I thought I could give it up this time. I really did. 75 cap announced as the last, Square-Enix continually catering for only the very high level players, and the continuous arrival of more NA-version noobs to make levelling up increasingly painful. But, my interest in genkai 5 has me frothing at the mouth and Dynamis looks vaguely cool too.

So, like my last return, an all new selection of threads was called for. The robe I was wearing at the end of last year was distinctly metrosexual, so I decided to pull a Gaia Dublet off the shelves, which shows off my well-formed forearms perfectly, as well as boosting my VIT for some inappropriate reason. Still, it's got good DEF and it looks solid, so I'm happy. Finish things off with the obligatory MP-biased equipment and I ended up with 555 MP. Probably enough to challenge the lamest of WHMs.

To avoid tension at home, I decided to get up early (5am) and try and get a few hours in before the missus wakes up. Not a good idea. Apparently noone in the US plays between noon and 4pm. Waited an hour to get a party, and it was really pick'n'mix. 2xRDM, BLM, PLD, DRK, DRG. The dragoon was way lower than the rest of us, but we actually had a riot in Crawlers' netting a few thousand exp in 90 mins. Not too shabby. The PLD kept disappearing thanks to a crap windows installation, but it kept things entertaining. Today was a different matter. Got up at 5am, waited an hour for a party again, this time the spread wasn't as bad, but we went to Boyahda to fight crabs. They were a bit too hard for us, and when we got linked by a Water Elemental, that was the end of that. 800 exp in 1 hour. Bah.

After pretty unsuccessful levelling at that time, my thoughts turn to how I can play, if at all. I could try soloing BST, but that would be avoiding the whole essence of my will to play - the high level, over-alliance stuff.

Some more interesting reading at Shitaraba... the gaijin hate is in full flow these days. Particularly surprising is this post which labels two of the most famous importer linkshells as being full of idiots who just fight HNMs and MPK everyday. How friendly.

Family Computing

This weekend saw the nostalgic release of several Famicom games for the GBASP, all lovingly emulated with little bits of modern technology, like wireless link-up and sleep mode. Not being witness to ye olde NES craze of the 80s, I had to snap these up. Countless memories I never had, all born within hours of queueing up outside Bic Camera on a chilly Saturday morning. Of the ten titles, the ones I am becoming most attached to are Excitebike (never played before in my life) and Mappy (for it's incredible music). The two shoot-'em-ups, Xevious and Star Soldier, get a bit of a thumbs-down from me, since the GBASP is no good for shooters without auto-fire options. Everything else is good, too.

When John and I went to pick up the games, we got pounced on by a couple of unsuspecting Mainichi journalists. They took some pictures of John and interviewed the two of us. I guess I didn't say anything interesting because they didn't put me in the paper, but John got a couple of inches in the broadsheet on Sunday morning, and an article on the website. Rightly so, since he's been a Nintendo fan for far longer than I have.

If you're trying to get hold of any of the games, since they work in any GBA, good luck. The only ones that are still available in shops at the moment are Donkey Kong, Pacman and Bomberman - I guess they over-estimated sales for those three - and there is no word about any re-runs at the moment. Nintendo would be crazy not to keep these in production, but they've done plenty of crazy things before, so it's hard to say either way.

Posted by Jonnyram at 05:57 PM | Comments (2)




February 02, 2004
020202 +2

It's hard to believe I've been married for two years already. Don't things seem to get faster and faster as you get older? I thought about this in some detail yesterday and I think I found a reason. Maybe it doesn't apply to everyone, but if you think it matches you, by all means make some use of it... As time passes, you take on more responsibilities and more commitments. These commitments take up more of your time, leaving you less time to just relax and compose yourself. You sleep less, you feel more tired, and generally have less energy to do more things. So, the solution is, choose your commitments carefully. If you feel you are doing too much, try to shed some of those commitments. Don't read too deeply into this, it doesn't have any hidden meaning - I'm just readying myself for the unavoidable commitments that lie ahed in my life.

So two years on from the big day, how has my life changed? Well for starters, it's nice to have this underlying feeling that someone is always there for you, and it's nice to have the reciprocal feeling too - being responsible for someone's happiness and well-being. Sure, we have our arguments and fall-outs, but a lot of it can be put down to cultural or language differences. The feelings underneath never falter, though, and that's the biggest change for me.

Posted by Jonnyram at 12:20 PM | Comments (1)