Not much to tell. Playing lots of Everquest lately; Sony sold it to DayBreak, who started a pair of new “progression servers”, starting over from the original game and releasing the updates every six months. That means I can now play EQ without breaking my Sony boycott on purpose. (Which they earned by ruining EQ and SWG). It’s kind of interesting that my computer is three years old, yet EQ is so much older (16 years), that I can run 2 instances with no trouble at all.
Watching Overlord and Gate animes. Both are surprisingly good
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, despite being from “old” genres. Overlord = The Game is Real Now; Gate = Tanks vs. Fantasy. Hint: the tanks win. The helicopters win bigger.
Overlord (recommended by Dr. Heinous) wins on the small touches. Last player in a VR MMO when the server shuts down finds himself inexplicably in a medieval world similar to the game, which was apparently a GuildWars-type setting. He’s got his guild’s base, all their resources and magic, the (literally undying) loyalty of all the NPCs he and his guildmates created to serve them, and nothing better to do. I find the bittersweet end of the game and server shutdown to be pretty much on the nose, but it’s the personality quirks of the various now-real NPCs that make it good. Idly messing with the NPC settings before shutdown, he changes the personality of one NPC to love him — then gets embarrassed at being such a putz. When the game becomes real, it’s even more embarrassing. (The boob grope was totally gratuitous).
Other touches — a flashback to a discussion between two players, in which one confesses to having bought a VR hentai dating sim he’d been looking forward to, only to be squicked out by discovering his seiyuu sister had done the primary girl’s voice. The “serious warrior” NPC that looks like a lobster…and wants the protagonist to have a son with one of the females, so he can carry the boy around on his shoulder and be called “uncle”. The goth-loli vampire that stuffs her bra. The guild rules, of which there were only two: 1. Your avatar had to be inhuman; 2. You had to be a functioning member of society (have a job — NEETS need not apply).
Also, the show doesn’t pull it’s punches. People die, sometimes horribly, at the hands of the protagonist, his allies, and his enemies. Most of the time, they deserve it. Sometimes they don’t. Despite being an undead lich, and finding that he’s somewhat emotionally constrained by that form, the player is generally a decent guy, and keeps finding excuses to “do the right thing” although with a rather mercenary touch.
Overlord is available on Hulu or by subscription to Funimation’s streaming service. Gate is on Crunchyroll of course.
