tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-15109200114435506632024-03-19T10:12:29.698+00:00Inventory FullBhagpusshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03499162165023939880noreply@blogger.comBlogger2902125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1510920011443550663.post-39848458730552727742024-03-18T12:32:00.000+00:002024-03-18T12:32:11.644+00:00Death Trip<p>
</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjQLKY8ueWRhFnBqOMsqYQmyqdqcvdYhsp068v679Tu9eooV70chSEFjmPtwnOrV-_gNa1lICMoT0WIkWT6efhy2t-AvcPoIANbWjUbbc-i1aqD7RUWpjFmaEv6LRf-iUgiJTuoi0Kljk-lknjbdpAWI_xjyjh-HVxw5-sabbgR615obg8oqAZLxTRXsz8/s1891/shcr1.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1000" data-original-width="1891" height="338" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjQLKY8ueWRhFnBqOMsqYQmyqdqcvdYhsp068v679Tu9eooV70chSEFjmPtwnOrV-_gNa1lICMoT0WIkWT6efhy2t-AvcPoIANbWjUbbc-i1aqD7RUWpjFmaEv6LRf-iUgiJTuoi0Kljk-lknjbdpAWI_xjyjh-HVxw5-sabbgR615obg8oqAZLxTRXsz8/w640-h338/shcr1.png" width="640" /></a></div><br />Although I said I didn't want to turn this blog into an obituary column, I
probably need to recognise that the road is about to run out for most of the
significant names from my teens and twenties. I try my best not to give in to
nostalgia but there's<span style="color: #ff00fe;"><a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/teach/bring-the-noise/music-from-our-teens/zvfphbk">
ample evidence</a></span>
now that biology plays a part, too, and that's less easily shurugged
aside.
<p></p>
<p>
Even if that wasn't true, I am literally sitting here typing this while
looking at a visual reminder. There's a faded satin scarf strung across the
wall behind the monitor that's been there since we moved into this house
thirty years ago. Most of it is obscured now by stacks of books but the part
still showing reads "<i>Steve Harley And Cockney R..</i>."
</p>
<p>
<i>Steve Harley</i> died yesterday at the age of 73. It was a shock in a way
although as I said in reply to my ex-wife, who sent me a link to the news, I'm
always a little surprised when any old rocker makes it past sixty. They really
didn't hold back in the seventies and eighties and it catches up with most of
them eventually.
</p>
<p>
In my teens, <i>Cockney Rebel</i> came very close to being my favorite band. I
first heard them through the scratchy, fading signal of
<i>Radio Luxembourg</i> in 1973, when the band's first single, the
magnificently overwrought epic <i>Sebastian, </i>became a hit all across
Europe.
</p>
<p></p>
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<p></p>
<p>
It was then and remains now one of my favorite songs of all time, although as
with all such favorites, I almost never listen to it. The more you listen, the
less you hear. You have to pace yourself if you want to live with a song
forever.
</p>
<p>
I bought the first album as soon as it came out a few months later and played
it incessantly and melodramatically, as we all did with our favorites in those
days. Cockney Rebel came several times to play in the city where I lived
over the next couple of years. Bands, even quite successful ones, used to come
round and round on a kind of musical conveyor belt back then, which is one
reason I rarely found it necessary to to travel far to see any of them. If
they couldn't be bothered to come to me...
</p>
<p>
The first time they played, I saw a card on the noticeboard of the super-hip
record shop I was almost too nervous to go into, asking for volunteers to come
hump gear for the band in return for a free ticket and beer. I was a bit too
young for that but I've always kind of wished I'd offered my services anyway.
It would be a story.
</p>
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<p></p>
<p>
The next time, they'd had a few hits in the UK and had upgraded from clubs to
concert halls. I went to that one. The thing I remember most about the gig
isn't anything from the performance. It's the row of stalls outside the venue
selling scarves and tees and badges and who knows what else.
</p>
<p>
It was the first time I'd really noticed anyone selling "<i>merch</i>", as we
definitely didn't call it then. I imagine it was beneath the likes of
<i>Hawkwind</i>, <i>Yes </i>or <i>Pink Floyd</i>, the kind of bands I was used
to going to see. By their standards, Cockney Rebel was almost a pop
group.
</p>
<p>
So I bought a scarf. I mean, why not. I doubt I was even being ironic. And I
wore it for the gig and when the band got to <i>Tumbling Down</i>, the epic
number (All Steve Harley's songs were epics) that ended with the whole
audience singing the chorus for what seemed like hours, I held my scarf above
my head and swayed from side to side along with everyone else.
</p>
<p>I'm not going to say it was magical. But it was.</p>
<p></p>
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The next year, I saw them again at the same venue. By this time they were on
their fourth album and Steve had gone weird. Weirder, I should say. It's not
like he wasn't weird to begin with but now he was heavily into Rosicrucianism
along with everything else.
<p></p>
<p>
The whole sound of the band (The second iteration of Cockney Rebel, after he
sacked most of the first line-up) had changed almost out of recognition, from
Bowiesque glam to a funkier groove that somehow managed to feel dry and
swamp-ridden all at the same time. Out of all expectation, I
<i>loved </i>it.
</p>
<p>
Cockney Rebel released five studio albums in the 1970s before calling it a day
until Steve got the band back together a good few years later, when they
recorded one more. The first two were released under the band name alone, the
others as <i>Steve Harley And Cockney Rebel</i>.
</p>
<p>
Of those six albums, the first - <i>The Human Menagerie</i> - is an
acknowledged classic, while the rest are generally considered at best hit or
miss. I like the second (<i>The Psychomodo</i>) and the third (<i>Best Years Of Our Lives</i>) a lot but they aren't entirely coherent. They each have a couple of his
best songs but also some undeniable filler. The fifth,
<i>Love's A Prima Donna</i>, is not great and the much later sixth album I
have never heard.
</p>
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<p></p>
<p>
The fourth, <i>Timeless Flight,</i> was not well-received at the time and I'm
not sure what its critical reputation is now. It is, however, one of my
favorite albums. I listened to it a very great number of times back when I
used to play vinyl but unlike The Human Menagerie, which was the first album I
bought on CD, I never thought to upgrade.
</p>
<p>
I have, however, listened to some of the tracks online, now and again, and
relatively recently (By which I mean in the last decade.) and I think it
stands up pretty well. I have
<i><span style="color: #04ff00;"><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pco9vY6PMB0">All Men Are Hungry</a></span></i>
on in the background as I type and it sounds great, still. What it's about I
have no more idea now than I ever did although I do now realise it has
something to do with <i>Hemingway</i>...
</p>
<p>
That's the thing with Steve Harley. He was a striking lyricist, famous for it,
and yet rarely did I know what he was trying to say. He was so fin de siecle
you couldn't make out the meaning for the brocade.
</p>
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<p></p>
<p>
It didn't matter. It never mattered. As he once said of Sebastian, "<i>It's poetry. It means what you want it to mean... I can't define its
meaning. It's like most poetry, it's a lovely word</i>." He made his method even clearer in another interview "<i>'Sebastian' is possibly a sort of Gothic love song, possibly not: I'm not
really sure to be honest</i>."
</p>
<p>
If Steve didn't know what his songs were about, I don't know why we should be
expected to. What always mattered with his work was the imagery and the
emotion. That was a powerful narcotic to an adolescent and it hit me hard
enough the bruise hasn't faded yet.
</p>
<p>
Thanks for all the memories, Steve. Like your songs, they've lasted well.
<br />
</p>
Bhagpusshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03499162165023939880noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1510920011443550663.post-34591980835881782212024-03-16T14:12:00.003+00:002024-03-16T23:47:20.868+00:00Awkward Interregnum<p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiiudQ6MT_1vyN24cSIN-IzEHcUCFifhTeUXoiuiBkdstdGHKwlSNkgoQafy_H6CvsD2kEndk4uk18TJI8X6lbFt_VjAmCTZIx-sqnZiSU2nTuYwSlCG2_Kh9Q5SBJU-pSGrhe-oCDPvYni4e013UOmZhgiTZpv7Y8yC7iHWrrjo45jsDnC5pQP2tx6aoU/s1152/aihead1.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="896" data-original-width="1152" height="498" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiiudQ6MT_1vyN24cSIN-IzEHcUCFifhTeUXoiuiBkdstdGHKwlSNkgoQafy_H6CvsD2kEndk4uk18TJI8X6lbFt_VjAmCTZIx-sqnZiSU2nTuYwSlCG2_Kh9Q5SBJU-pSGrhe-oCDPvYni4e013UOmZhgiTZpv7Y8yC7iHWrrjo45jsDnC5pQP2tx6aoU/w640-h498/aihead1.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><br />Regular readers may have noticed a marked absence anything to do with AI here at <i>Inventory Full</i> lately. It's not just that there haven't been any posts specifically about the technology or the cultural phenomenon or the underlying concepts; there also haven't been any AI-generated illustrations necessitating end credits listing prompts and models.<p></p><p>It's not a change of policy. Nor is it a reaction to the low-level pushback AI occasionally generates. It's a lot simpler than any of that. I just got bored with it.</p><p>Not with the potential. I still find that thrilling. It's more like what happened with VR. There, I was never remotely convinced or impressed by the claims being made, a position I think has been borne out by experience. With AI, I did think something was genuinely about to happen.<br /></p><p>And it probably will, one day. The thing about AI as it stands now, though is...</p><p><b><span style="font-size: x-large;">It's <i>not </i>AI.</span></b></p><p><b><span style="font-size: x-large;"></span></b></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><b><span style="font-size: x-large;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhVLwIhk3V_05nkcNIp3YX7zdBXH4XmvHsBCv5AclY0G1JhBcRcN9KCLvQYpabSD9_w3PD-5X2wZaRZuAcSVp0w5Wz5k_7HbL8HWfYlem4xQ3Vw9id2GD9G7C0FFM-cQadALfSSiC9IEfQLewVK4jnesrMQrrZLznq9hWmi7q7lbhtiRxW7ijBNXfXl_iY/s1152/aips1.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="896" data-original-width="1152" height="498" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhVLwIhk3V_05nkcNIp3YX7zdBXH4XmvHsBCv5AclY0G1JhBcRcN9KCLvQYpabSD9_w3PD-5X2wZaRZuAcSVp0w5Wz5k_7HbL8HWfYlem4xQ3Vw9id2GD9G7C0FFM-cQadALfSSiC9IEfQLewVK4jnesrMQrrZLznq9hWmi7q7lbhtiRxW7ijBNXfXl_iY/w640-h498/aips1.jpg" width="640" /></a></span></b></div><p></p><p>I mean, we all know that, don't we? No-one really believes anything we're seeing or hearing about is <i>intelligent</i>, artificially or otherwise, surely? </p><p>Calling any of it AI is confusing, misleading and increasingly annoying. It's gone from a promise to a buzz-word to a cliche in just a couple of years. </p><p>Unfortunately, labels stick and AI is the label attached to the disparate collection of algorithms, apps and processes currently drenching the media and drowning all coherent thought, so I guess we're stuck with it too. Since we've used up the acronym on what's effectively nothing more paradigm-shifting than a bunch of productivity software, what we're going to call any genuinely intelligent artificial entity when or if it ever appears, I have no idea. </p><p>Master, probably. Or God. </p><p>That, however, is a problem for another day. More likely, another century. For now, we're all going to carry on using the thick-headed shorthand we've been handed so let's just try and make the best of it.</p><p><b><span style="font-size: x-large;">It's not very useful</span></b></p><p><b><span style="font-size: x-large;"></span></b></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><b><span style="font-size: x-large;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgrF0vMB5r9u4hqEkqARTVzfkLZleqgjiwdp4MQwuPtn-DtRT6VUhqVLiPeZIbpgVfO0v7v423lY1sh5Yp2RpTPtWa8j0hNI2nWI_v4V2jPG3x2oZtDzrGu53tL6h2NwQHhSBywi2fswNUPi4lJgn39XGqoWQdladJdzjzHqbdEbWLzR76uqj6VjIwEht4/s1152/ai90s1.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="896" data-original-width="1152" height="498" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgrF0vMB5r9u4hqEkqARTVzfkLZleqgjiwdp4MQwuPtn-DtRT6VUhqVLiPeZIbpgVfO0v7v423lY1sh5Yp2RpTPtWa8j0hNI2nWI_v4V2jPG3x2oZtDzrGu53tL6h2NwQHhSBywi2fswNUPi4lJgn39XGqoWQdladJdzjzHqbdEbWLzR76uqj6VjIwEht4/w640-h498/ai90s1.jpg" width="640" /></a></span></b></div><p></p><p>I mean, it isn't, is it? Let's be honest. Everyone in this part of the blogosphere who's experimented with AI has reported back with overwhelming evidence of inaccuracy. </p><p>The AIs that are really <i>Large Language Modules </i>have been designed and developed to build sentences and paragraphs by extrapolating the next most likely word in a sequence, based on the petabytes of data fed to them from trawls of the internet, authorized or otherwise. That allows for an initially astonishing impersonation of something a person might write but it has very little to do with fact and even less to do with truth.</p><p>The tech giants behind all of this are doing their damnedest to force these systems to comply but by my own experience I'd have to say they aren't getting very far. The main reason I'm not using <i>ChatGPT </i>or <i>Bard </i>(Now <i>Gemini</i>, for reasons.) or whatever the other one is called is that it actually takes me longer to put a post together with any of them than it does to do it the old-fashioned way.</p><p>That's because I have to fact-check everything they tell me before I can risk publishing it, unless I'm just using the output for humor, in which case the less accurate it is, the better for me. Otherwise, I have to put everything I don't know to be true through <i>Google Search</i>, at which point I clearly could just have searched for the information that way to begin with and saved myself a step.</p><p>It's widely reported that Google Search has deteriorated of late but it still seems reasonably precise to me. I can always find what I want, even if what I want is frequently on <i>Reddit</i>. Moreover, the whole supposed benefit of using AI to search, which being that you can communicate with it in normal, conversational English, is what I've been doing with Google Search since the early 2000s.</p><p>I learned correct internet search practices way back in the 1990s but I haven't bothered to use what I learned since Google made it optional. Google Search easily parses full sentence queries and returns highly appropriate search results, so what value does AI add other than a fatuous "<i>Thank you</i>" at the end?</p><b><span style="font-size: x-large;">It's not funny any more.</span></b><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiKgDDKxIk9vcot2hktAc_fOjkjbFYz7hWxettIelrneTa6urelzfX_0K7YeNbEbcJjhp43USle7gc2tRn-4ftrMtnMqejFS_X5-hK8eJkcNhFKfBdIWkmnfkzLsyyLCEl-dxxyjzYqTLWRocOl27smLoofHCspXKAAfDKSAxa4w1LKCIclBeiPKQT7ICU/s1152/ma1.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="896" data-original-width="1152" height="498" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiKgDDKxIk9vcot2hktAc_fOjkjbFYz7hWxettIelrneTa6urelzfX_0K7YeNbEbcJjhp43USle7gc2tRn-4ftrMtnMqejFS_X5-hK8eJkcNhFKfBdIWkmnfkzLsyyLCEl-dxxyjzYqTLWRocOl27smLoofHCspXKAAfDKSAxa4w1LKCIclBeiPKQT7ICU/w640-h498/ma1.jpg" width="640" /></a></div>I guess whether AI was ever funny is a matter of taste but it used to make me laugh out loud, sometimes uncontrollably. I found the nonsensical non-sequiturs all kinds of amusing - charming, whimsical, sweet - and the warped, weird images delightful. <p></p><p>Two things have happened to blunt those positive impressions. The AIs have gotten much better at faking being human and the novelty has worn off. </p><p>The second is probably the more damaging. Jokes aren't funny when you've heard them lots of times before. </p><p>I follow <i>Janelle Shae</i>'s excellent blog <span style="color: #ff00fe;"><a href="https://www.aiweirdness.com/">AI Weirdness</a></span>, in which she tests to destruction the capacity of various AIs to follow simple instructions. When I first started reading it I had to be careful not to have a cup of coffee in hand when I opened a new post in case I laughed so much I spat it all over the keyboard. Now most posts barely raise a tired smile. Seen one <span style="color: #ff00fe;"><a href="https://www.aiweirdness.com/learn-your-farm-animals-with-ai/">mislabeled animal</a></span>, you've seen them all.</p><p>Janelle still seems to get a laugh out of them but I fear she's having more trouble with the first problem. These days the AIs tend to give her something a lot closer to what she's asking for than they did a year or two ago. She has to push them harder to fail in a humorous way. That does suggest at least a move towards usefulness but it also diminishes what made the results so fascinating before - their inhuman alienness. </p><p><b><span style="font-size: x-large;">The pictures all look the same.</span></b></p><p><b><span style="font-size: x-large;"></span></b></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><b><span style="font-size: x-large;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhVkGjQPqLHCkG99wAKfq2l9-byR0kLgslgS2Dmec4Xkiu2BISCaaTeO0wsIdwl8HlALoxj2e6tdjD8nC8vlh8MVeBHiCZrUfqE8DeAgZUfxKHaagbUKD-F7d8xJkbvRJbDYIIfHe1z62NHEBkKq9wBIiuK_lu_UmU5ftNRLixYBZ1cs5xoIuZ0ze2Bvok/s1152/wdf1.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="896" data-original-width="1152" height="498" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhVkGjQPqLHCkG99wAKfq2l9-byR0kLgslgS2Dmec4Xkiu2BISCaaTeO0wsIdwl8HlALoxj2e6tdjD8nC8vlh8MVeBHiCZrUfqE8DeAgZUfxKHaagbUKD-F7d8xJkbvRJbDYIIfHe1z62NHEBkKq9wBIiuK_lu_UmU5ftNRLixYBZ1cs5xoIuZ0ze2Bvok/w640-h498/wdf1.jpg" width="640" /></a></span></b></div><p></p><p><b><span style="font-size: x-large;"></span></b></p><p>Not literally. That <i>would </i>be interesting. No, what I mean is that as the AI Image Models become more and more sophisticated, the results seem to have acquired something of an AI imprimatur. You can look at an image and immediately sense it was created by AI. Just not, unfortunately, in what I used to think of as the good way.</p><p>There were two things I liked about making pictures using AI. Firstly, it meant I could imagine I could draw. Secondly, all the pictures looked bizarre.<br /></p><p>I can't draw. Never have been able to. All my friends can draw, even the ones who <i>really </i>can't. Drawing is weird. If you believe you can do it, you <i>can </i>do it and other people believe you can, too. I never believed it so I can't draw and absolutely no-one ever thought I could.</p><p>If you look back at the earlier AI images on the blog, they are horrific. Warped, distorted, unnatural, freakish. That was what I liked about them. If I use <i>NightCafe </i>to make images now, they're <i>almost</i> proper pictures. Sometimes they're very good. Sometimes they're just a tiny bit off. Occasionally they're very poor but never in an interesting way.<br /></p><p>Whatever they are, though, they're clearly not "<i>my</i>" pictures any more. Not in the way they were when the people in them had three arms. These all look like commercial art. I like commercial art well enough in its place but I don't aspire to using it here. It's too slick and corporate and functional for a funky, home-made blog.</p><p><b><span style="font-size: x-large;">It's nowhere near ready yet.</span></b></p><p><b><span style="font-size: x-large;"></span></b></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><b><span style="font-size: x-large;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj9KjUhDc1JM2DREB_svLZHTABzvxTBu7HBN7YUdMQ9ousKMqOZ7VqiBM8Y_ncGKaOrT_ZyGCaOaOKcoRj-kMly6JJ7qHxH4DdkCSaLAbyOMyHyg2F8oQqxJ1efiL62Do_NV8kSkOOZix5KPio2aXttgvqLlqVz5DgqJWmT6K3GP7Ed10b7B22y8OWJUuc/s1152/bai1.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="896" data-original-width="1152" height="498" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj9KjUhDc1JM2DREB_svLZHTABzvxTBu7HBN7YUdMQ9ousKMqOZ7VqiBM8Y_ncGKaOrT_ZyGCaOaOKcoRj-kMly6JJ7qHxH4DdkCSaLAbyOMyHyg2F8oQqxJ1efiL62Do_NV8kSkOOZix5KPio2aXttgvqLlqVz5DgqJWmT6K3GP7Ed10b7B22y8OWJUuc/w640-h498/bai1.jpg" width="640" /></a></span></b></div><p></p><p>I've said this before but I'll reiterate: I want to be able to press a couple of buttons and have a complete blog post appear, indistinguishable from something I could write myself. Better still, I want to type in a short plot synopsis and have an original story as good as most of the proofs of novels I take home from work. (Seriously, it's not that high a bar...) </p><p>In other fields, I'd like something that could generate animated cartoons or CGI movies as good as the ones I watch already, just from a few brief instructions in plain English. Most of all, I'd like a small device I could clip to Beryl's collar that would talk back to me, convincingly, in her voice while we're out walking.</p><p>None of this is currently available or even possible, although if you follow AI reporting in the media you absolutely could believe it was. It reminds me very strongly of the early days of VR, when everything seemed to suggest we'd all be running around inside the <i>Star Trek HoloDeck</i> by Christmas.</p><p>About the only thing the media gets right about AI is a that it's a highly disruptive technology. The problem is, until it gets a <i>lot </i>better, the kind of disruption it causes isn't going to be the supposed cultural reformatting that might or might not lead to a genuinely different, maybe even better, future; it's going to be the kind of disruption you'd get if you released a swarm of killer bees into a crowded shopping mall.</p><p>And that's why there's not much AI on this blog right now. I reserve the right to go back to covering the phenomenon should anything interesting develop - I am still keeping an eye on it and it is a fast-changing field, although most of it isn't changing anything like as fast as I'd like. </p><p>Right now, though, it feels like there's nothing much to say about AI that hasn't been said too often already. When there's something to talk about, <i>then </i>we'll talk.<br /></p><p>I will still use some AI images if I find it convenient or appropriate (Obviously I was always going to use some for this post.) but honestly I'm getting a lot more fun out of going old school and running screen grabs through an image processing app until they distort to the point of unrecognizeability. <br /></p><p>I may also do some more experiments with the LLMs just to keep an eye on progress there. If they ever start to return consistently accurate results I would be interested in using them as research assistants. If that happens, though, it'll probably be the last I ever write about them. At that point, they'll become about as interesting as spell checkers or email clients. I mean, I use a spell-checker on every post but I don't feel the need to tell anyone about it.</p><p>As for my dabbling with audio and video, unless and until there are some very major advances, I can't see that continuing. It takes ages and I get nothing interesting out of it. Right now, AI in those fields is probably at the stage of becoming a useful tool for professionals. The day when the ungifted amateur can produce satisfying, convincing results for almost no effort is far, far away.</p><p>As for all the other things we also call AI, like the kinds of procedural generation used in virtual worlds or the way mobs follow a path or fight in an MMORPG or even the app I use to remove parts of an image and refill it with something unnoticeable, well no-one's really talking about any of that when they use the jargon these days, are they? I imagine that although PR people will try hard to convince us otherwise, all of that will carry on much as before without any of us needing to pay much attention.<br /></p><p>I think that about covers it.</p><p>Oh, wait! I haven't even mentioned Artificial Insemination... <br /></p>Bhagpusshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03499162165023939880noreply@blogger.com7tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1510920011443550663.post-7579555033865292802024-03-15T13:21:00.002+00:002024-03-15T20:46:09.320+00:00Different Class<p>
<img border="0" data-original-height="505" data-original-width="1920" height="168" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh0oTY7qXiW2iaBkftpSJKawE8OcXSbJv2ZlKtlTRzoDjkl_8jdth3P46sVh7rfko5dD3clhwune2cN45febYCDghHi9GWd6EGmh60U84NKxPmHXc0uNJ_jsqzM5jjX627gLcoWC6IQffqgbGkxLuPdQkYR3WlRnCo04Zg8-U7877lRmBv6GNgSWBCR7BM/w640-h168/steamsale1.png" width="640" />
</p>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div>
When I went to log in to <i>Nightingale </i>yesterday, I noticed the minimally
interactive banner (You can click it and it changes very slightly but only
once.) at the top of the screen announcing the <i>Steam Spring Sale</i>. It
doesn't feel much like Spring outside but if Steam says it is I guess it must
be.
<p></p>
<p>
As time goes on I become more and more enmeshed in the Steam ecosystem I
resisted for so long. I used to see people talking about Steam sales and shake
my head at the idea of anyone falling for such an entry-level marketing ploy.
Now I hear the news and go "<i>Ooh! I wonder if there's anything good?</i>"
</p>
<p>
There wasn't, not really. I can't claim to have gone through the entire list
line by line but I flicked all the way to the end of the main page, where what I
imagine are meant to be the most enticing offers are, and didn't see much I was
interested in. Not at those discounts, anyway.
</p>
<p>
Of course, there were some very heavy reductions, some of them even on titles
I have wishlisted, but they're games that regularly go on sale.
<i>Horizon Zero Dawn : Complete Collection</i>, for example, has been 75% off
several times since I put it on my wishlist.
</p>
<p>
The problem with that one and several other bargains I noticed is that the
cost isn't what's stopping me. It's knowing I won't play them. I
don't even claim free titles from <i>Prime </i>any more unless I'm almost
certain I'm going to play them almost immediately.
</p>
<p></p>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiarZrTeKAv3PT7DUlo6wnKyhkE2wLHhZTBXlX50tH9F7drO4jD-supdWC689VZro8FOC64H4tETMNNLW5OgR9bOryIpW5E96Spj1Z-PEJW17k8YjYtiAkLoLeCZYkmuQZ6WUCdOw8aM2LWkF66dXee6BcRuKDobSxB7jF97-qa8M92Z47PswlHjDcWGYk/s1920/o9punk1.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="1920" height="360" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiarZrTeKAv3PT7DUlo6wnKyhkE2wLHhZTBXlX50tH9F7drO4jD-supdWC689VZro8FOC64H4tETMNNLW5OgR9bOryIpW5E96Spj1Z-PEJW17k8YjYtiAkLoLeCZYkmuQZ6WUCdOw8aM2LWkF66dXee6BcRuKDobSxB7jF97-qa8M92Z47PswlHjDcWGYk/w640-h360/o9punk1.jpg" width="640" /></a>
</div>
<br />
<p></p>
<p>
Horizon Zero Dawn looks great in principle but in practice I'm pretty sure the
gameplay wouldn't suit me very well. £9.99 may not be much but it's still a
waste of money if the game's just going to sit there in my Steam library
gathering virtual dust. Rather than buying it because it's on offer I should
probably just take it off my wishlist.<br />
</p>
<p>
There's an argument for culling the list quite severely. It's full of titles
that have been on offer numerous times without triggering a purchase. For most
of them, though, that <i>is </i>price-related. Discounts between 20%-40% just
don't seem generous enough to make me think "<i>I'd better jump on that!</i>"
</p>
<p>
Even at half-price I rarely bite. There are four titles on the list at 50% or
more off in the current sale but I haven't gone for any of them... yet. In
every case, what that tells me is that I'm not really as keen to play them as
I thought I was when I put them on. All of them are titles I wishlisted after
playing demos in various <i>NextFests </i>and as I've said a few times, for a
lot of games an hour-long demo is probably about as much as I ever needed.
</p>
<p>
There's also the salutory fact that the last several games I bought in Steam
sales I either haven't even started yet or, worse, played for a while then
somehow forgot to finish. If that was because I wasn't enjoying them it would
be one thing but actually my hit rate on picking games I enjoy is extremely
good. I'm just very bad at sticking with them for long enough to get to the
credits.
</p>
<p></p>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhHcjwdXGYZBTMIhR9zav8dRVgARid8X0uENWUFIGm09IQYDXpsLAm5HPCGCP8UU0GZwQumBv0PjwmtJ8Iz04BwFaIocVt9cRdIIsv7dRQRmDb44Si4Dyh_z87zRgmj-vee4-Tw7AhCNQECiNdR9JsEsWBpqQYDvU1CpD9XY5VCrB3vVMEhldz9RLP92T4/s1920/09band1.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="1920" height="360" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhHcjwdXGYZBTMIhR9zav8dRVgARid8X0uENWUFIGm09IQYDXpsLAm5HPCGCP8UU0GZwQumBv0PjwmtJ8Iz04BwFaIocVt9cRdIIsv7dRQRmDb44Si4Dyh_z87zRgmj-vee4-Tw7AhCNQECiNdR9JsEsWBpqQYDvU1CpD9XY5VCrB3vVMEhldz9RLP92T4/w640-h360/09band1.jpg" width="640" /></a>
</div>
<br />
<p></p>
<p>
Then there's the issue of timing. When I put <i>Coreborn </i>on the list, for
example, I had space in my schedule for a new MMO/Survival title. Now I really
don't, even at 70% off.
</p>
<p>
Perhaps most important of all, though, is that a lot of the games on my
wishlist just aren't very expensive to begin with. If I wanted to play them -
as in <i>right now</i> - I'd be happy to pay full price. For a discount to
work its magic it needs to be attached to a game I'm already teetering on the
edge of buying anyway. Then even a small reduction is enough to nudge me over.
</p>
<p>
And that's how I came to buy <i><span style="color: #ff00fe;"><a href="https://store.steampowered.com/app/1443200/Class_of_09/?snr=1_7_7_151_150_1">Class of '09</a></span></i> last night. I've been
thinking about it ever since I somehow stumbled across a playthrough on
<i>YouTube </i>a few weeks ago. There are <i>lots </i>of playthroughs of the
game on YouTube. I'm going to embed one here but please pay serious attention
to the warning that comes with the game itself: <i> </i>
</p>
<p>
<i><b><span style="font-size: medium;"></span></b></i>
</p>
<blockquote>
<i><b><span style="font-size: medium;">This game contains reference to sexual themes and explicit criminal
acts such as drug solicitation, substance abuse, homicide, physical
assault, sexual assault, fraud, and self-harm. </span></b></i>
</blockquote>
<p></p>
<p>
Boy, does it ever. And the rest. That's just scratching the surface of the
ways Class of '09 could offend, upset, disturb or outrage. If you're ready
for it after all that, go ahead, don't let me stop you.
</p>
<p>
Tell you what, let's just have the intro. I'm not convinced clips work out of
context and I'm not expecting anyone to watch a whole playthrough.<br />
</p>
<p></p>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<iframe allowfullscreen="" class="BLOG_video_class" height="292" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/ARfZaEhHxuI" width="528" youtube-src-id="ARfZaEhHxuI"></iframe>
</div>
<p>
I've played two games of Class of '09 now. I think that's how it works. You
just keep playing in the forlorn hope of getting any kind of acceptable
conclusion. Catharsis.
</p>
<p>My first run, Nicole hung herself. That was cheery.</p>
<p>
My second run she's hiding at home because she thinks something she posted on
the internet is going to get her school burned down by extremists. Compared to
some of the endings I've seen, that doesn't really seem like such a bad
outcome.
</p>
<p>
If Class of '09 was just sweary, boundary-breaking shocksploitation, obviously
I wouldn't be here writing about it now. It's a lot more than that. It's
witty, smart, funny, sweary, boundary-breaking shocksploitation, with very good
voice acting.
</p>
<p>
It didn't surprise me in the least to discover there have been attempts to
shift the property to other media. It would make a great animated TV show, not
least since one of its acknowledged inspirations is <i>Daria</i>.
</p>
<p>
A Kickstarter looking to fund an anime based on the game raised $132k on a 35k
ask last year, enough to make an 11 minute pilot episode. That's yet to come
but there's a three minute teaser made for the Kickstarter that's really good.
</p>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<iframe allowfullscreen="" class="BLOG_video_class" height="292" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/Z1jvXZ-Tqc4" width="528" youtube-src-id="Z1jvXZ-Tqc4"></iframe>
</div>
<p>
It'd be nice if that all goes somewhere further than a pilot but for now the
game's the thing and I plan on playing it plenty. I particularly appreciate
the structure, which seems to resolve itself into shortish, TV-like episodes
as you hit the inevitable buffers on every playthrough. More games should come
in bite-sized chunks.
</p>
<p>
When I've seen a lot more of Nicole's fractal life, no doubt there'll be
another post. There are supposed to be thirteen endings but how many branches before you get to them I couldn't say. It's too early to make any solid statements about how looped the
gameplay is or whether there's ever any real sense of progress or achievement.
I suspect there isn't and I imagine that's the point.
</p>
<p>
The one thing about the game that slightly worries me is that it's the sole
creation of one guy, <i>Max Field</i>, who might just possibly be a bit of a
dick. Here's
<span style="color: #ff00fe;"><a href="http://www.otakusandgeeks.com/articles/interviewwithmaxfield">an interview</a></span>
with him that kind of gives that impression. I'm not entirely comfortable with
all of this supposed female psychological insight coming purely from a male
perspective, either, although that leads onto a whole corridor of doors I
<i>really </i>don't want to open.
</p>
<p>He sure pisses the racists off, though, so at least he has that going for him.<br /></p>
<p>
Anyway, judge the work, not the creator, I guess. I can recommend an
entertaining, if not entirely helpful,
<span style="color: #ff00fe;"><a href="https://www.theguardian.com/books/2023/may/07/monsters-a-fans-dilemma-by-claire-dederer-review-whats-your-cancellation-policy">book</a></span>
on navigating that cultural minefield if anyone's interested. I liked it more
than <i>Rachel Cooke</i> from<i> the Guardian </i>did but I can't argue with
most of her criticisms. It's all over the place.<br /></p>
<p>
And we're getting off the subject again, aren't we? Back to the game. Or
should I say games?<br />
</p>
<p>
There's a sequel called <i>Class of '09: The Re-Up</i>, too, which I cannot
imagine not wanting to play once I'm done with this one. It may have to wait
for another sale though. At the moment it's a derisory 20% down although
there's a double pack of both games (That I now realise is the one I
<i>should </i>have got.) for 45% off.
</p>
<p>I guess sales do have their uses, on occasion. <br /></p>
Bhagpusshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03499162165023939880noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1510920011443550663.post-4156119100373318572024-03-14T14:41:00.000+00:002024-03-14T14:41:52.577+00:00They Only Come Out At Night<p><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhS62tLjgE1AEK9SrsMzpfW79XwxPKc4BDLO2I6tWLWK-AEJKEchpdRnQlJ8mLGU5a3muDbYZEwKn01k4VubJ1zV0BRcyFWddKq2FzwxKc2CuVelfvW40g7kPSIBM9XsGjHhSD25CTRZr4gI7XpK5QUSDQkvz5lwe8rDSW5f0yT_y-PZ3cz2y07tQuKjnM/s1920/ngnight1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="1920" height="360" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhS62tLjgE1AEK9SrsMzpfW79XwxPKc4BDLO2I6tWLWK-AEJKEchpdRnQlJ8mLGU5a3muDbYZEwKn01k4VubJ1zV0BRcyFWddKq2FzwxKc2CuVelfvW40g7kPSIBM9XsGjHhSD25CTRZr4gI7XpK5QUSDQkvz5lwe8rDSW5f0yT_y-PZ3cz2y07tQuKjnM/w640-h360/ngnight1.jpg" width="640" /></a>One thing I haven't mentioned about <i>Nightingale </i>is what happens after the sun goes down. The monsters all come out to play. Everywhere, even your home Realm, innocuous by daylight as it is, becomes a playground for murderous mobs, all of whom seem to know exactly where to find you.</p><p>To put that in a less flowery context, there's some mechanism whereby as soon as it gets fully dark, <i>Bound</i> mobs, the Fae Lands stand-ins for zombies, begin to appear. I haven't figured out exactly how it works but it looks very much as if traveling about after dark- or even standing still for too long - causes portals to appear close by.</p><p>Depending on your temperament, you could see this as a handy delivery service, bringing useful crafting materials right to your door. Or you could find it scary and unsettling and very much wish it wasn't happening, or at least not to you.</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjHpphURCY0JmSOXoORiAqu_cibv8ocb2wHalq_eDSdsWKY23OSfl9kf8Cx4zn3NaaqAkDzQ6_oQYWbVxlgzcnbsvz6K5zy265dITViR45Ddh2CiUYyndE3DEctVRMrrYoBVDvS6ots2rVMfJYW6F0UItmVqViexZ6BtdLV4pq91SfLKZApzUeDVzTZUPU/s1920/ngmoon1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="1920" height="360" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjHpphURCY0JmSOXoORiAqu_cibv8ocb2wHalq_eDSdsWKY23OSfl9kf8Cx4zn3NaaqAkDzQ6_oQYWbVxlgzcnbsvz6K5zy265dITViR45Ddh2CiUYyndE3DEctVRMrrYoBVDvS6ots2rVMfJYW6F0UItmVqViexZ6BtdLV4pq91SfLKZApzUeDVzTZUPU/w640-h360/ngmoon1.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><br /><p></p><p>More likely, you might not even notice. I'd been playing for more than a week before I found out it was even happening. That's because Nightingale has another mechanic called <i>Rest </i>that means there's a good chance you've never stayed up more than a few minutes after sundown.</p><p>I find it very easy to forget Nightingale is supposed to be a survival game. It has all the usual switches and levers - not only Rest but <i>Hunger, Stamina</i>,<i> Item Decay</i>... all the old favorites. The thing is, they're all extremely easy to counter, making them minor irritants at most. </p><p>Personally, I'm torn. I really don't see the point, for example, of having Item Decay, when you can literally repair all of your gear with a single click, for a cost that is utterly trivial. Yes, the amount of Essence Dust ramps up to apparently ludicrous amounts as your gear improves but as soon as you notice you can convert regular Essences into thousands, even millions of dusts, that's the last time you'll ever need to think about it.</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjfug9DcsjBbP2RObJcyx8tBhAfv4mEvNzhFdtdgbuAEYP4ZBTGKOXN5MtxXRinwqvATG0rlw7EQJGmKrB54kwUHqrruyPuYgkpdCAVokgvcnXv2dwMGJFDhjI5MDB5MSB1zz1XCWhS_7T418KIPBWSOrW4IEUlGpEae1vJDU3v36uGb9AqSE2rJ4Pr5GI/s1920/ngmoonstripe1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="1920" height="360" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjfug9DcsjBbP2RObJcyx8tBhAfv4mEvNzhFdtdgbuAEYP4ZBTGKOXN5MtxXRinwqvATG0rlw7EQJGmKrB54kwUHqrruyPuYgkpdCAVokgvcnXv2dwMGJFDhjI5MDB5MSB1zz1XCWhS_7T418KIPBWSOrW4IEUlGpEae1vJDU3v36uGb9AqSE2rJ4Pr5GI/w640-h360/ngmoonstripe1.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><br /><p></p><p>On the other hand, I'm not at all interested in making it harder, slower or more expensive to keep your gear up to scratch. I'll take a meaningless, trivial repair system that doesn't get in the way of my enjoyment over a more "<i>realistic</i>" one any day. <br /></p><p>Food works much the same as in every game but particularly like it does in <i>Valheim</i>. You can have up to three foods in play at once and all the buffs stack. The basic foods last a few minutes but as you get more recipes and become better at cooking the duration goes up. The buffs from food are very significant so it's unlikely you'll ever need to be reminded to keep eating. Again, it's a couple of clicks every ten or twenty minutes and forget about it.</p><p>Stamina needs managing in relatively interesting ways. <i>Swimming </i>drains it very quickly, <i>Gliding </i>fairly quickly, <i>Climbing </i>not quite so fast and <i>Sprinting </i>barely at all. You also need Stamina to fight and dodge so it's a hands-on stat in most situations. That, however, just makes it feel like Stamina in many games, not just the ones with the "<i>Survival</i>" tag attached.</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhpUfvFzHUc09ax5hdUOkkKFTOplxpQzHEal71S1BltR_pqvlFCYjyWYC-5BrQM6SZhfEZYHWDAJ9KdCHL9X1L1iwiimUFaUjSTLt3Waqo56wE8krca68NtSXzyf2Pv91-ON7-LAdS_VxXzkdcF06lULEtf784a8U0flb47EaRI3yG141wwGXLrD71vGVk/s1920/ngmoonsea1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="1920" height="360" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhpUfvFzHUc09ax5hdUOkkKFTOplxpQzHEal71S1BltR_pqvlFCYjyWYC-5BrQM6SZhfEZYHWDAJ9KdCHL9X1L1iwiimUFaUjSTLt3Waqo56wE8krca68NtSXzyf2Pv91-ON7-LAdS_VxXzkdcF06lULEtf784a8U0flb47EaRI3yG141wwGXLrD71vGVk/w640-h360/ngmoonsea1.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><br /><br /><p></p><p>Of all the primary survival mechanics, the most asinine is Rest. Honestly, I cannot see the point of this at all, at least not in its current implementation. You have a blue bar that tells you how tired you're getting. As it drops you lose some stats (I think...) and if you let it go all the way down you can't do anything that requires effort, not even jumping onto a ten centimeter high ledge. </p><p>It's almost like a second Stamina bar in a way, just one with a much slower decay. It would be very annoying if it wasn't insultingly easy to restore to full.</p><p>To recover your fully-rested state, literally all you need to do is click on a bed-roll. Or a cot. Or a bed. Even the handkerchief-sized pet bed your fancy Dachsund sleeps in will do. It doesn't have to be your bed, either. Any furniture an NPC sleeps on will do just as well.</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg-48oKK3HpfDtlti-vxXdIn0mIQPSOOm5480yILll-c4hoZtkU6pJ67ULEzFSk5mKmD-OHLSFnU63kXgnarw0AOUBXOWasSuCSuVOii3HiGDAEA16FCT65SDzwq4mGtTD0-kyHlw9qgTyT9s4qhUxxP4Oy2TVdb0aEoUwPVi4aKeanOwU5A0bjfQwLfa8/s1920/ngmoonring1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="1920" height="360" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg-48oKK3HpfDtlti-vxXdIn0mIQPSOOm5480yILll-c4hoZtkU6pJ67ULEzFSk5mKmD-OHLSFnU63kXgnarw0AOUBXOWasSuCSuVOii3HiGDAEA16FCT65SDzwq4mGtTD0-kyHlw9qgTyT9s4qhUxxP4Oy2TVdb0aEoUwPVi4aKeanOwU5A0bjfQwLfa8/w640-h360/ngmoonring1.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><br /><p></p><p>Making a bed-roll requires just a few sticks and some plant fibre. It needs to be under cover so you might have to use a few more sticks to put up a tent but Nightingale is far better than most games at recognizing when you're sheltered from the elements so a doorway or the mouth of a cave will do just as well.</p><p>In other games I've played that have similar mechanics - probably all of them - there's a discreet pause to indicate time has passed. Sometimes your character actually lies down on the bed. Sometimes the screen goes dark. In Nightingale, when you take a Short Rest, nothing like that happens. </p><p>Instead, your Rest bar instantly returns to full and that's that. All done. Unless, of course, the sun has gone down.</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgScN6-KHvxeO2l7HZiI9z3yiQH2XWn-knff4V9woprEdLyyndhV-0ykxy5uJ2SKrmOULpKl30yjOyiJ2_M-WiZcf-GiZfBFjzqhPqttls4YL9CLxBQZsfMxBM0mpcdX0WbpOA3IuEqx2kWcG3DghoN5gXW8fSeJ4wL2e3O-3IipO3-Jo5meJW5rxr6sjw/s1920/ngaurora1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="1920" height="360" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgScN6-KHvxeO2l7HZiI9z3yiQH2XWn-knff4V9woprEdLyyndhV-0ykxy5uJ2SKrmOULpKl30yjOyiJ2_M-WiZcf-GiZfBFjzqhPqttls4YL9CLxBQZsfMxBM0mpcdX0WbpOA3IuEqx2kWcG3DghoN5gXW8fSeJ4wL2e3O-3IipO3-Jo5meJW5rxr6sjw/w640-h360/ngaurora1.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><br /><p></p><p>Nightingale uses a fairly lengthy day-night cycle. I haven't timed it but it feels like daylight probably lasts at least an hour. I have no idea how long night-time lasts because as soon as night falls, clicking on a bed or bed-roll brings up the option to take a <i>Long Rest</i>. Once you've tried it, you probably won't ever see darkness again.</p><p>Clicking on Long Rest does instigate a very brief pause, maybe three or four seconds at most. The screen goes completely black, then the morning light rushes in with a disorienting effect like someone letting off a magnesium flare before quickly stabilising to regular daylight. </p><p>This has two highly advantageous effects: firstly, it avoids any and all interaction with the creatures of the night and secondly anything you had cooking in the forge or the oven or any other crafting table will have instantaneously completed. If you need to something that takes hours to craft (Not that unusual.) it's a smart idea to save it for bedtime.</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiCP2Ef1avkKyNLsP2gJsusDO-V4Ol-FP4AsgvUJXCTLG2dK8r6-ET42VQy5g4mNhyphenhyphenxZ6_hwelXA_nwgVgA1Vwi8CEHOPi6-rY3G0hX1Ft__QKb7io3CTwV-f680ET2pDdvd4aepbHPgOWFAUuy3mDyYw7mncjVjzGxd7cKJr61n4LNCk9zPqCyRRYPY3A/s1920/ngaurora2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="1920" height="360" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiCP2Ef1avkKyNLsP2gJsusDO-V4Ol-FP4AsgvUJXCTLG2dK8r6-ET42VQy5g4mNhyphenhyphenxZ6_hwelXA_nwgVgA1Vwi8CEHOPi6-rY3G0hX1Ft__QKb7io3CTwV-f680ET2pDdvd4aepbHPgOWFAUuy3mDyYw7mncjVjzGxd7cKJr61n4LNCk9zPqCyRRYPY3A/w640-h360/ngaurora2.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><br /><p></p><p>Once again, I'm in several minds about this. I do think the current system is laughably inept but fixing it would almost certainly mean making it more awkward to manage without adding any entertainmnet value. I'd lay odds all of these Survival mechanics will be heavily overhauled during Early Access but I certainly wouldn't put any money on the new iterations being any more fun to use.</p><p>The one significant downside of the way darkness has been turned into something players both want to avoid and find very easy side-step is that a lot of players may never even get to see the astonishing night skies. All the sky-boxes in Nightingale are spectacular, as are the lighting effects, but the wheeling auroras and giant moons of the Fae Realms' night skies deserve special praise.</p><p>It's not just the sky at night, either. Many of the settlements and structures light up at night to be seen from far across the zone. The Essence vendors all travel in elaborate wooden caravans that come to glittering, glimmering life as soon as the sun drops below the horizon.</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh2KVU9FbC1JdZQdor68Hsisvvx6IVwSZbZM03u_xjblt-wJWlscRCwoRsMLCwKd7EWilUQdDkFt3W2ppxK-Mqst5n1TvScgxrW7CrrRv8kd94O2N8hwrcqpJyTR6WqdE2Ot4AVQFPJoJhRUvSgGcMWCreLMznzXDqKU2JmS0pAYDFGI6OPPeuFbeKjPOs/s1920/ngcara1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="1920" height="360" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh2KVU9FbC1JdZQdor68Hsisvvx6IVwSZbZM03u_xjblt-wJWlscRCwoRsMLCwKd7EWilUQdDkFt3W2ppxK-Mqst5n1TvScgxrW7CrrRv8kd94O2N8hwrcqpJyTR6WqdE2Ot4AVQFPJoJhRUvSgGcMWCreLMznzXDqKU2JmS0pAYDFGI6OPPeuFbeKjPOs/w640-h360/ngcara1.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><br /><p></p><p>Because Nightingale is internally moddable through use of any number of Cards, it is possible to create a very safe Realm in which night never fades. I might have to think about doing that, just for the screenshots.</p><p>Until then, though, I'll carry on with my early nights. Might as well enjoy some good, sound sleep while it lasts.</p>Bhagpusshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03499162165023939880noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1510920011443550663.post-75281458503512625222024-03-13T11:52:00.000+00:002024-03-13T11:52:13.647+00:00You Can't Take It With You<p><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgOFhyphenhyphenHsohdn4dg6JTwy-gMvVHZLCqkWPoCvLEX9gkkgNXsce9mxWhX6MHy-zTUivEKhAQh5Zbnn3WUr-GRtNLo_CRfhHdBoDGcSVB3E8-RWOc-3wUz2G8fdJQjQg5ABhtdislscJt2eitzqRxP5SAbMlS_V5gghSm6RxJusDqsshAtEPpjWq7WHWhhKRM/s1590/steamplayed1.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="691" data-original-width="1590" height="278" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgOFhyphenhyphenHsohdn4dg6JTwy-gMvVHZLCqkWPoCvLEX9gkkgNXsce9mxWhX6MHy-zTUivEKhAQh5Zbnn3WUr-GRtNLo_CRfhHdBoDGcSVB3E8-RWOc-3wUz2G8fdJQjQg5ABhtdislscJt2eitzqRxP5SAbMlS_V5gghSm6RxJusDqsshAtEPpjWq7WHWhhKRM/w640-h278/steamplayed1.png" width="640" /></a>Sorting my <i>Steam </i>games by time played today, I was surprised to find that at 78.8 hours, <i>Nightingale </i>still hasn't broken into the top five, although not as surprised as I was to see what it will have to pass to get there. Sitting just ahead at #5 on the list with 81.2 hours played comes <i>Bless Unleashed</i>. How did that happen?</p><p>It's always possible I left <i>BU </i>running while I was long-term AFK of course, something I have been prone to do with games on occasion, but it's probably just that compared to any other genre, MMORPGs take up a phenomanal amount of time to play in even the most casual fashion. The only reason there are any other kinds of games in the first couple of rows of my Steam list is that I hardly play any MMORPGs through <i>Valve</i>'s supposedly universal platform.</p><p>Most people don't, I would guess. A lot of the biggest, best-known, most successful, long-running names in the genre predate Steam entirely. Their players, active or lapsed, already have standalone installations, accounts and launchers provided either directly from the games themselves or via bespoke portals mandated by the developer.</p><p>For a long time, even after Steam took over many PC gamers' hard drives, almost all new MMORPGs came with their own launchers. It's only in very recent years that MMO developers have chosen to offer their games primarily or exclusively on Steam.</p><p>It has become something of a routine for older games to add themselves belatedely, usually with a flourish of publicity, and it does sometimes result in a surge of interest, bringing in new players for a while. When you look at the numbers playing through the platform a little later, though, it doesn't always seem as though many of those new players stayed for long.</p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhbBAy7l7oOhuyhTXKPZpkH4ak71_J-j6x0SvjjyAe9Tyb6k__VKND-_dvmJe9Wig3NIYJDB2HmSU621-_vks5atrZY81ub3LCRkbPtUAvOuaEZ1PnuUHZmr5e2rLTUBF47nmIfC78gLi1TadYUR4yygrRDco9gBTtvF7pcNJ7Z6eGk-sZUmFw2d9eOrx8/s725/gw2sc1.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="49" data-original-width="725" height="44" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhbBAy7l7oOhuyhTXKPZpkH4ak71_J-j6x0SvjjyAe9Tyb6k__VKND-_dvmJe9Wig3NIYJDB2HmSU621-_vks5atrZY81ub3LCRkbPtUAvOuaEZ1PnuUHZmr5e2rLTUBF47nmIfC78gLi1TadYUR4yygrRDco9gBTtvF7pcNJ7Z6eGk-sZUmFw2d9eOrx8/w640-h44/gw2sc1.png" width="640" /></a></div><br /><p></p><p>Even less likely is the prospect of a significant proportion of the installed base for an MMORPG moving to Steam. I could play a lot of my MMORPG rotation there - <i>EverQuest, EverQuest II, Lord of the Rings Online, Guild Wars 2 </i>- but I don't. In some cases I'd have to begin again from scratch, an obvious non-starter, but even if the Steam version of the game can let me play my regular characters I'd still have to go through all the rigmarole of linking the accounts. Why would I bother?</p><p>Clearly most people don't. Taking the <i>EQ </i>titles as an example, <i>Darkpaw </i>would have been out of business years ago if the real average concurrency of the two games combined came to barely 350. <i>LotRO </i>on its own almost doubles that and <i>GW2 </i>makes it into the low thousands, which might just about be viable for a small indie developer but not for a sub-division of <i>NCSoft </i>with several hundred developers to pay.</p><p><i>Daybreak </i>don't like to tell us exactly how many people play their games but you certainly don't need more than three dozen servers to accomodate three hundred and fifty people or even a couple of thousand, if we use the old 5x peak concurrency figure that used to be the top-end estimate for total participation in online games. The Steam numbers for all MMORPGs that aren't also Steam exclusives like <i>New World</i> and <i>Lost Ark</i> are more than just unrepresentative, they're downright misleading.</p><p>The disparity is so extreme it does make me wonder whether it's really worth an older MMORPG tooling itself up for Steam membership at all. Yes, there's that initial burst of interest and the concommitant flurry of new players but once the initial excitement fades you're left with a permanent red flag for anyone looking to answer that perennial gamer's question: "<i>Is this game dead?</i>"</p><p>If you looked at Steam for any of the titles I've mentioned, the answer would be "<i>As a Dodo</i>". <i>GW2</i>, sometimes reckoned to be one of the front-runners among Western MMORPGs, doesn't even appear on the list until you've clicked through ten screens of results. Then again, it could be worse. <i>Rift</i>, languishing at #1534 on the chart as I write, is so many clicks down in the hole I lost count. </p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj0yKSGp1MER3gpqhxQJ0sqH3Jp2MXYdepnZVwzdXmtKMLs8tUXryrpWHKhHyL74aJKIT2JPCyrBnNdB04M-p6g9T1uJ_AWzdCUvUeJMrMcgIFMgkI8JQvbbR9aPfR8um-vKTinn4hrVMs-7n4PZK-lbLWSypqNsl0rOSSA9S5jVpPwsFCudfQD9c2i1WY/s719/riftsm1.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="502" data-original-width="719" height="446" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj0yKSGp1MER3gpqhxQJ0sqH3Jp2MXYdepnZVwzdXmtKMLs8tUXryrpWHKhHyL74aJKIT2JPCyrBnNdB04M-p6g9T1uJ_AWzdCUvUeJMrMcgIFMgkI8JQvbbR9aPfR8um-vKTinn4hrVMs-7n4PZK-lbLWSypqNsl0rOSSA9S5jVpPwsFCudfQD9c2i1WY/w640-h446/riftsm1.png" width="640" /></a></div><br />Rift, however, is the reason I was looking at my time played in Steam games in the first place. I'd seen the recent announcement about <span style="color: #ff00fe;"><a href="https://www.trionworlds.com/rift/en/2024/03/11/rift-na-shards-merge-notice/">server merges</a></span> and I thought I'd get ahead of the rush by moving my <i>Faeblight </i>characters before <i>Gamigo </i>put them wherever they were going to put them if I did nothing about it.<p></p><p>Given the lack of attention anyone - developers, publishers or even players - has shown Rift since even before <i>Trion </i>shut up shop more than five years ago, it's perhaps more of a surprise to learn the game still has enough servers to <i>need </i>merging rather than that it's actually happening. Server merges, in any case, are an inevitable phase of the life-cycle of any MMORPG and Rift was designed with an unusual degree of flexibility in that regard. Players have always been able to swap servers almost instantly with no charge. I've moved a few times already.</p><p>Consequently, I wasn't expecting much trouble when I logged in last night to move my seven Faeblight characters to either <i>Greybriar </i>or <i>Wolfsbane</i> or possibly some to one and some to the other, since I already have characters on both and I'm not sure how the processes handles overspill when you hit your allowed character-per-server buffer. That potential snag I may have thought of; I had not, however, reckoned with another: the guild bank.</p><p>It seems that when Trion created the transfer system, they allowed for the smooth movement of just about everything except the contents of the Guild Vault. I imagine that was intentional to avoid customer service issues when someone tried to jump ship and take the whole lot with them without telling anyone. Rift has one of those very annoying automated systems for handing Guild leadership to someone else if you don't log in often enough so I can see how it could happen.</p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjFTh2zIjIgXBgQLk_kU_8YJE9eDiqPfMaXiwkqSefXzFWkWZekw2u73cP4yufmTMJKgMyJHSiTkCU6kT2T6Q8NBtZsx46F3pkZoO290G1eGCT7yu3yVumfVngpsI5aV5_DBurpE6CUZ0i7mUUTxLJwHSBdxY9H2ZO9j3su3EawEa5QZTb4iHngZztkPXE/s1920/riftchars1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="1920" height="360" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjFTh2zIjIgXBgQLk_kU_8YJE9eDiqPfMaXiwkqSefXzFWkWZekw2u73cP4yufmTMJKgMyJHSiTkCU6kT2T6Q8NBtZsx46F3pkZoO290G1eGCT7yu3yVumfVngpsI5aV5_DBurpE6CUZ0i7mUUTxLJwHSBdxY9H2ZO9j3su3EawEa5QZTb4iHngZztkPXE/w640-h360/riftchars1.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><br /><p></p><p>Moving the guild itself is easy enough. The Guild Leader has to move first and tick a box to say they're taking the Guild with them. Then, whenever another member of the Guild moves across, they're automatically added back to the roster, albeit for some reason at entry-level, meaning everyone has to be re-promoted. A bit half-assed if you ask me but a minor inconvenience at most.</p><p>The contents of the Guild Vaults, however, aren't going anywhere. The Valuts have to be completely emptied or you can't move at all. And therein lies my problem.</p><p>As I'm sure will astonish no-one whose noticed the title of the blog they're currently reading, my Guild Vaults in Rift are completely rammed. So, for the most part, are the bags of all my characters, although I did take the trouble a while back to make sure the ones I log in now and again at least had one empty bag to collect the inevitable "<i>Welcome Back</i>" bribes.</p><p>I considered the possibility of distributing the Vault contents among all my characters but even then there's not enough space. I thought about making a bank mule just to carry the load but I'd have to buy a another Character Slot. It was while I was looking at how much that might cost when I had a small epiphany: this is fricken' Rift we're talking about!</p><p>How often do I play Rift? Am I ever going to play Rift again? Do I really care which server my characters are on in a game I don't play now and don't plan on playing in the future? </p><p>More to the point, even if I could buy a character slot for Rift Store Cash or Credits or whatever they're called, of which I still have a ton from when the game converted to F2P, do I even want to spend the <i>time </i>it would take to get the move done? To make a character, run through that damn tutorial, make some bags, transfer them over, join the Guild, meet whatever criteria you need to be able to withdraw stuff from the Vault, take everything out and stash it in another bank...</p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhQt2GXhyphenhyphen-ZF50N7sL6mQPQccqwODt70FqEDwhoAAr0NohW9drTiBsda9AZNm8byU6zFiRpUFIUZJIwqzWLgElwF_3yVYMLyvAPd1OV84vJqSC6q0AoEBqqA39jSqjeyWNBXxouiMmhxNCuztyE67bCJJpveHvRDcKlKM6xasYZKjB1F7EQGDslYG4iLRY/s1920/riftmask2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="1920" height="360" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhQt2GXhyphenhyphen-ZF50N7sL6mQPQccqwODt70FqEDwhoAAr0NohW9drTiBsda9AZNm8byU6zFiRpUFIUZJIwqzWLgElwF_3yVYMLyvAPd1OV84vJqSC6q0AoEBqqA39jSqjeyWNBXxouiMmhxNCuztyE67bCJJpveHvRDcKlKM6xasYZKjB1F7EQGDslYG4iLRY/w640-h360/riftmask2.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><br /><p></p><p>No. No I do not want to waste hours of my life doing any of that. I wanted to press a couple of buttons and forget about it, not start some major project that would take up hours of my life just to get me back to where I began - not playing Rift. </p><p>Except as the record shows, I <i>do </i>occasionally play Rift. It's my seventh most-played game on Steam. I've spent more hours playing Rift since it moved to Steam than I've given to <i>Palworld</i>, albeit over a much longer period. And one of the reasons I still play Rift now and again is <i>because </i>it's on Steam. I very much doubt I would bother if I had to find and update a standalone client but because the button is just sitting there, sometimes I give in to whim and log in for old time's sake.</p><p>It helps that Rift is one of the games where I can play all my old characters. I can't remember if I had to set that up or if it was done automatically when the game was added to the new platform but it definitely makes it more likely I'll keep coming back, if only very occasionally. I suspect that if older MMORPGs were able to achieve seamless integration with Steam at no effort for the players it might help at least a little with retention. Then again, it's not like I ever spend any money when I'm there so there's probably no value in it for the companies running the games, even if they can get a few old lags to look in once in a while.</p><p>Having considered the possibilities, I'm going to do nothing. Not yet. The Gamigo announcement acknowledges some players may just not bother to move their characters ahead of time:</p><b><blockquote><span style="font-size: medium;">"Further details will be provided for those who may not transfer to Greybriar, Wolfsbane, Deepwood, or Laethys in time, ensuring your transition is as smooth as possible."</span></blockquote></b><p>I'll wait until I hear what those "<i>further details</i>" are. Last time something like this happened they just flagged the old servers as Inactive and when you logged in you were forced to move somewhere else. For me, that would probably be as good as anything. If I'm not playing my characters anyway, I can not play them just as easily on a closed server as an active one.</p><p>Until then, it's back to Nightingale to see if I can't push past Bless Unleashed and maybe even <i>Divinity: Original Sin 2</i> at 91.3 and <i>Dawnlands </i>at 103.4. Both of those seem possible. </p><p>New World at 235.8 hours, though? That's not going to happen. And as for <i>Valheim </i>at 384.8? </p><p>That's a record I doubt will ever be broken.<br /></p>Bhagpusshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03499162165023939880noreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1510920011443550663.post-56475121240945160202024-03-12T07:18:00.000+00:002024-03-12T07:18:18.848+00:00The Essence Of Nightingale<p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiQSOS32rhqYX08__FZsrnf_yhT9M4txpL1cYAAiCsCk4lbLeHZ7p7xeQbZFddJC8Q0CRKCr3mkskZbdBVtppljciF4uhyphenhyphen1_JtP_TI7BW_O5DU37KtDT6UnlWl3KDAoH6Mo5E0O6_SkgTVcj4pk3qaE6gRsc1xN7mZCdJ8q4civQ_nqVAmPh48mb5zlK94/s1920/ngfish1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="1920" height="360" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiQSOS32rhqYX08__FZsrnf_yhT9M4txpL1cYAAiCsCk4lbLeHZ7p7xeQbZFddJC8Q0CRKCr3mkskZbdBVtppljciF4uhyphenhyphen1_JtP_TI7BW_O5DU37KtDT6UnlWl3KDAoH6Mo5E0O6_SkgTVcj4pk3qaE6gRsc1xN7mZCdJ8q4civQ_nqVAmPh48mb5zlK94/w640-h360/ngfish1.jpg" width="640" /></a></div>As you can see, <i>Nightingale </i>has fishing. What self-respecting survival/rpg mash-up doesn't? It's not a very sophisticated implementation of the skill/sport/hobby/pastime but it's fun and useful, either of which trump sophistication in my book, when it comes to pretending to catch imaginary fish in a video game.<p></p><p>I don't exactly remember when, where or how I acquired the recipe to make the fishing rod <i>Flora</i>'s holding in the shot above. My best guess is it was one of the basics included with the Simple Workbench but it could just as easily have been a reward from one of the countless Insight, r Agility or Combat challenges. </p><p>Sometimes, when you succeed at one of those, you get a new recipe. I might have gotten my fishing rod that way. I know I had it for a long time before I bothered to make it, which I ony did because there's a quest that requires fish oil you cvan only get from specific type of fish you have to catch for yourself. </p><p>Other than recipes, what you get from doing those challenges are Essences. Essences are the fuel that keeps Nightingale's engine ticking over. I'm not sure it's ever explained what they're the essence <i>of </i>but the human survivors trying to make something of their new lives in the Fae Realms have adopted them as a kind of universal currency, so you can never really have enough. A small amount of Essence also converts into enough Essence Dust to fund all your repairs for weeks.<br /></p><p>OK, I suppose technically you <i>could </i>have enough Essences, eventually. There's a finite number of things to buy with them, for a start and you can certainly have enough of the lower-level ones quite easily as you outgrow the items they can get you. </p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhaPCu6wZsL2FdBgDI2sxUUVp8FZW7WjRdd1efqzfp5GiuRr9ajzffXHfe9-q1l3hZA3RQUbxRDUBVT6WaiO4lVXF-cLPCvaAWYqqVeVmwSs8lEQyzgIEja30iksHZPxQaj7unoQ9ub_oc7HMra61w5xjIuX-VCq9yeHD4Tfow_D6688vj_sQlQrGBR2Hw/s1920/ngtwsky1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="1920" height="360" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhaPCu6wZsL2FdBgDI2sxUUVp8FZW7WjRdd1efqzfp5GiuRr9ajzffXHfe9-q1l3hZA3RQUbxRDUBVT6WaiO4lVXF-cLPCvaAWYqqVeVmwSs8lEQyzgIEja30iksHZPxQaj7unoQ9ub_oc7HMra61w5xjIuX-VCq9yeHD4Tfow_D6688vj_sQlQrGBR2Hw/w640-h360/ngtwsky1.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><br /><p></p><p>Recipe vendors are mostly found in specific Realms. Realms come in tiers and vendors in each tier use the local variety of Essence as coin. Naturally, as you progress through the Realms, becoming ever more powerful as you go, the weaker Essences of the lower tiers and the items they buy lose their significance. Still, I imagine completionists, who must make up a large proportion of players, if not the majority, will want to grab all the sets, no matter how useless they've become.<br /></p><p>Essences are also neded to upgrade your gear, a process that, in Nightingale, has a massive effect on your viabilty as an adventurer. I'm used to more incremental progression systems, where it's hard to tell which of two items is better without one of those inbuilt comparison functions to make it clear but there's no need for anything like that in Nightingale, where upgrading an item can almost double its primary stats.</p><p>That, of course, means Nightingale is also one of those games where you don't need new gear because you can just keep improving the gear you already have. I don't generally like that approach to progression, mostly because I find it boring. It's extremely practical, sure, but practicality has never been high on my list of criteria for enjoying a video game.</p><p>My main objection is to the aesthetics, though, not so much the gameplay. It's not that I want to go back to the turn of the millennium, where getting an upgrade to your leg slot item meant finding out which monster dropped something better for that slot, then finding and killing it, if you even could, so you could steal that monster's pants, strip them from it's cooling corpse and put them on, still warm. Or, more likely, get the alternate drop and have to kill the damn mob several more times before it dropped its pants.</p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgglZTC0jR4jROqYFWre-TfDhR_p-GI2M15icQIY1nKO60DQp3SAS5yPqdJWYLDS7Y6CPsm82Ufo6451f40VxubWwBr9ahER89ieJM3aluTvgjvg_zYjyj2i7FvjndtTOba_Jh3qfTIJ6OUP3IPMtzY7-Sa8B1fiGbFv0lOpmu63A1zWSTmE1JjTv0Rq8A/s1920/ngtwtower1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="1920" height="360" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgglZTC0jR4jROqYFWre-TfDhR_p-GI2M15icQIY1nKO60DQp3SAS5yPqdJWYLDS7Y6CPsm82Ufo6451f40VxubWwBr9ahER89ieJM3aluTvgjvg_zYjyj2i7FvjndtTOba_Jh3qfTIJ6OUP3IPMtzY7-Sa8B1fiGbFv0lOpmu63A1zWSTmE1JjTv0Rq8A/w640-h360/ngtwtower1.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><br />In addition to upgrades, Nightingale does also have a number of different gear sets that represent some kind of progression system in themselves, so you won't be stuck wearing the exact same thing forever. Instead you will be changing your gear approximately once per tier and <i>then </i>upgrading it, multiple times, which is better than nothing but nowhere near as good as a fully-functioning appearance system.<p></p><p>Nightingale doesn't have such a system yet, which is fair enough in Early Access, I guess, although personally, if I were head of a games studio, a fully-functioning appearance system would be a top priority all the way back in alpha. What's worse is that there isn't even a mention of any such system in the recently published <span style="color: #ff00fe;"><a href="https://playnightingale.com/news/roadmap-and-message-from-ceo/">Not-a-Roadmap</a></span> covering the next two stages of development.</p><p>The upgrade system, like the Essences it uses, also comes in tiers. So far there are only three and the naming convention used suggests there aren't going to be many, if any, more. There are four qualities: Common, Uncommon, Rare and Epic which come in four corresponding colors: Grey, Green, Blue and Pink. Stop me if you 've hear this one before.</p><p>I suppose there's Legendary and maybe Mythical still to come in the standard RPG progression hierarchy, which would allow for enough vertical progression to support at least a couple of expansions. That should see them safely through the next few years.</p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiwJwfA5omiQkDLW3MCAuJpvfDh-PuoTwCwRR9XZXb_a0Lq0UtcLBdefpnCMIn8LFCw4pEijwTNspD_C6373Y-MXqzHYigQU6Fpr0k7yeiUpywBfxAZiVWI9EG4aW9bpca7CD_9vz4j7e3H0hcjNEqQwbzBFioHCuziwzSkYcpFiotTVLhCyPhm_q_3kdI/s566/ngcoffee1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="566" data-original-width="379" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiwJwfA5omiQkDLW3MCAuJpvfDh-PuoTwCwRR9XZXb_a0Lq0UtcLBdefpnCMIn8LFCw4pEijwTNspD_C6373Y-MXqzHYigQU6Fpr0k7yeiUpywBfxAZiVWI9EG4aW9bpca7CD_9vz4j7e3H0hcjNEqQwbzBFioHCuziwzSkYcpFiotTVLhCyPhm_q_3kdI/w268-h400/ngcoffee1.jpg" width="268" /></a></div>For now, though, we have those basic four. In theory you could upgrade your Common items to Epic, I think. You can definitely take Common up to Rare. I can't be absolutely sure what happens after that because I don't yet have the Epic Upgrade Bench or whatever it's called.<br /><p></p><p>I have the one that uses T2 Essences to upgrade Uncommon to Rare. The Epic one, it won't surprise anyone to learn, I'm sure, uses T3 Essences, which come, as you'd expect, from T3 Realms. </p><p>The catch is that the vendors who sell the recipes for the Epic crafting stations and the items they produce only take T3 Essences, which means you have to do challenges in T3 Realms to get them. And those vendors want huge quantities of Essences for most of the recipes they sell. A few recipes go for the knockdown price of 100 Essences but the going rate for most is 1300 a pop.<br /></p><p>That would be extremely awkward if it weren't for the current state of what passes for an endgame in Nightingale, which at present allows for some appropriately epic Essence farming opportunities. </p><p>When you complete the first chapter of the main storyline and gain access to <i>The Watch</i>, you get a short questline to unlock <i>The Vaults</i>, a trio of repeatable dungeons backed by some very iffy lore. When you zone into any one of the three Vault instances (One for each biome.) you find you're no longer playing solo. Suddenly and without any real warning, the game has turned into an MMO.</p><p>I have no idea if there's any formal match-making algorithm operating behind the scenes. It certainly didn't feel like it the few times I went in. I just spawned in at the start with a dungeon run already in well progress. I don't even know how many other players were in there with me. More kept spawning and running past me so I fdidn't waste any time trying to figure it out - I just followed them. </p><p>From the Gear Score next to each character name I could see I was teamed with some people much better equipped than me but also others about the same and one or two quite a bit worse. When I say "<i>teamed</i>", I mean it in the loosest possible sense. There's no organised group or party, just a bunch of people soloing together, much like public events in any post-<i>Warhammer </i>MMORPG. </p><p>There's no shared loot system for drops, either, Anyone can hoover up anything that lands on the ground. That sounds problematic but then again, there's no credit system for completion either. As soon as any challenge completes, everyone in the dungeon can open the Essence chest and take a full share. </p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEglilnlpcYJQC5ShSV8b_Kvf5oF6zOb8OC0BBD_-gSx21iL5IOL7bkJWcvwl89JFbK8qG481q87zrSf7vEZDXpML6K2csrSbIfehFdN765sWtMPuhNgvgQwWtWUkjtm5N7Gm9SSvvp7-vcR2q_XJzkw8au-ulgPkSX452gcIGpxRlGrxleqtgOA6T_CZyk/s1920/ngsil1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="1920" height="360" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEglilnlpcYJQC5ShSV8b_Kvf5oF6zOb8OC0BBD_-gSx21iL5IOL7bkJWcvwl89JFbK8qG481q87zrSf7vEZDXpML6K2csrSbIfehFdN765sWtMPuhNgvgQwWtWUkjtm5N7Gm9SSvvp7-vcR2q_XJzkw8au-ulgPkSX452gcIGpxRlGrxleqtgOA6T_CZyk/w640-h360/ngsil1.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><br /><p></p><p>There are regular loot chests, too, and I think they all have hypothecated items for everyone that opens them but there it's harder to be sure, especially since no-one ever speaks. My evidence for the supposition is If I was taking anyone else's stuff out of the chests, they never complained about it and there was always something in every chest I opened, even if other players got to it before I did.<br /></p><p>In content, the Vaults are like a collection of the usual Realm challenges bundled together with a Boss at the end. There's some half-assed narrative justification for this in that the Fae supposedly used them for some nebulous sort of training and the Boss is actually always the same eternal etentity, inadvertently brought to the Realms by Qatermain himself, who keeps incarnating in varying forms. Killing him repeatedly is the only way to keep him from overrunning the Watch. </p><p>I was not convinced by any of this but then neither are al lthe people who explain it so I think there's meant to be some ambiguity. Most games don't even bother putting any kind of narrative fig-leaf on this sort of thing so credit to Inflexion for at least trying.<br /></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjhJhrZlJt8WxPUZ9gY5IjZPTDgPHDXsp9GNCSNu_vikdBCGJ5ceHodsmAqKCJh8NKy60Yp_WQup5JL6oGKp0MbNNWqQwFPwv020bY_fMj8dcbWbYYZ9CPFbFZ90e_XMHxg3cUl08iIDM4h4TChDDY8DlQc7yoPzpB7DdB6qwRUpSEYVGBcspUBs5nuEoU/s775/ngess1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="490" data-original-width="775" height="253" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjhJhrZlJt8WxPUZ9gY5IjZPTDgPHDXsp9GNCSNu_vikdBCGJ5ceHodsmAqKCJh8NKy60Yp_WQup5JL6oGKp0MbNNWqQwFPwv020bY_fMj8dcbWbYYZ9CPFbFZ90e_XMHxg3cUl08iIDM4h4TChDDY8DlQc7yoPzpB7DdB6qwRUpSEYVGBcspUBs5nuEoU/w400-h253/ngess1.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>The Vaults would be tough to solo, something you can do by crafting your own Vault card for use in a crafted portal. Soloing would be crazy right now, though. In the four or five runs I did I only saw the boss twice. Once he was dead within miliseconds aof my arrival in his arena and the other time I fought him, tanked him briefly, died, ran back and picked up my loot after someone else fiunished the job seconds later. <p></p><p>At the moment, as a critical mass of players reaches the endgame and tries to grind the tens of thousands of essences needed for the upgrade recipes, the public Vaults are constantly busy. You can zone in and find one in progress immediately. Since you get all the rewards just for being there, it makes no difference if you arrive just as everyone else leaves. You get the same rewards as if you'd been there from the start.<br /></p><p>Well, so long as you can find all the glowing bubbles you need to click, anyway. A full run nets about 300 Essences but I could never find all of them - the whole damn place is a maze. </p><p>My fastest run netted me a couple of hundred Essences for the time it took me to run through an empty instance from the entrance to the zone-out. My highest total was maybe fifty more for a whole lot of fighting along the way. If you can face doing back-to-back runs for an hour or two, you could make several thousand Essences but even that would only buy you two or three recipes. You're going to be at it a for a while.</p><p>It's not going to be to everyone's taste, not least because it's a major change of direction from what you'll have been doing for the last 30-50 hours. If you don't like the sudden switch from solo or co-op to open grouping, there's always the option to just carry on as you were. As I mentioned, you can set up your own, private Vault but there's a whole set of open-world T3 solo Realms you can craft and farm. All you have to do is make the cards. There's even a quest to get you started.<br /></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjCA_bXNqEN6xLdsfXjuE18R1oZBwzm-cYuQon7nWCWHX7V0Z7-YDelsta61jJGTzOI1lqFw3yiXsx3lMOmAnCfLlQYnagcoA5djY5RvlOI5SHLXipeNgFwOPByBTWiGWm6P4bpaNPZriBbUXHMkAo3XWYQ0uksEA1uzKOnnp7gpG2PYHNa4IaFeWAIkZs/s1920/ngtvend1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="1920" height="360" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjCA_bXNqEN6xLdsfXjuE18R1oZBwzm-cYuQon7nWCWHX7V0Z7-YDelsta61jJGTzOI1lqFw3yiXsx3lMOmAnCfLlQYnagcoA5djY5RvlOI5SHLXipeNgFwOPByBTWiGWm6P4bpaNPZriBbUXHMkAo3XWYQ0uksEA1uzKOnnp7gpG2PYHNa4IaFeWAIkZs/w640-h360/ngtvend1.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><p></p><p>I made one last night and had a run around to see how hard it would be. It was perfectably doable with my Rare gear but I'd be lucky to get a tenth as many Essences for ten times the effort. I'd recommend the solo/co-op Realms for exploration and for gathering mats but clearly grinding in the Vaults is the way to go if you want to farm Essences, at least until the current levelling bubble deflates and the torrent of nearly-free Essences dries up.</p><p>Other than for the fun of it and to satisfy the inevitable wish to have all the best stuff, there may not be much point in grinding for those recipes anyway. HAvign a full set of Epic gear would certainly make everything a lot easier but the main reason you'd want to be doing that content would be to get the gear in the first place. Once you have it, I'm not exactly sure what the point would be in carrying on.</p><p>For that, we'll probably need to wait until some higher-tier content is added to the game. That could take a while. It's not even in the medium-term development plan.<br /></p><p>Reaching the Watch does feel like an ending to me. Not the end of the whole story, for sure, but the end of the first chapter, definitely. The driving urge I had to push forwards has all but dissipated now. I feel more inclined to go back to pottering around, exploring the variations on the three biomes, building up my base and generally leaning into the sandboxier elements of the game, which have very much taken a back seat for me until now.</p><p>Or maybe I'll just go fishing. </p><p>I wonder if you can upgrade that rod...<br /></p>Bhagpusshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03499162165023939880noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1510920011443550663.post-70694514676623118742024-03-11T11:24:00.000+00:002024-03-11T11:24:06.242+00:00Second Impressions Count Double<p></p>
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<br />A salutory side-effect of having the entire history of music available for
free on <i>YouTube </i>at the touch of a mouse button is that once in a
while I get to have my face rubbed not just in my own ignorance (An everyday occurrence.) but worse, my own arrogance. Before the 'tube, if I
formed a lasting judgment based on little more than supposition, I could hold onto it quite comfortably without worrying about finding myself contradicted by those pesky, annoying
facts.
<p></p>
<p>
These days, though, every time I follow a link I run the risk of being exposed
to something that challenges my personal prejudices or overturns them
entirely. Such an event happened only a few days ago, when I was lying in bed,
looking at my laptop, wondering what I could watch to pass the last few minutes
before switching off and going to sleep.
</p>
<p>
All I wanted to do was watch a couple of music videos but for once I had the notion to look backwards instead of forwards. I
was scratching around in my mental files for possibilities but if there's one thing I can't do with any facility any more it's
pull random names to order out of what's left of my memory.
</p>
<p>
To do that, I almost always need some kind of external prompt, which was
how I ended up typing <i>Daisy Chainsaw</i> into the search field, just to get started. I don't
suppose I've thought about that particular nineties band since... well, since
the nineties. I only thought of them then because I'd recently written <span style="color: #ff00fe;"><a href="https://bhagpuss.blogspot.com/2024/03/i-think-that-ones-mine.html">a post</a></span> featuring <i>Daisy Dreams</i>, whose excellent song <span style="color: #04ff00;"><i><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N2BvaGxR_nA">Molecules </a></i></span>I'd
listened to half a dozen more times since I posted it.
</p>
<p>
I remembered Daisy Chainsaw, in so much as I remembered them at all, as some
kind of female-fronted pop-rock act along the lines of
<i>Transvision Vamp</i>, a point of comparison that should already have been
raising red flags, since it was only a few years back that I <span style="color: #ff00fe;"><a href="https://bhagpuss.blogspot.com/2018/02/everything-is-everything-else.html">discovered</a></span>, with a confused combination of delight
and discomfort, that <i>Wendy James</i> and her band were a whole lot better than I'd
either remembered or even realised.
</p>
<p>
It's with a similar sense of contrition I come here to day to affirm that
<i>KatieJane Garside</i>, singer, songwriter and lifespark of Daisy Chainsaw,
is also very much better in just about every respect than I knew or more likely let myself know. In fact, having spent some considerable time now, going
through her extensive back catalog and reading about her career, I feel I need
to realign her and her work alongside the likes of <i>Polly Scattergood</i>,
<i>Jane Weaver</i>, <i>Victoria Astley</i> and <i>P.J. Harvey</i>.<br />
</p>
<p>
Like all of them and a few other favorites of mine, I now recognise KatieJane as a true original, a genuine artist and an untameable force of
nature. The incontravertible evidence, now readily available to anyone willing
to tap a few keys and sit back and listen, is that she always was. How I came
to think otherwise is testament to my unfortunate tendency to avoid things
I've already chosen not to like, regardless of any short-fall in exposure to
the thing itself.
</p>
<p>
About all I can say in my defence is that I am generally willing to change my
mind, when presented with a convincing counter-argument, particularly if I'm
the one making the presentatation to myself. I'm also more than willing to admit my
mistakes and try to make some amends, so in that spirit, here's a brief
selection from KatieJane Garside's sparkling career, beginning with the only
band I knew she'd been in until I learned about all the others just a few days ago.
</p>
<p></p>
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<br />
<p></p>
<p style="text-align: center;">
<b><span style="font-size: x-large;"><i>Love Your Money</i> - Daisy Chainsaw</span></b>
</p>
<p>
Where else to begin but with her notorious performance on that most '90s of all '90s TV shows,
<i>The Word</i>, a show notorious in its own right for any number of reasons. I used to watch the
show most weeks but I don't remember if I saw this particular episode. You'd
think I would if I had but The Word was not a show one watched sober. At least not
if one had any sense. Many weeks it passed me by in a blur.<br /></p>
<p>
Had I seen it, I'd like to think I'd have realised what a stormingly powerful, subversive
stage presence KatieJane was. What I suspect I might actually have thought was that she seemed a bit hyper and her band looked a bit
like <i>Sigue Sigue Sputnik</i> which, very superficially, they did.
</p>
<p>
Of course, I really liked Sigue Sigue Sputnik but it wasn't the sort of thing you
admitted to in certain circles back then. It's OK to admit to it now. Probably.<br /></p>
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</div>
<p style="text-align: center;">
<b><span style="font-size: x-large;"><i>Love Your Money</i> - Daisy Chainsaw</span></b>
</p>
<p>If you didn't like the live version, you
aren't going to like the studio cut any better, I imagine, and the official
video is disturbing in a whole number different of fresh ways, not least that bass sound. How are they even making it <i>do </i>that?<br /></p><p>The building reminds me of the party
scene in
<i><span style="color: #04ff00;"><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yk1_LqbYgQU">Dogs In Space</a></span></i>, the movie in which <i>Michael Hutchence</i> from <i>INXS </i>tries his hand
at acting. He's playing himself, mostly, and quite well, too. It's a talent. Not everyone can do it. <br /></p>
<p>
There was an awful lot of that student house/anarchist squat chic going around in the early '90s. If you told me this was shot in the band's actual house I wouldn't
question it. When you listen to <i>KJG</i> speak, she's very posh but then all
the squats were full of public school types. It was a strange time in many
ways.
</p>
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<p style="text-align: center;">
<b><span style="font-size: x-large;">Interview from Rapido</span></b>
</p>
<p>
I used to watch <i>Rapido </i>fairly religiously, too, but I don't
recall seeing this before, either. If I had, I'm not sure it would have endeared me to
the band at the time. I wasn't as big a fan of that kind of chaos then, not
when it frequently imposed itself on me in the street, at gigs or pretty much
anywhere I went outside the house. It all looks a lot more fey and harmless
now with thirty years between us. Honestly, if anyone thinks things are bad now, they clearly weren't around for the casual street violence of the '70s, '80s and early '90s. It only calmed down when they took the lead out of petrol.<br /></p>
<p>
Watching all this, it's not at all surprising to find KatieJane an
acknowledged influence on <i>Courtney Love</i> and also, I read, on
<i>Arrow </i>from <i>Starcrawler</i>. I imagine on a lot of less well-known
front-women, too. Makes me sad to think I missed it all when it was happening
right under my nose. I didn't really stop going to these sort of gigs until a
decade later. <i>I </i>could have been getting elbowed in the face in that mosh pit.<br /></p>
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<p style="text-align: center;">
<b><span style="font-size: x-large;"><i>Pretty Like Drugs</i> - Queen Adreena</span></b>
</p>
<p>
And here we are, exactly a decade later, in 2003 with KJ's new band,
<i>Queen Adreena</i>, who I had never even heard of, much less heard, until a
couple of days ago. I blame <i>EverQuest</i>.
</p>
<p>
The progression from Daisy Chainsaw is remarkable. Live, there's still the same
wild energy, the same pagan abandon, but in the studio...
</p>
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<p style="text-align: center;">
<b><span style="font-size: x-large;"><i>Medicine Jar</i> - Queen Adreena</span></b>
</p>
<p>
<i>So </i>much more disciplined. Ten years will do that, although leaving the
band where you wrote none of the songs to start another where you write them
all must help. And yet the relentless drive, the remorseless attack, remains.
That claw hammer bass. Those merciless drums. Guitar squalls like choking gulls. And KatieJane just rises above it all. She just rises.
</p>
<p>Has she peaked? Of course she hasn't!</p>
<p>
Daisy Chainsaw released just one album in maybe five years. Queen Adreena put
out half a dozen between the turn of the millennium and 2008 and inbetween
those there was also a solo album, released under the name <i>Lalleshwari</i>.
</p>
<p>It's very different.<br /></p>
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<p style="text-align: center;">
<b><span style="font-size: x-large;"><i>Puppy Love</i> - Lalleshwari</span></b>
</p>
<p>
<i>Now </i>you see where I was going with that Polly Scattergood comparison,
right? I have no more proof Polly follows knowingly in KatieJane's wake than
<i>Let's Eat Grandma</i> do but there's natural progression in art, too, isn't
there? That ground has to be broken before flowers bloom.<br />
</p>
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<br />
<p style="text-align: center;">
<b><span style="font-size: x-large;"><i>For You I Hold My Breath</i> - Lalleshwari</span></b>
</p>
<p>
Another track from the album <i>Lullabies In A Glass Wilderness</i>, here set
to footage from the problematic <i><span style="color: #ff00fe;"><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Valerie_and_Her_Week_of_Wonders_(film)">Valerie And Her Week Of Wonders</a></span><b>, </b></i>such a<i><b> </b></i>perennially popular choice among YouTube creators I
sometimes feel I must have seen pretty much all of it just through watching
music videos.
</p>
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<p>
<b><span style="font-size: x-large;"><i>In The Arms Of Flowers</i> - Ruby Throat</span></b>
</p>
<p>
Even before Queen Adreena's last album hit the record stores, KatieJane was
off again, this time to start a neo-folk duo called <i>Ruby Throat</i>.
Another four albums followed until, in 2020, she changed names again to
release what remains her most recent album, this time under the name
<i>Liar, Flower, </i>although the members of that band remained the same as
before - KatieJane and her partner <i>Chris Whittingham</i>.
</p>
<p></p>
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<br /><b><span style="font-size: x-large;"><i>Broken Light</i> - Liar, Flower</span></b>
<p></p>
<p>
What, if any, the difference between these two ongoing projects might be I
have absolutely no idea. I just hope there will be more from one or other of them Or some new aggreation. It's been a while.
I'd hate to think I've finally caught up with her just when she's stopped.
</p>
<p>
Even if, I'm very glad to have gotten myself straightened out over all of
this. There's thirty years of back catalog to explore including not just all
those albums but poetry, lithographs,
<span style="color: #ff00fe;"><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/en/book/show/36503673">a biography</a></span>, even
<span style="color: #ff00fe;"><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/en/book/show/6271846">a graphic novel</a></span>
published by <i>Image</i>, no less. </p><p>Some of this but by no means all is still available
from
<span style="color: #ff00fe;"><a href="https://sleeplikewolves.katiejanegarside.com/">Katiejane's website</a></span>. The rest, like the truth, is out there, somewhere, just like KatieJane
herself.</p><p>I wonder who or what I need to re-assess next? It could be a long list...<br />
</p>
Bhagpusshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03499162165023939880noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1510920011443550663.post-51404858061087353522024-03-08T13:48:00.000+00:002024-03-08T13:48:50.890+00:00It's A Long Story...<p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi4Uyb7kv0rSIuep5qYkcfqe4rJuZaGtOW6FF_JhnFVQhQr_21x1vvLiZY9BK7qaAYRAc0cqnZEE_8br58-GstuvR9PSE823tEIlqsLJZdCQjWhO7nHy_dx2aWFs35lGZcOu2_K431ILflL1GFPzaz3yVkmlFo5agtuJSQ45dz1csiEAHJLNBOhxkuj6_A/s1920/ngtw1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="1920" height="360" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi4Uyb7kv0rSIuep5qYkcfqe4rJuZaGtOW6FF_JhnFVQhQr_21x1vvLiZY9BK7qaAYRAc0cqnZEE_8br58-GstuvR9PSE823tEIlqsLJZdCQjWhO7nHy_dx2aWFs35lGZcOu2_K431ILflL1GFPzaz3yVkmlFo5agtuJSQ45dz1csiEAHJLNBOhxkuj6_A/w640-h360/ngtw1.jpg" width="640" /></a></div>I had every intention of posting a <i>Katie Jane Garside</i> retrospective today but then I got up this morning and finished what looks to be the <i>First Book of Nightingale</i>, so I thought I'd better write about that instead, while it's still fresh in my mind. Katie Jane has waited more than thirty years for me to recognize her talent. I don't suppose she'll mind waiting a little longer.<p></p><p>So, here's the thing about <i>Nightingale </i>I don't see anyone talking about: it has a really strong story. Certainly the best I've seen in a survival game, which may be damning it with the faintest of praise, but even extending the reach to MMOs, it's right up there with the best. </p><p>Again, not really selling it, am I?</p><p>Let me be more specific. As far as I'm aware, Nightingale has just one, single narrative thread. It's crisp, clear, coherent and meaningful. If you follow it, it takes you through the whole game, up to the point where you arrive at <i>The Watch</i>, whereupon the game stops being a solo survival RPG and turns into a lobby MMO.</p><p>As you advance through the game, it looks for a while as if you're just picking up the usual fetch quests from those various NPCs developers employ to guide you towards new explorable areas or quest hubs. After a while, though, you begin to realise that none of these are just breadcrumb quests. Nor are any of them either optional or independent of the others.</p><p>All of them, without exception, relate directly to your one, central purpose, which is to get back to Nightingale. In that respect the game has a clarity of intent rarely seen even in single-player RPGs. If you want to play Nightingale as anything other than a freeform building game, you <i>have </i>to do the main storyline quest. All of it.</p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgrLPXq-MiBd8LJ3WV2rEjJPSm93JKRmz-bPS-hvr8ndyugkycK7eyY1834Co8LiMAfrztlSt7j-dOSHQoTbIBXF9C-AjNCr6AMU1UXx4lTFMKEEFa2NbSHKnmkYQyUgi_asMYmp_xzkAvV7MzvT0v9zoqZe_7lFXPAR8Rcc58wUtIsxPY8YJEpB5QgicI/s1920/ngtw2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="1920" height="360" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgrLPXq-MiBd8LJ3WV2rEjJPSm93JKRmz-bPS-hvr8ndyugkycK7eyY1834Co8LiMAfrztlSt7j-dOSHQoTbIBXF9C-AjNCr6AMU1UXx4lTFMKEEFa2NbSHKnmkYQyUgi_asMYmp_xzkAvV7MzvT0v9zoqZe_7lFXPAR8Rcc58wUtIsxPY8YJEpB5QgicI/w640-h360/ngtw2.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><br /><br /><p></p><p>To be strictly accurate, I can't say for absolute certain that there are <i>no </i>side-quests. There <i>is </i>that one involving <i>Bass Reeves</i> that I talked about before. I still haven't been able to finish it because I'm not willing to break the promise I gave him, not to talk to <i>Wilhelmina </i>about his mission in the Realms. I'm reasonably sure, however, that if I did tell her what he's up to, it would only feed back into that central narrative, not spiral off into some unrelated escapade.</p><p>Although the storyline is effectively single-minded, it never feels linear. The path to The Watch continually splits into byways then loops back around. By the time you find Nellie Bly on top of her sandstone massif, you have effectively reached the geographical end-point of the questline. Not to be too spoilery about it, she's standing next to the portal that will take you to The Watch. All you have to do is help her get it working.</p><p>Doing that took me about half of the seventy hours I've put into the game so far. It could have taken me a lot less, had I opted to go down the traditional murder-hobo route, which is offered as an option. Getting the portal machine into a stable condition requires items from three creatures it would not be too innacurate to call Boss Mobs. I imagine if you opt simply to find and kill them you could get it done in an hour or so, especially if you also make the charm you can use to take you straight to them.</p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgSX4_NbDIm0tSXPCIkj9muaFxEQor9AARgUah6wK_97_cA-vLQQEprosdQIQr2z9xDSnlpH9-H4awL_iuw_QUQskiRZCvKRx_Ob1wscONQb0blEInT_7JcKrOxDE6lVCRWfb8VX5zyOODEpyF1wEZhTlXaTc619W0WzeTk2AVduAlxVA_CtaWpIQAm4wI/s497/nglist1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="497" data-original-width="343" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgSX4_NbDIm0tSXPCIkj9muaFxEQor9AARgUah6wK_97_cA-vLQQEprosdQIQr2z9xDSnlpH9-H4awL_iuw_QUQskiRZCvKRx_Ob1wscONQb0blEInT_7JcKrOxDE6lVCRWfb8VX5zyOODEpyF1wEZhTlXaTc619W0WzeTk2AVduAlxVA_CtaWpIQAm4wI/s320/nglist1.jpg" width="221" /></a></div>If you listen to reason, though, and opt for trade instead of assassination, you'll find yourself enmeshed in a series of fascinating conversations with remarkable individuals concerning the lore and mores of the Fae realms. They will tell you what you need to do to get the things you need from the powerful creatures who have them, but first, naturally, they 'll want you to do something for them.<p></p><p>When you satisfy their needs, they'll give you a list of ingredients and you'll spend many more hours searching for rare materials to craft the ritual oferings you'll eventually hand over to the various Elders you otherwise would have had to kill. In return, those Elders will give you what Nellie needs to work her engineering magic so she can send you through the portal to meet her boss, <i>Allan Quatermain</i>, greatest of all the Realmwalkers and the one man who might actually know a way to get you back to Nightingale. </p><p>All of this takes a long time. I think it probably took me about thirty hours from finding Nellie Bly to speaking with Quatermain this morning. That thirty hours sits on top of another thirty or so during which I needed to raise my powers to a height where I could master the six Sites of Power, access to all of which is necessary before you can complete Nellie's quests. </p><p>In this fashion, every aspect of the game is dependent on every other. The game tells you from the very start that getting back to Nightingale is the be-all and end-all of your existence and so long as you accept that premise, everything you're tasked with doing makes absolute and perfect sense. It's one of the most focused gaming experiences I can remember outside of a point and click adventure game, which at times is what I felt as though I was playing.</p><p>That in itself would be enough to make Nightingale's storytelling stand out but there's another layer. Remember <i>Puck</i>? He's the impish and mysterious Fae, who introduces himself at the beginning of the Tutorial and keeps popping up ever afterwards. He's also the only character with a voice actor, so you know he's important.</p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjIx-gTXU-mgLxsKbRl33yL5N7B_ICWh9ZbiF63UV7ZsQ_PfhQ6j3ljwI1JBeBlVDILyVAwwHsbL1MP_xeCtkuxXlVbBGrOxXzqplLPlGSr8cAo04-qxv5LwipsF92zjZoCA9FOoocElr8WtkBnGRScVvEaxhDhk0wBnVvlYn_sWMsX1wFPYDo0TdYvcYo/s1404/ngnbw1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="786" data-original-width="1404" height="224" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjIx-gTXU-mgLxsKbRl33yL5N7B_ICWh9ZbiF63UV7ZsQ_PfhQ6j3ljwI1JBeBlVDILyVAwwHsbL1MP_xeCtkuxXlVbBGrOxXzqplLPlGSr8cAo04-qxv5LwipsF92zjZoCA9FOoocElr8WtkBnGRScVvEaxhDhk0wBnVvlYn_sWMsX1wFPYDo0TdYvcYo/w400-h224/ngnbw1.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>Puck, it will surprise no-one to hear, has an agenda and as a Fae he is not to be bargained with lightly. If only you had a choice about that. It would be very inappropriate of me to give away what he has to tell or to reveal what the consequences of listening to him might be, but I will say that what Puck reveals sets up the future of the game in a way I found both enticing and intriguing. The story is just beginning, it seems.<br /><p></p><p>The structure and the plotting, then, feel exemplary for a game of this kind, so it would be as well the writing and dialog were up to the same standard. And they are.</p><p>I'm picky about these things. I cut imported games with shaky translations a huge amount of slack because I love whimsy and their infelicities and mistakes frequently make me laugh. For game written in English, however, I don't always show the same leniency. I react strongly against anything that smacks of Fantasy Blockbuster Novel writing for a start and neither do I react well to maudlin sentimentality, worthy earnestness, leaden, lumpen prose or sophomoric "<i>wit</i>".</p><p>The writing in Nightingale mostly avoids all of these traps and tropes. Its main fault is verbosity, something I'm hardly in a position to criticise, but for the most part the dialog feels very much in keeping with the supposed nineteenth century setting, without straying into the uncomfortable hinterlands of pastiche or parody. <br /></p><p>That, at least, applies to almost all of the quest dialog which, it should be said, can be extensive. There are many ancillary conversations to be explored before you get to the inevitable acceptance of the task on offer. </p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiKJyuvSvGA3pvC_RKRJh485bpGcUDjroumpkOeRfYlicr5jKanXu_kG2X5lKN1v5sbNMwNcbsWz9Ys742aHm7600plz-ZGdaBknZRHdgXUFRC_aqj91gkGLAvlbdqsrreZQmS_rnevZxQgZ3VGAYNTNfBoyT7LodshE8G5_sTz01zIAomCNeZUr1Hdndg/s1559/ngaq1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="901" data-original-width="1559" height="370" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiKJyuvSvGA3pvC_RKRJh485bpGcUDjroumpkOeRfYlicr5jKanXu_kG2X5lKN1v5sbNMwNcbsWz9Ys742aHm7600plz-ZGdaBknZRHdgXUFRC_aqj91gkGLAvlbdqsrreZQmS_rnevZxQgZ3VGAYNTNfBoyT7LodshE8G5_sTz01zIAomCNeZUr1Hdndg/w640-h370/ngaq1.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><p></p><p>Most of those conversations are optional, so if you don't care to dig into motivations and circumstances, the choice to take the job, no questions asked, is usually there. You will miss a lot of interesting back-story that way but at least you'll be done in time for tea.</p><p>As for the many letters, notes, journal entries and other scraps of paper you'll come across, scattered around the Realms, there I'm not quite as convinced. Having the private journal of a nineteenth century adventure seem over-written to the point of incomprehensibility may well be an authentic representation of the form but it doesn't make for much of a fun read in a video game.</p><p>That, though, is about my only negative criticism of the writing in Nightingale. Other than that, I found the story involving, entertaining and informative throughout. I'm very keen to find out where it goes next, although I'm not even sure if the next chapter is in game yet. As for the way the narrative informs and gives purpose to the gameplay, I can't remember when - or if - I've seen it done better.</p><p>All of which would be a storming recommendation for a single-player RPG. Whether it's such an unalloyed compliment for a game sometimes described as a sandbox is another matter. It is extremely directive, after all and taken as a purely narrative experience it might also be a little dry. </p><p>Where it shines is in the combination of its various strands and the harmonious way in which they come together to weave a singular experience. After seventy hours and what feels like a satisfying conclusion, I could almost stop playing now. </p><p>I'm not going to, of course.<br /></p>Bhagpusshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03499162165023939880noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1510920011443550663.post-58082857634541734772024-03-07T16:49:00.000+00:002024-03-07T16:49:11.415+00:00After The Bombs Fell, Everything Looked Much The Same...<p></p>
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<br />I'm not in the mood to write another long post about
<i>Nightingale </i>today. Well, OK, I <i>am </i>but I'd rather <i>play </i>Nightingale
and anyway I doubt anyone wants to read another one of <span style="color: #ff00fe;"><a href="https://bhagpuss.blogspot.com/2024/03/an-inconvenient-truth.html">those</a></span> quite yet. I do
have a few other ideas bubbling up but one is a music post I'm saving
for tomorrow because somehow Friday or Saturday seem like music post days and the rest I'm not quite ready to go with just yet, so...
<p></p>
<p>
I thought I'd put up a couple of trailers for game-related media I
happened to watch just this very morning. It so happens they're both for properties
based on games I don't play but that doesn't mean I'm not interested. In fact,
I'm a lot <i>more </i>interested in the franchises as TV shows or movies than I ever was in the games themselves.<br /></p>
<p> Which isn't to say I've never thought about playing them at all. I have. Both of
them.I'm not saying I thought about it very hard but it has occasionally crossed my mind to give one or other of them a try.<br /></p>
<p>
Actually, now I come to think about it, I think I may have played one of the franchises, once. At least I own a boxed copy of one of the games. I just
have no memory of ever taking it out of the box, much less logging in. </p><p>And I think I might have claimed at least one more on
<i>Prime</i>, although once again without actually installing it. They seem to be working through
them there, which isn't surprising since <i>Amazon </i>is behind the upcoming TV
adaptation.<br />
</p>
<p>
The other franchise I am certain I've never played. I haven't read as much about it either, although I've read a few bloggers' tales and it's always sounded like
something I might enjoy, even though I've gone so far as to do anything about it.<br /></p>
<p>
Everyone knows what IPs I'm talking about so there's no point trying
to be coy any more. Let's watch the trailers.
</p>
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</div>
<p>
Now, that looks solid. I'd watch that show even if I'd never heard of the game. </p><p>I'm
not the greatest fan of post-nuclear horror and I've always thought this
particular franchise looked a little sub-<i>Philip K Dick</i> in tone, which
ought to be a compliment but somehow isn't. Still, that's an enticing trailer. The visuals have a sand-blown austerity
that's nicely dirty-clean, the central character seems comfortably
under-played, the action looks crunchy and the dialog snaps.
</p>
<p>
I mean, it's a trailer so all of that should be a given but at least they've
gotten that much right. Not everyone does. Not even nearly.
</p>
<p>
I notice it's directed by the same person who did the TV <i>Westworld</i>,
another show I never watched but probably should have. From what I know of
that one, this could be its cousin. I seem to recall Westworld was generally
reckoned to be decent so that's an encouraging sign.<br />
</p>
<p>
Naturally, this being one of those properties the press like to call
"<i>beloved</i>" - albeit that's a strange way to talk about a fairly vicious
satire on contemporary mores set in a post-apocalyptic hellscape - there was bound to be a deal of apprehension about whose truth is going to be told here. </p><p>I
scanned a fair way down the lengthy comment thread on <i>YouTube </i>and it's
full of people posting variations of "<i>Please let it be good</i>", which
puts it well ahead of the familiar "<i>This looks like a pile of crap</i>"
markers hardcore fans often feel obligated to lay down in advance, just in
case anyone confuses them with someone who didn't make up their mind four
years ago, when the project was first announced.
</p>
<p>
Not having any prior affections to be trampled, I'm quite looking forward to
it. It's on Prime from April, when all the episodes arrive at once. I've been
complaining I don't have enough new live action shows in my general field of
interest right now so I don't have much of an excuse not to watch.
</p>
<p>
This next one I'd have to go out of the house to see when it launches,
presumably sometime later this year, so<i> that's</i> not going to happen. No
doubt it will hit a streaming service not long after though, so I could catch
up with it then. Would I want to, on the basis of this trailer? Let's see.<br />
</p>
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<p>
Anyone think that looks... kinda similar? I guess it's just the
post-apoc setting. Stil, to have watched them both in the same morning does
feel a little... extra.
</p>
<p>
I imagine the elevator pitch for this one was "<i>Mad Max In Space Meets Guardians of the Galaxy</i>." Not the original <i>GotG </i>from the comics, of course. That was an
almost completely different team and one I loved, back in the day. No, I mean
the MCU version that everyone now thinks of as the real ones. And, to be fair,
I also like that crew well enough.
</p>
<p>
The main thought I was having all the way through watching this trailer was
"<i>I wonder what Cate Blanchett said when her agent told her she was up for this?</i>" I do tend to think of her as a fairly heavy-duty, serious actor but then
she was <i>Galadriel </i>in <i>Lord of the Rings</i> and apparently she kept
the ears and had them bronzed, so...
</p>
<p>
I have to say she looks surprisingly into it. She's only ten years younger
than I am but you wouldn't think it from all that diving and rolling and
shooting. You don't get that kind of action in a <i>Woody Allen</i> movie. I
guess if nothing else <i>Borderlands </i>should make<i> </i>a nice career
bookend with
<i><span style="color: #ff00fe;"><a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0122814/">Bordertown</a></span></i>. Not that I'm suggesting this movie is going to end her career or
anything...<br />
</p>
<p>
<i>Jaimie Lee Curtis</i> and <i>Kevin Hart </i>being in a video game
adaptation isn't such a stretch. No strangers to genre, either of them.
<i>Jack Black</i> as the supposedly annoying-but-cute robot, though? That I could really
manage perfectly well without.
</p>
<p>
As for the actor playing <i>Tiny Tina, </i>she's new to me, although she has
an impressive portfolio that suggests she shouldn't be. I don't know enough about Tiny Tina to say if <i>Ariana Greenblatt</i><span class="yt-core-attributed-string yt-core-attributed-string--white-space-pre-wrap"><span class="yt-core-attributed-string--link-inherit-color" style="color: #131313;"> </span></span>is a
convincing cast, but even though I'm no expert on Borderlands, I had at least
heard of the character, which is more than I can say for any of the others, so I guess it's a good role for an up-and-comer. </p><p>I was a bit surprised, though. For
some reason, I'd formed the impression Tiny Tina was some kind of adult,
gnomelike creature not, as <i>Lionsgate</i>'s official description puts it,
"<span><i>a feral pre-teen demolitionist</i>". Does that make her more or less interesting? Hard to say.</span>
</p>
<p></p>
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<p></p>
<p>
I <i>was </i>quite impressed by just how much of the trailer is shot looking
backwards through the windscreen of a car. It's a brave move for an action
movie. I do like in-car interaction scenes. Especially ones with a lot
of yelling and arm-waving. I'd watch a whole TV show based around that,
so long as it didn't have <i>James Corden </i>anywhere near it.
</p>
<p> The rest of it looks not too shabby. The effects and the sets look good and
the action sequences are par. I'm not sure there's going to be a lot of
quotable dialog but a movie like this really only needs two or three genuinely
good one-liners. That's all anyone ever remembers, anyway.<br /></p>
<p>
All told, I'd definitely watch it, if I was watching full length movies, which
currently I don't seem to be. I do have a lot of them backed up for when I
start again, too, and I doubt this would skip the queue. It will at least join
the end of the line, though, I can say that much in favor of
the trailer.
</p>
<p>
All that remains is to wonder whether, having watched these cinematic
representations, I might now be more pre-disposed to play any of the games in
either of the franchises. </p><p>Nope. Don't think so. But maybe that's not how it's
supposed to work, anyway.
</p>
Bhagpusshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03499162165023939880noreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1510920011443550663.post-787122172165327432024-03-06T20:41:00.002+00:002024-03-06T20:41:24.539+00:00An Inconvenient Truth<p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgN3fY1u-MWH6-27D-G5jr4oQuHCWNVFABWXj5kUP3_tmnO53ZvTnhXbzFYJzJ19Ia-5mWafl58XiJMMFpFm7qysqbZq49QSr8FiJRkYHU-TuRRBfmKcVCu1xVouYplQBc2tN-PLK0TkLCzKFuF0kYC74ieTY8Aj2MoPpAM8cZiF2C0ZaamtGjzaqr-Rng/s1920/ngsunset8.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="1920" height="360" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgN3fY1u-MWH6-27D-G5jr4oQuHCWNVFABWXj5kUP3_tmnO53ZvTnhXbzFYJzJ19Ia-5mWafl58XiJMMFpFm7qysqbZq49QSr8FiJRkYHU-TuRRBfmKcVCu1xVouYplQBc2tN-PLK0TkLCzKFuF0kYC74ieTY8Aj2MoPpAM8cZiF2C0ZaamtGjzaqr-Rng/w640-h360/ngsunset8.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><br />After more than sixty hours, I'm now fairly convinced that the key to <i>Nightingale</i>'s stickiness - for me, anyway, as with <i>Valheim </i>before it - lies as much in its inconvenience as in its undeniable wonder and beauty. Inconvenience and, it has to be said, risk. <p></p><p>I always say I don't enjoy risk in games. On the whole I don't, but the need to be constantly aware, to be always fully engaged in what I'm doing, is paramount when it comes to holding my attention in a survival game. Unlike MMORPGs, I don't generally play survival games to relax.</p><p>In all the time I played Valheim, I could never truly let my concentration lapse. There was always the possibility, however remote, that something unexpected would happen and things would escalate faster than I could respond.</p><p>It used to be like that in MMORPGs. That same underlying tension fueled the infamous addictive quality that drove the success of <i>EverQuest</i>. There, despite the longueurs, the tedium and the repetition, an awareness that, with one wrong decision, everything could fall apart, made the whole experience feel more significant than a video game had any right to be.</p><p>It's an addictive quality famously based on the risk of loss, the concentration required to avoid it and the effort needed to recover from it, should the worst happen. More positively, it's also about luck, chance, fortune and surprise and the ability to react to the unexpected as it happens.</p><p>The most obvious of inconveniences, the one everyone worries about the most, is what happens to your stuff when you die. One thing original EverQuest, Valheim and Nightingale all have in common is that when you die - and you will - you lose all your stuff and have to go get it back.</p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjH0zxYcSscrca7w-ioqEsYCjBx3Mmk5ybmG2K1tKjv7GxIrUV9aa82dFzvV4wjYWWk6HWQioQfxzhFMXx5rwoqKcb0sZhxBf1oB9lYGmgYi9ZQlFkOGOQCmbsRwV17RDFdcOzRYUSrg4XkGuruCvCJBF8uf8vSCY1KI8Q2nZq2S3-91uXoNaBGe_51PrA/s1920/ngdora2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="1920" height="360" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjH0zxYcSscrca7w-ioqEsYCjBx3Mmk5ybmG2K1tKjv7GxIrUV9aa82dFzvV4wjYWWk6HWQioQfxzhFMXx5rwoqKcb0sZhxBf1oB9lYGmgYi9ZQlFkOGOQCmbsRwV17RDFdcOzRYUSrg4XkGuruCvCJBF8uf8vSCY1KI8Q2nZq2S3-91uXoNaBGe_51PrA/w640-h360/ngdora2.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><br /><p></p><p> It's actually not as harsh in Nightingale in that you get to keep what you're wearing but it's still bad enough. You still have your clothes and whatever you had on your hotbar but you don't have the rest of your gear any more and you do have a hefty debuff for being so remiss as to die in the first place. Getting your things back is going to be tough but if your bags were full you sure as heck aren't going to write it off to experience. </p><p>Problem is, the thing that killed you will still be there and you will be weaker. If you couldn't beat it last time, how are you going to do it now?</p><p>That's where the interest lies. I say "<i>interest</i>" rather than "<i>fun</i>" because I am not going to pretend this is fun. Although, as Mrs Bhagpuss will confirm, there was a time when I did like to tell people how much I enjoyed corpse recoveries. </p><p>Boy, that used to annoy them. Annoyed Mrs Bhagpuss, too, come to think of it. Especially when I said it when she was in the middle of getting her own corpse back.<br /></p><p>But I did. And I do still, in a way. Getting your stuff back in a video game can be an interesting puzzle. It takes thought and planning and tactics and strategy and some thinking on your feet when it all goes wrong again. It also takes patience and determination because you'll be lucky if you only have to do it once. When it works, it can be very satisfying. </p><p>When it doesn't, though.... that's when people log out and don't come back. Which is why very, very few games stick with mandatory corpse recovery and item loss in the long term. MMORPGs that start with it inevitably tone it down and usually end up removing it altogether. Corpse recovery hasn't been unavoidable even in EQ for more than twenty years.</p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEivr4xdogrmdScgjN1jB2FksfEWgEhXQhDY93HhtaNqAe5XxWM70mgKHz2_G58P_nyNPLhtz3GhnTYkPPPrKP4spWk6MgH_YiXQ-8n3qj4dF7mEStTeg3b8nWMOcHkPPZZDFenGrVU1HJ4EI1j7XN7q5wa-wt5rZqOULbUb5XXounIKJqzCL95i9eHVIjs/s1920/ngdark1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="1920" height="360" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEivr4xdogrmdScgjN1jB2FksfEWgEhXQhDY93HhtaNqAe5XxWM70mgKHz2_G58P_nyNPLhtz3GhnTYkPPPrKP4spWk6MgH_YiXQ-8n3qj4dF7mEStTeg3b8nWMOcHkPPZZDFenGrVU1HJ4EI1j7XN7q5wa-wt5rZqOULbUb5XXounIKJqzCL95i9eHVIjs/w640-h360/ngdark1.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><br /><p></p><p>In MMORPGs these are design decisions but survival games tend to delegate these kinds of choices to the player, or at least to whomever has control of the server. <i>Palworld, f</i>or example<i>, </i>allows you switch the death penalty off altogether so you respawn at a place of your choosing with all your stuff. </p><p>I made that change to my private Palworld and although I don't regret it, I suspect that decision had more than a little to do with the sense of disconnection I had with that game. I enjoyed my time there but it didn't always feel completely convincing as a place and I think that complete abnegation of risk was a factor.</p><p>Risk, of course, plays a widely-recognized and acknowledged role in the appeal of many games. We hear a lot about "<i>Risk vs Reward</i>" as a design concept. It's generally accepted that there has to be some measure of perceived risk in order make players feel there's some weight to what they're doing. The debate revolves around how much risk there should be, not whether there needs to be any at all.</p><p>Inconvenience, though, is rarely seen as any sort of positive in a game. Players demand and developers strive to provide quality of life improvements to make inconveniences go away, tweaks that often continue throughout the life of the game. Even games coming up to their twentieth anniversaries still list QoL improvements in their patch notes.<br /></p><p>For some players, though, and it appears I'm one of them, inconvenience can be weirdly appealing. The bulk of potential customers are looking for a clean, polished experience, but for a significant minority who get considerably more pleasure from figuring out how things work than they do from "<i>playing the game</i>", what others call inconvenience qualifies as content.<br /></p><p>Even in Early Access, Nightingale has plenty of content. It has exploration, puzzles, crafting and building as well as quests and a story-line. None of them are what I'd call "<i>convenient</i>". </p><p>Let me briefly take you through some of the reasons why.</p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgN9_qXmQyO5vxoFSpw3qB88ZzuXPClBCYZBnUhbav2OGvEHcg-D4oALRRc2jWLZDYIXTB_tt_5D0OSbLrX3_ceGvcQiTrTtavGZVnCxNRX2EHEfypm3g0PJL5IilqRqCNJMWthNze9DlIpDlHNAvXtcVeoyZ-3V3aljAj2rUZcHFAHZPF8kxaVcfbY3Uo/s1920/nghangar1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="1920" height="360" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgN9_qXmQyO5vxoFSpw3qB88ZzuXPClBCYZBnUhbav2OGvEHcg-D4oALRRc2jWLZDYIXTB_tt_5D0OSbLrX3_ceGvcQiTrTtavGZVnCxNRX2EHEfypm3g0PJL5IilqRqCNJMWthNze9DlIpDlHNAvXtcVeoyZ-3V3aljAj2rUZcHFAHZPF8kxaVcfbY3Uo/w640-h360/nghangar1.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><br /><br /><p></p><p><b><span style="font-size: x-large;">Exploration <br /></span></b></p><ul style="text-align: left;"><li><span style="font-size: medium;">The possible range of biomes is large but all of them
have to be created by the player through a combination of crafting and
interaction with in-game devices.</span></li><li><span style="font-size: medium;">Some of which you also have to craft.</span></li><li><span style="font-size: medium;">After you've discovered the recipes, that is.</span></li><li><span style="font-size: medium;">And found the machines. <br /></span></li><li><span style="font-size: medium;">It's a highly complex system that takes a good deal of learning and even more tuning to provide the desired results.</span></li><li><span style="font-size: medium;">Once you make them and travel to them, all of the maps are huge</span></li><li><span style="font-size: medium;">But travel is slow. </span></li><li><span style="font-size: medium;">There are no mounts. </span></li><li><span style="font-size: medium;">You can sprint but it uses stamina.<br /></span></li><li><span style="font-size: medium;">So do climbing, gliding and swimming.</span></li><li><span style="font-size: medium;">You can die from falling.</span></li><li><span style="font-size: medium;">And from drowning.</span></li><li><span style="font-size: medium;">Consequently, stamina management is a constant concern. </span></li><li><span style="font-size: medium;">As are environmental conditions like rain, hail or polluted water, all of which have negative consequences that need to be avoided, prevented or cured. </span></li><li><span style="font-size: medium;">You also get exhausted if you don't rest. </span></li><li><span style="font-size: medium;">If you're exhausted you can't run, swim, jump or climb.</span></li><li><span style="font-size: medium;">Plus you can sprain an ankle or break a leg.</span></li><li><span style="font-size: medium;">Or an arm.</span></li><li><span style="font-size: medium;">Try climbing with a broken arm.</span></li><li><span style="font-size: medium;">Or sprinting with a broken leg.<br /></span></li></ul><p><span style="font-size: x-large;"><b>Puzzles</b></span></p><ul style="text-align: left;"><li><span style="font-size: medium;">There are "<i>Intellect</i>", "<i>Agility</i>" and "<i>Combat</i>" puzzles but all of them require aspects of the others.</span></li><li><span style="font-size: medium;">There are few, if any, explanations of how any puzzle works.</span></li><li><span style="font-size: medium;">Some are nested.</span></li><li><span style="font-size: medium;">Some are mazes.</span></li><li><span style="font-size: medium;">Some are very simple.</span></li><li><span style="font-size: medium;">Some aren't. </span></li><li><span style="font-size: medium;">Even when it's clear <i>how </i>a puzzle works, it's frequently not easy to <i>see</i> how it works. </span></li><li><span style="font-size: medium;">I mean that literally.</span></li><li><span style="font-size: medium;">Some puzzles require you to observe a number of things that aren't all visible on screen at once from the same perspective.</span></li><li><span style="font-size: medium;">Some puzzles don't play fair.</span></li><li><span style="font-size: medium;"> Agility puzzles, for example, cannot always be solved without building scaffolds or ramps.</span></li><li><span style="font-size: medium;">That's not agility, is it? <br /></span></li></ul><p><span style="font-size: x-large;"><b>Crafting</b></span></p><ul style="text-align: left;"><li><span style="font-size: medium;">There are very many crafting stations, most of which make intermediate items that can be used in others.</span></li><li><span style="font-size: medium;">All stations come in different qualities so there's progression.</span></li><li><span style="font-size: medium;">Some stations require fuel.</span></li><li><span style="font-size: medium;">Some stations can set you on fire. <br /></span></li><li><span style="font-size: medium;">All stations can be crafted by the player. </span></li><li><span style="font-size: medium;">Most of them need to be, although there are NPC stations dotted around.<br /></span></li><li><span style="font-size: medium;">There are "<i>Augmentations</i>", subsidiary devices which enhance the stations. </span></li><li><span style="font-size: medium;">Augmentations, which also have to be crafted, can affect multiple stations at once but have to be placed appropriately to reach them all.<br /></span></li><li><span style="font-size: medium;">Environmental effects such as lighting or shelter also affect crafting stations.</span></li><li><span style="font-size: medium;">All crafted items, including the Augmentations and Stations, can be made from multiple materials.</span></li><li><span style="font-size: medium;">All materials have varieties, qualities and stats. </span></li><li><span style="font-size: medium;"><i>Lots </i>of stats, in some cases. <br /></span></li><li><span style="font-size: medium;">Materials affect outcomes, although it is not always clear how or when.</span></li><li><span style="font-size: medium;">Recipes are not automatically granted. </span></li><li><span style="font-size: medium;">They can be found as drops or rewards and also bought from vendors. </span></li><li><span style="font-size: medium;">There are <i>a lot</i> of recipes.</span></li><li><span style="font-size: medium;">And <i>a lot</i> of vendors.</span></li><li><span style="font-size: medium;">Getting all your recipes takes a lot of work. </span></li><li><span style="font-size: medium;">And also some luck. <br /></span></li><li><span style="font-size: medium;">Finished items frequently require many sub-combines, some of which require sub-combines of their own. </span></li><li><span style="font-size: medium;">Making anything takes time. </span></li><li><span style="font-size: medium;">Often a lot of time, at least in gaming terms.</span></li><li><span style="font-size: medium;">Crafting is <i>far</i> too inconvenient in <i>far </i>too many ways to sum up all of those inconveniences in a bullet point list like this.</span></li><li><span style="font-size: medium;">Seriously, it's really, <i>really </i>inconvenient.</span></li><li><span style="font-size: medium;">But hella fun!<br /></span></li></ul><p><b><span style="font-size: x-large;">Building</span></b></p><ul style="text-align: left;"><li><span style="font-size: medium;">OK, building isn't <i>that </i>bad<i>.</i>. </span></li><li><span style="font-size: medium;">It's snap-together prefab parts.</span></li><li><span style="font-size: medium;">And they fit pretty well. <br /></span></li><li><span style="font-size: medium;">How bad could it be? <br /></span></li><li><span style="font-size: medium;">There are a lot of parts, though.</span></li><li><span style="font-size: medium;">And a number of styles.</span></li><li><span style="font-size: medium;">And you have to craft them all.</span></li><li><span style="font-size: medium;">And the better ones require sub-combines. <br /></span></li><li><span style="font-size: medium;">And unlike most games with housing, you can build anywhere and as extensively as you want.</span></li><li><span style="font-size: medium;">Which means you're going to end up tearing down and rebuilding.</span></li><li><span style="font-size: medium;">Repeatedly. <br /></span></li></ul><p><b><span style="font-size: x-large;">Questing and Storyline</span></b></p><ul style="text-align: left;"><li><span style="font-size: medium;">Bundled together here because they often seem to be one and the same</span></li><li><span style="font-size: medium;">Also, they seem to be inextricably bound up with crafting.</span></li><li><span style="font-size: medium;">And crafting progression.</span></li><li><span style="font-size: medium;">And exploration.</span></li><li><span style="font-size: medium;">And exploration progression.</span></li><li><span style="font-size: medium;">And combat, of course. <br /></span></li><li><span style="font-size: medium;">Although sometimes you can craft an item to bribe a mob to give you its drop instead of killing it.</span></li><li><span style="font-size: medium;">Much faster and easier just to kill it, of course. <br /></span></li><li><span style="font-size: medium;">Just be prepared to be criticized for your thuggery if you do.</span></li><li><span style="font-size: medium;">And to miss out on sub-quests.</span></li><li><span style="font-size: medium;">On really big, long, involved sub-quests. </span></li><li><span style="font-size: medium;">Like half the fricken' content of the game, it seems like, sometimes.</span></li><li><span style="font-size: medium;">So maybe don't just kill everything, yo!<br /></span></li><li><span style="font-size: medium;">Also, better be ready to go exploring.</span></li><li><span style="font-size: medium;">And you'd better like reading because there's no voice acting but there is a lot of flavor text.</span></li><li><span style="font-size: medium;">And instructions.</span></li><li><span style="font-size: medium;">That you need to follow.</span></li><li><span style="font-size: medium;">It helps if you can do funny voices in your head.</span></li><li><span style="font-size: medium;">Well, it helps me...<br /></span></li></ul><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEipPptZ60H7H1giTcZBsamHSS8IYeYD6FVs5hCwPO-LyXjMCvwocSMcVT95th8nqTKtf5OHALL733rPNs9pOxTBgiGyBdsT5VRlHzKPXfRdW44XeHrwGrBuDy85PK-kOAhaQ7OpLMFQ3iQX4qI5LTVR7QAlOm9s1AVxR2wFfiQZkCSBsAwgGyQhKfuvO-0/s1920/nggloom1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="1920" height="360" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEipPptZ60H7H1giTcZBsamHSS8IYeYD6FVs5hCwPO-LyXjMCvwocSMcVT95th8nqTKtf5OHALL733rPNs9pOxTBgiGyBdsT5VRlHzKPXfRdW44XeHrwGrBuDy85PK-kOAhaQ7OpLMFQ3iQX4qI5LTVR7QAlOm9s1AVxR2wFfiQZkCSBsAwgGyQhKfuvO-0/w640-h360/nggloom1.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><br />I think that's enough to give an idea of just how fiddle-faddly Nightingale is and I haven't even touched on the magic system or the extremely fine gradations of choice available in crafting, enchanting and otherwise enhancing your gear. Or the potions. Or the food. Or stealth. Or using the Spyglass.<br /><p></p><p>Everything seems to lean into everything else. There's no real boundary between the types of gameplay on offer. You need to be willing to engage equally with all of them and they are all very complex. </p><p>Unnecessarily so, I'm sure many players would say, but I would not be one of them. Inconvenience that draws you in rather than pushes you away is a very difficult trick to pull off but clearly, for me, Nightingale has managed it, in much the same way Valheim did a few years ago.</p><p>Still, I strongly suspect Nightingale will not hold the same, wide-ranging appeal as the viking survival game. I think the crafting is likely to appeal hugely to a very limited demographic while driving everyone else to distraction. I think there's a point of diminishing returns to this level of
inconvenient complexity and I imagine a lot of people reached it long
ago. <br /></p><p>I'll get there soon too, no doubt. Even at Tier 2, it's already taking me literally hours to gather the mats, make the combines and finish the items I want. It's only going to get worse, I'm sure. I don't think I'm going to be sounding so cheery about it by Tier 5. <br /></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhnZ_9sCyMugOk2XK4LNQNp_ZDqznR_DyqCabtqq2q6TcjLqKgaERvvwyMmGrrWcZgYSo9Bn6QgNJrvxutdJgw_-WU-2NLmBxZtoq9rOrbYoI2nMk6-1hMT25tLSQpC3jTcsPf5ewidg5xT_xMpvJlA8LQl5P1VRqaCAnYArJU0ofQyBrP6JgoS5DmOroI/s398/nghunt1.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="187" data-original-width="398" height="150" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhnZ_9sCyMugOk2XK4LNQNp_ZDqznR_DyqCabtqq2q6TcjLqKgaERvvwyMmGrrWcZgYSo9Bn6QgNJrvxutdJgw_-WU-2NLmBxZtoq9rOrbYoI2nMk6-1hMT25tLSQpC3jTcsPf5ewidg5xT_xMpvJlA8LQl5P1VRqaCAnYArJU0ofQyBrP6JgoS5DmOroI/s320/nghunt1.png" width="320" /></a></div>For now, though, I'm still motoring along although I'm not sure how much traffic there is ahead of me. Today I completed the last of the six Sites of Power, <i>The Hunt</i>. For that, as for the first five, I got a Steam achievement. As of time of writing, only 8.2% of players have made it that far.<p></p><p>It does look as though what I'm finding compulsive, everyone is finding exactly the opposite. Never mind, though. Just wait a while and I'm sure it will all get honed down until there are no inconveniences to speak of. By the time the game officially launches, you'll most likely be able to finish in a few seconds what's currently taking me most of a session. </p><p>By then, though, I won't care. I'll be long gone, probably off playing some other half-finished game that drives everyone nuts with its awkward, annoying mechanics and its refusal to make anything simple. </p><p>Luckily for me, that's most games when they begin. I'm not likely to run out of options any time soon. Especially while Early Access stays popular.<br /></p>Bhagpusshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03499162165023939880noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1510920011443550663.post-54448538653295580882024-03-05T14:00:00.002+00:002024-03-06T10:41:13.939+00:00Maybe Some Day<p>
</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhWPiYyTochsZW9c7KWB_KK1BaQYAgAgyNMGHzsBE_ISBOavcD6qY-PRP_Ha_dR35uWhK7Z7n2_FRlK-cc27HJeZiIj5Sx7m-UWM9zOwL9JLUHkpoBJEIOxie8FcYZzK-1T1GVCwCV-pKuUfhAr3ZQXTKjGZgKwICHT19MsyhQPD4ix-wxy8uPuGnnFCWw/s1920/tofsas1.png" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="1920" height="360" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhWPiYyTochsZW9c7KWB_KK1BaQYAgAgyNMGHzsBE_ISBOavcD6qY-PRP_Ha_dR35uWhK7Z7n2_FRlK-cc27HJeZiIj5Sx7m-UWM9zOwL9JLUHkpoBJEIOxie8FcYZzK-1T1GVCwCV-pKuUfhAr3ZQXTKjGZgKwICHT19MsyhQPD4ix-wxy8uPuGnnFCWw/w640-h360/tofsas1.png" width="640" /></a></div>I gave myself the day off blogging yesterday to play <i>Nightingale</i>. I
think I'm circling in on the primary reason why I'm finding it so compelling
but I'll let that percolate a while longer. In the meantime, I thought I'd
make good on a promises I made in a previous post.<br />
<p></p>
<p>
I started writing about games <i>Palworld</i> and Nightingale had stopped me
from playing but then ended up writing about just one of them, <i>Allods</i>,
which I actually <i>had </i>played, a little, somewhat defeating my own
argument. I said then I'd do post something about the rest later and here we
are. It's later already!<br />
</p>
<p>
<b><span style="font-size: x-large;">Games I'm Not Playing</span></b>
</p>
<p>
Obviously, that could be an extremely long list. If you want to be literal
about it, it would be all games ever made except Nightingale. That would be
kind of a lengthy post even for me, though, so I'll stick to the handful I
quite possibly would have been playing, if it hadn't been for (Insert
ironically struck-through reference to meme from ancient
<i>Hanna-Barbera</i> cartoon old people still somehow expect anyone who didn't
grow up watching Saturday Morning Cartoons to get and then shake their heads
wearily when they don't here.) two survival games on <i>Steam</i>.
</p>
<p>
I'm not even going to bother listing the obvious ones, the ones I was already
playing before I got de-railed or, more accurately, ran my own train off the
tracks, like both <i>EverQuest </i>titles or the many single-player games I'm
in the middle of on <i>Steam</i>. This is just a short list of games I have
bookmarked, meaning to try, added over the last few weeks either because they
looked interesting or because I thought I might get a post out of them. More
likely both.
</p>
<p>
<b><span style="font-size: large;">Eterspire</span></b><b><span style="font-size: large;"></span></b>
</p>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<b><span style="font-size: large;"><iframe allowfullscreen="" class="BLOG_video_class" height="292" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/srb7wG1LNqQ" width="528" youtube-src-id="srb7wG1LNqQ"></iframe></span></b>
</div>
<p></p>
<p>
<i>Syp </i>did
<span style="color: #ff00fe;"><a href="https://massivelyop.com/2024/01/08/no-shortcuts-mobile-mmo-eterspire-launches-on-android/">a short piece</a></span>
on this one for <i>MassivelyOP</i> back in January and I thought it looked
interesting enough to bookmark for possible further investigation. It's<span style="color: #ff00fe;"><a href="https://www.eterspire.com/"> a mobile title</a></span>, available for <i>Android </i>and <i>iOS</i>, which self-describes as "<i>the <b>best</b> mobile MMORPG in the history of the universe!!</i>" Look, they even bolded "<i>best</i>" so it must be true!
</p>
<p>
Really, when you see a claim like that, you have to check it out, don't you?
And there's more...
</p>
<p>
"<i>With engaging combat, tons of rare items to collect, and no overly
complicated systems to slow you down, Eterspire cuts through the fluff and
takes you straight to the action.</i>"
</p>
<p>
Good, 'cos I really hate being slowed down by those darn overly complicated
systems. That's why I've played fifty-five hours of Nightingale these last two
weeks.
</p>
<p>
Looking at the screenshots and taking the temperature of the extensive patch
notes, I get the feeling this is something along the lines of
<i>AdventureQuest 3D</i>. I like <i>AQ3D </i>a lot but I still hardly ever
play it, so why I'd think I needed another like it beats me. I'd have to play
it through <i>BlueStacks </i>or <i>Nox</i>, too, which is another hurdle it
will probably never pass but even so it's on the "<i>Maybe One Day</i>" list
now.
</p>
<h2 class="app-title">Hello Kitty Around The World</h2>
<h2 class="app-title">
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgFr053ydlSyUVl17PB8krDkUTtlO9aOdL23r-0rbrA6EZTJ450-VUcnFr-Uaf6ApOEHthOJYWNxtjXVQUgoqLq9Wrenvx502z477dDJvzPHWsw45XeIrwNCLcn3HPpOT2mi_zHzJz9DxFaWZp2DKQP1L4SVy7CAfuXAeWfnKst6SQNbTa0DWYRAAtgm08/s1519/hkatw1.png" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="852" data-original-width="1519" height="358" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgFr053ydlSyUVl17PB8krDkUTtlO9aOdL23r-0rbrA6EZTJ450-VUcnFr-Uaf6ApOEHthOJYWNxtjXVQUgoqLq9Wrenvx502z477dDJvzPHWsw45XeIrwNCLcn3HPpOT2mi_zHzJz9DxFaWZp2DKQP1L4SVy7CAfuXAeWfnKst6SQNbTa0DWYRAAtgm08/w640-h358/hkatw1.png" width="640" /></a>
</div>
<br /><br />
</h2>
<p>
<span style="font-size: small;">I can't now recall where or why I was reading about this. I didn't bookmark
my original source, only the Bluestacks entry for the game, which was as far
as I got in my attempt to play it. I do remember seeing something that
suggested this was an important title for some reason. If I knew
<i>what </i>was important about it, I'd tell you. </span>
</p>
<p>
<span style="font-size: small;">Oh, wait, maybe <i>Google </i>knows...</span>
</p>
<p>
<span style="font-size: small;">Aha! <i>Now </i>I remember! Or at least, I remember what started it all. It
was something I read at
<span style="color: #ff00fe;"><a href="https://www.nme.com/news/music/x-japans-yoshiki-to-compose-official-theme-song-for-hello-kittys-50th-anniversary-3569333">NME</a></span>, because <i>of course</i> a music site was going to be my go-to for
important news about <i>Hello Kitty</i> games.
</span>
</p>
<p>
<span style="font-size: small;">From the NME, I learned that 2024 is Hello Kitty's fiftieth birthday. She
really doesn't look her age, does she? That was how I started looking at at
Hello Kitty stuff again, but how I ended up with
<i>Around The World</i> specifically, I have no clue. </span>
</p>
<p>
<span style="font-size: small;">It's what I bookmarked, anyway, so I'll have to assume I wanted to check it
out for something. Maybe if I ever actually play it I'll find out what it
was.<br /></span>
</p>
<p>
<span style="font-size: small;">My personal history with Japan's most famous feline (And that's a highly
competitive title, let me tell you.) doesn't go back quite as far as half a
century but it does stretch all the way to the late 1990s, which is when I
bought a Hello Kitty pencil case in the <i>El Corte Ingles</i> department
store in Barcelona. A few weeks later, I gave that pencil case to a work
colleague as a leaving present, when she decided to go to back to
America. </span>
</p>
<p>
<span style="font-size: small;">We were the only two people in the office who knew </span><span style="font-size: small;">both </span><span style="font-size: small;">who <i>Buffy the Vampire Slayer</i> was <i>and</i> that the show was fit
viewing for adults, so a Hello Kitty pencil case seemed to be the obvious
choice to give her to remember me by. Plus it was all I happened to have
with me at her leaving do in the pub after work. God, remember when we used
to do things like that? Another world...<br /></span>
</p>
<p>
<span style="font-size: small;">A little bit later, I briefly played the Hello Kitty MMORPG,<i>Hello Kitty Online</i>, mostly out of spite. I wanted to be able to hit back at anyone who used
it as a lazy diss to put down any other MMORPG they happened not to like,
which was very much a trope of the early 'aughts. </span>
</p>
<p>
<span style="font-size: small;">It's always a more effective put-down if you can open with "<i>Have you actually <b>played </b>HKO? Because <b>I </b>have.</i>" </span>
</p>
<p>
<span style="font-size: small;">I don't think I ever did that, by the way, but I always thought I might. I
guess it could still happen, but I doubt it. After all, I'm not a
hot-tempered kid of forty any more.</span>
</p>
<p>
<span style="font-size: small;">Of course, the Hello Kitty game I really want to play is
<i><span style="color: #ff00fe;"><a href="https://www.hellokittyislandadventure.com/">Hello Kitty Island Adventure</a></span></i>, which is basically Hello Kitty meets <i>Animal Crosssing</i> as far as I
can see. Unfortunately, that one is only available via
<i><span style="color: #ff00fe;"><a href="https://apps.apple.com/us/app/hello-kitty-island-adventure/id1553505132?ign-itscg=30200ADM&ign-itsct=sanrio_arcade">Apple Arcade</a></span></i>, which not only requires an iOS device capable of running the game but
also charges a subscription. Never gonna happen.<br /></span>
</p>
<p>
<span style="font-size: x-large;"><b>Embers Adrift</b></span>
</p>
<p>
<span style="font-size: x-large;"><b></b></span>
</p>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: x-large;"><b><iframe allowfullscreen="" class="BLOG_video_class" height="292" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/6uGcB7BWvTk" width="528" youtube-src-id="6uGcB7BWvTk"></iframe></b></span>
</div>
<p></p>
<p>
<span style="font-size: small;">Finally, a game you can play on the PC!
<i><span style="color: #ff00fe;"><a href="https://www.embersadrift.com/">Embers Adrift</a></span></i>
is one of those uphill in the snow both ways, retro "<i>golden age</i>"
MMORPGs that were all the rage a few years ago, only it's one that both
actually launched <i>and </i>hung around. I'm pretty sure it used to be
called something else and there was probably some drama involved at some
point but I neither remember the details nor care enough to go look them
up.</span>
</p>
<p>
<span style="font-size: small;">The important part is that from the start of this month it's getting one of
those endless free trials I like. The way I play, those might as well be
free games. It's not like I often get much further than the starting zones
in most MMORPGs, and anyway those are usually the best bits.<br /></span>
</p>
<p>
<span style="font-size: small;">The devs also recently made some changes to the early stages that
apparently mean you don't have to get a group before you can even take on a
kill ten rats quest any more. Oh, it's still laser-focused on "<i>Group-based Gameplay</i>" with all the usual promises and reasons, but like just about every
similar game ever, it has finally occured to someone that players
occasionally either want or need to do stuff on their own, if only for the
sake of their sanity. </span>
</p>
<p>
<span style="font-size: small;">As the
<span style="color: #ff00fe;"><a href="https://forums.embersadrift.com/index.php?threads/february-27th-whats-new.4438/">patch notes</a></span>
from a preparatory update for the free trial last month put it "</span><i>A new solo loop has been added to the Meadowlands' Noxious Bog Ember
Vein.</i>" Now, doesn't <i>that </i>sound inviting?
</p>
<p>
MOP
<span style="color: #ff00fe;"><a href="https://massivelyop.com/2024/01/31/embers-adrift-adds-more-solo-content-and-bulletin-board-system-with-its-january-update/">reported
</a></span>back in January that the recent changes were just the beginning of a new
approach to solo play in the game:
</p>
<p></p>
<blockquote>
<span style="font-size: medium;">"“One of our primary goals in 2024 is to deliver more structured gameplay
for those who begin their adventures alone,” the studio says. “We hope that
by providing more tangible goals with meaningful rewards to solo adventurers
they will stick around longer increasing the likelihood of forming a group
to tackle a dungeon or complete a quest. To start the year off we are
launching three new EV solo loops and our new Bulletin Board System!"</span>
</blockquote>
<p></p>
<p>Amazing how every new developer has to re-invent the wheel, isn't it?</p>
<p>
I don't know how well Embers Adrift is doing but generally these kinds of
changes only come in response to either player demand or demographic decline.
It seems the old school B2P + Sub payment model was the first thing to give.
That would be a <i>really </i>hard sell in 2024.
</p>
<p>
It's still $39.99 for the full game but the subscription is now one of those
optional deals that give you perks of various kinds. A change like that
wouldn't have moved the dial on my interest but the combination of
<i>not </i>having to pay $40 plus the prospect of at least some content I
might actually be able to see without having to make a whole bunch of new
friends I'd never meet again did at least motivate me to bookmark the game to
have a look at later.
</p>
<p>Op success for the Marketing Dept. I guess..</p>
<p>
<b><span style="font-size: x-large;">Tower of Fantasy</span></b>
</p>
<p>
<b><span style="font-size: x-large;"></span></b>
</p>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<b><span style="font-size: x-large;"><iframe allowfullscreen="" class="BLOG_video_class" height="292" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/Lf_jI3A7J1s" width="528" youtube-src-id="Lf_jI3A7J1s"></iframe></span></b>
</div>
<p></p>
<p>
Aka the game I didn't play when everyone else was playing it because I was too
busy playing <i>Noah's Heart</i>. So, if I didn't bother then, why would I
consider it now?
</p>
<p>
<span style="color: #ff00fe;"><a href="https://www.mmobomb.com/news/tower-of-fantasy-announces-collaboration-anime-series-evangelion">This
</a></span>is why. The prospect of meeting <i>Asuka, Shinji, Rai </i>and the rest in a
game is enticing - although I notice the promo only mentions <i>Asuka </i>by
name. I guess she <i>is </i>everyone's favorite...<br />
</p>
<p>
The crossover event begins on in exactly a week on 12 March but I'm unclear as
to whether it will then become permanent content or if there's a date set
after which it goes away.
</p>
<p>
If it's the latter, I'll probably never get to try it but if it's staying for
good then maybe I'll eventually find a window to take a look at a game I
probably should have played already, anyway.
</p>
<p>
And that's all of them for now. Not counting the games on my Steam
wishlist I almost bought or the Prime games I almost downloaded.
</p>
<p>
If I ever get around to trying any of them, I imagine you'll read about it
here. Meanwhile, it's back to Nightingale.
</p>
Bhagpusshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03499162165023939880noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1510920011443550663.post-1881079714769451892024-03-03T19:02:00.004+00:002024-03-03T19:02:50.880+00:00Social Climbing<p>
<a
href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhQ28V8xqqKWe4F2XQVq_vXZJJJRGpBWC2kMQmF7mMS8L38mJZ-eapKfy4VyemG0UpElyqtj2aOn-rULMrotK2g-0ZYRZZprGnkcodnxc8EBhBD2gqlxm_L3FVwybicCuheAtVCBLHgL0xg3n-4cQS9kljoqz1WesDSE84OiFEdL9U9u4PWY75TR12-Za8/s1920/ngsunset7.jpg"
imageanchor="1"
style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"
><img
border="0"
data-original-height="1080"
data-original-width="1920"
height="360"
src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhQ28V8xqqKWe4F2XQVq_vXZJJJRGpBWC2kMQmF7mMS8L38mJZ-eapKfy4VyemG0UpElyqtj2aOn-rULMrotK2g-0ZYRZZprGnkcodnxc8EBhBD2gqlxm_L3FVwybicCuheAtVCBLHgL0xg3n-4cQS9kljoqz1WesDSE84OiFEdL9U9u4PWY75TR12-Za8/w640-h360/ngsunset7.jpg"
width="640" /></a
>So much has happened in <i>Nightingale </i>since I last
<span style="color: #ff00fe;"
><a href="https://bhagpuss.blogspot.com/2024/02/first-catch-your-hare.html"
>posted
</a></span
>about what I've been doing there, I hardly know where to begin. I suppose I
really ought to try to keep to a topic and make some coherent points about the
game but really I just want to go "<i
>I did this! And then I did that! It was awesome!</i
>", like a ten-year old kid telling you about a trip to the adventure park.
</p>
<p>
Which is pretty much what Nightingale is, come to think of it: a trip to the
adventure park. There's a lot of climbing up things and jumping off, for a
start. It took me a while to get the feel of both of them, but once I got
comfortable with the <i>Climbing Picks</i> and the <i>Umbrella</i>, there was
no stopping me.
</p>
<p>
They're both slightly more awkward to use than similar options in other games
but they work wonderfully when you get the hang of them. They both also have
the enormous benefit of being dual use items. Triple in the case of the
Umbrella.
</p>
<p></p>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a
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src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEisyKMha8Qo-6bSq4ZvYBrw1w3m89sdipUlVjq7tA5upmH1NnNhxb9eFr0puQrnedsmc1JNxdF_yQnmCgeqTTpZUzgJk9kaEMoDPzwPFEXEndjdUf9ZQFwtxpvPX0cz4II1-OrpRVJ3gXX29cOAxNYHTXxJU-UQPtUsR8ZKFYfuhU_2h_AIpnIYEOFiL-s/w640-h360/ngleaves1.jpg"
width="640"
/></a>
</div>
<p></p>
<p>
The picks make pretty good weapons, which is a big help when you pull yourself
over the lip of a cliff and suddenly find yourself staring up at a bear. The
Umbrella is a glider but it also keeps the rain off, very important in a game
with a deleterious "<i>Wet</i>" condition, and also the sun, which can be even
more dangerous in the desert, where you get "<i>Hot</i>" in very short order
if you step out of the shade.<br />
</p>
<p>
Speaking of the desert, I've been spending a lot of time there lately and boy
is it harsh! It's one of the most deserty deserts I've seen in a game,
all flat, barren sand, blazing sun and nothing much moving anywhere. I find it
quite mesmeric.
</p>
<p>
The picks are absolutely vital in the desert, something I would not have
predicted. The storyline has you making a portal to a
<i>Desert Herbarium Realm</i> in search of one <i>Nellie Bly</i>, who
supposedly can help you on your quest to get back home to Nightingale. But
first you have to find her.
</p>
<p></p>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a
href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEicOMzeaBvjL4MKnJEBjjTgEBC7taADq7S0JnX-kbo9P0qWV9zIQ-Y8mW6Z8G-nHs-XulZuK6iExXWpW_rdYOQkuH1FpeorokPK5SYdXP5MApgg7Erzt8kCzMR0cH-JfqmWuPM2QpIZlUso7nnQFN6Hf8oIMq5jk1tv8sdnptMibWpwNS73GBudfRJr_Z8/s1920/ngair1.jpg"
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><img
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src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEicOMzeaBvjL4MKnJEBjjTgEBC7taADq7S0JnX-kbo9P0qWV9zIQ-Y8mW6Z8G-nHs-XulZuK6iExXWpW_rdYOQkuH1FpeorokPK5SYdXP5MApgg7Erzt8kCzMR0cH-JfqmWuPM2QpIZlUso7nnQFN6Hf8oIMq5jk1tv8sdnptMibWpwNS73GBudfRJr_Z8/w640-h360/ngair1.jpg"
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/></a>
</div>
<br /><br />
<p></p>
<p>
It's a Tier 2 realm, meaning you'll probably want to have upgraded all of your
gear to <i>Refined </i>quality, although if you've upgraded the stuff you got
from <i>Twitch </i>drops, that probably still has the edge. That campaign has
been extended, by the way, and if you already got the drops once, you can get
them again. I did. I'm going to give them to Dora.
</p>
<p>
I made Refined versions of most of the rest of my gear but it was a faff (Cf
the post linked above.) and I was trying to save on mats, so I left out a
couple of things I thought I wouldn't need, like the <i>Sickle </i>and the
picks. As it happens, even if I 'd wanted to replace my
<i>Simple Climbing Picks</i>, I wouldn't have been able to. I hadn't noticed
then, but I didn't have the recipe for the Refined ones. Unlike most of the
others, it didn't come with the upgraded crafting station.
</p>
<p></p>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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><img
border="0"
data-original-height="1080"
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height="360"
src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh3vQB1azJt6-mq_3Fcd5d2fk2H6pLFA0iBbxLw4Rci2JOI4rtyjg-TMx3E-MW_q1Z3tsp-mDLIhO1SNdVbZIY55FGfkCsgTk7Yk6pjqkA0CUdl4RimevUcAQw0AZS0jtDhT_3i2pU0R6JHVDP9StH30LxtemnLhI_MQ__X71JZEztLhdt8sDCbkOJwhno/w640-h360/ngcone1.jpg"
width="640"
/></a>
</div>
<p></p>
<p>
Worse, I was trying to keep my bags as clear as possible so I could fill them
up with loot in the new Realm, so I didn't even bring my old picks along. That
turned out to be a major error of judgment.
</p>
<p>
Since Nightingale uses procedural generation to create a unique version of
each Realm when you crank the handle on the portal, I can't say for sure
whether Nellie Bly is always to be found hiding away on a completely
inaccessible plateau, surrounded on all sides by sheer, eighty meter cliffs,
but that's where she was in my Realm.
</p>
<p>
I knew where to look because quest NPCs are marked on the map, albeit in the
vaguest fashion possible. I could see her marker but I couldn't figure out how
to get to it. It looked like it was up on top of this gigantic pile of rocks
but it could equally have been in a cavern hidden somewhere inside or even a
cave beneath.
</p>
<p></p>
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style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"
><img
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data-original-height="1080"
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src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi_yDT5lk3kLKVpXaS_FKFXK0c3zk18YvvBcEvDbtcB9zKHEBSJ0l1fdC4XMt9YwwOQZlvPPZ22ZTrJ3JJ_ReyMB6GrU3KxeY-nfWm9xPSHXbg8Y_vex0shTt9M2EgStiX3R4HVFdCY2VDoBdgpiyvtJ8C_nB0Tpu7DnKgKYP9qhBOHoAgWm996F0HPCcs/w640-h360/ngcp1.jpg"
width="640"
/></a>
</div>
I spent a good hour trekking all the way around the giant mesa, looking for a
way up, in or through; a road, a track, a path, some crumbling sandstone steps -
anything. There was nothing. Nothing but blank rock.
<p></p>
<p>
It looked like I was going to have to climb the damn thing. I contemplated the
idea of going back and getting my Simple Picks or, better yet, making some
Refined Picks, which would presumably make it easier, somehow. Luckily, I
didn't immediately map back to Abeyance Realm home because while I was still
wandering about the sands, I ran into an Essence Trader, who just happened to
be selling the recipe to make the Refined Picks.<br />
</p>
<p>
That confused me. Didn't I have them already? It tells you in the sales window
if you've already got something and greys it out so you can't waste your
Essences. The Refined Picks weren't greyed out, which is how I discovered I
didn't have the recipe.
</p>
<p></p>
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src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg4kFaappKieJ3MIljo7sOBZvWjvM_vwYVjcaKkXU0S7-TXcjNfeTns2bgm00hbHnjBEfmc1MgnnP4Rj3X48TPkTb89tEz2Bw92PkuzKIyZCrSTcDIL-p4Xsr34mjIacg5LBoxeQPGKhZHHK2lLq91Uu-ApSfnTdZOlBND7cXWWcD4GJ8TAalbxIGNNtv8/w640-h360/ngmachine1.jpg"
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</div>
<br /><br />
<p></p>
<p>
In retrospect, I wonder if the whole point of not giving you the recipe for
the Refined Picks up front is to clue you in to the fact that you're going to
have to climb the cliffs to find Nellie. That would mean she's up there in all
Realms. Or else I'm reading too much into it, which is always a safe bet.
</p>
<p>
Anyway, that's where my Nellie was and I did indeed have to buy the recipe,
portal back home, scrape up the mats, make all the subcombines, then make the
picks and come back.
</p>
<p>
Boy, it was some climb! As I mentioned, Nightingale is one of those games with
multiple buffs that all stack. You need a lot of stamina to climb or you
<i>will </i>fall and break your leg. Breaking limbs is a thing in the game. A
very annoying thing.
</p>
<p>
You might even get really unlucky and die, if you fall really far. Done that.
Didn't like it much. Don't recommend it.<br />
</p>
<p></p>
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</div>
Luckily, you can buff up your stamina in all kinds of ways. I ate a bunch of
different meats and berries and almost doubled mine before I began the ascent.
It was enough, although only just.
<p></p>
<p>
Once I'd found her, Nellie had plenty to say. Not out loud, because so far
<i>Puck </i>is the only character with a speaking part. Everyone else
communicates in writing. I won't give too much away but suffice it to say
Nellie does not have the answers you're looking for...
</p>
<p>
...but she knows someone who might. Isn't that always the way with these
things? And don't they all have just one little thing they want you to do for
them before they'll tell you where to go next? Actually, you'll be lucky if
it's just the one.
</p>
<p>
The next stop on the story train is Victor. I won't tell you his last name.
Maybe you can guess. One of Nightingale's more corny design choices is
bundling in as many familiar 19th century personalities as they've been able
to glean from their battered copy of
<i>Arthur Mee's Children's Encyclopedia</i>. They don't make any
differentiation between actual people and fictional characters, either.
</p>
<p>
I have an exceptionally high tolerance for whimsy but even I find it a bit
much when someone tells me the device they're working with was designed by
<i>Nikola Tesla</i> and <i>Marie Curie</i>, working in tandem. Victor,
naturally, turns out to be exactly who you think he's going to be, unless of
course you thought he might be <i>Victor von Doom</i>, which wouldn't have
been that much of a stretch, given some of the other people who turn up.
</p>
<p>
Naturally, Victor doesn't live in the same Realm as Nellie. I mean, why would
he? Sure, it would be convenient for anyone trying to find him but if you had
the power to spin up private realities all your very own, wouldn't you go live
in one, too?
</p>
<p>
At least he doesn't live on top of a cliff. No, he lives on top of a tower.
Nice little set-up, actually. Two rooms and a balcony. I'd take it as a
holiday let, especially with all that glorious sunshine because, yes, it's
another Desert Realm, the wrinkle this time being that it's a
<i>Desert Astrolabe Realm</i>, not a Herbarium.
</p>
<p></p>
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<br />
<p></p>
<p>
I had to go home and make the cards first, before I could go there, of course.
And since I hadn't finished with the Realms attached to my two existing
Portals, I had to make a new Portal, too. That's three so far.
</p>
<p>
The whole thing is starting to remind me of <i>Valheim</i>, where I ended up
with more portals than I could keep track of with a map. Fortunately, you can
rename Portals in Nightingale, so at least I won't have to put up a whole
bunch of hand-made wooden signs this time.
</p>
<p>
One of those earlier Portals just goes to a Realm I made as an experiment. I
was farming that one for T1 Essences but I don't really need those any more,
especially with the 500 or so I already have, so I suppose I could let that
map go and re-purpose the Portal when I need to find the next link in the
chain.
</p>
<p>
The other one, though, I want to keep. <i>Bass Reeves</i> lives there and I'm
kind of in the middle of a deal with him. He's a lawman, tracking down a
fugitive. I'd never heard the name before so I didn't think anything of it
when I met him, but wouldn't you know, last night I noticed a show on one of
the streaming services about the real life Bass Reeves.
</p>
<p></p>
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</div>
<br />
<p></p>
<p>
He was"<i
>a runaway slave, gunfighter, farmer, scout, tracker, and deputy U.S.
Marshal</i
>" according to
<i
><span style="color: #ff00fe;"
><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bass_Reeves">Wikipedia</a></span
></i
>. Even when you don't know who people are in Nightingale, it turns out you're
supposed to. I'm going to have to start googling everyone from now on. (Oh,
look!
<span style="color: #ff00fe;"
><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nellie_Bly"
><i>Here's Nellie!</i></a
></span
>)<br />
</p>
<p>
I got sent to find Reeves by <i>Wilhelmina Sasse</i>, who doesn't appear ever
to have been anyone other than herself. She's a journalist and she wants to
know what Bass is up to. He's told me because I did some stuff to get him to
trust me but he swore me to secrecy and now I have to decide whether to keep
my word or sell him out to the gutter press for a handful of silver.
(Actually, essences, but that doesn't have the same resonance.)
</p>
<p>
This is one of those inflection points, where you can tell you're playing an
Early Access game. For all Nightingale's many merits, there are a lot of
those. You can choose to keep Bass's confidence and not tell Wilhelmina what
she wants to know, but if you do, there's no way to finish the quest. It just
sits there, giving you the fish eye.
</p>
<p>
I'm leaving it like that in the hope that they eventually patch in an ending
for those of us who value honor over personal gain. Or just don't trust the
press.
</p>
<p>
Meanwhile, I'll be busy working on the shopping list of components Nellie
wants for her machine. Victor's just the start of it. I'm sure every other
bugger I run into will want something, too. Just as well I'm not planning on
going anywhere for a while.
</p>
<p>Forty-seven hours and counting...<br /></p>
Bhagpusshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03499162165023939880noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1510920011443550663.post-25951183877086493302024-03-02T17:54:00.002+00:002024-03-02T17:57:06.840+00:00Endings And Beginnings<p></p>
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</div>
<br />Time for a very quick update on TV shows I've finished. If I leave it any
longer I'll have forgotten what I wanted to say about them.
<p></p>
<p>
They're all animated shows. I seem to watch mostly animation these days. It's
not so much a preference as it's all I can find that interests me. There's a
dearth of live action shows in the styles or genres I like right now, at least
on the services I subscribe to. I think I need to sub somewhere else and
soon.<br />
</p>
<p>
Let's begin with a couple I
<span style="color: #ff00fe;"
><a href="https://bhagpuss.blogspot.com/2024/02/devils-and-daemons.html"
>wrote about</a
></span
>
before, when I was still in the middle of watching them. How did that turn
out?
</p>
<p>
<b><span style="font-size: x-large;">My Daemon</span></b>
</p>
<p>
<b><span style="font-size: x-large;"></span></b>
</p>
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</div>
<p></p>
<p>
I absolutely <i>loved </i>this. I would say it's one of the best anime I've
seen but a) I haven't seen enough for that to carry the weight it needs to be
a compliment and b) there seems to be some controversy over whether
<i>My Daemon </i>is actually anime or not.
</p>
<p>
That really is a pointless debate in my opinion but when I went to read up
about the show, after I'd finished watching it, the only things anyone seemed
to care about were whether or not it qualified as anime and whether it was a
good <i>Pokemon </i>rip-off or just a rip-off. I read more arguments over that
than I did any discussion of story, theme or execution.
</p>
<p>
Some people didn't want to accept anything made outside Japan into the anime
fold (The studio that made My Daemon is based in Thailand.) while some claimed
the Japanese setting was enough to give it a pass. Others weren't having any
truck with digital animation, insisting anime had to be hand-drawn.
</p>
<p>
Semantic literalists repeatedly reminded everyone that "<i>anime</i>" is just
the Japanese word for "<i>animation</i>" so any animated content is
automatically anime anyway. Cultural gatekeepers weren't having any of that
reductive claptrap. It got quite heated at times.<br />
</p>
<p>
I never read anything about shows while I'm watching them, for fear of
spoilers, but if I like a show I almost always go read reviews and opinion
pieces about it as soon as I finish it, often literally moments after the
closing credits roll on the final episode. I want to see if other people
responded to it the way I did and also I'm hoping to postpone, just a little
longer, that numbing moment when you realize it's done and you won't be
hanging out with this particular set of imaginary friends any more.
</p>
<p>
In that respect, when it comes to My Daemon, I seem to be an outlier. No-one
else seemed to be pining for more or needing support and affirmation for their
loss. The minority who wanted to talk about the content and quality of the
show at all seemed underwhelmed by most of it. There seemed to be a sense that
it was mostly for kids, not especially well-animated and generally nothing
much to get excited about. <br />
</p>
<p></p>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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I would like to disagree most strongly with all of that. In terms of tone and
content I found it not just adult but positively grown up. Thematically it deals
with grief, loss, abandonment and betrayal in some very bleak and uncompromising
ways. I found much of it hard to handle, emotionally, and some of it actively
hard to watch.
<p></p>
<p>
Technically I don't suppose there's anything in there that wouldn't pass the
regular checks for content suitable for sub-teens, although the
<span style="color: #ff00fe;"
><a
href="https://parentguiding.com/2023/11/my-daemon-2023-parents-guide.html"
>parental advisory site</a
></span
>
I checked suggested using discretion in letting younger children see it. They
recommended it be watched by"<i
>older children and teenagers due to the intense themes and animated
violence</i
>", to which I'd only add "<i>...yeah, and the rest!</i>"
</p>
<p>
The thirteen-part series is self-contained, to an extent, and has a satisfying
conclusion, although it clearly anticipates a second season, which I regret to
say it probably isn't going to get, not having been especially successful or
well-reviewed. The first eight episodes are the most harrowing.
</p>
<p>
If you can get through those, it does shift tone slightly, towards more
traditional action-adventure. There's even a fight on top of a moving train.
It was a change of pace that came as a huge relief to me after the
claustrophobic, introspective, soul-searching intensity of the earlier
narrative.
</p>
<p>
Even so, it never really lets up on the animal cruelty, some of which I found
quite distressing. It was a strange co-incidence that I watched it almost at
the same time as playing <i>Palworld</i>. I've never played a Pokemon game but
if either of these "<i>inspired by</i>" takes is remotely accurate to that
IP's ethos, it has to be a damning indictment of Pokemon itself.
</p>
<p>
Together, the two of them have made me re-assess some of my own behavior while
gaming. Too many of the things we blithely accept as "<i
>just how the game works</i
>" simply don't bear close examination.
</p>
<p>
Overall, I'm very glad I watched My Daemon and would strongly recommend it to
anyone who thinks they have the stomach for it. Just be ready to have your
assumptions uncomfortably challenged.
</p>
<p>
<b><span style="font-size: x-large;">Hazbin Hotel</span></b>
</p>
<p></p>
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<p></p>
<p>
This one ended much sooner than I expected. It seemed like one of those shows
that takes most of its time setting up the premise and introducing the
characters before suddenly realizing there are only a couple of episodes left
to deal with the plot.
</p>
<p>
That said, I thought it was great. It looked fantastic, made me laugh out loud
several times, had me hissing the villains and cheering the heroes, and left
me feeling satisfied and sated after the big ending. The songs were pretty
good, too.
</p>
<p>
One thing I will say is that I do seem to have watched an awful lot of shows
in the last two or three years with demons or devils as the protagonists. I'd
like to write a whole post about it but I need to do a lot more research
first.
</p>
<p>
A lot of them are generically demonish but this one has actual, named devils
and angels from the Judaeo-Christian tradition, something that always feels
weird. OK, there's no actual <i>Daughter of Satan</i> in the Bible as far as I
remember from my Religious Knowledge O-Level studies, and even if there was
I'm pretty sure she wasn't called <i>Charlie</i>, but <i>Hazbin Hotel</i> has
roles for <i>Satan</i> himself, not to mention <i>Lilith </i>and
<i>Adam</i>.
</p>
<p>
As seems to be the norm these days, the devils are the good guys and the
angelic crew the villains, only in the case of Hazbin Hotel there's very
little in the way of nuance when it comes to the angelic hordes. Satan is a
charismatic fop with a suppressed paternal streak you do <i>not </i>want to
awake. Adam is a genocidal, carpet-chewing sociopath and all the angels merely
his unthinking storm troopers. They're idiosyncratic characterizations, to say
the least.
</p>
<p>
The show was great fun from beginning to end and broke viewing records for
<i>Amazon</i>, so I imagine we'll be getting more. I will definitely be
watching.
</p>
<p></p>
<p></p>
<p>
<b><span style="font-size: x-large;">Star Trek: Prodigy</span></b>
</p>
<p></p>
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<p></p>
<p>
<b><span style="font-size: x-large;"></span></b>
</p>
<p>
Now this was a complete surprise. I am not much of a <i>Star Trek</i> fan
although I am slowly coming to believe that, in the eternal cats vs dogs
debate, I'm probably more attuned to the wavelength of the Federation than
either the Empire or the Alliance.<br />
</p>
<p>
Even so, I couldn't even name all of the official Trek shows. I watched the
original series in the seventies (Not the sixties, when I don't recall even
knowing it existed.) and the first season and a half or so of
<i>New Generation</i> in the eighties, quitting out of boredom before, as
people like to tell me, it got good.
</p>
<p>
After that, I think the next Trek show I watched was <i>Lower Decks</i>, which
I loved. That positive experience was why I thought I'd give this one a go and
I'm very glad I did. It's not as sharp and clever as Lower Decks and it's much
more tuned for a tween-teen audience but it's fast, funny, exciting and very
coherently plotted. I enjoyed it a good deal.
</p>
<p>
As usual, the best thing about it was the characters, all of whom are nicely
individuated, recognizable types without actually being stereotypical. The
voice acting is solid, not spectacular, with no-one really standing out as
particularly impressive or annoying. That makes perfect sense with such an
ensemble cast and such a focus on camaraderie and teamwork.
</p>
<p>
I assume the show is canon, if only because one of the main characters is
<i>Capt. Janeway</i> from <i>Voyager</i>, of whom I had heard, even though I
never watched the show. She seems very dry. I'd be interested in watching an
episode or two of Voyager now, just on the basis that she's probably pretty
good in it.
</p>
<p>
The animation is not stellar (Ha!) but it does a job. The visuals are at their
best when the team visit various planets. The interior of the ship really
doesn't give the animators a lot to work with.
</p>
<p>
The plot, while consistent and tightly-focused, doesn't make a whole lot of
sense but that's nothing new. Most SciFi shows don't make sense if you think
about them too hard. This one involves time-travel, which is always a big red
flag to logic, anyway. It also features any number of call-backs to other Trek
shows and series, which may delight or infuriate, depending on your tolerance
for fan service.
</p>
<p>
The show has a fractured past. Originally commissioned by <i>Paramount </i>and
shown on <i>Nickelodeon </i>in two, ten-episode half-seasons, it was then
cancelled after a second season had already been approved and work on it had
begun. <i>Netflix </i>picked up both the first and second season, the latter
of which is supposed to air later this year.
</p>
<p>Once again, I will be watching.</p>
<p>
<span style="font-size: x-large;"><b>Neon Genesis: Evangelion</b></span>
</p>
<p></p>
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<p></p>
<p>
I knew the name from the manga we sell at work but I never thought it looked
particularly interesting. Then one day I was chatting to one of my managers,
the one who games and watches anime, and she recommended it in the strongest
terms so I thought, since it was right there on Netflix, I'd give it a go.
<br />
</p>
<p>
O. M. G! This is one of those "<i>What did I just watch?</i>" shows, pretty
much from start to finish. It's an acknowledged classic (Did not know that.)
from the nineties (Didn't know that either.) with an infamously weird and
divisive ending.
</p>
<p>
The show runs 26 episodes but they ran out of money for the animation towards
the end so the last two are basically slide-shows. The show then became a cult
as the director, <i>Hideaki Anno</i>, spent the next two decades trying to get
the story told the way he wanted.
</p>
<p>
There are a bunch of <i>Evangelion </i>movies, all dealing with the same plot
as the show, most of them on Netflix, all of which I still need to watch. My
manager, whose opinions are sound, tells me they're all better than the TV
show, which means they must be damn good because the show is wonderful.
</p>
<p></p>
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<p></p>
<p>
Visually, it's stunning, in large part because of the direction rather than
the animation. Shot selection is incredible. It looks like an art-house movie
from the eighties or nineties done in animation.
</p>
<p>
Characterization and voice acting in the American dub are good to very good.
(I'm not even going to get into the
<span style="color: #04ff00;"
><a
href="(And I'm not even going to get into the Netflix vs ADV vs Japanese original arguments. I saw this version first so it's always going to be the version to me.)"
>Netflix vs <i>ADV </i>vs Japanese original</a
></span
>
arguments. I saw this version first so it's always going to be
<i>the </i>version to me.) I'm guessing the levels of hysteria in some scenes
would be orders of magnitude more intense in the original so I'm happy to be
missing that. I don't think I could cope with a full-strength, anime-style
<i>Asuka</i>.
</p>
<p>
The world-building is off the charts but also very hard to credit. For a
start, the timescale, fifteen years after a global catastrophe, doesn't seem
to be anywhere near long enough to allow for the rebuilding that's taken place
and the technology level is probably hundreds of years ahead of ours although
everyone behaves like it's still the nineties.
</p>
<p>
None of that matters, of course. It's a full-on, sensual, intellectual and
emotional assault that can feel quite overwhelming at times. Fortunately,
there are also huge swathes of teen drama, adult soap opera and slapstick
comedy to get you through the tough-to-follow parts. I never did figure out
where the cyborg penguin fitted into it all.
</p>
<p>
Now I need to find time to watch the four, essential movies that supposedly
make sense of the whole thing. That's going to be a trip, I bet!
</p>
<p>
<b><span style="font-size: x-large;">And The Rest Will Have To Wait</span></b
><br />
</p>
<p>
I'm pretty sure I've watched other stuff through to the end as well but I
can't off the top of my head remember what it was and anyway that's enough for
one post. Next time I write about TV, I'll go through the several shows I
started then dropped, something I find very interesting when other people do
it.
</p>
<p>If only I can remember what those shows were, that is...<br /></p>
Bhagpusshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03499162165023939880noreply@blogger.com9tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1510920011443550663.post-3767607990626859882024-03-01T16:38:00.002+00:002024-03-01T16:38:59.565+00:00I Think That One's Mine...<p>
</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgSUcGdQ72XpLgR-rlvhS4YdyXaof7q4tvk5YgEKPpVhmFTXl85LzubigDoVbnWjI08NY-9F87hVZC5PKB_0IGypCvjXWQ9b8k9kgy-ogDZZJToioOyovRb5CSdvigeI7KDGpOjFsBPs7siRApMTLndp_V8oIbKjEEF7-ccxBahMbW5nGd5T00K9uDf1mM/s1920/cxcx1.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="917" data-original-width="1920" height="306" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgSUcGdQ72XpLgR-rlvhS4YdyXaof7q4tvk5YgEKPpVhmFTXl85LzubigDoVbnWjI08NY-9F87hVZC5PKB_0IGypCvjXWQ9b8k9kgy-ogDZZJToioOyovRb5CSdvigeI7KDGpOjFsBPs7siRApMTLndp_V8oIbKjEEF7-ccxBahMbW5nGd5T00K9uDf1mM/w640-h306/cxcx1.png" width="640" /></a></div><p>It turns out there <i>is </i>one thing that can get me to stop playing <i>Nightingale </i>after
all: a music post. I took a moment after lunch to consider whether I'd rather play some more or put this together and look where we are! <br /></p><p>I wasn't going to do one this week, either. I'd been thinking I hadn't found a lot to share since last time but when I checked my notes I found I had plenty. Enough for
two posts - or one post, no duplications, no filler.
</p><p></p>
<p>
In fact, I'm listening to a brand new possibility right now. It just popped on my feeds and it's been on YouTube for all of one
minute (Literally.) I'm the 35th person to watch it. Given that it toplines two absolute
rock legends, I suspect that number will grow a few orders of magnitude before I publish. (Edit: 6.4k views at publication.)</p><p>I don't see any reason why we shouldn't open with it.<br />
</p>
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<p style="text-align: center;">
<b><span style="font-size: x-large;"><i>I'm Waiting For The Man</i> - Keith Richards (Velvet Underground
Cover)</span></b>
</p>
<p>
I've heard a lot of covers of <i>Waiting For The Man </i>over the years and
most of them have been dull. It's a much, much harder song to do well than
anyone imagines. That is one of the best I've heard, for several reasons.
</p>
<p>
For a start, <i>Keith</i>'s voice really suits it. He's a similar singer to
<i>Lou </i>in that he doesn't have a great range and doesn't ever try to push
the edge of what he can do. He sits back and lets his timbre and his tone do
most of the work, which was what Lou did to huge effect most of his career.
</p>
<p>
Then there's the lyric. One of the strengths of Lou's songwriting was always
that it felt at least partly autobiographical and this is one of the prime
examples. It's a story song drawn from an experience most people who cover it
clearly don't have. Now, I'm not suggesting Keith went down to Lexington
himself to score back in the sixties - he probably already had people to do
that for him by the time the Velvets went into the recording studio - but
there's no questioning his authority when it comes to the drug life.
</p>
<p>
Most of all, though, it's the arrangement. It swings! Almost every cover of this goes so four-square it's like driving in fence-posts. Keith feeds back into the kind of R&B he and Reed both grew up with, a sound that, along
with Lou's beloved doo-wop, underpins much of his songwriting.
</p>
<p>
It's a great cover. I hope the rest of the album it comes from turns out as
well.
</p>
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<p style="text-align: center;">
<b><span style="font-size: x-large;"><i>All The Young Dudes</i> - Pet Shop Boys</span></b>
</p>
<p>While we're in the business of one icon covering another...</p>
<p>
I'm not at all sure this works. Chris really just keeps his head
down like usual but Neil is taking some risks. I think he just about gets
away with it although if we're talking about singers with limited
range...
</p>
<p>
Also, what's with all the changes to the lyrics? Weren't <i>Bowie</i>'s good
enough already? I can get behind what sounds like some ad hoc improvisation
but why does he insist on adding "<i>dad</i>" to the end of every chorus? At least, I
think he's singing: "Y<i>ou're a dude, dad</i>" , except I keep
hearing "<i>You're a doodad</i>", which is extremely distracting.
</p>
<p>Still, a nice curio. Worth sharing for the novelty value.</p>
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<p style="text-align: center;">
<b><span style="font-size: x-large;"><i>Britpop </i>- A. G. Cook</span></b>
</p>
<p>
Enough with the greatest hits. On to the new stuff. A tribute from a leading
creator of the sound of ten years ago to the sound of twenty years before that!<br /></p>
<p>
<i>A.G. Cook</i> says he's going to retire his <i>PC Music</i> brand this
year. Hyperpop is over. I wish I'd come to it sooner but as we all know, no
sound, fad or style ever truly goes away. Even if it takes a break for a
while, it'll be back soon enough, when the retro train reaches that station.
</p>
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<p style="text-align: center;">
<b><span style="font-size: x-large;"><i>Von Dutch</i> - Charli XCX</span></b>
</p>
<p>
Hyperpop may be on the way out but Charli's on the way up. Never a trend,
always a trendsetter.
</p>
<p>
The song is a banger, as the kids used to say back when hyperpop was new and cool, but I think this
is a truly great video, too. How did she persuade the authorities at
<i>Charles de Gaulle</i> airport to let her film it? I guess they're French so they're probably in awe of her.<br /></p>
<p>
I love that thirty second fade-out where she just rides the luggage return, too, except I was terrified her hair was going to get caught in the mechanism.
We've all wanted to do that. (Ride on the conveyor belt, I mean, not get our hair caught in machinery, although as I always say, if you can think of it, someone, somewhere is doing it, or wants to.)</p><p>But anyway, that's why people become pop stars isn't it? So
they can indulge their fantasies.<br />
</p>
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<p style="text-align: center;">
<b><span style="font-size: x-large;"><i>Molecules </i>- Daisy Dreams</span></b>
</p>
<p>
About time for someone who's never featured in one of these posts before, I think. I <i>have
</i>been doing some actual work on this stuff, not just stealing from music feeds,
for once. This came out of a link-hop session that followed on from something
<i>Jarret Wolfson</i> posted, to which we'll come in due time.
</p>
<p>
I spent the best part of an hour listening to bands and artists with
cute/weird/funny names, most of them from the greater New York area and let me
tell you, if you think a lot of the stuff I post sounds similar you should
hear the stuff I <i>don't</i> post!
</p>
<p>
<i>Daisy Dreams</i> stood out by a mile from all that sameness, which may be
because they're actually from Munich. Yes, Munich in Germany! Didn't know that
until I googled them. <br />
</p>
<p>
A lot of people have been doing takes on the indie sounds of the 'nineties and
'aughts but very few focus in on this particular strand, which was
never that popular, even at the time. It reminds me strongly of
<i><span style="color: #04ff00;"><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gvVbNxpr_Pg">The Becketts</a></span></i>, all that complex, disciplined interplay between guitars and bass
with the vocal soaring over the maelstrom.
</p>
<p>
It doesn't hurt that I really like the way she phrases. Those elongated
vowels. No-one ever said molecules like that, not in New York.<br />
</p>
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<p style="text-align: center;">
<b><span style="font-size: x-large;"><i>If Michael Was A Dog </i>- </span></b><b><span style="font-size: x-large;">Big Dumb Baby<br /></span></b>
</p>
<p>
Best band name of the week although I'm not entirely clear if it belongs to
the whole band or just the singer. The aforementioned Jarrett Wolfson posted<span style="color: #04ff00;"><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=locPijaU0sc"> a clip of them playing live</a></span> at one of the cellar clubs he seems to live in and
while it was too muffled to appreciate on its own merits, it did
send me scurrying to <i>YouTube </i>to hear them properly.
</p>
<p>
That got me to this, which eventually led me to flip through the entire
hundred-plus entires for the <i><span style="color: #04ff00;"><a href="https://tinydeskcontest.npr.org/2024/browse-2024/">2024 NPR Tiny Desk auditions</a></span></i> in which I did not
find a single thing I liked. I like this, though, from the 2022 set. It
reminds me of <i>Moldy Peaches</i> although the rest of
<i>Big Dumb Baby</i> I've heard doesn't,
<span style="color: #04ff00;"><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=242a0gFOIts">much</a></span>.
</p>
<p>I wonder who Michael is and what he thinks of the lyrics?</p>
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<p style="text-align: center;">
<b><span style="font-size: x-large;"><i>He Is On His Way Home, We Don't Live Together </i></span></b>
</p>
<p style="text-align: center;">
<b><span style="font-size: x-large;">Anastasia Coope</span></b>
</p>
<p>
Winner of the prize for longest title of the week. Until I put it into
italics, it didn't even all fit on one line. <br />
</p>
<p>
I'm not sure if this is naive art or just wilfully jarring but either way I
love it. Obviously brings to mind
<span style="color: #04ff00;"><i><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=47yuiPK01kg">Joanna Newsom</a></i></span>
but since comparisons are invidious I won't mention it.<br />
</p>
<p>
I suspect there will be more from <i>Anastasia </i>in future posts. I
hope so, anyway.
</p>
<p>
Slight pause while I lisen to the rest of that Joanna Newsom song I just
linked...<br />
</p>
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<p style="text-align: center;">
<b><span style="font-size: x-large;"><i>Doves (ft. Benjamin Booker)</i> - Armand Hammer</span></b>
</p>
<p>
And we're back. We're at that part in the middle of the set, when the band wants to cool
things down and the audience starts to feel restless. Still, you have to pace
yourself, don't you?
</p>
<p>
Why is it, by the way, that the featured artist credit goes with the title of
the song, not alongside the main artist? Always wondered about that. It feels
wrong, somehow.
</p>
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<p style="text-align: center;">
<b><span style="font-size: x-large;"><i>Milky Max</i> - Lip Critic</span></b>
</p>
<p>
Not quite out of the woods yet but at least there's a beat to it now. That
video's taking no prisoners, either, is it?
</p>
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<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b><span style="font-size: x-large;"><i>Missing Out</i> - Maya Hawke</span></b>
</div>
<p>
The nonsensical arguments about industry plants and nepo babies rumble on. Who
fucking cares? Is it a tune or is it not a tune is what matters. This is a
tune.
</p>
<p>
The lyric leans into all of that, though. Feels kinda autobographical. I guess we
can't ignore it entirely.
</p>
<p>
I was torn between the ultra-twee <i>Fallon </i>performance and the somewhat
solider (Is that a word?)<span style="color: #04ff00;"><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=07mY4aKM3GE">
official video</a></span>
but in the end I'm all about the twee and always have been.
</p>
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<br />
<p style="text-align: center;">
<b><span style="font-size: x-large;"><i>Ball Gag Ki$$</i> - Angelic Milk</span></b>
</p>
<p>Then again...</p>
<p>
Originally from St Petersburg, now re-located to Berlin, no doubt for
reasons.
</p>
<p>
There's a new single out, called
<i><span style="color: #04ff00;"><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZTCDxq04NP8">Diana Ross</a></span></i>. It does not sound like the old stuff. Instead of channeling
<i><span style="color: #04ff00;"><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r26krlXFmOI">Transvision Vamp</a></span></i>, <i>Sarah, </i>who
<span style="color: #ff00fe;"><a href="https://www.last.fm/music/Angelic+Milk/+wiki">pretty much is the band</a></span><i>, </i>seems to have gone back a few decades for inspiration. It's working, too,
but there's no video for that one so I've gone for one of her classics
instead. She has a few of those.
</p>
<p>
I was going to end with a couple of thick-ear Aussie thumpers but I think that
would throw off the balance, such as it is, so I'll save them for an Aussie thick-ear special.
It's not like there's a shortage of bands to choose from for one of those. </p><p>Which means I guess we'll have to go with this. Not the strongest of finishes. Wish I'd saved <i>Charli</i> for the end, now.<br /></p>
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<p style="text-align: center;">
<b><span style="font-size: x-large;"><i>Coffee </i>- Hinds</span></b>
</p>
<p>
I liked <i>Hinds </i>better when they were <i>Deers</i>. Now the bass and
drums have quit and it's just the other two again, like it was before. I guess
that's progress?
</p>
<p>
And I think that just about wraps it up for another week. I got everything in
that I wanted except for <i>Julia Robyn</i> and <i>Li'l Yachty</i>. Maybe next
time.<br />
</p>
Bhagpusshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03499162165023939880noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1510920011443550663.post-77779348501790317982024-02-29T16:21:00.001+00:002024-02-29T16:21:09.629+00:00Other Games Are Available<p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj8UFfQmtgQxA6KISqNNEVAfFqYW28ISXFzhbzSDxrff8JM0jZxB4adlEQU8belcmIG0-kf12hLahotvBtrXR8Aexr395fWlbiBvK_QWbQttqRcbOKm5zZx4epGMauYSz3JFC02Gr2Z4M5JlaFr7uH0-hKKKCqgWWbMJNZbbrtr2hDEuMv58G4oGdfo9GA/s1278/allodsgib1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="879" data-original-width="1278" height="440" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj8UFfQmtgQxA6KISqNNEVAfFqYW28ISXFzhbzSDxrff8JM0jZxB4adlEQU8belcmIG0-kf12hLahotvBtrXR8Aexr395fWlbiBvK_QWbQttqRcbOKm5zZx4epGMauYSz3JFC02Gr2Z4M5JlaFr7uH0-hKKKCqgWWbMJNZbbrtr2hDEuMv58G4oGdfo9GA/w640-h440/allodsgib1.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><br />Not that I'm much of a one for making plans but any vague idea I might have had for keeping to some kind of gaming or blogging schedule this year have been wrecked by the arrival of two survival games, one of which I was eagerly anticipating, the other which I'd barely heard of before it appeared. <p></p><p><i>Palworld</i>, now claiming twenty-five million players worldwide, claimed more than forty hours of my time over four weeks, making it a very worthwhile purchase, but still left plenty of time for doing other things. <i>Nightingale</i>, with thirty-three hours played-time in just over a week, hasn't been so accomodating. It's left little time for any other games, including Palworld, which I haven't touched since last Tuesday.</p><p>Rather than muse <span style="color: #ff00fe;"><a href="https://bhagpuss.blogspot.com/2024/02/nightingales-sweet-song.html">yet again</a></span> on just why Nightingale should be so compulsive, I thought I'd make a short list of the games I had been thinking of playing and writing about, in the hope that naming them in public might somehow nudge me into playing one or two. It's a long shot but it might be worth a try.<br /></p><p><b><span style="font-size: x-large;">Allods Online</span></b></p><p>I'll begin with the one (And only.) game I have actually logged into since I downloaded Nightingale. And what a weird choice it is, too. Why would I want to go back to this all but forgotten artifact of the <i>WoW</i> Clone era? The game that promised so much and then<span style="color: #ff00fe;"><a href="https://www.keenandgraev.com/2010/02/20/bringing-you-up-to-speed-on-allods-onlines-launch-debacle"> broke <i>Keen</i>'s heart</a></span>? (Remember him? What's he up to now, I wonder?)<br /></p><p>It all started with something I read a few weeks back. <i>Syp </i>wrote a very brief piece for <i>MassivelyOP</i>, answering the question absolutely no-one was asking: "<i><span style="color: #ff00fe;"><a href="https://massivelyop.com/2024/01/08/whatever-happened-to-allods-online-lets-check-in-at-the-top-of-2024/">Whatever happened to Allods Online?</a></span></i>" In the third and final paragraph he mentioned how a recent patch had "<i>added the Gibberlings’ homeland of Isa</i>". That caught my attention.</p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjkhE40r6Xd1jojqcP37R4h_Cn_rSvvJEz-xSS1kbDjvoSWeuP1NVOO12_MW6Fxfx2LuspSE1tc8r9TnH1tjDSq8lejJeeQAZkbzL19_BzlNJiVbDePqpigf9FGtY3I-Ax8ITMSpsj5cb6k-ZdaWPY4j9xvjuQabW7PhpLJDgNJEGdcYge4CYGfxRClGm0/s1920/allodsmoon3.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1018" data-original-width="1920" height="340" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjkhE40r6Xd1jojqcP37R4h_Cn_rSvvJEz-xSS1kbDjvoSWeuP1NVOO12_MW6Fxfx2LuspSE1tc8r9TnH1tjDSq8lejJeeQAZkbzL19_BzlNJiVbDePqpigf9FGtY3I-Ax8ITMSpsj5cb6k-ZdaWPY4j9xvjuQabW7PhpLJDgNJEGdcYge4CYGfxRClGm0/w640-h340/allodsmoon3.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><br /><p></p><p>The <i>Gibberlings </i>are one of MMOdom's more unusual playable races. They're sharp-toothed, woodlandish animals, which is nothing unusual for the genre, but they come in packs of three, which certainly is. In the game, you run across single NPC gibberlings occasionally but the PC character is an eternal tryptych; three siblings who do everything together, always.</p><p>It's very strange and hard to forget once you've played one. Mrs Bhagpuss, who only ever played Allods Online during the beta, well over a decade ago, still mentions the Gibberlings quite often. I've played the game several times since then, in a few of its many iterations; on US and EU accounts, through <i>MY.Games</i> and <i>GPotato</i>, on PC and on tablet, where it was one of the few full MMORPGs than ran flawlessly for me.</p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgB0b6SVddZbhfnygzcv4n4ewwMiLmFKb4fP2lxzWQRuZiSU3SuYsTsllGmx9g7uzpCjNindIMSziaHZtzi7KIuu2_jZGmiCnJdOnHQu40Fsm_MIA_Cw6N87riLqOpF6x63swqi8GTXTdK3ExHkzmVssGlwJu7SOj8YXVg1scEkyYaeEgAC8vG-bYDtF-o/s361/allodsqt1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="361" data-original-width="300" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgB0b6SVddZbhfnygzcv4n4ewwMiLmFKb4fP2lxzWQRuZiSU3SuYsTsllGmx9g7uzpCjNindIMSziaHZtzi7KIuu2_jZGmiCnJdOnHQu40Fsm_MIA_Cw6N87riLqOpF6x63swqi8GTXTdK3ExHkzmVssGlwJu7SOj8YXVg1scEkyYaeEgAC8vG-bYDtF-o/s320/allodsqt1.jpg" width="266" /></a></div>I started out playing a Gibberling character but later I played an Orc and one of the catlike race, the <i>Priden</i>. That last was a mistake. The cats have their own starting island and although I tried to level up far enough to get my invite to the mainland I never quite managed it. <p></p><p>It pretty much put a stop to my interest in the game. Although the storyline was interesting and the quest dialog well-written and fun to read, the mechanics were even more pedestrian than the rest of the game I'd seen - and Allods is not a particularly thrilling title when it comes to moment-to-moment gameplay at the best of times.</p><p>That, though, was my only real complaint. In almost every other respect, <i>AO </i>seems to me to be something of an undiscovered - or at least wilfully ignored - gem. I would love to get further and see more than I have so far. Ironically, the furthest I ever got was in beta, when Mrs Bhagpuss and I played together and got as far as the first of the non-consensual PvP zones, which came in somewhere around Level 30, if I remember right.</p><p>I would very much like to see the ancestral homeland of the Gibberlings, long thought lost but recently re-discovered. When I played one (Er... three...) they started off in the Bavarianesque starting area where one of the human races begin. Well, after the dramatic in media res beginning on an exploding space rock, followed by an enforced hiatus on an abandoned Allod, that is. </p><p>Impressed I can remember all that? Well, don't be. I did it all again about an hour ago. It all started after I finished playing Nightingale (Three hours, right after breakfast. What the hell is wrong with me?), when I was thinking about what I could blog about, other than survival games. </p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjivydtp6G29stKxl1gScyEa0OOejdTIRX9AmmYSAqvpoyCrORvYz5FGrhOb1FFCwEMlI6FWw4WsN_CHI3aZC8VnaWVMQt2x8_w__1PbqpzmYVpF3E5GGbHJkZvXjs2L37-dSrvxSGeiTUrb-U1VNjYqH60ino6gEN55DTfWhFqjJyhVwarnWd3ovLMEuM/s1920/allodsmoon2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1018" data-original-width="1920" height="340" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjivydtp6G29stKxl1gScyEa0OOejdTIRX9AmmYSAqvpoyCrORvYz5FGrhOb1FFCwEMlI6FWw4WsN_CHI3aZC8VnaWVMQt2x8_w__1PbqpzmYVpF3E5GGbHJkZvXjs2L37-dSrvxSGeiTUrb-U1VNjYqH60ino6gEN55DTfWhFqjJyhVwarnWd3ovLMEuM/w640-h340/allodsmoon2.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><br /><p></p><p>As I mentioned a while ago, I've gotten into the habit of bookmarking things I've seen or read that might make blog posts. I had a flip through those this morning and noticed there were several MMORPGs I'd been thinking, for various reasons, of trying - or trying again. Almost without thinking about it, I googled "<i>Allods Online</i>", just to see who was publishing it now and what I'd have to do to start playing and to my great surprise I found it's <span style="color: #ff00fe;"><a href="https://store.steampowered.com/app/459160/Allods_Online/">available on Steam</a></span>, where it has a surprising and well-deserved <i>Mostly Positive</i> review rating.</p><p>It's entirely possible I haven't played Allods since I started using Steam. It's also entirely possible I've played it on Steam already. I have a terrible memory. Luckily, I also have a blog...</p><p>There are eighteen posts here with the Allods Online <span style="color: #ff00fe;"><a href="https://bhagpuss.blogspot.com/search/label/Allods">tag</a></span>. The first goes all the way back to<span style="color: #ff00fe;"><a href="https://bhagpuss.blogspot.com/2011/10/glorious-future-awaits-allods.html"> October 2011</a></span>, almost the beginning of the blog, when I'd just re-installed the game. My most recent was only a couple of years ago in <span style="color: #ff00fe;"><a href="https://bhagpuss.blogspot.com/2021/11/ill-get-off-this-blasted-allod-if-its.html">November 2021</a></span>, when I was complaining about that damn Priden starting zone and swearing I'd get free of it. I never did. </p><p>In both those posts I said many of the things I've said in this one, which I'm betting won't matter because no-one is going to remember any of it. I can at least confirm that the information about the game being available through Steam is new (Well, new to me...) Back then I was playing on MY.Games own platform.</p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj8X332pKw5pLW_DBDBvx-_2fl1h8VZT4jbzppMS9jjhpy_dQPXIJGYecPUNyFccarhJ-6QHbkKXd95tDzFC6hL_czjxpN_p6cYWVKUT6ypsKcu11Dw0vd-q-WdMuuYVvCf3aoFWNmkbCtZwdHl6-cNug2dmoOAs4UfMzWMPX7WHkF9osLjnnRnEz2n6_o/s1920/allodsmoon1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1018" data-original-width="1920" height="340" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj8X332pKw5pLW_DBDBvx-_2fl1h8VZT4jbzppMS9jjhpy_dQPXIJGYecPUNyFccarhJ-6QHbkKXd95tDzFC6hL_czjxpN_p6cYWVKUT6ypsKcu11Dw0vd-q-WdMuuYVvCf3aoFWNmkbCtZwdHl6-cNug2dmoOAs4UfMzWMPX7WHkF9osLjnnRnEz2n6_o/w640-h340/allodsmoon1.jpg" width="640" /></a></div>And I probably still am, behind the curtain. I installed the game via Steam this morning but when you hit <i>Play </i>it takes you to an external launcher. The important part though is having the first button on Steam. I'm increasingly coming to see why people like that. It's just so convenient. No wonder all the publishers want to be represented there.<p></p><p>I wasn't planning on playing Allods today, just setting it up so I could play some other time, but I had to test the login ptocess to make sure it worked and then wouldn't you know I ended up doing the basic Tutorial and some starter quests. When I logged out I was Level 5.</p><p>As I said in that post a couple of years back "<i>Allods
is fun. Always was. I might keep playing.</i>" I probably will - sporadically - but if history is any guide I won't get any further than I ever have. My Priden is still on that damn island and lord only knows where the Orc is now. </p><p>To my considerable surprise and delight, though, the <span style="color: #ff00fe;"><a href="https://en.allodswiki.ru/db/quest/1047-the-lost-homeland">quest </a></span>relating to the Gibberling homeland that was added in a patch last July begins in a low-level zone and has no level restrictions. I was sure it would be some endgame content I'd never see. </p><p>Surely, between marathon Nightingale sessions, I can at least make it far enough in Allods this time to get the quest, even if I never finish it! Place your bets now.</p><p>And speaking of Nightingale, I'm afraid the temptation is too strong. All those other games I was going to talk about, the ones I'd like to be playing and posting about if I wasn't in the grips of this unealthy obsession? They're going to have to wait some more even for a mention. </p><p>Also, it gives me something else to post about another time. Never waste valuable resources. That's all that survival game training paying off, right there!<br /></p>Bhagpusshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03499162165023939880noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1510920011443550663.post-45342945314115811432024-02-28T15:49:00.005+00:002024-02-28T15:58:31.809+00:00First Catch Your Hare...<p><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgn9-oAEfO4Bx7lDSTNk6Pv3pd3dObfftSV8NYTd_Icq9XWWY2q8JgTMbIuHJAQaojC4Vy3DjvNyDuUlhhARjpBSc3viPniDA7pCktUEB29w0uvHDqtheZbDsqC5HQUwCaeBn-EY44XNn0o_hNJ41pIr7tAJwdpCmLCQ1qLXWZeOVQHJZY30SuF3cfhdsI/s1920/ngsunset6.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="1920" height="360" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgn9-oAEfO4Bx7lDSTNk6Pv3pd3dObfftSV8NYTd_Icq9XWWY2q8JgTMbIuHJAQaojC4Vy3DjvNyDuUlhhARjpBSc3viPniDA7pCktUEB29w0uvHDqtheZbDsqC5HQUwCaeBn-EY44XNn0o_hNJ41pIr7tAJwdpCmLCQ1qLXWZeOVQHJZY30SuF3cfhdsI/w640-h360/ngsunset6.jpg" width="640" /></a>Here's an odd fact about <i>Nightingale</i>. The sun rises in the south and sets in the north. Or it does in my Abeyance Forest Realm, anyway. In my Antiquarian Forest Realm, however, the sun rises in the north and sets in the south.</p><p>Does it mean anything? Is it telling me something about the Realms and the Byways that I ought to know? Or is the direction the sun travels merely a pseudo-random artifact of procedural generation?</p><p>I have no idea but it's the sort of thing that makes the game feel more mysterious and otherworldly, a sensation that has a lot to do with why I can't seem to stop playing it right now. It really is an explorer's dream. From the reviews, it seems most everyone agrees about that.<br /></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjmMTIXSbGGO0e6PJ7asYINGJe5lC6-XhDfi0iCeNpNlFuSVqfH8rztgD8JDu3jiRwqcnKt4L52YdBqLA-OqBnjcoMgUri6oxsoOihe9jZhTAjwDz3fpGz-DC7aODtrhM_EgxVH9-iITsfQjNG0i1fJ0vIdBYB784WEq128u7uHvXnvnNqClYMSlONbQWk/s1920/ngskull1.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="1920" height="360" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjmMTIXSbGGO0e6PJ7asYINGJe5lC6-XhDfi0iCeNpNlFuSVqfH8rztgD8JDu3jiRwqcnKt4L52YdBqLA-OqBnjcoMgUri6oxsoOihe9jZhTAjwDz3fpGz-DC7aODtrhM_EgxVH9-iITsfQjNG0i1fJ0vIdBYB784WEq128u7uHvXnvnNqClYMSlONbQWk/w640-h360/ngskull1.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><p>Not everyone is in such accord about the rest of the gameplay, though. Always assuming we can agree on what the gameplay even is.<br /></p><p>It's clearly a survival game <i>now </i>but I keep hearing that the endgame, if and when <i>Inflexion </i>finish it, is going to make Nightingale feel more like a Lobby MMO along the lines of the original <i>Guild Wars</i>, complete with a central, multiplayer hub where you can find other players, form parties and take on dungeons and raids. </p><p>How that is going to fit in with the sudden pivot to add an offline solo mode the devs apparently never intended to offer at all, I cannot begin to imagine. It sounds almost as though they'll have to make and maintain two separate games, if players who choose to go for the offline solo version aren't going to be locked out of endgame content altogether. </p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj0rZj6sp2K4L7D-hr-zA-SY2RxIqqY9fCoOxzzjNm6aq-3-eH0Vpy77M6_mUaQiZRzd7POIuuGZnXVBUHjhdmOLJDOOtydtdtlJ9BHkmOmgtK4Y7Ean2v4FRz1zadZL010Bikd67IC7XkLJ7qrPeT5XC5sF1Yn8srAlKBsiq0Zn9tgHorC1Z4BVJRP5gU/s604/ngstraps2.jpg" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="604" data-original-width="364" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj0rZj6sp2K4L7D-hr-zA-SY2RxIqqY9fCoOxzzjNm6aq-3-eH0Vpy77M6_mUaQiZRzd7POIuuGZnXVBUHjhdmOLJDOOtydtdtlJ9BHkmOmgtK4Y7Ean2v4FRz1zadZL010Bikd67IC7XkLJ7qrPeT5XC5sF1Yn8srAlKBsiq0Zn9tgHorC1Z4BVJRP5gU/w241-h400/ngstraps2.jpg" width="241" /></a></div>Or I guess the game could just stop at a certain point for offliners, unless they flip a switch to go online and join everyone else. That'd be popular, I'm sure!<p></p><p>It's easy to see why they're changing their plans, though. Nightingale currently has a <i>Mixed </i>rating on <i>Steam</i>, in large part because a lot of people don't like having to be online all the time, particularly when the servers aren't handling the load particularly well. That last is being addressed quickly. New servers for South America came online just today. Spreading the load ought to help.<br /></p><p>I was taken a little aback by the virulence of the objections to an internet element for the game. Apparently the always-online requirement came as quite the surprise to some, which is hard to credit in 2024. Since I deliberately avoided reading much about the game before it went into Early Access, I can't say whether that's down to poor messaging by the developers or wishful thinking by some of their customers. A bit of both, probably.</p><p>Browsing the reviews, another common complaint, even from some of the people giving the game a thumbs up, is that the crafting system is wildly over-complicated. That was going to be the basis of the post I was going to write but to go into all of the implications properly would take me all afternoon and for once I'm very clear that I'd rather play a game than pontificate about it. </p><p>I know! Undermines the entire ethos of the blog, doesn't it?<br /></p><p>This, then, is the shorthand version of that post, believe it or not. The gist of my argument is that you really can't please all of the people all of the time but if you want to stay in business you'd better at least try to please most of them most of the time. And good luck with that!</p><p>The kind of crafting Nightingale has now clearly falls somewhat short of that goal. As a fun way of spending a gaming session its appeal is, how shall I put this... <i>niche</i>.</p><p> <span style="color: #ff00fe;"><a href="https://steamcommunity.com/id/addier/recommended/1928980/">One reviewer</a></span> offers an excellent summation of the problem:</p><p></p><blockquote><span style="font-size: medium;"><b>"...you craft a thing so you can use that thing to craft another thing, which is needed to make a different thing, then that different thing makes another 'nother thing, and then the 'nother 'nother thing is used finally as a reagent for what you actually wanted to craft in the first place. And that thing you actually want to craft needs about 4 different items that all have the same issue."</b></span></blockquote><p></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi37opZpnhfHkQx62Jul1tLwfhyphenhyphenfGh8QyXJobn8prl8vYTmBoDvyRCtJ7glnBscHZ16ijIfzhoH63L4LvuT71cl0IzRwzwQH9_vrXqOqi8fZdM8aobifiZ__EVph6_kJ_kZEOHYZWZg2DJzMnwMOa02YqXQRX-mqQmKqicZaQC2xm3Me3E33Ikb_BImXAI/s597/ngstraps1.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="597" data-original-width="362" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi37opZpnhfHkQx62Jul1tLwfhyphenhyphenfGh8QyXJobn8prl8vYTmBoDvyRCtJ7glnBscHZ16ijIfzhoH63L4LvuT71cl0IzRwzwQH9_vrXqOqi8fZdM8aobifiZ__EVph6_kJ_kZEOHYZWZg2DJzMnwMOa02YqXQRX-mqQmKqicZaQC2xm3Me3E33Ikb_BImXAI/w242-h400/ngstraps1.jpg" width="242" /></a></div>It reminds me of the original crafting system with which <i>EverQuest II</i> launched, twenty years ago. That one lasted less than a year before it was completely revamped. Most people loathed it, although there's still a rump of disgruntled veterans who occasionally lobby (Always unsuccessfully, thank God.) for its return, especially on the retro servers.<br /><p></p><p>There is one absolutely enormous difference between the two and it's a difference that makes <i>all </i>the difference. In original <i>EQII, </i>no single crafting class (With the exception of Provisioner, but let me not derail my own post with that little sidebar.) could make all the necessary sub-components to be self-sufficient at their chosen craft. </p><p>Everyone relied on at least one other class, often several. You either had to play multiple alts and level different tradeskills or you had to buy or bargain for your sub-combines from other players. Guilds set up virtual crafting sweatshops, while individuals horse-traded among themselves. It was hell.<br /></p><p>Some people, naturally, loved it. Or claimed to. Most <i>really </i>did not. <i>SOE </i>saw sense after a few months, which still felt like far too long, changing it so you could, by and large, craft all you needed for a tradeskill with the character who was supposed to be the expert at it. </p><p>Over the years, many more iterations came to crafting, all of them moving the dial further towards either ease of use or entertainment or even both at once. The subset of crafters who seem to value verisimilitude over everything else kvetched about it but commercially the direction of travel seemed both wise and inevitable. </p><p>In the two decades since then, just about every game has chosen to let players move smoothly through the crafting process without making too much of a fuss about the fine details. It's not uncommon to separate refining from manufacturing, so you have to smelt ore to get metal or tan hide to get leather but once you have the basic materials it's straight to the finished item. </p><p>I'm in two minds about the whole thing, which rather surprises me. So long as I don't have to negotiate with another human being for sub-combines, I find I quite enjoy them. It's strangely satisfying to have to make straps and twine to bind tools together instead of just choosing a recipe, clicking <i>Combine </i>and having game physics hand-wave away all the awkward in-between stages. </p><p>Then again, it's only fun for a while. Like many things, getting all the right pieces together is fascinating the first time you do it, less so the second time and a pain in the neck forever after. If I was a game designer, I'd use the same mechanic for learning recipes that many games use for opening fast travel routes: first time through, you have to do every step yourself but after that the game does it all for you.</p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiaHn-1MvYgSwai6rHkDWqtojnGq_7tLQMafFZWSPtZ1FjmUxqFXzmPiGBH6XTQFkfvmZ5MdqNv76o9wftg5YJHP8fae73L-qeLTo7kTdPH21_hFIirXxVgINEDC29Wb5JTfdSKYbDcYShg_BqM9c77P3vQwXoZXydrUEUD0T6ufB8XQKSwm0mGOLdUzmI/s1514/ngsickle1.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1040" data-original-width="1514" height="440" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiaHn-1MvYgSwai6rHkDWqtojnGq_7tLQMafFZWSPtZ1FjmUxqFXzmPiGBH6XTQFkfvmZ5MdqNv76o9wftg5YJHP8fae73L-qeLTo7kTdPH21_hFIirXxVgINEDC29Wb5JTfdSKYbDcYShg_BqM9c77P3vQwXoZXydrUEUD0T6ufB8XQKSwm0mGOLdUzmI/w640-h440/ngsickle1.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><br /><p></p><p>Even as I say that, though, I'm aware of the potential loss of something ineffable but invaluable. Call it immersion or authenticity or granularity; whatever you call it, we all recognize it when we feel it and at the moment I'm feeling it in Nightingale. Every brick removed risks bringing the whole thing crashing down. </p><p>One of the frequent complaints in the negative reviews is that all this busy-work gets in the way of playing the real game. I wondered, even the first time I saw someone make that assertion, just what they imagined the real game might be. If there's much more to progression a survival game than making better stuff so you can go to tougher places and kill tougher things to get stuff to make better stuff to go to tougher places...<br /></p><p>Sometimes you don't want to pull on a thread lest the whole tapestry unravel. </p><p>With that caveat, I'm pretty sure we're going to see many quality-of-life improvements to crafting as Early Access proceeds. There's one <span style="color: #ff00fe;"><a href="https://playnightingale.com/news/launch-week-highlights">on the way</a></span> already.</p><p><span style="font-size: medium;"><b></b></span></p><blockquote><span style="font-size: medium;"><b>"Additionally, we have some much-requested quality-of-life improvements in development, the most notable of which include craft from storage and queued crafting."</b></span></blockquote><p></p><p><span style="font-size: small;">OK, that's two. With many more to follow, I'm sure.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: small;">I'm happy. I'm glad to have had the opportunity to play the game the way it is now but also happy that it's going to become less fiddly and fussy, with luck just as I begin to lose patience with all that fiddle-faddling nonsense. Sometimes you <i>can </i>have cake and eat cake.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: small;">Even if you do have to mill your own flour and fire your own plates first.<br /></span></p>Bhagpusshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03499162165023939880noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1510920011443550663.post-51518940998683114302024-02-26T20:08:00.001+00:002024-02-26T20:08:19.221+00:00Nightingale's Sweet Song<p><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhzVUOjr3jpLU4lkH6YuTy0L2PYnoeMlQt3Gtv5_7sprvhhBBnj23qoviIwgs7BVNMDYedFXAomV_YxlcK_FgOjn-rgaJyqIpFzNyd39HuNxnYGzPvY69O8JAEY9YOPH1-1YTVthfRT6PxZ8bAU8vCBx44wiR965m1AWgoed4ybpF6k7Djle-6T7pMKqfU/s1920/ngtunnel1.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="1920" height="360" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhzVUOjr3jpLU4lkH6YuTy0L2PYnoeMlQt3Gtv5_7sprvhhBBnj23qoviIwgs7BVNMDYedFXAomV_YxlcK_FgOjn-rgaJyqIpFzNyd39HuNxnYGzPvY69O8JAEY9YOPH1-1YTVthfRT6PxZ8bAU8vCBx44wiR965m1AWgoed4ybpF6k7Djle-6T7pMKqfU/w640-h360/ngtunnel1.jpg" width="640" /></a>You know all those explanatory posts and videos people like to do? The ones that come under the catch-all title "<i>Why I Play...</i>"? This is the opposite of one of those. <br /></p><p>When it comes to video games, I'm not much interested in Achievements but I do find the ones <i>Steam</i> hands out quite useful for bench-marking my progress against everyone else. This morning I completed an instance called <i>Astrolabe Site of Power</i> to obtain my Astrolabe card, for which I received the fifth of Nightingale's fifteen possible Achievements.</p><p>The Astrolabe is part of what is either the main quest-line or the extended tutorial. It's hard to tell them apart since the former seems to shift imperceptibly into the latter at an unspecified point. <i>Puck </i>is still popping up to offer instruction, advice and criticism but then I suspect he'll be with us indefinitely. He clearly has some agenda of his own he's not yet ready to reveal.</p><p>Although Nightingale is ostensibly a sandbox, it employs a number of mechanisms familiar from more directive genres, not least gatekeeping by gear score. The Realms are riven with opportunities that require no particular marker of ability to attempt - towers, ruins, caves, ziggurats and mysterious structures of all kinds - but the entrances to storyline instances are closed off by crackling force-fields that don't let anyone pass until the necessary requirements are met.</p><p><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhCRTBsETVfvKXYUE9oZtLPH5ChL14x3aOcEhOl85sCwhZyASYat8JzN2FrcfSUOack3u60rLUzNPOvoAqis8k6u5BbSnHM0wqPQIi8PQcWG628qEnEwqD9DX9UCUjC2d160gLRM9uI6MXvZ-2pHEnE6O9_45NwK1rRLCYwvLpREvG_lBWOqNZkC2A9f_k/s1868/ngpuckfood1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="920" data-original-width="1868" height="316" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhCRTBsETVfvKXYUE9oZtLPH5ChL14x3aOcEhOl85sCwhZyASYat8JzN2FrcfSUOack3u60rLUzNPOvoAqis8k6u5BbSnHM0wqPQIi8PQcWG628qEnEwqD9DX9UCUjC2d160gLRM9uI6MXvZ-2pHEnE6O9_45NwK1rRLCYwvLpREvG_lBWOqNZkC2A9f_k/w640-h316/ngpuckfood1.jpg" width="640" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: medium;">Excuse me? Are you my dietician now?</span><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><br /></p><p>The same checks, unsurprisingly, apply to resource nodes, all of which come with a gear score below which your tools simply bounce off. I don't know how far the numbers in Nightingale go up but given that I've seen nodes that require a score well in excess of two hundred, it seems safe to assume that the GS30 needed to enter the Astrolabe indicates its positioning at a fairly early stage in the storyline.<br /></p><p>You might think, then, that quite a lot of players would have breezed past it long ago. I certainly would have thought so but it seems I'd have been overestimating the interest, enthusiasm or willingness to follow instructions of the great majority of my fellow Realm travelers. As of time or writing, the Astrolabe has been completed by fewer than fifteen per cent of players.</p><p>The next instance in line, the <i>Provisioner Site of Power</i>, asks for a Gear Score of 40. I already have that. <i>Exactly </i>that, in fact. It would also seem to be quite closer to the start of the game but fewer than ten per cent of players have claimed the Achievement for that one.</p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjjpG17cUA_QLUi3aw1vSeGzFpmZKBagz_v32F4p4Pn52Fh-fHcGjlsI2oygcO-1gUMRjhcGsCPNYBmPsdA-Hf2wcjTfzI6cMHCm2xoNnXAsA07JQUHgDH3gZpZExRy-6sWu2m2kePQfB9v87zlQGn5VPPKfuX7j6SddCoGpeBk8I58G1Bz11P_AdpG5zc/s517/ngachi1.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="344" data-original-width="517" height="213" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjjpG17cUA_QLUi3aw1vSeGzFpmZKBagz_v32F4p4Pn52Fh-fHcGjlsI2oygcO-1gUMRjhcGsCPNYBmPsdA-Hf2wcjTfzI6cMHCm2xoNnXAsA07JQUHgDH3gZpZExRy-6sWu2m2kePQfB9v87zlQGn5VPPKfuX7j6SddCoGpeBk8I58G1Bz11P_AdpG5zc/s320/ngachi1.png" width="320" /></a></div>It's impossible to be sure whether what seems like a very steep tail-off in engagement with the main storyline equates to a similar withdrawal from the game as a whole or whether it just indicates a disinclination to follow signposts. Nightingale is a survival sandbox, after all. Maybe most players prefer to do their own thing and set their own goals. <p></p><p>It would be easier to assess the probabilities if I knew just how much of the tech tree was gated by the storyline. As yet, I'm unsure. You can buy a lot of recipes from vendors and for currencies that are easy-to-very-easy to acquire. Basic essence dust can be salvaged from literally anything so all you need to do is chop down a few trees. Tier 1 essences, <span style="color: #ff00fe;"><a href="http://tobolds.blogspot.com/2024/02/moving-house-in-nightingale.html">as Tobold explains</a></span>, are easily farmed from Fae Towers and other sites of interest in Antiquarian Realms.</p><p>Without doing any deliberate farming at all, I've already obtained enough of both to buy every recipe I've seen on sale and to upgrade all of my main gear slots. Given the relatively challenging nature of my adventures in the Astrolabe, which included one death for me and several for my companion and which only ended in success when I found a nice, safe spot from which to snipe the boss without him being able to do anything about it, I'll be doing what I can to raise my Gear Score a bit more before taking on the Provisioner.</p><p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEguVR5Oz7LYXt_6eKCvxlg4ORebSobmtuGnHISxtpJEtTBxhems25AcqGZ_r62a12RtGPmKMsZ9x3JkE8gp7W77u7aye_raF3_agg4vcJo7BqFJOWghWBUMdhcgbw1r3LeUtUWG6zXYFAHrTR3oiALiRq1DCvkzpKwCE-KzLRJ74tV2LWIB0CHkAJNIh6s/s1920/ngperch1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="1920" height="360" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEguVR5Oz7LYXt_6eKCvxlg4ORebSobmtuGnHISxtpJEtTBxhems25AcqGZ_r62a12RtGPmKMsZ9x3JkE8gp7W77u7aye_raF3_agg4vcJo7BqFJOWghWBUMdhcgbw1r3LeUtUWG6zXYFAHrTR3oiALiRq1DCvkzpKwCE-KzLRJ74tV2LWIB0CHkAJNIh6s/w640-h360/ngperch1.jpg" width="640" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: medium;">Hang on Dora, I'll come revive you after I've cheesed him from up here.</span><br /></td></tr></tbody></table></p><p>Again, though, I'm unsure just how much upgrading I'll be able to do. I suspect that although everything within my current upgrade tier - <i>Uncommon </i>- is open to me without further recourse to the storyline, whatever comes after may not become available until a set point in the narrative. I suppose I could go look it up, but where's the fun in that?</p><p>The whole thing is made much more complicated by the layered nature of Nightingale's power structure. It reminds me very much of <i>Valheim </i>in the way you can stack multiple food and potion buffs not only to raise various resistances but also to increase you health pool and give yourself all kinds of advantages. </p><p>In this respect, compared to Valheim, Nightingale seems at least an order of magnitude more complex. As in Valheim, you can change your own stats through what you eat, drink and wear and according to what buffs you can acquire but you can also change the environment around you according to what cards you choose to play. It's as though <i>Inflexion </i>took the console commands that allowed you to change Valheim (Or <i>Palworld</i>.) as a player and put them inside the game so you could change them as a character instead.</p><p>It's a subtle difference, since the outcome is much the same, but it makes for a more immersive experience, at least if you're the kind of player who sees their character as more than just an extension of themselves. It puts the mechanics at a remove from external reality, binding them into the lore and the environment, and by doing so attempts to uphold the fiction that Nightingale is something more than a game. </p><p><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh-a921xlQrOT3k6D8D0vwxtSXXSLw3Vayz2-RyAGA5JZHETB9Rb5zms10dwdT1XA3QxtLEUggQ-fOeh7iEmv1JUB0KwfzUGpbV1Wj4BiSPUxA6klTKlGuyj_UbHP3qaiogP8ZRdbZZolOK31ldN5UYeW9ohJSmQ3koS9SJcVIeG20Fhbwinv1lg_iA_sk/s1920/ngthingy1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="1920" height="360" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh-a921xlQrOT3k6D8D0vwxtSXXSLw3Vayz2-RyAGA5JZHETB9Rb5zms10dwdT1XA3QxtLEUggQ-fOeh7iEmv1JUB0KwfzUGpbV1Wj4BiSPUxA6klTKlGuyj_UbHP3qaiogP8ZRdbZZolOK31ldN5UYeW9ohJSmQ3koS9SJcVIeG20Fhbwinv1lg_iA_sk/w640-h360/ngthingy1.jpg" width="640" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: medium;">Those are mining nodes sticking out of that thing.</span> <br /></td></tr></tbody></table><br /></p><p>It would be tempting to claim that's a contributory factor to why I'm finding it more compelling than Palworld but the facts don't really bear out that interpretation. I made a couple of console changes to Palworld and they added to my immersion there rather than detracted from it. It didn't matter that it was a metafictional rather than a fictional act.<br /></p><p>I suspect I'm finding Nightingale a good deal more immersive mostly because there's a lot more to see and do than there is in Palworld, which already feels a little thin by comparison, even though I've really only seen a couple of Nightingale's Realms - <i>Abeyance </i>and <i>Antiquarian </i>- and just one biome - <i>Forest</i>. I did get a brief exposure to two other biomes, <i>Swamp </i>and <i>Desert </i>- in the early tutorial but I couldn't pretend I explored them to any significant extent.</p><p>How many more Realms or biomes there might be I couldn't say. Again, I could look it up but I'm not going to. Not yet, anyway. I don't feel the need to do any research of that kind because it's clear to me I still have a great deal to discover about the Realms and biomes I already know or know of. The maps feel huge and they're partially procedurally generated so there are an infinite number of variations on the finite themes. </p><p>It's taken me nearly real-life day's play to get this far and I haven't even done half of the stuff marked on the maps in the two Realms I've opened, which is nothing like everything there is to do there. I can't see how it can take less than several more real-time days to exhaust the possibilities already in front of me. Even with the number of hours I'm putting in right now, that would take a month or more and that's just two maps out of as many as I care to create.</p><p><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgQPltJdwKyjl4XgLAIOLQd_hym5XQ71bOdWElVT1OdZoGHU_zYJlNKHnrHc3mBjr8GDZVlqlj3Z29Jc6ia9yxOP2QVCt0pWMTpf3ATjr-AQPgGLQH5vhpmDGeQN5vKYjVaMXIb_F1MynrSWp_h156tFqOcTGFtt2iv8LINyX2o5WklNhqNW1OV-C-UbB4/s1372/ngnodes1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="714" data-original-width="1372" height="334" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgQPltJdwKyjl4XgLAIOLQd_hym5XQ71bOdWElVT1OdZoGHU_zYJlNKHnrHc3mBjr8GDZVlqlj3Z29Jc6ia9yxOP2QVCt0pWMTpf3ATjr-AQPgGLQH5vhpmDGeQN5vKYjVaMXIb_F1MynrSWp_h156tFqOcTGFtt2iv8LINyX2o5WklNhqNW1OV-C-UbB4/w640-h334/ngnodes1.jpg" width="640" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: medium;">Maybe by the time I have GS230 I'll also have a way to get up there.</span><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><br /></p><p>Good, new games often give an impression of unlimited potential but it's rarely sustained. I'm not claiming I'm going to be spending the next month or two playing Nightingale for several hours a day, every day. Then again, that is what happened with Valheim, where Steam tells me I've spent a somewhat unnerving 384 hours so far. </p><p>What I will say is that although I've played and enjoyed a slew of new games in the last year and found much to write about all of them - <i>Noah's Heart, Dawnlands, Once Human, Tarisland, Palworld...</i> - I can't remember thinking about them anything like as much when I wasn't playing them as I have been about Nightingale. The last game that applied to probably <i>was </i>Valheim.</p><p>I suspect it might have something to do with the need for forward planning. That does always get me thinking outside of the sessions themselves and Nightingale is one of those games where just running about aimlessly doesn't always get you as far as you'd like, although it's certainly fun to do anyway. <br /></p><p>Despite what I said earlier, I'm not convinced it's about content either. I suspect much of that may become repetitive after a while once the assets that get re-shuffled every time you make a new Realm become familiar. </p><p>It's certainly not about polish. Nightingale is neither as polished or finished as the other games on that list, not even the ones that are still in beta or Early Access. In fact, Nightingale is buggier than any game I've played in a while.</p><p><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjf-Q3_fjo0_BQpkRqsq6jPmvCYOhtriyCMObSgVE300-_gKMqihHb80dFtCmtCzwFv1uBksaC_dCPor3PunIylXa_E2V0DXy4DWfJIB9JjdsBfdkGHd3Ax3gstgeyQjZJv7IEnhalpDjJ5xIf-jrwAMqCxYAbiQX838rOvMQz1kjoTFPdlG-rQOA0FLYw/s1553/ng2doras1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="810" data-original-width="1553" height="334" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjf-Q3_fjo0_BQpkRqsq6jPmvCYOhtriyCMObSgVE300-_gKMqihHb80dFtCmtCzwFv1uBksaC_dCPor3PunIylXa_E2V0DXy4DWfJIB9JjdsBfdkGHd3Ax3gstgeyQjZJv7IEnhalpDjJ5xIf-jrwAMqCxYAbiQX838rOvMQz1kjoTFPdlG-rQOA0FLYw/w640-h334/ng2doras1.jpg" width="640" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: medium;">Dora, cloned by a bug.</span><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><br /></p><p>I don't think it's about affection for my character, either. I like her well enough but that utterly expressionless face does make it hard to bond with her. </p><p>(On that topic, I would like to revise my comments on the lack of idling animations very slightly. Flora does sway very slightly from side to side when at rest. That's it, though. And since we're on the subject of personalization, I also found out today there <i>are </i>emotes in the game. Like everything else, you have to find them for yourself. If you hit "<i>Z</i>" yet another radial menu pops up, this one with a number of emotes from the obvious (<i>Wave, Salute.</i>) to the outre (<i>Relevé, Pirouette</i>.). No <i>Sit</i>, though.)</p><p>It <i>might </i>be the deep crafting system with its many, many possibilities for making slightly different variations of every item. I'm sure that's going to appeal to a lot of folks. It sort of appeals to me - in theory - but I know myself well enough to understand I'll never make full use of it, just dabble around the margins, as and when I happen by sheer chance to acquire a full set of mats to make something strange or unusual.</p><p>What is it, then, that seems to have pushed me further into the game than 85% of the other people playing it, even if we are only less than a week in and there's ample time for everyone to catch up and pass me as I inevitably run out of enthusiasm next week or next month? Could it the story, perhaps? </p><p><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhG-JDIu-MAswrqG2cMoW59W6KdCypk3RL4E1DUG0tJUmi44PjqQuqhhyyiMuXp9fS6z6vsr77RNSWDU3G1xO45T-GYMhnivbSM_NNBmaJ9z9rwWQEcys1fpSvB8-FORCAr7CxM0lcOblj2dPuV8icbh5G5E001te5O1_3tD4zIfKkRss79APg6hdCCzcM/s1586/nglotus1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="752" data-original-width="1586" height="304" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhG-JDIu-MAswrqG2cMoW59W6KdCypk3RL4E1DUG0tJUmi44PjqQuqhhyyiMuXp9fS6z6vsr77RNSWDU3G1xO45T-GYMhnivbSM_NNBmaJ9z9rwWQEcys1fpSvB8-FORCAr7CxM0lcOblj2dPuV8icbh5G5E001te5O1_3tD4zIfKkRss79APg6hdCCzcM/w640-h304/nglotus1.jpg" width="640" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: medium;">I have a feeling I'm going to be needing a lot of these.</span><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><br /></p><p>Nah, I don't think so. It's nice that there is one and the narrative conceit of trying to find a way back to Nightingale (Yes, it's a place. Did we not cover that?) does offer both a reason to push forward and a framework for doing so. It's hardly a page-turner, though. There's no sense of needing to Find Out What Happens Next in capital letters. It's more of a general signpost on which way to go than an engine driving me relentlessy onward.</p><p>I don't have an answer to all these rhetorical questions, by the way, just in case anyone was waiting for one. This post is me, musing out loud, hoping something will come to me. It hasn't, not yet.</p><p>If I really take a step back and think about it, I'm not even sure Nightingale <i>is </i>resonating more strongly with me than most of the games in that list above. The posts I wrote about them, especially in the first week or two, probably sound just as enthusiastic. Maybe I just get over-excited when I have new stuff to see and do and write about. </p><p>Even if that's true, I don't think I played more than twenty hours of any of those games in the first five days. Nightingale definitely has <i>something </i>they didn't. </p><p>If I find out what it is, I'll be sure to let everyone know. Until then, I'll just keep playing in the hope it might eventually come to me.<br /></p>Bhagpusshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03499162165023939880noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1510920011443550663.post-74561775474034259762024-02-25T22:05:00.001+00:002024-02-25T22:05:26.874+00:00If You Can't Play It, Write About It<p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhTkYJIdGWId9zwfOmm3B4jW9FF39AGRQBK8eCsaLFsNpWyuJvo1p9nEjdQJclS6maTqxH32e-DLw_Ma0OQUxGENdE4KPPx9izlAMPuEM5CHKk5ug5_xV4c1qRZlClCVfd5dzC8maZ5eub_LLDQiyBFDq6Fe2pg8Ml-5AsfN2VPou7FURMoUTqOBmOqwls/s1920/ngsunset4.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="1920" height="360" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhTkYJIdGWId9zwfOmm3B4jW9FF39AGRQBK8eCsaLFsNpWyuJvo1p9nEjdQJclS6maTqxH32e-DLw_Ma0OQUxGENdE4KPPx9izlAMPuEM5CHKk5ug5_xV4c1qRZlClCVfd5dzC8maZ5eub_LLDQiyBFDq6Fe2pg8Ml-5AsfN2VPou7FURMoUTqOBmOqwls/w640-h360/ngsunset4.jpg" width="640" /></a></div>I have about half an hour before dinner. I could either play <i>Nightingale </i>or put the quickest of quick posts together. I logged out last night outside a "<i>dungeon</i>" that did not go well on first attempt. I'm not going to try and run <i>that </i>in thirty minutes but I do have plenty of screenshots so...<p></p><p>I've been playing Nightingale a lot. <i>Steam </i>tells me I've racked up just over twenty hours in five days and I was at work for two of those. I think this is probably the most hours I've played any game, per day, since <i>Valheim</i>. </p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgflRTZPr3EJkce5pWuKzACm0GteNRNDMUPBUJ69sk69PSquy1DZU9SBMxc1tqkw2X8rRJ4uDeT8NsjgJWlUcuN0jgYUIDFhnhM2TKfpGw_owKkU4P3hIHzcCeHWpgnbn4VyfWQHFbiAOap70B-y_gje0yv1ReFAS97drPLdvHQMqKdhm_XQ3xRy73OPCY/s1920/ngsunset5.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="1920" height="360" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgflRTZPr3EJkce5pWuKzACm0GteNRNDMUPBUJ69sk69PSquy1DZU9SBMxc1tqkw2X8rRJ4uDeT8NsjgJWlUcuN0jgYUIDFhnhM2TKfpGw_owKkU4P3hIHzcCeHWpgnbn4VyfWQHFbiAOap70B-y_gje0yv1ReFAS97drPLdvHQMqKdhm_XQ3xRy73OPCY/w640-h360/ngsunset5.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><p>It's not exactly the game I was expecting, either. I went out of my way to avoid finding out very much about Nightingale before Early Access, so that's hardly surprising. I think I was imagining something along the lines of an open-world, 3D <i>Fallen London</i>. </p><p>It's not much like that at all.</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhegZkNBCYpa-mZgj91UArYCZYHvyGkCfiFEmG20ccsqj67IBrMSPuCst3jx4ZAb8YwUsDSWoaOeC9AJVqEMDzjTz0TfMrYpRHki5dBpWwSspy5RW9JLWIShnWFcUGprzoHs8gzVCSY54UAxYWE2onE1sWQpQ196zBHlmtL0nD6bgfKIAzoVtoUo7At0zQ/s1920/ngstatue1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="1920" height="360" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhegZkNBCYpa-mZgj91UArYCZYHvyGkCfiFEmG20ccsqj67IBrMSPuCst3jx4ZAb8YwUsDSWoaOeC9AJVqEMDzjTz0TfMrYpRHki5dBpWwSspy5RW9JLWIShnWFcUGprzoHs8gzVCSY54UAxYWE2onE1sWQpQ196zBHlmtL0nD6bgfKIAzoVtoUo7At0zQ/w640-h360/ngstatue1.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><p>For one thing, Nightingale is much more of a puzzle game than I was anticipating. There are puzzles everywhere, although they're hardly intellectually taxing. What's more, some of them are jumping puzzles. I very much was not expecting those.</p><p>There are difficulty settings but they mostly affect combat, as far as I know. Those are good for getting through tough "<i>dungeons</i>"but I'm not sure they can help much with the non-combat challenges, although the Minor Arcana certainly can. We'll get to how that works later, I expect. When I actually understand it.<br /></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEilQHc2t3lFaXjdd1qGcBbiJCYCaqbijuTWqbHG8q6_nezzraIvqV_okGF1aaxIZO0iKo912KbQK8PmW7Lyg9dFd0j_vdh6g_tHdyr9fNeBJ14-xeSChZd_2RTVupIXDArKxEdmM0watL2R_J2rFp7gR1HnadmABtTJb5ROIKo5NSXgfSh_JEovM7zDuKQ/s1920/ngchest1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="1920" height="360" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEilQHc2t3lFaXjdd1qGcBbiJCYCaqbijuTWqbHG8q6_nezzraIvqV_okGF1aaxIZO0iKo912KbQK8PmW7Lyg9dFd0j_vdh6g_tHdyr9fNeBJ14-xeSChZd_2RTVupIXDArKxEdmM0watL2R_J2rFp7gR1HnadmABtTJb5ROIKo5NSXgfSh_JEovM7zDuKQ/w640-h360/ngchest1.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><p>Fortunately, if you can't jump, you can climb. Or build. Stairs, ramps, scaffolding, bridges.... It's a weird game that gives you jumping puzzles and then lets you avoid having to do any jumping. </p><p>But then, Nightingale is turning out to be quite a weird game. In so many ways.</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEguD2WuiHyGk4CLL-kaZDkS29AEsHmDvq-q5_Mw-F2ausgs0vMFHzsQv89hyphenhyphen4qb3kAtrbImJ8CW6N1B7T6f5DWBQuSmO9hPatL1dZu71b_foqk4e4YbRT8fi2SukQpKDXY-_DQOCalM_CHbOK7tdFZwSwojjaB06hYryHMKJRvNE_SRfcwgQAZGHzvA7d4/s1920/ngumbrella1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="1920" height="360" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEguD2WuiHyGk4CLL-kaZDkS29AEsHmDvq-q5_Mw-F2ausgs0vMFHzsQv89hyphenhyphen4qb3kAtrbImJ8CW6N1B7T6f5DWBQuSmO9hPatL1dZu71b_foqk4e4YbRT8fi2SukQpKDXY-_DQOCalM_CHbOK7tdFZwSwojjaB06hYryHMKJRvNE_SRfcwgQAZGHzvA7d4/w640-h360/ngumbrella1.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><p>For example, I certainly didn't anticipate spending half my time gliding through the air, hanging onto an umbrella like a steampunk Mary Poppins. It's hella fun even if it is nearly impossible to steer. </p><p>Gliding chews through stamina at a terrifying rate but there are ways to change that. Quite a lot of ways. There seem to be quite a lot of ways to affect everything. I didn't expect that, either. It's like modding the game in real-time, from within.<br /></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiIJbYBOdtlrgLqre8_UdQZUsZ_lQIQN0gvNLBC9fz6P223-gOuNKROG4x0BXZkQj85Togo0gUN5WH2PbJUs7RzbEZfH4Ns5zFgG-ZfwSw_r_GtCAl9uS1DyRd9dtvzNM7J4GO89XbnNN8ENW-UVJrfan1WVNtHCGfaxlUhihF6YvJhuGgnlk8M-CQBMqA/s1920/nghut1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="1920" height="360" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiIJbYBOdtlrgLqre8_UdQZUsZ_lQIQN0gvNLBC9fz6P223-gOuNKROG4x0BXZkQj85Togo0gUN5WH2PbJUs7RzbEZfH4Ns5zFgG-ZfwSw_r_GtCAl9uS1DyRd9dtvzNM7J4GO89XbnNN8ENW-UVJrfan1WVNtHCGfaxlUhihF6YvJhuGgnlk8M-CQBMqA/w640-h360/nghut1.jpg" width="640" /></a></div>Overall, Nightingale seems to be much more of a "<i>game</i>" than I imagined, even though it absolutely <i>is </i>a survival sandbox as well. At least at the stage I'm at, it has a narrative strucrture and a linear plotline as well as all the usual survival mechanics. It's almost like playing two genres at once.<p></p><p>An anecdote: the screenshot above was taken following what may have been my most <i>Valheimesque</i> moment since I last played Valheim. I was edging along the coast when night fell. I couldn't go right because I'd drown in the sea. I couldn't left because I didn't have the stamina to climb the cliffs. I couldn't just wait it out because I was in danger of becoming exhausted from lack of sleep and I was getting too tired to fight off the maurading Bound and spiders that kept coming at me out of the darkness.</p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi1CR_pMIng2rLLo8tWLxltUxpbx3cJ-VymvnLUH68mORjQtYLXbXR1ODaIw_Gw9kUh34IIeqxoX_nAHQ62wT8nLiqZEFGDahaYpkh_BfQCb9DchNMbZDHcMAHjunWd6p1unKmhBsGj7cvmfRJYJuehthGNgWD78aoFj19nsXEFDZRAOmdDC5zAUQiwS5o/s1920/ngdawn1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="1920" height="360" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi1CR_pMIng2rLLo8tWLxltUxpbx3cJ-VymvnLUH68mORjQtYLXbXR1ODaIw_Gw9kUh34IIeqxoX_nAHQ62wT8nLiqZEFGDahaYpkh_BfQCb9DchNMbZDHcMAHjunWd6p1unKmhBsGj7cvmfRJYJuehthGNgWD78aoFj19nsXEFDZRAOmdDC5zAUQiwS5o/w640-h360/ngdawn1.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><br /><p></p><p>In the end I had to build myself a hut and put down a bedroll so I could get through until daylight. Then I found the cave where the spiders were coming from and discovered a portal to another Realm entirely. That never happened in Valheim.<br /></p><p>But that's just how things are right now. Adventure, mystery, discovery and wonder at every turn. After a while all of it will start to feel codified and familiar but for the moment it still seems other-worldly and magical.</p><p>I'm going to enjoy it while it lasts!</p>Bhagpusshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03499162165023939880noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1510920011443550663.post-55155917114113584552024-02-23T11:57:00.001+00:002024-02-23T11:57:47.603+00:00Temptation All Around<p></p>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgjdoT7q8LkJdSJnwUfGztmuNr5uaDLGsvptPEQ7bJGYjyMFGZZd1Y7vZ2fCTImVoOedlx46tijpkB3eKcb5kc9UhIOzgaEP4bEXMBNyudEY5yIiagUEeuerfKrYrIayhAiNIikmyG_TmcdOnjig61wY_q48CSYPFAohQubpvOkuwtt_r-WPM9qD0ssWWc/s1920/ngportal1.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="1920" height="360" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgjdoT7q8LkJdSJnwUfGztmuNr5uaDLGsvptPEQ7bJGYjyMFGZZd1Y7vZ2fCTImVoOedlx46tijpkB3eKcb5kc9UhIOzgaEP4bEXMBNyudEY5yIiagUEeuerfKrYrIayhAiNIikmyG_TmcdOnjig61wY_q48CSYPFAohQubpvOkuwtt_r-WPM9qD0ssWWc/w640-h360/ngportal1.jpg" width="640" /></a>
</div>
<br />It's Friday! How about a few notes and queries? Okay, then. Here we go...
<p></p>
<p>
<b><span style="font-size: x-large;">Gonna Make You An Offer... </span></b><br />
</p>
<p>
<i>Steam </i>has a sale on. Steam always has a sale on, but this one is more interesting than most. It's a <i>2K </i>Pubisher Sale and although I didn't immediately
recognize the name, I certainly recognized the games:
<i>Civilization, Borderlands, Bio-Shock, X-Com...</i>
</p>
<p>
So far, so impressive, but wait! Check out the discounts: 90%! 91%!! 93%!!!
Apart from a couple of measly half-price offers on games that cost less than
$5 full price, everything is two-thirds off or better.
</p>
<p>
Cuts this big raise a couple of awkward questions:
</p>
<ol style="text-align: left;">
<li>
Just how big does a bargain have to be before you feel you <i>have </i>to
take it, even though you don't really want it?
</li>
<li>
If you call yourself a gamer but you've never played these classics, at
these prices is there any excuse not to try them now?
</li>
</ol>
<p>
I can answer the second quite easily. I don't call myself a gamer. I
grudgingly accept "<i>Gamer</i>" as a useful if misleading shorthand term but
I wouldn't self-identify as one. I certainly don't feel the need to
have personally played every classic game, although I do believe I ought to
recognize the names and know a little a bit about most of them.
</p>
<p>
The first is a bit harder. I do like a bargain and these are some really good
deals. A few of the games I can eliminate quite easily on the grounds of genre
or subject. I'm never going to start playing 4X games or at least I can't see
it happening. Others, though, are harder to turn down. Bio-Shock is right in
my area of interest and I'm increasingly beginning to realise how much I like
the tactical, turn-based gameplay that's often descibed as "<i>X-Com style</i>". It does seem strange to enjoy the copies but ignore the originals.<br /></p>
<p></p>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgTrBQMYtAEYYn_ApjG9AVvusBx8Sj0U9ePfhuoBhnfz_IY3sgWtePUGvYRcShK0Nyjcvm0FsEkdHJiNLs8Te1SdNkw4wvH_N_MYaPONTO4DlIG3A-Rs5Omp8Sgoq6a3hXET_islA8mWyc_kDZyo6XiAJB2J4xWQb0mP8tzCUOJfnmfeBN048EwwMLDLuQ/s944/steamsale2k.png" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="139" data-original-width="944" height="94" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgTrBQMYtAEYYn_ApjG9AVvusBx8Sj0U9ePfhuoBhnfz_IY3sgWtePUGvYRcShK0Nyjcvm0FsEkdHJiNLs8Te1SdNkw4wvH_N_MYaPONTO4DlIG3A-Rs5Omp8Sgoq6a3hXET_islA8mWyc_kDZyo6XiAJB2J4xWQb0mP8tzCUOJfnmfeBN048EwwMLDLuQ/w640-h94/steamsale2k.png" width="640" /></a>
</div>
<br />
<p></p>
<p>
In the end, though, is a bargain really a bargain if, after you buy it, it just
sits there, unused? These are all games I've thought about playing before and
decided against. If they were sitting in my Steam library, would I be any more
likely to play them? The scores of DVDs in this house, still with the
shrink-wraps unbroken, suggest otherwise.
</p>
<p>
And then there's the sheer scale of the offers. The two X-Com Collections
comprise 26 games! Who has time for that? Even the Bio-Shock Collection, with
just three full games and some DLC, would probably take weeks to play
through.
</p>
<p>
The games are mosly available in the sale individually, some of them for absolute peanuts.
I am very tempted to drop a few pounds just to have a few in my collection.
But in the end, truism though it may be, money is money. A tenner for half a
dozen games that could give me entertainment for months is an objective
bargain but I already have a ton of games I haven't played that I got for
nothing, which has to the best bargain of all. And am I playing those?<br /></p>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg8o9DZEBmxhn3r1fXSDR2HdI_bhiCsjCmt8enQOxMUrpjZk7g-S8T2-T53QjWBRVzbEuW95-ebTXnmBsG0-y6UmXrHqsUdvBZna-0Na2DFIKByYzPTAHPzXV3j7L_8dFRPKCqqczNLbp_-1dtoNcmnhYqOTxC4iMLKJWv704QxT5Irjt0XM8jayU7ejF8/s321/ff1.png" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="150" data-original-width="321" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg8o9DZEBmxhn3r1fXSDR2HdI_bhiCsjCmt8enQOxMUrpjZk7g-S8T2-T53QjWBRVzbEuW95-ebTXnmBsG0-y6UmXrHqsUdvBZna-0Na2DFIKByYzPTAHPzXV3j7L_8dFRPKCqqczNLbp_-1dtoNcmnhYqOTxC4iMLKJWv704QxT5Irjt0XM8jayU7ejF8/w640-h300/ff1.png" width="640" /></a>
</div>
<br />
<p></p>
<p>
I'm still dithering. I might crack and buy a couple of titles. The sale is on for a couple of days. I'm working all
weekend, luckily, which should give me something of a sanity buffer until the temptation disappears.
</p>
<p>
Weirdly, the game in the sale that started me thinking about all this wasn't
any of the big names I've mentioned. It's right down at the bottom of the
list, among the flurry of after-thoughts and also-rans: <i>Freedom Force</i>, the first super-hero game I ever played.
</p>
<p> Freedom Force came out more than two decades ago, in 2002. It had a lengthy
demo, which was included on a disc on the cover of some magazine I bought back
then. I remember playing that demo and
not thinking it was all that great. And yet I can still remember it with startling clarity. </p>
<p>
I certainly didn't buy the full game when it was released although I have a
vague idea I might have picked it up free from some service or offer at some
point. It's entirely possible I already own it, somehow. And yet I can't quite
shift the feeling it would be nice to have it on Steam, where I could not play
it so much more easily than I'm not playing it wherever else I have it.
</p>
<p>
It's 75% off. They're asking £1.07 for it. It would be rude not to take them
up on an offer like that. Wouldn't it?
</p>
<p>
<b><span style="font-size: x-large;">Always On The Internet (Slight Reprise)
</span></b><br />
</p>
<p></p>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjd_nCxxISeFX84ErGTVhREX4aLFTR1bFJKpqzWN1w-QlyDf0RgT3ADD39-e-zMzNXnk1-wwAfFqJI1AHDJ9TGqKUFS0jqzeC5RA_ZzlCpvlj6q3r_nL65wQWkCbk0nSG7qMECjsp9PA_rwFlXhEFeQ8FVgU9QUpcri_BNLCnZuty5LGrAgHdILiwr8VCs/s1040/ngoff1.png" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="387" data-original-width="1040" height="238" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjd_nCxxISeFX84ErGTVhREX4aLFTR1bFJKpqzWN1w-QlyDf0RgT3ADD39-e-zMzNXnk1-wwAfFqJI1AHDJ9TGqKUFS0jqzeC5RA_ZzlCpvlj6q3r_nL65wQWkCbk0nSG7qMECjsp9PA_rwFlXhEFeQ8FVgU9QUpcri_BNLCnZuty5LGrAgHdILiwr8VCs/w640-h238/ngoff1.png" width="640" /></a>
</div>
<p></p>
<p>
And now a couple of updates on <i>Nightingale</i>. Just be thankful you're not
getting a full post.
</p>
<p>
There were two announcements from <i>Inflexion Games</i> waiting when I logged into
Steam this morning. One confirmed the arrival of Nightingale on
<i>GeForce Now</i>. The other apologised for the game being always online and
promised an offline version "<i>as soon as feasible</i>".
</p>
<p>
It made me think. I've been playing my games through an internet connection
for so long now I'd all but forgotten it was even possible to play video games
without one. When I log in to <i>Prime Gaming</i> or Steam and launch a game, I
literally never even think about whether I'm playing on or offline.
</p>
<p>
I haven't had any of the reported connectivity issues with Nightingale that
others have. Well, that's not strictly true. I've had two disconnections, both
of which were immediately resolvable by logging back in. That's so
insignificant I wouldn't even class it as an inconvenience, let alone a
problem.
</p>
<p>
It is true, however, that I'm playing entirely solo and that I have no plans
to play Nightingale in multiplayer or co-op in the future. I guess I
don't need to be online for that, although I had been assuming the servers were
doing some of the heavy lifting, not my PC. My question is, if a game like this moves
offline, isn't the client PC on which it runs going to need to be more
powerful? Or is that not how these things work?
</p>
<p>
Of course, if my PC wasn't up to running Nightingale, I could still play
anyway, using GeForce Now. I was all over that for a while with
<i>New World</i>, before I upgraded my RAM and video card last year. My
then-set-up was able to run New World but after an hour or so it would grind
to a halt and have to be re-booted. It also made some worrying noises and kept
the room warm without my needing to use the wall heater.
</p>
<p></p>
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</div>
<br /><br />
<p></p>
<p>
That was why, as soon as I had the components installed, the first game I
fired up to test them with was New World. It ran smoothly, didn't bog down, and my PC
purred along, quiet and cool as you like. The ironic thing was that once I
could play New World locally, I didn't much want to.
</p>
<p>
Playing on GeForce Now was efficient and
effective but it was also just annoying enough to make me not want to bother
after a while. There were a few extra steps every time you wanted to log in
and because I was too mean to pay the subscription I was stuck with the free
service, which made me queue for a server in the evenings and booted me out
once an hour.
</p>
<p>
I could re-queue and start again an unlimited number of times but it just made
me less interested in playing, overall. I would absolutely use the service to
play a game I wanted to play that wouldn't run at all on my machine but in the
case of Nightingale, I can't see the point.</p><p><b><span style="font-size: x-large;">...That You Can't Refuse</span></b> <br /></p><p>
On the topic of how much of a bargain does something have to be before you
buy, how much of a bribe does it take to get you to come back? </p><p>We're all used
to MMORPGs running campaigns to get people to log in again to games they used
to play. I used to jump on those. Now I mostly ignore them.
</p>
<p>
I did acquire most of my ingrained gaming habits back in the days of <i>EverQuest
</i>and its imitators, though. I do have certain triggers and one of them is xp.
If I hear a game's giving big, bonus xp - double or treble, say - it does
often make me feel like taking them up on the offer. Even if its a game
I haven't thought about playing in years.
</p>
<p>
Enter Black Desert with its
<span style="color: #ff00fe;"><a href="https://www.mmobomb.com/news/black-desert-online-players-can-work-together-to-earn-800-exp-boosts-during-8th-anniversary-event">800% XP Bonus</a></span>. Eight. Hundred. Per Cent. I mean I can't even.
</p>
<p></p>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<iframe allowfullscreen="" class="BLOG_video_class" height="292" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/-VBy-JUMN0g" width="528" youtube-src-id="-VBy-JUMN0g"></iframe>
</div>
<p></p>
<p>
There are some strings. It's a community event. The titular 800% is predicated
on players working to gether to gather a total of 30,000,000<i>
Seals of Sincerity</i>. That sounds like a lot but who knows?
</p>
<p>
The whole thing is Ostensibly on behalf of the game's eight anniversary although it t
may also have something to do with <i>Pearl Abyss</i>'s finances, which as
<i>Nosy Gamer</i>
<span style="color: #ff00fe;"><a href="https://nosygamer.blogspot.com/2024/02/looking-back-at-five-years-of-pearl.html">reported</a></span>, don't look that bright right now. I'm sure they'd love for a bunch of lapsed BD players to come back to the fold.</p><p>There are some titles and other goodies
you can claim, too. I do like a title... <br /></p><p>I definitely didn't have "<i>Play Black Desert</i>" on my spring schedule
but damn! 800%! I wonder if I still have the game installed?
</p>
<p>And finally. <br /></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;"><b>Always End With A Song</b></span></p>
<p>
Mrs Bhagpuss tipped me to this one. "<i>She's got a candy-floss voice and it's about losing love or something.
You'd like it</i>". And she was right. She knows me so well...
</p>
<p>
Also, it has 50m views on <i>YouTube </i>and it was #1 in the UK last year so why the
heck I needed Mrs Bhagpuss to tell me about it beats me. What do I have
these damn music feeds <i>for</i>?<br />
</p>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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</div>
<p style="text-align: center;">
<b><span style="font-size: x-large;"><i>Strangers </i>- Kenya Grace</span></b>
</p>
<p style="text-align: left;">
I just love the way she stretches the vowels. And the skittering drum &
bass production. And the shimmering whispers. It's weird how everything that
used to be avant garde ends up going mainstream.
</p>
<p style="text-align: left;">Weird and very wonderful.<br /></p>
Bhagpusshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03499162165023939880noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1510920011443550663.post-669723150036059462024-02-22T18:22:00.004+00:002024-02-22T18:22:54.711+00:00Feeling Twitchy<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgEYUDtMFZu3omu5W_ID8qllePq3qpKdoBFriVIyfODP8bwF9dIfKM7vwsT9hL2t0jQdqgw11uAJ1-Z3KGeeFldxaMlhJitBdjqtvZSO_pFqCy_-BIB8Fcz2WG_xdpdTHeqC9nqly2JEkG7AJKyFeL7kBcmIAT9WGrD8zcOetBRuAkuWMtRGm99W0ometM/s1920/ngdress2.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="1920" height="360" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgEYUDtMFZu3omu5W_ID8qllePq3qpKdoBFriVIyfODP8bwF9dIfKM7vwsT9hL2t0jQdqgw11uAJ1-Z3KGeeFldxaMlhJitBdjqtvZSO_pFqCy_-BIB8Fcz2WG_xdpdTHeqC9nqly2JEkG7AJKyFeL7kBcmIAT9WGrD8zcOetBRuAkuWMtRGm99W0ometM/w640-h360/ngdress2.jpg" width="640" /></a>
</div>
<p>
This is somewhat of a makeshift post. I spent two hours composing a much longer, more detailed one, then I managed to delete it by accident. Unrecoverably. Not for the first time, either, and I don't suppose it
will be the last. It's amazing how you can just brush two or three keys at once as you reach across the keyboard and something like that happens. </p><p>The post you're not reading right now was about graphical fidelity and appearance gear in
<i>Nightingale</i>. Don't get excited. There <i>is </i>no appearance gear in Nightingale. That was
one of the points I was making.
</p>
<p>
Since I'm stuffed if I'm going to re-write the whole thing and since I'm even less
inclined to spend another two hours writing another one, we're just going to
have to make do with some pictures of the <i>Twitch </i>Drops I got myself by
having
<span style="color: #ff00fe;"><a href="https://www.twitch.tv/gladd">Gladd's channel</a></span>
tabbed out and muted for six hours today. There's <span style="color: #ff00fe;"><a href="https://www.gamerguides.com/nightingale/guide/basics/getting-started/nightingale-twitch-drops-launch">a promotion</a></span> on.<br /></p>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhHofkSmk31Xthiq2kVWh33uMLlSNk2LA6XTkYudRqets4G5xbMZR91EgywsJDKoWs-gjIU-xeQv-ww9QOWuLR2G80nRSC0yU9Qy5GsTUM9eKt-wlWkAc0ZqzqBHnEbQ62GWVG-_rTJ6RK7H7i07xseFFez3qJ1eP2WhlcUGA638d4yloedO5Yx9LUFpwA/s1920/ngdress3.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="1920" height="360" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhHofkSmk31Xthiq2kVWh33uMLlSNk2LA6XTkYudRqets4G5xbMZR91EgywsJDKoWs-gjIU-xeQv-ww9QOWuLR2G80nRSC0yU9Qy5GsTUM9eKt-wlWkAc0ZqzqBHnEbQ62GWVG-_rTJ6RK7H7i07xseFFez3qJ1eP2WhlcUGA638d4yloedO5Yx9LUFpwA/w640-h360/ngdress3.jpg" width="640" /></a>
</div>
<p>
Acquiring Twitch Drops was a new experience for me but I imagine I'll be doing
it again, now I know how easy it is. The hardest part was finding a channel
that didn't keep dropping out all the time. I tried three yesterday and they all did it,
repeatedly, so it was good to find one today that didn't.
</p>
<p>
Other than that, it seems like something for nothing. The promotion goes on
until the 27th but it only takes eight hours of "<i>viewing</i>" to get
everything. You can easily do it in a day.
</p>
<p>
Here's what's on offer. The outfit splits into five pieces - gloves, shoes,
pants, shirt and hat. The dress swaps in for the shirt. Altogether there's
something for every clothing slot. You also get the recipes to make them all - so you can replace them if they wear out, I guess.<br />
</p>
<p></p>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEht_PK29oNEb0c2MQvCu4h40X3BaJrq6qYS9Ar_ueQTjSxO48Q4sF51bR6bYKzxU_rkbpOGgxq3J2O_bYYW33Olf8RiVE0Psy5wgabJVgp8aWNpNMRpgpMNUoFi-Cfrsi-bcFN2LSVaKBQKwVKWZm4HBnV6uuPsAkuQCjMwMmMvu2Iqk4A3ShCOne7FJsQ/s1190/tdrop1.png" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="780" data-original-width="1190" height="420" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEht_PK29oNEb0c2MQvCu4h40X3BaJrq6qYS9Ar_ueQTjSxO48Q4sF51bR6bYKzxU_rkbpOGgxq3J2O_bYYW33Olf8RiVE0Psy5wgabJVgp8aWNpNMRpgpMNUoFi-Cfrsi-bcFN2LSVaKBQKwVKWZm4HBnV6uuPsAkuQCjMwMmMvu2Iqk4A3ShCOne7FJsQ/w640-h420/tdrop1.png" width="640" /></a>
</div>
<br />
<p></p>
<p><br /></p>
<p style="text-align: left;"></p>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgroWCrwWFvkUlyUxj0yvwggUN5tDLtKIytAHpyC7SzTTxIiw4stxoHhPHbWZdNLdbhfF9-GBru1WLkamBVozhANzNrqb7DBd0LCmZbvIh6RSYQ7OU6Iajjma8QO_iTWPF4i9NUZEp92-baqylDVhUAmxzQJBI7hEvRIFT2Ie1RubKBghcjfsXsKj-QqRI/s864/ngbrolly1.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="864" data-original-width="607" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgroWCrwWFvkUlyUxj0yvwggUN5tDLtKIytAHpyC7SzTTxIiw4stxoHhPHbWZdNLdbhfF9-GBru1WLkamBVozhANzNrqb7DBd0LCmZbvIh6RSYQ7OU6Iajjma8QO_iTWPF4i9NUZEp92-baqylDVhUAmxzQJBI7hEvRIFT2Ie1RubKBghcjfsXsKj-QqRI/w141-h200/ngbrolly1.jpg" width="141" /></a>
As well as the clothes, there's an umbrella. Umbrellas are kind of a big deal in Nightingale. Did you know they double as parachutes?
Well, they do
</div>
<p></p>
<p>
You could even use one as a makeshift glider at a push, although they use stamina to float so you
wouldn't be gliding far.<br />
</p>
<p>
The final reward, the one that takes the full eight hours to get, is a dog. A <i>Distinguished Puppy</i>. It's a
dachshund wearing a top hat.</p>
<p>
I'm not sure how he'll work with Dora, my trusty help-meet. Are there cosmetic
pets in the game? Maybe you can have more than one companion out at a time.</p><p><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi2NFq9F_5AJqmQaWMfr4lFHjKtMlcU_ae9fjH40lBgmpreO9ItyD-lcDXvwFQOXtTLhihTgpxADoH2KBYMQ2rVhr4Jtw2PCv2wrTce6TgYtLM08N4jQqIT-x4Tku1Ch_WsvoEBlc1dR3CFpd5CSbzkFrhodtU9dHuk_ys8Y2wIN-UuPTx_QxHeLhOod1s/s1080/ngdp1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="753" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi2NFq9F_5AJqmQaWMfr4lFHjKtMlcU_ae9fjH40lBgmpreO9ItyD-lcDXvwFQOXtTLhihTgpxADoH2KBYMQ2rVhr4Jtw2PCv2wrTce6TgYtLM08N4jQqIT-x4Tku1Ch_WsvoEBlc1dR3CFpd5CSbzkFrhodtU9dHuk_ys8Y2wIN-UuPTx_QxHeLhOod1s/s320/ngdp1.jpg" width="223" /></a>I think he's about ready. Hold on... let me just log in and claim him. I'll find out how he works and take a screenshot... </p><p>Ah! I didn't think of that. The Distinguished Puppy is a house item. It took me a while to work it out. Unlike the other rewards, he doesn't just pop up in your pack. You have to craft him from the Building menu. </p><p>More specifically, you craft his bed. It's under the "<i>Rest</i>" sub-category and it's an actual, tiny bed. You can sleep in it yourself if you want, although I can't imagine how that works. </p><p>As soon as you place it, the dog appears nearby. He roams around a little, lies down, sits up... generally acts like a dog.<br /></p><p>About the one thing he doesn't do as far as I can see is use his bed. I was expecting him to lie down in it but I don't think he does. </p><p>He's also quite disturbingly realistic. He looks like an actual motion-capture of a genuine dachshund. He's creepy, frankly, especially with that hat.<br /></p>
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</div>
<p>
At least he's purely decorative. The problem I have with the outfit and the umbrella is that it's all proper
stat gear <i>and </i>much better than what Flora had. If you can get major
upgrades just by not watching someone else live-stream the game, it does kind
of blow a hole in the progression mechanics. And since gear upgrades are a huge
part of the motivation in this genre, that can't be good.<br /></p>
<p>
Then again, it is very early days. Just because the "<i>Simple</i>" clothes
Flora's wearing don't match up to these freebies, either visually or statistically, doesn't mean the next crafted set won't make the free stuff obsolete. Just so long as the developers don't make a habit of giving away the farm, I think we'll be okay.
</p>
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</div>
<p>
As for me, it's not the first time I fat-fingered an entire post into oblivion
and I don't imagine it'll be the last. I might re-do the post I lost tomorrow
or I might just take the hint and move on. It had a few good lines but I don't
think we'll be missing all that much.
</p>
<p>
The main point I was making was that all new games ought to come with two
things as standard: a way to take screenshots without the UI and an appearance
system for clothing. If the endgame is Fashion Wars or Playing Barbies, which
let's be honest, it always is, and if developers want their game to look great
in every screenshot, which of course they do, why wait? <br />
</p>
<p>
I mean, you don't want people to know they're really going to be running
around looking like <i>this</i>, do you?<br />
</p>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiLB4fRR5UJsAcMV5ovesBkeYGGukFgCaSo1Ma13KzeZiezW1V1tBa5isznD2_DBE7_YcKC3T-syBPRmlqqKb_Y3tkaw6at_Eaj6zlksPUHEeoEE9La2oHgpl7EwP5cuScRvUfPAzOJaG3xY5AefLjrl1ztcOwam0mepZiriZe9ffVk-EQLGniMYExamSo/s1920/ngclothes1.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="1920" height="360" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiLB4fRR5UJsAcMV5ovesBkeYGGukFgCaSo1Ma13KzeZiezW1V1tBa5isznD2_DBE7_YcKC3T-syBPRmlqqKb_Y3tkaw6at_Eaj6zlksPUHEeoEE9La2oHgpl7EwP5cuScRvUfPAzOJaG3xY5AefLjrl1ztcOwam0mepZiriZe9ffVk-EQLGniMYExamSo/w640-h360/ngclothes1.jpg" width="640" /></a>
</div><p>
I rest my case.</p><p>Well, that turned out to be a better post than the one I lost, I think. Shame to lose that line about the cruel younger son who dresses the housemaid up as a lady for a joke. I was pleased with that one but I'm sure I'll find another chance to shoehorn it in, somewhere.</p><p>Oh, I just did, didn't I? Well, there we go!<br />
</p>Bhagpusshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03499162165023939880noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1510920011443550663.post-25332345462898122082024-02-21T21:21:00.000+00:002024-02-21T21:21:17.105+00:00Nightingale: First Impressions<p><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgJsqOiFoUic4sg6pklLlZZSHLHmWjXjiA3K9LTaFg4IXONUqjc7d1Y4WUIRcmIdFs3NlUfm-9iU1AiqkZUGMY1b-2a4vG75w2UVUSg3TCtLbYqyXc0Vb0HZqxmlUbq_Z7brtFi1cBQSW_xaePHkX1ojPOUURrg4oD-TmZ43J8hYzzapdzRCpJuTjB5VCQ/s1920/ng1.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="1920" height="360" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgJsqOiFoUic4sg6pklLlZZSHLHmWjXjiA3K9LTaFg4IXONUqjc7d1Y4WUIRcmIdFs3NlUfm-9iU1AiqkZUGMY1b-2a4vG75w2UVUSg3TCtLbYqyXc0Vb0HZqxmlUbq_Z7brtFi1cBQSW_xaePHkX1ojPOUURrg4oD-TmZ43J8hYzzapdzRCpJuTjB5VCQ/w640-h360/ng1.jpg" width="640" /></a>I began writing this post only because <i>Nightingale was </i>offline this morning for the inevitable emergency update following yesterday's seemingly successful launch. I say "<i>seemingly</i>" because it certainly seemed successful to me; <span style="color: #ff00fe;"><a href="https://massivelyop.com/2024/02/21/nightingales-early-access-launches-to-mixed-steam-reviews-performance-hotfixing-and-a-growing-playerbase/">from what I've read</a></span>, though, not everyone enjoyed such a happy introduction to the game.</p><p>I published<span style="color: #ff00fe;"><a href="https://bhagpuss.blogspot.com/2024/02/waiting-for-nightingale.html"> yesterday's post </a></span>just before seven in the evening. To my considerable surprise, ten minutes later I was playing the game. I was able to make a character, log in and complete the lengthy tutorial with no bugs, glitches, lag spikes or interruptions of any kind. It played for almost exactly two hours and thoroughly enjoyed every minute.</p><p>This morning, once I'd gotten a few practical concerns out of the way, I logged in again and played for half an hour or so until the server came down for an emergency patch. It took about an hour, as promised, then I was back to play some more.<br /></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhkvz9CMGEFWNTzZYhd6v0F9qwBPO_Uh9LnUiaVytHwzoy2ypSaWeeIGU-ZH4jyY5zkeIGFYII4wTJsIHv6oIpe5YNBaG2JX6elzJOXlWE-soXlZYFyqTb2mk4Mm856DC67VSBNS35YPGHTq3oatqIs3LXqr4KzwJD_ZIYhhw4ov-JJJA0XNzDH7I3ynv0/s1920/ngsunset1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="1920" height="360" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhkvz9CMGEFWNTzZYhd6v0F9qwBPO_Uh9LnUiaVytHwzoy2ypSaWeeIGU-ZH4jyY5zkeIGFYII4wTJsIHv6oIpe5YNBaG2JX6elzJOXlWE-soXlZYFyqTb2mk4Mm856DC67VSBNS35YPGHTq3oatqIs3LXqr4KzwJD_ZIYhhw4ov-JJJA0XNzDH7I3ynv0/w640-h360/ngsunset1.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><br /><p></p><p>All of which does suggest I've been having a pretty good time. I have, but let's not run away with the idea the game is perfect, not even in these very early stages, when all new games tend to show themselves at their best. I've had to revise several parts of this post, some more than once, not only because of the inevitable learning curve, which means I'm discovering new things all the time, but because I'm beginning to realize Nightingale is a quite a bit buggier than I originally thought. </p><p>Things keep changing and I'm not at all sure they're always supposed to. But more of that later.<br /></p><p>First, as always, comes Character Creation. Well, always except on those ill-judged occasions when some jaded developer decides it would be clever to start off in media res, setting players up as fully-geared, powered-up, endgame characters before pulling the rug and stripping them of all their possessions and abilities an hour or two into the game. Then it's to back where they should have started in the first place, sans gear, sans skills, sans everything. I hate that trope.</p><p>Luckily nothing of the kind happens in Nightingale. Character creation veers sharply towards the other extreme, almost a game in itself. Making a character involves a great deal of reading and a lot of fiddling with sliders. </p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiPIBr022URcPJ8AoYhh1XyLFdSJOdPdXyaecgop2-OHOD-KE4AT3PtL3ONb_R5-qSqNccl2z1Npg4lRdyDtdeJpWwP9krGwufDBAkpbQiknmooblcqyUVdKCxEdWcG9pp0r1wezVnlF7I2ZqVEGKnALbrRw_axLYbJUlr2PnP1HxmUxHcwdZUfyxz-Ris/s1920/ngcc1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="1920" height="360" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiPIBr022URcPJ8AoYhh1XyLFdSJOdPdXyaecgop2-OHOD-KE4AT3PtL3ONb_R5-qSqNccl2z1Npg4lRdyDtdeJpWwP9krGwufDBAkpbQiknmooblcqyUVdKCxEdWcG9pp0r1wezVnlF7I2ZqVEGKnALbrRw_axLYbJUlr2PnP1HxmUxHcwdZUfyxz-Ris/w640-h360/ngcc1.jpg" width="640" /></a></div>I didn't time it but I think it took me at least half an hour to make my character who, inevitably, ended up looking pretty much like all my other characters. I made the mistake in <i>Palworld </i>of deliberately going for something different and I've been regretting it ever since.<br /><p></p><p></p><p></p><p>There are a few parameters you can set that directly affect gameplay. You can choose your difficulty levels and how ready for adventure your character is going to be. You can also change these on the fly in the game itself though so, counter-intuitively, those important, gameplay-affecting decisions feel less crucial than what your character looks like, something that currently can't be changed later. </p><p>There are also some annoyingly abstruse choices to contend with, like having to pick your parents, grand-parents and great-grandparents as well as your age and exact date of birth. You're offered no explanation of why or whether any of that might be relevant to gameplay and there's no gloss to explain what the very specific options you're offered might mean.</p><p>Even though I had no idea why I was doing it, I tried to make those choices as mindfully as I could. Whether any of them will ever matter - or be referred to ever again - I guess we can only wait to see.</p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEirLQ5CQXgwmwK641HnRFwS46erQqgDHN06Y2Uid_3b1vAeWbVlOfp1e2miQ5Pzcz37P0MDoHqJwrlTrcVIOCxBab-fiDzeUTvrOlL__5mS8YlKdHnwTe5XKxw9jm_JPVfb0Tyc3X5Ysumq4zz_M_Xdpo4qR8QShV_3Oh4rrJRjYjBN7audQwBXqHi2crI/s1920/ngcc2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="1920" height="360" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEirLQ5CQXgwmwK641HnRFwS46erQqgDHN06Y2Uid_3b1vAeWbVlOfp1e2miQ5Pzcz37P0MDoHqJwrlTrcVIOCxBab-fiDzeUTvrOlL__5mS8YlKdHnwTe5XKxw9jm_JPVfb0Tyc3X5Ysumq4zz_M_Xdpo4qR8QShV_3Oh4rrJRjYjBN7audQwBXqHi2crI/w640-h360/ngcc2.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><br /><p></p><p>More meaningfully, there are some well-documented and properly explained difficulty choices. I opted for what appears to be the standard difficulty and preparedness (Medium) so as to play the game as close as possible to the nominal default setting, something I always like to do, at least until circumstances dictate otherwise.</p><p>There were so many possibilities that even thirty minutes spent fiddling with sliders felt like not nearly long enough. Trying out the full range of colors in the make-up settings alone could fill a full session. As has been observed before, though, no matter how much time and effort you're prepared to invest, characters in Nightingale do look a bit... odd.</p><p>There's a florid, Victorian aspect to the whole thing, hinting at too many hours spent in over-heated rooms while wearing too many layers of uncomfortable clothing. If I had to use a single word to describe the overall feel of Nightingale's Character Creation process, that word would be "<i>florid</i>". I suspect it might be something of a Marmite situation for some but I've decided I like it. </p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg0sH4F1heWh77skeXb8saYMmragYDwLQyOM-kAUhxONRVRWaBG8GF5nJSGp30lGVDDGNgt4KmGwwX4rCIMnDDJnKSKGKKmE-U9BNm047p-YEpB3oNsa6WjK3V1K03JXUfrPAMT5wihEsz6oJSTHqxZ0axBaRQlVR_3OC4tPn29Zoq3GpskecPSczYly5Q/s1920/ngorange1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="1920" height="360" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg0sH4F1heWh77skeXb8saYMmragYDwLQyOM-kAUhxONRVRWaBG8GF5nJSGp30lGVDDGNgt4KmGwwX4rCIMnDDJnKSKGKKmE-U9BNm047p-YEpB3oNsa6WjK3V1K03JXUfrPAMT5wihEsz6oJSTHqxZ0axBaRQlVR_3OC4tPn29Zoq3GpskecPSczYly5Q/w640-h360/ngorange1.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><br /><p></p><p>What I don't like so much is the absence of idle animations and facial expressions. I noticed something felt off even in the Stress Test. This time, I took a moment to watch my character just stand there, doing nothing, staring fixedly ahead. I wanted to see if there was a cycle of idle animations, like there has been in just about every similar game I've ever played. </p><p>As far as I can tell, there is none. When I'm not pulling her strings, my character remains rooted in place, immobile and expressionless. It's disconcerting, not to say disturbing.<br /></p><p>Since I seem to have moved rather too quickly on to the subject of things I'm not all that happy with, let's get the big one out of the way. The controls and the UI are clunky as hell. The UI <i>looks </i>nice enough, although that Victorian letterpress look isn't a particular favorite of mine - and if it was I'd be quite annoyed it's only used for some things, while everything else uses a much more futuristic font. The clash is quite jarring. </p><p>It all <i>works </i>perfectly well. There's nothing actually <i>wrong </i>with it... it just feels awkward.</p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh5Gdm7tCkCnxLbjz8rmfMX1o5mvWnNk-7esR4fbfGy6GdQuaK9fjXEo4zJLqA5PpKLGSmBmxg7ve_qsas64pLk7IbOCHe1CuZARZ53MmwTwgjUpZ1wbEQdd54mqif7L0R8B-yLELo7URHNXyct-CCNSR65EvzC7TAuwlzUjiIBs5KRlQ56JsdbvzIazik/s1920/ngshovel1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="1920" height="360" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh5Gdm7tCkCnxLbjz8rmfMX1o5mvWnNk-7esR4fbfGy6GdQuaK9fjXEo4zJLqA5PpKLGSmBmxg7ve_qsas64pLk7IbOCHe1CuZARZ53MmwTwgjUpZ1wbEQdd54mqif7L0R8B-yLELo7URHNXyct-CCNSR65EvzC7TAuwlzUjiIBs5KRlQ56JsdbvzIazik/w640-h360/ngshovel1.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><br /><p></p><p>Swapping weapons and tools is finicky at best and occasionally buggy. In most modern games I'm used either to the game itself selecting the correct item contextually, on use, or at worst with a roll of the mouse-wheel. Last
night I had to press a number key to get my character to wield the item I wanted. I could see the individual icons on the hotbar, so it was at least straightforward to pick the right one and press the right key but it felt very old-fashioned. </p><p>This morning, however, all that had changed. I was now able to change tools by rolling the mouse-wheel, which was great, but all the icons on the hot bar had turned into shovels so I couldn't tell which was which until I selected it and saw on screen what my character was holding.</p><p>As of this afternoon, post-patch although that may be coincidental, the mouse-wheel selection is working and the correct icons are back. Fingers crossed it stays that way.<br /></p><p>Then there are the menus. Boy, there are a lot of menus. <br /></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgzudUBx9uoB6XuBj7pYwbmijr4g__iKpH8RE7hVg-PvnPFxi2DILIO49PmHPObwBMu6-Z82aRdAXhOy5JuzQv3CKyWXGOj-tKMxfZvH3sz3TttwolWUMFbrtYyMboO9y5pa2yufEvrr6EywB2-Ov7Gc7O3yAQ3a3Nr8qs2SxfH4P5-xGiuO4C1UYTPtg0/s1920/ngcards1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="1920" height="360" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgzudUBx9uoB6XuBj7pYwbmijr4g__iKpH8RE7hVg-PvnPFxi2DILIO49PmHPObwBMu6-Z82aRdAXhOy5JuzQv3CKyWXGOj-tKMxfZvH3sz3TttwolWUMFbrtYyMboO9y5pa2yufEvrr6EywB2-Ov7Gc7O3yAQ3a3Nr8qs2SxfH4P5-xGiuO4C1UYTPtg0/w640-h360/ngcards1.jpg" width="640" /></a></div>Some of them are radial. I'm not a huge fan. I can tolerate radials for less-used functions but I don't like them for anything I have to do very often. Nightingale seems to love its radials, especially for crafting. It's a survival game so I'm going to be doing a lot of crafting and seeing a lot of radial menus. Can't say I'm delighted about that. The radials, not the crafting. I'm fine with the crafting.<br /><p></p><p>Fortunately the developers haven't decided to use radial menus for everything. It just feels like it, sometimes. The other mechanic the developers love is a drag-and-drop card system; it's very pretty but also quite clunky to use. </p><p>The cards are kind of a signature note for the game so, fortunately, the interfaces for them do look a lot more polished than the radials, which is just as well. Honestly, some of those radial menu look like they're still using place-holder graphics.<br /></p><p>Still, that's what Early Access is for, right? It's just a fancy name for "<i>Beta You Pay For</i>". Everything's temporary. I'm sure all the systems and mechanics will get plenty of tweaks in the year or two Nightingale spends in EA before it officially launches, most likely to complete indifference from all sides, if the fortunes of almost every other EA game to date are any kind of guide.</p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjBI43WCjpED-mudgTLawa9nmEUPXkXRl3MRG7nmQb9uqupbjVP6CCswjC-Gbuvfxth5UGlPMxYrHq1jhEVLTJzKqQHC2NuNmwfE1cP268A9kPvNDmqKzSO0beWNEmOQImNjDwSHDb08E-unPO2NTX_EwL1-x02gMANUeQXJl7Q33TZaxeJikfqRmrVvBQ/s1920/ngumbrella2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="1920" height="360" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjBI43WCjpED-mudgTLawa9nmEUPXkXRl3MRG7nmQb9uqupbjVP6CCswjC-Gbuvfxth5UGlPMxYrHq1jhEVLTJzKqQHC2NuNmwfE1cP268A9kPvNDmqKzSO0beWNEmOQImNjDwSHDb08E-unPO2NTX_EwL1-x02gMANUeQXJl7Q33TZaxeJikfqRmrVvBQ/w640-h360/ngumbrella2.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><br /><p></p><p>So far, though, those are about all the complaints I have. It's not much: some clunky mechanics that will almost certainly get a polish later and a few dubious design choices that don't happen to match my preferences.</p><p>On a much more positive note, for the five and a half hours I've played, I've found the gameplay compelling, the writing more than competent, the lore and the world-building intriguing and the voice acting and graphics both excellent.</p><p>The graphics you can judge for yourselves from the screenshots, which for once look exactly like what you'll see in game. The lighting effects are spectacular, the level of textural detail is impressive but it's the colors that really make the game pop. </p><p>I quite often juice those up a bit for the blog. In too many games, screenshots come out looking a little muted compared to the in-game visuals. I didn't need to do any juicing for these. Nightingale is as rich in color in capture as it is in play.</p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjLjzNz8NluGDGgd-PJOxiG6E7R48HqFPyuiG8DCzEx9ftYOn7BoKkkRFRKy-e3J2TV9QrU0xhLmIWNtZgsO4sc1_MTzrDsiPWpTYjTMKKk9gQCSe3c2xPtIMIwmqxFBcgOfMiD30pRJfzV68RQMitVnCJNt05FRfXJEUFP33LnHHGPdKFEHgaGD-l4xk4/s1920/ngsunset2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="1920" height="360" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjLjzNz8NluGDGgd-PJOxiG6E7R48HqFPyuiG8DCzEx9ftYOn7BoKkkRFRKy-e3J2TV9QrU0xhLmIWNtZgsO4sc1_MTzrDsiPWpTYjTMKKk9gQCSe3c2xPtIMIwmqxFBcgOfMiD30pRJfzV68RQMitVnCJNt05FRfXJEUFP33LnHHGPdKFEHgaGD-l4xk4/w640-h360/ngsunset2.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><br /><p></p><p>Praising the voice acting is really praising a single person. The only speaking role I've encountered so far is <i>Puck</i>, played with a whole fruitcake in his mouth by <i>Marc Warren</i>. By that I don't mean he mumbles like Marlon Brando. I mean he's plummy as hell. And it works. It sounds like a Shakespearean actor slumming, which I imagine was the note the director gave him.<br /></p><p>The best I can say, to show how much I liked Warren's delivery, is that I let him get to the end of every single sentence just so I could listen to him roll the words around his mouth like a rich oloroso. Normally I read the text so much faster than the actor delivers it, I can't bear to wait for them to catch up. I flip ahead and cut them off mid-sentence. Not here. Listening to Marc orate is like listening to a good radio play.</p><p>There are obviously similarities between Nightingale and <i>The Secret World</i> but none more so than this. The last game I can remember playing, where I chose to sit and listen to every spoken word, purely for the pleasure of hearing the delivery, was <i>TSW</i>. That was also quite possibly the last game I played where I didn't quibble with the line readings. This, at least on my brief exposure so far, is going to be the next.</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiaHeOq6Y0KwSliEydk1mdUbHb0oEroOnYlQjy6akTUQMBNrF9xNRvuXaQsqfLrYA3xR5dENoDZhkIuqW1wT_W9C25bp4cMns23vtr1c27_z811SI5Rb_qBJLKrc41A_tlP0jTwNr2WFWnutt2LSEWofLO4bkcbM7TWlc54Io1JY93jWoXBH3UYIx5xXWM/s1920/ngumbrella.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="1920" height="360" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiaHeOq6Y0KwSliEydk1mdUbHb0oEroOnYlQjy6akTUQMBNrF9xNRvuXaQsqfLrYA3xR5dENoDZhkIuqW1wT_W9C25bp4cMns23vtr1c27_z811SI5Rb_qBJLKrc41A_tlP0jTwNr2WFWnutt2LSEWofLO4bkcbM7TWlc54Io1JY93jWoXBH3UYIx5xXWM/w640-h360/ngumbrella.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><br /><p></p><p>So far, it's been just one actor, though. Let's not be counting those chickens or they might come home to roost. I'll reserve judgment until I hear someone other than Marc deliver a few lines. <br /></p><p>So, the game looks and sounds good. Great. But how does it play?</p><p>Judging by the time I've racked up so far, very well. The survival gameplay loop works its usual magic. There's little in gaming as addictive as working your way up from nothing to become landed gentry and I was building my first shack before the game even told me I should. Building seems very good but I'll save a post on that for when I've had a lot more experience with it.<br /></p><p>The first two hours were taken up with a basic tutorial, stage-managed by Puck with a trickster's sleight of hand. There are three zones, or Byways of the Realms as the lore has it, each giving you a brief introduction to what's in store later. After you make it through all three, Puck asks you to pick one and that's where you begin the game proper. There's a title card and everything!<br /></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEimS_1AC4JemR9zuoPpEmCKQgwadghXfbknE_bJyHRbRv1jCEXjTXutKe5UpiV1kW9ScrLUoB-3XWHZ-nHX9567s9FVvsHGOpgNGMZ8FBTCmxiOUcRc1qnGo8unCavO8LIezmERXo2gVskIPcd0dz5JCUJOjofb5ogh1rjEsd4bXYZbHsD2VwCHRC-CQUs/s1920/ngsunset3.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="1920" height="360" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEimS_1AC4JemR9zuoPpEmCKQgwadghXfbknE_bJyHRbRv1jCEXjTXutKe5UpiV1kW9ScrLUoB-3XWHZ-nHX9567s9FVvsHGOpgNGMZ8FBTCmxiOUcRc1qnGo8unCavO8LIezmERXo2gVskIPcd0dz5JCUJOjofb5ogh1rjEsd4bXYZbHsD2VwCHRC-CQUs/w640-h360/ngsunset3.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><br /><p></p><p>The three biomes are Forest, Desert and Swamp. Obviously I picked Forest but the others both had their attractions and I'm sure they'll be coming around again later. If you stick to the instructions Puck gives you, you'll zip through all three in no time. Well, in two hours, but that would be a mistake.</p><p>I regret not throwing off Puck's harness sooner. It was only in the third Byway, the swamp, that I chose to ignore his endless series of instructions and go exploring. There were a couple of wooden towers with hot air balloons tethered to the top and I couldn't resist going to see what they were for. </p><p>Loot is the answer. Each of the towers had several chests, filled with all kinds of goodies, as well as a bunch of crafting materials, just lying around, waiting to be taken. I ended up with so much in my bags I could barely move. I had to deconstruct some of the mats for essences, used as a currency across the Realms, just so I could walk to the portal. </p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhHhmMkukAF6y0gkVGwd2ZUsdjmlMNxixEJN-_SwjQl8MV00rLcuKKvYoTJt4Bgntfmtz_pIkIAmzlZPQQWtQG0fkUvmYdOO0C4YZoBvbxcxKwRr5u5EgkddGHKdzVotrONdpwtJYmKhWiQEuPqA5lBgOp7A3aekWrEaEkfmgelkXBrVGnPy7nJApl6I10/s1920/ngtower1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="1920" height="360" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhHhmMkukAF6y0gkVGwd2ZUsdjmlMNxixEJN-_SwjQl8MV00rLcuKKvYoTJt4Bgntfmtz_pIkIAmzlZPQQWtQG0fkUvmYdOO0C4YZoBvbxcxKwRr5u5EgkddGHKdzVotrONdpwtJYmKhWiQEuPqA5lBgOp7A3aekWrEaEkfmgelkXBrVGnPy7nJApl6I10/w640-h360/ngtower1.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><br /><p></p><p>Of the items I took, several have already come in useful, especially the umbrella. Getting wet is a thing that happens in Nightingale but not if you have an umbrella.</p><p>After the strict tutorial finishes, you find yourself in the place where the Stress test began, something that either gives a lie to the assertion that the test began at the point where a regular player would have been playing for ten hours or suggests there have been some major changes since then. Or that the devs expect people to explore each of the three maps a lot more fully than I did...</p><p>Thankfully, one thing that <i>has </i>changed are all those boars. I was able to get myself sorted out and set up without having constantly to defend myself from predatory porkers. It wasn't all tr-la-la in fairyland, though. I built my base so close to an ancient artifact I got attacked by zombies in my own front yard. I also had to deal with a few wolves down on the beach, which is apparently where they like to hang out in the fae lands.</p><p>Fighting them off was easy enough although I did die once, due to weight of numbers more than anything. Combat in Nightingale, at least at these low levels, is fast, frenetic and fun. At the default difficulty, winning is easy enough, while losing doesn't come with any too onerous penalties. </p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjBuau3ClygDgx1KFIqmqQ9j6XNoMOsRkFDU5T5VmH6W2AR0nYOKxwyXMdYXnqL7WW6ggXf_DEe6ZPDwmFapag8UqyoR2Kwt9vOjLw_X_REdUXWXEFcb9YNrsaCmfsHFhJXvMV0NICZxgfzizRthxIbkyI2GBAc_FXDzSYwRmdmgtkAVJ510xonZ__moB8/s1920/ngtower2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="1920" height="360" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjBuau3ClygDgx1KFIqmqQ9j6XNoMOsRkFDU5T5VmH6W2AR0nYOKxwyXMdYXnqL7WW6ggXf_DEe6ZPDwmFapag8UqyoR2Kwt9vOjLw_X_REdUXWXEFcb9YNrsaCmfsHFhJXvMV0NICZxgfzizRthxIbkyI2GBAc_FXDzSYwRmdmgtkAVJ510xonZ__moB8/w640-h360/ngtower2.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><br /><p></p><p>The combat animations, like all the animations really, when there even are any, aren't much to look at. Fighting style is similar to New World or any number of similar games but a lot less slick. Really, everything about Nightingale feels a lot less slick than most of its competitors, although that's not necessarily a negative. I quite like a few rough edges, particularly at this stage. Better than knowing everything's been worked over so rigorously it's never going to change. <br /></p><p>Towards the end of my third session, during which I spent altogether too much time building a house, I picked up a follower. Her name is <i>Dora</i>. My character's name is <i>Flora</i>. I didn't plan it that way but I wish I had. Probably just as well I'm playing on my own.</p><p>Dora is very useful. She doesn't say much, or indeed anything, but she helps with the mining and the fighting and most importantly she rezzes me when I die. </p><p>Together we took on the first "<i>dungeon</i>" in the storyline and beat it. It was a close call. Dora must have picked me up off the floor at least half a dozen times. I picked her up once. It was chaotic but it was good fun, especially when I figured out that if the boss was made of metal he'd be the perfect target for a mining pick.</p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjlzlrMIRx7wemvGU9l0NphafTxajdiGA6uru5Dz4G4BLF9S6ghyrMVvDehELJtKppg96CP-zGvsrc2w88EdbJTMjszEHct7B3DzWWJdbzjIKXtAsGwdtw0dSr_wWkcny84hLZEJbwXqQQXbVpLldldwi7rLpO8WzHa2a4wnD1H5FDzcFRaE57Wu9wqtH8/s1920/ngdora1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="1920" height="360" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjlzlrMIRx7wemvGU9l0NphafTxajdiGA6uru5Dz4G4BLF9S6ghyrMVvDehELJtKppg96CP-zGvsrc2w88EdbJTMjszEHct7B3DzWWJdbzjIKXtAsGwdtw0dSr_wWkcny84hLZEJbwXqQQXbVpLldldwi7rLpO8WzHa2a4wnD1H5FDzcFRaE57Wu9wqtH8/w640-h360/ngdora1.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><p></p><p>If the fights stay like that I'll be happy but if they get harder it's good to know you can tune the difficulty on the fly. That battle opened the way to the next Byway, or at least it will when I've crafted the card for it, but I've only seen about five percent of the map I'm on, so I don't think I'll be leaving this one just yet. I think I might just have a bit of a wander around. See what I can find. </p><p>It's nice to be playing a game with a bit more structure than <i>Palworld </i>and yet not too much more. A sandbox with a few signposts here and there. Given the chance, I'd rather be playing <i>Once Human</i>, which seems to me to be the best of these kind of games I've tried so far, but until it comes back, Nightingale will do very nicely<br /></p><p>I'm going to leave it at that for now, mostly because I'm itching to get back in and play. I realize that's a stronger recommendation than anything else I've said here. </p><p>As I mentioned in a post the other day, I've played a lot of Survival and/or crafting games in recent times. I was wondering whether Nightingale would suffer as a result. It hasn't. If anything, I feel refreshed and revitalized by my first few hours in the game, ready to give the genre another few dozen hours of my life. </p><p>Let's see if I still feel that way after a few more sessions.</p>Bhagpusshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03499162165023939880noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1510920011443550663.post-39485260680713644242024-02-20T18:49:00.000+00:002024-02-20T18:49:12.213+00:00Waiting For Nightingale<p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhDhv3qguuBiwL1Og3z3ymVYy1f2StLPnh4-viosd0yXkvxK-wNqU8K5CnYsTlnff_H4Olxk0nW3UNnfo8XXl6GCbb_BVRvCitkOStjPVSi9HQzXMgRaW4q6-k-q45YhJubTYx0245pUZ1DecTJ3WwEuJRg2FI-48bk73QcYP_6hxZTpFvEKgEmxLPsWLs/s2459/nightbuy1.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2459" data-original-width="1640" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhDhv3qguuBiwL1Og3z3ymVYy1f2StLPnh4-viosd0yXkvxK-wNqU8K5CnYsTlnff_H4Olxk0nW3UNnfo8XXl6GCbb_BVRvCitkOStjPVSi9HQzXMgRaW4q6-k-q45YhJubTYx0245pUZ1DecTJ3WwEuJRg2FI-48bk73QcYP_6hxZTpFvEKgEmxLPsWLs/w426-h640/nightbuy1.png" width="426" /></a></div>I had a plan for today's post. I was going to wait for <i>Nightingale </i>to release, something I thought was due to happen at 4pm. I was going to buy it, then try logging in with the Stress Test client to see if it would update.<p></p><p>If it did, it would save me a lot of download time. I'd be able to make a character, take a few screenshots and do a quick post, all before tea. </p><p>Then I'd have the rest of the evening to get stuck in to the game itself, always assuming Beryl would let me. Evenings are her play time and she insists on full participation from everyone in the <strike>pack </strike>house.</p><p>It might still happen but that schedule has already slipped. As I write, it's just before six in the evening and I'm exactly halfway through the 52GB download with an estimated fifty-nine minutes to go. </p><p>My time zone conversion turned out to be an hour out. The game was actually due to go on sale at 5PM "<i>London Time</i>", as the Nightingale <i>Discord </i>put it. I sat in the Discord channel for about twenty minutes in the lead-up to going Live, listening to people chatter about this and that. </p><p>One person said it reminded him of being in /ooc in <i>EverQuest</i>, waiting for an expansion to launch, which seemed like an oddly old-fashioned reference. It made me wonder what the age demographic for Survival games might be. I would have guessed it might skew fairly young, maybe clustering around the late teens/early twenties, but thinking about it, there's something of an age-agnostic feeling to the whole genre. If Survival games were board games they might well have one of those irritating "<span style="color: #ff00fe;"><a href="https://www.quora.com/Why-do-certain-toys-and-board-games-have-an-upper-age-limit-usually-99">7-99</a></span>" advisories.</p><p>As five o' clock drew near, I tabbed out of Discord to refresh the game's Steam Store page and stap me if it wasn't up already. It must have gone Live about five minutes early. </p><p>I bought it and as soon as Steam had my money, an "<i>Install</i>" button popped. I wondered for a moment whether to ignore it and follow my original plan with the Stress Test client but it occured to me there was a fair chance doing that might cause some conflicts, so I decide to play safe and let Steam handle things the way it clearly wanted to.</p><p>Rather than sit staring at a download screen, I took Beryl out for a walk she didn't much want. Then, when we got back, I started writing this. </p><p>A quarter of a century spent watching progress bars fill. It's a life. I guess.</p><p>Steam helpfully sends an email whenever a game on your wishlist becomes available. I got mine for Nightingale about thirty seconds after the <i>PayPal </i>receipt confirming I'd bought it. </p><p>The email contains all the usual promotional pictures, text and links but it also includes something you don't often see these days: a street address. </p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEibVgvCnmb1yDxZqkexjMqV5SE6t_zRGRla_4vSm_lrmeUv4OuoN_nMUDZc_nRecT5xkadgDD1gjsLHo_jw1XVZxk-dC9_XaSHy3i5GSQsMq6EtVluDqW0sb9yll94I686XrFRgUbBmAVDopgKySCOwFs_UW2svnaIgGIJpdFEVkFgo8ZKql1Qz2bGKh2I/s614/igadd1.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="476" data-original-width="614" height="496" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEibVgvCnmb1yDxZqkexjMqV5SE6t_zRGRla_4vSm_lrmeUv4OuoN_nMUDZc_nRecT5xkadgDD1gjsLHo_jw1XVZxk-dC9_XaSHy3i5GSQsMq6EtVluDqW0sb9yll94I686XrFRgUbBmAVDopgKySCOwFs_UW2svnaIgGIJpdFEVkFgo8ZKql1Qz2bGKh2I/w640-h496/igadd1.png" width="640" /></a></div><br /> <p></p><p>Why the developers felt the need to include their full postal address I'm not really sure. Maybe they're hoping everyone will send them a Christmas card. </p><p>There's also a link to "<i>Add us to your address book</i>". I don't think I have one of those. </p><p>The last time I remember having an address book would be back in the 'nineties. I clicked the link to see what would happen and it opened a <i>Microsoft </i>app called "<i>People</i>", which I never knew existed. Then again, I try never to use any Microsoft apps if I can possibly avoid it. </p><p>After that, out of curiosity and because people in the Discord had been making some fairly big and confident claims about how well the game was going to do, I thought I'd see what impact it was making on the Steam charts, ninety minutes after launch.</p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjZnhHID4n51lek23Es3I0QTaOi0GgmOgGmoB6287jSUJrIjdmUxICkHMGUsgymvq62zEOfPmVqNw5Hz6Z8gUs_aI3NA6V2fVA-Ub1IAdns7Z-m9yl2m0D9edXf1zjCTpgucc8gsmq8ZyhfKq_CrqgYLx7VhcUgxjEya2Xu_6y4neacFSKnTHnwUtZo7_U/s767/steamerror1.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="171" data-original-width="767" height="142" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjZnhHID4n51lek23Es3I0QTaOi0GgmOgGmoB6287jSUJrIjdmUxICkHMGUsgymvq62zEOfPmVqNw5Hz6Z8gUs_aI3NA6V2fVA-Ub1IAdns7Z-m9yl2m0D9edXf1zjCTpgucc8gsmq8ZyhfKq_CrqgYLx7VhcUgxjEya2Xu_6y4neacFSKnTHnwUtZo7_U/w640-h142/steamerror1.png" width="640" /></a></div>I don't think that's a good sign. Or maybe it is. Maybe it means so many people are trying to play it broke the counter. I kinda doubt it, though.<p></p><p>Speaking of counters, mine says there's about half an hour to go. Just enough time to make myself a coffee and have a sandwich before I get to the next stage - the inevitable first-day patch.</p><p>With luck, I might yet get to make a character tonight. I was never expecting to play for real until tomorrow, anyway. Still, there's no need to let a little thing like not being able to log in to the game stop me posting about it on the first day, is there?</p><p>Apparently not. You're looking at the proof of that.<br /></p>Bhagpusshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03499162165023939880noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1510920011443550663.post-2633882371192206652024-02-19T16:56:00.005+00:002024-02-19T18:59:37.151+00:00Ignorance. Not Always As Blissful As It's Made Out To Be.<p>
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjC817BKu7F5qKFCjTZANoEaANtW0u3f9SgpYwipIMLAaGp3n1PQQWQYUQg-ioNwOqLzQt9QyhJAQBort4oJVvF8LbVO1CjETi2gFxxPN5zacr8ffPIfQLl6nJ8MGcAC8UprgedL7MVIZEJCwTT4tUi-lxMKTSeuDUrJ76Z5E2zRkuuFML6fW4jTyGmiAo/s1920/palwave1.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="1920" height="360" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjC817BKu7F5qKFCjTZANoEaANtW0u3f9SgpYwipIMLAaGp3n1PQQWQYUQg-ioNwOqLzQt9QyhJAQBort4oJVvF8LbVO1CjETi2gFxxPN5zacr8ffPIfQLl6nJ8MGcAC8UprgedL7MVIZEJCwTT4tUi-lxMKTSeuDUrJ76Z5E2zRkuuFML6fW4jTyGmiAo/w640-h360/palwave1.jpg" width="640" /></a>
</p>
<i>Tipa </i>at <i>Chasing Dings</i> posted
<a href="https://chasingdings.com/2024/02/18/palworld-is-a-thing-that-happened-i-guess/"><span style="color: #ff00fe;">a lengthy and detailed review of </span></a><i><a href="https://chasingdings.com/2024/02/18/palworld-is-a-thing-that-happened-i-guess/"><span style="color: #ff00fe;">Palworld</span></a> </i>yesterday. I'm sure it's both excellent and accurate, only
I got about a third of the way through and had to stop because it seemed like I
was reading about a completely different game to the one I'm playing. It
sounded like a much better one, too.
<p></p>
<p>
The opening paragraphs of Tipa's post deal with the plot, backstory and lore
of Palworld. It all sounds fascinating, particularly since I didn't realise Palworld <i>had </i>any.
</p>
<p></p>
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left;">
<tbody>
<tr>
<td style="text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjoITFe2tveJHrpCQ3R9CbkOg1nfT63sbMZGGOV1_Lpp2WJH4uGgUt7erV88bwfpJKUSHNA65SgWf8AyztaM6Fiv89zWMuy88bxfcSdSuxBrvKPtcNYurRUzBUUYFspkR7Vm2GPNJe2QsY9OSqRrhdvgNDN5_egQFSLsMwjEdaB1OaEXcaZs3yzqKBKvh0/s1259/pallore1.png" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1259" data-original-width="925" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjoITFe2tveJHrpCQ3R9CbkOg1nfT63sbMZGGOV1_Lpp2WJH4uGgUt7erV88bwfpJKUSHNA65SgWf8AyztaM6Fiv89zWMuy88bxfcSdSuxBrvKPtcNYurRUzBUUYFspkR7Vm2GPNJe2QsY9OSqRrhdvgNDN5_egQFSLsMwjEdaB1OaEXcaZs3yzqKBKvh0/w294-h400/pallore1.png" width="294" /></a>
</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: medium;">I feel kinda bad about fighting them now.</span><br />
</td>
</tr>
</tbody>
</table><p>
You might think the disparity in our experiences could be explained by the time we've each spent there. Tipa has put over a hundred hours into the
game, while I've only racked up about forty. But forty hours is still a lot.</p><p> Or maybe it's our relative levels. She's Level 43, while I'm only Level 26. Again, though, I'm still more than
half-way to the fifty-level cap.
</p><p></p>
<p>
You'd have
thought that would be far enough to let me see the shape of the game and start filling
out some of the detail. You'd certainly think that by half-way to cap, if
there <i>was </i>a plot I'd at least <i>know </i>about it.
</p>
<p>
Thinking back, I suppose I was briefly aware of something going on in the background.
Some kind of nominal narrative structure, at least. There was
<span style="color: #ff00fe;"><a href="https://bhagpuss.blogspot.com/2024/01/its-not-exploit-if-no-one-sees-you-do-it.html">that tower fight</a></span>
with <i>Zoe </i>and <i>Grizzbolt</i>. At the time it seemed like both the end of a
prologue and the beginning of a storyline.
</p>
<p>
Only it didn't go anywhere. I was Level 10 when I went into that tower and
Level 11 when I came out and in the following three weeks and fifteen levels I
haven't seen one word of any follow-up. Not a hint. Nothing.
</p>
<p></p>
<p></p>
<p>
The Tutorial ended and that was that. Since then I've just been exploring,
catching Pals, building my bases and levelling. There's been no shortage of
character progression but there's been no sign of a narrative of any kind.<br />
</p>
<p>
Tipa explains there are five tower bosses, representing five human factions on
the island. She describes this as being "<i>told environmentally, by glowing slates left in interesting places.</i>" I did find a few of those right at the start of the game. They save to a
Journal, which helpfully tells you there are thirty-nine altogether.
</p>
<p></p>
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right;">
<tbody>
<tr>
<td style="text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEijrr7z7nq0pnTudI8onBECq1_4wI8X5wMR85aLAHAjEsAxesCCApWXLM6842XrVHeCxGex_Y3PFgf9cx8fl5-gOp4AfnH1ycpixc0sQlHO3yG8sdkeERlEy_QUAYZxwQfOOOSZehv-MkeFXaTgnmF01IyYT79npDnb8l1z7nxEC9TQw-aNQYXy2Hqj2fY/s1038/pallore2.png" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1038" data-original-width="928" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEijrr7z7nq0pnTudI8onBECq1_4wI8X5wMR85aLAHAjEsAxesCCApWXLM6842XrVHeCxGex_Y3PFgf9cx8fl5-gOp4AfnH1ycpixc0sQlHO3yG8sdkeERlEy_QUAYZxwQfOOOSZehv-MkeFXaTgnmF01IyYT79npDnb8l1z7nxEC9TQw-aNQYXy2Hqj2fY/s320/pallore2.png" width="286" /></a>
</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: medium;">I figured.</span><br />
</td>
</tr>
</tbody>
</table><p>
I was keen to collect them and read them but in my forty hours so far I've found
just nine and all of those I found in my first week or so. I haven't seen a
single one since. </p><p>What's more, all but one that I have found have been part of the
<i>Castaway's Journal</i> series, which only tells you what you, as a player, have
probably already figured out, since you too are a castaway.<br />
</p><p></p>
<p>
Even without written evidence, I had figured out there were several rival
groups of humans on the island, mainly because I keep running into camps of them
and they keep shooting at me. Since none of them ever say anything, though,
and since there's never anything in their camps other than a single Pal in a
cage, I've taken to thinking of them in much the same light as the generic bandits
you find all across the <i>Karanas </i>in <i>EverQuest</i>, there to be killed and looted and not much more.
</p>
<p>
Tipa makes their rivalry, based on entirely different and mutually opposed
philosophies, sound a good deal more intriguing than that. I'd really like to know a lot
more about it. Only the game doesn't seem to want to tell me anything.
</p>
<p>
I had already been thinking a good deal on the moral implications of playing
Palworld, something that was made quite uncomfortable for me by having started playing the game at about the same time I began watching
<i>My Daemon</i>. At some point I do want to get into
that in a full post because, as Tipa suggests, it opens a whole can of very
distateful worms.
</p>
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left;">
<tbody>
<tr>
<td style="text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh9merG8u1csFueCCJZJpTit6uOTWh6jubHivj6EMvE93ikSIc1B_ubm_Z5tFxuZv7UicEHwciaCrLOfLILrYRsTHb_105Q7LQDw0FQbmgqQuJ8eopjZNjQiS39ky2ibApQBJAVLEh5Ej4m77usnGQQgSvp1FuJEfRX7fkqnnMl0y4WylB_1wYyrhgk8s0/s1723/palrad1.jpg" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="867" data-original-width="1723" height="322" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh9merG8u1csFueCCJZJpTit6uOTWh6jubHivj6EMvE93ikSIc1B_ubm_Z5tFxuZv7UicEHwciaCrLOfLILrYRsTHb_105Q7LQDw0FQbmgqQuJ8eopjZNjQiS39ky2ibApQBJAVLEh5Ej4m77usnGQQgSvp1FuJEfRX7fkqnnMl0y4WylB_1wYyrhgk8s0/w640-h322/palrad1.jpg" width="640" /></a>
</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: medium;">This, I did <i>not </i>know.</span><br />
</td>
</tr>
</tbody>
</table>
<p></p>
<p>
For now, though, I think I'm going to make looking for those informational
plaques more of a priority. Then again, given the amount of time I already spend
exploring and the fact that I make a bee-line for anything that glitters,
glows or looks remotely unusual, I'm not sure how much more I can do.
</p>
<p>
I suspect the prime reason I know so little about what's going on in
Palworld is my unwillingness to look anything up, read any guides, watch any
streams or do anything at all that might in any way give me more information
than I stumble upon by chance by playing the game. Because of that sort of behavior, as soon as the Tutorial ended, my every
successive discovery was left purely to chance. And that can be a very slow
process.
</p>
<p>
Case in point: in an earlier post, I made a snarky remark in a picture caption
about how you can make chairs in the game but you can't sit in them. In fact,
as far as I could tell, there were no emotes in the game at all, which I
thought was very odd.
</p>
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left;">
<tbody>
<tr>
<td style="text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjPiiD2-ct0b7YKeW4N-iW82bpopPF_4quXt8kiOJrapXaLntIoihvMKexqaXs1-pjGdsXMhjtrCbeTB9xs367rABEMwXmEBqpcPW5GXaWf_rXG8s_R0AzVOzNOExgJ_yH7CFQ-P3c9wpx1r0bm8KJoX2WhvlqT4HUnhgDx6mdaiQ9CxyaHZiVD7TVZs28/s1920/paldance1.jpg" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="1920" height="360" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjPiiD2-ct0b7YKeW4N-iW82bpopPF_4quXt8kiOJrapXaLntIoihvMKexqaXs1-pjGdsXMhjtrCbeTB9xs367rABEMwXmEBqpcPW5GXaWf_rXG8s_R0AzVOzNOExgJ_yH7CFQ-P3c9wpx1r0bm8KJoX2WhvlqT4HUnhgDx6mdaiQ9CxyaHZiVD7TVZs28/w640-h360/paldance1.jpg" width="640" /></a>
</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: medium;">What passes for dancing in Palworld, apparently.</span><br />
</td>
</tr>
</tbody>
</table>
<p>
And it would be, if it was true. Which it's not. There <i>are </i>emotes.
Not a whole lot of them but some. </p><p>What there's not is any obvious indication of how to access them. I stumbled
across them about an hour ago, completely by chance. Here's how.<br /></p>
<p>
If you stand near enough to one of your Pals a kind of tool-tip appears to
tell you can either press "<i>V</i>" to pick them up or "<i>4</i>" to interact
with them. Pressing "4" brings up a radial menu of Pal commands. This I knew
from pretty much the moment I tamed a Pal and let it loose in my base.
</p>
<p>
What I didn't know is that if you press 4 when there's no Pal nearby, a
completely different radial menu appears. This one allows you to issue battle
commands to your active Pal but it also leads to a third radial menu, this
time for Emotes.I only found this out by accidentally pressing 4 when I was too far away from a Pal I was trying to feed.<br /></p>
<p>
Once there, you can find not one but two sitting emotes; one for sitting on the ground and another for
sitting in chairs. The latter is a bit of a fudge, to be honest. It puts you
into a sitting position but unlike other games it doesn't automatically
position you on the nearest chair. You need to edge yourself into the right
spot first, then sit. Even so, the effect is pretty convincing.
</p>
<p></p>
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left;">
<tbody>
<tr>
<td style="text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjpHXT6vnPDMztFpVK34R9JMhXFGuWFmeigRJfz-Y31crRWTEdN04ybaVPg8SfEjq5HnzDsYnLqv1NIBXBafmKf8BuBisi7SEV5cGdYnElNF0rN2Mt35daksriK3lyJ3l_4qbCt5PdnqVrHdkNPWpSPrgM2ZUIlIp9F47UWLN-IaAJs63e-2pUnzBuLspY/s1920/palsit1.jpg" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="1920" height="360" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjpHXT6vnPDMztFpVK34R9JMhXFGuWFmeigRJfz-Y31crRWTEdN04ybaVPg8SfEjq5HnzDsYnLqv1NIBXBafmKf8BuBisi7SEV5cGdYnElNF0rN2Mt35daksriK3lyJ3l_4qbCt5PdnqVrHdkNPWpSPrgM2ZUIlIp9F47UWLN-IaAJs63e-2pUnzBuLspY/w640-h360/palsit1.jpg" width="640" /></a>
</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: medium;">Sittin' by the fire, the radio plays a little classical
music...</span><br />
</td>
</tr>
</tbody>
</table>
<p></p>
<p>
It's not even as if this information isn't there in the game
itself. There's a whole in-game <i>Survival Guide</i>, filled with handy tips for things you need to know. It even has a section called <i>Radial Menu</i>.
</p>
<p>
The thing is, I've been so strict about avoiding spoilers (Maybe stubborn
would be a better word for it.) I decided on Day One that everything in
that Guide counted as a spoiler. Until today I never really looked at it. I'm
beginning to think I may have been taking the whole "<i>No Spoilers</i>" thing
a touch too seriously.
</p>
<p>
And it's an apposite time to learn that lesson. At four in the afternoon
tomorrow, exactly twenty-four hours from now as I write,
<i>Nightingale </i>will enter Early Access. It's another game about which I
have made a concerted effort to know as little as possible. I want to be able
to go in fresh with as few expectations and assumptions as possible, so my
experience will be as organic and unmediated as it can be.
</p>
<p></p>
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left;">
<tbody>
<tr>
<td style="text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgogmGbty2plXNvC4P6sCMIeIlL4dHbijzvDjPqFAyQk3vX8RpqD0e3nuLwOdu8YYqVAt9UYd7tcShyphenhyphenWiEBtMfj-J74vz3DU3aUA5x3BpAvTozUjJTsLbm55k2890cWVEWIe8Tm33i508PX1OqFM-YEKhIQOdcCnJJVAVO27wbCFbRMMxh4UZyLfy7NGCg/s1920/palsun1.jpg" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="1920" height="360" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgogmGbty2plXNvC4P6sCMIeIlL4dHbijzvDjPqFAyQk3vX8RpqD0e3nuLwOdu8YYqVAt9UYd7tcShyphenhyphenWiEBtMfj-J74vz3DU3aUA5x3BpAvTozUjJTsLbm55k2890cWVEWIe8Tm33i508PX1OqFM-YEKhIQOdcCnJJVAVO27wbCFbRMMxh4UZyLfy7NGCg/w640-h360/palsun1.jpg" width="640" /></a>
</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: medium;">With every new day comes a new opportunity to learn.</span><br />
</td>
</tr>
</tbody>
</table>
<br />
<p></p>
<p>
Which all sounds very fine but there's discovering things for yourself and
then there's not finding out crucial information until it's too late. I'm at the point now, forty
hours and a month in, where I'm ready to start doing some research on
Palworld, to make sure I'm getting as much out of the game as I can. Only problem is, I'm also probably about to take a break from the game, thanks to Nightingale.</p><p>If
there's a lesson to be learned, it's probably that I need to be a tad more
flexible in future. Be less shy in looking for help, advice and suggestions,
when going into a new situation.
</p>
<p>
I'm not suggesting I'm going to go straight to an online guide to tell me how
to play every new game from now on. I'm just saying that if the game actually comes with a
guide, I probably ought at least to take a look at it. After all, when games
came in boxes I was one of those people who'd read the whole manual, cover to
cover, before I even logged in.
</p>
<p>
I'm not sure I want to go back to <i>that </i>level of nit-picking
preparedness but I feel, just maybe, I might have taken winging it as far as it can go. Somewhere between the two extremes would probably be a better place to rest.. </p><p>Now all I have to do is take my own advice. I'll get back to you on how <i>that </i>goes.<br /></p>
Bhagpusshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03499162165023939880noreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1510920011443550663.post-16520179737071521592024-02-17T19:45:00.000+00:002024-02-17T19:45:01.996+00:00Any Color You Like, So Long As It's Pink<p></p>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg25PDIkxLFqGNGlICrcaY8XT_D055M7VTju3uwUYHuCu0ZAKSqtRW69tJoMGuq383O7PFy1p10G56XKSHCpX69VROrGruWz3ZEb8Zo5KZh5l7e2XZS1BjeqfYuG9YEklX_REvfPm-ouRxa2kR_HpoR1PWdwufZXYjfNIfWKVUMaKOSWAbWKti35q_YUIU/s1920/eq2eday1.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1017" data-original-width="1920" height="340" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg25PDIkxLFqGNGlICrcaY8XT_D055M7VTju3uwUYHuCu0ZAKSqtRW69tJoMGuq383O7PFy1p10G56XKSHCpX69VROrGruWz3ZEb8Zo5KZh5l7e2XZS1BjeqfYuG9YEklX_REvfPm-ouRxa2kR_HpoR1PWdwufZXYjfNIfWKVUMaKOSWAbWKti35q_YUIU/w640-h340/eq2eday1.jpg" width="640" /></a>
</div>
Since <span style="color: #ff00fe;"><a href="https://bhagpuss.blogspot.com/2024/02/games-for-sale.html">that post</a></span>, where I talked about deciding to play some
<i>EverQuest II</i>, then spending less than five minutes in the game, I'm
happy to say I've now passed several happy hours there, having a very good time indeed.
It felt refreshing to go back to a more structured gaming experience after the
sandbox free-for-all of <i>Palworld</i>, although the degree to which my play in just about any game could reasonably be described as "<i>structured</i>"
is relative, at best.
<p></p>
<p>
I did at least manage to complete the next instance in the
<i>Ballads of Zimara</i> Signature Questline, along with several side-quests.
Experience comes so very much more slowly in <i>BoZ </i>than in recent expansions. I'm
still undecided whether I approve of the change or not but I'm fairly sure it will
put a stop to any fantasies I had about leveling all my
<i>Skyfire </i>characters to the cap before the next expansion.
</p>
<p>
That said, we are on a two-year cycle for level cap increases. Even with
the hyper-accelerated xp we were getting, I don't think I ever capped all my
characters until well into the second year. It may still be that I'll
catch up in 2025, just in time to slide right back down the hill for the
expansion after next, by which time the cap ought to go to 135.
</p>
<p>
I'm stuffed if I'm going to start planning two years ahead, anyway. I barely
plan two <i>days </i>ahead, most of the time. If I were more organized, I'd have started
in on the <i>Erollisi Day</i> event while there was more than four days left.
Of course, that would have required me to have had some sort of plan to do the
holiday content at all, which would have been be a plan I did not have at all, not until this
morning. </p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh4Bmn0Ur9PW57ZC8w05bYTemyws8NEDOm0KCipu7NKScnOSjvzurNbpi2Vtk-0vF_Q19fR_odpnQWZYiVjsMHhCwsG5hS3N5Z_pV9bdnxNMeuHCgD4euSoc5pnrv4RkH5fnKKGchBL8pUC4J-LR-Ueny1XE1MzR_PPG0jQvzPUdByFiWZdOA1bPAo7nxQ/s1920/eq2ph1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1017" data-original-width="1920" height="340" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh4Bmn0Ur9PW57ZC8w05bYTemyws8NEDOm0KCipu7NKScnOSjvzurNbpi2Vtk-0vF_Q19fR_odpnQWZYiVjsMHhCwsG5hS3N5Z_pV9bdnxNMeuHCgD4euSoc5pnrv4RkH5fnKKGchBL8pUC4J-LR-Ueny1XE1MzR_PPG0jQvzPUdByFiWZdOA1bPAo7nxQ/w640-h340/eq2ph1.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><p></p>
<p>
I logged in to finish off some of the aforementioned side-quests and it wasn't until I'd
finished that I suddenly remembered there was a holiday going on in <i>Norrath</i>. I
thought I'd read something about there being a new quest. I always try to
do those for every holiday. It seems rude not to.
</p>
<p>
Mostly, these days, what <i>Darkpaw </i>calls holiday "<i>quests</i>" are what
I'd call "<i>collections</i>". Which is fine. Collections are great. They're
easy, they're fun, they're relaxing; they're ideal holiday content. They
aren't bloody quests, though, so it would be nice if whoever writes the copy
for the promos would stop calling them that.
</p>
<p>
I'm long, long past the day when I find it fun to run aimlessly around
Freeport, looking for whichever NPC has been given the job of handing out the
starter for a new questline. I had a quick look at
<span style="color: #ff00fe;"><a href="https://www.everquest2.com/news/eq2-erollisi-day-2024">the official announcement,</a> </span>
where I learned the quest was called "<i>Can't Fight This Feeling</i>", then I googled to find out where to go.<br /></p><p>Last time I did something like this, I mentioned my concern, when I found out the relevant Holiday page on the <i>EQII </i>wiki hadn't been updated, even though the event had been going on for a while. I am here now to tell you I'm no less worried this time. If anything, more so.</p><p><span style="color: #ff00fe;"><a href="https://eq2.fandom.com/wiki/Erollisi_Day">The Erollisi Day page on the wiki</a></span> hasn't been touched since last year. The "<i>New This Yea</i>r" section reads <br /></p><h2><span class="mw-headline" id="New_This_Year">New This Year</span><span class="mw-editsection"></span></h2>
<b>The event will officially run from 02/9/2023 at 12:01am PST through 02/22/2023 at 11:59pm PST</b>
<p>That is... not encouraging.</p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhp4HZ3JEevGZbsq3OBNO_qEfWk5q7A2LlimPa706HBGT3deWH2fti4OwwwFxeG7_HPw5PDFZkHegjbmCzU74gO8-Kdx4zgC5k5rj2ICFVVbknuhDSZ85VNaeENGi2VfFtjsb5vfdgS3n3mmdKFEfKu7QqQx_5PiDNeItXvuwwORWOVEPP-2K5KJ9bkIsY/s510/eq2edq1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="510" data-original-width="432" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhp4HZ3JEevGZbsq3OBNO_qEfWk5q7A2LlimPa706HBGT3deWH2fti4OwwwFxeG7_HPw5PDFZkHegjbmCzU74gO8-Kdx4zgC5k5rj2ICFVVbknuhDSZ85VNaeENGi2VfFtjsb5vfdgS3n3mmdKFEfKu7QqQx_5PiDNeItXvuwwORWOVEPP-2K5KJ9bkIsY/s320/eq2edq1.jpg" width="271" /></a></div>Fortunately, we can always rely on <i>Naimi Denmother</i> for holiday updates. I went to <span style="color: #ff00fe;"><a href="https://eq2.eqtraders.com/articles/article_page.php?article=q1034&menustr=080000000000">EQ2 Traders <br />Corner</a></span> and found everything I needed. The new quest is indeed a collection, of sorts. One of those where you do other quests and kill mobs and among the drops you find something unfamiliar that, when you examine it, offers up a "<i>quest</i>". <p></p><p>That quest inevitably consists of carrying on doing whatever it was you were doing until a bunch more things drop, each of which updates your "<i>quest</i>" in exactly the way a collection would, except without troubling you to click them to add them to an actual collection. Then, when you have them all, you go talk to someone, who gives you a reward. Just like you'd hand in a completed collection.</p><p>You see where I'm going with this. I think the way it qualifies as a "<i>quest</i>" is that the person you give the stuff to has a short conversation with you, whereas the Collector would simply say "<i>That's a decent find. I'll give you something for it</i>" or words to that effect. That and not having to click anything. It's a fine definition, for sure.<br /></p><p>According to EQ2 Traders, the quest starter drops either from mobs in <i>The Shard of Love</i> or <i>Nektropos Castle: Love's Errand</i>, a holiday version of the infamous necromancer's lair. I'm often complaining about how poor my memory is but one thing I do seem to be able to remember with worrying clarity is where things are in Norrath. Worrying, that is, because it shows how much of my life I must have spent there.</p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhOed2Tc5CWkFHEdhtEJEphc2EO50HQZsnwRQVHzFKL176cpV8FYil6QJLZaK5NgSXysmd4MnOUkIZg9R2ohFb3oOO-sNvSAeXlYicwqRCEpIFe3O8Ttc2Ac7c8Uqrh1t1k2JuXU5TE3xVfnCQzq7DVcpL7xSnE8uIu17P6jOxBPRsp-yLOJU7dmNb4TBg/s686/eq2edw1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="686" data-original-width="424" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhOed2Tc5CWkFHEdhtEJEphc2EO50HQZsnwRQVHzFKL176cpV8FYil6QJLZaK5NgSXysmd4MnOUkIZg9R2ohFb3oOO-sNvSAeXlYicwqRCEpIFe3O8Ttc2Ac7c8Uqrh1t1k2JuXU5TE3xVfnCQzq7DVcpL7xSnE8uIu17P6jOxBPRsp-yLOJU7dmNb4TBg/w248-h400/eq2edw1.jpg" width="248" /></a></div>I seemed to recall the entrance to the Shard of Love being right next to the docks in <i>Everfrost</i>. I also thought I remembered it being a rather easy-to-navigate and generably enjoyable zone, unlike <i>Nektropos Castle</i>, which is a bit of a maze inside, with lots of locked and secret doors and hidden passages, as you'd expect in a dark and foreboding place like that.<p></p><p>To cut short what could easily turn into an unnecessarily long story, I was right in all respects. I found the entrance with no difficulty but then had to go in and come out again because the Shard only scales to 90 and I was on my Berserker, who's coming up to 128. There was an "<i>Agnostic</i>" version of the instance, one that works for any level, but I didn't remember what "<i>Agnostic</i>" meant in EQII until quite a bit later, so I ignored it.<br /></p><p>It wouldn't have made much difference to my stated goal of doing the new quest, anyway. The mobs were all grey but they still dropped holiday items. I was going to carry on like that but what happened was, I spawned the first Named mob within a minute of entering the zone and then couldn't bear to think of killing it and not getting whatever it might drop. </p><p>A quick trip back to Freeport to mentor down to 85 soon fixed that and it was just as well I took the trouble because I quickly realized what a really great holiday Erollisi Day is... if you like playing dressing up. Which, obviously, I do.<br /></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjvPwCrWnKCksnQR9Y1IN5yTsWF9YmGM6p5DojuJyWgY5B8mD2QyTgVywEuaigTV329RysZI1Pt83uBWzNYfMZs8ou9tfkqKJAQeArtyb9eqKkcFvxwFaKxx1zc9PD2jkPVjs3j-0BrG8U_xQhUJ6NU9GPJapF7XkPgsi-ARScyC1nACsGmUEhTyySht8U/s306/eq2coupon1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="265" data-original-width="306" height="265" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjvPwCrWnKCksnQR9Y1IN5yTsWF9YmGM6p5DojuJyWgY5B8mD2QyTgVywEuaigTV329RysZI1Pt83uBWzNYfMZs8ou9tfkqKJAQeArtyb9eqKkcFvxwFaKxx1zc9PD2jkPVjs3j-0BrG8U_xQhUJ6NU9GPJapF7XkPgsi-ARScyC1nACsGmUEhTyySht8U/s1600/eq2coupon1.jpg" width="306" /></a></div>It's been a long time since I did this particular holiday with anything like serious intent. I'd forgotten it was one Mrs Bhagpuss and I used to farm for appearance gear and house items, back in the day. It was always very good for that and a lot more seems to have been added to the loot tables since then. All good stuff, too.<br /><p></p><p>One thing dropped that I have never seen before and now find myself wondering if it's new this year and if so how many more like it we'll be seeing: a coupon for 20% off all Erollisi Day items in the Cash Shop. At this point I'd love to be able to tell you I was outraged and plan to cancel my subscription in protest but actually I was unreasonably excited. I went straight to the Cash Shop and spent ten enjoyable minutes going through everything in the relevant section, coming away with the gorgeous, pink pegasus you can see me riding in the screenshots.</p><p>I was only thinking yesterday, as I collected my monthly 500DBC stipend and saw the total tick past 33,000DBC that I probably ought to think about spending some of it. Now I have and if I get any more of those vouchers I'll almost certainly spend some more. There are some really nice things in there!</p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi-CCuptCO3J4gHHwvvxcSb6vhAz2lG345rYTCxjTnMHaTCY0suDrlYSV9bNFFK5PyZ4oE5-BpHZ560iS_OEUoqgBnEq0n2IsemRsp2ZI6nbfjR7gvlq0rftBFgE4gKRn_uCCKvW76kdpPqSPA1OQO74f9DJKd8AwdNfsZVnZd4iG_hEG-4P46ric1kzc4/s829/eq2edcloak1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="829" data-original-width="434" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi-CCuptCO3J4gHHwvvxcSb6vhAz2lG345rYTCxjTnMHaTCY0suDrlYSV9bNFFK5PyZ4oE5-BpHZ560iS_OEUoqgBnEq0n2IsemRsp2ZI6nbfjR7gvlq0rftBFgE4gKRn_uCCKvW76kdpPqSPA1OQO74f9DJKd8AwdNfsZVnZd4iG_hEG-4P46ric1kzc4/w336-h640/eq2edcloak1.jpg" width="336" /></a></div>There are also some really nice things for sale on the Erollisi Day vendor and even more going free in the chests dropped by all the Named mobs in the Shard of Love. It didn't take me long to decide a pink mount deserves a pink rider. I bought my Berserker a pink outfit and a pink hat. <p></p><p>I also bought him a pink cloak and then another cloak, even flashier, albeit not so pink, dropped off one of the Nameds, but he isn't wearing either of them. That's because he was lucky enough to get the <i>Valorous Wings</i> as a drop in <i>Mithaniel Marr</i>'s <i>Lovely Treasure Trov</i>e chest on the first kill. Some people report having to wait a while for those. Like forty kills. Or more.<br /></p><p>The reward for the new quest is also a back item - the<i> Huntress' Mounted Quiver </i>- so I'm spoiled for choice. Yet again, I'm reminded how incredibly generous EQII is with appearance gear and house items. </p><p>I mean, yes, there's great-looking stuff in the Cash Shop, but the reason I have so much DBC saved up is that there's always such a fire-hose of really nice drops and rewards in the game itself, I hardly ever even think of spending my funny money. Coming from a decade of <i>Guild Wars 2</i>, one of the stingiest games for appearance and cosmetic gear I've ever played, it's hard to overstate just how refreshing it is to be able to log in knowing I have a great chance of getting something worth having every single session.</p><p>I'm working tomorrow and <i>Nightingale </i>arrives on Tuesday, the same day the Erollisi event ends, so I barely have any time to farm for more stuff. If I can fit in a session or two, I'd like to get some goodies for a few of my other characters, especially a couple on other servers, who won't have the benefit of the duplicate Heirlooms I've been getting as I farm.<br /></p><p>It'll make a nice change from all that surviving - for a day or so. Then it's back to punching trees, I guess. At least until the next Norrathian holiday rolls around.</p>Bhagpusshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03499162165023939880noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1510920011443550663.post-34878004222919679602024-02-16T13:00:00.001+00:002024-02-16T13:47:04.900+00:00If You're Gonna Do It, Do It Right<p>
</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj9_F3_ceXrYzXmBvlYMK5uRzk3P7AEfX45Nttes012ydD6-IyLZqkzV9YeMY8jZMXhiZFeM6CdtZDEYUrpFexjQOoV1rjEvmArqP_mVailAbrw_iJmNZl5xJAzzxDq6XRljH19gjYSYPYQVJ8gvq1Fj5xxX-A8cATkmdstbQWhqyU1AOwvLie-KCc6pWo/s1920/coverblue1.png" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="917" data-original-width="1920" height="306" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj9_F3_ceXrYzXmBvlYMK5uRzk3P7AEfX45Nttes012ydD6-IyLZqkzV9YeMY8jZMXhiZFeM6CdtZDEYUrpFexjQOoV1rjEvmArqP_mVailAbrw_iJmNZl5xJAzzxDq6XRljH19gjYSYPYQVJ8gvq1Fj5xxX-A8cATkmdstbQWhqyU1AOwvLie-KCc6pWo/w640-h306/coverblue1.png" width="640" /></a></div><br />As threatened, here's a whole post full of covers. It seems as though several
new ones pop up in my feeds every day. I think I might be getting cover
fatigue. Why should I be the only one?.
<p></p>
<p>
I was about to make some fatuous point about the way the worldwide web and music
streaming services have shoved people doing other peoples' songs to the
forefront of the culture but then I realized it was twaddle. It's been like
that forever. The one really big difference now, in the days of the internet,
is the speed with which it happens.
</p>
<p>
It used to be that you'd go see a band and they'd come out for the encore and
do some song by someone else you never expected them to even know, let alone
cover, and you'd feel blessed and privileged to have been there and seen it.
Now, every time any band covers any song by anyone even once, it's online<i> </i>in a dozen shaky phone saves before the band are even back on the bus.
And if it's a half-way well-known band there's a squib on the music news feeds so everyone hears about it.
</p>
<p>
Plus you soon realize that band played that song on every fricken date on the
tour so now it doesn't seem quite so magical after all. Ditto the endless
albums of collections of curated covers by famous, semi-famous and
wish-they-were famous artists of other famous or more often cult-famous bands
and singers, not to mention the obligatory "<i>my favorite songs or at least the ones we could afford the rights for</i>" covers albums by acts maybe not quite at the top of their careers or
conversely <i>so </i>at the top of their careers no-one can stop them
indulging their every whim...
</p>
<p>
...and the <i>YouTube </i>channels and radio stations that have
everyone who comes in to do a set of originals also do a cover (Looking at
you, <i>TripleJ</i> and <i>Live Lounge</i>...) and the bands and artists that
make an entire career out of doing nothing but weird covers of unlikely songs
(That'll be you,
<i>Nouvelle Vague, Postmodern Jukebox, Puddles Pity Party...</i>)<br />
</p>
<p>
So, yeah, there are <i>a lot</i> of covers. And yet, no matter how many there are,
how glutted the market, a really good cover never fails to amaze and delight.
I have a couple of dozen new or new-to-me covers in my covers folder right now, all gathered in the last month or so. It's too many
for one post but we might get through half of them. I just have to make sure it's
the better half.
</p>
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<div style="text-align: center;">
<b><span style="font-size: x-large;"><i>Dog Days Are Over</i> - The Last Dinner Party</span></b>
</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b><span style="font-size: x-large;"> </span><span style="font-size: medium;">(Florence and the Machine
<span style="color: #04ff00;"> <span><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JrYnggjTJfk">cover</a></span></span>)</span></b><br />
</div>
<div>
<p>
Let's begin with the band of the moment. After a lengthy and extremely
well-managed build-up, the debut album is finally with us and it's <span style="color: #ff00fe;"><a href="https://www.officialcharts.com/chart-news/the-last-dinner-party-prelude-to-ecstasy-debut-number-1-album/">breaking sales records</a></span>. There's a lot of hype and a deal of suspicion about<i>
Last Dinner Party</i>
but screw all that. The performances speak for themselves.
</p>
<p>
I've never been much of a <i>Florence </i>fan although she's always been
popular in this house. I do like a couple of her songs, though and
this is one of them.
</p>
<p>
It also gives me the opportunity to mention something really obvious about
covers that I probably don't always emphasize enough, namely that for a
cover to work <i>as </i>a cover you really do need to be pretty familiar
with the original. Otherwise it's just a song. If they'd covered pretty much
any <i>Florence and the Machine</i> song but this or
<i><span style="color: #04ff00;"><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1SmxVCM39j4">Kiss With A Fist</a></span></i>, I wouldn't even have known it was a cover without someone telling me. <br /></p>
<p>This time, I think just about everything I've picked is so well known that shouldn't be a problem. Then again...<br /></p>
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<div style="text-align: center;">
<b><span style="font-size: x-large;"><i>One Of Your Girls</i> - The Last Dinner Party </span></b>
</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b><span style="font-size: medium;">(Troy Sivane cover)</span></b><br />
</div>
</div>
<div>
<p>
Case in point. I've never heard the original of this. I want to now, though.
That's something a good cover of a song you don't know always does - makes
you want to go listen to
<span style="color: #04ff00;"><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZhGl8McrOHo">the original</a></span>. Partly to compare, partly just to know. I always want to know.
</p>
<p>
Come to think of it, I probably should always include a link to the
original. Or to the version that's being covered, since sometimes what
you're hearing is someone's cover of someone else's cover. Hang on a moment
- let me just go back and retro-fit a link to the original on that first one...
</p>
<p>Okay. We're good!</p>
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</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: x-large;"><b><i>What I Was Made For</i> - Troy Sivane </b></span>
</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: medium;"><b>(Billie Eilish
<span style="color: #04ff00;"> <span><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cW8VLC9nnTo">cover</a></span></span>)</b></span>
</div>
</div>
<div> </div>
<div>
No excuse for not knowing this one. How many times has this song turned up in a post here, now? Gotta be four or
five. I'd bet it won't be the last, either.
</div>
<p></p>
<div>
There are a few ways to do a cover: <br /></div><ul><li>You can take a very well-known song and do
it very differently, which can be either genius or hubris or, in the case of
transposing an upbeat, cheerful song into a minor key and playing it at half the original
tempo, or taking a slow, sad song and punking it up, incredibly clichéd. </li><li>You can - and far, far too many people do - take
a well-known song and do it <i>exactly </i>the same as the original, like it was karaoke night at your local bar and there was a prize at the end. </li><li>You can take an obscure song and do it however you like, same or
different, because everyone will think it's yours anyway, unless you tell
them. <br /></li></ul>
<div>
Or you can do it the hardest way of all, which is to take a great song, sing it
straight, and still hope to make it seem like it was worth doing and you brought something new.
Congratulations, <i>Troy</i>. It was and you did.
</div>
<div><br /></div>
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<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b><span style="font-size: x-large;"><i>Barbie Girl</i> - Janet Devlin </span></b>
</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b><span style="font-size: medium;">(Aqua cover)</span></b>
</div>
<p></p>
<p>
And now, in a practical demonstration of why you should never listen to
anything I say, here's an upbeat song re-framed as a slow ballad in a minor
key that's the very antithesis of cliché. Instead, it opens up the
original, revealing a raw interior I, for one, never realized was there.
</p>
<p>
I mean, come on! Did you? I've heard
<span style="color: #04ff00;"><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZyhrYis509A"><i>Aqua</i>'s <i>Barbie Girl</i></a></span>
a thousand times. I've always loved it. It's a happy, bouncy, singalong
nursery rhyme with a glam sensibility and a mindless refrain, made for bawling ironically when drunk. Isn't it?
</p>
<p>
No, apparently not. I'm ashamed to say that until I heard this cover, I'd never
really listened to the words before. And, yes, <i>Janet Devlin</i> has, as she
says in the notes on YouTube, given the lyric a bit of a re-write, but after I
heard her reading I went and read
<span style="color: #ff00fe;"><a href="https://www.google.com/search?client=firefox-b-d&q=barbie+girl+lyrics">the original lyric</a></span>
and she's done no more than change the emphasis to bring out the dark
desperation already there, trapped in the Aqua original.
</p>
<p>
That's what a really good cover can do. Open up the original so you see it
afresh. I have several more examples. Here's a good one.
</p>
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<b><i> </i><span style="font-size: x-large;"><i>Super Trouper </i>- The Japanese House</span></b>
</div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<b><span style="font-size: medium;">(ABBA<span style="color: #04ff00;"><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BshxCIjNEjY"> cover</a></span>)</span></b>
</div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div>
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I don't like ABBA. I have never liked ABBA. I'm as sure as I can be I never
will like ABBA. Consequently, I have never really listened to the words of any
of their irritatingly chirpy little ditties. I assumed, if I ever thought about it at
all, that they'd be as dimly facile as the infuriatingly catchy
melodies.
</div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
Obviously, I was wrong. I won't say this cover opened my eyes to ABBA's
virtues the way S<i>onic Youth</i>'s incandescent, revelatory version of
<span style="color: #04ff00;"><i><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y21VecIIdBI">Superstar </a></i></span>revealed to me the sheer majesty, tragedy and genius of <i>Karen Carpenter</i> that
had previously been hidden behind the glare of her public image, but it's
certainly gone some way to make me take the Swedish legacy act a little more
seriously. Or at the very least, to listen to what they're actually singing
about.
</div>
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<div style="text-align: center;">
<b><span style="font-size: x-large;"><i>Lose Yourself</i> - Kasey Chambers </span></b>
</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b><span style="font-size: medium;">(Eminem<span style="color: #04ff00;">
<span><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_Yhyp-_hX2s">cover</a></span></span>)</span></b><br />
</div>
<div>
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
While we're on the subject of incendiary covers...
</div>
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
This is over eight minutes long but I insist you listen to it all the way through. It builds and builds until the catharsis of the release comes as a
glorious explosion. This is a prime example of taking a song so perfect in
its original incarnation it seems impossible to match let alone better and
then doing it anyway.
</div>
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
Not that I'm saying Kasey does it better than <i>Eminem</i>. Not <i>better</i>, any
more than <i>Tori Amos</i>'
<span style="color: #04ff00;"><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vDaFF3COQq0">cover </a></span>of <i>Bonnie & Clyde</i> is better. In each case, it's just better that both versions exist. Together they are more. </div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"> </div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">Eminem is a legend for reasons and
one of those reasons is his storytelling. All good stories thrive in the telling and<i> Kasey Chambers</i> knows how to tell a
story. That's all.<br /></div>
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</div>
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<span style="font-size: x-large;"><b><i>Fade Into You</i> - American Football </b></span>
</div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: medium;"><b><i>(Mazzy Star cover)</i></b></span>
</div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<span style="font-size: small;"><b><i> </i></b></span>
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<span style="font-size: small;">There are songs no-one can cover and there are songs everyone thinks
they can cover and all too often they're the same songs. No-one should cover
<i><span style="color: #04ff00;"><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ImKY6TZEyrI">Fade Into You</a></span></i>. No-one can hope to match <i>Hope</i>. </span>
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<span style="font-size: small;"> </span>
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<span style="font-size: small;">Unless...<br /></span>
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<span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span>
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<span style="font-size: x-large;"><b><i>Fade Into You/Lover</i> - Suki Waterhouse</b></span>
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<span style="font-size: medium;"><b>Mazzy Star/Taylor Swift <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-BjZmE2gtdo"><span style="color: #04ff00;">cover</span></a></b><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-BjZmE2gtdo"><span style="color: #04ff00;"><b><br /></b></span></a></span>
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<span style="font-size: small;"> </span>
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<span style="font-size: small;">Or ...</span>
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<span style="font-size: small;"> </span>
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<span style="font-size: small;">Seriously, if you can do it <i>that </i>well and you have such great
ideas for the visuals or you can make those kinds of connections... y'know
what? Go for it.</span>
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<span style="font-size: small;"> </span>
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<span style="font-size: x-large;"><b><i>Sweet Jane</i> - (Hardly Strictly) Bluegrass</b></span>
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<span style="font-size: medium;"><b>(Velvet Underground <span style="color: #04ff00;"><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uHxLawJONeQ">cover</a></span>)</b></span>
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<span style="font-size: small;"></span>
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<span style="font-size: small;"> </span>
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<span style="font-size: small;">There are a lot of <i>Velvet Underground</i> covers. Really far too many.
And of all the classics in the Velvets' back catalog,
<i>Sweet Jane</i> has to be the most covered of them all. I once made an
entire C90 cassette of Sweet Jane covers and that was in the 90s, when I
didn't have YouTube to search them out for me. I didn't need it. I had enough on vinyl and CD already. Right there
<i>in my house</i>!</span>
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<span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span>
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<span style="font-size: small;">That was about thirty years ago. How many of the things do you imagine
there are now? Who'd imagine there'd be anything new to do with the old
chestnut? Well, I guess you could get a bunch of bluegrass musicians with
banjos and mandolins to back <i>Chuck Prophet</i> from
<i>Green on Red </i>and see how that turned out...</span>
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<span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span>
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<span style="font-size: small;">I'd say it turned out just fine.</span>
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<span style="font-size: x-large;"><b><i>Flowers </i>- Bowling For Soup</b></span>
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<span style="font-size: medium;"><b>(Miley Cyrus<span style="color: #04ff00;">
<span><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G7KNmW9a75Y">cover</a></span></span>)</b></span>
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<span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span>
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<span style="font-size: small;">Now we're out of the woods! Bring on the fun stuff!</span>
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<span style="font-size: small;">I love <i>Bowling For Soup</i>. I particularly love the way they just go
on and on being Bowling For Soup, never trying to be anything different or
cooler or more respectable. Really a lot like <i>Miley</i>, now I come to
think of it...</span>
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<span style="font-size: small;"> </span>
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<span style="font-size: x-large;"><b><i>Intergalactic </i>- ATARASII GAKKO! </b></span>
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<span style="font-size: medium;"><b>(Beastie Boys <span style="color: #04ff00;"><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qORYO0atB6g">cover</a></span>)</b></span>
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<span style="font-size: small;">Some covers just feel inevitable.</span>
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<span style="font-size: small;">Now all I need is for <i>Atarashii Gakko!</i> to cover<i>
<span style="color: #04ff00;"><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3h2PJqUMoY0">Death To The Apple Gerls</a></span></i>
and my life will be complete.</span>
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<span style="font-size: x-large;"><b><i>Blue Skies</i> - Lana del Rey</b></span>
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<span style="font-size: medium;"><b>(Irving Berlin cover)</b></span>
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<span style="font-size: small;">I may have been a tad sniffy about a few of <i>Lana</i>'s covers in the
past - I really don't like her version of <i>Blue Velvet</i> but then it's
a very dull song - but she's done some absolute corkers, too. This is just
wonderful. A complete re-imagining of a song so old and tired you might
have thought it would be cruel to wake it up.</span>
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<span style="font-size: small;">For once, I've had to attribute it to the songwriter, not the
original performer, because honestly I have no idea which of the many
recorded versions of this is reckoned to be the original. The true original version was by <i>Belle Baker, </i>who first sang it in an all-but forgotten musical called <i>Betsy </i>but as far as a cursory google search will tell me, she never set it to shellac or whatever they were using back in 1926.</span>
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<span style="font-size: small;">I say we all agree this is the definitive version now and leave it at
that. And the same for this post. I got half-way through the pile and I
think I used all of the best ones so it would only be downhill from here if I carried on.</span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: small;"> </span>
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Okay, granted I didn't get to give you <i>Rick Astley</i>'s take on
<i>Yes</i>'s
<span style="color: #04ff00;"><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W2cb8NH8Ro4"><i>Owner of a Lonely Heart</i>
</a></span>but you can't have everything, now, can you?
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<p>
I'll maybe save that for next time. Because there <i>will </i>be a next
time. It's not like people are going to stop mak<span style="font-size: small;">ing covers any time much before the heat-death of the universe...</span><span style="font-size: small;"> </span><br />
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Bhagpusshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03499162165023939880noreply@blogger.com4