Brendan's Progress = Finished... for now

I did it. Just like I said I would. I fucking did it.

Thoughts about this some other time... I am fucking done with writing for the moment. lolololol

But remember... this story... this isn't over...

Brendan's Progress and the Final Stretch Part 4

I'm so close to the end I can smell it.

As of this post, I'm 44,120 words in. I have 5,880 left.

I also have work tomorrow.

I'm probably going to write again before the night is up. Maybe start at about 11pm and finish before midnight, clock those words in to see where I stand (which will done here in an edit sometime around midnight) and I may write some more after midnight...

Because I have work in the morning... -_-

I think that having work in the morning, however, will be better for trying to finish up this goal as opposed to having work in the afternoon and evening... I can't quite put my finger on why though... I guess because... oh whatever, it's just a better way to finish it off.

But yeah. I'm there. The end is near. Now obviously, this could be words written towards the book, but fuck. I need breaks and stuff. My brain is sizzling from all this writing, I swear.

Like, I definitely took much longer breaks than I should have today. I had a plan to write at least 1000 words every hour on the hour from 2pm up to whenever, but I was playing video games and watching videos. It's been rough, but I'm getting these words done. Hopefully, I'll have at least 45,000 done by midnight, and then maybe squeeze out another 1000 or so after midnight before I go to sleep. I feel like I need to crunch out as many words as I can so that after work, it will be relatively easy to coast to the finish line.

But yeah. The end is near. I can smell.

Then maybe I can work on this novel in a regular, sane manner... Shit.

Edit: (1:11am) 46,022 words. Approximately 4,000 words left. Oh fucking boy. This could potentially be a photo finish, but I'm definitely going in today. Gonna bust off a couple hundred words on phone at work, then I'm a finish strong when I get home.

I am going to Win NaNoWriMo.

Brendan's Progress and the Final Stretch Part 3

As of this very post, I'm at 40,135 words. I have 9,865 words left to write in a matter of two days.

I'll probably still write a little bit more before this day over. I may even write a little more after midnight, and have it count for "tomorrow" and whatnot.

But I'm getting there. I can see the light. I brought my remaining word count down to below 10k. This is very, very doable at this point.

And I still got the fire to write it too. It's not like I'm struggling to come up with stuff. Granted, this is heading in a direction I kinda sorta didn't exactly imagine it to go... mostly within the specific details of where it went at this point, as opposed to where it is a whole... oh, my mind, what a wonderful piece of work.

But this is what happens when you improvise a novel from scratch. I have plenty of general ideas, but I have no idea how this is going to come out in the end. I do know that when it's all said and done, the final product is going to be ridiculously amazing.

But I still don't think I write literature. Naaah, literature is for those who give a shit.

This entire novel seems to be based on not giving a shit. Or rather, the entire way I'm writing this novel is based on not giving a shit.

Tuesday the 29th and Wednesday the 30th remain. Tomorrow is my final day off from work, and Wednesday, I do in fact work. But if it's not too busy, best believe I'm cheating and going to get more than a few words done via my phone....

So yeah. 40,135 words written. 9,865 words left to write. Enough of this day is left to knock out maybe 500-1000 more words, and maybe tomorrow, if I'm really, really ridiculous enough and insane enough, I'll knock the entire remainder out...

That actually sounds like something to aim for...

Brendan's Progress and the Final Stretch Part 2

Well... NaNoWriMo is almost complete... there's like three days of writing left... Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday.

I fucking got this.

I made some baller ass gain today... 6275 words today.

I even managed to throw in a sex scene.

Sex scenes... I find an interesting difficulty in writing sex scenes... but I'm going to leave it up to your imagination to figure out what that difficulty is.

Right now, I'm at 36,715 words. I have 13,285 words remaining.

I am totally going to hit this goal. Procrastination for the win.

Brendan's Progress and the Final Stretch

So NaNoWriMo is almost over. Today is the 26th of November, and this ends on the 30th.

As of this posting, I have 30,440 words. And I'm on my way to work now (*insert vintage Marko Man rage here*) so I'm done writing for the day.

I do have the next three days off. That's Sunday, Monday, and Tuesday. With about 20,000 more words to write, I have to make ENORMOUS gains on those three days because Wednesday, I'm back at work. At least it will be in the morning, so I can come home and try to finish whatever I didn't finish, but still... I need to make the next three days count hardbody.

Like, I seriously need 3 consecutive 6000 word days, minimum, for me to feel like this can be done.

And it can be done.

So where exactly is Brendan right now? At the airport, duh.

And I'm making a total mess of the place. :-)

And I'm not even done fucking the place up yet...

And my mind came up with yet another plot twist. And I'm sure that my mind will have another plot twist in store as well.

Of course, remember, the end of November does not mean the end of the book. Nope, I'm nowhere near done with the first third of this book (as far as my mind can see it as of right now). There's still a ton of crazy shit to just throw into this book, and it's going to be amazing, at worst.

But right now, I need to just focus on that 50000 word goal. I even deactivated my FaceBook.

Yes. This is Serious Business.

Corruption

A part of me is corrupt, a part of me is pissed,
A part of me doesn't wanna be corrupt in this bitch.
The way this world works doesn't give me a choice,
So I express myself in violence since I have no voice.
You can't fight a good fight when you're fighting an asshole,
You can't get the truth for free without a golden lasso.
I have me some dirty money, grenades, and bullets.
I'm just the trap of a trigger, they're the ones that pull it.
You claim to be a hero, but open your eyes,
You're applying pain too, but use peace as a disguise.
If everything was peaceful we wouldn't be here,
Humans cause the chaos, that's why we always see fear.
You say you fight for justice based on what you've seen,
Get the dirt out of your eyes and learn what justice really means.
The real knows that I'm touchin on deep stuff.
After blood comes peace and I ain't even spill enough.

View

Yes... Yes...
Let's all come face to face with our dreams, and then wake up.
Allow reality to wear you out, putting you to sleep.
Then dream, repeating the cycle all over again.

Song of the Day!

YES! IT'S BACK! SONG OF THE DAY!

So... have you ever been walking somewhere or going somewhere or maybe going nowhere at all and you got music playing someway, somehow, maybe through an iPod, an mp3 player, or a radio, and suddenly this one song comes on and it changes your entire mood? You were all stable an inanimate one moment, then this song comes on, and BOOM! You're an insane dancing mess... you're driving and suddenly you can't even drive right cause this song is playing, or you're walking and suddenly you start walking to the beat and dancing in your walk, or you were perfectly still and stable and inanimate and suddenly you bust out in a private, spontaneous performance?

Enter "Atomic Dog" by George Clinton.

I'm going through my mp3 player, playing the songs, deleting the ones I don't want anymore and keeping the ones that I do.

And this comes on. Suddenly, I bust out in dancing in my walk, and when I stop walking, I can't even stop dancing, hitting some nasty steps. I forget how hilariously good I can move sometimes.

Anyway, for that, this is the Song of the Day.

Atomic Dog

I need to get at some more funk...

Oh... that's disco... hmmm.... HELP!!!

More of Brendan's Progress, Lost Adventures in December, and Other Stuff

More of Brendan's Progress


On Sunday, I was able to throw down 5,002 words. Awesome.
But then I wasn't able to write anything on Monday because I was in Philly again. ^_^
Today, after I finish posting this, I'll get back to writing and possibly catch up with whatever number of words I should be at.

The last thing that I did with Brendan was throw him into the mansion of a drug lord, and I randomly threw him into a fight that has nothing to do with the goal in that mansion. If this novel has any more randomness like that, this is never going to get finished.

Good. ^_^

I just realized that today is the half way point, and I don't think I have 20,000 words. Obviously, having 25,000  words on the 15th of a 30 day month with a goal of 50,000 words would be nice.

But then again, this week, the suggestion was to ignore the word count and just write.

That advice got me 5,002 words that day.

Well... I'm going to see what I can do and I'm going to write. I'm gonna try to finish the whole thing with the drug lord, because once that's finished...

THAT'S WHEN SHIT GETS REAL! >>>:-O

Lost Adventures in December


So I had been mentioning "The Lost Adventures of Mark Wins" for quite a while now, and yet, I haven't posted a single Lost Adventure.

No, I didn't forget. I've just been slightly busy and/or relatively lazy.

In December, you'll get all 3.5 adventures (because my recent visit to Philly may or may not be considered an adventure., but I'm not going to write about today regardless because of NaNoWriMo)

Whatever Happened to Videos and Songs of the Day?


More laziness.
And you can blame all of that laziness on work aka Murphy's Realm aka (the newest name) Infinite Loop. Enjoy!

Thing is, it really doesn't take much to do a song or video of the day, especially when I'm still watching YouTube and listening to music on a pretty regular basis. But dat job tho...

Other things to come...


...include

• An Analysis of Crisis City in Sonic Generations
• Classic Sonic vs. Modern Sonic
• Probably a Ultimate MvC3 review since I do want to see if Captain America makes that game worth my playing
• The reason "Infinite Loop. Enjoy!" became the new name for my job.
• The announcement of some Self-Published material.
• and more...

For now... time to get back to the writing.... of the novel, that is.

Obama and the Troops

In mid-October, Barrack Obama has said that the War in Iraq was done and that he's bringing the troop home.

Now, say what you want about what Obama may or may not have done during his term as President, but since I work in an airport, I can totally confirm that I have seen more soldiers returning home in the past few weeks than I have since I first started working there in June. 

Realize that I only work in one terminal in one airport in the US for (approximately) 8 hours a shift, and most of those 8 hours have me either in a restaurant or a dish room, so in the end, I only see but so much. But I have definitely been seeing at least three to four soldiers a week in a four to five day work week.

In other words, after years of a war that we probably didn't even need to enter (because... you know, the guy that took down our towers was in Afghanistan), our soldiers are finally, and definitely, coming home.

I know for some of us, it's a bit too late. I know that for some of us, late is not better than never because the war already took he or she whom was very precious to us already. 

Personally, I haven't lost anyone to the war, but I know friends who have lost friends in the war. Conspiracy theories aside, I think that those sacrifices have not gone in vain.

In any event, in some shape or form, this is a victory. And I just wanted to let you know that if there is one thing that Obama is doing right, he's definitely bringing our troops home.

Happy Veterans Day!

Man on the Move

To heaven, or to hell?
He walks the gray area,
Or maybe a fine line.
The meanest of the mean
Because he could not be nice.

And yet, he maintains this personal,
For reasons, he refuses to explore.
A heroic badass.
A justified criminal.
Vigilante with his own law...

Was he treated unfairly?
Or did he begin the cycle?
Impossible,
They say that the human
Can only learn corruption...

But some are born with it.
Some are born of it.
Some are born about it.
Some are born throughout it.
But who is born without it?

Really though... humans.
Just another animal.
Classify what they want,
They may know the science,
But they defy no science.

Everything is predictable.
Even the unpredictable.
Unpredictable in pattern
Creates unknown knowns
That can be exploited.

This man... he is no different.
Try as he may,
Fight as he must,
He cannot resist
His divine inner workings.

And he will continue to damage.
And he will continue to destroy.
And he will continue to depress.
Until the end, where it all runs out,
And he can continue, no more.

Brendan's Progress, X-Men vs. Street Fighter, and Sonic Generations Music

Brendan's Progress (aka the NaNoWriMo part)

So as of time of this post, I've got 9297 words complete.

It's still a bit slow, as I don't exactly have this story where I want it yet, and I think between a combination of actually attempting some kind of character development and overall bullshitting, there's a legit explanation of why I'm not wholly excited over what I'm currently writing.

That just means that I'm not being over the top enough. Which makes sense. Other than a few bits here and there, this has been a rather ho-hum experience.

But what's keeping me going, maybe more so than the desire to actually hit the 50,000 word mark by the end of the month, is the knowledge of exactly where this novel is going. There are certain events of this story that I've gone over a ridiculous number of times in my head, especially while I'm at work, and the more I think about it, the more ridiculous I make it, and... well, it's going to be ridiculous. That's all I can say. Like, there's going to be this huge turning point in the story that makes no sense before we get to yet another turning point in the story that makes no sense, but it'll all tie together somehow because I think that I actually have a goal for the character that is Brendan. I've made him into something, and I think I may be trying a little too hard to establish to the reader what I've made him as, and throughout the course of the book, he's going to do some amazing things....

I just wish the beginning of this didn't suck so bad. But I just gotta press on. I can edit shit to be better or out completely when it's all said and done, but for now... just keep on pressing.

This is definitely a masterpiece in the making.

X-Men vs. Street Fighter

You know how you get bored one day and you decide to try something new?
Or, better for this particular piece of the blog, you get bored and you try to explore something that you dabbled in for a bit but finally decided, with nothing else to, to actually try to immerse yourself into a new experience with that dabbling?
Even better for this part... ever had access to a video game and played it for a bit, but set it to the side, and then randomly decided to give it a deeper, truer shot?

This is what happened with X-Men vs. Street Fighter. This game was on my computer, mostly to watch some epic battles between top players on GGPO. Randomly, however, I decided that I wanted to play it and actually try to get good at it (or at least as good at it as I am in Marvel vs. Capcom 1).

And man, this game is really fucking intense.
And man, this game is much better than Marvel vs. Capcom 3.

Like, I'm playing this game, right? And I'm currently getting an interesting feel for Cyclops. And his combos are pretty cool, but require some interesting timing. And then combined with the rules within the system of the game, PLUS SIX ATTACK BUTTONS (that's 2.5 more attack buttons than MvC3 has), you can actually show some kind of creativity in your combo. And that creativity can lead to mad mix-ups. And those mad mix-ups can lead to you losing 100% of your life for free before you even know what happened. No X-Factor needed.

And I think that's what's really satisfying about this game... being able to pull off combos that do a shit turd of damage with your own hands, not some bullshit embedded in the game. X-Men vs. Street Fighter has rules in its game system that try to keep infinite combos out, but all it does is add to your creativity, figuring out what moves have what properties, and using those properties to either get around the rules or break them entirely.

And being able to learn this stuff is a wonderful, intense experience. Much more satisfying than any silly ass combo I ever learned in MvC3, especially when they're the only real combos that make more sense to use.

Sonic Generations Music...

...is so fucking amazing.

As it stands right now...
Here's my Top 5

5) Crisis City

4) Toxic Caves

3) Stardust Speedway

2) Vs. Shadow

1) Open Your Heart remix

I can sit here and tell you that I haven't even heard everything, so this list is subject to change.

But I doubt it.

Wait a Second... What About Apex?

Yeah..... still haven't gotten around to practicing any type of Smash at all. Between work, and now NaNoWriMo and the desire to play Sonic Generations over anything, plus WWE '12 coming soon... I'm clearly going to lose every possible set if I don't go MetaKnight...

I might have to summon my inner douche and actually play MetaKnight to get a win, too.

Also, Apex 2012 now has Super Street Fighter 4: Arcade Edition (with that new patch) and Ultimate Marvel vs. Capcom 3 on deck. Now... hmm, I don't think I made that post about SSF4:AE and how I had been playing the game on the low and how I don't think the game is that bad except that it's simply not SSF2:Turbo and thus I find it really slow these days, but yeah. That's kinda the reason why I'm not entering that.

But Ultimate Marvel vs. Capcom 3... well, I may actually play that game a bit more regularly than I did its vanilla counterpart...
It solely depends on how Captain America feels when I play him. I read some of his changes... between getting his double jump back and getting his Shield Slash to OTG again, he just might feel like good ol' CapUSA from the MvC1 days.

And that's where the fun begins... Cap, Zero, Strider, anyone?

I may throw Vergil in there somewhere though... or Dormammu... I've been fucking with his firestorm shit... it's too funny to see 36 random hits come from changing the color of my hands.

All of those characters would have much more fun gameplay if they were in XvSF's system...

Divine Wound

Make this stop.
Make this end.
Forget your flaws,
You're the perfect candidate for this.
Heed my warnings,
Read my message.
Have your date with destiny,
And end this.

My Final Verdict on Sonic Generations

So the game came out today.

I played. Got pretty close to beat it, but due to time constraints, couldn't quite beat it. Only thing left to see theoretically is two bosses.

That said, I think I played enough of the game to review it.

Graphics:
This game is beautiful. I was playing and watching Crisis City go by and it almost made me wanna play Sonic '06. Almost. Planet Wisp looks amazing too... that whole Wii vs. HD stuff makes a difference.

There are a few cases where I feel like Classic Sonic levels shouldn't be so detailed because I seriously saw a platform just float from foreground into the background (fuck you Crisis City). Otherwise, it's sick. As in awesome.

Sound:
The music already makes this game 5 times better than it had to be... aside from the modern City Escape remix. I still think that the original City Escape is infinitely superior to any version in Sonic Generations, but maybe you like them, and they aren't bad. Just preference.

And then you have situations where you win music from doing certain challenges, finding a certain amount of red rings, and other stuff. And then you have situations where you can choose to play certain music for certain challenges. That makes the game 10 times better on top of the 5 times better than it had to be. For some reason, I was blasting the Toxic Caves Remix to any rival battle and doppelganger race. I'm sure that the more music you crack open, the more fantastic personal choices you can make for any given challenge.

And the sound effects... all your classic stuff is all there.

Controls:
I have a minor issue with the controls...
1) Classic Sonic's jump feels like it's too low to me... like Classic Knuckles' jump or something.
2) There are times where I try to homing attack with Modern Sonic, and it just doesn't come out.

I feel like issue 1 is definitely design based. While there aren't any places that can't be passed due to Classic Sonic's lower feeling jump, I do kind of find it a pain.
Issue 2 is probably all my fault. lol.

Otherwise. There doesn't seem to be much of an issue with the controls... Oh yeah... drifting? Fuck drifting. Then learn how to drift. Then be amazed at how drifting works.

Gameplay:
I still stand by my statement that the game is too short. I also stand by my statement that there are levels that should have made the cut. But damn it if they didn't pad it as much as possible.

You have 3 eras, 3 levels per era, and 2 acts per era. That's 18 acts. Each act has 5 challenges, so that's virtually 90 levels or something like that. Technically, you should have to only play, like, 18 acts, but the game is such that after you complete each era (or 6 acts), you gotta do 3 more challenges before moving on to the boss... so it's like 9 acts, and then a boss. And that doesn't include what is probably the mandatory Rival Battles that have fake hedgehogs just chilling.

Whatever the case may be, Sega extended the hell out of the few levels that they had in the game.

As far as the game itself is concerned... it's plenty of fun. And it's not quite the easy quest that Sonic Colors was... these levels do get rather challenging towards the end... or towards Sky Sanctuary depending on how fast you think you should be able to go as Sonic the Hedgehog.

These levels, however, are huge. Instead of the micro levels that Sonic Colors had, they just gave us Huge levels in Sonic Generations. Eventually, you'll look at the time and be glad that the 10 minute time limit doesn't exist. Seriously. Some of these levels are one hell of a quest on their own.

And then you have the challenges. Some of them are easy, some of them are ridiculous, but all of them seem pretty cool. And of course, everything is ranked. They start at D, and end in S. And some of those S ranks are harder than they come off... I would know.

Overall:
This game is plenty of fun. I still think it's too short, and I still think that there should have been more levels. Hell, if Tails can be like how he didn't remember Green Hill but found Chemical Plant very familiar by its smell, I see no reason why there couldn't have been a Carnival Nigh reference.

That said, I don't think Sega was lazy with this game like I first believed. They definitely put in a lot of work into this package, and levels that should have made the cut aside, this is a very complete package.

If you're a Sonic fan of any kind, you should definitely check this game out. It's incredible by all kinds of gaming standards.

some extra notes:

• Seriously though. The best part of this game has got to be the music.
• And my favorite level is Speed Highway.
• Silver has gained my respect... that Rival Battle...
• But why all the bosses so weak though? Four hits?
• Shadow, however, proved to be the worthiest opponent in my opinion... like, you gotta beat rings out of him and whatnot lolol.