[/caption]I just wanted to follow up with some things I've been doing these past couple of weeks.
Seeing as Blizzard's Wrath of the Lich King is coming out on the 13th of November, I figured I'd level my alts since there's not much else to do at this time. Since the last big patch 3.0.1, Blizzard included the level 80 talent specs for everybody. The game right now is still tailored to level 70 content, however the new level 80 talents greatly increased the damage & abilities for every class, reducing the time it takes to level from 60-70.
The hybrid classes (Druid, Paladin, Shaman) will benefit the most with this new expansion coming out since Blizzard is claiming everybody will be able to passively switch between two talent specs. What this means for a hybrid is you can get the best of two worlds. One world is being able to efficiently do damage, and the other world is being able to effectively heal. So in any event, if you're PVPing with a friend, it'll be nice to have the option to effectively fulfill either role people need you for.
In a two week timeline, I've managed to get my Shaman from 60-70 from 28 hours of gameplay. I must confess I did get help thanks to Zygor's Leveling Guides, which definitely help cut back on the time it took to level my guy.
I also respecced my mage from frost to arcane, to try out the new abilities they got with the 3.0.1 patch. I have to say that there really isn't any skill involved playing arcane. It's definitely turned into a (what the WoW community refers easy/simple things as) "faceroll" spec. It's simply too easy to kill people. I feel kinda dumb playing it to be honest. There's only 2 things you need to win in PVP, Slow & Arcane Barrage. It was nice to be effectively kill people after awhile, but then I started getting bored from it, as I was only having to hit 2 buttons over and over to win. As a result, I'll probably end up respeccing back to full frost before the expansion this Thursday.
Fallout 3 came out a few weeks ago, and I took some time to play the game, and while alot of people & critics love the game and gave it fantastic reviews etc, I can't talk myself into playing the game for more then 10 minutes at a time. I've launched the game several times, and attempted to play it a few minutes here and there, but I end up losing interest. I even tried making things interesting by accessing some cheat codes and spawning in a bunch of enemies within the Megaton city causing the citizens there to declare war against the enemies I spawn in. While it was entertaining at first, it got boring pretty quick. I never played the first two Fallout games, although it's not like it really matters as the story for Fallout 3 is independent of the other two. In fact I never even heard of the Fallout series until my friend Nick introduced them to me.
Far Cry 2 came out a couple of weeks before Fallout 3, and despite it getting mixed reviews, I've had more fun playing that then Fallout 3. I like being able to drive around in a jungle with several options being able to take out the enemies. I always get satisfaction from running people over in vehicles. Also I like the new system they put in place when it comes to managing weapons. As you explore the game in Africa, you have a GPS with a tracker that allows you to find diamonds through the zones. The diamonds are used for currency allowing you to purchase and upgrade weapons as you progress. You can use weapons dropped from the people trying to kill you, but on occasion you'll find their weapons tend to jam, or break overtime in mid-battle, so it's advisable to use your own weapons. My only complaint is that Far Cry 2 apparently has some kind of memory leak; as I've noticed my frames gradually decrease over time. I'm sure one of the patches addresses this issue, but I'm currently running a crack that prevents needing the DVD to play the game and haven't bothered with it since I'll get stuck dealing with that "Insert-the-game-in-my-DVD-drive" DRM bullshit.
That's pretty much it for now.
