Recently, watching those Portal 2 trailers/previews got me thinking: "I could sure go for some Paranoia right now." You know, Paranoia, the game where The Computer controls everything, and is your friend, and where you could easily die due to your own stupidity (you should have known that that corridor was full of invisible lasers) or as just one subject in The Computer's experiments.
The first edition was published in Nineteen Eighty-Four.
I realized that people who liked Portal would probably like Paranoia, as far as RPGs go. Admittedly, if they don't already play RPGs, then Paranoia is probably a bad introduction to them, seeing as how knowing the rules is treason, but that's beside the point.
Anyway, that got me thinking: Given a video game, what RPG would a person who likes that probably also like?
If you liked Portal, then you'll love Paranoia.
If you liked DDO, then you'll love D&D 3.5.
That's all that I've got so far. I'm working on a list, which you can find here. If you have suggestions for VGs that I forgot, RPGs that I forgot, connections that I missed or didn't do justice, or whatever, then leave a comment below, send me an e-mail, or hit me up on twitter.
Tuesday, June 29, 2010
Friday, June 25, 2010
Pokemon: All Natural Challenge
I've got a special challenge for all of you Pokemon trainers out there. The short version of it is quite simple:
Don't use TMs.
Now, I'll tell you a story.
Back when I was playing the original games, starting with Blue version, I didn't use TMs, basically because they're one-time use, and I didn't want to use one inappropriately and get messed up. There were some that could be purchased, but those cost money anyway, and I kind of naturally hoarded it. Remember that this was back before repeat battles and Amulet Coins.
Of course, you can still get all of your favorite TM moves. After all, lots of Pokemon learn TM moves. For instance, in Pokemon Ruby, Pikachu learns Thunderbolt and Thunder by leveling up, and those are both also TMs.
Thus, breeding can be important. I'll give you an example.
Want a Rhydon with Iron Tail and Thunderbolt? Breed a male Aggron with Iron Tail onto a female Rhyhorn, and get a male Rhyhorn with Iron Tail. Breed that onto a female Pikachu to get a male Pichu that knows Iron Tail. Evolve that into a Pikachu, and level it up until it learns Thunderbolt. Breed that onto a female Rhyhorn, and the hatchling Rhyhorn will know Thunderbolt and Iron Tail. Well, that last part only works assuming that Bulbapedia is correct. I'll double-check.
Holy crap. The one that I'm planning will know Thunder, too. XD Yes, I'm actually still following the "All Natural Challenge" to this day. It keeps things interesting.
"But wait!", you say, "That will make it harder to make a competitive team."
That's why it's a challenge. ;)
P.S.: Let me know what you think in the comments below!
Don't use TMs.
Now, I'll tell you a story.
Back when I was playing the original games, starting with Blue version, I didn't use TMs, basically because they're one-time use, and I didn't want to use one inappropriately and get messed up. There were some that could be purchased, but those cost money anyway, and I kind of naturally hoarded it. Remember that this was back before repeat battles and Amulet Coins.
Of course, you can still get all of your favorite TM moves. After all, lots of Pokemon learn TM moves. For instance, in Pokemon Ruby, Pikachu learns Thunderbolt and Thunder by leveling up, and those are both also TMs.
Thus, breeding can be important. I'll give you an example.
Want a Rhydon with Iron Tail and Thunderbolt? Breed a male Aggron with Iron Tail onto a female Rhyhorn, and get a male Rhyhorn with Iron Tail. Breed that onto a female Pikachu to get a male Pichu that knows Iron Tail. Evolve that into a Pikachu, and level it up until it learns Thunderbolt. Breed that onto a female Rhyhorn, and the hatchling Rhyhorn will know Thunderbolt and Iron Tail. Well, that last part only works assuming that Bulbapedia is correct. I'll double-check.
Holy crap. The one that I'm planning will know Thunder, too. XD Yes, I'm actually still following the "All Natural Challenge" to this day. It keeps things interesting.
"But wait!", you say, "That will make it harder to make a competitive team."
That's why it's a challenge. ;)
P.S.: Let me know what you think in the comments below!
Thursday, May 27, 2010
Kinekt Gear Ring
Apparently, I get an additional entry in this contest for this Kinekt Gear Ring if I blog about it, with a link, and comment with a link to this post. Since I want that ring... well, here you go.
http://reviews.jennyonthespot.com/2010/05/27/bling-bling-its-the-kinekt-gear-ring/
http://reviews.jennyonthespot.com/2010/05/27/bling-bling-its-the-kinekt-gear-ring/
Friday, May 21, 2010
The Economy is Out to Get You
No, I don't mean that the economy has become sentient and decided that you're its enemy. That's not quite how it works. Here's what I mean.
As you're probably already aware, inflation is bad. In short, inflation is bad because your money is weaker, so the same amount of money gets the consumer less stuff, or the consumer has to spend more to get the same stuff. Thanks to inflation, a dollar doesn't go as far as it used to go.
So, the opposite of inflation - deflation - must be good, right? Well, that's not quite true. When deflation occurs, the average consumer has less money to spend. Thus, while the money might go as far as before, there's less of it to spend.
Admittedly, deflation might help a specific individual, if that individual had a steady job and a stable income. That is, it could help if inflation were truly the opposite of deflation. It has come to my attention recently that deflation does not mean that prices actually go down. Rather, deflation occurs when less money is spent on a given commodity. So, when layoffs hit an area, and people have to find lower-paying jobs, they're less likely to spend money on unnecessary things, and they're likely to spend as little as possible on necessities - buying generic brands of foods, for instance. Thus, the market value of a given general commodity - bread, beans, butter, that sort of thing - goes down, while the prices that manufacturers stamp on their products remains the same.
Basically, inflation's bad for each person individually, and deflation means that the economy is doing poorly.
I'm sure that I could have articulated this more clearly, but I think that you get the point.
As you're probably already aware, inflation is bad. In short, inflation is bad because your money is weaker, so the same amount of money gets the consumer less stuff, or the consumer has to spend more to get the same stuff. Thanks to inflation, a dollar doesn't go as far as it used to go.
So, the opposite of inflation - deflation - must be good, right? Well, that's not quite true. When deflation occurs, the average consumer has less money to spend. Thus, while the money might go as far as before, there's less of it to spend.
Admittedly, deflation might help a specific individual, if that individual had a steady job and a stable income. That is, it could help if inflation were truly the opposite of deflation. It has come to my attention recently that deflation does not mean that prices actually go down. Rather, deflation occurs when less money is spent on a given commodity. So, when layoffs hit an area, and people have to find lower-paying jobs, they're less likely to spend money on unnecessary things, and they're likely to spend as little as possible on necessities - buying generic brands of foods, for instance. Thus, the market value of a given general commodity - bread, beans, butter, that sort of thing - goes down, while the prices that manufacturers stamp on their products remains the same.
Basically, inflation's bad for each person individually, and deflation means that the economy is doing poorly.
I'm sure that I could have articulated this more clearly, but I think that you get the point.
Tuesday, April 20, 2010
The Doctor is Human
I've thought about this before, and yesterday, I figured that I should blog about it. The Doctor, from the SF show Doctor Who?, is human.
"But wait," says everyone who knows anything about Doctor Who?, "The Doctor is a time lord." You are correct*, and the time lords are human. It seems most likely that the time lords are the result of the evolution of an isolated human population. They seem morphologically and physiologically so similar to humans that their arising completely independently of Earth's biology would have to occur astronomically improbably. And, of course, being evolved from humans means that they are humans.
Let's compare and contrast. On the one hand, time lords have two hearts** and can regenerate. On the other hand, time lords are bipedal plantigrade pentadactyl tetrapods with opposable thumbs, fingernails, two forward-facing color-vision eyes set in closed ocular orbits in skull-enclosed heads with hinged jaws bearing white, bony teeth, pink, fleshy tongues, and soft, pliable lips, altogether capable of speaking human languages, ostensibly with the assistance of vocal chords. They also ingest food through this forward-facing face-holes and apparently have taste buds, too. Time lords also have fleshy, dish-shaped ears on the sides of their heads, hair that grows out of the tops of their heads, along their eyebrows - and, by the way, eyebrows - and reduced or absent hair elsewhere. Also, time lords have skin in that variegated sepia range (dark brown to pale peach-ish) that humans have, as opposed to, say, green or orange. Oh, and time lords can be killed by untreated cyanide poisoning.
That's basically my argument for why the time lords are human. There are other things, but I haven't actually seen proof of them. For instance, I'm assuming that time lords have spinal chords enveloped in vertebrae, which would make them chordates and vertebrates, respectively, but I haven't actually gotten a look at The Doctor's back well enough to tell if there are vertebrae there, so I didn't list them above.
Anyway, if you see anything that I should have included in my lists, then leave a comment below, but, more importantly, if you see someplace where you think that I might be wrong, then leave a comment below.
That's all for now.
*as long as you didn't add a clause asserting that The Doctor is not human
**The fact that time lords have hearts is a similarity, by the way.
"But wait," says everyone who knows anything about Doctor Who?, "The Doctor is a time lord." You are correct*, and the time lords are human. It seems most likely that the time lords are the result of the evolution of an isolated human population. They seem morphologically and physiologically so similar to humans that their arising completely independently of Earth's biology would have to occur astronomically improbably. And, of course, being evolved from humans means that they are humans.
Let's compare and contrast. On the one hand, time lords have two hearts** and can regenerate. On the other hand, time lords are bipedal plantigrade pentadactyl tetrapods with opposable thumbs, fingernails, two forward-facing color-vision eyes set in closed ocular orbits in skull-enclosed heads with hinged jaws bearing white, bony teeth, pink, fleshy tongues, and soft, pliable lips, altogether capable of speaking human languages, ostensibly with the assistance of vocal chords. They also ingest food through this forward-facing face-holes and apparently have taste buds, too. Time lords also have fleshy, dish-shaped ears on the sides of their heads, hair that grows out of the tops of their heads, along their eyebrows - and, by the way, eyebrows - and reduced or absent hair elsewhere. Also, time lords have skin in that variegated sepia range (dark brown to pale peach-ish) that humans have, as opposed to, say, green or orange. Oh, and time lords can be killed by untreated cyanide poisoning.
That's basically my argument for why the time lords are human. There are other things, but I haven't actually seen proof of them. For instance, I'm assuming that time lords have spinal chords enveloped in vertebrae, which would make them chordates and vertebrates, respectively, but I haven't actually gotten a look at The Doctor's back well enough to tell if there are vertebrae there, so I didn't list them above.
Anyway, if you see anything that I should have included in my lists, then leave a comment below, but, more importantly, if you see someplace where you think that I might be wrong, then leave a comment below.
That's all for now.
*as long as you didn't add a clause asserting that The Doctor is not human
**The fact that time lords have hearts is a similarity, by the way.
Tuesday, March 30, 2010
Daylight Wasting Time
I was recently thinking about how, a long time ago, I deduced that Daylight Saving Time is actually quite wasteful. So, I tried to go back and re-deduce my previous logic.
First of all, DST obviously doesn't change, in either direction, the amount of daylight that there is. The clouds don't part, the Earth's spin doesn't change, and Earth's sun doesn't brighten or dim based on how we've set our clocks.
Moreover, though, DST makes us have to deal with nighttime more. Think of it this way. Imagine that, on a certain day, sunrise would be at 0600. This is just to make the math simple. Let's say that you would wake up at 0600. In that case, you would get up at sunrise. But wait! What if it's DST? Well, we set our clocks 1 hour ahead. Now, sunrise is at 0700. If you're anybody besides a farmer (or hunter-gatherer), though, then your schedule isn't based on sunrise; it's based on the clock. So, if you're waking up at 0600, then you're waking up 1 hour before sunrise. This can be applied to any time, of course. If you'd get up at 0615 - 15 minutes after sunrise - then you'll get up at 0615 - 45 minutes before sunrise.
I noticed this back when I was going to school, since it increased the frequency and extent to which we would have to travel to school in the dark. Of course, this also affects teachers, bus drivers, and parents who have to get their kids ready for school. This also tends to affect anyone who works an 8-5 job, which is probably at least half of all workers.
I mentioned farmers, so I've probably gotten someone thinking "but DST was made for farmers!" Well, that doesn't really make sense. Farmers don't care what time the clocks say. Sunrise could happen at gobbledygook mcsquigglepants and it wouldn't matter.
First of all, DST obviously doesn't change, in either direction, the amount of daylight that there is. The clouds don't part, the Earth's spin doesn't change, and Earth's sun doesn't brighten or dim based on how we've set our clocks.
Moreover, though, DST makes us have to deal with nighttime more. Think of it this way. Imagine that, on a certain day, sunrise would be at 0600. This is just to make the math simple. Let's say that you would wake up at 0600. In that case, you would get up at sunrise. But wait! What if it's DST? Well, we set our clocks 1 hour ahead. Now, sunrise is at 0700. If you're anybody besides a farmer (or hunter-gatherer), though, then your schedule isn't based on sunrise; it's based on the clock. So, if you're waking up at 0600, then you're waking up 1 hour before sunrise. This can be applied to any time, of course. If you'd get up at 0615 - 15 minutes after sunrise - then you'll get up at 0615 - 45 minutes before sunrise.
I noticed this back when I was going to school, since it increased the frequency and extent to which we would have to travel to school in the dark. Of course, this also affects teachers, bus drivers, and parents who have to get their kids ready for school. This also tends to affect anyone who works an 8-5 job, which is probably at least half of all workers.
I mentioned farmers, so I've probably gotten someone thinking "but DST was made for farmers!" Well, that doesn't really make sense. Farmers don't care what time the clocks say. Sunrise could happen at gobbledygook mcsquigglepants and it wouldn't matter.
Friday, March 12, 2010
Survival Mode Tweak
I've come up with a tweak to what I'll call "Survival Mode" in this post. Survival Mode, for our purposes, is a mode in a video game (usually a first person shooter) where each team (usually 2, possibly more) has a certain number of lives, and the first team to run out of lives loses. (Problems arise with 3 or more teams. Does the game end when 1 team is out? (presumably, whoever has the most lives left wins) Or do you keep going until there's one team left with lives? (creating a player elimination - or in this case, team eliminatiion - mechanic))
But what if the teams have different numbers of players? For instance, what happens in a 5v4 game? Well, usually, each team gets the same number of lives. In some games, though, the larger team might have an advantage, as 5 people are better at killing 4 people than 4 people are at killing 5 people, all things being equal. Here, I propose a tweak to this sort of gameplay.
Instead of counting deaths, count spawns. In this way, the team with 5 players uses up 5 spawns right away, while that with 4 players only uses up 4 spawns. Of course, this shortens the game unless the base level of "lives" is changed, but that's up to each game, anyway.
But what if the teams have different numbers of players? For instance, what happens in a 5v4 game? Well, usually, each team gets the same number of lives. In some games, though, the larger team might have an advantage, as 5 people are better at killing 4 people than 4 people are at killing 5 people, all things being equal. Here, I propose a tweak to this sort of gameplay.
Instead of counting deaths, count spawns. In this way, the team with 5 players uses up 5 spawns right away, while that with 4 players only uses up 4 spawns. Of course, this shortens the game unless the base level of "lives" is changed, but that's up to each game, anyway.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)