James Mason's Blog -or- The Journal of Contemporary Lunacy

I thought that 2017 had been a big year but 2018 has surpassed it in almost every way. Visiting the USA twice, spending time in England, Wales, Germany, and the Netherlands along with visiting Hong Kong, Vietnam and Thailand. This is what it looked like on a map: I managed to tick a few things off my wish list on the way. First time flying Business on: Singapore, Qatar, Cathay Pacific, and Emirates First flights on the shiny new A350-900 Visiting Snowdonia NP, Wales and walking the Llanberis path (in the snow) Returning to Zion NP, Utah and ticking off Angels Landing and Observation Point - amazing hikes, both Visiting Bryce Canyon, Utah for the first time - and experiencing it covered in snow Trying out Virgin Australia's Premium Economy SYD-LAX Ticking off all the art galleries and museums I'd most wanted to visit on the US East Coast Visiting some parts of Australia I'd missed out on over the years - most notably the wonderful state of Tasmania ...

Without wishing to make too much of what is very much a first world problem, it was a bit of a miserable experience growing up as a fan of JPRGs in Australia (end elsewhere in PAL territories). Limited local releases It wasn’t that we missed out on obscure or fringe titles either - the “big hitters” of the genre, Final Fantasy and Dragon Quest were completely absent from shelves. The very first Final Fantasy to see a PAL release was VII on the PlayStation. Dragon Quest took even longer - the PlayStation2’s Dragon Quest VIII was the initial appearance for the series (the number was even dropped from the title, something that also occurred with the EU/AU/NZ Nintendo DS releases of Dragon Quest IV, V and VI. Presumably this was done to prevent any confusion but I like to imagine marketers saying “what other Dragon Quest games?” while whistling innocently. Interestingly, some titles did still slip through the cracks. Lufia II [SNES] appeared as simply “Lufia” (the first game, wh...

For a bit of a change, I'll be writing up a (hopefully) proper trip report of my recent trip to the US. This involved lots of hiking in Joshua Tree, Zion, and Bryce Canyon. I figured this time of year would be a good time to visit in terms of lower temperatures and lower visitor numbers at Zion and Bryce. Getting There Unlike my last two trips to the US, which involved more round-about routings, this time I simply booked a simple cheap economy (sad face) return from SYD-LAX. For reference, here are the flight maps for my previous trips: From the beginning of 2018, a multi-carrier trip heading westwards And from 2017, heading eastwards via Auckland, NZ This trip I did end up upgrading the SYD-LAX leg to Premium due to a discounted UpgradeMe offer but missed out on a Business class upgrade on the way back - my low ball bid was obviously just too, well, low. Next time, in Part 1: Impressions of VA's Premium Economy cabin, venturing into LA'...

Compare the pair (and more) So many versions/ports/translations of Final Fantasy VI, which leads to the inevitable question: which is the version to spend 60 hours playing through? It's a question that's been asked all over the net with as many opinions as there are interested gamers. It can actually be quite fascinating, there are comparisons based on translation, looks, censorship (or the lack thereof), nostalgia, system of choice, and more. As an aside, The Legends of Localization site has a wonderful breakdown and comparison of the different translations (complete with video), and is well worth having a look through. It's certainly not a choice I've been able to make 100%, but I have ended up settling on a SNES play-through using the (admittedly flawed) RPGOne re-translation. I've also sunk a lot of hours into (but not completed) the GBA and PSX ports. The GBA is (IMHO) the best of the official ports, but it does require some patching to restore the ori...

Queenstown, NZ This was the one major part of NZ's South Island that I had yet to visit and I was blown away by the geography of the area. High peaks, mountain ranges, a gorgeous lake and towns nestled between the shore and the slopes. The highlight for me was the hike to the summit of Ben Lomond. The 360 degree views at the top made the effort in getting up there well worth it.

After spending a night in Queenstown (it rained), I got up early and drove up to Cradle Mountain NP (it rained all the way) and enjoyed some mixed weather (to put it mildly) while walking. The weather ended up forcing a change of plans - I was originally going to do a loop that went near the summit but the weather up high at and beyond Marion's Lookout was just so brutal that I ended up turning back (about 30 mins after the lookout). The change did work out reasonably well as I took the relatively sheltered trail past Crater Lake to Ronny Creek then back to Dove Lake. It was a bit of a shame to have not much of a view at all from Marion's Lookout (it took 10 minutes of waiting for it to clear enough to see anything) and Cradle Mountain itself was invisible until mid-afternoon. Still, a really nice area to do some walking with an amazing variety of plant life and scenery.

After warming up with a walk to the pinnacle at Hobart's Mt Wellington the day prior, I ventured a bit farther into the wilderness and tried the Eliza Plateau portion of the Mt Anne track from Condominium Creek (20km down the unsealed C607, itself 30km along B61 from the nearest town at Maydena). It's almost a constant climb after a brief walk through a marsh. Quite challenging as the track varies, sometimes just following a watercourse that has gouged a path down to the rock. The views over Lake Pedder were wonderful and only get better they higher I climbed, at which point more and more of the surrounding mountains became visible. The weather turned nasty as I headed back down (it seemed to change every 15 minutes anyway - rain, sun, wind, cloud) and it poured a which made it a real slog and obscured a lot of the view, which was a pity. Despite the ending, it was still a worthwhile and enjoya...