Author: FyreHaar

The Haul

Now that the Holiday gifting season (and the massive Steam sale) are over, here is the list of what you can expect me to be reviewing over the next couple of months. Be aware, many of these titles are ancient and are here because

a) They are still good games regardless of their age

b)They were less than $5 on Steam.

Assassin’s Creed II

Bioshock (I know, I haven’t played it!!)

Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic

Rome – Total War Gold

Braid

S.T.A.L.K.E.R. – Shadow of Chernobyl

Torchlight

I figure that’s an assload of content to disembowel and regurgitate for your pleasure.  I have about a month and a half until DOWII: Chaos Rising and two and half months until God of War III.

Also, the Leatherworker has stated that we should get a new video card for the gaming PC. The one we have is super crashy. I mean, it crashes during TF2 for crying out loud. He hates that and even more, he hates seeing me do the angry penguin walk to the kitchen after yet another failed attempt to play Dawn of War multiplayer.

So any suggestions for a new video card? We are an Nvidia house, so none of that ATI crap.

-fyre

Last Night in TF2

This weekend while playing a gripping round of Team Fortress 2 I was informed by a teammate that they had “all the achievements.” Like, all of them, for every class. There are more than 100 achievements and some of them are very difficult to achieve without help from either your own team or the opposing team.  I replied “You have no life.”

This might have been overly harsh coming from someone who has played more than 20 hours of video games in a week in which she also worked a full time job and trained for a triathlon.

“You’re right,” he said “I have no life.”

I don’t know how to feel about that. I do know that I spent a very great part of the next day cleaning my house and playing with my dog and cats.

Get out and love somebody in person, you won’t regret it.

And it will make the headshots that much more delicious.

-fyre

Useless Headline or Most Useless Headline?

“Mom calls cops to thwart video-game-playing son” from the San Francisco Chronicle.

Seriously?? The headline makes it sound like they had to save her from some psychotic high functioning 25 year old who was having a psychotic break. The truth of the matter: She called the cops because her 14 year old son wouldn’t stop playing video games.

Let’s reframe the proposition shall we?

“Public safety funds wasted by woman who insists on letting electronic devices and law enforcement do her parenting for her.”

or perhaps

“Woman who lack even a modicum of parenting skills falls back on public servants when an ill fated first attempt at discipline fails.”

I mean FFS. Your 14 year old won’t stop playing games, what do you do? First you ask them to stop. Then you tell them to stop. Then you unplug the console and carry it into your bedroom and put it under your pillow. You also take the TV remote with you, as most TVs these days require one to function at all. On Monday you sell the console and get you and your kid into joint counseling/parenting sessions. Because if your kid is up at 2:30 AM playing GTA, he’s not the onlyone with the problem.

-fyrehaar

Can’t wait for it to end – The TF2 War

I know that TF2 being an old game, the developers have to come up with events and ideas to keep it fresh, fun and exciting in a world of shiny new games. and I’m not trying to bag on the whole Demoman v. Soldier idea, it’s cool and fun (soldier forever! demos suck!!).  But the game has been fundamentally changed since they started the war and will remain so until it ends. Everyone is so focused on the war that the game has fallen by the wayside. Servers are Demo Servers or Soldier Servers and heaven help you if you actually try to get an objective on them.

It’s a good idea, I’m just not very excited about how the community has responded to it. I also hate demomen with a passion and seeing so bleeding many of them makes my teeth hurt. Grenade spamming bastards. Kill em all!!!

-fyrehaar

One step closer to actually working??

The release date for Chaos Rising has been announced!!

I may begin to serve my dark lords on March 11 2010. Pawns of the false emperor, your doom is nigh!!

Let’s all cross our fingers and hope that I will actually be able to play both the expansion pack and the original game, which has been pretty much FUBAR since Last Stand came out.

-Fyre

Stardust – Cannonball Read #2

Stardust by Neil Gaiman.  Fantasy, Nouveau Fairytale.

Well, I love me some modern takes on the fairy tale and I love me some Neil Gaiman (Sandman is tha bomb!!!!) so this seemed a prefect choice. More tellingly, I love the movie based on this book. I thought I was set up to love this book but it left me lukewarm.

The book follows Tristran Thorn as he leaves the village of Wall on a quest to win his one true love’s heart. He has marvelous adventures in the land of Faerie and, it being a fairy tale, he wins through to his goal! This is all you really need to know before you read this book in terms of plot. Gaiman’s genius for unique characters is in full effect as he populates both Wall and Faerie with memorable personalities and conceptions of magic.

Continue reading Stardust – Cannonball Read #2