Stex Toys

That being a confession to my XBOX. Or any console for that matter. Oh sure they’ve been switched on to watch a movie or check some trailers but in terms of actually playing a game.. well Red Dead Redemption is showing some play time on the 6th of June and then nothing.

I wasn’t expecting this either. Sometimes you can feel these down times approaching and can wind down correctly, finish off whichever game is currently your favourite spin and settle in for some none gaming activities. But this was not the case this time. If anything excitement was high. Red Dead was proving to be a game I could get lost in, and E3 was coming. E3 which last year, having just fully gotten into console gaming proved to be an invigorating experience that set me up for the next year of gaming greats. And yet this year it seemed to be the death knoll for my interest.

OK so the conferences weren’t aimed at me. They had new hardware to sell, new hardware that opened the doors to forms of gaming I have at best a passing interest in. But there where still a fair few games that should have inspired me. Gotten my thumbs twitching in anticipation. And yet… and yet, this did not happen.

Maybe it wasn’t E3. Maybe my recently rekindled love for World of Warcraft running on my good old faithful PC that had seen its gaming hours slashed over the past 18 months had planted it’s taint on me once more. But I think not. The addiction hasn’t bitten, if I have a night without WoW I feel fine. There’s no longing for the desolate plains of Tanaris or itching to make a quick gold or two on the auction house. Sure I’m enjoying my time in Azeroth once more but it’s a healthy time, one shared with good friends.

Perhaps it’s the signs of a decent summer, the sun shining outside the call of birdsong drawing me away and out into the wilds. A wedding on the horizon, much to plan and do there but with few distractions in my life there is time and more for these things. Double Income No Kids sees availability at a maximum for a responsible adult, and plenty of my contempories with harder jobs and children are still gaming.

Nope, none of these things are a real reason or even an excuse for my lack of gaming. It’s plainly just a drop in interest and these drops have come before and they have passed. It’s just a case of riding with the tide, let it ebb away and then begin its build up once more ready to resurge. I just hope it’s in time for Halo Reach!

Much has been going on on the gaming front over the past few weeks/month. No that you could tell from this blog of course as I keep failing to check in on it! So I’ll post my monthly “Oops I forgot to post anything recently” post here and now
Lets start with the sentence I have denied I would ever say, and also knew I could never avoid. I have returned to World of Warcraft. Yes, yes, I had managed a good two years clean of having it’s toxins coursing through my veins, and yes I remember how bad it can get. But all things said, it is still the best game ever crafted on so many levels and the one catch it has that works better in an MMO than any other genre, community. Because a good experience online is always far more influenced by those you are spending your time with than what is actually occurring in game.
Plus things have moved on since last we played, and I’m not talking just about the improvements in the game itself. The ascension of the likes of Skype make voice chat a very simple task these days. No need for TeamSpeak servers or the like, a small group can make do with a conference call running in the background, and a cheap £25 headset. The difference voice communication can make should not be underestimated, and is the one thing that caught me off guard back in 2008 when that now beloved XBOX 360 dropped into our possession. Now I fully expect to be talking to folks whilst I game except in those rare occasions when I want the story of a game to fully come through without interruption or distraction, such as titles like Heavy Rain.
But all is not lost on the none MMO front, May 1st saw the start of the second Gamerscore challenge of 2010 of the Digital Cowboys Community, so points are being grabbed on as many 360 games as can be squeezed in. I’ve even gone as far, over the past few months, or stocking up on some very cheap sub £5 games to ensure my stock is high. Also this time PenguinGirl is joining in the fun so not only am I competing against the best gamers of the DC Community, but also my own better half!

So all in all there will be plenty of gaming being done, and I’ve not even mentioned having gone to The Gadget Show Live, which I really should do a post on also.. maybe next month

There has been somewhat of a resurgence in my PC gaming of late, following just over a year of some solid console gaming. Fear not though, this is not an abandonment of my new found appreciation of all things ‘box, ‘station and Wii, but more a levelling out of my gaming time to encompass all of my children.This was somewhat sparked by the introduction of a new graphics card, I’d been upgrading various part of my PC over the past couple of years as i saw fit however they where all very much centred around creating a nice stable platform on which to actually use my PC for the usual assortment of browsing, social networking and photo editing. In this time my previous graphics card, an ATI X1900XT, had over extended it;s life somewhat, and whist it allowed me to continue to play games I was pretty much reduced to minimal settings in everything recent. Things came to a head when I was trialling the Beta of Star Trek Online, an MMO and as with MMOs in general minimal graphics requirements where, well, minimal. When my PC even started to produce stuttering frame rates with this, I finally had to give in and upgrade.
Nothing too grand mind, I always set myself a limit of less than £150 for new graphics cards. Anything more and you are usually paying for newness, too much less and you’re buying something with no real future. Thankfully ATIs 5xxx series had recently been introduced, and there is some very tasty DX9 performance to be had from even the lower end of the spectrum of these cards. So it was that I plumped for a 5770 1GB, a little outside of the main gaming cards (58xx) but more than enough power to send my DX9 games screens to my 1920×1280 display with aplomb.

After the usual initial blast of playing every game I had installed for sometimes as much as 10 minutes with the setting all on MAX, I eventually settled down to actually playing some games again, many that I had been holding back on until I could enjoy them in full detailed glory. So it was that some recent classics got themselves reinstalled, as well as some newer titles I’d picked up in Steam sales. Mass Effect is finally getting the play it deserves, the latest instalment of my beloved Dawn of War, that being DoW II is taking everything it can from the new card. Strangely even some older games which aren’t that graphically demanding have found some play time, The Movies being a notable addition here.

I have however taken some inspiration from my consoling ways. A Wireless USB adapted now allows me to use the 360 controller for any games that support it, which for anything recent is a straight drop and play with all controls matching those on the console versions of the game. Also games with Achievements are getting top billing, even if they are just Steam achievements.

All in all it’s good to make a return to PC gaming, and even more so as part of a much wider family that spans all of the current gaming options bar the PSP, for choice.. choice is everything.