I’m one that goes through games for the experience or the story, and find little replay value in going through a game again.  Even when there’s a game that I really enjoy, I rarely try and hunt down every little secret or achievement… the rare exception was getting every Riddler trophy in Batman: Arkham Asylum.

Now that my main WoW character has reached level 85 and maxed out all trade skills, I’m looking for the next thing that makes the game fun.  The only real reward in the game is the goal of greed and attaining new things.  It’s the conquest of building up your character that makes the game addicting, and the thought of starting a new character (an “alt”) just makes me cringe.   According to my “guild friends” the whole reason to go through the hundreds of hours building up a character is to do high-level dungeons and raids.  This just isn’t fun for me.

When you add in the “guild drama” that accompanies playing with other characters, then the game turns into a source of additional stress rather than a fun escape, which is what a game is supposed to be.  The rudeness and entitlement of “internet anonymity” is amplified with PUGs (pick up groups).  Even if you game with people you know, players tend to severely over-react to a simple game faux-paus, and the social fallout can preoccupy one’s thoughts and shake the confidence that you may have in the “real world”.

The truth is I just have too many other things to think about than to deal with the social dilemmas of the average kindergarten playground.

I may continue to play every now and then, but will probably do so alone.  The whole point of using one’s character for dungeons and raids is just lost on me.

This is complete hogwash, I say.  There are at least 2 sides to every perception, and usually even more.

Take the public opinion of the president, for example.  Regardless of your policital affiliation, everyone can agree that there are always differences of opinion on how the president is doing.  If perception were truly reality, then both sides are always right; the president is doing a great job, and this is the worst president we’ve ever had.

So, whenever anyone says “perception is reality” I always chuckle because that seems like an extremely abstract cosmological concept, just like Schrödinger’s cat.

I am always wrong.  Yet, I am always right.

Below are some of the famous people in the world that are now connected through yours truly:

• Alton Brown
• Bill Gates (on three seperate occassions)
• Gates McFadden
• DeForest Kelley
• William B. Davis (The Cigarette Smoking Man)
• Adam Sessler
• Morgan Webb
• Blair Herter
• Abbie Heppe
• Walter Koenig
• James Doohan
• Jussi Gamache, Sean Drinkwater, and Kasson Crooker of Freezepop
• Wil Wheaton
• Jonathon Coulton
• Marina Sirtis
• Michael Dorn
• Nana Visitor
• Judson Scott
• Uwe Boll
• June Lockhart
• Nichelle Nichols
• Chase Masterson

A very close call goes to David Duchovny and Gillian Anderson, as my wife and I spent two nights in Vancouver, Canada in the apartment building where Agent Scully’s apartment was filmed.

There are many countless others whom I have met through my connection at OCmodshop.  I have met many PR reps, presidents, writers, developers, and testers for many PC products and video games that you have probably played.

So, if you’re on this list, know that you are now part of an extended community.  No need to thank me; I’m here to help.

Fast-forward to today and the industry has changed quite a bit.  The cool custom projects that were originally created by a handful of hardware enthusiasts are now created en-masse by several different manufacturers.  There are still lots of innovative modding projects that just haven’t been duplicated by manufacturers, and the modding community is still going strong.

Over the years, we have delved into PC game reviews, which honestly is what drives PC technology to be faster and cheaper.  If it weren’t for the PC gaming market, then the gaming industry as we know it would not exist.  The current console market of Xbox 360, Playstation 3, and even the Nintendo Wii has been influenced by PC gamers and PC technology, and there are still parts of PC gaming that cannot be rivaled by consoles.  Of course, I speak of MMOs, and the graphics of any modern PC game completely obliterates any console of the same generation.

OCModShop has grown from a personal technology blog into a great online resource of information.  At the beginning we were struggling to reach 3,000 hits in a month, and we now reach that within a few hours.  If you really want to see what we were like in our humble beginnings, you can check out OCModShop’s Wayback Machine…

Here’s to how far PC technology has come, and I feel very privileged to be allowed to follow along as a technology and gaming journalist.  Thank you to all of the vendors and gaming companies who have supported us throughout the years.

Here’s to another 10, 20… and even another 100 years of honey-dipped, slow-roasted PC modding goodness!

Thanks for reading!

Alan McCloskey

I recently had a customer insist on implementing a full-screen script for their online marketing brochure, which is a horrible idea.  Here are some pros and cons for implementing such a feature, and you can make an informed decision for yourself.

Having a web page go full screen can be a technique to grab your customers’ attention, but is usually perceived negatively by the consumer.Here are several reasons why forcing a full-screen website on your users can have negative effects.

Users are usually browsing other web pages
Most browsers today use a tab-based navigation system.If a script on a particular site forces the browser window full-screen, then all of the websites in the other tab are also forced full-screen.Fixing this is not a one-button click, as the window is not “maximized” but rather the window is resized to the exact dimensions of your desktop.

Most users do not maximize their windows
Many users who are browsing the web are usually doing other things, and like to have windows showing so they can go between applications, or have access to desktop items.Usability studies generally show that users generally only make items full-screen when their current desktop resolution is inadequate for the content to be displayed, such as a spreadsheet or word-processing application.

Full-screen pops are usually considered malware
Web users have become familiar with internet malware (viruses, malicious scripts, and browser hijacks), and they usually bait users by either mimicking the operating system (like a virus has been found) or by making it very difficult to avoid their message (i.e. go full-screen or kiosk mode).Any web site that forces a user to go full-screen will generally have this same negative feeling associated with it

Demographics have already been performed on your site’s layout
The designer who worked on your website has already analyzed demographics and usability studies to determine a layout suitable to your average user.The average user’s desktop is usually 1280×1024, and inexpensive laptops and widescreen monitors are making 1440×900 and 1920×1200 very popular.The main page was designed to be 980 pixels wide and 750 pixels high, leaving a decent amount of room for “browser bulk” at common resolutions.

Forcing full-screen for every user will leave a lot of unused negative space for those with widescreen resolutions.

The user wants to feel in control Nearly every user will maximize a window if they want to, but they have to feel like they are in control of their own computer.

Forcing a full-screen web page on a user is counter-productive in marketing terms.A user’s time spent on a site is reduced to several seconds when they feel they have been “trapped”, thereby eliminating the attention that you were looking to grab.

There are several online marketing strategies to get good customers, and they rely on the principle of “good bait”.If your message or layout is pleasing, then they will stick around, place an order, and recommend it to their friends.

I met Adam on the show floor of PAX last year, and we chatted for a bit and even talked of a potential interview.  Trying to follow Wheaton’s Law (“don’t be a dick”) I played nice and am going through the “proper channels”.  I met with the Executive Producer of X-play and so we’re trying to set up an interview or at least get some dialogue going to create an article about how X-play has affected the gamer scene.

While Abbie Heppe wasn’t there, Blair herter and Michael Leffler were there to meet with the crowd.  The G4 camera guys also went through the line to see if anyone wanted to make a fool of themselves on national TV.

Since I run several successful online businesses and websites, I use Facebook mostly as a networking tool, but I have connected with old high school friends… until recently.

I was reminded of someone when looking through nostalgia, and casually looked this person up on Facebook.   She proceeded to tell me what a horrible person I was, told me to go to hell and never contact them again. I was even accused of being a stalker, even though she accepted the friend request.

It is one’s nature to defend themselves when attacked, but I instead apologized for whatever I may have done to offend in the past or present and wished her well in her endeavors.  If one is willing to hold onto stuff like that after twenty years, then they obviously do not have the capacity to move on.  The evidence of this social dysfunction and lack of ambition is all around this person: no relationship, no children, a small career, and staying in the same small town she was born in… and she’s ugly, too.

Another former incident involved an old high school girlfriend who went so far as to block me once I requested a Facebook connection.  I could cite many atrocities that she did to me, including numerous and repeated infidelities, but I moved beyond that.  Yet it was her that didn’t want to speak to me?

The lesson learned from these situations is this: Many people do not want to be reminded of a past period that caused them pain, regardless of whose fault it may be.  Let’s face it: for many people high school is the most painful social period of their lives.

Most people reconnect with old friends via Facebook for the same reason that people go to high school reunions.   They seek gratification of proving to their former peers that they are successful, and have moved beyond whatever person they were (or constraints they had) in high school.

I connected with some acquaintances from high school, but incidences like these make me wonder about some things.  Why establish fake friendships with people to whom I barely spoke, have no relevance in my current life, and are stuck in a world from two decades ago?

Underneath it all, Facebook is technically  a faceless, cold technology, but it brings about real human emotions and reactions like what was once “normal” social interaction.  Just like in real life, one must choose carefully whom they surround themselves with for an emotionally healthy and satisfying experience.

So, think carefully before connecting with an old “friend”, whether it be from high school or an old job.   If there was any negative situation associated between you two then you may have to prepare  for a rejection or negative judgment rather than resolution.

If only I had the ability to “unfriend” or “block” someone in high school…

I have sinus problems, and they are severe and recurring.  If I don’t do something about them when I first feel the allergic sting of watery eyes and drippy nose, then I am quickly fighting off a sinus infection.

I totally freak the fuck out when I can’t breathe.  At night, I panic because I have an irrational fear of a stuffy nose.  Because of this panic, I also don’t like to take antihistamines, sleep aids or nasal sprays, because they make my body feel funny, which exacerbates the panic.  Nasal sprays may help at first, but your sinuses eventually rebound and make you more stuffy than before.

Last year after a two-week sinus infection, the doctor gave me Flonase, which is a local steroid.  Steroids reduce swelling.  It’s local, so the medicine doesn’t go all through your bloodstream or produce weird side-effects.  Coupled with a NeilMed Sinus Rinse (which is part of my regular hygene routine), this produces the Shock and Awe campaign against my sinuses.  Sure, I still sound a little stuffed up, but my sinus problems are gone in a few days, rather than transforming into an all-out bacteria battlefield in my head.

Medicines do not work.  There are a ton of them, and it’s a crap shoot if they are effective.  Medicines make you feel drugged or drowsy.  The only thing that definitely works is a good sinus rinse… often.  For me, reducing the sinus inflammation (which is the cause of the excess mucus and stuffy nose) is only obtained by a local steroid such as Flonase.

The time has come to update OCModShop.com.  We’ve been running basically the same engine since 2002, which is a custom .NET application writeen in .NET 1.1.  I’ve been writing enhancements and band-aids to get more functionality over the years, but the World Wide Web has matured to the point that the application needs to be completely re-written.

I’ve been looking at WordPress because it is an “out of the box” solution that is very powerful and extensible, but I’m concerned that is isn’t as custoimizable as I may need. Many sites that use WP frankly all look the same, which may be because many webmasters aren’t designers and are fine with the “canned” look.

On one hand, why re-invent the wheel when WP does a lot of things that make a successful blog.  WP can be extended to be a news manager, newsletter manager, gallery, have postbacks, rss feeds, and many other features.  This CMS has been tested and many bugs have been eliminated.  If I write a custom .NET application then I will have to debug it myself, and deal with other growing pains.

The main thing I need to do is: manage the site… My time has been split between fixing and enhancing the site rather than managing and writing content.

If I do WordPress then I may fix several issues, but I may be stuck at a particular level.  Some really really big sites have custom engines which appear to have a more flexible user experience than WordPress can deliver.  One example of this type of site is Gamespot… I can’t even begin to imagine how they organize their content into a CMS.

Either way, doing .NET or WP, there will be a steep learning curve.  I’m just trying to figure out which road I want to go down, and which one will have the best results.   If I do WordPress, then I’m also going to have to convert all of my content over.

Advantages of WordPress (for me)

• built-in image uploading and embedding engine
• automatic rss feeds
• auto image resize and watermarking
• built-in social networking support
• built-in search engine
• built-in “related articles” engine
• SEO-friendly URLs

Disadvantages of WordPress (for me)

• images cannot be organized into categories
  All images for posts within the same month are thrown into the same directory (”/2008/12/” instead of “/reviews/motherboards/” for example)
• seperate pages
  There are some plugins that can split articles into 2 or more pages, but I need something more extensible (each review should have sub-tabs like “specifications”, “article”, “gallery” and “comments”)
• dynamically changing headers
  I want the theme to change based on a particular holiday, like Christmas.
• Multiple RSS feeds
  Right now I have 20 RSS feeds, broken up into categories.  Not sure if WP can handle this
• thumbnails on announcements
• forced into “widgets”
  Most extensibility seems to be through widgets, which seem to be stuck to the widget bar.
• Archiving
  WP doesn’t seem to handle archives like I currently have set up
• News
  Each individual news item is handled like a post, which can clog up the CMS.  If I integrated news with my articles then I have like 40 categories to weed through, which can confuse users.
• Limited to MySQL
  I’m used to Microsoft SQL.  I have finally found interfaces that make managing MySQL easier, but just doesn’t have nearly the same features of Microsoft SQL.

In case anyone hasn’t figured it out, I really love video games.  So much so that I just can’t buy all the games I want to play.

Most of the time, new games just aren’t worth buying.  They cost too much or you get through them way too quickly.  Sometimes the game just isn’t worth $60… which is what happened when I purchased The Darkness.  You can now pick it up for $5 at a used bin.

So, I started renting video games.  If you’re a nut for Xbox gamer points, then this is definately the way to go.  You can play through games to get much of the 1000 points that each game offers, without going broke in the process.

For example, the Lost game is incredibly easy, and you can get through it (and earn the 1000 gamer points) in an afternoon.  The beauty of this is that I didn’t have to buy this crappy game.  Don’t get me wrong: it’s a decent game that any Lost fan will like, but it’s nowhere near worth $30 or more.  You play it once and are done with it.

I became a member of GameFly over 6 months ago, primarially so I can write reviews on games (at least the ones that the sponsors don’t send me).  Overall this has been great, but the really “hot” games have low availability.  I like it so much that I recently upgraded my account to have 3 games out at one time.

When purchasing used games at GameCrazy yesterday, I noticed that they are renting games for $7 for 5 days.  This is abolutely crazy.  If I wanted to rent 3 games for 5 days, it would cost the same as a GameFly subscription…  Hmm… which is better: $21 for 5 days or $29 for a whole month?

If I can find a used game for $10 then I’ll buy it.  I bought Crackdown and FEAR for $11 each… so I’ll be playing them over the Thanksgiving holiday.  I also have 3 GameFly games to extract gamer points out of, too.

I also bought Resistance: Fall of Man for the PS3.  There are only a few exclusive games for the PS3 that are worth having.  Since I already have an Xbox 360, I will buy games for that platform just because the 360 has a much bigger online community; and for the gamer points.  PS3’s network is free, and newer games are supporting “trophies”, but somehow it just doesn’t feel as connected as the Xbox Live network.

So, I also bought a full band kit and invited a few friends *cough* Donandhisgirlfriend */cough* over to play Rock Band and Guitar Hero 4… and they totally cancelled on me.  I guess I’ll have to recruit the neighbors.