tweek it, map it... recap it.

so the weekly update is in, and i noticed some things when i was punching in the numbers. number one, on the chart, the people who have the lighter colors lines representing their gains. well their update "anchors" where almost impossible to see. i corrected that by just changing everybody's anchor to a basic black color. it is very easy to distinguish from the line itself, and allows us to use the rollover score read with ease.

after doing that, i realized how much our chart resembled what could only be described as a very complex version of a Guitar Hero music sheet. it is almost kind of eerie, and yet i wonder what it would sound like were it actually playable.

something else i noticed, the score to achievement ratio. i mean there is a serious lack of any kind of trends here. where i did over 300 points this week with around 7 achievements or so, i think Jake did like 75 achievements, and only got 45 points. wtf?! there is some serious unbalanced gaming going on there. i mean a good chunk of his achievements had to be worth nothing, and that is a gyp quite frankly. so what i may do is whip a chart to tandem the gamerscore. the second chart of course would display achievements gained. since this is also information that is contained in our weekly recaps over at 360voice, it should be no trouble at all. it will include all the data available back to the beginning of our mission. i would expect that to be up before next weeks updates.

the one difference to note between the two charts. our gamerscore chart is a cummulative score. so every week, the scores are tallied and added on to our previous scores. the second chart tracking our actual number of achievements gained would only represent that week in the update. so unlike now, where the chart is steadily rising to our individual goals. the new one will be showing each weeks endeavors, and will have all the peaks and valleys one might expect to see on a graph. at any rate, i am going to get busy coding that up.

Round 3 is a-go!

What's up, everyone?

Just dropping by to let everyone know that the new challenge on 360voice is pending.

If you are wanting to join us for our next round, just hit up this link: http://www.360voice.com/join/CI581IP6

As soon as everyone joins up, I'll start it up. It is going to be a week longer than our last one because there are a few hot titles coming out between the end of March and beginning of April. I didn't want us getting caught inbetween challenges with a bunch of games.

Anyways, sign up and lets get this party started!

Happy gaming!

much faster than advertised...

i originally had planned to have the non-google widget version of our chart up by next week monday. well good news everyone! i actually finished it yesterday. all in all, with some minor tweaking today, it took much less effort than i had originally planned. now that this particular task is complete, and i am aware of just how easy it is to add on a second chart - mayhaps tracking the groups total achievments. this will come in handy once we figure out the donations part of our charity. laters.

oh, and btw, if you do not like the current color of your line, feel free to shoot me the hex of one you like better. the obvious exception to this, of course, would be white, as it would not be visible at the moment. also, let's try not to avoid dupe colors as well.

ok there seems to be some updatum infinitum going on over at 360voice. yesterday, i read that they were have some site issues due to hacker interference. today, they are completely down. i do not think this will affect the tracking we use, as i believe it is the same system that runs gamerDNA. which is their current parent site. the weekly chart update may be delayed until their site it up and running again. also, i have no idea how this will affect the current challenge of which we only had a few days left to complete. at any rate, if the update doesn't happen tomorrow. that is more than likely the reason. unlike my reasons as of late, of which i have had none.

speaking of the chart, i have been doing some research, and i am going to be working on a method that will make the update easier to... well update i guess. right now, the chart is only a few upates long. so it is not too cumbersome to use the google widget thingum. however, at some point, it will become a totally unholy mess that i have to sift through. so, over the course of the coming days, between my anti-bioweapon efforts, i will be working on the way i had originally planned to post the chart on here before i found the easier way. or at least what was at the time easier. i would expect this change to take place before the next episode of heroes. as i believe they are skipping a week, and i am not exactly sure why.

Gears of Evil 5!

So, how's everyone doing tonight?

I'm sure we're all too busy playing the last major release of the month to be reading the intertubes, but I thought I'd post an update anyways. Of course, by "last major release", I mean the last note-worthy video game, Resident Evil 5. There are a few more potential releases worth checking out in the coming weeks, most notably Wheelman and Wanted: Weapons of Fate, as well as a few arcade titles. Still, Capcom's latest zombie...erm..."infected" shooter is probably the last to really catch the eyes of everyone.

On the achievement side of things, I think you're looking at one of the easiest 1000 points you could possibly gain for a Triple-A title. I mean, 370 of those are just for beating the game's various levels/chapters and difficulties. Good thing, thought, that the achievements are stackable, so you could get all those in just two play throughs. Unfortunately the hardest difficulty can't be unlocked until you beat the game on "Veteran".

Not a big deal, really, since the game is pretty fun and addicting. It is a tad like "Gears of War", though. That isn't a bad thing, but I'd have liked to see this entry in the series push the boundaries like "Resident Evil 4" did back on the Gamecube, and later Playstation 2. I wasn't expecting ground breaking, "Oh my god! I can't believe they did that!" game play, but something new would have been nice.

Speaking of something that would have been nice...actually getting what is depicted in the Collector's Edition press release. See, in all the initial product photos, we were shown that the Chris Redfield figurine was about the same size of the video game box itself. The figure actually looked like the 6" figure from the RE5 figure line from Neca. Any sane person would actually think that that was the figure that they were getting, or at least one of similar stature. Instead we are given a measly 2" figure similar to the Altair figure from the "Assassin's Creed" Special Edition. Bleh. Then...don't even get me started on the "messanger bag", again depicted as being much, much larger. Again, we are given a paper-thin fabric bag that is about the same quality of the "Support the Arts/Music" bags you can get at Hot Topic for $1.

If I hadn't gotten it at a discount thanks to working at Best Buy, I'd have been rather pissed. Oh well.

Anyways, enough ranting. Happy Gaming!

2 months in!

Well, we are in the mist of a heated battle over at 360voice.com right now. Erm...okay, so it just started a day or two ago, but whatever. MOtaku was the winner of our first challenge, but it was only the first of many!

I just thought I'd drop in to do a little update since we just passed the 2 month marker of the entire year long challenge. Using the chart that MOtaku is gracefully updating for us, here's a few specs. We're currently running with 10 participants, rocking out a total of 18,195 points between the 10 of us. That's an increase of +7,840 over the last time. Our busiest week was between February 16th and February 23rd. Current forerunners of the challenges are MOtaku (+4,395) and myself (+3,675).

I don't know if it was just because the month was shorter than the others or just because nothing was really released, but gaming wasn't really in the cards, uh?

Oh well! Here's to March and hopefully more fruitful point gains!

Mar 2 update, a day late.

ok, i really have no excuse for not updating the chart yesterday. the fact of the matter is, i simply kind of forgot. i did not even realize that i was a day off until i was posting the chart and i almost put the wrong date on it. i blame all the sushi i have been eating over the weekend.

in case you missed it, Braid was available on XBLA last week for a mere 800 points. from playing the demo so long ago, i had actually been waiting on a price drop for quite a while, even if it was only a temporary one. the game is easy in the sense that it is essentially a side scrolling platformer, that makes odd references while being artistically alluring all at once. it does have a more challenging side. one that is based on puzzle solving, and time manipulation, sort of a solve-em-up if you will. so completing the game, is not necessarily as easy as playing through. nevertheless, you will still earn achievement points for doing both.

Who watches the Watchmen?

Greetings, everyone.

Been a while, um? Tonight begins our second challenge over at www.360voice.com, so I thought I'd pop in and just chat about the gaming deal of the week going on over at Best Buy right now.

See, whenever you buy an XBox 360 console or anything related to XBox Live (games are excluded unfortunately), you receive a voucher for 2 free tickets to see The Watchmen film in either standard or IMAX theaters. Why I think this is so impressive is because The Watchmen: The End is Nigh is laughing on XBox Live this Wednesday for 1600 Microsoft Points. The game is roughly 8 hours in length with 6 chapters set as a prequel to the movie, playing as Nite-Owl and Rorsach in their early days as heroes during the 1960's.

Still, 1600 points might seem a bit steep for a super-hero beat-em-up, but think of it this way: you are buying the game and getting to see the movie or you're buying 2 tickets to the movie and getting the game for free. Either way, even if the game is only mediocre at best, you get a good 2 and a half hours at the theater.

That is all, folks. Happy gaming!

minutes to midnight

ok so i was kind of asked to hold off launching the two week challenge a day, so that one of the newer challengers could sign up. so instead of it already being in effect as of midnight p.s.t. it will be launched later this evening around eight in the central time zone, because i will be leaving for work then. not to worry for all those building up points, they still count toward the weekly updates. so keep on plugging away at 'em. just to reiterate, the challenge will launch later today, and all points obtained after midnight p.s.t should be in the challenge.

also, i have an appointment with the optometrist tomorrow to get some smexy glasses. unfortunately, i am almost certain this will require having my pupils dilated. as a result, i do not think i will be playing much tomorrow. or driving, or laser tag, or doing much of anything that requires great ocular acuity. so i would not expect much from me on the first day right out of the gate. i may go grab some sushi with some friends of mine, but that is about it.