Games, Geeky Things, and General Musings
First it was Wildstar,
Then I downloaded Anarchy Online, but never booted it up.
Now I’m tempted to either restart one of my old Eve accounts, or start from scratch since I can’t remember a thing.
Why don’t I just play my FFXIV character?! Why am I so anxious about going through more group content?! Argh.
There are a lot of ways to add incentives to playing video games. In addition to achievements, there’s also the lure of items you wouldn’t normally be able to see without some degree of work.
I’m lured into continuing WoW due to a number of things, and I’ve decided to write them up as goals for me to achieve as I continue playing the game.
Goal One: Reach level 90 on my Hunter and my Monk.
I really want to see most of the content for this expansion, and in expansion’s previous. As such, I want to take my old hunter, whom I moved off of an oceanic server onto Baelgun, out of retirement.
I also enjoy playing my monk, even if it has a wild sort of playstyle. Love martial arts. 😀
Goal Two:Battle Pet Supremacy
I would like to take a pet battling team to the top of the leveling game, and make it a force to be reckoned with. Preferably one from each family.
Goal Three: Get some specialty mounts
There are three mounts I’m particularly interested in, and those are the Mekgineer’s Chopper from Wrath of the Lich King, the Raven Lord Anzu’s mount from Burning Crusade, and a camel from the Ramkahen faction in Cataclysm. None are flying mounts, but I already have my helicopter jet engineering mount, so I’m pleased there.
Goal Four: Have farm, will travel.
I would like to get a farming system set up on Pandaria. Hoping that particular aspect of the game expands into housing, but for now, I’m just interested in the awesomeness of it.
That’s what I have planned for WoW. Of course, there’s no telling what game might catch my fancy, but I’m hoping that, between WoW and TSW, I’ll be pleased during the majority of my playtime.
Yes,Victor, you games-meandering bastard.
You’re playing or trying TOO MANY freaking games.
You have Borderlands 2, Dark Souls PC, X-Com: Enemy Unknown, and Morrowind (using the Morrowind visual enhancer) to tide you over on the non-MMO front.
Then you have an active sub to LOTRO, which you don’t play actively, and WoW, which you’re having trouble connecting to reliably.
AND you got a year’s membership to Pirate101?!
WHAT THE BLOODY HELL WERE YOU THINKING?!
Now you’re considering getting The Walking Dead and subbing to RIFT and getting the Storm Legion expansion? I mean, I understand wanting TWD, but you could never stick to RIFT!
And you want to go back just for the freaking housing?! What the bloody, bloody hell is churning around in your head?
*imaginary hairpull*
For the love of all that is finger-licking good, like fried chicken, curb your purchases, at least till November.
Signed,
Victor’s Meandering Mind.
Basically, the above title states my sentiment rather well. I’m enjoying the Pandaria expansion more than any expansion ever primarily because I skipped most of Cataclysm and am actually playing Cataclysm and Pandaria content at the same time. Everything, as a result, feels new!
Pandaren also don’t make me feel so bad, because they’re rotund, like I am. And they kick ass. 😀
Of course, a Tauren flying kick is still a sight to behold, but a Pandaren Flying Kick is a really close second.
OH! And PET BATTLES ONLINE IS AWESOME. They need to tune some of the abilities for balance though (seeing some very overpowered PVP Pet Battle team-ups reused repeatedly)., but PVE wise it’s fun.
Right now, I’m playing Final Fantasy XIV and having quite a bit of fun. The old annoyances I had with the game that made me leave before have been mitigated significantly, and Square Enix’s team for the game is really working hard to show people that the Final Fantasy MMO is a force to be reckoned with.
Things I personally love about this game in its current state:
1. Structured Freeform Progression: This is the term I use to refer to how Final Fantasy’s leveling system allows you to be the kind of fighter, harvester, or crafter you want to be.
Changing the tool in my hands changes my class, and there’s a certain satisfaction in leveling up new crafting classes just to see LEVEL UP flash on the screen. Basically, it melds the structured leveling progression of most MMOs with the freedom to not be pegged as a particular class if you feel like switching.
2. Simplified Crafting
Originally, FFXIV’s crafting system damn near forced you to multilevel crafting classes if you wanted to be self-sufficient. To make something of a low level in a certain crafting field, you had to be a high level in a different field (or know who to talk to) to get his stuff you needed to make your own stuff.
Recipes have been streamlined to require fewer components from other fields or at least need specific items from a different, equally or lesser leveled tradeskill. Old recipes still exist though, and those recipes have a “dated” prefix to refer to them being part of the old echelon. You can still try and make those items for XP if you wanted, actually.
3. There’s finally an explanation for seemingly random shit.
There are two resources that seem to be very useful now, and they are https://www.ffxiv.mozk-tabetai.com/ and https://www.mooglebox.com. One is a great item, loot, and recipe compendium, and the other has a gathering tool that explains what you have to do in the gathering minigames to net specific items from gathering more readily.
4. The Future and its Story
The game is gearing up for a reboot called A Realm Reborn. They will pretty much wipe the whole damned planet out and literally shut down the servers prior to launch to move all the characters onto new servers for the reboot.
The best thing about this for me is that they have a freaking story explanation for the entire event, where (if memory serves) someone teleports every person on the planet to the end of time and then throws them back into the future of the world after a meteor crashes onto the world. Something like that. Basically… you get a cool lore entry about the sundering of Eorzea as a private reward for sticking by the game.
Anyway, if you feel like playing the game before the reboot, sign up and join my character Victor Stillwater on the Masamune Server. Cheers!
My previous post mentions that I’ve basically been hopping from game to game to find enjoyment, but I think it’s time I learned to do a bit of game juggling.
Currently, I have a six-month subscription to EVE on a new account, and at the same time, I will be enjoying Gulid Wars 2 and The Secret World and what they have to offer, slowly but surely. I don’t want to make any of them a main game (unless I think all three are my main game), but all of them provide something different and appealing for me.
EVE: Internet Spaceships and Sandbox goodness
The Secret World: The lore and mythos is intriguing, and Investigation missions are boss.
GW2: Free-to-play fantasy with action combat and potential longevity.
I’ve never really tried to multitask gaming before, so if you folks have any ideas on how to best juggle games, let me know!
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On another note, I’ve been dealing with some frustration regarding my connection to the Internet recently. I had trouble patching and playing certain games, and more recently, certain sites, like MMORPG.com (my workplace, basically) and Steam’s Store pages (Missed the last few days of the Steam Sale as a result) do not load properly, making it difficult to actually read or click anything.
I’ve been managing the frustration by focusing on other activities, but I’d just really like for my connection to be stable so my browsing and gaming can go back to normal again.
I don’t ever remember stepping into a quantum accelerator, but I do remember sitting in front of a computer, writing this blog post, mostly because I’m doing it right now.
It seems that I’ve become the epitome of a quantum game leaper. Or hopper. Or Hip-hopper.
WHATEVER.
The point is this: I spent a month and a half in LOTRO and currently have a three month sub there. I switched to RIFT for five days, then moved to The Secret World for two weeks, then Star Trek Online for one week, and now I’m contemplating going to EVE Online to round out the pre-GW2 time.
At the same time, I want to maintain a sub to The Secret World, mostly because I want to see what Ragnar and Funcom do with their commitment to monthly updates. So… we’ll see what happens.
For now, I’ll keep leaping, striving to put right what once went wrong, and hoping each leap will be the leap home.
My main character in LOTRO, Civrot the Warden, is probably a lot paler now than he used to be. Except for a short jaunt to the front door of the Mines of Moria, I’ve not actually stepped outside Moria in quite a while, and I find myself feeling rather dreary at the prospect of staying here for a long while.
Travel times are long, locations are sometimes confusing, and the enemy density is quite high, though I’ve heard that’s already been tweaked down a notch.
Sure, there’s a sense of wonder that comes over me when I imagine the place being constructed, but I miss the sunlight.
Here’s to hoping i reach the end of the Moria epic chain soon enough. /salute
So, since I started playing LOTRO again, I’ve noticed there are a few things about the game that bring out my obsessive-compulsive and otherwise aggressive nature. One of them is flower-picking. The other is horses. I prefer not buying them off the store, so earning them is a special treat, like a day gone extra awesome!
Now, ever since I got back into the game, I’ve had this fascination for acquiring cooler looking or faster mounts. My return coincided with the release of the Spring Festival, and since I hadn’t done it yet, it took only two hours to amass the needed Spring Leaves and Race Tokens for a Simbelmyne Horse.
As a result of a winning Twitter Entry, I also acquired a Perlino Horse, which is apparently the PAX 2012 Steed.
Finally, I also got a Jester’s Steed as a result of turning in enough flowers for the flower-picking quest for 30 boxes. Without knowing it, I’d actually gotten the steed skill but thought it’d be a item I’d need to click. Only when I checked the my Mount skills did I find the steed in my inventory.
In any event, I feel very lucky that I got all three horses in a week, and also managed to scrounge the money for the LOTRO MIthril Edition for 2000TP and another Steed.
All in all, my LOTRO days are pretty fun, barring the occasional death by horse travel bug.
Some time ago, I took Everquest out for a trial run, but I never really got into it because the controls felt alien to me… I mean, pressing H to hail an NPC? Typing words to talk to an imaginary being through the internet? Preposterous, right?
I’d been conditioned by the Eq2/WoW-era RPG to demand an experience that was similar to itself, to the point that I’d never really given the first Everquest a proper run-through because of its naturally different style of play.
I want to rectify that due to my current situation. Right now, there are a couple of AAA free-to-play MMORPGs I’ve not tried, and with my current need to conserve my money, it seemed like a good idea to go and revisit Everquest, especially since I actually have quite a bit of Station Cash on my account that’s doing nothing there.
At the same time, I’ve set EVE Online on an 11-day training regimen, even though I have only four days left on my sub. Whether it trains past day four is beyond me, but at least I’ll have a better inkling of what my plans are when I come back.
In addition, I want to try another genre I’ve yet to actually experience: the superhero game. I’ve downloaded DC Universe Online for a run, and I’m going to make an ice character for use.
My SC will go more to Everquest, probably, mostly because DCUO doesn’t seem to have housiing. Hopefully, I’ll enjoy Everquest and DCUO and, perhaps, even a bit of LOTRO, even without spending for anything with more money than I’ve already invested.
At the very least, some new and old games will get their time in the spotlight.
My thanks to Kaozz of ECTMMO for reminding me of the Everquest F2P transition that’s happening.