"Adam Park, Adam Park, why aren’t you blogging anymore? Adam Park, Adam Park, add something to your blog! Adam Park, Adam Park, it’s been forever since you last put something on your blog! Adam Park, Adam Park, Adam Park!"
Possible excuses I could use right now: "I’ve been too busy doing school work." "My computer was broken." "My internet stopped working for a while." "My dog ate my router." I’m actually not going to use any of those excuses, because just about all of you already know that the real reason I haven’t been blogging is because I’m lazy.
So, I decided to write a massive blog entry about my boring life and the boring things that have happened in the past several days.
First, the obvious change on my website that you probably already noticed is the site theme. I used to have a moderately plain and boring grayscale theme with no other theme-related colors; the only different colors came from the graphics I used. Then, a few weeks ago, I created 365 Parkzer, a daily photo blog that has not yet gone public. From the theme I used there, I picked out a color (which happened to be lime green) and found complimentary colors to build a theme for my main website out of. I obviously wasn’t going to make my main website a lime green theme, so I toned down the brightness a notch and used different shades. Now it sort of looks pastelly, but pastelly is probably better than neon flourescent.
Another interesting event that happened this week was my neighborhood Spring Cleaning. Basically, my village hall gives free garbage pick-up once a year for everyone that lives here. My household happened to have a broken snowblower, a broken trimmer, a broken plastic sled, a broken dart board, a broken broom, a broken shelf, and two broken pairs of slippers. We put those out on the side of our driveway so the garbage truck could pick it up. But the interesting part is that people were driving around with those rapist vans with no windows and were picking up other people’s garbage to use for themselves. Little did these people know that everything we put out there was broken. In a matter of about ten minutes, someone had taken our snowblower, trimmer, sled, and dart board. Hopefully they won’t be dropping those back off here once they find out that they’re broken…
Wednesday and Thursday of this week (yesterday and two days ago) was the PSAE testing in my school, which is the Prairie State Achievement Exam. This exam consists of the ACT (American College Test) and the WorkKeys Test. Those two tests are supposed to measure an individual’s preparedness for college and the work force. The thing is, only juniors take these tests. All the other students in the school had to do something else and keep quiet while the juniors were testing. It ends up that the seniors were assigned to various sessions called Electives, which consisted of the Senior Project (giving back to the school) and listening to guest speakers. For the first day, I spent three hours landscaping in front of the main entrance, ripping up old mulch, moving shrubs, planting trees, sodding grass, and all that stuff. Right after I was done with that, I went to visit the freshmen I normally lead in physical education, who were having their normal classes in shortened versions. The visitation ended up as me leading three consecutive PE classes. The second day of testing, the seniors got free breakfast in the gym. The problem was that the custodians never tore down the tables and chairs in the gym, and when it came time for my gym period, the tables were still up in the gym. We also happened to be rained in beacuse the grass was still wet. The gym period consisted of putting away about 450 chairs and 50 tables. The past two days have probably been the most torturous two days of high school I’ve ever had.
I was actually going to make this blog post a lot longer, but I sort of ran out of things to talk about. And I feel lazy again. I’ll post some more stuff up in the next two days.
Monthly Archives: April 2010
Pokémon Episode 616: Mastering Current Events
When the episode begins, Ash and his friends are lost in the forest. Ash sends out his Gliscor to go look for an open path while he and his friends continue walking through the woods. Shortly after, they hear Gliscor’s cries and head toward the sound to find a large opening with stone pillars. They notice that Gliscor and a Chimecho are being attacked by a Scizor. Gliscor escapes, but Chimecho continues to be chased. Scizor uses Metal Claw on Chimecho, but Chimecho counters with Psybeam. Scizor then goes for a Double Hit, which strikes Chimecho directly and sends it flying into Piplup.
While Piplup tries to recover from the collision, the Air Battle Master and his granddaughter fly down from the sky and arrive in hot air balloons. They identify themselves and explain what they do. The Air Battle Master says that many trainers ask him to train their Pokémon, but most of his requests get rejected because he believes it is a waste of time training Pokémon that will never get stronger. Ash immediately asks for a battle, and the Air Battle Master approves, saying that it will be a good way to kill some time.
The battle begins with Gliscor using Steel Wing. Scizor dodges the attack and uses Metal Claw for a direct hit. Scizor then uses Double Hit for another direct hit, and hits with such accuracy that it seems like Scizor is predicting Gliscor’s moves. Gliscor tries to use Sand Attack, but the wind current blows the Sand Attack away. Scizor uses Metal Claw again for a direct hit, then Double Hit for another direct hit. Gliscor attempts to use Fire Fang, but Scizor uses Double Team to avoid the attack. Gliscor then tries to use Steel Wing, but Scizor easily dodges the attack.
Meanwhile, Team Rocket sees Ash, but their hot air balloon collides with a stone pillar and the ballon pops after hitting a sharp twig. Team Rocket blasts off into the sky.
Back at the battle, the Air Battle Master thinks it is a good time to end the battle. He commands Scizor to use Hyper Beam, which scores another direct hit. Gliscor manages to recover and tries to use Fire Fang on Scizor while it is incapacitated from the recovery turn of Hyper Beam, but Scizor manages to avoid the attack by soaring high up into the air using the wind current, then dives straight down and uses Double Hit. Gliscor takes another direct hit and the match ends with Gliscor’s loss. While Ash tends to Gliscor, the Air Battle Master and his daughter state that Gliscor is weak. Regardless, the Air Battle Master lectures Ash, saying that the art of air battling involves the essential wind and reading it with one’s entire body. He offers Ash to stay at his house.
Night falls and the trio sleeps, but Gliscor is outside watching the moon. Ash and Pikachu wake up and walk outside to talk to Gliscor, and Ash offers to train with Gliscor. Dawn approaches with a bag of tin foil which acted as confetti that was blown by the wind. Gliscor uses the pieces of tin foil to practice riding the wind. As Team Rocket approaches, Gliscor falls into their balloon. But Team Rocket is blown away by the wind current shortly after, and Gliscor continues to train.
The next morning, Ash requests a rematch with the Air Battle Master, and the request is accepted. The battle starts off with Gliscor using X-Scissor. Scizor then uses Meta Claw, but Gliscor dodges the attack. Scizor then uses Double Hit, and Gliscor gets hit the second time. Gliscor then uses Sand Attack into the wind, and the flying sand hits Scizor. Gliscor then uses Fire Fang, and Scizor uses Double Hit. Gliscor uses Fire Fang again, and Scizor uses Double Team, but Gliscor manages to find Scizor anyway. Gliscor then uses Giga Impact, an attack that it has never used before. After the strike, Gliscor rises upward with the wind to recover, then uses X-Scissor. Scizor uses Double Hit. Gliscor attempts to use Giga Impact, but Scizor uses Hyper Beam to score a direct hit and end the match. Although Gliscor lost the match, Ash is glad that Gliscor has learned how to ride the wind, and has learned a new move, Giga Impact.
Back on the ground, the Air Battle Master offers Gliscor to stay and train with him. Ash tells Gliscor that it is up to him to decide. Gliscor has flashbacks of the times he spent with Ash, but ultimately chooses to stay with the Air Battle Master and train. From a nearby cliff, Team Rocket observes Gliscor and starts crying as they watch Ash and his friends bid farewell to Gliscor and continue on with their journey.
Dungeoneering Creates Single-Player Runescape
Anybody that has played games online before knows of the massive diversity of games game producers introduce into the market. Even in the role-playing category, there are thousands of games, such as World of Warcraft and Dungeons & Dragons, to name a few. The two that I will be focusing on today are AdventureQuest Worlds and Runescape.
I remember reading an article a while back about AdventureQuest Worlds when it first came out. A game reviewer shared his opinions of AdventureQuest Worlds, and explained what he liked and what he disliked. One thing he specifically stated that he liked was the fact that AdventureQuest Worlds had instances. For those of you who do not know, instances are different versions of the same map area. For example, Instance 1 could contain Players A, B, and C; Instance 2 could contain Players D, E, F, and G; Instance 3 could contain Players H and I; and Instance 4 could contain Player J. As you can see, an instance does not have any restrictions to how many players it can contain; players can play with their clans, in pairs, or alone. Please note that instances are different than worlds. Worlds are large divisions o the game generally divided by server or region. To make it easy to understand, worlds could be considered to be large-scale instances, while instances could be considered to be small-scale worlds. AdventureQuest Worlds has both worlds and instances, while Runescape has only worlds (and no instances).
Letâs take a quick sidetrack and reflect on our multi-player gaming experiences. What is the most annoying thing about multi-player games? One could say that the most annoying thing is when the game lags, or when the servers are down, or even when the player ranked first in the world gains more experience, making it even harder for you to catch up. But deep down, we all know what bothers us the most. The most annoying thing about multi-player games, without a doubt, is the presence of annoying people. Nothing is more annoying than someone following you around, bothering you and asking for free stuff and money. Nothing is more annoying than someone who invades your space and starts interrupting you while you are playing. Nothing is more annoying than someone who butts into the conversation you are having with your friend and randomly begins to insult your mother or the size of your genitalia. If you could take an eraser out of your pocket and erase the annoying person out of the game, you probably would. And I would too.
Remember what I said about instances? That an instance can hold as many people as you want it to hold? It can also do the exact opposite and hold as few people as you want it to, keeping everyone else out. Opt to teleport to another instance, smash the numeral pad on your keyboard a little bit, tell your friends via private messaging what your random number is, and transfer to the new instance, leaving behind all the other annoying players. As long as the annoying player doesnât smash his or her keyboard in the exact same manner as you did, and does not get the same random number that you did, they wonât be able to follow you. As you can see, implementing instances into a multi-player game is very useful.
Just a while ago, we learned that Runescape has no instances. You canât elect to go to Instance #69 of Varrock in World 46.There is only one Varrock in World 46, and everyone that happens to be in Varrock in World 46 is placed in the same map area. However, the introduction of Dungeoneering brought a very interesting change to this. Although itâs still not possible to transfer over to a specific instance of the Dungeoneering area, an individual or a team can transfer over to an area very similar to what an instance would be like. A person or a group of people can do what they wish without a fear of random outside interruption. Basically, Runescape adapted the core of instances when Jagex modified the idea of instances and threw it in to Dungeoneering.
Obviously, because instances were considered a positive aspect of AdventureQuest Worlds, it will also be considered a positive aspect of Runescape. It seems to be that Jagex is choosing to be more conventional with the way they design Runescape, and it appears to be appealing to a wider range of players. Will Jagex continue in the footsteps of other successful games to attract more players to Runescape? Only time will tell.
“Garage Sale”
A guy this morning was putting up signs around our neighborhood that said "Garage Sale."
Why would he ever want to sell his garage?
And if he were to sell his garage, how would the buyer take it home? Would they cut it off his house and take it with them?
It’s amazing to see how stupid people can be these days.
The Bone Crusher and its Effect on Prayer
Starting out in Runescape Classic as one of the slowest stats to train, Prayer has taken a significant and historic turn from a stat only patient people can train to a stat only rich people can train. With the release of the Ectofunctus and Gilded Altars in Player-Owned Houses, training Prayer has been greatly sped up, but the cost of training has skyrocketed. With personal altars with incense burners giving up to 3.5 times the normal experience per bone and the Ectofunctus giving 4, more people wanted to take advantage of these quicker training methods. But, as anyone with a basic understanding of economic supply and demand will see, a drastically higher demand with only a slightly higher supply results in rising prices. Thus, the first of many causes of rising Prayer training prices was introduced: new and faster ways to train Prayer.
A future update after the release of altars in Player-Owned Houses made them easier to use, as if sacrificing bones on an altar wasnât easy enough. Back when Runescape Classic was around, and even for some time during Runescape 2, a lot of skills had to be trained by lots of manual clicking. Take Cooking for an example. A handful of years back, the only way to cook a full inventory of Raw Tuna was to click on a Raw Tuna, click on a fire or range, and repeat 28 times. This involved a total of 56 clicks (if one were to not make any misclick mistakes) and a lot of mouse movement. People started complaining that cooking in this manner was annoying and was a waste of energy, especially when another player was standing on top of the fire, forcing someone to click twice on the fire instead of just once, yielding a total of 84 clicks. Jagex listened to the whining of their players and decided to take action to pacify them by releasing the Cook-X option. Those who remember algebra class should remember that X is a variable that can represent any number, which in this case is user-defined. After clicking on the Raw Tuna, then on the fire or range, players have the option to right-click on the menu that appears and click on the Cook-X option. Then, one can type in 28 and hit Enter to initiate an automatic cooking process that cooks an entire inventory with only four clicks, three keystrokes, and almost no mouse movement. After the people got this update for Cooking, they knew it could happen for other skills too, and continued to complain, this time for Prayer. They said that it was far too easy to misclick on the bones and bury them instead of use them on the altar to sacrifice them. Sadly, Jagex got hypnotized by the players again, and this time released the Use-X option for Prayer. This brought a second cause of skyrocketing bone prices: more convenient ways of training Prayer.
After a while, Jagex noticed that Prayer had not received any utility updates for a while. They released one or two new Prayers once in a while, but these updates were rare. People declared that training their Prayer level above the 70s was tedious and almost pointless except for being able to use Prayer for longer periods of time. But even that wasnât good enough motivation, as making money to buy Prayer Potions and doing quests to be able to use the Holy Wrench was a much more beneficial use of time than burying or sacrificing tens of thousands of bones. So, Jagex listened once again to their whining players and came up with Ancient Curses, an extension of the Prayer skill. Upon completion of a difficult quest, a player could unlock a completely new set of prayers that were far superior to the older prayers. The single-digit stat boosts of before became double-digit stat boosts. The new prayers could now drain stats of the opponent. The protection prayers of before became reflection prayers, not only giving protection from the specific style of combat, but also reflecting back some damage to the opponent. One now had to train his or her Prayer level into the 90s to be able to use all the Ancient Curses. This brought yet again another source of rising bone prices: more benefits of training prayer.
After the release of Dungeoneering, however, we saw a new item that may finally lower bone prices instead of raise them. A reward released with the Dungeoneering skill purchasable with Dungeoneering tokens made it possible to train Prayer without even thinking about doing so. Meet the Bone Crusher, an item that someone can keep in their inventory to automatically bury all the bones they receive as monster drops. One of the main reasons people spent millions of coins on buying higher-leveled bones was because they didnât want to take the extra effort to bury the lower-leveled bones that they got as drops all the time from the monsters they fought regularly. Now, they donât even have to move their mouse, as a single inventory space sacrificed could mean easy Prayer experience. Obviously, not many people (if any) have gotten enough tokens to be able to buy the Bone Crusher, so there hasnât been much of a drastic difference in the price of Dragon Bones. However, we may be seeing a fall in prices in the future as more people earn enough tokens to buy the Bone Crusher, and have to spend less effort training their Prayer level in the future.
Devil Smoke
The Epic Tale of Little Ian
Once upon a time, there was a boy named Little Ian. He lived a few minutes away from Adam Parkzer, and they rode the same bus to school.
One day, Little Ian missed the bus. Fortunately, the bus route is organized so that the bus ends up passing Little Ian’s bus stop twice, once at the scheduled time and once about ten minutes later. Unfortunately, Little Ian also missed the second pass, which essentially meant that he missed the bus. But Little Ian wasn’t going to give up there. Little Ian had a plan.
Little Ian went back to his house and grabbed his bike. He hopped on with his backpack and started pedaling as fast as he could. His plan: to catch up to the bus and get on it at all costs. Little Ian knew that he would succeed.
Lucky for Little Ian, the bus route also included a stop in an out-of-the-way location to pick up a girl, who we will refer to by using her initials, CW. Out of all honesty, picking her up is an utter waste of time, and takes an extra one minute out of everyone’s lives when she could simply walk for a few hundred meters and not make the bus have to drive into an isolated area, then make a u-turn and retrace its tracks. But obviously, Miss CW is fragile and we must pick her up directly in front of her house, or else she might break in half. And also, the extra wasted minute gave Little Ian another opportunity to catch up.
Little Ian could see the bus in his sight. The massive yellow motor vehicle was coming to a slow halt at a stop sign. Little Ian vigorously motioned to catch the attention of the bus driver. He did it. He had succeeded. Little Ian proudly hoisted his bike over his shoulders and stepped on the bus. He walked in half-way of the length of the bus and placed his bike down. He proudly seated himself in the seat adjacent to Miss CW and put on a ear-to-ear smile.
Meanwhile, Miss CW gave disgusted looks to Little Ian.
As another school day passed, it was time to go back home. Little Ian, however, had a tiny problem. The bus driver wouldn’t let him bring his bike back on the bus, and told him that he would have to ride his bike back home. With no other choice, Little Ian went to his bike and started cycling home.
The end.
Yep, that story’s 100% factual and it happened today. I’m interested to know what happened to him. If he got hit by a car or got eaten by a hyena and died on the way back home, I think the bus driver has some lawsuits coming her way.
Obviously, some of you are saying, "Since when did you have a soft spot for little boys?" The thing is, the bus leaves my school at 3:00 PM, and it’s about 3:24 PM when I get back home. Of course, there’s a few stops before my stop, and it takes about a minute for me to walk from my bus stop to my house. But still, that would average out to anywhere between 15 and 20 minutes for the bus to bring me back home. Imagine how long it would take to travel that distance on a bike, especially seeing how hilly the rodes are near where I live. Little Ian’s probably not even going to make it back in time for supper.
Dungeoneering: A Safe Haven for Botters?
As almost all Runescape players know, Jagex has been struggling to fight against botters, or people who use programs and other software to play Runescape for them automatically. This obviously makes the game unbalanced and unfair to the people who play without any third-party macroing software, as these individuals work hard and spend lots of their time earning money and leveling skills, while the botters simply set it and forget it.
After the release of the new Dungeoneering skill, I managed to gain several levels before I got bored of it. Ever since I started playing in 2005, I think training Dungeoneering is one of the slowest-progressing activities in the game that I have ever done â even after a few hours of playing, my Dungeoneering level was still in the single digits. However, the point here is not that it is slow; the point is that I have played continuously for a long time. Now hereâs something new to think about: generally, when I do a single task over and over for a long time, I run into a random event, something that tries to foil botters. Oddly enough, I didnât run into a single random event during my Dungeoneering adventures, neither in the lobby, waiting area, nor in the dungeon. I never saw anyone else get taken away by a random event NPC, and the handful of people I asked said they never saw random events in the Dungeoneering area as well.
One might argue that Dungeoneering is just like a mini-game/activity, so there are no random events, just like the other mini-games/activities. However, Dungeoneering is the first place in which players receive a worry-free botting area where they can train most skills of their choice. The only other mini-game/activity in which botters can train a variety of skills is Stealing Creation, but Stealing Creation has threats. First, the people on the other team are out to get you â not only is Stealing Creation a skilling game, it is also a combat game. Second, even your teammates may become a threat if they are people that want to become Player Moderators and report any suspicious activity, no matter how subtle it may be. Finally, Stealing Creation requires interaction with others, including teammates and opponents; one cannot play Stealing Creation by his or herself.
As stated before, Dungeoneering solves all these problems. The opponents that would have killed you in Stealing Creation do not exist in Dungeoneering and are replaced by NPC monsters. Kill these monsters once and they never come back, unlike their Stealing Creation counterparts that may return for a revenge kill, even if already killed once. Essentially, a botter could manually kill a few monsters before starting their bot, then not have to worry about dying again. Next, Dungeoneering allows you to enter the playing field, known in this case as the dungeon, by yourself. This solves more problems than one could imagine. Not only will it keep you out of sight of other random Dungeoneers, it will also keep you out of sight of your friends. Just flip private chat off and plunge into your own private dungeon, and your friends will have absolutely no idea that you are online or that youâre botting.
So is Jagex going to do something about this new problem theyâve created? Are they going to implement Dungeoneering random events, in which the Sandwich Lady magically appears in a dungeon deep underground and offers you a snack? Will they implement full-party Dungeoneering random events in which the whole party is teleported to a random event at the same time and collaborate to solve a puzzle? Only time will tell.
Pokémon Episode 615: The Treasure is All Mine
The episode opens with Ash and Dawn training with their Monferno and Piplup. Monferno uses Flamethrower on Piplup, but Piplup dodges and uses Bubblebeam. To dodge Bubblebeam, Ash instructs Monferno to use Dig. However, as it is digging, Monferno finds something in the ground, which the trio soon discovers is a treasure chest. They attempt to open it, but it is stuck. Meanwhile, Team Rocket is watching from the bushes and plan to steal it.
After failing to open the chest, Brock decides to give it to Officer Jenny to see if she would be able to open it. However, Team Rocket appears disguised as a group of pirates and tries to steal the treasure chest. When Ash refuses to hand over the chest, Team Rock reveal their identity, only to be Thunderbolted by Ash’s Pikachu and blast off into the distance.
After Team Rocket land, James remembers that the chest is his. Team Rocket return to the trio and James explains his situation. Brock challenges James to open it to prove that he is the owner of the chest. However, James fails to open it after three attempts and the security system on the chest activates, shooting Team Rocket and making them blast off again. However, as Team Rocket is blasting off, James recalls what is inside the treasure chest, and states that it is something that cannot and should not ever be revealed to the world.
Meanwhile, the trio head toward a mansion, later identified as a summer estate, in which a butler sprints out from and greets them, identifing the chest as James’. The butler looks for James but is unable to find him. Confused, Dawn asks if the Master James that Sebastian the butler is referring to is the same James that is in Team Rocket. Brock affirms, stating that the James from Team Rocket is extremely rich.
Back with Team Rocket, James explains that he doesn’t want to be found by Sebastian because otherwise, he will be forced to marry Jessibell. James insists that the rest of Team Rocket help him because a team always sticks together; he starts devising a plan to seize the treasure chest without Sebastian finding them.
In the mansion, Sebastian feeds the trio. Just as he was about to ask them where they found the treasure chest, the doorbell rings. When Sebastian opens the door, Jessie, disguised as Jessibell, appears and says that James sent her to get his treasure chest. Ash brings down the treasure chest, and Growlith comes downstairs as well. The Growlith happens to be James’ Growlie, and identifies James, ripping his disguise apart. When Sebastian realizes that it is James, he sends out Spinarak to use String Shot so James cannot escape, but James sends out Mime Jr. to use Teeter Dance and stop Spinarak. Then, he heads over to a booby trap control where he opens up a trap in the ground and sends Sebastian plummeting.
With Sebastian out of the way, James tells his story of his treasure chest. He explains that when he was little, he first met Jessibell and wanted to marry her. To express his love, he wrote a love letter to Jessibell, which he placed inside a treasure chest that he received as a gift from his parents. Later that evening, James went to Jessibell’s house, in which he got the approval from Jessibell, her parents, and his parents for the marriage. However, in order to marry Jessibell, James was commanded to get rid of Growlie, to which he refused and called off the marriage. He ran into the woods where he buried the chest with the help of Growlie’s Dig.
As James finishes the story, the security system of the mansion goes off, and James notices that Jessibell was approaching because Sebastian called her when he was in his trap confinement. Sebastian manages to escape the trap as the real Jessibell enters the house, and he leads her down a tunnel that James could be found. Several steps ahead, James, the rest of Team Rocket, and the trio started running away down the passageway. They manage to reach the end of the passageway where they find a door. They get on the other side of the door and block it off using massive boulders so Sebastian and Jessibell cannot access the other side of the tunnel. Once in temporary safety, James tries once again to open the treasure chest, but fails, activating the security feature of the treasure chest once again. James fights the treasure chest with Growlie by using Flamethrower, Dig, and another Flamethrower. Eventually, the treasure chest turns into a rocket and blasts off into the sky.
On the other side of the door, Jessibell calls out her Vileplume to use Solar Beam, which is powerful enough to clear the passageway and give Jessibell access to James. As Jessibell confronts James, James asks Ash to get his Pikachu to use Thunderbolt on them so they can blast off and escape Jessibell. As Pikachu uses Thunderbolt and as Team Rocket blasts off, it is Jessibell that blasts off instead of James.
As the episode comes to a close, the trio continue to walk down a path toward Sunnyshore City, while elsewhere, James and Meowth are running away from Jessibell.
Videos: McHenry County College Law Day 2010
The following two videos are a simulator of a potentially real-life situation that a law enforcement officer may encounter. The recording is of a commentated replay of the actions taken by the volunteers that participated in the activity. Gun shot locations were registered by a laser recognition system, and the location of where and when the bullets would have landed are marked by the red points.
