Lately, it's been perfecting my stream-to-TV setup using the Steam Streaming beta, and modding some older Bethesda titles.
On the streaming front, things are going very well. I was pleased to discover that it streams non-Steam games, as well, which is a HUGE win for my newer BioWare titles. Also, I've been having a lot of fun impressing my son with how good I can get some of these games to look on PC. Skyrim, for example, despite being almost three years old, can still achieve an insane level of graphical fidelity, once the right mods are introduced.
Right now, I'm just sliding the Alienware laptop under the TV, jacking into the secondary HDMI, then connecting an old wireless mouse and keyboard I had the foresight to hold onto.
Problems: power and wireless keyboard and mouse. My power situation behind my TV is a bit ... unstable, and I have no desire to introduce anything else into it. This means I'm running my power cable across the room, into a 3-2 converter, then into an extension cord. Also, the range on the wireless keyboard and mouse kinda sucks, so I have to run the access point halfway to the recliner, which means that people and dogs are free to accidentally knock it down right and left.
Both of these are easily resolved via minor expenditures. What's great is that the proof-of-concept is increasingly successful. I'm now curious to see how low I can go in terms of specs for the streaming machine. I'd guess proc is the key component there, as well as having an HDMI out. I plan to rummage around the house soon, and see what I can throw together.
As stated before, I'd like to just set up a dock at each TV for a super-powerful gaming laptop, and have that act as my streaming machine, that I can also take on the road, much like my existing Alienware.
Modding Mods
On the modding side, I've been looking a lot at Morrowind and Fallout 3.
The number of mods for Morrowind is staggering. On one hand, you have the official add-ons, about which I knew nothing, and then you have super-mega-huge overhaul mods, like MGSO, which transform the game entirely, into something almost modern.
I'd installed MGSO a while ago, started tweaking some shit under the hood, broke it, and then also got frustrated, because I tend to game on three different PCs, depending on what's going on, and keeping the install and tweaks across three different devices was a huge headache.
This time around, I knocked it down to two devices, and did the install one after another, keeping the settings very simple. The game still came out absolutely beautiful, especially once you hit the wilderness. It's not just visuals, mind you, it's also the ambience of the environment. Everything from insects to little splashes of water to rustles of leaves makes the world, finally, feel totally alive.
I wish I'd reinstalled this mod from the beginning of this journey, but now I'm glad I did it at all.
Speaking of Elder Scrolls, it was fascinating turning my older boy loose on Skyrim, and observing a) how he reacted to various scripted events (for example, he just wanted to watch the sky for the dragon, rather than act on its impending arrival), and b) how he approached the actual 'game.' He decided he was fine with letting his NPC handle most of the combat, since he was busy picking locks and looting corpses. Then, he wanted to move in straight lines across terrain to an end point, rather than sticking to the roads. Watching it, I was marveling at how many of those tendencies are tendencies that we share. We also share a tendency to be a backseat player, and drive each other crazy in the process.
The next Elder Scrolls Online beta can't get here soon enough.
I've almost been making some minor tweaks to Fallout 3. Mainly, the game struggles a bit with multi-core procs and can even crash sometimes because of that. A few minor edits to the game's config file nipped that right in the bud, and it runs rather nicely now. I'm also looking at a handful of graphical mods. The game looks a bit long-in-the-tooth now, and it'd be nice to up the textures on some of the faces and environments.
Oh, and randomly, I grabbed a total conversion mod for Oblivion called Nehrim. I'm curious to try this one out at some point. It's a whole new world, totally separate from the Elder Scrolls, and I love shit like that. I'd love to something like that someday.
Yes, but you will be talking about actual games at some point in this gaming blog, yes?
Morrowind. Yup. Been playing more Morrowind.
As I've talked about before in here, I find that with Morrowind, more so than any other game I've ever played, I have to be very conscientious about keeping myself in the right frame of mind when I play it, otherwise I'll never come back. I fight, sometimes, to keep myself from being obsessive about making progress. Morrowind is antithetical to this concept, in both its structure and its themes. Morrowind asks, or rather insists, that you chill the fuck out and just immerse yourself in the world. I'm now trying to bust a green librarian out of a floating sky prison above Vivec. This shit is just awesome.
Meanwhile, I'm also all set for Thief tomorrow. I've got my preloads done, one on the main desktop, the other on the laptop.
Interesting. I just noted that Thief is unlocking tomorrow at 1PM central. Looks like it'll be a late lunch tomorrow, and I'll be lugging the Alienware to work. Which is fine.
I anticipate that I'll play quite a bit on Tuesday, barring any technical launch issues, and have some impressions on Wednesday. I may even get all crazy and put up a Tuesday night post, as well.
Here's some Thief reviews, by the way.
EGM
Game Informer
GameSpot
PC Gamer
Polygon
Rock Paper Shotgun
Take from those reviews what you will. In there is some sort of aggregate, but I always wonder how much things like predisposition based on rumors, wanting to fit in with other reviewers, and consideration of being able to make a living because ad revenues are still flowing in inform some of these guys. Historically, I find that there are some reviewers that I tend to match up with, while others seem to be existing in a world that is in total dissonance from my own. And that's okay. I tend to find more use for reviews after I've played the game to completion, as I often enjoy engaging some of these guys afterward to compare notes.
Anyway, if you had a mad Thief boner, don't get upset by other people not loving something you've already decided was the game to ever come out tomorrow. Unless you love it and want them to make another one ever again, it doesn't matter what other people think.
I still plan on seeing what's what, and I'm looking forward to it.
Thanks for reading, and lemme know what you think of Thief!
-Blaine
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