Folks Who Play To Lose

Good afternoon everyone,

Last night's stream of Overwatch was certainly interesting, as some of the early randoms I've played with had some really questionable decision making processes... and then there were the last two matches of the night where folks were intentionally hiding and just doing enough to not get kicked from the matches. It really makes things frustrating. Everyone knows I don't mind losing if the match itself is good, but to lose a match due to clear sabotage is just wrong on so many levels.

That said, we did have fun overall, and of course big thanks to PandaSweet for being apart of many of the more entertaining moments of the night. I picked up one Play of the Game as D.va, and I feel like I had some equally good plays as Moira and Mei when I was playing as them. I know some folks wonder when will I use other characters, but I've have me favorites when I play Overwatch. I know what I can do with them in almost any situation. Of course, I could come up with a Channel Points redeem for folks to pick the character i play, but that could end up with me using some characters I really don't like the mechanics (Hanzo, Doomfist, Genji)

Twitch Clip Links

1.  I am powered up!
2.  QUAD KILL!!!!
3.  Aw... damn!
   

For the raid we dropped in on ShadowNeverSeen who was playing Turnip Boy Commits Tax Evasion, which was an Indie Puzzle Adventure game! They stream over at twitch.tv/shadowneverseen!

Today's Fitness Boxing 2 daily workout featured Difficult Challenge Combo #2, Difficulty Challenge Combo #1 and Difficulty Challenge Combo #3. We unlocked the Hiro's Champion achievement today, and now my next target are the achievement's associated with Evan... first Evan's Contender which requires 30 hours trained, and then Evan's Champion which requires 50 hours. Currently I have 14 hours trained using him going back to before the EX Achievements were available.

Fitness Boxing 2 Rhythm & Exercises EX Achievements

• Hiro's Champion: Train with Hiro for over 50 hours
  

Experimented with CAPCOM Arcade Cabinet last night to see if it could be of a similar achievement journey CAPCOM Arcade Stadium was... and while it does have online play (or had, I didn't try that part of it), CAPCOM Arcade Cabinet feels off in terms of movements I would make when playing something like 1943: Battle of Midway. Still, we might take some time to feature it on a Wednesday night as something to mess around with prior to Gears of War: Ultimate Edition.

Also, it does appear many of the achievements associated with the collection are rather buggy or require circumstances so prescience that I straight up refuse to even attempt going for 100% completion. I figure I'll I'll go after the more logical achievements and then move on from there. 

CAPCOM Arcade Cabinet Achievements

• AAA: Set a new record on the High Score table.
• Art Lover: Unlocked a picture in the Gallery.

Now I know that the EA Sports servers for NBA Jam On Fire Edition still worked, since it was a backwards compatible game, however the trick to get the updated terms in conditions required another game, SSX. So by messing around with that for a bit I was able to get the NBA Jam online multiplayer to work a bit. Now the question comes down who is still player either game online in 2022? Who knows, but it's nice to know the option is there.

SSX Achievements

• That Was Easy: Unlock all Game Modes
• Grindage: Grind your first rail (not achievable in Tutorial)

For tonight's stream we're going to play What Remains of Edith Finch, which from what I understand is an Indie Puzzle game, that should at most take about four hours to finish. We shall see!

So on that note we'll see you later over on twitch.tv/fredcasden! 

Raids, Leveling and Fishing

Good morning everyone,

The end of another week is here, woo-hoo! Anyway last night's stream was a lot more fun than even I was anticipating, because we were joined for a bit by Kalenal to help with power leveling Blue Mage and to get an understanding of the Ocean Fishing aspect of Final Fantasy XIV! Kalenal, of course, streams over at twitch.tv/kalenal! 

A big part of the stream last night did focus on the Pandemonium raids, doing all four in a single night, which worked out quite nicely in terms of getting the things I need to get the best possible gear I intend to go after. The raids themselves were mostly okay, thought I did struggle more in the Fourth Circle than I normally do. Thing that did surprise me was the wait times being a lot longer for the First and Second Circle.

Also hit the mark in Final Fantasy XIV that unlocked the Tantalus Attire for having an active account for 150 days. Now I'm not 100% sure, but I believe Tantalus was the main character of Final Fantasy IX, but having not played it I'm not sure, but the attire for FF14 does look similar in design from what I remember.

Apparently there is apparently another Final Fantasy XIV live letter scheduled for today, so I'll check those notes after the stream to give my thoughts on them with tomorrow's blog post!

Big thank you to FnDanteSavage for popping in with the Twitch Prime subscription last night! He is a gentleman and a scholar!

For the raid, we dropped in on DaemonsW0lf who was playing Hunt: Showdown over at twitch.tv/DaemonsW0lf!

Twitch Clip Links

1.  Oh wonderful....
2.  When a fate spawns when you're fishing
3.  A Little Level Boosting

Did some more Forza Horizon 4 off-stream achievement hunting last night, finally found a small stretch of road to get the Noisy Cartographer achievement, and finally did some co-op races as well... I may be terrible, but hell it got me another achievement! I will admit the achievement popped at 529 roads, but there are 531, so I really wonder where those two little strips of pavement are, but I'm not going to go hunting for them.

Forza Horizon 4 Achievements

• Test your Might: Complete The Trial.
• The Noisy Cartographer: Drive down every road in Britain.
• Jolly Cooperation: Complete 5 Horizon Life Co-op Races.

Today's Fitness Boxing 2 daily workout lasted 31 minutes with Beginner Combo #2, Straight Combo #1 and Weaving Combo #2. Since I've been doing little extra sets on top of the daily, I think there is an outside chance I can complete the requirements for Hiro's Champion by Monday or Tuesday... keeping in my mind original guess to complete that was to be around the 12th of March.

Look, I liked Samuel L. Jackson's performance in Pulp Fiction, but there was a snowball's chance in hell of winning Best Supporting Oscar for it back in 1995, because I don't think his performance was better than Paul Scofield's performance in Quiz Show, who I believe should have won the Oscar.

Picked up In Darkness On Fire Book One: Flames of Alexandrite by Kate Flemming off of Amazon and it's a pretty good book. Since it's told from a first person perspective, you really get into the head of the main character Alexander in just how conflicted he is about his wants and desires. It's actually a pretty breezy read considering the subject matter.  

Also nabbed a few cheap things on the Xbox side of things, Haunted Halloween '86, #SincuaAttack, What Remains of Edith Finch and SSX. The first three games are for potential easily 100% completion purposes, but when it comes to SSX it's to see if I workaround related to the EA terms and conditions for online play related to NBA Jam: On Fire Edition works.

For tonight's stream we'll be continuing Persona 5 Royal, which is our long-term Friday night game! 

So on that note we'll see you later over on twitch.tv/fredcasden!

Far From A Flawless Victory

Good afternoon everyone,

Last night's stream featured the story mode of Mortal Kombat IX, which of course is just known as Mortal Kombat because it was a reboot of the franchise and a re-telling of the story of the first three Mortal Kombat games, introducing a new generations to all the characters... and killing a quarter of them!

I'm not kidding, for all the good that comes with the story of Mortal Kombat IX, they really went out of their way to kill off a good chunk of the 'good aligned' characters. Sure many were brought back in Mortal Kombat X and Mortal Kombat 11, but the infamous moment when Sindel one shots everyone but Sonya Blade and Johnny Cage in chapter 15 really is a way of saying 'none of these characters matter'. And then there were some of the fights and how wonky the game can be with how block heavy some can be, and Shao Khan can be an absolute monster unless one is spamming certain special moves, but that is what it is. 

Some of the character model designs still look good for a decade old game, while others certainly didn't age that well. The controls are still pretty damn responsive by modern standards, and the impact of every attack sounds really damn good. That said, some of the audio was mixed oddly to suppress the stage music, but Mortal Kombat has never been a franchise known for having good music

Now we also went ahead an unlocked 50% of the Krypt during the stream, getting a good portion of the alternate costumes. And I am considering doing more Mortal Kombat IX stuff associated with Gears of War: Ultimate Edition on Wednesdays, since we'll be using the Xbox One console for the later when teaming up with Iceman.  The big thing I do want to accomplish with Mortal Kombat IX is 'mastery' of one character, and that would require 24 hours of play time using one character, 100 victories, 100 finisher, 10,000 pints of blood and 100 X-ray attacks done

For the raid we dropped in on Kalenal as they were playing Final Fantasy XIV over on twitch.tv/kalenal! 

Mortal Kombat Achievements

• Halfway There!: Complete Story Mode 50%
• There Will Be Blood!: Spill 10000 pints of blood
• Cold Fusion: Unlock Hidden Fighter "Cyber Sub-Zero"
• Quan-Tease: Unlock Hidden Fighter "Quan Chi"
• Back In Time...: Complete Story Mode 100%
• Undertaker: Unlock 50% of the Krypt 

Twitch Clip Links

1. Jax has been disarmed
2. Ah his is in the air 
3. Lucky... 
   

Today's Fitness Boxing 2 daily workout lasted 28 minutes with Front-Back Step Combo, Beginner Combo #1 and Hook Combo #2 for an estimated calorie burn of 441 kcal. But as you can tell with the screenshot we did some extra, which I always try to squeeze in even if I don't documented here on the daily blogs!

Messed around with SoulCalibur again last night trying to bang out some more achievements and noticed that one that was unlocked a few days ago was finally credited to me (Close Call). Anyway, for as barebones as the game is the achievements are possible to some degree. Anyway with the 'Guardian' achievement that does extent my current streak of Xbox achievements another day, so woo-hoo!

SoulCalibur Achievements

• Close Call: You have triumphed over extreme adversity and defeated an enemy with very little health.
• Guardian: You have learned to counterattack your opponents' repels and parries.

A new week is here, but let's look back at what games we featured on Twitch last week, which were Overwatch, Tell Me Why, NBA Jam: On Fire Edition, Forza Horizon 4, Gears 5, Final Fantasy XIV, Persona 5 Royal and Mortal Kombat IX! 

If you think Donald Trump was a good leader, then you are a fucking idiot and you should move to Moscow and kiss the feet of Vladimir Putin you misanthropic nutball.

For tonight's stream, well you know what day it is, it's Sunday, which means Overwatch. Currently there is a mini-event called Reaper’s Code of Violence, which is to unlock a new skin, icon and spray for Reaper. So that is our goal for the evening!

So on that note we'll see you later over on twitch.tv/fredcasden!

Roads and Collectables Found

Good morning everyone,

Let me begin this post the same way I started last night's stream by saying that Greg Abbot the governor of Texas has set a dangerous standard by making every family that has a youth who is trans a target for harassment in order to try and save himself politically. He, and anyone who supports him, are clear and present dangers to the American People.

That said, last night's stream opened up with Forza Horizon 4, as I set the goal to try and find every road in the main area of the game.... and some how I haven't discovered the final 3. The map says I've been everywhere, so I have no clue where these short side roads would be at. Still I finally found the final Beauty Spot location in the game to get that achievement.

Iceman joined in for Gears 5 as we set about searching for the final four collectables of the game, having to replay two major parts of the campaign. It did work out rather nicely, as we discovered a unique aspect of of JACK's shield which can stop a pouncer from diving onto a player. We also took Iceman into his first run of an Escape, which was chaotic fun.

We did announce that next Wednesday the Gears of War franchise fun will continue as we're going back to where it began with Gears of War Ultimate.. which was the remaster of the original game. It has an extra section that was exclusive to the PC version, so it should be a lot of fun. For that adventure I'll use the X-Box One for it since it is an older game.

No raid last night, but we did host JustBrootal who was playing Call of Duty: Warzone over on twitch.tv/justbrootal!

Forza Horizon 4 Achievements

• Taking the Grand Tour: View every Beauty Spot.

Gears 5 Achievements

• It’s Not Hoarding if Your Stuff is Cool: Collected all Campaign Collectibles

Twitch Clip Links

1. I would create restaurant... 
2. JD... Phrasing
3. The Shield Stopped The Pouncer! 
   

Today's Fitness Boxing 2 daily workout lasted 34 minutes with Difficult Challenge Combo #1, Difficult Challenge Combo #2 and Difficult Challenge Combo #3 for an calorie burn estimate of 647 kcal.

Jumps into Tell Me Why to speed run Episode 3 with all the 'negative' choices to get the final achievement to 100% complete the game. Needless to say skipping over all the context and lore of Mary Ann really takes a lout out of the game, which means going for the 'split' of the Twins is something deliberate one must go for.

Tell Me Why Achievements

• Life Tears Us Apart: Complete the story with the twin's bond weakened
  

Messed around some more with NBA Jam last night as well, wonder how many achievements are actually do-able with it that don't depend on online play.

Back in the 90s my dad did a lot of research into family history, tracing his side of the family back to Belarus on my grandfather's side, and Ukraine on my grandmother's side... so it that later part that has me hoping that the mess caused by the Vladimir Putin gets sorted out quickly. 

It's looking more and more doubtful the 2022 Major League Baseball season will start on time, I meant it ain't that hard to say 'we'll use the old agreement until the new one is agreed upon', but the greed of the players and stubbornness of the owners continues to hold things up 

I have no issue with Machine Gun Kelly being in WWE 2K22, I however do have a problem with yet another WWE video game using licensed songs for the menu screens that cannot be used for custom entrances. It's really a waste of the rights fees 2K has paid to acquire the use of those songs... granted it's a terrible selection regardless.

For tonight's stream we'll be playing Final Fantasy XIV, probably do a daily alliance raid, level up blue mage and fishing a few levels!

So on that note we'll see you later over on twitch.tv/fredcasden!

Which Tell Me Why 'Positive' Ending Was Better?

Good morning everyone,

Last night we continued and finished Tell Me Why, and we went the extra mile to see both endings, one where Alyson stays in her and Trevor's mother's house, and one where they left the town to move on with their lives. Now one thing that surprises me is that as of 2/22/22, The 'Lock-Up And Go' ending is the one damn near everyone picks, and so it really makes me wonder why would folks pick it over 'A New Chapter'.

Probably the first reason is that most folks would want to see the twins basically putting everything behind them, and since Alyson does have some issues needing to sort through it's more of a happy ending... and the other with her staying behind, it does seem to set her up for many of the same issues her mother did. On the other hand, with Alyson staying behind allows her to basically forge her own path and do what's best for her and probably do something with all the Goblin stories that played a huge part of the game.

It's really a tough call... but what wasn't a tough call was making sure Trevor and Michael end up as a couple, and doing every single puzzle which certainly adds a lot of lore and back story to make everything makes sense. If you have not done every puzzle in the loft, you should because it really opens up a lot of details.

Now with last night's stream, we have every achievement for episode three except for one... and that involves making sure Alyson and Trevor lose their power of communication telepathically with one another. So after doing a little Final Fantasy XIV, I loaded Tell Me Why back up and basically did a speed run of Episode 1 and 2 making every 'negative' choice when it came to memories and conversation possible... which basically shows how 10 years apart can really divide how people view things.

Anyway, we had some extra time so we loaded up NBA Jam: On Fire Edition, which was released way back in 2011. Rather surprised the NBA Jam brand has been left dormant again for so long, but considering EA hasn't made a basketball game in what seems like forever I'm not surprised. Still managed to knock out an achievement for it which was a nice little bonus.

For the raid, we dropped in on SeverOmega who was playing Apex Legends over on twitch.tv/severomega!

Tell Me Why Achievements

• Mailbox Bandit: Found out who the Mailbox Bandit really was
• Just One Fix: Helped Sam fix the engine
• Are You My Daddy?: Learned the truth about Sam's relationship to the twins
• Fish all the Fish: Caught all the fish with Michael
• The Princess' Lost Treasure: Uncovered the princess' lost treasure
• And Everything In Its Place: Placed all collectibles in the attic
• Twins4life: Completed the story with the twins strongly bound together
• A New Chapter: Started writing a new chapter with Alyson
• Lock-Up And Go: Locked-up and left the Ronan house with Tyler

NBA JAM: On Fire Edition Achievements

• Jam Sesh: Participate in 5 JAM Now games.

Twitch Clip Links

1. This is how legends begin 
2. Make The Move
3. Everything in its place 
4. Dawkins Is On Fire!
   

Today's Fitness Boxing 2 daily workout lasted 31 minutes with Sway Back Combo, Hip Shape Focus Combo and Straight Combo #2 resulting in an estimated calorie burn of 462 kcal. I am closing in on 600 consecutive days since I started the original Fitness Boxing in the summer of of 2020.

So with Tell Me Why finished, what will be the next game dedicated to Mondays & Tuesdays? As of right now I have not made up my mind yet, but there are a number of possibilities on the X-Box side of things that I'm considering. Current contender include Dragon Ball Kakarot and Game of the Thrones: The Tell-Tale Series (which I have a physical copy of).

At the time I'm writing this it's 64 degrees outside, which is nice, but the forecast is to see it drop down to the mid 30s tomorrow. Welcome to the wacky weather of later February in New Jersey

For tonight's stream, we'll lead off with more roaming around in Forza Horizon 4, then we'll load up Gears 5 to find the last four collectables needed to it an achievement!

So on that note we'll see everyone later over on twitch.tv/fredcasden!

Best of the Week February 23 to 29 2020

This week was a big week for my Twitch Channel as I added an Xbox One to expand what I do, so this week's highlights come from Overwatch, Portal, Gears of War 4, Star Trek Online, The Division 2, NBA Jam and Twitch Sings!