Killed in a smiling accident.

I received an email this afternoon when I got home that contained the code granting early access for, and subsequent rhinoplasty of, my characters in Age of Conan. Or something. It’s definitely got something to do with horns, at least. Or maybe that was getting the horn? Must be all the mature boobies in the game. Not sure what the sexual attraction of antiquated seabirds is, but I suppose that there are stranger things in the worlds of Robert Ervin Howard.

So that’s it. Strapped in, locked down, doors to automatic, turbines to power, all systems are green for go. F.A.B. All ready for the take off of Age of Conan. I’ve given up reading the general bloggerama because there’s no real firm information. Vanguard looked like a train wreck in the making from day one. Age of Conan seems more like Pirates of the Burning Sea in this case: it could go either way, and nobody is really sure which. But there’s more drama in soothsaying doom.

So it’s just a case now of gripping on to the armrests, singing the Golden Grahams song and waiting for the g-force of launch to kick in, followed by the rickety rockety ride through the atmosphere, and then either the weightless elation of orbiting through the gaming heavens, or plunging back to earth in a crimson ball of pure forum-ite flame.

Oh, those Golden Grahams.
Oh, those Golden Grahams.
Crispy, crunchy, Graham cereal,
brand new breakfast treat.

Well, the intention was to write a little reviewlet of Miéville’s Iron Council, but to be honest, in browsing around to see if anyone else thought, like myself, that the book was the expression of an incredibly imagined world of wonder wrapped in a story that dragged like the hind foot of a zombie on fright night, I stumbled into the Debating Iron Council blogstravgansa over at Crooked Timber.

Warning, spoilers abound! I’m putting the warning here, after the link, to punish all those of you who have shot off to read somebody else’s post before finishing with mine. The Internet really doesn’t teach the best of social graces when it comes to the art of conversation, it teaches us more about how to… Ooo, look, goldfish everyone! Goldfish!.

What really interested me was the link about two thirds of the way down the post which pointed to China’s responses to the points raised by several of the bloggers. It’s an interesting read, and gave me an insight into the man behind the book which coloured my opinion differently after having read his point of view, and more importantly showed that he felt that there were some valid criticisms, some of which he had received in the past, which he had tried to correct in Iron Council, obviously with varying success depending on each critics point of view.

But that’s not the really great part, the fun comes further down. In the mire that is the comments. Anyone who has blogged, read a blog, or once knew a man whose auntie’s dog was featured on a blog, will understand what happens in the comments. Generally, you get the nice people, writing to share their thoughts and perhaps heap a little praise on you for being able to do no more, if we’re honest, than string a few sentences together in a vaguely entertaining fashion. Then you get the Commentards; these are the people that have to pick a hole in something that you’ve said - not really justification in itself: debate is, after all, the art of war refined into a slightly less ‘head cleft in twain by sword’ fashion - but crucially, should you dare to respond and attempt a defence of your position they will essentially resort to calling you a Nazi and correct everything you’ve said as though you know nothing about the subject under discussion and that you’re simply trying to oppress them, even if the subject at hand happens to be the best selling book that you wrote.

Fun side-entertainment, head on over to China’s response post, and see if you can spot the point where the poor author’s soul is sundered into a thousand tiny little pieces. Hint: it’s his last post to the comment thread.

Those of you who stayed to finish this post before heading on over there, well done, award yourselves a biscuit and a small caffeinated beverage of your choice. Those of you just coming back from the other thread where you shot off like a puppy after a stick, those of us here who stuck around are now ignoring you like the bad puppy that just peed on grandma’s favourite Victorian winter shawl. While grandma was wearing it. That’s some mighty fine projectile peeing you’ve got going on there.

The wonder of it all though is this: more and more authors are making their presence felt online, and I’m not talking about the stand-offish token page, where you get the impression that the author is wearing industrial marigolds and a face mask, and holding the page out to you at arms length pinched between their finger and thumb so as to make sure that the amount of time that they will be in contact with you, via the page, is as little as possible. No, these authors, the Gaimans and Abercrombies (and I’m sure many others, these are just two of the prominent ones that I happen to read) of the online world, respond to readers either directly in comments or as the focus of their own posts. This rather brave behaviour gives an ‘indirect direct’ access to them that provides insight into the mind behind the stories and the person behind the characters, such that all of their works are enhanced tremendously from knowing them that little bit, as much as you can know anyone online. As much as you know me. For all you know I could be a fifty year old transvestite boxing champion with a walrus moustache, called Marjorie.

I did feel a tinge of sadness though. It was the idea of having such access to luminaries of the past, contact which in the past would have been reserved for only a close circle of friends, that triggered the melancholy; specifically I was thinking of the inimitable Bard himself, seeing as I find myself endlessly marvelling at his wordsmithing. I wondered what he would say to us if he had a blog and could respond to our questions and comments, briefly I marvelled at the possibility of contact with that mind and what insight we could have garnered, until I pulled-up short and realised the inevitable, the one and only comment that he would post: he would tell us all to fuck off, because he was fed-up with having to answer to the griping pedantic diatribes of a bunch of ingrates.

But it would be the most beautiful blog comment ever composed by man.

Amongst many splendid podcasts, Mark Kermode’s film reviews from Simon Mayo’s radio show are always a highlight. “Wittertainment at its most wittertaining”, as Wikipedia definitely doesn’t say. Highlights are the quotes you really wish they would put on film posters instead of “The best comedy of the year!!”, “The best film of the decade!!1!” and “The greatest work of art ever in the history of mankind!1!1!!!”, such as The Santa Clause 3 being “the cinematic equivalent of tertiary syphilis”, and for Captivity: “It’s a Russian-American co-production, and on the basis of this I want the Cold War to start again now”.

On this week’s podcast, Kermode mentioned that someone had taken his Iron Man review, featuring typically Kermodean impersonations of actors that are so bad they’re good, only worse than that so they’re bad again, but then even worse still than that so they wind up being brilliant, and added actual Iron Man footage, and sure enough the result is the greatest ever work of art in the history of mankind (ever).

Earlier in the week Rock, Paper, Shotgun pointed out an Audiosurf update, and I’ve really got back into that over the last few days. I’m now the undisputed MASTER of many songs, thanks to a cunning two-pronged attack of obscurity (nobody else seems to be playing Bad News’ Masturbike or Sizzla’s cover of Subterranean Homesick Blues) and incorrect tagging. Not in a deliberately cheating “tag a high-scoring song as something else” way, just having an MP3 collection spanning many years of using many different rippers with differing ideas about punctuation, character limits and how to tag compilations, so there may be fierce competition on the leader board of “Lily, Rosemary and the Jack of Hearts”, but I’m out there on my own for “Lily, Rosemary and the Jack o”, and I suspect my high score for “Oliver s Army” wouldn’t fare so well against those of “Oliver’s Army”…

Thursday, 0030 hours
Meh. That’s the game uninstalled, worthless pile of junk. Might as well go to bed.

0730 hours
Maybe I should reinstall it and… no. No, I’m never touching it again.

1330 hours
Man, Thursday afternoon off, and nothing to do. Shame that game sucks so badly. I’ll just go around all the MMO forums and tell everyone how terrible it is. Let’s see… “All you suckers ought to start playing this game it is totally amazing!”? Hah, what an idiot. Must be one of the devs under a false name, or a paid shill. I’ll set him right… “Of course if you actually have a life, as I do (with my job that pays so fabulously well I have had to turn down numerous offers to be lead designer of major MMOs and my supermodel wife, my Ferrari doesn’t drive itself you know), you will find yourself at the mercy of sad cases who can afford to play the game all day.”

1410 hours
That’s the MMO forums sorted out, wonder what other people are saying… blah blah blah, brilliant, blah blah blah, rubbish, blah blah blah, people should check This Other Game out instead, it will totally kick That Game’s ass. Hmm. Might as well have a quick look at the website…

1430 hours
OMG look at that concept art OMG it is AMAZING OMG this other game is going to be AMAZING OMG I am totally posting in my blog about it.

1517 hours
OMG look at this dev chat transcript OMG they totally *nail* everything that is wrong with MMOs at the moment at they are totally going to fix and and totally make this other game AMAZING OMG I am totally posting it in my blog.

1849 hours
OMG I just spent hours reading all these community pages and forums and it is totally amazing there are some amazing LOLFUNNY webcomics about this other game and the community is really great and there is amazing fan art and this other game is totally going to be the biggest thing ever in eighteen months time (or maybe two years or a bit longer).

1931 hours
Dammit what kind of idiots do they employ at games shops, I need to reserve a pre-order for this other game and a special edition pre-order and a pre-special pre-edition post-order pre-deluxe box set and they have not even heard of it, I’d better try every other games shop within a thirty mile radius.

2117 hours
“… I know it’s long past closing time, but this is urgent, I tell you. I need the special deluxe collector’s metal tin ultra edition of this other game, and the one that comes with the mecha-penguin pet, not the one that comes with the zombie-wombat, ‘cos the penguin totally has better stats and… yes, I know you’re a wholesale pet food supplier, but I’ve tried every other shop in… ” huh. Line’s gone dead again. I think my phone might be faulty, I should check with the telecom company. Hey, and they might have the pre-order pack with the mecha-penguin…

2240 hours
No luck with reserving the game, never mind, I’ll get back to hyper-analysis of every developer chat or status update. I’ll feed them all into a database and then by running word count analysis and similar I’ll be able to detect which classes they subconsciously favour so I can play them.

2330 hours
OMG OMG OMG OMG OMG OMG they’ve announced a pre-pre-pre-pre-pre-alpha pre-stress pre-test of this other game!1!!1!!! The developer says “Please note, this is simply a wide-scale test of some of our networking tech to monitor world-wide performance, and simply consists of a screen that says ‘HELLO SHAUN’ while the program communicates with our servers.” OMG OMG OMG it’s going to be AMAZING OMG I hope I can take part I’m going off to their site now oh man it’s a bit busy with everyone trying to get in *refresh* come on *refresh* *refresh* come on *refresh* *refresh* *refresh* *refresh”

2359 hours
OMG FilePlanet are distributing the client, and you just need to be a SuperHyperUltraMega Subscriber to get it, only fifty bucks a month and a minimum twelve month contract, totally worth it, DOWNLOADING CLIENT NOW, THIS OTHER GAME HERE I COME!

Wednesday, 0100 hours
Aww, the awesome war-group is breaking up. That was amazing, though, we really took it to the enemy kingdoms. I’m going to post all about it on my blog.

0124 hours
“… and then I was all, like, “SLICE”, and my buddy was all, like, “FIREBALL”, and the enemy were all, like, “oh no way oh man we have no chance you guys are so awesome” and we were all, like, “yeah” and we totally captured the outpost and it was awesome.” Click, post to blog. I’ll just upload this video capture and these screenshots to go with it, there we go.

0130 hours
Just time for a couple of quick posts on some MMO Forums. “All you suckers ought to start playing this game it is totally amazing!”, link to my blog. “HAW HAW World of Carebears check this awesomeness out”, link to my blog.

0735 hours
Just check the blog comments… tsk, that’s so childish. Leaving insulting messages like that, typical of jealous players in other games. Good job I’m mature in my response; edit all their comments so they say “I SMELL”, there we go.

1230 hours
I’ll just pop out to an internet cafe, see how the blog’s doing. Let’s see… usual rubbish, “you outnumbered the opposition”, “you were all level 50 and they weren’t”, “most of the people you killed were AFK”, blah blah, they just don’t recognise true skill. Oh, here we go! “Wow awesome post u should check my site out”, there’s someone who appreciates the finer points of masterful PvP, I’ll definitely look at his site… what a nice man, he’s selling genuine Rowlexe watches at bargain prices, a connoisseur and an altruist.

1732 hours
I can’t wait to get back to that PvP zone, we’re going to crush that enemy Kingdom again! They have no chance, make their time!

1734 hours
Hmm. This outpost is slightly more on-fire than I remember. Sneak attack by the enemy, obviously, best be on guard. Ah hah, there’s one over there, Aragonne, I’ll teach him a lesson, CHARGE! My weapon hit, but… to no effect? And now I can’t move! HAX! Incoming lightning bolt, ARGH!

1735 hours
What the hell gear is he wearing? /inspect… Some purple rare items, some yellow epic items, the pauldrons are an odd shade of puce which makes them mythical quality… he isn’t even carrying anything in his hands. No, wait, there’s an asterisk there, *mouseover*… “To see the item in this slot, please don the special glasses provided in the box that render the colour wavelength of fandabeedozee quality items visible to the human eye.”

1736 hours
/whisper Aragonne “Where did u get that lewt???/?”
Aragonne whispers: “lol while u were killing noobs we were running the temple of krzzzkrzzzyn raid to get phat lewt lol noob”

1822 hours
Argh, corpse camped all the way out of the zone. Man, this sucks. Back to the capital, better get a party together for that temple raid.

1843 hours
All right, here we go, some of last night’s posse are up for raiding the Temple of Krzzzkrzzzyn. We just need to capture the Temple Gates from the enemy Kingdom first. Fire up Teamspeak, we might need the co-ordination, NOW TO BATTLE, MY COMRADES, THE FIGHT SHALL BE GLORIOUS!

2015 hours
“Oh yeah, we’re weakening them, they may be decked out in uber gear from raiding but we have the numbers”
“That’s it, isolate the knight, everyone on the wizard”
“Soon the gates will be ours!”
“Err… guys… look to the east”
“Oh my… how many are there?”
“Looks like just about everyone we killed last night. And their friends. And they don’t look too happy…”

2112 hours
“… watch out, Strrydur, wizard at three o’clock starting to cast…”
“… no good, I’m ensnared, can’t move in to…”
“… THEY’RE ALL OVER ME, GET THEM OFF, GET THEM…”
“… got him, starting to cast, ARGH! Stealther interrupted the spell…”
“… they’re controlling Streyedoor, keep away from him…”
“… no good, I’m done for, save yourselves…”

2220 hours
“COME ON U NOOBS we can still do this”
“who are u calling noob, noob, u r a noob”
“no wai, noob, u r teh noob”
“yeh well at least i have fifty kills noob u have four”
“cuz u r a killstealer ur tictacs suck LERN 2 PLEY”
“my tictacs are gr8 but ur build totally sucks for pvp carebear”
“STFU u 2 noobs u both suck”
“no u stfu”
“no u stfu”
“no u stfu”

2225 hours
Well, the battlegroup broke up. That sucked. I’m going to go back to the general PvP zone to gank me some noobs.

2247 hours
Huh. They keep banding together now, or using other cheats and exploits like calling in higher level friends. That sucks.

2330 hours
“… in conclusion, it is reeeddikkyoouwwlessss. This game is rubbish. This is the worst game ever released. The devs are all idiots. Drunk monkeys could have made a better game by banging keyboards with bananas. Every decision they made is totally wrong. The entire design of the game sucks all the possible fun out of anything. It was obviously rushed and not tested properly. It is totally unfair because other people play more and have better stuff and there are more of them and they can kill me even though I am brilliant at PvP and it is totally unfair. I am unsubscribing from this game right now, and never buying anything from the company again ever.” Post to forum, click. Post to blog, click.

Tuesday, 0017 hours
Soon, yes, so very soon, I shall be a fearsome level 50, the apogee of the game, a mighty and awesome achievement. I should prepare a speech or something. Let’s see… “One small kill for man, one giant level for mankind”… nah… maybe some Churchill. “Can I save money on my car insurance, oh yes, yes, yes.” Hang on, wrong Churchill. “This is not the end. It is not even the end of the beginning. But it is, perhaps, the beginning of the endgame.” That’s it. I’ll broadcast that in General, very stirring.

0029 hours
Last kill, here we go, broadcast: DING FIFTY WOOYAY LOL I AM TEH WINNAH!

0030 hours
OK, not quite the statesmanlike effect I was after. Not to worry. Now, back to the PvP zone!

0047 hours
Let’s see, who do we have here… Arragawn, level 27. I’m not even going to pause to report him for name violation, swoop in and SMITE! Bwahahahaha, one shot kill, I’m the daddy! Arrowgone, level 23, MAIM! Aragun, level 34, SLICE! Hrm. Still alive? DICE! That’s better, a triumph. Huge success. Oh yeah, I’m serving up the Typhoo now!

0134 hours
/tell Arugon: That’s open world PvP, you should have known what you were letting yourself in for. I’ve always said that what sets this game apart is the excellent implementation of open PvP, if you can’t take it maybe you should head back to World of Carebear.
Ahahahahaha, BURN! Ooh, I’m on fire.

0145
Dammit, I suppose I ought to go to bed. I’m on a final warning for turning up late to work. And a final warning for falling asleep at work.

0740 hours
Just five minutes, I can log in for five minutes over breakfast while I eat Sugar Puffs straight from the box…

0755 hours
Dammit, dammit, never mind, I’ll just get going and finish getting dressed on the way.

0807 hours
I don’t know why people keep sounding their horns, it’s like they’ve never seen anyone putting on a pair of trousers while driving.

1120 hours
… and then by using a shield, I could take the points from two-handed specialisation, and put them into deepening the casting pool instead… what? Yes boss, absolutely, just running off the copies now.

1554 hours
… altogether, that comes to seventeen gold pieces, please. Pounds! I meant pounds, seventeen pounds, please.

1629 hours
… 56, 57, 58, 59, HALF PAST FOUR, I’m out of here, GOGOGOGO, out of my way people!

1722 hours
GRAGH! TRAFFIC JAMS! Deep breaths, deep breaths, remember what the analyst said after that road rage incident with the foam LARPing sword… Put on the CD of the in-game music, visualise the setting. I am a calm, relaxed elf, strolling through the forests of Nrjohal. I am a calm, relaxed elf COME ON, YOU COULD GET A BUS THROUGH THAT GAP, MOVE IT forests of Nrjohal.

1750 hours
Ah, back in game finally. Who’s next to challenge my fearsome PvP skillz, then? Ariggon, level 30, SMASH! Awragan, level 28, FREEM! Arrowgun, Ranger Warmonk, level 42 (feel that slap bass), SLASH! HACK! POKE! Hang on, he’s fighting back, is that allowed? BASH! SWEEP! USE THAT FUNNY LOOKING THING FOR REMOVING STONES FROM HORSES HOOVES! He’s got me down to 75% health, t’ch. SMITE! BEAT! PUMMELL! Got him, that took ages, though.

1755 hours
“… in conclusion, Ranger Warmonks are reeduckyewlessly overpowered and must be nerfed at once so I can always one-shot kill them.” Click, post to forum.

2030 hours
Hmm, an invite to join a war-group from our Kingdom. Might as well hook up with them, see what it’s like.

2355 hours
Oh, man, this is amazing, we’re dominating the battlefield! Crushing all opponents, capturing outposts, laying waste to any who dare oppose us! This is the best game ever released, I’m totally playing this game forever. If only they had a lifetime subscription option, there’s no way I’m ever going to move to anything else, this is totally awesome, it’s got the depth, the graphics, it’s amazing. The devs are my favourite people ever, I think I’ll get some photos of them as posters. Maybe I could get enough to wallpaper the whole front room. I’m going to name my kids after them. Least, I will if I ever have kids.

Monday, 1322 hours
Huh? Where am I? What’s… man, I must’ve just dozed off there. What time is it? Half one, phew, only lost a couple of hours. /played time is… 70 hours 52 minutes? My god! It’s Monday! I’ve lost an entire day. Thank god it’s a bank holiday, I used up all my leave this year on the stress test. And that day where I stayed home refreshing the browser ever 2.3 seconds applying for closed beta. And they demand a signed note from the doctor after all that sick leave I took for the last game launch, it’s like they didn’t believe I happened to catch the Black Death and malaria the same week it launched.

1324 hours
Good news is, I fell asleep onto the keyboard, so with the continuous input at least my character wasn’t automatically logged out. Login time saved right there.

1326 hours
Even better news, I feel asleep onto the “turn right” and “attack” keys in the middle of an area with respawning mobs, and I’ve gained two levels in that time. By my calculations, the XP gain per hour improved by 4.3% in my sleep. Some might say that shows gaining levels requires no skill whatsoever and is merely a function of time spent in game, but it’s obvious that I’m so uber I don’t even need to be awake to show off my mad skillz.

1328 hours
Getting a bit rancid, maybe I should go for a shower? No way, can’t afford that much time. I’ll give myself a quick spray of deodorant.

1329 hours
Turns out I left the deodorant upstairs. Can’t spare the time to go and get it. Sprayed under my arms with the compressed air I use to blow dust out of the PC case, that’ll do.

1334 hours
Right, level 48, just two more levels, here we go now.

Montage ensues, to the soundtrack of..

Grinding, grinding, grinding,
Grinding, grinding, grinding,
Grinding, grinding, grinding,
Ecks Peeeee!

Grinding, grinding, grinding
Though the sun is blinding
Grab the loot I’m finding, Ecks Peeee,
Pick up fang and paw and feather,
Then skin ‘em for the leather,
And onto the next bunch on the map,
All the things I’m craving,
Arenas, housing, raiding,
Are waiting right at that level cap,

Slash ‘em up, loot the corpse,
Loot the corpse, slash ‘em up,
Slash ‘em up, loot the corpse,
Ecks Peeeeeee,
Kill the mobs, sell the trash,
Sell the trash, kill the mobs,
Kill the mobs, sell the trash,
Ecks Peeeeeee,

Keep slaying, slaying, slaying,
No matter what they’re saying,
The vendor keeps on paying, Ecks Peeeee,
Don’t try to understand ‘em
Just stab, loot and frag ‘em
Attack anything that isn’t tame,
My add-on’s calculating,
There won’t be much more waiting,
‘Til I’ll be a part of that end game,

Slash ‘em up, loot the corpse,
Loot the corpse, slash ‘em up,
Slash ‘em up, loot the corpse,
Ecks Peeeeeee,
Kill the mobs, sell the trash,
Sell the trash, kill the mobs,
Kill the mobs, sell the trash,
Ecks Peeeeeee!

2359 hours
Level 49 and nine bubs, nearly there!

Sunday, 0000 hours
Still grinding mobs for XP. Five levels to go.

0100 hours
Still grinding mobs for XP. Five levels to go.

0200 hours
Still grinding mobs for XP. Five levels to go.

0300 hours
Still grinding mobs for XP. Five levels to go.

0400 hours
Still grinding mobs for XP. Five levels to go.

0500 hours
Still grinding mobs for XP. Four levels to go.

0501 hours
Belay that, still five levels to go. Turns out it was actually church bells ringing, not the “ding” sound for level 46.

0515 hours
DING LEV… no, wait, church bells again.

0530 hours
DING LEV… no, wait, church bells again.

0545 hours
More church bells, well, they’re not catching me out this time!

0547 hours
Turns out I dinged level 46 two minutes ago.

0600 hours
Still grinding mobs for XP. Four levels to go. Haven’t slept for thirty hours, but no ill efefcts notiacble.

0700 hours
Stlil grindign mobs fro XP. Fuor levesl to go.

0800 hours
Stlil ginrdign mbso fro XP. Furo lveesl to og.

0900 hours
liSlt gdnriign smob rfo PX. ruFo lvesle ot og.

1000 hours
liilt gdnrSign sofb rmo Pu. rXFo lveoes tl og.

1100 hours
WWWWWWWWWASADWASDAWDWSDWADASWDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDD[text buffer overflow]

Saturday, 0000 hours
Just a couple more quests and I’ll be able to participate in open-world PvP… ahh, the cut and thrust of dynamic combat against a thinking, cunning opponent, that’ll be the stuff, none of this tedious, repetitive grind, killing ten rats, twenty bats, thirty gnats (tricky one that, until I found the Flyswatter of Insecticde), forty hats. I don’t know why they restrict it anyway, they should let anyone of any level join in! The whole world should be at war! Only cowards don’t want to join the glorious battle!

0047 hours
That’s the 50 Slightly Bigger Rats Than The Previous Set Of Rats Tails handed in to the NPC, DING LEVEL TWENTY ONE! To the zone with open PvP!

0051 hours
Zone loading… zone loading… here we go, oh yes, this is the life, watch out foul enemy, I’m coming for… what? I’m dead? DAMMIT stupid bug, I’ll just rez and… I’m dead again, huh? Combat log… Aragown hit you with a fireball for 5,407 points of damage? NAME VIOLATION REPORTED TO GM! /who Aragown… level 37? Already? What sort of sad case is level 37 already? Hm. Looks like he’s walking off, OK, I’ll rez and… Ouragon critically backstabbed you from stealth for 7,123 points of damage?

0134 hours
GM Neville: How can I help you?
STry1d3rrr: I keep getting killed!
GM Neville: By other players, in an open PvP zone?
STry1d3rrr: Yes!
GM Neville: I’m afraid that is working as intended.
STry1d3rrr: But… they’re higher level than me!
GM Neville: Yes, due to customer demand, PvP is totally unrestricted in this zone. Is there anything else I can help with?
STry1d3rrr: Well… the people who keep killing me also taunt me by then making a nice cup of PG Tips!
GM Neville: Yes, I suspect they’re quite surprised by the result of the /teabag emote as well.

0158 hours
“… in conclusion, the concept of open world PvP is reddikyouless, and the devs are idiots for including it.” Post to forum, click.

0243 hours
Thank god, I managed to get out of there while the gankers were occupied with another dumb schmuck who stuck his head in at level 21. Right. I’m going to get to the level cap in PvE, then I’ll show them.

0317 hours
60 Even Bigger Than The Last Lot Of Giant Bat Fangs handed in to the NPC

0442 hours
70 Quite Similar To The Last Lot Of Rats, Only Wearing Stilts So They’re A Bit Bigger Tails handed in to the NPC

0610 hours
80 Tails From Giant Rats Dropped Into Combat By Giant Bats and 80 Fangs From Giant Bats That Drop Giant Rats Into Combat handed in to the NPC

0723 hours
Dead rats, dead bats, what d’you think about that, huh? Fat cat in a top hat, thinks he an aristocrat, yeah, c’mon now.

0724 hours
Maybe I should lay off the ultra-caffeinated energy drinks.

0916 hours
The next quest line’s in the farmyard muck
Fetch the farmer a rabbit, a chicken and a duck
Feed the sows and the cows and the farmyard cats
Kill some hogs and some dogs and the farmyard rats
Jug the hares, catch the mares, grow a pound of pears
Sheer billy goats in hairy coats
You get a horse (of course) and a ton of turnips
DING LEVEL 35!

1438 hours
If there are 1,000 other players on this server, running the same quest lines, I calculate we will have wiped out the entire animal population of the world seven times over by the time we’re all level 25. Also, the bandit groups in Forest of F’tang must have had, at the very least, 97,000 members (assuming a consistent drop rate of one bandit badge per 2.78 bandits). No wonder the three members of the village militia need our help holding them off.

1515 hours
Level 42, oh yeah, feel that percussive slap bass.

1636 hours
Time since parking the car on the drive with the game: 28 hours, 16 minutes. /played timed: 28 hours, 9 minutes. Must work on that seven minute gap next time. Note to self for next game release: leave a front window open and remove windscreen from car. If I don’t wear a seatbelt, I can ram the car into the wall, and the momentum should fling me straight out, through the window and into position. Clear three minute saving.

1928 hours
Levelling really slowing down now. Quests getting harder to find, almost like the developers had concentrated more on the earlier zones in the knowledge that normal people would take three months to hit level 40 so there’d be time to patch more content in after release. Reactions also dulled by fatigue.

2345 hours
Ding… level… 45. Quests… totally dried up apart… from Mayor Placeholder… who requested… Set Quantity Here of Select Body Part Or Generic Possession from Choose Mob Type. Must… keep… grinding…