I had intended to write a blog post about my plans for this year but then Star Trek: Online went free to play. So in honour of this wonderfully beautiful fact I'll write a short review of the game then I'll boast about a recent purchase I made, then I'll tell you my plans for the year, is that ok with you? (Don't answer that, this isn't a democracy.)
Star Trek: Online (STO) is a Massively Multiplayer Online Role-Playing Game, or Muhmorpuhguh(MMORPG) I've played it for 3 or 4 days now and my honest opinion is that it's a very good game. I didn't like it at first because I couldn't quite work out what was missing that made it feel so hollow but once I placed it I was able to move on from that. What was missing was that space flight was lacking that "Oh my effing gee I'm in a space ship moving at a theoretical maximum of 9.9 times the speed of light to the power of 10" feeling and felt more like going for a stroll while having small white things thrown at you. But once you get over the disappointment of warp speed feeling more like a brisk jog. If you like Star Trek you really should give ST:O a go, it's a brilliant way to re-enter the incredible universe created by Gene Roddenberry. It hasn't been cannibalised for profit which was my biggest fear at first but it's so faithful, with hundreds of throwbacks to the series, whether that's NPCs (Non-Playable Characters) who are in some way related to a series character or a mission in reference to a series plot.
I started off playing as my favourite species in the Star Trek universe, the Ferengi, (Jooble Blob the Ferengi Engineer, to be precise.) but found myself unable to role-play properly as their preferred tactics in battle tend to be to run away screaming, but boy do they have the lobes for profit. I restarted in the late hours of Saturday in a fascinating new role, Lieutenant Commander Solak the Vulcan science officer, Captain of the U.S.S Un-Imaginable, formerly of the Un-Fathomable, jointly of the Un-Thinkable. He's having a whale of a time running missions for the United Federation of Planets. It really is a brilliantly faithful and enjoyable game, so much so in fact that it's torn me away from Skyrim, which has been my life since 11/11/11.
My recent purchase is a wonderful piece of magic called the Asus EeePad Transformer Prime (and yes, I'm aware of the cheap sales move to put the words "Transformer" and "Prime" in the same search key so Optimus Prime, of Transformers can give them some accidental advertising.) It's brilliant, in fact I'm typing up this post on it as we speak. It's a tablet that connects with a keyboard dock, thus converting it into a touch screen notebook.
It runs Android (Ice cream Sandwich, 4.0) on a 1280x800 touch-screen using the world's first quad-core tablet CPU and come with a standard 32GB flash storage, full specs here.
I'm still discovering things right now, like the fact that it comes with a free copy of splashtop remote desktop functionality for accessing computers on the same wi-fi seamlessly, I've played with that kind of software before but it's never felt as smooth, always been jittery and had resolution problems, this one changes the host PC(or Mac)'s resolution to match that of the remote device which was really the icing on the cake for me.
The keyboard dock is incredible, at first I half expected it to be a cheap clunky horrible affair that I'd only use to dock the tablet in when I wasn't using it but no, I find myself using it as a laptop more than a tablet, which I tend to use mostly for games and the occasional portrait view of something. The dock also comes with a built in SD card reader and USB slot for connecting an external storage of cd/DVD drive to.
My new year's resolutions are as follows, yes I know it's almost a month late but I only just decided to have some, so shoot me (please don't).
Learn a new word (how to spell it, how to pronounce it and how to use it in context) each week.
Go on a 2 hour long walk 3 times a week.
Get a job and finish my Computer Engineering Level 2 BTEC studies, been slacking off recently.
Study in intricate detail the back of my own hands so I can use the phrase "I know it like the back of my hand." and not feel like a liar.
and most importantly, blog once a week.
Star Trek: Online (STO) is a Massively Multiplayer Online Role-Playing Game, or Muhmorpuhguh(MMORPG) I've played it for 3 or 4 days now and my honest opinion is that it's a very good game. I didn't like it at first because I couldn't quite work out what was missing that made it feel so hollow but once I placed it I was able to move on from that. What was missing was that space flight was lacking that "Oh my effing gee I'm in a space ship moving at a theoretical maximum of 9.9 times the speed of light to the power of 10" feeling and felt more like going for a stroll while having small white things thrown at you. But once you get over the disappointment of warp speed feeling more like a brisk jog. If you like Star Trek you really should give ST:O a go, it's a brilliant way to re-enter the incredible universe created by Gene Roddenberry. It hasn't been cannibalised for profit which was my biggest fear at first but it's so faithful, with hundreds of throwbacks to the series, whether that's NPCs (Non-Playable Characters) who are in some way related to a series character or a mission in reference to a series plot.
I started off playing as my favourite species in the Star Trek universe, the Ferengi, (Jooble Blob the Ferengi Engineer, to be precise.) but found myself unable to role-play properly as their preferred tactics in battle tend to be to run away screaming, but boy do they have the lobes for profit. I restarted in the late hours of Saturday in a fascinating new role, Lieutenant Commander Solak the Vulcan science officer, Captain of the U.S.S Un-Imaginable, formerly of the Un-Fathomable, jointly of the Un-Thinkable. He's having a whale of a time running missions for the United Federation of Planets. It really is a brilliantly faithful and enjoyable game, so much so in fact that it's torn me away from Skyrim, which has been my life since 11/11/11.
My recent purchase is a wonderful piece of magic called the Asus EeePad Transformer Prime (and yes, I'm aware of the cheap sales move to put the words "Transformer" and "Prime" in the same search key so Optimus Prime, of Transformers can give them some accidental advertising.) It's brilliant, in fact I'm typing up this post on it as we speak. It's a tablet that connects with a keyboard dock, thus converting it into a touch screen notebook.
It runs Android (Ice cream Sandwich, 4.0) on a 1280x800 touch-screen using the world's first quad-core tablet CPU and come with a standard 32GB flash storage, full specs here.
I'm still discovering things right now, like the fact that it comes with a free copy of splashtop remote desktop functionality for accessing computers on the same wi-fi seamlessly, I've played with that kind of software before but it's never felt as smooth, always been jittery and had resolution problems, this one changes the host PC(or Mac)'s resolution to match that of the remote device which was really the icing on the cake for me.
The keyboard dock is incredible, at first I half expected it to be a cheap clunky horrible affair that I'd only use to dock the tablet in when I wasn't using it but no, I find myself using it as a laptop more than a tablet, which I tend to use mostly for games and the occasional portrait view of something. The dock also comes with a built in SD card reader and USB slot for connecting an external storage of cd/DVD drive to.
My new year's resolutions are as follows, yes I know it's almost a month late but I only just decided to have some, so shoot me (please don't).
Learn a new word (how to spell it, how to pronounce it and how to use it in context) each week.
Go on a 2 hour long walk 3 times a week.
Get a job and finish my Computer Engineering Level 2 BTEC studies, been slacking off recently.
Study in intricate detail the back of my own hands so I can use the phrase "I know it like the back of my hand." and not feel like a liar.
and most importantly, blog once a week.
