Today's Notes 12/14/20

Good afternoon everyone,

We woke up early enough to get in a bonus stream, this time officially breaking in Fitness Boxing 2 as the new morning standard. Setting things up for a heavy workout, I can safely say that Fitness Boxing 2 does a better job of keeping me on pace than the first one did, but then again, we basically have to start over for the beginning, which means we're unlocking all the exercises again. That said, this did show off how glaring Lin's dialog and instructions being a mix of old and new is, as it can be a bit jarring. Also because of the length of the workout session, I did get to experience the No Mercy mode, in which in the instructor basically goes all drill sergeant, which is quite the change up in personality. As you see the results screen is quite different, but all the important stats are there. Really surprised my Fitness Age was at 23, when I'm really use to seeing it around 18-20, guess having too many 'okay' punches and misses really count against me. Oh almost forgot, yesterday did a weigh in and I was at 260 pounds!

We followed that up with a little Animal Crossing New Horizons, and we picked up our new resident in Hopper yesterday. He's clearly more of an elderly dude near as I can tell, wonder how well his personality will gel with everyone elses. Also for some reason Sherb said he was hacking things, which was totally weird. I wonder if his line of dialog was mentioned because I don't really spend the Nook Miles I've accumulated. I probably should though. 

We closed out the morning stream with Super Mario Bros 35, a single run through because things got off to a good start, and we battled our way to a 2nd place finish. Probably could've came in first if I didn't have to use my coins to try and get myself the power-ups needed to survive the amount of enemies that appeared on screen. Still finished in the top 5 is nothing to sneeze at!

Of course, we have to talk about last night's stream of Overwatch, which saw just about every match be a Quick Play match, which meant I was mostly playing Tank and Support, as was the case with PandaSweet when she joined in the fun! Of course we learned from last week and in the last hour we queued up as damage heroes only, which meant we got in some matches with other characters. I continue to work on using McCree when ever I can, having gotten better at moving around the payload to try and stall as much as possible, but he doesn't really have the kit to survive for long if my team's tanks aren't attacking on the payload.

Tonight we'll be back to Kingdom Hearts Re:Chain of Memories picking up on the 11th Floor of Castle Oblivion. With luck we'll get through the 11th and 12th floors along with the related bosses with as little trouble as possible, but if the battle against Vexen was any indication last Monday, this could be a complete slog of a night.  

On a side note note, an author I've been following for a quite some time on the fan fiction front that uses the handle Drace Domino recently had a book published called Rise of the Battlebitch, consideri I'm a big fan of their work, I figured I'll give it a read when I get the opportunity.

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

 

Today's Notes 12/13/20

Good morning everybody...

Last night's stream was pretty damn epic with the first several hours of it being dedicated to my intended Frank Sinatra concept, complete with me wearing a fedora, suit and tie. It ain't often I'd put on such a get-up, but it really felt perfect with the intentions of the stream. I didn't have to dig too deep into a lot of my back up songs to pad things out, and we did plenty of duets. Hell I opened up about a dozen seeds tonight off the songs I performed with Gloopdawg, BluVelvet, Westsider29, MellowMermaid, kevinMation, GoodhauerU, Aledus1, Godzilak, Kalenal, Jigokunoinu, iggyzig, Hawleigh, Sihara, Sasifla, xnormalxoxo, & Flint_Locke. Not all of them were Sinatra songs, but I good chunk were.

I also already did the daily workout for today in Fitness Boxing 2, and discovered it DID import all my data from the first game, it's all in the My Data section. Because of the changes made to Fitness Boxing 2 to make it flow more better, it is basically learning the game and motions again. So I'm not as mad as my daily streak not being counted... though I do think I'll keep up with the first game, because if I FB2 in the mornings, for 30 minuets, and the FB1 in the evenings say after a stream for 15 minuets, that keeps everything on track and I can get a light work out in before bed. I have noticed where some corners were cut with Fitness Boxing 2, as the default trainer from the first game Lin has a mix of new and old dialog, so instead of all her lines being re-recorded, it bounces back and forth between the two. It can be a little jarring but we'll make do. There is also an in-game achievement tracker so technically there is away to 100% complete Fitness Boxing 2 which I do find funny... then again the Just Dance games also have achievements through Ubisoft's game tracker. So way I figure when I wake up in a few hours I'll do Fitness Boxing 1 to keep its streak going then Monday we'll do the switch of FB 2 being in the dominate game.

UPDATE: At 2 PM EST, I did a weight in, and I'm down to 260 lbs! 

That all said, with it being Sunday, that means we'll be playing Overwatch this evening, as we'll be doing Quick Plays and other nonsense in the usual chaos that happens! We might try to intentionally get into match ups as damage only, as that proved to be a nice change of pace when PandaSweet and I tried that last week!

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

Best of the Week December 6-12, 2020

 Here are highlights from my twitch channel for the week of December 6 to 12, 2020, which feautred Overwatch, Fitness Boxing, Animal Crossing New Horizons, Super Mario 35, Kingdom Hearts RE:Chain of Memories, Tom Clancy's The Division 2, Star Trek Online, ESPN Baseball 2K4 and Twitch Sings!

Today's Notes 12/12/20

Good afternoon everybody,

On this day in 1915, Francis Albert Sinatra, better known to us all as Frank was born in Hoboken, New Jersey. Without question, he is one of the most iconic performers of all time, Sinatra was star both as a singer and an actor, and tonight over on twitch.tv/fredcasden, I'll be doing a stream focused on songs perform by The Chairman as well as many of his contemporaries. We might even try and see if there are songs Sinatra did that were originally done by other performers as well. This is gonna be a lot of fun I bet.

Of course I did Fitness Boxing session today, solid work out, good way to get the joints moving and the blood pumping... and then I saw Fitness Boxing 2: Rhythm and Music arrived, and needless to say I started setting it up. Yes I did make sure to get the free No Mercy DLC for it straight away. Now here's what I certainly found out, Lin is not the default trainer, it's Janice... but Lin is still in the game as soon as I could i made her my default. Only the data of height and weight carries over from the first game, which means my current streak of 159 days of doing the original Fitness Boxing is not recognized in Fitness Boxing 2, and I'm guessing this is because Fitness Boxing 2 has a much different set up as it include a target weight goal set by the player, different heads up display and other things. So if I want to continue my streak in the original, I have to keep at it, and do Fitness Boxing 2 in addition to it. We'll see how long that lasts lol.

Last night's stream saw the start of a new 'series', where I'll be playing ESPN Baseball 2K4 on the Playstation 2, the goal is to play all 162 games of the 2004 season as the Philadelphia Phillies, a team that had Marlon Byrd, Jimmy Rollins, Bobby Abreu, Jim Thome, Pat Burrel, Mike Liberthal, Placido Polanco and David Bell as the every day line up at the start of the season, with the rotation including Kevin Millwood, Randy Wolf, Brett Myers, Eric Milton and Vicente Padilla. So far, I'm 2-4, playing against the Pittsburgh Pirates and Florida Marlins... which meant last night's stream ran close to six hours. I'm thinking we'll try and do only one series in a stream, depending on what day of the week this ends up being regularly featured on. Then again we're losing Twitch Sings on January 1, which basically frees up Saturdays to be the perfect day for long broadcasts!

As far as thing on Animal Crossing are going, well looks like a new resident will be arriving on my Island tomorrow, wonder who it'll end up being! 

Anyway, that'll just about do it for today's notes! Catch ya later!

  

Video Commentary: Celebrity Deathmatch The Game

Recently on one of Twitch Streams I played Celebrity Deathmatch: The Game, which is based on the MTV show of the same name, and this is just a video commentary on it, a review if you will.

Today's Notes 12/11/20

Good afternoon everybody,

First up, Happy Birthday to my pops... and while I tried to avoid talking about the election, he brought it up, so ya'll can guess at how awkward that went. Still he's doing well and considering we haven't spoken directly or indirectly in several months, it was nice chatting to him for a bit. I did find it amusing when he said he can't come to New Jersey even if he wanted too, blaming Governor Phil Murphy and quarantining requirements, only to then ask if I caught Covid-19 and sound completely relieved when I told him I've been working from home since the pandemic hit.

Shaved off the mess that one would call a beard in preparation for tomorrow's Twitch Sings stream, and the total of tunes still sits at 3,146. So with less than 24 hours to go, looks like everything is set for a Sinatra-esq stream! Now is there I away I can wear a fedora and headphones at the same time... probably not... anyway, not sure if I'll go with a tie or not because I don't have a white button shirt, but either way we'll have fun. I really should look up to see what songs Sinatra covered in his career that are in the game cause I know there was stuff he did that was done by other performers

Finally had snow on my Island in Animal Crossing, and it is really nice seeing the change in the seasons within the context of that game.Keeping in mind, my island has a lot of trees on it, so it looks pretty cool.  I do wonder who will end up replacing Biff on my island...

Of course I did a Fitness Boxing stream today as well, solid workout, even had one set that purely perfect! And if you know anything about motion controls and such, you know doing anything totally perfect is very rare. So I was pretty fired up for that when it happened. Funny thing is I could've had two perfect sets out of the three done today.... ah well.

Last night's stream of The Division 2 was of course a co-op stream with PowerThumbz and FNDanteSavage with Iceman7667 being the fourth member of the crew. We finished the first manhunt and then went about doing Hunter things. It was a real scramble to join in as I finished work and had to get everything set up within a couple of minuets so they weren't waiting too long for me. There was a great a moment when Thumbz was ranting about a guide he found listing a phone as a walkie talkie, which lead to me asking where the walkie talkie is... needless to say Thumbz 'Oh for fucks sake' response had me laughing pretty damn hard.

Not completely sure what we'll be doing for tonight's stream yet, but we'll come up with something, and on that bombshell, we'll see you over on twitch.tv/fredcasden at about 9:30 PM EST

Today's Notes 12/10/20

Good afternoon everybody,

Let's first talk about last night Star Trek Online stream, which of course started with the realization (after I was told) that once again skill invalid bug appeared and forced me to once again respec the character I was using... which means I will have to do that again for every other character I've created over the years. It is odd that the developers have introduced a bug they don't seem to be able to fix, months after it first appeared. Of course the stream itself went smoothly, as we have completely caught up on existing main-stream story content for Star Trek Online as it pertains to my Cardassian in the Klingon Empire. Now if I were to guess, the next chapter in Klingon Civil War story arc should probably be coming in January or February, because it will be very unusual if it dropped in the middle of December. Hell I remember an episode of the Tibbles in Ecstasy podcast where one of the hosts (the one who didn't sound like he was on ecstasy) complained about the lack of new story content in regards to how grinding became and that was in December of 2016... I only remember this because that was went I ended up in the hospital.

Now tonight's stream is of course not going to be Star Trek Online, since we did that last night, instead the plan is to team up with Iceman7667, PowerThumbz and FnDanteSavage for more Division 2 manhunt things in what will surely be another night of lunacy. We'll probably start as son as I finish work, which means I'll be very pressed for time to get things set up. This is why time zones can be such a pain to deal with sometimes.

Anyway, we got today started nicely with Fitness Boxing, and it was a burner that is for sure, with quite a bit of ducking in the sets. It is amazing in one regard with how in-frequent I see the step combos appear in the daily routines that when I do see them, I always struggle to match the timing on back steps, feeling like I jump the gun for lack of a better terms.

 

Of course I did manage to finish listening to yet another Doctor Who audio drama, The Marian Conspiracy which sees The Doctor (Colin Baker) finding a temporal nexus point tied to the family ancestry of Evelyn Smyth (Maggie Stables). This story is notable for it's the first Big Finish Doctor Who story at introduces an original companion in Evelyn, who is quite different than most companions in that she is in her 50s which makes many of the stories she appears in having a much different approach in which her age and physical well being become major plot point. Something else that is striking is this story's ties to Queen Elizabeth I, granted the focus is on Queen Mary I, but when one actually takes stock of how Elizabeth is mentioned or encountered through all of Doctor Who (TV, books, audio dramas, comics), it is obvious that too this day she holds a special place in the hearts of the British people. 

At this exact moment there are still 3,146 songs left on Twitch Sings, so we're two days away from my plans for Saturday night's broadcast and things are looking good!

Anyway, on that bombshell we'll see you later, have a great day folks!