Cobwebs everywhere!

Howdy,

So.. yes, it’s been a long while since I’ve posted anything about anything really. But let it be known that I’m not giving up on this blog, not just yet anyway! The reasons for my mysterious and rapid, albeit temporary, departure from the blog-o-sphere are contained within this here blog entry.

A few years ago, a chum and I started a web series which became rather popular. This web series was called ‘Safety First’ and featured on ScrewAttack.com (For reference, the show description can be found on their wikipedia page: Clicketh Here), unfortunately due to a change in my own career goals and other projects my good friend was working on, we had to put the show to bed. Why not enjoy one of our more well received episodes whilst you mull over what a tragedy to the internet this is:

Fresh Pots of Interest: Saturday 21-07-12

Unfortunately, the usual news and information posted this week carries with it a tragic tone. As most of us will know a mass shooting took place in the Century 16 complex of Aurora, Colorado. I don’t want to spend long on this topic, not to underplay the horror or tragedy of these events, but simply because there is only one avenue of perspective to follow regarding them; we should focus primarily on helping those who have suffered.

If you are in the area local to Aurora, Colorado then please click THIS LINK to see how you can help.

I don’t think I need to say any more than that, please help if you are able.

Fresh Pots Of Interest: Wednesday 18-07-12

 It’s been a relatively slow week for exciting news, but I expected a dip after SDCC. Here’s what’s been best over the past few days, I heartily recommend all of the ‘just for fun’ videos.

Fresh Pots of Interest: Saturday 14-07-12

Well it’s Comic-con season so there’s plenty of delicious news to choose from today. Here are my picks for this weeks highlights!

Top Ten: Video Game Themes That Gets The Blood Pumping

Music can do strange things to a person, it’s like a manipulative, dark, force that creeps into the mind encouraging abnormal and abstract behaviour. Music holds a power over us that can bring us to tears or give us the strength to go the extra mile. I seem to remember that in the US Army they encourage tank crews to play aggressive music when engaging in battle, so obviously there’s some kind of logic behind it.

Music, therefore, in video games should reflect the tension and emotions that the player should be feeling when engaging with the characters or scenario of a particular game event, and there are some games that do it spot on. Today I’ll be looking at my personal top ten video game music tracks that truly get the blood pumping by either making me so tense I can barely mash the buttons on the pad, or spurring me on to a heroic victory.

Let’s do this!

Fresh Pots of Interest: Wednesday 11-07-12

Eventually I’m going to run out of interesting debates to have with myself so I thought it would be easier just to highlight the various going ons in the world that I thought might be of interest to those of you who are subscribed to my blog. So here are a few things that you may or may not know about what’s going on… and my supplementary opinions of them sculpted carefully below them.

So with my fingers poised like a concert pianist at his first recital let us begin this mid-week catalogue of interest.

Musings: Achievement Unlocked

As a newly qualified teacher, I can reveal to you now that the inner workings of formal education have changed significantly over the years. Gone are the days when children were subjected to ‘education massages’ via large, high velocity, blunt objects and no more shall teachers refer to the osmosis form of education, where textbooks and leather bound volumes are piled next to our pupils with the certainty that they will absorb the information contained within. No, simply put, the world of teaching has changed; with information at the press of a button and gaining the next prestige level being seen as more important than passing your GCSE’s the only option available to teachers is to trick pupils into learning.

I speak about this not because of the changing scope of education but because of a changing realisation within the world of technology and entertainment.  Have you ever had that almighty awakening moment, perhaps a little too late, that the quest you’re on, that avatar item you’ve just unlocked, the boss you’ve just killed or the katamari you just rolled had no meaning to it? I’m not saying that the entertainment value is in question here, but perhaps that the accomplishments that are achieved in game are outclassed by the accomplishments that could have been made had you taken the opportunity to do other things. I’ve had a lot of friends or friends of friends who have dropped from university due to world of warcraft, heck there have been people in the world who have neglected their own children because of the addictiveness of games and I know there’re a few wasted summers I’ll never get back because of various RPGs that took me by the wayside.

A Quick Rant: Entitlement Vs Enrichment

First off, I must apologise for the lack of updates in the past week but I’ve been both; moving objects between three separate houses and dealing with the nightmarish creatures residing behind the larger objects that even the fires of hell would recoil at. In short; reaching around the back of a wardrobe to get a firm grip before you move it is almost entirely as terrifying as this scene from Dune.

Aside from my own personal, ghoulish, fears, lately it has become apparent that the debate over if gamers are becoming too entitled is now reaching its peak and I for one would like to throw my two pennies squarely in on the matter. The internet shaking event preceding this debate was, of course, Bioware’s confusing gaffe over the day one DLC for mass effect 3, the game’s poorly strung together ending and tactless, altogether perplexing,  final message the game left you with. The overall negative response to this from the gaming community was not altogether unexpected, but somewhere along the line the crazy dial was turned from outrage to violence. Death threats and abusive comments were sent from community members to Bioware staff which left the more sensible fan-base of the series stuck in the middle horrified at their gaming compatriots and shocked by Bioware’s response to the fan outcry.

A Quick Rant: Diablo III

It has certainly been long enough now that Diablo can let it’s own major dust-cloud settle onto the ground and Blizzard can go back to business as usual. Apart from the initial problems regarding authentication issues with digital copies and the various number of error messages that people had to battle through to get into the game, Diablo III seems to be tugging along ok (unless you’re still waiting for your digital authentication to kick in, in which case I’m sure your plight is hugely important to blizzard and they’ll get back to you in the next 10 -20 updates).

Top 10: Nostalgic PC Games That Need A Come Back.

Currently there seems to be an annoying trend, and I am by no means the first to pick up on it, for games to have an unnecessary deluge of squeals, prequels, add ons, tag ons and expanded universes. I suppose it can be entirely tempting for big wig executives to want more of the same eldritch witchcraft used to torrent in the cash for titles that carve out their own place in history, the easiest way to do this is stamp a big rubber 2 next to the title and hope for the best. The general rule of thumb goes that as time goes on and the more you throw on top of the original, they will inevitably lose their alure. l imagine it like living in wonka’s chocolate factory, you might be happy for the first few months but I can bet that within a year you’ll be craving for a succulent roasted leg of oompa loompa.

Let it not be taken lightly, then, what I am about to outline as a ‘top ten’. It’s with a fond sadness and blissful awareness that, for the most part, the games I am about to mention were never truly thrown into the money grinder and still retain their sweet nostalgic flavour. Yet I can’t help but feel that, were they ever given the chance to come back to us with all the bells and whistles that we are so used to in this space age future of ours, we would welcome them with open wallets.

I am aware that some of these games will already have sequels or re-makes, I just feel that we should be rolling up our sleeves and saying “all right, but this time… let’s do it right”.

So here we are: