Week 4: Right Under the Wire

Was watching Royal Rumble tonight, so short post for this week. Still playing FFXIII-2. I'm probably about half finished with it. There seems to be a lot of side content, but I'm really not interested in doing any of it. Fought a boss last night that required a paradigm setup I totally did not have, so I had to spend awhile grinding to get it. After that, I totally face rolled him though. Game is fun so far, but I could easily see it out staying its welcome if I were doing all the side things.

Waiting for a few more update before going back to GRAV. Still really fun, but needs a bit more basic functionality with the base building in particular.

Currently Playing: Final Fantasy XIII-2, FF Theaterhythm: Curtain Call, Monster Hunter 4 Demo
Games Completed: 1
Games Purchased: 1
Net Total: 0

Week 3: The Longest Journey COMPLETED

So I finished my first game of 2015, which was The Longest Journey. Here is my quick review.

The Longest Journey was released in 1999, towards the end of the traditional point & click adventure game era. For this, it suffers from some very obtuse puzzles, but ultimately the narrative is quite good and pulled me through it. For a game released in 1999, it would still be considered very progressive. Female lead character who isn't afraid to call out sexism, dealing with an abusive household, classicism, and more. I look forward to playing Dreamfall at some point in the future. Four out of Five Guybrush the Dancing Monkeys.

In other news, they announced the release date for Monster Hunter 4 Ultimate. February 13th, so I'm going to be trying to finish Final Fantasy XIII-2 before it hits. Depending on which friend I ask, XIII-2 is either great or horrendous. I'll find out myself, starting now. But Monster Hunter 4, that's a game that I will play for a long time. It is just such a satisfying experience, but I'll talk more about that in a later post.

Currently Playing: Final Fantasy XIII-2, Grav, FF Theaterhythm: Curtain Call, Monster Hunter 4 Demo
Games Completed: 1
Games Purchased: 1
Net Total: 0

Week 2 - Eclectic Boogaloo ( Grav , The Longest Journey )

So what have I played this week? Well, I'm about half-way through The Longest Journey. The narrative is really great, but it does suffer from being a very old-school point and click adventure game. Preface, one of the games that made me want to design games was The Secret of Monkey Island. Guybrush Threepwood is one of my favorite characters of all time. This doesn't mean that I like all the design decisions from the games though. Specifically, I've never been a huge fan of the classic "Well, no idea what to do now, let me try combining every single item in my inventory" dilemma. It may have had some strange, endearing quality when I was a kid, but now I'd prefer to get through the narrative with puzzles that are a bit more logical than "use the rubber duck to hold the clamp open and put it on a string so that you can then fish out the key." I'm still going to finish, though, because I am intrigued and do want to get to Dreamfall and Dreamfall Chapters.

However, I did buy another game without having finished one. It's called GRAV, and it just released in Early Access form on Steam. I put a lot more time into this than any other game this week. It's pretty great thus far. We built bases, danced around fires to regain health, found crashed ships and overrun science labs, built really derpy armor, built better armor, and much more. I've found it incredibly compelling thus far, plus I can run my own server. Some pictures are at the bottom.

I've also started a portable game to play both in bed and when I'm not at home. However, this isn't one I purchased, it's one I already had. I'm not really sure how I'll judge when I've completed Final Fantasy Theaterhythm: Curtain Call, but I'm sure I'll when I consider it "done." Probably after playing every song at least once. So far I'm enjoying it.

Currently Playing: The Longest Journey, Grav, Final Fantasy Theaterhythm: Curtain Call
Games Completed: 0
Games Purchased: 1
Net Total: -1

(buy Grav, everyone)

Week 1 - New Year

I've decided I try to do too many things. Last year, I signed up for a 52/52 movies/books challenge, and that failed miserably. Not because I don't like watching movies or reading books, but because I also like playing video & board games on top of spending time with my family & friends. So while I do enjoy all these things, I realize that I need to focus, as when I spread out among all the things I really don't get to do enough of any of them. Spending time with the family isn't going to go away, ever; and neither are video & board games, so I'm going to prioritize those this year. Some might scoff at this, but it doesn't mean that I'm not going to read, or that I'm not going to go to movies, but I have a serious backlog problem with games and this year I plan to deal with it. Well, at least parts of it. I have no delusions of clearing up the entirety of it, but I need to make it better.

I've enacted some rules on myself for this year when it comes to video games.

1) I Can Only Purchase a New Game if I Have a Positive Completed Number
What I mean by this is that, with the exception being getting a game at a great price for pre-ordering via my Best Buy Gamers Club or Steam/GMG sale, with each game I purchase I have a "credit" for which to buy a new game. Any of the ones I get as deals take this "credit" into the negative, with a max of -3, which is a totally arbitrary number I picked but will stick to. As of now, I'm completely even with 0 purchased and 0 completed in 2015.

2) If I Can't Decide What to Play, I'll Ask Something/Someone to Tell Me
Generally, if I get a new game, that should be what I make my current active game. As I mentioned above though, my backlog is pretty epic, with many games that I haven't completed really making me a bad person. I'm using Backloggery to keep track of things, and while this isn't extensive, it's a list of games I have that I WANT to complete. Here is my backloggery page http://www.backloggery.com/piratepwnsninja
Part of the issue with having such a huge backlog is that I get decision paralysis when choosing what to play. To kick things off, I used Backloggery's random game picker to tell me what to play. If people that read my blog/post on my FB have recommendations for what I should be playing, they can send them to me.

3) I Will Update My Blog With Progress
Each week, I'm going to post about what I played and/or completed. Maybe multiple times a week, maybe not; but at least once a week.


So this is my post for Week 1.

Currently Playing - The Longest Journey
Games Completed - 0
Games Purchased - 0

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