I was incredibly hyped for Cities: Skylines 2 before release. I'd played the original for several hundred hours and I've always been a big fan of city builder games going back to the original SimCity and SimCity 2000. But so far, I've only put about 80 hours into Cities: Skylines 2. I just find myself bored, and I think it's time to ponder why.
For starters, I feel that Cities: Skylines 2 hasn't done as much as it could have to feel more like a simulation.
As the original Cities: Skylines aged, it started to feel more like a city painter than a city simulation. Despite adding features like industry specializations and new transport options, these additions never seemed to make a meaningful difference in how a city was run or how difficult it was to achieve positive outcomes.
I was hoping Cities: Skylines 2 might address this, and arguably it has ever so slightly. The game's beginning is more difficult than it used to be, especially at launch when it was essentially trivial from the start. But despite that, the simulation still comes across as shallow.
FATE is a game I saw at Walmart. And GameStop. And online. And bundled with computers sold around late 2005 through 2006. It was, for the span of about a year, seemingly everywhere I looked.
But while everyone seemed to know about it, no one I knew IRL played it. Opinions were hardly more informed online, where gamer forums often mocked the game as "Diablo for kids." Or so I remember. The game didn't receive a lot of reviews, either, though the few that were published gave it high marks.
At some point, as I recall, I did play it. Most likely as a demo, because demos of the game were circulated widely online and as pre-installed software on Windows PCs. It's a perfect game to bundle with a new system: it looks inoffensive, it's easy to pick up and while it had 3D graphics, they were low-end (an 800MHz Pentium III and video solution with 32MB of VRAM was all it required).
Having always been curious about the game, I've started to pick it up now and again, as I plan to cover it on Computer Gaming Yesterday in celebration of the game's 20th anniversary.
With Knojaw's death last week it was of course time to roll up a new character. And since I'd spent most of my time playing Rogue a bit jealous of the caster classes, and of Warlock specifically, I decided to roll one up. Yes, a old man Human Warlock. A bit boring, I suppose, but I rolled him mostly because I've not leveled up as a Human for some years.
So far, Harridon has only made it to level six, which wasn't the most riveting experience. Yes, the human starting zones sure do involve a lot of thugs. And kobolds. And then higher level thugs, and higher level kobolds. But they are, at least, not much of a threat…until I get to Westfall, I'm sure.
While Elywnn Forest is a classic but basic zone, the Warlock class is great from the very start. By level four you have a pet, a nuke, and two damage-over-time spells. It's a powerful setup with good variety and great class flavor. I've always been partial to pet classes, and Warlock is one of the best.
I've also spent a few hours editing my next video for the Computer Gaming Yesterday channel. This is an exciting first for my channel: a video about a computer.
Well, it finally happened. On December 29, 2024, Knojaw kicked the can.
I rolled Knojaw, an Undead Rogue, on the new Hardcore servers for World of Warcraft. As you can tell from the time that has passed since then, I didn't play him obsessively, but I had a good 20 to 25 hours into him. I spent a fair amount of time fishing and cooking. Knojaw lacked a jaw, but he had a refined palette.
My mistake was typical of most deaths in World of Warcraft. I got overconfident and went someplace I shouldn't have. I picked up the quest Resting in Pieces, which begins when a talking head randomly drops from a Gnoll, and followed the quest chain into the castle on Fenris Isle.
The castle was thick with Gnolls, far too many for me to take on alone. Fortunately, a Warlock was also trying to do the quest. We grouped up and fought our way to the top, where the talking head had a prize waiting for us. Successful, we then began to battle our way down.
Faced with three Gnolls and taking some hits, my random ally said "Bro, this shit is FIRE." Which, of course, is exactly the moment everything went wrong.
If you're reading this, you've somehow come to the very first blog post on Computer Gaming Yesterday. Welcome! You're no doubt in rare company.
Blogging seems to be coming back into style among a certain set of elder millennials. And let's be real: mostly, it's just 'cause we're getting older. As our lives become more complex, we yearn for simpler times and simpler websites. But that's a topic for a different blog.
This is Computer Gaming Yesterday, so this blog is about computer games. Here's why I'm starting it.
First up, I want to remember what I play. For several years running I've been asked "what was your favorite game of the year?" and have found it a tough question to answer. What did I play? How much did I like it? What was my favorite? I can come up with some kind of answer, but often I remember a better answer later.
Second, I want a place to host my writing about computer games. I started Computer Gaming Yesterday as a YouTube channel, and that's not going away or becoming less important. But making a video takes a long time, and I often find myself left with tidbits and smaller ideas that don't really justify a full video. You'll find those tidbits on this blog.
Third, I want a home base for Computer Gaming Yesterday. I registered the domain and created this website about a year ago, but it's mostly sat idle. But now that I have several projects going – including my book on EverQuest, which was released in December of 2024 – I feel the need for a "home page" I can tell people to visit when they want to know more.
So, that's it. That's why I'm starting a blog in 2025.
Now then – gaming goals in 2025. What do I want to accomplish?
I want to complete a lengthy video on the Civilization franchise. That will mean playing some older Civilization games. I want to try some games I missed, like Civilization III and Civilization Call to Power.
World of Warcraft has again caught my eye, and since I've finished up my book on EverQuest, I have more time to play other MMORPGs. The big, hairy goal I'd like to achieve (but probably won't) is to hit level 60 on a Hardcore server. A more practical goal is to just keep playing the game instead of getting distracted, as has often happened in my attempts to dig back into World of Warcraft after the Legion expansion.
Looking further into 2025, I hope to make some time to visit more real-time strategy games from the late 1990s. I'm thinking of games like Myth, Total Annihilation, Ground Control, Warzone 2100, and Earth 2150, just to name a few. There's a lot of popular games from that era that deserve some coverage.
Anyway, that's it for my 2025 goals, and for my first blog post. Shew!
