WHS Publications

Hello Seniors!

If you have not had your senior portrait taken at South Coast Photographic yet, please call or visit their website to make an appointment ASAP.

You must have a senior portrait (or an appointment for one) to submit a senior quote!

The deadline for both is 9/30.

See flyers attached for more information.

The 2022 Yearbook is finally here!!!! Pick up a copy of our book on May 19th (seniors only) or 20th (for all students)

PICK UP OUR LAST ISSUE OF THE YEAR TODAY!!

Varsity girls softball lost to Diamond Bar 4-13 in a home game Thursday, March 31.

The Mustangs quickly fell behind, being down 0-7 in the first inning. Then, Diamond Bar hit a three-run homer to push the lead to 0-10. The Mustangs scored two runs in the second inning. They also improved their defense, preventing the Brahmas from scoring runs in the second, third and fourth innings.

“A lot of our coaches said we have to start coming back. Obviously we could not give up, and everybody was kind of thinking the same thing,” middle infield senior Sophie Valle said. “There was nowhere to go but up.”

In the third inning, third basewoman freshman Isabella Murrieta hit a home run, earning two runs for the Mustangs to put them at 4-10. To finish the game in the seventh inning, the Brahmas hit another three-run homer to increase their lead to 4-13.

“Toward the end of the first inning, our team changed pitchers, and we stopped stressing so much,” pitcher senior Daniela Leon said. “We realized that we still had a lot of time left in the game and we could possibly come back. The game was still far from over.”
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By Ryan Huang
Photo by Mia Nam

Make sure you grab the latest issue of The Hoofprint tomorrow during your third period class or during lunch at the news stand by ASB!

Pick up a copy of The Hoofprint on Tuesday, March 22!

Applications are due by next Friday, March 25. We look forward to hearing from you all!

A spiritual and mechanical successor to the massively popular Dark Souls series, FromSoftware’s new video game “Elden Ring'' breathes much needed life into the genre of open world games, which is currently suffering from a severe lack of variety. For 13 years, FromSoftware’s games have grown a cult following with their tight and intelligent level design and deceptively simple core gameplay loop of explore, die, repeat. “Elden Ring'' expands on this formula, introducing a detailed sandbox environment for players to explore at their own pace, letting them bounce from place to place and craft their own adventure.

This approach, a drastic departure from FromSoftware’s signature of highly intentional linear level design, renders the game both more and less difficult, as players are encouraged to explore multiple connected areas, all with different challenges and strong enemies, without having to commit to finishing a level to move on.

On the topic of storylines, “Elden Ring” expands on FromSoftware director Hidetaka Miyazaki’s love of environmental storytelling. Instead of a narrator, the game’s atmosphere conveys the mood of each location in painstaking detail. The story becomes a mystery that the player has to uncover, rather than something shoved in their face, and the subtlety of the ex*****on greatly improves the player’s immersion into the world that “Elden Ring” builds.

The combat of “Elden Ring” stays true to the original Dark Souls formula, known for long and somewhat clunky attack animations and a focus on dodging and finding the rhythms of enemy movement patterns. The long windup times of the weapons make them feel powerful, but the damage they do is almost insignificant to the stronger enemies the game has to offer, like area bosses.

“Elden Ring” is a tremendous step forward for the Dark Souls series, and raises the bar for every open world game that is made after it.

By Jason Wu, Staff writer
Photo source: PlayStation.com

Mrs. O’Shields’ Studio Art and Advanced Studio Art classes continue to work on the claymation stop motion animation projects they began in December.

Students in both classes use at least one clay figure and various other supplies to create casts of characters to animate. Each student must use a cardboard box as the backdrop to their work, and create a story that integrates both the background and the characters.

"The most important thing is to create a good storyline to work with, since a stop-motion depends on that," senior Emma Wei said. "It takes a lot of hard work to do that."

Studio Art students use the program Stopmotion to capture a string of images that can be shown in quick succession to mimic motion. Claymation projects typically take 2 months or more to progress from the planning stage to the final product.

“The best part is seeing everyone's projects at the end," junior Sarah Yu said. "It's interesting to see how they all turned out."

By Jason Wu, Staff writer
Photos by Sofia Majeed

Rhapsody in Blue placed second in the novice division at a competition hosted by Chaparral High School Saturday, Feb. 26 at Temecula Valley High School.

Rhapsody members sang “Don't Rain on My Parade” from the musical “Funny Girl,” “Good Morning Baltimore” from the musical “Hairspray,” “Nine to Five” by Dolly Parton and “That Lonesome Road” by James Taylor. Two judges evaluated the choir’s showmanship and choreography, which includes synchorizonation and cleanliness of movements, while another two judged the choir’s vocals.

“I really liked ‘Good Morning Baltimore’ because our solos were amazing. The song flows a lot better and everyone is familiar with the song,” Rhapsody in Blue member junior Rosie Liu said. “Though the judges’ opinions matter, how well you do really depends on you. As long as we did our best, then we performed well.”

Though Rhapsody in Blue typically competes in the intermediate division, the choir made the decision to compete in the novice division this year because of setbacks imposed by a year in pandemic. Four schools competed in the novice division.

“I felt that it was a good idea [to compete in the novice division] since many Rhapsody in Blue members are performing in-person for the first time,” Liu said. “The Chaparral competition was pretty good because it was a nice experience for newcomers.”

Rhapsody in Blue will compete again Friday, April 1, in which they will perform the same songs in addition to “Better When I’m Dancin’” by Meghan Trainor.

“I was so proud of them,” choir director Lisa Lopez said. “They remembered all of the tiny details we had been cleaning up for weeks. We really had less performance time on stage than the other schools, so any performance would have been great. But they really cared and really shined.”

By Andrew Kim, Staff writer
Photo courtesy of Lisa Lopez