Yesterday, I met up with some of my College buddies for dinner. We meet up at 4pm instead since we heard news that Titan Quest is going to be released in Singapore yesterday, so we had a walk around town to source for the game.

There were only a couple of shops in town that had the game. And one of my buddy informed us that there was this game shop at this IT & electronics centre that probably sell the game at a cheaper price than the rest. So he rang up the shop and inquired about the game and we headed there.

Three of us bought the game from them with a discount of roughly $5 per piece. After that all us happily went for a hearty dinner.

So we tried playing the game after we got home and one of my friend had installed the 'leaked' version on his PC before and the original conflicted with the registry so he could not play it. He somehow did manage to solve the problem and we were all game for a multiplayer session. We used Hamachi, so we could play LAN support session but unfortunately, the same guy had problems setting the Hamachi game port open!

We started asking him to test a couple of ports to see if the Hamachi software can reflect the new change and after awhile, we found a port that works. We had to open the ports on our router to reflect the new changes and reload the game a couple of times during this proccess. Pretty irritating if you ask me!

So we finally had an MP session and it was rocking! One pure tank, one tank/caster (me) and another archer we waltz through to Sparta pretty easily, taking on the undead hordes even as they rise (Spirit Mastery is exceptionally good vs undead, which is the Mastery my character is using) and things are looking good. We did drop out of session once and another the host had a CTD  during our 2 hour plus co-op session.

Will play the game a bit more before I write up a review on Titan Quest. So until then, I'm going to kill some Centuars!

Recently, when I was packing my cupboard, I came across some dusty looking books at a corner. Upon inspection, I realised that they were game manuals from a long time ago. Flipping those manuals, I started to get the feeling of what games always gave me back then. It was the feeling between excitment and curiousity.....

So this is the reason why some 'recent' old games I have added into my collection list. Thinking back, the 90s was the time of great computer gaming era, at least for me. The excitement of exploring the unknown and crafting a whole new world made my head spin. Civilization, Colonization and Master of Magic are the games I grew up with. I was in my teens back then and recalled vividly when my uncle gave me the game, Civilization. If I was not mistaken, I was 12 or so back then.

And so this trip of nostalgia I will take. As years passes by and new games appear, the golden memories of the 90's will always be the greatest years of computer gaming for me, just like the 80's for rock & roll. I still do hope that a new game could some how make me feel that little special feeling I get when I was a boy and take me back to the era of the greatest computer games...

Ok, the aftermath of E3 06 as well as before than, a couple of games have caught my attention. Below is the list of upcoming games that I think might rock! (Ranked based on release dates)

1. Titan Quest (Hack & Slash Action RPG)
2. Hellgate: London (First-Person/Third-Person RPG)
3. Medieval 2: Total War (Historical Turn-Based & Real-Time Strategy)
4. Marvel: Ultimate Alliance (Action RPG)
5. Neverwinter Nights 2 (Classic D&D RPG)
6. Caesar IV (Historical City Building)
7. Spore (First of its kind Genre of Genetic Simulation)
8. Europa Universalis III (Historical Strategy)

First off is Titan Quest which looks pretty decent and promising (a la Diablo style). So far from impressions, the only setback is the lack of PvP and the restrictive multi-player mode. Its release date is in June and so we shall see what it's made of then...