Brian vs. Final Fantasy XI

I've always had a fear, looking into an MMORPG, that it'd consume my life and distract me from everything else outside of it if I were to get into it. I was lulled by certain people into believing that this game was worth the risk, though. That it was a fantastic online experience that could not be passed up and had to be enjoyed. Others suggested that it might have been different.

I caved. I decided to find out for myself.

The reality surprised me.

The installation of this program is daunting, to say the least.

You start out with five CDs. Not being interested in Tetra Master online, I skipped it, and tried to run the installer off of disc one.

Surprisingly enough, it won't install unless you've already got Play Online installed. Well, okay, then. So I install that. After that's done, disc one, disc two, disc three, disc one. Then you have to manually install disc four.

Five CDs for this game?

Crazy.

So we finish that, and then it turns out that to play FFXI you need to go through the Play Online interface, which is basically a stream-lined Square oriented AOL. It does http-access (for data on the game) e-mail access (for the e-mail address they give you with the game) and it gets you into the game, as well as hosting its own chat services and buddy list.

All of which are features that don't do a whole lot for me. But you can't proceed without registering the Play Online client. I don't know why, since it's not like you could do anything with it you couldn't do without an internet connection anyway, but they require it. So we finish this up, and have a Play Online ID.

Great.

But you can't do anything with a Play Online ID except register a 'handle'. Which is linked with your ID, and your e-mail address.

Okay, fine. So I do this, then I poke at their system a while. Dunno if I'm ready to play online, so I toy with the chat feature. You can't chat without creating a 'nick' and linking it to your handle. Er.... Okay. I'm guessing that the handle is the one that would be on the buddy list.

So I do that, see that it's basically a dumbed down IRC ... that's fine. Time to play the game.

But you have to update, first. I'll be honest; you expect this from an online game. They've got tons and tons of patches. So I figure, DSL, 20 minutes of patching at most, since the game has only been out for a week, we should be set.

Two hours later....

Yes. Two hours later I actually get into the game.

Whoo. Character creating was kind of amusing. You get different theme music for each race/gender you can pick, and the honky-tonk human female's music was second only to the cheezy disco lounge/80's porno music of the frolicking catgirl. So I pick my character (a white mage) and get into the game.

First off, I don't know what's going on with the interface. I've played a small handful of online games -- Everquest, Asheron's Call, Ragnarock Online, and Earth and Beyond. All of them have what ultimately amounts to a clean, managable, and usable UI.

The UI, for me, really makes or breaks a game. That's what determines if you can even play it. There was an amazing lack of explanation for how to handle even simple movement controls, the mouse-directions for moving your character and the camera were unintuitive, and (as far as I could tell) unconfigurable. I eventually managed to get the keyboard into a more comfortable configuration for me, but the way that the game dealt with focus (like Windows programs can) was just insane. You click, a menu pops up. But nowhere near the cursor, and now when you click, that tiny window is just shifting from preset a to b, while you're trying to figure out how to chat with another player.

This one could be my fault for having the resolution set really high. It's possible that with a lower resolution, that pop-up menu would be more obvious. Regardless, the control scheme does have the appearance of something that's really powerful if you take the time to learn it. I'll give it that much.

However, the game was unable to convince me to invest that time.

I played for about four hours, which, by my reckoning, means that I spent about as much time installing the game as playing it. Unfortunately, despite all the hype, the game comes across like most other MMORPGs. It's IRC with a really shiny interface, and a lot more numbers.

It couldn't distract me by being cool enough to get around that. The character models were limited, there just seemed to be a general lack of effort to the whole thing, and there was pretty much no one online on the server I got stuck on (you can't choose which one you go on, you know) that spoke English.

Poor luck of the draw, maybe, but color me unimpressed. Here's to hoping that Square-Enix issues refunds, though I doubt that this is the case.

Oh well.

I might go shopping for new clothes today. I could use them, given that I start a new job tomorrow.

Hmm.

Brian vs. the Interview.

Round: #5

I lost the last round (#4), so I didn't have high expectations when the splashscreen showing Brian Man vs. Interview_005 came up, though I thought it was odd that the actual 'vs.' logo was silver instead of blue.

I shouldn't have been surprised; it was a scripted battle.

So, I go in, and all the buttons I press don't do anything, my character (Brian Man) jumps into the center of the platform (Phone Interview Arena), then immediately busts out the Power of the Stars on Interviewer_005.

Interviewer_005 looks like a pallet-swap of 2-4, so I was shocked when he was hit and transformed into Interviewer_001, and said, "You're hired. You start on Monday."

Then the results were tabulated, and my pay ratio increased by a good 26%, and it said to enter my name for the top 10 high scores.

Third place. Not too shabby, though I think my round 5 results put me in danger of not beating my life with an S rating.

I really want to beat my life with an S rating, so I can unlock newgame+ and the cheats. From what I hear, beating it with a B or higher is enough for the newgame+, but those cheats make all the difference to me. The A level cheats are like, money and social status editor, I want the venue cheats from rank S. Psychic powers, debugging mode....

It's hard work, I tell you.

Ugh.

You know, the main problem with writing a journal that's visible to the public is that you have to be careful to censor yourself. I can't really afford to talk about work-related stuff too much, because (really) someone from work might find out and get offended.

There's a precedence, you realize, and that means I have to be careful.

Anyway, there's good things about it too.

Number one, judging by the comments I get, people only read this site when I tell them to, so it's essentially private.

But it's public enough that I remember to keep up my obligation to actually read it.

The main point of that being that, well, I want to be able to look back on this some day and remember what I did, say, a year ago. To remember where I was, what I was doing, and what I was thinking.

As for why you are reading this site, well, I guess you're just a snoopy and invasive person who wants to know all about me.

Or, you know, I pointed you to the site because I thought there was something worthwhile, like the FrankenMP3 player tidbit.

And those are good, too, because they encourage my creative drive, which has been on the decline (as mentioned) since the HD crash.

Which was less of a crash and more 'rampant stupidity'.

But enough of that.

My profound noise for the day: You find depth where you look for it.

Good enough for now, I suppose.

So.

Last night I had a strange dream.

At least, to me it was a strange dream.

I don't usually remember my dreams, so this one really stuck out to me.

Let's see. There was a lot of stuff in the begining I don't remember, but it was relatively detailed. There were things like those old-fashioned furnaces you see in classic New York city apartments, with little pipes and intricate wiring everywhere. It wasn't important, but the level of detail made me somewhat suspicious through the entire dream. I don't know why.

There was a little girl, I'd guess somewhere between eight and eleven years old. She had brown hair, and it was shorter than mine. Maybe shoulder-length, at most. I think she wore glasses sometimes. She was pretty, and I attributed it to her mother.

Apparently she was my daughter, which is something that surprised me.

My apartment was on top of an apartment building, but not really like a penthouse. More like an extra apartment that just happened to be above the rest. I wore the Trench, and I think I usually had gloves, a scarf, and a fedora on, too.

Everyone said I was cold and distant, but I knew I really felt sorry for this daughter of mine, who lived on her own in a mansion someplace away from me.

No idea about the mother's whereabouts. I guess she had passed away, but the dream-me never even bothered considering it.

So this daughter has some vast mystical power, and apparently I do too, though mine is highly specialized or something. I end up hardly being able to use my own powers to accomplish anything I see in the dream, though the people I do work for tell me that I'm pretty good at it. Apparently, I'm like a meta-human from Read or Die, and this story is focusing on my personal life, where my powers don't matter as much.

She uses her powers once, before I met her, and summons the spirits of every evil being and person that has died in her lifetime, and they all follow her around, invisible to everyone else, trying to take over her mind. I remember finding out about this only much later. I guess I was aware of them, but for some reason I couldn't directly drive them away. Or I could, but something told me if I tried, I'd wake up and miss something important, so I had to keep on doing nothing directly.

Then I found out that the spirits were afraid of me, even though I wasn't doing anything to them, and stayed away from me, even though they were trying to get closer to my daughter.

So I stayed close to her and kept them away.

And I remember holding her, and she was trying to tell me something....

...and I woke up.

Much strangeness.

A moment of silence, if you please.

Ladies. Gentlemen. Protect your children from what you are about to read.

Tonight, this very night, a trusted companion of many months perished.

On the way home from an appointment, I pulled my MP3 player from my pocket, and it slipped from my hands. Now, I'm not one to leap to any defense available, but I would like to point out for the record that reality has often interfered with my plans, and it wasted no time taking advantage of another opportunity to do the same, here. Before you could say, "Sweet Newton's first observation!" reality kicked in and enforced the law of gravity on me.

Come now, ladies, gentlemen. What are the penalties for violating a law of physics? Cartoons and anime have been doing it for ages, and no one yells at them for it. But the second I even have the potential to break a law of physics? Enforcement.

There is no hesitation.

My beloved MP3 player, shiny silver surface, polished plastic chrome, and hand-burned CD-of MP3s tumbled to the cold, unforgiving asphalt right then and there.

I gasped in horror and dove to retrieve it, hoping somehow that by throwing myself on its ruined remains, I could transfer some critical essence of my own spirit into it, to give something of me to death, so that it might live.

Alas, that bitch, reality stood in my way again, and mocked me. The player was broken. The lid would no longer latch properly, despite my efforts to stem the seal and keep its vitals contained within. And then, there, to my eyes, revealed by the light of the moon, I saw it.

The disc.

The precious essence of my player, lying there on the ground, inert.

And scratched.

Life has not known as much sorrow and rage as I in that moment, drunken on the intoxicating tonic of hatred and remorse, but that coldly logical spark in the back of my mind insisted that there was a way, there was a way, nature be damned. I searched, a long task involving many precious minutes -- minutes while the player grew cold and stiff in my pocket, to find the missing pieces of the latch. Something was loose inside; but no matter. I knew how to solve this.

A battery was missing.

Inconsequential. A suitable replacement could be found elsewhere. Some suitable ... er ... donor ... in its prime would make my dream a reality.

I returned home, and pretended nonchalance. Nothing was amiss. Nothing was out of the ordinary.

The moment my flatmate's attention was drawn elsewhere, I fled to my study, frantically wrenching the player and all sundry pieces from my coat to fling them to the desk. Tools. Tools. I needed tools to go about my grisly business. I paused only long enough to lock the door, secure in the knowledge that no one could disturb my experiments now.

And then ... as gritty and repulsive as the task was ... I made the first incision.

A simple cut, through the friendly, once lovely and flawless label on the bottom, to reveal the first of the screws.

Hmm. No screws there.

Well, time could heal all wounds, and it would forgive me, once I defied nature itself!

Proceeding onward, I wrenched open the un-latchable lid, not turning my head aside for a moment as I beheld what should be hidden from man for all time. I confess. I may have looked away for a moment.

Nonetheless, I turned back, and began the fiendish task of unscrewing all four sealing bolts.

A grisly, demented process it was, but what man of medicine -- NO! -- science was I to refuse work when the tools were already there? Had I not a magnetic-grip screwdriver with interchangeable heads, ranging from six sizes of Philips and flathead? Fourteen sizes of hex bolts? Even a breathtaking ... eight ... star hexes?

Pity I only got a chance to use the one Philips, really.

But in short order my work was done, and I, like a boy, breath quickened with anticipation as he opened his presents on Christmas day, prepared to lift off the inner cover and behold the very workings of the machine itself! Yes! But ... what was this? Defied! Nature stands in my way once more, for evolution has seen fit to provide this player with not only screws to mount it, but plastic prongs that hook in?

Fiendish.

But I had no qualms at this point. No hesitation. I had already gone this far into the process, up to my elbows in parts and removed screws (an awesome four, all told), and quickly exchanged the Philips head for a flathead.

I paused only a moment -- a moment, I assure you -- to study what would become my most beautiful creation. Licking my lips with nervous anticipation, I wrenched, prepared to lever the thing open and lay about the grisly innards!

My anticipation was not rewarded for some time.

Regardless, I persevered, and in an explosion of minute plastic springs, the inner workings were revealed.

Mankind was never meant to play with such beauty, nor even behold it. But I was not balked! Nay! Neither reality nor nature could stay my course, now!

With frenzied motions, I began to put the plastic pieces back in place, one at a time, delighting in the way I realized they worked, they fit together within the system, that they ... dare I say it? I dare! The way they gave life to my MP3 player!

Cackling with fiendish glee, I reassembled the entire thing in total, rendering my newmade patchwork golem complete. Lacking only ... the power of electricity.

Unable to find a decent lightning storm, I plundered spare batteries, and tried the player again.

But wait. The disc. The disc is missing.

No matter -- my hands cannot be more sullied at this point. I delved into the trashcan where I had dropped the disc previously, and wiped it briefly with a soft dry cotton cloth from the center outwards, avoiding any circular motions. Good enough.

I put it in.

Then, I pressed the 'play' button.

And what happened next, I must tell you....

Ladies. Gentlemen. You may wish to be seated.

For you see.... My creation....

LIVES.

Also, I flubbed an interview badly.

Bummer me.

G'night!