Yea it's that time of year again when the holidays start a flying by once Halloween has gotten here. So before you know it you'll be having Thanksgiving dinner with your family and then you'll blink and it'll be the next millenium. Gotta love how time flies by like that. It only gets worse and worse as you get older. Hell at 21 I feel old some days. So has everyone seen the new Opposing Forces avi? If not you can get it from fileplanet here and check it out. I found it rather amusing as I've never looked at too much stuff from Opposing Forces to date. Next up was a result of me pretending to do work yesterday. Anyone ever seen the internet browser NeoPlanet? Most haven't so check it out here and have some fun. It's based off of IE but is much more amusing. My friend showed me this many months ago and I forgot the name of it and had been meaning to go search it out but I forgot. The most amusing part of it all is that it has skins so you can really customize the look of it if you wish. And best of all it's not Netscape!! Which is the most useless browser anymore. Of course if you ask Akula or VorTeX they'll disagree with me but that's besides the point. They are known to be wrong on many occasions. So for the time being I'm going to use NeoPlanet as my default browser just for a change of pace for once. As I refuse to install IE 5 as that is a flaming peice of shit also. I can't understand how I can like IE 4 and fucking hate IE 5. Though it's Microsoft and they have proven they can fuck up anything out there. VorTeX said he was going to update Mind Games today and he hasn't as of yet. Going to have to have a talk with that boy when I see him again. If anyone looks at the message board you'll see Danno posted something again today. I thought I would comment on it here. He states that the only map he ever sees being played of ourse is Citadel v1.1. Well he's quite wrong. I have had quite a few e-mails as of late from people who tell me they are running our maps. Plus I have seen Cydonia on at least a dozen different servers already. Actually I'm pretty sure I have seen each and everyone of our maps on a server in the past week at least once. I'm going to make it much easier for you people to scout out servers running our maps here this week. Maybe I'll work on that tonight again. So um yea something something something and away I go.

Among the many things in life you should really not do I have another entry into the scrap book called life. I finally got to see the Blair Witch Project tonight. Not that I had been dying to or anything. Actually probably just the opposite but I digress. I figured I had to at least see it so I could have some new material to pick on people for. Yea I know, I'm a bastard. Anyways I'll give it this...it was suspenseful. Though I had been told a million times it was scary. Hell if I know. Basically from the start I just wanted to see how it ended which didn't help matters any. All in all it wasn't as bad as I had figured it would be. It was fine to watch once. Maybe a second time to catch some details you missed the first time. But after that I don't see it having a huge replay value. Ok so this leads to my point which was things in life you really shouldn't do. I watched this movie on Halloween weekend and then walked back to my room late at night alone and I have to travel through a short bit of wooded area to get here from where I was. Now talking about things that will creep you out, that was one of them. It's amazing what the mind will do to itself. Anyways here is my list of things I accomplished today that you guys might care about: nada. Once I'm done typing this it's a toss up of playing psx for a bit or working on my current thing I'm not disclosing details on yet. It's almost 2 am so I'm pretty sure some how the psx is going to win out. As if I actually worked on something I'd get all into it and be up until 5 or 6 am. So what are you doing for Halloween this year people? I'm doing what has become my normal thing to do during the over half a dozen years. (christ I'm getting old) What's that you ask? Nothing. I haven't actually gone out trick or treating since I was in like 7th grade. I don't know if people were just assholes in my neighborhood or what but I'd been catching shit from everyone that I was too old since I was in 5th grade. Though they were judging it solely on my looks. Mind you I was over 6 feet tall by the time I was in 8th grade. Which oddly enough I haven't grown for shit since then to speak of. But it bugs me cause I have friends who were still going out when they were like 17 and 18 if not older. So since I'm tall I just get fucked in the deal. I once had some chick refuse to give me candy one year. I mean god she had to be a whole 25 years old if that. I think it was just an old woman trapped in a young body cause she sure as hell was bitchier then an old woman. So yea at least this line of babbling has a theme for once. Gotta give me credit for that no? Even if it has not one damn thing to do with this web page. Whelp off I go to do something or another.

Hi it's that time of day once again when you must read what I have to say. What a sad opener no? I thought so too. Anyways I thought I would mention this. I was going to last night but I was busily working on a unix shell script last night for my one class. Fun stuff. (I'm lying in regards to this particular script) So I spent some 4 hours working on it last night and never got to update the page. So now that classes are finally over today and I've had some time to stand around and do nothing (ha like that happens) I'm doing the update. So the main point of all this irrationality is one little itty bitty thing that affects like two dozen people total, if that. I fixed the gamespy tab. The copy that was on the ftp's was not the right one for some unknown reason. It was missing Cydonia. I would have done this before it was released but I wasn't aware. The copy I have on my computer had it and the one on here is always up-to-date with mine. So I know for a fact I've had Cydonia on mine for quite some time so I'm at a lost why the one on here didn't have it. I dunno maybe I fucked something up (wouldn't be the first time) or maybe the gods felt the need to laugh at me. Hell if I know but I do know for a fact now that it's the right one. Of course I have no idea how long it takes the mirrors to update with the newer one but by now they should all be as I put it up last evening. In other news. While I was in class today and we were discussing this book of poetry I was having some ideas for what I think I'm going to work on next. Oh I tell you I was still listening to the discussion. I mean I love poetry so damn much. Anyone seeing the sarcasm yet? Well you should as I'm laying it on pretty fucking thick. So yea wondering what the big deal is? I figured so. Well two fold. A) I had ideas. That's amazing as is cause my brain has been so fucking fried for over the past month I haven't had one idea come to mind in all that time. B) That means we are going to have something new to show off for you guys some time *soon*. Akula is doing god knows what. I think he's taking a break for some unknown reason. So there won't be anything new from him for the time being. VorTeX is still stuck on his peice of shit computer so he's moving along slowly. And I'm still busy as all hell but I'm hoping like hell to get a good bit done this weekend on school work and other things. Therefor I will be able to have something to show you at some point. Vague eh? Yea well that's life for you.

I'm not dead people. Not yet at least. VorTeX left out a possibility. I had to go home for the past two days hence why I haven't been here. Though he was paritially right. The reason I haven't run into him in the day or two before that though was cause the network has been being a whore again and I haven't at times been able to stay on for more then 5 minutes out of 30. I would have left a message somewhere before I left yesterday had I been able to get on period. The network was fine the entire day I was at class or taking care of things before I left and about the exact instant I went to actually use it for something it fucked up and would not come back on. I finally said fuck it and headed home as I had to be there. Speaking of which I got a good story about that I have a good story to tell but I don't care to explain it all right now. It's going to be a rant so be warned. I'll try to put that up maybe tomorrow when I got some time. Anyways as for VorTeX's other possibility for my sudden death, hardware failure. I'll just kill that possibilty now. First off I have two totally working computers running at all times so if one dies I still won't be far away. Point two as far as that goes is this. I have so many freaking computer parts laying around that if I actually did break something on one of my computers I'll probably have it replaced within the hour or less. Yea I know I'm a sad computer geek. Just wait until I actually start making more money. I am working now for a professor here at school helping with his research (I might have said this before). So now I'm actually not getting further in debt and I'm actually coming out of it slowly. Just wait until I start to get a positive amount of money. I have plans for building an entirely new computer which I've mentioned here before. That thing is going to fucking own all hell. I was eyeing something else for it today while I was home. That particular piece isn't exactly high priority as of right now but by the time I get it built and running they'll be even cheaper and I won't be able to resist the extra power. Of course I'v decided that the first thing I'm getting is a new cd player for my car. I got a 'new' car about two months ago and I tell you what. I fucking HATE the radio. I mean if the thing at least had a fucking tape deck in it I would be happy enough for now. I'm so used to this big ass stereo in my car and having a choice in what I listened too. Of course I *was* just going to put the old tape deck in this car for now but of course it's a HUGE pain in the ass to do so I figure fuck it I want a cd player for it anyways and I can get a good deal on them installing it too. As they said they can do it in about 30 minutes and it would probably take me two hours I go with the lazy option for once. So that just jumped ahead in life and I'm getting it asap. Of course it's also going to cost me under half what the computer is so you know that helps too. Of course I should be going to bed but instead I'm here rambling on about nothing. I wonder how many of you actually read all I say. So here's something new to amuse me. Say hi to me with an e-mail and let me know if you think I should shut the fuck up or go on as always. Your vote really does count so seriously let me know what you think. I'd appreciate it. Hell if you can't read long enough to get this far then what is the point in me even saying it? That's what I thought too. We'll hopefully have the mind game results up tomorrow or the next day and have some new shit up all the way around for this weekend. One last note. HA VorTeX!! I didn't overwrite your post. And a sleeping I go.

Well.. the launch of Cydonia was successful and now it is time to look to the future. A group effort for a map is probably going to be previewed somewhere in here. All 3 of us Z Factor folk are contributing to this with content in some form or another... with Lord Bishop and Akula being the ones doing the majority of the work. So keep an eye out for new info on that soon.

I don't know all of what everyone else is doing at this moment. Work is being done here and there on our half-life mod that's still in the future. Akula, I believe, may be taking a small break before he starts something new. :) Lord Bishop, well... is up to something or another... While I'm on the topic of him.. he's been away for the past few days for what is most likely either a hardware failure or network problems (a safe bet is on the latter as his college is notorious for problems with the net).

What I'm up to right now are a few things. First, I'm pushing myself to get Snipe Hunt up and moving (right now I'm slowly doing a little of this and a little of that... it's hard to start over on a map) and out the door. I estimate a couple of weeks before it hits the streets. I'm pushing to get it done so that I can start on my next map project. It's gonna be for TFC (rather likely my last map for TFC.. as I want to play around with some of the other half-life mods and the new games coming out such as Q3:A and UT). Its gameplay, if implemented right, will be pretty unique and I think it'll kick everyone's ass :) Keep on the lookout in the next.. ohh.. month or so for some hints and such on that. Work also continues on making the menu graphics better.. expect a redesign whenever the hell I get around to it.

Finally, if you haven't already, check out the mind games section. It's gonna get better.. I promise.

And Cydonia has taken off like a bat out of hell. It has surpassed Dethwell as the most downloaded map produced by us to date. That doesn't exactly count Citadel v1.1 which had over 2000 downloads from Radiums review site but that was released before Z Factor Productions was fully and officially launched. Of course at the time plans were in progress for Z Factor and Akula had already committed to being apart of us so it's included here on the site. Anyways I'm rather excited by it's success so far and it's only been out since Thursday night. Of course once some sites review it and it gets out there even more it will, dare we say, be mainstream. At least that is the ultimate hope of making maps for anyone. There is nothing worse in making maps then to spend weeks and weeks and even months of time on a map and produce something that is great and then for some reason or another have it fail becuase the server admins won't run it. This is usually due to the fact that most gamers are stupid. You can take a map like 2fort and fill a server. Then it flips to another map and everyone leaves. So those who have it can't play it and those who don't are too lame to learn a new map. Which in quite a few cases is an excellent map. If you ever pay attention to the stats on gamespy you'll notice that there are at anyone time almost 800 servers running TFC games. Yet if you filter out all the servers that are running a map made by valve you'll notice there is no more then 150 running user made maps. Does anyone else other then me see a problem here? I think that is insane. Why do you people feel the need to play the same few maps time and time again? Wouldn't you think a little change in life would be nice? I mean I got bored of playing 2forts on TFC the day after it came out. I mean it was repetitive enough on TF as is. BAH! Learn to experience new things people...you might just find your new favorite map. And I don't mean that for just our maps. I mean that for any user made maps as there are plenty out there which are just awesome. That is my rant for the day. Support the all of the community you all are apart of, not just a few sections of it. Anyways this week we should be showing some new screenshots for an all new map never before seen on here. Yea we are just machines aren't we? Also I've been pondering updating Urban Escape quite a bit to accommodate for everyone's concerns they have voiced lately. I have a handful of ideas plus I gotta see where I can incorporate some of the things people were suggesting. So we'll see how it goes this week I guess.

I should go to bed but I gotta do this update first cause I know I won't have time to tomorrow until rather late. So I've been keeping an eye on things today for Akula since he is gone for the weekend and I have a HUGE interest in Z Factor as I always do. I mean it was only half me idea to start this group in the first place. So yea I checked the site today at just after 1 pm and was like holy hell we got over 100 hits today already. Keep in mind our best was 126 unique hits in one day. So I get back to my computer just before 9 and I was looking at the counter on the page and I go 'hrm...wasn't that like just over 3200 when I left?' As now it was well over 3500. So I checked the stat tracker and about pissed my pants. By the time it was over with 'yesterday' we had almost 500 unique hits. Talk about shattering your previous record. Hell we already got 40 some today and it's only 4 am. I doubt we'll get that many again today but you never know. So I'm more then hyped about the amount of exposure we are getting as of late. Just what I needed right about now in life I tell you! So I was checking out gamespy and again to my surprise I found that cydonia had managed to make it onto a few servers already. Of course soon as I had a chance I jumped in on a game. I got to play at this one server in particular for some time tonight. Check them out at 167.193.196.178:27017 and let Mr. Bubbles know he kicks ass. He's the server admin if you care to know. Him and I got talking and we might have something fun for you instore for you once things are finalized. As for Cydonia. I expected it to be well recieved but hell even this kills even my expectations of it. Not that I mind of course. I love being apart of this show here at Z Factor and saying I had a hand in making such a fucking kick all ass mother fucking map like Akula's Cydonia. Yes that's a lot of swearing but I assure you that map warrants it hands down. Of course you could be one of those offended about swearing. Of course you have the option of not reading the site too. HA!! Take that. Now I won't get started on that topic. So as I was saying. I love this cause I've helped create what we are and I will continue to have a huge hand in on everything that comes through our site. So you know it will be of the best quality. I don't settle for second best. Hell I pretty much forced Akula's hand in redoing the underground of Cydonia and look what good that did? Everyone loves it. Of course it was only half of the underground but none the less still backs up my point. I tell you I could sit here and ramble on forever about how damn hyped I am. Of course I won't for fear of mutiny. Oh and this fact about I have to go to bed cause I'm taking Katie's roommate to get her haircut tomorrow so I'll need to get up at a semidecent hour. Keep in mind I was volunteered for this task by Katie but I don't mind. Can I get a moooo???

First off I'd like to start by thanking everyone who e-mailed me about Rollins. That is the most e-mail I've gotten for something I posted on the site. I replied to everyone individually also cause I'm a nice guy like that and when I write someone about something I like it when they respond to me. So that's that for now. On to stuff about Cydonia. First off if you were here early enough yesterday evening you will have noticed that the post was up but the link to the download wasn't. Well I wanted to explain that one. First off Akula left for the weekend last night for Virginia Beach (someone kill him please as they are calling for snow here this weekend) so he posted before he left. I was busy at the time and I didn't have a chance right away to take care of the downloads page. Well once I finally tried to my network flipped out. So what should have taken me 5 minutes to take care of almost twook me 2 hours by the time it was up finally. The next problem came was once I finally got the stuff on the webpage, it wasn't updating to the new pages. I have no clue why and you can kill GSI all you want for it. Hell I even promote it. When I released Dethwell the entire fileplanet shit the bucket and was fucked up all night and then this time we release something it wouldn't update the fucking pages. So anyways I don't know what time they finally came online last night but I checked them when I got on the computer finally about an hour ago and they were up. I'm assuming they have been for a bit but I wouldn't know for sure. So that is the reason/excuse why the news wasn't up-to-date with the downloads. Just wanted you all to know why. Some days I hate this fucking school. Well most lately. You'd think that after two weeks of the network going down at least 6 times a day for a short bit that they would think 'hrm something is fucking wrong here?' Of course not. Fucking bastards who claim to know something about computer networking. I swear one of these days I'm going to go up there and slap the living fuck out of them. Of course once it starts working again half the time it's like a T1 on crack and flies like a mother fucker. I downloaded something at 95 kb/s the other night right after it came back on. Ironic eh? So that leads me to my next thought. This isn't in effect until later this evening but I'm going to throw up the server with Cydonia on it. Maybe at least some people can get some fun in on it. Of course if the server geeks out don't swear at me cause I have no control over it. It should be fine once half the school disappears for the weekend like they always do. Maybe by the time I get enough money to build my super powered server they will have the network fixed cause I heard rumors of them going to actually rewire the damn thing and POSSIBILY (god I hope as this would be stuipd if not) they are going to get a new server. Hell if I know this is ever going to happen but maybe some day before I graduate. Sure as hell would be nice. Anyways IP for it today is 205.149.85.98 and it should stay that for now. Which brings me to another idea. I have a thought for something new I want to do around here but I gotta get it all ready and set up before I can ask for any info for it. Anyways until then check out this server at games.uq.net.au as they are playing some of our maps. Of course note where that is so if you don't get a good ping to it don't come to me. Move if you really want to play on it that bad. Of course the server gets mentioned cause the admin was nice enough to e-mail me and tell me about it. *hint* *hint* *nudge* *nudge* Get it?

Woot! it's finished, kaput....PUT A FORK IN IT, IT'S DONE!! Well now....that's done. the mirrors haven't Yet updated and won't untill early saturday but it should be on CDROM now. I'm not sure if LB will be running the ZFP server with this map all weekend or not. i'm sure he'll let us know. Anyways sprint over to the downloads section and pick up this bad boy ASAP. I don't think you'll regret it at all. hummm.....might try my hand at a hunted map next. After i finish something for LB :)

As the topic states this update has something to do with the man mentioned. First off I'm kind of curious as to something. I want to see who knows who Rollins is and who doesn't because much to my surprise a lot of people around here don't know who he is. So this is for everyone, e-mail me and let me know if you know who he is or not. Maybe one of these days I'll figure out how to do the polls here at PF so I can throw one up on our page from time to time. Anyways on with my point, as if I ever have a true point. Henry Rollins was here on campus last night. He wasn't performing but was giving a lecture actually. That too seems to amaze some people. He has his Spoken Word Tour which I assume he does from time to time as he was here just under two years ago for the same 'event' and he spoke of some of the different places he has does this tour. As I said he was here two years ago and my friend who went to school here at the time, Chris, was all hyped and wanted to go see him. So knowing who Rollins was and all I figured what the hell and went to see him. Man I tell you that was about one of the best things I ever seen in my life. So of course when I found out a few weeks ago that he was returning I just had to go see him again. For those of you who are wondering why you'd want to see the same lecture twice...well it wasn't. I don't think he spoke of one single topic both times. Well I lie sorta...his main theme again was that you should learn as much as possible and experience as many experiences as you can in your life time and not to ruin it with alcohol and drugs. Of which I fully agree on, even the drinking and drugs part. They are bad I tell you! Anyways back to Rollins. Keep in mind the fact that he didn't just stand up their and preach these ideas. It's impossible to explain his style of lecturing without actually seeing him. Which brings me to my next thought. If you *EVER* have the chance to go see him, do it! I'm not suggesting this...I'm telling you to do so. Both times I have seen Henry Rollins he has TOTALLY blown my mind away and that is such a hard thing to do once. Bottom line is this man is amazing and he deserves every bit of hype he can get. I mention him partially because I enjoyed his show so much and partially because he speaks of a lot of the things we promote here at Z Factor. Which basically leads back to the mind and expanding your knowledge. In other news you'd probably notice that VorTeX never did another response. Well it's cause he knows I'm the man! No actually it's cause there was no need. I am an opinionated bastard if you can't tell right? And if I think your wrong I'll publically say it and stand behind it. Well I still stand behind what I said and I'm sure VorTeX does too but we are smart enough to respect each others opinions on it even if we can't respect each other. (that's a joke your supposed to laugh) VorTeX and I get along fine and the fact that we will brutalize each other like we do just goes to show you that we are true friends. Confused? Well if you can't tell what you think is the truth about what you think to your friend then what kind of friend can you really be? Not much of one I say. Though I must say I've gotten a little life out of everyone since that post. SCarton has actually been doing some work. I almost died. Akula has been working on Cydonia all along which is damn near ready for release. All that is left is to playtest it and make sure everything works and then do a little tweaking I'm sure before it's finally ready. We will have it out as soon as possible which we hope to be within the next week. Which is a good thing as we need something new to generate more hits. Anything for the almighty hit counter...er something. As for the Mind Games, VorTeX and I are going to refine it over the next few days or so. As soon as I see him and I'm not busting my ass with 30 million school projects at once we'll work on it. Anyways that covers it for now in one of my rare posts in the early part of the day.

I don't have time to write my full reply to Lord Bishop's most recent public being an asshole. I will tell you that he's most mad that I left while he was telling me the work that I had spent 5 hours straight getting right (I didn't even take the time to eat dinner.. I just worked on it) was being puked on. It was already late.. and I didn't want to take the time to cuss him out. So I left. And he calls it running away... I call it wanting to get some fucking sleep. Expect more from me when I have some time. If leaving to get some sleep and not desiring to get into an argument is fucking childish.. well then I guess I'm fucking childish...

Elllll Beeeeee!!!!!! And I'm here to make everyone's life miserable and there isn't a damn thing they can do about it. Now if you notice there are a new set of graphics for the links. In VorTeX's great destruction of the good computer he lost the format and font used for the old grahpics. So he whipped up some new ones since he finally got that new section up (which I'll get back to this topic). So here's what I want from all of you guys. Drop me a line and tell me what you think of the new graphics. I know this is going to piss of VorTeX but that's life isn't it and what I already stated as my point no? In my opinion they suck hard core. I mean like no joke I could have made something better with my eyes closed. (he only gets this much abuse for his actions tonight which were very fucking childish) Man I am mean and don't you love it? Sad thing is right about now I don't even give a rats ass. Next we move onto bashing SCarton. Does anyone who reads this page even know who he is? (by this I don't mean as in knowing him personally but know what his purpose is around here) Probably not. He is and has been for some time point blank worthless. Fucked up thing about this is he won't even know to be mad at me cause I doubt he even reads this page. Lastly there is Akula. Now his attitude towards things at times pisses me the fuck off but at least he is doing something around here. He is going to have Cydonia out in the next week or two I figure. If you haven't seen the shots of this map yet you need to check out the projects page and drool over them. So here is my problem in life in regards to Z Factor. I do all the work around here and no one can honestly argue that. Yes VorTeX took care of a good bit of PR for Dethwell. That's *real* time consuming I tell you. Note the sarcasm. One e-mail sent to a ton of sites. Hardest part of that is writing the damn e-mail which I know isn't that hard for VorTeX to do. He also did do this new section of Mind Games. Now as the concept was pretty kick ass as I understood it I must say I'm rather unimpressed with how he implemented it. And it pretty much removes me from any chance of participating with it on any kind of regular basis. Of course we could revise the whole section yet and probably will do just that, I'm still kind of pissed about it right now. Ok so now that I'm sure I've thoroughly pissed him off I shall move on. My point is this. If it wasn't for me updating this page as often as I can think of something to say then there wouldn't be a damn fucking thing here and it pisses me the fuck off. I'm sure no one would visit a site on a regular basis if it wasn't updated more then once a month. I know I could just say this in private but I like the motivation of looking like a bunch of assholes to the general public. Goes like this. If the day ever comes that I decide I just don't give a fuck anymore...you are all screwed here at ZFP and don't you know it.

Whelp your all fired I say! I mean I didn't expect a HUGE turn out for this playtest but no one is a little sad don't you think? Akula and I had a fun time twidling our thumgs for awhile. At least with VorTeX the guy who cut the fiber optic line needs shot. Speaking of cutting fiber optics. Why is it that they never actually cut minor ones? They fuck up the big ones every time. But think about it...there is this big ass expensive line which the internet hindges on (at least in some cases I've seen) and the guy goes 'Oh hey what am I doing? Just cutting a major line, nothing important.' And proceeds to cut it. I mean how stupid can one be? Maybe I'm all wrong on this idea but hell it's starting to sound a little retarded after awhile. You'd think they'd fucking learn. Anyways I'm going to have to sit and think what we are going to do about this whole playtesting thing or lack there of. In other news VorTeX promised me before he left tonight he would have our new bit up tomorrow. As for that happening, I'll believe it when I see it. I'm just a little anxious as I got some what I believe to be good material for it and I'm holding off using it, as I'm sure I'll run out of material for it soon enough, until he gets it done and ready for all to see. Man I wish I had something else to put up here but I don't have a damn thing. I am doing nothing for this site really other then reporting what is going on with others. Life is taking it's toll and until I can get at a point of dedicating a lot of time to working on things for Z Factor I won't half ass it and not give the projects the attention they need. Though I'm am actually going to spend some time on a peice for Cydonia cause Akula couldn't get it to work right and I have a bit of previous experience with the thing he's trying to do so I'm going to take crack at it and hopefully get it working tonight in a short manner. So yea that's my story and I'm sticking to it. *shakes head* Bad country song (as if any country music is good).

I'm rather amused here. Yesterday we had the most hits in a single day that we have had since we put up the stat tracker. It may not seem like a lot to some of you but to us it's great cause we know that people are looking at our site. We are looking to break our single week record to this week as we are well on our way. We had 338 last week and we are already 242 this week and it's only Wednesday! It looks that we'll beat our monthly record by the middle of next week too and we still have the second half of the month to go. Now if that isn't motivation in itself I don't know what is. I might just have to update more often if possible to give you guys something new to read on a regular basis. VorTeX and I are discussing as I speak to you about doing something new around here to give you something to think about. It'll probably be mostly run by him but I will support him as I can. It should be rather fun I think. As the saying around here goes lately, 'anything that supports creativity'. Hopefully we will have that up by tomorrow if not today some time. You never know around here I tell you. Personally I REALLY should do work so I can get some hours in so I can get a pay check so I can have money. Which I have no motivation to do right now but I really should. Anyways we still got spots open for the playtest so drop someone a line and let them know ok? Wonder what else is up. I got a very recent copy of Cydonia on my HD. I need to check that out sometime soon wouldn't you think? Notice I am jumping from idea to idea really bad today? My brain feels like it OD'd on crack today or something. At least I'm in a good mood in comparision to recent days. Ok so when I get something new up I'll throw a post up about it and maybe I'll have better stuff to say then. Till then...

I had fixed the broken link graphic and put a Collective link back in the side.. but LB overwrote it... foo on him! Luckily for him.. I went and fixed it again and cleaned up our links too. Who am I to talk though? It's not like I've actually been around at all the past week...

Rather than jinx my return by going boldly forth and starting something new.. I'll just say a few words. Me=Too Damn Busy. That should cover it :)

In other news.. I have the next 3 days off from school (god I love the county fair!)... so I plan on resting, relaxing, and maybe doing something. I know everyone around here has terribly missed me in my absence... but they shouldn't get too attached to me... I'm bound to disappear again :)

I'll post the results (there were only two entrants sadly) for my last riddle... and try to think up something better.. I might just work something different out for this. You'll have to wait and see I guess.

One more thing: If you haven't downloaded Dethwell (the first true 4 team Capture the Flag map for TFC)... what's stopping you? SNAP TO IT! Get Dethwell NOW! If you have.. be sure to get all your friends and relatives and enemies and associates and every stranger you meet on the street to download it too. Is that too much to ask? :)

Joe out.

Just thought I'd let you all know that there are a bunch of new screenshots of Cydonia up now. Should be six new ones and two old as most of the old were removed/updated. So go on over to our projects section and check it out. The shots shown are pretty close to the final product I would assume. *insert some witty comments here* I am in such a bad mood tonight it's not even funny. I will probably continue to be in a fucking bad mood all fucking month so get fucking used to it now. At least I was nice enough to warn you. I keep telling myself that at some point in my life something will go right for me. I'm still waiting for that to happen and at this current rate I have a long wait ahead of me. Anyways Akula is still looking for people to help him playtest Cydonia so why don't you be a nice person and drop his ass a line and let him know you are interested. Seating is limited folks so sign up now while you can. Me...by default I get a VIP pass...er something like that. I'm there by default cause I rule. Actually it's cause I tell Akula just how much what sucks sucks. Honesty and feedback is a very good thing when it comes to playtesting. As the WHOLE point of it is just that and then you take that information and see what is worth noting and tossing the rest out and then doing something about it. Ask me and I'll tell you...I get some STUPID comments which aren't even worth reading let alone doing something about. So without useful feedback it makes the playtests worthless. So that's my rant for the day I guess. Nothing better to rant about except my personal life and this is just too personal for once for me to put up here. Such is life.

WooT!! I live! Sorry for not sticking my nose around here the past few weeks. My next map has been hogging what little computer time I have had the past few weeks. Work on Cydonia is moveing along nicely now and it's look has changed a great deal so you might as well head on over too the Projects section and look for yourself. The CTF half of the gameplay is all layed out just need to work out the other half of this dual objective map. After that it's down to ents and endless texture alignment. Expect playtesting to begin next weekend if all goes well. Mail me if you would like too attend playtests.

In other news Radium has pulled the plug on the TFC site and closed down his message board. Trust me it's not that big of a loss and there are others too take his place in the TFC world (DM too if he doesn't remove his head from his ass). Personaly I've yet too have any luck with map reviewers so fuck it. I'm off for now......i'll update when satan is shovleing snow :)

For those of you who are paying attention you will notice that the graphic for the link to The Collective is broke. Goes like this. VorTeX put it there and had it linked directly to the file on Borg's site. So Borg redesigned his site again and now the file isn't there where it was before. So I went looking and couldn't find it. Now that brings us up to where we are...no graphic for the link. I e-mailed Borg about it and hope to have a reply to it sometime this month. (I'm poking fun at the boy but he does a lot, not to mention he too is getting married just like someone else around here did just last week) Lets see what else have I done this week? Jack shit? Nah not quite. I wrote a news updater program for this us. Actually I'm using it out right now as this is the first post I've done since I had an acceptably working copy of this. This is super duper version 0.3.5 which is actually slightly older then the most current one. Too lazy to open up Builder and compile the new one. Yes that's sad. Besides it's only some small fixes for the links and I know how to get around them in this version if I was to actually use the links but what do I have to link to? Hell if I know either. At the current rate I am going this is going to be the only project I'm going to work at on a semi-regularly basis. I just have too much school work to do right now and this program is about the only that actually helps me out. I've expanded my knowledge of Builder a *huge* amount since I've started this program. Which is a good thing as I'm also using Builder to write my program for Software Engineering. Which is the ONLY program we get to do in that class so it better be good no? It's just going to be fucking huge as I'll be working on it all semester. So what does this mean to all of you? Jack-fucking-shit! Yes that's right...you heard what I said. I just thought someone (as in me since no one else does) should update the site so you guys keep coming back in search of 'real' news. Speaking of everyone else. Has anyone else been wondering this other then me? Where the fuck is the answer to VorTeX's last riddle? I mean like I talked to the boy a week ago and he said he'd have it up soon. Some day I'll understand these super smart friends of mine (mostly in reference to VorTeX and SCarton) who have all the intelligence in the world, ability to do anything they please, and yet lack the most important thing, motivation to do anything about it, especially over a period of time. Yes I'm publically flaming them but someone's got a light a fire under their asses before it's too late. And speaking of before it's too late...I must go.

So it's been a semi-amusing day I guess. I had fun playing Mario World on the SNES with Katie today for a couple of hours. You just gotta love playing video games with females regardless of which game it is. Once I finally was able to pry myself away from her and get back 'home' I got an unexpected surprise which was nice for a change. To make a long story short the leader of the TF division of Clan 30+ was having a problem with Techway (go look at the nostalgia if you don't know what Techway is) and requested my help. Me being the dedicated person I am to my maps I immediately helped him out. So after finally being able to fix the problem for him I was invited to come to their clan practice tonight on Techway. Of course me being one to love playing my own maps, I couldn't resist and I hopped on over to their server. I had a ton of fun with them if I do say so myself. It actually ended up being one of the bigger games I've ever played on it but hell I'm not bitching. I was reminded of two things tonight. First off how much I love TF (even compared to TFC, though a good game in it's own right) and secondly how much I 'miss' playing in a clan. I haven't had a chance to play in a semi-organized game of anything since sometime in April. Had I been old enough I would have had an invintation to tryout for them but of course I'm not 30+ just yet. I gotta mark this in the books though, for once in my life I wasn't too old. Such is life I guess. At least I made some new friends who might help us out in the future with playtesting and other related things. Who needs VorTeX for his PR slickness when you got me? (*gives VorTeX a low blow*) He'll get the joke I'm sure. I only say this cause in the past week I've managed to secure a few new relations which will be beneficial to us in the near future. Lets see what else I got to say here tonight. I continued work on my 'news updater' proggie I've been conceptualizing for a couple weeks now. I just laid down a VERY basic format for it last weekend and decided I wanted to do some coding tonight on it. Plus it's a huge learning experience for me with using Borland Builder 4 as I have very little prior time using it. For anyone who knows anything on this subject, let me just say this. Builder 4 kicks Visual C++'s ass so hardcore it's not even funny. I fully support anything that can take something Mircosoft tried to do and make it 20 million times better and then shove it right up Mircosft's fucking ass. God you gotta love that! Things that suck about this project. Until the very later stages, this program is going to be in house use only. Meaning it's only for us here at Z Factor to use for the time being. I hope at some later date to release it so it can be used on a wide variety of sites. What sucks about it is that even though I'll find it useful and everyone else here should too, I still won't have anything to 'show' for my time to the general public. I decided on yet another project I'm going to work on but I can't reveal any details yet on that cause it'll ruin the fun I'm going to have with Akula and VorTeX about it first. I won't be able to start on this one for a little bit at least to any major degree. Then there's the thing I'm helping Akula with in his map which is being a pain in the ass in a sense. Half-Life just doesn't want to agree with what we want to do with it. And then there's my other map I'm probably about 80% done with (the one that is for a future project). And finally two other super major projects which I, and those who will be helping me with it, will be working on off and on when we can/feel the need. Oh yea...and then there's zfactor the map. Thought that was dead didn't you? It's not...just on the backburner but is the next thing on Akula's list to do. As my part is done as it's getting until he does his part some more. So that's a whole TON of things going on for me no? I rather enjoy it cause it gets me motivated and leads to another nice thing I'm discovering. By working on more then one thing I don't get so irritated with it at times so when it does get on my nerves I can just set it aside for a few days and work on something else until I feel the urge to come back to it. Hopefully this all eventually translates into more fun things for you people to play with. God damn I had a lot to say eh? Hell I need to shut up before someone gets a firing squad after me and puts me out of my misery. Phew...it's over...finally.

Onwards we move into October. Expect some 'spooky' shit from us this month. I can't substantiate any truth to that statement but hell I'll make some shit up as I go to fit in with it. Ok this is sad. I was just looking at the links that are listed off to the side here and was thinking I was going to do a little more revamping of it and I just noticed something. We have a link to Radium. God damn it I guess that's what I get for not making a good bit of this page. (ie I had nothing to do with that peice with the links and it was thought by SCarton that it would break up the page some so it would look better) I guess I'll really have to do something about that, of course at a slightly later date as I have no desire to do it now. I was peeking over at Radium's TFC review page and found out something of interest. Appears he's decided to drop the TFC site until further notice, which in a lot of cases means never again. Damn I so wanted to see what he would have to say about my maps. (note the sarcasm) Ah well such if life and onwards we move. At least now people won't think he is THE final say on new maps. In other news. There was a bit of Radium bashing going on over at ETF in the past few days. And if you look at Radiums site you'll see his rebuttle to some of it. I found it rather amusing to hear other peoples take on this subject I've spoken so blatantly about. I'm also enjoying this whole PF is satan's spawn discussion going on lately. No matter how much some of the 'nicer' sites try to cover it up as being that's still what they are saying basically. I guess that's a morbid way to look at the whole subject but I just see it that way. We all gotta kick our kicks somewhere in life now don't we? One thing I absolutely love around everywhere lately is this whole fuck the masses and run your site how you want. That's like the one unifying theme out there lately. It's funny though cuase those who say it for the most part are still being assholes about how other people are running their sites. God you just gotta *love* this country. And yet another note. I like these sites that bitch about people only updating with rants and babblings and nothing of any 'true' content. That just cracks me up to no end. First off I rant on here non-stop and then I get encouragement from my readers and friends on just how damn funny I am and to keep it up. Secondly if I didn't go off on my little tangents here so much what news would we have to report? I mean an update once every 2 or 3 weeks is kind of a waste. Map making and editing in general is a slow ass process and you can't report non-stop on it as that gets boring and repetitive and damn it I want people to read what I say. And if no one does then what's the point in saying it? At least the hit counter has been moving pretty good since we released Dethwell. Hopefully with each new thing we do the more known we will get and the more people we will get to come here more often. I've been pondering doing some changes around here and redoing some other things. As time goes on and what defines us changes so must how we do things. Our basic goal here is to support and encourage creativity, no matter what form it takes. From there we continue to grow, expand, and change every day. But that's how life is supposed to be now isn't it? In 'related' news...VorTeX is back again (lets see how long it takes him to break a computer this time), Akula is married and continues to work on Cydonia, and I'm here trying to keep my brain from leaking out of my head. God what a mess that makes I tell you.