But it flew away from her reach, and the bullets catch in her teeth

Happy 2012.
This may be the last year that mankind continues to exist! Or it may just be another notch in our belt of millennium. Regardless, I hope you are doing ok.

I have not been up to much, honestly.
With the BBC project done, and the minecraft cartoon finished, I have mostly just been horsing around with friends during the holidays and catching up on some much-needed gamery.

I did produce a video for christmas and even though its a couple of weeks after christmas, I hope it still fills you with christmas cheer!


For christmas I got my brother a giftcard and a nice warm beanie hat. For my father I got an FM internet radio transmitter so he can listen to his favorite internet radio stations in his room. My dad has pretty damn good taste in music. Old records of eric clapton and the peaches, and loves modern stuff like M83 and the White Stripes.

I got some great DVD's for xmas and a nintendo 3DS which I havent gotten any games for yet but due to me registering it online I got a free copy of Mario vs Donkey Kong which is a downloadable title for the Nintendo DS's now. It's also hard as fuck.

I also bought a small game off the downloadable game service called FREAKY FORMERS.
What little I can say about this bizarre 2D spore knockoff is best said with this video I made about it. Enjoy.



I've also been trying alot of new games lately.
I got into the beta for Tribes 2. I am awful at it.

I downloaded DC UNIVERSE ONLINE.
I played it alot for about 3 weeks until I reached the end-game content. And much to my dismay, like most MMORPG's the endgame content is just more boring fetch-quests and copy-paste nonsense. So I stopped playing. May uninstall it eventually. I just have no reason to go back. For what little there is, it is glorious. But not enough for me to pay money or replay much of it.

However in my time playing it, I did make 2 sort of cool characters.
The first was SERGEANT DOE, based off the Team Fortress 2 Soldier character. He used rifles and gadgets and was a Controller. Controller by the way, is the most unfun class to be in DC Universe. Don't do it. Just don't. It's a horrible complex thankless job.
Anyway. After getting to the endgame raids and crap with him and growing bored I decided to make a villain character.


Strelok from S.T.A.L.K.E.R. Shadow of Chernobyl and Call of Pripyat. Electricity and pistols. Superspeed for movement. Much more fun than Doe. However all the villain quests were the same as the hero ones and I just couldn't be bothered to go through it all again.

If you're a fan of World of Warcraft and enjoy mindless skill-less repetition than feel free to give DC Universe Online a try.

I also got into EVE ONLINE. I received a 30-day free trial from a friend. And I made another Strelok.
EVE might be the most intelligent, complex and brilliant online game ever created. However in being these things it is also perhaps the most dull. Sadly even giant space battles between dozens of ships basically boil down to droves of brilliantly-designed frigates and vessels orbiting each other slowly firing various subsets of multi-functioning ammunition at each other to see who blows up first, while adults shout orders at each other in VENT.
I'm not really sure what to make of it. I think if the battles were turn based and more strategic I'd probably have loved it. But for being so large, so long, and needing so much time and money to play and understand things that could really be simpler and more intuitive, I just can't recommend it. It is beautiful though. Like most MMO's its worth trying just to ogle at the insane world the artist's have created for it.


So with little else to play when it comes to 'rpg' sort of things I have returned to my first love, Spiral Knights. Joined a guild full of knowledgable chaps and have retooled my knight into a tank of death.

I'm the one with the gasmask. I have started doing what so many players of the game do in that I have started building sets for my character. Different loadouts of gear that I swap to and fro depending on the types of foes I may face in the upcoming challenges.
Mostly with the help of my good friend Avid Lebon. Who is not only a fun person to play games with but also helped me sort out some frightening psychological issues I had 6 or so months ago.



______________
______________
______________
______________
______________


It's not just been vidya gaems however. My friends John and Jack introduced the rest of the friend group to an odd series of modern board games. Each of which is rather unique and show just how much potential board games still have if people are creative when designing them.

The first is a game called Settlers of Catan. This game is apparently world famous and has been played by billions and has huge contests, conventions, and songs devoted to it. Somehow I had not heard of it until a couple of weeks ago.
It is rather brilliant. A sort of clever mix-up of risk, stratego and monopoly where you have to seize land and roll dice to see if it gives you the resources you need to expand. Every expansion earning you a Victory Point which brings you closer to winning. Things in the game can change rapidly at the drop of a hat and theres quite a few expansions that make it into an even deeper experience.


Along with Catan we've been playing Puerto Rico which is a sort of a stock game. You basically claim a crop and choose which character in a town you will be. AS the turns go, you can collect crop, sell it, put it on boats, hire workers, etc. At the end of the game theres several various tech-trees to earn points and whoever has the most is the winner. It too, is strategic and is apparently enjoyed the world over.


And finally we have been playing a massively complex tabletop game that seems almost reminiscent of warhammer, but does not play as such called Twilight Imperium. I honestly can't describe the complexities of this game. Basically imagine every mechanic and tool from every board game, tabletop game, dungeon and dragon campaign, and video game rpg ever used and combine it all into one sci-fi epic where you are basically playing the Republic from Star Wars. Each game lasting nearly 6-10 hours in length.


The amusing things about all these games is, as fun and strategic as they are, human nature turns them into something else entirely. We sit down thinking to have a cultured experience about outwitting each other but we quickly devolve into petty neanderthals trying our hardest to win the game without seeming aggressive.

Here is what you think will happen:


But here is what actually happens:



I would recommend playing all 3 games. You can play Catan online at the official site but I think it costs money.



Anyway. My internal clock is summoning me to the land of slumberville to catch 40 winks.
I bid you good day.