An insanely long blog entry today, whose length will boggle your mind. Mainly for convenience reasons I've had to merge two different blogs together, the Friday's obligatory Now Playing list, and a forewarning. Read on, guys!

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 Teh Shocking Revelation

 I hereby declare a worrying, earth-trembling fact: you guys will have to spend a week without me here on GameSpot. :cry:
 I know, but amidst your sudden waterfall of tears of woe, you must read the remainder of this blog, as its much more uplifting towards the end. ;)
 So, the reason for my absence: I'm off to South Wales for a week on holiday, it's gonna be pretty great. I have my DS, my guitar, and my MP3 player to keep me occupied, and there is also a TV down there with the basic channels (so at least I can watch a bit of television even if it doesn't have stuff like Q and Kerrang) :D
 I'll try to find an internet cafe down there so maybe I can check in once or twice, but don't get your hopes up too much. ;)

 So don't expect any posts from me during the following week. Thats a bit of a shame, really, cos I've joined two... no, wait, make that four, brilliant unions lately, and seeing as they're all relaitvely new, it pains me to think i won't be much of a role in their early development.
 The name of these four unions? Read on:

 All Things Wii - self-explanatory title, really. Owned by Toms115, this union is completely based around the Nintendo Wii, and I won't be fulfilling my responsibilities as an officer over the next seven or eight days. Its off to a good start, maybe not as good as it could have been, but nevertheless, gradual growth can lead to some pretty great communities (well thats what All-Around Gaming was like.)
 Movies, Games and Music - I generally don't like unions that go by the multi-topic rule, but this union is doing a really good job of juggling all three subjects at once. The topics up on the board are very diverse, ranging from a specific type of music to a discussion on a particular movie. Owned by XenoMorph00010, the union is advancing scarily fast, already incorporating review competitions and other events even though its less than a month old. Kudos to the MGM union.
 Bloggin' It - The amount of potential this union has is unbelievable. I think the idea of a union based around blogs is a truly golden idea and i don't think i've seen it featured in any other union on GameSpot so far. The early topics open up a lot of early discussion and I'm on friendly terms with all of the members. This union just plain rawks. The thing I like about the early development of this union is that aclark is incorporating the appliance invite thingy, where you have to apply for the union before you are accepted into the ranks. So if you're a pretty big blogger, and I know some people on my friends list who are really great journalists and are not in Bloggin It, you really should give this union a try if you want some great blog-related discussion. Great job to aclark24 who has put this union off to an excellent start.
 PC Central - This is another pretty cool union, headed by AndyWilliams24, that has an insane amount of consistently active posters especially when you consider the fact that this union is not even a week old yet, at least not last time i checked. Excellent discussion and some excellent members, although the board is kinda biased towards stuff like Windows vs. Linux, ATI vs. Nvidia, stuff like that. But for every topic like that we have imaginative ones that allow a lot of space for creativity, like Alternative Endings and F.E.A.R's Best Frights. Exceptional start to a Union that I think one day could be one of the best (if not, the best) PC-focused union on GameSpot.

 So they are the newly formed unions I'm going to miss out on for the next week, and of course i'll be absent from my longtime favourites that I try to post in everyday, or at least browse around; these are the brilliant Surrounding Force Union, the excellent Community Contributions, and of course the dominating All-Around Gaming! :D 
 And again, sorry for the unions, their respective leaders, officers and recruits, I will be absent for the next week. (Is that  a good thing or a bad thing?)
 And of course don't expect any comments in your blogs, I sadly will not be able to. I'll be on the beach if you need me. ;)
 And lastly its a sure thing that i won't be on xfire either so don't try and contact me for a game of UT2004, Halo, Civilization IV, EaW or anything like that, I'll be offline.

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 Now Playing: Edition #3: Omg! Handheld gamingfest!

 So in gaming activity I don't think I'll be able to do any Xbox gaming, PS2 gaming, or PC gaming, seeing as I can't exactly take a console on holiday really. So i'm faced with Nintendo's lifesaving handheld piece of genius, the DS. No, not the Lite. The original chunky one. ;)

 So without further dilldallying and ado, I present to you an all-handheld version of Now Playing. (Provided you're going to read a little bit more) :P

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Mario Kart DS

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 Current Level of Activity: Completely Non-Existent

 Likely Activity During Holiday: High

 Likely Activity After Holiday: Dangerously Low

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 Mario Kart DS has a lot of singleplayer replayability so I'll be starting everything again, and doing 50cc, 100cc, 150cc, mission mode, Mirror 150cc, and some time trials over the course of the holiday. After the holiday, though, I'm not too sure...

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Advance Wars: Dual Strike

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 Current Level of Activity: Reasonably High

 Likely Activity During Holiday: Frighteningly High

 Likely Activity After Holiday: Reasonably High

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 Advance Wars Dual Strike just never gets old, and I hope to complete every single mission in the War Room by the end of the holiday, currently I've only completed the top three with S ranks (Spann Island, Moji Island, and Duo Falls) so i'm setting a challenge for myself there.

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 Animal Crossing Wild World

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 Current Level of Activity: Completely Non-Existent

 Likely Activity During Holiday: Relatively Low

 Likely Activity After Holiday: Completely Non-Existant

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 I'm just taking Animal Crossing along for the ride, in case the other three DS games get boring. :D It pains me to say it but I have little to no interest in the game right now. :P

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   Metroid Prime Hunters

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 Current Level of Activity: Completely Non-Existent

 Likely Activity During Holiday: High

 Likely Activity After Holiday: Medium

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 I'm aiming to rekindle my love for this excellent portable firstpersonshooter, it is truly awesome but that fiendishly addictive strategy game known as Advance Wars Dual Strike is almost permanently in my DS. Here's hoping I can pack in some quality time with Metroid Prime Hunters.

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 That was quite possibly the longest blog ever! YAY! Teh 1337!!11!! So, by the time you've read all of that blog, I should be back from my holiday, and you'll have been reading this article for seven days, or, 168 hours! So your attention span is generally very good!
 Goodbye guys, I'll see you next week!
 Your good friend,
 stevenscott14

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 P.S. Don't forget leave your speechless comments! :D

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 Yay! Woohoo! The cries of joy echo across the void that is my blog! The episodes of Fable: Lost Chapters have returned, bringing with them more invigorating comedy and reverberating imagery! More cries of joy! Hah!

 If you missed the last instalment, or have only just started tracking me, WHERE THE HELL HAVE YOU BEEN?! Before you read any further, you must by all means read the thrilling opening to this majestic saga, otherwise you will be cursed by a Nymph and some Hobbes will maim you when you're asleep. Got it? Yeah! You better had! Or I'll turn you into Balverine food!

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 The resonant air of Bowerstonewas as peaceful as ever; women staggering around drunk and tripping over their own dresses, children playing hide and seek and getting into fights whenever they were found, and stranded widows wailing over their mushroom-poisoned son and cheekily asking me to go get an antidote involving four toadstools, a weirdo witch, and a leaky cauldron. The rude cow! No thank you!

 Ahaha! You know why? Cos I got baddies to beat up! Bandits left right and centre all asking for a piece of my Iron Longsword (recently acquired, and not from eBay either, which is a pleasant change) so with all these trader-traumatizing fools to deal with, I haven't had time to assassinate shopkeepers to steal their weaponry hanging from the ceiling, or time to flirt with local women either. And with the acquisition of a new leather suit, which put my attractiveness up by I think +30, they're still not interested at all.

 Damn.

 I've steadily veered towards the Light Side since last time. Last time of course i was a bit of a dual personality and that confused a lot of people, so now I've changed for the better. You hearing this, I am a better man. So now with my alignment creeping up the angelic side of things, I'm actually applauded for everything I do and followers stalk me everywhere just like that blasted Pikachu in Pokemon Yellow. And it is really annoying and the temptation to overthrow them with my sword is just overwhelming, but NO! I am a warrior who fights for whats right now, not an evildoer who stabs people for no reason! I will not give in!

 People know my name now, too. And I was going to save up for a brand new name, too, the names "Avatar" and "Piemaster" sound intriguing, but I ended buying a nice Oak Longbow too. Combined with my Level 4 accuracy, it can annihilate Bandits in one go. Have a bit of that!

 So whenever I walk into, say, la Heroe's Guild, or Bowerstone South (I ashamedly haven't reached any other cities yet, cos I've been busy with a particularly difficult sidequest down at Orchard Farm) people will shout "AHAH! There's Ranger, how you doing today?" "How's it hanging ranger?" "I feel safe with Ranger around!" Honestly, i'm a celebrity. Yay!

 And for even more publicity, I'm no longer a pathetic Teetotaller either! I went on a drinking spree which resulted in lots of vomiting in people's beds (rather amusing, really) so I'm now a Light Drinker, I think. Not for long, you wait, I'll be the biggest alcoholic in Albion soon! :twisted: I know its nothing to be proud of, but the game has a really cool drunken effect, where you stagger around and the surrounding envrionment is all wavy and blurred. Its prety cool, I tell you!

 And now I'm off to do another quest for 1,500 gold, hopefully. I'm wanting a nice house in Bowerstone, so I can settle down with a wife who gives me gifts but I don't give her any in return. And I won't ever be home, either. She'll be so happy by herself, won't she? Won't she?

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 That concludes the second instalment of Ranger's thrilling life! Leave comments below, whether good, bad, or neutral.

 Quoth the previous blog;

 "Holy crap, its is quite literally scorching down here right now."

 I couldn't have been more wrong, really. The temperature seems to be getting gradually higher and its gone way past the unbearable mark. Hell, Britain has hot weather for once; must be a miracle, hm?

 I want the rain back. I went to Alton Towers yesterday, and a long bus ride filled with excessive amounts of travel sickness basically spoiled my mood and I was strangely quiet for most of the day except for sudden bursts of adrenaline prior to riding Air and Nemesis.

 Still, four hours of queuing did not do wonders for my mood.

 And after puking all night and suffering from bad sunstroke, here I am. I've been absent from school today and I've been asleep all morning; I played a little bit of Halo online before and I was strangely brilliant at the game, coming 1st out of a game featuring 15 players... I was saying to myself, "Wtf?! I need to lie down!!" So thats exactly what I did.

 Sorry for not posting in many unions lately, I'm just not into it right now. Blame the heat. I'll try and post in the AAG, SFU, All Things Wii, Bloggin' It, MMU and PC Central a lot tomorrow.

 But for now, I think I'm going to vomit as soon as I've clicked submit.*

 *Hell that was probably the best conclusion, to any blog, ever.

 Holy crap, it is quite literally scorching down here right now. Temperatures have soared drastically over the weekend and there's been either lots of complaining about the humidity or lots of joy about open, blue, cloudless skies above our heads. I sit somewhere in the middle of that group; on one hand I think that I'd much rather be inside gaming, but on the other hand I think, "Who honestly needs gaming on a beautiful day like this?" And that latter thought is amplified by the fact that I have a large inflatable pool in my backyard at the moment and the temperature is pleasantly cold, just the thing to get rid of all your heat-related complaints.

 Man, I'm thirsty now.

 So I'm going to get some J20 in a minute (read; very nice fruit drink, apple and raspberry flavour today, refrigerated for the last three hours) so I'll have to keep this post short and sweet while still retaining the usual level of, ahem, quality.

 Ah, hell with it. I'm only writing this to serve as a purpose for thanking you all for the kind comments you left for my first video blog that I uploaded last night. You might want to watch it if you haven't already, its underneath this conspiciously short entry (by my standards anyway) I appreciate your positive feedback and I hope to get more in my next video blog, which may be arriving sooner than you think. Or maybe not.

 So, ciao, everyone, I'm off to get some J20!

 [video=ICMxw2Sv5bIFuDE]

 ^^ Above you is the very first edition of my video blogging saga. In this one, I had to take advantage of Andy's eyetoy and computer to film and upload, seeing as every method I attempt seems to end in a problematique.

 So I hope you enjoy it, and I hope you can appreciate how much of a psychopath I am by watching this video blog.

 [video=IHBglmTw5bIIszA]

 The video above me is Muse's "Time Is Running Out", I uploaded it to see if there was a general problem with uploading my videos, because I uploaded a video blog before, GameSpot processed it, and then there was an error that prevented everyone from watching it, so that sucks.

 Anyway, Muse seem to have successfully been uploaded, so I hope you enjoy it.

 Hey there guys;

 Just a pretty quick entry today, by my standards, anyway, it's 10:51pm on a Tuesday night and I have school tomorrow, so I'll have to keep this short and sweet:

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 - First off, give a round of applause to the Surrounding Force Union; after a long time we've finally advanced to level 4. The SFU suffered from the defective percentage glitch for quite a while, and we were stuck on 18% for about two months, so give a w00t to the SFU.

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 - I joined two Unions today. First off is the Movies, Games, Music union, recently formed by my good friend XenoMorph00010, and first impressions of this union is that its got a bright future in store. There has been quite an amount of posting and the union, as far as I can see, was only formed yesterday, so I think MGM will go the distance.

 I also accepted a charter member invitation from my good friend Toms115 for his All Things Wii union, and i think it formed about half an hour ago. This is its second attempt at formation and this time it succeeded, and i would give the opening procedures a go myself but thats a reserved honour for the proud leader. So here's to All Things Wii, I say!

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 - School tomorrow should be out of the ordinary. In my Music class we have to do a stage performance of some sort and then get judged; if any of you actually watch the crap reality TV shows like American Idol or X Factor, you'll know what I'm talking about. But I can't sing! So I'm forced to bring in my guitar, i think, and do an instrumental piece without any vocals whatsoever. Still undecided on what i'll play, though.

 I also have an assessment in my Maths class tomorrow... end of year exams. My Science exam has already taken place and I done reasonably well if you count 86% as good. So wish me luck on my Maths exam, I have a bad feeling about this one. It's based on topics I'm not very good at.

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 - Haven't played any games today, other than a twenty-minute game of Unreal Tournament 2004, against bots. I'm really lacking the enthusiasm for that game at the moment, while my enthusiasm for Fable Lost Chapters and Halo grows.

 I'm also considering buying one of three games, these are the trio I have to choose from: Call of Duty 2, Far Cry, and F.E.A.R. At the moment I'm leaning towards COD2, but I need your recommendations... I'll probably buy all three over the summer, along with HL2: Episode One, but i need to know which one to buy first.

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 Thanks for reading!

 I'm contradicting the last one here; I said it was going to be a weekly feature, but things have happened, and graphics cards have got installed, so my Now Playing list has undergone a drastic change and there's no better way to tell my fellow GameSpotters what I'm playing than to do the second edition of Now Playing.

 I got some feedback for the last issue, ranging from lukewarm to positive comments, so i'll give it a go again; and without further ado, here is the second edition of the critically acclaimed :P Now Playing.

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 Name: Halo: Combat Evolved; PC Version

 Current Activity: Relatively High :D

 Xfire Count For This Week: 5 Hours :D

 I don't care if the Xbox version is sitting in my cupboard, because I have the inferior PC version to play! Doesn't sound like pretty good logic to me, but, hey, I can't play Halo 2 on Live, so I'll play the original on the Internet. Bravo! But actually, it's the single-player thats been sapping the 5 hours out of me - I'm not sure why. Yesterday I raced from The Truth and Reconciliation, through Silent Cartographer, and well into Assault On The Control Room, on Normal difficulty, which in my opinion is pretty darn challenging. :D But, hey, I need a singleplayer FPS challenge, and I don't have many others that are quite as good as Halo. :P I'm considering buying Call of Duty 2, both for the singleplayer and multiplayer components, so that should divert my attention from Bungie's ported masterpiece for a long long time. Or maybe F.E.A.R, but at the moment I'm leaning towards Call of Duty 2. So I'll say the farewell while I can. :)

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 Name: Unreal Tournament 2004

 Current Activity: Medium :?

 Xfire Count For This Week: 2 hours :?

 I've had this game a fair while, now, and, deep down, in the darkest corners of my mind, I feel my enthusiasm for the game lessening. Pretty darn fast. I played a few half-hearted games with AndyWilliams24 on a Deathmatch server today, but I only played for about 20 minutes before becoming bored. I desperately need something to revive my optimism towards the game before that Current Activity count veers towards Low, and eventually, Dangerously Low. :cry: I don't want that to happen; its such an awesome game and its a shame that I'm abandoning it slowly. Maybe its time for my longterm affair for this game to diminish. Or maybe it isn't - maybe I'll find a new lease of life for the game! :) Y'know, look on the bright side and other such lovely sayings! Yeah, I'll do that! Or.. will I? :?

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 Name: Fable: Lost Chapters

 Current Activity: Medium - High :)

 Xfire Count For This Week: 1 hour :? (it will be much more in a few hours, I'm going to play this game when I finish typing)

 I only started playing this game late weekend, and I'm about to hit the 2 hour mark. For those who didn't read my previous blog, it was an entry about how far I was into the game and what I'm enjoying, and what things I've done, and what quests I have encountered. So if youve got some time I would definitely recommend a read. Please. And leave comments. :P Fable: Lost Chapters is a truly amazing game in every sense of the word, possibly because its one of the only RPG's I have ever liked enough to keep playing long into the night and even until teh early hours of the morning. (I'm talking bout the Xbox version there) The choices you can make are awesome, and as the infinitely wise comb_over recently said, any game that lets you save hobos from malicious bullies by releasing farts to get rid of said bully, then so be it. That game will be an awesome fixation, just because you can let loose a bum burp to repel a bully. :lol:Yeah, Fable is most definitely a great game but expect it to be in Now Playing for a relatively short period; it's quite a brief experience, really, even though I intend to upgrade my character to the maximum and maybe even post some videos on GameSpot of me going on massacres through towns and other cool stuff. :twisted: Stay tuned.

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 And on another topic:-

 - I filmed a video blog; a relatively short one, on the downstairs computer's webcam. That didn't upload. It just didn't work.

 But then, I got one up here, on the webcam, that I've filmed, but for some strange reason the sound thats coming out of my lips is released two seconds before my lips actually move to say it. In other words, the lip synching is completely wrong. Would you still want to see a video blog even if it looks like I'm speaking Chinese thats been translated into English by a machine? Or will anyone provide some help if youve had any problems with this sort of stuff? :? :(

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 That's pretty much all I have to say. And what a lot I've said. You probably havent read all that, have you? :P Ah well I don't mind. I love writiing insanely long pieces of blog. :)

 I'll catch you all later,

 stevenscott14

 Hi, guys, and welcome to my blog... it's 3:09 on Sunday, July 9th, and to vanquish the thought of returning to school tomorrow and abandoning my newly upgraded computer (see blog below, you inattentive fools) I've decided to load up my profile once again and bring you yet another piece of journalism by yours truly.

 This piece of journalism is the first in a series of... diaries... if you like, concerning the time I spend in Fable Lost Chapters. Sure, it's a little long, but hopefully my sick sense of humour will make you laugh a few times... so I hope you enjoy it. Some of these entries might even be video blogs, if you're lucky. So, sit back, relax, and enjoy teh ride...

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 So, a dual personality, you ask? No, for once, I'm not talking about me and my Dark side; the Dark side has been quelled forever by the teachings of Master Yoda (see above banner, you people who are ignorant to all things Star Wars) I'm actually talking about the character I'm beginning to develop on the PC version of Fable, subtitled Lost Chapters. :D

 I'm at the stage in the game where you just begin to find your freedom and where you start to find your niche in the perplexing, evil-filled world of Albion. I originally started the game hoping to be a purely good soul; the type of guy who would help you out of a tight spot where Bandits are chasing you; the sort of dude who helps old ladies cross the road without getting hit by a car. (Actually, scratch that, there's no cars in Lost Chapters, is there?) And, yes, if you pursue this goodness for a good amount of hours, your character within the game will eventually get an angelic halo, neatly perched on top of his head.

 Why did I want to be good? Well, that's mainly because of my Satanic antics when I used to devote my soul to the Xbox version. I wanted a change from being an evil, obese swordsman; the kind of brute with heavy, battle-scorched chainmail armour, because that's the sort of personality I usually am familiar with in games like Fable. (And, to be perfectly honest, that's not a huge amount of games in my book)

 But, no, the temptation arises again. Just as I leave the Heroes' Guild, filled with thoughts concerning my training, feeling the adrenaline and freedom flow freely, I realise that I'm not going to have much fun being a good soul who can only kill bad guys. Especially in the early hours of the game, where there's only a few wasps to shoot down with your Yew Longbow. There's always some innocent men walking around, pleasantly plump from their last meal, with a merry spirit surrounding them; a sickening bliss that makes you want to whip out your katana and behead them without a second thought. And, predictably, that's exactly what I did; the equation amounted up to: blade + neck = decapitation. :twisted:

 So, now, of course, I'm a wanted man. Nobody in the Heroes' Guild particularly likes me :evil: , mainly because I stabbed the man who sells the alcohol to the barflies, and I "accidentally" mistaken a scarecrow's head for a guard's, so I sure as hell riled them up as well. What's worse, even in Bowerstone South, a town where your weapons get confiscated on entry, I punched an infant. Sure, there were a few kids playing hide and seek, so when this little kid went to count, I jabbed him with my fist, right into his face. What a nice little reputation I'm building up here. :twisted:

 I'm working on upgrading my Skill, rather than Strength and Will - I've always adored the bows and the crossbows, and stealing weaponry is always a pleasant alternative to spending the gold (which I got taken off of me when I got kicked out of the Guild) so yeah, Guile and Accuracy are nice little outlets for my Experience points. For now, I'm just a stealthy sniping little rogue that nobody likes; hell, I'm even starting to attract the flies with my evildoing. :twisted: :D

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