Since the last time I updated I have picked up a few new titles such as Metroid Prime 2, Metal Gear Solid 3, and Knights of the Old Republic 2. All the game have their ups and downs, but instead of going into great detail I'd suggest just reading the reviews I wrote over at Gamer's Logik. Or at least you could if Jon had some time to upload them…

I also tried out the new World or Warcraft at the request of my cousin Draos. The game is fun at times but quite frankly there isn't a lot of motivation for me to turn it on. I would be surprised if the game is played past its first month.

Shield and I also tried out the game on Xbox Live Tuesday night with Prfectjon and a friend of his. Unfortunately we had some lag issues, but Jon thinks he has isolated the problem, and we tried again over Live Wednesday night with no lag at all.

I was fairly impressed with the Halo 2 online stats Bungie has on their site. It keeps records of every game played online with much more detail than who won and who lost. Things like accuracy, medals won, who you killed and how many times, who killed you, and even a game viewer that shows your position and the position of the enemy every time you or he was killed.

Overall I would say I'm very pleased with the game, but then again I have yet to meet somebody who wasn't. Hopefully in the next week or two enough GL members will get online to play a bit. Jon has already set up a Logik clan, but how often we will do things is uncertain. Either way I'm looking forward to playing some more online.

I also picked up an Xbox Live starter kit yesterday in anticipation of the Halo 2 release next week. I had usually heard good things about Live such as all the features it comes with and how easy it is to hook-up and use. Seeing it first hand I can see what they meant. You just plug the Xbox into a cable modem and sign up for an account. I don't have any games with Live support however. I did download the new content for Knight of the old Republic, but all of my saves are in the final area and you are unable to leave. So I'll have to wait for another play through before I get to see anything new. The starter kit came with some demos to play online, but playing a demo for the first time against people who have been playing the whole game for months now loses its appeal rather quickly. Either way, it's all set-up and ready to go once Halo 2 gets here.

I highly doubt there will be much online playing of Halo 2 the first night I get it. So far the groups plans entail bringing everybody's TVs and Xbox's to my house and playing LAN games all night. I know full well I have an 8am class the next day, and that I will also be taking a test in said class, but I think for a night of fun with Halo 2 after waiting two years for it to finally release will be worth it.

Lately Shield has been taking note of the large amounts of time between classes we all have Wednesday afternoons, and is hoping that we might be interested in playing D&D in those hours. I'm not totally against the idea; I've had fun playing it before. But, as you may have noticed in the above paragraph, I have a love of lightsabers, and this time around I would prefer a game in the Star Wars universe. Whether it will get off the ground or not remains to be seen, and is mostly on Shields shoulders. It's his idea, and if he doesn't put it together, I still get naptime. So it's pretty much win-win for me.

The recent Halo 2 leak seems to have, at least the gaming portion of the net, all talking about it. It's times like this I wish I had modded my Xbox. Sure the games in French, but do I really need to know what the enemy is saying to know I should shoot him? Just makes that wait till November 9th seem that much farther…

I talked with Shield over the weekend and found that he was quitting the game because he absolutely hated playing Warrior. He had bought the game to play Paladin, but ended up having to put all his resources into war to be an efficient tank. In the end he just got fed up because there was nothing he was looking forward to in the game. After talking for a while he has decided that perhaps he may start getting on again to finally try out Paladin. If he likes it, he may stay around. If not, I guess he's quitting for good.

I suppose I should start with FFXI. This may be one of the last posts on the subject. I only play games as long as I'm having fun, and XI is starting to lose that. It's a combination of things that anybody reading this is already going to know about, so I won't go into details other than, the game has turned the suck up. Add to that everybody I knew in game is quitting. All of GL is leaving for WoW, and Outcasts just lost interest. I decided to go on alone, and while that was fine for a while, it just got boring too quickly. I will probably stick around for a while longer, but it keeps getting more and more painful to turn the game on everyday. If nothing else, I'd like to finish the last of my AF before I quit.

I picked up Pikmin 2 a few weeks ago. A fun game to be sure, but it's not perfect. However, the flaws weren't enough for me to regret my purchase, and for those still on the fence about buying the game, you can see my review here.

There isn't much in the way of new games until late October, so for a while it looks like just school and work as usual with the occasional replay of some as of yet unnamed games.

I've been able to complete three of my five artifact armor quest since reaching level 50. The hardest by far was the Eldieme coffer key. Finding a party that would accept a lvl 50 was hard enough, but then once I had a key I needed to find a coffer. Most of the spawn points require two people to get to, so I had to settle for camping one spawn point and waiting there until it popped. I was eventually successful however, so that one less coffer I have to hunt down. The one I'm really dreading anyways is Castle Oztroja.

Some of the other things we can do are some missions, and what I've been looking forward to, the artifact armor quests. Well, I'd say about half looking forward to, half dreading. They are not known for being easy. Most of the quests will require either more levels, or more people. It will be nice to actually have the armor after such a long time though.

Outside FFXI, I picked up Star Wars: Rogue Squadron III Rebel Strike in town. I enjoyed the last game, and this one was supposed to have all the old levels in co-op, which was enough for me to justify a $20 purchase. It's pretty fun, but the new missions on the ground just don't seem to fit in the game. The new levels are nice, but the co-op is where its at. It's just more fun when you are flying with somebody that doesn't try to evade Tie Fighters by flying in a straight line…

Since my job is always in the evening, and there isn't much to do on FFXI during the day but fish, I decided to re-play KOTOR. It is my favorite Star Wars themed game, and a pretty good RPG overall (with the exception of a few annoying glitches). Replaying the game has only reminded me how much I am looking forward to the upcoming sequal, KOTOR II, and luckily with this new job, and can finally afford to get it. Noviel has become increasingly annoyed with my interest in console RPG's however. It means I'm using my tv, and she can't play FFVII. Why she doesn't get on when I'm at work is beyond me.

After the movie we came back to my house to try and finish Four Swords. We've been sitting at the last dungeon for a while, but haven't turned it on for one reason or another. Either way, we popped it in and made our way through the last dungeon, almost made it to the last boss, when somehow the game glitched and aloud us to go no further. At first we just assume this usually happens, and there must be some puzzle, we needed to complete. But after a few hours of frustration, Noviel looked up a guide, and discovered that we had glitched the game, and were now stuck. The game doesn't have an in-dungeon save feature, you have to complete an area to save, so we will be forced to walk back through the entirety of the final dungeon again. Needless to say, this left us quite a bit aggravated. I just hope it doesn't take us as long to pick it back up as the last time, I would like to finish the game.

Aside from leveling, I decided to try for my artifact scythe last night. I didn't bring anybody in the group with me, because I had a pretty good feeling I was going to die, and I didn't need them all dieing too. So I headed over to Giddeus and did a search for higher-level players who might help. There was only one player higher than me, a lvl 71 Japanese red mage by the name of Naoelle. I asked for some help and he/she seemed happy to oblige, which came as quite a shock to me since most high level players don't give me the time of day. Either way, we headed over to the NM I needed to kill for the quest, and within a matter of minutes it was dead, and I was on my way back to Bastok to get my scythe. I had assumed the quest would be much more time consuming that it was, and I suppose without Naoelle's help if very likely would have been. I'm just thankful he/she was there and willing to help me out. Something tells me however, that the rest of my artifact gear will not go so smoothly.

I've added a screenshot of my character on FFXI to the left bar on the site a few days ago. I don't know how current it will stay, but I'll try and keep it fairly up to date. I had never even used the games screenshot abilities before, and I doubt I will be taking many now, but if I take some interesting ones, I may post them up just below my character picture.

Outside the game, Magus, Sandman, Noviel, and I have been playing Four Swords since it came out. I haven't brought it up at all to this point, but it has been a fairly fun game…when people work together. As with the previous Four Swords game, and Final Fantasy: Crystal Chronicles, this game seems to want you to compete, and work together all at the same time. I don't know about the rest of the world, but when somebody has just lit me on fire so I couldn't get some force gems, I'm closer to throwing them into a hole than helping them push a block.

One thing became immediately apparent to us, not that we didn't see it coming. Shield desperately needs to level his sub job, and get some new armor. Normally we would have waited for him to do this in the first place, but a number of people were having work the next few nights, and we wanted to level while we had a chance. It went ok, and got faster as we went along. However with Shield's low sub job and old armor, defender was all that was between him and death. We solved the armor issue before we logged tonight, but the sub job problem will have to wait until Shield has some free time to go level it.

Besides FFXI, not 30 min ago something pretty bad happened to my computer monitor. I say something because I don't really know what happened. I was sitting here typing when the screen began to distort, then just shut off. As if that wasn't bad enough, there was then a *poof* noise from the monitor and a plume of smoke arose from the top signaling the rather abrupt death of my monitor. My first thought was perhaps a power surge, but all my other electronics where unharmed, and the monitor is on a surge protector anyways. Needless to say I'll need to get a new monitor. In the meantime I grabbed one of the old ones around the house.

Other than that, Strahd has decided to pick up the game. I haven't had much of a chance to level with him; I don't have any more classes at his level. Hopefully that will change and I can get the chance to play with his as well. I'm not entirely sure what he thinks of the game thus far. I know he wanted to play before he moved, but he had no internet connection. He, of course, has one now and immediately decided to pick up FFXI. I hope it was what he expected.

To start, we have only one tank in the group. We have a number of back-up tanks, but they're for emergency only, never meant for main tanking. We would need to find another tank for a second group before we could even consider splitting up. So far nobody in the current Linkshell seems to be qualified for the position. Those that are close enough in level don't have the time to party with the main group. Those that aren't close weren't planning on a tanking job anyways, and I know I won't be the one to ask them to play the game differently just so I will have a better time.

When the tank problem is eventually solve, there is of course the problem of splitting the two groups up. There is but one Bard, and you can bet it will be the source of some argument from those not fortunate enough to get him in their group. There are also schedule conflicts. Getting two well-balanced parties who also have at least a night or two a week off at the same time will be a miracle. It's a big enough problem as it is, but at least now we can do with one or two no shows. Even with the problems however, there is no better solution. The current situation is not the way to go, and it's effects are beginning to show as people seem to lose interest altogether. Hopefully a solution can be reached shortly that will make it better for everybody. If it doesn't soon, it would seem I may be leveling my Dark Knight with pick-up parties. I don't know if everybody else is made of money or what, but I'm not. I can't keep paying out a monthly fee to SquareEnix every month, I've got enough things sucking money away, the least of which being college. Should the main group not pick up the pace, I may not have another option anymore.

On a brighter note game wise, since the main party has been static for the past week or two, I've had plenty of time to level with Shield, and my cousin Draos who did pick the game up. Lucky for us he picked white mage and we could usually pull a party together without much effort. We've managed to get Shield his sub-job already, and when Draos gets on next we will do the same for him. I was pretty fortunate these two have been on. With all that's been going on with the main group, or more appropriately, all that hasn't been going on with the main group, Shield and Draos getting on has given me a chance to finally play the game again. I had forgotten what it was like to actually play the game outside of fishing.

Outside the game, most things are normal with one exception. I was on the phone with David(Strahd) last Thursday(5/6) and he asked me if we had anything planned for that day. I told him no, and that we would probably just be doing things on Friday as usual. He then told me that he would be leaving to Minnesota on Saturday so he wanted to do things both days. I asked him how long he would be down there, to which his only response was "forever." Needless to say, finding out a friend of the past 5 years was moving away, two days before he left was quite a shock. We all spent Thursday night here playing games, Halo among them since we knew this would be the last time we all got to play it together. We all went to lunch Friday afternoon, and went to see Van Helsing that night. The movie was pretty lack luster, but the night went fairly well. After the movie we went to the only restaurant in town still open and sat there for a few hours knowing this too would be the last time we were all there together. Afterward we came back home so everybody could get their cars and head home, but before we left, Noviel decided to snap a photo of the group (minus Shield) sitting in my room. Can't say I care for my being in the picture, but it was a nice one just the same.

Shield finally decided to pick up the PS2 version of FFXI about a week ago. He went Warrior with eventual hopes of going Paladin. Magus and I have been leveling with him, Magus with his Red Mage, and me with my Paladin. He's up to level 12 last I checked. We try to go as fast or as slow as he would like, but sometimes it not entirely possible with leveling our other jobs in the main group and other such activities. In addition to Shield, my cousin is now considering buying the game, and possibly going White Mage. This would help considerable if he caught up to Shield considering the one class we are always looking for when we party is White Mage. This would make leveling a lot faster, but I would hate to think I'm slowing them down when I'm leveling my Dark Knight when they are open to level their classes. Hopefully this won't cause too much of a problem.

In addition to all this FFXI, this week happens to be finals week. I've taken all but one, and of course they left the worst for last. I have my advanced programming exam tomorrow at 8 am (it was 7am but the teacher graciously said we could come in at 8 instead). Once I am finished this semester will be over and I will officially be on Summer Vacation. Well, not exactly vacation from work, but at least from school.

The Last Samurai came out on DVD yesterday, so of course I stopped by Wal-Mart to pick it up. I saw it in the theater back in December, and I really enjoyed the movie. If you haven't seen this movie yet, I would highly suggest it. This is the movie that should have won the Oscar for best movie of 2003. Not the craptastic epic known as Return of the King. I have no doubt that my belief as to who should have won what is highly resented. Most people out there have fallen in love with a once great book series that is now nothing more than a 9 hour bore fest in the form of a lackluster movie trilogy. Hell, books on tape would have been better. But for some reason, people seem to love the movies. Poor ignorant fools.

The group decided that it was time we got everybody to 30, so we spent Tuesday, Thursday, Friday, and Saturday nights getting everybody up to 30. The levels were spread out quite a bit however so some hit 30 long before others. When this happened, they got buffer experience, and then disbanded from the group in an attempt to try and get the whole party even again. We managed to be fairly successful at the endeavor, and now the group is at least in the same range of XP.

Having my Dark Knight up to 30 is a joy within itself. I got to play around with it last night before I disbanded, and while my weapon skill didn't seem very improved with the new abilities, stacking Souleater, with either Berserk or Last Resort had me hitting an average of 120 to an IT enemy; great for damage, bad for my own health. However, now that we are back up to 30, at least some of the party can switch back to their desired classes that we switched from at 30 to level advanced jobs. Athos and Darock will be switching back to Thief and Monk I assume, and hopefully Athos' Trick Attack will help not only me out, but the rest of the part when it comes to keeping the hate on Keenan.

Not everybody will be switching back though I'm assuming. I may be wrong, but Kyden's Warrior, and Alana's White Mage are both at 33, so I assume they will wait and switch when the rest of the group has gotten up to 33 before switching, or at least in the vicinity as not to kill the xp. As for the rest of us, I believe Keenan, Kyal, and I will be keeping our advanced jobs, Paladin, Bard, and Dark Knight. Turambar should switch shortly from White Mage to his Red Mage, although I'm not sure exactly when because he's the only White Mage we have until Alana switches back. Diddle will be keeping Black Mage as far as I know, and I hope that he does. The Exit magic, and eventually Warp II magic will be a God sent.

With all the playing in the last week however, most people have expressed a feeling to take a break. I guess I'm not really against the idea. Plenty of the part needs to go make some cash to afford the new armor they can now equip, and some people may just like some time away from the game altogether (I have no idea why ). Hopefully everybody will get accomplished what they hope to do with their time off. I'm hoping it all doesn't take terribly long though, as our next destination for leveling would seem to be the Altepa Desert, and I'm all for leveling in new locations.

Not a whole lot besides that has been happening. Finals are coming up fast, but not soon enough that I've started to worry about them. FFXI is about the same as always, but still enjoyable enough that I keep playing it. Haven't played too many games outside of FFXI lately, not too many games are coming out for a while that I plan on picking up. Hopefully that will change soon and I can blow the dust off my consoles and get some play out of them.

As far as everything else goes, not a whole lot has been going on there either. Everybody came over last night, but there wasn't a whole lot done. I did manage to finish the History paper I have due next week however. Always nice to have that off of ones conscience.

Including Mikey we had 11 people on last night all trying to figure these missions out. It mostly came down to those who knew what they were doing, and those who didn't. Unfortunately, those who did were flooded with so many questions by those who didn't, that it was hard to answer them all in short order. Thus confusion followed for many people between not knowing where to go, and the occasional bad information. By the time we all had the airship passes in hand it was 5am here (4am PST), which meant we had been at it for 8 hours. Lucky me, I could get about 5 hours of sleep in before my first class of the day, but a few people were not so lucky. A few of the guys on the west cost got less than half the sleep I did, and some on the east cost were actually in danger of being late to classes and work had the missions taken any longer. Needless to say, this will be the last all-nighter the group pulls.

FFXI goes on as usual. There hasn't been a whole lot of time for the whole group to get together, so we've pretty much been doing our own things. Hopefully we can get a few of the missions knocked out in the near future to get the Airship passes. With the Playstation 2 launch this Tuesday, I expect the servers to become a bit busier. While many players seem to dread the coming events, I haven't given it a whole lot of thought. I had hoped however to get a little bit higher in levels so we aren't competing with all of the new players for places to level. We are high enough however that this shouldn't be a problem unless we really slow down the pace.

As always, the group is leveling as often as possible in FFXI. To break from the monotony however we are getting some outside help to finish up some more missions in an attempt to unlock the airship passes. I'm all for it personally, and an airship pass would be very beneficial. Hopefully we can finish it up over the weekend, and travel will become a bit easier.

My Spring Break is almost over, and as with any other break, it ended far sooner than I had hoped, and I'll be back in school soon enough. There is still some time left though, and I'll spend it playing Metal Gear Solid: The Twin Snakes for the Gamecube that released earlier this week. I've played through the game a few times, but I'm still trying to unlock a few things. While the game isn't quite up to par with the original, it's still pretty good.

The entire night wasn't dedicated to FF:CC however. After that and grabbing something to eat, the rest of the group went to the local theater to see a movie, while Magus and I came back home to play FFXI with the rest of our online group. It was a fairly good night. Everybody got two levels, and I'm getting pretty close to a third. I'm not sure when we plan on going out again, but I would really like to get my Dark Knight up to were my Warrior is, so the sooner, the better.

This is also the start of my Spring Break. I've got an entire week off which is nice, although I don't know what I'll do with it. Well, actually I have a pretty good idea of what I'll do with it. Play as many games as I can. I'll be getting the new Metal Gear Solid: The Twin Snakes part way through next week, so hopefully I will be spending some quality time with that. Since the game is a remake of a game I've played through countless times, I will assume that even my first play through will be fairly short. However, if the game follows the rest of the series, then I should be able to get plenty of replay value out of it and plenty of unlockable items to keep me entertained. I'll post more on that, once I finally get it.

We went out for the first time today with all the classes to level them, and it was pretty fun. I enjoyed using some of the new abilities I have with the Dark Knight class, although I had hoped to use Drain to increase my dark magic skill. Unfortunately, Jon was pretty good at keeping most, if not all the damage on him, so I found little use for Drain.

Leveling is a bit slower than we are used to however. We are out there with 8 people at a time, which is a bit larger than usual, and that cuts into the experience points. Add to that, we only have one true tank, which means that we are limited in what we can take without seriously putting the tank in danger. Further more, since a few of us are using these weapons and such for the first time, we are missing a bit more than we're used to. Hopefully after a bit more practice with these new jobs and abilities, the group can get back into a rhythm that we seem to have lost in the transition.

Last night was mostly set aside for the Dragoon quest. As everybody who wants to fight the dragon has to be doing the quest, it meant everybody involved unlocked the class. Only one person in the group is planning on going Dragoon for a main class, but just about everybody wanted the class just the same. I've spent some time leveling it, and I had a bit of fun with it. It would definitely be one of my next choices for a main class after Dark Knight.

Aside from FFXI, FF:CC hasn't gotten much action in quite a while. It's been a little difficult finding a time when everybody can come over, but hopefully we will be able to play for a bit on Friday.

I finished up the astronomy lab last Saturday, and I'm glad to have it out of the way. I'm not done with the whole class however, I still have lectures every Monday and Wednesday, but it hardly matters when compared to 8 hours a night for three days in a row. Hopefully now that my schedule is back to normal everybody can come over on Friday as usual. It's been a while since we've been able to, and I'm sure, at least those of us who were in the lab, are just itching to get out and do something.

Just about everybody has hit lvl 30 on FFXI, and those who haven't are pretty close. We will probably level another night or two but after that we will pretty much be working on unlocking advanced classes for everybody. Of course once everybody has what they want, I assume it will be right back to leveling. I'm all for getting my Dark Knight up to where my Warrior is, and maybe a little past, but I would like to do more missions, and conquests, and such. I doubt I will find much opposition as I get the feeling most everybody else would like to do the same.

Almost everybody seems to be taking a short break from FFXI. The last two people who need to get to 30 are more or less detained until Sunday, as am I. When I do get some time to play, I usually spend it fishing or completing some quest. Magus is almost up to our level, and he is close enough that he just levels with us when we go out. In my opinion he should really level more without the linkshell to gain some more levels in our absence since every level he gains with us isn't getting him any closer. But he seems somewhat disinterested with the idea, and is content to just level with the group, which if he stays that way, he will always be a few levels down.

The group here is till playing FF:CC, but it's starting to get a little repetitive. We do the same thing year after year, and we are beginning to get the feeling that we aren't doing the right thing. With that in mind we have been trying to go to the places people in town suggest going to, and we keep trying to find new places we haven't been before. When we do find new places the game is still fun, but going to old places over and over is just boring. Hopefully we will start to find more new and interesting places.

With the lab and everything going on, nobody has been over to play much FF:CC. We left off at the end of year 4, but I don't really know how far in that is. I could be anywhere from the beginning to the end. We plan on getting everybody over on Tuesday so we can play some more. We would have liked to play earlier, but that was the soonest everybody could get off.

With nobody over, and my Internet going down last Thursday, I got some good quality time with Metroid: Zero Mission. This is one of the greatest GBA games I have ever played. Playing through it was almost like my first play through of Super Metroid. I just couldn't put the game down. The extra Nintendo slapped on the end to extend the game an hour or two wasn't the greatest until you get all the equipment in the area. The extra parts of the game were more or less just an excuse to give you all the power-ups from Super Metroid, that weren't in the original game. Once they were in my possession, the last area suddenly wasn't so boring.

FFXI wise, about half the group has unlocked advance jobs, and the other half is either still trying to get to lvl 30, or is already there but needs the whole group to help in getting the class. Hopefully we will be able to get those all unlocked shortly, and be on our way to the next big thing…whatever that is.

As for FF:CC, I have been enjoying that quite a bit as well. Magus, Sandman, and Shield came over and we logged about 6 hours on the game. It works a little differently than I had imagined, but overall it's pretty easy to figure out. I can't say there is much at all story wise, but there are a few things here and there. Maybe that will present itself later on. Either way, I'm having a pretty good time playing it.

Between those two there hasn't been any time today for FFXI. The rest of the week isn't looking too great either. I have an astronomy lab in the evening for the later half of the week, and I won't be getting home most nights till about 12-1 pst. Hopefully I will be able to find some time either before school, or somewhere else to get on and play a bit.

So far, the game has been somewhat interesting, but there are times in which I really haven't been given a lot of information on where to head next. This means I spend a lot of time just looking around until I hear somebody screaming for help, or a cut-scene takes over. Overall though, the game has been fun enough for me to keep playing.

Since I'm waiting for the rest of the group on FFXI, that means most of my time is spent fishing. It's really too bad, what I did play with my Dark Knight was quite fun, and I would like to go level it some more. It will be nice to have other people out with me when I finally do though. In the mean time, all the fishing I've been doing has been getting me a lot more money that I thought it would. Apparently there is some kind of fisherman shortage or something, because people are buying it as fast as I can catch it. Not that I mind though. It's nice to have a good supply of money, especially after looking at what some of the spells for my Dark Knight are going to cost me.

I spent much of the end of this week leveling in FFXI. I however, did not do this with the rest of my linkshell. Instead I started leveling with other people in order to get to lvl 30 and unlock the Dark Knight class. I managed to do so, and now I'm just staying put there until the rest of the group catches up. Once they all get to 30 I will be helping everybody unlock their advance classes as well. Once we all have them we can begin leveling them.

Given how much time I spend on the game, Dangit and Shield have been considering buying it. Shield is somewhat closer to that endeavor as Dangit doesn't have Internet at his house. Shield may have to drastically upgrade his computer to run the game however, and living in a house where games are already looked down upon, a MMORPG isn't going to go over well.

Magus is still playing catch up, but he is much closer now than before. He is within 3 levels of our lowest players, and with any luck, he can be leveling with the rest of the group sometime this week. I believe he has finally decided on the advance job of Ninja. While that wouldn't have been my first choice, it is nice that he made up his mind. He seems to like the idea of dual wield and other such benefits you get out of the Ninja class. That, grouped with his Thief skills should take him a long way.

Beyond the advance class Magus and I have picked, the rest of the group seems to have decided on theirs as well. It looks like we will get one Paladin, one Dragoon, one Samurai, and two Summoners. However the group is trying to convince one of them to go with Bard instead. Given what abilities I've seen Bard's using, I tend to agree…

Here we are another week gone by, and while I am closer to unlocking an advance class, I still haven't quite gotten there. The group really didn't even get out leveling this week. The nights we planned to, the server went down, and the other nights we were collecting keys for the Kazham Airship pass. We decided it was best to go after them because Kazham will be the best place to level at the level we're at. Hopefully in the next few days we can go out and do some leveling. However, even though we didn't go level this week, I did end up leveling once. Killing all the easy enemies for the keys for 10-15 xp a pop eventually got me another level. It was nice to level up, but not exactly the speed I would have preferred.

Magus is getting closer and closer all the time. He made lvl 20 yesterday, so he is trying to finish up the chocobo quest to cut down on travel time. Hopefully after a week or so in Quifim, he can start leveling with us.

I played the game for a little bit tonight, but I didn't really get a chance to try out the new Internet connection because Squaresoft had to take the servers offline for emergency maintenance. This isn't the first it's happened, hell, it's not even the first time this week it's happened. I hope that whatever problems they are having they fix soon. Not having the game to play doesn't leave me with much to do until Final Fantasy: Crystal Chronicles releases in February. Hopefully I will be able to try out the new Internet in the next day or two, to see if it's working alright.

Now that hopefully the Internet is fixed, all that is left is my computer. The motherboard is in the mail, and the RAM showed up today. As soon as it arrives I should be able to install it and the new video card I picked up and be playing on my computer again.

Magus started partying with some people to catch up, and he seems to have found a few good people out there that he regularly levels with. He is slowly making his way to catch us, and the time we spend unlocking advance jobs should be enough for him to final reach us. He is undecided at this point what advance job he wants, and what exactly he will be doing with it. At the moment, the linkshell is hoping to help him collect the last item to receive his sub-job.

I finally ordered a new motherboard and cpu for my computer, as well as 512MB of RAM. I decided on the Athlon 2600 which will be sufficient to run FFXI, as well as a few other games I wish to play. Hopefully those parts will be in sometime next week so I can install them and get my computer back up and running. It would be nice to have it back.

While one computer problem is fixed however, there is always another that follows. At current I have a wireless ISP, and so far they have been somewhat unreliable. The Internet often fades in and out, and while this is quite annoying while surfing, it is absolutely infuriating while playing FFXI. If the problem persists I will begin looking into cable Internet that is provided locally. Hopefully that will solve my current problem.

Besides FFXI, I started a new job today. I haven't had one for a few months, so it's nice to have money coming in again to buy the games and stuff I want. The downside of course is that it eats up all my free time. It's a good thing the group always plays at night already, or I would start missing out on a few things.

Magus has his computer running again, and so he is back on the game. He couldn't go with us last night however because he hasn't caught up to us in levels, and going with us wouldn't do him any good. With us leveling again, it will be increasingly difficult for him to catch up, but chances are everybody will stop to help him level in the near future so he can go with us from now on.

This is the first weekend since I started school, and I find myself wishing for summer vacation already. Most of the teachers I have are average at best, and most of the classes will have me doing all sorts of papers and research. This is to be expected in a college class, but it makes it just that much worse when you see it in print.

In the mean time, I installed FFXI onto a second computer in the house, and took my video card and installed it in there. So far the game runs better than I have ever seen. It will make an acceptable substitute until I can get my computer back up and running.

Magus is having his own problems with his computer as of late. A combination of his internet being down, and his computer refusing to network to any other computers means that his return the FFXI may not be for a while. Too much longer and he will probably start coming over here to play his game…

Classes start up again next Wednesday at the college, and needless to say, I'm in no hurry to go back. This semester should be at least better than the last since the classes I've chosen are much less difficult. I went with Advanced Programming, History 102, Psychology, and Astronomy. I have an interest in all four of the classes, and I'll be plenty thankful I'm not in English Literature II this semester. Magus and Sandman ended up in all four of the same classes I'm in after the math they wanted was already filled up.