Category: Gaming

[Life] Steam Machine Thoughts

I’m going to preface this by saying that this is not an unbiased review of the steam machine. We’ve had a steam deck in our house since 2022, and absolutely love it (for reasons that I’ll get into shortly). It is not a surprise that we also enjoy the steam machine a great deal. If you’re looking for unbiased comments or someone who hates it you’ll have to keep searching.

To start things off, we are a 4 person gaming household. We have two PC, a laptop, and (previously) the steam deck (now replaced by the steam machine). We also have a Switch 2, but that isn’t the object of this post.

Our steam deck handled our (huge) steam libraries, including family sharing, and also hosts our xbox game pass (streaming library). That in itself is a very large collection of games. The steam deck would see daily use, but it had some limitations, not all games work, and some games really needed a mouse / keyboard combination. It has also been a few years now, and I’m not certain if you can upgrade the hardware, it was starting to show its age.

So we discussed whether we would buy a new PC, another laptop, or the steam machine. All of them are expensive prospects this day in age. Eventually we decided to go with the steam machine. I put us in the queue and waited for the lotto – which we did not initially get in.

A few weeks later, here we are.

It was VERY simple to set up. I did also have to configure it to add the xbox game pass to it, but that went without a hitch. I know these days you can also add GOG, Amazon Gaming, and even Epic Games. I haven’t done any of that.

We opted to go with the 2TB version, and got the controller, too. The price could absolutely be reduced if you opt to go with the 512GB version, get an SD card, and forego the controller (you can use a wireless xbox controller just fine). The footprint this machine takes up is TINY, which is amazing. It’s silent, and so far honestly I have nothing negative to say. It has only been a day though, so of course I’ll need to give it more time. Hopefully it holds up just as well as our steam deck has.

[EQL] Ding – 50

It actually happened a few days ago now – but I reached level 50 on my first three classes in EverQuest. The combination? A Bard, Paladin, and Rogue. Except I wasn’t quite feeling the synergy between those characters so as soon as I hit 50 (which happened in Plane of Hate, as it were, love that zone) I decided to go back to level 10 and level up a new combination of characters.

I love playing the Paladin, and I also love playing the Rogue, but I am not in love with the bard. I decided to swap the bard for an Enchanter, and start over again. It feels like Enchanters can do everything my Bard can do – but better.

So now I’m level 36, attempting to level up again.

It’s really not the Enchanters fault. Their charm spell is just very over powered. Especially if you upgrade it at all with motes. Even upgraded, my Bard’s charm spell lasts for less than 2 minutes. That’s a lot of time spent re-casting charm.

I did wander around Hate quite a bit, earned a lot of class gear that I was able to pass down to my character so that when I do get the urge to play someone else (because of course I will) that I’ll be ready. I also upgraded my weapon to be 10/10 which is the max rank you can upgrade items (for now).

Next up? Crafting.

As always, happy gaming – no matter where you find yourself!

[WoW] Gold Making Wrap Up (Week 32 2026)

What do you know, last week was not a bad week for making gold! It’s amazing what happens when you actually log in and post your auctions. Of course at the time of this post now I’ve actually forgotten to do it for a few days (again) but hey that’s alright.

There was a huge patch yesterday – I’m not even sure what it was about. I did log in to a cinematic playing, I didn’t watch it though. I’ll catch it another time, when I can focus on it. I did also have a lot of housing dye in my mailbox. No idea what that was about, either.

I sold a handful of expensive recipes which accounted for most of the gold earned this week. I also sold a swift springstrider (mount) and some plate transmog. Nothing very expensive in those categories, but since I sell across 10 servers, it adds up.

I did also restock my auction house characters, it was well past time. I am very slowly creeping towards my 100k liquid (again) – right now I believe I’m sitting at 98,000,000. I do need to put some gold towards game time on my 2nd account, but I’m hoping I can earn a bit more first before that happens. We’ll just have to see next week!

As always, happy gaming – no matter where you find yourself.

[EQL] A Waiting Game

I learned yesterday that the reduced experience you get when playing with others in EverQuest Legends is unintentional – and then I was excited, because it sounded like it was going to be fixed at the next update, which we all assumed would be Tuesday, August 11th.

Except then they made this announcement.

Bi-weekly schedule is fine, but I was really counting on them fixing this glitch. It just doesn’t feel good to earn significantly less experience in a group than by yourself. In fact it actively discourages me from grouping with my partner, because I know we could both be earning so much more if we played apart.

So for now, I’ll continue to wait.

[EQL] Look Ma! 46!

At level 46 you are finally allowed into the planes and so of course I immediately grouped up with the husband (who hit 50 earlier on in the day) and off we went.

The zones were HARD, but supposedly we’re equal to 6 players, even though it sure didn’t feel like it.

I also somehow accidentally spent 150 motes upgrading a level 40+ bard charm spell that I did NOT mean to upgrade quite so much. That used up ALL of my T1 motes, and while I can charm up to 58 now which is pretty neat, it was NOT what I had intended on doing with those motes.

I also decided to (once again) change my class. I’m dropping bard to grab enchanter. I also decided why not level up druid, since I hadn’t before and I want the ports / rituals. Yes, this puts me right back down at level 10, but I feel like that is perfectly fine as long as I’ve got a few max level when the next expansion comes out, which should be sometime this winter. Anyway. We’ll see how it goes.

Happy gaming, no matter where you find yourself!