HDTP

I went to the doctor today for the first time in...well, its been at least 3 or 4 years. I needed to have a doc sign off that I was in good health for my college so I took the opportunity to get a general physical.

To cut an otherwise boring story short, I'm fine in just about all ways. Lungs and heart checked out, no hernias, and pulse (60 BPM) and blood pressure (117/80, I think, or maybe it was 117/60) all normal. I've never really been a sick person, and I'm guessing all those years of baseball, wrestling, and cross country are paying off in decreased medical bills.

I've gotten addicted to EVE Online recently. They had a 14-day free trial and I had a lot of free time, so I decided to give this space-based MMO a try. I must say, its a very interesting game. Most MMO's have you raising character levels and stats, and equipping various armors and weaponry. EVE deviates a bit from this by removing the concept of levels. Right off the bat, you start training various skills. These skills come into play when you purchase a ship or add various weapons and armor to your ship. Each usable item in the game has various skill requirements, and you must meet each requirement to use the item.

The size of space in ginormous, and EVE does a VERY good job of portraying the size of New Eden (the name of the system the races of EVE inhabit, for more back story check out this page). You navigate by setting destinations and engaging your auto-pilot, which proceeds to navigate the vastness of space to get you to where you want to go. This method of navigation sounds a bit boring to some, but the fact is the time it takes to get from system A to system B can be so long (5, 10 minutes) that you can actually put the game down and let it run its course while you go do some chores or read a book or watch TV. Right now, as I write this, I'm returning to my corporation's headquarters, and I have about another 2 minutes of travelling before I make it there.

Don't count EVE out, I really can't do the game any justice unless I take up a whole two more pages. Just know that this game is very community-based, from system alliances to corporate espionage, all the way up to the very economy that you buy goods from. Demand and supply play strongly into commerce, and you can even follow EVE's "stock market" in-game. Neat stuff!

And before I sign off for the evening, I owe a friend a plug for some skinning he did. First off, a little background: as some of you may know (read: most of my readers), I'm the webmaster for the Deus Ex High Definition Texture Project (HDTP) and have been for a little over a year. Over this last year, the project has been aiming to enhance and recreate (in high-poly models and high-resolution textures) all the weapons, decorations, crates, barrels, and NPC's in the game.

Well, a great deal of progress has been made, and I happen to be good friends with some of the texturers and modellers. One of the modellers, ThalesA7X, was nice enough to do some custom skins of upcoming weapon models for HDTP, and here they are, a lineup of the best Matt's Blog Weaponry available on the blackest of markets!


The always potent Gas Grenade, filled with hot air and ready to kill

Knock off a few baddies with this witty weapon

When you're up against a mech, go with the best

Because you deserve the best...plasma-based weaponry


Recognize anything about the textures? And before I get anyone else mad, I want to thank JC12[/b] for the Gas Grenade, Glock, and LAW models (fan-freaking-tastic work my friend), and [b]Snipamasta for the Plasma Rifle (can't wait to see that baby in-game)! And of course, watch for the official release of these weapons (with appropriate textures of course) sometime in September, if everything goes according to plan :P

And because he did such an awesome job with these, ThalesA7X gets a plug and I make myself out to be an marketing whore...but hey, I have custom weapons and you don't!

Good night everyone!