mancide's blog

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  • Bowling

    So I have been bowling a bit frequently lately. So far my high game is 141. I have somehow lucked into two nice, but older bowling balls that haven’t cost me any money. I had been using a AMF Sumo until the other day I was able to secure an Ebonite Clear Wolf that someone discarded. I just needed to remove the old finger inserts and I could use it, I’ve also got some replacement inserts coming to fit it a bit better.

    I was also able to figure out that the Wolf will make a good spare ball, as I’m able to control if it hooks or not by my release. The Sumo is weighted in such a way that it’s going to hook regardless of how I release it.

    I am really looking forward to continuing this new hobby.

  • Woot Off

    My saving-sense is tingling and telling me there is a woot-off in progress!

  • Know More Things

  • Sticky Sweet

    I normally don’t get things like this for breakfast, but just look at it. How could you resist? It was actually not bad. The chocolate chips on the pancakes were a little much for me, but the syrup was actually quite tasty. And the spinach scrambled “green eggs” were mighty delicious. Anyway, if you get a chance to stop by IHOP be sure to try the Mayor’s Breakfast or the smaller version JoJo’s Breakfast.

  • Atmosphere

  • New Music

    I posted a couple of new tracks on my myspace band page. The Hand That Feeds is a remix of the same Nine Inch Nails song. This is something I had been working on off and on since Trent Reznor released the master track in a format that allowed for people to play with the master tracks of the song. The second song is called muted and it is an original song by myself. Please check these out and leave me any feedback you see fit!

  • Gaming Culture

    Gaming Culture:
    A Look into the Language

    For most people, the start of the gaming culture culminated around the release of the Nintendo Entertainment System on October 18, 1985 (Businessweek, 2008). Since that time game consoles, as well as the communities around them, have developed their own culture and, in some instances, their own language. The gaming culture has even grown to the point where it influences other aspects of daily life. This article will focus on the following questions:
    1. Who is the gaming culture?
    2. How has the gaming culture developed its own language?
    3. How has the gaming culture influenced other groups?

    Who is the gaming culture?

    When you talk about the video gaming culture, most people immediately picture a youthful person around the age of thirteen. This is far from the case. The average age of a person in the video game culture is 33, and this person has been playing on average for 12 years. The average age of the most frequent purchaser of video games is 38. Sixty-seven percent of American Heads-of-Households play computer and video games. (ESA, 2008) The video game culture is not that of teenage boys. The video game industry is a large entertainment segment comprised of $9.5 billion in sales for 2007. (ESA, 2008) Thirty-eight percent of all gamers are women, and women over the age of eighteen (31%) represent a significantly larger portion of the market than boys under the age seventeen (20%). (ESA, 2008) Additionally, in 2007, 24% of Americans over the age of 50 played video games. And with the introduction of the Nintendo Wii gaming console, this number is expected to grow significantly. (ESA, 2008)
    As you can see, the video gaming culture encompasses far more people than the stereotypical member of a teenage boy. Gamers come from every segment of the American population, and most have been a part of this culture for many years. While it may be true that gaming started out as a phenomenon linked to teenage boys, it has rapidly expanded to be a serious competitor in the entertainment market, so much so that movie tie-in games are becoming more commonplace. New games, such as Grand Theft Auto IV, are even linking the in-game soundtrack to real-world purchases. (Staff, 2008)

    How has the gaming culture developed its own language?

    Video game culture has many words that are simply derivatives or intentional misspellings of actual words. Most of the cultures language is based on the English language, and most technical terms share meanings with other software terminology. The most interesting words, however, are specifically from the video game community; more specifically, the on-line multiplayer communities that pit gamers against other gamers world-wide have developed their own verbs such as pwn and w00t. Pwn is a slang version of the word “owned” which gamers use to describe a particularly humiliating defeat. (Spohn, pwn – own, 2008) w00t, which incidentally was voted Merriam-Webster’s 2007 Word of the Year, is defined as expressing joy (it could be after a triumph, or for no reason at all); similar in use to the word “yay”. (Merriam-Webster Online, 2007) w00t also has history as an abbreviation of “We Owned the Other Team”, and was typically used after games where one team dominated the other. These are the most prominent, however there are several other terms spawned by the video game culture such as spawn, ping, newbie, greifer, gone gold, lag, clan, and camper. (Spohn, Internet Games Glossary, 2008)

    How has the gaming culture influenced other groups?

    The most obvious example would be the inclusion of w00t as Merriam-Webster’s 2007 Word of the Year. (Merriam-Webster Online, 2007) However, the video game culture’s influence can be seen in other media as well. Movies, in particular, have been heavily influenced by video games. Hitman released in 2007 was based off of an Edios video game of the same name. Super Mario Brothers, Doom, Resident Evil, and Tomb Raider are all movies that are based off of video game counterparts. (Answer.com, 2008)
    Even the style of cinematography has been influenced by video games. Doom featured a first-person sequence in the film, which was a direct homage to the first-person view of the video game. Tomb Raider’s acrobatic sequences are also taken from the acrobatic feats of the digital Lara Croft.
    It should come as no surprise that video game culture is starting to cross over into other culture groups and entertainment medium. When you get past the personal bias that video games are purely for teenage boys and come to the understanding that large segments of the general population are a member of the video game culture; it is easy to understand why video games have had such an influence on our entertainment and language. Video games are very much a part of the mainstream culture and will be for the foreseeable future.

    References
    Answer.com. (2008). List of Films Based on Video Games. Retrieved March 29, 2008, from Answer.com: http://www.answers.com/topic/list-of-films-based-on-video-games?cat=entertainment

    Businessweek. (2008). A Breif History of Game Console Warfare. Retrieved March 28, 2008, from Businessweek: http://images.businessweek.com/ss/06/10/game_consoles/source/4.htm

    ESA. (2008). Top 10 Industry Facts. Retrieved March 27, 2008, from ESA: http://www.theesa.com/facts/top_10_facts.php

    Merriam-Webster Online. (2007). Merriam-Webster Online. Retrieved March 28, 2008, from Merriam-Webster Online: http://www.merriam-webster.com/info/07words.htm

    Spohn, D. (2008). Internet Games Glossary. Retrieved March 29, 2008, from About.com: http://internetgames.about.com/library/glossary/blglossary.htm

    Spohn, D. (2008). pwn – own. Retrieved March 28, 2008, from About.com: http://internetgames.about.com/od/glossary/g/pwn.htm

    Staff, Y. V. (2008). GTA IV Unveils New Music Download Model. Retrieved March 28, 2008, from Yahoo! Games: http://videogames.yahoo.com/events/grand-theft-auto-iv/gta-iv-unveils-new-music-download-model/1199430

  • Hava Platinum

    So I have some game videos I have created with a Hava Platinum HD over on the Help Me With My Game Problems blog. The process was relatively easy, however I still need to tweak the final FLV quality settings, but that should get better over the next few movies. Matt helped me set it up, as it is the same setup he uses for MattPlays.

  • Paying off credit cards feels awesome

    I paid off a little over $10,000 worth of consumer debt yesterday. This was made possible by breaking that old 403(b) account I had from a previous job. So three Chase cards are paid off, and I will be canceling one of them soon. The other two I will keep around because the Amazon one I only use on Amazon orders, and it earns gift certificates from Amazon, and the Disney card we will use when we go on the Disney cruise later this year, as it too earns bonus money. The Bank of America and First National cards will be canceled as well; Lowe’s and my medical bill are gone as well. I figured this is around $322 a month in minimum payments that will no longer be going out. Close to $350 when you figure in the additional snowball amount I was paying.

    This leaves only the car, home equity loan, and one consumer loan for appliances (which at 0% and a low monthly payment I was not concerned with paying this off). The wedding and cruise are now paid in full with no interest charged. That is a big bonus.

    Some people have said I lost about $200,000 by breaking this account now, but I counter that with as soon as I can, I am going to increase my 403(b) contributions to 10% to match my employer’s input, so I think I can actually make this money back.

    I am also going to split that monthly savings between paying additional on the Toyota loan and putting the rest back in savings.

    This is a big relief, and it comes at a good time. My fiancée’s car is having problems, and we will have to save about $500 to fix it. She is also getting laid off March 1st. Money will be tight, but at least the over-all outlook is much better than it was just a month ago.

  • Blu-Ray “wins”, but who decided the war?

    Due to the announcements yesterday that Netflix and Best Buy are dedicating their HD operations to Blu-Ray, this appears to be the final nail in the coffin for HD-DVD.

    However, I pose the question, who really decided this “war” was over? Was it the same company that brought Blu-Ray to the market when it wasn’t ready to compete with HD-DVD. The same company that bet it’s game console could sway the market? I bet it’s purely coincidence that they are the company that owns two movie studios, developed Blu-Ray, and manufacture the only “player they would recommend, due to upcoming changes to the platform. But Pioneer, Samsung, Panasonic and Sony have all been selling standalone Blu-ray players to customers, a representative at the Blu-ray booth at CES said.”

    I may be bitter because I bought an HD-DVD player. I’m still holding out for the firesales on HD-DVD discs to pick a few more up. I also think Blu-Ray early adopters are bitter, and we might see more suits as the whole Profile 2.0 event happens later this year; which will effectively render all stand-alone Blu-Ray players incompatible with the completed feature set of Blu-Ray 2.0. Might I add that Profile 2.0 adds no features over what HD-DVD offers today, and in fact merely gets Blu-Ray to the same feature set HD-DVD has offered since it hit market.

    High-definition video discs accounted for $300 million of 2007’s $23.7 billion home video market, but high definition represents the future. In its first two years, high-def players are outselling the DVD player in its first two years.

    Blu-Ray also accounted for 62% of the disc sales, versus 38% for HD-DVD. One has to wonder if the weak software library of the Playstation 3 (which accounted for an additional 3.25 million Blu-Ray players on the market) had anything to do with skewing disc sales. I know if I had spent money on a Playstation 3, I would have felt compelled to buy some software to justify the $600 price premium on a gaming system that lacks many features of the leading next-gen console; but that is an argument for another article.

    While HD discs may be the future of the home video market, they still face an uphill battle, even with a clear “winner”. DVD players and discs are 79 times greater than the total HD disc market. Statistics such as only 21% of homes have HDTVs and of that only 14% are connected to an HD source do not bode well for consumers clamoring for HD discs. Couple that with the fact that most HD players, Blu-Ray and HD-DVD, upscale existing DVDs. In most instances these look good enough that typical consumers cannot see the benefit of the HD version over an upscaled DVD.

    So consider this my last take on the “format war”. I’m going to go play some XBOX 360 and wait for Amazon to put the bargain bin HD-DVD sale in the works so I can stock up. I’ll also be waiting for a Profile 2.0 compatible combo player, or possibly pick up this nifty combo HTPC that is currently the bee’s knees.

    Seacrest out.

    UPDATE: It appears my assumption of the PS3 having a weak game library driving Blu-Ray sales may have been the wrong assumption to make. It appears that I should have came to the opposite conclusion. That the increased number of PS3/BD players should have correlated to an increased number of disc sales. When you figure the attach rate including the PS3, the disc to player sales ratio is around 1:1; HD-DVD was around 4:1. So the studios should have been looking at the format that was selling more software per player, not what format was selling the most units in the admittedly niche market that is HD disc sales.