It's been a while since my last blog post. Just been way too busy to do it. I've gotten myself a handful of new games recently, been plodding through them. So I'm just gonna jot down a few thoughts about them... Ghost Recon: Advanced Warfighter (PC) As a casual GR1 player, I wasn't really expecting much after the GR community got anal raped (without KY) with the release of GR2 on the consoles. Not that they minded since it was rubbish. To make an awfully long story incredibly short, I didn't like it. It had some solid ideas but the game itself was too slow paced. I grew bored too quickly and hit the uninstall button after a few plays. The pace was dull, the story uninspired, the AI unchallenging and the level repetition mundane. Thanks for that one Ubi. X3: The Reunion (PC) Had my eye on this one since release. Not really played it much but the scale of it is staggering. Think EVE but you directly control the ships. Me like. Evil Genius (PC) Mwah ha ha ha! I loved it. Played it almost non-stop until I completed it. Like Theme Park but you get to take over the world. What a fantastic game. Now to wait for a darker version where I can order my minions to have their evil way with the prisoners while they slowly bleed to death. I'm not sick, I just enjoy good entertainment. Galactic Civilisations 2: Dread Lords (PC) I'm hooked. I've played about 4 games on massive galaxies in the last 2 weeks alone. I like Civ3 and 4 but wasn't too keen on the "Age of Old" setting. So this sci fi setting touches me in a place that makes my leg twitch. In a good way. Pariah (PC) Another one I've had my eye on and with it costing less than £2 on Amazon brand new I thought 'Why not?' The engine itself is great, it's a good effort at using as much of the unreal tech as possible at the time. But it's no where near as ultra realistic as the back of the case said. I was expecting to actually bleed all over my floor if I got shot. So there was some pretty fancy footwork from me in the first few levels I can tell you. Now that I've unleashed my fury onto the world it's time to get back to modding GalCiv2. I've canned all my other mods for the time being to focus on this one. I grew bored of the others plus they weren't that good. But this one...this one is gonna be the mutts nuts.

A bit later than usual but oh well. Over this last week I've only managed to play with two games. I've finally completed Quake 4. Finally done it. What a game. I loved the storyline so much, hell, I was almost feeling patriotical near the end. FOR HUMANITY! You gotta love humancentric games, always making us the good guys. I guess that's why I love WH40k so much, we humans aren't the good guys. We're the bad guys but we're far from being the worst guys. Anyway, back to Q4. I loved the fact that you were fighting with fellow marines throughout the game. And when I was with Strauss, Rhino squads 'Tech', I couldn't help but mimic Strauss' voice by saying "I'm John Abruzzi..." Then I checked the imdb and low and behold, Peter Stormare provides the voice for Strauss. Fantastic!! Moving on, moving on. I've also reinstalled FarCry after a friend of mine said they recently played it. I had the urge and started having a go again. I decided there was too much of the game I didn't like (even though the overall experience was amazing) so I've started to mod it. Damned simple compared to other games I've worked on. And at the moment, I'm using other peoples models until I can get my own in place. But what I've basically done is replace some of the weapons, changed a lot of the skins, replaced the soundtrack, added better sounds and replaced those damned Trigens. The new setting of the game is based around Russia's attempt to breed a super soldier on a paradise island with no laws to restrict them. So, that means all the mercs are in Russian camo and are now speaking Russian (thank you Ghost Recon) and I've replaced the M4 with an AK. Le w00t! I hated the jungle themed soundtrack of old so I've replaced it with that of Sonic Mayhem. THE Sonic Mayhem. The same Sonic Mayhem that did the music for Quake 2 and 3. I've cut and editted snippets and the music sounds great. None of this sudden drum beating thing to scare the sh!t out of you. No thanks. Anyway, back to modding I go. It feels good to be creating again.

It's Friday again, blog day. Not much has happened this week, gaming wise. Been busting my left nut at work. Oh well. I completed Homeworld 2 two nights back. Brilliant game. Very challenging I must admit. Since there's no set difficulty level each mission can be extremely easy or insanely difficult. Then, to really confuse you, it goes back to being easy again. It really kept you on your toes as you didn't know if the next mission would be a cake walk or not. My only real gripe with the game is that it was too scripted. You could complete missions by using trial and error. Fine tuning your plans each time you failed on the odd insane mission. The music, however, is phenominal. The game is loosly based on ancient religious stories from the middle-east, and the music reflects that well. Kudos, Relic. Also, I have been dabbling with C&C Generals and it's Expansion. To be honest, I'd say the modifications for them. Some have some really good ideas behind (i.e. Blitzkreig) while others just seem to be run-of-the-mill (Defcon). Halogen, the Halo modification for Generals, looks to be quite good. Should be fun. But since seeing the brand new Supreme Commander update I'm left wanting. There's not much in regards to scale with C&C Generals. In Generals, there's one rifleman, one tank, one fighter, one transport, etc for each side. In real life there's a wide variety of things in the military. There are thousands of ways of getting soldiers across the battlefield nowadays. Guess I just want too much. To curb my lack of adrenaline inducing pursuits (gaming wise) this week, I've decided to go back and finish Quake 4. I'm just about to be Stroggised. This should be good. Apparently some gamers have vomitted from watching the Stroggification scenes so this should be fun. On another note, my father went to Multiplay's recent i24 event. He was disgusted by the way it was ran. £75 just to walk onto the premises while the staff just let you get on with your business. No food, no accomodation, no nothing. He reckons he could do better and I've no doubt he can. I wouldn't put it past him to try to be honest. And from the sounds of it, he is activley pursuing it. I'll be sure to mooch some free tickets for myself. I've been trying to get my hands on the old Fallout games. I've no idea where my Fallout 2 and Tactics CDs have gone. Strange that both have disappeared without a trace while the rest of my collection is intact. And I've tried to buy them online without luck. People are actually asking £20-30 for the game; used!! It's in the Sold Out range now that should be, at most, £5. It's extortionate, they know that it's quite rare nowadays so these blood sucking sons of b!tches are trying to milk it. They're not true gamers. These are the sort of people who would charge you for complimentory water if they found you wandering the desert. Jokers. Oh yeah, I watched the Ghost Recon: Advanced Warfighter vids (and downloaded the demo, not yet played) and I found them to be highly frustrating. There's nothing worse than watching someone play a first person shooter when you know you can do so much better than they can. I found myself shouting at my monitor; "AIM! AIM! OMG! n00b!! It's called recoil, compensate for it!!! Don't shoot there, he's not gonna be there by the time you've clicked fire!! OMFG!!!". Yeah, I'm quite elitist when it comes to FPS games. Hell, I'm the guy who w(c)ould take on a bunch of Tommy totting yanks with a Kar98k in CoD2. ~Kas

Hello, hello. Time for my weekly gaming update. Lucky you. Anyway, I've gotten my Gamespot profile up to standard (after having one for over two years). Added all my games, done some reviews and some other stuff. I never realised I had so many. And I always complain that I'm bored. And it also seems some people weren't too appreciative of my reviews of BF2 and Halo. Got some fun private messages. All I can say is this; "It's my opinion, fanboys!" Anyway, back to gaming. This week I completed Escape from Butcher Bay. Brilliant game. The battles in dark were done without fault although the AI is lacking. I'm in the middle of writing a review for it so I'd expect one around Monday. I've not played Earth 2160 at all this week. Mainly because it keeps making my PC overheat and die. So instead, I purchased Homeworld 2. About bloody time. Started playing the campaign and it is a lot harder than the previous ones but I'm liking it anyway. Only fault is that I want the 'cockpit' view that was in Cataclysm. Also, thanks to the BitTorrent community, I can finally play C&C: Generals again. I've had the game legitimately for over 3 years now but the damned thing has always refused to install (even got given Zero Hour the following Xmas, gutted) and EA refused to help me with it even after numerous emails. So, I downloaded the mother and I've been playing the C&C Classic mod (First Tiberian War). Speaking of C&C, C&C 3 was announced this week! Now that was something exciting. Although the preview image was rubbish, I can just imagine the game oozing greatness. That is if they stay true to the formula of TS. Back onto the FPS front, the spiritual sequel to FarCry, Crysis, looks to be a bloody fantastic game. The physics engine looks incredible. The amount of fun and depth that will add to a game... Rogue Trooper was released on PC yesterday. And me being me, I've already spent my money on other pursuits. I didn't think it would be out for at least two more months. Oh well, pay day is next week, I'll pick it up then. I've got enough to keep me busy until then. I'm still debating whether to install Commandos Strike Force or not. My dad has given it to me and has raved about it but I don't know, it looks like it's lacking. I'm off to work now, so take care. ~Kas

Hey peeps Not that anyone is reading but it's nice to write about stuff anyway. It's been a good week for me gaming wise. After years of putting it off, I finally purchased and completed Republic Commando. I was simply blown away by the game. As a Star Wars fan I knew this would be the game for me when I first saw the E3 trailer back in '03. This puts a welcome perspective on the SW universe. I'm not a fan of the jedi or sith to be honest, I'd rather be a Stormtrooper than a padawan. Stormtroopers are the rock stars of the galaxy, baby! I also purchased the Chronicles of Riddick game for PC after reading the Gamespot review on it. How good is that game!? The game has been executed almost without fault. What a surprise that was. Hell, even the obligitory training session was done brilliantly and I had a lot of fun hunting those guards in the sewers. Fighting in the dark has never been so brilliantly accomplished. The AI isn't perfect but it does do things that I wouldn't expect. This is probably due to my previous experience with generic AI which has been coded to an 'adequate' level. When someone puts an effort into AI these days, it shows. Hats off to the makers of that game. Bloody hell. Also, today I finally took the step across the water. I signed up for a Total Access account for Gamespot. Well it's only a few quid a month so why not? Anyway, Gamespot > Gamespy by far. Off to work now, think I'll do some reviewing and get my account up to standard when I get back. Toodles ~Kas