Your ZU History [V.2]

Hi! A while back I created a thread like this, but now I think everyones time here at ZU has expanded. So how about another one? Since the previous one is long dead.
Okay, here is my history so far. Which is quite big now.

Link to previous topic. w00t!

My history here.

I first registred in March, and I was called paulroe. It was my first forum, (now I'm also a member of Legends Alliance) and its my favourite forum. I didn't know a thing, and I wasn't very good on a computer. My first post was in the new members board, I just said I was new and asked a few questions. LinkN64 (who now has a different name. Can't remember what it is though.) answered all of them. I added him to my buddy list, as I thought it would open up more interactive things for that user, I didn't really know. But I'm not really with the ZU buddy thing, nor am I against it. I was a pretty big poster. I mostly posted short one-liners, quite n00bish ones... yeah. But I didn't consider myself a spammer. My first thread was Games you HATE! I really wanted it to get popular, I felt like I was a king when my thread got big. I think thats pretty stupid now. 'lord-of-shadow' locked it after nine or so pages, saying that it was too much negativity. I got really angry and sent him a massive flaming PM, narrowly missing a strike. After that I got my first sig & avy set, I thought the sig makers were extreemely talented. And over praised them when they gave me a sig. But I was extreemely unknown when I was called paulroe, nothing much interesting happened. I felt very proud when I made The Zelda Guiness Book of Records. 2005. I think it was the first gaming challenge thread. The mods were very happy with it, and I got lots of PM's saying it was a good idea. I was very proud... quite sad yes. Then I had a long drout from going on ZU, still going on every-day, but looking at the threads on the index and nothing interested me. After getting into it again, I realized that I wasn't making myself noticable at all, and I was just another unknown, un-mature user. Then I spotted the user name change thread - and changed my user-name to Unknown. (well it was unknown first, then whoever changed my name must have realized it wasn't a captial u, and changed it). I got an absolutely awesome sig from the almighty Sizzlin', (now called Sizzlin) followed by another animated one from King Neorej.

Then Sizzlin' inspired me (without actually saying anything to me) to become a sig maker. I opened up my own shop , using a lowly paint program to make them. No one requested, not surprised - the sigs looked awful. Then ItalianLink (soon to be named Sonic, now is named iLink) PM'd asking to comment on his sigs, thinking I was a proffesional sig maker, which I was not. Then he showed me Photoplus, a simple, free and brilliant program. Then me an I.L. opened up our own sig & avy shop. Which started my gigantic sig making obsession. The first shop is dead now, and now I use the almighty Photoshop 7.0. A lot of people starteed to know me then, and I PM'd the mods/smods/admins with questions a lot.

Then I noticed the newbies, how painfully irritating they were! I knew I was like that once so I had to be patient with them, but they did get on my nerves. By this time, I was in the Faroe Clan, I was an approved adopter, and I could do sigs/avys and animation. I have done a lot of people sigs/avy/animation and I actually really enjoy. (Though, I was pretty crap back then =/)

Then I started the BA, though it seems very confusing, but it looks like a lot of fun. And thats basically where I am now. (I've missed out a lot of stuff, as you might have guessed - but thats the main points I can remember.) Heh, seems like my real life is a lot more interesting, sometimes. But this place really does wind away my free time.

The next highlight (s******) in my ZU history is, well... opening another shop with Italian Link/Sonic/iLink. Looking back at teh GFX, I was still pretty crap. Getting better though, yes I was definatly getting better. Then that shop closed, as I was pretty tired of making GFX.
(I admire V99's work the most, I aim for his standards.)

Then I just casually posted, all casual and all. Just posted... casually. Yeah. Made some cool topics that were just random and interesting, some got locked. So I just carried on posting cassually... oh and after having another drout from ZU. I scrapped the BA thing, I can't be botthred with it as of yet. =p

Then! I opened up my solo GFX shop! w00t! Check. It. Out. What do you think? Is it good? I personally think I'm starting to get really good, but still need a lot of work. w00t! w00t! w00t! Thats my latest GFX shop. So now I'll stop rambling on about it.

Now, I'm typing this, I did a small few requests in my sig shop, and posted cassually. It was around this time that I joined the Legends Alliance forums. (Link above). But I still prefer these forums too it. Other then that I've just cassually posted on both forums (this one a lot more, not paticulary active on the other one) and gone on Newgrounds a lot (lovin' that site).

Soooo, here is where you post your ZU History. w00t!

List of favourite people here, so far.

• Sizzlin
• lord-of-shadow
• Lioness
• iLink
• BGS (But where on Earth did he go?)

Thats in no paticular order and I've probably forgotten some-people, but meh.
And most of all, I like posting... casually. (sp?) And creating GFX. w00t!

UPDATE: OMG!! iLink's been banned! Italian Link/Sonic/iLink has been banned! Goodbye, dear friend. Or is it just temporary?

I joined in October 2004, when I misunderstood someone and ended up joining here instead of a smaller zelda site. I was incredibly new to the internet, this was the third forum I joined, and when I posted my 'I'm new' topic here I got two pages of 'Try not to post in the wrong section, then people might like you'. So I left for a bit because I felt like the members here were jerks.
I came back a bit later to see how it would be and I got adopted by Stormcat(Lone Wolf) who ended up being my second friend here.

After I was adopted I decided to try and join a clan, so I went on my posting spree and when I had 100 posts I decided to try to get into Nayru, but my test came back as a tie between Din and Farore, I chose Din because I'm not entering a clan who's goddess has hair that bad.

Then I felt like adopting someone so I posted a lot to get the 300 posts and was an approved adopter, I adopted Derik Elf and Dark Prophecy, Dark Prophecy soon became inactive and got himself banned, I don't feel responsible for this as he never replied to my PMs. Derik Elf went on to join Din, I haven't seen him around on the forums lately, but we still speak on MSN.

It was only when I started adopting that I left my n00b-typing phase and tried to post a lot, but properly to get 1000 so I could customize my CT, but ZU changed the rules so I didn't need to, I've just cruised my way ever since then posting about 6 times a week.

I've also had a series of websites advertised here, and all of the bad ones have been 'criticised'(bah) and all the good ones have been ignored.

Next I adopted Wall1, he's gone inactive and totally ignors me. I am now only adopting people with MSN or AIM or Gtalk

Now I just lurk around the General gaming forum posting occasionally, I now realise how annoying some of the older members can be, with their 'pwn the new people' policies just seem wrong, espesially since I know what it can be like to be very new, and how easy it can be to flame someone if the 'pwn' you.

I recently celebrated my ZU birhday, and this is my 900th post.

And that is the boring history of me.

I joined Septemper 16, 2005. My dad had recently gotten the internet at his house, though I had it at my mom's, and I decided to look up the Hylian language. I thought it was cool and was going to download the font on my computer at home. When I went home I forgot the site's name and just typed Zelda and googled it. One of the links was this site. I had heard about forums before, but never joined because it sounded to confusing.

I decided that I would join because it was about Zelda, something that I love. My first post was in the Newbie section. I got about four replies, one coming from Dog Dog. I ended up posting in Adoptie Central but, nobody asked to adopt me. This time I posted again. I couldn't think of anything original about myself, so I decided to put down a writer. Alehandro ended up adopting me. After saying I was a writer it got me interested in writing.

I reached fifty posts and PMed BGS for the test. He replied about three days later with the test. I took it sent it back and he told me the results about a week later. I found out I was in Nayru, where a lot of my hommbres are.

I started a few threads. Kiddy Game, What's your favorite element?, Mages, warriors, and Archers Oh my!, It's all about the story, CREAM, and one just asking for help, which was locked after it was answered because I didn't put it in the help thread.

Now 620 something posts and two months later here I am.

But I'm not really with the ZU buddy thing, nor am I against it.

Yeah, I remember the second week after I joined I asked you to be my buddy and you replied by saying, "no." I was pretty crushed.

Ill Just post my story from the old thread.

I joined In January by word of mouth by my good friend Alchemist(whom most older members know). It was my forum that and was a bit unsure about anything. I was stupid enough to make the stereotypical n00b threads like the "zOMG ZLEDA MOVIE!!/1?" thread and had horrid grammar and such. I soon started to make friends like Necco and Exadis who are still great friends today. I soon matured alot and have been known now for a good 2 months or more as "ZU's Juggalo" for the love of the worlds most hated band ICP.

I've been here for over two years. Seems longer.

When I first entered the forums I was sucked into an arguement held by jonboy and andi, two fellow dinosaurs who have since disappeared (to my knowledge, anyway). This was the time when Sear's post count numbered in the hundreds - ancient history, friends. Trico was new; Dryth posted regularly; Arha and andi held sway; the most popular thread of the day was Ansem's "Savage Nation", in which everything now discussed in "Serious" was throw pell-mell together and we fought like dogs. Good fun.

I remember when a dimensional rift opened between Zelda Universe and the Total Annihilation boards which shared the same server. This brought us Stormay and the mad genius of Hindmost, and despite the stress to Lars, a good time was had by all.

A few months later I moved into the BA. I invented a character named 'Pip' - I don't know if I ever had a definative battle, but the one with Bobslob's stands out in my mind as pretty memorable. Pip was voted Best Character. I began a training school, and only ever had one graduate - Fireball.

I left for a while. I've had my share of so-long-cruel-world threads, much to my shame.

I've written dozens of stories, most of which were well recieved (or tactfully ignored), and was awarded "Best Writer" more than once. When "Serious" first opened up, it was my home. But then it got old, because I was getting older.

About a year or so in, I applied to be a member of the Team of Writers. I promised myself once I was twenty-six I'd leave altogether. But I haven't. Maybe I never will.

I invented the ZUser Created challenge, and I got to know Lioness, aka Shetani, aka coolest chick ever. Also Fox McCloud and Anime Queen, who are my spiritual siblings. There's a temptation to make a list of all the people I've known a respected here - as a testament to ZU, the list would be long and thorough. You know who you are.

I think one of my favourite things about being on the board so long is this: I got to see Mirren grow up. From dubious beginnings to a well-rounded gentleman who thinks before he speaks. I'm proud of you - more than you could know, kiddo.

I don't have that much to say, since I joined in June this year. I'm not going to pretend like my posts have made some huge contribution to ZU in these 5 months, but I'll still give a little history, for anyone interested.

I started lurking around ZU toward the beginning of the year, probably around December of 2004. I didn't read every day, but occasionally. I thought this was one of the best structured Zelda forums I'd seen. Well, at least it was definitely better than the GameFAQs ones.

I didn't register at first, even though I had things to say, mostly because I thought I was too old to be posting here. But then I got over that, deciding that it really didn't matter that much to me. Besides, there are people here that are my age anyway. Another thing that factored is that I've been posting on a different message board (reality TV related) for almost three years. The average age at that site is probably 30s and higher. It has 30,000 members and only 5 moderators. Needless to say, ZU is considerably different in terms of structure and content, so I wasn't sure how well I'd fit in this community.

Anyway, I registered under the name Nameless. <ans> made my first "What's in a Name?" signature. In June, I created Nameless' Top 50 Extravaganza, several Zelda-related lists that are supposed to be funny, kinda like David Letterman's Top Tens. I got a good reaction from the first list "Top 50 Things You'll Never Hear Navi Say" list, so I kept it going. Last month, I finished my 13th list. To be truthfully honest, I've been bad about keeping it up lately, with all my homework and all. I'm probably going to make 3-5 more in December during my Holiday break.

I changed my name from Nameless to Jims, for continuity's sake. And besides, at least, Jims actually sounds like a name... I've thought about trying to get the Top 50 thread renamed, but I think it looks funnier to have it so outdated.

Other than that, I'm not really that notable. I just pop in and out of threads, making some unfunny remark and whatnot. Ultimately, I like to keep my posts light and fun in nature. Super-serious threads aren't really my forte. I think I've started a grand total of, like, 8 threads with a post average of 2.something. Even though I've been here 4-5 months, I still feel really new to the site. That might never change. *points to custom rank*

Exciting, huh? Boy, I bet you're glad you read this.

Wow... That was longer than I thought it would be...

Originally posted by pipking
I think one of my favourite things about being on the board so long is this: I got to see Mirren grow up. From dubious beginnings to a well-rounded gentleman who thinks before he speaks. I'm proud of you - more than you could know, kiddo.

Wow, I was already having a great day, but damn did that just make it perfect, pip


I think I'm one of the people on ZU that I could have a novel written about my time here, because of all the conflicts I've gotten myself into. I like it though, a lot

I joined here 2+ years ago, and since this was my first forum, I was not only obsessed, but I was a complete n00b. I was definitely one of the biggest post-whores in this board's history, and I ended up being disliked by most of the population. I was mainly active in the BA, where I did all my battling and got to know some of my first buds, most of the members nowadays wouldn't even know who they are. It took a year or so, but eventually the stupid washed outta me, and I just became an ass, which I still am.

I feel I've done enough on here too, from the 14+ pages of threads I've made (good ones, for most of the time) winning Best Fic Writer 3 times, becoming Mod of the fan works and cleaning that place up, and of course, the first ZUC writing contest which I'm still very proud of. Like pip, I've written a ton of fics, ranging from a variety of genres, and I've even made a couple sprite comics. I'd really like to win Best Fic or Best Writer again this winter, but if not, it's fine. My pieces are so long that they tend to turn people away

And in all, you have what you see before you; open to any opinion.

The mods were very happy with it, and I got lots of PM's saying it was a good idea.

I don't know about that... I kept looking for excuses to lock it. I think I have something against popularity or something.

Threads like these always make me feel old. Very old. And grouchy. And outdated.

In almost exactly a month, I will have been here for three years. Seems like much longer then that, but hey. I joined back before the Wind Waker came out. I think I got bored one day and decided to join a few Zelda forums. I ended up signing up here and at the late Zelda Elements, but I didn't really stay at Elements.

At the time, there weren't even a thousand registered users here - compared to the 24,525 we have at the moment - so it was a much smaller community. A much nicer community, really. All the regulars actually knew on another, and we could actually foster friendships, or rivalries, or anything else. We actually had room for inside jokes, and for common memories that everyone could remember and laugh at.

Unlike today, where there are so many people and posts that we've lost all sense of community... I don't like it much here anymore, to be honest.


My first post was to accuse Lars, the founder of ZU, of stealing my example for why cel-shading was a good thing from another board I went too. This was at the height of all the arguments over whether or not tWW's graphical choice was a good one or not. Lars went by the username "AnakiN-" at the time, too.

I then went on to post for a few weeks, until myself and Maldrea theZora (Big Bro Davidia's sister), who had joined the same day as me, went on a campaign against the mod team. We started a topic in the Suggestions forum complaining about the way that the moderators were to quick to lock topics. I distinctly remember being filled with self-righteous fury about the way moderators would lock threads... just because there was no way for good discussions to continue. Man, how times have changed. Hahahah. If my past self somehow signed up and started posting, I'd probably hate his(my) guts. Or just ban him, one or the other.

That thread got locked, unsurprisingly. I think Remus, or "Remus Lemitus" as he was known back then, did it... but I can't be sure. Who knows. That thread's long gone, either way.

I don't remember when I was made a moderator... probably about three or four months after I joined, but I can't be sure any more. I was made a super-mod first thing, since that was the standard back then - we didn't have section mods. So I've been moderating this place for more then two and a half years... heheh.

I've made so many friends over the years, I won't bother mentioning them in much detail. A few highlights include DrZaius, DarkTechyonGekido, and Andi, all three of which were before most of your times. I consider Lioness and Tsukasa very good friends, and Lars and Mirren as well. I haven't been too close with most of the other mods, but I'd consider most of them friends as well.

Hah. I remember back when I made the suggestion that SearanoX be made a moderator... He was such a helpful little newbie at the time We had a spam patrol, which was essentially a bunch of normal members who would PM moderators whenever they saw something that needed to be dealt with. I was getting two or three PMs from Sear a day, at one point.

Meh. This place sucks now.

Originally Posted by pipking

A few months later I moved into the BA. I invented a character named 'Pip' - I don't know if I ever had a definative battle, but the one with Bobslob's stands out in my mind as pretty memorable.

Oh, yes, you did. Grun fought him. Lost, too, I think. Pip was on his way to destroy the world.

*goes to find battle* Seems it wasn't I that made it..
Sh, here we go! The end of days" Aww.. Ain't that purty, I had wee tiny posts. 7 replies long, too, not long.

Anyways, on to my ZU history. (I don't remember dates for a dog's toungs, so you'll kinda have to figure out a timeline yourself)

It begun with Peefy. He's my neighbour and friend in real-life, and he was already registered at ZU. He tried for a long time to get me to join, and in the end, I did. Here's my newbie thread, horribly spammy and my english was *uhum* let's just say bad. Fun, anyways, all oldbies with lotsa posts that greeted me.

I don't remember much about my early months. I was somewhat active in the BA, though. With Grun. My first and best character. Well, maybe not best, but I'm almost sure I like him the best. For some things. Ok, I'm not sure.

Some time ago, I was made a S-mod. I think it was mostly because of my time zone, so I should take some work of Lioness.

Some less time ago, I helped during the re-make of the BA, but I'm almost all out of that now.

I'm not much active now. School, etc.

Oh, I too agree: Everything was better in every way before.

Hey, you kids! Get off my lawn! *shakes cane*

I'm too lazy to type out my history, so read here:

http://wiki.zeldauniverse.net/index.php?title=User:Nox

In the summer of last year, I was browsing the ZU site, and suddenly I got the nerve to join the forums. Back then I went by the name of Aiko.
I generally don't like places with big communities, and the 8083 members we had then certainly seemed too big for me to ever feel at home here. Still does, actually.
I rarely ventured into the actual Zelda boards. Every topic concerning the games I was interested in had been talked to death. I mostly hung around GCC and the Signature Shops. A day or two after I joined I started up my first sig shop, solo of course. The sig maker partnerships weren't around then, although I heard they had been a trend before. My shop did quite well, and I made somewhat of a name for myself in the signature business. That year I won first runner-up for a few of the graphical awards in the 2004 ZU Winter Awards.
After a few months I broke out of my shell and started posting in a few other places, mostly sticking to General Gaming and Entertainment. I joined the Farore clan, but wasn't terribly active there. I continued on like that for a long while, as my shops cycled through opening, bursting business, eventual work overload, and their closing. Newer graphic artists started to revere me in a way, asking me questions and showing me their work, hoping for critiques.
This year in the Summer Awards I wound up winning first runner-up once again, losing to a graphic artist more dedicated to his work than I ever had been, at least this year. Shortly after I began to sort of fade away from ZU, showing up every now and then, but mostly being inactive. Several of the old members I once knew were leaving, and the number of newer members was on the rise. I started to dislike this place more and more, and found it challenging to find any intelligent discussions worth reading or joining in on. I think that's about where I am now, after returning from my three month-long absence.

If you REALLY want ot know:

Acctually joined here in april in another profile. You can PM me if you want to know who I was. Anyway, I posted things that never made sense, I made threads that got locked within an hour, nobody liked me. But I made one friend on ZU because we both had an interest in the wwe, at the time, his name was bigevil. But we lost our computer, and I had no way to get to ZU. I just decided when I got a new computer to get a new profile and new name, and so far, nobody hates me. (I hope)

Well, I knew about the main site much longer than I knew about the forums. When we (my siblings and I) got the Zelda Collector's Edition Bonus Disk at my house through Nintendo Power, we started looking for Zelda sites for assistance, and found this place. My brother was actual the first one to come here, and told me about it when I started up a OoT file. I had recently quit another Zelda site (one that will remain unnamed, though a lot of you attend it) after deciding it consisted of spam, jerks, and arguments, so I was looking for another place to hang out. I eventual decided to check out the forums here.

The one reason I did actual join is kind of embarassing now: There was no Serious Discussion here at the time. Really. I had left the other site when I got in a giant argument in that site's SD board, and was loosing because I was naive and hadn't spent much time on internet debates before. But the person I was arguing with (who I think is here, but will remain unnamed) still felt like rubbing it in my face that I was wrong, just to boost their own ego. So I joined this site in hopes that I wouldn't enter any more arguments like that. I had a different username there, so none of you would remember me, anyway. I forgot what my username was, too...

I chose the name Miniblin and stuck with it because miniblins are awesome, and made my thread in the Newbie board, and garnered a lot of really positive replies (compared to my previous introduction post on another forum). Ego boost. So I decided that this was my forum hangout.

I was really shy here at first, and didn't see myself ever becoming a respected member. I did realize I was somewhat noticed when I was nominated for Best Newbie award, even though I got like three posts. I eventually left the Zelda forums here all together and just hung around the community, posting at the rate of 1,000 posts per year.

I also remember with great chagrin, the miserably failed Miniblin Fan Club (centered around the enemy, of course, though inspired by my username). I was to blame, of course, because I spent my early months focusing mainly on expressing my great obsession with the miniblin character, and eventual got a few people to follow me. The Miniblin Fan Club thread was locked, I was blamed by a mod (it was my fault), and that was a great turning point in my ZU career. I was not invinicible here. I would try and be more careful from then on. I did consider leaving, because I'm fickle with my forums like that, but then remembered that I could still make up for my mistakes.

Things continued as normal. I made great friends, most of all being Jordan L., who I've PM'd so much I regularly had to clean out my PM box (though I usually had to be reminded by someone else. But that was pre-Mod). I still considered myself almost totally unknown here on the forums.

When SD did finally arrive here, I was mortified at first. But I did yearn to express my developing beliefs (or lack of), and posted my opinions, which I had thought out more than a year earlier in the previous forum. While the arguments and debates here may seem awful to some, I actual like them because on my previous forum, they were so much worse. I spent a lot of time in SD until it was taken away from here for a period of time. I also spent a lot of time in GCC, Entertainment, and the Naryu Clan.

I did try to leave for a bit. The influx of newbies attributed to the new Zelda-game info and Summer time lowered this place's quality for a period. But I can't stay away. So I started posting again a week later (so much for a perminant leave).

Skip ahead a bit, and we come to present day. My clan held elections for mod, and to my incredible surprise, I got the majority of votes. I had no clue. I sat in suspense for weeks until I got the job. Ego-boost it was not, though, just a sort of waking-up.

That's my history, I guess. I think I've grown up a great deal in the time I've spent here. This place was a major outlet for my own beliefs, and where I sorted out my atheism. I joined here at a fragil time, when I was entering teenagehood and quickly loosing my innocence. I also think I'm being too serious because everyone knows this is just the internet and a forum, and I'm being silly. But one truth is that I'm really shy, and I never could have discussions like I do here in real life.

I <3 internet.

Same as my previous history, with a few edited bits and additions:

I was lurking around the forums for awhile, maybe a month or so (though probably more, it seems like more now that I think about it), before joining in April '03 under the name Great_Emu. I had checked them out mainly for theories about both past, present, and future games. I don't know any of my first posts or what I was like because they were lost in the hack. I know I probably wasn't a "n00b" since I had been a member of a couple of other forums before and knew how to act and type like a human being. I remember having a small argument about the gorons in tWW with a user who is no longer active, and also getting upset with the now-absent Zaius when he swore in a thread...at the time my younger brother would usually watch me on the computer, and of course he'd have to use the words in front of my parents and then I'd get in trouble...Other than those two instances, I was very similar to way I am now...except now I don't even go in the Zelda sections, let alone post in them. Basically I would say what I have to say, only posting at most a few times in any given thread.

I went inactive in October of 2003, but continued to check in just to look around every so often. I don't really have a reason that I can remember, it just happened. In July 2004 I returned to comment on the new feature, "Behind the Rupees". I vanished again for about three months and then came back in November, and have stayed here, more or less, ever since. A lot had changed from when I first joined; mods I knew from the days I first had vanished and some members had become mods. There was a serious discussion forum, an adoption centre, and a newbies guide.

I changed my name in April (my two-year anniversary) to what it is now. I've never made more than one thread, which was concerning the hack when it happened, but while I was making it some one else made a thread, so it was locked fairly quickly. I was thinking of starting a thread in the Entertainment section of late, but it requires some more planning and mod-approval. As for my activity, I was assuming it would drop at university, but it seems to have not...if anything it's increased. My activity when the