Thursday, August 18, 2011

Complaints Department: YouTube and Heroscape

Heroscape has been around long enough that I would have thought there would be more YouTubers commenting on the game. And yet, when I get on The Tubes hoping to find someone's gorgeously oversized board with loads of scenery and innovative use of terrain and engaging scenarios, the best I can find is some guy who makes middling-size, but very boring maps. Yes, he's done good photography to make those boards look nice, but as a terrain designer, I'm disappointed by the sheer dullness of the look and feel of them. The next best is this pair of guys who only posted one video map, and that map is sort of interesting (since it uses a CTF and a race-style scenario), but not actually all that great. The rest are... well, disappointing. It makes me want to just scratchbuild a big map using all my parts again, do a combat report on it, post it to YouTube, and make a point of specifically saying how fail all of these other guys are. I mean, seriously, have any of them even read Heroscapers.com?

(Click below for pics of my largest map to date!)

Tuesday, August 16, 2011

Sadness

I'm told it's important to allow yourself to be sad once in awhile. I personally hate that concept, but I have to admit it's exceedingly true. I'm not sure what that means for me right now, since I'm not honestly certain whether this current feeling of depression and irrational emotional pain is internally or externally sourced, but frankly it makes me uncomfortable to realize that it's probably best for me to just try and experience this as deeply as I can while still functioning in the world.

My emotions are erratic, and that itself is a huge problem for me. I keep breaking down over nothing, and it's tough for me to get things done. I'm worried about this semester, because even without my feelings going haywire all the time it's going to be relatively difficult for me. I'm... well, I'm displeased with this. Things are crazy enough without having to deal with falling apart all the time. I'm getting married, for crying out loud! But I still haven't gotten this troublesome little emotional issue under control yet.

And the worst part?
The worst part is...
I can tell you right now that if this grows much further I'll doubtless return to my suicidal urges.

Still won't act on them. Too much to lose, and too many to disappoint. Whatever keeps me alive, right?

But still. They'll be there again before long, if this doesn't get a lot better in the meantime.

I wish there were an easier way to get rid of it, once and for all, but I suppose it's never that simple. It would be nice, but sadly the only ways I know to do that are far too destructive to far too much besides the problem. So I guess the thing to do now is just live with it. Maybe have some shenanigans or something to take my mind off it, though that probably will only work as a stopgap. Until next time -- and there will be a next time, don't worry -- I'll keep moving ahead on this path. I have little choice but to do my best and trust it will lead me free of this trouble.

Wednesday, August 10, 2011

...Wut. 0.o

First lucid dream ever, just now. It wasn't a great dream, but it was a huge landmark for me. It wasn't lucid in the sense that I realized "oh look, I'm dreaming, let me start doing impossible things now" so much as "either I can let this continue, or I can stop now by choosing to stop dreaming." But there was a realization nonetheless that it wasn't real.

I don't remember exactly how it started, but the first thing I remember was being with Melody. I was giving her a very particular look, and kissing her in an unusual way. Then it cut to later, when I was in more or less the same situation, only I could now do more than just kiss; thanks to some kind of "sex mods" I had installed in myself online. I think I had an understanding of this at the time, but I didn't see the actual control panel or whatever until later on. They gave me the ability to do virtually anything sexual, of any intensity or level of appropriateness. But when the time came to use the second batch of them, I realized it wasn't time yet and thought it through. I seriously thought about it, with Melody looking at me in confusion, but I confused her even more by deciding to wake up rather than disrespect her by using them early. Then I had a couple of flashes of the online control panel and briefly saw the names (one of them, I think, was called "KissMod v1.something," which is ridiculous). Then I was outside the store where I'd bought the system, and it looked really, really seedy. There was no one inside, and the inside was really dark even though it was bright outside and there were big windows. There were two buildings, apparently related, though I was only interested in one of them. They were both closed, and I guess after I looked around the outside of the one I was concerned with, I decided I was done investigating and woke up just under two minutes before my alarm went off.

Which all was awesome, because for the first time ever I actually consciously chose to end or otherwise manipulate a dream, and even though the dream was more or less all about immoral behavior, I still chose to end it.

Saturday, August 6, 2011

Dream

Had an odd dream this morning. Not bad, but odd. Actually I was pretty excited when I woke up. Why, you ask, dear reader? Well, I will tell you.

I was excited because I spent the whole dream hanging out with TRiPPY, who is unequivocally one of my heroes (heroines?), and even got to explain part of Gurren Lagann to her. ...And then I think I met her again and she was jealous that I got to hang out with her earlier. Which was odd now that I've woken up, but in the dream I think she represented someone else since she had the wrong face. But then, I still can't figure out who it really was, because she was dressed as Imagni, and I kept referring to them both as the best artists in the world. Though they didn't end up meeting, they both seemed to want to. Also, while I was hanging around the first TRiPPY, it somehow came up that the reason I was doing so to begin with was that she had something to do with my wedding, which was awesome. And when I'd first arrived, she was with someone else, who I think may have been my brother. Then we somehow got onto the topic of Libera Me From Hell, and I was telling her about the lyrics, and she sounded genuinely excited, and maybe even impressed that I knew what the heck the guy is rapping in that song.

All else aside, it was a pretty awesome dream.

 

EDIT: ...I'm not sure whether I dreamed this or not, but I just remembered that (I think in the dream) Azia had written a book that someone in my family or immediate surroundings was reading and that was awesome too. Trouble is, I can't remember whether it was before or after I fell asleep.