Aleph Ersatz

When I first started League of Legends I thought it was great.  Hell, I made a big review like post about it claiming it to be fun and worth trying.  Well now, I am taking all that back.

LoL is crap, not because of the gameplay, but because people have destroyed it.  The forums are filled with trolls, assholes, and bigots.  Event the forum “Adjudicators” are racists and are verbal about it.  The game is filled with Elitist assholes, the updates cater only to those that have hundreds of hours to devote to unlocking the “Legendary” champions, while us causla plays get raped and blamed for all their failings.  It is not fun.  It is not enjoyable.  It is not worth the hassle.

The basic problem is this: to unlock the good champions, runes, and summoner level,  you need IP or RP.  IP you get by playing games, win or loss, but more for winning.  RP you can pay for.  However, to win a Normal game, you need a good champion and rune setup, which requires you to play.  IP and XP are reduced for practice games, and if you practice agaisnt bots, you get nothing.  So the only way to win is to either pay money, or have played practice games till you are sick of them just to stand a chance in norma games.

This hugely cuts into the fun factor because not only do you have to grind, but you also end up frustrated from all the trash talk.  And there is tons of trash talk.  LoL is filled with igrnorant trolls, which makes every PUG a huge hit-and-miss exercise.  Even pre-forming a team with friends is usually a 50-50 chance of winning at best.

Thus, the only way to enjoy this free game is to pay for the good content.  The best heros can be unlocked easily once paid for, making practice and low-level summoner games easy.  Once that is bought, then one can enjoy the game.  Otherwise, playing LoL is a gigantically frustrating waste of time.

That’s right, game’s, I’ve been playing them!  Or at least trying demos.

Tired the demo for the over-hyped Left 4 Dead 2.  While I’m a fan of Left 4 Dead, 2 doesn’t offer all that much more in the way of “new features”, just some new faces, voices and terrain.  The whole addition of melee weapons takes away from the dual pistol logic, pretty much cripling any interest I had in it.  Sure, a frying pan is fun to wahck zombies with, but what about being able to use a Mag Pistol and  Frying Pan?  Why do I have to sacrifice a pistol that is vastly supperior to half of the starting weapons for a stupid melee?  Why do I need limited ammo?  C’mon guys!

I have the beta of League of Legends, but have not played it yet.  Looks like a decent RTS game, with some fun multiplayer, I just have not started it up yet.  The beta is free to pay, so I’m sold on that for the time being.  The website feels far too much like a korean MMO right now, but that’s fine because most korean MMOs are actually rather fun, even if rediculously hard on the leraning curve.

Have my eyes set on Tortchlight in the near future.  $20 for a Diablo-clone by the same guys that made Diablo?  What’ not to love there?  Mayb be a single-player game, but for that price, a self-distributed game is probably well worth it.  I’ve heard many good reviews of it, and I’m hoping it holds up.  I’m a huge fan of Diablo, and with luck this litte pck-me-up will be just the thing I need while I’m waiting for Diablo III to show it’s ugly face in 2011.

I have tried 3 times to download the Mod verion of Dino D-Day, with no luck.  It is supposedly a HL2 mod and soon-to-be-full-game where you fight Nazi Dinosaurs.  (For anyone who has seen Idiocracy, this should not be a new concept)  The demo video looked fun but I have given up trying to download it for now.  I just cannot get an installer that works!  Maybe sometime in the future, when I feel the need to punch a T-Rex in the face, I will try again.

Lastly, I found out about a Startcraft AI competition.  Seems that this game just will not die!  Several APIs exist for developing bots for the existing game, adding on their own AI dlls to play against.  A very nifty concept and impressiv for a 10+ year old game.  Expressive Intelligence Studio is holding an AI competition with a dealine of September 2010 for entries.  They promote using something called the BroodWar API for programming it.  It’s a nifty and pretty straight-forward way to interface with the game, and allows anyone with basic C++ knowledge to easily work with the game and programming.  They are also working on a LUA interface for scripting that way too.

I’ve been poking at the BW API just a little and have decided I am going to go as far as making an AI that builds a basic base, and sends a single group of units to attack.  That’s all I want to do because making a proper AI is way way to hard.  Now if anyone wants to try and start a team to develop a SC AI, then I’d be glad to help, but by myself I just do not have the time, motivation, or knowledge to make a working, let alone competative level, AI for SC.

I have found a wodnerful site for tracking one’s anime and manga lists: http://www.myanimelist.net

I have disabled the Otaku List subpage off of this site and am switched over to using hat website instead.

You can check out my new pages here:

Anime List

Manga List

Does anyone know of any decent alternatives to facebook? I never use the apps, and I only use it to keep in contact with people or coordinate events. I seriously hate that thing and I want to shut My account down, it’s my currently link to a few people.
Suggestions?

Hey look, another three weeks and not a damn post.  I swear, I’m alwamost ready to try that stupid Twitter thing.

Finish Scribblenauts.  The puzzles were not as hard as I expected.  90% of them have a pretty basic solution once you know how to use things like ropes, tractor beams, helicopters, and the occasional velociraptor.  After that, it’s all just easy wins.

Still have to finish GTA4 now, and return to Fallout 3 now that the GotY edition and all the DLC is comng out.  After that I’m planning to try Bioshock or maybe Borderlands, depending on what I can run.

Left 4 Dead 2 is almost out, and I’m almost ready to get it.  Seriously, frying pans?  Who doesn’t want to try using that against a horde of brain-hungry living undeads???  But I mean, barely a year after L4D came out, another $50 seems a bit much.  Maybe steam will have a deal soon …. or I can find 3 other suck…I mean, friends yeah, friends….

Anime evolution 2010 will be on for August 13 - 15 at UBC!  It has been confirmed on the forums!  Prereg will start in november, and I will be there, in costume!

And yes, I’m being link-lazy today.  You can “google” the stuff I mentioned, I know you can.

Okay, I’m hooked on Scribblenauts.  Now that the novely of creating damn near everything I’ve ever wanted is done, ‘m not trying to sole the puzzles and levels.  They are HARD!  But, I found an awesome resource I have been helping with some: Scribblenauts Wiki!  Not alot of stuff yet, but very organized and setup nicely!

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In other news, GT5 looks amazing.  I wonder if it’s coming out for the PS3 or the PS4?  I mean seriously, when will it be done?  Even if your not into the game, or cars, the music is damn awesome for this video.  That’s supposedly in-game rendering only, too.

Or check out the song by London Elektricity.  It’s called Just One Minutee (Apex remix).

If you havne’t heard of it, Scribblenauts just came out and I got to try it today for a little while.  Long story short: I want it!  Thus, I endevoured to find it today after work.  While everyplace is sold out, the most homourous place to visit was London Drugs.  You have to love associates that have no fucking clue what they are doing or what they sell.

My coworker P and I entered London Drugs, found the games section and browsed the scant selection of DS and Wii titles, hidden behind the Wii accessories.  While their selection sucks, they do have DS and Wii stuff there.  So we went to find an associate for help.

P: “Excuse me, do you carry DS games?”

SA1: “Maybe, over there my know.”

P: “We’re looking for a specific DS game, can you look it up?”

SA1: “Let’s go ask them.

We wander ove to the games section where another associate is busy with a  customer.

SA1 (to SA2): “These guys are looking for Nintendo DS, er Nintendo DS games or DS games.”

SA2: “We don’t sell Nintendo stuff here.  Sony and Microsoft only.”

SA1: “Oh ok.  Sorry guys.”

We proceeded to look at each other, thank them both, and walk a littl ways away.  We got about 15 feet, then burst out laughing.  We joked about going back and pointing out the Wii and DS stuff in the store, but man, how bad can you be?  It’s your department, you should know what you sell!  Unless, of course, Sony makes the DS, then man have I been working for the wrong people!

After two and a half straight days of playing it, I have to say that Demigod is a fantastic LAN party game.  I wish we’d found it sooner!

Easy to pick up, easy to challenge oneself, easy to strategize and perfect.  Damnably entertaining in large groups or small.

So I didn’t even hold out six months before I’m back on the “no-posting” wagon.  For a while there, I actually contemplated switching to Twitter, but really, I don’t want to be a twit.  And the concept is stupid.  I hope it dies, just like that stupid AYBABTU.  That didn’t last long, right?  I mean, who even remebers it?

I have been up to alot, actually.  Working, tons, been doing 200+ hours a month again.  Reading tons and tons of manga.  The otaku list needs a major update as I’ve read at least 10 - 15 different books and novels in the last while.  Found a bunch of new good stuff, and some of the worst mangas in existence!

I’ve begun the long and arduous process of learing Japanese.  Not only am I horrible with spoken languages, but this one also involves re-learing how to read.  However, I’ve managed to nail down most of the Hiragana table, so all I need to do is learn Katakana, practice, and start learning the grammar structures.  Sounds so easy doesn’t it?  Been practicing my reading on vaious things around - maily mangas - and actually I’m doing pretty well.  Plus I’ve found a variety of very useful and informative websites.

• Grammar and Langauge: http://www.guidetojapanese.org/index.html
• Writing and tidbits: http://japanese.about.com/
• Writing: http://www.geocities.com/Tokyo/Shrine/7047/
• Hiragana Pracice: http://www.chipchat.com/NihonGo/protect/HiraganaDrill.html
• Katakana Practice: http://www.chipchat.com/NihonGo/protect/KatakanaDrill.html

I’m actually really enjoying being able to read it.  It seems like such a huge feat, but I know there is much more to come.

Lastly, I wrote a letter to a newspaper and got it printed.  While not hugely exciting, I’m kinda happy.  It’s in today’s Now Newspaper.  If you can read it.  I’m not readily posting a link because it lists my name on the letter.  But if you know me, send me an IM or email and I’ll send you a link.

Finally finished The Talisman.  Was a pretty good book, very interesting, and I can see how the styles of King and Straub converge, but generally had a  good idea of when King was he predominant writer.  His work just burrows under the skin of one’s imagination, creepy as hell, but absolutely fantastic.

With that is done, I’ve been pounding away and the local libraries’ manga collection.  Found a few interesting ones, and updated my otaku list to match waht I’ve read recently.  Insert sigh here. It grows, always growing…

Got my hands on The High End of Low.  Jesus fuck, was that ever a load of shit.  Not that I expect much from a Manson album, but that was pure, uninspired, crack induced crap. Not even worth a once-over listen too.  Couldn’t do more than three songs at a time, at most.

Gladly, though, a couple other good albums may be coming out soon from artists I enjoy alot more than Manson.  VNV nation has a new album on the 23rd, and are touring.  Now if I could only get to Seattle for July 1st!  30 Seconds to Mars may also have a new album soon, which will also be pleasing.  There are a couple more, too, I just cannot remeber whom!