Well, that's that then. 9 years ago (if we skip the leap days), I registered with a little Bionicle site called BZPower. 8 years ago, I left. 1 year ago - plus a few days - I came back. Bionicle had gotten the axe by then - no more sets, not many more serials.

Why'd I leave?

Honestly, part of it is that I thought I was too grown-up for Bionicle. I was a middle schooler - I didn't want some boring, the-heroes-always-win stuff for kids! I wanted something darker and edgier, like Sonic Adventure!

Go ahead and parse that for everything wrong with it. I'll wait. My only defense is that I was a middle schooler, and I couldn't really afford the sets (though frankly speaking, I always did love the setting and story more than the sets - but I wouldn't be caught dead then buying a Bionicle book. Go figure.)

So why'd I come back?

Part of it, truth be told, is that I finally got back my login details. I changed my display name at some point after I registered from GSR (fun fact: originally GoldenSunRules, but I now just see it as "GSR") to something completely different, and at some point in my hiatus some upgrade or database change led to that becoming my login name. Thus my last successful login until last year (when I remembered that other name) was late 2006.

Part of it is that, at the end of the day, I'm a sucker for Bionicle. Yeah, it's a decade-old cancelled kids' toyline, that has been duly noted. Yeah, it had some really cringe-worthy stuff in there (Mask of Light's voice acting speaks quite literally for itself). But having immersed myself in all sorts of mature works (which I did and still do enjoy immensely), I found I still have a soft spot for a story that, by and large, is just the good guys vs. the bad guys. Granted, part of this is nostalgia - Hero Factory really doesn't appeal to me - but I have to admit I was pleasantly surprised to learn just how large the universe became over the years of Bionicle's run. Elemental cyborgs struggling to protect their people even as the tribal culture that they know and love slowly tears away to reveal a story of biotechnology on a grand scale? Sign me up.

And part of it is that, frankly, I missed being around a decent online community. I'm active on three other boards besides BZP at the moment - one is large enough that I don't know any of the members that well, one is largely ruleless and extremely fast-moving, and one is a practically inactive fan forum for a series whose fate is currently in limbo for the English-speaking world. BZP's not as big as it used to be - the downtime truly did a number on things - but it's usually got somewhere between 50 and 100 active members on during the day, and people are usually pretty civil to each other. Granted, Bionicle being gone is putting a bit of a drag on things, but that's a topic rather larger than this blog's focus.

So what now? Honestly, I'm not sure. College's starting up again soon, and that'll eat into my time here quite a bit - and it looks like it's going to be a very, very busy first month or so. But I think I like it here - there's getting to be familiar faces around, and the good response to "Fractures" really made me feel like I was contributing to the community. And I do have a rather larger project brewing in the back of my head (which I'd actually hoped to get a little more fleshed out over break, but c'est la vie). Granted, said project would have an expected readership of... 5, or so? I guess it would technically appeal to one smaller audience and one very large audience, but said audiences have a pretty small intersection. But I digress.

Anyways, here's to you, BZP. I can't promise I'll be around forever, but I hope to make the best of the time I am.