LANs and Lightsabers
Two big areas of interest in this post. Power's out at work so it's a convenient time to type this all up.
First, STGC FragFest. Steph and I both worked half a day, then I had my car worked on, then it was off to Utica. Steph didn't really have anything to play on the PC, so she brought along her PS3 and PS2 as well as the TV from our bedroom. We stopped by my parents' place so I could pick up a couple games (Descent 3, tearing the house apart and finding F.E.A.R. along the way) as well as Jen's camera battery charger. Then it was off to the school itself.
As usual with the student center LANs, things were pretty low-key. The League of Legends tournament was Friday night, and there was the World Championships up on the screen on Saturday. It was a League of Legends centered LAN; back in the day (damn it), it was Counter-Strike that was the big one like that.
I played Descent a tiny bit (I couldn't get them to work on Windows 7 so I bought it for cheap through Good Old Games), but couldn't get the hang of it with a joystick, something I was really looking forward to. I also played pod (stylized like that, radial symmetry and all that), but it has virtually no replay value, so I did a championship and that was that. I was glad that I'd picked up F.E.A.R., as I ended up playing that a lot (with many breaks, I startle easily) as well as inFamous on the PS3 (man, all these funky stylizations of the game names). There was this neat moment while playing F.E.A.R. when I lined up a headshot then Spiro jumped me, causing me to click and take the guy out.
I just realized that there was no computer smash… the LAN is definitely evolving. Sponsorships generally don't happen anymore, it's not just us, it's a nationwide thing. We all got League of legends rubber wristbands. And, that's it for swag. Prizes were ordered off of ThinkGeek (delivered to my parents' place Saturday morning, Detlef accompanied me to go get it all). I won the telescope ring I had my eye on; it has virtually no actual magnification power because of the small distance between the lenses but it's still fun to play with. So with all the evolution it's been going through, it'll be interesting to see how it does as it goes into the future. This is probably Jen's last time running a LAN; she plans on graduating next spring and she really needs to have someone else run it while she's still there to help them get to their feet. I worry we'll have another dry spell like we did after Matt Moss but before Jen.
Okay, on to the next topic: the tenth annual* Lightsaber Choreography Competition.
First, here's our entry, Echelon: Boter vs. VaporTrail.
Really solid. Needs sound work, some effects aren't done, but it was a really good effort. I felt that we had a really good chance at the top three.
And then I saw the entries. Holy shit. People brought their 'A' game and of the nineteen entries, at least half were really good. You could have taken the top six, tossed them in the air, and been happy with any three that landed in the top three.
Entries were released at midnight Saturday morning, and I watched through them with Steph, Andrew, and Amanda. Originally there were eighteen entries; even though there ended up being nineteen (last minute scare of ours almost not getting included_, I still refer to them as the front nine and the back nine. The front nine had a few good ones, but aside from Hilltop Duel (gutsy kids with really fast chroro, though they had performance to work on) and Rise of the Fallen (far and away my favorite short film of them and in my top three for the fight scene in general, dude I was blown the fuck away), not too much. The back nine quickly ramped up the quality.
After the LAN, Steph and I got back home promptly (after lunch with people at Denny's). Steph was exhausted and went to bed, while I picked up Shannon. AJ joined us belatedly. This was the third year of Down in Front live judging, and as always it was a lot of fun. We got some good feedback that we'll be folding into the final edit of Echelon.
The winner ended up being Whiteley's Ferocity. A judge comment was that they did a double-sided saber vs. two single sabers better than The Phantom Menace. (Another said, "They should, they had thirteen more years to work on it.") Echelon followed them up, not helping, but having seen all them I know that it didn't deserve top three. It's not a reflection on us, though, it's a reflection of how well everyone else did.
I look forward to seeing Echelon get finished, and seeing the behind the scenes stuff; Vapes posted a bunch of stills and photos last night. It's been an exciting trip and it was great to hear the judges talk about us (and one of them mentioned That's Amore, which I now look back on regretfully but hey, at least I was remembered).
*Dorkman brought up the point that althought it's an annual competition, this isn't the tenth year, there was one year with two competitions. But, it's annual now so that's what I'm calling it.
Now I should really be focused on Firestorm… I'm kicking myself for having taken it out of my bag, I could have worked on that today. Oh well, at least I got this done, and power should be back on in half an hour or so.
First, STGC FragFest. Steph and I both worked half a day, then I had my car worked on, then it was off to Utica. Steph didn't really have anything to play on the PC, so she brought along her PS3 and PS2 as well as the TV from our bedroom. We stopped by my parents' place so I could pick up a couple games (Descent 3, tearing the house apart and finding F.E.A.R. along the way) as well as Jen's camera battery charger. Then it was off to the school itself.
As usual with the student center LANs, things were pretty low-key. The League of Legends tournament was Friday night, and there was the World Championships up on the screen on Saturday. It was a League of Legends centered LAN; back in the day (damn it), it was Counter-Strike that was the big one like that.
I played Descent a tiny bit (I couldn't get them to work on Windows 7 so I bought it for cheap through Good Old Games), but couldn't get the hang of it with a joystick, something I was really looking forward to. I also played pod (stylized like that, radial symmetry and all that), but it has virtually no replay value, so I did a championship and that was that. I was glad that I'd picked up F.E.A.R., as I ended up playing that a lot (with many breaks, I startle easily) as well as inFamous on the PS3 (man, all these funky stylizations of the game names). There was this neat moment while playing F.E.A.R. when I lined up a headshot then Spiro jumped me, causing me to click and take the guy out.
I just realized that there was no computer smash… the LAN is definitely evolving. Sponsorships generally don't happen anymore, it's not just us, it's a nationwide thing. We all got League of legends rubber wristbands. And, that's it for swag. Prizes were ordered off of ThinkGeek (delivered to my parents' place Saturday morning, Detlef accompanied me to go get it all). I won the telescope ring I had my eye on; it has virtually no actual magnification power because of the small distance between the lenses but it's still fun to play with. So with all the evolution it's been going through, it'll be interesting to see how it does as it goes into the future. This is probably Jen's last time running a LAN; she plans on graduating next spring and she really needs to have someone else run it while she's still there to help them get to their feet. I worry we'll have another dry spell like we did after Matt Moss but before Jen.
Okay, on to the next topic: the tenth annual* Lightsaber Choreography Competition.
First, here's our entry, Echelon: Boter vs. VaporTrail.
Click to viewReally solid. Needs sound work, some effects aren't done, but it was a really good effort. I felt that we had a really good chance at the top three.
And then I saw the entries. Holy shit. People brought their 'A' game and of the nineteen entries, at least half were really good. You could have taken the top six, tossed them in the air, and been happy with any three that landed in the top three.
Entries were released at midnight Saturday morning, and I watched through them with Steph, Andrew, and Amanda. Originally there were eighteen entries; even though there ended up being nineteen (last minute scare of ours almost not getting included_, I still refer to them as the front nine and the back nine. The front nine had a few good ones, but aside from Hilltop Duel (gutsy kids with really fast chroro, though they had performance to work on) and Rise of the Fallen (far and away my favorite short film of them and in my top three for the fight scene in general, dude I was blown the fuck away), not too much. The back nine quickly ramped up the quality.
After the LAN, Steph and I got back home promptly (after lunch with people at Denny's). Steph was exhausted and went to bed, while I picked up Shannon. AJ joined us belatedly. This was the third year of Down in Front live judging, and as always it was a lot of fun. We got some good feedback that we'll be folding into the final edit of Echelon.
The winner ended up being Whiteley's Ferocity. A judge comment was that they did a double-sided saber vs. two single sabers better than The Phantom Menace. (Another said, "They should, they had thirteen more years to work on it.") Echelon followed them up, not helping, but having seen all them I know that it didn't deserve top three. It's not a reflection on us, though, it's a reflection of how well everyone else did.
I look forward to seeing Echelon get finished, and seeing the behind the scenes stuff; Vapes posted a bunch of stills and photos last night. It's been an exciting trip and it was great to hear the judges talk about us (and one of them mentioned That's Amore, which I now look back on regretfully but hey, at least I was remembered).
*Dorkman brought up the point that althought it's an annual competition, this isn't the tenth year, there was one year with two competitions. But, it's annual now so that's what I'm calling it.
Now I should really be focused on Firestorm… I'm kicking myself for having taken it out of my bag, I could have worked on that today. Oh well, at least I got this done, and power should be back on in half an hour or so.