The Patent Dragon's Zone of Soul Retraction

Yeah, I missed another day, but to be honest, you weren't missing very much. The "main event" was the "race" to complete the "Borg Assimilated" equipment set for my other Star Trek Online characters before one set of four on-ship devices becomes two sets of three when Season 7 kicks in, and that's been continuing today - there's no guarantee I'll be able to complete the Borg set for both remaining characters, but my Klingon Defence Force representative may be close enough for it to work out...

When not "grinding" episodes in space, I've also been enjoying some downloaded content for Skyrim, in the form of "Hearthfire"; the new add-on house-building system. It's no way as in-depth and customisable as the set-up in Ultima Online, but you do have to build each part of your dwelling literally from the ground up.

In the meantime... I'm 0 for 2 on attempts to watch this week's CSI Miami, as the show's conclusion approaches. Damn.

And finally... I'm considering starting to post the latest piece of the WORLDS COLLIDE run-in starting Monday. That'll give me about a week... mark... before Chapter 4, which should be the conclusion, will be due in. Can I possibly make the deadline...?

ITEM! Games news - in Skyrim, what I'd thought would be a short, simple quest turned out to be a proper - and quite literal - pain in the ass.

( Cue tedious Skyrim tale - skip it if you want. Includes possible game spoilers... )

Someone find me a bandit camp, and an unassailable vantage point. I got me a pretty sweet archery set, and a brand new Fireball spell. Someone has to PAY... or maybe I'll load up a previous save, take Barky-Thing to a lonely mountain-top, and Fireball and FUS RO DAH the miserable beast into the afterlife.

ITEM! Talking of archery, there was a piece on today's "breakfast news" about the rise in popularity of the sport leading up to the Olympics, and how it's been inspired by archers in the movies. "Here goes some face-time for Hawkeye in AVENGERS", I'm thinking, but noooooo - it's all about the heroine in Hunger Games, and the lead character in upcoming Pixar movie Brave - also a girl. Not even the slightest acknowledgement of Hawkeye.

That's bloody sexism.

And finally...

ITEM! My last time-sheet was a major pain. It had to be "done online", or so I was informed, and THAT was an unbounded joy - NOT. Once I got the damn thing to work, I was told, at the end that...

*...takes a deep breath...*

...I had to print it out. Twice. They still, at the end of it all, want a piece of friggin' paper.

Madness. Not a "game-breaker", but still... so much for the "paperless office".

I really have to organise my time better. These last-minute posts are a bit of a cop-out, aren't they...?

Sometimes, you just can't put down a pitched battle for a fort.

However, I didn't spend the whole evening fighting Imperial soldiers or Borg. District 9 was on TV for the first time, and that was my first opportunity to see it again, so I sat and did just that. I am late on my Prometheus review (short version - it was excellent), but I intend to rectify that tomorrow. Yes, tomorrow.

No, really.

...really MUST do my posting earlier in the evening...!

I now have THREE games gnawing at my free time - welcome on board Legend Of Grimrock, a purchase I've been planning to make since I heard about it. It's a pretty slick "classic dungeon crawl" in the Dungeon Master style, but I don't expect to be devoting THAT much time to it, not now I'm doing so much better at Star Trek Online and Skyrim...

I'm being a naughty boy lately - I haven't been playing games this much in years... and there are other things to attend to - AREN'T THERE?

BIG gaming session - haven't played so much of anything for YEARS. If this lappy was going to let me down, it would've done it by now...

I'm really going to have to "turn it down" a bit, if I'm going to get anything else done. It's not easy when you're two ranks from the top of Star Trek Online and just took part in a major-league city storming in Skyrim. Both games are really "comfortable" now - and there's nothing cooler than giving The Big Dragon-Shout and knocking giants of humanoid and spider origin flying...

Heeheehee!

Ooooohkay - stuff in Skyrim is going better now that I've turned the difficulty level down. So, what next? A calm, measured approach to training within the game? A quiet day away from the "stress"?

Naaaaah - let's give Star Trek Online a try! Watch the several hours of download creep by! And just look at the unrelenting tutorial mission that goes ON and ON and ON, with its wacky ship controls!

Please tell me there's some kind of "holodeck" for practising with the flight controls, or this is a game that will get old very quickly...

Yes, I blew a posting slot. But... but I have Skyrim now.

Alas, no screenies to celebrate, 'cause they're corrupted somehow. Poo.

At least the new laptop can handle the game.

Today's Highlight... AVENGERS was awesome again, with added perfect lighting for the mid-credits teaser (thanks, NPH). I can start to see THOR 2 coming together.

Back to this movie - news just in is that AVENGERS did indeed make £15.7 MILLION in its opening week. Sweeeeeet...

Today's Lowlight... Security issues on the new machine. Surprise surprise - MacAfee is involved. Cue several weeks of trying to sort all this shit out...

Oh, and my Mission 101 report for April is likely to be delayed a bit more. Bugger.

And finally... No SKYRIM today. Poo.

Oh, and no CAPS-LOCK light on the new lappy either.