The Rest of 2012 in Games

I've just been playing a lot of Diablo III lately. A lot.

I thought I'd take a moment (just for the hell of it) and list a few games coming out in the remainder of 2012 that I'm looking forward to playing. Just before E3 is probably a good time to take stock of things, and then I'll do so again after and we can compare the two lists for endless hilarity, no doubt. As is the norm with this type of thing, I'll probably end up buying half of these and only playing one or two, but here goes anyway:

X-Com: Enemy Unknown
Halo 4
Assassin's Creed 3
Darksiders II (though I still need to play the first)
X Rebirth (is this still happening?)
Borderlands 2
Dark Souls PC

Hmmm, I guess this is a shorter list than I'd thought. Some iffy entries and games that have already come out this year that I don't have yet:

The Walking Dead
Max Payne 3
Mass Effect 3 (big maybe, I'm grudging against EA right now)
Torchlight II (maybe sometime, but it seems redundant that Diablo III is out)
Day Z mod for Arma II (I'd have to buy Arma II, will wait until the mod is more mature)
Hitman: Absolution (depending on how it turns out)
Dishonored, probably

That's all I can think of for now...

Diablo Three-feated

Or, "D3feated," perhaps.

Here's my character sheet as I roll Meiairi into Nightmare difficulty for more sick 'quips:

I've been having a burning hell of a time with Diablo III. I've been lucky enough not to really have any issues due to the always-online nature of the game. I just wish they'd sort out the auction house situation once and for all. As of this writing, commodities auctions are still down, meaning I have a crapload of gems sitting in my stash  just taking up space. I'm not currently investing any gold into the jeweler, because the blacksmith and my own gear and storage costs don't leave anything left.

I'm given to understand that 'the game doesn't really begin until Nightmare,' which I think is garbage because I spent somewhere around 30 hours enjoying the color-coded loot out of Normal difficulty. I'll give those angry Internet men one thing, though, and that's that even in the first hour of Nightmare I've encountered a few blue and yellow mobs with new traits affixed that made them much more of a hassle to click to death.

Now that I've plowed through the game for the first time, I can leisurely settle into the long, long lifetime this game is going to have, if Diablo II is any indication. Eventually, I'll probably play every class to 60 at least once. No need to rush things. I'm just going to sit back from time to time, put on a podcast, and star wearing out the mouse in search of something to sell on the auction house. 

I wonder; do they still have legendary crafting materials in the game like there were in the beta?

Diablo Has Returned

I mentioned in my last entry that I was planning to play a lot of ipad games on my trip to Japan. Well, that didn't happen. In fact, it seems like there is no better way to ensure that I will not play a game than for me to blog about doing so. It's very strange.

I didn't play much of anything at all on the trip itself, since I was mostly busy doing a myriad of other things. I played a battle or two of Tactics Ogre on the planes there, and while I was in Tokyo I picked up a copy of Monster Hunter Portable 3rd, which I've spent about 5 hours playing, since.

It's definitely Monster Hunter! I really enjoyed what I played of Tri on the Wii (about 50 hours' worth, if I recall), and that experience helps to make heads or tails of this game, which is pretty similar, but does have a few key differences. Being on PSP, there is of course no right-hand method for camera control. I've tried "the claw," but haven't found it really necessary thus far. I've only done the first single player quest and a bunch of tutorial quests at this point, but there is a way to center the camera behind you by tapping the L button, and that has been sufficient. I like to think I'll have time to play a lot more of this game sometime in the future. We'll see.

Arriving back in the States after a couple of weeks, I would have liked to jump back into playing a lot of Dota 2, but I overworked some muscles in my back and was laid up on the couch, instead. I have slowly worked myself up to sitting at the PC by playing some matches of Tribes and messing around a bit with the new level creator tool for Portal 2. I have made one level so far, and it is hardly an inspired work of genius. It's cool that you can do that, though.

And, of course, one of the biggest releases of the year has just dropped on us. Yes, Diablo III is here at long last. 24 to 36 hours on from release, it is even playable, when the servers are up. I was at least able to get on last night (about 24 hours post official release) long enough to create my female Wizard, Meiairi, and play through the first couple of quests. I'm still only about halfway through the content that I played through three times during the beta. I went with the Wizard because it was the most fun of the three classes I played in beta, and yes, because she is sexy. Her beam attacks are particularly sexy. When I played the beta, the rune system had yet to be implemented, so I am excited to get into that once I get her to level 6. She's at 5 now.

The real currency auction house (Blizzard seems to be calling it the RMTAH) is not yet online, unfortunately. I'm really looking forward to making a buck on that. If I could even just make enough money playing Diablo to pay for the next expansion pack or some Steam games, I'd be thrilled. And if I can make more than that....