AlttC's Blog

Something fast

2006-08-24T06:20:00.000-07:00

At school I had to make a comic about my study. This is the result; beware, it's in Dutch *puke =P*

Mondays...

2006-08-14T05:39:00.000-07:00

Hi everyone,

Nice sunny weather is just as normal here as a hangover after a not-so-down-to-earth-night. NOT! It's raining cats and dogs, almost literally speaking. I think our small country absorbed the water like a sponge, because I get the feeling that we're living a bit higher than usual due to the thin air... Below see level my ass, we would've drowned by now then. Will the rain ever stop?

Ironically enough, the sky is clearing up as we speak. I can even see some sun in my room just now. You know that feeling? The feeling you get when you're finally used to something and while you're finally at peace the 'something' just changes again.
Oh well.. At least I don't have to worry about getting lost in a storm when I go to my job. The sun will probably vaporize me before I even get there.

Life goes on ^^
I bought myself a laptop for my new school. Too bad the payment went wrong, and now my order got deleted and my money is gone too. D*mn! Moreover my cellphone still isn't in my possesion and our Digital TV is having fun playing games with us. Congrats to everyone who wanted to annoy me, you've just succeeded.

On to the more enjoyable things in life... like Wii. The Nintendo Wii is probably my last game console because I kinda lost my interest in games... NO! Please stay with us sir! I'm still ok, I'm not mad! Yo lady! Argh, my fans! They all fainted... Well, the only thing I can do now is stop writing and hope the best for these few dear readers.

Take care everyone,

Kostas

BTW: It's raining again, oh sweet hilarity...

Dragon-Drawing-Duel

2006-08-07T16:06:00.000-07:00

Hi everyone,

Today I had a drawing-contest with a girl named Rosa. Actually we started Sunday, but we chose to show our works to each other this Tuesday. It ended up that her work was the best... Quite impressive, although I could not take a good look at it because she showed her work through the webcam. I'm quite happy with my dragon, but I'm almost sure that mine lacks the "force" compared to hers. Nevertheless it turned out fairly well.

We agreed that a background would be nice, but neither of us finished that part yet.
Oh well... We'll see about that later. The point is, I've probably been beaten by a girl ThE HoRroR ^^ No, I would like to congratulate her, because it's very hard to beat a guy like me *cough*.

In other news, I returned my cellphone to the company because of the small beauty flaws. I hope I get a perfect one in return; also because of the high prices for package mailing.

Oh man, am I tired now. It's only 01:19, but it feels like 08:00 on a Monday morning before work. On the background I hear Limp Bizkit with My Way Or The Highway. It's on a loop (like usual), but I guess I'll change it now.

My bed looks like heaven right now; if I ever where to have a girl in this bed, the bed should look just like this ^^ I'm 'a Do Things My Way! Woops, guilty for not changing the song. *click* Ok, now Billy Talent is on with This Is How It Goes. It's a really great rock band with a special feeling in their music. I would almost call it 'The Force' again.

Well, I hope this is enough for today/tonight.

Take care,

Kostas

Drunk over-aged girls in karts; cellphones included!

2006-07-24T15:10:00.000-07:00

Hey everyone,

Because of some 'certain circumstances' I wasn't able to post on the blog. If you're looking for me these days, you should wander around the Geestmerambacht; I bet you'll find me doing a nice twisted jump in the water; which, of course, fails. Luckily this time of the year it lacks some seriously annoying bugs and bacteria. The down side proofs itself with the children who are now allowed to play in the damn water. Sadly there are more under-aged girls than necessary, not to mention the OVER-aged girls...

In the evenings you can find me with a few neighbours and other scum around here.We're probably playing SSBM or Mario Kart: Double Dash. Finally some punks I'm able to beat! With little luck you can even find me in a pub... Don't worry folks, I won't get drunk. That mainly has to do with the high prices of beer (2 euro); but I shouldn't forget the part that I just don't like to drink beer. Give me Heaven, but Lord, please don't give me beer!

Some other info about me lately: I surrender mysellf to mass-consumption. I finally found my "inner-whore" and got myself a cellphone. Nokia6230i is her name and she does everything I want... Except for looking good. The problem is that the back can't be connecred correctly so it's a bit higher than the rest of the gadget. It now looks like some strange punk haircut, which is not funny... Oh well, with a little luck I'm allowed to send it back and get me a new one ^^

I hope I will be able to update more often from now on. For now, all I have to say is: "Thanks for reading and please leave a comment" ^^

Take care,

Kostas

Some BS for a change ^^

2006-06-27T09:57:00.000-07:00

Hey everyone,

I feel like I have so much to do lately. So many things on the (black)list to take care of... However, when I check how much time everything will cost you could say I've got quite much freetime; it just doesn't feel like it...

I want to write as much as possible, but at the same time I don't have a clue what I, a guy who's knowledge goes as far as a brick, could possibly tell you, the intelligent readers who read this blog out of pity.
I haven't played any games the last few days (except a game of chess with my neighbour) and I'm not in the mood to talk about problems in life.
Here I am, sitting behind my PC after a long day in the city Alkmaar looking for a gift without any results. I just turned my music off and took my headset... It feels good on my ears. They say it doesn't matter how cold your body gets, as long as your ears and feet are warm, you won't find it too much of a problem.

Why am I even posting now? I'm probably getting on your nerves. But hey, don't worry! You're allowed to bitch at me in the comment section.
Ready... GO!

Greetings,

Kostas

Finally done!

2006-06-19T07:49:00.000-07:00

To be honest, I do not believe in God, still I want to thank Him because I'm done with my days of slavery! Yep, school is no more. I guess I'm free to say that "I'm 2 cool 4 school!" now ^^

That happy feeling of homework and finals is gone, sad but true. The nasty holidays are about to start. Last thursday I heard the relieving words from my teacher, I didn't think I could make it, but I did! D*mn that felt Go(o)d.

Immediately I was invited to a gameparty at a friend's place -thanks Jeroen- to release all the adrenaline of the past five years in a few bloody battles on screen.

Kung Fu how it's supposed to be!

After a quiet day, I was invited to another party on Saturday -Rob, thanks to you too-. After a little talking, we went outside to the nearest greenness planted bush called "Geestmerambacht". There was a 'Indian Summer Festival' going on there and the tickets were 30-40 (!) euro... So we decided to watch from a distance. It was already midnight so a few of us were drunk as hell ^^

Of course I was still sober, to guide the rest (and watch them struggle, hehe). It's very amusing to see some drunk punk with a girl on his back stumble and almost break his neck (God I wish we had pics!). Fun times, fun times! ^^

One of my best friends will make his comeback in a few weeks; as you might know Wesley went to Tasmania for a year. For pure educational purposes of course, right Wes? I hope he will be able to survive the culture-shock and if he does, I'm sure he won't survive the lack of oxygen here. Man, it seems like everyone I know is starting to smoke nowadays. I'm getting a bit sick of it, because they all ruin their health and of course it's choking for others, like me.

Are you a slave too?

Oh well, I guess we leave the smokers alone for now... But I WILL continue on this subject later on! It's quite sunny outside, so I guess I will take a walk outside. Take care everyone,

Kostas

Fun with Art

2006-06-09T14:03:00.000-07:00

Hey everyone,

This post will be a little less educative. I'm gonna show you my latest art pieces. "Art pieces? Ow Nowhs! My eyes, they burn!" Silence! You haven't even seen them yet!

The first one is from a manga/anime; his name is Gohan.

Gohan SSJ

I've drawn this one with an example on the computer:

Original image

Do they look a like? No? Good! Because they're supposed to be a bit different.
After the drawing, I scanned it and coloured it on the computer. I think it came out quite well.

Next on our list is Samus Aran. You know, the female Bounty Hunter from Nintendo.

Samus Aran

This is the example I used:

Original image

I have also drawn this one while peeking at an image on the computer and later on I also coloured it, like Gohan. Only this time I used a different shadow pattern and style. I think it turned out nice.

Well, that's it for now. I also have non-coloured drawings but I'll wait with posting them until I coloured them too. I hope you liked them; post a comment if you do. And if you don't, you should also post a comment, perhaps with some useful help.

Take care,

Kostas

Graphical power and cheering!

2006-06-04T12:05:00.000-07:00

Hi everyone,

I just had my finals previous week. God, I think I fucked some test up... oh well, we'll see about that later.

Lately, one of the main subjects of discussion, within the gamers community, is Nintendo's Wii graphical power. People think that Nintendo is hiding something from us and many are convinced there will be a Spaceworld 2006 in a few months. Spaceworld was a big event where Nintendo held a few important speeches before. I must say that even I am thinking there's a big possibility that Nintendo will have a new Spaceworld, but I don't think Nintendo has many graphical power left to show us.

It's true that, at E3, the games for Nintenod Wii didn't look as nice as games on the 360 and the PS3. Nintendo always said they weren't going to challenge Microsoft and Sony at a graphical level. They just said you would say "Wow!" when you see the games in action. While we did not really say "Wow!" people where speculating about some conspiracy theory... Where have we seen this before? Last year there were about the biggest conspiracy theories in the world of games, and all about the codenamed Revolution. The Revolution would contain stereoscopic view, virtual reality and who knows what else. The madness was insane; yes, an Insane Madness.

Back to the point. The funny thing is.. We're still not sure what the Nintendo Wii can handle. Nintendo never told us any specific details on the graphical power and after being busted, they confessed that the Wii's at E3 were actaully Gamecube's with a Wii attachement. So we still haven't seen any real Wii at all; we first didn't care about graphics and wanted to know more about the controller and now it's the opposite. Because we know quite much about the controller, we want the system to become as powerful as possible in our little minds. We want all that, while Nintendo told us that the Wii will be cheaper than the other consoles (probably around 200, 250 dollar/euro). We'll see what happens...

In other news:

I bought the DS music game Osu! Tatakae! Ouendan and it's really great. Mind if I explain a bit? No? Ok, here we go!

You play the game as a team of male cheerleaders and with your cheering you try to help people. For example; a student is getting disturbed by his family all the time, while he needs to study. As the cheerteam you cheer for guy so he is able to handle all the situations without failing his tests. It's a really funny game and the manga style suits it well. In order to help people you will have to touch numbered bubbles appearing all over the screen. Of course these bubbles are in sync with the melody and it works perfect. The game is so addicting! The music is al J-Pop; which is a plus for me.

I recommend the game if you're tired of the old-fashioned games you're used to. Of course, if you own a DS that's probably the case. The menu's and the story are in Japanese, but it shouldn't be any problem at all. You can buy the game in the Japanese webshop Lik-Sang without any shipping fee. If you don't feel comfortable ordering from Japan, you can also ask your local gameshop if they want to order it for you or maybe even have it in stock (which I don't think). The game will be released out of Japan too, but I can't recall the name (something like 'Cheerteam').

Well... That's all for now.

Take care ^^

Kostas

A positive view on games

2006-05-14T07:01:00.000-07:00

In reaction to an article on gamesite Moz La Punk, I wrote my own experiences of how games changed my life. You always hear people say videogames will motivate you to run around like a lunatic with a semi-automatic machinegun. To me, that is nonsense. I won't deny some deaths caused by gaming, but I don't think games alone are the problem then. You can read my own experiences if you like:

Well… I don’t have such big stories to tell, but games really did help me and my friends in life. To start with a friend: He always failed English tests because his basics were not good enough. Although he always played games, he did not really read the text much. Nowadays he plays First-Person-Shooters and MMORPG’s and although his marks aren’t always as high as he wants, I can see his English improve in many ways.
The writer of the article talked about his younger brother who learned reading with the help of games.

I have played games since I was about six years old. At first I played on a Atari, which didn’t have much text in it. But then I got my first PC, and I played Jazz JackRabbit 2. It started with some guns I had to remember. Of course this is less hard when you are already able to read in your own language, but it really helped me. I became really interested in games a few years later, and when we finally got Internet, I searched the whole Internet for info about new games. I knew I would be able to find more information if I searched on English websites, so I did. Together with English TV-shows and probably my interest in the language I became better and better. I wanted to have information and therefore I had to read it in English.
It works the same in games. When you play a RPG, you want to have information about your mission and stuff. The only thing you will need to do is understand the language. Because of the fact you get an image of what happens or about what you need to do, you don’t have to look up for a word in a dictationary. Eventually you will learn the words by seeing them time after time.

Another positive thing about games; when you are angry or depressed you are able to excape to a different reality. It feels like all your annoying responsibilities are gone for a few hours. You can just ‘relax’ and do what you want. You could even shoot people down to lose your agression… the agression that you might have used in real life otherwise…

I had a few problems as a child, my mom got cancer and although she survived, I always had to help her when I was young. She lacked energy many other healthy people (like me) did have. Because my dad doesn’t live near us it felt like I had to do everything (which wasn’t the case, but I was little and didn’t get the whole picture). I was a quiet boy, so I kept my problems in my head. Games really were a way to escape from the annoying life I felt I had. I could live in a other world were I did things for people because they trusted me. It was not the case that I was asked something by my mother and failed to do so because I was too small. I wasn’t a burden, but really a help. That really felt nice for a change.

Well… this was kind of a personal story. :$ Oh well, I think I made my point clear. Games really help you when you’re having a hard time getting somewhere in life.

I hope you all share this opinion with me. If you don't, please explain in the comments-section. You are also welcome to post any other comments of course :) Thanks!

Kostas

E3! A second heaven to gamers...

2006-05-12T12:12:00.000-07:00

Hey everyone,

The world's biggest gameshow is currently taking place in LA and I should be studying right now... Well, I can assure you I haven't missed a bit of info about the new game-consoles.

The press conferences of Sony, Microsoft and Nintendo took place just before E3 and, as usual, were very interesting to watch. Each of the big companies often make big announcements on these conferences. They also show lots of new games and other media; they try to make a great show, because part of the press their opinion is based on these events. Here is a summary of the conferences.

Sony:

The conference started a bit boring, they showed all kind of statistics about how well the Playstation 2 and it's smaller (but almost as powerful) little brother. There's no doubt that Sony has sold frightenly much consoles and even more games! After the sales Sony finally showed us some Playstation 3 games. Some kind of Eye-toy used a card-based game which one can move with their hands. You just wave your hand across the board where the camera was aimed at and the TV will present your hand as a pointer. Your hand doesn't change the way it looks, but it becomes an event where you can trigger other objects on the screen. Quite funny, but not that spectacular in my opinion. Next they finally showed us the Playstation 3 games in a trailer. The first game to be focused on was the sequel to Gran Turismo 4... Gran Turismo 5. It looked pretty, but to me it seemed quite boring.

After a few unnecessary games we got to see Final Fantasy XIII. Although it's a long series, it still sells like hell and will continue to do so because of the great gameplay and beautiful graphics.
Luckily we got to see another young woman next, who was fighting all kinds of hideous monsters. Everything looked so smooth; this game will probably be a so-called killer-ap for the PS3. So definetly be sure to remember the name 'Heavenly Swords'.

Until now, the conference had been fairly boring. Only a few games appealed to me and never was I blown away. Sony kept the best for last and showed their new controller. The design of the controller is exactly the same as their previous one (the DualShock). There are a few differences:

- The controller has a tilt function build in
- The controller won't have any rumble abilities
- The L and R - buttons are a bit bigger
- It's fully wireless

The PS3 will launch 12 november this year. You will be able to choose between two versions: PS3 with 20 GB hard disc (499 euro) and one with 60 GB hard disc (599 euro). Quite high pices if you ask me. Will the Sony fans buy this? (double meaning)

Nintendo:

At the start the show was presented by a ceremony of Shigeru Miyamoto; the only difference was that he ceremony was completely digital. Mr. Miyamoto hold the Wii-controller in his hand to control the ceremony; besides a few flaws in his actions the Legend of Zelda theme was perfectly played. While he ran of the podium the audience cheered. Right after that the so-called Reginator came to stage and presented the Wii controller. After a trailer with a few great, but also a few shabby games, we got to see the controller in action. A firts-person-shooter called 'Red Steel', which by the way had fairly poor graphics on some parts, was showed and the possibility to aim the Wiimote in all directions seemed to work perfectly. The light effect were quite nice but the pixels on some doors where clearly seen sometimes. Next Nintendo showed The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess. The graphics were great, although this is going to be a game for Wii's predecessor, the GameCube. It will also be available al the launch of Wii with the possibility to play with the special Wiimote. Nice innovations were shown, like grabbing items with the nunchuku (the second part of the Wii controller) just while moving the controller to a different angle. The Wiimote even got a (low-quality) soundbox installed so you will be able to hear your sword, arrow, gunfire from your controller into the game. It's that little step forwards to stereoscopic gaming.

Nintendo told us the Wii will always be on-line, even when it's turned off. This will make it possible for other gamers to visit your village in games like Animal Crossing and also will it automatically download new free content for your games. Nintendo told us that not every secret of the Wii has been revealed yet and showed us a bit of tennis with four players on the podium. Digitally that is. We hope to have all info about the console soon, especially about the specifications; these are only known to be much lower than X-Box 360's and PS3's.

Microsoft:

While I sadly haven't watched this conference (it was only live available via the X-Box Live network) but I know a few details of it.

The start was, like Sony's, a bit boring and had some sales in it if I;m not mistaken. A few big games are annouced like Fable 2 and the next GTA. That was quite a shock because people first thought that would be de killer-ap form Sony, but Sony didn't mention the game (though it will be released on Playstation 3). There were no big announcements on the console because it was already shown on the previous E3. One big thing for Halo fans was a small trailer of Halo 3 which revealed a few things about the story.

Opinion:

Well... these were the three conferences. Many people blame Sony for stealing Nintendo's idea of the motion sensing in the controller. But according to Sony, they already had plans to do this since 1994. Why they never did anything with it? It was not possible. Personally I think they were too scared to bring something new on the market. They like to play it save. It's a shame they didn't show some great new games. One great game and another nice one is not enough to steal the show.

Nintendo had a great start, the ceremony thing was quite funny and they didn't talk much about the sales. They slowly got less interesting... never boring, but we wanted to see some first-party games from Nintendo. They only showed a few flashes of Crisis, Project HAMMER and Mario Galaxy. And where the heck was the new Super Smash Brothers? Also Nintendo did not talk about any upcoming GameCube titles. Luckily later that day Super Paper Mario and a new Donkey Kong game were announced for GameCube and the next day a new Super Smash Brothers trailer was shown. Also Mario Galaxy is playable at E3 now and it gets some really positive reactions.

Microsoft didn't do anything ground breaking but what they showed was of high quality. Quite some sequels, but they all were from games people wanted sequels of. Alan Wake, GTA, Halo 3 and many more; That's what 360 gamers want.

This has been a great E3 (actually, as I told before it's still busy) and although some companies had better shows than others, there's still a lot to look forward too!

Thank you for reading my article and please leave a comment :)

Take care,

Kostas

Welcome

2006-05-01T05:14:00.000-07:00

Hello everyone,

This is my first post on my own blog. I'm not exactly sure what I'm going to post here; but I guess it will have something to do with the slice of life ^^ I'm a gamer so expect lots of columns about the gaming industry from my point of view. In additon, I'm also a big anime-fan; manga's are not really my style, but I will not hesitate to read one when I get the chance.

About 'AlttC', it's my nickname. While my nick was AlinktotheCube first, I thought the nick was too long so I kinda made it shorter. Why AlinktotheCube you ask me? Well... My first game-console that I bought myself has been the GameCube and my all-time-favourite game would be 'The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past'. There you have it... the whole story about AlttC ^^

That's all for now I guess... Please visit again. I'll probably/hopefully have some articles ready for you to read.

Take care,

Kostas