Thoughts Regarding What Remains Of Edith Finch

Good morning everyone,

Last night's stream opened with What Remains of Edith Finch and we nearly unlocked  every achievement for in during the stream. I thought it was going to be longer than it was, but it was two out play through from start to finish. Still for a short game it certainly told an interesting story of a family that pretty much had a boat load of tragedy happen.

The imagery of some scenes can be rather disturbing, particularly when one involves sticking one's head under a guillotine,and I would assume a good portion of things have to do with mental illness in all sorts of various forms. Believe me, I was in no way prepared for what happened in some of the chapters. It really is a game that would need to be experience.That said there was one bit that I absolutely loved and it was the entire chapter that was purely a copy of John Carpenter's Halloween, right down to the music. That was really well done. 

I did go back to complete the last achievement I needed and man having to sit through some of those stories again was not exactly pleasant, but still the What Remains of Edith Finch is 100% completed.  Basically I missed the Fence peephole early in the game... and had to go through every other peephole as well, which meant going through every story up to the start of Lewis's story... and let me say watching what happens to Gregory twice in one night is not something anyone should see.

We also messed around SSX on stream, and boy am I not good at that game at all. Sure it will take practice, but the reaction times needed on some of the 'easier' runs certainly are beyond what I'm capable of recognizing when there are sudden turns. Also remember to do tricks and figuring out how different combination of tricks is certainly something that will take time. But hey we had fun with.

We also featured Paladins last night, and it didn't take me long in during Siege matches to get an idea of just how one-dimensional some people are when playing it. I mean c'mon, my reluctance to even try to carry someone who didn't selected items in the first two rounds still resulted in a win because I was hanging back and playing defensive... then later I broke out the classic Ying hiding near the objective and spamming clones to heal the tank, which went unnoticed by the other team.

 What Remains of Edith Finch Achievements

• All Roads: Take both paths to the house
• Great Owl: Catch 2 rabbits with only 2 swoops
• Let Him Finish: Let the drunken sailor finish his song
• Clear the Table: Clear all balls off the pool table
• G-R-E-G-O-R-Y: Knock all the letters of Gregory's name into the bathtub
• Everything Ends: Finish all stories
• Thanks, Johann!: See Johann's name in the ending credits
• Loop-de-loop-de-loop: Play Calvin's story again
• Wildlife Photographer: Take a picture of the rabbit outside Odin Finch National Park
• A Closer Look: Look in all peepholes and telescopes long enough to hear Edith's commentary
  

SSX Achievements

• I Need A Boost: Make your first Mod Purchase
• Who Needs Boost: Earn a Bronze Medal on a Race Event in Explore without using any boost
• Pass The Board Wax: Make your first Board Purchase
• I'm Alive!: Rewind out of Death for the First Time (not achievable in Tutorial)

For the raid we dropped in on Swiftsupafly who was messing around with Bridge Constructor over at twitch.tv/swiftsupafly! It was fun seeing him try and fail to get some bridges made.

Note: Since the A Closer Look achievement was gotten early this morning (like at 1 AM), that means my current Xbox achievement streak is up to 26 days.

Today's Fitness Boxing 2 daily workout featured Triple Cobmo #2, Intermediate Combo #1 and Biceps Shape Focus Combo.

Realized there actually was a game based on the short lived series Ugly Americans, it might be good for a laugh to check it out. I do remember the show to be pretty good and Callie being a stand out character.

For tonight's stream, at the time of this writing I'm not 100% sure what we're going to do, we may go old school or maybe start up something, we'll see.

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

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!