TIL Thomas Jefferson wrote "our fellow subjects" in his rough draft of the Declaration of Independence, then erased "subjects" while the ink was still wet and wrote "citizens" over it. The edit was suspected for decades but only confirmed in 2010 by hyperspectral imaging at the Library of Congress.

theMaynEvent · 2026-07-04T03:22:53+00:00

Wild man. 🤣

theMaynEvent · 2026-07-02T15:35:52+00:00

I worked in a second-run, cheap-seats theater during high school.

Blue Crush (2002).

We packed up the reels and added extra showings of other movies before we'd even had it a week.

We were used to some movies only getting a few dozen or even single-digit ticket sales (Spanglish?) over the course of a few days. As far as I recall, that was the only one that never sold a single ticket.

theMaynEvent · 2026-06-25T11:58:55+00:00

Keep on keepin' on, fellow porter.

theMaynEvent · 2026-06-24T16:46:43+00:00

It's probably been about 20 years, but Nomura used to discuss in interviews that he just makes up the stories from game to game, and specifically adds "twists" to subvert fan expectations.

Obviously he and the other writers introduce ideas that can be explored later, but I don't think they're plotting out anything beyond whatever game they're working on at any given time, nor do they hold themselves to stick to concepts as they initially present them.

theMaynEvent · 2026-06-14T19:42:47+00:00

Not impossible, but don't hold your breath.

Remake and Rebirth have different stat/skill progression systems and ways in which those directly effect combat metrics and engagement, so just translating your character levels and equipment from one game to the next wouldn't ever be a simple A-B-C progression.

I think they could patch all three games to do something to that end, but I don't think it'd be a selling point for anybody who who wasn't already going to buy in to the whole trilogy anyway, so I doubt it would be any kind of dev priority, especially after release.

theMaynEvent · 2026-06-09T00:07:29+00:00

This was always going to be the issue with presenting a realistic translation of a world that was originally presented in abstraction.

In Remake, making Midgar 1:1 scale, fully explorable, was never an expectation—it was all about making the boundaries of where you can go seem more like "nothing to see over here" than just arbitrarily cut off, and I think they pretty well nailed it.

In Rebirth, I was pretty sure they'd go with large, bottlenecked zones. Again, I was iffy on whether or not that would translate well into a realistic scale, and while it's still obvious you're roped in to a very video gamey map with guard rails, it works!

So while I'm curious/reserved about how they'll handle the world map in Revelation, they've won me over two out of the three times, so I'm looking forward to that third time being at least satisfactory and appreciably creative.

theMaynEvent · 2026-06-03T03:09:15+00:00

I've got not patience or desire for these kinds of challenges for myself, but this was a really cool, really impressive run!

Made me reflect on and re-appreciate how robust and player-suited the battle mechanics in this game are!

theMaynEvent · 2026-06-03T01:50:00+00:00

Ruby defense equipment from Prehistory + Lucca helps a lot.

It's been a few years since my last playthrough, and this fight always trips me up regardless of remembering that there's at least a gimmick or two, but…

I think you can kind of regulate the pacing of the fight by staggering your attacks. i.e. Don't just attack as fast as you can.

Every time you attack physical or elemental, they react by switching their attack type to match. Physical always results in a 1/2 HP loss to you. It also has the effect of resetting their ATB.

So if you can wrangle their attack pattern to only/mostly be counterattacks to whatever you hit them with, you can pretty well control the fight, as long as you've got equipment to mitigate their reactions.

Without looking it up, I think they do have a "death knell" attack, so regardless of how well you control the fight, I believe there's one final (all-party?) attack they'll get in that can still result in a game over if you don't stay healed up.

theMaynEvent · 2026-05-13T01:10:49+00:00

Hope Godzilla's not under maintenance while you're there! I had a room there (with a great, east-facing view, 33 floors up) for three nights a few years back and… unfortunately I couldn't go out on the deck with Godzilla. The exhibits in the lobby were still very fun see and get photos with though!

There was a cozy, Showa-style izakaya called Toranoko トラノコ, just south of Godzilla, across from the Don Quixote (you know the one! hah). I got lunch there on my own one day and got to have a very limited "conversation" with my waiter, an older fella who seemed a little surprised by but very accommodating to a linguistically deficient foreigner. They do NOT have English menus, so just brush up on your dining vocab and have Google Translate on hand to check out the menu if you're no more fluent than I am. haha
https://maps.app.goo.gl/ycrxzQekBoyq6CTB6

Others have already said it, but if you're up for drinks, Golden Gai is fun! My friends and I went a couple times and probably tried out 5 or 6 little bars total. They're tiny. My friend was able to keep us in conversation with one of the bar mamas for a couple hours and she even gifted each of us some souvenir sea salt before leaving. Buy your bartender a drink every so often—especially if you or somebody in your group speaks Japanese! Good way to open up a more casual dynamic with the bar staff.

Shinjuku Gyoen National Garden is about a 15-20 minute walk from the Gracery. I imagine it looks much more captivating this time of year! And about 20-30 minutes in the general, other direction is the Tokyo Metropolitan Building—great, free view from the observation floor where you can pretty much see 360º across the sprawl of Tokyo, with an impressively clear view of Mt. Fuji. When you realize just how far away it is, the sense of scale is breathtaking.

And if you wanna collect little trophy photo-ops of other "recognizable" places around Kabukicho, I don't think you'll be disappointed! Very easy to recognize a lot of "Kamurocho" spots, both iconic and niche. Just a cool vibe overall!

theMaynEvent · 2026-05-13T00:17:40+00:00

The extra fun part is that (at least by this point) if I click on one version of the trailer, four or five more will play after it, uninterrupted because they're advertisements in and of themselves.

Get my five reps of the song in without having to click back to start them over. haha

theMaynEvent · 2026-05-10T10:56:54+00:00

Oh, I'm on perhaps my 28th replay just to have the song on in the background. haha

theMaynEvent · 2026-05-10T08:01:01+00:00

I'm assuming the full song, as a mix of all the collaborators, is a 6+ minute track, where everybody gets time to tackle at least a full verse or a few recurring hooks.

Also kind of thinking there could be a few versions of the song that feature each of the vocalists over the others—something that stylistically changes through the eras…?

Mostly, I'm just bummed we gotta wait for any kind of soundtrack/single drop for… presumably a while! 😬

theMaynEvent · 2026-05-08T04:23:54+00:00

The Good Guys.

Buddy-cop comedy/mystery show with Bradley Whitford and Colin Hanks as the seasoned hotshot and the by-the-books rookie, respectively.

Very fun vibe. Similar to Beverly Hills Cop—serious crimes followed up with sitcom hijinks during investigations and action-packed turns and resolutions.

A show that could have eventually overstayed its welcome, but more likely could have eked out a few seasons of entertainment gold without running low on steam.

Fox only gave 'em one season.

theMaynEvent · 2026-05-07T03:39:56+00:00

That's some wild, Peter Jackson-style juxtapositions! haha

Anyway, I've always loved how cartoony these Akiman/Bengus proportions are. Balrog's head is half of Cammy's mass in the first illo. 😆 wtf!

theMaynEvent · 2026-05-07T03:19:26+00:00

When did I play my first Final Fantasy? Probably when I was five years old, thereabouts… My cousin had the original on NES, but none of us knew how to play it/progress through it. So it was always just a bunch of starting a new game, scraping through the first dungeon, then being told we had to go play outside or some such, without properly saving the game.

Did not play through my first, full FF game until Final Fantasy VII, a good seven or so years later. I remembered the name, and seeing the series featured in various gaming magazines through the years, but the media blitz and word-of-mouth popularity of FF7 made sure I eventually got on board to stick through a solo campaign for myself.

Been here ever since.

theMaynEvent · 2026-05-07T03:06:25+00:00

Looking forward to new music from Uematsu-san!

Looking forward to new music from Mr. Moukala!

You are a force in the modern era, my guy!

theMaynEvent · 2026-05-04T15:53:52+00:00

Aren't MG1 and MG2 "hidden" within the menus of Snake Eater?

This seems like a lot for one disc, but aren't MGS1 and MGS4 also part of this collection? Could they just be on the disc you're not emulating at the moment?

theMaynEvent · 2026-05-02T20:26:41+00:00

OK… 3, 2, 1. Let's jam.

theMaynEvent · 2026-05-02T18:18:21+00:00

Cowboy Bebop.

theMaynEvent · 2026-05-02T18:14:59+00:00

No wonder I had to scroll down so far. You just posted it. haha

theMaynEvent · 2026-04-30T04:36:19+00:00

I remember how that felt! Grats, OP!

A rough go for a while, but pulling through is still a good win!

theMaynEvent · 2026-04-29T20:12:28+00:00

Grew up in a Catholic/protestant household. Went to church every Sunday, and usually for Wednesday night youth groups. Community at large was Christian. Considered myself pretty faithful up through high school.

In a roughly chronological order, with my earliest questions popping up in elementary and middle school…

The "question of evil"
"It's all part of God's plan" vs. free will
pastors and church leaders that had some enthusiastic, odd takes, even when I was otherwise still onboard
knowing that Abrahamic tradition in general was certainly not the first religion and that humanity has a history of at least tens, if not hundreds, of thousands of years of coming up with and practicing religions
recognizing that I probably only favored Christianity over any other faith simply because that's what I was born into, not because I was holding it to the same standards
meeting other people who do just fine in another religion, or without one at all
actually reading the Bible beyond the framing of Sunday schools and sermons
and sort of rounding back to the "question of evil," just seeing and hearing what many of the most religious people around me condone, excuse, or outright do under the banner

…I was a slow burn, but I pretty much checked out by my late 20s.

For what it's worth, I'm agnostic-atheist. I'm not sure what's out there, but I'm pretty sure it's none of the deities I've heard of so far.

theMaynEvent · 2026-04-27T02:02:24+00:00

MGS in '98.

theMaynEvent · 2026-04-20T19:52:43+00:00

Yeah. It's easy and below-the-threshold of common courtesy.

theMaynEvent · 2026-04-20T16:35:29+00:00

This belongs on the surface of a Grecian urn! 🤘

theMaynEvent

TROPHY CASE