User:BlazeHedgehog
About Me
My name is Ryan Bloom. I was born on July 6th, 1983, in Denver, Colorado. As a child, growing up, I did not know my father - from what my Mother has told me, he would sometimes abuse her. He was a Vietnam War Vet, was colorblind, and had Cancer, which eventually claimed his life sometime in late 1991. Growing up he would sometimes visit us, but I only knew him as "Uncle Ron". It wasn't until I was older (13-15) that my Mom finally told me who "Uncle Ron" really was.
My Brother, Rory, was 14 years old when I was born, making him, nowadays, almost old enough to be my Dad. In the absence of my father, he has tried to act as a fatherly figure at times. Being how much older he really was, he wasn't a typical older brother. He's always been very caring and somewhat protective of me, always looking out for my well-being. I appreciate that probably more than he knows.
From an early age I was always into videogames. Some of the earliest memories I can remember, about the age of 3, I figure - I can remember attempting to play games like Pitfall on our Atari 2600, and I remember Pac-Man and Super Off-Road Arcade Machines. I was never very good at them - at such a young age, I really did lack the hand-eye coordination required to steer a truck around the course. From an early age, too, I drew a lot. I remember being proud that I knew how to draw eyes - that might sound weird, but to this day, I still consider it a very important quality; being able to draw eyes that are "alive". Growing up, I was in to your typical things: The Real Ghostbusters, He-Man, and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. Shortly after I was born, we moved to California - where we would stay, until Mom got word my Dad had died, meaning Colorado was safe to return to. We've been in Colorado ever since.
In 1988 we purchased a Nintendo Entertainment System. By now, I was skilled enough to be able to understand how games worked and got pretty good at Mario - but I never could beat it. The Hammer Brothers and Laiktu were always the death of me. I remember a friend of my brother's coming over and showing me a trick he had learned - this was a time long before the internet, mind you, so we couldn't just look these up on Gamefaqs - the trick was now the legendary "infinitely increasing" 1up trick. To this day I don't think I've ever been able to do it myself. These were some good times, for me, as the NES bridged the gap across to a lot of the friends I had at the time. Everybody I knew had an NES and some games. This gave me access to a extremely wide variety of stuff to play, even if I never got any new games myself (for the majority of the NES generation, I had six games: Mario/Duckhunt, Boy & His Blob, Dick Tracey, Tetris, Puzznic, and The Legend of Zelda - anything else was either played via rental or via friends). By now I was becoming a pretty big gamer.
But nothing would compare to Christmas, 1991. My Brother recieved a mysterious piece of hardware that Christmas, one that I merely shrugged off as a piece of stereo equipment - I'd never heard of a "Sega Genesis" before. It wouldn't be until a week later that I'd learn what it was - Citizen Kane was on TV, that night, and we had some Guests over. I was only a kid, so "Citizen Kane" was deemed something I should not sit around and watch - not only for my well being, but as not to distract the adults. Not wanting to stay in my room (as I wanted to play the NES), I was sat down in my brother's room - infront of his TV - and the Sega Genesis. What I played was one of the most impressive and memorable videogames I had ever seen in my entire life: Sonic the Hedgehog. This game completely changed me from casual gamer to hardcore. That night, I drew Sonic the Hedgehog, and it was one of the best pictures I had ever drawn.
You could say that moment was life-changing. It sounds silly, but that was a defining point in my life that greatly shaped who I am today.
I was obsessed with videogames and Sonic the Hedgehog from that day onward. After my brother moved, I craved more Sega Genesis. I asked for one for Christmas. Christmas 1992 rolled around and I found myself with... a Super Nintendo. Despite my begging and pleading, my Mom remembered how much I liked the NES, and figured a SNES would be a good choice. I couldn't reject it; a SNES was good, too. But I still wanted a Genesis. And finally, Christmas 1993, I had my Genesis. And it was good.
From here, more bonds were formed through gaming - but they were through gaming alone. Looking back, this period; late elemetnary school to middleschool, my friends were terrible. I didn't think so then, but now, I realize, they were jerks. I was your typical punching bag. It is a time in my life I would probably be better off forgetting about. Because I had missed my shot to get a Genesis in 1992, I bought a Sega Saturn with my own money in 1996. I got a Playstation for Christmas in 1997, and with it, Final Fantasy 7. It was in Middleschool I was first introduced limitedly to the Internet - through the webbrowser Lynx, and the Mail Application, Pine. Geeks out there will know exactly what these are.
But it wouldn't be until the last week of Highschool that I really learned about the internet. Graphical browsers and Power Macs opened the door for me, and in my Junior year, Brand-new G3s were installed. The internet was at my fingertips. It was around this same time we finally upgraded our old computer at home - from a crusty old Monochrome Hyundai to a 266mhz Packard Bell with 48mb of RAM. Computers, videogames, and drawing were my strongest hobbies, and when I wasn't hanging out with my new friends in the Computer Lab at School, I was on AOL here at home. My brother, for Christmas 1999, sent me $200. I used it to buy a Sega Dreamcast and Sonic Adventure. It was also this year I got into the habit of selling my artwork for money - a friend of mine, Keith, would pay me $15 for a picture of whatever he requested. That Christmas, I made over $175. I spent it on Presents for my family. To date, that is the most money I have made off of comissions.
Unfortunately, something strange happened in Highschool. Whereas previously I was always somebody who got average grades - C's and D's - the minute I hit Highschool my grades dropped like a rock. Straight F's across the board. It felt as if no matter how hard I tried, I could not bring my grades up. I began to lose interest and during the last few weeks of my sophmore year I began cutting classes; one or two classes a week. By my Junior year I was cutting one or two classes a day. Soon, I was cutting half the day. Then the whole day. I never saw my Seinor year. To this day I do not know the reason things got as terrible as they did in Highschool - after the indescribable living hell that was Middleschool, Highschool was a lot easier to tolerate, with my new friends. My Mom speculates it was trauma from Middleschool carrying itself over, and she blames Middleschool for my shy personality today. Me, I don't know. Perhaps I have a learning disorder - over the years I have slowly discovered that, thanks in part to my creativity, I am more of a visual learner; I learn faster via hands-on training and doing, rather than reading about it. But at the same time, I don't know if I buy that - during my late Sophmore year and early Junior year, I was enrolled in Vocational Schooling, to help bring my grades up. I didn't like it, and within three weeks of each enrollment, I left.
After I dropped out of Highschool, I vowed to get my GED (General Education Diploma). For $50 you take a 7 hour test that measures how much you have learned and if you know enough to function in general society. For free, you could take a pre-GED to see if you had the skills to pass, as not to waste the $50. To pass, you needed a score of at least 40; tests are hand-graded and are not based on wether you got the answers right or wrong - but how you answered them and your knowledge from responses. I scored a 42. That was in 2001. I never did take the GED test (the testing center was a few dozen miles away, and I never got my license and had no car - so I needed somebody to take me there; unfortunately, testing dates always conflicted with my Mom's working schedule). By now, I fear I have forgotten too much from Highschool to be able to pass.
Since then, I have dug myself into the cliche hole of jobless, overweight geek who lives in his Mom's basement. I am slowly trying to work my way into indie game design, but thanks to my own procrastinative (is that even a word?) nature, I rarely finish any of the projects I begin.
Achievements
- Super Mario: Blue Twilight DX (Producer, Designer, Everything)
- Sonic Robo Blast 2 (One of the many texture and sprite artists)
- Sonic Time Attacked (Cutscene Animator)
- Halloweenies (Producer, Designer, Everything)
- The Darkness (Producer, Designer, Everything)
- Blazefire Videogame Radio (DJ)
- Sonic Amateur Games Expo (Founder)
- Sonic: The Fated Hour (Unreleased, Producer, Designer, Everything)
- Sonic Adventure: SRB2 (Unreleased, Producer, Designer, Everything)