Nerd Tests and Ratings

Found a neat website, and put the results in the top right corner.  You take a nerd test and it will rate your percentages based on answers in the different categories.  I'm officially a "Cool High Nerd".  When completed you get some HTML code that you can embed.  Click my results to go the site or if you don't feel like clicking on the results then CLICK HERE!

Just some games I've been playing...

Ok Ok, so with the tiny terror (see baby below....) getting to 4 months old she is sleeping longer through the night which means I can catch up on some gaming I have had backed up.  Been trying to finish Fallout Vegas but Just Cause 2 has been distracting me with grappling hook fun.  I know the game is ok but for $5 on Steam I could not pass it up.  Nothing like vehicles to buildings, planes to vehicles, people to planes, well you get the idea.  Mainly I have been playing my backlog from the of Fallout 3 expansions, Fallout Vegas, Little Big Planet 2, Racing in Gran Turismo 5, Getting around to finishing Oblivion.  Hey I know that game has been out forever but I picked that up mid 2011.  I'm not to big on RPGs but I've had fun being a sneaky darkelf.  Oh and running my custom modded Non - Madden Madden Franchise.  By that I mean I took out all of the real teams from Madden, Plugged in 32 custom teams and stadiums and running my Portland franchise.  GO Lumberjacks!.  Now if I could only get my offense as high as my defense I am set.  Mostly I play FPS, Action (Uncharted, Assasins Creed) and some sports (Madden, any good Racing games).  Anyways, enough late night ramblings, I have gaming to do!

Project Samples

Just a quick post with a few tidbits I worked on.  Nothing high end or fancy.  Remember I am still in school for this stuff.

PS the picture of Chuck, Randy and I was taken before Randy passed away. Great times, sniff, great times...

Below is a video I did for my Machinima class......it's pure cheesy goodness.

Christmas Time!

So I decided to put up a few more recent pictures of Kaori.  Since my last rant she has gotten a little better and I manage to get about 4 hours of sleep a night in a stretch.  This is her first Christmas,  she is 3 months old.

Christmas Eve, sitting in Grandmas
 lap with her fancy boots.

Trying to get her to pose for a good picture,
but just keeps chewing her lip.

Sitting with Mommy opening her first
Christmas present!!! Looks like she is a pro.





Resting on Daddy, she is tired from all
the excitement.

I just wanted to put up a few newer photos and let everyone see she is not always a crazy baby. 

Ok its been a long time.....

Well sorry that I haven't posted for over a year now.  School has been tough, I lost my job (Thanks for lying about cut backs!!!!!!!!)  which I am still out of work (Thanks ECONOMY!!!!!!!!!) and now on top of it all.....surprise A BABY!  My wife and I were not planning on having children but that got blown out of the water. 

We have a lovely little girl Kaori Madison. 

Just finished feeding....all quiet on the Western Front

I wanted a Japanese name in sticking with my heritage (although I look like your average white guy).  The name Kaori means fragrance.  Now as a proud new parent I will say that our baby is cute.  Of course I sound biased which I am to a degree but I am honest in telling you she came out quick.  This avoided sitting in the birth canal and thus avoided the typical newborn got-beat-in-the-face-look-like-a-boxer.  She is wonderful and even though we did not want any children I cannot imagine life without her now. So.......

All of this this leads my to the real meat of the post.  DON'T LISTEN TO THOSE ASSHOLES AT THE HOSPITAL!!!!!!  What I mean by that is please put your baby on a schedule, don't use this new age feed whenever, let them do whatever, keep them held all the time bull.  Cause you can guess what happens...you have a spoiled child like my lovey lumpkins.  She does not sleep through the night still after 2 months.  You only get maybe 3 hours.  She still has her days and nights confused.  She will not go to sleep without constantly being held.  I understand she is a newborn and needs lots of attention and care but there is no structure.  Now that the time has come to introduce a schedule you are making the problem worse (my wife has to go back to work in a month).  If I just went with my gut and stuck to a damn schedule from the beginning I know these problems would have been avoided.

Now don't get me wrong, I am not abdicating putting my child in a dark closet with a bottle and telling her fend for yourself.  What I am saying is that all of the doctors and nurses we met have this same "philosophy" about rearing children that is supposed to be better for babies.  Well let me tell you it stinks, worse that a loaded diaper at 4 in the morning.  My mother raised my brother and I with a schedule from day 1.  She was raised with schedule from day 1.  You know what?  A lot less problems occurred.  I was sleeping for about 6 hours a night withing a short period of time as a baby.

My mother warned about this new feed a will schedule.  I was all naive thinking hey the docs and nurses know whats up.   Boy I feel like that guy that goes to the used car lot, gets down the road and the engine blows.  Too bad, you drove it off the lot sucker....  Now we are trying to get a 2 month old that has quickly and stubbornly accustomed to doing things her own way and on her own pace.  I also found out afterward some of the nurses pushing this new way of think crap don't do it themselves and are on the supposedly outdated schedule method.  WTF?  Really you are gonna tell me this is what I should do but not follow through on it.  AAAAAHHHHHHHHRRRRRRGGGGGGGGG!!!!!!

3:46 am, crying her head off.  The photo came out blurry
from her squirming about.  Plus I forgot to turn on the flash.
from being exhausted.
Just remember this is what the "plan" results in....

So the lesson for today is Doctors and Nurses should stick to just the medicine part and shut the hell up about anything else outside of that field.

Btw if you think I'm some kinda chump for calling my child a cutesy name lovely lumpkins then I wish to setup a MMA exhibition match and introduce you to the Elbow twins and their friend Mr. Armbar.

Final Project

Some of this has been posted before, but I recompiled it, and presented with pictures of the game below so it all comes together for my final project.  I have also posted a YouTube video here.

JB's stick it to 'em
Robert E. Pitts Jr.

Have you ever in customer service and wanted to tell off that rude customer?  Well now can!  Choose from an assortment of remarks, comebacks and things to do to get back at them.

Features

• Game board is shaped like an airliner, you move around the plane and hopefully you get off through the escape slide.  Inspired by flight attendant with JetBlue Steven Slater
• Play your cards against the customer cards in a battle of wills to see who can dish it out best.  Movement based on the card battles.
• Decision making is key.  Do you play it safe and wait to pull out the big card or go for broke and try to quickly make your escape?
• For even more entertainment, an interactive DVD is included that has comedic clips of customer service situations that you choose to play instead of cards.
• Play through to avoid the dreaded managers office.
• Makes a great party game where everyone can have a good laugh
• Motivation
• Your ultimate goal is to slug through the customers and make your escape from customer service.  Tug at the emotions of the players as they relive those dreaded times with rude customers.  Anyone who has worked with the public understand that people can be rude, obnoxious and downright mean.  So feel free to let it all out and tell than what you really think.

Genre

The game is a mix of a board game, card game and the benefit of the DVD

Target Customer

The large percent of the population working in a customer service role of some sort.  Everyone from waiters to department stores employees.  People want a release from dealing with the public.  Read this quote from austenbronte who wrote on ABCNews.com. "Working with the GENERAL public is mundane and rude people like that woman can drive your insane, day after day, after day, after day. WAY TO GO STEVEN! You are free from that daily nightmare, now I wish you good luck in fighting the legal system and the airline, so you can stay out of jail."  - Taken from ABCnews story linked here - http://abcnews.go.com/Entertainment/steven-slater-jetblue-flight-attendant-quitter-online-hero/story?id=11369252

Competition

None that I have found.

Unique Selling points

• It would be the first game of its kind
• Allows people to role play tough customer situations finally get to stick it to rude customers
• Great party atmosphere game
• DVD allows for longer play and great laughs
• Tap into the potential of workers tired of dealing with rude people.

Target Hardware

• Tabletop and a DVD player – according to the Digital Entertainment Group 2009 year end report, 92 million households have a DVD player.

Design Goals

• Easy - setup and game play
• Entertaining – Good laughs, replay value with different play through based on the cards dealt
• Group Play – get together and share the laughs
• DVD – videos appeal to the YouTube crowd and are campy and funny

Rules and play-through information


The Rules are simple but with a bit of strategy. You have two desks of cards. One deck is the Customer Cards deck (CC), the second is Service Representative deck (SR). CC cards are comments, complaints, obnoxious remarks and general dumb customer interactions and are weighted with negative values from -1 to -10. SR cards are comebacks to complaints, inventive ways to get back at customers, general ways to frustrate the stupid customers of the world and are weighted with values from +1 to +10. You initially start with 10 cards in hand after shuffling the deck.

The board is shaped like an airliner, you move around the plane and hopefully you get off through the escape slide. Movement is determined by how you play your cards. Meaning SR-CC=movement. Move forwards or backwards the appropriate # of spaces.  If negative you do not get another card. The catch of course is to strategize your card use. You can also get a bonus SR card on select spots on the board. If you run out of cards, land on select spots or select cc cards with the instructions for mangers office, you then proceed to the  managers office and lose a turn. There are 3 mangers offices around the board. When you go the managers office you go backwards to the previously passed office or if you are not past the first office return to start. On your next turn only if you have run out of cards  you draw 5 cards from the SR deck.

To add a little spice, you can utilize the DVD by landing on select spots on the board or selecting CC deck cards with the DVD icon. Some clips will be positive for the player or negative siding with the customer - movement will come from these. The clips will be around 30 seconds or so and will be campy and funny. The result will make you move forwards or backwards. You do not lose or draw a card with a negative DVD playback result, just move the appropriate number of spaces.
Another option as well for direct head to head competition is to play with another person in charge of the CC cards as you battle directly for victory and escape from the customer service nightmare!

Picture of Service Representative Cards

 Picture of Customer Comment Cards

 Picture of Game Board Layout

 Picture of actual prototype gameboard & Cards

Cards and Dice

Premise

• A Different twist on high card draw, using dice as a “power up” and utilizing joker cards as a re-roll of dice.

Rules

• Each player rolls three dice.  These dice are added onto point total of cards as a “power up”.  They can only be used one at a time and once used are removed from play (unless you draw a joker).
• value of cards ace=1 through king=10
• joker cards let you re-roll your dice and act as a way to reload your “power up”.  If joker is drawn then you re-roll your dice putting them back in play and then you draw another card (to replace one that was played).
• deck including jokers is shuffled and each player draws 10 cards
• high card including “power up” wins.  Cards are played by each player first sliding a die forward if being used and then simultaneously placing their cards on table face up to see who won.
• After you play your cards each player draws a card, winner drawing first
• most wins determines overall winner

Revisions after play-through

• I dropped the number of cards drawn from 10 to 7.  this allows for a little more randomization of what you will draw.
• As a variant, I added the option to add up to two dice at once, discard after usage of dice still applies.