Gaming – Page 345 – A Pixel Nomad

A Return to EVE Online

For a month or two now I have been missing my days in EVE Online. You may remember back when I used to play I was heavily involved in PI (which was relatively new at the time), invention, and my mining operation. I had just learned the skills required to fly a Tengu, which is a Caldari strategic cruiser. Beautiful ship, I had had my eye on it for months. In order to fly one you need a lot of skills and of course just flying one isn’t going to be enough, you’re going to want to find a fit for it, too. For me that took a bit of time, I had absolutely no skills placed in missiles, and the Tengu has 4 launcher slots (called hardpoints on the UI) and one turret hardpoint. It would be pretty important to be able to fit it with something useful. In my case I decided to go with a PvE fit, for flying missions. While the ‘main’ part of EVE Online that people tend to hear about is PVP, I don’t usually spend a lot of time in that sector. That’s one of the reasons why I enjoy the game, it’s pretty open to what you decide you want to do.

Anyway. Before I left I had queued the skills I would need, and was just waiting on them to complete. Probably the reason I took my ‘break’ (I dislike waiting on skills). I’m pretty sure before the Tengu I was flying a Dominix, which is a great starter ship but I was using drones as my major offensive. Swapping from drones to missiles was an interesting change, but I’m slowly getting the hang of it.

Things have changed since last I played. Most notably, the UI. Invention (manufacturing, etc) is much easier to understand, and far more welcoming for newer players. The learning curve is still there, but not nearly as bad (IMO) as it used to be. When I returned to the game I tried to re-familiarize myself with everything without knowing what I was working on last time I was in game. It was a bit disorientating. With that being said, it was also much like riding a bike. Once you remember the basics you just get right back on. I decided to ease into things by doing a very easy L2 mission for Astral Mining Inc, security. I can’t do higher missions because I don’t have the faction required yet. The Tengu blew them away (they were simple kill missions, nothing fancy) and I felt a wee bit over powered. I then noticed that my faction for CreoDron was quite high, and noted that my Research & Development agents were all with CreoDron. You need faction to work with those ranks of agents as well, so I had probably been working on that at some point in time. You use R&D agents to earn RP, a currency that I spend to get datacores, which is used in crafting. There are lots of different types of datacores, used for everything in game from ships to ammo. I have enough faction with CreoDron to fly L3 missions (that’s level 3) which reward a great deal more than L2. Previously I would fly mining expeditions or delivery ones. Now that I’m flying a Tengu I decided I would try my hand at some security.

It took some time, but my first mission was an easy success. I had three points of enemies to destroy, and none of them got close enough to me to matter. I was able to heal myself just fine, salvaged and pillaged all the wrecks afterward for goodies that I can use in crafting, and had a lot of fun doing it. I know this is child’s play for many EVE Online players, but as a player just returning, and one who has never been in the thick of much combat before, I was pleased.

I believe probing has changed too, and there are now icons in the sky that I’m not familiar with, so I still have quite a bit of learning / refreshing to do. I miss my wurmhole expeditions, and I’m already contemplating re-activating my second account. For the time being I think I’m good with just the one, but it would certainly make mining operations smoother to have my miner / hauler duo going. I would typically run a hulk or ice miner on my 2nd account and run my Orca on the main account. In any case, it’s nice to be back, and I’ll be posting about my adventures (minus specific details of course, that’s just the way EVE is) here as always.

Happy gaming, no matter where you find yourself!

An Expansion In the Works (Sims 4)

It was only a matter of time before EA released information about the first Sims 4 expansion, and now we finally have those details. Their first expansion will be called “Get to Work” and includes three new careers for your Sims.

I was personally hoping for a pet expansion, but I don’t think we’ll get one for some time. The expansion releases in April of this year, only a few months away. Players will be able to choose from careers like doctor, scientist, and investigator. One feature that we started seeing at the tail end of the Sims 3 is the ability to create retail businesses, and that is included in the first expansion of the Sims 4. You’ll be able to create bakeries, clothing boutiques, art galleries, bookstores, and basically whatever else your little sims heart desires.

Aliens will also be making a return, but this feels like less of an expansion feature and more like something that should have been included in the base game that is finally ‘done’ and they decided to tack it on as a feature.

Of course I’m excited about the expansion, even if it isn’t pets. I’m hoping EA also goes through and eliminates some of the bugs we’ve had since release, and I hope the expansion gets off to a good start. I’ve been afraid to patch lately because of the latest fiasco, and EA doesn’t exactly have the best of track records.

Do you plan on picking the expansion up? Are you sticking with Sims 3 for now until 4 has a good backing behind it? Let me know in comments!

Too Little Time

A lot has been going on and keeping me busy, so of course something had to give. In my case it was gaming and updating this site. I’m hoping things are under control now, but we’ll just have to see.

With the announcement of a Guild Wars 2 expansion on the horizon excitement started to flutter past my typical means of social media. A few friends were playing here and there, and I decided to get in on the excitement. I’ve always enjoyed playing GW2 but my problems with the game are two fold. First of all, I have no idea what you’re supposed to do at level 80. I can understand the leveling process and earning gear and crafting, but once I hit 80 I couldn’t figure out how to keep myself interested. On that same note, I have no idea what has changed and what the story is and what I have missed in the history of the game. For example, Lion’s Arch is a huge disaster. There are NPC scattered all over in small groups crying. The place is in ruins. I have no idea why or what happened. I wish games better handled those who are returning.

I did pick up a second account when they had the $10 weekend sale, because that was just too good to pass up. It gives me some room to make new characters when the expansion comes out along with giving me some extra bank space. I love buy to play games where you get to play the entire game for the simple cost of the box. Of course GW2 also has a shop, but I haven’t really felt pressured to use it.

I deleted two of my older characters off of my main account (they were low level and characters I had never played before) and re-created them on my 2nd account. I have more potions (especially experience ones) than I know what to do with, and I figure these will come in handy down the road.

Have you recently returned to GW2? How are you finding it? How do you find motivation to continue playing once you reach level 80? Let me know in comments!

My Thoughts on Joystiq & Massively

With the recent news that Joystiq is merging into Engadget and Massively is on the way out, I’ve had a lot of thoughts cross my mind. Now, let me get some things straight first. I’ve never written for Massively before but I do know a good number of people who have worked for them. I also don’t follow Massively on twitter, I don’t subscribe to their RSS, and to be very blunt and honest it’s because I simply don’t like the articles. They didn’t appeal to me. A small handful did (I loved reading things on Wurm Online and Vanguard:SOH) but for the most part it just wasn’t a site that I had interest in.

That doesn’t mean there isn’t a place for those types of articles. There are. Just because my personal preference doesn’t match up doesn’t mean I suddenly want to see those people without a job. If every single video game site was the same, it would be incredibly boring. There’s an audience for EVERYTHING out there (size of that audience differs, of course) and I think that in these times especially it’s important to show compassion. These are people. Friends. They work hard. A lot of past employees from these video game sites move on to bigger and better things. I wouldn’t be where I am today were it not for my humble beginnings writing for Beckett Massive Online Gamer, and MMORPG (many years ago). Did everyone like my stuff? No of course not, I’ll be the first to admit that I am not nor have I ever been a journalist of any sort. I’m a writer, yes, and sometimes what I say is interesting enough that I get paid for it, and sometimes it’s not.

Anyway. The whole point of this ramble is to say that it’s sad to see others celebrating when sites like these close down. I’m sure people rejoiced when Beckett MOG shut down too, but that was my paycheque, and it hurt. Show a little class.

Stranded Deep

As I mentioned last week, I really enjoy survival games. A friend pointed out ‘stranded deep’ to me last week, which is available on steam greenlight. The basics of the game are simple. You start out on an airplane and that’s where you’ll do a brief tutorial. You make a martini by dragging items around and learning how to use your inventory (which is a maximum of 8 slots to begin with). Crafting is pretty simplistic, which in this game I found to be a good thing. Basically you right click and drag items around close to one another in front of you, and a little square menu will pop up that tells you those items craft into something.

Eventually your plane crashes and you find yourself swimming around in an ocean, surrounded by sharks and water, with more sharks and water (and a few islands). Your goal from that point on is survival. The graphics to this game are absolutely beautiful, and the music caused me to jump out of my chair more than once. I managed to survive the first day, but just barely. A shark decided I would make a great meal as I was swimming around trying to explore an old abandoned boat I found just a few feet off of my island. I was getting a bit tired of eating nothing but crab, so I crafted a crude spear so I could catch some fish.

For this game it may be worth watching some of the tutorials that are out there if you’re easily frustrated by trying to figure craft recipes out. Most of them are simple logic, like dropping sticks on the ground in a pile (5) will allow you to create a campfire. You can then turn that campfire into a firepit, and turn that firepit into a fire spit, where you can hang food and cook it without having to manually hold your food over the fire.

So far my only negative comment would have to be that when food finishes cooking – you hear a ding, like a microwave. Out on my little island home away from home I’m not really expecting to hear a microwave ding when my crabs are done cooking over an open flame. Since the word of the food changes from crab to cooked crab, I really feel this is an unnecessary feature, and should be disabled. Unless of course your isolated island is equipped with a microwave. Then by all means, keep the ding.