In Transport fever I redid all tracks on one end of Eastleigh Railway Passenger Station, removing or reducing a good many jarring bumps. (I exempted tracks between the station itself and a nearby roadway crossing. There's just not enough room between station and roadway to iron out a bump-causing dip in the various track lines. Also did a decent amount of scenic work between Eastleigh and Dunwich.

Just finished uploading and publishing my latest Transport Fever Ride-Along episode (8). It can be found linked in our "Projects" thread.

As I wind down on ESO's Summerset binge now that I've done most of the content, I've picked Oblivion back up and also have Pokemon Mystery Dungeon: Explorers of Sky to play on and off again.

I completely forgot how complex PMD got with the second installment, so chances are I'll be mostly playing that in the near future.

Still playing Transport Fever exclusively. As usual my time there is spent adding or improving scenery. I did spend hours attempting to improve tracks around St. Mawes. That turned out so poorly I reverted to a pre "fix" save. Be that as it may, a link to the new TpF Scenic Ride-Along is found in our "Projects" thread.

This entry is better titled "What are you NOT playing." For a while the answer was Transport Fever.

The vast majority of my TpF mods come from Steam Workshop. Just before supper this evening I decided to launch the game long enough to capture what will be the opening of Scenic Ride-Along ep9. Made it to the launch screen, to be greeted by a red warning flag. A mod I use has been removed from the Workshop. When that happens it's pretty much "game over" so far as Transport Fever is concerned. Steam removed the files from my installation and won't launch the game without them. My hope was that I did not actually run any of the removed Canadian Mikado steam locomotives. I'd likely have been safe then. Such was not the case.

During supper I recalled having backed up Steam's TpF Workshop directory early this month. Searched through those 180-some backed mods until finding one whose Workshop Screenshot matched the missing mod's description. Copied backup files/folder not into the Workshop directory but rather the folder Steam let us place non Workshop TpF mods in. Activated that backup. Voila, the game launched!!!! Happy camper. To be on the safe side I replaced two in-game loco I know for sure are from that mod with a different modded Mikado. Should be okay for the duration. Assuming there aren't more Canadian Mikados traveling the rails that is. <crosses fingers>

In Transport Fever, most of my time has been spent "filming" scenes for my upcoming Scenic Ride-Along episode. This has been surprisingly time consuming. More so than with any previous episode. That's coz I'm using more third-person clips this episode, in addition to the nose-view ride-along itself. I've at last amassed a group of clips I hope will fit together into a logical sequence, but am still not wholly satisfied with one of the too many Oil Finery arrival/departures. As to why so many third-person clips, it's partly to add a little spice, largely to compensate for blurriness during the ride-along proper. Still need to create still images to serve as Title and End cards, assembled and edit raw footage into an actual presentation, add text narrative, create an upload file, and of course post it to YouTube, hopefully this coming weekend.

Not sure what's next. I've pretty much exhausted train routes with enough scenery to warrant filming. I might be able to add one or two more to the list should I put lots of effort into it over the next week to so. But...I really need to devote time to improving routes, stations and track-work itself. Until that's done much of the map isn't worth adding scenery to. In fact it's counterproductive as it makes me reluctant to enact needed changes.

After whining about how hard it was gonna be assembling this week's TpF upload, I got everything done yesterday except text narrative. Even that's all but finalized maybe a third of the way through and in spots throughout the video. There's enough in place I can upload it as-is, push come to shove.

Worry over material for future episodes remains. I see uploads becoming fewer and further between. Unless I get of my duff and make desperately needed improvements to train routes, track-work and some railway stations. Thing is, I've not developed much talent for that. Attempts to set things right normally end in failure and deleted saves.

I bought a new PS4 and with it No Man's Sky and Rainbow Six The Siege.

Still devoted to Transport Fever. Am adding scenery to the map's main oil well complex. Can't figure out what do with a bare stretch of shiny grass ground texture between Complex Railway Station and the Wells. A gentle yet pronounced upward slope limits what I can place there. Too, most everything I place blocks view of the well complex itself, which isn't desirable. I can and probably will slap a crop field there, but hope to avoid that if possible.

Speaking of TpF, I've uploading another Scenic Ride-Along episode. It can be found linked in our "Your Projects" thread.

ADDENDUM:
Finished the bulk of work at the Oil Well Complex. Only intricate detailing remains. Can't for the life of me drum up enthusiasm to continue on. Prolly just need a bit of a break. Hopefully I'll be back at it hot and heavy tomorrow.

So I've gotten past the "main" part of Pokemon Mystery Dungeon: Explorers of Sky, which means that the game finally opened up a bit. So I'm taking this opportunity to gain levels and IQ and recruit some more Pokemon for the harder content before actually doing the post-game story which is mostly side episodes at this point (just about ready to do the Manaphy sidequest...which i guess is technically a main story considering it's mandatory before you move on to the continuation of the main story...). Managed to recruit Mewtwo (the highest level team member so far at level 80) with Jirachi also issuing a challenge that I guess I'll get on eventually. Maybe I should do the Manaphy story so I can find more legendaries.

Also, a friend of mine introduced me to EverQuest II about a year ago on the grounds that the crafting and housing would probably interest me and I recently tried it out again and it finally "clicked" for me. I made a Barbarian Wizard then and he's since become a Provisioner (both character and crafting level at around 20 now). I also recently made a Human Paladin when I learned that you can only have a character focus on one of the nine crafting skills at a time, and resetting brings you back to crafting level 9 and you lose all your crafting recipes above that. He handles the furnishing. Not gonna get too into it, especially since a free account can only have 2 characters lol. At most I'm gonna mess around with interior design. You can do a lot with it, apparently.

I've become somewhat bogged down in Transport Fever. Scenic detailing is at a standstill until I make needed track/route improvements over much of the mainline. Need to establish more functional industries and industrial routes to adequately cover cities either not being supplied or under supplied. Problem is, other than industries already in use, the map generated with them in screwy locations, making it super hard to connect raw resource sites with processing plants, then to cities that need finished products. Spent a lot of time pondering it. So far nothing truly satisfies.

On the plus side, I HAVE made some worthwhile track improvements. Not enough, but it's a solid start.

Playing Rainbow Six Siege and though I love Tom Clancy's game and it good sadly its pay to win similar to how Star Wars Battlefront 2 was plus it has other issues that keeps it from being really enjoyable such as people abusing the friendly fire aspect and there's a lot of toxic players.

Nose deep in World of Warcraft's new expansion. Levelled to cap, grinding out gear now. Raids start beginning of September.

Been getting into A Total War Saga: Thrones of Britannia. This game had the misfortune of coming out when Khajiit was obsessed with BATTLETECH, so this one didn’t really give it the attention it deserved. It’s a solid Total War game, if you like those, and the map being condensed to just the British Isles makes for a very detailed game world.

I've been playing KotOR II with Restored Content Mod, primarily because it plays well on my laptop, which isn't exactly the a gaming rig. It's so far been great, even if it still has Chris Avellone's whining about the setting. Even so, as far as deconstructing Star Wars and the Jedi Order went, he at least did it well compared to other attempts. Looking at you, Episode VIII.

I've been playing some Fallout 3 the past few days after not playing since January. There is a ton of content I haven't explored yet. It's been fun getting back into it. But all I got to say is:

[censored] Talon Company, [censored] The Enclave, and [censored] Super Mutant Overlords. For crying out loud, they are EVERYWHERE. I don't remember running into them so many times before.

Almost every time I step out of a metro station, I run into [censored] Talon Company mercenaries who have been contracted to kill me. And then in some more open areas, an Enclave vertibird drops down and drops off soldiers. Then its Super Mutant Overlords in the ruins. At least I've gotten to see the groups go at it with each other several times (except for TC vs. Enclave, I think), but [censored] I am so tired of perpetually crossing paths with them.

You have discovered the reason why a lot of people like myself use a mod that reduces the amount of experience you get. Once you get to level 20, it is all Albino Scorpions, Feral Ghoul Reavers, and Supermutant Overlords. Likewise, if you do the main quest to a certain point, it is all Enclave as well. Though if I recall they will die down once you finish the MQ. I think their bases remain around the wasteland, but the vertibirds stop.

Decided to pre-order the Division 2 for the PS4. Can't wait to play the Beta.

I think you're lucky; I specifically go to their spawn points in order to get their valuable armor and guns.


Different strokes, I guess...

So for the first time ever since I first played the game series, I attempted some of the harder post-game dungeons in Pokemon Mystery Dungeon: Explorers of Sky. So far I've done pretty well in the easier ones, and I think I've built up enough skill to tackle the temporarily reduced to level 1/base stats dungeons eventually.

First I try for the other dungeons with restrictions. I've done the Southeastern Islands (Solo, 8-item limit, No money) and Zero Isle North (No EXP gain, level 90 enemies after a certain point), so maybe I should give Oblivion Forest a try next to see if I have what it takes to complete Destiny Tower (Solo, Temporarily Brought Down to Level 1, No Money or Items, and unlike Oblivion Forest, Destiny Tower has 99 floors)

They aren't hard to dispatch. They're just a nuisance with how frequent they are. Granted, it is nice that they drop Chinese Assault Rifles, as that is one of my go-to weapons. But other than that, I'm just tired of coming out of the subway and hearing "Durr, Talon Company!" I don't have much use for any of their other stuff. Now I've started to come across Albino Radscorpions, but they aren't that much trouble.

But nothing is more annoying than those Super Mutant Overlords. The added irritation with them is how much health they have.

So Battle for Azeroth has launched and I'm going to be raid tanking.

I'm a druid, so that mean giant furry bear mauling stuff while making everything angry so it hits me instead of my friends while they kill it.

The fights are kind of intimidating looking, I've been watching fight videos.

Haven't raid tanked in a while. This'll be interesting.

As someone who’s always been a front-line damage-soaker on games, you have my respect for such a usually thankless role.

“F”

Or not, the article was posted on April 1st.

Installing Portal 1 & 2. I haven't played these game in years.

Just played some Diablo I, using the Diablo I HD Mod. It works on Windows 7, and plays in 1920 x 1080. You still need the original game to play it, and you need to copy the DIABDAT.MPQ file from your cd to the install folder on your hard drive. Then copy the mod to your install folder, and start it with Belzebub.exe.

It is not exactly the same as the original Diablo. Some things have been added, like the assassin and necromancer classes. Skills have been added too. It plays a maybe a bit more like Diablo II. It was fun going down memory lane with it for a while. Back in the day I spent a looot of time playing this game.

Diablo memory lane indeed! I only played DI a bit to help fill in gaps from DII. I spent loads of time playing Diablo II though. Many fond memories with the 'Bowgirl' a couple decades ago as a bow/bow amazon. I loved the game because it elegantly supported a Mystic Archer.

Tried to install and play it again a few years ago and though it installed and played, the graphics were neon distorted. 256 colors or whatever and it was just a mess that I had to give up on.

I get the same brightly speckled dots all over the screen if I try to play the original Diablo I (or a lot of old games).

If you go to Blizzard's website and create an account, you can link your Diablo II cd-key to it. Then you can download a digital version of Diablo 2 which is supposed to be playable on a modern PC. The tricky thing is when it asks for your cd-key, don't use your original one from your cds. You will find a second digital version cd-key in your account info. Use that.

I did that and installed the digital Diablo II. But I get an exception error every time I try to start it. You might have better luck.

I did get it working after all. Follow the instruction here, and download the Glider wrapper, install it, and set it up with the instructions on the page

Tonight Khajiit will finally finish off the main story in BATTLETECH. Onward to Coromodir!

I'm playing Sweet F.A. .

So I not only got my main Pokemon to level 100 recently in Explorers of Sky, but I also reached Grandmaster Rank yesterday. I thought I'd need a bit more grinding but I guess I was wrong and probably very impatient when I was younger and I first played these games.

Still haven't tried the harder dungeons but I have a Ledyba ready to take them on. Maybe I'll do those first and THEN try to recruit one of each Pokemon (including alternate formes)

So that ended up being disasterous. It didn't make it past floor 14 of Destiny Tower. I decided to take Drifloon instead, which ended up being the best choice. It starts out with Minimize (increase evasion), and its Unburdened ability makes it act twice in one turn, without using up PP, so long as it's not holding an item. Never mind that it's holding onto a bag anyways...and a held item somehow STAYS in the bag if it is equiped. Got as far as the 20's before i was quickly defeated thanks to being dumb. I think this'll work! :v

Local Child-Stealing Ghost Balloon Climbs Insanely Tall Tower; Meets God

(It was midnight and my camera's bad)

Needless to say, Drifloon did very well. On to Zero Isle South for 99 more floors of hell.

Zero Isle South cleared, and it was significantly easier than Destiny Tower given that Reviver Seeds actually dropped there (and regularly) making it much less stressful because I didn't have to worry about a single dumb mistake undoing all the time spent in that hellhole. On top of that, there was a severe lack of Max Elixirs (that weren't sticky) so I pretty much had to rely on getting knocked out and revived to restore used-up moves halfway through.

There really isn't much of a reason to get to the end of the dungeon aside from bragging rights, since all but one of the locked up treasures are on the first 30 floors. The only thing waiting for you farther on is the Miracle Chest on the 96th floor and a treasure box on the last one, and even going for the Miracle Chest was pointless since I got another one from the Recycle Shop when I was getting rid of the excess stuff I got there. I also got an IQ Booster, which is supposed to drop from another post-game dungeon I haven't done yet. So....yeah, that's another one I'm doing just for completion's sake. At least the absolute hardest ones are out of the way.

Now that I've done pretty much all I want to do in Fallout 3, I've moved on to a couple of other games.

Just started a puzzle game called Q.U.B.E. this past week. It's interesting, mostly because I really like the aesthetic. Clearly some inspiration from the Portal games.

And after a month of not playing it, I decided to give the original Fallout a go again. I had played for a few smaller sessions but didn't really care for it much. I picked it back up last night and I am quite enjoying it now. It helps that I now know what I'm doing. Quite clunky controls, but that isn't all that unexpected from a 20+-year-old game. I'll definitely keep it going. The atmosphere is much better than in Fallout 3 and 4, but I still enjoy the gameplay of 3 and 4 much more.

Still mainly playing FFXIV, but over the last week or so I've been playing through Destiny 2.

The base game of Destiny 2 is...not that great, much less interesting than the first game. The 'expansions' however bring the game way up, and are a ton of fun. Unfortunately I've hit a grind wall for the most recent expansion, have to grind out some random repeatable missions before I can move on with the story, and I'm not really feeling motivated to kick on with it. Likely going to set the game aside now.

It's really just made me want to play through Mass Effect again, so I might go ahead and do that instead.

Rome: Total War finally came out for the iPhone.

The controls are clunky and hard to get used to, but that’s probably because I’m a klutz.

But it doesn’t matter. Now...

Now I can finally live out my warlord tendencies and exterminate people left and right.

Wipe them out. All of them.

Unlimited Power!!!

UNLIMITED

POWAAAAAAAAAAAAHHH

I AM THE SENATE.

Also I immediately got my faction leader killed (Brutii) because I picked a fight with Macedon like, 15 turns in LOLOLOLOLOL

Who would’ve thought an army of Town Watchers would get massacred by them frickin’ Hoplites, amirite?

Bahahaha! Khajiit would probably find that game is a nightmare to play on a phone.

15 turns in sounds about right. It usually either Macedon or the Greek Cities you are mixed up with by then. But Town Watchmen!! Oi!

Rome is your fwiend.

Finishing up PMD: Explorers of Sky, which is actually a lot more laborious that it might sound. The list of goals to accomplish that so far are:

-Recruit at least one of each 492 Pokemon, including variants. Only need Grass and Trash Cloak Burmy as far as variants go, but I have like, half of the grand total recruited? Need to train and evolve some because recruiting them otherwise is a pain.

-Get Celebi to Level 100. Required to complete the above, since Kecleon can only be recruited by a level 100 Pokemon with the Fast Friend IQ skill. It's the ONLY way to get its Recruit Rate out of the negatives (along with either the Golden Mask or Amber Tear held item), because screw you. Level 76 with the IQ skill learned so far.

-Clear Zero Isle Center. Not as hard as the other dungeons I tackled, but I kinda want to put that off till the end.

-(Stretch Goal) Get Infernape to level 100 so I can have a full team of Max Level Pokemon for Zero Isle Center. Probably not necessary but I like to have options.


In spite of all this I'm already thinking of (finally) getting Pokemon Ultra Moon to continue this Pokemon thing and also maybe get Assassin's Creed Odyssey. I've been on the fence for the latter, so I'll let my friend who preordered it to try it out before I buy.

Started Divinity: Original Sin last week, after getting it on a GOG discount for $10. Larian Studios earned my trust after how excellent Divine Divinity and Divinity 2 were.

So far it is decent. I'm a little frustrated at the slower pace, which is partly because of the turn-based combat that I typically don't like. But what is more frustrating is trying to figure out all the things to do to sufficiently level up enough so I can go beyond the port town of Cyseal at the beginning (the monsters outside the gates are too tough for my characters at the moment). But I'm still having some fun and giving it a chance since it is Larian has not disappointed me yet.

I really enjoyed D:OS, but yes I agree that the start is quite slow. I've been thinking about going back through the game again as a different race (was lizard the first time) now that I know how everything works.

Pro tip: Talk to animals is a super handy skill to have.

Isn't it D:OS2 where you get to pick a different race, though? Or did I completely miss that option in D:OS? I like my characters, though. Nice to know I am not alone on thinking the start is kind of slow.

Thanks for the tip. I was thinking about getting it the next time I level up (if I'm able to) because I tried talking to a couple animals and it said the Animal Friend, or whatever it was, was needed. So it looks I will definitely get it then.

Ah my mistake, it was the second one I was thinking of!

Funny story, that. I originally planned and used my faction leader as a stonewall (even built a fort lol) to dissuade reinforcements from Athens and Corinth when I assaulted Larissa with my main stack (all of my generals with a bucketload of Hastatis and mercenary bois). Larissa only had like, a hundred or so militia hoplites defending it for some reason so the going was ridiculously easy.

And I (foolishly) thought that was all Macedon, the heir of the Great King, had to offer.

So with my ego running high, I had my faction leader charge (WITHOUT REINFORCEMENTS) at a gathering of Macedonian soldiers thinking that they were probably along the same level as the skeleton crew that I massacred at Larissa.

Two things.

1. Like I said, I didn’t reinforce my faction leader (who only had like a pair of Velites, one hastati and five Watchmen).

2. I didn’t check the Army composition of my enemy.

It turns out that they were ridiculously decked, to the point that it had me thinking that maybe THESE were the garrison at Larissa. Cavalry, archers, a mother lode of phalanxes, EVEN A GODS DAMNED BALLISTA FOR SOME CURSED REASON. A BALLISTA.

So you know. Bye-bye, G-Pop Brutus I went.

I did actually survive a siege once with my faction leader and about half a dozen peasants. The trick is to let the computer lay siege, and then sally. The AI does not handle sallies well. You can ride out with your cavalry from a back gate, go around the city, and attack them in the flank. Once you get a few units coming after you, break off and head back to the city. Hopefully you have some decent walls with towers, because the towers will shoot the enemy once they get in range. Then just ride around the city with the enemy pursuing you the entire way. Wait until they get exhausted, then turn and charge them again. That will often rout them.

In the case of my faction leader plus peasants, I put all the peasants behind the city in one big pile. Then the leader sallied, got some of the enemy to pursue him, and then lead them back to the peasants. The enemy routed as soon as they got close to the peasants, because they were tired, and suddenly the were way outnumbered (peasants are not worth much in a fight, but there are always a lot of them!). Then I just rinsed and repeated, taking rest breaks to rest my general.

Here, I found a link to it.

Pehhh-zaaantz!