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Blog of Extreme

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Location: Sarawak, Malaysia

Wednesday, November 17, 2004

Navigate for Vacation 2004

I’m back from my KL vacation, and while it may not have been as fruitful as my past visits where I would splurge and buy a ton of stuff (I was on a tight budget this time), it was still a fun trip.

Day One
Our Air Asia flight was delayed (which seems to happen a lot with this airline) and we only reached KLIA at about 8:45PM. By the time our cab reached the hotel, it was just about 10PM, so I rushed to a nearby KFC to get a quick takeaway for dinner (They don’t serve meals on Air Asia) and rushed back to the hotel to catch Survivor on NTV7. Problem is, the hotel had all the Malaysian channels EXCEPT NTV7! So I missed an episode already!

Day Two
After breakfast, went out to Sungai Wang Plaza and looked around the arcade there. Was kinda disappointed there weren’t really any new games around. King of Fighters: Neowave was available, but like in Miri, no one was playing because of the new fight options. They don’t want to play it if they can’t use all 3 fight options at the same time like in KOF 2002, hence the reason most people would rather play that.
After a quick lunch at McDonalds, I walked over to Times Square where I was supposed to meet up with my friend, TenzanTeam2K. I hung out at the arcade while waiting for him and tried my hand at a new game from Sammy (Guilty Gear series) called Rumble Fish. What caught my eye about this game was the incredible graphics they used for the characters, kinda like a 3D style but in 2D, looked like a moving comic book where everything is animated joint by joint. I got good at this game pretty quick, and even won a few challenge fights! I couldn’t beat the boss of the game though, or I think it’s the sub-boss as it was also a selectable character.
TenzanTeam2K then showed up and we made a quick trip back to Sg. Wang Plaza cause he wanted to see if Rumble Roses for PS2 was out yet. While we walked, we of course talked about our favorite subject: PURORESU! We talked about everything from Dragon Gate’s ODG belt to the debacle that was the changes to the NJPW Osaka Dome show. We reached Sg. Wang and looked around, and unfortunately Rumble Roses wasn’t out yet. So we made a big U-turn and headed back to Times Square, then busted some ass at the arcades for a bit. Holding my own against some of KL’s finest at KOF2002, I then watched TT2K play this weird Japanese drum game, and he rocked away at Stalker Ichikawa’s Lone Ranger theme! We then played a few more games before hitting the road.
We first went to one of his friend’s house to meet up a few of them. And they were quite a colorful and happy group. They were playing this bizarre PS2 game called Kamatari Damachi (I think that’s how the name goes), where you had to roll-up everything in your path to create a “star”. It was really weird but definitely fun watching them play, and it made me want to get a copy for myself. One of TT2K’s friends also had a killer 5-string bass guitar and is himself a metal-head like me. I need to get me one of those one day.
When then headed out for TT2K and his Muslim friends to break fast. We had a little trouble finding a place cause everywhere was closed early due to Hari Raya being the next day! After two misses, we finally found a place to settle down and eat. TT2K’s friends discussed politics while he and me continued our puroresu rants and raves.
Tenzan then dropped me off at Kota Raya since he couldn’t find a proper route to drop me off at the LRT station. I thought, cool, I could look around for PS2 games while I’m there. Unfortunately both of us didn’t check our watches and it was way past 9PM when he dropped me there, so all the shops were closed. And there was a long queue at the taxi stand with NO TAXIS wanting to pick anyone up cause those greedy bastard drivers didn’t want to charge by meter. So, being the dumbass I am, I just WALKED all the way back to the hotel! Took about twenty minutes, and I was exhausted when I got back and had a blister the size of a 50cent coin on my right foot! Nice going, Brainiac!

Day 3
Starting again after breakfast, I made my way to Sg. Wang Plaza again and went to Victoria Music Station, where I found a bunch of new CDs not available in my home town yet, and it will be lucky if they do turn up. I didn’t get anything new since none of them were on my priority list. I did however pick up the first Dry Kill Logic CD, The Darker Side of Nonsense in the bargain bin for 50% off!
I then went around the corner to the magazine stand there and bought the latest issue of PSM magazine, that had a duel review of Rumble Roses and WWE Smackdown! VS RAW, as well as Prince of Persia: Warrior Within, a highly anticipated game that I had forgotten about! And they gave it a perfect 10/10 rating!
I then went around the next corner as I made my way to the arcade passing the various game shops along the way, and low and behold, Rumble Roses was available! I immediately picked it up along with a few other games (see the video games blog for a list and previews of what I bought) and continued on my way to the arcade to test my KOF skills against the locals.
I thought I did pretty well against the KL players. I really surprised them at first with my Ramon skills, though they quickly figured out how to counter my offense. They used the usual combination that had to have either Yashiro, Kyo, Iori or Chris on their team for the cheap combo specials. I used my regular trios of either Ramon, Terry Bogard, Chang KoeHan, Joe Higashi, Ralf or Robert Garcia. I lost more then I won, but I still thought I did pretty good.
I then bought a takeway from Mickey D’s and headed back to the hotel for lunch and a rest. But wouldn’t you know it was raining? I got a little soaked on my way back to the hotel, but nothing serious. After lunch and a short rest, I went out and caught a cab to KLCC, hoping to get some puroresu mags and check out if there were any good affordable books at Kinokuniya.
Wouldn’t you know Isetan where the Japanese mags were sold was closed today cause of Hari Raya? Geez. But while I was at the main Kinokuniya store and browsing through the pro-wrestling/MMA books, this guy by the name of Sam asked if I had an interest in submission fighting since I was eyeing a book on submissions. Turns out he’s just getting into MMA and said that there was a small interest quickly picking up in Malaysia. He said he even heard of a class that charges about RM100+ per hour per lesson! Interesting.
I caught a cab back to the hotel, but first I went to Sg. Wang Plaza to spend more coinage on the arcades. Heck, I was awed by TT2K’s skills at the Jap drum game that I gave it a shot! After the tutorial, played the level 1 game. No prob. Level 2? Easy. Level 3? Broke a sweat, but could still keep up. Didn’t seem that tough, so on the next game I jumped straight to a level 3 game and CHOKED! I left and got a fast food takeaway before going back to the hotel to watch X-2: X-Men United on Star Movies.

Day 4
Caught a bus to Kota Raya after breakfast and bought a light gun for my PS2 along with the game Crisis Zone, which I like playing at the arcades. Of course I didn’t notice until much later that the gun I bought was supposed to come with a foot padel, and they didn’t give me one! Dammit.
I also asked Tenzan if he’d like to meet up again since I had nothing else to do for the rest of the day. We agreed to meet at KLCC and then go to his place and bust some ass on Rumble Roses and KOC2.
So I get to KLCC and wait for Tenzan, but he came a bit late since he had a prior engagement. And how’s this for a bad idea: On a busy day like that (a public holiday), the management decide to close HALF of all the public restrooms in KLCC for renovations! Dumb.
I finally meet up with Tenzan at Kinokuniya and we make our way to his place, again talking about puroresu while browsing the mags he bought. We finally get to his place and start battling it out in Rumble Roses. My first impression of the game is that it sorta does play like the early WWE Smackdown! games, but with a lot more eye-candy!
We then played 4 of the best rounds of King of Colosseum I had ever played! I lost 1-3, but I still had fun. I first loss as Takashi Sugiura to CIMA. I was still a bit blur on the controls since I hadn’t actually played the game much in the past few months other than watching the simulations I made. Next, I loss as KENTA to Koji Kanemoto, but got some sweet revenge after the match when I hit the Busaikyu Knee on Kanemoto and flipped him off after the match!
I then scored my first win as Jun Akiyma, beating Hiroshi Tanahashi with the Sterness Dust which TT2K had never seen before until then! It was a fitting way to beat Tanahashi after he kicked out of the wrist-clutch Exploder! He then took a cheap shot after the match as he dropkicked me out of the ring since KENTA did it to Kanemoto earlier.
Then came the big one: Kenta Kobashi VS Hiroyoshi Tenzan at the Tokyo Dome! I lost this one cause my timing for blocks and counters was still off, but it was still a great match we had! One fun spot being Tenzan ducking my Lariat followed by Kobashi flipping through a German Suplex attempt and connecting with a running lariat! I even put on a strong fight as I kicked out of his moonsault and at least FIVE attempts at the Anaconda Vice! I managed to hit a moonsault of my own, as well as the dreaded sleeper suplex, but he finally managed to put me away with another moonsault! We scored a 95% rating for that one!
TT2K’s friends had come over by then and they were going to go out for Raya visiting, so they dropped me at the nearest taxi stop and I caught a cab back to the hotel. I had my dinner, then went back to the arcades from some quick gaming, including once again showing how much I sucked at the Jap drum game!

Day 5
A lot of rushing about today as we had to check out of the hotel by 12:30pm to catch a cab to the airport. I made a last round of Sg. Wang Plaza and managed to get the complete Season 3 DVD set of South Park. I also looked around in vein for a descent watch and finished my time again trying my hand at the Japanese drum game. I never did figure out which theme was Stalker’s though.
But wouldn’t you know our flight would be delayed AGAIN? Does Air Asia EVER take off on time??? The flight was delayed for about an hour cause they had problems with the stabilizer pressure. Needless to say when it was fixed, I was still nervous cause it’s no big secret I hate flying.
We finally touch down in Miri Airport at about 6:15 PM, and had to catch a cab home since there was no one to pick us up from there. Who would have thought it would end up as the Cab Ride from Hell?!? Seriously! This old dude driving the cab was tearing up the roads at a whooping 30-40KM PER HOUR!!! Good God, I wished the damn driver would have at least stepped on the gas just a little since it was an open road in front of us! And I could tell the other motorists behind us were more than agitated at the snail’s pace we were going! Word of advice to the driver: RETIRE ALREADY! Drivers like you are considered ROAD HAZARDS!

And thus ends the Navigate for Vacation tour 2004.

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