So you think you can contribute, eh?

Saw this today about the contribution system in WAR. Just more evidence the the system is flawed.

I personally have had issues with the contribution system since beta, and I am surprised that Mythic has not addressed the issues that many players have with the contribution system.

Vacation time, woot!!

Well today is the beginning of my five day vacation. How did I manage that you ask? Pretty easily actually, I normally have Monday and Tuesday off, Thursday is Thanksgiving, and I had asked for Friday off a few weeks ago, and I was able to con, I mean talk a co-worker to cover for me on Wednesday. How sweet is that!

So I am pretty much going to kick back and relax, enjoy the time off and watch hockey and football, and play as many games as I can!

I do want to play WAR this week as I am really enjoying my Chosen character, but I do need to create an Order career too. Of course there's NHL 09 I can play as well, but I think I am going to concentrate mostly on Fallout 3. I still have an active WoW account, but I've had little motivation to go and play the game.

There are other Xbox and PC games I have that need to be played, but who am I kidding, I know I am not going to get to them anytime soon.

Devine Intervention?

Well, looks like my goal of posting at least once per day will not be met this month, oh well. I really should pay more attention to this blog in case someone actually reads this!!

The heavy metal patch for WAR was released on Tuesday, but without the combat changes I was looking for. I was disappointed, but it's understandable that Mythic wants to do right by this and not screw things up. But lately I have been feeling torn about which MMO's I am going to play. I currently have a sub to WoW, and I did buy Wrath, and of course I have a sub to WAR as well.

But I have been thinking of giving LOTRO or EQ2 another run, but I still want to play WAR, and I don't want to feel like I wasted money on Wrath....argh! So after much debate with myself, and not being happy about the WAR patch, I figured I would play out my WoW sub, cancel WAR, and just forget about MMO's for awhile.

So on Tuesday night I log into my account on WAR, see that the next payment is due on the 19th, and I cancel my account. Well, two days later I'm doing my normal blog reading, I come across Ysharros and JoBildo's blog and find that Casualties of War now has open recruiting for WAR.

Well isn't that just great. I cancel my account, and the one thing that I know I would stay for, people to play with, finally happens. For some strange reason, I decided to fire up WAR while at work after reading that (yes, I get to play games at work, muuuahahahah), and wouldn't you know it, the account is still active. What I figured out is that the account renewed on Tuesday, but wasn't billed till Wednesday. We what luck is that, I tell myself.

So I naturally apply for membership to CoW, thinking that if I get to join then I'll stick with WAR for awhile, cause I was having fun and I would like to play more of it. Lucky for me I get accepted to the guild, and now all I need to do is get in touch with a GM and get my characters a guild invite.

WAR review.

I am happy to announce that the wonderful people at GameSquad.com have published my review for Warhammer Online: Age of Reckoning. You can read it here.

This is my second review, and I hope do be able to do more in the future. The review is two months after release, so I'm sure that most people have already decided whether or not they are going to buy the game. But I decided to take my time and experience what I can and then write about the game without being caught up in the early hysteria that can happen when a game is released.

A little disapointment here, a bit of unsatisfaction there...

I was really looking forward to the beginning part of the week with two big updates coming, the Heavy Metal 1.05 patch for WAR and the NXE for the 360. But I have to say that I am a tad disappointed with both.

The new 1.05 patch for WAR was more than a couple week event, it was suppose to have some changes to careers that I was very interested in. So imagine my surprise when I read that the career changes did not make the patch, all the while as the patch is downloading. Mythic has decided to delay the career content in order to do further testing to make sure they get it right, and that's not a bad thing. The new Heavy Metal event stuff is cool, and I am always for content, but I really had my heart set on the new combat update stuff.

So next comes the NXE. Like an idiot, I stayed up way too late to get the new update so I am just a tad tired at this moment. I was looking forward to the new look, but I was really excited that my resolution for my 19" monitor will finally be supported. I have been running my res at 1360x768 and it worked, but I was itching to play games at 1440x900. So I fire up a game, and right away I noticed small black bars at the top and bottom of the screen, WTF!?!? So if I run a rez that is not native to the monitor, then it's full screen??

So to sum things up, it was a very disappointing day yesterday for me.

Soylent Green is people!!

I really couldn't think of a good title for this post, but it works, lol.

When is choice a bad thing? When there are too many choices, and I am specifically talking about gaming.

I've been playing WAR since day one, and I am still enjoying the game a lot. But, I noticed yesterday that for one reason or another I had not logged into WAR in almost a week. That got me thinking that if I don't have an overwhelming feeling to log into the game, then is there any reason to keep on paying for a subscription?

Another reason for this line of thinking is because the other night I was at Gamestop to exchange my red ringed 360, and made an impulse buy of WotLK. I did resub my WoW account because I wanted to try out the new talents in the 3.0 patch, but I was not looking forward to playing Wrath at all.

I couldn't help but feel a little guilty about the purchase because I was also thinking about getting the new EQ2 or the LOTRO expansion instead. And now I feel that I have to play some WoW at least till my sub runs out in order to feel like I didn't waste my money buying Wrath.

But what about WAR? Well, I still like the game, and I am having a blast with my Black Orc. I prefer a deeper PvE experience, and WAR is lacking a bit of that. But on the flip side, I really enjoy the PvP that WAR has, a lot more then I did with WoW.

I just can't start dabbling in MMO's again. With my time being split between family, work, the 360 and other PC games I want to play, I can only give attention to one, maybe two MMO's now a days, but that might be pushing it. I know my wife would like me to just pick a game and stick with it!

On a side note, you know you have a cool wife who can identify which MMO you are playing just by watching me without me telling her, I love that!

So, my WAR sub ends tomorrow, so I have all day today to make up my mind if I am going to continue playing WAR, move on to another game, or even just take another break from all MMO's for awhile.

Gears of War 2.

It's no secret that I did not like the first Gears of War. I thought it was highly overrated.

So when GoW2 was announced, I figured it would be this over hyped piece of garbage. Well, not quite so.

As it turns out, I had the chance to play through the campaign coop with a friend, and I had a great time.

The graphics are better and more colorful than the GoW, there are some additions to the gameplay that work great, and you get a better sense of just how epic the war really is in this game. And I really like the changes to the multiplayer, no more rolling shotgun one hit kills anymore.

My only real complaint about the game is that the difficulty can border on the impossible at times. And I though that Epic tried too hard to give the game a story.

But I want everyone to know that I was wrong about GoW2, it's a great game and I would recommend it to everyone!

Console Goodness.

Well, I had a three day weekend, and I spent 90% of my gameplaying time on the 360. First up was a heavy dose of Gears of War 2, a game that I have not been waiting for. But, a friend of mine talked me into getting it, and I'm glad I did.

We spent the better part of three nights playing through the game coop on hardcore. One thing I noticed was that the game starts off much easier than the first, but Acts IV & V get extremely hard. I was also glad that multiplayer was changed some. No more rolling shotgun one hit kills, but the match making needs to be looked at. I will admit that I enjoyed Gears 2.

The other game I played when not doing Gears coop was NHL 09. I was able to participate in a large number of club games, and had a blast. I did play goalie for two games and got rocked. I know I'm better than that, but I think lack of play with nervousness did me in.

I was able to get a bit of time in with Fallout 3, but not much. I have been focusing my time trying to complete the survival guide chain quest, and right now I am on my way to River City., wish me luck!

Some random stuff...

Since I don't really have anything to talk about in depth, I thought I would just throw out some random thoughts.

I am in the process of finishing up my review of Warhammer Online. It has taken me way too long to finish it, but, the extra time does allow me to play the game longer and get a better feel for it.

Speaking of MMO's, I am thinking that I really need to just choose one MMO to play, and stop dabbling. I recently resubbed to WoW, and even though I am having fun now, I am just not looking forward to WotLK, not one bit. I am however thinking of reserving the Moria expansion for LOTRO and even doing the lifetime subscription. That way I can play as little or as much as I would like, and not worry about feeling like I am wasting $15 a month. So do I stick with WAR? I or how about going back to CoH, that game is pretty awesome, and it's not fantasy based!

I completed Fable 2 last week. That game started off so great, but turned into a series of time sinks with a shallow main story. The game is much better than the first Fable, and I would recommend it to everyone who likes action-rpgs. My two main complaints would be with the ranged combat and the short and disappointing story. As I played the game, I felt that the game was punishing me for trying to play as a ranged combat focused player. It seems that focusing in either melee or will and using ranged periodically is the way the game was built. Also, the two important parts of the story, the spire and the ending, are two of the worst examples of story telling ever!! The spire was bad enough, but the final confrontation is extremely disappointing.

Fallout 3 is AWESOME!!

And finally, I am looking forward to the new Call of Duty game for the PC, finally I can get back to fragging my buddies online.

No words...

Foul play not suspected in missing Barrie teen case

As a parent of two, this truly saddens me to the point of tears.

A win for America!

Last nights election for Obama as president has been seen as a win for America. And that the nation has changed, and that America will been seen in a different light from now on.

Or so I am lead to believe. For the record, I voted McCain, and my feelings about Obama have nothing to do with his color. But I will say that it is sad that it has taken this long for a person that is not white to win the Presidency, and hopefully I will be alive to witness the first woman to be elected as President.

I am personally fearful now that the Democrats hold all three branches and have little in the way of opposition to push through their liberal agendas. All I can hope for is that there are still some old school Dems in the House and Senate that are not too keen on the new Presidents way of doing things.

I'm afraid that the time when someone ran for President because they felt that they could make a change for the better for America is long gone, that died out after FDR left the White House. Maybe Obama will change that, maybe he will deliver on what he has promised. I will wait and see.

Fable 2 is done!

Well, I just finished Fable 2, or rather the main story about 30mins ago. And not to spoil anything, but the ending is crap. In fact, the more I played, the more I was becoming more annoyed with the game itself.

The controls are unresponsive at times, most of the game itself is a huge time sink to mask the terribly short story, and using firearms in aimed mode is very frustrating. The game was great for awhile, but it really looses its appeal around half way through.

I'm glad that I completed the game, but I would have to say that I am disappointed with the game as a whole.

A little bit of WoW.

I finally decided last night to re-sub to WoW. Some of my friends have decided that WAR is not for them and have gone back to WoW. I've been interested in the new 3.0 patch content since reading about many months ago, but I am just not all that interested in WotLK right now.

the thought of grinding my lvl 70's to lvl 80 is just something that I am not looking forward to, no matter what the content is. The first expansion should not have raised the level cap, and been more focused on adding content to the 'old world' instead. But, it doesn't really matter now does it.

But I did have fun last night. I respecced to Prot for my warrior since I was the one needed to tank last night in the group. Prot is something that I have very little knowledge of, but I do know that I has alot of fun doing it.

As of now though, I still like WAR, and I really like my Black Orc. Who knows, maybe I'll just cancel both my MMO's and just play the Witcher Enhanced version that I bought recently!

Fable 2 thoughts!

Fable 2 has turned out to be the great game that I thought it was going to be. So much so that I have had to delay my play time of Fallout 3! This game is so much better than the first, graphics are great, fighting is wonderful, more things to do, and coop multiplayer that isn't great but it's there.

My only concern is that the story itself is rather short. There are a good number of other things to do in the game, but to me a lot of them feel like time sinks in order to mask the shortness of the actual game. Like the fact that I can get a job in the game, what's the point of that? I have job in real life, why would I want to work in a game that I am playing to relax! And the whole marriage thing too, at least being married in real life isn't as tedious as in the game.

But in all, this is a great game that everyone should play!

Empire:Total War event!

On Oct. 24th, I was able to go to San Francisco to an event for Empire:Total War. This was the first event I have had the opportunity to attend, and it was a blast. I met Mark and Kieran from Creative Assembly, and they were fantastic.

If you are at all interested, you can check out the info from the event here.

What was really cool was after the event, we were treated to a real live naval battle sail event, on the ships themselves! Being the smart guy that I am, I made sure to bring my camera and take a few pictures of the sail event.

These are just a few of the shots that I took at the event. It was a great day out on the bay, sunny, cool, and nice and windy, perfect for some naval maneuvers!

Fallout 3 midnight launch on Monday!

Earlier today I received a phone call from Gamestop letting me know that they are going to be doing a midnight launch for Fallout 3 on Monday night!

So I will be heading over there tomorrow night around 10pm to wait in line for my copy. I actually preordered the collectors edition for the PC, but I could only find a pic of the Xbox version really quick.

Guess I better play some games tonight and tomorrow before I get my copy, cause I have a feeling that I will be a bit busy after Monday night!

Some randomness...

Since I haven't posted much lately, I thought I would just throw some thoughts together into one post...

I have been playing Dead Space on the Xbox 360 for the past few days, and it's much better than I thought it would be. I thought it looked like crap after reading about it and seeing some screenshots, and because it's made by EA, but I was wrong, it's actually very good. It's what System Shock would be like if you removed all the rpg, added some really nice graphics, and changed the game from a fps into a Resident Evil clone. But it works, and I am having alot of fun.

I'm hoping to get some time in with Fable 2 before I lose more time when Fallout 3 is released on the 28th.

I haven't played alot of Warhammer lately, but I have been having alot of fun with my Black Orc running scenarios while questing, which is what I thought you are suppose to do. Seems to be some dislike for scenarios floating around the blogosphere lately. Two things really that bothersome, players just camping out in the warcamps, and the amount of xp gained in a scenario has become the new grind to gain rank, both take away from open world RvR. I agree that something needs to be done to encourage players to do more ORvR. But I have noticed that my enjoyment has increased alot when I began to que up more scenarios while questing. Problem is that scenarios give out too much xp and questing gives out too little, that's why I try to mix both in during a game session.

The new Star Wars MMO was finally made official, really looking forward to that. Here's hoping that SWG will finally be able to be put to rest and taken out of it's misery.

Max Payne movie is not nearly as bad as critics say it is, but it's not a good movie either. How can you make a movie out of an action game, but take out all the action?

The World Series started, not really interested, the Raiders beat the Jets on Sunday, surprise surprise, and the Sabres are undefeated, woot!

Tired of NHL 09 online!

Last night had to be the worst time I have ever had playing some pick-up online team play in NHL 09. I play defense, I like playing defense, and I think I am pretty good at playing defence. I was a little rusty last night I will admit, I haven't played a game in about a week. But the verbal abuse I received last night was completely uncalled for.

Really I am just tired of the online aspect of NHL 09 now. I love the human factor with online play, but either there are no more team players, or I just have the worst luck in playing games with asshats who don't know how to play hockey as a team.

Here's how the night went; look for a game for almost ten minutes, finally get in one. Endure verbal assault on how to play hockey from a moron who only likes to hang on the other teams blue line so he can get the pass and make a crappy deke and turn the puck over, we lose 0-3.

Next game starts better, is better except for the elitist short power forward who is a massive puck hog. I turn the puck over once in front of the net which results in a score for the other team, it happens. Have to hear about more about how I need to play my position. Of course no mention of the many block shots I had, or the four assists. And we won this game 7-2!

Still, I press on and try one more game, and it freezes on me just before the end of the first period. Just the motivation I needed to end the night and go to bed.

Early Max Payne impressions.

Early reviews for the new Max Payne movie are in. And to no ones surprise I think, the critics hate it. Seriously, is any one shocked about this.

Of the three reviews that are currently out, only the review by Variety is even worth reading. It at least had some comments on what was wrong with the movie. After reading all three reviews, I got the feeling that none of the film critics have ever played a Max Payne game, a shame really. The central theme from the reviews seem to be that the script is bad.

Well I will be going to see this on on Sunday, and I'll give my thoughts on the movie afterwards. I tend to enjoy game to movie adaptations, and I'm a huge fan of the Max Payne games, so I might be a little biased, we shall see.

Warhammer Online one month later...sort of.

For many people, yesterday marked the one month anniversary of playing WAR. I was one of the unfortunate ones that did preorder the game, but was unable to get a beta and head start key from a certain retailer, **coughGamestop blowscough**.

I have spent a good amount of time looking around the blogosphere for comments and concerns both positive and negative on the state of the game one month after launch. Just like everything else in the world, you have those who love the game, and those that think the game is worthless, but everyone agrees that there some areas that need some fixing.

One major concern is the popularity of the scenarios, and the lack of open world RvR because of them, and that the game is grindtastic without said scenarios. The reason why these scenarios are so popular is because it is easier and quicker to gain rank then it is to do questing. The unfortunate side effect is that there tends to be little PvP in the RvR lakes in the game.

There have been many comments on what can be done to remedy the situation in order to move players away from the scenarios and into the RvR lakes. Mythic has taken notice and has taken a few steps in the right direction with the Experience Enhancements that they have introduced in the past week, and only time will tell if it works.

My main concern for WAR is the shallow PvE content in the game. I can only comment on what I've played, but what I have played hasn't been all that great. There are other factors as to why scenarios are so popular than just gaining rank, like the rewards you can earn and the amount of travel it takes to get to and around a RvR lake. But if the PvE was more satisfying, then I think you would see more players out running around and possible doing more open world RvR like Mythic wants.

I personally like the game, but I really enjoy PvE questing, and with the uninspired PvE content, WAR is not keeping my interest like I was hoping it would.