(Bliz) ZARD

No, this isn't an article about some cool game developer :D

You see, I haven't picked up my guitar for like three or four months, Well I haven't got time to browse some new tunes let alone let some sink in my head, but then some unexplained urges (no, I'm not exaggerating) lead me to browse some more Zard song,

Who? Zard was a Japanese... one man... sorry, I mean one woman band: vocalist, songwriter, and lyricist Izumi Sakai, was? Yes, Sakai passed away some four years ago, Zard golden age was in 90s where their (well at that time there's five more person in there) songs takes away the japanese crowds, Zard also wrote songs for animes (most on Detective Conan/Case Closed and Dragonball GT), they're also famous for being mysterious, only got two LIVE concert yet spawned numerous high-selling records, and yet again: almost zero videoclips (Damn, they made Pearl Jam looks small, sorry Mr. Vedder)

For me Zard was a band that defined J-pop, influenced by the New Wave movement from international music all of Sakai's song has a harmonious feels in it, here's the thing: I never put my finger in why the hell all of her songs always got this old animes feeling in it, let alone always fits with animes. The fast paced songs brings the feelings of power and spirit, the slower ones has smooth and shiny lovey-dovey thing, the beats, the distortion guitar, the synth, even the monotonous bass always had a nostalgic feelings in it, on top of it: Sakai's voice are one-of-a-kind thing that flow together with the instruments, it's more like her voice was the thing that completes the songs, like the songs can't be sung by anyone else but her. I know it's the mixing that do most of the work but when I listened their only real live album the feelings stays the same, Sakai's voice and Zard's music really combined into something I never heard before, and until this moment I DON'T RECALL I never heard something like that been done by other than Zard

Call it nostalgia, call it past New Wave cravings, and yeah maybe a "stuck-in-time-can't-let-got otaku's QQ" might closer to the spot, but I first listened to Zard almost ten years ago and at that time all of their songs already feels coming from another time in a dreamy picture of a town's beach outskirt, Sakai's death probably put an end to Zard's journey and we're doomed never heard anymore of those songs and voices again, but looks like technology saved us a bit since Zard lives once again in form of a double album called Best Request: Beautiful Memories, This is a retouch of all their hits but also contains live versions of some of their songs, played by musician Sakai's had work with (twenty of them) combined with recordings of Sakai's voice

So I picked up my guitar and work over Makenaide's bass tab once again, just like ten years ago, but now I knew that this song will be immortalized in my mind, thank you Miss Izumi Sakai for such a great work of art

Selected Works:
- Makenaide (24 hours-TV official song)
- Too hi no Nostalgia
- Unmei no Roulette Mawashite (OST Detective Conan)
- Don't you see (OST Dragonball GT)
- Iki Mo Dekinai
- My Friend (OST Slam Dunk)

Hyperspeedist (The Galactic Empire)

"A lightsaber is a fictional weapon in the Star Wars universe, a "laser sword." It consists of a polished metal hilt which projects a blade of light about 1.33 metres long. The lightsaber is the signature weapon of the Jedi order and their Sith counterparts, both of whom can use them for close combat, or to deflect blaster bolts..."

(from Wikipedia) 

Star Wars The Old Republic (SWTOR) is the next hype on my brain, but it's actually wasn't the first Star Wars-themed MMORPG, in 2003 Sony released Star Wars Galaxies (SWG) which an initial succesful hits, despite being plagued by 'punishment' methods such as permanent death of characters and huge time investment. SWG was scheduled to close on December 15 2011, the rumored release date of SWTOR, thus the hype thickens

The hype probably caused by the fact that SWTOR is being developed by Bioware, the original maker of Star Wars: Knights Of The Old Republic (KOTOR), an RPG which is a huge success in late 2003, at that time Bioware is already succeeded with their other RPGs such as Baldur's Gate and Neverwinter Nights, Bioware's RPG always had huge worlds, great story (which is also huge and engaging), a festival of visual eye-candy and memorable characters. When I first played Baldur's Gate I was baffled and addicted by the huge amount of quest, In Neverwinter Night I was impressed by the abundance of storyline, Bioware developed RPG storyline like old school Krondor into the next level, too bad my experience with Bioware ended with KOTOR 2, after that Bioware just keep on rolling with their award-winning RPGs like Dragon Age and Mass Effect.

Of course it's another matter to develop an MMORPG, one of the challenge is probably to make the "role-playing" more... intriguing and enjoyable, for example: Guild Wars 2 proclaimed they will break the "Holy Trinity" of MMORPG by not making a dedicated healer/tank/dps class, SWTOR didn't make comment about role gameplay but their character sheets revealed that they do have specialized class but with hybrids as base, the Operations and group play also shed some light with some asassin class tanking lasers, also trooper with medic skills.  Of course some skeptic said SWTOR will become just another WOW in space and soon will be joined by other WOW clones in the outer rim of MMORPG, some fans of the original Star Wars series also expressed concern that the gamifying of Star Wars Universe will destroy the 'legendary' status of Star Wars franchise.

Well, concern will always be there, the game wasn't coming out yet anyway, I'm a Star Wars fans myself although I got sucked into Star Wars universe not by watching the original trilogy (which is great) but by playing LucasArts "static-First Person Shooter" game: Rebel Assault

I finished it like 5 times a day

At that time the simulator genre are dominating the market and LucasArts have their share with X-Wing and TIE fighter, The cute thing is: it's not their game who got me in, it's their story, you see... old school games comes up with manuals which also contains a spin-off short story beside the story of the game itself, some games also take it to the limits by publishing artbooks and fictional schematic or character sheets... well on those day programming limitations are not the reason not to create a vast and story-driven world, the music from John Williams also made a plus.

 A great composer,

when all my friends credited Metallica, I credited John Williams at my psych test

Nevertheless my journey of Star Wars game geek begin, I pocketed almost every Lucasarts Star-Wars themed games,  collected the Jedi Knight series dreamed of Lightsabers, KOTOR came out, immersed at the story, tried my hand on Star Wars Battlefront and Republic Commando, up until one day I hit the wall and can't play the latest of the craziest Lightsaber FPS: The Force Unleashed (1 and 2) thanks to my incapabilities to buy a new gaming spec... or indecisiveness

Okay, let's end this with a cool trailer from The Old Republic, damn that Trooper looked badass

The Returns: Part two

It's been 5 months since my last writing, Fact: being an azerothian is addicting, but I somewhat enjoy my progress, never felt that it's a drag. It takes like 3 months for me to get to max level and realize that it's just a fraction of what can you do in this game, so as a PVE person I began gearing for heroics, doing dailies, and maxing professions, as a RDF user IMO Cata dungeon are challenging at first but it's getting easier as you progress and geared up. I pretty much complete all heroics dungeon and always crave for more, not very much though since I only can play for like 4 hours a day before sleepiness attacks

Speaking high level heroics I also experienced another type of interaction, I already told you that I'm a casual player with limited playtime (except on weekends) and takes anything in game lightly or moderately, well the fact is other people doesn't do as well as I do :))

Some bosses on heroic required mechanics that I called 'dancing' (since I'm a melee DPS) it requires me to constantly moving in and out some areal buff or deadly attacks from the bosses, failed to avoid, complete, and/or reach these mechanics 99% resulting in instant death and often brings the group to a wipe, The difficulty and needs of inter-role communications on the last two hard-mode 5-man dungeons are somewhat point-breaking for some people, the PUG groups are bound to have some difficulties when stressed out players begin to lash out on other player due to wipe or other people inabilities on some bosses mechanics (whether they're deliberate or innocently honestly don't know about the mechanic), take a look at Jindo the Godbreaker's fight where you must kill some continuously spawning ghosts while avoid meteor-like deadly attacks from the boss, not only that, you must use some bigger ghost attacks to actually damage the boss (and you in the process) so there are various way to get killed in this fight, thus nicknamed him Jindo the PUGbreaker

Tank and Healer got it the hardest since they are the main players often looked as leaders on PUGs (especially tanks) the sheer numbers of adds can be overwhelming for a tank, the spreading mechanic of some bosses and the little awareness of some players can lead to a frustrated healer, not to mention when a DPS busy surviving and resulting of a drop of DPS, it often leads to a 'shouting' match and blaming each other, I've seen a fair number of dropped groups which left me alone in the dungeon only to reque, got another wipe (due some mistakes), another rinse and repeat name-calling and shouting, group dropping and I was left alone again,

I'm not bragging about how I survived all those shaming and name-calling, I personally never dragged myself into a drama by insulting or pointig out other player even if it's the truth, IRL I'm one of those short tempered person, well not quite easy to anger though (except where it's work-related which goes down to life-related), it was kinda sad really that a regular hello on start can results in a bunch of F and S words, Some people blame the mechanic of Random Dungeon Finder where you grouped with someone from another server and little chance that you'll ever see them again thus Gabe's Dickwad's theory, some people said the it was some 'elitists' who ruined the game by expecting the 'casuals' to do as they told and some 'elitists' blame 'casuals' from being lazy and refused to learn some bosses mechanics

At first I researched these things and found a big unbridgeable gaps between the 'elitists' and 'casuals' but as I progressed into the content myself I realized something: All these issues, rages, debates was born from the inabilities to take everything in your own limits. For example: some high level heroic dungeons have half to an hour to clear, some people like to take it slow when other tend to gogogogo through, the first step is to understand the quality of the groups, probably by taking out the first trash mobs or conversating at the start of the run, I always said a quick hello at the start, trying to make gesture as a happy casual player, if anyone replies it's a good sign, when no reply it's usually the sign of a really long and bad run, tank like to run through without looking at healers mana? DPS occasionally steal aggro? bad mouthing healers/tank who good at their job? It all goes down to one single question, can you adapt? Can you stretch your patience? Was it worth it? Is it beyond your limits? If it is simply says sorry and drop group and not another word (reque if you still feel fresh for run, never if you burned out), if you're the confident type you can try to walk on their pace without losing your heads even they occasionally points and shaming you, and hope that everyone will kick you or they'll drop group and you're ended up with someone better :D

Nevertheless I RE-learned something that I learned a long time ago, some people attitude can be frustrating but it's a choice whether to debate about it or go on without it, an ironic thing since I occasionally lost it in real life.