So I just killed the Shadow Yukiko boss. This was my second attempt as my first was one of those "I've saved so I'll just mess around til I die" runs. I leveled up to lvl. 18 and fused myself a Jack Frost and she became almost insultingly easy. Anyway, I had my Ibanez on my lap whilst playing and between turns I had a plinkle...then stumbled into the guitar melody for the Boss Music. It's thus:

e|--------------------6-----------------------------
B|------8---6------8---6------8---6--4------4--4-
G|5--7---7---5--7-------5--7---7------7--7------
D|--------------------------------------------------
A|---------------------------------------------------
E|---------------------------------------------------

Hopefully that has turned out ok. Anyway, from there the melody is the same and you can figure out the rest as you go as it stays the same shape. I'll probably tab it fully sometime, but I don't have an uploading files account of sorts anywhere.

New shoes! I like Converse, because the material is flexible they fit around my wide feet, unlike trainers which are just rigid rubber.

Trivia of the day: Famous shoe-designer for the stars Jimmy Choo's son is Danny Choo, world renown otaku.

I got Persona 4 recently and I was dead worried that I wouldn't be able to play it because of Uni work. Luckily, that fear lead me to doing more work than needed early, so I have plenty of free time for it.

I've also started drinking Red Bull. The smell isn't pleasant but I really do enjoy the taste. Plus, unlike coffee, it really does perk me up. I guess I just have a high tolerance for caffeine.

I finally brought myself to finish Persona 3.

On the way home today there was a family of chavs hanging around my bus stop. Much like how Mercury is attracted to itself and merges into larger forms, more chavs started appearing out of nowhere making the group 3-4 times the size it was previously. All other buses that stop there had already left and the thought of getting onto mine with these clowns wasn't the end to a Monday I had hoped for.

They didn't get on my bus. In a lot of ways this disturbed me more. This family (mum, (step)dad, two brothers and a baby) were just hanging around a bus stop shouting obscenities at each other. It's not like there was anything of interest in the immediate area; there's a church across the road and all the shops are a 5 min walk away. Was the idea of a family day out to be around a random bus shelter? Is it a new trend?

This is how I look/feel like.

Crudely drawn using GIMP. I think my mouse is about to die because it refuses to draw in a straight line. The thing in the background is meant to be Death, not a minstrel.

I noticed something odd in my room yesterday. It looked kinda like an alarm clock but with no clock on it. Turns out my mum bought me a carbon monoxide alarm in case the boiler, that's directly below my room, ever went A over T. It was nice of her and everything, it's better to be safe than sorry, but it would have been nicer to have been told sooner. If it ever went off I wouldn't have known what it was for or what to do.

Ok, I'm bored out my tree so here's what to do: Like any other scavenger hunt, I list a bunch of things and you all have to go find it. Google is a good start. Anyhow, here goes:

• A music recommendation thread in OT that contained no metal.
• A picture of Rio Natsume that shows no cleavage (pics of her back or just her face are disqualified).
• Deity_Slapper's last post as Deity_Slapper.
• A video of the OTcars 2008.
• A Ctrl-Alt-Del comic that contains less than 150 words.

I can't think of anymore at the moment. I doubt anyone will do it anyway, I'm just bored. :P

So I downloaded AGS Editor and I'm getting the hang of it pretty quickly, even though I've never touched C++ coding in my life.

I already know the idea for the first game I'm making: it's about a guy who gets stuck in his dream and has to resolve issues within his psyche in order to progress and ultimately wake up. But a thought occured to me the other day: what about Gamespot: The Game?

I have it figured out in absolutely no order whatsoever (as is my normal thinking pattern) - guy gets sucked into the internet ala Freakazoid, and winds up in Gamespot OT. From there he has to maneuver around various religious threads and girls advice as well as other boards (System Wars is full of trolls for example). I also want to work [Rule 1 and Rule 2].org into it as like an omnipotent nemesis or something. Any ideas are welcome.

Honestly, I've forgotten where this blog is going. Thereby Narwhals.

When a questionnaire asks you to give a response between 1-4, 5 is not an appropriate or clever answer. Neither is answering in sentences or leaving a question blank when "I don't know" is an option. Finally, read the bloody question! If it asks for ONE response, don't tick all the bloody boxes like an obsessive compulsive. :evil:

Just got back from Al Murray the Pub Landlord. Fantastic show. I'd show you the pictures I took with my lil crappy camera phone, but unless the sun is at the highest peak of the day it always comes out rubbish. Let's just say that he had a bazooka that fired Smokey Bacon crisps. :D

Killzone 2 apparently came out today. This game has just been passing under my radar for months. I find nothing beyond the aesthetic achievements to be a real selling point. The multiplayer does seem interesting, so I may pick it up whenever. System Wars has been almost physically split in two, with half declaring "flop", which as far as I can gather is anything below 9.5, and the other half's "Killzowned" battle cry. Ever since Final Fantasy X I've stopped getting my hopes up for games, it's just easier on my delicate ego when my hopes and dreams are dashed. Plus, I've found it incredible asinine to argue whether a game is better than a different game if one or both aren't released yet.

Getting all my stuff sorted for this JET Programme. Applications are due in September, so I've got a load of work to do before then. I get a bit giddy about it sometimes.

In Britain, we feel we always get the arse end of the deal when it comes to video games. Our release dates are often months or years apart from our cousins across the pond, we get cruddy boxart, and the prices are always higher. Arcades are no exception to this rule:

This is a typical 10p gamble game for kids. I'm sure everyone has had a go on these at some point in their lives. This particular machine has been there for over 10 years and the alarm that's supposed to go off if shook is broken. On more than one occasion I've seen kids taking flying kicks at these things.

The prizes of the UFO Catchers are normal Disney stuff you'd expect, but snowmen? This is just a typical example of how poorly managed these arcades are. Who the hell wants a snowman in February?

Those two are Dancing Stage Euromix 1 & 2, which are now 9 years old, side-by-side. The handle bars behind them are battered, worn, and held together with duct tape. It apparently has the Silent Hill theme on it, but I've never heard it.

Aaah, now we're surely getting somewhere, right? Mario Kart 2, you can even play as Ms. Pac Man on it. Well, the machine my girlfriend is sat as has a busted coin slot, so no-one can use it, and you can see that some ADHD brat has attempted to pull off the instruction stickers. I did manage to enjoy a game by myself, though.

We've arrived at the end of our tour. On the left is a Sega Rally link-up machine - no, not a new one, but the original Sega Rally on the Sega Saturn, released in 1995, complete with wonderful 32 bit graphics. On the right is House of the Dead 4. I wish I could say more about it, but the machine wasn't working for whatever reason.

The typical British approach to arcades is "if it ain't broke, wait until it breaks. If it is broke, wait until next week". If Sega, Namco-Bandai and Konami ever wonder why arcades don't do so well in England it is quite simply a combination of high prices (a quid a go, so ten pounds will last you probably 5 mins), poor maintenance and outdated machinery.

I'm all for the retro vibe, don't get me wrong. I loved playing Street Fighter II and Virtua Fighter 3 with my cousin, but there's a line between purposely going for the retro crowd and being too lazy to update the machines. That Sega Rally machine's steering wheels have next to no friction left in them, simply sliding and banging from left to right like a freshly oiled bike wheel.

The was a Ghost Squad gun game behind me when I took the Sega Rally/HotD4 shot, but I can't look at it for long. The image on screen has gone out of sync, causing a weird effect of blue and red on screen. I'm not sure if this is done on purpose and that I'm supposed to be wearing 3D glasses, but either way the actual guns themselves are never calibrated. Firing a shot will result in your bullets flying about 20cm to the upper left of what you were aiming at.This disorientating experience left me feeling a little sea sick.

I'm sure that there are good arcades in England somewhere, but this is supposedly the best on in the North West which is very disappointing. The machines are old, broken and expensive to use. There is little to no variety, with everything being either a racing game or a rail shooter. If it were a bridge, this arcade would be the rickety sort found in an Indiana Jones film, over a canyon of some kind. Everyone else seems to get across fine, but the moment you step onto it one end breaks and sends you flying into the wall of the opposite side. You hang on for dear life as you scramble to the safe solid ground above. Once there, you realise your wallet has been stolen and your childhood was kicked in the nutsack. Then the bridge set on fire. And you caught herpes.