Elves, Cameos, and Companies – Geekout 2

January 2, 2017 Leave a comment

On today’s Geekout challenge from my page-a-day calendar, I’m supposed to list: Two Middle-earth Elves, Two Celebrities [who] have Made Cameo appearances on The Big Bang Theory, and Four Video Game Companies.

2017-01-02 Geekout

Looks like those icons must indicate the category, I’d guess it’s fantasy, general geekiness, and games.

Two Middle-earth Elves

I’d say the toughest part for this one is choosing from which of Tolkien’s texts I should make my selections. I’ll admit that I’ve never finished the Silmarillion, but I’ve read half the book more than once. The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings, however, each have more than enough elves to choose from.

Elrond

Appearing in The Hobbit, The Fellowship of the Ring, and The Return of the King, this elf stays important throughout the series, unlike some who make appearances in only The Lord of the Rings or The Hobbit. Additionally, he always seems somewhat mystical, and is relatively nice to the characters we’re following.

Thranduil

The more reclusive and less-trusting elf, Thranduil and his elf brethren create an interesting challenge for Bilbo and his Dwarven allies, imprisoning the dwarves until their barrel-riding ally manages to plan their escape. While I’m not too happy with his portrayal in the recent movie adaptation, I like the character, since he offers such a different view of the Elves than we received earlier in the book while meeting Elrond. Not all elves share the same opinions it would seem!

Two Celebrities with Cameos on The Big Bang Theory

Now here’s finally a tough question for me. I’m not much of a fan of The Big Bang Theory. While it’s got some good geeky humor, the show seems to ridicule nerds and geeks, casting us often in a poor light. There are funny points, and jokes that are certainly for us exclusively! Maybe it’s just me though!

Wil Wheaton

As a child actor, I was not a fan, however, I’ve come around to Wil Wheaton following his roles on Leverage and The Guild. I do know that he was on an episode of The Big Bang Theory. I didn’t watch the episode, but I heard something about the cast and him. For some reason I’m remembering something about bowling. Maybe I’m way off on this one.

Brent Spiner

I heard about this as well, so I hope I’m right here. I remember something about it, since it made for a double Star Trek cameo. I recall something about a birthday. Either way, Data is an awesome character with really interesting development in The Next Generation, and Brent Spiner really played him well. Since Star Trek, I’d have to say my favorite of his characters was in Independence Day. So many people didn’t even notice it was him!

Four Video Game Companies

Now this is a laughably small number of game companies to name. I’m guessing someone thought four would be a large number, since most of the questions so far have asked for two.

Square Enix

As a fan of many classic RPG franchises, including Chrono Trigger/Cross, the Final Fantasy series,  and the Star Ocean series, it would be difficult to exclude the creators of those games who now comprise Square Enix.

Their current direction is somewhat questionable at times, however, I am hopeful that the FF7 remake will not be the disappointment many predict. In addition, I’ve appreciated some of the games they’ve published, including Life is Strange.

Blizzard Entertainment

Talk about a company that really got in a decades long groove. Warcraft was a good game, and I remember IPX connection games of Warcraft II so long ago! Everything changed with Diablo, Starcraft, and Battle.net! Talk about an acquisition, Blizzard North bringing along Diablo set the stage for this company’s triumph in online gaming. Never again was there a need to try and get LAN games going with friends. Online gaming was now easy.

This company is never the first in their genre, but when they show up, they take over. Their development efforts seem to stretch on forever, but if they let a game reach release, it’s impressive. These days I think Heroes of the Storm is the closest they have to a non-success, but only because it’s not the top MOBA.

Quantic Dream

A company close to my heart, Quantic Dream does not disappoint. No, not even with Beyond: Two Souls. The creators of Heavy Rain and Indigo Prophecy, two of my favorite games. Interestingly, Indigo Prophecy was originally called Fahrenheit outside the US, a crazy thing, since we’re nearly the only country using that system.

The games this studio creates aren’t for everyone; story-focused games are their expertise. As a player, you’re guiding a movie more than anything else. There are skill-based challenges and story-impacting decisions to make which determine how the story will end. I’ve watched the endings of their games more times than I’d like to admit, and I’ve played through each game quite a few times as well.

BioWare

At this point, you may have noticed my story-driven, role-playing game focus. I must include the creators of the Baldur’s Gate series of games. Yes, I cite them for that, since that’s where I first experienced their games. Those games used D&D rules, so that was quite fun for me!

Using similar rules to D&D, their Star Wars game, Knights of the Old Republic, was (and still is) one of my favorite games. If you’ve not played it, I recommend giving it a try sooner rather than later. It’s not a new game, so the controls are starting to show their age. The story and adventure are quite fun though! They were not the creators of Knights of the Old Republic II, however, they came back to the series with The Old Republic, their MMO that I do still play!

Now, before anyone tries to have me strung up, yes, I played and loved Mass Effect and Dragon Age! They’re great games that show that BioWare can take those same skills and transition from D&D and Star Wars to their own worlds with Dragon Age and Mass Effect respectively.

Wrap Up

It seems I’ve managed two of these posts in a row. That won’t last, however, I’m hoping that The Big Bang Theory questions doesn’t become a trend – I’ll exhaust that expertise quickly!

Filed under Fantasy, Video Games Tagged with , , ,

D&D, SHIELD, and Starships – Geekout 1

January 1, 2017 4 Comments

Welcome to my first GeekOut post! I received an interesting page-a-day desk calendar for Christmas 2016, and I feel like writing about the topics in the calendar. We’ll see how frequently I post these, but it should make for an interesting topic prompt for a geeky guy like me!

2017-01-01 Geekout

Is this easy mode? I can easily manage this challenge. I expect this will get more difficult given time.

Two Dungeons and Dragons Character Classes

Anyone who knows me well enough will know exactly where I’m going to start with this one, as I often enjoy playing a Bard. A little more difficult to choose my second answer (with there being so many), but I’ll discuss Druids, a more unique spell-caster in the game. I’ve been playing Dungeons and Dragons in one form or another since I was a very small child. I must’ve been five or six years old when I first played the game with my father and slightly older brother. I still play D&D or other role-playing games on a regular basis.

Bard

Not always the most powerful character, in fact often known for never being the most powerful character, Bards are an absolute blast to play! As the name suggests, this class represents a traditional storytelling, poetic, musically inclined individual. While playing Dungeons and Dragons or other role-playing games, the bard’s role is more supportive than directly influential, inspiring greatness in others rather than himself.

Bards tend to wield poetics and music to affect a situation using an almost (or sometimes literal) magical element of their performance. Often spell-casters in D&D, bards magic (when they have it) is wielded through these performances, and can sometimes have their effects hidden within the songs themselves, making the onlookers unaware of the magical nature.

What I think many players of D&D campaigns miss, however, is that a party of adventurers is often liked for the wealth they bring to town. Their actions, while sometimes benevolent, are often also arrogant and destructive. Many campaigns seem to gloss over this, your adventurers may not be well liked. Your bard acts as your ambassador, both a well-liked person about town and also one to tell the tales of your actions that often improve the lives of the townsfolk.

Without a bard, who would tell the tales of how your barbarian wrestled the dragon to the ground or how your ranger managed to find the encampment of slavers who nearly made their escape with a dozen of your friends and family?

Often, however, people will leverage a bard to inspire humor rather than actual support.

Druid

Everyone knows of the studied Wizard in his robes and beard, but fewer know of the more primal magic of Druids. As on of the representatives of the natural world, the druid can be a useful ally in the wilderness. Druids come in all shapes and sizes, but tend to wield nature’s magic at the same level as their more studied, wizard peers. Druids spend their lives attuning themselves to nature rather than the arcane, and through it wield a different type of magic. Druidic magic works with plants, animals, and the world around them.

Rather than subverting the natural ways of things, the druid will attempt to work with them. Being a friend to nature, Druids also often have animal companions traveling with them, a fun addition to every party of adventurers making their way about town. That hermit in the woods with the magical powers, making potions, etc. is often the “druid” in story-telling. While he’s not a druid, Radagast the Brown is a nice stand-in for one within Middle-Earth.

Two S.H.I.E.L.D. Agents

While there may still be many to choose from, this is somewhat tougher than Dungeons and Dragons was. I enjoy Marvel (especially what they’ve done with their “Cinematic Universe” so far), but outside of a few team-ups, I wasn’t big into these growing up.

Peggy Carter

All of the filming that Marvel’s been doing lately has brought a lot of prominence to Agent Carter. With her receiving her own show after entering the Marvel Cinematic Universe through Captain America’s movie. Simply put, she’s quite the badass.

What makes these agents great (and she’s a standout in this regard) is that a lack of super powers never stops them from saving the world repeatedly. Peggy relies on her friends (being far greater for it), and is an inspiring leader to them as well!

Nick Fury

This character may be out of his original era, but he’s been re-invigorated by Samuel L. Jackson’s portrayal. This eyepatch-wearing director of shield seems to have plans within his plans. He’s one you don’t mess with, and it’s fun to see him on screen still.

The way he holds himself while dealing with (often uncontrollable) super heroes is impressive. He stands on their level and doesn’t back down. It’s hard to not have some respect for Nick Fury.

Phil Coulson a.k.a “Agent”

I couldn’t leave this one out. We’ll call him an honorable mention and leave it at that.

Six Iconic Named Sci-Fi Starships

And we’re back into an area I know well. I’ve been watching sci-fi shows since I was quite young. Growing up in a nerdy family meant that Star Trek TNG was on every week when I was little. As I grew older, I read and watched a great deal of sci-fi. Let’s jump/warp into some ships.

Starship Enterprise

Where else could I start this? I thought about cheating and answering with Enterprises: NX-01, NCC-1701, NCC-1701-A, NCC-1701-B, NCC-1701-D, and NCC-1701-E, but that did feel a bit like cheating. For this I’ll count them all as the USS Enterprise, but the number of incarnations of the vessel should show how iconic it is within the Star Trek universe.

While I may be a fan of Deep Space Nine, the USS Defiant isn’t as iconic as the Enterprise. It’s had more captains mentioned on screen than I can remember, and I’m sure the books have mentioned more individuals who’ve captained Enterprises (but I’ve not read the books). Kirk and Picard will both be remembered for a long time as captaining their vessels through TV shows and movies.

Millennium Falcon

I think many would have me strung up if I went somewhere other than Star Wars after Star Trek. Prior to being the smuggling freighter flown by Han Solo, this star ship belong to Lando Calrissian. Whil Star Wars is full of interesting ships, including Star Destroyers, Super Star Destroyers, X-Wings, Y-Wings, A-Wings, TIE Fighters, TIE bombers, etc. Those, however, are all types of ships, and often not named. While there are some important ships in the series like the Tantive IV, the Slave I, or the Executor, none follow the action of the series as well or as significantly as the Falcon.

Plus, there’s something magical about the idea of the independent ship out for itself in a whole galaxy full of danger and opportunity. I think this ship must have influenced a lot of others, and the idea certainly resonates with me. I can see the influence in Firefly as well as Outlaw Star, two of my favorite shows.

Serenity

Firefly may have ended earlier than many would liked, the show continues to live on in the fans. The Firefly-class ship featured in the show is Serenity, a cargo vessel captained by Malcom Reynolds. The show may seem to be an ensemble cast of 9 characters crewing the vessel, but when you watch the show, you realize the 10th character is the vessel.

With the reception the show has had, and all of the love from fans, I think this less-than-one-season show will live in people’s hearts longer than one would otherwise expect. Amazingly, the vessel (and its show) was brought back to wrap up the story in the film named for the ship!

Battlestar Galactica

I think having a television series re-imagined decades later, and both series being titled for one-specific show the entire series revolves around makes a starship fairly iconic. While many may not know the show at all, the name is likely known to them well.

Being a bastion of humanity traveling through space makes the ship important throughout the story, and while some may argue about the quality of the shows, it’s hard to argue that this is not an iconic ship.

Heck, I’ve played the Battlestar Galactica board game more times than most people want to think about, and I do still enjoy the game!

Discovery One

While 2001: A Space Odyssey may not have continued the way that some other science fiction stories have, many know of it still. I think what makes this ship iconic today is less the ship itself than HAL 9000, the AI in control of many of the ships functions.

Take this off the list, HAL.
I’m sorry, Dave. I’m afraid I can’t do that.
What’s the problem?
I think you know what the problem is just as well as I do.

The Milano

Yeah, I’m stretching here, since I kind of decided to keep it to one per franchise, but Guardians of the Galaxy has really captured people’s attention. Star Lord a.k.a Peter Quill owns and pilots this nimble vessel. Plus, it’s got a cassette player! Who doesn’t love that?!?!

I’m noticing a trend here, with the Milano, Millennium Falcon, and Serenity making three ships involved in not-so-legal activies captained by similarly overconfident characters. Either way, they’re fun!

Honorable Mentions (in no particular order)

  • Slave I – Star Wars
  • Executor – Star Wars
  • Tantive IV – Star Wars
  • USS Voyager – Star Trek
  • USS Defiant – Star Trek
  • Rodger Young – Starship Troopers
  • Rocinante – The Expanse
  • The Heart of Gold – Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy
  • Normandy – Mass Effect
  • O’Neill – Stargate
  • George Hammond – Stargate
  • Destiny – Stargate

Filed under Fantasy, Role Playing Games, Science Fiction Tagged with , , , , ,

Mentors: Helping Us Follow Our Own Paths

January 1, 2013 Leave a comment

Through life, we learn many things. We learn from many people, and we grow as individual members of a much greater society. Through our experiences, we gain great wisdom that we may use as we wish. Some keep their wisdom within, wasting its greatest use. Some people will share their wisdom with others offering guidance, and those greatest of all will teach others how to gain wisdom of their own.

I think it’s about time that I wrote about the last group of  people. I’ve had quite a few people help me during my years. These people I would refer to as mentors. They offer guidance more than just instruction. A mentor offers advice and direction instead of issuing commands from his or her own wisdom. Mentors help us grown as individuals. Earlier in the day of my writing this post, I ran into one of my mentors from when I was in high school. He was a teacher at the school, however, I never took a class of his. In fact, I don’t even recall how I met this specific mentor.

I know, thinking back on my own growth, that I received a lot of guidance from him. Not that he ever told me what to do, but I talked with him about my plans, my thoughts, and much more. Through his listening, questioning, and advising, I gained a great deal. I’ve had other mentors in my life. Many of them I’ve had more interaction with, but I still count this one among the most important in my life. He showed me a great many things. He taught me in many ways how to be a mentor to others, since he’s the only one I’ve had who hadn’t much connection to me. The others are those I’ve worked with or in whose classes I’ve learned in.

Thinking back on things, my greatest mentors still know me today. I think that speaks somewhat to their greatness as teachers. Remembering your students after many years is truly great. When I said “hello” to him earlier today, it was while we were each leaving a late night showing of The Hobbit. He was there with his kids, so we didn’t have time to talk. I was truly impressed that he not only recognized me, he remembered me, my name, and discussions we’d had in the past. Additionally, he remembered the name of the person I was with, my wife. Neither of us ever took his classes. He knows well the other students with whom I attended school as well. An impressive memory, and it’s clear if you talk to him, that he is a great teacher for it. When I was in school, the Lord of the Rings movies came out while I was in high school. That was one of his few remarks while we talked today.

I was emailing with one of my mentors from college recently, and I had the chance to talk with him about how I was doing. I am glad that I had that chance, because there is one thing I want to tell all of those who have helped guide me in my life, “I am doing well. Thank you for everything.” When I say that, I don’t mean financially doing well. My life is relatively stable, but most importantly, I am happy with my life. I have a wonderful wife, I have a fantastic home, I have a loving family, a love my job, am grateful for my coworkers, couldn’t ask for better friends, and am truly blessed. I have my mentors to thank both for my having those and also for my being able to realize that I have them.

Those who know me well, have heard me rant about the bad teachers I’ve had in my education. I’ve had my share of bad teachers, I’ve always used them as an opportunity to learn on my own, rather than following their guidance. I’ve also had my share of great teachers, and this post is my chance to make sure that people know that there are great people out there. They’ll help you, they’ll guide you in life. They’ll show you how you can help others in the same way they help you along the path. I only hope that I can offer similar guidance to those who cross my path in life.

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Bicycle Commuting

July 28, 2012 Leave a comment

When the weather is not as hot as it has been (90+ and humid), I will often ride my bike to the office. I live a little under 5 miles from my office, so I can do the ride in the morning without arriving drenched in sweat. This is important for someone who works in an office in close proximity to other people. The heat, however, would cause me to arrive drenched in sweat, so I’ve not been riding to work for weeks.

I find that a bike ride to work is great way of removing stress. Sometimes I am stressed about things that will be happening at work, and a ride to the office clears my mind of these concerns. It’s also great for the ride home. You very quickly get your mind off of work and onto what you’re doing. Much more so than driving does.

I am not athletic by any stretch. In fact, my BMI is about 29, so I am just barely under obesity. I say this as encouragement for others. I am overweight and can ride my bike to work nearly 5 miles and it’s not very difficult. You can do the same thing.

In fact, I am writing this post to encourage more people to try biking to work. It’s great exercise and doesn’t take a lot of time out of my day. My commute takes about 10 minutes by car and about 20 minutes by bike. Thanks to traffic lights, I average 30 miles an hour going to and from work. I average 15 miles an hour on my biking commute on the exact same streets.

Please take safety precautions and learn about biking on streets before you try this. I am obviously not a medical professional either, so make sure you check with a medical professional before trying this.

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Renewing Renewable Power

June 16, 2012 Leave a comment

I’ve had plenty of discussions with people about renewable energy sources. Some people have interesting ideas about how we can overcome the many challenges presented by trying to harness energy sources. Some people have just provided me with more information about the topic. Some people have strong opinions about how we should deal with our energy needs.

I say “harness” for these types, because you can’t just go collect a bunch of stuff and make the energy on your own time. We don’t have control of many of the renewable sources of energy. We cannot control the winds. We cannot control the currents. We cannot control the clouds, the rain, or the rotation or tilt of the earth.

Much of the world is outside of the control of humans, and this creates a great deal of challenge to our plans of harnessing energy. In my limited knowledge of how our power grid works, I do know that we have to adjust the energy in the system based on the demands of those using the system. This is one of the ties that keeps us on fossil fuels. I don’t recall where I was told this, but I’ve heard it before. I’ve heard it used as a reason to only convert partially to renewable resources.

One interesting idea that was presented to me when I was still in high school was an idea about using hydrogen power to fuel many of our devices. The challenge here is that in order to get the hydrogen required to power our vehicles, we need some source of power. Well, traditionally, that would mean that we would burn fossil fuels in order to generate the power required to get the hydrogen. We can all see the issue with this. The idea presented to me had a solution to this. Use a solar power plant to provide the energy required to make the hydrogen.

I had a thought while driving home from my brother’s house the day before father’s day 2012. I was driving along and saw two windmills in the sky. One has been running for a while, and the other is one that is new and hasn’t been started yet. I started thinking about the idea that these sources are not controlled and must be balanced with the sources we can control. Fossil fuels can be controlled, and we use them to balance the system and keep it under control. I don’t believe that this is the answer, since it keeps us tied so heavily to an energy source that we know will eventually run out. I don’t want to argue with anyone about the amount that remains. Perhaps there is enough for fifty generations or only two. The key is that humans will outlive our sources of fossil fuels and need to develop better energy sources.

We need to take a different approach to controlling our power grid. Instead of making sure that it has the power required when the need arises, we need to have the required power the whole time. Instead we should be using the excess when it’s available to power for the future. To put energy away for new things.

Imagine that you have a solar power plant out in the middle of nowhere. Obviously “the middle of nowhere” has very limited energy requirements. Use the excess for something else. Use the excess to power to get the hydrogen power to fuel cars. Then if there is a spike in “nowhere”, and it needs more power. You just slow the production of the hydrogen. Perhaps we need to look also into storing the power in batteries (I know this has been investigated before).

It seems like our ideas for our power system are not looking at new approaches. People keep trying to come up with better ways of creating and harnessing renewable sources of energy, but I think the real challenge we need to solve first is how best to integrate. If we keep allowing people arguments against these sources of energy, we can never win the battle, and we must move to sources of energy that are better and longer lasting.

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Black Bisector

May 9, 2012 Leave a comment

I started playing Star Wars: The Old Republic in August 2011 as a beta tester. At the time, the game was quite buggy. It’s not nearly as buggy anymore. I really enjoyed playing the game. I made time to play a lot of the different classes. I tried being light side republic, dark side imperial, dark side republic, and light side imperial. The game’s lack of balance for gray characters has kept me from becoming a neutral.

Alignment

Being a longtime D&D player, I care a lot more about character motives than just light/dark. My current character is a Jedi Knight named Zimeesa. He’s fallen far to the dark side, but not out of “pure” evil. Most decisions he makes are based on a zero-tolerance policy in saving and promoting the republic. He never questions his decisions, and any willing actions taken against the republic are always responded to with a self-judged execution. I mentioned willingness in the actions taken against the republic. Without mentioning the storyline, I will say that he didn’t always feel that way. His opinions changed. He used to not care whether the action was willing or not.

Guild

My friends and I started a Star Wars: The Old Republic guild on the Tarentatek server. We named that guild after our favorite character title, “,Black Bisector”. I would often run around as “Zimeesa, Black Bisector”. In fact, I have been doing this with every republic character I play since I started playing in the beta. The title is just awesome. If you don’t know what that means, I recommend that you blueshift your yellow tangent and assist the Gree on Coruscant.

I am a Black Bisector. We are recruiting if you want to join the Black Bisectors!

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Hello world!

March 19, 2012 Leave a comment

The first post gives a blog its first chance to show it’s worthwhile. Can there be a better time to greet the world?

This post will likely not have any content added to it after it’s published, and will start with fewer sentences than most future posts. This gives me less chance to screw it up, however, I am sure that I’ve made mistakes already. Feel free to call me out on them. I didn’t read through this post looking for mistakes, so it should be easy to find some.

While I don’t strive for perfection, I do try to not look like a complete idiot.

Now for an introduction.

I am a nerd. What kind you ask? I involve myself in too many nerdy endeavors to categorize so easily. I will use the general word to describe myself for now. As I write more posts, it should become clearer.

I hope everyone reading this is doing well.

Have a great day!

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