Been back from Atlanta for a while now, but it's in a way good to know that it's over and done with. Had to pitch an idea to corporate sharks about emerging tech that we should acquire. Missed one vital question that stayed the hand of any full support, but overall I'd say we did pretty well.
On the other hand, it was a bit more rushed last time. In February, for me it was all about networking, meeting new people, pushing my comfort zone. Now, any networking was done late at night, and I've never been good at being on my game late at night. Still, made a few extra friends.
Turns out that persistent cough was a strong case of notsureitis. Fit the general description of three ailments without quite being any of them, so heads have been thoroughly scratched and, until today, working from home to not infect others. So far, so good!
Buckle up, this one's a long one.
I found it a little entertaining to tell people that I wasn't terribly impressed by the game to hear them say, "Oh yeah, everyone I know who's played it has said that." Clearly, I need a few better friends.
I'm finally getting some desire to play the game again, and that's because I spent the last night with furrowed brows, poring over the world to find those elusive few items for Treasure Trove. I found them! Six items total, all of which on disc 1, five of which in Ipsilon Mountains. Now, I can understand why I missed the other one; it was part of a patrolling minigame to open up a hidden shop at Grand Staff Construction Base, and it was sitting there, guardless. That one I get. But Ipsilon Mountains was evil. The first item was a tree in the middle of a group of trees, so you better hope you found the right one to ram. The second was shoved into a corner, where the only reason you'd go looking in the corner was if you already knew the item was there. You could not see the tree until you could ram it. And the last three were rocks. Plain old rocks that blended into the surroundings which just needed to be run into to pick them up. Which would help if they didn't blend in and look like obstacles.
Going to do the Seeker of the Deep DLC when I get home tonight, level up, get my nifty new items, and if all goes well, Killalon will fall. If not tonight, hopefully tomorrow. After that is arena victories, the last skill item, get my skill master achievement, then beat the game. The end is in sight!
I don't like the inclusion of tricks. I'm not behind the whole FMX thing, even if the last one got me my 24th gold. I've gotten up to the Extreme tracks, and if I play some more, it'll be for challenges and squirrels. I'm planning on streaming my first attempts at the Extreme tracks, due to someone making a comment that they'd want to see that. Of course, that person is currently kicking the stuffing out of Trials Evolution, so there's that.
I'm rolling my eyes at the whole announcer story though. I'm playing Trials to challenge myself, to complete this platformer, to jump over explosives and balance on my tire to gun it to the next checkpoint. To hear philosophical commentary on whether you're the same person when you wake up in the morning... did they forget what game they were making? Still, having fun with it, as well as most of the Retry comments.
If it weren't for that P90X challenge, I doubt I'd be hitting it this hard, but I don't doubt my back would probably be feeling better.
https://www.trueachievements.com/LeakyTinCowJudo.htm and I have been pushing each other to keep going, fight through the burn, not only get those five stars but nail those challenges as well. All I can say is that for myself, it's been incredibly effective. I've got 7 5-star ratings on Shoulders and Arms as of today, and I only have two challenges left that will be picked up as soon as I finish up all 12. Even better, that'll be my tenth Stamp Card, which means I'll have a new top contender for
DarthFracas Big Game Trophy idea, currently sitting at 8.45.
I'm not sure what video to use after this, though. Maybe something with a lot of punching, then switch over to something with squats. Get towards that last achievement.
This month's stat roundup is going to be a gleeful event indeed, and a lot of that is a 1500 TA day because I randomly decided to join
https://www.trueachievements.com/LeakyTinCowJudo.htm and
https://www.trueachievements.com/T+Svectra+T.htm in the DLC achievements. Once again, I'm reminded that there are great, entertaining people I haven't met yet, so quit being a curmudgeon and figuring everyone sucks. Even if we have to schedule a session at some point to take over Big Team Battle for vehicle achievements, it was still a huge shot against the backlog that game presented. Maybe I'll get back to it before too long.
Despite the nagging voice in my head reminding myself that the launch for this game was a bug-ridden mess, I still ended up downloading it as something to play at night. After I learned a little trick about my computer, everything was fine and I haven't had problems since. It's essentially an upgrade to
Full House Poker, which I still haven't finished, but that's okay. My plan is to do the All-Pro tournament, then look forward to leveling up and gaining chips online. No clue how I'll get to a million, let alone five million.
I thought the irony was all too fitting that after the Fulgore DLC came out, I essentially relegated him to boosting sessions and focused elsewhere. After the KP glitch, I stopped paying attention to the trials without realizing that I got them to line up rather well: Play three versus matches with Jago, win a Survival match with Jago. Play three versus matches with Sabrewulf, win a Survival match with Sabrewulf.
And from that, I decided to steamroll back through the original characters, play my versus matches, then get as far as I could with them on Beginner. It helped their fight titles, it helped the general titles, it helped the achievements, everything. So now the only character I have under 80 Fight Titles is Fulgore, and I still have to go back through Spinal in order to do it right. After that, the ranked matches and grinding truly begins.
Saints Row IV was started after a friend and I decided $20 was a good price, then $3.30 for the season pass. I'm liking it a lot more than expected, but I think it's largely because I didn't like SR3 all that much. I never played the first game, and as far as I can tell, they played it straight. SR2 was a parody of sandbox crime games that, in my eyes, was all but perfect and one of my favorite experiences on the 360. SR3 tried to take that same formula and turn it up to 11, but it came across to me as caring too much about how much they didn't care.
You heard it here first: SR3 was the hipster of the series.
This one, though, I think the design document must have looked like "This game is stupid fun. How can we make it as stupid fun as possible?" And through all that, they succeeded, albeit in a slightly familiar way. It was around the time I was playing a NyteBlade fanfiction training simulation that I realized that it was very similar to Borderlands, pulling all aspects of pop culture to mock.
Speaking of, we finally went through
Borderlands 2, and I must say, Handsome Jack is quite possibly the second greatest upfront villain I've ever seen. (It's going to take a feat of extraordinary writing to top Dolores Umbridge.) Really, it was as much the character himself for being as hated as he was, but it was just as much Dameon Clarke delivering those lines almost with such callousness in the beginning that cemented it early on. What I thought was really well written was the fact that, especially right at the end, Jack always believed he was the hero. And if someone came in right at that point, they might see Jack more sympathetically.
Moving onto the Badass Crater of Badassitude, we quickly followed suit with Mr. Torgue's Campaign of Carnage. It didn't take us too long, we kicked Piston's ass, we were declared the ultimate badass, and I enjoyed a healthy respect for the plot mocking itself approaching every major point.
Not a whole lot has my attention on the game front, apart from
Watch_Dogs on May 27th and
The Golf Club with a nebulous release date. That means, once I finish up with Lost Odyssey and Trials Fusion,
https://www.trueachievements.com/LeakyTinCowJudo.htm will be pleased to know that I intend to get some quality time going with
Dark Souls . Whether I actually do it or not is another question, but that's where the word intend comes into play.
I also plan on streaming a bit more in the future. For example, I'm looking at streaming Trials Fusion over the weekend where I attempt Extreme tracks blind. Haven't seen them before, no Youtube, no pausing for guides, just me, the track, and anyone who wants to see me fail a particular jump for five minutes at a time.