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History of the Northern Crater, back to Day One...Dec. 20: - I intended to actually update with a whole lot of stuff today, but you see... it's like this: First I updated my gallery in the fan art section (with my first two FFIX pieces!), and that all went fine, then I was going to add some FFIX midis I found to the sounds section... and I had realized last time I was looking up a midi (yes, on my own page - I have too many), the sounds page took forever to load since there are so many midis that even the text takes forever to download, and I should really divide it into separate sections by game. So I started making header graphics for each individual game... but didn't have any Mystic Quest screenshots sitting around, so I started playing it to get a fitting one, and suddenly remembered the perfect place to get a header for a "sounds" page from... and uh... I ended up playing it for about 4-5 hours. And I had a great time. So all you people who say MQ sucks - bah. It's no FFIX or anything, but I like it. :D Once I'd gotten that screenshot though, I was able to divide the game midis up, make the headers, and add a bunch of new FFIX midis. However, that took pretty much the entire evening, and I'm tired. ;) Note to those who have sent me mail in the last month... I've had one of the crappier months I've had in a few years, and thus decided I was going to ignore everything I received until I didn't feel like kicking people in the face. However, things are looking up now, so I'll try to get to all that stuff. =) Nov. 25: - Now that I've played a little ways into FFIX, I decided I could take some of the tentative info in the character descriptions in the information section out and put some better (non-spoiler, naturally) character summaries in for the characters I've actually gotten. Since the manual didn't bother giving any. :P Also, I hunted down the first few midis for the brand new FFIX section of the sounds page! Mm, I love midis... and Vivi's Theme is my current favorite track, by the way. :D That little guy is so cool... ...And as I was uploading this stuff, I realized that a new FF game out means... new version of the FF Code! So there's a beta version up now, with names of player characters only - I'm waiting until I've beaten the game (or until I'm very close to beating it) to determine what non-player characters are important enough to add... because there's an awful lot of recurring ones in FFIX. Some that I'd initially blown off as being one-shots have come back repeatedly to play a larger role, so who knows what'll happen next? Whoa... and while checking to make sure I got all my links right on this update, I see that I got hit number 34,000 on the main page. So gee - thanks for the visits, you guys! I just hope it's not as I fear, and it's all the same four or five people sitting here and hitting the Reload button because they have nothing better to do. Heh... Nov. 22: - I now have FFIX! (Thank you again, dear! ;)) And as is my tradition upon receiving a new FF game, before I take the time to actually play it, I have to torture myself by getting the character info from the manual and typing it up for the information section here. And eek, I didn't realize they'd changed the spellings of a couple names. O_o And unfortunately, there was barely any character info in the manual, just quotes... but those are now added, at least. And now, I go off to play. *sighs in relief* Nov. 1: - Today, a bunch of little things... some of which are way past overdue. On the serious fanfics page, you will find two new fics - a short FFVII story, The Turks: Regrets and Consequences, by Luke Taylor, and Toki no Hourousha, an epic FFV tale by Morgaine MacLir. Also, a shockingly huge song parody featuring spoilers from every single FF game to date plus Chrono Trigger, by Donal-mus. Aye yi yi... In the graphics department, there is a new fan art of Kit by Rachael Mayo in the Guest Gallery, and I finally got around to uploading some new things in the Desktop Graphics section - a FFV wallpaper graphic I did on a whim in Photoshop, an (incomplete) FFV icon set I did to go along with the wallpaper, and an updated FF8 icon pack - now complete with a chocobo! And just because I could, I added a bunch of neat midis from various non-FF games to the misc. games midi page. And I think that's everything... for now... Oct. 27: - Now, wouldn't it be great if I could keep on writing one new chapter of The Heirloom every week? Well, it would, but it's probably not too likely. Although... most of chapter 6 was written ages ago, so it may come sooner than that. ;) Man, I've been watching too much Gundam Wing - during the big action scene in this chapter, I was hearing Rhythm Emotion in my head. Oct. 20: - One brand new, action-packed chapter of The Heirloom, featuring Gabriel and his friends and their wacky adventures in Midgar! *cue theme song* Oh wait... we uh... don't have a theme song. Oct. 1: - Just what the majority of the site visitors have been waiting for (or at least it seems that way...) - the first three chapters on The Heirloom. I decided to be evil and end this update on a bit of a cliffhanger. Heh heh heh... Sept. 20: - Heh, I was reading my guestbook the other day, and realized that regular site visitors were holding conversations in there... So I did something I've been meaning to do for quite some time: get a message board for the site. ;) Not that I expect it to be too busy, in fact I suppose it'll be dead most of the time. But what the heck... might as well give it a shot, huh? The link will be located by the guestbook, until I take the time to integrate it into the site navigation graphic. :P That's it for this update... but check back in a few days... I'm awfully close to finishing my edits on the first few chapters of The Heirloom. ;) Just need to decide if my cover pic is good enough, and whether or not to have Cid continue with his "@#&%!!" stuff or just write the words out... I'm sure we all know them anyway. Heh. Sept. 9: - Hmm... a year ago today, I bought FFVIII. I can so clearly remember that feeling of anticipation -- a whole new FF world to explore, characters to get to know... And now, they're like old friends. It seems like I've known them forever. Not that I'm sick of the game, but man, that whole experience of knowing I'd be discovering a new world for the first time... *sigh* Now I'm craving FFIX again, I better stop that. At any rate, I was inspired to work a bit on the Information section, so I added character profiles of FFIV's Edward and Yang. Pretty soon, I'll have the whole FFIV section done, I think. And those looking for some wackiness, I added a new song parody by Robert Silvers. Once again, he parodies a hideously irritating rapper - this time, it's Eminem! Bwahahaha... Sept. 5: - This isn't really an update, just a little news flash/editorial... because after so many years, it appears that American gamers may finally get their hands on FF2 and FF3! These two, along with an enhanced version of FF1, were announced a short time ago for the handheld WonderSwan Color, but since the original WS was never released here, it seemed unlikely that they'd be bringing over the new version. But hey - we could dream, right? Looks like our dreaming paid off, because the WSC has been confirmed for release in North America. Considering that FF Anthology and Lunar: SSSC proved that modern gamers are willing to dish out money for older games, it's a real possibility that these updated versions of the Famicom titles will be made available. I know I'll be buying them. =) Ah, to have a complete set of every FF game legally... and in a language I can comprehend! Then I can start adding the nice FF2 and 3 midis I have to this page, too. ;) I think I'm more excited about this than the upcoming release of FF9... I mean, I've always known we'd get FF9, but I'd pretty much given up hope on the idea of FF2 and FF3. Read about it and check out the pictures - aren't those FF1 characters adorable? :D Sept. 1: - Yep, still working, but I just HAD to put up the really cool counter gift that Shinryuu drew me. :D Mmm... must draw FFV art to contribute... no, must work. D'oh. August 23: - Still working like crazy, but I thought I'd take a little time out to say thanks to everyone for getting TNC past 30,000 hits despite my lack of updates. And email. And so on. Seriously, that's how busy I am. :P And again, seriously, thanks a lot for keeping the site at hand, because the day is quickly approaching where I will be starting up frequent updates again, including that sequel everyone's been waiting for... ;) If you want that day to come faster, and would like to give me some motivation, head on over to teamxkalibur.com and check out what we're doing, and maybe sign the petition if you think it sounds cool. =) Anyway, aside from the plug and the thanks, I actually did do a little bit of updating... added a new song parody, and a few new midis from FF5, FF8, and Mystic Quest. And also, I have a big announcement to make: Since I'm no longer GIA staff, I feel bad about using up space on their server. In a few months, when I get paid, I'm planning on getting a domain name and giving TNC a permanent home, but until then, it may be that I'll move the site to Tripod temporarily. I already started, in case this URL vanishes under mysterious circumstances, but I won't publicize that URL until the whole site is actually up there. So in the immediate future, to get to TNC, please use http://come.to/thenortherncrater, lest the normal URL you know now no longer works. I'm not sure if I'll be able to leave a forwarding page. And even if I do, the site is likely to move again soon. ;) Thanks again, folks! I'll try to get to answering my back log of email soon... really... :P July 2: - What's this? An update?! Just one little thing, but hopefully you'll like it... I certainly had fun making it. Those who have been waiting for word of the sequel to Misbegotten, go here for a little something to get you interested... ;) And in case you've been wondering what job I have that's keeping me so terribly busy that I can't update for awhile, well, the cat's out of the bag, so to speak. Here's a little hint... okay, actually that's not a "little hint", that's a rather straightforward answer. Since that much has been publically released now, I guess it doesn't violate the NDA I signed. =) Yes, that is what I'm doing. No, I didn't do the character art, but the "Computer Technology!", "Cliffs and Waterfalls", and "On a Boat" screenshots are my work. Bwahaha! :D It's an awesome job, but we have tough deadlines. So TNC remains unupdated for a little longer... hopefully not too much longer. Oh, and by the way... my net-link account is currently dead. It'll probably be back up by the 6th or so, but don't expect any responses to email until at least then. :P May 17: - This isn't so much an update as a notice... I'm sorry I've been neglecting the site, and I'll reassure people that no, I'm not intending to abandon it. There's plenty of things I still want to do with this site. ;) However, there will likely be no updates for the next six weeks, if not longer. See, I got some really good news about my job, which I'm not going to go into detail on, but basically it means that for the next month and a half, I need to concentrate on nothing but my job. In a way this sucks (I got a game I've really wanted for a year last week, for my birthday, and I won't even get a chance to play it until July, it appears), but under the circumstances, I'm not complaining, because once it's over, I'll likely have money to spare, and I can take a few months off working at all and enjoy life. :D So my various pages will be neglected even longer, yes. On breaks, I'll try to catch up with some of my email, though, and hopefully I'll have tons of new fics and art and so on to post when I'm finished. And I'm planning something really... unusual... to introduce my upcoming sequel. Just wait and find out, I'm sure everyone will either love it or think I'm a real egomaniac, but man, it's going to be so much fun to do... ;) And so... I'll see you in July! If I don't break down and do a couple tiny updates here and there in the meantime. Heh heh... April 23: - I dunno about anyone else, but I'm really, really digging the Amano pics for FFIX. And from the trailer, the promise of a return to the medieval fantasy settings, and the information Sakaguchi let out in recent interviews, I'm seriously looking forward to this game. And so I spent some time tonight cleaning up the available Amano sketches a little, to use as character pictures in the brand new FFIX profiles in the Information section! So far it doesn't have much, just the tiny bits and pieces that have been released about the characters. Also, GameCat posted an awesome song parody the other day, which I promptly begged him to let me put up in my Parody section, and he agreed. It's TMBG, see -- I had to post it! :D Two semi-site-related things I feel like mentioning here: First, if you've sent email recently, you probably haven't gotten a response, and that was because my computer was having serious space issues and I could barely get to my mail at all. Thanks to a co-worker at GIA, I now have 6 more gigs of space available, and now I can get back to replying, when I get the time. Sorry about the delay! Secondly, if you haven't seen my homepage that I plugged last update, you probably didn't know that the thing I'm getting seriously into now is amateur voice acting. What does this have to do with TNC? Well, my first role, and the one I've quickly become identified with, is Sorceress Edea in an FF8 radio play! :D Check out Wing Heart Productions for more info, and clips of most of the FF8 characters' voices as they will appear in the drama! The VAs are really, really good... I can't wait to actually get started. =) April 13: - Yeah, okay, it's a long time between updates, but after finishing my 50 chapter opus, don't I deserve a long break? ;) And to be perfectly honest, I've had no time to play video games for a couple months, and so I kinda lost interest there for awhile... However, Nation posted some really cool wavs on a message board I go to, which solved an ancient question once and for all about the real lyrics to One-Winged Angel. This inspired me to do a little reworking of Angel of Darkness, and a new section has been added containing those lyrics and a few other sound files... including Sephiroth's voice! :D And I got rid of the embedded midis I had there, because embedded midis are evil, and I can't believe I let that slide for so long. They're still in the shrine though, in the new section, along with some other ones. And on another note, as I said above, I haven't been updating this page so much because I've been sort of uninterested in video games. However, this doesn't mean I've not been updating anything at all. <SPAM> I've had a redesign for my homepage in the works for months, and that is now implemented, in the form of EarMouse! Yes, it's a weird name, and if you want to know the story, go visit it. It's likely to get more frequent updates than this page, by the way, since it doesn't have one specific topic and I can update it about any game, anime, TV show, strange guy walking down the street, or cultural anomaly that I want. So if it goes awhile between updates here (also, if you've ever had the bizarre urge to hear me sing Celes's opera song... yeah, right) and you want to know what the heck I'm up to, check there. </SPAM> Mar. 23 - FINISHED! Chapter 50 of Misbegotten is now up, and the story is done. I would be real excited that after two years, the story is complete (especially since it's only the second long story I've ever finished in my life), but I sorta wish it could go on forever... at least I've still got a sequel in the works, so this isn't the last appearance of Kit and *spoiler omitted*, unless I decide not to post the sequel. Thoughts on that? I don't want to post the sequel if people think it would mess up the original story to go on from here... Mar. 19 - Well, I'm still not entirely satisfied with the three chapters of Misbegotten which I posted, but I don't think I ever will be... and I'm in the right mood to post these particular chapters today, since yesterday my guinea pig died, after basically 24 hours straight of me doing all I could to try to pull him out of it. *sigh* I miss him... Julio was a great little guy, and the house seems so quiet without him trying to converse with my squeaky computer chair... Also in this update, I'm adding two new submissions to the Serious Fics section: The Art of Living Forever, by Matthew Schuele, and A Tortured Soul, by Daphne Sy. The former is a shockingly moving FF8 story, considering the character it revolves around, and the latter is an in-depth examination of FF7's Aerith, as she looks back at the events of her recent years. And wow, it occurs to me that if you're going to read everything in this update, you might want a big box of tissues ready. Like I explained above, it's that kind of day, and I guess this update reflects that, though it wasn't really intended... Mar. 10 - This is actually not an update, but a notice... *sigh* Due to a really annoying computer error that no one can figure out the cause of, I lost all the email from the last two years that was not yet replied to and placed in another folder besides "Inbox". This includes all the fanfics that have been submitted in the last several months. If you're one of the people who has sent me a fic for posting, please resend if it's not too much trouble. I'm sorry... that goes for anyone who didn't receive a reply to an email they sent to me. The last few days have been spent trying to actually be able to receive mail again as well, so no more Misbegotten has been written either, and now I'm behind on my graphics work, so it may be longer until it's posted than I originally thought. :P Again, sorry... I'm seriously ticked off, as there was a lot of email in there I really wanted to keep. But on the brighter side, at least we have some info on the next FF game... check out the GIA for all the coolness. I think I already like Steiner... heheh, ever since I saw the trailer, I've thought he looks like a hilarious character. ;) Ooh yeah... new FF games always have a way of cheering me up. Mar. 5 - Actually, this is another small one... sorry! You see, I've got to explain here... Today is the second anniversary of TNC, and looking back in the Site History (which I just divided up by years, so it doesn't take forever to load), I realized that two years ago, on the very first day, I uploaded the first two chapters of Misbegotten. I was thinking, wouldn't it be cool to finish the story for the second anniversary? Unfortunately, I've been so busy with other stuff that I was unable to get it completely done, but I did finish two chapters - and after that, there are only two more. So I wondered about posting those today, then finishing the last two and posting them a couple days later... but as the two chapters I finished both end on a major cliffhanger, I decided that would not be good. :P So instead, there's no new chapters today, but the entire story should be finished and posted within a week, or possibly less... Now, as to what is in this update... Speaking of Misbegotten, I got a special custom award for it, along with one of the nicest emails I've received in who knows how long... *sigh* And also, this afternoon as I was lying in bed, waking up, I had a demented idea for yet another stupid Song Parody, this one a TMBG song... sort of... and I just can't turn down a parody idea. :P Feb. 5 - Not much today, just a new chapter of Misbegotten. Now I'm at disc 3, and you know what that means... ;) I shouldn't be typing, but I just had to do some writing, I was going insane... Jan. 18 - Been awhile, and that's for two reasons: One, I'm busy doing graphics work. Two, my hands are getting really bad again... so I've been trying to type as little as possible. :P Fortunately, people sent me stuff to update with that didn't require much typing on my part! :D So over in Counter Gifts there's a new one from Luke Taylor, who was visitor #22,222, and Crono and Dekar's FF Code Maker is now updated for version 2.0. Thanks, guys! And my single contribution to this update is a doofy little FF5 midi. Heh heh... I was bored and unable to work on my fics or pages, and sequencing doesn't require any actual typing, sooo... Jan. 3 - Just a small quick update to proclaim that I've now beaten FFV! :D The ending was great, too, just absolutely beautiful... and so after watching the pretty FMV sequence a few times, I hunted down some midis of all the music from the ending... and there's a lot of it. So now there's about seven new FFV midis in the Sounds section. And since I was changing my FF Code, I added the FFV characters I'd neglected to that list, and did a rather large update to my About Me page, which hadn't been updated since before I played FFVIII, I think. :P Also includes info on my new cool job... ;) Jan. 1, 2000 - First update of 2000... happy new year, folks! That Y2K thing sure didn't do anything, thank goodness. I'd be ticked if all my files I haven't uploaded yet vanished. At any rate, I've been disgusted with the way I'd neglected the Information section for ages, so I've been working on that little by little, and now I have all the basic stats for every FFVI and FFVII character up. Back story and analyses will come later... I'll try to do a couple per week, depending on how my hands hold out. But at least the basic stats are there... Only other thing in this update is a new FFV midi in the Sounds section, since I got to the final area yesterday. And may I say, that final dungeon is brutal... at least now I know which enemies to just run from. :P |
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