Archive for the ‘General’ Category

Master of Magic

Sunday, May 5th, 2013

Master of Magic was released on PC in September 1994. Today, May 2013, practically 20 years later, I can finally say that I have played a perfect game with my first 100% score finish in Impossible mode.

To think I almost threw the towel on this one when I ran into an enemy wizard right after I lost all my initial troops trying to take an adjacent neutral city (which meant I was now trapped in a peninsula with only my starting Gnoll city) within the first 30 turns. I feared the worst when I had to reject Gunther and Brax early on, but I lucked out and got Shuri with Agility soon after. I got her geared well enough that by the time the wizard turned hostile I was barely able to hold off against a stream of Gorgons and Rangers. I got Zaldron as my second hero and he almost died many times to Rangers and Horsebowmen attacking my capital. Once Shuri’s gear was done, I went on the offense and took the continent, which was full of cities. On my approach to finishing the last city of the first wizard off, I ran into the second wizard and ended up getting Awareness. This allowed me to avoid fighting multiple fronts as I then took over the majority of Arcanus fighting one wizard at a time. Getting Serena with extra spellcasting geared up helped hold territory as I pushed across Arcanus.  Zaldron basically sat at home for most of the game and provided a minor boost for my overland casting. This was one of the few games I somehow did not get Phantom Beast or Spell Blast in my spellbook, so I ended up using Phantom Warriors all game and had to keep the enemy wizards banished to avoid spellcasting retaliation. However, I got Haste later, so Shuri was able to take down nodes in Myrror as part of the mop-up to clear my spellbook and research the Spell of Mastery.

The question is: Now what?

Fear of Water

Friday, March 11th, 2011

Hearts out to Japan for the 8.9 Earthquake earlier. I hope my two friends in Tokyo are okay.

Protected: A Realization

Monday, May 24th, 2010

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Extended Absence

Monday, April 19th, 2010

I can’t believe it has been almost a year since my last post. I guess I put my life on hold for a bit longer than I had anticipated. I guess it is time to get back into the flow of things…

Trying New Things

Friday, December 12th, 2008

I am entering a Soul Calibur 4 tournament tomorrow. While I do not expect to win any money out of this, I guess that this is a good opportunity to try something different. I have never been particularly good at fighting games, but the concept of meeting new people and being able to have live competition is appealing. Online play has proven, at times, quite frustrating; and it would be nice to see how the game plays without lag being a factor.

Comic-Con 2008

Tuesday, August 12th, 2008

This is way late, but last month I attended Comic-Con 2008 down in San Diego. I only took a couple of pictures, and I could probably post some of them if I wasn’t so lazy in getting them off of the camera. It’s ironic because I ran out and bought a digital camera the day of the flight out. There were a ton of people there at the convention, and the city itself was very nice. Still, it was good to be able to attend one of these and see just what it was like to be able to view it as a consumer instead of an exhibitor. The only thing that seems certain is that I will want to attend Anime Expo in 2009 in Los Angeles.

A Vacation At Last

Monday, June 9th, 2008

I appear to have survived through it. It only took six years, but I’ve finally taken my second vacation. However, I’m not certain that hiking and camping out in various parts of Washington and Oregon would really be most peoples ideas of a vacation. In truth, it was probably not far away enough from work and home; afterall, I was still in the same time zone. Of course, it wasn’t all bad, as there was definitely a purpose, and some memories, to go along with the trip.

High: Sitting around a campfire, chatting with a bunch of people trying to stay warm.
Low: Hiking 7+ miles in the rain.

Still, there was some interesting times. It was good to at least get away from the bubble that is known as Silicon Valley. It is sometimes pretty amazing how easily we can get caught up in our daily lives without ever stopping to really consider what it is like outside of our spheres of influence. It was also somewhat amusing to have to operate in a different mode of survival for a brief period of time. Sometimes, it helps to place things into perspective when you break away from the usual routine.

A Show

Saturday, May 17th, 2008

Saw what could probably be classified as my first music show ever: saw the Yoshida Brothers in San Francisco at Yoshi’s. It was pretty good. Those guys did some crazy things with a pair of three-stringed instruments.

Of Trials and Tribulations

Tuesday, April 8th, 2008

It’s been an interesting couple of weeks where I have had to delve into the duties of owning a home. It’s amazing how inconvenient storing food can become when you suddenly don’t have a fridge for a period of time. While, thankfully, that is now taken care of, there are still many other things that need attention. Strangely enough, other than the general stress of having too much to do, I feel that it has yet to hit me that everything actually belongs to me. Of course, I realize that, ultimately, I am responsible for myself and must make do with what I have. I am essentially running out of valid reasons for not getting tasks accomplished. While it is now home, the place is still devoid of things that I think would give it life. So, I guess that I will see if things begin to settle down in the next few weeks.

“Good” Friday

Friday, March 21st, 2008

I think not. Today was horrid. Nothing went smoothly at all, and many things got pushed back. While a shower did not help, a nap and some food certainly did ease things. It is unfortunate that life is sometimes this complicated. I still honestly believe that it shouldn’t be.