Thoughts on L4D: Crash Course

It came as a bit of a surprise to find out that there was going to be some new DLC for L4D, Valve really didn't make a lot of noise about it, unlike when they did the Survival pack. After finally getting to play it I can see why there was so little fanfare.

Was there anything wrong with it? No, not really, it was basically the same as all the existing campaigns, you run through a city in an eternal dusk setting shooting zombies and trying to find you're way to safety. I have only two minor problems with the game:

1. The campaign was way too short, consisting of two maps, one set in an industrial/warehouse district, prompting you to run through a maze of storeroom, offices, and alleys due to street blockage caused by jackknifed semis and the sort, and a finale episode that entails you to run through a fairly extensive shipping yard to get to a vehicle designed to travel the streets safely. Seriously though, if you're escape vehicle is a ten minute run from the safe house, can this really be called a safe house? Seems to me this is just a house, but I digress.

2. Guns and ammo are everywhere to be found. On the surface this may not seem like a problem, but the degree to which weapons and ammunition are scattered throughout the levels was one of the main atmosphere setters in the original campaigns. You were always aware of how many rounds you had left because that's how close to death you were at all times, but Crash Course apparently had an M-16 fairy run through the entire map sprinkling her certain brand of love. It got to the point that I was more worried about hurting myself tripping over piles of ammo in the street than the zombies getting to me. The one thing they did do is limit the health packs, however that's still not the same thing as limiting the firepower; as long as I had one point of health left I could continue shooting, you never had to worry about being defenseless AND hurt.

Along with the guns and ammo, there were an almost unlimited supply of gas cans and propane tanks laying around to shoot, not to mention the pipebombs and Molotovs; I think this is a sign of Valve trying to cater to the instant gratification crowd, giving more and better destructible environments, something I personally don;t need, but it's no biggie. One feature I really liked though was in the finale, you're required to flip a switch to start a generator, bringing a horde of zombies down on your team; the catch was that you have to stand there in the open for about 10 seconds doing nothing button hold the switch in order to activate the generator. On top of that, you need to do this again in the middle of the fight in order to restart the generator. A lot easier said than done.

So there you go, all in all it's a good add-on. A quick campaign that can be played relatively painlessly. I would also say that the maps seem to be longer than any of the original campaigns and I think the graphics are a little smoother. My opinion is that this is essentially a beta for Left 4 Dead 2, what you see here is what you'll be seeing there, based on the screenshots I've seen of the new game.

Since it's free, as long as you have the PC version, there's no reason not to get it and play it. If you have the 360 version I would seriously consider waiting for L4D 2 and saving the 500 odd points that Microsoft is charging.

Top 10 Movie Plot Holes

God I wish I could take credit for this one, but I can't. I do however have to say most, not all, but most of these questions have crossed my mind at one point or another during my life time.

Top-10-Unanswered-questions

Gotta say, number 10 is the one that bothered me the most, even back in the days before I knew anything about networking computers or viruses I wondered how the hell they did that one.

Robs Thoughts on WoW Classes

I've been playing pretty religiously for the last 3 months now and I have to say I'm really set in this game, Blizzard has truly created an immersive world that draws the player in, This is in no small part due to the surrounding actions of the game, not just the hack and slash, although without that there's little point in playing the game, but the things you do in between the hacking and slashing. Add the race/class mix in and this game just doesn't give up.

So what are my favorites you ask? I'm glad you did! Today I'm just going to address the race/class thing (mainly class).

I freely admit that I haven't tried as much as the game as I would have liked to (yet) so my opinions are slightly limited, but I have managed to bring a Warrior, a Hunter, and a Paladin up through the ranks with an assorted mix of professions between them; I've also got a mage in the upbringing and have started dabbling with a priest, but they're fairly low level. Along with this I've hit most of the races, even a couple of the Horde types, but I'm pretty much an Alliance guy.

Without going into too much detail, I need something to write about down the line, I've enjoyed all of them, the Dwarven Hunter, the Gnomish Mage, the Human Warrior, and I've got no problems with my Night Elf Priest, but I have to say none have brought me as much joy as my Human Paladin. I think the Paladin is a great choice for the up and coming WoW player, they dish out the dirt and heal when needed; add plate armor to that and you've got an awesome dude. To be honest I can see my warrior starting to approach my Paladin in DPS, but it's just not the same thing as playing a Holy Warrior; Hurtinator lives to kill whereas Ultronicus lives to kill AND heal!

The Paladin allows you to get a taste of the magic user mixed in with the attack power of a warrior, giving you a sample of both sides of the spectrum, adding in survivability to keep you going; my warrior has spent a lot more time dead than my Paladin. The best part of this is that down the line if you want to get a pure magic user going, like a Mage or a Shaman, you have an idea of how that works and what you need to focus on. The warrior doesn't lend itself to these skills as well, although Blizzard has managed a pretty gentle learning curve for all classes.

As for the human part, well if I had to do it over again I might have gone dwarf, my hunter is really cool, but he's a human and I accept him for that. Each race has it's unique abilities giving it an edge in certain things, but I mainly went human so I could stay in a comfort zone.

Having said that though, if PvP is your thing, I'd say a Hunter should be your choice, although this changes as time goes on. The very heart of WoW is wearing bigger boots than the next guy, and two sets of boots is always better than one (especially when one pair of boots is worn by a gorilla named Randolph). I don't mind the PvP, but it's never been a big part of my lifestyle. The Hunter also gives you a taste of magic use, although it's almost strictly limited to offense magic, and is largely associated with your gun, but magic none the less; as a matter of fact I think the Hunter teaches you more about Mana management than the Paladin does, an important skill for magic use.

So there you go a very limited run down on my thoughts for starting WoW. Only thing left now is for you to go and find out for yourself.

Dark Disney Princesses

Stumbled across this the other day. Thought it was cool enough to share.

Dark Disney Princesses

Now There is Some Good Advice Here: Shit MyDadSays

A friend of mine runs a humorous blog where every once in a while he shares some Internet gold with the masses. One such nugget was a Tweet, or whatever you call a twitter site, called shitmydadsays. I now visit this page every day.

Don't get me wrong I don't have a Twitter account anymore and I firmly believe very very very few people are interesting enough to pull off a worthwhile Twitter run. I did say in the past that there are a few worthy Twitters going on and shitmydadsays is one. Not only is it humorous but there is some damn good life advice there that I think needs to be shared.

1) "The universe does not give a fuck about you. You are a speck in its shit."

Why do I like this quote: well there seems to be an epidemic of people wallowing in their own sense of self importance. Thank god I'm a humble bastard but it seems like a plethora of the human race needs to read this piece of Dad advice and take it to heart. :)

2) "Don't listen to the pussy side of you when you make a decision. People gravitate towards being a pussy. Remove the pussy, son."

Damn good advice here fear of taking a risk leaves many an opportunity missed. Note being humble doesn't equate to being a pussy :)

3) "The worst thing you can be is a liar....Okay fine, yes, the worst thing you can be is a Nazi, but THEN, number two is liar. Nazi 1, Liar 2"

Glad the man straightened that out for me.

4) "Here's a strawberry, sorry for farting near you...Hey! Either take the strawberry and stop bitching, or no strawberry, that's the deal."

What a lesson in negotiation!

I hope the guy running this Twitter sees the genius his dad is sharing.

Left 4 Dead Crash Course

I believe what we are seeing here is a case of Valve doing a little bit of backpedaling. After the uproar over the announced Left 4 Dead 2 they have decided to throw people a bone and will be releasing some new DLC for the first one. The whispers on the Internet seem to be indicating that we'll be receiving it starting September 23.

Now don't get me wrong, I'm looking forward to Left 4 Dead 2, sounds like they've got some cool things going on in there, such as melee weapons and infected wearing hazmat suits made of asbestos; nothing like finding out you Molotov Cocktail just became obsolete. Having said that though, I have never supported the choice to change the characters, I think there is a lot of story left to play with Francis, Louis, Bill, and Zoey, but life goes on doesn't it?

L4D Crash Course is going to tie together No Mercy and Death Toll, showing how the intrepid 4 go from a helicopter rescue from the hospital rooftop to being abandoned on a highway in the middle of nowhere, cool! The current complaint I have is this release seems to be a bit more geared towards the vs aspect of the game, where players take on the role of infected against other players, something I've never cared for. On top of that it's supposed to be streamlining some of the survival levels, again, something that I could live without; me and Darcy found a comfort zone with it and even thrived in the survivals for a short time, but in the end I'd rather gain ground and accomplish something.

There you have it in an nutshell, L4D is getting a new campaign to tide you over until L4D 2 hits the proverbial shelves (except for our friends in Australia that is, although to be fair the game hasn't been banned there, they've just refused to give it classification, thereby rendering it unsaleable down under), and the download is completely free from Valve. That's right 100%, no strings attached, absolutely free!

Unless you bought the 360 version, then it's going to cost you 560 Microsoft points to get the new DLC. Yes once again XBox live has decided to go for the gusto and put a qualifier the free term. Screw you Xbox live! I try to support Microsoft, I mean what are your choices, either give your money to Apple, HA!, or go Linux, and after working with Linux let me quote something I heard long ago and fully support "Linux is worth your time if your time is worthless.", but it's not always easy.

But I digress. Once again, good news for L4D players, the zombies, they need- a-killin'! So a-killin' I will go.

WoW: Pet Taming The Easy Way

To date my hunter has had 4 pets, a Coyote Packleader, every prairie farm boys dream, a Crocolisk, a really decent tank/DPS hybrid in my opinion, and two gorillas, an Elder Mist and a Silverback who I just picked up last night.

Me and Darcy were questing South of Booty Bay, doing all that humdrum every day stuff like slaughtering pirates and hunting giants when Darcy happened to discover a Silverback he just had to have. I was busy a ways off searching bottles on the beach so it took me a minute to get to him when he started calling for help. Turns out the Silverback has a nifty little talent that makes him a desirable pet and a tough one to tame.

If you don't know how it works to tame a pet I'll fill you in on the basics. Upon reaching level 10 the Hunter trainer will inform you that it's time to get a pet of your own, you then go out in the wilderness and tame 3 different pets that the trainer commands you to; once that is done he turns you loose to get a pet of your own choosing. To tame a pet you find an animal that appeals to you, making sure that it is either the same level as you or lower (and there's little point having a pet lower than yourself) target it, and start waving a stick in the air, exuding waves of what could only be pure love, judging by the hearts that appear in the air around you. A progress bar also pops up and once the bar is empty, taking about 30 seconds, your pet is tamed; that's all there is to it, yup, just stand there and soak up the punishment that your pet-to-be hands out while you're taming it, cause in case I for got to mention it, the pet attacks constantly during the process. And therein lies the rub of today's topic.

It turns out Silverbacks have pushback effect, where they are able to knock you flat on your ass when they attack; the main downside being that when you get up you have to start the taming all over gain, giving them ample time to recharge their ability and push you back again. This is where Darcy's problem came in and we ended up killing 3 of them before we managed to tame one.

How to save yourself the trouble? Pretty easy if you have the Freezing Trap ability. We tested it out on his gorilla and then tried the method out to get me a Silverback of my own, worked flawlessly the first time. I first laid a trap in front of myself and backed up a few steps; I then started the tame process, causing the Silverback to charge; upon hitting my trap the Gorilla was frozen in place, allowing me to continue the tame uninterrupted; at this point Darcy came along and dropped another trap in between me and the still frozen gorilla; at the 20 second mark the trap broke and released the Silverback, who promptly ran into the second trap and was frozen again. About half way through the second trap cycle the tame finished, the trap thawed, and I had a brand new, fully tamed, level 42 Silverback Gorilla to match Darcy's.

So there you have it, save yourself some trouble and use the traps you've got, freeze 'em and tame 'em. I'm looking forward to getting Randolph and Clyde in PvP, Pushback's a bitch unless you're controlling it.

Okay I Decided that Amazon Hates Canadians

The biggest problem with living next door to the United States is that us Canadians are exposed to all the American media. True over all this isn't so bad and at times it is damn entertaining. However, it also means we are tortured with commercials and media promoting things we can't get in The Great White North. This resulted in agony for millions of Canadians when the iPhone was released in the United States and we could only paste our faces to the store window while told "no you can't have that in Canada".

We did finally get the iPhone thanks to Rogers but that was only after being forced to watch our American neighbors flash their fancy phones in front of our faces for what seemed like years. I don't own a iPhone and I chalk that up to bitterness. In fact I'm probably going to get the Blackberry Storm instead and think as Rob would say "Steve Jobs can suck my ass".

The newest villain to torment us Canadians is Amazon and their cursed Kindle. I'm an avid reader and so is my lovely and loving wife so our house is filled and I mean filled with books so the introduction of a good eBook Reader interested me a lot. I was even willing to shell out the money the moment I heard about the Kindle even though it's over priced. However, Amazon said nooooo you can't have the Kindle and then later said noooo you can't have the Kindle 2, your Canadian, then they stuck up their noses and walked away.

I can't even get an American friend to send me one becuase it turns out that you not only have to have an American address and credit card to buy a Kindle you also need that to buy the eBooks for the Kindle.

Now I understand the Canadian cell phone network thing could cause a glitch but I don't buy the copy right thing for a 2nd. Sony can sell us books for their reader and Amazon.ca seems to have no problem selling us books. Now I think Amazon could have said sure you can buy the Kindle but sorry the whispernet feature won't work in Canada. However, we'll sell you the books on Amazon.ca and you can download them to your Kindle via a computers USB port. However Amazon didn't do this and pretty much flipped us in Canada the bird not even commiting to trying to get us Kindle in the near future. I'm almost as pissed off about this as I am about Coke advertising their pop in glass bottles. Therefore, I'm not going to buy their stupid Kindle even if it comes to Canada and am looking at the alternatives.

Alternative 1: The Sony eReader

Alternative 2: Wait for the Indigo eReader

Alternative 3: The Astak EZReader

Alternative 4: The Cybook

Not sure which one I'm going to go with but I do know that Jeff Bezos and his Kindle can: to quote my good buddy "Suck My Ass"! :)

Okay Christian Bale Robot ???

I'm pretty sure anyone with an internet connection as heard the famous Christian Bale rant which made me dislike the man more than I already did but for some reason made my loving wife think he was even hotter then before:

Some Blither about the Bale Rant

Today I found this promotional media for a game that I'm pretty excited about, Borderlands, and think it's worthy of adding yet another internet link to:

Making of Borderlands Series ep 1