All posts tagged lame

Xbox DEAD

By | 31 January 2011 | Video Games | 6 Comments

Apparently Microsoft’s XBL division is built upon the backs of gamers. I think that the last time that I renewed my account I must have used a credit card (defying all reason), which put me at Microsoft’s tender mercy. At some point XBL changed the terms of service making you opt in to auto renewal automatically upon give them a credit cart. Also, they removed the ability to disable this “feature” from the console, or web browser. The only way to disable auto renewal is to call XBL support can cancel it. I could have sworn that I did place the call, but I am sure I must have fallen for some other trap that automatically flipped the renewal flag on for my account, they make it pretty difficult to identify when it will happen.

My problem relates to auto renewal. Recently my XBL account expired, and I got the notice about the account expiring. So, I went down to Best Buy can cash in a couple of reward zone certificates to get a renewal card. I then went to xbox.com to redeem my card. Low and behold it wouldn’t let me. It kept forcing me to the billing information page to change my credit card information. With a message stating that the card would be charged $59.95 immediately upon being updated. I said screw that.

After speaking to one of the XBL reps the details of the scam were unfolded. Apparently, since auto renewal was turn on, they did not immediately shut off my account, instead they kept slamming the expired card while leaving the account active for a about a week. As a result, my account is now suspended pending paying an extortion fee to XBL. Since they allowed me to use the service for a week that basically constituted some kind of agreement to pay for the next year at their fully marked up price. Lame.

They will not even let me redeem the points that are already on my account, I’m pretty pissed. At this point I have two choices, I can either pay the extortion fee, or I close my account and start from scratch with a brand new account (losing the $20+ worth of point on my account).

XBL–

UPDATE: Well, I paid Microshaft’s blood ransom. And, my account status have changed to “active.” Now I just need to remember to disable the auto renewal before they obliterate me at some point in the future.

D&D Comes to an End on the Lakeshore

By | 19 December 2010 | General | 4 Comments

The two hobby shops on the lakeshore that were hosting public play of D&D no longer do so. The Muskegon shop moved into a smaller space, so there was no longer room. And, the Grand Haven shop was forced to abruptly close due to a variety of reasons. Grand Rapids is now the only host of organized play events in West Michigan at this time. Bummer.

Harry Potter / How to Waste an Afternoon

By | 16 December 2009 | Rant | 9 Comments

Last night I finished rereading Harry Potter. Its the first time I have picked up the book since the series began to develop momentum many years ago. Not surprisingly, I have come to the same conclusion; Harry Potter is a wretched book.

There are so many problems with the book, I don’t even know where to begin. And, I am not talking about the whole sacrilegious angle. I suppose my biggest gripe would be the style of the writing. It is inconsistent, and agitating. Reading it is like talking to someone that keeps slipping in and out of an irritating accident. This however is just the tip of the iceberg.

One of the things I found most disturbing about the book is the promotion of a strong sense of classism. There is a sharp delineation between the “elite” magic users, and everyone else, whom are referred to as “moggles” with some level of contempt. And, to make the normal people seem even more awful, the author reinforces her stereotype by having the foster family of Harry Potter  behave brutally towards him.

In fact, the whole situation with his family is another annoying facet of the story. The book basically begins with him, as a very young child being dropped off at his Aunt’s house. This was necessary as his parent were slaughtered by a wizard who is apparently not a nice guy. The problem is that his aunts family essentially hate him. In this section of the book, Harry is apparently a well behaved child, but is constantly punished. On, the flip side, once he is taken to the magic fairytale land to learn to be a wizard everything is different.

Harry Potter seems to be a character of opposites. In the regular world, he is good but falls downwards. In the fantasy land, he constantly does foolish things, and is quite reckless. However, the worse he screws up, the more upward he fails. It makes little to no sense. While I agree that no good dead goes unpunished, it is pretty rare that failure is directly rewarded either. And, really is this a lesson we want to teach our children?

I could rant about this forever, but I am going to tie it up here. Upon reading the book twice, and giving it due consideration. I am whole heartily issuing it my lowest possible rating, -5. Please people, avoid this book at all costs.

The Vikings are Pathetic

By | 25 October 2009 | General | 1 Comment

The Vikings demonstrated that they were nothing more than pretenders today. They turned in a PATHETIC performance in their most important game of the year. Hell, they looked like Detroit. I am throughly disgusted.

Final Fantasy X, One Post Wasn’t Enough

By | 15 August 2009 | General, Video Games | 2 Comments

It would seem that I was not detailed in my last post about FFX, vanlandw pointed out a couple of critical areas I missed. So, I have decided to do a follow up post.

Exciting World of Micromanaged Combat

There is a huge problem with the combat in FFX. Characters can only get experience if they are actively involved in combat. For example, if you had three people in your party and only one person killed the enemy that person would be the only one to get experience. Your other team members would be left with nothing. This violates a convention that RPG gamers have gotten used to over the years. That standard is everyone in a party splits experience regardless of what they did during the battle.

While this new system may be innovative, and slightly more realistic is makes battles a pain in the ass and utterly tedious. This is because you have to swap out party members during battle so they can do something. This requires constant juggling of characters and a lot more micromanagement that I’d like to think about while grinding. My preferred method is what was used in FF7: everyone in the party gets full experience, and everyone not in the party gets half experience.

Wretched Crystal Room

I do not even know what you would call this area, but people who have played the game will know what I am talking about. Within Sin there is a room you have to run around and collect gems that appear, and disappear (usually just before you get to them). While you are running around trying to collect the gems before they fade away there are crystal shards that jut up from the ground at random. Normally, this isn’t that big of an issue, but the way it is setup is just sadistic. You spend almost the entire time running blind across the circular area trying to find the gems, because the camera is facing your character so you cannot see where you are running. I can only assume the game designers did this to be dicks, and to increase your chances of running into shards.

If you hit one of these shards you are instantly propelled into battle. And, these battles are nothing to laugh at. Most of them just force you to spend precious items you have collected. But, one in particular is just sadistic. The Great Malboro is an insidious creature that has a special attack called “bad breath.” This horrible ability utterly screwed my team, as it inflicts various status ailments, including some kind of confusion. The result was that it could slowly pick away at my characters while they slaughtered each other, and all I could was watch.

Sadly, I had never encountered anything like it in the game up to that point. As a result, I was not at all equipped to face it. Luckily, I happened to have a return sphere so I was able to add first strike to one of Auron’s weapons. I charged his overdrive and held it until I fought the creature. I was pretty strong when I faced it, so that over drive was usually enough to get it before it could get me. Ugh, I still get furious just thinking about it.

Moonflow

Be careful what you name things. I have read several books that use the term “moonflow” to refer to menstruation. Unfortunately this made much of this sequence of the game quite disturbing, and / or just gross. The thought of moonflow glowing is just wrong. And, riding a creature the lives off of organisms in the moonflow, ugh. The stories about Yuna repeatedly jumping into the moonflow as a child…and then, when Tidus and Wakka just jump into the moonflow…the thought of that battle still makes me feel dirty.

Although this should be an unwritten rule, it is an important one: do not name things after menstruation.

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