After everything, I am completely satisfied with the outcome. It seems that through the downfalls, everything has fallen into its ideal place.

It would have been very difficult to have fit Sarah comfortably into our PortCon hotel room.

We made it to PortCon for three days, and I was happier to have been able to stay for part of Sunday than if we had left Saturday night, even though we missed Thursday.

Just being with Kun makes a significant difference. Yesterday, Tomo came over and the three of us talked and played. It was like old times. I want things to stay like that, the familiarity we have with each other and our close friendship.

PortCon 2008 was amazing. I have such fond memories of PortCon 2004 [my first convention] and PortCon 2005 [the year I staffed] that I don't think anything can surpass those two conventions in my mind, but this year came very close. Certainly my favourite convention since PortCon 2005. Surprisingly, I didn't take very many photos -- perhaps seventy? My average is around 150.

I still need to type up a convention report for PortCon 2008, so I shall refrain from adding additional detail here.

Monday was a down day for Kun and me. We reminisced about old cartoons and watched openings on YouTube. Mighty Max, Ronin Warriors, Batman, Batman Beyond, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, X-Men, Doug, Recess . . .

On Tuesday, Kun and I went around to various stores with two of Kun's other friends (who I'd list if I knew how to spell their names). I spent more money than I did throughout all of PortCon. Dark Knight merchandise was tempting me, but all I bought for it was a coin tin with the Joker on one side and Batman on the other. I also bought the Crüxshadows' new single - which was officially released on this day, although the only place I could find it was Hot Topic; I don't like the main song ("Immortal") as much as I did "Birthday" (although "Birthday" had to have time to grow on me), but it's still good and I like the remix of "Araidne" better than the original version from Dreamcypher. Finally, I bought a Kashimashi figure at Newbury Comics (Yasuna) and volume nine of Pet Shop of Horrors.

Unrelated to the above, but I would like to comment on the irony that one person's generosity can be another person's cruelty.

Again unrelated to the above, but Kun and I were on the PortCon forums and one of the threads asked people to list their top five manga. I've decided that my current top five are: Hunter x Hunter, Pet Shop of Horrors, Earthian, Yami no Matsuei, and Level E.

Lastly, and loosely related to the above, volume 21 of Hunter x Hunter is now officially out in English. The Killua scenes in this volume are some of my favourite in the series and I was curious about Viz's translation, so I took a look when we were in one of many bookstores.

I was disappointed. There is a reason why I generally prefer fan translations over Viz's.

We're off to Portland in about twenty minutes. And possibly PortCon and New Hampshire after. But definitely Portland.

I'll be back sometime between next Tuesday and 21 July.

I hope everyone has a safe trip.

( Objectives and status screens. )

Translation: I found the fabric for Killua's boot covers and bought two white T-shirts. I also managed to purchase some hair glue for Killua's wig right before Sally's closed. Finally, I checked my baggage sizes and they should be fine for Amtrak (assuming I can fit all of my cosplay into my green duffel bag). Technically, my skateboard is 2" too long, but there's not much I can do about that; I suppose if they give me trouble, I can either leave it at Kun's or somehow get it to my mum at the end of PortCon.

All of my cosplays are washed and ironed. All that's left is to finish up Killua's boots and wig and pack.

(The 'mission accomplished' screenshot is from Thief II: The Metal Age. The objective and status screens are altered screenshots from 'The Sword' mission of Thief: The Dark Project.)

Meme#1: Icons

1. Reply to THIS post, and I will select four or five of your userpics that I like.
2. Make a entry and talk about the icons I have chosen.
3. Other people will then comment on your entry and you will do the same as I have done for you.
4. Thus creating a NEVER ENDING of icon squee.

As I still have to complete this for Sarah, here is my commentary on the icons she chose:

( Icon commentary. )

---

Meme#2: Characters

Name a character from one of my fandoms and I'll give you:

(a) Three facts about them from my personal canon/fanon;
(b) A reason he/she sucks;
(c) A reason he/she is awesomecakes;
(d) Five things that never happened to that character; and/or
(e) Five people that character never fell in love with and why

---

Meme#3: You and Me

1. I'll respond with something random about you.
2. I'll tell you what song/movie reminds me of you.
3. I'll tell you the very next person/place/event I think of when I think of you.
4. I'll say something that only makes sense to you and me.
5. I'll tell you my first/clearest memory of you.
6. I'll tell you what animal you remind me of.
7. I'll ask you something that I've always wondered about you.
8. If I do this for you, you must post this on your journal.

---

Meme#4: Date? o_0

Comment and I will;
-Tell you what I find attractive about you.
-Tell you where I would want to go on a date with you to.

[Yes, it's odd, but Sarah did them all for me, so . . .]

My mum dropped me off at an arts and crafts store about half an hour from our house while she attended a meeting in hopes that I could find the rest of my cosplay materials.

I have never seen so little fabric at an arts and crafts store before. They were also completely out of white T-shirts in my size. As was the store we stopped at on the way home, which also didn't have the fabric for Killua's boots.

The trip wasn't completely wasted. I bought elastic for the boot covers and some sushi at the grocery store (spicy salmon and avocado). I also bought hair dye, specifically red, although I debated over using light brown instead as it's closer to Hisoka's colour. Nevertheless, red it was; it will probably come out more of a deep reddish brown because my hair's so dark. And even though it's inaccurate for Hisoka, I dare say it will look better than black hair would.

So yes. Frustration.

The earliest Isumi would be used would be when Sarah comes down, so I'm not too worried about finding a T-shirt. However, I am surprised that it's been this difficult.

As for Killua . . . I did buy some felt I could attach to my current boots, but it's wouldn't make them that much more accurate. The colour on my current boots isn't that far off; the main problem is that they're lace-up instead of slip-on. Unfortunately, there are only two fabric stores within fifty minutes of us now. My mum said we could go out to eat Saturday and then look for fabric afterwards. If for some reason I'm not able to get the material for Killua's boot covers, I'll just use Killua as he currently is and put it on the list of things to do for next year.

Tomorrow is washing and ironing. And Killua wig. And hair dying. And I still need to call Tomo.

( Sarah notes. )

( PortCon notes. )

( July notes. )


Now for the Ritsuka photos. This is the final version of the outfit. There's supposed to be a belt, but it never looked right and got scrapped. The wristband also isn't quite the right colour. Other than that, the biggest problem I had was getting the bangs in the front to stay together. Actually, I could have done better with the hair in general. Unfortunately, there aren't very many photos; I ran out of pose ideas. I also belatedly realized that I forgot to fasten the side buttons on the right side of the overalls until halfway through the photos.

This was the original cosplay reference image, though it got somewhat merged with this image.

Finally, I still like the colour on my corduroy overalls more, even though they're too baggy.

( 月のカース　冷たい夢の中で．．． )

"'Accept in your mind that anything which can happen can happen to you.'"
--Nikeratos, quoting Pythagoras; Mary Renault's The Mask of Apollo

I am not surprised.

ἐκ δ'ἀμφοτέρων μεμιγμένων ἀδημονεῖ τε τῇ ἀτοπίᾳ τοῦ πάθους καὶ ἀποροῦσα λυττᾷ, καὶ ἐμμανὴς οὖσα οὔτε νυκτὸς δύναται καθεύδειν οὔτε μεθ' ἡμέραν οὗ ἂν ᾖ μένειν, θεῖ δὲ ποθοῦσα, ὅπου ἂν οἴηται ὄψεσθαι τὸν ἔχοντα τὸ κάλλος· ἰδοῦσα δὲ καὶ ἐποχετευσαμένη ἵμερον ἔλυσε μὲν τὰ τότε συμπεφραγμένα, ἀναπνοὴν δὲ λαβοῦσα κέντρων τε καὶ ὠδίνων ἔληξεν, ἡδονὴν δ'αὖ ταύτην γλυκυτάτην ἐν τῷ παρόντι καρποῦται.

Ek d'amphoterōn memigmenōn adēmonei te tēi atopia tou pathous kai aporousa luttai, kai emmanēs ousa oute nuktos dunatai katheudein oute meth' hēmeran hou an ēi menein, thei de pothousa, opou an oiētai opsesthai ton ekhonta to kallos, idousa de kai epokheteusamenē himeron eluse men ta tote sumpephragmena, anapnoēn de labousa kentrōn te kai ōdinōn elēxen, hēdonēn d'au tautēn glukutatēn en tōi paronti karpoutai.

So, because of these two mingled sensations, it is greatly troubled by its strange condition; it is perplexed and maddened, and in its madness it cannot sleep at night or stay in any one place by day, but it is filled with longing and hastens wherever it hopes to see the beautiful one. And when it sees him and is bathed with the waters of yearning, the passages that were sealed are opened, the soul has respite from the stings and is eased of its pain, and this pleasure which it enjoys is the sweetest of pleasures at the time.


--Σωκράτης, ΦΑΙΔΡΟΣ/ Sokrates, Plato's Phaedrus 251E - 252A (translated by Harold North Fowler for Loeb Classical Library)

I found some scraps of fabric around for Ritsuka's wristband. It's not the exact colours, but it's close enough for me. (The cosplay is supposed to have a belt, but I scrapped it because (1) I hate wearing belts, (2) I couldn't find a belt that looked even roughly similar, and (3) none of the potential belts I tried with the overalls looked good.)

So, once I make the wristband, I have to:

-respike Killua's wig
-make Killua's boot covers
-buy Isumi's shirt
-redye my hair black (and possibly get it trimmed)
-wash and iron outfits

And that should be it except for the packing. My mum and I are leaving for Maine Wednesday morning (2 July).

I've installed all of John P.'s texture enhancements for Thief: Deadly Shadows. Initially, I began with only the Garrett textures and gameplay tweaks because I was unsure if my laptop could handle all of them, but having all of the textures installed hasn't appeared to affect gameplay speed with the exception of the loading zones (which are now approximately twice as long, about the same length as Bloodlines' were on my Sony Vaio).

In addition to John P.'s texture pack - which also provides new starting and loading screens, alters the glow of loot and selected items, and disables the arrow trails - I've tweaked Thief: Deadly Shadows more than I have any other computer game, which is due in large part to the readiness of the Thief fan community to make tweaks available to everyone. Previously, Vampire the Masquerade: Bloodlines was the game I manually altered most and all I ultimately did was enable the console, disable the autosave, and make some slight graphics adjustments in order to decrease loading time. As such, I've made the following changes to my play version of Deadly Shadows (I also have a second, untweaked version installed for use with the editor): removed the opening videos, disabled the bouncing arrows on briefing screens, shrunk the light gem and compass, disabled the blue glow on selected inventory items, removed the lockpicking HUD, rebinded the movement keys to mimic Thief 1/2's ['W' as run forward, 'S' as walk forward, 'X' as walk backward], increased the mouse and leaning speeds to mimic Thief 1/2, disabled first person 'head bobbing', disabled the third person death camera, and a number of other more minor adjustments.

But enough with tweaks. Onto the screencaps! (Which are brought to you courtesy of John P.'s new Garrett textures.) The screencaps are rather large, but I didn't want to resize them; it would be rather odd to apply new textures that enhance graphic detail and then shrink the screencaps down so that the new detail couldn't be observed.

Below the cut are four screencaps of Garrett (completely unedited, even for contrast and gamma) taken in third person. The first two show the enhanced Garrett texture based on his Deadly Shadows face and a fan-made clothing skin that is supposed to be reminiscent of his Dark Project outfit. (I like the brown armguards, but personally think the top is too light.) The second two show his fan-created 'masked' face and fan-made clothing skin based on his Deadly Shadows outfit (which is black, although the original game's didn't cover his arms completely), which I prefer (although I must admit it makes him even more obviously a thief in the City sections, though it doesn't matter if you're ghosting [as it is, some of the citizens will ask "What's with the hood?" or make similar comments on Garrett's sketchy appearance when you pass them]). You can see a screencap of the original Garrett skin here.

( 'Is that a thief I see before me? Guards!' )

This is the paper I wrote for The Silk Road this past semester. The only major changes are that the footnotes have become endnotes, Greek lettering has been added, and a few minor grammatical corrections have been made. To use the endnotes, click on the number in the paper you're interested in and it will take you down to the endnotes section. To return to where you were reading, simply click on the same number in the endnotes section.

I've tried not to presume any foreknowledge about Alexander the Great, Ancient Greece, or the Silk Road. However, there are some instances where I use topic-specific vocabulary, such as referring to Alexander's 'Companions'. In these cases, the word itself is footnoted and you can find additional information in the endnotes.

Any remaining grammatical or formatting errors are mine. The reason it took so long to put this up is that I wrote all of the coding by hand; please inform me if you find any footnote breaks.

Finally, please do not take and claim as your own work. I'm not completely satisfied with this paper, but it's typical of me to be critical of my own writing.

( The Greek Presence in Bactria. )

Thief: Deadly Shadows is the third - and, at the moment, final - game of the Thief series that began with The Dark Project in 1998. Looking Glass Studios, who also created System Shock and Ultima Underworld, initially designed The Dark Project as an action/adventure game with additional RPG elements set in a grim version of Camelot. It was only later that thievery became the game's focus and stealth play in a pseudo-medieval/steampunk world the game's trademark.

The Dark Project was successful enough that a souped-up version of the game was released in 1999 as Thief Gold and a sequel - Thief II: The Metal Age - in 2000. Shortly thereafter, Looking Glass Studios closed, which led Thief fans to wonder over the fate of the series. However, the fandom did not die, perhaps in large part due to DromEd, the level editor for the first two Thief games that was released with Thief Gold and allowed fans to create their own missions. It was in this time after the closer of Looking Glass that the concept of Thief2X: Shadows of the Metal Age was born -- a fan-made expansion for Thief II made through DromEd that would be as lengthy and complex as the previous Thief games. If the professional studios wouldn't made another Thief, the the fans would do it on their own!

As it turns out, the studios did make another Thief game -- Thief III: Deadly Shadows, which was released in 2004 and lost it's 'III' title in an attempt to access a wider audience who hadn't already played the first two Thiefs. Thief: Deadly Shadows brought with it a number of changes: new developing studio (Ion Storm), new game engine (modified Unreal 2), new technology, and new platforms (both PC and console [XBox]). Nevertheless, a number of ex-Looking Glass employees worked on Deadly Shadows with Ion Storm, including designer Randy Smith and sound master Eric Brosius.

Deadly Shadows continues the story of Garrett, the expert thief lead character of the series who was an orphan living on the streets and stealing to survive until he became part of the Keepers, a secret organization focused on gathering information and maintaining balance in the world. However, after the Keepers trained Garrett, he left them and used the skills they had taught him to become a master thief. Garrett is not a heroic character, nor is he a villain (although it can be - and is - debated among players); rather, he is someone who is primarily looking out for himself and mostly wants to be left alone, only to be manipulated by powers higher than himself into taking action throughout the course of the three games.

That was a far longer introduction to the Thief series than I set out to write, but I think it covers it well. Now, to the gameplay of Deadly Shadows!

Deadly Shadows introduced a number of new features to Thief gameplay, while revising others and taking a few away. Here, I'll go through what I consider the most important features one at a time. This will contain spoilers, but minor ones.

( Deadly Shadows gameplay. )

There are a number of aspect in Deadly Shadows I could choose to focus on, but as this review is already longer than either I anticipated or any other review I've written, I'm going to write my overall view of the game (my opinion, obviously) and then conclude with my favourite and least favourite missions.

Was Deadly Shadows a good game? I would say yes.

Did Deadly Shadows live up to the Thief legacy? It tried, and it's still recognizably Thief, but there are definitely improvements that could have been made. I'm still on the fence on this one (no pun intended), though I'm not going to question it's title as the third in the Thief trilogy (which some have done).

Is Deadly Shadows equal to the first two Thiefs? No. The first two Thiefs, in addition to Thief2X, are superior to Deadly Shadows. Even though the graphics and AI are worse, the atmosphere and the story are more impressive. Deadly Shadows particularly dropped the ball in the briefing and cutscene department, which may seem a minor complaint, but it's a problem when you can't even animate your main character consistently across the game. However, I especially mention briefings and cutscenes because they were beautiful and enthralling to watch in the first two Thiefs (and Thief2X carried on the tradition admirably) and were some of the most memorable moments in the game for me.

In conclusion, something worth playing for Thief fans, as well as those who enjoy stealth games. However, Thief fans will probably find fault, in addition to being less challenging than the first two Thiefs. It's difficult to live up to a legacy and (as of this year) ten years of support and devotion from one of the most talented small fandoms I've ever had the pleasure to encounter and Deadly Shadows doesn't quite manage it. But maybe the fans will.

Actually, strike that. The fans already have. If the over 300 fan missions out there, Thief2X, The Dark Mod, and the still very active fan community over on TTLG doesn't prove that, I don't know what will.

( My favourite and least favourite Deadly Shadows missions [some spoilers]. )

Any and all spelling and other errors are my responsibility and I apologize; I have not edited this at all.

I finished the first season of Maria-sama ga Miteru, a total of 13 episodes. There's not nearly as much humour as there was in Kashimashi and the animation isn't as nice, but I do like the majority of the characters. Ironically, my last favourite character is Sachiko, who, together with the main character, is supposed to make up the primary pairing of the series. I don't dislike their relationship, but I also find them the least interesting.

Sei, on the other hand, I adore. My other favourite characters are Rei and Yoshino. I know that doesn't mean anything to those of you who haven't seen the series, but I'll have to type up a proper review later.

It's another list time. This is primarily for my reference and is characters I would like to eventually cosplay. I'm sure it will be added to and adjusted.

( 'To Cosplay' list. )

Since there is no built-in screencapture in Deadly Shadows, I used Corel Capture to take screencaps (which I also used for some of my Bloodlines images). Unfortunately, the screencaps came out excessively dark even though I adjusted the brightness in-game and it looked perfectly fine while playing. Hence, I've re-adjusted the levels and contrast on most of the screencaps so you can see more clearly what's happening, even though it loses some of the atmosphere. I also changed my display back to 800 x 600 in the middle of taking screencaps, which is what I played the game in.

( Shalebridge Cradle screencaps without spoilers. )

( Two extra screencaps. )

( Shalebridge Cradle screencaps with spoilers (mainly AI). )

I finished playing the Shalebridge Cradle mission in Deadly Shadows yesterday. Ocean House from Vampire the Masquerade: Bloodlines has retained its title as the scariest computer game level I've ever played. To be fair, Shalebridge Cradle was at a bit of a disadvantage; I had read an article about the level with spoilers about a year ago since I thought I wouldn't have an opportunity to play it for a while, whereas I didn't spoil myself at all for any part of Bloodlines.

The atmosphere of Shalebridge Cradle was nevertheless impressive. There's something about the very architecture of the lobby that makes you uneasy, and that's just the beginning. I'll have to take screencaps (and there is no built-in screencapture).

On the other hand, the Cradle was the easiest level for finding loot and the second half of the mission was less challenging than I had expected.

I'm now on the very last mission -- the Wieldstrom Museum. We'll see how it compares to the museum mission in Thief2X. About four more hours and I should be done.

Sarah, I'll be calling you tomorrow; I've been feeling a bit under the weather today and want to try to get to bed early tonight.

Quote of the Day: "So what's the value of the political parties to you?"
"They organize our animosities."
--Stephen Colbert and George Will on The Colbert Report, 3 June 2008