Josh has posted the 4th edition of the Carnival of Gamers.
Go there now.
Archives for 2005
On Carnivals and Roundtables
So we’ve had three successful Carnivals of Gamers, currently gearing up for the fourth, and I’ve been thinking about the current Carnival schedule. Is twice a month too often? I usually try to post at least one “Carnival-worthy” post before the deadline, but twice a month can be a lot. It may not be this way for everyone, but I was contemplating a suggestion to go to a monthly Carnival.
This came on the heels of Corvus’ idea of a monthly roundtable discussion. His idea is to have a central theme that everyone blogs about and then those posts would be passed around, Carnival style. I really like this idea, I will participate as occasion allows, but I wanted to know, from those who’ve participated in the Carnival of Gamers if we should hold the Carnival once a month, as well. That would give everyone time to participate and it would give the host a little more time to get the Carnival together.
This is something that I’ve been mulling over in my mind. What do my fellow carnies (and those of you who read the Carnival) think?
Update: It appears that the consensus is that the Carnival would benefit going to a monthly format. As it stands now, the 4th Carnival will continue as scheduled (tomorrow) and then Carnival #5 will fall on August 4th (the first Thursday). Hopefully Unfettered Blather won’t be adversely affected by the date change. AFK Gamer will then host #6 in September.
Sports Gamer on NCAA 2006
The Blog for the Sports Gamer is quickly becoming one of my favorite blog stops. Moreso right now because one of the contributors, bill, is filling us in on his experiences with NCAA 2006. I’ve cooled on the NCAA series due to 2005’s lacklusterness (is that a word?). Bill (who is a Buckeye like me) did what every other Buckeye Fan does when they get the newest NCAA title — the play OSU vs. Michigan (the greatest sports rivalry of all-time). Bill has a recap of the first half and the second half, along with his impressions of NCAA 2006. Of course, OSU was victorious, as they have been the past 3 out of 4 years. Go Bucks!
So now, after reading these initial impressions, I am contemplating an NCAA 2006 purchase, something I thought I may pass on this year. I’ll probably still wait until its price comes down a bit, but as it stands now, I think I may be NCAA’ing it again this year.
Don’t forget…
… about the Carnival of Gamers #4!
The Place: Cathode Tan
The Host: Josh of Cathode Tan
The Submission Email: carniegrue AT gmail dot com
Make sure you get your entries to Josh ASAP! I’ve got something I’m working on but I’m not sure it will be ready for the Carnival, so I may have to comb through the archives for something this time around.
Happy 4th of July!
Hopefully everyone in the good old US of A had a great Fourth of July! I took a little break from video games this weekend, it was rather nice. But it’s back to the old grind tomorrow (both at work and in Guild Wars).
Wouldn’t it be great if Independence Day was actually Independence Week?! Man that would be flippin’ sweet.
Speaking of Golf…
I’m always about two weeks behind on my Penny-Arcade reading, so I just came across this one tonight:
Absolutely hilarious. So my golf fantasies have come full-circle: I checked my Yahoo Fantasy Golf League (yes, Virginia, there is Fantasy Golf), played a round of Shot-Online, got my Penny-Arcade golf comic fix, and in about six and a half hours, I’ll be hitting the links with some friends (and fellow-buttonmashers) for a round of early morning golf. I should be asleep right now but I’m too giddy with anticipation.
Golf is life!
Shot-Online, Season 2
I may be going out on a limb saying this, but I would imagine the majority of you readers are not playing Shot-Online, the greatest Golf MMORPG EVAR. That being said, if by some chance you are playing (or have played in the past) Shot-Online, then you’ll be pleased to know that “Season 2” has launched. The website has been redesigned and there’s a whole new client to download. I downloaded and played a round of golf but I didn’t notice too many changes.
The game is still free, but you can always throw PayPal money (it’s fake, like Monopoly money, right?) at them and buy in-game items from the store. I’m all for them trying to make their money this way, but I’d rather earn my items the old-fashioned way — grinding through hundreds of rounds of golf. Call me a glutton for cyber-punishment, but if I can’t grind, I ain’t playing.
So far I haven’t played a round of golf with other players yet. I’m still a lowly level 6 golfer with no game to speak of. It’s depressing to have my all-time longest drive be 207 yards. And that’s when it was sunny and a 10 MPH wind at my back. I figure once I get up around level 10 or so I’m going to give the whole multiplayer thing a try. But for now, I still think Shot-Online is a pretty fun game, especially the free part.
Are you a cheapskate?
If you are, and you’re a console gamer, you need to know about this. You may have to register to access this. In a nutshell, there’s a huge list of games that will be on sale ($9.99 a pop) next week at Circuit City. If I can beat the hoarders to my local CCs, there’s a couple games I’d like to get my hands on (Baten Kaitos, F Zero, Riddick)
Useless Silicon…
Want to know how to make a little square piece of silicon absolutely worthless? Process it to contain 63 million transistors (say, to be a GeForce 4 Ti 4200 core), each pumping electrons to-and-fro, allow this switching to heat up the silicon really hot and then make sure the fan on the heatsink is broken. This should ruin all those submicron oxide layers and other tiny features and make your GPU a piece of worthless silicon. Which is what exactly happened to my trusty ASUS VT9280. It was quite a workhorse, even though it was at the low-end of the GeForce 4 cards. It served me well for almost 3 years, so I can’t complain too much. The little fan pumped as much as it could but lately I had noticed it was sounding a bit louder than normal. Then last night it went ka-put, dying a horrible, sizzling death. It has shaded its last pixel and verticed its last vertex. A moment of silence, if you please.
Thank you.
I guess I should see this as somewhat of a boon. This gives me a chance to upgrade to a better card and not feel guilty (or feel the proverbial heat from the buttonWife, since she uses the PC, too). I decided not to go all out on the new card, but I didn’t skimp either. I’m still an nVidia guy, so I’m sticking with the family with a new EVGA e-GeForce 6600 GT. The card is a bit old but I think it will suffice just fine. I’m not running DOOM3 at insane resolutions, I just want to get back to some Guild Wars. I’m going through withdrawls and I need a fix. Lucky for me, I snagged a good deal on the card and I’m excited about my new hardware. It’s like my birthday or something.
I didn’t get around to installing it tonight but hopefully this time tomorrow I’ll be running around Ascalon, powered by my new trusty 6600 GT.
You ever dance with the devil…
Went and saw Batman Begins tonight and I must agree with the consesus — it’s GOOD. It takes a while to get going but it really hums once the movie finds its pace. I was a little wary of Christian Bale being cast as the next Batman, and at first I thought he looked a little off, but seeing him in the mask, he just looked right. Keaton looked right. Kilmer and Clooney did not (certainly not Clooney).
The casting was great. Gary Oldman is one of my favorite actors and he plays his part so well. Freeman and Caine were great. Neeson was a bit of a stretch, but that is forgivable. People are panning Katie Holmes but I thought there was just enough of her – that is to say not a lot. The guy that plays the Scarecrow was pretty creepy.
I give it a thumbs up. Action was fast and chaotic, not mechanical and choreographed. Nothing felt hokey, it felt real. It was a great movie and a great foundation to who Batman is. Now there is depth to Bruce Wayne’s past, but I’m a little confused. I don’t know the whole Batman mythos but it was my understanding that Jack Napier (aka The Joker) killed Bruce’s parents. Well, that appears to not be the case in Batman Begins. I’m so confused… can anyone clear this up?
Update: Wikipedia sheds some light on the Joe Chill/Jack Napier issue. (Thanks, Amit!)