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Thank you to Laura for the beautiful flowers that were delivered this evening, and to all of you for your memories of Jonathon, or rather Desbreko. We miss him so much, and my husband and I sat here in tears ( good tears) reading all the kind things that were said about our son. We knew only a little of his activities online, but we did know that he considered so many of you his friends. A few weeks after Jon passed away I wondered how I could let you all know, but we were in such a daze that trying to get on the Otaku site never occurred to us. Laura's note made me realize that maybe we could reach her and all of his friends here. We're both in our 60's and not tech savvy at all, so I hope you all will forgive us. It's still hard to imagine our life without Jon in it, but hearing about him from you all has made it a little easier to bear. Thank you so much for sharing.

I was thinking...cancer treatments and funeral costs are expensive even with insurance. If Desbreko's Mom (or even Laura on her behalf) want to set up a gofundme page I'm sure that we could all pull together and help a bit. I know that there aren't a lot of us left around here and the total raised won't be a huge amount, but if we can help the family of a young man that meant so much to this community, then I say that we show why we are a special place and pull together!

Hey all, Before this place dried up, it was the only Internet forum I frequently posted at (still don't use forums to this day). The collection of people, topics, talent, and overall vibe was fun and exciting. I loved the meaningful discussions, the RPGs, and the culture unique to this place. Sometimes we still fondly look back upon our previous days here and there, but we're rarely all here at the same time because of time zones, schedules, life. Having said that... Perhaps we could set a date aside in the upcoming months where for one day, (Call it OtakuBoards Day, Otakuboards Con, whatever) we all visit the forums like the old days and try to contribute something of value. We could celebrate this forum that we've all enjoyed so much at one time or another. I'm not saying that you have to sit at the computer and stare at the boards all day. Just check back throughout the day when time allows. Make a thread. Respond to a thread. Post some artwork. Write and share a story. We could try to be as active as our lives allow on that one day and party like it's 2001! I'll just pull a tentative date out of the air and say, January 17th (U.S). If anyone is on board (get the pun?) with the idea, we can alter that date and after we all agree, we can reflect the change either in the OP, an announcement, etc. I know it'll take a while before people see this thread--so tell your friends and direct them here. I wonder if we can spread the word and attract members who haven't posted in years. Even if you're new, it could be a good chance to have some fun. Let's set up something special! RSVP List (Jan 17th, 2016) Moi (Charles)JapanPetieBooAllamorphJCBaggeeDragon WarriorMelty CatShyGavinQueen AsukaBrasilHeaven's CloudThe Vampire: EdDeathknightAnnieBraidless BakaSaraEndymionJohn MagusSyk3ShwaSaiyaPrincessXRoxie Faye aka MistressRoxieDesbrekoJamesTheShinjeLehShinmaru

You too mate. I must admit, this COVID-19 situation kinda has me hankerin' to create an old-fashioned OB RPG...

I was deeply saddened to hear about Des' passing. It feels even worse to realise how long ago it happened. You just don't expect someone so young to go that way. He must've only been about the age I am now, and it seems devastatingly unfair for him to have suffered how he did. It was almost unreal to read his series of tweets and realise that this was the last people heard of him. It's been a very long time since I (or I guess, many of us) had much to do with this forum. Des was a fixture though, and a fantastic member of the community, who helped make it the welcoming, friendly and active community it was. He was the epitome of what this board represented. For someone who lived half a world away and who I haven't spoken to in probably ten years, I think he might be the closest person I know to have passed away. I think everyone's comments and memories here show how well loved he was, and I'm sure that he continued to make a positive impact in his life post-OB. Vale Desbreko.

... most interesting. I found myself saying this to a colleague of mine. For some reason he didn't think it was as funny and nostalgic as I did. Thanks, Gavin. Thanks.

A few things have changed the past years like working full time, co-habitating with another human, and using a very different set of slang these days, but apparently I'm still staying up way too late when I should be sleeping. Hey guys, been a while. I was at work when Laura messaged me about Des' and my original thought was "no f--king way... holy crap." I got along with Jonathan really easily. He didn't let stupid things rile him up and couldn't be bothered by petty dramas that we tended to observe from... others. He was my never-emptying source of prime screencaps all through the many years of caption battles and still the guy I think of when I see anything Rozen Maiden. Dude was awesome and I'm sad I didn't have the chance to tell him that more sooner. That said, I won't lie, I have definitely not been broken down the same way as some of you guys have. I'm very sad that Jon is gone and that I didn't message him more before the end, but overall I'm still going on alright. I am and always will still be the old man who has seen too much. I had a friend from work pass away from complications of leukaemia some years back (Graft vs Host Disease is seriously messed up), and I actually ended up being a pallbearer during his funeral. I've had a very close friend who has been dealing with depression and suicidal thoughts for a lot of the past 3 years as well, and in a lot of ways he has put my mind into a degree of preparation for what I may have to deal with some day (though I hope to all hope that day never comes). And a lot of you may still remember that one week many, many years ago one of our closer friends here almost got away from us in a similar way. Who knows, maybe I'm running out of tears to shed? Probably not. The worst things really can happen in an instant. Sometimes we can see it coming, other times all it takes is a tree and a windstorm like what happened to one poor local boy a couple weeks ago. Things can and will happen to us and the people around us, and with technology the way it is, the world is a whole lot smaller and our groups of friends are getting wider and wider. People we know will one day not be there. This is part of the life experience. It still sucks, but that's not gonna stop this truth. That said, while a lot of us have drifted away from this site, we can't help but acknowledge that we've been shaped by it a lot, and a lot of our younger formative years as sort-of adults started here. We all grew into the people we are not thanks to the people we met here. And this is why even though the last time I threw a message back and forth with Jonathan was in 2013, I can still tell people around me now about how chill and easygoing he was, how he was probably a huge fan of at least one thing they love, and why so many people now, all around the world, will still grieve for him so much now. Let me tell you guys something kinda ridiculous: I started posting here less, more or less abandoned my duties as a team member on this site (still really sorry about that, Adam!), and overall only popped back to write an essay or two about how my life had been going about girls I took far too long to get over. Despite that, my Firefox homepage is still "theotaku.com/backroom/". Even if we don't use the site as much now, we don't have to close the connection. Des' worked hard to help code that stuff, damnit... ....okay, maybe it was actually really easy for him... Either way, even if this reunion is for the worst reason, just let it remind you all that everyone who affected your life here will continue to do so once you're well into your grown-assed adult lives now. We're all still here. And you all still mean something to everyone here... ...oh crap... ............I was supposed to have a cup of tea in Des' honour today. Oops. Sorry Des'. I'll fix that tomorrow, promise.

You make it sound like we're being put out to pasture, man. :P

I like trains.

OB was the last forum-based internet community I was a part of, I think; since then, I've been involved with a small, close-knit game streaming community for several years now. And although there's something about message boards that I miss, an itch that remains unscratched, every time I find a new one that I think I might like to take part in, I'll sign up, browse the boards, look for a thread I might like to participate in, and... eh. I just kinda lose the motivation to participate. Is it because message boards used to be more or less the only way to be social online, and now that need is filled by a newer generation of shallower, more immediate social networking services? Is it because I found OB in my more vulnerable teenage years and I just don't need that kind of community in my life anymore? Is it because OB back in the day really was just a lot more lively and special than these other places I've tried out since then? I dunno.   Maybe we don't come back because observation has taught us that nostalgia is a siren song, and if we try to rebuild the special thing we once had we'll only find that we can't just reach into the ether, grab the spark of meaning that once imbued it, and shove it back in again. I'm different, you're different, the world's different, and they can't ever be the same again.   But that's just what observation has taught us, and sometimes observation is wrong. Like AmbyCakes referred to (excuse me, AmbyCakes. Almost forgot all the old post styling conventions!), the magic of forums is asynchronous communication. It's actually not a big deal for us to get back togetherâ??no commitment, no co-ordination, no planning. Just gotta hop on, make a post, and hop back off until someone else replies. We like to think that "life got in the way", but you know what? Most of us are probably twenty-somethings with ten or a hundred times better internet connections than we had back in the day, and desk jobs with plenty of hours to slack off during. And yeah, we've all changed, but guess what else: most of us have probably become way cooler and more interesting than we used to be. Because guys, I love you, but have you gone back through any old threads lately? A lot of that **** we posted back then was pretty cringe-worthy. I don't really want to be an anxious teenager talking about the Matrix again. I'd rather be an adult talking about the Matrix.   And I'd rather hear about the new things you guys are into, too, and the interesting lives you led when you were away from OB. Did you guys know Sara got married? Ok a lot of you probably did because of Facebook, but isn't that cool?! We should talk about stuff like that.   I think forums probably ended because they stopped being what we thought they had to be: our online homes. Maybe this one can live again as something else: our online neighborhood bar (yeah, you know what that is before you even click). A place that doesn't fill our deep emotional needs, it just greets us with warmth, familiar faces and good conversation whenever we feel like popping in.   And if, like Boo expressed, we wanted to do this somewhere without the ostensible focus on anime, maybe we could goad Tony into re-establishing Orange Lazarus; that was the real cool kids' club anyway.

I am fairly certain my last post here was some kind of "omg, it's been so long!!1" type of deal, and now a few years later here I am again, haha. :) It's awesome to see some names I recognise--Shy, SaiyanPrincessX, James; glad to see you are all doing well. Speaking of the old guard, I can see it's PiroMunkie's birthday as I type this, so Happy Birthday if you ever read this, old chum.   So what am I doing, like, right now? Well, I can tell you I've just been on a massive nostalgia trip trawling through what used to be the Roleplaying & Storytelling forum--So many of our old threads and games are still there, frozen in time, it's surreal. Feels like I'm walking through the empty halls of my old high school or something. (By god, I wish we had finished Maverick Hunters: Personification!)   I won't bore you with the gory details of my sordid past so here's the synopsis--worked for the tax department, got fired for being a daydreamer who did no work and spent all my time writing stories, survived an earthquake, survived another much worse earthquake, got a graphic design qualification, met my long-term girlfriend of four years, got a design job with a big media company, moved around the country, survived ANOTHER earthquake....   And now most recently, my partner and I have moved back to our home city of Christchurch, and have just bought a house together! It's a pretty grown-up thing but I am still very much just a big kid--still playing way too many video games, still watching cartoons and anime (although I just watched Eva Rebuild 3.0!), still getting lost in my own imagination writing short stories and drawing maps and pictures that no-one else is ever likely to see, hehe.   To any other oldies who might stumble across this at some point in the future--Rahia, Rico, TN, Seph, Warwick, Neil, and the many others I've no doubt forgotten... I miss you guys, and I hope you are all doing well.   -Flash

Dear reader,   I am typing this message while rebels lay siege on my client's castle in Amsterdam, the capital of Europe. My client, someone you seem to know mainly as Boo, has asked me to call for your help. He has a very large sum of money that needs to be kept safe while he finds a way to free himself of the clutches of the communists. You seem to be the only person he entrusts with this task. The number we are speaking of is just little over 610.000 EUR which roughly converts to 3.512.000.000 USD, as you may know. There are two reasons why he asked for your help in this:   1. According to DNA tests you are the closest living family member he has. 2. The money was earned by the big success of the OB Podcast, which featured many of you. ¹   I regret to inform you that due to Europe's current regulations, you would only able to give Boo back 1.000 EUR and you will have to keep the rest of the money and do with it as you see fit. Please send me your bank account number, credit card number, access codes, login codes for OtakuBoards, picture of you, picture of you naked, and a picture of your mother via private message on this website. I will transfer the money right away.   Thank you for helping my client out! Have a nice day.   Yours faithfully,   Boo's lawyer     Get it? It's a CON.  Ha.     ¹ Korey hasn't seen a single cent of it, so please do not mention it to him.

[img]http://i47.tinypic.com/2yyccxl.jpg[/img] here it is! (: hope you and Shinmaru like it..xD [b]SLOTS:[/b] 1. [s]Shinmaru's portrait![/s] --- 2. --- 3. ---

https://www.guildwars2.com/en/news/celebrating-20-years-of-guild-wars/ "Twenty years ago this month, ArenaNet launched the first Guild Wars® campaign, which would eventually be called Prophecies™." MEMORIES!

Holy moly, this place still exists! I was having a nostalgia trip on Facebook of when Boo randomly put song lyrics of an Original Song parody we did on the OB podcast back at its height. Looking back, the Podcast was one of the most creative things I'd ever done and it was so much fun to interact with so many of you guys in person. The show was just a giant hodge podge of user-generated, user-driven content and it truly embodied how amazing and talented so many of you were. I remember my early years of OB were just me with a very age-appropriate user name doing random RPs with total internet strangers. I remember being intimidated to interact in other forums because I felt so out of my depth there, but the regular posters there were so amazing welcoming and kind. A fond memory (and this really dates me here, lol) is when I got my first invite to a group AIM conversation with several of the staff/regular members. I felt so honored because at the time I was a brand new moderator. It was so cool to interact with people in real time versus on a forum. From there it was Skype and Facetime and even IRL meetups. So many of you are so rad. I hope everyone is doing well!

Gods. It's been a long time. I turn 32 in March. I got glasses three years ago. I'm engaged and living in a house with my polycule that we own. 13 year old me first finding this place would never believe this post.

It's been a long, long, LONG time... (2000's username was Patronus)

I completely understand where you are coming from, and see it in my own posts from 20 years ago. But I think we need to remember that as humans, we're meant to grow and change and the fact that you can look back and pinpoint why you acted the way you did says a lot about you. You're self-aware and have the ability to recognize your own past flaws - a trait I don't think many people have. I spent a lot of time on this forum 20 years ago. I was a kid, brash and eager to stand out from the crowd. I can without doubt say that's not at all who I am now. Is it cringeworthy? Yes. But it's also a good reminder of how far I (we) have come.

I do not have as lengthy a response. I was a huge matrix nerd back in the day. Posters, merch, etc. Lol. I was very pumped to get back into that world and see something new and different. I enjoyed it, though 1 & 2 were my favorites, but that could just be because I was so influenced by it as a teen. I had a few qualms with it but I don't know how to put them into words. I think I wanted more action, less psychological chit chat in his video game world... But that's also the old teen in me. ?‍♀️

No one will see this. They're 5 now. He loves his hot wheels roads, she is really good at coloring. I'm happy one of them got my artsy side. Their dad is a good artist as well so one had to.

Not sure how I got myself back to OB and not sure if this thread is still alive but I figured I'd come back to check it out. Thus, here I am, writing this post. I hope everyone is doing well during this pandemic and has been doing great things throughout the years that I have been gone. As for me, after my long 12 years in the Navy, I left medically retired. I am now back at home, enjoying my life on the other side as a civilian. Honestly, it's strange for me to think I had a life before the Navy; seems like the Navy is all I know. But anyway, hope to see some familiar names pop up.

Twenty years as of today! Wild. mattdamonaging.gif

Hey everyone! The old OB podcast was mentioned in a chat earlier this morning and I happen to have a complete copy of the episodes that I hosted way back when (I'm not sure if others were uploaded elsewhere after the last one that I have). If anyone is interested in taking a walk back in time to 2011, I've uploaded all of the episodes and a CSV with titles, descriptions, and a few stats for each that you can download here: https://www.otakuboards.com/podcast.zip

Welcome to OtakuBoards! Hello! Just because you're new to OtakuBoards doesn't mean you have to be a stranger. After all, you're part of a pretty tight community now. You're going to be learning about us and we would like to reciprocate the effort by learning about you too. Feel free to use this thread to tell us more about yourself. What are your hobbies? Why did you choose your user name? What are your favorite television shows? What kind of experience do you expect to have here at OtakuBoards? It's all up to you to decide what to tell us. Also, if you have any questions about the site in general, feel free to include them in your post. We'll be glad to help you. We look forward to hearing from you!

Honestly anyone who signs up here in 2018 and starts posting in earnest is some kind of superhuman in my eyes, but yeah, necro-ing a thread that might be as old as the poster themselves is a truly next-level move. I couldn't even attempt it.

Haha, yeah I agree. I never would've imagined that either. I've had to do lunges while holding one, just to finish a workout. Never thought that would happen, lol. Currently they have their first cold. Here's two, a few weeks ago. Jun is wearing the shirt I was brought home from the hospital in, 31 years ago. The other is one of the few pics of me and them.

Welcome, I've been here for over a decade, almost two decades. It isn't as active as it once was, hoping one day it will pick back up!

We should start deciding baby names. It takes a villageboards, as they say....

This is a little late but I want to thank Ginger and SunfallE for beautiful flowers you sent in memory of our son Jonathan (Desbreko). I has been really heart warming to see how many friends Jon had and how well liked and respected he was. I want to thank all of you for your expressions of sympathy. Desbreko's Dad

Greetings. So I reached out to the family and they told me that everything has been paid for. However if you would like to, they would rather you donate whatever you are willing to the places that helped Desbreko with his treatments to further the cause of finding a cure for cancer. I have found them for you guys and the links are below: City of Hope American Cancer Society Stanford Medicine Thanks for the willingness to help guys. Laura/Japan

The site that hosted this has long since been taken down and the Stitcher link no longer works but I still have the original files. I attached the episode in question for anyone interested. OB Podcast 11 - The Real Stuff Sucks.mp3

Career path update: I got that agency job! I'm a designer at a small studio in Madison, Wisconsin now. Dessert situation: apparently on Wednesdays everyone goes and gets really good malts, so I'd peg it at "agreeable".

Look at all these familiar faces. Hi guys! I actually came back to this site for a moment because I'm writing a piece for my job, which I wouldn't have without joining these boards. I'm doing my Doctorate in English and Cultural Studies and get to work as a lecturer too - there's a big series of talks in the summer that I'm involved in around digital culture so rightfully I ended up back here. I'm only 24 now and I joined in 2003, thirteen years ago. I was the type of kid that spent a lot of time in my room and on my computer, so I was here quite a lot making RPGs. Since I've been writing from my undergrad and had a lot of success in that area, I've never come across a time where I've improved creatively and technically in my life than joining these forums - everything after was a steady climb that doesn't compare to the dive bomb of joining a random internet forum when you're eleven. It's not necessarily learning how to be a writer, but more the imaginative process that goes into what we used to do here; character and world creations, collaborations, motivation to carry on (I don't recall a finished RPG though) and the benefits of thinking big when you're working with what is essentially such a small, limited platform. You have to come up with a lot of clever solutions and most of the people I work with don't have the same base skill set I feel I've gained from my adventures online. This forum, which again explains why I'm back here right now, is also a gateway to my field of expertise in what I hope is a long career for me. I feel like I grew up here. There was, of course, the outside world, but this place is influential to my perception of my work and the cultural landscape I'm exploring. Also, I certainly was a pretty lonely and depressed kid, and I still have trouble talking to IRL people about anything that's troubling me. The friends I made here got me through to being an adult who is almost comfortable with myself, and sometimes I cherish the memories of the friends I had on here more than the ones outside. I'm actually quite upset AIM closed down and I can't stay up until 4am to chat to some of you. To be specific though, I'd list my lessons from this site as: Creative Writing;Graphic Design;Handling criticism;Never argue with Allamorph on the rules and regulations of grammar;Internet etiquette; Boo is not from England.

Thriving.

The last couple of weeks, I've been rewatching "The Wallflower." I love that show. I don't really think I can explain the allure it has to me, though I want to make mom watch it because she keeps bothering me that I didn't grow up to be "the lady" she wanted. I liek a frumpy girl who likes scary, macabre things. I also really like the word MACABRE. 

This girl I really like bought me chocolate, video games, and special bath stuff, so we're gonna spend some quality time in the tub playing the new Monster Hunter.   [spoiler]THE GIRL I REALLY LIKE IS MEEEEEEEEEEEEE[/spoiler]

so im not popular, i have one female friend and she is very cute and yes she is an otaku gamer type but im me, so i cannot talk to her im shy but she thinks im ignoring  i don't know how to tell her that I've "liked" her for a while help?    

  Hey kuji. ;-)   I think we were all very different. Things used to seem so much bigger - and I guess they were at one stage! I remember when I'd log into OB each day and find dozens (and, at times, well over a hundred) new posts across the forums. It really did feel like OB was a big community, but not as painfully big as a 4chan or something like that.   As it is, I never really got into message boards much after OB. I post occasionally on AppleInsider, but that's about it. I used to post on Steam User Forums, but now the Half-Life area has died down so much that I don't really bother anymore.   OB was really the only place that had that really unique mix of topics (everything from political debate to video games to RPGs). :)   It's good to see some people still around. Although, there are a few people who just disappeared and I've always wondered what happened to them...

If only there was I way that I could find the perfect words necessary to respond to this topic...

Well, I keep coming back here to check up on things, sometimes I can have a quick burst of activity but I never end up staying because the forums are so quiet now.  OB has sentimental value for me, as the first online community I ever signed up for, and I'm all for any ideas that'll jolt the senses and give OB a new lease of life. So when I saw this thread adressing the issue,. I knew I had to try and remember my password and contribute a few ideas... For your consideration.   Gear the forums toward fan art. :3 The Otaku community has been focused on fan art for a long time now, while the boards are now more centered around general discussion. I suggest taking a dual-media apporach encouraging the fan art community to both discuss the series and share their art works with the community. You could spin this as a way for artists to get noticed and get a wider audience. OB then benefits from the large fan art base on TheOtaku, streamlining the memembership so their existing TheO account also works here might, already have been done, but if it hasn't, my idea! :tongue:   Kill. The. Padded. Room. Party. >.>   Why? To encourage new threads and discussions on the topics that won't just fade as pages pass and other discussion vie for space. The lounge has not been the same since that thread opened, it's the all-encompassing behemoth that takes in almost all areas of discussion and it leaves no room for other discussions, why start a new thread when you can just PRP it?  It's exactly the same reason I have not discussed much anime series after the one-thread-per-anime thing came into being. Which segues perfectly into my next idea,   Opening separate anime forums again. ^_^ The goal of the move was a good one, cut down on maintenance, but in the end, I think, a lot of the more nuanced discussion about a particular series was lost to a general thread of 'I like it' and 'the latest episode was so cool.' Those examples are paraprhased but that was the general feeling I got. We lost those insane but enjoyably fun conspiracy threads and those threads on a specific topic that woudl spiral into a whole new arena of discussion and take on a new life of it's own, or maybe that was only the Digimon thread about the pink Power Ranger toy. This works well with the idea to incorporate fan art, as each series can then have it's own little hub. The art forum can then be used as a place for all non-specific art works, the graphics worms, the banner requests etc.   Bright large logo and logo competitions O_IO This ties into the fan art focus idea. How about having a big logo at the top like we used to have, with the graphic links and intergrated anime characers? You could hold regular competitions to design them. There were some good logos that came out of those competitions, Syk3's was awesome and who knows? Perhaps something big bright and cheerful would be more inviting to some people as well. :)   These are things I believe can help stimulate the OB community and bring in the new membership base. What are your thoughts?

To actually answer the question, I've been ... different. I didn't start lurking/posting here until I was about halfway through my first year of college. I'm a smart guy, and a good worker, but I suffered from a mild case of general inexperience-based-ignorance and accepting apathy (i.e., 'this kinda sucks but I'll work with it') and thought I could work through something I didn't fully understand and didn't really want. I was diligent at first, but I kinda saw a lot of my peers giving way less effort for the exact same result, and for a while I tried that and then wondered why it didn't work. And then combined with some serious disillusionment and some poor choices regarding work and finances and roommates, I ended up basically retreating from a lot of the world for about a year. But then I got sick of it. I was going absolutely nowhere, doing nothing to better myself and wasting my money (which I didn't really have), my talents (which I started to let stagnate as well), and all the time in the world. And my parents, who are good people, didn't really know what else to do besides tell their twenty-three year old son to buck up and get with the program, because although they're supportive and understanding, they're not the type of people to sit there and hold your hand through everything. They worked their own way up and had to deal with just as much stuff as I did, so they weren't going to come flying to my rescue just because I felt bad and didn't want to try. And mostly I was tired of sitting on my ass all day doing nothing but sleep and eat and ... process food. So in April '11 I enlisted with the Navy. I wasn't actually able to ship out until the end of October, but I moved back home in the interim and almost immediately found work: making biscuits at Hardee's for eight hours a day. Not the most glamorous of jobs, but it was tiring, and it paid, and it kept me from further pushing myself into thoughts of what a miserable sot I was. Funny how work does that for you. Especially work where you exert yourself. Beating down dough and slinging around biscuit trays and trash bags and scrubbing the food muck off the floor makes you break a sweat. So I did it, and did it well, and when I left everyone was let down because once I got into it I made some damn fine biscuits. (And kept a damn shiny floor.) I shipped out to Basic Training Camp (or BT Camp, hence "boot") 25OCT11. I know that date by heart; it's kinda like my second birthday, now. And that was two months of essentially group isolation while a set of sailors made us stronger and faster and less collectively stupid. It wasn't fun, but I kinda miss it now. I graduated from there in early December, and since then I've been in bar-none the longest training pipeline in the military. (Even longer now because of delays due to equipment failures and staff integrity issues.) I'm still not even a real sailor; I have yet to lay eyes on an actual steaming ship, much less be allowed inside one. But it's necessary for us. My rate (or job, for you civilian types) is a nuclear-qualified mechanic. I, along with two other rates, maintain, work on, troubleshoot, operate, and fix nuclear propulsion plants, which are installed on every one of our submarines and aircraft carriers. Nuclear propulsion is basically a keystone to our fleet strength; without it, our carriers can't travel around the world without needing to be so-close to a friendly port for refueling, and our ballistic/guided missile and fast-attack submarines wouldn't be able to stay underwater for extended periods of time without running out of food or killing their crews by diesel/gas fumes. But nuclear power is also a touchy subject to the general public. We can't afford to have nuclear disasters. Otherwise we'd lose access to basically all our allied ports (and what few neutral ones allow us in), and our strongest vessels would remain tied to port on one of our coastlines. So they train us for a minimum of a year and three months, although I'll hit my two-year mark in the Navy in just over two more months. I mean, think about it. If I were to come to San Diego and say, "Hey, I want to build a nuclear power plant to power your city, but I want to put it right about the middle, right where all the people live," I'd get shot down immediately. If I said, "Also, yeah, I wanna put wheels on it and drive it around the city," I'd be laughed out of the state. But at any given point in the year right now, there could be over half a dozen (maybe over a dozen) of those exact platforms sitting right there. And the city lets us. Heck, we even have a nuclear carrier parked in Japan's backyard. Think about that. Think about the history of that country and this country and that word. So they train the ever-loving crap out of us so when we go and operate a no-shit live plant for realsies, we don't botch it. But I'm almost done. And I just got orders this week, so provided everything goes well, I'll be moving to Seattle in October. In the meantime (with, like, the two free hours a day we're given while in this pipeline), I still read and write sometimes, goof around on game systems, have been going to the gym much more often, and have recently gotten really into Airsoft and snowboarding. I hope all the rest of you are well.

Ew.

[quote name='Silver Mech'] [quote name='chibi-master']Macadamia nuts are really good! They have an odd texture, but the flavor is really light. They're good alone, but are best in cookies because they get even softer when cooked that way.[/quote] I should look for ome on [u][b]Amazon[/b][/u], then.[/quote] [quote name='Silver Mech'][size=5]I should look for ome on [u][b]Amazon[/b][/u], then.[/size][/quote] [quote name='Silver Mech'] [size=6][u][b]Amazon[/b][/u][/size] [/quote] [center][img]http://i195.photobucket.com/albums/z158/Allamorph/Misc/lolz/reactionz/1336812246294.jpg[/img][/center]

For Boo - I hope you read this! Here is your pony..hehehe! c: [img]http://i50.tinypic.com/20fdb4j.jpg[/img]

[b]Zelda[/b] taught me never, [i]ever[/i] to mess with chickens.

[quote name='The Professor' timestamp='1332413959' post='710852'] [font=comic sans ms,cursive]12345? Really? Good thing you weren't trying to get into my luggage.[/font] [/quote] [font=trebuchet ms,helvetica,sans-serif][color=#9900ff]*jots this down for future reference*[/color][/font] [font=trebuchet ms,helvetica,sans-serif][color=#9900FF]As an aside, apparently we can Like posts now. This shall be handy.[/color][/font]

[font=trebuchet ms,helvetica,sans-serif][color=#9900ff]Okay so I had made a post in here about the game when I was close to finishing it, and then literally a day later the site went BEWM and ate my post, so I'm going to make another one now that I've actually beaten it.[/color][/font] [font=trebuchet ms,helvetica,sans-serif][color=#9900FF]This game. I wanted to love this game to pieces. I really, really did. It's chronologically the first game in the series, you can fly around, the game looked downright beautiful -- and I'm someone who barely ever puts stock into graphics -- and I just wanted to eat it all up. The entire internet seemed enamored with it, and I wanted to be one of those people.[/color][/font] [font=trebuchet ms,helvetica,sans-serif][color=#9900FF]I, unfortunately, am not one of those people. I mean, don't get me wrong -- it's still a good game. Great, even, when it really hits its stride. It starts off with a ton of energy and makes you so excited to jump right into the story.[/color][/font] [font=trebuchet ms,helvetica,sans-serif][color=#9900FF]And then, for me, around Lanayru, it just slowly started to fall flat. The desert was a pain to navigate, and I was not fond of the mining facility at all. And then things after that just...got really shaky.[/color][/font] [font=trebuchet ms,helvetica,sans-serif][color=#9900FF]I can sum up my main two problems as thus:[/color][/font] [font=trebuchet ms,helvetica,sans-serif][color=#9900FF][b]One:[/b] The sheer lack of places to go. I get that they were trying to cram everything onto a single-layer disc, but even then I don't really like that excuse. You're sent to the same three places each time you go down, and while they do do things to shake it up, it just gets really frustrating. I wanted to be able to explore interesting new locations, and it just kinda failed. The sky REALLY dropped the ball in this regard -- it's so limited and cramped. It didn't feel like the vast sky at all. I was hoping the thunderhead would explore more of that, but it didn't have a whole lot, either.[/color][/font] [font=trebuchet ms,helvetica,sans-serif][color=#9900FF]That said, the third visit to each area I actually really liked...except for Faron [which I'll touch on later]. The stealth mission in Eldin was shockingly fun, and Lanayru was not that bad, probably because it was mercifully short. And I loved Skyloft itself -- it's probably my favorite hometown in any of the games.[/color][/font] [font=trebuchet ms,helvetica,sans-serif][color=#9900FF][b]Two: [/b]FETCH. QUESTS. I don't mind them in small doses, doubly so if they're just sidequests, but the middle of the game just POUNDS you with so many of these stupid things that the game became more of a chore than anything else. I wanted story and exploration, not pointless padding in the form of "HEY GET ME THIS THING AND I'LL TELL YOU WHERE TO GO...JUST SO YOU CAN GET MORE THINGS FOR PEOPLE LOL!!!!1!111111!!!11!!1". The third and final visit to Faron with the Tadtones was the worst, which sucks because I probably actually would have liked it if there hadn't already been so freaking many beforehand. [Although the rage was doubly compounded by Fi tossing the dowsing at me when I was already 75% done, and then you can't even use the dowsing when you swim anyway, so what's the point?! GAH!][/color][/font] [font=trebuchet ms,helvetica,sans-serif][color=#9900FF]NOW. With that all said, there were still good things to make it worthwhile.[/color][/font] [font=trebuchet ms,helvetica,sans-serif][color=#9900FF][b]The story: [/b]The story managed to keep me interested all throughout, and was my main motivator throughout the whole ordeal. Catching on to all of the mythology gags was fun, too [even if I had to look a lot of them up later because I'm that dense >_>;].[/color][/font] [font=trebuchet ms,helvetica,sans-serif][color=#9900FF][b]The characters: [/b]This is my main selling point right here. I love, love, [i]love[/i] the cast in this game. They rank up there with Majora's Mask and Wind Waker's cast for me. The denizens of Skyloft are all unique and likeable [generally, anyway; I kind of wanted to pour more dust on Pipit's mom after her little side story when you get her gratitude crystals], the races on the surface are all interesting and fun, and then Link and Zelda themselves are probably my favorite to date. Ghirahim is a delightfully disturbing villain and a fresh change from the "GRR I'M GANON AND I'M ANGRY >:C" that we're usually used to. [spoiler]Demise is a surprisingly affably evil guy, even when you kick his face in. He's a better sport than his sword[/color][/font][font=trebuchet ms,helvetica,sans-serif][color=#9900FF] at any rate.[/color][/font][font=trebuchet ms,helvetica,sans-serif][color=#9900FF][/spoiler] And then there's Groose, who is basically Mido if he had better writing/character development and played an active role in the story. His development pleasantly surprised me, and he ended up being my favorite character out of the whole thing.[/color][/font] [font=trebuchet ms,helvetica,sans-serif][color=#9900FF]But yeah, great ragtag bunch of misfits. I really hope to see their ancestors in future games. [Especially Groose. I refuse to believe his physical similarities to the Gerudo is just a happy coincidence.][/color][/font] [font=trebuchet ms,helvetica,sans-serif][color=#9900FF][b]Gameplay: [/b]I'm...actually kind of torn on the motion controls. Generally, they work pretty good. But there's just some times when it feels tacked on -- the key things to the boss doors are a prime offender. Whoever thought that'd be a good idea needs to be slapped with a lobster.[/color][/font][font=trebuchet ms,helvetica,sans-serif][color=#9900FF] But I'm kind of miffed because Nintendo themselves admitted that the long development time is because of the fine-tuning of the motion controls, which means everything else just kinda took a backseat, and it shows. I actually had a similar complaint towards Pokemon Black and White, but it had the inverse problem of the story, while good for a Pokemon game, took up nearly everything, while all the other stuff got pushed off to the side, especially in the postgame.[/color][/font] [font=trebuchet ms,helvetica,sans-serif][color=#9900FF]I digress, though. I've rambled long enough. It's a good game. It's just deeply, deeply flawed. I'd recommend it to fellow Zelda vets, but I couldn't in good conscience recommend it to someone as their first Zelda game.[/color][/font]

[color=deeppink]So are we taking bets on when the stalking starts? I'm betting middle of page 5, and closed by page 8 out of moderator annoyance. [center][IMG]http://media.lawrence.com/img/photos/2005/04/07/inigomontoya.jpg [/IMG] [/center] That's totally me. True story. [spoiler]Actually, [URL=http://nottofifty.vox.com/library/photo/6a00c22523d659604a00c2252a3ce98fdb.html]this[/URL] is me.[/spoiler][/color]