I went to spend the day with a childhood friend, whom we’ll call Matt (mostly because that is in fact his name), and the day’s events led us to an evening in front of his computer. I had used the trip as an excuse to quit my summer job at Target early, as I’d be returning to college out of state soon thereafter, and I didn’t feel like coming back to town just to spend my last meager weeks of free time jockeying a cash register. I had just returned home to Maryland from a week-long trip to New Jersey. Suffice it to say that the game was formative to the person typing this, molding how I viewed, played, enjoyed, critiqued and reflected upon my favorite hobby.Įarly August, 2003. To say I merely played this game during its golden age, or even that I played it a lot, would be a gross understatement on the other hand, it would be equally unfair to say that I tryharded Galaxies, as for reasons that will be discussed in some detail, the experience itself was hardly at all about reaching some sort of endgame. BT’s album circumstantially became my unofficial soundtrack for Galaxies, often accompanying me late into the evening as I underwent my maiden voyage into MMO gaming. Published at the tail end of June 2003 by Sony Online Entertainment, SWG sought to bring well-funded brand recognition to a genre just beginning to flex its muscles in a freshly burgeoning period of high-speed internet. Reexperiencing it in retrospect was having the culinary understanding to appreciate the confection for what it truly is.Įmotional Technology was also released just over a month after LucasArts’ new hit MMORPG, Star Wars Galaxies: An Empire Divided. Perhaps closer to the mark is that the melancholy of late 2003 was the sea salt sprinkled on top of a gourmet confection, and EmoTech was the sweeter for it. So, how was listening to it again from a position of relative security? Hard to say for sure, but I don’t think ‘cathartic’ is quite it. BT played a big part in helping me maintain some semblance of sanity. The album featured heavily in the next ~18 months of my life – a period characterized by literal failing grades due to undiagnosed ADHD, a supremely awkward living situation in a substance-free dorm with a strict, uncompromising RA as a roommate, a neglectful lack of support from home due to parents in a loveless relationship well into the process of slow collapse, and a blanket of depression that I would frankly call a natural response to the above. Released in early August of 2003, I picked up EmoTech the first week it came out, a few weeks before I went back to college for my sophomore year. It was in this spirit that, during my first week on the job, I found myself listening to BT’s album Emotional Technology. Avoiding obvious social commentary about how this is what it’s supposed to be for everyone, I’ve been seizing the opportunity to experience familiar things without the Sword of Rentocles hanging directly over my head. Given… well, everything, this is a development that I feel strangely guilty about. Introduction – An Adventure Manual-Ī few weeks ago, I started earning a livable wage for the first time in my 36 years of life. The Decline and Fall of the Corellian Empire But, I don’t have a blog, and I’d intended this to be a discussion for anyone even remotely interested, so here we are. I don’t know if this is the ‘appropriate’ place for this, and I suspect this will tread dangerously close to outright blogging.
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