Hey people, so far I've finished 2 papers, 3rd one, which is Fluid Mechanics and one I predict will be my second worst paper, is in 4.5 hrs time. And it's also the longest at 2hr 30mins.. from 5pm to 7:30pm. ZZZ.. I'll sure come back and concuss..

Anyway, this post is to introduce to all you bored muggers out there, waiting to try something different and interesting. It's an old MMORPG game, called EVE Online.

Stumbled upon it while googling "free online games" since I was so bored.. and needed something to keep me occupied.. It was actually a tough contender to WoW on a MMORPG review site, and surprisingly it was a game not many know of, so here I am to introduce this gem to you all.

Below are some features of the game you people might find of interest:

Futuristic, Space Exploration/Mining, Post Apocalyptic Setting

Pulling away from the currently very hot fantasy-Tolkien setting, EVE is a refreshing change in that instead of controlling an elf, gnome or troll, you actually pilot a small space ship (that can be changed, if you get rich enough) and explore the universe, doing whatever you want to, instead of flowing a more or less linear route of leveling to a certain level, fight certain bosses etc. Its very Star Trekkie, and you can really feel like a small frigate trying to carve out a living in a gigantic universe full of player-run corporations and pirates lurking around.


One Large Persistent Universe

Unlike in most MMORPGs e.g. WoW, EVE doesn't utilise shard servers (I think that's what they're called) meaning they do not have parallel dimensions of the same world, individual servers of approx. few hundred players each. Meaning you cannot interact with people outside of your server.

EVE works by having one huge gigantic world on a network of servers, and the world can be very aptly described as: A universe. At any one time 20,000 - 30,000 players can be playing online in the same universe at the same time. That is darn shiok. Plus you fly in this full 3D space instead of a walking 2D plane.


Freedom of Play

Like I mentioned in the first paragraph, this game is nothing but linear. It all depends on what you feel like doing. For e.g. if you prefer a peaceful life, you can just be a miner and keep getting better equipment to mine ore to sell (trust me this is addictive), or be a pirate and upgrade a small and offensive ship to launch sneak attacks, or be a big transport to trade goods between solar systems. Or, you could manage a large corporation and rule an empire. The range of play is staggering.. you start from a small single-player like frigate mining little pebbles, and you see those players who've played for years fly their giant cruisers 432049893280 times bigger than your mosquito, escorted by destroyers, who are actually human players and not NPCs.


Less occurences of twits and idiots

One may complain that the learning curve of the game is real steep, and the amount of information available is insane. While that is true, but I feel that's what would appeal to gamers searching for a realistic and more complex game, instead of plain point and click. Similarly, the upside is that twits and idiots usually give up once they start their tutorials. Which is good, leaving behind a bunch of serious, and mature gamers. There are still some cocks in there, but much lesser, say, compared to Maplestory.


Wonderful graphics, sound, voice overs

For the geeks, this is a fine fine, finishing touch. Despite being a game released in 2003 where 3D graphics are still in its budding stages, the 3D textures and animations and the way they mix in the use of beautifully rendered 2D images for backgrounds, icons, portraits etc make the whole thing a visual treat. Best part is, it doesn't require a very high powered computer to play. The client's only 600MB anyway!

Also, there're very nice star-trekkie audios too. For e.g. when you are about warp to another location, you hear a robotic female voice report: "Warp Drive Activated" Then the very familiar warping sound effect as your vessel travel through space.


Free 14-Day trial

Best part is there's a 14-day free trial!! Just google "EVE Online free trial" ( you can use the Google search bar located below ) and click the first link there. Just download the client, sign up for the free trial, and yay! you're in. Please do read through the website's player's guide so you won't be so lost in the game, and the in-game tutorial is a must.

Lastly, my name in the game's Edaran. Oh, remember you can put anything for name, including a last name, which I didn't put.. Send me an EVE mail if you're in I can help you around a bit.. =)


Here's a picture of the game, and my ship mining along with my corporation mate.

Labels: eve, eve online, free trial, games, mmorpg

Signs of MugGate: NUS, the impending apocalyptic doom

Well, in hall there's a guaranteed tell-tale sign of the upcoming exams. Other than the usual library being flooded, the relatively reduced noise levels, I've noticed another of such sign, and decided to take a photo and show u guys =) Look at this:

Labels: bluetooth, exams, internet sharing, macdonald's, sygate

Animal Convention

We just had an animal convention 2 days back, where we went to visit Gwen's ragdoll kitten, and fortunately she stays in KR B Block so its just right opposite my block =) Then we moved back to my room with the kitten to meet Lashe..

Haha it was amusing to see Lashe so eager to sniff and play with the kitten, althought she's more than 10 times her weight, and we were so worried that Lashe might accidentally injure the kitten Pooka in her excitement. So in the end when Lashe got uber excited we had to put her on the chair to calm down, where Gwen's friend stroked her and played with her. (Disclaimer: photos below were stolen from tp's blog)

that's gwen and her cute kitten - Pooka :)

first up! we've DOG meets CAT

then we have CAT meets BIRD

Studying and XiaoKaoBei

Studying EE2009, Signals, in the library right now.. felt good to sleep at 11+ (or was it 12) last night and woke up at 9 today to study.. YAY.. brought XiaoKaobei along with me though.. as she was chirping away as usual one woken up, and was disturbing tp's sleep.. she's now nicely snuggled on my shoulder sleeping, after climbing around the whole time.. and chirping.. which I hope did not disturb the restof the people in the library.

Benefits of having a parrotlet: They're so tiny they're usually missed, and their chirping's so soft most people don't mind at all (unless your bed's 1m away from the cage like mine, and they're chirping while u're trying to sleep). Plus they're blue, furry and adorable, everyone loves them hahaha..



Ok, back to mugging spectras, Fourier transforms and yada-yada.

Labels: parrotlet

This is going to be a really long post.. hehe full of photos and all! Both my darlings are now deep in sleep, during this sleepy afternoon.. And I'm taking a break from chionging to mug to blog. =)

Lashe



Grandma's Bdae

After settling Lashe, we rushed to PGP to shower and get changed for the birthday celebration. Haha, for the first time, I actually wore the white blazer I bought in Taiwan =) well I must say it looked pretty good wahahahaa... good enough for me to take a typical-cliched shot of myself in the mirror, in all true epitomised cam-whoreness, complete with the blurred mirror effect, and of course the important face-covering flash from the mirror. Check it out. So I turned off the flash and took again. LOL.

On the way to Novena MRT -> United Square -> Vienna International Seafood and Teppanyaki Buffet we took some more random shots to entertain ourselves. My relatives were all pretty surprised that I was actually ON time this year, since I was late for almost every year previously.. and we rushed for the food immediately, as you can see from the absence of mention of food the whole day due to Lashe.. The food was good, but not uber-fantastic.. good enough to fill our bellies though.










Ben's Musical

Yep, ben's upcoming musical.. haha always knew he was rehearsing for some Medicine Fac production, but never really knew what it was about. And then one day, while on the way to collect my lab reports at Engin, I walked past this poster. You see, it was a poster with 5 faces. 2 big ones on top, andd 3 smaller ones below. As I walked by I merely scanned across it, seeing the top left face, and the bottom 3. And of course, the title of the production, "Just Great", which I found to be odd as it reminded me of Jus Tea drink by Yeo's. Then after a bend, tp exclaimed: "Ben! Ben!" I went: "Where? where?" and looked around for ben. And there it was. "Omgwtfbbq" zoomed past my mind a couple of times. The last face I missed was freaking ben's big face on the poster. For those who have not seen it yet, here it is! Taken by the humble 2-megapixel Motorola A1200 phone.

Honestly I think he looks like some doctor version of GTO (Great Teacher Onizuka, the rascal turned school teacher), where some Ah Beng managed to get through MedFac and became a doctor. Since we're already on this, let's imagine...

Paramedic:	"Doctor! We need some help here! We have a burn victim here, mostly 2nd degree burns, and her condition is critical."
Ben:	"KK... coming coming.."
Ben:	"Wah lau eh.. you look like a freaking char siew sia.. kk let me see.. Hmm.. (serious face) ok your skin's a bit crispy already, but the flesh still tender.. Can. I know already.
Ben:	"Oi Missy! Get this woman here some Zambuk! and then get some Colgate also. My Ah Bu last time say got burn use Zambuk and Colgate best. Damn shiok somemore."
( Woman dies on spot at Char Siew comment )

Back to Lashe

Just visited the pet store today, as Lashe ran out of her pee pads and we urgently need them, if not a pee tray full of her pee in liquid form is really messy. Also did some grocery shopping for essentials at Sheng Siong, e.g. shampoo, milk, tissue paper. Today we bought this really cheap Japanese brand pee pad, about half the price of the ones we got at another petshop.. its $38 for 120 pcs, as compared to $7 for 12 pcs.. And they're packed really compactly in this diapers like packaging. 120 pcs.. hopefully it'll last us long. However its considerably thinner than the previous one.. now to wait for Lashe to pee to test out its absorbency. The pee tray I mentioned is the purple and pink yogi silver-nano technology pee tray, to prevent Lashe from stepping on her own pee and leaving pee prints all over.



Xiao Kaobei

Now now, you guys must be wondering, what's Xiao Kaobei? haha well it's the name of my youngest addition to the parrotlet family, the only surviving female baby of the latest batch from Titan.. hrmm sadly her other sibling passed away shortly after leaving the nest, and I suspect smth is wrong since the death rate since last batch is pretty high.. will investigate in the hols.

Btw, she's been named Xiao Kaobei as she's the noisiest baby chick I've ever encountered, chirping away, singing to herself non stop.. and crying right on time each time for food. This name was inspired by tp btw..

Due to the disappearance of my usual plastic aquariums, I had to use a makeshift wooden nestbox to house XKB.. which I thought was better too, as she spent her initial weeks at PGP in the air-con room, and the wood would provide some insulation. and keep her warm. The down-side I was worried about was that the nestbox was dark and cut-off from the room and people and I was afraid she won't be acclimatised to activities in the room, loud noises and people, and become a fearful bird like Baby.

However, she turned out to be the cuddliest one amongst all her brothers and sisters! haha.. despite just leaving the dark nestbox, she takes to humans very well, and it pretty bold and adventurous. One good measure of her tameness is her willingness to let me preen her, by fluffing her head into a ball for me to scratch. Only Titan used to allow this consistently previously. So I'm deciding to keep her =)

Also after reading about the successful training of a lovebird by a fellow local MoPa forum member, (lovebirds aren't exactly very easy to train, as are most small parrots) I'm quite tempted to attempt some basic training with XKB, as that member has kindly included step-by-step instructions of how he did it and even videos of his parrot. You guys can check out some amazing videos here at http://bryansangels.ohitsuji.com/. Especially the coin deposit and fetch.

Ok, that's all for now, XKB is currently nestled on my shoulder sleeping.. now that makes 3 sleeping darlings and only me awake haha.. this is bad.. all our pets are following our screwed up sleep cycles and turning nocturnal.


Random Shot

For an amazing stroke of luck, and to find out what the seemingly obscene and foul liquid is doing on tp's laptop screen, visit tp's blog to find out more =)



P.S. The mynah chick has unfortunately died a very horrid death last Friday morning due to unknown causes.. *sigh*

Labels: dog run, lashe, parrotlet, vienna international, west coast, yogi pee tray

STARDUST

Firstly, let's start off with Stardust.. a long anticipated movie, fitting right into my favourite genre of fantasy and sci-fi. It was motha'f***in' good.. although it was the usual 2hrs, it felt much much longer than that, and every moment was fully savoured and enjoyed.

The fallen Star, Yvaine, played by Claire Danes wasn't very appealing to me at first.. just not the super hot kind, i.e. a certain Ms Alba.. but as the show progresses, she just seemed more and more lovable. All the characters were so real and well played by the uber cast, such as Captain Shakespeare by Robert De Niro, Witch Queen Lamia by the epitome of "lao-chio" Michelle Phieffer(?), and the many actors who played the violent/evil princes.

The show can be simply summarised as warm and fuzzy, sprinkled with fantasy and intrigue, peppered with exciting fight scenes, but somehow it's one of the few shows that actually made me feel lovey-dovey.. wahahaha.. and it had a ending that I liked =)

I would actually recommend people to go watch this show, and if you like it, let's wait together for "Golden Compass" to come, which is supposedly an even bigger hit. But be warned though, the story is quite rushed, as they had to squeeze the whole novel in.


The Fallen Alien Star

Haha just went for tuition today, and came back at about 10:30pm.. yesterday XKB (the name of my newest youngest parrotlet chick, a noisy gal we called Xiao KaoBei) was weaned, and feeding perfectly fine on seeds, free from hand feeding. Just when I thought the parenting was over.

When I got back tp dearie was telling me all about this little chick that the block B people found in the midst of the good luck supper. So I hurried to Ritchell's room where they made a little cosy nest out of a hamster habitrail part, which I think was perfect.

They actually tried getting some formula from tp to mix, and fed a bit to the chick, but was kinda too watery and might risk aspirating the chick by going into the lungs. It's now on my desk in its cosy little nest, being fed every ONE HOUR.. I was like wtf when I did my research online on mynahs, which was my first guess.. and yep, it is a mynah chick and its really super ugly and gross if you are accustomed to seeing parrotlet chicks and thought they were pretty ugly. Imagine those kind of carnivorous plants that ate people up in b-grade movies, miniature size.

One good thing is that mynahs are actually very smart birds, as those of you who, like me had pancakes stolen by them before would know. Which means that like parrotlets, they do grow attached to their caretaker and actually remembers people and can be tamed if handfed from young. And, they're well known mimics, able to talk from the young age of 2 months. Soon, then block B can have its own block Pet! One that is expected to live up to 25 yrs.. lololol.

However, multiple bad bruises were observed on both sides of its head, which it must have sustained from the fall from the nest.. and its abdomen seemed wayyyyy too distended and stretched in my opinion, and I fear that it might have more serious internal injuries, but maybe its just the way mynah chicks are.. Well, at least its eating and pooping fine now.. let's hope for the best. AND cheers! the chicks requires no night feeding hehehehehe.

So after XKB, here comes yet another 1-2 months of intensive handfeeding.. Check out the pictures below of tp feeding the chick, which people are contemplated naming "Beeker/Beaker" haha..

P.S. those of you who dunno what a mynah is, they're the little brown birds with yellow beaks you see everywhere in Singapore.. or go google for images.

Labels: chick, mynah, stardust

lovingly friend luncheon meat decked with sliced cheese, between buns grilled on the hot pan.. cover it with mustard and.. its totally yummilicious!