Kept After Class

Wednesday, March 10th, 2010 | Author: Nightmaren

Spring break! It's like obtaining a glimpse of Summer Vacation... A friendly reminder to hang in there!

So you guys know that I am a first year year college student– Meaning that I am fairly new to this lifestyle. Back in high school and middle school, it would always be the same thing: Wake up at 6:20 AM and arrive in class before the first bell would ring at 7:30 AM. It’s [shockingly!] a tad different in college… Everyone I know has a screwed up sleeping schedule one way or another. Of course when I see these people, I think to myself, “Such a thing could never happen to me! How could I possibly mess up my sleeping habits?” By going on Spring Break early, that’s how.

Don’t get me wrong, I haven’t become a lazy student or anything. I guess you can say that I have been giving myself a taste of what is to come during Spring Break. This usually consists of me staying up a little late to spend a few minutes on a game or to play with a scrap of code. Yesterday, (and the last few days actually) I spend a little more time than a “few minutes.” I have been staying up to about 1 or 2 AM actually just messing around. My half-sleepy mind would think, “It’s okay! I’ve done all my homework so I can enjoy for a few hours~.” My awake mind would want to smack my half-sleepy mind in the mornings.

So last night was not much different… Consistent with the past few days, I had a bit of difficulty sleeping. Maybe it is because my brain is still semi-consciously doing whatever I was doing before going to sleep. I set my alarm for 6:45 AM simply because I want to get up early, because I know that once I get up and running, the sleepiness goes away.

Also on par with the last few days, I wake up approximately thirty minutes before my class starts. My body seems to “know” the absolute latest it can sleep till– Whether I have a 9:30 or 11:30 class in the morning, it always squeezes the last bit of sleep out of me, causing me to miss breakfast and head directly to class after showering. This practice does not bode well with me; I hate having to start the day without breakfast. Since today was no different, I wanted to break this trend by running to the dining hall and grabbing a glass of soy milk before heading to Chemistry Lecture.

Today was a rather gloomy morning. As I ran through the campus, wanting to not be too late to my class, I felt that it was rather clammy outside. There was no sunshine to be found either… the sky was just an off-white with a thin layer of fog obscuring it. The weather needs to seriously make up its mind in Dallas; it was completely sunny outside yesterday. The campus itself seemed sleepy as well– there was barely anyone to be seen. At this point, I began to wonder if my class started at 9:00 AM rather than 9:30 AM. Though it was a few minutes past 9:30, I would have still seen a few people such as myself who were struggling to reach the lecture hall in time. I never was good at times. As I saw a girl coming out of the dining hall, I breathed a sigh of relief; it was just one of those days where the whole campus moves at a sluggish pace.

As I reached the dining hall, people seemed to be fairly quiet as well. It’s pretty amazing how much the weather can affect people. As I quickly downed a glass of milk in front of the pantry, I glanced at my watch to make sure that I was [fairly] on schedule. It was only five minutes past 9:30… Pretty good! I mentally set a goal for myself to arrive at Hoblitzelle Hall before 9:40 AM. As I broke out into a brisk jog, (which was annoying since I had a backpack on) I let my mind wander a bit (which always produces interesting results). Perhaps it was due to the fact that my body thought I would run out of energy, but my mind invoked flashbacks of Professor Quirrell running into the Hogwarts dining hall exclaiming “Troll in the dungeons!” shortly before collapsing. Maybe that’s why I began to walk (albeit speedily) to class instead.

As I approached the classroom doors, I panted for a moment and figured I would slowly open the doors so as not to look like yet another fool arriving late to class. This did not happen for one reason or another. I guess my body just wanted to get into the room as soon as possible. As I felt the whoosh of airs from the doors, I turned my attention to the front of the room … which was completely empty. It was pretty dramatic actually, with the gentle hum of electrical equipment interrupting the dead silence of the room… I had imagined frantic music playing as I hurried to class.

Being one who is good in impromptu and emergency situations, a number of explanations ran through my head. Was there a campus-wide intruder alert? Was class cancelled due to unforeseen circumstances? Was class actually supposed to end at 9:50 AM and I somehow took too long? Upon doing this, I looked at my watch and actually took the time to read the entire time.

7:38 AM.

At this point, everything fell into place. The reason I had not noticed earlier was because I am so used to just looking at the minutes section of my digital watch. As for getting out of bed at all? I suspected that in my sleep, I set it two hours ahead on accident.

After grabbing a proper breakfast and obtaining a puzzled look from the staff member who lets students in, I headed back home. Sure enough, my alarm clock was two hours ahead. I’m a bit confused how I could have possibly done this in my sleep though. See, my clock is one of those clocks which automatically sync their times from somewhere, only requiring the user to set the tiny switch at the bottom of the clock to the appropriate timezone.

Once I'm awake, I can power through the... whole... day...yy...Zzzzz...

I wonder how I succeeded in flipping this switch to Atlantic Standard Time… I must have been completely strangling the thing. The fact that I keep my bedroom locked rules out the possibility of someone else doing it for me too.

Oh well. I guess this will eventually be filed under “college memories” but it was a rather strange way to start the day. I sometimes read about pranks or mistakes causing people to go to school on Saturday or something, but never have I done anything like that. I think I’ll blame this one on Spring Break not coming quickly enough! Ah well, school only persists until this Friday. After that, I will have a wonderful week of no classes which I’m sure will cause me to forgive Mr. Spring Break.

Well, I’d stay and chat more, but I should go to class. It’s a rather nice sunny day today, and I wouldn’t want to be late!

Category: Everyday Life | Tags: College | Leave a Comment

Better Raise Some of My Class Skills

Wednesday, March 03rd, 2010 | Author: Nightmaren

So here’s a topic I haven’t really touched in a while: MMOs. What? That’s all I talk about? Nonsense! I simply don’t tend to post other things on here!

As a busy student, I really do not have time to dedicate to MMOs anymore. Lately, I have just been focusing on time-killer games on the PSP or elsewhere. A few days ago, my room mate asked me why I bother with MMOs. While they too were a gamer, they simply could not understand my fascination with MMOs compared to other games such as first person shooters. Their rationale was that in MMOs, becoming “better” consists more of leveling/grinding rather than actually improving one’s skill. Thus, it is not easy to tell just how much one is getting “better” at the game.

While I believe this a valid point, I also believe this argument to be a narrow one. If you think of a game like Bioshock or Half-life 2, can you honestly say you are getting “better” at the game? What I mean is, isn’t fighting splicer after splicer or combine after combine “grinding” in itself? Sure there are no experience points or numbers, but isn’t picking up a new weapon or something the equivalent of leveling up?

Ok so maybe it is a little difficult to juxtapose the two. What I am saying is this: Skill level-wise, it is difficult to judge one’s skill level since in both cases, the character himself is getting stronger– Be it though experience points or new weapons. The real test of skill comes when you go against other people in multiplayer mode or *cough* in PvP in MMOs.

The argument my room mate presented that MMOs don’t let a gamer’s skill increase is thus really too narrow a statement in scope: In any game, the real test of skill level starts when one is faced against human opponents.

MMOs tend to be more tactical oriented, especially since large groups need to have plans for different scenarios against different monsters. While other multiplayer (versus) games require teamwork, the objective is largely to survive and kill the opposing team. Each requires skill… They just require different types of skill.

Perhaps the biggest difference between MMOs and other games (gameplay-wise) is the lack of validation of one’s accomplishments. In most games, you have a score or mission you need to clear in order to gain progress. I’m sure that for a lot of people, such checkpoints are real ego boosters that illustrate how far that they have come. In MMOs, you don’t really get such things, making the grind seem more tedious than it really is. If one requires such validation, they can usually go find a field boss or spawn that they would not beat before and defeat it to see how far they have come, but most people don’t do this solely for that purpose. Perhaps since I am the type of person who rarely needs their ego stroked or who tends to look at many things in a black/white set of rules, I don’t require such validations and can thus enjoy an MMO far more.

Of course, there are various other aspects of an MMO that must be utilized if one truly wants to enjoy it. Too many people try to solo an MMO and go “this sucks!” a few hours later. It’s astonishing how few people understand that the whole point of an MMO is to be social and team up to face challenges. Only when one battles together in a group can one see the skill and tact required to effectively play an MMO.

Category: Gaming | Tags: MMO | One Comment

A Winter Spent With Friends

Friday, February 12th, 2010 | Author: Nightmaren

The last time I posted anything here was when I came home from college during winter break. You know how it is when school starts again– Back to the grind. It’s been busy, but I have been meaning to post some of my recent experiences here though. I’m sure many of you know by now that the college life has really been a new experience for me. Accordingly, I am sure that this winter will be something I won’t forget.

When winter holiday was finally over, my friend Charlie and I drove back up together to Dallas. We were each busy with our own families over the break so we had not talked much, so it was a nice opportunity to catch up during the long car ride. The ride went significantly faster this time around, even after stopping at Subway (because we did not want to think about Dining Hall food after having Home-made food for weeks). When we finally did reach the campus, it was still surprisingly empty. We had arrived the Friday before school started so we figured that most people would come back during the weekend. After helping Charlie take his stuff to his apartment (he’s my neighbor after all) and tipping him $10 (since his service was free, that’s like a billion percent tip!), I went straight to my bedroom and fell asleep on my bed.

I had been the first in my apartment to arrive home, so it still was a few days until the rest of my room mates came home. In the mean time, I met some of my other friends and enjoyed talking to them after a while (everyone seemed to be in good spirits).

Our apartment complex covered in snow

Life quickly seemed like it would resume as it left off when we went to Charlie’s apartment to play video games. Eventually, my most favored room mate came home (lazily, on the last possible day with no buffer days between school) but I was still happy to see them. First thing I did next morning was to go in to their room and give them a hug– We had just become that close over the last semester.

I was also surprised to find out that my friend Linh had brought Christmas presents for everyone~! Perhaps some of us were expecting it because she was doing Christmas shopping, but I know I certainly was not expecting her to buy me a present too. I know that it was an exciting experience for me, since I had never had such a Christmas with such good friends. After a few false starts (due to not everyone being there), the day for opening presents finally arrived. Prior to this, our presents had been sitting under the “tree” in Charlie’s apartment (meaning next to the couch). I was impressed with the amount of things Linh bought for all of us: A Nerf pistol set for all of us (effectively starting a war between us), A gift card for Charlie’s room mate, A K’Nex building set for Charlie (he is an engineer), A DeviantArt laptop bag plus a yo-yo for my room mate, A Blair cell phone swing for me (One of my favorite characters from Soul Eater), A surge protector (since my computer was previously damaged in an electrical storm), and a K-On mouse pad featuring Yui + Azunyan.

If you knew us, you would see that Linh pretty much pegged our interests/needs with her presents. It really did resemble the classic “Christmas Day” scene that you would see on TV with the kids tearing off the wrapping paper on their presents and playing with their toys right away. It really made my day. I’m a bit disappointed Linh caught me off guard however since I did not have anything to give her.

The field behind the Residence Hall looked like a primary school courtyard with everyone playing in the snow

I’ll have to put a lot of thought into next year’s present~

Speaking of presents, Rimu-chan (from the IRC channel I frequent) gifted me Counter Strike: Source as a present too. I have known the people in my channel for a while now and I was happy that Rimu considered me a good enough friend to get me something (and remember me during my periods of absences from the channel). Accordingly, I had sent some of my closer friends from the channel Holiday wishes.

Since then, life went on as normal as far as school work and studies went. Yesterday however, I woke up and saw inches of snow sitting on the ground. This is most unusual for Dallas as it never snows that much. But yesterday, it snowed all day causing classes to be cancelled after 3:00 PM. Texas rarely ever sees snow, and for a lot of people the record-breaking snowfall was a very pleasant surprise. The campus looked really beautiful and many people were building snowmen and taking pictures. One wouldn’t really be able to tell, but I was happy about the snowfall too.

I declined however when it came to playing in the snow. Or rather I tried, but didn’t really get into it and ended up feeling out of place. I must say that this genuinely annoyed me that I did not feel the same as everyone else but I simply could not help it. I did however realize that the weather would be nice for playing more intensive MMOs on my computer as it would help in preventing my computer from over heating. I spent most of the day doing this, sleeping, and working on homework. Thus, you can imagine my annoyance when I found out school was cancelled today (a Friday). While I was grateful for the unexpected long weekend, a disruption in my school routine really bothers me (I’m not exactly sure why). That, and the fact that I spent a good deal of time working on something that would have been due today, only to find that it is now due next week.

Though I suppose I really should forget about all that and actually play in the snow like a normal person. I’m not sure what it was that prevented me from doing so. Maybe it was the fact that there were so many people outside (which tends to make me feel uncomfortable) or the feeling that I was not having “fun” like everyone else (which really did bother me).

A park area around Jonsson and Green Halls looked beautiful during the night time

While I am fairly used to this routine whenever people play outside in general, (I feel out of place and awkward despite my best efforts) I guess it annoyed me that I was not able to enjoy something like school-cancelling snowfall in Dallas to its full extent.

I will say that it was rather peaceful watching the snow from my window while playing Final Fantasy VII. Maybe my friends felt something was up… I’m not sure. I know I tend to underestimate the amount my friends can “read” me at times. At any rate, my friend asked me to go outside and take pictures with her around 10:00 PM. I was a little surprised (why?) and almost declined the offer. I reconsidered however and agreed… I like how the Earth appears during the night time anyways. We ended up walking around in the snow for a bit and met up with Charlie and Cameron’s friends building Kamina (from Gurren Lagann) out of the snow. (It looked pretty good too). After lingering for a bit, we walked towards the park area near the lecture halls and took pictures of the snow covered trees against the night sky. The campus really did look like a “winter wonderland” covered in snow.

It was also nice to see the campus guards patrolling the area. They warned us to stay out from under trees since some of the branches were breaking due to the snow’s weight. After sticking around a few more minutes, we went home to appreciate the usefulness of portable heaters. Say what you will, but I had fun.

In all, I really think that this winter season will be one that I will remember for a long time. For me, winter usually means staying inside and doing stuff, rather than spending time with friends. This year was different, and a nice change in some ways.

Samee looks so happy standing under the canopy of snow covered trees... and unknowingly stepping on the plants underneath! D:

Category: Everyday Life, Reflection | Tags: College, Snow | 3 Comments

Back to Basics

Tuesday, January 19th, 2010 | Author: Nightmaren

Well it had to be done eventually I suppose. Last night I got a chance to speak with Chii as to how things are going for her. As usual, she is really busy and has devoted herself to studies. It was her request that she be demoted from an author to a subscriber-reader at Kept After Class since she does not know when her inactivity-trip will end.

It is a little sad to see someone like her let go. Chii was the first poster on this blog about her resignation at EuphRO2 and has been one of the more active posters. (Sadly I cannot say the same about myself). However, this is something Chii feels she needs to do and that she just cannot maintain herself on the server/gaming “scene” she was once a part of. We’re students after all– One day our lives will take shape and then…

In short, I wanted to wish Chii good luck and let our readers know the current state of things. I know things have been slow here lately, but I hope to bring you guys some good articles moving forward.

On a side note, I wanted to notify you guys that I have been changing my online handle to Nightmaren lately. Don’t worry, it’s still me… I just would like to use that name on this blog as well, since I use it in many other places.

Category: Reflection | Tags: School | 2 Comments

Home Again

Friday, December 18th, 2009 | Author: Nightmaren

So it’s finally over… A semester of college gone in an instant. At last, I am finally back at home in a comfortable room, a soft bed, and a clean house that still has that newly constructed smell. Still though, at the same time I feel… away from home. As I fall back into routine at my own house, I cannot help but think about my apartment back in Dallas, and the friends I met there.

So yesterday was the first “official” day of Winter Holiday. People had been leaving earlier when their exams would finish, but I had the misfortune of having exams until the very last school day. My neighbor and I had planned on going home together since we live within 25~ish minutes of each other, and he was nice enough to wait for me to finish my exams. At the same time, another one of my friends would be joining us because the person who would have dropped her before was unable to do so. The plan was for us to drive to Brenham to drop her off, then all the way to the Houston area to drop me off in Sugar Land and for my neighbor to return to Houston. When we planned the trip a few nights before, Google Maps said that it would be about a six hour drive to Houston, not taking going to Brenham into account. Obviously, we were in for a long ride.

Yesterday morning seemed to be the day of departure for most of my friends. The campus was already beginning to feel empty as students began to go home to their families. It was an odd feeling… as I began to leave to meet up with my neighbor in the morning, I decided to stop by at my room mate’s bedroom, just to say my goodbyes. We both talked a bit about the semester flying by and just kinda took in the moment– It was pretty sad to see us packing and carrying our luggage. We both agreed that it was only temporary, and that it would be much worse in the Spring semester when we would go home for the Summer, but still… It really hit me how close we had become.

The car ride was long, as expected. We left at 8:00 AM and began to head to Brenham. My neighbor is a good driver so the car ride was enjoyable. My friend slept in the back for most of the time and I basically talked nonsense with my neighbor to pass the time. When we finally reached Brenham, we stopped at Jack-In-The-Box to get lunch since it had probably been three and a half hours then. They had some nice smoothies/milkshakes since Brenham is where the Blue Bell ice cream factory is so, of course, everything had “real” ice cream in it. When we finally dropped off my friend, we stopped at a gas station to refill, then finally headed off to Houston. I can’t say that it was a very eventful drive, but it certainly was nice to see the familiar Houston area again.

I… don’t know, it’s strange. When I came to college, I was planning on only regarding my room mates and such as people I would be seeing often because they would be in the same dwelling as me. I suppose that was an uneducated mindset. Now that I have actually lived with people I do not know, I have really grown close to them, as I’m sure they have too. I’ve never really allowed anyone to get to know me very well before this. I mean, I’ve had friends but hmm… This just is different to me. I guess it’s different when you live your everyday life with people.

I guess, what I’m trying to say is that I’m very happy to have met you guys and I will be glad to meet you again! I definitely had a good first semester and I hope that I will have a great time moving forward as well.

Category: Everyday Life, Reflection | Tags: College, Family | 3 Comments

Time For a Change

Tuesday, December 08th, 2009 | Author: Vyers

Hey guys,

I know a lot of you must not know me that well… I haven’t nearly attained some of the community-attention that Sonic and Chii have but I still have had my share of experiences =). I know I have slowed in my postings, but I think I’m going to go ahead and call it quits here. Don’t get me wrong!– I’ve had a great time, even if it was limited. I’ll definitely be hanging around as a follower… I just won’t be posting anymore. I have spoken with Autumnal and she agreed that I can even take a sort of “back seat” if I want and help out with the site layout and stuff like that. You can’t get rid of me that easily! (Or maybe you like having me around, eh Autumns? ;D )

But yeah, this is something that I’ve been meaning to do. You know how sometimes online names become stale after a while. Heck, my name is a character off Disgaea… virtually no creativity there.~ I think I’ll take a break, hang around, and go off on my own journey after a while to return as a different person. Who knows? I might even come back as the Vyers character you know… I know Ultimate Sonic’s creator abandoned the name for a while. He came back when he realized that the screen name was a part of him, and changing it meant losing his identity.

So with that, I bid you farewell, but not goodbye~ Thanks you guys for the wonderful time and keep on sharing those memories! I’ll be lurking to see the future of Kept After Class … perhaps you might even add a new author… I know Autumnal was contemplating this and had a few people in mind…

(Ha ha… Poor Maxine is gonna cry editing my post… She always hated editing mine the most~!)

Category: Reflection | Tags: Journey | 10 Comments

~Memorable Days

Thursday, November 26th, 2009 | Author: Nightmaren

A few months ago, I reached an important point in my life and went off to college, living with complete strangers. I am sorry for taking so long to update, but as promised, I am here with my thoughts about college life.

Some insightful friends of mine mentioned that the quality of people’s lives depends on their perception of how they are living. In all honesty, I hear idioms stating such things all the time. Thus, while thankful for their encouragement, I silently shrugged off their statements as words being said as per social protocol. However, I am delighted to report that they were indeed correct. Perhaps it’s because I never really had a chance to stay in one place and interact the way I have with people in college, but sometimes I take a step back and look at my life in college and am amazed at how much my life has changed.

As I wrote about in my previous post, I sometimes felt that my life was lacking after watching some types of anime, especially those of the “slice of life” or “school days” genre. It’s not so much because I’m unhappy because of my day to day experiences, on the contrary… such genres just remind me of an idealized way of living that would be difficult for me to emulate; A juxtaposition that I simply cannot help but make sometimes. However, if you recall, I also stated in the same post that I would try to become a more “involved” person. Again, I’m not in the least dissatisfied with myself, I am simply striving to become a better person and participate more (within reason) in society. All that being said, my college experience thus far has been fantastic, with new experiences around every corner. As I sit here at my comfortable desk with my heater on this cold Dallas night, I can’t help but think that years later I will look at this post again and recall the importance of this experience to my life.

So my first impression of college is that there is always something happening on campus. In all honesty, I came to college with an intent to look out for myself and take care of myself, ready to treat other people the same way I would treat them in high school: temporary peers whom I might message on MSN sometimes if I like their company.

My roomie's room, plus a Cameron. Top: Before, Bottom: After. Not much progress in cleaning... Note the empty bowls of noodles and the "I give up" demeanor of the bottom photo.

I mean, when I wasn’t moving to a different school every year, that’s how we would “hang out” and sometimes go over to each others’ houses to play games or something. I soon came to realize that the people I call my friends at my campus were much more than what my traditional definition described. I don’t know… When I first entered my apartment and saw everyone standing there, I was indifferent. Polite, but indifferent. Having gone to so many different schools, such an experience was routine for me. Though, I guess something about living with your friends just naturally causes you to grow more attached to each other. Of course, I can only speak for myself, but that’s how it is for me.

If any of my friends do see this blog entry, I hope you’ll forgive me for excluding your names. It’s nothing personal, but I don’t know how comfortable you would be with your name on a public blog since I more or less didn’t ask for your permission. Though, if you want, feel free to comment about anything that pertains to you… I won’t mind if you don’t ^^. But yeah- I’ve never lived with people other than my family before… even temporarily. It’s a little interesting (or frustrating, take your pick) seeing other peoples’ lifestyles. Take my one of my room mates’ bedrooms for example: As soon as you walk in, you wonder why there is a dumpster connected to the rest of the apartment. It’s just always been like that since day one… clothes scattered everywhere with random items thrown about the floor. At one point, my roomie was telling me how they keep finding broken hangers all over the room because people keep stepping on them on accident. Oddly enough, at one point that room used to be the un-designated “hang out” spot in our apartment- Perhaps the magnitude of the mess was so epic that people just wanted to bask in its presence.

In all seriousness, that particular roomie is probably one of my closest friends on campus. We have a lot of common interests, being both internet people and were raised from a similar lifestyle. Our mysterious fourth room mate is still as mysterious as ever as they tend to spend more time with some of their other friends rather than us. Of course, I’m not criticizing them for this fact at all- In fact, I would be in no position to do so anyways. See, all this has been a big change for me. I’m not one who likes to leave my apartment a lot or hang out with my friends too long; It’s just how I am. Initially, my friends would get a tad annoyed at the fact that I would never join them in anything they would do, but eventually they came to realize my nature and gave me my space. Since then, I have been going out with my friends more (at my discretion of course), possibly because I have become more comfortable with them. After a while, a sort of routine was established when it came to deciding when to eat lunch and with who. Eventually, a sort of group materialized, consisting of my apartment, our neighbors and some friends from other apartment buildings.

After the first few weeks or so, the time between then and now feels like a sort of blur to me, possibly because I was exposed to so many experiences at once. I can’t say that I can organize my thoughts well in this post, but I can certainly try. I guess the biggest thing that’s changed for me is the fact that I experience a good deal of other peoples’ lives alongside mine. Of course, when things happen in a friend’s life and they need my help, I’m willing to do so as I am sure they would for me (no matter how idiotic they sometimes act). I mean take my room mate with the disastrous room: Counting today, they’ve officially lost their wallet three times with us helping to look for it every time. The first time, the wallet wasn’t actually lost but instead dropped its contents in some unknown place, causing my roomie to replace everything in it (a student ID and a debit card). One of our friends who lives in another apartment building (but would always be over at our place) was generous enough to purchase them a new wallet… one that would actually hold its contents. We thought that this would solve things until they lost their wallet again. As we all mentally face-palmed, we searched for the missing wallet until it’s found… in the very bedroom of its owner. Of course, this episode did not prompt my roomie to clean the room. This lack of action really didn’t help when the bloody wallet was lost a third time right before Thanksgiving holiday. As another frantic search ensued (this time catalyzed by the fact that the dining halls were closing soon) you can imagine how hard we wanted to smash our heads against the wall when my roomie’s brother calls in order to report the missing wallet’s sighting. I… I just don’t know.

You know, after that initial cleaning, we never cleaned our apartment again. Though sometimes the Cleaning Fairy (A.K.A. Friend from the building over) stops by and does it for us out of sheer frustration.

Speaking of messy habitations, our apartment at the time was not stellar looking either. In fact, it had boxes and random things thrown about everywhere half due to the amusement of it all and half because nobody wanted to clean it. When the day for room mate agreements finally came, (a month into the semester pretty much) we basically stood outside our Residence Advisor’s apartment waiting for her to come back because nobody booked a time slot before hand. At midnight, she comes into our apartment and basically does her job. Being someone who likes to sleep on a decent sleeping schedule, I went to sleep. However, my room mates apparently went crazy and cleaned the entire apartment until around 1:00 AM. Why? I do not know. I only know that I could not recognize my apartment when I crawled out of my bedroom the next morning (until I saw the kitchen… no one dares set foot in there).

Hmm… What can I say? Things are just different for me, and I am having difficulty putting them into words. If anything, this blog entry will just invoke memories, but I’ll try my best to convey them. See, none of my room mates have a car, so our neighbor is the one who drives us every place. Basically, whenever he wants to go to Walmart or something, we tag along and get whatever we need to. I also like the fact that his preferred time to go places is at night time… I simply love riding in the back of the car and seeing all the street lights at night. I don’t know, but sometimes when I come out of Walmart at night with my friends, I just think to myself, “Dang… this is such a real life thing to do.” I know, it’s weird! But seriously, I just feel in awe at my life [now] sometimes. Not to mention that going to Walmart with friends is a whole lot more fun than going by yourself. There’s nothing like distracting your friends who are still checking out by standing past the cashiers doing the Caramelldansen with maximum ridiculosity.

The Caramelldansen has been a recurring thing with me actually- I think it’s due to the hyperness of being exposed to the moonlight or something. We formed a sort of tradition where we always go to the Chili’s restaurant after every Chemistry test. It happened originally because the dining halls would be closed after the test so the whole lot of us would be irritated (because of the test) and hungry… not fun. Well the first time we went to the restaurant, I remember that I was proud of myself because I did the Caramelldansen at the waitress when her back was turned and I smoothly put my hands behind my head when she turned around. Don’t ask me why… I honestly could not answer why. Though I’d also like to note that whenever we pay our bills, being the nerd that I am, I always try to spell something with my tip like 1337 or something. I later found out that the standard rate that one should tip is 15%… oops =(

Yup… I am pretty inexperienced when it comes to these “real-world” sorts of things, but I get through it. I try my best however and try to be as polite as possible when in a good state of mind. Thank goodness that I haven’t made any serious mistakes like losing my apartment keys like my friend from another apartment building did once. If that was not bad enough, their room mates’ parents were coming to visit (or something like that) so their room mates were not able to let them into their apartment. Since I knew they would probably do the same, I let them stay in my room until they were able to retrieve their keys on Monday (this happened on a Friday, I believe). It was an odd and honestly a little funny experience because of the sheer amount of fail going on. Oh well- it worked out in the end. As soon as she got back on her feet, everything was back to normal.

Such is my life here at college, and I am enjoying how different it’s been. Running home in the rain at night because we forgot an umbrella, having my roomie sit in my room and talk about what’s happening back home, playing games in the ATEC building… every experience has felt like a scene from an anime or a comic book. My friends who commented on my last post were right; Life’s experiences are how one views them. I came to college with an open mind, and my first semester is almost over. I had a great time that I honestly cannot convey, but I have a feeling that these experiences will become more routine in the coming years. Nevertheless, I’m glad that I have great friends and a great opportunity to learn at this college.

If you’ve been reading until now, take a moment to look at the structure of this post. Sure the content is important, but look at the haphazard structure of my storytelling and my constant interruptions. I told you that I’m overwhelmed with the sheer amount of new experiences with this new life style… clever, no?

Category: Everyday Life | Tags: College, School | 4 Comments

eAthena: Doing too Good of a Job?

Sunday, September 20th, 2009 | Author: Ultimate Sonic

As you all know, I was once an avid Ragnarok Online player. I know I revisit the topic a lot, but people have the tendency to keep a special place in their hearts for their “firsts.” In my case, Ragnarok Online was my first MMO… ever. Especially for some of us online-regulars, you might be able to see the significance of such a thing. Perhaps my memories of the game are romanticized by now, but never have I had such a great time on an MMO since then.

…But enough about that. As you may know, there are a number of different softwares available to run a Ragnarok Online server. The Aegis and eAthena softwares are the most prominent, with the exclusion of Freya which is now defunct. While the three emulators all have a purpose to run Ragnarok Online, they take different spins on their approaches, namely with the way customizations are handled. For my purposes, I will briefly discuss the Freya and Aegis emulators before talking about eAthena, which is undoubtedly the most popular one today.

When I first started playing Ragnarok Online on EuphRO, I recall that it ran the Freya emulator. Now, I’m not really in a position to fully discuss the pros and cons about Freya because quite frankly, I did not know anything about the game back then… I think I recall a /botcheck command included by default, which was a nice touch but I also heard that it did not work very well. I’m not even sure if eAthena was around at the time as I know that EuphRO was using Freya because it was free rather than the disputed Aegis. At any rate, Freya was a fairly wide-used emulator at the time and I believe that the efforts of its team is worth noting. On April 26, 2007, the Freya project was discontinued and the developers passed the torch to the eAthena community.

The Freya Emulator project has been discontinued. The forums/mantis bug tracker no longer exist. The SVN repository however is still available here:

https://ookoo.org/svn/freya/

Thanks to all the developers making the Freya project possible, including Yor, MagicalTux, Proximus, Mikeyboy, and the rest. May Freya live on in our memories.

- Tsuyuki, Head Administrator of the Freya Project

All the while developers were feverishly working on other Ragnarok Online emulators, there was one that readily existed, and matched almost exactly with the official Ragnarok Online software. Aegis was a server software created by Hakkyu Kim for Gravity Corporation, the developers of Ragnarok Online. Why is that significant? Because Aegis was eventually leaked to the community by several teams who had compromised official Gravity computers. Thus, apart from the occasional missing SQL entry, Aegis was identical to the official software, meaning those with the software could easily run a server with all the features the official servers contained.

If the community is in possession of the actual server software, everything is all set, right? Well actually, Gravity makes regular revisions to its software to add more game functionality or content; These are the “episodes” that are released on a regular basis. In addition to that, many server owners were afraid of the legal repercussions associated with using private software as the legality of the code was a grey area. Also, I understand that it was difficult to add too much custom content, at least at the time and the process could be much simpler on a server emulator built from scratch. As a result, other software emulation developers sought to create a better emulator- one that was much more efficient than the sloppy Aeigis code.

Eventually, the focus shifted onto eAthena. The eAthena software was coded in C++ and was built with user friendliness in mind. The emulator comes with a multitude of custom commands, along with the [now] staple @autoloot and @autotrade commands to enhance playing experience. Needless to say, eAthena’s customizeable structure attracted a lot of users, and ultimately map developers, spriters, and other modifiers to make available different customizations for people to add to their servers. As a result, eAthena is the most widespread emulator for private Ragnarok Online servers, with regular updates to accommodate the ever changing official Korean servers.

eAthena did a good job… the first software anyone goes to for Ragnarok Online servers. But do you think its possible to have done too much off a good job? No offense to the developers, but I truly wish they hadn’t touched a few things as I feel they are altering the gameplay.

Let’s start from the top. Server owners are interested in attracting people; As a result, they must (reasonably) cater to the players. Players are interested in becoming better than others with minimal effort… at least most of them are. Emulators are supposed to provide a gameplay environment similar to the official game, with customizations for events or to fix problems the official servers refuse to fix. Now, players enjoy the idea of super high experience rates, @autoloot (items go directly to inventory when monster is killed), @go (teleport to another town), and dual clienting (running two client instances at the same time). While these aspects do not reproduce official game play, this is what [most] players want and server owners enable these features to keep them interested. In turn, the player population is interested in supporting the server by donating to aid server costs. In order to encourage donators, most server owners offer incentives such as custom items or normal items with enhanced stats, giving the donator an advantage over normal players. Thus, the vicious cycle of gameplay-affecting customizations turns, resulting in a game that is by name Ragnarok Online, but must clearly be something different.

It's difficult to see true frolicking like this anymore.

As such, I prefer the only other available alternative, Aegis, whenever I look for a server. Even so, Aegis tends to be outdated as binaries must be taken through Gravity computers for it to be incorporated into private servers. eAthena has done a great job, and is very secure and stable, but its simplicity can also be viewed as a negative aspect. eAthena is so easy to set up in fact, that even a 10 year old can simply download the software and run the *.bat file to have a fully functional Ragnarok Online server. As a result, there are so many Ragnarok Online servers, making it difficult to tell which ones are reputable and which ones are there just for their owners’ egos.

The staggering amount of customizations found on servers is my main gripe whenever I search for a Ragnarok Online server to play on, and is my main obstacle from starting the game again. Sure, I can go play on the official servers, but I also feel the need to express my disappointment at the extent such features have altered gameplay. If servers did not have such features, newcomers will be able to experience the game as it was intended; Unfortunately, I don’t think private servers cater to newcomers anymore, as there is declining interest in Ragnarok Online’s “outdated graphics.” Instead, the private server scene is a disarray of players server-hopping from one place to another and desperately trying to level back up at light speed. The game is not supposed to be about leveling, the game is not supposed to be easy. The basis of an MMO is the interaction between people and team effort, and with such features, this basis is being lost.

Category: Gaming | Tags: Ragnarok Online | Leave a Comment

Vocaloid: Virtual Entertainers

Wednesday, September 16th, 2009 | Author: Ultimate Sonic

A few of the Vocaloids taking advantage of their free time.

You know, I’m a little strange in the way that I don’t like to reveal the things I like. I mean, I’d be into something (say a television series or character) but would not talk about it or even not wish to discuss it; Instead, my actions would give away my fondness for the character/concept. For example, I would claim not to like something, but then I would turn around and draw it or otherwise express my fondness of the subject in my own passive way. It’s not because I don’t want people to know… I’m just like that, heh.

At any rate, I recently had the opportunity to play the PSP game, Hatsune Miku Project DIVA (初音ミクプロジェクトディーヴァ) which can best be described as a game to appeal to Vocaloid fans. I never had much interest in Vocaloid, seeing as I cannot understand a shred of Japanese and I tend to judge things based on content rather than surface appearance, but I figured that I’d give the game a try, simply because I had seen the Hatsune Miku girl so much and my friends were playing it. At any rate, in my opinion, the game that Sega JP created was decent (unfortunately, Miku moving around in the background distracted me more often than not during some of the faster songs) but they did capture the charm of the Vocaloid concept.

For those in the dark, Vocaloid is basically a vocal-synthesizing program that can create a vocal track by typing in words and adjusting the pitch, length, etc of the sounds. The first “voice” was marketed under the character Hatsune Miku who is depicted as the singer of the produced song. Since then there have been others such as Kagamine Rin/Len and a few more. Now, I think this was a creative move by Yamaha Corporation as it is much more fun to imagine that you are instructing a virtual character how to sing rather than using a program that would “render” a song. In Vocaloid’s case, the voice’s “character” can be imagined to be the singer, which has an appeal of its own.

People who are familiar with me know that I always enjoy the “virtual assistant” or “virtual sentience” concept, probably because I have always loved cartoon/anime/videogame characters and, like most others, wonder what it would be like if they were [at least semi] real. Playing the PSP game, I can say that I enjoyed seeing Miku dance along with the song because it just made the Vocaloid program that much better; It lent complex programming flesh, bones, and long blue hair. The character alone has created a fanbase for the Vocaloids and I’m sure there are others like me who are looking at the big picture and looking forward to more advances in this field.

It’s probably just human nature to anthropomorphize (Is that a word, Maxine?) things… I mean look at animated characters such as Sonic the Hedgehog. At any rate, it was a neat idea in Yamaha Corporation’s case. The Vocaloids have a large fanbase; Even one of my friends plans on making a presentation about Vocaloid in her Oral Communications class. (Boy do I wish I could see THAT, haha.) Oh well- at any rate I guess I’m just another fan now. Sure the character is moe and all, but if you look at the workings behind her, the feat is an admirable one indeed.

The Miku Clock was created using Miku's voice-synth abilities to speak the time in Japanese.

So how about the future? Vocaloid is unique in this aspect right now, but I certainly hope other products can incorporate an element like this as well, even if it’s just as a mascot that the product becomes “known” as. One event that really caught my attention as I was reading was a “Live” concert with Hatsune Miku starring. Of course, Miku can’t walk out of the computer screen, so the staff had a giant screen on stage that would show Miku singing while actual people would play the music. Sure, if you look at it, its just a cartoon playing on a TV screen, but can you imagine? Once we have holographic technology, you might just see Miku on stage dancing with the rest of the performers. F,

Category: Anime | Tags: Hatsune Miku, PSP, Vocaloid | 5 Comments

Those First Few, Hectic Days.

Tuesday, August 18th, 2009 | Author: Nightmaren

Desperate nerds are desperate, I suppose. My room mates built an entertainment system playing DDR out of cardboard to keep us busy.

((I apologize for the low image quality! As some have heard, my camera broke before move-in so I had to use my cellphone. As you can see, I had not properly configured my phone-camera yet.))

Day 1: Move-In

So I had to wake up early at about 5:00 AM to get ready to drive to Dallas. The drive in itself was pretty smooth… I mean nothing huge happened. (Driving for 5 hours was pretty boring though). To top that off, I was starting to come down with something so I had to switch with someone to drive for me the rest of the day.

When I finally arrived and got my keys, I headed up to my apartment to greet my room mates. Two, I would know. The third, no one had seen or heard from. I was greeted by familiar faces when I knocked on the front door (as opposed to opening it with my key because I thought this would be rude) and they helped me take some of my things to my room. As I was finishing, they went out to get something to eat (an offer which I politely declined, as I had already eaten) and left me to arrange my room. Strangely enough, the computer was not the first thing I set up, which scared me a bit… I just seemed compelled to doing other things.

Around 5:00 PM, my PA (Peer adviser… an equivalent of RA here) came knocking on everyone’s door to tell us about a building meeting we were having (I’m living on campus after all). My roommates were still out, this time to look for boxes to build a couch (lol…) so I went there myself. Basically, it was a generic welcome/get-to-know-the-rules type meeting, but it also our building has two awesome PAs named Farah and Bryan who wont let us get bored. There are official activities planned all week which I may or may not go to. I also found out that a guy from my old campus lives in the same building as me, which was pretty cool. That’s a pretty big deal we are talking about- most of the people from there went to a closer new campus than Dallas.

After everything was said and done, I went back to my room. I’m happy that our residence quarters give each person their own decent sized, lockable room (which it seems most campuses do not have). Around 10:00 PM, I turned in for the night, as it had been a long day.

… Until I was woken up by my roommate knocking on my door at 1:45 AM saying “Hey! Come out! Got some people for you to meet!” Well, since I was [barely] awake at this point, I figured that I’d might as well say hi. My other room mates had gone to Midnight Madness a freshman party that went until 2:00 AM and had just come back from there. We talked in the living room a bit (with me still sitting in my night clothes, which I did not care to take off) and after about 10 minutes, I excused myself to go back to sleep, because in all honestly, I would rather meet people while the sun is up, thank you.

Day 2:

This is my first full day on campus. I woke up at 8:00 AM, a time that I have been training my body to get up these past few days. Not much happened as far as morning routines go. When it was breakfast time, I left my apartment and spent 15 minutes (a duration later shortened to ~7 minutes) looking for the dining hall. Upon reaching there, I saw that the timings for the hall on weekends was from 11:00 AM to 7:00 PM. Just my luck- I had to wait another hour. I suppose they expect us to wake up late on weekends, but I do wish I had known about this before hand. Other than that, just a bit more shopping for things that I forgot on my list. By the end of the day, I was pretty tired and had a slight headache cause I was doing so many things, thus I went to sleep early.

I was never great at DDR. I think I still did badly on our version too... It was hard to tell.

… Until I woke up at 1:00 AM with a huge headache. Seriously, what is up with me waking up at 1:00 AM every night? It turns out that I had come down with a fever of some sort. Strangely, this tends to happen when I move. Perhaps it’s because my body is not used to the different atmospheres, or because I try to settle to quick, thereby overworking myself. At any rate, I woke up with a massive headache and could barely open my bottle of Tylenol to take it. With luck, I should be feeling better soon.

Day 3:

I did not have a nice sleep due to my headache, but felt a little better in the morning albeit congested. My folks came over to make sure I was feeling well so I skipped eating in the dining hall. They were nice enough to bring a couple muffins and brew some tea for me so that I could lie in bed for a bit. The hot tea did me some good, as I was able to regain my energy and get a few things done around campus. The campus itself is beautiful, but there is currently a bunch of construction going on due to their beautification project. I don’t really mind the working sounds, but walking around closed-off pathways got annoying. In order to retrieve my textbooks, I had to walk all the way around the library in the sun just to get to the store.

That being done, I went back to my apartment and relaxed… I am really hoping that I am able to get well before classes start (on the 20th). I pretty much had the whole place to myself, as one of my room mates was out on a freshman camping activity (something, as you would expect, I would not attend) and the other was staying with family nearby. The final room mate is still unheard of, and I am starting to think they died or something.

Tomorrow will be my last entry regarding my first few days at my new campus as that is the day when my guardians (who came to ensure that I have a comfortable move-in) will say goodbye. There will still be a couple more days until classes start, but as far as my transition to this campus goes, their farewell will be the last significant event before I fall into routine.

Day 4: Goodbyes

I woke up this morning feeling a little ill, but I seem to be better than the past few days. I still get a headache sometimes so I am relying on Tylenol to tide me over. My folks came over earlier than expected, [probably purposefully] catching me off guard. As I took a shower and got fixed up, they sat in my room for a bit and took one last look at it. As far as goodbyes go, it was nothing special. They were quick and to the point, and were not overly emotional- (just the way I like it) I mean, it’s not like I won’t be seeing them again, right?

As I hugged them goodbye, they kept on sprouting advice to me even as they were walking out the door (“don’t forget to take Tylenol if you need it!”, “Don’t hesitate to call!”, etc.) They really do care about me a lot, as do I. Half of me still feels like they are still around the corner at the Inn they were staying at. I guess it just hasn’t sunk in yet that I’m on my own here. You know how sometimes you can just feel that something is going to be fun or something? For me, I can just feel that soon, I won’t be able to wait to go home… just not so soon.

Classes start on the 20th… wish me luck!

Category: Everyday Life | Tags: College | 2 Comments

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