Quick Skyrim love.

I have been playing The Elders Scrolls 5: Skyrim, since release day.  I have found it to be at least the best game released this year. The story is deep and over satisfying, the combat flows vastly better than it did in Oblivion. I find it to be a return to Elder Scrolls 3: Morrowind. You will even find a lot of Morrowind references throughout the game.  If you are like me you lived and breathed Morrowind I have covered before how much time I spent in that game.

If you are an achievement whore or trophy whore you won’t find them to be much of a challenge, I was able to get them within a few weeks of playing, or a day or two if you really just grind them out.  The one thing you have to understand about this game is that the world itself is huge I mean it’s the biggest world I have ever seen. It is literally a mini game trying to run from one city to another.

It hardly matters what race you chose to play, I have noticed small differences in the way people talk to you or react to your race. The details in the game are second to none all the small things they put into this game really make the difference in how good it comes out.  We have found all kinds of little details for example a dead body on the ground with a giants club smashed into his “head” or the place where his head should have been.

And let me tell you what Giants in this game do not fuck around; it’s never smart to pick a fight with one unless you are ready for a showdown. Most of the time giants have lots of back up, it could be a Mammoth or another Giant they hardly ever rock it solo. There never seems to be a lack of something to do or something new to find in this game, it’s damn near endless.

Basically if you haven’t yet picked up this enormous quest of doom, beg Santa for it!!

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Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning

Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning was first showcased at PAX 2011 in Boston, MA on March 11th. The concept of Amalur and it's history and lore were created by R.A.Salvatore and the artwork is being done by Todd McFarlane. With those two powerhouses as part of the storyboard & design, we can no doubt expect a beautiful, engaging game with a compelling storyline set in a rich, detailed world. From the videos and trailers I've seen thus far, the game already looks beautiful. The release date is currently February 7th, 2012 for U.S. and February 10th for Europe. I've already got my pre-order at GameStop. I figure right about the time I'm done with Elder Scrolls: Skyrim and mostly played out on Battlefield 3, this game should be ready to release. I'm looking forward to it, especially when I heard Salvatore had created the world. I've been a fan of his writing for something like 18 years, when I bought my first ever Campaign Setting for Advanced Dungeons & Dragons called Menzoberranzan. I was instantly hooked on Salvatore, Drizz't Do'Urden and D&D in general. For now, I'm living it up in Tamriel, but come February, you can find me in Amalur.

Game On, Brothers & Sisters

-Keredain-

Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim

So, Skyrim has been out for 7 days now, and I figured it was time to give ya'll a rundown on how the game is going for me, so far. Honestly, if there's anyone still left on the fence about this game, I'd be pretty fucking surprised. I've already put well over 40 hours into this game, with no clear end in sight. There is so much to do, so many options available to you, it can be daunting, even a bit overwhelming. There are hundreds of caves, mines, ruins, forts, towns, camps and oddities to explore around the world. It's so freaking huge, but holy shit, is it beautiful. I'm constantly finding myself in awe of things I come across. The attention to detail is bloody amazing. From the strange things you'll find to the random comments people around you will make. There are numerous large questlines to follow, similar to previous TES titles. Skyrim has it's own versions of the traditional Guilds. Mages, Fighters and Thieves, the return of the Dark Brotherhood. Tons of other questlines of varying length, Radiant Quests that you can quite literally do forever. Tasks you can pick up in town or out in the wild. Easter Eggs everywhere, keep your eyes open. Honestly, when I first heard the Strategy Guide for Skyrim was over 650 pages long, I was stunned, but after spending a brief amount of time in-game, I'm not surprised anymore.

The game has a few bugs, I'd be lying if I said it was perfect, but I will say they're relatively few. Save often, and save in more than one slot. You'll thank yourself for it later. I've only come across a debilitating bug one time during a Quest where I could not complete my objective. I had to reload a much older game save and lose a lot of spent time & experience. I learned my lesson and now save more often. Autosaves can also save your ass. I've been playing the game on the lowest difficulty. I'm still having a great time and it is still quite often challenging. There are no benefits, aside from bragging rights I guess, to playing on harder difficulties.

The crafting is extremely well done. Smithing is brand new and amazing, while Alchemy & Enchanting have had a bit of an overhaul. The combination of all 3 can produce seriously powerful results. I still have yet to complete the Main Quest on either of my two characters, but I feel absolutely no reason to rush to the "End" of the main story. On my newest character, a very melee-oriented, heavily armored, Shield-Bashing Master Smith, I'm just running around the world doing random dungeons & caves, not really doing any actual quests unless I stumble upon them. And I'm really enjoying myself.

So, in the insanely unlikely chance anyone out there is still undecided for this game, I have this to say to you: If you like Action/RPG's at all, then you need to own this game. Period.

If I had a rating system, this would get 5/5 Stars or score a Perfect "10" purely for appearance, sound, music score and addictive gameplay.

Game On, Brothers & Sisters

-Keredain-

Lord of the Rings: War in the North

Bizarro & I snagged this game on the 2nd and, I have to say, we've played the shit out of it. Three back-to-back games on Normal, Hard & Legendary, and I honestly can't remember the last time I was able to sit and play a game start to finish, and then start right over again. The gameplay is enjoyable, the controls are tolerable, the storyline is decent, but often seems a bit off the mark from actual Tolkein canon. (Radagast seemed a bit too friendly for a wizard who wasn't overly fond of people, and a wizard who is extremely knowledgable about birds, beasts and creatures being caught unawares and kidnapped by spiders seemed a bit rediculous to me)

The game plays a lot like Diablo 2 or a dozen other Dungeon Crawl type games, I think they overstated the whole "Combo your attacks together with your friends for devastating effect", because as far as I can tell, it doesn't make much of a difference. After 5 or 6 days we earned almost every single achievement (Bizarro actually got them all, I'm only missing 2). It's a great game, but if I was being honest with you & myself, it probably wasn't worth the full $60. Rent, borrow or buy this game when the price drops for a good, enjoyable time sink.

I'm happily chewing up time now until (Dun dun dun!) Skyrim, which releases tomorrow night at Midnight, when I will be leaving work and heading to my local GameStop to snag my already fully-paid copy and then break speed limits to get home and watch with awe as 5-6 hours disappear and I force myself to sleep a few hours before cramming some more Skyrim time in before work on Friday. Until then, a measly 26 or so hours, I have Stephen King's On Writing and Battlefield 3 to occupy my time. See you in Tamriel.

Game on, Brothers & Sisters

-Keredain-

Soon my friends...SOON.

It’s nearly here boys and girl. Battlefield 3 will be released in just a few short days. Unlike most of you I will not be going to any midnight release for the game. My Xbox is still not back from repair land. But it’s making its way here. Sadly it won’t be here till Wednesday after noon.

However I’m sure most people will be in the mid 20s by the time I start playing the game, and that’s good it gives them a chance against me. I plan on fully destroying that game when I get it, I’m talking non-stop playing till Sunday night when I pass out in a awesome pool of my own filth.

I don’t know about some of you but for me BF3 marks the start of some hardcore gaming. That lasts till I get Skyrim.  After the buy BF3 the next on my list is “The Lord of the Rings: War in the North.” And I fully expect to play that to death as well. Then of course is Skyrim, and I’m not sure if I am going to follow Skyrim with “Halo: Combat evolved” or “Batman: Arkham City” I haven’t really broken it down yet.

I do know that after I pay off Skyrim, I am going to save every cent I can spare, so I can just fucking wreck “Black Friday” you can get some of the best video game deals on that day. I also like to stock up on Blurays and other interesting shit. Anyhow back to the battlefield, if you haven’t seen it yet there is an interesting few web episodes of something called “TheController - Battlefield 3 - Episode 1”  

it’s a fun little thing that pits 6 Pro-Gamers with 6 nOObs. As they compete for $50k cash. It’s worth checking out if you are a fan of the new battlefield game or you just like to make fun of nOObs.

Pre-Order Hell.

I don’t know about you folks, but I am sick to death of competitive DLC for games. What I mean by that is every store that sells games has different DLC for pre-ordering a single game. For an example Batman: Arkham City, has so much shit for pre-order. Best Buy has the “exclusive Tim Drake Robin skin” while the GameStop/EB Games has the “Joker’s Carnival of Horrors challenge map” Amazon it’s self has its own pre-order and so does Wal-mart.

To be honest with you I wanted to pre-order this game, but I had a lot on my plate to begin with so I couldn’t get it done. However looking at all this pre-order shit even if I wanted that Robin skin from Best Buy I wouldn’t get it, I never pre-order anything from anyplace that’s not GameStop.  It’s a matter of convenience, for me and I don’t buy shit online for the most part.

I understand the need to compete for sales, video games are a huge industry that makes a ton of money and everyone wants a part of it. I just don’t like being stuck in the middle, most of all I don’t like being stuck in the middle of a pre-order war that generally ends in Xbox live selling that same shit later.  I remember the big pre-order whoa, over “War for Cybertron” these entire different player skins, from all these different places then they released every one of the skins as a DLC pack.

The release of all the skins pissed so many people off, I remember hearing a story about how some dude drove miles out of his way just to get the Jazz skin from Best Buy only to find out a couple of months later he could have got it with the DLC pack. Also you have the people who order more than one game from different locations just to get all that DLC and I think this is what the parent company of said game company want.

If they can get you to buy two of the same thing just for that little bit of DLC, they got you by the nuts. But then again this isn’t exactly a perfect plan because you can very easily turn around and sell that shit to Game Stop unopened and get a decent trade in and Power up points. Regardless of any thing I personally feel that if they want to offer exclusive DLC I think they should keep it to different copies of the game, like a special Edition or a limited edition. That would give me more of a chance to get what it is I want.

When I do buy Arkham City I will be getting the collector’s edition, because I am a huge fan of “Frank Miller’s Dark Knight Returns” and as I understand it the collector’s edition of the game comes with that Batman skin and so far that is the only way to get it. I understand that some people think that a little healthy competition is good, and they don’t mind being jerked around by these corporations. Personally I’m about sick of it; I don’t need a trick to make me buy a game if I want it I will get it. Pre-order shit is cool but it’s never enough to make me buy something.