Benie's Games Blog

Ever since I read the news about Garrisons and what you do to get them, I’ve been super-hyped for them. Even last night, I couldn’t sleep. I kept thinking about how my RP is going to work with the Garrison. What is it… almost mid-August 2014? And I still have no idea when WoD is going to be released. Seriously, brain? Chillax.

So I’m browsing YouTube and searching for “Garrison WoD Beta” to see if I can get any more info. I come up on a video titled: “Top 5 WORST PROBLEMS With Garrisons” from YouTuber ‘BellularGaming’. And I’m all “What? But Garrisons are going to be fucking epic!!” Curious, I view the video. And after watching it……..all the hype in me has now been replaced with anger directed at Blizzard.

Mainly due to them lying to us. Remember in BlizzCon 2013, when they said, we’ll be able to move our Garrison, and be able to have a Garrison anywhere in Draenor? That is now FALSE. We are now stuck with one Garrison, in one zone! No more thinking about building a Garrison in Nagrand… you can kiss that hope goodbye!
The reason? It was to give Level 90 players the ability to build a Garrison quicker. Ok. I do like this… but, in my opinion, I would had just rather waited until Level 100, and have Garrisons as endgame content as a reward!

So, not only do we have to wait ’till Patch 6.1 to be able to fly in Draenor, we can’t relocate our Garrison…..*facepalms*…..Hopefully, in Patch 6.1, we’ll be able to move Garrisons. All I can do is hope. Surely, Blizzard will look at how players like or dislike this, and see if they should allow players to relocate. I hope they do, but.. this is their game, not ours.
On top of it, he adds a point of future expansions and patches, how will they affect Garrisons. I…personally had never thought of that, IF there is another expansion behind this one. I was actually hoping they would put the game to bed with MoP.

He also adds a good point of how boring it’s going to get, with the follower system. The fact you can’t go with your followers into a dungeon or whatever, though I assume this is just to not encourage ‘single player’ raiding. But they could easily tone down the rewards to encourage you to dungeon with real players.

And there’s also another point. Once your Garrison gets to Level 3 and you got all of your desired buildings placed… what do you do then? By that time, you’ll be close(if not at) Level 100, going by what I’m hearing of how quickly you’ll be able to level. I’ll probably be so bored with my Garrison, I’ll probably quit again until the next major content patch.

And another problem. If I(and I probably will..if doing so doesn’t give me issues like in WoTLK) dual client, I’m going to have to manage both my main and my alt’s Garrisons, as it’s the only way to advance the questline. It makes me wonder, what’s the point of leveling my alts, if they’re going to see the same thing I will if I group with them? The only point I can think of(with the current path of Garrisons), is they won’t see the same quests I will.
My actual point, was to have my alt and my main have two separate Garrisons. That way, I’ll be able to own multiple Garrisons. I still can with this, but with them in the same exact place on my two monitors… it’s going to be damn confusing which Garrison is which. It’ll be like if I was playing Skyrim on two separate instances, using the same custom house.

In this current stage, and if they don’t change things and soon… this is going to make one of the main aspects of this EP, pointless. And I’m seeing it already. The questing, it’s so much similar to getting Molten Front rep in Cata. You do the work, they somehow have the construction materials you need as your reward…. wtf? YOU are the leader of your Garrison! You shouldn’t be having to lift a fucking finger except managing it!! What happened to the feeling of having followers quest for you?! If I don’t want to do a fucking 3 man boss to get 100 Garrison Materials, send my followers to do it, while I go solo a dungeon!! Give me that option!..actually, technically I do have this option. As some of the quests your followers can do can take a long time, and game time is realtime(Central Daylight on my server).
But in reality… this Garrison really isn’t yours. You can’t customize it. You can’t rename it. You can’t even relocate it. It’s just an instanced quest hub, just like what I did in the MoP questline. I feel like kicking myself in the ass for having all of that damn hype for Garrisons.

Meh… maybe Blizzard really wanted to do all of these really cool things, but were way over their heads. I mean, really… ever since the announcement, I felt they were running out of ideas. And maybe this is proving it. I’m also hearing that certain things have been cut from the release, like this World PvP zone people wanted.

To be honest, I would rather they made it where the farm in MoP could be viewed by people in your group. This is all I really gave a fuck about. A private area for your groups that you all can chill out and RP(if you wanted to), that random people can’t walk into your conversations and ruin it. That’s all I want!! Sure, customization would be cool, but it’s not really high on my priority list.

I was watching another Nobble87 video about changes to the Darkmoon Faire in WoD. More rides, more stuff to buy, more stuff to do. Quite cool.
After that, I just saw another video from YouTuber ‘HeelvsBabyface’, and he shows exactly what you need to know about Garrisons! And what he revealed, ohh… my god, I can’t WAIT!! 😀

This is what I know that hasn’t already been said before(do remember, this is still in Beta. Things could change);
1. The first Garrison you will be able to build… seems to be for free after completing four quests, you’re in charge of establishing a base in Shadowmoon Valley(if you’re Alliance). This means, you’ll be able to build one at Level 90! You’ll have no resources. You’ll be able to get some by finding them either scattered in chests around Draenor, completing Garrison-related quests(some are piss-easy, while others require you to group up and kill Elites). You’ll have control of your Garrison through the Town Hall’s control table.
2. The Garrison feels alive. You see your followers walking around, and random things happening. It’s to show that the Garrison isn’t just for you, that you’re in charge of their safety.
3. It takes time for construction of new buildings and upgrades to happen. Some can be within 30 seconds. Some can take an hour. Once a building is done, you’ll get a notification nomatter where you are. You then have to finalize the building if it’s OK to you to be in your Garrison.
4. There is a cap of 1000 resources. Getting anymore is a waste of time. They won’t roll over. If Blizzard increases this cap or not in the future, is unknown.
5. Your Garrison will have guards to help protect you and the NPCs that reside in it, provided by your faction.
6. Your Garrison can come under attack by members of the Iron Horde, where you and your guards must defend it. And the battle can be pretty lengthy. However, this is not a forced event. Think of it as a Scenario. You can choose to do or not do this. But the reward for doing it, is mentioned to be quite nice.
7. When it comes to follower questing, you have to make a decision on who you want to send out on these missions. The enemies they have to face have a debuff. It’s recommended to have a follower that can counter that debuff. The chance of success is measured below, from a 0% chance, to a 100% chance they’ll come back to your Garrison safely.
8. Some of the buildings you can have in your Garrison are quite useful. You can have your own personal bank, and a personal Flight Path. You can even have an Inn to give you a special Hearthstone to teleport back to your Garrison.
9. It seems to me by looking at the video, you can’t rename your Garrison… sadface. Infact, it names itself. Such as “PlayerName’s Outpost” for Level 1, “PlayerName’s Fort” for Level 2, and “PlayerName’s Stronghold” for Level 3.
10. Of a Level 3 Garrison, you can have these portal statues that you can physically move around the Garrison, and use these as fast travel points to get to areas that you visit the most, quicker. I’m sure there will be a quest to get these. Don’t think they come with it.
11. Building the Barracks will give you a new “Call to Arms” ability that you can place on your hotbar, which will cause soldiers from your Garrison to assault a specific area of your choosing for 15 seconds, nomatter where you are in Draenor. Has a 5 minute cooldown.

What I don’t know;
1. Can you have more than one Garrison?
2. Can you move your Garrison to another area? And if you can, how much does it cost?
3. Can your Garrison go under attack by PvPers, when on a Normal server?
4. How do you upgrade your Garrison? Is it based of your player level, or do you just use resources?

Anyway, I can’t fucking wait for WoD now. Really wish it was November right now! Can’t wait to have actual player housing! No more random players walking into my conversations!

Been watching a few videos to get caught up with what’s going on with the Warlords of Draenor Beta, since I’ve never been a beta tester for Blizzard ever since Vanilla WoW.
This post has spoilers, which warned their viewers that if you don’t want to see them, don’t watch the video. The same goes to this post.

Currently, it’s still unclear exactly when in the WoD questline we’ll be able to build a Garrison. There’s actually nothing new about Garrisons that hasn’t been said before. Blizzard seems to be keeping this hush hush to not spoil the surprise. And I really hate surprises. Especially ones like “SURPRISE!! It’s patch day!” or “SURPRISE!! You just walked into a PvP zone and are now flagged and we never told you!”

Moving on, the videos I’ve seen from the over-talented YouTuber, wowcrendor, show footage of the “new” worlds of Draenor, such as the Spires of Arak, and ‘New yet Old’ Nagrand. The only thing I’m glad about, CollectionQuestHellmarsh (Zangarmarsh) is on the bottom of the ocean! No more depressing zone! 😀 And Nagrand, the floating islands are not there. The zone looks… different(there’s no Halaa), yet it still has that “congrats for surviving Outlands this far!” feel to it.
Also, I saw him talking to Thrall, and he calls him a ‘Commander’ instead of a ‘Hero’ or a ‘Champion’. I’ve seen this before of another NPC in one of his videos. Maybe you’re the leader of the force to stop the Iron Horde from invading Azeroth?
Or, maybe you get this sub-title after hitting Level 100 and having your first Garrison? This actually would make more sense, being the commander of your Garrison.

He also says, that he feels if you do the main questline only(no side quests), you’ll have it done in half a day(12 hours). Which, to be honest, sounds pretty sad. But here’s to hoping doing side quests in Draenor is worth it.
I’ve also heard, that once you enter the portal… you can’t leave. As in, go back to Azeroth. It’s like the song Hotel California. You can “check out” as in log out, but you can never leave.
You see, you’re part of a group that has to stay back to make sure the orcs don’t invade Azeroth. You’re pretty much rewriting the lore of Warcraft. Remember going to the two towns in the Blasted Lands and they say they’ve been there for a long time? … You’re now one of them. Maybe this is how you get the title of ‘Commander’.

Moving on, YouTuber Nobbel87, talks about that he feels the lore of WoD doesn’t really fit with our lore. Having never played WarCraft 3 and the other games, I don’t know much about it. Only that the orcs got tainted by fel blood by an evil orc named Gul’dan who worked for the Burning Legion, and then went to invade Azeroth. Garrosh tries to rewrite history by making the orcs not drink the fel blood, yet still attack Azeroth even stronger than they once were(aka, the Iron Horde).

Though the release date of WoD is still unknown to me(I believe it’ll be around October-November of this year), the game nearly looks finished from the footage I’ve seen(there are still a lot of bugs, but that’s why they have beta testers). I really can’t wait to learn about the Arokka(the bird-like people), see what Skettis was like before it was corrupted. It’ll be awesome.

I’ve just learned of another feature. Players and NPCs(anything that can be clicked on) will have an outline representing their faction to you, which will better show if something is hostile(red), neutral(yellow), or friendly(blue). Flagged friendly NPCs and Players will have a green outline. You don’t even have to click on them. Just mouse over.
The feature reminds me of Wurm Online, because you can do the same thing as I did, which was called “sweeping for hostiles” of seeing if I spot a red outline.
To me, that kind of kills the immersion. I hope it’s a clientside feature, and can be turned off.

I don’t often say I was in the wrong unless I feel I am. And in this case, I think I might be.
I’ve been watching a particular interesting YouTuber by the name of ‘DaSquirrelsNuts’. He’s done a lot of Euro Truck Simulator 2 videos. He also has done Battlefield 3, Train Simulator 2014, Next Car Game, Kerbal Space Program, and a lot of other simulators, all in 1080p(highest known(HD) resolution for viewing). And what he says in these videos, while driving a truck through Europe, is quite interesting. Mostly because, he’s from Great Britain, the people that make your legs feel like jello when they talk.

Anyway, I remember in one of his videos, he mentions SCS being an indie company. Now, years ago, I didn’t know what indie gaming was. But getting to my point, he also did a video about the DLC for Euro Truck 2: “Going East!”, and saying how this mod and that mod may or may not work with it. He mentions ProMods will work 100%, but didn’t know if TSM would.

Nearly in the middle of the video, he’s talking about this “American Truck Simulator” he’s mentioned before in his previous videos. He believes, that they’re hard at work making this, how North America is “bloody huge”, and he believes they’re doing…state by state. And I’m all “HOLY FUCK!! That would blow away both Rig’n’Roll and the failures of the 18 Wheels of Steel series!” I mean, can you imagine every state, as detailed as possible?!
Then he mentions again, how SCS is a small company. How they only had like 20 people working on Euro Truck 2. I must say, that is impressive.

So, maybe I was wrong about SCS. Instead of being pissed off they “took my work” back in Convoy, I should feel honored instead. He mentions that SCS doesn’t know how to map the US correctly, and those words were definitely proven time and time again in the 18 Wheels of Steel series. And maybe. Hopefully. This ‘American Truck Simulator’ is a way to say “We’re sorry we made a mess in the past. We’ve gotten better! Give us another chance, please?”

Squirrel also adds, that he’s heard SCS wants to listen to the community about this future game, to make it right. They’re looking for people who drive trucks IRL, people like me(retired map editors)… I think I’m going to join the cause. This to me, would prove SCS is sorry and they want to undo their mistakes of the past. And I would definitely help them do so.
I’m starting to feel like an asshole for giving them a penny for Euro Truck 2… but at least I can redeem myself by buying this DLC. Yes, it’s $13, but this means more money for SCS to help them develop more.

I keep forgetting how expensive it is to make a game, especially as an indie company.

I said before, that there’s certain mods for Euro Truck Simulator 2 like what I’ve did in 18 WoS PTTM, Haulin’, and Convoy of expanding or editing the current map.
But there’s this strange site that seems to stick out like a sore thumb, yet the community there doesn’t seem to mind it. It’s called ProMods. And their main bread and butter is this map that they claim they’ve been working on for two years. That’s some dedication.
To get it, you have to make an account. I don’t get why, but whatever. I’ve been having to deal with this crap before, that they refuse to show their downloads without you doing an account.

Also, you can only get this map from their site. And here’s the kicker: If you decide to upload it to another site, they see you as a criminal and actually will prosecute you. Yes, this is what they say when you go to download it, word for word: “REDISTRIBUTION OF THESE FILES ON OTHER WEBSITES OR FILEHOSTS IS A CRIMINAL OFFENCE AND OFFENDERS WILL BE SUBJECT TO LEGAL ACTION”. Legal action? Criminal offense? Over a map? No. This isn’t even legal. They aren’t allowed to make this kind of statement. It’s a map the developers of the game gave the tools for.

They can’t even handle having TSM working alongside their map as a compatibility patch! They go fucking ballistic when they see it being uploaded somewhere else! They’re so attached to it, it’s ridiculous. It reminds me… of myself when it came to my roads on the…Minecraft server that shall never be mentioned.

It’s like, it’s the future, and one of my old maps is so damn popular, that a website with a strange map-worshiping community cult was created to protect it, like it was a god.
And the community, they’re all “Are you serious? You created an account just to download this?! But the community! Come! Talk to them! Come say hi to the developers!”
Wow. Just wow. This isn’t a fucking game, it’s JUST A MAP!! But if it needs this much protection, then it has to be a really, really good map.

They claim the reason why they’re so protective of this map, is the trucksim community has “low moral values”. They say people have taken it, did edits, and upload it on their site and claim they did all the work. Yes, I can see how that’s a problem. But to threaten with jailtime over a fucking map? That’s not possible. They can’t legally do that.

But if they were working for SCS as a 3rd party map, then yes, I can see why they would have that copyright claim. But from what I saw, this is a fansite and not a legit business. As in, they aren’t affiliated with SCS in any way.

Saw this Early Access game last night, based off of Viscera Cleanup Detail: Santa’s Rampage, yet it’s made by the same devs.
So, imagine you’re playing a game like the DOOM or Dead Space series, but in an “alternate reality”. This time, you defeat the evil. You save the day. And eventually, life goes back to normal(don’t see how). Yet…, who’s going to clean up all of that blood left behind of your slaughtering of alien scum? This is where this game comes in.

You play as another guy that Roger Wilco kind of wishes he was instead of a guy being in the wrong place at the right time; a janitor, who has to clean the once filled halls of hell, get all of that blood off, remove all the decapitated corpses, and restore this space station back to what it was before the aliens attempted to slaughter the human race.

Yet, I don’t see why anyone in their right mind would think it’s a great idea to clean up stuff like “God save us” written on the walls in blood. I’d personally condemn the station as a memorial of the ones who died. Why would anyone want to live back in what had to be pure hell? I don’t get this, at all.
Yet, they did the same thing in Dead Space 2 with renovating the… ah crap, I almost said a spoiler.
Anyway, you must be getting paid big credits to agree to this job. Though I swear, you’re going to become like Issac Clarke and suffer dementia of seeing all of those bodies, the words smeared on walls with blood, and possibly feel or see ghosts of people.

Or maybe I’m just thinking about this way too hard, and just laugh and say to myself “it’s just a game! Those things aren’t going to happen, because they haven’t been programmed to!”

Looking at the bundle, I thought “what the hell” and got it. Though I feel I got my revenge with SCS.
You can set how much you feel each developer of that game should get, and I was able to give this game… 1 penny. And even this, I felt was being generous.

So the game. Is it better than the failure that was the 18 Wheels of Steel series? Yes and No. It’s actually pretty hard to compare the entire series with this one game, or its previous game.
Let’s just go with what I like and don’t like about it;

What I like;
-SCS provides free updates to the game. This is a first that I’ve seen. Maybe they’ve changed. … Maybe I should drop my grudge. They seem to actually care for the community now, unlike in the past. And they aren’t backpedaling anymore.
-Is in Europe(including the UK), instead of the US. A pretty nice change of scenery. In Europe, you drive on the right side of the road(and use left lanes as the fast lane). But in the UK part of Europe, you drive on the left.
-Really, really nice shadows and lighting. Sometimes I swear if you look at a truck from the right angle, it almost looks like the picture was taken IRL. They used a really good engine when they made this game.
-There’s map mods that can expand into other countries, and an official DLC(Going East!). Something that couldn’t be done in the 18WoS series (the USA is small compared to Europe).
-European Trucks use licensed names(another first), like Volvo, MAN, and Scania.
-Traffic are somewhat smarter. They obey speed limits(yeah, they’re pretty fast). Some of them give you the right of way(only when you’re on their way) while others can be jerks.
-Sometimes when you are involved in an accident, it’s seen as an accident, and not damage to your truck/trailer, giving you a higher chance to deliver your cargo with no problem.
-Massive increase in AI traffic density. At some intersections, you can be sitting for 5 RL minutes for traffic to get out of your way.
-For hauling cargo, you don’t have to sift through trailers you don’t want to deliver(ADR, fragile, high paying, etc…), this is defined by your Skills trees. You can select if you want to haul high priced(but also overweight) cargo or whatever, going by how much you put in each tree.
-There’s a lot of truck customization. For example, I can have a paintjob of a dragon sitting on a cliff. That’s a win right there.
-No competition. There’s no rival truck companies; no ‘how much share of the economy’ you have. Just you and the open road. This also can be boring overtime.
-People don’t bitch at you(and you don’t get fined) for using your High Beams at night. Sometimes I have to, when I can barely see the road infront of me.
-It’s freakin’ easy to get money in the game. Just haul a bunch of high priced, long distance jobs and you’ll have 500,000+ euro in no time. I feared I was going to need to cheat or use a trailer, thinking I was going to see humongous expenditures after getting my own truck. Not with this game.
-Having to sleep is optional, not forced. You can tick off the fatigue simulator and you’ll never get tired. Love that.

What I dislike;
-Has those ugly barriers used in a lot of driving games, that you’re not allowed to go through, yet AI traffic can. Just seems unrealistic and could be easily avoided in certain situations.
-No police is good, but having them replaced with super-sensitive, always watching traffic cameras continuously pointed at you, waiting for you to fuck up is bad. 😛 Sometimes, it feels like there’s an invisible cop following me, giving me tickets for running into people, going through red lights, and not using headlights at night/in rain.
-Traffic will not respond to the player signalling to turn left or right. They’re too stupid to slow down(or at least get out of their way) when seeing a massive truck trying to merge left. Constantly, I had a car zoom past me when I’m about to merge to pass slow traffic on the right.
-AI Traffic spacing between themselves…. why do they leave a three car gap between eachother? Why? There’s no need, and it’s even more stupid when waiting for a break to safely merge into traffic of an intersection(especially with an oversized load).
-AI traffic density seems to fluctuate, and unfortunately not by time of day. Sometimes, you can have rush hour traffic at night, and feel like you own the road in the day with no traffic on it.
-The GPS can’t be configured to select the fastest or most direct route. And also no option to set anywhere you click on the map as where you want the GPS to direct you to.

So, playing it. It’s actually pretty fun. But due to playing for just under a week nonstop, it’s also getting boring. Let’s say it’s a game that has very little to challenge the player. Instead of forcing challenges like most games do, it lets you ‘suck on a bottle’ with “Easy Mode” on the side of it, allowing you to choose if you wish to be challenged. In other words, it’s tailored to casual people, yet, if you set the right features, it can be challenging.

I both like and dislike this. It’s like a fight with my emotions with one side saying “I want the game to be harder!” and the other saying “SHUT UP!! I like it easy and simple!”.
How is it easy?
1. Able to acquire money quite easily by doing a lot of long haul, high paying jobs.
2. No competition = No real point in hiring workers and being “the best” company in Europe. But if you want to do it for the sake of realism, don’t let me stop you. Don’t understand why there’s no “Simulate having rival companies” feature.
3. The game allows you to take your earnings from quick jobs. It should limit the amount of money to encourage you to want to start your own business. Because the whole business aspect of the game is where it shines.
4. Why is there a bank feature, when it’s too easy to make money and maintain your bank account? The only reason it’s there, is for people that are too lazy to simply haul from Point A to Point B for 2-3+ RL hours. Another reason from what I heard, people use this to help grow their business (which is pointless anyway).

In conclusion, the game feels like an “unfinished” Alpha(having features called “Simulate this happening as if it happened IRL”), allowing the player to challenge themselves instead of the game doing it for them. Again, I like and dislike this.

But the real point here and someone actually said this which woke me up, this is a Simulator. How you play isn’t going to be the way everyone else is. Even some YouTubers, don’t use all the realistic features. But not for them, it’s for their viewers, to not bore them, which is always nice.

This is what I keep reading about this game. Heard the campaign isn’t all that good, but the graphics are amazing(from what I’ve seen of Dad3‘s and Dan‘s videos of the game).

This a a 3rd person shooter, set somewhere in the future. The city of Dubai has been hit by a massive sandstorm, and another one is approaching.
You are in a group of three American soldiers, with the task of locating survivors and formulating an exit strategy to evacuate the city.
But soon you realize, that some sinister thing is afoot and your team must stop them.

They say to “not expect a happy ending” with this game. That it will change how you look at modern warfare games like Call of Duty and Battlefield. The story is supposed to be dark and gripping. Makes me wonder if it’s going to be one of those “the hero dies in the end in a blaze of glory to save his friends” things.
It’s also supposed to draw the line on who are the “good guys” and the “bad guys”. Questions like, are you the hero… or the villain?

Anyway, it’s about finished downloading for me. Going to go play this and see what I think. Try to play it as legit as I can. I think it has health regen, which is always a plus for me.