The Clear Inspiration For Final Fantasy XIV's New Alliance Raid

Good afternoon everyone,

Completely caught up on the 6.1 Main Story Quest content of Final Fantasy XIV and I was right in my assumption that everything is being done to set up further expansions down the line. That said, I did do the story line for Myths of the Realm, which is the side story for the Alliance Raid called 'Aglaia'... and boy did I struggle with the first two big bosses of it, which the knock off the edge mechanics. Also, it appears that this Alliance Raid story arc has some heavy influence from the Greek Myths.  

Think about it, it is basically stated that these higher beings exist in their own realm, that they assume another form to 'observe' things up close,  and let's not forget the fact that 'Aglaia' is an alternate spelling for 'Aglaea' who was one of the three Charities in Greek Mythology.  In fact I will not be surprised if the next two Alliance Raids are named after the other two Charities, 'Euthymia' and the other being 'Thaleia' as these are the alternate names for 'Euphrosyne' and 'Thalia'. Granted 'Euphrosyne' has a second alternate name in 'Eutychia '

Anyway, last night's stream of Overwatch was a lot of fun as we played nearly every match with friends and associates, Big thanks to PandaSweet, BangBangBang and BloodyClown for being apart of the action! Now in addition to Quick Play matches, we also worked in some of the Archive matches, a couple of Mystery Heroes and Mayhem matches. Characters who I ended up using ended up being D.va, Wrecking Ball Reinhardt, and Moira, who I picked up three play of the games as during the stream. So all in all a great night. I also had a play of the game as Wrecking Ball but it did not save for whatever reason...

Of course of the clips, one should probably take a look at the third one, because I've rewatched it a few times, and I'm still not 100% sure exactly how the hell did I survive being knocked off the ledge twice by Winston. I think my expression says it all. 

Twitch Clip Links

• I'll take Red Lobster... Sizzler... but not Olive Garden! 
• Team Kill and Marshmallows!
• How did I survive?! 
  

For last night's raid, we dropped in on PradoxGamerAU who was playing Rune Factory 5 over at twitch.tv/PradoxGamerAU!  

Today's Fitness Boxing daily workout involved Hook COmbo #1, Waist Shape Focus Combo and Block Combo.

I have enjoyed adding an instrumental track to the nightly highlight reels over on facebook.com/FredCasdenGaming has added a lot, and worked out rather nicely because of how low the game audio is during my streams.  

Not at all surprised that the Phillies could not follow up their offensive output from Saturday night against the Marlins, as they got yet another reality check yesterday afternoon in a blow-out loss. That said, as I look at my Fantasy Baseball team, I'm considering dropping both Jonathan India and Mark Canha from my squad, but hopefully they'll be able to return to help stabilize who I have available most days. I did dropped Alex Kirilloff and replaced him with Trey Mancini

I've been kicking around a few idea for some fan fics, some based around Mass Effect, I'll probably pass them along to a few folks I know instead of writing them myself.

For tonight's stream we'll be returning to Mass Effect 2, as we'll search for any loose missions in areas of the galaxy map thanks to maps found last week before focusing on recruiting Thane and Samara.

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

What Did We Do Last Night... Plus My List Of the 20th Greatest Fighting Games Of All Time

Good afternoon everyone,

Last night's stream was a lot of fun as we featured three games, the first being Super Night Riders, a game I've messed around with off-stream during my latest achievement streak run. We knocked out two achievements, both of which required multiple runs of the Valley and Hanami stages to accomplish. I did make an on-stream attempt at the Course 1 to 6 achievement, and only made it to the 15th lap out of 36. We might occasionally make on stream attempts at it in the future. A phrase that folks heard me say a lot was 'the runs have to be perfect' because the margin for era is very slim.

The second game we featured was SoulCalibur II HD Online, as we messed around with it's Arcade and Team Battle modes. I am going to count this as a game finished on this years tour we actually got the achievement for clearing the Arcade mode on stream. We did try using Tekken's Heihachi Mishima, and it's just surreal because he doesn't use weapons, he uses his iron fists! 

We were joined by PandaSweet when we jumped over to play some Paladins, and thinks started off on a hot streak, I believe we started with 5 or 6 wins in row! Things got a little more iffy as the night went along. I ended up using the following characters of Ying, Viktor, Tyra, Ashe, Inara, & Cassie. Big thanks to Panda for being apart of the fun

 Super Night Riders Achievements

• Valley Stage Cleared: Cleared the valley stage.
• Hanami Stage Cleared: Cleared the hanami stage.

SoulCalibur II HD Online Achievements

• Flame Wielder: Victorious over Inferno in Arcade
• Comrade in Arms: Team Battle Cleared

Twitch Clip Links

• We can do this! 
• We did it! (Barely)
• Beating Inferno! 
• That got close!
• That worked! 
• Frantic Action
  

For the raid, we dropped in on Kalenal during their Birthday stream as they were playing Final Fantasy XIV over on twitch.tv/kalenal!  

Speaking of Final Fantasy XIV, I did a few Main Story Quests, and it really seems like a lot of the post-Endwalker content is going to be about setting up traveling between the Source and the First more common place for the NPCs considering the deep ties the Scions have with the other world based on what happened in Shadowbringers. 

Today's Fitness Boxing 2 daily workout featured Weaving Combo #2, Beginner Combo #2 and Straight Combo #1

Recently WatchMojo put out a list of the 20 greatest fighting games of all time, but it was clear they were trying to make sure franchises were represented in some way, so I figure I'd do my own list. Using the rule of one game per franchise, I list my personal top 20 fighting games of all time, with the stipulation being that I actually have played it, not based on its reputation. 

1. Street Fighter Alpha 2
   
2. Virtua Fighter 2
3. Skullgirls 2nd Encore
4. Marvel vs Capcom 2: New Age Of Heroes
5. Tekken 3
6. Mortal Kombat X
7. Dead or Alive 5 Last Round
8. BlazBlue:Central Fiction
9. Power Rangers: Battle for the Grid
10. Rival Schools: United By Fate
11. Darkstalkers: The Night Warriors
12. SoulCalibur V
13. Guilty Gear Xrd -Sign- 
14. Injustice 2
15. King of Fighters XIII
16. Ready 2 Rumble Boxing: Round 2
17. WWF WrestleMania: The Arcade Game
18. Jump Force
19. Under Night In-Birth 
20. Super Smash Bros: Ultimate 
    

Keep in mind, I play fighting games very casually, so what I look for is something that sticks with me and that I enjoy the game play of it to consider playing again if I have the means to do so. Also WWF WrestleMania The Arcade Game is without question a fighting game... I actually consider it the 'improved' version of what Pitfighter was.  Actually, the biggest problem people will have with my list is that Killer Instinct (2013) isn't on it... and the reason is simple, I've never played it.

Putting that list together does make me consider getting a wired control for the PC again, since a few fighters I have only through STEAM. I'm actually surprised Skullgirls 2nd Encore is not on the Xbox side of things... I know the original version is.

It's the start of a new week, so lets look back at all the games from the past seven days which featured Overwatch, Mass Effect 2, Fallout 76, Final Fantasy XIV, Persona 5 Royal, Paladins, SoulCalibur II HD Online & Super Night Riders!

The 76ers blew out the Raptors last night... and one wonders if that success can be found three more times, considering some key members of the 76ers roster can't enter Canada due to not being fully vaccinated against COVID.

For tonight's stream, we're playing Overwatch, as we'll see what what archive options are being featured, but mostly focus on Quick Play.

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

Malice in Futaba's Palace

Good morning everyone,

Boy did last night's stream of Persona 5 Royal go long... as once again I made up my mind to just go for it when it came to doing the Palace as soon as we reached it. Thing is the entire four story arc of Persona 5 Royal was worth it as it revolved around the introduction of Futaba Sakura, who is probably one of the most popular of all the confidants in the game, depending on your point of view.

You see her story is something a lot of folks can relate to, a simple misunderstanding or remembering something wrong can ruin things for a lot of folks. While in the context of the game, Futaba clearly had her memories influenced, I think a lot of folks can relate to her in terms of wanting to shut themselves away from the outside world or to take that one step beyond if the pressures of reality are too much.  A lot of people can relate to feeling like that... hell you can tell I do because I there is such a 180 degree difference between how comfortable I am working from home and having to deal with people face to face.

That said, I really enjoyed the layout of Futaba's palace, the Egyptian styling really was a nice change of pace, and unlike the first three Palaces in the game, Futaba's actually had a compelling layout that didn't make it feel like a chore getting through it. Some of the puzzles were a little odd,.. and dealing with all the enemies certainly made things interesting in regards to who was in the party (Mostly kept Morganan, Ann and Makoto).

The boss battle against a corrupted version of Futaba's mother certainly felt like it dragged a bit because of how certain things needed to play out, but the story of Futaba exercising her personal demons made it worth it seeing. I am very much looking forward to seeing how things play out during next Friday's stream of Persona 5 Royal.

That said, my screw ups in regards to the guide I'm using to try and progress stuff certainly is rearing its ugly head

Persona 5 Royal Trophies

• Success Built on Sacrifice: Performed a Gallows execution.

Twitch Clip Links

• Hi! 
• It does! 
• Boom... head shot! 

For the raid, we dropped in on x9abenonymous9x who was playing State of Decay 2 over at twitch.tv/x9abenonymous9x!

For those that follow my YouTube channel located HERE... I went ahead and split last night's stream into two parts, both will be made available on April 21, 2022. 

Today's Fitness Boxing 2 daily workout was doing before 6 AM this morning, because as I said a few weeks ago, if a streak goes super long (as is the case with Persona 5 Royal), I might as well knock out the Saturday workouts as a way to wind down.The exercises were Advanced Combo #1, Weaving Combo #1 and Intermediate Combo #2. I did set a new personal best for Uppercut Combo #2 on No Mercy, so that was a plus.

Fitness Boxing 2 Stats For April 10 to 16, 2022

• Punches Thrown: 11,832
• Estimated Calorie Burn: 4806.28 kcal
• 20/30 hours trained for Bernardo's Contender
  

Happy birthday to the amazing Kalenal, who will be doing a birthday stream today over on twitch.tv/kalenal! I believe they will be playing Final Fantasy XIV!

After months of speculation, Toni Storm finally revealed that the reason why she left so abruptly was because she felt the WWE wasn't for her professionally. No shock there, too bad more folks haven't figured that out and continue to hang on to their 'spots'... (Dolph Ziggler, Natalya Neidhart are examples 1 and 2 respectively)

For tonight's stream, well, we'll probably mess around with a few random games, not sure what as of yet. But you know we'll be up to something!

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

We Did A Little Of Everything Last Night in FFXIV

Good morning everyone,

Last night's stream of Final Fantasy XIV saw a little of everything, a couple of Raids, some leveling up for my roles as Dancer, Botanist, Fisherman and Lancer. I did try to dedicate trying Astrologian, but the first job quest really does a poor job of laying out how to use the abilities for the role.

Beyond that I did do one Main Story Quest, which saw us catching up with a few of the other Scions to see who will be apart of the story early on. Needless to say I loved that Y'shtola was caught napping in the library when we went to recruit her. I do wonder on if some new designs were considered to show some sort of passage of time, but then again, a number of the Scions did get a makeover rather recently

Also messed around a bit with the Easter event which is a cute little story, and is proof that I should pay attention to the events that take place in Final Fantasy XIV..  Following the stream I did advanced the MSQ to get the new dungeon done, and it certainly was interesting. Having to navigate while being spun around was nerve racking.

Twitch Clip Links

• The delayed reaction to what happened....
• Long enough to see that happen 
• Oh we got an achievement 
• We couldn't quite get the Limit Break off in time
  

For last nights raid we dropped in on Oldish22 who was focused on the PVP aspect of Final Fantasy XIV over at twitch.tv/oldish22! 

Made a few OBS tweaks mainly for the camera to be where it covers the chat box in most games that I play, this would of course be in regards to Final Fantasy XIV, Star Trek Online and Overwatch. Plus it makes me look huge! 

The Phillies lack of quality pitching is already being exposed early in the season, because if the line-up doesn't put up big numbers, there is no chance they'll win.

I've been on Twitter for 13 years... certainly doesn't seem like it, then again at one point I did a complete wipe of everything I tweeted to reset myself.

Bam Bam Bigelow was trending on Twitter late last night... all because Kim Kardashian happened to be dressed in a manner that reminded people of him. Talk about weird! 

Speaking of WWE, there is a once again a trend to blame THQ for the quality or lack their of when it came to a lot of the issues with various WWE games post WWE SmackDown: Here Comes The Pain. Let me remind folks that THQ was the publisher, the developers were Yuke's, aka the people that has yet to create an actual demo for AEW despite having nearly 20 years experience working on wrestling games.

Considering the trend (as of late) when I do have work it tends to favor morning workers, I might curtail my workouts to where I do the 30 minute daily, then jump right into work. It kind of worked out yesterday. That said, Today's Fitness Boxing 2 daily workout featured Uppercut Combo #1, Body Straight Combo and Triple Combo #1 and due to circumstances I was able to put in some Free Training as well. I can safely say the weekly stats for this week will not look as good as compared to last week when I look at the totals tomorrow.

25 years ago, when HBO had a major comedy special, you knew the person being featured was going to have some fresh material to work it, and you didn't really know what they were going to do... but now a days, with their continued obsesses with Bill Maher, you do know what you're going to get. A contrarian who hasn't been funny in any shape way or form since the 1980s. 

For tonight's stream we're back to Persona 5 Royal, and I believe we are about to start the fourth story arc, where Futaba starts to make an appearance. At least that is my general understanding of what's upcoming based on fan fiction and fan art.

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

A Long Night of Fallout 76!

Good morning everyone,

Last night's stream of Fallout 76 certainly went longer than anticipated, but we ended up finding some quests that were interesting that took some time to figure out... thank goodness for the internet to look up various things  Big thanks to Iceman for being apart of a lot of the fun!

In terms of what I actually accomplished, well I got some of the early quests done, and boy the fast travel sure is useful, but having to use the very limited in-game currency of bottle caps to do so almost makes it not worth depending on how far one is. We hit level 10, as indicated in the achievement list below, and the Final Departure mission certainly is something most people do early in the game... but it's so damn easy to find side quests and get distracted.

Case in point, Iceman and I found a house that had a large underground facility underneath that involves having to work our way though it's sub-stories to learn more about the organization, as it has a ton of lore and things associated with it. I think we'll focus on those when Iceman joins in next time as I work my way on catching up in the main story.

On a side not and as indicated by some of the clips below, I'm going to make good use of any unsolicited phone calls, maybe I should come up with some ways to troll them.

Fallout 76 Achievements

• Wild West Virginian: Reach Level 10
• Final Departure: Complete "Final Departure"
• Photo Bomber: Take 20 Photos

Twitch Clip Links

• They hung up... rude... 
• Calling back the number that just called me... it was not in service... 
• He's just bring his trash along with him! 
• Random Explosion Took A Chunk Out Of Me 

For the raid we dropped in on x9abenonymous9x who was playing Gears of War: Ultimate Edition with FnDanteSavage over at twitch.tv/x9abenonymous9x! Of course the Gears of War franchise has been featured a lot on my Twitch channel over the past two years. 

Today's Fitness Boxing 2 daily workout involved Left-Right Step Combo, Advanced Combo #2, and Double Combo #2. No Free Training during this morning's workout due to work. Might try and squeeze it in later.

Sojourn is going to be the first new character in Overwatch 2, and will be featured in the best for the game. I didn't see any of the game play footage yet, but judging by what I see on Twitter, people seem excited.

My Xbox Achievement streak ends today at 62 days, and during that stretch we unlocked 449 achievements in a wide variety of games. I could have gone for something involving an easy achievement to unlock for today, but since I want to dedicate time to Final Fantasy XIV with all of its new stuff, pulling back some on the Xbox side of things off-stream.

For tonight's stream we'll be playing Final Fantasy XIV, we'll do a few dailies, try to some leveling on botany and fishing, maybe even do a current main story quest!

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

More Loyalty Missions In Mass Effect 2

Good morning everyone,

Last night's stream of Mass Effect 2 saw along of things done, as we focused on several of the Loyalty missions, namely for Mordin, Grunt and Miranda, plus finding a few side missions. For those wondering, Mordin kept the genophage cure data, Miranda talked with her sister and Grunt... is Grunt. WE had a few close calls during these missions, namely with the Thresher Maw. 

Now at this point I still have not picked up Samara or Thane, but the next time we play Mass Effect 2 on Monday's stream, Thane is who we're going to pick up first, then Samara, then we'll do a side mission in order to be able to set up both of their loyalty missions. If things flow right, that is probably when we'll do Lair of the Shadowbroker too... which sets up Tuesday to be to finale and wrap of Mass Effect 2. 

I do have a very practical approach to playing games in this franchise when you think about it, to where I do every little thing possible. Of course there is the issue of finding all the components needed to fully upgrade a weapon, and I may have made a mistake or missed something somewhere.

Mass Effect 2 Achievements

• The Cure: Gain the loyalty of the Professor
• Big Game Hunter: Thresher Maw defeated
• Battlemaster: Gain the loyalty of the krogan
• Incineration Specialist: Incinerate the armor of 25 enemies
• The Prodigal: Gain the loyalty of the Cerberus Officer

Twitch Clip Links

• I do dare!
• About the one request for Shepard
• The very model of a.... 
• And they say Miranda and Jack can't get along
• How Shepard handles Jack and Miranda 
  

For the raid we dropped in Phoenix_Face over at twitch.tv/phoenix_face as they were playing Counter-strike: Global Offensive!  

Don't be surprised that with the 6.1 update you'll see me talking about Final Fantasy XIV a little more frequently in regards to off-stream gaming, there is new main story content. The first quest sees the Warrior of Light meet up with Tataru who gives the player a new outfit. Also, since a lot of the Endwalker involved frantically getting around some places, it was made clear we're going back to the newest areas to explore. The second quest does more about setting things up as well as introducing some characters important to the plot, as well as reuniting the Warrior of Light with Estinien and reminding us as to why we will not be see some of the Scions, but that G'raha will be involved.

I would have done the third quest, but the power went out at 1:30 AM, thankfully I always keep my phone pretty charge so I ended up listening to a recent episode of 83 Weeks with Eric Bischoff. Power came back up at 4 AM.

Today's Fitness Boxing 2 daily workout involved Body Uppercut Combo, Body Hook Combo and Uppercut Combo #2. As I was able to do some Free Training, I set a new personal best for Uppercut Combo #1 on No Mercy. 

I did finally realize the on-stream text box for anything said by the chat was too far to the right, resulting in some words being cut off. I made the adjustment this morning so it should be alright during tonight's stream.

With the achievements earned playing Mass Effect 2 last night we're up to a streak of 61 days, which could end up being 62 days if we get lucky tonight .

Why? Well tonight we're back to Fallout 76, as we'll roam around and try to get things related to the story done.

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

 

Those Fun Little Loyalty Missions In Mass Effect 2

Good Afternoon everyone,

Last night's stream of Mass Effect 2 covered a lot of ground as we began work on the Loyalty missions and restocking up on all the resources to make sure we can do as many upgrades as possible.  Also managed to get a few combat related achievements taken cared of , getting the Brawler achievement resulted in me getting killed, and I had a number of close calls as well during a few side quests. In fact I think I got them all finished, but I'm not 100% sure.

Jack's Loyalty Mission is always a hoot just for the fact that what she thinks happened isn't exactly true, and Jacob's Loyalty Mission is good for a Walking Dead: Telltale Series joke since the voice actor for Jacob's Father and Lee are the same person. Garrus' Loyalty mission is a bit of a pain in the ass because of the giant mechs, which we also encountered in a side mission. This resulted in me not having any heavy ammo and Grunt's Loyalty mission being something to deal with. We also recruited Tali and did her Loyalty mission, which is always great, particularly when it comes to having Shepard shouting down the Admiralty board.

Of course what makes the Loyalty missions great is that for the most part, if you go Renegade, you get the best possible scenes.  

Also yesterday was Commander Shepard's birthday, which was kind of cool for lore purposes.

Mass Effect 2 Achievements

• Master at Arms: Kill enemies with 5 different heavy weapons during the game
• Catharsis: Gain the loyalty of the biotic Convict
• Warp Specialist: Warp the barriers of 25 enemies
• Ghost Ship: Complete the investigation of a derelict alien vessel
• The Quarian: Successfully recruit the quarian
• Tactician: Hit 20 different targets with multiple biotic powers to combine the effects
• Brawler: Shoot and kill 20 enemies while they're knocked back by a punch
• Ghost of the Father: Gain the loyalty of the Cerberus Operative
• Treason: Gain the loyalty of the quarian
• Fade Away: Gain the loyalty of Archangel

Twitch Clip Links

• Achievement: Warp Specialist 
• Critical Mission Failure 
• Leave my crew out of your political BS! 
• It Wouldn't Bother Shepard 

For the raid we dropped in on YRGamerBunni who we randomly found on Twitch and playing the Legendary Edition of Mass Effect 2, over on twitch.tv/YRGamerBunni! I did see something a bit odd, since they were playing the PC version of the Legendary Edition, the aspect ration for dialog and cut-scenes kept switching on their stream from 16:9 to 4:3.

Today's Fitness Boxing 2 workout featured the following exercises: Hook Combo #2, Front-Back Step Combo and Beginner Combo #1. Set a new personal best during Free Training on Hook Combo #2 set on No Mercy Difficulty.

It appears the WWE is all about unifying championships once again, as the ADHD managing of their own roster and storylines goes through the cycle of being too damn lazy to actually having distinct shows with no-cross over is rearing its ugly head again.

Taking a long shot to apply for a Virtual / Remote position at Comcast/Xfinity... I will not be surprised if I get shot down for the exact same reason I get shot down for every other job I've applied for over the past 5 years: 'no college degree'.  On the flip side, this unfortunately resulted in an increase of 'scam calls' as frauds pretending to be staffing agencies started peppering my phone this morning. In fact out of 5 calls received, only one had the company name come up on my caller ID.

For tonight's stream we'll be continuing Mass Effect 2, we'll probably lead off by looking for side quests before landing on Tuchanka to deal with Mordin and Grunt's Loyalty Missions. We might also do Lair of the Shadow Broker as well.

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