So...
I've been think heavily about giving an old character an overhaul. I usually brainstorm while doing some remedial task such as while I'm washing dishes at work, or while I'm out driving for whatever reason. It was actually while I was out driving, while listening to the Blazblue soundtrack (which, by the way, is friggin' amazing. I suggest downloading it if you have the time and space), that I came up with the idea of giving the character in question a new theme song. So I decided to research Rock/Metal bands with a Jazz/Swing influence. I found out about a band called Diablo Swing Orchestra.
Holy Shit.
I walked into a minefeild of awesome.
The best way to describe them is exactly as I described above. It's Swing Metal, with a little bit of a opera style. Think hybrid between Nightwish and Cherry Poppin' Daddys.
Example:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ad-l54T_kYY&feature=related
The rest of their songs all have this dark metal orchestral sound with a slight Jazz beat to them, so, yeah... I like it.
I'll be downloading their album... will you?

Awww Yes! I love this question because it shows you just how psychotic I am.
You want to know how I make difficult decisions?
I use a D&D style
If it's ten or under, I go with the first choice. If it's eleven or over, I go with the second choice.
Otherwise, I just ask someone else's opinion.

tags: writer's block

I just watched the Comedy Central Roast of Joahn Rivers, and I have to say, for the first time in my life, I want to fuck a one billion year old woman. Joahn Rivers.... You are the awesomest old broad in the history of ever, and now, I am your biggest fan... born this century...

I've been in a really creepy mood lately.
I've been wanting to bone up on urban legends, and I've been stuck in creepy/crazy mode for the past two or three weeks.
Well, the point is, I am really intrested in surrounding myself in creepy shit lately. In particular, I've been really wanting a really creepy mask lately. I don't mean some laytex rubber Halloween mask, I mean something like a noh mask, a voodoo mask, or a plague doctor mask. The problem is... this shit is expensive. On average, the average authentic mask is really really expensive, and the quality replicas are either really cheesey or just out of my price range. So.... I've been thinking....
I think I might try to make one.
Do you think this project might be worth my time? If so, what style should I try for?
I'm really into the plague doctor mask, as it not only looks really creepy, but it would be easy to make, but any suggestions otherwise would help.

An imagenation is a powerful tool. It can tint memories of the past, shade preceptions of the present, or paint a future so vivid that it can entice.... or terrify, all depending upon how we conduct ourselves today...

Black Onslaught

Who can I say, not one knows the vast divide!
That ain't gonna fall off, getting lost outta your mind!
Beast with the saints, chains of lightning, whipped debris!
Everywhere I go is burned down to ashes now take on the wall!!

Pullin' in the reigns and hold back the hunger!
'Cause there is no man...
Pullin' in the reigns and hold back the hunger!
No, now it's too late...

Falling from above! Death from above!
We should never be!
What a big, big mistake!

Falling from above! Death from above!
It's too late to be!
What a big, big mistake!

Fine! Crime! No ways to pay!
Life! Death! Nothing to remain!

Who can I say, not one knows the vast divide!
That ain't gonna fall off, getting lost outta your mind!
Beast with the saints, chains of lightning, whipped debris!
Everywhere I go is burned down to ashes now take on the wall!!

Pullin' in the reigns and hold back the hunger!
'Cause there is no man...
Pullin' in the reigns and hold back the hunger!
No, now it's too late...

Falling from above! Death from above!
We should never be!
What a big, big mistake!

Falling from above! Death from above!
It's too late to be!
What a big, big mistake!

Fine! Crime! No ways to pay!
Life! Death! Nothing to remain!

Read my own lips...
I'm the last to go...
Finally it's time...
Oh hell, I'm gone!!

Pullin' in the reigns and hold back the hunger!
'Cause there is no man...
Pullin' in the reigns and hold back the hunger!
No, now it's too late...

Falling from above! Death from above!
We should never be!
What a big, big mistake!

Falling from above! Death from above!
It's too late to be!
What a big, big mistake!

Fine! Crime! No ways to pay!
Life! Death! Nothing to remain!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h8ZtMetz_Qg

I love the hell out of Ishiwatari's music. If I was going to go gay, it would be for him.
P.S. This just makes me love Blazeblue even more than before.

Whe ou see the n r e, u will sle agai
you an call f me b t I wi not com
your c ice is m de
arwell

So, I got ahold of this game called Blazeblue. It's a 2-D fighting game from Arc Systems Works, with fast-paced intense gameplay, unique and wild character designs, a enguaging story, and a mostly heavy metal soundtrack.... Sound familliar?
I would cry bullshit if it wasn't for the fact that I know Ishiwatari had his hand in the creation. It seems this is the reason why Guilty Gear has been locked in upgrade-hell for the past seven years; because Ishiwatari-san had had his hands full with this new project. Besides, now Arc Systems Works has more than one fighter under their belt. Prehapse now they will become the new Capcom or SNK.
As for the game itself, it's surprisingly fun. It feels alto like Guilty Gear, only with alot of changes that make it it's own little monster.
One of my only complaints is, they honestly couldn't think of a better main character design other than a red-clad toughguy who weilds his sword backwords?

After all these years...
They are finally making a Trigun movie:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HCcEv0gFnpM
Fuck. Yeah.

Okay, I have two more dilemmas.
One is a simple color dilemma, the other is a costume dilemma, and I could (as usual) use some opinions from some opinionated people.

First up is the Queen of France, and ultimate badass Scarlet.
[IMG]http://i25.tinypic.com/syt5wo.jpg[/IMG]
This time around, she looks as epic as she is suppose to be! The problem is her hair. What color should her hair be? It was originally white, but since two of her allies have white hair, it will seem kind of redundant. I thought red, but then it will seem like I'm pushing the "red" theme she has a little too far. I thought purple, but that would make her look a little too much like an already copywritten character (who I kinda'... sorta'... based this design off of.... a little bit....), so I want to avoid that aspect. Anything else will just seem odd, (I don't feel like pink, green, or blue will fit her design; and off-shoots of white like gray or silver will be a little too close to white). Although I'm open to any opinin, I'm just voicing my thoughts. So what do you think?

Second is an new character, the crazy bondage ninja Reiko.
Here is the first design I did of her:
[IMG]http://i31.tinypic.com/zspzjd.jpg[/IMG]
I sort of want to modify her design a bit, so I came up with four redesigns (P.S. Before we get into this, I just want to point out that her weapons of choice are various chain weapons hidden inside her clothing. Although I drew a couple where he's holding a whip, no matter what, she'll have thoes chain weapons. I'm just too lazy to draw chains on pictures that I'm not sure I'm commited to yet, so for now many of thoes pictures are unfinished. Chains are a pain in the ass to draw) :

1: A modified version of her original design
[IMG]http://i29.tinypic.com/amcck8.jpg[/IMG]

2: A modified Ninja costume
[IMG]http://i31.tinypic.com/11wd090.jpg[/IMG]

3: A Body suit with detatched sleeves
[IMG]http://i32.tinypic.com/2817woh.jpg[/IMG]

4: A school-girl outfit
[IMG]http://i26.tinypic.com/2a8ephy.jpg[/IMG]

So, the question is, which looks better?
Personally I'm still partial to the redesign of her original costume. It just seems to fit her well. Anyway, thank you for your time, and please drop me a line and tell me what you think.

Comment back when you see this.

*!*!*!*!* EDIT MOTHERFUCKER *!* EDIT MOTHERFUCKER*!*!*!*!*
Full Color, with two variations!
[IMG]http://i28.tinypic.com/f3b2na.jpg[/IMG]
So the question is, which looks better? I like both, and have no problem with either, but only one of these versions of Slash can be official. So I'd like to aks you, which one looks better to you?

The Traditional Red with black stripes?
or
The brand new green with yellow stripes?

*!*!*!*!*!*!*!*!*!*!*!*!**!*!*!*!*!*!*!*!*!*!*!*!!*

This is one of the most recent drawings I did of my original fursona, Slash:
[IMG]http://i31.tinypic.com/n2bs5w.jpg[/IMG]
It's pretty bitchin' but I've felt it lacked something since I drew it.
Well, to say the least, I figured out what was missing in the first picture....
This is Slash. My ultra-awesome lizard-man hero. He fought everything, he kicked so much ass, he was there for every one of Millenia's biggest events. Unlike most of my heros, he doesn't have a difinative super-mode... because he's so badass he doesn't need one. But my problem was that he looked to.... hmmmm.... nice, I guess. He looked a little too pleasant. He's suppose to be massive, intimidating, and wild. There, he just kind of looks like a stoned surfer. Despite his size, claws, and the club he's got in his hands, he doesn't look like he would harm a fly (I mean, in reality, he wouldn't. He actually IS very pleasn't, very mellow, and very wise; he's almost a pacifist, but the problem is he doesn't look like he is. He's suppose to look like he's three seconds away from eating you, when all he wants to do is relax, drink pina coladas, and play majong all day).

This, on the otherhand is a drawing of him I did this evening:
[IMG]http://i32.tinypic.com/160txsh.jpg[/IMG]
It's a bit difficult to see, because of how soft the lines are, but... well you get the picture.
He looks the way he should. He looks like a monster. The strpies and ripped-up pants look very wild, the tribal-design silk shirt looks like something a yakuza would wear, and I upgraded his weapon from the weird spiked club to the badass fire-axe I designed for him for one of my RPs with my D&D gang.
This is the way I always wanted Slash to look... it just took me this long to figure it out.
P.S. Just for shits and giggles, this is his theme song:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=01p9uKV9BP0

Edit!
Now for Vincent's First Draft!
[IMG]http://i42.tinypic.com/2m6qsjs.jpg[/IMG]

[IMG]http://i43.tinypic.com/mk9iu1.jpg[/IMG]

It's totally not finished, I've still got alot of work to do, but I am so happy she turned out as good as she did.
Oh, and too the people who know me well, and have listened to me yap about my characters; this is totally who you think it is.
I'm really happy with the design changes. The taller, more mature look suits her. And the college student moteif fits the very steam-punk world of Millenia better than the old witch costume does (even if the oversized hat was too cute for words).
I even like how I accedently drew her with bigger hips and longer legs. She totally looks cuter pear-shaped then when she was scrawny.

I originally opted for a costume that had a very "buisness suit like" design (button-down blouse, black pin-striped slacks and a tie), but I decided (despite being really sexy)that redesign didn't look "Holly-like" enough.
Right now, I'm totally happy with the "girl next door" look.... and I'm gushing, so I'm going to stop and get back to working on the huge character sheet I'm working on.

Next will most likely be Vincent, then probably Slash, Nomed, Kenji, Cassie, Scarlet, and maybe some of the new guys you haven't heard of yet.

There is something I have come to realize, Kimchi, if prepaired right, is the world's great equalizer. It doesn't matter how much of a badass you claim to be, Kimchi will show you just how much of a sniveling little bitch you really are. It's one of the most painful foods I've ever eaten, It not only hurts going down, but it hurts coming out..... but.... it hurts sooooo good.
Just saw "Revenge of the Fallen". Better than the last movie. Nothing but a non-stop action movie, lots of great humor (The Twins were funny as hell), and it brought alot of awesome to the plate that Michel Bay is going to have to top in the next film. I'm not going to give away any spoilers, but let's just say I always have been and always will be a Optimus Prime fanboy.
Today I bought "Shin Megami Tensei, Persona 4", I've been playing it for only an hour, but I'm already in love with this game. Atlus, if you keep licensing and importing kickass games like this, I will forever be your best customer.

HOLY SHIT!
Both Farrah Fawcett and Michael Jackson died today.
I never saw that coming.

I'm going to get stupid in here tonight!

I had meet up with and joind a group of Role Players who were planning on starting a DnD campaign. It seemed to be going well, until the campaign's story the DM was cooking up got a little to dark and gritty for some of our tastes. In the end, the campaign just plain out fell apart when our DM tried to involve (Get this, I'm not kidding) rape, suicide, pedophilia, and teen-aged pregnancy into the mix. Now... Let me put this in prospective. One of our members is a sweet, kind, and somewhat overly apathetic young lady, I'm talking Sara grage Fluff-Ball. It really disturbed the hell out of her that that basket-case DM was taking out all of his insucurities on not just all of us, but seemed to want to pick on her the most (and had you all been there, you'd realize how much of an understatement that was).
So, to say the least... five of us left the others to their own devices.
One night, the five of us were sitting around drinking and yapping about RPing; and we mused about playing around with a campaign revolving around being as Heroic as possible. I somehow convinced them to use the Millenia universe as the campagin setting (mostly because we decided that a setting where anything can happen with the only guideline being that it has to have very obvious anime/heavy metal overtones worked well for a fun and imagenative plot).
We called it "Emerald Dragon". It felt like the unholy union of One Piece, Brutal Legend, and every 80's/90's action cartoon ever made. There are cheesey one-liners, goofy catchphrases, and characters that constantly walk the line between cool/lame. To say the least, it's a campagin that makes us feel like kids again.
Sometimes, you don't want to worry about whether your character is going to be killed off, sometimes you aren't intrested in playing a emotional cripple, and sometimes you just want to give a speech so passionate and heroic that it actually brings you and your group to tears.
Some of our characters do have inner demons, but we never play it in a "feel sorry for me" kind of way.
Our heroes are total badasses. They really are the kind of people that you can actually look up to, while our villains are so annoying that no one minds when we have to kill them off.
Even the anti-hero has a big-swinging pair of balls. You wanted him to become a good guy, and he eventually did.
We have running gags and jokes that we used that actually still make us laugh every time we use them (One of the characters I play, the leader of the team, is eccentric to the point where he carries dried bacon around with him so he can lure monsters out of hiding. Every time we "meet someone new", one of the first things they ask is always "Do you smell bacon?" At one point someone in a Taco Bell we were eating at actually asked that, and we all just cracked up laughing.)
Even when the story called for a character to die, everyone opted to Deus Ex Machina his ass back to life.
We had been playing this for about two months, when we decided that it was time to end it, so we went out with the most epic ending for a fantasy story ever and it climaxed with my hero piloting a floating country into the moon, ending with a "Is he dead? NO HE'S ALIVE!!!" kind of ending. It was the most cliché ending ever, but everyone actually cheered when our DM allowed him to live.
The Story was happily ever after, Good triumphed over evil, and none of the characters we grew to love died.
So, the moral of this story; Yeah, sometimes a dark and gritty story can resonate deeper within us. Sometimes we feel like we can relate more to the antihero than anyone else. But... sometimes, it just feels more fulfilling to be a true hero, one who wants to save the world, one who wants people to cheer for him, one who wants to do what he can to win. Not for glory, welth, or fame, but because he knows it's the right thing to do and he likes doing it.
I guess what I'm trying to say is, I'd like to pretend I'm a Sol, a Kratos, a Dante, or a Cole McGrath; but really I'm more of a wise-cracking jackass loveable comic relief, like Axl, Issune or Luffy. If that makes me a pansy, than so be it. I'd rather be happy and carefree than dominated by my pain. Sometimes, a light-hearted story... just feels right.

Follow me if I advance. Kill me if I retreat. Avenge me if I die.

Oh jeeze, that's a good one.
It's sort of a three-way tie between Pizza, Tacos, and Chinese.
I think it honestly depends on my mood. I might want Taco Bell one night, and Panda Express the other. Pizza is rare for me, but when I get what I want (Bacon Chedder from CiCi's, or a Chicken/Mushroom Stuffed Crust with Alfrado Sauce from Pizza Hut), it always turns out to be one of the most orgasmic experiences I can have.

tags: writer's block