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Dec. 30th, 2009 @ 09:26 pm Metroid Prime irritation
One irritating thing about Metroid Prime is that saving is not an anytime-you-like affair; you are governed by that archaicism, the save point.  As a result, played 5-10 minutes more than I really wanted to.  Fortunately, only sort of dizzy as a result.  25 min = Too Long.
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mii
Dec. 30th, 2009 @ 12:21 pm New game...
I got tired of Paper Mario: 1000-Year Door after about 20 hours of play.  I don't know why, but it's just not engaging enough.  And you know, I have few enough gaming hours that I should spend them playing games I really enjoy.

I'd been planning on acquiring Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicles: Crystal Bearers shortly after Christmas and doing that, but the reviews of it are short enough of stellar that I can wait until it drops in price as a used pickup.  Huz bought a copy of Metroid Prime Trilogy around Thanksgiving, and has been enjoying Metroid Prime a lot.  So I decided to give it a go.

Metroid Prime nattering; early mild spoiler )
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mii
Nov. 30th, 2009 @ 09:20 am Hah - I guessed correctly!
Tales of Monkey Island Chapter 4 is available for download on WiiWare today!

(Now, given that I really need to go out and acquire a medium-size suitcase tonight, will I have time to actually *play* any of it before I fly to Boston tomorrow night? We shall see.)

(See, we have two suitcases in good-to-okay condition. One HUGE one that we bought when we went to China last summer, and one kind of itty bitty one - think pilot-case size - that's going to be less than useful, as I want to take my ice skates with me. An intermediate size would be a Useful Thing.)
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mii
Oct. 28th, 2009 @ 09:58 pm Quiet day at home.
I stayed home today with the vague cold-like sensation of having no energy at all.  (This, after coming home early from work yesterday, after having spent the morning making sure that whatever I worked on could be easily fixed/recovered if I did something appallingly stupid - which meant I mostly did sequence analysis and figure-building.)  I went back to bed for about an hour after dropping Huz off at the train station, and spent the remainder of the day largely hanging out at the computer.  I designed a few different itineraries to NZ and Australia to see what dates and order did to prices.  I watched Season Two Episode One of Dollhouse over on hulu, which was overall not bad TV but I made sure to visit Wikipedia afterwards to find out more of who exactly these people were.  And I played a fair amount of Final Fantasy Tactics Advance 2, which, some 70+ battles in, continues to be extremely engaging.  Didn't play any Scribblenauts today, though I did last night.  I continue to find the lexicon impressive, though aspects of control are less intuitive than might be desired.  Also, there's a HUGE difference in difficulty between the Puzzle levels (e.g. Reunite the girl with her kitten on the roof) and the Action levels (Starite is shown, need to overcome various difficult and/or dangerous obstacles to acquire it) within the same relative set. 

More energetic tonight than last night.  I cleaned the bathroom, at least partly, and swept the floor while getting an education on flavors of Linux.  Me, I like chocolate.  Does anyone make a chocolate-flavored Unix?



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tazz
Oct. 15th, 2009 @ 10:22 pm Penny Arcade does Scribblenauts
Tags: ,
No, this doesn't win you a level.  (At least, I'm pretty sure it doesn't.)
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tazz
Oct. 12th, 2009 @ 10:32 pm Some random stuff
• Air New Zealand has one flight a day from Christchurch to Melbourne... and it's at 6 AM.  Hmm, rethinking order of New Zealand islands visitation.

• It's started sprinkling.  Go here to read a neat poem about the upcoming storm by my friend nezumiko.  Hope the kitty room in the garage doesn't flood.

• Work is busy but cool.  We will hopefully get a somewhat important result tomorrow.

• Scribblenauts is also cool  (Huz gave it me for my b-day.)  However, I do Not Approve of their opinion of Science (try it as an object, then interact with it!).  Also, it does not know the word terrarium.  Ribosome, I can understand and forgive it not knowing.  However, when it doesn't know the word I typed, it comes up with 2-3 suggestions, of which I often won't recognize one!

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tazz
Sep. 26th, 2009 @ 06:16 pm Recent gaming thoughts/reviews
The new Nintendo Channel, Tales of Monkey Island 1, and Wii Sports Resort )
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mii
Sep. 5th, 2009 @ 10:03 pm Quick update before bed
Current Mood: very tired, go bed now
D&D: Rolling a natural 20 on a Move Silently roll while invisible = teh awesome

Being a male dwarf who plays a female gnome as part of a traveling group of players = amusing.  Fantastic PC interaction.  

Chibi-Okami for the DS: Um, okay... let's see how this pans out!

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tazz
Sep. 3rd, 2009 @ 08:17 pm Just glance quickly at the picture.
A bunch of scientists at IBM.... or a handful of guys getting ready to play Rock Band/Guitar Hero with the drum kit?

You decide!

(Image ganked from this article.)

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tazz
Aug. 23rd, 2009 @ 08:22 pm Video game question: Metroid Prime for me?
So here's a question: Metroid Prime Trilogy has just come out.  It's getting great reviews so far.  I've never played any of the games.  Furthermore, I've never played an FPS, which is - if I understand correctly - an extremely sizeable chunk of the MP gameplay.  (The exception in my gameplay history are the 'shoot the bunnies' minigames in Rayman Raving Rabbids, which is fairly forgiving; the bunnies aren't generally trying to shoot back, you're just trying to maximize points.)

I enjoyed Zelda:Twilight Princess a lot, and Zelda: Phantom Hourglass a pretty fair amount too.  Both of those were, I think, on the 'easy' side of adventure games; there was only one boss I had to try more than once to beat in TP (never mind the burning cart run), and three in PH.  I like my adventure games along that scale - some challenge but not insane.  I know the developers turned down the difficulty of a couple of bosses in MP2, but am nonetheless concerned.

For those of you who have played any/all of the Metroid Prime games (admittedly, 1 and 2 with GameCube controls, which have been vastly improved in the rerelease) and know me, I'd appreciate input: would I enjoy them? 
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tazz
Aug. 21st, 2009 @ 08:46 pm Vacation day summary
Today was overall quite nice, with some excitement scattered here and there.

Trees, travel, cooking and sleep )

Soon it will be bedtime!  And then it will be the weekend!  Skating, Harry Potter, and sleep, yay!
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tazz
Aug. 21st, 2009 @ 11:00 am If the tech ain't broke, don't fix it!
I've been spending an inordinate amount of time over the past few weeks throwing my ~120 IgSF proteins into Drosophila S2 cells, and running a whole lot of Western blots to figure out which ones are expressed and which ones aren't.

Cut for shop talk )
But now I am at home, on another required vacation day, waiting for the tree guys to finish their work so I can go do stuff. My right arm is pleasantly sore from having played FFT A2 for too long. Opened up the Fusilier jobline!
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ig-fold
Jul. 18th, 2009 @ 09:14 pm Weekend
- Tea eggs for the win!  Thanks, [info]digitalemur !

– No skating class this AM, but we went skating during public session and got Very Tired.  Reverse Killian position feels *really* weird.  But then again, so did standard Killian at first.  Practice practice practice. 

- Speaking of practicing, there were about three different kids all working on their routines for ISI Worlds, which happens in about two weeks.  They took it in turns out on the ice: the "Ease On Down the Road" girl would go, then the girl with the vaguely recognizable music, then the James Bond boy.  Then they'd do it again.  And again.  That's quite something, in kids none of whom is over the age of about 11, if that.

- Speaking of ISI Worlds, why is it that I can't find ticket information anywhere???  Grmph.

- Having fun with Tactics A2.  Everyone's about level 14, and I clearly need to buy some more spiffy weapons so folks can learn more skillz.  (No, it's not really spelled that way.)  It's a slightly odd system, if like me you never played Tactics Advance but loved the original FFTactics: equipment teaches you how to do stuff.  And everyone gets ability points, even if they didn't participate in a given battle.  Huh???

I Like Weekends.  :)

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tazz
Jul. 8th, 2009 @ 09:21 am Life update
Haven't posted in much too long; my apologies!

Had a lovely super-long holiday weekend - my department decreed that All Regular Employees Shall Take Thursday Off to help us spend down our vacations.  So I spent Thursday taking a kitty to the vet (just regular checkup, no emergencies!), having lunch and hanging out with a work buddy from the Genome Center, rummaging at the library, finishing Chapter 2 of Paper Mario 1K-year Door, and generally relaxing.  (I was sorry to miss seeing [info]nezumiko  - hopefully next time she won't have the flu!)  Friday we both had off.  Um... we went skating, and I think we just hung out.  Saturday I did a pretty thorough vacuuming of the bedroom, which badly needed it.  Privet trees/bushes, to which I'm horribly allergic, are just starting to come into bloom, so anything I can do to lower the amount of allergens around is a Good Thing.  We spent the evening indoors with the kitties with the doors and windows closed, so the noise of the fireworks wouldn't freak them out too much.  Sunday I went to church, we skated again, I cleaned the living room/dining room, and finished Phoenix Wright 2.  (If you make the last couple of in-court choices wrong, you get a surprisingly detailed 'wrong' ending; much more interesting than the usual simple slamming of the courtroom doors.  The 'right' ending is, of course, even better.) 

We also finished reading Neal Stephenson's Anathem aloud to each other.  It definitely deserves its own post, hopefully I'll get to it soon.  For now, suffice it to say that it's a book that demands your close attention on pretty much every page, but is overall worth the effort the reader puts into it. 

Finally, a marvelous video ganked from kayray - College Humor's reworking of West Side Story into Web Site Story.  It's only about 4 minutes long, and extremely well done.  (Worksafe.)

</div>


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tazz
Jun. 11th, 2009 @ 09:27 pm No topic, just stuff
Tags: , ,
I stayed home today, as I guessed yesterday I would.  I slept better than I had the previous night (the cold had largely moved from drippy to stuffy), but nowhere near enough to make up for the sleep I'd lost the night before.  After breakfast and Huz leaving for work, I went back to bed and slept for something over an hour.  It helped.  As did the Peach Pleasure with Immunity boost that I went and fetched myself at lunchtime.  I'm still not healthy, but I feel a great deal more alert than I did for most of yesterday evening.

I finished Phantom Hourglass.  Last boss battle is HARD, had to look up a second walkthrough to find out how to deal with his nasty spin attack.

I acquired a package of beef jerky at lunchtime too, figuring that something I could chew on without lots of calories might help my sinuses stay clear.  Don't know if it really helped, but it tasted nice.  However, I just noticed that the nice folks at Whole Foods probably paid someone to write the following jingle I found on the back of the package:

Sing this little song the next time you're "home on the range."
  Oh give me a snack
  I can fit in my pack
  Made with beef that's organically raised
  It's seasoned just right that when you take a bite
  By the flavor you will be amazed
  Our jerky's superb
  Low in fat and with protein so high
  That when hunger is strong just remember this song
  Eat beef jerky - it'll satisfy

I can just about hear Garrison Keillor singing it as a parody on Prairie Home Companion.

Finally, I know I've been nattering way too much about Scribblenauts and how much I'm looking forward to it.  But I think I've found a demo of it that will appeal to this crowd.  You can write "Cthulu" and "God" and they fight!
</div>
Back to work tomorrow I expect.  Mooooooooore minipreps!

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tazz
Jun. 6th, 2009 @ 09:47 pm E3 and associated gaming stuff
Last year's E3 was a small, quiet affair filled out largely by independent shows by the video game studios that just happened to be proximal in both space and time to the so-called main event.  This year, it seems like everyone was under one huge noisy tent once more.

Cut for length and gaming natter. But there's pretty vids behind the cut! )
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tazz
Jun. 1st, 2009 @ 01:25 pm Oooo, shiny!
Am watching an auction for Phoenix Wright 3 over on eBay.  I'll check on Friday and see if it's reached the level of the other auctions up.  If so... well, let's say I have another possible option.  :)  (I'm not actually done with PW2 yet, but I'm into the second half of the last case.)

Also, Scribblenauts has a publisher!!  Yay!!!

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tazz
Jun. 1st, 2009 @ 12:05 pm Home again!
We're back from our vacation!

My parents are doing pretty well, it was good to see them.  We went to the special Titian, Tintoretto, and Veronese exhibit at the Museum of Fine Arts together in the middle of the week.  Special exhibitions at the MFA are usually good; this one was no exception.  :)  What was exceptional, I thought, was that each and every painting had a blurb next to it talking about one or more aspects of the painting: style, content, sweep.  Given that it was an exhibit looking at three rival painters, it sensibly grouped the paintings mostly by subject matter, so that the viewer could see what each man had done with, e.g. Saint Catherine in conversation with Mary and the infant Jesus, St. George and the dragon, portraits, etc.  Fascinating exhibit, and worthy of visit by anyone interested in comparative art study, Titian et al, and/or pretty paintings of people.  Even Dad seemed to enjoy himself.

Friday we took the train down to New Haven for the huz's 15-year reunion, and had a good time.  There were a number of people we knew from his class, and a couple of people outside his class (a friend doing the 20-year reunion who we knew from Storyreading, and - somewhat astonishingly - a lady who worked in the cafeteria of Huz's residential college when we were undergrads and who I would swear hasn't changed at all in the intervening years who was on the catering crew.  We were pleasantly surprised by the food at this reunion - much better offerings than the dining-hall quality food that we had at the ten-year.  We don't know whether this was due to Yale food generally improving, Yale recognizing that 15 years out of college everyone has good jobs and is used to real food, or that as the number of years out of college increases the cost of reunion does too and some of the cost goes to better food, or some combination of the three.  (We will be interested in hearing from the folks going next weekend what the food quality's like for them.)

Now that we're home, we're discovering that the cats really shed a ton while we were gone.  There has been much hair removal, sweeping, and vaccuuming.  It's getting to the point in the year when the cats shed out their winter coats and I need to vaccuum twice a week to keep the hair density under control.  Woo.  We need to do laundry as well.  In a while we'll go skating for the first time in well over a week, and I will have a voice lesson after having pretty much not practiced in close to two weeks.

Huz finished Phantom Hourglass at my parents and has started Final Fantasy A2.  My current point of pride is that I have gotten to the warp point after level 6 in the Phantom Dungeon with only 29 seconds gone from my hourglass.  (That, of course, is using every shortcut and every golden pot I can get my greasy little hands on.)  Huz is now whacking Ganondorf in Twilight Princess, a reasonable thing to do on the last day of vacation.

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tazz
May. 19th, 2009 @ 07:34 pm Finally! Thanks much, Nintendo!
Current Mood: delighted
Meant to post this yesterday when it happened, but failed due to busyness:

The Wii Virtual Console posted its 300th title here in the States yesterday.  After a lot of (largely) games-you-never-heard-of and/or games-that-sucked-back-when-they-were-first-released, Nintendo took the centiversary as an opportunity to post a game that fans have been crying for ever since the day after they released Zelda: Ocarina of Time:

Legend of Zelda: Majora's Mask is finally available.  According to the boys at IGN, it's as good as ever - and better than the release in the GameCube Collectors Edition, due to some bugginess having been worked out of the system.  Huz is figuring it'll be his next big adventure to play.  It'll take me a while to get to it; I've just opened Chapter 2 of Paper Mario: 1000-Year Door, and I should play Ocarina of Time before playing its sequel. 

And we ought to be able to download lots of stuff now, having invested something like twelve bucks on a 4GB SD card.

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mii
Apr. 29th, 2009 @ 01:22 pm Gaming squee
A new chapter has been announced in the Ace Attorney series!  It stars Miles Edgeworth, longtime prosecuting attorney from the original Phoenix Wright games, a pleasantly complex individual who should be fun to have as a focal character.  But that's not the only thing that's new...



The characters... they move around!  No more first-person POV with a static screen in out-of-courtroom locations!
 
Whoa.  Just whoa.

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tazz

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