Hordes!

Now for a real update :)

I’ve made the call - and went with Hordes as my chosen side on the WarMachine vs. Hordes discussion trail. My first starter box is the Circle Orobos, which features Kaya as the Warlock, two Argus’s (two headed wolves), and a Warpwolf. Should be a hoot :) going to be some new challenges for me in the way of assembly - particularly since most of the assembly points will not stand on their own, so I need to figure out some way to hold little pieces of metal together while glue dries. Thus far to support this part of the hobby I’ve snagged a set of small hobby files and a set of clay shaping tools to handle the green stuff manipulation. I’m hoping to find some time this week to try my hand at some hard core assembly action. Otherwise I’m slowly working my way through the rule book. I had Tony and Ross out to try the game - Ross is unsure, I think, but Tony wasn’t too keen on the prospect of painting little bits of metal and then moving them around a fake playscape :)

Father’s day was a great success - in addition to a great steak dinner my wife bought me BOTH Metroid Prime 3 AND Endless Ocean. I’m holding off on starting on Metroid just now (as I’m wrapping up the first installment of the Halo series - sorry, while I may play them I refuse to link to Micro$oft’s products because I’m an opinionated bastard), I did have some downtime this weekend (due to a sprained ankle) to get in some serious Ocean time. And that game is just blasted awesome - if swimming around doing literally nothing but looking at stuff is awesome to you :) I like it, anyway. There is zero rush or pressure to do shit, and you basically have this vast aquarium to amble around in. There are just two things to worry about: not swimming too far from the boat (which leads to you forcibly returning to it), and running out of air (which, also, leads to you forcibly returning to it). That’s it. I’ve interacted with some 6-8 different sharks, one of which is known to attack humans - with no issues. I swam around a humpback whale without getting clobbered by his tail flukes. I’ve handled puffer fish without getting poked. Etc :) Even cave diving is übersafe: If you get lost, just hit the “return to boat” option and try again. The game is pure genius, and a collector’s wet dream. Each creature (and there are hundreds) have 3 pages of information to unlock (all trivial stuff that can be found on wikipedia, of course), plus there are small salvage items to find (sparklies on the ocean floor) and pseudo-minigames (take a picture of this, lead this other diver to that) to do - but all optional. The entire measure of “progress” really is just how many different fish you find, some new clothing options, and getting all the necessary special diving equipment to go night diving and deep diving. To top it off you can connect with a buddy and go on partner dives. The controls are butt-simple, requiring only the wiimote. I file this under the “must have” category if for no other reason than how well they did the game.

One likely-to-be-acquired title for the PS3 - Burnout: Paradise City. This is just a fun little game that I’ve played the demo of and then recently watched a bit over at a friend’s place. Basically the concept is you are a car (well, “in” a car perhaps, but there are no pedestrians and no visible drivers - so you are basically just a car) living in a city. Nearly every intersection has some kind of “event” - a pure race, or a “marked man” event where you have to outrun folks trying to wreck you, or another event type in which you are trying to wreck as many other cars as possible, etc, supports online multiplayer racing, and generally just kicks ass in the fun department. As both I and my daughter find this sort of thing fun, it’s a likely contender for the “to buy after Rockband” portion of the gaming budget.