Happy cow is happy

[0215]

I just finished doing this one. I'm pretty happy with how it turned out. It's for a gift, so this one won't be going into my Etsy store.

:)


Harvest Moon was definitely one of the best games on the SNES. I don't think any of the sequels captured the feel of the game at all.

[0220]

Megaman is Mega

[0155]

After much messing about, I finally set up my Etsy account to sell some of the craft stuff that I've been doing. I've only put one piece up so far, but I have several more under development that should be completed soon, and I'll be listing them as soon as they're done. I'm quite pleased with the result, even if I do say so myself.

Here's a picture of it. I would have preferred to put one up of someone modelling it, but it doesn't look right on me :)


I have no idea if it'll sell, but I'm happy with the outcome regardless.

I watched AvP2 while I was doing all this shit this evening, even though I know this movie sucks. I'm not exactly sure what's wrong with me.

[0202]

Oh so crafty

[1542]

I've finally started doing something creative and crafty after a couple of months of thinking about what I was going to do. I may have missed my calling as an 8-bit sprite designer. I've got a couple of pieces complete and another 2 projects underway right now, but I'll post pictures when I've got a some more finished.

It feels nice not just going home to watch TV at night.

[1545]

These Sealed Lands...

[1556]

Today I finally finished Team Ico's Shadow Of The Colossus. This is far and away one of the best games ever made.


If I ever get a horse, I'm calling it Agro.

[1605]

Talking about games

[1434]

I never seem to have a lot of free time these days, so I end up talking about playing games a lot more than I play them. When I do get a chance to play them, they're generally games that I can pick up, play for five or ten minutes and then go and do something else.

Last night I went home early with the intention of spending some time playing Burnout Paradise, Fallout 2, Mass Effect or any of the other myriad games I've spent money on but not played enough.  That didn't happen though, and here's why...

After briefly trying the demo for MegaMan 9, I bought the full* game off XBox Live Arcade.  Now, I loved MegaMan as a kid, and MegaMan 2 is one of my all time favourite games, but I don't remember any of them being even close to as hard as this is.

I spent HOURS playing it, and I managed to kill ONE of the eight master robots.  It made me want to smash my controller, so I played Castle Crashers instead.  What an ending.

So, in summary:

FUCK YOU, MEGAMAN 9!

[1447]

* this is open to interpretation

Killing tomorrow...

[1822]

I picked up Rock Band at the weekend. I've been waiting for this to come out over here since it was released in America.

It's far more fun to play than either Guitar Hero 2 or 3.

I spent most of the weekend playing the extra At The Gates and Metallica songs I downloaded. Definitely time well spent. Playing the songs with 3 others is hilarious. I enjoyed playing Blackened so much that i hit up eBay looking for ...And Justice For All on vinyl.

Kind of on that topic, I'm stoked on a new band that is in the works. Hopefully it's going to be a lot of fun.

I went to see the new Indiana Jones the other day. It was pretty great, although it did lose the plot a bit towards the end. The fight between the greasers and the college jocks was great.

Tonight a bunch of us are going to hit up Tim Burton's Batman in Cineworld. I'm really glad that the cinema is showing old movies on the big screen. Next month is going to be Blade Runner. I actually can't wait for that.

I wish I had seen Turmoil playing in 2000.

That's all for for now.

[1856]

On new songs and apparel...

[2041]

Cornered practice was last night. We recorded instrumental demo versions of our three latest tracks. Jon wasn't at practice because he was studying for his exams, which are in full flight. I'm pretty happy with how it turned out. I uploaded one of them, with the provisional title of Barricade, onto our MySpace. People seem to think it's pretty good, so I'm happy about that.

I'm stoked with how much interest there is from people in hearing the rest of our new stuff. We've put a lot of love into it, so I hope it goes down well when it eventually sees the light of day.

I sorted out the Another Day In Hell shirts yesterday. We're going to be getting a limited run of them done, and there won't be a reprint. They should be ready for our second last show, with Crowd Control, on the 28^th of June.

It'll look like something along the lines of what's on the right (click for a biggun [edit: even bigger now, just for Gav)...

They'll be printed on white Fruit Of The Loom heavyweight classics in a bunch of sizes. If you can't make it to the show and want one, hit up the Another Day In Hell MySpace, or email halfshellrecords [at] gmail [dot] com, and we'll see what we can hook up.

There won't be a reprinting of these and once they're gone, they're gone for good.

It's payday tomorrow, so I'm thinking about buying a new PC to celebrate. I didn't really want to buy another PC, because I'd much prefer to have a Mac, but I want to have a solid development machine that I can use from home. I've not really been a complete technology nerd for some time, and I guess I'm ashamed to say that I found some perverse pleasure in reading through technical specification, looking for what I want but not paying too much for it. It's not going to be for gaming rig or anything even close, and the only real stipulation I had was that the motherboard have a HDMI connection so I can plug it into that ridiculous TV I have.

As for size, it'll be a small form factor one, but with a pretty decent AMD X2 and 4 GB RAM. I think the modular power supply is a good idea, partly because it increases airflow and all the benefits that brings along with it, but mostly because I hate trying to get cables in and out of the way. The one I picked out also has 4 native SATA power connectors. I Also went with an SATA hard disk and DVD drive.

I also spent a little while looking for a cheap Mad Catz HDMI adapter for first generation XBox 360s allowing them to output signals in 1080p.

I eventually managed to hook one up from GameStop. Hopefully it'll arrive soon. It'll also free up the component input port on the TV for my Wii. 480p MarioKart, here I come... *ahem*

Finally, Rock Band is out tomorrow. Hell yeah. Sorry Rachel, but you're never going to see me again.

Now I'm done.

---

Bands I'm listening to that you should also be the one that's listening to:

• Spat On
• Piece By Piece

[2139]

Like a stone, like a stone...

[2330]

I've been in hospital for the last week. Woke up on Tuesday in unbelievable agony. It took between then and Thursday night for them to figure out I had a renal stone.

It wasn't a very pleasant experience, so I'm not really into recounting it. Instead, here follows what I did when I wasn't curled up in a ball, fucked up on painkillers, going for scans and not eating for 3 ¹/₂ days.

I finally finished Broken Sword. That was class. Nico is a horrible bitch and isn't very aesthetically pleasing.

I played heaps of Starcraft, which is something I missed out on before. It's still pretty deep as far as strategy games goes.

I watched a couple of documentary movies. The Corporation, Enron: The Smartest Guys In The Room, Global Dimming and An Inconvenient Truth.

I watched Lords Of Dogtown. I really enjoyed Dogtown and the Z-Boys when I saw it a couple of years ago, and this is was a thoroughly enjoyable movie. Emile Hirsch is great in it. I hope he hasn't destroyed his career with that Speed Racer shit.

It please me greatly that I was visited by my mom everyday, and by heaps of other good dudes and dudettes. Every visit was really appreciated.

I was back in work today, the day after I got out. It wasn't a fun day in work. I guess it'll be a little while before I'm back in fighting form. Then everyone is dead.

You should too.

---

Albums I'm listening to that you should also be the one that's listening to:

• Cursed - One
• Slayer - Reign In Blood

[0108]

Impulse

I've been playing Guitar Hero III now since it was released on the XBox 360 in Europe, and I'm pretty good.

I've completed the game on a couple of difficulties, played through the co-op campaign, unlocked every song in it, gotten 5 stars in plenty, and even 5 gold stars in a couple, and had hours and hours of fun doing it.

I still haven't managed to finish the 'expert' campaign because Beat The Devil, featuring the ridiculous battle mode, is actually beyond me. Neither have I bested Through The Fire And The Flames, although I have managed to get about 78% of the way through the songs and gotten the 3x Star Power achievement.

But anyway, I'm pretty good.

My brother, on the other hand, is INHUMAN. Every time we play he destroys me at the game. Last night was the worst thrashing yet. I could partially blame this on a slightly faulty controller (the red fret is a little unreliable), but I'm not one for excusing my own shortcomings, especially when in the presence of a Golden God. He had scores that were THREE times mine. 380 note streaks. 99% of notes hit.

He is a freak, although he can't beat the devil either.

I can't wait until we get to play Rock Band, especially considering that drums is actually what he loves the most...