LadyCrimson

We were going to see the Star Wars movie this morning but I was too sleepy. My PC case made noises again after several hours so now the case-side is technically off, just lightly leaning against the rest of the case. I used painters tape to "seal off" the gap openings re; dust. The entire HDD holder (detachable modular component thingie) is a cheap piece of plastic **** that likely can't handle the weight and vibration of 2 (or maybe even 1) HDD's. Maybe I should just go all 4TB sata SSD's for storage/image and video writing even if they might not last as long and say screw HDD's entirely. I could buy 6 of such SSD's, toss in two and have two sets of spares until/if I ever build yet another rig. Edit: holy crow, 4TB samsung Pro sata ssd's are like $1k. I have moolah but I'm not that crazy. Never mind. Maybe in a year or two.

Rented John Wick 3. That early knife fight scene had me rolling. The rest of the film could have sucked and I wouldn't have minded because of that scene. Luckily, the rest of the film didn't suck. The first film is probably still the best one but at least this 3rd entry had great fight sequences and some moments of hilarity (not much plot or sense but...). And Fishburne's little speech at one point? Top cheese, man, top cheese. (edit - can't wait for the 4th to see Fishburne and Reeves take down "the Table" - give me more cheese!)

After stuffing some case edges with paper my PC case was mostly quiet for a while but this morning started up with that annoying slight hum/vibration noise again. Fiddled around a bit. Took off the side-case cover again (this makes the noises stop). Finally noticed the removable box that holds the HDD's in place, its press tabs to release/lock disks are super flush with edge of the case. Hm. Maybe they're touching the (rather poorly fitting I might add) clear plastic part of the case cover. Found a very thin piece of styrofoam sheet packing. Taped it to that corner of the sidecase cover. Put cover back on. It's quiet again. Or at least, a lot quieter. Main hum is gone and while HDD's still make bit o' noise when file accessing (slightly more than if the cover is completely off, I mean) it's not clunky/vibrate-y sounding like before. What a crappy case and HHD holder design. I mean I like the case for some other reasons (size, cable management etc) but ... pffft.

Rented "Once Upon a Time in Hollywood." Strange movie. Lots of fantastic and/or hilarious moments and bits. Brad Pitt just gets more and more awesome as he ages (that and the roles he chooses). But overall for this specific movie the lack of ... plot? story? not sure how to describe? ... made it not a favorite. Maybe I just didn't like/care about any chr. but Brad Pitt's - vs. liking all the chrs. in Pulp Fiction, say. Regardless, still lots of things to admire/like in it, don't regret seeing it.

Making a whole cross-rib beef roast in the slow cooker. Just the roast in there with a smidgen of water on the bottom (will add tiny whole potatoes later). Never done that before, outside of a corned beef brisket which is different to me than a fresh roast. Hoping it will come out somewhat sliceable vs. insta-shredded, since strings around it. That's always been my thing re: beef in a slow-cooker. I feel like it's always a beef-stew texture/flavor which I'm not all that into. We shall see. (hubby would eat it either way) It just sounded easier to clean the crock-pot bowl than a slotted roasting pan top ...

I'm intrigued by the method of filming/superimposing the VR game + player. Much more interesting than just seeing the VR graphics itself. I want to beatsaber to My Sharona! It's cool too how while the movements everyone does are similar different people can have different movement styles. Like this guy with all his major arm twirling and drumming. And when the music turned to that meme girl-swinging-onion song at around 1:50, I lol'd.

Watched a 2nd episode of The Witcher. I just can't get into it. Again, it's not terrible/don't hate it. Just doesn't do anything for me and half the time I feel like I have no idea what's going on/why I should care. Whether this is because I miss a word or sentence here and there or because I'm not familiar with the "world" I don't know. Lost in Space is available now tho, so I'll be spending the next days/week watching that instead.

... Happy Holidays.

Ran through the tutorial zoo mission of Planet Zoo. Some decent gameplay details/options. Some learning curve but not that complex, yet not mind-numbingly simple either. The park/foliage and animal graphics are fairly good for a sim, although nothing hugely impressive. The human park visitors/workers are in this cartoonish/low-detail styling however, which feels odd/out of place. I've tried a few "zoo" sims before and didn't like them at all - this one seems much better/more my style. Not quite good enough (so far) to make me want to play multiple hours in one sitting but good enough I'll fire it up a few more times and see if the engagement factor increases over time. Sims can be funny that way.

Once in a while I turn on something besides FFXV. Once in a while. --------------- I'm not sure yet if I find this cute or scary. The contrast between more realistic/detailed animals and the "cartoonish"/low-detail humans is a bit disconcerting. Odd decision. Gameplay seems decent tho.

Hey, Lara? Wrong game. GTFO. ...Square and their crossover stuff. Photoboming Prompto's photos - it's very rare. Only 2nd time for me. Edit: forgot ... also ... GET UP PROMPTO, GET UP

The final/last update (w/the release of Ep. Ardyn) made the game much more stutter-y and problematic for many people on the Steam version. Not me, but lots of complaints about it (since SE is "done" with the game/won't fix it, likely). There's been some evidence that installing the 4k pack (another huge download) for some reason makes the stutters go away. I've had that installed since Day 1 and have never had any major/persistent issues even on my old putt-putt rig. Anyway, if you're having issues and it's on Steam, you could try that. The higher res textures and movies are still noticeable even if you're not playing in 4k etc. I'd also keep TRAM setting to High, not Highest. Even w/11GB VRAM, Highest can cause more performance loss/suck up 9.5-10gb of vram on my system and sometimes I drop it down to High even if I can use Highest. And yeah...the side quests in the game are pretty bad. I mean if you like the combat it's just fun to ... more combat ... and later Hunts have some tough battles, but they're almost all fetch/kill quests. And don't get me started on the find lost Hunters and broken down cars "quests." >.> Don't expect stellar storytelling pacing either. I still love the game tho.

rofl Spammer! Ban thyself!

Does this mean I can refund and if the package still arrives in a few days, it's free loot? Amazon is Kewl.

Not for the music but the dance covers: ....the guy in the santa hat is pretty good. This group/company has a large rotation of regular dancers, and a camera guy who's pretty good. I'm rather enjoying watching a lot of their videos.

Installed RE2/remake, spent about 20 minutes going through what seemed to be 2178 graphic/display options, started the game as Leon, saw it auto-saved at the spawn point, exited game. The options menu exhausted me apparently. (that and the 1.5 hour wait to download it)

I was thinking a cheap reverb software filter but either or. I forgot it was Xmas week and ordered some jerky off of Amazon. Page claimed it would be here before Xmas - actually it claimed Wed - but here it is Fri night and I'm still jerky-less. *cries*

Tried to watch the 1st episode of The Witcher. I'll agree Cavill fits the role/does a decent job but even from the very start action sequence I felt like I was watching SyFy or CW but with even less budget. Nothing wrong with that if the show is good overall (hey I still watch ST:OS right) but for me the pacing was a bit off and much of the dialogue and other actors felt rather stilted/shallow. There's nothing extremely "wrong" but things just feel a little off somewhere. I'll try to watch more later ... I've heard the last few episodes "get better". This is from someone who hasn't played the games (outside of an hour or two of TW3) nor read the novels, tho.

I caved and bought RE2-remake + Planet Zoo. Probably won't try them until tomorrow tho. Unless I can't sleep.

When you're in-game: "Ohhhh this night-time oceanside is so relaxing/beautiful!" When you're looking at the screenshot later: "...it's a tree and the sky is sorta blueish." Oh well.

Noticed Resident Evil 2 remake on Steam is around 20 bucks. Seems a good sale price and another spiffy action game to utilize the 4k goodness with (I built this machine I'm going to get use out of it, darnit) But what's the combat like? Is it really hard or convoluted mechanics-wise? Is there an easy mode? Since, y'know, I'm lazy as **** now.

Driver and Ridley have been getting praise for their acting in these films as is - and I thought they had some chemistry as yin and yang foils or whatever - which just makes one wish they'd had something more substantial to work/showcase their abilities with.

Happy Fur Holidays or something.

DMC5 (PC) - didn't finish (but it was pretty and sorta combat fun, I could understand why many may have liked it a lot) Dragon Quest Builders 2 (PS)- didn't finish but it's fun and an improvement on the 1st game. Borderlands 3 (PS) - finished. It's ok, not as replayable as the first two(at least in its pre-game of the year/no dlc's yet, state). I think everything else wasn't technically 2019 or more casual short indie PC and mobile games. Note: not finishing a game, for me these days, isn't always a reflection on game quality but more a reflection on my increasingly shortened game sessions and lack of patience/committed motivation.