What´s my/your current reading/viewing/playing amusement?

[Dave Syrinx]

Glad to hear you´re better. I just came back in from the cold. -3 Centigrades . Had to swap to winter tires. Bummer. Can´t feel my toes and my hands are pitch black. Sucks to do manual labour

Cheers!

[kabukiman]

How are you now? Hope you recovered.
I have been playing the mmrpg age of conan. One quest was interesting: getting 3 tomes. The Shadow Over Acheron, The Pashtun Horror and The Haunter In The Dark. The reward wasn't great, but the reference were nice.

[Mr. Handy]

Yes, I'm fully recovered. I went to Philcon last weekend and had a great time (I'm still catching up). I bought some new games there as well that I haven't had time to play yet: Death Angel (a cooperative WH40K card game of Space Marines vs. Genestealers on a Space Hulk), Luna (a cooperative board game), the Space Alert expansion The New Frontier, and The Legend of Drizzt (a D&D board game of the same type as Castle Ravenloft, which I have, and Wrath of Ashardalon, which I don't have yet).

I'm still reading Dracula, and I'm not yet halfway done.

Spoiler:

Lucy Westenra

just died.

In my Doctor Who marathon, I just finished watching Terror of the Vervoids, the third sub-story of The Trial of a Time Lord. The final two episodes, The Ultimate Foe, are next, and that's it for Colin Baker as the Doctor. Then it's three 14 episode seasons of Sylvester McCoy.

I recently started playing Civilization V's full game tutorial. It's on the easiest difficulty level, so I'm doing amazingly well. I'm playing as India (chosen randomly), and their special ability has a bonus and a penalty, though the penalty outweighs the bonus. Building more cities is a huge disadvantage, though not as much of one on easier levels. I'm going for a cultural victory, though I may end up with a science victory first. My capital is growing and flourishing, and I've just founded my second city and built my first Wonder of the World, Stonehenge (which produces gobs of culture as well as Great Engineers). I can really churn out wonders thanks to my high production, a local supply of marble in my backyard, and one of the social policies I obtained. The Great Library is next, as I can really use the science boost. The only other full-fledged civilization in this game is the Iroquois, and they're not doing so well, though they do have a couple of techs that I don't. They never built a single military unit as far as I can tell. Their starting warrior must have gotten upgraded to a spearman by finding ancient ruins, and they just sent it marching due east (my scout met it on its way) until it reached my territory. There were some ruins that I hadn't found yet, as they existed on a tile I hadn't managed to explore yet, but I sent a newly built scout there and it arrived just behind the spearman. There were also barbarians camped out there, but rather than fight them, the spearman went straight for the ruins, blocking my path. It got to them ahead of me, but the spearman got badly wounded by the barbarians and managed to escape with 1 HP. It later got picked off as it moved north, probably by a barbarian galley off the coast that I can't see. Now they have no military at all, and there are barbarians not far from their only city.

[kabukiman]

I stopped playing civilization at II. It was consuming too much time, and I didn't wanted to repeat the mistake with the III.

[Mr. Handy]

I played Civilization I, II, and III a lot. They are a lot of fun, but it's hard to find the time. I preordered Civilization IV, but there was a bug that they never fixed that kept it from working properly on the computer I had at the time. You could play it, but there were bizarre graphical effects, and the fog of war still revealed rivers and flood plains when it should have kept them hidden. It would probably work right on my current computer, but I never installed it on this one.

I just got to the Medieval Era in my current game. I got the Iroquois back for "stealing" my ancient ruins. One of my scouts found another ruins just four tiles away from where they had started, yet they had never found it (probably because they didn't build any military units up to that point). I got my scout upgraded to an archer, which I hadn't been able to build yet at the time, and it still retained the scout's special ability to ignore terrain costs. Unfortunately, it only had 2 HP at the time and got killed by a barbarian archer before I could get it home. At least the Iroquois didn't get it. I completed the Great Library and the Pyramids in my capital before turning my attention to other things, though with another Golden Age coming up I'll be getting back to building wonders soon. My capital is now size 10, and my second city is size 6. Both are still growing fast, as I'm positively swimming in food. I'm about to build my third city, and I think that'll be it for me. I'm going for a cultural victory, and it's better to build fewer cities. I've completed one social policy track and started on a second (which will help me get more culture), but I need to finish five tracks before I can build the game-winning project.

[Dave Syrinx]

Speaking of games. I´ve been checking out some relatively new games. I´v just recently built a good-old desktop to my six year old son. The specs are around 2gb video memory. 3,8Ghz processor 2,5Gb memory. I threw in a 160Gb drive and a DVD burner. (I have 20 desktops in the storage so I have plenty of spare parts.)
Not much to brag about but it´s a relief not to be forced to head out and buy stuff to be able to play games.
The specs let me play almost anything at low graphics performance.
The low drive space is worked around with twenty 160Gb drives as back up.

Now to what I´m play-testing:

L.A. Noire
Skyrim
Kane and Lynch Dog Days.
Heavy Rain (PS3)

The background for testing those games is that I really liked playing Mafia - The City of Lost Haven when it came out in 2004.
I also played a lot of Dunegon Siege when it was hot in 2003.
Fahrenheit - The Indigo Prophecy back in 2005.
Codename XIII from 2003.
That and not having a good enough computer for newer games I decided to try out the new games on the newly assembled desktop.

I think the games I´m playing now are mirrored in the games from 2003-2005 with a mixture of some of them. The extended realism and enlarged game worlds speak to me. But I really see where the games come from.

L.A. Noire could work really well to use as a Call of Cthulhu game. (Just played a little of Dark Corners of Earth from Betsheda but I like the Noire game better.)

Anyway I just wanted to share my gaming diary with you guys.
Currently I´m hooked to watching playthroughs of Darksydephil. He´s quite funny to watch. Guess I´m a bit lazy
Those gives a general idea of how the game runs before playing it.

Over and out.

/Dave

[Mr. Handy]

I've played and enjoyed Mafia, Indigo Prophecy, and XIII. I've never tried Dungeon Siege, though. I do have Heavy Rain for my PS3, but I haven't had time to try it yet. I have literally hundreds of games I've never had time to play. In Civilization V, I just need four more social policies on the fifth and final track before I can build the Utopia Project and win the game, and I can do those quickly thanks to my huge cultural output and massive production in my capital (which also has an absurdly high defense strength even if an enemy somehow manages to breach my rather secure borders). Victory is pretty much assured in 40 or so turns (I should be in the early to middle Industrial age then), but I haven't had much time to play of late. I did squeeze in two turns tonight, but I want to get Zombie Apocalypse fully going again before I play any further. After that, I want to play again on a higher difficulty level with a larger map and more opponents, but before I do so, I want to play Watchmen: The End is Nigh for the PS3. I just bought it a couple of days ago, and it was rather cheap too. It takes place years before the events of the graphic novel, and you can play as Rohrshach and Nite Owl.

I tried Death Angel and managed to breeze through the first of four locations quickly and with no casualties, but I lost two Space Marines one after the other early on in the second location. Then I lost three more, leaving me with one, just before I made it through to the third location. Luckily, that location is easier to get through when you have fewer marines, so I reached the fourth and final location, which was a breeding ground for Genestealers that also contained two Brood Lords. In order to win the game, I had to kill both of them. My lone marine didn't even survive the first round.

I also played Luna, which was clever and fun. It was kind of easy playing it solitaire, but that was using the preselected start recommended for one's first game. There are also higher difficulty levels that will make it harder.

I'm over 80 percent done reading Dracula. Our heroes are in a confrontation with the infamous Count, but not the final one.

In my Doctor Who marathon, I'm now two-thirds of the way done Delta and the Bannermen, the third Sylvester McCoy story. Only 33 more episodes remain in the classic series.

[Dave Syrinx]

Merry Nerdy Christmas to you all!

(Not my craft )

This could have been mine, though. I just returned from a tour to the garage. Dug out some scart cables and an old P4 desktop along with a GeForce 6600 graphics card. Also found an ancient steering wheel and pedals.
Will be assembling a VCR for my five-year-old kid. Got hundreds of Disney movies in the attic. So, it´s time to let him watch a select few.

The computer stuff, I´ll use to try to play Need for speed -the Run.

Beside that I spend too many hours in Skyrim Universe. Just restarted a game and am going to clear all quests in Falkreath.

About movies - I watched Mission Impossible - Ghost Protocol, which I can recommend for some casual fun watching. A more RPG oriented movie is Straw Dogs with Alexander Skarsgård. That one was really neat. "Horror in the cabin" meets "Redneck mentality". Great fun to watch!


Merry Christmas, once again.

/Dave

[Mr. Handy]

Merry Christmas!

I've seen the original Straw Dogs from 1971 (directed by Sam Peckinpah), which was quite good. I haven't seen the recent remake yet.

I finished reading Dracula and started on The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo. It's good so far, though I haven't gotten very far yet.

I'm in the 26th and final season of classic Doctor Who. I've just finished Battlefield, which leaves three stories containing ten episodes to go. Next is the confusing and complicated Ghost Light, which I only vaguely remember.

I won that tutorial game of Civilization V almost two weeks ago, then played through Watchmen twice, once as Rohrshach (whose fighting style is really vicious and dirty) and once as Nite Owl. It's a fighting game and is fairly short. There's also Watchmen-related bonus material on the PS3 Blu-ray disc, but I haven't had time to watch it yet. I've also started a new game of Civlization V on the second difficulty level. Still easy, but a bit more of a challenge. A new patch was just released a few days ago, which was good timing, but it still didn't fix the graphical problems or the annoying crashes. My random civilization is Arabia, so I'll be swimming in gold and (eventually) oil. I'm planning for a diplomatic win this time, as I'll be rich enough to bribe display my generosity to the city-states. I actually managed to meet Germany on the very first turn - my starting warrior moved onto a hill, and theirs moved onto a hill barely within sight of it. Berlin is only nine tiles away from Mecca. Fortunately Bismarck likes me and is friendly, as the Germans can make nasty neighbors if they're hostile. I just have to snatch up the choice territory that lies between us before they get it. I also met the English on the tenth turn. There's one other civilization I haven't met yet, and they're doing the best according to the Demographics screen. The Germans managed to find El Dorado and snag a boatload of gold (they also made first contact with two city-states). I could have had it first if I had headed in the right direction, but I didn't know it was there and had gone looking for Berlin. I did manage to find two sets of ruins and grab them just before someone else would have. One got me the Sailing tech for free, which was nice, though I can't use it until I build a coastal city. The other gave me survivors of an ancient civilization that increased my capital to size 4 right after it reached 3. I'm 22 turns in and I'll be able to start making settlers and expanding rapidly pretty soon.

[kabukiman]

This days I haven't play any MMO (usually I play age of conan or Lord of the rings online), because I started playing knights of the old republic. It's a rpg where we play a jedi and we can choose with actions the light or the dark side (I'm playing the light).
I read 4 more books of the manga higurashi: we see the things of the perspective of the twin Shion and we finaly understand why she got crazy.
I resumed my drawing and I should post them in my blog soon.

[Mr. Handy]

I'm just about finished The Curse of Fenric in my Doctor Who marathon, which I think is the best Sylvester McCoy story. I still have the bonus features as well as a special extended edition to watch. Next is the final classic Doctor Who story, the three-part Survival, which I should be able to finish on Monday.

I'm more than a quarter of the way done The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo.

My Civilization V game is going well. After a little over 85 turns, I'm into the Medieval Era and well ahead of my rivals. Egypt and Germany are friendly, though England doesn't like me much. I built three more cities in quick succession, and I'm starting to win over the city-states and connect trade routes before I expand any further. I've explored most of the world and found several more ruins that the other civilizations missed. They were nice to have, but nothing spectacular.

[Dave Syrinx]

I went back to 2007 and found a treat from Paris!

Frontier(s) by Xavier Gens

A love story. A family... A troubled family. Riots and right wing winds. An absolute gore feast.
Starts out with a regular modern urban scenario and ends in a desolate rural area. Great movie!

You can really feel how it could be used as an RPG scenario with a lot of choices.
Deception and horror all the way!

[Mr. Handy]

I saw that one years ago, but I don't remember it too well. I'd like to watch it again the next time it's on, though.

Well, my Survival DVD turned out to be blank. Apparently they forgot to burn it back at the factory or something. The bonus DVD was fine, though, so I watched that and watched Survival online. I called up BBC America and they're sending out a replacement, but the problem is that I bought it months ago with a card that has since expired and been replaced. They can only send out a replacement by refunding me and charging me again (at least this time I got them to take into account the original sale price and promo code I used, so that's one less thing to straighten out; it was a pain when they sent me the DVD version of Doctor Who Series 6 instead of the Blu-ray version I ordered), and the law requires them to only refund to the original card, so I'm going to have to call up my bank and get them to move the funds over. That was why my replacement order had been canceled, which I had just found out today. It took me 23 months to finish the classic series Next up is the 1996 Doctor Who TV movie, which I last saw in 1996. Then I have a collection of Eighth Doctor audio stories. After that, I'll put the new series on hold so I can watch the DVDs and Blu-ray discs I bought in the past couple of years and haven't had a chance to watch yet.

I'm almost halfway done The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, and it's getting really good.

On Monday I got to within two turns of the Renaissance Era in Civilization V, but haven't had a chance to get anywhere since. Germany betrayed me by denouncing me to the world and threatened me, but so far there's been no war. I'm ahead in tech and production, so if there is one it won't go well for the Jerries. Half of the city-states are now my allies, and I'm on track to win eventually.

[Dave Syrinx]

Too bad with the blank DVD. Regarding The Millennium - Series: I have cheated I started to watch the trilogy, the Swedish not remake with bad Swenglish. I´m really enjoying the investigation Blomkvist is taking on.
Strangely, I tend to compare most things to my "gaming life" and this one fits right in the CoC - investigation niche.



Cheers!
/Dave

[Mr. Handy]

Yeah, I was thinking the same thing as I was reading it. I don't want to watch the movies before I finish the book on which each one is based, as I want to avoid spoilers. I want the mystery to take weeks to unravel rather than have the whole thing revealed in a couple of hours. The Swedish trilogy is available here too, with English subtitles.

[Dave Syrinx]

Good think I didn´t reveal anything then. The TV-series release in DVD is nine hours long and will deliver more depth than the trilogy movie release. (Adds about two hours of plot )

Cheers!

[Mr. Handy]

A war started in Civilization V, but it wasn't the one I expected. Egypt declared war on England (and England's city-state ally Monaco jumped in on England's side). Egypt is my friend and England isn't, but I don't want to get involved in a war at this time and risk Germany stabbing me in the back while I'm distracted. Their denunciation wore off 50 turns after they made it, and the very next turn they denounced me again! Luckily nobody's paying any attention to that, since they weren't my friends any more when they denounced me the second time. I'm still able to give some support to Egypt and improve our relations further without having to commit to war (they recently asked for a spare luxury resource, and I gave it to them), but they haven't asked me to join yet. Egypt has only one city, but gobs of military units. England has almost no military but three cities (plus their ally). England also has a lot of gold and can rush buy troops. I expect Egypt to have some early success, but the tide may turn. One of my units near the fighting caught a glimpse of a nearly dead Egyptian archer, though it survived whatever attacked it.

[kabukiman]

I am playing Deus ex the human revolution. I'm in Hengsha (fictional city near Shangai). I'm doing most of the scenarios with stealth avoiding killing anyone, even if sometime I feel the urge (like when the mecenaries killed the residents of a slum). I'm working for a corporation that suffered an attack some months ago, and I'm investigating who was the responsable; for now, the clues point for a rival that wanted to buy the company that I work for.

[Mr. Handy]

I have the first two Deus Ex games, but have never gotten around to playing them. I've heard wonderful things about the first and horrible things about the second. I've heard of the new one, but I don't know too much about it.

As I expected, Egypt started out well in Civlization V. After besieging Nottingham (the closest English city to Egypt), it finally fell and the Egyptians installed a puppet government. A few turns later they attacked York, England's second city, but it managed to hold out. Then Egypt and England made peace. England had blown it, wasting its money by trying to buy Warsaw as an ally and get them into the war. However, because Warsaw is naturally hostile and I had recently completed the Patronage social policy branch, the alliance lasted all of one turn, and then Warsaw made peace with Egypt the next turn. England did manage to build the Great Wall, which is a good defensive wonder that slowed down Egypt's advance. Then Egypt built Himeji Castle, another defensive wonder that they didn't end up needing, as Egypt's territory wasn't threatened. As a result, the war got into a stalemate. I'm about halfway through the Renaissance now.

[Dave Syrinx]

Skyrim update: Reached level 20 by doing quests in the Falkreath region. Mostly clearing caverns and shrines as well as training to become a decent Smith. The graphics in that game is outstanding, mountain slopes and flowers, great vistas.