There she be.

Interesting thing about hitting that level - it's not just an armor and officer upgrade, it's a full-blown do-over of your chosen play direction. You get so much new stuff that you have to start thinking about what direction you want to take yourself, your ship, and your crew.

Good times.

Tower Knight is down, the hard way. Hard way turned out to be ... not so hard. Just had to get over that OMG he's HUGE thing, and then it was ... well, not easy. Fun, though.

More STO shots below. Tons of stuff to do so far, and I'm 2 levels away from my new ship. I got exploration missions, patrol missions, new base missions, and storyline stuff as well. Therefore, whee!

So I'm trying to kill the Tower Knight without cheesing it, and he intimidates the crap out of me. I remember when I used to do boss fights with giant things, but this guy just scares me. Maybe it's because the entire game is so full of creepy tension.

Oh, I just realized what the game reminds me. Vagrant Story! Same creepy dungeon setup, same very fast death if you don't pay attention, same single protagonist against great odds, weapon modification, total player character customization, etc. Anyone familiar with Lea Monde will find Boletaria hauntingly familiar.

STO is fun, just wish the server didn't keep crashing. I have 4 more levels to get my first serious business ship, darnit! If I lost my Mk II quantum torpedo spec. tactical console I shall be ... annoyed!

Here's some shots of my shininess. A fleet battle (group mini-raid), some ground combat action (mmm random planet generation), ship showoff shot and ... I went to Vulcan and all I got was a screenshot of some ginormous masonry.

Apparently someone snuck in the original Alien vs Predator onto Steam without telling me. 5 bucks to revisit some of the most tense gaming ever? Yes please.

GoG has acquired rights to Activision's old catalogue, hopefully this means Interstate 76 will show up there one day soon. There's a classic and atmospheric game, even if I did get stuck on the dream race and ragequit because dammit, it's a dream. Losing the race shouldn't mean game over, dammit! Anyway, in the meantime, my newly whetted appetite for RPGs will be quite pleased with Arcanum. Never played it, heard great thing.

I have completed Dragon Age. Great game, complete with a great ending. Looking forward to replaying it one day again, with a mage tank and archery for a change. And someone with a big axe; definitely was missing someone with a giant two-headed axe.

I have begun my foray into Boletaria (Demon's Souls). I am slowly getting my reflexes back; still not sure if I should stick with my lightning fast (but very short) dagger, or attempt my sister's method of the Pokey Stick. Time will tell - so far, I died a lot.

HistoGrafica - old pictures of your hometown. Very neat concept for a site. Looks like only larger cities are covered, but still nifty.

Almost to the end of Dragon Age. You know a game drags on just a tad too long when you get more suspense out of what you will play next, and not what will happen in the game you're playing now.

Not that Dragon Age drags, but it does have a lot of content - which means that, given my available playtime, I've been playing it for over a month. It's new game time.

Star Trek Online headstart this Friday. Looking forward to making a new crew - this time I'm going Engineering. Other than that, I think it's Demon's Souls time. Unless I get sidetracked by this new Assassin's Creed DLC coming out.

Now this is something; a Dwarf Fortress that's been going for 200 in-game years, and 1.5 realtime years. For those of us who actually played the thing and know all of its peccadilloes, this is even more of an accomplishment. For those who haven't ... well, it's hard to describe, but basically everything in those screenshots has been built by dwarves that you give "hints" to in the game. No god view, no drag and drop, no superpowers - just a lot of patience, strategy and micromanagement.

I'm getting close (I think?) to wrapping up Dragon Age, and then gonna try and spend some time with Star Trek Online before Lily shows up. Whee!

The Star Trek Online beta is surprisingly captivating. It's some sort of combination of IP that does tolerably well in an MMO setting (even if there are some terrible omissions that would greatly enhance atmosphere) and gameplay that is familiar and different at the same time.

It's amazing how many MMO conventions can be handwaved away as sci-fi fluff, and Cryptic's done a tolerable job of adding in a reward system in a universe that technically doesn't use currency anymore.

Also, auto-grouping and public quests. Mmm, auto-grouping. Mmm, public quests. Combined.

Anyway, some shots. This is the light cruiser you get at start; you have a few variants to choose from, but the customization is limited until level 11. Still, you can do quite a bit with the 3 different paths of advancement given to you (yourself, your ship and equipment, and your bridge officers and their abilities). I am currently sporting disruptors and quantum torps on the front, and a disruptor bank on the aft, with my officers providing shield boost, a shield sap (sunder armor haha) and a salvo of torpedoes.

Edit: More shots in the gallery. Some randomly generated planets and space sectors.