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+---- Thread: Ida's new blog (/thread-2650.html)
Ida's new blog - Ida - 12-May-2020
I liked the blog feature that was on the old CCZone. At first, I thought it was a bit of a strange thing to have, and I didn’t really know that the blogs existed until I stumbled on one, I think it was on Miika’s page. But then I really liked to read them. And I started on a blog series of my own, but it ended sort of abruptly. Now it’s about time for an update from me. This is only for those of you that are interested enough to read it ? I’ve been away from Chip's Challenge and the community for several years now. I’ve been checking out the forum and the wiki every now and then, but not much more than that. I’ve really missed it but there hasn’t been time. Now I’m back in the game since about a month – I still don’t have time really but I try to find it.
I saw that my last blog post here on CCZone was in March, 2014. It’s actually no wonder that it stopped there, considering that in May of that year my husband, who was my best friend in the world and the father of my then 1-year-old daughter, died in a car accident. We were both 29 years old and we’d been married since 19 and a couple since 15, and we were looking forward to being 90 together. So my life ended then and there, and all that really mattered was my daughter. Anyway, long story short, after a while I met a new man who sort of shared my story, his wife died also after 10 years of marriage, leaving him with two little kids. Eventually we got married and then got two more kids together so now we have five. I got life back, but one that is totally different from the one I had. Anyway, I moved to his place and then a little over a year ago we sold his house and got a new one together. Coming from two separate households, we have more stuff than we could ever want, and with 5 kids and work and all, we have virtually no spare time. It’s been a crazy time and still is.
So, real life events were the main reason why I’ve been absent for so long. But I also partly blame Apple and Microsoft for it. Apple because the iPhone and iPad removed the need for a computer in our home. I can handle online banking, e-mails, social media, looking up recipes, searching for phone numbers etc etc on either my mobile phone or one of the kids’ iPads. We really don't need our computer anymore, and since the move we haven’t even lifted it out of the moving box yet. And my old laptop where I had all CC stuff, I don’t even know where it is anymore. Fortunately, I use a computer at work, and fortunately, it’s a laptop that I take home with me every day, but, unfortunately, it’s a 64-bit-system. And that’s where Microsofts part in this comes in – that my computer wont play old 16-bit games. I know there are several ways round that, but the step to do so has been to big for me to take. However, I just recently found (on the wiki) that a couple of you guys discovered a tool and created a script that was a really easy fix to this, thank you!
So now I finally have access again to both chips.exe and an editor, and, like I said, am back in the game again.So, what am I up to now, CC wise?
• I’m playing through CC1 again from start, to get individual times for each level. I know what my total score was back in the days since it’s on the score board, but not the individual level scores. I do have them in an excel sheet which is probably backed up somewhere on a USB stick, but it will probably take years before I find that if ever so hopefully it will be faster (and more fun) to just play the set again. I’m currently on BLINK...
• I’m trying to convince a couple of my kids that CC is the best game ever. They both seem to like it actually, even if they are genrally more into Roblox and Minecraft and the like. My daughter who is now seven just designed her first few levels and they are not bad for a 7-year-old.
• I’m watching, or sometimes just listening to, CC let’s plays on youtube (currently JB’s playthrough of CCLP3). I really like watching playthroughs when there’s commentary so thanks to you guys who make them!
• I’ve created an account on Steam and bought the CC1 & CC2 bundle. I could only download CC1 though due to lack of disk space. I think I’ve only played Lesson 1 so far. Is there also community activity going on over there? That’s a new world for me to explore, and so is CC2. From what I’ve seen so far, I think I’m sticking to CC1 as that is the perfect game according to me
• Of course, I’m also designing new levels, that’s what I’ve missed the most I think. Most of the time I get an idea first that would be a cool concept for a level, and then quickly write it down before I forget, and then I can hardly wait til I have time to implement it. As of now I have 20 new levels that I’ve made the last few weeks. If one of you would like to receive a copy of the set to playtest for me before I release it, that’d be great. I’ve solved them all myself, but it would be good to have some feedback on time limits & difficulty when playing without knowing the solution beforehand, and a second pair of eyes to look for busts. Also if you could confirm solveability in Lynx, that would be even better, as that is something I have yet to try. Send me a pm either here on CCZone or on Discord if you’d be interested in helping with that.
• I’m also trying to compile all my previously released levels plus the new ones into one big set. I was about to do this years ago. Back then I had a master set where I had ALL my released and unreleased and unfinished levels, and were picking levels from there. But then the editor I used (not sure which one) because of some bug overwrote that set with a blank set. I blame myself because I had actually seen it happen before and should have been more careful backing up my set. It wasn’t the end of the world though because I had most of the levels if not all stored in various other sets, but it kind of put me down. And then about the same time, life happened and the whole project was stalled. Anyway, now I have a set with some 100+ levels including those 20 new levels, but I want to do some thought through level arranging before publishing it, ensuring there is variety among the levels and a difficulty curve, and maybe make some really minor edits to some levels (like changing some titles).
So that’s an update from me. If I decide to continue 'blogging' I think I’ll add new posts to this thread instead of starting a new one. It would be great to read more blog entries from the rest of you as well, but I still have a lot of old posts to dig through that I haven’t read.
RE: Ida's new blog - Hash1 - 13-May-2020
That was quite an interesting read, Ida.
Even though it's been 6 years, sorry for your loss, and it's been quite heartwarming to read that things turned out well for you after the tragedy.
As for people blogging, I'm pretty sceptical that there will be much more blogs, as this site is mainly used as a scoreboard, while Discord is where everyone engages in conversation. (Which I have nothing against, but I personally enjoy more reading stuff from here than on Discord, because things are more organized, and not just random posts thrown out for everyone to see before they get buried by the newer posts.)
I might just start a blog of my own after I get around to releasing my first set (which is more than 95% done). I've been planning this blog for quite some time now, and have already written things in a word document for it. After the blogs weren't a thing anymore I was like oh well, then. But now that they're back,...
Anyways, it's nice to have you around again!
(Or better put, it's nice to see your back!)