Goodnight everybody!
A Picture Is Worth A Thousand Words… but I only have 406 of them.
Looking back on history can be more fun than people might realize. I was browsing my RSS feed during a break today and came across this article about American History as told during Japan’s Edo Period. It was quite a fascinating thing, looking through all of those pictures from a whole other era. This needs an anime or manga adaptation, make it happen and I’ll be on it like a bum on a bologna sandvich.
A thread of images from a Japanese illustrated history of America from 1861.
Here is George Washington (with bow and arrow) pictured alongside the Goddess of America. 1/ pic.twitter.com/LoF54y54bL
— Nick Kapur (@nick_kapur) November 14, 2018
It’s funny to think that there was once a time when Japan wanted to remain closed off from the rest of the world, but at the same time they were fascinated enough to draw depictions of what they thought we were. The depictions of past presidents are astonishing… They had no idea about our culture, anything. There wasn’t much of a way for them to do so either given their strict rules about entering and leaving the country. As a result we have these artistic depictions of what life would be like in the US from the perspective of someone who has never set foot outside of their country or had any access to current events of the time.
This is both beautiful and terrifying to think about… considering I know people who feel that everyone should go back to their (dis)respected countries and stay there. Oddly enough that only seems to be reserved for folks that have skin tones of the spicy or chocolatey variety… I never see one white guy say to another to go back to Finland or England (though that would be amusing). I’m looking at these pictures, and thinking about quite a few of my co-workers or some of the neighbors that feel we can wear blinders to the rest of the world and be perfectly content with it. Hell, some of them don’t even understand why I even have international friends. I never thought that living in the 21st century, where anyone with even a cheap phone can talk to someone half way across the world, and even in this day and age we still have people that would be even the slightest bothered by the smallest speck of indifference.
Of course I would expect conflicts, especially from people that want to buy things from other countries because its cheaper… everyone seems to be all about their own home team until coins are involved.
Hell hath no fury like an Overlord scorned
Or was that stoned? :v:
I love being able to go into the dev console and head around making screenshots worthy of appearing on my desktop. I can’t remember the purpose, but my robot friend and I kicked a bunch of shiny metal ass. I was rewarded with much needed swag and further instructions. Perhaps I’ll adventure more tomorrow if I’m still feeling green under the gills.
Oh yeah, and Fallout 76 released… anyone check into it?
Adventuring through Paititi
I can file Tomb Raider games under my list of games to play while not feeling entirely well or coherent. Over these last few days I’ve felt really ill. In one part due to the tree being removed from our house, all the sawdust and the rot from the center of the tree probably isn’t doing me any favors… My entire weekend was pretty much spent in bed. Today I’ve still been fighting with sinuses and other types of pain… Fortunately I’ve been keeping well medicated, but enough about my own problems… Back to things that distract me from physical agony.
I’ve been having a romp around Paititi for the last couple of days. Mainly searching for whatever isn’t nailed down, and discovering side quests and other stuff along my travels. Tonight I actually progressed further into Paititi, even managed to kill someone performing sacrificial rituals… the most unfabulous ritual of all… I’ve also been playing a bit with Photo Mode. It’s alright I guess. I do like taking scenic pictures as well as the occasional in game selfie in adventure games, so it all works out I guess. I’ve invested about 16 hours into this game so far, and now that I’ve thought about it this seems like quite a tradition I celebrate every year. Around this time I was having fun in Rise Of The Tomb Raider, and before that playing the first in this particular trilogy. While I still prefer the originals, there is definitely something that hooks into me and keeps pulling me back into this newer set.
Coincidentally they did release The Forge DLC today. I haven’t had a chance to visit it yet, nor have I ventured into coop. Perhaps when the planets align I’ll play with another human being.
OverlordTomala and Yutram play Serious Box Solid
We get together and play a full conversion Serious Sam mod that transforms the game into a Garry’s Mod depiction of the Metal Gear Universe.
Weekend Open Thread: Bethesda Owns My Ass Edition
Despite the nice crisp weather I’ve been feeling under the weather today… I can’t tell if if its allergies or the cold going around… or if I’m just sleep deprived which is a huge possibility I’ll try to sort soon (though I’ve found some nice foolproof sleeping aids if you know what I mean :v: ). But other than feeling a little off I had a nice chill day. Played a little bit more of Fallout 4, and even managed to do a little bit of Quake Champions with Yutram for awhile. We tried out different game modes and ended up annihilating each other other over separation anxiety due to the fact that it kept placing us on separate teams… and not being able to read the damned dark red font over everyone’s head. As usual there is footage involved, but the question “will it ever see the light of day?” looms over it.
Aside from that some of the other modes were fun. I’ve always been an old school style Deathmatch or gone for some TDM, but I did have a bit of fun with Sacrifice, Hot Rocket and the gamemode that spawns you as different people. Oh! Slipgate was fun too. Though chasing that red anus sometimes got confusing, though I guess that depends on the map doesn’t it…
Here’s to me waking up without half my face feeling like its on fire. :happy:
Using my noodle
It’s been awhile since I’ve shared any culinary wisdom. Tonight I took leftover roasted ham and turned it into a dish that I made by scratch with no help from a book.
One of my favorite sauces to make is a white sauce. I added Parmesan and smoked Gouda, and also a few splashes of Marsala with Italian spices as well as the ham. Tasted like a nice creamy Alfredo by the time it was thickened and ready for noodles.
Folded in the noodles. They’re wheat noodles, while the rest of the food may be fatty the wheat will help counterbalance it. 😛
That and the corn, can’t eat pasta alone… But eating this was really excellent. I’ll have to remember to try adding different boozes to cream sauces in the future to see how well they turn out. Will probably stay away from Creme De Menthe and Midori though…
The Playstation Classic runs on an Open Source Emulator
Ever since the release of Nintendo’s NES Classic we’ve been seeing more mini consoles/computers pop up, such as the C64 Mini, and the Playstation Classic. An interesting detail was noted about the latter device, apparently it runs on the PCSX emulator:
The PlayStation Classic uses an open source emulator, PCSX. Lesser educated people might see this as a cause of frustration, but here's the reality: it's an acknowledgement that an "amateur" emulator can be just as valid as an "official" one (and they're usually better!). pic.twitter.com/zJztoiYiwT
— Frank Cifaldi (@frankcifaldi) November 8, 2018
Nice to see that Sony has learned their lesson after the bleem incident. (Bonus points to anyone who knows what I’m referencing.) 😛 I shouldn’t be too surprised considering other consoles are pretty much the same internally with a tiny shell to give us warm fuzzies of a long gone era, but at the same time the idea of casting out $100 for a tiny computer with a built in emulator configured to play only 20 games doesn’t seem worth the dough (though I could say similar for the others). Unlike Sony though, I have to give props to Nintendo for at least selecting more memorable games. The list of games for the PSClassic are quite lackluster with the exception of a few titles. I remember the PS1 era for Metal Gear Solid, Tomb Raider, Crash Bandicoot, Spyro The Dragon, Twisted Metal and a few others. I’m going to guess there’s a possibility that at the very least Activision might have something to do with the lack of Crash and Spyro. But I figured since one of the Final Fantasy titles would have appeared on the Classic that Square Enix would have parted with at least the original Tomb Raider?
I still expect people to go forth and purchase these things for nostalgia sake… but I’ll just hold onto my original, the PS3, and my emulators. I don’t need to spend a large chunk of my paycheck on something I could build, configure and install myself. :v:
My face won third place
Today was my first day back to the grind… It was busy, but nothing too bad… I did find out that I had won third place in the Halloween contest recently, so I came home with some Halloween swag. :happy: Some candy, a gift card and a thermos. Surprisingly the haul was better than last year. I was in a three way tie for first place and got $2 gift card… Who knew that by underachieving I would have a better prize? 😛