Brick's in the House Baby!

Have you ever played a game, and just didn't want to stop? A game so good that you found yourself asking "what time is it?" over and over, only to realize you've stayed up 8 hours too late? Sorry, Legendary, but you can blame Borderlands for that one. This game throws you in the experience, keeps you there, and just doesn't let you go until you physically pass out, and even then, you'll be thinking about it in your sleep.

The first experience I had with the game was hopping into a co-op game with Omega and Rand, and learning the basics of the game like Deal of the Day, the skill tree, inventory, and stuff like that. Once I got the hang of everything, the game came together and became really enjoyable.

Some may say I became addicted to vending machines in the end, that's only some-what true... it's just because my x-button mashing skills are so much better than everyone else's, that I always had a full inventory, thus was in the vending machine 80% of the time.

Another thing I was great at, was driving; one word: impeccable. I didn't ever complete the 5 seconds of air-time challenge, but I could flip another car in an instant. If you thought you were going to enjoy riding with me, you thought wrong. It either meant you were going to end up face-down on the ground with an exploding barrel as your last hope, or you would find yourself stuck half-way up a staircase not able to move. Most of the time it was just better to walk, but even then you might find yourself pushed 300 feet from your original destination, courtesy of Apple's Taxi Inc.

Don't even get me started on the loot. I was accused of hording it all, but let's get one thing straight, I had very good reason. At the second boss, the bone guy, the really tough one that downs you if he even looks in your general direction. Well, we finally kill him and I go down simultaneously. Rather than listen to Apple crying out for help to be picked up, what do Rand and Omega do? They go straight for the loot and leave me to die. Up until that point, we were sharing loot, but from there on out it was every man for himself. I couldn't believe the betrayal myself...

The art style in the game is cel-shaded, and I really liked that. It's good to have a unique change once in a while. I liked how you could tell how rare a weapon was by it's color also, even though the so-called Legendary weapons were way worse than the ones we were finding that were ranked lower. All in all, Borderlands has been one of the most enjoyable game I've played to date, yes, even better than Sacred 2.

My Seraphim Could Beat Up Your Seraphim...

WARNING: This blog may or may not contain "dork shit." =P

Well, I finished Sacred 2. Total time to 1000: 123 hours. I reached level 63, and was able to find some people hosting a Niob difficulty game at level 66 and 67, and finally got that achievement yesterday afternoon.

Then, I finished up the boring Level 15 achievements with the two remaining classes, High Elf and Temple Guardian. After that, I finished up the last achievement by going through a campaign with zero deaths. It was one of the more enjoyable playthroughs, because it was on Bronze, and I had all the knowledge of playing with a level 60+ so I put a bunch of level 60+ stuff in my level 20's gear. Needless to say, I was untouchable. :D

Tomorrow I'm going to try and pick up Borderlands. I really, really hope I can find it tomorrow, otherwise I'm going to have to miss out on some co-op action, which will probably be a lot of the fun. In the mean time, I think I'll play me some NFS: Shift or Space Chimps. Such great choices, right?

Sacred 2: Niob, Here I Come

Sacred 2, your days are numbered. I started my epic journey ten days ago, and I've only got four achievements left. A total of 97 hours to show for it, and a few more to go, and by few I mean 10+.

I've just spent the last few days solely leveling my main character and going through the Bronze, Silver, and Gold campaigns. I thought the game would be almost impossible at my level to beat Gold, but it was actually really easy. I soloed the last boss in about five minutes.

Now it's time to ride my red sabertooth tiger to the promise land, which is the Niob achievement. Once I hit level 65 I'm either going to have it by way of other people hosting, or trying to complete Platinum campaign. I'm currently a level 58 Seraphim with 8,275 hit points, an attack value of 3,065, and a defense of 937; so, I'm a little overpowered for my level.

There was a point where I loved this game, and then a point where I was starting to get bored. I'm now back to loving it, even with the hours I've put into it. Being overpowered has never been so much fun...

Sacred 2 Fallen Rand

Ten days too long, I know, right? or maybe for some of you, ten days wasn't long enough in between blog posts. Anyway, there's a good reason, but it's also a bad reason. My laptop decided to not display anything correctly, about a week ago. Long-story-short, I called HP, they said the monitor didn't count as hardware so it wasn't covered, and I've been sitting here thinking of ways to either fix my computer, persuade HP that it is covered, and/or buy a new LCD monitor for $300.00; none of which I really want to do.

Besides all that, in my gaming life I started up Sacred 2 a week ago and haven't stopped playing since. Literally, I think I've played every minute of every day since I've gotten the game. No, wait, that's Stallion and his Super Weapon on Chromehounds... I've only played all but a few hours every day.

I don't know where to begin with Sacred 2. The game some-what reminds me of Runescape, an MMORPG that I used to play when I was younger, which was as addicting as WoW is for some people. I've never actually played WoW, though, so I wouldn't exactly know, but it's up there.

We (Omega, Fro, Bro, and I) originally got Sacred 2 together to enjoy the loveliness that is co-op. We ran through the story 1.5 times and that's been about it. It lasted about 20 hours, and we still have to go through it 2.5 more times together.

On the single-player side of the game, I've been in a whore-type mode for some reason. 50 hours and counting, and I just completed my first campaign solo. I've done pretty much everything I can do in the game, with about 820 in it already. I have to play the Silver, Gold, and Platin campaigns before I can enjoy the full 1000 though. Even though I'm 70 hours in, it could very well take another 70 hours to do just that.

The map on Sacred 2 is so huge, that it makes Oblivion look like a playground; Sacred being the town. There are so many things to do, explore, and fight. The leveling system is one of the hardest to understand at first, though. It took me a really long time before I knew what everything was.

Besides that, this has easily become one of my favorite games. Even though the next 70 hours are just going to be gaining levels, it's the first 50 that really count, right Too Human? Right.

Forza 2: Weakened

I started Forza 2 a month ago for reasons I've forgotten by now. The first race, I had one of the hardest times I've had with a racer, because it was my first full simulation racing game. After learning that it's not your typical Need For Speed take-a-corner-at-200-mph racer I began to have more of an appreciation for the game.

I started playing the game again about a week ago. The majority of the races in the beginning I played on the easiest setting, with all assists on. It's the only way I could actually get a win, because it takes some time to learn how to drive in Forza. I then found the Hire Driver feature, and I had at it. I've been playing the game with a hired driver at Skill level 1, and 55% earnings from each race.

I know it defeats the purpose of enjoying the game, but to be honest, this game is way too long for someone just entering the simulation racer genre, and that's me. I actually really enjoy the game, and am some-what looking forward to Forza 3, but for the rest of Forza 2, and that won't be long, I'm going to be hiring a driver until I reach level 50 and finish the game.

I did have some fun with the car achievements when I reached level 40; a little experiment to try and unlock them all in the same minute (except Korea), and it worked somewhat. It actually spread between two minutes but it was done in under one. I bought every car except one in reach region and saved those last cars in the Auction House. When I had the remaining 8, I selected Receive Car for each one and like magic all the car achievements popped one after another.

I'm currently in the process of winning the next two Career tournaments, because I just hit level 45. After I finished those, I'll go for 50 and finish the other two to complete the career. Then, it's just the Arcade Mode achievements and the Online boosting.

This game is severely starting to wear me out, and I need to finish it quick before I start to hate all games period, again.

So-Long Server0355, You Will Be Missed

I had the pleasure of finishing up Section 8 about two weeks ago. Aside from the graphical decline, the game actually runs very smoothly and is quite enjoyable. It may not be up to par with some multiplayer games, but at least I had fun, something I can't say with some of the bigger titles...

I then proceeded to find two copies of NFS: Carbon and boost the hell out of it for OXP, something I did not enjoy doing one bit. It was the same time ODST came out, the lack of sleep made me cranky. I'm still pissed it's going to be near impossible to get that 100 point achievement for reward cards. I did get Level 50, however, so whenever I feel inclined I'll finish the single player achievements for a total of 845 gamerscore.

People do crazy things when servers are about to be shut down. I remember the Call of Duty 3 scare when a bunch of us boosted like 60 hours just to get that General achievement. The funny thing is, most of them didn't go back to finish the campaign yet. Another situation I can think of that's more recent is Chromehounds. I think tjayars, smrnov, Stallion, and MightyMango are tackling that game and getting the most out of it before the servers croak in January.

I understand the pros of dedicated servers, but I think it's time Microsoft does something about achievements and dedicated servers with a time limit on them. Even though it's a very small percentage of people who actually care about unattainable achievements, it shouldn't be looked passed so easily considering every achievement is supposed to be unlockable, regardless of how long it's been out.