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The journey back To EORZEA (1/?)

Final Fantasy XIV Character standing in an Inn room

I’m going back to Final Fantasy 14. This will be my 4th attempt. Every time I started playing FFXIV I fell off somewhere in the first chapter, A Realm Reborn. The consensus online seems to be that its the worst chapter. Apparently it is that “bad” that Square-Enix shortened and removed several quests in ARR in 2020. But even with that my last attempt failed.

Earlier this week I resubscribed and download the game. This time on PC, I previously played on Playstation. After loading my old character I had no clue what to do or where I was, or even how to play. Took my bearings and started looking for a guide to relearn how to play my level 51 Black Mage.

This video was very helpful:

Next up was finding out where I am in the story. My next MSQ is “The Ultimate Weapon”. Googled the quest and it was a “fuck me” moment, apparently the last time I stopped playing I stopped right before the start of the “Big Battle” and end of the ARR quest line, with some additional quests to follow before heading into Chapter 2 Heavens Ward.

I was inclined to just jump in now that I know how to play again, but I have only a vague recollection of the story so far. Someone on Mastodon suggested rewatching the cutscenes with The Unending Journey book at an Inn, but it misses out all the details not shown in the cutscenes. So will be looking on YouTube for a good video, so far I only found crazy long ones.

To be continued.

June 20, 2024

Destiny 2: The Final Shape Launch is going well

Got in around 2pm. Progressed through the campaign up to getting the new Prismatic subclass and then nothing.

Will try again later tonight, but it’s one of the worst launches a Destiny 2 expansion has had. But it was also on track to beat the highest concurrent player counts in Steam. So not all bad. Destiny 2 is not dead yet!

June 4, 2024

PS Plus and Destiny 2

I just did the unimaginable, moved my main Destiny 2 platform from PS to Steam. I’ve played Destiny on PS since the betas of Destiny 1, but this announced price hike of PS+ is just getting too much. I only have PS Plus for online gaming but at $80 a year it almost doubles the cost of Destiny each year. And I’m a casual player doing just vanguard stuff, strikes, gambit and seasonal stuff. But all of that required PS Plus apparently. Worst of all, Sony owns Bungie.

August 31, 2023

Visual Novel Sale on Steam next week

Time to spend some money again!

August 3, 2023

PC Gaming update (2/?)

Small update on building my gaming rig. The case came in, a Lian Li Lancool 216 ARGB in black. The thing is huge, but has great airflow. Also bought my PSU, a 1000W Corsair. Only need a Cooler, RAM, NVME drive, and a GPU now.

And while I was clearing space I wiped and packed up my old PS4 Pro I hadn’t turned on since I got my PS5 at the end of 2019. Wanted to sell it, but checked the trade in value at places like GameStop and Best Buy. GameStop would only give me $70 store credit. Best Buy on the other hand… $180. It seemed way too high but coincidentally also $4 less than what I paid for the PS4 Pro. Back in 2018 Target had a price error where certain coupons would stack on online purchases. Stacking the 3 coupons the best way, it brought down the price of a PS4 pro to $184. Traded it in and it covered the price of the PSU.

August 2, 2023

Getting back into PC Gaming

Years ago, back in 2001, I used to be a PC gamer. But in college a laptop was easier and moved on to consoles, the GameCube to be precise.

When the Steam Deck was announced and joined the waiting list. Once I got the Steam Deck it quickly became a regular in my gaming routine, pushing out the Switch which as been gathering dust since. But the idea of playing on Steam Deck on the go, and then moving to the big screen with the same game started to appeal more and more, something the Switch does so well. Tried the Steam Deck Dock but graphics were obviously meh. So last week during Amazon Prime day I started checking prices on PC components. Amazon was pretty bad with deals but Best Buy had an almost 50% discount on a latest generation AMD CPU with MB, and then I just bought it.

I picked up the CPU two days ago and next week the MB is ready for pickup. I’ve already started my build on PC Part Picker (see below) and will tweak, finalize and purchase the rest in the coming weeks.

So I guess this is Part 1 of many as I get back into PC gaming.

PCPartPicker Part List

Type	Item	Price
CPU	AMD Ryzen 5 7600X 4.7 GHz 6-Core Processor	Purchased For $134.99
CPU Cooler	be quiet! Dark Rock Pro 4 50.5 CFM CPU Cooler	$89.90 @ Amazon
Motherboard	Gigabyte B650 AORUS ELITE AX ATX AM5 Motherboard	Purchased For $154.99
Memory	G.Skill Trident Z5 RGB 32 GB (2 x 16 GB) DDR5-6000 CL36 Memory	$104.99 @ Newegg
Storage	Western Digital Black SN850X 2 TB M.2-2280 PCIe 4.0 X4 NVME Solid State Drive	$99.99 @ Adorama
Video Card	Sapphire NITRO+ Radeon RX 7900 XTX 24 GB Video Card	$1049.99 @ Amazon
Case	NZXT H510 ATX Mid Tower Case	Purchased For $9.99
Power Supply	Corsair RM850e (2023) 850 W 80+ Gold Certified Fully Modular ATX Power Supply	$119.00 @ Amazon
Mouse	Asus ROG Strix Impact II Wired Optical Mouse	Purchased For $38.56
	Prices include shipping, taxes, rebates, and discounts
	Total	$1802.40
	Generated by PCPartPicker 2023-07-23 16:48 EDT-0400

July 23, 2023

Death Stranding

After the reveal of the Death Stranding 2 Trailer at the Game Awards I felt like playing the first game again. So a couple of days ago I started my third play-through of Death Stranding. Going for the Platinum this time.

January 1, 2023