A Cataclysmic Beginning to a Cataclysmic... Beginning

So patch 4.0.1 for Blizzard's World of Warcraft has been out for a while now (since before Halloween I believe), and it's received a lot of mixed reviews. The new resource mechanics for several of the classes (especially hunters!) had a lot of people scrambling to figure out their new rotations. Personally, I just gave up on my hunter until Cataclysm: when the expansion hits the shelves on December 7th, I'm just gonna make a Worgen, but that's not important. Today I want to look at how the world is slowly changing as C-Day slowly draws nearer.

   Elemental invasion, you say?! Well sound the call to arms!  

   If any of you have been on recently, you've surely noticed the quests appearing in Orgrimmar and Stormwind. I'm going to try to summarize what's happened so far, as of November 15th. Now keep in mind that I play a Horde character, so that's the point of view this is coming from. I've heard the Alliance version is very similar. So the Twilight's Hammer Clan, or Cult as they've become, have begun to work under Cho'gall; (whom some of you may remember from Warcraft 2) to prepare the way for Deathwing by destroying Orgrimmar (and Stormwind). To that end, they've begun to infiltrate the population, and are preparing ritual sites throughout the city, from which to launch an elemental invasion. Garrosh Hellscream, now acting Warchief of the Horde, has had the military (who ask for the players' help) heavily increase security (in one quest, you are tasked with patting down civilians who attempt to enter the city). Eventually after infiltrating the Cult, earning their trust, and learning the ritual with which they will summon the elementals, you are tasked with destroying each site, and that's as far as the story has progressed up to this point. Oh, and on a side-note, Thrall has traveled to Outland to join the Earthen Ring, leaving the Horde under Garrosh's command (hooray for a return to a militaristic Horde!).

   I will try to update the blog as more quests are added: WoW and Cataclysm will probably become my main priority for a while, though I am pretty engrossed in a book that I'd like to review when I'm finished with it.

Giant Ants and Cazadors Aren't the Only Bugs in New Vegas

So New Vegas has been out for, oh, I'd say less than a month now? I finally beat it the other night (on PC) and can confidently say that it's a great FPS and RPG hybrid, just like Fallout 3 was. However, I'm sure I'm not the first person to encounter some problems during my travels in the Mojave Wasteland.

   I remember back when 3 came out, and there were a lot of complaints regarding bugs on the PC version of the game. Whether it be because of the monster of an Alienware I had back then, or just sheer luck, the only problems I encountered were a few crashes while exiting the game. Now that New Vegas is out, however, I think I understand how those people felt. Even with my hella-fast XPS-260 video card (I've got a 500 on the way!), I encountered a few areas and combat situations that felt, for lack of a better word... sticky. *Possible Spoiler* I could be fighting the hordes of Legion at the Hoover Dam and not experience a thing, but trying to find the All-American in Vault 34 was like wading through a time-dialation field from some old Star Trek episode. Also, for anyone who pre-ordered the game at Gamestop, you may have noticed that the Weathered 10mm Pistol can't have a silencer equipped without the model completely dissappearing and forming an exclamation mark above the Courier's head (I confirmed this on PC and 360, a friend of mine had the same problem).

   Now, I don't want this to become a ranting thread, but it REALLY pisses me off when a game gets released that could still use a lot of work. Another great example was S.T.A.L.K.E.R. Call of Pripyat, in which I couldn't even finish the damn game! Cmon Obsidian/Bethesda, look at how successful Bioware and Blizzard (for the most part on the latter) are with releasing finished games. All I'm asking, and I'm sure that everyone else would agree, is that video-game designers in general take just a little more time polishing off the game before rushing it to the shelf.

   If you've got any bugs or buggy games you think should be known about, be sure to name em in a reply!

Introduction

Hello to everyone who was unlucky enough to stumble upon this page! This is my first blog, so I'll be doing a lot of trial and error while I figure out how everything is done.

Basically, I want this to be a blog for fans of video games (specifically RPGs like Fallout, Dragon Age, WoW etc., though I will review many others) and fiction novels (fanasy and science fiction for the most part). I've found that a lot of these games or books that I finish leave me wanting to discuss them with other people, though usually my friends' tastes differ from mine, and so I've decided to try my hand at blogging.

Give it a chance, see how things end up, and let me know what you think of how I handle things here: I'd like to learn and improve. Right now it's late, and I'm waist-deep in crap that I need to finish, and so I'll try to post my first real discussion tomorrow night over the newly-released Fallout: New Vegas. I'll try not to spoil anything, but if I can't resist, I'll be sure to place plenty of alerts.