The Pages of Now & Forever (More or Less)

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Hahaha, yeah right.  True my future has a popular fan fiction writer for closet pedophiles might be hampered but I’ve grown to accept that some dreams are best left dreamt. 

Actually I’m posting to let anyone who cares know that I’ve started my own blog as more personal way to keep track of various art projects and to keep me drawing.  My dreams of a Muppet Babies yaoi might be dead but not of being a worthless penniless desperate well-to-do artist.

You can find the page here. Feel free to RSS it or whatever but be warned: not all of the art is pretty…in fact a lot of it sucks.  Lots of doodles, scraps from my sketchbooks, aborted drawings, and every now and again something that I don’t entirely hate.  Oh, and given that it's my artwork, there's probably some nudity (it's not all fan service, I promise). I still haven't figured everything out but so far it's working pretty well.

So farewell, and thanks for putting up with me for so long.

     It's reasons like this that make it difficult to dislike self-absorbed gaming blog Kotaku. The only Squaresoft commercial I remember from "back in the day" was for Chrono Trigger. I think it was on MTV and, for some reason, completely in Japanese ("Kerono Trigga").

     I don't believe Mog was ever this useful in the actual game. He'd jump forward, do a silly dance, and then fall flat on his face like he had some sort of mental disorder. Stupid, cute little moogle.

     I’ve never really considered myself a blog whore but now that I’ve magically attached a streamed video to my LiveJournal I don’t think I can hide from that label any more. I hope you’re happy.

     Anyhow, if this doesn’t convince you to pester me for a free 10-day trial and play World of Warcraft then you can just go to hell. Ah yes, irrational, emotional outbursts. My journey towards the dark side of blogging is nearly complete! Now I need go cut myself...

            There are five, maybe two-hundred, design atrocities that have haunted my gaming career not least of which is the dreaded “water stage.”  Typical traits of these bastard levels include, but aren’t limited to: the ability to drown, floating controls, slow movement, automatic scrolling, and obscured vision.   

No one enjoys water stages and those who say they do are liars.  Fat, ugly, hateful liars.  Yet there they are, polluting our otherwise wonderful games.  I can only assume they are used to interrupt regular, enjoyable stage progression so that the player isn’t allowed to have too much fun.

I recently received Sonic Rush for the DS and there I was, having a good old time running my little polygonal hedgehog through the woods at blazing speed when whatever Sega-induced buzz I was working on is permanently killed by Stage 2: This Stage Is Nothing But Water.

Water stages in Sonic games are probably the most ludicrous and cruel of all water stages simply because the games are supposed to be built around speed.  This doesn’t make similar stages in Super Mario Brothers any less worse, of course, nor the sequences in Half-Life or Quake 2 where you have to swim from point A to point B before you very short oxygen supply ran out.  The justifiably obscure Bravoman, tries to mix it up by turning the platformer into a shooter for the water stages.  This only makes the game suck even more.

The one possible exception would have to be Donkey Kong Country and that is only because of the incredibly relaxing, 80s-synth-like background music featured in those rendered watery stages.  DKC was one of those games that if you hit pause the music would continue.  Being the ultra geek that I was I had my SNES rigged up through a separate receiver so I could pause the game, turn off the TV, and simply chill to that wondrous tune.

I’d like to say that I’ve since gotten a life but here I am complaining about video games in my online journal.  It’s like the water stage of my existence.

I’ll roll my eyes at the countless posts on the World of Warcraft forums regarding breast sizes and non-raider angst but there are those few glimmering turds that sit atop all of the others and suffocate my arteries with their inane logic and mind numbing ignorance.

One such post began with the popular trend of bashing anime, specifically a piece of fanart titled “Anime Demon Hunter.”  As ridiculous as the title is it was hilariously appropriate because the image is exactly how you would imagine it.  The only way it could have been even more generic is if it was titled “Japanimation Demon Hunter.”

Naturally the mere mention of anime sparked an intense battle flinging Naruto, Dragonball, and tentacle porn-related insults all over the place.  This isn’t what caught my attention by the throat, throttling it in a violently epileptic fury of malicious delight.  No, it was the mutant argument about yaoi.

Yaoi is a favorite topic of mine because in the past it has been so bizarrely misrepresented amongst the more rabid American fans.  Consider this slightly paraphrased statement from the volatile thread: “Yaoi is not about arousal but gay-relationships.  If you took Will & Grace and turned it into an anime it would be considered yaoi.”

“Delusional” is the item that springs immediately to mind.  Well, that and “Ahahahahahahahahahaha!” followed quickly by “Woooooh!”

I realize genres become blurred with greater exposure but the “it’s not porn” angle of yaoi never ceases to crack me up.  It is porn, of course, but certain fans just can’t except it or are simply too embarrassed to admit it.  Granted I think the above statement just confused shonen-ai with yaoi but the image of hardcore Will & Grace slash is just really, really funny.

Knowing the futility of the effort I replied questioning the author’s definition of yaoi but it and the original statement were drowned out by many, many posts arguing interpretation of the demon hunter (“He has tattoos,” “Nuh-uh!  He has a blindfold,” “You stupid @$%# his wings are supposed to be longer,” etc).  This is probably for the better because I can only imagine how much fun arguing with a delusional fan-person over the World of Warcraft general forums would be (somewhere between pulling off one’s toenails and being molested by Grape Ape).

If you take anything away from these words let it be the following:

Will & Grace is not yaoi.

            A poorly drawn, anthropomorphic Grape Ape having sex with a younger version of Jonny Quest is yaoi.

     So by now I’m sure you’ve heard that Nintendo has officially named its next system the Wii (pronounced “we”).  Forums and news sites are rife with horribly punned headlines such as “Nintendo takes a Wii,” “Let’s all play with our Wii,” or “Wii Wii Wii all the way home.”

     It’s times like this that make me feel justified in my current ambivalence toward the industry.  The near insane amount of backlash Nintendo is receiving from fanatics and *cough* journalists alike is pretty ridiculous.  I mean, I made fun of Microsoft’s brilliantly stupid “Xbox 360” moniker but that was mainly because of the logic behind its philosophy (or lack thereof).  The name still isn’t going to prevent me from buying the system (the complete lack of anything interesting on it will).

     Now if Nintendo released a penis-shaped system and called it the Hitler Hugger then I might have an issue purchasing it.  The Wii, though?  Come on.  We’ve survived the Turbografx-16, the Super Nintendo, the Genesis, the Playstation, and the Dreamcast.  Hell, even our games sound ridiculous: Final Fantasy XII?  World of Warcraft?  Super Mario Brothers?

     We as gamers have been playing stupid games on stupid systems sense the industry’s birth.  A little Wii won’t change that.

In two hours I’ve managed to not only create more computer generated 3D than I have in my entire life but also offend every astronomer everywhere with my heretical and naïve map of our known solar system.  I’ve seen fifth grade science fair projects more accurate than this atrocity.  It is, indeed, a dark day for astronomy.

This is my first real step forward into the wonderful yet hilariously terrifying world of Maya.  My guide is a slightly intimidating book that seems to adjust its difficulty randomly.  At first we’re creating simple spheres on a grid.  Next we are to create a fully operational trebuchet so that we may overtake the neighboring kingdom what with their high stone walls and lethal archers.  Then, I think, we’re making a cube.

            Anyhow, there’s Sol in all of its inaccurate glory.  I’m too animate it next, spinning the planets and moons around each other and, eventually, the sun.  It started getting pretty complex and my head’s already killing me from work so playing god will just have to wait until tomorrow.  I’m pretty excited, though.  I mean, what I’m doing is really, really basic but I’m starting to form (dangerous) ideas of how I can already tweak this abomination of science.  Patience, however, is a necessity for I have already learned that skipping a step (quite by accident) ends in hilarity for the author and confusion for me.

     So Jay and I started an "emo" band sometime in 2004.  It's taken us this long to put out our first album because, you know, we're so depressed and stuff.  Here's the jacket to the first, self-titled CD.  You can click on them for higher resolution images but I won't be responsible for any cutting inspired by our deep and edgy cover art.

     While I'm on the subject of sarcasm and making fun of people check out this little write up Zangief contributed to my page.  If you ever become interested in freelancing you really should read this first and then proceed to cry yourself to sleep.  Or just listen to our band!

     Just a quick update to wish you all a happy holiday season filled with joy and numerous job offers that you'll pass to Jason.  And hey, here's a little something extra because I love you all so much: an abusive retrospective commentary of one of the greatest 2D fighting games ever made, Samurai Shodown (spelled correctly, mind you).

     Happy holidays, all!