2009 - Another Year Gone By

December 2009

Not the best start to a summary, I'm wide awake at 6am in the morning (Malaysian time, of course) because I got woken up by some damn mosquitos and couldn't get back to sleep. That means I've really only had about 5 hours of sleep since I was kinda restless last night...but anyway, this is a summary of 2009's events and a retrospective view on what the year was for me.

This year, Sidhe saw Shatter hit the online marketplace for the PlayStation Network with much buzz. While I didn't really contribute directly to the game, I did somehow earn a place on the credits under the Research and Development team. The game is beautifully polished and really fun to play, and it's a great step for the company's portfolio. Aside from that, I also had a small contribution to Activision's HotWheels: Battle Force 5 for the Wii, and FlickKick Rugby and FlickKick Aussie Rules for iPhone.

We also completed our year-long project for the Wii, Rugby League 3, but unfortunately that won't be released until March 2010. It was my main project for the year and I certainly took away a lot of useful experiences and knowledge from it. It had its ups, and it had its downs - probably more downs than ups, as we shared in the post project review. Nevertheless, despite the hardships the team faced, we've produced a really fun game that our ever-enthusiastic forum-goers will love, and I'm very proud of what we've achieved - even if I do complain about it so often!

Psypoke saw a REVAMP to its layout and code structure. It's absolutely beautiful, everything is in PHP classes and object-oriented, it brings a tear to my inner geek. We also had Pokemon Platinum released in the US earlier in the year, and HeartGold and SoulSilver in Japan later in the year, so there was plenty of nonwork for me, the nonadministrator. Stephen has kept the site running smoothly and my thanks to him for keeping the retards at bay. May our viral marketing accounts on Facebook and Twitter provide us with some quality traffic over the next year. Apart from the two big games, we also saw some good content added to the Pokemon Ranger 2 section thanks to tiger10x, and the ever-growing TCG section thanks to idkmybffFrost.

Apart from the content aspect of the site, we also had the return of Psypoke Idol, covering 512 Pokemon and Pokemon formes from four generations and over 20 weeks. The activity proved to be a favourite with thousands of votes pouring in week after week. Over the course of three rounds, site users would rank each Pokemon from 1-5 and the highest ranking portion of that group would advance to the next round. The first Psypoke Idol winner from 2004 was Mew, and with the announcement of HeartGold and SoulSilver dominating the Pokemon community headlines, it was no surprise to see Lugia take first place in this year's contest.

Wellington life has continued to change, with a few changes in flatmates and then a house move from the Fortress to the Villa about 100m away. The new place is clean and modern, and comes with luxurious items such as a dishwasher and insulation. There is also a swimming pool and gym for use, free of charge, and I have enjoyed their benefits at least once this year - hopefully more next year, but no promises.

I have lost count of the number of times I went to Strawberry Fare this year, but if I had to make a guess, it would be close to 20 delicious times, with the most being three in November. May the epic desserts continue in 2010 and may my metabolism maintain its awesomeness.

Keeping in the food category, two important traditions were started by me and my workmates: Good Food Friday and Spicy Food Thursday, as they were originally called, now it's Good Food Wednesday so Matt can make it after class, and Spicy Food Tuesday because Owen occasionally has soccer on Thursdays. It's basically a good excuse to socialise with my workmates over a tasty meal, usually at Cinta, Great India and New Kor on rotation. Our two biggest advocates, Chris and Matt have since left the company but Matt still enjoys Good Food Wednesday. May there be more Legendary Hot King Prawn Tom Yum Laksa in 2010!

Trips this year included Cape Palliser, Mystery Creek (if you can count that, it's more of a tradition now), Mt. Taranaki, Castle Point, Mt. Ruapehu and of course Malaysia. There were visits from William, Mat, Nat(asha), Nat(alie), Shereen, Alice, Sabrina, Ness, Raymond and Nancy. I went to Wellington Zoo for the first time, became a New Zealand Citizen and travelled on a New Zealand passport, improved my Super Smash Bros and Starcraft skills, played through all the single player campaigns for Starcraft and Warcraft III and their expansions, switched music teams at church and also helped out with the Youth Band, increased my alcohol tolerance and made 43 blog posts. I ate lots of good food, partied hard with lots of friends and wrote lots of code.

Yeah, it's been a good year.