PLN at KIS

What I’ve learned about myself as a
1) writer
2) thinker
3) producer
4) social being/ networker
5) problem solver

PLN – which stands for Personal Learning Network – seemed nothing more than a ‘C-block class’ to me when I first encountered such a differently shaped class. Frankly, I should say that I was a little bit ticked off at the fact that I had to deal with a ‘new’ thing, and I couldn’t be bothered; without knowing that such system will find out things about me that even I wasn’t aware of.

I am a freshman in high school this year, and I came from a Korean public school, where English was treated something like a dog-food. It was no wonder that I was afraid to write about my opinions, because I knew I’d have many flaws that I fail to detect. So, naturally, I developed this sense, so that I give a deep, depressing sigh when I am put to a writing moment. I thought this sensation would last for way longer than I expected, but soon, as a student going through the PLN program, I found out that writing is freaking fun, and that writing about what you really like is what makes it fun. Unlike other classes or occasions when I have to write, I was given an opportunity to actually become a writer, a real writer, for the 77 minutes that I had in C block, and during my own blogging time. As a writer, PLN was more than a mere class but a huge device that I desperately needed, which ended up discovering my potentials. Now that I have had my chance to find more about myself, I will be using this momentum to keep going further, until I become a ‘real-world-writer.’

A while ago, I wrote a post about ‘navigating’ my career through the PLN program, and as this piece of writing tells me, I have to admit that PLN had made me into a deeper thinker in general. What I mean by a deeper thinker is that I have become more mature in terms of thinking, and such change had made my writings look better compared to the ones in the past, and I have actually become a more efficient problem-solver. PLN was never an easy-A course, and it required the students to take full responsibility and maturity. Writings needed to be in a form that is appropriate to the audience out in the world, therefore I spent more time than any other writings, when I was typing for my blog.

Other than being a more creative thinker for the sake of writing, I can also say that I have become a more responsible problem-solver. Before, due to the fact that there were always people at the back in case of a problem, I didn’t care much of what I did. If I made a mistake, I could easily lean back, hoping for those supporters to push me back up. But, in the world of global and networked society, such method didn’t work out. So, PLN had introduced me to how things in the professional-world are done, and how I needed to grow up. As a result, I developed a sense, so that I prevented many mistakes from occurring, and even if it did, I was able to find the most efficient ways to come up with a solution.

PLN was also being a guideline of how I should produce quality work. Mistakes were fine, because that is the source of all the good experience and education, but such thing did not make laziness tolerable. Once, I was thinking and dragging too much with my project, and I was inflicted with a low grade which now, I think I deserved. That had taught me a valuable lesson that if the production rate is significantly low, no matter how high-quality my other works are, people would not be interested, and will abandon my idea easily. Laziness is never accepted in the pro-world. In the end, I grew up, and kept on producing whatever I needed to produce at an acceptable rate. After all, I wanted attention, and I needed to prove myself that I deserve such thing.

Lastly, as PLN – personal learning network – is self-explanatory in the sense of being a guideline, I was introduced to the whole new world of socializing and networking. Before I even knew PLN existed, I thought just talking and chatting to my friends was good enough to be considered ‘networking’. However, now that I saw how world-wide network was running, I was dazzled, and was excited to try so.

Unfortunately though, seeing from what I have done, I didn’t really succeed in becoming a good, world-wide networker. I had a habit where I was lazy to do stuffs that I didn’t usually do. So I did use Twitter - Mr.Burell’s probable favorite networking application – but I never used it as I used MSN and Skype with my friends. That is the conclusion, but is never the end of the story. Just like how I learn from my own mistakes, I did the same thing for this particular event, and I will, not may, develop as a young networker, and hope to be recognized, linked, and running.

Now that I finished writing about such a special program that I faced for one full semester, my head nods automatically in agreement that PLN was the course that had influenced me in the most ways. I thank Mr.Burell and myself for giving me a chance to experience this sheer brilliance, and I will never make all the times I spent here a waste, but will develop this into something that will shine in the future.
Photo credits to marttj

So far, I have shot some screencasts on my second review. Since it’s quite distracting how I click and talk at the same time, I decided to do it separately.

Since I have more footages than I need in the actual review, I decided to set a model that will be utilized to cut the footages, and it follows:

Pez ? Title Screen

Me holding the same sign as the GTA review, saying stuffs like “welcome to my second explosive review…” and also describe what game I’m going to review and moving straightly to the second category.

Starcraft opening screen ?
The opening screen with the BGM. Freeze the screen, describe BASICALLY what the actual picture represents. Just for fun.

menu, exploring the 4 menus you can click on ?
“Single”, “Multiplayer”, “Map creator”. “Exit”. Common sense, but provide the readers with their functions. My goal is to inform the readers as much as possible so that they might actually try this game.

Go into Single mode ? explain BASIC different modes ?
Click on the single mode. (tell people the difference between the expansion and the original.) Classify mission, and custom games. List the differences.

Finally, the races. ?
Mission screen. Zerg, Protoss, Terran. Figures in the middle, each representing the missions with different stories.

With the 3 figures in the middle?
Click each of them, and give a glimpse of how things look like in the missions. Layouts, maybe even the stories. For fun.

Finally, introduce the Battle.net ?
“it doesn’t end at single play…” beginning with such quote, introduce watchers to the multiplayer mode that uses the internet. How things go, and how many variety of games there are on the net.

Sum of the things with blink of footages
Avgn style. With a strong voice, finish the footage. Giving the image of stars – the score of the game.

Most of the people believe that life does not exist outside of the planet we are living in.

No life outside of the Earth? Nonsense! It’s already here.

Proudly presented by Blizzard Entertainment, one of the most popular entertainment corporations in the world, Starcraft was released in April, 1998.

Before anything more, what is Starcraft? What KIND OF game is it?

Starcraft belongs to the genre of RTS, which stands for Real Time Strategy. Literally, it is a game where you organize, and initiate strategies of your race and lead to victory. However, as ‘real time’ part is self explanatory, your enemy develops at the same pace as you develop, meaning that you might have to change your strategies constantly in order to combat the strategies your opponent has.

Is it one of those ‘classic’ RTS games that’s based on WW I or WWII?

Well, it is an RTS, and it does include vast amount of army and war content (if it doesn’t it’ll be more like a tycoon game. Yuk). However, the reason why this game was so ground-shaking was because it was based completely outside of the Earth and for the most part, the human history.

The story tells me that human race needs other inhabitable planets that humans can live in, due to the worsened condition of the blue planet that continued for centuries. Then, they encounter a race, Protoss, the prevailing aliens of the particular galaxy the humans were exploring in. Of course, since humans were just completely new aliens for them, Protoss concluded that they are trespassing, and are threats to their race. A war starts between the races, and it gets bigger and bigger day by day. Meanwhile, a new race, the Zerg, is created by the scientists from Protoss. Unfortunately, they’re power was beyond their expectation, and set loose out of their reach. Thanks to the Protoss race, now it is a war between three races: the Terran, humans from the Earth; the Protoss, the ancient keepers of the galaxy; the Zerg, the monsters born from science.

The day this game was out on public, it blew such number of people’s minds that this game spread through the U.S at an incredible speed, and even to Asia. Now, it is THE most popular game in South Korea. People from all sorts age group plays this game - even a job called ‘professional gamers’ or ‘pro-gamers’ emerged as a popular job in Korea.

A decade passed after this game was released. Considering the fact that the game market is developing at a ridiculously fast rate, a decade makes any kind of game just ‘too old to play’ and forgotten. Starcraft on the other hand, managed to survive that stereotypical behaviors of gamers and got popular everyday.

Now, let’s enter the Matrix once more to see what this game’s made of.

Interface

Interface is the first thing that the gamers put into their consideration. The reason for this matter is because interface is the first thing the player sees and sees every single time they play the game. It can attract more users like ants on a candy, or it might as well get buried to the bottom of the Earth as if it never existed. Harsh stuff, but it’s part of the competition.

As for Starcraft, I’d like to say that it is by far the most successful interface that RTS games ever developed. Some anti-fans (those mean people on Youtube who leaves mean comments) criticized that it was too dull, but it was soon proved that it is set as the idol for RTS interface, and frequently used by other RTS game developers.

It is incredibly compact, but it contains everything you need to play the game; it’s never too many nor too little.

First, you have a map on the bottom left corner, which can track the units’ location, movement and action. With this map, you can constantly monitor different locations to react for any emergencies, or the opponents’ unexpected strategies.

Secondly, the middle bar shows you the specific details of the buildings and units you click on, and an image of them.

Thirdly, the right hand corner is where there are 9 little squares for any ‘actions’ you can perform. Normally, half of them are empty, and even if it is full, most of the movements can be performed with your mouse and keyboards.

Balance between the race

One of the scenarios that happens to the ‘stinky’ or ‘sucky’ RTS games is this: people play the game for the first time, and enjoys it pretty much; then they challenge their friends with their own favorite races, and yet they like the game; eventually, the players reach out to the online network to challenge more people around the world, and realizes that everyone uses the same race, just because they are superior; soon the player gets bored of the race and tries other races out, and finds out they are way too weak, and quit the game.

Starcraft is far away from that matter. However, this matter is hard to describe for me, and hard to understand for you, unless you actually play it – so first things first, here are the races of Starcraft.

Terran

Terran are the humans from a planet called the Earth (duh). Since Starcraft’s saga starts at the year 2229, humans had all the technology we can possibly imagine, and also all the worries such as pollution, population boom became the reality. The population reached 260000000000 people, about 4.5 times bigger than the current population (in 2008). The planet had no room, and the level of pollution has reached its max.

So, with all the fancy technologies humans had, they had reached their hands out for inhabitable planets outside their solar systems, and the grand war between the galaxy starts.

In the game, Terran is loved by many players in the world, because they stand neutral to any abilities. The units are relatively cheap, and they’re at a medium strength – possibly stronger compared to the price. Also, their pace of development is maneuverable by the user, so Terran users have the biggest range in their level of playing. The gap between the good Terran player and a starter with Terran is huge that the game ends so quickly.

If you want to experience what ‘the stable’ is like, try out with Terran. It will definitely be a great guide for you to approach Starcraft.

Protoss

Protoss is one of the noblest races in the entire universe, and they have amazing and unknown technologies that are completely new to humans. They are proud and cautious and doesn’t like any conflicts; which is why they wanted to extinguish the flame of the Terrans as soon as they appeared in their visions.

Unfortunately, due to the characteristic settings of this race, the game-play is a little bit tougher than Terran, the race I introduced before.

They are first of all, expensive. Generally, the buildings and the units you control in the game are the most expensive out of all 3 races in Starcraft.

It’s surely not expensive without a reason though. They have the double-layered defense system called the cybernetics shield; units are never harmed unless the shield wears out. Also, the damages the units can give is very high compared to the other same-level units from other 2 races.

Most of all, due to their high expenses in buildings, the development rate is the slowest out of the 3 races. Don’t worry though, because Blizzard entertainment has balanced this game out so well, that Protoss’ basic units can have equal amount of effects with the high-tech units from other races.

Zerg

Zerg is the unfortunately-born race, and was created by the accident in a Protoss laboratory. Protoss might have thought that these little ‘bugs’ are harmless, but now they became the fastest evolving race of all.

As a benefit, Zerg units are the cheapest out of the other races. Often there are 2 units created at once at a very small price; and because of this, Zerg’s strategies are usually initiated with hundreds of units. It can be a split attack from different directions, or just simply outnumbering them.

Just the opposite of the Protoss, Zerg are the cheapest AND the weakest at the same time. It wouldn’t be fair to have hundreds of units with outstanding power would it?

Also, in addition to the cheap price, its pace of development is unbelievable. When other races are mining in preparation for the spurt, Zerg can already be producing warriors that are ready to strike.

If you want quick and fast style of game play, Zerg is the right race for you.

By having 3 races with interesting backgrounds sorted into 2 extremes and 1 medium, the balance is ultimate, and had no conflicts or frustrations whatsoever.

Psyched already? Or just still pending?

Unlike RPG, RTS allows you to play one round and leave. Meaning that even if you are busy, you can just play one round as a way of ‘chilling’

So come one and take a chance to ‘chill’ with this awesome game from Blizzard entertainment.

Feel the ‘legend’ that was carried on for 10 years straight yourself.

Sound – OOOO
A little repetitive, but the scale of the music is incredible. Great song to listen to.

Graphics – OOOOO
Not 5 points as in fancy, but its compatibility. It’s not too fancy nor stinky. It can be played in basically any graphic cards in computers nowadays, and it’s never insufficient to simulate the required details.

Gameplay – OOOOO
Blizzard’s magic and RTS has met its peak. Unlimited possibilities of strategies, balance as firm as ever, fascinating storyline.

Variety – OOOOO
Single play with CPU is available, the story mission mode, with special goals are available, multiplayer games via internet connection is available, and even map creating is available. What do you need more.

OVER ALL OOOOO a must have game.

Image credits to fiveinchpixie, EilSel, Mil, Vrogy, Pablo Noel @ Flickr

Which Pill Would You Like To Take?

To be or not to be - in this case, to buy or not to buy. If you were thinking over this problem, and are reading this post right now, you are doing the right thing.

Grand Theft Auto: Vice city, developed by Rockstar Games, is the forth and the best episode of the whole series Grand Theft Auto. First, it had a tremendous success appealing to the avid gamers on PS2 and Xbox, by launching the console version. Then, they had added some more magic to their pot, which ended up as ‘THE BOMB’, the PC version of the game.

You might wonder why I emphasize the fact that the PC version is better than the console version, and I completely understand. I own a few games that came out in both Playstation2 and PC, and they were exactly, or almost the same. It was just the hardware difference. But Grand Theft Auto, not only the developers had modified the controls and commands for the game, they had added more ‘fun elements’, meaning that players have access to more entertainment. Such as vehicles, which is the most common thing you encounter in this game (since this game’s called the Grand Theft ‘AUTO’).

As I am a person who had played both the PC and the console version, I’d like to point this one example out, just to make it clear for you.
Now, now that you have the ‘pill’s ready for you, let’s look at the ‘prescriptions’ shall we?

Pros

- AMAZING variety of action. You can do whatever you want to do. Drive a car, fight with people, buy clothes, change cars. EVERYTHING!

- 3 in 1. Just with one game, you can enjoy 3 genres of game. Driving, 3rd person shooting (TPS), and RPG. It never gets you bored.

- Improvements in the variety of the vehicles. All 3 land, water and sky is available for you to explore, and for the most part, assault.

- Storyline became as firm as ever. It’s long, and thrilling; it makes you feel like you’re watching a full 007 movie (only that you’re on the gangster side). If you’re bored bumping into things, there’s always the story mode, or mission to catch up on.

- Soundtracks. GTA Vice City has managed to get over 2000 licenses on music, so that you can listen to your favorite tunes while you drive a car. Some people even say that this game’s price is nothing even if it was for the soundtracks.

Cons

- Nice attempt to add some realistic aspects to the game, but this time it hit its back. Since it’s a free-flow game, saving data is vital - if you clear the entire game and quit without saving, it will leave nothing, meaning that you will have to start all over again. Now, is saving easy? The answer is no. I guess the game makers thought ‘it will be fun to put the checkpoints at places where you sleep right? Just like the reality.” No guys. I hope you can save the progress in the ‘esc’ or ‘menu’ next time.

- Cops get on your tail way too easily. One time, I was going to the clothes shop, to get a new look, and then I just accidentally crashed into this young dude on a bike. I automatically got a police star, and a whole bunch of cops started to chase me. Then I get busted (since the cops are usually faster than you), which lands me in front of the police station, a.k.a the other side of town. It really drove me nuts.

There. Just like any other games, GTA Vice City has both pros and cons. It’s just that I consider it a phenomenal and extraordinary game. It’s way too addicting, and it deserves its fame as a GTA series game. Now that you have the pill and the prescriptions in front of you, go ahead and take the pill you want.

TWO (OR THREE IF I HAD) THUMBS UP. BURNING HOT

Photographies’ credits to Gene Hunt, pinkangelbabe, and niznoz on Flickr.

“Slippery when Wet”

This sign with yellow background is seen in our everyday lives like department stores, parking spaces, etc. But one thing that is true to most of the people is that they don’t really take it seriously. I don’t do it either.

Then why is it there? To make the place look good? For those who just don’t get the logic of wet floor? I don’t think so. It is there because dangerous things happen, which starts from even the smallest things that people do not consider important, just like the wet floor in this case. Some of you might wonder why in the world I am talking about the ‘wet floor’ right now. Well, that’s how things are turning out right now.

I glimpsed over the brilliant posts done by fellow classmates. It’s good to hear that most of their work is turning out great. I was feeling the same way. My planning was perfectly carried out without a single problem, and I was excited as the ‘producer’ of this project. However, I just met the biggest and the very first bump on my way.

The story is this. Since I had my first post done, which provided through information about my project overall, I started to stretch out my hands to reach my first video review. I chose the game I wanted to review on, (thanks to many of the people who assisted me on Twitter, I have a list of games I’d like to review in the future), and the script on my way. Basically, I was ready to roll.

But the event broke out behind my back, and hit me really hard on my head. Since the whole point of my project was informative/funny game review, it would be nothing without a game. I HAD the game on my desktop (Macbook didn’t seem to be a good choice to play a game and review it on). The day I wanted to film and screen-cast, it was gone. According to my mum’s detailed explanation, our desktop blacked out and didn’t turn on. The problem turned out to be lack of cleaning, and the age of the computer (and its components). So, it went away to come back in a shiny form, and on its way to the tech center, it took my opportunity to record my very first video.

Of course, I did try everything I could to do it on my mac, but the wall, getting-the-game-on-my-macbook didn’t seem to move out of my way at all.

That was my grand story of why my video’s not up on Youtube yet. It does sound like an elementary student’s I-don’t-have-my-homework excuses. And I do confess that it is my responsibility for this. But since the water is already spilled, my only way is to get my video up on the Web as soon as possible.

2008, February. A Glimpse on How Things Flow.

Just because I had a bitter taste of the reality towards the end of the month, it does not mean that I’m an exception from the job of reflecting on the month I had. I have to say that it was very sweet at the beginning and turned out very bitter in the end. So let’s see what I’ve done and made on the second month of 2008…

1. Overcame the obstacle

This is the month that had changed my whole project. This networked learning was a crazy (in a good way, of course) for me to encounter in school. It was new, and I was a “noob” at it. I was just looking at what other people were doing, and followed them. But as things became slowly familiar, I decided to take the gamble, and part away from the rest of the group. I’m on my own now, and really think it was a great choice. Which is why I have listed it here, on this post. Without this one single choice, I would still be in the mist, struggling to navigate my way.

2. Networking.

Networking has been an issue for me ever since the beginning of the project, and I still think it is right now. But the reason for putting this category as a thing that I achieved this month, is because I got something satisfactory out of it, though the process was kind of sloppy.

- If I had to mention the details, I would name these two people: jdwilliams @ Twitter, and SoojinLee @ Twitter. These two people stretched their hands out for my question, and inspired me to go back to the basics. I’m not anywhere near to being a professional, so I needed to start from the most basic thing. From my perspective, I thought that basic technique was ‘imitating’ (within the margin of not violating any kind of things).

That one spark of an inspiration had an absolute impact on my limits at that time, and pushed me to the next level.

3. The Project

Compared to this one, the two things above were not big at all. Bearing the fact that this month was a very beginning stage of the whole project flow, I am very proud of what I did.

- Information

Through my “visual” podcast, and a long post on my blog about my project, I think if anyone read it, they would understand what I am doing. Which is very helpful in general, because no-one wants their audiences to frown in confusion when they see the product. In my personal opinion, I did my best and did a good job on this.

- Video. The final product for the month…

Unless you skipped ahead without reading the “grand story of what happened” above, I’m sure you are now aware of where my video is. I apologize again, and I guarantee that I will never disappoint any of the viewers, and I will make it look like a product worth the time I spent on it.

So. Therefore. In Conclusion

Looking back, I think February a very successful month for me to spend. It was worth while, and gave me the opportunities to get the best out of it. So I want to confess that I deserve an ‘A’ for this month. This self grading system is really embarrassing for me even now. The way I grew up in school was “get what you deserve to get, and compare with other people around you”. Last month, the thought that my work was generally sloppy, and the modesty (or pressure) blocked me. But this month, I would like to express myself with confidence. Since I’m just a student, I don’t know how you think about my work and effort. But if you think I really don’t deserve the grade I mentioned, I will prove myself with the following works.

Thank you for reading this long post.

The Pictures are credited to:

yewenyi , mrjoro , oddsock, juque @ Creative Commons, Flickr.

The first week of this whole project career flowed very well. I wrote a piece explaining what I’m going to do, and what I have learned from the pros so far. I reviewed Chappelle, and “The Angry Video Game Nerd”, and what makes them so good. I think I took time and got something out of the careful attention I put in. I’m happy about what I wrote, and what I am writing, since I really think that I did something. I feel the ‘development’.

Now that I have all the ‘theoretical’ stuffs in my mind, the thing I need now is the ‘experience’. Meaning that I am now going to do some action.

This is the game review for GTA: Vice City from the famous game review website, Gamespot. I can see how professional it is. Which is why I chose it as a model for my future review’s format.

Heading right up, my next product will be a screen-cast review of GTA: Vice City, with some funny skits in the middle, just to make it a bit more entertaining (since I started with the concept of making a comedy movie).

Stay Tuned.

The World Of Game Reviews

Technology, especially in IT and computer science develops so fast, many branches have rooted out from that category. Among those “baby categories”, computer/video games are the fastest growing market in the world. Simply because people like that kind of entertainment. Unfortunately though, it’s not a free cookie. People needs to spend money on the entertainment they desire, and they don’t want any regrets.

So who do they rely and trust to prevent themselves? The professional game reviewers. I am planning to do the same job, so that my information can be a help to those who need it. Before I take any further steps, here are some “gods” or “gurus” of the game review world.

Dave Chappelle, is a well known sketch artist, who makes incredibly funny skits that is broadcasted on TV. I have to say that he is an absolute genius, because he has no problem making fun of anything. In other words, he can just bump into something controversial and transform it into a comedy sensation. I agree that he’s not a game reviewer. However, I didn’t want to give up my stance that his skit was the best review I’ve ever seen, and that it deserves to be mentioned.

Dave Chappelle’s skit on Grand Theft Auto: Vice City

Dave Chappelle did a magnificent job on doing a skit on how he thinks about that game, without any spoken words (except for some of the every-day quotes that keeps the skit flowing). It was funny as heck, but still it gave out basically all the important factors in the game in 1 minutes, mocking it at the same time.

Now, let’s cut it apart and see what it is about.

1. Chappelle imitating the awkward movement in the game when he was bumping into the tree - This didn’t really have anything to do with the reviewing element, but laughable factors in the middle are essential. Video is a media where people sit and watch. If they’re not captivated, it’s a failure for sure. Make it funny and entertaining is what I/you can learn from this 2 second action

2. Chappelle stopping the car by standing in front of the car and forcing the driver our of his car- The climax of the video. As you can see from the game’s title, Grand Theft Auto, a major part of the game is to basically steal the cars in the game. Now you can see where the controversy sparked. Keep it concise, factual, and neutral the biggie here.

3. Chappelle getting shot, and shooting the person, ending up as a murder. Also part of the game. You can choose weapons anytime, and kill people freely. Though it is in the virtual world, its popularity fortifies the amount of impacts it has on the players. Another controversy was started at this part, because the consumers of this game is mostly made of kids/students, the age when they can get influenced A LOT. What I learned from this is- point out the truth. The consumers deserve to know the dark side.

4. Finally, looking at the video generally, the format sent chills through my spines. It perfectly imitated the format of the game itself, and just by keeping it that way tells the audience that it is a review of that particular game. Simple things can have even bigger impacts than the big fancy devices. Keep looking. That’s what I learned here, and what I want to do the most.

The AVGN Series -

I wanted to mention the Angry Video Game Nerd. He’s a great reviewer, and he had shook the world in a week, with just one video. Now he has his own website, and channel at Youtube. But I don’t think it is quite suitable for me to post one of the videos up here. The reason being him cursing literally every second.

Still, the fact that he is my #1 idol would not change (not the cursing skills). He has absolutely no flaws at reviewing games, and he reveals everything from inside to outside. The pros, the cons, and from different perspectives.

He keeps his videos in amazingly entertaining format, so even if you are not interested in video games, it can still be a funny video.

Now that I had a looked at some of the greatest game reviews of this time, it is time for me to start my engine and head for my own review. Since it is the beginning for me, I will be reviewing the game Dave Chappelle did: “GTA: Vice City”.

As always, advices and idea offers are more than welcome to me. I want to learn, and I want to make a good product that can both satisfy myself, and help people at the same time.

Photo credit to hunterseakerhk, rafe baron, dave asch

 Product!

From all the time I spent on directing my own way for my project, now I am actually at the point where I can take a step forward. I am pretty sure that I am ready for it to present to people and continue marching forward.

2/19, I started watching the video on Grand Theft Auto: Vice City by Dave Chappelle, so that I can catch and offer my thoughts to even the smallest parts of the video. The reason for that is because I am thinking Chappelle has put far more things than I can actually imagine, since he never used any specific verbal expressions (which is one of the most fascinating factors that makes this review attractive).

Today I took notes on the factors used in the review. Just to make it easier and clearer for me! So now I have a basic chart of comparison and contrast that will format my actual product.

Even though it will be almost impossible to affect my product of the week, but I will be updating twitter constantly, so that I can get some wider views on my topic (hopefully). After the product, networking it is.

[Paul, where’s the podcast? It’s not linked! Also check: punctuation inside of brackets, below; - CB]

The Quick Energy Boost - Podcast.

While I was thinking about how my reviews are going to turn out, trying to find some inspirations, I completely forgot about posting my podcast, which would have made my idea clearer for sure. I admit I missed the timing, so this time, I added some finishing polish to it, so that the time I missed can be at least covered.

It has been a good event for me to reconsider the fact that blueprint in my head is not going to get my project anywhere; that I need to share it and explain to the public.

So this is the first actual podcast that I actually tried to do “non-schooly”. That should explain why it is sort of awkward in many ways. I might have added some parts that I don’t actually need, or even getting in the audiences’ way of understanding my points.

I enjoyed while I was making and polishing this podcast; though I don’t know how it is going to turn out So any kind of opinions and advice will be more than welcome. Enjoy!

It has already been a few weeks since I started this class. It was totally new to me, and I was worried about the path I wanted to choose. Now, I’m here writing a post where I’m at a point where the project is beginning. Since it’s a project that I navigate myself, I’m really looking forward to the result, and I’m ready to take full responsibility of it.

So the first product that I want to achieve was influenced and supported by the network that has reached all around the world (although I don’t really have a full communication with many people). Just a tweet, saying that I’m looking for some suggestions on games that I can make fun of, whynot88, a person from twitter sent me a link to an online-game website that had many funny elements in it.

I was excited, so I followed the link. As whynot88 had mentioned, it looked funny, but it wasn’t exactly the game I was looking for; it seemed to broad to make fun of to me. (a student)

However, that one depressing result had an influence that I never expected. Fortunately, I did not stop there, and thought about what I could do (A plan B). So after some time of researching, I found about “the Angry Video Game Nerd (AVGN)”. It was funny as heck, and it had really good reviewing factor in it too. But the language in it was too explicit for me to set it as my role model.

That was a frustration TWO IN A ROW. I thought I needed some rest, or ‘chilling’ (which wasn’t exactly a part of my plan). So I went to Youtube, and typed in “Dave Chappelle” who is my favorite comedian. I love his shows. I was surfing through the list of his skits and BOOM I found the treasure. “GTA - Chappelle’s show”. GTA is an abbreviation for a game called Grand Theft Auto, and due to its inappropriate contents, it was target to many criticisms. Just like I was thinking, it was exactly what I wanted to have a look at. So strangely, my little ‘chilling time’ put a comma to my whole navigation of my project.

This is my final thought on how my first product will be looking like.

1. It would be a review, a game review. A written media, maybe with a podcast of my voice, to keep the topic on track.

2. The review will look just like the professional ones, unbiased based on facts.

3. Once I do that, the second product will be a video, just like what Dave Chappelle did.

I never knew I would actually be writing this kind of post, because I really felt like I was in the middle of nowhere, helpless when I was given an opportunity to carry on my own project of my interest (personally I think this is what school does to us). But, since I am now onto this stage where it’s all set for me to act on, I will not let myself down. Also, I think chilling time is good too, since you never know where the opportunities are around you

(This is the “GTA - Dave Chappelle” I was talking about)

Photo Credits to Macwagen & hunterseakerhk