AWESOME!!! (deals)

So, I hopped on Steam a few days ago and noticed... FREE STUFF!!! That and a whole bunch of deals for those of you with the money to spend. Most games are under 20$ and if you meet certain requirements you can get even more off. I already got Portal and Flat Out free and am going to continue trying to get more. The biggest deal/ contest they have going on right now is, if you can complete enough of their goals and get coal... You could win all of the games steam has to offer... Thousands of games for several days, weeks, or even months of magnificent PC gaming. Anyway, now that I'm done nerding out about that... This is another reason steam isn't such a bad idea if your computer is up to date, and has some good hardware on its side. With the right mind-set and the time, you can play almost any game you could want to.

Anyway I hope all of your christmas's were good, and I hope you continue reading. Until my next post ALONZI!

Its 2011 Christmas!!

A post for all those that celebrate and all those that don't. This happy holiday season has been good to me, and it has shown me that if you try and put yourself out there a lot is possible. In one month I even got 150+ views on this little blog that I honestly didn't expect anyone to read. You all have already given me a gift this year by showing me that people do care about what I say sometimes, but at the same time that doesnt mean they always will or that it was a huge deal. I will keep posting about whatever I can think of and tell me what you think, or even what I could post as another topic later. Merry Christmas, Happy Hanukkah, just happy holidays all around no matter what your religion, what you believe, or what you think. This is the season of happiness and forgiveness.

My job search (a little ranty)

When I moved and got the stuff I had left back over there, everything I own fits into about a single box... But things are not what makes a person great or memorable, its the personality and the mind, and what that person decides to do with it. I still don't have a job and honestly am starting to feel useless, I know I am good with people. I can work with people, I can work with most anything else that's simple enough. My main issue has been that I stopped trying, I know it was a dick move and I'm trying hard again... I'm not used to the working world though, I mean even my brother and sister had an in when they got their jobs. I don't want to wait anymore though, I NEED A JOB! No matter what it is, if I don't get one in a few months I seriously have no idea where my confidence levels are going to be. I know I joked a few times about only wanting a job for Christmas, but honestly, it was no joke... If I could choose between a bunch of fancy gifts, and actually being able to buy anything for myself, I'd choose the ladder. I just wish job hunting was as easy as it was when I got my first job as a paper boy, and than my slightly harder to get job at a mini-mart near my house. Things just have gotten so much more complicated and impersonal, for me if you take out the human element, you take away the draw of the job. Not to say I won't try and conform to the new way of job hunting, but I just don't understand how things got so weird so fast. I've always though you would want to meet the people you hire before hand, no matter what you might be doing, even a phone call would be nice. I guess what I'm trying to say is the new way of job searching is much more tiring for me than what I experienced in the past, makes me feel old saying that but it's how I feel. Please don't take too much of this to heart though, besides the wanting a job thing that is. The point of my posting this was so the few readers I have might know what's going on in my life, after all part of the title is "What I'm doing". Thank you for reading, and remember to keep your chins up, until next post I'll be sleeping......

or not near a computer anyway...

Peace!

Time For A Face-Lift

Or at least that's what most of the sites I frequent must have thought to them selves. I first noticed it on Facebook, it sorta kinda took a page from everywhere else and is letting you have a simple background picture. To me it looks tasteful and is going to keep a lot of people happy, mainly because it didn't screw with Facebook Chat, or the feed page. It does seem easier to read and access, along with letting you check specific months of posts instead of clicking "show more" about a thousand times. In my opinion Facebook's Timeline feature is worth it, just check to see if anyone you know has it and give it a try, as I understand it you can remove it later or simply not publish it if your not sure about it yet. The second place I found some aesthetic changes was YouTube. It started this winter face-lift a while ago, not that I remember when it started... But the changes have only improved usability and have given YouTube an over all nice look. The most recent thing I noticed was the 3D functionality and what seems to be a snowflake effect YouTube has put into some of the videos. I'm not sure which videos can or can not have this effect yet, but a lot of them have a little snow flake button just next to the quality button. I've found various other changes that appear to be minor, I would go into detail as to what they were but it is getting late so I'll just say there have been a lot if you look around. Just to name two sites I've noticed subtle changes in, there's http://www.escapistmagazine.com/ and http://blip.tv/. But as I said, the changes I've been able to find were small, and if you weren't looking you wouldn't notice.

Anyway, happy holidays and have fun with your holiday plans. As for me, I am going to be in the mountains with someone special and half of the family I will eventually call my family. Please comment or whatever you do on here, and give me some ideas if you have some, I'll post again soon.

Suspicious Activity? On My E-Mail? It's more likely than you think...

So, apparently my aol mail account has been disabled for my safety because of its "Suspicious Activity". I had already known about said activity but since there was no option to force me to be logged in to send something, I could do nothing about it. I let it lay where it was and blocked the occasional spam message that I got. Now... After all of this time... AOL has finally caught on to the problem with my account, the only solution however... Close it for MY protection... What The HELL! Honestly I'm not the only one who has an essentially hi-jacked E-mail account, I'm pretty sure mine got jacked from one of my friends hack messages. They didn't send it, but they were infected... You'd think AOL would just have though of something to... I don't know... Disable boting on their mail services? Would it be that hard to make the person have to know a password and where their computer was located? Anything.... I just can't believe this... On top of that my account is now locked for 24 hours because I couldn't answer the security question, which I'm assuming is case sensitive. So, I doubt, HIGHLY, that I will gain access to my MAIN FREAKIN E-MAIL! ...for a while... I know I am no server expert but youd think they would have gotten the help of someone big in virus and spyware protection by now, like oh, I dunno... CISCO systems or McAfee? Seriously, most of the e-mail services out there need to tighten the cracks a little. I don't think this little rant will change anything in any way but, man I wish it would. If anyone else has problems like getting recipient could not be found, when you did not send a message, please comment and tell me about it... Also it would do those people well to memorize, thoroughly their security question answer, so they don't get locked out of their account.

Forge: Simply Magic

So, I play Magic: The Gathering when I can find someone to play with, and when I can find the spare time. I have had only one of those things lately and no deck so I decided to look into a game that I used to play, Forge. It's a fully functional Magic deck tester, or that's what I use it for. You can build a deck out of any of the cards that they have installed which at the moment comes to about 9,536 cards in total, possibly more if there has been an update since I last checked. I assume this project has taken a lot of the designers time, and with it not being made by a company, even more of that individuals time. The creator originally made it just for fun and to see if he could, I coded a little and seeing if you could is a great way to pass time while programming.

The AI works well, the card graphics are the real life card pictures, and the deck builder is fantastic if you know the rules of deck building. Theirs even a working quest mode, that I sadly have to say I have not given a try yet. If the rest of this program says anything about what the quest mode will be like though, I should give it a try as soon as I can.

Over all this game is decent and has support for Mac and PC users. The user interface is simpler than it used to be and is easy on the eyes. If I was Wizards of the Coast, I would allow this game to be produced as a cheap deck tester, even maybe calling it Deck Forge or something. Eh, pipe dreams, but anyway if you are into trading card games and cant figure out magic, give this a try. Hell if you do know how to play magic use it as a deck tester and something to help you find better combinations.

If you'd like to check it out look at their blogger:  http://mtgrares.blogspot.com/
                                                       or their site:  http://www.slightlymagic.net/wiki/Forge

Sometimes the download links go down but its not his fault, just the site he hosts on going down. He always re-posts the content elsewhere though, so if you get into it no worries.


I rate this program 4 out of 5 for ease of use, being one of the few brave enough to keep pushing forward, and for just being a great game overall.

Operating systems: How much do we really know?

We all use one, even if we are on the go using a smart phone. Although I'm going to stick with what I know and talk about the three big players in my opinion. There are the two everyone's heard of, Mac and Windows, but there is actually another option that not everyone considers, it is mostly if not completely free and it is called Linux. From personal experience each of these operating systems works very differently but I haven't really done the research into each of them. I have to say I don't have a lot of experience with Mac but I have used Linux and Windows quite a lot.

Anyway I'll start with what I have heard or do know about Mac. It's better with graphics programs and creative projects than windows is and has a selection of Mac only  programs to select from. While not having as much in the gaming department it still is pretty good about not getting viruses (mainly because no one makes Mac viruses...). Anyway the big thing that turns me away from buying a Mac computer isn't the operating system, its the way they are built half of the time, with the monitor and computer in one unit. It makes upgrading hardware more dangerous and difficult, that and I'm a gamer. From what I've seen there are not nearly enough games for Mac to help me keep playing the games I love.

As for Linux, it is generally used in servers and is decent for that from what I've seen. I could be wrong and things could have changed, but from what I remember Linux OS was used in servers a lot of the time. The viruses, it does have less than Windows, however I would assume it has more than Mac because it is used in servers so much. It is harder to learn how to use depending on the version of Linux you choose to use, some could be similar to Windows, others could be like Mac. I've only had experience with a couple versions however and they were more like Windows than Mac. Honestly, I don't know if Linux can run games without having compatibility programs running and installed. I never figured that part out, but from what I hear Linux is fun to mess around with.

What can I say about Windows... It runs smoothly if your careful but, some versions have never and will never run well. XP seems to still run fine for me, even though Vista and Windows 7 have both come out. For me Vista had no problems but, I've heard so many complaints that not all of them could be small screw ups here and there. As for Windows 7, it seemed to fix all if not all of the problems that Vista just couldn't seem to correct with its updates. To me 98 still seems more convenient but cant run anything worth while now a days anyway. Windows is the most widely used OS and honestly why wouldnt it be, it's in schools, libraries, and so we wanted it in our homes. Its our safe, home sweet home of operating systems and if your already using it, there is little reason to change to anything else.

I hope  you enjoyed this read, and I love to get feedback so please comment.

Reviewing: Killing Floor

I figured it was about time I got back to what I like doing, Gaming. So here it is, I played a two day trial of a survival first person shooter called killing floor. There was a deal on it through steam so I figured it was worth a try. So far what I've seen, it has a decent system for collecting weapons, gaining money, and having different classes that still can play similarly enough to not destroy your ability to play the game. The amount of enemies and the number of different enemies both are fairly high compared to what I'm used to in survival horror games, but it is what I love in these games. It is a wave based survival mode, the one mode I wish more games had minus a time limit. You gain cash based on the number of enemies destroyed, and I believe you get more for how you kill them. The class I started with was the sniper like class, you level this one up by getting head shots, than there are other classes that level up depending on damage dealt, kills made on specific enemy types, and so on. The one issue I have with this game is the slow level ups that I've seen, I believe I was only able to level up 2 or 3 times with the sniper class and it seemed to take forever after that. The level selection and weapons almost seemed to make up for that though. You can also level up other classes while using a different class if you use the right weapons. It all seems a bit difficult to understand but once you get the hang of it, this is a very fun game. If I could get the money together I would definitely buy this game as soon as I could, and at the low price of about $5 why wouldn't I? As I usually sugest though, do research and find a demo if you can before spending the cash on any game, just because I like it doesn't mean everyone will. Definitely give it a try if your into challenging multi-player, or single-player zombie killing fun. I give this game a 3 out of 5 simply because it seems too familiar, not that its a bad thing.

A link to the games site here: http://www.killingfloorthegame.com/

Hopefully you enjoyed this read and will continue reading, as always I would love comments to see if I can improve anywhere. Until next time, peace!

The search (rant?)

I had made a Magic deck a long time ago when I was still living in Massachusetts, tonight I started to miss my old deck which had gone missing. The logical step would be to look where I think it might be, but what if the place it might be, is not your own. I can't yell at them to have it cleaned by any date in the calendar even if I tried, and even with it clean, would they look in those dozens of bags that could be hiding it? I don't blame them though, I blame myself for not taking it from the bag as soon as I knew I wasn't using it. I should have known it would go missing, it is mine after all. With me having only about three big things to my name one of them would have to be gone forever, it wouldn't be my life if it didn't I suppose. I still wish I had enough extra cards to at least make a meager life gain deck though... It was my first deck I ever really made on my own, it changed as I made more friends and I had finally changed it to the point where I was completely satisfied with where it was. I even had one of my cards signed by a voice actor from a few anime I had watched, it wasn't just cards to me, to me it had meaning and I just wish that those who I have told where to look will eventually see that. This probably sounds like the nerdiest thing ever, but honestly imagine if you had created something, built it up and finally had it how you wanted, than having it disappear without you even being able to write down what you had accomplished. This was one of my small things that I had, and I had made. No one made this deck for me, a few people helped me build it, but in the end all of the big decisions in this deck, I had made. Now that its gone and I have very few cards that work together, I don't even know if I want to keep them anymore, if I can't fine my deck I might just sell all of my cards or send them away to my friends. Honestly, without my first deck, or at least the card list for my first, I don't see a point in playing anymore. That and noone around here plays Magic the gathering much anyway. Thank you for listening and I hope that you hold on to your small things in this life.

So here it is: Steam

A program that seems to be designed around playing games with your friends, and putting all of your games together in one place. Sounds amazing right? Well I'm going to figure out exactly how awesome this program is in this review.

There is a lot to go over so I'll start with its basic functionality. It allows the purchase and download of thousands of games directly to your computer, along with some free games and free demos. They have offers and specials that include lowered prices, bundles, or limited time demos. You can even buy games in stores and put in the installation code into your steam game manager. Why download all of these games and put the codes for already purchased games in here you might ask. Well here's your answer, it allows you to use your account to play your purchased games anywhere on any computer capable of doing so. That means you can never lose your CD or DVD to install your game, and will never have to be worried about scratching or damaging your game again. Some newer games even have achievements through steam, just like the 360 and ps3 have on their systems. It also has a chat client that allows chat in or out of games, Steam also allows people to send a gift of a game, which is simply a second copy of a game you have purchased that you can send to someone else. With all of this in one place, with no monthly fee, I have to say I support it.

Steam was created by a company called Valve which has produced games which have been very successful and odds are you have heard of at least one of them. The most popular titles include; Portal (series), Half-Life (series), and the Left 4 Dead series. These games were all pretty creative and at the time they were created were thought to be revolutionary and unique in a fantastic kind of way. It is another reason to support their company and use their services for your gaming needs. I am so sorry I'm starting to sound like a commercial... Anyway point being in my opinion these are reasons to use Steam to manage your PC gaming library.

Not to say their aren't reasons you shouldn't use it. Some games don't cooperate with Steams interface and can lag more under steam than not, and some games crash if steam is not up to date. Honestly, I have never had a problem where a game crashed due to lack of steam updates but that's just me. The chat won't completely interrupt your game but because you have to pause the game if your going into the chat screen, it is a bit troublesome, that and if your friends do anything Steam will display a notification in the upper right corner of the screen. Lets just say I'm glad I don't have any FPS's or I'd probably want to kill someone about that little problem. Even with these minor distractions, it has never made a game unplayable for me, and has always ran perfectly well in my experience.

In the end its up to the individual experience and how they use the client that will determine if they like it or not. I would recommend anyone who is into PC gaming to give it a whirl though, I mean they even have some free to play full-version games in their library of 1800+ games. So even if your broke you should make an account and give some of those games a try.

Please leave comments if you can and I look forward to any feedback I can get. Ill post again soon, and I hope to make it a good one.

Posts: What to do, what to do?

I am starting to realize that my review posts are getting more hits than all others. This has made me decide on posting more reviews on products that we all use, or are thinking about using. The only issue with this is that I honestly have no idea what I can review, as I write I do get a few ideas. I will post what I can, but while lacking a decent system to play on, or an XBox 360 or PS3, it does make it a tad bit difficult. If you have any ideas let me know and I'll see what I can do, however with what game systems I have I feel that any PS2 or WII reviews would be useless. If you think otherwise let me know and I'll see what I can do.

I really am looking for feedback so if you read this please either look at my other posts and comment if you please, thank you.

Pokemon and such (now on your computer)

Just figured what with the lack of posts and my new frequent usage of Pokemon Online. It is a game made by a person(s) a while ago as far as I can gather, and gives you a selection of any Pokemon you can think of that has been in the main series, including legendary's and the rarest of the rare. The moves they can learn are all of the possible, non-cheated moves they can learn in the games, same goes for the abilities and such. Its pretty addicting and helps you come up with strategies, and gives you experience with the best of the best EV's and IV's that can ever exist. I am getting serriously addicted to it and I am loving everything it allows, including shinnies and all that. I am looking for people I know to start playing but somehow I doubt that its going to happen anytime soon. It would be fun to know the people you battle after all and see what kinds of strategies they use. Anyway if you are interested in this game, the link to the website is http://pokemon-online.eu/.

I thought this was too short so I will add my current team and their movesets.

Dragonite Lv.100 [Inner Focus]
-Ice Beam
-Fly
-Outrage
-ThunderPunch

Yanmega Lv.100 [Speed Boost]
-Psychic
-Shadow Ball
-Air Slash
-Bug Buzz

Darmanitan Lv.100 [Zen Mode]
-Earthquake
-Superpower
-U-turn
-Flame Charge

Hitmonchan Lv.100 [Iron Fist]
-ThunderPunch
-Drain Punch
-Fire Punch
-Mega Punch

Poliwrath Lv.100 [Damp]
-Earthquake
-Ice Punch
-Scald
-Psychic

Luxray Lv.100 [Intimidate]
-Volt Switch
-Thunder Fang
-Crunch
-Signal Beam

This post just got a ton bigger but anyway, thank you guys for reading and I will be posting again when I can.