JOSHUA: Familiar Face
I watched the 1995 film "Hackers" again. Did you guys remeber the fact that Angelelina Jolie showed her boobies in that movie? Another thing that was working in the back of my brain was that the protagonist Dade Murphy/Zero Cool/Crash Override (who later I found out was actor Johnny Lee Miller ex husband of Ms. Jolie herself) looked kinda familiar - he's also the star of the "Mindkillers" movie I was watching last night. He also played "Sick Boy" in the movie Trainspotting .
Weird.
JOSHUA: Mindhunters
Tim once told me about this film so when I saw a copy I decided to get it. Basically the story goes something like this:
"On a remote island, the FBI has a training program for their psychological profiling division, called "Mindhunters", used to track down serial killers. The training goes horribly wrong, however, when a group of seven young agents discover that one of them is a serial killer, and is setting about slaying the others. Can the few that are left figure out who the killer is in time?"
After watching the film, I kept trying to remember what Tim wanted to me see. I knew it was something to do with the characters, but not exactly what. Though so part were "like duh", basically I liked the concept.
Tim once told me about this film so when I saw a copy I decided to get it. Basically the story goes something like this:
"On a remote island, the FBI has a training program for their psychological profiling division, called "Mindhunters", used to track down serial killers. The training goes horribly wrong, however, when a group of seven young agents discover that one of them is a serial killer, and is setting about slaying the others. Can the few that are left figure out who the killer is in time?"
After watching the film, I kept trying to remember what Tim wanted to me see. I knew it was something to do with the characters, but not exactly what. Though so part were "like duh", basically I liked the concept.
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Friday, July 30, 2004
JOSHUA: Photographer of the Year
It’s official, I’m the Photographer of the Year . . . well for the company’s Photography club/workshop anyway.
We’re just wrapped things up for the 2003-2004 block and I won the overall monthly competition by 2 points. It’s kinda funny that the photo that game me the last few crucial points were from an instamatic camera which fought against the SLR cameras of the other members.
I was supposed to get a medal for my efforts, but I guess they’re still having it made. They did give me some high definition professional film and some ASA 100 film. Which I kinda found weird since I prefer using the digital camera over that of the traditional one.
They did have a raffle and I did win the grand prize of a free Digital Photography Training. I guess that kinda makes up for it.
It’s official, I’m the Photographer of the Year . . . well for the company’s Photography club/workshop anyway.
We’re just wrapped things up for the 2003-2004 block and I won the overall monthly competition by 2 points. It’s kinda funny that the photo that game me the last few crucial points were from an instamatic camera which fought against the SLR cameras of the other members.
I was supposed to get a medal for my efforts, but I guess they’re still having it made. They did give me some high definition professional film and some ASA 100 film. Which I kinda found weird since I prefer using the digital camera over that of the traditional one.
They did have a raffle and I did win the grand prize of a free Digital Photography Training. I guess that kinda makes up for it.
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Monday, July 26, 2004
ZAK: More Powerful Than A Super-hero
Had another one of those weird days at the office.
There’s this quarterly thing called “Breakfast meetings” held at the office to discuss how the company’s doing for the last couple of months. Each time this is done, some sort of twist is made in order to lighten things up. This time the theme was that of Super-heroes! As if that’s not weird enough, each of the presenters had to come in costume and at the same time try to present their report in reference to the theme.
Anyways, I was one of the reporters and was surprised to think that most of the other reporters were thinking of this as some sort of contest. There one who was planning to go as Kato (Green Hornet’s sidekick). Yet another one was going as Superman. Some even got to get their department mates to play part of a group thus some were in going as the Power puff girls (complete with the Professor) and yet another one was going as the X-men. Seems everyone wanted to better the other’s presentation and even bought their costumes.
Left to my own resources, I was wondering what I should do. So I went to the store and bought myself a Spider-man T-shirt. Not a costume, but just one of those with “Spider-man 2” written on front and a big drawing of Spider-man at the back.
Come presentation day, I was the last to give my report. So clad in a white long sleeve sweatshirt and the T-shirt on top of that, some jeans, rubber shoes and a pencil tucked in my ear I started to explain: “I was forced to think of someone who was more powerful than the super-heroes that came before me. Since most of the heroes came from comic books, I guess coming as a simple comic-book artist gives me better leverage when dealing with them. I may not be the one fighting crime but I’m the one who’s instructing the heroes what they should do – kinda like when you’re at Finance and dealing with the Sales people.”
Anyway, I then proceeded to present my report. I found some comic panels of spider-man before hand (those panels with drawings but with no dialogue yet), which is in turn I made a flash presentation just like those dot comics found in the marvel site. It kinda fit nicely into the comic book artist theme I was going for.
Everyone was line, “He got us there didn’t he?”
Had another one of those weird days at the office.
There’s this quarterly thing called “Breakfast meetings” held at the office to discuss how the company’s doing for the last couple of months. Each time this is done, some sort of twist is made in order to lighten things up. This time the theme was that of Super-heroes! As if that’s not weird enough, each of the presenters had to come in costume and at the same time try to present their report in reference to the theme.
Anyways, I was one of the reporters and was surprised to think that most of the other reporters were thinking of this as some sort of contest. There one who was planning to go as Kato (Green Hornet’s sidekick). Yet another one was going as Superman. Some even got to get their department mates to play part of a group thus some were in going as the Power puff girls (complete with the Professor) and yet another one was going as the X-men. Seems everyone wanted to better the other’s presentation and even bought their costumes.
Left to my own resources, I was wondering what I should do. So I went to the store and bought myself a Spider-man T-shirt. Not a costume, but just one of those with “Spider-man 2” written on front and a big drawing of Spider-man at the back.
Come presentation day, I was the last to give my report. So clad in a white long sleeve sweatshirt and the T-shirt on top of that, some jeans, rubber shoes and a pencil tucked in my ear I started to explain: “I was forced to think of someone who was more powerful than the super-heroes that came before me. Since most of the heroes came from comic books, I guess coming as a simple comic-book artist gives me better leverage when dealing with them. I may not be the one fighting crime but I’m the one who’s instructing the heroes what they should do – kinda like when you’re at Finance and dealing with the Sales people.”
Anyway, I then proceeded to present my report. I found some comic panels of spider-man before hand (those panels with drawings but with no dialogue yet), which is in turn I made a flash presentation just like those dot comics found in the marvel site. It kinda fit nicely into the comic book artist theme I was going for.
Everyone was line, “He got us there didn’t he?”
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Friday, July 23, 2004
GENE: Ragnarok Offline
Rico fixed the computer! Yehey! Joshua would be so happy!
Got hold of a copy of the Ragnarok Offline game. It's the server version actually, which means one can play it without connecting to the level-up-games servers. I think this is a beta version or something. I had to guess some of the commands which were still in korean. I was able to try a couple of characters and would probably try the others when I find time. It is pretty much addicting but there's something missing from it. Playing with yourself is not as fun as playing with someone else.
Yuck! Joshua! Get your mind out of the gutter! Piper!! Joshua's thinking dirty thoughts again!
Rico fixed the computer! Yehey! Joshua would be so happy!
Got hold of a copy of the Ragnarok Offline game. It's the server version actually, which means one can play it without connecting to the level-up-games servers. I think this is a beta version or something. I had to guess some of the commands which were still in korean. I was able to try a couple of characters and would probably try the others when I find time. It is pretty much addicting but there's something missing from it. Playing with yourself is not as fun as playing with someone else.
Yuck! Joshua! Get your mind out of the gutter! Piper!! Joshua's thinking dirty thoughts again!
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Monday, July 19, 2004
RICO: House Computer Fixed
Found time to format the hard disk and finally got the computer system working. Much to Gene and Joshua's delight.
Found time to format the hard disk and finally got the computer system working. Much to Gene and Joshua's delight.
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Saturday, July 17, 2004
JOSHUA: KING ARTHUR
Was bored at the office so I left early to be able to catch a movie and try to get rid of the boredom I was feeling. Went to Greenbelt three and watched King Arthur. Was sitting beside Deither and Kristine for two hours of more boredom. I expected something more from the movie but then again what could you get from a film who wanted to be based on a more realistic version of the myth?
Was bored at the office so I left early to be able to catch a movie and try to get rid of the boredom I was feeling. Went to Greenbelt three and watched King Arthur. Was sitting beside Deither and Kristine for two hours of more boredom. I expected something more from the movie but then again what could you get from a film who wanted to be based on a more realistic version of the myth?
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Friday, July 16, 2004
JOSHUA: Spidey
I’m assuming that as of this time most of the people have already seen the Spider-man 2 movie, so I don’t think I’ll need to give a blow-by-blow review. Nor do I believe I need to give the lecture on what lessons one can learn from the movie regarding heroes and self-sacrifice.
I guess I can safely say that it’s great summer movie. Well, for me anyway. I went in expecting drama and more spidey action and I wasn’t disappointed. The hero sub-plots were nicely done. I really felt sorry for Doc Ok. Tobey Maguire’s spidey stance, moves and stunts (or maybe those were just CGI but then again it was beautifully rendered so I’m not complaining) to the shooting of the web balls and other neat spidey tricks/action.
The inside jokes were a treat as well - the elevator skit and the “My back! My back!” scenes were funny (though, as usual, there were times that I would be laughing all by myself when those scenes were shown – or probably laughing for a different reason. :P )
I’m assuming that as of this time most of the people have already seen the Spider-man 2 movie, so I don’t think I’ll need to give a blow-by-blow review. Nor do I believe I need to give the lecture on what lessons one can learn from the movie regarding heroes and self-sacrifice.
I guess I can safely say that it’s great summer movie. Well, for me anyway. I went in expecting drama and more spidey action and I wasn’t disappointed. The hero sub-plots were nicely done. I really felt sorry for Doc Ok. Tobey Maguire’s spidey stance, moves and stunts (or maybe those were just CGI but then again it was beautifully rendered so I’m not complaining) to the shooting of the web balls and other neat spidey tricks/action.
The inside jokes were a treat as well - the elevator skit and the “My back! My back!” scenes were funny (though, as usual, there were times that I would be laughing all by myself when those scenes were shown – or probably laughing for a different reason. :P )
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Monday, July 5, 2004
GENE: Campaign worlds and blogs in a state of flux
should have known better than ask zak regarding the eberron book.
anyways, i confirmed with the host and it seems that the computer is still down for another week. i guess the rest of the blog and campaign projects will likewise be on hold together with that. as of these. currently there are three blog projects which are trapped in limbo:
Tempest Feud: the crew of the Lee Hua are contracted by the neogi to take care of something for them in this blog version of the spelljammer 2004 campaign.
Shackled City: continuation of the adventures of Amun-Ra, Archibald VanDerBoren IV, Ian McLaren, Pharem Carrabhin, and Thariel Valkyrie in the city of Cauldron. based on a chain of adventures featured in Dungeon Magazine.
Sharn: Isabella, Laverne, Mother Butler, Augustus, Derek and Tsu Chow are transported in this conversion project of the Thorngate series into the campaign world of Eberron.
should have known better than ask zak regarding the eberron book.
anyways, i confirmed with the host and it seems that the computer is still down for another week. i guess the rest of the blog and campaign projects will likewise be on hold together with that. as of these. currently there are three blog projects which are trapped in limbo:
Tempest Feud: the crew of the Lee Hua are contracted by the neogi to take care of something for them in this blog version of the spelljammer 2004 campaign.
Shackled City: continuation of the adventures of Amun-Ra, Archibald VanDerBoren IV, Ian McLaren, Pharem Carrabhin, and Thariel Valkyrie in the city of Cauldron. based on a chain of adventures featured in Dungeon Magazine.
Sharn: Isabella, Laverne, Mother Butler, Augustus, Derek and Tsu Chow are transported in this conversion project of the Thorngate series into the campaign world of Eberron.
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Friday, July 2, 2004
ZAK: FLUFF AND CRUNCH
Gene asked me to take a look at a copy of Eberron - the new campaign setting of the D&D game. I guess he wanted to see how salable the ideas found within the book are and on whether there are stuff that can be useful in the other project.
For one thing I think Eberron in a well thought of world. Umm… let me kinda reword that – Eberron is made up of stuff from a jumble of thoughts. I think it was made to clearly resell the D&D/d20 system and try to gain more sales on the existing books that WotC came up with. The book is riddled with tons of different stuff which touches on different books that have been published by WotC for the last three years. One would need to have a complete collection of the said books in order to fully make use of the stuff located in the Eberron books. It’s like one person said “why don’t we put this idea in” “cool!” and they place the idea there. Then later “how about this idea?” – a totally different one” and the reply would be “sweet!” and they place them in so the final product looks like a hodge podge of things. I do have to give credit to Keith Baker (the creator of the setting) for trying to give sense to all the stuff and elements that was put in the setting – regions, houses, intrigue and such. A good DM might be able to find, sort and modify all the stuff he needs in his campaign but otherwise it’s going to be a nightmare for some.
Basically, for me, much of the book was FLUFF. Too many interesting things were described but not enough explanation was given as to how to enable players and DMs to use them in their games. I guess I would fall into those type of players who have more need of CRUNCH (game mechanics) rather than FLUFF coz I think almost 20 years of gaming experience can enable one to easily make up his own setting and storylines and yet, it would take a great game designer to find new ways of using the d20 system to it’s full advantage.
Gene asked me to take a look at a copy of Eberron - the new campaign setting of the D&D game. I guess he wanted to see how salable the ideas found within the book are and on whether there are stuff that can be useful in the other project.
For one thing I think Eberron in a well thought of world. Umm… let me kinda reword that – Eberron is made up of stuff from a jumble of thoughts. I think it was made to clearly resell the D&D/d20 system and try to gain more sales on the existing books that WotC came up with. The book is riddled with tons of different stuff which touches on different books that have been published by WotC for the last three years. One would need to have a complete collection of the said books in order to fully make use of the stuff located in the Eberron books. It’s like one person said “why don’t we put this idea in” “cool!” and they place the idea there. Then later “how about this idea?” – a totally different one” and the reply would be “sweet!” and they place them in so the final product looks like a hodge podge of things. I do have to give credit to Keith Baker (the creator of the setting) for trying to give sense to all the stuff and elements that was put in the setting – regions, houses, intrigue and such. A good DM might be able to find, sort and modify all the stuff he needs in his campaign but otherwise it’s going to be a nightmare for some.
Basically, for me, much of the book was FLUFF. Too many interesting things were described but not enough explanation was given as to how to enable players and DMs to use them in their games. I guess I would fall into those type of players who have more need of CRUNCH (game mechanics) rather than FLUFF coz I think almost 20 years of gaming experience can enable one to easily make up his own setting and storylines and yet, it would take a great game designer to find new ways of using the d20 system to it’s full advantage.
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Thursday, July 1, 2004
GENE: DINOSAUR
the host was reading the (news)papers last night and a couple of articles surprised me. one was a book review section and it discussed how the dragonlance books, specifically the legends trilogy, changed the reviewer’s life (said reviewer is in high school and possibly reading the 3rd printing of the book). i read the legends when i was high school. it was one of my beloved books back then. how could i resist a story about raistlin (looks around the cranium to check if the raistlin persona is listening, wouldn’t want to stroke his ego) especially when it was about the him in the height of his power and his subsequent downfall.
another article which caught my eye was that magic the gathering (the collectible card game) is coming out with it’s 45th expansion in the coming month. 45th!!! it’s been around that long? why, i can still remember the time jd pulled out and gave away cards from the beta set. i wonder how one would pick his cards if they would still allow type one games.
of course, there was also the spider-man articles since it started showing at the local theaters yesterday. spider-man was around since i started with comic books. ageless! much like the new cartoon of the teen titans which is being shown on the cartoon network. even if it’s kinda different from the hard copies I collected back in the days, the general idea’s still there.
reading these articles is complex. for one thing, one should feel happy that all the stuff one loved when he was a kid is still there. however, it is also kinda sad that even if these sources of glamour are around, one cannot help to think that the amount gathered from them is still not enough to help one and those around him to stave off the effects of winter like it used to. maybe it’s just the fact that people change (read: grow old) and thus one must learn to adapt to things and events around him but he still needs to hold on to some things or else one would totally lose himself in the mundane ness of life itself and eventually be extinct like the dinosaurs they are now.
the host was reading the (news)papers last night and a couple of articles surprised me. one was a book review section and it discussed how the dragonlance books, specifically the legends trilogy, changed the reviewer’s life (said reviewer is in high school and possibly reading the 3rd printing of the book). i read the legends when i was high school. it was one of my beloved books back then. how could i resist a story about raistlin (looks around the cranium to check if the raistlin persona is listening, wouldn’t want to stroke his ego) especially when it was about the him in the height of his power and his subsequent downfall.
another article which caught my eye was that magic the gathering (the collectible card game) is coming out with it’s 45th expansion in the coming month. 45th!!! it’s been around that long? why, i can still remember the time jd pulled out and gave away cards from the beta set. i wonder how one would pick his cards if they would still allow type one games.
of course, there was also the spider-man articles since it started showing at the local theaters yesterday. spider-man was around since i started with comic books. ageless! much like the new cartoon of the teen titans which is being shown on the cartoon network. even if it’s kinda different from the hard copies I collected back in the days, the general idea’s still there.
reading these articles is complex. for one thing, one should feel happy that all the stuff one loved when he was a kid is still there. however, it is also kinda sad that even if these sources of glamour are around, one cannot help to think that the amount gathered from them is still not enough to help one and those around him to stave off the effects of winter like it used to. maybe it’s just the fact that people change (read: grow old) and thus one must learn to adapt to things and events around him but he still needs to hold on to some things or else one would totally lose himself in the mundane ness of life itself and eventually be extinct like the dinosaurs they are now.
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