Rant 1162 / There Is Not A Single "I" In This Rant.

That auto-translating chat in Game of War is awesome. It's like the Babelfish from Hitchhikers' Guide to the Galaxy but in text form. Somehow it's able to automatically detect which language each person is typing in and immediately translate the text into whichever language the reader is using.

It's not perfect but it's as good as Google Translate IMO. One feature it has that makes it so good is the Correct for Rewards minigame in which players can correct wrongly spelt words for a small reward. However abuse is reduced by removing any incentive for players to spam it nonstop through the 5-word limit for each player every 6 hours. Since there's no reason to play it quickly, we might as well correct the words seriously.

In addition, there are two tiers to this to reduce mistakes. First, we're given the entire sentence with the word highlighted. In the next tier, we are given the sentence and the game makes us choose among 2-4 of the corrected words from players who played the first tier.

























So Shadowrun Returns has just 15 hours of gameplay.

Short, but for the quality of the plot and the price, it was worth it.

Fortunately, the game also has a content editor and there is already at least one custom campaign available, a remake of the SNES Shadowrun game still in alpha stage.

With the amount of hype this game is getting, it's very likely that there will be good campaigns ready in 6 month.






















It's amazing how much stuff  needs to be thrown/recycled every time a part of my home is cleared of old stuff and tidied up. Although this should have been done over a year ago, better late than never, right?

So now all that's been cleared and settled are two shelves and half of my mother's room. The plan is  to clear out as much trash as possible and find a space for one of the wardrobes in my room. How many wardrobes does a guy need anyway?

When the room is done, the entire living room, the balcony, the kitchen and the aforementioned wardrobe will need to be settled. Who knows how long that's going to take at this pace?

Tiring work. While exercises work specific muscle groups, this trash-clearing job uses my entire body, so no specific part of my body is tired - the entire body is tired.

Clearing out trash sounds easy but everything needs to be sifted through so that everything that's thrown away is indeed rubbish or recyclable. At the same time, in order to avoid creating heaps of unsorted stuff, everything that's been sifted through needs to be placed at the right parts of my home, eg screwdrivers go to the hardware drawer and coins go into the piggy bank.

Now my living room is filled with bags and bags of unwanted stuff, mostly faded clothes and ancient leather bags. The relationship between women and their bags is probably one of the most famous (or notorious), so imagine what it's like when after a woman passes on. Plenty of leather to dump, mostly dusty and flaking (bad leather). Some were good but all of them went into recycle bags regardless. Not sure if they're recyclable but who cares? Those recycling company guys will sort them out anyway.

One thing is for sure: there have been and will be a number of happy people after the bags are dragged downstairs to the bins, both the recycling and the trash bins. Just last night (Sunday), we brought down several bags as we went for dinner with my bro's in-laws, and on my way back to the lift afterwards, an old man was at the void deck rubbing the thick layer of dust off one of the old luggage cases we left at the trash chute exit.

Despite being so dusty and with all metal parts very greenishly rusty, someone actually wants it. That's a win-win. There's now more space and less dust in my home; he gets something he finds to be of value.

To be honest, it was a little hard to throw away all the luggage cases. Every single one of them were in perfect condition on the inside; only the metal zips and handles and rivets or whatever were rusty. It took constant mental reminders that nobody here will ever use any case that rusty, so there was no reason for them to be kept here.

Rant 1161 / Shadowrun Returns Is Refreshing - 2D Turn-based RPGs Are Rare These Days.

Twice in recent months I've had to sleep very little just for a single night.

From this, I've learnt that sleep can really be stored. If you sleep well normally, one night without sleep won't affect your mind.

I expected myself to be tired from the morning onwards, but even without exercise and caffeine, I was fine. With exercise, I was at 100% although it took longer to start my engine.



Anyway, I learnt from the new trainers at RT that jumping is important for static cardio for weight loss, so I'm incorporating a lot of jumping in my routine now. Three minutes of jumping exercises heats me up more than 10 minutes of cycling, so I have no doubt about its efficacy.





















Spartan Wars is dying. Been playing it for a month now and it's getting a little boring, mainly because nobody attacks me and I'm really far from anyone. Used to have a few neighbours but most of them have left the gaming while the remaining ones are either slightly stronger than myself or weaker.

Recently, there was an incident but it didn't do much. Someone hacked into the server and gave 101k pearls (ingame currency that can only be bought with real cash) to everyone who had bought pearls before.

I didn't get any, but plenty of others did.

It's surprising how many people got them; I thought it was pretty stupid to spend money on a game like this. Moreover, it isn't cheap. A relatively tiny purchase can easily cost as much as a whole game in the app shop. Even FF4 is only S$20, while the smallest amount of pearls one can buy costs US$6 (S$7.80).





Meanwhile a new clone has emerged and it's far better than Spartan Wars. The prices in Game of War are just as ridiculous but again, plenty of people are buying. It's even easier to tell here because everytime someone buys gold, everyone in his alliance (aka guild/clan) gets a little something too.

No wonder there are so many games like this out there.
























So Game of War is really heating up my iPad, forcing me to remove the cover last night.

You know what? The unprotected iPad actually feels much better!

Not sure how I can keep using it this way though. I have the pouch but I think it's going to be inconvenient if I want to use it while walking outside, like when I need the map.



















Recently saw the ad saying that there was a 10% discount off Comfort cab fares if the Mastercard Paypass  was used for payment.

After checking the list of NFC-enabled phones, it turns out that my Lumia 520 is not... but the 620 is. They had both cost the same but the specs on the 520 was better. Oh well, I couldn't have foreseen this anyway.



























Shadowrun Returns turns out to be better than expected.

Riding on the Kickstarter classic RPG revival wave started by Wasteland 2, it had appeared to be a promising game. However, without any experience with any Shadowrun games, I had backed it just because it looked good.

It was only some time after the KS campaign that I thought about it again and noticed the stupidity.

Regardless, it's a good game so everything is ok. This is just one of those rare occasions when stupidity is rewarded.

Shadowrun Returns is an RPG with turn-based tactical combat gameplay. More interestingly, it combines both sci-fi with fantasy to create... something like Mass Effect. Ok, so at least ME changed the names to make it less like magic, while over here they really are elves, dwarves, orks and trolls and people actually use magic and summon spirits.

The game is set in the future where drones and cybernetic body parts are commonplace. Some time between now and the game's present, an event known as the "Awakening" caused these fantasy races and magic to come into being. Hence, now there are people who can handle both, like Dr Castle who is both a shaman and a medical doctor.

Equipment can be bought and equipped, body parts can be replaced by cybernetics at a cost of your essence (the thing that makes a human human), and the level system is like the one in Mass Effect.

4 hours into the game so far and only a very minor bug has been found, so my 15USD hasn't been wasted at all.

Rant 1160 / Theoretical Singapore-Barcelona Train Journey Itinerary

Theoretical Singapore-Barcelona train journey.


Singapore - Bangkok:

Day 1 (Woodlands - Butterworth) 0830 - 2200

(First class seat) = 127SGD

Day 1-2 Overnight stay cost unknown.

Day 2-3 (Butterworth - Bangkok) 1430 - 1330

(Lower berth) = 111RM (44.40SGD)

http://www.ktmb.com.my/images/pdf/Train%20Fare.pdf
http://www.ktmb.com.my/images/pdf/Jadual%20Intercity%20Effective%2023%20May%2020131.pdf
http://chingnengbin.blogspot.sg/2012/06/backpacking-to-bangkok.html

======================================================
======================================================


Bangkok - Vientiane:

Day 3-4 (Bangkok - Nong Khai) 2000 - 0745

First class sleeper berth = 1217THB (49.60SGD)

(Nong Khai - Thanaleng) 0910 - 0920

Second class shuttle train= 30THB (1.20SGD)

(Thanaleng - Vientiane) 0920 - ??

Tuk-tuk = 300THB (12.20SGD)

(note: no train service between Thailand and Beijing due to absence of this in Laos and Cambodia)

http://www.seat61.com/Laos.htm#Bangkok%20to%20Vientiane


======================================================
======================================================


Vientiane - Hanoi:

Day 4-5 1830 - 1700

Modern sleeper bus = 550,000VND (33SGD)

http://www.seat61.com/Laos.htm#Hanoi%20to%20Vientiane


======================================================
======================================================


Day 5-6 Overnight stay preferable to allow a time buffer, cost unknown


======================================================
======================================================


Hanoi - Beijing:

Day 6-8 1830 - 1208

soft class 4-berth sleeper = 299CHF (401.50SGD)

http://www.seat61.com/Vietnam.htm#Hanoi%20-%20Beijing%20by%20train


======================================================
======================================================


Day 8-9 Overnight stay cost unknown


======================================================
======================================================


Beijing - Moscow via Mongolia:

Day 9-14 0805 - 1358 (note: 6 days 5 nights, departs only on Wednesdays, arrives on Monday)

K3 deluxe cabin aka first class 2-berth sleeper compartment + international mail fee = 1067 +100USD (1477.80SGD)

http://www.chinatraintickets.net/china-trains/


======================================================
======================================================


Day 14-15 Overnight stay cost unknown


======================================================
======================================================


Moscow - Paris:

Day 15-17 0744 - 2042 (departs Tuesday, arrives Thursday)

23Й 2-berth sleeping cars = 24,150RUB (943SGD)

http://pass.rzd.ru/main-pass/public/en
http://www.moscow-paris.ru/scheme_en.html


======================================================
======================================================


Day 17-18 Overnight stay cost unknown


======================================================
======================================================


Paris - Barcelona:

Day 18-19 2216 - 0943

Flexible second class sleeper = 365SGD

http://www.raileurope.com.sg


======================================================
======================================================

One-way overall summary

$$$:  S$3454.70 + 1 night in Butterworth, Malaysia + 1 night in Hanoi, Vietnam + 1 night in Beijing, China + 1 night in Moscow, Russia + 1 night in Paris, France + food + beverages + insurance + etc

Time: 19 days 18 nights




======================================================
======================================================


This requires more research in the future.

Tickets: Which has to be bought at the station? Can they be bought on the day of travel? Which carries the risk of running out (for sleeper cabins) if I buy at the station? Which can be bought online? Which website will charge the least?

Lodging: Decent hotels/hostels near the stations

Food and beverages: Prices of snacks/meals in every country

Insurance: Will be expensive

Money: How much of which currencies do I carry?

Best to carry just a single backpack. What do I pack?

Rant 1159 / Leverage Is A Nice Show

One thing I have finally concluded is that my days as a wholesaler is numbered. The small wholesaler is obsolete in today's economy in which retailers deal directly with manufacturers. Before, retailers tend to not have the capital nor capacity to handle large amounts of goods, hence we come into do it for them.

No such thing now. Large retailers can easily do it themselves while small retailers would rather scrimp on a few dollars and try to deal with the manufacturers' retail prices themselves. In fact, international brands can do my job better than I do and they're everywhere. While I order my designs by the hundreds, Uniqlo manufactures by the hundreds of thousands. Even though their jackets are thinner, their marketing allows them to sell at comparable prices.

My business has no future; what is important now is what I am going to do about this.

And to think I was planning long term for this. There is no long term in this path; it's nearing its end within a decade.

Going online means becoming a retailer myself. Good as a side income.

Considering the option of investing all that I have on dividend stocks. Not REITs. Not sure why they're still recommending REITs. Interest rates are rising and rents are dropping. Too late to jump on the bandwagon. Maybe the experts are trying to keep the prices up while they sell away everything.

Now I see why businesses eventually fail. Not because the owner is incompetent but because of market forces. Adapting is one thing but this requires a complete change in what my business does. To adapt is to change one or a few aspects of my business and let the core remain the same. I can't allow the core to remain here - the core is the problem, and to change it is the solution.

Feel like making 卤水 lu3 shui3 but my fridge is full :(

One of the biggest item is the two containers of pork bolognese I made last night. 500g of pork, 3 tomatoes, 1 onion and a whole jar of bolognese sauce there. Should last a week or more at the rate I'm going since I'm taking it slow.

With so many ingredients in my fridge, I'm having 3 or 4 courses every night. Just small amounts of each, like tonight, I had a handful of linguine with the bolognese, a whole grilled sanma fish (first time gutting a fish myself because usually I buy from a fishmonger who does it for me), a few slices of salami and some chicken wings that were having a promotional discount at Cold Storage (S$4.99 for 5 so I got my bro to buy 10).

Speaking of gutting a thawed frozen fish, I didn't manage to clean it enough so I had to scrape the insides a bit more while I ate. I'm familiar with the taste of a poorly gutted fish so it wasn't anything unusual, although I think it might be disgusting to some.

But I did find some roe instead. What a pleasant surprise that was. Ok, so I admit I wasn't entirely sure whether it was roe since this was my first time, but it looked like squid roe (I've gutted squids before), so I placed it next to the fish on the aluminium foil to grill it.

The taste test confirmed it was roe, so now I know what raw fish roe among fish guts looks like.

Other stuff I have filling up my fridge are mainly vegetables. Normally I buy a whole load of those and fill up half my fridge with them. It's ok because I have a terrapin and anything that wilts gets chopped up and thrown into the tank. No waste. And of course I remove any rotting parts beforehand.

Except for onions and garlics. Spring onions are the worst so I don't buy a lot of those. They're highly necessary for a lot of Chinese dishes but they don't last very long (dry up quickly in the fridge although some parts remain edible for more than a week). Still, they're long and fragile, hence they take up a lot of space.



Anyway, google calls 卤水 "brine" and "bittern" but those nowhere close to what I meant.

It's basically a gravy that can be cooked with any kind of meat, inner organs and eggs. It's probably been a year since I last made it but now I'm in the mood since I bought 2kgs of frozen mid-joint chicken wings last week, 6 fresh whole chicken legs and 20 of the largest chicken eggs I can find in my neighbourhood ($0.30 each!).

This dish takes time because after throwing the eggs in till they're cooked, I have to remove the shells and throw them back in again to absorb the flavours. That usually takes half a day.

Maybe I should make it and split it into several containers but with minimal meat. I still remember the last time I made it and the meat didn't taste very good after a week in the fridge. This time I should probably split the gravy and then cook one container of it with some meat for each meal.



























Nothing much to blog about these days. Been camping at my comp for the current Steam Summer Sale all day everyday. Not exactly everyday tbh but close enough.

Also been leaving 4-6 games open on my PC whenever I'm not actually playing to earn cards to sell. Made about US$6 so far and spent about $3 due to the slow speed of this revenue stream.

I'm selling all my cards except 1 of each game in case the prices rise back to normal levels in the future. Theoretically, there may be an extreme oversupply of cards atm due to everyone buying games on Steam and camping at their PCs like me. Since they're waiting, they may consider running those games while AFK since the computers will be left on anyway.

But it's just theory and I'm selling almost everything I have. It's a good time to not give a damn about cosmetic stuff right now.

Some games, though, are taking forever to give me new cards, like Sins of a Solar Empire: Rebellion. I've left it on for 2 consecutive nights and all I've received is 2 cards while all other games of mine get me 3-4 by the second night.

Whatever. This is not an urgent issue anyway.






















Exercise. Decided against restarting the P90. Obviously I'm not fit enough to even try after all these weeks without any exercise at all.

Started with a little jogging, cycling and weights. Weights are hard again but this was expected.

Thought about brisk walking at the track nearby but felt like doing it in my underwear at home. Moreover it would look weird for a young man like me to exercise there at 10-11am on a weekday.



























Booked a trip to China. Almost forgot about this. In fact, I was a little late and the hotel I wanted was sold out for the month I wanted. Now it will be only a week after my trip to Korea.

Thought about Japan but decided against it. Too late, too expensive, too unnecessary.

Rant 1158 / Saccharin > Aspartame

Finished Magrunner. Ending was as expected, no surprising twist there. Not much horror either except for the stages where I get chased. Getting chased around helplessly does induce some kind of fear regardless of whether the monster's scary or not.

Nice game but like many games these days, there's no much replay value. I already know how to beat the puzzles so replaying this game would mean I in for the story only.

I think a sequel is quite possible here although the ending was not a cliffhanger.



One thing I forgot to mention is that I should probably add that it's also quite similar to Red Faction: Guerilla about the magnet thing, except in RF all the magnets can do is attract while here, they can also repel.


















So now that they have got a new recycling company to replace Sembcorp, Veolia, to handle our recyclables, the new system is that they place a large recycling bin at the ground floor and residents have to dump their stuff inside. Fortunately, there is no need to sort them out as the Veolia people will do it for us.

The catch is that the old system used by Sembcorp is that all we need to do was use the bags they provided to store our recyclables before leaving it outside our doors every fortnight. The old system was so much more convenient.

In any case, people are still recycling on weekends. Last Sunday, the bin was filled to the brim and I had to leave one of my bags next to it. It's surprising given that on all other days when I dump stuff inside, it's always half full at most.

My practice is to bring one or two shopping bags' worth of recyclables down every time I go out of my house, eg for work. I have plenty of plastic bags so those are never a problem. It may look a little weird holding what look like bags of trash as I take the lift down, but I figured it's for a worthy cause and there's no reason I should give a damn.

Speaking of recycling, it must be such an awesome industry if you have the capital for the whole setup. I mean, those guys are profitting on donations! It's like Red Cross except it's a for-profit organization. The only issue is that the sources of its materials are spread across the country but it can't be that expensive relative to the prices of its products.

Then again, the quality control of its materials must be a really tough job.

















NS2 is a lot faster now with all the reduced res costs. I've only barely tried marines though, so I don't really know much about them from their perspective. What I do know is that their exos have this cool new weapon that's just like Megaman's gun. Used by someone with good aim and that thing can really kill.

The other thing that I feel has changed is the role of gorges. They used to be pretty useless over the long term and it wasn't a good idea at all to be a career gorge throughout the game. I remember this because I used to be a gorge all the time in NS1 and I felt handicapped when I tried this in NS2.

Now, I see gorges all the time. In every game, there is always at least one trying to hold a certain strategic location with its clogs and hydras with the help of a few skulks. The difference between then and now is that this tactic actually works.

Bile bombs are so amazing now since there are so many gorges. In every battle from mid-game onwards, I'd see gorges bile-bombing everything and every marine since the bile now also erodes armour very quickly. Really softens them up for the skulks.

Babblers are another ability I see a lot in late-game. Usually gorges would keep them close for protection but sometimes, they would use them on fellow aliens because apparently they act as some kind of armour when used like this.

One problem with babblers that I didn't notice as an alien is that they become a trail behind the gorge when it tries to run, making it easy for pursuing marines to know where it's going.

Too bad I'm more used to playing as the skulk and onos now. Probably should try the fade more. Lerks, not so much.

The thing about lerks is that agility is absolutely vital to its survival. With its low HP and armour, it allows no mistake at all. All it has is its small size and speed, so hit-and-run is its only real tactic, so much so that the carapace evolution is useless on it compared to regeneration. The carapace does not make enough of a difference to the lerk while the low HP means regeneration can fill up its HP bar fairly quickly.

Since it's all about speed, my bad ping on American servers gives me a bad handicap while playing as a lerk, hence skulk and onos.






















Saccharin's supposed to have an aftertaste but I find that it goes better with my coffee than aspartame. Its sweetness is just closer to sugar than aspartame whose sweetness is more of what we Chinese call "甘甜" (gan1 tian2).

Saccharin's also a coal tar derivative and this sounds kinda disgusting, except a lot of other stuff we eat also have pretty disgusting origins, like artificial flavours that come from crude oil. Everytime a label says "artificial flavouring", coal tar and crude oil are some of the examples of their origins.

Too bad aspartame is way easier to find here than saccharin.

Rant 1157 / It Is Really Impossible To Find Wool At Reasonable Prices These Days.

I'm surprised Magrunner isn't as famous as it should be.

Or maybe my standards really dropped after Remember Me.

Regardless, I find Magrunner to be a really good game.

This game is, just like many reviewers have said, a mix of Portals and the Cthulhu mythos. Instead of a portal gun, you get the Magtech gun. It does not open portals but it magnetises certain objects to allow you to solve puzzles.

In the place of the humour of GLaDOS and Wheatley, there is the horror of Cthulhu.

At this point, I think now that this game can probably be better described as a mix of Portals and Amnesia: The Dark Descent.

Part of the horror comes from a similar fear mechanism that was used in Amnesia where you get red veins and trembles when looking at monsters and certain "horrifying" objects. So far, I've come across just one statue was pretty scary, although IMO the pictures on some of the walls were even worse.

From my experience in Amnesia, it would be safe to assume that at some point, if I stare at those things for too long, I'd go insane and die or something.

Eventually, I believe I will have to actually fight monsters because one hint on the loading screens told me that explosive crates can be used to kill monsters.

So far, not yet. Things are just getting creepy but no combat at the moment.



















So I'm buying an extra casing for my Lumia 520 from Aliexpress. The prices are far better than the ones on Ebay, while those on Ebay were way better than those on Dealextreme.

Whatever happened to DX? Now their prices are ridiculous!

Tried searching on Qoo10 but nobody's selling flip covers for this phone.

At the same time, I also found ABS and PLA filaments for 3D printers available on Aliexpress, so if I don't use much in the future, I'll probably buy from those sellers instead of buying in bulk from wholesalers.




















Just like when I first used the N8, I'm really ignorant when it comes to the current generation of handphones. For one, I was impressed by the Panorama function of the Lumia 520.

However, I don't like how the clock on the lock screen cannot be turned into a virtual analog clock and the layout of the home screen.



















NS2 is now a lot more fun with the new stuff. Babblers look fun and they make gorges a lot more useful over the course of the game. The catch is that they only last a few minutes while costing 1res each, so it takes some intelligence to use them properly.

The game has also been sped up through the reduction of resource costs for all lifeforms, although upgrades for them now cost a bit of res. For example, an onos only cost 60 now compared to 75 in the past, but with 3 upgrades it can cost 84 res. One option for dealing with this is to evolve into an onos without upgrades, then wait for the res to upgrade later, if it survives long enough.

Still, I see plenty of onos dying too quickly, so I guess us pub players haven't really improved much after all these months. Me, I really suck. A large part of this has been due to the 200ms ping but then again, I wasn't a particularly good player in the first place.

The Singapore servers are always empty but I notice that sometimes, there are a few players with similar pings as mine on the American servers I frequent these days, especially Monash #2. I like the 24-player limit.

Rant 1156 / Busy Weekdays Make Us Appreciate Weekends More

After a couple of chapters into Remember Me, TR suddenly felt like such an awesome game.

The latest problem I have with RM is the camera control - they like to have that panning shot whenever they change camera to make it look good. What irritates me is that I cannot control my camera when it's panning for those several seconds, leading to confusion about whether the camera can be controlled.

I know it looks good if you're watching someone else play but if you want to make a movie, just make a damn movie!

The other thing about the camera is that it sucks at finding the right angle. Often during battles I would find my camera jammed into some corner and all I see is a jumble of unidentifiable graphics as I try to roll around dodging all the attacks indicated by the exclamation marks. Basically, I'd get blinded by myself.

What I think it needs is to allow the camera to move beyond the walls and turn the walls invisible when I'm close to it, just like any decent PC game would.

Although I didn't know this beforehand, I can now tell that this game is a console port, and it got ported badly. The camera's programming is just so bad for a PC game.

...

Finished it. Was tempted to quit but the story dragged me back.

This game has taught me one thing about game design: don't mess with a gamer's camera. Seriously, when I'm given control of my movement, don't touch my camera. Not only does it cause confusion, it annoys me too when it delays me unnecessarily as I wait to regain full camera control.

I also realized that lag caused my combat to get horrible. Not only do my buttons not get detected, causing my combos to break, but also it makes me dodge at the wrong directions as the camera changes angle but the orientation does not follow immediately.

Many times during the battles at the end of the game with a whole bunch of enemies, I'd keep somersaulting right into them when I really wanted to roll away from them. That forced me to spam dodge to get out again and thus broke my combo.

If these problems didn't occur, this game would have been so easy because I noticed that dodging actually gives a split-second of invulnerability.

One thing I have to admit is that they really know how to control the camera in the cinematics and the memory remix scenes. I guess they thought a game's camera works just like a movie's.



As for the plot, it was nice but full of holes. For one, wouldn't everyone have noticed that something was wrong with their memories when the other memories don't match up? For example, when Olga thought David had died, wouldn't she have thought about why she was after Nilin at all? Something doesn't click there, right?



In any case, this was a semi-decent game to pass the time while we wait for better games.























Went back to NS2 after a long break and it's now a totally different game compared to the release version.

For example, there doesn't seem to be the simple invisibility anymore and it got replaced by a combination of it and silence - Phantom. This new evolution turns me invisible when I'm stationery and keeps my attacks and movement silent. Totally an ambush ability.

Another new thing is the alien tunnel. I think it's built by gorges and each gorge can build two tunnel openings that will connect to each other when both are completed. Basically an alien phase gate except it's dropped by the players instead of the commander as in the case of the marines' phase gate.

The tunnel is really cool because players actually have to run through it instead of just popping out at the other end instantaneously. When one opening hasn't been built, only half the tunnel is lit by the eerie alien lights. Even when incomplete, I think it still serves the purpose of giving newly hatched aliens a safe haven to regroup and buy their evolutions in.

Unfortunately, there doesn't seem to be any SG server anymore so the best I get are Australian servers that give me 110+ ping. Although I don't miss the horrible SG alien players, I like the gameplay better when my bites can actually hit something.






Best moment at 1:07.

Rant 1155 / GMG Sales > Steam Sales

http://www.theonion.com/video/new-wearable-computer-also-sucks-your-dick,33017/

I think a good movie is one in which there aren't any characters that are so annoying you wish they would just get killed by the villains.




















So I've now come to the conclusion that it is not really a feasible idea to order my groceries online. Right now I have tried S. S. Kim twice and I must say that the products there are just inferior stuff compared to even the housebrand stuff from supermarkets and anything in the wet market.

The prices aren't particularly cheap either, at least not cheap enough to make up for the difference in quality.

In fact, the only things I am satisfied with are the corn kernels, chicken nuggets, fries, bacon, meatballs, fried fishballs and chicken legs.

None of their frozen meats and sausages are good.

And after the dory fillets, I'm not interested in trying out the rest of their frozen seafood.

As far as I know that's the cheapest option online, so it looks like other than those few items, there is no cheaper way to get my food.
















So I was thinking I could also cannibalize the graphics card on the old PC that was about to be thrown away. Since it was a Radeon HD 5800 series, I thought it would work with my Radeon HD 6970. Moreover, my motherboard allows Crossfire which basically means it can handle the dual-GPU arrangement.

I took it out, checked online for guides on how to set it up... then I hit upon a hitch - the GPUs need to be in the same family model number, ie the 5800 series does not work with the 6900 series.

:(






































Ok, so Tomb Raider wasn't such a bad game after all. Other than the QTEs, I didn't notice any major mistakes in the game.

One thing I did note was the hair. Although it's great they tried to produce individual strands instead of one whole chunk, it did have the tendency to vanish when my camera's at certain angles, making Lara look very weird, like she's got some hair thinning issue or something.

However, I don't see any replay value in it and it's not exactly a fantastic game IMHO, so my final conclusion is that it's an okay game. I'm sorry if they were being honest at the beginning of the credits when they said this was the best game they could produce, but that's my opinion of the game. In fact, I find DXHR to be a better game than TR, just because sneaking all the time is so awesome.

















Now on to Remember Me. I can see why everyone says its combat sucks. It's really quite monotonous but I can handle that. No aiming, just lots of spamming. Kinda like playing a MMORPG anyways.

So far I've just reached the third chapter and I noticed two issues.

First, sometimes I don't see where I'm supposed to go and I can't move the camera.

Second, the orientation of the directions changes and remains the same at the wrong times. Usually, it changes when the camera moves, so even though I'm at the same spot, left becomes up and right becomes down. My mind does not adjust like that. My directions are oriented to the protagonist's position. Her down should be my down and her right should be my right too.

The worst is when it doesn't change when it should. I got this issue at the Kid Xmas battle where despite the camera movement and the protagonist's change in position, my WASD does not change. At one point I got so annoyed because dodging requires a direction to move towards and one does not dodge projectiles by rolling in the same direction as them.

Yet I did... several times. In one instance, I rolled to the left before the camera moved to another angle. Then I wanted to change direction again so I rolled left... and she rolled forward. I spammed the same combination and she kept rolling forward.

If I followed the camera's orientation, I would have to hit down, but I was hitting left. If I followed the character's orientation, her left was my right, therefore if I hit left, she would have rolled to my right.

Rant 1154 / Tick Tock Tick Tock Tick Tock Tick Tock

So I finally decided to tidy up a small part of my living room while my housekeeper was cleaning my room. In the process, my bro mentioned my mother's PC and since the monitor has already been sold and the PSU is faulty, we might as well take out the usable parts and sell/recycle the rest.

Now I have 12GB of RAM instead of just 8, but I still can't use the hard disk because I don't have the caddy for it. I have all the cables but I just can't fit it properly without the right caddy.














Also been watching movies. Quite a lot in the last few days, relatively speaking. Just watching the old movies from the 2000s that I've either missed or completely forgotten about, like Vanilla Sky,  Black Hawk Down, Van Helsing and Queen of the Damned.

Tomb Raider also gives me nausea slowly so I'm taking long breaks. Another reason is because I have a solid excuse to not go out, although I'll have to in the coming week. Contagious or not, there are things I can't delay for too long.























Although I'm REALLY excited about the 3D printer, I can't deny that I don't really have that many things to print.

Which sucks because I'm going to have like 6-7kgs of plastic.

There are some things that I will be printing, but I will probably only use half of the spools.

Oh well.