Amazing Game

I've been playing Baldur's Gate 3. This game was in an early release state for years. I was interested in it, but I waited until the full release became available. This is just an amazingly deep game.

You can play it multiple times, making different choices and finding new parts of the story that you never imagined might exist. The choices you make with your character, and the companions you choose for your party, will make huge differences to your play through.

My first run was as a Human Sorcerer, I tried to play as a "Good Guy", but I did not manage to save everyone. There were some mistakes along the way. It was a complete blast. I started a second run with a Warlock and it's already been a much different game, easier, and a little darker. I find it hard to make "Bad Guy" choices.

I'll probably play it again, and try to be more evil. I want to experience as much of this game as I can.

Pros

• Amazing writing
• The best voice acting I have ever seen in a game. Sure sometimes one or two will be good, but every character is perfect here.
• So many ways to get through a situation. You don't have to look for the one way to beat a boss. There are many ways, you may not even have to fight to win.
• You can play it again and again and have new experiences. There are multiple endings.
• It took a while, but the Mac release is great. I started playing on the PC, but switched to the Mac when it became available.

Cons

• I used to hate turn based games. This is the first time I have really enjoyed it. But, there are still some times where it feels like an oponent is just standing there doing nothing.
• Inventory management could be way better.
• There are still some bugs. The first act of the game is mostly perfect. It was in beta release for years. There are some bugs with the later part of the game. I'm sure they will fix them. You can work around most of them.

Valheim - Is Good

VALHEIM Official Site

A new game, now in early access, is taking over on the PC. And, I love it so far. This game is a cross between Minecraft and Skyrim in a world based on Norse mythology. You build and explore to improve your gear and weapons. The world is procedural. Each of the five zones have a boss to fight and new dangers to survive.

Building is intricate and fun, but you will need a lot of resources. It's way more time consuming to collect the things you need to progress than a game like Minecraft. It also feels more dangerous in each new area. So far I think the game has a reasonable balance of grind to reward, but I may change my mind as I advance farther into the game. I waited way too long to fight the first boss. I could have done it way sooner than I did.

I'm now building a new base on the edge of the 2nd boss area, and it looks like getting metal tools and equipment will be very time consuming, but I've only just begun. The game feels amazingly stable and complete for an early access game. I think it's very worth playing in its current form. There should be an amazing set of updates over the next year or two and it should only get better as time goes by. It will also likely get more expensive.

The only big negative I have so far is that it doesn't work on the Mac. It should play fine on any modern mac. It's not that demanding of a game. The developer just don't haven't made a mac port a priority. I really wish this would change with this and many other games.

The Last Campfire

Really loved this little game. Easy puzzles in a new and interesting story. It's short, but complete. I'd love to see more of their world in the future. I played it on the Mac desktop via Apple Arcade. My only complaint was a concern if my progress was saved, it was, but was not obvious. Took me around 5 hours to complete.

Brain Dump

I was thinking about a few blog entries, but they were all small. So, I'll combine them into one big mess.

3D Printers

I was an early adopter of 3D printers. My 2nd printer was a Makerbot, but Makerbot stop focusing on consumer printing and stopped supporting their older printers. I will never buy anything from them again.

Today there are so many amazing options available. The technology has gotten cheaper and easier to work with. I have been considering buying one of a couple of different printers.

• Original Prusa I3 MK3
• Creality Ender-5 Pro

I just ordered the Prusa. It costs more than the ender, but has a few more features and good support. Its a kit that I will have to build. Should be fun.

8-Bit Madness

I'm a nut for old computers and old computer games. I've been pretty excited to follow the progress of the Commander X16. This is a new retro inspired computer. The idea is that you can write software and work with a simpler easy to learn, but more modern, computer.

It should be easy to port old C64 code and make some amazing new things as well. This computer is being created by a team of people, but the 8-Bit Guy is the driving force.

He has a great series on the history of Commodore. I have watched it a few times.

I Give Up

I tried for so long to only game on the Mac. And, it is possible. There are some great games on the Mac. But, so many games are never ported, or are ported badly. Many others that used to work, no longer work, due to the 64 bit transition.

So I bought an Alienware R8 with a 2070 Super. It's not top of the line, but it can play games. I won't be using it for much more than that.

I'm really curious to see what happens with Apples transition to Arm based Apple Silicon. But, for now I'll be doing most of my gaming on a PC again.

Sony PlayStation Network Account Frustration

Some how I managed to end up with a PSN master account with my real name as my console id. This is the public name that shows up in online games.  I don't remember setting it this way, but I can imagine thinking that I would be able to change it later.

You can't change it!  They do not allow any mechanism for changing it.  WTF!

This is the kind of thing that keeps me from ever using a service again.  I'm trying to be more reasonable than that, I just spent over $100 dollars on a PlayStation Plus membership and a new game that I can't return.

Sony has apparently said they don't want people changing their ID to prevent trolling.  But couldn't they just put a time limit on name changes. Talk about bad user experience.

So I'm having to now create a Sub Account, meant for minors, so I can use a different ID. Now's the time where I point out that Trolls could do the exact same thing.  I don't want multiple accounts where I have to lie about age.

Crazy decisions by dumb companies.

While attempting to fix all this I wiped my PS4 and now have to reinstall everything.  That was my mistake, I should have gone online first, before trying anything I could do to find what should be an obvious feature.

I now need to apologize to my wife for yelling like a madman at the PS4 last night. I haven't been that angry in a long time.

Scribblenauts Remix

Scribblenauts Remix for the iPhone/iPod is an amazing creative and fun game. Give it a try.

http://www.scribblenautsremix.com

Bioshock

I played the demo of Bioshock on the 360 and decided to pre-order it, I should get it today or tomorrow. The demo and the glowing reviews give every indication that this will be the game one of the best games of the year.

I'll post more on it after I complete the full game.

Nintendo Wii

After much searching and an absolute refusal to wait in early morning lines, I managed to get a Nintendo Wii. Target had at least 8 of them and the checkout guy seemed puzzeled at my excitement. Heres my early review:

• Nintendo Wii: The graphics are the only disapointment on the Wii. The controls are the best of any console. This is the first time I haven't missed a keyboard and mouse on a console. The Online store could learn a few things from Microsoft's marketplace, but I expect it to improve over time. I have not been able to find a second Wii controller, or component video cables.

• Wii Sports: No one expects the sample disc that comes with a console to be worth much, but I have spent as much time playing Wii Sports as I have any of the other games I have.

• Rayman Raving Rabbids: Think of Wario ware style mini-games that make you laugh. This one is really fun and should be fun to show your friends when they come over to gawk at your Wii.

• The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess: Wow! Apparently I haven't really even started the game yet, and I'm already 3 hours in. The story seems to be complex and the controls are spot on. It's supposed to take 60 hours to complete this game.

XBox 360

Well, we got an XBox 360 and it's pretty damn cool.

Pros:

• Very nice interface.

• Playable demos of almost everything.

• 1080i HD output to our TV.

• Playback of MP3's from our XP server over the local network.

• Viewing of Pictures from our XP server in HD.

• XBox Live Arcade games are almost more fun than the full XBox games.

Cons:

• Can't play movies from the local network server without Windows Media Center OS.

• Games are slightly more expensive than PS2 and PC games.

• Very loud cooling fans.