Tag Archives: Games

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Let it Ensue.

Well, over the course of one day and a sleepless night, I proofread, edited, and FINALLY FINISHED THE STORY of The Door. Yes, I finally finished. That makes it the first story I’ve ever entirely finished. In entirety. Ever, so far. I will remind you that I’ve been writing stories since 3rd grade.

So, yeah. In the near future, maybe I’ll find a publisher that can help me out– and then we’ll have ourselves a novel!

Excitement aside, I’m going to bite the bullet and get to work tonight. My original idea is going to have to wait a while, so until then, I’ll get into the thick of it. As for games to start with… I have a bit of more good news. Due to a string of events I don’t want to explain at this time, I managed to get a free PS3! I have Prototype, Soul Calibur IV, and Ni No Kuni (which was made by Level 5, same people who made Dark Cloud and Dark Chronicle! I see many simularities so far!) Sounds good, right? I’m still wondering at this moment which game I’ll play, or whether I’ll just go for my PS2 games first…. Grrr…

If any of these new games interest you, please tell me! I intend to do this in earnest, so I do actually need some feedback. I won’t be able to get any more games for months, and if this doesn’t take off immediately, I might lose the possibility of pursuing it further. Any support is welcome.

So that’s all for this update. I should have another one tonight while I’m editing the footage.

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Okay, Guys. Down to Business. Calling All Gamers!

Well, here we are. I have the basic equipment I needed for the gameplay videos. Now I just need to find out what game to start with. I should probably start out with some relatively short games, so Ico, Shadow of the Colossus, and a few others would work well, however I wanted to wait until we have a PS3 so we can play the newer edition– at least for Ico, since that will unlock 2p capabilities.

Anyhow, I also have the capability to play such games as Don’t Starve, and quite a few SNES games using an emulator (Most of these SNES games are from my early childhood, and I am excited to play them. In fact, a few of them, I dare say, started me on the path of the gamer. A few are Mickey Mania, Paperboy, Donkey Kong, and a few others. I intend to get some that I missed out on as a kid, such as Fire Emblem and Chrono Trigger– and for the horror lovers, Clock Tower).

So yes, any suggestions will be heard! The list of games I own for PS2 are in this post: https://myonlyreality.wordpress.com/2013/11/10/list-of-games-i-have-to-replay-due-to-memory-card-destruction/

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Life-Altering Changes

A great deal has happened. In fact, enough has changed that it left my family shocked– and even me.

I left Vlad recently. I feel that, even though I am grateful to him for helping me through these years, I appreciated him more as a friend than as a lover. It was the first time I’d ever broken up with someone, and it was… painful for both of us. I decided that I would rather leave him now than wait 3 to 7 years from now when we’re at the altar. I thought that it would hurt him less now than then.

There is no sugar-coat to the words I’m about to say: I found someone else, and that was the catalyst to my leaving Vlad. I know that sounds bad, but I like to pride myself on my honesty. I’m sure there are a lot of things that should be said, but I think it proper that I not speak that freely about the tender feelings of the wounded. I still love Vlad as a friend, and I would never slander him on my blog– I have no cause to. Anyone who has read my other posts know what an impact he had on me, and how much he helped me become who I am today.

In other news… I will start doing online videos very soon. I need to figure out my new equipment, as well as what I can do. I will have time in the future to start working on stories again, and I will start looking into publications– so that way I can upload a few of my short stories for your enjoyment.

And finally, I would like to say that I am in a great deal of pain. I know that seems slightly random or whiny… I don’t mean for it to be that way. I am putting this down for reference. I have been in excruciating pain for roughly three weeks now. It is difficult to walk and nearly impossible to sleep. The pain is deep in my right hip’s joint. Every step I take puts pressure not only on something that feels dislocated, but also applies strain to my other hip, which causes sharp pain throughout my pelvis. When at rest, no matter what position, sitting, laying, or standing, the pain in my right hip is so great that it feels like someone harpooned me through said joint, and the pain goes down to my knee, and sometimes even to the ankle in liquid spurts of agony.

Usually, when this happens, it only lasts a couple of weeks and then goes away almost as swiftly as it arrives, but this time it not only persists but has gotten worse than it ever had before. Heat, ice, rest– none of these do any good whatsoever. So please, keep me in your prayers, if you don’t mind.

But like I said earlier, I am not griping. Mostly, I am just stating why I am limited to my house for now. I missed a lot of work over this hip.

Anyway, I’ll keep you all posted on my youtubing. Just keep an eye out. I am back now– and I won’t disappear again. In fact, I will even start drawing again in the near future– I am getting a new item in the mail in a few days, hopefully, that will allow me the ability to draw via paint shop pro 8– I really hope it will be compatible. The only thing I’ll need then is a nice stylus– and then I’ll be set. I will then start on all the things I’ve been meaning to begin. Concept art, and all that jazz.

I’ve been getting into more games lately– and I see an end to my debt! Everything will go fine, within the next month or so. I might even have a PS3, and eventually, a PS4. Anyhow, I’ll have plenty to talk to you guys about in my next post. Any questions not involving the breakup will be answered. Drop me a line!

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Ah, A Reprive

Well, I think I’ll be able to get the hang of this soon enough. I am in the middle of a three-day weekend of sorts. I even turned my phone off (which may not have been a good idea, but I had the feeling that I would just continue to be stressed out if I was glancing at the phone every two minutes) I have not gamed in a while, although I do have Minecraft on my computer now. I worked really hard to make a cool looking house– and then moved on to another area. I can’t find any sheep though. I found enough to make one bed– but I’m afraid if I kill any more of them, I’ll be doomed.

Also, work on Zetty’s story has come to a grinding halt. So much of a halt that I haven’t even dreamt about things for her story in over a week. On the other hand, Overfide, my newest outlet of insanity, has been taking massive leaps in production. For anyone who missed the post on that, Overfide is something that hit me like a lead brick. To the face. Multiple times. With the force of a train.

Thanks to Overfide, I have once again tapped into that gory place in my brain that I haven’t been able to write from in ages. Let me give you an example of what I mean. A few weeks ago, I was really sleep-deprived and typing a memo to myself. Basically, trying to start a conversation with myself. Did I mention I was tired? Anyway, so I was typing, and suddenly:

“i just…. i havent’ had any fodder for writing, other than the story that has been dragging me by the hair. first Zetty’s story, then that flirtatious vampire story, and now this. This monster/masterpiece that attacked me. A story devoted to fear itself. Something everyone can relate to… although perhaps the story is more painful than i can let on. It is making me dredge things from the drain that is covered in dried blood. i’m clawing at it, trying to get it open. fingernails broken. fingertips busted. biting my tongue to keep from screaming with pain and or frustration….
my brain has been in this dark, dark place for a while. and i don’t know why. it is strange, and kind of enthralling….”

The next day, I recalled that I had typed something, and had no memory of what it was I had actually concocted. Upon reading it, I just sat there, feeling along the walls of my mind for that door that had been closed for so long. It is still open. I can finally write the way I once did.

There was a time when, when I wrote, I would stare into the screen, my fingers blurring over the keyboard, for up to 4 hours. And then, upon stopping, I would marvel at what I had produced, because, at that “delicate” age for me, this dark, terrible, tragic stuff that I was writing (about murder and the like, to be general) was coming out of nowhere, as if I were not the one truly writing it. Sometimes it’s still like that.

Oh, and some good news that is in no way related to what I just wrote: I should be able to get out of debt relatively quickly, if I could just find my landlord. She still leaves notes on my door, but I can’t find her, and when I call her, it goes straight to voicemail. This is worrisome, but I am confident that it will work out.

And an afterword: if anyone is interested in that “flirtatious vampire story” I mentioned in my night-time rant, tell me in the comments!

 

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I’m Baaaaaaack (with an all-new and extremely awesome project)

I really have no excuse for that long absence. Seriously, I don’t– and I’m sorry. However, I have done lots of stuff since the last time I posted. I had his a block in my life in most manners. I had no money, no food, and my creativity was starting to dwindle due to the fear and depression. My hours got cut at my job because we weren’t getting much business, but I understand that. I’m just glad I still have a job.

However, I won’t be getting anywhere with my debt unless I start making more money, so…. I applied for a third-shift job at walmart. They called me back before I could call them. I went through the interview, took the drug test, and Friday, I will go to orientation. After that, the real war will begin. Once I get the hang of working there (and sleeping only when I get the chance– my life will seem similar to the song Caffeine by Psychostick), I expect my hours at Subway will increase back to normal.

I’m enjoying sleep while I can, knowing that I won’t have time to after this week. Of course, I am also saying this because I want to keep blogging as well– perhaps before I pass out each morning/evening.

If I can just pull this off, I will be able to get out of debt within a few months, of this I am confident, and then I’ll be able to start saving up. I’ll be able to buy myself things, and perhaps I can buy my own house, away from noise. In the future, I guess I could always just rent it out if I move, or sell it when I decide to move far away. But I’d like to own something, you know?

Eh, as you can see, my ambitions have increased. My funds, hopefully, will too. I’ll be able to afford to study programming, and I’ll start trying again to learn Japanese, now that I have a friend who wants to learn it with me– and that brings me to my next topic.

You may have noticed that when I start writing a story, I stop working on it soon after having started. That happens a lot for me. I have been writing since 3rd grade, and have started at least 25 stories– and never finished a one. Sure, I’ve completed 2 written manuscripts, and another story is entirely typed except for ONE MAJOR EVENT, but, well… I think I am afraid of success, or something. I’m afraid of what comes after, and I’m terrified that, since I can’t afford to publish them, one of the “free publishing companies” will rip me off. I’m just… terrified of losing my stories to someone else. That’s another reason why I don’t share them.

But after I stopped writing Zetty’s story (which you can find entombed at http://zettytrat.tumblr.com/) I began working on a vampire story (that is sparkle-free, btw) and then, once that left my head— BOOM! Headshot. Something snuck into my brain and took me apart from the inside out. It was so amazing that I sat and wrote out a glossary, and then character profiles, and then looked up tons and tons of Tribal Tattoos and other Tribal markings. I was obsessed with this idea. In love with it.

And then I let two of my friends in on it. One says, Awesome! Can’t wait to read it. The other says, This would make an awesome TRPG, or video game. (TRPG is a table top roleplaying game, for those of you unfamiliar with them) This friend is who got me into TRPGs, namely with Tenra Bansho Zero. His idea of my new story becoming an in-depth TRPG stunned me– and then I started thinking how awesome it would be. So now he an I are working on the system, using such amazing role models for TRPGs such as Tenra Bansho Zero, Call of Cthulhu, and of course D&D. We’ve come up with many unique ideas, and we have a lot of ground to cover. A lot.

Updates on the new story will be on another blog, http://fideandfear.wordpress.com/, where this aforementioned friend is an administrator as well, so if I am working too much and can’t update, he can. So, yeah. Once we get some things figured out, and COPYRIGHTED, I’ll start posting story notes, and perhaps the glossary, and maybe some other things to that blog. Keep an ear to the ground, because once we get everything fleshed out, we are going to use Kickstarter to fund our project. We will definitely have rewards for donors, including a copy of the novel, once I finish it (and I can’t stop working on it. He’s keeping me on target), and other bonuses. This is going to be incredibly fun, if a lot of work. Please support us in this, and give us some feedback! And, of course, leave comments on this blog and that one asking any questions you may have. And, finally, one last thing, when I learn programming and such, I do indeed intend to make this an actual game. Perhaps a PC game that will extend to consoles if it is a success. I, myself, am leaning more toward the PS4, but that’s just me.

So for now, I leave you with the encouragement to follow this project, and tell me what you think! Don’t worry, Zetty’s story isn’t dead, I’m just stepping away from it for now.

I am also not giving up on my gaming channel. Once I get out of debt, I’m buying the hardware and software I need to do that. First thing, I promise.

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Like or Comment If You Would Watch Me Livestream Video Game Playthroughs

Title says it all. But, just to clarify, or to elaborate:

After I take out this loan, I will be a little bit up, I expect. I will be able to save money, again, or at least I hope so. In any case, I should be able to pay off all of my debt, and not have this overwhelming fear swallowing me up… And since that debt will be a lump sum that I will then owe the bank, I should be able to focus easier on “keeping my head above water” as Vlad likes to say (a lot). Now, since I will be “above water,” I should be able to afford the cheap equipment necessary to make online videos of me playing the games. This will be a lot of fun for me, and I sincerely hope it pays off… Who knows? If I do well enough with it, I could be doing much better than merely “keeping my head above water.”

On the downside, I might not be able to do these things on youtube. I might have to use Twitch, which I found through Denkir the Filtiarn (he streams video of himself playing games, frequently), and then just upload the video itself directly to this blog. That won’t be a problem, for me. However, I don’t think I’d make any money doing that. That’s not the main goal, mind you, but the state I’m in currently demands I consider money no matter how slim the chance I’ll actually get it.

If anyone has any suggestions, I am all ears (0r eyes, since I’ll be reading them…) I seriously need all the help I can get!

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Sure Hope This Goes Well

I’m home alone, now, and I’ve been up since 5:30 am. I feel like I’m going to pass out any moment now… but I really want to work on that drawing. I have most of the first step done, and if I keep on it I should have it finished by 1 am, but… I am just afraid that I will end up sacrificing quality due to exhaustion. I’m stuck here. Do I make some hot tea and stay up half the night playing old Spyro games and working on a drawing, or do I get some rest and hope I have the inspiration necessary to work on it tomorrow? I’m not sure about anyone else, but for some reason, the sunlight takes away my will to draw things. Makes no sense, but whatever.

I elect the idea involving caffeine. Just hope I don’t have more chest pain. And maybe some cute music will wake me up (Ah, classic Spyro games… your soundtracks forever haunt me in a good way.)

Ah, and now I officially want to listen to chains upon chains of beautiful OSTs. Final Fantasy X, Dark Cloud, Shadow of the Colossus, Ico, Destroy All Humans, Castlevania: Lament of Innocence… and others. Anyone who does not think video games are art truly does not understand the concept of art, am I right? If movies are art, what makes them art? The embodiment of an idea, or a way to evoke a feeling or response from an audience. That is what art is! Video games such as Shadow of the Colossus do that through engaging gameplay and an UTTERLY FLAWLESS soundtrack. Not to mention the gorgeous story with that completely unexpected ending– and the graphics! Oh, the graphics!

…Ahem… Sorry about that. I didn’t mean to start fangirl-ing.

In any case, that little rant alone gave me some energy. I will now listen to game soundtracks until the drawing is finished! I don’t have to work for a few days, so my sleeping pattern can be tweaked again. Yay for being young and able to manipulate sleeping patterns!

Anyhow, I might not post anything else tonight. I might collapse after finally finishing all editing, and not get around to posting anything until tomorrow… nonetheless, I’ll cross that hurdle eventually. Just as long as the sun doesn’t rise while I work…

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About My Gaming Situation

I borrowed a copy of Codebreaker that had definitely seen better days, and used the SkipDr on it until it would work if you held your breath (and squinted, crossed your fingers and toes, and jumped up and down while clucking madly like a chicken). I need to tell you one thing. I have 50 games. And 4 cards. They are all full to the brim, especially with how much memory Codebreaker consumes. I kept Codebreaker on my first memory card, which had my most beloved games on it (Dark Cloud, Spyro, Final Fantasy) so I could cheat to my heart’s content. For a while, that worked well. So what went wrong?

I noticed on the Codebreaker menu that I could look at what was on my cards, which is cool, since I could put Codebreaker in, decide what game I wanted to play/destroy, and then find which memory card had the data on it, so that way I wouldn’t have to restart, look at the cards, and then go through the laborious process of getting the Codebreaker to work again (I don’t enjoy jumping up and down and clucking madly like a chicken. It is degrading for me, and it bothers my neighbors). So I was viewing what was on the card, and I discovered that I could condense data to make more space. My first reaction was HOW DID I NOT FIND THIS SOONER!!! I AM SO HAPPY!!! and I, without hesitation, condensed all the games that I had not played in the previous 2 weeks (which was about all of them, with the exception of Dark Cloud, Final Fantasy, and Star Ocean. A few others, as well, but…).

I started playing Grand Theft Auto Vice City, after that. It was one of the files that I didn’t condense, because I was enjoying the cheats. When the game loaded I discovered that my previous data was gone, somehow. When the game eventually froze, I looked at the memory card– and discovered it was entirely blank.

Now, this is the card that has all of my favorite games. Dark Cloud, for crying out loud, had data from 10 years ago! 10 years! I had maxed out the time on my first profile, and visited the dungeons 376 times (or somewhere in that range. I was trying to get to 999 to see if it was limited to that. I guess I’ll never know, now). My Crash Bandicoot, my Spyro, my Final Fantasy games, my Kingdom Hearts games… All were obliterated somehow– and I assumed that, since it happened to that card that it happened to all of them, and the idea of that was too terrible to imagine, so I simply refused to look at the other 3 cards.

Desperate to see if I could get my data back through Codebreaker, I tried like mad to get it to load– but to no avail. Grand Theft Auto won’t load either, anymore. My PS2 has declared war on me, or so it seems. So, faced with the reality that I would never get that data back, I finally decided to look at the other 3 cards a couple of days ago.

All non-condensed files were saved. However, the funny thing of that is the only other non-condensed file was Star Ocean, which will crash without using Codebreaker– since I was cheating so hard… So I am left with no game files (but maybe two, and one was botched, and corrupt– no idea what game it was, either). So, you see, it was still pretty bad, even though for those 3 cards, I can get back the data, if I ever find another functioning copy of Codebreaker, since the data is still on those cards. The only one that was completely wiped clean was my favorite card, which is definitely the irony of things.

So, I definitely have to replay all of my games due to my stupid decision. I mean, while condensing, I even thought, “maybe I should only do it to one card, to see if it will have any ill effects” but I thought, “I can always replay the games, and besides, it won’t touch Dark Cloud, since I won’t be condensing it!” Shows what I knew.

Now when I get the urge to play a game, I kind of die inside, because I can’t reach the level I wanted to play, typically because it is located in the final hemisphere of the game. So I have to play the game through all the way, which takes all the joy out of it, and by the time I reach the part I wanted to play– if I reach it at all– I am so upset that it takes the satisfaction out of it. I love the games, but if I want to play a specific part, I want that part– not the five hours of gameplay it takes to get to that part. That’s what my save files were for– so I could access the game when and where I wanted to play it!

So, in short, I’m going crazy. I really wish I could do playthrough videos already– but at least I know that I have a buddy (or two) that I can play with when I finally get the materials. I might even be able to start early, depending on what goes on. Denkir seemed interested in doing playthroughs– or maybe I misconstrued. If we got the things needed, we could do voiced-playthroughs on his youtube channel, and just-the-game playthroughs on mine. In any case, it would be fun. And for those of you who hate old games, he has more modern ones. I probably would, too, but I’m broke. And when I get money, it’s not going towards a console– it’s going toward groceries. Lots and lots of groceries. I will be so stocked up that my shelves will overflow and collapse. I’ll have to store food under my bed and in my closet and everywhere between. I don’t care– I just want food in the house again! Consoles can wait until then.