Zero Credibility

As you probably have noticed I’ve vanished from this site since early december and there’s the reason to it: Cataclysm. Plus incoming x-mass added some more fun on Steam and I’ve bought megatons of games during this period. I wish I can clone myself to be able to play them all now. But of course major reason of me being absent here is WoW. Since I’m not in even more serious raiding guild I took leveling and preparing for raiding very seriously this time so I was totally consumed by the game entire december and early January. Now, when things have settled a bit I can look outside this game. Our guild have cleared all raid instances already and we started working on heroic modes. This is more steady and long standing task which will take a while. As for the Cataclysm itself, Blizzard pulled WoW another step up. They improved rendering a bit (of course not dramatically, but those cosmetics they’ve added refreshed the game a bit), made bosses more tough if to compare them with WotLK expansion. Main thing I think is that they made some really challenging content at start there, even 5 man dungeons aren’t that easy as they used to be in previous addon. So as you can see I’m still in this game and kicking.

From the games I got on Steam during sales I got hooked by Railworks 2 and Greed Corp. Railworks 2 is very nicely done rail simulator whichВ satisfiedВ my old need of driving diesel locomotives. Locomotive models are pretty precise and gameplay itself is proper simulator with some tasks taking more than 2 hours of driving train and managing it. There’s alot of addons and one can basically submerge oneself there in this railroad world.

Just thought that I’ll post about current events in WoW where I spend all my spare time. The guild I’m in have cleared Ulduar month ago, and now we’re doing hard modes of the bosses. I’m really glad to see Blizzard is improving the game constantly. These new hard modes of the bosses are properly designed replay value of the game. You can improve yourself constantly till the next major content patch and there’s no boring farming. Hardmodes are really hard and they designed to keep guilds busy for a longtime. Also Blizzard constantly tunes the encounters so they’re really fun to play. If you want relaxed raid, you just kill the boss normally, but if you want some wipefest night, you can enable hard mode and wipe till you drop but if you manage to defeat him afterall, you get additional hi quality items. This new approach gives second life to the game and raiding especially.

Actually I had to post this quite some time ago but just was kind of busy with crunches at work and extensive WoW raiding at home. So here it goes, since my last update alot have changed. I’ve changed the guild, bought WotLK and finished it. Meaning, my new guild have killed all possible bosses in the new expansion 10th December. That’s actually two weeks ago. Yes, we’re pretty hardcore these days and progress with fast pace through the content. As for the content itself, Northrend is a very well designed place in terms of landscapes and quests quality. It feels better than Outland, probably because it’s in Azeroth and everything feels at home. Outland was too alien I guess ;) The main raid dungeon Naxxramas is kinda easy for us, but I think it’s good because I was tired of Sunwell Plateau’s cruelty. We storm through it in a fun and relaxed pace and I like it. Though, there is encounter in the expansion which I consider is the best in the game – the fight with Malygos. Very well designed and complex fight introducing new things like flying on the platforms and on the drakes. AwesomeВ  done fight. I hope there will be something no less interesting in the Ulduar when it ships. This week my guild is relaxing due to x-mas celebrations and prepares for future victories doing achievements in heroic 5 man instances in lazy mode. So, generally speaking my WoW life is in some quiet mode these days which is good because I can now sleep more and try playing other games :)

Just in time, I’d say. Right before the release of the next WoW expansion “Wrath of the Lich King”, my guild managed to kill main badass of “The Burning Crusade” expansion – demon lord Kil’Jaeden. No matter that the whole TBC was nerfed recently, this boss was still hard to execute because it requires alot of focus from the raid. I feel happy I succeeded there. The moment of the boss kill will be remembered for quite some time. WoW, being the game for the achievers, completely made me happy customer. Of course, I wouldn’t do this alone, alot of efforts were made by my guild’s leaders and old friends from the old server who helped to gather this new guild together. Now I’m looking forward to conquer Northrend.

This is “hello I’m alive” type of update. The music side of my life is quite calm at the moment, no new releases were obtained since last update, maybe something cool will appear soon though. The gaming part is quite busy. My old guild Origin have disbanded, but can you imagine that during the last raid to the Black Temple I’ve got second Warglaive. The luck was on my side at that time. A pity the great guild have disbanded like 2-3 days after this, so I decided to transfer to another server and join another guild known as OTD that tries to conquer Sunwell Plateau. I’m there for like one month now, and it seems a friendly place to be. Hope to conquer WotLK content with them.

I’ve finally finished God of War: Chains of Olympus in nightmare mode. It took me 2 months! After this I’ve completed all 5 challenges. What a great game! I never was bored to retry my attempts there, not sure why, probably because the game plays so smoothly and cool, I wanted to play it again and again. Highly recommended game. Now, friends presented me Patapon and MGS: Portable Ops, these two are next on my dissecting table :)

Finished this amazing game last week during the vacation. This one is another example of top quality game for PSP. The game catches from the beginning with non stop action and various combat situations, like miniboss fight rapitly switching to the proper bossfight without time to relax. You move forward smashing skulls of the enemies, destroying environment and moving objects. Add here one of the best graphics on PSP I’ve ever seen and cool story which forces to play till the end. Upon completion there’re new challenges and God Mode (very hard) becomes available. And when you complete God Mode there are even more goodies will be opened in the game, from “the making of ” movie to the new secret levels. So, what do you think? I started replaying this game in God Mode now, yes it’s so cool and has awesome replayability. Highly recommended!

Finally I’ve found the game for PSP that’s really worth its money. It’s Final Fintasy: Crisis Core. The game is very varied in terms of gameplay and story. As in every japanese story or movie, it’s far from any cliche thus not boring. The characters’ development is very intriguing. Also characters design is one of the best in the games in general, especially animations and costumes. This game is beautiful in all aspects, from its weird combat style, which might be confusing in the beginning but then you get hang of it and it becomes really cool, to the minigames that are scattered across the game like little gems of fun. I also liked that the story is very important there, this is the main driving force of the game. Attention to details is top notch there, this also makes this game perfect. Designers put additional thought to remove all boring and routine moments from it. If you got PSP, I strongly recommend you to buy this game, you will not be dissapointed.

Decided to write about my adventures in the game that I play all this time in the background. Our guild took a nice pace in progressing through the game. Last time I made a post about WoW we were starting doing Serpentshrine Cavern and Tempest Keep dungeons. Oh my, that was 16th October I just looked! Time flies fast! For this day, i.e. 8 months later, we fully cleared Black Temple and Mount Hyjal and have them as our relaxing playgrounds now, taking challenges in Sunwell Plateau. But what’s most funny that happened last night is that I’ve got the weapon of the true nolifer – the legendary sword of Illidan (main bad ass guy in the game) – Warglaive of Azzinoth. This sword is considered to be very rare drop and having it is a big digital joy. So you can congratulate me and my guild in achievement of proper noliferism status. Now I look all asymmetric and need the second one! Damn this game! ;)

With the release of WordPress 2.5 I decided to post in this dusty “blog” and test new WordPress which is now looks so leet that I feel out of place. Anyway, since the last site’ update almost 2 months have passed and it feels like 1 week. The life is quite monotonous work-home cycle here, with sporadic fun blasts like parties with friends, etc. I’m pulling myself out of the winter with the last effort. The spring is always quite depressing period for me as I fight two things: from the one side I’m kinda tired of the dark cold winter but from another I feel approaching summer sunny hell. And I’m not sure what to do to survive this collapse. The snow have melted. The mud, dirt and dust is now uncovered and lay all over the city, making me feel even worse. I’m craving for cleaning rains, but I know that there won’t be any heavy rain soon. Just sun that exposes all the old dirt making me feel sad. I wish this weather condition ends soon, making green leaves and grass cover ugliness of the world. But everything will be properly green in May or something, so it’s entire month or more to wait yet.

Living under these circumstances I’m still enjoying life as much as I can. I’ve finally read Hunter Thompson’s “Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas” which proved to be very close to the movie thus making movie indeed brilliant. I like Thompson’s style and enjoyed the book a lot. The book I’m reading now is Douglas Adams’ “Hitchiker Guide to the Galaxy”. This one is also very funny book with proper English humor which I’m fan of. I have a desire to re-watch the movie too.

In the gaming part of my life there’s hardcore raiding in WoW. We‘ve entered Hyjal Summit and Black Temple dungeons and raiding them constantly, which is really challenging and fun. I’m also very glad that there’s all Unreal Games available on Steam now. I was unable to buy UT3 here as it’s only russian version available (i hate translated games), but Steam gave me possibility to try proper UT3 and replay classic old Unreals if I ever will have spare time.

So this is basically what’s happening now at this end of the sewer. Nothing seriously exciting but not boring at the same time. Months sneak by while I’m busy performing my daily routines…

If you still think that I’m completely consumed by WoW, you’re kinda wrong, because I have some time for the other games. I’d like to tell a couple of words about the three games that pleased me a lot and which I’m gonna play in the nearest future. First game that I’ve bought for myself on x-mas off Steam is Call of Duty 4. Initially I thought that this is gonna be reallife boredom with general shooting. But no! The game took me tight and released only after I finished it 6 hours later. It is really addictive and has cool looking visuals. But not that plastic type of visuals that are inherent to the most modern games like Doom3, it’s really proper next-gen that doesn’t irritate the eye. The gameplay is very dynamic and won’t let you relax in a minute. There were some situations where I was really scared or I was really proud when “we” (me and the squad of bots) managed to win certain battle. Proper AI of as enemies as companions makes this game flawless. Add here nice small things like grabbing flying away helicopter and squad commander is helping you to get on board, etc. make this game very rich and remarkable. Don’t miss it really, this is what all modern games must be!

Second game is nothing else than Puzzle Quest. Don’t stare at me! I blame Steam for that! Really, the game turned to be so cool that I got hooked immediately after trying the demo. Developers managed to mix casual Bejeweled (which I also like) and some kind of hardcore RPG and succeeded. This game is so addictive it’s scary. The base of the game is pure randomness and you try to survive through it using your class abilities. Thus, you can make your enemy to skip the turn or damage him greatly by moving figures on board as u wish, he in his turn uses the same tricks against you. It’s very easy to play and has that element of suddenness which makes it so attractive. I also discovered that the game is available for PSP and other platforms which makes it even better. Maybe I’ll get it for PSP one day. Try the demo and you’ll be hooked I guarantee ;)

And last but not least comes Dawn of War: The Dark Crusade. Then again, it’s all Steam’s tricks. Goddamn games are at hand now, it’s so easy to buy them I’m gonna go bankrupt soon. They sell DoW Platinum pack with 3 games in it for real cheap price and I got hooked by this offer. Long story short: DoW is a top RTS. Gameplay is challenging and fun at the same time. Units are cool looking, almost like those action figures from the table game of Warhammer 40k. The sounds they yell are also quite atmospheric. Developers also added global map where you decide what country you gonna attack and you can play the game for any race from available 7! That’s amazing. Of course I took Chaos side and started devastating silly Imperial Guards with my army of darkness. Upon finishing Dark Crusade I’ll play Winter Assault and the next addon Soulstorm should be ready at that time ;)

So, now I feel like a fish which caught on all the hooks Steam placed all over their site… But “I’m not a fish! I’m a man!“