Contemporary Role-playing

The release of Titan Quest, another Diablo clone pretending to be a role-playing game, almost made me gag with it's setting. Sure, Titan Quest might not be your typical fantasy game -no elves, goblins, and orcs- since the setting is in the ancient world mythology. But still, I had enough of sword and sorcery. So instead of getting Titan Quest, and play a primitive game in a modern way, I bought a D20 Modern Core rulebook and the Urban Arcana campaign book (for $50 only), and will play a modern game in a primivite way...the pen and paper way.

D20 Modern Core

The main reasons why I got a D20 Modern Core rulebook is that I've always wanted to play a RPG in a dystopian or post-holocaust setting, and I'm already familiar with the system. D20 Modern offers a lot of materials like new feats that are appropriate in a modern/future setting, freeform character classes, and starting occupations. All materials presented in this book are very adjustable to your preference offering you freedom and control over your game.

Urban Arcana

The Urban Arcana Campaign is an alternate reality setting, where Shadowkind species (Elves, Dwarves, Orcs) walk amongst humans but can't see them for what they really are. Only a few "aware" humans can see an Orc as an Orc. I really love the concept of this setting, fantasy creatures in a modern world. Elves use rifles instead of bows, Dragons dwell in subways and sewers, and Orc clans are a bunch of biker gangs.

It's been eight years since the last time I played a pen & paper/table-top RPG with my fellow "Magickeros" at the 2nd floor of Signs & Symbols. So I really need to brush up on my role-playing skills since I'm getting back to my roots. Now if can only find a couple of people so I could begin the campaign.

Reaping the Rewards II: Radeonated!

Last time, I was having a hard time choosing an item for my graduation gift. But, after much research and migraines, I finally decided to get a new graphics card and memory, which I figured out would be much use to me than a PSP or an Mp3 Player.

So today, I went to Best Buy early in the morning...make that REALLY early in the morning since I waited outside an hour before the store opened. When they finally opened, I wasted no time and proceeded to the computer area of the store. I immediately secured the items that I wanted: a 512MB PC3200 memory and the ATI Radeon X1600 PRO graphics card, and paid for them.

Upon the installment of the parts, however, I got a little bit disappointed when the service technician told me that my power supply unit is only 300 watts, and that the Radeon X1600 PRO requires at least 350 watts. I was glad that he was new and still in training. Another technician came to -rescue- me and explained that the graphics card can run at 300 watts if a system isn't loaded, and mine wasn't loaded. So he went on with the installation run a couple tests -installed and played a game and watched a couple of movies- to see if it functions properly, and it did

I hastily went home, after the successful installation of my new hardware, to try my newly buffed rig. So I loaded SpellForce 2 and all of a sudden my whole system restarted. I figured out that the problem was in the display drivers of the card, and not with my PSU. So I logged into ATI's website and downloaded newer driver versions of the graphics card, installed it, and fixed the problem.

I've been playing SpellForce 2 for hours now and, so far, I've never encountered any problems. The graphics of my games now are giving me a mesmerizing, tantalizing, and scintillating experience.

Torrential Downpour

I’ve been using BitComet since 2004 to download torrent files from the internet. However, just recently, I’ve heard a lot of good things about uTorrent, which is another torrent client. So I gave it a try and was completely amazed by it.

uTorrent, or micro torrent, includes many features that are also available in other torrent clients. However, unlike other clients, it only uses a small amount of your system’s memory. When I download one file, BitComet uses 18MB of memory while uTorrent only uses around 3MB. The other cool feature in uTorrent is probably the speed guide which automatically configures your settings based on your connection speed, and also checks if your port is properly forwarded.

After using it for a couple of while, I’ve decided to use uTorrent as my default client. When it comes to features, there’s nothing much different between uTorrent and BitComet. But uTorrent’s small memory usage is a big plus for me. It helps a lot when I’m playing games while running a torrent client in the background.

Torrent and Piracy

BitTorrent’s ability to distribute large amount of, easily accessible, files have been abused and misused by a lot of people. I might be one of those people but that depends on your point of view.

Movies, music, and games are usually the popular files. A person might say that: “I can’t hurt the industry, I’m just one person”. What a person does not realize is that there are millions of people all over the world saying that. In my case, I don’t download those files. I still go to theatres and rent movies. I still buy CDs because it’s impersonal to collect a bunch of files. I’m an ardent supporter of the gaming industry, and consider downloading games as a sacrilege.

So what do I download? A bunch of anime that are not available on DVD, or aired on TV. Missed episodes of my favorite shows. Also, and of course, I download pornography. You can’t hurt the porn industry. I mean, the pornstars, directors, and any person on the set won’t lose anything since their work is already the big reward.

A Hundred Games

I didn't realize that, when I logged in at PC IGN to add SpellForce 2 on my collections list, I've already reached my 100th PC games mark. That's all the games that I have in my possesion right now, and that list excludes other games that I played but do not own.

To most people, 100 games is probably a lot. But owning a hundred games during my seven years as an active gamer (1999 -present) isn't that much. I've missed a lot of games too, including classics like Anachronox and Grim Fandango. But it's always quality over quantity. I must say that an average score of 8.6 is good enough.