After writing about .hack//SIGN and poking around on the fan wiki, I decided I wanted to find out what was going on in the follow-on games (.hack//INFECTION, .hack//MUTATION, .hack//OUTBREAK, and .hack//QUARANTINE.) As I mentioned previously, I don’t have any flavor of Play Station, nor the games themselves, so I sought out condensed playthroughs on Youtube in the hopes that I might at least understand the major plot points and maybe a bit more of the lore of this universe. Continue reading .hack//GAMES
All posts by The Plaid Mentat
Skorpios: Kneebreaker
After having played Skorpios: Toybreaker, I couldn’t help but think back to my old favorite archetype, and see if I could make a tag & bag deck work with Skorpios Defense Systems. The remove from game ability can affect the Runner’s grip as well as anything else, so why not? This brings me to Skorpios: Kneebreaker – a deck all about tagging the runner, then flatlining them. Continue reading Skorpios: Kneebreaker
.hack//SIGN
After my tour with Star Trek, I decided to go back to an old favorite and watch .hack//SIGN. I saw this show the first time when I was working on my undergraduate degree at Mesa State College, and it has stuck with me since as an interesting character study. I got the Funimation DVDs and was (for the first time) able to watch it with dubbed audio, which helped me just sit back and enjoy it. Continue reading .hack//SIGN
Skorpios: Toybreaker
As I set out to play Terminal Directive, I knew I would need to run a new kind of deck. My old advanceable ICE deck was doing ok, but it relied heavily on its identity to make it work, so with a new identity comes a new kind of deck. This one I call Skorpios: Toybreaker, as it really wants to break apart the Runner’s rig… …And then remove it from the game. Continue reading Skorpios: Toybreaker
Iterative Methods for Linear and Nonlinear Systems
As part of my resolution to read some Numerical Analysis stuff this year, I read C. T. Kelly’s Iterative Methods for Linear and Nonlinear Systems. I can say with certainty, that on the surface I underestimated this book. I expected a thin book on iterative methods (it certainly has less pages than Nocedal and Wright or Yousef Saad’s book), but it certainly has some substance to it. Continue reading Iterative Methods for Linear and Nonlinear Systems
Android Netrunner: Terminal Directive
Despite being another campaign style game, I recently picked up Android Netrunner: Terminal Directive. This box had me interested for a few reasons, and I was lucky enough to have someone else at the shop that was interested in playing as well (better yet, he was interested in playing as the runner.) Continue reading Android Netrunner: Terminal Directive
Star Trek
I recently finished the first season of the original Star Trek and I found that I quite enjoyed myself. There were certainly episodes that are the very definition of campy, but there were also episodes that explored some interesting ideas and made Star Trek a social exploration of its time. Below, I make some general observations, and talk about a few episodes that stood out to me. Continue reading Star Trek
Learning from an AI
I’ve recently been on another Prismata kick and, because it’s a game of perfect strategy, it got me thinking about a couple of things. First, I started to wonder if I could build an AI to play Prismata effectively (and, by effectively, I mean defeat the other AI), and then, I started to wonder if I could learn to get better at Prismata by doing so. Continue reading Learning from an AI
My Alma Mater
I recently got the chance to go to Colorado Mesa University and sit on a panel of other graduates to talk about our current position and educational trajectory. This was a lot of fun for me for a few reasons, the least of which was not that, for me, talking to students and talking about my job are both a ton of fun. Continue reading My Alma Mater
Demoing a Game
As part of my New Year’s Resolutions, I decided I was going to get some work done on my own game this year and then demo it. To help me get it right, I decided that I wanted to demo it in stages, so last weekend, I demoed my movement rules. This is probably the trickiest part to get right, because I want to have a game with Newtonian physics. Continue reading Demoing a Game