First, props to the mysterious stranger, who has always abhorred mention, for generously replacing my DDR pad with a Mad Catz Beat Pad Pro. As with everything, you know who you are. The pad works well and is of decent quality, at least until the metal pad becomes a reality. That might be a month or so off, by the by. Regardless, a NetJak review of the hardware is not outside of the realm of possibility.
Advance Wars DS had garnered praise of the highest sort from the good folks at Penny Arcade, and it seems only fitting that I mention my own impressions of the game here. HOLY POO ON A STICK THIS GAME IS GOOD. I've said it before, of course, but it does bear repeating. The challenge has been given quite a kick in the pants with the introduction of tag and multi-front battles, not to mention timed missions which countdown in real time. Whenever a new concept is introduced, AWDS gives the player a ridiculous advantage, but you had better learn your lesson because there WILL be a quiz. In about thirty seconds. Even with this, the enemy AI is very crafty, and the game doesn't need to resort to ludicrously absurd contrivances to put it on an even keel with the player. That's not to say the Black Hole force doesn't have neat and unfair toys (like the Black Crystals), but they're used sparingly enough that it doesn't become too much of an insurmountable battle. I fired up the War Room the other night just to see if it was any better. Outside of the long-ago multiplayer battles at Adelphia, I never used the War Room. This should tell you something.
This past week, we were also treated to Issue 5 of City of Heroes, which brings with it new areas and a few little bonuses. After reconfiguring my powerset, I was off to fight bad guys again. It wasn't until a half hour later that I realized I had forgotten to add Hasten back to my setup-- but it didn't matter. I was kicking enough ass and staying reasonably well-fueled even up against even-level and +1 thugs that I didn't even notice. Simply put, my scrapper is a minor goddess, ripping through street scum and criminal soldiers like nobody's business. And she looks damn good while doing it, too.
Of all the programs on Anime Network, I've found myself most attracted to Full Metal Panic Fumoffu. Maybe it's because I was reading the FMP comic while it ran in Newtype, maybe because I just have a thing for slapstick in general, or maybe because currently it's the only show running from the beginning. Or it could be because Adelphia's version of the VOD service sucks. The website advertises Elfen Lied on the VOD service, but Adelphia doesn't carry that show; ditto for Dark Water, which I actually wanted to see. Ah well; I've since learned that new stuff is released Thursdays, so that's going to be a big night for me (when coupled with the prospect of new CSI). I might watch through the run of normal FMP as it goes. At least until something wraps around again, like Nadia. The j-pop videos are a nice touch, too. And E's Otherwise seems to be "X for the Linkin Park crowd", at least from the preview clips they're showing.
Some might wonder why I'm talking more about TV than video games; this week I've been watching more TV than playing games. This weekend, in between the trip to Cedar Point and the sleeping after the trip, I'll be playing more games. 'Specially because I get Monday off. Yay for Labor Day! Yes, the day when we all give thanks to our mothers for squeezing us ou-- er, wait, wrong kind of labor. I get them confused, y'know.
All right, folks. Time for dinner and then either more Advance Wars or I'll finally get around to seeing School of Rock. Hero is also on the VOD service... it was a fun movie when I saw it last year, I might just see it again. Oh, before I check it out, does anyone know anything about Kai Doh Maru, good, bad, atrocity? Input is always appreciated.Saturday, September 3, 2005 11:05:00p: *
Oh, by the way, I came across a copy of Neal Stephenson's "The Diamond Age" this afternoon and, so far, have enjoyed it thoroughly. It's been on my list for quite some time, along with finally getting around to reading "Idoru" and re-starting "Perdido Street Station". In his book "On Writing", Stephen King wrote that "If you don't have time to read, then you don't have time (or the tools) to write". I've always thought of that as sound advice.
Part of this reading kick is to get me back in a literary mood in preparation for National Novel Writing Month again. Getting a two-month head start on priming the idea factory will help out quite a bit; I firmly resolve to actually finish a novella this year, and I really want to get through Book Two of the actual novel I started last year (the current status is 45,000 words over 80 pages, and this might actually go up if and when I plot out and fully write the flashback story). I have no problem with the fact that A Game Of Lords has taken me a year to get only a third of the way through... part of me thinks it was a bit too ambitious to start with, but the story is too far begun to give up on now.
The novella will have to have a defined outline, with maybe about fifty elements (given that each element takes about a thousand words to write). To have a defined outline, though, I have to have a plot, and at this point, I don't. But that's OK for now, as I'm not creating just yet these next couple weeks; I'm absorbing and thinking. I would like to write something set in modern times, and while I'd like for it to be funny, it might not be. I haven't been genuinely funny in a long, long time... And now that I'm thinking about it, a solution to my plot problem might have fallen into my lap. But we'll see.
Good night, folks. I'm going to go write down this idea and then go to sleep, dreaming of the wonders that Nell has in her Illustrated Primer...Sunday, September 4, 2005 9:57:00p: *
So, Cedar Point. Company paid for a ticket and meal, so naturally I went. Let me preface this by saying that, under ordinary corcumstances, I like amusement parks. The atmosphere is very much one where people are having fun and enjoying life, and that really rubs off on me. I tend to pick up on stuff like that, and when people around me are feeling good it's hard for me to remain down for very long.
Still, going to an amusement park by yourself really, really sucks. These places are designed for groups, and so are the rides-- I mean, who's going to believe you if you went on the Millennium Force three times in a row if nobody you knew saw you do it? (Incidentally, the lines for the major coasters were invariably longer than three hours.) So basically I walked around and did my own thing for the most part, and caught a couple shows when I could. I watched a neat high-dive show, then accidentally got into a little kids' show with the Peanuts characters. I escaped as quickly as I could, feigning cell phone summons, but I sort of wished I had an excuse to stay.
That said, the park was very nice, and I'd consider going again assuming three things: first, that I'm still in good financial shape by next summer; secondly, that I plan ahead and don't wind up spending a quarter of my monetary allotment on parking; and finally, that I not go alone. All these are pretty certain except the last one, and that's kind of iffy. I mean, there's a long time between now and next summer... Maybe I'll take the time to get a girlfriend again.
.....................
...yeah, it sounds ridiculous now that I think about it.
I need to start a new post for the next item I want to mention. 'Scuse me.Sunday, September 4, 2005 10:05:00p: Attention All Creative People*
This is for most of the DDR Erie crew and pretty much everyone in the forums here at TFO.net. I've been doing a lot of reading and thinking, and I've decided that I'm not the only one around here with any amount of literary talent. I know at least three people in my immediate circle of friends who have written very long pieces of work and are presumably capable of doing so again. And I also know that they haven't produced anything lately due to waning interest in writing. You know who you are.
That's going to change.
As I mentioned the other day, I've been preparing for this year's National Novel Writing Month and I think I have a fairly solid framework for a story. The problem is, of course, aside from the rabid wordsmiths at the NaNo forums, nobody is going to be sitting on my shoulder and saying, "You know, you haven't written anything for the novel yet today." And really, I have enough voices telling me what to do; I don't need lunatics from around the nation doing the same.
Unless those lunatics happen to be my friends.
What I envision is that those of us with the will to do so will participate in the NaNo. We'll register in the forums, use them to update word counts and all that, but we will be our own editing circle. I'll work tomorrow on a little Perl script that can check the "last updated" timestamp on files, and then I'll set up directories for everyone to upload their novellas. Anyone who doesn't update at least once a day gets their name in red. On the front page. In big bold letters. Myself included.
The idea being that I don't want to be the only one doing this and saying "this is what I did, aren't I great?". I hate doing stuff like that. I'd much rather this be a collaborative effort. Maybe we'll all churn out total crap. Maybe we'll be able to compile it all into a book of short stories for publication. Either way, we are all going to get to 50,000 words and we are all going to do it together. It's much easier to get published if you have several novellas in one volume instead of each of us as unknowns getting published individually.
This can work. I am sure of it. So post in the forums or give me a comment if you feel you're up for it. Think of it this way-- typing at a pokey 16 words per minute you can crank out a thousand words an hour. Do this for thirty days, with more on the weekends, and you've got fifty thousand. It might be rough getting the time to do it, but do it. You'll thank me. (I hope.)Tuesday, September 6, 2005 8:26:00p: When I Rock Creativity*
Stealing a line from BT. 'Cause it feels so damn good to be back in the writings again. I finally got the momentum of the story going again after maybe two months, and another two thousand words just sprang up on the page today. I also borrowed a trick from our good friend Pez and sat down during lunch to work, which produced a quarter of today's work. I may just wind up doing that as a general rule.
I mentioned this in the forums, but the TiddlyWiki tool has been a pretty useful thing to have to organize a huge amount of notes, say, for a novella. I would suggest it for anyone looking to do any sort of long-term project planning. It's compact, self-contained, and very useful. The only drawback is it's not upgradeable-- once you start using it, it's tricky to move your data to another version. Not impossible-- someone more clever than I will undoubtedly figure out a way-- but tricky enough to discourage it.
The video for "Somnambulist" is pretty good. The video for Goldfrapp's "Strict Machine" is, well, freaky. An avant-garde thing that looks... well, like a kaleidoscope on LSD. Hm.
I'm not sure what I plan on doing for the rest of the week-- an opportunity closed itself yesterday, when I totally forgot about the opportunity for Indians tickets-- but I'm sure something will come up. Something always does. In the meantime I'm going to try to finish a few missions in Advance Wars DS.Sunday, September 11, 2005 7:33:00a: *
I'm going to talk about DDR here for a little bit, so if that sort of thing bothers you then you are certainly free to skip to the next post. But before I do that, I want to thank my sister and Kat, who both busted out the amazing Google skills from opposite ends of the country (north-south) and saved me from being horribly lost when the damn RTA maps were friggin' wrong at the bus stops, and none of the damn drivers would tell me where I needed to go to catch the buses back. Ahem. Oh, and Slip, I'm halfway through the Air movie now-- I'll probably post about it later today.
As you know, I've been playing DDR with some amount of intensity for about a year and a half, almost two now. I've had an interest in the game since 2002, but only at the start of 2004 could I actually play with frequency due to location and interest. Part of this had to do with the fact that, in 2004, I moved to Erie, which had a really good and tight-knit group of players. Also, it was small enough that everybody knew everybody else, and there was a real impetus to get better (for me, anyway)-- these people were cool and I wanted to hang around them more. I did get that chance, of course, but here in the last couple months it sort of fell apart as everyone went away to college, and I moved here to Cleveland.
Of late a lot of people from the DDR Erie crew are saying they miss the scene. Part of it might just be the usual college homesickness that begins to set in around this time, but it's also a valid concern. I know Tempest, Rob, and Aaron went forth into places where the scene was very nebulous or non-existent; myself, I was going into an area where DDR was played, but it certainly wasn't done as coherently as Erie's was (partially due to the fact that the machines around here are in various states of disrepair or are impossible to find... after the brief stop at work I have to make today I might go and see if the one Beatmania machine I found works yet). The few times I did get to interact with the "Ohio DDR" people were at the Fun Fore All tournaments in days gone past; they were polite (and they loved Pop'n like nobody's business) but they were also a very different sort of group.
As I'd said, the Erie folks are very tight-knit. We know each other, we're in close contact (or we try to be), that sort of thing. When things go wrong, everybody knows and usually everybody tries to help. There was, of course, also a sort of adverserial relationship between the Erie and the Ohio players, but as far as we were concerned it was mostly just for show. The Erie players tended to emphasize cameraderie and just hanging out; the Ohio folks seem to push perfect attack and getting high scores. While I have no problem trying to do my best, I just don't like the pressure of seeing someone AAA Pink Rose HVY and then I have to follow it up by trying to survive Trip Machine STD. (Though I'm not without my pride; I played at the Parmatown Mall yesterday and made a point not to touch the bar once while actually playing.)
I think maybe it's those differences which really make me feel like the odd man out in all of this. Everybody has certain expectations, and living up to what you think someone expects of you is very hard. That sort of rivalry-- the Erie/Ohio thing-- really has to be understood as 'just playin'' by both sides or it breaks down into bitterness. I know there's a difference between talkin' shit and actually wishing someone ill, but believe it or not (gasp!) I have a tough time distinguishing between the two. The ability to detect sarcasm is not exactly something I was blessed with. I don't know, actually, what everyone thought when I identified myself as being "the Erie Pop'n guy". Since none of the Ohio folks read this, and since Bemanistyle is still down (I really, really don't want to post to DDR Freak, as they'll eat me up and spit me out over there) I can't ask any of them yet. They seemed impressed enough when I did my routine (Rythym & Police, Twinbee, Absolute, Daikenkai, and My Summer Love Oni; all STD except the last, no mods, and pausing barely seconds in between songs), but again they could have just been sarcastic. By their estimation I would have been terrible-- after all, I didn't AAA or even AA any songs, even though I passed.
Of course, maybe I'm just thinking too much about this and I should just go back to playing solely at home. I'd rather not-- I learned so much at the arcades and have improved quite a bit; plus, the song selection is better-- but if it's a choice between being scared or being comfortable, I'll take comfortable any day.
We shall see. I'll catch you cats later.Sunday, September 11, 2005 7:22:00p: *
Just a quick test. A couple pages should have the new layout setup ready. We'll see.Sunday, September 11, 2005 8:51:00p: Config System Enabled*
Well, I'd been meaning to do this for a while now, but finally got around to it tonight. Starting today, you can select any of the layouts of TFO.net that you liked from the ones made available since the redesign. Currently this means... two. The old layout and the new layout. Cookies should be enabled to save your preferences; if you choose not to do so, you'll just be shunted to the default template. Hit the "My TFO.net" or "Config" link on the page to get started. I'm going to make a goal of creating a new layout each month.
I really like this layout; it relies very heavily on CSS and not quite so much on images. In fact, there're only three images on the main page now (not counting invisible spacer pixels)! Quite the change from the image-heavy Status Screen. That was a bit of a joke, really, and I'd never intended for it to be the primary layout for so long. Plus, IE can't possibly screw up the color matching on this one (actually, the flaw is in IE's PNG display). Pretty soon I'll be getting rid of the renovation bar and working on new, good content. Or not, depending on if I finish before November 1st. I just need to write some quick documentation.... done.
I'm really tired all of a sudden, and there's nothing on TV right now, so I'm going to turn in early finish the Air movie. Wednesday, September 14, 2005 7:41:00a: *
...has everyone seen Advent Children already except me? A better question would be, is anyone else willing to wait the extra freakin' month? Games are for importing. Movies and TV are for waiting.
Or something like that. (pushes aside order slips for very many anime soundtracks)
I guess I'm just an unusually patient sort; if I know for a fact that something is on its way to the US I'll usually hold off on importing or bittorrenting it. This is because once I do decide to order/download it, that patience goes right out the window, replaced by a nagging voice that asks "Is it here yet? How about now? Hell, you paid ( for shipping/ for a fat pipe), it should have materialized in your lap once you clicked it. Why isn't it here yet? Make it be here sooner!". It's like the Ranch Tooth. Only for greed.
Anyway, work beckons. Hard to believe, really, we're almost halfway through September. Later, folks.Thursday, September 15, 2005 6:25:00a: *
And more Tokyo Game Show news-- Final Fantasy IV is being released on the Game Boy Advance. A U.S. date is unknown, but likely; which means a retranslation will probably be in order. Also, as if the fact that it was cute as hell back when I played the first game's alpha wasn't enough, Ragnarok 2 let slip that Yoko Kanno would be handling the music. I wonder if the game won't see an official U.S. release, but I somehow doubt it-- did the original ever get officially sanctioned for the U.S.?
There's something nifty in the works for you guys, if you're a fan of my writing at all. I'm not entirely sure how it's going to look in the final project, but rest assured there's going to be some new features on the site before the end of the month. And I haven't forgotten about that text adventure... actually, the stuff I'm doing at work will make the text adventure much, much easier. It might even wind up being a completely original thing (as in, not using The Z Machine).
But tonight, I intend to get my City of Heroes on and maybe, just maybe get to level 23. I've been sitting here for so long and I haven't had a really good session since the new issue hit. We shall see. Nore TGS news as it piques my interest.Thursday, September 15, 2005 5:42:00p: *
So, Xenosaga DS is actually a remake of the first two games, a la Kingdom Hearts Chain of Memories. I can live with that. What troubles me is that XS3 is touted as being "the final installment of the Xenosaga trilogy", which really, really burns. I mean, here I was three years ago tickled beyond belief that Xenogears was going to eventually be remade, and now the project seems to have stalled. Ah well. There is hope yet; maybe Soraya Saga will remake it for a next-gen system. THAT would be enough to get me to buy in.
I mentioned Yoko Kanno's music this morning, but how about Tetsuya Mizuguchi's new title? The man behind Rez and Meteos has promised a new title above and beyond Ninety-Nine Nights, which incidentally sounds kind of blah. We shall see tomorrow.
Today be th'day that th'real men o'th'sea can go out an' walk th'streets wi'out fear o'bein' mocked an' ridiculed by th'landlubbers or th'police! Aye, 'tis a wonderful thing tae be out on th'glorious morn o'Talk Like A Pirate Day!
Me ol'gaffer maight be thinkin' I'd be fool enough tae attempt tae honor this tradition o'th'high seas during the course o'my travails, but ARRR, if'n I don't work for a bunch a scurvy lubber bilge rats... So I'll be tonin' down th'pirate parley until I know it's safe. An' if'n I meet any fool ninja durin' the day, avast! He'll have a taste o'the steel, an'no mistake.
The rest o'ye, me bonny crew, say it wit'me me hearties! YAAAAAARRRRRRR!!!!Tuesday, September 20, 2005 11:32:00p: *
A new company named Xseed, being a side-project of a few former Square USA folks, announced today its plans to localize the new Shadow Hearts game as well as Wild ARMs 4. This is all well and good until you realize we still haven't got Wild ARMs Alter Code F yet. Rrrrrgh.
On the plus side, KOS-MOS says hi.Wednesday, September 21, 2005 9:59:00p: *
It took very nearly a year, but the NaNo I started on November 1st, 2004 has finally reached the requisite 50,000 words. My outline for the second half is shaping up to give me quite a bit more. Actually, I figure I am about exactly halfway through the first draft now, and the outline has given me plenty of a chance to get the story wrapped up in some sort of coherency. I'm probably going to finish the outline tonight, then work on writing as much as I can before the next NaNo starts.
Lost was.... excessively creepy. And re-watching the CSI finale is going to be a lot of fun. By the way, I should not be allowed to have the TV on while I write.Wednesday, September 21, 2005 11:51:00p: TFO.net NaNoWriMo Notes #1: Wanna Be Startin' Somethin'*
This being just about forty days before the start of the 2005 NaNo season, I figured it was just about time for me to start offering some advice based on my own experience. When I was first told of the idea, I had a couple minor story ideas running through my head. One was an out-of-work guy who finds his grade-school sweetheart living homeless in the streets of his new town on the other side of the country. Another was a swordsman who could only carry his blade in the flesh of his back (which eventually was what I went with, combining a couple other old threads into it). The last was a sprawling space-opera I'd started on in my spare time at GE, and that I had planned out over six books (which eventually became a short story I was going to submit to a contest, but never got around to doing).
The fact of the matter is, I had three disparate ideas with extremely nebulous planning. The only concept I'd done any real planning on was the space drama, and that was incredibly sparse due to the fact that I really, really hate writing outlines. To me, a story is only interesting once. Once it's been told-- either in an outline, or verbally to someone else, or whatever-- I usually can't bring myself to go back to it. Now, obviously, I did do so with the space thing, but I cheated a bit with that. I took a very neat concept that was brewing, and that I had let myself go way off into the far reaches of imagination with, and then I slashed it down to a seven thousand word short that stopped the concept dead in its tracks (no pun intended).
The problem is that without a guideline it's very easy to forget the flow of the story. You need to know where the story is going in order to tell it, and sadly that means telling it to yourself all the way through at least once. Now, certainly I don't want to say that you absolutely have to have an outline to do the TFO.net NaNo. What I am saying is that it is a useful bit of work that can save you headaches in the long run (or short run, in this case).
One of the most important things to remember about an outline is that it is brief. Don't go into too much detail just yet, and certainly don't put in good lines that you might want to use in the prose-- jot those down elsewhere. What you're doing is summarizing the dozens of nebulous paragraphs in the ether into a single sentence (or several sentences lumped together in a monstrous run-on, but if you're doing that you have bigger obstacles to writing than just plot). Later you'll expand on what you set out here, but that's later.
It's difficult to judge how long a work is going to be based solely on the outline. Myself, I tend to average about three hundred to four hundred words per line item; some writers can go several orders of magnitude larger than that and still not come to a point. Others will go as sparse as a single paragraph-- which probably means they've overanalyzed their outline too much. You want to make sure that you can expand sufficiently on a line item to warrant its inclusion; otherwise you should consider lumping it in with another line item just to be safe.
Let me show you an example of the outline I wrote (finally) for A Game of Lords:
Maris welcomes Barine into her house, to Lee and Natalie's surprise.
Barine explains that she does not intend to follow the orders she was given-- that she wishes to uncover the truth behind Lee's curse and Natalie's power.
Lee questions Barine's motives, claiming that she is moved only by pity.
During her practice, Natalie is drawn towards the shack but pulled away at the last moment by Millie and Johanel.
The first two line items actually took a bit longer as I added some digressions, but they managed to end up at about 700 words each. These (coupled with a fifth line item, which I'm going to keep my little secret for now) comprise an entire chapter for me, though in final editing I may just dispense with chapters altogether and blend scene changes as drama dictates. Regardless, this is a climactic cycle of about 2800-3000 words, which I feel is a pretty good length for a chapter (given 300 words per 8 1/2x11 page, the chapters would range between nine and twelve pages single spaced; I haven't quite got the hang of resizing the page in OpenOffice just yet so I have no idea what it would be like in print). For a NaNo, you should shoot for about sixteen 3,000 word chapters, meaning roughly eighty line items. For a full-length novel, you'll be looking at a hundred line items at minimum, to give you options during editing.
I mentioned the phrase "climactic cycle" just now, and while I'd love to go into detail about it, that will have to wait until next week. Right now, I'd like to get to the bottom line: If you feel you need an outline in order to work, or if you feel one would help you, I would advise that you start it now. There's no prohibition against doing plotting and characterization work ahead of time, so take advantage of it; just remember that they can't be counted as part of your 50,000. I'll be doing outline work off and on for the new NaNo this week and next, in between bouts of creativity for A Game Of Lords. I'm eager to hear the ideas people are kicking around, so post your potentials in the forum.Saturday, September 24, 2005 9:42:00a: *
There's a known bug in the profile system which so far prevents the RSS feed from showing up if you're not on the default layout. I'm working on fixing that this morning.
EDIT 10:18a: The bug is fixed, everything's cool again.Monday, September 26, 2005 9:19:00p: *
Hey, folks. I think it's really something when I sit down to write for the novel and wind up writing two thousand words for a plot point that wasn't even in the outline (but is important nonetheless). This motivation thing could really pay off.
Anyway, I've been watching Fruits Basket lately, to the surprise of exactly no one, and I'll be honest, I was not expecting what I got. Here I thought I was going to get some sappy, overly sentimental piece of junk that would be the animated equivalent of "Days of Our Lives" crossed with that episode of CSI. Instead, I wound up with a sweet, endearing, and at times riotously funny series about a complicated family. Part of me sort of wonders where it's all going, but another part just says "hey, enjoy it while it lasts, and watch Kyo bust up the house more". Shigure remains quite possibly one of the most awesome characters in anime.
I also managed to catch a little bit more Full Metal Panic Fumoffu, which remains bizarre, and the regular FMP, which remains engaging. Then there's Genshiken, which I am pretty sure I would be more comfortable watching with Pez and the rest of the Erie crew. Slip, I think, said it best by saying that there's little more unnerving than being the only person to laugh at the jokes. Still, it is enjoyable for what it is. I suppose it's like the Rocky Horror Picture Show-- it's all right when you're alone but it shines brightest when viewed by a crowd.
Speaking of that, it is getting to be that time of year, isn't it? Halloween approaches, and all you Goth-types in the readership (both of you), I see you shiver with antici--
No. Hell no. I am not going to go there.
Games. Not much for me to speak of on that front, actually; I've been doing the writing thing so long that I've had little chance to catch up on what I've wanted to get into. Would you believe I still haven't ordered Pop'n 11 yet? That'll have to change this weekend, but for the moment I'm pretty happy with what I've got. I picked up Radiata Stories about a week ago and haven't touched it since due to noveling and technogeeking, but what I have played, I liked. Enough that it's really bothering me that I can't find time to get back to it. From what I hear, it's a short enough game to complete, so maybe I'll try blitzing it some weekend soon.
All right, I'll make myself a deal. If I get to 62,000 words before this weekend, I can spend it playing Radiata Stories. If not, I write all weekend. I'm at 52,900 now. I'm sure I have enough outline to get me another nine thousand words over the next few days. Anyway, it's a short weekend-- I have work on Sunday, for about an hour or so, so that'll cut in a bit. Still, it's all good. Even that little time off won't make that much of a difference in how much I actually play.
I have given my sister the iTunes bug. And the stomach flu, apparently. But iTunes. Yay for iTunes! Yay for Apple in general... ah, but that's a story for another night.
Wow. I meant to make this just a quick "status of Furry" entry before I went off to watch more Fruits Basket, but it's already grown into a twenty-minute behemoth. If I had spent this much time writing for the novel... I'd probably have to go late into the night. I need some relaxation, really, so I'm not going to feel guilty about watching this. Later, folks.
Oh, and by the way...
...pation.Tuesday, September 27, 2005 7:18:00a: *
Actually, in terms of game news, there're a few things I neglected to mention last night that deserve a quick once-over:
First off, the GameStop/EB Merger is official and the price named is just under a billion. Without a doubt, that is the most mind-boggling number I could have ever seen in regards to a merger about video games. Sort of lends a little credibility to the theory that maybe, just maybe, gaming is important. Once we get the political yahoos off our backs we'll be just like any other medium. And by that I mean "owned by Rupert Murdoch".
Word of another merger came over the weekend-- Square-Enix and Taito. Now, that is bizarre. You could sort of see why Square and Enix joined up, but adding Taito to the mix-- when they haven't been a major player in gaming in, oh, five years-- that's just plain weird. What IP, exactly, does SE want from them? Surely not Bubble Bobble, or Puzzle Bobble/Bust A Move. Surely not Arkanoid. Surely not... well, damn, that's about everything they're really known for, isn't it? Actually, I take that back; if the result of the SE-Taito merger manages to bring the Azumanga Daioh version of Puzzle Bobble over here, then I will gladly give my blessing to the ways of the corporate overlords and consume my goods like a happy little drone.
Fruits Basket continues to get interesting; but that's for later tonight. Much later. Right now, time for work. You cats take care, OK?Wednesday, September 28, 2005 6:35:00p: *
I mentioned Super Princess Peach way back in last year's E3 and promptly forgot about it until today, when Kotaku reminded gamers everywhere that it would hit Japan in October.
Yeah, I pre-ordered that bi-- er, game. Expect the review sometime early in November.Friday, September 30, 2005 7:12:00a: *
As a heads-up for those of you interested in that sort of thing: RPGamer has restored their fanfiction section. I certainly have mixed feelings about it, but I also realize that perhaps things are better this way. I'd suggest heading over and reading the new work, at least.
I've realized that I'm probably not going to hit 62,000 words by midnight tonight-- I'm at 56,200 now and expecting another six thousand is just gullibility when I've only managed 2400 in the last four days. Still, I am going to try; if I make it, I'll spend the entire weekend with Radiata Stories. If not, I'll likely write all of Saturday and into Sunday.
Either way, doing it on a Mac is really weirding me out...