Life is Strange But The Colors Are True

Good afternoon everyone,

Last night's stream featured Life is Strange; True Colors, and we got through three chapters in a stream that went 7.5 hours. This will contain spoilers for the game! You have been warned.

Our hero is Alex Chen who is going to live with her brother Gabe in Colorado, her power is based on empathy, she can read other people's emotions and use it to piece together what is either making them sad, angry and scared. This does have a draw back because she can feel those emotions and sometimes it will cause her to have a corresponding outburst (I came across two such instances, 1 is part of the story and the other towards the end of episode 3 seems to be avoidable). The town of Haven Springs is certainly a lovely little town, and we certainly have a lot of room to explore when we're outdoors. It's a lot 'bigger' than what we've seen in the other Life is Strange games by far, and you can use Alex's power to get a great deal of insight on the town.. Hell Exploring every thing and interacting with stuff such has finding spots for Alex to sit down and think about stuff are counted towards decisions made.

Anyway, Episode 1 is really a long drawn out introduction, I meant you basically are introduced to everyone important in Haven Springs, from Ethan and Charlotte, to Ryan and Steph, to Duckie and Diane... it all feels very genuine... if you ignore the fact that Gabe basically has been hyped about the arrival of Alex for some time. The story itself doesn't really get rolling until the end of episode 1 when Alex, Ryan and Gabe go to find Ethan who sneaked off to go into a closed off mine around the same time some mining excavations were going to take place. Gabe is killed,despite him phoning in a request for the excavations to be delayed... and the episode two opens with a clear conspiracy in place when the person Gabe talked to says 'there was no call'.Turns out the company doing the mining is up to some super shady shit, which becomes slowly more obvious over episodes two and three, but is fully revealed that they want to hide something at the end of episode three. 

Now between the main plot there are several awesome sub plots and mini things that are peppered through out the game, you can interact with arcade machines for mini-games, find collectables that give further insight into the town and people of Haven Springs, and lot of these collectables are found by using Alex's powers, so in every area you can roam around in, always do a full search. Also there are some events tied to things people say, such as taking a lunch order or answering a riddle.

Regarding Alex's personality, she is certainly a medium between Max and Chloe as being kind of the most well adjusted... and she is certainly way more likeable than Sean from Life is Strange 2. Just over the first three episodes we see Alex come out of her shell from being unsure about moving to Haven Springs to being an big part of the small town community.

Unlike the first three Life is Strange games, True Colors does have a 'streamer' friendly mode.... however there are at least two instances I found in regards to there being awkward with no music at all instead of a non-licensed fill in. Both happen in Episode 1, one is when Alex and Gave are listening to a Kings of Leon record... and the other is when Alex finds the guitar beneath the bed.

You might have guess but I'm really looking forward to seeing what happens in episodes 4 and 5!

Following the stream we sent the fun over to Sheepfuzz (twitch.tv/sheepfuzz) who was playing Jackbox Party Packs! Sheepfuzz does a lot of community streams and is just an awesome streamer with a great personality! 

Life is Strange: True Colors Achievements

1. A Letter To Riley: Find the “Riley Letter” Memory in Chapter 1
2. Head Count: Find the “Helmet” Memory in Chapter 1
3. I Thought I Could Hunt The Monster: Complete Chapter 1 of Life is Strange: True Colors
4. Umbrella: Find the “Umbrella” Memory in Chapter 2
5. No Handouts: Find the “Rent Check” Memory in Chapter 2
6. Time For Something New: Find the “Button” Memory in Chapter 2
7. Bird Spotting: Help the Birdwatcher find her bird
8. Pro Tip: Find the “Gummies” Memory in Chapter 2 
9. Found Dog!: Help the Hoodie Guy find his dog
10. Something You Build: Complete Chapter 2 of Life is Strange: True Colors
11. Earworm Squasher: Find and play the Student's lost song
12. Hell Divers: Find the “Bomber Jacket” Memory in Chapter 3
13. Ethan's Dollar: Find the “Dollar” Memory in Chapter 3
14. And How Does That Make You Feel?: Find the “Appointment Slip” Memory in Chapter 3
15. Upright and Above Ground: Find the “Old Paper” Memory in Chapter 3
16. Valkyrie's Dish: Find the “Valkyrie's Dish” Memory in Chapter 3
17. Memory Collector: Find all Memory Collectibles in Chapter 3
18. Burying Something: Complete Chapter 3 of Life is Strange: True Colors 

Twitch Clip Links

• Bad To The Gnome! 
• Death has been cheated!
• Alex Sings... Yes She Is Singing... What is she singing we don't know 
• I Got It Right!
• Alex's Glasses Have No Lens
• Sitting At The Dock Of The Bay 
• Let's Do A Good Thing!
• Sorry Alex You Don't Have Time Travel Powers
• My Expectations of the Shipping Community
• I Have The Power... HE-MAN!!!!
  

We have two new additions to the collection that arrived yesterday from Japan. The first is Marvel vs Capcom: Clash of Super Heroes.... for the Sega Dreamcast. As you might know... I don't have a Sega Dreamcast, nor is my intention to get one that would play the Japan-release version of MvC. See I was expecting to get the PlayStation version, the one that is a very unique version of Marvel vs Capcom: Clash of Super Heroes that is a full on conversion to a 1 on 1 fighter with different gameplay mechanics and balancing. That said, it is cool to have a version of Marvel Vs Capcom that was released to the Sega Dreamcast because it is nearly arcade perfect in that is has the full 2 on 2 experience... but we kind of already have that with Marvel vs Capcom Origins that have I in my digital PS3 collection.

I have not given up hope on finding the unique version of Marvel vs Capcom for the original PlayStation, but the only way to find it is to look through imports from Japan, because the North American releases are way too overpriced.

Anyway, the other addition we have Shiritsu Justice Gakuen: Nekketsu Seisyun Nikki 2... which translates to  "Private Justice Academy: Hot-Blooded Youthful Diary 2".... but it's actually version 2.0 of Disc 2 for Rival Schools: United By Fate. It includes all the mini-games from the older version, along with two additional characters.The novelty here is the extra characters and having an 'updated' version of the Rival Schools is pretty neat... considering that the true sequel Project Justice has only ever seen a home release on the Sega Dreamcast.

Former Chicago Cub and Montreal Expo Andrew Dawson runs a funeral home in Florida and business is way to good for him because of how many knuckleheads in that state refuse to have any commonsense when it comes to protecting themselves from COVID and it's variants that are popping up. 

Today's Fitness Boxing 2 daily workout lasted 31 minutes with an estimated calorie burn of 437 kcal. The exercises for today were Hip Shape Focus Combo, Straight Combo #2 and Swayback Combo. I did step on the scale yesterday and my weight is down to 246 lbs.

Didn't do any ranked matches in Overwatch yesterday or today (so far), so no results to report.  

For tonight's stream we will be continuing Life is Strange: True Colors and we will finish episode 4 and 5! This is gonna be awesome!

See you later over on twitch.tv/fredcasden!

Today's Notes 8/22/21: We Have All Eight Badges

Good afternoon everyone,

I did not get up till 1 PM Eastern... just wanted to point that out first

Yesterday was weird as I called into work to see if they needed help, and imagine my surprise when I'm told 'yes' because 'everyone was falling behind' and I was too 'kick butt'. So what do I do is get back to back completes and suddenly everyone else got on a hot streak. Guess if I suddenly show up and get things done it means everyone else needed to get their butts in gear. So that was a good feeling.

Anyway, on to last night's stream of Pokemon Let's Go Eevee, which saw us heading for the Seafoam Islands first... and I happened to stumble across Articuno, I wasn't actually looking for it, I just happened to find it while working my way through the cavern of Seafoam Island. Imagine my surprise at how easily Eevee was able to take it on using the Buzzy Buzz, and then capturing it was no where near as big a pain in the ass as Zapados was last week!

From there we went over to Cinnabar Island to tackle the Pokemon Mansion to get the key needed to face Blane to get the Fire-badge. Oddly enough, there is a way to avoid battling his gym's trainers just by answering five trivia questions correctly, which is what we did by looking up the answers for the two questions I did not know! Between Eevee and Blastoise we were able to wipe out his entire squad of Fire Pokemon.

With now seven badges in hand, it was back to Viridian City to face Giovanni one last time to take the gym badge. We didn't have too much trouble, tackling Giovanni's trainers, but when facing him, he did managed to have one of my Pokemon, Victreebel, knocked out, but we just went to Eevee to seal the win and to get the Earth badge, making for a total of 8

So with this all done, next Saturday's stream will be focused on the journey to get to the Indigo Plateau to face the Elite Four... and that journey means we'll probably come across Moltres, the last of the three legendary bird Pokemon. If all goes right we should be able to finish Pokemon Let's Go Eevee next week!

Now here's the list of clips from last night' stream

• Eevee Versus Articuno 
• We caught Articuno 
• Eevee Paws 
• Wrong Move... But It Still Worked 
• Ooo Yeah The Glitzy Glow!
• Your Soul Belongs To Eevee!
  

After the stream we raided Kalenal (twitch.tv/kalenal) who was playing Final Fantasy XIV!, Kal does stream regularly on Mondays, Wednesdays and Saturdays! 

It's Sunday which means we have a new highlight reel, and I've changed the format to use 30 second clips. Anyway this past week we played Fitness Boxing 2: Rhythm & Exercise, Overwatch, Chrono Cross, Ehrgeiz, Rampage: World Tour, Rival Schools: United By Fate, Star Trek Online, Life is Strange, South Park, South Park Chef's Luv Shack, South Park Rally, Vs & Pokemon Let's Go Eevee!  

Today's Fitness Boxing 2 daily workout lasted 31 minutes with an estimated calorie burn of 519 kcal. The exercises for today were Triple Combo #2, Intermediate Combo #1 and the Biceps Shape Focus Combo. We're going to be sticking with Lin as the trainer as we now focused on earning the Lin's Champion achievement which is to train with Lin for over 50 hours. Currently we're at 44 out of 50 for that.

With all the organizing I've been doing of stuff lately, I thought I lost the journal I was using for when I was playing the Zero Escape trilogy... turns out it was sitting on a digital clock...

For tonight's stream we're playing Overwatch as we do every Sunday! There will be Mayhem matches in the first hour and then the focus will be on Quick Play matches. Also the Pirate Bastion skin is rather neat. We'll get started around 7 PM Eastern!

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

Today's Notes 8/19/21: Ehrgeiz Is Awesome!

 

Good morning everybody,

We had a lot of fun last night with a triple header of PlayStation games, Ehrgeiz, Rampage World Tour and Rival Schools: United By Fate.

First, the big game of the night was Ehrgeiz, which was published by SquareSoft before they became SquareEnix, it is a fighting game that has a full 360 arena combat, this is not like Tekken or Virtual Fighter where you side step to one side or another, in Ehrgeiz you can move in any direction. The controls while basic are very friendly for new comers, as I was able to figure out some basic combos with the characters I used. The controls are very responsive, better than most fighting games from that late 90s period.

Graphically, Ehrgeiz is a gorgeous game, the character 3D models look great, and thus the Fight Fantasy VII characters that I saw (Cloud, Yuffie, Tifa and Sephiroth) look really damn good, and it's probably this game that made people want to see a remake of Final Fantasy VII with how the characters looked in a proper 3D environment with character models to match.

When it comes to how the game sounds the music is incredible, regardless if you use the original or the arranged sets. All the sound effects, plus the grunts and groans expressed by the characters sound pretty solid.

 There are character endings for getting through the arcade mode, but I'm not sure if it's just for clearing the initial battles, because after facing Django, there is a fight against some monster during the credits and I'm not sure if you have to beat it to get the endings. I cleared arcade mode as Yoko, defeated the creature and saw her ending, then did it as Sephiroth, got killed by the creature and saw a Final Fantasy VII music video. Needless to say there's a debate about this.

Will I stream this again... probably, because there are characters to unlock and there is an RPG build into the game that might be interesting to check out.. 

We then checked out Rampage: World Tour, and clearly this was just button mashing fun, and it is something that should get a modern day port with online play because tearing up the world as 1 of 3 monsters would be incredible. We cleared about 20 stages before moving on... but only then did I realize, this game has an auto save feature, which means it might actually be possible to beat! Would probably make for a hell of a marathon stream. 

We closed out the night with Rival Schools: United By Fate, using the arcade disc and doing a classic using Akira to celebrate her being added to Street Fighter V this week. It's too bad I'm so use to burning meter that getting to fight Hyo is damn near impossible for it since to reach the true boss in this game you have to win certain fights under certain conditions which I believe is to beat Raizo or his partner with a burning vigor attack to win a round.

Anyway here's a list of clips from last night's stream!

• The Billion Dollar Princess Is In Another Castle
• 
  Note: The game will look nothing like this! 
• They did not think about Yoko's Name...
• When in doubt use the sword!
• Exploiting Django's weakness to low kicks
• Was That Supposed To Be The Boss Fight? 
• Yoko vs Jo 
• Yoko vs Cloud
• Yoko's Ending! He was confident... but he should not have been 
• Cloud's Excessive Finish On Tifa 
• Sephiroth Brings Down Meteors
• Coming in about 20 Years; The FF7 Remake! 
• The Print Is so TINY! 
• Paris Has Been Totally Destroyed!
• Philadelphia Totally Destroyed!
• Strong Comeback
• A Burning Vigor Finish!
• Finally we get past them!

Following last night's stream we raided Kalenal over on twitch.tv/kalenal, they were playing Final Fantasy XIV Online. If you're into Stream Raiders, Kalenal is a great channel to watch while waiting for the next battle!  

Arriving in the mail today were 8 additions to the gaming collection: Gears of War, Gears of War 2, Gears of War 3, Gears of War: Judgement and Gears of War 4. All 5 games I have digitally (big thanks to Iceman for hooking me up with the X-Box 360 games last year. With the exception of Gears of War 4 which is factory sealed, the other four games are all used, but not like the discs are going to see much action.And Yes I did say there were 8 additions, the other three were Life is Strange Before The Storm Limited Edition & Life Is Strange 2 for the Xbox One, and Fate/Extella The Umbral Star Noble Pahntasm Edition for the PlayStation 4. I'm currently looking for the original Life is Strange for the Xbox One to complete the set

Added 2 items to my comic book collection> The Adventures of Superman #602 and Legion of Heroes #31.

Today's Fitness Boxing 2 Daily Workout lasted 31 minutes with an estimate calorie burn of 487 kcal. The exercises for today were Hook Combo #1, Block Combo and Waist Shape Focus Combo.... and all of these were just focus on my midsection. We're up to 98 out of 100 for the Karen's Best Friend achievement, which means will hit that tomorrow... a day later than I predicted earlier in the week.

 For tonight's stream we will lead off with Star Trek Online with the usual endeavor quests and such, and we'll pair it up with maybe some fun on the Xbox One.

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

Highlights for the week of April 18, 2021

 

 Here are highlights for the week of April 18, 2021 of things that went down over on http://twitch.tv/fredcasden! This week we played Overwatch, Fitness Boxing 2 Rhythm & Exercise, NHL Face Off, Star Trek Voyager: Elite Force, Uncharted: Drake's Fortune, Tom Clancy's The Division, Hades, Star Trek Online, Dragon Ball Z: Ultimate Battle 22, Knockout Kings, Rival Schools: United By Fate and ESPN Major League Baseball! 

Today's Notes 4/24/21

Good evening everybody,

Yup I totally slept in today, granted I didn't hit the sack till about 4:30 AM, and didn't get up till 3 PM, but hey I'm here aren't I? 

Anyway last night's stream was focused on games from the PlayStation One era and obviously these were games I have not played in probably 15-17 years.

First up was Rival Schools: United By Fate, as we went through the arcade mode on Disc 1 with Sakura and Hinata, and we did not get the good ending because I didn't realize you need to get through Raizo and his partner by using a team up super. We then messed around with the stuff on Disc 2 (or the Evolution Disc) which included a variety of different game modes and I still had my original save file so trying to to beat my old high scores was an interesting challenge.

Next up with Knockout Kings, EA Sports first venture into boxing video games, and we messed around with fights in all three weight classes (Heavyweight, Middleweight and Lightweight) as well as the slugfest mode. I ended up winning the first two fights using Muhammad Ali and Oscar De La Hoya in their respective weight classes, but lost as Floyd Mayweather and Butterbean (in the slugfest mode). I did find myself trying to use the combos I often see as apart of Fitness Boxing 2 with all the button presses, but I can safely say Knockout Kings was very unresponsive at times.

Lastly, and the real highlight from last night, we messed around with Dragon Ball Z Ultimate Battle 22, a game which I have never beaten, even on its easiest setting. But the stars were aligned, as I made up my mind I was going to 'get good', picked Android 18 and we went through the 1P vs COM mode, beating every other character in the game. It may have taken me an hour to do so, because I took my share of loses, but we got through it and best part is I got footage to prove it. Since there are no unlockable victory endings, I'm counting Dragon Ball Z Ultimate Battle 22 as a finished game for this years tour.

Following the stream I messed around with MLB The Show 21 and got the call up from Triple H to join the Phillies main roster, earning the Welcome To The Show Achievement. Since I was playing nightly after the streams, and playing every game I was starting, it took me about a week from the when the game went live last Friday for pre-order purchasers. A lot of folks have done it faster by simulating seasons, which is a cop out I think.

Todays Fitness Boxing 2 Daily workout was only 38 minutes.... so I did an extra 30 minutes in Free Training and boy do my legs feel it! It paid off as we're up to 99 points for the Sophie's Best Friend achievement, which we'll get tomorrow, so we'll have a new trainer starting with Monday's session. I also set new personal bests today with punches thrown (2802), estimated calorie burn (1147.05) and exercise duration (1 hour 9 minutes 14 seconds)

Added Legends of Wrestling II for the PlayStation 2 to my collection today, I did have this game years ago, but traded it in and tracking down a copy at a fair price took awhile. Also found a copy of the manual for ECW Anarchy Rulz, too bad I couldn't find the original jewel case with the back cover. Ah well.

For tonight's stream we'll be wrapping up the 2004 season in ESPN Major League Baseball, playing the Saturday Night games of each week. We'll get started with this at about 7 PM EST because I want to get a shower and have dinner first!

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