Monday, January 16, 2012

Ding!

To me, leveling is like the Dark Side.  Its power and influence always seems greater than anything else, and eventually it will consume and destroy you.

Well, I may be exaggerating a little bit.

In any case, I've reached the level cap in The Old Republic, and I've done so with a feeling of relief.  You may question that, and perhaps ask, "Well, if you were enjoying the game so much, why would that be?"  That answer is simple:  MMOs are structured to always make you feel that if you are not at the level cap, you are behind.  It's one of the downsides of the genre.  In fact, Blizzard just recently made a post about exactly that topic:

http://us.battle.net/wow/en/forum/topic/3881721982

I've always been one to agree with the notion that it's always the journey that's important, and not the destination.  I envy anyone who can successfully apply that philosophy while playing an MMO.  It's not easy to do.  I find it much easier to think that way in real life.

That aside, the story of my Sith Warrior throughout his 50 levels was nothing short of amazing.  One thing that stands out to me was how the game made you feel powerful no matter what level you were.  That's not easy to do.  (For example, before the revamp of WoW's 1-60 questing, you felt pretty damned weak for quite a few levels.)

I'll have much more to say about the whole thing at a later time, when I have access to my screenshots.

On to a different topic.

My new computer is running perfectly, and I've pretty much got all the settings just the way I want them.  I'm very happy with the quality of the system, its performance, and everything else.  So if you're wondering -- Cyberpower PC gets my seal of approval.

I do have one issue, though:  the monitor.  Actually, two issues with that one item.

The first is really odd and not so bothersome.  It seems that the buttons on the monitor itself don't really work all that well.  You see, it has five buttons.  A power button, a menu button, two "menu navigation" buttons, and a "select" button.  Well, the power button does nothing.  And the other four buttons turn the power on/off.  Wha?  It's bizarre!  But it doesn't really affect me all that much, because I never use those buttons.  (I have my computer set to turn off the monitor automatically anyway.)

The other issue is probably going to cost me my sanity.

The monitor has a stuck pixel.  At least, I think it's "stuck".  I'm hoping it's stuck, because apparently stuck pixels can be fixed.  "Dead" and "Hot" pixels cannot be fixed.  I did some reading, and apparently "dead" pixels are always black, and "hot" pixels are always white.  And they cannot be fixed.  Stuck pixels tend to be red, green, blue, or yellow.  Mine is blue, so I'm hopeful in that regard.

You may be thinking why this is such a big deal, given that a pixel is really, really small, and surely it can't be all that noticeable, right?  You'd be surprised.

While playing The Old Republic, I swear to fucking Crom that little blue dot puts itself dead center in my character's forehead during EVERY FUCKING CONVERSATION.  It is utterly infuriating.  I keep telling myself that it's no big deal, and really it's not.  But I can't stop looking at the damned thing.  It's like an old carton of milk.  You know it's sour, but you're a dumbass and sniff it anyway.  That's probably a bad analogy, but you get my point.

On one hand, I keep telling myself that it's really not that big of a deal and that it's easily ignored.  I'm sure I won't even notice it anymore after another week or two. (Honestly, that's a bit optimistic of me.)

On the other hand, I paid good money for this new system, so shouldn't I demand complete satisfaction?  (I should mention that I don't blame Cyberpower for this.  They simply sent me the new monitor, which they got from their supplier:  Sceptre.  That's the brand of monitor.  It's not their fault.  They just sold the product.  I expect them to test my new system (which they did), and did not expect them to test my monitor.)

So I'm kind of debating with myself what exactly I should do.  First of all, since stuck pixels can apparently be fixed, I'm going to try that first.  I found a guide online about some things I can try to do.  I really, really hope it works, because otherwise I'm left with the following:

First, I'd have to read through my warranty to find out if it covers stuck pixels in a monitor.  I probably won't be able to find a definitive answer, so I'll have to directly contact the company to find out.  If it does, that means I'll have to package up the monitor and send it back to the company.  OPTIMISTICALLY, I'd have the monitor back in a month.  (Two days to figure out if the warranty covers it, one week for it to get back to the company, a week and a half for them to process it and ship me out a new one or fix the old one, and a week for it to get back to me.)  The thought of going through all that makes me want to stab a puppy.

And I realize that every single person who reads that paragraph is thinking, "Wow, he's a whiny little bitch, isn't he?"  Yes, I probably am.  But what I'm trying to do is weigh the options.  Do I really want to go through all of that hassle just because of a little blue dot?  Now that I have this monitor, I'm used to having it, so going back to my old (smaller and less awesome) monitor for a month will make me very irritated, mind you.  (Yes, yes, whiny bitch, got it, we've covered that already.)

To go back in a complete circle, I hope I can somehow "unstick" this pixel myself.  Otherwise I'm probably going to go clinically insane.

No comments:

Hello!

Holy smokes.  The last post I wrote for this blog was on October 18, 2017.  Through the little more than  two years since, this blog has be...