_hojo:Eye of the Beholder

_Many years ago, I had 2 addictions. Actually, that’s a lie. I had a few addictions. Nothing like drugs or anything, don’t worry. Anyways, I had some addictions. The addictions I speak of, specifically, were Minesweeper and AIM. More specifically, talking to a girl I had a big crush on on AIM. Even more specifically, talking to her on AIM while playing Minesweeper. All the time.

_hojo:Woody’s Roundup.06

_Well…obviously, there have been things happening in my life since the last roundup. I’m now in a new place of residency. My room is much smaller, but I have many new things to better maximize the space given to me. If I had this stuff in my old room, I’d have had a fuckton of space. Oh well. Once I’m FULLY settled in, I’ll have pics of the new rig up in another post [I actually am settled in, but I’m not really done setting up my room yet. Stuff is still lying around…I haven’t figured out what I’m going to do with a couple of my things yet.] Well…I was settled in during the FF13 post, but now I’m getting back into the blogging…thing. Well, no more than before. Not like I ever kept up a torrid pace of posts. But I do try to make ’em meaty, even if I have to combine single paragraphs about 10 different games to make ’em that way! And now, because you’ve got a friend in me…it’s time for another roundup.

_hojo:Final Fantasy XIII – revolutionizing the paradigm outside the box

_On December 17th, 2009, Final Fantasy 13 was released in Japan. The hype was huge and the internet was abuzz with “He said, she said” from friend’s brother’s cousin’s roommate who speaks japanese but can’t read it that well who was about 5 hours into the game, but already had written up their final impressions on the full game. After about 2 weeks, you’d have thought that the entire internet was fluent in japanese, had imported the JP FF13 and had played through the full game already, because if you brought it up, they’d tell you how linear it was, how the storytelling was weak, who the worst member of the awful cast was, and how the lack of towns ruined the gameplay. Because everybody had totally played it. “I can’t wait for this to come out and get torn apart by the US reviewers because it’s horrible!” All this from people who weren’t jaded anti-S-E revisionists who loved FF7 back when it came out, then when they found out that kids that went to Hot Topic were into Advent Children, they started telling people that FF7 was totally gay and K-ON! is hardcore. No sirree. Anyways…on March 9th, FF13 hit US shores, and shockingly enough, I decided for play it myself and judge it based on my own feelings. Novel concept, eh? These are those feelings put into words.

_hojo:Woody’s Roundup.05

_Phew…we’re getting there…is there even anything for me to add here that’s happened since last time? My life is so uneventful. Well…that’s not true…but it’s uneventful in the fact that nothing happens that I’d feel comfortable talking about it here. Though I suppose that might be a little bit of an insight into my life, cryptic though it may be? Nah, that’s bullshit. Perhaps…I’ll step a little bit into my musical tastes as of late? As black and white as possible, I’m usually in one of two moods: up or down. When I’m feeling down, I like listening to down music, and vice versa. My “down” albums of choice of late have been Alice in Chains’ self-titled album and Brand New’s “The Devil and God Are Raging Inside Me.” My “up” albums have been the Beach Boys “The Sounds of Summer” and Spinnerette’s self-titled album. And when I’m in the mood for a little bit of both, the entire Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex soundtrack collection has been working pretty well. Maybe that’ll give you a little more insight on the inner working’s of Hojo? Or maybe not. In any case, it’ll just have to do. Deal with it. Now…the boot fits. Time for a roundup.

_hojo:Woody’s Roundup.04

_It’s been a while since the last roundup, hasn’t it? The animals have gone batshitcrazy, running amok all over the place. It’s about time to wrangle them up. But first…have I done anything interesting in the time since the last roundup? These opening paragraphs of WR’s are the only time i ever really talk about myself on this blog…but no, nothing interesting. Well, some stuff. I started a diet. My current progress: 50 pounds and 6 inches over 3 months. Decent progress, but I’ve still got plenty more work to do. The struggle continues…I miss all the delicious snacking. Thankfully, it’s a low carb/high protein diet, so while bread and potatoes ;_; are off-limits, tasty chicken and steak and still good. And I’ve replaced things like crackers, chips and cookies with peanut butter. Seriously. And looking at the last Roundup…that happened right after my birthday. Well…Christmas happened a while back month ago. I got some sweet Powerpuff Girls on DVD and Calvin & Hobbes books. They’ve brought me great joy over the past couple months. No new games were gotten, but that’s OK.  I own enough games that I haven’t beaten. I’ll be more psyched for getting new games for birthdays and Christmas when everything’s finished. Actually, I think I’ll be more psyched for being able to replay old favorites guilt-free when everything’s finished ;-D So…that’s about everything I feel like talking about for now…hey, howdy, hey, let’s round up some games, shall we? There’s a lot of ’em…

_hojo:welcome to Earth

_I played Earthbound for the first time a few weeks ago. I’ve been trying to write a blog post about it. But…it’s been hard. I’m trying to come to terms with the game. Trying to decide what my actual stance on it was. Trying to put into words what I felt about it. It’s been hard. Now some time has passed…and things haven’t really gelled in my head. But I figure I’ll shit something out on it anyways. No time like the present, right?

Gendo – Back to Basics; or a short conversation on two Neo-Old School Games

Well, I’d like to start off this post with apologizing for not posting in such a long while. For what ever reason I seemed to have forgotten this blog existed (not true), and haven’t written anything in 3 months. Truth is, I think I was just lazy and didn’t really have anything to talk about, but now I do and I promise to write more often for the benefit of the blog. 🙂

So what am I talking about today? Recently over the years of 2008 and 2009 we’ve seen a little bit (read: little) of a resurgance in old school type gaming. That is, games that are either unabashadly old school in style, such as Mega Man 9. Or games that are rooted in old school stylings, but bring something new to the table or have the look and feel of a new game, such as New Super Mario Bros. Wii. Incidentally these are the two games I’ll be talking about today.

_hojo:Final Fantasy 3/6 – the CES run

_Earlier this year, I happened to be browsing the “in-depth FAQs” for Final Fantasy VI (originally released as FFIII in the US) on GameFAQs, when I stumbled upon an interesting idea. “Beat the game using only the 3 characters you’re required to get during the 2nd half of the game.” I thought to myself, “What an interesting idea, especially since I’ll be using a lot of Celes and Setzer.” See, I oftentimes never use Setzer when i play FF6, and while Celes does get a decent amount of forced play throughout the game, I usually find myself dumping her for Terra once I get her back in the party. I was also looking forward to seeing the changes that would occur plot-wise, as there are many decisions the game expects you to make that aren’t actually required. Not much, really. But there were still some humorous back doors taken by Square when you don’t do all the optional shit.

_hojo:Metroid Prime (Metroid Prime)

_Oh, Metroid Prime 2: Echoes…why are you so shitty? OK, maybe might be a bit harsh. Actually, it’s really harsh. It’s not actually that bad. It’s rather enjoyable. But why is it still so shitty? I find myself asking this question…and I’m not sure of the answer. I’m hoping that by the end of this post, the answer will become clear to me. Join me on a journey through space and time to find the answer to the unanswerable. OK, not time. And it’s not unanswerable either, but at this point, I’m just kind of going with the flow and I have no idea how this is going to end. Should be fun, though…right?

Gendo – The Day The Earth Stood Bound

Just recently Starmen.net held an annual event that they like to call the EarthBound Funktastic Gameplay. I don’t much about it personally since I’ve never really followed the goings on of Starmen.net too closely, but by chance I found out about it through Lyndis of The Backloggery. I’ve always been a fan of EarthBound and an annual playthrough of the game sounded like a lot of fun. Personally I hadn’t played Earthbound since I was a kid so I figured this would be a good chance to get reaquianted with the game. People seem to throw around a lot of praise for EarthBound, lamenting it as beeing underrated and perhaps one of the best RPGs of all time. This recent playthrough reminded me why EarthBound truly is one of the greatest RPG experiences out there, and why more people need to play this oft ignored gem.