Currently Dead Throne By The Devil Wears Prada Vengeance see related

I Think We Call This A Re-do?

Currently Suicide Season By Bring Me the Horizon The Comedown, because Here We Are, Take a Bow, 'Till You've Fooled All of Us Now! see related

Super Sadface: I R Deadz0rs

Currently Fever By Bullet for My Valentine Your Betrayal, So Take Your Eyes Off the Trigger♪ see related

When Information is Too Much for Me

Well hey there, fellow readers ('fellow readers' because I'm jaded and insecure enough to re-read my own blogs for spelling errors and critiques). How's everybody doing this weekend?
Well I'd love to know, because I'm about to share mine.

This weekend is another weekend at my infamous father's house. While in the past I've admitted to hating his guts and having several plans to murder him, I've come to the ultimatum that I love my dad, even if it's just as a friend, and that he has dramatically changed over the years. Why have I came to this conclusion? Because I'm too lazy to hate him and have better things to think about, like my new work schedule.
That right, ladies and gents, Andrew got himself a summer job. Well, it's been a job I've had for a while, but I've been officially put on the payroll now, instead of being paid cash in an envelope every week. It's a maintainence place in Indianapolis called KMC, and the workers are nice and $8.50 an hour never hurts.

I also got to attend the amazing yearly experience known as Mayday. Mayday is a concert held yearly in Indianapolis by the local rock radio station and had some big bands show up this year, the top two being Three Days Grace and Bullet for My Valentine. I thought Bullet personally killed it, especially with their new album that just came out a few days ago. Definitely going to cover Waking the Demon or Your Betrayal by them. The only downside to the concert..?
My girlfriend passed out in line because she was dehydrated. Yeah. Ever want to see me panic like a mother-f*cker? Have my girlfriend pass out in 95 degree heat 100 feet from the front of the line. You'll also get to see me cut 500 people or so in line while screaming and carrying someone at the same time. Fun stuff, I'm telling ya'.

Lastly... I got sun burned. Damn, and it hurts like hell too. Now to go work by pools in hot summer heat to add to it!

Well I'm out once again, just wanted to updated the blog to prove to myself that I still existed.
I'm outta here like I'm outta days to be a newbie on this site (Really, it's been 976 days since I've made this account, and this is my third one. God I'm getting old.),
.::Andrew::.

Currently Final Fantasy XIII By Square Enix see related

Gaming: The Stuff You Didn't Want to Know About It

Well hello there, fancy seeing you again.
I haven't actually made a blog that was both informative and personal in a while, so let's get right to it.

Through the past few years of my life, gaming has been everything to me. It's no joke, either: I play games, I review games, I watch people play games, I desire to make games, I would eat games if I wouldn't choke, die, and have wasted $60 doing so. While never digging into the 'hardcore' standard of gaming, due to the lack of funding and my impeccable spending habits (Damn you Chimera, why must you be over $2000?!), I still consider myself a hardcore gamer due to my dedication.

Now, let's get one thing clear: I know a lot about how the gaming world works. I know legal issues, controversies over games, and have won numerous debates over video games or certain titles. At times I think I know way too much, and at others I feel like I hardly know anything compared to others, which I would still argue is true. But what do I exactly know about video games that makes me feel so intelligent in the field? Well, you're in luck, for it's sharing time.

My first interesting subject on video games is the legalities of all of it. Did you know that you could do jail time for making certain decisions when creating a game? It's true. Say, for example, you wanted to create an MMOG (Massively Multiplayer Online Game) and you put in a "Cash out" option, which is essentially when someone buys an item for a game with real money, and then can sell it back to break even. Well, depending on how it's used, it could send you to jail. It's completely plausible (and has been attempted!) to have someone murder your own wife with this method. Say you want your spouse offed, and you hire a hitman to kill her, all you would have to do is buy an expensive in game item(s), trade them to him, and then he could sell them back. Bingo, bango, bongo, no paper trail, no suspicious bank notes, and one dead spouse. But don't worry, the law is one step ahead of those crazy killers, it's been in the book for years. 

Another fun place to look at is marketing sales and overall sales. Most people don't buy video games if they're on a budget because "$60 is far too expensive for 10 hours of fun." It almost makes sense, doesn't it? At $6 an hour, that's like watching 10 hour-long movies in a row when compared in costs. But if anything, we should be grateful that the games are $90, which was what XBox 360 and Playstation 3 games were originally supposed to cost. With games costing millions of dollars to produce, millions more to advertise, and then finalizing it all up with employee bonuses for being project leads and their two week victory break common in the gaming industry, games get pricey FAST. In fact, they're so pricey that they bank on people buying about 1 million copies of the game within the first month or so, otherwise it all starts to go down hill. Take Dall of Duty: Modern Warfare 2. The total costs to produce that game, ALONE, was anywhere from $40 million to $50 million. Granted it might be a bad example since they've already made more than $1 BILLION off of the game, but some designers barely break even and even sometimes lose profits. That's just how risky it is to make that $60 game you're unsure about buying.

One final thing to look at in this crazy lecture is the term "gamer" itself. Some think of it as a kid who stays inside on Saturdays to play on his 360, some think of it as  a pasty-faced overweight guy with a mic strapped to his head, and others could even think of it as your mother logging into Facebook every few hours to update her Farmville account. Gaming has become socially more acceptable now than ever, but some people have trouble understanding that. Most 'hardcore' gamers wouldn't bat an eye at Farmville, be it that there's no achievements, no ultimate reward, or not even a dedicated server, but some look at Farmville players and see as hardcore of a gamer as I am: someone who spends every waking moment they can updating something that has no real value, if not for the gloating rights.
So who really is a gamer, then? I would personally argue everyone is, whether they realize it or not. When something grabs your attention and you have to beat it for personal satisfaction, you're a gamer. When you have to replay a game JUST to get the "Beat so-and-so Game on Impossible" achievement, then you're a gamer. When you look back at games like Pac-Man and Dr. Mario and go, "Those were when gaming was real", then god you're old... And a gamer.

What I'm trying to say is that there's so many ways to look at gaming, and I can't even begin to fit all of it on this blog. So think about some aspect of gaming you'd like me to discuss, and I'll get right on it. Even pick me a new topic if you want, I'll do it. Seriously, I'm debating which is better: Wish Bone or Zoboomafoo on PBS Kids tomorrow... Really. I'll take anything other than that.

And to keep my promise about my personal life: It's going great. School's becoming more tolerable, I had an amazing Spring Break, I'm finally with the girl I've been interested in since Christmas, and now we're going to Prom together... Which is impressive since I didn't think I'd be going to Prom at all in my high school career.

And that's it for now, and hey look! No apologizing this time!

I'm outta here like God of War is out of gods to kill (Really, Kratos, this whole thing started because you were mad at one god, why kill the rest? To gloat. God, he's a hardcore gamer indeed. -Multiple entendres and puns inserted there-),
.::Andrew::.

Currently Paper Walls By Yellowcard The Takedown, because We've Been Here Many Times Before... What's One More?♪ see related

Woo-Hoo! New Blog with 96% More Happy!