Two BIG accomplishments!

I am pretty proud of myself for the progress I have been able to make. First off, I just completed Lego Indiana Jones. Short and easy, but a very cool and fun game. I liked it just as much as Lego Star Wars.

The first big accomplishment was finally finishing Final Fantasy VII: Crisis Core a few nights ago. I had stepped away from it for a long time thanks to GTA4, Burnout, and a couple other games, but I was extremely satisfied with the game and ending. Simply awesome. I didn’t expect the ending to have as much of an effect on me as it did. Anybody who has played through the original FF7 should know how the story ends so I was expecting it, but the way it was presented with the gameplay, music, and of course, the FMV sequences was just beautiful. Very powerful. I am glad I returned to it. The gameplay left a bit much to be desired (too much button mashing) and the DMW was weird, but once you got used to it and accepted it, the game was a lot of fun. I can appreciate the innovation and it was totally worth putting up with the button mashing to have the wonderful experience of returning to Midgar and all its characters.

My other huge accomplishment was finishing Metal Gear Solid 4. Like GTA, I had never got more than a few hours into the previous MGS games and had never even touched MGS3 (or the NES and PSP chapters for that matter). However, due to the almost legendary status of the series, characters, and story, I had a base knowledge that, coupled with a perusing of the MGS Database that is available on PSN, provided me with enough of a background to make me feel ready to enjoy the game fully. While there can be some gripes about this being more of an interactive movie than a game (the last act in particular has you watching more than playing it seemed to me), I thought it was simply outstanding presentation. This would be a much bigger complaint if the characters and story were not so interesting. I was impressed every step of the way with the gameplay, story, presentation, and graphics. A game like MGS really forces you to play differently than most other games. I won’t go into spoiler territory and discuss everything that was so awesome about the game, but I will say that I just listened to Giant Bomb’s June 19th Giant Spoiler Snakecast, and that is an excellent listen if you want to reminisce about all the insane excellence of this game. It’s not my favorite game of all time or anything like that, but on my list of games that I have mad respect and appreciation for, its definately somewhere in the top 3, if not number 1. Hats off to Hideo Kojima, the man is revolutionary in the video games industry!

Next up, I still plan to finish Siren: Blood Curse, and I am starting Condemned 2, Ninja Gaiden Dragon Sword on the DS, and The Simpsons Game. I tried not to start anything that required a huge time commitment since I am back to work on tuesday, but I thought I made really good progress during my two week sabbatical. Now if I can just figure out how to beat the last damn boss in Bionic Commando Rearmed! >:(

Status update

As I predicted and expected, I’m over a week into my break and hopelessly behind. Its ok though, I’ve got some good gaming in. I’ve actually been able to stay away from Burnout Paradise enough to finish Uncharted on Crushing difficulty for my first Platinum Trophy (whooo!), get all the way to the last boss in Bionic Commando Rearmed (can’t figure out how to beat the guy though), and beat Ratchet and Clank Future: Quest for Booty.

Now I am playing Metal Gear Solid 4 again and I have started Lego Indiana Jones. I’ve also started playing Final Fantasy VII: Crisis Core again and am very close to beating it I think. I kind of fell away from that game because so many good things came out to tear me away from it. I’m committed now!

What I need to play is Siren Blood Curse. If the first few chapters are any indication, the rest of the game isn’t too long so I should be able to beat it relatively quickly.

I think I’m in love!

They picked a new girl to be Lara Croft from Tomb Raider. She’s a total babe, and she’s a gymnist so she can pull of all the moves from the games! I’ve decided that since my wife gets a fantasy freebie, then I do too. Found!

A ray of hope

Had my interview with Fidelity today. It went really well actually. Since I worked in the mortgage industry already, it was very easy to relate to this person and company and describe my experiences and abilities that directly applied to this job.

Interestingly though, I didn’t interview for the position that the hr rep initially submitted me for. I originally applied for about 4-5 positions since they all seemed to be things I could do after working for Chase for three years. After talking with the hr lady, she said she was going to forward me to the hiring manager for an Inspections Processor position. But I ended up interviewing for a Client Services Rep. Not really sure what happened; I left a v.m. for the hr lady but I’m not really too concerned. Just a foot in the door would be fine. I would be working with lenders on properties that are in default regarding property inspections, upkeep to the property and land, changing the locks, getting home owners insurance set up for the lender, and things like that. Unfortunately, this also entails talking to the property owners who are going through the default process, and they are obviously not in very good moods because of this. With my background I am confident that I have a thick enough skin to handle that, I just want to learn about the company and what they do so I can starting learning and moving up. Basically, start all fucking over again in a new company to prove myself and just HOPE that I still have a job in 3-4 years. Getting laid off and looking for jobs sucks big donkey balls.

On the good side they are expanding (not surprising given the nature of what they do in that location) so hopefully there will be job security for the foreseeable future, it seemed like a fun office to work in (the hiring mgr was laid back and the place was all decorated up for the Olympics), and since our region is the west coast, we have the option to work flextime! They don’t have an incentive program though so I will have to wait and see what the salary is. Actually, she did say that they have made a proposal to corporate about an incentive bonus program, but it needs to get approved by corporate first, so there’s no telling when or even if it will become reality. If they offer me at least what BoA offered me I think I will take it just the same. The drive will be about the same and I would rather continue to build on the knowledge I gained at Chase then go back to credit card customer service.

I don’t have any other interviews lined up yet so time is running out. I am supposed to start at BoA in a week and a half and I would really rather turn down the job before then instead of start there and then leave a month later. I don’t like burning bridges like that. I am still meeting with DBM on monday so hopefully they can get me some leads if Progressive and Fidelity don’t pan out (or even they do pan out, who knows).

Third time’s…..a..charm? Eh…

Well, my face to face interview at Progressive was about as harsh as I expected. I studied for several hours yesterday and today and still felt unprepared for some of the questions they threw at me. First damn question they asked me was enough to make me go “uhhhhhhh…..” “Give me an example of a time when someone made an unreasonable request of you. What did you do?” Huh??? In retrospect, I could’ve given any number of examples about stupid brokers trying to submit piss-poor conditions and expecting a final approval, but the problem with those stories is that the vast majority of them don’t really have “happy endings” that would make for a good answer in an interview. The broker can’t use the condition and that’s that. I eventually came up with something from Charter One but I don’t think it was a very good start to the interview. If I had been prepared for it, I could’ve come up with something better.

They seemed to focus a lot on the negative questions. You know, the one’s designed to trick you into giving a negative answer. Normally, I’m fine with those. I know how to give an example that starts with a negative situation and turn it around to show how you learned or growed from it, I had even prepared a few stories like this. But when they asked 3, 4, 5 questions like this that were all extremely similar I started running out of examples. “What the hell???” The interview with the 2nd guy went better. I was finally able to give some positive stories and get a little more comfortable, but overall I left feeling that some questions I answered well and some I answered not quite as well.

Do I think I got the job? Hell if I know. I’ll find out either friday or monday when the hr lady calls me. I’m convinced that its impossible to ace an interview with Progressive. It makes me wonder what kind of robotic interview sevants they ARE hiring. The good thing is that I feel I interviewed better than I did last time I interviewed with them three years ago. Hopefully I did well enough for them to make an offer. We’ll see.

In the meantime, I have an interview tomorrow with Fidelity. I am more hopeful for this one. I can handle most interviews with just a few behavioral questions just fine. Also, my suprise interview with DFAS that came out of nowhere went fantastic. The guy was extremely easy to talk to and a really nice guy. He said he was impressed with me and the way I interviewed. We actually had the interview in a tiny storage closet-sized “conference room.” It was very intimate, but he was so easy to talk to I wasn’t even nervous really. The bad thing about that job is that because its the government, he said it would be between 3 weeks and 3 months before I heard anything. Needless to say, I’m not holding my breath waiting for them. If they call me in three months, then I’ll have a serious decision to make depending on where I’m working at the time. I’ll update more after my interview tomorrow. Depending on how that goes, I’ll continue to apply places.

Gentlemen, start your engines!

Ok, so my last day of work was yesterday.  And unless I find another job that starts sooner, I have two weeks until I start at Bank of America.   So that means that in between hunting for jobs and going on interviews I have to get through as many games in my backlog as possible.  After perusing my collection and making determinations and decisions, here is my list in no particular order.  There are more than this but these are the ones I REALLY want to at least try before I start work again.  A few I will probably just play for a little while and say, “Yep, cool.  That game is fun,” before moving it aside and starting on something else.  The majority though I do intend to finish someday, as indicated by the astericks.  I probably won’t come close to going through the whole thing but its always better to shoot for more than is possible right?  Better to aim high than low.

1.       Ace Combat 5: The Unsung War (PS2)
2.   *  Onimusha: Dawn of Dreams (PS2)
3.   *  Persona 3: FES (PS2)
4.   *  Ratchet: Deadlocked (PS2)
5.   *  Condemned 2: Bloodshot (PS3)
6.   * Lego Star Wars: The Complete Saga (PS3)
7.   * Lego Indiana Jones (PS3)
8.   * Portal (PS3)
9.   * The Simpsons Game (PS3)
10. * Ninja Gaiden Sigma (PS3)
11. * The Orange Box (PS3)
12.    Disgaea: Afternoon of Darkness (PSP)
13.    Jeanne D’Arc (PSP)
14.    FF Tactics: War of the Lions (PSP)
15. * Final Fantasy XII (PS2)
16. * Metroid Prime 3: Corruption (Wii)
17. * Ninja Gaiden: Dragon Sword (DS)
18. * Beat Uncharted on Crushing difficulty setting
19. * Finish PixelJunk Eden (PSN)
20. * Finish Bionic Commando: Rearmed (PSN)
21. * Finish Siren: Blood Curse (PSN)
22. * Finish Metal Gear Solid 4 (PS3)
23. * Finish Final Fantasy VII: Crisis Core (PSP)
24. * Finish Professor Layton and the Curious Village (DS)

That gives me about 14 days to play 24 games. I’ll be lucky if I get through half of them. And let’s not forget that Ratchet and Clank: Quest for Booty comes out next Thursday. Not to mention the fact that I will probably continue to be pulled into the occasional online session of Burnout Paradise randomly along the way. But hey, I’ll have a hell of a lot of fun trying! And who knows, if I get the job at Progressive I am trying for then I won’t start working again until Sept 29th! So I could potentially be looking at almost a month and a half of lazing about scratching my balls. Here’s hoping! I will give status updates along the way as well as a recap right before I go back to work.

Felt like a speed run…at least for me

I finished Uncharted: Drake’s Fortune this weekend.  I started playing it Friday night/Saturday morning and finished it early monday.  I haven’t beaten a game from the start that quick in many years.  I guess its just a testament to how much I like it.  It really is an incredible game.  I also went back and finished it again on Hard and got every trophy except the one for finishing it on “Crushing” difficulty (and the Platinum obviously).  I can’t even remember the last time I played through a game twice!  Now yes, I’m playing it on Crushing to get the last trophy (and thus my first Platinum!).  The game was very noticably more difficult on Hard compared to Normal.  The enemies are a lot more aggressive as far as moving to flank you and throw hand grenades, and I think there are more of them too.  I wonder how hard it will be to play through the game on Crushing.  Thankfully, I can turn on some of the cheats, including the unlimited ammo for any weapon.

Also, I have found (unsurprisingly, in retrospect) that I played the game very differently than I would have if I wasn’t trying to earn trophies.  I actually cared about playing skillfully to get certain achievements.  I also used a guide to get some of the treasures and medals.  If not for trophies, I would have just played the game once, on normal difficulty, and not cared about playing with any kind of skill.  I can definately see this becoming a trend as more games that support trophies are released.  While this will wreak havoc on my ability to knock out games on my to-play list in a reasonable time frame, I think that I may get more out of my games this way.  And it will assuredly make me actually FINISH more games, and may even make me a better player just from earning some of the more skill-based ones.  I’m looking forward to it!

Due to tomorrow being my last day at work I will have 2 weeks to catch up on some games, and I plan to play as many games in my back catelog as possible.   I don’t start my job at Bank of America until Sept 2, and if I get something better then I will probably start even later than that.  So I am stoked to start playing Bionic Commando: Rearmed this weekend.  I may even get Street Fighter Alpha too.  I will have to look through my backlog and make some choices.  Good choices!!!

On to phase 3

Well, my phone interview with Progressive went pretty well. I spent several hours at the library yesterday studying and planning out what I would say. Since I was able to print out my past interviews on the Progressive careers site and I knew what they were looking for, I was able to feel pretty confident going it.

As ALWAYS happens, she still hit me with a couple questions that I didn’t expect, but most of those were still looking for the same information and skills so I was able to use most of the same answers. I have a face to face interview next tuesday at 6pm. I’m really excited to have another crack at it, but this will be the hardest part of all. I’m going to study some more this weekend and monday so hopefully I will do better than I did a few years ago.

I’m still going to BoA tomorrow to begin the fingerprinting and background check process just in case. Hopefully I won’t have to do more than that. I’m also meeting with the DBM people for my orientation and I think I’ll probably call the City of Cleveland’s job search people just in case. But for the most part, I feel good.

I want to be BioShocked

Just got a look at the new BioShock trailer for PS3. I know, I know, I need to get a 360, but it probably won’t happen until I get my 2008 tax refund.

But in the meantime, damn this game looks cool. I’ve been hearing so many good things about this game and I’m anxious to see what all the fuss is about. I love the fantasy-sounding music at the start how it sets the mood for this amazing underwater utopia and the promise of bliss. Then it gets more ominous and you get the feel from the imagery that something is not quite right. Then, it gets downright action-y and the images get even more bizarre and it shows you gameplay footage. This will be a day one purchase for me; hell, I’ll probably reserve it!

Good news? I suppose so…

For those of you that don’t know, we had a meeting at work last week. To almost nobody’s surprise, Chase overestimated their workload projections and as a result our termination date has moved from Oct 1st to Aug 15th. I only have a job for about another week and a half. Fucking awesome.

I’ve been pretty busy since then getting up early, posting for jobs, and making phone calls almost every day. I’ve had a few bites but nothing really good yet. I went in for an interview today at Bank of America for a customer service rep position and must’ve made a good impression becuase she made me a job offer right there at the end of the interview. While this was a nice ego boost, I’m somewhat less than stoked, for several reasons. 1. This job is in Beachwood and I live in Lakewood. We will be moving back to the east side eventually but until then the commute will not be fun. 2. The pay is more than what they offered me at GE but still not quite what I’m making now. 3. The shift available is kind of a hybrid 2nd and 3rd shift, so the hours would be something like 8pm-5am, give or take a couple hours, with the expectation that I will be working some weekend and holiday days. Mega-lame. 4. Judging from what I’ve heard from my current collegues that came to Chase from BoA when they used to be MBNA, the job is less than stellar. I am NOT thrilled about having to cross-sell things like credit protection, mortgages, and the like in the process of providing customer service. I am not a salesman by any stretch of the word and I don’t like doing it. 5. Lastly, and this is the most important thing to me, after everything I’ve learned in 3 yrs at Chase and everything I became responsible for there, I know I am capable of so much more. I feel like going back to telephone customer service would be a step backward instead of forward.

I’m trying to look on the bright side. They’re a big company just like Chase, and the credit card industry isn’t going anywhere, so I’m confident about the issue of job security. Hell, in economic hard times people actually rely on their credit cards more, which means more work for me. Also, the monthly incentive bonus opens up the possibility of making up for not only the base pay cut I would be taking, but also a portion of the incentive money I used to make at Chase. Now that I think back on it, I was probably a shoe-in for the job given my customer service, banking, and call center experience. The lady barely looked at my letter of recommendation before she made me the offer. She also mentioned that there are opportunities for advancement (position and financial) within the call center, so that’s good.

Still, the job doesn’t start until Sept 2nd, so they way I see it I have until then to find something better. I may even keep looking after I’ve started depending on how I feel about the job itself once I start doing it. I have recently received interest from Fidelity Information Services (a big name in the mortgage and financial industry) as well as Progressive Insurance, either of which I would rather work for depending on the pay. So we’ll see. If I don’t find anything better than at least I’ll have a potentially well paying job lined up and ready to go. And if I’m looking at the bright side here, than I should just be thankful for that given the state of the economy and the job market right now.

In other news, we have just recently passed the point of no return in putting together our 10-yr high school reunion. The deposit for the venue has been sent and confirmed, we have sent out fliers notifying as many of the Lakewood Class of ‘98 as we have been able to locate, and we received our first two ticket orders today. My friends Roy and Mike have opened up a joint bank account (with my name to be added as soon as we can align our schedules to do so) in the name of the event and we have been able to provide guests with the option of paying for their tickets via my PayPal account where I am handling the email billing/payment side of things. The only things left to work out are the little details such as food selections, decorations (if any), and things of that nature. Roy has been responsible for spearheading this whole thing from the very beginning and I’ve been meeting with him and various other LHS alumni pretty much every other Sunday for months now and things are really coming together. The only thing is, as the date gets closer things are going to start happening very quickly. I just hope I am able to settle into a new job before things really start ramping up.

With everything that’s going on right now I’m really proud to be able to help plan the reunion as much as I have. Maybe its because this is something positive that I can put my energy into for a little while and feel like I’m accomplishing something, momentarily forgeting about the huge piles of crap that have been accumulating in certain other areas of my life in recent months. Thank god for Devon, video games, and my motorcycle. Video games and my bike remain extremely effective stress relievers these days, and Devon has been very encouraging in my job search. She took the news of our new end date much better than I thought she would and has supported me and my decisions throughout the process. Thanks honey, I love you!!! Yeah, I know, I’m gay.