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GeekNights 080923 - PAX '08: Part 3

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  • In general, I recommend checking outGrammar Girlif you really want help improving your grammar. It's a really neat, friendly site and podcast. ^_^
    Though Grammar Girl may be a legitimate alternative, I find reading a book is the best method for improving ones grammar.
    True enough, though it's also good to hear straight from somebody's mouth, "Listen up: here is the rule for this thing, and here is why." It can help if you really have specific problems.
  • Grammar Girl also has books :)
  • Rym, Scott: I have it straight from Khoo himself. The pre-reg, and overall counts were both turnstile. I don't have an article; Such info comes from the organizer forums. Convention people know what they mean, and normal people just care about the large number.
  • Rym, Scott: I have it straight from Khoo himself. The pre-reg, and overall counts were both turnstile. I don't have an article; Such info comes from the organizer forums. Convention people know what they mean, and normal people just care about the large number.
    If that's true, it's not good. The vast majority of badges I saw were 3-day. That brings the attendance of PAX down to, or even below, Otakon levels. That's weak sauce.

    On the other hand, if PAX's attendance really is not significantly greater than the Otakon attendance, it says a lot about the failures of the anime industry when compared to the success of the video game industry.
  • Rym, Scott: I have it straight from Khoo himself. The pre-reg, and overall counts were both turnstile.
    I'll have to get them to clarify their exact methodology, then. That sort of count is usually facilitated by counting badge-days, which would put PAX at a fairly pathetic turnout considering how crowded it was and how many of the badges were three-day. Furthermore, most the press I can find cites "badges sold," which, if you are correct, is patently untrue, yet PAX has made no statements to correct them.
  • edited September 2008
    On the other hand, if PAX's attendance really is not significantly greater than the Otakon attendance, it says a lot about the failures of the anime industry when compared to the success of the video game industry.
    I don't think it's as much about the industry, as it is what people want out of cons. Anime cons are the new "Fandom", an offshoot and successor to the sci-fi and star trek conventions of the '70's and '80's. PAX is more like a county fair; Everyone plays video games, and there's not a specific community that is the con. What that means in terms of number is simple; Most anime fans go to their local anime con, but only the hardcore and a sampling of the more casual fans go to the video game con. As much as I like and buy anime and games, I represent the majority of the anime buying community, while just a small percentage of the video game buying: It is the long tail of casual gamers that make games profitable.

    As for the press; I can't really say. They get things wrong, and make assumptions.
    Post edited by GauntletWizard on
  • Most anime fans go to their local anime con,
    Actually, most people at the large anime cons are nonlocal.
    Everyone plays video games, and there's not a specific community that is the con.
    Yet somehow, the attendees at PAX were incredibly homogeneous compared to anime conventions.
    As for the press; I can't really say. They get things wrong, and make assumptions.
    What's interesting is that pretty-much all fan conventions use actual badge counts, as does just about every anime convention in America except Anime Expo. It saddens me a it that PAX uses the absolutely fallacious method of counting, which gives no useful indication of actual attendance whatsoever and which is favored by marketing and industry cons.
  • Günter, do you have any awesome stories about your Rome: Total War times? I was bored one day, just randomly generated a huge army of the civilization that could use elephants, and gave myself only archers, of course with all the archers, or most possible, with 'gold' weaponry. Just put them all the way back, and wait. :D Great silliness. The elephants got very darned close, but luckily started routing and ran over their own troops. Also, having such an awesome general that you can adopt him in your family = epic win. They are young, have an enormous popularity with the people and are amazing strategists. :D They also result in the Senate asking you to kill your leader(s) all the way to the point where you killed said awesome general-son. At least, that's my guess.
  • Günter, do you have any awesome stories about your Rome: Total War times?
    I have one. I installed them through Steam, but they won't start. No error message, no nothing. Valve will not support them or answer my question, since it's not their game. SEGA doesn't actually seem to provide real support. Valve refuses to refund my money. I'm preparing to chargeback my credit card and wash my hands of these games.
  • Günter, do you have any awesome stories about your Rome: Total War times?
    I have one. I installed them through Steam, but they won't start. No error message, no nothing. Valve will not support them or answer my question, since it's not their game. SEGA doesn't actually seem to provide real support. Valve refuses to refund my money. I'm preparing to chargeback my credit card and wash my hands of these games.
    That's not awesome. Annoying in the least. I think you would like the games if they worked. But no game is fun if it fails to run.
  • Most anime fans go to their local anime con,
    Actually, most people at the large anime cons are nonlocal.
    It would be interesting to see a large con start a Frappr map for their attendees.
  • That sucks, Rym. I think you might have been pleasantly surprised by these games.

    I've always loved trying to scare the crap out of entire opposing armies at once. On of my most successful attempts at this was in a forest map. I deployed two mounted units and two of those head-throwing units on either side of a clearing, hiding them in the trees. In the middle of the clearing I put a line of heavy infantry and a few archery units behind them. I used the archery units and some peasants to harass the opposing army into charging my line. When they were close I sent out the head-throwers, ordered my archers to use flaming arrows, and ordered my heavy infantry to charge. This unnerved their less disciplined units enough to cause them to rout. Just before the Hestati made contact with the enemy line, I ordered the cavalry to charge the opposing army. At that point the enemies front line lost their shit, their general died, and the whole thing cascaded through their ranks until their whole army (including the units they had hidden) was routing.

    I sat back, laughed, and flipped off my monitor.
  • edited September 2008
    The reason why people probably aren't joining the forums, is because you're, (SCRYM), such Grammar Nazis.
    Why would we want people that don't know how to convey their ideas properly here? They said in the podcast that grammar, intelligence, and non-annoying-ness is strictly enforced. People who can't abide by those rules are not welcome here. They would rather weed out those people and have nothing but awesome people here.
    Not everyone is a fucking retard about proper grammar.
    The reasonwhypeople probably aren't joining the forums,isbecausethatyou're,(SCRYM),aresuch Grammar Nazis.

    I hope that's good enough grammar for you in my sentence above. I spent like 5 mins on it!
    And yet you still made it wonky somehow. Inserting random commas does not equal proper grammar. Also, you had some redundancy going there;the reason is already the why.

    Ironically enough, your second-to-last sentence was perfectly fine. :) Your last one was acceptable in a colloquial sense, though I would have written out the entire word "minutes", personally.

    In general, I recommend checking outGrammar Girlif you really want help improving your grammar. It's a really neat, friendly site and podcast. ^_^
    Thanks for the advice.
    Someone's been the butt of every insult lately...
    Yes, I'm gagging on the number of people who have to jump down my throat every time I make a mistake.
    Post edited by CHOIS CHOIS CHOIS on
  • Not everyone is a fucking retard about proper grammar.
    What? That seems somewhat out of context.
  • edited September 2008
    Not everyone is a fucking retard about proper grammar.
    How are Rym and Scott retards about grammar? It is their forum and their rules. If you don't like it, you are more than welcome to leave. Believe me, I'm sure there are many others along with myself that would like to see you leave.

    I find you annoying, ignorant, and just plain stupid.

    Scrym,

    I'm not trying to be the one to start anything, but Morio-kun/unedumacated has shown many times that he can't use proper grammar, has been extremely annoying lately, and his intelligence is something to be debated. Maybe he's doing it on purpose, maybe he's just bitter because he's been called out so many times by many other forum members, however he hasn't brought anything of real substance to the forums. How much further before you even consider banning him?
    Post edited by Rochelle on
  • Practically everyone on this forum has been the butt of many insults before and because of equal opportunity, we have to insult everyone in the same brutal fashion. It just happens to be Unedumacated's turn.
    Yes, I want it to stop! I'm sick of it.
    Not everyone is a fucking retard about proper grammar.
    What? That seems somewhat out of context.
    I mean, not everyone cares to the point of insanity. I make an effort to check my spelling and grammar (I know shocking), and when I make a mistake or four, people have to flip shit!
    Sometimes when I troll the forum for a few minutes and make a quick post, I don't give it my all to check it word, per, word, and when I come back, I'm on probation. I know you guys want to keep the unwashed masses out of your ivory tower, and yes, enforced spelling and grammar is a way to do so, but my spelling and grammar has to be at least 60% better than the rest of the Internet.
  • Not everyone is a fucking retard about proper grammar.
    Maybe he's doing it on purpose, maybe he's just bitter because he's been called out so many times by many other forum members, however he hasn't brought anything of real substance to the forums. How much further before you even consider banning him?
    Yes that is why, I'm sick of you guys flipping shit!
  • Yes that is why, I'm sick of you guys flipping shit!
    Or you can try to be a better person, and swallow your pride and either leave and never come back or post, or you can try to earn our respect and post properly. People have been annoying in the past, people gave them shit about it, yet they still stuck through and have made better posts and participated in decent discussions.

    You obviously don't care and rather just take the low road and be a troll.

    If you're so sick, just leave and that's that.
  • Practically everyone on this forum has been the butt of many insults before and because of equal opportunity, we have to insult everyone in the same brutal fashion.
    Haha, I never thought about it like that. It's so true!
  • I'm not leaving, I just don't want people flipping shit! Don't be acting high and mighty just because you were called the FRC of the West coast.
  • I'm not leaving, I just don't want people flipping shit!
    If you don't want people flipping shit, then post properly FFS.
  • I'm not leaving, I just don't want people flipping shit!
    If you don't want people flipping shit, then post properly FFS.
    It should be noted that unedumacated seems to improve his spelling and grammar whenever he gets irate about people complaining about his grammar and spelling. As is evidenced by his last few posts in this thread. So, as to answer the question.
    Yes, I want it to stop! I'm sick of it.
    Keep posting like that, that's proper English spelling and grammar.
  • I must admit, I feel people are becoming too harsh about the spelling and grammar mistakes here. I love how the mistakes are changed, and I love when Mr. Period used to edit posts with a comment like 'Remember to spell check your posts, since I am getting sick of doing it!' or something else to that regard... but I am getting SICK AND TIRED of this quoting of peoples posts to fix the errors that you see in them, and then following this quote yelling at their inability to post instead of just continuing the discussion at hand. When people choose to do this, they are just being annoying and not beneficial to the forum since they derail the discussion with their post.

    I made a mistake, and was put on probation because of it... but my intelligence was never called into question because of it. I was never made fun of because I am not the greatest speller. I was corrected, my post stayed true to what I was trying to add to the conversation, and the community benefited from the post. Yes I was embarrassed that there was red all over my post, and I make sure to double check my spelling now, but there was NEVER a time I needed my post quoted just to show that I misspelled a word.

    If you feel obligated to have the post changed immediately, lets get more mods. But Jesus this quoting crap needs to stop, nothing beneficial is coming from it! The topics are just derailing and I have no wish to get into these rediculous discussions about spelling, but I sure as hell wanted to add to the conversation a page ago before all the flaming.
  • Yes, listen to Mosquitoboy. Correcting the grammar and spelling is not your job. If that's what you want to do, become an English teacher.
  • Wotse? Watse?

    I'm curious to what the acronym is since I cannot spell it by simple phonetics or find it with Google.
  • Wotse? Watse?

    I'm curious to what the acronym is since I cannot spell it by simple phonetics or find it with Google.
    WotC (Wizards of the Coast).
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