your joy is my low

Yes kids, it's time for another one of my top ten lists. These happen to be events in video games that just make me look like this: :O Events big or small that just change the course of everything and make me feel like I'm actually immersed in something rather than just sitting in front of a screen mashing some buttons. Now, this is obviously not an OF ALL TIME and crap list, since I haven't played Every Game Ever -- this is just a personal list of amazing/favorite OH MY GAWD DID THAT JUST HAPPEN moments. Those ones that always make my jaw drop and slap a big AWE. AWWW YES. across my face in giant IMPACT LOLCAT FONT.

Note: I have included no spoilers in these top ten. The videos that have spoilers are marked. Anything that sounds like a spoiler isn't really a spoiler. You know all the people in ObsCure die, you know Megaton blows up if you want it to -- any real spoilers have been left out of this list. You can click on the videos at your own risk (if the videos have super mega real spoilers, I will mark them).


TOP TEN FAVORITE "OMG WHOAAAAAAAT?" VIDEO GAME EVENTS:

10.) ANY DEATH IN OBSCURE II (ObsCure II: The Aftermath) -- sure, it's pretty much a parody of slasher films and the controls are kind of off and the game has a certain layer of cheese spread all over it, but every time you get to a point and one of your friends dies, it's just like, WAIT WHAT. They aren't just characters who have kind of popped up and been like HEY LET'S GET DRUNK. You actually play as pretty much everyone in the game at one point or another, so in one moment you could be controlling someone who makes you laugh (Stan) or makes you roll your eyes (Corey) or makes your fanboy heart go pitter-pat (Amy, usually -- but Shannon is hotter ;D) and the next moment their blood is running under everyone else's feet. It works. Another reason it really works? Because you know people who fit these characters.

VIDEO: NO! Not my viking! (lol spoiler a little?)

09.) THE FINALE OF DEAD AIR (Left 4 Dead) -- It wasn't hard to pick the most epic moment of this game. Truly there are many moments where you're like, "WAIT, DID THAT JUST HAPPEN?" But the plane flying straight at your team of four standing on a loading platform, the plane on fire and about to crash, and then the four exclamations, usually something along the lines of "DID YOU SEE THAT?" and "HOLY SHIT!" definitely makes my list. Everytime I step out of that safe room and I know it's coming, I always have to stop and watch it (sorry Bill, Francis and Zoey) -- wait for it to finish it's descent and listen to the exclamations. Then I can start fighting zombies.

VIDEO: Did you see that?!

08.) THE FINAL LEVEL IN BRAID (Braid) -- I didn't play this myself, but I watched the boyfriend do it late one Saturday night. It was quick-paced and pretty cool, but once Nate got Tim to the end of the level and the Princess was asleep in her room... and once everything started going the other way, my jaw dropped. It was so seamless. Everything Nate had made Tim do on the way to the end was being done backwards and it looked so right that I suddenly was squealing, "IS THIS THE SAME TIM?" This had to be one of the most brilliant level designs ever. MY MIND. SHE IS BLOWN. HE'S COMING TO GET YOU, SISTER.

VIDEO: Hold up. Rewind. (This video contains spoilers you probably won't really get if you haven't played the game. ALSO, WATCH IT IN HD. WATCH IT IN HD.)

07.) KEEP YOUR FRIENDS CLOSE (Grand Theft Auto: Vice City) -- This is the final mission in GTA:VC and boy is it a doozy. Let's just say there's lots of betrayal and lots of guns and Tommy Vercetti taking over this posh Miami Vice City pad is quite an ordeal of amazing proportions. As I was spraying enemies with a machine gun from my office and then chasing some sumbitches to the roof and sniping some other sumbitches (names all withheld to prevent spoilers lol), I realized what a big pile of YES PLEASE WHAT this mission was. It was a perfect gigantic bang to end the game with (well, end the main missions with ;D). BULLETS EVERYWHERE! P.S. Ray Liotta rocks. so. hard.

VIDEO: Say hello to my leetle friend. (SPOILERS!)

06.) DISCOVERING THE WHARK/WAHRK & THE GALLOWS (Riven) -- When I hit Village Island in Riven, I remember coming across an interesting contraption that I was forced to ride up. Later learning that it was basically a gallows that Gehn used to sacrifice people to a beastie he owned in the water below known as a wahrk, I felt an empty pit in my stomach. I rode up the thing that people were forced to ride down on to get eaten. After the pit went away, there was a wash of THAT WAS CLEVER AND AWESOME over me. Cyan never failed to amaze me with their design and storylines. Later, I managed to come face to face with said beastie (and said beastie got mightily pissed at me when I kept calling him and didn't feed him - HE IS SO CUTE) and after that, every single time I had to get in those little subs to ride around underwater, there was always a blanket of unease that settled. I knew the beastie was somewhere out to get me. D: When you can manage to smack me in the face with that uneasiness (and also manage to try to force me to find ways around getting into the subs) then you definitely win at atmosphere and gaming in general. Good show, Cyan.

VIDEO: Feeding time!

05.) CHAPTER 7 - THE FINALE (Phantasmagoria) -- Oh lawd, Sierra. I can't even begin to get into this crack. The year was 1995 and the chapter number was 7. There was a time limit, there was a husband with a demon inside him, there was a wife I was controlling -- a wife who had lost pretty much everything since she moved into this craphole mansion. Don chased after Adrienne like a maniac and by the time I was old enough to play this by myself (my Mom was playing it the first time I saw it) I had the final chapter down to a science. It scared me so bad. I didn't want anything horrible to happen so I would do every motion and every action as quick as my finger could click. I didn't want Adrienne to get sliced in half, I didn't want Adrienne to get her face ripped off by the demon, I didn't want Adrienne to fall to a bone-crunching splat in that hole in the secret passageway, I didn't want Adrienne to have to watch her husband die. The graphics aren't up to today's standards and yeah, the acting can get a little cheesy but the whole chapter still makes me shudder to this day. (And Don's cackle gives me nightmares.)

VIDEO: What a happy marriage! <3 (SPOILERS! And this dude kills the chase sequence - LONG VERSION. I love it. I could never master the long version. ALSO, OLD SCHOOL GORE/BLOOD WARNING, LOL~)

04.) BLOWING UP MEGATON (Fallout 3) -- An event this big is surely saved for late in the game when the player needs a GASP moment, yeah? Not this one. Once you make it out into the big, beautiful empty Capital Wasteland, you stumble your way into a city called Megaton. Megaton is named this way because it is a city built around a giant, unexploded atomic bomb. You can be a good samaritan and use your skills to disarm said bomb, or you can be a giant dick and get paid a lot of money (bottle caps, in this case) by a man named Tenpenny (through a little snake of a man named Mr. Burke) to blow the sucker up. If you do this, you get to watch it from a distance with Tenpenny and Mr. Burke at your sides in the safety of the giant Tenpenny Tower. And you know why Tenpenny wanted the city destroyed? It was an eyesore and "ruined" the view from his penthouse landscape. :|

VIDEO: Oh Tenpenny. You card.

03.) THE CABIN (Resident Evil 4) -- This is SO DAMN FUN. You have control of your man Leon S. (Sex, lol) Kennedy and you're fighting alongside the hot Luis (and Ashley Graham is cowering around and stuff here too) in a cabin/barn that's being attacked on all sides by Los Ganados. They're coming in the door and through the windows and finally you're cornered on the second floor where they begin climbing up ladders into the windows and charging the stairs. It's beautifully executed, wonderfully scored and knows how to keep you right on the edge of your seat (if you're low on ammo Luis holds out on you until the very last moment then finally tosses you some). Plus, Luis + Leon = SEXCELLENT. This has to tie (in this game) with one of the coolest boss fights ever -- the Lake Monster, El Lago.

VIDEO: Talk about adrenaline rush. (Bonus! Leon in his pimp suit!)

02.) MEETING ANDREW RYAN (BioShock) -- This was truly badass. This whole area. Finding the room with the pictures, meeting Ryan, listening to Atlas spill it. Once you hear it all and think back to what has transpired previously in the game, your jaw just kind of drops. Then the fact that they strip you of everything you've built up and drop you somewhere you aren't used to and just pretty much go, "HAVE FUN WITH THIS." I love it. Loooooove it. Also, GOLFING NEVER LOOKED SO MUCH FUN!

VIDEO: A man chooses, a slave obeys. (SPOILERS.)

01.) ENTERING ROOM 312 (Silent Hill 2) -- Konami killed it here. Absolutely. This sequence and the emotion and music and colors and angles. EVERYTHING about it just sort of kicked me in the face and left me there for a few moments going, "really? really now? .......really?" Not to mention after you get over that, you're forced to run through a horrible mess of burnt hotel hallways and up a collapsing staircase to some form of the wife you've been looking for. The best part about though is the feeling... the feeling of playing through the last parts of the game with that lump in your throat and that gross ball of dread in your stomach from Room 312 -- that feeling of total betrayal. Why have you been helping this guy through Silent Hill? Well played, Team Silent. Well played.

VIDEO: I'm not your Mary. (MEGA ULTRA SPOILERS.)


IN CLOSING: I love video games. Screw the whole "psh, they aren't art" BS -- if music is art, movies are art, stories are art -- what do you get when you put all those things together and make it interactive? INTERACTIVE ART, NO SHIT.

So this icon has been sitting on my desktop for a few weeks now, waiting for me to put it on my lj with the rest of the icons. I was going to use it as my OH GAWD DRAMA icon, since Michael Jackson is totally settling down with his popcorn and getting ready for some serious action, but I figured it needed to be uploaded for other reasons now too. It's Michael Jackson, you guys. Even if you weren't a fan of his music, you can't deny how influential and popular he's been in the field of entertainment.

His music was catchy and unique, his dancing was amazing, his videos were epic and there isn't gonna be anyone like that for a very long time. Sure, in recent history things have gotten odd, but I know when I think of Michael Jackson, none of that shit pops in my head first. Him dancing with a bunch of zombies does, him doing the moonwalk does, him singing with his sister ("Miss Jackson if you're nasty"~ <3) on Scream does, Smooth Criminal does, Don't Stop Till You Get Enough, Remember the Time, P.Y.T., Black or White, Billie Jean, Jam, Bad, Beat It, Rock With You -- there's so much he's done. So many artists when asked who their influences are list Michael Jackson. Usher, Justin Timberlake, Mariah Carey, Aaliyah, his own sister Janet, even the newest American Idol, Kris Allen. Hell, just last week one of the dancers on So You Think You Can Dance talked about how much he loved Michael Jackson and how he would stand in front of the tv when he was a kid and practice dancing like him (the home video footage was darling).

I'll totally admit that as I sat on the couch the other day and watched this whole thing happen: Michael Jackson rushed to the hospital, Michael Jackson in a coma, King of Pop pronounced dead -- it was hard for me not to get a little teary-eyed. It's Michael Jackson. He was untouchable. He was the epitome of POP STAR. He was DANCE. He was MUSIC. And now he's gone and we're left with his music and videos.

Yeah, I'm not a dancer or a musician, I haven't been influenced in some artistic fashion. But I sure as hell am a fan. I'll dance flail around to his music, I'll sing it in the car or the shower and love every second of it just like I always have. His death hasn't changed that. He'll always be one of the greatest artists of our generation and there's no way he'll be forgotten.

To close this post. Everyone should have this song. EVERYONE.

Thriller - Michael Jackson (right click, save-as)

(I love Michael Jackson eating popcorn. XD)

I know I've posted about these amazing pictures before...

Ngngghhghghhh, want to use one SO BAD but can't decide.

PRINCE ERIC. JIM HAWKINS. THOSE ARE MY TWO LOVES, YOU CAN'T MAKE ME DECIDE. D:

(look at eric's smiiirrrrrkkkkk but but but jim looks so cute and innocent sjdkfjsakdfjrrrrrrrrrrrr whatttt)

Here are some random pictures.

( My Solo Family notepad, some pictures of fake guns for Ashley lol, my Jack Frost boots, my P4 poster, a note I wrote to my mother when I was little and me looking amused in a dress hur hur. )

[/random] XD

Today (technically yesterday now, lol) is my sister's birthday (some of you knows her as Valval, Valerie or zoopiglet). And I am commemorating it with lots of awesomeness. The best part of this commemoration is that her and Brian are here right now for Thanksgiving/her birthday so she most likely will not see this until she gets back home. LOL SORRY VALVAL!

People always ask us, "HOW COME YOU AND YOUR SISTER NEVER FIGHT? D: I DON'T UNDERSTAND HOW YOU HAVE SUCH A GOOD RELATIONSHIP."

I don't know if it's the 10 year gap, or if there is just something weird going on with the workings of the universe, but we've never fought. Sure, there have been disagreements and stuff ("bitch, go do the dishes/cat box.") -- but never any YOU ARE SUCH A WHORE AND I HATE YOU GTFO OF MY FACE kind of things. Which I will admit, has been pretty nice.

SO HAPPY BIRTHDAY, VALERIE. YOU HAVE MADE ME WHAT I AM TODAY. Seriously, it's all your fault.

1.) On Mister Solo: "You should really get back into the Star Wars books. Jacen's an angsty teenager now and he wore a skirt in this one book."
2.) On me showing her a hot actor I found & asking who it was so long ago: "Oh, that's River Phoenix. He's dead."
3.) On River Phoenix: "You should watch Stand By Me. He was in that."
4.) On Stand By Me: "You know that was adapted from a Stephen King story, right? If you liked that then you should read The Long Walk by him too. That's full of angsty teenage boys as well. You would like it."

THANKS VALERIE. :D


Also, thank you for getting me into all kinds of other crap I am into today -- this has made me not a whiny, emo-tween, skank-stank bitch. Here are twelve other things I am thanking you for. Notice I am not thanking you, my sister, for ALWAYS BEING THERE FOR ME and ALWAYS UNDERSTANDING MY PROBLEMS and all that other slap-happy shit they sew into pillows and put on fluffy holiday cards cause that jank IS A GIVEN.

THANK YOU:

1.) for staying up all hours of the night playing video games with me. Hunting for treasure in Final Fantasy IX while riding a chocobo until 4 a.m. was never so appealing and hilarious.
2.) for totally making fun of me when I was scared and hid behind the couch while playing the first Silent Hill.
3.) for making awesome voices for characters like Cid Kramer.
4.) for getting me into webdesign and putting up with all the stupidity I upload to echuta.net and whatthefun.net.
5.) for not making fun of me when I wanted to go to Katsucon in 2001.
6.) for subsequently joining me at conventions cause they were fun -- and then us going to OUR FIRST DRAGON*CON in 2003 (ALSO CELEBRATION II, NOT IN THE MUD).
7.) for not laughing at my crappy writing. D:
8.) for everything Disney World related, from trips to taking pictures for me when I forgot my camera like a tool.
9.) for helping me finish that William Faulkner paper in 11th grade when I waited till the last minute and thought I was going to failyourize but you forced me to write and do my work.
10.) for helping me with costumes. :D
11.) ... (you didn't think I could make a list thanking you for stuff like this without the infamous ...)
12.) for always keeping the Mark-love alive (it is not hard with him dancing seductively all the time).

HONORABLE THANK YOU MENTION:
"An Ass's limit break uses Shit." (Damn you and your grammar, Final Fantasy VIII.)


( And this is the part where I share with you some classic memorabilia and shiz under this cut. PICTURES GALORE! OH MY GOD FLASHBACK HEARTATTACK. )

In closing, HAPPY BIRTHDAY, GANGSTA. NOW GO TALK TO A WALL.

P.S. I PICKED YOU UP A LETTER-WRENCH FOR YOUR BIRTHDAY. I GOT IT FROM JAMES.

P.S.S. You didn't think I could leave out them, right? XD BEST COMMERCIAL EVER.

They are playing Legend right now on one of the Encore movie channels and that makes me really giddy, despite being sprawled out on the couch trying to ignore the pain in my midsection. I've easily seen this movie over fifty times and I want the white dress Mia Sara wears in this movie (I would wear that at my wedding, dudes, for real -- here, seventh picture down). This was when Tom Cruise was hot and not all... Tom Cruise. And he wears a boy-skirt. And Tim Curry looks fucking awesome. djfakjsdkfjasdkfjasd Look how cute~ <33333333

This movie totally corrupted me as a child. I loooooooooooove~


EDIT: LOL ALSO HO SHIT. There is the part where Jack, Gump (I effing love Gump), Oona, Screwball and Brown Tom are in the dungeon and one of the butcher guys has like a freakin' Pyramid Head on. In 1985. And he's hacking up body parts or something. LOVE IT. XD

GAME: Silent Hill 3
PLATFORM / YEAR: Playstation 2 (later PC) / 2003
SAMPLE MUSIC: Dance With Night Wind - Akira Yamaoka
GAME TRAILER: HIT IT!
FAVORITE CHARACTER: HEATHER. HEEEEEEEATHER! With a side of Douggie.

WHY THIS GAME IS BADASS: Besides the fact that the main character's name is Heather WHAT. XD No seriously, they had a ball with this one since the lead is a female and one of the warnings on the box beside the big M RATING is always sexual themes. Vincent was pretty leery towards her (and well, everyone) and Claudia kept talking about her BIRTHING A CULT'S GOD. Dude, Heather just wants to go to the mall, stfu you freaks.

This game had a serious creep-out factor going, especially at the Amusement Park -- something so damn happy looks so wrong. The roller coaster, the haunted house, the carousel (THAT FIGHT :O). Sure, the place was creepy in the first game but the graphics and noises and so on in this one just made it all the kdjafkjsdfkjaskdfjkasjdfskjd-er. It seems like with each game they find a way to make it more vibrant and more dreadful -- how do those two go together? I CAN'T DESCRIBE IT.

As much as I love this game, mega-heavy on the CULT FACTOR made it not as enjoyable as Silent Hill 2 was. I love the story of the Cult and the story behind it, but I like it better when it's in the background, as it is in Silent Hill 2 and later Silent Hill 4: The Room. 1 & 3 link up directly (as does 0rigins, with the two of those) -- and that is awesome, but I like the stand-alone stories better.

ALSO, ROBBIE THE EM-EFFING RABBIT. YES.

MOST UNSETTLING MOMENT: Undeveloped fetus eating. NEED I SAY MORE?

MOST PRETTY DAMN GORGEOUS MOMENT: Gorgeous and pretty and DAMN in the most "OH SHIT YOU'RE KIDDING ME" way possible -- Heather going back to the apartment to find her dad. I admit, I got teary-eyed. I can't believe they did that to him.

I need to pass the time till Silent Hill Homecoming comes out, so I will make an entry on one of the five main games in the series and why it kicks MAJOR EFFING ASS ALL UP AND DOWN THE BLOCK. It's milkshake brings all the other survival horrors to the yard. If any of you guys are afraid to play these games or something, these entries should hopefully help you TRUMP THAT FEAR AND GRAB SILENT HILL AND MAKE IT YOUR BITCH. It's totally worth it.

And if you're still too scared, then I can invite you to an AIM chat and basically youtube/explain/gush the whole series to you. For reals. The storyline/characters/blah blah = jafkj;ksfjdaklsjf;sjfsjlfsf;sdafjyesssssss.

(SIDE NOTE: all the music is done by AKIRA YAMAOKA and he's an EFFING GENIUS. And he gets even more amazing with each game.)

LET'S BEGIN WITH THE FIRST ALMOST A DECADE AGO!

GAME: Silent Hill
PLATFORM / YEAR: Playstation / 1999
SAMPLE MUSIC: Killing Time - Akira Yamaoka
GAME TRAILER: HIT IT! (omg the lizard at the end nooo!)
FAVORITE CHARACTER: Tie! Harry and Cybil.

WHY THIS GAME IS BADASS: When horror/survival horror games were all "BOO I JUST JUMPED OUT AND SCARED YOU LOL!", this game decided to slide into the scene with a story of a man looking for his daughter after they both got into a pretty nasty car wreck. Sure, it had it's JUMP OUT AND MAKE YOU PEE YOUR PANTS MOMENTS (hell, cat in a locker D:), but it also had it's moments of absolute dread -- where you knew something was there and you didn't know what it was and your imagination was running wild and it was ten times worse when whatever was back there actually showed itself (Cybil on the carousel made me hide behind my couch and continue playing by peeking around it from there, I'm not kidding).

The flashlight/radio static combo was a double punch in the gut, especially in the dark, cause the game would warn you with the white noise and then make you flail around madly with your flashlight to find the source. Hell, even when you were outside in the daytime (foggy as all get out though, natch) -- when that white noise started it was time to flail around madly cause you didn't know whether whatever effed up pink and bloody piece of walking meat was gonna come bounding at you on all fours or swooping at you from out of the sky.

Yeah, looking at it today, the graphics aren't great, the voice acting is a little deliciously cheesy and the controls take a little getting used to, but whenever I see that little brat Cheryl running off and Harry Mason flipping his shit and going after her into the dark, only to be molested by gray, slimy children things with knives -- I get a happy shudder. Cause it's time for YAY A BIG SCARY ADVENTURE and BATSHIT CRAZY PEOPLE KEEPING LITTLE BURNED GIRLS IN THE BASEMENT. You just get roped into this series, and no matter what ending you get (HELLO UFO ENDING LOL), you feel like you accomplished something -- even if Harry Mason ends up back in his jeep with his bleeding head wound pressed against the driver's side window. For real.

And you know with drugs (white claudia), a cult (oh oh oh them!), keeping little burned girls in the basement, torturing mentally-fragile hospital staff, letting your nurse friend get mutant-molested and then shutting the door on her, fighting a lizard that opens his mouth the wrong way and just plain telling people, "MY NAME IS HARRY MASON. I'M IN TOWN ON VACATION~" that any other game that follows this one with the words SILENT HILL in the title are gonna be one hell of a bumpy ride.

MOST UNSETTLING MOMENT: Tie between Harry Mason shutting the door in Lisa Garland's... face, and watching Cybil Bennett stand up from her spot on the carousel and jerk and spaz her way over to you.

MOST PRETTY DAMN GORGEOUS MOMENT: Harry and the baby. <3

PLAY ITTTTT.

I was straightening up my room and I saw my five D*C programs on my shelf. I hadn't realized 2007 was my fifth year. XD I went back and looked at some old pictures and thought that in honor of the five years I've been acting like a super uber-dork (aka MYSELF) on Labor Day weekend, I would post my favorite Dragon*Con pictures that my camera captured.

This convention is amazing and everyone should go at least once. :D

( 65 pictures! 2003 - 2007! Long Walk! Slash! Expanded Universe (TK/J/J/Z/T/A etc.)! Spartans! Caleb Ross! Ghost Hunters! LOVE. )

I HOPE TO HAVE MORE AMAZING DRAGON*CONS WITH YOU BITCHES FOR MANY YEARS TO COME. <3333 HEART HEART HEART.

Now, I'm going to get me some Taco Bell. O_O

AHAHAH. I still have pictures from high school/prom on my server. Flashback!

I can't believe that was 4 years ago. D:


Aaaaand I made the mistake of putzing around King sites and stumbling across this excerpt from Lisey's Story and now I want to read the book again.

This was for the well-known women's magazine that publishes the column "Yes, I'm Married to Him!" She spent roughly half of its five-hundred-word length explaining that her nickname rhymed with "CeeCee." Most of the other half had to do with her recipe for slow-cooked roast beef. Lisey's sister Amanda said that the picture accompanying the interview made Lisey look fat.

<333333 lol amanda debusher ILU. XD

( How many times had Scott come breezing in, calling "Hey, Lisey, I'm home—everything the same?" Meaning is everything all right, is everything cool.

;______________________________; )