HAPPY EARTH DAY.
Like what Greenpeace has always said, it’s time to take back the planet.
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[161] Of Eve: The Second Genesis
Right now, I am just less than an hour worth of game time away from my second ship, the admirable Griffin class freighter.
After weeks of playing Eve: The Second Genesis, all those patience, hours of mining the rare omber ore, running from both the authorities and the pirates, and even the patience of waiting for slow docking procedure is finally paying off. All I need now is 20k more credits and then, Griffin will be mine.
Griffin is a good freighter designed by the Caldarian engineers and it cost exactly 320 000 worth of credits. This is roughly a product of 4 200 refined ombers. Once I have the Griffin, all the pirates are going to lick my ass.
If you are unfamiliar with the Caldari and the Griffin, I am currently a beta tester for Eve: The Second Genesis, a game produced by a company from Iceland named CCP. It has been in the beta stage for almost a year and I joined the testing team around the eighth stage of testing and that was back in February.
The game is basically massive online role playing game (a.k.a. morpg, a relatively new genre in the gaming world) cum a real time strategy game and has the same basic concept as Earth and Beyond. You are in control of one ship at first and your main objective is to make money. In the world of Eve, it is all about money. Money motivates almost everything, much as in real life.
Currently, there are four main races which the players can choose from. In the final version however, another race will be added. Each race has its own advantages and disadvantages and it depends what role the players wants to be; a miner, a trader, a pirate, a CEO or anything. The options are simply a lot if not endless.
There many ways to make money. The easiest way is to mine resources and there are a variety of resources that can be mined. The only place where the resources can be found is at the asteroid field, or the roids as the Eve testers are calling it. Nevertheless, the precious ores can only be mined at far away roids and usually, there are pirates that guard the field. Another way is to trade items from one system to the next. Looting is an option but Taking up a bounty hunting or courier mission provide attractive amount of credits. Although the mentioned methods are the major ways to earn credits, each new patch for the beta tester seems to bring more alternatives. The latest addition is the stock market. The market coding has not been implemented by the programming team at CCP but it will be interesting to see how corporations will wage a war through the stock market instead of the conventional means with missiles and stuff.
The choices are endless simply because the Eve universe is simply huge. In a system, there are usual an average of five to ten stations and each offers different items for the players. Not only that, each system is part of a constellation which typically contains up somewhere around seven systems and that constellation itself is part of a region. At the same time, a few constellations build up a region. And the best thing is there is countless number of regions. Of course it is not an infinite count but any sane people certainly wouldn’t count the number of leaf on a tree. To demonstrate the shear size of the universe, once during a test run, there were 4 servers running and each server has the ability to serve more and 2 000 players all at once.
The eye catcher for this game is the game play graphic. In GameSpot, the reviewer was even surprised after knowing that a beautiful graphic was actually game play graphic rather than a CGI for the plot’s film. Another interesting fact about this game is the ability for the player to create a unique face for the player’s character.
A screenshot of me docking on a station orbiting a water planet.
This game will be the new Everquest. Instead of calling it Eve: The Second Genesis, it will be Eve: The Second Crack. And of course, the first gaming crack is Evercrack (reads Everquest for the illiterate).
For more information, visit Eve Online.
p/s – Fucking Blogger won’t display the correct format. Go to www.eve-online.com manually instead of following the above link.
p/s 2 – Fucking Blogger’s problem is now solved although the current command I am using is supposedly to be fucking wrong.
p/s 3 – There is too much fucking pressure. One more fucking annoying n00b gonna make me fucking crack. Especially the fucking n00b teammate that threw a fucking nade in front of me. I was fucking mad at that fucking n00b for taking 90% of my fucking hp. I fucking gave him a fucking headshot with a fucking shot gun immediately after my blood shot up to my fucking brain. FUCKING n00b!!! I am so fucking mad that I am gonna fucking hack some fucking ppl with some fucking nick on MSN. Better not do some fucking nick on your fucking IM if you don’t want your fucking C drive to be fucking wiped out. Do you hear me you fucking n00b? DO HEAR ME FUCKING |\|00b?!?!?!?!!?!?
p/s 4 – That feels fucking good. Ah…
p/s 5 – This is way too much profanity. Sigh…
p/s 6 – Screw you guys, I’m going home. Er…wrong phrase.
p/p/s – UNCLE FUCKA!!!
Shut your fucking face uncle fucka
You’re a cock sucking ass licking uncle fucka
You’re an uncle fucka, yes its true
Nobody fucks uncles quite like you
Shut your fucking face uncle fucka
You’re the one that fucked your uncle, uncle fucka
You dont eat or sleep or mow the lawn,
You just fuck your uncle all day long
Hmm!
What’s going on here?
Oooooooooooooooooooooooh
Fucker fucker uncle fucka fucka fucka fucka fucka
Shut your fucking face uncle fucka uncle fucka
You’re a boner biting bastard uncle fucka
You’re an uncle fucka I must say
Well you fucked your uncle yesterday
Uncle fucka… thats
U-N-C-L-E fuck you
Uncle Fuckaaaaaaaaaaaaa
tonight…
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[160] Of from Michigan to the Netherlands
I met my economics advisor yesterday and she recommends me to take up Statistics with Economics. This is going to get ugly, really ugly.
Anyway, Michigan failed to prevail over Minnesota for the NCAA Hockey and Red Wings lost to the Mighty Ducks. Now, I must admit that I don’t really follow NHL as much as I would want to but I know losing to the Mighty Duck is embarrassing.
Well, at least Ajax still has a chance against AC Milan next week. After reading and seeing match highlights and reports, Ajax surprising dominated up to 60% of the game. I was expecting Milan to show Ajax who is he boss but apparently, Ajax is not a whipping boy. I won’t be expecting Ajax to advance to the semifinals but with Ajax current form, I am willing to raise my bet on them.
In the Eresdivisie, Koeman is optimistic that Ajax still can overrun PSV but personally, I say Koeman is too optimistic. If I were Ajax’s chairman, I would advice Koeman to concentrate on the second place and on the Champions League.
Onward to the British Isles, the match of the season, Arsenal – Manchester United ended in a draw. In any case, Arsenal has the upper hand right now. However, the advantage will quickly evaporate if Arsenal loses any one of its final game. Manchester United on the other hand needs to win all its last games if they want to keep up the pressure on the Gunners.
Categories
[159] Of world history
If I were given a chance to choose in when and where I would be born in, there are four options that I would seriously consider. The first period of course would be right now, anywhere in the first world nations where technology reigns supreme. Next in line would be in southern Europe during the Renaissance. Thirdly, anywhere in the Islamic civilization from the Abbasid rule till the Umayyad Andalusian days and finally during the classical era in Athens or Rome.
I wouldn’t choose any place in the new world during the ancient times simply because the culture there was too barbaric and thus living even the most decent life will be almost impossible. Ancient Egypt and the Mesopotamian (or the Persian) are also out of the equation because, although their architectural feats were impressive, the Greek and Roman provide a far more interesting scenario. Finally, I wouldn’t live in Chinese Empire realm because they were technically and geographically deprived from contact with any other powerful civilization and thus lack the excitement that Athens, Rome, Alexandria, Cairo, Damascus and Baghdad enjoyed.
The first thing that I will explain is my choice on the modern world.
Why anyone wouldn’t want to live anywhere in a first world country today? All life’s possibilities are here and today. Information and wealth are excessively abundant. The distance between one point to another are nothing but physical. We could virtually reach the other side of planet in mere minutes. The internet has made our life easier in almost every means necessary. All we need to do is order a delicious pizza or an ATi Radeon 9700 Pro over the net and then wait for the pizza boy or postal service to deliver it right to your front door. Read what is happening in Baghdad today while you are sitting comfortably in front of a high end computer with an instant black coffee on your side to start the beautiful day during the warm greenly spring. Go to classes or offices or in matter of fact, anywhere with modern day transportation. It doesn’t how, by the tires, cruise all the way across the pacific or airborne; you will get there eventually (provided the wallet is thick of course). Food are plentiful and not to mention delicious. People are friendly or at least polite. Hack, this is heaven on Earth baby. There are some problems though like Osama bin Laden and getting a bad score for an engineering course exam but hey, life is a risk and we all will die sooner or later. If you think too much of the risk, you might as well commit suicide now.
On the other hand, life during the Renaissance would be interesting indeed. Trade was on its peak and kingdoms were starting to send out expedition to find land in order to find new profitable trade routes. Wealth was starting to build up and culture was enjoying rejuvenation like it had never seen before. Be in the court of kings and see how their recklessness changed the world. Be in Seville and Lisbon and look out for Columbus, Diaz or Magellen. Or better set foot in Pisa and Venice and see how Michelangelo polished up his name. At the same time, listen the argument Galileo made against Church and quietly laugh at the Church illogical counter arguments against a single man revolutionized modern astronomy. Life was a high profile drama back then. At the same time, enjoy the mythical stories of the oriental and read the scientific works of Muslim scholars during the golden age of Islam.
One will wonder how the Renaissance was achieved and eventually will look in the direction of the desert during the day when Islam ruled supremacy in all areas. Be in ancient Damascus and Baghdad and see how Islam saved the world, the European in particular by preserving the classical Greek works and further refined it. Make yourself present in the House of Wisdom that was established by Harun al-Makmun and be marveled at the collection of books before it was destroyed by the ravaging Mongol armies. See also how they transferred the art of paper making from China through the Silk Road to the other part of the world and used to for their own advancement. At the same time, be amazed at how they integrated the modern numerical system into theirs, abandoning the abacus and thus enabling scholars making steps further in the field of Mathematics. Look at how the great Persian and Byzantium Empire crumbled under the might of the Muslim army.
Wonder at how the Crusaders managed to conquer Jerusalem and see Saladin reconquered the holy city of Religions of the Book. Listen to the stories concerning the struggle between Richard the Lionheart and Saladin. And finally, be in Alhambra to experience the height of Islam in Cordova and Granada, the one place that became the genesis point of European supremacy.
If that doesn’t impress you, sure being side by side, or least living during the times of Julius Caesar, Mark Anthony, Brutus and Marcus Aurelius or with Alexander the Great and Plato himself makes you shudder. See how Caesar and Anthony fell in love with Cleopatra or be in front of the Roman Senate and hear to Mark Anthony when he said “Friends, Romans or Countrymen!” out loud after the assassination of a great person that changed a republic into a despotism and inevitably a monarchy. If you like the dead tree edition, then delve by yourself in the Great Library of Alexandria and enjoy the wisdom of the ancient world or see yourself the construction of the ancient Lighthouse of Alexandria, one of the seven wonders of the ancient world.
Damn I love history.
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[158] Of funny stuff from Yahoo!
I found that this is outrageously funny.
