What happened to communities?

A long time ago it wasn't too hard to find people to play PC games with.  You might not know a bunch of kids in the neighborhood, but you could easily stumble into a community or clan/guild/team/club that was easily accessible.  Your favorite server clusters normally had paid support and solid websites with forums that were available.  Things have change, both for the better... and the worse.

Back in the hayday of Tribes we had a lot of different communities.  There were the elite players of the Base community.  There were other, smaller, Base communities that had plenty of support.  There were small groups set up for Shifter and Renegades, as well.  Then there was the community that I belonged to, Ultra Renegades. Ultra Renegades was a basic mod built for Tribes.  It offered unlimited jetpacks and the ability to use "boosts" and "brakes", not to mention the infinite ammo.  Some interesting modding and adjustments changed the entire game.  It played differently and gave a lot more freedom.  The game was now truly an aerial marvel.  The maps went from interesting layouts with vehicles to free-for-all, above the clouds battles.  It was truly a thing of beauty.  It was my first real experience of intense gaming.

Sure, Unreal Tournament, Quake 3 and Counter-Strike would all be part of this original push to get online multiplayer gaming to where it is today, but not of them did it like Tribes.  All of these games had large mod communities (CS was actually a mod created for Half-Life) and they all ushered in a kind of play-what-you-like gaming that we may never see again.  Each of these games also had rather large communities.  Not the kind of large that we think of today when we look at huge games like World of Warcraft, Starcraft, or the Call of Duty franchises.  Counter-Strike, for many years, held the title of most popular online game.  You could stumble upon a group of people who were plenty interested in play and easily fill servers with friendly faces or people you were used to playing with.  It was as easy as finding a community filled with people you enjoyed and like playing the game like you did.  Oh, how I miss those days.

Today the possibility of being in a truly active community is pretty slim.  The forums are populated by know-it-alls.  The websites are normally run by exclusive cliques or teams who wish to generate revenue.  No, I'm not mad at people making money, I'm mad when they cover it up with bullshit.  It isn't a new thing, even back in Tribes you saw things moving this direct, but now it is more of the norm.  Today you also see a mish-mash of the communities.  You see several different games supported, if you call it supported...  There is more going on than simply the love for a game or gametype, it's not good or bad, it's both.  It embraces the though of gaming and being a gamer, but it also removes the personal connection that we used to have with the group of people that we played with.  Bouncing from one thing to another can be frustrating.


I know most of it is just nostalgia.  I know I am probably romanticising the past.  Sometimes it feels good.  I remember being a part of a bigger community and a smaller one.  I took part in discussions about Tribes and also about technology on one site.  On another I talked with my clan and we chatted about the game and dicks (also, man asses).  These kind of communities seem to be giving way for larger more homogenized communities and I'm not sure how I feel about it.

Benchmarks are overrated.

The first thing that you think of when you hear about benchmarks is probably CPU or GPU tests.... well, at least if you're a PC gamer.  This is an age old tool that we have used to compare similar products or even see where the older ones stack up to the latest and greatest.

For a longtime benchmarks have used video and processor intense tests to decide how each one handles what they throw at it.  Unfortunately most of the tests are not real world examples of what we see.  Sometimes the tests reveal strengths and weaknesses that you may never run in to.  If I only played WoW, but wanted to have a good experience then I would obviously look for scores that related more to me.  I play a lot of modern shooters as well, so I'd want to know what product gave me the best performance in that category.  We use these synthetic tests and expect them to represent the actual capability of these cards.

A lot of these tests don't even push the cards to the fullest.  They don't stress them to the point that they could be.  They do push them and test them, but they are rarely working in a real environment.  A fresh install of Windows with nothing but a benchmark application open isn't how most gamers run their set ups.  I know that I've got Steam open almost all of the time.  I've also got a copy of Ventrilo running.  In the case of playing BF3 I've got Origin AND Chrome open (Chrome can become quite the memory hog with a couple of extensions running).  If I'm playing WoW you can bet I've got Winamp on and I may have Chrome open to check out WoWHead and look up spots from transmog gear or whatnot.

The fact remains that we are still using this tired old method to tell us what is performing where.  While it is nice to know that the last generation is better than this one, I'm not sure it is as important as it once was.  There are many new features available now that we could have never dreamed of.  Realistic water, amazing smoke effects, the facial expressions, it's all very cool.  While the video cards might be "faster" does that mean that they are really doing much more?  nVidia has gone so far as to use the extra power on their GPUs to power a physics engine built into their drivers.  That's pretty cool and I'm not sure we have a benchmark to see what the offloading of physics can do to the overall experience.  Not to mention how much more in depth the experience can became just because of the way the physics is handled.  I can tell you right now that playing some games, especially those built on the Unreal Engine, can be drastically changed just by adding that extra physics power.

While I understand the importance of these tests, I'd like to see some headway made or some more standard tests developed to actually see what kind of REAL WORLD performance they give.  We have seen some rather disappointing numbers from these new sets of CPUs released, but are they really disappointing?  Maybe we just don't know how to measure the gain of their performance yet.  Once we start using more and more cores to push forward or the software gets better I am sure we will elevate these chips in terms of dominance.  Even dual core chips faced some problems at release because we just didn't know how to measure what it was they were capable of.

Your KDR does not determine your worth.

I have always been a support player.  Even as far back as Tribes I felt more comfortable laying turrets and maintaining base defense, rather than running around and raking up huge scores capping flags or getting tons of kills.  As it turns out, I'm still that kind of player.

I would much rather hang back and be support, rather than go charging in at the front of the line.  I've only ever had one character that was a legitimate tank (even my Warrior back at 60 only tanked on the Garr fight).  I normally hang back and heal or try to do ranged DPS.  In PvP I like to get my hands dirty and be up close and personal, but that's an entirely different matter.  When it comes to FPS games I do the same.  I am much more comfortable hanging back and with others rather than running and gunning my way through the map.  I have competed at medium-ranged tiers in a few things and even taken a trip out to CPL before.  I've never been super pro, but I've always tried to remain an asset to my team and sacrifice myself and my score for the good of the team and the win.

I've never been a scoring beast and I rarely put up huge numbers.  I am normally sitting in the middle of the pack and have done all I could to keep my teammates up and scored a couple kills in the process.  It isn't the most exciting thing to do, but it keeps me in the game.  Back in America's Army I enjoyed going through the training so that I could be a medic or a sniper.  It was fun.  I got a whole lot of different things accomplished and I felt proud when I was done.  Sure all I did was pay attention and answer questions, but it was something that I enjoyed and something that I felt added an extra amount of depth to the game.  You had to dedicate your time in a different way and then you could be useful to your team.

I think that it is great that BF3 offers this kind of gameplay, but the current system of leveling is just too ridiculous.  This forces people to get and play the game early or get stuff getting buttfucked.  People of much higher ranks with many more unlocks than you have an obvious advantage.  While I am all for taking my lumps, this is... a bit extreme.

I hope that in the future they tier the servers or offer intelligent matchmaking.  In the future I also hope that people same the KDR banter for TDM.  Defend or attack the objective and do what you have to for the win.  It's just that simple.  In games built around teamwork there shouldn't be anything else to be concerned with.

We really are elitist pricks.

Console gamers might get inferior games and they may have tween screaming nigger and faggot at each other all over the place, but they have fun.  They don't care about much more than kicking ass and having a good time.  Sure, the console scene is filled with children and frat boys, but they all manage to enjoy what they are doing.  I wish the PC community still had some of that.

As a long time PC gamer I know that being an elitist dickhead is just something that comes with the territory.  As gaming has changed and evolved on PC a lot of things have happened that have been huge let downs.  I have seen a lot of people let it take them over and just be flaming dickbags.  I'm guilty of this to an extent.  My anger for PC gaming stems from people settling for shit or falling for stupid gimmicks.  They call it progress or cutting edge, but in the end it's just a bunch of garbled shit that doesn't matter.  Eventually, some of it comes to fruition and ends up helping... most of the time it stays a pile of garbled shit.

We have so many people today who are hosting podcasts or putting out YouTube videos that is hard to tell who to even listen to.  Since I'm an opinionated old asshole who has been playing PC games for a long time, I generally feel that I have a pretty good grasp on it.  I've known some guys for a while we are very into posting videos and most of them are affiliated with an online PC gaming community.  I think that it's great for people to share ideas and thoughts.  I especially enjoy the fact that people are able to reach such a wide audience.  I'm not too excited about what they might say.  Remember, we are all elitist pricks.

I try as hard as I can to support the guys over at KBMOD.com.  They seem like a good bunch of guys and I know a couple of the folks, and have for years.  From time to time there will be something that is either just stupid as fuck or something that might be up for debate and discussion.  I, of course, say something and it turns into a shitstorm.  My feelings aren't hurt and no, I'm not mad.  I just wish that we, as a community, were more capable of interaction with each other.  There shouldn't be such a hatred for people who belong to a different school of thought.

I love sound cards.  They sound lightyears better than onboard.  Always.  Period.  That makes a dick.  I think that Max Payne was more influential than Modern Warfare.  That makes me a dick.  I think that if you an FPS gamer and you've never played System Shock 2, you're a fucking poser.  That makes me a dick.  I think that the same people that say WoW is too easy are the same people who cried because it was too hard.  That makes me a dick.  However, I'm not always right.

When SLI (Crossfire, too) was first born it was a gimmick.  You could get a 20% performance gain!  HOORAY!  Get the best card ever and then get another one.  Spend 1200 bucks on video cards and get 5 more FPS, hooray!  SLI has now come a very long way and with boards being able to support multiple cards at full data speeds you can see very extreme gains.  Was SLI shit?  Yes.  Is SLI still shit?  Not so much.  I wouldn't recommend two lower end cards in a set up, but two high end cards will give you some series power for years to come.

5.1 and 7.1 gaming headphones have been a cheap marketing gimmick for years now.  Some makers used different software to emulate the sound.  Others actually put different drivers into the headphones, but they were normally cheap and of low quality.  Most audiophiles or sound junkies will tell you that you aren't doing any better with a bunch of small, shitty drivers and would be better off with a quality 2-channel set.  That aside the actually science of sound hasn't help these headphones out either.  Headphones have a problem when splitting sound, which doesn't happen in a normal environment.  You hear the sound coming from both left and right, but you can distinguish it based on way-to-difficult-to-explain sound shit.  Thus, making this a gimmick market, full of garbage.  They package it as awesome and sell it for an outrageous price.

Today I watched a video by someone who was really hyping a pair of these.  I watched the video and was completely stunned.  Not only had they bought into this, but they were peddling it on their YouTube channel?!  I, of course, made a smartass comment.  How could I not?  Instead of being mature or explaining that the technology had progressed to a certain point or explained why this was different, he basically sent me a message and told me I was a fucking idiot and since I hadn't X'd that I couldn't Y.  It's pretty standard, this is how fellow gamers treat each other.  I assumed he was hocking a product, he assumed I didn't know how headphones worked.  The usual.

I checked out the website and did a little looking.  The headphones actually seem pretty legit.  They carry a hefty price tag and chances are this guy was getting something for gushing about them on YouTube, but they did seem decent.  I did some extra reading about the company and some of the stuff they have developed for sound delivery and I am now interested.  Interested enough to get a new headset?  Doubtful.  I use a headset for voice only.  I like to disturb sleep.  Really, I like to separate my channels because my hearing ain't so great.

I can admit when I might be wrong or when something may have become way better.  The PC community as a whole really has to work on this.  Treating each other like shit isn't going to help our efforts to grown the community and introduce more people into PC gaming.  It damn sure isn't going to make those console fucktards think that they're missing out.  Stop being such faggots, seriously.

A little alone time with BF3.

First, fuck Origin.  Seriously.  What a fucking piece of dogshit.  Requiring me to launch this hideous fucking piece of dogshit EVERY SINGLE TIME I want to play the game is so fucking retarded.  I don't mind having Steam open, it has games and friends and plenty of other shit that I care about. Origin has BF3... and a copy of a game that won't even run on my PC.  Steam at least takes the time to make the older games that it supports run on a PC via Steam.  UGH!  So many fucking facepunches!

Some things I'd like to touch on, however....

Time between rounds is too long.  This is insane.  45 seconds between rounds PLUS a map load?  The map needs to be preloading during this pause in the action so that we can jump in and get the game started.  I've played a lot of game and for a long time now and maybe in 2001 these kind of load times were okay, but not today.

Obvious difference between new players and "vets".  By this I don't mean FPS badasses, I mean.... THIS GUN FUCKING SUCKS.  I see people flying around with many different guns, all with upgrades and attachments.  While I think this is awesome, it is also overkill.  How is a person like myself, especially this early in the game, supposed to really keep up?  I spent a few hours getting spanked by mostly people who were 25+.  It wasn't fun.  As a matter of fact, it fucking sucked and made me almost want to uninstall the game.  I don't mean getting beat on and suffering a learning curve.  I'm used to it.  I've been around a long time and adapted to a lot of different games.  I was pretty decent at BC2 and was able to do well with each role, though Medic and Assault were easily my best.  Surely since they've been rolled together I should get the hang of it.  The fact remains that the gap is rather large and this doesn't make it any more fun for people who come in even later in the game.  By around 25 I had every unlock for BC2, I assume it is a similar case in BF3.  I saw lots of people over 30 and several over 40.  Yikes!  This leads me into the next things....

Tiered servers.  BC2 had tons of special servers set up which kicked and/or banned you if you were higher than a certain rank.  Some communities had several of these.  I remember playing on some that went from 1-19, then 20-29, then 30-35, then all levels.  I played on one when I first started that was for all levels but was restricted by kills/rank.  Above rank 20 you could only use a pistol and if you got 20 kills you were not allowed to get anymore.  Sounds crazy?  Yes.  Ended up being fun?  A whole lot when learning the game and maps.  Why was this not something that was implemented.  Shitty F2P games have been doing this for years.  Surely with the new browser-based system this could easily be done.  I'd like to hop on and try to feel out the game and maps without being fucking raped.  I know that they don't have that much time on me, but it is obviously enough for a clear advantage.

There is ZERO point to defib.  Seriously.  No one is fucking dead long enough.  By the time I can round the corner and get my guy up, he has already elected to deploy.  Now my ass is hanging out there trying to defib him and get blown away.  Fail, fail, fail.  I also see an alarming trend of not moving as a unit and not helping your team.  Look, if someone is willing to help you kill shit, keep you healed up and fill your gun with ammo... I'd keep them around.

The netcode is still kind of shitty.  Several times I died when I was behind cover, from someone who shot at me previously.  Or I was shot after going prone or crouching or even rounding a corner.  I know bullets travel, but it doesn't seem like the netcode does so well.  I saw other people who could pull off amazing feats of shotgun sniping with ease.  It makes no fucking sense.  BC2 was a little rocky at first, I am hoping they even everything out.


All of these gripes aside, the game is good.  If only they'd cut out about half of the lens flare.  Bleh.  I enjoyed the game, even though I'm pissed off about the things above.  I expect a title that is hyped this much and developed for this long to bring it.  They brought it, they just didn't bother finishing it up first.

Tribes: Ascent aka Tribes: WTF happened to my inventory station?!

I got to spend a good bit of time with Tribes:Ascend this weekend and I've got to say.... awesome!  This game is insanely fun.  I really hope that in the coming months that they put it together just right and make the Tribes community very happy.

The game is very engaging and a whole lot of fun.  That doesn't mean that it isn't without faults.  There were some random bugs and issues, but nothing major.  The overall experience was really very good.  The jetpacks felt natural and even though skiing is again a "feature", they didn't make it feel super cheesy.  The feel of the game is very much the same as Tribes 2 (which was my favorite), but without some of the customization... I'm not sure how much I will truly enjoy it.

There were only two maps available for play.  They were actually fun, but got very boring very quickly.  I am used to large and more open maps, both of these were kind of small and compact.  That doesn't make them any less good, it just doesn't give them quite the same feel as the older games.  The first thing I did on both maps was find the generator and flag stand and then find the best spot for turrets.  Then, I got to work.  I have always been a defender or a chase.  Since there isn't a good loadout for me to chase with, I decided to sit around and defend.  The layout of the bases are pretty much what you would expect from a game in the Tribes franchise.  Nothing super amazing, but still well put together.  There are multiple ways to approach both (the gens and flag), which makes defending and attacking much like a chess match.  You have to be able to see your opposition making multiple moves before they do it.

The loadouts were an extreme disappointment for me.  I won't go into full detail, but I just couldn't find loadouts that made sense with my playstyle.  I understand that not everyone plays like me, but surely that level of customization should be there in the Tribes games.  Even in the shitsuck that was Vengeance you had custom loadouts.  Sad panda.

HOWEVER, my only issue being with the loadouts and the game being MONTHS away from launch...  That means that this game is pretty fucking good.  I am really enjoying the game and to be honest, I've played this more than BF3 since I got my video card back.  BF3 being a triple-A title with huge hype behind it AND it's losing my attention to a game in closed beta by a pretty mediocre developer, what does that say?

Too much going on!

I got my card back.  I finally played BF3.  Tribes started it's beta.  My buddy finally transferred over to my server on WoW.  So much has gone on.  Phew!

First and foremost, my old buddy Evissic (E for short) has now moved over to my server in World of Warcraft (Dalaran).  We played together years ago back on Scilla and have kept in touch but not actively done much with each other in a long time.  We chat on steam and occasionally chill on Ventrilo, but now he is back on a server with me and we have jumped in some old instances.  Duoed several instances and started on some other.  Black Temple and The Eye were a lot of fun.  I never got to see them when they were relevant.  Obviously Molten Core was something I saw plenty of.  We have even two-manned some of the new non-Heroic instances.

I got my video card back.  YAY!  This has really made me less angry.  No more random BSODs or drivers restarting on a desktop.  FINALLY!  It isn't the same card I sent in, but I am glad to have it back regardless.  This means that I can not only play the games I was already playing at a higher level, but I can play my NEW games... finally.  Woot!

Tribes: Ascend started it's beta.  Since I pre-ordered I got an automatic invite.  While I haven't played much of it, I can say that it is much better than Vengeance.  It doesn't have quite the right feel for me, but I think that might be because of the limited customization.  I was always a turret whore or a flag chaser.  I used kits that made those very niche roles easier for me.  With the new system these kinds of things are impossible and I'm not doing so well. =X

And finally... the game I had been waiting for.  Battlefield 3.  Oh my fucking God.  So much sunflare. =(  I'm going to need sunglasses to play this fucking game.  It's intense.  Again, I've not got much time with it either, I've still got to find my feet and really work out some of the weapons and whatnot, but it seems fun.  I got a couple maps in and did so/so.  Being patient really pays off in a Battlefield game, being fucking crazy doesn't hurt, either.  Being willing to scale things and jump down on people is an obvious advantage... apparently.

The last week has been fun and eventful.  I hope this next week is better.

Double post! Also, updating some stuff.

As I strive to be more active here I am also going to go back and take care of some older post that I ignored.  No links, no pictures, just words?  MUST FIX!  I've already updated a couple with some colorful pictures and I plan to include them from now on.  I am also going to try to go back and update links.  This way if anyone every gives a fuck, it looks sharp and sexy.

Also, cocks.

Sorry, no pictures for this one.

Fan rattling = no more. Still hate this video card.

I ordered, received and installed the replacement fan for my heatsink.  I picked up the Hyper 212+ and I liked the fan on it, but after a couple months it had started rattling uncontrollably.  I knew that it was the fan, but I was willing to give it another shot.  I ordered a replacement fan that is, as far as I can tell, the same as what came with it.  If this doesn't work out I will invest in another silent cooling PWM fan, I guess.  I'm hoping the last one was a fluke.  The fan still worked, in the sense that it moved air, it was just annoying as hell to listen to and I wasn't sure I would make it much longer.

However, even with this new fan attached, my video card is still a huge piece of shit.  As I said before I am using a 5770 that my brother had very little luck with.  I managed to crash the drivers and have to reset them WHILE I WAS TYPING IN THE ADDRESS TO BLOGGER.  Really?  Quality control must REALLY suck over at Sapphire.  Piece of shit.

I can't wait to get my 6870 back.  I'm still a little nervous about it actually being in working order, though.

RMA success?

I should have my video card back by this weekend.  I can't wait.  I just hope that it comes back in working order.

My 6870 started to do strange stuff over the summer.  I assumed that it might be something to do with the case or cooling, but after swapping out the case and adding a new power supply I had pretty much ruled out the most common issues that arise.  I made sure all of the temperatures were functioning within an appropriate range.  It progressively got worse and worse until the point at which everything just stopped working the way I needed it to.  Games became hard to play and shit just sucked, basically.  I managed to get information together to RMA the card. 

The RMA process was pretty shitty, but I managed to get it sent off.  Now I am just have to hope that it comes back working.  My brother went through the RMA process twice with Sapphire, both times he got a card back that just didn't work like it is supposed to.  Right now I am using one of those cards, because I don't have anything else to really use.  This card BSODs everytime you try to load up something in Direct X 10 or 11 and it has trouble just doing Direct X 9 work.  I have seen it on many occasions actually lock up while browsing a web page or watching a video on the web

It is infinitely frustrating.

I am hoping for the best but preparing for the worst.