2013

Hey, the number on the calendar changed, LETS DO THINGS???

This year I'm not going to be buying any games. This is part new year's resolution, part practicality. The sheer amount of unfinished games I own is a little embarrassing and I'll be doing my best to rectify this for the next year. I'll also be attempting to get another run published on SDA - I remember promising to submit Klonoa 2 a few years ago, and it hasn't happened yet.

Things to do:

• Read all the books I got for Christmas
• finish Final Fantasy X-2, XII, XIII for Emily to watch (even if she doesn't want to)
• submit speedrun of Klonoa 2 / Majesty / a game that is not Arcomage to SDA
• go to Crystals for Life and be happy
• get my Unfinished percentage on Backloggery to be <65%?

Speedruns I want to do:

• Klonoa 2: this is already routed, I just need to do and record it! Maybe if I stream all these attempts then people will actually like to watch me.
• Majesty: a long time ago I did some ILs of the every non-Expert level, but now that Majesty HD is out I can improve those. Hopefully I can beat my old times and then finally figure out some decent strategies for the harder levels.
• Arcomage: technically I already have an improvement to Destruction recorded and ready to submit, but I wanted to beat my Building time too and that is really hard.
• Warhammer 40,000: Space Marine: not usually my kind of run, but I love this game and feel it deserves more attention, no planning done yet.
• Total Annihilation: this has been on the back burner for a long time... the sheer amount of missions and usual 'destroy everything' goals weigh heavily on my patience.
• Blaze and Blade: done lots of planning for this, though the entire game isn't routed out yet. My main worry is that I'll get to the end and not be able to beat it, because the last section is haaaaaaaaaard.
• Puzzle Quest: this started out as a joke but I do love the idea of running such a pointlessly random game. Needs a lot of work.
• Warhammer 40,000: Kill Team: I know this game pretty well already and have some strategies in mind. It's short and should be fairly simple to do.
• Grandia 2: grew kind of despondent when I lost my notes/haxtools but I definitely still want to do this.

I'm not going to set an unrealistic expectation and claim that these will all be done this year. I need more focus than that; something I have always lacked. I will simply try to do as much of these lists as I can.

Happy New Year.

Christmas 2012

Nothing is particularly special about my Christmas. My family and I usually spend it being too full while playing/reading/watching whatever we bought for each other. This year is slightly different because for a change I haven't been feeling too great. It's difficult to eat much and this cold I have has been going on far too long, making me prone to headaches. I make it sound harder than it is.

Merry Christmas.

Oops

So I accidentally bought some PS2 games today because I was already in town and I don't know, I'm an idiot or something.

• Mega Man X: Command Mission (PS2) it's pretty good for a capcom game
• Iron Man (PS2) yeah I know this version isn't supposed to be that great, but I didn't know all the PS2 games were BOGOF so I grabbed this one at random pretty much

Not much else to report. Emily went to hospital for her test results and they basically said 'surgery will not help you very much' so she has yet more pills to enjoy.

Gaming â Arran

What with the inimitable ShadowWraith hanging around my house for a bit, there's been ample time for gaming. I must have watched him play through Devil May Cry 3 about seventy times by now. Like the fighting games I occasionally love, it has enormous potential for humour and it is quite visually satisfying too. We played through together with me as the doppelganger and despite not having all that much control over how the game went it was pretty awesome.

Aside from that, I also got to try out two of the random mystery PS2 games I've been acquiring. Daemon Summoner was a complete mystery to me, being devoid of even a wikipedia page and GameFAQ, so I didn't know what to expect, but it was terrible. Reminds me a lot of Turok with the fog and awful frame rate. The crossbow takes an unreasonable amount of time to reload (though somewhat realistic I guess) and the melee weapon seems to do about zero damage. I got to the second level which is a forced stealth section with absolutely no display of enemies around you or even if you're hidden a là Thief, with numerous patrolling guards. Rather than taking the time to learn the routes and timing I switched the game off. One day I'll come back to it, but it may well end up being the last game I ever finish.

The other one is Haven: Call of the King which is not as unknown, but almost as annoying. An action adventure in the vein of Jak and Daxter, it has the same kind of art style and controls, except Haven is sort of sticky and has a large turning circle. It's a shame because it obviously had good production values but screwed everything up in small ways. The game is linear rather than hub-based and the levels take a long time to explore. I don't dread going back to this one but it will take a lot of patience.

Emily picked up Naruto: Rise of a Ninja for me on a whim and despite the potential for terribleness it's actually pretty good. Exploring Konoha is a good deal of fun and the combat is hectic and visceral. It's a shame the DLC is unavailable as I'd like to replace the awful English voice acting and download the free extra characters. I think I'm close to the end of the campaign as I just beat Kiba in exam stage 2. Not bad at all. The camera is stupid though.

I thought it was also high time I finished my easy play through of Earth Defence Force 2017 also. Easy difficulty is very very easy, so it's not much of an accomplishment, but it was pretty cathartic. The last level has a truly insane roster of enemies and I dread to think how many tries it will take on Hard or Inferno. I also played through the first 5 or so levels with Arran on Hard. I'd recommend this game if you really hate ants. Watching them fly about the landscape as you set off explosions everywhere is neato. Also it cracks me up when the soldiers start chanting EDF, EDF!

Also I got 1000g on Dynasty Warriors 6: Empires. I like this series despite the repetitiveness and playing as every musou character as the achievements demand is a good way to experience it. Meng Huo OP!

Family Matters

Been re-interested in genealogy stuff again lately. I still find it amazing that Emily's 4th great-grandfather fought in the American Revolution. It's difficult to trace my family tree back that far because of my parents' extremely common last names. Davies and Jones, both with roots in Wales...

Connor Kenway

I love the Assassin's Creed series and I've never really made a secret of it. Ever since playing the first game, my imagination was captured by the possibilities of the storyline and the simple pleasure of exploring an ancient world with hand and foot. The mystique of the game universe Ubisoft have created still makes me marvel.

So naturally I'm playing Assassin's Creed III and enjoying it immensely. America (before it was America) is laid out beautifully and I'm agape at the sheer amount of additional stuff there is to do. Hunting deer or slitting throats, it's all brilliant and I don't know if I'll ever get enough of it.

Wakefield CeX

CeX is the greatest shop!

First, some DVDs to watch:

• The Ultimate Fast Show Collection - this is what we actually came for, so naturally we bought a billion other things too.
• Lord of the Rings Complete - Special Extended DVD Edition - Emily wanted to see these again; I wonder what the extended edition adds?
• Iron Man - Emily also wants to see the backstories of the Avengers, as we both really enjoyed that film.
• Captain America - The First Avenger - ditto
• I Am Legend - it's not quite the book, but I think it's a really good take, also Will Smith

So now down to the real meat... JAMES:

• TimeSplitters [PS2] - I have TimeSplitters 2 and like it, so why not?
• Haven: Call of the King [PS2] - I have no idea what this game is!
• Eternal Quest [PS2] - I have no idea what this game is either!
• Dynasty Warriors: Gundam 2 [360] - ahahaha
• White Knight Chronicles: Origins [PSP] - kind of a strange entry to the series, but I don't have a PS3

Also went to Games Workshop and bought Warhammer: The Island of Blood, a starter set for Warhammer Fantasy with High Elves vs. Skaven. Emily really wants to paint this stuff! To help with that we also got Hobby Starter Set (set of 9 paints, flocking, brush, glue etc.) and a Chaos Black spray.

No money left now. Noodles for the rest of the month.