But seriously, this is no joke. This is Real Talk.

As many of you may have heard, Xbox Live recently granted gamers the right to display a number of details about their personal details online, among them race, gender, and sexual orientation. And while in our culture we are moving in an ever-more accepting direction to different faiths and creeds, beliefs and ways of life, one of the most hostile environments for acceptance and change is in the quite faceless and odds-evening ether of the internet.

Gamers are, by and large, classified as nerds, geeks, dweebs, and generally socially unacceptable social outcasts. And while we’re growing to be more and more socially acceptable almost by the day, as evidenced by the popularity of titles like COD:MW2 and the Halo franchise, Madden and Tiger, we are still a subset of humanity that is commonly made fun of, mocked, and not allowed to sit at the cool table in the lunchroom.

Lisa’s ire at her competitor was eclipsed only by her rage towards the clerk that sold her a joystick for a racing game.

Even the nerds that rule the world (Steve Jobs, Bill Gates) most likely still have an element of social awkwardness, and insecurity, and frequently the less spectacularly successful social outcasts have very little in the way of productive outlets to dispell these sorts of feelings, and will frequently attempt to turn the tables on society from behind their most powerfully faceless seat of power, the computer keyboard.

There are very few things as mystically empowering as the magic curtain that is the internet. There, a six-year-old can absolutely destroy a forty-six year-old-man’s will to live with a single bullet, a hundred-pound girl can rush for 400-plus yards against a towering football-scholarship athelete to win the NCAA championship, and I can be whatever and whoever I want to be, for a little while. Behind the h00ge 53ri35 of t00bs, we are all powerful, we are all on the same playing field, we are all equal.

Except we’re not. We should be, but we’re not. I learned a long time ago that internet boards are not for sharing helpful information or opinions, but rather for fanboy flame wars. I learned that if you’re playing on Xbox Live, party chat is the right answer, followed closely in second place by: Mute All, and there isn’t a third place. I learned that if you’re good, bad, in first place, in last, not in voice-chat, talking too much, talking too little, totally silent, or in any way at all present in any multiplayer game EVER, you are gay. Gay. Gay gay gay. Or a fag. Or any of a HUNDRED absolutely disgusting and inexcusably offensive words that have NOTHING to do with anything that anyone really is or is not, because someone, somewhere has a small mind and very likely ANOTHER small body part, and needs to compensate for it by being verbally abusive to someone else who either is too polite, or too scared to respond. Or possibly, too smart (Dude, you’re muted. Seriously. You can shut up now. Sorry I shot you in the face. Only not really actually sorry at all. In fact, i’m pretty excited about it.)

But I digress: Xbox Live has given us the ability to add a number of details about ourselves to our gamer profile, and while that is a victory of sorts for the open-minded gamer, it also may (and probably will) spark more of the idiocy that the internet has become famous for. But, intrepid and brave adventurer that i am (behind the empowering mask of the internet) I have decided to set up a seperate gamertag and identify myself a number of ways over a two-week period, with varying degrees of in-game interaction, and see if Microsoft’s manaeuver is making a positive impact, a negative, or any at all. Feel free to drop a comment with your gamertag if you want to see this experiment in action.

PS, I’ll be funny again next week. I promise. Thanks for coming back to the lovely and festive tea party that is Real Talk.

That is all.

Mutedly Yours,

James.

So, I’ve been pretty swamped lately with many different things… okay, so all of these “things” are Final Fantasy XIII.  For real.  Recently, however, I’ve been deciding how to add a D&D room to my recently roommate-less townhouse.  I’ve been pretty stoked about all my ideas, including purchasing a nice round plastic table from Sam’s Club and some shelves.  Then, I found out about this guy.  Now I feel ashamed and dishonored that I don’t have enough yet.  But I will prevail.  Oh yes, my D&D room will supersede this one… never.

So maybe you are a Fat Geek, that is okay. But you might be reading thinking I really don’t want to be for all my life though. We are here to help you.

Now, you need to know a few thing before you get started as stated in The Hacker’s Diet -which is free to read, but kinda dry in my opinion- says the more calories that you put into your body the equal to more energy you have to expend to stay balanced or lose weight. Simple right? You put X amount of Stuff in your body you need to use it, or else your body will store the excess for energy later. Your body just get calories and thinks sweet I have to use X amount of energy today, but I only need 3/4s of this energy here (because we all know a Calorie is a unit of energy, right?) I’ll just store this for later, maybe tomorrow we won’t have such a good haul and will have to go without.

Now I want to tackle two problems deeper What you put into your body and How you get rid of that fat. Let’s stick with the first this week. Food. More exact Diet. AH! BAD WORD BAD WORD! I hate the word diet outside of it’s regular context. Diet is literally what you eat, not what you don’t or force yourself to eat. This is important with my philosophy of dieting, which with my degrees in both Sports Medicine and Mad Science makes me very qualified to talk on the subject.

Sportsmaster, my Dean and Advisor at Mad Science Community College.

If you come from the mind set that you need to reduce somethings in your life in order to trim down this wouldn’t be totally off base. Making yourself eat very little and expect yourself not to binge later on? Terrible idea. Let’s look at your pantry and see what we can do. Now, I want you to look in side and pretty much get rid of anything that has the word “Toes” in it. Fri’toes’, ‘Toe’stinos, Dori’toes’ all of them aren’t very good for you and you know it. They are full of fats, and like witches there are good fats and bad fats. You have to basic schools of Fat, Saturated which due to it’s large chain of chemicals are harder for your body to break down and Unsaturated which are found in natural sources and are broken down easier by the body. Does this mean throw out and stop buying fired corn with flavor sprayed on? No, oddly enough I think you can have your cheetoes (again toes) and eat them too. Here is a word of stupidly good health advice Moderation. You know the food guys that stuff themselves in the name of sport? You don’t need to be that guy/gal. Food is made to enjoy flavors and supply you to go though the day, not to pack you to the brim. If you are faced with the mega super Godzilla size portion and you know that you will feel bloated, greasy, and bulbous. Don’t get it.

Well...good job picking vegetables, I guess.

The opposite side to moderation is that you aren’t living off of rice and hope. I live on a fairly okay lifestyle, I eat a ton of veggies and fruit, and try to stay away from fast food meat except for a couple of exceptions. It is fine to have the exceptions as long as exceptions aren’t normal daily habits. For example, I love Ruebens. A Rueben sandwich is corned beef, sauerkraut, swiss cheese, and Thousand Island dressing (Russian, if the place is serious) on grilled or toasted rye. There is nothing “diet” wise that is healthy on that sandwich. I eat it though, and then judge a place based off of the Rueben. Enjoy your vice, in moderation. Keeping it a special event helps it stay special. I haven’t gotten into what I feel you should be eating, looks like I will do that next week.

Note: This is what you should be eating.

As always, justin@pixelatedgeek.com This week I want to know what you are eating, What is your vice?, What is your favorite sandwich?

I’ve had a terrible day, in fact I have had multiple terrible days. I’ve dealt with issues such as weight/image problems, my parents divorcing, teenage angst,   heartbreak, sexual frustration, sickness, and death. It sucks. It’s dirty. It hurts, sometimes for a while. You take time and you deal with your emotions because you can’t deal in motion. Take the time you need, everyone is different so it might take longer for some than others, but don’t over indulge. I recommend not starting and hosting a pity party, you don’t have the time and no one brought snacks. Plus, you have better things to do than be sad for the rest of your life, you have opened Pandora’s Box after all that hurt at the very bottom is hope.

and Guns. Hope and Guns. Which is also the name of my new band.

I finished Heavy Rain this week, if you get the chance pick it up for a very well crafted cinematic game. I promise not to give anything away, but there are multiple times where the main characters could die or fail. My FBI agent Norman Jayden (Who’s voice actor took inspiration from Christopher Walken and a Boston stereotype) bit the bullet while I was playing, then one of the coolest things to happen to me while playing videogames happened. THE GAME DIDN’T STOP. No Retry screen. It just kept moving along. I talk about my virtual disappointment and revelation for this reason. Life doesn’t stop. Things that are bad will happen to you. You can try and avoid all of your mistakes in your life, but like the Black Racer they are going to catch up with you.

That's right fools, a New Gods reference.

Think of every story of epic scale bad things happen to the hero/es. Luke’s aunt and uncle got fried, Rocky was a no one with a speech impediment, and Milo and Otis got lost from the farm. Did they buckle under pressure? YES! Then they got up and kept going. The important part of failure isn’t the fact that you failed. It’s what choices you make after the fact. A good majority of us are living in the mistakes of the past and not in the possibility of the future. Which one are you? Which one do you want to be? Now, get up, get going. You still have a life left to play.

Have questions, comments, hopes, dreams, fears? I’d love to hear them. justin(at)pixelatedgeek.com

If you haven’t heard about Quirk Classics, that probably means you’ve been living under a rock on Mars for a while.  These guys are responsible for the hits Pride and Prejudice and Zombies and Sense and Sensibility and Sea Monsters.  Well, the latest one to come out from Quirk is the hilariously titled Android Karenina.  It apparently follows Tolstoy’s classic fairly faithfully… except that its lead heroine is not unlike Data from Star Trek.  Personally, I am salivating in anticipation for this robot classic.  Also, I’ve heard some craziness in the rumor mill about an Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter.  This book will combine two favorite things: emancipation and vampirism.  How can you go wrong?!

As the Poet once said: shawty had them apple bottom jeans (jeans), boots with the fur (with the fur), the whole club was lookin at her, she hit the flo (she hit the flo), next thing u kno, shawty got low low low low low low low low

Seriously though, Flowrider is actually talking about the topic I wish to discuss today. In the song he describes a lady decked out in proper attire in the socially stressful situation of a dance club using her skills and confidence to hit the “Flo.” Which I blindly interpreted as Flow until I was corrected by my other scholars. Flow, not Flo, is an interesting concept, introduced by a man named Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi (try and say that competently, Cheeks-sah-mah-hallie) to describe “The Psychology of Optimal Experience”. In fact he named a book that very same title. Go figure.

Now game developers have been using this model for just a little while now. I should clarify, they haven’t been using this model intentionally for a little while. Mostly the fine folks at thatgamecompany have struck on this. While one of the games they worked on started off as an MFA Thesis looking at Flow and Video games. RIGHT? I was so happy to find these guys. They believe that creating games that engage you, where YOU are creates the most enjoyment  and over all pleasure for the gamer. I firmly love this notion. Go read up on it if you have the time, I fully endorse it.

But, to how this can help you. That’s what it all is about anyway.

Most people don’t challenge themselves to the point where they could. We have been over the positive effects on controlled stress, so apply it. We either have too much skill and no time or Challenge, or we have too much challenge and not enough skill. So scale it to whatever suits you. If you played though God of War 2 on easy and aced, jump up a level.

Good job, why don't you try a Harder difficulty?

This idea not only keeps you going and boredom at the way side, but it makes you keen and sharp to the problems that you have. Plus it’s just a lot more darn fun. So, take a hint Figure out what you need to do and Scale to what is surmountable and challenging.  Then DO IT.

You like it? You hate it? Tell me about it. Start a conversation. Email me justin (at) pixelatedgeek.com if you have a request.

So I thought I’d search the web to find all the geeky Mr. Potato Heads  that Hasbro has put out to date.  Check after the jump to see what I found (including… Darth Tater).

No, this post isn’t about the most fun you can have ever. Everyone has there own definition of that, so it’s hard to capture or pin point. Ultimate Fun is terminology that I use at camps that I work at in the summer months. Defined as “The act and art of calling off a game or activity at the point in the game or activity where maximum fun has been reached or fun is starting to be replaced with contempt or anger”. What does that mean?

This, might help. Imagine that you are playing kickball with the youth, you have 3 great innings without complaint, around inning 4 though some kids are getting fed up with the game in some fashion. Stop the game right there. Does that seem extreme? It shouldn’t, let me tell you why. If you play for too long or too much the fun of the game rots over time. The game looses it’s luster so to speak. Giving yourself increments helps curb this joy half-life. Going for prolonged bouts while fun will burn you out on whatever activity you are doing. It’s like a wine that you savor for a couple of hours and not a juice-box of wine that you do a mini keg stand with.

Every time you drink this, a French stereotype gets it's Beret.

Now, let me take a break in the advice box to be specific about what activities are acceptable to file under this mindset.  I find that applying this to things that have low to middle ground emotional attachment to be the easiest to work with this. Something like a hobby, a video game, actual physical sport, or a not so serious relationship (that’s closer to the top) fit nicely into this. The reason I say lower emotional significance is that you can call yourself on it easier and actually adhere to the release. A actual example for you nerdy nerds, you are playing a game with someone who doesn’t like video games or isn’t as zealous about the game as you are. Once they give you the “Really just one more level” look,  you should end it there. If you were to continue dragging them though levels because YOU wanted to they are going to resent that and the last thing they will remember is that they were not having fun.

Leaving it alone for a while means you can always come back to it at a later date. People have this idea that things are going to vanish if they don’t consume it all in one sitting. Not true. Coming back gives you an appreciation of what you left, so you can better enjoy it.

This whole idea hinges on Empathy, something that we as a whole are not well known for. You have to be ready to notice that someone just isn’t having as much fun as you are while watching a marathon of Teen Titans, and having the ability to put your wants aside and bookshelf it for a while.

In short, if you can be aware of levels of joy you can stop while the gettin’ is good. And always come back to that good gettin’, because it will be right where you left it.

As always hit up my inbox if you have a request for something justin (at) pixelatedgeek.com Thank you, Goodnight!