i've got your ocarina right here

On the advice of someone who should know, I’ve traveled back in time to 1998 to play Zelda: Ocarina of Time. Since I already played Zelda: Windwaker on the Gamecube, everything seemed very familiar. Too familiar, almost. It’s as though the Zelda: WW game is just a copy of Ocarina with revamped, toon-shaded graphics and new dungeons. Same controls, same items, same sound effects. But I haven’t finished Ocarina yet, so maybe the comparison won’t hold true. Of course, I wouldn’t want that to leave the impression that the game isn’t any good; it’s great. Just fewer polygons.

In other gaming news, I polished off Metroid Prime. I think I rushed through the last half of the game. Played about 40% in one weekend, which in honesty is too much Metroid. In any case, the game kicks ass and you must play it.

You might be thinking to yourself: “Bryan never talks about anything except video games anymore.” Well, you could say that. And you’d be right. This is because I have a job, and although it would be fun to turn this into a blog about the new stuff coming out of Apple, talking about that stuff would probably get me fired fairly rapidly. There is probably a server somewhere on the Infinite Loop campus silently trawling all known employee blogs for any sensitive information, hooked to a machine that prints out pink slips.

And, besides work, my life is a vast and unchanging sea of waking up, coming home, eating, and sleeping. Sure, I try to exercise and go out sometimes. But even the aberrations from my schedule seem so mundane that I have trouble posting them up here. Maybe that’s my problem: I have too high an editorial filter on myself.

So, in an effort to reverse this self-imposed chilling effect, I’ll revisit the highlights of my week so far. Monday is one of the two days every week that Leslie goes to her credentially classes for six hours. Because, after all, it’s not enough to just teach all day and spend every other waking hour planning for teaching and grading. So, I usually have the evenings to myself. I recently leveraged my member’s 20% discount at REI to buy a nice new pair of climbing shoes (Anasazi Velcros, if you must know). I hadn’t broken them in yet, and my old Moccasyms were badly in need of a resole. So, I decided to spend my evening at the local over-priced climbing gym. I dropped off my old shoes for resoling (they should be done in a couple of weeks) and headed over to the bouldering area to see what was left of my climbing skillz after all these months of disuse.

It turned out that I did pretty well, and I also managed to meet and hit it off with a couple of other climbers. I’d sort of forgotten the automatic friendship and community that goes along with climbing. Maybe if I return next week, and I see the same people again, I might establish something like a routine.

Tuesday evening was spent with Les catching up with the daily show using our new PVR bliss. Wednesday was soaked up with ripping netflix DVDs and ocarina. And that brings us to today, which I’m clearly spending working in my cube.

Tomorrow is Friday and payday. Bliss. I might be coming to Austin in a couple of weeks for these alleged graduation shenanigans. We’ll see.


Comments

cameron2004-05-06 20:16:37

I was trying to think of all of the ways in which Wind Waker was not a copy of Ocarina, but my brain is way too fried right now and overflowing with anatomical terms and biochemical pathways. But after finals are over, I fully intend to address this topic.

bryan2004-05-07 15:28:12

Well, like I said, i’m not done with ocarina yet. but the way you start with the silngshot, then get the boomerang, and learn the sword spinning thing, and the way you fall through the holes in the ground the same way, and after you beat a boss the little floating pool of light is there. I mean, come on.

More Mario Drama!

bowser threatens peach

Part IV of the Mario Bros. Flash movie has been posted! The previous parts seem to be disappearing from flash sites, so I decided to just nab them all and mirror them on my server. You can see part IV here..

In case you didn’t get a chance to watch the first three parts, they’re here:

Maybe I’ll just set up a page of my favorite flash shenanigans.

Enjoy!


Comments

brittany2007-09-08 12:57:54

when r u making the 4th part of the movie? i want to see it!

brittany2007-09-08 13:42:59

omg that wa so cool! r u making a 5th one?!

bryan2007-09-14 08:36:50

I didn’t make them–just found them somewhere on the internet. Maybe someday there will be more, but I doubt it, at this point.

metriod, pvr, the weather

well, life seems to have settled down in into it’s post-vacation routine again. I go to work. I come home, sleep. And so forth.

Nothing really notable has been going on. I’ve been playing a lot more of Metroid Prime. It took me a while to get into, but it proved very rewarding once I did. Once I finish I’ll probably post my impressions of the game overall.

Also, after three months of self-imposed abstention, I bought a toy. It’s a PVR (personal video recorder). The idea is that, while I really don’t watch that much television, the stuff I do like (mostly on comedy central) is only once or twice a week, and I don’t care enough to change what i’m doing so i can sit in front of a TV. Also, I’ve gotten to the point where even one commercial is enough to make me recoil from the TV room in horror. So we got this ReplayTV thing that is supposed to automatically figure out when all your favorite shows are on and record them for you, and when you play them back it automagically skips all the commercials. All this for $120. Sign me up.

Finally, I should mention the freakish weather of the last couple of days. It’s been in the EIGHTIES AND NINETIES. I know. It’s amazing. How quickly I forget my roots.


Comments

cameron2004-04-26 14:33:46

Metroid Prime = WHOOP! I’m excited about all the info we’ll get about Metroid Prime 2 (Echoes?) after E3.

Let me know how the whole PVR thing works out. Ever since I learned of TiVo, it seemed like something I would use and enjoy.

bryan2004-04-29 09:39:31

So far the PVR has kicked ass. We’ve gotten to watch the Daily show, which we almost always miss because we go to be to early, and I found late night showings of the Family Guy and Kids in the Hall. I didn’t even know the shows were still on the air anywhere, and now I can watch them whenever I want!

I just finished Metroid (took me about 5 attempts on the last boss), the same day I read about MP 2. So now I’ve played Zelda:WW, Mario Sunshine, and Metroid. What are other must-plays for GCN?

Cameron2004-04-29 16:15:57

Did you ever get your Zelda Collectors Edition? You should definitely take Ocarina and Majoras Mask for a spin. Other than that, the o­nly other games I’ve played significantly are Mario Kart Double Dash and F-Zero GX. I rented Soul Calibur II and enjoyed it as a rental. And I have Prince of Persia, which I know you’ve played o­n PS2. But other than that, I don’t have much. I’m looking forward to hearing more about Tales of Symphonia and the Lord of the Rings RPG.

bryan2004-04-29 20:06:24

Yes, I did finally get it. I got two, actually, because after they sent me my replacement my apartment complex told me they had been sitting on the other one for about a month. I guess it’s time to give Ocarina another shot :)

em2004-05-01 11:18:57

Did you intentionally embed two other “pvr” instances in your email?

post-vacation routine
proved very rewarding

bryan2004-05-06 16:16:34

no… how eery.

cozumel pics posted

We’re back! Leslie and I culled the 600 or so pictures we took down to 140 or so for gallery. Full narration included there. We’ll post some videos soon, too.

ear gets better, weather gets worse

so, yesterday out o­n the boat my ear was feeling a lot better, so i decided to try going down just 10-15 ft to see if it would behave. it did, so I joined the others for two awesome dives. the first was in palancar gardens, the edge of a drop-off at about 80 ft. The second place was called punta tunich, and it was definitely our best dive. these was a swift current that took us along the edge of a coral wall so we didn’t have to swim at all. We saw a turtle, bunches of the usual fish, and got a great underwater group shot at our safety stop.

in the afternoon, after everyone was showered, we went out for lunch at a great little restuarant, “ambiente.” I had some killer chicken mole. Then we did a bit of strolling and shopping in the downtown, then Leslie and I went for some resting and reading in the hotel while we waited for the evening to arrive. The weather was looking stormy when we headed out to eat around 7:30, and by the time we were finished, a full-blown storm was underway. Big lightning, loud thunder, the works. I think the Doug captured some video of it. We went in to our hotel just in time to have the electricity go out. We gathered in o­ne hotel room to watch a movie o­n battery power–indiana jones, which after skipping was replaced by SNL’s best fo will ferrel.

This morning we slept in, then I finished the da vinci code, then we went out and rented a scooter and an old convertible bug. we rode out to see the ruins, then to the east side of the island. we had seafood o­n the beach, then drive along the coast of the island back north to San Miguel. The weather looked alright, but we had been warned that continued bad weather might force us to cancel our evening dive tonight. Alas, it did. There’s no rain, but the winds are pretty high and the water looks choppy.

So, we’re now bathing and preparing for a night of putt-putt golf and drinking. woo.with luck, the weather will break tomorrow for our 10am snorkeling trip.