• Emily is Away Too
  

  3 hours playtime

  21 of 21 achievements

</li>

January

Good start to the year. Probably because I had time off work and spent a lot of it inside, out of the cold and gaming. I bought quite a few games in Dec and Jan.

I didn’t mention the Dec ones in my last post, so I forget when exactly I got the different games but my total number has risen a little since the last post. I think this month it was: Heat Signature - which came with Morphblade, The Long Dark, Basingstoke, and Lovers in a Dangerous Spacetime. Haven’t really put a lot of time into any of these yet as I was focusing on other and older games.

Emily is away too
Bit of a strange game. Interesting, but I don’t think I could have played it much longer than I did. The main issue I had was the typing method. Basically there’s a kind of internet messenger that you type messages in, but as the messages are set you can’t type what you want. Instead, whatever keys you press a pre-determined message appears. So if I type ‘asdjahsd;khalskfhal;shda;shd’ it might come up with ‘Hi Emily. What have you been up to’ and it’s one keystroke for every keystroke in the message that appears. Playing the game involves doing this a LOT and it gets old quickly. Aside from that there were some good references to the early days of the internet and popular culture which I could relate to.

Watchdogs 2
I spent a lot more time on this. 49 hours in total! Unfortunately it doesn’t count towards my statistics on BLAEO or Steam as it’s on the UPlay launcher. I got almost all the achievements, was just left with 4-5 achievements that you can only get by buying a DLC and 1-2 that are online (I’m not very good at the player vs player part!). Fun game. An open world (Just Cause, Far Cry, Saints Row kind of game. Big world and lots to do. It wasn’t too repetitive, but started to drag a little towards the end.l I’m not gonna get the DLC, so I don’t think I”m gonna get much further with this and have uninstalled it.

Mass Effect
Continuing my trend of using other clients this month, I went onto play Mass Effect on Origin. I’m very slow getting around to playing this. Released in 2007, I bought it in 2012, and last played it in 2015! To be honest, I didn’t remember that much of the story from the parts I’d already played but just continued from my last save. Total play time is 28 hours, but I guess only about 6-8 of that was this month.
There are no achievements, and I missed some of the best screenshot moments at the end of the game, only getting one of the ship heading into the distance and the credits. Not very exciting so I haven’t uploaded them. I focused on the main mission and didn’t bother with a lot of the side missions or travelling around the galaxy. I can cross this one off my list now, but I do have other games int he Mass Effect series to play, which leads me onto my next post!

Mass Effect 2
After Mass Effect, I went straight onto the second in the series. Another one I was slow to play. Released in 2010, I bought it in 2012, and hadn’t played it before this month.I enjoyed this a lot more than the original. Partly because the graphics were a lot better, but I felt a lot more involved in the story too. It might have been because I played through it all and so the story flowed better than the original. I liked all the characters too, aside from Miranda.
I think I completed all the major missions, got all the crew members and all but 3 of them were loyal to me. Managed to complete the final mission with the entire crew surviving. I couldn’t get any screenshots for this one, key combination I used last time wouldn’t work for some reason.

Real life news
In real life, I found that I have a cataract in one of my eyes. I posted about my eyes getting worse in an earlier post on this site (Jul-Aug), but the opticians I went to at that time didn’t see any problems. It’s very early, as I’m only 37. I thought only people in their 70’s and 80’s get them, but apparently they can start from around 40. Still a bit early. They can also be caused by accidents and blows to the head, which made me think whether 15 years of kickboxing might have had something to do with it (only a hobby so very few fights, but regular sparring). Everything I’ve read suggests it needs to be a pretty big impact though, like a car crash. So don’t think that’s part of it either. Not gonna do much about it just yet, other than get stronger glasses and get regular check ups. My left eye compensates a lot, so I guess that’s a good thing.
Just started getting back into the gym after the winter break and then got a cold :-( so that’s something I need to focus on in February before I get fatter!

Hope everyone else had a good January!

August - December 2018

No assassinations for a long time. I’ve been playing sporadically, but not consistently enough to finish any games. I also did a little gaming away from Steam. I picked up Watchdogs 2 from Amazon when it had a price error and have been playing it a lot over the last week during my holidays (29 hours in and at 64%). I haven’t been on Uplay or Origin for a while and have a few games I completely forgot about on there. I should probably include those in my stats somehow or make an effort to play them!

I actually did another clear out of games that I didn’t think I’d play again and reduced the number of games I have. Then went on a little buying spree. The total number is still lower.

Not that exciting in real life either - work was pretty busy, I went to Hong Kong for a short holiday, and I entered and won a kickboxing tournament. I’m healthy though and nothing really bad happened, so a good year in all!

2018 in retrospect

I didn’t clear any games, but have managed to improve most of my stats. My never played games are dropping as I make an effort to play them and the will never play games have been played or removed. One small annoyance is that as far as I can tell, removed steam games still count towards your average game completion. So even though I have fewer unplayed games, my average percentage dropped a little :(

These are my statistics going into 2019. I’m happy I keep these in my profile, as I can see how my backlog has reduced over the last two years.

Steam Stats

Beginning of 2019 - 241 games, 2690 achievements, 33% average game completion rate

BLAEO Stats

Beginning of 2019 - 237 games

• Wolfenstein: The Old Blood
  

  6 hours playtime

  18 of 50 achievements

• Orwell
  

  4 hours playtime

  17 of 27 achievements

July-August

Not much playing time this month. I started Prey and Dead Cells, played Orwell and recently had a crack at Wolfenstein The Old Blood.
The Old Blood was a surprisingly short game. I should probably go back and get some of the achievements, but I’ll leave it at beaten for now. Fun game, but I wasn’t keen on the zombie part of the story. It’s rare for me to beat a game as I’ve not been playing much, so feels good to be able to post something here!

I knew Orwell was short. The style of the game was pretty novel and it was good to play something a little different. There are different ending, which I should probably try for as they’d be fairly easy achievements to help improve my stats! but we’ll see. I wouldn’t come back for a sequel, but glad I played it.

Been busy at work as usual, I visited family and friends in the UK for the last two weeks, and while I was back I got my eyes tested to find that one eye has significantly worse sight than the other. I didn’t really notice before as my other eye compensates for it, but now I know it’s very annoying! Anyway, I have new glasses, which helps, and I guess I should wear them more. My eyes are apparently healthy, but still a little worrying. Just getting old I guess :-(

Maybe I’ll get LASIK if they continue to deteriorate. How’s everyone else’s eyesight? any experience of LASIK or one dodgy eye? :-)

• Shadowrun Returns
  

  9 hours playtime

  no achievements

May-July!

Still busy and still not playing many games! On the plus side, I have completed one game, removed two from my library (Dota 2 - never played it, TF2 - played a bit but never really got into it), and I didn’t buy anything in the sale! I did ‘win’ one game from the very short amount of time I spent on the sale min-game, but not one of the ones I wanted. Hopefully it will be better than I expected.

Shadowrun Returns Can’t remember when I got this or whether it was in a bundle. I bought it as I enjoyed Shadowrun: Dragonfall a lot. This seemed a lot shorter game, still enjoyable but I preferred Dragonfall. There are no achievements in this game (unlike Dragonfall) so it makes ‘completing’ the game a lot easier. I’ve finished the story and there are no achievements, so all done!

February-April!

Just checking in, as I’ve done very little gaming. Work has been busy.
I’ve played a few hours of Enter The Gungeon in the last week or so, but that’s all.

• Epistory - Typing Chronicles
  

  9 hours playtime

  46 of 55 achievements

January

Epistory was a in a bundle I bought a while back, but I didn’t install the game. Decided to give it a go recently. Pretty fun. Nothing like Mavis Beacon, the only other typing ‘game’ I’ve ever tried! I kind of expected this to be more educational in that it would help me to improve my typing. There was no guidance of any kind of how to type, which probably would’ve taken away from the enjoyment of the game, but including something like this might have helped me become better at typing and get those remaining achievements! I could probably get a few more just by playing for a little longer, but I doubt I’ll ever get the 60 wpm and the game doesn’t have enough replay-ability for me to go back and kill 7,500 more enemies I need for one of the others. Anyway, a fun short game (to beat at least) and a new type ;-) of game for me.

Other games I’ve played but haven’t finished this month include Streets of Rogue, Poker Night 2, Stardew Valley, Beholder, and Batman: Arkham City GOTY. If anybody would like to add to their backlog, here’s a short giveaway (11 hours or so from this post) for this group and my whitelist.

Giveaway: Just Cause 3 XL

November and December

No completions in the last two months. I’m a terrible assassin!

I received Stardew Valley from Lilith (^o^)/ at the start of December and have been playing that a lot recently.

Other games I’ve made some progress in but haven’t finished over the last two months are - Doom, Enter the Gungeon, Neon Chrome, Spelunky, PixelJunk™ Shooter Ultimate, and The Swapper. I’m not a big fan of The Swapper but am trying to persevere and finish it. Neon Chrome is okay, but can feel my attention waning on that one too. The others are good and I’ll continue with them.

I had another clean out of games that I won’t play or are multiplayer only with dead servers. One slighly annoying thing is that games from bundles are registered on Steam together, so I can’t delete one without losing the others too. Guess I’ll just have to hide them, learn to love them, or ignore them in my library.

2017 in retrospect

The end of 2017 marks one year for me on BLAEO.
At the start of the year, I made a lot of progress. Probably because I could choose from a lot of games and concentrate on the easier ones to complete, I also had a bit more time. Things have slowed down a lot since then and I haven’t beaten or completed many games.
However, the site has built some good habits in my gaming. It’s encouraged me to play games I had ignored in my library, clear out ones I’ll never play, and has also made me think more carefully about what I buy. So, while I haven’t completed as many games as I’d like, the site has helped me a lot!

Here’s my progress for the year from the stats page of my profile:

Beginning of January - 276 games

End of December - 249 games

• Galactic Arms Race
  

  9 hours playtime

  24 of 50 achievements

October

Galactic Arms Race was a SG win that I never really played. I put about 8 hours into it over October. Completed all the single player missions and collected a few achievements on the way. A lot of the remaining achievements require grinding or other players. As the multiplayer seems dead and I don’t really like the game, I’m gonna mark this as beaten based on the missions. Unlikely I’ll get to complete it.

Not much else to tell. I’ve been busy, so my gaming has just involved quick games of Spelunky, Enter the Gungeon and Nuclear Throne. All games that are easy to play for 10-20 minutes at a time, but unfortunately all games that I’m very bad at! No making much progress in any of them tbh.

• Trine 2
  

  11 hours playtime

  21 of 97 achievements

• Cogs
  

  5 hours playtime

  13 of 18 achievements

• Beat Cop
  

  16 hours playtime

  30 of 32 achievements

September

Beaten a few games this month, although I did spend most of my time in Rising Storm 2: Vietnam - No major progress in terms of achievements and it’s not really a game you can ‘finish’. I put about 50 hours into this game this month and finally feel like I can contribute to the team I’m on!

Trine 2 An old SG win that I never really got into. I completed the main story, but didn’t get anywhere near all the achievements. I didn’t enjoy the game enough to try for them. It’s now in ‘Beaten’ and I doubt I’ll come back to it.

Cogs Completed the inventor mode and got through a lot of the timed and move challenges, but stuck on a few so don’t think I’ll complete this. Similar to Trine 2, in that this was another very old SG win that I didn’t really get into. Glad I gave it a decent go and completed the main part of the game.

Beat Cop Enjoyed this a lot more than the other two. The final two achievements require a new run through, and it’s a bit repetitive for me to do that right away. Might come back at some point though. Fun little game from Humble Bundle. Glad I didn’t pay full price, but fun if you get it on sale.

Last month I mentioned that I had deleted a lot of games from my library. I guess the stats for the site hadn’t updated, as it’s only now I’ve noticed the change. Not a huge change, but those deletions and me updating the info on BLAEO has helped my stats a little.

August

My posts are becoming less frequent and it’s difficult to keep track of which ‘week’ of my backlog assassination, so I’m switching to the more common monthly reports.

I had a bit of a cull and deleted a lot of games that I didn’t have any real interest in playing or had got sick of (about 30 in total!). Also bought a few, so there have been quite a lot of changes in my library.

I’ve been jumping between these games for the last month, but nothing beaten or completed:
Bioshock - had it forever, but never really made an effort to play it. I remember getting a bit stuck fairly early in the game and not knowing where I should go. Also got very creeped out by the characters! I’m past that now, and have made some decent progress.
Torchlight - got this in a bundle, but never played it as I’m not really into rpgs and the whole fantasy genre. Better than I expected, although feels a bit grindy at times.
Shovel Knight - fun! some difficult parts, but generally feels like a good difficulty curve that keeps me coming back for more.
Crookz - picked this up in a bundle. It’s ok, but I have to be in the right mood.
The Curious Expedition - pretty difficult, but good fun. Quite different to any other game I have.
Beholder - dark. I really like the theme of the game. I read some fairly critical reviews, but enjoying it so far.
Renowned Explorers - feels a bit shallow, and I don’t like the limit of 5 expeditions. Seems silly to stop at 5 then have to start again. Not bad though.

…and after a long break, I’m dipping back into multiplayer games. LFD2 was pretty much the only game I played for a loooong time, but I haven’t played online for a while. Partly because it’s difficult to find populated servers with low lag where I am for a lot of games.

Verdun
Warhammer: End Times - Vermintide
Rising Storm 2 Vietnam

I like Verdun the most, so far. Had it since early access, but didn’t put a lot of time into it. The WW1 setting and weapons are great. Nothing like the panic of trying to reload in time to shoot an approaching enemy, and the action of shooting is much more satisfying than an automatic weapon. Hopefully the recent Humble Bundle inclusion will increase the number of players.
Vermintide is fun, but there’s more emphasis on hand to hand combat than I’d like. I guess it’s like LFD2 or Payday. Hasn’t grabbed me in the same way as LFD2 though.
Rising Storm - only played a few hours in this, but seems very difficult. A lot of veterans from the early Rising Storm games, and the lack of a single player option (as far as I can see) means you’re thrown in the deep end - having difficulty locating/identifying enemies, and accidentally killing teammates! Probably doesn’t help that I don’t bother with microphones.

Multiplayer

On the topic of multiplayer games, if anyone wants to get achievements or just play for fun (I’m too old for the super-serious, clan-affiliated, abuse hurling play that kids these days enjoy!) in any of the multiplayer games in my library, then add me on steam and mention this post or message here. I’m in Japan and play around 9-11pm some weekdays and a little earlier at the weekend, which can it difficult for timing and server locations but so long as there isn’t too much lag I’m game.