Jeez, when was I last here? Some time in September.

Anyone remember me? Y'know, the guy with the somewhat obsessive interest in Morrowind? Yeah, well, I set down to watch some TV weeks ago and somehow, in the midst of a rerun of That '70s Show, I managed to forget to log in here on occasion and to update that mod guide I was working on.

RANT ALERT

Anyway, wow, a new expansion to Neverwinter Nights is out. It looks pretty good. Which is probably why I'll buy it. Because Obsidian is great at making dull, subpar games seem fun. Which is really a dissapointment because I had high hopes for NWN 2. Well, initially. after Mask of the Betrayer (which I played first) they dropped quite a bit. I initially gave Mask of the Betrayer a 8.0 when I played it on my old computer, assuming it was a great game and it just ran so slow because my hardware was outdated. After playing it on my new computer and hitting a max of 15 FPS even with it's mediocre graphics turned all the way down on hardware which should more than handle it at 60+ FPS I can safely say the only redeeming feature was the story. I know this, yet I fall for the ads every time.

END RANT

I picked up the collector's edition of LOTRO Mines of Moria. It comes with a heck of a lot of free stuff for 80 dollars. Haven't got around to installing it yet, though. Not that it'd matter much considering my characters are still fairly low levels.

For those still interested, yes, my Morrowind mod guide is on temporary hiatus. I just haven't been interested in Morrowind much lately and by extension haven't installed any mods to blog about. I've been playing a lot of Oblivion the last couple of days, though. FCOM, a mod that combines all the major overhauls for Oblivion will be out of beta soon so I'll probably be spending a few days glued to my computer installing that monstrously large mod. It'll definitely be worth it though.

I've been thinking about this lately, and I thought I'd ask those that read my blog before making my decision. When I get back to working on my Morrowind mod guide would you prefer it if I took it offsite and hosted it on something like freewebs (or webs.com or whatever it is they're calling themselves now) in addition to blogging updates? Seeing as people get banned left and right here it seemed it might be a good idea to have it offsite so that in the event my account ended up banned the guide wouldn't be lost.

I bought a PS3 during my absence from Gamespot. Yay for impulse buys I guess. LittleBigPlanet's pretty fun.

Oh hey, reruns of That '70s Show will be on soon! And with that this blog post and the last 3 months of my life may have come full circle. I'll make a note not to forget anything this time lol.

Man, you randomly disappear for a few months and Gamespot goes and changes their layout. Feels kind of cluttered now, really, with all the sidebars and links and whatever else I haven't found yet. I see the forums haven't changed, still the same layout (and topics) as always... lol

Anyway, I've been trying to stay off the computer and away from the TV lately and get more exercise which is why I was gone. But it's September which means hurricane season for the southeastern states here in the US which means here in the midwest we get what storms manage to hold together after they cause problems for the states bordering gulf of Mexico and the eastern coast. And all that means the ground has turned into 3-inch deep mud. And since the town I live in was built on drained swampland it has a lovely geographic layout that holds in water. Long story short it's too dang muddy to step off pavement without sinking into the ground. Good thing I have treadmill so I can still get some exercise. Of course if I dust off the treadmill and use it for what it was intended I have to find a new coat rack.

Of course, that's not the only reason I've been gone. Living in a rural area is mostly great except for the intermittent loss of electricity or phone/internet connection. Which is nearly weekly now. According to the old folklore of weather prediction by the color of caterpillars we're going to have a harsh winter. I'm not one to take stock in the opinions of insect weathermen, of course, but I still hope folklore is wrong. I do like seeing snow in winter of course, but I'm not too keen on the idea of having another ice storm taking out power for a week to a month depending on location like we had at the beginning of this year here in the middle of nowhere.

In the meantime I've been playing Mercenaries 2 since It came out. I'm a bit disappointed in some regards. The game seems much shorter than the first Mercs game, with only a few missions instead of Mercs' Deck of 52 plus side missions. You have to play through the game's story to unlock the whole map and until you clear quite a few missions you're constrained to a very small area. Air strikes and supply drops are a lot harder to come by, and you're not going to be getting much of anything until you recruit a helicopter pilot, luckily you recruit him early in the game. Worst of all though is that they censored some of the swearing- and that just sounds stupid. Now on the other hand they definitely improved a lot of elements. Hijacking vehicles is better by far, you actually have to interact a little more to hijack heavy vehicles like tanks. Of course with the better graphics current gen consoles can handle the explosions are much more gratifying and shiny, and since it's a Mercs game things will be exploding frequently. Mercs 2 has a much nicer choice of vehicles, too, including civilian vehicles in both regular and beat up "junker" types, a few motorcycles, and some special vehicles modified to do unique things you can get from your mechanic as the game progresses. Of course the best thing is that Mercs 2 takes place in Venezuela, which means the environment is far more colorful than the first game and it's constant gray and brown environments. To sum that up, if you like over the top action movies and want a game that plays like one, Mercs 2 is a good pick.

As for my Morrowind mods guide, I'm just reinstalling the game right now so I'll try to get an update to the old installments and a new set of mods up soon.[Update: Or I will as soon as I remember where I put the expansion discs, anyway...]

And on a completely unrelated note, I just noticed that Gamespot's spell check doesn't recognize Gamespot as a word. Odd.

Well, I'm sure this is going to look long-winded and boring enough as it is so I'll shut up now.

************************************Foreword*************************************

Bah, ended up with another partial entry. I need to get Part 3 together before I run out of decimals to use...

Picked up my new computer today, not the best rig ever made but it more than handles all of my games maxed out and with 2x AA at 1680x1050. I figure it will at least hold up for a year or two before I need to upgrade anything. Maybe longer if I don't want to play newer games at maximum settings.

******************Vality7's and Yacoby's Grass Project******************

I'm sure you all know plenty about this by now so I'll just skip to giving you the link.

Beta release:

http://www.bethsoft.com/bgsforums/index.php?showtopic=850315