Sunday Summaries #2

Another week has flown by and we find ourselves again on a Sunday. This week I’ve not gamed  as much as I thought I would. I did however manage to get my Red Mage to level 60 so that’s a goal I can cross of my list! Next to getting Red Mage to 60 I have also picked up White Mage again. This was my original first class to max level and from playing it a bit again I can remember why I chose it. So simple and elegant and yet so fun to play. I will be focusing on getting her to 60 next and maybe all the way to 70 as a sort of queue booster. I’m not sure yet.

I finally caught up to Game of Thrones aswell and am now waiting for the new episode to be released tomorrow. However seeing the catastrophe that was the release of the first episode of the season I’m not getting my hopes up on being able to watch immediately. Still it feels nice to be on par with all the friends that watch aswell and I am really curious to see where the story is headed.

I also picked up Splatoon 2 for my Switch and have to say that my first impressions are decent. I just really need to adjust to the controls and that might take me a while. I also started a Necromancer in the new Diablo 3 season. I’m sitting on level 30 currently and am taking my time exploring the class. So far I really enjoy the corpse explosions and summoning armies of dead.

Lastly we cleared omega 1 savage with our static tonight and we got to 10 procent on omega 2 savage. I still have a lot to learn on Ninja but so far the fights are fun and interesting.

As for next week…

I intend to devote a few hours to Diablo to get my Necromancer to max level and slowly work my way through the season.

I’m going to be spending some time on my White Mage and Botanist in FFXIV and make sure my Ninja is properly melded before we continue savage progress on Wednesday.

I also hope I can find some time to play Splatoon and learn the controls properly. It seems a very fun game and I want to make sure I get my moneys’ worth.

In the real life department I have a big lung test day coming up on Tuesday and I need to devote some time to my thesis. I might post on Tuesday after I get all the stuff done because I’m quite nervous about it and I probably need to get it off my chest. Next to this it’s a normal work week so I hope I have enough energy to game in the evenings.

The Summer Is Magic

After a more personal post yesterday I want to return to games and gaming today, I mean that’s the whole reason I’ve started this blog in the first place anyway right?
Today’s topic covers a magical summer filled with all sorts of lovely events taking place in many of our favourite games. I’ll start off with FFXIV and the second big event that’s taking place in Eorzea next to the craziness that is Yo-Kai medal farming.

I present to you the official art for the Moonfire Faire of 2016! This time Square is preying on our nostalgia and introducing the Power Rangers into our Eorzean lives. I’ve personally not started the quests yet, but I know you can obtain armor, emotes, furniture and an orchestion scroll. I’m absolutely planning on completing this event on both Sandrian and Sarella but reading about a lot of bugs going on right now I think I’ll just wait a few days before throwing myself into the fray. Atleast there will be enough to do next to Yo-Kai farming, my weekly Crystal Tower raids and trying to cap Lore. I already did Weeping City and Void Ark for this week luckily, so I don’t have to worry about those.
Next to that I’m slowly levelling up my alts with all the FATES that I run for the Yo-Kai medals and doing Crystal Tower on my level 50ish characters. So far it’s netted me one level on my MCH, one on my AST and one on my MNK. So I’m slowly heading to 60 on everything!

Next to events in Eorza there’s also a lot of things happening/about to happen in the Blizzard universe. The Legion invasions will start somewhere this coming week so I’ll be on WoW a bit more, soaking it up and experiencing all of it. I have the game pre-ordered, but not via Blizzard so I can’t dive into the Demon Hunter experience yet, and that’s fine with me.
Next to WoW shenanigans a new season has kicked off in Diablo 3 aswell. To be quite honest, I’ve not touched D3 in a very long time and I don’t think I will spend any time playing this current season. I’ve fallen out of love with that game a while ago, mostly because the people I normally play with have all quit… And the constant grinding of the same stuff over and over is starting to get really, really boring. Even the seasonal rewards don’t have me coming back to the game. So unless Blizzard is going to make a major announcement at Blizzcon about Diablo, I think for me that’s a closed chapter for now and I won’t be returning to Sanctuary for a long time.

An event that has caught my attention is the summer games event in Overwatch.
I’ve not played Overwatch that much since launch, but I can never pass up goodies in a game, especially since I can earn them for free! So I’ve strapped on my Overwatch boots again and have about five games under my belt today, and opened a few loot boxes that made me very happy. I got one of the valkyrie skins for Mercy, who is by far my favourite champion, and one of the Summer Games highlight clips, more specifically the one for Tracer. I’m really enjoying myself playing Overwatch for now. Although I end up mostly playing supportive characters like Mercy and Lúcio, I also know my way around on Soldier 76 and Tracer. I hope I can play enough to unlock lots of lootboxes and earn lots of the Summer Games stuff before the event ends on August 22nd.

The last big thing going on is the new Adventure for Hearthstone. Apparently we are getting a partied up version of Kharazan to dawdle around in and I’ve been slowly saving up gold so I can start unlocking the wings as they come out. Blizzard made a tiny prologue to the adventure that is free to play for everyone, so I’m curious to see how that turns out. aswell.

All in all August is going to be a busy month with plenty events, releases and other stuff going on. And I haven’t even mentioned No Man’s Sky or the actual Legion launch yet!

Recap and Goals for May

So last weekend I had big plans for this week. Lots of stuff to do in FFXIV and try to make some progress in Pokémon Blue. Let’s see what became of that shall we?

  • Level Monk to 35
  • Level Machinist to 35
  • Level Armorsmith to 20
  • Level Blacksmith to 20
  • Complete Scholar Zenith Relic (2.0)
  • Get to and defeat the second Gym in Pokémon Blue (this will be my train game!)

As far as levelling went, I had a very succesful week. Both my Monk and Machinist made it to level 35 (and quite a way into 36 aswell) and I managed to get my crafters to level 20 aswell. I haven’t really had the time to pick up the Scholar Relic quest, but seeing as April isn’t technically over yet I could just start and maybe finish it tonight.
I did make some progress in Pokémon aswell, just not as much as I had hoped. With the arrival of both Tides of War and Illidan I’ve been reading much more than I have been playing games and thus booked less progress than I had hoped.
However tomorrow starts a new month, and as I’m happier when I have stuff scheduled to do I think I’ll make goals for the month of May and see how many I can actually achieve.

Goals for FFXIV

  • Level Monk to 50
  • Level Machinist to 50
  • Level Alchemist to 30
  • Level Armorer to 30
  • Level Blacksmith to 30
  • Level Culinarian to 30
  • Level Goldsmith to 30
  • Level Leatherworker to 30
  • Level Fisher to 30
  • Level Miner to 30
  • Finish Scholar 2.0 Relic Zenith
  • Finish Monk 2.0 Relic Zenith

Goals for Blizzard Games

  • Get rank 20 in Hearthstone
  • Finish second wing of League of Explorers
  • Unlock third wing of League of Explorers
  • Finish Diablo 3 chapter 4 for the season
  • Play Overwatch! (I got early acces to open beta)

Other Goals
Both Gaming and otherwise related, I want to do all of this aswell.

  • Finish reading Illidan
  • Finish watching Gotham season 1
  • Defeat second and third Gyms in Pokémon Blue
  • Play through two additional worlds/mission clusters in Ratchet and Clank
  • Wrap up some personal stuff related to University.

As you can see I have quite a list for May. Luckily for me a lot of these goals are “easily” attainable. For instance all the crafters in FFXIV I want to level are already above level 20, which makes me confident I can get atleast a few of them up to level 30 aswell.  Rank 20 in Hearthstone is something I aim for every season aswell, so nothing new there. I really want to get a bit more time in on Ratchet and Clank though and also on atleast one handheld game, hence I picked Pokémon Blue.
At the end of May we’ll see how far I’ve come with all of this.  I hope quite far! I do really love ticking things off my list…

Sunday Morning Musings

Actually by the time I’m writing this particular post it’s already past 2 in the afternoon here, but what the heck, it’s morning somewhere in the world right? So I’m just going to go with Morning muses…

Sunday is a weird day for me. I’ve turned it into my chores day for the week, since it’s usually the day that I know I will be at home to get stuff done. This means that for a big part of the rest of the week I let my room become this huge mess, which I then clean up on Sundays. This entails folding away a few days worth of clean laundry, taking all the dishes downstairs and clean them, dust and vacuum my room and changing my bedsheets.
It’s also the day I consider my “offscreen” day. Because I plan all my chores on this day, and because I spend enough time staring at one computer screen or the other the entire week, it’s nice to look at something else besides pixels on a screen.

This week I find it even more important to just stay away from using my wrist/mouse too much. I’m not sure how I did it, but I’ve hurt my wrist somehow with either sleeping on it the wrong way, or making a wrong move with carrying my bag. I know what RSI feels like, and this isn’t it. It just feels like a muscle pulled the wrong way at some point, and when I make certain movements it kind of hurts… Which also limits the time I’m able to use a mouse. Which is incredibly sucky seeing as I’ve been playing Diablo 3 a lot the past two days… Which you largely navigate by using your mouse.

Speaking of Diablo… I realize how much of a love/hate relationship I really have with that game. I always love the new Season starts, only to be disappointed about a week of playing in. You see, when I picked up this game at the inital launch we had a little group of friends that would play with eachother. That group of friends is still there… Only whereas they still play together, I feel like I’m being left out. I know that I can come across as whiny in all my posts about my friendships lately, but I’m just really sick of how things are going and have developed over the last year. I don’t always want to be the one to start things up anymore, or the one to stay in touch. And it’s affecting my gameplay and the enjoyment of some games, but most of all Diablo 3.
So for this season I’ve set my standards quite low. I just want to play my monk and unlock all the chapter rewards. I’m not aiming to be the best on the Greater Rift ladders (because honestly I really can’t be arsed to put in the time) but I do want to experience all the new stuff Blizzard has added. So doing atleast one Class Set Dungeon is quite high on my list. As of right now I need to complete about five more challenges to finish up my last chapter, all of which are tied to playing more so I can earn rewards to tackle content. This Season I don’t have to worry about gear, because Blizzard has been nice enough to hand you a full set for completing challenges in the chapters. So I’m rocking a 4/6 Sunwuko set with a really disgusting build. And loving it… For now.

Weekend Entertainment
A thing that has rolled around again is LCS or League Championship Series. Although I haven’t played League of Legends in forever, I love watching the various series in the weekends. This year I prefer the NA scene over the EU scene, simply because the players I cheer for and enjoy most are playing in that region at the moment. I’m cheering extra hard for Renegades this split, since they are the first team to have a girl on the starting roster and I’m damn proud that she made it up to that stage.
Other than that I’m still cheering my butt off for Doublelift, who should be able to become a formidable force down in the botlane now that he has Yellowstar as support. Although my heart broke when Doublelift left CLG and “Rush Hour” botlane was no more, I’m sure he can make it work with his new Support. So yeah, suddenly I became a TSM fan after being a CLG fan for many seasons.

I don’t actually actively follow all the games. There are a select few I will watch, the rest I listen to while playing FFXIV for instance. It’s nice background “noise” for my Botanist leveling. I have to say my hour per day approach is seriously working for that. With the GC manuals, the GC daily turn-in and just doing leve’s I’ve already managed to get to level 43. I think I’ll be 50 soon enough, especially if I keep on doing about 2 levels a day.
The only thing I need to motivate myself for now is farming my Dragoon Zeta…

The Elephant In The Room

As I got home on Wednesday evening I browsed Steam for a bit. I always check out what games are on offer, even though most of them are really not my thing. Whilst doing this a game with a rather peculiar title caught my eye: Tembo the Badass Elephant. It was on sale for €3,24 and it looked to be some sort of silly platform game. I went to check it out for some fun and giggles, looked at some screenshots, looked at the trailer… And was hooked.
This game essentially brings me back to the 16-bit console days that I experienced as I was growing up. I had a Sega Genesis (called Mega Drive here in Holland) as a child, a present I got for my sixth birthday. My dad has always been a bit of a technology geek and he had seen the rise of video games early on. I’m pretty sure we still have a very old Atari game system in the attic somewhere… My mum wasn’t very much an avid gamer but she liked puzzles and eventually got one of those wannabe Gameboy type things that only had Tetris on it, which she was actually quite addicted too (and quite good at aswell I might add). Anyway, they decided to gift me a Sega which at the time came with the first Sonic the Hedgehog game. I’m not really sure how many hours I spent infront of this console, but it must have been quite a lot. I had a few Sonic games, a ton of Disney games and even a Jurassic Park game. My heart broke when eventually you couldn’t get any new games for the console anymore, even though I’ve only really finished a few of them.
Looking at Tembo, and the developing/production companies (SEGA and Game Freak, yes that company that developed the Pokémon franchise, that Game Freak) I felt like I needed to have this game, even if only it was on sale now so I could get it cheap.
The story of the game is simple. You are a Rambo type military elephant that needs to save Shell City from an organisation called Phantom. You do this in a platform type, sidescrolling game setting where the companies have tried their best to combine a lot of fun 16-bit game mechanics. It has the speed of Sonic, there’s some Donkey Kong and Yoshi’s world elements in it… And it’s just overall seriously hilarious. A level takes about 5-10 minutes to play through, depending on if you just want to finish the level or also want to complete all the objectives for that level. It’s simple fun, the style used in the game itself is very colourful with a lot of comic book elements (see picture below).
All in all I only have very good things to say about this game, except for the one flaw that is resolutions. In settings you can’t go higher than 1920x1080p, which is fine for me… But for people with higher resolution screens it obviously isn’t. Personally I would recommend just playing windowed, since fullscreen can be a bit buggy when shutting down (ie. I had it crash on me a few times) but if you’re looking for a fun sidescroller with a lot of 16-bit elements, this might just be the game for you.
MMORPG shenanigans
Season 5 of Diablo 3 has started yesterday and for the first time since the first season I’ve immediatly started to play at launch. I rebirthed my existing Monk and am well on my way to 70 already. If I didn’t have to go out today I would’ve been 70 before dinner easily, but alas. My monk is “stuck” on level 61.5 and I’m having a blast so far. You can notice Blizzard overhauled a lot of things with the latest patch and so far I’m having fun playing.
I’ve also been poking about in FFXIV a lot, leveling my Bard, my Astrologian and since Friday my Botanist. Endgame Gathering and Crafting has been the one area in FFXIV I haven’t poked my nose into yet and I really want to with this expansion. Seeing as the only crafter I have on 50 is Weaver… And the mats I need are gathered by Botanists… I figured why not just level that up and start working towards that level 60. So right now I’m doing about an hour or less a day of BTN leveling. It’s quite soothing in a way. Doing levequests to just gather things, doing a “get me X materials” quest every 5 levels. It allows me to zone out a bit and still feel useful. I hope I can get my BTN to 50 by the end of this week atleast, but seeing as I’ll be having a lot of free time, that shouldn’t be too big of a deal. Especially considering that my only other goal ingame right now is to finish my Dragoon Zeta. Which shouldn’t take very long either.