Oh. My. Gosh.

I don’t know what was going through the makers’ heads when they made this game, but I really want to meet all of them. And give them a hug. They are geniuses! This game was pulled off fantastically. Normally, that’s an easy thing to do, to make a game I find fantastic, but this does absolutely everything wrong and does it well. There was so much that could have flopped in this game–the characters (Welll…I can’t say I like all of them, but they are good…Beat dropped my IQ by at least thirty points), the background, the story, especially the battle system–but all those little quirks that would break a normal game meshed together in some miraculous way to form what is now one of my all-time favorite games.

The battle system is really something that you can either love or hate. I liked it, although admittedly I didn’t play it the way it’s meant to be played, but then I’m a noobcake at action battle systems. The system itself is called the Stride Cross Battle System. It implements the DS’s dual-screen and touch-screen features. On the bottom screen is Neku, the main character. You control him by dragging, touching, tapping, slashing, etc. the stylus to either move or use pins and the ‘psychs’ (short for psychic attacks, I presume) they contain. On the time screen is your partner, who is controlled with the D-pad to both attack and rack up points for a fusion attack. It sounds tough, but it becomes second nature after so many battles. Or you can be a loser like me and totally ignore the top screen. Whatever works. It does have a steep, steep learning curve, so get ready for that.

Battle System: 8/10 - I was iffy about it, but y’know…

What I really liked was the story, the characters, and the dialogue in between. The main character is a emo, anti-social, teenage boy named Neku Sakuraba. There have been a lot of complaints, mainly from people playing in the first couple of ‘days’, that Neku is annoying as all heck. Why yes, he is. However, I didn’t think of him as being quite as annoying as most people thought. I actually really liked him! He’s got some really good dialogue and I loved all his sarcastic quips. The thing is that he’s annoying on purpose, which leaves room for…dun dun duuuuun…

Character development!

Character development is what this game is about. Take a fifteen-year-old punk, toss him into a life-or-erasure struggle for a few days (or a few weeks) and see what happens. Watching Neku grow is one of the best things about this game and one scene at the end of the credits makes it all extremely worthwhile.

The story is…seriously, what’s a word for it….*proceeds to thesaurus.com* unearthly. Heh, pun. It revolves around something called the Reaper’s Game, a seven-day race in the Shibuya district of Japan to accomplish missions handed out at the beginning of each day. Sounds mundane, but that’s only because I don’t want to totally spoil things. Everything about WEWY is so twisted and weird and fanatical that it’s nigh indescribable. It’s like a black hole–once you go in, you’re not coming out. Or an onion. Every layer of depth you peel off just reveals another layer better than the last. You’ll find yourself well into Neku’s shoes just trying to figure out what the heck is going on. Every answer you find just leads to more questions. A lot more.

Story/Characters/Writing: 10/10 - I want to work for these guys. Seriously, can I get an application paper? <3

Most importantly was…It’s kinda hard to explain…This is one of those rare games that nearly reversed my outlook on life. It’s all about stretching horizons. You’ll see once you play it.

And I mean it. Seriously, go play it right now. Shoo shoo.

I nodded slowly, trying to digest this information. “So, you are a Magician, and so was that assassin, and you two used to be good buddies.”

“In the loosest sense of the word, yes.”

“Then why did he try to kill me?”

“That I will have to explain later.” He rose, grabbed a package from the trunk at the foot of his bed, and tossed it to me. “Put these on. You cannot walk through Cymaria looking like a peasant.”

I caught the package and tore it open. It was full of what had to be costly, and disgustingly gaudy, clothes. I cocked an eyebrow at Din. “In case you haven’t noticed, I am a peasant. I’ll wear what I’ve got on, thank you.” I tossed it back, but he returned it.

“And, in case you have not noticed, I just saved your life. I do believe you owe me at least this much.”

“No way. Those clothes would pay for the deed to my entire town. I ain’t wearing something so exorbitant.”

“But you are not wearing those rags either.” He saw the look on my face and backed off. He paused for a moment before changing tactics. “There is a reason besides aesthetics that I want you to wear these.”

“Are they assassin repellant?”

See? I like that a whole lot more. This is on page 10-11 of Noblesse Oblige. We’re a third of the way done. Woot!

Anyway, decorating for the Prom started today. We actually got a lot done! I’ll be sure to take a camera and start uploading pictures. =D

It’s been a long time since I posted, huh! Most of that is because…Well…I have no decent excuse. I’m just lazy. Oh, an I did get Super Smash Bros.: Brawl and Kid Icarus. That may have contributed.

Anyway, I just got back over the weekend from this SkillsUSA competition in Boise with James. We were supposed to build a website within the space of nine hours (We did it in five and we were dying of apathy towards that stupid daycare website by the end of it) about an after school daycare called Sunny Day. We did it, and I think we did fantastically! We’ll hear about whether we won or not tomorrow.

Before the actual competition, James and I got to hang out in downtown Boise where he showed me around since he had lived and worked in Boise for a while as a page. We went out for lunch at the Pita Pit and Coldstone, and nearly got eaten by a squirrel.

But you know what the absolute worst thing in the world to have before a huge, brain-rattling competition like that is?

A fire drill at 11:00 pm.

No, really.

So, I was playing Civilization 4 in my hotel room (I was the only girl, so I got one all to myself. HAH!) and went out for a drink. The only thing they had that I relatively liked was Dr. Pepper, but my caffeine intolerance gave me this whopper of a headache so I had to go to bed.

I was just about to drift off when the fire alarm hit.

I panicked, quickly forgetting everything I had learned about fire safety, grabbed by purse (and not a coat. Of course), and ran outside where several others were waiting. We all knew it was a false alarm; the hotel was stocked full of high school kids, every one of them likely to pull the alarm as a joke, so we all went back into the hotel only to be shooed out by the fire department and the police.

So we climbed into one of the school buses waiting in the parking lot through the emergency exit in the back. Altogether it wasn’t that much warmer than it was outside, but it did help a little and I could lay down in there and die from my massive migraine.

Finally, we got to go back inside and I just went back to sleep, thinking that I never got the chance to even take a shower that night and would have to hurry in the morning to fit one in.

I hate people who can’t resist pulling fire alarms at eleven freaking o’ clock. >>’

But, nevertheless, it was a really fun experience!

Oh. Right. I’m supposed to talk about updates, too.

Well, as for the blog, we’ve been hit by a truckload of spammers, which I am deleting without mercy. If your comment is entirely irrelevant, I’ll delete it. I’ve even been deleting comments that that designed to be generic, comment-all comments, but have porno links attached. Really, how low can spammers get…Oh, wait, silly question. So, if you find your ACTUAL comment deleted and you want it back up, e-mail me and I’ll see what I can do about it.

Also, I’ve been working on my short story Noblesse Oblige. I figure that it’s only going to be about thirty pages long, so I might as well get my butt into gear and work on it, right? I actually really like where it’s going! It’s giving me a good break from Forsaken Game, too, although I really, really, really need to work on FG. I’m getting all sorts of sequel ideas that need to stop until I can finish the first book in the series. Maybe my brain figured that I would be done with FG by now and set up all the sequel ideas on a time-release basis.

Lastly, I thought I’d post up a little sample of Noblesse Oblige…

Sample deleted and exchanged ’cause I have a better one in the next post. Go read that instead. =D

And there you have it. I know it’s out of context, but this is part of the conversation that starts the whole story. This particular excerpt is from page three out of nine. I’m going to go continue working on it now!

Later days!

The REAL stroke of genius is what I just did!

So here’s the story. I got a Wii for Christmas, along with Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess. I’m one of those weird people who have to get really into the game. As in, I stood up throughout the entire game (so far), only sitting when either on horseback or when a long story sequence was coming up. I acted it out, too, even when I didn’t have to. (Swinging the wiimote like a sword is required, throwing the wiimote like a 250 lbs. Goron is not.)

Then I decided to add just one more thing into the mix.

A treadmill.

I can’t even begin to elaborate how awesome this is. It takes the gameplay to a whole ‘nother level, even beyond what the Wii’s already accomplished. Sure, there is the whole problem of tripping, but take it slow and it’s amazingly easy.

For the record, the distance from the spawn point in Karkariko Village to the middle of the Death Mountain dungeon (that one area with the water and the sniping Bokoblins) is about 1.5 miles. Give or take, since I had to hop off the treadmill once in a while to snipe those Bokoblins right back.

Alright, yeah, the ACT. I took it on February 9th and…well…it wasn’t that bad. It was mostly short on time. I was rushing to finish every section, especially the math one. The one thing I really learned was that you’ve got to think outside of the box.

What did I get on my first try?

30.

And yes, I’m taking it again. Most people raise their score by two on the retake, right? Well look out 32, ’cause here I come!

You, too, Lakebed Temple. My treadmill and I are coming for you. Muahahaha!

This gem’s name is Rune Factory: A Fantasy Harvest Moon.

Yeah, you heard me right.

This game is like a combination of Legend of Zelda, Harvest Moon, Mana, Pokemon, and Final Fantasy, all rolled into one teeny-tiny little package. I personally can’t believe that so much can be stuffed into one tiny little game card.

Anyway, about the game itself:

The story starts out with Raguna, a young man who’s lost his memory. Alright, first of all, this is the most overused video game concept ever and is nigh impossible to do well. He stumbles upon a girl’s house, hungry and thirsty, on the verge of death (although he acts a little less dying than most hungry/dehydrated people would), and the girl, Mist, gives him a hoe and a watering can. I had to laugh the entire first five minutes because it’s all so pathetically done. I was willing to forgive that, however, since the art is just so gosh darn pretty and I was expecting good things from his game.

I was not disappointed.

There has been one common factor between the last two Harvest Moon games, Song of Happiness and Rune Factory, that really makes them fun. You have to work. Hard. On most Harvest Moon games I’ve played, they practically give you everything on a silver platter. In these new games, you have to work to just survive, let alone make a living.

Then there’s the sheer amount of stuff to do, none of which is really required. You can farm, fight monsters, tame monsters, fish, make stuff, cast magic, get married, make friends. Basically anything.

It really deserves a better review, but, once again, I’m in school.

Anyway, I’ve got a new idea for the website which will hopefully be added sometime this week/month. I’m hoping that this will spark the next internet phenomenon.

Internet, meet Style Sheet. Style Sheet; internet.

If anyone reading this wants in on something really cool and happens to be good at making websites (graphics, (X)HTML, admining, or anything) then please contact me. I’m gonna need as much help as I can get with this project.

What I did finish was the website! Sure, some of it is sloppy, disorganized, but…it’s done, right! No more broken links! Now I’m gonna start really digging into the wiki, getting all of my character information up.

And I totally got thrown off my Taylor being immature. Narg. There’s one should’ve–been-very-interesting blog post down the drain.

He died Sunday night at about 7:00. I’ve heard that he passed away while reading the scriptures. It might be just a rumor, but it sounds like something he’d do. I kind of get an idea now of how the children of Israel felt just before entering Canaan when Moses died. It’s sort of a, “Well, what do we do now?” feeling. For people older than me, maybe it isn’t so weird, but Hinckley has been the president of the church since I was five. He was just always there. It was almost as if he was invincible; that he couldn’t die. And then…

Well, it’s almost a time for joy as well as for sadness. His wife missed him.

Other than that, in an influx of spiritual prowess, my Seminary class almost passed our 80% scripture mastery test. The point of this test is so: The class is given a list of twenty-five scripture references (in the Old Testament, this year) and keywords summarizing that scripture. We memorize these and take a fast-paced timed test. The point is for the class average to be 80% or higher. Today, we got…

79.8%

NARG!!! Ah well, I passed the test 100% and so did all the other girls in the class. It was the men that dragged us down. Xp

I’ve also been updating the website a lot. I’ve added the ‘About‘ and ‘Must-See‘ pages, so be sure to check those out when you’ve got time.

Rest in peace, President Hinckley. Our prayers our with you and your successor.

Anyway, I’ve been sitting here for hours waiting for the award ceremony. During that time, I at least got to work on my forum. I had to completely delete and reinstall it last night due to an SQL error and just barely got the categories and forums in it up. There’s really not much there, but now I can at least open the link to it on the main site.

As for the main site, I’m considering learning ow to do frameset XHTML for the sake of my sanity. As it is now, when I edit something on one page–the navigation bar, namely–I have to go in and edit it on all the other pages as well. If I can get frames to work, then it means I only have to edit that one page! It would be so much easier. I’ve already simplified editing my website for the most part, but…well, not all of it.

Besides that, I’m working on saving up money for college and a laptop computer of my own, mostly through scholarships and whatnot. I’ve signed up for a couple, although they involve mostly luck. The one I’m really putting my hopes in is the ‘Writers of the Future’ competition. For that one, I need to write a story less than 17,000 words, which is about…30 pages? NaNoWriMo has messed with my sense of persective so badly that 17,000 isn’t such a big number to me and I’m already 1,700 words or so into it. It’s a new story–completely new–and I don’t even have the slightest idea of where the heck I’m going with it. It’ll be fun!

Well, not a good spot to be blogging. Maybe I can write something more eloquent later.

 Alright, there’s my plug for the day.

 Once again, I’m updating in homework club (Well, not really homework club. I’m just here with Megr while she takes a test). Funny how this place seems like such a good place to update. Even funnier considering that the techs haven’t blocked it yet. *laughs maniacally and proceeds to taunt the techs and their evil Bess the Blocker-Hound*

 By the way, I never asked: How is the design on the main page of my website? I was tired of the old one–it was too dark–but I couldn’t think of a new color scheme. I just went for the colors on the walls of my room because I like them. XD If you guys’ve got any better suggestions, then please, I’d love them. Seriously. I suck at colors! ^^’

 Melissa came and visited! It was a complete surprise! Megr and I were on our way to mutual when she decided to drop off a letter with them to save on postage. As we were pulling out of the driveway, we saw Mel in the doorway! We almost literally tackled her, stayed and talked for a while (consequentally getting myself in trouble with my worry-wart dad) and went to visit her again yesterday with brownies and a miniature version of Prof. She’s finally left teenagerdom since it was her birthday yesterday…Weird. XD

 That–the second time we visited Mel–was after I had taken two hard for BPA. One was for Accounting and it was a DEMON. I’m serious. I thought I was good at accounting until I took that test, and it didn’t help that Mrs. Archibald refused to let me leave her class, giving me half the time required to finish both tests. Each test needed about…a hundred and ten minutes each. I did them both in seventy. The other test–XHTML, which was a dream in comparison–I was able to retake a bit of because the techs–once again, curse them–disallowed viewing html documents on the flaming browser here. So, I redid it on Mom’s computer. And still within the alloted time! HA!

 I had more to say on that topic, but I got side-tracked. Oops. XD

 I’m so sick of school. Really. Our new superintendant (Sorry, no spell-checker) is a farmer at heart, one of those guys who claims “Back in my day, we walked ten miles UPHILL both ways in this sorta snow!”  So, we haven’t gotten a single snow day, despite the fact that Main Street is still coated in three inches of ice and most cars and houses are buried. Not that much of an overstatement, mind you!

 Well, about time to go home! I’m off to work writing and…well, yes, goofing off more. I wouldn’t be me if I didn’t goof off like I do, now would I.

 Alright, so I’ve been sluffing working on my website. Now, however, seems like an awesome time to be working though! I’m currrently sitting in homework club at school–although I don’t need to be, mind you–and I can amazingly enough get to my website from here! Unfortuately, it’s only a matter of time before they attempt to block my website at school for no good reason and any sort of access to it. Hopefully, when and if that happens, I’ll be able to persuade them otherwise.

Anyway, today’s the big year! This year I’m going to try my hardest to edit and finish Forsaken Game. At the moment, I’m working on Chapter Five, Melancholy. For the longest time, I almost completely forgot about what was going on in the chapter and it was very close to sinking into infamy. Now, luckily, we’ve got a pretty decent idea of what it is.

I’m also rereading Paradise? by Melissa Wadsworth. I copied and pasted it onto a word document and took it to my downstairs computer along with about fifty episodes of the D.Gray-Man anime (Also a current obsession).

Heck, it might be easier to just list what I’ve been doing.

• Playing the Wii, of course, mostly Fire Emblem: Radiant Dawn at Blind’s command.
• Playing Ragnarok Online. My Hunter got three levels in one day (New Year’s Eve) and is now level 87!
• Watching D.Gray-Man. For a while, it was turning towards a lousy ‘Akuma of the day’ anime like so many others, but it’s finally going into some recognizable storyline!
• Dragonriders of Pern roleplaying, a lot! Megr and I have started our own Weyr called Westing and we’ve got six other excellent members! <3
• And just school in general. Much loathing. >>’

Maybe one of these days I’ll have a blog entry with an actual topic, eh?