Castlevania - The Dracula X Chronicles

I just recently purchased a PSP off of a friend and to my joy - there is a Castlevania game being released this October.

Castlevania - The Dracula X Chronicles focuses on my favorite series of the chapter. The game will be a remake of the never before released "Rondo of Blood", which was a Japan exclusive Castlevania title. The coolest part about this release that it will include two nifty unlockables - the original Rondo of Blood and Symphany of the Night!

Rondo of Blood made an impact when it was released for the PC-Engine in Japan. It brought to life a new vision of the series, especially with the character Richter Belmont. Fans were delighted when this game was "coming" to the SNES. I was excited, especially because I was 10-years-old at the time and video games were a cornerstone of my entertainment. When Dracula X appeared in the states I was stoked. Others were not so much because Dracula X wasn't exactly direct port of Rondo of Blood - but rather an interpretation. The stages from what I've seen were redesigned. The music held strong through!

Symphany of the Night was a great release and probably the holy grail of the entire series. I remember getting the second edition of PSM magazine (which I still own by the way) and it covered this game in depth. I had to have it and the purchase came soon there after. The game was brilliant among other terms, combining side scrolling action, rpg elements, and a soundtrack that would stun even the greatest composer. Unfortunately that game has never been returned to me..... hint hint clue clue!

For your reading pleasure I've included a few links and the trailor that is floating around YouTube. The chronicles have me excited to say the least. October 23rd can't come fast enough!

• IGN coverage of the game
• 1up.com coverage of the game
• Highscore coverage
• The Castlevania Dungeon - the ultimate resource of Belmont gaming!
  

Tips for working at home

In this installment I will look at the benefits of working at home versus working at the office. For those of you that have been lucky to experience both are encouraged to give their feedback.

It is everyone's dream to be able to work their own hours, arrange the work schedule around their lives and not have to go into the office on a daily basis. For the past 4 years I have worked in various fields as a telecommuter. It has had its benefits but it also has a lot of headaches that are included in the package.

Working at the office entails a lot of experiences. You are in a team environment, dedicated solely to getting the job done while seeing that the company succeeds. You have a reason to leave the house and more reason to work your way through the ranks.

The Benefits of the Office

• Variety of people to interact with
• Resources available to you at little to no cost
• You can ask someone in the matter of seconds if you have a question
• Provides just enough change of routine so that you don't entirely hate your home
  

The Downside of the Office

• Constant interuptions - with more people equals more (and sometimes unwanted) communication
• Time away from friends and family - it can take a toll on you socially
• Staying at the office too much could result in increased stress and fatigue
  

Working from Home is breath of fresh air. You can choose the hours you work, complete other tasks while you work, and more.

For myself - working at home entails modulating my work. I can go to class, come home to knock out an hour of work, go back to class and repeat the process throughout the day. Another upside is if I get too frustrated with what I'm doing - I can release the frustration during a 10 min break. The best part about home - those breaks can include PS2!

The upsides of working at home:

• Save on traveling costs
  
• Work from the comfort of a couch, desk, or recliner
• Choose when you finish your work
• Complete work with less distractions
  

The downsides of working at home:

• You have to make sure your resources are up to speed
• You have to be an even greater master of time management
• You must steer clear of distractions at home when you finally decide to work
• Communication between coworkers and employees can become difficult
  

Midway through the week

The new schedule is a breath of fresh air. In a way it reminds me of how young I am and has in other ways awakened my zest again. I really want to get submerged in web development again. Time will only tell how this will all pan out.

Class so far is fairly easy. I wish I knew how much I had it made during my undergrad years. Easy days, easy work - no real responsibility.

Well, I'm now off to kill a pile of work which includes:

• Development of a web report/database interaction
• RU School of Communication Web Site
• Covers for a few guides for RU Athletics
• Mailing list program for RU Athletics
• and more!
  

Setting up the home office

Radford University resumes its fall schedule on August 20th (this upcoming Monday). With that coming around the corner, it means that I will be adjusting my work schedule, with part of my hours coming at home.

To assure that I have a comfortable working environment, I went out and purchased a few essential items (desk, comfy chair, office supplies, etc.). I hope it works out well, because at home I can finish more of my work with less distractions. Granted, it may put a snag into my IT job, but I can always run to the office if something major happens right?

I will be in class Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. I will be reporting to the office on Tuesday, Thursday, Saturday, and maybe some Sundays and other various times depending on the workload/time of month, etc.

Wish me luck, it's gonna sure be a test of my time management skills.

Abundance of projects

I don't know how I let so many projects sneak up on me. Currently I have been working/have worked on:

• New Alpha Kappa Psi: Omicron Sigma CMS driven site
• Results - Galax/XM advertisement web site
• 3 web reports for ResultsTel Inc
• Covers for RU Athletic Media Guides
• New Phi Beta Lambda CMS Web Site
• Launch of HMediaWeb.com

Each project has their own flavor, ranging from graphic design to dynamic programming and even into static placement. I will post links to all of these in the upcoming weeks.

Comparing a college day to a work day

Definitely my days in college were much different than my days now at work. I have a few classes this fall, but those days will be different than my days in recent years. Let's take a look and compare.

College Mornings
Nothing beat being 18 and not having anything to do other than going to class. In college, most classes started at 10am for me, rarely before 9am. Granted, my first college class was a Cisco Networking course that started at 7:30am. This was back when I definitely wasn't a morning person! Back to the subject - while I was at community college, this meant crawling out of bed, driving a mile down the road and going to class. At Radford University it was even more convienent - just roll out of bed 3 mins before class and run. After class was finished I'd hit the Bonnie for breakfast or go back to my dorm to take an enjoyable (and probably well needed) nap.

Work Mornings
I wake up typically around 6:15am, shower and try to be out the door by 7:15am or 6:45am. This gives me plenty of time to drive, depending on the location I am leaving from (Radford Home or my Parent's Home). I begin my workday around 8am. By noon, I've already completed an abundance of data entry, updated forms, and have taken care of various IT related issues.

College Day
Days in college were fun. I'd go to my classes for the day, have lunch with a friend or two, then I'd find something to get into. Sometimes it meant going to the library, but most of the time it meant chillin with one of my fraternity bros.

Work Day
Work isn't college. A lot of my time is spent keeping on top of things, taking care of conference calls, keeping documentation, entering data, and more. There's not a lot of time to waste! Interact with very many different people and I must always keep my composure.

College Night
College nights are why we all go to college. Nothing, and I mean NOTHING beat going out with my friends to a college party and living it up. The amount of people you could meet, the spontaneous energy around it all, and the memories that you'd still talk about for weeks (and years I've found) all made it worthwhile. Going to bed was NEVER before 3am.


Work Night
I'm never up past 11pm and wore out by 9:30pm. I usually reflect on the day, look forward to the weekend, and overall relax as much as possible. Hangouts are are during the week.

Compare and Contrast
Work and College are a like. There's a lot of work to do and I have to work with a lot of people to get the job done. They differ tremendously in terms of seriousness though. College is very carefree whereas work is not. You have to be on top of your game due to the competitiveness. College has competition too, but it isn't the type of competition you see when earning money is involved.

I recommend to those of you in college to enjoy every second of it that you can. To my fellow coworkers in the real world - I hope you made many memories while in school. It'll definitely make icebreakers with the coworkers a lot more interesting!

ASP.NET .. Meet AJAX

At work I've been working with our developer to create a report for our agents to track some of their call/sales data.

This form is trick because of the amount of information that it will be obtaining. In some ways it is easy, but the flowchart itself provides a lot of forks in the road.

The form will be dynamic, with some of the fields populating from a database table. When agents answer specific items with "Yes", a window will appear with more options. Vice versa, if they answer "No" then another window will glide in. This will obviously be done with AJAX. I just hope the dataflow is an easy process. In all reality, this will be my biggest AJAX project since I started toying with it earlier this year.

At the moment I have designed 90% of the layout. From here it will be on to the table creation for the database, creating the javascript to work options in the form, and finally on to the ASP.NET controls for interacting with the database.

ASP.NET has been a smooth transition. I feel I am picking it up much faster than originally thought. I respect the technology now, it's no PHP in my eyes, but it definitely packs a violent punch that delivers results!

*In NO WAY SHAPE OR FORM was that a pun directed at the company I work for... haha*

HMediaWeb.com

While HMEDIAPRO.com is down, be sure to stroll over to www.hmediaweb.com!