Nov 11

Video Games to Track, Watch, and Play

by Chris Billows in Hobby Heedings, Playstates Theory 0 comments tags: Emergence, Games Analysis
I have an interest in the overall-scope of Video Games; but limited time to play all of the things that are of interest. I think I have come up with a solution, to help define in my own mind what are the games I need to restrain myself to. Video Games have at times been called Possibility Spaces; I think its a very great name since it is about exploring new places, tools, and concepts. Since there is not enough hours in our lives to play every possibility, I have come to accept that others can do the exploring is just as good. Twitch is a good example of the fun of witnessing games. Lots of narrative based games like RPGs and FPSs we see the game’s setting telling a story about the world. Following the narrative-linear format, these games are like books and movies. When you finish the game, you finish the story. The story is not going to advance unless you play. History waits for the player. It these kinds of games where we are acting as the page turner. Successfully overcoming obstacles advances the story. Witnessing these, spoilers and all, means that I don’t need to play […]
Nov 04

Buried by Video Game Abundance

by Chris Billows in Hobby Heedings 0 comments tags: Games Analysis
Like most enthusiasts who have a hobby, I tend to over do things with my enthusiasm. I over-collect Music and Video Games. I’ve developed (link to my itunes) a system on how to organize my music and enjoy it. My iTunes practice is a form of O.C.D. trapping. The level of detail I go to is pretty absurd, but I find it scratches an itch. Its almost like a ‘controlled burn’. Allowing it to run rampant in this one contained area of my life, but learning to let things go in other areas. Anyways, enough self psychoanalysis! The biggest difference between Music and Video Games is that Music is so much easier to ‘consume’. A typical song is about 3 minutes and the amount of brain power required to appreciate a song is about 1/100th of what an intense, intricate game requires. So I’ve come to the conclusion that Video Games will remain something that I will enjoy with much less frequency than Music. I simply do not have the time to play Video Games, while I can play Music when even at work. There are websites (The Backloggery) that help encourage people to play their backlog of games. I’ve […]
Jun 11

Response to Defining Play, Game, and Gaming

by Chris Billows in Hobby Heedings, Playstates Theory 1 comments tags: Game Philosophy, Playstates
Over at DavidMullich.com I shared a couple of comments relating to his definitions on Games. #1 Hi David! I appreciate your definition “a playful activity with rules and goals.” but do think it does not go deep enough. A jigsaw puzzle has rules and a goal, but its not a game (which is why its called a puzzle). A role-playing game also has a rules and goals, but its not a game like chess is. I’ve come up with a definition to games that satisfies my mind and I would like to share it. “Games are about the Play of Measurement”. The measurement can be physics (3D shooters), grid (board games), tractable (CRPGs), etc. I’ve included a link to my theory blog post so would welcome your thoughts. Best regards, Chris #2 I agree with you. A Jigsaw puzzle is not a game, but could be made a game by adding a time limit (complete the puzzle in x amount of time). I believe you would say that this is an example of conflict (race vs the clock) while I would see it as a Puzzle made into a Game by the addition of the Play of Measurement (time being […]

Warning: Trying to access array offset on value of type bool in /home/genxtral/domains/billo.ws/public_html/wp-content/themes/fit/bloglisting.php on line 39
Dec 30

Enjoying iTunes via Statistics Year 4

by Chris Billows in Hobby Heedings 0 comments
A year ago I posted about my third year of listening enjoyment on iTunes. Another year has come and gone and I am pleased to share my nerd and show you my listening statistics. Listening to music has become such a part of my life I basically have it going all of the time. I use two different programs to run the statistics. The more polished one is called SuperAnalzyer and it creates some wonderful statistics and graphs. SuperAnalzyer PDF Document The other program is a fabulous little script written by Scott Yanff. Thanks Scott for updating it with some new reporting goodies. iTunes Statistics Text Document These statistics were taken early December 30, 2012 of my personal library. It is a snapshot of a year of iTunes use and listening. After listening to a song a couple of times I will assign a rating to it. Some changes of note: 25,717 songs has grown to 29,915 songs with over 4,200 songs being added to the library. 2,238  artists has grown to 2,575 artists 1,710  albums has grown to 1,938 albums I have almost 30,000 songs and I have listened to 61% of them at least once. Last year I listened […]

Warning: Trying to access array offset on value of type bool in /home/genxtral/domains/billo.ws/public_html/wp-content/themes/fit/bloglisting.php on line 39
Dec 26

Enjoying iTunes via Statistics Year 3

by Chris Billows in Hobby Heedings 0 comments
A year ago I posted about my second year of listening enjoyment on iTunes. Another year has come and gone and my iPod Touch has become how I listen to 90% of my music. I continue to enjoy the organizing of my music library and savor the anticipation of artists waiting in my queue. I use two different programs to run the statistics. The most polished one is called SuperAnalzyer and it creates some wonderful statistics and graphs. SuperAnalzyer PDF Document The other program is a fabulous little script written by Scott Yanff. Thanks Scott for updating it with some new reporting goodies. iTunes Statistics Text Document These statistics were taken late December 26, 2011 of my personal library. It is a snapshot of a year of iTunes use and listening. After listening to a song a couple of times I will assign a rating to it. Some changes of note: 21,108 songs has grown to 25,717 songs with over 4,600 songs being added to the library. 1,737 artists has grown to 2,238  artists 1,341 albums has grown to 1,710  albums I have over 25,000 songs and I have listened to 44% of them at least once. Last year I […]

Warning: Trying to access array offset on value of type bool in /home/genxtral/domains/billo.ws/public_html/wp-content/themes/fit/bloglisting.php on line 39
Mar 01

Lesson Six.One in Using iTunes: Creating A Playlist To Queue Music

by Chris Billows in Hobby Heedings 0 comments
My first Playlist that I will share with you is about queuing up music to be played. This kind of playlist may not be necessary if 1) you don’t believe in rating your music, and 2) you don’t have that many songs to queue. I have over 20,000 songs, so managing what I am going to play requires some planning. Also, being a bit of a obsessive type I find organizing things to be a source of enjoyment for me. 😉 First of all, create a Playlist in iTunes by going File > New Smart Playlist, then name it. I called mine ‘Rating Queue”. iTunes prompts you with a new window asking how you want to filter the music in your Smart playlist. Use the following filters: 1) Plays is less than 2 (This is important since I listen to songs at least twice when I rate them. Sometimes, I will rate a song as soon as I hear it, other times it will be the second go around). 2) Media is Music (this filters out movies and podcasts and audio books). It will look like this: Now, if you have thousands of songs, your new Smart playlist will have […]
Recent Posts
Recent Comments
Categories