The Hutt (kind of) Recommends: Black City Saint

Black City Saint by Richard A. Knaak

I've played Diablo since I was fourteen years old. For a very long time it was also the ONLY thing I played. If the legends and history of Sanctuary, and Tristram, hadn't intrigued me so I wouldn't have discovered Richard A. Knaak's stories at all. The legends of the Sin War and the stories about Zayl the necromancer all have special places in my bookshelves.
   Obviously, I needed to know whether Knaak had written anything else relevant to my interests and that, my friends, is how I stumbled upon Black City Saint - an urban fantasy tale featuring true 1920's flappers, bootleggers, shapeshifters, dragons, Feirie and saints.

   In Prohibition time Chicago there are worse things than getting mixed up in bootlegger wars to worry about, something Nick Medea is trying his very best to not let people find out about. He's been the immortal guardian set to guard The Gate between this world and the world of the Wyld - the dark Feiriefolk  - these past 600 years, ever since... Well, suffice it to say it's been a bumpy road from once being called Saint George to where Nick finds himself now.
   Ever since The Night the Dragon Breathed and set Chicago ablaze some 50 years ago, more and more of the Wyld have been found on the wrong side of The Gate. The more of the Wyld that gathers the larger the problem it gathers around. Like moths to a flame they gather.
   Nick has to look inward to a part of himself he deeply mistrusts to solve this riddle, at the same time as people from his troubled past resurrects and resurfaces.

   Black City Saint has a lot of the elements I like about Knaak: the somewhat sombre but relatable main character, a sarcastic familiar, plenty of dry wit and a lot of action. Unfortunately, it also has all of the things I don't like about Knaak: too many small characters, a lack of female characters* and a way of getting stuck somewhere in the middle of the story and drone on about something rather insignificant before throwing the final boss fight in your face.
   However, it was well worth it for the sarcasm! But honestly I'd rather read 'Kingdom of Shadow' and 'Moon of the Spider' again if I had to reread anything Knaak. Humbart Wessel brings the best disembodied quips to the party.

 * Black City Saint doesn't even pass the Bechdel test;
the only conversation between two named female characters happen
off screen and is only mentioned to have happened. It's absurd.

The Gamer Hutt?

This past October I had a sudden, but forceful, urge to play something other than Diablo 3 for a while and bought The Witcher, Spore and The Orange Box (Halo, Halo 2, Portal and Team Fortress 2).
On a whim.
As you do.
(They were on sale.)

I finished The Witcher pretty soon and though I was intrigued by the story the game itself is kind of... drawn-out to the point of excruciatingly boring. I found myself wanting to skip through most of it (all combat, most quests etc etc) to read more about characters and get further with the story. Just talk to NPC's about other NPC's more vital to Geralt's own story. (My interest is skewed by the fact that I've seen the Polish TV show Wiedzmin and I LOVED IT SO MUCH. 10/10 would recommend. Well, maybe 9/10 and the fact that it's on a very tight budget is evident in... everything.)
The end fight in The Witcher game was utterly and completely anticlimactic for me.
I was not a happy camper.

Understandably, I was hesitant to try anything else for a while as I was hungover from my Witcher experience. I went back to Diablo 3. And it's still boring as all hell unless you're in multiplayer mode. Yesterday I finally installed Spore. Played a little. It's totally brainless but in a fun, time-wasting way.
Today I installed The Orange Box. And tried Portal. The cake might be a lie but the hype sure wasn't.
I've never really called myself a gamer, but maybe it's high time to add an other nerdy title to my name.
Speaking of games; I've bought Carcassonne + an expansion (Bridges, Castles and Bazars). It's the best.

Reaper of Souls

I'm happy to announce that my monster computer has been revived and the D3 expansion proved to be worth the money I didn't really have but threw at Blizzard anyhow. Yeah. Life is odd.

Happy 1st birthday D3!

If you play Diablo 3 today, this first anniversary of the release of the game, you'll get a treasure and magic find bonus. So go play now, all of you! The game is still quite shitty but there might be some good loot around.

Diablo III - an afterthought

I've played through the game and must admit: I'm disappointed.

Normal difficulty is too easy, the jump in difficulty to Nightmare too big and the game is too short. The four acts were over too soon and having said that I actually mean it in the bad way and not the good way. To clarify: it’s not in the "I can't believe the game is already over because I really wanted to play forever and ever *insert dreamy stare*"-way but more of the "what the fuck do you mean 'end credits'?! WAS THAT IT?!!?"-way.

Let me tell about more of the things I didn't like:
This game is the bastard child that Torchlight and World of Warcraft should never been allowed to have. Personally, I disliked the design of Torchlight and hate WoW so deeply it’s bordering on the obsessed, so it's awful either way.
You can't play it without an internet connection. Not even single player. My connection is unstable at best which makes every fight a possibly lethal one as the game might freeze at any point and unfreeze when my life is so low I can't possibly heal. Trust me, I've been killed by those teeny tiny spider thingies in the second act... Not to mention all the cock-up’s that those overloaded servers have caused constantly since the release.

Diablo himself looks like a mix between the xenomorph queen in Alien and a balrog. I’m not impressed. What was wrong with the old design? Since Diablo III hurls old character names and insider information from the first game at you I thought they'd be more careful about making Diablo closer to what we ran away from like scared babies that first time we ran into him all those years ago. But no. It was not to be. Forget the hulking figure of the first game and throw your hopes of meeting the gigantic demon king of the second game in the bin because it’s not going to happen.

Was there anything to like? Well, yes. Of course.
I love my Collector's Edition box - it's beautiful. I like the music. I like that reading the journals and books you find hidden away all over give you experience and little stories about all kinds of things from myths to the history of Sanctuary. It gives some of the depth and story that I wanted to be included after reading the Diablo Archive.

I enjoy the beauty of the game, the art. Some things look so closely related to Torchlight I couldn’t quite make myself like them but when one looks at the detail that has gone in to suits of armor and in-game movies I almost forgive Blizzard and concludes that it really is a pretty game after all.
Ambience is what dragged me in and made me play Diablo to begin with but I can’t help but feel that ambience is exactly what Diablo III is missing. It’s the kind of game you speedily run through once only to return in order to play with friends or possibly find good loot. I don’t play for loot. It’s a bonus but not my primary target.

Dear Blizzard, either hop it or give me a game that makes me proud to be a Diablo nerd.

D3 - Error 33

Haha, the list of problems with Diablo III is endless it seems. Servers have been down most part of the day for maintenance and the level of rage on Battle.net is infinite. Mostly because there's no intel whatsoever about when the servers might be up and running again.
I didn't give that huge pile of money to Blizzard to be stuck with an "Error 33" and just like some have pointed out on Battle.net: if single player had been available offline this wouldn't have been an issue. Lots of people don't like playing with others (I'm one of them) which means that playing online is completely useless for most of us. Blizzard needs to attend to this. They need additional servers for their millions of gamers before there's an assassionation.
I want to play my game.
------------------------------------
Edit:
I tried logging on at about 2:30PM and got an "Error 33". 7:40PM I could finally play again. The problem seems to be solved for now. We'll see what this week brings...

D3 - installation complete

And it's gorgeous.

D3 - installation trouble

Apparently, there are a lot of people experiencing trouble with the installation of Diablo III. I've heard accounts of the installation taking somewhere between 15 minutes to 4 hours. My installation has been going on for 45 minutes with a tenth of the game installed. In other words, my installation will be over 3 hours but it might actually work. Emphasis on might.
Now, if you excuse me, I'm gonna cancel my installation again because I need to go and will not leave the installation running while I'm gone. Hating this.

D3 - delivered

After much wait I finally received this precious gem and of course wanted to install it and enthusiastically slay as many monsters as I could in as little time as possible whilst staring at all the wonderful detail and amazing scenery. I’ve been longing to see what magic they’ve been creating this time and so I started installing. 1½ hour later roughly 14% had been installed. I abandoned the idea and tried again the following day with the same result.
As we speak I’m making another attempt at installing my, kind of very expensive, game. It’s been 30 minutes and 7% have been installed.
What am I doing wrong?
Does anyone else have this problem?
Why does this happen to me?
Murphy's Law strikes again.

"Hello, my friend. Stay a while and listen."

It feels like I should say a word or two about Diablo III and the fact that the game will finally be released from the shackles in which it has been kept for so long, deep in the dungeons of Blizzard Entertainment. May 15^th is the big date and I’ve already pre-ordered the Collector’s Edition which has apparently sold out in the web shop I ordered from. It worries me that I can’t see the product in store any longer. It doesn’t feel right. It says in the confirmation email that’s it’s a little over 6lb heavy which made me squee like crazy. It’ll be so pretty I could die.

My relationship with Diablo started in 2001 when I borrowed the first game from a classmate (read: extorted from her) and it’s been a lasting love. I recently dusted off that first game and took my time to enjoy all that nostalgia that welled up from deep inside at every quest. My favourite is still on the 14^th level where you run into the Blood Knight Lachdanan who wants nothing more than rest in peace. Find him the Golden Elixir and you’ll receive the Veil of Steel. The Halls of the Blind is another favourite.

"I can see what you see not.
Vision milky then eyes rot.
When you turn they will be gone,
Whispering their hidden song.
Then you see what cannot be,
Shadows move where light should be.
Out of darkness, out of mind,
Cast down into the Halls of the Blind."

Even though Diablo II’s aspirations were larger and the story was deepened and I bought the Diablo Archive (four Diablo novels in one) it hasn’t left the same kind of impression. As much as I wanted to try all the different classes I got tired of it too fast. Since then, I’ve waited for Diablo III and I’ve wasted my time with Titan Quest: Immortal Throne in the meantime. It’s a substitute as good as any.

But I don’t need a substitute anymore.

I can get the real thing.

Soon, precious, soon.