Quake Live Goes Live Today!

After successfully running the closed beta for the last several months, Quake Live will be opening it's beta to the rest of the world later tonight.

Quake Live in a nut shell is an extremely fast-paced first person shooter that can be played in a web browser. The game is based around the very popular Quake III: Gold.

I'm not really supposed to talk about the fact that I actually got invited to participate in the closed beta of Quake Live a few weeks ago, but well, since today is the official launch day of the open beta, I don't think it matter much now anyways. Yeah, Quake Live is extremely fast. It's extremely competitive. But is it extremely fun? Yes, yes it is. Since the servers are hosted by id themselves, there is really no noticeable lag and it's very smooth, considering it's being played in a browser.

What's really cool about Quake Live is that you take a 10 minute skill test which will determine where you fit in the world of Quake Live players. In the match listing, there will be something there saying that you will be matched against players with your own skill level. And there will be others saying that if you attempt to compete against these players, they will wipe the floor with your hide. I'd stay away from those matches if I were you. haha

Another cool thing about the web-based game is you can actually play against bots, that's if you're rusty and want to practice a bit before going head-to-head against some of the best Quake players in the world(well, not really, but you get the point).

Quake Live is completely free but in order for them to make some well-earned money, they'll be adding in-game advertisements.

Check out their website today so you, too, can participate in all the glory that is Quake Live.

Age of Conan, A New Kind of MMO

Note: Click the images for full resolution.


King Conan

It's been awhile since I actively got back into any MMO. The last BIG one I was actively involved in was City of Heroes a few years ago and months after I stopped playing, I tried getting back into the super hero powered MMO, but for the life of me, I could not. Not sure why. Sometime when you stop playing a game for long enough, it's like a whole new experience the next time you start playing again. But since I've played CoH for months on end, non-stop, I couldn't really get back into it, maybe one day I'll be able to.Anyways... World of Warcraft is another example of an MMO I could not get back into. Although, I never really, truly got into WoW, played it for a few months, but wasn't around long enough to get to the high levels.


Pythiasdamon, Cimmerian Dark Templar on Cimmeria

Now brings me to a new kind of MMO. Age of Conan: Hyborian Adventures. The game launched in May of 2008. I knew about it, but didn't know what it could offer me that others before it offered me. I wasn't really that interested in finding out. A friend of mine(Wap) had just built a new computer and was anxiously waiting to play it. He was able to install it, but some things(graphic elements) weren't working right, as this was at launch so there was still bugs in hiding. He didn't play it that much then, but told me it was pretty cool. He was going to send me one of his buddy keys to try out the game for myself, but for some reason, the buddy invite system wasn't showing up/working right.


DIE SHAMAN!

Okay, fast forwarding to a week ago.. it appeared that Age of Conan was finally running the way it was meant to run for my friend and he went from saying it was just "pretty cool" to "FUCKING AMAZING!" so for obvious reasons, that really got my attention. He told me that the buddy invite system finally started working and was able to send me a buddy invite so I could try out the "the most savage, sexy and brutal MMO ever created" for 7 days, except that it was 10 days because of the large 6GB download which happened to cost $2.99.


My new home... for now.

So I finally started downloading it, installing it, and because I had Windows 7 installed, it would not work because DirectX 11 was installed and the download manager needed DirectX 9.0c to run properly. So guess what I did next? Well, you may have guessed that I went ahead and did nothing, but you would have guessed wrong. I tried to dual boot Windows 7 and XP. I created a new partition, fixed up everything and restarted. Get this... "Error loading operation system". Not sure WTF I did wrong, but I must have screwed something up. I went ahead and tried to install Windows XP anyways, but that didn't work. I said fuck it and install Windows XP right over Windows 7, had to be done, sucks, but that was the sacrifice I was willing to make so I could play the most brutal MMO ever. I installed Windows XP, installed all the necessary software and then finally started installing Age of Conan. It was done and was ready to play FINALLY.

I loaded the game and had to download all the patches and what not. It was done patching and bam, the game was loading at last. Lots of cool screens before the exciting cutscene of Conan almost getting stabbed in the back by one of his people, just a test to see if he was still quick.


Prepare to die, Red Hand!

Well... I created a character, I won't list all of the options which is quite a few. I created a Cimmerian Dark Templar on the Cimmeria RP-PVP server. At first I was almost going to change my mind and create another character with a different class, but went with it and boy was I lucky I didn't change my mind. The Dark Templar is amazing, although I'm sure the other classes are just as awesome, seeing how this is my first character in Age of Conan.


FATALITY!

I think this post has gone long enough, and I would say "long story, short", but it's kind of late for that(lol). I will say this though.. I had a chance to play Age of Conan for a week now, off and on and yesterday, I headed to my local GameStop and picked up the game right then and there. Age of Conan is really "the most savage, sexy and brutal MMO ever created" and difinitely "a new kind of MMO", worth every penny, the full retail price and the $2.99 I had to pay just download it. Seriously. The game is that awesome. I don't say that too often about any game, unless I find myself really enjoying it.


Slaying the Bat Demon

So if you're into MMO's that are exciting, have full cutscenes, nudity, cussing, lots of action, blood and gore, and the occasional comedic dialogue, then do yourself a favor and see if a friend has a buddy invite so you, too, can try Age of Conan out. You will not regret it. Nope, not a chance.