Currents of Time

BILLING FEES FINALLY ANNOUNCED

Fee Type Service Period Price per 30 days
Basic Service Fee 30 days $6.99
90 days $5.99 (total $17.97)
180 days $4.99 (total $29.94)


$30 for half a year start on January 5 omg I can totally afford that.



GLEE!

First:

( FFXIII the rest of Chapter 11 )

And, beyond that (numerical order and all)...

Hilarity! The FFXIV free trial month has been extended to two now because SE has finally had to accept that its launch was LESS THAN SPECTACULAR and that it still needs some serious tweaking.

( More on that. )

... Okay, I'm done talking about things no one understands now. XD

Anyway, when I heard they'd given out a second free month, I laughed and laughed and it huuurt so bad, because something is wrong with my lungs and breathing is hard and I have a cough sometimes. But! Good news! Word around is that this is the last stage of things and it should clear up in another day or two! So hopefully that plays out and I'm not coming down with, I dunno, pneumonia or something. That's a fun one. I'd gladly never have it again.

Woke up freakishly early Friday morning because we were leaving early and because I have a bunch of errands to run before we left. So I throw myself to the floor around 7 am? Run around, barely finish everything, and am ready to go at 9 am! .... 9:05 the phone rings, it's my mother, she's only just leaving, so I've got an hour to waste. I COULD HAVE SLEPT MORE? Woe. She arrives, we finally leave, everything's good! It's kind of warm, sun is shining... We drive without incident for five hours! Then we pull over to change drivers and, in a display if incredible timing skill, my brother calls while we're at the rest stop. He wanted to let us know it was snowing where he was, had been snowing for the last day+. We still had blue skies and sun, so that was kind of strange to hear. SURE ENOUGH, THOUGH, I've barely been driving for ten minutes when suddenly it's snowing! WHERE DID THAT COME FROM?! I don't drive long ("only" about two hours), because my ankle's still bothering me, and the snow's only been getting worse as we've gone along. (I have a bunch of pictures taken from the car, if anyone wants me to upload them, just let me know. Or check Facebook, since they're up there.) It ended up snowing the entire weekend. And nothing accumulated! It was insane.

Anyway, we rolled into town, checked into a room, and then met my brother... wasted some time, ate dinner, crashed early (driving all day can do that). On Saturday, we went to the National Museum of Play, 'cause they've got a LEGO exhibit right now (Nathan Sawaya's stuff), and it was AWESOME. Here is a photo link dump, but I think all of them can be seen at his site (and the pictures are probably better quality. Light was a little too low for no flash, but then the flash bounced off them). LEGO tree, man and his reflection, paint project, no flash and with flash.

Random other images from the trip include the tree behind my brother's place (he doesn't know why there are chairs in it), a MASSIVE SNOWMAN OMG seriously this thing was ridiculous, and the only magnet on their fridge (I love the duck's expression. IT KNOWS IT IS IRRITATING YOU AND IT DOESN'T CARE. It is mocking you).

We ate more delicious food (we ate a lot of delicious food...), didn't really do anything on Sunday, and then drove home Monday in THANKFULLY NOT A SNOWSTORM (we drove home in the dark in a snowstorm last year). It did rain, though.


AND THEN I CAME HOME AND FFXI / THE PLAYERBASE HAD EXPLODED. (To be fair, I knew about that before I got home again, since my brother had seen most of it and told me.) Those of you who get mail from my FFXI characters, in the next set of letters they're ignoring the fourth wall again. More so than usual, I mean. Just so you're prepared.



PS IT IS MARCH NOW HOORAY HOORAY WE SURVIVED ANOTHER FEBRUARY


Edit:
Transformers fandom is full of lunatics in the best ways possible. The thread's a bit long, but you can just read the first post for the story.

I think I'm almost finished with Star Ocean: Till the End of Time. Just hit what was probably the major plot twist. Minor rambling ensues.

Cliff is, perhaps, the most appropriately named character in any game I have ever played (also, he is kind of a moron, except when he suddenly isn't). The only better names might be Tank, Unstoppable Force, or Rock Wall. Which is, you know, a cliff. So, there you go. He rarely takes damage! Hey, Cliff, go solo that boss battle without any HP loss. "Okay!" AND THEN HE DOES IT.

Speaking of walls, you know that feeling you get when you unexpectedly run into one?

Yeah, me neither, really, but I think it kind of might be something like this.

I'm on disc 2 and just got slapped silly by the plot. I'm mostly sitting here going "Whaaaaaat?" all over the place. My brother is laughing at me, and I can't say I blame him. This is exactly the sort of WTF plot twist that I love watching other people get and react to. If the situation were reversed, I'd probably be stuck on the floor, giggling helplessly, at this point. As it is, I am merely delighted and also a bit boggled.

MASSIVE SPOILERS HERE

( With added black-out in case you click the cut anyway. OVERKILL! )

OKAY END MASSIVE SPOILERS

I dislike one of the characters, and I always feel bad when I actively dislike a character. It's usually worse when it's a female character, because they get so much unfounded hate as it is, but her voice drives me up the wall, and I don't really care entirely for her personality, and bleh.

BUT ASIDE FROM HER, this game is more fun than I remember it being! Of course, I am still not very good at the battle system, but I suppose that doesn't matter as much when you have CLIFF THE TANK in your party.

And it feels like the plot is progressing more than it did in FFXII, which is a nice change. I'm sorry, FFXII, I did enjoy you, but everything happened so slowly.

Or maybe that was me taking for ever to get anywhere. Either way. There are more cutscenes in Star Ocean, how about that? I actually know the main characters.

Edit:
Paraphrasing a medic, but not by much: You all need to take care of yourselves! Don't get hurt too badly! Except Cliff. He can do whatever he wants. Don't worry about Cliff unless he actually dies.

EDIT II (Wednesday night):
THE END

I'm losing count of these references, Squeenix.

( main screen... )

ORCS, MAN. All this time I thought they were just speaking broken basic, but no! They speak meme! (orcs: the organic Junkions of the future?*) Someone take the internet away from them.




* This reminds me. In the hospital, they've got one of those wrist support gel-pads at one of the computers, and on the thing, it says "ERGOTRON."

I like to imagine Ergotron is a highly neurotic Transformer who can't understand why his fellows can't make things more, you know, ...ergonomic. If he thinks it is wrong, he destroys it (or at least tries to), because for whatever reason my brain decided right away that he is an unlucky Decepticon. He probably turns into a highly adjustable chair or something. And ends up dead somewhere after blowing up the wrong computer console.


Yeah, I don't know.

(TUESDAY WAS A REALLY SLOW DAY IN THE LAB.)

We have a tree! It is a very nice tree~ But it was very cold when we went to get it! Possibly I froze a bit. But it was okay! Because tree. Plus, the tree farm gives us free hot chocolate and candy canes. We've also got most of our lights up. AND we got a lot of snow over the last few days, so finally things are sparklywhite. Everything is so pretty!

It is also still freezing, but that is what FIRE is for.

We get to decorate the tree soon! We've been meaning to do it already, but I keep having this WORK thing that I have to go to, and it steals all my time away.

Dissidia clips show Shantotto fighting! POSSIBLY I AM MORE EXCITED FOR THIS GAME THAN I SHOULD BE, AND POSSIBLY PART OF THAT IS FFXI CHARACTER IN IT YAAAY shut up i know no one knows or cares we exist .__.

Oh, and since that's a brilliant and totally not planned at all segue. STARLIGHT FESTIVAL!!! It is the best one of the year! TREES! SNOWFLAKES! PRETTY EVERYTHING AND AND YAY

Aaand, this year they changed it up, so the actual game is not completely awful and impossible! Thank you, SE! ♥ Now instead of having to find someone of a specific job and level range, or any of the stuff they asked the first year (it was HONEST TO GOD IMPOSSIBLE the first year. Not so hard after that, but still bad), we just need to find someone of the correct race and gender. It's fun! We don't need to just stand around crying in frustration because there's no Elvaan male with a level 63 Beastmaster anywhere in Vana'diel. (To be fair, 2006 was Treant cheering, but I missed it 'cause of ... I... don't remember? BUT I DID MOSTLY MISS IT. Also, was like a dumbed down version of the original Twinkling Treat event from 2003, which was awesome, so I was a bit disappointed by it.)

PLUS we still get to give presents to the NPCs and more than in previous years yay! And we get to go out and smash boxes. SO NOW I have pretty +1 boots (so now I can call my NPC buddy and have her turn up in the Dream outfit!) and the awesome new items. Bells! We get bells! They ring when you hit things with them! I have the NQ and the +1, so I am EPIC DUAL-BELL-WIELDER. *jingles down the road*


eee I love the Starlight Celebration so much.


So I am warm and happy and the house smells of tree, yay! and I AM IN A GOOD MOOD.


Pretty much the only negative thing right now (ASIDE FROM THE SUBJECT LINE LOOK AT ME AVOID THAT SUBJECT AHAHAH) is that I am having Promyvion dreams. I'm not sure if it was the map-hunting, helping people with Mea, or a combination of the two that set it off, but it's... not fun. Promyvion just sets me on edge so much. Of course, since this is Promyvion and why do things halfway, eh?, as soon as I start waking up, I start forgetting everything. (I'm usually very good at remembering my dreams.) So I just walk around feeling unsettled all day. (I managed to really freak myself out last night and then couldn't get to sleep, too, which was like. Added fun. WORD OF ADVICE if you're visiting the Emptiness in your sleep and are generally unnerved by it and feeling really tired and on edge, do not look out your window and think, kinda looks like Promyvion out there, BECAUSE THEN YOUR MIND WILL SUB IN CRAVERS AND WEEPERS AND STRAYS AND AND mostly the Cravers, really, don't ask me why.)

I am sorry, but Promyvion just sets me right off.

the dust and the-

Maybe I will make an illustrated entry about it later.


BUT. GOOD MOOD.

Just not keen on the idea of going to sleep again. whee~!

Anyone who's been interesting in ever trying Final Fantasy XI but not at the cost of buying the game, SquareEnix is doing a free 14-day trial. All you have to do is download (WARNING: THIS WILL UNDOUBTEDLY BE A MASSIVE DOWNLOAD. It's only the original game - no expansions, otherwise it'd take a few days - but it's still going to be big). This is, in fact, legitimate. Offical site says so. (It's currently the - top - second announcement: Announcing the "FINAL FANTASY XI 14-Day Free Trial"!)

That link/site is for the North American free trial (I... don't know why there's a difference), but you can find the European version of the same offer at the Euporean PlayOnline site.

(There's probably an Asian - or at least Japanese - one, too, but I can't read Japanese. Japanese POL site.)

After the trial period is over, they'll apparently give you 90 days - 90 days? wow - to upgrade to an actual paying account.


I happen to think this is awesome. Good job, SE! Finally getting on top of this "free trial" thing that pretty much every other MMORPG already does!



(If anyone actually wants to do this, you should tell me. Get onto Phoenix server! I'll say hi to you!)

WHY ARE YOU BEING NICE

WHY ARE YOU LISTENING TO THE PLAYERBASE


WHAT IS THIS WHAT ARE YOU PLANNING



I AM ON TO YOU!!!




...Only you, SquareEnix, can so frighten the players by being nice and doing things they've wanted since the dawn of time in Vana'diel.

Now, seriously, what evil or WTF-inducing thing are you about to spring on us? The suspense is killing me.

Edit:
I mentioned my Supernatural DVD set came with a tiny Impala, right? So, I am bored. And talking to Aniko. And have just finished putting stuff back on my desk (had to clear it off to clean a bit). (So now it has TF:A Blackarachnia, Alt Mirage, Cybertron/Primus, some books, my PS2, and a stack of papers.)

And I have a tiny Impala in my hands and no idea what to do with it....

( ADVENTURES OF TEENY IMPALA )

I am not sure why she puts up with me sometimes.