Merry Christmas!

Wishing all my blog readers a Merry Christmas!

I wanted to take a screenshot using my own account in Orpesia server, but G1 game and forum servers went down for more than 24 hours, and still ongoing... Well, it's already Christmas (depending on your time zone), so I made a short visit to Rembrandt server where players were spamming Christmas Trees and firecrackers outside of Auch. Meanwhile, you can get news concerning G1 fail status at Neume's Twitter, Sword2 Twitter, Port Coimbra (server status), and Sword 2 Fuc Face Book.

Anyway, the Christmas event involving rescuing Rudolph to make it for Christmas and G1's attempt to fix patch/server in time reminds me of a movie production by Sky One in 2006 - Terry Pratchett's Hogfather. Adapted from the novel Hogfather, the story involved an assassin attempting to kill the Hogfather (a parody of Santa Claus), resulting in Death (Grim Reaper) standing in for him and delivering presents to children on Hogswatch (a parody of Christmas).

Below is an interesting excerpt from the novel relating how Death (in his capacity as substitute Hogfather) deals with The Little Match Girl and his conversation with his butler... And uh, *cough* BitTorrent file here for the movie.

"But... little match girls dying in the snow is part of what the Hogswatch spirit is all about, master," said Albert desperately. "I mean, people hear about it and say. 'We may be poorer than a disabled banana and only have mud and old boots to eat, but at least we're better off than the poor little match girl,' master. It makes them feel happy and grateful for what they've got, see." I KNOW WHAT THE SPIRIT OF HOGSWATCH IS, ALBERT. "Sorry, master. But, look, it's all right, anyway, because she wakes up and it's all bright and shining and tinkling music and there's angels, master." Death stopped. AH. THEY TURN UP AT THE LAST MINUTE WITH WARM CLOTHES AND A HOT DRINK? Oh dear, thought Albert. The master's really in one of his funny moods now. "Er. No. Not exactly at the last minute, master. Not as such." WELL? "More sort of just after the last minute." Albert coughed nervously. YOU MEAN AFTER SHE'S- "Yes. That's how the story goes, master. 's not my fault." WHY NOT TURN UP BEFORE? AN ANGEL HAS QUITE A LARGE CARRYING CAPACITY. "Couldn't say, master. I suppose people think it's more... satisfying the other way..." Albert hesitated, and then frowned. "You know, now that I come to tell someone..." Death looked down at the shape under the falling snow. Then he set the lifetimer on the air and touched it with a finger. A spark flashed across. "You ain't really allowed to do that," said Albert, feeling wretched. THE HOGFATHER CAN. THE HOGFATHER GIVES PRESENTS. THERE'S NO BETTER PRESENT THAN A FUTURE. "Yeah, but-" ALBERT. "All right, master." Death scooped up the girl and strode to the end of the alley. The snowflakes fell like angel's feathers. Death stepped out into the street and accosted two figures who were tramping through the drifts. TAKE HER SOMEWHERE WARM AND GIVE HER A GOOD DINNER, he commanded, pushing the bundle into the arms of one of them. AND I MAY WELL BE CHECKING UP LATER. Then he turned and disappeared into the swirling snow. [...] Nobby pulled aside the blanket. "Search me," he said. "Looks like we've been chosen to do a bit of charity." [...] Shortly afterwards there was some tinkling music and a very bright light and two rather affronted angels appeared at the other end of the alley, but Albert threw snowballs at them until they went away.