Friday 3 June 2016

Tomb Raider

I got the Tomb Raider reboot waaaay back for "free" on PlayStation Plus on my PS3 and I just picked it up and started playing it again. I recently had the opportunity to fast travel back to some previous areas and do some completion I'd missed the first time round. Having completed that I was delighted to find I was only at about 66% total completion so hopefully got a huge chunk of the game left to enjoy.

When it launched there was some pretty valid criticism of some of the tropes employed in the story telling and that jaded my experience at first but, as a game, I can't recommend it enough. If you like that sort of thing.

Wednesday 1 June 2016

What it's like to play FFXI

Back in the day we all played FFXI. My brother occasionally gets tempted back for a dabble. On his most recent foray he has what can only be described as the quintessential FFXI experience. I never played any other old school MMOs so I dunno how typical this is but it's classic Final Fantasy.

He writes (FYI he's dyslexic and I haven't proofed or corrected it):

So, the other day I started to collect blue spells again. It was going well but I realised if I upgraded some of my gear to llvl119, there were some with more blue skill etc which would make it easier.
 
So I looked into it and the upgrade to  Relic Feet 119, was much easier if I upgraded the old relic to +1 before making the jump to 109, then 119. It also saved me a lot of money.
 
So I needed to farm dynamis for some currency and the -1 item so that I could make it. before then upgrading it to ilvl119.
 
So I changed to thief, and I was annoyed that I was still using the Thf Knife and assassins armlets for TH, as it was brining down my ilvl score which in turn reduces the effectiveness of my Trusts therefor making anything I do on Thf more hassle.
 
So I thought, I will see what I can do to get some of the better TH items, I saw that I had the +2 version of the Empyrean armour from Abysea for the feet, and when upgraded to the new ilvl109 version had +2 TH and +3 on the ilvl119. I looked at the upgrade requirements and all I need was 1 item from an NM in Abysea.
 
Excellent I thought, and I said the one thing you should never say when playing FFXI "i'll go do that quickly then". Bored yet? this hasn't even got to the long winded bit.
 
So I looked at the NM. To pop the NM, you needed a Key Item from a lesser NM, and to guarantee the Key Item you need to get the red proc on the mob by using the right weapon skill. So I tool up as my newly levelled and skilled up warrior, as its the send best job for procs, covering about 80% (nin is best). I check the NM I needed to kill and it is popped using 3 farmable pop items, all for sale on the AH house. So I buy a pop set and head off as War/thf.
 
I choose the wrong atmas, and didn't pick the one with TP regen, I pop the NM and trying to proc the Red !!! was taking a long time as I was wafting on some weapons. Anyway, the proc turned out to be a WS from SAM, and as I had subbed Thf not SAM I couldn't proc it. Bugger I thought. but luckily the KI dropped anyway.
 
I popped the NM with the KI, without reading the wiki. turns out the NM does a disease breath move which knocks down your HP to a tiny amount if you tank it from the front. I was using a Trust tank who stood in front, died and the NM them proceeded to kill everyone else. GREEEAAATTTTT.
 
It's ok, ill just farm another 3 pop items.
 
First pop item, drops from normal mobs, I rounded up about 15 of them, fell cleaved a few and got a pop!
Second pop item, drops from a 10 min respawn NM, went and killed it, it didn't drop....
Third pop item comes from an NM, to pop this NM, you need a pop item from the mobs round his spawn...
 
It takes me 20 minutes, to farm another full pop, I pop the NM again, but the proc is Samurai again and the KI doesn't drop.
I then farm another pop, I get lucky, and its done in 5 minutes (still got sub thf here with TH2). I pop and no joke the proc is Sam again! no drop
 
So fuck it, I got back to Jueno and go War/Sam with the wooden katana. head back, minus TH. I buy another pop set and pop the NM! The proc this time is now NIN, so I cant proc and the KI doesn't drop....
 
So I go to farm another pop, with out TH. it takes 60 minutes to farm one pop set. In the end I ended up getting the bloody pop item I needed from a golden chest rather than the bloody NM.
 
I pop and proc the NM and the KI item drops, hurrah.
 
I pop the NM and tank it myself, making sure I am behind the mob, I kill it and item drops hurrah.
 
It's now 11pm, im arsey tired and stressed at the fact I spent 4 hours, doing something that stopped being fun after about 45 minutes, that I didn't even need to do, to do the thing I actually wanted to do. I log out and uninstall the game.
 
So the thing I did, to speed up the thing I wanted to do, to speed up the thing, to speed up the other I thing I was already doing, took 4 hours in the end.
 
TLDR - don't fucking play FFXI, until I reinstall it again in 2 weeks (read days).