dreamfall: the longest journey

last week, i just completed my first proper pc game, Dreamfall: The Longest Journey. the problem with me is, i can never patiently finish a game that has too many choices or paths to take. as in, say, if your character takes this path and does this instead of something else, the story ends up being different. or, if there is too hard a combat involved in the game i will just give up pressing left right up down altogether. i'm terrible with combat coordination. i'm even only just beginning to get a grasp of getting the camera view of the character steady. so anyway, lucky for me, i've found my lucky stars. Dreamfall is the ideal game for my kind of people. simple fighting and obvious goals to achieve. the story's very long, as the title suggests.

the female lead is Zoe Castillo, she's in a coma telling us her story. first setting in casablanca, in her room. she was watching her huge tv screen that appears on her glass walls and all of a sudden there was static and a black and white picture of a little girl calling her name. that part spooked the crap out of me. like what the hell...?! (hair standing) i thought this was the game with the freaky girl in the box cover of a game called F.E.A.R. see what i mean?? so anyway Zoe ignored it until she saw it a few more times on screens at other places she went to, asking her to save someone named April Ryan, and in conjunction there was the disappearance of her ex-boyfriend, Reza. turns out the reason why he has gone missing is because of the story he's been digging into, some evil plans he found out about this high-tech creation company called WATICorp (who has a similar company logo as sony ericsson! just look. haha)

so, on her trip to finding Reza, Zoe met some bad guys and they "hooked her up on the dreamer". the dreamer is a device that artificially puts you to sleep and you start dreaming. (duhz, ok sorry.) that brought her to a place, black and white snowy landscape with an eeriely crooked house. yes, that freaky little girl's world. so upon running towards the only target there is, the house, the snowy ground opens and Zoe falls into a medieval world. here, she finally meets April Ryan, but not before getting kidnapped by April's gang. however, April didn't need her saving at all so they tried tranporting Zoe back to her world and figured that she wasn't here physically but mentally, like a dream.

so the story goes with some role changing as you get to control April Ryan at one time, and another guy called Kian. he is an Apostle ruled by the Six (six goddesses) and was summoned to get rid of the freedom fighters who may overthrow their rule. and these disobedient citizens are actually April and her gang.

the game is good because you will want more and they do give you lots. some negative stuff though is that the game involves alot of pretty lengthy conversation, which you'll end up clicking to skip them. only some parts of the talking is important, tells you what to do next, but it's all logged down somewhere you can check back with later anyway. i'm personally a little disappointed with the finale though. for one, they are all conversations and cut scenes, secondly, the story doesn't really end, and thirdly, i just feel that something is missing at the end.

senior's camp highlight

out of the three days spent helping out with the games prepared for the freshies in the actual FOC, friday was the coolest. we started with meeting at the mrt, and followed by a walk to the kallang river where our dragon boats were waiting for us. yup, we did dragon boating! it might be the only chance i get to try it out so i went ahead with the risk of getting my arm muscles strained and getting soaked with salty smelly sea-water. although it was drizzling earlier, the weather was fine when we were out there. nevermind the light rain cuz' we get water splashing back too while rowing.

"lucky" for us, we got the experienced guy on board, who later made some girls scream by asking us first to sit with our legs dangling out of the boat. with that, he rocked the boat from left to right til our feet dipped into the water. then comes the exciting one. (please don't try this without a license) we pulled our legs back in and have to sit on the edges of the boat, and grab on for dear life as he again rocked the boat and this time, he rocked alot harder. i just have to let go to fall backwards into the water!! by now, everyone including the guys were screaming like nobody's business. the motion goes as, our butts dipped on the water surface, then we rise high up above the people sitting opposite from us, then down to wet our butts again, then up again, and so on. lucky we know how to hold on tight!

let me skip to talking about harbourfront shopping centre, but i don't know if that's the name haha. anyways, i figured there was abit of looking around i can do there! they've got some nice sports shop and fashion boutiques and the new courts and best denki kinda electric-ware megastore, called BIG. another nice place to shop around, just take the mrt!

then comes the next highlight. fright night at sentosa's dragon trail. obviously, that nature walk wasn't meant to be explored at night. it was so freakin' dark in there, i couldn't see my hands in front of me! i rather i wouldn't have to open my eyes in there, i don't want to see anything i don't wanna see. seriously. there wasn't enough programmers so they arranged me and Siting only to be stationed at the first station, which was already way inside the forest! two girls alone?! but lucky we have nice friends around who comes to check on us from time to time. special thanks to chairman Edwin, cp Yew Hong and vice-chair Jieming. actually the couples being made to go through the walk also helped ease the scary atmosphere. when they come or come back to us, i felt a sense of relief. we were already so freaked out, and still we have to worry about mosquitoes. it came to the extent that we broke the mosquito coil into many pieces and smoked up the entire area haha. somebody came up and asked if we were smoking! hahaha... i don't know if i can tahan staying there in the darkness and with the mosquitoes, and with no toilet around, for 6 or more hours on the actual foc. i hope there'll be a better arrangement.

and just like many camps, people get sunburns. i got it too. painful. i never seem to learn from these painful experiences haha. maybe cuz' they're just too rare.

i'm also curious why our SRC field haven't grow any flour wheat or milo tree, we've been throwing all that crap in that field for all these years! haha... joke joke.

whatever fun i had with these camps, it's always good to come home and take a nice long rest after that... and soccer betting anyone??

am i talking about school?!

at 0230 hours i finally completed my architecture drawing project. i kinda hope we can get it back some way after the marking but chances are slim when lab reports too seldom get to come back to us. thing is, i've spent so many hours coming up with the dimensions, then decorating the interiors, then spotting mistakes, erasing and drawing, erasing and sketching, until all's quite nice, an art i haven't had the chance to do for the longest time already. feels really good. achievement i've been denied of 3 long years ago... oh well, i've a different path now, and i've also managed to return from hell. haha. whatever that means...

now that the worst is over, everything else to do with school doesn't really matter anymore. i'll get stressed when i have to and keep consistent with daily work. thank goodness i have my 'guide' back this semester so i know that i must do my work!

funny how i sometimes wish school would start when i'm still in the midst of the boring holidays. it's just really different. maybe this means i probably should get a job. and this also mean i should obtain a position in the place i want to work once i graduate. then i'll be satisfied. seriously.

alright... starting to babble. i think i'm beginning to suffer insomnia again. but i simply just don wanna sleep early anyway.

lucky, it's the holidays.

kick off, cats, kids

you can stand amidst fields of gold and green
and hear a billion heart that beat unseen.
you can join with the crowd and cheer as one,
at the place where they all come.
you can fill 90 minutes of fleeting time and space
with tragedy, and triumph and amazing grace.
you can carry them forever in your soul.
their names carved on every goal.
this is where you can always belong.
this is where legends are born.

--- as advertised by starhub,

official broadcaster of

world cup 2006

09.06.2006. and it's kick off for world cup 2006! i wonder how this year's games will turn out. the crowded betting booths. the colours, numbers and letters on the screen. predictions, luck, chance, play number of goals or which team wins overall, queues, bets placed, then hope and pray. a little chance for people to win some extra cash. then feel good.

oh my, now trying to recall, only then am i clear that the finals match 4 years ago was the one of germany vs brazil. i caught the match and did all the cheering with my family, the whole lot of them, cousins and aunts and uncles. wore the fake self hand-drawn germany team jersey, mind you its number 11 somemore i tell you, miroslav klose. my idol at that time haha. it was a birthday celebration cum catching the 2002 finals. boy do i remember the soccer field cake! whaha. green.

time really flies, that was so before i went into the u. and now i'm already so far from then. the 2002 finals also reminded me of something else... but you have me now. we are much better than that. and we are so far away from those borders now. =) i feel so much more grown up.

buddy and lula. i finally met them. they look really good and have nice furs. when my little cuzzies asked which one i liked better, i simply said both. i like lula's activeness and buddy's eyes or, face, he's so shy. both so cute.

yesterday was one of the days where i'd run and hide to avoid playing with kids. thank goodness there are actually kids who are so much better than my crazy cuzzies, my cuzzies are cute, but can be "too cute" at times until u want to faint.

sigh. another rainy cloudy day. not for swimming. when will it be as sunny and warm as last weekend again??