Keyrock

It's a Dragon's Dogma 2 review. Edit: Here's another one: Along with the link in case it doesn't embed properly: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SQQO4C1veeI

Not the worst trailer I've ever seen, plus George Miller is 4 for 4 in this universe... 3 1/2 for 4... I'm more positive on Beyond Thunderdome than most people; it's not a great movie but I've watched in probably 4, 5, maybe even 6 times at this point. It's one of those movies that when I happen by it I'll just watch it and after I'll feel mildly entertained and like I didn't completely waste the previous 2 hours, which is more than I can say about some movies. Anyway, I'm totally down for The VVitch vs Thor, this is the crossover event I didn't know I needed in my life. I am curious, though, will this movie focus on Furiosa, because it certainly seems so from the trailer. That may seem like a stupid question for a movie called Furiosa, but Max isn't the main character of his own movies. He's the thread that connects them all, but he's just a drifter that passes through people's lives, it's those people who the movies are really about. Max is just some guy and then he's gone. He's more a force of nature than anything.

Yeah, I too was bummed when she was killed so early on.

Deep Rising (1998) - A group of soldiers attempts to rob the vault of an ultra luxury cruise ship in the middle of the South China Sea. Unbeknown to them there is another thief already on board the vessel and, more importantly, giant sea monsters. When they arrive on the cruise ship they take part in an Aliens ripoff rather than the Ocean's Eleven ripoff they were planning on. This movie stars Treat Williams and Famke Janssen and it's good, old fashioned, mid-budget action horror schlock. As mentioned, this movie very much borrows from Aliens; a ragtag paramilitary group fights to survive against monsters while stranded in a remote location. This is maybe the best Aliens ripoff I've seen. It's not as good as Aliens, but it's a thoroughly enjoyable movie. The movie is tense, it's very well paced, the acting is solid, the action is exciting, there is some really awesome gore, and the CGI, while obviously dated, is significantly better than what I expected from a mid-budget movie from 25 years ago. We spend just enough time with the cast and get just enough character development with each of them so that we care about them when the monsters inevitably kill them. Speaking of monsters, the movie does well to display the power and the threat of the monsters without actually revealing them until nearly an hour in, and only a partial reveal at that, the full reveal is almost at the very end. This is just a good ass movie. I very much recommend it to anyone that likes Aliens and movies like it.

Posting this Alone in the Dark review as a link since embedded youtube videos still don't show up for me on my desktop (they do on my phone). https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eFALcIRFrWw I like that you can play as the OG 1992 sprites, that's a neat bonus.

I made a new batch of mead, started it a couple of weeks ago. Today I bottled it and I of course tried a glass. My target is strong beer/weak wine strength around 9 or 10%ABV. I don't have a hydrometer, but going off how I felt after drinking a glass, I think I hit my target. It's sweeter than my ideal sweetness level but only slightly so, I'm within shouting range of my ideal sweetness level. It has a bit harsh finish right now, as expected, but given enough time to mellow, I think this batch will have a pleasant taste. I should add that I went with raspberries and mint for flavoring, which has the byproduct of giving the mead a really nice pink color.

@PK htiw klaw eriFHave you messed around with the free character creator? It's really good. The RE Engine produces some stunningly detailed character models, I'm happy seeing it used for games other than the Resi series.

Right now I'm leaning toward starting as a thief with either a fighter or a mage as my main pawn. As far as advanced vocations go, I'll cross that bridge once I start unlocking them.

I guess it's not on my end then. My guess would be forum weirdness too, I've been here long enough to post several rants about the forum software, I'll spare y'all posting another rant.

It's this Dragon's Dogma 2 trailer, hopefully it works this time. I can see it on my phone in my previous post but not on the desktop I posted it on. It doesn't make any sense. Edit: Nope, can't see it in this post either. I'll post it as a link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=18HF6jWRIBM I also changed it to a link in the original post. Maybe it's an age restriction thing? I don't know. Let's also try the same video from a different source, maybe this one will embed? Nope. Maybe it something on my end? I'm confused.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=18HF6jWRIBM Holy smokes, if this winds up being anywhere near as good as it looks... I mean, they kinda cheated by having Ian McShane voice the trailer, he's automatically going to make whatever is happening on screen seem better. Still, the combat looks freakin' awesome. We're gonna find out in a week's time, I guess.

After watching the trailer, I am now neither more nor less interested in seeing this movie.

I was waylaid by a golden saint not once but twice recently in my travels. This may seem like a nuisance, but in fact it's great fortune as golden saints supply among the best souls in the game, and I just happen to always carry grand soul gems on me. I turned one of the golden saint souls and an adamantium mace into this: That mace makes me nearly invincible in melee and 400 charges means that it will take a loooong battle for it to run dry. I guess the best defense against it would be paralyze, can't life-leach if I'm not attacking. I'm not sure yet what to use the other golden saint soul gem on. Anyway, I hope I run across some more golden saints.

The Aftermath (1982) - After a pair of astronauts crash land on Earth they discover that the planet has recently suffered an apocalypse. The few remaining survivors have to contend with mutants and a marauding gang of murderers and rapists led by Sid Haig. Last year I watched a vanity project called Empire of the Dark written, directed, and starring dad bod champion Steve Barkett. This is the second vanity project of his I've watched, although this one was made first. Very much like Empire of the Dark, this is just a classic enjoyable adventure B movie and way better than most vanity projects I watch. Better as in more technically sound, not necessarily more fun to watch. This movie is competently made; it's cheap and cheesy and the acting ranges from bad to mediocre, except Sid Haig, who's an order of magnitude better an actor than everybody else, but there's a plot I can follow, characters act reasonably sensibly most of the time, the shots are properly framed, and the subjects are in focus, that's more than I can say for many many vanity projects. I've enjoyed Steve Barkett's vanity projects, they're both cheap and cheesy but enjoyable solid B movies. Of the two I think I like The Aftermath better. The ending is rather dark and brutal, which I found pleasantly surprising. Typically in a vanity project our heroic star/writer/director saves the day and gets the girl, the same can be said for a typical adventure movie. Not here.

The character creator for Dragon's Dogma 2 is really great. The interface leaves a bit to be desired but the functionality is pretty great. You can make 5 characters and 5 main pawns and import one of each into the game when it releases. Here's one of the characters I've created: This isn't the first game to release a character creator before launch and I hope it's a trend that continues, especially if the character creator is fairly deep. I'll typically spend several hours when a game launches just making a character, letting me do that ahead of time is much appreciated. Here's a pawn:

I did a perilous trek south from Nivalis in extreme northeastern Morrowind south to Necrom. I was saving frequently along the way because there are some NASTY customers out in that part of the countryside, both in terms of bandits and beasts. The trip got me thinking about how this compares to the Morrowind in TESO, given that the Tamriel Rebuilt project got started before Oblivion released and long before TESO was a thing, so I looked up a map of the current TESO: Turns out the area I went through isn't even in TESO yet, it's the grey part north of Necrom, I cut a line south along the eastern half of that peninsula. That map actually goes a little bit further north, you can't zoom out far enough to show the entirety of what's in the game at once, even in openMW, but that's almost all of it. It's a little hard to see because they don't exactly use contrasting colors on this map, but there is the path I took south to Necrom, more or less along the eastern coast of the continent (I was always close to the shore but rarely on the actual shore itself), plus the parts of Vvardenfell and mainland Morrowind I explored previously. I'm currently in Akamora. I am consistently pleased with the content in the Tamriel Rebuilt mod. I was hoping this was simply more Morrowind and that's exactly what this is. I don't feel that this is a step down in quality compared to the vanilla Morrowind content. There are settlements, caverns, ruins, quest chains, encounters, etc. It's all been overall enjoyable and just feels like a natural extension of Morrowind. As you can see on the map, I have A LOT more to explore, plus there's more coming. There's no ETA AFAIK, but the next update to the mod promises to be the biggest ever and will be adding a big chunk of southern Morrowind. Eventually, I'll be able to go to Narsis.

After a long and perilous journey I finally made it to the City Above Necrom.

The town of Llothanis in far eastern Morrowind: It's unmistakably Telvanni, which means it looks awesome and is a nightmare to navigate.

Downloading the character creator now... Edit: I like the character creator. It gets pretty in-depth. It even lets you set your posture.

After attending to some mage's guild business in and around Balmora I decided to head back to the mainland for some more exploring, but this time I decided to go to Firewatch and branch out from there to explore the northeastern most part of Morrowind. Exploring along the coast I ran into a fellow Nord woman who did not take kindly to my presence. She put up one hell of a fight. In the picture I have half health but that was taken after I had chugged a potion, I was pretty close to death at one point. There are some fairly challenging enemies here so it's a good thing that I'm very well equipped. Venturing further north I then took a boat to Nivalis. This is about as far north as you can go in Morrowind, or all of Tamriel, for that matter. From here I plan to explore the island Nivalis is on then work my way south on the mainland toward Necrom.

Dirty shameless save-scummers.

I have sympathy for @kanisathaand @xzar_montybecause I was in a similar position some years back. I believe they are specifically looking for isometric RTwP CRPGs. A little while ago both isometric and turn-based games were out of fashion, so you can imagine that isometric turn-based CRPGs were few and very far between. Since then we have had a resurgence both in isometric games and in turn-based games, which is right up my alley because that's my jam, but now RTwP fans are the ones getting the cold shoulder. I unfortunately have no suggestions for y'all since, as I've mentioned, RTwP isn't my thing, so I have no reason to seek those games out, but hopefully some isometric RTwP games are in the works, plus RTSs. I feel bad for RTS fans, they've been malnourished for years. I don't play RTSs, on account of being complete dog**** at them, but, man, it's been tumbleweeds in RTS land for like a decade, I hope y'all get some good games eventually.

I finished Like a Dragon: Infinite Wealth clocking in at a svelte 150+ hours; probably a good 50 hours of that was on Dondoko Island. I also defeated the final bosses of both the Yokohama dungeon and the Honolulu dungeon. These are extra hard boss fights above the level of the final boss of the game, your Ruby and Emerald Weapons, if you will. Really great game that builds on the foundation of Yakuza: Like a Dragon. They made positioning in combat more important this time around with a whole array of combo attacks and assists. You have a bond level with each of your companions and at certain thresholds (10, 20, 30, 40 , 50) you gain assists with said companion. With that in mind, it's a good idea to get all your companions' bond levels up to 50 ASAP. Ideally, you get them up to 100 to unlock the 6th and final skill inheritance slot which you can use for Essences, but 50 is the big number because it unlocks the full spectrum of assists. You can set up some crazy chain reactions with assists, the enemies can do it too, the system works both ways, but the AI doesn't exploit the system that often, it mainly occurs by happenstance, whereas I'm constantly purposely setting up these chain reactions. I've one-shot groups of enemies using a standard, single-target physical attack by exploiting this system. Standard physical attacks and some skills have the knockback property, it's exactly what it sounds like, the attack knocks the victim back, sending them flying in a direction. This can knock them back into something in the environment, causing more damage to them, into one (or more) of their allies, damaging the ally(ies) in the process, and/or into one of your characters, triggering a free attack on the poor sod, provided you have a high enough bond level. You can ping pong enemies around the battlefield if you set things up correctly, it's pretty great. Battlefield positioning is also important for lining up enemies for AoE skills which hit enemies in a line or a cone, but that was already present in Y:LaD. The new map, Honolulu, is freakin' awesome. It's definitely RGG's largest map yet, it's significantly larger than Ijincho and absolutely dwarfs both Kamurocho and Sotenbori (no Sotenbori in this game, just Honolulu, Ijincho, and Kamurocho), that said, it's still tiny compared to other games. Honolulu, Ijincho, Kamurocho, and Sotenbori COMBINED would still be much smaller than Night City in Cyberpunk and that's without Dogtown. It's not the size of the map but the quality of its contents, though, and I'm happy to report that Honolulu is just as wonderfully meticulously detailed as all of RGG's previous maps. Back to Morrowind I go.