The Blogwind

As far as I'm concerned, the introductory blog post doesn't really count as a post. Seeing as I hate leaving these things so sparce (though I suppose the advantage this has over my ill-fated LiveJournal is that this is all done through Neoseeker, which means less sites to remember to check and more tabs free for my TVTropes browsing), I figured I'd best get down to the bitching promised in the aforementioned introductory post.

First up, the media. Not the internet (this time), seeing as that'd be a whole blog post by itself (though I certainly plan to address one of my major gripes in this post) but the humble television.

Moreover, how much it sucks huge donkey bollocks. The cartoon channels for a start- they aren't as good as they used to be, I'm sorry. This could be just because I'm finally growing up, or it could be because childrens television just isn't what it used to be- though I must salute Fosters' after their little "stunt" on the Thanksgiving Parade. Then there's the rest of the telly- the soaps, the news, hell, even the documentaries once you've watched them all, and lets not forget reality TV. The soaps try too hard to be overly dramatic and just end up being unrealistic and, dare I say it, cheesey. The news only seems to fixate on the bad things- come on, we have all these stories about blood, guts and terrorism, what's the harm in the odd "PRESCHOOL TEDDY BEARS PICNIC GOES TO PLAN"? Sure, it might not be as exciting (read: ratings whore-worthy) as "101 KILLED IN TERRORIST ATTACK IN INDIA", but as things stand I can't help but get the impression that all that ever happens outside of my life is shit, shit and more shit. I mean, Jesus, I get my daily dosage of "SHIT IS HAPPENING" before I even turn on the frickin' telly.

Okay, before I write a whole blog of incoherent babble about the news, time to bitch about re-runs. God damn re-runs. This is the lesser part of my television-based ire, since I can appreciate that you can't constantly churn out new episodes of new series (unless you want them to be steaming piles of monkey bollocks, which I for one don't), so that one gets a breif reprieve for now.

Then we're onto the "reality" TV. Oh boy, I'm gonna have a field day with this. Reality TV doesn't exist. There is no way you can stick a camera anywhere without people trying to make themselves look good for it. Take Big Brother- the TV version, not the Neoseeker one (this time). It's not reality anymore, it's a group of corporate bastards sticking the most controversial group of people imaginable out of the "ZOMG I WANNA BE CELEBRITEE" volunteers into a house and passing the popcorn amongst themselves. And there are people that somehow find this crap entertaining, but hey, at least it's not another bloody rerun, right? Well, yes it is. It's the same crap with different faces each year. The worst part of it all is that my family watch this shit. Three months a year of utter bollocks- and then there's the other nine with slightly-less-utter bollocks. I'm sorry, I'm re-running with my terminology already, aren't I?

Time to move onto an issue that's probably closer to the hearts of the Neoseeker populace at the moment; memes. Pass the flame shields and shit deflectors, people, I'm probably going to catch some flak from the memetards among you for this.

Memes are not funny. This may sound hypocritical after I've saluted Fosters for their Thanksgiving stunt, but that's more out of me appreciating the song and tittering at the people rageing at being Rickrolled again. Yes, Rickrolling is a meme, but that's irre- okay, it is relevant. The point, however, is that memes are funny precisely one time. That is five million times less than I have seen some of the more notorious offenders here. No, it is not "Over 9000". In fact, the humor level of that meme is far UNDER 9000. No, you can not has cheezburger. No, I will not lol at your cats. Most importantly, no, I do not like Mudkips.

"BUT DEATHWIND, HOW DO YOU PROPOSE WE BE FUNNY THEN"

By using your damn brains and coming up with something original. If I can make a group of people laugh with what little wit I have left, so can you. Just... think a little. Humour comes much more easily than you'd probably think.

And last but not least, the giant robots.

"HEY DEATHWIND, WHATS THIS ABOUT GIANT ROBOTS???"

That, dear viewer, is one of those little bits of praise and happy fun time I promised to squeeze into the hall of rants. Or just plain nerdery, which given the subject matter here is very likely. Super Robot Taisen: Original Generation 2, a Strategy RPG featuring... giant robots. Lots and lots of giant robots, from all sorts of mecha anime- or just the Banpresto (the comany behind SRT) Originals, seeing as those are the only mechs featured in the OG sub-series (the only ones that have ever made it out of Japan, owing to the HUGE lisencing costs). I could write a whole blog on why I find it awesome; the script- which unlike some other SRPGS with huge casts I could mention (hey Fire Emblem), actually gives everyone a decent amount of screentime-, the gameplay (always my biggest concern with games), and just how plain satisfying overkilling everything is. Just yesterday, I started EX-Hard Mode (the game's hardest mode, where the enemies actually get upgrades, you can't customise weapons and all the pilot upgrades cost twice as much), so I could get the happy-fun-time screwing around mode. Now, being the sort of person who would normally run away at the mere mention of the phrase "Hard Mode", it's honestly not as bad as I thought it would be. Until about 13 stages in, that is.

This particular stage is the only one I'm struggling with so far. In this stage, you have to protect a badly battered space battleship. From nothing stronger than a host of fighter jets. Sounds easy, right? Wrong. These jets are the most agile little buggers ever- think about 10-30% chance to hit one while they're set to evade attacks- which they will always be on your turns, much to my chagrin. The battleship starts horrendously damaged, and if it goes down, you start again. This battleship also takes a surprising crapton of damage from these jets- though that could be more me refusing to upgrade it since I'll only have it for a few chapters and wanting to save money for the ton of awesome I'll get later on, but hey-, and once you've sent all your mechs over to deal with the first 10-12 jets, another group swarm in to **** you up. That's as far as I get before they all butt**** me and I have to restart the episode.

And I am bloody loving the challenge. Every time you go through the game, a large amount of the money and Pilot Points (PP) you've collated over the course of the game is inherited in the New Game+ option, which then leaves me with everyone joining with enough PP to get all three of the essential skills at the start- on normal, anyway, where you only need 260 PP to get the "Big Three", whereas on EX-Hard (where skill costs are doubled) you need 520 (unless the character is awesome enough to have one of the Big Three inherently), something only about three or four of the cast have stocked up throughout my files. For the first time since my first playthrough, it's giving me a hard time and for that I am thankful.

And that's all that I promised with the title done. Next time I dare to think about anything other than how the hell I'm going to get through this game (29 stages left after this, and it only gets worse from here! =D=), you can expect me to turn my ire to the Internet, and possibly some bits of school. Maybe even a summary of the epic hell I've fought through OG2 by the next blog post.

Until then, live long and prosper!