Regardless of that, I think now is the time to catch up on article reading, the pursuit of trivial knowledge and checking out and editing a heap of articles for the Baulko Bulletin. Oh, and going through the forums to read up on everything I may have missed, and making sure there’s nothing offensive on there that we have to deal with.

And then there’s the study for school, and the Software Major work I have to finish, all while trying to complete Final Fantasy XIII, Crackdown 2, F.E.A.R. 2: Project Origin, and Crysis 2 among other things (and by finish, I mean get as many achievements as I can be bothered to get). Oh, and probably get the rest of the achievements for Assassin’s Creed 2 and Assassin’s Creed: Brotherhood, Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare, Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2, Call of Duty: Black Ops, Crackdown, Halo: Reach, Halo 3, Halo 3: ODST, The Elder Scroll’s IV: Oblivion, Tom Clancy’s Ghost Recon: Advanced Warfighter… just to name a few. Most of those achievements would require me to get Xbox Live Gold, and spend pointlessly large amounts of time on the games, something I don’t really have avaliable until after my HSC…

Anyways, I’ll certainly be busy these holidays. And aside from those things, I hope to be able to go out and watch a few movies these holidays, but only if they’re any good. Too bad Iron Man 3, The Dark Knight Rises and Star Trek (Untitled sequel) don’t come out until next year… but Thor and Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 2 are coming out soon! I think… BTW, the wonderful thing about my birthday this year (besides the special number that it is) is that I’ll be going to see the Sydney Symphony’s Meet the Music concert! Yay!

Oh, and a note to myself: go back through all your posts/blog entries and edit out personal details. My paranoia is picking up slightly again (spurred mainly by Hungry Robot or whatever that show on the ABC is called).

P.S. what do you guys think of the changes to the theme I’ve made?? Personally I like it (duh, I made it), probably mostly because it looks different to the previous one, no other reason than that. I’d probably change 2 colours on it next year and like that more instead, also just because it’s different. I’m trying to follow my ‘roadmap of sorts’ in progression of ‘features’ in it (e.g. I’m currently calling it version 1.0.3, with plans to have a working 404 error page by version 1.0.5 and yes, I’m doing my development in stages like that… I wonder what kind of software development approach I’m using… little documentation, lots of prototypes… probably Rapid Application Development. See, I am learning something in 2 unit Minecraft… er, I mean 2 unit Software Design & Development. =P

It was an enjoyable day, with Ben and his MacBook and a school laptop, Sean with his desktop plugged into the TV, and me borrowing my mum’s laptop. Ben certainly had the most resources =]  And when it came to deciding what we would have for lunch (Sean’s mum gave us a choice), since we were running short of dice, Ben even wrote up a script to randomly choose what we would eat for lunch!!

Friday was the more hectic and busy day, at least for me. Starting off, it was Paintball with some Stoop, Back Stoop, and what I like to call ‘anime-group’, or ‘A-block group’. I don’t actually know what they call themselves, but the group included Li, Miho, Steph, Vivian, Ben and Lenny, so I guess you know which group that was.

When we arrived, we were waiting outside for a while, awaiting the arrival of people. After everyone had arrived, we finally went inside, watched the safety videos and signed indemnity forms (which basically said, if we got hurt, it’s not their fault, so we couldn’t sue them…) After kitting up, we played our first game, and had our first taste of the painful nature of being hit by a paintball from a marker. We were divided into two teams of 14, and one team was green (with a green card attached to the front of their marker), the other ‘black’ (because the markers are black). Throughout the day, green team were notoriously ‘campers’. They wouldn’t move up from their base much. I mean, some of them would, but the majority of them wouldn’t.

The first game was a game of plain warfare. 4 minutes of respawn, then you’re-hit-you’re-out. At first it was going fine, paintballs were flying, people were getting hit, and black team (the team I was on), was getting hit the most (good or bad, you decide later after the story). When respawn time was over, then it got less hectic, as people were less inclined to expose themselves. Here was when the green team showed their stuff. Camping back at their end of the field, they held us black team off. Due to the limited range of the markers we were using, we had to move up to actually hit them, causing us to be hit in return. Were we slowly picked off, with only a few of us left. After 13 minutes, the ref decided to call the game over, and out emerged all the players.

Next was a capture the flag (or as you Halo fans might know it, 2-flag CTF). Immediately as the game started (also with a 4 minute respawn), Bryan (black team) ran to to retrieve the flag… and then immediately went diving for cover as paintballs went flying in his direction (fun to watch =]  ). Hiding next to him, I searched for people to target, but alas, once again, Green team was mostly camping at their base, making it hard to get a shot at them or getting the flag to the goal (in case you were wondering, as I know many of you CTF people are, there was a variation to this game. To make it harder, the flags were placed in the middle of the field, and we had to ‘return’ them to the enemy’s base. Yeah, hard). Eventually, Kai, Jeffery and I attempted to move forward, except that we never made it, because Jeffery & I were eventually hit by paintballs raining in through the tree cover, and because seemingly all of the green team was on that side. On another note, green team never even got their flag, so we beat them there =] (either because we were too good at stopping their more aggressive players, or none of them tried, or both).

The next game (as I remember it) was a zombie game. We humans lasted pretty long. But after 13 minutes, we were basically all dead. The zombies finally overran us. Apparently, the ref once saw a team of humans out last the zombies, so after a long while, she made the zombies non-respawnable, and then the humans won. She said she wanted that team on her side if there was ever a zombie apocalypse.

After that was a ‘drug-runner’ game. FBI vs Drug-runners. The FBI were confined to their smaller side of the field, and had to stop the ‘drug-lord’, who could only be hit in the chest and head, from reaching the goal: a container in the middle of the field. The drug-runners had to support their lord, and had 3 minutes respawn. The FBI, the good guys, couldn’t arrest people outside of the border, and had 4 minutes respawn (but they could still shoot at people on the other side of the border =]  ). First up, black team was the FBI, and Anthony Liang was the drug-lord. He, funnily enough, ended up cowering behind some barrels near the back of the field (where they started). The green team failed to make enough ground in the match, and we had them pinned down. After 13 minutes, the ref called off the match and said that Black team won (because the drug-lord never made it to his destination).

Learning from their mistakes, the teams were swapped and Black team was now the drug-runners, with Li being the drug-lord. Our battle plan: gain as much ground as possible, as quickly as possible, and suppress the FBI. Li sprinted up to about 8m from the goal, and the rest of us took up positions around or with him. At first we though we would wait for the respawn to be over before working on getting Li the rest of the way, but then, Lenny (who had the best vantage point looking into and through the container, stopping any advance into it) had to reload, and Li saw his chance. Without telling any of us, he ran for it. And made it!! The rest of the team, meanwhile, was busy blasting people, trying to stop them from attacking Li. He made it, in 2min 47sec. Afterwards, the ref told us the fastest time was 7 seconds. Apparently the first team had done it in 20 seconds, and so, not wanting to be bested, the 2nd team sprinted, screaming, markers blazing and made it in 7 seconds. Yeah, fast (considering they had to run about 40-50m from the actual start point, around obstacles. I think the guy might’ve jumped, or started further forward.)

Afterwards, we moved onto a game called Blackhawk. Originally, the idea was to have to pilots, and get them to the cockpit of the barrel & wood mockup Blackhawk, but then the ref decided to change that before we had even started. New mission: get 4 people inside the helo, without being hit, for 1 minute, non-accumulative. HARD! While Black team did have the better side of the field, Lenny especially from the green team was extremely good at stopping people making it to the helo. However, of all the people that made it, only Black people ever got inside. I was in there!! For about 2 seconds before I was hit. Eventually I made to the cockpit, before I thought I was out because a paintball splattered and got in my hair (I discovered later that I was still in really, but I called myself hit thinking I had been, as I couldn’t actually see my hair, and Owen said I had paint in my hair, but never told me how much.) Unfortunately, the cockpit didn’t count, so I was pinned down there.

The next game we played was a game of attrition. One team assaults a fort, the other defends. First up, black were defending while Green assaulted. Yeah, funny, one of the few maps where camping was a dedicated idea, and Green weren’t first up =]  While we courageously fought from our fort (=] nice eh?), cowering behind the barrels that made it up as some people watched our flanks, we occasionally made pot shots, before ducking very quickly. Tim made a very observant statement halfway through the round: “I got off one shot and got five in return!” Needless to say, it came to a stale mate, as many of us remained behind the fort, while some were like Bryan and moving out to root out the remaining Greens (although I think a few of them were still stuck nearer to the back, we had scared them good!)

After discussing our options about what to do to use up our last ammo, we swapped games, and then decided to play until we ran out. Unlimited ‘respawns’. So, we fought tough and hard. Eventually the Green team ran out of ammo, whilst many members of the Black team tried to fight their way up to the fort, or just try and hit the guys as they poked their head out. I foolishly tried running up their flank, before being peppered by two markers several times. Shirley has good aim…

Now, because I felt like it, and I’ve been working on it for several hours this morning and last night, here is Changing 2.1!!

Officially released at 9:00am 15th Jan, 2010. 6 days, 1hr & 50 mins after the last release. My fastest ever release!! Then again, all I did was change the sidebar, and remove the random title coding because it stuffed up the page… I’ll have to find a way to work around WordPress for that…

You can download the rar file (104kb) here

Not much that’s happened really.

My piano exam was last Tuesday (17th November). Didn’t do as well as I should’ve. Didn’t practise enough though, so that is my own fault. Not pleased with my result, but I’m happy I passed and that it’s done, finally.

Thursday saw the Band ‘Christmas’ Concert, with performances from all the bands in the school, plus a few other groups. It also, sadly, saw the farewell of our Band Conductor/Master for the last 11 years. Bye Mark!! We’ll miss you (well, some of us will at any rate)!

After my piano exam, I haven’t really been bothered doing work much. Playing games a lot, reading books, playing what-ever-I-feel-Like on the piano…… Friday arvo, I went over to Ben’s place to have a celebration of sorts. Also there was Don, Lok and Simon. Mostly all we did was play Halo 3. Once again, Ben and I dominated, unless they forced us to play solo while they teamed up. Then it was much harder. But Ben and I still got nice scores (even if neither of us won). For hours we played, stopping only for food, drink, monopoly, and for all the others except Lok and I (who didn’t feel tired at all) sleep. On that thought, I didn’t really feel tired till I had been awake for 36 hours straight………. Finally went to bed at 9:41 pm, which means I had been awake for over 40 hours. Tiring.

But, besides playing games all night/morning long, my brother has finally got a copy of Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 for the Xbox 360, and so I’ve been playing through that (I really suck at it… maybe I’ll be better when I learn the levels), and watching my brother playing online multi-player games. Definitely looks, feels and sounds awesome, and is a step up from CoD4.

But now I gotta go to Church, so I’ll just end this post here and now. Besides, I don’t really have much more to say, except that having only 5 hours of sleep before being awake for over 36 hours makes me feel really tired (unless I get distracted, or have caffeine!!)

P.S. This post is the 256th post by me, Ant! BTW, 256 is 2^8

Yeah, so, it came out at like 9pm Friday, and costs around $100 and all that. I don’t care. I WANT TO PLAY THE FULL VERSION!!! I’m tired of the Demo already… The plot sounds good. Still waiting for the soundtrack. It got soldout in about 1 week… how is it that popular?

Anywhos, besides MSY, what good computer stores are there in Sydney? Prefferably in western Sydney… I’ll have to go looking.

Already people have finished it. Already the plot has been written up on Wikipedia. As I write this, I remind myself, only a few more hours untill it’s out in Australia and New Zealand. Stupid ratings board. Now Australia has a toned down version of the game… Oh well, still a great game. Edit: THE GAME IS 12GB LARGE?! AND IT STILL DOESN’T END?!On another note, is it just me, or do a lot of blogs just seem to die? Is it because the people can’t be bothered, can’t find anything to blog about, or have more of a life than I do?