Tilting at Windmills

Whew, haven’t posted in a month… Had a lot of things outside my hobby work going on.

My work team has moved to a new high-rise building in Bellevue… which I’d be happier about if I hadn’t been downgraded from a shared office to a workstation. (NOT a cubicle, a workstation, basically a desk in a large room of desks.) Also, not all that keen on heights… I’d turn down a windowed office if offered.

Also, my parent’s dog, a delightful mini-schnauzer who’s only five years old, is probably not long for the world… she was severely anemic and required a blood transfusion. It’s probably some form of bone marrow cancer; my parents have decided not to put her through the agony and torture of a biopsy just to find out which terminal disease it is. Instead they’ll just enjoy the time they have left with her.

Game-wise, been playing a bit more of World of Warcraft lately. The new expansion was announced and was a considerable surprise to me… revising the old content was not something I expected. A step in the right direction, really.

A lot of what made some of the old games like Ultima special to people was how attached they became to familiar places… so when you screwed with them it really triggered an emotional response. The general decay of the land due to pollution and ignorance in Ultima VII is a good example… I’m not sure Ultima IX is as effective, because the land is so radically different that it really isn’t the same place at all.

Anyway, I’m going to try and get my programming work on the CRPG going again this weekend… I’m making some display changes first, then I want to work on figuring out action interfaces and determination.