Benie's Games Blog

I must say.. Notch actually did good with this update. If it wasn’t for my mods being broken (again), I would use this. This is a very good update.
It has new blocks, the first underwater animal (Squid), sheep are now in different colors, and the ability to paint wool blocks to make them look just like the ones from Minecraft Classic.
However, only a handful of dyes for the wool blocks look exactly like they do in Classic (and may have the same Block ID). The others are altered versions of them. The red one is more of a blood red color. I can’t say “Notch was just being lazy” which isn’t true in the slightest. I say he wanted to separate Classic from Beta. To show that Beta is “more modern” than Classic.

Also, someone made an optional Minecraft Client back on New Years Eve. It does what Notch promised he would do; ask if you want to update. I found it today of someone in the Single Player Commands thread telling another member to use “a non-updating client”. After asking, he said it’s part of this community pack.
So I checked the wiki (remembering that I saw it before), got the link, and downloaded it.
I then ran the client, and it acted like “Update? What update? There was an update? Ehh, probably a shitty one anyway.”.. I fucking LOVE it!! 😀 Now I will NEVER be forced to play offline EVER AGAIN! It’s a godsend, like Single Player Commands.

Other news I wanted to pass along. MCEdit is still alive and frequently updated. And one of its updates finally renders underwater blocks, allowing you to sculpt deep oceans. And in my case, remove what was left over from my early attempts of the transit system. I can finally remove the eyesore I made around House Memorial.

Speaking of the transit system, Wayward Desert Station is finally being constructed. I made an underground station for it — above ground. It’s a pretty good design if I say so myself.
I’m planning to import my Pyramid from my Mynecraft server over to it, to add to the theme.

With the AUTOCART-like replacement, and knowing Minecart Mania isn’t dead (just.. “on hiatus”), construction will continue on my transit system.

No real plans anytime soon, but I am planning something for the existing lines and stations. This is impossible to do in Minecraft, unfortunately, but not impossible to do on paper. Making several webpages for the site via the “new” webpage creator angry showed me (KompoZer, a replacement/upgrade from Visual Page).
I basically want these pages to look realistic. Like done for a real Metro system such as Washington D.C’s. It’ll have a picture and lots of data about it (wish one of them was remembering the day I started and completed each one of them).
But it’ll also have a Minecraft theme (of course), listing all stations beyond it in block distances. Would be impossible converting these figures to Miles.

I do have an idea of extending the Wayward Line’s southbound line even further south, to reach angry’s southern expedition area, but when it nears it will go underground to not disturb the scenery (similar to the planned Wayward Desert station).
Along the long journey there and back will be several stations. A “Tree Island” station, and a “Explosive Testing Site” station. That station will be extremely deep underground (maybe surrounded with Bedrock to stop griefers from blasting their way in).
The northbound side of the Wayward Line badly needs to be extended (where it’s stopped due to construction). I’ll have to go on an expedition to see what’s beyond it.

Minecraft has been in beta for quite some time now, yet I’m still using v1.2.2. Simple reason.
Notch bug-fixes, and his bug “fixes” break needed mods and cause more bugs than you can shake a stick at. However with Dragon Age: Origins – Awakening completed (finally), I debated if I should come back. Even made an ass of myself asking for a program that will check minecraftforum.net for me for updates to my mods.
After looking at the list of changes between 1.2.2 to now and seeing no serious bugs, I’ve decided to give it a chance.

So I went to see if I can update my mods, and half of them now require ModLoader, 1/3 of them haven’t been updated, and two of them have their authors who have stopped working on them. All because of Notch’s constant updates.

I have three mods I MUST have to continue my enjoyment of this game;
No Animals (for SSP), to stop them hurp-durping all over my tracks and laughing at me at my failed attempts to stop them.
A time freezer, to stop nighttime so I can see.
Minecart Mania, to give my World2 Transit System a purpose in SMP.

I had to literly bump my old request thread for a No Animals mod. Quite sad really, but it got the attention of one who made what I (and others) wanted.

For the old Day/Night mod I had for 1.2.2, I found three options for it. One used ModLoader and the other two didn’t. The one I’m using is from a mod called Single Player Commands, that brings the console from SMP into SSP.

And the final one… the situation is grave for the World2 Transit System.
Afforess has dropped SSP compatibility and made the SMP version a Hey0 mod. So all I have to do is just fire up my server with Hey0 and continue playing it, and everything’s cool, yes? Ohh I wish it was that easy…
Hey0 has stopped working on his server mod, saying he lost his interest with Minecraft. No Hey0 = No Minecart Mania. No Minecart Mania = …. no purpose for my transit system.
Afforess however hasn’t completely given up on SSP. He gave up on it because of Notch shitting out updates left and right.
A new server mod named “Bukkit” is supposed to replace Hey0 in the future. Will Afforess make the SMP version work with this… Bukkit mod once it comes out? No one knows.
AUTOCART is pretty much, left for dead. 🙁
There is however an AUTOCART-like replacement out, for SSP. It comes with Zombie’s Modpack. It uses your arrow keys to move it along the rails. And when Notch releases the next patch, it will have a “speed lock” that I suggested.
Wish he’d release it before that happens, since I’m refusing to update once again.

Everyone knows now that what Notch is doing is getting on their nerves. It’s not just me anymore.
Hell, if WoW was like this with their updates, they could possibly lose a… oh.. half of their fanbase. They may have over 11,000,000 players, but if the devs start to get update-happy that number will be greatly reduced.
I know I would quit, permanently.

But you got to look at it another way. Notch did what most video game devs would not (or very rarely) do; release the bare bones of Minecraft Alpha to the public.
The mod-breaking is a consequence of mod authors having to directly modify core game files, and the fact Notch seems reluctant to release the SDK. Remember before when there was no way to save your texture packs?
Minecraft has grown before our eyes, yet we bitch and moan everytime a critical to us mod breaks.

Half of me agrees to what I just wrote. The other half… well. We’ve already seen that side before.
He wants to say “There’s no excuse anymore! The game is in BETA now!”, but the truth that this is sadly an early beta, technically still making it Alpha.

As long as the updates fly out of Notch’s ass (lol’d at my own words) as fast as we bitch about them, it will remain like that. But eventually, there will be a day where the madness will slow down.
And that day, hopefully, is when Minecart Madness will rise again. And so will the usefulness of the World2 Transit System.
It’s all a matter of time. Surely the game won’t be in development forever, right? … Right?!

Trying to drain what’s left of my Christmas money, I got two more games yesterday.

1. Booster Trooper.
2. Dragon Age: Origins – Ultimate Edition

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I started playing Booster Trooper as a guest pass from a friend of mine. What I first saw I thought “Ehh.. another multiplayer-only game”. But actually this has Single Player in it, and you can complete against bots.
The object is simple — kill the opposing team, over and over again. There’s four gamemodes..
Capture the Flag, but instead of flags you have giant rings
Destroy the Beacon. Red team tries to destroy Blue’s two beacons to win the round. Blue has to defend them.
Deathmatch. What’s there to say about it?
Team Deathmatch. Red VS Blue in an all-out fragfest.
The game is set out sometime in the future, which is why both teams have jetpacks. It’s probably the first 3D side scrolling multiplayer game I’ve seen in my life.
Your weapons range from an Assault Rifle to a Rocket Launcher, and can be changed… anytime you die.
Reason why I like this game is because of the hilarious death screams of ending several enemies with one rocket, and the red “Double kill!”, “Triple kill!!”, “QUAD KILL!!!”, “CARNAGE!!!!” text you see infront of you. You also can gain achievements in Single Player that you would normally get in multiplayer.
What I don’t like is the fact it doesn’t save what you set to set up the match everytime you play. For example, I set Bots to 11, play, I quit the game/map. I go back in, and I have to set it again to 11. Everytime. Hoping there’s a text file lurking somewhere that I can set the defaults.

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And then there’s Dragon Age. I first wanted it due to the name and the bloody dragon on the boxart. But the irony of it is there’s only one dragon in the entire game. The term “Dragon Age” easily means, the Medieval Age. The age of knights, kingdoms, and shivery.
For months I’ve been thinking of getting it, yet the price kept turning me away. But I did something I should had done months ago… watched a tutorial of it on Youtube.
There’s plenty of them too, but it still wasn’t selling me. That was until I noticed “Hmm… you know this looks alot like WoW.”, and I saw you can join up as a group.. that sold me right there.
I bought it and started the download yesterday. It took until tonight for it to finally complete. This thing has Origins, Awakening, and nine DLC’s all bundled into a $37 pack, which was cheaper than getting both Origins and Awakening separately.

The reason why it took so long is because of the shitty download speeds I was getting. Had to constantly switch servers just to get a decent speed.

Alright, now with ranting about how shitty Steam’s servers are, time to talk about the game. One thing I want to mention is each class (and sub class) is a game in itself. Such as playing a Warrior has it’s own story, and playing a Mage is another story which is completely different from the others. All of these different versions of the game’s opening are known as Origins. It’s the origin of how the player character, you, came to be what you are now in the game.

As for the gameplay itself, it seems if there was a game before it (depending which class you choose), and apparently there was. Dragon Age: Origins is supposed to be the spiritual successor of Baldur’s Gate. I would say that this game is just another “k, here you go, we couldn’t afford telling you what to do so good luck!” game, but it does have a tutorial… a limited one that doesn’t cover everything you need to know about the game, such as this Tactics tab.
From what I can see when it comes to combat, healing is just like WoW (you wait after combat is over and your health goes up on its own). And if one of your party members die, it’s like Mass Effect (as in they come back to life after all hostiles in the area are dead).
However, if they die, they receive one or two nasty wounds as punishment for being defeated that can only be healed by two ways. Using a healing spell or going to a “party camp” which I haven’t found yet.

The plot of the game boils down to one thing; there’s these “darkspawn” which are like the Scourge in WoW, except they’re demons. Their armies, known as a Blight, are marching north as they kill everyone and everything in their path.
Every 200 years, they attack. The game is based around the start of the 5th blight. The leader of the darkspawn is an archdemon, who happens to be inside a… you guessed it! A dragon! The words “fierce” and “immortal” given to me from an NPC told me before I found out through the wiki.

I am already having second thoughts of this game, though. When your companions level, you have to manually set their skills and sub-skills and that’s quite hard for someone that just started playing. I can barely keep up with my own gear and skills. Would be nice if they could auto level, but it seems everything is manual in this game. Also it would be nice if your Mage companions would heal you. I’m just growing tired of seeing everyone but me dying in battle.
Maybe I’m just doing it wrong. I can dual weld now, but I’m having trouble locating a merchant.. or anyone I can sell this useless trash I’ve been collecting and try to get a pair of good 1H swords. I’m too busy questing to have a chance to just search for an NPC that’ll buy or trade.

It seems to me knowing what each of your teammate’s strengths and weaknesses are is crucial to completing this game, due to being able to control your party members. You can also get one of your party members to look into the party inventory (again, manually) and pick what they need from it. Also, after what I think was the end of my origin, I went to a random town where I was told by one of my party members “This town will be visited by the darkspawn soon. We should visit here because it may not be here when we return.”
Does this mean that there’s an annoying internal clock in this game, ticking down to a set time where you have to complete the game or you fail, or there’s phases where if you leave and come back later it’ll be gone? I really hope not. Because if there is, I won’t give a shit how long it took me to install the game because I would be uninstalling it.
I hate time limits.

Another thing I don’t like is the lack of autosaves. I did alot of shit an hour ago (side quests for a town), and lost it all due to a crash because the autosave didn’t … save it.

This game is however not without some (and I do mean SOME) humor. One thing is talking to an NPC and you and all of your party members are covered in blood splatters from a recent attack.
Blood splatters seem to be one of the themes of this game.

This game seems to lack any sort of transportation, including horses. Maybe it’s because the previous blights killed them all. When going somewhere on the world map, you click there and a trail of blood splatters shows your current location on the map.
Speaking of going places, the loading screen times are horrible, sometimes taking 30 seconds until finally loading the new area.

Other than all the issues I’ve faced so far, as long as there’s no internal time limit or phasing system I’ll do my best not to bitch about it.

A few minutes after the clock stuck 12 I bought four games off of Steam.

1. Plants VS Zombies GOTY
2. Super Meat Boy
3. VVVVVV
4. AaAaAA!!! – A Reckless Disregard for Gravity

Best game I think is either AaAAaAaAAAA!!! or Plants VS Zombies. The other two require quick reflexes and knowing exactly what you did before so you won’t fuck up.
Well, actually they all do. But it’s something about games 2 and 3 that make them harder than the other two.

Let’s talk about them. First, Plants VS Zombies.
I didn’t see why this game is so popular, or so addicting. I do now.
Zombies are coming for your braaaaiiinnnnssss. Why? They want to know why you’re able to make plants that can attack them, so they want to feast on your head.
You however aren’t going down without a fight. With the power of the Sun, you have to defend your house from the hordes of ever increasing strengths of zombies using your plants.
Each time you complete a level, you get a new plant. What makes this game addicting, yet also frustrating, is the night and fog levels.
You get plants with increasing damage, yet also increasing in how much Sun you need to place just one of them. If you’re unable to defend yourself, the zombie will simply walk into your house and eat your brain.
You do have a critical line of defense, but it can only be used once. A lawnmower on each lane. If the zombie manages to get through your defenses, it’ll get mowed down. But if another zombie manages to get through… consider your brain theirs.

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Second game, Super Meat Boy. This game seems to be popular with the resident fags of the DMT Chatroom (not all of them).
This game involves a small wad of meat who’s inlove with… a small wad of bandages. And of course there’s an evil guy. This guy is named… Mr Fetus. Seriously, who wrote the script?
What doesn’t make this game stupid is the fact it’s addicting. It’s manly about bragging rights on how fast you can complete a level against your friends, or enemies.
You must know the art of walljumping in this game. If not it has a small tutorial placed right into the story.

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The third game is similar to Super Meat Boy, except it’s more… 2D. This game is oddly called “VVVVVV”.
The game has an old arcade game feeling to it. You’re a Captain of a ship, which obviously something bad happens. After the crash you find out you’re all alone and have to locate the crew. There’s no jumping involved since you’re in a Zero-G environment. You can walk on the ceiling to avoid normal.. and unnormal (hopping “YES” things and shit) obstacles.
What makes this game quite difficult is, it’s a memory game. Memory of knowing every level in a split second. Knowing where obstacles are and platforms as quick as you snap your finger.
Some levels, the walls are full of spikes, which is the reason for the game’s name. Reflex skills are critical.

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And we move on to the final game. “AaAaAA!!! – A Reckless Disregard for Gravity”. This game has been known for awhile, yet didn’t really seem worth the money to me. Even now I have mixed feelings about this game.
The year is… sometime in the far future. There’s flying cars, and buildings. Everything is floating in the air, almost like a Virtual Reality feeling. You’re a professional jumper.. so you think anyway.
Every map is inside a cube. You can unlock these cubes by paying for them in… teeth. Yes. Human teeth.
There’s no real goal to this game, which is why I said I have mixed feelings for it. You jump off a building. You get close to buildings to “Kiss” and “Hug” them. Every Kiss and Hug and tallied to your final score when you land. Your final score is based from stars. You’re supposed to get 5/5 stars.
To land, you hit your spacebar to activate your parachute. The object is to get all the way down the map and land on the marked area of the landing pad.
Some maps don’t even have a landing pad, where you have to make a tough decision of when to activate your parachute. Because once you do, you can’t undo it. You stop collecting points once the parachute is deployed.
Later on, you get other abilities. So far I can flick people as I’m falling (thumbs up for fans, and a fuck you for protesters), and spraypaint buildings that allow it. Both gather points.
Another way to get points is to crash head first into colored point signs. Aim for the red “1 GRAND” ones the most. A new one is to bombard these large birds. Forgot how much they’re worth.

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So that’s pretty much about them. Do I feel like I wasted my money? No. They were on sale. And it’s not my money anyway. It’s my Christmas money. 🙂
Planning to buy two more games later on today or tomorrow.

I’ve been working on planning that new road I’ve had my eyes on for awhile. It’ll be attached to the secondary path up to my settlement.
Unfortunately, this is hard as hell. I’m dealing with 90+ slopes and having no idea how many dirts I have to dig into the side of the hill to lower all slopes to 20.

This will not be a repeat of my failed idea several years ago back in JK-H which started my Homestead hunt. I’ll get this. It’ll just take more time than I hoped it would.
Only thing that seems to be working is digging down from the very top.
Another idea I’m planning to do is staring at the 90+ slope ahead of me, climbing up it and then start digging away at the slope behind it to make it flat, to give myself something to “lean against” as I slowly hack away at the 90+ slopes to get them down to 20.

No doubt I’m possibly looking at over 600 dirts having to be removed, and then some. And that’s just to get it up the hill. Once up I have to determine in tiles how far away the peat is, to the south of me. This actually will be the easy part.. IF there’s no huge hills to the east of the road.

Once that’s done and the cobblestone is laid for the entire distance of the new road, I have to make a few directional signs to point to my settlement.