Highlights of 2013!

When a new year beckons, it is time to give thanks for the year that has passed.

The problem is, this year I haven't been really active in blogging the events in my life, so I have no record of what happened! Gonna have to go with memory and Facebook searching.

1) Took Animal Behavior
I have almost no memory of any significant event that arose from school, apart from taking this really fun mod called Animal Behavior. My review of it can be found here, but it was just a really enjoyable module with a great lecturer, content, and got to hang out with the lovable Lois from church :)

Our project was on cats... you can ask me personally about what we did.

2) Celebrated CNY with Szehong and friends.
One thing I enjoy doing is to hang out with my gf friends, or for her to hang out with mine. For CNY we had a gathering with her secondary school clique, and had a great time!

Dinner at Esplanade... we had deep fried panda with braised panda on the side. (ok no we didn't. I'm sorry. I love pandas. And they are an endangered species. So love your pandas).

3) Shot a ridiculously good photoshoot using an amateur camera with Szehong
It was just a casual, fun idea, that we would go to Vivocity and take some mock wedding shots just for fun, with my average noob Samsung camera. So we basically set the camera on timer, quickly got into position, and posed. We never expected to take some pretty darn amazing shots:

4) Got the best internship in my life.
Haha ok this is partly because it was the ONLY internship in my life. And it wasn't just a good internship because of what I learnt on the job, or because of the opportunities it opened to me. Additionally, it was because it allowed me to meet a bunch of great, awesome and fun people.

We were lucky how most of us could hit it off really well and had great hours of crazed laughter and stomach-aching moments in that little room we spent together every weekday for 10 weeks.

I also got the youngest, most friendly supervisor among everyone in Yining, who was more than just a supervisor but also a friend to me.The tradeoff was that she had the least experience as well... but judging from how much time the other sups had for their interns, I think I got the best deal :P (she still owes me my testimonial though grr been chasing her for months)

5) Met my sbff, Eri Sasaki
This could be combined into the previous point, but I thought it deserved one in itself. I became close friends with one of my fellow interns. Through random conversations about our US SEPs, personal lives, and own relationships, this friendship blossomed way beyond my initial expectations. I call her my 'sbff' now, which stands for 'second bff' (first one is my bestie chris haha.)

Our first (and ONLY??) picture together, way before we became close friends. How come we don't have any pictures together!

I'm really grateful for meeting and getting to know Eri, as she's just such a pleasant, positive person to be around. Being the cynical, pessimistic person I am, my interactions with her remind me constantly that it's ok to be idealistic and just... dream and be happy sometimes.  Plus the gf seems to like her, so that's great. Hope we can be long term family friends and our kids can be playmates or something ^^


6) Wrote, directed, and filmed several video projects for some psychology modules
This was another series of events that came out of the blue. We had to come out with something creative for our presentations, and after some short brainstorming we decided to film a Modern Family video for my Positive Psychology module.

I volunteered to write the script, and we proceeded to have a great time filming it.

Our presentation was about Optimism, so I created two characters to contrast the optimistic vs pessimistic style, and wrote what I hoped to be a funny script for it. It turned out pretty well, and was rather well received by the class (judging from the laughter :D )
And the more important thing is that we had SUCH a hilarious great time filming it (watch till the end for bloopers). Laugh until damn tired.

Following this success, I got bold and volunteered to write the script for the presentation for another module, Addictive Behaviors. It turned out pretty damn well too. Our topic was exercise addiction, and our goal was to present what we wrote in our research paper to the class in an interesting, engaging manner. This was our final product:

Part 1 (Watch this)

Part 2 (You can skip this if you want, abit technical)

Part 3 - The Music Video (WATCH THIS)

I don't know which project I'm more proud of - the Mist Family was a longer, more funny script; but I am the lead character in Axel Size! hahaha. Oh well, I love both of them. And kudos to a supportive group (in both instances) who had faith in me and was willing to be directed by me haha.

Positive Psychology group, after our second presentation. Top picture we were in character (of our skit).

Addictive Behaviors group, after the semester.

I think what made the whole experience for these two videos better was that at some point, my entire group decided to just have fun and not care about grades too much. Not everyone would be willing to do that, but I'm glad I was surrounded by like-minded people. When you release the inhibition of trying to 'fulfil criteria' to get a better grade, you just have more creativity and more room to make a good video.
Plus, I really enjoyed seeing the whole process come to fruition, and discovered that I have a mini passion for making videos like these.

Oh, we did really well for both videos nonetheless (about an A/A+ grade for both).


7) Got a surprise 24th birthday celebration
This came at the end of a grueling day of filming for the Mist Family video, so its pleasantness was amplified ten times. Like omg ! The good things never end!

Must really thank sbff for planning this and going to buy the cake and all. So lucky to have her as a friend!

The Mist Family... minus Raymond. We went to eat dimsum after the long day of filming.

Also, I somehow got two more birthday celebrations after this (albeit a combined one with October babies), once with SNL and the other with PALs. I think it's the most number of 'surprise' birthday celebrations in a year I've ever had in my life.

8) Discovered Escape rooms!
This year, several companies sprung up in Singapore running escape room games! The basic premise is that you are locked in a room, and you have to solve a series of puzzles to unlock a series of locks to get out of the room.

I formed a little team with the PPSD interns, and we've been to several escape rooms now: Wonderfool Dream (our first, failed cos the first puzzle took too long) and Dimension Z (solved) at The Escape Artist, Chamber of Secrets at Xcape (solved. Really great puzzles here) (I also went to Catch me if you can @ Xcape with another group), and Painter's Murder at Freeing SG (solved. Didn't enjoy it much, was too easy)

I really enjoy solving the puzzles and marveling at the genius of the puzzles. Hope we can continue solving rooms!

9) Started playing Hearthstone
My gaming 'addictions' change from season to season, and my recent obsession is Hearthstone: Heroes of Warcraft, a CCG made by Blizzard.

I've joined two events so far, one being a promotional event which I got lucky and won $120, and another being a constructed tournament which I finished in 4th place, something quite admirable considering others have spent over $50 on the game while I've spent $0 to buy any cards.

My loot from Bugis+  promotional event.

I'm pretty much engrossed with strategizing and writing guides for this game at the moment, and really enjoying this. Wonder how long this will last heh.

The community is starting to grow too (the game is still in closed beta!), so hopefully this game becomes bigger than it currently is, and I can say I was one of the pioneers in Singapore LOL. 

10) Went to Tokyo, Japan.

I'm not sure whether it's memory bias, but somehow the exciting and great events seem to all happen during the second half of this year. What happened in the first half of the year??

Anyway, this great year culminated with an overseas vacation to Tokyo with the gf and friends!

Szehong and I wearing yukatas at an indoor onsen place at Odaiba

We went to Odaiba, Shibuya, Shinjuku, Akihabara, Harajuku, Disneyland+Sea, and Ueno. It was a great sampling of Japanese culture, something that I've only heard being squealed and proclaimed from the gf all this while (haha) before going for this trip.

Disneysea was so damn beautiful I can cry

I really like the 'expected' service standard of being extremely chirpy and polite from all the service staff in Japan! (even the 7-11 people) The technology of toilets was pretty cool too (why doesn't Singapore implement buttwashers?! best invention ever).

And the food! The food!!

Ok, for more food pictures, go to this link, I blogged about it previously.

It was such a nice break from reality - I recall on the last day of Japan my brain had already began planning for what I had to do back in Singapore. Vacations are nice. 

And you know what they say about couples who survive a vacation together.... ;)

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And that's a wrap! I ended this year as I did every year for the past 3 years, watching the fireworks with the girlfriend :) It's just a nice exclamation point to the end of the year.

May 2014 be an even more fun-filled, blessed year! Happy new year everyone!

My first constructed Hearthstone Tournament

This weekend, I attended my first ever constructed deck Hearthstone tournament! It was organized by Hearthstone Alley, in conjunction with Gaming Entertainment E-sports Exhibition @ Downtown East!

I originally thought it was just a small LAN affair (didn't know it was together with this big event), but was taken by surprise when I arrived at the venue:

It was a big, big event, with spectator seats for the main event (DOTA 2), with a large 60 PC (my estimate) LAN set up for games, with other arcade games like Street Fighter, some cube game where you must tap the buttons to the music, and many more on display around the area.

The main event was the Asian Cybergames for DOTA2, and had the different international teams play live on stage! Was pretty cool... if only it was something like LoL or Starcraft which I understood. Was pretty awesome hearing the crowd reactions and commentators' hype when big things happened.


ANYWAY. Back to the main point of this post.

My event pass! Allowed me access to the gaming area heh.

I've never spent a single cent on Hearthstone, and so my decks weren't the best I wanted them to be, but I made do with what I had and submitted three decks for the competition.

-Blue portion I'm explaining my card choices, so if you can skip it if you don't want to read it-

Rogue - I actually used this to ladder until I ran into some trouble with pre-nerf frost mages and stopped playing for a while. It's a deck reliant on some neat combos to avoid damage, and a fairly quick early-mid game deck, not intending to keep the game going for long. 
I only used one Defias as while it's a gimmicky opening play, it loses its value as the game drags on. I included Fan of Knives and Abomination to deal with any warlock rush deck (on hindsight, a mistake) or pally heavy minions deck. Assassinate was for big minion removal (BGH may be better, but I don't have it).

Paladin - A mid game control deck - I would have removed Ysera for Ragnaros (if I had it), and Worgen Inf for Sylvannas (if I had it). On hindsight, 2 Sword of Justice may have been better.
Otherwise, it aims to control the board with Equality Consecrate, Hammer of Wrath, and the Divine Shields. Also has a tricky Blood Knight added in to capitalize on a pally mirror match (I did have an 11/11 one game)

Warlock - An aggro rush deck. I use this for ladder too, as I like short games when playing ranked. Double power Overwhelming has won me many games. Shadowflame was included as an insurance against any other minion heavy strategy. This deck basically loses if I"m not in a winning position by Turn 8.

-end of explanation-


I had to choose two decks for the group stage (4 groups, 5 in each group, Top 2 of each group go to Winner's Bracket, bottom 2 go to lower bracket, last guy eliminated), so I decided on the pally and Warlock deck, as they were pretty contrasting playstyles - one was a control, mid game deck, while the other was a rush aggro deck - good balance.



Group Stage
Group stage matches were Best of 3, round robin style. I approached the event with an open mind - I knew my deck was probably one of the most budget decks (only two Legendaries, and one is not even a good one (Ysera)). I was there just to have fun, and see how far I could go.

I received news that my very first game would be streamed live - with a live camera on my face and stuff. Wow. Ok. Can. I kinda like the camera anyway and just pretended I was streaming myself. (I'll post a link of the VOD (video) when it gets uploaded)

Nerves and all faded away as I won my first game, and then my first series (2-0). And after a few hours, I was pleasantly surprised with my luck as I topped my group with 4 match wins, undefeated albeit for one game. I would move on to the winner's bracket!

Brackets here: http://challonge.com/hatsg2013_groupa

Several of my games were definitely won due to luck. Just got some good topdecks, and I won. Got some nice compliments about my 'deck being strong'... which was quite flattering considering they were all budget decks.


Playoffs Stage

My match was casted again - and in this first series I had tremendous luck. I think describing it won't do it justice, I will wait for the stream to be uploaded and you can watch the amazing state of events for my 2nd and 3rd win and my reactions. I won 3-1.

I lost to Kero (the same guy I lost to at the Bugis+ event!) and his strong shaman spellcaster + warrior OTK decks (managed to beat his shaman deck tho), and dropped to the lower bracket.

After which, I had a comfortable 3-0 win against DJLOLX (I watched his game right before, and knew of his tricks. He had this tricky combo where he plays a Starving Buzzard and a Snake trap in combo. If you hit it, he basically draws 3 cards. I Backstabbed it LOL. no snakes)

And.... came the semifinals. I had to win to guarantee myself a cash prize, and if I lost I wouldn't win any cash. My opponent was the same guy I knocked out 3-1 at the start of the playoffs... and unfortunately luck wasn't on my side this time as I lost 0-3.

Brackets are here: http://challonge.com/hatsg2013


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Was a fun event overall! There was a lot going on other than Hearthstone, though I was lazy to take part in the festivities. When you enter the place, you get this Quest card which basically requires you to go around the whole D'Marquee area trying out the different games, and report to the 'quest-masters' to get chops.

Questmasters in maid costumes. I thought it was really cute how they had an exclamation mark above their heads, like those NPCS in RPGs :D

Wish I had won some prize money! But oh well, it was a great run considering I didn't buy any packets. Can't wait to watch the recorded videos! Should be good.

I can't haz moneys

Ok this is quite annoying.

Just a few days ago, I was pleasantly surprised when my friend sent me a Whatsapp:



 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Apparently one of her friends had shared my blog on his Facebook feed, helping to publicize this blog. More importantly, I'm glad that I'm making an impact to inspire others to write module reviews too (I just hope certain objective standards are upheld!)

Anyway, this may or may not have contributed to it (probably not), but I got a notification from Wordpress saying 'Your stats are booming!'. I went to check and this was what I saw



 

 

 

 

 

 

 

As you can see, there was a certain spike on Dec 24th.  How big was this spike, you may ask. On average, I get 100-200 views a day (close to 100 uniques average). On 24th Dec, I got almost 1000 views (500 uniques)

What!?

Well the most logical explanation is that it was because results were released that day. I'm not sure why people are googling for module reviews when results just come out, but I guess some sort of relief/panic mode set in then. I foresee another spike when CORS opens.

ANYWAY. The whole point of this is to complain about something - seeing the fairly decent stats, I thought of monetizing this blog. So I went to check out several options... Nuffnang, Google. Guess what.

 

YOU CANT ADVERTISE ON WORDPRESS.

ARGH. SCREW YOU WORDPRESS.

 

Ok it's kinda silly I'm getting upset over this because I started out doing these reviews not for money anyway. But it's because of the 'success' of the blog that made me WANT to get money out of it. Success is bad! It makes you crave more. I have to learn to remember the intrinsic motivation I had when I first started doing this. Oh well. Anyway, I'm just doing one more semester of this.

It's a good learning lesson really. We have to remember why we started out doing something we enjoyed, and don't let our success get to our heads. Passion keeps us going forever. Money only lasts till it's spent.