In which I dust off my blog

The last three months have been very busy on the work front with a very tight deadline project that has been rather taxing, plus on call has been manic in May. Also I was diverting a lot of energy into driving lessons, theory and practical test preparations but happily I sat my driving test and passed on the second attempt.
Awesomely my father in law donated his car to me which was great and saved me quite a bit of hassle finding a car.

So after spending my annual bonus on car insurance and tax we undertook an adventure to Bluestone with family and friends. Of course every holiday experience has to start with hiccup and this one was no different with a bolt that holds the gear pivot shearing off and me having to call out the Breakdown service, thankfully it was repairable.

After 1 month driving I still dislike it, but do enjoy the hour or so I have reclaimed on my daily commute.

Games

I haven’t really been playing much in the way of social games recently, my Game List in the sidebar is likely very out of date.

  • Battlefield 4 – After the worst start in FPS history I decided that my trigger finger was wasting away. I have been playing a few nights a week as a drop in game.
  • Dreamfall Chapters – Man this game is so detailed at times, a great follow up the previous games in the series.
  • Always Sometimes Monsters – Part of me thinks this game is an old school masterpiece reskinned, but maybe not. Very good and harrowing story.
  • Space Run – A fun tower defense game that seeing you having to adapt mid level to counter opposing forces.
  • Kentucky Route Zero – I’ve only just started making my way through this interesting story.

Board Games

games.2015.06.01We headed down to Rules of Play in Cardiff  twice in the last 2 months, damn that shop has alot of choice and it maybe a few pound more than Amazon but supporting a “local” business is more important, plus you get to browse.
In the digital age I buy my Computer games and Music via download outlets but with physical copies of tabletop games it’s nice to read the blurbs and ask a real person about a game rather that taking those Amazon feedback scores as gospel.

This last month we have obtained:

  • Zombies!!!
  • Love Letter
  • Race to Adventure
  • The Cave
  • Bucket of Doom
  • Zombie Dice 3
  • Tsuro of the Seas
    plus our wedding anniversary gifts
  • Hobbit Love Letter
  • Machi Koro

We’ve had a great time playing through them all recently and some of our existing games too.

An empty Battlefield

Despite the bug fixes that have been applied to Battlefield 4 the game still suffers a strange imbalance between the classes. Maps feels a little too big, the Time to Kill is quicker, the netcode looks to behave rather oddly at times with players making impossible shots, after playing 5 or so maps the game starts to lag and stutter and requires that the client be restarted.

The biggest problem we encounter is that fighting as a group/team/squad is nearly impossible to organise as auto-balancing, crashes and the seemingly absence of the functionality that existed historically to place players with the same tag in the same squad/side.

Combine that with the fact that the multiplayer serves a continuous stream of vehicles and aircraft all boils down in the pot to deliver a game that is far worse than any of the previous Battlefield games in my opinion.

New old stomping ground

I usually play PS2 weekly, either with the FRR group on Fridays or over the weekend, this is enough to sate my Auraxium cravings.However the reasons around BF4 listed above act as a catalyst in bringing my outfit back to the realm of PlanetSide 2.

Just at the right time it seems as SOE embark on another round of WTF changes. In the recent series of patches SOE have really focused on making non-subscribing members aware of the fact with an annoying popup that shows in game as a notification.

Thrown on top of that the fact that all members were given a double XP weekend, the gloves look to be off when it comes to targeting freemium players.

I was a paying member for a number of months and to be honest unless something changes in the business model there is no real incentive for me to pay a monthly subscription the benefit doesn’t match the cost, plus that subscription money will be going to pay for my TESO.

TESO

Not plumping for the pre-order gubbings to cut some cost off the game purchase but I’m really looking forward to immersing myself in the land of Tamriel. I played in the beta and it really did feel like a game I could enjoy, with it’s lack of nag screens and cash-shop sales.

As it officially launches tomorrow I’ve heard good stuff about the pre-access launch already, so finger crossed it’s gonna be a smooth ride.