Overdue update part 2: SK's visit!
Well after years of talking about it, and the occasional fall-through of plans to do so, I finally got to meet with SK, a.k.a. Brian, a.k.a. Starmie Knight! Naturally there was a lot of anticipation going into this, as he's a fellow Mario Sports player, and despite his extreme kindness and politeness, had no reservations with pre-emptively mocking my apparently inevitable downfall once I'd face him!
That said, if anything, he was actually -more- kind and polite than we thought! I don't think the guy could've uttered a truly negative word about us or anyone X) And while I didn't second-guess giving him a nice place to stay here and all, he apparently felt necessary to pay for -multiple- meals for both Ren and myself x_x Too nice... He was a gracious guest, and it was really nice having him here.
However, that should all be fairly obvious to everyone fortunate enough to know the guy online X) Rest assured, it's all true, and his jestful smack-talking online disappears into fun-loving humility in person, it seems!
The first night he arrived was nice indeed. I played a little amusing trick by implying that I'd chosen quiet and non-evil music for him in the car when we picked him up.. yet had rigged the CD player so my car blasted out Glen Benton's belting out "LET THE KILLING, BE-GINNNN!" from Vital Remains. Aside from a little bit of video gaming that night, it was late and nothing special to report. Thursday he came with us to the Baltimore Aquarium, and got to marvel at all of the amazing sights from several inches above my line of sight. That was the most adventurous thing we did with him, as the rest of the visit was mostly filled with general nerdery X)
First off, the big lug, on top of paying for several meals, got myself and Ren some very cute custom-made shirts of our characters in FFXI. He even got me brandishing my favorite type of weapon =) It was really cute of him to do that for us, and we made sure to get a picture of us in our awesome shirts of nerdery. He also got Ren a super cute Mew plushie for her birthday... actually when he told me what he was getting her, I was like... aw dang! That's a damn good idea XD But she naturally loved it and I was happy for both involved~
Saturday after Ren left, we had an aesthetically unexciting, yet highly productive day in pooling our many exploits and successes in pokemon diamond to upgrade our trainer cards and vastly increase each others' pokedexes. Again, may not have seemed like an exciting day, us both sitting down playing our DSes.. but dang if it wasn't productive for both parties X)
However there was plenty more fun to be had than that. On thursday, my Stella DVD arrived in the mail, and even with him not fully watching all the time, he was still cracking up alongside us as we watched. Same could be said for when he watched The Soup with me X)
Then there were the two epic Mario Party 4 battles the three of us had. Sadly he got the short end of the stick overall! First battle, he got a reversal of fortune near the very end that helped the computer by deducting my huge wealth of coinage, leaving Ren to win out with her superior board star-hoardage and event panel bonus. Second time, he absolutely annihilated the competition, winning almost every minigame he could and easily winning the most coins earned and highgest total coin bonus stars. But his bad luck with rolls and my exceedingly good luck meant I still won. Poor guy X)
Super Smash Brothers Melee was quite fun. He's extremely good and I'm still a newbie, so I had no hope in competition with him, especially since I'm too stubborn to use a better character than Bowser. So though 1 vs. 1 battles were entirely futile, it turns out I could make a great partner X) He provided the finesse, I provided more damage and opportunistic kills. We had fun making short work of every computer team we could design on the hardest level. Was very fun, especially since I could still contribute significantly despite my very poor experience compared to him!
Ren and SK were new to Grim Adventures of Billy and Mandy, but it's a quick to pick up game and a whole lot of fun regardless. We had a lot of fun playing that a bit, and it was great hearing him and Ren laughing at Fred Fredburger's frequent and hilarious "Yes!"ings and other amusing sayings.
Mario Kart DD and Mario Strikers were imbalanced in the other direction. Because those are the main things I play with Alex, I had way more experience than him in those and it wasn't really a contest. We did still play some DD with Ren, doing some fun Shine Thief battles, and then Ren as my backseat driver as he went solo in an All Cup Tour. This led to some truly hilarious moments, when in the heat of the races, Ren would instinctively punch or throw weapons at our opponents, with SK turning out to be the victim X) What was especially hilarious was Ren making an action, me immediately seeing that SK was the victim, and my horrified expression and responses would only then clue Ren into what happened. We about died laughing when on the last lap of DK Mountain when I was comfortably in first, but got caught up before the bridge. Once we got onto it, SK barreled up from behind, but Ren was just worried about me getting caught and didn't want to be overtaken, so instinctively punched...
But it wasn't just that she punched him... poor SK flew -straight- off the bridge XD After all the laughing, I naturally rubbed salty humor into the wounds, but it was a classic moment of nerdish anti-glory. After Ren left we tried Strikers, but again, I had a lot of practice since that's one of Alex's favorites to play and he's only played a few times with his friend. Then we got into the Mario Power Tennis, which was definitely the best overall.
He talked a very big game on how he'd beat me at this game in the past, which I admittedly countered just as self-assuredly that I'd win. Luckily, myyy words were backed up with results X) Regardless of who I picked, I could beat him on 1 on 1 play... turns out his tendency to be a fantastic net player and my experience with playing the back line and using opportunistic net attacks made me win. It was satisfying, but not nearly as fun as when we ventured into teaming up.
Holy crap! I thought it was fairly good that Alex and I could generally beat a team of one Pro, one Intermediate, and that one time a while back, an ex of mine beat double Pros with me narrowly. SK said we should try double Ace opponents.. and holy crap, we -did- it =D Against almost every player in the course of numerous teams we faced.. the hardest of which was probably Bowser and Wario, which took our third try. However, his fantastic net play with Mario, coupled with my saving and shot set-up skills led to many stellar battles and ultimately, a win against every team we made! He's a monster at the net; he blocked some fantastic shots, and basically hit every open opportunity given to him. My specialty was the saves and setting up shots for him/getting it past the net player, though there were a few times I was able to go on the offensive with my power shots, or force them to net/hit out with drop shots. I was especially proud when I actually scored from the back line against the opponents without any power shot influence. Hell yeah =D
I always used Paratroopa and Koopa Troopa alternating.. he used Mario all but once or twice, when he tried Wario to great success. We attempted a role reversal once of having me at the net and him in back, buuut it was mostly disastrous... gotta play to our strengths X) Was still floored that we could beat double Aces, but just goes to show that I was short an SK-caliber teammate! Alex is decent, but he's very easily distracted and not as potent as SK in blocking shots X)
And then this morning I drove him back to the airport, ending a very fun number of days. Did I take a certain smug satisfaction from winning the games a lot? Of course a little, but I had such a blast playing things with him and Ren that it's far eclipsed by those memories X) Great times, and will look forward to the next time we can do it!
and with that, I'll begin work on part 3, the Ren portion of the visit! =D To cap it off, here's a couple pictures of the absurdly tall (keep in mind, I'm about 6'2"-3") SK with me and Ren.
I enjoyed this picture, I just wanted to be goofy in expressing the shock that is having someone significantly taller than I.
And then cuter ones of our group =) That amazingly awesome scenery is actually my front yard.. so awesome~ (more pictures in next post too)
That said, if anything, he was actually -more- kind and polite than we thought! I don't think the guy could've uttered a truly negative word about us or anyone X) And while I didn't second-guess giving him a nice place to stay here and all, he apparently felt necessary to pay for -multiple- meals for both Ren and myself x_x Too nice... He was a gracious guest, and it was really nice having him here.
However, that should all be fairly obvious to everyone fortunate enough to know the guy online X) Rest assured, it's all true, and his jestful smack-talking online disappears into fun-loving humility in person, it seems!
The first night he arrived was nice indeed. I played a little amusing trick by implying that I'd chosen quiet and non-evil music for him in the car when we picked him up.. yet had rigged the CD player so my car blasted out Glen Benton's belting out "LET THE KILLING, BE-GINNNN!" from Vital Remains. Aside from a little bit of video gaming that night, it was late and nothing special to report. Thursday he came with us to the Baltimore Aquarium, and got to marvel at all of the amazing sights from several inches above my line of sight. That was the most adventurous thing we did with him, as the rest of the visit was mostly filled with general nerdery X)
First off, the big lug, on top of paying for several meals, got myself and Ren some very cute custom-made shirts of our characters in FFXI. He even got me brandishing my favorite type of weapon =) It was really cute of him to do that for us, and we made sure to get a picture of us in our awesome shirts of nerdery. He also got Ren a super cute Mew plushie for her birthday... actually when he told me what he was getting her, I was like... aw dang! That's a damn good idea XD But she naturally loved it and I was happy for both involved~
Saturday after Ren left, we had an aesthetically unexciting, yet highly productive day in pooling our many exploits and successes in pokemon diamond to upgrade our trainer cards and vastly increase each others' pokedexes. Again, may not have seemed like an exciting day, us both sitting down playing our DSes.. but dang if it wasn't productive for both parties X)
However there was plenty more fun to be had than that. On thursday, my Stella DVD arrived in the mail, and even with him not fully watching all the time, he was still cracking up alongside us as we watched. Same could be said for when he watched The Soup with me X)
Then there were the two epic Mario Party 4 battles the three of us had. Sadly he got the short end of the stick overall! First battle, he got a reversal of fortune near the very end that helped the computer by deducting my huge wealth of coinage, leaving Ren to win out with her superior board star-hoardage and event panel bonus. Second time, he absolutely annihilated the competition, winning almost every minigame he could and easily winning the most coins earned and highgest total coin bonus stars. But his bad luck with rolls and my exceedingly good luck meant I still won. Poor guy X)
Super Smash Brothers Melee was quite fun. He's extremely good and I'm still a newbie, so I had no hope in competition with him, especially since I'm too stubborn to use a better character than Bowser. So though 1 vs. 1 battles were entirely futile, it turns out I could make a great partner X) He provided the finesse, I provided more damage and opportunistic kills. We had fun making short work of every computer team we could design on the hardest level. Was very fun, especially since I could still contribute significantly despite my very poor experience compared to him!
Ren and SK were new to Grim Adventures of Billy and Mandy, but it's a quick to pick up game and a whole lot of fun regardless. We had a lot of fun playing that a bit, and it was great hearing him and Ren laughing at Fred Fredburger's frequent and hilarious "Yes!"ings and other amusing sayings.
Mario Kart DD and Mario Strikers were imbalanced in the other direction. Because those are the main things I play with Alex, I had way more experience than him in those and it wasn't really a contest. We did still play some DD with Ren, doing some fun Shine Thief battles, and then Ren as my backseat driver as he went solo in an All Cup Tour. This led to some truly hilarious moments, when in the heat of the races, Ren would instinctively punch or throw weapons at our opponents, with SK turning out to be the victim X) What was especially hilarious was Ren making an action, me immediately seeing that SK was the victim, and my horrified expression and responses would only then clue Ren into what happened. We about died laughing when on the last lap of DK Mountain when I was comfortably in first, but got caught up before the bridge. Once we got onto it, SK barreled up from behind, but Ren was just worried about me getting caught and didn't want to be overtaken, so instinctively punched...
But it wasn't just that she punched him... poor SK flew -straight- off the bridge XD After all the laughing, I naturally rubbed salty humor into the wounds, but it was a classic moment of nerdish anti-glory. After Ren left we tried Strikers, but again, I had a lot of practice since that's one of Alex's favorites to play and he's only played a few times with his friend. Then we got into the Mario Power Tennis, which was definitely the best overall.
He talked a very big game on how he'd beat me at this game in the past, which I admittedly countered just as self-assuredly that I'd win. Luckily, myyy words were backed up with results X) Regardless of who I picked, I could beat him on 1 on 1 play... turns out his tendency to be a fantastic net player and my experience with playing the back line and using opportunistic net attacks made me win. It was satisfying, but not nearly as fun as when we ventured into teaming up.
Holy crap! I thought it was fairly good that Alex and I could generally beat a team of one Pro, one Intermediate, and that one time a while back, an ex of mine beat double Pros with me narrowly. SK said we should try double Ace opponents.. and holy crap, we -did- it =D Against almost every player in the course of numerous teams we faced.. the hardest of which was probably Bowser and Wario, which took our third try. However, his fantastic net play with Mario, coupled with my saving and shot set-up skills led to many stellar battles and ultimately, a win against every team we made! He's a monster at the net; he blocked some fantastic shots, and basically hit every open opportunity given to him. My specialty was the saves and setting up shots for him/getting it past the net player, though there were a few times I was able to go on the offensive with my power shots, or force them to net/hit out with drop shots. I was especially proud when I actually scored from the back line against the opponents without any power shot influence. Hell yeah =D
I always used Paratroopa and Koopa Troopa alternating.. he used Mario all but once or twice, when he tried Wario to great success. We attempted a role reversal once of having me at the net and him in back, buuut it was mostly disastrous... gotta play to our strengths X) Was still floored that we could beat double Aces, but just goes to show that I was short an SK-caliber teammate! Alex is decent, but he's very easily distracted and not as potent as SK in blocking shots X)
And then this morning I drove him back to the airport, ending a very fun number of days. Did I take a certain smug satisfaction from winning the games a lot? Of course a little, but I had such a blast playing things with him and Ren that it's far eclipsed by those memories X) Great times, and will look forward to the next time we can do it!
and with that, I'll begin work on part 3, the Ren portion of the visit! =D To cap it off, here's a couple pictures of the absurdly tall (keep in mind, I'm about 6'2"-3") SK with me and Ren.
I enjoyed this picture, I just wanted to be goofy in expressing the shock that is having someone significantly taller than I.
And then cuter ones of our group =) That amazingly awesome scenery is actually my front yard.. so awesome~ (more pictures in next post too)