Last post 15 feb… oh WOW update needed!
MOVING/MOVED
I suppose the big news is that I am NOT back playing LOTRO! But I did get to leave Argentina and take my family to Europe… I am now slowly sinking into Sweden… yeah it’s not been as easy as I expected and the Swedish bureaucracy has been much worse than I ever imagined. The last 2 years has literally overwhelmed Sweden with a tsunami of immigrants, which has not left much of a welcome for Tsuhelm n family. Me, EU citizen (Don’t get me started on the ominous BREXIT and the possible future ramifications!), with newly Britished sons and non EU wifey. Swedish friends have slapped their heads in disbelief that I chose to move to Malmo, which was the main entry point, and most affected city in Sweden. I just wanted to be close to my beloved Copenhagen; I also hoped that my network of friends would be there to smooth my return. Well they have certainly helped me but nothing has clicked into place so we have ended up in expensive accommodation, have only a limited right to remain in Sweden and I need a job like YESTERDAY. I did cheekily force the authorities to take my kids into the Swedish schooling system and my wife is busy studying Swedish everyday and wanting to kill me every other day for my unpreparedness… just another of the harsh realities of life of a EU jobseeker in Sweden.
Tsu and Sons in Malmo.
So you can maybe imagine that I have no time for gaming right? Well that would be way too sensible…
LOTRO
Still no working computer… we dismantled my wife’s old oft fixed computer and brought the harddrive along with the 100’s of gigabytes of family pics which we gave up trying to backup in the cloud. I had always promised myself a new gaming PC when I finally returned to Europe but jobless and living on the edge in Sweden maybe now is not that time. So the 10th anniversary has gone, Turbine has become Standing Stones Gaming – with all the pipe weed in game its surely should be Standing Stoned Gaming. I just hope they do a good job as the vociferous fanbase will Stand (them up and) stone (them for spoiling their) gaming… Little snippets of news that have reached me have indicated that it’s still going… and indeed one can simply walk into Mordor… or not!
Do I still play with my COC…
Yes I am still playing… I have been super close to packing it in at times and yet again another clan has slowly died… we are hanging on just and hoping that after the long absent leader popped up and handed over the reins that we may be able to turn it around. But does anyone really care?
I have reached th10 and boy if I thought upgrading walls at the end of th9 was slow this is downright tedious. I cant be bothered to grind out the farming for wall upgrades so I just slowly plod along. The introduction of a new base to build and slightly skewed raid dynamic offered a brief respite but that has now sunk into even more of a time sink. SUPERCELL still know how to introduce the occasional buzz into play with events and odd happenings (builder vanishing was great!) but overall does not remove that lingering stale taste in the mouth after you realize that you have spent years licking a time sink!
And BR?
Nope I quit… I didn’t rage quit, or decide to stop playing, it just stopped being opened, it is still installed… Nr2 son was massively into CR and I left my big active clan (Supreme Cream – WOOT!) to make a family clan with him. We plodded along slowly, we LOVED the 2vs2 which they removed… then added back and then removed. And I notice it’s back again! But for fucks sake make your mind up! I think the 2vs2 mode is a proto Bridge. It plays so well this way, getting to know your partner and his playstyle and then factor in the opponents and their game. Maybe with the massive amount of permutations now available BR’s complexity becomes its undoing. I was enjoying myself so much that I was on the verge of recommending friends (non-gamers) to come and play with me… but the effort (or cash!) required to build up decks is just too much and I simply fell off the cliffs named ‘NOT BOTHERED.’ Now I don’t even miss it.
MINECRAFT
OK not really my addiction, but my nr2 son’s favourite game and his skills just keep growing. He constantly amazes me and I can see that he isn’t cheating, he’s not copying from YouTube vids. He really creates his own amazing structures. Our new apartment in Sweden weirdly came with an Xbox 360 and the State library rents outs games for free. I have had to rent out Minecraft continually (I keep trying out LEGO games, so far nothing has beaten the LEGO movie game.) and I will keep doing so until I find a cheap second hand version somewhere or until I start earning again and then I will buy a new version. Both boys love playing together, something they were not able to do with the PE edition on their ipads (without getting Microsoft accounts!) And do I play? Well of course I get sucked in every now and then. And boy does this game suck you in … I once spent 2 days working out how to get pistons and redstone to manipulate lava flows over a secret cave… why? The mind boggles! I built a waterslide to bedrock to speed up mining for my son who promptly found diamonds and was over the moon for days! I then installed a water lift with signs and airpockets to quickly rise back up again, which my son ignores as he prefers his own staircase!
What a game!
And yet more MCOC
Yeah I have come close to packing this in as well, especially when the original alliance I was in, started to die. An in game friend introduced me to his new alliance and they accepted me, and I have been there ever since. For a game that sucks in so much time, they are surprisingly undemanding. I mean they want you to meet targets but they do not demand arena grinding or full participation in all events, which I imagine would quickly suck in every minute of every day. It is that GRINDY!
I keep promising myself and alliance mates to get better at fighting but it’s slow (for me at least!) I cannot justify perfecting MCOC while looking for work, I do try by explaining it away (to non gamer wifey) as stress relief but to be honest if my work drought continues I may well have to let it go. I am already letting ride the daily arena grind (just for milestone prizes) and it shows in that I struggle to earn enough to level champions. Talking of which MCOC has done a great job at maintaining the MARVEL universe throughout, It manages to hit every long dormant MARVEL nerve I have ever had and it keeps them lit and throbbing for more.
My roster is continually growing… now 5 five star champions, and a plethora of 4 stars too… some of them maxing out. Next year 6 stars will be introduced, as the power creep sets in, surely without new gameplay this may be the first death knell sounding.
Like every cash gobbling mobile game MCOC has an interesting back story Korean giant Netmarble bought out Kabam in February and it has been far from smooth sailing since. A couple of fluffed updates has managed to introduce fractures into a once solid group of hardcore players. Update 12 was a costly fiasco and even the latest update introduced changes that were clearly not well thought out. A bug got passed quality checking that has managed to corrupt in game gold for many players. Interesting read here.
FUTURE
Nr1 get a JOB
Nr2 get a gaming PC and catch up on a lot of gaming…er LOTRO!
Nr3 get a PS3 and 4 (yes both) as I have missed out on some amazing games… Dark Souls, I offer you my still pulsating heart to chomp on and spit out!
Nr4 start surfing and swimming again (maybe swim then surf is safer option.)
Nr5 if non of above kill me (or wifey) I hope to start blogging again… let’s see what the 2nd half of 2017 brings Tsu’s way.
tsuhelm 
Good to hear that you are alive and well and… umm… living in Sweden.
What with Brexit looming, perhaps it was now or never!?
THX 😉 Brexit certainly was a factor…
I was just reviewing my blogroll – so many blogs have changed address or gone! – and I wondered, how you’re doing. Still in Sweden, and properly settled now?