What Do You Listen To?

Tipa gave me this idea with her latest post about music, and I thought it would be a good idea to share some of the bands/artists that I listen to that are either slightly obscure/older/completely awesome (in no particular order.) Sorry, Tipa, but I am going to have to steal a few 🙂 I only put up videos for a few of them, and a few are actually just still images because I thought the videos were stupid or they had the best sound quality. In any case, I hope you like them and I encourage you to check out the rest if you haven’t heard of them. I would love to know what some of our fellow bloggers listen to as well.

1. Zero 7 (Electronic’esque)
2. The Shins (60’s sound)
3. Blur (Brit Rock)
4. Travis (Brit Rock)
5. Joshua Radin (think Simon and Garfunkel)

6. Jamie Cullum – Twentysomething

7. Camera Obscura – If Looks Could Kill
8. Silverchair (Rock)

9. Jellyfish – New Mistake

10. The Gabe Dixon Band – Five More Hours

11. Sonata Arctica – Victoria’s Secret
12. Dream Theater (Prog Rock, or Fantasy Metal as I like to call it)
13. Nightwish (Fantasy Metal)
14. The Hush Sound (Indie Rock)
15. The Decemberists (Indie Rock)

16. Dishwalla – Angels and Devils
17. Muse (If you don’t know/like Muse, you probably need to get your head checked 😉 )

18. Nickel Creek – The Lighthouse’s Tale
19. Oscar Peterson (Jazz)
20. The Postal Service (Electronic)
21. Psapp (Electronic’esque)
22. Splender (Rock)
23. Spoon (Rock)

24. Steadman – Wave Goodbye
25. Vertical Horizon (Rock)
26. A Tribe Called Quest (Good, Old-School Rap/Hip-Hop 🙂 )

27. Amos Lee – Keep It Loose, Keep It Tight
28. Ben Folds (Just Plain Awesome)
29. Bond (Techno-Classical?)
30. The 88 (Rock)

~Kanthalos

The Evolving Gamer: Time vs. Reward In MMO’s

I’ve really been thinking a lot over the past few days about what has changed for MMO players over the past few months that has really led to this slump in excitement for the games we love. While this hasn’t happened to everyone, there are still a great deal of gamers who can’t really seem to find that game that really gets their blood flowing. There are potentially dozens of reasons, but I want to take a closer look at one or two of the reasons here. Rather than look at the any events that have or haven’t taken place lately, I decided to look at the bigger picture. What has changed in the past ten or so years that has really caused our perceptions to shift and our desire to play our favorite genre less or with less enthusiasm?

I think one of the biggest changes that we have seen as gamers is actually not related to the games at all, but rather changes that have taken place in our lives. Many of our lives were radically different when we first started playing MMO’s compared to how they are now. Many of us were high school and college students when we first started playing MMO’s, but this isn’t the case anymore. We have graduated and moved into the work force with many starting families and buying homes. These things are all going to drastically change the way we play our games, both in terms of our perspective towards the game and also in terms of how much time we can realistically spend playing them. I want to focus most specifically on the element of time.

It should be pretty obvious that if we have less time to play MMO’s, we are going to try to do all we can to squeeze as much enjoyment and entertainment out of the time that we do have. I remember sitting in Fort Tethana in Asheron’s Call for hours during my summers in high school just going through vendors hoping to find good gear that people had sold. I would never consider doing this today. This then means that we aren’t going to want to spend several hours waiting for a group to form or grinding faction reputation or collecting crafting materials. We just don’t have the time for it. What this really does for me is create a system of importance. I see that I’m going to have to spend all of this relatively boring and uneventful time in game to advance my character in some way, and it causes me to question what I could be getting done away from the game. Even if it’s not something important, like watching a TV show or playing the XBox instead, it’s still is worth pondering.

While MMO’s are after all games and should be played under the assumption that they aren’t going to be filled to the brim with usefulness and importance, they are also quite different than console games in that you invest much, much more of your time and yourself into them through your character. If you have less and less time to spend gaming and you begin to see that your time isn’t going to be spent in a worthwhile fashion, are you going to be as likely to continue playing as opposed to spending time with your family or riding your bike? This is really becoming an issue for me, and I’m beginning to wonder whether it’s the fact that I don’t really have a game to get me to reconsider this philosophy or whether this is just a part of aging and re-evaluating priorities. I certainly hope that aging and gaming aren’t mutually exclusive and I don’t think they are, so I’m going to wait it out and hope that “option a” makes itself clear to me soon.

~Kanthalos

Vacation

Hey Everyone,

I’m going to be out of town until next Saturday on vacation.  Getting ready to go is part of the reason for the slow posts lately, but you can expect me to return in full force around the 23rd or so.  Hope you all enjoy yourselves while I’m gone.  Happy blogging.

~Kanthalos

XBox 360 and Long Weekend

As it is a holiday weekend and we just bought an XBox 360, your regularly scheduled posting will recommence on Tuesday. Kthxbye.

-Mrs. Kanthalos

Good to Go!

Rather than write up a new post, I figured I’d just revise this one. Obviously, the new domain is up and running, and the everything along with it (RSS feed/sitemeter) should also be functioning properly. w00t! Go ahead and re-subscribe (or subscribe for the first time) to the feed now if you’d like. In any case, I’m glad it’s finally taken care of, and you can expect me to get back to my typical posts tomorrow, which will likely be Mythos-related again.

~Kanthalos

Little Update

Ok, so rather than decide where to put things on one domain, I found out that I could just have two domains. Since my Dad is hosting it, and he has some extra spots, I can host them both for the same price. In any case, I’ll be switching this over very soon to its new home, at which point I’ll need anyone to resubscribe to the rss feed if you haven’t done so already.

I do have a couple more questions, though. What exactly is the difference between exporting your blog to another site, and transferring the whole thing to a new domain? Thanks in advance.

I’m headed out for a couple hours, but I’m gonna do everything I can to get the blog switched over tonight, so you can expect it by tomorrow at the latest.

~Kanthalos

Getting my own domain: A few questions (Please help!)

Ok, so I just bought a domain, and I’m trying to decide what to do with it exactly. I have hosting already, and but I need a little advice. I want to have both my blog and a personal page connected with it, but I’m not sure which I should use as my homepage. I could either make the blog mmoreinsight.com, or mmoreinsight.com/blog or whatever, but I’m not sure which I should do. Can anyone think of a reason why having one or the other as the main page would work better?

Also, I am wanting to upgrade so that I can modify the CSS and use another theme. How easy or difficult is this to do using another domain to host the page? Does anyone have any nice themes they would be willing to share with me? I would prefer one that is widget-ready with three columns that is manly, but doesn’t really have a theme (sports, computers, animals, etc..)

Right now I’m thinking it’s just a matter of preference as to which page I choose to put where on the site, but if there is anything that I might not be considering, please let me know.

Thanks in advance.

~Kanthalos

One small step for man, one big check for Richard Garriott

According to a Reuters article, Richard Garriott is shipping out into space next year on a trip to the moon. The price tag? $30 million. I for one had no idea he had that sort of money. While that seems unbelievably expensive, I do think it would be pretty cool. I think I’ll wait another 30-40 years and if it’s within my budget by that point or our planet is about to explode resulting in a mass exodus, then maybe I’ll have my shot at going into space 🙂

~Kanthalos

Sorry

Hey everyone,

I’m sorry I’ve been a little slow on the posting the last couple weeks. To be completely honest, I just haven’t really felt the urge to play anything lately and I’ve been busy staying on top of my schoolwork. I’m sure I’ll get back into the swing of things here within the next couple days, so don’t lose hope, there’s plenty more to come!

~Kanthalos

Murloc Suit For Sale

One of many up for sale. Not surprised, but amused all the same 🙂

~Kanthalos

Gods and Heroes Stress Test This Weekend

Gods and Heroes is having a stress test this weekend, and they are giving away beta keys for it. Go check it out.

~Kanthalos

Forget Age of Conan or WAR: It’s Time For WolfQuest

I hate to tell everyone this, but we’ve been so blinded by our obsession of WAR, AoC, PotBS, and all these over games that we’ve missed what truly will be the next WoW. I’m honored to be the first in the blogosphere to share this new game with you. It’s called WolfQuest. I won’t go into details, since the video explains it all. *Shakes with anticipation* we can only sit and wait until this beauty is released!

~Kanthalos

The Ultimate Twilight Zone Collection!

I just thought I’d throw it out there that I just got the entire collection of The Twilight Zone, all 156 episodes along with some commentary from Rod Serling. No more waiting for the New Years marathon on the Sci-Fi channel to get my fill, I’ve got them all at my fingertips! Some of my favorites are The Midnight Sun, The Hitch-Hiker, The Slot Machine (FRANKLIN, lol) and Perchance to Dream, not that any of you know episodes by name, but most of them are really good and thought provoking to say the least. Now I just have to work on my Stargate SG-1 collection which is at season three now 🙂

~Kanthalos

Out for the Weekend

Well I’m taking off for the next few days to go visit my fiancee. I might have a chance to write something up, but I’m not sure. I’ll be back at it on Monday though, so I hope to see you all back then.

~Kanthalos

The Meme’s roll on…

It appears that i’ve been sucked into the swirling vortex that is the meme by Tipa (thank you, btw.) My best tips have already been covered, hopefully mine is alright, though.

-Start Copy-

It’s very simple. When this is passed on to you, copy the whole thing, skim the list and put a * star beside those that you like. (Check out especially the * starred ones.)

Add the next number (1. 2. 3. 4. 5., etc.) and write your own blogging tip for other bloggers. Try to make your tip general.

After that, tag 10 other people. Link love some friends!

Just think- if 10 people start this, the 10 people pass it onto another 10 people, you have 100 links already!

1. Look, read, and learn. ***
–http://www.neonscent.com

2. Be EXCELLENT to each other. *
–http://www.bushmackel.com

3. Don’t let money change ya! *
–http://www.therandomforest.info

4. Always reply to your comments. ****
–http://chattiekat.com

5. Link liberally — it keeps you and your friends afloat in the Sea of Technorati. *
–http://chipsquips.com

6. Don’t give up – persistance is fertile. ***
–http://www.velcro-city.co.uk

7. Give link credit where credit is due. ****
–http://www.sfsignal.com

8. Pictures say a thousand words and can usually add to any post.**
–http://scifichick.com

9. Keep writing, no matter what, and the quality will follow. ***
–http://www.critical-hits.com/

10. Stay out of your comfort zone. Take risks, don’t be afraid to look dumb.*
–http://ambernight.org

11. Keep to a schedule. People return to blogs when they know they will find something new.*
–http://westkarana.com

12. Don’t be afraid to talk about your personal life once in a while.
–https://mmoreinsight.wordpress.com

-End Copy-

Hmmm, this should be fun. I choose Fred, DamianoV, Wilhelm, Cameron, Adele, Darren, Boon, Rick, Aaron, and Pixiestyx. Whether it’s from me or someone else, none of you could have avoided the meme train, so I’m just cutting to the quick. Chances are most of these blogs are in your favorites, but I enjoy reading every one of them, and want to give them some credit, so there you go 🙂

~Kanthalos