Christmas 2009

The Christmas holidays began for me on the 24th. After my half day at work, I met up with Duelist, Addict and Mambo at Funan Centre. We shopped around and then had a late lunch at Shokudo at Raffles City. I realized all these open food bazaar restaurants always have rosti which I really like. haha.

On Christmas itself, I met up with Kyo, Akira, Brainy, Bahamut and Mango for dinner at Suntec City. At first we were planning to have Kuishinbo but it turned out that the buffet charges were much higher that day. We ended up eating at Kenny Roger's which was just as fine since I love their chicken.

At night, we went over to Bahamut's place for some BlazBlue. I haven't touched the game in months and ended up spamming a handful of combos that I could barely remember. I can't wait for Continuum Shift!

(As I post this, I realized that I should be more cam-whorish and be daring enough to snap pictures next time...)

I spent my Saturday at home playing video games. I was in the mood for some music and picked up several rhythm games to keep myself busy; DJ Hero, LIPs Number One Hits and Guitar Hero Van Halen.


Here's the obligatory Prinny-with-new-toy photo. And yes, I have to stack up several empty boxes every time I want to play.

On Sunday, I met up with YongHao to catch Sherlock Holmes at AMK Hub. It is always fun to see Robert Downey Jr. in any movie. I don't know much about the character but I guess they were going for modern-day Holmes who has some character flaws and can fight really well. The plot was a little weak to me but it does hint at a sequel. The show has a lot of investigative moments when it reminds me of CSI. haha.

Looking at the Halo Legend Anime Series (Part I)

Halo Legends starting airing over Xbox Live on alternate Saturdays since November. I believe it is up on YouTube and other sources as well. Some of you may have watched it so here are my brief personal views on the episodes out thus far.

1. The Babysitter
Studio: STUDIO4°C


This is actually currently my favourite episode so far. Nice, clean traditional anime character designs and a memorable story to boot. The plot is based on a familiar concept from the novels (the rivalry between the ODSTs and Spartans). There was a cool twist at the end that left me thinking. Looking forward to see the upcoming "Origins" episode which is done by STUDIO4°C as well.

Halo Geek Moment: That Brute 's Gravity Hammer must be out of batteries seeing how totally UN-destructive its impact is.


2. The Duel
Studio: Production I.G.


This episode centers on one of my most favourite subject matter in the Haloverse; the Sanghelli (aka Elites). The story takes place before they actually joined the Covenant. Seeing them portrayed as olden day honourable Japanese warriors (complete with Kimono!) was a nice touch. Fight scenes were cool, too. Unfortunately, the animation did not do it for me. It was said that they were going for a CGI-meets-watercoloured-painting look but all I saw was a pixelated mess. Some may applaud it for its unique animation style though. Ah well.

Halo Geek Moment: We get to learn how the "Arbiter" became a 'bad' title.

3. The Package
Studio: Casio Entertainment


I found this to be my least favourite episodes so far. So the Spartans are supposed to retrieve a 'package' from a Convenant ship. What ensues is 15+ minutes of filler'ish back-to-back action sequences that seem to serve no purpose other than to showcase the studio's 3D polygons/CGI rendering prowess. It's very mindless and disappointing to me.

Halo Geek Moment: In some parts of the action scenes, the camera switches to a first-person view (complete with crosshair) similar to the video game. This would've been a cool gimmick... if they did not re-use it multiple times during said action sequence.

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The remaining episodes will be aired over the first few months of the new year. I am actually planning to get the DVD/Blu-Ray just so that I can experience the anime a second time in Japanese. hehe.

TIme to Clear Leave

It has been a while since I had a normal update. Everyday has been the same for me: It's all work and games.

There was a period of time when I actually thought that I may be out of the job soon because my agency was in danger of not hitting our quota to stay in business. However, things are starting to look fine now so it is no longer a cause for worry.

I started clearing my leave this month. I was advised against clearing several days at one go so I went and spread out my 3 days to one day per week. It doesn't seem ideal but it is actually not too bad since I end up coming to work only 4 days a week.

Clearing my leave actually reminds me that I need to negotiate with my boss for more annual leave next year. I always felt that 7 days a year is quite pathetic. I'm gonna see if I can ask for something more reasonable like 10.

VGA: Halo Reach

When I first saw the Halo Reach world premiere trailer during the Video Game Awards (live stream) on Sunday morning, I felt cheated. So much hype and they just showed a 2-minute pre-rendered cutscene without a single gameplay video.

It was only later in the day that I realized that whole trailer was running on the in-game engine. I went to catch it again on Gametrailers and also downloaded it off Bungie to watch on my laptop. Still felt it was nothing to write home about.

I got back from work today and saw that the HD trailer was up on the Xbox Live Marketplace. I decided to give it one more shot.

I ended up watching it several times. It suddenly looks and sound so different on my usual gaming setup. I managed to catch little tidbits that I missed out. The music of Halo never fails to impress. Spring 2010 seems so far away.

For those wondering why the game has such an odd name, it's based on the events of the first novel.

More MW2

Penny Arcade hits the nail on the head once again.
http://www.penny-arcade.com/comic/2009/11/30/

Those knife runners (Marathon+Lightweight+Commando) and Akimbo 1887 shotgunners are overpowered.

I finally Prestiged today on MW2 (360). Haven't been able to spend much time with the PS3 version due to the "Fetching Playlists" bug. It is kinda annoying not being able to play whenever I want.