I don't really update that much anymore. I got an AIM message from Tina asking what happened to my site, and I checked it out... It's been so long since I updated, that my site had nothing on the front page. Well, now it does.
I just got back from watching 28 Days Later, and it was a really good movie. Everybody says it's a "zombie flick", which is true, but they add a new twist to the zombies... Most zombies are portrayed as stumbling, slow, dumb creatures. They were never really threatening, because they moved like a 90 year-old crippled man. In 28 days later, the zombies sprint around really fast, and it makes it scarier because outrunning the zombies on foot isn't really an option.
This is pretty old news, but a few days after my birthday (June 15), my friends threw me a surprise party at Chuck E Cheese's, and I think it was the coolest thing that anybody has ever done for me. It was really cool and I hope everybody that was involved knows that I really enjoyed it and it really meant a lot to me.
I reactivated my Asheron's Call account YET AGAIN, and I put a nice chunk of time into it since then. The AC binge has died down slightly over the past week, but it's mainly because I found another MMORPG, that is in beta testing but is an *extremely* good game and worth playing. Even if it IS gonna be over in 11 days. Too bad it's all in CHINESE and I can't understand a DAMN THING. Please come out in the US.
Let's see... what else...
My NWN mod has been put on hold, maybe forever, maybe not. I haven't been playing NWN much, and I don't feel like I am really qualified to make a module yet, because I don't have enough knowledge of the later levels of the game to make stronger monsters balanced... I need to know the mechanics of the game before I start adding to it... I might buy Shadows of Undrentide once I get some money. I'm probably gonna start working at Admiral a few days, so I just might have money again. I promised myself I'd start saving up for a new computer though, so I might have to just stick with the entertainment of Asheron's Call and illegally downloaded games until I have enough money to buy a new comp. After that, I'll buy whatever I want... I just need a new comp.
I really wanna make it back to the LAN sometime... As long as I have a decent spot to set up in, and there's not too many people. I get really uncomfortable when I'm around a lot of people for long periods of time. Especially when there's people that I don't really know. I know I could just introduce myself to them and I would technically "know" them, but I have trouble talking to people that I haven't been around a whole lot. I've had the same problem with all of my friends... every single one of you, even though you may not know it, when I first met you, I was probably pretty uncomfortable around you. But after being around you guys for a while, I got comfortable. There's kind of that process with everybody I meet. If there's people around that I don't know, chances are that I won't talk nearly as much, if at all. I'm always afraid that I'll say something that somebody could take offensively, even if it wasn't meant to be. So, I just stay quiet.
Which is probably why I was pretty quiet for a lot of the time I was at the last LAN (or current lan, for people that are there). Lots of people around I didn't really know.
It's been almost two weeks since I last updated, so I figured I should update.
I was lannin' it up from pretty much 6/5 to 6/10, just been chillin' at my house since then. There's just something about being at a LAN for a while, then going back home and having a bunch of food to eat, and getting on the internet without having to worry about somebody lagging you down with Kazaa, and sleeping in your own bed for as long as you want. It kicks ass.
Not that I didn't like being at the LAN, it's just taught me to appreciate being at home a lot more than usual. I'm gonna stay home for at least a few more days, my birthday's coming up really soon (technically it's tomorrow) and my mom and sister are coming back from out of town. I'll be 20 years old... damn I feel old now.
There was a MUD that I played after Purple Dragon shut down, called "The Jungle MUD". It shut down maybe three days after I started playing, but it interested me and was very disappointing when it shut down. Well, it came back up, and I've been dumping some time into it. There's something about muds that are completely unique from graphical online RPG's... They're completely free, they're fun to play, and the community is usually very friendly and, well... not assholes. I prefer playing on muds that average about 10-30 people on at a time, because everybody gets to know each other. The larger muds aren't really like this, people mainly stay within their own little groups when it comes to socializing, because there are way too many people to keep track of.
Anyway, if anybody is interested in playing a text-based online RPG, I would recommend checking that one out. The theme is a little different than any mud I have ever played, because all of the players are animals. Instead of choosing races like Human, Elf, Dwarf, etc., you choose the type of animal you are, like Carnivore, Herbivore, Omnivore, etc... It's all on the site if you're interested (probably not).
Listening to: Laurent Garnier - Cycles d'oppositions (HEY ROCKY I FOUND THE FART SONG)
Anybody that knows me, knows that I'm not against game piracy. Most of the games I own are burned, with the exception of a rare few. I legally own Half-Life, and Neverwinter Nights. I was a legal player of Asheron's Call for over three years. I legally owned Everquest and Ultima Online for that matter. What do all of these games have in common? I had a reason to buy them.
After reading this article on RPGamer, I started thinking... Game piracy is inevitable. As long as people have blank media to put the game on, and it works afterwards, people are going to pirate games.
What game companies need to do is find ways to make the consumer NEED to purchase the game, in order to get full enjoyment out of it. For example, it's nearly impossible to play a pirated Neverwinter Nights online, unless you somehow get ahold of a legal CD key that hasn't been used yet to create an account. More companies need to make their games have online capabilities, and require a valid and unique CD-key in order to play online. Too many games are using CD-keys just for installing the game. Just grab a keygen, and bam, you have the full version of the game.
Neverwinter Nights, on the other hand, requires you to create an account (for free) using your own CD key to be able to play online. Most of the enjoyment from that game comes from online play, just like most games. Half-Life is also kind of doing this, with their pirated cd-key blocking and stuff. It forces people to go out and legally buy the game to be able to play it online.
It's annoying as fuck for the people trying to pirate the game, but it's an effective strategy and it's only fair.
So what am I saying basically? Game companies need to try harder in making the game worth purchasing. Imagine if Vice City PC had an online mode, and the only way you could play it was to purchase the game. I honestly think the game would sell like crazy, everybody wants to play GTA online. When it's only single player, what's really the point of buying the game, when you can just copy it? Or what about Morrowind. If you could play that game online, and people had to buy the game in order to do so, it would have done much, much better than it did. But Bethesda is stupid, and they swore that they would never make an online Morrowind. So I'm just going to keep downloading their software for free, I'm not missing out on anything.
You're not going to stop software piracy by putting up statistics on how much money the game companies are losing. The only way to stop it is either to make a reason to buy the games, or to stop making games completely. I think the game companies should lean more toward the former than the latter.