FREE TABULA RASA
12/17/08 UPDATE: I have TWO (2) Tabula Rasa codes left! Please leave a comment on this post and I will contact you through e-mail. Then it's time for some Yultide Bane extermination!
I don't really think NCSoft is "the devil" but for some reason I can't really place my finger on I have never really had a good impression of their company. I'm not sure what the deal is, as they publish at least two solid games, City of Heroes and Guild Wars.
Maybe it is because I am back-lashing against the grind-and-level MMO model which their flagship title, Lineage 2, could be a poster child. Maybe it is because (even though I think it is an excellent game) I just can't get into Guild Wars or perhaps because (while I think it still has game mechanics that are innovative 4 years later) City of Heroes is kinda bland. Or maybe it is because they allowed the stillbirth that is Tabula Rasa to be released.
So what is up with Tabula Rasa? I feel pretty depressed about that - I mean it was a crappy game on the surface, but still it always felt like it some kind of hidden potential lurking just below its plastic facade. Oh well, it will be gone soon now.
While my feelings for Tabula Rasa were love/hate I have to admit I did have some feelings for the game, so I am going to activate a new account on December 20th 11th and play it out until they kill the servers.
Why December 20th 11th? Tabula Rasa will become a free-to-play game on January 10, 2009 so making a new account on the 20th 11th will result in being able to play the game continuously with no monthly payment until the servers die on February 28.
And here is the best part: I have 5 Tabula Rasa boxes left over! Nobody wanted to buy them (lol) so I want to use them up before they are completely worthless. So I HAVE FOUR TR NEW-ACCOUNT CODES TO HAND OUT to whoever wants one. I'm not sure how to hand them out, so if you want one leave a comment below and I will get back to you through the e-mail address you leave. I'm thinking I will just hand them out to the first four people that ask, but if I unexpectedly get a gazillion requests I'm going to have to break out the 100-sided die.
So if you are lucky enough to get a code, I will e-mail it to you and you can use it to make a Tabula Rasa account at NCSoft and take advantage of the initial 30 free days. In fact, if you would like to play together we can roll on the same server and group up. The TR client can be downloaded directly from your NCSoft account after it is set up.
Speaking of free stuff City of Heroes is offering a free play all weekend ending on Sunday (Dec. 7). I'm considering giving it a whirl for a few hours to see what it has become like over the past few years.
Even though I found it lacking in depth of immersion I have always had a soft spot in my heart for this game, probably because I could fly around the maps. CoH also has some other features (like side-kicking) that I think should be as standard in an MMO as mail or an auction house.
(But I probably won't play CoH - I haven't logged in to LOTRO in like five days or so, which means I will likely spend time on that. After all I would like to eventually get at least one character to level 50 so I can enter Moria, lol.)
Believe Your Justice
OK, I couldn't pass this one up. I ran across this trailer the other day and I haven't been able to stop thinking about how ridiculous and funny it is.
It is for the Japanese game Metal Wolf Chaos - a game which pits a fictional President of the United States, Michael Wilson, versus his arch-nemesis Vice-President Richard Hawk ... both of whom apparently enjoy zipping around the nation in super-powered battle mecha.
Judging by the trailer this game hits on so many of the evil-US-government memes from the past decade it is almost chilling, though in it's own Engrish way it comes off as preposterously funny. It is interesting to watch this, though, knowing that this is how another society internally views your own; it's a bit like overhearing a private conversation about your family.
But it apparently has everything: a wicked vice president, a maverick president, a complicit mainstream media and explosions galore. And of course 20ft-tall mecha with guns popping out of every orifice.
Favorite Quotes:
"NOTHING IS POINTLESS! And the reason is because I'm the President of the great United States of America! YEAAAH! Jodie, I'm going to step on into outer space!"
"Believe your justice."
"A heart of justice is a heart that loves America."
"Richaaaaaaaaarrrrrrrrrrd!!!"
"You guys are roast chicken!"
Time Passes Slowly …
I am now about a solid week with the new machine, which I am considering dubbing François.
LOTRO looks great, obviously, though it lags out worse than the older computers. I'm assuming it is because I have yet to perform the gauntlet of stutter-troubleshooting exercises. It looks beautiful and gets good frame-rates, though. I actually sighed out loud like a comely wench when I first went traipsing about the Shire. OK, that's pushing it, but there was a lot of IRL Wizard's Fire involved, so my memory is a little hazy.
I no longer have to put up with the indoor lag of Fallout 3 - Rejoice! The outdoor areas were fine on the Nvidia 8600 G, but the indoor areas were sometimes a nightmare to get through. But no longer. The sad news about Fallout 3 is that I lost my saved games and have had to start over from the beginning. Oh well!
This time I'm going with an evil guy and focusing on Stealth and Science. I want to try out a character who is not focused on combat to see what challenges arise. But after annihilating the entire Springvale School gang with my 10mm pistol shortly upon leaving Vault 101, I can see the challenges may be few on the Normal setting. I think a bump up on the difficulty level is in order.
In case it wasn't inferred from the lack of rants about gaming on linux, I decided to go with Vista 64-bit over a linux distribution (though I was eyeing Fluxbuntu). It just makes sense for me right now, which I find rather sad in way. The ability to just get up and running with apps like Creative Suite and Steam without compatability layers or virtual machines made up my mind. Well, that and the joy of MSDN academic licensing. You can trust I am too skinflint enough to even pay $99 for an OS, and I would rather spend five months making Steam and Fallout 3 work together in CrossOver than that. But I got an easy way out so I took it.
I also decided to install good 'ol DOSBox. I loaded up a high school favorite and spent a little time reminscing about being a nerd. I can see myself having a lot of non-game related fun with DOSBox as well. But I am a weirdo that would be amped about using WordPerfect 4.2 to type fart jokes.
Judgement Day
Yesterday I experienced Judgement Day ... or at least the Everex equivalent of it. My XT5300T laptop finally died, victim of the convergence of poor heat dissipation and faulty motherboard. Suffice it to say, while finding a laptop with it's specs for $700 seemed like a deal at the time, only getting 10 months use out of it makes it a really poor buy. Oh well, live and learn.
Perhaps the biggest downside to this is that while some of my personal files are locked up, ALL my saved games from Fallout 3 and Colonization are as well. And then there is that thing about no longer having a gaming rig. That can really put a damper on a good-old-fashioned Wasteland killing spree.
And here I thought I would be writing a post about how I bought the Mines of Moria expansion and played a Rune Keeper up to level six (they are awsome, btw). Or I thought I might pen some funny missives about the multitudinous, shambling horde that is made up of newb Wardens. It makes me feel bad even rolling one to level six to try out the class. Seriously, they might have to change the name of the game to Lord of the Wardens.
Ah well, at least my old standby (P4 3.0E, 2GB DDR400, x1950 pro 512mb) computer has LOTRO already loaded. Now to just wait for the Moria patch to install itself while I look for a new computer.
What's that? A new computer? Yes and I have detailed all the parts below even.
I wanted to wait longer to upgrade my computer but fate has conspired against my will, and I found myself spending the entirety of last night browsing Newegg for my new budget masterpiece. And when I say budget, I mean it. Because this is an unexpected expense, the goal for building this new rig is to maximize the dollar-for-power ratio as much as possible.
So first things first - time to lay a few ground rules:
- I will only buy parts that have free shipping. Making no exceptions really helps keep this interesting.
- I will not adhere to any brand loyalty as much as I can. My guiding motivation is PRICE.
- I'm only buying core parts - no monitor, OS, mouse or other peripherals.
The list:
- The body - I decided to shop for the case and power supply first, which is different for me (I usually start with a CPU or GPU). I can't really complain about what I found
- hec Raptor500 While I am not entirely confident about the 500 watts it supplies, it is a solid unit with dual +12V rails each carrying 19A. And it was -$10 plus an additional -20% from the price. Making it only $39.
- Antec Three Hundred Black Steel ATX Mid Tower Computer Case There is a good chance I would have bought this anyway, as I am looking for a case like the Antec 900, but without all the ridiculous disco lighting.
- The CPU - This was the first big decision. Should I go AMD or Intel? Obviously, at this point in time, Intel makes the better chips. But the real question on my mind is do they make the better dollar/performance chip? As far as I can tell AMD and Intel are nearly tied on this front, with Intel chips outperforming AMD by a bit. So I decided to go with
- AMD Athlon 64 X2 6000+ 3.1GHz 89W - Unlike the original version of this chip, this is a 65nm chip running at 89W. The original was, I believe a 95nm/125 watt. This makes it better for overclocking and slightly more competitive with Intel.
- The motherboard - I didn't spend a lot of time on this, some might say to my own peril. The choices, however, were not numerous and I happened upon the GIGABYTE 780G HDMI ATX Motherboard fairly quick. It meets my basic needs and was relatively cheap. It can't SLI, but I don't need that. What it does have is support for a Phenom quad-core and DDR2 1066 RAM if I decide to go that route in the future.
- The video card and RAM - As you can imagine, I spent a considerable amount of time going back and forth on which card to buy. I considered an ATI HD4850, but in the end brand loyalty played a small part in my decision to get an Nvdia card. Originally I was going to purchase a GTX260, but unfortunately my skinflint nature won out. I figured I could settle for 128 stream processors instead of 192 if it meant saving me $70. I chose the
- BFG Tech GeForce 9800 GTX 512MB - While it may not be the top dog, I'm not sure if anyone can argue that this is not a solid card. At least I'm hoping. The predominant reason I chose this card, rather than talking myself into the more expensive GTX260 was because of a combo deal being offered with RAM:
- CORSAIR 4GB DDR2 800 - Normally I only get G.Skill RAM, but in this case I could not pass up the deal being offered. What makes this RAM fancy is the fact that it will ultimately only cost me $10. YES THAT'S RIGHT. Ten American dollars.
- The 9800GTX cost $149 and when you get them as a combo, the RAM costs $39. But the RAM also has a $30 rebate, making it cheaper than dinner. I couldn't pass that up.
- Storage Drives - this is the one area I didn't really skimp but that is because I didn't need to. Aside from paying the exhorbitant prices for the Western Digital Raptor drives, most hard drives are reasonably priced and don't have a lot of variance. And DVD burners are just basically cheap. So I chose the best for the money.
So that is my new rig, and all it cost me was ... drumroll ... $535! And that is before the $30 rebate on the RAM - I will also remind you once again I paid exactly $ZERO for shipping. Ah, good times with NewEgg.
Now I just have to wait until the parts get here. The real decision for me is whether I should install Vista64 and carry on like normal or install Ubuntu64 and install Creative Suite 3 into an XP VirtualBox, leaving many of the newer games I want to play in limbo. I will probably be opting for Vista, all things considered. But my heart lies with Debian (and Ubuntu). We'll see when we get there, I suppose.
Lots of links in this one
I haven't been gaming much lately. This is a bad time of year with regard to the amount of free time I have.
I have been carrying on with Fallout 3 and have managed to raise my character's Small Arms to 100 and Agility to nine. Though I've realized this may have been a mistake and definitely won't be taking the Gun Nut perk. I don't plan on modding past the 100 limit, though, so I will just have to look at the Small Guns Bobblehead as a collectible and focus on items with non-gun enhancements.
In other news I am suffering from a great deal of ... I'm not sure what you would call it. Confliction? Ennui? Whatever it is, I have it. It has a lot to do with my inability to play MMORPGs lately, for whatever reason. Which is a shame because I have a month of time with DDO going to waste. Alas!
I have had it in my mind to make a clean break with all MMO-related games for a couple months and focus solely on older games. Not that I have the time for this either, but I can't shake the thought out of my pot-diseased brain that I should go on a binge the likes of which haven't been seen since the days of EGA graphics. It's the same part of me that thinks I should switch 100% to linux and run dosbox out of WINE so I can play the same game I was playing in 1989 rather than continue to dual-boot with Vista and play Left 4 Dead (which is coming out tomorrow). You know, the tweaker part of my brain.
I am also not feeling the spending of a grip of cash on the numerous titles and expansions coming out this time of year, as I think many of us understand. I can see even my munificent subscription to LOTRO ending (I sub even if I don't plan on playing partly to hold the $10/month rate but also to show support for the game) in the face of financial reality. It could even prevent me from using most subscription-based services, whether MMO or not.
I wonder if there will be a boom of F2P games when the realities of the financial crisis finally hit home. Probably not, as $15 a month is still a solid deal if it is your primary entertainment.
I have personally considered joining an Ultima Online freeshard. I am a more recent comer to the MMO world, one of the WoW wave so I have never played Ultima Online or even Everquest. I thought it would be interesting to give this title a whirl 10 years after it's release.
But that is all assuming I don't simply go away to Left 4 Dead land for good, ending with my brains eaten.
Fallout 3 Diaries
In my frantic search for anything and everything Fallout 3, I just came across a page on the official site featuring the character diaries of Nate Purkeypile, an artist for the game. His write-ups are fun to read, but by the last one, "Porkchops the Fish Lady," I was laughing my ass off.
Maybe I'll start writing up my experiences from the point of view of the character in the game. That would make for an interesting style of walkthrough, lol.
Greetings from the Wasteland
Sorry, can't write much ... lost in the Capital Wasteland ... chasing mutants ... leg just got blown off ...
Fallout 3 is my new favorite game. I haven't even touched Colonization or DDO the past few days because of it, and so far I have barely scratched the surface. I have killed a goodly number of ghouls and super-mutants in wickedly gruesome ways, however. Think eyeballs popping out of exploding heads (yuck).
For my first character I am specializing in Small Arms, Repair and Sneak to start off with plus a good amount in Science and Lockpicking. So far I am up to level 7 and have my Small Arms at 85 (out of 100). I have been focusing on Intense Training and Swift Learner for my perks so far, but I plan on getting Gunslinger to go with a 10 in Agility and 100 in Small Arms and possibly the Gun Nut perk to push me above the 100 mark in Small Arms. Yes, you could say my dude is a pistolier.
OH NOES!
I renewed my WoW subscription.
I to had look at some of the shiny new changes they made. I really like the idea of achievements and having a separate container for pets and mounts is a much-welcome change. But it kinda feels like they should have been in place a year ago. I know, I'm a complainer.
I did get in a quick four-man of Zul Gurub - that was tons of fun. We did pretty well also, making it all the way to the Edge of Madness. Our group consisted of a Druid for tank, a Shaman for heals, and a Mage and a Rogue for dps. Sadly to take down High Priest Thekal we needed just a bit more dps - the timing in getting all three mobs down before they resurrect each other was too much for us without the additional damage. That and I had to set up my keys on the fly, was struggling to stay asleep and haven't played in a month. Suffice it to say, my equipment was solid red by the time I ported out.
And the best thing about getting all wrapped up in WoW again for a few hours? I got a totally brilliant idea for the next expansion (before this one is even released ... even before I have sufficiently immasculated myself enough to actually purchase the abomination).
OK, so the idea: repurpose all the level-duplicate zones into new high-level content zones. If leveling from 1-60 is a zip-bang affair, why not do away with redundant zones? For instance, Stranglethorn Vale, Arathi Highlands and Swamp of Sorrows all have pretty similar level ranges. Once you reach your 20s and beyond why should you have so many quests in different zones?
In the beginning, I think, this was a good design decision. It gave the world a big, open feel and players had numerous options on how to level their characters. It helped separate Horde and Alliance a bit. Of course a lot of people power-leveled their characters from the beginning and that is now fully endorsed as a play-style by Blizzard in the form of end-game development and the more recent leveling-speed boosts.
So now we have this big, empty world.
Why not pull a Warhammer on Azeroth and create a seamless two-continent leveling path with the disused zones being redeveloped into level 80 (or 80-90 more likely) zones? You could have players leveling 30-40 in refined Arathi Highlands and make Strangelthorn Vale a level 80 zone.
DDO gets right into the Dragons
I've been playing DDO off and on as well mainly to experience the new introduction areas - this game has come a long way in the past couple years. To be honest with you, I've come to look at DDO as one of the better MMOs available right now in terms of originality.
I also have something of a fetish for it's weird, synthesizer music soundtrack. It reminds me of music that seemed to grace a lot of the weird and cheesy sci fi and fantasy movies in the late 70s. I can't get enough.
But the new storyline is great, and the type of thing I love to see in an MMO type setting. The addition of hirelings is also welcome. The seemless integration of the hireling mechanic into the very beginning of the story was also delightful. For a better breakdown (with screenshots) of the new player experience, Syncaine of Pumping Irony has made several informative posts.
I don't think too much of the new character creation system, but as I've mentioned before I'm the type who always hits "customize" in every game that lets me. I can see how the new system would be even easier than the old system for a total D&D newb.
But sadly, I may wind up allowing both my DDO and WoW subscription lapse, as I have finally gone and bought Fallout 3. That's right, it is downloading over Steam as we speak. I was going to pass it up and focus on other games in the hope it will eventually come down to $30 (I'm not a big fan of buying games that cost more than $40), but what the hell? This is a quality title.
And while I'm certain FO3 will hold my interest in the long term, in the short I may set it on the back-burner and focus on LOTRO or continue to scratch my Colonization and Team Fortress 2 itches. I am, however, confident that Left4Dead will be holding my attention like all it's Source-based counterparts I've played and that release is but a mere few weeks away.
But I'm almost certain at this point I won't be bothering with WotLK until next year, if at all. Decisions, decisions - what is the deal with fall and all the new titles, lol?
Site Redesign and stuff
I have been staying pretty busy over the past week, but sadly not much of it has involved gaming. Well, not directly.
I made the new site design for fortuente.com live yesterday. Originally it had a CSS-based dropdown menu system, but it didn't work in Internet Explorer so I just shoved the sidebar to the bottom of the page and relased it in a pique. I'll be refining the site little by little, I will probably end up using a Javascript menu or switch to a regular two-column layout.
It did prompt me to be frustrated enough with IE to include a "Get Firefox" button at the bottom of the page. I should probably be fair and have an Opera button as well. Lol.
The past week the only two games I have managed to log any time into are Colonization and Team Fortress 2. I think I am beginning to understand my Team Fortress 2 fascination: I seem to really get into TF2 mode when I am working on something like designing or developing a web site. I mean, after staring at numbered lines of colored letters on a white screen for six hours what is really better than sparking up a fatty, putting some Prince Jammy on foobar and blowing people up?
Colonization, however, is what gets me pumped up to tackle the projects. I have to say, however, some of it's imperfections have been showing. But it matters not, it's still a really interesting take on Civilization 4 - in fact it has me pining for a mod that plays like Civ4, but includes the economics and logistics of Colonization. "Civilization Ultimate" or some such thing.
I plan on starting a new Colonization game tonight or tomorrow, and hopefully this time I will beat it. In fact, I think I'll post my save games for anyone who would like to see in-game what I'm writing about.
I haven't even got around to buying Fallout 3 yet, there is so much to do. As much as I have been looking forward to this game, I've decided to put it on the backburner for now. I really want to get my LOTRO Champion (still 37) to 50 before Mines of Moria comes out.
I fear that will never happen, though. Which brings me to a predicament I have been having lately: swearing off MMOs for good. As in all MMO-type games. The reason, I think is that I am simply not a social person. I have had a great amount of fun playing with other people in non-MMO environments - Neverwinter Nights 1 and Team Fortress are two good examples - but those experiences are less about chatting and more about playing the game.
I enjoy exploring, which is probably what attracted me most to these games in the first place, but the perpetual grinds they seem to be comprised of has really worn on me. I suppose I lack the time and people skills to really fill in the blanks. But I will keep plugging along - why not?
Which leads me to Wrath of the Lich King. Will I buy it? Will I resub to that pit of insanity known as WoW?
The sad, sad truth is that I will. I had my finger on the renew subscription button just an hour ago, but fortunately I gave the girlfriend my plastic. Gives me even more time to think, lol.
Figuring out Colonization Strategies
I've been playing a lot of Civilization the past few days and still have yet to beat the game. At first I thought it was the usual culprit, Maryjane, but after spending some quality lurk-time at Civ Fanatics, apparently it isn't just me having problems. My last game I came close, though.
I've been playing as Louis de Frontenac of France on a large map. I chose Frontenac more because of the military bonus (Grenadier I) than the native interaction bonuses. Since the only way to win the game is by killing every member of the King's Royal Expeditionary Force (REF), it only make sense to be as militaristic as possible. But the native tolerance does help as I've been avoiding wars with natives or other European colonies in order to have a crushing defense.
I founded five cities: as I planned from the outset to use the honeypot strategy during the War of Independence I made one port with four inland cities. "Honeypot" is a name I came up with to describe this common strategy due to it's passing similarity to the computer security technique.
This strategy involves maintaining one strong port city until the WoI, then all-but surrendering it to the REF at the outset of the war. Why? To take advantage of the crushing 100% settlement bombard bonus that cannons have. A contingent of cannons with solid dragoon support can capture cities quite easily, and with a good network of roads the dragoons can quickly respond to the REF out in the field.
So I will retake the port city then leave it once more with two or three sacrificial soldiers (those poor indentured servants). The REF will once again retake the city whereupon I can practice shooting fish in a barrel. Profit.
There is no question defending an inland empire is easier as well. With a solid network of roads and cities placed close together your dragoons can quickly respond any threat. Between the enemy placing troops in the roach motel of your port city and sending the rest on futile death marches, the theory is that you will whittle down the REF in no time.
But just getting to this point has been quite a trial for me. A few of the extremely important things I've learned so far:
Do not produce Liberty Bells until you are almost ready for war.
Build the Printing Press and Newspaper before slotting Elder Statesman, so that when you do they will begin your LB production with a bang. The size of the REF increases with your LB production, so you want to achieve the 50% support for Independence in as few turns as possible.
Starting with five cities ranging from 8-18 population, nine Elder Statesmen, five Printing Presses and three Newspapers it took me roughly 40 turns. I added some Free Colonists to the Town Halls and built a fourth Newspaper in that time.
Use Cannons exclusively for your pre-WoI army
Now, to be honest I do not exactly understand how this is all calculated yet, and I can not be assed to look it up right now. However, a very important consideration to make in determining your LB production is the size of your population.
If you have soldiers garrisoned in your city, they will count for your population but will somehow drag down your LB production (this is where I am hazy on details). Cannons for whatever reason are exempted from this. As you will be wanting a formidable army of cannons during your WoI it only makes sense to stock up on them as early as you can and use them to defend your cities from hostiles.
Food, Guns and Horses are the only commodities that matter
This is certainly not true, but I am trying to highlight their extreme importance. These are the raw materials for Dragoons, the top over-all military unit. Because anyone can become a Dragoon (or a Soldier), and because you are penalized in LB production for maintaining a standing army, it is wise to stock up on guns and horses for the end game WoI. Food will keep those future bullet-catchers popping out at a nice rate.
This last game, I had roughly 1200 Horses and 1000 Guns stockpiled and between that and my Cannon army I was easily showing King Louis who was boss. Sadly for me on this last run through, I ran out of time before the King sent all the troops over. I ended being short by about 15 turns, even.
Which means that as far as I can tell so far, it definitely takes longer than the 16 (give or take a couple) turns I was trying to win my WoI in. I figured that because I had the units and strategy I would be able to hand him his ass on a platter - and I did just that - but it took the King too long to actually ship his units to fight me, so he won by default.
To me that's a weakness in the game (I declared in 1775 after all), but oh well. I will make sure to plan for it next time.I really wish there was more than one way to win this game.
I think I am going to spend a day or two using the map editor to run simulations on the fastest way to run up LB production and try to see just how population affects it. If I remember, I am totally baked right now.
Blogs I Read
- Brian Psychochild Green
- Elder Game
- Fabled Lands
- Kill Ten Rats
- Killed In A Smiling Accident
- OSG1 – Online Strategy Games
- Pumping Irony
- Ralph Koster
- Stylish Corpse
- Tish Tosh Tesh
- Troll in the Corner
Browser Games I Play
Fortuente Pages
Game Sites I Like
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