Today's Notes 4/29/21

 Good morning everybody,

You know how people were complaining about it being a chilly March and April? Well considering the heat spike for today, I rather it be chilly than hot and humid! 

Anyway, last night's stream of The Division was pretty solid, as we found a lot of collectables covered and advanced the plot, as indicated with the achievement unlocks of 'The Engineer' which is to rescue Paul Rhodes and 'Can't Stand The Heat' which is to clear out the villain group know as The Cleaner's main base. Also went into the Dark Zone to earn the 'Worth The Wait' achievement. Big thanks to Iceman for his help in getting all of this done!

The United States Postal Service is being really fucking weird as far as the Philadelphia Processing and Distribution Center is concerned because any time my mail ends up there it always ends up in some weird as fuck holding pattern. My research has shown this has been going on there since the fall of 2019 (based on reddit postings and other online complaints a simple google search shows), it's now the end of April and they clearly have not sorted things out there.They want to blame COVID-19, but this goes back over a year for the same facility!

Today's Fitness Boxing 2 session was little bit wonky, still solid, but because I was looking into what the hell is going on with the USPS. Still today's session was good enough that this has been my best overall much since August of last year, and it will become my best month period working out tomorrow because I'll past my all-time estimated calories burned by just doing a 20 minuet workout (I of course will do a 30 minute workout tomorrow lol)

Tonight's stream will of course start with Star Trek Online for the first couple of hours, then we'll switch to something else on the back end. Not totally sure what will be on tap for the second half of the stream, but I'll think of something!

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

Today's Notes 4/28/21

Good morning everybody,

Last night's stream was shorter than expected, because while we did finish Uncharted:Drake's Fortune, making it the 15th game we've beaten this year, I'm surprised that the final eight chapters took me less time to get through that chapters 1-7 last week and 8-15 on Monday night. And this is factoring in the many... many times I died. Maybe it's because the last third of the game is more action heavy and has fewer puzzle platforms to navigate, and it's not like there were that many to begin with. Still everything fell into place story wise, and the ending was satisfying if a bit odd considering the final battle was against the main villain's side kick. Speaking of that final battle, that really came down to pattern recognition of knowing when to move out of cover to attack and advance.

Anyway, the final leg of Uncharted Drake's Fortune wasn't all that long, and so we messed around with some other PS3 related things, mostly 3 on 3 NHL Arcade, basically your standard arcade style hockey game that at one point had on-line play. we managed to get a trophy unlocked because I changed some settings around to make thing easier because the games are quick. 3 on 3 NHL Arcade does not feature actual NHL Teams, just a collection of all-star players. Fun times to be had, but doesn't offer much replay value.

Also messed around a bit with the PS3 version of Sonic The Hedgehog CD, and oddly enough a trophy popped for it that I already had. I am thinking on a night where I don't have anything serious planned we might dedicate to beating it. Could be fun filler.

Yesterday at around 3 PM EST, totally lost power, and I'm grateful that I bought the battery back up power supply to make sure I was able to power down my computer safely. I do need to probably reposition one of my monitors to make sure one stays powered on via the battery back to make shutting my computer down easier in such a situation. That said, I'm glad PSE&G finally has an outage map that is mobile phone friendly to see an estimated power restore time... granted the time the power came on I lost two hours of work... but still, glad to see they have it.

Today's Fitness Boxing 2 session was another solid 30 minute workout, and we did a bit extra that will basically ensure that April 2021 ends up my best workout month since August of last year, and we have a shot of passing the work I put in during that month! All comes down to the next two days!

Tonight we'll be back playing The Division, roaming New York and picking up on side quests and collectables in parts of the map I've already been too. We may be joined by Iceman, but I'm not sure.

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

Today's Notes 4/27/21

Good morning everybody,

Last night's stream of Uncharted: Drake's Fortune introduced an element that I was not so keen to deal with: The jet ski. Now I get it in terms of a big action adventure game you need vehicle sections or something that breaks up the monotony of all the cover-base shooting that takes place, but the controls for the jet ski were just awful, where (as I discovered) need to hold down X and R2 just to speed up. Why? Why was that a thing? And this is not even getting into the fact the placement of enemies meant that both sections turned into 'remember where the bad guys are' and to pick them off at a distance. As I said last week, I enjoy the puzzles, the story and the characters.... but the action game-play is just a chore to get through.

That said we did make it to the start of chapter 16 last night, and so there is a possibility we may may finished Uncharted: Drake's Fortune tonight. 

Following the stream I did load up MLB The Show 21 to chase after the Winning In Style achievement, which involves "Win a game on any walk-off" (i.e. winning during the bottom of the last inning). Thankfully this can be a quick achievement to turn, just set up an exhibition game with three innings, play at the home team, keep the away team from scoring and then score in the bottom of the third (or extra innings). 

Today's Fitness Boxing 2 session was solid, did a good half-hour for the daily, and since I had a little extra time did an extra set to make progress on Bernardo's free training achievement. I do have to say, the voice acting for Bernardo is rather good and pretty even with no really awkward phrasing or tone through out. That said, his character model's upper body seems too large for his lower body. 

On the collector's front , may have come across a trio of Star Trek games two for the PS2 and one for the PS3. Star Trek Shattered Universe, Star Trek Encounters and Star Trek (2013). Shattered Universe from what I understand is more a fighter-pilot type game involving Captain Sulu and the Mirror Universe, Encounters is kind of like the bastard cousin of Star Trek Legacy, where you get to use ships from different eras but there isn't an connected story to drive home the plot, and Star Trek (2013) is the game set between the first two films JJ-Trek Universe, and a game which I played using the steam version a couple of years ago. If I'm right, hopefully we'll add these games to my collection in the near future.

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

Today's Notes 4/26/21

Good afternoon everybody,

Last night's Overwatch stream was a lot of fun as we messed around mostly with the Archive missions, getting the new Mercy skin for the event. Big thanks to PandaSweet for joining on the chaos, as we made sure to get her the skin as well! I've really come to enjoy using Dva in the trio of Archive missions, as I've gotten the timing down on when to use her abilities down to an exact science.

Following the stream I did messed around a bit with MLB The Show 21, going after the Friendly Gesture achievement, which is to use Pinpoint pitching and, strike out 3 batters within an inning. The Pinpoint Pitching is not only just aiming with the right analog stick, but using the left analog stick to do a motion / design representing the pitch which is just weird. Also tried out the March to October and while pitching won't be a problem, hitting will be so that will be slow progress.

In a case of when it rains it pours, having issues with both the washer and dryer at about the same time. Fucking weird how things like that can happen.

Today's Fitness Boxing 2 session was streamed as it is every Monday as we did an extended session. There were a few humorous moments, such as me doing a jump when it was time to switch boxing stances, as well as not so humorous when I totally blanked on throwing a punch. Since we did extra in addition to the daily exercises, I've managed to equal the time duration of this past Saturday. Also April is my best month of burning calories since September of last year

Tonight's stream will be the continuation of Uncharted: Drake's Fortune, as we'll be picking up with the start of Chapter 8. With my understanding that there are 22 chapters in the game, that means we're about a third of the way through it, but my concern is going to be in regards to how many waves of enemies am I going to have to slog my way through.

Well we'll find that out later tonight over on twitch.tv/fredcasden! 

Today's Notes 4/25/21

Good afternoon everybody,

Last night's stream of ESPN Major League Baseball saw the wrap up of the 2004 season, as my Philadelphia Phillies finished with a record of 111 wins and 51 losses and that was with me simulating most of the second half of the season. A big goal was to make sure Jim Thome won the triple crown, and he did with a batting average over .400, 48 home runs and over 180 RBI. Now I thought about just simulating the playoffs, but Iceman was shocked I would do that, so on Saturday of this upcoming week, we'll continue with the first half of the post season.

Continuing to look for stuff of interest when it comes to older games and things of a collective note, and I think I have a bead on things like Die Hard Trilogy, WWF WarZone and Tomorrow Never Dies for the PSOne. Obviously the first of those three will go into my idea of having a 'Bruce Willis' night when it comes to games associated with him. The other two are more for completing collections, as I have WWF WarZone is the one game I'm missing related to WWE wrestling games from the PS1-PS3 era, and it's the last one I'm missing from the Acclaim published wrestling games from that same era. Tomorrow Never Dies falls into completing the James Bond collection of games, but I know I'm still missing a few. 

Finished a Rule34 fan fiction commission last night, and got $50 for it, granted my interest in the pairing of Kelly Kelly and Randy Orton was not exactly all that high, since Kristi and I did everything logically possibly with those characters during our long writing collaborations.

Today's Fitness Boxing 2 daily workout was about 43 minutes, but since it's a Sunday we did about 20 minutes extra. In comparison to yesteday, this workout was a few minuets shorter but we still burned an estimated 1083 calories. We finised up Sophie's Best Friend Achievement today during the daily workout, so for the extra portion I did, we switched to Bernardo, and quickly unlokced his related achievements of New Student, Best Student, Stylist, Fashion Designer and Fashion Saboteur. At this point 80% of the in-game achievements are now unlocked. Also stepped on the scale today and I'm down to 249 pounds! 

Tonight we'll be playing Overwatch, as we do every Sunday, and we'll be taking full advantage of the Archives event which ends this week, so we'll be going after the Mercy skin right off the bat. We'll get this stream started at around 7 PM EST tonight.

And on that note we'll see you later 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!