big giant circles

<---biggiantcircles btw. (duh)

Yeah, I totally forgot about Chipp/Xyco, and I'm sure several other OCR peeps there too. Hope you guys are staying safe and everything gets back to normal soon.

It's up to an 8.9 at this point. Dale posted on FB, said he's ok for now... Hope he stays that way, for sure.

Is anybody keeping up with the giant earthquake/tsunami that is going on in Japan right now? This is horrifying...

Haha, awesome Actually I pretty much cleaned out Walgreens, bought some of like pretty much every over-the-counter meds they had from sudafed up to mucinex. Then I gave in and just went to a doctor (who was probably the most loony-toons medical professional I have ever met lol) and managed to get a prescription for some antibiotics. I totally wanted to go to Will's place though. I probably could have, but we stayed up pretty much the whole night before that, and I was just sort of at that point where I had to rest or I might just pass out at any given moment lol

Minecraft: I has it.

Yeah, that sinus infection pretty much destroyed my whole first weekend...

Yeah, seriously, seeing 3 of this picture gives me all kinds of happy Happy birthday guiz!

You know, shamefully, not from me. I took a million photos last year, and this year I just decided to just not worry about snagging pics of everything, for better or worse. But I know pics were taken, and when they pop up, I'll try to get them posted here.

I'll type out my full report later, but GDC was rad and here are some of the OCR-specific highlights: -Rooming with DannyB, Josh Whelchel, and others -MegaRan is awesome -Gratuitous amounts of DayJobOrchestra -I finally met Anosou, and he is every bit as sexy IRL as in IRC -Finally met AE/A Rival and he's a pretty rad dude too -Finally met Lizz -Hanging out with Kunal & Virt -Awesome cheesesteak with Bustatunez & co -seeing OCR peeps Bustatunez, Dan Reynolds, Jeff Ball, and Zircon (through proxy by Jill) get to win a GANG award for MI2 -Zircon/Pixie totally won the GANG GDC composer's challenge -Lots and lots and lots of other stuff (I'm sure I'm leaving out a bunch right this sec, but I'll fill it in later) Lowlights: -Wicked sinus infection landed the day before I flew to SF and pretty well screwed up the first few days I was there. Flying (changes in air pressure) + Ears/face being stuffed up = lots of pain. I thought I might have permanent hearing damage when they popped at one point. -I DID NOT GET TO EAT AT IN-N-OUT BURGER (mainly due to said sinus infection) -zircon's absence -DJP didn't win the GANG recognition award that I nominated him for -it came to an end So anyway, I'll do a full-on proper post-GDC report a bit later, but mainly I just wanted to make a thread for all the OCR people to chime in on.

BTW I totally finished my track just in the nick of time for GDC

I KNEW ABOUG SOULIARC BEFORE HE WAS A REMIXER Good on ya, dude, welcome aboard, the song is fantastic!

Well, I'm not necessarily saying Link needs a voice. Look how well Half Life 2 came out. I would want the dialogue to take that approach. People talk to you, but your actions do the talking.

HAVE YOU NO HEART??

I am Ganon's nephew. And now, you now know my real beef.

That's not really an excuse for them to keep doing it. "Well boys, we've flubbed it up for years, but don't you worry, the fans expect it, so it's coo." I like the musical cues and stingers too. Stuff like that gives any game more charm. They could easily leave the "da Da DA DAAAA" fanfare in there, while still allowing you to hit A and skip the text and speed up the process.

That's a fair observation, pretty much across the board. I know the odds of us ever even seeing a LoZ game come from a reputable western studio are probably about as good as winning a publishers clearing house sweepstakes. It's pretty much just wishful venting on my part. I thought that would be pretty clear already, but there it is, just so it's out there officially. As for my main beef with the game, I thought it would be clear by now too, but despite my grimacing about silly voices and other mediocre stuff, my main beef is quite clearly the wasted time due to the extreme repetition of things that DO NOT need to be watched after the first few times. This is going to sound harsh, but anyone who might defend such a feature as being necessary simply has no sense whatsoever. To say that those people "know what they're doing" yet look at what an obvious flaw that is is to me personally, quite baffling. Nothing against people who like the series. I've never said "People who like LoZ are idiots" and I never will, but I stand firm by my observation that the unskippable BS needs to be dealt with. It's been going on since OoT and it was going on in TP. What the hell? I guess being forced to sit through pointless nothings is a bigger deal to me than a lot of people, and that's fine, in the end, nobody's hurt at the end of the day and life goes on. And I suppose I could just not play the game and move on, but I admit I find it hard to not raise my voice at all because it seems like such an obvious, glaring design flaw that for any of the awesomeness contained in LoZ, it leaves such a bad taste in my mouth. Whatyagonnado, as Larry might say. Plus, considering that LttP is probably in my shiny, gleaming hall of awesome games that I <3 and right off the bat set me up to love the LoZ series very early, I consider me shouting for change to be more of like, support from the sidelines shouting for the underdog b/c I want him to win, and not shouting at the champion calling him a loser because I just don't like him at all. *edit* I complane becoz I kaer

Thought this was quasi-appropriate http://www.collegehumor.com/video:1945481

That's because it was Team Ninja. Hence why I want a western studio to do it As Mustin said

Well, I'm not saying it needs a style or a plot overhaul really. But honestly, how many LOZ fans would be offended if Nintendo allowed you to skip cutscenes? If anybody was offended by that, they'd be a genuine idiot Since I've played through Wind Waker 3 times, that should tell you that I enjoyed the game enough to not hate it, but I was definitely ready to throw my controller through the wall every time I was forced to sit and watch the animation of pulling a treasure chest out of the ocean and opening it up (usually for like 5 rupees) or feeding that annoying fish that tells you what island is hearby, etc etc. I also think a lot of the music in that game needed work. There were some really catchy/cool themes that just sounded like they were thrown together without a great deal of TLC, and then for the rest of the music, it was just a bunch of ambient pads mostly. And the dialogue was silly and childish in many places (like the pirates). And I have just never been a fan of the way they do voices--that is, having one really silly sound that blankets over the conversation with that particular character. "OOOOOooooohhhhhh!" <--Beedle "HWaaaaah!" <--Orca "Heeeeeyy!" <--Killer Bee kids "H-h-ee-ee-y!" <--King of Red Lions the list goes on and on. That's why I say I'd like to see a western studio be able to take a stab at it. I guess those things are just easier to accept in eastern culture. I want real voices, non-corny dialogue, more epicly produced music, and I WANT TO SKIP CUTSCENES dammit. That crap really does add up to hours of wasted time by the end of the game.

I for one would like to see a western studio take a stab at a Zelda game. Japan just can't quite seem to work out all the kinks. I'm so sick of unskippable cutscenes, odd voiceless characters, silly dialogue and vocal fx, the overall cartooniness, being told what a map/compass/small key/bombs/arrows, etc etc etc do EVERY SINGLE TIME you find them. Granted, there are a lot of Zelda games I haven't played. Now, LttP and Link's Awakening were fine. OoT and pretty much every other 3rd person, 3d game have been merely "ok" bearing all the flaws I mentioned above. I'm sure all the hardcore fans will hate me, but since the SNES/Gameboy games, all of their games have basically consisted of a few awesome things, surrounded by a lot of "meh." It's like, I really want to find the game amazing, but they just never quite reach it. That awesome picture is more epic than any actual Zelda game I've played on recent platforms. Flame away.

Clamato Fever is a bit over-compressed I believe. To the OP, I believe you have the option to use the original music if you're not a fan of the new music.

Very cool news!