T.G.I. Friday

My post really doesn't have anything to do with the restaurant chain T.G.I. Fridays, but I can say I've been there. Before Paul and I left Glasgow we did go for a meal at what I assume is Glasgow's only T.G.I. Fridays. We both had burgers (Paul's a simple Bacon Cheeseburger; mine some kind of double burger with everything including onion rings. I've got to stop ordering those kinda things) and the acclaimed desserts also lived up to expectations. But rather I refer to the fact that it is now the end of the week. Maybe it's not such a good fact though, since this leaves me high and dry for a couple of days as far as job hunting goes. Speaking of that, it's been going good and bad. Good in that I've been having a reasonable amount of interest. Bad in that it's been either for Delphi programmers (which I am reluctant to program in again) or for Investment Banks (which isn't bad in itself, the money's good, but I don't want to commit to 2 years or so working for them, especially because they want 4+ years really). In fact just this morning I pulled myself out of the running for an investment bank job because they stressed that my staying here for a year sounded like too little. The job itself sounded ok and payed quite well but I couldn't bring myself to saying that I'd definitely be here for even 18 months. I might well be here for that long given the right job/sequence of events, but I couldn't guarantee it and I found it quite difficult to even bend that truth too much. Too honest for my own good I guess. So instead I will redouble my efforts to find a job within the games industry (fingers crossed for Sony) or some short contract work, but like I said, I think I'm on ice until Monday.

This weekend I'll be catching up with Karen before she goes on a Contiki Tour (again) and not long after returning I believe she's returning to Australia. Paul of course is coming along too since she's a mutual friend, in fact they sort of decided where we'll be going, to the Ministry of Sound nightclub (located here). I've been reading the website, and it seems we'll be turning up for one of their Saturday Sessions which is fine by me, probably a good night to see what the club is like. From the looks of it you can even book your tickets early for the Saturday Sessions; I'll have to check with Karen if we should do that. All in all, should be a good night out and the rest of the weekend shouldn't be too bad either.

For any arcade buffs out there, I know there aren't many, the other day Paul and I went to Funland Trocadero. It's a large arcade in the London Trocadero shopping centre just off Piccadilly Circus. It's a couple of floors and filled with all sorts of things, arcade machines, pool tables, bowling lanes, dodgem cars, and a sports bar. As with many of the arcades around here (the UK in general), it's also filled with gambling machines. Kinda like pokies but all different sorts of ways to lose your money. What's even worse is that only some of them are in the "18 year olds or over" section so anyone can use most of them. Rather terrible in my books, if you're going to lose your money you may as well hear some music, jump around a bit or watch 2D animated sprites beat each other up. I saw all my old favourites, DDR especially (of course there's a lot of EuroMix's here, I cut my teeth on the home version of Dancing Stage: EuroMix so I have fond memories of it) but there were some new games that I'll mention just now.

Firstly there was Guitar Freaks. This was the first time I'd actually seen the machine in real life. In a Jackie Chan film there's a crime boss playing the home version (I think it was Who Am I, correct me if I'm wrong), and I also remember Lost In Translation has a punk-esque Japanese guy playing the arcade version complete with leather jacket and cigarette in his mouth. So drawn to the Bemani series that I found myself compelled to play it, paying my £1, holding the "axe" controller and instantly choosing the very easiest level. This was a little bit of a mistake since after a short practice/tutorial session, I was allowed to play only one song instead of the 3 song norm for the music based genre. Still, I got most notes spot on and even "wailed" by holding the guitar vertical for the indicated notes. Quite fun I thought if not a little silly, I even found myself taking the stereotypical stance (legs apart, one in front one behind. I have images of Slash with his big hair rocking rhythmically backwards and forwards to the music).

Secondly was EZ2 Dancer 2 or something. I think it may have been the Korean version, but I don't know. Anyway it's very similar to my old friend DDR, but each player has only 3 step panels (very large and very smoothly placed, no nasty metal clips do snag your feet on) and 2 hand sensors (like Para Para Paradise or Dance Freaks) which are used simultaneously during each song. This sounds like the arcade machine you saw Dave, can't remember if you knew what it was called already. Again I felt the need to play this since it adds another element to a game I already enjoy. Once again I chose the easiest setting just to get used to the idea. The game plays along quite well and is very enjoyable, needing some hand/leg coordination which is basically unnecessary (but not unheard of for the free stylers out there) in DDR or Pump It Up. Because it's more to do with coordination (I guess) the songs seem a little less taxing than what DDR has evolved into. I'm quite happy with that since my legs seem to fill with lactic acid at an unprecedented rate while playing something like Paranoia or So Deep on DDR. There were some hot Asian chicks (if I can be a little crass) playing it there too and quite frankly they made me look bad, especially the one girl who played the Club difficulty (basically the Double setting for DDR and the like). Obviously she's been playing it for a while as she was quite fluent at it, probably would have drawn a crowd if it was a little busier. But apart from being outclassed on it (I did well for a beginner, and it's nice to be at the beginning of a game again) it's very enjoyable; I think I might be going back to that one for a while. My only problem with it was that it doesn't seem to have the difficulty selection that DDR has. It only has 3 difficulty settings, which actually seem to restrict you to certain songs, and only 1 difficulty setting if you want to play double. A little disappointing, but I think it was the same with Pump It Up, so maybe it's a Korean thing or something.

My final arcade machine note was another music game, this time drumming. Not the Bemani game Percussion Freaks though, this one I hadn't even heard of before, something like MTV Digital Drummer. I didn't play this one as it was getting a little late in the day so I can't really comment on it, but it looked new, it looked fancy and I hope it has some cool songs on it. I really started getting into the drumming section of the Bemani games, but Magic Mountain's crappy machine stopped me from really playing very much. Now that looks like it isn't an issue, instead it's a time and money barrier I face. Well, once I have a job there's always the occasional weekend to visit the arcade :)

Time to call it a night, so I'll let you all know what the Ministry Of Sound is like, it's supposed to be world renowned or something.