Never again

So in film studies, we just finished watching Jaws. Holy fuck. Am I scared shitless to get in the water ever again. I'm not gonna do a review on it, but I just wanted to touch upon some common fears people have in relation to this movie. Shark attacks are one of the most frightening experiences anyone can have. I think this movie puts into perspective how terrifying it is to be in the territory of a 35 foot eating machine.

Oh yeah, and I looked up "shark attack" on Google Images and this is what I found:


Oh my fucking shit farts. If this didn't make you shiver...no that's impossible. Every single person that looks at this picture is struck with fear. Imagine yourself in that diver's position and if you turned around. I think I'd shit the water so much that it would be more brown than red.

THANK YOU SO MUCH

Hi, Matt here. I just wanted to extend a BIIIG thank you to Chris, Janet, Priscilla, JR, and everyone else who helped me out. KTHXBAI XD

Obama's Nobel Peace Prize

Wow. Just. Wow... Obama winning the Nobel Peace Prize? Some of you may be thinking,
"It's about fucking time!" While others, me included, are thinking, "Huh??"

Don't get me wrong, Obama is doing a great job so far in the White House. Doing Nothing. Think about it - Health care, the War in Afghanistan, Recession and domestic policies. What has he really done?

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Jeff:
Well, the reason for giving Obama the prize as I heard on the news, was that so far he's not doing a BAD job of dealing with foreign affairs (it is given to him for his handlin of foreign affairs), and to give hope to the world, some inspiration that someone, at least someone is doing something for them; so that the rest of the world can follow Obama in stepping up and facing the world. Quite frankly, I don't feel he deserves it either, but if it serves its purpose then alright.
But also, what does it tell the world? Dishing out Nobel Peace Prizes like that? I mean you look at all the other winners, like Martin Luther King Jr. for example, can Obama's actions really even compare to that in any aspect? I don't think so.


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Matt: I don't actually have anything decent to say about this because I just heard about this when Jeff and Ryan were discussing it here. But from what I understand, many people think that Obama recieved the award for doing nothing. Just goes to show how manly he is.

Missile at Moon (NASA)

So Friday, October 9, 2009 way early in the morning NASA, launched a missile at a certain spot in the moon in search for ice or some indication of water. Groundbreaking? I think not. To me, this seems like an extremely selfish action. At least $70 million were spent on that project, all for one thing, to check for water and potential life. If you really think about it... what else could that money have been spent on? What could damage could have been done to the moon and/or the Earth? We don't know how the moon works, we barely know how the Earth works why shoot missiles at it? We don't know for sure what consequences it could have yielded, but as of now it seems safe and nothing has gone wrong.
Selfish yes, that $70 million could have been spent helping the poor, poverty-stricken people, ESPECIALLY in this time of crisis (recession) that is far from over. (Not to mention all this other humanitarian stuff that it could have been spent on.)

Matt: I agree and disagree with Jeff. First of all I agree because it does seem like a lost cause in retrospect. According to Mr. Turek, the actual test didn't meet the ideal conditions for the experiment. In retrospect, we could say that the money could have been better spent on more useful research. But the other half of me disagrees because it seems natural for human beings to want to study what they don't know about. And we definitely don't know a whole lot about the universe. So in a scientist's point of view, this experiment could have been a stepping stone for other great discoveries to come.

Ryan: I agree and disagree as well. "Attacking" the moon had a purpose - to find water. Science is all about failure, In order to learn you must fail. And based on what I've seen, we learned alot. I agree, the money was somewhat of a waste, but the information we may have gathered from the attack might pay off late-game. I disagree with Jeff on spending the money on poor poverty stricken people. The poor need help thats for sure, but the government is more likely to spend the money on the War in Afghanistan or use it for more Bail-outs. Such a waste.

A word on October events

Well we just entered the month of October. School is slowly passing by. Yay.

So today, we got that student representative report in 5th period, informing all the students about the things to come in October. Pretty good stuff there.

One thing they mentioned was the Spirit Week, which is going to be next week, I believe. Dance-off on Wednesday. Dance-offs are really interesting and exciting to me and I used to like them. Used to.
...
Sigh...
Need I remind everyone what happened last year?
Remember how everyone was so into it? And people were pulling out sick tricks and doing some crazy moves? And then all of that got interrupted. BY THE DAMN PRINCIPAL. That got me kind of annoyed. Then they resumed the competition with a new rule, your head cannot be touching the ground, or something like that. What the shit kind of rule is that? I understand that they might be worried about the "dangers" of dancing, but these guys know what they're doing. And then after like 5 more minutes, the dance-off got stopped again. The next thing that happened pissed me off to heck. The rest of the battle was canceled just cuz the principal couldn't handle the awesomeness of the dances. Hellfuck.

Ryan: Hellfuck indeed. Also, another reason she stopped the dance-off was because spectators were doing some stupid shit, there were a few of them on the roof of the building overlooking the performance. If you want good seats, get there early, don't ruin the event for everyone please D:<

So I'm kind of looking forward to it, kind of. I can't really expect a whole lot out of this year's because it's being restricted by a lot of things. Or should I say, by one thing/person.

I know a lot of pretty good dancers that would make excellent competitors, but I've never seen them go up. I wish they would, because I think that it would be great for this kind of event.

Ryan: I agree, the dancers we know would rip up the dance floor like no other. But then again, the competition in this school is pretty tough, there are a few underground king-pins we don't know about.

So for this year, Halloween is on Saturday. Does that mean that dress-up is canceled? Hell no it's not. Dress-up day will be on the Friday before Halloween, October 30. This is another thing I look forward to in the school year. It's really fun to dress up and see other people's costumes as well. Freshman year, I didn't dress up as anything because I didn't have any ideas. Sophomore year, I pulled out a very crude Urahara cosplay. Junior year (my personal favorite), I dressed up as L. This year I don't know what I'm going to be. I remember in an AIM chatroom, I discussed with some people what we should be for Halloween. We had all these great ideas (my personal favorite was a group dress-up of Brawl characters), but then we realized that October 31st is on Saturday. So we were unsure if the event at school was still going to be held. Unsure, we withdrew all plans. But now that we know for sure that there is going to be a dress-up day, I wanna set those plans back in action. We gotta end senior year with the most squeezed out of the school year, right? XD
Ryan: Pirate.

VG Review #8: Crossfire

Hi guys, this is another VG review XD. This one is very different because instead of a game that you can play on a console, this is a game that you download and play massively multiplayer style. Another reason why this review is so different is because Jeff is helping me write this entry, since he also plays Crossfire. Get it crackin.

Again, this a game that you can download. You can get the game client here if you're interested. It's an FPS game, if you couldn't tell from the picture above. FPS means First Person Shooter, which means that you are in the first person viewpoint shooting a gun, which means you better kill some people or you're dead.

Well, first of all, you have to download the game. Then register. Then you login when the game screen comes up. Then you are required to make a nickname for yourself and buy a character, either SWAT, OMOH, or SAS (Wiki if you don't know what they are). You are not required to buy a gun right when you start, but you can. Some of the guns you can choose include MP5, M4A1, MP7, AK-74, M60, K1a, and more. If you do not buy a gun, you use the default weapons, the M16 and the M700. The M16 is an assault rifle that has decent stats. The M700 is your default sniper rifle and it does pretty well; 2 shots guarantees a kill, if you hit your target. Now some of you might be wondering how you can hold 2 main weapons. Well, you can't really hold 2 main weapons at a time. You have these things called bags (lol I fail) and in each bag you can hold up to 1 main weapon, 1 pistol, 1 throw weapon, and 1 melee weapon. Your main throw weapon is probably going to be the grenade, and your main melee weapon is probably going to be the standard knife. You do not have a default pistol, so you'll have to buy one, if you decide to do it.

Now on to the main weapons. Your choices for a main weapon are assault rifles, submachine guns, sniper rifles, shotguns, and machine guns. If you're new to the game, I recommend a submachine gun because they're relatively easy to use, and make decent killing machines (>:D). I myself use a K2 right now, a gun that many people consider to be the best gun in the game. But I honestly think that the best weapon in the game is the Scar Light. There are a lot of weapons that you cannot buy right when you start the game because they require a certain ranking. These later weapons are not hard to get, but they do require quite a bit of time and effort to obtain.

Another thing is that there are certain weapons that a normal player like myself, and probably yourself, would not be able to access. This range of weapons can only be bought with real money. The real money is turned into ZP, which is probably short for Z8 Points (it's Z8's game). It is not an opinion, but it is a FACT, that these weapons give the user very unfair advantages. Most of these weapons offer an extended clip, boosted accuracy, higher power, and extra add-ons. Such weapons include the AK-47 camo, the M4A1 Advanced, the M4A1 custom, the Golden AK-47, the AWM camo, the SG-552 camo, heart grenades, combat axes, and some more cheap (not literally) weapons. People who use these weapons usually appear as women characters in-game, and the best advice I have for you when you see one is: leave the game.

On to the actual gameplay. Being that this is an FPS game, you have your standard Team DeathMatch and Elimination modes, but Crossfire is unique in that it offers a variety of other ways to play. In Search & Destroy, one team is assigned the task of detonating 1 of 2 sites, and the other team's goal is to stop that team from exploding anything. In Ghost Mode, one team is partially invisible and is given the task to blow up 1 of 2 sites, and the other team is required to stop them. In the Vietnamese version of Crossfire, they also have a Zombie Mode, which looks extremely fun to play, so I hope Z8 includes this mode on a later patch. In addition to all these different modes, you can also play the same modes, but with some modifications. There are options available that restrict all players to using just knives or just sniper rifles or just pistols. The variety of modes keeps the game fresh and fun to play.

So what do I think about this game? Well I like it. I like the fact that you can choose your weapons based on your play style and also carry around other weapon sets for different situations. Again, I like the different modes you can play in. Sometimes I get bored with Team DeathMatch, and when that happens, I can join some other game with an Elimination mode or a Search & Destroy mode. It's a pretty fun game if you have the time to play it.

Unfortunately, there are quite a bit of flaws about it, too. But not all of them are directly about the game. For example, some of the people that play it ruin my experience by calling me a hacker or a "stupid ass bitch". Of course you're gonna get those kinds of people on an MMO game. [By the way, there used to be a LOT of hackers on this game, but Z8 or Suba did a really good job with patching up all the bugs and loopholes] Another thing (Jeff might touch up on this in his opinions) is that there isn't as much realism as we had hoped. Jeff pointed out to me that the AK-47 is very INACCURATE in real life, but in Crossfire, it is a very ACCURATE weapon. Some of the recoil is unrealistic too. Some guns have way too much; and I can tell that it's too much because I've seen them in action in real life. But one of the main problems I have is the "ZP whores", as I like to call them. These are the people that decide that they want to own everyone and start spending real money on the game in order to get better weapons than the rest of the common players online. One of the ways you can tell if someone is a ZP whore is if they are playing with a woman character (SPOP). 90% of the time, that person is a ZP whore. They ruin the game for me because none of my weapons can match their dollar-bought firearms. I seriously think that Crossfire should draw the line somewhere.

Overall, I'd say it's an entertaining game. It's not great, it's not horrible, it's just...good. It's especially fun if you have someone you know playing it with you. Try it out if you have the time and hard drive space.


Gameplay: 8/10
Controls: 8/10
Difficulty: 7/10
Graphics: 9/10
Music/Sound: 8/10
Overall: 8/10



That's my take on this game. Jeff, what do you think about Crossfire?
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Alright so here's my side (Jeff) of this game. Honestly I think Matt covered the majority of it, but there's always more opinions to add.

Alright, so with the gameplay, if you're into CS (Counter-Strike) you'd like this game, though most likely you'll choose CS over CF because it is paid for and more developed. If you've played console shooters like Call of Duty, or CS, you probably wouldn't be interested, but for those people who don't like to spend money on games, this is a great choice. The gameplay is pretty solid and straightforward, not too hard to figure out. There are a few minor flaws with the physics sometimes but it's totally tolerable; for example, aiming right on the person, wasting a whole clip without hitting them once; doesn't happen too often and it's correctable with experience.
The guns... i'd say they're 70-80% realistic, (don't expect Call of Duty physics and capabilities with this) the AK-47 as Matt mentioned above I realized is a pretty accurate analogy to the real one, it is depicted pretty well and made playable in the game. Z8/Suba did a great job with the weapons design and all its features including recoil and aim considering this is a free game. The one drawback is if you're like me, you do find it to have a very limited variety of weapons, but I'm sure they'll add more with new patches. One thing's for sure though, the people who pay money for this game are overpowered, but not invincible, enough skill will be enough to surpress them with any gun.

Overall, this game is a GREAT free MMO, if you're into FPS. It combines a solid gameplay with good weapons, and it has enough in it to keep you from wanting to quit; I mean who gets tired of shooting people?

The Importance of Soundtracks

In the morning, I drove to church. Well, I usually drive to church, but this time it was a little different. I plugged in my iPod to the car radio and I started playing Mario Kart music. DAMN. That was the best thing ever. I really felt like I was in Mario Kart. Which was good and bad. Good because it gave me the "in-game" feeling. Bad because I was so into the music I almost crashed. =P

I also tried this experiment with one of the Blue Yoshi authors, Ryan. So as many of you know, I like Lucky Star. So does Ryan. But anyways - and I may have talked about this before - in the Lucky Star anime, the characters mostly talk about trivial things on a daily basis. And when they do that, some music plays. It sounds like elevator music from the start, but it's a little jumpier than that. It was entertaining to watch, so I downloaded some of the background music, and went to school the next day. I put in an earphone, started up the Lucky Star music, and proceded to have a conversation with Ryan. It worked like a charm. Not only did it make the conversation more enjoyable, but it made me feel like I was in a TV show or an anime. Haha yeah.

It's freaken awesome when you're doing something and you have music to go along with it. It just exacerbates every experience you have while doing whatever you're doing. For example, try running with frantic horror music. You'd probably feel a little scared and run faster.

Some more practical applications:
- When you're doing your homework, play some heroic music. In reality, you're only doing homework, but in your head, you'll feel like you're slaying dragons.
- Set up some upbeat song as your alarm in the morning. You'll probably wake up happier and be ready to take on the day (I actually know someone that does this).
- In the shower, play the Psycho theme. Just kidding.
- At night, find some ambient music to play. Unless your intention is to NOT fall asleep. In that case, put on some screamo.

Experiment around. You'd be surprised.

Oh Ehm Gee Frostycola is All Up In Hurr! (And Jeff, too XD)

This is a very cool day for Blue Yoshi, because now we have some new authors! Ryan Ruan and Jeff Tarn have both agreed to write for Blue Yoshi and share their random thoughts as well as me sharing mine.

So without further delay, here's the second author of Blue Yoshi, Ryan!!





Whoa! Looks like change is afoot in this little blog!

What up readers? The name be Ryan. But please, when on the internet I am known as FROSTYCOLA!!! /applaudandlaughterensues

I am very excited to be blogging with Matt kay? His posts are very entertaining to read and I can only hope to be as funny as he is. I really hope you enjoy our random-ass posts as much as we do!




And here's the third author of Blue Yoshi, Jeff!

Whooo so I am sure this is gna be a crazy blog now LOL. This is Jeff. How you doin'?



...come on Jeff, is that all you could think of?

LOL Potter

So I heard that the last book of Harry Potter is going to be split up into 2 movies. I think that's a pretty good idea, since one movie may not be enough to capture all the events in the book. And this is coming from a Potter noob, since the last book I read from the series was Prisoner of Azkaban. After that, I just watched the movies.

So...what are they gonna call the movies? Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 1 and Part 2? But wouldn't that kind of be inconsistent to the other titles? Maybe they'll just give them the same name, Deathly Hallows, and expect the viewers to figure out which comes before and which one comes after.

OR, they could name the first movie "Harry Potter and" and then name the second movie "the Deathtly Hallows." Or maybe they'll just give them original names. Who knows...I don't.