So I took a moment today and looked through some of my older posts in this blog and was surprised at some of my insights into gaming. My typing could use some improvement though no matter how brilliant I seemed to me. My search of previous posts led me to the very one I made. How hard is it to finish a game? I looked at the date I made that post and it was March 2nd, 2007. Just over 7 years. Wow!
Have I changed as a gamer? Definitely. For better and worse. Have I played a lot of games since then? A tremendous amount. Have I finished those games that started this all?
Well . . . .
I'm ashamed to admit that even after 7 years I still haven't finished any of those games. But on the bright side neither has my brother.
In Final Fantasy VII I'm not even back to the spot where I was before my stuff was stolen in 2009. And I'm even further behind in Mario Sunshine than where I was in that gamer pre thievery. I'm so stuck in Jedi Outcast that I can't even find out where I am in the strategy guide to help me get out of whatever room I'm stuck in. And in Summoner I've just barely made it to the first town. I haven't even gotten back in the sewers.
I've played FFVII and made some progress but I'm taking it slow and stead about leveling characters up and making sure I have enough money to buy everything I want before I go into a town for the first time.
With Jedi Outcast it's just a pain to disconnect the 360 and change the cords, system and controls out to just play that one game. Changing to the GameCube for Mario isn't a whole lot better either. It's been awhile but I think Jedi Outcast is a backward compatible game and I think I might have even tried playing it on the 360. But that meant I started over . . . again. Of course that would also mean I'm not stuck any more.
Needless to say I've had problems sticking to this goal to finish in a year. Hey, it's been 7 years and I'm actually further behind in all games than where I was pre-thievery. With all the great games that are coming out it's really hard to stay focused and finish these older games.
I tried making Sunday night "Retro Night". A night each week where I pull games on older system (or the oldest games on current system) and play those. It worked for awhile but what I ended up playing was Pikmin (1 and 2). Those are great games so who can blame me. Maybe what I need to do is go to some far away hotel and take just one system and lock myself in the room for the weekend and play nothing but one of those older games. Maybe that's something I can do with my tax refund.
At the very least, after 7 years I'm still consistent. I'm making lists of all the games I want to play . . . . only to play something else. But most importantly: I'm still playing video games. The question might be the same but I'm okay with that.
Showing posts with label Star Wars Jedi Knight II: Jedi Outcast. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Star Wars Jedi Knight II: Jedi Outcast. Show all posts
Tuesday, March 4, 2014
Monday, November 12, 2012
A little bit of this, a little bit of that and whole lot of boredom
I've been playing a bunch of things lately. I got bored trying to learn things in FFTactics so I switched to Final Fantasy II. I finished the first one on the PSP but I honestly can't remember anything about the game. FF2 is different and I'm having a hard time getting the hang of it. If you attack physically those stats go up (but magical stats go down) and the reverse is true. My problem is I get into dungeons and I don't want to use up my magic points because Ether is so damn expensive so I use a lot of physical attacks. I know I'm going to be screwed later on in the game when I need that powerful mage and I don't have one.
I also dusted off the old Xbox system and hooked it up for awhile. I restarted Jedi Knight II: Jedi Outcast. It was one of the games dain and I decided to "finished" a long time ago. Actually since 7/16/2006 to be exact. I could have played it on the 360 but I didn't want to. I know the exact date that started all this because I printed the email and apparently I've been using it as a page marker for the strategy guide. I stopped playing because I got lost in the game and the guide was no help. Strategy guides have come a long way since then. I figured the best thing to do was start over (with the cheat code BUBBLE entered - - I don't take any damage). I played for awhile . . . and got bored.
So, I reconnected my PS2 and put in Summoner. That's another one of those "let's finish them this year [2006] games. This time the guide helped and I feel better about how to play the game. But I got bored because I'm just replaying the stuff I had already done since my stuff was stolen.
So, I went back to my 360. I tired some zombies in the Dr. Ned DLC for Borderlands since I've finished the game (I'll do a review of it later). But the zombies don't make any noises when they come up on you and I got tired of being jumped when I'm trying to do something. Although those flying things are more annoying.
So, I decided to play some online stuff by myself. It's really hard to find friends to play with these days. But that's okay I play better without them. It's true. It doesn't matter what game we play but when I play with friends I end up sub 500 on my kill/death ratio. I'll die 2x at least for every kill I get. I don't know why this happens but it does. Because I've been playing solo mostly (except when Natra sends me an invite) I've noticed that my skills are getting better. I've only had one match with a 1/2 kill/death ratio; everything else has been much better than that. I've even gone positive once or twice. I'll usually finish with about 10 kills to 12 deaths or something like that. Just over this weekend alone my kill/death ratio went from .551 to .571. Not bad considering I've got a lot of deaths under my belt in that game. I'm also finding the game more fun to play now that I'm doing better. I don't get frustrated as much and I don't let a death discourage me. I do have moments of panic when I'm under that .500 threshold but I always seem to find a way to do better before the match is over. And I'm finally getting some of those maps. I guess I now need to try playing with friends to see if I can translate this success when I play with them. Any volunteers?
So that's about it. A little PSP, Xbox, PS2, and 360 gaming all in the same week or two. I've even been tempted to pull out my GameCube to work on that "let's finish" game (Super Mario Sunshine). And I've got an itch to play my old N64 as well. I've either got too little of an attention span or too much boredom. You decide.
I also dusted off the old Xbox system and hooked it up for awhile. I restarted Jedi Knight II: Jedi Outcast. It was one of the games dain and I decided to "finished" a long time ago. Actually since 7/16/2006 to be exact. I could have played it on the 360 but I didn't want to. I know the exact date that started all this because I printed the email and apparently I've been using it as a page marker for the strategy guide. I stopped playing because I got lost in the game and the guide was no help. Strategy guides have come a long way since then. I figured the best thing to do was start over (with the cheat code BUBBLE entered - - I don't take any damage). I played for awhile . . . and got bored.
So, I reconnected my PS2 and put in Summoner. That's another one of those "let's finish them this year [2006] games. This time the guide helped and I feel better about how to play the game. But I got bored because I'm just replaying the stuff I had already done since my stuff was stolen.
So, I went back to my 360. I tired some zombies in the Dr. Ned DLC for Borderlands since I've finished the game (I'll do a review of it later). But the zombies don't make any noises when they come up on you and I got tired of being jumped when I'm trying to do something. Although those flying things are more annoying.
So, I decided to play some online stuff by myself. It's really hard to find friends to play with these days. But that's okay I play better without them. It's true. It doesn't matter what game we play but when I play with friends I end up sub 500 on my kill/death ratio. I'll die 2x at least for every kill I get. I don't know why this happens but it does. Because I've been playing solo mostly (except when Natra sends me an invite) I've noticed that my skills are getting better. I've only had one match with a 1/2 kill/death ratio; everything else has been much better than that. I've even gone positive once or twice. I'll usually finish with about 10 kills to 12 deaths or something like that. Just over this weekend alone my kill/death ratio went from .551 to .571. Not bad considering I've got a lot of deaths under my belt in that game. I'm also finding the game more fun to play now that I'm doing better. I don't get frustrated as much and I don't let a death discourage me. I do have moments of panic when I'm under that .500 threshold but I always seem to find a way to do better before the match is over. And I'm finally getting some of those maps. I guess I now need to try playing with friends to see if I can translate this success when I play with them. Any volunteers?
So that's about it. A little PSP, Xbox, PS2, and 360 gaming all in the same week or two. I've even been tempted to pull out my GameCube to work on that "let's finish" game (Super Mario Sunshine). And I've got an itch to play my old N64 as well. I've either got too little of an attention span or too much boredom. You decide.
Wednesday, September 1, 2010
Old....but still true
I've just been flipping back through older enteries seeing if my style has changed and if I'm actually getting better as a writer when I came across this one:
I laughed at out loud at the last paragraph. It's been more than three years since then and I don't think neither dain or I are any closer to finishing those games than we were back in March of 2007 when I posted this. I have an excuse . . . my game saves were robbed. I don't know what dain's excuse is other than the fact that there are so many more games out there that he owns but hasn't played. Oh wait, that's my excuse too.
How hard is it to finish a game?
I was sitting around with nothing better to do (obviously I was at work) when I had an epiphany. I own a lot of video games, but I haven't finished very many of them. Okay, I had only finished 3 (Legend of Dragoon, Final Fantasy X and Final Fantasy Tactics Advance). And I wondered why I hadn't finished more. I sat and stared out into space, pondering this dilemma when I had another epiphany. I'm a video game addict.
I play video games a lot. And I own a lot of video games. But there just doesn't seem to be enough time in the day to play them all . . . especially when new ones keep being released. I'd buy a game, play it for several hours, then have to put it aside so I could play the next great game I just bought. When I finally make it back to that first game I'm so lost I don't have a clue what to do next so I just start the game over. I've probably played the first 5-10 hours of ALL my games at least twice. And some of them more than halfway through.
It's great to have a lot of games. I enjoy them all. But I want to enjoy the fact that I've finished them. Not finishing some games meant I couldn't talk to some of my friends because THEY'VE finished the game and they don't want to spoil anything for me. It's annoying when you're not in on the secrets. So I devised a plan:
Pick one game for each console and don't play anything else until you've finished those games.
Since I own several systems (SNES, N64, GameCube, PS, PS2, Xbox, GBA SP, PSP and a PC of course) I figured I could pick several different types of games to play to suit my every changing mood (I am a girl after all). But how was I to "stay on target"? I could enlist my gaming brother. After all, he's the "dealer" that got me hooked on video games.
When I told him of my plan, he liked it, since he's having the same problem as me (with a lot more games to agonize over). He wanted in. We put our heads together and made a list of games that we both own (for the same console). We'd be each other's support system and help network when we got stuck in a game and can't find that damn hidden treasure. ARGH! Since it was my idea, I let him pick the games. He picked: Final Fantasy VII (PS), Summoner (PS2), Star Wars: Jedi Knight II Jedi Outcast (Xbox) and Super Mario Sunshine (GameCube).
I had dabbled in all of them (had 10+ hours in FF7) but I was ready to start over and play them to the end. We started out with a bang, all gung-ho and everything, but that didn't last long for either of us. I found out I have another video game addiction. Xbox Live. There's something about beating another player and knowing their human and not AI (though for some it's hard to tell the difference). I laugh gleefully (some call it a cackle) but I enjoy myself. Especially when they find out they've been beaten by a girl. Then my gaming brother opened the flood gates and got me hooked on something else. Xbox 360.
We both exercise a lot of restraint not buying new console when they first come out. Let other players work out all the bugs and kinks in the new systems, we'll wait for a later release. But my brother couldn't wait anymore. He bought a 360 before Christmas. We met up each week and I had to sit there and drool while he played Gears of War and played around on the dashboard. I couldn't take it anymore. I caved. I bought a 360 in an after Christmas sale. And now I'm hooked. Achievements? I'm all for them. Gamerscore? I'll show you mine if you show me yours. Now it's not just another new game that I want to play, but a whole new system.
It's been 6 months since we started our little pact. Neither one of us have finished a game he picked out. We're getting closer, but at this rate it'll take us 3 years to finish them all. And think of all the games we're NOT playing (or trying not to play) during that time. On second thought, I don't think I want to.
I laughed at out loud at the last paragraph. It's been more than three years since then and I don't think neither dain or I are any closer to finishing those games than we were back in March of 2007 when I posted this. I have an excuse . . . my game saves were robbed. I don't know what dain's excuse is other than the fact that there are so many more games out there that he owns but hasn't played. Oh wait, that's my excuse too.
Friday, January 2, 2009
Pity the failure that I am
So I didn't make it. I was 234 points away from breaking the 10,000 point barrier with my gamer score. Yet another New Years Resolution I didn't achieve. And to think I was one boss battle from picking up 125 points in Lost Odyssey. So close, and yet so far.
I not only failed at getting the score but I failed at playing Lost Odyssey. I got into an area that I couldn't handle. The regular enemy encounters were killing me . . . literally. I fled like the little coward that I am. I love that game, but it got to a point where all I wanted to do was rip the disk from the drive and chuck it out the window. Maybe this weekend I'll take some time to focus on the game and strategies to help me survive instead of rushing through it to get points. Besides, if I finish the game then I can go back to Blue Dragon.
When my attempt to get gamer points from Lost Odyssey failed I started playing Gears of War on insane. I figured if I could get achievements for finishing chapters on insane I would also get the achievements for hardcore as well. Doubling up is always nice. It didn't work out that way so the clock turned over past midnight and I was at the same gamer score I had the night before.
Now if I had spent some time playing those games earlier in the week instead of playing Gears of War 2 with my friends I might have met my goal and finally cross one resolution off my list. But you see, I like playing with my friends. As crazy and emotional as they sometimes tend to get, they're a bunch of real stand up guys. So I blame my failure on them. Yeah, that's it. It's all their fault. If they would just act like jerks so I wouldn't want to play with them then maybe I'd actually achieve a goal I set for myself. I'd like to try and see them be a jerk . . . without laughing about it either.
There are a lot of other New Year Resolutions that I didn't achieve either. I still haven't finished Final Fantasy VII, Mario Sunshine, Summoner or Jedi Outcast like I've been trying to do as a challenge with my brother dain. I guess those should be on my resolution list this year as well. Oh well. I guess my resolution of world peace didn't quite work out either.
With all the house/moving stuff that's been my life the last couple of months I haven't given it any thought about what my 2009 resolutions should be. When I get a chance I'll review where I came up short with my 2008 ones and see what dreams/goals I want to complete this year. Does anyone have any Prozac they could share?
I not only failed at getting the score but I failed at playing Lost Odyssey. I got into an area that I couldn't handle. The regular enemy encounters were killing me . . . literally. I fled like the little coward that I am. I love that game, but it got to a point where all I wanted to do was rip the disk from the drive and chuck it out the window. Maybe this weekend I'll take some time to focus on the game and strategies to help me survive instead of rushing through it to get points. Besides, if I finish the game then I can go back to Blue Dragon.
When my attempt to get gamer points from Lost Odyssey failed I started playing Gears of War on insane. I figured if I could get achievements for finishing chapters on insane I would also get the achievements for hardcore as well. Doubling up is always nice. It didn't work out that way so the clock turned over past midnight and I was at the same gamer score I had the night before.
Now if I had spent some time playing those games earlier in the week instead of playing Gears of War 2 with my friends I might have met my goal and finally cross one resolution off my list. But you see, I like playing with my friends. As crazy and emotional as they sometimes tend to get, they're a bunch of real stand up guys. So I blame my failure on them. Yeah, that's it. It's all their fault. If they would just act like jerks so I wouldn't want to play with them then maybe I'd actually achieve a goal I set for myself. I'd like to try and see them be a jerk . . . without laughing about it either.
There are a lot of other New Year Resolutions that I didn't achieve either. I still haven't finished Final Fantasy VII, Mario Sunshine, Summoner or Jedi Outcast like I've been trying to do as a challenge with my brother dain. I guess those should be on my resolution list this year as well. Oh well. I guess my resolution of world peace didn't quite work out either.
With all the house/moving stuff that's been my life the last couple of months I haven't given it any thought about what my 2009 resolutions should be. When I get a chance I'll review where I came up short with my 2008 ones and see what dreams/goals I want to complete this year. Does anyone have any Prozac they could share?
Friday, March 2, 2007
How hard is it to finish a game?
I was sitting around with nothing better to do (obviously I was at work) when I had an epiphany. I own a lot of video games, but I haven't finished very many of them. Okay, I had only finished 3 (Legend of Dragoon, Final Fantasy X and Final Fantasy Tactics Advance). And I wondered why I hadn't finished more. I sat and stared out into space, pondering this dilemma when I had another epiphany. I'm a video game addict.
I play video games a lot. And I own a lot of video games. But there just doesn't seem to be enough time in the day to play them all . . . especially when new ones keep being released. I'd buy a game, play it for several hours, then have to put it aside so I could play the next great game I just bought. When I finally make it back to that first game I'm so lost I don't have a clue what to do next so I just start the game over. I've probably played the first 5-10 hours of ALL my games at least twice. And some of them more than halfway through.
It's great to have a lot of games. I enjoy them all. But I want to enjoy the fact that I've finished them. Not finishing some games meant I couldn't talk to some of my friends because THEY'VE finished the game and they don't want to spoil anything for me. It's annoying when you're not in on the secrets. So I devised a plan:
Pick one game for each console and don't play anything else until you've finished those games.
Since I own several systems (SNES, N64, GameCube, PS, PS2, Xbox, GBA SP, PSP and a PC of course) I figured I could pick several different types of games to play to suit my every changing mood (I am a girl after all). But how was I to "stay on target"? I could enlist my gaming brother. After all, he's the "dealer" that got me hooked on video games.
When I told him of my plan, he liked it, since he's having the same problem as me (with a lot more games to agonize over). He wanted in. We put our heads together and made a list of games that we both own (for the same console). We'd be each other's support system and help network when we got stuck in a game and can't find that damn hidden treasure. ARGH! Since it was my idea, I let him pick the games. He picked: Final Fantasy VII (PS), Summoner (PS2), Star Wars: Jedi Knight II Jedi Outcast (Xbox) and Super Mario Sunshine (GameCube).
I had dabbled in all of them (had 10+ hours in FF7) but I was ready to start over and play them to the end. We started out with a bang, all gung-ho and everything, but that didn't last long for either of us. I found out I have another video game addiction. Xbox Live. There's something about beating another player and knowing their human and not AI (though for some it's hard to tell the difference). I laugh gleefully (some call it a cackle) but I enjoy myself. Especially when they find out they've been beaten by a girl. Then my gaming brother opened the flood gates and got me hooked on something else. Xbox 360.
We both exercise a lot of restraint not buying new console when they first come out. Let other players work out all the bugs and kinks in the new systems, we'll wait for a later release. But my brother couldn't wait anymore. He bought a 360 before Christmas. We met up each week and I had to sit there and drool while he played Gears of War and played around on the dashboard. I couldn't take it anymore. I caved. I bought a 360 in an after Christmas sale. And now I'm hooked. Achievements? I'm all for them. Gamerscore? I'll show you mine if you show me yours. Now it's not just another new game that I want to play, but a whole new system.
It's been 6 months since we started our little pact. Neither one of us have finished a game he picked out. We're getting closer, but at this rate it'll take us 3 years to finish them all. And think of all the games we're NOT playing (or trying not to play) during that time. On second thought, I don't think I want to.
I play video games a lot. And I own a lot of video games. But there just doesn't seem to be enough time in the day to play them all . . . especially when new ones keep being released. I'd buy a game, play it for several hours, then have to put it aside so I could play the next great game I just bought. When I finally make it back to that first game I'm so lost I don't have a clue what to do next so I just start the game over. I've probably played the first 5-10 hours of ALL my games at least twice. And some of them more than halfway through.
It's great to have a lot of games. I enjoy them all. But I want to enjoy the fact that I've finished them. Not finishing some games meant I couldn't talk to some of my friends because THEY'VE finished the game and they don't want to spoil anything for me. It's annoying when you're not in on the secrets. So I devised a plan:
Pick one game for each console and don't play anything else until you've finished those games.
Since I own several systems (SNES, N64, GameCube, PS, PS2, Xbox, GBA SP, PSP and a PC of course) I figured I could pick several different types of games to play to suit my every changing mood (I am a girl after all). But how was I to "stay on target"? I could enlist my gaming brother. After all, he's the "dealer" that got me hooked on video games.
When I told him of my plan, he liked it, since he's having the same problem as me (with a lot more games to agonize over). He wanted in. We put our heads together and made a list of games that we both own (for the same console). We'd be each other's support system and help network when we got stuck in a game and can't find that damn hidden treasure. ARGH! Since it was my idea, I let him pick the games. He picked: Final Fantasy VII (PS), Summoner (PS2), Star Wars: Jedi Knight II Jedi Outcast (Xbox) and Super Mario Sunshine (GameCube).
I had dabbled in all of them (had 10+ hours in FF7) but I was ready to start over and play them to the end. We started out with a bang, all gung-ho and everything, but that didn't last long for either of us. I found out I have another video game addiction. Xbox Live. There's something about beating another player and knowing their human and not AI (though for some it's hard to tell the difference). I laugh gleefully (some call it a cackle) but I enjoy myself. Especially when they find out they've been beaten by a girl. Then my gaming brother opened the flood gates and got me hooked on something else. Xbox 360.
We both exercise a lot of restraint not buying new console when they first come out. Let other players work out all the bugs and kinks in the new systems, we'll wait for a later release. But my brother couldn't wait anymore. He bought a 360 before Christmas. We met up each week and I had to sit there and drool while he played Gears of War and played around on the dashboard. I couldn't take it anymore. I caved. I bought a 360 in an after Christmas sale. And now I'm hooked. Achievements? I'm all for them. Gamerscore? I'll show you mine if you show me yours. Now it's not just another new game that I want to play, but a whole new system.
It's been 6 months since we started our little pact. Neither one of us have finished a game he picked out. We're getting closer, but at this rate it'll take us 3 years to finish them all. And think of all the games we're NOT playing (or trying not to play) during that time. On second thought, I don't think I want to.
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