14 DAY TRIAL // Andrei Dumitrescu: This weekend I have my birthday party so gaming is going to take a back seat to talking to all friends and enjoying a various amount of alcoholic beverages. But I really cannot go on for two full days without turning on the computer and engaging in some videogaming and I will likely download the 1.3 patch for Hearts of Iron III, which has been released as a beta by Paradox Interactive and is set for an official release at some point in early September.
Hearts of Iron III is a superb grand strategy title but its sheer complexity has led to its working less than perfect after the two first patches released. It's by no means broken in any way but there are small glitches that the dedicated wargaming community, which usually picks up Paradox games, will spot immediately. The company has moved rather fast to create a comprehensive patch and is now asking the community to offer some feedback and tell it whether any huge bugs remain in 1.3. I will contribute to that effort in the coming days.
Totu Florian: I need a time machine. Or I need to munch down on an entire crate of Speed to make time slow down. Every second of spare time I get goes into Borderlands. On itself, this isn't a problem in no way. It's not really that I miss other activities, though, maybe just a little, I wish I could invest more time into sleeping, or at least eating. The game addiction only becomes a problem when things of true importance come to light, such as Dragon Age: Origins being launched next week. It may sound like I should have plenty of time to give Borderlands the finishing blow, especially since I'm a maniac and all, but the game is just so good I simply need to play it with all the other characters. Especially since, now that I've scouted Lilith's skill tree, I find myself in the position of being drawn to all classes.
I haven't jumped the Dragon Age: Origins hype train for no reason and didn't do it just to be part of the flock. The game managed to pick my interest with more than just the cinematics, which are amazing, or the gameplay and story details, which, of course, are just as brilliant. What got me so excited was the Character Creator that unveiled a very interesting skill tree with the possibility of some very distinct builds for the same class. Also, Dragon Age: Journeys, the 2D browser spin-off, proved to be a fun game for me, which is a very rare thing as far as the casual market of “workplace” games goes. So next week it's going to be do or die, the do part being the games while the die part refers to famine and sleep deprivation. May the best man win. Oh, and I almost forgot, Happy Birthday, man!