Day One Hundred fifty-one: evening of December 31st 2009

I just want to wish one and all a peaceful (or eventful, if that's what you crave), prosperous and healthy New Year.

Day One Hundred fifty: evening of December 30th 2009

Remember, I said that I was going to be working from my Mac Book Pro I would be transferring my MS Works files and work with them on MS Word for the Mac. Guess what? (Again, asking that question is a dead give away to what the answer is going to be.) It didn't work. I know that I could go on and give specifics - versions, file types, et al - but I'm not. It would be a waste of time. Microsoft to Microsoft and it did not work. Microsoft Word: 2008 didn't even ofter the the Windows Works file type (.wps). When I selected the 'all files' category in the OPEN menu, I was presented with, in essence, a message that said "huh?" When the file opened, the document on the screen was missing information and had, what I figure was, formatting information. I don't know what was going on, but that is the way it is. I could go out and upload a file conversion application to handle this situation, but I'm not.

The text editor offered by Blogger is sufficient. It catches the flipped characters, but misses the back-to-back word duplication the I occasionally type. So, it will do. I'll just have to be a bit more aware of what I'm doing (meaning - proof read). Maybe, I'll switch over to Word in the near future, because I prefer to take my time while I type and I don't like typing online.

I'll think about it.

Day One Hundred forty-nine: evening of December 29th 2009

As usual, I managed to squeeze in a few hours of Borderlands in the morning after breakfast. I hit the Level 50 around 11:15 in the morning, quit playing and started house work. The addictive qualities of the game are playing upon me. I want to finish the second play through to see how far I get, to see what Zombie Island is like, and play the DLC that is due out in January (PS3). I don’t need to play it, but I want to play it - addictive, huh?

The only thing that I’m going to do is transfer some of my text files to my MacBook Pro to work on MS Word as opposed to MS Works on my Toshiba netbook. The touch pad sensitivity on the netbook is a little distracting. I’m not a touch method typist, so my thumb hanging over the touch pad probably causes the sudden cursor shift that I experience while I type. I don’t have that particular problem on my Mac, but that machine is heavier, hotter, and larger that the netbook. I will be able to play Dragon Age: Origins on the Mac, which will take my mind off of Borderlands - replacing one addiction with a potential new one.

We shall see.

Day One Hundred forty-eight: evening of December 28th 2009

Today was a recovery day. I’m glad that we did a lot of the straightening up yesterday, because I fell asleep just about anywhere I sat down. We were able to go out and run some errands in the afternoon. When we returned, I loaded up Borderlands for a couple hours. I reached Level 49 before I broke for supper.

As I look back, I’m amazed at the way the game generates the opposition. I mean the kinds of creature are anchored to the location, but the actual strength and abilities of the creature are scaled up to match the advanced abilities of the player. More boss battles are against creatures or individuals that really requires assessing the threat level of the boss and any other of the multiple attackers, especially, if you plan to survive. Remember, regeneration costs, based on the funds that you possess-more funds=more payment due after regeneration.

When dinner was over, I walked the dog, fed the pets dinner, and settled in to see how much closer I could get to Level 50. Right now, I’m about 75 percent complete, and looking forward to the addition of the final points needed to advance. I also am wondering what I’ll do after I reach the level limit.

Day One Hundred forty-seven: evening of December 27th 2009

Assisted hosting the party, but by the time the party happens I was pretty much played out. The running up and down the stairs with two sets of chairs, totaling eight, placed a serious drain on my battery. Overall, it was a success. I think every one left sated and happy, two desirable results for any party. Those two can be superseded by the combination of sated, happy, and inspired. But two out of three isn’t bad.

Once I returned the chairs to their original location, I was able to find some time to play a little more of Borderlands, and advance from Level 46 to Level 48. Only two more levels before I max out the game and, now, I wonder if anything happens when that occurs.

We shall see what happens in the next few days.

Day One Hundred forty-six: evening of December 26th 2009

As peaceful as yesterday was today was very labor intensive for everyone in the family. Eight loads of laundry, shoveling snow offloading supplies for a party tomorrow, hanging a large graphic, all seemed to chew up a lot of time. Prior to the arrival of the party supplies, I managed to sneak in some Borderlands. Not much mind you, but I moved a little closer to the next level and picked up a welcomed enhancement for my turret gun.

Right now, I’m typing this entry, sipping some club soda with scotch, and watching a science fiction action flick - Komodo versus Cobra. You know its bad when a female adventurer being chased by giant komodo lizard with evil intentions, doesn’t throw off her heavy backpack to save her life.

Well, the military is going to drop the bombs in twenty minutes and I’m about ready to fire up something, as soon as the situation on the island is resolved.

Where is Godzilla when you really need him?

Day One Hundred forty-five: evening of December 25th 2009

With the family activities behind me, I was able to fire-up the Xbox 360 and play one of my gifts from my wife and daughter - Brutal Legend - at about 10 pm. So I tried to complete the first stage/scenario in the game. It is a very nicely done game. Villains look villainous, and heroes, heroic. The intro with Jack Black is interesting way to draw you into the visual setup for the game as a Rocker’s adventure in the old days of rock music. It was a wish by the Roadie, voiced by Jack Black, to go back to good old days of Heavy Metal. A wish that is granted after an on stage accident, and is well beyond his expectations.

So, I played through the first scenario, a tutorial, which introduced me to the basic moves, attack, defend, power moves, combos, and driving. I might have to play it again, just to get better feel for the controls, or just pull out the manual and refresh my knowledge of the moves that can be done. I’ll probably go with the manual and learn the moves over again.

As the game progressed, I wonder if I’ll be able to handle the driving sections. I have a tendency to keep the ‘pedal to the metal’ but, in this game, ‘maneuvering’ is an aspect of the driving portion of the adventure, and I’m going to have to master it.

The only other thing that happened was an email from my sister about the game Oblivion, which was her Christmas gift. It’s an old game, but very stable and I though, easy to get into. Well I was wrong, so I’ll have to answer it as soon as I complete my blog entry

Which I will do now.

Day One Hundred forty-four: evening of December 24th 2009

“’Twas the night before Christmas, when all through the house

Not a creature was stirring, not even a mouse. . .” I can honestly say that there are plenty of creatures stirring here, late this evening. I’ve described the tentative events that were supposed to occur and they did - almost exactly the way I stated. My batteries are pretty much depleted and I’m acting on impulse power. I did manage to sneak in about an hour or so of Borderlands, while the ladies were out doing some last minute acquisitions.

I have to upgrade my weaponry, even with large magazines I have to reload, which can lead to an early demise. This happened at an uncanny rate in scenarios that I had previously had a better success rate. The brute character, a heavily upgraded bruiser, needs in excess of sixty rounds of rifle ammo @150-160 points of damage per shot. Meanwhile my shield seems to vanish quickly if my opponents are firing from near by.

Although the turret gun is usually a lifesaver, if I don’t deploy it at the right time some of the suicide characters blow past the gun and hit me. I have stopped running up to a group of foes to throw down my turret gun, the beat a hasty retreat to wait for the turret gun to do its thing. I think that caused my death three times in four attempts.

Well, I guess you can ditto my wishes to you from yesterday’s post, and I hope you have “just settled down for a long winter's nap. . .”

Quotes from the poem “The Night Before Christmas”

by Clement Clarke Moore (attributed to him in 1823) or Henry Livingston (claims made by his family to have an earlier date - 1808 as per a Don Foster).

Nothing like a controversy to make an occasion a bit more interesting.

Day One Hundred forty-three: evening of December 23rd 2009

Today was a very hectic day, the safety release valve on one of the hot water heaters failed. Luckily I was able to get a hold of our plumbers, and the valve was replaced. But it is a temporary fix, the water heater is almost twenty years old , and has started showing its age. This event, plus the usual housework, and some Christmas preparations really twisted intentions of the day.

I managed to squeeze in about an hour and a half of Borderlands, and all I can say is it is a completely different game. The creatures from the first play through have evolved into major beasties, human, avian, and animal (I haven’t even gotten to the zombie island). I’m wondering how I’m going to handle some of the oncoming battles.

The good thing about the more powerful enemies- higher experience points. I was able to advance two levels in the short session. Another bad thing, the higher cost of living-weapons and player enhancements cost an extremely large amounts of cash.

Well tomorrow is another action packed day, waiting for the plumbers, wrapping presents, and more house cleaning in preparation for the family Christmas dinner on Friday.

Have a merry holiday season and best wishes for the upcoming new year.

Day One Hundred forty-two: evening of December 22nd 2009

I started wondering about starting a new game in Borderlands with my existing Soldier class character. He’s was at the 42nd level and in the coop game dominates the battlefield. Well that changed when I began a replay at the Soldier’s current level. Talk about eye opening. Most of the ordinary opposing forces are around the 32nd level, but the bosses are closer to the Soldier‘s level, heavily armored, and “packin’ heat.” The Soldier’s weapon will be issuing 300+ damage to a boss over and over, using up a clip of sixty shells and the beastie is still standing. The next thing I know - BAM - my shields are gone and I’m taking serious damage. The adrenaline kicks in, the controller is lowered to my lap for stability, and I reckon whether it would be better to turn about and run or drop my turret gun, then shifting to flank the opponent in this scenario. Most of the times the turret gun is enough, but on occasion, I run to the nearest cover and wait a bit, shield charging, and I’m looking at the HUD (Heads Up Display) checking the approximate location of the enemy forces. I’ve had to ‘fight for my life’ on at least three times so far.

I’m not sure what I’m going to do tomorrow. Take a break from Borderlands, and go back to Dragon Age: Origins on the Mac, or continue the Borderlands primary mission to finish up.

There are other games waiting in the wings, and I have to take on those challenges, also.

We shall see tomorrow, hopefully the snow shoveling won’t take everything out of me.

Day One Hundred forty-one: evening of December 21st 2009

I downloaded the Mac version of Dragon Age: Origins. It took approximately three hours to download and another fifteen minutes to expand/install. Once installed, I had to log onto EA Online to register/activate the game, then it was off to the fantasy adventure. It seemed to be structured similar to the console game, but there were differences in the character set up. Building the physical appearance of my character seemed smoother and less complex. I felt that the information about the skills and talents were better explained as I selected them.

I decided to try a different character type, so I selected to play as a human warrior. And the introductory story was completely different from the elf setup. The mechanics allow you to approach the adventure up close like the console or, using the scroll wheel, zoom out and play "a la Diablo" (Can you guess which I chose?).

I played for about an hour, moving through a set of interactions, and picked up my first party member - my pet war dog. We fought a battle against some large rats, and used the pause to assign the initial attacks and then let the battle take its course with only minor adjustments. No one was seriously hurt.

After completing the familiarization scenario, the real battle begins with a sneak attack upon the defenseless castle (the main force had been sent off to the impending battle against the Dark forces). Roused from sleep by the sounds of battle, I had to put on my armor and begin battling the human invaders with the support of my pet. After defeating the initial assault, I find that my mother appears to be alright, but as to the rest of the family, that has yet to be confirmed. I paused, saved, and exited the game. It was supper time. I’ll get back to it tomorrow.

I’m glad I have completed enough of the Borderlands adventure.

Day One Hundred forty: evening of December 20th 2009

I spent a few hours playing co-op Borderlands trying to handle the driving scenarios. My controllers are slightly out of alignment. There is a small forward drift to both of them, so much so, that I have pull back a bit to stand still. But during the driving scenario that requires the elimination of some crewed carts, that drift would mean I wouldn’t need to be controlling the driver and the gunner at the same time. The technique was moderately successful, if the attackers repeated their routes. But, as I said, moderately successful, because a few units didn’t follow a discernible pattern. In fact, one unit rammed my car, intentionally or unintentionally, resulting in the higher leveled character death.

Well, it was fun setting off down a flat section of the plain and firing off the main cannon.

Day One Hundred thirty-nine: evening of December 19th 2009

Today, I decided to attempt playing Borderlands in split screen mode or cooperative mode. Yesterday, although I didn’t mention it, was a very brief attempt was made to do this, but I was advised against it because the level differential between the characters was to great. It became apparent when all the enemy levels were closer to the level of the higher leveled player. Also, weapons, shields, grenades, and character enhancements were geared to the level of the higher team member. This left the lower level player unable to take advantage of found equipment. I aborted that game and decided to try it a different way on a different day.

Today was the different day. When I set up this game, I logged in the lower level player first, and then the higher level team mate was the second player. Generally, this worked out satisfactorily. The equipment levels matched that of the lower level player. However, during game play an occasional opponent had a level value closer to the stronger character. This isn’t a problem because the tactics employed keep the weaker unit behind cover, while the heavy weight blasts away. On occasion, the weaker unit can draw attention to it by firing at the opposing forces, forcing the enemy characters to move toward it. That can bring them under fire from the higher leveled player, and on occasion, could lead to a problem if you don’t begin cover fire right away and one of the attacking units has a higher level with more powerful weaponry.

It was fun replaying some of the game this way. I have to decide if I want to continue the broad approach, taking on all side missions, or just move straight through to complete the primary mission. We’ll see tomorrow.

Day One Hundred thirty-eight: evening of December 18th 2009

I spent about two hours playing Demon’s Souls this afternoon. It didn’t take long to familiarize myself with the controller, and was off to explore the castle that I initially started with. The side access that I had opened remained open, but I had to fight my way through the same foes that I had previously disposed of. Because the doorway had remained open, I was able to get to the battlement without having to retrace my original path.

I happy to say that I didn’t die during this run through, although I did come very close twice. The first close call was when I wasn’t able to separate to more heavily armed human guards, and the second happened when I trigger a trap on a narrow battlement causing large rounded boulders to crash down on me and the undead warriors I was engaged with. That last one was too close for comfort, luckily I had been collecting the smaller heath potions and was able to regain my health, and continue my exploration. What kind of things did I find: Another armored knight traps by undead warriors; a merchant, trap behind some ruble, who has a selection of armor and weapons - it looks like I will be fighting my way through the castle a few more times to accumulate enough souls (the only recognized currency so far; and some dragons, one at rest and the other alert. I got as close as I though wise, but ultimately I allowed discretion be my guide and returned to the nexus to repair and stow my old gear - my trusted leather helm, which was replaced by a plate metal helmet.

At this point, I decided to check out some of the other portals and will begin exploring the additional areas that may supply me with souls and equipment. We shall see what becomes of me in the near future.

Day One Hundred thirty-seven: evening of December 17th 2009

Borderlands is additive. I wrote that yesterday, and I stand by it today. I have found that in thoughtful video games that offer multiple characters to play through the game, really expand the nature of the game. Although the scenarios are the same and the game moves through those scenarios in about same sequence, the tactical solutions made to accommodate the strengths and weaknesses are intriguing, to say the least. This takes the game’s trial, error, and retry in new directions.

So today I finished with the stealth character, whose comments reflecting her enjoyment of her empowerment were funny in the beginning, but I wonder if those comments change as the game progresses (see, an addicting factor). Anyway, I shifted to the ‘tank’ character, the last of my selections. Don’t make the mistake of assuming there is a diminishing of intelligence with this character. You, and I, supply the intelligence to the character. But I will say that, after an initial session of running and jumping around the opening staging area, I started doing a stupid thing. My character, called Brick, is a tank type character and I began acting like a tank, which means that I moved straight at some foe straight on, taking all the bullets, until I’m close enough to strike out at my opponent. Of course, my health line is slowly disappeared (no shields at the start). Later on you can purchase a shield, but there are a few adventures before that occurs. After the shield, your special talent is attained. For the tank, it achieving a Berserk nature. Your only weapons are your hands, which become very powerful damage dealers. You still take damage, it doesn’t register because of the blood haze that your actions are filtered through. This talent actually permitted me to act out of normal approach. I actually went up to two of the early bosses and ‘duked it out,’ face to face, toe to toe, mano a mano. . . you get the picture don’t you. It was fun, and was not as threatening because I had gotten used to checking the impact of the boss and his henchmen on me. I think that I reached the ninth level before I stopped. How does this character do later on, when he takes on the ultimate boss (see another reason to stay hooked into this game.

Well. It’s late and I want to get everything squared away, before I hit the sack.

Day One Hundred thirty-six: evening of December 16th 2009

Borderlands is additive. I just wanted to try out the other characters. I thought that I would play the new character until I achieved a trophy for using the character’s special talent. I wasn’t sure I how long that would take, but at least it would be a fixed point.

So I started with the Hunter character, whose special talent is the ability to activate ‘falcon’ creature that would attack one of the creatures opposing me. The trophy is awarded when fifteen foes are killed this way. I think that occurred during the eighth or ninth level. I should have stopped, but I just needed to play a bit more to activate some weapon. If I wanted to play at a later time, it would be nice to have my character’s offense set. The next thing I know, it’s an hour and a half hours later, and I’ve passed level thirteen. I’m glad I was able to finish up my morning chores, because I could feel the guilt building. I stopped playing the Hunter, and shifted to the Siren.

Siren talent, as best as I understand right now, is a power stealth move. You press the activation trigger, she vanishes with a ‘pop’, is able to move unseen for x number of seconds and reappears with another ’pop’. Apparently the ‘pop’ can be destructive to those nearby. I haven’t tried it yet, because I had to run errands and get supper ready (everybody’ favorite Potbelly’s entrees with a latte chaser), but I will.

So my plans to play Demon’s Souls and Dragon Age: Origins fell through, but what’s the use of being retired if you can’t be a little flexible-maybe tomorrow or maybe not. We shall see.

Day One Hundred thirty-five: evening of December 15th 2009

I’m sitting here staring at the blank page, wondering how I should start and what should I say.

I finished Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 at its most difficult setting. Of course I have posted this on Facebook and Twitter. Nothing like posting ‘ennouncements‘.

As far as the closing scenarios, I got stuck in the airport boneyard, but I followed the in-game advice of a character (Nikolai) letting the two opposing forces hunting me fight each other down, and then move out taking care of the remaining ‘tangos’. I jumped the gun a few times and paid for it with restarts. There weren’t any bullets left in my sniper rifle, but my submachine gun had plenty of ammo for the last dash to the car near the runway.

In the last to scenarios, in the caves and on the water, I was a bit more cautious in some regards, relying on my hand grenades in the caves and erratic driving on the waterways to get out of tough spaces. I’m not going to cover the final battle with General Sheppard (no need for a spoiler alert), other than we survived.

Now I’ll go after Demon’s Souls on the PS3, and return to Dragon Age: Origins on the Xbox 360.

Day One Hundred thirty-four: evening of December 14th 2009

The day began with the usual activities, walking the dog and breakfast lattes for the ladies of the house. My morning repast is usually a cinnamon chip scone and a large coffee. But occasionally there might be a variation with a piece of banana-walnut loaf or, keeping with the season, a slice a gingerbread loaf. Today, when the respectable working people left the house, I settled in to complete Call of Duty Classic, before solving, if it can be solved, the snafued Modern Warfare 2 scenario.

The last set of scenarios in CoD Classic deal with the Russian campaign. They went smoothly, I survived most of them, but a problem appeared when I couldn’t sprint, which, in the opening scenario, got me killed twice. Normally, on the PS3, holding down L3 (pressing down on the left directional stick) permits a short bursts of speed to your run. After finishing up the final scenario, which entails clearing the way for the flag bearer to let the Red forces know the building was theirs. Halo and Call of Duty were the first shooters that I completed, so playing brought back so good memories. However, by comparison with today’s incarnation of the Call of Duty series, this one is dated visually, with texture mapping, physical appearance, and character movement being the easiest to notice. But for fifteen dollars it’s a nice intro to the genre.

Moving on to CoD: MW2 after my Classic experience proved unsuccessful as far as completion of the scenario is concerned. It convinced me that I was out of position, out gunned (I mean, I had to empty a clip into someone to take them down) and I had outstripped my teammate, who could be counted on for some support on my way to the last checkpoint. Conclusion, and not taken lightly, restart the whole scenario. Learning from my mistakes, I moved through the scenario, quite quickly. Really a bit too quickly, because when it came time to leave the safe house, I began to fail leaving the house. I paused and looked at the HUD map on the pause page. It shows where friends and foes are located. Granted, it only shows those enemies that are close by, but that is a big help in planning any moves. I had managed to pick up some heavier weaponry, earlier, including a light machine gun, which I used to my advantage. After assisting in clearing out the house and reloading my weapons, I decided to go to a back window and play sniper overlooking the field where my teammate was battling troops dropped in via helicopter. That field cleared, we began the run to the checkpoint. After five tries, with grenades and light machine gun blazing, we reached the checkpoint. I won’t say anymore because I don’t wish to give away the close of the scenario.

I want to close saying that I had gone on line to see what the walkthrough were describing, and other than the final run, I didn’t match any of the advice posts. What I liked was the free form solution process that players of MW2 are able to use. It is a boon to novices, who discover a personal solution to their bottlenecks.

Day One Hundred thirty-three: evening of December 13th 2009

Today was pretty much a low tech to no tech day: Laundry, pet maintenance, Christmas tree lights, dish washing, and Chicago Bears watching (most unsatisfactory).

When it became obvious that the Bears weren’t going anywhere, I snuck in a few hours of Call of Duty Classic on the PS3. The game is on the hard drive, so quitting is simple - no disk to remove. Not much has changed, the hard scenarios are still hard, and the graphics still hold up. I played through the American and British sections, yesterday and today, and had fun with the challenges of the first Call of Duty game.

During the British defense of the bridge on D-day, after throwing some grenades, it dawned on me that during my stalled progress in Modern Warfare, yesterday, I threw some grenades, but when I completed the previous scenario, I didn’t have any grenades, flash-bang or fragmentation, when I left the building. Hopefully the appearance of grenades in this one might mean I have some smoke grenades available. If that is the case, then I have something else to try tomorrow.

Well it’s pleasant sitting here with the Christmas tree’s lights supplying some of the light in the room. After taking out the dog, it will be straight to bed.

Day One Hundred thirty-two: evening of December 12th 2009

I’m having trouble thinking about which direction I should take in this post. I could talk about going online to play Modern Warfare 2 and my adventures there, or how I got myself into a pickle in MW2 in the next to the last scenario and can’t figure out what to do to survive, or what the outcome of my old students attempt to reach ‘prestige’ in 24 hours.

Normally, I go verbose, but I’ll really keep it short.

I had fun in MW2, and advanced from Level 1 to just short of Level 9.

No matter what I do, I can’t survive this part of the scenario. I’m blasted by mortars and shot at by any one who has a weapon and I can’t escape the situation.

It seems that they finished playing early this evening, but didn’t make it to Level 70.

Well that is it, have a fine evening and don’t let the bed bugs bit.

Day One Hundred thirty-one: evening of December 11th 2009

Very short entry today, I’m watching some of my old students play Domination on Modern Warfare 2.

I had to change my PS3 hard drive, it reached its limit when I tried to download Call of Duty Classic. The only significant problem was the size of the drive that I upgraded to-60GB to 80GB. It will do until I can get a 320GB or 500GB hard drive over the weekend.

I found out that I needed to use a special program to use FAT32 (related to the File Allocation Table), but allow the PC to format the backup drive as 100GB rather than the prescribed 32GB.

The next problem was the length of time it took to set up the new internal 80GB hard drive. Backing up the PS3 hard drive to the 100GB HD - about two and a half hours. And the reverse is took about the same time. So hard drive time totaled about five hours, and that was for an 80 GB hard drive.

The actual swapping of the drive went well, just like the photos showed.

Well, I’m going to end this and go watch my students play CoD:MW2.

To the victors the spoils.

Day One Hundred thirty: evening of December 10th 2009

It took me about an hour and fifteen minutes to collect the balance of the zombie brains. I tried to remember where I repaired the claptrap bots, because I had accumulated 39 item storage slots and I wanted to repair the last one for a trophy. But after reviewing the various potential sites, I decided it was time to move on.

Before moving on, though, I had to shovel snow and do some housework. Once the tasks were completed, I setup to play Demon’s Souls. After starting the PlayStation, I notice that the PlayStation store was offering Call of Duty Classic for fifteen dollars. I enjoyed that game on the Macintosh, so I purchased it to see how it looked and worked on the console. I started the download and saw that it would take about thirty-five minutes, so I loaded up Demon’s Souls, and began my new quest. After accepting one of the ready-made characters, I started the tutorial session.

The tutorial is setup to familiarize you with the basics of movement, combat, interaction with the game, and checkpoints. Once you go through this, you end up in boss battle with a demon called the Vanguard, and you die! End of tutorial.

Not really, and this is where I’m a bit confused, you end up in a place called ‘The Nexus’. I guess it’s a purgatory of sorts, where some of the souls of the fallen are captured and allowed to venture out gathering demon souls, ultimately buying your way back into your world. In the Nexus, you interact with other souls and learn the some of the background of where your at, actions that you can take, how others have acted, and basic character management.

Your path back into the world, as a soul catcher, is through one of five touchstone portals. I picked one that was close at hand, and was transported to the battlement of a castle. You are quickly introduced to serious combat. Cautious movement is key, move to fast and you trigger multiple enemies. Their goal = your elimination. One slow lightly armed attacker, can be handled with minimal damage inflicted on your character, if any. But release two or three at the same time, and you will be re-starting the level at the beginning with all collected souls lost and health plants diminished by the amount you used prior to your demise.

Re-starting means just that, all the enemies are reset where they had been before your demise and you have to battle through them again. Now there is some help along the way. If you see a bloodstain on the floor, move over it, and activate it when you are notified to do so. You will see a ghost like form interacting with an unseen foe. Take this to heart, “Forewarned is forearmed,” actually works here. Glowing runes on the ground, usually pass on verbal information or messages from previous player (?). If a body seems to have a glowing orb over the body, move over it and activate it when prompted. Usually, there are items available for you, from medicinal plants to battle equipment. If you move over a bloodstain that is where you died in battle, you will be informed that, after clicking on the stain, you have regained all you lost souls. So remember where you ended your adventure.

I played for a few hours, died six to eight times, and ended my adventure without actually completing the level, so that means that I’ll be re-stating at the beginning again, when I return to the castle.

I don’t want to go online, yet. I want to really be confused or stressed before I tap into the forums. This is a challenging, trial and error, form of adventure.

Live long and prosper.

Day One Hundred twenty-nine: evening of December 9th 2009

Steven Colbert is on and I can barely keep my eyes open. I spent some time on Borderlands, but no major accomplishments, although I did accept the zombie brain collection quest and I’m on the last set of brains (250) to feed to the character known T.K. Time to spray bullets at eye level to harvest the brains of the zombies. I’ll try to finish it off tomorrow and get back to CoD: MW2. I’ve got to restart my Demon Soul adventure, too.

Moving furniture up stairs is a tiring activity, but it had to be done.

This more like a Twitter entry.

Day One Hundred twenty-eight: evening of December 8th 2009

So it was zombie hunting in Borderlands today. Basically, game play in "The Zombie Island of Dr. Ned" can be described as: Get a mission and fight zombies types to achieve the missions objectives, then return, fighting zombie types all the way back. Repetitive, yes, but fun. The variety happens with the various types of attacking zombies. Some are fast, some are slow, some spews caustic fluids, others are heavyweights that heave 55 gallon drums of an explosive materials, and the are even midget zombies. They respond to gun shots, moving toward the reports. This results in an effect similar to waves of zombie attackers. You’ll get done with the job at hand, look up and see more zombies are bearing down on you. There are occasions, with you shields depleted, warning beeps going off, when you look at the Heads Up Display (HUD) to check on the location of the zombies, wondering will the waves ever end (but not for long).

Of course the final objective will involve a ‘boss’ battle. You’ll probably have learned how to circle and fire, recognize when the ‘boss’ is planning a power, then adjust your path to clear away from the upcoming threat, and ready to move away to recharge your shields and health in the worst case scenario.

I’ve played "The Zombie Island of Dr. Ned" somewhere between nine to ten hours and have had a lot of fun with it. I cost ten dollars, and that breaks down to about a dollar an hour. Not a bad cost to entertainment ratio.

Day One Hundred twenty-seven: evening of December 7th 2009

This morning I played Modern Warfare 2 again, right after I changed the kitty litter, of course. Then managed to get bogged down in the capture of the sub base. It was funny, I made it through both the stealth approach and the village fight with one or two setbacks, but then the sub base. One and a half hours spent trying to beat the clock. Two minutes from the first shot until reaching the check point. A helicopter, armored troop carriers, troop trucks, and 30 to 40 armed troops, whose mission was to prevent our group from reaching that check point. I can control a Predator armed with missiles that I can control. The supply is unlimited, but there appears to be a twenty to thirty second arming time, so judicious use is important.

My opening shot is a cooked off grenade over as small group of guards by the gate, follower by taking out the helicopter and some nearby troops (big explosion). Then it deteriorates into a street fight with three possible paths, left, right, and center. Sticking with some of you group is important. The left path takes you through a building with three or four tangos and then out into the open toward a central building that happens to be the destination of the troops choosing the central path. Joining forces to fight our way through the covered way sounds like a good idea, especially if the Predator is used to thin out some of the enemy troops in front of you. This opens into parking area and a road way with an area packed with large shipping crates (good cover, if you have time and you don’t). Just about thirty meters beyond this staging area is the checkpoint. Oh, there are some two story buildings ringing the checkpoint, of course the are no snipers there - not. It’s a nice killing field. Ultimately, after trial and error (heavy on the error), I chose the right side to travel down. Your right flank is protected by building with some gaps, filled with enemy soldiers. Your left is afforded some broken protection with a petrol truck and a large petrol storage container, all very flammable/explosive. Rather than wait for it to explode next to you, the Predator targets them and any nearby troops. This can clear a path to the next gap, and then the end of the above mentioned roadway. If you wait to long at any of the gaps, you’ll become a sitting duck and you’ll run out of time.

Once you reach the end of the road a troop truck will appear, requiring immediate interdiction by the Predator. If you have about 40 seconds left at this point, you have a good chance of making through. Stay with your mates as much as possible, and remember the two story building crewed by snipers. There is a point when you about 12 meters away from the checkpoint when you have to make the decision whether to be cautious or make a dash for it. Out of four tries, I succeeded once. I swore I had covering fire, but those darn snipers weren’t suppressed. I did some quick fire as I dashed on that final try to see, if I could keep their heads down. Something worked that last try. That was a good feeling which lasted about two seconded and then the final part of the mission kicked in. We had to cover an operative and defend our second store loft. Claymores, Predator strikes, and some sniping completed the mission, as they say in literary circle, almost anticlimactic.

I played some Modern Warfare 2 Special Ops challenges and finished off by heading into Borderlands for zombie control. I think there are four more scenarios left in CoD: MW2, and that will be the end of the veteran challenge. Huzzah!

Day One Hundred twenty-six: evening of December 6th 2009

More Modern Warfare 2 was played today. Sometimes working solo works, especially if a flanking move will be effective. Other times, sticking with your squad will add their firepower to yours, allowing you to use cover when needed (recovering from injuries) without fear of being flanked. But there are situations where the enemy units appear out of nowhere, bypassing your squad mates. This can be irritating, to say the least, but I guess the game's AI is trying to tell you something about your positioning/defense. Sometimes, if possible, I’ll place a claymore there.

If I get a chance tonight, I’ll boot up Demon Soul on the PS3. According to a number of reviews it is extremely challenging and very unforgiving - Caution is the word.

Day One Hundred twenty-five: evening of December 5th 2009

I decided to play Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 at the veteran level. I was watching an Xbox Live piece about playing MW2, and the Xbox staffers that were hosting that segment said that that was the way to go. It’s very challenging and very frustrating at times. In other words, your avatar, you, die a lot. Well it’s true. I’m about a third of the way through and I’ve lost track of the times that I’ve “pined for the fjords” (a Monty Python parrot reference). I was amazed that I actually got through the first half of Brazilian slum scenario, but I did.

Advice: know where the next check point is and do what ever it takes to survive until you get there. If you die before you get there, know what was the cause of your demise. The ‘tangos’ don’t always reappear in the same place at the same time, but you should be aware that the game’s AI considers that a prime location to place a weapon. If you have enough grenades, use the walls to carom them into the center of the next room, flash bang or fragmentation, just remember not to run into the room before they go off. If the situation allows it, play the corners, using them to screen you while you acquire and shoot your tango. I’m not very good at returning grenades thrown at me, so I run a lot. This exposes you to fire, but if you know the lay of the land behind you, you might find a nook to duck behind. Switch weapons, based on situation you are entering. If the tangos are close, shotgun or machine pistols will work, otherwise assault weapons.

Well, I have to get back to the second half of the Brazilian slum scenario. I need to prepare myself for a leap of faith, after a long run.

Day One Hundred twenty-four: evening of December 4th 2009

It was me versus Microsoft and Apple on a computer, not the corporations but their manifestation in the computer. My wife needed to use a PC for engraver that runs on a PC. There was no Mac version of the software. Her lab is completely Mac, but according to the online ads at Apple, this isn’t a drawback. I know that because I’ve used Parallels to play some PC games on my Mac Book Pro.

But, her situation was different. One of the machines that she received from another school, that graphics program had changed, had used BootCamp with Windows XP Professional. She activated the virtual PC, installed the engravers software, and discovered to her great satisfaction that everything worked. But, there is always a but, she couldn’t get the computer to hook up to the her local network. Try as she might, nothing worked. She has set up the network and oversees it from her desk. She knows how a Mac network works. I know that Parallels’ virtual PC works with our wireless network, and BootCamp should to. So I went to school with her today to see if I could ‘fix’ the situation.

After running a Mac/PC lab for three or four years, I sort of familiar with the operation of the two operating systems (OS). I set up a bridge Mac that was recognized by the Pcs and we could transfer files between the two OS. Anyways, I sat there opening the properties of the various network components, both Ethernet and the wireless components, tweaking the settings. I did this for a couple of hours. You know how it is ‘man versus the machine.’ I knew I could get it to work. Whatever was not happening, was because something was missing. When I had exhausted all of my options, it was time for the internet search to begin. In hindsight, I should have started here, but I knew Windows.

Some of the items, missed the issue, but finally, modifying the search, I ended up with information that described the initial setup of the application with the operating system. There it was, the magic word. The word that I should have remembered from my previous experiences with Windows - DRIVERS.

As best as I can figure, the techs at the previous school, probably wanted to see how BootCamp worked. They installed a basic setup, fired it up and left it right there. They never installed the Windows drivers that would allow the virtual PC to recognize various Mac components. I manually installed anything and everything that might be of use. I had to manually install the drivers because the XP version running did not have Service Pack #2 on it, so the Windows installation wizards wouldn’t work. Well, to prevent this entry from becoming a chapter of a book, after some minor property adjustments, the connection to the network happened, and we were on line. I tried installing Service Pack #2 but the hard drive that the techs at the other school had set up wasn’t large enough (5.5 Gigabytes) to hand the temporary files - Ratz.

I found some fixes for this problem, but they were all time consuming, and I was running out of time. This operation took way longer than it should have. All because I didn’t remember ‘drivers’ soon enough. Oh, Windows, Windows, Windows! I hardly know you.

Day One Hundred twenty-three: evening of December 3rd 2009

This is a case of brain dead writing, I’m exhausted after running around literally morning, noon, and night (the breakfast food and coffee run, the dentist appointment in the afternoon, and going out to dinner - okay it’s not that demanding but there was a visit to the dentist). Brain dead is appropriate, considering the hour or two that was spent on 'hot lead' zombie control in the Island of Dr. Ned , between the dentist and the dinner. This is the latest downloadable content for Borderlands.

It was fun, but repetitive. But what would you expect when you’re told what the mission is and the prime directive requires you shot for the head.

I’ve tweaked my character using the character tree. Now, my character’s health regenerates with the destruction of the tangos. What better place to have this trait than a zombie hell. I haven’t had to use a health potion since my arrival. I’ll have to see his works out when I hit a major boss.

Day One Hundred twenty-two: evening of December 2nd 2009

What a difference a few levels and the right equipment can make. I breezed through the final Borderlands' gladiatorial challenge that I had problems a few days ago. The extra levels enhanced my life source, and my proficiency with weapons also increased the power of the weapons. Selecting the most appropriate military skill unit (heavy gunner) added more power, accuracy, and increased magazines size meant that I could hit hard, fast and longer than my opponents. I was a pleasure watching the hit points flow away from my intended target.

I committed a number of errors in play. The chief one was finishing the game before I checked out the side quests. Talk about being sucked into a game. I would think along these lines, “I just need a few more points to level-up. Just until two pm - for sure,” or “Wow the guardian characters look so interesting, how hard is it to take down,” or “I’m not going to let this monster beat me.” So, as the trophy was entitled, “Destroyed the Destroyer.” Even after the end of the game, I decided to see if I could find the Zombie adventure. The rational, “How do their zombies look?” The game designers sure knew how to bait, lure and catch the gamer in this epic adventure (40 hours minimum, estimating the approximate time on game). I can let it rest here or look into another game, with a different character type (more points for me if, if I’m picked up. ‘Decisions, decisions, decisions.”

Just before I started this post, I noticed a ‘making of ‘Avatar’’ on cable. The computing powers used to link the real actors with their ‘avatar’ for on the fly viewing the of the scene was truly amazing. I am looking forward to the release of this movie, even if I view the movie some times after its release when the blu-ray DVD is issued.

Day One Hundred twenty-one: evening of December 1st 2009

I’ve changed direction in Borderlands, I need to see if I can build up may character a bit more before I return to the third round in the arena. I found a few forums that describe the same state that I encountered the other night. Most respondents offered solutions, based on what worked for them. A few described steps that didn’t work for me, like waiting, or moving around the arena, or checking in corners for stuck foes. One individual, criticized the respondents for whining and, essentially, to suck it up. This seemed sort of an arrogant position, unless the individual is a purist, offering no help under any game play related situation. No one called the individual out for the statement, and I didn’t feel like joining that forum. A few individuals, said that they ‘sat on a grenade’ and restarted the challenge.

So, I picked up a different quest and moved on, knowing that I would return at a future time and finish that quest. I’ve advanced two levels since the then, and picked up some more potent equipment. I’m closing in on mastering a couple of weapons. I’m not quite sure what that does, other than I received a trophy for the first mastery that achieved. Maybe, I'll be returning to the arena in the near future.

This afternoon, I spent the last few hours devoted to the completion of Borderlands’ main quest, which is where I’ll be returning that scenario as soon as I finish this up.