TF2

I just played TF2 for the first time online. It was released on October 10, 2007. Not a bad effort.

It's also probably the first time I've played an online multiplayer game in several years. There was a few good and bad points that formed my first impressions:

Good

• It resembles the first TF game somewhat
• Heaps of players and servers, and good pings
• In game voice comm, occasionally annoying but mostly entertaining chat from the other (mostly younger) gamers
• Heaps of achievements to unlock with each class
• You get to shoot people and blow things up
  

Bad

• The player movement and speed is drastically reduced from TF and QW
• No bunnyhopping
  
• All of the classes are balanced, but it seems every character has flaws such that you can't really dominate at all or survive for long without dying
  
• The sentry gun is way too strong and fast, with some classes there's simply no weapon to destroy it
  
• The maps are a little repetitive, there's not that many of them, and they favour the defense. Some of the game types are designed purely for one team to "camp" a point and not get overrun - with no offensive goal at all
  

In summary it's a bit of fun and I may keep playing it casually for a bit longer, but I just doesn't seem like the game I could ever play seriously and want to become good at - not that I'd have the time to - it's just not that satisfying to win a map, it feels like more of a grind to get the kills and play on offense (I don't and will never play on defense).

USA Holiday

All the articles are here:

October 24
October 25
October 26
October 27
October 28
October 29
October 30
October 31
November 01
November 02
November 03
November 04
November 05
November 06
November 07
November 08
November 09
November 10
November 11
November 12
November 13
November 14
November 15
November 16
November 17-19

Some YouTube videos are here:

Pier 39
LA Clippers intro video
LA Clippers vs Phoenix Suns - Barbosa puts the Suns in front late in the game
LA Clippers vs Phoenix Suns - Butler for the Clippers at the other end
LA Clippers vs Phoenix Suns - Nash with the eventual game winner
This is the way all close Clippers game end up
Universal Studios tram tour
Universal Studios Halloween Night #1 - guy with chainsaw
Universal Studios Halloween Night #2 - park entrance
Universal Studios Halloween Night #3 - Shawn Of The Dead street
San Antonio Spurs intro video
Tower Of The Americas
San Antonio Spurs vs Oklahoma City Thunder - player intro
San Antonio Spurs vs Oklahoma City Thunder - It's KERNKRAFT 400!
San Antonio Spurs vs Oklahoma City Thunder - George Hill late game three
Outside Lucas Oil Stadium
Cover band playing Free Fallin' inside the stadium *
Part of Indianapolis Colts intro video
Indianapolis Colts vs New England Patriots - It's KERNKRAFT 400 again!
Indianapolis Colts vs New England Patriots - National Anthem
Indianapolis Colts vs New England Patriots - Randy Moss TD!
Indianapolis Colts vs New England Patriots - Julian Edelman TD!
Indianapolis Colts vs New England Patriots - Joseph Addai TD
Indianapolis Colts vs New England Patriots - The 4th and 2 play
Indianapolis Colts vs New England Patriots - Reggie Wayne winning TD
Indianapolis Colts vs New England Patriots - Reggie Wayne winning TD replay **

* The last time I heard Free Fallin' it was being performed by Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers at Super Bowl XLII - not a good sign
** When they start playing Rock And Roll Part 2, the game is over

If I ever get the chance to visit the USA again, I think it would go like this:

• Florida
• Boston / New York / Toronto (maybe) / Chicago (maybe)
  
• Las Vegas
• Seattle / Portland (maybe) / Vancouver (maybe)
  
• LA / San Diego / Mexico (maybe)

USA Holiday, November 17-19 (The End)

Indianapolis, Chicago, Los Angeles, Sydney, Melbourne. Stuck at LAX for 7 hours, stuck in a seat for 14 hours at a time, but I guess it was worth it.

USA Holiday, November 16 (The Brickyard)

As it goes when you ride the bus, I had to head downtown first and then on another bus out to the Indianapolis Motor Speedway.

They do some behind the scenes tour only about 20 days of the year, but the museum is open all the time, and you can take a bus tour around the circuit. Started with the bus tour which is fun, not often you get to go around a permanent race circuit, even if it was just as a passenger. After that had a walk around the museum which had a whole lot of old cars that had raced in the Indy 500 over the years (most of which I hadn't heard of) but also a couple of Formula One, Nascar and motorbikes as a few different kinds of events have been hosted there in the last decade. The highlight of the museum was seeing the JV and MS cars.

Overall the trip out to the speedway was great, but if you got to drive yourself on a part of the track it would have been that much better. Walking back to the bus station afterward was by far the coldest I have felt. I had to resort to a beanie and gloves, and even that only helped a bit.

Start Your Engines!

Lots of old cars.

AJ Foyt Jr, won the Indy 500 four times.

Back outside for a flying lap.

The winners podium and the pagoda.

The only remaining bricks on the circuit, beside the start-finish line.

Gasoline Alley. Cars go here to refuel.

The great Al Unser Jr.

Mario Andretti. Getting a bit more modern now.

Jacques Villenueve 1995!

Winners trophy, complete with small heads of each of the winners.
Not the best looking trophy if you ask me.

Michael Schumacher 1991!

The Nascar trophy.

I could almost run faster than this thing.

Survived the arctic conditions and made it back into downtown. The Indiana Pacers court, the Conseco Fieldhouse is also located in the city, so had a chance to check that out as well as the Circle Centre Mall, which was one of the better malls I've been to.

The weather was just too bad to spend a full day outside, so I didn't get a chance to have a wander around the White Water Park area. They have a zoo, paddle boats (fun to race), a NCAA Hall Of Champions (that was closed on Mondays ffs!) and a couple of other things. There was also a canal running through the west part of the city, which was basically like a less glamorous version of San Antonio's river walk.

USA Holiday, November 15 (Fourth And Two)

Had to get up at 5:30am for a flight to Indianapolis. Not as bad as it sounds, because they were closing all of the streets in the city between 5:30 and 6:30 in preparation for the marathon in the morning, so managed to avoid most of the ensuing chaos. As we were heading to the airport there was hundreds of people lining the streets, waiting for buses to get from the city to the starting line (it seemed), I'm not sure why they wouldn't start and finish the race in a more convenient location.

The two airports with free wifi? The ones you'd least expect: San Antonio and Indianapolis.
Actually, LAX I would least expect...

The Indianapolis hotel was near the airport, rather than downtown, because we're only here for one and a half days. There was a whole bunch of hotels in the area, but as a group they seemed to be in a deserted place in the middle of nowhere - perhaps that's how all airport hotels are. A taxi driver later said something about the hotel being near the "old airport" which seemed to explain it (they'd relocated the airport terminal at some point perhaps), but looking at a map of the area that doesn't seem to make any sense. Anyway, there was a cool Waffle House next to the hotel, so that was a good consolation.

Since there's nothing to do around the hotel, took the bus into the city early, ahead of the NFL game. Problem was that the bus was about 3 kilometres away. There's no footpaths either, so you're just walking along the side of the road. Not much fun.

Arrived in the city to find what seemed like about 80% of the people are wearing Colts jerseys. Blue and white everywhere. Had a bit of a walk around but it was quite cold, and also very windy to make things worse.

South of the City Centre Circle.

East.

North,

Something in the middle.

West.

Map of IN. Lucas Oil in the top right corner.

Indiana State House.

Had some Taco Bell for dinner, which after going to actual Mexican restaurants seemed like such a poor imitation. The cheese quesadillas I had seemed like they'd just been delivered in a bag and thrown in a microwave.

Got to the game way early, and made our way to our seats. The ramps they've got to walk up to the upper levels had such a shallow incline that I takes something like 5 to 10 minutes to make it to the upper section. There wasn't much pregame action, so just had a bit of a walk around some of the stadium.

The game was great fun, and high scoring which is a bonus. The only downside is that it is very slow to watch in person, and the game ended up going for about 3 and a half hours. I was both excited and afraid when the Pats took a (unnecessary) risk to finish off the game, and of course a little upset when it backfired. It wasn't all bad though, as it was a decent consolation to be able to see the excitement of the whole crowd when the game was over, and it continued out in the streets.

Getting back to the hotel from the city wasn't a fun experience. I researched a bit about it on the internet that stated that (unlike Melbourne, New York etc) you can rarely just hail a cab off the street, you need to call for one to pick you up. That's a bit of a problem when there seemed to be almost no public phones around the city. Finally found one and called one of the companies for a taxi, waited for a bit, didn't seem to arrive, waited a bit more. After giving up on that, we did just manage to flag down a guy driving out of the city who said that it was a bit difficult to get taxis after the game but there's places closer in the center of the city where you have a much better chance to grab one. Thanks a lot for that great advice internet & hotel staff. Ending up getting home some time around 1am I think.

Looks more like a barn than a stadium.

But it's all good once you get inside - and all the way up to your seats.

Bill on the big screen!

Brady practicing.

Manning walking around, didn't seem to practice a whole lot.

A Colts family - one of many.

Big flag for the anthem, fills up the whole field.

USA Holiday, November 14 (Mission Accomplished)

Made another attempt at visiting Mission San Jose today, and this time assisted by a bus. It's pretty easy to spot the mission thankfully, as it's on the main road and a pretty large area. I was surprised how large the whole area was given that the mission itself is quite small, as the photos will soon demonstrate. From the surviving buildings you get to see and the visitor centre, it was interesting from a historical perspective to learn a bit about the history of Texas.

Inside the front gate of the mission.

The main building and the church.

Church entrance.

This is something special called the Rose Window. Not really that exciting.

Mill.

Granary.

Went to Brackenridge Park next. The park includes the following: Kind Of Miniature Railway, Walking / Running Tracks, Picnic Areas, Zoo, Japanese Gardens. The tracks leading through the woods aren't really the kind of place you'd want to go at night, or if you've ever watched The Blair Witch Project.

The name of this place seems to alternate between Chinese and Japanese Gardens.

The Americans like their Japanese gardens.

Didn't get to see a couple of corners of The Alamo the last time (it's only a small place but we were running short on time) so went back to see if we missed anything - not really.

James Bowie, David Crockett, and lots of others I don't know.

A lot busier on the weekend.

I'm not sure if it's always like this, or maybe lots of these people were down for the San Antonio Rock 'n Roll Marathon that was on the following morning. From all accounts it's just a normal marathon, it's not rock 'n roll themed or anything like that.

Another building in The Alamo.

Went past La Villita again as didn't get to see it last time also, there's not much to see there besides a few shops, but again it's a nice area right in the middle of the city that they have managed to preserve. Really good job the way they've retained their history and heritage.

Planned to get some dinner from the local Subway but they didn't have any Veggie Patties! (They also didn't have any of the "Personal Cheese Pizza" which is also nice, and good value for like $3.50, not sure if they sell them in Australia). This Indian (not native American) guy in line behind me wanted the same thing, except the conversation went more like this: "Have you got the veggie maxi?", "The what?", "The veggie maxi?", "We've got a veggie delight...", "No the veggie maxi", "Veggie delight?", (His friend steps in and describes a veggie patty), "Oh. No, we don't sell them here". Hilarious. What the hell is a veggie maxi??

So, I had self-serve frozen yoghurt for dinner! I'm sure I must have mentioned the abundance of "low fat" frozen yoghurt stores by now, I can't remember though. Anyway, if I haven't, self serve with choose your own toppings is great for any meal of the day.

Went off to see the Spurs vs Thunder game after this - with the bus ride going a little more smoothly this time, including not heading in the wrong direction for the bus stop after the game. It was good to get to see the Thunder play after four other games before this, and what was even better was that the Thunder won! The Spurs probably should have caught up at the end, only for some costly turnovers to ruin any chance of that. The crowd was quite flat in the last quarter as the Spurs were a few points behind most of the way.

The Spurs like odd year numbers.