Tuesday, 5 June 2018

Random Roundup

It’s been another quiet month of gaming, being away for a few weekends putting a bit of a crimp on free time. A bit of progress in Elder Scrolls Online quest lines, a few War Thunder flights; Destiny 2 got its new Warmind expansion, so I headed back in there for the enjoyable, though (as pretty much everyone has observed) rather short, story missions. The basic combat remains eminently satisfying and a month or two off is sufficient to freshen up the somewhat repetitive nature of late-game number-nudging, and as an added bonus Stephen Fry makes an appearance in voice form. Not many lines, but always a treat; a Fry-voiced Ghost would be an excellent addition in best Jeeves traditions: “Perhaps sir would care to try a Void weapon against this particular target?”

Being away from the PC Marvel Puzzle Quest has been soaking up a fair amount of time on the mobile. The random nature of match-3 games can make things a bit frustrating when cascades of matches fall for the opposition (pure luck, of course), but satisfying when you get them (thanks entirely to play skill, it goes without saying). When energy and/or patience runs out I switch to Wordscapes after Melmoth tipped me off, a crossword-ish anagram type of thing that gives the old grey cells a bit of a workout.

Away from games I’ve done a bit of a technology refresh with a new phone (the Honor 9 Lite was quite a bargain) and television (a 4K Sony running Android for a bit of smart-ness). Running an HDMI cable from the PC to the telly gives a cracking picture, and a very compact wireless keyboard with touchpad works pretty well to control things from the sofa, though it’s not ideal for fine work – trying it with War Thunder resulted in some involuntary looping-the-loop and a distinct lack of defying the ground.

Further still from games, the city of Wells is a lovely place for a weekend with a rather impressive cathedral and Hot Fuzz locations to spot. Better still when there’s a comedy festival on, we caught shows from James Acaster, Rhod Gilbert and Hal Cruttenden between enjoying stone carvings of grape-scrumpers being beaten. We’ve also, over the past while-and-a-bit, started doing a few Escape Rooms which have proven to be most enjoyable, including all three of the rooms at TimeQuest with Melmoth & family. They are, as the name suggests, time-travel themed rooms, really well decked out with period (or mythic) props and puzzles, highly recommended if you’re ever in the Kent area and fancy being locked in the past for an hour.

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