my mental sieve...
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| Evil Wayne my mental sieve... |
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Tuesday, May 29, 2007 Old Skool Gaming Kick There was some online chatter about StarCraft 2 about the video that was showed up last week. That set off some people to be really enthusiastic about it, but--maintaining my previous stance--it looked like more of the same. Booooring. Because I always felt that Total Annihilation was a better multiplayer game, I asked about a demo for the new version, Supreme Commander. Sure enough there is one. I downloaded it and it's pretty good, even if is sort of chugs on my machine when there's a lot going on. (Oddly, TheBoy totally dug it. He loved the idea of making machines build other machines. He actually maxed out the unit cap and, with a little help from his pop, completely obliterated the enemy. He's going to love RTSs when he can really strategize.) This let me to a round of old fashioned TA which is still as good as ever. But after that, I started thinking about StarCraft. Before I knew it, I had it fired up and I was engrossed in the single-player storyline. I forgot how good it actually is. Because the graphics are somewhat dated, I started thinking about other RTS from back in the day. Command & Conquer comes to mind. It was my first exposure to any RTS (it was one of the first, I believe). I was totally blown away at the idea you could build a base, train some soldiers and lead them to war. Even if the soldiers were only about 8 pixels, it looked and played like nothing I had ever seen before. Unfortunately, I have no idea where my original C&C discs were, but I did have my Red Alert discs handy and that's a great game too. I absolutely love the introduction video; back then, I remember being wowed by how much like a movie opening it was; Here, feel the nostalgia. So I played some Red Alert, which runs kind of goofy on XP, but at least it worked. I got into a couple of missions and TheBoy took over. Which was a little better for him; Supreme Commander was frustrating him at times because he had too much going on, but Red Alert was slower and you couldn't queue up 200 units at once (of course, I had to put the computer on Easy, otherwise it would have crushed him in a tank rush). Finally, on our little tour-de-pixel-gaming, I played a round of multiplayer StarCraft with Joe last night. We teamed up against a single computer component and it pretty much kicked my ass. Luckily, I was able to move my Command Center and Barracks before it decimated me and I hid behind Joe's Protoss base, but I never really recovered. Joe pretty much won the game. And that brings us full circle: Multiplayer StarCraft blows. posted by Evil Wayne | 6:49 PM 0 comments Friday, May 25, 2007 New Space I'm now officially in my new space. We did a lot of cleaning and packing up Wednesday and it pretty much came down to, Move Yourself. I filled up five moving crates of garbage and work materials and pushed them to the other side of the building. I had to get rid of stuff that had accumulated over the years. Like my intense banana-sticker collection.  It took another day for my PC to get moved and I have some miscellaneous stuff I still have to put away. They still haven't moved the printers, so any I still have to run to the other side of the building. This cube is bigger, but shorter walls. If I stand up, I can see just over the top. Boooo. There's a ton of draw space that I don't need, I gather this originally was an office manager's cube or something like that. I've got room for two chairs and my desk runs along the whole back wall, around the side and a little island jutting out across the middle. I guess I can interview people if I like. But it's brighter out here and much more noisy. Lots of chatter from all around that a little jarring. More importantly, I'm closer to all the upper echelons of management. A lot closer. Uncomfortably close. I spent seven years in my little, isolated cocoon and now I feel as if I've been thrust into the limelight over here. Unsettling doesn't begin to describe it. posted by Evil Wayne | 10:06 AM 0 comments Tuesday, May 22, 2007 Tired Sweet Jesus am I tired. I haven't slept right for the last few days and it's starting to catch up to me. This is partially my fault. I got sucked into either SE:IV or Second Life over the last few days and was up much later than I should have been. But last night I tried to go to be at some reasonable time (11:30) but I just couldn't fall asleep. I was wide awake until at least 1:30 and probably beyond that. Every time I thought I might be drifting off, something seemed to keep me awake. Right now, I've got that nervous, caffeine-induced alertness that doesn't make me question why I can smell things, like the color green. But I know that sitting here, in front of a computer screen is going to sap the life out of me by midday and probably replace it with a throbbing headache. That's if I'm lucky. If I get particularly unlucky, then I'll get blindsided with a migraine and my brains will spill out all over the desk in explosion of blood and skull. Ha! Take that new people moving in! posted by Evil Wayne | 9:43 AM 0 comments Monday, May 21, 2007 Calling 'em Like I See 'em I wish I had blogged on Friday, because I would look like a freaking psychic now. They're moving all the offices around here at work. Basically, consolidating a two-floor building to one. To that end, every department on my floor was supposed to shift around. Only some did not, and that left us--production--out in the cold. They did build two offices for my boss and the head editor in the area they thought we were going, but none of the cubes over there got moved. Tomorrow my boss and the head editor are supposed to move into those new offices and leave us where we are until they can build the cube structure we were promised. On Friday, I predicted that the people moving into the new offices would want the rest of their department with them ASAP. And that would cause the rest of production to be forced into any empty cubicles as a "temporary" fix, until the proposed cube-struture is actually finished. Only, it would never be finished and we'd just be stuck scattered about. Well, they told us today we are moving to temp cubes by the end of the week. I'm freaking Kreskin. posted by Evil Wayne | 5:15 PM 0 comments Tuesday, May 15, 2007 Archeological Dig They're moving the offices around at work. It's a major round of musical chairs as the entire first floor is moving upstairs with us and the whole company is shifting around. Production is being forced to move over with the rest of the division. They've cut new offices and, allegedly, there's going to be a new cube farm where Order Processing is. Frankly, the whole thing bites. It's too bloody noisy over there and the editors do *not* get offices. At least I've got my iPod (for however long that lasts). But I've been emptying out my cube to get ready for the move. I filled up two recycling bins of paper that's been accumulating in my space. It's a time trip sometimes, coming across papers that FH#2 worked on, or Jill, some stuff marked up from Jen's days, before she left and her office became a landfill. I've got a box that contained all the materials from the first 5 books I worked on. That should have tossed like 4 years ago.  Behind a large stack of paper, I found a desk calendar shoved in the back, still flipped to April 10, 2000. The day I started here. posted by Evil Wayne | 1:38 PM 0 comments Thursday, May 10, 2007 That's Senior Electronic Publisher to You I got the written part of my review today and I, apparently, have an official "Senior" added to my title. While there's absolutely nobody under me (for the general lack of other EPs, of which there are none) and it doesn't really do anything other than add six letters to an already bloated title, it's still neat to finally have Senior attached. I've never been Senior anything. I have been a royal pain-in-the-ass before, but you don't get paid diddly for that. posted by Evil Wayne | 5:23 PM 1 comments Wednesday, May 09, 2007 Watership Down Tine and I sat down to watch a movie last night. It got about 5 minutes into it when we started hearing this thud against the window. This is the same window we use to pass wood in, so it has no screen and the cat uses to get in the house by scratching at it until we let her in. After a minute I got up to look for the cat and sure enough she was bounding on to the sill, but she kept falling off. When I got to the window, she would normally be watching me, but this time she had her back to me, her fur raised slightly. I figured another neighborhood cat might be in yard and she was running for her life. She's kind of wimp. So I quickly opened the window to rescue her. Nala turns and before I can react, she bounds into the house with something in her mouth. Something big. Really big. Holy fuck! I start to think and in my mind I think she's got a squirrel. But it's tail isn't puffy, and before I can finish that thought, I'm shouting, "The cat's got something in her mouth! Jesus Christ it's a fucking rat!" And she's in the house running for the kitchen, I think Tine screams. Without thinking I race after her and she's under the table and she drops it. But my mind is racing, I know what's coming. I know it, because I've never seen a cat bring home anything dead. Just as I reach the kitchen, she drops it and the thing is off and running. It darts under the kid's computer where Mike is sitting and he just about rips the chair out from under him and leaps out of the way. I'm swearing like a drunken sailor. Most of it direct at the fucking cat whom doesn't seem interested in her treat. Apparenlty, Nala retires to the living room and streches out like it's a lazy Sunday. Very quickly I pull all the furniture away from the area. Chairs, the kitchen table, Mike's amp. I need to make room so if it comes out, I can see where the hell its going. I bound up to the hall and throw on my boots and grab some work gloves. I grab a trash bag and start to really worry about what the hell to do. Rats and mice can literally crush themsleves down to fit into tiny areas. This thing is about 1/3 the size of the cat herself. Maybe a little bigger, but that doesn't mean it can't fit into a tiny creves or find a way out that I can't see right away. I swear more. A lot more. I grab the flashlight and start probing under the desk. Meanwhile Tine has a blanket she's got pinned to the hallway to keep it from getting out of the kitchen. She has me close all the doors downstairs. She has Mike get the broom and has him start whacking the china hutch to startle it. I have to make him stop that, because I'm not read should it suddenly appear. Then Tine and Mike switch places and she starts readying herself to smash it. I have to make her stop whacking the floor and the hutch. "I'm not ready goddamn it," I said. I'm really afraid she's going to cause it leap out, probably at me. I keep moving the light and then some of the wires from the computer to get a good look under the desk. I'm so afraid that it's already gotten away somehow. Then I spot it. The light dances off it's glowing red eye. Its head is sticking out from behind the PC on the floor in the corner, just behind this red folder-case we have for manuals. It looks huge. But it's not moving, I'm hoping it's injured enough to keep from darting until I can figure out what the fuck to do. "Flush it out here and I'll smash it," Tine said with this fevered pitch. She whacks the floor with the broom like a baseball player tapping his bat on the plate. Somehow I'm not reassured. For one that broom is a Halloween prop. "Stop it," I say, depserately trying to think of how I can get it into a trash bag. Then she suggests I reach in and grab it. Which doesn't sound that appealing to me. Even if I manage to get my hands on it, I really don't know it can't bite through these gloves. I don't need a round of rabies shots. It still hasn't moved. So I have Tine get me a second trash bag and I slide it under the desk blocking its way out. It doesn't react, so I get bolder and prop open the trash bag with a couple of small cardboard boxes. Now the bag is basically covering the entire underside of the desk, open like a small plastic cave. If it runs, it'll either run out into the open--and at me--or into the bag. Then I take the broom--which I took away from Tine--and start to move the folder-case. As I do, I fully expect the movement to startle it into running. It does not. I start wondering if it's not really injured. Which could be bad. Unpredictably bad. But at the same time, it's ears look a little too big for a rat and I start to wonder. "Holy crap, I think it's a rabbit," I say. Suddenly Tine's demeanor does a 180. "A rabbit? Aww, Don't hurt it." "What?!?" "It's just a poor little bunny, don't kill it." "I don't know it's a rabbit," I remind her, not taking my eyes off it. But it still hasn't moved and it really does look like a small rabbit. "And it's still a wild animal." I decide it's now or never and take the broom by the end and slowly poke it with the handle. Again, I expect it to bolt and again it does not. It does move slightly and now I can tell for sure. "Yeah, it's a rabbit." Another round of don't kill it. At this point, if I can get it out of the house, I'll be more than happy. Another poke and a prod and it leaps out from its hiding spot and I have to make one threatening move to get it to leap into the bag. I quickly scoop up the bag and double check that I've got it closed and that I'm not dumping the rabbit back onto the carpet. Then I bound upstares to the side door. "We should keep the little bunny," Kelly pleads half-heartedly. "It's still a wild animal," I say and open the door. A few steps outside and I'm in the backyard. I walk over to the edge of the yard and dump out the bag. I'm still not 100% convinced it won't bite me given the chance, so I sort of toss the gently onto the ground. I turn around and the cat is there. I chase her away into the front yard so she can't just come back and return her gift to us. After that, I assume the rabbit made it back home to the warren or was eaten by a bengal tiger. "From now on," I told everyone. "We don't let the cat in unless we know for sure she doesn't have anything in her mouth." posted by Evil Wayne | 10:21 AM 2 comments Tuesday, May 08, 2007 Our Con The con came off pretty well, even if it was a low-key affair (apparently much lower than Shaun expected, although I figured there'd at least be a few more players). I got out there Friday afternoon and had a heckuva time finding Shaun at first, thanks to Cingular's stellar and reliably intermittent service. I left about 8 message, including a gorilla-attack message with no reply. Eventually it came together and we hooked up with Hendo at the same time. Unfortunately, they had conveniently left us off the schedule for Friday. Sort of mixed blessing. I was tired, but I would have played Naskart. In the end, we got in on a game of Shadows Over Camelot and that was pretty decent, even if we had no idea what was going on when we started. On Saturday, after Joe, DaveE and Teddy arrived, we set up all of the game in a fairly large room and waited. ... and waited ... and waited... I can't remember which order things happened in, but we got to play a short, zombie-LARP that was amusing then some NasKart action took off right after Versaillespunk got players.   Joe and I got some Gears of War on the XBox 360 in, which seemed less like a shooter game than lots of cinematic cut shots. Seriously, there was this long sequence of fighting that I wanted to do, but the game said, Nooooo. We did get the obligitory game of Outdoor Survival in. Man, that game rocks in a totally sucktastic way.   The Tox Uthat game got the stragglers and while starting with six players, quickly wound down to three then two. That game seemed to have less energy. Or maybe I suck as a GM. Probably a little of both. What I do know is that the aliens I had worked on were a bunch of Hollywood paper mache props, because every time one showed up, it died. I believe that I killed two or three troopers. Whereas they should have been the terror on the ship, they were the laughing stock. Even the final, albino-alien, with his suped-up stats, only killed the medic that opened the door and then died as soon as it was spoken to harshly.   The game ended about 7:30ish. Shaun and I decided not stay out there another night and headed home after having dinner with the rest of the NELUG crew.  Overall, I think we might have been expecting too much. I would do it again, but probably just the Saturday and not stay over. posted by Evil Wayne | 10:29 PM 0 comments Sunday, May 06, 2007 Sequential Today is 05.06.07. This kind of thing only happens once a year until 2014. So you've got another 7 years of this crap. posted by Evil Wayne | 11:02 PM 1 comments Thursday, May 03, 2007 Our Con Prep III Pretty much down to the wire here. I finished up the PDF for the rules this morning, doing some last minute tweaking of the text.  I've finished all but the last module on Tuesday night. Some touch up on the Cargo Bay is still needed, but that shouldn't be too much of an issue. I spent last night putting together the units, which was a wise choice over completing the last module. Turns out putting together the units was much more time-consuming that I expected. It didn't help that a lot of my minifigs are spread out over various bins from previous games. But I managed to put together six, unique squads of four units. Plus I managed to churn out three more aliens for a total of five.  It'll either be a terrifying, turn-by-turn ordeal for the players, or it will end very quickly. posted by Evil Wayne | 1:51 PM 0 comments Tuesday, May 01, 2007 Our Con Prep II The weekend was a bust. I'm not sure exactly what happened, but I wound up with precious little done. A confluence of small events came together to keep me from really blocking out time to get anything seriously accomplished.  I really should be done with all the modules at this point. Instead, I've come a total of 60% more than last time. Here's hoping that tonight I can pull off at least finishing the 40% module. At this point, I don't think I'll get the entire Cargo Bay done. I've got the first level complete (more or less) but I wanted to add a second story. I'll leave that under the: If There's Time heading. There won't be time, but I'll leave it there anyway. posted by Evil Wayne | 1:25 PM 0 comments |
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