Good Morning Friends! I apologize for missing a Mixtape Monday last week, but I was fully in holiday mode and not caring about the world one little bit. For anyone who might be new to my blog, every Monday I post a playlist full of songs that have been lovingly crafted like one would have done with a precious blank cassette tape. I think that was part of what made Mixtapes in general so carefully crafted because, to be honest… a pack of high-quality blank cassettes was freaking expensive. Like legitimately a pack of three quality tapes was about half the price of an album… which is fine but nothing that you felt like you could squander. Anyways… nostalgia trip finished because today I craft my mixes for you in modern formats like Spotify and YouTube playlists.
Mason and Librarian
Often times the mixes I share with you have a clear theme to them… and I have to be honest this is probably not going to be one of those. There is a theme, but it is a deeply personal theme that won’t actually relate to anyone outside of my own skull case. In late high school I had two wildly different friends that lived a few houses down from each other, and as one drifted further down paths that I did not want to follow… I ended up clinging to the other. The day I crafted this mix, I was thinking about the wild juxtaposition of these two friends because really at their core they could not be more different. One grew up to follow in his father’s footsteps and became a Stone Mason, and the other followed his childhood passions and become a Librarian. I don’t really have much connection anymore to the first one, but talk at least weekly to the second one and chances are he will actually see this mix at some point when he catches up on my blog. Like it won’t make much sense, but this is an album that reminds me of the two of them more than actually relates to them.
Track List
True Nature – Jane’s Addiction
Freak Scene – Dinosaur Jr.
Violet – Hole
Misery – Soul Asylum
Welcome to the Fold – Filter
Nothing – Stabbing Westward
Trippin’ on a Hole in a Paper Heart – Stone Temple Pilots
Sabotage – Beastie Boys
Points of Authority – Linkin Park
When Worlds Collide – Powerman 5000
Space Lord – Monster Magnet
Lay Lady Lay – Ministry
Pets – Porno for Pyros
Listen on Spotify
Listen On YouTube
With that, we close the nineteenth chapter in this Mixtape Monday series. This is one of my favorite ones to listen to because the same thoughts that lead me to choose this specific lineup are sort of now imbued in the final product, and listening makes me think about these two friends. I have a wealth of close acquaintances, but I have very few really close friends in the world that I have let down my armor in order to see me behind this facade. I am thankful some years back I reconnected with the Librarian, who is awesomely moving to my town and hopefully once the pandemic is a bit less scary we can do some real world shenanigans again. As always I hope you enjoyed this Mixtape and if you are new to the series you can find the entire series run over at the archives below.
Featuring: Ammo, Ashgar, Belghast, Kodra, Tamrielo, and Thalen
Tonight we start the show off with Kodra talking bout Celeste and making it past the Farewell segment of the game. We talk about the conclusion of the Epic versus Apple lawsuit and how it is pretty bad for both companies, but especially bad for Epic. From there we talk about our impressions of the games shown off at what would have been the Sony E3 show if that happened. This leads into a discussion of Tam recently trying out Avengers and how it is still not a good game after all this time. We talk for a bit about Pathfinder Secrets of Magic book and martial spellcasters in general. Finally, we have a bit of a discussion between Thalen and Kodra about Super Mario Maker with children.
Good Morning Friends! Yesterday we got the PlayStation Play Showcase for 2021… which far as I can tell is what they would have shown if they had actually participated in E3 this year. As is the case with any Sony presentation, there was a lot of obsequious nonsense, largely in the form of a truly bizarre high art chess metaphor thing at the beginning of the show. I am certain this is going to be what we see from this point on for PlayStation ads on television instead of you know… actual gameplay segments. If you care to experience the entire conference there is a link below. I am pretty hyped about some of what I saw yesterday, and this morning I am going to talk about the elements that excited me.
I have no idea what is going on with this game but I am interested. Apart from being a vehicle for delivering slow-motion butt shots, it appears to be this mashup of Bayonetta, Nier, Devil May Cry, and Korean Horror films… and the only bit that worries me is I could see this leaning into the Soulsborne genre. I knew and still largely know next to nothing about this game but I am intrigued. I think this game represents what is best about the whole convention circuit nonsense, is that it shows you a vision of a future that might come to be. We know nothing about the release date, and apparently, this was originally announced as a game for Xbox and PC so who knows what might have changed in the process to have this being shown at a PlayStation conference.
We’ve seen this game before, but the last time we saw it… it mostly looked like a movement tech demo. Now we actually get to see the world surrounding the character and some of the story elements. I have to say I am not big on spellcasters but this definitely looks like an interesting game. If this goes the way that I think this is going to go… this might just become another big AAA franchise with Frey being as popular as Aloy. This appears to be a PlayStation console exclusive, but is also releasing on the PC. My mindset might be changing about which I prefer, especially given how damned easy it is to play PS5 remotely from bed via my phone.
This trailer has a lot of fucking explaining to do. We are introduced to this adorable fuzzball, given its name… Homer… and then the trailer makes it seem this poor smol baby gets abandoned. You can’t do this shit to us. I demand answers… is the cat okay? Who is going to take care of the cat now that Frey is gone? Does time pass differently in whatever world she is pulled into? Home needs to be okay, and they better explain it to us.
Okay, it was already a given that I was going to give Wonderlands a spin when it is released, but I am always happy to watch another trailer. This time around they set it to the very apt Gimme Chocolate by Babymetal. I am not entirely certain there is a more apt song than this for anything Tiny Tina related. I mean she is a lot… an awful lot… and best served in small doses. That is my only hesitancy with this game, because if it is all Tiny Tina being Tiny Tina… that could get old really fast.
This game knows its players. There were lots of glamour shots of exploding piles of loot. So… legitimately it is like they made a trailer just for me. I love shooting monsters, I love it raining loot, and I love Babymetal. I am super sold.
I love Knights of the Old Republic, Revan is my favorite character in Star Wars history, and this game takes place in my favorite setting. It is not a huge ask to get me to replay all of that and experience it with a shiny coat of paint. I loved going back and re-exploring Mass Effect and I am absolutely certain I will enjoy going back and exploring Knights of the Old Republic all over again with fresh eyes. Early this year I finally got around to playing Knights of the Old Republic II, and I am really hoping this means we might see that get the remake treatment… because god it is a mess with some positive aspects that really needs some tweaks and improvements.
I have loved Wolverine since I was a little kid. I followed the comics religiously for years and was of just about the right age when he got his own solo comic for the first time. There are a lot of people who discount this anti-hero as a gruff single-note character, but he has some depth Bub. I am looking forward to seeing him treated with the same quality that Insomniac brought to Spiderman. Given how many crossovers there have been between Spidey and Wolvie… I could even see these franchises colliding at some point down the line. We don’t have a lot to go on, and that was a cinematic trailer and not something in game… so I expect we will probably have to wait several years for this one to see the light of day. Still that said I am excited to know it is on the way.
I am not certain, but I am pretty sure we are just about to get a game featuring both Spidermen… Miles and Peter… along with Eddie Brock’s Venom… and motherfuckin Kraven the Hunter. Kraven has always been my favorite Spiderman villain and I am so freaking on board to see him in a video game that does so much service to the comics. Like I am not certain… and I don’t think it has been verified… but there is no way that is NOT Kraven doing the voice over in this trailer. It is such a great time to be alive for comic book fans, and these stories are more accessible than they have ever been for those who never got into reading brightly colored newsprint.
I am not super into the fantasy of being a spellcaster, but I really do enjoy weird Japanese horror elements. So when it comes to Ghostwire Tokyo I am intrigued but not entirely sold. I love the strange neon world that it seems to be set in, and I love the monster designs… but it will all depend on how it feels to play. I am hoping a demo gets released at some point, because if it is spellcasting as an equivalent of first-person shooter like it was in the Heretic/Hexen games then I am probably on board. If it is more fiddly than press button get spell I am not sure. If I do pick this game up it is likely going to be when it is deeply discounted.
The star of the show for me had to be Dad of War. I really enjoyed the first game and it reminds me that I really need to get back and finish it. It seems like Kratos gets back his chains from the original series, but also continues getting to use the super fun axe. I am so on board with Ryan Hurst as Thor, because I am going to be honest… him playing Beta in Walking Dead was one of the few things that made the Whisper War watchable. I love the treatment the team has done with Norse Mythology and it seems like we are just going to keep getting more of that good good stuff. It does make me wonder what is going to happen once we have wrapped up the Norse cycle of this game. I would love to see them explore Persian and Babylonian mythos next.
There are a bunch of games that I didn’t really single out. Blood Hunt for example looks really cool, but I don’t really like battle royale games even if you skin them with the Masquerade. Alan Wake getting an upgrade is nice for those who loved that game, but I hated the gameplay of shining that flashlight on things. Grand Theft Auto V gets yet another release and I am sure it will sell well, but I could give a shit because I still have yet to play it. There is something about the rockstar style of doing open-world games that do not jive with my sensibilities. Guardians of the Galaxy looks interesting, but Square failed me so massively with Avengers that I do not trust it. Gran Turismo 7 looks lovely, but I also don’t want to have sex with cars… and I am pretty sure it is specifically targeting that demographic as always.
I am going to be completely honest… it was a great show, but still does not give you much of a reason to buy a PlayStation 5 yet. All of this stuff is coming out in 2022 or later, which means there is still not going to be a lot of truly PlayStation 5 exclusive titles for a long while. I mean I loved Ratchet and Clank and am looking forward to Horizon Forbidden West but it is definitely seeming like this console generation is taking a bit more time to ramp up.
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Yesterday kinda sucked, and to be honest this week so far has been fairly awful. The core problem with a holiday that gives you off a Monday, is that a five-day week is still crammed into the remaining four days. However, that specifically is not what made yesterday awful. My wife was out for the evening, and with that generally comes a binge of guilt-free completely unresponsive gaming. However, the moment I got off my last conference call for the day, there was a loud boom coming from the direction of the power substation for the neighborhood and everything went dark. This was the beginning of what was ultimately a 4.5 hour long blackout. Thankfully my phone was fully charged, and as it got progressively darker in the house I found a candle. Apart from that I ordered some takeout and snuggled with my cats while I waited for the lights to come on. It was a stark reminder how many of the things I enjoy require electricity… and those that don’t explicitly require it do require good lighting.
Moments after my wife walked in the door… the power came on, so needless to say I did not make near the progress last night that I had hoped. Let’s review how far I have managed to make it in various jobs since the last time I posted one of these images. Dark Knight, I have taken from 76 to 79 and I should be able to easily take it to 80 tonight. Monk, I have taken from 63 to 66 and potentially can put on another two levels there if I focus a bit. I’ve gained a single level of White Mage, but it really has not been a focus. Lastly and disconnected from any of my pre-Endwalker plans… I have pushed Culinarian from 21 to 24 largely because I have had some extra beast tribe allowances and been using them with the Ixal to help level that up a bit albeit slowly. At some point, I am going to want the ability to craft my own food, so I will probably be slowly working that up.
In my travels, I encountered the strangest thing. It isn’t at all uncommon to encounter players that do not yet have a job and are leveling as one of the base classes in Palace of the Dead. However, yesterday while in Heaven on High, I did a bit of a double-take when I noticed we were running around with a Thaumaturge and not a Black Mage. Something important to note… your Class turns into a job around level 30 and Heaven on High requires you to be level 61 in order to enter. I blanked out the player’s name because this isn’t about shaming them, but I posted it on Twitter and got a bunch of different responses. Firstly most people thought they were simply a troll, and I could see that given that they do have a few actual jobs. In the run, the player said something to the effect that they wanted to be a Thaumaturge and not a Black Mage and was super defensive about that point… which makes me think they have gotten this line of questioning more than once.
Another friend thought that maybe they were just a hardcore roleplayer and devoted to leveling as the base class for some of the jobs. Notice they have level 80 in Gladiator, Conjurer, Lancer, Rogue and have taken Pugilist to 50 and Thaumaturge to 68. If it is a roleplayer, that is fine… but please god don’t make your alternate way of playing the game the problem of live players. In the Deep Dungeon system it doesn’t matter that much, but in actual proper duties you are missing like half of your abilities if you enter the dungeon as the Class and not the Job. Back in the day there was a bit of precedent for doing this, because often times as a Class you had more access to a wider variety of cross class abilities than you did as the final Job. Now however it is largely just playing the game “wrong”. My personal theory is that they are no-lifing the Deep Dungeon systems to level a bunch of things and have not come up for air long enough to actually finish the job quests.
Once I finish off the Dark Knight today, I am probably going to focus a bit more seriously on White Mage and try and get it up to 80. Monk is going to continue getting a bunch of time with me focusing on doing that class with the roulettes that I am not comfortable healing. Wierdly I feel way more comfortable doing things like Alliance Raids with the White Mage, because at least there are other healers who can maybe help out when I falter. I do my best to carry my own, but I am not nearly as good at healing as I am at other roles, and I own that. That said I am getting better and I am going to have to given that two of my remaining classes are healers and I don’t just want to grind them up exclusively being green dps in the Deep Dungeon.
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