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[FearfulJesuit]

I have given myself the pseudonym of "Rikki Lintu".

[Max White]

Any significants to it?
I gave myself the online pseudonym of 'Max White' because I saw it on a laundry powder ad.

[Phantom of The Library]

I have given myself the pseudonym of "Rikki Lintu".

The first thing I thought of when I saw that was Rikki Tikki Tavi.
Then that reminded me of Kiki.
Then that reminded me that I'm still only on year six of Sluggy Freelance.
And now I'm going to be tempted to start reading it again all of the rest of tonight.

[SalmonGod]

Then that reminded me of Kiki.

This reminds me to put the fork in the garbage disposal.

[Heron TSG]

@Truean - That's fantastical. Absolutely fantastical.

Today the Physics II class (including myself) got to finalize our plans for a second-semester final project. A friend and I are both making instruments to investigate harmonics and the physics of sound, while simultaneously planning to use our finished products for a Science Olympiad competition. From what I saw last year, the standard duet was some kind of horn for the treble and a shitty-to-average xylophone for the bass part.

Last year, he made a pretty good wooden ocarina, and I made a horrendous PVC xylophone, nicknamed 'The Golly G'. The Golly G was so named because we were surprised it made any recognizable notes, much less the G^# scale it was intended to play. My partner is a really talented musician, and so was his original partner. Then his partner dropped out of the whole shebang without warning two days before the competition, not having made anything for his instrument. During school the next day, I gathered three of my friends from Physics to make something that could play the requisite 8 notes. We found a shitload of rectangular tri-section PVC pipe, calculated the right lengths to get the natural frequencies we needed for the notes, and went at it with a rusty hacksaw in a supply room for three hours straight. When we emerged, we had the most ridiculous looking xylophone I have ever seen. I'm no percussionist, so I wrote the names of the notes on the 'keys'. 'Good Golly it's G^#!' and 'Holy F, Batman!' among them. The keys hung from some old twine threaded between the outer partitions of each key and duct taped to a broom handle up top. The mallets were glass stirring rods with rubber stoppers on the ends.

This year, I resolved to make an instrument that sounded more like an instrument, instead of smashing rubber on PVC at particular frequencies. I'm making a goddamn bagpipe, and it will be glorious! I've already made the chanter, and am working on the drones now. My partner is making a PVC french horn. We are going to rock the socks off of the creativity division. The piece we'll be performing will be Ride of the Valkyries by Wagner. I've convinced my brother to come along to film this if he can. It will be glorious.

[Rose]

vids or it didn't happen

[MaximumZero]

My dad is a rabid right wing nut, which is just as bad as the left wing nut. He repeats endless rants to anyone he can force to listen to him. I have them memorized, it's boring. I'm in no mood for it.

Just to screw with his head, tonight I passionately argued for the British Monarchy system of rule as the best ever. I played it straight and passionately advocated that the King's way was the best way. He had no idea what to do. None of his stock "liberal v. conservative," ranting applied. He was quite dumbfounded. Fox News has not brainwashed him for this particular situation.

Me: "There's a reason God made superior people and put them in Monarchies."
Dad: "Who's superior?"
Me: "The King...."

It was a hilarious shake up to the overly predictable, drawn out discussion rant he has with at me while I try to get away or desperately try to change the subject.. It also ended far sooner than usual with, by definition, less ranting from him. I'm far happier having spent less time with him as he rants tonight, and could give a shit less about politics. I actually got him to change the subject and talk about anything at all besides politics! Mission accomplished!

Less time getting ranted at, yay!

Your move old man, let's see what you do with this....

Ooh, next time you could go with Technocracy! All hail the Friend Computer!

[JoshuaFH]

Fortune Summoners is really starting to grow on me. For a game I had no expectations of to begin with, it's proving itself to be quite the little package of entertainment. What I like most though, is that it's evident that it appeals to my most highly valued game characteristic: to be Hard but Fair.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

My favorite game of all time is God Hand, the game whose SLOGAN was Hard but Fair. It was not just hard, it was ballbustingly hard; at the same time though, it was fair, in that the game never pulled any cheap tricks, whenever you died, it was YOUR fault. There was no hand holding, it gave you the tools to win, and damn well expected you to.

Fortune Summoners is shaping up very similarly. FS enemies are intelligent, BIZARRELY intelligent for such a simple looking game. They'll dodge your attacks, use their dodging to get into your face, they block intelligently, attack incessantly, try to surround you, avoid getting cornered, follow your movements, and facing them in a group increases the difficulty by an entire factor for each enemy. Sana is such a great secondary character, because fighting alone is many times harder than fighting in a group, so you really do need her for victory, and so she establishes her own importance.

Learn your character well, because the game expects you to fight intelligently, something made even more important as your opponents will not show any mercy, and the fights themselves are extremely chaotic, not helped by how clunky movement and combat are, but it's all about learning Arches abilities, observing your enemies, and building your playstyle to reflect that.

The dungeons so far are both treacherous and well-designed. The first dungeon, I didn't even bother with preparation, but the second will beat you into the dirt, sending you crawling back to the entrance to stock back up, and prepare yourself properly, before tackling it again.

And other than that, I love the art style and the carefree dialogue and atmosphere the entire game has. I just got the first Wind Crest, and I'm liking the game so far, but there is a certain lack of drama, a lack of tension from not having a larger antagonist or overarching goal to work towards, but I'm hoping the game will pick up some of that slack as I continue on.

EDIT: Sorry if I was being a tad too spoilery.

[Sirus]

Whoa dude, spoilers!

Anyway, I'm loving the game as well. The combat is very satisfying and intense. I'm not sure why a ten-year-old girl with a sword makes for more exciting combat than a big-budget title like Dragon Age, but it does.

[Aklyon]

And when you finally finished God Hand, you got one of the best credit sequences ever.

[Bauglir]

I finally got this stupid knot to work. Yessssss.

[Scaraban]

And when you finally finished God Hand, you got one of the best credit sequences ever.

What. the fuck.

[Vector]

Never Let Me Go, by Kazuo Ishiguro, is excellent.  I don't know if I'll end up recommending it in the end, but I can tell you that I was literally hooked from the first sentence, which doesn't happen much with me... and I ended up trying to read it while I walked down the stairs to dinner, until I almost fell down them.  In the end, I read the first 50 pages or so during dinner.  Marvelous.  I still don't know what's going on, but I'm looking forward to finding out.

[Heron TSG]

...I just wrote the chorus for Emerald Sword by Rhapsody of Fire for the Baritone Horn, meaning that I can transpose it to bagpipes.

I heard I liked heavy metal, so I put some heavy metal in my heavy metal so that I can rock out while I rock out.

[MaximumZero]

...I just wrote the chorus for Emerald Sword by Rhapsody of Fire for the Baritone Horn, meaning that I can transpose it to bagpipes.

I heard I liked heavy metal, so I put some heavy metal in my heavy metal so that I can rock out while I rock out.

I would like to hear you play that before you put it on the bagpipes, please.