Mainly spent my time chasing down the weekly Game Pass rewards but tried some others as well. 

I always start by looking at the weekly rewards on Xbox. This week I figured out how to complete challenges on Bing. Then I checked the sales and almost bought Civ VI because it was just under $20. Then I went into Game Pass rewards and played the weekly game challenges. Finally, I made some progress in a few old games, then starting my bowling simulation play, and finally got back to Dragon Quest XI. Phew. It was a full day. 

Games Beaten

2016 sucked for me. Not because a bunch of celebrities bit the dust or our politics got even more polarized, though that didn't help, but for extremely personal reasons I won't go into. 

 Hey guys, sorry I've been away for so long. Had a bit of a depressive slump, had a bit of a breakdown, had some life shit. It's okay though, I'm feeling a lot better now! Getting therapy, on decent meds and whatever, and while I still have my blue periods (gross), I'm a lot healthier and have a lot more confidence in myself. I know I was a complete and utter self destructive asshole who got swept up in being super selfish and in general kind of a cunt. At the same time though, I now recognise that I am getting better. I'm feeling empathy again, which means I also feel a lot of guilt over some things I have done that I don't overly want to go into here, but I also recognise that it's all part of getting better. Sometimes you have to feel worse to get better.

I'm going to listen to a lot of music from 1969. I figured I might as well extend that to books, so I'm going to read Patrick O'Brian's Master and Commander. I saw the movie and thought it was great. What about the video games?  Well, there were several space flight sim computer games made on mainframes, which makes sense because this was the year of the Apollo 11 landing on the moon. I tried to play them and then any others I could find. The results are recorded below.

Played mostly Doom today and cooled down with some Minecraft. I should've switched to PS4 and played some No Man's Sky, but I was waiting for Mark, who had to reinstall Doom, to start up again so he could try out the map I made in Snapmap mode. I was going to go back to Doom when the reinstall finished, but it never did. For some reason the last 25 GB or so slowed down to a crawl. Anywho, here's a breakdown of what I played today. 

Happy cyber Monday! I'm done my shopping for the week. I went to Toys R Us late on Sunday, but didn't get anything. I was looking at Lego Dimensions Story, Level and Fun packs but aside from the Midway level pack, I didn't really feel strongly about any of the rest. The Level Packs were marked down $10 from $30 and that didn't seem all that special either. I'll get it later when I start playing the game. Onward to the week's gaming.

What do you call Thanksgiving day shopping since stores like Target open at 6pm? I bought some stuff on both Thurday and Friday, but mostly Thursday. Since last year, I've been heading to the shops after Thanksgiving. I usually arrive there way late for the real crowds, like 11pm, so it's kind of nice to look through what's left without getting trampled.

I wasn't feeling much up for Doom today (Sunday), so I fell back on my chill game, Skylanders: Trap Team and stayed with it all day long.

We are fast approaching November 7, which in recent years has been marked as “N7 Day” by EA and BioWare, and is usually a celebration of all thing Mass Effect. We’ve done things for N7 Day in the past, and I’m sure we will this year, as BioWare is set to finally show off the upcoming Mass Effect: Andromeda in a big way. Considering that the game is expected early next year it’s a little worrisome that we have seen so little of it by now. With that being the case, I thought it would be fun to take a look back at my favorite game in the series: the first Mass Effect. That game had some serious issues, but instead of fixing those issues for Mass Effect 2, BioWare’s solution was to throw most of them right out the window. So let’s take a look at some of those problems with the original Mass Effect. I will identify the major issues, explain what BioWare’s solution was, and provide an alternative fix that I hope makes its way into Andromeda.

Oh! Hello there, sorry to have left this place..........again. :|

Before I talk about Xenogears...

Thought I was going to play Gears of War Ultimate Edition today, but Minecraft sunk it's teeth into me again, leaving me with a kind of sickness. 

Grabbed this from PC Gamer site. E3 starts Sunday afternoon with EA then later Bethesda, MS/Sony Monday, Square Enix Tues.

I couldn't come up with an alliteration for both Friday and something game-themed except fragging, flanking, and I'm not really a huge shooter gamer, so ....

Hey everyone! Since I have more time on my hands, I want to be more involved in writing on here and really connecting with you ladies and gentlemen. When I first started on Pixlbit, I was a newcomer into writing about video games, media, and anything geek related. And you all welcomed me with open arms and always gave me positive and helpful feedback and I'm grateful for that! 

Honorable Mention: Destiny

There is so much to say about E3. First I caught the Sony Conference at the movie theaters. That was pretty cool and jammed packed with a much older crowd that I expected. I didn't get to see Microsoft's full conference since I was at work but I say that I am excited to know more about and play Scalebound, Inside, and Sunset Overdrive. The Halo Master Chief Collection was great but not something I am too excited about. Playing all the maps in the series though is incredible. I think Microsoft had some great things but I wasn't impressed. Scalebound peaked my interest though most but we didn't see any gameplay. Sunset Overdrive is likely going to be crazy fun.
Now as for Sony's Conference, the start of Destiny is nice but frankly my excitement for it has dwindled a lot. There is so much more that I am excited about and the lack of seeing any compelling story narrating as you progress makes me feel like I will end up getting tired of it. With that said, my pre-order still stands and will get it but feel a bit lukewarm with the title now and that is really no thanks to games like Far Cry 4, Batman Arkham Knight, and Assassin's Creed: Unity. They all look ridiculously good in the size and detail. The altitude in Batman Arkham Knight and Far Cry 4 are incredible. Assassin's Creed just won't let me go. Unity is jaw dropping gorgeous.

So, I watched all 4 conferences yesterday. Here's my take: