On my way to school, I was daydreaming away on what I would do with my indie game studio once I could get things moving. That’s when I realized, maybe it would be better to go with a slight change in the name since it seems there’s some sort of Shadow Falcon comic book in existence. Sure, there’s a good chance that’s not a big deal, especially since the words aren’t all that original, but people can just be jerkovs about such things.

Anyway, was just thinking about some possible things. I definitely did not want to add “studios” to it, and I’d rather not explain why for that one. I thought maybe “games” would be something to add, but it just didn’t seem to fit right. But then, it hit me. Just one little change would make all the difference.

Shadow Falco.

Whether I’ll stick with it or go back and forth between the original, I have no idea. But for now, I own it.

I went and purchased a domain for the gaming studio, company, or whatever it’s called I want to start up. For now, it’s nothing, but today marks the day it all began.

Shadow Falcon.

I have been thinking about getting started already on my own little game “company.” Names have been flowing in and out through my head. Something to stamp my work with.

Meanwhile, I’ve starting working through the book XNA 4.0 Game Development by Example to get me into a position of being able to build my own side-scroller for my game programming class. Judging from what I’ve seen of the class book (Learn XNA 4.0), we won’t be getting near side-scrolling in the course, and if I’m mistaken, it’d probably be at too late of a time for me to get my project up to snuff. I figure the sooner I get to it, the better.

I’ll talk more about the book later, but the overall thought of this post is: I want to start my own company. Start with indie games and move up. But, I need to decide what to do.

I let this place go dead, which isn’t cool. I just need to do a better job at keeping things up-to-date. It’s hard to do though if you’re busy.

My classes this semester are: an astronomy lecture and lab, a web programming class, and a game programming class. I hope to somehow use these to better my site. Maybe even end up making this all rather portfolio-y. Who knows.

In the web programming class, we make use of the Apache Tomcat server, which is pretty nifty. We also began using Cloudscape for databases.

The game programming class has us using Visual Basic C# in conjunction with XNA Gaming Studio.

I will go into more detail on things in future posts. At least that’ll give me something to write about.

More technical difficulties flowed after the previous fix. First, after installing a plugin, I had some sort of quarantine error.

I ended up finding the solutions here. It said it’s something Macs tag on files that haven’t been run yet to prevent them from doing anything until they have been approved. A very good feature, but it made the situation a bit annoying. What I did was deleted the plugin and downloaded again through Ubuntu. Problem solved.

But then, the permalinks weren’t working. =/ After some searching, I found the answer here.

To enable the mod_rewrite module at apache, I just simply do this 3 step:

First, add the rewrite.load to /etc/apache2/mods-enabled/
sudo ln -s /etc/apache2/mods-available/rewrite.load /etc/apache2/mods-enabled/

Second, edit the apache configuration for my virtualhosting. For example, in my computer I only have one virtual hosting (/var/www) that is default from installation, so I make some adjustment for that (In my case I have to edit this file /etc/apache2/sites-enabled/000-default)
sudo vi /etc/apache2/sites-enabled/000-default
Change the Allowoverride value to all for the document root directory
For example, I made change to this part of the configuration:

Options Indexes FollowSymLinks MultiViews
AllowOverride all
Order allow,deny
allow from all
# This directive allows us to have apache2′s default start page
# in /apache2-default/, but still have / go to the right place
# Commented out for Ubuntu
#RedirectMatch ^/$ /apache2-default/

Finnaly, just restart the apache
sudo /etc/init.d/apache2 restart

My suggestion though would be, for the second step, to do
sudo pico /etc/apache2/sites-enabled/000-default
instead. Much easier, in my opinion.

I was testing out running LAMP on Ubuntu 10.04. I tried installing WordPress to see if I had the databases up and functioning. However, I kept getting a blank screen on install. It seemed that no matter what I did, it wouldn’t work. I tried connecting to the database using the same information on another page and it worked. I didn’t get the problem.

Then, I found that I needed to put this into the terminal:
chown -R www-data /var/www/wordpress

That was it. Did that, and it worked! Crazy, huh?

Below lies my current Pokemon team.

If you can’t see the images above, your browser is old!

I’ve beaten through the main story already, taking down the Elite Four and the King of Team Plasma. And since I want to bring up Zekrom here, let’s take a look at the new comers to my Pokemon party!

I excitedly caught this little fella on Route 10. I’ve loved his evolution since I first saw it, so I was eager to grab him the soonest I could. Route 10 is just north of the town of the eight gym, so it took me a while to get there. Rufflet has replaced Ducklett as my flying Pokemon. However, for now, Rufflet gets swapped for Ducklett when I need Surf.

Pansear had struggled a long ways, being a first form Fire-type in a rainy evolved world. When he hit level 43 while I was fighting on Victory Road, I evolved him with the Fire Stone. Now, if only I could find the TM for Flamethrower.

Krokorok became a strong force on my team, and in time, earned enough experience to evolve into his final form. Even stronger, he was one of the more valuable assets I had while fighting the Elite Four.

Appearing to face Reshiram, I left a spot open for Zekrom to fight against the yang to his yin right after being caught. Replacing Zebstrika for my Electric-type, Zekrom is a powerhouse. I seem to have too many physical attackers now.

 

But these were not the only changes done to my team of Pokemon. There is one more that no longer sits with the others.

>>> Read more >>>

Many of the major Pokemon sites out there don’t really have their moveset lists for the fifth generation of Pokemon games. Because of that, I know I’ve been struggling with trying to decide on Pokemon to have for my team and what moves to teach them. I thought I would keep my finds and thoughts here, not only for me to look back on, but for others who might find it useful.

Because no one will get the pun, “Niten-ryuu” was Miyamoto Masashi’s sword style.

As that implies, I will start out with my thoughts on techniques for Miyamotter’s line of Pokemon. I will make some for Dewott and Samurott specifically. I will also keep in mind that many people do not like to start over with their starter, and in doing so, cannot get the special egg moves on their Pokemon.

And I will also keep in mind that getting an actually good Hidden Power is very difficult if you are using in-game Pokemon.

Note: I am not saying these movesets are the best choices to go with, especially in something like OU battles. They are just possibilities that I came up with.

>>> Read more >>>

I think I figured out what I dislike most of all about Samurott. It’s the beardstache.

What do I mean by beardstache? See the image.

Notice how the lower set of ‘stache is not connected to the nose, but to the chin. It is connected to the beard. Yes, Samurott has a beard. And that second pair of extended facial hair is part of it.

If I pretend that beardstache isn’t there, I like Samurott’s appearance a whole lot more. Perhaps it’s because of how enormous it is. Maybe it is because it is overkill, with the otter whiskers already being adequately represented by the normal mustache. Or it could be that a beardstache is just not something I am used to seeing. I don’t think I’ve ever met a person with a beardstache.

Whatever the reason, if time heals all wounds, maybe it is something I can get used to. Then maybe I’d evolve Miyamotter afterall. Also, if I ever were to meet someone with a beardstache, I wouldn’t be so thrown off by it.

Two pun titles in a row. Anyway, I thought keeping up on info on my Pokemon adventure would be fun. So here is where I am right now in Pokemon White.

Of course, first comes Miyamotter himself. He was my very first Pokemon from Prof. Juniper. He’s a jolly little fella with one heck of a Razor Shell attack. Miyamotter is definitely my favorite of the bunch. Right now, he’s at level 37.

Pansear was a gift from a guy in the Dreamyard, where you get the elemental monkey that will help you best at the first gym. He’s at level 35. Lately, he’s been having a hard time fighting because it’s been rainy weather in the game and rain lowers fire power.

I caught this guy at Route 3 as a little Blitzle. After taking on the Flying-type gym, he’s gained a lot of experience and is the highest leveled Pokemon I have. He’s level 38. Zebstrika has Lightning Rod to help Miyamotter out by drawing the electric attacks away.

I caught Krokorok in his first form in the desert. The move Bulldoze has been his favorite lately. He’s at level 37. I recently taught him Dig to save me some PokeDollars that would be spent on Escape Ropes. I don’t think he’ll be keeping it though.

This is my Sawsbuck named Bucky. I used to have a cat named that and the name came to mind when I caught the little deer. Evolved now, he is in his fall style with the leaves turning red. I am very excited for the game to switch to winter next month because that’s my favorite form! Bucky is level 35.

I caught this bugger earlier today while eating breakfast. It took forever to find one. I don’t really plan on keeping Ducklett forever, I just wanted a Pokemon that could use both Surf and Fly. 22 is his level.