At The Fountains Of Sadness

Urgh I need to write a blogpost.

Tomorrow, no wait, actually on Saturday, I'm going home on vacation. According to Pope that is too often, but this is how it works to live in a socialist state. So I just wanted to put some words here on this page of mine, to give an illusion of life.

I've got two levels I've been working on, one is one I need to finish because I promised, but I think I made it kinda crap so I've been trying to rework it as good as possible. The other is some other dumb project I've started and restarted and restarted so many times and so long ago I keep losing track of what I meant to do with it.
Also I had this idea for doing a level like this:
You play through an empty landscape, then exit.
First repeat, the landscape is filled with ancient buildings.
Second repeat, the buildings are ruined, nature has reclaimed a lot of it.
Third repeat, modern structures fill out the ruins, push back nature again.
So the point is you play through the same yet different level from A to B four times. (Though not like that freakin insane speedmap some crazy insane dude (was it speedy?) made.)
Anyway my idea was to keep it small and simple and let the iterations add details. I haven't done anything with this but I would like to try. Mostly because I've got a hateboner for old stuff merging with new tech. BUT NOT STEAMPUNK! STEAMPUNK IS THE DUMBEST SHIT EVER! Like Metroid Prime instead.

This Opera Unite thing.
It's a feature of Opera that lets users host services on their personal computers that are accessible to the WAN through Opera's proxies. I took a look at the documentation, and the actual services are essentially web servers written in javascript with some magic host objects to handle connections and file IO.
I've got this idea (COPYWRITE DONT STEAL!!!!1) that you could make a turn based roguelike/diablo/D&D using this. The DM is the person hosting the Unite service, he's got access to some dungeon editing tools, and during the game he can use his 'Evil Points' to spawn monsters and generally make things miserable for the players. The players connect to the DM's service and can then be selected by the DM to join the game (otherwise they'll just spectate) where they'll get to select a class and maybe some stats. (All very simple though.).
I think this would be a fun project to work on, but I'm not sure what would be the best way to implement the actual interface.
Client/server interaction would be done via AJAX. Would it be best to implement the visuals in google.maps-like tiles/javascript or in flash? You can really do a lot with layering transparent PNGs using javascript these days.
This is another thing I'd like to do.

I need to learn how to use Maya. OK, I kinda know how to use Maya in the most basic way, but I need to get good at it. I've been running it for a bit at work and a warezed version at home, but I'm lacking motivation for it. Besides the whole job security bit.

I've been meaning to cock up a way to make Ogier able to make levels for Source engine games. Some things like displacements can't be supported of course and would ultimately have to be done in Hammer, but just being able to do basic editing in Ogier would really improve my morale for making a TF2 L4D level. (Which would then be another project to do I guess! SIGH!)
What it would be is some app that scans the Source game's files and extracts all the textures and entity definitions and converts them to Ogier format, and then another app for exporting xmp to vmf.
I'm not sure if all that hassle is worth it for just being able to make more levels I'll never finish though.

I bought an iPod (classic, 120 gigs, black). Woe unto me.

The weather is hot. Dreadfully hot. I hate it.

Ah yes, music.
Lately I've been again into italo disco, which owns. Then I got my hands on all of Thomas Bangalter's stuff, because I've been meaning to do that, and that owns too. Then for some reason I have been dismissing what Guy-Man had been doing on Crydamoure, which was dumb of me because all of that owns too! Entire fucking label owns! It's insane! (Something unrelated I found just now) Then I started listening to Phoenix which is mostly ok but they've got a few songs that totally own too. Also I got SND's Atavism, which owns. Can't find any actual tracks from the album on youtube though, but here's something else that totally fucking owns anyway. And I caught up with some older Fennesz albums now that they were up on bleep, which also (surprise!) own. Clark's got a new album out too but I haven't had a chance to listen properly yet.

Ok. That's it. Peace. Soldiers are cute.

Ok, I'm going home for easter for some days which will be nice I think.

A bit dumb to be away from the internet the week that Riddick ships, but I can probably survive.

I've been working on a new map to replace honey, been writing some qc for it, would like to add a new monster but I'm not any good at animating mdls. I've got a plan on paper though and I'm like 20% done maybe?

I also have been pulling out some of my old Java projects again since I've got an idea for a game in there that I've been tinkering with for some years now but never made any headway with. Now I realize why you should write actual informative comments and not stuff like

//U KNOW WAT THIS MEANS!!

because no, I don't know what that means. I've been trying to re-read and get a grip on what is going on but I'll probably get bored again.

I reinstalled Diablo (1) again and have been playing for a while. The first 8 levels are pretty fun and atmospheric, then it starts wearing thin in the caverns, and hell is boring.

Also started replaying HL2. The first day, city 17, the canals, the industrial suburbia, is pretty much the most gorgeous environment I know of in any game. It is just such a perfect mix of urban decay and sci-fi.
At work we're doing some realistic environments at the moment, and we've been trying to figure out how the fuck Valve pull off just making a square room out of six brushes, putting some texture on the walls and maybe a prop chair in a corner, and it looks totally convincing and real. How the fuck Valve? How?

I wanted to get some new DS games for when I go home now, and I wanted Rittai Picross but that's not available here, so I got The World Ends With You instead. I have no fucking clue why, I don't even like RPGs. This will be the worst game I ever play I'm sure. God I feel dumb!

I need to shave but fuck it I'm going to bed.

EDIT: Had to add a pic, this was too boring otherwise. Edit edit: No I did not draw it.

I don't have much to add besides that.

Christmas food is generally the nastiest food I eat all year. Norwegian christmas food traditions were established in a time when Norway was a poor country and fatty foods were considered a luxury. So yay for dessicated meats in fat and fat with salt and more fat and bones covered in fat. This is funny to me because I am myself a fatty pork who must buy tickets for two seats on the plane.

Three weeks is waaaay too long to be on vacation at your family, really missing work now.

Plzx post recommendations for good mp3 players with >50Gb space that are not ipods.