Where Have I Been? Announcement 02-20-2015

If you've been following along, I haven't updated this blog since September. I hope to end that dry spell now.  I have a new announcement.

I am leaving my medical coding and billing career.

It was a hard decision to make. I spent two years preparing for that career. It became a problem when I realized that if I were to continue and get a job in that field, my writing would suffer. It has been suffering long enough. For months I was depressed about it and wondered if I should stay in that path.   As I tried to prepare for a certification exam, the career was suffocating my writing and creativity outlets and I was losing sight of who I am and what I truly wanted.  I know now that medical coding and billing is not the right career for me.

Writing is.  I am good at typing/word-processing, and I love the computer. I love being expressive and creative.  My writing may not be at its best now, but I am willing to learn more and improve my writing skills so as to write for professional purposes. I can exercise my curiosity more often now and not feel like they are distractions.  I should still have a day job, but in the long run I would like to write for a living.

So on that note, I am going to attempt to keep Cyborg Haven going.  I am sorry for those who thought I gave up on it.  I simply was letting life take control of me, when I needed to take control of my life.  It's time to move on and be happy.  Look forward to the future instead of dread it.

Happy belated new year, and welcome to more possibilities!

Regarding plans for Sonic Fan-girl Chronicles, + My Love for Video Games

It is just as I feared.  I have become ambitious in trying to finish My Sonic Fan-girl Chronicles and just didn’t get back to putting up new chapters for quite some time.


As I may have said before, pursuing this My Sonic Fan-girl Chronicles project was a way for me to heal after I watched that video about the Sonic.exe computer game.  I wanted to rebuild my appreciation of Sonic—not that I didn’t have it already but, just to strengthen it I guess.  I had chapters of different points in my life where I first played a new Sonic game, and I looked forward to updating Cyborg Haven with these posts.  But lately this project didn’t seem so important to me.  I hate to say that.  And what’s worse:

I haven’t played a console Sonic game in months. Not even Sonic Rivals 2 on the PSP.

This year, new priorities came up that are related to my new career, and for that my Sonic writing project suffered. I still want to continue writing it.  I really want to write about how I got interested in Shadow the Hedgehog and what I thought was so cool about him back then, in 2001.  Shadow still deserves a special post about him from me because though I love all three hedgehogs to pieces—Sonic, Shadow and Silver—Shadow is ultimately my favorite.  I at least want to do that before I stop writing more chapters.

Maybe it won’t necessarily be part of the project, but since I haven’t been playing any other video games lately, then from time to time I would be writing mostly about my memories playing Sonic games.   I still have games like Prince of Persia (2008) and Devil May Cry 4 that I can return to playing and write about when I do.  And I can’t forget NiGHTS: Journey of Dreams, because  I love NiGHTS as well and still vow to someday get the NiGHTS into Dreams HD on Steam (I don’t have a Steam account; I plan to get one after being a little more financially established).

Perhaps along the way I can also share links to YouTube videos that contain content from video games I’ve enjoyed, or soundtrack songs from games I appreciate the music from.  Sonic Unleashed has plenty of that. I love the soundtrack to Sonic Adventure 2 as well, especially Shadow’s stages, Knuckles’ stages, and even the music for Rouge’s stages too.  OMG, I can’t forget Final Fantasy VII too!!  Maybe also I might share links to music tracks from video games I haven’t played but have heard some of the music and appreciate the musical score, like from Journey or Assassin’s Creed.  And of course, if there is news about any new video games coming up such as Final Fantasy XV, Kingdom Hearts 3, or a new Sonic game (or even the Sonic Boom cartoon, y'all!), I'll write my thoughts on those too.

No question I still appreciate video games. Even though I am not playing them as much as I used to before I changed my career, I want to share the joy video games give me with their gameplay, their stories, their music and their characters.

Happy New Year! New Year, New Beginnings

Happy New Year, dear readers!!  It's a new year and I wanted to take this opportunity to thank everyone for reading Cyborg Haven and for those stopping by for the first time, thank you! 

 

Of course, I've still got a lot of my Sonic the Hedgehog history to share, but I'll see if I can fit in some other video game topics as well in the coming months.

 

I am looking forward to the new year!  Aren't you?

 

Is Mega Man X?  We'll see...he's getting comic book exposure very soon!  More on this later!

 

Art by AmethystAnne
Mega Man X belongs to CAPCOM

 

New Year, New Habits

The New Year has started and I don’t think I even touched my PS2 or my PSP so far. Maybe I needed a break from gaming? I dunno. It is still one of my favorite pastimes. I guess after finishing Crisis Core near the end of last year, I feel like, “Gosh is there any other video game as good as this?”

I need to return to the list of games I started but haven’t finished yet. That should get me started. Of course, that will include Mega Man X: Command Mission and Mega Man X8.   I probably shouldn't buy any more new video games until I finish at least five of the ones I already have  :D !  And Dissidia: FF is going to keep me busy on the PSP for a long while.

Other Video Games I Haven’t Played in a Long While That I Should Return To

• Sonic Unleashed (the latest Sonic Game I have)

• Final Fantasy XII (I’m supposed to be in the Stilshrine Miriam now…)

• Sonic Rivals 2 (Stupid elusive Chao…stupid Sonic…LET SHADOW WIN!!)

• NiGHTS: Journey of Dreams (Why do I neglect NiGHTS so?)

• Devil May Cry 4 (Yeah…because I only just started it.)

• Jak and Daxter: The Lost Frontier (uh, yeah…this game too)

Lately I've been having dreams that included Cloud Strife, even Zack Fair,  and/or Vincent Valentine.  The graphics were as good as FFVII: Advent Children Complete.  I feel like even though I've sort of already finished Dirge of Cerberus: FFVII, I should give the Extra Missions a try.  The extra missions in Crisis Core seem more appealing to me though (more than the ones in Dirge of Cerberus).  That could be because I am not that good at aiming Vincent's Cerberus at things.  I just make him shoot and hope that the target mark stays where it's supposed to so that he gets a hit.    I should just go for it and give Vincent's game a chance again.  That mysterious Vincent...I am all of a sudden interested in his mysteriousness again.

What to do with my Mega Man X Collection…?

I gave it to Sis.

I’ve played Mega Man X, Mega Man X2, some of Mega Man X3, and X’s side of Mega Man X4. I started playing X’s side in Mega Man X5, and then it just got…well…I didn’t feel like I had to get back to the game again that eagerly. But Sis really misses it. She is as much a Mega Man X and Zero fan as I am…only more so because her favorite Reploid is of course Zero.

It didn’t make sense for me to keep the Mega Man X Collection in my bedroom when I wasn’t playing it. Sis would benefit having the collection in her bedroom and feeling like the collection is hers now rather than needing to ask for my permission to get to it when she wants to play Mega Man X5. As a matter of fact, she is currently left off at the Sigma battles for X’s side. She’ll have to play through the Boss Run again, but those will be no big problem since we know their weaknesses. It’s Sigma who’s the pain in the @$$. Sis also wants to finish playing through Zero’s side of the game, in which he had become a Maverick and X had to fight him.

[Sigh]

We made a trade; I gave her the Mega Man X Collection, and she gave me the Casshern Sins Part 2 Blu-Ray (we each bought one part of the Casshern Sins collection). This way she gets what she wants, and I get what I want, and we don’t have to pay for anything more. Heh heh, we got in an argument about this actually :D What is the Mega Man X Collection doing in my room if I am not going to be playing it any time too soon?

HAPPY HALLOWEEN!!!

Amethyst Anne here, wishing all of you readers to have a very happy Halloween and lots of your favorite candies!

Unreadable Comments

There is a reason why I moderate comments for Cyborg Haven.

     I have received several comments that I cannot read because they are not in English, or rather they don’t contain any of the 26 letters in the English alphabet. They are just squares. Furthermore, they contain at least 35 links (shown as a group of periods) to dangerous websites that can be harmful to the computer when accessed.

I would have published one of those comments, because part of it was readable and it was a nice commment.  What stopped me was the group of unknown links.

I do NOT want to put my readers and their computers in harm's way.  I care about my readers’ safety, as well as my own. So here is my message to the two identities that are sending me these un-readable comments (and you know who you are): If you can read my blog, why don’t you respond in the same language as my blog?  So please, and kindly, if you want to respond to a post then do so in English.   And please please PLEASE refrain from including those links to dangerous websites and videos.  Otherwise, I WILL REJECT THEM.  I’m sorry but that is how it has to be.

Thank you for understanding.

A funny drawing

Hello,
     I just thought I'd post this and share it with readers.  I used the  Microsoft Paint program to draw it about a few days ago.  Must've been in a silly mood. *.^

     I love the expressions on the little dots as they see Pac-Man's hungry open mouth.  Especially the first one; he goes like  :O  .   Because he's first on the menu!

My Gaming Variety

You're probably wondering why I take too long to finish games like Crisis Core: Final Fantasy VII, or Sonic Unleashed.
     I don't stick to only one game to play.  I like to switch between several, because I like variety that way.  I like to have a choice; when I feel "Cloudy" then I get back to Crisis Core or the orignal FFVII, or I might be in a Sonic mood after reading the Archie Sonic the Hedgehog comic books, and then I'll play Sonic Unleashed (or in a "Classic Sonic" mood and play his old-school SEGA Genesis titles).  NiGHTS: Journey of Dreams is still in the SEGA universe and, it's a fun and addictive game that I can play for 2:30 hours at a time.  And I love the NiGHTSy music; I dance to the music from the Bellbridge chase mission ("Dreams Dreams") whenever I get the chance.  I'm always giddy and cheerful after playing NiGHTS.
     I go to the Jak and Daxter series whenever I feel like getting to a platforming game.  Plus there's some jumping and punching and shooting and comedy (a la Daxter mind you) and best of all, Jak.  Oh, of course, there is also Jak X, a combat racing game in the Jak and Daxter world.  If I feel like racing, then that is the best racing game I have in my collection.  Come to think of it, it's the only racing game in my collection.  o.0
     [Sigh]  I'll start Jak and Daxter: The Lost Frontier next time.  I's be NiGHTS crazy for a long while now.  *,*  

The PSP battery use

In the short few months I owned a PSP, I know now that after about two hours of playing on the unit, I check the battery settings and it indicates that around 40% of the battery power was used.
     In fact, I had to charge my battery recently, two days ago.  When I played on my PSP today, the charge level went from 100% to 62% for the 1 hour and 50 minutes or so that I used it.  This means that one hour equals about 20% of the PSP's battery power--that is if you are using a UMD (that's pretty much the only way I'm using my PSP now.)
I'm hoping I won't have to replace the battery pack too soon, though;  if it gets too warm where I live, the charge level decreases on its own.  It's how from September 29th to October 9th the charge level of my battery went from 33% to...well, it didn't turn on, which means it was 0%.

So how is it for everyone else?  Do you keep track of how much battery power is used when you use your PSP?  It may depend on the frequency of use and the length of time, wouldn't you agree?

My PSP is starving...

What's this?
My PSP is still sitting in my bedroom with its battery uncharged!  I tell myself that I want to finish Crisis Core: Final Fantasy VII before I am too tempted to buy Dissidia: Final Fantasy (before its price goes down to $29.99).  Why am I not charging my PSP's battery?
    Maybe I put off charging my unit because it takes over two hours to charge and I only remember that I have to charge the battery just before I go to bed.  Well, I'll try not to forget this time.  Cuz I wanna know what happens next for Zack Fair.  Are Zack and Cloud ever gonna have that lunch together?  Poor Cloud.  [Sniffle]

The Memory Card I Lost

     It was some time in November 2006, soon before Thanksgiving Day when this happened. I was playing Jak X: Combat Racing, and I was done with about 38% of the game, as it indicated. At some point in between races, I decided to upgrade Jak's ride. I changed color after color, wheels, the engine and something else, I forgot. But I didn't realize that after every time I made a change to the race car, the game automatically saved. I didn't take that into account until I saw that the auto-save indicator was still flashing like it was still trying to save. I played another race, and the auto-save check mark was still on the screen. I didn't like that; somehting was fishy. I stopped playing and tried to see if I can exit to the title screen, but it wouldn't let me. There was no way to get out of it. I made a no-win decision to reset the game, and it happened: the data in the memory card became corrupted.
     I knew it was a bad idea, and I did it anyway.  I lost the data for the finished Chaos Legion, Shadow the Hedgehog, Sonic Mega Collection Plus, Jak II completed, Jak 3 completed, and ultimately Jak X. I kind of cried.
     Boy, did I screw up...
     But it was soon before Thanksgiving Day. After a short while, I thought, Hey, at least the world didn't end and my family is safe.  And besides, this past June I realized the joy of playing Jak 3 all over again.