Today's Notes 6/22/21: The Reapers Have Arrived

Good morning everybody,

Yesterday things got interesting with a circuit breaker being tripped, certainly lead to me figuring out how to make things cool without stressing the wiring of the house! It lead to a slight delayed to the start of the stream, but not much of one.

Anyway, last night's stream saw the start up of Mass Effect 3: Legendary Edition, and I'm probably going to be taking my time with this one more sore than the first two games because of finding every damn item in space with the notes I used from the prior runs on PC. There are way too many awesome visuals in ME3 so I find myself stopping to see if something is screenshot worthy, and I posted a bunch over on Twitter.

In terms of the game itself, we basically did the intro, roamed the Citadel and Normandy and managed to pick up Garrus on the Turian moon. We also knocked out a bunch of achievements because I want to try and be as efficient as possible with everything being done on stream, so that meant one side quest plus going around the galaxy to find stuff and talking to everyone while exhausting conversation options!. Here's the list of what we accomplished:

1. Driven: ME3: Return to active duty
2. Focused: ME3: Evolve any of your powers to rank 6
3. Bringer of War: ME3: Chase down an assassin
4. Shopaholic: ME3: Visit a store on the Citadel
5. A Personal Touch: ME3: Modify a weapon
6. Untouchable: ME3: Escape a Reaper in the galaxy map
7. Lost and Found: ME3: Dispatch 10 probes to retrieve people or resources in Reaper territory
8. Eye of the Hurricane: ME3: Kill a brute while it's charging you
9. Mobilizer: ME3: Bring a veteran officer aboard

And of course we have a several clips from last night as well which I'll listed next:

Twitch Clip: Hello Legs

Twitch Clip: Shepard Meets The Press 3

Twitch Clip: Achievement: Untouchable

Twitch Clip: Battle on the Turrian Moon!

Twitch Clip: EDI Tells A Joke

In terms of where we'll be picking up, for Tuesday's night stream we're heading to Grissom Academy first to rescue Jack and then we'll do the mission to pick up Javik and see what various things we can knock out as well. 

Also I need to mess around with the Noise Gate in OBS to try and cut down on the noise caused by my fans.

Anyway we added four games to the collection yesterday: Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex for the PS2, Ghostbusters (2016) for the PS4, Hyrule Warriors: Age of Calamity for the Nintendo Switch and Final Fantasy Anthology for the PS1

Today's Fitness Boxing 2 session lasted 31 minutes with an estimated calorie burn of 539 kcal. The exercises were Intermediate Combo #1, Triple Combo #2 and Biceps Shape Focus Combo. Mistimed a few jabs and a couple of uppercuts but otherwise a solid workout effort I think. We are now up to 73 out of 100 for the Laura's Best Friend achievement. 

And on that note we'll see you later tonight for more Mass Effect fun over on twitch.tv/fredcasden! 

Today's Notes: 6/21/21: Up Way Too Damn Early

Good morning everybody,

I woke up super early, at like 5:30 AM for no real reason so we got the day started.

Last night's stream of Overwatch was really heavy on the Mayhem matches, since that particular arcade mode kicked in at 8 PM Eastern for the first time in a while, and we managed to get 9 wins in it, which meant 3 loot boxes... which would be cool if I didn't already have everything possible one could get out of the generic loot boxes. Still, I had 5 plays of the game last night, 1 as Moira, 1 as Reinhardt and 3 as Dva! Big thanks to Panda Sweet for being apart of all the fun!

And of course, we do have links to some of my favorite moments of last night's stream which I'll list next

Twitch Clip: Total Gibberish

Twitch Clip: Some how I was still alive!

Twitch Clip: Took Them All The Way Down!

Twitch Clip: Nerf This! That's How You End A Match!

I did finish the mini-Overwatch fan fic I started on Friday after basically re-writing what I had down already to give myself an option for a follow up. I feel I had the dialog down the way I wanted, but the action and climax of the story (pun intended) were a little meh... but I haven't really sat down to write any serious fan fiction in quite a while. The basic premise is based around the one character interaction Tracer and Moira has that sometimes trigger when they are on the same team when waiting for a match to start. Anyway it's up over on HF under the title of Scientific Curiosity. 

Since on Friday we broke in the PlayStation 4, I figure we'll officially start up a large game using the system for Friday of this week. The most obvious choice is Final Fantasy VII: Remake, but I am leaning also towards Star Ocean: Integrity and Faithlessness. We'll see what ends up being the big PS4 game later in the week.

Today's Fitness Boxing 2 session was streamed, and we kept it basic, going just 31 minutes with the workout, so the estimated calorie burn was 492, but I did put max effort into everything. We're up to 71 points out of 100 for Laurea's Best Friend achievement, so if things hold steady we'll knock that out by maybe in nine days, 10 days at the most. And since this session was stream we have some clips.

Twitch Clip: Adding Sway Backs

Twitch Clip: Ready?

Twitch Clip: Time to pick it up!

Tonight we are continuing the Mass Effect Legendary Edition saga with the start of Mass Effect 3, which we'll be playing for the first time on console... which means I'll have to track down my notes for where every little item is that has to be scanned for, which means we'll be chased by the Reapers a lot and fuel re-fill points and credits will be very scarce. Still it should be fun as we've tackled every side quest over the first two games, so we should be in good shape for Galactic Readiness (in theory). We'll get this started in the early evening.

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

Highlights For The Week Of 6/13/21

 Here are highlights for the week of June 13, 2021 of all the games featured over on http://twitch.tv/fredcasden! This week we played Overwatch, Ftiness Boxing 2: Rhythm & Exercise, Mass Effect Legendary Edition, Tom Clancy's The Division, Star Trek Online, WCW Vs The World, WWE All-Stars, Xena: Warrior Princess, Bloodborne, Virtua Fighter 5: Ultimate Showdown & DC Super Hero Girls: Teen Power!

Today's Notes 6/20/21: We can now play as Harley Quinn!

Good afternoon everybody,

Last night's stream of DC Super Hero Girls; Teen Power saw a lot of plot advancement, as we defeated Toyman and saw that he was actually working with Lex Luthor! We also got to play as Harley Quinn and Catwoman, meaning only Star Sapphire is left to be 'unlocked'. I do have to admit, learning how to play as Harley and Catwoman was a bit difficult because I already put so much time into boosting up Supergirl, Batgirl and Wonder Woman. 

And if you're curious as to when you can start using the villains, Harley becomes available half-way way through chapter 4, since she has direct interaction with Batgirl, because (as near as I can tell) in the show, Harleen and Barbara are best friends who are unaware of each other's secret identity. Note: For each villain you unlock you will need to power them up in order to keep them evenly paced with the heroes since by the middle of chapter 4, Batgirl Supergirl & Wonder Woman should have 50% of their upgrades unlocked (If you're playing like I am and doing every side quest you come across).

That said, Harley's 'No Time Bomb' ultimate move is such a great screen clearer, and she has a great multi-hit jump attack that works great on larger enemies. I could have done without the race to defuse bombs while enemies are swarming in on me, because unless you notices where they are (or are lucky enough to see their locations on the mini-map) it can get really hectic.I do wonder how many chapters are left in the game because it seems like there are at least eight chapters.

Anyway, here are some clips from last night's stream

Twitch Clip: Nananana Cat-Dude!

Twitch Clip: No Respect At All

Twitch Clip: No Time Bomb... There It Goes!

Twitch Clip: Supergirl: It's Not My Fault He's Using Really Hard Words

Twitch Clip: Defeating Toyman!

I didn't do any off-stream gaming at all last night, because the length of the stream was about 5.5 hours, plus I had to put together the highlight reel for the Facebook page (that basically exists in case Twitch's TOS gets really screwy) and also the weekly highlight reel for my YouTube page (which exists as an archive for most streams as well as occasional video commentaries).

Today's Fitness Boxing 2 session went 31 minutes with an estimated calorie burn of 495 kcal. Blocking was a slight issues today, but I it's tough for me to stay in sync on blocking combos. We are now up to 58 out of 100 for the Laura's Best Friend achievement.

It's Sunday which mean's Overwatch is on deck for tonight, as we'll be having fun doing mostly Quick Play matches. Maybe we'll get lucky and we'll have Mayhem matches after the 8 PM Eastern Hour, but I doubt it.

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

Today's Notes 6/19/21: The Spilled Bloodborne Of A Virtua Fighter

Good morning everybody

Last night we finally broke in the PlayStation 4 on stream, with two games. Thankfully a delivery I wasting on arrived early... which also allowed me to discover an issue with the PS4. Since Sony designed the PS4 to be able to stream directly from it, it actually can block a signal to the a capture card... so I had to do some plugging and unplugging of HDMI cables and such just to get a signal to my main monitor so that I could access the PS4's settings to turn that blocker off.

So once the stream started, we lead off with Bloodborne. Prior to last night I have seen people play these styles of game where it's trial and error, and while I didn't really progress far... I did at least start to get a grasp of the mechanics of combat and figuring and how to do things. By the time I was really getting a grove in the same area I was basically running laps in, I was getting a little burned out on getting killed so often, so I think Bloodborne will be one of those games we go to in order to fill in gaps on a stream, like maybe pair it with Star Trek Online on Thursdays or something.We did get one trophy last night in Bloodborne which I'll list next...

1. Blood Gem Contact: Acquire a blood gem that imbues hunter weapons with special strength.
   

I also did a few hours of Virtua Fighter 5: Ultimate Showdown, jumping into ranked matches and actually had a good streak going. We were also joined by Reaper, another long time friend of the channel for some direct head to head game play, where it was pretty even granted all of my obvious mistakes started to get exploited and exposed, but we had a lot of close bouts! We unlocked no trophies in Virtua Fighter 5.

We have some clips from last night as well, which I posted the links for next:

Twitch Clip: Let Me Do The Smart Thing...

Twitch Clip: Wah! Son Of A Biscuit!

Twitch Clip: Let's Freaking Go!

Twitch Clip: Get Out Of My Ring!

Now Bloodborne wasn't the only game to arrive yesterday: Fist of the North Star: Lost Paradise, Uncharted Collection, Uncharted 4: A Thief's End & Star Ocean: Integrity and Faithlessness were all added to the collection..

Because of other circumstances, there were no Xbox achievements unlocked last night, granted I could jump on after posting this to tackle some, but other circumstances involving heavy objects will now allow for that. I had a pretty good streak of 39 days, with 200 achievements unlocked. My personal best was 87 days with 483 achievements acquired. 

However I did start work on a little Overwatch Fan Fic idea last night involving Moira and Tracer, based around a character interaction dialog they have when they are on the same team. I figure I could get something out of that would fit quite nicely over on HF.

Today's Fitness Boxing 2 Session went 31 minutes, with an estimated calorie burn of 501 kcal. We are now up to 66 out of 100 for the Laura's Best Friend achievement. As we can see the point addition is sometimes 2 and sometimes 3. There doesn't seem to be a set pattern but we'll get there eventually! 

Tonight's stream will be focused on DC Super Hero Girls Teen Power, picking up with the start of Chapter 4, which seems to be a Batgirl focused chapter, so it should see a lot of quirky stuff happening. 

We'll get that started about 7 PM EST over on twitch.tv/fredcasden! See ya then!

Today's Notes 6/18/21: From The Final Frontier to the Squared Circle to a Warrior Princess

Good morning everybody,

Last night's stream was a variety stream as we featured four games over on twitch.tv/fredcasden.

The night began with Star Trek Online, the Thursday night tradition, and of course the big deal was just doing the endeavors, which offered some variety this week, using polaron weapons in space, defeating terran enemies on the ground, restoring sheilds in space and completing any Task Force Operation on a intermediate difficulty. Now can some one tell me exactly when was it that people stopped realizing what the fuck to do when facing Leeta during Assault on Terrok Nor? When she is chasing you, run to the three pads so the other people can activate the one you lead her to! It's not that difficult! But on two different versions of that same TFO (one using Sorra, the other using Zagreus), I got stuck with dudes who clearly were leading Leeta away from where the rest of us needed them to be. It got rather annoying, particularly since I was the one that did the console puzzle both times. to get a force field to drop.

Anyway, following Star Trek Online, we loaded up WWE All-Stars. Released in March of 2011, WWE All-Stars is an over the top styled arcade brawler that went wither real cartoonish versions of various WWE Legends and Superstars of the time. I had this game in collection since 2011, I have played and in fact I had DLC for it, so were able to use extra characters, since half of the default roster was locked. We could get a special stream out of it, going through Fantasy Warfare to unlock the other characters, and if we do that we can add the game to the Tour List for 2021. 

Next we turned out attention to WCW vs The World, now we tried to play this a few weeks ago and the copy I had did not work... so I tracked down another copy, and this one worked, and boy did I not have a clue out to play... actually had to look at the manual to see a few details. I pretty much had my ass handed to me, and had to lower the difficulty to easy to win a match and to get an idea of how to play. This is one of those games we can throw into the PS3 or PS2 for just shits and giggles of just how bad I am at it and how old the game looks (it did come out in 1996 after all) 

The final game of the night was Xena Warrior Princess, based on the legendary show starring Lucy Lawless, this is one of those 3D action games from the PlayStation 1 era where it tried to be ambitious and simple, but it just ends up handcuffing the player. This game came out in 1999... with no analog options. Keep in mind the original dual-shock controller came out in 1997... so what the fuck? Anyway we stumbled and bumbled our way through the first three stages. Now there are 21 stages within the game, so I kind of figure we can divide this game up, going back to it every now and again to see if we can get further. We can pair it up with Star Trek Online on Thursdays, and have it be the first game we play after doing the endeavors. Or I could just start the game over from scratch and do a proper play through from start to finish over several streams. 

Any way, here's the list of clips from last night featuring all four games!

Twitch Clip: Rose's Theme From Alpha 2 Works Nicely

Twitch Clip: The King Tea Bag's CM Punk

Twitch Clip: Hey! We did a Russian Leg Sweep!

Twitch Clip: Did we get him? We got him!

Now following the stream my attention again turned to Trover Saves The Universe in knocking out achievements for it, and we got a few done, to give us 20 out 27. Here's what I did last night.

1. You Actually Did It?!: What the hell is the matter with you?! You actually made 100 baskets?! What are you a sociopath?!
2. It's A Video Game, Kill Something!: Don't kill any villagers, because God forbid you do something out of the ordinary!
3. Here's a dang achievement, stop killing me!: Jump Trover into the Acid Lake 5 times. How is this even an achievement?
4. Daddy Gotta Eat!: Instead of feeding the poor, feed Gail's roommate in under 5 minutes!

Note: I am copy and pasting the achievement descriptions as they, the developers of some games put way to much effort into trying to be clever.

Today's Fitness Boxing 2 session was 31 minutes with an estimated calorie burn of 506 kcal. There was a big focus on ducking and weaving today, so my core got a real work out. We're now up to 63 out of 100 for the Laura's Best Friend achievement.

For tonight's stream we are going to do some gaming on the PlayStation 4, so what I have ready to go are Street Fighter V: Championship Edition and Virtua Fighter 5: Ultimate Showdown, I am waiting for a delivery to arrive at the time this is posted, so if it arrives in time we'll go with my main choice, if not, then it's either one of those two games, the edge probably going to Street Fighter V to do it's story mode.

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

Today's Notes 6/17/21: Dividing Up The Division

 Good morning everyone,

Last night's stream of The Division was surprisingly breezing, thanks in part to last week when we reached Level 30 and can roam without much worry of getting to far ahead of anyone I'm teamed with. Which leads to the fact were not just joined by Iceman last night, but also Striker, a long time friend of the channel and who was very much equipped to steam roll anything we came across. Which meant we got s major story beats finished as well as more side quests done with items being found along the way.

Which means we got a lot of achievements done during the stream which I'll list now:

1. Headhunter: Kill a named Elite in the Dark Zone.
2. Plundered!: Extract a Superior or High-end Item from the Dark Zone 
3. United We Stand: At lvl 30 start and complete a Co-op Mission without anyone being Downed or Dying.
4. Fixer-Upper: Completely upgrade any two wings of the Base of Operations.
5. You Win Some, You Lose Some: Recover Tchernenko's research data from the Russian Consulate.
6. State of the Art: Fully upgrade the Base of Operations.
7. Bling! Bling!: Equip all Gear slots with Superior or High-end Items.
   

As you can see, two of the achievements involved in the Dark Zone which I wandered into to see if I could do anything there... so downing a named enemy (or rouge agent) and actually getting gear out of it in the same session was awesome.

Here are some clips from last night as well!

Twitch Clip: I Wonder If There's 101 Of Them!

Twitch Clip: Achievement: Headhunter

Twitch Clip: U2? No I Prefer Different Music

Twitch Clip:  Dude really... I'm on fire!

Also big thanks to Striker for gifting me King's Quest: The Complete Collection and Middle-Earth: Shadow of Mordor, adding two big games for further X-Box console related streams.

Was finally able to put together a complete in box copy of Xenosaga III for the PlayStation 2 (this means game discs, the manual and the correct style case), which also makes it the gem of my video game collection since it is one of those games that is very hard to find. (Hell the manual alone often goes for $40 on eBay).

Also added several PS4 titles to the collection: Uncharted The Lost Legacy, Exist Archive: The Other Side of the Sky. Persona 5 Royal: Steelbook Edition  , .hack//g.u. Last Recod, Tales of Berseria & Days Gone. Finding stuff to make for a series of PlayStation 4 only streams certainly has taken me into some unique directions. 

Following last night's stream I loaded up Trover Saves The Universe to get to work on getting all of its achievements that were not apart of my first time play-through last Friday. Here's the list of what I managed to knock out last night.

1. Jesus, Are You Still Listening to This?: Listen to all of Pop Up's introduction; ignore the homeless man being murdered outside your door.
2. You Almost Solved It! Keep Going!: Press the buttons on the Puzzle Tree 50+ times, cuz you don't listen, you little popsicle stick
3. Worst Guest Ever: You did it! You killed every killable NPC! You're certified, psychopathic killer!

The biggest issue with Trover Saves The Universe's achievements is that it practically calls for replaying every level completely, which is fine for finding the Power Babies I miss, but some involve either waiting for something to happen or being able to do things quick. Then there is the make 100 baskets item that is probably going to drive me nuts, granted I'm at 50 for that one, but still a long way to go.

Today's Fitness Boxing 2 session was 31 minutes with an estimate calorie burn of 453 kcal. We are now up to 61 out of 100 for the Laura's Best Friend Achievement. With steady progress daily, we should reach that goal by probably in two weeks.

For tonight's stream, things will start with Star Trek Online to tackle this week's endeavor quests, maybe grinding for a level or two on some ships that Zagreus and Sorra are currently in commando of and then we'll jump to doing something on one of the consoles. Not sure what yet!

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