Juggling

I swear to god managing two Google accounts in one browser is now beyond frustrating. I haven't had an issue in the past YEAR and suddenly over the past two weeks it's become a major headache. So I have my personal account as my primary, but I have a work one as well. So every time a coworker sends me a link to a google drive document, even though I'm using my work account at the time, it automatically assumes I want to view it on my personal account. So I switch to that account, paste the link in the address bar. SAME THING. So I log out of the one account, which logs out of ALL accounts, and log in with the work account first and then the personal account. Then I have the opposite problem, but at least I can actually view file I need to view. Then if you have multiple tabs open, it gets upset and tears you away from whatever you're doing just to let you know that you've been logged out on another browser. NO I HAVEN'T. So it makes you login again, which logs you out of ALL accounts, again. Then if you happen to have gmail for the OTHER account up, it gets upset, logs you out and forces you to login AGAIN. So in order to avoid it completely, I have to close all the tabs and restart. I know other people were having the same issue in the past, but I thought we were past that, Google. What changed?

Ugh, well that frustration aside...and assuming I don't get logged out again...here's some soundtracks for you:

Deadpool - This movie was great. Expectations exceeded. I still love the guy with his like...9 year old daughter in the line for Deadpool. The movie attendant came by and was like, uh, just so you know, this movie REALLY isn't for kids...like REALLY. He did end up leaving because of it.

I had no idea that Shaggy remixed the Juice Newton song. I heard Shaggy first so when I heard this song I was like...wait...did Shaggy rip off Juice? I have been informed that it is indeed a remix. I never knew. Also, the Careless Whisper song ("I'm never going to dance again")...Nick told me that was used in a cheesy driving PSA video every time someone who got disabled by a car crash was telling their story. Yikes.

Hateful Eight - Haven't seen this yet, mostly because we were late to the game and the night we WERE thinking of seeing it, we saw that it was 3 hours and decided that was a bit too late on a work night. Still planning on seeing it, but in the meantime...soundtrack. Also, I couldn't find a full compilation at high quality so...sadface.

Star Wars: The Force Awakens - Enjoyed it more than I thought I would to be honest. Was predictable, but good fun. I enjoyed the new cast of characters and the inclusion of all the old actors. Thought it was a fun touch.

I haven't touched much of my video editing queue as I've been busy playing Fire Emblem, writing and trying to catch up on editing some writing for others. Either way, it's going to be pretty quiet for the next two months as I have some big things and travel coming up in addition to maybe possibly finally figuring out what's going on health-wise.

Fire Emblem Fates (Birthright)

Pretty much all spoilers here...but I feel like I need to share my experience of Fire Emblem Fates so far. So before I get into it, I like the game quite a bit so far, but I am so damn confused it's hilarious. This is exactly the kind of ridiculousness I was hoping for. It's confusing and random in a good way...I think? I'm not angry, I just find it all funny.

Here's basically a recap of my thought process of how my first few chapters went:

**SPOILER ALERT**



Okay...I'm on a battlefield and two royal families are all here despite the rather large distances that separate them and they are both claiming to be my family. Clearly, like Awakening, this is a future event and there will be a flashback cause...tutorial.

OH NO WAIT IT WAS ALL A DREAM. I'm actually waking up in my bed surrounded by about 7 people all just...watching me sleep. No big deal. Not creepy at all. So I've got these maids and this butler and then all my siblings come in and the maids have some weird magic ice powers and now I'm fighting my brother on the roof. We are literally on the roof and he is on a horse. Why is there a horse on the roof? How did we get it up here? I HAVE QUESTIONS.

So I defeat my brother which means I can leave this fortress for the first time since I lost my memory (convenient?). Also this is the second Fire Emblem game in a row (actually, if you think about it...almost ALL of them have some sort of amnesia plot point) that the main character has some sort of memory loss. Apparently I'm locked in a tower for my own protection because memory loss. But it's okay! I'm strong enough to leave the fortress with all our brothers and sisters who visit all the time (but all don't question why I can't leave despite it just being uh...memory loss) and we're off to see our beloved father, WHO DOESN'T EVEN LOOK REMOTELY EVIL.

That was sarcasm for the kids at home.

So I see our father for the first time in what I can assume is YEARS, and he decides to throw a test our direction. He gives us this sword (which is also totally not evil) and tells us to fight the prisoners from the other country we're at war with. I fight them, dudes die except for the named characters (cause screw the other guys amirite?) who I refuse to execute.

Since I didn't follow orders and our brothers and sisters had to make excuses for us, I had to go and apologize to my father, who is giggling to himself alone in his throne room, and he gives me a special mission that only I can complete all by myself. Because that's not suspicious. All right daddy dearest, I'll take my butler and my knight and this "rehabilitated" criminal who looks like a mutated potato to the border fortress for "assessment."

Also, yes, I have a butler. His class, is "Butler". I have a level 5 butler. This is the greatest thing Fire Emblem has given me. I REALLY want to know what his tier 2 is.

I arrive with my little posse at the fortress and surprise, surprise, it's inhabited by soldiers from the other country! Gasp. We decide to turn back and report, but Mr. Potato Head runs in and attacks, so we need to stay and fight and defend ourselves...despite having a clear escape path. At any rate, we take the fortress, some of the royal family shows up from the other country, we need to make a hasty retreat, but Tayto man decides that he wants to stop us.

My butler just...disappears while Tater guy kills my knight WHO SLIPS THROUGH THE BRIDGE'S FLOORBOARDS. I'm not joking. I don't know if I saw it wrong, or it just looked weird, but it looked like both he, and the horse, turned into jello and slipped through the boards. Then my character got mad, grew stag horns, attacked the man and...fell...off? I'm not sure what happened here either. I actually thought my character jumped off to pull a Gandalf and catch up to the knight to save him...somehow.

Instead...and again, I'm not joking, my maid is suddenly falling after me. SHE is pulling the Gandalf instead. She grabs me and turns into a little dragon and we fly away to the astral plain with rainbows and happy tree houses where I rest for the night. After a good night's sleep I ask to go back to the battlefield where the little dragon maid warns me that there's a fight still on, but I don't care.

I arrive back at the fortress and within seconds I get knocked out and taken back to the other country by the woman I spared from execution. They take me to my REAL family in that country, because it turns out my real father was killed and I was taken hostage by the other king. My family welcomes me back with wide arms despite being fully invested in my family from the other country they're at war with. I meet my mother and then within a day (or so it seems), my REAL sisters are under attack. So my brother king takes me with him to save him so he can show us what evil things the other country is doing.

So there are BDSM Hulk Gorillas everywhere (okay they're called Faceless...) and they are attacking our sisters, so I need to rush to their aid by melting mountains with my fire powers. The king refuses to attack the four monsters on the middle hill. I saved these till last the first time and got my ass handed to me, so I figure I'd pre-emptively melt that mountain and make the king fight for me. Nope. He won't touch them. So I huddled up next to him and used him as a meat shield so that when they tried to attack me they'd HAVE to go through them. The jerk got slapped in the face and ended up killing one of them for me so I consider it mission success.

Shortly afterwards we learn about a woman who was taken from the other country as a child as a revenge kidnapping, but apparently the other side doesn't really care and she's happy singing at a pond every day of her life. I learn that my mother is maintaining this special magic barrier that stops actual soldiers from getting into the country if they're from Nohr, which is why they are attacking with evil magic BDSM monsters (because that makes sense).

Also there's some throne that can give me back my memories, but I decide not to use it because feelings.

Instead we go to a festival in the town where my family is going to announce my return and this assassin shows up and takes my sword, and then makes it explode (why did they let me keep the evil sword?). My mother jumps in front of me to save me and she dies. I get mad and then suddenly I'm a stag dragon. I transform into a Stagon...or a Deeragon if you prefer.

So now I'm a dragon and I run around one-shotting everyone. This level caused me some issues because at first I wasn't sure if you were supposed to be able to save the NPC from losing/dying (he doesn't die, just goes away until next level) so I kept restarting to see if there was a pattern. I looked it up to make sure and people said you can't save him. There were also a lot of people getting butt hurt about how hard the level was and I'm like...pish guys, this is easy what's your problem?

Yeah I ate my words. I figured out the way to bait the two dragonslayer sword guys is to throw one of my characters to the right to aggro the mages (because he had a high enough resistance) and bait the swordmen with my character to the left. It split them up nicely. My problem was I was trying to bait them all one direction and sneak around to hit the swordsmen twice, but then my other characters were exposed to the mages.

After that, Miss Songlady comes and calms us down and I turn back into a human. Then glasses dude shows up and tells me that the mother knew she was going to die, but not how or when.

...

So...like everyone then. That literally applies to everyone (unless there are immortal beings). "Ah yes, I will die...but I have no idea how it's going to happen or when"

YOU DON'T SAY.

Whatever. So he shows up and says that she told us about the statue in town that was destroyed, but happens to have a sword in it. Sure enough, on cue, when we mention it, the sword flies out of the rock and shlups to my hand. I guess I'm a special sword dragon now.

After this, the game makes you choose between Birthright and Conquest. I chose Birthright cause...I don't have Conquest yet. I'll download that later. Oh and my butler finds me again, so I'm happy.

Also the way support, inventory etc. is handled between levels now is in the special astral plain that no one asks questions about at all. I think this is where the "petting" aspect came into it, but that doesn't exist in this version anyway. It's...weird though because you run around getting things like peaches and beans and you feed it to the dragon maid and she levels up and you can go to your bedroom and invite people in and you get this closer than comfortable interaction with the one person you decide to invite in as they stare into your eyes on the screen...

Anyway, I just want to take the time, to appreciate the the plan of King Nohr. Let's recap. So, the King kills the King of Hoshido, kidnaps his child, locks the child away for...15+ years in a fortress, allows his children to train that child the entire time to fight, decides that it's time for the child to be let out, gives them the assassination sword, assumes that the character will refuse to execute the prisoners so he can send them on a quest with his hired man to start trouble at the border. After he just assumes that the character won't die (which ALMOST didn't happen because we fell off a bridge and had to be rescued by our dragon maid), will be captured by the other side and taken to the capital where the character would be recognized as the long lost child. THEN he had to assume she'd be allowed to keep the evil sword and that the mother would be there in the square with the character and the evil sword. Then they had to assume that the mother would sacrifice herself to save her child. Like...there are so many things that could have gone wrong with this 15+ year plan.

Overall, game is good. I am confused, but I really like the new things they've added. The enemy support aspect REALLY adds another dimension to strategy. I'm glad I played Birthright first because this may take some getting used to. I'll continue to play and give you updates on any further thoughts I have. For now this...just needed to be shared.


EDIT: This song has been playing over and over in my head randomly since I got the game.

600 Page Epic

Sent some of my writing to two people last night and nearly puked from anxiety. I promised that I'd give them regular updates, so I guess this is going to be a priority for awhile. My rewrites of the first bit are a lot better than what was there before, but I'm not entirely convinced that it's any good still. I like what I've written for the most part, but I'm a terrible judge of what other people are interested in so I have no idea how it will go over. I don't take myself too seriously, so that has probably spilled out a lot into my writing (and I'm aware of how much silly made its way in there). In the end, the writing is mostly for me and for fun (and to get this damn story out of my head), but it's still nerve-wracking.

Also Kristy mentioned that my first draft is a little...long. It'll be closing in on 600 typed pages when it's done, but I think it's because I like to add a lot of small details into my work. I'll need to pair down and go broader, but I have no idea how I'm going to do that yet. Gives me hope that people write these massive fantasy and science fiction novels, so my friends might actually be interested in reading. Either way, I guess now that I think about it, that's probably why it's taken me so long to get this segment done. There's still two more parts to write...and I have a lot of it in my head. Hopefully it won't take another 10 years to write. 

Speaking of which, I never gave the update on Kathleen, who raised all the money she needed for her editor. She's going to be self-publishing that book, so I'll let you all know when it's on the market. She is an incredibly talented and intelligent writer and storyteller, so I'm excited for her to get this story out. In other news, Amy sent me her material and it's been fun to see how much she has improved with her writing, even over the last year. And she's having fun with it, which is the point in my opinion. 

Anyway this should all be going on the other blog which is mostly abandoned, but not forgotten. 

Soundtrack Thursday!

Far Cry 4 - Suggested by Shauna. I've only played the co-op in Far Cry, which was so buggy, rushed and hilarious. Apparently it doesn't do the game justice. Michael has played 3 and 4. All I've really seen of 4 is Michael getting accosted by a honey badger.  

Guess it's an Ubisoft day. Somewhere Shauna is squealing with glee. Somewhere else, Mesk is puking rainbows. I'm stuck in the middle giggling about this. Excuse the quality. I was playing this on the PS3, saw that thing going somewhere it shouldn't be, so I picked up my camera and then something...unexpected happened. You can always hear my thought process in my voice/noises I make: curiosity to confusion to disbelief to tired acceptance. I've been sighing like that all too much lately.

Assassin's Creed Revelations - I actually did like this ending quite a bit. As much as Ezio's story was dragged out because of his popularity, at least they made a decent ending for him. I still plan on playing AC 4 and 5 because I actually own them, but I need some time to sit down and do that. I really do love the soundtrack from the second game (and it's uh...sequels? Expansions? bah). 

Rayman - Cause...I have no idea. I needed something a little more random/upbeat for 4pm in the afternoon. I'm not sick and doped up on meds this time I swear. Did I even post that? I should at least put it in unreleased if nowhere else. Oh, I did! 

Dead Space 2 is ALMOST complete. I'm a little bit stuck and angry with the final boss. If the death animation didn't take so long it would probably be much better but NO I have to watch myself get ripped apart for 8 seconds every single time. Everything, but chapter 15 going up in the next couple days here. 

I keep thinking we're almost done SOMA and it continues to drag on.

Evil Within and Murdered continue to be edited. Evil Within is going to be a masterpiece of awful, but I was recently shown a full review of Ultima 9 and I have to say that tops even EW. I was actually personally offended by Ultima 9 and I haven't even played any of the games. 

Fire Emblem will be continued after I've finished up with Dead Space 2. 

I Am a Grown Adult

Listening to Disney Soundtracks. Deal with it. Actually going to be listening to random childhood favourites today, not just Disney.

Mulan - I am struggling so hard not to break into song for the training montage song. It's so hard. I may or may not have been singing it as loud as possible in the car last night driving home. Feel free to judge me. And because I love this review - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zKLmyqNhKVA

Land Before Time - Don't listen to the other soundtracks in the series. Don't get me wrong, I loved all of these movies as a kid...until we got to 7 and we watched it over and over and over and over like 50 damn times while we were on vacation out at our cabin one year cause my brother wouldn't stop watching it. Don't get me started on Blues Clues. But anyway...the other movies get very uh...kid song-y.

I just got miso flavoured noodle soup in my eye and then burned my mouth on HOT TEA.

Lion King - I never got to be Nala when we pretended to be the characters at the playground. Not that I'm bitter.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VxTQKxyJyxw

I am still a condensed ball of stress, rage and angst, and have been for the last two weeks. I think if you poke me with a stick I'm volatile enough to turn the city into a crater. I'm so tired.

Also I'm finishing Dead Space 2 finally. I should be done on Saturday.

I've Had Coffee

The coffee helped. I'm feeling a bit better and I've been listening to soundtracks anyway so here you go:

Legend of Korra - playlist. Beautiful music in this. I really need to watch seasons 3 and 4.
Avatar: The Last Airbender - Love the music in this. The series finale music is top-notch. Sad about the quality in this video though.

Editing update:
-I have one session of Gauntlet left (a few hours) to produce. Still recording.
-Sorting out Evil Within. Found out I had two copies of session 1, so a little miffed by that since I've been low on space. It exists on 4 different drives at the moment. Edited Chapter 11 first cause...reasons. I think I'm going to re-edit/encode that for higher resolution and to check the spelling of mannikin/mannequin/manikin. I have no idea which one I used but apparently all are correct.
-Saints Row 4 - Just...sitting there for a moment cause it's a little more time-intensive to edit.
-I swear I did something else...oh yes, Murdered. Slowly working away on that.

RPG Update:
-Zones and maps partially planned out. Written dialogue filtered into respective maps and zones.
-Map 1 zone planning started
-Green Triggers complete and tested
-Demo of Mesk's Captain Planet RPG for ideas/lulz
-Building assets: music, graphics, sounds

Writing Update:
o.0

Spam for Lunch

Brain is fried from trying to do reports again. Not as hectic as last month, but something must go wrong. It's destiny. Microsoft Office snapped in half when my computer was accidentally unplugged by a coworker who was moving desks. Apparently Microsoft Office didn't like a sudden loss of power, refused to work, then refused to reinstall, then refused to uninstall, and long story short I'm REALLY SORRY YOUR TIME WAS WASTED TODD =(

Anyway was recently browsing my old email cause I have some people contacting me there and I decided to see what amusing things were sitting in my spam email.

Hey. Apparently I have delayed burrow notifications from YouTube. 

And delayed hemispheres notifications. Caution. They've got rounded edges.

I got enough strife in my life thanks.

Nice try EMMA. You're not getting my soul. I thought I made this clear after you tried a demonic binding and I ripped out your spleen. Maybe that's why she's being so polite.

I think it's a bad idea to get laid in the women's washroom. Seems unsanitary.

The last three weeks all I've heard about FedEx is that they make customs very difficult for people in Croatia and Serbia. 

People still used LinkedIn? 

Those are the good ones anyway. There was the obligatory Viagra one and something from the Calgary philharmonic but meh.

I intended to do a lot of video work last night, but I got home from work late and then I got confused about why I had 2 copies of the first Evil Within session and then somehow I ended up watching Mesk's Captain Planet adventure RPG. I'll post more of an update tomorrow for soundtrack Thursday.