Colemak

Ergonomics is possibly one of the biggest markets in the computer industry. Many ergonomic keyboards are generally more expensive than standard keyboards and some are more expensive than the very useless "gaming" keyboards and other game board type things. There are even ergonomic mice on the market, which range from strange vertical mice to trackballs. In the end, however, not everyone can afford this stuff and heavy computer users or people who have carriers based in computers end up with arthritis or RSI, and normally the first solution is ergonomics.

I'm all for ergonomics because I use computer's pretty much wherever I go and I use them all day long. I am in the market for an ergonomic keyboard and I recently received my first trackball mouse. I wasn't sure how I would handle the trackball, or if it would be a significant change, but I ended up enjoying it quite a bit and am excited to continue using it, even though I still need a little more getting used to and I have yet to play any games whatsoever with it.

For about a year, I suffered from mild tendinitis which I solved by swearing off games and computers for a day or two at a time. However, this is only temporary and so my problems would return rather quickly and other times I would just ignore them. This got pretty bad but ultimately it just became a constant in my life that I would feel minor wrist pain for most of the day.

About six months I started to use a keyboard layout called Colemak. It is a keyboard created just for ergonomics, but for computers. You may be confused about that last bit that I said, but that would mean that you don't know much about layouts. I'm referring to Dvorak when I say that.

This is Dvorak. As you may notice, it is very difficult to understand but it has proven to be one of the best layouts ever made. This layout, however, was made for typewriters and not for computers. If you take a look at Colemak, you'll notice that it is very similar to QWERTY (which is the standard layout in the US and other countries). This similarity makes it easier to learn as well as good for computer shortcuts. ZXCV are in the same place for Undo, Cut, Copy and Paste. There is actually a chart for the similarities on Colemak.com.

However, I digress. In the last six months I have felt no wrist pain at all and I am very happy about this. There is an estimated 3000 users for Colemak right now and the crowd is only growing. I, myself, am trying to get others to notice it and it's advantages. Try it today if you can. It's not too difficult to learn, but learning anything that is anything like a keyboard layout is going to be difficult if you have used the same one for many many years, so just give it time. It took me one day to memorize the keys but it's taken me months to get my WPM up to where it was. I, of course, didn't really try that hard to do so since I didn't mind a slow WPM, but it eventually worked itself up with time.

Colemak is easy to learn and much better than QWERTY and you'll always be able to get Colemak in some way on most any computer, but you won't unlearn QWERTY if you know it well enough, but your hands will feel better while using Colemak.

Also, caps lock is switched with backspace (well, replaced), but the change isn't as bad as it sounds. Caps lock is a useless key to me anyway and having backspace at my pinky has made typing easier on most any keyboard; some keyboards have tiny backspace key, but no keyboard moves the caps lock key.

Never use this device.

So, I, like many others, own an Xbox 360 and, not dissimilar to others Xbox 360 owners, have a Gold Membership with Xbox live (Referred to as XBL from here on in). There are many ins and outs to XBL, but I won't discuss that now as it is neither here nor there. I don't, however, have my TV anywhere close to my home internet router, and this becomes a problem in many ways, and I shall discuss how I've attempted to solve those problems.

As many should know, Microsoft sells their own wireless device for the Xbox 360 (Referred to as 360 from here on in). This device is very expensive and, although it is very useful and functional, I don't really have $100 to throw away for a little tiny plastic wireless adapter for my 360. This becomes a problem because I want to play online and take advantage of my Gold Account, which I received as a gift, but I don't have the capital needed.

Ah-Ha, I take to the internet for something similar and much less expensive. Sadly I found nothing at first and so, for months, I searched for an easy way. Alas I found a wireless adapter made for the 360 by one of my favorite manufactures: Pelican. I was happy and amazed at it, since the price was an easy $40-$50 off of the Microsoft adapter. I was saved, or so I thought.

For a while this device worked very well and I was happy. A few notes for what I didn't like at that moment and time. The UI isn't user friendly. Not that it isn't easy to use, but the instructions on how to get to it and then modifying it was complicated. Not for a geek or someone highly computer literate such as myself, but for the average Joe, it wasn't an everyday task or an easy one at that. The process involves changing several settings for your LAN connection, after replacing the connection with Pelican's Adapter (because it used an Ethernet cord to connect to the 360), and then connecting to it with a browser window. This isn't new for anyone who has ever set up a router, but not everyone knows what they're doing and, before you know it, changing one number means a world of confusion. That was my only real vexation with it, and I wasn't even directly affected by it.

Now, I used the Pelican Wireless Adapter for a few months, or an month I don't remember, and it was good. Ever now and again a connection would go weak or drop, but that's not too distant from what I expected from any wireless connection, especially one that was so far away from the access point. However, not too long after that, the adapter stopped working on me. I did nothing to it, it hadn't moved from the time I first configured the settings and I hadn't touched it at all, but it ceased to work.

My first thought were "It's fine, nothing a power cycle couldn't fix" and so I powered it down, waited about a minute and then powered it up. After around four or five minuter, more than the suggested boot time, I tried to connect to XBL. Nothing. I couldn't even connect to my network and nothing was happening. I waited a little more in case there was a bizarre case of it booting incorrectly and then rebooting on its own. Unlikely, but I waited for a very large amount of time (I was washing dishes) and tried again. Nothing once more.

My second though was "Perhaps the configuration was lost in the power cycle" and so I moved the adapter to my computer and opened the settings. Nothing had changed. Every setting was the same from when it had been first set. The device had obviously booted as well since I had opened the settings and could change the configuration. I was boggled and annoyed.

My third though was "Okay, so maybe it fixed itself just now" and, without testing it from my computer first, I moved it back to my 360. I booted it and waited a few minutes before trying. Upon my soul this device then took a shit. I still could not connect. I didn't know what was wrong and all of my immediately useful remedies didn't work and so I consulted the internet again. I came up empty for any answers and there have never been any updates to the firmware, at least none that I found.

My final thought was "Fuck this shit" and so I restored to factory defaults and reconfigured the device for my home network once again. I even tried it from my computer this time. I got nothing, but for shits and giggles (By this time I had had zero giggles left in me) I hooked it up to my 360.

So, in the end, after having and using this adapter for quite some time and spending a good amount of time trying to fix it (I left out the two or three other power cycles, the three or so times I went back and forth from 360 to computer trying to get the settings right, and restoring it two more times), I can say that you should not buy it. I don't know what I got wrong or what I did (or didn't do) to break it, but in the end it was a waste of money. I suggest that if you own a laptop to bridge connections from its wireless to its LAN for your 360 and you can find out how to do that elsewhere on the internet.

P.S.: I still am not going to waste my money on Microsoft's adapter.

Guitar Hero Help.

So, I like to think myself somewhat of a good Guitar Hero player. I'm not a top player like those on Score Hero, but I have done a few things that others may see as impossible in their life times. I don't really want to brag, since I'm really not THAT good in comparison to thousands upon thousands upon thousands of other people, but I'm better than tens of millions of others in the world.

My meaning for this is to (as the name states rather obviously) help people with Guitar Hero. I have found it difficult to gain simple help from anywhere and I would like to be the first to do something of the like dedicated to just helping people. I like help in any game that tests skills, so I hope others will find this useful.

What I can't stress enough is that before ever looking for help, you should go through the tutorial. I'll be referencing everything that is explained in the game and I won't be explaining simple things like that in any post for Guitar Hero Help. I also don't want to see questions that pertain to the most basics concepts of the game and I'm not going to explain the controls or the like unless I must, which is very unlikely. Besides that, all my jargon that isn't used in the game will be explained in every post.

I'd like to take this time to explain my tentative format:

1. I will explain the challenges of the song that you should understand before playing and the challenge of the song as a whole.
   
2. I will then go into each section and try to link a video/chart to each individual section to give a visual example of what you should see in the section
3. In each section I will explain the techniques used and challenges had within the section.
4. I will then give tips and hints on how to overcome and practice the section and the difficulty and priority and over all how to prepare for it.

I will not explain every section of every song. If I don't talk about it, then it's either so easy that you should never miss it (Aftermath in Raining Blood) or it has no notes in it (Wahhhh in the Halo Remix DLC). If you do find a section difficult and I left it out, then I will have no problem helping you with it if you do ask, unless you're just being dumb and asking why I didn't put in a section that has four notes in it.

Before any questions, I only plan to help out with expert guitar. I have no skill when it comes to singing or drums, but I will suffice to helping with difficult bass/rhythem guitar(where applicable) if it's a lot diffirent from guitar. I'm not limiting my help to Guitar Hero alone... but I don't own Rock Band or Rock Band 2, so, if requested, you'll have to allow me some time to get the game and play the song and gain experience with it before making a post about it.

Um, I'm back?

I haven't updated this blog in ages, but I hope to change that as of... soon. I don't know when, but I'm going to try to do more things with this blog, maybe even get famous. I'm not entirely sure what I'll be doing, or if I'll be doing it, but what I might do will be relevant to video games, as well as whatever I damn well please to talk about.

Each post will have a title that announces the feature that I'll be exploiting. Hopefully I'll be able to become popular and I'll try to update fairly often, but I fear that some of my ideas may take too long for me to update as regularly as I wish, and I may run out of ideas or subject matter. I 'll do the best I can to become something, but what I will become will be decided by future me.

However, what I don't want to become is a news site, so I hope that I don't sink that low that I'll start to post news on my blog just to gain traffic... even though I don't really think that will gain me traffic. But yes, hopefully I'll update again soon, maybe even tonight. I'll certainly be making another post, however I might not finish it tonight.

Tip Sheet For Gears of War 2: Horde Mode

1. STAY TOGEATHER


SRSLY. Staying togeather results in team work. Team Work is key in most online play, especially Gears of War, so learning it now will help you in the long run. Really. I've played many games where guys just seperate and it always ends in failure. If everyone does this in a game that you are playing, just pick a guy and follow him. That should help your chances a nice deal.


2.HELP YOUR FRIENDS


If a commrade is downed, help him up. NO, do not kill this or that enemy first. Help your friends. You will die and fail. Not fun. So, priority number 1 should be to help downed comrades, especially if they are 0.001 inch away from you.


3. USE THE SHOTTIE


Using the lancer when you are 2 feet away is made of failure. The shotti is a close range weapon, it will fuck some shit up. HONSTLY. USE IT. Please.


4.USE MELEE


Punching a dude in the face is easier than running around firing at nothing. Also, when using the lancer, do not try to chainsaw the same guy over and over again after it is obviously made of fail. Pull out the shotti or a pistol and smash them in the face.


But first of all, beat the game twice: on Hardcore and then Insane. This will get you a good deal of achievements and vastly improve your skill level.

Holy Shit

I have a friend who is a music heavy individual. Although he's a sterotypical metal lookin guy, he actually has a very eclectic taste in music and a huge amount of knowledge in it all as well. He's a classical buff who listens to all the classical composers such as Bach, Beethoven and Paganini. He also listens to a good amount of Metal. All types of Metal and sometimes that scares me. He's also huge.


This post, however, is not about him; this post is about an awesome band he just introduced me too called Apocalyptica. They may sound like your traditional metal bang, alas they are not: They have four members, there of whom(at the present) play Electric Cellos. You read that right: Electric CELLOS. It sounds very strange at first, but the sound and the music they make is just stunningly amazing. I was in awe when I first heard them and I can't really explain it. They also did covers of various bands, one being the little well known 80's speed metal band Metallica. It sounds strange and it certainly is different, but after listening to One covered by Apocalyptica, I was speechless and almost cried. I thought the song was beautiful one two guitars, but four cellos(They recorded it when they originally had four cello members)? It was amazing. The vocals aren't even cut out, but they are played by a Cello.


This was an adventure to me and its the first band I've been excited about for a while and I hope that anyone who reads this can grow to love them as well.

Good thing the Rain isn't creating Artifacts every where

I must admit: There aren't too many gamers out there who don't play shooters or will not play a shooter. In fact, I doubt there are too many people who haven't played one at any one point in their life. I'll play one for a few days or maybe even a week, depending on how interested I am or how long the game is and my will to beat it. I have had my ups and downs with most, and the downfall normally comes from restarted mechanics or roller coaster difficulty or bad story. Resistance: Fall of Man is a game that generally has all three of those but sold amazingly well for some reason. Halo 3 and 2 also have those same characteristics ( The reason I omit Halo: Combat Evolved is because I loved the game because it was hands down a great game for the period).


The game that I have most recently played is S.T.A.L.K.E.R: Shadow of Chernobyl. Many who might read this probably think I'm a moron for playing but I do so that I love the game. It glitches so often and has no motivation except the mysterious story, but I can't say I hate the idea of an open world FPS. One thing I hate about most FPS's is that they are linear and have a very sustained rate of progression and specified choke points. S.T.A.L.K.E.R. doesn't share that. You can do whatever you want and kill whoever you want, save the traders. Go anywhere and kill anyone are two things I liked about Oblivion (Which is another game I come back to a lot).


I also recently upgraded (replaced) my old (dead) video card and now I can view all of its prettyness. Screen Shots don't do the game justice because they don't show the grass and trees and wind all swaying and moving and alive. Inside environments and night time environments really shine because the lighting in the game is its best highlight. I really do like the graphics, although they are way too system heavy for a game that doesn't look nearly as good as it should for its weight. I can't say its ugly though. I am generally excited about the coming prequel as well, and I hope that the game doesn't require Nasa to play, seeing how it looks ten times better than a game that looked alright and ran like shit.


S.T.A.L.K.E.R. is also a difficult game. It combines the realism and frustration of a game like Counter Strike: Source and the lack of auto saves such as the ones in Oblivion. The first mission of the game on its easiest difficulty is easy to say more difficult than the entirety of a few games on their hardest difficulty (Rouge Trooper). Saving often is the only way to counter act this, because the only way to get a new gun without having to pay out the ass, is to kill other guys who have better guns than you. Unless you find one that is hidden or off a dead body in the middle of no where, namely a place you shouldn't be because a guy with a better gun and more bullets than you couldn't survive.


The glitches in the game are very bad as well. I lost a save once because I accidentally saved while dead. I don't know why the designer decided that you could do that, but when I loaded back up, not only was I dead, but I was sent to bad design hell. I don't even know what happened, I was underground or some shit and clipped into the ground, or hell or something, but I also had a gun in my hand that I couldn't shoot. There have also been many times where dead enemies fell through the ground, or would clip in and out of the ground. When it rains, there are artifacts everywhere, not even artifacts created by the rain, everything seems to feel like doing the same, even the sky, which turns yellow for some reason. A friend of mine couldn't play because he had a yellow sky, a bright, glowing yellow sky (with shaders on) or no sky (with shaders off). I don't know why this happened, but we thought a patch would work, but it did not and made things worse. The guy who stands out in front of the bar also glitches and repeats the same line over and over again. I love the game, but I hope this is all fixed in Clear Sky.


I love the combat though. The guns are all different and really show their advantages and disadvantages. The bad part of the weapons is that there is a constant progression of better guns or guns that you wouldn't want or buy. The pistols really shot this, because each pistol has slightly better specs than the last. They are realistic though and make gun fights both interesting and frustrating. It isn't funny when your primary runs out of ammo, or when you have another primary with you, but the guy(s) you are shooting at are completely out of range. It makes looting bodies very important, and even picking up guns and taking their clips, which is time consuming and much more difficult to do in a fire fight because you have a weight limit (or a limit that causes your endurance, which governs your ability to sprint and jump, to go down really fast with it reached).


There is also the ability to sneak around if you wish. You are given two bars:one for the amount of noise you make and the other for your personal visibility. I generally don't sneak around too often, but when I need to, or don't feel like (don't have the resources for) getting into a large fire fight, the meters are very useful.


Overall, I love the game and I think everyone who enjoys an FPS should give it a try or two.