The Crusades

The Morning After

Yesterday was a trying day to say the least.  The funeral for my grandmother was at the odd hour of 9:30, and to add to that it was 35* outside which made me cling to my leather jacket like a life vest.  The wind that was blowing made the graveside portion absolute torture.  When we got back to the dinner afterwards, we huddled around the coffee pot trying to warm up.  I feel like it has been too long since I had been to a catholic funeral, because after going to mostly protestant ones over the last few years…  it felt very clinical and detached from my grandmother.  I am sure she would have liked it, being the devout catholic that she was, and the priest… however hard he was to understand seemed to do his level best to give her a proper sendoff.

Normally I am used to absolutely losing my shit at some point during the funeral service as loved ones recount tales of the deceased.  This didn’t happen, either in the losing my shit variety or the recounting tales variety.  It was a mass, just like every other mass I have attended… with the exception that there was a casket at the front.  Nothing about the service felt like we were honoring my grandmother… instead it just felt like we were obeying a ritual.  It is sad she is gone, but the positive of it all is that I think it is going to help my generation… the cousins to reconnect.  We stood around and visited for a couple of hours in the church hall after the service.

For whatever problems my moms generation has had with drama… that seems to be completely absent from my generation.  It was good seeing my cousins and finding out that all but one are living in close enough vicinity to be able to get together for dinner.  My wife is already scheming to have some sort of a cousins day out at the zoo.. in part because the children of my cousins don’t really know each other… and that is a damned shame.  I remember similar outings to the kiddie park etc, that let my generation mingle and get to know each other.  While I have never really fit into my family, it seems like none of my cousins have really felt like they fit in either.  I guess it is time for us to create our own brand of family.

The Crusades

Screenshot035 I have to say I love everything about the crusader.  I somehow got left out of the Reaper of Souls beta shenanigans, so yesterday was quite literally the first time I had played one.  I have always been drawn to “tanky” characters, or at the very least sword and board oriented ones.  The crusader so far does not disappoint at all.  I have only made it a little way through the play through and I am already digging the look and feel and style.  My friends seem to have a problem with the male crusader voice acting, but I dig it so far.  So right now I am completely torn, I want to play my crusader so much…  but I also want to complete Act V.  In part because I don’t want the internet to spoil my fun.  I can only go so long without reading tweets about D3, and sooner or later someone is going to spoil the ending.

Granted Blizzard games are not exactly high fiction, but I am trying to keep whatever I can about the game secret for now.  Which is extremely ironic, considering I live streamed the entire evenings play.  So basically… if you care about spoilers don’t watch.  It should be at least mildly entertaining as within moments of starting playing last night, I ended up with two other friends joining me in my mission.  Whenever Rae is in the channel it is always entertaining.  As the evening went on we ended up with Tib, Waren, Drathis and eventually Tam in the channel as well.  Granted our trio never really changed during the course of the evening, but suffice as to say that we were all somehow playing Reaper of Souls.

So far I am really enjoying the new content.  I don’t want to dig too deeply into it as to create my own spoilers but the maps are pretty vast, and extremely detailed.  The thing that I am liking the most so far is how almost every single dungeon has some sort of new event.  These were my favorite thing about Diablo 3, but they just felt like they were to sparse or random as to whether or not you would actually see one.  The amount of creativity that went into designing this acts traps and events is pretty great.  There is also an amazing sub theme going on, that will make Frank Herbert fans excited, but I won’t go into more detail than that.  It is not exactly subtle, but fans of the Dune series will pick up on the references.

Bounty of Games

eso 2014-02-17 13-58-08-09 Right now my big hope is to be able to get through Act five this week, and hopefully have my monk to level 70 to show for it.  The primary reason I am wanting to push through the content is that if my math is correct… Elder Scrolls Online head start begins this Sunday.  Granted this is the five day launch for folks who preordered imperial edition through Zenimax… but that is precisely what I did.  I have been really looking forward to this game and I am amped to finally get in and make some permanent decisions.  Like I have said before, I have been in testing of this title for over a year at this point and have watched it grow from something good to something great.  The only problem is…  it is launching super close to Reaper of Souls.  So while I don’t want to abandon playing a crusader… I know I will at least for the short term.  I intend to be in and streaming ESO from day one as I wander around and adventure on my Imperial Sword and Shield Dragon Knight.

4 thoughts on “The Crusades”

  1. Since I just now purchased Diablo 3 because it was on sale, I just want to finish the story and maybe hit 60 before TESO comes out. I just started act 3.

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