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Sometimes I wonder what I’m doing home in bed early on a Friday night but when Jeanne cuddles up beside me I know I wouldn’t want to be anywhere else.

Diablo III: First Impressions

I was finally able to play Diablo III for an hour or two. So far I’m not very impressed. To begin with, it is not complete. Blizzard is known for launching games “when it’s done”. This time around, they launched without Player-vs-Player (PvP). A small, probably minor part, but still a part. One can only wonder what else is not complete.

Possibly the downloader. It was buggy! Or at least the Mac version. Every time the network connection is interrupted, it exits without a warning and doesn’t even retry. Given the slow network speeds here, I would leave it downloading before I sleep. Then when I wake up expecting it to be done, I see that it has exited after downloading just a gigabyte or two. It took me several days! And guess what’s next? A painfully slow installation process. But hey, let’s just say it’s my machine and network.

After the installation, I played with the Demon Hunter. The witch doctor just looks absolutely primitive while the others are about the same as in the previous Diablo games. I chose the female version. Guess what? It’s Bayonetta, high stiletto heels and all! What’s up with that?!? I can just imagine those stilettos sinking into the medieval sod. And are high heels ever comfortable? Who needs monsters killing you when your shoes are doing it for you?

Then there’s the gameplay. There is no more stat or skill point allocation. Skills are “unlocked” at certain level. Stats are auto-assigned. Where’s the character building aspect of that? It’s like a vastly simplified gameplay version of Diablo II. It’s almost like it’s designed for console play. Indeed maybe that’s what Blizzard has in mind. Too bad RPG fans had to suffer. I still hope it will be fun and compelling so I’m giving it an honest go. Besides, I already paid for it.

Back Home

Got back home just now. Doctor discharged Jeanne with instructions to simply complete the rest of her antibiotics regimen. Whew! What a weekend!

Thanks to the doctors and nurses for taking care of Jeanne. Thanks also to Michelle and Gretchen who took stayed and slept with Jeanne  throughout her confinement (I shuttled back and forth between home and the hospital).

C5 Accident

Passed by the scene of an accident along C5 this morning. I was heading southbound after a visit to Big Bert’s when I noticed the northbound was empty. I thought it was either an accident or road repair. It turned out to be the former when I saw what seemed to be an AUV or SUV on its side. I later learned that it was a Mitsubishi Fuzion. It was southbound when it swerved, hit a lamppost, and got thrown into the northbound side where a taxi and a motorcycle then collided into it. Unfortunately, the taxi driver and passenger died. The Fuzion driver and motorcyclist were seriously injured. Could be driver error but after some digging, I found out that a few months back, there was a recall of Fuzions because of potential steering failure. Could that be the cause? Quite possible. If you have a Fuzion, better get it to the shop if you haven’t already. Drive safe!