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Ugh, carbonite wakeup gives me such a hangover. This time was especially hard… once I popped out, everything seemed choppy and discombobulated. I even forgot the password to my personal Datapad (and, forgot how to open it, as well!) I guess a year and a half frozen away from the universe will do that to you. Better a bit scatterbrained than being completely blind like you puny humans get.
First things first, figuring out how to move again… and remapping keys. I was always a WAXD kinda guy.. none of that wussy WASD or keypad stuff. It took a bit to find my inventory again, and then a bit of a pleasant surprise that I still had a ton of stuff, mostly advanced droid parts. Unfortunately, I couldn’t remember any of the other keys or even what I was supposed to be doing with them… ugh, carbonite sickness, me hates you.
When looking through my inventory, I tried to use my favorite FWG5 pistol… but no dice. Apparently, it must be that new Character Level thing. That’s when you know the empire is getting too strict -- when they’ve overridden the safeties on your own pistol! Guess I’m only CL 30 and need to be 54 for this one. I thought I had more Pistoller skills, but guess I’m a wuss afterall.
So, as I start blinking away the string white lights of Mos Eisley, I see some guy with a question mark above his head… weird, because this ain’t WOW. I talk to him, and get some quest to deposit 100 credits in the bank. Whatever, but credits are credits. As I walk to the bank, I start looking around the world… and notice things look brighter than I remembered. At first, I thought it was graphics lag, then I realized it was from all the people! There are tons of PCs running around, spamming auctions and invites, and so on. Lots of questions asking me to build/program droids.. Guess I still have my MDE title on. It takes me a bit of hunting to find the Community screen to switch it off.
OK, enough lollygagging around. I head off to find the cantina… not really able to recognize it from the outside. I’m terrible with navigating, and it doesn’t get any better after sleeping for a year. I try for the cantina, and it takes me a bit to remember to hit the “m” key for the overhead map. I find it and look around until I see a shifty pirate-type in a back room. Ask for training, he gives me a ship, and I’m off to the races! Or, to the Starport. I think.
As I start running out to the starport, I hear shots and then see my health bar declining. Stormtroopers are firing at me! Must be either a Temporary Enemy Flag or something… maybe cause I still have -4500 Imperial Faction… not sure. They didn’t shoot on the way in. I stop by the Bazaar and look to buy some basic weapons or stuff. Nothing! No droids or creatures or weapons or wookie armor for sale, seemingly on the entire planet. WTF? Is no one using the bazaar, or what?
I head out to find my new starship, eager for some space battles The starport is much like I remembered though with lots more people hanging around and everyone pestering me for an invite. People keep asking for Droid Programming… not sure how that works. I didn’t knoe you COULD program a droid. Interesting. Maybe a space thing?
I wonder around the starport and look for way to call the ship. Not really sure, and can’t see it anywhere. I stumble around, and see a Ship terminal. This must be it. I access it, choose “Launch” and up we go!
Space is a bit tricky and overwhelming at first. More tricky than I’d think. In space, the mouse axis moves the ship… and I can’t seem to click any action buttons… there are some icons on the right side and bottom, but I can’t get the mouse to select them, it just repoints the ship. The Up key increases speed, and I go off to aim at red dots in distance. There are iron asteroids all around. Thinking it’d be like on the ground, I try the tab key, which selects the enemy. Get close enough and start shooting. Easy. Leading the target with the green pointer… a bit harder, but my 15-year old Wing Commander skills come in handy. Or so I thought.. I guess after shooting at 5 or 6 ships, they all start attacking me at once. Who would figured.
Right then, in the midsts of battle, I get a call from my wife to go helper with the groceries. Can’t she see I’m fighting evil space pirates?! Well, happy wife, happy life, and off I go to do manual labor again. I mean, sheesh, brain the size of a planet, and I’m carrying groceries! As I get back to my cockpit… er… seat, I see that the screen is flashing red, and sirens are blurting. There’s a big [Eject] button on the bottom, but as my mouse points the ship, I can’t seem to click it. Err.. I think fast, and type /eject, which luckily works. Score one for the devs. But minus one for the groceries.
I regenerate at the space station, and a NPC is asking something about landing or wanting work. I want to click something, but still can’t target anything. I must be missing something seriously obvious here, but it’s damn frustrating! I also don’t really know how to highlight a patrol point or waypoint or anything… Quit for the night with /exit.
Or not. An hour later, I’m back in the game. Couldn’t stay away. I come back to life on the ground and go back to quest-giving dude to see if he gives you a new ship, he just repeats the quest details. Urgh. I went back to the starport, examined my ship in the Starship Terminal, saw everything was 0ed out.
Hmmm, thinks I. How should I fix my ship? I asked around a bit, and a ShipWright told me there are General Purpose repair modules.. each have points that you can put towards any ship repairs. I bought 5 for 4k each, and used them to repair the ship (took about 2.5k points, I’d guess). Back into space, and off towards the nav point, now (I guessed that N was for nav menu). I still wish I could see ship status. Everyhting else is a blast (heh, heh.. I wonder how many others came up with that joke), especially the star fighting.
It seems that orienting my ship along the axis improves the hit rate… It’s so much fun to kill things in space.
Duhh!!! The Alt key!! That’s how you get control to click on your other buttons! I can’t believe I forgot that. All my kingdom for an Alt key! Now, I can access the menus and figure things out better.
After completing my mission and killing the baddies, I flew back to the station… and had an offer to land. I didn’t land, and lost the menu… and couldn’t find out how to land again… a bit annoying. So, I flew away, flew back, and had the options again. Ahh, that makes sense.
Also noticed in my Inventory that I had a droid-interface module that I must have picked up as loot… but there was something at the top about needing a certification… I’m guessing that I need higher level to add it to my ship. Or some Pilot-use skills to install it.. Now, I need to figure out what droid pieces are needed -- Maybe I’ll make an Adv R2 unit to stick in my ship… Aww, the droid-lust is back! Now, back to shooting the baddies!
Back for another mission, then up for more killin’! I love the space game!
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--The Hermit
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