Last night was a good night for Pop’n. I opened all the Pop’n Best Hits songs. Then I put in Pop’n 7 and cleared some stuff that has given me problems in the past, then some new stuff:

Sweedish - Hyper (27)
Hamo-Rock - Hyper (28)
Radio - Hyper (28)
Kiteretsu 2 - Hyper (30)
KyouGeki - Hyper (30) <—God this song is fun as hell!
And everyones favorite level 17 Hyper - Folky

I also finished editing my feature lastnight so yay for that. I will probably write a feature about how Beyond Good & Evil is the most cinematic game I have seen in quite a while.

So I played a bit of Pop’n this weekend. I realized that I was still fending off my illness a bit all week and into Saturday a bit even. I had completely forgotten that I had changed controllers. Well not really, but mostly.

It is much different to have the buttons flush to the controller. Some things have been made simpler, some not so much. Very quick scales can be BSed better, but I had to change my 2 button hands. By change I mean place them differently as now I was hitting the wood with the button. That does not feel great in case you’re wondering.

So my skill level was quirky for most of my playtime over the weekend (probably only 4 hours total). At the end of it all I did end up getting back to my skills and clearing 2 new songs (Glam Rock – Hyper and something else).

I also watched Sara play quite a bit of Beyond Good & Evil. This game reminds me of Oddworld meets Sierra Adventure games. It is very cinematic and nice.

I watched Minority Report again this weekend. Had not seen it in a while and it was still just as good as it was the first time. The only thing is this time the ending (no spoilers, I don’t think I have ever spoiled a movie for anyone who reads this) was more prominent as being a cop-out. The writer/director/whoever decided that after all the clues and what not that we may not have gotten all the details and been a bit confused still (which you have to be kind of dull to have not put it all together). So they cop-out and have a nice little voiced in (almost voiced over) wrap up. No shit, like I did not figure this out 15 min ago Mr. writer/director/whoever. 3.5 out of 4 stars.

I should get a few hours for Pop’n tonight. I should also be finishing another feature in a little while. I am almost fed up with the site that “hired” me. They can’t seem to get their act off the ground.

First off, I made the list to get promoted. It will be happening with in the next 2 months. Yay. This means I will be a yeoman second-class and making $177.71 a month more ($2,132.52 a year more). I will also be getting a 3% raise ($61.82 a month) on Jan 1 2005. YAY!

Next, Blade Runner was voted, by scientists, as the best sci-fi film ever. RAD!

Third! Gradius 5 has an AMERICAN pre-order bonus!
http://www.gamestop.com/product.asp?product%5Fid=B280818A#ship
Konami (hell a shmup!) is supporting the US. So awesome, send in your pre-order!

4th: West Wing Season 2. I just finished it last night. For the last 3 episodes I felt like the writers may cheat the audience and pull some fake emotion in the end… or something worse. Fortunately, I have never been as moved by anything on television as I was by that ending. Hell few films move me like that did. Anyone willing to take the risk of purchasing the first & second season (just the second season would probably work too, but not recommended) you would more than likely be well rewarded for it.

Season 3 comes out on November 2nd (a lot of things are coming this November, but that should be contained for an entirely different post) and I am greatly looking forward to it.

Afternoon yesterday I really started to improve. I am still not 100%, but I am getting there (just a weak stomach and mild headaches). The illness did not run through my wife as quick as I unfortunatly. I am not sure it hit her has hard as me at any point, but it is taking its time with her. She is sleeping in right now, and I hope she gets well quick. She should.

Perhaps tonight I will get to play some Pop’n. Wayne will probably pass me up if I don’t get any practice in… ;p

So since I was pretty much not well enough to do much else I played a bit of non-bemani games. I spent a bit of time with Gradius Gaiden yesterday. I had not played it in months… wow. It took me a while, but I got back to where I use to be able to get to, Level 4. I hate that Moi head level. Hopefully I will be able to figure out a good route through it… some day. Then I put Metroid Prime back in to see if I was interested in finishing it yet. I made it a bit into the Phozon Mines, but then put it away after my 4th retry through the mine. At least I made a bit of progress.

I also watched a movie last night so… movie review.

Bad(der) Santa: There is not really much to say about this movie. It is about a bad representation of the human race who only succeds in doing any good by accident. While the situations can be humurous at times it was more dull than funny. Nobody makes any progress in their circumstances and comedey is decent. I would not do more than rent this film. It was dedicated in loving memory to John Ritter, which made me happy in the end. 1.5 out of 4 stars.

Well I ended up getting really dehydrated yesterday and went to the ER. I got put on an IV and had some fluids pumped into me and some nausia medicine too. That made me pretty wacky, so that sucked. I have spent most of the time since then sleeping. I am feeling quite a bit better now. My wife had the same thing as I and she is not recovering as quickly. Thank you all for the well wishes, I greatly appreciate it.

I am sick as a dog. I cannot keep down anything. I woke up every 20 min all night from dreams I thought, but then at 4AM I started throwing up. My joints hurt and I am slowly dehydrating. This sucks.

Well, I plugged my Pop’n controller in yesterday to get some more play time in and ~ dead. It was dead… I have no idea how. I am guessing that it was the controller PCB and it just died from “normal use” or what ever. I got my Kagura Ransai shell in this morning (yes, my mail was delivered before 7 AM on Monday morning 0_o) so I have to take apart my Ghetto Box and transfer everything over to the new one. I may as well just rewire it while I am at it. There goes my whole night…

So the good news is that I am getting much more competent at Pop’n. I passed at least 6 level 29+ songs. One was a 32 I belive, most were 31’s. I got 2 bars away from beating ee’mall Trance - Colors. Seriously, this hurts my arms at this point. My hands and arms are moving so quickly that if I do any more than tell my hands where to go (i.e. actually pay attention to where they are going and if they hit the right button) I will get confused. It is kind of weird: I know how fast my hands are and how fast they are moving, yet it supprises and shocks me. Kind of cool really.

EDIT: Got the list of songs (I compiled a list for the accomplishments thread at Bemanistyle):
Winter Dance -White Eve Hyper
Hyper J-Pop 2 - North Wind Hyper
Depa Funk - Talk of Depa Underground Hyper
Rock Guitar - Absolute Hyper
Lesson - Pop-Step-Up Hyper (I BS’d my way though the speed scales though)
Psyche - L.A.N. Hyper
Passion Live - Lovers Day Hyper (I think, I may have remembered this wrong)

Mad Maestro: Gimmick over game?

Yea, here is my mini-review of it. After a few hours of play with it I have decided that I will more than likely never invest the full time to “master” the game. The premise of a good game is there. A skill based rhythem game with a classical music theme (I do enjoy classical music) that suffers. Why? Pressure sensitive buttons. That is right, you have to press the buttons at different pressures. Now realising what pressure your supposed to press it at is easy, but actually doing it… is mainly luck.

There is light, medium, and heavy presses on the beat of the note count (either 4/4 or 3/6 manily). The heavy presses are not too much of a problem nor is light, but going from light to medium, heavy to medium, or medium to eithther is quite difficult. On top of this your quite likely to hit early on heavy presses or late on light presses. So why do this? It feels like they did not properly test the game. Having the X button as light Square or Circle as medium and Triange as heavy would have been much better.

I think that this game suffered from thinking that being a brand new feature with the dualshock2 controllers that they would get more people to buy it with a new feature/gimmick actually being used. This could have been a really solid game, but it just leaves you cold.

Well, I went to court yesterday for an accident my wife was in. I was a passanger when a guy blew through a stop sign and we side swiped him. Anyways, I could have cared less about it, but he gave the cop fake insurance info. He never showed to court, so there is a warrent out for his arrest and driving without valid insurance was attached to his ticket. This sucks, if the guy clams up in his house, and never drives anywhere then there is no chance of his arrest. Like the stupid cops in this area even care about something like this when New Orleans is on the top 5 cities for most murders in the US list. Now I am going to end up paying the $500 deductable for my insureance to cover fixing the damage (estimated at $2400) then my insurance will go up.

3.5 years of paying insurance every month. Not one single claim. Then because of an accident I could not have prevented I have to pay more money. Someone explain this bull shit to me (that was rhetorical).

~~~~~~

I helped my friend Tom move into a new place last night. He go evicted from his last place (”I don’t know why they evicted me! I mean I was just late with the rent, like it was that bad.” “Tom how many times were you late?” “Uhhh, this was like my 5th I think….” ).

So he is now in a larger place. He has a room mate who has basically absorbed his; Computer, TV, Xbox, DVDs. The only large dollar item she brought was a couch (which is really firm and not comfortable). After we left his place, it was a disaster (”They can clean up this mess. This is what they get for evicting me!” ). He claims that if they try to bill him that he won’t pay it (”You know that will really screw up your credit?” “Look at me, does it look like I really care about my credit?” … ).

Then as we were leaving him at his new place (aside from his roomate smoking pot in the apartment — which he said he was going to not let her do) he stated he was going out to buy beer for them … minors… I can’t even get up the strenght to do the :rolleyes: again.

I am seriously at point where I am going to let him hit rock bottem (and if the interior/exterior of this “new” appartment is any indication it will not take long) before I try to offer him any advice. I have been in situations like his and am trying to spare him from it, but he is turning a deaf ear.

~~~~~

90 more days….

2 more level 30 songs knocked out in Pop’n Music. The ee’mall Punk Hyper and Country Beats Hyper. I went back and tried to knock out a bunch of Hypers in Pop’n 7… man I am still pissed off about the point/levels of Pop’n 7. Most of them are so-o off base. The only one (IMO) that got re-evaluated properly was House (Foundation of our Love IIRC) in 8. It is a 13/27/37 in 7, but in 8 it is upgraded to 22/32/??. Now I think 22 is a bit high for the 9-line version, but 32 is quite accurate for the hyper.

I also forgot how much fun KyouGeki is. I should work on that more just for fun. Also, I hate Miracle 2… have I said that before.

With Pop’n 10 coming out, and Internet Ranking I need to step up my training heavily. I played some IIDX and (while I know I am improving because I get higher scores) I still suck. I think that IIDX will only be a “take-a-break” kind of game for a while, not seriously. I want to hit at least the level 34 mark competently by Pop’n 10’s release. Right now I am at the level 28 mark for competency and 30 mark for training. 91 days until release and give or take another week for shipping. The clock has started.

http://www.web-konami.com/products/index_hb.html

November 18: Pop’n Music 10 and Beatmania IIDX 8th style… 

My guess is that it will total out to $120 about shipped. That means that I need to save about $40 a month just in case they are at 7th style prices again. This is also assuming that I do not decide to get a special edition of one of these.

What sucks is I went to Toys R Us for their 1/2 off game sale yesterday and spent about $70. I got:

Boktai
Onimishu Tactics
Mad Maistro
Fantavision
Rygar
Sphinx and the Cursed Mummy
Beyond Good and Evil

All were $10 or less each. O well time to save again.