What the Fuck Happened in May-June 04, Man?

06.28.04

Forums and Updates

We finally have new forums (they are also linked in the lefthand menu). They are hosted by Ryan of runuo.com. Enjoy.

On another note, I've been working the graveyard shift temporarily and being that not much is going on at night I frequently run out of things to read. So, out of boredom I started looking back over my old Joy of Villainy site and the sheer volume of stuff I used to post after I took it over. Hell, there were even times that I posted 4 or 5 times in a single day. Granted, in cases like that it was a couple of quick blurbs, but I was basically posting constantly about one thing or another.

This got me to thinking. The reason that I used to post so much as opposed to how infrequently I (we) post now is several fold :

Most obviously, I was playing a game that the site was 100% dedicated to (UO). It's easy to go on and on about things you do in game when you know everyone reading the site is on the same page as you.

I was playing said game a whole lot

Many of the updates were posting or responding to user input

I had endless hours of free time at work to come up with stuff to post, new sections to work on, etc.

Those four things combined made for an extremely often updated gaming website. So, the question is... is that something you guys would like to see me get back to? Obviously, not tons of brief daily updates because there just isn't always something to say, but what I mean is getting more back to the "here's what interesting happened to me in game today" type stuff along with newbie guides, user submitted stories/screenshots, etc. Keep in mind that I'm playing Planetside and contemplating Final Fantasy XI with nothing else in the foreseeable future, so I wouldn't be talking first hand about anything else.

Also in the forums is a new poll asking what MMOG you currently play most. This is for me to get a sense of how far off the pulse of my readers I really am and go from there. Not saying I'll play a game just to stir up updates there, but maybe it'll spark some ideas for new sections or viewer submitted stuff.

I dunno... just some thoughts I guess. Post to the spiffy new forums whatcha think.

06.17.04

Forums

We are aware that the Forums are gone. They were under control of Azaroth and thusly they went poof (I'll leave it at that :/).

We have a couple of offers for people to host our forums, so we'll see how that pans out. Once we get something up and going, I'll link 'em in the lefthand menu.

06.16.04

IPY and Azaroth

Azaroth and the In Por Ylem UO server have left behind all affiliations with WTFMan.com. I would like to wish both much luck and I hope both are a great success. I'm sure the other WTFMen join me in wishing them well.

After spending an abundance of time on the server as an administrator, I have come to a couple of conclusions. Some are obvious and some sorta surprised me :

According to the players, you are never 100% right. It doesn't matter if you are running an event, making a change to the code, adjusting spawn, etc... you are not making the right choice for everyone. The extremes are the worst of course, but even small nudges in one direction or another will send people to the boards/IRC/email bitching. God knows you can't keep things stagnant because then the server gets boring. So everytime you try to improve something, you're going to catch hell for it.

Players assume they know everything. While I tried to share a vast ammount of information with players, there are just some things you don't tell the masses. How-to's on major bugs and specifics on account hackings spring to mind, but there are plenty of others. Players absolutely have no faith in staff trying to resolve issues even if they directly say they are working on it. Without tangible proof (which isn't always wise to give or even available), you're not doing anything.

If a staff member does something to you or a friend of yours, the staff member is automatically in the wrong. This one I don't understand because hell, Azaroth banned one of my longest term guildmates from the server and I thought he was right in doing so. Why others seem to think that if they or their friends gets punished for something, it's the end of the world and staff = nazis.... I'll never get.

On a server where the staff are 100% volunteers getting absolutely zero compensation of any type, the players will still not think they are getting enough. Volunteers get burned out - especially considering the issues I'm covering. Spending countless hours trying to help people only to have them turn around and say they want more this and more that is a bit aggrivating. Changes take time especially when you're short staffed, but this is a completely foreign concept to some.

People love to think it's their god given right to be a complete and utter cock to people. I'm an asshole, but for the love of God I've never done 1/10th of the shit I witnessed some people doing on IPY. I can only imagine that on pay servers it's got to be worse since players think "I paid, I can do whatever I want". Fucking idiots.

Speaking if idiots, there are a lot of them. Granted I knew this before working on IPY, but it really hits home when you not only have to deal with them, but try to help them.

Well, those are only a couple of the many conclusions I came to... Christ, no end to the revelations from working on that server.

Anyhow, best of luck to Azaroth and IPY.

06.12.04

Utter Stupidity...

Here I am, yet again, with another post to amuse and entertain. Today a friend of mine and myself somehow, someway, managed to get on the topic of wierdo extremist groups. He then explains to me that apparently, there is a group of people out there who believe the earth is flat.

I cannot make this shit up

After perusing this site, and nearly dying from hysterical laughter, I figured that it was DEFINITELY worth sharing. In case you are too lazy to click the link, here are some gems from the site:

What is the Earth's shape?

The Earth is flat. It is shaped in the form of a pentagon, and thus has five corners.

Uhhhh, someone please tell me that this site is actually a joke and I am a few years behind.

What is the "middle corner"?

If one was to draw a line from each corner to the centre of the opposing side of the Earth, the line would intersect in the middle of the Flat Earth. This place is known as the Middle Corner.

Does the "middle corner" prove that 5=6?

Yes.

I don't care how many fucked up theories you come with, you will not be able to convince me that the number five is actually the number six. What the fuck?!

Does Idaho exist?

No. The existence of Idaho is a lie, fabricated by a conspiracy of cartographers, as is England.

What about North Dakota?

That doesn't exist either.

Errrr, I've been to both of these states, I mean, these states do suck, and I almost wish they WERE some sort of conspiracy. This is NOT the case however.

There's a lot more where that came from, I just cannot believe that this shit is real. I highly recommend visiting the site, it has never ending humor value. I guess that about does it for this edition of utter stupidity. See you next time!

06.09.04

Pistons > Lakers

Shaq was like "In Vas Mani" but Wallace was like "Corp Por! Corp Por!"... someones regs are getting looted in this series, and my money is on the hometown boys to be divying it up on the bank roof. Go Detroit! If all else fails we can always resort to Plan B, which is simply to sell all the courtside seats to White Girls, therefore Kobe will be so distracted he shall be rendered useless.

On another note... why do I love Ebay? because I can buy shit like THIS

My inner-redneck is beside himself with joy right now. Zing .- Greybeard

05.31.04

Pass the lubricant, keke ^^

I have recently made the mistake of purchasing a copy of Lineage II. What a festering, pus filled cockboil that thing is. I swear to God that the only way those anime inspired characters could appear more homosexual is if they were motion caputred giving each other reach arounds. For fucks sake, even the "Orc Warrior" who one would think should be a hulking, fierce monstrosoity looks like he would be more at home sharing gardening tips on the Christopher Lowell show. Not that I have anything against homosexuals mind you, if men want to smoke each others poles in the privacy of their own home then Godspeed to them, I just dont want to play one in my MMORPG. On another note, since the world of gaming has been so deep in the shitter of later I have actually kept my attention turned to "gasp!" the REAL world. Street racing on the weekends has been the mainstay for me lately, since if there is one thing I hate more that japanese anime MMORPG's, its ricer cars fartcan mufflers, 3 story spoliers and TYPE R stickers all over them.

Sorry fuckheads, you car is neither Fast, nor Furious. With that being said, here is the June 04 edition of "Dumb Shit I Blow my Money On." - Greybeard

05.20.04

Where I have been...

Well, I sure haven't been playing many MMOs. Most all of them suck, and I find I just plain don't have that much time for tem anymore. Although I do hear rumors of a new PK server being opened in Asheron's Call. Maybe when that comes around I'll be there.

No, what I have been doing is far more fun, and profitable. I've been playing Poker. Lots of it.

I actually started playing last year online after I came back from our JoV Vegas trip. I quickly lost the $50 I deposited, and felt like a retard, which really isn't a rarity. But I saw potential for big things here.

This past March, after my wife had pretty much decided for sure that she was going to spend another 3 years getting her Phd, I decided to try and make a run at making Poker a steady second income. I'd been playing off and on for the past 8 months and won over $1000. So I deposited $300 into Party Poker and decided to make a run at it.

I started at the $3/$6 tables, I won some, and lost a lot, then won it back, then lost, then broke even. I realized my piddily bankroll couldn't handle these limits, as well as my lack of skill couldn't handle the tougher opponents at this limit. As a general rule of thumb it's a good idea to have 300 times the big bet of the limit you play at, so on April 20th, with my $300 I moved down to the $.50/$1 games.

I played a lot, I mean a lot, approximately 5,000 hands at this limit, 2 tables at a time until I hit the $600 mark on May 11th. I am currently at $707 and loving every minute of it. My goal is to have $1800 by July 11th for when I go on my Vegas Trip with Ron. While I have been doing this I've actually kept an online journal of my winnings. I thought there might be some interest here, so I've decided to make it a feature of the page. So no more Poker content on the front page, I'll put it in a special section here.

It's funny, I used to think that killing people online was one of the greatest feelings while being on a computer, I was wrong. Dragging a huge pot from people who repeatedly talk trash while playing bad poker is much more fun for me. If you have the urge, why don't you join me at the tables? You can sign up here. Hope to see you there.

Edit: I removed a couple of the affiliate links, I don't want people thinking that is the main reason I posted, because it's certainly not. I have been writing about Poker for a while now and figured it was more appropriate to write about it on the site I am a writer for since it is a form of gaming, and quite popular these days.

05.16.04

And another one bites the dust

Sometimes you get fucked, then the boys doing the fucking are rarely of the heterosexual variety.

Case in point, the story behind the shittifying of a once-promising game. David Allen's take on what happened to Horizons and Artifact Entertainment, at one point both his, is quite a good article over at Gamemethod.com.

Now, you've got one side of the story here. And, obviously, taking one side of a story as gospel and running with it can not only be pretty blind and stupid, but also incredibly unfair.

However, we all know how Horizons ended up. It's one of the biggest, stinkiest piles of dogshit on the market today that was clearly and unabashadly corrupted and molded by corporate fuckups and the afforementioned non-heterosexuals attached to their cocknballs.

Check it out, no matter what you believe or how the story may actually be, it's an interesting article, and it does appear that David got fucked out of something he was pouring his life into by ladder climbing cocksuckers in an astounding display of douchebaggery.

In fact, not only did he get fucked, but we, as players of these games, got fucked as well.

Either way, whether the article is the truth or the half truth, the end result and the basic facts remain the same.

I hope you have better luck in whatever you're up to next, David.

I guess those cocksuckers had just better appreciate the fact that they fucked you out of your company and your game, and not me. I would have left the building alright, to promptly return with a fucking baseball bat.

05.16.04

Gary Busey is a god damn idiot

Everyone's seen the fucking mug shots.

When you look at those pictures, you figure - here's a man who has hit rock bottom, and is clearly quite an alcoholic/cokehead/acid dropping dude. You get a laugh at the hair and imagine how drunk he was that night. Then you move on.

Pretty funny, though.

Well, in reality - not really that funny.

I was unfortunate enough to watch two episodes of the new "I'm With Busey" while waiting for the Simpsons to come on on the comedy network.

Not only do you gain the true knowledge of how incredibly unfunny those pictures are, but you get a much better mental picture of the kind of shit this halfwit was up to that night, and Busey goes from being a mildly funny joke to being fully blown sad.

I'm not exactly sure what the network execs at the comedy network were thinking on this puppy, but they sure didn't plan on how unfunny it was to watch a guy who is simultaneously insanely out of touch with basic reality and full of himself because of it try to show off for a fat jewish kid by signing and dancing around some old indian drums, crossdressing, and in general just being one of those fucking idiots that makes shit up while they talk. You know the ones. They tend to get punched in the yap before long in public places.

Watch an episode of I'm With Busey, if only to contribute to one of this man's many drug abuse problems. He's bound to be five or ten hits from losing the ability to speak.

I guess, depending how you look at it, it's either the saddest fucking thing you've ever seen, or the funniest show on television.

Either way, Gary Busey is a god damn idiot.

05.14.04

Nick Berg Video

An American citizen is decapitated and the video of it is posted on the Internet. Somehow, this turns into a political issue. This absolutely amazes me. This is exactly why I hate politics.

Good christ even the parents of this kid are blaming Bush. I got bad news for ya, slick.. you should be blaming the fucker with the hood and using a knife to saw off your son's head for his death. I'm not 100% sure, but that guy is my prime suspect in the "who caused Nick's death?" mystery.

Furthermore, any of you that thinks that sawing (not cutting, not hacking... SAWING) off a guys head with a knife is an understandable response to humiliating pictures of some POWs, then you have some goddamn issues. Don't let the media cause memory loss here folx. Iraqis just caught 4 contractors and mutilated their bodies not a month or so ago... and last I checked this guy who did the sawing is directly linked to good ole Osama bin Laden who is, of course, a big fan of the US.

Don't try to sell me this political horseshit. I don't mind people going that extra mile to win an election, but this ranks up there with "Bush knew about 9/11 before it happened" type ignorance. If you're reading this site, I expect better of you. If you want to hate someone, do it for their ACTUAL faults... there is rarely ever a need to make shit up.