I find myself with a lot more free time these days. With that I grow bored of simming all the time.

Pulling out the heavy joystick, rudder pedals, Oculus Rift (or TrackIR), waiting for the program to load, setting up my flight plan, looking up a start-up procedures. It can be quite complicated and exhausting. Especially if I’m playing a combat sim where I’ll probably end up getting destroyed by SAM, AAA, or other aircraft. Too much of it can feel like a job…especially if I’m unfamiliar with the aircraft.

Racing sims are the same. It can be a pain to pull out the wheel, stick, and pedals; get them bolted down to the desk; pull out the Oculus, and then spend 10 minutes of setting up just for a few laps around a track.

So what about other games? Lately I’ve been trying some different genres, but haven’t found a genre I’m really into. Some of the big budget AAA games feel too linear, that I’m playing an open-ended movie while getting distracted by hoards of bad-guys who keep getting in my way from the main story. I feel like the time invested could just be used in watching a good series on Netflix instead…heck I feel like just opening a “Lets Play” on YouTube and watching someone play for me, while skipping the boring parts.

I’m bouncing back and forth between two MMORPGs. FFXIV is finally starting to get good now that I’m finally done with the main story and on to the expansion content. But it feels way too grindy at times, and the story (again) makes me feel like there’s a fast forward button.

Elder Scrolls Online is okay. But too repetitive at times as well. I swear if I walk past another dungeon with an NPC standing in front of it asking for my help. I’m just going to punch that NPC in the face.

Tried exploring some CRPGs. Played through Skyrim and kept bouncing back between wanting to be some cool Nordic Warrior, a Wood Elf archer, or a Breton Mage. I spent more time on that stupid intro sequence than actually playing the game…which is a problem I have with nearly every CRPG. I can’t just enjoy playing from one perspective. I think the Witcher 3 is the only notable example of a CRPG that I can enjoy given I can’t change the look or class of Geralt. And that I do like!

Now I find myself exploring some strategy games. I played a bit of Total War: Warhammer and found it enjoyable. Two hours of my morning were gone with “Just one more turn” in effect. I ended up screwing up by engaging in a two front war and couldn’t be arsed to roll back to a previous save. I just said “Screw it” and let the enemy AI decimate my armies and my cities…and you know what? For once, I didn’t regret it.

I’m going to try a few more strategy games. I really hope I can find my niche. But it seems like sims is the only thing I’m really into at the moment *shrugs* :(.

Heya!

This week has had its ups and downs with simulation. I’ve had a difficult time getting into civilian sims, namely X-Plane. The lack of VR support doesn’t bother me as much anymore, but flying airliners does.

I don’t get it. I’m having no difficulty flying an A-10C Warthog or a F-15C Eagle, shooting down tanks, and flying back to base. Yet, when it comes to trying to set up approaches in an airliner, I have a difficult time and it’s simply just not fun for me.

Perhaps I just need more patience, or perhaps it truly isn’t that fun for me as I’ve spent a majority of my time in smaller prop-planes. Just this morning for instance, I made a quick IFR flight over the Puget sound in a small Cessna 172 and I enjoyed every minute of it. I may consider flying in a Baron 58, a Cirrus SR-22, or a DA-42 later. That to me is more fun.

So perhaps I’m just taking X-Plane the wrong way and trying to force myself to play it as others do when they share their pictures of 737’s or Airbus’s…instead of enjoying it in my own way.

Today though, my mission is to rerender some areas of X-Plane. I had nearly 200GB of Orthos that I deleted, they took simply way too much space. I found ZL15 a good balance in space and texture resolution. For now just rendering commonly flown areas in WA. Should take a few hours or so. Afterwards I plan to render parts of Southern California, Las Vegas, and Arizona. After that I want to render parts of Florida, Colorado, and parts of the UK (Because I always wanted to visit the UK). It’ll be a good weekend project.

I’m also considering doing some sort of cross-country tour, I’d like to fly down the West Coast using a variety of different aircraft and perhaps Livestream it and post a lot of pictures as well.

In non-simming news, I’ve been replaying Red Dead Redemption in anticipation for RDR2. I never finished the first game, so this will be a great excuse to actually get into it and finish it up! Farming Simulator 2017 is coming out next week, which I have already preordered and am totally excited for.

Other than that, my ISP gave me a notice saying as of next month I’ll be capped to 1TB. On one hand, it sounds like a good reason for me to stop using them and switch to another provider…but I’m going to use it as an excuse to cut back on playing newer games and spend time on games I already have. While my focus is on RDR for PS3, I’m also wanting to focus on Rise of the Tomb Raider on PC…perhaps do some live streaming as well. Also the upcoming Farming Simulator 17 will be taking much of my time too.

That’s it for now. I’m busy with other stuff in my personal life so I’ll be at home a lot. I’ll be on a nice little stay-at-home vacation :).

One of the things that bothers me about being an adult gamer is the element of choice. I’m fortunate enough to have the capability to play the latest games in the best settings possible. That’s great. But too much of something good isn’t good at all.

Lately, I’ve picked up Mafia III. It’s a good story marred by repetativeness in many of the missions. Do I continue the game despite the flaws? Do I wait for a patch? Do I just move on?

The Witcher 3 is another good example. Fantastic game worthy of the “GOTY” title, yet recently traded in my PS4 copy for a PC copy to enjoy the maximum quality graphics. The problem is that I also traded in 20+ hours of gametime, forcing me to start all over again. I can’t bare through repeating the story when all the suprises are already known to me. Unlike a good book or a TV show, I can’t just skip chapters or jump to the next season. I’m stuck with starting all over again.

Something I usually bring up in these posts is my fascination of sims. DCS has taken much of my time, as X-Plane, Train Sim, etc. Even Space Sims like Elite Dangerous or arcade-style “sim” War Thunder is a huge thing for me. There’s no story in any of them, yet I can sink 20 hours into doing nothing but target practice in my A-10C Warthog on a bunch of idle low-armored targets.

Yet what of the other games? Why can’t I invest that same 20 hours into Mafia III or Witcher 3? Why am I just so bored? Why can’t I jump into Overwatch for 3 hours and rank to level 100+ like so many others?

I’m not sure I can answer those questions. I cycle interests so frequently that it’s better to not ask and just go with the flow. Maybe, eventually, I will delete some unplayed games from my hard drive. But until then my sims are what brings me a lot of enjoyment…and I should definitly consider cutting back on my normal gaming purchases since they all end with the same story…me not finishing them :(.

Okay not going to talk about 9/11.

I’m going to talk about hobbies! I’ll make this short and sweet.

This week, finished up the training for the A-10C Warthog in DCS using my new A-10C replica joystick, the Thrustmaster Warthog. I now feel like I know the basics, but I feel there is so much to catch up on. Tactics, armaments, armor, tanks, AAA, SAM, etc. Modern warfare isn’t my strong suit. I can tell you all about a Ju-87 or an IL-2. I can’t tell you the difference between an F-15 and an F-16 other than the F-16 has one tail fin. I hope DCS can help catch me up on this as it’s the best modern simulator at present next to Arma 2/3 (which is more about ground warfare).

Not much else to talk about this week. Need to catch up on a few other hobbies today as well as a few games. Also been playing through War Thunder in VR with the new joystick and it’s a blast!

That’s it for now.

Hey again!

Recently I just picked up the Oculus Rift. Great VR device and the potentials are endless for how it can be used.

I wont go into a full detail review on the device, you can find that at many other places. What I will talk about today are the limitations I have with my current software environment.

I love simming: flight sims, train sims, racing sims, etc. I’ve been using a TrackIR and it’s compatible with nearly every sim I have. It basically tracks your head and changes the scale of what you are looking at to the monitor you’re looking at. Basically, if you want to look 90 degrees to your left, you rotate your head 45 degrees while you stare at the screen in front of you. It’s a workaround to VR that has been in use for years.

VR, on the other hand, has been a game changer. You are “In” the cockpit looking at the guages the world around you…it leaves a lasting impression that using anything else simply is just not the same experience.

The problem? It’s not fully supported yet by many programs.

Out of the box, I can get these games to run fine in VR:
War Thunder
DCS
Elite Dangerous
Project Cars
Euro/American Truck Sim

Nearly every other game can be played in VR Mode in a wide/curve screen “Theater Mode”, which is hard to explain. Basically your monitor suddenly turns into a giant cinema display (which can be played in a “cinema” environment as well!). It makes gaming “feel” like a whole new experience even though in reality I’m sitting in front of my monitor in my boxers.

The programs I use most often, that will not work are:
X-Plane
Train Simulator

And that’s what makes this all frustrating. While I should be grateful that I can play many of those other games. Being unable to play X-Plane in VR has been frustrating. Sims like DCS are amazing, yet they are focused on combat and use a completly different set of keybindings which means I’ll have to learn a lot more to get back up in the air…and of course I have things shooting at me which makes it a little more stressful than just a quick VFR flight around Seattle.

Last night I found a plug-in for Flight Simulator X called FlyInside. It’s limited to a 15 minute demo but from what I saw it was exactly what I was looking for. Downside? I’d have to purchase it for full functionality at $40, then go back to FSX and repurchase some scenery and aircraft that I already own for X-Plane. I also had serious frame rate issues under FSX with my old hardware setup and some installation/registry issues on some addons (although that may no longer be a problem with my new setup). So there has to be a bit more tweaking involved.

Train Simulator still won’t work, but I can live without it.

Those are some of my first-world gripes. I’m definitly not regretting the Oculus Rift purchase one bit…it’s something that has to be experienced that text or a YouTube video cannot fully describe.

As most of you know, switching interests is just something I do. Kinda sucks…but I can’t imagine myself settling for the same thing for too long…I go nuts.

I’ve tried for the longest time to fight it. It was one of the reasons I joined the Navy…to have some sort of uniform set of beliefs…to live a life of a singular purpose. It didn’t turn out quite the way I expected it to. My depression was bad, and my anxiety went through the roof as the times I tried to get into gaming, art, or writing…the pressures of qualifactions…the fear of having Chief walk in and yell at me for enjoying a hobby was just simply too much to handle. I didn’t enjoy qualifying in stuff because it didn’t interest me, and the hopes of a creative life was what pushed me through…if only just barely. The fear of having that taken away from me was a prominent stress, as well as mundane repetitive motions that still linger feelings today. If someone orders me to clean the workshop, for example…it triggers an anxiety (PTSD?) attack that brings back emotions from the Navy. Yet if I do certain tasks on my own free will, I have no problem at all.

Probably that’s why I’m so happy at work. The flexibility is what drives me to succeeding in what I do. Finding new solutions to difficult problems is what I’ve enjoyed even when I was a kid trying to find a way to create a makeshift antenna out of a hangar to get better TV reception (when my dad would get cable cut off). I’d look inside a VCR and examine the inner workings of it. I’d open up a tape recorder and figure out what makes it spin. As a teen I would tinker with my parents computer and find out how to make it run faster…how to overclock it…how to make the old CRT monitor work when it started flickering (by flipping it upside down). How to make websites, how to create CSS scripts, create IRC macros and scripts, how to make graphics, how to create art…and so forth.

But that’s that. What is new?

I’m taking flight sims for a break for now. X-Plane is going through a beta period for a new 10.50 patch. The first few patch revisions so far have crashed the sim, prevented plugins from working, and have major issues. I figured it was a good time to take a break and wait it out instead of spending hours waiting for an update to fix the sim.

Taking a break from sims was in good timing. The Steam sale started last week. It’s been a while since I’ve enjoyed a good game and I picked up a few games, as well as catching up with some old ones.

One of the biggest surprises was Doom. Despite NVidia’s app suggesting I turn all settings to minimum, I decided to keep the game as it was, and still enjoy an average 45 fps. I’ve been enjoying Elder Scrolls Online a lot…the exploration is a huge aspect…and it gets rid of the repetitive quests of “Kill 12 monsters”, “Find 15 bails of wheat”, etc.

Also getting back to Crusader Kings II/Europa Universalis. I’ve been waiting for a sale to catch up on all the new DLC. Now that it’s finally here I can enjoy the ahistorical recreations of the Medieval and Renaissance periods. I’m at the same time playing through some of the Total War games to get a more close-up perspective on the battles and action.

As with hardware, I added a new 1TB SSD for gaming specifically. Filling up my primary HDD with games wasn’t something I was willing to do…too many flashbacks of blue screens and losing all my games, saves, and data from a nasty hard drive crash.

I’ve also been tinkering with ordering a GTX 1070 or 1080. Having the most powerful video card in the market creates security for the next few years in having maximum performance for all my games; especially X-Plane, Star Citizen, or whatever the next big-budget video game comes out.

It was frustrating, I originally was lucky to order the GTX 1080 but the wait time was very frustrating. At least “2 weeks”, then a week later checking on the status it still said “2 weeks”. I opted for the GTX 1070 but ran into the same issue. Yesterday decided to check again and finally got an order for the GTX 1080. It’s shipping right now!

Despite the high performance I’ll be getting, I’m sitting away playing Nekopara. It’s some weird cat-game I found on the Steam sale. You are the “master” of these two humanoid cat-like creatures and there’s a lot of strange suggestive text. I’m strangely entertained by it?

Which brings me to my next topic: Japanese gaming.

It’s been a few months since my Japanese phase. I picked up Tokyo Mirage Session for the Wii U  and Digimon Story Cybersluth for the PS4. I’ve played a couple hours of Tokyo Mirage yesterday and I’m enjoying the similarities from the Persona series. I’d love to get into Digimon but my knowledge from the old series is sketchy at best…although I did have a cool Tamigotchi-like toy I got as a kid. At the time the series started, I felt it was a lame Pokemon rip-off. But it has grown into something more…

I’ve gotten back into Japanese studies again. No particular reason, probably to better understand and read a lot of the text. Despite my interests in German or French or whatever…I find Japanese more interesting so I’m going to go with that.

Hopefully sometime in the future I can get back into programming. Along with many other interests, there must be a “Reason” to get back into it. I’m not quite ready to start off in some new direction yet, and I’d feel like I’d be wasting my time. Similar with drawing.

I have the tools to get back into my interests, and that’s very important.

That’s about it for now…some good thoughts for this month.

It’s been a good first run with flight simming, and I’ll definitely stick with it indefinitely. I’m strongly considering a pilots license and the costs associated with it.

Usually I can get too hardcore into something, and I worry where my limits are. Started by renderings lol of WA state for VFR practice, and the realistic scenery is absolutely gorgeous. Then I rendered SoCal for PilotEdge. Then I figured I was that far, why not render central Cali, Florida, Oregon, Utah, Colorado, and everything in between.

It’s time consuming, I started running low on space on my HDD, my VRAM started hitting its limits, and it made flying a game of waiting for loading screens of shifting through low frame rates a la FSX.

For now I have it all disabled, using just the generic textures and objects until I figure things out. It’s not pretty but it gets the job done. I want to fly, not spend time posting screen shots.

So far so good. Got myself a few new aircraft to play around with. Spending a lot of time on GA aircraft but I like to dip my toes into some more commercial aircraft eventually. It’s just fun.

Cutting back on the tweaking and enhancements has also given my more time to work on my model kits and start getting back into normal gaming again. Just got into Total War: Warhammer and Overwatch and it’s a blast.

It’s been a good three day weekend, but I feel that it went by way too fast. Just want to do a bit more relaxing for the rest of the day.

Exhausting day, but a nice way to end my vacation.

Last night, I did some practice ILS approaches. I didn’t do too bad and nailed most of my approaches. Flew around SoCal mostly, and used GPS and VOR navigation (with radials and stuff) to do an ILS landing.

Yesterday since I had issues with the King Air 200…and blowing up the engines. So today I decided to take it easy…and pick a regional airliner!!!

So this morning tried a Dash 8 Q400D, never flew this aircraft before…and I had some issues with the cabin pressure that I resolved by setting up the Bleed Air valves. It’s a good stepping stone to a bigger jet. With it being a regional twin turboprop aircraft with an FMC, I can set up decent approaches by plugging in some data. ILS landing back into PDX didn’t go so well again, somehow it switched over from my planned approach to a direct one. Still have no idea why.

I finally got my account activated for FSEconomy. If you’ve ever played Pocket Planes (it can’t be just me), then the idea is similar. You rent an aircraft and fly passengers or cargo from Point A to Point B. It uses the data from the simulator and adds an MMO-like experience. I went to an airport that had a Beechcraft Baron 58 (can hold up to 5 people), picked up 5 people and took off from Sequim, WA to Arlington, WA and I got about $1600 for the trip.

From Arlington I found three people who wanted to go to Lake Chelan. So I flew to Lake Chelan.

Now I have some people in Lake Chelan who want to go to Centralia. I’m exhausted but it’s nice to have some goals…and some reason to visit the smaller airfields. Makes a big difference as opposed to simply flying back and forth to familiar places.

I’m not sure what else to do. I’m probably going to go to the Museum of Flight for my birthday. Kinda cool, last time I went to an air museum was at the Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum in DC. I also went to Cape Canaveral as a kid and that was cool.

Trying to get into some games again. I’ve talked about ESO but I’m just not really feeling it. It’s hard to get back into a game after I’ve stopped playing for about a month and a half. Maybe later tonight? Tomorrow…or Sunday?

Wow, what a nightmare today was.

I’m a huge fan of all of Beechcraft’s aircraft. The nimble Bonanza, the powerful Baron 58, and the majestic King Air.

This morning I did some flight planning. I went with the King Air 200, beautiful airplane. I picked up a random route…and I just so happen to find a real life King Air flying from Paine Field to PDX. Wonderful opportunity!

I decided I wanted to do an RNAV approach. Basically I plug in some coordinates in the GPS and the controller will vector me to the airfield. The entire flight ended up being a disaster.

First off, I took off from KPAE, saw another flight doing some pattern maneuvers on the other runway…I think “Wow that’s cool to see others flying!”. 5 minutes into the flight, my engines went out over Elliot Bay. I tried to do emergency procedures but they were pretty much dead. I reviewed what went wrong, corrected it, and flew again.

I’m restart the session, head back towards Portland when the approach controller logs online. Great I think! I have someone to help me out. He was very friendly and asked me to descend around Mt. Saint Helens.

My engines suddenly went out again…no idea why. I told him that I’ll need a nearby airfield to land on, got routed to a close one…and landed in a field. He was helpful and asked if I wanted to try again.

This time I flew around, the approach was going great. I was flew a bit high a few times but overall I was on track and following real-world charts to my destination. I’m routed to land on Runway 28R. I plugged it into my GPS, and about 2 miles to the runway, the vector is completly wrong. My airplane starts swinging to the left. Holy crap!!!

The controller said “You’re going way off, land at Runway 28L”, at this point I’m flying at 150 knts and about to overshoot the runway. I immediatly disengage the autopilot, pull the flaps, and…landed!

If this was PilotEdge, I would have had the controller screaming at me. Fortunatly this guy was really cool and said we all make beginner mistakes :).

Needless to say, I’m going to hold off on the big turboprops and jets for now and stick to the easier GA aircraft. I’m also going to do some ILS landings as those are less confusing than the crazy RNAV GPS which I still struggle with.

I’d love to one day do some cross country and intercontinental flights. I’m just not there yet. With that said, VATSIM is a great place to fly, it’s not perfect and it’s certainly not the real world…we’re hobbyists first. I think that gives it an edge over PilotEdge which is used for real-world training…and I’m not ready for that yet.

Later, I plan on doing a flight from Santa Ana to Ontario CA. It’s a common flight on PilotEdge and sounds like I’ll see some lovely scenery (as much as I love the PNW, SoCal also has a place in my heart).

More pictures later.

A followup from the last post. Just did a session on VATSIM. It was actually quite relaxing. I flew from Ellensburg, WA back to Paine Field in Everett.

Unfortunatly the entire trip there was no ATC communication at Seattle Center. I had to use Unicom. At the same time there were a few others flying around the area using the same text-based frequency so I sorta copied what they were doing.

It was still a great trip, and thanks to the training videos from PilotEdge I feel more comfortable speaking to ATC. It’s certainly not realistic, but there’s sort of a nice feeling that I don’t have to worry about swapping frequencies, airspace violations, deviations, or anything else that could be bad news.

It ultimatly end with a couple questions. Do I want to replicate what it is like in real life, so if I do take flying lessions I’ll be confident and comfortable with complex procedures. Fly primarily a C-172 because I may not be comfortable with using other aircraft? Stuck in Southern California? Or do I want to have a more casual experience, fly around in a variety of aircraft…a Piper, a KingAir, a 737? Go all around the world for fun? Enjoy the scenery and the joy of flying?

It’s a tough question. Basically I either study the real thing, or simply have fun.

I think I may do both. I’ll keep studying the procedures and the speak from PilotEdge’s training videos. I don’t have to worry so much about being yelled at for deviations, or feel obligated to use the service because I’ll be paying $20/month for it. VATSIM is free and a lot less stressful, and I can practice without too much worry. Eventually I can build up the courage to go back to PilotEdge and not be so stressed out.

It also gives me time at home to take care of personal things and time to play with others on other games (such as ESO)…which is really important.