Blast from the past.... Close Combat III

I dug out Close Combat III, which installed and loaded up without any problems whatsoever.

I was able to patch it, copy over my old saves, loaded it up and started playing.

Fraps seems to be a little on the odd side as sometimes it seems to work with the game and other times it doesn't. Unfortunately I was unable to get a recording.

The game has a lot more options than the second. Both for gameplay options and with selecting battles/operations/campaigns.

The game is also a lot more detailed in regards to the soldiers you have, they all have their own history in greater detail than the second where you could ignore that side of things. And you can here as well but it is more in your favour to pay attention to this.

Especially as you now appear as a soldier on the battlefield.

You get promoted and as you rank up and as the time line increases you gain access to better units and options to refit your current troops to give them access to better vehicles and weapons.

There are way more versions of troops as experience and morale plays a much bigger part of the game

So having a "leader" unit near lower skilled units can stop them from panicking/deserting etc.

With all new features and options the best one I like is the way that wrecks are left on the battlefield. Your no longer facing off against the enemy on the same map. It is now the map that shows the wreck of a tank or vehicle that was lost from either side.

Two tanks hit and smoking....

Two wrecks on the next battle on the same map....

This game is good but it isnt' as much as a blast as the second game, at least for me and my nostalgia.
The fourth game at least for me added more refinement and a better flow to the battles with it's changes. I'll test #4 next.

My Eve Online.... Update

Eve game play has been pretty uneventful and "normal" for me.

On all my characters I did sell all of their accumulated implants. This did indeed net a pretty penny. There were some very shiny implants including a lot of the gifted implant sets. Most of that isk went to buying the plex's I used to add more training time to my alts.
Both of my mains are training up as usual and doing hi-Sec P.I.
I've been clearing and sorting ships and gear. Again checking fits as I went. Nothing really unusual but I was left with a few extra fitted ships on my primary main. All PVE fit, a Hawk, Hookbill, Buzzard, Osprey (Stable Logi Fit), Drake and a Dominix. I again have that feeling to go do something useful pve wise with them.... I'll suppress that for as long as I can.
My primary Alt as well as both my Amarrian and Minmatar based alts are doing pretty much the same, hi-sec P.I. and training away. Once the training is done I can look into getting them doing things where they can leave their better implant clones behind and see about living more dangerously. For now they are also doing some missioning and site scanning, again nothing heavy at all.

My Nullsec alt is by far the character with the most logged in time. Maybe not the most or best game play but definitely the most logged in time. Soooooooo much time is wasted with waiting for an opportune moment. Mainly with moving ships and items around.
Lately I've fallen out of love with the current area of Null. The alliance is imo spread too thin over too much space. Maybe it is just the summer but the amount of blues and blue activity has sunk while the number of reds randomly roaming around is so high that it feels like I'm the red in their space.
The new sov system is not helping to band the corp or alliance members together. As an example of this the alliance POS Jump Bridges have been unfueled for the last two weeks despite the amount of moaning about it there was only recently an alliance mining op suggested for this weekend. That's a long time to get things sorted on an important infrastructure "convenience" never mind it's strategic use. They haven't even bothered to use the excuse that they need people doing things in every system due to Fossie Sov. Or that they want ppl in every system to gang up and defend using it as a motivator.
Even pvp defencive fleets and gangs are very cliquey, non announced and the intel in channels is very spotty so much so that I usually (in clean clone pod) jump ahead before I can move stuff about.
There is just plain apathy for everything at the moment. This has been happening for a while and maybe it is just the summer lull. But it sucks.
Over all my game play has been whittled down to selling items that I have remaining on the market with a little ratting on the side. Whatever brings better isk in faster.

I've either sold up ships and gear or moved them out to hi-sec. What I have left in Null is really small in comparison to what I once had. I sold off my ratting Drake as the Caracal is much faster and can tank just as well. It also has the virtue of being a lot easier to replace if it does get exploded.

The main isk making activities are:

Ratting in a Caracal....

Mining in a Procurer....

P.I. is still the main earner....

The last time I did a clear out and move out to hi-sec was when the alliance moved within null and although I have made a good go of this new area it is a shadow of my former setup and now I've made it an even more shimmed down version. This was done to make it more intense on isk in the wallet rather than having it wrapped up in the market or with assets in Null (that I wasn't really using). With better assets all safe in hi-sec.
I still have a massive lot of fitted (shitfit) frigs and destroyers that I can use for pvp. But I really don't want to switch out to a blank clean clone for pvp that often. So much training time is lost when moving from a +3 clone to a clean clone it's not funny. Change from a clean clone to a +3 implant clone changes his skill queue time from 211 Days 17 Hours into 186 Days 4 Hours. That to me is a plex in the difference and I don't want to waste it. The carebear in me is strong.

There have been a few posts online about getting rid or keeping the character attributes, worth a read (here and here). I think it would be good to remove the option of them on a character and just give all players a general benefit/buff instead. Implants is the real tricky question.



I've been thinking of getting a character into wormholes again. And found these two interesting. (here and here)


The interesting Eve news is still ongoing, I wonder where it is leading....

And I like the new medium citadel, it does look a tiny bit bigger than a "medium" tho....

Annoyances in wow....

Funny and true....

Blast from the past....

I went through a lot of software/files in a disk/HD tidy up and decided to take a few old games for a nostalgic re-run and a replay of some old saved games.

Three games I tried were:
Close Combat 2 A bridge Too Far.
Star Trek Birth of the Federation.
Star Wars Supremacy.



I'll start in reverse order to the way I tried them.

First off, Star Wars (Supremacy for me and Rebellion for the U.S.), which I wasn't able to get working. Mainly because my version of windows is 64 bit and the patch for a 64 bit install doesn't seem to be available anymore. There is a longer way to get it to work by making the changes manually, but I wasn't that nostalgic. I'd rather get it working again on an older pc I have but that isn't in my own house just yet.


Second is the Star Trek game Birth of the Federation. Which I did spend a lot of time in when it came out first. It installed without any trouble. I was able to do the install, patch and copy my saved game files etc and ran the game perfectly. No additional changes or tweaks needed.

The big thing for me in replaying this game is that the user interface was not as intuitive as I remembered. So there was a re-learning curve.
I also remembered the game map being a lot larger. Even when the map is zoomed out with no exploration done it feels really small. Factor in all the other races on the same map and I felt like I was tripping over them on the first turn. Not a bad thing on lesser difficulty settings but the harder it is the worse the starting position (as you have little to defend yourself with). In saying that the game is better balanced than on the face of it. There are many options for diplomacy etc. The interface is a strong Star Trek feel and really brings the game to life as there are all the usual (Next Generation) sounds and graphics. I really like the voice feedback the game gives.

After reloading some saves and checked things out I didnt' stay with the game for long and uninstalled it after about two or so day's.

Lastly the title of all three that I probably spent most of my gaming time on, Close Combat A Bridge Too Far. I love strategy games and the Close combat series really is a great set of games. I only count the original # 2, 3, 4 and 5 in that comment. But I have seen more online but I've not played them.

On installing the only problem I found was that I couldn't do a full install, as it was unable to see the hard drive properly. I thought I had no disk space at all. It did do the minimum install without any problems. 

A day later I decided to check the reinstall option and was able to reinstall the full setting over the minimal install.

Not running files off the CD did increase the load times as well as the games overall speed.
There is a slowdown of the end game screen where there is a reveal from black to the details screen that reacts slowly (see my gameplay vids below). And the mouse speed is incredibly fast when trying to move the screen around. While I can't do anything about the reveal it really isn't a problem. The movement with the mouse isn't really a problem as well as I use the arrow keys to move about... No problem for me but it may annoy some people. 
All my saves worked well and brought a lot of memories back of the epic battles. The game has a lot of options and can be set as easy or as hard as you like. And if you really like a challenge you can set the enemy to be maxed out with the best troops while you take the weakest of the weak. It can lead to some epic wins and crushing defeats.

I like the way the game is themed, following the battles of each phase/day and comparing your progress to the level of the real historic thing.

Some battles require your side to take a point like a bridge fast before the defending German side blows the bridge and slows your advance on that front.

That can lead to mass slaughter akin to this....

I do like the settings that are more realistic so when fighting an enemy you can get lucky and panic the soldier on the enemy side that is hauling their biggest weapon....

The only gameplay down side I've come across with this replay is that the end of the campaign does delete your saved game on completion. I recall now why I saved and duplicated so many save game files.

I've enjoyed this game so much again I'll be leaving it and will pop back to a game or two when I feel like it. It makes me want to reload the next editions of the games.... I'll have to see about that.

Meanwhile here are two battles from the Grand Campaign from both sides.
My German defence game is a late campaign version and my Allied Attack is an early game version.

Eve Online.... Blast from the past screenies.

Last weekend I dug out an old laptop to re-purpose. In doing so I checked the hard drive before wiping it clean and found a bunch of screenshots from Eve online.
While I'm sure I did take these off it before I may as well post some of them here while they are sitting in front of me. These screenies are form around 2011/2012 and a re just out of interest.  While the laptop never played the game at max graphics they are not too bad for the time. Which isn't that long ago.

Sense, new incursions and an old spud....

I may have said it before about another post but this post also from the Low Sec Lifestyle blog does make sense. Maybe there are no true answers for the goals of some games, except the ones the player says (and the way they play the game).

Reddit has an interesting entry that brings new light (screenies) to the meaning of the Drifters... I hope there will be more information coming soon, not just a variation of the current Sansha Incursion running. Maybe a more Hi-sec based, formal structure to incursions.... that would be more accessible to solo players. Not quiet dungeon groups but something similar would be great.

 

And I've seen the new images for the fully fleshed-out Dominix redesign. I like it bu I can say that I will miss the old spud.

Eve Online.... No new ship....

Just some lore/background information and some RP npc gameplay. No new ship line in the works for capsuleer's. So says CCP Falcon.

But in browsing the interwebs I did see this:

 Makes me wish there were a few more niche vessels to be used for specific (new?) roles/jobs.

Windows Insider treat....

Not that I am one but I thought the pics and gif were offbeat fun for Microsoft....

http://blogs.windows.com/bloggingwindows/2015/07/21/a-fun-surprise-for-windows-insiders/

But first....

World of Warcraft....

Wow weekly has an interesting piece on the limits of the current game design and the potential fixes....

On the wow front I've still been hopping about a lot on a lot of different characters but I've limited what I want from them. My main Hunter will get the last tablet to finish his current Legendary quest, my third 100, my tank, will start to get HC's done with guildies as puging is such a nightmare. And I think I'll just start levelling my Rogue.... We'll see how all that goes.... 

Eve Online.... Beating wow in this corner

I was waffling away in my last WoW post about how it seemed like too much to do and having too many goals to reach on too many characters and saying that Eve was not like that.... I read this post today and it captures a lot in the way that I "do" Eve as well, only said in a constructive and well thought out couple of paragraphs, well said.

Eve Online.... Skillpoint gift

 
The Dev post about the skillpoint gift says that all characters that had an active skill queue when the outage happened will get 50,000 free SP!  Nice!!

Eve online.... keel-laying

The official announcement is interesting, could there be a new class of ship coming to Eve....

Eve Time Sink....

Interesting post over on Cloaky Bastard, well worth a moment of time....

Dust 514.... CPM2 Process had begun.

Ever since the last event and the last patch I've just been tweaking the fits for my main and alt, the new slot layouts have made a lower skilled player like me a little bit better but have made a higher skilled player a lot more lethal as they have the skills to equip more now, not just in quantity but quality as well. There is a lot more tweaking and balance needed by the CCP team.  At least in my own view from where my characters stand.
I've been logging in to get the daily login bonus on both characters and the usual "one win, one key reward" daily mission. Thankfully there does seem to be a few advances in the daily missions as this post states. With luck when the new missions hit they should be a welcome addition.

The new design a SKIN competition is looking to get another new skin into the game, details here.

The latest thing is that the CPM 2 election process has started. the official announcement states:

KEY DATES

• Candidate application period opens on 15th of July, 2015 at 12:00 GMT (submit your application here);
• Candidate application period closes on 29th of July, 2015 at 12:00 GMT;
• Voting begins on the 30th of July, 2015 at 12:00 GMT (submit your vote here);
• Voting ends on the 13th of August, 2015 at 12:00 GMT;
• Election results are announced on the 17th of August, 2015.

If you have any additional comments, please feel free to contact us via cpm2@ccpgames.com
And remember: you can always find CPM-Specific Forums right here.

I have to admit that I have skipped over a lot (99%) of the bluster on the forums and elsewhere online regarding the candidates but I am probably going to do more "research".


It will be interesting to see if there will be a large turnout for a small community.

Interesting....

TOP 15 UPCOMING GAMES  -  FRANKIEonPCin1080p

Top 25 Upcoming Games Of 2015 (Second Half) -gameranx

Fun in Amarr....

 
It's a rare thing that an "NPC" is seen in local chat interacting with players. I like the idea of a roleplaying game master bringing the universe alive and not just seeing a charecter in a video cutscene. I like the fact that it was done and really hope that it will be done again as the story moves on. I wish I had seen it myself. These screenies (Amarr funtimes - by tgl3 on imgur) and this Reddit post tell the story...

Wow gaming....

I am left with a little over 5 weeks of game time on my wow account and stuck in a mire of quandary's.

The guild/friends on my main realm are great but the more I do on one character the more I feel the need to get the other alts up to a similar standard.

During the week I went onto all my other characters across all the other realms and "tweaked" their gear to match the updates to the heirlooms as well as transmog those heirlooms.

There is so much unplayed potential and game play experiences. There is a lot I've not seen an angle on regarding the alliance side these day's. So I spent more time with my old main realm on that side. In doing so I levelled up my very first wow character that final few levels to get him into Dreanor. My wife has a level 100 alliance character and helped with some minor boosting.

But once in the starter garrison I was left feeling flat, I already have a level 91 Druid on my main Horde realm so why grind up an other on a realm that is essentially dead when I can nose around her garrison to see what a level 3 Alliance side looks like (no spending gold on upgrades just to see graphics).

Maybe it really is about who you play with. If that is the case I should be levelling an alliance warrior on the same realm as her level 100 instead of complicating things by cross realm commands to group up.
That leads to the why level a warrior there when I really should be levelling my horde warrior that is 20 levels lower than the Alliance version. Again it all comes down to the game play and who it is with. She had no character the same level on the alliance that would be a levelling buddy so why not just get back to the main realm and hammer away on the characters there and all that that entails. So I did.

But..... always a but..... My main hunter is powering along and geared well, but I need to really spend time to finish off the legendary quest line and get his dock really up to scratch.
My Warlock is a slightly better ilevel than my kick ass hunter but fails miserably on the dps front thanks to Blizzard breaking locks and leaving him broken and alone on the garrison floor. he needs more work on the legendary quest line and get his dock up to scratch as well.
But my third "main", Pally tank (really new) needs to get geared up, finish heroics, move on to getting purple gear, start being a raiding tank, get his dock, get his legendary quest line to a mid point.

 
But then there is the 91 Rogue/Mage/Monk/Druid/Death Knight and 92 Priest I want to level up to 100 to start the process all over again of garrison/gear/quest lines and docks.

I am completely ignoring all the things you can do in the new area from the last patch, especially for dailies and rep grinding. Sod flying.... for now. I really can't see myself grinding enough to get that done despite the mounts and pets etc that you can get once you have the reputation.

My warrior of level 37 is at least retro fun when levelling.
I did have another hunter at level 20 but I deleted him in favour of starting a shammy again but that shammy is still level 1 and has never done a quest.... literally just created.

So it's a game that currently feeds my brain's latent ADD/OCD needs while wasting vast amounts of time doing so. I'm an addict and I can't say no even though I really want to I keep coming back for more punishment.
There is really too much to do at the upper end even on one character. But that is what keeps most people gaming in wow. And it's not the only game to be like this.
There were some good comments in this video from Brent Justice regarding the latest patch for STO, like the last patch that came out for wow it is new and long....
Eve is a bigger non-liner sandbox that allows so much more than wow and I dont' have a quarter of the same problems there even with the patches and so many changes happening these day's.

In the end it's all my own fault/problem with what I do in wow and how I do it.

Maybe I should just go with my main hunter and sod the rest, sticking to pvp game play and gearing up that way (like the old day's) while doing noting but pet battles while I wait for matches. But that would be a longer term "thing".
Either way 5 weeks isn't enough time to get a lot done so I'll end up faffing about and getting what I can completed (time permitting) before handing all my mats/gold/stuffs to a little mage goblin to keep all for herself and my game time counts out.

Eve Online back gaming....

It was an interesting time (almost 12 hours) when there was no Eve to log into. Like missing the Internet completely I started doing other things, online/offline/gaming and non gaming.

Not quiet but near enough.

The Pain continues....

Ouch....