Off By One

Well, it’s been a busy few weeks here, as evinced by… well, nought, as far as you all can tell. I’ve been lazy with regards to all kinds of aspects of communication, and it shows. Sometimes, I am amazed that anyone even pays attention.

So, here’s a summary (I do this more than I should, I think).

1. I’ve finally got my own computer back again. Although it’s been a frustrating month (All of September) with no personal computer, on Oct 1 I received the aforementioned shiny new Macbook Pro 17”. This thing is a titan among computers, easily being usable as a TV too I’m much pleased with it.

2. In connection with the above-mentioned computer acquisition, I should be looking at updating some plugins I’ve got out in the wild; I’ve been meaning to for ages, but because I’ve been without a computer for what feels like forever, it hasn’t happened.

3. In what can only be called an embarrassment of riches, on the same day I received the new MBP I also received my work laptop, which is well on its way to being an adequate replacement for my work desktop. Shockingly all of it works, except for the goddamned wireless, rendering it more or less 100% tethered at home. More to come, there.

4. I finished Neal Stephenson’s “Baroque Cycle”, a 3000-page epic set in the years preceding the enlightenment and telling a very interesting (fictional) story about the lives of Newton, Leibniz, and some fictional people of the time. It took me ages to read, but it was so worth it.

5. I’m at 37 jumps now, only one injury!

6. I should get to work.

7. Bioshock kicks my ass eight ways from Sunday. I am so pleased with it, and am so going to try a replay.

Well, there went any hope of productive evenings…

I was going to resist…

I’ve got more consoles now than I’ve had in my life (Char with her PS2, PS1, and GC, me with my Xbox and Wii) but god damn it, this Bioshock demo is going to suck me in, I just know it.

Of course it’s coming out for the PC, where I have to reboot to play.

I think I might run Windows for a while. Just until the shakes end.

Or I’ll buy a goddamned 360, not because I believe in it as a platform, but because playing the sequel to System Shock 2 is, actually, worth $700 to me. Yes, it was that good.

As can also be gleaned over here, “Doom 3”:http://www.doom3.com/ has been released, and I have acquired a copy for myself as well. I’m holding off purchasing it until payday (or the one after — but I am going to buy it)

Jebus, this game is gorgeous.

And scary.

I just played for an hour now, and I’m into the part where the game becomes, well, Doom.

I’m not really sure how to put this other than as point form lines. The game is tense, dark, scary, atmospheric. The sound is phenomenal. The enemies are creepy. Ammo is, if not scarce, rarer than I’d like it to be. Did I mention that the sound is phenomenal?

The above traits, minus the graphics praise, could almost be pulled directly from reviews of another game I tout to anyone that asks: System Shock 2.

I don’t think that this is a coincidence.

Now, if only I had slightly higher-end hardware to run this work of art on.