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Everquest Farming Guides!
Posted on November 28th, 2018
Not a large update, but an update none the less! I have added two new zones, Gorowyn and Sathir's Tomb to my Everquest Farming Guides and also updated the Howling Stones guide. My Everquest Farming Guides are currently behind a donation only paywall - you can donate as much as you want but technically just 1$ will get you full access to them. For more information follow the link provided.
There are guides for TLP players too in my Farming Guides section; it covers all expansions from Omens of War to Ring of Scale and eventually I will write guides for Burning Lands too! That is the perfect segue into the next thing I wanted to talk about, Burning Lands!
I'm fairly certain that during the month of December I am going to buy a dozen or so expansions and do Burning Lands while it is current expansion content. For the last few years I have lagged behind, a few people have even made fun of my website for only having guides for multiple expansions behind. I am going to make an effort to change this with this expansion.
I don't plan to put all Burning Lands guides behind my donation only paywall, but I will put some of it behind it. If you're concerned about me getting money hungry, it's very unlikely. Almar's Guides has been free ever since 2009/2010 and the only money I make off it is from an occasional donation & advertisements. I always feel very awkward asking for donations and money since I am just not that type of person; I like earning what's given to me not begging for it!
With that said, as always your donations are appreciated. Everyone who donates makes it possible for me to continue working on my website and writing guides.
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New Retro Guides
Posted on October 19th, 2018
Disgaea: Hour of Darkness Guides
Monster Rancher 3 Guides
Dragon Quest VIII: Journey of the Cursed King Full Walkthrough
Not a large update, just a few guides I have completed in the last month. Dragon Quest 8 still needs to be finished/edited but the other two are done. I plan to do another Everquest update by the end of the year and aside from that I will be working on my book and other website.
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Notice for Everquesters
Posted on October 13th, 2018
Also in the next few months I am going to be updating my World of Warcraft classic guides to get them ready for the WoW Classic servers. I do not know if I will be playing WoW classic though, I haven't decided yet. If I do, I plan to box it.
I'm also going to be redoing the nav bar on my website, Everquest players get used to using the Everquest button. Sometime in the next few months I am going to start removing the EQ expansions from the nav bar and placing retro consoles there. Basically the retro nav bar you see at the top right now will be the new nav bar on my site, with Everquest and WoW Classic getting their own buttons.
There's a chance I may switch to Wordpress in the future too but that'll be awhile. The previous update yesterday I talked about a new website to launch with my book, I'm going to experiment a lot with Wordpress when I set that up - if I like it enough I will transition Almar's Guides off Cold Fusion. Cold Fusion costs literally like 4x more than regular hosting (apparently because it's a 'legacy' platform), it's silly.
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10 Year Anniversary & Updates!
Posted on October 12th, 2018
Would you believe me if I said I have been waiting a whole year just for the moment to use this video? I'm actually one month late for announcing my 10 year Anniversary due to my trip but - the 24th of September 2018 is when Almar's Guides turned 10 years old. What a journey it has been!
I have a few announcements to make but first. I have about three dozen pictures or so from my trip to the Appalachian Trail which if you want you can take a look at here.
Here's another of some footbridges I had to navigate in the woods across a swamp. Made me appreciate the person who goes through the effort of maintaining them a whole hell of a lot.
Wawakanda Boardwalk (one of the more touristy spots of the trail in NJ)
Stone Walls in the Forest. This caught my interest because there were so many of them throughout the forest. Someone at some point had to go through the effort to stack all the stone and based on how many stone walls I seen it would have taken 1 person months to do it. So, I am assuming it was a collective effort but for what and why? Google only had theories no explanations. Best theory I read was the Native Americans did it.
Mountains in the distance. I don't get many views like this where I live so I stood in awe of many of the views along the trail.
If you'd like to see the other pictures I have feel free to check out the album. It was a fun trip, I had a lot of fun and am thinking of hiking more of the trail next year. Though I doubt I will thru-hike it. I don't like the concept of thru-hiking too much, you end up rushing and you're more concerned with putting in the miles so you can finish it than you are with stopping and seeing all of the sights. That would ruin the trip for me.
The other thing I would like to talk to you all about is a book I am currently writing that definitely won't be for everyone. If you've followed my website for these 10 years you may know I have already written two books, both fiction, both not the best. I'm currently doing a non-fiction book which is going to be in support of The Intellectual Dark Web and against the "far left" (ex of far left: Vox, Antifa, CNN, Cory Booker, Kamala Harris, #metoo). My reason for this is I used to be very far left, if you had talked to me 10 years ago when I started this website I probably would have signed up for Socialism and thought it was the best thing in the world.
I probably would have agreed with the people like Antifa, like Chris Cuomo, like Maxine Waters, like Eric Holder, who advocate for violence against their enemies. I probably would have nodded along at Hilary Clinton saying we won't be civil until we're (democrats) back in power. I probably would have parroted the same party lines like The Intercept did with Brett Kavanaugh and would have probably bought the lie, hook line and sinker that he was guilty.
Luckily though, I grew up. I've realized that advocating for violence against your enemies is morally wrong and not how you win a debate. Nor is character attacks and trying to destroy a man's life, like the Democrats did with Brett Kavanaugh. That's why I decided to write this book. I'm putting together a compendium of arguments against the far left in the hope to convince some of my more reasonable friends why their positions are incorrect. Things like why Socialism is silly, why this notion of White Privilege and "Race Science" is complete nonsense. Why calling someone a pseudo-intellectual is just a disingenious way of not confronting their ideas.
This book isn't going to be a list of my opinions backed up with no evidence. I'm anal about sources so I have 40 - 50 for every chapter, the Index is probably going to be longer than my actual book. Despite what many people may think too, I am not going into this project uneducated. Here is some of the books I have read about these issues:
Steven Pinker: Enlightenment Now (Amazing glass half full take on the world; changed my world view)
Ben Shapiro: Bullies (Shines some light on the Obama Administration and how Democrats resort to smear campaigns and personal attacks)
Douglas Murray: The Strange Death of Europe (Talks about how the EU covered up Muslim Rape Gangs and failed on virtually every level to do anything about the issues they face in the country due to immigration. Why did they fail? Because of the left leaning policies and culture in their country.)
Jordan Peterson: 12 Rules for Life (I love me some Clinical Psychology. Very good book, I recommend this to everyone)
Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn: The Gulag Archipelago (Need an example of why Socialism is dumb? Look no further)
Johnathan Haidt & Greg Lukianoff: The Coddling of the American Mind (Goes into great detail to explain how the safe spaces, PC culture is ruining the American Educational system - kind of a moral philosophy. Also this covers the primary thing that got me interested in this topic as a whole. My best friend works at a local college and I wanted to be an educator myself but after seeing how much the far left was destroying colleges I decided instead to follow a different path and speak out against the radical liberals I see.)
The Communist Manifesto (Short book, basically a pamphlet)
Steven Pinker: The Better Angels of Our Nature (Talks about how Violence has been on the decrease for many generations, I didn't finish it though but I am like half way. All his books are obnoxiously long)
Sam Harris: The Moral Landscape (Good argument put forth by Sam but I think Jordan dismantles it in their four -- two hour talks moderated twice by Bret Weinstein and twice by Douglas Murray)
Charles Murray: The Bell Curve (With how much drama this book has drawn I had to read it. One thing to note: Scientific Racism/Racialism is founded on the premise that Race should be a subdivision below species; Charles Murray doesn't even make that argument throughout the whole book. The entire premise of Racialism is founded on a caricature of an argument. It's ridiculous and shows how ass backwards the far left has things).
Not Books: I've read a few Christopher Hitchens books and a few Richard Dawkins too. Also a few from other authors like Robert Sapolsky etc. Primarily I read about psychology and philosophy as those are my two fields of most interest. If you like this same stuff I would recommend Sam Harris - Waking Up Podcast; Dave Rubin - The Rubin Report; Ben Shapiro - The Daily Wire (Right wing take on daily political stuff); Steven Crowder's Louder with Crowder (Change my minds are great and he has other segments which I enjoy - more of an entertainer though not like the others) and Joe Rogan's Podcast. I've listened to basically every episode of the Waking Up Podcast, I've seen most of Rubin's content and I watch Ben Shapiro when I want an honest take of what is going on in the world. I also follow Eric/Bret Weinstein and Jordan Peterson on Youtube. I watch almost all of the interviews Jordan is in and I try to keep up with most of the Intellectual Dark Web members and what they do. I've learned about as much from these people as I have from books, I am so thankful for Youtube because it's been able to provide a free education to millions - I agree wholeheartedly with Jordan Peterson that Youtube is basically a gutenberg revolution just with the spoken word.
That's the current source material I am using for my judgments/statements. The point of this is both to share my sources/book recommendations and to show you I am not like your guildy that opens his mouth about politics but has a very shallow understanding of the actual issues. I'm open to disagreements, if you'd like to argue with me about this stuff feel free to follow the link below to the page where you can leave a comment. Assuming you're civil I am always open to debate, if I am wrong about something I wanna hear it.
For those of you reading this worried that I might be politicizing Almar's Guides - I have already bought a different domain name that is going to go live when I publish my book. Aside from me announcing my book on this website when it comes out and this update you don't have to worry about me politicizing Almar's Guides. I won't be posting political updates on this website in the future or any nonsense like that. At most I may link to something on my other website which will have more to do with the Intellectual Dark Web.
These two projects of mine will be unrelated. The reason I decided to write my book is because I have been writing guides for years and I am good at connecting the dots and breaking down complex ideas. I feel like there hasn't been many people to connect the dots on these topics or break them down so that everyone can find them palatable. I'm also not the type of person who can just sit around and wait for someone else to do something about the problem. I've thought about writing a non-fiction book for years and this topic is something I am very passionate about. I see how much Europe and Canada is destroying itself with their far left politics and am scared shitless that something like that might happen to America. That is NOT a world I want to live in and I would hate myself forever if I let something like that happen and did nothing to try and prevent it because I was too cowardly.
Wanna comment on this update or call me a twat? Head over to my Disqus page just for that purpose!
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EQ Contest & Retro Updates!
Posted on August 11th, 2018
Lots happened between the last update and now. First thing first, Redguides is hosting the Everquest Contest I was on about all those months ago. If you're a member of Redguides all you need to do is make a post following the rules in that thread. If you aren't a member of Redguides and are playing EQ then I must ask, what are you doing with your life? Join now! I hope to do more contests in the future and hopefully I will be able to give away stuff not just in Everquest. That way everyone who uses my website can benefit and not just one niche community.
I have also been actively adding more guides to my website these last few months - not EQ guides though - Retro ones! These next few months I will be working heavily on the Retro section, which already is pulling in almost the same amount of traffic my EQ guides are. Here's an example of many guides I have written recently:
Breath of Fire III Guides
Legend of Legaia Guides
Parasite Eve Guides
Parasite Eve II Guides
The Legend of Dragoon Guides
Wild Arms Guides
Chrono Trigger Guides
Last thing is, if I don't post another update before I leave left month... I'll be gone mid September - early October since I plan to section hike a portion of the Appalachian Trail. I'll bring back a bunch of cool pictures, hopefully see my first black bear in the wild too. Should be fun - I'm excited!