So I can confirm that I saw the first Christmas commercial yesterday, Oct 30th around 3pm, it was a pop-tart commercial. Now today, it's been a continuous on-onslaught of them.
Happy holidays.
Already.
;p
Wednesday, October 31
Sunday, October 28
Lego Chess based on their recent Castle set. Is that not awesome?
I've recently moved to California, something that allowed me the opportunity to realize a dream of mine and visit an official Lego store. A store filled to the brim with Legos, it was heaven. They had a small section filled with various people parts and accessories and allowed you to build your own custom Lego person to buy. Unfortunately, I never did buy anything. This Lego Chess set that I saw there definitely caught my eye, as did an extremely cool older castle set that included a locked door and little Lego key!
Admittedly that was awhile ago that I went, and I remain empty handed as far as buying from the store. I was just thinking of Legos recently and thought I'd share the story on this new blog. When I get a job I'm definitely going back!
You know, I mentioned this to my girlfriend just yesterday, that I'm really glad I grew up when I did. The 80s and to a somewhat lesser extent the early 90s were a great time period for kids. The toys, shows, etc, were more imaginative, simpler, and much more enjoyable. Today, kids shows are boring at best, and have little imagination behind them at worst. The toys are either overly complex or they're simply ridiculous (come on, battle armor Superman? Hulk punching through annoymous wall?).
Legos, however, above and beyond anything, defined for me the perfect toys. You are given pieces and your imagination is free to run wild. Not only that, you can learn simple engineering concepts, and improve precision motor skills. I had a friend when I was very young who really showed me the power of imagination. He would take pieces from his castle set and alter them in unique ways. He cut the arrows from the Lego quiver and made a sword sheath. He created a Lego armory/shop in his Lego castle. He painted a Lego breastplate black to make a dark knight. He even cut part of a Lego scimtar to turn it into a Lego katana.
Imagination is so wonderful to me. It is a calm peace in a world and life that can be chaotic. It's escape. And I'm thankful that there were and are products like Legos.
But still, I have to remember that there is a reality, and I need to take part in it.
Friday, October 26
Another George Bernard Shaw quote (you know, the guy who said the cynical quote under our title?) that I saw today:
"Life isn't about finding yourself. Life is about creating yourself." -George Bernard Shaw
You tell 'em George! I dislike those messages which are along the lines of "You can only be who you are" or that you're destined to what you're born to be.
You have choice people! Go make those choices, and become the person you want to be!
Thursday, October 25
** Forgive me I lost a tangible run in this post, will update more correctly at a dater date.
So I'm pondering right now...looking at the emotional health of humanity.
Ok, ok, too big, the emotional health of America (at least any "well-developed" country).
I read this article on wired.com and it struck me in such a way that I'm actually at a loss for words. See, I believe that the entire race of humanity has done away with the handbasket and cashed it in for an express one way ticket to Hell. Can you blame me? Yet people find it in their hearts to care for some animal, who is one in a million, yet still unreplacable and unique as a human.
So let me wander in my mind a bit.
I believe I'm a cynical hypocritcal bastard (and I know that doesn't make it OK, Roxanne ;p) but I still feel compassion for human plights.
Or do I?
I can't tell! I hear about a cop going crazy and murdering 6 people that lived in a house cause he was angry, my response: "Cop's are bastards, that's what happens when you give them power."
Yet I showed no compassion for the dearly departed. Which I don't understand because if I see something else, at a different time, it will hurt to see them like that.
You know, a major impact for me on my empathy for people was my family. I care about them more than I do about someone in the news. Very un-Christian of me I know. Still I wouldn't want to see someone get hurt for someone's neglegence.
Let me render this hypothese: if the action is justifiable or not determines my reactions. And that's very loose.
- Someone could rag on me all day, I would probably careless
- Someone makes a rash comment about my family, I blow up
- Anything happening to a cop, I don't care
- Any incidents that happen because OF a cop, I'm pissed.
- The rich who are greedy deserve their "just desserts"
- Though they shouldn't be treated differently
- Music & movies impact me with emotions that I can't always explain/handle
- The media makes me bitter and scorn the damned!!
- Children are nice
- Teenagers are promiscious, lying, Hitlers!!!!!!!
So I think I have my point of confliction. I'll have sympathy for the devil yet I'll cut him down here he stands.
I suppose that's the point, I'll have sympathy but expect no sympathy from me.
Boo-yah.
But me address this: the media has not molded me this way. No, they might fuel my burning apathy towards violence and what not. Nor was it video games, they only warped my preception of reality (ha!). Nope, I blame it on the male Jacobs gene. and a tinge of Latin machismo.
Let me clarify: the Jacobs men are cynical, stern, unemotional, and unaffectionate. Now holding this in, I have to make an effort in my role as a 4th generation Jacobs man so that I can show my sons I love them (but without using that word later on) and making sure my wife's attentive needs are met. Not just to meet but to show her that I do infact care.
Though it is hard and I slip from time to time I can be caring towards them. But I'll always be a grumpy, hardass that can't cry.
Take a break, you little fake - I blow brains my out, you hesitate.
Wednesday, October 24
So why was I coerced in to creating a facebook? I don't know. No one will probably find me, just david and matt, even though I can easily call both of them. I'll probably delete it next week. Especially!!!!!! if someone from HS tries to contact me.
That was a bridge I burned long time ago.
Cynicism reports today?
- I believe that these fires are biblical. The earth is suffering from disasters time after time, I hope everyone is up to date on their faith!
- I don't think the application guys care much here, it's been over a week since my request for the installation of a CRITICAL APP has been put in. Despite my urgencies and complaints, nothing has yet to be done on this, just beauracies. (or however it's spelt)
- Waking up late, now that just sucks. I woke up at 4:50am instead of my 3:45am and I had to rush to shower and got to work at 5 till 6am. SuxXxOrZ. No I wasn't late. I just wasn't early.
- Thankfully I am out of my teriyaki bowls for lunch!! It will be nice to eat something else for a change!!
- I don't like it when people come in for tours, it disrupts my rythm in work. Especially since one guy (talking to professionals mind you - and he's one himself!) states to a group of guests: "you need interpreters here, one moment you could be speaking redneck and the next oriental..." I'll let anyone interested know when he has finished clearning his desk.
That's about it.
Oh now you're sober, how'd I know you say that?
Tuesday, October 23
For some reason this posted when it was only meant to remain a draft. I'll post it a bit later
Ok, I have two so far.
- No Soft Drinks for the year
- Learn C#
That's it so far.
class ExampleClass{
static void Main() {
System.Console.WriteLine("Hello, world!"); }
I'm posting alot today, hope nobody minds (and by nobody I mean the one other reader of this blog).
I ended up not working on the nibbles remake I talked about earlier tonight. I'm fooling around with 3D stuff, and tonight I was playing around with lighting. Sort of confusing stuff that, but manageable.
I also mentioned earlier that I intended to attempt to remake Dragon Warrior 1. Well, in the original Dragon Warrior the dungeons were rather simple mazes and didn't differ visually from one dungeon to the next. However, a rather unique aspect that I haven't really seen in any other rpgs is that the dungeons were devoid of light. You had to either use a torch or cast the "Radiant" spell to see a small amount of dungeon around you. Nothing visually fancy considering it was a very early NES game.
One of the ideas I've had for the remake is to make the dungeons first person and 3D. In case you don't know what first person means it's basically that you see everything through the characters eyes. A while ago I tried creating some 3D stuff but got frustrated and temporarily dropped the idea. Now though, with the recent advances I've made in learning how to work with 3D, I may consider bringing back the idea. I think it would look cool to explore dungeons in first person and have the torch illuminate the walls in front of you.
I've also recently considered the idea of attempting to make the overworld map 3D but I think I'll abandon that idea. I really should keep things simple for my first game. A 3D dungeon would be alot easier than a 3D overworld map. Speaking of the overworld map, it's pretty difficult to draw water and mountains that look good and that can tile easily as a pattern. But maybe that's because I haven't really put much effort into those yet: I've been stuck on the trees. On a whim, I tried planting each little tree programatically to see if it'd stress the system or slow down the program, but to my surprise it doesn't seem to break a sweat. It'd be kind of cool to be able to control each individual tree. But I'm not sure if that'll bog down the program too much once game mechanics are added in.
I suppose I'm done rambling. Again. Perhaps all this belongs in another blog, I don't know? Aiur, did you even read this far? Do you still read this blog? Is the blog still in an identity crisis?
It'd be cool if I had my own independent game company. Hey, I can dream can't I?
Monday, October 22
I beat Final Fantasy 3 for the DS today!
My thoughts on the game:
The game felt very old school, which is a good thing for me. It definitely took me back to the feel of the earlier NES rpgs. The graphics were excellent, which was slightly confusing. I found myself at times wondering why there wasn't more, given the level of the graphics. It felt as though they changed nothing of the layout or feel of the original gameplay. But overall that's ok.
They added more story than the original. The characters in the NES version were faceless and nameless, but here they were given personality and actual faces (even genders). In the first half of the game this makes things interesting, but the story takes on an epic arc and the characters and their personalities are eventually lost. I won't give anything away, but I will say there's not much to not give away. It ends up being your basic save the world story. But hey, that's the way it's done in old school, so I'm not complaining per se. I just felt they gave up on adding to the story in the second half.
At first I didn't know what to make of the job class system itself. I seem to have played these job class games in reverse order from best to worst. My first experience was with Final Fantasy Tactics, which had the best Job Class system I've seen, and possibly the best overall character development system I've come across in an RPG. The second game I played was Final Fantasy 5, which was a step down in many ways, but still enjoyable. So the jump to this game, which lacked the ability to carry abilities over to other jobs, or to train your characters stats by what job they were using, was a bit of a shock. It was basically nothing but picking what job you wanted to be. I didn't really get into this system until the very end of the game, where I decided I really needed to pick my go-to team to take down the last boss. That customization is enjoyable, but not to a level I'm used to in most other games.
And as a side note on the job class sytem. Something Final Fantasy Tactics did that this game does not (nor does Final Fantasy 5 for that matter) is make it so you gained higher job classes by training in certain jobs. In this game, Final Fantasy 3, you're merely give more job classes at certain points in the game. That just doesn't sit well with me; I'd prefer to work on getting high skills myself rather than having them handed to me at alloted points.
My final point is that the last area is very long. Well, it's not too long really, but the inability to save makes it seem very long in that you're forced to press forward until the end. Luckily the Quicksave feature will save you from having to sit there for over an hour or more, but it is the only point in the game where I noticed the lack of save points. It's probably not a game who's ending I'll be seeing often...
...Oh, and Lord help you if you die at any point. It reminds me of the relentless cruelty of other old school games like Ninja Gaiden who would send you back ridiculously far if you died in the final areas.
Did I say everything I wanted? I don't know, I could probably ramble for a long time. I will say that it's good as far as remakes go, the graphics are an excellent example of what the DS can do, and I'm extremely looking forward to the upcoming 3D DS remake of Final Fantasy 4.
I'm not so sure I have much cynical thoughts in me as of late. I haven't had contact with many people, and my attention has been reverting back to where it once was: videogames.
I'm currently attempting to make a game in C# 2005 (Is 2007 out yet? Blasted fast technology) using DirectX 9.0 (10's out...and holy cow does 10 make games look good). I went in to this knowing little about how games are made, but I've been sputtering along, and I feel I've made a tiny amount of progress. I tell you, it's hard to learn by simply using Microsoft's help files!
Yesterday I figured out how to make textured primitives. A sad breakthrough I'm sure, considering where pros should be at. But by golly little progresses make me happy, and slowly but surely I'm getting better. I'm hoping to possibly make a 3d landscape for my game.
What game? An rpg of course. I'm thinking of remaking an NES game: Dragon Warrior 1. I have many ideas on how to improve it. Still though, I haven't decided if it'd be more productive to work on my own original game.
And last night the idea hit me that I should try making my own version of "Nibbles", an old QBasic game where you're a constantly moving snake who eats things and gets a longer and longer tail. It was a game I tried making in QBasic long ago, but now I could make a pretty good version using what I know of DirectX! So I might try working on that tonight.
Oh well, if I do, I may post the finished results.
So really, I'm too tired to be really cynical today, much less even provide an iota of thought to my post. But here is something that ticks me off. Data access. I've been jumping hoops to get added to the right security group at work and it's still been a week! I've had supervisors and team leads escalate and still nothing!! They even say it's done!! I still can't install it!! sob.....
That's my complaint, eat, sleep, and be merry.
Sunday, October 21
Starcraft, what can I say? Both Aiur and I used to play this game together via network play and loved it. The insane opponents! Nukes everywhere, crazy swarms of enemies, desperate sieges that lasted untold amounts of time. It was great.
I heard about Starcraft 2 awhile ago and geeked out. The only information they had available was on the Protoss units, and they didn't have many landscapes to show. Still though, it looked insanely good.
Fast forward to now, when I decided to see what's new on it. New screenshots! Info about Terran units! More landscapes! And HOLY COW is it looking good! I'm geeking out all over again. So I thought I'd post some of my joy and some links.
http://www.starcraft2.com/screenshot.xml?s=53
Mind blowing graphics. I've said it before and I'll say it again. With advances in technology companies can make extremely good looking 2d games if they base it in 3d. I wish more companies would do it. This is by far the best graphics for any game I've seen a preview of, even Gears of War or any PS3 game. The water, shadows, grass and trees and cliffs, everything looks extremely good.
Of course, I may be going over board simply because I love Starcraft ;p
If you haven't yet, I'd recommend playing the original Starcraft and it's expansion set Brood Wars. Not only is it very fun (honestly, one of the most well balanced games I've ever played in my life), you get the back story so you'll be ready for this sequel. If you love to be as creative as me, it also comes with a nifty map editor. But if map editing's your thing, I'd either go for Warcraft 3 or wait for Starcraft 2, which is reported to have an even better map editor.
Better map editor! I love map editors! Geeking out!
Thursday, October 18
I don't intend this blog to be a negative one but more rather an accurate one.
As the quote states above, we got it.
LOLZ
Wednesday, October 17
The best way to describe human truth may be through experiences. Jesus made much use out of speaking truth through human experience by way of His parables. Short little stories of human events that contained fundamental truths of the human experience.
Why would that be best? Because the truth can't be quantified, much to the chagrin of scientists and philosophers alike. They want something neat and compact. Something that can easily be distributed and leave no questions. But life isn't like that at all. It's subjective, ambiguous, chaotic. And nothing captures all of that better than tales of human experience.
But truth is there. A fundamentally deep and pure truth. And it's only there for those who choose to see it. Like the parables of Jesus, like the fairy tales of old. Tales of human experience. Ultimately everyone sees what they want to see, but some can and do see to the core value of the stories, and to the truth that lays behind them.
Life seems chaotic at times, but there is a truth behind it all. That's the end of my ramblings for today :)
Tuesday, October 16
Ah, yes, existentialism. I firmly believe that life should be peeled away throughout it's absurdities and defined in the most appealing (to you) way. Though, not everyone might be mentally and spiritually prepared to dwell far into their existentialistic world still, everyone should at least try.
Like why do I always see things out of place? A chicken on 290, a dancing coke fiend on Mangum. Personally, I can define these things, very loosely, but still I can.
I just don't get how people wander through life with a quagmire foundation on what reality is.
The Hills. Someone shoot me if my validation in life is a $5,000 dress from some Italian brand-name store. God, life is more than that. At least to me.
I have successfully defined many points in my life as important and self-concluding that I have some purpose on this world.
Yet, the bigger picture still awaits.
And yes, existentialism has given way to a severe nihilistic view such as: not everyone has a greater purpose. They will live, make a "living" and die. But sadly that's what many people accept and live. Mayhap, it's not so sad as it sounds but we shouldn't all expect to change the world. We can however, change our world and the ones that are around it.
Be a good parent.
My sons has defined me. My wife has defined me. My family has defined me.
So live life and question it all, no matter how absurd it is.
Oh yes, the Zune.
I <3 ZuN3 LOLZZEz!!1!1!!!
I bet Sartre was my real father.
Monday, October 15
Hello all, we're back...I guess? What was this blog about? A game we were creating, eh? So what's this blog going to be about now? I don't know...
And how long will it stay in the annals of the internet? Will some person 30 years from now read this? Will they wonder who we were? I don't know why I'm waxing philosophical (did I even use 'waxing' correctly?), Google will probably just go bankrupt...ahahahaha! I jest, I jest. In all seriousness they'll probably just end up merging with Apple and Microsoft and taking over the world. Wars will soon officially be nothing but mass FPS contests.
Speaking of games, I'm currently trying to develop one on my own. For now it's simply a remake of an old classic NES game that I'm using as a basis for learning the process. Perhaps it'll evolve into an original game, I don't know, but recreating a game is a suitable enough challenge for now.
Hey! Maybe this blog will end up being about custom games? That'd rock. For real kid. And whatever else the kids say these days. Do they still say groovy? They should. Like the Brady kids. That's a classic show reference if you're wondering. You shouldn't be wondering, because classic TV is something everyone should enjoy (maybe not, because if it was Nick at Nite wouldn't resort to more and more recent shows).
Hey! Maybe this blog will end up being about classic TV shows?! That'd rock. I'm just repeating myself now, and this post is long enough, so see ya later
So I wanted to bring this back.
Funny story,we lost the website due to credit fraud.
project1000 has entered an indefinite hiatus
I've decided to turn this into a real blog, with a strange template.
Bob can change it if he wants.
ANYWAYS if anyone actually reads this, im going to route this through some domain.
ANYWAYS
let me comment on The Price Is Right.
I am a member of the Bob Barker Babysitting Club. He watched over me many a summer weekdays, I grew to such affinity towards him that I, like many others, were struck with grief. But he had to have his time to himself.
Today, television history took place and I am witnessing currently.
Today is the first day that Bob Barker is not on the show.
Drew Carey is.
I like Drew, but the awkwardness that he has with the show is...well...awkward. He offers the show a new fresh breath, I suppose if I can just get over the fact that Bob isn't there for me any more I will be okay.
The audience seems to receive him well.
The main difference is Drew's demeanor on the show: he is a comedian and Bob was not.
For the first show, he has done good. Thought still awkward, the show must go on!!
Still...who can pay $811 for a hammock?
Damn.
Souljah boy tell em....
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