Busy November.

First snowfall this week. I tried so hard to delay (and even avoid) the purchase of winter tires but I gave in hearing all the snowfall warnings. I'm glad I did get a set though seeing it really DID fall and there's still plenty of crazy drivers out there... crazy as in still driving at insane speeds regardless of road conditions. Funny enough, the roads were a lot emptier once the snow stuck. The drive home was quite pleasant 'cept very cold. The snow did come and go now that the weather's slightly warmer, the rain's been pouring like mad. I imagine we'll be seeing more snow later next month though.

I've finally submitted my JET Application earlier this week. I decided against sending it too close to the application deadline date (Nov 30) just in-case of unforeseen problems. I went through about 4 draft overhauls, more than I've ever done on any academic paper. I definitely wouldn't of gotten to my final version without the support of my English proficient friends (yeah you know who you guys are). Now that it's over and done with, I can get on with my next task - my portfolio. I'll have to try and not think about it for another 2 months before the next dreadful hurdle called the interview. :|

Amazon.com is the evilest POS (hint: not point-of-sale). They had a vid game promo for a buy 2 get 1 free and I somehow splurged. A week later some those games go on sale for even cheaper. UGH. On its way up the border, customs got a hold of it and literally attacked my special Record of Agarest War limited edition. No, sorry to disappoint but there's no bombs in the shape of oppai mousepads in there.




My porn has been spoiled. :(
Work's been a bit hectic. We recently (two weeks ago) opened a new location in Coquitlam and then followed to get robbed the next day. We also got a new POS (point-of-sale) system which we launched in the same month as all these happenings which is also a great POS (not point-of-sale). Outdated, unintuitive, slow, unfriendly, unreliable (crashes)... everything you'd want in an efficient software of the 21st century.

And so November comes to a close in a few days.

PS: Monsters is such a shitty movie. Don't watch it, even if's free!

Mass Effect: The Second

Overdue half a year.


Aloha, beaver teeth!
STORY 4.5/5
The "continuation" of ME1... The Normandy gets attacked by an unknown ship on the way to finish off the geth leftovers. The crew are forced to evacuate but Shepard gets blown out of the ship and falls into a nearby atmosphere. Supposedly dead, Shepard wakes up back in one piece in a Cerberus lab under attack two years later and is told to join them in facing a new threat. You gather a fresh group of teammates, old and new, and get a new ship. Although this time around, ME2's ending prepares the setting for ME3.

The story this time around was definitely more character development driven as all the members of your crew had some significance in the main save-the-universe storyline.

CHARACTERS 4.5/5
Where to start? I think I liked everyone. It felt like the characters were definitely more alive in their fluid movements, facial expressions and just had more personality in general.

Miranda's front two beaver teeth drove me up the wall though (much like Sookie's front two teeth gap).. until I eventually got used to it. Jacob was cool, but I somehow kept unintentionally triggering the flirt dialogue lines. Grunt, the Wrex replacement, was cute but not as cool as Wrex. Loved Thane's story. Was indifferent with Jack but apparently she's a popular choice for romance. Samara - Justicars are cool. Mordin! They made him so awesomely hilarious. I would've totally tried to date him if the choice was there. ;)

[Partial spoiler?] Tali'Zorah returns. Meh. :b As for romance I was actually able to choose Garrus this time! The whole romancing thing with him was a bit of a disappointment, but hey, he's not exactly human so I let it slide. My wish from ME1 came true though. :D As for Alenko, WELL, I'm glad we broke up![/spoiler]

SOUND 4/5
The delicious epic music and voice acting has lived on in ME2.

GRAPHICS 4/5
Great improvements since the first game. I'm sure that I couldn't stop staring at Thane whenever I had a conversation with him. The details on his FACE were stare-worthy. The loading of textures and details were not noticeable like ME1 where objects would load by layers.

GAMEPLAY 4/5
There's no more weapon swapping, just only between the different types. e.g. sniper rife or bazooka. Ammo is no longer unlimited. The Mako's been changed into a planet probing mini game and it's even more time consuming than before. I must admit, I grinned when I probed Uranus though.

The morality feature had been revamped into a simple Paragon/Renegade system which is opened up by dialog/actions you take throughout the game. Certain Paragon/Renegade actions became available during dialog/cut scenes to alter the story a bit. I felt less worried picking a few Renegade choices here and there this time around. (ahem, beating a guy three times to get him to talk)

Traveling the universe now requires gas. SERIOUSLY. Thanks for reminding us that gas is indeed expensive, ME2. I was always poor because of fuel costs.

OVERALL 4.5/5
It was neat how my PC Dragon Age bonus armor for Mass Effect 2 was able to transfer over but it sucked how my helmet was always on. I didn't really get to see my actual face much until I finally gave up on wearing my awesome blood armor. :(

Having played the first one, ME2 definitely stood out with returning characters and the development of a universe I'm already well aware of. Even the little Cerberus news update that changes every day was a nice touch to the game. If you login every day, some stories actually related which was neat. :D

Again just like the first, you get to decide the fate of something universe changing at the end... which will be transferred elegantly into the 3rd game! More cameos, returning characters and then a bunch of new ones all over again! I'm ready for some more ass whoopin'!

Who needs candy anyway

It's unbelievable how it's already November. Geez, slow down 2010.

So Halloween which usually involves costumes didn't happen so much this year. Had a pumpkin carving party at Saboo's new place (or at least I hadn't been there yet) where a lot of everything happened but most importantly, the pumpkin carving was definitely the highlight. The first half involved eating when food was available (live chefs!) and I didn't actually start carving until 11pm (mainly due to the amount of people carving at the same time and waiting on people).


Yeah, I carved a fat(ter than the norm) wobbuffet. Ended up staying until 2am to finish up. Still waiting on the pumpkin group photo from Saboo though.

The followup was a visit to the Dunbar Haunted House with Saboo and Kyle (new friend!). Even though I do not particularly enjoy scary things, I wanted to check it out anyway since the lack of Halloweeny partying this year's underwhelming. The wait was about an hour or so and fortunately when it started to rain I had my trusty sword umbrella with me. So alright, it wasn't THAT scary but the costumes and props were amazingly good and I did get freaked out maybe twice or.. so. The amount of people forced us to move quickly so there wasn't any gawking time. The rest of that night involved fooding, Batman: The Dark Knight and Another Century's Episode, game courtesy of another new friend Marco (?!?).

Sunday, I decided to stay in since it was Monday the next day. Oh work, I hate you. Rant for another day though.

Still busy on JET application. Seriously, this thing is more stressful than all my schooling combined.

Oh yeah, double rainbow today.