G4MER

Back in 2009, I had the pleasure of going to PAX PRIME for the first time. My Buddy D. got us tickets to BYOC. I met Joshua Sniffen that year and we struck up a friendship. I had no idea about case mods and all that jazz at the time, and Josh was the one to introduce me. I also found out another friend of mine was a case builder, Charlie Falcone, who also builds some very awesome cases. This last year 2011 Charlie won the case mod build off at PAX with his cool version of a Warmachine from a game of the same name by Privateer Press. These two people have inspired me to give it a try.

Since then I have made new friends like Bill Owen who also does some very awesome work with Case mods. Bill has furthered my interest in case-modding and design. If your curious about any of these peoples work, Google them, or ask me to provide you with links.. I think you'll be amazed, just like I am. They build things of beauty.

Joshua Sniffens Web Site: http://nfc-systems.com/

Bill Owens Web Site: http://mnpctech.com/

Charlie Falcone - No Site to my knowledge.

Greetings,

I hope this message finds you in good cheer, and good health. The Holidays are upon us, and we should be thankful for all we have, and for the friends and family that share our lives. There are some though that have very little or who are in hospitals this holiday and need a little caring. So I am asking that you donate to a charity of your choice this Holiday season, and help make the Holidays great for those who may not quite have enough to celebrate.

Here are a few I like..

http://kaboom.org/

http://www.wish.org/

http://www.toysfortots.org/

And My Favorite is Childsplay, Being a Gamer, I like the idea of helping kids in Hospitals find joy and distraction through games.

http://www.childsplaycharity.org/

This is but 4 of the great Charities out there, please find one you like and donate what ever you can.. be it a dollar or more, every little bit helps. Just think if one million people gave 1 dollar, that would be 1 million dollars that charity would gain. So Please give and if your in need I hope that find the help and charity you need to get you though your hardship.

HAPPY HOLIDAYS to all and too All a GOOD NEW YEAR!

Greetings,

Most of the time I like to use this blog as my place to talk about games and gaming related topics.. too many people talking about politics and religion out there, and more talking about celebrity gossip. So, I like to focus on my hobbies. Well This time I wanted to talk a bit about my going back to school.

I just started back 3 weeks ago, with just two classes... easy ones in what the school calls Mini-Mesters. I am Enjoying it, Learning quite a bit, but the one thing I hate to do, is Read. Don't know why, but I just don't get all excited about reading books. And man in College you have to read all sorts of books. My two classes I started off with in my Criminal Justice Degree, were Art Appreciation and History 1302. These two classes seem to be over lapping each other with topics and info found in either of them, and I quite enjoy the connectivity of it all, because one builds on the other builds on the other. So each class is more effective in teaching the subject matter.

I hate to read.. yeah I just cant seem to get into it, only a couple books have ever captured my attention to where I could not put them down. They are, Roger Zelazny's - Amber Series, and Another Day, Another Dungeon By Greg Costikyan. My Wife can read the same book over and over, enjoying it each time. I tend to break books down to a series of images, and I can recall them almost like a movie in my head... so if I try to read them again the movie starts playing and I know whats taking place 10 pages ahead, and by the time I get there I am bored, I have already seen this scene 10 pages ago. I have always had a very visual mind, I am overly attentive to my surroundings, seeing things many people over look. I am also intuitive, guessing what is happening next or what the person says way before they say it.. This often can get me into or out of trouble, partly because it makes me impatient and I have things to do, people to see, blah blah blah.

So I was given a chance to get some extra credit, and it involves reading a book, and writing a report on it. There were two options, a feminist book, and the one I took because we read about it in my art class.. "The Absolutely True Diary of a Part Time Indian" - By Sherman Alexie. I am only a few pages into it, and I seem to be relating to this poor guy. Not so much the nerd aspect or the retard aspect, but the feeling of being on the outside looking in all the time. I never belong to a certain group, instead I was a floater, I floated to all the different groups. But inside I was a closet gamer, a guy who sat around a table with a few other closet gamer's and rolled funky dice and had fantastic adventures. Out side of that I ran with a tough crowd, one of the guys from back then heard I opened a game store and stopped by to visit, and said "Its a good thing we did not know about this back in our school days, or we would of kicked your ass". I told him they would of tried, and grinned. I hated the drama of High School and dropped out early.. went to Community College and got some education, decided at 17 I needed to be married and join the Army.. only proving what a retard I truly was.

This Book by Sherman Alexie, has given me something to think about, and taught me a thing or two so far. One aspect I like in this book is the guy loves to draw, I love to draw as well, he explains why he loves to draw and I wanted to share that with you because I think it is the most profound reasoning for why we draw.

"I draw because words are to unpredictable, I draw because words are too limited, No matter the language you speak be it Englosh, Spanish, Chinese or some other language it is limited to a tiny percentage of the the humans who will get your meaning, BUT! when you draw EVERYBODY understands you". -Retard

That was the great lesson I got.. and maybe one of the biggest reasons I hate to read, I am visual, pictures speak more to me than words do. Wonder if I can get the college to print all the books in picture format.. lol. I also like how he views the world with a sense of humor, how he can kid and joke about himself, we are all too uptight and concerned with our image. What a world we would have if we all were not so vain.

So Did I mention I am back in School, and loving it.

EA has started to pull all of its games and support from Steam and put them on their new ORIGIN application. You Wanted to Play Battle Field 3 with Steam friends, at this time Sorry folks you cant, it is an ORIGIN only game. That's fine, with so many people loosing hundreds of dollars on Steam when their accounts get hacked and then banned, its no wonder Steam seems to be loosing support from publishers. Besides that Steam has always sucked in the support department... why do you think they don't publish a phone number for their support team, because they would get an ear full constantly. Let us hope Origin has better support.

I pine for days when you went to the store bought your game, and played it regardless of some Social Game application having to be the middle man. If PC gaming is dieing, this would be why.

Recently I was given an opportunity to own a tablet for dirt cheap, An offer from Best Buy I could not refuse. Due to being a student and having a job though the college I was offered a Toshiba Thrive for a very low price.. how low I can not say, part of the deal. Well I was given the choice between 3 tablets, the Toshiba 10.1 Thrive ( the one I took ), ASUS 10.1 Tablet, and the Samsung 10.1 Tablet. No the iPad was not offered, and to be honest after looking at it and the Thrive, I would of still taken the Thrive.

I am really new to the Tablet scene, and am discovering all sorts of cool things.. for instance with the right apps, you can use it as your TV remote, or as your blue ray player/controller. I even found a way to use it as a game controller.

I have even found some nice office suite software so I can connect my wireless keyboard and mouse to the tablet and write papers or turn on the mic and have the voice to text app take notes of the instructors lesson.

Then there are the games. Wow I am amazed at the stuff you can get for the Android 3.1+ systems. There are nice First Person Shooters in real 3D just like on my PC, as well as MMO's that look a lot like WoW or ultima online. I really enjoy some of the simple games too like Hearts or Solitaire.

What I like about this Thive Tablet, is the full size connectors for USB, HDMI and the smaller camera port. There is also a speaker connector so Music is in full spectrum. I got THOR blueray, and installed it via wifi connection to my tablet. Watching the movie on the smaller screen with headphones in bed while the wife slept was awesome!

I got Skype for my Android phone and my tablet and was able to vid-chat with my wife from my tablet to the phone.. that is just awesome. So with so many places with free wifi these days, I should be able to vid conference while having lunch. YEAH!

Well I could go on and on.. but if your thinking about getting a Tablet, I say do it. I suggest the Thrive by Toshiba.