Category: Gaming

Changing of the Guard

Published on Tuesday, 11 October 2016 11:59

Faelandaea

0 Comments

Okay, so maybe not the guard, but there will be a changing of my controllers this month. They are bulky and not that easy to swap out constantly, so I tend to do my simulation games in rotations based on major releases. This month, Farming Simulator 17 releases. Also, there has been a LOT of changes to Euro Truck Simulator 2 (ETS2), as well as American Truck Simulator (ATS). So on October 25th, I’ll be changing out my CH Flight Yoke and Pedals for my Logitech G27 Shifter, Pedals and Wheel.

As such, my Twitch Stream will also be focusing on driving type games rather than flight. At least for the time being. I am trying to rotate out every few months to keep both hobbies alive for me.

In other areas of gaming, I have been trying some new things. I watched the Anime titled Arpeggio of Blue Steel (I hope I spelled that right) and it got me into a naval mood, so I decided to give World of Warships (WoWs) a try. It was amazing to start playing the game and find out that they actually have special events where you can earn ARP ships. Totally blew me away. I always thought WoWs was pure historical ships, but it turns out the ARP thing is kind of a big deal in this game. You even have the option of the Yokosuka port, which you have to be stationed in to see ARP content.

I also bought Naval Action from Steam … and played it for 1 hour … then got a refund. I understand the game is in Alpha, but it certainly has a LONG LONG LONG way to go before even coming close to being called a game instead of a concept. Fortunately, Steam can refund you if you have played less than 2 hours of the game, and they promptly did so. Thank you, Steam.

As for Final Fantasy XIV (FFXIV), I tried to get back into it, but found I am still on burnout from it. So I’ll just keep checking every couple of months on my house. I do plan to sub to Star Wars: The Old Republic (SWTOR) and catch up on the stories there. I have honestly been enjoying the new storyline, but hate the fact that it is pretty much turning the game into an online single player game, and these new companions you work so hard to get are only usable sometimes. I understand immersion and all that, but you’d think you would be able to go back and visit a planet, not necessarily doing missions, and be able to use the companions you earned from before. Regardless, I still enjoy the story, so every few months I re-sub and catch up.

Well, that’s my gaming update. I’ve made a decision that I want to sync up my posts with VF, Facebook, Twitter and my own web site, so regardless of where I know you, you’ll be reading this on your own terms and not chasing me down elsewhere for updates. 🙂

Time for work, so until next time, all. Be safe.

Track IR 5 with Pro Clip

Published on Thursday, 31 December 2015 09:40

Faelandaea

0 Comments

So in anticipation of getting my Track IR, I watched YouTube videos on setting it up with games I already have. For Farming Simulator, it is literally a bloody nightmare, but I am working on that even as I type this. However, for games like ETS2, it works natively and even has built in profiles to work properly with those games. I hopped into ETS2 … crashed … realized major patches had come out that broke my mods, and started a new profile. Ah the joys of a modded game being updated. But either way, after starting a new profile and hopping into the truck, all i can say is WOW!

Now – a little bit of history here. I had Track IR already once – years and years ago. I think it was version 3 at the time. I’m not sure. But I was pretty much exclusively an armchair pilot who went on to real flying afterwards. But in the simulator – FSX – I was strictly a virtual flight deck pilot. In the virtual flight deck, especially on advanced airliners like the PMDG 737, there were gazillions of knobs and such to click with the mouse to have a smooth flight. At the time, TIR was so sensitive to my head movement, that I ended up actually sending it back for a refund because I could not hold my head still enough at all to click a single knob on the flight deck. It made for a very interesting – and very disastrous – test flight that ended in me closing out the game else I’d eventually crash the plane anyway.

Now, years later and coming into 2016, I have been doing a lot of driving games that do NOT need knobs, etc switched on and off around me. Whatever I do need is hard mapped to buttons on my Logitech G27 setup that I use. Thus, I decided to give TIR another try. I am glad i did, but there are some things I;’d like to post here to help save some people some money:

Do NOT bother with the “Pro Clip” add-on. It;s junk. Not only does it add an extra wire to the side of your headset for the cat to play with, but it just doesn’t work – at all. You will see many YouTubers who got it to work, but they are advanced programmers and geniuses who did scripting or something to get it that way, because I guarantee you they didn’t just slide a few sliders and get this thing to work. No matter what I tried, even positioning the clip just like the ONE YouTube poster who actually posted his clip (straight vertical), it would not read my head properly. I;d turn left – the camera would go UP and left. I look right, camera goes DOWN and right. It kept thinking I was rolling my head somehow. It also was VERY VERY glitch-ridden in the movements, and it was a nightmare.

I had almost given up and once again pondered a second return of the TIR setup when I noticed on my desk the little hat clip I had set aside. The hat clip is a reflector only version of the head piece, and it is the basic item you get if you do not want to use the track clip pro. It;’s passive, where the Pro is active (giving off beams of light instead of just being reflectors). I scrounged around and found a hat, ditched the Track Clip Pro, and restarted the TIR software. BAM! I didn’t even have to configure anything and it worked out beautifully. All i had to do was hit the hotkey to re-center the camera based on ym new clip position and I was in business. It was right after that when I went into ETS2 and had a wonderful set of 2 drives with this thing on.

I’ll have to keep posting and let folks know how it works in FS15. I am following Reef’s awesome advice here: http://fs-uk.com/forum/index.php?topic=169990.msg1195394#msg1195394

Anyway, for those considering TIR, save your money and just get TIR 5. Don’t bother with the Track Clip Pro. I should have researched more, because a Google Search actually found a LOT of people out there who had the same struggle I am having, or different struggles, which all ended the same – with them using the basic hat clip and tossing the Pro Clip back in the box.

SWTOR Character Progress

Published on Thursday, 03 September 2015 22:32

Faelandaea

0 Comments

[embeddoc url=”http://faelandaea.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/09/SWTOR-Roles.xlsx” height=”1000px” viewer=”microsoft”]

Antisocial Social Systems

Published on Saturday, 01 September 2012 19:40

Faelandaea

0 Comments

Okay so after a lot of time trying to get a friend to game with me on SWTOR, she finally joins up. Of course like an idiot one of my pitches to her was “Yeah we get to stick together and I can help you level because my characters are all high level!” Annnnd .. come to find out that the only way I could really do anything was follow her around in the open world and toss heals without grouping. And I could not join her in instances, of course, because with my levels, I’d steal all the XP. Okay, so I guess i could roll a new character and level it, but I already have all classes and roles leveled up to at least level 30. Frustrating. What I do not understand is why a lot of MMO games seem to have designs that take the second “M” out of MMO. M = Multiplayer. M = social. The whole point of an MMO is so people can play TOGETHER. A couple of games I play have it so that at least if you join a group member you get a level Sync. Some games call it “Mentoring”. STO calls it something else, but it essentially works almost the same, though you have to be careful who the leader is. many times I have invited a low level friend in that game and got them smashed because I was level 50 and they were like 13 or something LOL. SWTOR – I hope you guys someday allow high levels to be on par with low levels for XP purposes. I don;t care how you do it, but if I invite friends to play, I should be able to help those friends without punishing them for me doing so.