Skyrim: I used to be a blogger, then I took an arrow in the knee

Wow has it really been over a month since my last blog? Well I think I owe a very good explanation as to why this happened because on 11/11/11 this baby arrived at my doorstep.

Okay obviously when I'm playing this shit (and by shit I actually mean the most epic game ever), I look nothing like the above photo. I'm seriously sitting in front of the PC without any make-up in my baggy jamies, hair completely unwashed, with five slices of pizza and beer to last me for the ten hours of dragon-slaying fun. But if I post that photo I'm pretty sure I'd scare the shit out of you.

I was at first reluctant to post this blog up because its a totally different topic for my readers but then I realized that to be a good blogger, you have to be a well rounded one. So after losing around 150 hours of my precious life to this game (I'd lose more but finals and papers kept me away), I decided to make a blog post explaining why Skyrim is for everyone -- for the sexual-deviants, the kleptos, the deranged twilight fans, and yes, theres a place in Skyrim for you too. 

I really want more female gamers to play this so we can brush each other's hair and talk about our epic adventures across Skyrim -- acceptance into the Thieves' Guild, stealing copious amounts of carrots and leaks and hiding them in Solitude, joining the Companions. We can laugh about blacking out after a drinking competition and waking up to the horror that we sold someone's goat to the neighborhood giant! What fun that would be.

HOARDERS

Do you ever have that feeling of wanting to keep everything you've ever owned? Well now you can! Almost everything in Skyrim can be picked up which means you can hoard as much shit as humanly possible. Now some people get creative with this and really go out of their way to show off their hoarding skills. Others, not so much but thats not the point. The point isn't what you have... ITS HOW MUCH YOU HAVE RIGHT? And the great thing about Skyrim is the variety of items you can hoard (namely, everything). You want a Glenmoril witch head? You got it! A hundred ruined books? Yes, please! Theres so much to hoard and so little time!

INTELLECTUALS

When I first started playing Skyrim, I tried to read every book... This was honestly a mistake as there are hundreds of books in this game with vivid information from how to properly pick a lock to the Falmer's history before enslavement. Maybe you are feeling like reading The Lusty Argonian Maid or maybe a Brief History of the Empire 1-4. For those who have a more keen interest in the literary arts, this is probably a heaven for you. 

ROMANTICS & SWINGERS

For those people who are a little frisky in bed, know that you aren't alone for Haelga in Riften shares the same feelings. Though I'm not sure you can participate in Haelga's ... "fun time", you can get married! I know I know its not the same, but hey its way closer than any ass you're getting ATM right? And your NPC wife will most likely cheat on your sorry ass if you neglect her so in a way, its like settling down and getting into that relationship you always wanted but will never have.

PSYCHOPATHS & SERIAL KILLERS

This one is a given. You kill a bunch of forsworn, bandits, falmers, etc in the game and you don't really give a shit. But for someone to really kill an entire town in Skyrim.. It's quite devastating. You form bonds with these people, deliver their parcels from Riften to Markarth, play tag with the children. I'm convinced that you really do have to be some sort of psychopath or at least extremely intoxicated to wipe out every NPC (as they don't revive without cheats) and save.  But hey, whatever gets you off! I won't tell.

KLEPTOMANIACS

If you're the type of person who loves stealing everything in the real world -- Swiffer Wet Jets, toothbrushes, Haribo gummy bears, enemas, anything, and everything then Skyrim is for you. If the thought of a bag full of stolen Nord mead, troll fat, and wooden buckets are tantalizing for you, then you need to start playing ASAP. If you level up enough you can even pickpocket the clothes off their backs like this fellow. 

FAILED INTERIOR DESIGNERS

With Skyrim, everything is an art. For those withdrawn wannabe art collectors, here is a safe haven for you to go wild with artistic expression in the comfort of your own home. Feel like creating pure havoc in your house with broken pieces of wood, ruined books, and other pieces of precious art that others so hastily call junk but never could? Now you can!

YOU

So for those people who are in self denial to any of these traits or who honestly do not see themselves transforming into a werewolf, decorating their house with assorted meats, killing the entire population of Whiterun, reading every book or collecting every item, there's always the possibility of playing the game as the "normal" human being and killing dragons, ending the civil war, or even just becoming a lone hunter-gatherer and saying fuck you to the whole story line. Whatever you want to do, theres always a place for you in Skyrim. So I hope this is a convincing argument for some of you guys to start playing Skyrim and maybe that hair brushing can start sometime soon.

Until Next Time,

Mint

P.S. All photos aside from the first one are not mine and are property of their respected owners :)

Portal2 Review & Mortal Kombat Came!

 

Mortal Kombat came!!! I bought it because Amazon was having a video game sale and it was 20 dollars off (no way). And I heard this was the best Mortal Kombat since the first one. TBH, I'm not a fan of fighter games but Aaron is so I bought it essentially for him. 

I just played it today so I don't have any real thoughts on it yet. I do love the grotesque setting and slutty costumes that all Mortal Kombat games have so yay *u*!!

I'll do a review on it when I finish (if I finish.. I might just play versus forever with Aaron because the "lucky" chance is so addictingly fun). But now to get down to business....

I beat Portal2 already in both single player & co-op!! For the people who don't know, Portal2 was one of the most anticipated games this year. Let me give a brief run through of what Portal is like... 

In short, you are locked in Aperture Facilities and you have to try and escape with your portal gun. Now this is the freaky part. Your gun creates one portal that when you enter, leads you to the other portal. I think the picture above explains it better than I ever could. Its essentially a first person puzzle game.

Now onto the review. I've played Portal1 and I liked it a lot but I would get frustrated because I'd blow myself up all the time (err well I would just let the laser hit me and die). In Portal2, I actually died probably.. two three times in the entire game. I don't know if they baby proofed the course but I actually enjoyed Portal2 because it was more challenging, but definitely harder to die.

CO-OP is a must have. If you don't have friends, make some... and then persuade them to play with you. The CO-OP story mode is actually around the same time length as the single player. You would think co-op would be easy but its actually pretty hard! We spent a pretty long time figuring the last course out... but thats probably because you can always be a total dick and kill your partner.

Now onto the bad parts. First off, like Portal1, its way too short! This game probably plays... 20-30 hours AT MOST (CO-OP included)... And that is if you have some sort of cognitive disability and can not process shapes and objects. The good thing is that there will be an update where users can create their own maps later on... ILL BE WAITING ON IT

Another bad thing is of course there is zero replay value... once you finish this game. Its done. Also, there isn't a companion cube... WHAT THE FUCK?!? there were actually no other "characters" I could bond with like the first one I know bond with a cube.. dumb right?

Overall I still think this is one of the best games of 2011 simply because of the witty humor and storyline. I mean come on... HOW CAN YOU RESIST POTATO GLADOS?!? HILARIOUS!

Now onto food & etc things...

 

Here is me wearing the shirt I bought the other day! 

We went to Yummy Yummy on Irving St after discovering that New Sandy's chef left... So we are directing our pho and pho-related activities to Yummy Yummy for the time being (well... until New Sandy's cleans their act up!)

The rolls are to die for! Its not your conventional roll but rather, a roll covered in panco-esque batter,

Of course, our beef carpaccio. This is not as good as our usual place but it will suffice for now!

AMAZING!! Spicy noodles. Now I know you guys are all thinking... who eats that at a pho place? Well this is the bomb!!

I kind of miss using my dSLR lately so I've been trying to take photos but then I realized why I use my camera on my phone more now... First of all the convenience... and second of all because dSLRs show all your flaws and imperfections if you don't know how to light the face. But here is a candid photo of me with rilakkuma! I took it myself with my shutter wide open so obviously could not focus as well as I wanted it to ): I should have used f/4 or f/5 instead. DARN ME FOR BEING GREEDY AND WANTING A LOWER ISO!

 

For those of you who are wondering --> f/2.8 iso 400 1/60

Gosh I love the coloring on this lens! Even if I did shop the colors a bit!

Okay before I leave, I wanted to ask you "what games do you guys play?" this can be childhood or whatever (OCARINA OF TIME FTW) Primarily because I've always liked playing until I reached puberty when I decided that tits+make-up>entertainment+games so getting back to playing these past years is really refreshing. 

Until Next Time,

Mint

Nerd Sundays #001: Dead Space 2 for iPad Review

So part of my New Year's resolution is to update my blog more often. I'm sure most of you can tell that I'm not a very committed blogger ): So I decided to motivate myself by blogging at least once a week on things other than what I did or what my make-up looks like because to be honest, that takes a LOT of time/energy to find someone to take my photo or spend time camwhoring then shifting through my photos to find one where I don't look like an alien.

Most of these posts will probably be about photography (such as lens reviews/ lighting tutorials), tech stuff (shit I really want/ apps or games I like)

TOPIC #1: Dead Space 2 on iPad

 

(Awwww yeah. Killing dem bitchez.)

So as you may or may not know, horror games are my favorite genre of gaming. I'm not a fan of RPGs or MMOs (don't boo me ; o ;). I used to be when I was younger (think 12/13) but as a college student with a boyfriend, a dog, a job, and a blog, I simply don't have enough time to put into playing RPGs/MMOs. That, and I get addicted to shit really easily so I could potentially fail a few classes. (When I played RE4 with Aaron, we both spent a whole week of our winter break in our pajamas, living off a combination of canned foods and delivery. Thus, with my shitty immune system, I got really sick from not seeing the sun enough and ruined a good half of our vacation overseas.)


Aaron actually bought Dead Space 2 for the iPad for me. Even after seeing the trailer, I was unconvinced that the game was scary. Something about being trapped in space with mutated aliens just didn't feel scary.  However, after playing for a good fifteen minutes I was scared shitless. I kept dying (its very hard to control on the iPad, mind you!)

(I hate walking past those corpse because I know for sure one of them is about to attack me)

The game play is a third person shooter ordeal. Concept is simple: you perform small missions to find out whats going on. 

It may seem steep for ten dollars on the iPad but trust me, it is well worth it.  The cons of the game are, that I get a headache very fast. This may be due to me squinting to see the details on the iPad. More cons are that upgrades for armor costs real money ): . I'm not a fan of paying real money to upgrade my suit. Also, it may get a bit laggy depending on how many things are running on your iPad


After playing it on the iPad, I decided to buy Dead Space 1 on Steam. Primarily because I have a good computer now so why not optimize its usage I should go in chronological order anyways right? I will upgrade again after I finished Dead Space 1 but so far, I highly recommend the iPad app!

Until Next Time,

Mint