Trading for House Items in Legends of Norrath #EQ2

LoN has a new house item, a fantastic looking (empty of fish) aquarium. In order to make sure I got one, I took part in the promotion they had going on where you could purchase a tournament pack which included three boosters and the aquarium for $10. Since there’s no guarantee that a booster pack comes with a loot card (and that’s pretty much the only reason I play LoN, is to win goodies) I decided to trade my booster packs for loot in the trade area. I came away with 2 paintings, a pack of shrink potions, a tapestry (house item),  and a storm in a tea cup (another house item) from trading with other players. I may not be the best player, but I really enjoy LoN as a way of wasting time while LFG etc. and winning items I can use in game is always a plus.

I’m still working on my Norrathian museum and have obtained a few more books through donations (thank you!) which I’ve added. I think I am at 405 books now give or take a few because I’ve been slightly neglectful of adding titles to my list. There are a lot of items I still have to get, like the tapestries in Sinking Sands and I haven’t even begun to work on faction for that yet. I love collecting these items that continue to tell a tale of my character.

Once the multiple house ownership goes live (I expect it will be a few months after the expansion comes out) I’m looking forward to adding an “actual” house to the museum via portal. I’d like Stargrace (pictured above) to have a living area, which is something I don’t currently have because I’m always adding relics instead. Not that it’s a bad thing! I really wish more games took the time to implement player housing, I understand that it’s not everyone’s cup of tea but there ARE a lot of people out there who find this a nice relaxing way to enjoy their game when they don’t feel like quest grinding and partaking in PvP etc. Ah well, one day, maybe!

Happy gaming, no matter where you find yourself!

An Electrifying Experience #Magicka

Last night I finally had some time to spare and managed to dive into a few rounds of Magicka with Blamefulgecko and Petterm – two good friends of mine. I haven’t even finished level 1 yet on my own but that didn’t stop us from sharing some laughs and dying a handful of times.

“Magicka is a satirical action-adventure game set in a rich fantasy world based on Norse mythology. The player assumes the role of a wizard from a sacred order tasked with stopping an evil sorcerer who has thrown the world into turmoil, his foul creations besieging the forces of good.”

One very important thing to remember while playing is that wet robes = bad. Very bad. Especially for me who tends to have a heavy lightning casting finger. See electricity and water combined means that you’re likely to end up dead and to demonstrate this I did it over and over again. Mostly because I wasn’t paying attention to the condition of my robes (little water droplets spray forth) and I was trying to move out of the way of the “friendly fire” from Blame.

I’m not sure if we even finished the level, but it was still a lot of fun and I couldn’t stop giggling. I’m glad I picked up the game from steam, and so far even the single player levels have been a lot of fun while I run around exploring and learning what combination of spells to cast to get the effect I want. Of course a lot of the time I end up with some hefty backlash that instantly kills me, but it’s still fun.

Happy gaming, no matter where you find yourself!

Silhouette Makes an Appearance (Sorta) #ChampionsOnline

I haven’t logged into Champions Online since uh, well. Since release actually. I never made any secret of the fact that me and super heroes don’t typically get along. It’s hard enough for me to find common ground in a science fiction MMO, superheroes rank even further. However; that doesn’t stop me from logging in and playing with the awesome character creator, or WANTING to enjoy these types of games even if they’re not really a good ‘fit’ for me.I tend to dabble. Maybe one day I will find a game that changes my mind completely, much like EVE.

I spent some time re-visiting my first superhero, Silhouette (pictured above). I love her character name and had designed a dark costume that you can barely see unless you look close at the details (I’ll post a “clearer” picture later on). Thanks to some awesome twitter conversations (as much as 140 characters ever is a conversation at least) my interest was piqued and I wanted to see what had changed and explore a little. I finally made it out of the tutorial, although I don’t remember how to do a number of things in game. The first thing I had to re-teach myself was how to hide the UI for screen shots. That came before everything, even movement.

With the basics learned I managed to finish the tutorial, and since my character is technically over 100 days old I had a whole lot of goodies waiting for me. I also noticed I have all sorts of little action figurines that I can summon as companion pets (I don’t think they have an actual function, correct me if I’m wrong).

Before I progress too much further I’ll probably start over with a new character so that I can learn things like – how to learn skills or upgrade them or anything at all to do with skills actually because I don’t have the faintest idea how those work. Or what I need to look for when it comes to gear. A brief revision is much needed.

I will also be poking my head into STO (Star Trek Online) over the next little while. Another game I haven’t played too much since release but I’m abnormally excited about – again I blame twitter conversations. It’s amazing how much more ‘fun’ a game can be when you’re playing something that a number of your friends also talk about.

Speaking of which, today I played Magicka with two such friends, and it was a blast – literally. I’ll have more to say about that tomorrow.

Happy gaming no matter where you find yourself!

Please Don’t Force me to Give up my Job #CRTC #meterednet

If you haven’t heard, Canada is switching to a metered billing plan for internet usage – a bill passed to make this ridiculous thing legal. What this means basically is that we (users of the internet in Canada) will have an incredibly low cap on internet – right now it’s being spoken of as 25 gigs a month. For every gig OVER this 25 gigs a month, we will be charged extra. The number right now, is $2 a gig.

That’s the jist of it. If you want specifics, please take a look at my friend David’s in depth post. It’s a fantastic read. You can also find more information here, and here.

My job requires me to download multiple games every single month in order to write about them. I also work from home, so I use my home internet. That does not include any internet I use for regular things like downloading movies, ipod apps, netflix, youtube, game play and game patching. That doesn’t include the multiple purchases from steam, etc. There is, quite frankly, NO WAY I will be able to afford to do my job with this cap in effect. I simpley can not afford to pay $2 extra for every gig I go over the cap, I don’t make enough money.

PLEASE speak up about this fellow Canadians. Contact your local government officials, sign the petitions going around and get involved. This is NOT ok to implement, the internet is supposed to becoming EASIER to access, not only for the rich who can afford it.

Please help out by spreading this news around to your fellow Canadians who may not be aware of these changes.

Another great post here by Darren from Common Sense Gamer – check it out.

City Festivals, Leveling, and other Games #EQ2

Looking over the ruins in West Freeport (can you spot my trusty billy in the shot?) I wonder when they’ll finally rebuild. It’s been a really long time now and I think Lucan needs to hire better city workers if they can’t repair a simple building.

This week the Kelethin city festival is going on which I am quite excited about. They’ve added some new housing items to the festival and I’m eager to check out the doors available. Remember each city festival only happens twice a year so if you want to stock up on your favorite item now is the time.

These past two days I’ve been leveling a new swashbuckler. I have one on a second account but decided it would be nice to have on my main account. I’m currently level 73 I believe, thanks to the awesome leveling powers of Ibeogur, a guild mate (berserker). It also helps that I have 120% bonus due to other level 90 characters, and typically have an experience potion running. Of course once again the argument of ‘why are you rushing to the end!’ comes into play, but I actually have characters at all tiers, and some I quest with some I craft with and some I just want to do current content with. It simply depends on my mood. I also deleted a 90 dirge not that long ago, growing bored with her lack of progression. I may end up recreating, I haven’t decided quite yet.

What has everyone else been up to? Playing your game of choice? Holding off for something else to release? Personally I simply can not wait until Sims Medieval releases. I’ve been playing games from the Sims franchise for years now and I don’t expect this to be any different. Dragon Age 2 is also another big title I am waiting for, but I haven’t pre-ordered it yet. I think I will pick that one up at EBGames when it comes out. Then of course there’s rift at the end of this month – and oh what a slow month it is!

Happy gaming no matter where you find yourself!