjoyed the third. Played through them all multiple times, got all the DLC etc. Just downloaded 2 and 3 onto my Xbox One (through the magic of backwards compatibility) so I'll be playing through them again soon.

Just played through Street Gangs (NES) again. Lots of kicking and eating


I must say it has to be my best playthrough so far. No real trouble anywhere, not even when fighting the Twins just before the end boss. I always max out Kick and Throw and that makes it quite easy, but one cannot afford to relax at the later stages because you do take lots of damage if you get hit.

Fun!

Earlier this afternoon I played three games of Solitile, losing by two stacked tiles the first game, winning the third. Solitile and I go way back. I received it on a disk of shareware included with one of the first computer magazines I ever bought back in 1989. It is amongst the first PC games I played and remains a favorite. Truth to tell, I'm not much impressed by any of its various tile layouts save one, 'the bridge', but think the bridge a classic. Nor do I play Solitile all that often any more. Until today I hadn't launched it in months. (I own and play the 'modern' Windows version, rather than DOS version from the magazine.)

In Banished, I did not major expansions but rather fine tuned existing nodes, adding barns, wells, a cemetery or two, and in one case a chapel. I debate adding yet another trading post.

Would that be Mah Jongg tiles? I love this game and have played several versions, and have seen a 'bridge' layout in more than one Mah Jongg game. Those are tough!

Aye, Solitile can be considered a Mah-Jong / Shanghai tile removal variant, though default tile faces are not Mah-Jong like. Here's the game's web page, where a free demo can be downloaded. The screen capture that appears there is of 'the bridge'. I find the bridge to be very addictive once you grasp how to win, or rather how to attempt to win.

WOO HOO !!!!!! KC!!!!!!! WOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOT !!!!!! You have been missed !!!!!!

I installed a new version of Linux (Debian) in early November. Since then I've racked up 2278 games of freecell of which I've won 2251 mostly played while watching Max Kaiser or news about various critical world situations on YouTube.

I started playing freecell to exercise my aging brain but it has almost become compulsive to have a game going while watching anything including movies. my best time is 1min.34secs.

Sadly, playing Oblivion has reached this stage.

That is a very touching letter, bobg. I’ve always enjoyed tales of Angel’s adventures, even the ones that make me cry.

I often think of that letter when gaming with Lothran. It makes me re-appreciate him and our long history together.

-Don´t worry btw, Lothran! We´ll be having fun with some goblins tonight!

Great to see you, bobg! What a poignant letter from little Angel indeed. Indeed, I cannot visit the Anvil guildhall nor walk past Benius Manor without thinking of her. Most especially at breakfast time in the Anvil guildhall, Buffy thinks of her as she asks for some appleberry juice. Perhaps, someday. . . .

I truly wish it were different. There was a time when Oblivion had a 'larger than life' feeling and Angel stole my heart away with her unique approach to living in Cyrodiil. I've tried a few RPGs since then but nothing seems to recall that time. These days my semi-invalid wife requires more of my time and attention so it's hard to really get into the games anyway. She still thinks Angel looks just like her as a girl. I wonder where she got that idea from In October, we celebrated our 53rd anniversary.

Bobg, sorry that you've not been able to get back into fully enjoying Oblivion. I also know what you mean about Freecell being somewhat addictive - it is a fun game that is easy to 'pick up and put down'. I was caretaker to my late wife many years ago and know how draining it can be. Massive congrats on your most impressive anniversary however. Wow!

When time permits, I hope you will continue to drop by and update us on how things are going.

I've been playing Unravel, the new sidescrolling platform/puzzle game that I've been waiting for since it was announced at E3 last year.

You play as a character called Yarny, who is made of a single thread of yarn which gradually unravels as you move through each level - solving puzzles and exploring as you go.

Visually, the game is completely, utterly gorgeous. The soundtrack is also superb, and does such a great job of creating the right atmosphere for each situation.

There is a storyline, but I've only played through the first level so it's not too clear. The game seems to revolve primarily around memories and emotions. Very subtle and thoughtful from what I've seen.

You can really feel how much time and effort the little dev team (Less than 20 people) poured into the game, and it's an absolute pleasure to play.


EDIT: Just completed it. Can't remember the last time a video game moved me in such a fashion. Good gracious me. The levels are all so varied, detailed, and intricately designed that I found myself wanting to explore as one would in an open world game. The storyline (though I hesitate to use the word) is so subtle that you really feel as if you're exploring it yourself, and leaves a lot open for interpretation.

I can't recommend this one highly enough.

I've been playing Arx Fatalis, an old school first person RPG released around the same time as Morrowind. Of course it was completely eclipsed in practically every way by Morrowind, which was an amazing game for it's time and stole the spotlight.

Arx Fatalis was a dark and desperate roleplaying experience with nothing really similar to compare it to. The game is based on a planet in which the sun has gone out, forcing a large number of different species like goblins, trolls, and humans to retreat deep underground into the old dwarven mines and coexist.

The groups have divided themselves by species and each taken a part of the sprawling underground caves as their own. Aside from the dark cave system, the inhabitants have created small towns and settlements which are surprisingly detailed and interactive.

Cettlements feel alive with residents moving about and trying to survive. The sounds are amazing and it truly feels as if you are in a cave system. You'll hear echoes, dripping condensation, your own footsteps, and of course the hum of air moving through the caverns.

Now I'll get into the character, skills, customization, inventory and dialogue.

First with the negatives: You are unfortunately forced to play as one of four preset characters, all of which are white males. The dialogue is alright but there are no real options about what you'll say. Speaking to a character will start a preset conversation with automated responses from your character. The inventory is also clunky and distracting, but manageable.

Luckily the skills and depth of the game make up for this.

For instance you can pour points into stealth and rob people going about the day or you can work on strength or magic and hack/slash enemies until you can buy equipment after selling their stuff.

You'll need to eat so there are several food items in the game. You don't have to buy or find food. You can also build a fishing pole to catch fish and then cook them in a fire to sate your hunger. The spells are truly amazing. Bad guys chasing you through a tunnel? Erect a magic barrier blocking them from following you. Or summon a monster to eat them for lunch. Just don't forget to cast a control spell on the demon or you may be next. Slow time, light torches, enchant items, and levitate.

There are a plethora of choices aside from the routine bow/sword playstyles, although these are present the game doesn't force your hand.

It is an excellent but somewhat flawed game that looks surprisingly good and provides approximately 40-100 hours of semi linear play.

I have looked a bit in Arx Fatalis´ way but never really gotten around to it, unlike Bioshock. I may eventually get it as it really sounds like something I´d enjoy.


Thanks for the extensive review, Kiln

Yes, thanks for the concise and insightful review, Kiln! Ah. . . so many games, so little time.

Yesterday I finished playing Firewatch. It is not an action game, nor even technically an RPG. It is fairly linear in both gameplay and narrative. There is no melodrama associated with Saving the World or stopping Dr. Evil or even becoming the Superhero of the Moment. It just puts you into the shoes of a man named Henry, who is running from something (isn't everyone who takes this sort of job?) and takes on a summer firewatching in the Shoshone National Forest. He has to spend the season alone in a one-room lookout high above the forest, with only radio contact with one other lookout (Delilah, at the Thorofare Lookout to the north). We never see Henry - just his hairy legs and chubby hands, and Delilah is only a disembodied voice. The game is set in 1989, so no iPhones, iPods, or even a basic flip phone (which makes the cut phone wires all the more portentous). The biggest threat here is fire. Yup, fire, as in Forest Fire. This is just after the HUGE Yellowstone fire that burned all summer of 1988, and was visible even to me in the Twin Cities region (the soot and smoke from that fire caused some pretty dramatic sunsets that summer). So instead of putting the fire out, the crew just monitors the fire.

What makes this game really cool for me is that it is story driven. I became immersed in the story of Henry, and through his radio conversations, in that of Delilah. And the graphics are deceptively simple, but I found them deeply dimensional, and immersive in an atmospheric sort of way. Not detailed the way they are in TES games (especially Skyrim) but more in the way of how light and air is treated. Not to give out any spoilers, but in the end, it was a bit disconcerting trying to hike out ahead of the fire, because smoke was obscuring everything to the point where my lungs were beginning to complain (and I'm sitting safely at home! In a non-smoking house!).

It only took me six hours to play the game through, but it is just so much fun exploring the trails and watching the sky change. The sound scape too, was pretty impressive. Normally I play with the music turned off because it obscures too much of the environmental sounds for me, but in this case I left it on because it was NOT ON ALL THE TIME - only when I am about to discover something, or something is about to happen.

There are no enemies to kill, no zombies to avoid, no weapons to wield, no skills to level up. Nothing that would make a game worth playing for some. But if you want to just lose yourself in a world where not everything is life or death, and not everything has an answer, and what matters are your emotions, your developing relationship with a disembodied voice, and an amazing wilderness area to walk around in, go for this game. It's available on Steam and directly from the website (though it does require Steam activation to play).

I have a couple of days off coming up - I think I will play this game again just to enjoy the slower pace.

Ark Survival update on the Xbox one is game breaking. Don't do it!

Ui problems, broken shadows, and spawns producing literally thousands of bugs around swamps. I'm trying to report it but their official forum isn't confirming my account.

Heh, I was just thinking about doing that update. Thanks for the warning. I encountered a similar bug bug before which caused loads to spawn at the edge of a section of forest, and in turn caused me a great deal of frustration.

I'm playing Final Fantasy Explorers, a 3DS game I picked up earlier. I've only played for an hour or so, but it seems pretty fun so far.

Ha!

I knew you´d cave and let me know

I have dropped back into 1st person shooter addiction.

Fallout 4
Far Cry 3
Metro Redux
Dishonored

Waiting for Doom.

Can you describe Far Cry 3 in your own words? I bought a PS3 a couple years ago and it was one of those package deals which came with this game. Never tried it though. I've been assuming it's a mixture of Tomb Raider and something more open-worldy?

Far Cry 3 is the best of the Far Cry games IMO. It may not have the power of the modern console powering it but it has a very neat story line and voice acting and a better overall balance to the game.

By balance, what I mean is that the game delivers the progression in a very sweet way. It always seems to be at a smooth pace- each part, whether climbing a radio tower or crafting or upgrading fits in nicely to the speed of the main quest. Far Cry 4, by contrast, seems like a huge playground with 100 independent things happening and no cohesion.

The 1st person shooting mechanics are really good. It has very nice upgrades for the weapons and the battles are lovely and brutal. One minute a tiger is mauling your leg the next you are raiding a pirate base down by the water.

The South Pacific island is great. There are numerous caves and beaches to explore with heaps of hidden collectibles. The audio is very good- gunshots, pirate dialogue, waves washing up on the sand and animals all surround you.

I really love the cut scenes in the game. Vaas is a brilliant antagonist and makes you wonder why Beth can never deliver anything close to this level in Thieves Guild or DB...

As a 1st person shooter I would give it 9 out of 10.

For people who do not like these styles game they will probably say 5-7 out of 10.

It all depends what you like.

Tomb Raider is way more linear than anything here. Only the tranquility of the playground reminds me of the adventures of Miss Croft. This game has plenty of open world goodness. Attack the base using stealth, sniper from range, use animals to help clear things out, or soften things up with grenades and a frontal attack. You can even hang glide and go swimming with sharks.

Oh okay, that sounds neat. Maybe I'll try FC3 this summer. It'll be one of my "summer" games, if I'm burned out of Fallout 3 or whatever.

Blasphemy!


Fallout 3 is my summer game every year

Far Cry Primal. Having a jolly good time with it.

Still has that Far Cry feel to it, even though there are some changes from previous games. The big open world is gorgeous, which is something FC games have always done well. I'd say the map is at least as big as in FC4, if not a little bigger. I'm 16 hours in and it looks as if I've explored about 50% of the world. As in previous games, there are enemy camps and outposts spread across the world, and clearing them will allow your tribe to spread and grow.

The story puts you in the animal skin shoes of Takkar the beast master, from the Wenja tribe. The game focuses on rebuilding the Wenja tribe, and defeating the rival tribes - the cannibalistic Udam and the pyromaniacal Izila. You complete quests to gather wandering Wenja peoples together, and are helped along the way by 'specialists' who also provide Takkar with new equipment and skills. There is no English dialogue in the game, and everyone speaks the game's own prehistoric language (with English subtitles), which is really cool. There isn't as much drug use as FC 3 and 4, but missions that involve the shaman mostly include drinking mystery potions and having spirit visions, which are really nicely done and give you an insight into the way the other tribes think or how the world works.

Skill progression is split between several skill trees, and each tree needs you to recruit a certain specialist to your village before you can use them. For example, the warrior specialist has all the cool takedown skills, while the shaman has the beast taming skills. Other than that it's pretty much the same skill point based system from previous games.

The combat is brutal, as expected, with clubs, bows, and spears being the primary weapons. There's a good range of equipment and skills, which allows you to play however you want. Beast taming is of course the most fun thing in the world, and there are 14 beasts to choose from (plus 3 more if you have the Apex Predator version of the game) which all have different strengths and abilities. Hunting is a big part of the game, of course, with a huge variety of animals ranging from deer to mammoths.

It's refreshing to play a Far Cry game from a different perspective like this. I'm not sure how many more times I could do the 'bewildered American man shoots his way through a civil war' thing that the series is so fond of. Primal is a good change of pace for the franchise.

I've been having a lot of fun playing Final Fantasy Explorers, but I'm getting that itch to head back to Cyrodiil again.

Think I'll start a new character, a Spellsword, of sorts. My Nightblade's all well and good, but sometimes I feel like playing a character that can cross blades with the foe.

Sat down this evening to grind for three hours in Zelda II: The Adventures of Link (NES). I don´t plan to play it through, I just like leveling up and getting stronger

Downloaded Pokemon Red onto my 3DS (Red, Blue, and Yellow are all available on the online store as of yesterday). Aaah this takes me back.

Just last week I was playing Omega Ruby, so to see how far the games have come is really cool.

I felt up to playing something for the first time in weeks this morning. Settled on Minecraft. Not my primary Minecraft world but a test world generated back when I updated to MCv1.89. Spent a good two hours (until lunch) exploring a vast cavern system while gathering resources. Rotten luck searching for diamonds. Found only two so far, not even enough for a pickax.

I installed an Oblivion mod that replaces window reflections but haven't launched the game to check it out.

I've recently been playing Warframe. I originally downloaded it last year, but only got a couple of hours in before ESO arrived and swept me away.

Now, after several hours, I'm having a blast with Warframe. It's a third person shooter RPG thing with multiplayer stuff, but not quite an MMO. Set in space, lots of lore and sci-fi stuff.

You play as a titular 'warframe', of which there are dozens to play as. You can craft new frames, weapons, items etc. and the game never lacks for things to do. You can get a pet dog-like creature called a Kubrow, and you can build and decorate your own dojo. I'd talk more about the story, but a lot of it could be considered spoilers.

Only two issues I have with it:
1) Very 'grindy'. You'll end up playing the same levels a few times over to get crafting blueprints and materials, and it takes time to craft things. For example, I had to kill the same boss 4 times before I got the blueprints for the components of a new warframe. Each component takes 12 hours to craft, then the frame itself is going to take 72 hours. I know it'll be worth it because the frame will help me advance in the game but...84 hours!? (of course you can always pay real money to speed up the process, or bypass the grinding and crafting altogether)

2)Very difficult as a solo player at higher levels. My friends all play it on PC, so I have to go solo on Xbox, and at higher levels it's proving very tricky. Once I craft a new frame and some new weapons it should be easier.


Anyway, it's free to download and play, and it's fun.

For over a week now, maybe two, I've spent a lot of time in Minecraftia. Not my main world, but rather my putz-around world. Nice thing about that world is that I have no presence as a 'builder' there and instead devote the entirety of my time to branch mining, resource gathering, spelunking and gearing up my avatar. He's in full enchanted diamond now, the chest plate having a quite excellent set of enchantments. Much of his base is underground and ugly as can be. That's where his wheat, potato and reed farms are. (He has not yet found melons, carrots and surprisingly pumpkins.) He has a fenced off area outside his cave used for a tree farm and combo cattle/chicken pen. (Protective outer fencing there was finalized just this evening.) No sheep, chickens or rabbits yet, though there are plenty in the wild close by. I doubt my avatar there will become a great long-distance overworld explorer, but I won't rule it out.

Otherwise I've done no gaming whatsoever.