Now that they’re gone, I’ve been at home taking in some Me Time. But that mostly consists of internet, reading Stone of Tears, and TV. I tried working a bit on my 3D project. But I really don’t know what he’s looking for when we are making our characters. First he says he wants something that we have to do a lot of texturing for. Then he said he wants it to have facial features. I want to make a cute character… like Mei from My Neighbor Totoro but she wouldn’t have that much texturing. And I was doing Jack-Jack from the Incredibles but there’s hardly any texturing needed for him either!

Blah, whatever. I just need to find something that I’m really passionate about. Like Bill.. he’s really passionate about drawing and he’s really gotten better throughout the years. As for me… I have no real productive hobbies. I read. I play games.

I want to write and animate. But I haven’t gotten Maya for my computer until now. And I haven’t really been practicing with it so it’s really frustrating. I need to buy some books on it. I really like 3D animation and writing, but I feel guilty if I do these things for fun instead of doing my class work.

I’ve got about 2 months left until graduation. 2 more months to finish my SR thesis. After that, I can pretty much do whatever I want. Can’t wait.

Sword of Truth – Terry Goodkind
Wizard’s First Rule
Stone of Tears
Blood of the Fold
Temple of the Winds
Soul of the Fire
Faith of the Fallen
The Pillars of Creation
Naked Empire
Chainfire
Phantom
Confessor
Debt of Bones

Neil Gaiman
Coraline
The Graveyard Book

His Dark Materials – Phillip Pullman
The Golden Compass
The Subtle Knife
The Amber Spyglass

The Chronicles of Chrestomanci – Diana Wynne Jones
A Charmed Life
The Magicians of Caprona

The Looking Glass Wars – Frank Beddor
The Looking Glass Wars
Seeing Redd

Inkheart – Cornelia Funke
Inkheart
Inkspell
Inkdeath

The Prydain Chronicles – Lloyd Alexander
The Book of Three
The Black Cauldron
The Castle of Llyr
Taran Wanderer
The High King

Inheritance Trilogy – Christopher Paolini
Eragon
Eldest
Brisingr

The Alchemyst The Secret of the Immortal Life of Nicholas Flamel – Michael Scott

It’s not a complete list at all, but I’m getting kind of tired and I want some breakfast. More later!

For those who have no idea what it’s about. Here’s a quick synopsis:

Richard Cypher is a normal woods guide who lives in Westland. But his dad has been murdered. While searching the woods for clues to his death, he sees a young woman being tracked by a group of men. He chooses to help her escape. Her name is Kahlan and she tells him that she’s from the Midlands and that she’s come to Westland to find a wizard, The Old One so that he might help the Midlands from the evil wizard, Darken Rahl who is trying to take over the world with his magic, charisma and deceitful ways. Richard takes her to his wise friend, Zedd, who just happens to be the Old One.

We find out, along with Richard, that he is the first true Seeker in a thousand years. And may be the only one who can stop Darken Rahl, according to prophecy.

The rest of the book is about the three trying to find the third box of Orden (Darken Rahl has the other two and needs the third one to unleash and weild an unstoppable power).

The book is filled with lovable characters and the world that has been created is believable and well drawn out. I was going to write which characters I liked… but I like almost all of them. And I hate the “bad” ones.

I’m not sure whether or not I am sad about this, but I very much prefer the book to the show now. I think that’s because the show is very episodic. You can watch an episode on its own without really knowing what happened prior. I understand completely how some of the fans of the book feel about the show now. I wish that it had been made into a mini series rather than a weekly show.

It’s okay though. I have 10 other Sword of Truth books to satisfy myself with =]

On the topic of games, I guess I am in the market for a new game again but more of an RPG. I’m thinking about Star Ocean but I might just go back to the PS2 and finish FF12. Then play Revenant Wings for the DS.

Anyway, moving on. I’m currently on Spring Break. WHOOO!! So far I’ve been to New York with Bill and Russell. Bill and I went to go see Neil Gaiman, one my favorite authors. He wrote Stardust, one of my favorite books. I know it’s not really fair to say he’s one of my favorites even though I have only read one of his books… but I LOVE Stardust hahaha. I got him to sign a comic book, the Graveyard Book and a copy of Coraline that I got for Em.

Neil Gaiman’s voice is beautiful btw. It’s very soothing and poetic. Jess told me she bought an audio book of Coraline from iTunes and he reads it. I would like to buy one for Stardust =] His voice is very melodious.

Also, I’m nearly done reading Wizard’s First Rule. I have about 50 pages left to go, out of 800 some pages. So I’ll probably write a review for my next post.

The best part of CC though, is the story and of course… Zack Fair. THE best character in the Final Fantasy series. He’s badass AND he can joke around and be silly. But on to the story. It’s a prequel to the legendary Final Fantasy 7 PSX game and details the events that occur before FF7 and why certain things happen.

Now I must say… I have not played FF7 since I first began playing RPGs… which was probably around 8th or 9th grade. Nearly 8 or 9 years ago! So to be completely honest, I don’t remember the exact details of the story in FF7. But a lot of stuff does start to make sense because of CC. I love Aerith now. I couldn’t stand her in FF7 but… SPOILERS?……… she and Zack are too cute together.

Battling system was all right. I didn’t like the whole Materia fushion thing. I didn’t understand it and I never synthesized any new Materia and I still beat the game, so it isn’t necessary. I would like to go back to play the game in Hard mode sometime but again… not my PSP hahaha. One day I will get around to buying one and playing this game… and then FF7 afterwards.

I really wish they would remake FF7 for the PS3. That would be epic! Cause it’s a shame that they came out with the prequel but newer fans wouldn’t be able to play the game that follows if they didn’t have it previously. Cause that game is going for $100 or more new. And I can only imagine it going higher as time goes on. I should pick up a couple copies of it before it becomes impossible to find… One to play, one to keep.

Anyway, again, I hope that they do remake the game but as of now, there are no plans for it. So in the meantime, I anxiously await FF13 =]

Good stuff. The show is about a guy named Richard Cypher who is the first Seeker in a thousand years. What a Seeker is, I still am not sure lol. But he is destined to kill Darken Raul <– not even sure how that’s spelled. But anyway, Richard is joined by Kahlan, a Confessor and Zedd, a Wizard. I don’t fully understand what a Confessor does, but if she touches you, she can pretty much take away your free will and can control you.

I didn’t really like the acting at first… but after a while I really got into the stories and characters. Craig Horner, who plays Richard, is mighty fine btw. And his acting is adorable. (Stole that pic from somewhere I don’t remember, SRY.)

Now I’m a huge fantasy buff, and to have a show about a fantasy world is captivating to me. I’m so glad that it’s been picked up for a second season because I will definitely be watching that. And even though I can watch the episodes for free on hulu, I would no doubt pick up a dvd of the show if and when it comes out.

I forgot to mention, the show is based on The Sword of Truth series by Terry Goodkind. If the show is a good adaptation of the novels, then I think I may enjoy them. I was going to buy the box set of the first three books from Borders cause they had a 40% coupon but alas, they did not have it. So I just bought the first book with the coupon. Book ended up being like $5 and I used a gift card hahaha. It’s a pretty thick book and I’ve been pretty busy so I doubt I will finish it any time soon, but I will definitely blog about it when I get around to finishing it.

Now I’m going to either watch an episode or read the book =] Peace out!

Jeebuzzz. What do I do? I ended up buying it from Buy.com for $76.99, no tax and I could’ve gotten free shipping BUT being impatient… I wanted it asap cheaply.. lol so I paid $4 for 3-5 shipping. I’m sure it’s wishful thinking that I’ll have it this weekend. But that’s okay… I have work to do so it’s probably best that I don’t get it hahaha.

Next day, I find out it’s backordered! So there’s no telling when I’d even see a copy of the game. So me being impatient, resort to ebay. There’s a guy selling it used for buy it now $72. He played it once and it wasn’t really his kind of game so he was selling it. So I buy it from him and cancel my buy.com order.

This morning I see that buy.com has the game back in stock and that it would ship in 1 or 2 days. WTF? Had I been just a little bit more patient the game probably would’ve been shipped today and I may get it this weekend. But since I bought it off the ebay guy, I’ll probably end up not getting it til next week or something since he’s sending it through media mail which is hella slow.

Patience certainly is a virtue. I’m quite sad about it now. AND I’m sick. Both combined are making this day not so good. Thank goodness I don’t have class Thursdays.

EDIT: I forgot. What makes it ok is that our internet is back! So far it seems to be perfect. Hopefully that lasts. It’s just too bad I don’t have Street Fighter to play live!!

Despite the negative reviews of Season 2 and 3, I still found myself engulfed in the world of Heroes. But again, that’s probably cause if I didn’t like an episode, I’d just go on to the next one right away. Season 1 was certainly the best. All the characters and events weaving together were done so intricately. I think the best part of Heroes are the characters. My favorite is definitely Hiro Nakamura. He’s so cute! His facial expressions and the things he says are so funny. I love it whenever he does something he yells out YATA!

SPOILERS sorta

I was beginning to like Gabriel/Sylar. I know a lot of people thought that was annoying. But I personally liked how he was becoming good. I thought it made him a better character that he was actually able to fight his “ability” rather than just giving to his killer instincts. I thought it was lame how he went back to his killer ways. But I guess that was inevitable cause of Mr and Mrs Petrelli.

END OF SPOILERS

Btw, I didn’t know that Hayden and Milo were dating! I totally got the vibe in the show but they’re supposed to be related. WEird. Especially since he’s like… 10 years older than her. All happiness to them.

Anyway, I’m hoping the end of Season 3 will be better than the first half. I want Sylar to be good. But people keep screwing him over and not really giving him a chance. So I doubt that will happen. I’m not really sure what to expect of the new season. Hopefully it’ll be good!

10. Fat Princess (PS3) – This game looks hilarious. You have to save a princess, who’s been kidnapped. The thing is, the bad guy has been feeding her so much that’s she’s gotten so fat you need 5 guys to carry her. You can play as a single player or with up to 16 people on a side to overthrow the other team’s army, take over the castle, and save the princess. Looks like it’ll be lots of fun :]

9. Guitar Hero: Metallica (PS3/360) – What more could I say? I can’t wait Metallica songs on Guitar Hero. Especially looking forward to Unforgiven. And many others that I don’t know the title too. Em’s always playing Metallica songs at work. Can’t wait for this one.

8. Muramasa: The Demon Blade (Wii) – Found this game from a 2009 preview list from IGN.com. The background images are really pretty looking. It’s a hand drawn 2d game. Not really sure what it is but looks cool. Might rent it.

7. Star Ocean 5 (360) – I’ve never played a Star Ocean game before but I’ve heard that they’re really good. I plan on picking up the one on the PS2. This game looks awesome.

6. Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicles: Echoes of Time (Wii/DS) – This game is compatible between both Wii and DS. You can play coop between the two systems with other players. That’s a pretty awesome feat. It looks so cute ;]

5. Final Fantasy Dissidia (PSP) – Now I don’t have a PSP myself, but I’ll probably buy one sometime in the future. Probably after I graduate. There’s a few games that I would like to play on the PSP including this one. This fighter is a game that includes characters from the Final Fantasy games, bad guys as well as the main characters. Some of the characters that are included are Cloud (FF7), Squall (FF8), Zidane (FF9). Some bad guys include Sephiroth (FF7), Ultemica (FF8), and Kuja (FF9). Looks to be good game. Sad it’s exclusively for the PSP.

4. F.E.A.R. 2 (360) – Okay I’m not too sure why this game is on my list. I hate horror games, mainly out of fear. I bought Resident Evil 3 for the wii and I played about 5 minutes of that and I couldnt play anymore cause I was too scared to play alone. As for F.E.A.R. 2, I played the demo with my cousin Anthony by my side and we still jumped and shrieked from playing. I wonder how the whole game will play out. I’m not a big fan of fighting soldiers, I thought it would’ve been better with less of them and more ghosts. But again, I’m curious to see what the real game will be like. Yeah… the girl is scary as ish.

3. Fairytale Fights (360) – There hasn’t been much released on this game yet, but from what has been released, I’m definitely keeping an eye out. It’s based on beloved fairytales (obviously) but all the characters are deranged psychopaths. I read that in one part Red Riding Hood is walking through the forest and slices up all the forest animals with her knife. Morbid yes. Graphics? To say they are adorable would be a complete misuse of the word.. but they are cute in a strange sort of way. Check out the link:

2. Street Fighter IV (PS3/360) – A classic game remade in 3D. The Street Fighter games were one of the first video games I have ever played. And I cannot wait for this one to come out. The graphics are gorgeous and included in the Collector’s Edition, is an animated short about the characters. It’s stylized anime and from what I’ve seen, it could be very good. This one comes out in a couple weeks. Most likely will be my next purchase.

1. Final Fantasy XIII (PS3/360) – This game has been in the works for ages now. I had hoped that it would come out this past Christmas but it was delayed and I think that was because of its conversion to the 360. XIII was at first exclusively for the PS3, but now it will be available for 360 owners as well.

This game looks amazing, of course not a surprise for a Square-Enix game. The main character is apparently the female version of Cloud (VII). And she is pretty badass. The official FFXIII web site now has a video of some of the gameplay. It looks amazing. And I’m stoked. The only con for now is that this game is being most likely being pushed back to 2010. That’s ok by me, I still have the XII games to finish =]

Final Fantasy XII Site

Well that’s my list!