alcamin

What an incredible tennis match! Andy Murray, the British number 1, playing Richard Gasquet, the French number 1, in the 4^th round of Wimbledon. Gasquet led 2-0 sets and by that stage Murray looked finished, completely beaten. Nothing he could do was enough to beat the powering Frenchman, something that wasn’t helped by Murray’s many unforced errors. But somehow the plucky Brit got back into the match and crawled back the next 2 sets. With the crowd behind him it was Gasquet’s turn to fade and by the end of that 4^th set he was in real trouble. It was Murray’s game from the taking and eventually won 6 games to 4. An absolutely stunning comeback! I’m so glad I turned the TV on tonight! What a treat!

So now Murray is into the quarter finals. Impressive, but of course his next opponent is Rafael Nadal, so I don’t suppose he will be going any further. Nadal really is something special. But hey, enjoy the moment Murray; you really do deserve it. If there is one thing the British people like it’s an underdog, and when that underdog is a local hero, well that just makes the victory all the sweeter! ^^

My faith in Amazon was obviously well placed. I reported the problem I was having with Guitar Hero III to them, organised for the old version to be picked up on Monday by the courier company DHL, and asked for a replacement. This was accepted and about two hours later I received an email saying that my replacement had already been dispatched. Blimey that was fast! It arrived the next day and I’m happy to report that the new version works brilliantly! No dodgy buttons this time thankfully. Now I can finally have a proper go with the awesomeness that is GH3. Damn I love that game! ^^

Thanks Amazon! You guys kick ass! *does a jig*

The new guitar!

Basically the top fret button (the green one) was faulty and went for long periods of not workings at all (normally when I was in the middle of a song). At first I thought the signal was just not getting through to the Wii but after fiddling with the setup that was obviously not the answer. Everything else worked after all. The only thing I can think of is that there is a loose connection so I’m now going to have to send it back to Amazon and get it replaced. Needless to say I’m not best pleased. I’ve been looking forward to playing this game for a long time now so picking up a faulty copy is pretty irritating. Oh well. The sooner I send it back the better. At least I still have Zelda so it’s not all bad. I also have the classic controller now too so I can finally get some of those great retro games.

*sigh* I’ll let you know what happens at any rate. Hopefully there won’t be a problem. Amazon are normally pretty good. Fingers crossed.

It's finally happened. I have at last moved into the modern gaming age and bought myself a Wii! Hurray! I've wanted one for quite some time now but due to a heavy workload I didn't really want to distract myself with its awesomeness (which would have happened, I can assure you ^^). Now that has all finished I felt the time was right so I wasted no time in getting one and I'm already loving it.

A friend of mine actually lent me his for a while a few month ago so I was already pretty familiar with the system. Even though it isn't anywhere near as powerful as, say, the 360 or PS3, it is certainly the most unique, which I've always liked about it. Nintendo went in such a different direction with it compared to their rivals and took a big gamble in the process. If that controller hadn’t work properly or people didn't respond to it the whole project would have fallen apart. Without that element the Wii is completely pointless as it has nothing else to fall back on. As we know however the Wii has been phenomenally successful and my admiration for Nintendo continues to grow. They were willing to take a risk and try something new and because of that I respect them hugely.

So basically, my summer is now sorted. There is no longer a reason for me to leave my room (apart from food and answering the call of nature, of course ^^). If anyone has any suggestions about stuff I should get then pleased let me know.

Now that I have some more free time and my studies have finished for the time-being another important issue has come up in my life: fitness. Over the past 8 years I simply haven’t been able to get out and exercise, what with my illness and all, so that has taken a big toll. Now that I’m healthier and actually have a solid direction in life (university mainly) the need to get into shape has never been stronger. At my current level uni life would be extremely tricky so something had to be doing about it.

So I joined a local gym in an attempt to remedy this little/huge problem. I’ve been a member for a few months now but it’s only been in the last few weeks that I’ve been able to get in regularly and actually get a decent program going. So far things are looking good. The first week was tough, as I knew it would be. Everything hurt after an hour on the machines to the point where I thought my arms were going to fall out of their sockets. I expected that however so it didn’t come as much of a surprise. I battled through it and now things are much easier. I’ve been steadily increasing the time I spend on all the machines and so far things have been going pretty well. No major disasters or anything at least. :) Not only that but I’ve also been paying close attention to my diet and making sure I eat in a healthier manner. That isn’t a huge problem either really as I’ve always had a pretty good diet. I’ve never been a huge fan of junk food (I have a McDonalds about once every 2 months) and virtually no soft drinks so really all I’ve had to do is eat a bit more fruit. It’s only a little thing but it should help in the long run.

So yes, soon I’ll be a fitter, stronger me and hopefully have enough stamina to enjoy the summer as well as having a better chance of coping with uni life. Wish me luck!

The one other part of the Orange Box I feel I should mention is Portal. For those that don’t know Portal is a puzzle game developed using the HL engine where you must solve challenges using (yup, you guessed it) a portal gun. Basically the object of the game is to create a series of wormholes in the walls/floor/ceiling to gain access to different areas and avoid various obstacles in an attempt to escape from an experiment gone very badly wrong.
 

 
The reason I singled it out here is because I had an absolute blast playing it! It’s beautifully made, really well thought out and extremely challenging. Above all though, it’s hilariously funny. I can safely say that I haven’t laughed that hard while playing a game from many, many years. There were times where I was in tears (making playing difficult), it really was that good. Your nemesis, the crazed computer GLaDOS and her little minions, are a truly wonderful creations and brought a huge smile to my face every single time. Never before has a machine been so sarcastic and so blatantly insane (she even gives HAL, from 2001: A Space Odyssey, a run for his money, which is saying quite a bit). Whoever wrote the script should be given a medal and the keys to the city. The humour is just so off-the-wall and so crazy that it’s just a joy to spend time with. It hits all of the right buttons and is always timed perfectly making it a thoroughly enjoyable experience. All of these factors have really reawakened my love of puzzle games so I have a lot to be thankful for. I highly recommend checking this game out.

But just remember this: “The cake is a LIE!!!!”

So my OU course is over and I finally have some time to relax and take things easy. What a relief! It been quite strange not having to do anything over the past few days. There has been so much going over the past month it feels odd to just stop all of a sudden. Still, it's given me a chance to catch up with some good old games playin’ and movies watchin’ so that’s been good. :)

One game that I have been playing recent is Half-Life 2. It’s strange that someone like me, a devoted PC gamer, has missed out on this for so long, even after all of the acclaim it’s received over the years, but something always stopped me getting it. I have no idea why. I loved the original so why I wouldn’t get the new one is a mystery. My brother gave me the Orange Box for my birthday though so I had no excuse to not give it a go. As it turns out I love this game!

Looking at it now it is obvious that it’s a 4 year old game. If you compare it to something like Crysis and Call of Duty 4 then the graphics do look a tad dated. That isn’t surprising of course, PC games are evolving incredibly quickly, and I’m certainly not saying that they are bad. Far from it. It’s actually amazing how fresh they look and it certainly isn’t a distraction from the main things that really set this game apart from its rivals: the gameplay and story. Without fail I will always choose a game with a good story and poor graphics over a game with good graphics and poor story. If it isn’t engaging to play on that mental level then forgot about it. Luckily, HL2 follows on very nicely from the original and still maintains that interesting and unique feel which made the first such a big hit. The Source engine should also be given a huge amount of credit for this games success. It really is a masterpiece without a shadow of a doubt. Everything moves so effortlessly and realistically. It’s just a joy to spend time with it.

There is still quite a bit of stuff I haven’t looked at on the Orange Box yet; Episode 2 mainly Team Fortress 2 so I still have a lot of gaming to do. I’d better get back to it then. ^^ Expect more HL2 stuff soon. There is a lot to talk about, that's for sure.

I’ve finally got that damn assignment out of the way! Thank god for that! It took a bit longer than I expected but I think that overall I did a pretty good job, considering the circumstances. Because I have had a few bad weeks (my health still plays-up every now and then) I am quite behind so I had to skip quite a few parts of the textbook. It’s not ideal but that’s just how I have to play it.

There’s no rest from the wicked though; I’m starting the next one straight away. Basically, I have about a month to go and in that time I have to complete one more normal assignment (the certain one) and the final assignment, which is like 2 or 3 normal assignments all rolled into one. Needless to say the pressure is really on and I’m already exhausted. If I can complete and pass this course then I’ll be able to get into university this September. If not then I don’t know what I’m going to do. I don’t even want to think about it really.

So anyway, I’m busy, stressed and very tired. It will be SO nice when this whole thing is over. I haven’t been online much lately (as I’m sure you can understand) so it may take a while for me to get to any journals and such, so please bear with me. If you suddenly get a huge dump of messages in your inbox one day you’ll know why. XD

Now it’s time to get back to work. Crack that whip slave-driver!

Yes! Heroes, Season 2, is starting on BBC 2 tonight at 9pm! I’m really excited! When the first season was aired last year I was gripped as I rarely have by a TV series. After missing out on other big shows like Lost (a series that I still need to catch up with) I really wanted to just sit down and watch something new and, being a bit of a geek (okay, a total geek :D) the concept behind Heroes really appealed to me. I wasn’t disappointed. From the very first episode I was completely hooked and I’ve remained like that ever since. The virtually everything about it has been great: the characters, the story, the script, the products, it’s all been top-notch and wonderfully brought together. The only thing that really bothered me was that by the end of the first season the story started becoming rather confusing. Don’t get me wrong, I still enjoyed it and certainly followed what was going on, but I just felt that it was starting to get needlessly complicated. That is only a very small criticism however in an otherwise excellent series. Perhaps it was made like that to set up the new season, I don’t know. We’ll just have to wait and see. :)

So yes, Heroes Season 2 on BBC 2 at 9pm tonight! If you can, watch it! If you can’t, sucks to be you (unless you’ve seen it already of course ^^) I’m just glad I had the self control to avoid watching it on the web. A series like this one deserves to be seen on a nice big TV screen not off some crappy streamed video. :)