My Irrational Indifference to Netflix's Price Hike

A few days ago, Netflix dropped one helluva bomb on its customers which includes myself. The $9.99 package, which combines both unlimited web-streaming and one-at-a-time DVDs by mail, will be no more. Instead, both are separate $7.99 packages, which amounts to roughly $15 for both.

There was a huge public outcry. All the major media outlets wrote about it and "Dear Netflix" was trending on twitter with angry reactions to the price hike. Reaction ran the gamut from angry comments, phone calls to Netflix, to even rage induced subscription cancellations.

On Terraria and Minecraft

 

A few months ago, if you saw Terraria you might've thought it was a cash-in copy of Minecraft. But that's not really fair, nor is it accurate.

My friend also blogged about it on Tumblr and someone reblogged his post with a very adequate analogy. Minecraft is a mining game with RPG elements. Meanwhile, Terraria is an RPG with mining elements. Sheer. Brilliance. That is exactly how I feel about Terraria and it explains why it's so addictive. The RPG elements are much more pronounced in Terraria while mining is a secondary function that serves to enhance it.

A simplified history of Pokémon's metagame part 4: Diamond and Pearl

Since part 1, 2 and 3 of the history of Pokémon's metagame, there have been a lot of recurring themes and ideas. Every generation had at least one powerful and memorable change that easily makes it the reason why everyone remembers that generation. Also, the metagame at this point has been ancient history to many trainers.

But now we're in our 4th generation with the Diamond/Pearl generation, or DP generation. DP was the first Pokémon game on the DS and it’s still fresh in many trainers' minds. But in my opinion, the changes brought forth in DP were some of the biggest changes ever. Old contenders flailed about in the wake of these changes. Old ideas had to be reworked as long held mechanics were turned on their head. And much like SkarmBliss and Curselax before it, one thing so defined the generation that it would be forever remembered no matter how much the metagame may change in the future. Many readers are probably familiar enough with the DP generation to know many of the things I'll be talking about.

A simplified history of Pokemon's metagame part 3: Ruby and Sapphire

Ah, the RSE generation. Personally my favorite generation even though the game itself is probably the guiltiest in terms of padding game design as over half the routes were waterways meant to be traversed via Surf or Dive. This of course meant endless random encounters and trainer battles. While the game touted new additions such as abilities and double battles, my favorite thing about the RSE generation was the addition of weather changing moves that changed the battlefield.

I hope you like Surf, because you're going to do a lot of it!

A simpliefied history of Pokemon's metagame part 2: Gold and Silver

Of all the things that stick out in the metagame of Pokémon's first generation, the lack of a hard counter to psychic-type was most glaring. Alakazam was top dog and nothing could stand up to its dominance. So when Gold and Silver (and eventually Crystal) came out, the metagame was shook to the core as the world seemingly changed around Alakazam. Thus Gold and Silver signaled the beginning of the end for Alakazam's glory days.