Gamers Delight

"Why are you playing that game?"  It's a question I hear very often and I have been thinking about it a lot recently.  I think in general, video games are very good to us in that it can stretch our imagination and our creativity.  In a lot ways, it can show us what we can accomplish beyond our normal lives.  Sometimes in video games it can be very life-like (almost like reality).  Other times, it can be very surreal (like being in a fantasy world).  There are games that can challenge our minds (like strategy games), or there are games that are more action oriented.  Just like any book, there are many types of games that can appeal to wide range of people. 

Currently, I am playing Diablo 3.  The reason why I like this game a lot is because it is very much an high-paced, action-oriented game.  You are collecting gear to make your character stronger and gaining experience to further increase your character's power.  I am also playing on "hardcore" mode, which is where you have only 1 life (so if your character dies, it is gone forever along with the gear).  I am also playing Hearthstone some of the time.  Hearthsone is card-based game where you are playing against another player.  Each turn, players get to play cards that will eventually beat the other player.  The reason that I like playing this game is because it takes lots of strategy in building your deck and playing your cards in the right order.  I have also played World of Warcraft (WoW) in the past.  WoW is a MMORPG which means it is a massive mutliplayer online role playing game.  Although Hearthstone and WoW are great games, I prefer a more action-oriented game which is why I am still playing Diablo 3. 

In the future, I think the video game industry will continue to grow.  I have been playing video games ever since the original NES system was introduced (all the way back when it was introduced in Japan).  I have seen the growth of the video game industry with its better graphics and advanced gameplay.  I can only assume that the video game industry will continue to produce more advanced technology to further make video games more life-like or more surreal.  Maybe one day, we will all be using virtual reality technology and converse with each other using this technology.  Who knows one day (maybe) the vidoe game world might be more interesting to live in than the real world. 

Paragon 600

Well I finally hit paragon 600 for season 3. 

Took longer than I expected.  Even though my non-seasonal paragon level is only at 585, this season's progress went very quickly.  One reason is because I did many greater rift level 40's with my character.  It must be giving me lots of bonus xp at the higher greater rifts.  My previous highest greater rift was a level 35 on my wizard in season 2.  I don't know how much more paragon levels I can do before the season 3 ends.  Perhaps I can reach paragon 700 but I think that it is too far away even though there seems to be lots of time before the season ends.  I got a week off from work starting today so I hope I can do lots of xp farming this week.

I haven't tried doing the Public Test Realm stuff yet (maybe I should).  I really don't like to do ptr stuff because all your progress won't count.  But I would like to test out the new features and how my characters would work in the new patch.  To me it would be better to wait until the "real" patch comes into effect. 

I also decided to play with the monk in the new season when it starts.  My goal is to play each class for one season each.  On the first season, I played with the witch doctor (although I mostly played non-season that season).  The second season, I played with the wizard and for the current season I am playing with the demon hunter.  I figure the monk would be the next logical choice since I have played all the int classes first and now the dex class second.  After season 4, I guess I will be playing either the barbarian or the crusader. 

Died Again

Well I died again in Diablo 3.  It's been my fourth death this season already.  Having not died at all the previous season, this is a bit of a shock to me.  But then again not really.  I knew I would be doing a very high greater rift on my demon hunter so the potential of me losing another character was very high.  I had been running greater rifts 42 and 43 a bunch of times before and had very few problems with it.  The problem with running those rifts is that at any time, there could be that one elite or rare pack that could kill you. 

The potential for very high death rates in the higher greater rifts only increases the problems coming in patch 2.3.0.  With Kanai's Cube, the greater the chance everyone to reach a higher greater rift exists.  But with that increase in the power, also comes with increase in the amount of damage taken (which leads to more deaths).  The problem isn't the amount of power one can reach with the new system but it is the amount of toughness one can stack with their gear.  Unfortunately, you can't just rely on stacking toughness anymore since you will need the dps to clear a greater rift.  So balancing damage and toughness on a hardcore character is really difficult right now as well as in the future.  I hope that the Blizz dev team can think of a way to limit the damage take at higher greater rifts or increase the toughness through gear. 

Well fortunately for me, I had just created a backup character about a week ago in case anything bad did happen to my character.  I just didn't think it would be this soon.  I have already geared my backup and I am able to clear a greater rift 40 so I don't think I lost too much progress.  The only thing I really don't like doing right now is leveling up my legendary gems again because it takes a very long to level them up.  I also am now using an Unity ring with my demon hunter so hopefully this will prevent a future death.  I am quickly approaching paragon level 600 for season 3 so I am excited about that.  Well time to go back grinding, see you next week (hopefully without any more deaths :)). 

Mistakes

I recently watched the semi final game between Japan and England at the Women's World Cup of soccer.  Unfortunately for team England, one of their players scored a goal into their own net and consequently lost the game.  Well I do feel bad for that player but on the other hand, I'm sure that we all have made many mistakes ourselves (though maybe not as crucial).  I can think of many mistakes that I have made over my lifetime.  The best way of dealing with our mistakes is to convince ourselves that on the next chance we get, we will make the best decision to get the right result.  Didn't do so well on a test at school?  Well lets study a bit more and do better next time.  Got your character killed while playing a video game?  Find out what killed your character and try not to make the same mistake again. We should always try to learn from our mistakes so that we won't make the same mistake again. 

Some people say that the way to minimize making mistakes is to be very passive.  I do not like this attitude especially in sports.  Too often a team will stop attacking and just play defense.  Once a team does this though, it doesn't give them a chance to finish an opponent.  This was the most evident in the game between the Seahawks and the Packers in the NFC finals game.  The Packers didn't try to score touchdowns when they had lead and eventually the Seahawks came back and beat them.  "All the shots we don't take, will never result in a goal."

I know making mistakes makes us feel bad but I know that whenever I make a mistake, the next time I won't. Just like I am sure that team England decided to play harder so that they would not lose the next game.  And so they did Saturday by beating Germany in the 3rd/4th game.  So congrats to Team England for 3rd place at the Women's World Cup.