ECCC: Part 1

(helmet girl by Camilla d'Errico)

...Or the beginning of a geek experience.

So as mentioned via twitter, I was really excited about attending the Emerald City ComiCon this year. First of all, I'd be taking my girlfriend Misti to her first comic convention (a true geek rite of passage), but secondly I'd be able to introduce her to the artist Camilla d'Errico.

I attended the ECCC back in 2004, dragged there back a group of friends who were really into comics. I was pretty excited to meet Stan Sakai (the creator of Usagi Yojimbo), but other than that, I wasn't really sure to to expect. Later that day, my best friend Chip showed up, and we started to wander around Artist Alley. While perusing various prints and works, we saw this wonderful picture of a girl sitting on a sidewalk done in water colors. I bought one print, the "rainy version", while Chip bought the sunny version. Chip and I chatted with the artist, Camilla d'Errico a bit, and then I left.

I was instantly a fan of her work, which has an Anime/Mange influence, but a style all her own. After I was home a few days, I decided to see if she had any more art for sale, a sure enough, she did. I bought a few more prints and some original art (a kid's piece called "Paperbag Princess").

("Burn" )

Later she offered some more original art to me, which I gladly paid for (see the first piece "Helmet Girl - winking").

Jump forward to 2009 - Misti loves my Camilla d'Errico paintings, especially "Helmet Girl." I noted that Camilla was going to be at ECCC this year (I think she's there every year) and that we could go meet her and maybe get some more art. Of course, Misti thought this was a wonderful idea.

After a very long drive (another story for anther time), we arrive in Seattle and begin the convention. I made sure that we visited Camilla first (since there was the possibility that she would be a bit tired at the end of the day - a convention is a very draining experience).

Camilla was very nice and made Misti into an even bigger fan as a result. We chatted for a bit, got a graphic novel signed and then wandered around for a couple of hours, just taking in the whole experience. We chatted about what prints we wanted to buy from Camilla and then wandered back to Artists Alley.

We bought 2 prints and 2 comic books, all of which Camilla signed (she even sketched on the backs of both comics!). And then, while noting that she is starting to get over her camera-shyness, she let us take a picture with her.

So if you are interested in her work, like Anime, and/or enjoy discovering new artists - check out her site here: http://www.camilladerrico.com/

Next time: Costumes - freaks and geeks!

True Tale of Unspeakable Horror

...or a real life toilet humor story of survival and the power of friendship.

Life has a funny sense of humor. Oftentimes, humans are put into situations that stretch them to the very limits of their ability. In the not-so-distant past (about a year or so prior to this post), I was put into such a situation...

I work on the second floor of a house turned into the office. We have two rooms up here and a small bathroom with no ventilation. Needless to say, most of us know it's off limits for anything that can be construed as "socially offensive". Unfortunately a few of our employees who work in the community have no such qualms.

One such employee came hurtling up the stairs since the downstairs bathroom was occupied at the time. Like that infamous Jurassic park scene involving the water rippling in the cup, the sounds of her steps pounding up the stairs carried with them ominous portent. I listened in horror as the noises that came out of the tiny bathroom made my stomach turn. It sounded like someone had dumped out a used bucket of mop water into a tub. The female worker (yes, a rather large woman) then emerged, her face glowing in victory. She waved to me and my coworkers across the hall and then stomped back down the stairs.

Then the smell hit.

I threw open my windows and tried sucking fresh air through the screen covering. It wasn't working. I could feel my hairs curling as they tried to twist and turn from the foul entity climbing out of the tiny bathroom. My coworkers across the way thought I was just being funny until they smelled it too. They immediately slammed their door shut and lit several candles, feverishly praying to whatever god was listening. With a small gasp at the oxygen retreating from my window, I stumbled downstairs, eyes watering, looking for anything to combat the smell. Then I found the febreeze-in-a-can.

I went upstairs aerosoling the whole way and screaming, "The power of Christ compels you," while making the sign of the cross in mist particles. I could sense the entity retreating, keening in anguish as it was defeated by pureness in aerosol form: Febreeze.

In the end, we won the battle...but we were changed. Scarred, irrevocably by the horror we had just witnessed.

Every now and then, someone will bring up that horrible day. Those of us who lived through it will glance at each other, a haunted, distant look in our eyes.

Retro-gaming Review: Ogre Battle

....or revisiting a game of my youth.

So I'm currently replaying through Ogre Battle: March of the Black Queen. The game itself is a unique combination of RPG and Strategy (Real Time Strategy). You are the leader of a rebellion against an evil empire. As you travel the land toward the heart of the empire, you recruit several powerful characters to your cause. Seems simple right? However, this is just a cursory explanation. The real complexity of the game isn't apparent until you look at the main map screen and the individual character screens.

On the top right of the overworld screen for each map, you'll see a gauge and a sun dial of sorts that tracks the progression of day to night and vice versa. The gauge is your reputation with the people of the land and the actions you take and the units (a collection of your soldiers) that you use to liberate cities will raise and lower your reputation. Each unit has up to five members, and each member has a charisma/charm rating (CHA) and an alignment rating (ALI) - the higher the alignment, the "holier" or more goodly your character is. Therefore, it is important to show the best side of this rebellion to the people and have good units liberate cities.

On the other hand, some people like myself prefer to have armies of darkness (vampyres, werewolves, liches, etc.). This game allows itself to be played both ways. So in my case, I'd liberate the city with my good soldiers (paladins, knights, samurai, etc.) and then use my werewolves and wizards to hold the city.

It should be noted that this is not an simple, pick up and play. After the first few stages/maps (or "scenes" as they are called in-game), each map begins to take longer to clear. So barring a blitzkrieg on the enemy's capital city, you should expect to take about an hour or so per map. Again, this is purely optional, but to get the most out of the story and all the little sidequest items, you'll have to commit yourself and your time to this game.

For a decent walkthrough, check this FAQ.

As a side note: This game is apparently incredibly rare to find in the United states. According to various articles (you can see one here) , there were only about 25,000 copies released in America. And I just happened to pick up one of them (hey, it was a great summer game). Right now, a complete copy of the game can be found on ebay for about $150 dollars, or around $60 for the game itself (no manual, no inserts). No, I'm not planning on ever selling this game.

Now for the nostalgia -

As I noted, this game took time and commitment to play. I still remember spending hours on a Saturday just trying to clear stage after stage, until finally I beat the game. The ending was spectacular and seemed to nicely wrap everything up (I'll not spoil it). So I restarted and played through a second time, this time trying to get more of the little sidequests accomplished...and this time I got a completely different ending. Yes, there are multiple endings to this game, depending on who you recruit and even if you are male or female.

Another fond memory for this game involves my younger brother. I had just gotten my wisdom teeth removed (they had to be taken out via surgery) and I was home recovering (read also: doped up on anesthetic). I woke up to find my younger brother playing Ogre Battle on my SNES in my bed room. He had come in to check on me and thought he'd play some videogames while hanging out. So I'd get up and mumble suggestions to him every so often and then fall back asleep. Random memory, eh? Well, it was a preview of things to come. While my brother definately prefers sports games and racing games (Gran Turismo, for example), he's always had a knack and a soft spot for strategy games (Lords of the Realm, etc.). Maybe Ogre Battle was that nudge down that path.

So how does this game compare to memory? It is even better than I remembered. Call it age, call it maturity, but I understand more of the technical aspects of this game now that I'm older, and find myself enjoying it even more. If you can get a copy of this, do so! I've read that they just re-released it on the Nintendo Wii virtual console. It's worth playing, especially if you like games that take longer to beat.

Well, that ends this trip down memory lane. Next time, I'll either do Secret of Mana or Kirby Superstars.

Videogames, Periodic Table style!

(pic from the iheartchaos site)

...Or how to claim Mario helps with chemistry.

So I was cruising through a great news-ish site know as Fark.com, and I happened to stumble over this little article. Being the videogame fanatic that I am, I had to click on on immediately. I really had no idea of what to expect - a list of the games from which all videogames could be derived or constructed, a table of the most important characters in videogame history, etc. Instead, I found the table above, laid out like the original periodic table.

While I thought that it was clever overall, I had to wonder how much the creator was just getting tired of trying to match a character/game to an element and started just giving up there toward the end.

In other news, it's been awhile since I last blogged. To explain my absence in blogging, I feel should break it down by the months since my last entry -

September - I attended a conference on PLAY project, specifically to start working on early intervention with children diagnosed with Autism or Austism Spectrum Disorder (Aspergers to PDD - NOS). I will talk more about that in the future as we start to establish it more in the Moscow, ID area.

October - Busy month at work and of course the yearly Halloween party. Our company was expecting a state audit at this time.

November - Holidays and limited staffing meant that many of us in the office had to cover the workers who were leaving.

December - Same as above. Great month though, since my brother was graduating from college with a degree in advertising. Unfortunately, my brother had to move back to home in order to decrease his expenses, so the end of the month was spent in chaos as the family came up here to help him move out.

January - Things started to slow down a bit, but we were still a bit short staffed.

February - It was announced that our company's state audit was going to be the beginning of March. So for the month of February everyone was getting their paperwork in order, training with staff and so on.

March - We had the audit, which was a two day ordeal. Overall, it went pretty well. Sure we had to fix a few things, rename/relabel a few documents to be in compliance from here on. That being said, they have to find problems to report, otherwise it doesn't look like they're doing their job.

So there's my synopsis of life until this point, at least, the business side of my life.

For the fun side, I'm now at almost 11 months of dating my current girlfriend: Misti (you can check her blog out here ). I'm alternating my free time between videogames with my best friend, gaming Monday nights (D&D, D20 modern, etc.), and watching movies and hanging out with Misti. All in all, a very good life at this time.

That's all for now. By the way, let me know what you think about the ESPN box off to the side. I'm still not 100% sold on it.