Monday 29 August 2011

Trophy Huntin' (21/08/11 - 27/08/11)

Demon's Souls

Penetrator's Trophy
Slayer of Demon "Penetrator"

"Sounds like you're fighting a porn star" were the words of encouragement from my significant other. I suppose it did.

It was good to get back to Bolatarian Palace, which I found to be relatively light compared to the dark, moody settings of underground mines, old prison cells and diseased bogs. Working my way up to this boss, I realised that Demon's Souls no longer held its power of trickery over me. I now know this game too well to be deceived by its traps. As a result, I had no trouble in reaching the boss of world 1-3, who would have been pretty terrifying had I not been helped by an NPC I rescued a moment before passing through the fog gate.

Biorr fought valiantly, and very nearly died while drawing the Penetrator's gaze away from me as I let loose with the usual barrage of arrows.

Leechmonger's Trophy
Slayer of Demon "Leechmonger"

I think it's safe to say that I was a tiny bit over-leveled for world 5-1, as I cruised on through without so much as a grazed knee. As far as I could tell, this boss didn't even see me. From a high up place I was able to shoot at it with no threat of retaliation whatsoever.

Dirty Colossus' Trophy
Slayer of Demon "Dirty Colossus"

At last, a boss gives me a reason to return to my melee roots. There was no way this guy was going to succumb to puny ranged attacks. Once again, though, I think I was just too high a level for this to be challenging. His melee attacks were fairly strong, but easy to recover from, and his habit of covering me with swarms of flies was merely an annoyance.

This is the problem when you're given freedom of choice in which order you complete the levels in; by the end, you're going to be left with some encounters that pose no difficulty. Had I ventured into world 5 earlier on, it might have been quite an enjoyable experience, but I get the feeling that another world would have suffered in its place. Perhaps some sort of level scaling wouldn't have gone amiss.

Maiden Astraea's Trophy
Slayer of Demon "Maiden Astraea"

It's becoming all too familiar now that I'm given somewhere to stand that a boss can't reach. There's honestly nothing I can say about this encounter because once again, I just shot arrows at her until she was destroyed. The only thing that might have stopped me was her healing spell, but the damage of my bow easily outweighed it.

One boss left to go (three if you count the optional bosses that I'll probably have a crack it).

World of Warcraft

Character: Grimtoosk

I've Toured the Fjord
Complete 105 quests in Howling Fjord

I have indeed toured the Fjord, and I'm going to stick to my controversial opinion that Borean Tundra is far, far better. The story arcs there are just a lot more Horde-ish.

That said, Howling Fjord comes out the winner in the category of environment presentation. The way that the frosty green slowly turns to snow as you venture further away from the coast is a great introduction to Northrend. It's as if it's easing you into the harshness of the frozen wastes before you travel deeper into the continent, to the treacherous Dragonblight. I may have enjoyed the quests of Borean Tundra more, but there's no denying that its broken up landscape was much less characteristic of the icy northern continent.
 
Got My Mind On My Money
Loot 100 gold

Nothing to see here, just a milestone to make you realise how many times you've right-clicked a corpse.

Team Fortress 2 

Spy Achievements

Fyi I Am A Spy
Backstab a Medic who has healed you in the last 5 seconds

So much for 'quitting' the spy. There were many situations during this weekend's TF2 session in which a heavy just wasn't going to cut it, due to either a lack of medics or too many enemy sentries to be cut down by. Like a fool, I chose the spy once again.

It actually went better than it ever has. I'm still pretty easy to suss out as spy, but I managed to get a fair few backstabs in.

And as for this achievement, I'm happy to say that it wasn't accidental. I spotted a lone medic and decided to act as if I was waiting for him to accompany me for some ubercharged fun times. He took the bait, began healing me, and as soon as he ran on ahead, I sent him to meet his maker. When it all goes exactly to plan as it did here, the spy is a very satisfying class to play.

Spies Like Us
While cloaked, bump into an enemy cloaked Spy

Oops. At least it wasn't a pyro like it usually is. Perhaps we had some form of mutual spy respect, because we both continued on our merry way, choosing not to engage each other in pistol to pistol combat. Mostly it was because I panicked and ran away immediately, so as to not be given a taste of my own backstabbing medicine.

You Only Shiv Thrice
Backstab 3 enemies within 10 seconds

You see? That's a lot of backstabs for little old me. Sniper perches are one of my favourite places to hang out.

Slash And Burn
Backstab an enemy, who then switches to Pyro before they respawn

Pyro being the anti-spy class of choice, it's good to know that I managed to make someone rage enough to make this switch.

Spy Milestone 1
Achieve 5 of the achievements in the Spy pack

And there you have it. After almost giving up on the class altogether, I managed to have a really fun evening playing as the spy, collecting a handful of achievements which will act as my encouragement to continue.

My reward for this achievement is the Ambassador, a pistol that's suited to someone who makes a lot of headshots. Not me, then.

Engineer Achievements

Frontier Justice
Have your sentry kill the enemy that just killed you within 10 seconds

Should've been aiming for the sentry, pal.

Engineer Milestone 1
Achieve 5 of the achievements in the Engineer pack

As with the spy, it was another semi-successful evening as the engineer. A few of the token sentry spots were free, so I was able to set up and join the battle for once.

The reward for this achievement is the shotgun known as Frontier Justice, which grants you revenge crits for every kill by your sentry, following destruction of said sentry. I see no reason why not to switch to this, as I barely rely on the base shotgun for damage. The chance to dish out a little revenge sounds good to me.

Thursday 25 August 2011

I've Been Through the Desert with a Robe and No Name

Today, I want to talk about Journey. No, not the 70s/80s rock band that has been permanently ruined by a certain musical TV show that shall remain nameless; I'm talking about Thatgamecompany's upcoming PSN release that has so far been perplexing press with its bewildering simplicity. For a long time, I've been confused as to what Journey even is. I've been reading previews since it was first announced, which have, up until recently, danced around the question as to what the game entails.

It seems that the clue is in the title. Journey is just that; a journey that you embark on and nothing more. What we know so far is that you play as a robed figure in a desert. There are no quests or objectives other than heading towards a mountain in the distance. There will be obstacles along the way, but presumably nothing that could cause you to die. Jumping is limited in a power-up fashion, so the main challenges are going to be earning the jumps you need to continue on your way. The game is online, and features co-op with other players. Strangers that you meet on your way will be able to assist you by boosting your jumps.

For the moment, that's about all there is. It sounds incredibly simple, and you may scratch your head as to how it's going to compete amongst games where you, you know... do stuff. Of course, this is in development by Thatgamecompany, who released the enigmatic Flower in 2009, a game that had you guiding flower petals through the wind. I didn't personally play it, but when you consider the premise and then look at the high review scores it received, you start to understand that this a company you have to have a little faith in, and not judge Journey until you've actually sampled it yourself.

According to an interview posted on Joystiq back in July, the overall aim of Journey is to provide a new kind of cooperative experience. Every character will be completely anonymous and there'll be absolutely no communication outside of a simple non-verbal shout. By removing all speech and personality from each player, Thatgamecompany may have created the perfect online experience. I'm no stranger to the colourful personalities that the anonymity of the internet has bred. I've played World of Warcraft for years, and during several lapses of judgement I've been involved in a lot of groups of random players. While you can mostly ride out the resulting bumps in the road, every now and then you run into someone who seems determined to make it as difficult as possible for everyone involved. I wonder how those same situations would have gone if all our characters looked the same and the only communication was a non-verbal system (raid icons?) that purely served to facilitate teamwork. Journey seems to be exploring that reality.

In that sense, Journey is more of an experiment than a full game, but it'll certainly be interesting to see how people react to it, and to actually try it out myself. I'm usually quite hesitant to play online games with strangers as I tend to feel pressured into playing perfectly, so as to not feel judged as a simpleton when I make a perfectly reasonable mistake, as opposed to when playing with friends where I can feel much more relaxed in my idiocy (ask my old WoW guild about the "slowly reversing into fire" incident, it's always a favourite). Perhaps being completely anonymous with no worries of griefing could take the edge off.

Last I heard, Journey was set for release later this year. I look forward to satisfying my curiosity.

Sunday 21 August 2011

Trophy Huntin' (7/08/11 - 20/08/11)

Demon's Souls (Playstation 3)

Master Bowman's Trophy
Obtained Best Bow by Spiderstone

This is an unusual trophy for me in that it's one of those rare moments where I committed to farming for more than ten minutes. I was looking at upgrading my weapons, specifically my bow due to my recent found love of ranged combat. I discovered that my best option was the Sticky Compound Long Bow, a bow that's of benefit to characters with high dexterity. Initially, I was only thinking of upgrading it a few times, but looking through my items revealed that I already had a few of the rarer items I needed to upgrade it fully, including a pure spiderstone, which is needed to make the final upgrade. With that in mind, I set out to farming the shards and chunks of spiderstone I still required.

It was disheartening at first, when not a single shard was dropping despite multiple runs through the area that contained the beasts that held onto them. It was then pointed out to me that items drop much more often when in pure black world tendency. So, I committed suicide in body form 7 times to achieve this. Around the same time, I discovered a crystal lizard that dropped a nice amount of the items I needed, and I was able to kill it twice before it stopped respawning. That sped things up a little, but I still had a few more chunks to find, which thankfully all dropped at the same time after another stretch of farming.

Does all of that sound ridiculous to you? If you've never played Demon's Souls, I'm sure it does. But that's what this game has you do. You have to kill crystal lizards, kill yourself and spend a couple of hours running through the same tunnel over and over again to get the weapons you want. I'm happy with the outcome, though, as I now have a pretty fantastic bow that's dishing out respectable amounts of damage. I've decided not to do the same for my melee weapon and shield, which would involve yet more hours of mindless farming, instead choosing to focus on actually completing the game. Funny, that.

Maneater's Trophy
Slayer of Demon "Maneater"

This was bordering on Flamelurker levels of annoyance. The strategy seemed simple enough; shoot at the Maneater as it was running towards me down a long platform, run past it and to the other end of the arena when it got too close and fire at it again while it continued to run towards me. Unfortunately, I was finding that it was always a little too close behind, leaving me little time to fire at it. The wonderful thing about this battle is that a second Maneater enters the fray after a certain amount of time. If the first one isn't one or two hits away from dying, your chances of survival are lowered significantly.

I died over and over again, even giving up before I went off on my holiday to Dublin, vowing to destroy it when I returned. It turns out I was making the whole thing difficult for myself, as I hadn't noticed one massive detail; the platform continued and the arena was actually twice as long as I thought. With this extra length to run into, it was much easier to get enough distance to get a few shots in before the Maneater reached me. Following this facepalm-worthy discovery, I killed both Maneaters first time.

Old Monk's Trophy
Slayer of Demon "Old Monk"

This is one of the most interesting bosses in the game and makes very innovative use of online functionality. If another player is available, he/she takes on the role of the final boss for this world. It's a brilliant example of PvP as it brings a whole new meaning to the fight, as there's so much more at stake. You're no longer fighting to stave off a mild annoyance, you now have to defeat another player in order to progress through the game. Meanwhile, the other player gets to feel the power of acting as an end-boss, and has the chance to bring a stall to another player's progression.

Of course, this would have been interesting had I not been playing offline. I'm trying to unlock certain areas and events by bringing each world to pure white tendency. Unfortunately, world tendency resets to an average of every other Demon's Souls player's tendency every time you load up the game while logged into PSN. For that reason, I've remained offline so that my world tendency persists, as I just don't have the time to go through other means of bringing it up to pure white. As such, this boss was merely an AI stand-in that's very much a pushover, meaning a very easy silver trophy. A shame, but it's my own fault for playing offline.

Old Hero's Trophy
Slayer of Demon "Old Hero"

I'm coming across quite a few scenarios now in which it seems I've automatically entered as the victor, purely because I'm fighting with a bow. Perhaps I am reducing difficulty by playing it safe with a ranged weapon, but surely a game like this should be balanced around making it hard for any style of fighting. Sometimes it feels like I've broken the game.

This boss is blind, and locates you based on what it can hear. Make too many loud footsteps and it'll come right at you. Attack it with your melee weapon and it'll lash out. Stand at a distance and fire arrows at it, and it'll just throw a bit of a tantrum, but never actually find you. Once again, an interesting boss with an intriguing mechanic made trivial by my choice of weapon.

Storm King's Trophy
Slayer of Demon "Storm King"

Honestly, I think this boss fight was a reward, allowing me to deal out a little payback to the airbourne manta things that have been causing so much irritation so far. The battlefield's sky is littered with them, and they're all shooting their barbs at you. But in a small corner of the arena lies salvation; a sword named "Stormruler."

This thing cuts through the air at quite a sizable range, allowing you to kill flying enemies from the ground just by swing it in their general direction. It makes this battle very easy, but I honestly think that the aim here was satisfaction more than anything else.

This trophy and the last 3 were all achieved in one session, which has brought me considerably closer to the end of the game in just a couple of hours. I now only have the fifth world to complete before returning to the final two levels of the first world.

World of Warcraft (PC)

Character: Grimtoosk (Troll Druid)

Explore Howling Fjord
Explore Howling Fjord, revealing the covered areas of the world map.

We're so close to reaching the required level for Dragonblight that it seemed a waste of time to go all the way over to Borean Tundra to grab that last chunk of experience. With over 30 quests remaining to get the quest achievement for Howling Fjord, we decided to stay in the hopes of leveling up without leaving the zone. This achievement was a consequence of us having no idea where those 30 quests were hiding. We explored the whole zone mostly by accident trying to locate them. It turned out that we'd already passed the quest giver that starts the entire chain off earlier, but we weren't a high enough level to accept them at the time. One sneaky talking walrus-man had us flying around the whole zone...

Team Fortress 2 (PC)

General Achievements

Master of Disguise
Trick an opposing Medic into healing you.

I'm not sure why this is listed as a general achievement; surely it's a spy achievement? In any case, I don't remember this happening at all, and I can assure you it had absolutely nothing to do with any skill in deception.

Spy Achievements

Burn Notice
Survive 30 seconds after being ignited while cloaked.

Following on from my dabbling in spy play last Team Fortress 2 session, I gave it another go this weekend. Unfortunately, it went just as terribly as last time. There's something about it that I just can't get my head around. I managed to pick this achievement up due to the sheer amount of time I spent on fire. I'm probably going to abandon the spy for now. Clearly, it's just not my style.

Engineer Achievements

Doc Holiday
Have a dispenser heal 3 teammates at the same time.

On the other hand, while I'm still fumbling a little with the engineer, I'm finding it infinitely more accessible than the spy. This achievement shows that I'm useful for something, as I managed to keep a dispenser up long enough for it to be used more than once. Incredible.

Deputized
Get 10 assists with another Engineer where a sentry gun was involved in the kill.

Playing in 2fort, I was trying out different places to build a sentry gun. It's a bit of a hit and miss map when you're playing as an engineer, as it all depends on whether the opposing team is actually trying to capture the briefcase or not. When they are, there are strategic points which need defending, perfect for a sentry gun camp. When they're not, you often find yourself standing in an empty room with nothing going on. This session's 2fort was one of the latter.
  
I didn't let that stop me, though, as I was still keen to practice as the engineer. I found a spot just inside the entrance of the base that was seeing some action every now and then. For some reason, 2 other engineers decided to set up their sentries right next to mine, making the whole thing trivial. No-one could step into the doorway without being ripped to shreds in a second. It was a very dull situation, and it was at this point we quit for the evening.

It was this wall of sentries that got me this achievement, as unsatisfying as it was. I'm still waiting for that one game in which I finally place my sentry gun and dispenser in a great position, and get to play the engineer properly. Perhaps next time.

Friday 12 August 2011

So Much For Weekly...

I'm off to Dublin this weekend, so no Trophy Huntin' this Sunday. I'll combine the achievements from this week (all two of them) into the following Sunday's post.

Before anyone asks, yes, I will be drinking at least one pint of Guinness.

Thursday 11 August 2011

Cash Cow Level

Blizzard has been causing a lot of discussion amongst gamers lately, after some fairly surprising announcements about its upcoming sequel in the Diablo series:
One of these in particular stood out to me as the most shocking, but oddly, it's not the one that has been perceived by others as the most controversial. Blizzard has received an outcry of rage and frustration at the announcement that you won't be able to play Diablo 3 offline. It's difficult to argue for either side as it entirely depends on the experience you've had with online connectivity in games, as well as the quality of service you receive from your ISP. Honestly, though, the announcement of Diablo 3 adopting an 'always online' model didn't surprise me.

To me, the real money auction system is (so far) the most controversial announcement about Diablo 3, and it seems to have been somewhat overshadowed by the 'offline only' news.

I believe that introducing an auction system, in which players can buy or sell in-game items for real cash, goes against one of the main attitudes Blizzard has had with regards to its other games, especially World of Warcraft. The view that players shouldn't be able to gain an advantage over others in a game by spending real world money has resulted in the banning of many a World of Warcraft player trying to sell their in-game gold or even their entire account.

So, why now? What makes Diablo 3 any different, when what's on sale is exactly the same as in World of Warcraft? In the linked Joystiq news article above, Blizzard argues that Diablo differs in that its items are completely random, rather than being "deterministic, dependent mostly on skill, progression, and time spent playing." While it's true that your gear naturally improves as you progress in World of Warcraft, with a lot of 'gap filling' gear being on offer for various in-game currencies, much of the gear from raids and dungeons still remains random, and may very well include the best items for your character. Since these items are random, there's every chance that you'll never see, for example, the best shield for your character drop at all. Now imagine if that shield was available to purchase with real money, from someone who had been lucky enough to see it drop. Some might argue that this is exactly what Diablo 3 will be doing.

Of course, items from World of Warcraft raids could never go on sale for real money for the same reason that they can't be auctioned for in-game gold right now; there has to be an incentive for players to keep raiding. Teamwork within guilds thrives because of the model of progression that raiding provides. To have raid items available for anyone to purchase would kill progression. Diablo is more of an individual experience. While multiplayer is available, it isn't mandatory, and the entire game can be completed alone. So yes, it appears that Diablo 3 may be more suited to this new way of acquiring items, because it doesn't matter how far ahead of everyone else that shiny new, self-bought sword puts you, everyone will eventually finish the game anyway, you'll just get there faster if you spend some money on your character.

But why real money? If the aim is to allow players to buy the items they've been too unlucky to find themselves, couldn't the same have been achieved by sticking to an auction house that uses in-game currency? Item drops may be random, but gold is predictable; every character is capable of attaining gold without relying on chance, meaning that it would be fully possible to remove the random factor in obtaining certain items by focusing on saving up enough gold. The difference would be that the item had still been earned by playing. No-one would be gaining an edge just because they're willing to put extra money into a game that they've already paid the full price of a PC game for. Yes, an in-game currency-based auction house is being implemented too, but how many people are going to use it to sell items when the alternative is to sell for real money?

The reasoning given for the option of trading with real money effectively sounds like "if you can't beat them, join them." Diablo 2 items are wrongfully sold outside of the game for cash, and Blizzard believes that the new auction system will encourage people to undertake this activity officially, within the game, rather than underhandedly outside of it. This brings us back to the initial question: why take one attitude for one game and a different attitude for another?

What if Blizzard tried to eliminate illegal gold selling in World of Warcraft by incorporating it into the game in an official capacity? They could introduce a currency exchange in which real money could be converted to gold, and vice versa. It wouldn't create a problem with progression as the best items would still only be obtainable through raiding. Instead, players could pay a little extra cash and not have to spend as much time doing daily quests and farming materials to sell on the auction house in order to afford some of the game's high-gold cost luxury items. Boil it down to the simple formula of real money being exchangeable for less play time being required to obtain certain items and it starts to sound a lot like Diablo 3's micro-transactions.

Finally, how does this affect gameplay? Are certain achievements going to be easier for the player who paid to gear up their character? Is PvP going to be ruled by players with the most cash to spare? And what effect is this going to have on the game's economy? By offering two separate auction houses, the market is already split. Ultimately, it's going to be the 'gold farmers' that dominate. How are you going to handle the competition of their stockpiles of items they've farmed up, when all you want to do is sell the axe you found that doesn't suit your class? Blizzard has a lot to consider when implementing this, and will have to be careful not to upset the balance of the game for those that intend on closing their wallets following the initial purchase of the game itself.

Sunday 7 August 2011

Trophy Huntin' (31/07/11 - 06/08/11)

Welcome to a new weekly post tracking all the trophies and achievements I've earned over the last week. This may turn out very similar to "This Week I 'Ave Been Mostly Playing", but the focus on individual achievements will allow for a more structured post, rather than just a general overview of my gaming week. Let's begin with the past week...

Demon's Souls (Playstation 3)

Adjudicator's Trophy
Slayer of Demon "Adjudicator"

There's not much I can say about this boss. It looks interesting, being a big, bulging brute with a floppy, but destructive, tongue. Unfortunately, it was one of the easiest encounters I've faced so far.

I can imagine if I was trying to fight using a melee weapon, I might have found more of a challenge, and generally, the type of character I like to play is melee focused. Usually you would expect to have to pick between melee or ranged, the two being almost mutually exclusive, but in Demon's Souls, I've found that by focusing on increasing my dexterity while keeping my strength high enough to wield certain weapons, I'm quite capable of dishing out the damage both up close and from afar. It was quite a shock when I found a decent bow, fired at an airbourne enemy and the arrow killed it instantly. It was an identity crisis for a while. I'd defined myself as a man of melee, bravely fighting toe to toe with every monstrous demon that crossed my path. But now I found that I could stand safely at a distance, firing arrows like some sissy hunter? Unthinkable.

It certainly worked against the adjudicator though. Its weak point was its head, it could only hurt me if I was standing in front of it and it was extremely slow. Simply by strafing around it to keep at its back and shooting a handful of arrows at its head, it was vanquished within minutes.

Dragon God's Trophy
Slayer of Demon "Dragon God"

Now this is more like it. I wouldn't say that this was a particularly difficult fight either, but what it lacked in difficulty, it made up for in epic style. This thing was huge, its fist alone being at least three times the size of my character. As you can imagine, one strike from a Dragon God and you're dead before you hit the floor. You can't attack it directly, so what are you to do?

One of the mechanics I love to see in boss battles is the use of objects in the environment to bring the enemy down. In this scenario, there are two ballistae, one at either side of the chamber. A corridor filled with rubble leads to each ballista. Stealth is the name of the game here, as the tactic is to make your way along the corridor, hiding behind conveniently placed columns that act as a blind spot to the Dragon God. At an appropriate moment, you run out from your hiding place, smash through the rubble and pray that you're going to make it to the next pillar before you're crushed by a giant dragon fist. Once you get to a ballista, you fire it. The combination of both projectiles on ropes pins the dragon down. You can then proceed to the centre of the chamber to administer the extremely satisfying killing blow.

And that's my first silver trophy in Demon's Souls, as well as one of the worlds complete.

Fool's Idol's Trophy
Slayer of Demon "Fool's Idol"

A boss that creates false images of itself to disorientate you; ah yes, that old chestnut. Unfortunately, there was one thing that made it glaringly obvious which was the real Fool's Idol. Locking onto a target usually brings up its health bar, except on bosses where it's displayed at the bottom of the screen throughout the encounter. All of the Fool's Idol's false images had health bars when locked onto, so it was merely a case of cycling through targets until you found one without a health bar. Apparently, you can also tell by watching which image her minions worship, but I killed them all before starting on her.

Despite this, it was still an interesting level overall. The setting of a rotting, torturous prison has been the most disturbing so far, and I appreciate it for its creepiness.

World of Warcraft (PC)

Character: Grimtoosk (Troll Druid)

Level 70
Reach level 70

Level 70 means something to me. I began playing WoW when The Burning Crusade was the current expansion, so my first level cap was 70. It may not mean anything now as there are still another 15 levels and a slog through Wrath of Lich King content before reaching the maximum level, but I still get an odd nostalgic feeling when I see the number 70.

Team Fortress 2 (PC)

General Achievements

Riftwalker
Kill an enemy within 5 seconds of you traveling through an Engineer's teleporter.

I don't actually remember doing this, but such is the nature of Team Fortress 2 that you end up earning a lot of achievements by accident. It must have been a shock for the poor soul on the receiving end.

Heavy Achievements

Heavy Milestone 2
Achieve 16 of the achievements in the Heavy pack.

As you may have guessed, Heavy is my favourite class and the one I've played the most. In a genre that I'm mostly inexperienced and terrible at, the Heavy has allowed me to feel at least a little competent for the first time ever. I've noticed I can get a pretty decent score, especially when teamed up with a friendly medic.

Earning 16 Heavy achievements came with the reward of a new mini-gun named Natascha, which sacrifices damage and speed for the ability to slow down enemies. It seems very situational, its usefulness being based on the class make-up of the opposing team, but then, this applies to most of the Heavy's weapons. I've found myself mostly sticking to the default mini-gun, only switching to the alternatives in very specific scenarios.

Onwards to Heavy Milestone 3!

Permanent Revolution
Kill 5 enemies without spinning down your gun.

Obviously, I was paired up with a medic buddy for this one. The ÜberCharge is a wonderful thing, and allows for great moments like these. What a rush.

Vanguard Party
Be the first on your team to start capturing a control point in a round.

Another accidental achievement, though another possible product of the ÜberCharge. In fact, this may have occurred at the same time as Permanent Revolution. The capture point would certainly be clear after 5 enemies met their demise.

Spy Achievements

Identity Theft
Backstab the enemy that you're currently disguised as.

This week I experimented with a couple of classes that I've never really played long enough to work out what to do with them. The Spy is one of these classes and has always interested me, despite being of the sneaky play-style I'm not usually accustomed to. The Spy is quite a tricky class to play well, considering that your main tactic is to convince the enemy that you're one of them. I actually pulled this off a few times this evening, and managed to get a few backstabs in, including the hilariously insulting one mentioned in this achievement.

I'm still mostly awful at playing the Spy though, so I have a lot of practice ahead. And by practice, I mean deaths at the hands of enemies who see right through my guise.

Engineer Achievements

Uncivil Engineer
Provide an enemy player with a freeze cam of you and the sentry that just killed them.

The Engineer is the second class I decided to try out in this weekend's Team Fortress 2 session. My main problem with this class is that I'm not a very good judge of where to place a sentry gun. I suppose that just comes with experience. I did enjoy the difference in pace and the overall play-style of the engineer during those moments where I did get a few kills with a sentry gun. I'll definitely be coming back for more.

I gather that I earned this achievement just by being stood next to the sentry that killed an enemy.

Land Grab
Help a teammate construct a building.

There's no "I" in "Engineer"!