Civilization Revolution

Anyone else out there a Civilization freak like me? I was really excited to hear about Sid Meier's Civilization Revolution coming out for the consoles at E3.

I have been a huge fan since the first Civ came out almost 20 years ago. 20 years? Wow, that's incredible. I didn't have my own computer, so I would go to my friend's house and play on his. We played it using DOS. I would stay up all night playing that game after he went to bed.

When Civ 2 came out, I had a computer but no money for games, so I would trade with another friend of mine. He bought it and I would keep it for a couple weeks and then return it to him. I think I eventually bought the game, and my wife (girlfriend at the time) got into it, and she was as addicted as me. We even got her two sisters playing the game. As neither of them had computers, they would come to my apartment to play.

Then Civ 3 came out, and I was totally blown away. The game had just kept improving with gameplay and graphics. I played the hell out of that one. I had created systems and layouts to best utilize the terrain. If after so many years I hadn't reached a certain tech or number of cities, I would start over. The AI had increased dramatically, and you needed to be on top of it if you wanted to do well. I always had this personal problem of wanting all the wonders, and it was very difficult to do, but I was able to on several occasions when playing on one of the easier settings.

Then Civ IV came out. I think the game would have been good, but my now old computer could not handle the new graphics engine in the game. This really pissed me off. I had bought Sid Meier's Pirates and it was the same graphics engine. I don't know what it was with that engine, but it did not work well on my computer. Even after lowering the graphics settings to the lowest they would go, Civ 4 would only work for a few turns, before bogging down. I never got to play a whole game on my computer. It looked great though, and the introduction of the religion aspect added a great new concept to toy with. Maybe someday I'll get it to work or buy a new computer.

OR maybe  not. Now that Revolutions is coming out for the consoles, I may get my fix this way. It's been awhile since I've gotten to play a new Civ game, and I'm really excited. This should be great on multiplayer as well with voice chat and so on. With over a year to wait on this, it should be well worth it. I eagerly await the day I get a copy or the demo to try it out.

Posted by Doogs @ 1:46 pm EDT | Permalink | 1 Comments

Rock Band

I went to the Rock Band website (http://www.rockband.com/home.html) last night and checked out the news and details about the game. If you haven't yet, I recommend it. This game is going to be great. The drum kit looks especially fun. I imagine if you're skilled enough, you could hook the mic up on a stand and play guitar or drum while singing. I'm not sure I'm coordinated enough. I saw the song list which sounds great as well. I just might have to get my son or daughter playing the cowbell for "Don't fear the reaper."

Posted by Doogs @ 1:11 pm EDT | Permalink | 1 Comments

Great camping trip!

This last weekend was great for camping and fishing. My wife, kids, and I left Anchorage and headed for Whiskey Gulch. We met my cousin-in-laws, their kids, and another couple. We stayed two nights, went out fishing in Cook Inlet four times, and came back with 9 halibut between the 6 adults. The water could not have been calmer, and the sky could not have been more blue on the last day. We were all sunburned by the time we got home. My wife's cousin caught the biggest halibut, around 55 lbs. I caught the most at 3, but only probably totaled 50 lbs. The kids had fun. They met some other kids there and it was hard to keep them separated. I look forward to going again next year. In two weeks, I am going salmon dipnetting to get my yearly supply. My cousin-in-law and I got 75 reds last year, so we'll see how we do this year. I think we still have some left over from last year. I guess I need to eat more.

Posted by Doogs @ 12:56 pm EDT | Permalink | 0 Comments

Here fishy fishy!

Leaving for the weekend to go camping down near Homer, AK to catch some halibut. This annual trip usually supplies my and my cousin-in-law's families with enough halibut for a year. Watching Ferris Bueller on TV right now. That's such a classic movie. I love the line from the garage attendant who looks at Ferris and says, "What country you think this is?" after Ferris asks if he speaks English. Such a funny expression on his face. I watched the video of Rock Band from Harmonix at E3. That looks great. I can't wait to get my kids playing bass and drums. We'll rock the living room for sure.

Posted by Doogs @ 3:36 am EDT | Permalink | 0 Comments

Must need a new game

I keep staring at my stack of games and try to decide which to play. I can't though. I have many games I haven't finished yet, but they just aren't appealing to me right now. I wish games weren't so expensive, so I could get something new. I do have two games from Gamefly right now, Tony Hawk P8 and Just Cause. I really liked TH but I'm ranked 3rd in the game, and all the challenges left take so much time to complete, it's lost its appeal, not to mention each challenge now takes me hours to complete. Just Cause hasn't really held my attention. Is this game just a Central American GTA? It sure looks like the same game engine, just with different graphics. Anyways, I'll probably send that back and hope to get C&C III as it's at the top of my queue. Well, maybe I'll go work on GHII some more. I only have 7 songs left to 5 star on hard. I still have 3 that I can only get 3 stars on: Psychobilly, Msirlou, and one other. I just can't seem to get the fingers trained well enough. Ah well.

Posted by Doogs @ 3:10 pm EDT | Permalink | 2 Comments