Silk Road Online

“The first experience a player shall have is of one large world waiting to be explored and shaken up; a constant progressing adventure.” – Silk Road Online

After researching for various Free-To-Play games I came across links to Silk Road Online quite often. So, I decided to give it a try. As the quote above says, it is a large world waiting to explored.

The game was designed to re-enact the Silk Road trades from the 7th Century. Through the use of the game as a MMORPG, it is based on history, culture and stories of each and every Silk Road trade route. I love history and culture so I thought this would be a great game for me. Plus, the armor was pretty cute - and if you know me I love clothes in real life as much as I do in games!

While downloading the game (which took quite a few hours), I read up on their Cartoon Guides via their official website. They were rather cute and helpful to beginners and quite funny actually. Their website is very informative and if you plan to play this game, I suggest you browse through it while downloading the game as well.

While this is a Free to Play game, don’t expect it to be totally free. Sure, it could be if you don’t want any of the goodies which come via the Item Mall. It seems every “Free” game out there has these and this one is no exception. JoyMax has to make money too ya know!

Once I was finally able to make my character I was a bit disappointed. Very minimal customization was allowed. Then another big bummer came when I tried to login – the servers can be full! I haven’t read a “try again later” message when trying to login to something since the days of dial-up on AOL.

I played my character up to level 10 or so. The server was overcrowded (once I was finally able to get in) which made me quite laggy. The directions of what to do once inside the game were minimal and confusing. The map doesn’t show the full area which was highly annoying.

While I didn’t get to enjoy the possible positives of the game, I will list them here. They do offer a private and street stall to sell items. There is a message/friends tool which would have been quite nice too I am sure. There is also something called a Guardian System which means that high levels can help new players and they are rewarded for doing so.

Overall, the game looks a lot better on their website than it does while actually playing it. I was overly annoyed by this game after just a few hours. However, it is worth a try. It is free to try and who knows you may just like it more than I did.

Happy Halloween!

Halloween is the holiday most kids can’t wait for, but just what is it actually a celebration of? How did the traditions we know of come about? Is it, as some claim, a kind of demon worship? Or is it just a harmless ancient pagan ritual?

“Halloween” actually has its origins in the Catholic Church; it comes from a corruption of “All Hallows Eve,” “All Hallows Day,” or “All Saint’s Day.” November 1st, is a Catholic day of observance in honor of saints. But, in the 5th century BC in Celtic Ireland, summer officially ended on October 31st. The holiday was called Samhain (sow-en), the Celtic New Year. One story says that on that day, the disembodied spirits of all those who have died throughout the preceding year would come back in search of living bodies to possess for the next year. It was believed to be their only hope for the afterlife. The Celts believed all laws of space and time were suspended during this time, allowing the spirit world to intermingle with the living. Naturally, the living didn’t want to be possessed. So, on the night of October 31st, villagers would extinguish the fires in their homes to make them cold and undesirable. Then, they would dress up in ghoulish costumes and noisily parade around the neighborhood, being destructive in order to frighten away spirits looking for bodies to possess. Because, what spirit would want an unruly body that looked frightening? Even those spirits have standards to live up to!

The ideas of the practices changed over time to become more ritualized. The practice of dressing up in costumes like ghosts and witches took on a more ceremonial role. Irish immigrants fleeing their country’s potato famine brought the custom of Halloween to America in the 1840s. At that time, the favorite pranks in New England included tipping over outhouses (no toilet paper for the trees?) and unhinging fence gates.

The custom of trick-or-treating is thought to have originated not with the Irish Celts, but with a ninth century European custom called “souling.” On November 2nd, “All Souls Day,” early Christians would walk from village to village begging for “soul cakes” made out of square pieces of bread with currants. The more soul cakes the beggars would receive, the more prayers they would promise to say on behalf of the dead relatives of the donors. At the time, it was believed that the dead remained in limbo for a time after their death, and that prayer (even by strangers) could expedite a soul’s passage to heaven.

The jack-o-lantern custom probably came from Irish folklore. As the tale is told, a man named Jack who was notorious as a drunkard and trickster, tricked Satan into climbing up a tree. Jack then carved an image of a cross in the tree’s trunk, trapping the devil up the tree. Jack made a deal with the devil that if he would never tempt him again, he would promise to let him down the tree. According to the folk tale, after Jack died he was denied entrance to Heaven because of his evil ways, but he was also denied access to Hell because he had tricked the devil. Instead, the devil gave him a single ember to light his way through the darkness. The ember was placed inside a hollowed-out turnip to keep it glowing longer. The Irish originally used turnips as their “Jack’s lanterns.” But, when the immigrants came to America, they found that pumpkins were far more plentiful than turnips. So, the jack-o-lantern in America was a hollowed-out pumpkin, lit with an ember.

So, although some cults and devil worshipers may have adopted Halloween as their favorite holiday, the day itself didn’t grow out of evil practices. It grew out of the rituals of Celts celebrating their new year, and out of medieval prayer rituals of Europeans. Today, it is only as evil as one cares to make. Have fun this Halloween, and remember to be safe!

Harry Potter

One of my birthday presents this year was the boxed set of the Harry Potter books. I’ve never read any of the books before, but I had seen the movies 10+ times each (at least). I started reading the books just before I went on vacation in September and I didn’t stop until I finished book 7 last week. I was so drawn in by the books that I didn't stop to eat, watch my favorite shows or do anything I had planned. I stayed up reading unitl 2 or 3 in the morning even! It is just that good!

After reading all of the books, I have to admit it is one hell of a page turner. Even from seeing the movies, the books give a more in-depth insight into the world of Harry Potter. Which is better? Well, I don’t think I can judge that one. They both get an A+ from me! Sorry this post is so short, but in order to give the books justice I think I need to read them again to give a proper review. Plus well, I want to read them again!

Have you read the Harry Potter books? Have you seen the movies? What do you think of the series? Did you like how it turned out at the end? What would you have liked to have seen happen?

I'm Back!

This is just a quick blog to let those who read this know that I am alive. Last week I was on vacation in Maggie Valley, North Carolina with my family. Here is a short version of the trip for all those interested…

My parents, grandma and Aunt Doris went with me on this trip. We stayed at my dad’s friend’s house which was really more like a log cabin mansion. It was a really nice house, but will be much nicer once finished. It would also be nicer if his “interior designer” actually did the job correctly – but this is another story. I was supposed to be staying in the finished bedroom downstairs. However, I only lasted there for one night due to spiders. UGH – I HATE spiders. I killed a few and couldn’t sleep after thinking they could be in the room/bed with me. Ick! So, for the remaining nights I ended up sleeping on an oversized chair with an ottoman. Not too comfy, but it beats thinking spiders could be in bed with me!

The driveway going up to the house was quite bad. It was dirt and rocks going up a steep driveway along a side of a very tall mountain. My dad is the best drive I know though, so he was fine with driving up and down it. However, that didn’t stop my grandma from freaking out each and every time we had to use the driveway.

We went somewhere each day, so that occupied quite a bit of time. We visited my Aunt Stacy and Uncle Greg at their house one afternoon (they live near there). We went to Pigeon Forge, TN to do some shopping. We ate somewhere everyday and I didn’t always stick to my diet. I won’t be eating French fries again for a long time. There was a lot of pretty scenery and equally as much driving. Gas prices were through the roof though, and quite often we found gas stations with no gas at all!

The last day of the trip my Mom and I had the best time. We went to the casino in Cherokee, which was the first time I had ever gambled. I only played with $10 and on the cheap slot machines, but it was fun! After that we ate lunch at a restaurant at the casino. It was really good and actually cheaper than most places we had been eating at around there. Then we went gem mining. I’ve done this a few times before and I’ve always enjoyed doing it. This time though, I actually had a necklace made from a gem I mined. It is a mystic fire topaz. Really pretty!

I also did some reading while on this trip. I finished book 2 and 3 from the Harry Potter series. Yeah, I love Harry Potter and I’m 25 – so what? I got the whole set for my birthday and I’m reading them in order.

Overall, I am very happy to be back. My bed is soo much better than an oversized chair, I missed my computer and all the comforts of being “home.” This blog ended up being a bit longer than I expected, but oh well.

Hurricane Season

Growing up with constant threats of hurricanes every year, I am used to hurricanes. Florida gets hit quite often, and I lived in central Florida for most of my life. Packing up my stuff that I was allowed to fit in my bags and then evacuating with my family – possibly leaving everything else behind to get blown away. Luckily, nothing severe ever happened to our house or even the city we lived in.

In 2004, hurricanes hit Florida one after another. Remember that? I sure do. Even a seasoned hurricane Floridian was sick and tired of hurricanes after that. Sure, “hurricane parties” were fun and all – but the threat sure isn’t something to look forward to. We actually had a close call with tornadoes from Hurricane Charlie near where I lived in Orlando. The most severe hurricane that season was Hurricane Katrina. It didn’t hit Florida that hard but everyone remembers it from New Orleans’ devastation. They are still trying to recover from that hurricane.

Now, we have Hurricane Gustav that is hitting those along the Gulf today. We also have Tropical Storm Hanna (Hurricane Hanna sounds catchy and somehow that doesn’t seem like a good thing) out in the Atlantic right now. Hopefully, these hurricanes (and anymore that end up spawning out there) don’t cause devastation like some hurricanes have in the past. My thoughts and prayers go out to those in the path of these storms.

Shaiya

Shaiya is an online MMORPG that is part of Aeria Games. That means, it is free to play – unless you want to use the good stuff which costs you Aeria Points. I found this game from when I last reviewed Last Chaos which is also an Aeria game. I have been playing it off and on ever since. Online gaming isn’t new to me, so I understood many things about it. However, if you aren’t so inclined in the online gaming community, Shaiya offers newbie classes. I found this to be a cute and helpful thing for players, if they utilize it.

Character creation was actually quite nice. It allows you to zoom in on the character and rotate – great for checking out hairstyles! Shaiya only allows your account to play on the Alliance of Light or the Alliance of Fury though. This means that you can only create characters on one side. I decided to go with the Fury (also known as the dark side). They have hotter armor and I liked the characters more.

Once inside the world, I found that how the characters run is a little funny looking. The game loading music and music in some areas reminds me of Harry Potter. However, overall the graphics are great! Perhaps even better than some monthly subscription ones.

Questing was often dull, and I didn’t find a real storyline in the game. Don't expect to find any cutscenes or anything here. That was a bit disappointing because I like storylines in games. Nevertheless, grinding and killing stuff in a party was often fun. I actually made it to level 51 on my normal mode Pagan. I’m working on getting that to level 53 so I match. Hey, looking cute is a part of gaming too! I'm also working on a normal mode Assassin and a hard mode Oracle and hard mode Pagan.

Once a player reaches 50 in normal mode, hard mode is unlocked. Once a player reaches 50 hard mode, ultimate mode is unlocked. Only think I really dislike (and do NOT approve of) about this is that if a character dies in ultimate mode and either isn’t raised by a person or a resurrection rune (bought with AP of course) – they lose that character completely! As in, character is no longer there at login screen and everything on your character is gone too. That is just crap if you ask me.

PvP is not my thing in any game. Shaiya made no exception on this matter. Their PvP area is all about Light vs. Fury. The towers controlled equals which side has blessing and how much. I really did not enjoy PvP at all in this game. Perhaps it is because I am not good at it; perhaps it is because I had bad luck. I’m not sure, nor do I care. It just wasn’t my thing. I prefer to go kill monsters than people.

Monsters in this game were well designed. They were well detailed and interesting. There were even partially nude ones that were half-female half-snake or horse. Oh, I forgot to mention you have to be 18+ years old to play this game.

Overall, I enjoyed playing this game. There are many bugs they should fix and upgrades they should make. However, if or when they ever will, I do not know. As in most games, if your friends don’t play or play as often, it gets boring. It is a game I’d suggest giving a shot because it is free and will guarantee to take up many hours of your boredom. Happy Gaming!

Simulation Gaming

Lately I have wanted to play some of my simulation style games. So, going old school I pulled out The Great Empires Collection II, Sim City 4 Deluxe Edition, Sim City Societies, Sid Meier's Civilization IV and a new online browser style game called Ikariam.

The Great Empires Collection II was one of my first simulation city/world building games. I really quite liked playing it when I first got it, so I figured I would again re-playing. However, the old graphics and general lack of things to do proved me wrong. I guess I have just been too spoiled with updated games for me to appreciate older games such as this classic. It does offer quite a few options of play ruler-wise. I prefered the Pharoh one myself.

Sim City 4 Deluxe Edition is a great game. By far it is the best Sim City game out there. I remember I loved playing this game when I got it, but only could play it for maybe an hour at a time because it would crash on me. However, this time around it didn’t! A new PC in between that time helped too I’m sure. Playing a city or a region of cities and watching them grow and expand is really fun. I also liked watching the buildings get fancier or even become abandoned. I definitely recommend this game to anyone who enjoys these kinds of games.

Sim City Socities is a really cool game. It is similar to Sim City 4 - but not quite the same. The graphics are a lot better but unfortunately that caused my PC to crash out of the game every half hour to 45 minutes. Beware the system requirements even if met may cause the same thing. Not sure why this happens, but it does. If it didn’t do this to me, I may have enjoyed it more. Overall, I recommend trying it out. The price has really dropped on this item, so why not?

Sid Meier's Civilization IV was the first of the Civilization series games I tried. It was fun but the turn-based style annoyed me. It was a bit too slow. The single-player custom game was slow and doesn’t offer the option of just playing alone (without other nations invading in on you). Overall, it looked cooler on the box than actually playing it.

Ikariam is a web version of the above games, I guess. It is free and has nothing to download. It is constantly going on – even if you don’t login to play. I signed up for an account to check it out. I played off and on for a few days. Basically, don’t expect to get much accomplished in a short time. It won’t happen. Don’t expect to do much each time you login because it takes a long time to build or upgrade buildings, research things, etc. On the upside, you don’t have to do much to play it. Perhaps it gets better further on once you can expand to other islands and such. It is worth messing around with because you really have nothing to lose by doing so. They make their money off of people buying “Ambrosia” which I am not sure what the point of getting is yet. They sell 100 for $14.99 or 1,000 for $79.99. Not something I’d invest in, but whatever floats your boat.

After playing all of these games, the one that gets my stamp of approval is Sim City 4. It is the best overall game and for only $14.99 now it is in everyone’s price range. I would like to check out some new simulation style games, but for now I’ll stick with this one. Happy gaming!

Celebrity Morph and Look-A-Likes

I came across this rather interesting tool for celebrity facial morphing today. It was really easy to use. Just needed to upload a photo then it finds a celebrity that best matches you from the facial recognition. Very cool. Here is mine:

So, I guess I look like Monica Belluci. She is an Italian actress, who after viewing her IMDB page appears to be a very good actress. How cool is that?

Here is my collage of the ladies I look like most, according to this website.

*UPDATE - links no longer working!

So You Think You Can Dance

Congratulations to Joshua on winning this season of So You Think You Can Dance! He was my favorite male competitor. His original partner Katee was my favorite female in the competition. Katee came in 2nd place this season. What a great match! The finale was really great. The judges picked most of my favorite dances from this season to show again, one of which is below: “No Air” from the winners: Joshua and Katee! Enjoy!



Katee and Josh from So You Think You Can Dance

Big Brother Twins?

Is it just me or do Big Brother players Daniele (Big Brother Season 8) and Keesha (Big Brother Season 10) look like twins? Perhaps not identical twins, but twins. The similarities are easy enough to see (view picture above). What do you think?

Personally, I like them both. They both seem to be good people and play a good Big Brother game. Daniele came in 2nd place on season 8, with her dad, Dick Donato coming in 1st place. If Keesha comes in 2nd place, it would be quite eerie. As it is now though, she is my favorite in the house for season 10. The rest of the houseguests (with a few exceptions) quite annoy me.