LadyCrimson

The only game that "sacred" me to the point of making it almost unbearable to play for very long was System Shock 2. I don't know if it would do the same to me now, but at the time...yeah. It was the unrelenting tension factor, like seeing the movie Alien for the first time way back when. One of the mistakes some games make is the idea that darkness/low visibility is inherently scary. Not true. And I'd agree that a lot of that sort of thing only works the first time (maybe twice or a few times even). After that you know, so it doesn't work. But that's sort of the nature of average fear -repetition breeds contempt - and can't be helped. I think the OP's partial point, tho, about the undead having become just the cannon-fodder of most games is valid. Skeletons/zombies seem to be the next thing up from rats and it'd be nice to see a game step away from that. I'm not, however, sure I'd like unkillable undead/enemies (if they can do damage to me) - unless there was also a way to mostly avoid them. But then it becomes more of a stealth-game or something. Borderlands2 DLC had a skeleton enemy that would go down, but then keep rising up again unless you ran up to it and pulled some mystical sword out of its back. Something like that can work ok...and helps some with the "ranged is overpowered" issue as well.

Pizza. Twilight Zone marathon on TV. Maybe a shot or two of rum. Then I don't know what. Maybe a nap. Woke up with a really stiff back and it's finally starting to loosen up...which makes me sleepy. Been noticing Comcast cableTV wants you to "buy" movies through them now. $15-20 to "own" it. Of course, that means you have to have Comcast in order to access them. Hahaha. Yeah, no. Digital 24hr film rental, fine. "Buy", heck no.

An enemy that is hard to fight/win against is not scary of itself. That's just a tough fight. If there's a huge penalty for death in a game (like losing actual gear if you end up being unable to win/get your corpse/whatever...) then tough fights become sweaty-palm scary in a stressful sort of way. So if what you really want is just tense/hard combat with undead (vs them being fodder), I think that's a valid complaint. Being scary, tho... To be honest, I've never found ghosts scary simply because they're ghosts. Or zombies (most zombies I laugh at, they're not scary at all). Or any of that. Doesn't matter how they're drawn - sometimes the seemingly innocuous can actually be more "scary" upon the reveal of their scary actions/intents. It's also difficult to make them artistically scary in this type of game, I think - in terms of seeing them as you play - because of figure size. Hard to be scared of a small figure on your screen that isn't in-your-face. Scary encounters comes from nervous anticipation of not knowing what's around the corner and being surprised in spite of yourself even when you know something's coming. It comes from area atmosphere, light/music/tonal/sound cues we've been trained all our media-absorbing lives to tense up when we hear/see them, and, imo, most importantly, from the fear of having something to lose. Of course, what level/how much that individuals may require before they feel scared is...individualistic. An enemy (any type) that can lulz kill you in a few hits or something, just because they have awesome kill powers, is not scary. A challenge (or an irritation, depending on PoV) but not scary.

Reputation: I really disliked it in games where if you killed people in one town, every town/every guard everywhere would know to attack you on sight, as if everyone in the world knew what you and every member of your party looked like (even with hoods/helmets on). Unless it's a hi-tech sci-fi "big brother is watching" type game, such doesn't fly with me. Reputation should affect whether people are willing to ally with you sometimes, and there can be convo options that reveal who you are/deal w/your rep level, but...I dunno. I just don't like the auto-rep-encounter method. But I often accept it because I'm supposing something more all-encompassing complex is too much work/time. As to achievements or awards - even outside of Steam, seems like one can have earned titles in the game or something. I don't see how that would be that difficult..."if one has killed 1000 gnolls, give title "Gnoll Slayer." Not sure about badges you carry around...better than auto-rep (assuming you don't have to wear the badges) maybe.

Too...much...Neverwinter Online. Not just the Festival/fishing but doing tons of dailies to level up pets. When it's all done I can go back to hardly playing the game at all...

Was watching The Core late last night. Despite it's utter laughable "science" and lack of originality I kinda like that movie. Emphasis on kinda. Probably for the people that are in it more than anything else. Bruce Greenwood, Aaron Eckhart. And Stanley Tucci. I love that guy, he cracks me up.

Recovery is simple, but it still hurts like a mofo for a few days. Well, at least mine did. My scar is extra long. Maybe they can do it with a tiny hole and a laser tube now, for all I know. But yeah, it's not a long hospital stay type deal as long as there's no complications.

Yeah....I got the free puppy on a few chrs. Tried the top dungeon only once, with my main (only one that has 5 epic pets) which has a chance for a blue pet. Got through about 3/4 of the encounters I think but by then my group had lost almost all of their health bar (lost a lot of fights/had to do them twice) so I gave up. Haven't tried that one since. It's tough.

There's some truth to that. Plenty of folk who do almost nothing but play the Gateway after max level. The rest is a sensation of a series of short solo or co-op combat area missions without a real sense of "world". At least to me. I could gripe about WoW for many things, but for me at least, it did the "I'm in a world" feeling pretty well.

My mailsmiths and alchemists are all lazy roustabouts with nothing much to do most of the time, so they get to muck the stalls and run after me with the magical pooper scoopers.

Realized I sometimes stay in mmo's just for the chat. Maybe I need to do some irc again or something. Breakfast before bed.

Small slices of beef stir fried with: --strips of all 3 colors of bell peppers --yellow onion --sliced celery --2 sliced fresh/raw jalapeno --little bit of black pepper --garlic, soy sauce, etc etc. Spicy, simple, colorful. Yum.

In 2014, I'm determined and resolute that I shall ... uh ... hmm. I'll get back to you on that. ** ...I think what mostly goes through my head every New Year's is just "Wait, another year has gone by? Wat? Where am I again?" **Mr. Black, over there, says I should give him kitty treats 10 times a day instead of only once or twice, but I'm ignoring him....

Woke up. Pestered hubby a while. We blew our noses a lot. Watched hubby play a game for a while (while lightly dozing). Went to the store to spread my germs (sorry, world, I needed groceries). Made some food. Napped some more. Played a game with hubby a bit. Watched TV. Hubs went to bed. Going to play a little solo-game then shuffle and snuffle into bed as well. ....one of those extra quiet days.

Yeah...I'm afraid this last sale (plus with bags on sale too) gave my discipline a hard knock and I caved and bought some more Zen, which I haven't done in a while. A few more bags to spread among alts, couple of Stones and a few other pets. Could of done it all with AD to Zen exchange but I'm planning on using a lot of my AD to buy more fawns after Zenith (when their price will drop a fair bit more I'm sure) + I might upgrade a few pets. I can't do much more fishing, I'm fished out.

Been trying to play with hubby, and I have to say - the party system (even for co-op) sucks. Doesn't share the quests (most of the time anyway) so each player has to get it/turn it in, etc. Hubby's very slow with any learning curve in games and gets "lost" very easily (plus he doesn't like to "think" in games) so it's tough enough as it is without having to tell him constantly what to click on because I can neither acquire nor turn in quests for us as a group. Is there a share-quests option that I'm missing, or is that just the way it is...I've got us on free for all loot so he can just pick up everything without the stupid need/greed menu, but that's all the options I really see.

I'd largely agree with Keyrock, especially about the fast leveling and the diminishing returns aspect. At most it's a "pay to avoid time grind", which if that's the way one wants to go, it's an option. But I tend to roll my eyes when people cry P2W because of a "want it now" mentality. Most people who spend "a lot" of cash on this game (more than $60 say) do so because they just like to ... collect things. They have no true game-need for it, they just want to have it. There is one type of companion that isn't as "negligible" in effect, imo, however - the augment pets (cat, stones). These don't fight but they boost your stats by whatever gear/enchants you equip them with (like getting to wear 4 more pieces of gear). They don't attack, pull any unwanted aggro and can't die - thus the augments are usually the only "pet" people want to see you using in tough dungeons (well, crybaby PUG's anyway). And they can be overall quite helpful to lower-dps or lower-defense classes. However, one can do fine without an augment pet too. They are not needed and anyone who tells you they are is mindlessly parroting what "everyone" else says or are the obsessive "max stat" type power-gamers. One reason some complain, I think, is because of the PvP. There's no ranking match-up system apparently so the game will toss brand-new lvl60's together with long-term, high geared lvl60's. Or newbie lvl20's against lvl20's from long time players who can toss high rank enchants in their lowbie gear. This is just bad design and I can sympathize with people who like to PvP complaining about it. They should match up PvP matches by at least gearscore or something. Anyhoo - switching topics....the sled is silly fun! Worth getting for my main at least (she'll get a mimic too from an alt). Also ... I've gotten just past 13000 gearscore now because of those Artifacts. I'm starting to, for a DC, finally get moderately fast at doing solo stuff. Still...I'm not built with max HP in mind so I'm kinda crunchy.

Dangit, it *is* much easier with the GWF. That is totally not fair. But I know other classes can get up there, I've seen it. So I'll keep trying with my DC. Maybe one of her skills would be helpful...

I think GWF have it a bit easier because of their major run speed boost. I might try it with mine.

Mission: avoid hubby's cold. Status: failed. My head feels like a balloon. Not too snuffly/nose yet but head and behind the eyes are bad. Throat is swollen but not really sore. Mostly it's the head inflation. Argh.

Darnit, that's a huge companion sale. There aren't too many companions I'd actually want from the Zen store, but there's a few. Have my 2nd fawn, halfway to a 3rd but totally lost motivation to fish now. Saving my fish, maybe double rewards will get me there. Have you gotten to the top of the tall rock formation, Keyrock? If you land there there are two torches that light up. I hit the right spot only once so far with my DC, but mislanded the angle and ended up on the ledge just below it (the 1 in the pic) instead of where the torches are (2). I haven't been able to replicate it since and land there. Driving me crazy, heh.

I have a rather large hankering for some Americanized Chinese food myself, this afternoon. Think I'll go get some. Just relaxing today. Definitely don't like to go out during the after-Xmas sale maddess that happens around here. Hubs is suddenly feeling poorly (a cold probably) so he's wrapped up in bed still. Poor guy. Maybe some wonton soup will cheer him up.

For these types of games I'd say I tend to like a mixture. Super important things and a lot/most of high level gear could always be in the same place/shop, don't mind that, but not *all* the best gear. And of course a large part of random could be, as someone else said, for the lesser smaller thing (potions, scrolls, gems/vendor trash, low quality gear). Or another type of occasional random I tend to like is where this chest will always spawn one of three pieces from this armor set (for example) but it's random which piece. Definitely don't want full random ala Diablo/Borderlands style. I like that just fine in those games, but that's a different gameplay/style of game. Even so, in a game like Eternity, if it's completely hand-placed and predictable, it's really really boring, on replay, knowing exactly where to rush to to get exactly what item you want for your Warrior/Mage/whoever to wear as soon as possible. I like at least some level of unpredictability, loot-wise. P.S. if all the "best" stuff is predictable, it better be a big whup-can of a fight to get it. (or expensive so you can't buy it all in one playthru etc...something)

Why are people selling the Greater Stone of Healing for 70k ad when exchange rate wise they're worth more like 580k+ AD? Are they free somehow, now? Not that I'm complaining. *snaps them up* Might get to try an Epic dungeon with a fellow who claims to know how to solo the end boss (glitches him I suppose). Guess he wants a cleric along. Told him I couldn't promise I wouldn't just die a lot but whatever. I'm game, if only to see it a bit.

Valve made Left 4 Dead and Left 4 Dead 2 free yesterday, for a limited time. If you hurry you may still be able to get them, they're great co-op games. Ah. I think I already have those, probably bought when they were $10 a piece once or something. Haven't ever DL'd them yet. Don't think hubby has them, but since I can't load Steam's page at the moment ....