Dissidia Final Fantasy ( as well as a review of Advent Children Complete)

Yep, finally the much awaited Dissidia Final Fantasy in english is out, after waiting for about a year. The graphics are cool, you get to relive all the main protaganists from the Final Fantasy series, and put yourself in their shoes as they go through superb battle. Too bad, the english dub does not sound as cool as the original Jap voices. Too bad that some other interesting side characters are left out, like Tifa, or Yuna, or Vivi, Freya. There's a story mode, where there's some followup on character development of the good guys - just a short exposition. There's quick battle mode, where anytime you feel like beating some guy, you can go to. If you are in need of 'grinding', you come here and grind too. Your characters are customise-able, you are allowed to change their skill sets, the equipment, and accessories. And there always the good old summons so characteristic of the series. As you level up, you learn skills and master them, some times taking your skills to higher level as you master.

Oh did I mention, you get to save replay? And convert the replay to Avi format. Here's a video of me battling Sephiroth. Okok, I'm noob ok? No need to flame. But here's the general idea of the battle mechanics.



Ok, I've decided to review Advent Children. Because the Complete version with the Director's cut added in, is out! In Blu-ray too!.. Super high quality scenes. The movie's obviously longer, with more elaboration, and a bit more gore(more realistic in my opinion, who doesn't bleed after Sephiroth uses wind flourish with his Masamune?) Another big change is that you get to see Omnislash Mk 6 in this one! The above video you get to see the mk 5 version. The difference between the 2 is that there's more elaborate slow-mo scenes, and in mk 5, Cloud glows gold. But in Mk 6, Cloud glows blue, more in line with the rest of the show, where everytime there's Limit Break, the character will glow blue. Ok.. Here's the screenshots.. let them speak for the movie!




Right at the start of the movie, the camera pans, and you get a good view of Midgar, in the aftermath of the FF7 incidents. And there's Red XIII and the bottom right of the screen.











Tifa, pensive.











Midgar, Mako Reactor - The root of FF7.










Marlene, recounting the story, at the start of the movie. Here's it Meteor vs. Holy.
















Tifa's Dolphin Kick. Battle in the chapel as the crybaby mini version of Sephiroth's clone.










Cloud at his peak.













The juicy part: Sephiroth vs. Cloud. Epic battle.








If there is one word to describe this picture, I think its: Underestimation.
Sephiroth was pwning Cloud sorry ass all the way. And suddenly, Cloud tightens his resolve: His blade glows blue, Sephiroth's smiles confidently as he prepares to block Cloud's weak Omnislash. Except - that Cloud's unique sword splits outwards at this point, causing Sephiroth to stagger. This is the still shot, of that moment. Took me a while to PrintScrn it. The look of shock on his face: priceless.


May I present the high point of the movie? Omnislash Mk 6. English translation simply does not sound as cool. In Jap, its: 超究武神覇斬. Literal translation: Super-Ultimate War God Supreme Slash. There's nothing Sephiroth can do, he cannot counter, Cloud slashes him with a dashing attack, picks up another sword, and dash at him again.. Does this 6 times.
Sephiroth's HP at this point is '0'. Game Over.




I would like to post more pictures.. but it rather tedious, and I realised that Blogger simply cannot amply display the good resolution of my 1920*1200 pics. They look rather ordinary in here.. so ok.. I guess this is it. Overall conclusion for this movie: Must watch again. Oh, there's a 30 min anime for one side story: The Story of Denzel. So be sure to grab both.

The grass is greener on the other side, is it?

Suppose that before you lies 2 envelopes; with the following piece of paper and corresponding instructions: In the 2 envelopes, there are money. You are only allowed to take one, and here's some information to help you choose. One envelope contains twice as much money than the other. To further help you decide, once you choose a particular envelope, you can open it to see its contents. At this point, you are given the chance to change to the other envelope, or just take whatever you find in the first envelope. So, which one do you choose?

You reached out for one of the envelopes, and you find $x inside. Now, you stand there, thinking whether you should change. In your head, a small voice appears; The probability that the other envelope has either $2x or $0.5x is 50-50. You feel a little sinking feeling. Perhaps you should be be contented with what you have. At which the small voice came back again; Nonsense, you learned in school about calculating payoffs, did you not? Look again. Your expected payoff from switching to the other envelope is half of 2x + half of 0.5x. Which gives you 1.25x. So you should change. At this, you reach out for the second envelope.... And another voice came in: Wait, you chose the first envelope randomly. If in the first place you had chosen the other envelope, your reasoning just now, would have led you to this envelope that you are holding. So there is really no reason to change. In fact, the reasoning applies irregardless whether whatever sum of money is in your envelope. You do not even have to open the envelopes. You just choose one envelope, and your reasoning will lead you to the other, and once you change to the other, your reasoning will point you back to the first one, and an infinite regress will follow! So.. you are stuck here forever... As you stand there, gripped with indecision, what should you do?

That was the two envelopes paradox, and certainly it poses a good model of grass being greener on the other side. Both arguments seem equally convincing, whether to switch or not to switch. There are more arguments online, arguing the differences between probabilities, plumbing through all the fine nuances within the wording of the problem. It seems that having a look within the envelope that you first chose makes no real difference to your chances, since your chances appear to be resolutely 50-50. In fact, you weren't granted a peek inside the first envelope that you chose, it would not matter which one you chose, or whether you chose to switch. As it turns out, having a look does change matters, for you are granted extra information, in your favour actually.

A search on google found an interesting note by Dov Samet, Iddo Samet, and David Schmeidler on this problem. They recast the problem as follows: Imagine playing a 2 person game as follows, A chooses 2 numbers randomly, B chooses one of the number and then pronounces whether its the larger value or smaller value of the 2. B wins this game if he pronounces correctly. A wins if B loses. Imagine if you are A, how would you prevent B from winning in the long run if you kept playing this game? If you say that the probabilities remain resolutely fixed at 50-50 then your job is pretty simple isn't it? Just anyhow choose 2 random numbers. Since B cant win in the long run, you are going to win. But B do have a strategy for getting more than 50-50. Before B chooses any number, he randomly produces a number t. If the number he chooses is greater than t, then he stays put. If the number he chooses is less than t, he switches. To see how this strategy lets B have chances greater than 50% in the long run, let the 2 values of A be x and y. Assume B chooses x. If x < y < t, B switches correctly. If y < x < t, B switches wrongly. If t < y < x, B stays put correctly. If t < x < y, B stays put wrongly. Therefore, if t is outside range of (x,y), then B has 50-50 chance of getting it correct. If t is within range of (x,y), B is always correct. The game for B has become one of calculating the probability of t landing within range of x,y. If x,y are integers, then A can only make the range of x,y span as little as possible.

Green power generators

Whoo, check this out, latest news from PhysOrg!

Artificial Leaves Generate Power by Pumping Water

(PhysOrg.com) -- Natural leaves constantly lose water through evaporation, as the water in their veins is pumped up to the top of the tree. This process, called transpiration, could also create a mechanical water pump effect in synthetic leaves, and be used to generate power.

Researchers from the University of California, Berkeley, the University of Michigan, and MIT have constructed leaves out of glass wafers with tiny veins through which water can flow. The veins open at the tips of the glass "leaves," where evaporation draws water out of the veins at a rate of about 1.5 cm/sec.

Then, the researchers wired the leaves by adding metal plates to the walls of the central stems and connecting them to a circuit. By charging the metal plates, the researchers created a capacitor made from the two conducting plates separated by an insulating layer.

Clearly, these people still have quite a ways to go. But..but! Yes, but I already can see some good possibilities coming on!.. For example, these microwafers of glass could be integrated with solar panels.. and this whole contraption placed out in the sun! Or instead of using the capacitor method, we can use the Hall's effect instead, and place a strong magnetic influence near these plates to generate electricity. Of course, the current and voltage produced is really going to be micro, I can see easily that if this thing is ever going to be viable is that it has to be very large scale. I also believe that a new type of energy distribution throughout the country will have to be in place. In addition to the main power generators in the country, there will be a lot a lot of micro generators, in the form solar power and wind power, connected to the grid.