May 28 2008
Mass Effect Review // PC /// Eurogamer
Nice review that considers Mass Effect from a higher level regarding its story and immersiveness, as opposed to basic review of the gameplay since it’s pretty much the same as the Xbox 360 version.
May 27 2008
On Friday I told Phil Bell, my adviser, that yes I would accept an RA position with the Learning in Informal and Formal Environments (LIFE) Center. This meant that on Saturday, I emailed the Teacher Education Program (TEP) folks that I wouldn’t be returning to the tech instructor position I’ve had for the last 3 years.
TEP is going through a pretty exciting renewal process right now with the newly designed program debuting this quarter. It has an added online web community component that is being worked on over the summer, so it was relatively difficult for me to leave at a time when I could probably give some really handy advise.
Doing research with the LIFE Center, however, is too good to pass up. In a meeting with Phil last Tuesday, he basically informed me that I could continue doing my own research but just figure out a way to integrate it with the bigger LIFE stuff. He also said that we’ve talked about it before. The thing with Phil, though, is that I think we’re not always on the same page, so I’ve never really felt comfortable with joining LIFE for fear of having to put my WoW stuff aside. I figure, it’s still not super clear exactly what’s expected of me, but whatever. I can deal with change and set boundaries.
Anyway, it makes sense to collaborate with other LIFE people however it unfolds. Obviously, my data speaks of an informal setting where learning occurs. With the Center’s focus on innovation, leadership, collaboration, expertise, etc. it makes complete sense for me to join since those are essentially what I’m interested in, too.
All this typing is leading to the big news, though: I figure I need to return the laptop that I’m using right now to TEP, so I shopped around for a replacement! :)
I was going to wait until the end of the summer since I can probably hold onto the TEP MacBook Pro until they get a replacement for me, but since I’ll be traveling for a month this summer, I decided I needed a gaming laptop for Mass Effect, Age of Conan, World of Warcraft, and the Warhammer beta. I also decided, however, that I don’t need a top of the line gaming laptop since it’ll only be a month, so those crazy $6000 laptops from Falcon Northwest were off-limits.
Instead, I bought a $1350 Asus G1Sn-A1. The important bit is that it has a nVidia 9500M GS video card, which is basically the same as the 8600M GT that looks like it was popular last year. I know later this year, there are supposed to be mobile versions of the video card I have in my desktop system right now, which tells me that the one I just bought will be a little less powerful than my desktop’s, so this laptop certainly won’t be a desktop replacement for me. It should be totally fine for at least a year, though; probably at least two years. I mean this (older) MacBook Pro has an X1600 in it and it still runs TF2 fine.
There was another laptop that I could’ve gotten: a Sager NP2092. It was cheaper by about $150 but didn’t have as nice a warranty (Asus has a 1 year accident coverage on top of the standard hardware failure warranty!). The Sager also didn’t have as many ports and such. Only VGA out, for example.
What’s weird is that there’s also no DVI port on the Asus, but it has HDMI and maybe that’s the newer standard… I dunno; haven’t really kept up with hardware changes in a couple of years, but I thought HDMI was for TVs and stuff.
it’s amazing how much one can learn about laptops/notebooks in two days through sites like notebookreview.com
May 21 2008
I’m having technical difficulties uploading the videos I recorded during the Convergence Conference on Virtual Worlds that occurred in World of Warcraft earlier this month. Those videos will be uploaded shortly. Meanwhile here’s the chat transcripts from the three sessions.
Yes, I started a Rickroll… :) Slightly disorganized, since the panelists and attendees were all using guild chat, but I didn’t mind the chaos. Read about the session and panelists at http://convergentsystems.pbwiki.com/Session%201
A little less disorganized. Chat backchannel with Terror Novas about making it more orderly, but I felt uncomfortable with the idea of enforcing control. Maybe it’s a generational thing? I thought the stream of info was fine and that the panelist answers could just be in a separate channel, rather than forcing non-panelists into silence as seemed to be suggested. Read about the session and panelists at http://convergentsystems.pbwiki.com/Session+2
A massive info dump where lots of attendees discussed answers to the day’s questions. Afterwards there was an in-game wedding and then a raid on Sentinel Hill. For the Horde! Read about the session at http://convergentsystems.pbwiki.com/Session+3
Also, check out my screenshots!
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| Convergenc |
May 21 2008
As you can see above…
I’m joining Terry Schenold and others in the Critical Gaming Project at UW, and part of what we’re doing is setting up/maintaining a website with a blog and a forum, so I’m seeing how forum posts could be showcased on a blog by using mine as a testbed. :)
May 16 2008
Sightseeing in Liberty City – a set on Flickr
Cool comparison shots of New York compared to Liberty City!
May 13 2008
How to Build Team Morale & Cohesion by Goofing Off
From the Accidental Scientist. Relates to trust building through camaraderie I touch on in my WoW paper…
May 12 2008
but right now it occupies about 200GB of my hard drive and I ran out of disk space to actually compress the files! So yesterday, after dropping SG off at the airport, we went to Fry’s so I could get a new external hard drive. $100 for 500GB! I remember when I paid $550 for 340MB or so (early 90s)… (and of course even crazier about 10 years before that when my dad bought our first computer…)
So anyway, videos of the World of Warcraft conference that was held in WoW will be compressed soon and uploaded to a server somewhere… :)
May 09 2008
Today, tomorrow, and Sunday, there is a conference on virtual worlds research being held in World of Warcraft (noon Eastern Time, Earthen Ring, US, Horde side, Science guild). If you can’t join, you can watch the live feed each day at World2Worlds.
I’ll write-up full comments after this weekend when Gray and Song Gong (house guests who need someone to play boardgames with!) leave.
I have to say, though, that the panelists and moderators and that whole format worked a lot more in WoW than what I’ve seen similarly attempted in Second Life, but part of it was that I knew exactly how to manipulate WoW’s interface so that I could easily follow the chat. I also was able to /chatlog it all and Frapsed it all as a half-size movie to my HD. Now I have to compress the videos for storage (my HD is FULL!).
May 09 2008
Last Night On Earth, about 5 times – Best zombie game I’ve played.. though I’ve only played 3 or so. It can be unbalanced depending on the luck of the draw and dice rolling, especially for the zombie master, but it’s still a fun game. And it comes with a soundtrack CD! Too bad it isn’t quite long enough… We ended up playing that and the Event Horizon soundtrack, which was perfect.
Arkham Horror, three times – Fun cooperative Cthulhu-themed game. A little long to set up, so we played it again the next day before putting it away. Our first game, including set-up, took about 8 hours (spread over two days)! The next one took only 3 or so and the final one took about 5 hours… but that was partially because midway through we had a black-out. Seriously! And had to take some time to find and light candles. Photos soon… :)
World of Warcraft the Boardgame – I set expectations low on this one since I’ve played it many times before and decided that it wasn’t as good as I’d hoped. Alliance and Horde factions end up playing two separate games, almost, with lots of downtime as you wait for the other faction. So this time we played with a variant where we were all on one side (Horde, of course!). The only problem here was that we had four players so the end fight was a little unbalanced. But still, I thought it was fun. I think maybe there should be some way to keep a running total of all dice you get to role so that you don’t have to keep counting them during each battle. That might save some time.
Rummikub – I played this with Robin, my mom, and my brother a few weeks ago when we were at Ocean Shores. Fun game. Gray is very, very tired of it, after apparently growing up with it.
Give me the Brain – Aaron gave me this along with a bunch of other Cheap Ass Games (see below for others) since he was clearing out his closet. Players are zombies in a fast food joint and compete for control of the one brain among them to fulfill various orders or complete tasks. It wasn’t as fun as I remember, but still… :p
Lord of the Fries – Another CAG. This game is what I remember more and liked more. And this time I still liked it. A card matching game. I wonder if it could be combined with needing the brain to put fulfill orders… or if that would just make it mean you need one more card for the run…
Bleeding Sherwood, twice – Another CAG. Very resource-scarce bidding game featuring men of Sherwood Forest exploiting/ransoming or whatever various characters they meet. I thought it was fun and quick.
Duff Dice, about 8 times – Basically, Liar’s Dice with a Simpsons theme. The Duff beer cans need felt lining or something to make the game less loud and jarring to my bleeding ears.
Blackbeard – Gray bought this pirate simulation game and had it shipped to my place (it just came out and note that the photo above is not what comes with the game but since it just came out I had a hard time finding a good photo on bgg). It’s one of those independent publishers that wait for enough pre-orders before printing a game. Some bad things about it are: a. there a numerous typos despite the manual being available on the web for a while (I guess no one who read the manual reported back to them that there were typos). One huge typo on the game board itself (Soth instead of South). and b. the game seemed relatively dependent on the cards you drew without a lot of strategy that you could do with two or more of your pirate ships. I think Gray thought it royally sucked. Song Gong and I are willing to give it another shot before we pass judgment.
Pandemic – Fun cooperative game that I mentioned before. I like this game because it takes about 45 minutes. Makes for a great, light game to introduce others to boardgaming, since coop mode makes the possibility of newbies being trounced by veterans impossible.
Clans, twice – A cool area control game… Somewhat reminds me of water beading up on a smooth, water resistant surface. :)
May 02 2008
for a week of total geekdom.
We’re going to try to play at least these games:
And we’re going to the Seattle Art Museum‘s Roman exhibit (with a slew of Reedies–”slew?” gaggle? grouping? an anarchy of Reedies maybe?).
I’ll post game write-ups and photos if I have time.
This comes at a time when I’m trying to write a game review on The Witcher and morality in games. I’m also going to submit something for a pre-conference on games ethnography happening as part of AoIR 9 in Copenhagen in October. Due in one week! But if I don’t get in, there’s also a doc consortium happening there and the deadline to submit for that is in 3 weeks. :)
