This is a Blog

How do you find Gaming Daily?

2010-05-19T15:22:00.000-07:00

This isn't one of those cringe inducing surveys where website authors ask you to fill out forms so they can see how effective their advertising is (partly because we have none). Instead it's a list of the Top 50 all-time most used search terms that people have used to find Gaming Daily.

Quite a few are people poorly misled by the worst thing I've ever written, which was a crappy list of Top 5 songs from games. Apparently there's a few thousand folk willing to scrawl through google results to find gaming songs enough to click the link onto our site. Go figure, crazy bastards.

Most of these results really are pretty dull and only interesting/amusing to us, but I put them here as maybe you'll like a peek. I have no idea though why at number 21 numerous people are searching for in broken English "pc game decide good evil".

fallout 3
warren clyde
gaming daily
flotilla review
black mirror 2 review
rcp 90
far cry 2 warren clyde
mardi gras
the mirror lied
miami shark
silverballer
far cry 2 nasreen
canabalt prototype
gaming songs
canabalt
rcp90
dirtbike games
monkeylord
professor layton
tf2 hats
pc game decide good evil
gamingdaily
games for windows live
far cry 2 warren
adam atomic
fallout 3 secrets
warren clyde far cry 2
fallout
team fortress 2 sniper
rcp-90
nihilanth
hitman blood money
stalingrad
games for windows live doesn't work
fyi i am a spy
dirt bike games
fallout 3 imagesize:1680x1050
good gaming songs
black mirror 2
just cause 2
site:www.gamingdaily.co.uk
gaming blog
machinarium interview
borderlands sledge
fallout 3 landscape
yeah toast
torchlight
dirtbike game
ubisoft drm
far cry 2 warren clyde dead

Formspring

2010-02-15T11:38:00.000-08:00

First things first, I didn't quite give up on One A Day blogging. I just couldn't be bothered to put the effort in to get blogger working like a good wordpress account. I had a few posts stacked up, but the auto-update thing I installed didn't work. Then I've found that this blog posts things in the order they were drafted, as opposed to published. So I'd start write something long on a monday write and post something short on a tuesday then finish and post Monday's work on Wednesday, except then it appeared behind the tuesday post. Weird.

So, I've just come to bother you with a post that I've got a formspring set up here - http://www.formspring.me/EGTF

I'm not popular, not well-known and not a leader in any particular field. Ask me questions anyway!

OAD 6: My desk

2010-02-06T20:06:00.000-08:00

My desk is messy. It needn't be, but it is. On it there's two Latin dictionaries, a plate of unfinished korma, two empty plates with crumbs on, two empty drinks cans, my montior, a penknife, a bottle opener, a rack of blank cds, an empty cereal bar box and a nail grooming kit. My mic and ipod lay to one side and the keyboard, monitor and mouse are on it too. There's also a lamp and an alarm clock, two refereshers wrappers, some change, a timetable and some fingerless hobo gloves of mine. Also there happens to be a plastic thermoflask cup that held tomato soup once and as I lost my mousemat I have a copy of Private Eye sellotaped down that works really well. Have a picture!

Yeah, I came back home at 4:00 am and realised I hadn't done my One a Day. I'm a failure already. Waytogo me!

OAD 5: Street Fighter IV

2010-02-05T13:18:00.000-08:00

Ok, so recently I started playing Street Fighter IV. It originally started out as an article idea, which I feel pretty sated with how it turned out. Read it and comment, it makes me feel warm and gooey inside (and can forget I have no professional paid for career). Anyway, since finishing that piece I've returned to playing it quite regularly with a weird determination. I always hate fighter controls, as panicking around trying to input the move you want just to get frustrated when you move the joystick a little too far isn't a good time. It also makes me think less of people who take the time to master such fiddly controls.

It's also introduced to me a competitive side that I don't particularly cater for normally. SFIV is intense, one on one matches against people smug in their own technique. I'm not aiming to win nor do I want to be the best, I'm aiming to make them look as big a fool as possible for wanting to win so much. I mean, smack talking to me with a badly spelled name tag and trying to bring me down. It's just so hard not to get drawn into bitterly matching them at their own game, rather than enjoying yourself.

Smack talk is just something I'll never get I suppose. I understand the pyschological intentioning behind it all, but it makes me pity rather than drawn to anger. It reminds me of Mohammed Ali, most people bloody adore him but I detest the guy. People admire him for his smack talk and the psychological game he played as well as his fighting prowess. But although calling your opposing fighter in the middle of the night and leaving threats before a match might work, it just has no sense of fun or respect.

The best matches I've had in SFIV have been against other Dan players. That feeling when I see somebody else pick Dan just brings an elated smile to my face. The fights can be just as tough and arduous as against the usual dunder headed move spammer, but we have an actual mutual respect. To be able to have a taunt off in the middle of a fight before jumping back into the fray makes me feel better than any victory where I've been hollowed out by frustration beforehand.

Any other time I've played SFIV the game has felt rude and hostile. Another faceless person po-facedly playing the game with a burning determination to win, before parting without a word. Every single Dan player I've come up against however has been pleasantly chatty, recieving and sending messages of "Saikyo Power!" putting me in the right mood to get on with my day.

I have no idea what the point of this post was. One a Day for you!

OAD 4: Ivor Biggun

2010-02-04T16:08:00.000-08:00

Only a short and inappropriate post today. I can't say I had entirely normal tastes as a kid, and I can probably thank my dad for that. Whereas the favourite film of most children my age was a Disney film of some description, mine was instead The Blues Brothers. I believe I can also trace back why I have such a dirty sense of humour as well; one day my dad was bought a vinyl.

If the look of the damn thing didn't give it away then the songs most certainly will. Whilst sadly I haven't been able to find all of my favourite tracks from it, such rude songs bring back happy memories. Giggling with my dad and brother at the rude words I didn't quite understand but nonetheless expanded my vocab with. Later on when I was old enough to drink it was re-found. Suddenly every now and again when friends came round we'd get bored of more normal music and put on this filth and laugh. One friend burnt the music to a CD so we could take it on holiday with us. I am mildly embarrassed to link such songs to you now, but I think everybody should be able to hear the "I'm a winker (misprint)" song. Heck, Johnny Rotten loved the song.

So here it is, plus one other catchy jingle by Ivor that has slightly poor sound quality, but a very profound message about mortality.

OAD 3: Cheat Tutorial for Mass Effect 2

2010-02-03T06:44:00.000-08:00

I loved Mass Effect 2. The main plot didn't draw me in, but the character missions and everything else felt like I was living the best 20 hour movie ever. Everything else, that is, apart from the mineral mining. It's great and interesting at first, but when it gets to the ludicrous amounts of platinum required later in the game you've had just about enough of slowly scanning each planet whilst looking at a graph for the mineral spikes. So here's a handy guide for a more Renegade solution to minerals. Remember to left click when the prompt shows in the paragraph!

WARNING: BACK UP ALL SAVE GAMES FIRST.

1) Go and download Cheat Engine. You might have to disable your anti-virus for a little bit whilst downloading and installing it. Whilst running it's fine to put them back up but overly-sensitive anti-virus software doesn't like some aspects of the programme and can corrupt the download and installation of it. The programme itself is safe, but everything you do is at your own risk. As in, if you happen to be browsing porn at the same time whilst your anti-virus is down it's not my fault if a virus attacks your system.

2) Load up ME2, (preferably on the ship, after you have access to upgrades and are able to afford at least one of them) then alt+tab out and open cheatengine. Go to icon in the top left of the programme (a little computer monitor) and open the process of Mass Effect 2.exe.

3) Now go back to ME2, press escape whilst playing and you'll be able to see how much of each mineral you have. In my case I was pretty spent and had only 4399 Palladium, 5066 Iridium, 9797 Platinum and a measley 341 Element Zero. Make a note of your amounts.

4) Now in cheat engine it should default to exact value; 4 bytes, and above that there is a white bar for input. Put in how much of whatever resource you currently have that you want to change first (lets say my Platinum at 9797) and click First Scan. It'll scan and a list of hits will come up; take note there are multiple addresses but only one is the correct one. For me it was a massive list of about 30 or so matches.

5) Now, that's a heck of a lot. We don't want to start changing random values unless you want to put your Shepard through an end of the matrix situation and The Illusive Man revealed to be Agent Smith.

To narrow that down the best way I've found is to go and buy an upgrade and take note of your now deduced mineral amount. Go back to cheat engine and find the value that has changed to your current resources. I bought a small upgrade of 2500 to take it down to 7297 so was easily able to find the value affecting resources.

6) Time to avoid the interesting yet eventually tedious mining minigame by a quick bit of programming tedium instead!

Double click the correct address for the mineral you chose. It should jump down into the box at the bottom of cheatengine. Now hover your mouse over the value, double click, and a box will come up to adjust the value. I made mine 9000000. Go back to ME2, press Esc to jump out of menu and esc again to jump back in, and check to see if the value has changed. Did it work? If so you're a bonified cheater my friend! If it hasn't you probably had the same problem as me, in that I found there were two values that changed to my reduced mineral and only through first altering one and changing it back when it didn't work did I find the true one.

7) Now here is where note-taking comes in to avoid endlessly repeating step 5 in full. Take a look at the address for your altered mineral and note the digits. It'll be like 0E382429, 27135135 or so, of which there will be multiples with similar starts. For my platinum it was 1291202C for example, so for your value you should make a note.

8) Now click New Scan, and do the same for iridium (5066 in my case). A new list of addresses will come up (it may or may not be larger than your last list). What you're looking for here is addresses with similar beginning digits, so some judgement is required. The addresses are almost exactly the same, with only up to 4 digits separating them (4-8-C in hexadecimal). You are looking for practically the same thing. In my case, iridium and palladium were both exactly the same apart from the last digit; Iridium been 12912024. Now just repeat step 4 and 6 for each mineral to verify and voila, unlimited minerals!

I saved my game IN A SEPARATE FILE just in case, and it's safe to shut cheat engine down after altering. If you want you can use it to similarly adjust your Credits, and even take this know-how and apply it to other single player games with resources. Hope you found this little guide useful.

IMPORTANT NOTE - The addresses of the minerals change each time you load up a game, which is why I don't just out and out give you my values to make the process easier.

OAD 2: America - Bullet Pointed.

2010-02-02T05:02:00.000-08:00

I know I promised better for today, but screw it. For the past year and a half now I've been going out with a wonderful American girl called Alyssa. For the past 4 years I've visited America itself and lived with people there for about 2 - 4 weeks at a time. I haven't really seen that many touristy things, but I've seen a helluva lot that if I were to visit a country without a local friend I'd miss. But rather than deliver these inspiring insights, I thought I'd just run off a list bitterly of a few good things and alot that annoys me. Sorry Alyssa, Jon Baker and any Americans who may read this.

The Good
- Shopping; from 6am to 10pm most things stay open.

- Fast Food; TASTES SO GOOD AND SO MUCH CHOICE.

- Meat; See the same as above. Apart from the fact that you say Mince meat and they don't have a clue, instead it's ground meat.

- Able to buy Orange Tic Tacs seperate to Lime and Orange.

- Root Beer, Mountain Dew.

- Turning Right on a Red light; as Jeremy Clarkson said: The only good thing America has done for car travel.

- Optimism and Community; I found it surprising how bitter and jaded England as a country has become when in the presence of Americans. Though I myself am distrustful of Community, I'm not blind to the good and closeness it fosters in people. Folk will support events, band together more easily and be more relaxed about it all.

The Annoying/Bad
- Crap Candy and Chocolate. And I mean really crap. I've had sweets found in the back of my desk after 3 years that have tasted better.

- LOUD PEOPLE. I went to a night with some "frat brothers" once, and fuck me are they the loudest people on earth. When they were drunk the noise level was like a herd of elephants all orgasming at once, for no real need.

- Not been able to handle drink. I'm a light guy, 140lb/10 stone but damnit, that drinking age of 21 does really set American constitutions down. The fascination with alcohol too reminded me of when I was 14 and would rave about it and get drunk off of just a bottle. Nowadays I just want to go out with friends, get a bit drunk or go to a pub and chat. I'm an middle aged man in a young body.

- American Football; Ok, this one is just my own annoyance with Football worship over here carried over to NFL worship over there.

- Like. LIKE. LIKE LIKE LIKE LIKE. USE FUCKING URM OR SOME SHIT PLEASE. It's the most annoying speech quirk I've ever encountered, and girls see no problem in babbling like like alot like when like recounting like a story like. Just SLOW DOWN. Saying like and speaking quickly doesn't make what you say interesting. If you're stuck, don't throw in like as a filler word. Just urm, that's what urm's purpose is. I have my own annoying habit of counting how many times somebody says like in a minute if they use it uneededly. Get an American girl to tell you about their day or a story or fucking anything for that matter and you'll hear like 50-70 times a minute I've deduced.

- Calling your Fringe Bangs. Your hair does not explode. Stop this. It is the edge of your hair, thus called your fringe.

- Neesan instead of Nissan. If you're American and reading this, say miss. Now say niss. Now say Nissan.

- All news networks are as bad as one another. This is also probably a global thing, but I don't think many realise it about America as Fox gets most of the flack. I was just astounded at how extreme the views presented were, and how seriously the middle aged people I spoke to took them. Imagine if people pledged alleigance to either ITV news that only complained about chavs or BBC news that only complained about the Rich and you have an idea.

- Advertisments. I wanted to rip my own brain out rather than listen to another faux-caring Woman announcer. It's literally a bombardment of crap that makes me want to scream. I don't want your fucking head-on APPLY DIRECTLY TO THE FOREHEAD, I don't want viagra pills, that four flags commerical is alright but other than that take your souless tat elsewhere.

- Lack of good Radio. Have you ever heard Radio in America? If you had you'll be fighting to save the BBC and its ad free quality output a heckuva lot more. There are three flavours of Radio stations in America:
1) Talk Radio. This is just people talking and talking and talking without ever playing a damn song, interrupted every 10 minutes by an advert.
2) Modern Crap. This radio station of which there are a dozen tuneable at any time plays between 5 different songs, all by an artist like R Kelly or Lady Gaga. Some of these songs can be ok (I'm not a music snob) but god damn, it's the same as the advert problem. After been bombarded with them my brain goes on strike and I'm a drooling vegetable begging for it to stop.
3) Country and Western/American Rock. Also about a dozen of these, for no good reason other than it feels a bit patriotic and matches an atmosphere of Corn fields.

-Spanish workers. Americans struggle with an English accent. Mexicans barely speak English to start with. It's not like the local curry house run by turkish people over here; people who've honed their skills to understand and communicate in English. Every fast food place or shop pretty much has a Mexican working behind the till. This creates a problem for me: I can't place an order. For 4 years any time I've tried the order has come out wrong, so now every time I go to a McDonalds or similar I have to turn to an American friend, give them my order in English and have them repeat it in American English to the tillkeeper.

-Harry Potter. Edward Cullen. That American enthusiasm I mentioned earlier? For four years I've had American girls screeching at me to speak English and say spells, to titter among themselves when I grudgingly do. But the estaticness I've experienced surrounding Twilight and Potter is strange. Again, I'm a grumpy middle aged man in a young body.

This was a very ranty post; I've probably lost my few followers and all friends now. Tomorrow will probably be something sensible/entertaining on Vidja Games and not grumbling, so bear with me all several of you.

One a Day: Go!

2010-02-01T15:55:00.000-08:00

Right, a month late I've decided to try this insane project. So from the 1st feb 2010 to the 1st feb 2011 prepare for biterness, gaming, love, politics, films, books and all the sundry crap that pops into my head to write a post. This one is a little bit rushed as I started it at 23:55 and want to get it out technically before it's the 2nd of Febuary.

Here's a picture to enjoy to try and fluff this out a bit -

Speak better shit tomorrow! Promise!

Looking to Write?

2010-01-12T13:03:00.000-08:00

First post of the year for this dishevelled blog of mine. In the time since I last posted on here I've been over stateside seeing my gf, doing uni work and trying not to die on icy roads whilst driving.

The thing I'm posting about today though is that I'm now Deputy Editor over at www.gamingdaily.co.uk, a fun little PC gaming website that currently has four of us as regular writers. Our general aim is to do a tad more than regurgitating those same old press releases, rather we want to bring you interesting and unique articles about every aspect of PC gaming. Sometimes about games wankery, other times just simple wankery and cock jokes.

We'd love more writers though, so if you feel you that an article or more a week is the kind of thing you want to grit your teeth on drop me an email. If a regular gig isn't the sort of thing you can commit to, but you're itching to get a post out there then pitch it to me too. If you're a hot, sexy, girl in an area that's always conveniently close to me looking for a good time then don't email, though the offer is appreciated. We're non-profit (as in what income the site does earn goes back into maintenance), so can't pay you for any contributions you do provide yet unfortunately.

I like to think of Gaming Daily as a great place to get in practice and start to understand the industry a bit more, from getting used to a writing schedule to knowing how to bug publishers into getting review code for the latest games. All of us have a mind into getting published in print, and a number of past contributors have actually successfully made that jump. If I've tickled your interest and not crossed any intimacy boundaries in doing so then let me know, my email is right up there in the little linky bit.

Deputy Ed Ed

Steam Store Pages - Part One.

2009-11-27T07:01:00.000-08:00

The box art blurb has been the staple of advertising games that come in boxes for as long as I can remember. With most PC games on digital the steam store page now fills this void, where the publisher can explain the riveting features that beholdest within.

Sometimes though, a game is so dire that extremely fancy wording is needed to try and liven up the "features". So without further ado, I inversed the steam store metacritic rating and started reading through games I had no intention of playing. All ingame pics are courtesy of the store page, cherry picked for their awesome example of the game.

The cast ring their one shared agent to try and find a way out.

1) Grey's Anatomy - Metacritic 36/100

Play as the Stars. For the first time ever, play as Meredith, Derek, Cristina or any of your favorite cast members, with 3-D character models based on the original TV actors' likenesses. See the state of Seattle Grace Hospital's cast as it deals with one of the worst crises in the hospital's history!

Play as any of your favourite cast members? So I can play as Man Sitting on Bench #3? Fuck yeah, I love that guy! Man one time he had a sandwich, I was so fucking psyched at the drama going on. Interesting to note that it says I can see the state of the cast, rather than calling them the staff. This suggests to me there's going to be a bit of 4th wall pandering, and the crisis isn't really the medical emergency but rather that getting roped into this game is. Seattle Grace hospital has never sunk so low.

Influence the Storyline. Influence character dialogue and make critical decisions that affect the outcome of the storyline and the state of the hospital.

This I particularly like. Incase you forgot you were looking at a game rather than an episode of the show, there's this little nudge that, y'know, this experience is interactive. This is the same as Half Life 2 advertising "Influence where the player will be with full WASD and mouse movement! Influence when your bullets will fire every time you click the mouse!".

Perform Surgeries. Take hold of your mouse to perform multi-step surgeries as you tackle life or death situations in the operating room.

Ah, finally. An actual unique gameplay mechanic, until I realised multi-step didn't mean a DDR/Trauma Center mashup. Nice to know that I'm meant to take hold of my mouse for this, before I assumed I merely left some cheese infront of it and nudged it with my nose to play.

Accessible Gameplay. User-friendly interface and innovative gameplay takes advantage of the freedom of the mouse.

I've been taken advantage of too many times by friendly users to trust one ever again. Nice to know that they're extra keen to remind me that I will probably be using my mouse, I was mistaking this for the pre-windows 95 edition. I thought I was going over the top with my HL2 joke blurb earlier, but this game assumes you're 178% retarded.

The Steam Store page thought a pumping factory with no action or player onscreen best advertised this game. So much so there's three pictures of standard buildings out of the six on offer.

2) Damnation - Metacritic 41/100

Choose your own paths and navigate the world by performing daredevil feats on the edge of human ability.

Ok, so this game is actually advertising WASD interactivity as a feature. It does redeem itself by further contextualising that these will be daredevil WASD feats though.

Intelligent enemies will give chase and engage players in frantic gun fights and attacks that can come from any direction.

Isn't this one also a bit redundant? Come on, it's to be expected. You know what other game had intelligent enemies and the 3d potential to offer attacks from any direction? Battlezone. In 1980.

Miles of awe-inspiring landscapes and up to three hours of actual gameplay per level.

The vaugness of gameplay is what gets me here. What is fecking gameplay? Is 2 hours and 50 minutes stuck standing still and backtracking everywhere trying to solve a bad puzzle part of gameplay? Or multiple failed attempts at a laborious quick time event? Maybe even respawning again and again at a failed section a part of that three hour time, who knows.

As this is turning out longer than I thought for a one off piece, I'm leaving it here whilst I go and search for some more bad store blurbs.

Dragon Age: The Origin of My Regret.

2009-11-10T06:04:00.001-08:00

*MAJOR SPOILERS AHOY*

I'm a complete and utter tool. "Farm your garden for you as you inexplicably don't want to? I'll be happy to put off saving the world to do so!" This is my usual bend over backwards nice guy coming to the fore in RPGs. If it sounds vaguely good and helpful I see it as my sodding duty to make the game world a better place, just for the few occasionally times those nice deeds come back to gently squeeze rather than kick me in the buttock. I've always wanted to be the bad guy, but I just don't have the heart. It makes me afraid I'll hurt the game's feelings by not doing as it wants me to do. But then Dragon Age comes along and pisses all over that for me.

Now, Dragon Age is not the first to tell a dark fantasy tale with ambiguous moral dilemmas. Even though I've not played it I'm told The Witcher beat it to the pip on numerous fronts in sadistic fantasy creatures. But Dragon Age has felt so personal to me, and I've actually felt real sadness and torn even if my avatar wasn't in the slightest bit fussed.

My origin was the Dwarf Casteless, where you start off in the slums with an alcoholic mother and a sister who your crime boss is prettying up to pimp out to some dwarf lord. It's a very class orientated struggle, and so compelling that for a good time after it takes the game a while to pick up again. Every choice you make it feels like you're the Good person doing bad things just to survive, and all the nice gestures you try just end up landing you in a big heap o' shit. Show mercy to a guy? Turns out your boss had a spy nearby that turns you in. Defend advances on your sister? Your moneyflow is threatened to be cut off. Luckily your more street wise friend Jevek manages to worm your way out of it for both of you. I really grew to like Jevek, as even though he's thug he will banter a few jokes back and forth on the plight of your situation. Long story short, after a series of events you end up in your crime boss' personal jail with Jevek and have to fight your way out together, killing the boss in the process. You have to leave or be executed, so stuck between a rock and a rock you accept the invitation to join the Grey Wardens. Jevek had to stay behind but he's not guilty of the same crimes you were, and your sister had found a nice nobleman to marry her way up the class ladder. So off you trot.

Throughout all of this I had no real idea what was going on up in the higher echelons of the Dwarven society. My world view was attempting to get through day to day, with no time for contemplative politics to really filter down to my level. Some time later, fully Grey Wardenified, you return with your new party trying to recruit the dwarves to battle the great evil blah blah. Turns out there's a large power struggle occurring as since you left the old king had died and contention for the throne goes between his one remaining son and a popular lord.

Of course, it is up to you to help push events one way or the other. And the game leaves you with a beguiling sense of moral ambiguity over who you should be supporting. At no point do you get to directly meet either of the candidates before deciding who to side with, so all your information comes from gossip and hearsay. This is new and intriguing to me, as rather than the usual "I spoke to him and he's obviously the slimy bastard and that other guy is the virtuous leader" I had to judge them on distorted public perceptions. "Prince Bhelden promises to upheave the Caste system." "Lord Harrowmont is an old fool who won't change with the times. He hates Castless." Ok so the Prince it is then. "Prince Bhelden murdered his brothers and poisoned his father" "Lord Harrowmont was beside the king when he died, and was nominated ruler by him over his son." Urm, well the Prince sounds a bastard. Lord Harrowmont all the way baby. "Hi brother, I've just had my child by Prince Bhelden. Look at how well he's treating me and mum!"

That last piece of news especially sent things topsy turvy. If I side with Lord Harrowmont, I'm effectively killing my own nephew and the comfortable life of my kin. But Prince Bhelden seems a power-hungry toad. Reluctantly I go to see what the quest is to win the Prince's trust. "Lord Harrowmont promised the same land to two differing noble families for their vote. Here's evidence that we'd like you to show both of the families." Ok, so that makes me feel a little better. Lord Harrowmont was just another side of the same coin then. I set out and convince the first family, a snooty noble lady, to withdraw her vote. I then seek out the second, who turns out to be an amiable wise dwarf that cracks wise and is hated by the rest of the council for wanting to abolish the Caste system. But a good person like this supports Lord Harrowmont? I'm getting confused again.

And the game doesn't stop pulling punches. Just before going back to the person who issued me the letter giving quest I went into a library of some kind. Hoovering up all the dialogue trees I could find I ended up talking to the head remember and given an option to show him too the letters. "These are cursed fakes!" he cried, telling me that "such a contract was made, but with differing terms for both parties. There was no underhand dealing going on." Uh-oh, so Lord Harrowmont really was squeaky clean. I think I can salvage it as there's a dialogue option saying "I think I'm going to go have a word with the person who gave me these". So I just go over, accuse the quest giver and the moral choice will become clear right? Wrong. Turns out all I can do is tell him I did the quest successfully. I could restart right now, but that would ruin the premise of the game I felt. I made my choices on evidence that was there, I needed to stick by it.

I finally meet the Prince and he really is an oily bastard, but he got his family royal jewels to somehow impregnate my sister so I can't kill him in good conscience. But evil and ambitious as he is, he also wants to make some big changes for the better so that his name will be remembered positively. So he really is no more Castes, whereas Harrowmont would follow in the footsteps of the old king propping up an incredibly broken system.

I'm sliding down a slippery slope of conflicting moral interests here that somehow, this game has made me care about. It only gets worse as good friends betray you, the underhandness gets worse and there's much, much death. Because of me. And that is why Dragon Age makes me regret pretty much all of my choices, and so far doesn't seem to be relenting. I love it.

Murder On the Killing Floor (VTG)

2009-08-05T16:58:00.001-07:00

Unfortunately Sophie Ellis-Bextor is not a playable character, something I hope the DLC will solve. Since I last posted a crappy little update here two more posts have gone up on Gaming Daily. One talks about Mount and Blade, the other about getting my girlfriend eased into popping her videogame cherry. Also, a surprising link in the Sunday Papers at RPS for my pisstake Gaming Art Gallery. So now my writing pinnacle has been reached with a last minute hash using microsoft paint, time to start the inevitable degrade in the quality of my output.

Here, you can see my team are organised. This is because I am dead.

For those of you who play or have played Left 4 Dead, but have so far avoided Killing Floor on the assumption ZOMBIES + SURVIVAL = SAME GAME - Change your ways or be damned, for I have tremulously spoken. Reasons you may avoid it however are an abundance of (amusing) glitches, simple goals, possibly light content and shooter fatigue. If you hate having to wait to respawn too then steer clear, though it is amusing to watch the others when times are tense near the end of the wave. But if you die early on whilst the defenses hold and 400 monsters are left to go you'll be bored senseless, with only your right hand to keep you company. Otherwise, apart from if you retch at the sound of Cockney voices I am really hard pressed to think of any major flaws. I'm finding it hard even to avoid just deleting everything but one sentence in this post saying "Buy it, experience it". But then I am a hack after all.

Prepare to see this message more than you'd like.

The game itself is fairly easy to describe mechanic wise, so here's a boring bit without any jokes. You have free reign of the map you're on to set up your positions, the objective to survive each successively harder wave. At the end of each wave those killed respawn and you all run franticly to an ever moving trader to buy ammo, new weapons and armour with money earnt killing creatures. All the melee weapons and guns on offer here feel reasonably solid and you soon find your favourite load out.

On top of your weapons there's a perk system to tailor where your strengths are, and these can be levelled by meeting certain conditions for each one. Normal games are 6 man affairs, and it is often suicide to stray too far from the pack even on the 30 man games. Enemies come in a number of flavours that require different tactics to tackle, becoming tougher and spawning more of the meaner ones the higher the wave you're at. When you play, you'll discover just how pant-wettingly terrifying the mention of "four fleshpounders" really is outside the concept of a swingers' party. To help survive you can weld doors shut and heal each other, but your characters are not the veritable tanks that Zoe is and ammo is a sacred thing to be blessed sanctimoniously.

This is James. He too is cool and uses initals to name himself.

If I heard someone just sell the game to me as that I'd probably be ignoring it right now and indeed I did, despite Tom Francis giving it a quick whirl and saying it just might be good (though he did rush that post a little). Getting the game after a friend corralled me into it I can say the thing that really makes it is the tension, and for me personally it creates this on levels that make L4D feel pale by comparison. I do love L4D but with only five weapons to pick from and with generous ammo pickup points, infinite ammo pistols, the rareness of special infected and the relative durability of the characters it just feels more safe, dull even. That does change in L4D's survival mode, but only slightly. I've only played KF for 10 hours, but already I have so many more tales than even my games of TF2.

I didn't manage to get a good Fleshpounder screen, as too often I'm running away.

I think this is because the game is geared up to create epic last stands. All that careful planning, of welding doors shut and occupying a corridor with chokepoints and range does work initially. When with a team that knows what it's doing, you can plow through the first 4-5 waves with deadly efficiency. But then suddenly even your best laid plans slowly degrade, as the bastards just keep on coming. You're working hard, killing and killing and barely managing to hold the line. A few of your more trigger happy buddies have switched to their 9mm and firing frantically. Worryingly there's alot more than before breaking into the midst of you. Still calmly there, aiming down your iron sights and firing almost point blank now, trying where possible to line up those damaging headshots.

*click*

Your rifle is out. One of the earlier pistol buddies is using their knife now mainly, saving the pistol for those enemies it is suicide to charge. A glance at the counter tells you there are 90 enemies left, so it looks like you just might survive and re-stock for the next round intact. A few moments of panic then relief as two of the incredibly tough chainsaw monsters appear and are taken down with a close combat glitch and a guy with a chainsaw himself. Then suddenly that beast you'd been dreading makes an unwelcomed appearance, as one of your team shouts down their mic.

"FUCK! FLESHPOUNDER! AAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!"

It flashes on your screen that JB has been killed by the Fleshpounder. Then AsI - Rawr too. Your 3 remaining friends start retreating and firing wildly, ammo conservation forgotten as they forge an escape and try to whittle the beast down and finally manage to kill it miraculously. Monsters are everywhere now there's no longer a firing line to take them down before they reach you. Grenades blow up a fair few, but then you're out of those and it's down to the knife and 9mm as the horde descends and backpedalling begins. But it's no good; your earlier good firing position ontop of the car is now an island. You stave off enemies amazingly so, careful prioritizing even in panic the deadlier foes and managing a quick heal but seeing no hope of rejoining your teammates. The counter says 20. Yes! It might just be possible!

Then you see in the dark a glowing yellow line that you'd thought there would only be one of. The glowing yellow line turns red on the chest of the Fleshpounder as it roars and charges at you. Knowing your number is up, you decide to go out in style for the spectators watching. You have 7 bullets left in total, which might just kill the second weakest creature in the game let alone the second toughest. With no armour and 50% health, it seems you’ll die valiantly pumping every last round into the git.

Instead you hit "B"; which is used during the shop to give cash to players that need it and prompts a varied vocal cue from your character. A glowing £50 green note flies out of you into the Fleshpounder, as the random automatic voice clip ushers your famous last words in a cockney voice - "Loadsa Money!"

This was only my second game of Killing Floor.

If you don't find that epic, then let me tell you that pretty much every game I've played of KF has been as delightfully varied and tense as that, and it doesn't seem to be letting up. That time when we defended a castle with 30 vs 1000, killing a Fleshpounder with a carwash, a buddy welding me in a tight room with 2 Fleshpounders, the moment I mentioned two examples featuring Fleshpounders in a row. You needn't suffer the fatigue of the same maps recycled; there is a great wealth of community created ones that are pretty nifty. Indeed, I have defended the pub from Shaun of the Dead as the last man alive behind the bar with THAT rifle, fought around the Thames on top of its murky waters, battled up mountainsides and a wealth of other locations explored. If you can, get this game and join in with PCG's gargantuan 50 man server on the 14th of August. That is, mind, if the PCG offices have the ability to play games online once again. *Cough*.

If you can’t tell, I’ve fallen in love with this game, and at the moment it feels more than a fling. Time will tell, but I think it’s as much of a keeper as Counter Strike was in its heyday. So I ask you readers, put down your mediguns and backburners for a moment, leave your level 70 paladins and mounts. Come, and join me in celebrating this fine game.

Cat Got your Tounge?

2009-07-19T07:16:00.000-07:00

Correct weapon clipping is for pussies.

Where have I been? What have you done this past week Ed? I know no-one is really interested, but I will tell you anyway. Two more posts have gone up on Gaming Daily, so I haven't entirely been idle.

Otherwise I had a hectic week, where I drove all the way down to Bournemouth then onto newquay just to sleep in a car. I do not wish to repeat that experience. Highlights of the trip though involved eating Whale meat, which I thought was illegal but apparently Japan and Iceland can still harvest it. Most surprising was a sneaky visit to Bath on the way back, to meet word-entrepreneur Jaz McDougall and his lovely wife Lisa as he worked for those pleasurable PCG chaps. A nice encounter, which soon got over the awkwardness of meeting someone you know well in one sense but have never met before.

For the future then - I am job hunting at the moment, but I'll be around as much as ever probably. I'll still post here, and every sunday on Gaming Daily too. I plan on re-installing Fallout 3 so I can carry on Radiatwind, but now that I've announced it as a plan it probably won't happen. VTG crap will carry on also, as will any random features that spring to mind.

Wow, this post is shorter than I expected it to be, but then it is just a Wot I Done self pimpage post. There's not alot of me to pimp. My pimp will tell you that much.

VTG - Call of Juarez 2

2009-07-08T20:32:00.001-07:00

All good posts start with explosions. FACT.

I rode with a blazing cpu, spurred my mouse and played like the wind. That's right, it's Cowboys! Yee-har! It's been a while since I've tried my hands at a singleplayer FPS, whilst back at home I've been living up multiplayer as much as possible. But this is Cowboys, with sixshooters. How could I pass up the opportunity to go from freeform sandboxing to a on-the-rails-back-to-basics-well-executed-shooter-with-cowboys?

"Olllldddddd Maaaaaannnnn Riiivvvveeerr, that Ohmygodacannonisaimingatus!"

Call of Duty with Cowboys and a frustrating showdown minigame. That, in a snailshell, is it. But it doesn't give credit where credit is due, and doesn't give criticism where criticism is needed. Nor bad sentence structuring where bad sentence structuring is apparent. The setting itself is rather refreshing for all those of us suffering from World War II fatigue, as with it there is introduced weaponry which many will feel unfamiliar with. Plus: Nazis aren't anywhere in sight!

"My name is Bill S. Preston"

Whilst there's none of the crazy fun weapons that futuristic games throw in, it still feels satisfying to get the feel for each of the seven pistols and extra weaponry. Still, I do wish someday somebody makes a FPS/RPG game set during the 1800's about the English Empire, mixing Call of Duty shooting and Fallout 3 exploration with numerous close combat weaponry. But no exploding collars on slaves, as that might be poor taste. Though in this game the whole slave issue is glossed over to the extent that anyone tanner than tea is conspicously absent. Sorry to dissapoint all you Buffalo soldier fans out there.

Not pictured: Slaves.

The game itself doesn't really start to pick up till about 30 minutes to an hour in. You start off fighting in the American Civil War on the side of the...South? We'll just overlook that fact now. Apart from a few missions in the game at the start of each level you get the choice between one of two brothers; Thomas who is in essence a mix of Viggo Mortensen and Christian Bale to the point I thought I was catching the 3:10 to Mount Doom and Ray, a delightful pyschopath. Thomas is meant to be nimble and stealthy, able to reach places Ray cannot and Ray gets Dynamite and the ability to use two pistols at once and kick doors. You can upgrade the arsenal of both at stores located in the middle of levels, though you're not allowed to shoot the owner and take what you fancy. It's a shame, as I do it daily and I thought big bad outlaws would be allowed to rob at least one person.

Why do I think the game begins proper after 30 minutes though? Ok the game up to then - After a brief spat with the North they then desert the Army and fight in their Plantation Home, before leaving and drifting about before ending up in a fogged over town (with a frustrating end coach fight sequence and the hateful duel minigame) that establishes them as bastards. As you might've noticed, the screenshots so far have been somewhat dreary.

Pictured: Cactuses. Racial inequality is rife in the Wild West.

Suddenly I get what I came here for - Sun, shootouts and racist presentations of Native Americans. The aesthetics from there on out is simply astounding, not the best I've seen in a game but very enjoyable all the same. I'm not saying the start of the game is bad, but the locations just didn't entice me; I might as well have been playing Call of Juarez: Gaming in Grey. But on to the gameplay.

As I mentioned earlier, combat is pretty much the same as Call of Duty except for a few little differences. There's a special mode called "Concentration", which when I do it just makes my eyes cross but if you're a videogame character allows you to slow down time so you can shoot multiple people. Thomas' allows up to 6 instant kill shots on anyone in range when you activate it and you have to pull the mouse back and forth to simulate the cocking handle on the revolver or some bullhockey. For Ray's you hover over people to deliver mutliple shots up to 12. Bit gimmicky really, and they add a timer to it running out if you don't use it within 50 seconds of earning it. Man, I just used alot of words to essentially describe a shit feature which I constantly forgot to use throught the entire game.

In 1870, Cowboys discovered the Matrix.

Otherwise there's a strange cover system which almost works, where you stand by it and hope you latch on whereupon you can use the mouse to carefully peek around. When it works it feels natural, rather than edging out using the movement keys you use the mouse to angle yourself around it. When it doesn't work you frustratedly keep trying to find the sweetspot where the game recognises it as cover you're wanting to use. They also claim there's stealth in this game, but I can assure you none of that tom[francis]foolery takes place and instead the plan = shoot, and what can't be shotted you go a different way till there's shootable things.

And lastly, whilst Quick Time Events are gloriously absent there is instead a duelling minigame. I can see the reasoning for it, to give the game that extra cowboy authenticity and break things up a little. Instead it's a painful sequence where you circle each other hovering your hand controlled via the mouse near your holster, waiting for a bell to strike whereupon you have to move really close, click to draw your gun, wait for the bouncing targetting reticule (which you don't control) to hover over your foe before you can click to shoot them. Often the computer is faster than Flash on steroids compared to your clumsy fiddling and it's a big sigh, reaload and pacing around waiting for that bell again. Apart from that minigame sequence, the pace proceeds along amiably. The story is undoubtably cheesy but an interesting tale of greed and betrayal, filled with villains on both sides and an annoying younger brother who constantly preaches throughout the game. *Spoiler alert* I was actually happy when Ray shot him *Spoiler alert*

The hooker mini-game here is great however.

I thorougly enjoyed this cheesy action fest, it provided a solid romp though was not genre defining. Already I want to go back and re-try different weapon setups and play as the other brother (though it doesn't alter the mission at all). Multiplayer is included, but with the lack of support, convoluted way to connect to servers and load time plus small playerbase it's just not worth it. A good game, it's nice to play a shooter which isn't about WWII nor space marines and whilst not thought provoking is adrenaline pumping.

I give it 3.75 Fennings out of a possible 5. As arbitary scoring is all you need to base a game on, clearly.

The Other is in the Albert Hall

2009-07-05T16:01:00.001-07:00

I don't know either sir, I think he was making a reference to the post now up on Gaming Daily.

Don't worry, the drought is over. Unless you're Austrailian that is. But that wasn't what I was referencing, rather the whole me not having written for a little while. And I know how that is missed.

You want the latest gaming and politcal news? Insightful opinions? Correc?t puntuation adn spmelling/? You've come to the right place. I mean you're sat infront of a computer, go look up a website which offers the above. Here (and now at Gaming Daily) you'll just find irreverent wit, relating to games and sundry.

I've learnt better than to announce plans now, I'm rather ashamed over how poorly disciplined I am in that regard and really do need a schedule. So now I have a regular post over here every Sunday, and I'll be posting here about twice a week.

I'd like to thank Jaz, Jon, Craig and others (not forgetting Mr Francis) for reading what I scribble. It really encourages me to keep trying to write and improve. I know my idiosyncratic stylings can be a little hard to put up with, but trust me; some good may come of them one day.

Or I'll be a bitter and depressed person always thinking he could've done more, taking it out on his loved ones and self before dying miserable. Oh what a cheery note! Nah, I'm more positive than that. To prove so, enjoy this pilfered image -

VTG - Prototype: Part two

2009-06-17T11:42:00.000-07:00

For those eager to hear about how Tentacle Rape and Metal Gear Solid combine outside of fanfiction fear not; Part two is here.

Ok, I've plugged my controller into control port 2. Now fucking what?

Stealth then. It doesn't make much sense but then I don't mind it as much as I should for some reason. It's bloody annoying, as to stealth absorb (where you go behind them and give them a big hug. All soldiers secretly crave this) you have to be really close. But your character pushes people aside automatically when close and if you double tap a direction to finesse your walking you do a flying roll forward.

(Mashes the square button) UH-UH-UH-UH-UH-UH *SNAP* "Snake? Snake?! Snaaaaaaaaaakkkee!"

This has lead to some hysterical (for me) situations, where I'll go flying foward into the person I'm trying to stealth absorb and send them flat on their face, but thanks to broken stealth this doesn't raise suspicions at all. The situation goes like this in my head -

"Corporal! Private Jones just crushed my spine whilst attempting to do a flying forward roll on patrol."
"Oh that's fine sir, he does it all the time."
"Really? Military personnel just randomly fling themselves at any moment?"
"It's practice for dodging bullets sir"
"Very well then. Promote Private Jones for forward thinking at once!"

I keep searching for a caption, but all I can say is I haven't a fucking clue what's going on here. I think it could be love.

But playing it stealthily (though with its merits) misses the main aim of Prototype, which I feel is to gorily just smash everything with excessive collateral damage. In GTA, collateral is normaly something you set out to cause or are at least aware when you do so. In Prototype though when Civilian deaths happen I for the life of me have no idea when I mowed them down, as they aren't even punished. At all. Infact they're even given as a positive statistic, and as much as I try in a mission I always kill about a hundred unknowingly.

Believe it or not, this was a stealth mission.

Ah, Combat. Now here's the meat and two veg of the game, which it gladly swings infront of your face at every opportunity. The powers themselves are pretty diverse and cool, from tentacle whipping and blobfists to blade arms and full body armour. Combined with the fluidity of movement and there's plenty of fun to be had. Fancy performing the people's elbow from atop the Empire State Building? Then this game is for you (not recommended to fulfil this fantasy in real life).

Kicked ass : 5 points. Pulled heroic pose afterwards: 10 points. How cool you feel whilst playing: Priceless. For everything else there's mastercard.

Against normal foes you do feel like a killing god, until you get to a boss fight where it seems Dante from Devil May Cry came over and spilt his seed into the game. In short, they're attrition fests. Weirdly though, like the stealth they didn't annoy me as much as they should've. It seems Prototype has this strange phenomena where there's parts which would be unforgivable in ordinary games but which I would gladly play through here. What it does get right makes you forget any annoyances you may have had till after you've just finished a 4 hour session.

OMGWTFHAX *Sepiroth14 has left the game*

As I sit here, I've easily got enough to do a third post. I've still got to cover the combat in depth about fighting and hijacking, let alone mention the fun that can be had in Free-running (it's unbelievably great, which is an efficient summary). But I'm not here to do a proper review, just briefly what I enjoyed from the game as well as annoyed me (which is a part review I admit Jaz). At £35/$45 I don't think it's worth the price till it drops by about 10 or 15, but it is ridiculously good fun. Plus, you can fly and pick up cars as a dumpy 45 year old woman. Did I mention that?

VTG - Prototype: Part one

2009-06-14T15:38:00.000-07:00

The crickets have been absorbed and the tumbleweed burned as I'm back to having lots of time with nothing to do anything in. I was planning on doing a return piece with a themed play through about the Sims 3, but it seems more talented and interesting people have already beat me to the punch. So here's a more boring return piece with a view to Prototype; a game about a dysfunctional hoody stabbing people. With a blade arm. Then absorbing them. Sometimes becoming a woman. And flying. As a woman if he wants.

Basically it's a game promoting S.T.D awareness. Here's what your sex ed teachers meant about that burning sensation.

Prototype is very much onboard with the current trend of sandbox gaming. The story is confusing and cheesy as hell, but told interestingly. How is it told interestingly you ask? Well, outside of cutscenes you munch people. Like so -

Don't ever order your steak extra bloody.

There is a reason for this other than to make the Age Rating Board go "Fuck, do we have a 35+ certificate?" One it mundanely restores health, secondly though it allows you to assume the identity of whoever you stab with your tentacles and absorb into your body (DO NOT ALLOW JAPAN TO MAKE THIS INTO A TV SHOW). You then suffer what amounts to Vietnam flashbacks to fill you in on story elements. But other than turning you into a tweaked veteran it also gives you skills to operate vehicles and weapons, as well as turning you into whoever you just mercilessly picked upon. If they're human, you can become them basically no matter what character they are.

This lead to me doing more weird roleplay than usual whilst playing a game. To illustrate this, I became a woman -

I often used to reflect on how badly rendered I was. Life was hard. I had no job, no motivation, no family. It seemed all I did was walk around as filler in the world, someone to make up the numbers. But that was before I met Steven.

To everyone else, he was just one of the default skins for the civilian npcs that was repeated ad nausem. I even got him mixed up with his brother Stephen, who often walks beside him. But from the moment we met, I knew I could love no other. His walk, the way I could shove him aside with superhuman strength, his refusal to speak. I was soaring, scaling buildings even.

Our time together was magical. We used to walk along the promenade together at night, reminiscing over how we first met along that same walkway. But it was there that I lost him and myself forever.

The way the moonlight settled on his flatly textured jacket and face, I'd never felt closer to him for some reason. I moved nearer and held him tightly to me, enjoying the warmth of his body as I embraced him and he stood unresponsively, blocking my view.

I then remembered I was a quasi-human monstrosity that absorbed DNA.

GLOMPAGRUAGHGLOOPSLURPRARGHAAGSQUELCH

Shit. I've grown Testicles.

Next time, on View to a Game - Prototype: Combat, Hijacking, Solid Snake, Tentacle Rape, Flying and Parkour. (I decided this would be too long for one piece with my narrow blog making posts seem longer than they actually are). Linky here.

Crickets Chirping

2009-06-10T16:27:00.001-07:00

*Tumbleweed*

A Man approaches in the distance. But who is it coming to this deserted part of the internet? Could it be salvation?

Tune in Next Week to find out!

Birthday My.

2009-05-27T12:30:00.000-07:00

So it is.

Hoorahy!

View to a game... Explained

2009-05-19T14:32:00.000-07:00

If anyone was reading during that crazy period last week where I posted an update a day (boy, what was wrong with me) you might've been aware that I expressed a wish to do a regular feature again. However, I didn't explain what it would be apart from a paintshopped James Bond and a pun on one of his movie titles.

Well here's what I came up with. Not quite a normal review, not quite enough to be an original feature. Basically, I'm going to pick a random game and just give an honest tale of what the hell I did in my first impression. Be that I cheated the crap out of the campaign as I got eager to see the story (Hello starcraft) to just bemusment and getting my ass handed to me. So far I've got Starcraft, though not too sure as I just gave that one away and posted about it earlier, as well as the Diablo II complete set and Resident Evil 4. Feel free to suggest something no matter the age, I'll give it a whirl. So it looks like first up when I get around to it will be this gem -

Also, I'll be picking my gf up from the airport this weekend and she'll be here for 3 weeks. So I won't be on the internet so often it can be said, but I'll be around. Also she's been bugging me I never write about her or show a picture, so here she is -

She'll just have to read past the geekiness of the opening of this post to get to me showing her. And to prove this isn't me fabricating my life (as I know some creepy internet chaps that do), I'm going to chuck in another photo where we're *shock shock* together -

Matchmaking

2009-05-17T13:57:00.001-07:00

Halo. Ugh, just saying the name itself conjours up visions of blind brand-following idiots. However, I'm not totally against it, just that the majority of the time I'm afraid it just isn't for me. As most of you might be aware of there's a little series called "Red vs Blue" out there that's quite infamous.

Now, I can safely say that most machinima out there is vis a vis with a pile of garbage, and when it comes to Halo 3, with the introduction of Forge that number is particularly higher. However, there is a little gem I love that is quite witty and well executed called "Matchmaking", by a production company called Darkspire Films. Why do I love it? Why, for this episode mainly -

I reccomend them, if you don't find they're your cup of tea then it's probably because at heart I love been immature occasionally and liking things like this. If you liked that song then you can download it here, and the full two seasons can be found on youtube here.

If you can all take a break out of viewing TF2 hype or whatever busy Summery things you're having to do I hope you enjoy it, and that I don't have bad tastes.

View to a game

2009-05-16T17:32:00.000-07:00

I've decided to throw maybe a semblance of order at this place and see if it sticks again. After my last computer got dropped and I lost the saved games for my Radiatwind story (and haven't been motivated to roleplay the same way twice and wouldn't be able to re-create the random events that happened. Plus I couldn't stand Tamata again) I really haven't had an interesting regular feature or indeed anything interesting at all on this blog. I'll plan to make amends today!

Spy sappin mah woman!*1

What does a wiimote waving Pierce Brosnan have to do with this? Why nothing, he was merely an image designed to go with the pun of the title (incase you weren't clear it was an unsubtle play of words on a Bond movie name).

What's this feature about? Why the 007 motif? What can you expect from this? Well fuck it, it wouldn't be Bondesque unless I was mysterious and spy like about it. So I'm going to entice some 2 dimensional women into getting nubile around me then return to tell you what this is all about and reveal my maniacal evil plan for you to thwart.*2

*1 Failed captions/bad puns for this picture -

"Do you expect me to game Nintendo?"
"No Mr.Bond, we expect you to flail"

Shaken, not waved.

The Sensor is not Enough

Yeah, there were alot of failed ones. Now you know my writing process goes from shit to mediocre.

*2 The real reason I'm not giving it away is that I haven't actually written the feature yet, but I'm trying to update this place as much as possible in the hope someday, somebody might appreciate its amateurishness. The feature may change as I go also, I'm trying to tune it to be interesting and fun but also a bit different and unique to "This is a blog".

TF2 - What Class has what in their playlist.

2009-05-14T10:00:00.000-07:00

Trying to think of any songs which would be appropiate to each class. Chip in if I've missed something blindingly obvious, as at the moment I've only done a small sample for each class but I want to get a comprehensive list going. Most of these songs are crap yes, but maybe you can just enjoy the cheesiness. Also, they don't really go that well whilst playing I've found.

Sniper -
Two little boys Rolf Harris
Tie me kangaroo down sport Rolf Harris
My Baby Shot Me Down Nancy Sinatra
Land Down Under Men At work

Soon to be added to this list in the update William Tell Overture Gioachino Rossini

Pyro -
I am the God of Hellfire Arthur Brown
Disco Inferno The Trammps
The Roof is on Fire The Bloodhound Gang
Relight my Fire Take That
I'm a lumberjack Monty Python
Danger! High Voltage Electric Six
Burning Down The House Tom Jones & The Cardigans

Heavy -
State Anthem of the Russian Federation Alexander Alexandrov
Dopilsya Ex Sektor Gaza
Kalinka Ivan Petrovich Larionov
Korobushka Russian Folk Song
Valenki Russian Folk Song
Moskau Dschinghis Khan (Submitted by Jon Baker)

Medic -
Lil Marleen Lale Andersen
Symphony No. 8 in F Major Beethoven
Junge Komm Bald Wieder Freddy Quinn
Helfen Sie sich (Help yourself) Peter Alexander
Ghostbusters Ray Parker Jr.

Spy -
(so many possible choices)
Secret Agent Man Johnny Rivers
Spy Hard Weird Al Yankovic
The James Bond Theme John Barry
Another Way To Die Jack White & Alicia Keys
Mission: Impossible Theme Danny Elfman
Goldfinger Shirley Bassey
Live and Let Die Paul McCartney
A View to a Kill Duran Duran
Nobody Does It Better Carly Simon
The Man from U.N.C.L.E Various Artists
The Saint Orbital

Scout -
(Really fucking hard to pick for. You can tell I struggled here, so just picked either fast songs or annoying ones. Fuck you scout, pick your own songs)
Take Me Out to the Ball Game Tin Pan Alley
The Rockafeller Skank Fatboy Slim
Conga Gloria Estefan & Miami Sound Machine
Cotton Eyed Joe RedNex
I like to move it Shaggy
Start the Commotion The Wise guys

Demoman -
(This was weird and hard too, as most Scottish drinking songs and whatnot didn't fit the Demoman)
Scotland the Brave Contender for Scottish National Anthem
Cornish March Saor Patrol
Boom Boom Boom Out There Brothers
Hoots Mon Harry Robertson
Tear The Roof Off That Sucker Parliament

Engineer -
(Any American Country song seemed to fit the bill really, I'll only throw a few out)
Your Cheatin' Heart Hank Williams, Sr.
El Paso Marty Robbins
I'm So Lonesome I Could Cry Hank Williams
Today I Started Loving You Again Merle Haggard
Ring Of Fire Johnny Cash
Sixteen Tons Tennessee Ernie Ford

Well that's what I put so far. Complain, ask for changes and suggest things to me in the comments! I'll edit as I go (and give you a mention for your suggestion). Please think of something for the scout, I beg you.

To Craft a Star you firstly...

2009-05-13T08:24:00.000-07:00

Add eggs and sugar, then leave to bake for 500 trillion years. Step two is where it gets tricky...

(ellipses win!)

War - not complete without cigars

Now luckily, the screenshots of this game turned out perfectly viewable, unlike my experience seeing the cutscenes on widescreen vista. They made blood vessels burst within my cortinas through a mere 5 second viewing. So if you're wondering why these screenshots are only from the first few missions it's as my eyes became too bloodshot to continue.

He was only one day from retirement too

Starcraft then, the next definitive step upon the RTS ladder from Command and Conquer. Playing this game I can say was still as enjoyable as when I first had that brief go all those years ago, but it also showed me what I now took for granted in modern RTSes.

This would totally be a sausage fest if they weren't so butch and manly

The first shocking thing to hit me, as I dimly remembered before starting and as PCG mentioned in its preview of SCII was that you can only select 12 units. 12 UNITS?! Boy, have I been spoilt since. I think memory lane tended to pave over all the frustrating times I had throwing hordes at one another, as my army would throw itself fowards 12 men at a time (when the pathfinding worked). On the other side of the spectrum, I suppose it meant focusing more on use of tight units and early grouping. Still, that didn't stop me swearing at the annoyance of my big stompy army been forced to charge in a great stutter.

Blizzard, forseeing our energy and other world crises since 1998

Otherwise, the old game is still a joy to play with the charm offsetting the niggling annoyances that the RTS genre later ironed out. The basics are still there, from Group creation to box dragging and right click everyorders (and attack move thank fuck). The little heads of my units talking to me and moving about on the HUD still make me smile, and it is supremely satisfying to see little Zerg/Tyranids and my own Terrans/Hillbilly Space Marines explode in blood and gore.

The roof, the roof, the roof is on fire. We don't need no water let those mother zergers burn

Also one weird touch (or engine limitation rather) I like is when taking over and gaining an ally to control, they don't change colour to your side. Strange, but I think it's neat controlling purple and blue marines as opposed to magic costume changes. In my head I made my purple marines the command squad and had the blue marines protect them. I now wish to randomly colour troops on the fly in all RTS games now.

Again though, the cutscenes are the part that haven't aged well and caused me most strain and stress (though if they weren't so eye gouging the quirkiness of them is quite enjoyable). Look at the horror that is 90's CGI -

Well dey just gunne and dun fucked up my face boye

I'll post a full review when I've played more comprehensively, but that won't be for a bit yet. Hopefully this toe-dip into the bathwater first look impression will entertain for now.

Discs! In Cases! Bought with Paper Money!

2009-05-12T06:15:00.001-07:00

I really do set myself too many tasks at once. Currently I'm trying to read Joseph Heller's "Catch 22", write an essay, learn phonology and syntax sentence structuring, handwrite a letter, emailing folk, playing about 2 video games as well as whatever distractions the internet conjours up (read: Alot), not to mention my social life (read: Not alot). So should I focus on these tasks? Hell no! Lets overstretch myself that bit more.

Now as some of you may be aware, Starcraft 2 is around the corner and some people and Koreans are very excited about this. I've never owned the classic blizzard original, though have briefly played it at a friend's house when I was younger. Before it came out though I decided I should probably play it fully, just so I know what's going on. To that end I went out and bought Diablo II and its expansion set.

Urm...

Going back into the shop I also went and tried the two for £15 offer again and came away with Starcraft and its expansion pack in one box, as well as a random item of Resident Evil 4. Don't ask why, I've been meaning to try it but I just didn't realise it was on pc. Hurrah for console ports.

I'm not made of money by the way, in reality I found a gift card of £30 for GAME. Four games (three or five really, depending on whether you count expansion packs as a seperate game) seemed better than one, so don't fault me for not going modern.

I'm never going to fit these into my schedule. Also did I mention I'm crap at RTS?

*EDIT*
Forgot to mention this, but I could hardly believe it when I bought Diablo II and its expansion set when the GAME employee asked me "Have you checked if your system meets the minimum requirements?"

To think, I nearly bought a game I couldn't run! I really should've updated to keep up with those Windows 95/98 requirements. Not to mention 80mb of space needed! And 16Mb RAM?! Fuck me. I had as much hope as running that as if it were 160000Mb required.

Thank god for well trained employees helping me not make foolish purchases.

I fail at Zombotany

2009-05-08T02:47:00.000-07:00

Now, I "completed" plants vs zombies and it was a fun journey, so decided to dive into the mini games and extra modes where things get really interesting. One mode, called last stand, gives you 5000 sun power and you have to buy your plants at the start (no generating extra really apart from a measly 250 sun to patch up and repair inbetween flags). This provides an interesting twist as I can no longer carefully turtle as is my usually wont, but instead I have to choose tactics from the off. If I make a mistake, well, there's no correcting it in the field by throwing down some last minute cannon fodder or tall-nut. I now bring you personal examples from this mode that didn't work for me, mainly as I'm a bugger for symmetry but also as I'm incompetent -

Here was my first attempt, where I went wildly overbudget so had to skimp on my ultimate plan.

Next came the ice them and burn (as well as butter) them plan -

This one failed as again I blew my budget, so thinking the water would be safer as it wouldn't get as diverse amount of zombies I skimped out there. What I did forget was the unfairness of the game, where it would spawn 4 bucket zombies in rubber dingies right infront of my plants in a water lane. Alas, I couldn't fend them off and had to watch as my brave brave seediers were bitterely munched.

Then during my breakfast I looked down at what I was eating and it struck me. MELONS!-

Except that failed as a jack in the box zombie blew up one tall-nut and a ladder zombie climbed over another in a flukey bit of manuvering.

Am I boring you yet? Ok only one more fail then my success. Next came operation Ice-Queen-Transvestite (as she has some big nuts)-

But that failed too.

Here's me failing. Spot the jack in the box bastard that undid the dreams of plants and men -

The operation that did work was Halfway Sex Change (a pair of melons and nuts) -

The reason why this worked? Why simple, look into the determined eyes of the third from bottom tall-nut. Tall-nuts are stoticly posed anyway, he just doubles the amount of stoticlness. He was why I finally won. He is to whom I owe my final victory.

Well that and upgrading some Melons to ice didn't hurt.

If you haven't got this game yet then I strongly suggest you go out and buy it. Then say goodbye to your schedule.

On the cards

2009-05-05T15:55:00.000-07:00

I said that break was only going to be for a few days.

Opps.

Well I haven't been (entirely) idle in neglecting my writing space. I've got an interview set up with those lovely aussie chaps from a particularly funny gaming humour series called Doomsday Arcade.

This image has nothing to do with Doomsday Arcade, but I like it.

Also what's that I see on my steam account? Why, it's Plants Vs. Zombies. But I don't think anyone reads here for my serious reviews of things so I'll think of an original way to post about it.

Oh, and as an experiment I've never played Dwarf Fortress before. So I've hit up the wiki and pretended as though I have, and started a let's play topic on the Rock Paper Shotgun forums here. I have no idea how that's going to turn out.

Finally, hope you had a great birthday Jaz and that Zeno Clash didn't turn out to be a dissapointment!

*EDIT*
PLAY PLANTS VS ZOMBIES AT YOUR OWN RISK. YE SHALT NOT GET THAT TIME BACK.

Once again, a short hiatus.

2009-04-24T09:44:00.000-07:00

Only a few days worth this time. In my wake I'm going to leave with some random internet treats that I've amused myself with the past week which may or may not be up your alleyway.

1) Let's Play, something which I found having recently played Resident Evil 5. This person does a remarkably humorous exploration through the previous games, which enlightened me to the batshit insane story and logic Capcom have in this series. Also, another not on LP but I found a while back on some RPS comments from that delightfully plagiarised game Limbo of the Lost comes this humorous gem.

2) Charlie Brooker's Newswipe, which should probably be on youtube alongside his Screenwipe series on this person's channel. Highly amusing and informative, it's a damning and revealing indictment of the media culture we live in. Also news-wise, as my gf is American and loves this guy I end up watching the Colbert Report. If you're in the uk like me and can't watch it there's a handy programme called Ultrasurf, which is a must if you want to watch transcontinental exclusives.

3) If you've never heard of interactive story telling don't be alarmed, neither had I outside of the one on Explosm's forums. However this little one is most assuredly a beauty, and shows sometimes internet forums do do (damn you English language) good things.

Explaining National Debt and the Economic Downturn.

2009-04-15T09:02:00.000-07:00

You know that promise I made of good writing soon last post? Yeah, this isn't going to be the turning point.

I had a writing itch, casting around for a random topic I thought I'd try to sum up the economy. Then I realised there was nothing new to be said that more intelligent people hadn't done better and more eloquently. Rather than be challenged and intimidated by my own fear of failure to write a thought-provoking piece, I instead drew pictures in msn paint. I hope with these I can teach the (British) economy briefly to an 8 year old, answering why they'll be working their asses off for little to no return. Those loveable little rascals.

PAST

PRESENT

FUTURE

Now then class, your homework today is to explain a world problem in msn paint drawings. Also to venture forth your opinion on when I'll actually put myself out in the open and attempt to make a brave, smart and witty writing piece. You have until Monday, go!

*EDIT* A lovely highlight from John, which made me chuckle -

Betraying myself with a new pc

2009-04-13T06:58:00.000-07:00

I can't face the guilt. I have to get it out. I actually like my new pc, but I feel guilty and annoyed over the lack of charm it has over my old one. My old one I had to run at a 30 degree angle as one of the heatsink clasps was broken and if stood upright would lean away from the chip and cause overheating and shut down. It ran only what it felt like despite plentiful graphics and ram elegantly shoved in there. I had it in a pc case from 6 years ago as the 2 year old case it was in was too small to fit all the wires in place with the side on. I had to caress and probe it in certain ways to get it to work like a normal pc, and though it was a bodge job damnit I felt proud. Now I have this -

And by heck though it runs crysis and works like a charm I can't help but long for my faulty bastard of yore. And Windows XP compatiblity. To give you an idea of how I am when it comes to technology I prefer imperfect but fun to sleek and polished. For example, here's the car I drive -

I had £1500 of my own money for my first car. I could've gotten a nice safe fiesta or a dull corsa (like the friend who's parked in the background) or a hatchback of some type. No, I went with the crappy old British Triumph Spitfire. I'm lucky to make a journey there and back in this thing, and swear often trying to fix it. Would I have these problems with a faster safer more reliable car? Nope, but I wouldn't trade it in for the world, as I love it for its faults. And that's why this pc has me feeling dirty. And why this post is pretty much wanton rambling that is entirely disinteresting to read, but if you read this far then commiserations you bored soul you. I'll write something good soon I swear.

Cleaning off the dust

2009-04-05T23:52:00.001-07:00

Phew! I'm back, sad to leave despite having a love/hate relationship with America sometimes. I hope to get posts more frequently churned out now, especially with this shiny new machine with the hateful vista. It makes things easy yes, but I miss tinkering. So what game did I play when I first got back? Why Battlefield 2142 of course, many years late. I finally decided to do this as I've had the game in a unopened box for 2 years now, as I never really wanted to play it but I got back yesterday and saw it guiltily still there.

What did I think? Tedious and empty, but with the unlock system it was strangely compelling. If there's one thing that can make you feel rank amateurish its jumping into a game after the inital wave of new players have become veterans. People had all the tools they wished at their disposal whereas I lacked even the basics for each class. I'm not a bad player at fps and was holding my own on the scoreboard, but I was getting gutted by servers full of fancy equipment. Ontop of this despite my skill in killing with peashooters I was getting angrily typed at by people who were irate that I didn't revive them. You know why I didn't? As I couldn't.

Developers, if you're going to do a cool unlock system to compel people to play, please don't hold off core tools to classes. A similar example would be if valve released tf2 but witheld the pyro's flamer, the medic's medigun, the heavy's minigun et cetera, discouraging team playing by taking away the weaponry to do so. Or Counter-Strike with a new person starting out with a pistol against Magnum Sniper Rifles. Perhaps it's not as extreme as those but still, an irritating mechanic nonetheless.

On a leaving note for this post, I'd like people to suggest a game for me to buy and actually do a proper review. So far all I've done is play random games and nitpicked features about them, as I'm nowhere interesting enough to warrant people reading my opinion in a fully fledged review but I'd like to try it once. If not I'm going to play Wanted whilst critiquing it through the lense of quantum mechanics.

I'll be on hiatus!

2009-03-19T18:09:00.000-07:00

I'm going away folks for a little bit, so I won't be able to really post anything games realted unless it's indie. Want to know the reason for the dirge of posts? Well moving my pc from uni to home my brother dropped it, and the heat sink snapped off and clanged about rather violently down my motherboard. So today I finally bought a brand new shiny pc! I was too lazy to apply bandages and plasters to my aging wreck, which is sad, but I am enjoying the freshness. It's just a shame Windows Vista is so annoying to use. The computer is now called Adair, something I'll stencil on when I get back home.

I'll try to do another gaming article from memory and pilfered screenshots this time. Hugs and kisses to you reader! But there's a high probability you're male, so in that case just a handshake and pat on the back hug. Toodle pip!

How not to write story - Halo Wars

2009-03-13T10:02:00.001-07:00

I'm not a particularly huge fan of halo, though it is enjoyable in terms of mindless shootery. Recently I've noticed my Xbox sitting glumly in a corner; neglected, unfed, mess all over its litter tray. So I decided to give it some love and attention by playing Halo Wars on it, as any other game I can get for better on PC.

Now I once had a friend who was HALO 4 LIFE pretty much. Well I say a friend, I just happened to know him at a lancafe I used to frequent and he would talk crap upon crap for hours and hours. This led to the entire backstory exposition of Halo divulged halplessly to me whether I wanted to know it or not, as I waited for a PC to free up at the lancafe in order to get away from him.

As I have a habit of picking up useless information I reckon I'm pretty informed on the Halo "universe" due to this guy, without having to undergo reading the books or getting limited edition versions of the games. Ok, so backstory to piece done? Great, now I can get on and explain the link to the FMV from the game (scroll down a bit).

Firstly, I was quite charmed by the base buidling mechanics snatched from the carcass of the first Battle for Middle Earth game. The missions were pretty alright too, bugs and balancing issues aside and the fact that the later levels up until the last one were mysteriously easy (though they were cool for letting you use some big stompy blowy up stuff).

However, I'm not here to review the game. Ok I give it 6.8/10, happy? Rather, I want to gripe about the abandonment of sensible story telling.

The story to the Halo series isn't imaginative, what with all the ancient beings popping their clogs and leaving dangerous toys for people to play with and mysterious puzzles to follow. Maybe Mass Effect and Halo are set in the same universe? Only destroyed at different times. But the story has been thoroughly fleshed out, cliches and all.

So it bugs me to see such poorly fleshed out characters In this game. There's old grumpy but the best general there is stereotype, then there's fratboy gungho male with oh my goodness gracious I couldn't have seen it coming love interest in the form of sensible condescending nagging hot brainy lady. Then they're thrown together in these bad FMV's and the writers expect us to give a damn about them. Those who bothered to back read my blog (thanks!) will notice I wrote similar shitty characters in a story. However I'm not in my twenties yet even so young and amateurish. I also didn't get paid for it and wrote it in a two hour binge last minute. So I'm pissed at whoever decided to make this canon to a world many strange people love apparently.

They dont even bother to explain what the hell is going on, in the missions I'm told it's imperitive to capture this base or blah blah blah. A few involve finding the sciency lady, then the mission ends and suddenly an FMV is shown where the Arbiter chap forgets to execute her and decides plonking her down by a teleporter she wont escape, which she does, and somehow we've found her at the exact moment and loaction she teleported to. Hoorah! Also it's never explained why they wanted the lady specifically, at first I thought it was because she was brainy so they needed her brains but remembering that aforementioned backstory any human can activate the old ones devices whilst aliens cant. So they didn't need the lady, they could've just nabbed a marine.

Then the story further shits on itself as it turns out that now we've teleported to inside the planet with a sun in the middle and gravity inverted inside and oh god even with basic physics knowledge my brain is melting. Then it's revealed the reason the convenant are here is for...ships? And hey the Flood are here too, so it's a mystery then that they weren't catalogued on the earth database for when Master Chief pops up 20 years later. Fucking hell. I'm searching the battle map for traces of a blue police box for explanation as to why history has changed.

The point of this long rant then is that when you've got a big franchise like Halo, don't do a Star Wars and wipe the canon of the story with your ass by putting unispired characters in its past, as well as better technology and events that don't correlate or leave big plot holes. Like the arbiter's armour, it's meant to have been passed down alien dude to alien dude, but here the chap was pushed over an edge and left inside a planet next to an exploding sun (which had to be exploded by hand as folk have forgotten about long range detonators or timers in this future).

In short, I played this game and now I've got a headache. ARGH! BACK IN THE CORNER WITH YOU XBOX.

I did however like the sarky ship computer woman.

Nukeworld Series - The Glow Fantastic, part three

2009-03-06T06:14:00.001-08:00

Thank God that the bomb will either make these people sterile through genital radiation, or blow up and disintegrate them. It does the future of the human race some good with such willing participants for natural selection. Why is it though that it seems all places want to kill Radiat, whether violent and sudden or benignly like this? Did I put negative points into luck by accident? It's become obvious however that Radiat shouldn't really hang around, but before he hot foots it to the open road again he needs some supplies. Some mad woman with the almost porn star name of Moria Brown offers to help.

Seriously Bethesda, is it so hard to model a woman's face to be at least plausibly humanoid? Anyway it's a good job she's mad as she has no qualms about accepting clothes with bullet holes and blood in them (from folks killed by other people; Radiat was merely a happy inventory vulture). Whilst stocking up on edilbe healing needles and unsoiled pants, she asks us to check out the supermarket nearby. There's a supermarket nearby? Why the hell do you nutjobs live around a giant bomb then?! Come on lady, look at what it's done to the rendering of your face already. Gah. Looks wise she seems in Radiat's league though, and thinking chicks dig guns it's time for Radiat to work his magic (that doesn't involve telekinesis). This gives me a plausible reason for why I posed Radiat with a gun. Again.

Long story short - laid. The long story - he doesn't get laid. (If you wonder why you see Radiat's skin through his collar there, that's just because my machine is crappy. Incase picture quality hadn't given that away already)

Nukeworld Series - The Glow Fantastic, part two

2009-03-04T18:10:00.000-08:00

So feeling cool, with the gleeful concealment of firearms and the ethos of "who needs pecks when I've got tec" Radiat strolls into town like a funky sex machine. This evaporates within almost oohhhh two seconds when the Sheriff comes up and confronts him. Shit! Does he know about the gun? Or guns rather? Or the guns, baseball bat, bb gun, Culterly and the clothes as well as glasses of the dead person I stripped naked and am now wearing myself? Just play it cool Radiat, be polite and calm and he wont suspect a thing. Mwha ha ha?

Nice town you got here, sheriff. It's a pleasure to meet you.

Smooth smooth, nicely done. Now just keep this up and you're as free as a bird. Free birds can still get shot by a hunter and mauled by their dog though. Crap this guy is getting into my head! Quick act macho so he doesn't think you're scared.

You don't scare me. Hahahahaha!!!!!!!!!!! Not so tough now are you?!!!!!!!

Yeah I showed him, that nervous laughter and wet pffft in Radiat's pants? It was actually cool mother fucker laughter and the wet pfft was...erm...Radiat laying shit down, freestyle. On a literal level.

You got something you want to prove, boy?

Crap crap crap! Why did no-one give Radiat a class on mind games? We take a wild swing at moving a rook to bishop eight and trying to show we were in on the game the entire time.

Ha! I'm just messing with you.

See, we were just two people having a joke now yeah? No need for anyone to unsling their rifle now yeah?! We're all nice and friendly and lawabiding and friendly around here yeah?!?!?

After ignoring Radiat's behaviour we are informed where we can get some grub and a healthy drink of unstable isotopes down by the unexploded nuclear weapon.

Ahhhh, they're some gooooooooddd isotopes, I could just dri...WAIT, WHAT?! AN UNEXPLODED NUCLEAR BOMB?!

Part three

Nukeworld Series - The Glow Fantastic, part one

2009-03-03T14:19:00.000-08:00

B-b-b-b-blinded by the light. A canny song reference, what wit! Well this can only go downhill so lets start. Radiat stumbles out of the door into the sunlight, flumoxed as of where to go to next. Apparently being flumoxed gains you experience in this game though as it flashes on screen that Radiat is now level 2! It's nice to see pacifism with the whole not killing lark rewarded in such a way. Seeming as this game likes such liberal thinking so far it seems suiting to Radiatwind to try and gain another level for musing on the meaning of life whilst staring forlonly into the distance.

Unfortunatley self-reflection isn't a recognised achievement in fallout 3. 12 hours of standing there proved this and tired Radiat's kneecaps out. So with no luck on that front it was time to go find somewhere that had people who'd stop trying to kill him long enough to feed him first. A town called Mega 1,016.0469088 kilograms is nearby, and though not appealing seems a better bet than arthritic kneecaps and starvation. Finding it Radiat decided to buy/was scammed into buying a camera and a gun from some chap outside the entrance to take some badass photos of himself. You know, in order to show off to any future ladies he may meet over an evening of wine and mash potatoes.

It's a shame he can't help but appear as though he's close to tears everytime he poses with a gun.

Part Two

Nukeworld Series

2009-02-25T11:49:00.000-08:00

Hey there! If there was anyone who enjoyed my strange foray into copying Pratchett names with none of the style in a Fallout 3 playthrough, then I'll be putting up the second part shortly - Entitled punnily enough "The Glow Fantastic".

Unfortunatley, (though I screenshot captured everything I need for this piece and thought to put the screenshots on a pen drive) I suffered a hard drive failure and so lost Fallout 3 and all my saved games. The future is uncertain then for Radiatwind; I'll put the next piece up and then decide if I can be bothered to reinstall and replay in the same manner.

If you enjoy my humor though keep on coming back, as someday I may well improve! Or not. Give it 5/9 odds. Wait, is that good, bad, or average odds? Damnit, all those years of not gambling are coming back to haunt me. I could do a serious post on gambling if I felt like it, but as it is it's a nice segway for putting a image in to spice this post up.

You need to ring this number if you keep hoping I post something worthwhile one of these days.

I'll be as formal as I damn well like

2009-02-20T02:38:00.000-08:00

Here's one of my bugbears (Ohh what a cute word. *Ahem* *Reasserts manliness*). "Formal" essay writing guidelines for things like work submitted to university or professional articles.

Now, when you read the opening word you did understand "here's" meant "here is" yes? Good. That's all I ask to be able to do, it makes my writing more fluid as I type naturally rather than having to mentally think to type "that is", and for me makes it easier to read.

So if people understand what the fuck I mean and it doesn't make me look like an idiot what's wrong with it?

Again, I used "doesn't" just there. Typing "does not" just seems excessive and anal upon anality. I'm not falling into colloquialisms as I write, and neither am I butchering words making you the reader assume I'm an idiot if i ws to strt typin lk dis 2 u.

In that way I can see where formal writing and casual writing need to be different as formal writing gives pretends of intelligence whereas casual writing can make it hard to interpret what the author is thinking.

Knowing this doesn't stop me being annoyed at how I am marked down for using such abbreviations as "it's" and co. Does it make me look like an idiot as I type? No, so it doesn't detract from the mentality of the reader towards me. Can I still get my point across just as bloody well? YES YOU FUCKERS.

Nukeworld Series - The colour of Radiation, part six

2009-02-02T15:14:00.000-08:00

When we next wake it's to Tamata telling us to, well, wake up.

How weird. I was just dreaming about you...and potatoes.

She declines our offer of Mash to tell us the softly-voiced man has hot-footed it out of the vault. Well that's none of my buisness, I'm staying here where things are safe, dull and samey. Unfortunatley she tells us that this means people want to come and stick a bullet inbetween our third and fourth rib.

Life just doesn't get any easier does it buddy? Despite his attempts at modesty Radiat is given a gun. Sensing trouble ahead, he doesn't need telling twice and starts to promptly leg it.

OhshitshitshitshitI'mgoingtodieshitshitshit...

Somehow we make it through the fire and bullets, leaving all behind in our panicky wake. In a brief respite, using our 6 points of intelligence we think a disguise might be in order to help us slip out. Donning a handy Labcoat and glasses from a donor-card holder we begin sneaking out incognito.

Nothing to see there, just three people having a friendly debate. I think I'll leave them to it. Radiat makes it to the vault door and even manages to open it, when that fool Tomata comes along and leads the people with weapons right to Radiatwind! Women ehy?

Naturally, we start to peg it -

I see daylight! Terrifying sweet daylight and freedom! Hopefully it'll postpone the people attacking us with weapons. Nearly there...

Onto the next chapter, The Glow Fantastic

Nukeworld Series - The colour of Radiation, part five

2009-02-01T15:00:00.000-08:00

After the mental scarring we recieved when we were 10 it's time to flash foward 6 years, where we take our G.O.A.T. or something. It's passing my B.A.A-levels I worry about more, but that bad exam pun will have to wait. Radiat then sits down at a desk and gets his holopen ready for the first question (I'm really going to need to find a way to show text ingame better, damn narrow blog columns) -

Question One: You are approached by a frenzied vault scientist, who yells "I'm going to put my quantum harmonizer in your photonic resonation chamber!". What's your response?
Leave a radiatwind shaped hole in the air.

Question 2: While working as an intern in the clinic, a patient with a strange infection in his foot stumbles through the door. The infection is spreading at an alarming rate, but the doctor has stepped out for a while. What do you (do - ed)?
Screaming is to the best of my ablilites here.

The next few questions are rather humdrum till it gets to question 5 -

Question five: Your grandmother invites you to tea, but you're surprised when she gives you a pistol, and orders you to kill another vault resident. What do you do?
My grandmother makes an indecent offer to me? Wait, that sounds suspicously like...oh god no, the old lady, I thought I'd forgotten! Ohshitohshitohshitohshitohshit...

I end up convulsing and passing out during the exam, blanking only three years of my memory this time at least.

Part six

Nukeworld Series - The colour of Radiation, part four

2009-01-31T17:31:00.001-08:00

So Radiat is forced to chit chat amongst the birthday patrons, where he proceeds to be hit upon by a rather randy old lady who can't but help recount her past exploits (sorry for the small text) -

"Are you having a nice party? Ten years old, my my my. Seems like only yesterday that your daddy came...". Is she trying to suggest she's my real mother?

"I was 10 once, believe it or not! My goodness, the vault was practically crowded back then". Ew, I really dont need to know how crowded your vault was. And at 10 as well?!

I think the expression on my face there sums up my response to this lecherous old lady's pickup lines. She tries to offer me candy but I've been well informed on those matters. Fool me once shame on me, fool me twice shame on you lady. I wont let it happen thrice. I seek consolement in the adults around me.

"Oh, hey, don't worry about it. You might be surprised how much fun you can have if you give it a chance, though". Yeah, some good that advice served me. I was surprised by how so not fun it was with the old lady that I mentally blocked the next 6 or so years of my life.

Part five

Nukeworld Series - The colour of Radiation, part three

2009-01-30T17:21:00.000-08:00

So now we've discovered the only spell we can remember, it's time to pick suitable attributes. I have no idea how I'm going to play this character, though I tried to reflect what I best feel is his personality in attributes. Any alternative suggestions let me know and I'll alter accordingly -

Strength was a no-no. Perception to spot people/mutants screaming "YARGHHHH" and attempting to cleave my head off, Endurance to allow me to sprint short distances away from people cleaving my head off and low charisma as people want to cleave my head off for some reason. A little bit of intelligence and alot of Agilty and Luck and that finishes us off here.

A Birthday! Yayh! Oh cool there's a black kid at my party. I'm curious to know how with no direct sunlight and a limited populance to get funky with one another (in the bedroom) how everyone isn't pasty, white and unable to jump. Look at America, there's white people there that have some black ancestry after only 200 years. Ah well, no worries.

Part four

Nukeworld Series - The colour of Radiation, part two

2009-01-30T10:02:00.000-08:00

With a thin worried face and a small tuft of a wizzardly beard I think he'll be ready to face the world. But first, childhood!

The softly voiced man played his usual trick of locking him in a steel cage with no food or water. Oh that joker you! Anyway, it was from here Radiatwind was able to prove that he was capable of performing his one and only spell.

Levitation with no hands! Suck it Bethesda, keep your fireballs and lightning spells for other games. I have the much greater power of interaction using only my mind. A spell to make me run faster would be nice though...

Part three

Nukeworld Series - The colour of Radiation, part one

2009-01-29T17:01:00.000-08:00

Everyone seems to be doing themed roleplay-in-a-game on their blogs these days and who am I to ignore a bandwagon. So I booted up fallout 3 and decided to make a character whose adventures I'd chronicle for the time being -

Wait, that name might be taken elsewhere methinks

There we go, nicely themed. Radiatwind.

Radiat had a traumatic birth (there were blood flecks across his vision he distinctly remembers. He was disturbed greatly by this). His mother died and his dad had already fled the scene of the crime within 24 hours of him popping out of the womb. He ended up being adopted by the softly voiced man who birthed him. It was not going to be an easy life, especially as a penchant for magic told him that for roleplaying a wizzard he was in the wrong game. "Oblivion" and "Morrowind" his dreams would call to him sometimes.

Part Two

Idiots and Internet freedom : Religion

2009-01-22T17:08:00.000-08:00

"The word god is for me nothing more than the expression and product of human weaknesses, the Bible a collection of honourable, but still primitive legends which are nevertheless pretty childish. No interpretation no matter how subtle can (for me) change this."

Albert Einstein in a letter to philosopher Eric Gutkind, January 3, 1954

Here's a religious me.

Einstein's views aren't mine (I have a stance but who wants to hear that?). Just a little quote to provide some food for thought for those who happen to pop on by, but I dont expect comments as a) No-one reads me dusting my mind here and b) The topic title kindof says my opinion to religious debates online. The freedom of internet discussion with the personal factor removed has it's blessings but its curses too. Illiterate unchecked idots for one. Like me!

Here's a religiously offensive me.

Boring text, not many pictures

2009-01-12T05:44:00.000-08:00

This will not interest you. But I'm putting it here as I have bad luck with computers and loss of data and plus it'll help me despair of myself when I come to view it in the future. So without much further ado here's a story I wrote for my creative writing class at uni, which I was trying to eclipse the young teenage market that JK Rowling and co captured so well but I think I ended up making something incredilby lame. Apologies.

This panda wishes to apologise for what you may read.

Here we go -

There are few things that this boy remembers about growing up. He remembers at a young age, he’s not sure when, of being left with his aunt and unofficial uncle one day, his parents happily going for the weekend to a, a party or something? To some little obscurely placed get together he thinks it was. And he’s tried so many times before to remember the months and years in any coherent detail after seeing them last. He recalls the last moment he saw them, his mother giving him a metal toy car, and his dad treating him with a £5 note. He can’t even remember their last words.

***

But that was a long time ago. He’s older now, a teenager even.
This boy’s name is Terry.

***

Reverently he placed the lid back on a small box containing a miniature Ford Mustang and £3.67 in change. Anyone watching with a mind for clichés would’ve expected him to sigh or look sad as he did so; rather he carefully returned it to its place hidden amongst the debris of his wardrobe#.

Terry was shocked at the lack of guilt he felt, that he no longer sensed anything at the memory. It was more a reminder to him nowadays than anything else, a reminder of what life might’ve been like, what it was.
His mind was racing. It was his 16th Birthday and already he was thinking thoughts that would impress Plato himself!
Hah! If only, that was just his ego kicking in. And he was uncertain anyway about Ancient Greek philosophers, with something fundamentally wrong to him about having fully clothed ladies yet naked men on their pottery. He was a teenage boy after all; thoughts and appreciation of naked women came with the hormones. He then smiled slightly to himself, before heading downstairs in literal leaps and bounds.

Glancing at him people would describe him as being of middling height with dark blonde hair, which was neither fair nor dirty. He wasn’t heavily built either, rather slight and stretched a little, but from the way he flung himself down the stairs it was clear he had some athletic attributes.

This apparent athleticism forever puzzled his sports teachers; as Terry always played badly during the sports trials and so they’d pegged him down as not being worthy of their attention. This arrangement suited both parties just fine. Terry had free time and wasn’t committed to anything outside of school hours, and the sports teachers didn’t have to contend with Terry’s stubbornness. It was something he felt proud of, as though it was one little victory over the school bureaucracy’s intrusion into his life, rather than just the inventful laziness and skiving it probably was.

It’s not clear then till closer analysis, but it suffices to say Terry is mildly eccentric. And that’s only putting it mildly.

***

Why the fuck did his birthday have to be on a bloody school day of all days? It wasn’t as if he cared that much about his birthdays anymore, but just because he wasn’t that bothered about it didn’t mean that he should be entitled to an extra day off. The bastards.

This time he really did sigh as he waited for his toast. Sometimes he hated himself. Any time he thought bad thoughts about his aunt and uncle he did more so. They’d been good to him through the years, and though childless themselves had accept him as one of their own.

As the toast popped out Terry began to butter it as he wondered what the hell his life was leading up to really. And then thought what he really wanted was fame, but no actually he wanted to be understated but appreciated, no a legend in his own time, no no wait! Happily married and with love. No wait, go back one.
It was like having 3 voices at any given time in his head, with two competing for attention and a middle one trying to make sense of it all in the cross fire. Lost amidst it all was whatever part of himself that was himself, the part of him that ultimately decided. Then he had the added several further voices of hormones telling him to eat, procreate, grow, procreate, rest, hunt, procreate and procreate. It all led to a rather confusing committee by Terry’s book.

Hell, he was envious of those who could think with just one voice, and though dumb to some, to Terry those people who achieved it deserved higher accolade. It must be so much ruddy easier he thought bitterly, throwing toast deftly across the room onto his plate, to be able to just think and do rather than think and debate.

One of the pieces skittered off the plate and landed on the floor, where sods law stated it must land on the buttered side when you really least want it to. Terry swore again, this time out loud and started to scrape butter off the kitchen floor. Just another day, nothing noteworthy about it to hardly mark it out as a birthday apart from a smattering of presents left on his bed this morning. Otherwise same old routine, no special time to be had. It just made Terry reflect on his life as an unspecial person yearning for something more. Though he wished school were closed still.

***

Yet in only a few hours, he’d start to realise how wrong he was.
He is special.
Just not in a way he could have dreamed of.

***

Two doors down Portsol street from Terry’s buttering escapades a phone was ringing amidst the debris of another teenager’s bedroom. A scrunched up duvet with limbs sprouting from it indicated a bed with what may well be a person under its covers. An arm that was dangling down the side of the bed flopped into life and started patting around the bedside table looking for the source of this early morning annoyance, before closing around it and bringing it next to a half awake ear.

“Mmm?”
“Jenbear it’s time to get up for school! I left a bowl of cereal and some orange juice next to your bed and some snacks on the counter to take with you”
“Kay mum”
“Jenny?”
“Mmm?”
“Please get up, my morning’s stressful enough without worrying you’ve gotten to school on time-”
“Ok ok I’m up I’m up!”
“Ok darling I‘ve got to go, traffic‘s moving again. Remember I love you!”
“Love you too mum”

Dropping the phone on the bedside table once more the figure turned over to sleep on its other side. After 5 minutes more of peaceful slumber the phone once more started vibrating its way across the bedside table, waking the sleeping occupant who groaned and reached over to answer.

“Urgh, hello?”
“Jenny Jenny Jenny Jenny Jenny Jenny Jenny Jenny-”
“God shut up Terry”
“What’s the matter Jennywenny? Still asleep? Now I know you feel many pricks, and should by those grounds be resting for a billion years oh sleeping beauty, but we’ve got school to get to”
“Piss off Terry”
“Not into that I’m afraid Jen. Aww come now, is that anyway to speak to a friend?”
“Yes”
“Haha I know you don’t mean that. Anyway wake up! I’m outside your door. Don’t make me run upstairs to rouse you again”
“You have too much energy for the morning”
“I know! Great isn’t it?”
“No”

Hanging up the phone Jenny roused herself and stumbled over to her wardrobe, flinging on a top and picking some jeans from the floor before attacking her shoulder-length dark brown hair with a brush. Satisfied that most she’d gotten rid of the worst of the bed head she proceeded to apply hey only makeup; eyeliner to help frame her deep brilliantly green eyes.

Slumping downstairs she grabbed the bag of snacks left for her and examined its contents. Great, non-sugar everything. Everyday she craved something sweet but being diabetic this was a big nono apparently. At least these days with her diabetes she could check her levels without Terry making a penile joke involving pricks and making her bleed. That boy could be so predictable. Steeling herself at the front door, she prepared to greet the wave of bouncy immatureness.
Stepping out she found no-one was there. “Terry I’m not in the mood, I’ve got a headache so can you please just come out? I’m not moving from this doorway till you show yourself”. She leant her shoulder on the doorframe and slumped, arms folded, facing outward to see where he’d emerge from. At times like this she wanted to punch him so badly, but when he wasn’t trying to be funny or play pranks he was actually kindof sweet and endearing. It drove her insane, and some days she really liked him whilst others she could push him off a cliff. Maybe it was lo-

“Boo”

Despite expecting him to emerge she was still shocked, so much so she jumped and swung around to involuntarily slap him before she realised what she was doing. “Oww, what did you do that for?” he asked, mock-nursing his cheek which had turned bright red. The top of her head came up level with his chin, making it harder to tell someone off who looks down at you.
“How the hell did you get behind me?!”
“I jumped over the gate and came in through the garden. I got you good there though”
“And I got to slap you, I guess we both win. Come on, lets just get this walk over with”
“Jennnnnn”
“What?”
“I wish you’d admit you liked me sometimes, all I ever get is abuse in return”
“Alright I like you, but you deserve that abuse and you know it”
“Yeah, but I’m just a rascally scamp really. At least I don’t pay to get abused like your customers do”
“Shut up Terry”

***

As they rounded the end of the street on which the school was, they could see a multitude gathering outside the school gates which were closed for some reason. Terry decided to rush up and push through to the front while Jenny hung back. “Budge out the way! What’s going on guys?” Terry asked as he managed to get to the front of the crowd, who were standing in front of a notice hung on the gates.
“Apparently there was a big fire last night, not been enough time for them to set up alternative classrooms so we get the day off! Isn’t this cool?” Mark, his on again off again friend was standing in the crowd next to where Terry had managed to push to. “What are you going to do with your day off?” Terry was genuinely baffled, he’d wished for the school to be closed but hadn’t really planned for the eventuality.
“Err, I don’t really know. It’s my birthday, what do you suggest we do?”
“Dunno. School will probs be on again tomorrow and we don’t have a place for a big party. What do you feel like doing?”
“I haven’t a clue, I just wish there was something different we could do. You know, fun.”

Terry spun around as car honked and someone called him, Mark and Jenny over. Pushing his way out through the crowd in reverse (who were all straining to see the notice on the gates) he could see Pete sitting in a cheap land rover with Michelle next to him and Jenny standing by the drivers window. Pete was a good friend of his, from the year above. Whereas Terry’s birthday was late in the school year, Pete’s was early and had passed his driving test a month ago. They’d become good friends as Michelle was Pete’s girlfriend, and she was good friends with Jenny and so they’d all invariably ended up hanging out together.
“Hullo Terry! Saw you guys looking glum over there so thought I’d throw a little idea in the air. Seeming as school is out and it’s your birthday, and seeming as I have a car me and Michelle thought we’d treat you all to a journey. Up for it? I guess you can come too Mark.”
“So kind”
“What Mark meant to say was we’re up for it. You ok with it Jen?”
“I don’t see why not”
“Good, we‘re agreed. So where you taking us Pete?”
“Ah, that’s where the fun comes in. You guys heard of the band UrOnics yes?”
“Fuck yes we have. You’re not shitting me are you?”
“Well, they’re bound to play in Sheffield tonight, and my cousin happens to be a manager at Sheffield arena. I rang him and he said no problems about letting us in”
“Wow! If I were a less heterosexual guy right now I’d kiss you”
“Save your sap and get in then”

Jenny was elected to go in the middle seeming as she was the smallest, with Terry and Mark either side of her. “Look more comfortable Jen, you’re inbetween two guys! Your natural habitat” Jenny just sighed and rolled her eyes before starting to talk excitedly to Mark and Michelle. He always enjoyed his own jokes even if no-one else did. He couldn’t believe how well this day was going, and he’d only been up less than two hours. Maybe he shouldn’t lose hope on birthdays just yet after all, the coincidences so far had been amazing. He leant forward over the shoulder of Mark’s seat to talk to him.

“You know it’s so weird you offering us this just now”
“Well aint I just a generous bastard”
“No no, I mean today I woke up praying school would be closed and lo presto, and then I wished for something to do and there you pop up with your little offer.”
“Yeah, well, can I tell you a little secret Tezza?”
“Sure Pete” He lent closer to Terry and whispered, as he started to get the car into gear. “I happen to know for a fact who set fire to the school” He tapped his nose and winked “And I doubt they did it because of some birthday wish okay?”
“Yeah yeah, just me being a fool. Birthday wishes? I mean how bloody stupid do you get?”

Still, as the car set off, he couldn’t shake the naggling thought from his mind that maybe there was something going on today because of his birthday. He also wondered how Pete knew who’d set fire to the school, it had only happened last night after all, but whoever it was he wanted to thank greatly. It couldn’t be Pete, as he spent last night with Michelle. He had a feeling this day was only getting started.

***

Coming soon...

2009-01-05T23:17:00.000-08:00

Updates!
Features!
Updates!
Featurettes on updates!

Ok pretty much I've got a story I might bung on here that I'm doing for my creative writing module, might be a bit shit but then this is me so no surprise there. Also I'm planning on doing a few short random segments (well not planning but thinking I might) as well as maybe a humorous review or two.

Err...that's it. Wanna see a pic of one of my friends? You dont? Well I'm putting it up anyway

Pretty thing aint he?

Back a bit saner

2008-12-29T20:23:00.000-08:00

If you actually read this far back it's safe to ignore the post below, I've read it and realise I was rather tired at the time of writing. The crazy balls were bouncing around the inside of my cranium at that time and my way of expressing myself descended into gibberish. Like most of what I write.

Just recorded my voice today. Might be a bit to do with the cheap mic but urgh it sounds horrible. Unless you can make ladies croon with the tone of your voice never record yourself and listen to it, let that be a lesson. Also dont take pics of yourself if you look like this -

Grainy pictures are fun to try and find what I look like from

Anyway, recently I've been a tad bored as blog sites and other things dry up at xmas time as everyone kicks back (not like a donkey, apparently it's meant to mean people relaxing). In wake of this I've been doing the rounds on youtube and reading crap till I was bored senseless. I then had to fight the urge of just pissing my money away on random things (damn you internet shopping).

Apologies for not being funny. Trying doesn't equal achievement, only improvement and that's only when you have a bastion of natural talent already. I do not, however I might achieve lukewarm humour someday!

My theory for time travel

2008-12-12T19:01:00.000-08:00

I'm going to say yes, though pretty fictionalised and nigh on impossible time travel is possible. Stopping time is impossible, unless you can freeze atoms, but time travel is highly possible. The idea occured to me randomly and I want to write a novel based around my idea, but I'd like to bounce the idea around a bit first and see what needs tweaking.

Who the fuck's going to argue against a man with a blue box?

Anyhow, the idea will take a little bit of explaning, so I'll try and rail you onto my thought process (scary). If you throw a ball, you can aim it roughly and know where it's going to land but once it's left your hand you can do bugger all to alter it's path (we're going to forget about shooting it mid-air or things like that). Now if some being lets say god created the big bang, then every event is predeterminated, as if you strip away the complexities of life everything is just atoms bouncing around and for each bounce there's an effect.
Ok if you can get your head across my badly explained theses so far then I'll continue. So if atoms are always moving and if you could comphrehend enough you could see where each would go, I therefore reasoned that time travel could be possible in such a way. Highly unlikely of course, but what the heck.

"Yatta!" - translation: "This show has been seriously muddied down!"

My highly ficticous idea then would be to have a machine that could measure where each atom was, destroy them in the space outside the machine and think through at high speed calculating the paths of all these atoms before re-creating this scenario in the world outside. Those inside the machine will be safe and not destroyed, allowing for paradoxes and all sorts as time's still moving fowards the world has just been recreated differently.

Similarly for travelling back in time if you have this stupidly ficticious machine that could measure every single atom and it's path and then destroy and create it all, then it could track the reverse in flow and create it at a point where it wants. Hence time travel of a sorts, except time isn't travelled the world is just altered to a different point, but not a different point in time.

Too late bitch! You're dead and beaten to the punch by an 18 year old. Zing!

Ok I realise there's huge gaping holes in it, such as "that's a fucking stupid machine that wouldn't have the power supply to do those things nor the thinking process without being massive". A few little flaws I've been able to overcome in the land of comprhensive make-believe, was that if you wanted to travel back in time then the machine would save the world outside just before the person got into the pod, so it could retrace that persons atoms. Or some shit.

Wow, I'm going to give myself the convoluted bullshit prize 2008 for that idea. Still, there may be a little nugget of gold or at least hydroginated chicken in there.

Yum!

Taking names but ass is safe from kicking

2008-12-11T04:27:00.000-08:00

Hey whoever's reading, my name in full is Edward George Terry Fenning. A bit of a mouthful, yes, but it's not how I normally introduce myself. Just call me Ed. Or a profanity/nickname of your choice.

To justify this blog the reasoning was I just felt like irreverantly writing, so someday when I'm older I can look back on all I've done here and think "God I'm a twat". I'll be writing a bit about games, a bit about me, a tidbit of philosphy but overall I'd like to make it accesible and amusing to those other than me who read it. My mum would read and support it but she's a bit crap at computers, bless.

So that's my brief intro, time will tell if I stick it out so if you like what I do let me know and I'll carry on at it.