Getting older is not a bad thing...

Especially with loving family and friends. And when they know you and your passions, history and wishes very nice things can happen. For example, when your 50th birthday is approaching you may not have too much to be excited about. But then, my family from Croatia came just few days before (I'm sure they had to push few things around) the birthday. My wife organized a dinner in very nice restaurant (Sails, for people from Auckland) and then it all changed.

After ordering drinks and meals my brother-in-law could not hold the excitement any more and he insisted to give me the presents. There was a big pile of presents from my family, mum and sister, brother-in-law's family and my friends. I had no idea what treasure could be hiding in there...

After opening all the presents I was overwhelmed with joy and surprise. Now I am the proud owner of Atari 1040 ST! Again! Last time that was in late 1980-es in another country in another lifetime.

Here is my latest gaming rig.

But wait, there's more! I also got a one of the best games for Atari ST that I have ever played. For younger generations it is Xenon. And that is an original game with the box and manual!

If you didn't have 8-bit or 16-bit computer from that time you may not know that you will need the joystick to play games. It was almost a strange feeling to play with the joystick but it went away very quickly.

Getting a working Atari ST these days in not an easy task and Jovica did that for me. You don't know how much this means to me.

As you know my blog's name is called after Zerg from Starcraft. My wife knows it too well and here is what I got.

First time I checked for this license plate was probably 4 years ago (if not more) and i wasn't surprised it was available. Last time I checked was about a year ago and it was still there. I thought "Some day, I may get it..." And now I do!

 But wait, there's even more!

When it came to cake time I got another huge surprise. A Zerg base cake! I don't have the photos yet but that will come shortly. Thank you Ana!

More photos, thoughts from my kids and nephews to come later...

Diablo III impressions and patch 1.04

It's been a while since my last gaming update. This does not mean I didn't play any games, I was just to busy (lazy honestly speaking) to share that with you.

Since last time I have finished Skyrim's main quest line and played for maybe another couple of weeks wondering around and doing some small side quests. Then Dawnguard got announced for Xbox 360 only. Annoyed a bit I stopped playing Skyrim.

Then Diablo III got released. It was very easy to organize digital purchase, install it from daughter's DVD and start exploring. First few weeks were a bit frustrating due to problems Blizzard had - can't connect to server, kicked out of server due to maintenance, etc. Over the time things got better and I can't remember when something like that has happened.

I started with wizard as sorceress was my favourite class from Diablo II. It worked well and I have finished normal difficulty fairly quickly. Then I started playing cooperative games with my wife. We both created new characters for this purpose only maybe a 6 weeks ago. Now we a playing Inferno difficulty and both are level 60. I am demon hunter and she is a monk. This was a very good combination until we reached inferno difficulty. That was a real challenge. We were dying way too often, repair of gear costed too much (up to 30,000 gold) and most importantly it was frustrating and depressing.

Yesterday patch 1.04 got released. It has a whole plethora of improvements:

• Paragon levels
• Improvements of  Legendary items
• Shrink the gap between normal monsters and Elite packs (Champions and Rares) 
• Tuning of each player class
• many more

This patch made inferno difficulty much more enjoyable and gives you new goals to reach - paragon level 100.

For more details about the patch check these posts. 1.0.4 systems preview and patch notes.

More to come on Diablo III and with some pictures from game progress.

Skyrim - alchemy recipes for poisons and potions

One of features of Skyrim I really enjoy is the alchemy. There is a large number of available ingredients and quite a few combinations of these. I find potions very valuable and I make them whenever possible. Over the time I found some interesting combinations. Those are mostly poisons but I am quite happy with that.

Here are some I found/made recently:

• Poison of Damage Stamina Regen
• Ingedients: Histcarp, Elves Ear, Creep Cluster
• Effects: Decrease the target's Stamina regeneration by 110% for 101 seconds. Restore  126 points of Magicka

• Poison of Damage Magicka Regen
• Ingredients: Bear Claws, Hanging Moss
• Effects: Decrease the target's Magicka regeneration by 100% for 101 seconds. One-handed weapons do 81% more damage for 60 seconds. Health is increased by 81 points for 60 seconds.

If you just add Glow Dust to previous mix you'll get this:

• Poison of Damage Magicka Regen
• Ingredients: Bear Claws, Glow Dust, Hanging Moss
• Effects: Decrease the target's Magicka regeneration by 100% for 101 seconds. One-handed weapons do 81% more damage for 60 seconds. Health is increased by 81 points for 60 seconds. Drains the target's Magicka by 61 points.

• Poison of Damage Magicka Regen
• Ingredients: Nightshade, Butterfly wing, Glow Dust
• Effects:  Decrease the target's Magicka regeneration by 100% for 101 seconds. Destruction spells are 101% stronger for 60 seconds. Drains the target's Magicka by 60 points.

•  Potion of Fortify Destruction
• Ingredients: Hawk Feathers, Wisp Wrappings, Beehive Husk
• Effects:  Destruction spells are 126% stronger for 60 seconds. You are 101% harder to detect for 60 seconds. Increases Light Armour skills by 50 points for 60 seconds.

• Potion of Fortify One-Handed
• Ingredients: Bear Claws, Hawk Feathers, Honeycomb
• Effects:  One-handed weapons do 101% more damage for 60 seconds. Increases Light Armour skill by 50 points for 60 seconds. Restore 158 Stamina.

You will get different strength of potions even if you use the same ingredients. Any enchanted items that  improve alchemy skills are greatly recommended. When making these I had these items:

• Helmet - gave me 26% increase
• Ring - 22% increase
• Necklace - 22% increase

And that is still not fully developed Alchemy skill tree. I don't have the Poisoner perk yet that would give me the 25% stronger poisons. As you can see there is still room to make even better potions. Additional benefit is in money of course. Some of these can be sold for almost a 1000 gold. If you have Sinderion's Serendipity then you can get two potions at once. 

If you have some good potion recipes I would love the hear from you. Happy potion making!

Skyrim and Elder Scrolls news

As if spending a lot of time (about 600+ hours) playing Skyrim was not enough Bethesda made two big announcements in three days. Firstly, Dawnguard is announced for this winter (I'm in New Zealand). Dawnguard will be available for Xbox 360 first and other platforms are expected to follow few months later.

There is no information at point but some people were digging through update files and found some references to White Elves and crossbow weapons. It may be interesting to see Skyrim before Falmers.

Then today there is Game informer's announcement (sort of) of Elder Scrolls Online. Bethesda blog has some details :

The Elder Scrolls Online is planned for a 2013 release on both PC and Mac. To keep up on the latest news for the game, check out our official Twitter and Facebook accounts for the game, and also visit the game’s discussion forums.

To prepare for this I will take a photo of myself, send it to friends and family and start wondering through Tamriel with my dearest wife. Together we will roam the Tamriel and collect huge wealth in gold, weapons and potions. Until then I shall explore remaining parts of Skyrim and get few more perks.

Skyrim - tips from my experience

I played Skyrim  for about 600+ hours so far and at the moment I'm level 58. The main quest is finished but there are still things to do, items to collect and bad guys to kill. Here some of the things I would do differently (tips for other players maybe) if I would start it all over again.


1. Develop speech early
Late(r) in the game you will end up with a lot items and selling them is painfully slow if you can't sell any item to any merchant (Merchant perk). To make this even more efficient use an `Investor` perk and with it you can sell lot a more whole lot faster.

2. Develop smiting very early
If you are not a pure mage (let me know if you are, I'd like to know how are you doing) develop smiting completely. With smiting (and enchanting) you can create weapons more powerful then ones you loot or what would you get for completing a quest. For example see my dedric bow.

The problem is that I can't sell it to anyone... Bethesda, can you do something about this? Maybe create an exclusive merchant for really valuable/expensive items?


3. Enchant, enchant, enchant
Enchanting goes hand in hand with smiting. To start with it collect any magic item you can find and disenchant them. That gives you a wide selection of options to use on your weapons and other items. Once fully developed (top perk) you can put two enchantments on an item and that is fun and frustration at the same time. Previously I used capture soul and magicka damage on ebony bow. Now I have paralyze + soul capture. It is fun to see Drugar Deathlord do "planking" when hit by arrow. Frustration comes when you can put enchantment you want to an item you want, e.g. fortify archery can't be applied to torso armour.


4. Make potions, a lot of them
For my style of playing potions are very important. With enough skills (and lot of experimentation) you can make a potion for almost anything. The ones I make a lot are fortification potions for smiting, enchanting archery. On occasion I make a very nasty poison and then I apply it to my meele weapon. I forgot one - carry weight.

5. Vary your tactics
Change your tactics depending on the situation. Recently I have found that I am levelling up slowly, slower than usual. What I was doing was simple - get my powerful bow, sneak in and kill them all while sneaking. It works fine (more than fine - I can kill a giant with single arrow) but it becomes a habit and all of a sudden game can become predictable (or even boring). Remember that spells you learned a while ago but not using it? Maybe it is a rune and having a single, narrow corridor is a perfect place to put one in. Then lure the enemy in and take care of the rest with some other spell.


6. Choose your quests
As any RPG game Skyrim is about making decisions. Stay true to your beliefs and don't do quests you don't like. I will not do Boethiah quest just to get an item. I can forge and enchant better item anyway. Dark Brotherhood quests could be the same.

7. Join the Bard's College
Bard is not really an inviting title/class of player but if you go to Solitude do quests for them. You'll work hard to get the quest item and reward is very good. If you didn't do one I won't spoil it but I'll say reward is not in gold... Also, if you want training in speech you are at the right place.


8. Check your inventory/stash
It is easy to forget what did you find in the cave last week or the spell book you bought. I did forget about some spells and I am trying to use them more now. These are telekinesis, transmute, calm and fury. And ebony skin. I'm sure there is an Azura star somewhere in a chest in one of houses I own...


9. Don't forget the real world
Playing Skyrim is fun and it is so easy to forget to take care of daily things we do like the rubbish out or buy bread and milk for tomorrow. If it easier to remember watch that episode of Big Bang Theory when Penny starts playing Age of Conan...

Weapons crafting in Skyrim

I started playing Skyrim shortly after it was released and I really like this game. My wife also plays it a lot and very often we talk about quests, places, strategies and weapons. Recently I showed her my ebony bow and she was impressed. She is about 10 levels stronger than me but she can't make the bow that good.

That got me thinking how did I make it so good and how to improve that skill even further. At the moment I am testing my process and I'll post here full details how to get really good bow or other weapons. My latest success - killed a giant with a single arrow while sneaking!

Here is a screenshot of my preferred bow.

In next post expect description of reasonably lengthy process that will give you ability to craft powerful weapons.

New Nintendo's console details

We haven't seen a new gaming console in a while and it was expected to get one from Nintendo first. 2006 was a long time ago in computing/electronics world...


What do we know about new console? In June we should see working prototype at E3 in Los Angeles. 


"Nintendo Co., Ltd. has decided to launch in 2012 a system to succeed Wii, which the company has sold 86.01 million units on a consolidated shipment basis between its launch in 2006 and the end of March 2011," the company said in a statement. "We will show a playable model of the new system and announce more specifications at the E3 Expo, which will be held June 7-9, 2011, in Los Angeles."
From Ars Techica.


There are some hardware specifications leaked and according to news in various sources new system will have:

• 8GB of internal, flash-based storage
• 25GB optical discs
• IBM 3 core CPU
• AMD graphics card
• Support for high definition graphics
• Touch screen on controler
• Streaming technology (console to controller or TV)

What else we can expect? More CPU power than PS 3 or Xbox 360. I don't think they will focus much on 3D as DS 3D is out but the Nintendo itself is saying that 3D TVs are not widespread enough yet. It will have 3D capabilities built in. In terms of controlers Wiimote was the first one and it was great. Now Playstation has Move and Xbox has Kinect. I would not expect anything revolutionary here but you never know.

Hopefully Nintendo will make some new games designed from ground up to support HD graphics. I don't think anyone would enjoy playing low polygon character and other geometry on full LED HD TV.

Time will tell and it may be soon. It is only 33 days until E3.