I had so many plans this weekend. Go running, go to the cinema, sort the garden out, go and buy clothes. I have done none of these things. I am also aware that I have not written in my own blog or read anybody elses blogs for several days.
Perhaps I can find something to write about if I tell you what I have been doing.
Dragon Quest
While wandering around town yesterday buying groceries and such like, I found myself in the video store looking at the remnants of the Playstation 2 games available second hand. It would appear that shops have almost totally converted to the “next generation” games machines now - even though only one family in twenty can afford them.
(As an aside, I feel sorry for people who have bought XBox 360’s - apparently a third of all machines sold are failing, and have cost Microsoft over one and a half billion in repair costs alone… their entertainment division has lost more than 7 billion in the last year or so. How long until they cancel their games machine programme entirely?)
Anyway - “Dragon Quest” - what is it? I bought it from the bargain bin for something to play, and have been pleasantly surprised. Its a role playing game in much the same guise as Final Fantasy, where you wander a magical land fighting baddies, finding treasure, helping people and generally having lots of fun, frustration and lose your temper from time to time.
The game appears to be a stepping stone (in development terms) between Final Fantasy X, and Final Fantasy XII. There is an open 3D world for you to explore, with towns and people wandering the streets. The only difference seems to be that in the latest Final Fantasy you can always see your enemies up ahead, and can avoid them - in Dragon Quest fights happen at random as you wander around.
In a way I can understand the random fights, because the “forced encounters” do mean you gain experience and skills - even if you do end up having twenty fights while walking from one town to another.
Where Dragon Quest is far more appealing (in my opinion) is it’s humor. Where many role playing games take themselves far too seriously, this time fights are fun - during an encounter you can roar at your enemy to try and scare them away… cat monster things sometimes ignore their chance to attack you because they are too busy cleaning themselves.
You get the idea. I don’t know how long I will carry on playing it for (it only cost me a couple of pounds, and this is very much more a “W” game than a “me” game), but the signs are looking good.
So there you go - that’s what I did yesterday evening. I also watched “Analyse This”, the movie with Billy Crystal and Robert DeNiro in. Halfway through the movie I realised (while feeling sorry for the Billy Crystal character) that it was essentially the same story as “Meet the Fockers” - another movie I didn’t laugh at because I felt so sorry for the guy being continually dumped on.
The rest of my Sunday (what remains of it) will probably be filled with washing clothes ready for the week ahead. We might go to see the new Harry Potter movie, but I’m not exactly excited about it this time - perhaps because I know the 5th book was the hardest to read (it was SO boring!).