Where I'm headed

There have been some changes in my life of late, and I haven't told many people about them because some are a bit embarrassing, and others just aren't set in stone so I just don't want to get people excited until they are, but I just want to let it out what I want to do.

We'll start off back in July where I left my work.  The reason behind it was pretty straight forward: I was tired of it.  It was the same thing that I was doing 6 years ago, and it was very evident that I was burnt out.  So it was high time that I left.

Now it wasn't quite a dead end job.  Granted, there wasn't any different work for me to do because all positions in the 15-man company were filled up.  They literally couldn't give me any work.

Though they did give me the opportunity to advance myself a long time ago.  I was told I could ask the directors to pay for school if I went back to TAFE, and when I asked they happily said "Bring in the doco's and we'll organise your timetable."

Where I stopped was a lack of direction.  I didn't know what I wanted to do, and I didn't know where to look.  So I basically didn't bother.  I've been writing on here for quite a few years and it's all a bunch of crap in my opinion, very misdirected and loses momentum quickly and drops off without making any real point.  I'm aware of that and I put that down to my memory as I get halfway through an analogy and forget what my point was going to be, half of which I have trouble putting into words in the first place.

I'm working on that.  I've got drafts here and there with little notes about what I want to talk about, narrowing down subjects so I can elaborate on them throughout some big post that I want to make for when I get the motivation to write it up.  Not to mention I have a drawerful of writing pads and art pads that aren't being used, so what better way to use them than to put a pen in the ring spine, carry it with me and write up whenever I get an idea.

But back when I had the opportunity to go to TAFE, funded by my employers, I didn't take it up.  Cos I was silly and unmotivated to really get myself anywhere.

Now it's been six years and I'm unemployed, looking for work, and finally getting my finger out for TAFE.  But I'm not doing a writing course.  I've signed up for a Bar and Gaming course so I could get an RSA.  I chose to do this because 1: It's a Practical Skill that can be used anywhere.  If I were to go to America and stay with Jenny, I could easily get a job in a pub or bar.  I'm also looking at doing a MYOB course as well, but I need to wait a bit before I can actually afford it.

And 2: I am going to try and go to the 'Zoo to live with Jenny.  It's been almost 3 years we've been in a relationship, and we've spent almost 2 months together.  And it's getting harder and harder every day.

With my lack of job, it seemed the best opportunity for me to start somewhat afresh and look into going there until such time that we can return here.  I'm still not sure what all the little details are, like who I have to see, what documents I have to get and where to get them from, and finances are a big thing too.  Centrelink is a modest income, and it's getting me by, but it's not going to fund me all the way there.  So I will be pulling a few favours here and there from close friends and family.

That's where I am at the moment.  Aside from rambling about the games that I've been playing lately, and trying to apply for Temp Jobs, that's been about it for the past three months.  I'll be contacted by a Job Placement agency soon, I bet, to discuss Temp Work options, which would be nice.

I may also see about getting a second hand pushbike.  Start riding around the area and do some actual exercise aside from cleaning up around the house.  Its been ages since I've actually ridden a pushbike.  I still remember the last time I did though, I got out of breath so quickly surprised me immensely.  I also went through about 3 Bikes because they kept breaking on me.  Very frustrating, and luckily I got my money back.

But yeah.  That's my story to date.

The Poor Man's MMO

You know what I like about Borderlands?  It's not just a game that'll enterain you for a few hours.  It's an investment into your time and fun, and it was meant to as the poor mans MMO.

Tonight I spent about 7 hours playing with my friends playing a four girl army of Mechromancers.  Like a Necromancer, except less groaning and more robotic zappy zap.  And it's been awesome, not just because of the game, but because of how different the character is.  Gaige is a very different sort of character to play, especially if you follow the skill tree that Aaron and I did tonight: The Ordered Chaos.

To sum up what the tree does, your accuracy gets worse while your damage gets better, and continues to get better, so long as you don't force yourself to reload your gun.  For anyone who has played a First Person Shooter this concept is very weird, because you're asked to break a Good Habit.

Other characters don't quite have the same sort of condition, having to change your normal sense of comfort you would have with a First Person Shooter, but that's where the RPG feature comes in.  The game has 87 Bazillion guns, if you follow the advertising, and each gun is different in it's own way.

And no matter what, you'll practically be forced to change your guns after a few levels.  It'll take too much damage to kill an enemy and you'll be running out of ammunition as you scrounge around looking for a new gun to use.  And 9 of 10 times, you won't find something you want.

There's only 6 classes of weapon, but they branch off into their own manufacturers, of which there are eight, and each manufacturer makes certain weapon types and follow a particular pattern, like Maliwan Weapons always have an eleacment associated with them, while Jakobs guns will fire as quickly as you can pull the trigger, and Tediore guns don't reload, you actually throw it like a grenade and a new fully loaded gun will digistruct (digitally construct) in the players hand.

But wait, there's more: You have other equipment, such as personal Shields, Grenade Modifications, and Class Modifications, which all differentiate based on what their manufacturer!  One shield might be spiked, so if an enemy comes up and starts attacking you in melee, they'll regret it quickly!  Or you could throw a Fuster Cluck Grenade, which is like throwing anywhere between five and eight grenades at once!  And to boost that, you might have a class mod that not only increases your Gun damage and magazine size, and increases one or two of your skills.

Skills is one of the coolest part of your character, as I've already mentioned when I was talking about Gaige.

So far, there are five characters, and they're all very different in the way they play.  Especially with their action skills, whether it's something as simple as pulling out a secondary gun, or dropping a turret, or going invisible while a hologram of you slashes things around.

And you can do this all over Pandora, an expansive land of weird and wonderful creatures, and power driven Mega Corporations, all of which want to kill you: The Vault Hunter.  Especially Handsome Jack, the main antagonist, and someone who you really learn to hate.

The story of the Vault covers the two games and is significantly expanded on by the second game.  I'm even considering going back to Borderlands 1 to replay some stuff that I've missed out on, and even play characters that I haven't played before.

Not to mention the DLC's.  Some people might complain about having to pay for and download extra stuff, but this is worth it.  I've gone back to the expansion areas in Borderlands 1 several times over, and I have no regrets in doing so, and I expect to get the same feeling on Tuesday when the next expansion comes out, Captain Scarlett and her Pirate's Booty.

I can't begin to say how much fun I'm having with this game.  And I don't see myself getting exhausted of it any time soon.  That's what I call a good investment.

Jumping up and down and screaming for Attention

It's been a while since I've talked seriously about Playstation.  Because in seriousness, they're a joke.

The Playstation Department have made some silly decisions in their long history.  And they continue to surprise me.  Because now they have the Playstation Super Slim.  And my first question was: Can it play my Playstation 2 Games.

The Answer: No.  So I lost interest until I realised that it was about the fifth Iteration of the Console, and that's disregarding the differences in Hard Drive.  And it made me wonder why.

Since the beginning, they have been taking away and taking away, giving little back to the device that started at a ridiculous four digit starting price and had everything for a gaming console and a Multimedia system.  Anyone who has an original release console has the model at it's prime, at the cost of it's tubbiness.

The only thing that any owner of the model needs to do is up the memory.  Which you can do by replacing it with a Laptop Hard Drive which will set you back about $100-150 on Ebay.

But now you can get yourself a PS3 Super Slim that doesn't play your old PS2 games, which are still in stock because its predecessor is still selling, and It doesn't allow you to plug in your camera memory cards, unless you get a USB device which will set you back about $20.

Consoles are meant to be designed for about 10 years worth of play.  There's criticism on that, as certain developers think that consoles designed like that are holding back creativity and implementing the full visual power of games.  That's a fair enough argument since computers are exponentially growing in power.  Heck, my computer is 3 years old and it may have trouble playing most high demand games these days, and for good reason: It's practically outdated.

Consoles don't change at all in those years of development.  They use the same technology developed when they were released.  And whether developers reach the full potential of the consoles capabilities, I don't know, but if they haven't it does beg the question of "Why not?"

But that's a different subject, though if I continue on I'll be beating a dead horse that has been dragged through mud and nettles and declined from the glue factory.

The fact is that console design should be straight forward.  Playstation did take a huge leap of faith with the PS3 by making it a multimedia device, not a gaming platform like Xbox did, who have been tacking on special features without a problem over the years while keeping everything else they could want on there.

Playstation won't follow old recipes, but are "happy to rectify that with this updated game if you pay another $15 a pop for these $80 titles you bought in the hay day".

I hope Xbox continue to improve on their old recipe, because it's doing them well and I would be more than happy to continue supporting them as such.

But with console design comes with sensible investment into development and research.  And frankly, there are better places to put money into than designing a smaller console.

The Dark art of Video Game Resurrection

Click the pic for the original site

A long time ago I was somewhat excited about HD Remakes of games for multiple reasons, the biggest two reasons were that I would be able to get games that I hadn't been able to get before, and games that I did have but couldn't play would be made available.

But after picking up a handful of them, I came to a realisation that they weren't putting in any effort into it.  Take Splinter Cell for example.  It's a good game in it's own right.  But the FMV's were literally torn from the original game and put in the remake.  No buffering, not even an upscale on resolution.  It looked like crap.  Even in-game, one could tell that little effort was put into it except for reskinning various awkward polygons.

Same with the Halo Anniversary Edition.  They advertised that the only thing that would be changed about the game is the environment details would be significantly updated.  And yes, they granted that, but I felt it was a bit dumbed down by the experience of fighting an AI that was about 10 years old.

It was disheartening to say the least.

Mind you, there were a few remakes that I haven't been disappointed in.  One of which is Tactics Ogre: Let Us Cling Together.  It was rebuffed in style, fixed in a few areas and provided a few extras here and there.  Subsequently, I've spent over 150 hours on it.  Probably another 10 on top if you include the times that I deleted the save file to start again after a few months time.

But it's what you would want from a remade game.  It's like a sequel, it's cleverer, it's cleaner, it's smoother, and it's a more entertaining experience.  And remakes like that are few and far between.

One of which that came out sometime in the last month was Black Mesa.  It was a fan made remake of the first Half Life game, and they look to have done a fantastic job re-imagining the game with an up to date game engine.

And they admitted to performing a few tweaks to the game itself, and they were based on the changes made for Half Life 2.  That gets a massive Thumbs up in my opinion.  Rather than just buffering the visuals, empower the entire thing.

Returning to Halo Anniversary Edition, I voiced my opinion on how different the game would be like if the enemies reacted the same way as they do in Halo Reach, the last addition to the series, and how nice it would have been to simply have the option to go into the game thinking "I'm playing a game that started an era.  But not as I know it."

I had the same perverted thought with Borderlands.  When I started playing Borderlands 2, I picked up on all the little things they did to improve the game.  Like certain enemies zig-zagging around as they approached you; the Rock-Paper-Scissors effect of weapon elements and enemy types are more significant; the need to actually take cover because you're not as effective of a bullet sponge as you were in the first game.

The thought occurred that the developers of Borderlands could release a patch, an update with some of these changes, for the first game.  I for one would happily return back to the game and start playing again  Especially if they rehashed the Skill Trees.

But the point remains the same: Question whether the remake is worth it.  Because you could just be suckered into buying disappointment, rather than what you want: A steadier, cleaner reintroduction into familiar territory.

Jennicki in Brissy - Day 4 - 30 May

It pretty much explains itself

Australia Zoo Day.  This is the day that Jenny had been waiting for all her life, to indulge in their cuddlyness and cuteness of Koalas.  Anything else was just a bonus.  She knew what she was there for.

Y'see, Jenny has had a fondness for our little eucalypt monsters since she was a kiddilywink, and there wasn't a day that went by, in the time coming up to the trip, that she didn't mention how excited she was to finally cuddle a koala.  It seemed like I was just a formality.

Naturally we had to get there first, which was really quite easy.  First we get a bus out to the most available train station, Zillmere, take the train to Caboolture, then take the bus out to the Zoo.

Sounds simple, no?  Too bad it takes about 2 hours in total to get out there.  It's a good thing that there was a lot for Jenny to look at on the way, especially on the bus ride from Caboolture.  It was annoying though, because Jenny had her camera with her and we were passing the Glass House Mountains, but every time we saw them, they were gone just as quick.  Which is annoying when we were trying to take a photo of old Monkey Face.

Later, a lady on the bus gave us a tap on the shoulder and said that Jenny could get a good photo as we were coming up to a particular bridge going over a road that I wanted to call the Bruce Highway, but it wasn't.

Then we arrived.  It took one blink of the eye to see Jenny get off the bus and pull out the camera and take photos of just signs and trees and one of the Australia Zoo Staff who drive a minibus to one of the nearby stations.

Again, I was feeling like a bit of a third wheel while she drooled over the man in khaki.

Once I passed her a towel to wipe her chin, we began the walk into the Zoo itself.  I retrieved our tickets and we quickly had a wander over to the Gift Shop so Jenny could pick things out for gifts, and then tick them off if we found anything better later on.  Naturally I played silly buggers to recoup my place as the charming and funny boyfriend.

After such success, we began our walk through the brush and aimed for the one thing we really needed: Breakfast.  It was lunchtime by now, but damnit we were hungry.  But not so hungry to not stare at the leather skinned Alligators we walked past on the bridge.  We sat there for a good 10 or 15 minutes, taking photos, and wondering how quickly a feral Bush Turkey, a bird wandering around the grounds freely, would change its tune if it were dangled above the pit.

We were happily walking along, enjoying the foliage and more of me being eaten by creatures, until we were stopped and I was dropped like a bad habit because, you guessed it, she saw a Koala.

It's the most exciting moment of Jennys life

Reports from friends and certain family members about them being feral and terrifying and annoying and just downright unappealing.  But then you get a bit jaded when you've had them in your life from a young age.

But horror stories of any kind never put Jenny off at all.  She wanted to take him home and hug him and kiss him and squeeze him with all her heart.  Myself, three croc handlers and an Elephant Tranquiliser later, she was settled down and reassured that she would get to cuddle one later, after we had a walk around and especially after we had something to eat.

That wasn't so easy a plan to accomplish.  You see, Australia Zoo tries to be as stereotypical as can be imagined.  Not quite Paul Hogan level, but with enough -isms floating about on signs and such, it's hard to get the camera away from Jenny's face.

There was good that came out of it.  Jenny caught children in Uniform and remarked on their school hats; two girls holding a baby croc posed for her; and the fella holding a large snake offered her a hold which she giggled and shied away from, naturally.  And more of me playing silly buggers, of course.

Eventually she decided she was more hungry than photographer, and we made our way upstairs to the food court.  This was a new opportunity to get Jenny to try an Aussie Burger.

Sadly, she didn't go for it today.  I did and was only a little disappointed that there wasn't any pineapple.

We spent lunch fending off dumpster ducks and bush turkeys while admiring the large wood slice tables they had in the court.  They were very cool, and I kinda wished I could have one for my own home one day.  It'd be cool to have an office in that style.  I'm sure I've ranted about that before today.

Then we had to fill in time.  Jenny was getting desperate to hold a Koala, and we found the area where we were allowed to let Jenny hold one.  Under strict supervision, of course.  So we just had to faff around for about an hour and a bit.

Happily, there's plenty to do at Aus Zoo.  Like seeing the sheep mowing an area of lawn, and the petting zoo.  Jenny was delighted to see all the Goats just climbing the small platforms and staring at her blankly, while I enjoyed the piglets who were all too excited to just run around and round and squeal incessantly in their pen.  It was about this time that we found out about the croc show which was soon.

We wandered a little further away and saw the Camels gnawing away at a rather naked tree before returning to the Food Court and taking our seat to the croc show, where we laughed at the small flock of ducks waddling around the pool which hid an interesting white croc.  As we learnt, he wasn't albino, he was actually a white croc.

Then it was time.  Time to finally hold a Koala.  Jenny is a great smiler.  And if you saw the photos, you'd never see a smile bigger except in caricatures.

It took her a while to let go, but her life was now complete, fulfilled to the brim.  And to top it off, a few of the Dingo's were being walked about and Jenny whispered a few baby eating jokes.

Now it was time to really begin the excursion.  With camera in hand, she took photos of everything.  From encased spiders and creepy crawlies, to the long walls of tributes and memorials to Steve Irwin.  She was practically in tears at how much people loved him.

Then came one of the biggest surprises of the day for Jenny.

"It was heaven"

Jenny wasn't expecting Roo Heaven.  Sure, she was expecting Kangaroos, but not in an open enclosure where you could walk up to them and pet them and feed them.

The excitement was palpable.  She didn't know what to do with herself.  We spent a good few minutes disappointing a hungry kangaroo so we could take photos of Jenny with it while it looked around with someone with feed in their hands.

We let it move on and moved on to watch the short beaked Echidna's do laps around their enclosure; the wallabies stare at us from atop it's rock; and watch more Kangaroo's laze about while the bush turkeys wandered about doing whatever it is they do.  Aside from poop everywhere.

Our travels moved on to The Wetlands, where the Jabiru's plotted against us, Bruce Brolga (real name) remained adamant in keeping himself parked in the wrong area while he cleaned himself, the one Emu we saw refused to look at us, and I pointed out a few bottle brushes here and there.

Once we circled around, we were on to the Koala Walk.  Jenny was calm and collected as we walked around the Koalas in the trees and saw more Kangaroo's jumping about the open seating area that led into the Aviary, where i pointed out as many different birds as were flapping about.  Even saw a very silent and still Kookaburra.  It wouldn't be a few days until Jenny finally got to hear a Kookaburra making his morning laugh.

Then it would be my favourite area: The Wallabies.  And quite frankly, it was because we saw one scratching its arse on a wall.  Life's simple pleasures, y'know.

After was life's simple squirms.  Namely Snakes.  They were behind glass and I don't think any of them were moving, but Jenny was still feeling nervious watching them.  They're snakes after all.  The coolest thing I found about it was the snake skeleton wrapped around a tree and attacking a small pig (I think it was a pig).

By this time, we had finally circled the Zoo.  We had completely left out the Africa area, because Jenny said "Well, I can see african animals at home, so why see them here".  I looked at the map, and found there was a maze of small enclosures that we had completely missed filled with Taz Devils, more Dingos and a Cassowary.  Crimeny that's a weird bird.  No wonder it's so vicious.

After a few more photos of Koalas and a few pickups at the gift shop, we began the trip home.  I was clever enough to call mum and have her pick us up on the way.  And get Pizza on the way home.  It was too good an opportunity.