The Minecart Chronicles: In the Beginning

This project started for no reason other than pure fun and laughter. I've been playing Minecraft: Windows 10 Edition BETA for a year and a half now. Crashing the Minecraft party a bit late (almost 4 years late), I was amazed at possibilities of a game that looked so simple. It takes me back to the NES days of elementary school.

Since last August, I've been spending my free time roaming the same survival world I created on the day I launched the game for the first time. Made my first house near that spawn point, and it grew over time, along with my understanding of the game's world. I named the world Terra-Gaia, as an homage to the hilarious people over at College Humor, who made me laugh and summed up my childhood so well at the same time.

But it wasn't until Mojang released the Redstone Puzzle Map back in February that I got interested in redstone components and minecarts. The electrical engineer in me screamed with joy, and I knew I had to build something using this newfound knowledge.

And that's how this project was spawned: the first long-distance subway line in the land of Terra-Gaia, built entirely in survival mode. This section of HippyTesla.net will document the building process. At the same time, I will be capturing some footage, and, when the subway line is complete, using it to make a mockumentary about the process. If you get a few laughs out of it, then my mission was a success. But, more on the mockumentary when the time comes.

Before I drop a few words about the current status of the project, I think it's only fair to get you acquainted with the personnel working on it. I will introduce everyone using their Xbox LIVE Gamertags:

• Chaos3059 - the friend.

The company joker. Chaos is our railway specialist. Having played Minecraft long before any of us did, he is more familiar with automated cart dispatch, railway switches and that kind of stuff. When he's not building with the rest of us, he is overseeing and planning the railway system.

• SnakeL0rd - the nephew.

A very talented and creative guy. I introduced him to Minecraft sometime after I started playing. His creations put mine to shame, as SnakeL0rd's ability to make really pretty stuff out of pixelated blocks amazes me. He's not the best out there (seeing some Minecraft builds on the web, my jaw dropped pretty hard), but he's certainly strong in the creative field. You can think of him as our creative consultant.

• HippyTesla - yours truly.

An old-school gamer and a minecraft noob. A man with a loooot of free time on his hands. A comedian at heart. The man in charge, until The Wife raises her voice.

• The Wife - DO NOT DISTURB!

Silent Hill: Homecoming: Afterparty Thoughts

So, I finished Silent Hill: Homecoming for the first time a few days ago (didn't have a PC that can run it till a month ago).

I don't know why are people so negative towards this game, as I found it worthy of the Silent Hill name. It kept all the good things from the first 4 SHs and threw a more intuitive combat system on top of that. I honestly like the way I wield my steel pipe (heheh) in Homecoming a lot more than in SH3 where a walking penis pummels me up if I don't press the X button in the right way to do an overhead swing as opposed to the random swatting around if I press the X button the wrong way.