Leap Year

I can only legitimately title a post "Leap Year" once every four years so I didn't wanna pass up this chance. So far I haven't really done much, I was up late playing The Sims, the second generation of my legacy was popped out and she's now a happy child. The legacy thing overall is going well and it really does give me a reason to play the game. The stupid thing just froze while I was at a community lot though, so I'm getting over my anger at that with a blog.

Free Time

I haven't had a chance to post about Free Time, the new Sims 2 expansion, yet. I guess the main reason for this is that I've been too busy playing it and WoW again. So far FT has been pretty sweet. They added a lot to the game instead of just a new gimmick, although I guess the hobby thing is kinda just a big gimmick, but it comes with a lot more depth than the other ones. Before FT I could take any family and do my usual routine to have them making money hands over fist in no time, but now my time is a little more stretched and I can't just do the same thing everyday, which is nice. Also in the game your sims can play The Sims 3, and if it looks as awesome as it does in the game it should be awesome. It's Maxis though, so of course it will be awesome. WoW's also been working out better than I had thought it would, Jenn and I got a chance to play together the other night and it was fun, she's busy a lot with her raiding guild and assface, but that leaves me time to play on Ravenholdt and The Sims, so I don't mind much. The druid's fun and I can't wait to try out the alliance outland quests. Now I'm gonna go play one of those.

Elundil

Rawr
Zangarmarsh
Armory

Waste of Time

I was going to write a reflection paper on my CIS247 course like I did for my GSP courses, but I don't really see the point. It didn't cover much that I didn't already know, and most of the time I spent helping other students. I took the final today, drove out there and finished it in about 15 minutes, which is annoying b/c I spent more time in the car than taking the final but she wouldn't let us take it at home cause we might cheat or something, not like it was hard anyway. But whatever, I'm done with it, too bad I've got the same prof for 246 next semester =/

I guess this is a reflection paper after all.

New Shit

I finally did some stuff with my sidebar. I signed up for a Digg and Del.icio.us accounts and posted them over there to display news and sites I look at and all that. I also added a couple other blogs and I hope to add more soon. I think that's all I've got for now.

In The Middle

I just aced my first final of the day and now I'm in the computer lab studying for my next one. I ended up with a 98% in the class, which is really good, but I'm kinda down because I spent 3-4 hours last night doing homework and a reflection paper that would have put me over 100%, but since I didn't turn them in before the test I didn't get credit for them. It's not really a big deal, on transcripts an A is an A, but I'm pretty sure the prof thought I just blew off the last assignment because I had my grade padded enough that it wouldn't matter, but I really did do them! Anyway, I've gotta get back to studying, this next final requires a lot more studying than the last one did.

Reflection Papers

As an extra credit assignment in two of my classes I had to write a short paper about what I got out of the class and how I felt the class worked. I wanted to post them here because... well because this is my blog and I can.

GSP220 Math for Game Programming:

Going into this class I wasn’t really sure what to expect. I was hoping to take out of it some of the math concepts that I would need to program games but I ended up with a lot more. I had taken up to Pre-Cal in High School so none of the concepts were really new to me, although I did need a refresher for some, but I learned a lot about how they relate to game programming. One of my favorite things was working from the first couple weeks on our Point class, then building on that for the Vector class, and finally using that along with our Matrix class to play with the shapes for the final project. I had heard the class was a lot different with other professors and I think that our class got a lot out of it that wouldn’t normally have been offered. Although this was not a C++ class and a lot of what was going on in the program we looked at was over my head, having a chance to put my hands in it and play with what’s going on was very interesting. Not to mention the things we were able to do with what we learned about matrices was just awesome.

I was very comfortable with the pacing and structure of the class, but I think that was largely due to having a basic understanding of the math and C++ coming into the class. If I had to find a flaw in the class I think it would be that some people were overwhelmed by what was going on. To improve this, the school could make a C++ class a pre- or even a co-requisite for this class. All in all though, I got a lot out of this class and had a lot of fun doing it, I’m very glad to have taken it when I did.

GSP240 Fundamentals of Game Design:

Game Design was the first class I’ve taken at DeVry that I was really excited about when I signed up for it. Having a chance to learn about the game development process was a very interesting process. In addition to all the technical terms for things that I already knew I learned a lot about what goes into making games in a professional environment and the kind of effort that needs to be put into each and every game, even though most of the games that will be pitched won’t ever be made. Professor Maynes also brought a lot to the class that had nothing to do with the book, such as the importance of pitching the game and being confident in telling stories and presenting in front of a group in a highly stressful environment. Although I did know a lot of the concepts that were explained particularly in the last chapters that were covered in class, having an actual knowledge about it is better than the general understanding I had going into this. There was also a lot that had to do with the way levels are designed and the type of information that needs to be done before any work can start on a game.

My favorite part of the class was working on our own game as well as seeing everybody else’s presentations. Working on our game and being able to play off of each other’s ideas was a lot of fun and interesting to see what we came up with. The presentation itself was also an important learning process because the Professor gave the class as a whole feedback that I had never heard in a class before. Learning about what works and what doesn’t work in a Power Point presentation was a nice bonus to the other things I learned in the class. To improve the class I would have loved to have more time to spend tweaking and refining our game, including more than one presentation to see how everyone’s game changed over time, but that isn’t going to be possible with the semester changes that DeVry is adopting.

No Extra Credit

I missed an A in COLL148 by 10 points because the prof didn't add up my Extra Credit right. I hate her.

dr00d

My new Druid build

I've decided that I want to get back into WoW for sure. It may not last long, but I intend to play a druid. If things don't work out with that then I'll go back to my original idea of a Belf pally... again. The only problem is where to play this new Druid. I could always go back to Ravenholdt with Chuck and them, who apparently have a decent guild going now. But Chuck's a big fat Republican and not the best player, not to mention the server fucking sucks. Appolonius wants me to go back to Maelstrom, and I've already got a 20 something Druid there, so that's a bonus, but while I don't have anything against App, he's not my favorite person, and his gf is flat out annoying. My current choice is on Zangarmarsh with Jenn, but that comes with enough problems too. For one, Jenn and I aren't exactly close, we play at way different times, and I'm not even sure we'll ever get to play together, due to her being busy on her Shammy and her jealous, assface boyfriend thing. I also thought about asking what server Anthony from my school plays on, they seem like good guys and they do some casual raiding, which could be fun even though I wanna focus on PvP. Why do video games have to be such a pain in the ass?

Injustice

According to Access Services' Website, they have a vision. They accomplish this vision by "Providing quality, efficient and dependable ADA paratransit service." I may be crazy, but I don't think that quality, efficient and dependable service would leave a handicapped person in the cold just because they weren't waiting in the street when their transportation arrived nearly 20 minutes late. It's pretty appalling that they have such blatant disregard for their customers. The drivers won't go out of their way to find a passenger and usually late or early, making it almost impossible to go anywhere that requires an appointment, such as a doctor's office or, god forbid, most social events. I think the point of Access is to make handicapped people just stay at home. Access exists because a state law requires there to be some form of transportation for handicapped people but they really need to step up their service in order to represent the state in a positive way.

Who are you?

I'm bored. I'm tired. I'm hungry. I'm apprehensive about playing with Jenn again. I'm sad that my GSP classes are ending (crazy, eh?). I'm excited for my new GSP classes. I'm cold. I'm tired of Tara jumping all over everything. I'm having fun playing The Sims. I'm jonesing for Warcraft. I'm done with this post.

Weekend

Things I need to do this weekend:
-Write reflection papers for GSP 220 & 240.
-Evaluate CIS247 Proff
-Study for Finals
-Think of a way to get out of going to the VS launch on Wednesday
-Finish Uni to get ready for Free Time!

Meh

My friend Jenn came online today after I hadn't talked to her in a couple of months. Things with her have been kinda weird ever since I found out that she had been lying to everybody in our guild about something which I don't need to go into here, but needless to say this was not the most comfortable discussion I've ever had. Eventually we just stopped talking about what happened and we played WoW together for a little bit. I guess it wasn't so bad but I'm not sure if we can ever get back to that friendly place we were in before. Which is weird b/c we used to hang out a lot in the game, but then she started being super distant shortly before she moved and then told me what was really going on just before she moved and broke all communication. I guess I kinda wanna give her another chance b/c of the situation I was in with Diana and the fact that she forgave me, but this is a lot different. I can only imagine if I had told Diana that I was lying to her, then disappeared, then came back a year later and said "Let's be friends again!" what she'd have done to me. I dunno, I'm kinda jumbled with this and I wanted to get it off my chest.

My Legacy

I started the Martinez Legacy Challenge tonight. Shortly I'll be posting a link to my spreadsheet score card so that it will be trackable on the internets. I'm using some modified rules that I made myself, I don't have a problem with using a relationship decay mod and I'm using any items I feel like, although I'll do my best to resist using the inSIMinator. I've never really been big on money cheats, so I don't think that is gonna be an issue. I'm also starting a little early so that I can get my founder through college before Free Time comes out in a couple days, since I don't have any challenges that go along with that yet.
I also priced out my books for the next semester today and it came to just under $300 bucks on the school's site. Tomorrow I'll find em on Amazon used and compare the prices!

Gaming

It's starting to look like my gaming time's gonna be pretty full soon. The new Sims expansion coming out, Free Time, actually makes me wanna play the game again. And to celebrate, I'm gonna start a legacy family. I'm currently making up my own rules and point system because I think some of the other ones are a little too constricting. I'm also gonna make up some new rules that I think should have been included, like getting gold badges and whatnot. I also don't really care about using cheats, so I guess this is kind of just a way for me to keep track of what I do in the Sims. I'll probably get bored of it in not too long.

I'm also starting to get the WarCrack bug again but I'm not sure where I'm gonna end up playing. I'll keep you posted.

The Weight of the World

I'm finally done with my WaterWorld project. All in all it turned out a lot better than I was kinda fearing it would. The documentation turned out solid and even though we didn't have the best presentation, we didn't do bad, so I call it a win. Maynes was clear that even the best presentation was weak compared to what we could have done. I think he was kind of expecting that though because he more or less through us the assignment without even really telling us what we needed to have. People always say that the best way to learn to fly is without a safety net and that's pretty much what he did. Sure all of us could have done better, but what we ended up with was four solid game concepts and a shaky foundation for presentations that we could all improve upon. All in all I really enjoyed this semester even though I've been somewhat overloaded for the past week, Maynes really changed my mind about the standard of education at DeVry, you just gotta get the right prof.

Jukebox Hero

After playing Through the Fire and the Flames a couple times I think my fingers are going to fall off.

Another Bitchfest

The COLL presentation went better than I thought it would. Our presentation was still shitty cause the others were complete morons, but the other groups set the par so low our badness was actually a couple of notches above all the other groups today. The first group was a bunch of kids doing lowering the drinking age. These guys weren't bad and aside from a technical issue with their videos I'd say they were pretty solid. Next was a group about sex ed. I don't really know what their stance on the issue was b/c one girl was saying that teaching abstinence was the best way, the next girl said... something, I don't really know, the con side of their argument was a bunch of stories and then the guy literally saying "That's crazy." The last guy was also con and I really don't know what he was saying either, he just kinda rambled off some statistics and then said he was done. The funniest part was that their thing was just the four of them reading off of cards, they couldn't even manage to make a power point between themselves, which lead to theirs being the dullest thing I've seen in a long, long time. Next we were up, and even though it was short we had some good points and it sparked some decent discussion. The last group was about legalizing marijuana, and even though they had some valid points on the legalization, they didn't have any kind of debate at all. Most of it was just statistics about what happens to you and then at the very end they said some negative things but I don't even know what they were b/c they didn't have a slide or anything. The thing that bothered me the most was the prof was saying how medical marijuana wasn't a good idea b/c it should be up to the FDA not voters on what constitutes medicine. The problem with that reasoning is that the FDA hasn't said that marijuana doesn't have medical purposes, in fact they haven't said anything b/c they don't test it, they just stick their thumbs in their ears and wag their tongues at the idea of marijuana. The federal government had 15 medical marijuana test subjects in the 70s and then never asked them how the treatment was working for them. I don't know about you, but that doesn't seem to be a valid way to decide on a drug that could potentially help millions of people. This has kinda turned into me talking about drug legalization, which is a whole nother blog topic. I think I'm gonna end it here.

You Can't Do That, It's Wrong

Bleh, I've actually been doing homework for the last couple nights, what a fucking drag! Now, I know what you're thinking, and really, it wasn't all bad. I had some quality day dreaming and forum posting in between and some delicious beer that made the time go a little bit quicker, but other than that being at home has been dull city the last few days. The biggest project I've worked on was our WaterWorld game for GSP240. It was fun but painful at the same time. It's a group project, but my partner wasn't exactly involved with the whole thing. It wasn't his fault as I kinda took it upon myself to do it, and the parts I asked him to do he did perfectly, I just wanted more creative control over it, I guess. In class today I managed to completely finish the project I've got due Tuesday for GSP220, which turned out fucking excellent. We've been learning how to apply matrices to transform points and I really didn't understand the point to it all, but the prof gave us a sort of test bed with some objects and we had to manipulate them in various ways and the result turned out way cool. After the short stint I had as a construction worker I had a real fondness for working with my hands, being able to look at the result at the end was a great feeling. I can confidently say that typing in code and watching a world come to life is exactly the same feeling. Programming is awesome. On the neg side, I just finished a rather craptastic PowerPoint for my oh-so-dull COLL148 class. I predict we'll be the second or third worst group, cause there's some total fucking morons in that class. The entire project was done by me b/c the two other people in my group can't handle the most basic of instructions. Now this would usually lead to a pretty satisfactory presentation, however, I just didn't give half a shit about it. I mean, it's a totally bullshit class that's designed for them to squeeze just a little more money out of you. The prof is clueless and I'm pretty sure that we'll get a pretty good grade regardless of the shitpile that is our project. The only upside to it was getting to really work with office '07, which rocks. I think that's about all for now, gotta get up early and present tomorrow >.<

EDIT: Wow, that was long as hell and I didn't even get to the point of the title and Faith-in-Buffy pic that I chose. The topic for our presentation is abortion and all of the "pro-life" reasons have to deal with how abortion is murder and blah blah blah. The whole time I was typing that out I just kept thinking about Faith mockingly saying, "You can't do that, because it's wrong!"

The Long Way Home

I finally got the trade paperback for the first Buffy Season 8 arc titled, The Long Way Home, and reading it all over again was even better than reading it the first time. Yeah, I've got all the single issues, but I didn't wanna take them out of their shrine to reread them. There were a couple things that I didn't realize at the time or just plain forgot, b/c they did start coming out a year ago. One thing was that Buffy thought Twilight's symbol was "a beautiful sunset" and issue #11 where she actually fought Twilight was called A Beautiful Sunset. Also in issue #11 they reveal that Satsu was the one that gave Buffy the kiss of true love; however, when Buffy wakes up she says she has a funny feeling on her mouth and then yells "Cinnamon buns" when she wakes up. In the next issue she points out that Satsu's lip gloss is cinnamon flavored, reveal much? Anyway, I just thought I'd blog about that b/c Season 8 is the greatest thing ever and I loved rereading all of it, instead of doing my homework, of course.

Crastination Skill Level: Pro

Why is it that whenever I've got a lot to do I always get distracted and can't focus on it?