Things To Check Out

Rak and I showing off our awesome costumes :)

I really love games, I suppose that is why I play so many. That and there is always something to draw me back in. I like new stuff, free stuff, events, stuff that keeps me engaged. This weekend I thought I'd share a few new things going on, some free goodness and even some discounts.

Nelf and I have been really enjoying Defiance. To celebrate season two there is a code to apply to your glyph account for free fifteen days (a seven dollar freebie here). We jumped on it. The code is PARADISE. People in the game seem pretty cool, it doesn't seem to have a toxic community. I have seen that many people help out in areas, a lot of the time with events people will revive downed players, which is great. Love riding around in vehicles they are so FAST!! Every other game feels so slow now, lol. Good stuff here!

Heri joined us playing the other day and we really had a cool time, it was great to all jump in and play together no matter when we started or what our EGO level was. Perfect game to play with friends. Nelf and I tried out instances yesterday, not bad at all. We had fun, basically shooting things up. Nobody seems to run ahead, people seem to stick together in this game more so than trinity based groups in other games. The combat is fun, fast paced but you don't have tons of skills to worry about. You can swap out weapons on the fly. I have a weapon that does damage and heals, love that! So you can heal if that is your thing! A lot of interesting choices for weapons, you'll find something you like. It is still the most fun played with others, there is always something going on, which is probably the main drive for me to play. It feels odd playing older games that don't feature events, they are so captivating for me. I honestly can say I really love playing Defiance, for many different reasons than why I like other MMO type games. It is just different, very cooperative, and just plain fun.

Speaking of Trion games, Rift has a new hellbug event going on to celebrate the new Defiance season as well. I have really been slacking with Rift lately! I will try to pop in soon and grab one (if luck is with me, lol), I read there are some new ones, I'd love to have another in a new color and I still need a pet!

Currently Champions has a discount on Lifetime and subscription packages. I'm still playing and having fun. I should get a lifetime, but the ONLY lifetime sub I ever bought lasted me just a short few years as the game sunset this year (Free Realms). I'm slowly leveling, slowly... That tailor (character designer) really has a strong grip on me! My buddy, Rak, has been playing also. We did some alerts the other day and it was good fun. Alerts are missions where anyone can join (instance/dungeon) and you get some nice xp as well as an xp buff. I really love doing these, nobody is rude so far, they seem to go pretty quickly too. Plus, it is always cool to see what kind of characters join, I love seeing other people's costumes!

My character in EQ2 must miss me quite a lot, slack again! This weekend I hope to get some time in and check out the new house actors that were added to the game. These are models that look like players which you can use to decorate your houses, give them emotes and such. Very cool addition! These actors are made by tailors, I'll have to see if they added any into the station cash store, all I read was tailors as of now.

We're newbies again! Almost... 

And last but not least, Warcraft has a 7 day free time deal going on if you haven't been subbed for awhile. Redeem it by June 30th though! I didn't even see this in my email, Heri told me to check for it and there is was sitting all lonely in my alternate email. Nelf was really excited because he was thinking about playing but wasn't sure if he wanted to get back into the game, thus free time was perfect to find out with. Free, we love us some free time!

So, we put that free time to good use! We started up a couple of new characters after messing about on the mains for a bit. He went with a paladin and I went mage. I have never played a mage past 20 in all these years! We could pick up WoD pre-order and boost them but thought instead it would be fun to just play around for now. It isn't like there is a real rush to be at the cap anytime soon, heh. Looks way off into the distance for the expansion... Squints really hard... Nope, no rush.

On another note my Second Life (alt acct is fine) account was suspended, apparently something to do with an attempted hack. While I am selling stuff still in game, this annoys me to no end. Not even an email to let me know, they claim they are scared the email would be hacked too. Nobody hacked my account, I know Twig logging it on and taking all my money (Linden) all the time probably flagged it. Ugh... Not happy about that. Not that I play much anymore but it really ticks me off, the wait begins. I won't hold my breath. Like I need something else to play currently... right?!

Have a great weekend!

Defiance

Yesterday my son and I downloaded Defiance. I thought it might be something he was interested in playing, he loves shooters and was looking for an MMO to play. I figured I could try to have some fun with him and maybe end up with one of those awesome Dodge Challengers in the game (we have a pretty blue one IRL, I don't get to drive near enough >.<).

I started playing it first, wanting to check it out beforehand to gauge it. I read a bit on it here and there, it always sounded interesting, but I'm not much at shooter games. I never felt I was much good at them, to be honest. If you play some of the newer games like TESO, it is easy to get into, or even console games. The camera angles and such. It is a third person shooter, mouse/camera swings around the whole screen, which used to bother me but not as much these days. So, I did a few missions, seemed interesting enough. Got a little buggy type vehicle, or rather a four wheeler. It was a pain to control but went a lot faster than on foot. Great for getting across the massive maps.

Later on my son downloaded it. I met up with him, which is so nice and easy with the port to friend option. Instantly ports you to them and I didn't notice a cool down. I have got to say this is a great game to play with friends. It isn't bad solo but playing with someone else really is a freaking blast. What is nice is that you can jump in and join your friends without much worry about catching up. There is a leveling system but it is more so based on EGO points (think at it if WoW only based levels off of talent points or if EverQuest based levels by AA points, similar to how that would feel).

We rode around a bit, ignoring the story for a bit, doing random events. Which was a lot of fun. Then he wanted to head to San Francisco to do some main story line for the season. We were kind of mixed up on which to do first. It was a bit tough, we had some weapon upgrades but nothing spectacular. We finished it up and then stumbled upon some very large scale events. I think I made 15k scrip off of one. There are several currencies, scrip is mainly what you use to buy vehicles and a lot of weapons and upgrades. But the event, it was crazy. Big monster bugs (Hellbugs! so this is where they come from), robots and just lots of people around! Very, very cool.

We both managed to get new rides. I wanted a Challenger, ASAP, so I had read up where to get one. We headed over and grabbed ours. They are sweet, they take more damage, go faster than the old vehicles and control MUCH better. I'm not constantly running into everything, heh. That was a real highlight. There is a black one you can grab through the achievement system, I'd like to get it eventually. For now my orange one is quite alright with me. All covered in armor, it is a sweet ride!

What is refreshing, for me, about Defiance is the combat. Just nice to shoot things up and not follow a rotation. Swapping out guns, awesome. Lots of hotkeys to remember but they are very simple, such as V for vehicle, G for grenade, lol. I love the sniper action. Zooming up on a baddie's head and killing them, such satisfaction there. It is PvE, there are PvP games, but right now PvE is more than enough for me.

We jumped in and had a really great time. We didn't know much about what was going on, how levels worked and we didn't much care, we were having fun. It was refreshing to just feel like a true noob again, everything fresh and new and fun. Something I have not experienced in a long time, all combined together. I think Dire felt a little left out, sitting playing Diablo. I've asked him to play, it has big guns and cool cars! He isn't much for shooters though. I think he'd like it, regardless. It is a good game. I'm still working on having him join us, it would be even more fun. Still working on my brother Heri to join us!

Graphics are decent, runs great for me. Music is neat as well, very interesting at times. The feel of the game has a post apocalyptic touch for sure. Lots of great appearance items (I've seen on others). No screenshot function in game, I had thought we had one and missed out on a lot of great shots. So I had to paste a few in this morning, with paint (has to be in windowed mode to take them). Me have a post without screenshots? Haha... ! And the shift key... remember, that makes everything go faster.

I don't know how much I will play alone. I found myself playing already this morning, having fun riding around doing some events, that is a good sign. However, with others is where this game really shines. It is free, definitely worth a download just to try it. It ties in with the show. I've only watched a couple of episodes, I really liked it a lot, just not much time to catch it on a regular basis but I might try to catch up now. You see the main characters and others, which is neat. Even if you don't watch the show, it isn't a big deal.

All in all great fun to be had. Great with friends, easy to get in and out of, lots of missions and events. Easy to get to friends and get going. Bigger vehicles (cars and such) can ride two people. Give it a go, you might end up having some fun. I will say I was pleasantly surprised.

Space, Secrets and Super Heroes

If Illidan Stormrage were a superhero... I couldn't resist.

Lately I've just been all over the map with games. Playing around and just having fun, most of them I've been wanting to try out since getting a new computer. It is nice to reunite with an 'old' game, feeling refreshed coming back, seeing what has changed! So nice to have variety.

I poked my head back into Star Wars: The Old Republic. Which was neat, it looks great, was fun to see my companions again, run a few quests. I missed my ship, it is such a neat option, and housing is due out this summer, which is really cool. There is a new casino feature in the game. I didn't get much out of it, I don't have a whole lot of money at my level to blow on it, fun still. You can save up winning tickets to purchase items, which is a neat bonus. Real cool rewards! All in all it is very nice to be able to log in and play, with it being free. I gained a couple of levels while I was at it. It didn't feel as slow as I thought it was (as free to play).

I did miss a lot about SWTOR. It is good to be back, such a nice feeling game. Love so much about it, not sure why it never really stuck with me. I plan on eventually hitting the cap, one of these days. I'll probably pick it up on a more steady pace once housing hits.

I've also been messing around with Champions Online. I can just sit forever (literally) playing around with costumes. I decided to just roll a new character, get my bearings back. Seems it was probably around 2011 since I last played! Yikes, I have been gone a long time!

Combat isn't anything special but it works and I like it. The more points you gain with leveling, the better the game and combat feel. The first ten levels I floundered a bit, respeccing my (freeform) build many, many times. Now things are going very well and I don't die much. It was starting to get embarrassing.

Champions sports some cool new vehicles now. Basically you turn into the vehicle, they fly at very fast speeds, instant cast and each of them has a different type of build for combat. I like them a lot. When your health bar gets low they start to look damaged.

Sometimes the comic issue missions can really drag on. That is mostly on my behalf, getting antsy and not wanting to sit still for very long some days. All in all I am having a lot of fun. I decided to sub simply because freeform is too much fun. The premade builds are not bad either, I just have a specific build I prefer using, which takes a few levels to start ramping up.

There is a lot to do in champs, it is still a good game and I see a lot of people all over the place. We're down to one server but it isn't such a bad thing. The world feels populated and alive that way.

I also decided to play around in The Secret World. Reuniting myself with my character proved to be very confusing. I had no idea what I was working on before I took my break. I made a new character, an Illuminati, just for a different feel this go around. I was going dragon but then there was a cut scene where it appeared my male character was pushed back onto a bed by a female character, as he just sat there with a slack jaw. Dur, dur, dur... Whoa, whoa, stop the train! Very different than the female cut scenes that I remembered. So yeah, Illuminati now.

I don't know if I'll stick with it, probably not in any serious way. End game offers little for me, but the game does have a nice ambiance. I love the feel, most of the humor and the general story. So I'll play around with it for a little bit, here and there. It was cool to go about wandering around. More as I slowly play around with it when I can. I'd share screenshots but Funcom must have gotten a kick out of making F11 the default screenshot key, so I don't have any, as I was using the wrong button. Lameness.

Nothing super exciting, still fun though. Rift is still there, as is EQ2, still playing them when time allows. My son says he misses WoW, meh. I miss it sometimes, but I look at all these patch notes and warlords changes and just cringe. I'm currently downloading Defiance, because why not?! I thought he'd like it so I wanted to check it out finally. Great time too, since it is now F2P!

My first costume, edited a few times but keeping the general feel.

My vehicle.

Tried Illidan, why not Tyrael?

Super samurai, or something. 

Mission sending me to some bar, where I ended up in a bar fight ;) 

My ship, how I missed you!

Just such a cool feeling game!

Night out on the town, lol.

Playing around with a new character. 

Eye Candy

One of my dimensions in Rift.

Fun in the sun :)

Adventuring.

Far, far away. 

Hammer time.

Questing.

Ugh, I should kill them all.... 

Artifact hunting, shiny!

Posing.

A quiet moment while doing an event.

Visiting places in a galaxy far, far away...

Pretty neat light path.

Home sweet... ship?

Visiting some old world areas.

Memories. Skyfire mountains, which looks so similar to how it looks in the first EverQuest.

Cobalt scar.

Wildstar Impressions

As I mentioned in my last post, I didn't buy Wildstar, I did get a guest pass. I wanted to take advantage of it, to really get a good look at the game. Beta didn't thrill me, so I didn't play much. I still have two days left on my pass and I think I'll be logging in on them. So far I've logged in every day, I wasn't sure how much I'd actually play. So, here's my thoughts thus far.

Wildstar is pretty, yet at times there is almost too much going on. The characters look great, but sometimes I wish my characters were not so, I don't know, goofy? Though I do see the humorous edge to the game, I get it. Everything has a theme, a style and Wildstar does this one very well. They are all whimsical and cute, I do appreciate that on the flip side. I've seen some costumes (appearance armor) and mounts, on other players, and I can only rave at how cool they are. I still look like a lowbie twerp though! The world is interesting, it looks good, it has an interesting feel to it. Really great music as well!

I've played both sides to about level eight. I only have a few days with this guest pass and I wanted to see both sides. I can't say I prefer one over the other. Both are interesting, colorful, humorous. All the characters have a funny, bouncy way about them. I simply adore double jump. I love games which offer it. Questing has been enjoyable, for the most part. Crafting feels more like an alternative questing direction. I am working on scientist and explorer on each of my classes. I picked an Esper and an Engineer for the classes. Both have forms of pets, the engineer has more stable pets. Robots to be exact! I like having a couple of robots to help me on my adventures, just for the coolness factor alone. 

Classes, these are interesting. Because Wildstar has some rather unique races, I think locking classes away from certain races is just a bad idea. It sort of dampened things for me. I'd be a lot happier with more options. It just seems like something you'd see in 2005. One thing I am not crazy about is the building up of a resource to use abilities, it works but then again it doesn't give each class a defining feel, they all feel very similar. I did see how many abilities we get, we can swap them out on the fly, but the core mechanics are the same to a deep extent.

Races, they are quite nifty. Lots of different styles of faces, body types, a little bit of play with sliders and some fantastic hair options. Oh the hair! Some races get much better hair than others, but honestly this game has some of the coolest options I've seen in a long time. Wildstar, can I take your hair options to all my other games? Puh-lease! 

Combat. It works, it is smooth, nothing really bad, nothing super impressive either. It just isn't me. I have tried to like it, but I don't actually like it. I don't dislike it either. I prefer a more old school feel to my combat, so do my old wrists. The telemarks are not my thing and in the end it seems kind of childish to me. I'm not saying if you like this style of play that you are childish. More so, it feels like a simplified type of play that I don't enjoy. Too many colors all over, almost gimmicky. It didn't hook me.

The Wildstar team had a vision of what they wanted and you can see that while playing. It [Wildstar] has a distinct feel to it, it is very smooth and buttery, like sliding into a well made glove, it is a high quality product, I can't deny that. The execution for a silly, spacey, whimsical world was done well. Lots of bright colors, funny characters, it is all done really, really well. It is fun, I really like this game! I think the only thing really holding me back would be end game. The combat is not my cup of tea but I can't say it is the worst ever. Far from it. I'd like to buy it but I am still on the fence. I have two more days of exploring to do though. I doubt I can get to the housing, which is a real shame. 

There is plenty I think could have been implemented better. But there is also plenty that was done right. No game is, or ever will be, perfect. That's what keeps me playing, because if I sat and complained and picked them all apart (I do sometimes!) all the time, I'd never play anything. 

At the end of the day I can't see myself ever raiding 40 mans (ever again). I just found a lump in my chest and have a second appointment to further figure out what it is, which makes me question just how much I'd ever go back to those old days of not just jumping in when I want. Which is never. Sorry for that blatant derail of the post, but I have to think about real life and I am looking for a game that is there on the side with plenty of fun options no matter where I am in life. Because that is what games are- a side activity and life is... Life! Now if I can find some alternative to raiding, some longevity to the game after the cap, I probably would pick it up. I know there are daily quests and events, but I don't know to what extent of content there is. I'm sure I'll find out from all these awesome blogs I follow ;)

We'll see how I fare over the next two days. I thank my friends for the passes and offers for them, and a big thanks to Wildstar (Carbine) for the chance to check into the game at release, which was quite awesome!