P365 Day 56: In which Paul and I get new computers

(Go ahead, click on it. I'm Macarthur Snark, smack in the middle of that screenshot. Pixelation ahoy!)

When I heard about the Champions Online beta a couple of months ago, I was so excited because I have fond memories of playing City of Heroes with a nice little group of folks from Arsclan.net. Paul and I rather unexpectedly found ourselves in the CO beta, where we made a craptastic discovery: Our ancient computers simply could not handle the game.

Oh, believe me, I tried. I made it nearly all the way through the tutorial at 5fps (fewer?) with graphics that looked like this. It was really pathetic. But it wasn't like we could just run out and buy new computers; I'm still not working full-time, and we simply don't have the money.

And Paul said as much when one of our friends asked why we hadn't been playing.

Well, lo and behold, my brother-in-law — who really wanted to play CO with us and read the post — took pity on us and bought us each a new computer. New graphics card, new motherboards — the works. I won't say how much it cost, other than it started with an 8. The parts will get here Tuesday or Wednesday. I'm still not quite sure what to say (well, other than "thank you").

Just ... wow.