hpets

prillalar.com/drabbles/ Very addictive. Create your own short piece of fiction, a la Mad Libs! Here are a couple of the best ones I got:

1. Romantic Love

Alaena finished packing. Ever since Katrina, her own true love, had been lost at sea, Alaena had been cold.

There was nothing left for her anymore, nothing tickled her, all was black. So today, Valentine's Day, she was going up in a tree to become a fluffy mirror.

Just then, there was an angry-looking knock at the door. Alaena opened it and stood there accidently for a moment, before falling to the floor in a swoon and bruising her back.

When Alaena came to, Katrina was holding her arm and looking harsh. "My love," Katrina said skillfully, "I'm sorry for the ineffable shock. I've been shipwrecked on a white island for the last ten years, living like a scarf knit uselessly short. I was only rescued last week." She paused. "I lost my leg in the wreck. Can you still love me?"

Alaena could hardly believe her Katrina had returned. "I will always love you, leg or no leg. Besides, you can cover it up with a sword."

They embraced slowly and vowed to never be parted again.

And all was tough.


2. A Blood In Time

On a practically nonexistent and bleeding morning, Edward sat in the shadows. It was Valentine's Day and he was all alone. His hair ached in sorrow for the secret love that he could never share. How could he expect Buffy to love someone with an uncomfortable kneecap?

Harshly, he began to recite a poem he had composed. "Ah, my love is like a dangerous sparkly stake, all on a summer's day. I wish my Buffy would bite me, in her own troublesome way..."

"Do you?" Buffy sat down beside Edward and put her hand on Edward's neck. "I think that could be arranged."

Edward gasped cautiously. "But what about my uncomfortable kneecap?"

"I like it," Buffy said lovingly. "I think it's pale."

They came together and their kiss was like a ray of sunshine, awe-inspiring and deadly.

"I love you," Edward said magically.

"I love you too," Buffy replied and bit him.

They bought a werewolf, moved in together, and lived unexpectedly ever after.

I really really should be sleeping right now, but this just intrigued me so much!

x - Seen
o - Partially seen

CLASSIC DISNEY
-------------------------------
[x] 101 Dalmatians (1961)
[x] Alice in Wonderland (1951)
[x] Bambi (1942)
[x] Cinderella (1950)
[x] Dumbo (1941)
[x] Fantasia (1940)
[x] Lady and the Tramp (1955)
[x] Mary Poppins (1964)
[x] Peter Pan (1953)
[x] Pinocchio (1940)
[x] Sleeping Beauty (1959)
[x] Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs (1937)
[ ] The Relunctant Dragon (1941)
[o] Song of the South (1946)

x - 12
o - 1

DISNEY'S DARK AGE
-------------------------------
[x] The Aristocats (1970)
[ ] The Black Cauldron (1985)
[x] The Fox and the Hound (1981)
[x] The Great Mouse Detective (1986)
[x] The Jungle Book (1967)
[o] The Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh (1977)
[x] Oliver and Company (1986)
[o] Pete's Dragon (1977)
[x] The Rescuers (1977)
[x] Robin Hood (1973)
[x] The Sword In The Stone (1963)

x - 20
o - 3

THE DISNEY RENAISSANCE
-------------------------------
[x] Aladdin (1992)
[x] Beauty and the Beast (1991)
[x] A Goofy Movie (1995)
[o] Hercules (1997)
[x] The Hunchback of Notre Dame (1996)
[x] The Lion King (1994)
[x] The Little Mermaid (1989)
[x] Mulan (1998)
[x] Pocahontas (1995)
[x] The Rescuers Down Under (1990)
[o] Tarzan (1999)

x - 29
o - 5

DISNEY'S MODERN AGE
-------------------------------
[ ] Atlantis: The Lost Empire (2001)
[x] Bolt (2008)
[ ] Brother Bear (2003)
[x] Chicken Little (2005)
[ ] Dinosaur (2000)
[o] The Emperor's New Groove (2000)
[x] Fantasia 2000 (2000)
[ ] Home on the Range (2004)
[ ] Lilo & Stitch (2002)
[x] Meet the Robinsons (2007)
[x] Treasure Planet (2002)

x - 34
o - 6

PIXAR
-------------------------------
[x] A Bug's Life (1998)
[x] Cars (2006)
[x] Finding Nemo (2003)
[x] The Incredibles (2004)
[x] Monsters Inc. (2001)
[x] Ratatouille (2007)
[x] Toy Story (1995)
[x] Toy Story 2 (1999)
[x] Wall-E (2008)
[x] Up (2009)
[x] Toy Story 3 (2010)

x - 45
o - 6

DON BLUTH
-------------------------------
[x] All Dogs Go to Heaven (1989)
[ ] An American Tail (1986)
[x] An American Tail: Fieval Goes West (1991)
[x] Anastasia (1997)
[x] The Land Before Time (1988)
[x] The Pebble and the Penguin (1995)
[x] Rock-a-Doodle (1991)
[x] The Secret of NIMH (1982)
[x] Thumbelina (1994)
[ ] Titan AE (2000)
[x] A Troll in Central Park (1994)

x - 54
o - 6

CLAYMATION / STOP MOTION
-------------------------------
[ ] The Adventures of Mark Twain (1986)
[x] Chicken Run (2000)
[x] Coraline (2009)
[x] Corpse Bride (2005)
[x] James and the Giant Peach (1996)
[x] The Nightmare Before Christmas (1993)
[ ] The Puppetoon Movie (1987)
[o] Wallace & Gromit: The Curse of the Were-Rabbit (2005)

x - 59
o - 7

CGI GLUT (or 3-D BOOM CLUSTERFUCK YEARS)
-------------------------------
[x] Antz (1998)
[x] Happy Feet (2006)
[ ] Kung Fu Panda (2008)
[ ] Madagascar (2005)
[ ] Monster House (2006)
[x] Over the Hedge (2006)
[x] The Polar Express (2004)
[x] Shrek (2001)
[x] Shrek 2 (2004)
[ ] Shrek The Third (2007)
[x] Monsters vs. Aliens
[ ] Despicable Me (2010)
[ ] Megamind (2010)
[ ] How to Train Your Dragon (added)

x - 66
o - 7

IMPORTS
-------------------------------
[ ] Arabian Knight (aka The Thief and the Cobbler) (1995)
[ ] Back to Gaya (aka The Snurks) (2004)
[x] The Last Unicorn (1982)
[ ] Light Years (1988)
[ ] The Triplets of Belleville (2003)
[ ] Persepolis (2007)
[ ] Planet 51 (2009)
[ ] Waltz With Bashir (2008)
[x] Watership Down (1978)
[ ] When the Wind Blows (1988)
[ ] Yellow Submarine (1968)
[x] Secret of Kells (2009) (Saw it today! )
[ ] L'Illusioniste (2010)
[ ] Felidae
[ ] Fantastic Planet (197?) (added)

x - 69
o - 7

STUDIO GHIBLI/MIYAZAKI
-------------------------------
[x] The Cat Returns (2002)
[ ] Grave of the Fireflies (1988)
[x] Howl's Moving Castle (2004)
[x] Kiki's Delivery Service (1989)
[x] Laputa: Castle in the Sky (1986)
[ ] Lupin III: The Castle of Cagliostro (1979)
[ ] My Neighbors The Yamadas (1999)
[ ] My Neighbor Totoro (1993)
[x] Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind (1984)
[ ] Only Yesterday (1991)
[ ] Pom Poko (Tanuki War) (1994)
[ ] Porco Rosso (1992)
[x] Princess Mononoke (1999)
[x] Spirited Away (2002)
[x] Whisper of the Heart (1995)
[x] Ponyo on a Cliff by the Sea (2009)

x - 78
o - 7

SATOSHI KON
-------------------------------
[x] Millennium Actress (2001)
[ ] Paprika (2006)
[ ] Perfect Blue (1999)
[ ] Tokyo Godfathers (2003)
[ ] Memories (1995)

x - 79
o - 7

SHINKAI MAKOTO
-------------------------------
[ ] She and Her Cat (1999)
[ ] Voices of a Distant Star (2001)
[ ] The Place Promised in Our Early Days (2004)
[ ] 5 Centimeters per Second (2007)

OTHER ANIME FILMS
-------------------------------
[o] Akira (1989)
[ ] Appleseed (2004)
[ ] Appleseed: Ex Machina (2007)
[ ] Arcadia of My Youth (U.S. Title - Vengeance of the Space Pirate) (1982)
[ ] Cowboy Bebop: The Movie (2003)
[ ] The Dagger of Kamui (U.S. Title - Revenge of the Ninja Warrior) (1985)
[ ] Dirty Pair: Project Eden (1987)
[ ] End of Evangelion (1997)
[ ] Gundam Wing: Endless Waltz (1998)
[ ] Fist of the North Star (1986)
[ ] Galaxy Express 999 (1979)
[x] Ghost in the Shell (1996)
[ ] The Girl Who Leapt Through Time (2006)
[ ] Lensman (1984)
[ ] Macross: Do You Remember Love (U.S. Title - Clash of the Bionoids) (1984)
[ ] Metropolis (2001)
[ ] Neo-Tokyo (1986)
[ ] Ninja Scroll (1993)
[ ] Origin: Spirits Of The Past
[ ] Patlabor the Movie (1989)
[ ] The Professional: Golgo 13 (1983)
[ ] Project A-ko (1986)
[ ] Robot Carnival (1987)
[ ] Robotech: The Shadow Chronicle (2006)
[ ] Silent Möbius (1991)
[ ] Space Adventure Cobra (1982)
[ ] Steamboy (2004)
[ ] Sword of the Stranger (2007)
[ ] Unico and the Island of Magic (1983)
[ ] Urotsukidoji: The Movie (1987)
[ ] Vampire Hunter D (1985)
[ ] Vampire Hunter D Bloodlust (2000)
[ ] Wings of Honneamise: Royal Space Force (1987)

x - 80
o - 8

CARTOONS FOR GROWN-UPS
-------------------------------
[ ] American Pop (1981)
[x] The Animatrix (2003)
[o] Beavis & Butthead Do America (1996)
[ ] Cool World (1992)
[x] Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within (2001)
[x] Final Fantasy: Advent Children (2005)
[ ] Fire & Ice (1983)
[ ] Fritz the Cat (1972)
[ ] Heavy Metal (1981)
[ ] Heavy Metal 2000 (2000)
[ ] Hey Good Lookin' (1982)
[ ] Lady Death (2004)
[ ] A Scanner Darkly (2006)
[o] South Park: Bigger, Longer & Uncut (1999)
[ ] Street Fight (Coonskin) (1975)
[ ] Waking Life (2001)
[o] The Simpsons Movie (2007)(added)

x - 83
o - 11

OTHER ANIMATED MOVIES
-------------------------------
[ ] Animal Farm (1954)
[ ] Animalympics (1980)
[ ] Aqua Teen Hunger Force Colon The Movie (2007)
[ ] Batman Beyond: Return of the Joker
[x] The Brave Little Toaster (1988)
[ ] Bravestarr: The Movie (1988)
[x] Cats Don't Dance (1997)
[ ] Care Bears: The Movie (1985)
[x] Charlotte's Web (1973)
[x] Fern Gully (1992)
[ ] G.I. Joe: The Movie (1987)
[ ] Gobots: Battle of the Rock Lords (1986)
[ ] He-Man & She-Ra: The Secret of the Sword (1985)
[o] The Hobbit (1977)
[x] The Iron Giant (1999)
[ ] Justice League: The New Frontier (2008)
[o] Lord of the Rings (1978)
[ ] Little Nemo: Adventures in Slumberland (1992)
[ ] My Little Pony: The Movie (1986)
[ ] Pink Floyd's The Wall (1982)
[o] The Prince of Egypt (1998)
[ ] Powerpuff Girls: The Movie (2002)
[ ] Quest For Camelot (1999)
[ ] Ringing Bell (1978)
[x] The Road to El Dorado (2000)
[ ] Rock & Rule (1983)
[x] Space Jam (1996)
[ ] Starchaser: The Legend of Orin (1985)
[ ] Superman: Doomsday (2007)
[x] The Swan Princess (1994)
[ ] Transformers: The Movie (1986)
[ ] Wizards (1977)
[x] Who Framed Roger Rabbit (1988)<3
[ ] Wonder Woman (2009)
[x] Balto (1995)
[x] Spirit: Stallion of the Cimarron (2002)

Total
x - 94
o - 14

(No real spoilers in the journal. There could be some in the comments.)

Yeah, I'm a little late on this one, especially considering I beat this game about a month ago... Still, I've known for a while that this must be said, so I'm finally going to say it:

I have been a long-time fan of the Final Fantasy game franchise. For years I have always felt that I could depend on these games to consistently raise the bar on gameplay and entertain me with amazing storylines and awesome characters. With this in mind, Final Fantasy XIII receives a failing grade. Here are my top ten reasons why (and I say this having played the game beginning to end):

10. A Ridiculously Complicated-looking Combat System: I could not even begin to explain how the combat system of this game works. I will say, though, that it's complicated, and involves constant battle setting shifts and little-to-no actual selecting of specific attacks. On the plus, the game does do a good job gradually settling the player into this battle system. However, it wasn't until the very end of the game that I discovered I had been neglecting to use a very useful attack because its existence is never actually mentioned. Evidently none of the tutorials thought to mention, "Hey, click here and then scroll down here for a really strong attack."

9. Super-linear Gameplay: Final Fantasy XIII has 13 chapters. Chapters 1-10 consist of leading various groupings of characters (forced by the story, not selected by the player) down narrow pathways and fighting the monsters on the way. This is no exaggeration. Click here for a map of the first 3 chapters of gameplay. Then, yes, Chapter 11 comes along and all hell breaks loose. twobrothersandasister.com/wp-c… But once you get sick of the hoard of sudden mini-quests and decide to continue the story, you'll find yourself right back into the one-direction maps. Sometimes I just felt like turning the camera angle and watching myself scroll right the entire game.

8. Pointless Cutscenes: When I say pointless, I really do mean it. I couldn't count the number of times my running to the other end of the map was interrupted by a sudden interlude where the characters stopped to talk. And this was not important, story-developing talk. This was "So how are we all feeling?" and "Hey, let's state the obvious!" talk. In fact, there are so many and such long cutscenes that sometimes the creators actually had to interrupt these with some gameplay. Literally, there is more than one occasion where you watch a clip, then get to walk down an empty aisle, then watch the next clip. (Sidenote: If you're not going to play the game, here's the one clip worth watching: www.youtube.com/watch?v=xx-LTk… No real spoilers, apart from seeing what the characters' summons look like.)

7. A Plot Both Confusing and Utterly Basic: The main characters get marked by a powerful being to complete an unknown task in a limited time or be turned into monsters. Premise explained. Now let's throw in the terminology: The powerful being is called the Pulse fal'Cie (not to be mistaken with the Cocoon fal'Cie). The main characters, in being marked, are now l'Cie, and their task is known as their Focus. If the l'Cie fail to complete the Focus assigned by the fal'Cie, they will turn into monsters known as Cie'th. Get all that? Good. Now let's talk about the trials of the Eidolon, the War of Transgressions between Pulse fal'Cie and Cocoon fal'Cie, and the Sanctum that lives on Cocoon thanks to Eden who is powered by Orphan...

6. Stupid Character Names: Honestly, the only reason this one doesn't rank higher on my list is that for the most part it's easy to ignore. But when I really think about... All the main characters in this game have nouns for names! There are six chief characters (and you meet them all pretty early, so no real spoilers): Lightning, Snow, Hope, Fang, Vanille and Sazh... If I had access to the back of the head of the guy who came up with these names, I would smack it.

5. A Never-Properly-Explained Item Upgrade System: This is remedied by an online search and some note-taking, but holy crow, there is no actual way to know what you're doing here without some form of external guide! I won't get into the whole crazy system of upgrading stuff, but the important thing is that going by simple trial-and-error would lead to such a waste of resources that you'd have to spend hours of extra time in random battles to make up the loss. It's as if the game is trying to force you to buy the player's guide. ("Oh, did we forget to mention? The rest of the gameplay instructions are in our $25 book.")

4. A Combat System Where You Can Only Control One Character: This didn't bug me through most of the game, because honestly, having control over all three characters would've only made the battle system more complicated. But this really started to be a problem nearer to the end, when I began running into monsters that use the ability Death. Picture this: a battle system where the commanding character's death means you lose, regardless of the other characters' ability to revive. Now throw in a monster who once in a while might just cast an ability on your commanding character which instantly kills him/her. Just a little annoying. (And to make this several times worse, the end boss of the game is one such Death-casting monster.)

3. An Irritating Cap on Character Leveling: Remember the good old days when you could spend as much time as you cared to in leveling up your characters before choosing to move on with the story? Well for some reason in this game the creators decided not to let us do that. So they placed caps on how much characters can buff up, and these caps only move upward once the player has reached certain spots in the storyline. Once again, this is okay through most of the game, but the cap before the game ending is low enough to guarantee that the final boss takes a lot of time and effort to beat (and revisit my #4 issue with the game to see just how frustrating that is). And then once you've beaten the game... Congratulations, the cap moves upward! Hurra! How useful!

2. Annoying Characters: Let me reiterate that I played this game start to finish. And not once did I care about a single character. The reason? They're all super-annoying! From whiny-emo Hope to high-pitched voice Vanille to black stereotype Sazh, none of the characters offer any real sense of depth or progression. Sure, they all have plenty of emotional moments (see issue #8), but these moments feel so unnatural to the story that rather than feel for them, all I can think is, "Don't these people have better things to do right now than talk about their feelings?"

1. A Totally Unsatisfying Ending: By far the worst of Final Fantasy XIII's failures. I could deal with all of the game's other problems so long as I believed that the story was heading toward a great and powerful conclusion. And then I came to it. And it kind of sucked. Yes, if all you saw was the ending clip, you'd probably think it looks fairly epic. But epic means nothing if you couldn't care less about the people involved. Not to mention the fact that the characters' final big act after beating the end boss is somewhat (and by somewhat I mean entirely) contrary to what they set out to do. And there's perhaps the real trouble of it; never once did I feel like the characters actually knew what it was they were supposed to be doing. Right up to the end, every action feels like little more than a whim. Even more annoying, the idea is for players to continue playing missions quests after beating the game, yet the events of the ending don't mesh with the concept of everything continuing afterward as-is. It's like a video game continuity error, and it's the reason I haven't played another minute of this game since beating it.


So there's my long-winded opinion. As a Final Fantasy, this game fails.

Now here's the kicker: I still enjoyed playing it.

I finally seem to be out of my recent writing slump and back into a real work mode. Yey me!

And as those who know me are aware, when I'm on a role with writing I often have a hard time hitting the brakes, thus my need to write this journal right now. After last week finishing a thorough edit of first two chapters of the the semi-historical humour-fiction my dad is hoping to publish, and this week finishing the first chapter of a graphic novel that has started with me as a collaborative work, I finally got the inspiration to buckle down and get some work done on my own graphic novel story, Soul of the Forest. Now I'm sixteen pages in, and about half of that was done in the last two days! I think I've got about eighty or so pages left to go before I can start trying to submit this to publishers as Volume 1. How cool is that?

Now I'd better be off to bed, because I found out 4.5 hours ago that I work tomorrow. (It's a good thing I enjoy my job.)

Update: Well, it sounds as if the show is now officially playing, and according to reviews the music is mostly pretty good... Which to me means that Andrew Lloyd Webber just wasted a bunch of good music on a bad story.

Anyway, I highly recommend watching this review: blip.tv/file/3489900 blip.tv/file/3494461 It's interesting, fair, and frequently hilarious.

--------------------------------------------

Oh how I wish this was a joke...

Yes, Andrew Lloyd Webber has written a sequel to his classic, Phantom of the Opera, the musical which is perhaps my favourite ever (in a constant tight race with Les Miserables, depending on individual productions).

A sequel. To Phantom of the Opera. How did this ever seem like a good idea?

I found this out a week or so ago, but I read about it again more recently, and I thought I should take a look at the story plot. Sure enough, it promises to take a wildly-flailing hammer to the things I love about the original, including at least two characters who shift from caring, moral people into angry, destructive A-holes. Oh and Christine becomes a guest on the Maury show, apparently. (Plot details here: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Love_Nev…)

By the way, the new musical is called Love Never Dies... Urgh.

Not much more to say about this, other than that I intend to eternally see this musical as non-existent, or at least as non-canon. I don't think I'd see this even if it was offered to me free, because it would very likely hurt my adoring view of the original. Poor form, Lloyd Webber. Poor form...


Oh, and what really got me was when I mentioned this to other people and a lot of them responded, "But didn't Christine die at the end?" No, that would be the movie-version, AKA Webber's previously most recent grab at more money from this musical.