I would love to be able to tell you that a lot of thing has happened since my last update, but that's simply not the case. Then again I guess I could awlays lie to you and make up some stuff, but I'm all for honesty, so that doesn't really work out for either of us. So as I said, not a whole lot has happened to me, it's been the usual drudgery of life, with a few twists here and there. For example, I'm broke as hell as you probably already know, so I've been more or less forced to apply for social welfare until such a time that I can stand on my own two feet and be self-sufficient. Which in turn requires me to feel better on a psychological level, since that's what's stopping me from having a job. One can only hope that it doesn't take as long as you'd think it does. But then again, I'm feeling pretty good right now, and I have been for the past few weeks, so here's hoping, eh?
Oh, on tuesday I'm going to the dentist to pull out a wisdom tooth out with jaw surgery, lovely. But aside from me being worried as hell about it, it's going to be such a relief to finally have that god damned tooth out. It's been broken for about 3 years now, and it's caused me immense pain every now and then, even if it's been fine most of the time. So while I hate the fact that I have to go to Malmö on a bus (which I hate so very, very much), be nervous as hell about the surgery, sit through the actual surgery with god knows what in my mouth and then take the hated bus back home again, it'll hopefully be worth it in the end. See, I'm optimistic! You know what I call that? Personal growth, hah!
While that's all fine and good, what about the games? Well, I love me some games, and recently I've been playing quite a lot of them, including Dead Rising 2, Fallout: New Vegas, Fable III and Assassin's Creed: Brotherhood. And I'm guessing I'll be playing World of Warcraft again pretty soon, what with the third expansion, Cataclysm, coming out.
I've had a lot of fun with all those games, but none more so than with AC: B, that is one hell of a game. It picks up literally the moment where Assassin's Creed II ends, just where Ezio Auditore has spoken to Minerva, whom in turn was speaking to Desmond. Awesome, right? Anyway, from there, we head back to the Monteriggioni Auditore family villa, where shit hits the fan and stuff happens (this is spoiler free, because I'm nice like that). Then we end up in Rome, which is under heavy control by the Templar Borgia family. So Rome, that place is huuuuuuuge, you might think that at a glance, just one city will be kind of boring and repetetive, but this is not case. The city is so big that it doesn't matter much, and you'll be traversing the outskirts of the city as well, so there's even some variety. On top of that, you can now ride horses inside the city, which should give you an idea of how big it actually is. But yeah, Ezio has to take down the Borgia family of course, and while doing so, uncover a lot of juicy secrets having to do with both the Templars and the Assassins. Oh, and guess who's back? Subject 16! So there's more fictional conspiracy goodness in here too, fun! Another addition they've made to the game is that you can now have your own little guild of Assassins at your disposal, which can either be sent out on missions around the world or be sent on to unsuspecting guards, which is an awesome thing to do. You can just be walking around, see a couple of guards, press a button and out of freaking nowhere comes your Assassins to "Uh, uh, uh, uh, uh!" the guards. Or in layman's terms, stab them to death. They can come from the rooftops, out of a haystack or on a god damned horse, or just simply run up to them. And they won't give up until their targets are dead either. It's a lot of fun to do, and it looks equally awesome every single time. In addition, the game has multiplayer, which is a first for the AC series. It's very different from what I'm used to, but it's also a lot of fun. The basics are pretty much that you have a target to kill, and at the same time you yourself are a target to someone else. So you're both hunter and prey, while trying to stealth your way to your target without them noticing, and at the same time trying to keep away from your hunter as well. It makes for a really interesting multiplayer experience. I could go on about it, but that's pretty much what the basics are, even if there are a few variations of it in the form of different modes. I've had a lot of fun with this game, even after completing it, being the filthy achievement whore that I am. I've gotten all the single player achievements, but of course the game had to have stupid multiplayer ones as well, oh how I hate them! But that's what I'm doing right now anyway, trying to get what mp achievements I can, and I'm enjoying it, so two for two, eh? So to summarize, a fantastic game that feels much like AC II did, but much improved. Highly recommended!
As I said, I've also played a bunch of Fallout: New Vegas, which I also had a ton of fun with. It feels pretty much like Fallout 3 did, but which a change of setting to, you guessed it, Las Vegas. Or rather, what used to be Las vegas, now called New Vegas. The game starts of with you, a simple courier, getting hunted down and shot in the head by someone who knows that what you're carrying is of great importance to the future of the Nevada wasteland. Of course you survive the horrific event, and from there you're set out on a quest to exact vengeance on the ones that shot you. Once that is done, you're flung into the main, big quest of the game, finding the Platinum Chip that you were carrying. You know, the thing of great importance? Once you have it, you're given the option to side with either of the game's four main factions. And the game and the quests you're given after that vary heavily based on your choices. The addition of factions is, to me, a rather annoying part, since once you've made your choice as to which faction to side with, the other factions who see your choice as an enemy will attack you on sight. And it will also make the quests of those enemy factions unavailable to you, so it feels like it shuts parts of the game off for you. Of course, you can always replay from the start or from a save from before you've made your decision and experiment with different quests and outcomes to the game. I had a lot of fun with it, but it isn't a game that I would necessarilly want to replay any time soon, not even for the achievements, which aren't particularly hard to get, but they're very time-consuming to attain. But it's still a really good game, despite it's technical flaws (of which there are plenty). As I said, it feels a lot like Fallout 3 did, so if you liked that, you'll probably get a good amount of enjoyment out of this one as well, which I did. Just not as much as I had with the previous game.
So Fable III, what to say? I had a good time playing through it, but there are so many annoyances along the way, and particularly in the final stretch of the game. Once you've gotten to teh end game it really rushes the game along, and it kind of feels like that was intentional, like they just didn't want to work on it anymore. Aside from that, they've made everything so damned easy, for lack of a better word. There's no start menu for example, instead, when you start it takes you to The Sanctuary, which is like a secret room for members of "the guild". But as you're the only one who knows about it, you have it all to yourself and your annoying butler, voiced by John Cleese. Anyway, in this room, you have access to all your stuff, settings, inventory, weapons, gifts, things for your dog, multiplayer and what have you. That's all fine and good really, but I'd much rather just have a menu like in Fable II. Another annoying thing about Fable III is that houses you buy deteriorate, so you'll constantly have to pay money to keep them in tip top shape, and when you have 50-60 houses or so, tha can get annoying. It's something that shouldn't have been there, as it's just a pointless waste of time, even if you can buy buisnesses, which don't require upkeep. It's just houses that do. Other than that, it's pretty much what you'd explect from a game in the Fable series, funny, quirky, fantasy, brittish as all hell and all that. As I said, I had good time playing through it, but there are so many little grievances that I just don't want to return to it any time soon, so while it is a good game, I think I'd have to say that it's probably the 'least good' out of the three Fable games that exists. Much to the game's ending parts, which I can't really talk about without spoiling. If you've played it, you know what I'm talking about, and if not, take this as a warning.
And last, but not least, I've played Dead Rising 2, which was a lot of fun too. You play as Chuck Greene, a worried father to Katey, who has been infected with the zombie virus and has to have Zombrex (a drug used to hold off said infection) every 24 hours. So he does what he can to get her some, and it doesn't come cheap. So Chuck participates in a gameshow, which has contestants ride bikes with mounted chainsaws on them in an arena filled with zombies, and whoever kills the most, the most satisfying way gets the prizemoney. The game starts of with such an event in a fictional Las Vegas like city, and here, shit really hits the fan. Stuff happens, zombies break out of their holding cells and out into the city, and of course Chuck is framed for this. And now the game really starts, the city is infested with zombies and you have to get your daughter Zombrex every day over a 3 day period of time. Of course things aren't as easy as that, there are zombies, psychopaths and other goodies in your way to getting out of there. The big addition to the second game in the franchise is the ability to combine weapons, which is a ton of fun to do. For example, take a chainsaw and a paddle and you get a Paddlesaw, a paddle with chainsaws mounted on each side, and it's a ton of fun to use. There are about 50-ish or so combinations of weapons and there are a good amount of hilarious ones. And along the way to the end of the game, you'll hunt down the ones who framed you, find out why and uncover a conspiracy of sorts, much like in the first game. It's a trip well worth taking, but it's also one that I wouldn't really want to take again any time soon. There's something to be said about the game's inherent difficulty level, which is much like the first game's. Only this time around you get three save slots instead of just the one, so it's always something, but there's still the whole thing of being on time all the time. Fail to be so, and you've lost parts of the game, it might be brutal that way, but it really isn't that hard to be on time if you're not just running around, messing about. And if you are, there's always the choice of replaying the game. So yeah, lots of zaaaambies, lots of psychos and lots of fun ways to kill either. It makes for a great game, but again, I didn't have as much fun as I did with the firs one. Maybe they're just too similar? I don't know, it's something.So there you have it, that's pretty much what I've been up to since I last wrote in this godforsaken blog of mine (get it?). I'm doing good, all things considered, just nervous as all hell right now, but that will hopefully pass soon. Oh, and one more thing, it's December, the end of the year, which means that I'll have to make my top 10 list of games this year, which is exactly what I will do some time before the year ends. So the few of you who actually read this piece of crap can have something to look forward to, yay!
Until then, live long and prosper.
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