Matt Hackmann

MattHackmann

The thoughts and goings-on of some programmer dad.

Eternal Sonata - An Eternal Wait

Must post. Must get awful picture off the front page!

I'm pretty sure I've mentioned before that I'm eagerly awaiting Eternal Sonata, the RPG making its way towards Xbox 360 sometime in September. Actually, it was a (if not the) primary reason I bought the console in the first place. Halo is good and all, but my heart lies with RPGs and other story type games (i.e. Pheonix Wright).

So, anyways, I'd heard from a fairly reliable source that the latest Xbox magazine had a demo disc with ES on it. Almost immediately I went out and purchased a copy (I wasn't the only one). But, with these thing rarely is the pot of gold so easily obtained. Nay, the bastard disc wouldn't load. Well, it would but it would only give me small nuggets of which I hungered for only to choke mere mintes (or less) into said meal. I was pissed.

Lucky for me I went back an reread the news post for the comic I referenced up above and it held a small morsel of hope. An obscure reference to something about boiling discs to resurrect them from DVD hell. I didn't really expect much but I needed to play this demo (and I didn't really want to be gypped out of $8.99). So I nuked some water in the microwave and slipped the disc in. Much to my surprise all problems were erased and I was one with the game... until the demo ended.

As for the game itself it is pure joy encapsulated inside a stream of binary ones and zeros. The artwork is fantastic, the gameplay is solid. I'm hoping that the same will be said for the story as there isn't much sampling of that but from what I've seem I think all will be well. It'll definitely be worth my sixty clams and will get me through the couple of weeks between when I move in and school starts.

Well, I think that was sufficient enough to get the evil off the front page. At least the initial load, that is. I would be careful about how far and how fast you scroll down the page.

Zelda Art Week - Midna

So I decided to do Midna today. There are parts of this picture I kind of like but overall I really hate it. First off she looks like a guy. Second her head is not wide enough and I scrwed up the shading on the face so it's hard to make out her eye. The body I'm happier with than what it originally was, but it still seems... off. Ugh. Maybe whatever I draw tomorrow will be better.

It's Zelda Fanart Week!

I need to do more drawing to help beef up my skills. As such I have set up a little exercise for myself: select a theme each week and do a drawing every day. This week's theme, as the title suggests, is Zelda. Specifically, Twilight Princess. So I bring you my first "masterpeice":

Honestly, I'm not terribly thrilled with this. All I can say is I can't wait to get my Mac Book Pro from the school loaded with Photoshop so I can use tools I'm already familiar with. My Prismas are nice, but they lack an undo function.

Teh Arts

Last couple days I decided to actually DO something and crack out my Prismas and create beautiful masterpiec es that will be remembered long after I die. Or something.

It's the Cheat! Isn't he cute? He is until he gnaws your face off, that is.

Some kid and a frog off the cover of a book my little brothers and sisters got from the library. I was originally just going to draw the kid (which I only drew because that's what was in front of my face), but the crowd that had gathered around me started chanting for the frog. So I drew the frog. Whatever.

Stay tuned for some more awesome stuff. Awesome stuff that isn't wierd kids and flying frogs.

Weird Al RULEZ!

So, last night my bros and I went to Al's concert. It was freakin' sweet! He played pretty much every song off of Straight Out of Lynwood plus most of the mainstays (Eat It, Fat, Smells Like Nirvana, etc.). For the encore he played the cellphone song to which everybody, myself included, started waving their cellphones. After that he wound up with an extended version of Albuquerque. It was simply awesome. I shunned my quiet exterior and clapped and whooed and sang with everybody else. But, you're probably saying "Shuddup, give us teh pix!" I've only got a few because getting good pictures with the crazy lighting so I'm only giving you the good ones. Sucks to be you. [gallery=Weird Al Concert][/gallery]