Long ass rant mid 2014

In just a couple of days, I would have been working the work life for 1 year. Thinking back, a lot of things happened in the past year. Well, of course a lot of things happened in a year but it's more so compared to other individual years. Also, some people have been asking very adult questions and others have been making some weird (not bad) statements about me. I suspect this is because I'm more exposed to the outside world than ever before. Okay fine I was a NEET, now I'm not (crap I need to change blog name?!). This is gonna be a long ass rant because I'm just gonna speak my mind. Sorry for the profanities.

First things first, I felt my interests took a shift. With my first couple of paychecks, I finally got rid of the stupid stand-up piano which I have to wait for a internal solar eclipse to play, and got a digital piano. The solar eclipse is basically 7-9pm, if I have the mood or not tired from work, if it is not noisy at home, and if I don't feel that playing the same crap over and over will annoy the shit out of my neighbors (yes I'm damn thoughtful that way and it sometimes bother me). The digital piano is lovely. I love it. I can finally play my piano ANYTIME I want, so that allowed that interest to resurface. Not to mention that I have recently joined my company's band which jams most Friday nights. The sessions were usually awesome and I love the variety of our songs; English, Japanese, Chinese and even Filipino.

On the other hand, fighting games took a hit. I have felt like moving on from it for the longest damn time. It's already a decade since I first stepped into Bugis Virtualand to play CVS2. Almost all CVS2 community has moved away from fighting games at this point. Thinking about those days, fighting games truly felt fun. You know it's fun when you lose and still feel happy. Too bad those days are gone. Sometimes it really feels that I am playing just to rediscover those feels, but if I thought about it that way, it's impossible because it's those guys that provided the fun. The entire CVS2 bunch was a really happy bunch. The only other community I really felt was close to that is the Melty Blood community.

The other communities just weren't. There are still great people in there, but there's bad-mouthing, politics, really bad salt, shit-stirring, 'black faces' during play which I couldn't stand. It's upsetting that some newer players I feel do not respect other players enough. I felt that that is the foundation of all the shit that is happening in the FGC. I don't mean e-sport faggotry respect but the FGC respect. I actually couldn't stand it when I beat someone consistently and they start saying things (in a serious tone) along the line of me having more experience in the game...AND when they DO beat me like a couple of times they started laughing and start saying that I lost to someone who don't main the game. The worst kinds are those which I would win against, give me the cold shoulder/black face mid-game. I would usually give some chance (by all fighting game rights I should never give mercy but I don't want to lose a friendship either), lose and said player will give me smug look. There are a lot more situations like this and they seem to occur more and more frequently whenever I drop by. There are ways to induce SALT but those are not it man. For example, you have to have a legit win/lose ratio before you can start saying shit like "I DON'T EVEN MAIN THE GAME!" in their faces.

And that's just in game. Ugly things are also happening outside the game. It makes completely no sense that I feel more fun being AT WORK than playing fighting games. Maybe I'm too nice to stay in the community. I just don't want to say or do anything because it is not my community to run since I don't have much time to commit anymore and the community that I truly wanted to run for is gone. Whatever man. I still play fighting games for leisure but that's about it.

Now we talk about more random stuff.

A cousin has asked me on my birthday if I am going to work until I die. Work meaning my line of industry of course. I suspect that he won't be the last person to ask but here's my full complete long-winded as hell answer.

Firstly I cannot predict what the future Gerald thinks nor can I predict that far into the future as to whether something as volatile the Games Industry will evolve into something I hate. Taking that into consideration, I can only speak for the present me. The simple answer is yes and the simple reason is because I fundamentally love programming and games. At this point, I CANNOT see myself NOT doing games programming at any point in my life. I program at work, I program at home, and if I can frickin' program on my mobile phone I will do it. I love working on games because problems are always interesting.

Then the next question that was asked was if I am willing to leave my loved ones for the sake of my interests. I really think this question is unfair because I personally feel that it depends on the situation. Also, I feel that my loved ones (if they love me) should always respect my decisions and vice versa. If you bo jio me because you jio too many people, or forgot about me, or whatever, I can totally respect that. And once again it boils down to the scenario. If we were to take the extreme case, that I have to leave my loved ones and will NEVER EVER see them again because programming is outlawed here so I have to leave my loved ones to pursue my love of programming, the present me would by a narrow margin. That being said, I have to say that it is a clever disguise of the stupid question they ask you as a child which is the "If your mother and father are drowning in a pool, who would you save?" That question used to implode my brains FOR NO GOOD REASON.

Next thing is statements. Some people say that I don't care, generally. I'm actually ridiculously sentimental; I'm just really bad at showing emotions. If my loved ones were to die the next day I would be incredibly heartbroken but I don't think I will cry over it because some part of my brain accepts that it is part of life. People need to learn to let it go (hmm maybe that's why that song is so popular?). People need to know that things don't always work out their way. Seriously, if I didn't care I would truly be a NEET at this point. Ironically, I feel that other people do not care enough about others. Every little thing people do I care like friends arranging their time to meet with me, allowing me to rant at them, or my mother taking care of me...I appreciate all of that it. I just look like I don't. From an anime perspective, the reason why I watch all those really happy moe animes is so that when I run into a 'feels' anime like Clannad, Angel Beats, Air, Eureka 7, I need that library of moe animes to drown myself in so that I don't feel moody and sad for the rest of the week. Angel Beats, which I thought was not that good and a bit rushed, had me dead for a weekend. Fuck, let's move away from this topic.

Another rather popular statement being said about me is about how lucky I am regarding my path from education to career. Lots of people said it and I don't blame them because it certainly looks that way. In my perspective, it was more of a 'I'm lucky it worked out'. There's a slight difference in the meaning. A ton of things could have gone wrong in my pursue in games programming. Because it's a ton of things, with a ton of feelings involved, I'll probably leave most of it for another rant. There are quite a lot of obstacles I have to overcome and the ride isn't as smooth as people might think it is. People need to realize that I some a tough decisions like deciding to all-in for my GCE 'O' Levels and I had problems like the burn out I had right after my internship at polytechnic. There was even a time I wanted to just change industries.

I was lucky in the sense that I have a chance to ride. The opportunity showed up, I took it with some risks and perseverance, and it luckily it worked out. But it wasn't all rainbows and unicorns.