Box Art; Shmox Art

I'm going to just hop right into this one and see where it takes me. I have a huge problem with the box art of most video games in America. It seems that rather than hiring an artist from the department that made the game, the publishers decide to just get on Photoshop and play around with the faces and filter tools until they come up with the lamest, most ridiculous covers imaginable. Looking above at the example of Fatal Frame, one of my favorite games of all time, and you'll see my meaning. Calling it box art is generous. It seems like this portion of the game is mostly neglected, as if it were thrown together fix minutes before printing. Granted, there are some exceptions to this rule, but they are very few and much too far between.
And then we move on to the point of this article. My boyfriend and I were ecstatic when we heard the Amnesia: The Dark Descent was coming out with a retail box release. We both make a habit of actually wanting to possess the game in a physical sense. Digital copies are fine, but really we'd rather have something to have and to hold. Much like marriage, buying a video game is a sacred institution that we feel must be respected. Plus, I'm a horrifyingly paranoid person and I don't trust technology to not throw away things I worked and/or paid for. Many computer break-downs have confirmed that this fear is a correct and valid one. In sum, I want to be able to hold the things I buy.
When I first looked up the box art for Amnesia: The Dark Decent, I was extremely excited by how artfully done it was. A single rose sitting in an ethereal light while darkness creeps around behind it. While it may not have told me much about the game, I still enjoyed the artistic value of the box art.

For those who haven't played or heard about the game, Amnesia is a very special type of horror game. It's the horror we all had figured had died and been buried after Silent Hill 2. There are really two types of horror in video games. The first type is the kind we see in Dead Space and Resident Evil, or the 'BOO ARE YOU SCARED' type. The horror is very upfront with disturbing imagery jumping right into your face. It uses startling events, like monsters jumping out from behind you and loud noises in quiet rooms, and relies a lot on action/fighting. The second type is much harder to pull off, we see it in Silent Hill and Fatal Frame, it's the 'Subtle but I Pissed My Pants' type. This is where Amnesia: The Dark Descent falls. Subtly is key in these games. You barely see the monsters, and you can not fight back. Action barely exists in this type of game, besides the running and hiding. The scariest part of this game is truly that you are completely vulnerable, and that you can't even see what is after you. Nothing they show you can be half as terrifying as what your mind creates for you. For the record, I think both of these horror types have their merits, but the second type is so hard to pull off and the first type is so easy, it's no wonder BOO ARE YOU SCARED is so much easier to find on the shelves.
No game pulls this off quite as well as Amnesia. I literally played the demo for three minutes, fourteen seconds before I screamed and pushed the wheeled chair into the wall (and my boyfriend laughed at me so hard that his face turned red). I didn't see the monster, or die, or anything that would warrant a scream in your usual horror game. What happened? I door flew open. All. By. Itself. And I nearly peed myself.
So lets just sum it up as a damn scary game. So I was excited to finally own it myself, even though I had read about it to the point that I knew every plot point and surprise it contained, which is what I always do when I become interested in a game (Go on, quiz me on the zombies in Left 4 Dead. I know them all). But even though it came out February 22^nd, it has yet to be carried in any of the video game stores near us, and we checked them all. The nearest GameStop that had it is reportedly somewhere in Texas, which is a bit of a drive for us here in Maine. So finally, we went to the last resort and went to GameStop.com to order it. And that's when I saw this monstrosity. Apparently, we who want to own the hard copy of Amnesia don't deserve the well-thought out artistic version of the cover. We get this.

… WHAT THE HELL THQ? What is this?! Is that Scrooge McDuck gone awry, after going insane and ripping off his clothes? That's what my first impression was, for sure. You people are cruel, and stupid as hell. Why would anyone buy this, without already knowing how awesome the game is? I know I'm not the only one upset, because while looking for the release date of the retail box (for the above paragraph, I'm fairly short-minded), I found several threads dedicated completely to cursing the box 'art' to hell.
The worse part is, that's not even what the monster in the game actually looks like. Here's the thing; the monster in Amnesia is not often on-camera, and when he is you are often fleeing from him. This is a good thing, because the monster is quite... derpy. People, he is filled with herp with a happy layer of derp on top.

That monster is not scary. And the monster representing him on the box art isn't, either. If Amnesia: The Dark Descent were the first type of horror game where you could defend yourself and had to do more than turn tale and run whenever you see one of these guys, it would probably be one of the most unintentionally hilarious games on the market. I mean, I giggle whenever I look at that guy. Realistically, there has to be a lot of drool involved with this monster, as he obviously can not close that oversized mouth of his. And he is so cross-eyed, if he ever cried the tears would roll down his back. Then again, maybe that's how the monster finds you so easily in the darkness. He's looking two directions at once.
The point I am trying to make here is that just because you have a horror game involving monsters does not mean you have to put the monster on the cover, especially if the monster need to be turned into a scary duck to seem morefrightening. And for the record, to all box artists: THE BLUR TOOL IS NOT YOUR FRIEND. I hate that people can't seem to put together good box art for good games. I mean, there are some great ones out there. To prove my point, here are some rather good ones.

Bioshock, Red Dead Redemption, and Shadow of the Colossus. All freaking awesome games, all with really wonderful, informative and engaging box art. You pick up any of these, and you have a pretty good idea what the game is going to be about. Maybe not a complete storyline prepared in your head (if that were the case, the game would really suck), but a general genre and feeling of the game comes across. These truly deserve to be called box art. The others? The kind that copy and paste characters heads and overuse filter tools? Those are box monstrosities. 

Update on Not Updating

Hey guys! I know I promised an update on the whole teacher vs. common morality and such, but I am SWAMPED with homework since spring break is over, and honestly I don't have the time or energy to write a proper response to my meeting quite yet. It will happen, but until then, I'm going to re-post a few blogs that I had on tumblr that I really enjoyed and want to be here. :3 So look forward to those. One is coming at you right after I post this, so give it a read! Very geeky and video-game oriented. Haha. 

Reacting to Asshat Teachers

Two weeks ago, I had a very negative encounter with my Creative Writing teacher. I will repost the blog that I wrote then (at that time I wrote it on tumblr before getting this new blogspot account).

-=-=-

“Yesterday night, I was so offended I had to walk out of my Creative Writing class. For the record, I love this class. The teacher can be pretentious and rude, but that’s what you can expect from some teachers. You can’t mention a single book or movie without him saying it was overrated, and he picks on one kid who can’t speak English well so often that it upsets me, but it’s not like these things are that bad. The Turkish student takes it in stride, and Family Guy is overrated (even if I can quote every episode), so whatever. He just wants the kids to like him, and it works. It’s not like that is a crime. But yesterday he crossed the border between ‘Fun Teacher Who is Trying to Hard’ into ‘Offensive Jackass’ so quickly it made my head spin.

This may be a bit long, even though the whole scene took about five minutes. I entered class at 4:30, expecting to stay until 7:30 as usual. I left at 4:45, if even that late, because I couldn’t handle the inconsiderate jerk teaching.

The teacher, who will remain unnamed in this blog regardless of how I feel about him, walked into and started class as usual. He took the attendance, joked around with the boys in the class. When he finished, he said something along the lines of “I need your guys opinions. I’m writing a column, let’s talk about Japan.” I am too optimistic, even though I know this is one of those teachers that like to be ‘cool’, I thought we’d actually talk about it and started thinking about what I knew. It’s a mix of a lot and a little because I have friends over there and have been following what’s been going on because of that, but also have a weak stomach so haven’t looked at articles with pictures (which is pathetic, I know). Then he immediately laughed and asked “Is it too early to make Godzilla jokes?”

I was extremely firm and looked right at him and said “Yes” pretty damn loudly, because I’m f*cking sick of that goddamn joke. I’ve already removed three friends from facebook for that one, and I told him that, too. He ignored me. He also ignored the other five people who said it wasn’t okay as well. Someone goaded him, and said something along the lines of if people were still offended, then it was okay to make that joke. Because God forbid you wait a nice month or so for when Japan has recovered and people are all accounted for (like the people I care about who I haven’t heard from yet).

That is when I started shaking and packing up. I’m in the front row, so he saw me, but kept making joke after joke with some of the more ass-kissing students. What would they call it? Godzilla v. Tsunami? And they were laughing like nothing else. Finally I slammed my homework down in front of him and started leaving the room. He LAUGHED even more and said “See! Richardson is so pissed she’s leaving!” I was in tears and snapped back that I have family and friends in Japan (which is true), he laughed once more and said “okay” as if he were humoring me, and I slammed the door and immediately called a good friend because I was having a mini-breakdown.

I am disgusted at the teachers actions. I understand ‘Art needs to be Controversial’, though I don’t believe that. However, it had been four days. People are still missing. People I know and care about still haven’t been able to be contacted. Japan will make it through this, obviously. They were prepared. The fact that in a country with 127,560,000 people only lost around 10,000 in this disaster is proof of that. The entire country was built to deal with this sort of situation. They’ll be back on their feet soon enough… But we aren’t at that point yet. And we certainly aren’t at the point where it’s okay to make these sorts of jokes. For some reason, it hurt less when I was reading them on the internet. When a friend wrote them, I would just leave a comment telling them that it was offensive and I was un-friending them. When a stranger wrote them, I just ignored them and continued on (with a bit of my faith in the human race leaving with them).

But when a teacher, who I am paying money to learn from, makes those sorts of jokes even after being asked to stop, and then insults a person when they leave the room because they are so disgusted by his actions, makes these sorts of jokes, it crosses a very thick line. I have a tolerance for jack asses, you have to to function in our society, but I guess this time it hit much too close to home. My boyfriend put it well, saying ‘If someone had made a crack like that four days after 9/11, we would have kicked his ass.”

The worst part of this entire story is that it didn’t just end there. I know from a friend who stayed in that class that he had to defend me for a half-hour after I left, which means that he didn’t stop. I was hoping at least after I left that he would be shamed into acting like an adult, but that wasn’t the case. I still am not sure how I should react to this, but I better figure out before next Monday, because I have his class and at the moment I don’t think I can even look at him without feeling a sense of unbridled rage in my heart.”

-=-=-

Since that day, some things have happened. I wrote the the head of out English department to set up a meeting. However, because this week has been Spring Break for my college, I will finally be meeting him this Monday. I’ve had some people, including a family member, tell me that it won’t be worth it and I’ll just be patronized during the meeting, but I hope that isn’t the case. I’ve also been told that I’m overreacting… Which really hurts because I feel as though I’m still in the right, even weeks later. I am trying to be as polite as possible after this event so that no one can question my character in all of this. I just want teachers to act respectable, especially when they are speaking about recently lost and destroyed lives.

However, now that two weeks have passed I am starting to believe that the head of the English department will just say I'm overreacting, and nothing will be done about this. Worse yet, I fear going back to class and being mocked by the teacher. You see, this teacher is very rude to lots of people. He spoke of me after I had left the class, which is grossly inappropriate, and I know he won't be too 'nice' to make fun of me to my face.

If he does, I'm not sure what I will do.

I might freak out, I might cry, I might throw books across the room. Honestly, I just can't even guess. I'm going to speak the the supervisor about this, as well, and hope that he will speak to my teacher about not acting like a dick to my face.

All I know is that if he makes another crack about Japan, I will scream at him. I won't walk quietly out of the room, I will yell. It's not right to make fun of someones suffering that way, and yet in our society it happens all the time. I don't even know where to put the blame anymore, because the jokes are everywhere. Maybe it is just the way people 'cope', but that wasn't the case here. My teacher was purposefully pushing buttons to stay relevant, and because of that I will never forgive him. I will write on Monday about exactly what happened.

Bioware Neglected Their Main Demographic: The Whiny Homophobes

Hey guys! I posted this sooner than I expected, so here it is a little early. I just want to call out how ridiculous this 'Straight Male Gamer' is. He posted on he Bioware forum, complaining that he and all other straight, male gamers were overlooked in the latest Dragon Age installment. The thread already has one amazing reply from the games lead writer, so you should go and read that. He makes several amazing points. However, as a 'female gamer', I was grossly offended and needed to write on it. 

The original thread can be found here, with a wonderful response from David Gaider, the lead writer of Dragon Age II.

So let's begin. The bold words are my responses:

To summarize, in the case of Dragon Age 2, BioWare neglected their main demographic: The Straight Male Gamer. 

Well, this isn't going to be good, is it? Let's get to reading...

I don't think many would argue with the fact that the overwhelming majority of RPG gamers are indeed straight and male. Sure, there are a substantial amount of women who play video games, but they're usually gamers who play games like The Sims, rather than games like Dragon Age. That's not to say there isn't a significant number of women who play Dragon Age and that BioWare should forego the option of playing as a women altogether, but there should have been much more focus in on making sure us male gamers were happy. 

Women only play 'The Sims'? We aren't off to a great start, are we? I hate The Sims, and I can promise you I can list ten girls off the top of my head right now who are friends of mine who play real games, mostly RPGS. I play RPGs, it's my favorite type of game. So I suppose I don't count in this guys version of what being a 'gamer' means. That's cool, I guess girls don't come to any STRAIGHT MALE GAMERS mind when they think of video games, but that's something that we have to fix.

'Making sure us male gamers were happy' is another problem here. That sounds ridiculously sexists. Boys get priority over girls because... they are boys. That is his argument here, and it is extremely upsetting. It's complete bullshit, really. Why should a game company cast aside an entire category of gamers just because they are the minority? Thoughts like that are why there are so few female gamers. Because men treat it like a boys club that we aren't allowed to be apart of. That's half of a population being alienated, not spending money on games, because boys like this think girls don't belong in the 'gamers' category.

Now immediately I'm sure that some male gamers are going to be like "YOU DON'T SPEAK FOR ME! I LOVE DRAGON AGE 2!", but you have to understand, the Straight Male Gamer, cannot be just lumped into a single category. Its ridiculous that I even have to use a term like Straight Male Gamer, when in the past I would only have to say fans, but it is as if when the designers were deciding on how to use their limited resources, instead of thinking "We have fans who loved Alistair and we have fans who thought Alistair was annoying. We have fans that thought Morrigan was great and we have fans that thought that she was a ****. And we have fans who liked the combat and we have fans who hated the combat but liked the story. How do we make make all these groups happy?" Instead, it is as if they went "We have straight males, straight females, gays and lesbians. How do we make all these groups happy?" 

So rather than speaking for 'Straight Male Gamers' (which you already were failing at. My boyfriend in a straight, male gamer, and he denied relating to anything you are saying), you should be speaking for 'All Fans'. But dammit, us girls are ruining it for you, because WE ARE FANS TOO, as well as homosexuals. Also, I'm sure that the design team was trying to make everyone happy. For instance, the new Black Emporium. They noticed that fans download a mod in the first game to reclassify all of their attributes, and put a system in the second game to let them do that. In fact, Dragon Age II is one of the first games where I noticed enough positive changes in the second game that were exactly what fans asked for. I'm not saying it's perfect, but they were trying, and just because they weren't specifically serving the majority entirely and completely neglecting the minority doesn't mean they didn't care. They tried to let everyone enjoy their games.

In every previous BioWare game, I always felt that almost every companion in the game was designed for the male gamer in mind. Every female love interest was always written as a male friend type support character. In Dragon Age 2, I felt like most of the companions were designed to appeal to other groups foremost, Anders and Fenris for gays and Aveline for women given the lack of strong women in games, and that for the straight male gamer, a secondary concern. It makes things very awkward when your male companions keep making passes at you. The fact that a "No Homosexuality" option, which could have been easily implemented, is omitted just proves my point. I know there are some straight male gamers out there who did not mind it at and I respect that. 

Okay... So the only female love interest have to be a friend-type suport character. That's fun. He neglected to mention that Aveline is an option for a male love interest. Because if she has a backbone, she's obviously a dyke or completely unavailable to men in some way. And why do you NEED a 'no homosexuality' option? Can't you just click on the other options like everyone else? If the gay people can avoid getting into a straight relationship in the game, you should be able to avoid getting into a gay one. This entire paragraph comes off as 'homophobic' to me. God forbid he even have to deal with a gay man in his game. All of his characters must be STRAIGHT. All of his female characters have to be SUBSERVIANT. Otherwise, he is not getting what he wants and he will damn well complain about in on the internet like the entitled jackass he is.

When I say BioWare neglected The Straight Male Gamer, I don't mean that they ignored male gamers. The romance options, Isabella and Merrill (And Aveline, but fuck her she is strong and I need a helpless little princess or a whore), were clearly designed for the straight male gamers in mind. Unfortunately, those choices are what one would call "exotic" choices. They appeal to a subset of male gamers and while its true you can't make a romance option everyone will love, with Isabella and Merrill it seems like they weren't even going for an option most males will like. And the fact is, they could have. They had the resources to add another romance option, but instead chose to implement a gay romance with Anders. 

Merrill is adorable, for the record. I may make a male to have a relationship with her. But anyway, that is besides the point. I'd like this boy to point out an example of what 'straight male gamers' are attracted to. I honestly think he just wants a girl like Princess Freakin' Peach to be implimented. Unbelievable, unattainable, and unrealistic. He even gets dangerously close to racism here with the 'exotic' play. Isabella is dark-skinned, and Merrill has an Irish accent. How dare they not have a white American girl for you? I mean, a white, American, subservient girl who won't talk back or fight or anything. And wow what a waste of time putting a romance with Anders (which is my favorite character, so he not only appeals to 'THE GAYS', but also 'THE WOMEN'.

I'm certain that some will declare "That's only fair!" but lets be honest. I'll be generous and assume that 5% of all Dragon Age 2 players are actually homosexuals. I'll be even more generous and assume that the Anders romance was liked by every homosexual. Are you really telling me that you could not have written another straight romance that would have pleased more than 5% of your fans? 

Wow, nice statistics there. Guessing, but since you put numbers into your guesses, that make it intellectual. This guy obviously knows what he's talking about! There are percentages! I mean, he made them up, but.... but.... NUMBERS!

Dragon Age 2 did have its faults no doubt, objectively; combat that was fun initially but quickly got tedious as a result of constantly respawing enemies and too many random encounters, not so well disguised re-used environments, a flawed equipment system in which most of the loot you got could not be used. And subjectively, I've seen complaints of the new faster combat, the new dialogue wheel and so forth. But truth to be told, I wasn't happy with every single aspect of Origins either, but still I loved that game. The gameplay elements are only a part of an RPG, theres the story and characters that drive it. If the same amount focus and attention to characters were given for me as there was in Origins, I'm sure that even with all those technical flaws, I would have found Dragon Age 2 a good game, a flawed game, but still good. As it stands right now, with mediocre characters and mediocre gameplay, Dragon Age 2 is a mediocre game and I'd rate it as such. 

Now he is giving a review on the actual game. Good job throwing more of your opinions in at the end, or we might have all concentrated on the bulk of what was wrong with your previous statements. For the record, most of his opinions are felt be a lot of fans, including those who wrote real, professional reviews. He put in a lot that people would agree with, and I think he only did that so they would agree with the entire thread. Bull. The characters were just as in-depth as they were in Origins. I think this guy didn't notice that because he chose not to talk to half the cast for fear that he might see a 'GAAAAAY' option.

David Gaider replied in the last thread stating, "There's a lot of assumption in there, not the least of which is certain amount of privilege (not to mention an assumption that all straight male gamers must like the same thing)". It's odd to me that David realized that not all straight male gamers like the same thing, yet thought it prudent to try to include a cast that would be liked by straight male gamers, straight female gamers, gays and lesbians with a development time of 18 months. I just hope that the next game BioWare will get its priorities right or spend more time making the game. 

For the record, this guys says 'in the last thread' because he posted this rant twice. The first time, everyone pointed out the flaws in his argument. They also pointed out that he came off as a sexists, homophobic prick. He didn't like that, so he posted the same thing again so that this time people would have the chance to agree with him... They didn't. So because David Gaider (the awesome lead writer who I will certainly be following from now on) realizes that he can't please everyone and chose to try to please at least most from all different perspectives, both the majority and the minority, he's not doing his job. He should try to please only the majority. Good thinking.

Despite my opinions I fully respect the opinions of those who disagree with me so please let’s agree to disagree in a respectful manner and not let this descend into personal attacks. I respectfully request that the moderators simply remove the trouble makers and trolls who make inflammatory comments rather than locking the entire thread because that’s what the trolls want. Thank you. 

This is the cream on the cake. After he rants and raves like a spoiled child for paragraphs upon paragraphs, he talks about being respectful and how they are just 'opinions' so that no one can call him out on all of the ridiculous whiny nature of his post. As Relient K points out: opinions are immunity from being told you're wrong. (And paper rock and scissors all have their pros and cons)

Sucker Punched!

Hi again! Wow! I fell right to sleep once I got home! I was SO tired, I couldn't keep myself awake! I'm sorry I didn't post like I said I would!

Onto the date!

First off, the hair. Ehhhh... Didn't come out too great. Half-way through, I realized I didn't wet it first!! I suck at hair stuff, but wow... So the ends curled, but not much else. I decided that was okay, since I'm learning and I wasn't trying to go for full-out Lolita.

I wore a Lolita skirt and the headdress, but honestly I wasn't aiming at Lolita, not even casual. It's too casual to even be Casual Lolita. I wore a cute shirt I got for my birthday, the only Lolita skirt I own (I have two dresses, but only one two-piece outfit. This one is from my newest Wa-Lolita outfit I bought), some fishnets I bought for a Columbia cosplay, and my favorite pair of shoes. Simple, black, with a tiny little bow on them. I wish I could share pictures, but my family's old computer does not have a flash drive port and I don't have the right cables right now to connect the entire computer.

Now, onto the movie!

Sucker Punch certainly lived up to it's name! My favorite activity while watching movies is the guess what will happen at the end in the first fifteen minutes. My boyfriend can testify that I am almost ALWAYS right. That's the great thing about being a writer. I've read a lot, watched a lot, and played a lot, all while learning how story structure works.

At the end of the movie, I was right with my first few guesses, but I questioned myself a few times, and there was one part I didn't guess at all, so WAM! Sucker punch! It's a movie that you'll want to watch twice, because you want to understand every aspect. Cj and I spent the entire ride home asking questions to one another and figuring out little 'secrets'. :) It was fun.

Also, the outfits were gorgeous. I want to cosplay as Baby Doll, and I can't even decide which outfit I'd chose! There is one silly part where they sort of just... bedazzled her school uniform, which me and Cj giggled at, but even that was still pretty cute.

The characters were likable and well-developed. The fight scenes were INTENSE, so much so that even I got into them when I usually roll my eyes at that sort of thing.

Like I predicted, there is a lot taken from anime and manga, especially in those fight scenes, but it is not the copy+paste I thought it would be, and it's done in such a way that I don't feel cheated or tricked somehow, and I definitely enjoyed the experience.

If you are going to go out to see a movie, Sucker Punch is definitely one you should spend the eight bucks on. <3


But MovieBob puts it much better than me in his review.

On another note, I am getting my computer back on Monday, hopefully! It's been a whole, big, frustrating deal, but it's coming back fixed and purple and hopefully with all of my hard work still in-tact. I have a lot of half-finished stories on that hard drive I couldn't save in time.

So I'm going to wait until then to customize the blog. This computer is much, much too slow to use.

Tomorrow, I'm going to write my response to 'Bioware Neglected Their Main Demographic: The Straight Male Gamer'. As an avid Bioware fan (despite some of their faults), I feel that I should put in my two cents. Guess what? You'll find my two cents add up to that young man being an entitled, sexist, homophobic jerk. But I'll put it in much more eloquent terms than that. 

Greetings From The World of... Today!

It's currently nine in the morning, and I have a date with my amazing boyfriend, Cj, at 11. We are going to go see the movie 'Sucker Punch'. I'm not exactly sure what sort of expectations I have.

When I first saw the poster at the movie theater, I laughed and called Cj over to chuckle at how stupid Hollywood thinks we are. The poster is obviously pandering to the male libido and doesn't really care if us girls are interested or not. But then, I saw the commercials. Now I am intrigued.

It almost looks like a bunch of anime thrown together and dragged into real life. Quite literally. I'm predicting people everywhere will praise it for being so 'original' and 'innovative'. You know, the same way they do about Lady Gaga's fashion style. It's so new! … Well yeah, maybe to YOU. But still, I'm looking forward to something good.

I'm hoping it will be worth my optimism.

While my hot sticks are warming, I thought I might as well write a 'first entry'.

I'll try to keep this short. You'll get to know me eventually. ;) For right this moment, here's what I find important.

My name is Brianne. I wish it were something more catchy, but it's not. I can't even shorten it to something cute. My friend Rebecca can shorten hers to 'Becca', her sister is Elizabeth, but she made it 'Betsy'. I was a cute bubbly name like that. The best I got is 'Bri'. Not cute. :( Maybe I should ask Becca's family to help out. Haha.

I'd like to be a writer. I've been writing for most of my life, starting around 8-9 years old when I received my parents huge, old, bulky-ass computer. My dream job is actually publishing books for a living, but given that technology is killing the idea of words on paper... I have a dream of writing for a magazine about something I enjoy.

One of those things is video games. I like video games. A lot. I think they'll be a great medium for storytelling one day. As a writer, that's what I appreciate most in games. Another 'dream job' would being a game writer, or writing for a magazine or website like 'Game Informer' or 'The Escapists'.

I love Japanese fashion (hence the Lady Gaga remark earlier. I like the gal, but come on... She's not the 'first' to dress like that...), especially Lolita fashion. I used to be very into Decora as well, but that was too rich for my blood. Lolita is expensive as well, but at least with Lolita I don't slowly lose accessory after accessory until you have to start from scratch.

I'm growing out my hair. This part is important because I never had long had before. It's always been short, so I don't know how to 'deal' with long hair. Some of my blogs might be about this continuous struggle.

Just a simple hello, and a promise. I will update at least once a week. I will try to write longer blogs, but some of them might be short (like this one).

I'll overuse parentheses (just like I did above... And just now). I'll apologize for that now. But I promise I'll always use proper grammar and spelling, with maybe a 'wtf' or an 'omg' here and there, but I honestly doubt it. There is something very rewarding about writing 'what the fuck' all the way through. :D

When I get home from the movie, first I will write about how it was. The whole date, not just the movie. Then I will spend some time making this blog prettier.

Alright, hot sticks are warmed up now! I'll also post pictures of my hair. :) I'm testing out a new style I saw in The Gothic Lolita Bible, but adding curls to it as well. I'm not dressing Lolita today, just testing the hairstyle.