Thursday, July 15, 2004

It's All About the Rupees

	Finally, my website is complete and hosted, thanks to Tony. Either click the newly added button in my introduction or click this link to visit It's All About the Rupees. On the site you'll find a collection of my various writings, graphical works, and of course, a ton of Rupees. And speaking of buttons, you may have noticed that most of them are gone from my introduction. The only three left are ones for my myOtaku site, It's All About the Rupees, and the HTML FAQ. I decided a while ago that once I got my site done and put its button up I would get rid of the others, since they kind of cluttered up the introduction. It may seem a bit selfish, but I'm just going to have buttons for my own sites from now on. (I mean, this is myOtaku after all). Everyone is still linked to through my friends list, though. Oh, and another thing: I do plan on continuing with the HTML FAQ, now that I've got It's All About the Rupees done. So I haven't completely abandoned it, heh. Hopefully I'll be able to get the next section written and posted within the next couple days.

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Tuesday, July 13, 2004

Website Nearly Finished

	I've only got one more page left to make, and then my website will be ready to go up. Though I still need to dig through some of my older writings and see if there's anything I want to add to what's already on the site. I may end up editing some older stuff -- you know, to decrappify things -- before I put them up. I have boss strategies for every boss in Zelda: A Link to the Past and Zelda: Oracle of Seasons, but they really could use some revising. And actually, the one page I have left to make, I'm considering just not including. At least not for now; not until I make some more decent stuff to put on it. At this point I'm still trying to come to a decision, but I'll probably decide by tomorrow. In the way of gaming, I'm still slowly working my way through FSA completely in single player mode. I did the first stage in Level 7 yesterday, and I'll probably do the second today. I've also decided to buy Skies of Arcadia Legends for the GameCube. It's only $20 on GameStop.com, so I'm going to go into the local GameStop here and see if they have it. I figure $20 is about as low as the price is going to get unless I want a used copy, or to wait until the next generation consoles are released. And at that point, I probably wouldn't be able to find it at all except for used copies. Oh, and Ginny wants me to mention her. Apparently, I'll suffer if I don't. So be sure and visit her blog, Playful Simplicity, and spam her comments. She just switched layouts to one that lets people make comments on her posts, so I'm sure she'd like a bunch.

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Sunday, July 11, 2004

Now Playing #48

	Game: Final Fantasy I Track: Chaos' Temple Time: 2:03 Size: 16.1 KB I recently downloaded the Final Fantasy Origins soundtrack which, being the soundtrack to a compilation of FFI and FFII remakes, contains remixed tracks of all the songs from the game. And since I've always liked the original NES version of this song, I instantly fell in love with the FF Origins remix and just had to find a midi of the song to put up here. This midi is based on the original NES version, however, so it's not nearly as good as the FF Origins remix . . . though I think it's actually better than the NES version. The original is good, but there's only so much that could be done with the NES' sound capabilities. For those of you with broadband (or those of you that are patient), you can find the FF Origins remix here. Trust me, there's just no comparison between it and the midi.

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Saturday, July 10, 2004

The Story Ends

	With two slashes and a Tornado from Auron, for a total of nearly 200,000 damage, Final Fantasy X came to a close. I decided I wasn't going to wait to get Wakka's Celestial Weapon fully powered up; it's just not worth it. I may go back and play a ton of Blitzball to try and get that last sigil some time, but not now. 91:54 is long enough to spend on the game for now. I want some fresh meat, such as that copy of Final Fantasy Tactics I saw in GameStop a few weeks ago. Or maybe Skies of Arcadia Legends. Or one of the Dragon Warrior games. FFX was good -- mainly for its battle system and Auron's story -- but there's better things out there that I have yet to experience. Oh, and about FFX's ending. . . . It kinds of makes me curious about what happens, but not enough to buy FFX-2. Tidus is too much of a wanker for me to really care about what happens to him. And with both Auron and the CTB system gone from FFX-2 -- the two things I really enjoyed in FFX -- there really isn't much incentive. Maybe I'd enjoy the game for other reasons if I were to get it, sure, but I think they made too many drastic changes to FFX-2 to really pull people to it after playing FFX. Now if you'll excuse me, I must plan my next killing . . . er, purchase. Gotta feed the RPG addiction, you know.

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Thursday, July 8, 2004

Random Update!

	Not much else to talk about -- and I am not doing another instant ramen post -- so I'm just here to mention that my website is coming along nicely. I think I've finally worked out all of the layout bugs that were making me bash my head against random objects from time to time, so now I'm getting back to adding actual content to the site. That, and fixing little things in the styles that don't look quite right, aka tweaking. I can never stop myself from tweaking little things here and there until they're just right. Also, I'd like to say (yet again) that F-Zero GX is an awesome game. One of the best in my small library of ten games, and probably one of the best on the GameCube overall. Anyone who likes racing games is doing themselves a huge disservice by not at least renting this game. Heck, even someone like me who isn't that into racing games is doing themselves a huge disservice. This is the second time I've gone back to F-Zero GX after not playing for a long time, and it's still a lot of fun trying out different machines. Even though they're the same tracks -- though there is a good number of tracks -- what seemed so simple before can suddenly become a desperate struggle to keep from flying off the edge when you switch which machine you're using. Learning to use controlled slides on heavy machines with low grip ratings if fun, heh. I used to think it would just be flat out impossible to win on some of the machines, but now that I'm better at the game and I'm actually trying them out again, I'm finding that they're all good in their own ways, and their flaws can be taken into account and compensated for with a certain racing style. My favorite type of machines are still light ones with low body, high boost, and medium grip ratings, though. Little Wyvern, Mighty Typhoon, and Mighty Hurricane are the three machines that I've found I do best with so far. You gotta use the subtlety. ^_~

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Tuesday, July 6, 2004

The 4th of July

	Well, my 4th of July turned out to be a lot more interesting than I had thought it would. A lot more. The day started out like pretty much any Sunday, with me getting up and going to church. (Though when I say "get up," what I really mean is stop using the computer and get ready -- there was no sleep that night). And after I got home, nothing much was happening. I was just working on a graphics thing that a friend asked me to do. Then I got a call from another friend. He said he was bored, and wanted to do something . . . anything. So he drove down from the next town over in his "new" used car. We sat around trying to think of something to do for a while until we decided to head over to the park, where we heard there was something or other going on for the 4th of July. About halfway to the park, we decided to go to Wal-Mart instead and get a few cheap t-shirts and some transfer paper, for ironing a printed image onto a t-shirt. This we did, and then came back home, spending a few hours trying to think of funky stuff to put on the t-shirts and then wrestling with the coloring, seeing as I'm apparently out of black ink in my printer. Eventually two of them came out in purple and light purple, while the other was bright red. As for what was on them, the first one we came up with was simply some plain text in a large Arial font that said "wet t-shirt"; the second one said "100% homespun love" in a cursive looking font (don't ask me why he wanted a t-shirt that said that), and the third one was a drawing of a piece of pizza (that he drew in Paint) with the text "Please don't eat me... ...I love you." When it came time to go watch the fireworks, I ended up wearing the "wet t-shirt" one and he wore the pizza one. At the park where we were supposed to meet some other people to watch the fireworks launched from the fairgrounds a little ways away, we ended up wandering around for probably about an hour before we saw someone we knew. (Well, she saw me, and told us where the others were). Turns out they were way, way back all the way across the fields, about as far from the big crowd gathered at the park as you could get. So we walked all the way back out there, and got there maybe ten minutes before the fireworks ended. It's a big field. We sat and watched the big fireworks finale, which really isn't that impressive anymore since I've seen it nearly every year of my life that I can remember, but hey. Afterward, another friend came with us, and we drove around looking for something to do. This was the first time we've actually been able to drive around on our own, seeing as none of us had ever had a car of our own before. And guess what? There was nothing we could do -- we had little money, and we couldn't even rent a video because none of us are 18 or on our parents' accounts. Except. . . . After some comments from my non-car-owning friend, as we got in the car about to leave the video store, I jokingly suggested we stuff him in the trunk. Well, one thing led to another, and we drove out of the parking lot . . . with him in the trunk. We had left it open a bit, though, so he was actually holding it closed from the inside. And of course, the other friend had told him that, when he stopped hard, to jump out and start running. Can you see where this is going? So we drove around for a while. I actually had to stop the driving friend from stopping in this one parking lot, on account of there being a couple police cars stopped there, and the officers talking to some people. I figured that this was something you'd do around random bystanders, not the police. Because it looks exactly the opposite of what it is, and I didn't feel like getting arrested. So we drove around even more, eventually pulling into a shopping center and stopping next to a Jack In the Box. He jumps out of the trunk and starts running across the parking lot and we give chase, the other friend yelling things such as, "Don't let him get away! Shoot him! Get the gun!" as we run. We end up running right in front of a Target store in the shopping center -- thank God it was closed because of the 4th of July -- and the running friend yanked out a couple of carts from a row and pushed them in our way in classic crappy movie style. At one point, the friend chasing with me grabbed one of his sandels off his foot and threw it at the running friend. (I have no idea how he did this while still running, but hey, I don't wear sandels that much). So as I ran past the sandel, I reached down and grabbed it and. . . . I almost kept my balance. It was so dang close. If I had slown down a bit, I would've made it, but no, I kept going at full pace, heh. So as I tried to return to an erect posture mid-stride after grabbing the sandel, my momentum invariably disagreed with this action. It wanted me to keep going forward with the running (or should I say sprinting? I was running as fast as I could), while I wanted to move my torso back upright. Momentum won . . . and down I went. I fell forward, but I recovered quickly, putting my hands out in front of me and pushing myself back upright to resume sprinting. (Still while moving, mind you -- I slowed down through this, but never to below half of the speed I had been going). And while holding my friend's sandel in my right hand, I actually managed to push off with the bottom of it, heh. Unfortunately, my left hand didn't fare as well by itself against the asphalt, but not that bad. I managed to put down and lift up my hand fairly straight, so all I got was one small scrape that didn't bleed much. But, no matter what, road burn hurts, even in small amounts. But, nevertheless, I kept sprinting, sandel in hand. At that point I wasn't feeling any pain from my hand besides the small impact of it hitting the pavement. Also at that point, we ran out of parking lot, so my friend turned the corner of the Target store, stopping just around the corner and pressing himself against the wall, hoping we'd shoot right past. I'm more aware than that, though. I came around the corner at near full speed, saw him standing there, and stopped in the space of one stride while letting my momentum carry my right arm -- and the sandel carried in hand -- right around towards his face. It would've been perfect if I had actually wanted to hit him, but I stopped the sandel about an inch away. He looked rather surprised that I had managed to stop and bring the sandel around so quickly, saying "You were supposed to keep going around the corner." The chase over, all three of us sat down on the curb of the parking lot and the building, getting our breath back and laughing over what we had just done. It was great fun. And now I'm wondering just how many people were freaked out, since there were quite a few people there at that Jack In the Box. While walking back to the car, we got some funny looks, and a couple people hurried over to their cars as we walked past, heh. Leaving -- with no one in the trunk this time -- we drove around aimlessly for a while again, ending up stopping at another video store with no luck. It was the same story as before. So we decided to head back to my house, where we just picked out a few movies from my oldest brother's collection. (And also where I got to wash off my scrape, though I couldn't find any bandages. But it's healing fine, and it's in a spot where it shouldn't affect my video game playing too much, so whatever). It was a little past midnight when we put on Good Morning Vietnam, the first movie of the night. And after that we went on to watch Labyrinth, Alien, and Joe's Apartment -- in that order. I dozed a bit during a couple of the movies, but never got any real sleep. It was somewhere around 7:00 AM and I had been up for about 36 hours after all four of those movies, so it was hard to stay awake while reclined on the couch, heh. I think the only one I didn't doze at all during was Alien, since I had never seen it before, but I didn't think it was all that great. There were a lot of really slow parts that I guess were meant to be suspenseful, but meh. We got up and moved around some after that, and Four Swords Adventures was brought up several times, though we never got around to actually playing it. I made a pot of coffee, though me, my brother, and my dad were the only ones to drink any. Then again, both my friends had slept more during the movies, and one apparently hates coffee. (Don't know about the other). And then, for some reason, my friend -- the one that had ridden in the trunk -- decided to put on Kung Pow: Enter the Fist. I don't think the other friend was awake for much of it, though, so it was just me, my brother, and my coffee-hating friend. And my friend had to leave part way through it. My dad cooked some scrambled eggs after the movie (and made more coffee), so we had some breakfast and sat around for a bit longer, watching The Price Is Right. Apparently that's just what was on after Kung Pow got over. I don't think think any of us really cared what was on, though, so we just made fun of Bob Barker and the people on the show while we ate. Finally, The Price Is Right over and us having eaten, my friend decided he'd head back home. I cleaned up the small mess we'd made, emptied the dishwasher, took out the trash, and contemplated trying to stay up for the rest of the day. Then I remembered how long I had been up, and I stopped caring whether or not my sleeping schedule got screwed up. It was already screwed up. So I crashed, going to sleep about noon and waking up at 5:00 PM. Again, I just said "screw it" and went back to sleep until I got up at about 5:00 AM the next morning. So now I'm here, at 6:45 AM, July 6, finishing up this post. And that was definitely the most fun I've ever had for the 4th of July.

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Sunday, July 4, 2004

Now Playing #46

	Artist: Sammy Hagar Track: I Can't Drive 55 Time: 4:07 Size: 48.6 KB I Can't Drive 55, by Sammy Hagar One foot on the brake and one on the gas Well, there's too much traffic, I can't pass So I try my best illegal move Well, babe, black and white come and touched my groove again Gonna write me up a 125 Post my face, wanted dead or alive Take my license an' all that jive I can't drive 55 So I signed my name on number 24 Yeah, the judge said, "Boy, just one more.... We're gonna throw your ass in the city joint." Looked me in the eye, said, "You get my point?" I said "Yeah! Oh yeah!" Gonna write me up a 125 Post my face, wanted dead or alive Take my license an' all that jive I can't drive 55 When I drive that slow you know it's hard to steer And I can't get get my car out of second gear What used to take two hours now takes all day It took me sixteen hours to get to L.A. Gonna write me up a 125 Post my face, wanted dead or alive Take my license an' all that jive I can't drive 55

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Friday, July 2, 2004

Oh yeah, that. . . .

	I did some more work on my website yesterday/into the morning, after all but dropping the project when I got Final Fantasy X. (Hey, I've got priorities, okay?) The result of my work is that the wallpapers page is now done. It looks nice and pretty in Mozilla, but as always, IE is butt stupid and has no idea what to make of some of the code. The funny thing is, it gets the CSS properties on the table's td tags fine (though the borders are rendered stupidly in IE, as always), it just can't seem to deal with the table tag's align=center attribute. And that's standard HTML, so WTF? Basically though, almost the whole site is like that. It works great and looks pretty in Mozilla. . . . And it works in IE. I'm extremely tired of trying to work around IE's lame-ass rendering engine, though, so that's as good as it's going to get. If you're using IE and you want the full effect of the site when it goes up, do yourself a favor and download Mozilla.

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Wednesday, June 30, 2004

Coffee and Instant Ramen

	While I have at least one cup of coffee almost every day -- I'm drinking some right now, in fact -- I haven't had instant ramen in a long time. Probably about six months. But hey, I was hungry, there was one packet left out in the pantry, and I wanted something quick with little effort. It was perfect. I think I'm going to have to ask my mom to get some more the next time she goes grocery shopping. And yes, you guessed right, I have absolutely nothing to talk about in this post. I never thought I'd have to resort to talking about the things I ate recently, but desperate times call for desperate measures. And instant ramen fit the bill. Instant ramen will kick your ass. Don't underestimate . . . the instant ramen.

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Sunday, June 27, 2004

Now Playing #46

	Game: Super Mario World Track: Special World Time: 3:20 Size: 49.2 KB Who can forget the first time they made it to the Special World in Super Mario World and just sat there on the overworld for a while, and the classic Super Mario Bros. music started playing? . . . Okay, so maybe I've forgotten the first time, but I remember going to the Special World numerous times and sitting there, just to hear this music. And the first time I got to the Special World in Super Mario World: Super Mario Advance 2, it was an almost magical feeling, hearing that music again after so many years. This song is yet one more little thing that helps make Super Mario World my favorite Mario game. ^_^

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