Closing in on the end of Pokemon Violet

Good morning everyone

Last night's stream of Pokemon Violet got off to a good start with us capturing the eighth gym badge in sort order, which is very useful in terms of some of the very lucky surprise trades I made. As you may know, once you have all 8 badges Pokemon of any level will listen to you... which is helpful because one of the Pokemon I was lucky enough to nab was a Level 100 Ceruledge, a Fire-Ghost type, which makes it my heavy hitter.

Beyond getting the 8 badges done, I also cleared out the last Titan and the final two Team Star Bases. Reaching the final Titan (Which was the False Dragon) and the Fighting Type Team Star Base were a bit of a pain in the ass. But the battles and story elements were also quite enjoyable. Also knocked out the battles against Arven and Penny to close out the Path of Legends and Starfall Street story arcs.

Which means tonight, my first objective is dealing with The Elite Four and the League Champion. I think I can cover most match ups, or at the very least brute force my way through it, but this might take a few attempts. With luck we might even finish Pokemon Violet, but we'll see how that goes!

Thank to LvStrkr for 45 months of being subscribed to my Twitch Channel!

For the raid we dropped in on Kalenal as they were playing Trials of Mana over at twitch.tv/kalenal! 

Stream Clip Links

• That makes 8 Gym Badges
• It's saying I'm Titan... Holy Hell! 
• Defeating Penny With Flower Trick!
  

My mom is currently waiting on results for a biopsy that was done on her tongue on Sunday. There are times when I call her when she sounds great but also times when she sounds terrible. If any one would be kind to donate to her gofundme to help cover her medical expenses, please visit https://gofund.me/6adf8354

Last night's Monday Night Football game was postponed due to the scary situation involving Bills Safety Damar Hamlin. That entire circumstance is not how I wanted to clinch my first Fantasy Football championship since 2011.

Finished the latest Mass Effect short story commission, and got the instant request to writing the next chapter which would involve Kelly Chambers. I'm very tempted to make jokes in the next chapter regarding some of my theories regarding her in the context of Mass Effect 2. 

Today's Fitness Boxing 2 daily workout featured Biceps Shape Focus Combo, Difficult Challenge Combo #1 and Difficulty Challenge Combo #3 for 34 minutes

Did you hear about the kidnapping at school? It's fine, he eventually woke up!

Song of the Day: Starving by Hailee Steinfeld, Grey and Zedd

For tonight's stream, well as I said earlier, we're playing Pokemon Violet! Will we be able to finish the game? We'll see later over on twitch.tv/fredcasden!

Star Trek Prodigy Supernova Is Finished!

Good morning everyone,

Last night we finished Star Trek Prodigy: SuperNova and the final two stages took an hour each to get through, and the way I figure even with quickly advancing through the dialog it would be nearly impossible to 'speed run' those levels solo because of the types of puzzles involved in them. That said I did enough the final boss fight against the System Slayer, and how everything wraps up nicely. I'll most likely end up trying to find the remaining collectables off-stream to see what 'cheats' are unlocked.

Speaking of the System Slayer fight I did love the fact that all the mechanics that are taught during the game in how to deal with the Watchers are basically used for it, so it's not having to figure something out as was the case with the two earlier big bosses.

This does indeen mean Pokemon Violet will begin next Monday nigh, and hopefully there be a patch update before then to address some of the issues players have already experienced.

Prior to the stream I was playing Vampire Survivors just to knock out a few achievements, and because I had a few things on my mind and wanted to clear my head before stream. But since we wrapped up Star Trek Prodigy: SuperNova at an early enough time, I switched consoles to feature Vampire Survivors on stream and had a few successful runs in it.

Star Trek Prodigy: Supernova Achievements

• Relic Hunter: You found half of all Relics.
• Searching for Al'Shams: You met Lorn'ess, found a way into Al'shams Station, completing Taresse Level 2: The Frozen Lagoons
• Stopping the Supernova: You prevented the supernova and finished Taresse Level 3: Al'Shams Station.
• Saved the System: You defeated System Slayer and completed your journey!

Vampire Survivors Achievements

• Magic Banger: Find the Magic Banger.
• XVI - Slash: Reach Level 99 with Lama after unlocking the Randomazzo.
• Skull O'Maniac: Survive 30 minutes with Lama.
• Torrona's Box: Hold 6 different weapon evolutions at once.
• IV - Awake: Reach Level 99 with Krochi after unlocking the Randomazzo.
• Omni: Get Torrona's Box to Level 9.
• Tiragisú: Survive 20 minutes with Krochi.
• Vento Sacro: Survive 15 minutes with Zi'Assunta.
• Mannajja: Evolve the Song Of Mana
• I can't see anything...: Find the Yellow Sign.
• Forbidden Scrolls: Find the Forbidden Scrolls of Morbane.
• Skip 3: Survive 30 minutes in The Bone Zone.
• IX - Divine Bloodline: Reach Level 99 with Suor Clerici.
• Banish 5: Fill 100 entries in the Collection..

Twitch Clips

• Achievement: Relic Hunter
• Defeating System Slayer 
• System Slayer Loses His Head
• We'll Just Walk Around In A Circle 
• Evolving The Song of Mana!
• Would you like to ask a question? 
  

Big thanks to Kalenal for the raid following their stream of Trials of Mana over at twitch.tv/kalenal! 

Fow our own raid we dropped in on PowerThumbz as they were playing Vampire Survivors over at twitch.tv/powerthumbz! 

Got some writing done on the Dragon Ball short story commission, it probably has the most 'dialog' for an opening to set everything up so that things make sense. 

Today's Fitness Boxing 2 daily workout featured Front-Back Step Combo, Defensive COmbo #1, and Uppercut Combo #2 for 28 minutes. We completed the requirements for Sophie's Champion and now we just have one more in the form of Martina's Champion

Fitness Boxing 2 Rhythm & Exercises EX Achievements

• Sophie's Champion: Train with Sophie for over 50 hours
• Martina's Champion Progress: 60% (30 out of 50 hours)
• King EX Fighter Progress: 98%
  

Sunny-side up, scrambled, or an omelet? It doesn't matter. They're all eggcellent.

Song of the Day: Thunder by Imagine Dragons

For tonight's stream the goal is to wrap up the Android 21 Saga in Dragon Ball FighterZ while getting Android 18 and / or Goku to Level Link 40. WIll be interesting to see if we are successful on that objective.

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

The First Story Arc of Dragon Ball FighterZ Is Done!

Good morning everyone,

Last night's stream of Dragon Ball FighterZ certainly felt long as hell because of how long it takes for things to load, I mean seriously, Arc System Works really did a bad job overall in making it seamless of getting from one thing to another. After all souldn't the match up screen actually be loading in the actual fight like, I don't know... EVERY OTHER FIGHTING GAME RELEASED SINCE 1996!

Anyway, we focused on the Super Warrior Arc and I'm surprised that it wasn't until I started seeing enemies at level 20 that the A.I. would start giving me a challenge, so it was actually cool to have a challenge. The mystery of Android 21 certainly does involve playing the other two arcs to get the whole picture because there are a lot of questions, not to mention seeing how something fall into place.

That said, I did managed to unlock a couple of achievements not associated with the story mode, and I'm rather surprised at how few people have bother with the Tournament mode and Arena modes. Guess everyone is obsessed with 'tanked' matches, so I'll happily pad my bragging list with things that are obvious for folks to do. Managed to get to 10 arena matches with six being done off stream, and I need to somehow to 10 more to get another achievement. 

Dragon Ball FighterZ Achievements

• Link Level 20: Story - Raise Link Level to 20.
• I am Goku, the Legendary Super Saiyan!: Story - Complete the Super Warrior Arc.
• Ladies and Gents, We Have a Winner!: Tournament - Emerge as champion.
• Arena Enthusiast: Arena Match - Play a match.
• Arena Expert: Arena Match - Play 10 matches.
  

Twitch Clips

• Piccolo can see why Bulma picked Vegeta
• Defeating Android 21 
• It's In the Mail
  

Big thank you to Kalenal for the raid during the stream last night, as they were playing Trials of Mana over at twitch.tv/Kalenal! 

For our raid we dropped in on BestiBunni who was playing Magic: The Gathering over at twitch.tv/bestibunni! 

Today's Fitness Boxing 2 daily workout featured Weavomg Combo #2, Waist Shape Focus Combo and Hook Combo #1 for 28 minutes.

Where do mansplainers get their water? From a well, actually.

Why are social media influencers afraid when they go to the woods alone at night? They're constantly being followed.

Song of the Day: Revenge by XXXTENTACION

Finished the recent commission request for a WWE short story featuring what became two members of the Damage Control stable at SummerSlam back in August.

Already dreading work today because I saw the assignment I'm on is one where I don't thrive at. Ugh.

For tonight's stream we're playing Ghostbusters: Spirits Unleashed just for fun, as I already knocked out the story stuff off-stream because it does progress depending in regards to how many matches you play and your overall level.

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

We Finished The Last of Us And Like Everyone Else... We'll Never Play It Again

Good morning everyone,

Last night's stream of The Last of Us Remastered started a little early because I wanted to give myself a cushion on trying to finish it... and thankfully it was very straight forward when it came to getting things from point A to point B. Whoever came up with the 'sneaking battle' against David in the burning diner needs a swift kick to the nuts, but that was more luck than anything else to get passed it. It took me about a dozen attempt to get passed it because stealth isn't something I'm good at no matter what the game.

Now the novelty of playing as Ellie was kind of cool, and it does show that the developers were thinking ahead to what they were going to do in the sequel with her being the focus and finding out what Joel did. Quite frankly I'm not too keen on the ending because Ellie tells Joel her sacrificing herself so that a vaccine can be made was something she wanted to do

Now as the title says, I'm never playing the Last of Us ever again, because all a second play through would be is to find collectables I missed and upgrade Joel to have maximum stats. But the fact that The Last of Us had no standard achievements or things that allowed for a player to feel as if they were making progressing just sucks the joy out of the game. I like looking at games I re-play and seeing achievement list to make it feel like it was worth my time. The Last of Us Failed in that regard.

Now it was a bit after 10 PM when we finished The Last of Us, so we did some bonus gaming playing some Street Fighter V, clearing Sakura's SFV arcade ladder before getting my butt handed to me in some ranked matches. One thing I'm hoping for with Street Fighter VI is that there would be fewer loading screens between fights, both online and off.

The Last of Us Remastered Trophies

• No Matter What - Easy: Complete the game on Easy

Twitch Clips

• David gets to me...
• Chop! Chop! Chop! 
• You liar!
• Finished With A Super 
• Barely Held On
• Got 'em! 
  

Big thank you to Kalenal for the raid following their stream of The Trials of Mana, they cleared the section where they were miniaturized and are heading to the Wing Element portion. You can check them out over at twitch.tv/kalenal! 

Also huge thanks to Iceman for re-subbing to the twitch channel for the 55th Month in a row! Incredible!

For the raid, we dropped in on BestiBunni as they were playing Magic: The Gathering over at twitch.tv/bestibunni! 

Today's Fitness Boxing 2 daily workout featured Left-Right Step Combo, Hook Combo #2 and Beginner Combo #1 for 28 minutes. By my estimation, I should hit the 50 hour mark for the Evan's Champion EX Achievement by Monday

The Phillies vs Braves Division Series starts at 1 PM This afternoon... obviously I will be working but I'll have the TV on and on mute just to keep up with things.

What did the janitor say when he jumped out of the closet? "Supplies!"

Imagine if Americans switched from pounds to kilograms overnight. There would be mass confusion!

Song of the Day:  Water Fountain by Alec Benjamin

For tonight's stream we're going to turn out attention to playing Dragon Ball FighterZ, and we'll be using the Xbox One console for it. We'll look at the tutorial and other things before diving into local matches and maybe start the story mode.

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

Tekken 7 Has an Impossible Achievement

Good morning everyone,

Last night's stream of Tekken 7 was certainly objective focused as we went after nearly every single achievement, starting with having to face and defeat Devil Kazumi. Oddly enough the requirements to face her involved not getting a perfect round in any match.  My attention then turned to the Treasure Battles where I accomplished several achievements including getting promoted to Warrior as Kazuya. Exploiting some of the A.I.'s tendencies helped here

Now getting to fight in Special Matches in Treasure Battle involved a lot of 'luck', as every after 3-4 win either gimmick match (Turbo Speed or Double Damage) or a special boss fight appears, so it was literally just win and hope a match happens... plus hope it was someone I could beat. Thankfully the 'Special Matches' ended up being against Jin, which isn't as tough as the other possible opponents (Akuma, Devil Kazuya, Heihachi  and Devil Kazumi)

After intentionally going into Practice Mode to farm out the damage needed for one last achievement, I realized the only one left involved winning a battle in an online tournament. Problem is, good like finding 7 people to take part in a tournament, plus hoping you can beat one of them in the front round. So as it stands, I'm declaring the 'Okay! I'm Ready!' achievement as not being possible for me to obtain.  

That said, we did reach get the most out of Tekken 7. so we'll be moving on from it to focus on other things. We'll probably put another fighting game in it's place.

Tekken 7 Achievements

• Fear My Wrath: Beat Devil Kazumi in an Arcade Battle or a Special Match in Treasure Battle.
• Don't Hold Anything Back: Defeated 20 opponents of a higher rank.
• Roar! (Nice Moves!): Got promoted to Brawler.
• I've Finally Found You!: Obtained 50 treasure boxes.
• Hot-Blooded Fighter: Got promoted to Warrior.
• Wow, I'm Pretty Strong!: Won three special matches in Treasure Battle.
• No Pain, No Gain: Dealt 50,000 damage in Practice mode.

Twitch Clips

•  Achievement: Roar!
•  Achievement: Hot-Blooded Fighter
•  Achievement: Wow, I'm Pretty Strong!
•  Twisting Arrow Canon For The Win!
  

Big thank you to Kalenal for the raid as they started playing Trials of Mana last night over on twitch.tv/kalenal! 

For the raid we dropped in on BestiBunni who was playing Magic: The Gathering over at twitch.tv/bestibunni!  

Also thank you to RedFoxUKCov for resubscribing to my Twitch channel for the 12th month in a row! 

Today's Fitness Boxing 2 daily workout featured Front-Back Step Combo, Defensive Combo #2 and Triple Combo #2 for a duration of 28 minutes.

What did the little mountain say to the bigger mountain? Hi Cliff!

Why are there gates around cemeteries? Because people are dying to get in!

Song of the Day: The One That Got Away by Katy Perry

In the world of Fantasy Baseball, one of my teams won the 5th Place Playoff series, and the other didn't. So I have a 5th and 6th Place finish for two different teams. However in the world of Fantasy Football both of my teams lost this week.  

Got in some grinding on Capcom Arcade 2nd Stadium last night using Savage Bees and the face you get 500,000 points when clearing stage 16. Managed to knock out 1,000,000 CAPSO, so only 69 Million to go.

Also played a bit of MultiVersus, mostly focused on doing daily quests to work on the battle pass grind. Thank goodness these things can be done via bot matches. 

Already know work is going to suck because of the assignment I'm going to be on. Can only hope I'll be able to switch to something else in order to get a chance to be productive.

If you're looking for tools to help with streaming or communicating from home with work, check out what Xsplit offers over at Xsplit.com, use the promo code CASDEN to save 10% on your order! If you're looking for just general stuff, of course you can swing over to Amazon using my affiliate link: https://amzn.to/3L8N1Yj.   

I'm moving some items around for my streaming line up this week, The Last of Us Remastered will be featured tonight, because hey if I start at 6:30 PM Eastern and go to 10:30 / 11 PM Eastern, we'll have a tolerable time spent trying to move forward in that game. I think I'll treat it as a 'floating game', moving it around the week based on my mood.

So if I'm playing The Last of Us Remastered tonight, will that mean I'll play it also on Friday? Nope, I plan to start up Persona 5: Dancing in Starlight on Friday because at the very least trying to beat a rhythm game will be a lot more fun than dealing with the awful controls of The Last of Us.

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

Highlights From June 7 to 13 2020

This video features highlights from my Twitch channel from June 7 to 13, 2020. Clips are from Overwatch, Mass Effect Andromeda, Gears of War, Capcom Beat 'Em Up Bundle, Star Trek Online, Trials of Mana and Twitch Sings!

What Is Planned For The Week Of June 14

Looking ahead for this upcoming week over at twitch.tv/fredcasden, I'm trying to figure some things out as what the line up is going to be. Of course some things are already locked it based on major games that are either weekly features or part of the current tour.

June 14: Sunday Night Overwatch (PC)

- More than likely this feature normal quick place / role queue matches, as the Anniversary event has already ending earlier this week. So there isn't any pressure to get wins or to run something like Uprising over and over again.

June 15 & 16: Mass Effect Andromeda

- Monday and Tuesday will be completely focused of Mass Effect Andromeda, with roaming around Eos being the major priority on Monday, doing what quests I am able to before returning to the Nexus. That may carry over into Tuesday, it really depends on how much better I can with playing ME:A with a controller as opposed to a mouse and keyboard in order to deal with the Kett.

June 17: Gears of War

-Wednesday night the plan is to tackle more of Gears of War with Iceman, picking up somewhere in Act II. If Iceman can't make it, then I'll probably do some random gaming, maybe Power Rangers Battle for the Grid's story mode, or other console things

June 18: Star Trek Online

- Thursday of course is dedicated to Star Trek Online, and picking up with things on New Romulus for our Cardassian Captain in the Klingon Defense Force. More than likely this will be a lot of ground stuff as it does take quite a bit of time to get from part of the map to the other.

June 19: Trials of Mana or WWE 2K20
- So as of the time of this writing, on June 12, I figure I should be able to finish Trials of Mana, but of course, things could go horribly wrong with an expected difficulty spike. If I don't finish Trials of Mana tonight then it will be finished next Friday. If I do finish Trials of Mana tonight, then next Friday we'll start going through the story stuff for WWE 2K20

June 20: Twitch Sings

- Saturdays are of course always for singing, no real plan other than continuing to do songs on expert, complete duets and open seeds. The usual literal song with lack of dance.

Of course this is subject to change but this is a general idea of what I have planned for this upcoming week.

Highlights From May 31 to June 6 2020

This week's highlights includes moments from Overwatch, Final Fantasy XV, Power Rangers Mega Battle, Star Trek Online, Trials of Mana and Twitch Sings. The indication of June 4 being listed twice is not a mistake, as there were two streams on that day, one was to make up for June 3 due to technical issues beyond my control.

What's After Final Fantasy XV

With the goal of finishing the main campaign of Final Fantasy XV tonight, I'm considering the line-up changes

So this is for the rest of this week:
Tonight: Final Fantasy XV
Wednesday: The Division 2
Thursday: Star Trek Online
Friday: Trials of Mana
Saturday: Twitch Sings
Sunday: Overwatch

And this is what I'm thinking for next week
Monday: Trials of Mana
Tuesday: Trials of Mana
Wednesday: Gears of War or the Division 2
Thursday: Star Trek Online
Friday: Mass Effect Andromeda or Gears of War
Saturday: Twitch Sings
Sunday: Overwatch

Reasons: Mass Effect Andromeda is already installed and I've been doing some multi-player stuff over the last couple of weeks, and Gears of War is a game Iceman (who has been my running buddy on The Division 2) says he'll do co-op with me. Also moving Trials of Mana basically gives it two nights of week to get more done in it similar with how I've been playing Final Fantasy XV.

Now I do plan to do the Final Fantasy XV DLC but I want a break from that game, similar to how I took a break from the Division 2.

This is not totally set in stone, but it's what I'm thinking

Highlights from May 24 to 30, 2020

This week's highlight reel to cover the week of May 24 to 30 features Overwatch, Final Fantasy XV, Tom Clancy's The Division 2, Star Trek Online, Trials of Mana and Twitch Sings!

Highlights From May 17 to 23, 2020

This week's highlights include Overwatch, Final Fantasy XV, Tom Clancy's The Division 2, Star Trek Online, Trials of Mana and Twitch Sings! Which more than likely is going to be the lineup for this upcoming week too!

Highlights From May 10 to 16 2020

This week's highlights cover the week of May 10 to 16 2020 where I streamed Overwatch, Final Fantasy XV, Batman The Enemy Within, Star Trek Online, Trials of Mana & Twitch Sings! Be sure to come over to see things every night at twitch.tv/fredcasden

First Reaction To Trials Of Mana

A couple of weeks ago I was given Trials of Mana for Steam / PC by one of my regular Twitch viewers and this week I got around to not only playing it but streaming it... and here are my initial reactions to the game!