Happy Christmas Indeed

Hehe, yesterday was probably the most heart warming days I have ever had in a very long time. Me and my girlfriend had actually planned to celebrate my Birthday on Christmas and so we did. I am just gonna make this post a short 1 because the pictures will be doing the explanation for me. Okie so let's start with the first couple of pics.

Cookies ! All baked by my girlfriend. My goodness she is so sweet to have learned how to bake them for me. She told me that she spend the whole day doing it, and I was so touched because she really did put a lot of effort into making them. Her mom told me that she had actually made a lot more, but some failed, and some got eaten by somebody else. Personally, I know she really did try her best to make it a succes, and I really love those cookies that she baked because she used her heart into making it and also because it really tasted good.

Later, we went shopping at 1 Utama, met Wai Hong and Patricia there but did not really had much time to chat as everyone was minding our own business =P. Probably the only major decoration for Christmas that we have seen in 1U was this stage right in the middle of the new wing.

For dinner, we went to Shogun to eat(hey, I like Japanese food so I did not mind eating it even if it was Christmas), and it was at there that my girlfriend handed me my Birthday present. Ta~da my present was an original PC game, Gears of War. As someone who breathes and eat computer games, this is the ideal present for me =). I love her so very much because she has given me a really memorable Birthday celebration, and also the first Christmas that I have ever celebrated in my life. *Kiss*

Birthday Weekend

I know I know everyone only has one Birthday a year, but what I am talking about is of the English calendar( or whatever you call it) and the Chinese Calendar. Saturday, which was the 22nd of December is my actual Birthday but on the following day, which is the 23rd of December, it is my birthday based on the Chinese Calendar.

This year's Birthday really has nothing much to bragged about. In fact, the day started out quite sucky, because I had earlier planned a date with my girlfriend the day before. On the morning of my Birthday while I was having breakfast, when I informed my mom that I was going out, she immediately said I had to stay home or at least come back before the Reunion Dinner. The Reunion Dinner is of course not because of my Birthday, but it just so happens, that very same day is our Chinese's Guo Dong Festival (no idea what the English name is). Hoorah for me, I had to call off my date with my girlfriend and stay home (we usually only come home at around 8-9, so we knew we could not make it back).

Worse yet, at about 2 pm, my mom came into my room and told me that if I wanted to go out I could. Only thing was, at the very same moment, my girlfriend was already going out to visit her grandmother who is in the hospital. I felt really moody at first, emo-ing, and such, but later things took a turn for the good.

At about 8 something, my girlfriend asked me whether I would like to go out for a movie and so I did. Immediately went to pick her up and went to Leisure Mall to watch I Am Legend. We were rushing quite a bit, but I could not complain about it, because that was probably the few hours that had saved my 19th Birthday from being a complete disaster. When I finally reached home, it was a couple of minute passed midnight. I did enjoy myself by the end of the day, because I was spending time with the person I love the most, my lovely lovely girlfriend. = )

So, about "I Am Legend", the movie is not too bad actually but it is also not as good as I would have imagined. Mainly because, the movie only lasted one and a half hour, just when I thought things were starting to become really interesting. [SPOILER WARNING- Highlight between the tags to read the sentence]Someone had to go pull the pin on the grenade and go KABOOM with the rest of the undead. [SPOILER WARNING]

For some reason, the movie reminded me of Heroes, when the Shanti virus was unleashed and cause a pandemic that killed a major percentage of the world's population. And what did you know, both movies featured a virus infected New York city which is abandoned/ infested. If anyone had recently watched Resident Evil: Extinction, this movie is quite similar to it only it is slightly better than RE. So depending on whether you like stories about vampires/ zombies or just like to have ur adrenaline pumping, you should think twice before watching this movie.

Important Gaming Post

Okie this is probably the first, not even half an hour after I have written the first post, I am already working on the 2nd. Okie less talk more stuff to see for urself why this is so the "must share" news.

First look at this video clip.


Next, look at this bundle.

Okie good. Thats all for this post. If you are a true gamer, you will salivate over the video and next you will wish to take your wallet out and start saving up for that very very tempting PS3 bundle.

Surian Prom '07

Yesterday was all about preparing for the night that my girlfriend have been awaiting since the beginning of the year. She always likes this sort of gathering, but in contrast me who dislike crowded places. What can I say, I am a natural introvert and most likely would still be the same in the near future.Yet, I can still accept this sort of gathering because my girlfriend is there with me. Seriously, do not expect me to go to any freaking function alone. I will either leave after an hour or so, or jump out of the nearest window that I can find. So, last night was rather uninteresting for me, maybe cause there was really not many familiar faces around to talk with. Wai Hong is the only 1 present which I could chat with besides my girlfriend but he has his own partner to attend to also, so well you (should) get it.

The food there was probably very sucky for a hotel's standard. The dessert was probably the more "interesting" dishes. Some of the activities that they had reminded me of my year's prom, and that is actually a bad thing, cause I would rather have that piece of memory erased permanently from my brain. Overall, I think that the night was rather dull. After the prom though, I just took my time to drive home and sidetrack a bit so that me and my girlfriend had more alone time to spent together. I felt more comfortable being around my girlfriend more than anything else. By time I have sent my girlfriend home and arrived home back in my room, it was already 2.22 am. As it was already that late at night, my system was beginning to shutdown. I just changed my clothes, jump onto the bed and next thing I know it was already 11.30 in the morning.

Today, everything was back to normal, read 2 chapters of Starcraft's novel, tried Company of Heroes: Opposing Fronts ( it came with the graphic cards that I bought), went looking for my girlfriend for a bit, came home, had dinner, played Monster Hunter and now blogging. Nothing too interesting but that's the way I live my life.

Oh yeah, this week's episode of Bleach is out. Bleach 153 "The Devilish Research! Szayel Aporro's Plan". Ichigo kicked that very same Privaron Espada's ass again and left after that. In the episode almost everyone met an Arrancar/ Privaron to do battle with. Even Rukia met up with an old friend which was supposedly dead, and that is now an Espada serving under Aizen. Thing are starting to heat up, more battle to come.



Still on Bleach, the movie will be out this coming Saturday, on my Birthday! Frankly speaking I wish one of the present I can have on that day is an English subbed Bleach movie. The trailer shown during the opening song of this week's episode really wanna make me pee in my pants. I have a couple of them below. The first screenshot shows Hitsugaya most likely facing against Soul Society and the second is none other than the Captain Commander himself, wonder if he will use his Bankai. He is one very macho old man. XD



Guess thats all this time. I feel like reviewing a game soon just dunno which, any of the reader can recommend 1? Feel free to leave a comment in the chatspace.

Heroes & Aliens

Nothing about wearing thighs or little green man, just that I have been watching Heroes for the past few days. I have finished watching Season 1 last night before going to bed, and today I started with Season 2. Not too bad I might say, but personally up until where I have watched, I prefer season 2 more than season 1. My favorite character is probably Hiro Nakamura, the time traveling/ teleporting dude. Like who wouldn't which to stop time or teleport around. I personally would, saves time traveling, no need for driving. And for time bending, you can go back to before you made a mistake and fix that. Of course in reality, there are no saves and loads just like in video games.

Besides watching Heroes, my secondary activity was probably reading the Starcraft Novel which I bought the other day. The story is really very interesting (at least for me), maybe because the story is from the universe of Starcraft, one of the earliest real time strategy games that I had played before. It is amazing how something which I have not been playing for more than a half a decade, can still bring back some memories when certain names and words are mentioned. The book can really absorb me in once I start reading them. Maybe because I can really visualize what is going on, even without a single picture in the book.

It is already almost until the end of the semester break, can't wait for the semester to start although the subjects I am taking are still those boring ass subjects which has almost nothing to do with my major. One thing though, at least I know I am doing something more productive and not sitting around all day just relaxing. Frankly speaking I can't help but feel guilty when I am being over relaxed. It makes me feel weak sometime thinking about it, but IT is the thought of it that makes me feel even more discouraged to do anything about it. Bah~ I'm hopeless.

Anyways, tomorrow is going to be my honey's Prom night, hope I can adjust to a "younger" (well, they are 2 years younger than me after all) group of people. At least I know Wai Hong is going to be there. I have someone to talk to. *Joy* Hope the way I dress tomorrow will not disappoint my girl though.

I am the *not free*

As some of you might have known, I have not been posting for quite some time. All I can say was, I wasn't gaming ........*not totally*. In this week time , I guess I have learned one of those most important thing you have to know when you are studying for a computing degree: How to build a PC. Maybe the building process isn't that important, but what does, is knowing the architecture of what is in the chassis. I boldly admit that before I had the chance to build this PC, I had no idea how some stuff looks like even though I have read about them before. Some example are like the SATA and IDE cable, what they are use for and so on. Before I continue on, I must thank a certain good friend and all around good guy, Benjamin, because he was the one who taught me how to assemble/ disassemble a PC, followed me to LowYat Plaza (not once but twice) to get my PC parts, and made sure all goes well and constantly guide me whenever I did something wrong. Mei is lucky to have him =P.

So, back to my PC, we managed to get quite a lot of good parts at a low price, and by the end of the day, we used 3.1k for buying all the hardware. Of course that's not for the entire PC, I used my old printer, monitor, keyboard, mouse, DVD rom and an external HDD. The new parts include the following:
(1) Asus P5KR mobo (P35 chipset)
(2) Asus EN8800GT 512 MB GDDR3
(3) Intel Core 2 Quad Q6600 (2.4 GHz 1066 FSB 8 MB L2 cache)
(4) 2 x 1GB 800 MHz DDR2 Corsair RAM
(5) Cooler Master Chassis which came with a 460W PSU
(6) Western Digital 160 GB HDD

It wasn't easy deciding the parts I wanted, even though on the night before I was awake till 3 a.m. looking at the price list at lowyat's website . Even on that day I made a lot of changes to what I initially had planned to get. I would not say I was in a rush to get the parts but some might disagree. Although I wasn't a professional, I did ask for other's opinion such as Ben's friend(Jay) who is also another tech enthusiast. From him, I learned things such as XP can only run at max a total of 3.5 GB ram (the main reason I switched to a higher performance 2GB ram). He did gave a lot of good advice IMO, and I would like to thank him for that again.

Probably what surprised me was how powerful my new rig was, for one, it ran on High Settings for Crysis. What was even amazing was the fact that, it did not lag and yet it looked so freaking good. That changed slightly when Ben applied a DX10 skin mod for Crysis, but still that was only a very minimal lag. Even though my PC is no powerhouse, it is already capable of running the most demanding game at high settings, and that, I have nothing to complain about.

Oh yeah, since I just got my PC, there are still a lot of stuff I had yet to install which includes the Nokia Phone Software so I could not upload any pictures yet. Darn, now I can't show off my new rig.=P

Then today, I brought my girlfriend over to APIIT/ UCTI to register for the foundation program there. If everything goes fine, she will be starting her course mid of January. I have to say, UCTI has a really nice environment to study in, even the facilities there are very well done. I did actually considered studying there before I came to INTI but I have chosen the current college now mainly because I wanted to do a degree which allowed me to study in the US.

Right after that, we went shopping at Midvalley Megamall, my girlfriend did her usual window shopping and once in a while bought some stuff, and I just followed her to everywhere she go, excluding the lady's toilet. It was tiring but I did not mind, my girlfriend was back to her usual self, maybe cause one of her load, which is choosing where to study has been done and over with. I would gladly go shopping with her if she wanted to, even if it was tomorrow. As long as she is happy = ). We had dinnner at Sushi King and I just ate and ate non stop to recover the loss energy from all that walking. After that, we continued shopping for a bit before leaving.

Ohh I did went and got myself a couple of Blizzard's novels again. One of them being the 2nd book of Starcraft's Dark Templar Saga. I can't wait to start reading before my holiday ends. Hope I can finish them all. The other two is from Blizzard's Diablo saga.

Oh yeah I nearly forgot about Bleach for this week. Episode 152 "Ichigo Strikes Back! This is my Bankai", with such a title, you are sure to see Ichigo's Tensa Zangetsu. He is still in a battle with the Privaron Espada and this battle was the main focus of this week's episode. There are some funny scenes in the current episode that would sure to make you laugh or at least giggle. Below are some screenshots.

Late Night Post

Ah damn it. Bad things always happen at the worst time. Seriously, I wanted to write a post about my day out with my girlfriend but my desktop suddenly broke down. It is almost close to going six feet under, as even powering it up require several tries. Not only that, on that day, my phone ran out of battery so I could not take any pictures with it. Fortunately, my girlfriend did bring her digital camera and so some of our most memorable moments were still able to be captured. I dislike writing in my blog using my laptop for some reason, and that is why this post has been delayed a bit.

Regardless, heres wishing my honey a Happy *belated* 17th Birthday. It wasn't as if I did not wish her but the post IS written a couple of days after. I hope she had a good time on that day and enjoyed the present I got for her. = )

Oh yeah, and about the pictures, I would have to upload it some other time after I receive a copy from my gf. I would most likely be uploading into a online photo album instead and post the link or something up on my blog.

Before I forget, I would like to state my opinion that KLCC is one of the worst shopping center I have been to. It seriously suck b*lls and it actually did spoil the day a bit for me and my girlfriend. There is nothing much to do there, a lot of "sampah" loitering around, and as if it could not get any worse, when we wanted to pay the parking ticket, guess what, the 6 machines were all occupied. There were so much people that, while we were coming down from the escalator, we nearly fell because there was no ground for us to even stand on. Bloody place, if unnecessary, I swear I will not set foot there again.

Aikz, since my desktop is dying, I would most likely have to go get some replacement parts and try to scavenge the usable parts from it. Hope it does not cost much.

Well, its 1 in the morning time to sleep. Good night people

What's been happening......

Well, my parents are finally back from their Vietnam/ China vacation and I am glad they all came home safely. What I heard from my mom was that it wasn't fun, so thank goodness I did not go. I can't argue that I missed my mom's cooking after so many days of eating food outside.

Let's see what else..... Well nothing actually. I find it very weird how my days can pass that quickly when the only thing I am doing is playing my PSP. There was something different though, I am not playing Monster Hunster but instead I am now indulging myself in a remake of Final Fantasy Tactics for the PS1. The name of the game FF Tactics: War of the Lions. I can't say that I am a big fan of turn base strategy RPG but this game is another one of those "good but not the best" type of games for the PSP. In my opinion, one of the best part about it is that, every fight poses some kind of challenge regardless of your level. Since enemies level up at the same pace as you, no fight is an easy fight. One thing I didn't like though is the horoscope system. Unless you are very familiar with what star sign is compatible/ incompatible with which, it can be very frustrating to figure out which character is best used to fight whichever opponent.



Lastly, another episode of Bleach has been released. Episode 151 "The Raging Storm! Encounter with the Dancing Arrancar". This episode starts out funny but ends with a slight "wanting more" feeling. This episode introduces another group of Espada known as the Privaron and Ichigo and his friends each met up with a member of this Privaron. The next episode would probably show a lot of kick ass action but still the much anticipated fight with the real Espadas is what I am awaiting, but that would probably still be a long way more. ( I read the manga too, so I know the plot more or less). Will be uploading pictures for this week's episode as soon as I finish downloading the VLC player for taking screenshots.



Another day, another post. Before the end of today's post I would like to say, tomorrow is somebody's birthday =D . Okie not just anybody, but my somebody, and another somebody, for someone else. The sentence that came before this would have probably caused me to fail any English exam but that's not the point eh? ^^

Wii Makes Dog Horny

After looking at the video, I guess I know why so many people are giving the Wii as a gift for somebody else....Enjoy =D

Registration Status: Done

Wee, finally I convinced my lazy arse to return to college for subjects registration. I arrived at college about 1.30 pm. Ben also went to college together with me to plan the subjects that he would be taking come January. After about 3 hours, the final decision for the subjects that I am taking is, Microecons, English Comp 2, Cal 2, and Philo. Some subjects like eng comp 2 and microecons were not even in my initial plans. Regardless, this subjects will still be compulsory to be taken in the coming semesters. Below is my timetable.

Last night Szeten helped me to installed Window XP and also all the necessary driver. After all the installation is done, I think that something is still wrong with my hardware. Szeten tried playing DOTA on my desktop but it still suffered from lags even on medium setting. I have asked Ben to help with the unassembling of my desktop to look at every piece of hardware. He is busy with some of his own activities nowadays and at the mean time, I will be using my laptop for PC gaming instead.

Computer Broke Down

So, recently my computer was suffering from a lot of lag when a couple of application is being run at the same time. By a couple I mean 2 or 3. I have been wanting to format my computer for some time but always find myself too lazy to do it. After you format then comes all the reinstalling of this and that. By time you are done with everything, a day is gone. Finally, last night when Kai was over at my place I decided to ask for his help.

First he opened up my chassis to see if anything was roasted, this is because a week or two ago I smelled something weird in my room and it was during then that the computer started its lagging spree. My suspicion grew even larger when I was booting up my computer, suddenly the computer monitor mentions about some temperature issue with my CPU. Even after opening it up, we did not see anything roasted (what we saw was a lot of dust bunny which might or might not be the cause of the overheating). I was never a computer geek under about the beginning of the year and so I had never bothered to even clean up my computer because I was afraid I might damage something.

Since nothing was damaged, we just tried to format the computer using Szeten's CD. Little did we know, halfway through the installation an error occured and this problem with the installation CD caused my desktop to be a piece of metal until I get my hands on another copy of Windows XP Pro. Now I'm stuck with my laptop, I hate using it mainly because it is Vista and my dongle does not works on it. So I cannot play Monster Hunter online with friends which makes me lose any mood at all to touch the PSP. Instead I have been playing Crysis which is actually quite fun after playing with it for some time. I have to say though Bioshock is more fun in terms of gameplay, but for eye candy Crysis beats Bioshock by a lot.

By the way the last couple of days, I have been going out a lot and that is the main reason why I did not update my blog for quite some time. On Wednesday, me and my girlfriend went to the newly opened shopping mall, Pavilion which is located somewhere near Lot 10. It is a really nice place to go shopping especially for girls. I walked and walked the whole day and managed to get myself a pair of new shoes, a pants and a long sleeved shirt. By the end of the day, I was aching from the base of my feet to the middle of my spine but it was really enjoyable spending the day with my girlfriend.

Irony

I'm talking about my college transcript, just when I was planning to go to college to get it one of these days, the enveloped which contain my transcript was delivered to my house just this afternoon. At least that save me a trip of going to college or does it? I would still have to go register for the next semester's subjects that I am going to be taking. About the results, I got an A+ for Intro to Psych, but sadly my American History subject has a "W' ( which stands for a withdraw) beside it. Well, I just have to do better next semester. I am actually quite happy because my results were better than what I had expected.

Moving on, my family will be leaving for Vietnam tomorrow morning (way, way early in the morning) to go on vacation and leave me home alone to rust. Okie maybe I was the one who has chosen not to go. Vietnam gives me a feeling that it is really boring and I know better than to go on a boring trip. I wish my parents would pick a better vacation location. Every year its either China, China, or if we are lucky somewhere not China (but still within South East Asia). I wish they would go to places such as US or Europe. Bah, they are so unadventurous. =X

On a side note, since my girlfriend is free now, I can just spend that entire family vacation time with her instead.* Happy face* =D. We already have plans for tomorrow but still do not know where we will be going, but probably to that new shopping center, Pavilion. No idea how to get there but I have a car and the petrol, so that means its' time to explore. Finally I have some time to pak toh after a very very dreadful and long month.

Lastly, one of my favorite topics, Games. Crysis is awesome, its not like any other first person shooter mainly because you have to use your brains instead of just blindly rushing into a camp and go trigger happy. I spent some time with it, and found myself dying 90% of the time if I did just that. Rather you have to make use of what your nano-suits can do. I just love it when you switch to another mode and they say " Maximum Speed" or "Maximum Armor". One thing which sets this game apart from others, is physics and realism. For example, when your sight is blocked by some leaves on a coconut tree or something. Just shoot it and the leaf will actually react as though it is being shot at. What's more, if you shoot the trunk of that coconut tree long enough, the thing will come crashing down on your enemies or perhaps even yourself depending on where you stand. Everything in the game reacts to you just the way it should. Tyres of jeeps will go kaboom if you shoot at it. All these comes at a price though of course. Crysis is a system killer, because regardless of how recent you have bought your PC. It is impossible to achieve the best graphic settings, unless you are filthy rich and can afford the best of the best hardwares. Go take a look at the price of a stick of DDR3 RAM. Be amazed. For those who are still unconvinced just look at this.

Long Holiday

It has been roughly a month now since the holiday started, and u know what. I am beginning to feel really bored of it. There is nothing much to do. If I did not have my PSP I would probably have rusted. Maybe it's because I have nothing much to do. Hope things will change after my girlfriend's exams are over.

Worse yet, no result has been uploaded onto the e-Campus. I don't even have any urge to find out my results anymore after waiting for such a long time(I will still be doing so on next Wednesday when I am going back to college).

Ever since I got the dongle for playing online, I found myself getting more and more addicted to Monster Hunter. Simply put, more people, less work. As I mentioned in the review, this game is really fun when you can play with someone else. After all, when you are against a 100 meters long dragon, don't you wish someone is there to back you up?

To Ben, good luck for ur chili padi eating days. Work hard and you just might get what your mom said she will give =D.

Shopping

Went to Midvalley to "hang gai" for a while today. Mom and sis wanted to get some clothes before they go on vacation next week to Vietnam. Since my Dad wasn't home, I had to send them there. I actually calculated the time we left our home and by time I reached home. It was exactly 3 hours... 3 hours including the trip there and back. I don't think anyone can go for a shopping trip any shorter than that ( at least not for girls). Well, even for that short period of time only, it was really dreadful since I had nothing to buy and I was just the driver today. I constantly looked at the time past, but every minute seem to be a bloody hour. It wasn't fun. My brother and I, just walked around aimlessly just window shopping for a bit and eventually end up in MPH where we also did the same. Time seems to past really slowly when I am not shopping with my girlfriend instead.

I miss going out with her a lot. Even before her SPM started we had not been going out much. All that is about to end though. Her final exam is on next Monday (actually it should be the week after but her Chinese does not require much preparation), and hopefully after that we can have some time out together before she leaves for NS. Noooooooooo! NS! why ler choose her? I'm gonna be so lonely for the next semester. Emo @.@

Since that is the case I might be considering taking 5 subjects next semester but I am not even sure if there are any classes (which is actually related to my major) that will be available for me to do so. Life stinks =D.

Okie the above video is of Russell Peter, he is one funny ass comedian. My friends recommended it to me way earlier before this and I just thought that I would share it with you guys. More of his videos on Youtube.

P.S. Look for the one about the Chinese and Indians.

Games galore

There seems to be a lot of triple A titles out this couple of weeks. Gears of War, Crysis and Call of Duty 4 (all for the PC) just to name a few. Of course I would like to try for myself each and everyone of these games but since there are all on the PC, hardware is always a restriction. Despite lacking the necessary hardwares, I got myself a copy of Crysis and installed it on my laptop. Just when you thought the graphics of Bioshock could not get any better, Crysis comes along and immediately redefine the possibilities of gaming graphics. While the laptop is not the ideal piece of hardware to game on, it is a better option over my desktop. This are the following specs for my laptop:

(1) 2GB ram
(2) 512 MB Nvidia 8600M GT
(3) 2.0GHz C2D processor

Regardless of these specs, it did not prepare my laptop for the incoming graphics onslaught that is Crysis. From the very 1st cutscene, the framerate started to drop but was still acceptable. During gameplay the framerate increased, and it played a bit smoother. I had only played it for about 10 minutes but I can say that the game is rather well done, guns are customizable and your suit can switch between a few modes which would alter how you play the game. This is truly the game to switch your entire desktop for. Even if you are not doing it for this game, I am pretty sure that future games would still require a high end graphic card.

My results are still not uploaded online yet but I heard that the transcript can be collected in college already. I think that I might be going on next week to get it, while doing some research on the University that I would like to go to. Programming C is not that bad since I have already learned the basics from Kok Hoong before. For those newer topics though, I am still trying to understand what I am doing but there can be times where you really have to crack your head trying to understand how all this works. I think that I am a slow learner, because some parts where Kok Hoong said was easy, I still took a long time to understand. Sad really, but I won't give up on doing this = ).

Busy?

This couple of days was probably the more busy days of my holiday but I would still say it is nothing compared to during the semester's study day. Yesterday I was out the entire day from morning till late night. From 11+, I had to go fetch my girlfriend from tuition and after that went to KL with Szeten to get some of my stuff. One of them which include the Planex USB dongle which I mentioned about earlier. After coming home for less than an hour, I had to leave for Leisure Mall to have dinner with my family . I only managed to have some time to myself in the night time after 8.

Even then, I was trying to setup the USB dongle so that it could work with the PSP. It took a lot of effort to get it to work but it was well worth the time I guess. Still, I have to thank one of the forumer which I knew from lowyat.net. Without him to guide me I would probably be hammering that piece of dongle soon. My computer is starting to lag a lot, and that caused even more trouble during installation. As soon as I am done downloading some stuff then it is time to reformat the darn computer.

Today, I thought that I should also install the driver into my laptop. To my surprise, it was not at all easy to install it because my laptop is using Vista. Honestly, I am starting to hate Vista a lot, the only thing that makes Vista stand out is probably DirectX 10. If you are not a gamer, do not bother to get Vista, I swear the disadvantages outweights the advantages. After about 5-6 hours of trying to install that dongle. The final result is...........it failed......... What a big waste of time!

Talking about results, from what I heard from Ben, it will be out tomorrow. Although I only have one subject this semester but still, I am anticipating it. After the result is out, then it is time to prepare for application to a couple of University. I am still looking for another Uni at least, Ben's been asking me to go to SCSU, which I think stands for Saint Cloud State Univeristy. Have to take a look at it first.

Motion sickness

Has anyone ever experienced motion sickness without even moving an inch? Well, I did, what actually cause motion sickness for me is not sitting in a car, ship, plane or any transportation at all. It was all simply playing a game, more specifically Half Life 2. I am feeling so nauseous right now even as I am writing this post. I literally threw up my entire dinner due to it. This wasn't the first time I have experienced it, but this time was probably the worst. Since I have been playing lots of FPS(first person shooter) games for the past who-knows-how-many years, I have only experienced motion sickness on 2 games. 1 being Half Life 2 and another was Far Cry (the previous game made by Crytek, which is also the developer of Crysis).

Seeing as it had occur a couple of times, I went online to see if anyone else was experiencing the same problem and to my surprise a couple of forums has mentioned the same problem I was experiencing. All for the value of Orange Box. Whats the use of having 5 games for the price of 1, when you can't play 3 of it. Damn, feeling so sick right now, I am not even looking at the monitor when I am typing the post.

Well, other than that this week's Bleach is out. No screenshot this week, I don't want to look at any colorful stuff for the rest of the night. This week's episode is called "Ashido, the Shinigami who came from the Past". Long story short, still trapped in the menos forest, everybody tried to look for one another, learn about Ashido's(the shinigami from before) past, and the episode ended with a little suspense.

I am bored......

As the post title states, I am bored. I have not step out of my house for the past two weeks other than to have a meal or fetch my girlfriend from school/tuition. Ben said that the results would be out on Monday but have yet to see it on Inti's ecampus yet. So, to kill some time, I finished watching Honey and Clover Season 1. Then, just last night, I started downloading season 2 last night and it took me less than 1 day to complete the download. I immediately started watching season 2 and just before writing this post, I finished watching the whole of season 2. Do I have too much time or what?Haha Well, from what I can say. Season 2 ties up a lot of loose ends in season 1, and it focuses on the more serious matters (work, relationship, and responsibility). Season 1 was definitely funnier but season 2 was the one that wraps up the whole story. It was good, I would say, time well spent.

Of course I still had other matters to attend to. Example like my girlfriend and her SPM, learning C, and learn to cook (from my Mom). It can be dull sometime but I can't complain much as I have the time to do whatever I want to. One thing which has been irritating me for the past week or so, is that I am in a pre-sick condition and it is making me really uncomfortable. By pre-sick condition I mean that I have some slight symptoms but not bad enough to require a visit to the clinic( not that I'm complaining).

Besides all of that, today a new copy of GameAxis arrived in the mail. The front cover is of the new game "Kane & Lynch" which I heard is a co-op type game. I have yet to read it (like I said earlier I just finish watching H&C a while ago), but I think they will be some juicy reviews on new games, and hardware to go with that. There was also a booklet which came with the magazine, which is also talking about a new PC game "Crysis". It looks really good but the recommended requirement are as stated below:
(1) Window Vista (DirectX 10 I guess)
(2) Intel Core 2 Duo 2.2 GHz or better or AMD Athlon 64X2 4400+ or better
(3) Intel X38 or AMD 790 mobo
(4) 2.0 GB ram
(5) NVIDIA Gefore 8800 GTS/640 or similar

What this means is. My desktop is close to nothing of the required specs. My desktop does not meet any of the above requirement and it is really sad. My laptop on the other hand still manage to meet two of the requirements (which is also not all that great).

Last but not least is a postcard from PIKOM stating that the next PC Fair will be on Dec 7-9. Anyone interested to go? I personally wish to get an external HDD that is portable (unlike the previous 1 which I bought). This time, it is still at KLCC just like the previous two times I went there. Talking about computer I am actually planning to go to Low Yat Plaza, maybe at the end of the week. I have to go there to help my SiS replace her bloody pendrive which stopped functioning, and also to get a USB wifi dongle for myself. Szeten, wanna go??

:: SPM Stress ::

Girl, I know that you are already really stressed out but please do not be too "gan jeong". Tambah Minyak! Tambah Minyak!Hope Li Hom can give you more confidence haha. Enjoy this song dear.

Good Luck to all SPM candidates!

Tomorrow is the big day for all form 5 students including my own dearest. To all, good luck and all the best, hope everyone can get through the exam smoothly (My girlfriend especially). Had it been two years ago, I would have been studying all day and all night if compared to the present day. Anyways, SPM is no big deal, just another exam you will be taking in your entire life. No worries, no stress, just put all your effort into it.

To my girl, do your best and have trust in your own. You have worked really hard for the past two years, and I am very sure you are all prepared for it. Don't let others distract you, answer the questions at your own pace ( just do not exceed the time limit of course). I will be giving u support throughout the entire exam period. Good luck dear!

Right after dinner today, I saw the (probably) largest rainbow I have ever seen. The thing was huge as you can see (compare the scale of my house and the size of the rainbow) . I would have needed to take 3 photos to show u the entire rainbow. This rainbow might bring luck to my girlfriend in her SPM (who knows =P). It was certainly a rare sight and even my girlfriend saw it. Whats more, she told me she actually saw two rainbows but the 2nd one was too faint to be seen. Even better for her I guess (twice the luck) haha. I might sound really superstitious but at times like this, a little hope can bring amazing effect.

Health Hazard

Well, ever since the holiday started, I could feel my body getting more and more prone to sickness. My body was really heaty this couple of days, and only yesterday I started to have a sore throat and today I'm already coughing. One of the reason was probably because of my grandfather's smoking habit. He smokes like there is no tomorrow and we (my nucleus family) are suffering from it. This is because his usual "home office" is directly besides the staircase, so when he smokes all the smokes travel up to the 2nd floor.

My room is basically filled with smoke when he is home. I am not against smoker or anything, but I think that if you have to smoke, do it so that nobody will be exposed to your smoke. There is nothing much which can be done about it even. My dad has tried talking to him twice and yet his habit does not change. Seriously no consent for the rest of us.

Nothing much is happening this couple of days but after tomorrow the SPM is going to be here. Girlfriend is so so busy, barely has time to spend with her. Here's wishing her good luck in her exam. Dear all the best and hope everything is smooth sailing for you. =D

Blog Maintenance

Wow, I would say that today is one of those bad day that most people would have once in a while. So, I was experimenting with the layout for my blog's template. Since I did not know what I was doing, I downloaded the template prior to making changes in my blog.

I tried a few template which I found elsewhere and I did not like anyone of them. So, I tried uploading my template and a certain error occurred. Realizing I cant do anything about that, I tried to reuse the provided template and tried to edit it by my own. I had no luck with it, and finally I tried to upload the template again, and it finally succeeded. Even when that was done, I still had to go look for all the widgets all over again. All this I did, till 3pm++. That was basically half a day spent on repairing my blog.

Today also, I finished downloading the "Honey and Clover" anime (Season 1). I have actually watched half of what I downloaded even before the download is completed. What I like about this anime is not the love, and relationships part but of the senseless humor within it. My favorite character in this anime would be Morita. He is really random, and comedy just follow wherever he goes.

Still on the anime topic, Bleach's new episode is out and it's titled "Forest of Menos! The Search for the Missing Rukia". This episode is another filler, but for some reason I believe this filler would actually be good. After being assaulted by the Hollow they fell from the surface of Hueco Mundo into a subterranean forest setting. The forest is filled with low level hollows which range from as small as a human to as large as a few buildings tall. Besides that, Rukia is also missing from the gang during the fall and she was rescued by a rogue (at least that's what I think) Shinigami. Let's wait and see what happens next week.

Lay back life

Well, 1 week has already passed, this couple of days I started reading one of the trilogy that I bought a couple of months back. The beginning is not really that interesting, as it is really straightforward and there is nothing much happening. Hopefully it gets better, because I don't want to read three books and end up saying that it sucks.

Besides that, I have also watched Ratatouille (thanks Ben), in my opinion, I think the movie is really good if compared to the previous computer generated graphics movie, such as Toy Story and all. A rat which aspire to cook, and eventually got his chance to do so, at a prestigious restaurant in Paris. How original XD. Although I am guessing most people would have watched it by now, I still recommend it to those who have not. Probably the most memorable phrase in that movie is "Anyone can cook". Not sure if thats true or not but I am willing to put that motto into my head as I am also learning how to cook =D.

Just this couple of days, I started reading on my C programming to refresh all the things which Kok Hoong has taught me during the 1st half of the year. Fortunately, the basics are still quite clear in my head and this helped a lot when I'm reading about it. For those who does not have an idea of what programming is like. It is basically things like this:

printf(" Hello how are you today?\n");
scanf("%i", &answer);

It might look complicated but once you understand how everything works, there is a lot which you can do with it.

Then last but not least, I have also been looking for other University to apply to for a Summer intake. I would really want to go to US as soon as possible, because the more time I spent here, the more I risk my credits not being accepted. I might be applying to Wichita State University where Zi Chang is currently studying at. The application requirements is not as high as the University of Maryland, and most if not all of my credit hours until now could be transfered there. I would still be trying to apply to the University of Maryland though even when I am there.

I have also done some skin change for my blog. The layout is still the same but I would really want some comments from you guys who are reading my blog. I wish I had photoshop though because I would like to remove the Bioshock logo from the background wallpaper, as all I want is the texture there.

Bloody connection

Man, I would really love to update my blog more, but the problem is with the connection. It is truly weird because I can still have download speeds of up to 150 KB/s, but my web browser would load as slow as a snail. It is truly difficult to even upload pictures into the post.

Well, yesterday I have been planning the subjects I might be taking for next semester but since the timetable is subject to change, it is possible the planning would have to be done again at a later time. Still lots of gaming especially with my PSP.

Today morning, Szeten came over for a bit before leaving for his friend's (Kevin) house. Probably continue gay-ing there. All in all its been really comfortable relaxing my lazy butt off. Still I promise myself not to get over comfortable and forget about my other responsibilities. All play and no work, makes Way Loon a lazy sob.

Really wish the sucky connection would recover soon. Its getting really old and I might consider changing to a different service provider.

Review: Monster Hunter Freedom 2

This will be the second game review on my blog. Just like before this review will be written with the same rule as before; Graphics, Gameplay, Sound, and Learning Curve. For most who might have known if you had visit my blog frequently, this is the one and only game which I have been playing for the past month.

This time I am gonna start with the Gameplay aspect. For those who love to built their character and depend solely on raw skill to take down a huge monster in a game, instead of using the button prompting system of God of War, this is the game for you. With a couple thousand pieces of armor in the game and 11 types (10 if you consider light and heavy bowgun to be the same) of weapon classes to choose from. This is how customizable your character can be. The weapon you choose will determine how you play the game. With a longsword for example, you have no option for defending and it has a short period of delay in between each attack, but this is made up for by higher damage. Whereas, if you are using a lance, defending is vital for survival. It's a matter of preference to how you want to play this game.

Running around with a scissors might cause you t o lose an eye, imagine what might happen to this fella....

While playing this game, you will noticed that playing alone is not as easy or as fun as playing with a friend. Network play is the best way to solve your problem. Although none of your friend has a PSP, you can still go online to look for friends by using a USB Wifi Max Dongle(plugged into a PC of course). Playing with another player is both entertaining and simpler. Imagine your friend setting a trap while you lure the wyvern into it. Although once in a while there can be some accidental moment where for example, you might detonate a bomb in front of your friends face but that would probably make it even more hilarious.

There are a couple of modes in the game which coul d keep you busy for a very very very long time. For the basics there are gathering, delivering and hunting. But as you progress into the game, defending the fort quest will be unlocked. Besides that there are also some treasure hunting quest, and probably the most "challenging" one would be the training school. In the training school, you are given a set of armor and weapons and you would have to take down those monster using all the provide items. For me, I personally think that the training school is a tad bit too tough but it is completely optional (although you do get some rare stuff at the end and I heard it will also unlock the strongest dragon in the game).

See you later Mr. Dragon!
(click on it to watch it move)

Besides that, what is most fun about this game is that you can really get a great sense of achievement taking down one of those behemoth in game. Some of this fight can last up to half an hour and in the end nothing is more rewarding than watching this giants fall flat on the ground. For all this, I will give the gameplay a 9.0/10.0 rating

Go show that dragon whose boss.

Next Graphic, there is a noticeable difference in how the game looks if compared with the previous game. Undeniably, the graphics can still be better but Capcom has done a good enough improvement. The characters and actors all are nicely rendered. You can even see the vein on the monsters if you look hard enough.

Of course, since it is on the PSP, you would not hope to be seeing shiny effects all over the place. As always the shiny stuff, always has a price for it. As so, it might not appeal to some people who prefer a lot of eye candy. Therefore just to be fair, I would rate a 7.5/10, for the in game graphics.

For the Sound, the in game background music is always suitable to every map you are in. What I like the most is that, when there is a boss in the map, there will be a battle music, as if to arouse your senses into fighting mode. The music for the defending the fort quests are also really grand and just make you feel the tension during that moment. All in all, the BGM always blend to the situation and the environment and it really makes you feel really absorbed into the game.

Yet there are some parts of the voice acting that needs to be said about. It would have been better if they were actually speaking some form of English instead of random gibberish. This isn't much of a complain rather it is a comment.

The sound of blade cutting into the flesh of your opponent sounds really "satisfying" and all the sound that these weapon should made are exactly what we want to hear. Like unsheathing a sword will cause a sharp iron sound (obviously I do not know what that sound is called) which lets you know this is a cold hard steel blade and not a wooden hammer. So for the Sound I would give it a 8.5/10.0

Lastly, is the Learning Curve,as a hardcore gamer( I assume I am) I would say that using the first 10 hours or so to learn up the game mechanics is no big deal. For the casual gamers though, this game is seriously not recommended as you would probably get bored of the game even before the juicy part surfaces.

There is a lot to know about the game, such as how different weapons work, armor skills, cooking, fishing, combining, and a heck lot more. This is probably the downfall of the game because there are really few instructions in game other than the manuals which they have provided and believe me it would take you an hour to two just to read up on everything. Most of the time (at least for myself), I would run straight out into a quest and learn everything by myself. Sometimes this can be really tough as you find out that actually doing this will cause something else to happen and all.

Even fighting monsters is a chore, you have to know where they are the weakest, their pattern of attack, which parts of the body you can break and cut off (there are a lot of FAQ out there for this of course). For the fast learner though, this game might just take a couple of hours to pick up. This game is probably all about asking around in forums and such. Even though I have been playing like 200 hours perhaps, I still have a lot of stuff which needs to be clarified. That is why I will give a 6.5/10.0 for this part of the review.

So overall rating is 8.0/10.0 for the game, definitely I would recommend it to as many people as possible because I would seriously want more people to play with. XD