Tag: extra life

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Write a Novel for Extra Life

Hey, writers! Want to start National Novel Writing Month with a bang? I’m writing 24 hours (or more) November 1-3 to raise money for my local children’s hospital as part of Extra Life. If you’d like to join me, follow me on Twitter. I’ll follow back.

You can donate to my fundraiser here. For every dollar you donate, I’ll beta read 1,000 words for you. See this page for more information on what I like to read and what to expect for feedback.

Here are some additional details:

  • If you make a donation and would like me as a beta reader, send me a tweet or DM to introduce yourself and tell me about your project. 🙂
  • My offer applies up to 200,000 words across all donors.
  • My beta-reading pace is about 20k-25k words per week.
  • I’ll fulfill requests starting January 1st, so take November to write and December to clean up your manuscript. Or take even longer! I’ll give you an IOU.
  • Feel free to tweet or DM me if you have questions.

If I like it, I may read your whole story no matter how much you donate. In addition to raising money for sick and injured kids, I think of this as an opportunity to find new critique partners and writer friends. 😀

Oh, and if you’re interested in what I’m writing, here are my answers to Sophie Li‘s NaNoWriMo 20 Questions Tag!

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Update

Team KAIZEN

The past couple weeks haven’t felt particularly productive, but I guess they were about as productive as usual. On Friday the 24th, Team KAIZEN was invited to demonstrate PlayStation VR, Burst!, and Shattered Soul at Sacred Heart Children’s Hospital’s 15th-anniversary bash. I spent the day petsitting so Josh, Trevor, and Cyndi could participate, but it was a good time all around. This week, after I took a quick trip to Montana to visit the Port Polson Players, I finished implementing basic Asset Bundles for Burst!’s music and song data and added a loading screen to both the game and the song editor. It was easier to implement that I thought actually. I also broke out the Task Manager. Memory management, baby! Next week, I’ll probably continue optimizing loading music assets and create Asset Bundles for levels and fireworks.

Writing

By tonight, I expect I’ll be a little less than halfway done with Chapter 11 (of 12!) of The Twelfth Hour. Hooray! So far this chapter hasn’t been as big a pain in the ass as Chapter 10 was. In related writing news, I got Final Fantasy XV: The Void Noctis Continued to Leave Behind published on the Extra Life Community website. Surprise! A year later, my Final Fantasy XV article is finally complete!

FirstGroup America

The day before the event at Sacred Heart, I got another freelance job at FirstGroup America. Despite having no experience making ASP.NET applications, I’m debugging an ASP.NET application. O.o I suppose I’m spending more time optimizing MS SQL queries, which I have more experience with, than working in ASP.NET, but still, vhat a twist! I’m glad I spent a couple weeks playing around with C#/.NET a few months ago. I probably wouldn’t have felt confident enough to do this without it. Also, it’s been more than two years since I’ve handled MS SQL queries timing out, but by god, I still recognize the symptoms and have a full toolbox of solutions! Overall, my experience at Agile Data Solutions came back to haunt me in multiple ways this week.

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Final Fantasy XV: The Void Noctis Continued to Leave Behind

Empty Coleman Chairs

Last year, I claimed Kingsglaive: Final Fantasy XV failed to tell a coherent story without Noctis. Now I claim Final Fantasy XV failed to tell a coherent story because it didn’t include Noctis either.

Noctis’ physical presence fails to compensate for his mental and emotional distance from the game’s events. Despite his appearance, he primarily functions as a vessel for the player. Such protagonists serve many games well, but when the story’s world, characters, and purpose rely on the protagonist’s actions and personality rather than the player’s, his absence spells disaster. Final Fantasy XV has many intriguing ideas and great potential to tell a rich story, but Noctis’ emptiness riddles it with character arcs that go nowhere, contradictions, and confusion.

You can read the full article on the Extra Life Community website here.

For those of you who don’t know, Extra Life is like a marathon for charity, but instead of running or walking, you play video games to raise money for a children’s hospital of your choice. The official Extra Life event occurs November 3 this year, but you can raise money whenever you want year-round. Check out the Extra Life website to learn more, donate, and sign up!

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The Lightbringer

The Final Fantasy XV music video I created as part of Extra Life last weekend is finally done! It’s also probably the closest to a Kingsglaive: Final Fantasy XV music video (that doesn’t turn it into a horror or a comedy) I’ll ever get. So you’d better enjoy it. 😛

Feel free to donate to my fundraiser page if you feel so inclined.

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Extra Life 2017

I’m raising money for the Sacred Heart Children’s Hospital through Extra Life this weekend! I’m actually not playing video games as tradition dictates. This year, I’m spending the weekend making a Final Fantasy XV music video. You can donate to Sacred Heart Children’s Hospital, watch me video edit live, or read the articles I’ve written for the Extra Life Community website on my fundraising page here.

I promise the video won’t just be sound clips of people screaming on Jaws, The Wizard of Oz, and Dragonball Z over Final Fantasy XV footage (as hilarious as I think that is). If you don’t believe me though, you can donate to my campaign at any time. Feel free to wait to see if I produce something decent. 🙂

And even if I produce another load of hot garbage, consider donating if you enjoy my Extra Life articles or something else I do or donate just because. Just do it for the kids!

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Advent Children: What’s Beneath the Fan Service (Part 3)

Hello once again, Final Fantasy VII: Advent Children fans! Have you ever read a review of Advent Children and wondered if the author actually watched the movie? How about listening to reviewers parrot common criticisms about the film only to finish by saying that they love it? How can this film be so amazing and so unique and still receive dominantly negative reviews claiming that it is everything it is not?

Advent Children: What’s Beneath the Fan Service is a three-part series in which I debunk common misconceptions about what is arguably one of the most important CGI movies ever made. Part 1 analyzed Advent Children’s story, characters, and themes. Part 2 discussed how the film tells its story through action. Now, part 3 speculates why Advent Children is so misunderstood and argues its importance in filmmaking history. You can find it here.

Thank you so much for reading. I hope this glimpse beneath the fan service gives you the courage to tell people why you love this movie and why they should love it, too. What does Advent Children mean to you?

I’d like to thank Jack Gardner and Extra Life for supporting this series. For those of you who don’t know, Extra Life is like a marathon for charity, but instead of running or walking, you play video games to raise money for a Children’s Miracle Network Hospital of your choice. The official Extra Life event happens November 4 this year, but you can raise money whenever you want year round. Check out the Extra Life website to learn more, donate, and sign up!

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Advent Children: What’s Beneath the Fan Service (Part 2)

Hello again, Final Fantasy VII: Advent Children fans! Have you ever wondered what makes Advent Children’s high-speed motorcycle battles, giant swords, and physics-defying action awesome? What does this movie do that other action movies don’t? Would you believe that Loz throwing a motorcycle with his feet, friendship defeating Bahamut, and a gunshot wound threatening to kill Cloud all follow a consistent set of rules?

Advent Children: What’s Beneath the Fan Service is a three-part series in which I debunk common misconceptions about what is arguably one of the most important CGI movies ever made. Part 2, now up on the Extra Life Community website, discusses how Advent Children tells its story and defines its world through action, visual language, and efficient dialog. You can find it here. If you missed part 1, which analyzes the story Advent Children tells, you can read that here.

Feel free to spread this around! If you want more movies like Advent Children, don’t be afraid to tell people why you love it and why they should love it, too. Everyone needs to know what’s beneath the fan service.

For those of you who don’t know, Extra Life is like a marathon for charity, but instead of running or walking, you play video games to raise money for a Children’s Miracle Network Hospital of your choice. The official Extra Life event happens November 4 this year, but you can raise money whenever you want year round. Check out the Extra Life website to learn more, donate, and sign up!