Obsession.

A common requirement to be a geek seems to be obsession.

This has been true as far back as we can document geeks.

The most obvious examples one can think of is the Star Trek geeks. The quintessential godfathers of the modern geek age. Simply mentioning Star Trek geeks should summon images to mind of the almost unreal Star Trek conventions or cons. Hundreds…thousands of men, women and children united by the obsession with a seemingly failed, quite corny television show from the 1960's about the semi distant future where man kind set aside its individual racisms to explore the stars. As I mentioned, from the numbers, and the ratings, a TV executive would call this a failed show. It lasted a few seasons, then passed into the TV graveyard. Or so we thought.

Enter the Star Trek geek. The underground rumblings, and obsessions with this show eventually led to 6 motion pictures with the original cast, starting around a decade after the show went off the air. It has spawn numerous spin-offs about the future and past of the show, and led to several more movies involving the newer casts.

Now due to the power of what the geeks have done for this franchise. It has seemingly experienced a successful reboot of the franchise starting the whole story over, almost 40 years after the first episode. Such is the demand for this material the reboot actually managed to violate the cannon and lore of the original show, and the geeks of this world ate it up and are begging for another course.

Geek obsessions range far and wide. I have one friend in particular who is a wine geek. Her obsession has led to a quite impressive wine cellar, and considerations of a Digital UPC catalog of her collection to make inventory easier.

Another of my clan dove head first into the deep end of Joss Whedon's Firefly universe. Another 'failed' show, this show fell off the air after 10 short episodes. The show married a wild west culture with a steam-punk style space fairing society. A world where on pilots a starship, and brandishes a six shooter, while swearing in Chinese. But yet again the power of the geek obsession and demand spawned a major motion picture that attempted to button up as much as it could about the vast and complex story.

Now when I say another of my clan dove into firefly, I mean DOVE into the deep end, damning the torpedo's and the sharks. She joined a group of fellow obessee's in creating the PodCast the Signal.

http://signal.serenityfirefly.com . She owns the toys, 2-3 different copies of the show on various formats and will easily find hours of debatable topics out of the shows short cannon.

She is also a food geek and culinary adventurer, I doubt there is anything she would not try once, chocolate covered garlic anyone?

My wife, obsessed with anime, she can't wait for the books, so she spends her evening on websites that are translating the Manga just as fast the Japanese can drawn it.

Game obsession is another very common geek trait, 12 million subscribers to BlizActivisions MMO world of Warcraft is all the proof you need that game geeks are dedicated.

It almost seems a requirement to be a geek to have one or more obsessions……what kind of geek are you?

-L8r

Grendal.

Who the hell do you think you are?

This one ain't for the faint of heart kiddies, if you are easily offended, I highly recommend you stop reading this entry now.

Please understand that except for one very specific case, I am referring to comments made by means of example, and have tried to mask the language enough so that you can still tell what it was, but not go so far as to cast the term myself. Considering the context, and severity of the message I am attempting to communicate, I needed to refer to the particular phrases for impact.

I give much thanks to Emperor and Highlander from the podcast The Emperor's Court on www.VTWProductions.com for spinning me up on this one.

Penny arcade, a rather great online comic strip that has spawned its own subculture. Their ability to satirize the Geek experience is the stuff of legend.

None so much as my personal favorite, the GIFT, also known as the Greater Internet F*$#wad Theory.

This very simple theory stats that Anonymity + Audience = total F*@#wad.

Although I mostly see this in gaming, it is true in most environments where a degree of anonymity is guaranteed.

When people are in a social environment with those who have little or no chance of discovering their true identity, such as social games(MMO's, online games, etc), the decency barrier begins to dissolve.

People being to say things that they wouldn't dream of saying in person or over a phone call. The worst types of racial and hate speech comes to the front. From simple swearing and trash talk to the purest type of offensive terms that would send vietnam vets running for the hills.

In the online games I play, it is not uncommon to be called a c**t, or a ni**er, for simple as an offense as not knowing how to play a particular character, or being unlucky and dieing to a lucky shot by an opponent. These phrases uttered in a bar or other social setting would lead to a profound and through ass kicking. The person would probably be lucky to walk out under his own power. Not to mention that some of these phrases in public forums can cause the caster to be brought up on Hate Crime charges. People do not mess around with this stuff.

So I am left to wonder, who the hell do you people think you are. Why do you think that just because someone cannot easily hold you accountable for your words that you are free to say whatever you want?

People who know me, know I am no saint. In fact I have one of the dirtier mouths, and fouler tempers of my peer group. I say some things that get me in trouble, but I take accountability for them. However, NEVER, have I descended to the type of speech that is being published across these intertubes.

Is it that dirty thrill that you got away with something that is a cultural no-no. You called some one a n***er and pissed off a whole lot of people and no one could find you. You broke the social contract of society and offended people of different sexual orientations and that makes you a bad boy/girl?

Horribly enough, it seems to be that this counter culture is coming from our youth, although not exclusively, I usually am not wrong when someone starts in on one of these tirades and I guess they are 15 or 16. It seems to be the new form of rebellion. At least when they were just smoking they were only allowing darwinism to take its course.

Worse yet, I am starting to see this counter culture leak out of the Internet into society. I live across from a high school. Often I close my windows when the school lets out because I just don't want to hear this. It offends me, and ladies and gentlemen, I am damn hard to offend.

What is in store for these young people when they enter the real world. Well its obvious, one HR trip later and they are permanent burger flippers for life. I guess that is not all bad. I do like them double cheese burgers for a dollar.

My message to the Geek world. GROW THE HELL UP. Talking big, doesn't make you big. It only makes you sound like a total Fuckwad.

-Grendal.

Going geek, 1.0 League of Legends

Welcome to Going Geek. Grenddall here, the bastard of the internet.

There is a term in Indonesia called going bamboo. It is when a tourist, or stationed military person, etc goes to Indonesia and falls in love with the people, culture, environment and just doesn't leave.

I feel the same effect happens to people when exposed to geek culture. Be it gaming, facebook, the internet, Tech toys, etc. There is an allure that when a person realizes their entire music collection of 20 years fits on an ipod, or when the 50 year old man starts reconnecting with old army buddies over face book that he has not seen in 20 years.

Or maybe it was the first time you stepped into World of Warcraft and looked around and said DAMN, this is just cool. The game's near instant gratification system kicks in and you are now a faithful provider or Bobby Kotech's new lifestyle.

Anyway you got there, you now are inexorability drawn to all things geeky.

This blog will look at geek culture from all angles, and talk about various topics.

Tonight's topic is the new(erish) offering from Riot Games call League of Legends.

First a history lesson.

Once upon a few years ago, Blizzard entertainment was still a fairly company. Being honest, they still are, but now that activision is involved and that shit head is running the place, I fear for our once kings of gaming.

Moving on though, Blizzard released the third offering in the the now legendary warcraft series, warcraft III and shortly there after the expansion the frozen throne.

Among its innovations, there were two that stood out. The first was a fantastic editor and API that allowed fanboys, tech heads, and the hobbiest to create levels, missions, and even whole campaigns for the system.

The second was the addition of what was known as hero units. This relatively new concept in the RTS world allowed for persistently leveling singular units with their own abilities that would grow. These units could often swing the tide of any one game in their favor with their sheer presence.

Multiplayer games became as much how to properly play a hero as about the strategy of the units.

It didn't take long before the mod community started coming up with Hero only maps and fights. Where up to 5-10 hero's per team would duke it out over control points, resources etc.

This led to the eventual creation of a now legendary mod. This mod would go one to create a whole new genre of gaming and create a culture both skilled and notoriously elitest. This culture was uncomprimising and intolerant of new players. This my friends, let to the creation of Defense of the Ancients, otherwise known as DOTA.

DOTA, at least at the time I am writing this sported over 90 individual hero's inspired by classic's from the Warcraft Series, mythology, and even Anime.

Hundreds of usable items populate it's game world, with each of the over 90 characters sporting multiple build combinations of these items. To be accepted and l33t in this game required nothing less then immeadiate knowledge of every single hero and all their build options from memory, with near flawless execution of the strategies everytime. Failure to do so was often met with the worst type of responses. If you were lucky, all you would get called was a noob.

However the most amazing thing about DOTA is that short of the price of Warcraft III, which is still available for 20$ from blizz in a pack with it's expansion, DOTA was free. The only requirement was a thick skin and the willingness to study for the game like you were going for your PhD.

Fast forward nearly a decade.

The powers that be start seeing the potential of the DOTA genre. New business models are being tested and succeeding in the internet. The idea of the microtransaction has been born. Paying 1-5 dollars for a game, or service, or virtual item for a game you play. Be it virtual currency for your MMO, or that nifty cool sword you dry hump your screen over.

First up was Gas Powered Games, at the helm, the designer of Total Annihilation, arguably one of the single best real time strategy games ever created. Their offering, Demigod. Roughly( and I mean roughly) based on the DOTA model, this full retail game sported a lot of promises, was published by the near legendary Stardock games, fell flat on its ass. Shoty network code, ill concieved design, and just lack luster playability nearly destroyed stardock's reputation. Stardock nearly payed teh price for hero worship of the venerable creator of Total Annihilation.

Another year or two down the road, two other games appear on the horizon. Heroes of Newerth and League of Legends. Both from different aspects of the original DOTA creators.

Heroes of Newerth is still in beta at this writing. It is a retail version of DOTA. Complete and total, sporting an state of the art graphics system, and all of the original DOTA cast reconcieved for a new generation. It's biggest issue, it brought the DOTA community with it. The only way into the beta was to prepurchase the game or know some one who did. Just playing in the beta and trying to learn on the fly was enough to garnish the worst of the DOTA communities wrath. Drawing out racial slurs and the worst type of hate speech. Heroes pulls no punches.

Finally we come to league of legends. Or DOTA lite. Octale of Octale and Hordak vs. the world on www.VTWProductions.com refer's to this game as DOTA's retarded cousin.

This game was made for the masses. It sported several unique key features that makes the game fairly intriguing and accessable to the general populace.

First. the game is free. No shit, you download it from their site, you create your account and you are in.

The heroes are mostly original inspirations, not copies of DOTA heroes with new skins.

The community, while still including the self entitled assholes that the internet breeds in spades, seem more forgiving and friendly to new players.

The game comes with a few heroes to start, and on a rotating basis heroes will be available for play for free for a week. Every game you play provides you with influence points, heroes can be permanently unlocked with enough of these points. Also you can purchase 'runes'. These runes provide very minor advantages to your champions, individually inconsequential, but over the course of 20 of these runes, your champions begin to gain a decided edge.

Each game nets you between 50-300 of these influence points.

Simple runes cost 20, best runes cost 500 or so. Champions range from 350 - 6300 IP. Better heroes cost more etc. With enough time and determination, you can have full rune books, and every champion they release.

But Grenddall, you ask, how can a company make money like this?

Well.....through the magic of the micro transaction. A simple truth to this world, provide a way for someone to earn something for free through work over an amount of time and someone will just want to buy their way out of it. SO it is true with the champions and runes in league.

Welcome to riot points.

Riot points are purchased for cash. Right now best deal on riot points is 5000 points for 35 bucks, or about 142 points per dollar.

The top champions go for around 975 riot points, runes for 20 or so.

Special skins are available for champions that can only be bought with riot points. And there are those of us who's vanity or OCD demands they own these skins.

Not only is the riot point system available it seems to be working very well.

Riot kicks out a new champion once a month or so, forcing the drooling masses to play obsessively or kick out more money to acquire these lastest greatest items.

They also have a collectors pack for around 20 dollars that includes the game and around 20 heros right off the bat and is by far a great investment.

All and all, it is not DOTA. It is a kinder, friendlier DOTA. It gives champions a recommended item build at a single store that new player can start to tinker with for optimal performance.

The hero's are original and inspired. Some truely funny, others just dangerous. I have seen every hero played to a deadly degree.

I highly recommend you fork up the 0 dollars it will cost you to pull down this game and play it.

Now, its Grenddall's naptime.

l8r.