A Skaery Blog

Two More Games at 100%

2011-04-04T21:47:00.000+02:00

I've completed two more games, which I will list below together with a small recommendation. Remember that you can read all my recommendation on Steam by visiting http://steamcommunity.com/id/Skaery/recommended/.

Fun small puzzle game. I really like the idea behind the game, and I just wish it was a bit longer (I only took me 6 hours to get par on all the 24+10 levels). Anyway, fun game and great value for the small price.

Getting all the achievements in this game is pretty simple. Most you'll probably get by jump going through the levels, and the rest are all easy to do afterwards.

I was pleasently surprised when I tried out this game. The game is very cheat and just a casual fun solitaire game, and I was looking for a really casual game that didn't demand much from the player, so I bought it. Later I found out that Valve recommended charging more, but the dev didn't want to.

There's a pretty long story mode where the levels get more and more complex (I didn't really follow the story). You earn money which you can use to buy upgrades such as undo and see next card. You also collect eggs that you need to grow into adults by playing. However, there's 32 eggs to collect and they drops completely random (I'm not a fan of random drops!).

I'll easily recommend this game to anyone just for an easy casual game.

Another game that is straight-forward to get 100% on. The only anoying achievements are collecting all the eggs and getting all your pets to grow up. I want to blame that on the random drops, but getting all the XP to grow them up took me longer than finding the eggs, so I'll blame both.

Three More Games at 100%

2011-02-06T01:58:00.000+01:00

I've completed three more games which nets me a total of 75 Steam games (74 if you don't include Black Ops multiplayer) and one GFWL game (Fallout 3: Game of the Year Edition). The three new additions are as follow:

Worms Reloaded: I've always loved Worms, and even though this isn't the best version of it I've still had a lot of fun with it. I did, however, not enjoy grinding 17 wins in every gametype in ranked matches. That achievement has been on stand by for a long time, but, somewhat thankfully, noone plays ranked so it's not difficult to boost with a friend. It just takes a lot of time...

Star Trek D-A-C: Another multiplayer game, but another multiplayer game that thankfully has bots. Getting all achievements here wasn't really much of a problem, and it didn't take a very long time, which is a good thing since the game isn't all that fun.

Bloody Good Time: I don't know what's up with all these multiplayer games. All the achievements in this game can quickly be earned against bots. If you want to do it even faster (I used 4.4 hours) you can check out some of the console commands for round time and bonus points. After I had 11/12 achievements I was at 600/2000 stars for the last achievements.

Two More Games at 100%

2011-01-30T14:39:00.001+01:00

I've had a busy few days the last week.

I bought Tidalis at the Holiday Sales not because it had a big sale (well, it did get a 50% off), but because I like the developer (Arcen Games) attitude towards charity I wanted to support them. Before trying the game I thought it would be a standard match-4-like game, but with some crazy achievements (64!) that would be impossible to get. I was wrong about both. It is a casual game, but it does require you to be pretty active in the story mode or you'll lose very fast. Especially in the last ~10 levels I had a lot of problem (it doesn't help that they are randomly generated), and I did end up skipping a few to fnish it. Also, the achievements aren't that bad. Most you'll get by just completing story mode, and the rest you'll get by grinding. The worst achievement by far is "To The Moon!" which require your commutative stream lenght to be the distance from the Earth to the Moon. That is a lot of pixels! I had to leave the game running almost 24/7 for three days before that achievement was completed.

I didn't really expect much from Diamond Dan before I started playing, because I didn't really know what it was all about. However, I quickly came to like, and it reminds me of some old-school game that I can't remember the name of. You run around the outside of a temple. Your mission is to get to the bottom while collecting as many treasures as possible and avoiding traps while you progress. It sounds easy, and on easy/medium/hard it's not really that tough. Extreme, however, can be a real challenge in the later levels where there's almost more traps then safe rocks. This is one of those games where you fail a lot, but you keep saying, "One more try. I'll give it just ONE more try, and then I stop!". One day I spent around 4-5 hours on two somewhat simple achievement, which came as a real surprise for me. How easy the various levels are depends a lot on how lucky you are with the generation of the levels. One of the achievements require a speed run on one of the levels, and that really require you to reload that levels a dozen of times before you get the right combination of traps and such to quicky move downwards. Overall the achievements are all doable without too much trouble, and I didn't really find any of them annoying to achievement - not even the 1.000.000 point one (you'll probably have 500k after completing all the others).

70 Steam Achievement Games at 100%

2011-01-26T01:18:00.000+01:00

A few days ago I completed my Steam achievement game number 70. Game number 70 turned out to be Supreme Commander 2, a game I didn't think I would ever 100%, since I didn't think I would like it. I was not a fan of the first game so for a long time I didn't even want to give it a chance. This, however, changed when a friend forced me to play it since we didn't have a lot of other games to play over LAN. Supreme Commander 2 was not nearly as complex as I thought it would be, and it wasn't really that hard so I gave the campaign a shot. After reading some achievement guides it didn't sound like it would be that hard to complete, so I began going through the campaign on hard. And, as it said in the guides, it wasn't really that hard. The only hard achievement to get was the 25 online ranked matches, but my friend help me boost these, so thanks to him.

New Prince and Princess

2011-01-08T12:18:00.000+01:00

A big congratulation to the crown prince couple (of Denmark) after the crown prince has become the happy father of four. The crown princess and the new prince and princess are all doing fine after a great birth.

OCD, Addict, and Global Warming

2011-01-03T22:12:00.001+01:00

You know all that talk about global warming and all that talk about turning off everything so it doesn't use power? Hopefully Garry hadn't heard about it when he decided to update his sandbox of a game (Garry's Mod) with achievements. Among all the bad bad grind achievements he decided to have a 'Have the game running for a whole year' achievement. Well, you know some of those OCD people just have to go for it, and the first has just completed this. Congrats to Rhy for being the first.

Steam Treasurehunt

2010-12-22T14:41:00.002+01:00

The Steam Holiday Treasure is over, and I didn't even win a single game. I will review my progress in this post.

December 6th-7th

Self Portrait - Setup an avatar
Already done.
Got Tanked? - Become a Desert Fox in R.U.S.E.
See note below.
Up the Ante - Unlock The Iron Curtain in Poker Night at the Inventory
I already owned this game, but not this achievement. It didn't take long to get, though.
More Cowbell - Set a leaderboard score of at least 1,124,400 in easy (9 minute) mode for the "Paul Hartnoll" level in Chime
I already owned this game, but I hadn't played the specific song in easy. This took, naturally, nine minuts.

December 8th-9th

Friends with Benefits - Have 10 friends on your friends list
I had 83.
What Happens in Vegas - Complete Ol' Buddy Ol' Pal achievement in Fallout: New Vegas
See note below
Terminal Velocity - Set a leaderbord score of at least 22,600 on the level 'Mash Face Against Mountain' in AaAaAA!!!
This game has an achievement named after me for some reason, so, naturally, I already had this one.
Go To Your Happy Place - Play the demo or game The UnderGarden
Tried the demo, but didn't buy the game.

December 10th-11th

Join the Club - Join an Official Group
I'm already a member of 86 official groups.
Family-Style - Get Back in Business in Mafia II
I have 100% in this - well, except that one buggy achievement in Joe's Adventure DLC.
Stack the Deck - Be a Devastator in Magic: The Gathering
I am not good at Magic, but I already had this one.
Just Drop It - Set a leaderboard score of at least 85,370 for 'Classic - Small Wonder' in Droplitz
I already had 100% in this game, so that score was cleared.

December 12th-13th

It's Better to Give - Send a gift to a friend
I'm very generous!
Take One for the Team - Make a Sacrifice in Call of Duty: Black Ops
I only got this game because I could get it 40% at release, which made the price reasonable. I'm just missing the Zombie mode achievements, so this one was done.
Breaker, Breaker - Set a leaderboard score of at least 11,200,000 for 'Bonus Mode' in Shatter
I already had a score of 15,500,000.
Zombie Zoo - Create a Crass Menagerie in Left 4 Dead 2
I love L4D and L4D2 and I play them casually with friends. I have both games at 100%.

December 14th-15th

Sneak Peak - Download and watch a trailer from each of the following games: Deus Ex: Human Revolution, Homefront, BRINK, Red Faction: Armageddon, Warhammer 40,000: Space Marine, and Portal 2
I had a lot of trouble downloading these because Steam would freeze for a min. everytime I pressed download. After I was done, Valve decided to rename this objective to "Steam Gimme", and you just had to have an account. I got it the hard way!
Tunnel Vision - Become a Nosalis Hunter in Metro 2033
I haven't completed a playthrough in this game yet, since I didn't find it that much fun. However, I already had this achievement.
Cause and Effect - Create a Destruction Frenzy in Just Cause 2
I already owned Just Cause 2, but I couldn't play it because it requires Win7, and I'm still running XP on my PC. To took a chance, downloaded it on my laptop, and managed to get the achievement even though the game was lagging like crazy on very low settings.
Beat It - Set a leaderboard score of at least 3,770,488 for 'Survival Best Score' in Beat Hazard
Already done.

December 16th-17th

Smack Talker - Post a comment on a friend's Steam Community profile page
I actually had to do this. I'm surpriced I haven't done it before now.
One-Hit Wonder - Build a Wonder in Civilization V
Already done.
Road Rage - Set a leaderboard score of at least 10,515 for 'Slaughter, City Center' in Zombie Driver
Great game! I already had a score of 127,922.
Butter Me Up - Build Me Up Buttercup in Bob came in Pieces
Another great game! I have all the achievements already, so this was free too.

December 18th-19th

Suggestive Behavior - Write a recommendation
As I've already written about on my blog, I have made a few.
Made in the USA - Become a Founding Father in Empire: Total War
I already had this one, but I haven't played this game that much, since my game started crashing everytime I got to a specific mission.
Buzz the Tower - Set a leaderboard score of at least 37 for 'Beach' in flight Control HD
I think my score for every level is over 100, but for some reason this objective kept going from completed to not completed and then back again.
Overachiever - Played at least 15 games or demos since March 2009 (When Steam began recording playtime)
No comments...

I really didn't want to purchase a lot of games for this treasure hunt, since you only had to complete 10 out of the 28 tasks to do in the drawing for the 100 games, and I was expecting those 10 to be complete free. In fact, I ended up with 20 free tasks, and 6 very easy ones. The first day R.U.S.E. was 33% off, but I decided not to buy it for two reasons: 1. I wasn't really interrested in this game, and 2. I price was still too high, and I could buy it retail cheaper and just activate it on Steam if I really wanted.

The second day Fallout: New Vegas showed up with no discount, and at first I was happy to see this, since I still didn't want to buy a lot for a perfect treasure hunt, and with two expensive games the first two days it looked like that would be the trend.

Then the next few days came, and I got a lot of free tasks - well, the Just Cause 2 one was a bit of a pain as already described. I was now hoping for a game like Modern Warfare 2 to show up, so I could just say 'Fuck it!', but no. All free tasks too.

It was now Saturday the 18th, and I was only missing those two tasks from the first two days, and my damn OCD kept nagging me about it. It was too late to buy the game retail and just activate them on Steam, and I didn't want to spent 100€ on them on Steam. Thus, I decided to look at some of the other digital stores where I came across Direct2Drive where they were also 100€ in their EU store, and cheaper in their UK store. And on top of that you could add a coupon to get an extra 25% off, which in the end meant that the games was about half-price. I thought I would get an error when I tried to use the UK, and I got one:

Your transaction will require review by a Customer Service Agent. Please contact Customer Service for further information. We apologize for this inconvenience.

I decided to contact support, and let their responce time decide whether I should go for the two tasks or not. At 00:18 I made my ticket, and at 00:30 they responded:

I sincerely apologize that you’ve been inconvenienced!
In order to protect your card from unauthorized internet purchases our system required a manual review by a human being in a random security sweep. This is a precaution we take as an online, no card present merchant.
I have cleared your account and sincerely thank you for your patience! Please return to making purchases with us as you normally would. No purchase has completed from your previous attempt.
Feel free to contact me with any more questions you might have.
Regards,

That's just crazy! 12 minuts responce time in the weekend at night? Valve could really learn something here! Anywho, I bought the two games without any problems and activated them on Steam. I was not at home so via remote control I told my PC to start downloading them so they would be ready when I got home the next day. To make a long story short, the Fallout: New Vegas task took a few hours, and R.U.S.E. took around 30 seconds.

Click the image below to see the whole contest page:

And, naturally, the epic Hat of Undeniable Wealth and Respect:

RUSH review and 100%

2010-12-09T21:46:00.002+01:00

RUSH is a good puzzle game that never gets too frustrating, and if you do feel a bit frustrated there's a simple hint system that either tells you if your signs are placed the wrong place or tells you where to place signs. However, the game is missing a cute creature like Toki Tori.

The 21 achievements were easily done, but I still had fun doing them. I should have added to the review that the frame rate tends to drop when you start the boxes in the larger levels. This, however, isn't that important since you aren't actively doing anything while this happens. You should still note that some of the loop achievements can be a bit buggy if the game lags.

Rhythm Zone Review

2010-11-30T23:33:00.000+01:00

Good and fun music game built up the same way as Guitar Hero just with a keyboard. You can change the difficulty from decent to impossible. It's always a great feature in music games that you can add your own music - in this game you even get an achievement for adding 10,000 songs(!).

One little note: This is possibly the only game ever that gives me nausea. After one song my vision is all weird, and after 4-6 songs I just have to stop.

It's just a bit sad I will never get all achievements in this game. I don't think I have 10,000 songs to add, and the hardest difficulty is just impossible for me.

Kane & Lynch 2: Dog Days Review

2010-11-28T02:51:00.002+01:00

I've heard a lot of bad press about this game, and seeing that the game had already dropped to 29,99€ after just a few month didn't look good. But since the game had a 75% sale (already!) I could resist, since, afterall, the game has achievements. I won't be getting all the achievements for this game, since a lot of them are for multiplayer, and I don't want to play the multiplayer in this game. Here's the review I've written on Steam (for all my Steam review, look HERE).

Being an IO game I really wanted to like it, but I just don't. In fact, I have a hard time even comming up with something positive to say. Sure, the weird hand-held camera view is somewhat stylish, but it quickly just gets annoying. Also, who's filming and why? And why is gore and nudity censured?

The guns are weak, and doesn't really feel like they do any damage. The story, well, I never really got it - you hunt someone in the beginning, and your girlfriend gets *snip*, and you hunt the people behind? From all previews I thought it would be about a robbery, but that's only the multiplayer part (or arcade mode).

I've played 4.4 hours so far, and that's 3.5 hours of completing the whole campaign(!), and 0.9 hours playing arcade mode. I'll try to complete the co-op campaign, and then I'll just try to forget this game...

New Design

2010-11-27T16:24:00.001+01:00

I've changed the design so it looks more like Steam's design, since I really like that. Also, the new design has allowed me to make the text arena more width.

Steam Pre-Holiday Sale

2010-11-27T00:14:00.007+01:00

The pre-holiday sale on Steam has started, and this year the theme is gift packs - for instance you can get 10-pack of Freedom forces for only 7,49€ (84% off on each game). I'll list each day's sale here:

November 24th

Shank 33% off
Alpha Protocal 75% off
Borderlands 50% off
Prototype 50% off
Sam & Max: The Devil’s Playhouse 70% off
Counter Strike: Source 75% off
The Deus Ex Collection 75% off
R.U.S.E. 33% off
Indie Energy Pack (includes BRAINPIPE: A Plunge to Unhumanity, Galcon Fusion, Gridrunner Revolution, ProtoGalaxy, and Quantz) 90% off

R.U.S.E. 6 Pack 50% off
Half-Life 2 10 pack 77% off
Deus Ex: Game of the Year Edition 8 pack 83% off
Borderlands 6 pack 66% off

November 25th

EVE Online: Tyrannis 75% off
Defense Grid: The Awakening 75% off
Cities XL 2011 25% off
DeathSpank 33% off
AudioSurf 75% off
Batman: Arkham Asylum GOTY 66% off
Kane & Lynch 2: Dog Days 75% off
Indie Story Pack (includes And Yet It Moves, Gish, Puzzle Agent, Recettear: An Item Shop's Tale, and Jolly Rover) 92% off

Defense Grid: The Awakening 10 pack 84% off
AudioSurf 12 pack 86% off
Left 4 Dead 2 6 pack 75% off
Puzzle Quest 2 10 pack 65% off

November 26th

Burnout Paradise: The Ultimate Box 50% off
Warhammer 40,000: Dawn of War II Gold Edition 66% off
Machinarium 75% off
Tropico 3: Gold Edition 75% off
Torchlight 75% off
Empire: Total War 50% off
ARMA II: Operation Arrowhead 50% off
Blur 50% off
Indie Clever Pack (includes Doc Clock: The Toasted Sandwich of Time, Eufloria, Iron Grip: Warlord, VVVVVV, and World of Goo) 91% off

Freedom Force 10 pack 84% off
Portal 6 pack 86% off
Warhammer 40,000: Dawn of War II Chaos Rising 8 pack 75% off
Empire: Total War 6 pack 65% off

November 27th

Left 4 Dead 2 75% off
Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 50% off
Wings of Prey 50% off
Supreme Commander 2 75% off
Galcon Fusion 75% off
King's Bounty: Platinum Edition 75% off
Lara Croft and the Guardian of Light 50% off
Grand Theft Auto: Episodes from Liberty City 66% off
Indie Pulse Pack (includes AudioSurf, Best Hazard, BIT.TRIP BEAT, Rhythm Zone, and The Polynomial - Space of the Music) 90% off

Counter Strike: Source 6 pack 79% off
NyxQuest: Kindred Spirit 10 pack 85% off
Red Faction: Guerrilla 8 pack 75% off
Grand Theft Auto: Episodes from Liberty City 6 pack 75% off

November 28th

Mount & Blade: Warband 75% off
Tom Clancy's Splinter Cell Conviction 33% off
The Ball 50% off
Street Fighter IV 66% off
World of Goo 75% off
Patrician IV - Steam Special Edition 75% off
The Orange Box 75% off
BIT.TRIP BEAT 50% off
Indie Puzzle Pack (includes Cogs, Droplitz, Puzzle Dimension, Shatter, and Tidalis) 90% off

Osmos 12 pack 81% off
Tom Clancy's Splinter Cell Conviction 6 pack 50% off
Just Cause 2 8 pack 75% off

November 29th

Aliens vs. Predator 2010 66% off
Monkey Island 2 Special Edition: LeChuck's Revenge 75% off
Metro 2033 75% off
Peggle Deluxe 50% off
Beat Hazard 75% off
Colin McRae DiRT 2 75% off
Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic 75% off
Mafia II 25% off
Indie Air Pack (includes Altitude, DogFighter, Flotilla, Gratuitous Space Battles, and Plain Sight) 92% off

World of Goo 12 pack 79% off
Aliens vs. Predator 2010 6 pack 74% off
Trine 8 pack 87% off
Lead and Gold: Gangs of the Wild West 10 pack 78% off

Steam Recommendations

2010-11-26T22:37:00.003+01:00

As a new feature on Steam it is now possible to recommend a game to your friends. Sadly, you can't see all recommendations for a game. Anyway, it is possible to see all recommendations made by a single user by looking at the Recommended tab under his games (hopefully, they'll add a link on one's profile soon).

Anyway, I've been recommending a few games so far, though mostly games I've already discussed here. You can see them all HERE. The link has also been added to the right hand side.

100% on Flight Control HD

2010-11-22T17:23:00.003+01:00

Let me try this again...

This is a new small casual game on Steam, which didn't take long to 100%. This is my review of this game (see all my review HERE):

After ~30 min. you've tried every level, and it already seems a bit too repetitive. If just they've added some simple story mode or some special objectives it would have been much better. If you're just going after the achievements you'll probably have 11 of 12 after those ~30 min and ~30 games, which means your still 170 games away from that last achievement...

All in all, if you have 30 min. where you want to play a small, simple, casual game, then this is a decent pick if you can get it 50% off.

Finally, some free time!

2010-06-26T15:44:00.001+02:00

I haven't posted anything for a long time, since I've been pretty stressed with my master thesis, which I've finally finished and passed (I will post a few lines about this later). That said, I will try to be a bit more active from now on. And that said, I will probably spam this blog with posts about things that has happened the past month, and I will try to make an update of my achievement progress.

100% on Bob Came in Pieces

2010-05-23T14:33:00.002+02:00

Edit Jule 19th. - the game got 10 achievements, which I have now unlocked, such that I am truly at 100% again.

This game is a different take on puzzle games. You are Bob, a small alien who has crashed landed on a foreign planet. You start with a basic space ship, and as you progress through the levels, you'll find extra rockets and pipes you can add to your ship. The difficulty lies in chosing the right ship design for the right job. The story levels are quickly completed, and all the parts are quickly found. But for each level there are two speedrun achievements (silver and gold), and it's here the really hard achievements are to be found. In addition, the game has two times gotten new levels in the form of VR mission, which have all been really well designed, and I actually found these more fun than the story levels.

All in all, I think this is a really fun game, and I've had a lot of fun trying to complete the speedruns (which I'm usually not a fan of). For the price of only 6.99€, I would highly recommend this small indie gem.

100% on Altitude

2010-05-23T14:28:00.002+02:00

100% on Madballs in... Babo: Invasion

2010-05-13T01:06:00.001+02:00

After a long time I finally hit 100%. The multiplayer achiements in this game was really hard to get due to two reasons. 1) The player base is not that big. 2) The players playing have played for a long time, and are, thus, pretty good. I had given up on the multiplayer achievements, but then a free weekend helped a lot. Some newbs joined the game and I was able to get most. The last, host a 4-player co-op game, I managed to get with a friend and some random joiners.

100%

100% on Beat Hazard

2010-04-30T23:43:00.001+02:00

Beat Hazard is Asteroids on LSD. You are a small ship in the middle of space. Astroids are flying about and other space ships are trying to kill you. Every level in the game is different because it is randomly generated by a freely chosen song. The more beat in the music, the stronger your weapon becomes, but at the same time more enemies are spawning. You weapons, the enemies' weapons, and explosions are all very colourful, and at hectic times you can barely see the screen from colours.

When I bought the game I was afraid it would be like Bullet Candy, which I didn't like. But it's not! This game is fun, actually really fun, and especially since you decide your own difficulty by chosing songs - slow songs being the hardest. If you have a few minuts and fell like playing a casual game while listening to some tunes, then I would highly recommend this game.

Most of the achievements are fairly simple, and when you get the Veteran achievement (Accumulate 10 hours of play) you'll probably have most of the others as well. At first you'll think it will be impossible to get 1 million points in one track, but after you level up, you'll find 1 million points in one track is a lousy run. The hardest achievement is probably Survival Champion! (Reach 20 Minutes in Survival Mode), but with the right choice of music it's doable - a megamix is a good choice, make sure there's no quiet moments in the songs, nor at the beginning or the end. You'll most probably get the Boss Slayer achievement (Kill 8 bosses in 1 game) while playing survival.

Anywho, 100%!

100% on Fortix

2010-04-16T12:22:00.001+02:00

This newly released game (Fortix) is basicly just an old classic from way back. Let me describe it this way: you are a knight running on the edge of a picture. On this picture there are forts that you need to capture. You capture teritory by moving away from your baseline (which is the frame to begin with) and draw a line from one place of the baseline to another. The smallest side of the line is then captured. But things are not that easy! On the pircture there's also cannons shooting at you and dragons flying around trying to kill you. You kill dragons by capturing the teritory they're on. Cannons you destroy by either capturing them or capturing a tricker that fires a catapult.

If you have a few hours to kill, then this game is great fun, but it's also really short. It took me 1,6 hours to get perfect on all the easy levels. Completing the game on impossible took further 3,3 hours. In my opinion, that is too short. If the game only was 2,99€-3,49€ it would be ok - 4,49€ is a bit overpriced for the game when it is this short and the gameplay so simple.

Enough of that - 100% completed!

I'll finish this this post by showing how I completed the achievement "Dragon Crisis" (Let Xitrof lay 15 eggs on the final level, then win the level.)

100% on Simplz Zoo

2010-04-16T12:00:00.000+02:00

I'm so ashamed about owning Simplz Zoo... nah. This game is really a child's game or a girlie game. But the most important part of the game is the small puzzles in the game, which are all various Bejeweled games that are all fun. I don't really care about the zoo building aspect of the game, which luckily isn't that important in the game - you basicly earn resournes in the puzzles with which you can buy new things to your zoo.

Anywho, 100%!

100% on Zombie Driver (again)

2010-04-14T17:44:00.000+02:00

Zombie Driver, a GTA 1 style game where you drive through streets through hordes of zombies. Too bad the only missions in the game are "drive to this spot and clear out the zombies to save a few people"... WAIT! I already said this back in March. A few days ago the Slaughter mode was released for Zombie Driver, which included 21 new achievements. A bit much, but it's always fun to earn loads of achievements after just haven played ~30 minuts. The Slaugter mode is just you in your car in some sort of closed area with different environmental effects such as fog or darkness. Hordes of zombies then constantly spawn all around, and you have to survive as long as possible by slaughtering as many zeds as possible (note: you can't spell slaughter without laughter!). This mode really fits the title and is actually a lot of fun, especially since they added leaderbords (only ingame, sadly) where you can try to be the best of your friends or simply just the best of all. I must say that the new achievements was too easy to complete. On each of the five levels you need to score a certain amouts of points, but this is set way too low, imo. I did them all either in the first or in the second run. And I did every other achievement except for a few grinding achievements (which aren't crazily high either) while doing this.

100% on Foreign Legion: Buckets of Blood (again)

2010-04-14T17:31:00.001+02:00

I reviewed this game back in August 2009 when the game came out. I gave it a very poor score because of the big lack of contend - only one level! But, appently, the plan was all along to add extra contend for free later on. They just had to release "a beta-version" early on because they ran out of money (note: their own money!). The new contend pack released back in January helped the game a lot. A campaign with five maps was added, and the chance to customize your character and purchase weapons. I still think that 6,99€ is a bit too much - 4,99€ would be a better price. Anyway, the developers are still working on some multiplayer, which will probably help too.

Back on topic, I once again have 100% on this small game. The new achievements took about 3 extra hours to complete, where the last two hours was basic kill grinding.

100% on Everyday Genius: SquareLogic

2010-04-14T15:38:00.001+02:00

I earned the last achievement a couple of weeks ago, namely the "Piece Of Cake" (Solve all puzzles in a region.). When I saw this game released I instanstly bought it, since this is the type of casual game that I really enjoy, and I knew my girlfriend would agree. The game is somewhat like sudoku just where you get some solving help by small equations around the board. It is really well done, and with 20000+ different boards some very easy and some very complicated there is plenty to do. I highly recommend this game to everyone who enjoy casual puzzle games as sudoku.

Achievement Stats for March 2010

2010-04-08T23:39:00.001+02:00

This update comes a bit late since I've been busy with various things. Also, since there has been some significant chances to SteamStats, I'm going to change my stats here too. The chances to SteamStats (without knowing too much) include the deletion of millions of accounts (before SteamStats knew about more than ten million accounts, and now there's only a few thousand left). This was done for a couple of reasons:

Performance - the site was beginning to work really slowly because of the _large_ database.
Cheaters - now, recorded cheaters are easier to spot, and most cheat profiles are now not known to SteamStats.

Another change is the auto update of Top(something) every day, so the stats from the top players are always up-to-date. It naturally follows from all this that there has been a huge drop in achievement values

Here are my achievement stats for March 2010.

Achievement games owned: 77/104 (74,04%)
Achievements from owned Games: 2084/3435 (60,67%)
Achievements from all games: 2084/4170 (49,98%)
Owned games at 100%: 20/77 (25,97%)
All games at 100%: 20/104 (19,23%)

New achievement games to Steam:

Just Cause 2 (50 achievements)
Metro 2033 (39 achievements)
Shatter (30 achievements)
Sol Survivor (26 achievements)
Supreme Commander 2 (47 achievements)

Newly purchased achievement games:

Shatter (30 achievements)
Penny Arcade Adventures: On the Rain-Slick Precipice of Darkness, Episode Two (12 achievements)
Galcon Fusion (135 achievements)
Football Manager 2010 (60 achievements)

Complete list of new achievements earned:

(Mar 28) Champions Online: Doppelganger, Damaged Ego.
(Mar 27) Champions Online: Aegir Master Diver, Lemurian Sub Assault, Palus, Lemurian Sub Triumph, Aegir Rescue Diver, Aegir Master Diver.
(Mar 27) Defense Grid: The Awakening: Annihilator.
(Mar 26) Champions Online: Qliphothic Lore, The Kings Shall Rise, Kings of Edom Loremaster, Mystery of Mechanon, Mechanon Loremaster, Historian: Lemuria, Destroyer Research.
(Mar 25) Football Manager 2010: Invincible!, Star Man, Goal Machine, Unstoppable Force, Iron Curtain, The Boss, Cup Glory!.
(Mar 24) Champions Online: All About VIPER, Lemuria History: Caliginous Depths, Lemurian Carvings, Qularr Operations, Reflections on Destroyer, VIPER Recruitment, Vanquished Kigatilik, The Harrowing.
(Mar 23) Shatter: The Boss, High Speed Breaker, Going Further.
(Mar 22) Team Fortress 2: Tartan Spartan.
(Mar 22) Champions Online: Aegir Cave Diver, Rift Runner, Revolution under the Sea, Lemuria: Cartographer, Lemuria: Spawn Camper.
(Mar 21) Pirates, Vikings, & Knights II: Shooter, Hey, That's Mine!, A Chest To Die For, Quest For The Holy Grail, Gestir, Otzi The Iceman, Got A Crush On You, This Is Sparta!, Pop, Lock, And Drop It!, Tricky Shot, This Is Why You Can't Have Nice Things, You Shall Not Pass!, Seeker Of The Grail, Archer, Block N' Poke, Dinah, Weakling!, I Has A Parrot, Kills First, Aim Second, Sharp Pointy Teeth!, Berserker, Huscarl, Cornish Game Hen, Butterknifed!, I'm Invincible!, I Have Never Lost A Melee, Parrot Frenzy, I Shall Smite Thee!, I Shall Feast On Your Bones!, Anger Management, Holier Than Thou, Purple Heart, Why Did I Bother Lighting That?, From Davy Jones' Locker, Hero Kill, Mouse Trap, I'm Burnin' For You, This Is Madness!, Did I Do That?, POW, Right In The Kisser!, I Wish To Register A Complaint!, Great Balls Of Fire, Have A Nice Trip, Captain, Robin Hood, Shish Kebab!, Puppeteer, Agrianian Javelineer, Axed By The Arc, Well Rounded, Trapped Mouse, Madoff With The Chest, Goldmember.
(Mar 21) Shatter: Marching On.
(Mar 20) Champions Online: Sandtiger, Vanquished The Bronze King, Karkaradon Texts.
(Mar 19) Champions Online: Billy Goat Bluff.
(Mar 19) Shatter: Overkill, Old School, Fringe Benefit, Time, Attacked, Balls Galore, Storm Warning, Kinetic Harvest, Aurora, Shardenfreude, Granule Extractor, Krypton Garden, Freon, Amethyst Caverns, Neon Mines, Argon Refinery, Xenon Home World, The End of the World, Master Batter.
(Mar 18) Football Manager 2010: Champions!.
(Mar 17) Magnetis: Cousins, Brother & Sister, Twins, Buddies.
(Mar 16) Champions Online: Shadow Destroyer, Iguana, Vanquished Vikorin the Blind, Ruin from the Ancient Past, Jouster.
(Mar 14) And Yet It Moves: Stuntman, Random.
(Mar 14) Age of Chivalry: Burning Ambition, Face-kebab, BBQ Master, Seek and Destroy, First Blood, Robin Hood (Bronze), Five Star Arching, Char Broiled, Lumberjack, Olympian, Harvester of Sorrow.
(Mar 13) Team Fortress 2: Joint Operation, Medical Breakthrough, Tam O'Shatter, Spynal Tap, Play Doctor, Soviet Block, Geneva Contravention, Party Loyalty, Doctor Assisted Homicide, Grand Rounds.
(Mar 12) Champions Online: Vanquished Bleak Elder, Those Who Dwell in Bleakness, Pirates of the Abyss.
(Mar 11) Champions Online: Resonant, Vanquished Dr. Moreau.
(Mar 09) Zero Gear: Silver Medal.
(Mar 08) Team Fortress 2: Class Struggle, Photostroika, Ghastly Gibus Grab, War Crime and Punishment, Engineer to Eternity, Something Stickied This Way Comes, Crock Block, Triage.
(Mar 08) On the Rain-Slick Precipice of Darkness, Episode Two: Reluctant Hero, Millionaire, Pack Rat Strikes Back, Pervert, Moving On Up, POWER SURRRGE!, Arsonist, Lab Assistant, Endgame, Steel Cannibal, The Strength To Rule, Can't Nobody Hold You Down.
(Mar 08) Team Fortress 2: Where Eagles Dare, Wings of Glory, The Longest Daze, War Crime Spybunal, Dodgers 1, Giants 0, Retire the Runner, Blind Fire, Medical Intervention, Firewall, Quick Hook, Enemy at the Gate.
(Mar 07) Left 4 Dead 2: STILL SOMETHING TO PROVE.
(Mar 07) Zuma's Revenge: The Ocho.
(Mar 07) Champions Online: The Vengeance Journals, The Worms Crawl Out.
(Mar 06) Football Manager 2010: You're On Fire, Scoring Streak, Unbeatable!, Team Performance, Comeback King!.
(Mar 04) On the Rain-Slick Precipice of Darkness, Episode One: Pack Rat.
(Mar 04) Zombie Driver: I Like My Car Clean..
(Mar 04) Portal: Transmission Received.
(Mar 03) On the Rain-Slick Precipice of Darkness, Episode One: A Winner Is You, Immortal, Clean Sweep, Silent, But Deadly, Pacifist.
(Mar 02) Football Manager 2010: He's Signed!, First Victory, Clean Sheet, Hat-Trick, Double Hat-Trick.

Earth Hour 2010

2010-03-27T16:19:00.007+01:00

Remember to support the largest climate awareness event Earth Hour, which since 2007 has been supporten by hundred of millions of people around the world. The event is very simple:

from 8:30 PM local time, turn of all the lights for one hour.

"But it's in the middle of X-Faktor" (Danish program) is no excuse - in fact, they should support the event too by turning of the lights in Parken.

Read more about WWF's Earth Hour on http://www.earthhour.org

EDIT:

The hour has passed in Denmark, and looking out the window while sitting in the dark I have to say I'm quite disappointed. If I remember correctly, then last year my city turned off some of the city light. This year everything was on. Also, a lot of people around the block still had the light turned on. But then again, Earth Hour hasn't really been advertised anywhere this year for some reason...

100% on On the Rain-Slick Precipice of Darkness, Episode Two

2010-03-09T00:33:00.001+01:00

On the Rain-Slick Precipice of Darkness, Edisode Two - All achievements done!

100% on Left 4 Dead 2

2010-03-07T17:43:00.000+01:00

I love Left 4 Dead, and I love Left 4 Dead 2 almost as much. A problem with #2 is that they made the hunter useless. The hunter was by far the most fun character to play in #1, but for some reason they decided to make him harder to use and make it almost impossible to do high jumps by closing everything off. The boomer is also worse, but after some getting used to he's ok. But the spitter and charger in #2 are really great and fun to play (the jockey just plain sucks!).

Left 4 Dead 2 has some really hard achievements, and I've been working on them for some time now. The expert maps are almost impossible to do alone and you'll never know who joins a random lobby, so you have to hope that you have some friends who's up for the challange. I managed to force them to do four of the maps (also one on realism), but I still needed Hard Rain. After a lot of waiting and seeing that it probably wouldn't happen, I decided to look for a random lobby. After about an hour a lobby was finally created. Thankfully the players in this lobby turned out to be really decent players, and we actually managed to complete Hard Rain Expert Realism in under two hours, which is just crazy.

I'm really happy to be able to say, 100% complete! Bring on Left 4 Dead 3 =P

100% on Zuma's Revenge!

2010-03-07T17:30:00.000+01:00

I always loved the old Zuma game, so I was really happy to see this game with achievements. It's more or less like the old game just with a few more modes and boss fights (some of those bosses can be really frustrating. In normal mode I didn't die until the last boss, who killed me around five times.) After normal mode you can play Heroic Frog mode, which is the same levels just way faster. Iron Frog gauntlet, beat 10 levels in a row under 25 minuts (to get the Iron Will achievements) I actually did on my first for-fun-run. The only two achievements I actually had problems with was Foie Gras (Force feed the God of Pestilence 20 balls in 20 seconds) - stop moving already! - and The Ocho (Acquire 8 fruits using the Proximity Bomb) - this doesn't happen as often as you think, and I ended up having to play some random challenge maps to get this one.

100% on Zombie Driver

2010-03-05T13:22:00.000+01:00

Zombie Driver, a GTA 1 style game where you drive through streets through hordes of zombies. Too bad the only missions in the game are "drive to this spot and clear out the zombies to save a few people". Also, the game is just too short - 17 missions, all being more or less the same, all just taking a few minuts. Getting all the 12 achievements took me 3,3 hours, and that's with two playthroughs where I did all sidemissions (which are either "clear this area too" or "save the people within x minuts".).

100% on On the Rain-Slick Precipice of Darkness, Episode One

2010-03-04T23:17:00.002+01:00

On the Rain-Slick Precipice of Darkness, Episode One is the first installment in the RPG-Adventure game series based on the web comic Penny Arcade.

Too bad we'll never see the third and last episode of this game... Never the less, Episode one and two had a nice price drop a few weeks ago, going from 14,99€ and 19,99€ to both 4,99€, so I grabbed the first episode to try it out. It a decent game, sadly I never found the Penny Arcade comics that funny, so I didn't get all the humour in the game. The fighting system is fine, but I didn't realise until the final boss fight that you could block attacks, which made the game a bit harder than it would have been. Never the less, I managed to get through without dying. In my last epic battle against the giant evil mine my computer gfx card broke, so I had a couple of easy achievements waiting...

Any way, 100% completion - YAY!

/me goes to purchase Episode two.

Achievement Stats for February 2010

2010-03-04T17:22:00.000+01:00

Here are my achievement stats for February 2010.

Total Number of Achievement Games: 97 (91)

Total Number of Achievements: 4041 (3643)

Total Number of Achievement Points: 5374,53 (4808,76)

Average Points Per Achievement: 1,33 (1,32)

Achievement Games Owned: 72 (69)

Achievements Earned: 1875 (1747)

Achievement Points: 1932,08 (1784,35)

Average Points Per Achievement: 1,03 (1,02)

Complete list of new achievements earned:

(Feb 25) Pirates, Vikings, & Knights II: A Worthy Sacrifice.
(Feb 21) On the Rain-Slick Precipice of Darkness, Episode One: Steel Devils, Fight 'Em With Items, Level Awesome.
(Feb 20) On the Rain-Slick Precipice of Darkness, Episode One: Stray Cat, Nine Lives, All Together Now.
(Feb 20) Zero Gear: Bronze Medal, Gold Medal, Flight of the Falcon, Lemming.
(Feb 17) Champions Online: Dogcatcher, Gadroon Orders.
(Feb 17) Zombie Driver: Superbeast, Missed Flight, Zombie Driver, Pimp Car, Guns of Glory, Combo Master.
(Feb 17) Toki Tori: Hard Boiled, Escargone, Slimy Sewer Hard, Bubble Barrage Hard, Tunnel of Love.
(Feb 16) Champions Online: Vanquished Buster, Electric Boogaloo.
(Feb 16) Pirates, Vikings, & Knights II: I'll Be Blunt, Keg Stand!, Swinger, Oops, Did That Hurt?, Skirmisher, Heavy Knight, Parrot Killer.
(Feb 12) Magnetis: Sunday Player, Beginner, Thougie.
(Feb 12) Pirates, Vikings, & Knights II: Part O' The Crew, Asleep With The Fishies!, The Last Supper, First Blood.
(Feb 12) Nation Red: Breather.
(Feb 12) Age of Chivalry: Green is beautiful!, Timber!!!, Trebuchet Away! , KABOOOM!, I'm too young to die!.
(Feb 11) Toki Tori: Chef de Cuisine, Who are you going to call?, Creepy Castle Hard, All I got was this lousy T-Shirt.
(Feb 11) Zero Gear: Disappearing Act, Spring Chicken, I Get Around, Slippy Sez.
(Feb 10) Champions Online: Major, Predator.
(Feb 10) Team Fortress 2: Race for the Pennant.
(Feb 10) Toki Tori: Eggdurance, Forest Falls Hard, Cold as Ice, Close Encounter, True Champion, Master Chef, Bubble Barrage.
(Feb 09) D.I.P.R.I.P. Warm Up: Team Mate, Level 7 - Rolling Carnage.
(Feb 09) Magnetis: Pneumatic Drill, Power Hammer, Visitor, Fast Fingers!.
(Feb 09) Champions Online: High Five, I Believe.
(Feb 08) Aquaria: A New Chapter....
(Feb 08) Bob Came in Pieces: Chapter 2 - Silver Time, Chapter 3 - Silver Time, Chapter 4 - Silver Time, Chapter 5 - Silver Time, Chapter 6 - Silver Time, Chapter 12 - Silver Time, Chapter 2 - Gold Time, Chapter 3 - Gold Time, Chapter 4 - Gold Time, Chapter 5 - Gold Time, Chapter 12 - Gold Time.
(Feb 08) Torchlight: Cash for Trash.
(Feb 08) Zombie Driver: I Am The Law!, The Last Express, Die Zombies Die !!.
(Feb 07) Toki Tori: Sous-chef, Slimy Sewer.
(Feb 06) Champions Online: Guy with the Gun.
(Feb 06) Team Fortress 2: Frags of our Fathers, The Boostie Boys, Ain't Got Time to Bleed, Near Death Experience, Sticky Thump.
(Feb 06) Torchlight: Master Smasher, Down the Hatch, Supreme Slayer.
(Feb 06) Toki Tori: The Answer, Jeff, Cheapskate, So Sad, Deep Fried, Creepy Castle.
(Feb 05) Toki Tori: Apprentice.
(Feb 04) You achieved Toki Tori: Short-order Cook, Harderwijk Fried Chicken, Stackmate, Never gonna give you up!.
(Feb 04) Torchlight: Only a Master of Evil, Tormented.
(Feb 04) Champions Online: Contender, Volatile.
(Feb 03) Torchlight: Potion Whiz.
(Feb 03) Toki Tori: Dizzy, Cold Feet, Forest Falls.
(Feb 02) Champions Online: The Lemurians are Revolting!, The Deep End, Marine Memoriam, Lemurian Sub Victory, Sparky, Shadow of the Shark Men, Littlest Pet Shop Boy, Vanquished Stingray, Duelist.
(Feb 01) Champions Online: Aegir Wreck Diver, Vanquished Khusor the Crooked, The Lemurians are Revolting!.

Broken Computer

2010-02-26T01:34:00.001+01:00

Well, my GeForce 8800 GTS decided it didn't want to live anymore last Sunday, so since that day I've been without computer. Sure, I have my laptop - my six year old Medion laptop from Aldi (I was actually looking for a new, but I guess that must wait). Just to whine a bit more, the Friday before my television providor (YouSee) decided to change my full subscription to the basic package leaving my with a very limited amout of channels to choose from.

Hopefully, someone will come this weekend to look at my computer to see what needs changing. With a bit of luck (please!) I can do with just a new graphic card and an extra ram block (I only have 2GB now). If there's room (I don't think there is) I'll get a new internal harddrive too - I need a fresh install of Windows (haven't decided whether it should be 7, or just XP again) and I need to backup the stuff from the old harddrive. Plus, I could use the extra space.

If everything goes as planned, I should be back online with a new and improved computer within the next week. Then I just need to find a new name for it (Skaery is my laptop, and Hal, Chegg, and Zoey were my previous computers).

EDIT:
New parts have now been ordered. I decided to go with a XFX Radeon HD4870 with 1GB and a fresh couple of RAM blocks 2x2GB. Actually I wanted the HD5850 card, since it's only the 5000-series that supports DirectX11, but that series is more or less impossible to get in Denmark at the moment, and I can't wait until someone get some home. Never the less, HD4870 is still much better than my old 8800 GTS 320MB card, and it's only half the price of the HD5850 card. Sadly, though, the place I ordered the gfx card from didn't have any at home, but they should get some on Tuesday, and then with a bit of luck I'll have it by Wednesday (that is, unless they decide to show up when I'm not home).

At the moment the plan is:

Replace the RAM (should come Tuesday)
Install the new gfx card (hopefully no later then Wednesday)
Clean around the spot where my computer usually stands
Do a backup of my game files
Find a new internal harddrive with around 1TB (might wait a week with this)
Find a good version of Windows 7
Format C:

100% on Toki Tori

2010-02-17T13:50:00.005+01:00

Another game for the collection. Toki Tori, this small indie platform/puzzle game with 80+ levels ranking from easy to almost impossible was really fun to play. You play as Toki, a small cute chicking collecting eggs for something (spoiler free). In each level you'll get a number of items to use such as bridges, telewarps and bubbles. You'll need to plan ahead and carefully use your items in the right places, which can be very demanding from time to time.

Overall, with the price tag of $4.99/4,49€ (and 25% at release) this is a must have for puzzle lovers. The fact that the team behind the game actually adds stuff to the game after release enhances this point. So far they've added two community levels and a new one is comming plus something extra (I might not have 100% after this update!). A MetaScore of 81 is very well deserved, and I would give it 8/10.

3rd Place

2010-02-11T01:31:00.000+01:00

After fighting hard to keep my 5th spot on SteamStats on the top list I actually managed to get enough points to reach 3rd place. A lot of these points game from the small indie puzzle game Bob Came in Pieces where I did a few speed run achievements.

100% on D.I.P.R.I.P. Warm Up

2010-02-09T14:17:00.000+01:00

Finally, I managed to get the last two achievements I was missing in D.I.P.R.I.P. (Die In Pain Rest In Peace). This game/mod is one big grind, and after doing all the other grinding a long time ago I was still about 2000 kills short in the Team Mate (kill 5000 as a team) and Level 7 - Rolling Carnage (kill 5000) achievements. All that's done now, and I can leave this game to D.I.P.R.I.P..

Computational Commutative Algebra with Singular - Ideals, Varieties, and Gröbner Basis

2010-02-06T01:33:00.001+01:00

I finally finished my MAT5 (semi-thesis) last week. The exam went just fine even though I was sick I felt nauseous all day. Well, if you feel like learning about of ideals, varieties, and Gröbner bases in a polynomial ring here is my project.

LINK

Synopsis

We will begin by introducing some of the basic objects of the reports, such as the polynomial ring, ideals, and varieties. The computer algebra system Singular will be used throughout the report to help with the calculations.
The Gröbner bases will be introduced, and these will allow us solve various problems, such as to determine if a given polynomial lies in a given ideal, and to ease the calculation of common solutions for a set of equations.
The correspondence between ideals and varieties will be proved, and examples will be given to show these correspondences. In the last part, mappings between varieties and the quotient of the polynomial ring modulo an ideal will be studied.

The 50 Worst Movies Ever

2010-02-03T16:28:00.000+01:00

The magazine Empire made a poll to determine the 50 worst movies ever made. Here is that list (source):

50. Spider-Man 3
49. Showgirls
48. Town & Country
47. Soul Plane
46. Howard the Duck
45. Blade Trinity
44. The Matrix Revolutions
43. Year One
42. Parting Shots
41. Van Helsing
40. Superman IV: The Quest for Peace
39. Dungeons and Dragons
38. Son of the Mask
37. Max Payne
36. Eragon
35. House of the Dead
34. I Know Who Killed Me
33. Ultraviolet
32. The Spirit
31. The Pink Panther 2
30. Scary Movie
29. Southland Tales
28. The Sweetest Thing
27. Street Fighter
26. Glitter
25. Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen
24. Speed 2
23. Freddy Got Fingered
22. Jaws: The Revenge
21. Alone in the Dark
20. Swept Away
19. Gigli
18. Dreamcatcher
17. White Chicks
16. Plan 9 From Outer Space
15. Catwoman
14. Disaster Movie
13. The Avengers
12. Norbit
11. Meet The Spartans
10. The Room
09. Highlander 2: The Quickening
08. The Happening
07. Sex Lives of The Potato Men
06. Heavan's Gate
05. Epic Movie
04. Raise The Titanic
03. The Love Guru
02. Battlefield Earth
01. Batman and Robin

Achievement Stats for January 2010

2010-02-02T12:09:00.003+01:00

Here are my achievement stats for January 2010.

Total Number of Achievement Games: 91 (86)

Total Number of Achievements: 3643 (3243)

Total Number of Achievement Points: 4808,76 (3768,83)

Average Points Per Achievement: 1,32 (1,16)

Achievement Games Owned: 69 (63)

Achievements Earned: 1747 (1480)

Achievement Points: 1784,35 (1287,28)

Average Points Per Achievement: 1,02 (0,87)

Complete list of new achievements earned:

(Jan 31) Champions Online: Vanquished Rakshasa, Raiders on the Storm, Ceiling Cat.
(Jan 31) Bob Came in Pieces: Chapter 8 - All Parts, Chapter 9 - All Parts, Chapter 10 - All Parts, Chapter 12 - All Parts, Chapter 13 - All Parts, The Rare Syndrome.
(Jan 30) Champions Online: Avalanche, Lemuria History: Rastrinfhar's Abyss, Vanquished Captain Claw , Swabbie, Bottom Feeder, Parole Officer.
(Jan 30) Bob Came in Pieces: Chapter 4 - All Parts, Chapter 5 - All Parts, Chapter 6 - All Parts, Chapter 7 - All Parts, Chapter 1 - Silver Time, Chapter 1 - Gold Time.
(Jan 30) Champions Online: Murky Waters, Jolt, Vanquished Roman Stepanov, Cherenkov's Radiation, Half Full, Bleak Minion Assault.
(Jan 29) Champions Online: Robots, Radiation, and Rampage, Crisis Beneath the Sea, Lemuria: Explorer, Fully Submersible, Murky Waters.
(Jan 29) Bob Came in Pieces: Chapter 10 - Rusty Cage, Chapter 11 - All Parts, Partpourri, Chapter 11 - Purple Rain, Chapter 12 - You Spin Me Round, Chapter 14 - Gold Time, Chapter 13 - Drop It Like It's Hot, Back To Work!, Chapter 14 - Silver Time.
(Jan 27) Champions Online: The Flame of Krim.
(Jan 27) Bob Came in Pieces: Chapter 7 - Push It!, Chapter 8 - Search and Destroy, Chapter 9 - Let Me Blow Your Mind.
(Jan 26) Bob Came in Pieces: Chapter 1 - We Didn't Start the Fire, Chapter 2 - Part Shaped Box, Chapter 3 - Build Me Up Buttercup, Chapter 3 - All Parts, Chapter 4 - Rocketman, Chapter 5 - Underground, Chapter 6 - Run to the Hills.
(Jan 26) Champions Online: Monster Island: Cartographer, Monster Island: Spawn Camper, Banzai Pipeline, Hole In The Wall, The Qularr De-Fleeted, Flyswatter, Grease Monkey, Bait & Switch.
(Jan 26) Champions Online: The Wild Life, Corporate Malfeasance, Baywatch, Stop and smell the..., Drill Bits, Head for the Hills.
(Jan 25) Left 4 Dead 2: GAS GUZZLER.
(Jan 25) Champions Online: Flame-kissed, Vanquished Hyrg Coruscator, The Unnatural Imbalance, The Wild Life.
(Jan 25) Champions Online: Banisher.
(Jan 22) Champions Online: Vanquished Escaped Qularr Swarmlord, Conviction, Novicius.
(Jan 21) Torchlight: Line of Kings, Trolling for Punishment.
(Jan 19) Torchlight: The Need for Greed, Bum Luck, Hardcore Hero, Deep Delver, True Delver.
(Jan 19) Champions Online: Necrullitic Research, Blazing, Ghost Hunter, Slightly Queasy, Vanquished Necrull, Vanquished Zarn, Monster Island History: Andrithal, Necrull Intentions, When a Curse is a Blessing, Steam Bath.
(Jan 18) Champions Online: Canada History: Lynx Fold, Canada History: Hoarfrost Hills, Historian: Canada.
(Jan 18) Champions Online: Communication Breakdown, A Taste for the Toxic, Home on the Range, Tower Assault, Tower Defense, Respect for the Dead, Canada History: Lynx Fold.
(Jan 18) Champions Online: BASE Jumper, Three Coins, Get to the Choppa, Adaware, Top of the World.
(Jan 17) Zuma's Revenge: Foie Gras.
(Jan 17) Left 4 Dead 2: SHOCK JOCK, THE REAL DEAL.
(Jan 17) Zero Gear: Gentleman's Wager, Frozen Finish, Comeback, All You Need is Love, Paratrooper.
(Jan 17) Zero Gear: Pacifist, Pirate Party, War Games, Termination, Easy Rider, Inspector Kemp, Gentleman's Wager, Frozen Finish, Comeback.
(Jan 16) Champions Online: Vanquished Nest Leader Tadataka, Vanquished Ripper, Hatchling Assault , Vanquished Dr. Dino Demogaard, Monster Island History: Echinocos Shores, I Am the Egg-Man, Monster Island History: Slither Beach, Egg-Static, The Cast Away, Worshipped, Islander, Vanquished Slug, Alternative Energies, Gekko, Nest of Serpents.
(Jan 15) Champions Online: Apocalypse Survivor, Surrounded By Evil, Be Prepared.
(Jan 15) Champions Online: Vanquished Tilingkoot, Vanquished Mind Slayer, The Demon of the Lost, Monster Island: Explorer, Apocalypse Survivor.
(Jan 15) Zero Gear: Overachiever, Screwed.
(Jan 15) Nation Red: Ladies First, Right-Hand Man.
(Jan 15) Champions Online: Blue Collar, Monster Island History: Argent Corporate Wildlife Preserve, Taking a Peak, Vanquished Steel Commando, Corporate Predators, Tall Tale, War of the 'Foots, Canada: Cartographer, Canada: Spawn Camper.
(Jan 14) Champions Online: Get to the Point, Blue Collar.
(Jan 14) Zero Gear: Triple Flip, Ultimate Indie Gamer, Nail Biter, Float Like a Butterfly, Draft Master, Climate Change, Deep 6, Rocket Sauce, Good Sport, K.O., Use the Force, Deep Space.
(Jan 14) Zero Gear: Sting Like a Bee, Flippin Awesome, Barrel Roll, BFF, Double Flip, PWNT.
(Jan 13) Champions Online: Beachcomber, A Tree Grows in Westside, Vanquished Giant Destroid, Destruction of Mass Production.
(Jan 13) Champions Online: Vanquished White Rhino, Manimal Victory, Master of Manimals, Vanquished Mega-Terak, Monster Island History: Wayfarer Coast, No Probes Allowed, Beachcomber.
(Jan 13) Torchlight: Hat Trick, Passing the Torch, Hardcore Champion, Questor, The Long Haul, Noble Lineage.
(Jan 13) Zuma's Revenge: Justified and Ancient, My Cup Runneth Over.
(Jan 13) Champions Online: Vanquished Neanderthal, Guest Star.
(Jan 13) Champions Online: Machine Revolution, Lemuria History: Undying Reef, Guppy, Riders in the Sky, Flak Attack, Vanquished Windfist, Desert Bounty Hunter, Vanquished Neanderthal.
(Jan 12) Zuma's Revenge: We've Got Clearance, Clarence.
(Jan 11) Zuma's Revenge: You Want Fries With That?.
(Jan 11) Champions Online: March of the Manimals.
(Jan 10) Champions Online: Jar Collector, Maggot.
(Jan 09) Left 4 Dead 2: HEARTWARMER.
(Jan 08) Champions Online: Vanquished Dr. Destroyer.
(Jan 08) Zuma's Revenge: I Will Survive, Iron Will.
(Jan 08) Torchlight: Pension Plan, Superstar, Universally Understood.
(Jan 08) Zombie Driver: Sunken Hope.
(Jan 08) Serious Sam HD: The First Encounter: Game Master, Co-op Hippy, Serious Co-op.
(Jan 07) Champions Online: Lifeguard, Little Nook, Desert History: Area 51, Historian: Desert, Desert History: Project Stein, Pit VIPER, Offensive Line, Citizen Grond, Unsafe, Jailbird, Made in China, Dragon's Roost.
(Jan 07) Champions Online: Island Hopping, Monster Island History: Wells' Pass, Lifeguard, Little Nook.
(Jan 06) Champions Online: Mad Bling, Manimal Resources, Accident Prone, Twisted, Vanquished Ultimate Mind, Teleios' Journals, Imitation of Life, Walk with the Manimals, Hot Stuff, Private Practice.
(Jan 06) Torchlight: Price of Loyalty, Sir Mixes-a-lot.
(Jan 06) Champions Online: Manimal Assault, Vanquished Hyena Swine, Manimal Crossing.
(Jan 05) Torchlight: Modpocalypse, Rich, Beast Slayer II, Beast Slayer III, Hardcore God, Swift Execution, Speed King, Enchantment Overload, Transmogrifier, Gambling Enthusiast, Gambling Addict, Gambling Fiend, Epic Strike, The Horse Whisperer.
(Jan 05) Galactic Bowling: Flawless Finish.
(Jan 05) Champions Online: Purifier, Searching In Shadows, Johnston's Private Reserve, Ghost Camp, Secure the Perimeter, The Beast Within.
(Jan 04) Foreign Legion: Buckets of Blood: War Hero, What a plot twist!.
(Jan 04) Galactic Bowling: Noob, Nemesis, Champion Among Friends, Partial Credit, 710.
(Jan 04) Champions Online: Canuck, Canada History: Burial Butte, Good for the Spirit, Vanquished Paul Johnston, Maple Leaf, Great Demon Assault.
(Jan 03) Zuma's Revenge: Multiplicity.
(Jan 03) Zuma's Revenge: Zhaka MuMu, Chains of Love.
(Jan 02) Galactic Bowling: The Chosen One, Ladies Man, Triple Sacked.

5th place

2010-01-19T03:48:00.006+01:00

Finally I made it to the 5th place on SteamStats after getting a few more achievements in Champions Online.

One of the main reasons for me being able to climb this high is due to the game Champions Online. As of writing, this game has 712 achievement, and just this one game can more or less get you in the Top10. Naturally, a lot of the other players in the top have played in game, so it's not just me getting free points.

The problem with Champions Online is that it is an MMO, and I don't like those kind of games for two main reasons:

You need to pay each month.
You need to rely a lot on others and be social in the game.

Since the game have so many achievements I did a bit of studying, and I noticed that Champions Online is an irregular MMO in regards to point 2. In fact, Champions Online advertise itself as a solo-MMO. So most of the game can be completed alone without ever talking to anyone in the game. There are a few missions labeled as "recommending a team of 5", but these are very few, and normally you can find a few people to do them with, and then split afterwards.

When the game came on sale on Steam at 50% I thought I would try it out, since you get the first 30 days for free. But I actually found the game quite fun and ended up playing for a few month more. Also, I managed to recrute a friend (Recoon) to play the game too and help with some of the harder missions. He too really likes the game.

We both managed to get our characters to level 40 and do most of the missions (well, one of the islands has been unplayable for a few weeks, so there's still a lot of missions for us there), so the only thing that's really left to do is grinding, grinding, and some more grinding. A lot of the achievements are "kill 500 of that", then "kill 1000 of it", and finally "kill 5000 more of it". And then there's the "kill it with fire" or some other thing, and "take 10,000,000 fire damage", and so on. Other than these there are a few PvP achievements, but my character is really not a PvP type, so I don't know if I'll create a new for this, or just ignore them.

Achievements Stats for 2009

2010-01-09T03:18:00.005+01:00

Here are my achievement stats for 2009. I will try to do these stats every month this year.

Total Number of Achievement Games: 86

Total Number of Achievements: 3243

Total Number of Achievement Points: 3768,83

Average Points Per Achievement: 1,16

Achievement Games Owned: 63

Achievements Earned: 1480

Achievement Points: 1287,28

Average Points Per Achievement: 0,87

100% on Big Brain Wolf

2009-12-27T01:47:00.003+01:00

Another game quickly completed. Didn't really find the game all that fun. It's a point and click adventure, but the surroundings doesn't react at the time you click - your charactor has to walk over to the spot first, and he walks really slowly. Also, I did find some of the puzzles too hard compared to what I expected. Actually, I had to google a few, and I still didn't understand a few of them. Naturally, it didn't help that the game ran really poorly on the old system I played it on, even though it's better than the requirements for the game.

Team Fortress 2 Update

2009-12-24T16:51:00.000+01:00

Yes, I know this comes a bit late, but I still want to do it!

One of the most anticipated updates to one of VALVe flagship Team Fortress 2 has finally been released.

It all started with a WAR on the 10th of December between the Blue Soldier and the Red Demoman. Through out a week these two fought for a special crafted weapon by killing the most of the other class. On December 17th the war was over. It was close, but the Soldier won a close fight 6,406,065 vs. 6,372,979.

The update natually comes with achievements for the two classes - 35 achievements per class.

100% on Zombie Bowl-O-Rame

2009-12-24T16:22:00.002+01:00

After buying this small and simple game yesterday for 0,99€ I already managed to get all the achievements. All of them were very simple except from the perfect 300 game one - that took some tries.

Steam Holiday Sale in on!

2009-12-24T02:34:00.083+01:00

The Steam Holiday Sale is now on. Last year's sale was very nice with everything in the store at at least 10% and some speciel games at 75% such as BioShock and Portal. This year seems to be even better with deals going all the way to 80% and a lot of games at 50+%.

To name some of the larger sales we have:

66% on all Atari games with such titles as The Witcher: Enhanced Edition Director's Cut, Ghostbusters: The Videogame, and Champions Onlines.
50% on all Ubisoft games with such titles as the not yet released James Cameron’s Avatar™: The Game, and the Prince of Persia games.
Up to 80% on Indie games. Great games such as Meridian4 Complete Pack (and 80% on all their games!), Braid, Defense Grid: The Awakening, World of Goo, Trine, Machinarium, Zeno Clash, Aquaria, and Altitude.
50% on Eidos Collectors Pack
50% on Telltale Everything Pack

It doesn't even stop there. Everyday will have a different sale. I will list all these below:

23.-24.

Mirror's Edge™ at 75% - $4.99 / £3.24 / 3,74€
S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Shadow of Chernobyl at 90% - $1.99 / £1.39 / 1,99€
Defense Grid: The Awakening at 75% - $2.49 / £1.74 / 2,24€
Grand Theft Auto IV at 75% - $7.49 / £4.99 / 7,49€
Operation Flashpoint: Dragon Rising at 50% - $19.99 / £14.99 / 24,49€

24.-25.

id Super Pack at 66% - $23.79 / £12.89 / 23,79€
Need for Speed: SHIFT at 25% - $37.49 / £22.49 / 37,49€
Football Manager 2010 at 25% - $29.99 / £22.49 / 37,49€
Serious Sam HD at 50% - $9.99 / £8.99 / 9,99€
Left 4 Dead 2 at 33% - $33.49 / £20.09 / 33,49€

25.-26.

King's Bounty: Armored Princess at 75% - $9.99 / £7.49 / 9,99€
Red Faction Guerrilla at 75% - $9.99 / £8.74 / 12,49€
Elf Bowling: Hawaiian Vacation at 90% - $1.00 / £1.00 / 1,00€
Battlefield 2: Complete Collection at 75% - $7.49 / £3.74 / 4,99€
Cogs at 80% - $1.99 / £1.39 / 1,79€
Resident Evil 5 at 50% - $24.99 / £14.99 / 18,99€

26.-27.

LUMINES™ Base+Advance Pack at 80% - $2.99 / £1.79 / 2,99€
Dragon Age: Origins at 25% - $37.49 / £22.49 / 37,49€
Dragon Age: Origins - Digital Deluxe at 25% - $48.74 / £29.99 / 41,24€
Universe at War: Earth Assault at 75% - $4.99 / £3.74 / 4,99€
Star Wars Premier Pack at 50% - $24.99 / £17.99 / 22,99€
Prototype at 50% - $19.99 / £12.49 / 24,99€
Torchlight at 75% - $4.99 / £3.74 / 3,99€

27.-28.

Zombie Driver at 75% - $2.49 / £1.74 / 2,24€
Day of Defeat: Source at 75% - $2.49 / £1.74 / 2,49€
Hearts of Iron III at 75% - $7.49 / £6.24 / 7,49€
Complete PopCap Collection at 50% - $49.99 / £26.49 / 49,99€
Dead Space at 66% - $10.19 / £5.09 / 6,79€

28.-29.

The Orange Box at 50% - $14.99 / £8.49 / 14,99€
Killing Floor at 75% - $4.99 / £3.74 / 4,49€
Space Siege at 75% - $4.99 / £3.74 / 4,99€
Burnout Paradise: The Ultimate Box at 75% - $7.49 / £4.99 / 7,49€
Prey at 85% - $2.25 / £1.35 / 2,25€ (Sold out after 4 hours!)
BioShock at 75% - $4.99 / £3.49 / 4,99€ (Replaced Prey!)

29.-30.

Stormrise at 75% - $7.49 / £3.74 / 4,99€
Jade Empire at 75% - $3.75 / £2.25 / 3,75€
King Arthur: The Role-playing Wargame at 50% - $19.99 / £17.49 / 19,99€
Company of Heroes: Tales of Valor at 75% - N/A / £2.49 / 8,74€
Silent Hill Homecomming at 75% - $9.99 / £7.50 / N/A
Mr. Robot at 80% - $1.99 / £1.19 / 1,99€

30.-31.

Max Payne Bundle at 75% - $3.74 / £1.49 / 3,74€
Sid Meier's Civilization IV: The Complete Edition at 66% - $9.11 / £2.95 / 9,11€
Call of Duty: World at War at 50% - $24.99 / £14.99 / 24,99€
Left 4 Dead at 75% - $7.49 / €6.24 / 7,49€
FIFA Manager 10 at 33% - $33.49 / £20.09 / 33,49€
Osmos at 80% - $1.99 / £1.39 / 1,79€

31.-01.

Medieval II: Total War at 75% - $4.99 / £2.49 / 2,49€
Crysis Complete Pack at 65% - $13.99 / ?? / 17,49€
Half-Life: Source at 75% - $2.49 / £1.49 / 2,49€
Street Fighter IV at 75% - $9.99 / £7.49 / 9,49€
Multiwinia + Darwinia at 80% - $2.99 / £0.89 / 2,99€
Shattered Horizon at 75% - $4.99 / £3.74 / 4,99€

01.-.02.

All things DOOM, Including the Complete Pack at 66% - $13.59 / £7.85 / 13,59€
Sam & Max Complete Seasons 1 & 2 at 75% - $14.99 / £8.25 / 14,99€
Mass Effect at 75% - $4.99 / £3.25 / 3,75€
Portal at 75% - $4.99 / £3.49 / 3,75€
RedLynx Trials 2: Second Edition at 75% - $2.49 / £1.49 / 2,49€
Devil May Cry 4 at 25% - $22.49 / £11.25 / 14,99€

02.-03.

Trine at 75% - $4.99 / £4.24 / 4,99€
Command & Conquer: Tiberium Wars at 66% - $10.19 / £5.09 / 6,79€
Command & Conquer: Kane's Wrath at 66% - $6.79 / £5.09 / 6,79€
Command & Conquer: Red Alert 3 at 66% - $10.19 / £6.79 / 8,49€
Command & Conquer: Red Alert 3 – Uprising at 66% - $6.79 / £5.09 / 6,79€
The Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind® Game of the Year Edition at 75% - $4.99 / £3.24 / 4,99€
Counter-Strike: Source at 75% - $4.99 / £3.49 / 4,99€
Painkiller: Collectors Pack at 75% - $8.74 / £6.24 / 8,74€

03.-04. (Encore)

BioShock at 75% - $4.99 / £3.49 / 4,99€
Defense Grid: The Awakening at 75% - $2.49 / £1.74 / 2,24€
S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Shadow of Chernobyl at 90% - $1.99 / £1.39 / 1,99€
Torchlight at 75% - $4.99 / £3.74 / 3,99€
Killing Floor at 75% - $4.99 / £3.74 / 4,49€
Left 4 Dead 2 at 33% - $33.49 / £20.09 / 33,49€
Grand Theft Auto IV at 75% - $7.49 / £4.99 / 7,49€

My purchase list was as follows:

14,99€ Serious Sam HD
00,99€ Zombie Bowl-O-Rama
07,49€ Grand Theft Auto IV
13,99€ Best of TiltedMill Collection
03,99€ Big Brain Wolf
09,99€ Galactic Bowling
23,79€ id Super Pack
02,24€ Zombie Driver
03,05€ Indigo Prophecy
10,19€ The Witcher: Enhanced Edition Director's Cut
02,24€ Lucasarts Adventure Bundle
02,49€ King's Quest Collection
02,49€ Space Quest Collection
02,25€ Prey
07,49€ Burnout Paradise: The Ultimate Box
01,99€ Harvest: Massive Encounter
03,74€ Max Payne Bundle
09,99€ Zuma's Revenge!
02,99€ Multiwinia + Darwinia
14,99€ Sam & Max Season One + Two Pack
06,79€ Command & Conquer 3: Tiberium Wars
06,79€ Command & Conquer 3: Kane's Wrath
04,49€ And Yet It Moves
09,99€ Aquaria
04,99€ S.T.A.L.K.E.R. Clear Sky
01,39€ Sniper Elite
04,74€ The Ankh Pack

With a total of 180,55€. At least I did save 350,18€ from the normal asking price, and I actually ended up spending less than what I expected. Think I'm ready for the new year now...

Even thought it's almost a month ago Steam had their Pre-Holiday Sale with five days of daily sales, I will lise these below:

Day 1:

Grid at 75% - $7.49 / £3.74 / 4,99€
Fallen Earth at 50% - $24.99 / £14.97 / 17,12€
Osmos at 80% - $2.00 / £2.00 / 2,00€
Champions Online at 50% - $19.99 / £12.49 / 19,99€
Batman: Arkham Asylum at 50% - $24.99 / £14.99 / 24,99€
Dragon Age at 25% - $37.49 / £22.49 / 37,49€
Far Cry 2: Fortune's Edition at 50% - $9.99 / £9.99 / 14,99€

Day 2:

Dead Space at 50% - $14.99 / £7.49 / 9,99€
Left 4 Dead 2 at 25% - $37.49 / £22.49 / 37,49€
Star Wars: Knights of the old Republic at 75% - $2.49 / £1.74 / 2,24€
Madballs in Babo: Invasion at 80% - $2.00 / £2.00 / 2,00€
Majesty 2 at 75% - $9.99 / £6.24 / 9,99€
Cities XL at 50% - $19.99 / £14.99 / 19,99€
Mini Ninjas at 50% - $14.99 / £14.99 / 19,99€

Day 3:

Left 4 Dead at 75% - $7.49 / £6.24 / 7,49€
Order of War at 75% - $9.99 / £7.49 / 9,49€
Spore at 50% - $19.99 / £14.99 / 19,99€
Resident Evil 5 at 50% - $24.99 / £14.99 / 18,99€
Borderlands at 33% - $33.49 / £20.09 / 33,49€
Trine at 50% - $9.99 / £8.49 / 9,99€
City of Heroes at 50% - $9.99 / £4.99 / 7,49€
Ghostbusters: The Videogame at 50% - $9.99 / £7.49 / 9,99€

Day 4:

Battlefield 2: Complete Collection at 50% - $14.99 / £7.49 / 9,99€
Guild Wars Trilogy at 50% - $24.99 / £14.99 / 17,49€
Trackmania United Forever at 50% - $19.99 / £9.99 / 14,99€
Lucidity at 75% - $2.49 / £1.74 / 2,24€
World of Goo at 75% - $4.99 / £4.24 / 4,99€
Eve Online: Apocrypha at 75% - $4.99 / £3.74 / 4,99€
Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time at 50% - $4.99 / £4.49 / 4,99€
Prince of Persia: Warrior Within at 50% - $4.99 / £4.49 / 4,99€
Prince of Persia: The Two Thrones at 50% - $4.99 / £4.49 / 4,99€
Prince of Persia at 50% - $14.99 / £9.99 / 9,99€

Day 5:

QuantZ at 80% - $2.00 / £2.00 / 2,00€
Call of Juarez: Bound of Blood at 30% - $20.99 / £24.49 / 34,99€
Section 8 at 50% - $24.99 / £14.99 / 19,99€
The Chronicles of Riddick: Assault on Dark Athena at 50% - $9.99 / £7.99 / 9,99€
Mirror's Edge at 75% - $5.00 / £3.24 / 3,74€
Evil Genius at 75% - $2.49 / £1.74 / 2,49€
The Secret of Monkey Island Speciel Edition at 75% - $2.49 / £1.74 / 2,24€

My purchase list was as follows:

02,00€ Osmos
24,99€ Batman: Arkham Asylum
19,99€ Champions Online
49,99€ THQ Complete Pack
02,24€ Star Wars: KOTOR
09,99€ Ghostbusters: The Videogame
04,99€ Prince of Persia: Warrior Within
04,99€ Prince of Persia: The Two Thrones
04,99€ Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time
03,74€ Mirror's Edge
02,49€ Evil Genius

With a total of 130,40€. At least I did save 152,49€ from the normal asking price.

Tales of Monkey Island - Rise of the Pirate God

2009-12-17T02:21:00.005+01:00

The season finally was released December 9th a few weeks later than promised, since the original release date was somewhere in November. Never the less, I would rather have a polished, delayed game than an unpolished, at the time game.

In this last episode we start out trapped, but not in a normal sence...

That's right. Our beloved hero Guybrush Threepwood, Mighty Pirate™ is dead, killed by the evil pirate LeChuck. After you rise to the occasion (Get it? He's dead, and rises from his grave...) and become Guybrush Threepwood, Mighty Ghost Pirate™. Your goal in this last chapter is to find your way in the Crossroads and rise from the dead to defeat LeChuck who is holding your beloved Elaine. Luckily the deceased, but still lovely, Morgan is there to help. Also, a four-legged companion will help you on your way back to the living.

I'm not going to spoil too much of the story, but I will say that this episode closses the season in a beautiful way. Many didn't like the Tales of Monkey Island, but I really did enjoy myself playing through all the episodes.

Through out this last episode (and also episode 4) I took screenshots to put up on my Gaming Screenshots page (Note: If you haven't played the game, and plan on it, don't watch the screenshots.).

Tales of Monkey Island: Chapter 4 - The Trial and Execution of Guybrush Threepwood

Tales of Monkey Island: Chapter 5 - Rise of the Pirate God

First snow of the season

2009-12-17T01:52:00.002+01:00

Just a few pictures taken from my flat of the first snow of the season. Hopefully, it will still be there by Christmas.

New Steam Community Feature (Total Playtime)

2009-11-20T15:30:00.002+01:00

Valve has just today added a new feature to the Steam community profile page, namely total playtime. This addition has been awaited, since a Valve employee mentioned it long ago (HERE), and, finally, it's here.

Normally, you only have the option to view playtime for the past two weeks, but since March this year Valve has been recording gameplay hours of your games through Steam. Now, when you look at someone's profile under gameplay stats, you'll see e.g. "9.7 hrs / 157.7 hrs" where the first number is from the past two weeks, and the latter is total playtime since March. You can also look at people's gamelists and see how much they've played their games.

Here I should note that total playtime also includes idle time.

Google, I praise thee...

2009-11-11T18:12:00.000+01:00

For a long time Google has offered 1GB of storage for their Picasa service. 1GB is not very much (only around 300 full resolution pictures taken with a six megapixel camera), so users who wish to backup all their photos have to purchase extra storage (which also can be used on Gmail if 7+GB isn't enought). The prices upto now were 10GB for $20, 50GB for $75, and so on. So far I've used 7.18GB out of my 10GB plan, and already been annoyed by the fact that there were nothing between 10GB and 40GB...

Today this changed! Not only have they lowered the prices, but at the same time they've added more storage. So now the prices are 20GB for $5, 80GB for 20$, and so on upto 16TB (whoever needs that much?). With 80GB (70GB more than before!) I can easily backup all my parents photos too without risking anything (80GB is almost a quarter million high res photos!). I wonder what else I can backup...

Some links from Google:

Twice the storage for a quarter of the price (Official Google Blog)

More extra storage for less (Official Gmail Blog)

Purchase extra storage

Happy 20th Anniversary to Wallace and Gromit

2009-11-05T03:00:00.000+01:00

Title says it all. Wallace & Gromit have existed in 20 years. Man, I remember seeing their shows when I was younger. Not long ago I saw TellTaleGames had made an episodic game with the two loveable characters, namely, Wallace & Gromit's Grand Adventures. I got the first episode for free when I bought the Tales of Monkey Island and I enjoyed it much seeing it kept the style from the old shows.
To celebrate the anniversary TellTale put the adventures on sale for only 15€, 34.99€ being the normal asking price.

100% on Left 4 Dead (again)

2009-10-28T14:33:00.001+01:00

The Crash Course DLC added 10 new achievements for the two map long campaign. All of them were pretty simpel, some of them just required some luck. A few of them are also well overdue, like the 25 hunter jump, and the hit people with cars achievements. There are just a few problems with these two achievements.
1. The Crash Course campaign is not very hunter friendly - seriously, why did they lock the roofs?
2. I have yet to see a tank before the final. Luckely they did add a car and a container (which also counts) in the final.

The only achievement I had a problem with was the Smash Hit (Win a Versus campaign of Crash Course). That doesn't make much sense, right? No matter how many times I won that campaign I couldn't unlock it. In the end, while I was doing a few of the achievements with a friend (Bart Simpson), it popped up after I got all the others. He got his after I won over him (try to make sense of that).

Why you hate the Internet

2009-10-24T13:30:00.000+02:00

50 most annoying things about the internet
This is just a funny article telling you what you hate about the Internet. To name some:

1) Godwin's Law: As a [online] discussion grows longer, the probability of a comparison involving Nazis or Hitler approaches 1.
4) CAPTCHAs
6) The next big thing(s)
7) Blogs =)
8) Pop-up adverts
11) YouTube speech bubbles
12) Rickrolling (I blame you, YouTube!)
14) Comment pedantry (Shut up already!)
22) Viruses, scams and spam
27) WrItInG In A MiXtUrE Of UpPEr CaSe AnD LoWeR CaSe (Or just spamming 1337 sp34k!)
28) Patently absurd abbreviations (OMFGWTFBBQ!!1)
30) Filth, everywhere (I don't know about this one; the more filth there is, the less filthy the filth becomes...)
31) Websites that don't support a browser's back and forward features
34) Compulsory fields on forms (I don't want to fill out all those damn forms!)
35) National restrictions (Yeah, what's that about? Also, release things at the same time!)
42) The gradual erosion of your moral boundaries (That's what I said in #30)
43) Buffering (Fix mah Internet already!)
45) Hostility to 'newbies' (Yes, you! Mr. Anonymous.)

Big games with achievements

2009-10-24T03:19:00.001+02:00

More and more games with achievements get released. Most of these are various indie games, but it looks like that is changing. First of all, the publisher MumboJumbo has started putting in achievements (Zombie Bowl-o-Rama and Everyday Genius: SquareLogic). Then we have SEGA's Football Manager 2010, Konami's SAW, and one of the most expected games this year, Activision's Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2.

Game #200 on Steam

2009-10-24T03:01:00.000+02:00

I can't believe it's only three month since I bought my game number 150 on Steam (as I blogged HERE), but here we are. I wanted it to be something special so I could blog about it, but I couldn't really decide. At the time I reached #198 I knew what I wanted my #200 to be. I decided it would be Nation Red (for 8,99€) for a few reasons

It was announced that the game would get achievements (22 be be precise).
The support for this game is awesome, just look at the forums - they listen to every idea, and implement what people want (achievements, leaderboard, new playmodes, coop, etc).

I haven't really had time to play it yet, so I can't say much about it yet. Also, I will probably wait until the achievements are in place.
As I said, I decided when I were at #198. That meant I actually had to buy some other game first. After looking through the list of achievement games I decided on Spectraball, because I already had been looking at that game (it has achievements too!), and I just noticed that the game had been lowered to only 4,49€.

And the price for the game with the most stupid achievements go to...

2009-09-25T15:06:00.000+02:00

Let's first look at the nominated games:

Team Fortress 2:
For having a lot of achievements, where many are just farming, and keep adding new. Because of all these achievements there exists a lot of achievement servers.

Day of Defeat: Source:
Almost all the achievements for this game require you to kill a specific amount of enemies using a specific weapon. In this multiplayer game you can get all the achievement without ever playing against others.

Garry's Mod:
A lot of the achievements require you to spawn a lot of objects and then destroy them. There's also achievements for just being active for a very long time.

Unreal Tournament 3 Black:
Many of the achievements is about winning a certain playing style a lot of times. Basicly, you have to play hundreds of battles to get the achievements in this game.

Defense Grid: The Awakening:
This game more or less throws achievements in your face. For a long time this game had some of the easiest achievements out there.

Champions Online:
Basicly for being an MMO that forces you to pay for the game each month. The game has 640 achievements, so you get achievements for almost everything.

D.I.P.R.I.P. Warm Up:
All the achievements in this game you get for killing a specific number of enemies with a specific weapon.

And now to reveal the winner.
...
Let me just open this envelope...
...
...and the winner is

Wtf is wrong with Garry? Sure there's a lot of grinding and farming in the other games, but this takes it to the extreme. There's a lot of those "kill 1000 something", but you can only spawn like 10 at the time if you don't wish to crash the game. And "open the spawnmenu 100,000 times" - that's a lot of button pressing. "Play with 10 friends" - what casual player can find 10 players at the same time? "Say the secret phrase" - find a word on the internet and type it. "Experience 500 Lua programming errors" - find some addon that half-brakes the game. Play the game for a day/week/month/year - wtf? Who plays a game for a year... and I feel sorry for the people that already did this. Start the game 1000 times - what a silly amout of times, and on top of that, it's broken!
And the most stupid achievement is... "Yes, I am the real garry!" (Play on the same server as garry) - and Garry doesn't even play his own game. In the last two weeks he played 0.3 hours, and that was probably for bugfixes.

All that said, I managed to get most of the achievements - the rest will take about 11 month and a bugfix.

100% on Droplitz

2009-09-19T23:15:00.000+02:00

Immerse yourself in this addictive puzzler that's all about strategically twisting and connecting mismatched dials to save precious droplitz. Just making a single junction is child's play; can you master the art of the combo or will you let your pipes runneth over? Be warned: losing too many droplitz can be hazardous to your ability to win. With four unique play modes, a variety of board sizes, and infinite replayability, Droplitz promises to drain all your time away.

I got this game for only a few bucks, 80% off, on a very decent sale. The game includes 12 achievements, but over half of these were bugged at release. A patch to fix these were released a couple of weeks later, and after playing some more hours I got all of them (again!). Let me give a few hints:

Adventurer (Survive for 2 hours): This one is pretty easy. Just play Zen mode for more than 2 hours. I played for four hours withour problems before I got too bored and ended the game. While doing this one you'll probably get most of the others.

Zen Master 50 (Create a multiplier of 50 or more): This was the only one I was missing after my four hours of Zen. I found that it was pretty easy to get it in level 1-3. The level is big, and the droplitz move slow. Just work on the side at the time. Make a patch on one side, and start to create one on the other (without closing it!). When the large droplitz(s) has passed throught the path, and the path disappears, quickly close the patch you created on the other side. Keep going like this until you reach your goal.

96% on Ninja Reflex: Steamworks Edition

2009-08-30T03:28:00.000+02:00

You might wonder why I made this post when I'm not at 96%.achievements. Let me tell you. When this game came out you could get negative reaction times in Katana, but that got fixed before I got the game. In fact, it got fixed so well that now you can't even get under 30ms, which you need to do to get the "Strike Down Your Demons" achievement...

I used a decent amount of time to get the "Reflex Nirvana" (60 of 60 Gems Earned.) achievement, and while getting this I was making sure to get a minimum of A in all belt test (and I know I did that!). So when the game was over and I waited for the achievement popup for "Ultimate Ninja" (Get straight As on ALL of the 10 Belt Tests! The Ultimate Test for the ULTIMATE NINJA!), but no! No popups, no nothing! Reading through the forums I notice others with problems too... I will probably try to get it again later on. This time I don't need to get all the gems at least, so hopefully it won't take that long.

I will add more here later, basicly because this is a good and fun game where you can train your reflexes. I will try to add a few pictures and vidoes!

100% on The Wonderful End of the World

2009-08-28T23:02:00.000+02:00

I bought the game AaaaaAAaaaAAAaaAAAAaAAAAA!!! - A Reckless Disregard for Gravity, and yes, that is a lot of As, but what would you say after you jumped out from a tall building? The game is an indie base jumping game where you get points by staying close to buildings while you fall. But this post is not really about this game. I prepurchased it because it was made by the same people that created The Wonderful End of the World, which you got for free when you prepurchased the Aaaaas (it was actually cheaper than just buying The Wonderful End of the World). Also, I'm hoping AaaaaAAaaa... will get achievements.

The Wonderful End of the World is a... well, weird game. You are some strange creature that consumes all objects smaller than yourself, and by doing this you grow so you can consume even larger things. It might sound stupid, but it's actually quite fun (also quite laggy from time to time). Too bad the game is really short. It has 15 levels. Your goal is now to consume enought stuff to get a good rating (you get an achievement by getting A+ in all of them). In the first playthrought of the levels I got a A+ on eight of them, A in five of them, and in the last two I had some problems getting more than B+ to begin with. That is, those two levels took a few more tries.

To sum it up, after 2.5 hours I had all the achievements for this game (very easy to get!), and therefore I welcome myself to the 100% club.

100% on Day of Defeat: Source

2009-08-28T01:24:00.000+02:00

Another game to get 100% on. This time it was Day of Defeat: Source. Almost all of the achievements in this game is grinding kills; get 1000 kills with this weapon, get another 1000 with this, and so on. I managed to get all the achievements for this game without really playing it how you're supposed to; that is, I only joined other servers than my own for one achievement, namely AWOL (Play on 5 non-official Day of Defeat Source maps).

Most achievements in this game is done very easily by using the following method:

Get this map (which is called dod_orange_fight_arena):
http://www.2shared.com/file/6680394/7af863c8/dod_orange_fight_arena.html .
Create a server just for you.
Type the following commands in the console:
sv_cheats 1
mp_limitteams 20
mp_teams_unbalance_limit 30
bot_zombie 1
bot -team ger
sv_cheats 0
retry
Choose the team and weapon you wish to grind.
Grind.

You can also use "bot_mimic 1" to get all the bots to do the same movements as you (e.g. you can group them together for easy kills). Check out this YouTube for a video of it (I didn't make it!) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q7_8hPl4-FU .

Also, for the achievements where you need to be more than one person I used my guest pass for another account I made. I installed the game on my laptop beside my stationary. This method gave me "Jack of All Trades" (In a single life, get a kill with an MG, Sniper Rifle, Rifle, SubMG and a Grenade), "Putsch" (Kill a machinegunner who has killed 8 or more players from a single deployed position), "Double Cross" (Kill an enemy by throwing back one of their team's grenades or riflegrenades), "Eviction Notice" (Kill a deployed sniper or machinegunner from a distance greater than 100 feet with a rocket), "Don't Bring a Gun" (Win a knife fight), and "Combat Engineer" (Defuse 100 enemy bombs).
For "Combat Engineer" and a few others I played a map called achievement0001.bsp (google it!). I would also expect this map to be pretty good at just grinding kills, but especially the bomb achievements is really easy to get here, because it more or less only consists of 8 bomb positions and two flags.

100% on Trine

2009-08-21T16:56:00.000+02:00

I bought this game on 25% discount last week, and after 20 hours of playing I managed to get the last achievements. Or actually, according to my Steam profile page I'm missing one, namely "Way Out Of The Trine" (Earn all Achievements in Trine)... seriously, wtf?

Edit: Actually, I just started the game again and I got the achievement popup =)
Perhaps it's related to the fact I got my second last achievement "Survivalist" (Survive a level other than Astral Academy without any damage) after closing the game - that is, the popup came about 1 min after shutting down Trine.

Let me go through a couple of the achievements:

Master Collector (Collect all experience in the game): This was naturally the achievement that took the highest amount of time, but you'll get 15 other achievements while doing this - one for each level. Most of the experience is pretty easy to find - after my Very Hard playthrough I was only missing 0-5 on each level (and I wasn't really searching for them). I had some problems finding two in Heartland Mines, but apparently I wasn't the only one. I also had big problems in a couple of the other levels (sry, I can't remember their names) until I accidentily dropped a box in the sand and heard the sound of a few bottles. It's hard to see in this screenshot, but I had to sucide down in the sand to get two bottles in there. The last one is in Iron Forge (I think) and was well hidden in the lava (yes, that's right, in the damn lava!). After the sand accident I started moving boxes (that didn't burn up in the lava!) back and forth listening for the sound of a bottle, and finally I found it HERE where I'm pointing. A lot of the time I died before I could get deep enough in the lava to collect it...

What's Next? (Complete the entire game on Very Hard difficulty): This actually isn't that hard. You will only have a problem if your storm throught the level and all of a sudden gets cought between lots of skeletons.

Treasure Hunter (Find all secret items in every level): When you are playing through the game you really should be looking for as many secrets as you can. A lot of the things you find is very useful. If there's a few you can't find there's a good guide on YouTube - Part 1 :: Part 2.

What A View! (Build a tower with at least 12 Wizard-created objects and stand on top of the tower without collapsing it): As you upgrade your wizard you'll be able to create more planks and boxes. When you're fully upgraded you can create four of each. After you've found the right secrets you'll be able to create three more of each, giving you a total of 14 objects. You can built the tower in a lot of different ways, and when I did it I was actually just looking for some XP in a high place. I noticed my construction was quite stable so I added three more boxes (I had to create a tower with all 14 objects for some reason) and got it. Screenshot 1 :: Screenshot 2.

Whoops! (Kill 5 monsters with a single physical object drop or throw): Not really that hard. Group a bunch of skeletons and create a plank above them.

Better Than Developers! (Complete Tower of Sarek without any deaths on Very Hard difficulty): This wasn't really that hard, and I almost got it on my playthought on Very Hard. The knight is useless on this level. Use the wizard for creating a few planks and remove objects with spikes (what the hell are these called?), else, just use the thief with fire arrow to destroy the objects the boss creates.

Survivalist (Survive a level other than Astral Academy without any damage): I got this in Academy Hallways. Just use the thief's arrows (all the skeletons are without armour and very easy).

Still No Fireball (Conjure 500 objects in a single level): This is basicly you just standing by a save orb (or whatever they're called) and moving the mouse back and forth for ten minutes creating planks.

Undead Have Rights, Too! (Complete a level other than Astral Academy without any monster getting killed): Last level, the Tower of Sarek, is pretty easy. The only enemies are the few ones on the top. Just ignore them and use the wizard for what he's supposed to do. You can jump on them without hurting them.

Spring Master (Complete at least 5 jumps in a row on different skeletons without touching the ground): Once again, group together a bunch of skeletons and just jump on them till you get it.

Top Players

2009-08-21T01:41:00.000+02:00

A few days ago I finally managed to get myself into Top30 and thereby also the Top Players club. As of now I'm placed as number 23. In a few days I will probably be placed #21, and perhaps if I'm a bit lucky with getting some achievements, the Top20.

A lot of my recent points have come from Trine, but more about this later (that is, after completing the last two achievements, which will, hopefully, be tomorrow).

100% on Texas Cheat 'Em

2009-08-13T19:11:00.000+02:00

This game was quickly completed. The only achievement I had a problem with was "Something's Fishy Here..." (Win a hand with 5 of a Kind). I kept fucking it up. The easy way of doing it is probably playing against someone online and agreeing to coop to get it.

100% on Penguins Arena: Sedna's World

2009-08-05T17:40:00.000+02:00

After some repeative work I've managed to grab the last few achievements for this games. The achievements, and the game itself, are quite easy and straight forward. All you have to do more or less is play 150 fights (there is a achievement for taking part in 150 fights). If you're not a complete idiot you'll get all the achievements while doing that.

New achievement game (Foreign Legion: Buckets of Blood)

2009-08-05T03:37:00.000+02:00

A new game with achievements just popped up on Steam. Great, you think. Only 6.99€, and with the current discount it's only 5.24€, you say. Well, no! This game is nowhere worth that amount of money. All you get in one level (yes, one!) with a time limit of 10 min., five weapons, and four difficulities. The couple of times I played through the level it only took abount 7 min. (actually, you'll get an achievement for doing that). So what you get is 7 min. of decent playtime. After that it just gets repetitive and boring. That's a 1€=1min. of decent play.

I would not rate this game higher than 2/10 or 2.5/10.

It took me 0.9 hours to get all the achievements, and I was slow (failing at the veteran difficulty a few times). The first person to get them all got them just 45 min. after release...

At least the 3.57 point in game is worth at the moment on SteamStats got me in the Top30 - I'm now number 29.

100% on Left 4 Dead

2009-08-03T01:29:00.000+02:00

Finally! After a lot of work - and a lot of hours - I've finally gotten the last few achievements in Left 4 Dead. In this post I'll go through some of the achievements and tell you how I got them.

Cr0wnd (Kill a Witch with a single headshot): This is quite simpel if there's no SI around. Walk up to her, wait for her to get a bit angry and look at you. Then shoot her in the head with the shotgun (auto is your best bet).

Untouchables (No Survivors take damage after contacting the rescue vehicle): Can't really tell you how I got it, but I've seen a lot of people just getting by joining the server at the very ending of the finale. The easiest way is probably on easy with a few friends (kill the bots if you're not four).

Do Not Disturb (Sneak past all Witches in a campaign without disturbing one): This requires some luck - that is, sometimes the witch is placed in such a way you can't sneak past her. Also, don't use bots for this one.

Man Vs Tank (Single-handedly kill a Tank): Just play with some friends on easy that you can tell not to shoot at the tank.

Safety First (Play an entire campaign with no Survivors taking friendly fire damage): Play a easy campaign with bots where you only use mele. The bots can easily handle the infected.

Nothing Special (Survive a campaign with no Survivors taking damage from Special Infected): This one can be really tricky. You can do it alone with three bots by going fast throught the levels, but stop up and stay close to them when you hear a SI. Blood Harvest is a good map because it has big open areas. I tried this two times, and both times Louis was hit by a rock by the last tank in the finale. I ended up doing it with a few mates killing the remaining bot. Just move fast and stay close to each other when a SI is around. Actually, I found the hunter to be the worst. On our first try a hunter landed in front of a mate in the finale and hit him.

Stomach Upset (All Survivors complete a campaign without being vomited on): This can easily be done with the Nothing Special achievement.

Game #150 on Steam

2009-07-27T21:20:00.000+02:00

I just bought my 150th game on Steam some days ago. It ended up being the first person shooter game TimeShift for 14,99€ (25% off).

Not really a bad game, but a bit too linear for my taste. The game would actually not be very good (keeping in mind it's from late 2007) if it wasn't for you special ability - you can alter time to your likings. You can slow down and stop time. You can even rewind the time for a short while. This puts the game in another lighting - with this ability the game isn't just a standard FPS, because throught out the game you'll have to use you time changing abilities to solve a few puzzles. Also, it's always funny to stop time, charge in, shoot a few people in the head, start time again and see them thrown back. You can also steal their weapons when the time is stopped, which can be fun, but you drop the weapon you are holding doing so, and their weapons is often worse than yours.

The plot in the game is quite hard to follow from time to time, and from a quick Google search I could see I'm not the only one with this problem. This is really a shame, because, imo, the plot in a game is the most important thing. They could have spent a little more time making the plot more obvious.

All bad things aside, I had a fun time playing through the game, which took me about 6-7 hours. If I should grade I would give it a 7/10 (I would give it a 6 had I payed full prize).

100% on Tank Universal

2009-07-27T20:03:00.000+02:00

I just managed to get all the achievements for this wondering Tron-like game, and thereby joining yet another 100% club. Most of the achievements weren't really that hard; the only one I had problems with was "All Transports Away!". I had to replay that level 6-7 times before not missing any of the transports.

A lot of people have had problems with "256 Bit Supreme", which I don't understand. I actually managed to get two ranks above that rank (which just gives you an empty rank while counting your score, and then ends up as 256 Bit Supreme again).

The hardest achievement should be "Glyph Freak Deluxe", and I almost thought that I wouldn't get this basicly because there was no way to tell how many glyphs you've gotten out of the 128 you should get. I was quite pleased with it popup up at the same time as "A Full Rack" which wasn't that difficult either.

100% on Larva Mortus

2009-07-15T17:40:00.000+02:00

Finally I managed to find all the items in this game and thereby joining the 100% club. I managed to do it in 13.5 hours which is better (luckier) than a lot of others. The achievements for this game you get by this running around hoping to find the item, and, natually, you will eventually get them all if you play long enough.

Don't get me wrong, I did like the game, but while you level your character up the levels get bigger and bigger, and it will take a lot more time to search each room. Also, after actually finishing the story I was still missing like 5 items. I ended up creating three accounts before I found the last item I needed.

100% on Obulis

2009-07-12T16:37:00.001+02:00

I just finished this game and thereby joining the 100% club. Fun small puzzle game that I will probably replay at some time with my girlfriend.

Top50

2009-07-10T18:53:00.000+02:00

Last night I finally managed to squeeze in between the 50 players with the most achievements.

The achievement that got me in Top50 was the Trials 2 achievements Speed of Jorma (Beat Jorma Highway in under 18 seconds. Do you even know where the brake is?).

Lucas Arts will bring back the good old times

2009-07-07T03:04:00.000+02:00

Lucas Arts has just announced that they are updating a lot of their old games so they'll be able to run on modern computers. Already on the 8th of July they'll be releasing 10 games on Steam:

The complete list of games to be released on July 8 via Steam includes:
Armed and Dangerous™
Indiana Jones® and the Fate of Atlantis
Indiana Jones® and the Last Crusade: The Graphic Adventure
LEGO® Indiana Jones: The Original Adventure
LOOM™
Star Wars Battlefront® II
Star Wars Republic Commando®
Star Wars Starfighter™
The Dig®
Thrillville®: Off the Rails™

We'll also be able to visit Monkey Island again.

The full press release can be read HERE.

Happy B-day to me

2009-07-05T00:07:00.000+02:00

Born the 4th of July, that's me. So I'll congratulate me on my 25th B-day =)

Achievement games on sale

2009-07-01T22:26:00.000+02:00

The publisher Meridian4 has put all their games on a 50% sale to celebrate their 5 year aniversary (congrats on that). Well, this publicher has five games that have achievements (Larva Mortus, Obulis, Penguins Arena: Sedna's World, Space Trader: Merchant Marine, and Tank Universal). I decided to spent the 21.49€ for the Complete Pack because it was both cheaper this way, and I got 11 more games this way. So far I've played three games:

An old-style action game where you see the player from above. After playing for a couple of hours I've already earned 9 achievements out of 25 possible. It seems like you just have to play the game normally go get all of the achievements for this game.

A physics puzzle game where you have to get colour specific balls in a container with a same colour. So far I've managed to get three achievements out of 17 possible.

Well, you are a penguin, and you through snow balls after the other penguins to knock them out of the level. So far I've gotten three out of ten achievements.

These achievements managed to get me from a position around 140 to 99 on SteamStats =)

Game number 100

2009-06-30T18:13:00.000+02:00

On June 26th I bought my 100th game on Steam. I can't preciely say which it was because I bought the Heroes of Might and Magic V pack on sale for 12.99€ which contains three games and an editor for each.

On June 20th I bought Empire: Total War on a Weekend Deal for 24.99€. Hopefully I will be able to get some achievements in it - there is 30 to fight for.

Girlfriend became Cand.Scient and sister a HF student

2009-06-30T16:42:00.001+02:00

June 23th my girlfriend finished her studies at Aalborg University (AAU) and thereby became a Cand.Scient in Math and Physics. She finished with a 12 in her final thesis named "Analytisk perturbationsteori for lineære operatorer" ("Analytic pertubation theory for lineare operators").

Mette getting her grade from teacher and examiner.

Mette after the examination.

Pictures from after Mette examination

Pictures from the dimission

The same day my little sister finished HF (Higher Preparatory Examination Course), and she did so way better than expencted. Sadly she finished with a 4, but she did manage to pull out a 12 in Danish. Natually I couldn't be two places at once so I didn't see she get her student's cap. That is also the reason why I haven't got any photos of her.

So, congratulations to both =)

Firefox Tip: Don't highlight space after word

2009-06-19T22:50:00.001+02:00

You know when you double click a word this word will get highlighted, but also the space after this word. If you like me find this annoying, this is how you fix it:

1. Type about:config in your address bar
2. Look up layout.word_select.eat_space_to_next_word
3. Double click it to change the value to false
4. Profit

Now you can also highlight two words at once simply by double clicking the space between them (or right after the first word).

5 years on Steam (small CS:S history)

2009-06-17T17:37:00.000+02:00

I just noticed that I've been using Steam for a little over 5 years (joined June 8, 2004), so I'll try to take a short look back at my Counter Strike history (even though my memory is really bad).

Back in 2003 I wasn't really into multiplayer games, but very much into FPS (like Half-Life). My friend Recoon (joined October 30, 2003) kept bugging me about trying out Counter Strike, but I kept saying that it wasn't my type of game. I can't even remember how he got me to try it out, put apparently he did so June 8, 2004. Since then we both played a lot of CS, and after the release of Counter Strike: Source back in late 2004 (can't remeber if we got it at release) a lot of CS:S - CS:S has really cost a lot of hours.

Back in the days (2005) Recoon and I had a small clan (consisting of two members!) called the Westzidaz. The reason for the clan was more or less to make fun other clans' stupid names with stupid chars. We actually used the Westzidaz nick for a couple of years, and over those years we ran into a lot of people who wanted to join, which we also found quite funny. Also, we've been called cheaters so many times it's ridiculous.

In 2007 we were offered to play in a clan called TheHolyClan (THC) run by Mp69 and jESUS who was seeking some decent members. After some thinking we said yes. At times the clanned worked very well, and we had like 15+ members. Also, we did ok in some ladders.
Then came the dark times... we "hired" a trainer named Iver who more less did nothing but play CS:S or watch CS:S. We were forced to put in a lot of hours (more than some of us were willing to put in), and then all of a sudden he got another offer and left. Everyone was quite mad because he had split the clan by forcing too much seriousness into the game. More of the members didn't really feel like playing CS:S anymore, and it ended up with the clan leaders shutting down the clan and stealing all the money we all had paid (which was around 1000-3000 kr. - 150-400€). This was late 2008.

Shortly after Recoon joined another clan (together with another friend from THC) he had been playing a lot with called Team b0s. I didn't feel like joining to begin with because I had some exams at the moment and I really didn't feel like playing CS:S. After a while I started playing various games with members from Team b0s, like Left4Dead and a little CS:S. Team b0s isn't really just a CS:S clan, but more of a small gaming community, which I was happy to realize.
After some time more of the members actually thought I already was a members, but actually I was waiting for an invitation because I didn't feel like asking myself. Well, I got the invitation a few month back, and I'm proud to say that I'm a b0s!

1600 on IMDb

2009-06-01T02:56:00.000+02:00

I rate movies and series on IMDb, and I've just rated my movie/serie number 1600, which was Pretty Woman. It is not the first time I've seen the movie, naturally, but it's the first time after I started rating stuff. I decided to give it a 6/10.

You can check out all of my ratings HERE. Also, I added the link on the right side.

Weekend deals

2009-06-01T02:02:00.000+02:00

Each weekend Steam has one or a few discounts. Last week it was Team Fortress 2 due to the update, which made people rage because it was included in the Orange Box, which was the weekend deal not long ago.
This week was somewhat better, even though not all are merely weekend deals, but also other types of discounts. I ended up buying the Unreal Deal for 19.99€ even though I only really needed Unreal Tournament 3 Black. More of this game later. I also bought Splinter Cell for 2.99€, Splinter Cell Double Agent for 4.99€, the Bone-Breaking Racing Package for 4.20€, which include Trials 2 Second Edition and Monster Trucks Nitro. Last game I bought was Flock! for 7.49€. So a total of 39.66€ this weekend.

I already played Unreal Tournament 3 for some time. This game has 57 achievements out of which I've already gotten 10, two of which I'm particular proud: Open War (Complete Chapter 4 in Insane) and Untouchable (Reach 20 kills against a god-like bot in instant action without dying). This game gives good point on SteamStats so I will be farming this for a while.

Trials 2 Second Edition is a motorcycle game that is really really hard. I've gotten one achivements out of 25, but I will probably not get more than one more. Did I tell you this game is really hard?

Flock! is a small casual puzzle game where you with your UFO try to steer a herd of farm animals to your Motherflocker. I can't say much about this game yet - seems cute, but I don't know how much time I will be using on it. The game has just gotten 13 achievements out of which I've gotten three so far.

In the past few days I've also been farming Team Fortress 2 for 48 new achievements. I hope I can get a friend to help with with a few where you need two players so I can score even more. As of now I'm at 166 out of 245. I've also gotten two new for Left for Dead and a few for Killing Floor. All this hard work has placed me as number 142 on SteamStats with 280.59 points. I hope Unreal Tournament 3 can get me in top100.

New games

2009-06-01T01:37:00.001+02:00

This post is late due, so there will probably come a few right after each other.
I've gotten a few more achievements since my last entry, but due to the Team Fortress 2 update my SteamStats rating has moved slighty the wrong way. This should be fixed as soon as I start farming achievements for TF2 too.

I bought two new games on Steam a while back, and here I'll give a short review of them.

Bullet Candy is a small arena shooter ala Asteroids with a lot of visual effects. To make this review shot: this game really sucks, even for 3.99€. This game is completely impossible! There's bullets and mines everywhere, and on top of that there's flashy effects all over the screen. Perhaps if everything moved a little slower if would be possible to do anything.
I played a hour, got three achievements out of 20, which will probably be all I'll get from this game.

Cogs is a puzzle game where you build machines from sliding tiles. It took the team (that is, two developers) five years to create this indie game. It is really well done, and quite fun to play. I do miss a hint function where you e.g. can see what the solution should look like. Other than that, good simple puzzle game and well worth 8.99€. This game has 18 achievements out of which I've gotten eight.

100% on Half-Life 2: Episode Two

2009-05-28T16:51:00.000+02:00

Yet another 100% club to join. This time it was in Half-Life 2: Episode Two. As I wrote on my blog entry 18th May, I only needed two achievements - Get Some Grub (Squish every antlion grub in Episode Two) and Hot Potat0wned (Kill a Combine soldier with his own grenade).
I had already been trying for Get Some Grub a few times but always missed by two - one was hiding in a locker, the other was at the end where I wasn't looking. This time around I got it the first time.
Hot Potat0wned wasn't a problem, and I got it on a reflex at the first grenade-throwing combine.

Carnival in Aalborg

2009-05-24T01:39:00.001+02:00

So the annual carnival in Aalborg, Denmark has just passed (23.05.09).

Aalborg Carnival is the largest carnival in Northern Europe with up to 25,000 carnivalists in the Grand Parade and more than 100,000 spectators catching the magnificent wave of colours and fantasy along the parade route. Don't miss this spectacular event and be a part of a world full of colours, impressive costumes, music, rhythms and dance from all corners of the world!

I'm usually down there taking pictures, and the weather is usually more than good compared to what's normal. Last year the parade was something like 3-4 hours. This year I didn't last that long due to the heat - only like 2 hours. But that was fine though, because that was enough to watch the professionel teams and the first few waves of dressed drunk people.

You can press HERE to view all the photos I snapped while down there. Below is a collage of some of the photos.

My photos from the carnival in 2008, 2007, and 2006.

TF2 - Spy & Sniper update

2009-05-22T03:16:00.001+02:00

The long awaited update for Team Fortress 2 has been released. This isn't really one of my favourite games, but it has a lot of achievements - 227 to be precise, and it is a huge deal for some people.
This update adds 35 achievements to the sniper and 34 to the spy plus a lot of other stuff which can be checked out here --> http://store.steampowered.com/news/2529/.

I'm probably gonna check it out later... right now I'm gaming Killing Floor, which is pretty decent, but REALLY FUCKING HARD, imo.

100% on Zeno Clash

2009-05-21T18:41:00.000+02:00

I've just managed to join the 100% club in this wonderful indie game, Zeno Clash. I had some troubles with the Heavy Brawler (Defeat a heavy enemy without getting hit) archievement, but I finally managed to get it - my guess is that noone else (at all!) is allowed to touch your heavy for you to get this. Ch4Ep2 was the place to do this - stay in a small(!) wooden cell and beat him by running around him hitting him with your stick.

After playing this game for a while I really came to enjoy - both the story and how it's built. Also, the fighting style is really different from other games, and especially the Street Fighter (

Beat the game without using weapons unless it is absolutely necessary) archivement was a fun one.

There's talk about a ep2 which would be really great, and there's also talk about ep2 not just being a indie game. This I look really forward to!

This archievement just placed me at 251 on the SteamStats page. I wonder if it's at all possible for me to reach 100 - I have no clue how many points I need for that, but it will probably take a while.

100% on Plants vs Zombies

2009-05-19T14:43:00.000+02:00

Finally, I managed to get all the archievements for Plants vs Zombies. The only one I was missing was Better Off Dead (Get to a streak of 10 in I, Zombie Endless) - I got 10, no more, no less.

Steam Achievements

2009-05-18T18:43:00.000+02:00

This post is going to be about Steam achievements. If you don't know what Steam is, check it out at http://steampowered.com.

A few weeks ago I bought the Orange Box (for 9.99€) and saw Half Life 2: Episode 2 had achievements. At the same time I found the SteamStats page. This page crawls every Steam profile and compare the achievements the various players have obtained. At the moment I only had four games with achievements (Portal, Left 4 Dead, World of Goo, and Defense Grid: The Awakening). I had already farmed a little in Left 4 Dead for achievements, but that was it, and my rank on the stats page was way down. I checked my friends stats, and found that one person was better than me (The Re-Tard). It started out with me wanting to beat him, so I played ep2 for achievements (got all but two), but that wasn't still enought. Team Fortress 2 was also part of the Orange Box, and that game has a shitload of achievements, so I started farming some of the larger ones that gave the most points. After a while I beat him and kept going...

After some time I wanted to try out some other games that had achievements, and therefore I decided to buy Ninja Reflex (a fun small game where you train your reflexes). As of now I have 48/52 achievements (you can only get 51 because one got bugged after a bugfix - the three others I'm slowly working on). But I am a 3rd degree black belt!

The next game I tested was Popcaps Plants vs. Zombies. This truly is a great game that you can spend hours on... which I have. As of now I'm missing 1 out of 12 achievements, which I should be able to get.

Another game this SteamStats page got me to try out is Zeno Clash - a first person fighting game. A decent game that takes some time to figure out. I haven't earned that many achievements here yet - only 7/19. I still need to play the entire story once or twice plus some other stuff to get more.

The last game for now is the newly released Killing Floor - a 6-player co-op survival horror FPS where you have to fight of waves of various zombies. Compared to the price (17.99€ - 13.50€ on pre-purchase) this actually is a quite fun game - sadly I don't have 5 other friends who own the game (but I'm working on that - I already made three people buy it). Imo, this is really a hard game; I'm having problems winning just on normal difficulty, so this is going to take some time. Plus there still are some severe bugs in the game, which makes some perks harder to get, and one even impossible. For now I only have 9/43 achievements here.

Back to my SteamStats ranking. I started out as 100,000+. After I passed that I went for 50,000, then 10,000, then 5,000. 1,000 took a little longer, but as I'm writing I'm rank 595 (next goal at 500).
Now the plan isn't to become number one - not at all in fact. The highest ranked players more or less have all achievements for all games, and I don't plan on doing that. I only play the games a like, and I don't keep playing them after I grow tired of them just to get the achievements. But the purpose is twofold:

Try out some games I normally wouldn't buy (within reason).
Change my playing style a little to score some achievements.

Never the less, so far, so good. =)

Skaery's Blog

2009-05-15T23:07:00.000+02:00

So I decided to start up a blog. "About what?" you ask. Don't know really - I'll figure out as I go. It will probably just be some random thoughts and stuff about what I'm doing.

I guess this first entry will just be a short presentation of me - Skaery.
Name: Thomas
Age: 24 (born 24th July 1984)
Country: Denmark
City: Aalborg
Occupation: Student (Math and Physics)

As I said, a short presentation - neither you nor I want to hear my life story.

I write in English basicly because I like the language, and, even though I don't know who are gonna read this (if any), more people have the possibility.

I'm just gonna stop now because there's not that many things on my mind as of now. But let me welcome you to my blog, and good luck to myself with the blog.