nevalis

I work in software for a branch of a major company, but my manager last wrote a program 15 years ago in visual basic, one co-worker can't remember what his software does, and another whose only job is to write documents and do limited QA.

Details for major projects are trickled in during the project timeline, where requirements can change a few times a week. Best of all, the managers are business-centric who maybe took a weekend Microsoft Cert course, so they think they know technology.

Everyone is afraid to question their superiors or that's the excuse given whenever a decision is made that delays a project. (Yeah, I know rebuilding this web-service will set us back a week, but that's what so-and-so decided, my hands are tied). If you question anything, you're told to just do it.

Despite all that, when someone else outside the department plans a project, it's a joy to work, but unfortunately those are very rare.

While I love GDQ's single player videos displaying a mastery of exploits, pixels, frames, and timing, my favorites are by far the races. It has all the wonder of a speed run with an extra layer of tension thrown in. Of course, if one of the runners misses a major glitch, that tension immediately dissipates, but most I've seen have been great. The Super Metroid 4-player race from AGDQ with full commentary was amazing, and I managed to catch yesterday's Megaman X/X2 races which were also really good. The Zelda OoT race started good but a crucial mistake ruined it, but it happens sometimes.

So true. If I'm trying to figure out some workflow or logic, writing it on paper seems more effective even though it's just as easy to use Notepad or Visio. I think it's because I get to take my eyes off the computer screen for a bit so my brain doesn't have to be distracted with all the icons and shit and can focus a bit better.

I liked the foreshadowing...Also the fight was kinda cool.

Fun Fact: The music for Mario Tennis and Mario Golf was composed by Motoi Sakuraba (Tales series, Valkyrie Profile, etc.). Most of the tracks are fairly simple, but his style comes through when the action picks up.

Also, there's an NES game called Base Wars which is similar in concept (RPG elements in a baseball game). However, the twist is you can't get tagged out, you enter combat. You earn cash and use it on upgrades for your players such as weapons, and stronger hitting/pitching. It's actually pretty awesome.

I thought the Fort fights would be pretty boring, but then I found myself in the midst of a fort battle, when a massive storm approached. Now I'm trying to dodge mortar shots, rogue waves, and water spouts, Then a pirate hunter ship came in for good measure, because why not.

Capturing that fort was one of the most awesome and intense gaming experiences in a long while. Stick with it a bit. Once you get a few upgrades and start sailing into more dangerous waters, the action picks up.

Ys: Memories of Celceta is a pretty awesome action JRPG. The story is nothing new, but the music and game play are top notch. After finishing the game in about 25 hours, I immediately started new game + in Nightmare mode, and I rarely go back to a game right after finishing it, let alone an RPG.

It's not so much the album that gets ruined from overplay for me, it's when the content that a band produces starts sounding mostly the same that I move on. For instance, I often listen to Metallica's Master of Puppets album or Chicago's Chicago II in their entirety, but their later albums I couldn't care less for. Then again, most bands that span several decades tend to go that route.

At first I didn't think I'd try for the 'Hard to the Core' achievement in Dead Space 2, but by the time I finished up Zealot mode, I figured what the hell. As already mentioned, the difficulty isn't as hard, but there are plenty of easy death spots that can erase hours of progress. It was a good challenge.

My favorite achievement that just kinda happened was 'The Undying' in World of Warcraft back during tWotLK, which required beating the entire 10-man Naxxramas raid with no one dying. It was a standard farm run, and by the time we got to Sapphiron everyone realized what was going on but said nothing, much like no one talking to a pitcher during a no-no. When we took down Kel'thuzad, it was a rush akin to Vanilla WoW raiding.

I had a similar situation with my Vita purchase in October. Basically, I got the Walking Dead bundle for $200 and 18 days later, a new bundle was released that was $180 AND came with a 8GB card. I called up Best Buy to exchange it and they said the return policy is 15 days so no luck. I tried to negotiate with the manager for store credit and/or just an even exchange without any credit but he wouldn't budge.

I was annoyed, but kept my cool and simply accepted my poor timing. Now I'm more diligent when it comes to gaming deals and it's been paying off. Just recently I was able to pick up Lumines: Electronic Symphony on the Vita for $7 when just Monday it was $26 even though I don't think it was formally announced in the big PSN sale.