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Posts tagged "games"

Dissertation progress continues apace.


Tim got me a little whiteboard and it calms my troubled mind.

I decided the other day that when I've handed in my dissertation, we're going to Hay-on-Wye for a weekend in celebration. Yeah, this place. It's going to be amazing.

I also finally saved up enough to buy my own 3DS, and this awesome decal so we can distinguish between the two that exist in this flat:


(I had this gif here, but looking at it makes my head hurt.)


Just one bossfight away from beating Ocarina of Time! And then I'm going to get A Link To The Past Link's Awakening (EDIT: I can't be expected to remember names at 1am after a day of dissertationing) from the download store, and I won't stop until I have all the Zeldas.

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27. 8. 2011 12:59 am | Personal, Syndicated | Tags: , , | Comment

Dear Diary,

Bad night at the castle. After a very successful bit of mining in a new branch of the caverns that seem to make up the entirety of the peninsula (and beyond, like I discovered that one time I dug up to the ocean) I got over-confident and was overwhelmed in a dungeon full of skeletons and creepers. I went back to try to retrieve my tools and armour, but it looks like all of it fell into some lava when I died. Also I got myself killed again.

In adition, monsters have now re-infested all of the areas I made safe during this foray, as I discovered when I went in again to get out the 10 diamonds I had stashed in a nearby chest.

So I'm just gonna sulk in the courtyard and take pictures.





At daybreak it begins to rain. I'm sure this is somehow the skeletons' fault, as well.



Recently, I decided to start supplementing my pork and mushroom soup diet by farming. It's quite fun. Makes the place feel like a proper settlement.

The idea for the courtyard in the first place came because animals kept walking all over my fields and destroying the crop.



A little later, I make my way through the hill and climb my highest tower.



Someday soon I will make a boat and explore north, past the draw distance. But first I have to retrieve my diamonds and take revenge on those fucking skeletons.

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20. 7. 2011 2:28 am | Personal, Syndicated | Tags: , , , | Comment

Mistah Naruhodo!

First things first; my new number one game I am looking forward to:



Level 5/Capcom OTP FOREVER.

Change of topic: UCL continues to be the best place in the world. Next week Shahina Farid, the site director of Çatalhöyük, is coming to our "Issues in the Archaeology of the Eastern Mediterranean and Middle East" seminar. Yeah you know you're jealous. I don't actually know that much detailed info about Çatalhöyük, though, so I'm going to have to do some reading up.

Last week I went to the first of a series of Seminars at the Institute of Classical Studies on the theme of "Religion and Cross-cultural Trade in the Ancient Mediterranean and Near East". ♥__♥ I'd been looking forward to it all week, and it did not disappoint; it was really interesting and exciting. That sounds sycophantic, because my professor gave it, but it genuinely was. It's the kind of topic I want to study. I've always liked the intersections of different cultures and how they work, which I'm sure I can at least partly blame on my international/third culture kid* adolescence.

I've been hanging out with the Sci-Fi & Fantasy Soc and techSoc, and I'm thoroughly enjoying not being a recluse anymore. Social interaction: it's pretty great. Social interaction with geeks is even better. I may end up joining the Japan Society, as well. They have language lessons, you see, and I desperately need some speaking practice. I was talking to a girl at the last SFF Soc movie night, and it came up in conversation that I was learning Japanese, so she started talking to me in it. I could understand what she was saying pretty well, but I immediately forgot all words and my mouth wouldn't open. ぜんぜんできなかった。;＿;　もっと練習しなくちゃいけない。

Apart from that I've spent most of my time reading and slowly getting into a working routine. I'm going to start writing my first essay, soon, too. I get to cram the uses of the concept of 'objectivity' by processualists and post-processualists into a meagre 2000 words. I bet you all envy me for that, too. :| I've squeezed in a little bit of drawing (and I have a fair amount of art from the last few months that I haven't posted online yet), but scanning and editing is time consuming and frustrating, and I just can't be bothered. ¬__¬ I am plotting ways to get access to high-quality scanners, though (none of the UCl libraries/computer rooms have any, as far as I've been able to find out, but I do have access to a range of other London universities...), so it may yet happen.


*I feel slightly weird calling myself a third culture kid, even though I do identify with at least some of the things in that article, because after all I only grew up in three counties, as opposed to six or seven. (I get the feeling that very thought is an indicator of my third-culture-kid-itude.)

It also seems to be associated more with US-Americans of the previous generation, and all I know about it I learned from that wikipedia article, so there's that, too.
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24. 10. 2010 1:38 am | Personal, Syndicated | Tags: , , , , , , , | Comment

Pokemon and giant robots, fuck yeah!

Someone on the radio just started talking about their experiences of war. This entire entry feels even more frivolous now. Read on for frivolity.

I am re-reading Cloud Atlas. It's possibly even a little better than I remembered! :D

Also I am super late to the party, but I actually listened to some Lady Gaga songs the other day, and they are pretty good!

Thus concludes the not-quite-as-geeky section of the entry. ONWARDS~

So Saturday Tim and I went to Forbidden Planet and bought POKEMON CARDS. 8D A deck each and some boosters. And now I am really into it again, and I may make an excursion into the attic to see if I can find my old cards. Are they even legal anymore? I really want to build a Ghost/Psychic deck. In some way this is porbably Tumblr's fault for enabling me to look at so much fanart.

Some teenagers on the train on the way back made fun of us. XD Man, teenagers are ridiculous. I am pretty glad I'm not one and can enjoy Pokemon cards with impunity.

I also bought this pretty rockin' t-shirt:


Too bad Uniqlo doesn't have any Gundam t-shirts that look that cool. Don't worry, I still love you Gandamuuu~ ♥ I will love you even more when more Unicorn comes out. >_>

And and and I finally found a pre-owned copy of Beautiful Katamari at Game, so that's what I've been doing all weekend. No, really. All weekend. Except I forgot to save yesterday so I had to do everything again. >_> But I got more points and actually managed to do the Mars level without wanting to strangle someone, so woo!

I'm pretty sure Katamari is the best thing the games industry has ever brought forth. Pff, Half Life 2 or WoW or whatever. KATAMARI WINS ALL.

Over all it's been a pretty great weekend.


Only a week and two days until Paris! Paris Paris Paris! I am super excited. Gonna buy so many comic books and do lots of sketching and look at lots of beautiful architecture!


Speaking of architecture, I haven't done much drawing in the last few days, apart from a commission for my mother*, but here is a brush-pen doodle of some houses.


LOL WHAT PERSPECTIVE


There were some really great urban scenes in the exhibition of 20th century Chinese prints at the British Museum, and they've inspired me to try to get better at buildings and so on. Architecture and cities are one of my very favourite things.


Thus concludes the rest of this entry. Do come again.

*I think I'm going to start advertising my services for commissions sometime soon. :O Don't know how that will go, but one or two people — apart form my mother — have asked me, so it's worth a try!
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14. 6. 2010 12:51 am | Personal, Syndicated | Tags: , , , , , | Comment

Back in the UK.

I kept meaning to write an entry while I was at [info]petrolbomb's house, but I never got around to it. So! We did stuff! Beck was really busy with her classes, but it was totally fun just hanging out. :3 We watched a ton of films, I don't even know if I can remember all of them...

BULLETPOINTS!
• Akira (Weird! Super cool! Surprised by the optimistic tone of the end — I found it optimistic, anyway — wasn't expecting that from a mad-science-technology-out-of-control story.)
• An episode of 青の6号/Blue Sub No.6 (Pretty cool, despite the silly oldschool CG explosions. Probably gonna download the rest sometime)
• Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow (Still super pretty! I think all the improbable comic-book mad science pissed Beck off a little, though. XD)
• Some film about a depressed psychologisty in Hollywood... I can't remember what it was called, but it was alright.
• Kung-Fu Hustle (Oh man, EPIC. XD I'm totally putting this on my list of DVDs to buy when I have money)

Also some episodes of X-Files (which I'd never watched before!) and some Star Trek, which led to some drunken fun times. (I wish it was possible to link to a day archive on twitter.)


"Captain, I'd be happy to probe your rec-"

It was an awesomely fun night... and then I threw up a lot and felt horrible. -_- I don't really know why anyone would get drunk twice, tbh.

We also rented Army of Two, I think because it was the only two player PS3 game in Blockbuster's at the time, and spent some time sucking at it. XD It was pretty fun, though! Oh, and I played Final Fantasy X for the first time everrr. (Beck got super excited about this.)


And completely failed at it, apparently. XD I only had about an hour before my taxi to the airport showed up when I started playing it... I think I will have to acquire a SO INCREDIBLY LEGAL IT HURTS version and play it on a PS2 emulator.

And now I'm back in Surrey. It really sort of sucks when your BFFs live overseas, idk. :/

Oh yeah, and it's Valentine's Day today. I had an idea of going out with Tim somewhere, but jetlag won so we're just hanging out at my house. :3 I don't really care about the holiday much either way, tbh, I was just going to use it as an excuse to spend money on a date. XD *can't afford train tickets ever ¬_¬*

I'm going to stop writing now because it's time to eat apple tart. Officially.
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14. 2. 2010 10:39 pm | Personal, Syndicated | Tags: , , , , , | 1 Comment

Half-remembered media reporting of a scientific study go! 8D

I heard an interview on the radio a few months ago, with a psychologist (I think), who'd dome some research on multi-tasking that indicated two broad types of behaviour: "explorers", who constantly crave new stimulation and jump from task to task, and "exploiters", who concentrate on only one thing and do it thoroughly.

Which is how I'm justifying my wish that I had enough room on my screen to watch a TOS episode and play a single-player game of Solium Infernum at the same time.


In the mean time, the alien fly that invaded the Enterprise has landed in Captain Kirk's coffee, and I think he's about to swallow it.

Oh wait, no, it's not a fly, it's a super-fast space woman who wants to get in his pants.
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19. 1. 2010 12:58 am | Personal, Syndicated | Tags: , , , | Comment

New resolution: post more than once every 10 days. ¬_¬

I went to my UCL interview on Monday, and it went well! I was incredibly nervous and ineloquent, but I got an email the next day saying they've recommended me for an offer, so I must have made a fairly good impression. Haven't got the official letter from the college yet, but it looks like I'm going! :D :D

Ummm, what else. I went to see the Staffordshire Hoard after the interview. It was pretty cool. Sparkly, shiny things. I'll blog about it properly later, right now I've got a cold and my head is a bit foggy.


Some links:

• The Desert Peach - I rediscovered this the other day. The greatest piece of historical fiction set in World War 2 that exists, in my opinion.

• Choice of the Dragon - A very well written multiple choice text game. In which you play as a dragon:


What more could you want, right? It's got a great attitude on gender & sexuality. I noticed it when I was playing, and then I checked their blog and read the most recent post at the time, which confirmed how much thought they'd put in it. It's so refreshing not to have presumptions shoved down your throat: you can chose the gender of the dragon, and the dragon you futilely attempt to mate with (I will get the right combination of stats/actions one day), and it doesn't go "'knight' obviously = 'he'", either.

Their quest to introduce meaningful choices into games pleases me, too. It makes the whole thing instantly many times more engaging and entertaining. My only criticism is it wasn't long enough. :P

• One of my favourite fiction series, "Union Dues" by Jeffrey R. DeRego (as seen on Escape Pod and Clone Pod) is apparently being pitched as a TV series. I think that's brilliant. I'm not of the opinion that everything that's good should eventually be made into a film and/or TV show — TV is not the end-all of storytelling media — but I also don't have a problem with different versions of stories and things jumping form medium to medium and taking on new forms (I mean, look at Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy). In fact, I encourage it. If I find a fictional world I love, I want to experience it through as many different lenses as I can, to see all of it's permutations and facets and flavours.

Also TV probably has a larger audience than podcasts, and I think something of quality deserves to be seen by as many people as possible. (Or maybe rather: Everyone deserves to be exposed to quality entertainment.) I've never been into superheroes much, and I love "Union Dues". It's definitely worth it.

• I also have a key for the Star Trek Online beta! It's currently downloading. Very slowly.


Pff, I started this entry thinking I'd only list a handful of links, since my head hurt, and I ended up rambling all over the place anyway.
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15. 1. 2010 7:38 pm | Personal, Syndicated | Tags: , , , , , , , , | 3 Comments

Cookies; Games; Movies. Life is pretty good.

Hello Elllllll-jay! Sorry for not posting for ages again: I just haven't felt the urge to actually turn on my laptop this holiday season. I've been mostly hanging around in the living room enjoying our epic new HD TV, or gaming, or reading. I do have a cookie recipe for you, though!





It's a family tradition to make these at Christmas, but there's nothing that makes them intrinsically Christmassy, so you should go make them right now. You won't regret it.


We got an Xbox 360 for Christmas, collectively, and I've been playing Dragon Age: Origins. Chose a human mage to begin with, and it's tons of fun so far. :D I put points into cunning and the coercion skill, which means I can make NPCs do almost anything I want in conversations. It's pretty sweet. I dunno what specialisation I should go for, though. Blood Mage is out, since I'm being good, so maybe Arcane Warrior. I am going to shut up now, because no-one cares.

(I am also hitting on Alistair the Grey Warden guy as much as possible, because he is adorable. When you give him a gift he likes, he goes "R-really? This... this is for me? ;_;" like no-one has been nice to him ever before.)

I got Assassin's Creed II, as well, but I am determined to play them in order, so I'm waiting for Amazon to send me AC I.

Got some other great stuff, too, like a sexy jacket, books, socks, and a subscription to and back-issues from Current World Archaeology from Tim, which have actually been stopping me from reading the books. I really miss Archaeology, I have realised.


I've also been to see Sherlock Holmes and Avatar. I want to take Robert Downey Jr and Jude Law out of that film and insert them into a better one, so I can enjoy their brilliant interactions in a better plot.

As for Avatar, I am in two minds. It's cliché, and shallow, at times offensively so, but I adore the look. Especially the creature designs, fuck yes. Giant fantasy animals, insect and dionaur/reptillian influences, bioluminescence... basically they are pushing so many of my aesthetic buttons that I managed to completely ignore the stupid cat people for most of the film, in favour of the pretty colours.

Oh, except for their language, which was sort of cool, I guess, but that's probably only because I know they had it especially designed. Though I agree with this, in that I'm not sure why you'd go through the trouble of having a language made if the rest of your alien culture couldn't be more of a Noble Savage cliché if you were actually trying.

To be honest, though, I wasn't really expecting better. Sorry, films, I have low expectations of you.

But fuck it was pretty. I'm probably going to go see it again for that. Oh, and because I feel that every ticket might just be encouragement to make more sci-fi films. Alien planets: they work! Now put a good plot on one! Please?


I'm turning 22 tomorrow! It is common knowledge that, while I am ageing in a linear fashion, my greatness increases logarithmically. I've been in a pretty good mood, lately. Come on, 2010! Let's have a good new decade. :D
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31. 12. 2009 3:00 pm | Personal, Syndicated | Tags: , , , , , , | Comment

I have had a truly amazing experience.

I read this Rock, Paper, Shotgun review of "Typing of the Dead"* earlier, and was inspired to download the demo, and I can confirm that it is actually the best game of all time.


So I may be easily amused, but you cannot fail to appreciate the surreal cracktastical glory that is this game's dictionary. If I had any money I think I would actually buy the full version.


I have an interview for a part time job at T.M. Lewin tomorrow. Wish me luck! (I hope they do employee discounts. ♥_♥)


PS: Oh wow, I made an audience participation post and the audience actually participated! You guys are awesome. I will make up the rest of the questions after my interview tomorrow! <3

PPS: This is my new favourite page in all of Wikipedia: Lists of English loanwords by country or language of origin.


*You should all read RPS, by the way. Even if you don't really care about games. I have them on my RSS reader mainly for the writing style and sense of humour; occasionally hearing of a cool game is a bonus.
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17. 9. 2009 10:43 pm | Personal, Syndicated | Tags: , , | Comment

Entries with pictures are more fun.


I keep seeing these two next to each other. I wonder if it's on purpose. XD (Probably not.)

Look, guys, look what is finally gracing me with its presence:


It's true! I have it! I have Golden Sun and a stomach full of chicken pesto, the universe is smiling upon me once more.

My extra userpics for LJ have run out, but I think I will grit my teeth and make do with the three million and two I get anyway for being a tool and having a paid account. Will go through later and chose which ones to keep. First, more Golden Sun!
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14. 9. 2009 5:46 pm | Personal, Syndicated | Tags: , , , , | Comment