Broken Wing

As I said last time..

Tue, 13 Dec 2011 03:38:46 GMT

.. I'm not actually dead, I'm just busy with Tumblr and on Steam. And then, I check my e-mail, and decide to go to battle.net to be sure it isn't a scam and..

I got into the Diablo III beta.

Not sure if I should let myself be sucked into Blizzard's clutches again. Cataclysm was a tremendous letdown, despite months of telling myself otherwise, and what they've got planned for the future is not very appealing.

Stuff & Things

Wed, 09 Nov 2011 05:19:21 GMT

I'm not actually dead, I've just been elsewhere! Primarily on Steam but also on Tumblr. Particularly the "Ask" blog I made on there, concerning Fallout: Equestria, at 'Ask Littlepip'.

There's also that whole thing with me quitting WoW after 6 years; Cataclysm has been a massive disappointment and the future plans they are mentioning for the game are just not very interesting. There's just NOTHING TO DO except inflating your item numbers and then having them all be obsolete in the next patch. The next patch which takes them half a year to release. So I returned to Vana'diel and am now playing Final Fantasy XI as Aramaru once again. It's nice having content updates every 30 days again.. and a world with story and zones that aren't completely empty of other human beings.

R.I.P. Steve Jobs

Thu, 06 Oct 2011 14:18:13 GMT

Steve Jobs of Apple has passed on, due to pancreatic cancer. This is particularly spooky, as my mother just had eye surgery and was worried about her own health, not to mention other family members with similar problems to the outspoken Apple CEO. Now, I'm not an Apple fanboy, but at the same time the technology industry is going to be a much less interesting place without all the man's ideas. The massive increase in use of portable devices for music and computing; Nokia and other companies may be more invested in their cellphones, but if you say the word 'iPhone', everyone already knows what you're talking about.

The Register has an excellent (11 page!) article about him, here.

Freaking Ubisoft..

Fri, 19 Aug 2011 16:32:17 GMT

http://arstechnica.com/gaming/news/2011/08/ubisoft-lied-about-from-dust-drm-ubis-war-on-pc-gamers-continues.ars

So I preorder the game 'cause it was both low-priced and you got a hat in TF2. Admittedly, not a very good one, but I figured, hey, the previews for it were pretty decent and it was popular with the console crowd, right?

... and then find out right before I'm about to run it that it's got that horrendous DRM which requires you to connect to Big Brother's servers EVERY SINGLE TIME you want to play. Even if you're running Steam offline. And the port is bad; which makes no damn sense when you consider the XBox is a freakin' customized PC. I'm just glad I didn't actually start the game, so maybe I can get a refund, as the product is effectively "unopened". Gotta love companies which flat out LIE to their customers (check out the article for more)..

Long story short? Don't buy 'From Dust' on the PC, and screw Ubisoft.

UPDATE: Got a refund from Steam, something they rarely ever do, but a great gesture on their part considering what happened.

Not dead, just don't feel like typing anything right now..

Sun, 07 Aug 2011 06:25:43 GMT

Well, except this, really. I honestly wonder how many people even read this anymore.. I used to update multiple times a day, and got thousands of visits a day; gotta wonder if those two are connected? *smirks* Of course that was back when I was doing actual news and not just personal blogging stuffs.. anyways, I started playing Final Fantasy XI again and have also been indulging in a large amount of Team Fortress 2, playing on the "brony" servers which have an excellent playerbase and level-headed admins as well.. so.. uhm.. will type more when I feels like it.

*mumbles something about stupid (but good!) Steam sales blowing away months of savings too*

Happy 4th of July!

Tue, 05 Jul 2011 04:12:07 GMT

You see the title? That's what I'm sayin'! And.. little else, apparently, as I've not posted here in a month. I just hate typing when there's nothing to actually SAY, ya know? Anyways, hope ya'll have/had a good day!

/salute to our veterans

Sun, 29 May 2011 13:27:41 GMT

I'm a bit early, but want to make sure I don't miss it. Major respect to anyone and everyone who works in truly heroic jobs; firefighters, police, paramedics, military and otherwise. You guys save lives everyday, and the poor disabled shmucks like me do appreciate your efforts.

In regards to my last post, I think I'll just complete the entire thing so my work can be judged for the sum of it's parts. That too and, well, the people reading here don't seem to be into the pony thing so I'll try and keep it minimal.

Not too much else to say right now, hope ya'll have a good weekend!

MLP: Another Story

Sat, 21 May 2011 14:23:54 GMT

Confound these ponies, they drive me to fanfiction! Here then is the first chapter in what I hope to be an epic story, based around the idea of 'What would a Final Fantasy style MLP RPG be like?'

As usual, anon comments are enabled, so feel free to say whatever is on your mind about this! Feedback will determine what I change, add or if I even continue with the story.. I've actually got some "developer notes" if this proceeds well. Onward!

In another world, another time, there existed a land known as Equestria. As one might surmise from the name, the dominant races were equine; ponies, to be precise. The Earth Ponies are the most common of these, noted for their physical strength and connection to the land which borders on the supernatural. Next are the Pegasi, winged ponies with the ability to not only control the weather, but whom could also walk upon clouds and perform flight maneuvers which would put most other beings to shame. And finally, the Unicorns, who can channel arcane magic through their horns and are known to history as being amongst the greatest spellcasters in their world. These ponies, and their allies, lived under the care of the twin Princesses, Celestia and Luna, literal goddesses with powers over the sun and moon.

A millennium ago, Luna was driven mad with jealousy, as her dominion over the night wasn't as appreciated as the daylight her sister presided over, or so she thought. Celestia was forced to banish Luna to the moon, lest the world perish under the veil of eternal darkness. It was only a year ago that Luna escaped from her prison, and it took the actions of six brave ponies and the Elements of Harmony, incredibly powerful magic artifacts, to finally break Luna free of her malice, which manifested in the form of "Nightmare Moon".

What nopony knew, however, is that Luna's transformation and fall from grace wasn't entirely her fault. A dark power has been plotting against Equestria for centuries, manipulating events from behind the scenes, and it is finally making it's move on a grand scale.

~~~

The Everfree Forest is one of the most dangerous regions in all of Equestria. What at first glance appears to be merely a dense woodland is actually a result of the powers that corrupted Luna ages ago. The land itself was not subject to the magic which permeates the world to this day, and those who wandered within the dense canopy of trees tended to meet an unfortunate end at the claws of it's fearsome inhabitants, ranging from cockatrices to full-grown dragons. Fortunately, most of these creatures stay in the forest, as the rules of reality are different within it's borders.. a fact which has kept the citizens of nearby Ponyville safe.

In the darkest heart of the forest, a tear in the fabric of space-time suddenly appeared. Lightning crackled from the rift, and the surrounding terrain was blasted with tremendous heat, blackening the grass and melting stone. Just as quickly, it vanished, leaving behind only a mysterious figure shrouded by a gray fog..

Zecora bolted out of her bed, shaking and sweating profusely. The reclusive zebra lived in the middle of Everfree, but was normally left alone in no small part thanks to the magic wards she had erected within her home. Looking around, scanning the room for an intruder, she noticed that every item she possessed with even the faintest amount of magic within was glowing.. and at least two of the most powerful wards, embedded into traditional tribal masks, were smoking and lying on the floor.

"This is not good. Not good! What kind of power could have done this, within this wood?" she muttered to herself, cautiously searching for the origin of this strange disturbance. She wouldn't find the source though, as whomever, or whatever had emerged from the break in reality was slowly walking towards the edge of the forest, in the direction of Ponyville. At the same time, miles away at the capital city of Canterlot, Princess Celestia felt a cold chill wash over her. Something occurred to her in that brief instant, and she immediately rose from bed and levitated a quill, inkwell, and parchment to her side..

"To my most faithful student, Twilight Sparkle.."

~~~

The sun was rising on another beautiful day in Ponyville. The weather was, as usual, clear and refreshing, with a light breeze carrying the scent of ripe fruit and freshly baked goods upon the air. The various storefronts around town were opening, and even at this early hour, the town was bustling with activity.

Down a short path from the town square lies the Ponyville Library, where Twilight Sparkle, the prized pupil of Princess Celestia herself had resided for the past year. Tasked with "discovering the magic of friendship", Twilight, her new friends, and her draconic assistant, Spike, had a number of adventures over the past twelve months, ranging from matters as small as organizing a party to saving the town from a rampaging giant bear!

"Spike!" Twilight called, as she rose from bed and passed by Spike's basket on the floor below, which he curiously was not in. The baby dragon wasn't known for getting up before she did. "Spike! Are you there? Everything alright?"

"Yeah Twilight, I'm fine. I think you'd better see this.." he replied from the main room.

The purple unicorn took a breath and entered the central chamber of the library, expecting to be jumped by Pinkie Pie or maybe pranked by Rainbow Dash. Her friends had rather.. interesting habits, and after a year in Ponyville she thought nothing would surprise her anymore.

Spike was sitting at a table, with a number of books piled up next to him. Twilight recognized them as the ones she had been reading recently, and wondered why he had moved them.. but then spotted the official seal of Princess Celestia upon a large scroll he had unfolded before him. "Whatever is written on that paper must be important.." she thought to herself.

~~~

Meanwhile, on the opposite side of town, Fluttershy was tending to her garden and the animals who lived within and around her home. The yellow pegasus had felt it was her duty, more then ever, to do everything possible to help those in need, especially after the disastrous events of the Grand Galloping Gala the prior month. So when the mysterious mare, whom she had never seen before, wandered by her home and apparently had emerged from the Everfree Forest, she had to ask..

"Excuse me, but.. are you.." Fluttershy began, before she froze in fear. The pony before her was a dull gray color, even her tail and mane. She looked on with a penetrating stare, the colorless pupils gazing back at the shivering pegasus, and though she said not a word, she had a certain sadness about her. Although it was considered rude to stare, Fluttershy couldn't help but notice she had no cutie mark either; the symbols all ponies gained upon their flanks upon reaching a certain age, signifying what their special talents are.

"Twi.. light. Twilight Sparkle." the pony said, the words forming slowly. "Uhm, wait, you know Twilight?" Fluttershy asked, confused. There was something unsettling about this pony, and not just the fact that she was talking in an almost mechanical manner.

"Twilight Sparkle. I must be brought to her." the mysterious mare said, this time with a bit more force behind her words, almost as if she were commanding it. Indeed, Fluttershy felt an extreme compulsion to help, even though her heart and mind were both screaming at her to not trust this odd pony. "Y-yes. I know her.. I'll.. uhm, bring you to her."

"That will.. be satisfactory." replied the gray pony, as she trotted behind Fluttershy, the two heading into town..

~~~

A small bale of hay exploded into flames as a blast of magic fire erupted from a unicorn's horn. Twilight Sparkle was in a field just outside the Library, a stack of books alongside her, reading quickly from the pages of several ancient tomes as she kept glancing up at the rows of targets that Spike had set up for her, nervously preparing for another shot.

"Twilight, I know the Princess.. wrote to us, but is this really necessary? I don't think I've ever actually seen you use your magic.." Spike didn't get to finish his sentence, cutoff by an arc of electricity which fired from Twilight's horn like a bolt of lightning at another bale.

"I.. I know Spike. I hope I don't have to use this magic either. But the legends the Princess mentioned.. some of them are even older then the ones about Nightmare Moon. And I have a really bad feeling since reading her warning." Twilight took a deep breath and concentrated, a vortex of freezing air and water swirling around her horn, then solidifying around the third target, encasing the hay in a thin layer of ice. "Unicorn magic isn't normally allowed to be used for this sort of thing. But the Princess said that I HAD to learn at least these three spells as soon as possible. She wouldn't have sent a message telling me that unless it was important!"

"Ok Twi, just promise me you'll be careful, alright?" Spike said, a bit worried for her. Twilight was practically a mother to Spike at times, as it was she who had hatched him years ago, not to mention having raised him for most of that time since.

"I promise Spike. And.. thank you." she smiled. It was good to have friends like him.

~~~

Fluttershy's legs felt like they were made of lead. She wanted to be helpful, but every fiber of her being was telling her that this weird pony she was escorting wasn't trustworthy, and even might be dangerous! But she couldn't stop herself. It was almost if she was a passenger going for a ride in her own body, and she couldn't do anything but watch and hope whomever is steering wouldn't crash.

As they came into view of the building-in-a-tree that was the Library, Fluttershy walked forward, knocking a hoof against the front door with more strength behind it then she typically would employ. "Twilight, are.. are you home? I'm sorry it's.. so early.." she said, also with a voice louder then she normally would use.

"We're back here Fluttershy!" Twilight called from behind the Library, apparently outside. Fluttershy suddenly felt like a tremendous weight was lifted off of her.. she could move normally again! Turning around, the strange pony was staring at her, and she only heard a few words before the entire world went black..

"Your service.. is no longer required." said the stranger, as Fluttershy passed out and the enigmatic equine wandered off behind the Library to meet Twilight Sparkle herself.

~~~

Despite the otherwise perfect weather, dull gray clouds began to rapidly gather above Ponyville like a blanket, still allowing in sunlight but reducing the ambient lighting so that everything looked like it was cast in shadow. This was followed by a cessation of the wind; no breeze or movement in the air at all. All of this served to distract Twilight Sparkle enough so that she didn't notice her new visitor until they were right before one another.

"Oh, uh, hello! Can I.. help you?" Twilight asked, feeling nervous for reasons she couldn't quite put a hoof on.

"Twilight.. Sparkle?" the gray one stated, both questioning and demanding in the same breath.

"Yes, that's me, what is.." was all Twilight got to say in reply, as a blast of magic power surged from the newcomer's horn, knocking her into the books and then several additional feet back.

"Twi! Are you alright?!" Spike rushed to his friend's side, only to find himself suddenly levitating above the ground, then encased in a sphere of arcane energy. Try as he might, the sphere wouldn't budge an inch no matter how hard he hit it, and he found he couldn't speak or breathe fire either. A look of panic was all he could manage as he was reduced to playing spectator to the unfolding drama.

Twilight shook her head and grit her teeth, stamping her forehooves into the grass as she rose up. "How did an Earth Pony.. wait.. she has a horn now?" she thought to herself, glancing over at her now-opponent. She did indeed have a horn now, but it was.. transparent. Ethereal. Almost as if it didn't even exist, and Twilight was certain that was the case a moment ago!

"Twilight Sparkle." the unnamed mare stated in a voice that seemed far more confident then before, and rather mismatched given the diminutive size of the speaker. In fact, it didn't even sound like the same pony at all. "I am the first of seven. Prepare for your test." As she finished her challenge, Twilight gasped as a cutie mark formed upon her aggressor's flank.. a star surrounded by smaller stars. Identical to her own, right down to the colors..

EDIT: So yeah anyways.. actually, heck with it. This isn't "up to standards" so I'm gonna put it on the backburner for now. Not like I have a choice.. nope, I ain't bitter. Nor did anyone say anything. Maybe. But at the same time..

I think I'm gonna just release the entire damn thing all at once in "movie script" format like I was going to do originally and handle it that way.. yeah.. -_-

Art!

Mon, 09 May 2011 02:24:49 GMT

Nothing much to say, but I did just post a buncha (old) art over on my FA page, in the Scraps section. It's actually all videogame-related stuff from my junior high / high school days, but eh, figured I'd mention it since there's not much else goin' on otherwise. If you're curious, go on over and have a look.. if not, then uhm, don't!

!

Mon, 02 May 2011 07:53:07 GMT

I normally avoid discussing politics on the Internet, with anyone.. but for this I'll make an exception.. (Caution: Language!)

Facebook sucks.

Fri, 29 Apr 2011 17:36:01 GMT

That is all.

Stuff I Hate #7: Cut & Paste Anthropomorphics

Mon, 04 Apr 2011 04:38:32 GMT

Just caught the latest episode of the MMO Report and, oh jeez. Not this crap again. For some reason they put hideous frog-people in the original EverQuest, and now someone thought it'd be a great idea to do the same thing with Guild Wars 2. The vast majority of games out there do reptilian races horribly, and I can't think of ANY that have done amphibians in a way that doesn't make them look just plain wrong on multiple levels. Even Chrono Trigger, one of the best games ever made, didn't make the simply-named Frog LOOK cool; but he did have characterization which accomplished that.

But this rant isn't really about my dislike of these creepy critters. No, my complaint is the damn "paste an animal head onto a bipedal body and call it a day" deal these guys are pulling. Not only does it look awful, it's just plain wrong! A human does not look the same as a monkey or gorilla without hair! Sure, there's a distant resemblance but they AREN'T THE SAME! This was something I hated about EQ, and now GW2 is gonna take a page from that flawed chapter of design? Whyyyyyy?

So please, if you're gonna design an anthropomorphic race for your fantasy series, or just plain want to render one artistically, make the head and body shape appropriate. If it merely looks like the animal in nature, except walking, you've got a problem..

Tags and greetings!

Fri, 25 Mar 2011 21:40:25 GMT

To all the people who visited thanks to that little WoW/MLP spoof I did the other day, welcome! I don't (usually) update constantly, but a few times a month, typically. Topics here include games and personal stuff, and a tendency by yours truly to either rant or make an attempt at humor. Sometimes I succeed, sometimes I don't. Regardless, thanks for the visits and comments, and hopefully I can provide some entertaining content for ya'll.

Currently messing around with Firefox 4.0 and adding tags to my old LJ posts / cleaning things up around here IRL and online alike, that sorta boring stuff..

Other sites I frequent include..

Steam
http://steamcommunity.com/id/AramaruXI

Wowhead
http://www.wowhead.com/user=Aramaru

Fur Affinity
http://www.furaffinity.net/user/Makoru

Equestria Online: Latest Patch Notes!

Thu, 24 Mar 2011 07:56:33 GMT

So hey everypony, how's it going! I managed to snag a copy of upcoming beta patch notes for EO.. that's Equestria Online.. and thought I'd share them with ya here! Of course, these ARE for testing, so chances are they're gonna change!

(A reminder that Anon posting is enabled on this journal, so you don't need LJ account to leave a comment if you want!)

Equestria Online Client Patch 4.1.1

The latest retail patch notes can be found here: http://www.equestriadaily.com/

Lunar Knights

- Lightning Storm now hits 1 additional target, for a total of 3.
- Nightcloud now shares a cooldown with PVP trinkets, and breaks all the same effects those items do.
- Shattering Stomp's damage has been increased by 10%, but now only damages targets in a cone in front of the caster.
- The Runic Power cost of Night That Never Ends has been removed, but it's cooldown has been increased by 1000%.
- Pegasus Lunar Knights should no longer be unable to accept the quest "Oatmeal? Are You Crazy?"

Scholar

- Blink should properly work now. Again.
- Unicorn Scholar's horns should animate with an appropriate glow during and after casting, as they did in the previous patch.
- Polymorph: Parasprite has been removed from the game due to exploits.
- Telekenesis can now only be used on enemies or inanimate objects. Too many players were intentionally tripping their own allies and causing them to fall.
- Friendship is Magic is no longer interrupted by damage, and the mana regeneration effect is maximized for the closest 6 ponies (including the caster) within the area of effect.
- Locate Tome should have a higher success rate when cast closer to the book in question, with a guaranteed scrying when cast within 5 yards of the bookshelf containing the target.
- Arcane Armor has a new icon!

Animal Friend

- Ferrets will no longer eat vegetables.
- Buzzing Buzzards do not remain permanently hostile to everypony until server restart if anypony attempts to tame them and fails or is otherwise interrupted.
- Pink Jays are once again spawning in the gardens around Canterlot.
- Prime Glyph: Intimidating Stare now resets the cooldown immediately on this spell if the effect is resisted, but on Beasts only. This does not affect it's cooldown on Dragonkin or players of any type.
- There was a bug mistakenly flagging some fish as sentinent. This has since been resolved, and you can once again feed your pets fish if it is part of their diet.

Celestial Knights

- Hoof of Protection will now cause Forbearance on anypony it is targeted upon.
- The mana cost and cooldown of Avenger's Horseshoe has been reduced by 33% and 15 seconds, respectively, bringing this attack more in line with offensive spells cast by the other melee hybrids.
- Celestia's Boon can no longer be dispelled.
- Lunar Bane talent removed. Anypony who currently has this talent will have their talent points reset so you can choose another.

Professions

- Limited quantities of every type of craftable fabric should now be available at Rarity's shop in Ponyville, available exclusively to Tailors of 300 skill or higher.
- Herbalists can once again track herbs in the Everfree Forest.
- Diamond Dog spawns have been toned down in intensity; they can only appear if you actually uncover a gem while Mining, only at levels beyond 30, and are limited to a maximum of 3 spawns within 30 minutes.
- Mr. Cake and Mrs. Cake at Sugarcube Corner now teach all standard Cooking recipes, not just sweets.

Dungeons & Raids

- It is no longer possible to kite Shade of Nightmare Moon out of her room.
- All hostile mobs, regardless of level, will leash to their original position if they enter Princess Celestia's throne room or bedroom while she is within either. No, you can't drag adult Dragons in to attack her anymore..
- Babypony Abominations have a new, more terrifying model.
- The droprate for the various shards of the Elements of Harmony has been increased by 10%.

PvP (Pony Versus Pony)

- Due to popular demand, Froggy Bottom Bog is once again a Contested zone on PvP stables.
- It is no longer possible to begin a Buck Attack right as a duel ends to kill another player.

Bug Fixes

- A scripting error which was causing Fluttershy to run away forever, regardless of her current health if attacked has been corrected. If reduced to 10% HP she will now hide under her bed, untargetable, until the threat has left the area or been eliminated.
- Players whom chose the "Derpy Eyes" option during character creation no longer receive any penalties or benefits for doing so, it is purely visual.
- Dr. Whooves' model will not randomly switch between Earth Pony and Pegasus.
- There should no longer be a crash to desktop upon zoning into Fillydelphia for the first time on a given character.
- The word "wingboner" and it's associated emote will be censored if a player has the Mature filter activated.

Known Issues

- Cro Hoofstrong's dialog with Granny Smith has not been updated yet to reflect her newly-fixed hip. This is purely a localization issue and the fruit vendor does indeed walk better now! She still hasn't moved her apple cart though..
- It is possible to get Pinkie Pie stuck in an infinite loop via dialog choices. If this occurs you will need to relog or leave the zone and return. We hope to have this resolved via a hotfix soon.

Holy Celestia, this series has me hooked, I'm actually making pseudo-fanfiction for it now.. and yes, this is a parody of "What if World of Warcraft was PONIES?!". Try and catch all the references; every 'note' is relevant to either (or both!) series, sometimes in multiple ways! It's a simple concept, sure, but I had fun making this up.. ;)

Ponies Ponies Ponies Ponies..

Wed, 02 Mar 2011 14:58:47 GMT

Well, great. Another thing for me to get hooked on, a ~~children's card game~~.. I mean, a children's cartoon!

So yeah, you may have heard that there's a new series from the animator(s) whom worked on the GOOD Cartoon Network series, like Powerpuff Girls, Foster's Home, etc. And that series is.. unbelievably, My Little Pony. Yeah. They managed to take a show that's all about selling toys to little girls and make it AWESOME. Well, I guess that's been done a few times before with Transformers, which is incidentally also from Hasbro, so someone in control of the franchises is being smart about it. And I'm actually late to the party, apparently, as people have been raving about this new show for months now, and I only just sat down and watched it. And another episode. And another. Until I saw them all.

There's actually a ton of things in favor of this show, too. There's the referential humor and jokes that only adults will get; just like Animaniacs. Impressive voice acting performed by an experienced ensemble, and the characters expressions and lip syncs match up perfectly. The cast doesn't laugh or yell for no damn reason, like a lot of other cartoons lately are guilty of.. the 'moral of the story' lessons actually have something to do with the episode instead of being tacked on to the last minute, and heck, the show is even educational at times, by delving into mythology, science and other subjects as the plot demands.

They even managed to break stereotypes, or play with them when they do exist. For example, the super-girly fashion-crazed pony is actually very kind and is NOT a bitch, AND isn't a shopaholic but a business owner herself. That's a much better message to kids then "you should annoy your parents to buy things".. instead it's "you should work hard to help yourself, and make sure to help others too". I could honestly go on and on about all the positives of this show, especially in relation to everything else out there now, but I think you get the picture.

Just two final notes, regarding that Youtube account I linked. One, the episodes are generally posted in order, so the oldest would be the first, and so on. The pilot is a full hour, but suffers from having to introduce well, everything, and being more cheesy then the series proper. The second thing to note is.. anything that doesn't specify it's the new series, you should avoid unless you want to get some brain bleach. There's some older MLP stuff on there, probably for comparison, and it's HORRIBLE. Just.. avoid anything that isn't the current art style. You'll be glad ya did.

Karma can be.. an awesome thing?

Thu, 06 Jan 2011 13:50:14 GMT

Alright, so last night, I'm in Mount Hyjal, finishing up the quests I've still got left there, when I overhear a conversation from another player about how he's short some gold for his epic flight skill. Just for the hell of it, I ask how much.. he replies 800g, and seems to be a bit nervous. I open trade and simply hand over that amount; I don't know the guy, and chances are, being a total stranger, he'd prolly never pay me back either.

Regardless, he was happy as hell and repeated "omg!" a few times. I then proceed on my way, content that I've done a good deed for someone I don't even know over the Internet. And then.. a rare spawn appears right in front of me. I think it literally spawned, as it, a phoenix, descended from the sky and flew to the ground ahead. I quickly attack and kill it, a level 81 (I was on my 85 Paladin), and lo and behold, it drops an iLevel 346 superior item.. that is worth a thousand gold.

Queue flipping out and the realization that it was almost as if the game itself was paying me back for being nice. And then I told the guy I just gave the gold to about it, and that the money was no-strings-attached since, well, I now had something which was worth even more then what I gave him.

Yeah, that was pretty awesome.. ;)

Blarggh!

Sun, 12 Dec 2010 16:34:23 GMT

So hey, there's that totally awesome thing that life likes to do to me! Last post was all "hey I want to type about stuff" and all, right? Well right after that, my computer decides to die. As in, motherboard failure. Really? Right before WoW: Cataclym release too?

/facepalm

Well, on the upside, I was able to get a new machine and salvage my hard drives from the previous machine, so I didn't lose anything but time (well, and some money, but not AS much as it coulda been since, ya know, parents being awesome). My migraines have been especially horrific for the last week too, but the new PC is something positive at least! Here's the specs, which is a pretty damn sweet machine now that I get down to it..

CPU: AMD Phenom II X6 (Hexa-Core!), 3.2 GHz
RAM: 8 GHz @ 1.3 GHz
Storage: 2 Terabytes (1 TB main drive, 2 512 MB drives from previous machine) & Blu-Ray player / DVD-Burner
Video: NVIDIA GeForce GTX 460 w/ 768 MB

In other words, this thing is a monster, and the most powerful computer I've ever owned, let alone used, by far. Not only in absolute terms but relatively speaking too.. AMD doesn't make a more powerful or faster processor then this one, currently, and the video card can do DirectX 11 second-to-only-a-few others on the market. I'm using my Logitech sound system, keyboard and mouse with it, and my previous monitor too, among a handful of other parts, to keep costs down. But, again, wouldn't have been able to afford it without help from my parents, 'cause income from disability barely feeds me, let alone keeps the electricity on, so if there's anything for me to 'give thanks' for this season, it's that.

On a less hopeful note, my breathing problems seem to have gotten worse as of late, so if ya'll are talking to me online and I suddenly go quiet, it's probably to shove my face in front of the air purifier/ conditioner / cleaner thingy here. I can't believe I'm 30 already either.. feels like I graduated college fewer years ago then I actually did..

Well, anyways, I DID get to type a bunch of stuff like I wanted to; just later then I had hoped. Since I've got this new computer I'm installing stuff onto it now, so maybe I'll catch some of ya's online in Azeroth later. Ta~

Title thingy here, subject goes below!

Sun, 31 Oct 2010 07:17:22 GMT

Lately I've been finding myself in a mood to write, yet at the same time, I don't want to say a damned thing. There actually has been quite a few things going on with my life, both ingame and in reality, and.. it just doesn't seem to matter. I mean, who really cares if I got to level 30 in Fallout 3 (and barely even got into the main quest cause I've been doing all the side-quests and exploring the hell outta the game), or that I got x item drop in Team Fortress 2, or leveled some alts in World of Warcraft.

Nobody, really, and that's the problem. If I post about every little thing I do, then I'd be falling over to the Dark Side (aka Facebook and MySpace), where people seem to think the entire world wants to know every time they take a shower or walk their dog or fucking wake up! But on the other hand, if I say nothing, then ya'll might think I'm not around here anymore, and thus lose any reason to even bother checking this journal. And so on and so forth.. vicious circle, it is. So just typing all of this gets me thinking; if you had a choice of something interesting to read, what would it be? What's the kinda thing that you like to read about, and if it's written well, would get ya to read more on a semi-regular basis? Or, alternately, what kind of information or lore would you be interested in discussing, or hear me voice my thoughts on?

RealID : WoW Part II

Tue, 06 Jul 2010 19:42:15 GMT

Hey, big surprise, the first part is Friends Only, and why? Cause there's a little thing called privacy on this here Internets. This IS going to be a rant, so fair warning, but check out this gem of a horrible idea from Blizzard..

http://www.mmo-champion.com/content/1851-Battle-net-Update-Upcoming-Changes-to-the-Official-Forums

What. The. Fucking. Hell.

I already am getting WoW-related gold spam in my e-mail every single day now, despite NOT having my e-mail show up on any of my online profiles to strangers, including Livejournal, and now they want to put my real name(s) out there for total strangers to see? The whole point of RealID was, as they said themselves, for friends and family to communicate across games and servers. Not as ideal as, say, Steam's system, but acceptable. But this?

I'm thinking of cancelling my subscription right now if they don't go back on this, because it not only means I can never post on the official forums again without fear of very real identity theft or worse, but because it'd send a more powerful message, as I've been playing the game since it came out; and just killed the Lich King recently, which is what I was GOING to post about, but screw that now..

EDIT: http://www.wow.com/2010/07/06/security-flaw-allows-addons-to-expose-full-real-life-names-witho/

IT GETS WORSE!

EDIT 2: http://forums.wow-europe.com/thread.html?topicId=13816839821&sid=1

IT GETS BETTER!

Looks like virtually the entire Internet, even the non-WoW playing part of it, complaining about this, has caused them to reverse course, with a posting from Blizzard's CEO and co-founder as a reply, even. I don't normally bitch about Blizzard, being a fanboy and all that, but.. this was a very important subject and I'm glad they decided to heed our warnings about it.

Much ado about gaming

Thu, 03 Jun 2010 18:16:52 GMT

So hey, I haven't forgotten about this place, I just haven't had anything to say! So, I'm gonna remedy that right about now..

Recently, Valve had a promotion regarding the fact that they now make Macintosh versions of their games, and started with releasing Portal for FREE, even for PC players! So I downloaded and installed Steam and, one thing lead to another, and I got Half-Life 2 as well, since it was on sale for a mere 7 bucks. Now, keep in mind, the last time I played or even cared about an FPS was back during the days of the original Half-Life.. when I stopped playing Team Fortress, I stopped caring about the genre.

As of this writing I'm rapidly approaching 100 hours played between HL2 and Portal, the latter of which I played non-stop for a few days till I beat it AND got most of the achievements. And according to the Lost Coast framerate test, I average around 150 fps with almost every setting turned all the way up. So.. I'm totally spoiled by that, certainly..

I'm AramaruXI on Steam, btw. Can't believe someone else took the basic name, but eh, what can ya do?

Although this image is scaled down a bit, you can still see how beautiful the water effects are, not to mention the texture quality. That and Half-Life (and Portal especially) aren't all about combat, but puzzle solving and exploration, aspects which always draw me to RPGs, so that also is why I've easily blown through the past week without WoW. Which isn't to say that I've lost interest.. not really. Just good to take a break from the routine every once in a while, ya know?

Also due to this aforementioned switchup in what I usually do, I've found the time and creativity to work some more on various 'projects' of mine. This includes a Warcraft III campaign, spending time with / helping my parents out, having some home improvement folks come by to provide estimates on various quality-of-life fixes, and getting an air conditioner unit installed here, instead of having to rely on and waste money on firing up the central cooling when the rest of the house doesn't need it..

The only downside out of all of this, besides my health STILL sucking (although the colder air provided by the new AC definitely helps), is that my father's work situation could go either horribly bad or extraordinarily well, for reasons I legally can't even say here. Just that I hope after the literal decades of my Dad working his ass off, that karma will decide to give us (the family) a good deal.. if not.. well.. then times'll be tough for us a while after..

Waaah, RAGEQUIT (not me, others..)

Sun, 14 Feb 2010 20:09:21 GMT

So I was reading WorldofRaids.com and there was a post about a guild called Last Resort quitting, after playing WoW since release. And honestly? Goodbye, thanks for not knowing ya.

Seriously, they're bitching that the game is more accessable, and that it's "too easy", despite not doing all the hardmodes available in Icecrown Citadel. Uhm, hello, that's the point? That they spend months designing content that more then 1% of the game's population will see? And if you DO think it's too easy you can do the harder stuff?

I swear, it seems like people with a particular mindset infest every single MMO, and aren't happy unless the 'best' stuff is not only absurdly hard, but also they only THEY get to finish it or even see it. And then they'll come back months later complaining about attunement quests or needing to get keyed to unlock particular areas and.. ya know what? Just quit. Just, leave. Go. The attitude that ONLY one percent of the player base gets to see the stuff that 100% of the players have to download to their systems is absurd. Maybe if you didn't use fifty different mods to automate everything, or read strategies that other people have figured out, then you'd get to do the raids the "old fashioned" way. But you don't, and won't, so.. GTFO.

types

Thu, 14 Jan 2010 20:02:56 GMT

Prepare for it! Or something like that...

So, what's been going on in my life? Well, besides the usual doctor visits, prescriptions, tests and all that good stuff, there's at least been some positive development. I had a sleep study performed, since I know (and confirmed) I have Restless Leg Syndrome as well as sleep apnea.. but it was a hell of a lot more serious then I thought.

Leg movements per hour? 40 an hour average. Incidents of sleep apnea; resulting in decreased or stopped breathing? 60-80 an hour.. the normal # for each of these is less then 5. So, that's pretty damn serious..

Due to this, I've been able to get both a CPAP machine for use when sleeping, as well as a hospital bed to help with my back and breathing since I pretty much need to be elevated to rest as it is. I'd been sleeping on a couch-recliner the past few months instead of an actual bed, and it helped, but.. this'll obviously help more. This is in addition to the oxygen machine I already had, which they let me keep, saying that way I could use that during the day; and I've already had to do so twice since getting the previous items.

The uhm, positive aspect is the fact that it's more answers, rather then questions, and I'm getting the proper treatment. As opposed to all those years of "lol you're ok" prior to getting medical coverage..

In less depressing news! A friend of mine from high school got in contact with me again after several years of.. non-contact. The reason really being distance / his work schedule / etc. and not because of anything else. So we hung out for a few hours and I tricked.. err.. convinced him to get into playing World of Warcraft, so hopefully I'll have another cool person to game with again soon. As everyone knows, there's a limited audience for intelligent conversation amongst the average WoW population, and the Internet at large, so.. hey, good times?

So yeah..

Thu, 31 Dec 2009 13:44:20 GMT

I really ought to update this thing shouldn't I?

Sat, 10 Oct 2009 15:50:05 GMT

So yeah.. I'm back, and Horde (again). Fun times. More to be posted soonish.

Truth is stranger then fiction..

Sun, 22 Mar 2009 03:31:27 GMT

http://db.pokesav.org/main/?q=03-21-09-Event-Hoax
http://zip.4chan.org/v/res/28866300.html

4chan strikes again. Possibly.

"Trouble was brewing at the Pokemon Platinum release party earlier today, caused by none other than the notorious Team Rocket. An overweight, sweaty, and generally unkempt man dressed as James from the Pokemon Anime distributed his own, edited version of the flyers being handed out by nintendo officials, including an extra line regarding a Mystery Gift event (which was NOT officially scheduled to occur). Using his own hacked copy of the game, he distributed a mystery gift containing a shiny level 100 Gengar named.. the n-word.. (Moveset: Thief, Shadow Claw, Sludge Bomb, and Snatch). After several announcements through the loudspeakers dotting the area around the event not to download any Mystery Gifts (because they would "corrupt your game"), officials finally tracked down James and escorted him off the premises. As he was dragged away, the overweight cosplayer rebeliously yelled "TEAM ROCKET'S BLASTING OFF AGAIN!" No, really. You can't make this shit up."

. . . wow.

EDIT: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-jshiYIGbFk