Your AA Licence is canceled

It is time to hand your keys in for Auto Assault is closing down ...

On the AA site: http://www.autoassault.com/news/
This is posted..

"Important Notice — 07/02/07
NOTICE: Today NCsoft is announcing that it will be closing down service for Auto Assault at the end of the summer. The service will close at midnight on August 31, 2007. As of today, any player currently in the service with an active billed account will not be billed again. If players have previously purchased time via multi-month billing or time cards that extends their service past July 31, NCsoft will reconcile these accounts appropriately. There will be more announcements coming soon regarding the shut down of Auto Assault and its impact on current accounts. Please check back at www.autoassault.com for more information."

wow what a bummer.. and I was thinking about giving it another shot too...

This also at mmorpg.com....

"MMORPG.com Managing Editor Jon Wood caught up with NCsoft's David Swofford for a short interview. advertisement
As MMORPG.com readers may or may not know, NCsoft and NetDevil announced today that they will be closing the doors to Auto Assault on August 31st of this year. This afternoon, I had a brief conversation with David Swofford at NCsoft about the decision and what brought this announcement about.

In the end, and this probably doesn't come as a surprise to anyone, it really all came down to low and ebbing numbers. The number of players on the server was small, and it finally reached a point where it didn't make sense to continue.

I think David summed it up best when he said, "What we were putting in, we weren't getting back".

In the end, while they may be games to us, MMORPGs like Auto Assault are a business and a business that loses money just doesn't make any sense.

"It's unfortunate for the players," said David, "any time you have to close something down, but sometimes you have to make these decisions as a company".

The decision, I am told was made mutually between NetDevil, the makers of the game, and NCsoft, the publisher, and while the announcement may have seemed sudden to some, it was a decision made over time.

According to David, their decision was "certainly not sudden. We were looking at the numbers over time and saw that it was the right time."

Auto Assault launched in April of 2006 and will be one year and four months old at the time of its closing."

It is sad to see games shut down, never to be played again.. AA has a lot of great ness in there... I think it will be missed, even by people who didn't play it...

Tell us how you feel about it at the GA forums (click) ..

WAR BETA ..

A bunch of Beta invites went out today (yesterday depends where ya live) so make sure you look through your email's, you might be one of the lucky ones.. If you applied at the Warhammer Online Beta centre that is..

If ya missed out there is news from Richard that there will be another lot of beta invites going out soon..

Poster at VN: "will there be more this week, Richard? '

Richard: "Probably not this week. Don't lose faith though, we'll be adding more batches in increasing numbers and frequency over time. This was a fairly small batch."

I hope I get one..

Congratulations to all that did get into beta. Make sure you do a good job in 'testing' the game.. don't stuff it up... ;)

200000 BETA sign-ups in 10 days !!!

It loos as though a lot of people what to get into the WAR (Warhammer Online: Age of Reckoning) with over 200,000 Beta registration sign-ups in 10 days...

Official Statement: Link

REDWOOD CITY, Calif. - June 13, 2007 - Electronic Arts Inc, the world's leading interactive entertainment company, today announced that more than 200,000 players have signed up for the Warhammer Online: Age of Reckoning (WAR) closed beta test.

The Warhammer Online Beta Center opened simultaneously in North America and Europe on May 30th, and the 200,000 registration mark was surpassed over the weekend, less than ten days after launch. This makes the beta test of Warhammer Online: Age of Reckoning one of the most rapidly growing beta tests in the history of the MMORPG category. The Beta Center is currently open and accepting applications at https://betacenter.eamythic.com/signup.php .

Mark Jacobs, VP and General Manager of EA Mythic said, "We would like to thank the community for their tremendous response to Warhammer Online. The overwhelming worldwide reaction to the beta test has been phenomenal. The team has been working incredibly hard to create a genre-defining experience, and the beta sign-ups certainly validate the direction we're taking the game. Player input and testing will be crucial in our efforts to complete the game, and we look forward to beta participants' help in shaping Warhammer Online."

... and they say the sign-ups are still growing.. Beta get ya name in while there is still room...

Pizza Online !!!

I ordered our First Online Pizza last night, and I'll tell ya what the experience was great!!

I liked it a whole lot better than ordering over the phone.
Your not rushed, you don't have to tell the house to 'SHUT-UP, I'm on the F***en Phone!!',
The menu is right in front of you, no need to think and write 'orders' down, and no need to worry about correct money (enough money) if ya have a credit card (debit card) that is..

It also seemed to come faster that when you order over the phone.
So all in all I had a great experience with 'Online Pizza Ordering'..

Oh I ordered it from Dominos: www.dominos.com.au

Give it a go, it is the new way of ordering Pizza for me!!

PSP 8

Good old Paint Shop Pro 8.3 :)
I have been mucking around with this good old, well not that old, image program again of late.. I still like it over Photoshop, I have Photoshop CS2 as well, but PSP 8 just seams to me that little bit easer to navigate.. Maybe I am just used to it..

Anyway here is my latest forum signature (ya may need to click on it to see the right size for it):



And here is a picture of me... Well a part of me...



Hey I had to post something.. This is my blog after all :)

Forum Searching.

To use the search button or not use the search button, that is the question...
Many Many forums I go to, mod, or admin, always have the 'non-mods' that tell everyone to use the search button.
Non-mod = forum members that think they are moderators.. wankers is another name for them.
Some of these forums are fairly larger in member and post size, and can be quite scary to a new-comer..

I have seen in may cases a new member post a topic and a non-mod will reply bluntly 'use the search button, there are already topics covering this topic' type thing...
So/or the person will use the search button and find a topic that is relevant to the subject they want to discuss and so they ad a good reply and then the 'non-mod' will reply 'don't revive old threads'... Type thing..

So whether the 'member' used the search or not, they will be attacked, yes it is an attack, by the 'non-mod' member..

They can't win.

What I want to say to all forum goers is "If you are not a staff member of the site/forum, shut the hell up, be a part of the community, have fun (at no ones else's expense) be nice to your fellow members, help them, don't attack them and let the moderators/admins/staff handle the 'work' part of it..."
If ya see something out of place/wrong/rule breaking then let the staff handle it. If you don't like it, ignore it and move on.. No need to comment...

No More SGO:TCG Tournaments for Me.. I think...

I played my first 'Live' Stargate Online: Trading card game tournament today ( I played a couple in the beta) and it was great fun...
But I don't think I will play another one again. I will just stick to the casual and bot games...
Why.. Well It is a rich mans game.. Who ever has the most money can buy the most cards and have the better decks. I don't have a lot of cash, So while playing the $5 for the entry fee, and you get a booster pack with that as well (worth $3.49US (as long as you don't come dead last), If you don't place high up in the ladder it seems as though you only tend to lose $1.50 US.
But When you have the people spending a heap of money on the game and getting every card they can, then they play in the tournaments, there is little chance someone like me will come up top who doesn't have that many cards..

Also you need to be free for about 4 hours to play.. and in my time zone, to play 4 hours (10am to 2pm) is a bit of a pain..
So I still only lose $1.50 US you say.. yeah but if I play 3 tournaments I have lost $4.50 (I think) which I could of bought a booster with anyway and been a $1 better off...

Anyway there where 19 people that started in the tournament, at the end I was equal 3rd in points but was ranked 9th overall (with 5th and 8th place missing from the ladder??).. How does that work? FIIN...

The game is still great, I have a lot of fun building decks from the limited cards I got, and playing casual games.. Tournaments though? I can't see the point, or the extra incentive to do so... Maybe in the future? don't know...

WAR Pushed back till 2008

Warhammer online: Age of reckoning (WAR) was due to be released at the end of this year just in time for x-mass...
Well no longer it is now due to ship for the US and Europe (an Australia too I hope) to the first quarter of 2008.
Not a real big surprise, all games these days never land on the promised date and are always pushed back...
It is probably a good thing.. More time to work on things and get more stuff into the game.. but I do hope this does not mean the system spec's to play it will be higher....

Brown Nosing

What is with all the brown noses... I go through a lot of forums, the SGO: TCG, Stargate Worlds, and Warhammer fansite, a Few MMO sites, other gaming sites (the list goes on) forums come to mind, and people will do anything to get the attention of a game developer or site admin/mod.

For example, was surfing a forum just before and One person asked a question there, and a handful of members replied, then a developer of the game replied, then you can only imagine what happened then..
A couple of people then said, along the lines of "I was going to say that, but I seen you say it Mr dev" .. LOL ...
Then because a Dev answered in a thread most people reply and shout out for attention and instead of discussing the topic they are asking the Devs something else and chatting to them, instead of the topic starter...

This happens in all game forums.. World of Warcraft are really really bad for it...

Anyway, just wanted to get my frustrations out while I am in this funny mood....

SGO TCG End of Beta

Well it has come to the last day of Beta, and the last Beta tournament day as well.
I had a heap of fun during beta, and I can't wait to see what cards I get in the free starter pack and the free booster pack I get for playing in the tournament.
I won 3 out of 5 rounds in today's sealed game.. it was lots of fun.

Hopefully I see people stay after beta, especial that they can play casual games for free with the free cards they got from playing the beta.

Oh another cool thing, is the first Live tournament is this weekend, and if you play you get a Fifth, Hardened Foe promo video card, just for playing..
Yes a Video card.. there will be special cards for the Online version of the game that have a little 'play' button on them and it will show a mini-clip from the show for that card.. How cool is that..

Anyway I am hoping to be able to play.. Just for that card :)
Official Stargate Online Trading Card Game site link (click)

Stargate Online TCG Goes Live April 27th 2007

Yeeeehaaaw!!! The game is ready to live!!!!
I have really enjoyed the Beta, it has been a lot of fun, collecting the cards, building the decks, playing the game and i think I will continue playing this, especially since now I will get a free starter deck, just for being a Beta tester..

Quote from the Official Site

Stargate Online TCG Goes Live April 27th!

Sony Online Entertainment is proud to announce the launch date for Stargate Online TCG – Friday, April 27th.

On April 27th, players will be able to start their Stargate Online TCG adventures with the release of the live game. And we are starting it off with a bang by holding special release weekend tournaments all weekend! Get your hands on the exclusive Online promo card Fifth, Hardened Foe! Each player that participates in these special release weekend events can add this limited edition card to their online collection.

and also:

A "Thank You" to the Stargate Online TCG Beta Testers

Everyone here at SOE has been extremely happy with the involvement of the community during the beta testing of the Stargate Online TCG. Without your help we would be testing internally for quite some time. It has been a great experience for us, so we want to make sure it is a great experience for you as well.

As a "thank you" to everyone who has helped us in this beta test, we will be crediting your live account with a random starter deck once the beta is over. All you need to do is log in to the live game with your Station ID and you will have you deck waiting for you.

In Addition, we will be holding several large beta tournaments this Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday the 24th - 26th! Each participant in these "End of Beta" sealed deck tournaments will receive prizes in the form of a single booster pack and special avatar that only participants of this event will get. We will also give away additional digital booster packs to the top 3 players, and the top player in each of these tournaments also will receive a special new avatar only for them! All prizes will be credited to each player's live account.

There is still a few days left of Beta, so jump in and have a try-before-you-buy go at it..

Another paint job.

I am still playing around with small scenic bases for my warhammer figures, and I have come up with this one.
The photo's are not the best, but it is a space marine with a tyrant's head at his feet.
Was just trying out a blood effect by mixing in red ink and chestnut ink with some PVA glue for the blood...
Also wanted to try out some worms/grubs as well..

What do you think?

Stargate OTCG Skirmish mode

The skirmish mode is now live in the Stargate Online TCG.
It came into the game with tonight patch, as well as other fixes, and no more bubbles.. yay!!!
The skirmish is great. You play against the computer (bots) and you can try out different deck builds and take your time playing with out upsetting someone else's real play time or embarrassing yourself.
Once you get a good deck going it is had to lose to the bots, but hopefully in the future they will add more bots to skirmish with different skills and cards.

If you haven't had a look at the Stargate Online Trading card game yet, now is the time to check it out at stargateonlinetcg.station.sony.com, it is fee at the moment for it is in beta and it is only a 60 mb download (give or take a mb or 2).
If ya are going to play, add me to ya buddy list, Draxonfly, and we'll have a game.

A bit of painting...

First off Happy Easter to everyone...
I got the itch to do a bit of painting over easter, ad I wanted to see how I would go at making a scenic base on a 20mm base (warhammer 40K)..
I made one up out odd bits lying around, and I also finished painting an old plastic space marine I had sitting in the corner..

I think it turned out quite well, even though I hate painting space marines, I have so much trouble painting the power armour.. I don't know why..
Any way you can see some of my paintings over at MongBat.com ..
And here is an image of the finished miniature and base.. (all I got to do now is learn how to take a good picture.. lol )

Bloody Snobs

I been playing the Stargate Online TCG of late (if ya didn't notice) and for the most part all the people I play are great, nice and friendly...
But there is a couple that get around, they won't say a simple 'hi' at the start of a game, or even a simple 'gg' at the end.. That is all it takes... Not to hard to do that???

I know it is only a game and whether you say hi/gg or not doesn't effect the game play at all, but it is just common courtesy, and give that little extra pleasantness in game..
..in any game..

If we are gaming together, and ya don't say some sort of Hi and buy/gg when we play.. Then your on my ignore/block list.. I don't want to play with unfriendly wankers...

Even if you can't speak a word of English, you can still type a simple H or G ??? or some word that is the same in your language? At least I can see you are trying to communicate.

It is always the little things...

Stargate Beta Tournaments this weekend

From the main site: Stargate Online: TCG

Stargate Beta Tournaments Begin Friday, April 6th
Join us this weekend for the first round of Stargate Beta tournaments. While we test our tournaments, we invite you to test strategies and deck building skills.

Constructed Tournament Testing
Constructed Tournament testing begins Friday afternoon and continues through Saturday. Compete with your own decks that you've created in the Deck Builder. Will you lead your team to glory by going for the Glyphs or Experience win? Or do you have a dark side and go for the villain victory? Find out how your decks stand up against your competition!

Sealed Tournament Testing
Sealed Tournament testing begins Sunday morning at 10am PST and then again at 6pm PST. Now let's see how you do with the hand you're dealt, or rather, the deck. We'll give you a sealed deck to play with, and after the tournament, you get to keep the cards until the end of beta!

Participating in tournaments is FREE during the Beta Test period

Sounds like fun.. I'll be there.. well somebody has to come last ;)

Stargate Online TCG

I love trading card games, Yu-Gi-Oh!,Magic the Gathering and all that..
I have a heap of Yu-Gi-Oh! cards, and I have dabbled in the Yu-Gi-Oh! Online TCG and the Magic Online TCG as well.. Lost of fun but there is a tone of members that have been playing it for a while and if feels a little scary to get on and have a game against them...

Well now that Stargate Online: Trading Card game is coming out, this might be the chance of getting in early and having a go at a Online TCG where the playing field is quite equal at the moment..
Here is a link to the Main site: Stargate Online: TCG

It is in its beta phase right now, so it is fee to play and have a go at, there is a lot to think about while playing, but there is a lot of helpful 'hints' while playing to help you out, like highlighted cards you can play in the turn...

When it is released (which is soon by the sounds of it) the Offline (real cards) game will be released at the same time...

I love Stargate, and this game is quite fun to play, when ya work it all out that is (I'm still trying to work it out fully)....
Check it out, Stargate Online: TCG, and see what you think...
.. and if you see me on there (Draxonfly) give me a yell to have a game.. Just take it easy on me though... lol

Over it!

Ok I am over World of Warcraft .. once again..
This is about the 4th time I have quit this game, and I think this is the last time...
Warhammer online will be here, hopefully by the end of the year, and I am waiting on that. been following it for some time now..
But in the mean-time I am going through the glorified chat room that is called Second Life.. pfft.. kinda really boring at the moment...
Might jump on Dark age of Camelot again in the near future..

Just trying to kill time till WAR (Warhammer online).. It is looking to be a great game...
Oh I am also trying to build a Vampire count army for the table top game of Warhammer, and either a Dark elder of Ork army for Warhammer 40,000 table top game...

I have a few miniatures and I have been painting them for a year or so now, but I don't have an army yet or ever played a game yet.. so hoping to do that soon too..

wow'ed again..

I have restarted to play World of Warcraft, once again. This would be my 5th time at going back to the blasted game...
and it has me thinking, why am I back playing this game?
Well for starters I bought the Burning crusade expansion pack, for I am the type of person, if there is an expansion pack out for a game and I don't have it, I can not play it, it feels as though I am missing out on something.. but that is a blog for another time...
Back to why to I keep coming back? Well I have thought and thought on the 'why and I have found the main reasons I keep coming back to World of Warcraft is the UI mods and Thottbot..
Also WoW has made the mmo thing much more easer to play and understand...
But if it wasn't for the fantastic UI mods and thottbot, I just don't think I could handle playing this game for more than a day or 2...

But this also brings the question, Why do I keep leaving World of Warcraft? Well the main reason be hind that is the community, it is absolutely horrid, it is the biggest downfall to the game, the people behind the characters have some serious issues they need to work out..
This doesn't go for all people, some people in the game are some of the best you will find anywhere in the world.. but it is the idiots that spoil it, and give it a tarnished game...
The other thing I hate is the 'Elite' quest and mobs.. Especially the roaming elite mobs.. but elite quest suck...

Oh and the grinding for gear.. I love new gear as much as anybody, but the coin you have to put up for it is just stupid, or the grinding you have to go through (most likley fucken elite mobs) is crazy...

..but that is just my opinion...

Lord of the Rings Online..

I have been in the BETA for LOTRO for some time now, and I feel it can be a good game..
The Game itself is good, but it feels as thought there is something missing...
Also, to me, it Doesn't feel like a Lord of the rings game... You read the books, you can feel it, you watch the movies, you can feel it, you play the Battle fro middle earth games, and you can feel it.. but in this game, LOTRO, that same feeling is just not there...

I think they should of made the game on after the events of the Lord of the rings story, instead of along side of it..
For running around collecting eggs, killing bears, doesn't feel real epic, like the story does, to me..

Lord of the Rings Online, is not a bad game, and it will have a few people following it...
I think it could of been so much better though, get rid of that missing feeling...

I won't be buying it when it is finished (even thought I have the founders package), I will wait and see if any updates or expansions help fill the game out...

Oh and on a side note the latest large patch in the Beta, was a bad one I think, even thought it did fix a lot of things up, there was a bit of unnecessary stuff put in to make the game even harder... Just my opinion..

If you can get in and try it before you buy it, I recommend doing so.. Make your on mind up, don't let others do it for you..

If your thinking about the game, open beta will be soon, so get ready for it and have a go.. you might like it, or you might not..

LOTR Online founders key...

A bit of a kufuffle has been happening on the LOTR Online forums of late, It is looking that Australian and New Zealand people where going to have a tough time getting the founders Package for Lord of the Rings Online: Shadows of Angmar...

But I sort of came to the rescue, well for now at the moment, I found a good site where you can just buy the founders package, and don't have to pre-order the whole game to do so...

Well the site is onlinecdkey.com I got my pre-sale founders package from there, with no problems at all, and I will be looking into other keys/games and things from there as well... They also do paypal..

Happy gaming everyone....

S.T.A.L.K.E.R. is Finished ???

Are they sure.. don't they need more time??? ....
Well it has been a while but now it has been said that S.T.A.L.K.E.R. is Finished, and is off to the manufacturers....
WOW.. I don't know weather to get ready to rush out and buy it, or stand back a while and see how the gaming community reacts to it... yeah I might do that...

It's been in the making for a while now (around 7 years), so it will either be fully polished and be one of the best dam games out, or it has gone through so many changes, updates and such and be a good game filled with bugs, or it could be just bad... I think it will be the first one, but ya never know..
The PCPowerPlay team seam to think it will be a hit, and they haven't been to wrong before..

So where did I get this information from, well most of you reading this will most likely already know this news, but I read it at IGN.

"It finally happened. At an industry event in San Francisco, THQ announced GSC Game World's S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Shadow of Chernobyl was finally shipped to manufacturers for production, bringing a development cycle verging seven years to a close."

Yu-Gi-Oh: The Abridged Series....

Have you seen the Yu-Gi-Oh: The Abridged Series by LittleKuriboh over at YouTube?
I think they are some of the funyiest Yu-Gi-Oh! parodies that I have seen...

I used to (still can) play the card game (sort of) and I have watched the original Yu-Gi-Oh! cartoon series, which makes these parodies even funnier to me, but if you haven't seen the original series, you still might get a kick out of it, if you know a little about Yu-Gi-Oh it would help..

Check it out if you wish (start with episode1 and go from there): Click to go to LittleKuriboh's page

My eyes are bleeding

A lot of games today come with there game manual on CD, which means you have to put it in your CD drive and open it up and look as a screen to read it....This is a great way on saving paper.... and ink and such....But I hate it.. I like to have the game manual in a nice little booklet beside me In case I get stuck in a section or want to quickly refresh myself on some part of the game... Pick it up and flick through it.. I don't want to stop my game, have to load up a manual off a CD just to look at 3 or 4 sentences...
Yes I could print it out myself.. But it is not the same.....

Anyway.. Good on game companies with helping out the world a little by not using as much paper with the CD manuals and smaller boxes/plastic boxes.. (who knows what chemicals and shit go into making these things)....

I just like the little paper booklets better.....

To speek or not to speek

All these contacts I have on MSN, and many are online, then why am I not 'chatting to them.. They must be some one I want to talk to since I have them on the list....
I find no matter how badly I want to talk or chat to someone I am always waiting for them to Say Hi first..
What is worse is when Someone Does Say Hi and you say Hi back, maybe have 1 or 2 lines more of greetings then you get that 'awful silence' like you do if you where chatting face to face.. It is the same feeling...
We want to be with others, but when we are we don't know why???

Or is it just me....

Testing this stuff out!!

Just having a look at what this 'blog' thing does...
There are so many 'blogers' on the net these days, everybody shouting out for attention.....The Internet, just like the world if so full of things and stuff we don't need and shouldn't see or do....

But it is there..The basics of life are fading away so fast.. Should we hate our neighbour because he has that flash 'thing' that we want but don't have, should we hate them because what they believe and think of is different than us, should we hate them because they are there.....

We need to look past all of our differences and loot at each other as if we are looking at ourselves....The human race will never go forward no matter how much technology and power we have if we can't leave our barbaric past behind us and move forward as one planet, one species, one mind, not as one country/race/religion/ect...