Bugs, Virus and other Abominations

Bugs
Chet and I must have hunted down over 100 bugs and other issues since alpha began. I fixed most of them now, classified several as low priority (will get to them if and when I feel like), and have been really stumped by just two or three bugs thus far but they aren’t critical ones and, if need be, I know there are workarounds for them.

It’s amazing how bugs just keeping creeping up though. All you need is to forget a journal advance at some point or put in the wrong conditional on a convo node. I cross my fingers we will have caught all of these subtle errors before release.

So bug hunting and polishing has been going at a swift pace… until about two and a half weeks ago.

Virus
It started with my 5 year old daughter contracting a flu, with fever lasting a full week (most likely H1N1). Wife and I split the time at home. Paid-work productivity went down of course, and so did time spent on Trinity.

And then it was my turn. Woke up the day after my wife left for a 12-day business trip to South America with flu symptoms: test results two days later confirmed H1N1. So have been struggling to get over this since. Still not fully recovered. Wife is back now, so that is a measure of relief.

At one point even, my 3-year old had flu-like symptoms, but she was out of commission for just 3 days. Good to see how the young ones spring back so swiftly.

Although at home every day since, I haven’t had much energy to put into Trinity. Did feel good 2-3 days late last week and started work on a brand new area (felt good to sculpt and texture again) for the “drider and destruction” quest. Got a new alpha out to Chet too for a fresh runthrough, and looking forward to seeing the results of his hunt. But I haven’t had the spirit to do much more.

Abominations
Instead, I’ve have been putting time into Dragon Age, and killed a ton (certainly feels like it) of abominations and other darkspawns. Playing as a mage, which is hugely different than playing a wizard or even a sorcerer in NWN2. The quick spell refresh and low spell variety means the same strategy again and again in combat. Though combat is fast and furious, and the animations and especially sounds are extremely satisfying, it’s gotten a little old already, and I’ve put aside the game for now, still, after no less than 40 hours of playing.

Picked up Fallout 3 again, installed a couple of mods from Fallout Nexus, and I’m enjoying the exploration and the quests once again, though I expect killing Super Mutants, Super Mutant Brutes, Super Mutant Masters, and more Super Mutants to get old soon again. But for the time being that’s where much of my time before the LCD screen is spent.

Should be back on Trinity soon.

Thanks for reading.