Thursday, March 25, 2010

Published on the Internet Still Counts, Doesn't it?

It's not a huge deal, really. It's a paragraph on a Warcraft related website. But it's mine!

WoW Insider asked people to submit 100 words on what we want to see at Blizzcon 2010. A convention run by the makers of Warcraft, Starcraft and the Diablo series. You know what a convention is. This one is just centered on the franchises of one game company. I've never been to one. I doubt I ever will, but the news and information stemming from this convention relevant to my interests. So I submitted my 100 words, and hoped for the best.

The email came that they would be using mine (and several other people's) submissions in their article on the website. WoW.com is essentially a blog reader for World of Warcraft news and articles. They stay up to date on things so I don't have to. Kind of like reading a LOST blog, only with many contributing editors and articles on every aspect game. Not only were they using my submission, they were paying me for it. Awesome.

Oh, here's the link.

I like to write. I've always written for myself. I write a sporadic blog, so obviously it's not hard to get your words on the internet. But submitting something to a news article site and having it accepted and published with my name on it and getting paid for it makes it all seem so much more validated. Take something you enjoy, like a hobby, or a TV show, and imagine writing something about that and then someone paying you to share what they thought was a cool written work with a lot of people. That's pretty neat, right? Right.

The way they took the submission was pretty interesting too. WoW.com is part of the AOL network which has a program called seed. You sign up on the seed website and you can browse postings for submissions on various topics. That's how I send in the submission for WoW.com and got accepted. I sent in another submission on another topic recently. I'm waiting to see if they like that one too. If they don't, I can always post it on my own blog.

In other news, I should be getting the Xbox and FF13 on Easter weekend. Yay! Easter weekend will be in South Carolina with Teresa's family. Yay again! No, I mean that. And I'm currently engrossed in A Game of Thrones by George R.R. Martin. It took me awhile to start it, but now that I have, I have a hard time putting it down. I'll post more on that when I finish it. Work has been kicking my butt, which may or may not have been a contributer to the lack of posting on this blog. It appears it will continue to kick my butt well into next month before it (hopefully) starts to get better. It's not all in my control either. Most of it is a wait and see and hope and scratch and scrape to keep things going until that time. I took on a lot of responsibility when I took this job a year ago. I'm starting to feel the full weight of that now.

Spring is trying to break through. The weather has been a mix of cold and not cold. No snow, some rain, and I broke my windshield wipers a few weeks ago so that's not a good thing. But at times we've been able to have the windows open in the house and let the breeze in. Something Hannah does not like. Actually, she might like it, but it gives her ample opportunity to stare out the window and bark and the slightest sound of anything.

Tuesday, March 9, 2010

Final Fantasy XIII Out Today


Alas, I do not yet have it...

I have never had a burning desire to own a Playstation 3 or an Xbox 360. That's in part due to only really playing one game over the last 3 years, and with nothing coming out on the PS3 or 360 that really would drive me to buy it when funds are tight, you tend to pick and choose your entertainment options. I'm sure I'd own two or three of them if I had money to spare, but I digress... for the time has come.

With the release of Final Fantasy XIII, I finally have a reason that I MUST own a PS3 or 360, and lucky for me, my brother-in-law is selling me his old 360 for less than half what I'd pay in a store, so I'm excited. Excited that I'll have it soon, sad that that is not yet the case. I think it may be as early as this weekend that I'll have it. We'll see.

This is par for the course for me. I grew up a Nintendo fanboy. Sega was the devil, (well, Sonic was fun) and everything Nintendo did was amazing. My first taste of Final Fantasy was FF2 on the SNES. I nearly beat it over a weekend of renting it, so I had to buy it. I eventually went back and played the original on the NES too. Then FF3 came out. Best. Game. Ever. I played the crap out of that game. I probably put hundreds of hours into it. Not lying. No, I don't regret that. Well, okay, maybe a little, but it was still awesome.

Then Squaresoft, the publisher, had the nerve to put the next Final Fantasy on the Sony Playstation and not the new Nintendo system. We also learned that Japan got a lot more Final Fantasies than we did, so the numbering system was messed up. My loyalties divided, Square proved the winner, and when FF7 was released, I bought a Playstation and the game. I'm trying to remember how I had all this disposable income as a kid. I distinctly remember saving and purchasing with my own money my SNES, N64, and the PS1, but that was all before my first real job. Huh.

Another fun fact on Final Fantasy 7. After having the game for a week, I distinctly remember my mother seeing the game timer at 30 hours of play time. Aghast at how I had spent 30 hours, nearly a full time job and during a school week no less, playing it, she made me turn it off for awhile.

Playstation 2? Bought it when Final Fantasy X came out, which oddly, I think was shortly after the launch of the system itself, so I paid a lot for it. The graphics were beautiful though. Then XI was released as an online MMO. I have never played it. You think I would have, but MMOs were not a possibility for me during college.

And thus we come to today, where I have evaded the urge to buy a "current generation" gaming console because my gaming has been almost entirely on the computer for the last few years. But today is not just any day. Today, Final Fantasy XIII is out, and I have stayed true to tradition. Soon I hope to be happily seated in front of the TV, enjoying a game I've been waiting for for nearly 4 years. I hope it was worth the wait.

Oh who am I kidding, it's Final Fantasy! Of course I'll love it.