status 2023

2023.01.30

Playing something new/old with AOE1 Definitive Edition. Considering getting AOE2 DE (on sale), but my system is already sluggish with the first DE so there's no rush. AOE3 DE will have to wait even longer.

Looking over Steam and GOG sales there are some good deals, but I just don't feel like it. I have so much in my Steam account already, and boxes of old games to replay, it's hard to justify buying games my old system can't even play.

2023.02.07

That didn't last long - some Steam sales I can't pass by:

$1.49 LYNE

$1.99 Vampire: The Masquerade - Coteries of New York (2019)

$3.99 Papers, Please (2013)

$9.99 Call of Duty (2003)

CoD is overpriced, but the price do not seem to get any better over the years (checking stats on isthereanydeal), and it's an action game my current system should be able to handle. And it's something of historical value that I missed playing at the time.

2023.02.27 Steam

$1.99 The Hex (2018)

$5.99 XCOM: Enemy Unknown (2012)

2023.03.12 Steam

$1.99 Milo and the Magpies (2021)

$7.99 The Sherlock Holmes Collection (2008-2009)

$1.99 Sherlock Holmes and the Hound of the Baskervilles (2012)

$1.49 Paradise Lost (2021)

$0.49 Milk inside a bag of milk inside a bag of milk (2020)

$1.99 INSIDE (2016)

2023.04.12

$3.49 Bloons TD 6 (2018)

$3.74 Jade Empire: Special Edition

$3.74 Alone in the Dark Anthology (1993...)

$3.99 Alice: Madness Returns (2011)

$4.99 Medal of Honor (2010)

2023.04.13

In between games. Time to consider and give time to the regulars; the games I've been playing for years along with whatever the current game is: GTA5, TF2, June's Journey.

2023.04.29

Made myself play some TF2, just to keep up with that. Why is L4D 1 and 2 still installed? Play a round of each.

2023.05.08 GoG

$1.97 Empire Earth Gold Edition

$1.49 Tropico Reloaded

$1.74 Total Annihilation: Commander Pack

$0.59 Desert Law

2023.05.16 Steam, really good Bioware Mega Collection:

$4.49 Dragon Age: Origins - Ultimate Edition

$4.79 Dragon Age Inquisition

$4.79 Mass Effect: Andromeda Deluxe Edition

$14.99 Mass Effect Legendary Edition

$7.49 Dragon Age II: Ultimate Edition

46% Bundle discount, total $19.73

$1.99 Mirror's Edge Catalyst

$4.49 Max Payne Bundle (1 & 2)

$3.74 Hearts of Iron 2 - Complete

$2.99 Command & Conquer™ Remastered Collection

$2.49 Crusader Kings Complete

$2.49 Hearts of Iron III

$0.97 Just Cause

$1.49 Just Cause 2

$2.99 Just Cause 3

all that for $43.37

2023.05.25 GoG

$2.99 Beyond Good & Evil

$1.49 AER - Memories of Old

General rule: if it's on my wishlist, and under $4, just buy it.

If it's on sale for like 85% off, maybe still get if under $10, especially if it's older, and/or unlikely to go much lower.

Some very old games are seemingly locked at unwarranted high prices like $20, $30, etc. and are almost never on sale.

2023.06.10 GoG

sale on Baldur's Gate 1 and 2 Enhanced; already have on steam, but these give access to the originals, and I'll want to try those

$ 2.99 Baldur's Gate: Enhanced Edition

$ 2.39 Baldur's Gate II: Enhanced Edition

Weird, I can't add those to my cart and keep shopping. It starts a new cart.

Next cart:

$ 3.74 F.E.A.R. 2: Project Origin + Reborn

$ 1.99 Star Control I & II

Steam

$1.49 AER Memories of Old

$3.74 SLUDGE LIFE

$3.99 Star Control I and II

$4.49 The Talos Principle

$3.99 Wallpaper Engine

2023.06.10

Looking through the blog - what ever happened to Starcraft Remastered?

2023.06.11

OK, so I'm playing that now.

2023.06.12 GoG

$2.39 Master of Orion 1+2

$1.49 Imperialism

$1.49 Anvil of Dawn

$0.99 The Fall

$1.99 Apsulov: End of Gods

$0.59 Mainframe Defenders

$0.97 Blood Omen: Legacy of Kain

2023.06.17 It's good to have an RTS back in the back - so good, I think I should always have one in the rotation.

2023.06.26 GoG

$1.64 Arx Fatalis

$1.64 DOOM 64

2.49 FTL: Advanced Edition

1.99 Hotline Miami

2.99 Hotline Miami 2: Wrong Number

3.74 Jade Empire: Special Edition

1.99 Metro 2033 Redux

2.99 Primordia

3.99 Quake

1.99 Quake II

3.99 Star Wars Battlefront (Classic, 2004)

2.09 Star Wars Galactic Battlegrounds Saga

1.49 Starflight 1+2

1.99 STASIS: Deluxe Edition

3.99 The Longest Journey

1.69 Weird Worlds: Return to Infinite Space

2023.06.29

$9.99 Fallout 4: Game of the Year Edition

A little out of my usual price range, but I don't think this set will get much cheaper before my next computer.

2023.06.30 GoG

free Beholder 2

2023.07.03

I prefer having everything on Steam, and GoG is good too, but reluctantly Battle.net has to be in the mix. There's just not other way to get their games.

I thought I was done with Diablo 2, but Diablo II: Resurrected exists, and D2 was so great that I have to at least try it, and there's a huge sale now. Each of these are 67% off.

$39.99 $13.19 Diablo II: Resurrected

    comes with nothing

$49.99 $16.49 Diablo Prime Evil Upgrade

    adds D3, Reaper of Souls, Rise of the Necromancer, pet + wings

$59.99 $19.79 Diablo Prime Evil Collection

    same as above

I already have D3, Reaper, and Rise, so... I'll just get D2:R

Warcraft III: Reforged is half off; $14.99 for Standard Edition. Worth it? It's been a while, but I don't remember WC3 that fondly, though I remember playing as the undead was cool. And that solo RPG after the main story was nice... last thing I remember was something about a panda.

(didn't get it - the community hates it)

2023.07.12 Steam summer sale

Wolf Pack:

$1.99 Return to Castle Wolfenstein

$1.49 Wolfenstein 3D

N/A Wolfenstein: Enemy Territory

Valve Complete Pack (already have 17 of 22 items)

$0.99 Counter-Strike: Condition Zero

$0.99 Day of Defeat: Source

free Counter-Strike: Global Offensive

$1.49 Payday The Heist

might as well take the extras

$0.39 Payday The Heist Soundtrack

$0.99 Payday The Heist: Wolfpack DLC

$1.59 Half-Life: Alyx - Final Hours

$1.64 DOOM 64

$1.69 Weird Worlds: Return to Infinite Space

$1.74 Tropico Reloaded

$2.49 Endless Space - Definitive Edition

$2.49 Please, Don’t Touch Anything

$3.39 Stasis - Deluxe Edition

$2.99 Outlast

$2.99 Harvester

$4.04 Jazzpunk: Director's Cut Complete Edition

$7.49 Watch_Dogs Complete

$4.49 Technobabylon

$0.89 Technobabylon Soundtrack

$4.99 Victoria II

2023.07.28

Done with Starcraft Remastered. Uninstalled, archived.

Now what, SC2 Wings of Liberty again? It might be interesting to compare.

Updating...

2023.07.30

OK, so I'm playing this, for now: StarCraft II: Wings of Liberty (2010) [revisit 2023].

2023.07.30 Steam

$19.79 Red Dead Redemption 2 (2019)

$4.99 Black Mesa (2020)

2023.09.01 GoG

$ 2.49 Tom Clancy's Rainbow Six

$ 2.49 Heroes of Might and Magic 2: Gold

$ 2.49 Heroes of Might and Magic 3: Complete

$ 1.49 Cossacks Anthology

$ 1.49 Albion

$ 5.99 UnderRail

$ 2.99 FAR: Lone Sails

$ 2.49 Cossacks II Anthology

$ 1.49 Beholder

2023.09.04 Steam

$3.29 Stronghold HD

$3.49 Stronghold Crusader HD

$4.99 Rise of Nations: Extended Edition

2023.10.06 Steam

$3.49 Vampire Survivors

$1.99 Dracula: Love Kills

$3.99 Supreme Commander Gold Edition

2023.10.12 GoG

$2.49 Anno 1602 A.D.

$2.49 World in Conflict: Complete Edition

$2.99 XCOM 2

2023.11.01

$0.90 Californium

$2.99 The Evil Within

$3.99 The Void

$4.49 Hellblade: Senua's Sacrifice

2023.11.10 GoG

$6.69 Blade Runner (1997)
this is rarely on sale, and even though the cd is in the attic, i might as well have it handy

2023.11.27 Steam

$3.99 Gothic Universe Edition (Gothic 1 (2001), Gothic II: Gold Edition (2005), Gothic 3 (2009))

$2.99 Prey (2017)

$3.99 DOOM (2016)

$3.99 Firewatch (2016)

StarCraft II: Campaign Collection

2018.06.20
On sale, got it. Now I can play Legacy of the Void.

Start up Starcraft II, long long list of all achievements goes by.

I was going to replay Wings of Liberty and Heart of the Swarm, but reading my review of HotS really puts me off. Listening to this old Starcraft (original) music in the background makes me really nostalgic for the old game. Maybe I should have just spent the $15 on the remastered.

Suggested resolution is 1680x1050 but its really chunky. Trying native 1920x1200.

Legacy of the Void. Prologue. New campaign. Hard.
Amon, the Dark God? I forgot who the big bad was. Or that there even was one.

2018.11.27
So much for attempt one, I don't think I played for more than a few hours and now haven't touched it in half a year. I'd like to just get this over with, but I'm not going to set it to Easy just yet.

Watch Story So Far again; even in brief, that sure is convoluted.

I had it set to Hard, playing now on Normal but it seems a little too easy. Oh well, making progress.

Leave and come back, can't open save file, some sort of bug, posts about it go back for months. At least each campaign mission passed is unlocked as you go.

OK, so now I'm done with prologue, ready to start actual campaign...?

I still remember the emotional depth of the original Starcraft, I haven't felt it in so long... so it is interesting that they should kill off such a long standing character, one from the old days. I know it is the nature of this kind of space opera, even this early in the story. And yet... I will miss this one especially.

2018.11.28
It seems the best way to fight the save file bug is save often and if you start getting errors just restart your session.

I replay a mission so I can get that last achievement in it, to get five more points in the magic shop. I like the counselors on the ship metaphor, its a simple but effective way to manage the game. You have all your advisers handy to give their perspective, and you have an armory to choose your equipment, and a store to purchase little magic extras. I think it made the most sense in the Terran campaign, but it still works (especially as the Protoss lose their psionic instant messaging).

I like to purchase things that extend life and defenses, as I am a turtle at heart. Like playing at sandcastles on the beach, I love building defenses and just barely holding off the enemy. After this campaign I may check out what's going on in tower defense maps for this game.

2018.12.04
I think I'm about halfway through. Of course the good guys will win, the only question is who dies. I like that it could be any or even every named hero. I don't feel so good that the enemy is now some big outside other. Part of what made Starcraft such a good soap opera was that everyone was constantly making alliances and betraying each other. That got tedious after a while, but at least you knew everybody and it was all in the family. Maybe there will be some twist, like the big boss will turn out to be xel'naga after all, or maybe this is all the real test for ascension of the first and second races, or maybe everybody dies stopping the enemy and humans are the only ones left.

2018.12.11
Last mission: The Host.
First try I made it to 83%. I'm glad its not too easy.
Second time around much easier and more fun.
That's it, vanilla ending, no twists? We banish the big bad and the Protoss get to rebuild? What about the other races? No last appearances from the other heroes?
Ah, a message from Kerrigan, and then an Epilogue. OK, this is more like it.

2018.12.12
That's what I wanted: a way forward for Kerrigan (and Raynor) no matter where it goes, a resolution to the prophecies that have been made since we met the Overmind, and a fitting end to this xel'naga civil war.

And now I'm playing as Terran again. OK, can't mind that, just takes some getting used to.

2018.12.14
Hardest mission yet, escalates quickly. Must escalate faster on my second try...
It's always more fun when you understand the map, I almost want to run it again, but there's still another map. And now I play as the Zerg? It makes sense. This final battle kind of makes sense. And just like that, its over.

I like seeing Raynor back at the bar where it all began, and he's reminiscing the way characters do in movies (looking at photos, you hear bits of old dialogue, etc.) and then in walks Sara and he goes off with her. I've been turning it over and over, and you can come up with a dozen explanations easily, but it is unsatisfying. The denouement was fine until someone might actually feel some kind of sadness or loss, and then an unambiguous happy ending is dropped on it like an anvil, killing any last chance at this story being memorable in any way.

I dutifully sit through the credits, wondering how a city worth of people is required to make this game. Back to the Campaign screen where you are told in no uncertain terms "The saga of StarCraft II has ended. Thank you for playing." Was that extra finality needed for some reason? Am I completely done playing? It seems to think so, and it is probably right; this was a good product but I can't imagine taking the time to go through it again.

Let's see where this Nova Covert Ops fits in. Good thing I waited, it definitely takes place after the main story.

As suspected, since it features a named hero, its a hero mission; its probably all hero missions. I just realized I didn't get to use a single observer unit in all of the Protoss campaign. That was one of my favorite things to do as Protoss, coat the map with observers so I could see everything.

Next mission - hey, I've got a base. And spider mines, in a tower defense kind of situation. Nice.

2018.12.17
Last mission. Its painfully obvious Nova is going to kill Mrs. Mengsk and junior is going to banish her.

Well, basically that's it, though no mom confirmation. I felt more of a reaction at the end of the Nova story than the entire Protoss campaign. I want more adventures of Nova and her pirate scientist crew, rather than any more epic galaxy scale stories.

Was there supposed to be something at the end of the credits? Just endless rotating star field, so I hit escape after a while.

Now that I am spoiler free, I can read whatever I want about StarCraft.

!
https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/VideoGame/StarcraftII
http://us.battle.net/sc2/en/blog/8501031
(broke, see https://web.archive.org/web/20161203145603/http://us.battle.net/sc2/en/blog/8501031)

status 2015 December

2015.12.23
Still occasionally puttering with GTA 5, now that its done its easy to drop in and out of in short bursts, instead of obsessing over it.
Thinking about latest installment of Starcraft (the Protoss one), I could play that any time, no point in waiting for a sale or a better video card.
Thinking about Fallout 4, and how I still need to play New Vegas.

2015.12.30
Steam sale, picked up Stanley Parable and Life is Strange (1-5).

2015.12.31
Started listening to Cane and Rinse podcast, tried their Mass Effect 3 episode. Brought back some nice memories, but I didn't learn much new information, but I was reminded not to think too harshly about the whole franchise, just because the ending was wrong.

Still playing with GTA 5 sometimes, thinking about next game.

status 2014 October

Finishing Planescape: Torment is a big milestone, maybe the biggest, and I'm glad its behind me.

Its time to review the past, and plan the next step. I read my way through this blog backwards all the way to the beginning, fixing the odd typo as I go. I leave a few typos because I'm reading on a pad and its too annoying to edit, and to leave something for the next read through.

I have so many more old games to knock off the bucket list, but I just don't feel like tackling long-obsolete UIs, pixelated art, or glitchy graphics just now. I go to YouTube and watch a compilation of Blizzard movies from Starcraft 2. Someone put them all into one vid; I'd put a link but it will probably just dissapear, and then get posted again anyway.

That was kind of interesting, so I start watching a new cinematic edit of The Last of Us, and as good as it is, and seemingly edited down, its still five hours, and not something I need to do again.

I find an Age of Empires 3 shortcut and click it, what could it hurt to take a quick look. Well, there goes two hours of staring at a screen. I don't need life's fast forward button right now. Uninstalled.

One of the things that struck me on the blog read through was how much time I wasted covering old ground, while there are exciting new worlds to visit. If there's a lesson in here somewhere, how about not wasting time?

status 2013 December

Nothing much going on.

Stopped playing Starcraft 2 a while ago.

Occasionally I still think about the story of The Last of Us.

Tried Plants vs Zombies 2, got bored, got sickened by the money grabbing 'pay to play' model, didn't go back.

Played a round of Left 4 Dead, just the first map No Mercy, got a little nostalgic, but mostly bored.

Paged through my nearly 500 Fallout 3 screenshots. Got a little more nostalgia, but mostly I'm glad to be done with it. I sure would like to crack open Fallout (3) New Vegas, but Real Life won't allow that level of commitment right now.

I've lost the plot, what was I supposed to be doing, playing from oldest to newest?

I read back through the blog, following my bread crumb trail, fixing typos. Sometimes in my daily life I think about some aspect of gaming I really should write down. I am relieved to see I have already written many of these things down, sometimes even more completely than I am thinking about them now. I've been wondering if all this blogging would ever amount to anything, and now I know it has, at least for my memory continuity.

Starcraft 2: Heart of the Swarm (2013)

So far its very much Blizzard style, and not just the artwork, but the operatic story. The stage is as busy and garish as a carnival, and not a character is allowed to act rationally. The story starts with idiot ball firmly in hand, and never lets it go.

*spoilers*

Why would Kerrigan believe the news report so immediately and completely, without any verification what-so-ever. Its a known propaganda channel - why believe anything it says at all. Sure, it gets the plot moving quickly, but its the fatal flaw of the whole story, and I'm only in the first quarter or so of the game. After taking over the swarm, she immediately sets out to to rehabilitate her enemy into a loyal servant, which feels suicidal.

I don't like where this story is going at all. Blizzard is cannibalizing bits and pieces of the original Starcraft story, and building this weaker, less interesting story out of it. Come to think of it, Blizzard is always doing this, far back as I can remember. Story always seems to degenerate over time, like they are handing the writing duties off to interns who only read the back of the box. Particularly, the Xel'Naga used to be the only Eldritch Power, and the Zerg were a new creation assembled over time from many places. The homeworld of the Zerg, if I remember correctly, was just another piece of the biological melting pot that is the Zerg, not an original Eldritch Power itself. The Zerg, like the Protoss, were built by the Xel'Naga out of primitive races, even more primitive then humans. Its a little thing, that most will not notice or care about, but it takes the wind out of it for me. Who gives a shit about this story now.

Of course Kerrigan needs to become Queen of Blades again, but she did so on some old power's say-so, and just hoped everything would work out. Maybe at this point in the story, Kerrigan just doesn't care anymore, and doesn't care about consequences. The Blizzard world seems to be made of these elements: interesting doo-dads, heroism, betrayal, and stupidity. And the best cut scenes known to man.

---

A few days later, I'm about halfway through. A random click on Kerrigan to hear the little extras that all characters say, reveals she's doing all this to save Jim. This is just batshit crazy - and not from the character, but from the writers. Kerrigan was definitely in a very vulnerable state, and losing Jim was what pushed her over the edge into crazy revenge. She did zero followup before deciding Jim was dead, but its not that bad because she later reveals she no longer feels his presence in the Universe. Knowing she is powerful in The Force, this at least makes her snap decision sound much more palatable now. Now that Mengsk taunts her that Raynor is still alive, she again makes a snap decision to believe this new turn of events? And now she's going to rescue him, and she expects anything other than horror and revulsion from Raynor? These characters aren't crazy, the writers are. Its frustrating, because the voice acting and animation are very high quality, but the author(s) of this story are not in the same league.

The game is becoming very much Warcraft In Space.

I'm finally getting accustomed to playing the part the Queen of Blades, v2.0, but then suddenly I'm playing a Terran mini-game. Just when the Kerrigan story started getting a bit too heavy, we're back to playing a light-hearted Tetris game with battlecruisers. And it seems OK.

---

I finished a few days ago. The game left no impression on me, and I immediately moved on to other things. Even now, a few days later, I hardly remember it. What was the point? Oh well.

---

More days later, I try single player variations against the computer. I can already tell that I'm mostly done here, but I might be playing rounds against the computer occasionally. I think this calls for a separate track. I will start a scratch page for the odd SC2 game; it doesn't really merit a new post until the next update of the game itself.

status 2013 July

Since watching The Last of Us, I haven't done much. Mostly just plodding through Age of Empires 2, just so I can finish and be done with it.

Starcraft 2 expansion (Heart of the Swarm) went on sale, $10 off. Blizzard hardly ever has sales, until the product is years and years old, so I bought it. The reviews are not good. But its a Blizzard product - so I have to buy it! But I didn't buy Diablo 3, because of all the bad reviews, and I'm still not regretting that.

I better stick with the game plan though, of finishing off the oldest games first. At least, I better finish AOE2, or I never will.

---

Some weeks later, and I've chipped away at AOE2 for so long that its gone. It definitely made a pleasant diversion here and there, but it was starting to wear thin. I can say I'm well and truly done, except that they re-released the game in HD. I guess I'll check that out some day if it is on a good sale.

What do I do with the AOE2 Gold Edition box and cd? I think I'll start a new box called "SELL", and later when I have more downtime, I'll sell off all my retired games.

But now where do I go? Something recent, like Starcraft, which I've paid good money for and is just sitting there waiting for me on my hard drive, or keep on going through those old games?

BTW, I still think about The Last of Us sometimes. Its the sign of a good game, or at least the sign of a game with good hooks, that you're still thinking about it weeks and months later. And I didn't even play it, I just watched a playthrough. This is about as close as I've ever come to wanting to get a modern console, even though I know I would probably be endlessly annoyed by console issues.

now what

I finished the Wings of Liberty campaign again, and it was a nice refresher, it wasn't much of a challenge, especially at normal skill level.

I wish I could just have more campaigns to run through; the same but different. I want to just go through the motions of building up a strong defense, and turtling inside my base. Its pointless, and not really gaming, but its my comfort food.

I want to play something mindless but pretty, like AOE 3, but I uninstalled it. Maybe I can give Baracco Station another try, though the means of loading are really messed up now - who knows what Blizzard was thinking.

I saved a copy of that map, and I'm glad I did because no amount of searching can find it now. I right-click, select the only option, open with Blizzard Launcher. It starts SC2, but nothing more. Where do I put the map so I can start a versus AI game? Trying \Documents\StarCraft II\map.downloads.

That doesn't work either. Try Custom, nope. Maybe I should look further into this launcher. OK, let's try Arcade mode. I found it! I have to select 4v4 mode, then Create Private Game, before I can add AI players. OK, I can play, but I can't save my game. Which means I can't keep re-rolling until I get the configuration I want, which is myself alone on one half of the map, and my allies on the other side of the map. I hate sharing a base. Once again, I feel myself worn down, and unwilling to fight this hard just to have some simple fun. Out of desperation, I go back to some old saves.

Yeah, they work, but it feels weird and pointless. At every turn, Starcraft 2 is telling me it doesn't want me to play like this. Maybe I should just forget this whole custom map thing.

ZERGGGG!!!!!!

I just happened to catch today's release of the cinematic opening of the next Starcraft expansion. I usually miss releases, because that's just part of this whole vintage gaming thing. But today, a beautiful video done as only Blizzard does it, with crazy attention to detail, emotion, and story.

First, a quick view of the dense gray capital, evocative of a future New York City, and perhaps even invoking recent real-world tragedy? A bit of a stretch, but I felt it, and its a great way to instantly raise a sense of danger.

Then, a lovely bit of detail as water droplets streak upwards on the cockpit canopy of a Viking in flight through a rain cloud, and some small charm dangling where the rear view mirror would be. Then suddenly, through the clouds, the source of this mounting dread - an alien invasion.

Other details abound, wondrous in their brevity, like the sacrifice of a Viking, rapidly transforming to ground mode to delay the enemy advance, and getting swept aside before it could even fully bring up its guns. Then the long tension builder of the enemy advancing through a great open public square; the defenders lined up and waiting. Not a single face is shown, but you can guess what's going on under those helmets.

OK, the Wilhelm scream as a Nydus Worm crushes a marine? That was goofy, and broke the mood a little. I've heard from multiple sources you need that sort of thing to keep breaking the tension, so you can build it up again. Annoying, but forgivable. Before you digest the reality and metaphor of Mengsk's statue toppling, there's a dying battlecruiser falling nose-first onto the city. A beautiful way to underline the scene, but also a little risky to the storytelling. After all, if a giant space ship is just going to crash into a city, wouldn't it leave a giant crater, rendering the whole invasion and battle moot? You need to remember that battlecruisers can fly through deep space, but they tend to also be used in close ground support (at least in Blizzard's way of use), and are usually hovering just above a battleground. So, bad times for whatever neighborhood that battlecruiser hit, but its hardly a city killer. And I know its excessively geeky to even mention it, but if you care about this sort of thing, this is what goes through your head.

After that, its just some stuff about the plot but who cares, let's just watch that battle over and over again.

FPS, RPG, RTS

I started up the Starcraft 2 campaign again. I originally wanted to play more endless variations of the "Startion" custom map, but I avoided that trap successfully with a little help. One, I just came off wasting time in a very similar manner with Age of Empires 3, and two, its much harder to play custom maps now, due to various updates of the SC2 engine. I think I could get it running, but the SC2 game setup menu is so crude and slow I lose patience enough to break free, and try and do something more useful.

So I play the campaign instead. Its been long enough, and the first expansion for SC2 is on the horizon, so why not refresh the memory, and see if its still fun. And it is, because of all the little touches that go into it, that Blizzard is well known for. My favorite is the time in-between maps  where you get to hang out, upgrade your equipment, research new technologies, interact with other characters, and learn more about the story and the setting. I like it a lot, I wish the game spent more time there, but then this would be an adventure or RPG, and not an RTS.

I wonder what that would be like to play a sim of commanding an army, instead of actually doing all the clicking yourself, and just watching it play out from above, on board the Hyperion. I liked the mechanics of the Sims games, but there's little if any consequence, and I get bored. I remember when Blizzard shoe-horned RPG elements into Warcraft 3, but it felt clumsy. I enjoy the epic feel of a good long RTS campaign, but I like this experimentation with genre cross-over, and hope to see some more of it.

when games are like crack

I uninstalled Age of Empires 3 because I was wasting bucketfuls of time on it. Its safe and mindless entertainment, but a little too much so. Its one of the closest equivalents I have yet to find to a fast forward button to life. I think I could waste many more hours trying out all the combinations and permutations of different nationalities, maps, tactics, difficulty levels, etc. It would be fine, but I am left feeling empty afterwards. I pay my time and have nothing to show for it.

I was doing this with Starcraft 2 for a while, some time ago, and I thought I learned my lesson then, but it didn't stick. This is the dark side of gaming, or any hobby, where it becomes mindless rote, instead of an experience. Something to keep watch out for, I doubt this is the last time.

Starcraft 2 : tiring of the Startion

I think I've tried just about every reasonable combination on the Startion map, and I'm finally starting to get bored.

taking a GTA break with a little SC2

I was wondering how long I could play GTA3 San Andreas before needing a break.

It feels right and proper to play something in a different genre, and tried and true, so Starcraft 2 is my go to.

I almost let myself speculate when the next SC2 chapter is coming out, but that's almost as futile as wondering when the next Valve release is coming. Just keep that Zen state, it will come when it will come.

Meanwhile, I want to see how bolstering my bunker defenses with a line of Goliaths works.

stuck on the Startion

As a kid playing on the beach, I built sandcastles near the waves, and tried to hold them off as long as possible. Sometimes I'd be frustrated by a castle I couldn't finish, or a castle that was never assaulted by the water, but the most satisfying castles were the ones that were under frequent assault that I could keep going through effort and will.

And so now I play the Baracco Startion map on Starcraft 2 against the computer. I'm constantly tweaking the numbers and qualities of my allies and opponents, trying to find the zone where I can just barely hang on. I have no idea where the Startion map came from, but after various searches I have yet to find something that so approximates the Starcraft equivalent of my sandcastles.