Happenings of late (or, "The one about video games")

Well, there's not much to do at the moment. My table is done (it looks great!), and I'm not really in the mood for any of my games at the moment. Time for a post.

I've been working through all the Megaman X games. I finished X4 the other day (probably the hardest final boss yet!). X4 was a big change from X3 since it was a move from SNES to playstation, but it still kept the same feeling. X5, however, seems like quite a departure from the series. The bosses seem poorly designed and named (Axel the Red? wtf?), the multiple armor thing is a bit much, and the levels are painfully difficult and not really all that fun to play. I'm wondering if I even want to try to play through the whole thing.

I was browsing around Cash Converters as I like to do the other day, and stumbled upon Super Smash Brother Melee for only twenty bucks. Twenty bucks! EBGames sells their used copies for $47.99! Well, even though I was doing a good job of purging the game from my system, I couldn't pass up the deal and bought it. When I got home and started playing it, I noticed that my skillz were sorely lacking (I'm not going to try to push all the blame on using a wireless controller).

I also noticed while playing that the screen wasn't looking all that hot. It was especially noticable on the character select screen. If you know me at all, you know already that I quickly went to eBay to try to find component cables for the Wii. I found something that is (hopefully) even better: a set of component cables that connects to PS2, PS3, Wii, and XBox360. This solves not only my issue of getting the Wii hooked up on component cables, but also my problem of not having any more component hookups on my receiver, which would otherwise have meant that I would have to switch the PS2 and Wii cables depending on which I wanted to play.

Sometimes I have questionable spending habits. I was at Blockbuster earlier today, and bought Suikoden 3 for PS2, even though I don't really have any intention to play it. It was only $15, and I think it's become a rather rare title. I rented it once, and it was a pretty good game, so I figured it was a decent investment. Of course, it's just getting thrown onto an already huge pile of PS2 RPGs that I want to play through (I think I might give one of the Growlansers a playthrough once I get that cable in. Or maybe Final Fantasy 6. Or maybe...).

SPeaking of RPGs, I fired up Guild Wars the other day when I was bored. I did a quick mission to get the feel of the game again, and chatted with some guys who were sitting around. I pumped up the graphics with my new video card, and it looks really nice. However, it didn't get its hooks in me yet. I'm sure one day I'll get an urge to play it and get back into it, but my Wii, my slew of PS2 RPGs, and my board games are on my hot list these days.

I went to Sandy's camp last night with Sheena and Dan. Besides the abundance of mosquitos there, I had a good time. Nothing much to report here, just some sitting around talking. Sheena and Dan insisted I bring Bohnanza (really! not my idea!), and we played a game of that. I came in dead last, but I seem to have gotten another two people interested in that game. Chris also said he really wants to play Catan again this coming Tuesday. I hope other people are willing to play with him, because I think I'd rather try some lighter, faster games with other people. Plus, I should be teaching some new games as well.

Anyways, I think I'm done jabbering on.

Listening to... Pitchshifter - Keep it Clean
Link of the moment... Police Squad - In Color! Great show.

Hit the peg! Hit the peg!

Argh, thanks for waking me up, truck outside. Curse you!

I feel like I've been quarantined in my house lately. I can't seem to find anyone to hang out with. No one is phoning me, and anyone I phone is busy or not answering their phone. It was a pretty boring weekend; I just watched some movies on the movie networks.

Spiderman 3 spoilers
I watched Spiderman 3 on Friday, at a matinee. The theatre was only about half full. I don't want to give a full on review (I'm not a movie buff, so anything I say would just be coming from someone who doesn't know shit about production values and such), but I do want to say that I'm unimpressed with the way venom turned out. Topher Grace is not the right casting choice! They didn't put enough effort into building up Eddie Brock's hatred for Spiderman and Peter Parker. We saw Eddie lose his job, and have his camera broken, and even have his "girlfriend" stolen, but I never got the impression that it was all adding up and making him go mad.

On top of that, I didn't like how after Eddie supposedly reached his breaking point, he's still making wisecracks to Spiderman. I like how Scott Dewitt says that "Venom was the same dork as Eric from That 70's Show. Venom. Not the guy that turns into Venom. Venom himself is a dork". Venom and Eddie Brock really are two different characters, and there wasn't enough in the movie to get that point across. One thing I really missed not seeing as well was Venom calling himself "we", to show that the symbiote is a part of him, and not just something to enhance his powers. But enough of that.
END Spiderman 3 spoilers

I'm QUITE excited about my games night tomorrow night. I've had this fascination with werewolf ever since I had the idea of playing it. I've put a fair amount of effort into considering which roles to use, and how to handle voting in the day phase. I've whipped up some reference sheets for the roles and their powers, set aside some playing cards to assign roles to players, and even scrounged up some poker chips in hopes that the assist in the voting process. Now, all I've got to do is wait to actually play the game!

I picked up the Megaman X collection for Gamecube, as previously mentioned. So far I've blown through the first game, and I'm starting on the second. Even with all my heart tanks and four full energy tanks, the final boss took me countless attempts. Most of the time, I wouldn't be watching my health bar and found myself dead before I could use an energy tank. If memory serves correctly, X2 is just as hard, if not harder if I try to get the good ending by defeating three extra bosses.

I've been thinking of building my own poker table, using one of these designs. My old one is sort of in shambles, and if my weekly games nights actually pan out, having a nice table would go a long way. I've never been that good at that sort of stuff though. Even when I just changed the fabric on the old table, it came out in worse whape than when I started. I think I'm just too impatient. If I throw actual carpentry on top of that, I'm sure the end product won't turn out as it looks in my dreams. Still, I think stuff like that can be fun, and it's nice to have something that you built with your own two hands and can be proud of. I think I'll just mull over it some more.

Listening to... Death By Stereo - These are a Few of my Favorite Things
Link of the moment... They make it look so easy!

My computer's veins once again course with electricity

Yeah, I'm back home. Of course, I have oodles of info to burn through, but not much of it is fresh on my mind.

The trip home was pretty excruciating. I couldn't sleep very well the night before, since I was sleeping on the couch. We got up at 7 and were on the road at about 7:30. Things were going fine until just after the border. We took the wrong highway and started heading towards Detroit. It's a simple mistake to make, trust me. That detour set us back what must have been a little over an hour. Driving was pretty quick through Michigan though, aside from some rain that slowed us down.

A late dinner got us leaving Sault Ste. Marie at about 6PM, much later than we should have been. The real problems arose when it started getting dark out. After passing through Wawa, we saw a lot of moose, and if you hit a moose on the highway, it has a better chance of surviving than you do. So, the rest of the night, we had to drive pretty slowly and at full attention to avoid impending death. We had some issues with gas, too, as we had a really hard time finding a gas station open at night. We rolled into my driveway at about 1:45, making it an 18 hour trip.

I hope that we made Hugh's trip a memorable one. It certainly was fun having him around. We hit up Kakabeka, and he even went up Mt. McKay. We went to Scuttlebutt's and the Brown Street Station (where I met up with Sheena and Veebs, among others). And, of course, some general hang outage.

I've had this real nasty cough for about a week. It's hard to describe, but it's the kind of cough where when you cough, you don't feel any better and so you have to keep coughing. It's been keeping me up at nights and waking me up at all hours. I really can't wait to get rid of it so I can do some real relaxing. I bought a big jug of orange juice, so maybe that will expedite the process.

I bought a Wii! It's given me some good times. Wii Sports is still amazing, but I'm still waiting for some decent games to come my way. I think once some copies of Super Paper Mario hit eBay, I'll scoop one up. Of all the Miis that are populating my system at the moment, Hugh's is most true to reality, while my own is probably in second. Beyond those, I can't seem to make anyone else look that good.

Well, I'm getting tired. Time for point form updates!
-I bought a Wavebird from Cash Converters today
-Apples to Apples went over well with my friends, once again
-I'm going to buy Megaman X Collection tomorrow
-I got a blister from rocking out on my drums; I sounded pretty good
-I'm going to host a games night next Tuesday; I'm hoping to get enough people for a good game of Werewolf
-Heroes on Monday was awesome
-I'm going to see Spiderman 3 this Friday
-I've still got lots of cleaning and sorting to do

Listening to... Orgy - Social Enemies
Link of the moment... Oh, Sam Raimi, is there anything you can't do?

Que sera, sera

I feel like I'm not entirely content with my life as of late. I feel like I need a clean slate, a fresh start. I recently got my offer of admission from LU, and I'm torn between sending it off with my deposit and ripping it up in an act of defiance. I'm getting entirely sick of math, and school in general. Well, hopefully life gets better after an undergrad.

I don't think I've really done a stitch of work lately. I haven't had an assignment due in a while; I have one due on Monday, but I think I might just not submit it again (it's only 2%). I wrote my (makeup) midterm for CO453. I think I passed it, but then again, that's what I said about the first one. Hopefully, I'll at least get more than 35% on this one. As for that crypto midterm? 98%.

Well, at least I seem to be involved with more stuff lately. Tomorrow, Andrew and I will play in a euchre tournament at St. Jerome's. On Tuesday, we're skipping euchre to play in a Smash Bros. team tournament (hopefully this will also knock me out of my #1 ranking so I don't have to wind up buying a prize for myself). On last Wednesday, I went out for Nathalie's birthday. We went to some Vietnamese/Thai place. The food was ok, but nothing to scream about. For a few days there, I was eating very poorly. I had a meal at midnight the night before, then the dinner that I got that night lasted me two small meals for the rest of the day. The next day, I had a pizza pop around 4 PM and a small frozen dinner later that night. Now that we've gone to Sobey's, I've got more food in the house.

After the dinner at Nathalie's, we went back to her apartment. I won a match of Wii Tennis, and had a terrible try at Wii bowling because I randomly picked a left-handed player (as a result, every shot had massive amounts of spin in it). We also played a game she got as a gift called Loaded Questions. One player asks a question from a card, everyone else answers, the person to the right of the player reads them all, and the player has to guess which player picked which answer. Since there were six of us playing, things dragged on a little late (six players gives the player a 1/120 chance of guessing correctly, five players gives a 1/24 chance). Overall, a good time was had.

I had high hopes of getting some good sleep tonight, but again my nightly sleep cycle turned into an hour and a half nap.

I really hope I'm drawing near the end of Shadow Hearts. My characters are Lvl40, and I think the cap is Lvl50. It's a decent game and all, but things are getting a bit repetitive. Battles all seem to follow the same pattern. I hope you'll also notice the completion of Megamans three through 5; John and I are just before the Wily stages in 6.

My dog, Skipper, died the other day. My sister is really broken up about it (as well I would expect her to be), and my mom was getting choked up on the phone too. Me? Eh, I guess I'm pretty unaffected. He was a good dog, and he'll be missed around the household, but I'm not going to shed any tears for him.

Listening to... Hatebreed - Tear it Down
Link of the moment... Mike Joooooooones.....HAW HAW HAW HAW HAW HAW

I am not economically viable

Well, things have taken a slightly interesting turn lately. Ever since Katie and I have started hanging out more regularly, I've been thinking of her in a different light. I asked her out the other week, and she responded favourably. We went doubles with John and Julie, to the bowling alley and Kelsey's. After that, we watched Falling Down and Hostage here. I won't go into details, but I will say that the date was very fun but not necessarily encouraging. I've been convinced by third parties to not worry too much about it and stop putting unnecessary thought into it. We'll see how things progress.

John and I beat Megaman 4 the other day, and we're done the first eight bosses on Megaman 5. He usually lets me do the bosses, which I seem to have a knack for. I've set a personal goal of beating as many of the megamans as I can without using cheats. Of course, who has the time for video games these days?

300 was a decent enough movie. I think I wasn't really in the mood for it though. I was pretty tired when we left, and it took all my willpower not to fall asleep at the wheel on the way to Mississauga. I didn't notice any difference at all between the IMAX screen and a regular screen. The movie was good, but I think there were still a few cliche-ish parts. I guess overall I'd give it a recommendation.

This week's Network Design assignment was considerable easier than previous ones, but there are still some questions that I couldn't get done. I didn't finish nor even start my Network Flow assignment. Again, it's only two measly percent, so I don't care too much. I didn't have much time this weekend, due to the movie and the date. I suppose in theory I could have worked on assignments rather than playing megaman games, but where's the fun in that?

I got a conditional acceptance to LU. I don't know what it's conditional on, it says more detail can be found in my offer of admission. I guess I'll go; I'm not overly excited to do more learning, but I can't really think of anything better to do. It won't hurt me to take 1-2 years to get a post-grad degree.

Happy early birthday to Nathalie! Her birthday is this Tuesday (I think), and I'm going to her birthday dinner this Wednesday. I think I have an idea of what to get her, too. Of course, I couldn't possibly say what it is here, or it won't be a surprise! I just hope I can find one easily.

I wish I was sleeping right now. I tried going to bed pretty early, and I would have been successful, had my roommates been a bit more considerate. I could distinctly hear all three of their voices upstairs. Sure, I could have asked them to keep it down, but by the time I was awakened, the damage had been done. Well, it looks like another instance where I sleep for two hours one night, and 12 the next. It happened to me last week, and that 12 hours of sleep was quite relaxing.

Somehow I guess I need to fit in some study time for my last midterm. I've got to study the four assignments we've had, plus the first midterm I took. Well, que sera, sera. As far as my crypto midterm goes, I'm pretty confident that I kicked its effing ass. Good for me! It helped that I really didn't need to study the RSA stuff, as I did so pretty extensively last term.

Listening to... Iron Maiden - 2 Minutes to Midnight
Link of the moment... I thoroughly enjoyed this movie.

Then I must be some kind of Genius

Well, I got my midterm marks back. I got a 90 in Network Flow...excellent. Network Design? Well, I got the second highest mark in the class! Unfortunately, that mark was 35%. The odd thing is that the highest mark in the class was around 75%, so there was a pretty huge drop-off. We're going to have a make-up midterm, and the prof talked to us all individually. I didn't tell him off or anything. What worries me is that it doesn't look like he's admitting that he's partially to blame for the class doing so poorly. Well, there's still 90% of the mark to be decided, so we'll see how this second midterm goes.

My sleep schedule is quite off lately. Lately, I've been going to bed between 4 and 5, and waking up at around 2PM. On days that I have class, I usually only get a few hours of sleep, and then crash when I get home. I forget what messed up my schedule. I was looking forward to attending a games day yesterday, but I woke up at 3 and realized it was half over, and by the time it would take to get ready and get there, it wouldn't be worth going.

I'm finally on the second disc of Shadow Hearts, but I think there's still a ways to go before I finish it. I beat the co-op story mode of Timesplitters: Future Perfect with Hugh, after some horrendously difficult stages. For Yoshi's Island, I've only got to acheive my goal of getting at least 80 on every stage for the last world, and then beat the last stage. I haven't touched FFVI lately. I have too many games started up already, so I'm trying to get SH and YI out of the way first.

I'm talking to Aly as we speak ('we speak', being figurative, of course). He reminded me that he has my Serenity DVD. I suggested that we actually do something, rather than just saying "hey, we should do something". It looks like I'll be going to see 300 this Friday in Mississauga (or Mrs. Sauga, as I jovially refer to it) at the IMAX theatre. I guess it doens't really mess with my midterms or anything, and the roads should be nice enough to drive on, so I can't think of any good reason not to go.

Katie was over last night, for the first time in a while. I was starting to get the feeling that she didn't really want to hang out with us anymore, but she initiated the hangout, so I suppose my fears were unfounded. She, Andrew and I played some NES (I have a NES emulator for PS2 with 900+ games), Scene It, and Carcassonne. As the night went on, activities included making spaghetti, and Katie falling asleep on the couch. I didn't know if I should wake her up or not, so I just played some Megaman 3 instead. Eventually she woke up (at 3:30 AM) and I kicked her out of my house. Good times, as usual! Unfortunately, she is babysitting this Monday and as such can not come over to watch TV.

I bought a Pitchshifter CD from those seedy guys that set up shop in the SLC the other day. "deviant", if you must know. It was a rare find, so I was happy to pay the eight dollars (sans tax). It's not as good as www.pitchshifter.com (the album), but I haven't really given it any time to grow on me. Now if only I could find a Bucket Truck or Chore cd...

The university had 1.5 snow days at the end of last week. They closed up shop at 3:30 on Thursday due to some pretty fierce snowfall. Overnight, there was really nasty freezing rain, hence the closure on Friday. It didn't mean much to me, besides letting me sleep in and saving me three hours of unenlightening class.

Well, that's as much as I'm willing to type for now.

Listening to... Reel Big Fish - Take On Me
Link of the moment... NES emulator for PS1. Needs a swap disc or mod chip to work.

Shag-adelic, baby

You may notice a slight addition to the sidebar. Hopefully by putting that up, it'll cut down on the "games I want to play" posts. I finally beat Resident Evil 4. I'm right near the end of Megaman ZX as well, but there's no way I can get through the "beat all the eight bosses again" part without some FAQ help.

At Blockbuster the other day, I picked up Okami as planned, and since they had a buy-one-get-one-half-off deal, I picked up Meteos for DS for another ten bucks. The next day at Rogers, I saw Kirby: Canvas Curse in the used games section. It looks like a good game, and I can never find it on eBay, so I picked it up as well. I'd better not buy any more games for a while, it looks like I have enough to last me through until the summer.

I went to Chris' house the other day and played some Wii. I've gotta say it doesn't really live up to my expectations. With Marvel: Ultimate Alliance, I felt like all I needed to do was shake the controller in front of me until the guys were dead. When I tried doing one move, it would wind up doing a different one. With Wii Sports golf, the same sort of thing happened; it wouldn't do what I wanted it to do. Boxing had the same problem. When I'd try to punch low to the body, it would do a hook to the face. Tennis was definitely fun though. Props to tennis.

I played another two games of Carcassonne with Grant and Sheena last night. I think I might actually be getting to the point where I'm getting sick of that game. I've played it entirely too many times since I got home.

Maybe later today I should go return stuff. X-mas gifts, that is. I'm still not sure if I'm going to keep the camera I have or exchange it for one with a smaller frame. I guess I use it so rarely that it won't make too much of an impact. Canon's a good name, and I don't really feel like putting in the time to finding out what the best model is otherwise. I guess I'll just take it all in cash, because I can't think of what I should get from Future Shop. I certainly have enough games. I'm not sure if I really want to invest in any more boxsets at the time being.

Well I need to get some food in me. I'm sure I'll have to look for it outside the house, as the cupboards don't seem to be well-stocked lately.

Link of the moment... Slightly interesting article over at Joystiq

Happy commercialized holiday!

It doesn't feel like Christmas this year. There's no snow on the ground, and we didn't bother putting up a tree this year (we just had a two-foot stand-in on a table). Let's see what booty I got this year:

-New Canon 5.0MP digital camera (I might return it in favour of a smaller model, if I can find one at the same price. Quality is fine and all, but bulky cameras are no fun to carry around)
-Poker's Wild! (A game from the creators of Sequence. Might be fun every now and then)
-shirt and pants (love the pants, the shirt is ok)
-Battlefield 1942 (looking forward to play this via LAN, but not sure if I'll get around to playing it solo for a while)
-Yoshi's Island DS (yay!)
-Lego Star Wars 2 (I happened to burn this from a rental the other day, so I'm going to return it and get Okami for PS2 instead)
-large cash donation for me to buy things for myself (my mom wants me to get a Wii, but considering the lack of great games and my current backlog of games for GC, PS2, PC, and DS, I'll spend it elsewhere and buy a Wii later on in 2007. I'm going to get that video card which is now on sale at Future Shop for Boxing Day.)

I've also added Metroid Prime to my "to play" list. It's the top rated GameCube game, and third highest overall at GameRankings.com. I'm on the last chapter of RE4. For the first three days, I was able to play through a chapter per day, but the fourth chapter took me a long time. I should be done this game in a few days, and then I'll move on to The Warriors. I should be able to finish that in a week and a half, and when I get back to Waterloo I'll probably move on to whatever I'm in the mood for. In the handheld division, I should be done Megaman ZX in less than a week, and then I'll play my new Yoshi's Island DS.

Hugh says that by scheduling video games like this, I take a fair chunk of the fun out of it by destroying the spontaneity. I suppose that's slightly true, but I think that with games taking 20+ hours to beat, and with some games having pretty steep learning curves, it's too difficult to jump back into a game that you've already started and still take as much out of it as you would if it were still fresh on your mind.

So far Adam and I have played 5 (or maybe 6) games of Carcassonne. I think the game works very well with fewer players. There's much more of a "screw over your opponents" element. I played Settlers of Catan with Adam, Grant, and Chanel, and they all seemed to enjoy it. We had to cut it short since Adam had to go somewhere, and while we were playing, Martine and her boyfriend came over. I think we stopped with a three-way tie where Grant, Chanel and I all had 8 points. I'm sure they'd like to play again if the number of people fits. I still want to play with Sheena.

After Adam left, the five of us played Bang!. I started off by stripping a lot of cards out (character cards, more complicated action cards) to leave more of a basic game. After the first game, we added the characters and some more action cards and played again. My one qualm with the game is that it seems to take forever to kill anyone. After playing ten minutes, everyone might still be at full health. I think it would be better to play more rounds that are quicker to play. To remedy this, I think I'll take out some "Missed!" and "Beer" cards (which evade shots and restore health, respectively).

Well it's nearly time for Christmas dinner, so I'm going to go shower and put on my new clothes, then stuff myself with delicious goodness.

Listening to... Rage Against the Machine - Freedom
Link of the moment... Oh yeah, I forgot to talk about the new board games I've got my eye on. Lucky you.

PHYS 121 destroyed me

Well, one exam down. It was physics, and it was gruesome. I'm not looking forward to what my mark will be in that course, but I can't say I care too much. It's just an elective, and even beyond that, what's the worts that will happen if I don't get a good mark in some course this term? Nothing.

I've got a few days until my next exam. The next two are Linguistics and Graph Theory on Wednesday and Friday respectively. I think I'll mostly wing it on those exams. I'll review all the linguistics slides, but it will all be multiple choice and T/F, so it's nothing worth wracking my brain over. Graph Theory will mostly be about memorizing a few theorems, and being able to apply the rest of them. I've got a good grasp on the material, so I shouldn't run into anything that will disturb me on the final.

I went to J&J the other day, as I said I would. I found Bang!, and found Lost Cities after scouring the shelves a few times. Through the Desert, and Mystery of the Abbey, however, were missing. I figure MotA is a bit obscure, and they said TtD was out of print but they should get some more eventually. I didn't want to walk out of there without buying a $30 game, since I'm not often in a spendy mood and figured I should get something for myself. I wound up buying Carcassonne: The Discovery based on a review I found on Board Games With Scott, which says it captures the essence of Carcassonne while being more accessible to new gamers. TtD will have to go on my 'to buy' list for the next time I feel the need to get more games. I think the next time I want to buy some games, I might try out GermanGames.com which is local to Waterloo and has good prices and selection.

I won Megaman ZX off of eBay today for a measly $20 after shipping (it retails for $40). The only reason I got it so cheap was because I got it off a user with almost no feedback. It's probably a bad idea, but the price was right.

I think I might try to get involved in Watsfic and the UWGamers next term, if it fits my schedule. I stopped by the Watsfic office while on campus the other day to see if they were having any more games days. Turns out I just missed one last weekend. I also scolded them for not having their information more accessible, such as on their now-defunct website and perhaps over a newsletter. I'd join in hopes of playing games with people who play games. Similarly, joining the UWGamers would let me try out the new consoles and test drive new games for DS. Of course, walking to campus is such a pain in the winter term, I'm not sure I'd be motivated enough to go to events.

I'm almost done FF5! Isn't that so exciting? Although, I wound up exploiting a game feature to buff up my guys. I guess it takes some of the fun out of the game, but the final boss will still put up a challenge, and there's still an entire optional dungeon after that.

Only nine more days until I'm back home!

Listening to... Raised Fist - Illustration of Desparation
Link of the moment... I'm sure I'll buy from here when I'm back in TBay...no local shops there.