Already on it, but thanks!

And hop on Enigma's Cold War server. Great fun to be had there, even without the shiny new technology.

Just finished Titan Quest Immortal Throne through "Hades" section (killed the Devil himself). Now its on to more of the "added content".

Modded/cheated in one respect. Used Hex Editor to modify most of my apparel (obtained legally). Gave each piece a special capability that could be found on some "legal" apparel but I wanted it for everything the Heroine wore. Made things go quicker because I could kill easy enemies very rapidly (long twitch combat with easy foes is boring, to me). Made things slightly less easy because I cheated in such a way that I locked out normal "legal in game" modification buffs to equipment. And, importantly, she "looked good" in her equipment.

Died once 30 min from the "end of the Hades section". Another "accidental death" (I was not paying attention). Killing the worst monsters including the Devil himself was not hard -- on normal difficulty. Cheating is not necessary (even though I did, for fun) -- all that's needed is a good build.

A very good game to my tastes (not the "best ever" -- but one of the best in my library).

I can't read one of Allen's posts without picturing Matt Foley

My recent games have been

F1 2021
Forza Horizon 5
Sniper Ghost Warrior Contracts 2

Not much change from my last report. But I'll be adding Hitman 3 in the very near future I think.

Where did you get that picture of me!? Oh, that's Matt -- sorry

Actually, it does somewhat resemble me when I weighed 220lbs

My first wife divorced me -- I lost the weight. I've been around 140 for the last 40 years.

Per Wikipedia: "Foley is disheveled, sweaty, obese, clumsy and unstylish. He exhibits poor social skills, frequently loses his temper, often disparages and insults his audience, and wallows in cynicism and self-pity about his own poor life choices"

I'll try to do better -- I'm not sweaty enough and I haven't lost my temper in.. in the last 5 minutes

Haha, now I feel bad. It's the quotes thing I'm riffing on, not the appearance. I'm sure you're a fine looking man

Interestingly, the face in the picture does slightly resemble a "very fat me"

I was hoping I used enough smiley faces so you wouldn't feel bad

Meantime, I do use "quotation marks" a lot. Its just to call attention to key words/phrases and make reading my verbosities quicker -- for those who try to navigate my customary verbosity

No worries, I was just trying to be funny using a popular reference. Carry on

And anyway I'm sure you no longer live in a van. Down by the river.

To finish off -- so, people don't get the above picture too embedded -- here's my wife and I 30 years ago and almost 10 years ago -- on the dance floor (we competed Nationally -- haven't since COVID).

Competitions are Age Adjusted.

Since disposing of my gaming rig I'm playing mostly World of Warships on my trusty old lappy. I've just started carriers after 7 years of playing in WoW. I've had to resist the temptation to put my fist through the screen a number of times so far. Who decided playing CV's was fun? At least subs are removed (temporarily).

Also just dusted off Silent Hunter 4 but hopefully when I get my new laptop I'll start playing more modern titles.

Last month playlist

-- Hitman (all three World of Assassination trilogy titles)

Fantastic series for fans of the stealth genre. I think anyone who likes games like Deus Ex, Thief, Dishonored and Splinter Cell would dig the vibe in this one

-- Forza Horizon 5

Burned out on this a bit, but I was on high-burn for 300 hours. Good fun, cool cars.

-- GTA Online

Just in drips. There's not so much left to do that I haven't already. Anything I've ignored will stay that way. But still, each week is a new event, and I monitor it to see if it dovetails with my mojo. I had been waiting for a sale on the auto shop business, those went on sale yesterday, so I hopped back in and started splashing that Cayo heist cash. Bought Burton auto shop and another supercar while I was at it, the Vagner, which is like an Aston Martin Valkyrie or maybe Valhalla. I'll wait for a very long time just to buy what I want on sale.

Currently playing on a daily or weekly basis:

Fallout 76
Total War: Attila
Total War: Rome II
IL-2 BOS
DCS
F1 2021
ArmA 3
Far Cry 6
Elite Dangerous
Company of Heroes 2

Star Trek: Bridge Commander.

This version https://abandonwaregames.net/game/star-trek-bridge-commander You can fly a Dauntless and a Sovereign

Then found this and add to it

https://www.moddb.com/games/star-trek-bridge-commander/downloads/bridge-commander-remastered

I can control dozen of ships: Klingon (including the one in Undiscovered Country), Romulan (including Scimitar and Devore), Federation (Defiant, original Kirk Enterprise and the movies Kirk Enterprise, Khan's Reliant, Excelsior, TNG Enterprise and TNG movies Enterprise, Voyager, Enterprise from Enterprise), Dominion, Borg (3 different Cubes and Sphere and Diamond), Kessok, Cardashians, Ferengi.

I can also control Federation starbases, Deepspace 9, Cardashians bases, the weapon platforms from DS9, those alien ships that kicked Borg's butt in Voyager, shuttles.

The original Enterprise, Constitution class, the phaser and torpedo are blue. It's only in the new Enterprise from 1979 did the phaser and torpedo turn orange.

That Reliant (Miranda class) is tough. As the refit Enterprise I had to replay it over a dozen times before I beat the Reliant. Also the Enterprise phasers are not one long beam, it's like a double beam that bursts.

I am playing as Khan fighting Kirk



Why is Kirk chasing me with the Enterprise upside down?



Original Enterprise, phasers and torpedo are blue



Original Enterprise refit, phasers fire in broken beams



Picard Enterprise from TV against basic Borg cube (there are 2 higher Cube, a tactical and an assimilator). I just started 2 minutes and Borg already damaged the Enterprise.



Picard Enterprise from 1st Contact firing phasers and Quantum torpedoes at Borg Assimilation cube .

I've been playing Relicta a first person physics puzzler
a bit of EVE
Il-2 BOS playing with the Hurricane in the QMB
World of Warships and Wreckfest
and I like to build Putt Putt courses in Golf Around

I am going to check out that Bridge Commander NFB

Thanks for turning me on to this one -- its downloading as I write.

Playing it will be "scary" -- it probably will show me how dumb I am. We'll see.

I got it for free on Epic last Week I think (Ive gotten several cool games this way) I did have to watch a walkthrough video at the beginning couple of levels because I didn't see the clues at first but now I can use what I learned to figure them out on my own. It has a story and some exploring. Cool game.

Nice find, thanks! Had my eye for awhile on the GOG version.

On the same site I found "The Sum of all Fears" (Red Storm Entertainment) based on the original Ghost Recon game engine of which I have been wanting for a long time now. There´s also a movie by the same title.

Finally completed the 688-half of the missions in "688 Attack Sub" but having trouble captaining the Alfa. Can't get past an early mission of tracking a 688 for the required time.

Losing the Alfa in the 688 is easy (same mission, you play either hunted or hunter):

- set a WP for deep water, making noise as the Alfa stalks you.
- cut power to 1/3 (optionally firing off noise-maker) then dive right below layer.
- make 90d turn while staying just under layer (the shadows), likely losing him in the next few minutes.
- if not, dive deep (below 1000') then turn again just under the lowest layer.
- use contour sonar to mosey along in a trench (the Alfa doesn't have contour sonar in map MFD).

You get 20 minutes to lose him. I usually do it in 5.

Love this game! It's like playing a session of DOOM shareware, just some quick easy fun!

++++++++++

GS2000...eventually going to figure out how to get my throttle (collective) and rudder (tail rotor) working at the same time with my Logitech Wingman. At least the Easy FM is really easy to fly (holds altitude and forward motion).

Also no throttle in Tornado, have to use keyboard. Also some JS tweaking to do on 1942 PAW (forget the problem). Fleet Defender is a rare case of everything working perfectly (with proper DOSBox configuration).

And my very rare (years of waiting) SubWar 2050 Strategy Guide recently arrived...

++++++++++

My list of games to complete this year (the strike-throughs just didn't do it for me, might try again later):

[ ] 688 Attack Sub (1989)
[ ] Red Storm Rising (1989)
[ ] Wing Commander (1990)
[ ] Crisis In The Kremlin (1991)
[ ] Gunship 2000 (1991)
[ ] Star Trek: 25th Anniversary (1992)
[ ] Tornado (1993)
[ ] Star Wars: X-Wing (1993)
[ ] Subwar 2050 (1993)
[ ] SSN-21 Seawolf (1994)
[ ] 1942 The Pacific Air War (1994)
[ ] Fleet Defender (1994)
[ ] Star Wars: TIE Fighter (1994)
[ ] Descent (1995)
[ ] Apache Longbow (1995)
[ ] Hind (1996)

Some of that old late 80s early 90s stuff works well with multiple input devices. Chuck Yeager's Advanced Flight Trainer 2.0 was pretty neat with my full modern HOTAS setup.


Wing Commander 1 is timeless and has almost unlimited replayability due to the branching dynamic structure of the campaign. Amazing game.

I'm sure I'll eventually get the JS configurations straightened out.

Which reminds me...a shout out to Damsonn for this bit of GS2000 DOSBox tweaking...

cycles=30000

Mission briefing pages now work perfectly.

++++++++++

IMO, the ultimate game combo...