http://userimage.gamespot.com/images/icon/5/5/22629501714477346059850202352155/icon.jpg

Now that I have played through this entire game 3 times, I feel safe to say I know a lot about this game. I am going to make this a short blog post, so I am simply going to write the good, and the bad, like a review, sort off.

The Good:

Mowing down zombies.

Combinable weapons.

Levels are fairly easy to obtain when compared to other games.

Character can be customized with new armour/clothes.

The AI are not stupid and I might even dare say, they are ...intelligent.

The game levels, combo cards, P.P, and money is transferable to Dead Rising 2

The Bad:

Time limits on everything.

Killing zombies does nothing, they just appear there out of no where after you go away for a minute.

Combo cards are limited, and scratch cards are not upgradable.

The game ends and there is nothing more to do other than replay.

That was it folks. Hope you enjoyed.

Wow, I finally got all of the ranked free for all achievements, and man, they were hard. Now, most people try to win them by boosting, but I believe if you even tried to win them the real way, you would offset your appreciation and pride with a lot more dissapointment. Some of these achievements are not made for someone to win in a week of buying the game, but if you are a person like me, you want to win all of the achievements on the first few days, and then play for real while showing off. This game makes that impossible, working instead to try to force intrinsic and extrinsic pleasure mixed with operant conditioning. You have to keep "playing" the game to boost your skill and achievements over time because Bungie makes ridiculous rules about banning boosters. Now, that does not stop serious and smart boosters from boosting. You just can not boost skill, but it says nothing about boosting achievements. And that is what everyone actually wants to do, boost achievements. The rank thing really is not that important to a majority of gamers, and that is good, because boosting that gets you banned.

Key Message: MUST BOOST HALO 3 Achievements to be able to rest in peace and Bungie pretty much forced average people to boost.

End rant.

A presentation has always been a very cumbersome task for me, beginning in grade 5, and all the way to University. The reason for this is mainly the choice of either obtaining a partner and dealing with the hardships of synchronizing with each other, or doing the presentation alone, which involves problems such as the lack of opinion on whether a point is good, or how it sounds, because with a partner, it really helps to see how others will hear me and understand me. Also, in the past, I was always stuck working on projects day and night while my partners enjoyed themselves and came to ****with little to no knowledge of what they were doing. What I was surprised to see was that in University, my friends had actually changed, and did the work, and took the initiative, which really helped me overcome my fear of taking other Criminology courses which involved presentations.

This assignment in itself also helped to teach me how to present in a limited time frame and multiple problems. The reason for this is that my partner was actually thinking of working with another partner, and I was planning on working alone. The decision for joining up was a last second one, and then, to my relief, yet at the same time, my dismay, we were the first ones to present in front of the whole **** Now, I had no doubt in my ability to be able to finish the project, but the problems started arising when my partner and I could not find a place or time to meet and work together. My partner was working when I was home, and vice versa. Also, he had ****s when I was home, and when he was home, I had ****s. My partner also lives really far away from me, and so there was the question of who would sacrifice their time and convenience to meet up, which ended up with me running for 30 minutes to the Minoru Library every time, or staying after ****and then rushing to my work (which was luckily close by and est. time to get there was 5 minutes). Another problem we faced was the fact that he had a computer that functioned, and mine barely let me type a word document. But, in the end we managed to practice enough to present our combined best with all the necessary information, and being the first ones to present, we were hoping that any small errors we made would be looked on with a lenient eye by you, Mr. Ross.

Presenting in front of the ****also taught us a new lesson; our planning, our practice, and our resolve fail when so many eyes are on us. I had brought a card to read some small notes in case I forgot something, but the anxiety of presenting in front of such a large ****made me end up crumpling the paper and mixing it with sweat. Luckily for me, my memory is always made sharp at the time of great stress, and so I did not end up needing the card. But my partner and I, forgot some minor details, which threw me off at some points, and forced me to cover those details but my partner forgot the details I missed, so I had to retrack, lest our presentation lose its validity at a certain point we were trying to make (the last thing I wanted to do was have to tell a point when answering the feedback questions because we missed it in our presentation). But all in all, I have now experienced this process, and there is no longer the mystery behind it. I know what happens when presenting, I know those eyes, and I know my own reaction, and although I might fumble on one or two more presentations, I am confident that my other presentations will not only go more smoothly, but they will also be a simple task for myself.

#1: The problems I faced in finding an article

Finding an article involved many problems, such as choosing the country, choosing an article that was recent or mildly old, and thinking how it would work with a main point, and how flexible it was for changing main points. I was having great trouble in choosing an article, and had estimated that it will probably take until November to choose one. Luckily for me, my partner had already found a topic which interested him, and had even found another article which could be used to demonstrate the similarities of the two crimes even though they were hemispheres apart. But for myself, I was really unsure of what article to choose, and just could not find any article which would be simple to explain, and somewhat aroused the interest of the viewers. I was thinking of choosing articles in the Arabian world and Terrorism, but soon realized that those were global issues and not really issues that the Canadian government could in itself deal with and punish or reform. Then there were issues such as kidnapping and many others, but those articles were outdated.

Articles have also been a great difficulty because of the ways so many countries are "unrelated" to us than "related" to our ways of dealing with crimes and criminality. If this ****had been a specific ****such as dealing with the structure, history, or corrections of law, maybe one of those articles might have worked, but because this ****is so interdisciplinary, many articles would only teach about a single part of the **** rather than use the entire plethora of knowledge this ****is bestowing upon us. The article I wanted to present had to involve at least 75% of the things this ****had taught us, such as General and Specific deterrence, the effectiveness of age, gender, and culture with crime rates theories, the aging out theory, the theory that all criminals are human, but hide their humanity, and the simple fact that there are some crimes out there that can not be statistically or morally evaluated, and they themselves are rare, but can not be stopped because we can not measure or understand them.

With all of this in mind, the process of choosing an article was vastly difficult, and seemed overcomplicated. I had almost given up the thought for searching for the article on my own and instead decided to ask other students for some help with finding an article, and even started reading and watching the news much more often. I truly believe that had I decided to do this presentation alone, I would not have found the article in time, or if I had, it would not have flown as smoothly as it did. The most difficult part of the presentation definitely was finding the article, even if I did not choose a main point before choosing an article.

Another factor that caused me problems in finding an article included the good articles being old, or too new. When the articles were too old, there seemed to be no reason in presenting such a news story as it would probably have been part of a debate in a Law 12 ****for the first year students (myself included), or it would have been discussed in previous criminology courses for students who are in their second or third years. When the stories were too new, there was no trial that took place, so not only did this type of crime not take place in Canada and force us to assume Canadian reaction, but it did not even have a precedent set anywhere else, as it did not even take place in a court in its country of origin.
#2: Why I selected a particular article

We ended up choosing the article we presented because it was very flexible, and we could use any point we learned from Criminology 1100 and use it in our presentation as the main point of the case. We could tie in General and Specific deterrence not working on this type of crime as this type of crime is not a common crime, and so general deterrence will not be a common method against these criminals, and specific deterrence will not work, as most of these criminals are already old when they commit this crime, and by the time they are found, the lengthy sentence they get usually carries through to their deaths. Another factor we could encorporate was that there was no way to statistically or morally determine whether this type of crime would occur, how and why it would occur, and how it can be stopped. This is because no self report, victimization, UCR, or person can calculate the chances of this, and they also can not find out unless they unreasonably invade privacy and search the house. The issue of aging out also arose, as Fritzl released his daughter for a reason unknown, as if just to get himself caught because he was bored of this. The same thought can also be seen as a sense of humanity arising in him that he had locked away in the depths of his mind to commit this crime. And, the more cynical answer to this crime can also be that Fritzl did it just to see how long he could escape it. With all this in mind, the fact that he escaped/hid it for so long also helps to encourage criminals, which is the opposite of general deterrence. Age, gender, and culture are good in explaining/examining this crime because it happened in countries of different hemispheres, and culture really did not play a great part, but this type of crime would normally be gendered, as rape and force are both a masculine crime rather than feminin, and age plays a part, as it seems elderly people commit this crime rather than younger people.

Also, it had happened in a country, and its case had been completed successfully, and also, there was another example of a similar crime happening in another country on the opposite hemisphere with similar results to the country it took place in, but with the case not having yet been completed. The article that was our main point created a secondary article we could link to, that originated in a Commonwealth country, which then allowed us to compare the crime to Canada much more easily, as both countries are Commonwealth countries. The article is also linked to Canada as both countries have a strong stance against not only incest, but also against the holding of a person and forcefully having sexual intercourses with them.

Another reason I chose to go along with this article was the fact that this was a really rare and appalling crime, and it would help to set off a thought process, as most students, in my opinion, would have been looking at American type crimes of violence, and this sudden and weird crime would really spark their interest in persuing after unique crimes as well to present on.

#3: What I learned about crime as a global phenomena

From this article that we presented on, we decided to approach it in every direction possible, and as we were determining what the main point could be, we also learned that Josef Fritzl actually released his daughter, which led to the police interrogation, which inevitably led to her revealing that Josef had been committing these crimes. From this, we deduced that either he had humanity, a conscience, or some kindness in him, just wanted to see how long he could escape, or was a complete idiot. We ruled out that he was not an idiot, because he had gotten this far, and the basement plan was brilliant, so we only had two choices, either he was a thrill seeker, or he was a man who could not hide his humanity from himself any longer. From this we learned that incest is a taboo in almost all cultures, but also is empirically proven to be a reality and can not be prevented through any means, and all criminals have a conscience, making them human. We also learned that crime can happen anywhere in this world, and even the rarest of crimes occur in a similar manner in all cultures. Incest has been around for the longest times, and it has also been culturally punished since a past long forgotten. With the crime and its punishment so deeply rooted in history, it is a crime that can only be removed if it were legalized, which is not an option to any normal citizen in any culture. In this sense, even minor crimes occur all over the globe which are similar no matter which culture they are in, and that is because there are some drives and needs that people must fulfill, but are unable to do so without breaking a written law, making aboloshing that certain crime only possible if the law itself were removed. Incest, in itself is a desire that occurs not only through biological means to satisfy the drive to procreation, but also through a fetish type desire of humans to gain control over all females, whether sexual or through power. "The Fritzl case will very soon, after the trial, disappear from the headlines and presumably from public consciousness."-http://www.cafebabel.co.uk/article/29180/joseph-fritzl-austria-press.html. This crime, like all others, will at one point dissapear from mainstream minds.

Gamertag: Exalted Entity

So, I have Psychology and Criminology courses in the summer, and yet, I find that I spend more time on my Xbox 360, than I do on the weights or studying for my courses. For some reason, that does not hamper my marks, but I still feel like I game too much. I even find myself, on occassion, researching games when I should be researching projects. I am not sure if this is a problem, or not, but seeing as I get over 98% marks in courses, studying games might just be helping me relieve stress and sleep better at night. Which, in turn, lets me concentrate more of my time efficiently on studying. So...for historical purposes, I believe that I have come to a point where I can make a hypothesis to test out.

 

Gaming helps to alleviate stress from everyday life on a short term basis.

 

I will be updating this hypothesis after I have come up with ways to test this. If anyone feels I am violating the Laws of Falsifiability, or if I have other scientific errors with this hypothesis, please let me know in comments.

Achievements. We can not live with them, we can not live without them. Achievements keep us hooked onto games, yet after we get them, and we reminisce, we see that what was the point? Were they just a complete waste of time? Then we get on the Xbox 360, start playing, and start aggressively getting achievements again. And then we reminisce again. And the cycle repeats. What we can say for sure is that getting Xbox 360 achievements is kind of like an addiction, but in that your neurons, brain, and body are not addicted to them, but rather, your thoughts, and the neural impulses themselves lead us to wanting these achievements. For some it is a sense of completion, for some, it is for showing off, and for others, like myself, it is simply something to DO. Something that you can grab onto and do. When I have something else to do, like school work, and working, I do not even think about achievements, but most of the time, when I am bored, all I do is get achievements. Achievements are sort of like an obsession for me now, which is getting painfully bothersome, because instead of getting those achievements, I could be working out, or playing sports, but instead, I just keep trying to get achievements. I hate achievements! ....no...no, I love achievements. Well....I guess I love to hate the fact that I hate loving achievements. Yes, that makes sense.

So I went to school yesterday, handed in my project (that I did myself legitimately), and then came home. The Professor, even though I gave her all citation sources, thought I plagiarized the work simply because I had "sophisticated" writing in my entire project. She had apparently taken steps to "fail me" and "report me" to the dean. The stupid woman did not even realize that I had worked WITH the dean (who is a father of my close friend) on the project. In the end my marks were given, and I got an A+, but the problem here is that copyright is getting way too out of hand. If a person throws an idea into the world, we should give credit to him, but the true responsibility of the issuance and the direction of credit should lie either in government hands, the hands of the true owner, or in the hands of various educational and historical institutes. This is because in the past, no person had to personally "give credit" to any person unless they were citing an educated source to back their opinions. And the credit that was not given to the true owners in some people's writing did not undermine the fact that people still realized who wrote what. In addition, once you throw an idea out there, it is not right to hog it, because that idea is incorporated in us, and so we are just as right to use that idea. After all, the past generations and all their work belongs to us. We have inherited the past, and everything that comes along with it. True, if we steal software, or explicitly SAY, that the idea is ours, then sue us, lock us up, but if we just mention an idea that some other smart ass thought of before us simply because he was BORN before us, should not mean we have to keep saying, this man said that and put the whole damn idea in a quotation box. The law of copyright being written in stone is unjust, unfair, and not right under any circumstances. And for those who argue that if I was the one writing the stuff, and someone stole it, I would be pissed and then I would not argue what I just argued: THINK AGAIN. I have written countless police assessment plans that the government and my teachers have "stolen" from me. I am a graduate student, and my thesis is the property of the educational institute in which I wrote it, and by default, the governments. Where is the fairness in that, you ask? Well, I do not mind, my name does not get mention, but I do not mind. Fame is not everything, and sharing is needed. Your work is mine, my work is yours, our work is ours. See that last part. We for WE, instead of Me for you or you for me. Let us put and end to this damn selfishness and mock those who say humans are selfish. We should work collaboratively to help each other in any way possible, instead of credit hogging and limiting a person's ways to educate others without a long, formal, boring, time-wasting procedure. P.S: This was a rant, not and educational debate. Pardon me for my street language.

I do not really understand what the big deal is with Lost Planet 2. Everywhere and every site I look at, they are giving it horrible reviews. I personally bought the game, and I think they could not have made a better game had they been given the chance to remake this game. The game offers full Akrid battles, and when I say full, I mean full. You get to actually operate an Akrid VS in Multiplayer mode and access all of its special powers, such as jumping, gliding, rolling, etc... In Lost Planet 1, many people had asked for this, and now we got it, giving us a chance to play as the opponent to the humans, and by default, letting us be the first person to the Akrid side. What is more, is that we can now have abilities, and level ups, to better give a reason to keep playing, making the boredom of a game after completion completely nullified. Even after you beat the whole game, you still have something to do, whether it is playing the campaign, playing faction matches, or playing ranked online matches. To add to that, you can also play Ranked Online matches to receive rank promotions, such as officer cadet, warrant officer, etc... If all of this was not enough, we have customizable names, clothes, and weapons. We choose what kind of grenade we want to start out with, and we can choose an ability that helps us start with the maximum of that grenade. We can also choose what kind of machine gun we want, and talking about machine guns, we have a gun sword, which is awesome, as you can kill an enemy with 1-2 hits with it easily. This game has great achievements, campaign modes, online battle modes, customization options, and the replay value is off the charts. I simply do not understand what it is that is making people give such bad reviews to this awesome game. I give it 10 out of 10.