RPCrazy

Actually, I like Avie #1....the effect makes the "background" image (used as #2) look...well, honestly...devious. ^_^ But perhaps a bit too devious. After all, you want people to stick around so that you can beat their brains in, not scare them off first thing. ~_^ #2, dude. Go for #2. Now, as far as banners? I like #1. Very...smooth, I believe is the way I see it. Fluid. It gives me a good feeling. -purrs- But you could also go for #4. #4 works too. -nodnodnods-

[QUOTE][i]Originally posted by rttocs77 [/i] [B]No, no, no. I'm sorry it was just a bad sarcastic joke. I didn't mean it literally. Sorry. [/B][/QUOTE] Haven't you learned that you're bad at making jokes yet? Jennifer. (jen-nih-fur) Plain, simple...and I've yet to find a translation of it into any other language besides Welsh, which is where it originates from. Perhaps you could do Lynn ( vio[b]lin[/b] ) as well?

I just cropped it down to size...I think it adds to that "psycho theme" he's got going on to just be the face and the tip of the knife. ^_^ As for the avie, it's an animated .gif I found floating around the web. It's the actual logo of the happy bunny company. And lookit what else I've made! -cackles- It's a banner featuring one of my favorite comics, [URL=http://boymeetsboy.keenspot.com/]Boy Meets Boy[/URL]. Sadly, BmB will be ending on or around Jan 10th...but there's still the archives you can read through, and Sandra is starting a new comic soon featuring Fox and Collin, which I am very much looking forward to. ^_^ Anyway, yes...this is part of the Dec. 31st, 2000 comic. One of my absolute favorites. [IMG]http://www.otakuboards.com/attachment.php?s=&postid=537625[/IMG]

Alex, you traitor... -snuffs...kicking dirt on the Damned Box- Get the "newer" font from Shinji and change that around. You definitely loose the force behind the message with the overly proper wording, even if you didn't have control over it at the time. But leave out the X-box picture in the background. I think this works just as well. ^_^

Katana: next time you wanna cosplay, bleach your hair then dye it the blue. You can always dye it back to your normal color and wait for the bleach to grow out. ^_^ I personally have never dyed my hair. I have a very nice blonde streak in it (totally natural, I swear) which I'm afraid I will lose if I apply any dyes. However, I've seen friends get into horrible messes. Most of which have been mentioned already. The blonde being too bright, the red turning out pink. A horror story that turned out ok happened a few years back to my friend Jay. He had just finished bleaching his hair and went to apply dyed tips in the Manic Panic Electric Blue. His hair wasn't dry and the dye ran. Not badly, mind you...the effect was rather cool. His hair went from blonde roots, fading into green which in turn became the blue tips. I personally though he looked pretty damn cool.

You go, Alex. Thank you for saying everything that I was thinking. And yes, you should get back into screenwriting.

-laughs- Oh, my plans for life...you know, when you're 5? Life seems so simple... So, I had planned to be a vet...and then I wanted to be a marine biologist. It's like the curse of my generation...we all wanted to be marine biologists. And then, I turned 8 and I knew what I was going to be. A writer. I was going to write books and make people happy. I was going to move up to my sister's, live in the loft above her garage, with my dog, and go to Kutztown U in PA, USA. And then my sister realized the loft was unlivable. The inspectors almost condemned it. And she forbid me from having a dog. And Kutztown costed too much. And you know? I never really liked my sister anyway. She's mean and bitchy and the cause of most of my present day phobias. But at least I knew I wanted to be a writer (a lot of us here, isn't there?). Well, I stopped worrying about school so much. Actually, until my senior year, I totally forgot about college. And then life kinda said "Uh, you need to focus on me now!" I applied to Burlington County, the local community college, and am currently attending winter break. Now, however, I'm faced with a dilema: I'm not sure if I have what it takes to be a writer. I'm pretty sure I don't...and when you're faced with having to give up on one of your childhood dreams, that's hard. It's heartbreaking. So, I don't know what I'm doing with life. And I only have 12...13...15...16 months? Yes...16 months to find out what I'm doing, major in it, and graduate from BCC so that I can transfer to Rutgers and offically join Charles and PT in college. I'm screwed. That's what my outlook on my professonal life is right now.

Stop biting my nails. And I mean it this time, dammit! That's been my NYR since I was about 4...I'll be 19!!! 15 years, and I haven't put any real effort into it yet. I couldn't care less about school. -beams-

So, yeah...it's a research paper. My first term paper of my college carrer, actually. Most of it is fluff...but hey, what good research paper isn't? ^_^ There was something else I wanted to write here...oh, yeah! When I began writing this, my target audience was my oldest sister, the mother of Madison, who inspired me to write this. At said birthday party, she told Madison she had to stop playing the Spyro game, which ticked me off just a bit. And that little gush will make sense once you read the essay. ^_^ Just looking for comments. The paper has already been turned in, so there's no editing I could make that would help my grade, but if you see anything I missed, feel free to let me know. Ok, well...paragraph spacing isn't working. >_< So, I suppose until I figure out how to change that, this will do.. [CENTER]-------------------- Video Games, Your Children, and You[/CENTER] About three weeks ago, I sat in the basement of my best friend?s house having the time of my life. Alex, Matt, Paul, and I were sitting on the floor, in chairs, on tables...basically any seat we could find, with fingers madly pressing away at buttons and eyes intently glued to the TV sets as our favorite Mario characters zipped around the screen on hi-tech go-karts. Items picked up from spinning blocks on the dazzling courses were shot off at each other, sending karts reeling into the side lines, water hazards, sand traps, and other dastardly pit falls. We spewed forth things like ?You suck!? ?Who shot that shell?? ?Red block, dead ahead!? along with other comments, curses, and cat calls, weaving almost poetically in and out of our tense silence and roaring laughter. With the racing over, we popped in Super Smash Bros. Melee and we beat the living daylights out of each other with still more of our Nintendo favorites. For an entire night, nearly ten straight hours, we played, we laughed, and we bonded as only true Gamers can. It?s a tradition of our lives we?ve shared, sometimes among different friends and often at different times of the year. Even before our coming together almost five years ago, we were destined to be comrades simply because of our one common joy: video games. Now I?ve gone and done it, haven?t I? I?ve said that ringing pair of words that today makes parents cringe, whimper, and worry over the health of the next generation. Video games have been blamed for everything from the common cold, to school shootings which include Columbine (Muscari 588), to turning children into mindless killing drones who only have a desire to, well, kill. Yet can we really blame the media and parents for seeing us that way? I know all too well the stare induced when playing a video game and how a person loses all sense of time and place when swept up by Zelda or Donkey Kong. It frightens me when a) I look up from my game to see my five-year-old niece, Madison, and realize I don?t know how long she?s been watching, and b) she?s the mirror image of me: jaw slack with eyes intent on the screen, unblinking and (perhaps) a little drool on her chin. I wonder how this is going to affect her mind and her health. Is she going to grow up as the stereotypical, anti-social Gamer? How will the violence in my games transfer to her play with her younger sister, and to her cousins and classmates? I wonder, yes, but do I worry? Not really. After all, I?ve been playing video games since I was her age, and look at how well I turned out. People just don?t know, or refuse to realize, the good that video games can do. One thing video games have always had going for them is their ability to improve and develop skills. And I?m talking beyond that old cliché of hand-eye coordination into useful skills that?ll help later in life. Spatial visualization is the ability to manipulate and rotate 3-D objects mentally, and ?students with a high degree of spatial visualization are high achievers in mathematics and science. Improving spatial visualization may have a corresponding affect on student mathematics? (Dorman, par. 22). That?ll come in handy when Madison gets into Geometry or Bio-Chemistry. And if your child is looking to work on his or her problem solving, the Zelda Series has some of the most complex riddles, puzzles, and obstacle courses known to gaming. Claudia Wallis is a mother who became concerned when her son?s newest love, ?Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time? began to get in the way of most school work and other activities. That is until one day she took an interest in Nat?s gaming obsession, and described the game as ?devilishly difficult. Besides mastering arcane weapons (no blood, though), he had to memorize different sequences of tones--magic songs that transported the hero. There were puzzles to solve, strategies to plot? (Quittner, par. 29). Recently Madison has taken a liking to a popular Playstation 2 game, Spyro the Dragon. This poses the player with the same quest: these people are in trouble. You need to solve all these puzzles to collect these specific objects and save them. Sure, all those children?s shows like Blue?s Clues and Dora: the Explorer will teach your kids exactly the same thing...but those are on TV. As hard as they try, they will [i]never[/i] be interactive, thus limiting the effectiveness of their lessons. With video games, children are constantly trying and retrying to get this final gem or that last ring, and the satisfaction they get at the end of all their hard work is almost therapeutic. Speaking of being therapeutic, there have been studies in which video games were used as therapy; ?For example, video games have been used in behavior modification therapy and as a pain aversion technique for children with cancer? (Dorman, par. 28). Duchenne Muscular Dystrophy (DMD) is a disease in which key muscles in your body (specifically the limbs and torso) waste away...children as young as two can develop it, and they rarely live to see their twentieth birthday. A study showed that playing a video game, with controls modified by doctors to use the patients? respiratory efforts, may help [i]improve[/i] their muscular performance (Dorman, par. 28). And those seizures often associated with the quickly changing scenes of video games? One-third of the fifty world-wide documented cases came from children who experienced non-video game related seizures in the past or were photosensitive to flashing images in the first place. Only 5 percent of the cases actually proved sensitive to photic stimulation (Dorman, par. 8). As far as lounging around all day, while it in no way can be expected to replace physical activity, playing an active video game (like, say, Mrs. Pac-Man) for thirty minutes or so a day offers the same energy release as that of mild intensity exercise (Dorman, par. 5). At least my niece is burning some energy while she [i]plays[/i] her games...instead of [i]sitting[/i] on her butt and [i]watching[/i] TV. That brings me to the next point. It can?t be socially healthy for my niece to sit around all day, can it? Why, when her friends are outside playing and enjoying the sunshine, she?ll be inside playing these blasted video games. Which isn?t true; the anti-social stereotype of a Gamer is very misplaced. I relayed to you earlier a scene of a group of teens hanging out and having a party. A very geeky party, I?m proud to admit, but a party nonetheless. If your gaming child is smart (which you can already see is true simply because he or she is playing video games), your child will make friends who like being inside and playing a round of this game or that. The group will spend hours on end at the mall checking out the gaming stores or at another friend?s house playing the game you didn?t get for [Insert Holiday of Choice Here]. There?s also the fact that video games have become much more group involved in the past decade or so. When Nintendo first released Super Mario, it was almost a turn-based game, meaning players went until they die, then someone else picked up where the first left off. Someone else is getting the glory for your work. When you?re looking to be competitive and keep score, that?s just not practical. Duck Hunt was a primitive start at two-player, but that?s only if you were lucky enough to have two guns. And forget Donkey Kong and Zelda...that just wasn?t gonna fly. With the release of multi-player modes, Gamers can come together and play against each other. Also, a study done in Japan (the birthplace of Nintendo) found that kindergartners who played video games ?showed superior development in several areas of social skills? and ?were reported as ?having more friends? and ?speaking more willingly? than nonplayers? (Dorman, par. 18). Madison is right in that age group, and I can assure you I have never seen a child so eager to make friends with the neighborhood kids...and invite them over to play Spyro. So your kid isn?t going to be anti-social...but is he going to be violent? After all, they?ve done all these studies with the Power Rangers and other violent kids? programs and results show that a constant stream of violence into a young mind can warp it. Well, first off, most of those tests proved either to be inconclusive or pointed to other sources of the child?s aggression. Some even go as far to say the children weren?t being taught violence by the show. The mimicking of punches and kicks where done in a passive, make believe fashion, and not to be malicious or violent (Geist, par. 38). Secondly, those tests were done on [i]TV shows[/i], and we?ve already gone over the problem with those, haven?t we? How do video games affect a child?s aggression? A child playing a video game is shown to be less aggressive than one banned from the console. Killing the fictional characters shown on the screen serves as an outlet for anger, pain, depression, and frustration. And in teens, being a Gamer can dramatically decrease the stress usually associated with such a hectic time in life (Dorman, par.14). Madison is only five...but with school just around the corner and a whole new part of her life looming on the horizon, I can honestly say I feel comfortable knowing video games will be there to help her see life through. Video games encourage learning, promote social activity, and help your child deal with aggression and stress; then why do horrible things like Columbine happen to and around these Gamers? Sadly, it all goes back to their upbringing and their relationship with their parents. According to Sylvia Hewlett, who wrote an article for Parade magazine on the critical role of parents, ?during the last 30 years children have lost approximately 12 hours of parental time a week. Since research has uncovered ominous links between absentee parents and a whole range of emotional and behavioral problems, that fact should cause us significant concern? (Brown, par. 22-23). The children who see violence in a game, and then go perform that violence on a real human being were in need of help way before that game ever got into their hands. They needed guidance and they needed rules. Most of all, they needed parents who showed them how much they were loved. Pay attention to what games your kid is playing, and make sure that the parents of their Gamer buddies are doing the same. Set some guidelines, for yourself and for the kids: 1) Enforce your rules. Just because you came home late from a bad day at work is no excuse for letting them slide on the gaming regulations. 2) Know what they?re getting into. Do research. The Web is the best place to find reviews on any and all games. Find out what they?re rated and set a limit on what rating your child can play. 3) Play the game. Play it with them. Follow the example of Claudia Wallis and ask them to explain things to you. Not only will it let you look in on them, but you?ll get some good quality time in with your children. 4) For the younger ones: Make sure they know that doing what they see on the game is just pretend. They need to know that violence hurts other people and that hurting others in real life is wrong. And remind the older ones too...just make sure they don?t forget. 5) Watch them. Watch them, watch them, [i]watch them[/i]. If there?s any change in behavior, an unwillingness to give up a game, a growing aggression tendency, or just a gut feeling that something?s not right, you know you?ve got to do something, and fast. You?re the adult and the parent; it?s [i]your job[/i] to make sure your child is happy, healthy, and safe. It was just a week ago, and my family had a birthday celebration for Madison?s sister Camille, who just turned two. I entered my sister?s house, gave everyone a hug, and found myself being dragged away by an overly excited niece to see how far she had gotten in Spyro since my last visit. ?Watch me, Aunt Jenna! Watch!? and she proceeded to jump, fly, and glide her way almost perfectly through a stage, picking up gems as she went. Once the entire family arrived, we soon discovered things were suspiciously quiet, lacking the sound of five toddlers rampaging through the house. I was sent to look in on them, and never in my gaming history have I seen so wonderful a sight. My oldest nephew had taken up the game, face scrunched in concentration, while his little brother and their cousin looked on in awe. Madison sat with Camille on the couch, a controller in hand, trying desperately to teach a game she barely understood herself. I?ve seen the next generation of Gamers. They are cheerful and intelligent young boys and girls who will learn to love technology and share that love with others. They won?t be learning impaired, anti-social, or instigate school shootings. They will simply be happy, sitting in their best friend?s basement, playing their video games.

He's a jock. All he's got on his list of extra curriculars is football...and, well...like he says, he's [i]such[/i] an "up and comer"... :rolleyes: [QUOTE][i]Originally posted by Hells Fire [/i] [COLOR=darkred][b]When you have skills like me people will try anything to get you to come to their school. I could run down my stats for you but I don't have all night.[/b] Most school I've recieved letters from aren't really offering scolarship [b](not that I need one anyway)[/b]just brochures and junk telling me dates and stuff. I've recieved letters of admission from Georgia Tech and have been there on many occasions. My coach and family have pretty much said I'm going there and I am pretty much going there but I want to try some of my options before its actually to late. [b]When you are a athelete schools will be more gracious and kinder to you then some musical and academic people late comers.[/b] Yes I did start sending in letters late [b]but people listen when you are as good as me.*Head gets really big and then explodes*[/b][/color] [/B][/QUOTE] Gotta give you one prop, you know you're a pompous ***. My advice to you? Deflate that helium filled head of yours before you really explode. And drop football. Go for a real sport, like Chess or Gaming. Then you won't stand a chance of becoming an overpaid baby in the pros. ^_^ Good luck in everything you do...as long as it's not football.

Lol. -patpats- Good manslave. You may go pleasure yourself now... ~_^ The "font" is really Arby's handwriting, and if you'll check out my avie (which, I admit is a bit more than scrunched) that's the bottom half of the image not seen in the banner. "Feed my starving ego. Or don't. See if I care. You are all dumb & I hate you." It's a mix of sarcasim and Arby humor. -beams- Later EDIT: Here's my newest creation...I love the happy bunny, I think he's awesome. ^_^ [IMG]http://www.otakuboards.com/attachment.php?s=&postid=532309[/IMG]

I see only two problems: their legs are a bit funky and the black bars of the window look...too straight. Almost out of place. Think you could soften the edges of that a bit? Otherwise, I like it. ^_^ I like how the "Merry X-mas" actually looks like it was written in the frost, and their wings are [i]spectacular[/i]. Is that an X-mas tree I see back there? Very cool work. ^_^

A dragon? Really? How cool. That would have been a delema for me...Zodiac or a dragon? Oh, yes...forgot to mention I also have mine engraved inside. Just my name...full name, mind you.

[QUOTE][i]Originally posted by Sara [/i] [B][size=1][img]https://secure.artcarved.com/images/shanks/Designer/S/thumb/LO-658.jpg[/img] [/size] [/B][/QUOTE] NO FREAKIN' WAY!!! Dude, I want that! Did they have a GameCube one??? -peers- Though...I suppose it's a little late. I've had mine for...almost 3 years now, since Soph year. Silver (it's not the metal silver, it's some platinum mix that looks like silver, but way cheaper. ^_^ ), amethyst stone ([B]very[/B] dark. Some people mistake it for onyx, which makes me uber-happy. ^_^), my Zodiac symbol on one side under my graduation year and an angel on the other under my name. I also got a moon and star engraved over the stone, which probably contributes to people thinking the stone is onyx. I was never big on school spirit, but I was (and still am, to a degree) big on rings. At one point in time I was wearing somewhere between 12 and 15 rings on my hands every day. Needless to say, I have quite the collection. Today, though, I only wear two: my class ring and this triple ring I bought at the mall one day. Damn coolest ring I own. ^_^

-cackles- Teee heheheheh....I love it, I love it! If anyone is familiar with arbrowin.com, the style of this image will look familiar. I found the pic in Arby's ArtBox and well... -beams- [IMG]http://www.otakuboards.com/attachment.php?s=&postid=529330[/IMG]

Post the one with the circle in it, damn you!!! Post it, I compell you! -compells- You know, when you're the one looking over the dude's shoulder as he's creating the banner, it's so hard to post replies to these things and not have them come out as spam... >_<

I feel like the only one here still running on Win 98... >_

Briar Rose's dress is supposed to be blue, damn you all... -grrrs- ^_^ Love the art. Sleeping Beauty is my all time favorite Disney flick (sorry, Snow White...but you gave my nightmares)...and Sailor Moon is pretty cool. Not a terribly huge fan of it myself, but from what a friend of mine has explained it's a terribly complex little anime... I dare you to do the rest of the Sailor Scouts as a Disney character. -snickers- Neptune as Ariel, Uranus as a prince (probably Prince Whoever from The Little Mermaid to go with Neptune...but her hair's the wrong color. >_< ) Pluto and Saturn I can't think of anyone, but there's gotta be someone out there you could draw them as... 9.5....Briar Rose's dress needs to be blue and you need to work on the black eyes. ~_^

I'm the youngest of four kids. When my sisters married, they took their husbands' last names and my sister-in-law took my family's name when she married my brother. You can see we've been raised in a more traditional sense as far as marriage goes. However, we've also been raised to feel that if the "norm" doesn't make us happy, to change it. Not to settle, you know? With that in mind, I'm still not sure. I'd like to keep my last name. I like it, it flows well with the rest of my name, and it's something that has always been important to me. Even when kids in grade school changed "Mikus" (pronounced Mike-us) into "mucus" to tease me, I never said "I hate my last name. If I had a different last name they wouldn't tease me." Number one, I knew they'd just find something else to make-fun of. Number two, I was proud of my name, I didn't want a different one. Tee hee...when I was little I used to tell my mom I was going to adopt twins and tell them their daddy got lost in the Bermuda Triangle. That way I wouldn't have to change my last name. ^_^; Will I change my surname? Hopefully not. If my husband isn't willing to take my name, hopefully he'll settle for a hyphenated name or something along those lines. Really, I'm not all that worried about it. The man I marry will be agreeable without being a pushover. We'll find something that makes both of us happy. ^_^

[QUOTE][i]Originally posted by Baron Samedi [/i] [B]*runs off* Some idiot has granted PT mod-powers. What kind of crazy idea is this?[/B][/QUOTE] Correct me if I'm wrong, but aren't you our Secretary in CEPTM? And I'm on my cell with PT now, and he's saying...well, see for yourself: "Baron, I'm talking to RPCrazy over the phone right now, my Internet's down. I think you missed the point of the entire post. Had I intended for people to take it seriously, then I would not have actually said 'doctored picture' or 'light hearted'...whatever. I don't remember exactly what I said (since, you know, I'm not even looking at it right now :D ). Had I actually wanted serious crit I would have done it totally in Photoshop. Considering that all of my other banners have been totally in Photoshop, this was a fun little diversion. Something to goof off with, a light hearted banner. You're using the conventional definition of doctoring, the definition that strives for a quote, unquote "perfect imitation" with an understood serious nature to the newly created piece. However the distinction that you are failing to realize is that there are two definitions of doctoring. One in the conventional, and the other is the doctoring that harkens back to the screen shot doctoring of GoldenEye and Perfect Dark, the kind of doctoring in which tanks where made to float, Barney was placed into a Russian soldier's uniform, and in a lesser sense a humorous doctored screen shot of a fake 2-D GoldenEye game said to have been originally created for Nintendo entertainment system. As you can tell my motives for the doctoring were not of the conventional definition but more of the goof-off times of GoldenEye, in that my intent was to make something funny not a perfect imitation."

-snickers- Thumbs up to wiccansamurai and Amorphous. Post more, PT...let 'em know what's up. -much nodding done- EDIT: Weee! 100th post! -dances- Go mee, go mee.

Yay! Yay! PT for Mod! Yay! -beams- Tee hee, that'd be a happy day. ^_^

I'm really into truth. I have Drop Dead Day written on my calendar (Sept 29th for anyone who's interested). [URL=http://www.thetruth.com]www.thetruth.com[/URL] if you'd like to see further. This was inspired by a little fact and the Drop Dead Day anti-tobacco commericals. [IMG]http://www.otakuboards.com/attachment.php?s=&postid=517453[/IMG]

My assistant manager just recently converted to The Way of The Cube. ^_^ He bought his Game Cube yesterday and is looking for some good games to rent and buy to get his collection started. Now, while I've suggested a few my scope is very limited to the adventure games of Sonic Adventure 2, Spyro, Mario (Golf and Party), Zelda, and SSBM. For the Other Consoles (that damned Box and the Station) he gets a kick out of playing lots of sports games, some FPS's...you get the idea. He does like the more, well...fluffy games? Do I dare use that word? lol I've already got him renting M. Golf and...another game. Possibly Windwaker, I can't rightly remember. >_< Any recommendations? Or...warnings? How about it? Like, your Top 3 or 5 list for First Time Cubers.

When I tried RPing there, they had a 200 letter limit. I can't RP with a limit on what I'm allowed to type, that's crazy! So I gave up and started a RP group on Yahoo! for strictly Neopets characters... But no one joined. >_