Tale

Woohoo, excluded from jury duty. I was number 9 in the pool for a 6 person jury. The bailiff actually called me to be number 6 in the box, but then recalled that because I was excluded and he overlooked it. I assume it was a demographic exclusion, since the jury ended up being filled with people who have more grey hair than me. Which is a feat.

I'm feeling quite dashing today. A month ago I was considering to get my yearly haircut. That's how I do it, I get it cut down to nothing and then let it grow until it annoys me. Well right before I decided to do it, the attractive cashier that's a decade my junior at the grocery store asked me if I always got compliments on my hair. She said if she was a guy, this is the hair she would want. I decided I had to keep it. Today at work, the boss' son's wife told me she liked my beard. I guess I have to keep that. And in today's writing group, one of the others told me they thought my hair looked good in the ponytail I'm trying out. Now to find women my actual age.

Persona 5 It's just like 3 and 4 before it really. I feel like I've played it already. But since 3 and 4 were so great, it's not a bad thing.

Aww man, I miss that game. Instant buy. Can't wait for them to announce the sequel's port.

I love Nier: Automata so much. I played it three games ago and still can't stop thinking about it.

Just watch the ending on YouTube. I did that for the first Nier. I did watch the ending on Youtube. But doing that for Nier? Not even on the same level. SHAME

I think I need to accept that I'll never beat Drakengard 3. The final boss is a rhythm game. The boss shoots out waves of music and you have to tap a button when the wave hits you. And then it starts playing with the speed. And there are plenty of moments towards the end where you can't follow it visually. The action's off-screen, the screen is all black. All you have is the sound and timing. And sometimes the timing has changed. If you miss even once, you're done. The leading method of beating it seems to be syncing up video guides and following their timing. But I'm not having much luck syncing. I loved the journey of the game, but thank god Nier: Automata didn't have this kind of bs.

You sigh, I get excited. I finally have Ghost in the shell SAC. Good price on that. Didn't buy any games, though. My backlog is too intimidating.

The launch version of PS3 and generally the fat versions did overheat a lot. It's actually pretty interesting that it has managed to work this long. You should buy a new PS3 pronto since they just went out of production last month. Mine is still working but I'll buy a spare one next month since I still play a lot of games on it. Tip: try to find a slim version instead of the 500 GB super slim. The super slim has a weird disc tray and it can be bothersome. They're hard to buy new from good sellers as it is. Gamestop only sells used consoles. Target, Walmart, Amazon only sell third party. The "Amazon's Choice" third party is a super slim. Edit: And I've ordered my PS3. Amazon Prime had an option for delivery today, so I'll be back on the wagon in no time!

Yeah, there's lots of people with the same issue. It precedes a YLOD and was apparently pretty common in the old 60GB models. Which is what this is. I ended up eventually buying 3 PS2s and have already moved to my second PS4. It's about time the PS3 was replaced. I got the dang thing at Circuit City.

Guess I'm not playing Drakengard 3 anymore. My PS3 is shutting off in the middle of play, with online reports saying it matches symptoms for everything from overheating to drive failure. I was really enjoying it, too. How are PS3s still $200? And I still have Trails of Cold Steel 1 and 2 to play on PS3. And I am itching to replay the original Nier.

Drakengard 3 It's actually quite good in a "I haven't played any warriors games to compare, but the characters are simply delightful" kind of way.

I attended a writing group yesterday. Actually a little disappointed because of how casual the whole thing was. It was less a group for writers to help each other and more a group for writers to chat. A little too self-guided would be one way to put it. It was also the first time I've gone to a social event in over 7 years. So that was nice. I'm pretty sure I convinced them all I was a normal well adjusted adult. The fools.

I've moved on to Horizon Zero Dawn, but I can't stop thinking about Nier Automata. HZD isn't grabbing me at all.

Got ending E in Nier Automata. It's the best ending. Other players sacrificed their save data to help me see it, so when it came my time, I chose the same. Now I need to restart to get 100%. Edit: and by "restart" I mean I pulled my save file off PSN from yesterday. So I only lost about 8 hours of game time.

My birthday was yesterday. Went to work, went out to eat, went for a walk in the dark. That's how it goes. Signed up for a writing group today. I didn't know there was one so close.

That damn hover thing didn't even show up until DLC. The Mako was necessary for the main game.

I regret to say I'm going to miss the launch. Between Nier, Horizon, and Torment I simply don't have time for it. Given how big a fan I am of the last two I'll certainly buy it at launch, but I won't be playing for another month or two.

It certainly did, just not heavily. The gun upgrade system existed in its form because of the microtransactions in MP. The game had total parity between single player and the multiplayer horde mode. They basically farmed out all of the combat to the MP team. It's why single player has no collectors, no mercenaries, no thugs, no Krogan, not even wildlife. It's only Reapers, Geth, and Cerberus in neatly organized armies. And not even any battlefields where two groups fight, because that wouldn't be in MP either. It seems like the only actual mechanics the single player team were responsible are the awful awful boss fights.

Anything's possible. I'm not one to completely dismiss something. Otherwise I'd never have played Dragon Age: Origins or ME2. And I loved those two. Even Inquisition had enough redeeming qualities that I can say it was worthwhile. Heck, I enjoyed a second playthrough of Dragon Age 2 not too long ago. I'm not optimistic, but I'm also not inclined to think that one terrible game means all others will terrible.

I'm still waiting for impressions from people who thought ME3 was a dumpster fire. Not really interested in the opinions of people who thought the ending was a-okay and game systems built for microtransaction laden horde modes are great for single player.

Finished my first round of Nier Automata at around 18 hours. Trying to decide if I should continue with the second round or play some Horizon instead and come back later. I don't feel I've got the meat of the game yet, though.

I started by playing Nier first since I loved the first one. I'm getting some strong Metal Gear Rising vibes from the gameplay, though it's more forgiving on Normal than I remember that one being. Complete with enemies giving a visible cue before attacking and dodges not being able to cancel out of many attacks. But then a successful dodge leads into a powerful counter. It also feels a lot more open than MGR did. That game was about as linear as they get, but this has some modest open world elements to it. And it looks like you should be able to teleport around and revisit old areas with no problem. It even stole some Dark Souls mechanics, too. No auto-save, instead only saving at the warp points. If you die, you end up back at that point, losing stuff, and have to go get your corpse to get it back.

Horizon Zero Dawn arrived yesterday and Nier Automata is arriving today. I'm super hyped. Might finally end my anime binge for some games.

Anyone out there know lots about hot sauce? Trying to get into it. Grabbed a bottle of Cholula a few weeks back only to find out that's probably the weakest stuff. And recently grabbed a bottle of Louisiana. That's doing only a little better. Both are delicious, but I'd like something that's a bit harder on me. I can slather a slice of pizza and only end up finding the residual heat to be mildly annoying. But I don't want to go crazy, just looking to graduate.