On why this blog won't be like Kotaku

This blog is essentially a verbal and cognitive release of my own ideas percolating in my head from exposures to life, work and video gaming. It seems like common sense, but keeping something in your head (or, at least, never talking about or writing stuff down) is not always the best way to test out ideas. The way I see it, and this is based on my many many years in academia from the middle school era to the present day graduate level, everyone needs to develop a set of heuristics, or a rule set, in order to do something well or to accumulate "experience" in some field. For example, if you're learning how to master a game concept (say, developing a worthy strategy around the rigid structure of the Left 4 Dead and/or Left 4 Dead 2 finales), the only way most people will ever do well is to get in there, make a mess of things, and struggle with it a bit till they hit the sweet spot (sure, you might pick up a strategy guide, but there's no fun in that!).

Well, I might check out the forums for that particular game to learn the ins and outs, but gaming is all about the fun of trial and error.

Taking the gaming analogy to the self-expressive world, my personal ambition with this blog is to show video games through the weird, pulsating flashlight that is my brain. No doubt I'll be saying stuff that many will find obvious, insipid, dull or ludicrous but I do hope to spark a few electrons here and there (the ones working the nerves in the brain, that is, always keep your stuff grounded people!).

This blog isn't Kotaku because:

1. I don't have THAT much time on my hands.
2. I'm not as comprehensive as Kotaku, especially not for the consoles; this be as PC-exclusive as can be as I do not own any consoles (computers dedicated exclusively for gaming, bah!).
3. The stuff I talk about is a bit more personal and, given the disclaimer above, hopefully more though-provoking into what makes us humans who we are. I'm most definitely not a psychology major, but I ain't the bluntest knife in the first melee weapon slot of your typical RPG-esque inventory, too. Don't let that scare you off though folks, I promise to keep this as exclusive of boring details as possible.

And to keep the promise I made in Part #3, I'll do a good post of the library of my Steam account sometime later!

On my first (and hopefully not last) post

So... this is what blogging looks like, eh? Looks easy enough. One quick stop at blogger.com, a few clicks later, a quick association of this account with my GMail account (and honestly, who doesn't have a Google Electronic Mail account nowadays?) and *BAM* I'm on my way to blog writting.

Though English be me first language, I am certainly not privy to the finer points of properly constructing grammatically correct sentences, though you may have noticed that, hey, this guy actually capitalizes the first word in each sentence as opposed to the "hai gusy lol" responses we see on MySpace and Facebook these days.

Enough about me, let's talk about you! You probably stumbled onto this blog because you were either unfortunate enough to be bored of the regular ol' blogs out there and were in search of something new and exciting. Well, new and exciting is what I aims to bring! Provided you have an interest in video gaming, particularly that on the PC. 

Alright, enough about you, let's talk about me again... I'm an Electrical Engineer at some prestiguous university located in Austin, Texas, and I'm as mathy a guy as can be. Not mathy in the socially inept, I-see-numbers-everywhere way, but in the smart practical-problem-solving way, just like the good ol' Engineer from Team Fortress 2 (a personal favorite of mine). 

Pictoral Proof: Intelligence correlates directly to well-kept teeth, but can we establish causation? Sure, if we change our statement to "The Intelligence of virtual Texan Engineers correlates... etc. etc.", as he's probably the only virtual Texan Engineer I know of.

Of course, he's more concerned with guarding unknown briefcases from a plethora of enemy threats like Scouts and Spies, while I'm more concerned with Renewable Energy technology (in capital letters for maximum effectiveness) and the Optimization of such. Hey, optimization! Clearly I, the blogthor (blog author, I just made it up), am gifted in the art of English punnery.

I have a Steam account (and what self-respecting gamer would not have a free Steam account? DRM issues from specific games aside, of course), and I'll post a few screenshots in a later blog post of my libraries list to give y'all an idea of what type of gamer I am. 

Extra credit: I'll tell you right now, though, Sniper is NOT my best class in TF2, though I can play him 'fine' (usually with a 1:2:4 kill ratio on headshots:bodyshot/SMG:kukri kills, I love me some kukri!). Bonus internet cookies to anyone who guesses my three favorite classes in TF2; you have a 8C3, or 1/56 chance of guessing right! Extra credit bonus cookies if you can guess my favorite loadout for each of those three classes.

EDIT: Yay, for pictures not coming out right...