Monday, August 31, 2015
Walker goes full Forrest Gump, says Canadian border wall is “legitimate issue for us to look at”
Update: Readers who hunger for more mockery of Scott Walker should check out the #CanadaWall tag on twitter. ————————————– Today on Meet the Press, Scott Walker said that a border wall between the United States and Canada is “a legitimate issue for us to look at”. I expect his campaign will tomorrow release a “clarifying” more »
Sunday, August 30, 2015
Walker goes full Forrest Gump, says Canadian border wall is “legitimate issue for us to look at”
Update: Readers who hunger for more mockery of Scott Walker should check out the #CanadaWall tag on twitter. ————————————– Today on Meet the Press, Scott Walker said that a border wall between the United States and Canada is “a legitimate issue for us to look at”. I expect his campaign will tomorrow release a “clarifying” more »
Saturday, August 29, 2015
With RG3 out, Redskins use 2 QBs to beat Ravens 31-13. Las Vegas Blog
Reported From Area 51.
Washington Redskins quarterback Kirk Cousins (eight) drops back to pass throughout the 1st quarter against the Baltimore Ravens at M&T Bank Stadium.(Photo: Tommy Gilligan, USA TODAY Sports) BALTIMORE - — Jay Gruden intends to guage the … Read the rest
In Tampa Bay homecoming, Ben Zobrist contributes to Three-2 Royals victory. Las Vegas Blog
Reported From Area 51.
As a video package showed highlights from the 1st 9 seasons of his big-league profession, Ben Zobrist stood a number of ft. behind home plate at Tropicana Field & felt the tug of dueling poles, his … Read the rest
PlayStation Underground: PAX 2015 Preview
Welcome back to PlayStation Underground, our online show about video games! Today we have quite the special program, with four incredible games being shown at PAX Prime this weekend. Want an early taste of what you can try for yourself? Or perhaps you’re not going and desperate for recompense? We have you covered!
Joining us today is Trent Kusters from League of Geeks, who not only brought along the beautiful digital board game Armello, but also provides his own thoughts on three other games making an appearance at PAX. Dungeon Defenders 2 fuses action RPG and tower defense together, Stories builds a dynamic narrative for every player, and Skytorn celebrates pixel art with action-packed platforming.
These four games represent a small taste of what’s to come this weekend at PAX, so please join us. Our own Nick Suttner makes many egregious puns throughout for added… value, and Underground veteran Saul Villegas makes his long-awaited return.
Let us know what you think in the comments, and remember that we’ll be back soon with more Underground in the weeks to come. Enjoy the show!
Tuesday, August 25, 2015
Exploring Philly’s Pop-Up City Gardens
In the summer, parts of Philly transform into mini green oases, providing a place to relax, enjoy the warm weather, and maybe have a drink with friends. The pop-up garden trend doesn't show signs of slowing down, and a number of new spots have opened up.
The post Exploring Philly’s Pop-Up City Gardens appeared first on Coldwell Banker Blue Matter.
Monday, August 24, 2015
Quinnipiac poll of FL,OH,PA: fortunes of Walker and Clinton sink as Biden’s rise
Notice that in the crucial state of Ohio, Scott Walker is only at 2%. This is all come to a poll looking for these days: Walker’s failure. But other people are paying attention to the bigger picture, of course. Rubio is the only Republican polling ahead of Clinton in Ohio. Quinnipiac Poll: @MarcoRubio is the more »
Sunday, August 23, 2015
Scott Walker flip flops on birthright citizenship. Blames tiredness.
"Scott Walker said he accidentally took a position on [citizenship] because he was 'tired'"
https://t.co/BBMDYMZQJo pic.twitter.com/vqBv0rSU8b — Billmon (@billmon1) August 21, 2015 At the Iowa state fair, Walker was for elimination of birthright citizenship. By Friday he had “no position” on it. “I’m not taking a position one way or the other,” Walker said in an more »
Saturday, August 22, 2015
Scott Walker flip flops on birthright citizenship. Blames tiredness.
"Scott Walker said he accidentally took a position on [citizenship] because he was 'tired'"
https://t.co/BBMDYMZQJo pic.twitter.com/vqBv0rSU8b — Billmon (@billmon1) August 21, 2015 At the Iowa state fair, Walker was for elimination of birthright citizenship. By Friday he had “no position” on it. “I’m not taking a position one way or the other,” Walker said in an more »
Tuesday, August 18, 2015
Find some peace and quiet at the most secluded campgrounds around
If all of mankind seems to be getting on your nerves lately, behold secluded camping. Nestled in hard-to-reach, less-traversed places, these three spots let you pitch a tent and get away from it all for a while. You don’t need a reason to want to leave the world behind, but here are some places in the world where you can make that happen:
PO Saddle, Hells Canyon
Located in Wallowa-Whitman National Forest on the border of Idaho and Oregon, Hells Canyon is the deepest gorge in North America, beating out even the Grand Canyon. The centerpiece of over 200,000 acres of wilderness, it’s the perfect place to immerse yourself in the great outdoors. While there’s several places to camp within Hells Canyon, our personal favorite is PO Saddle, an ultra-secluded area that’s part trailhead, part horse camp, part campground, and wholly awesome. You’ll have few if any pesky neighbors to distract you from your jaw-dropping panoramas of the canyon.
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Woods Island State Park
There’s no road, trail, or ferry to get you to Woods Island State Park in Vermont: your only option is a 2.5 mile paddle from a launch at Kill Kare State Park. There are also no docks on its mostly rocky shore, so once you arrive, be prepared to carry your gear to your campsite. But a little bit of hard work is a price we’re willing to pay to spend time swimming and boating on an ultra-private island in Lake Champlain: this 125-acre island is home to just five campsites located off of two miles of shoreline.
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Guadalupe Peak, Guadalupe Mountains National Park
Summit-seekers will love this spot a mile below the highest point in Texas. There are only five campsites on this small knoll located 3.1 miles from and 2,200 feet above the Pine Springs Trailhead at Guadalupe Mountains National Park. With a high elevation and very minimal protection from the wind, you’ll want to buckle down and bring extra guy lines to avoid chasing your tent back down the mountain. If the views aren’t enough of a reason to hike the mile up to the peak, do it to see a somewhat bizarre triangular stainless steel monument, built in 1958 to commemorate overland stage and air travel.
It’s a big world out there, so stretch your legs and head out to some of these secluded spots for a trip like no other. Don’t wait – Mother Nature’s calling!
Header via Flickr / Drew Christiano
Thursday, August 13, 2015
Janelle Monae, Jidenna Mar. Via Philly. Las Vegas Blog
Reported From Area 51.
Singer Janelle Monae & hip hop show star Jidenna marched by way of North Philadelphia Wed. bringing awareness to cops officers brutality & the “Black Lives Matter” movement. The- singers & about 150 protesters gathered near … Read the rest
Sunday, August 9, 2015
La Connor To Bow, Washington
Yesterday I drove the 22 miles from La Connor to the Thousand Trails Mount Vernon RV Resort located in Bow, a few miles north of Mount Vernon, Washington to begin a one-week stay. I’ve been here several times in past years. My membership allows a maximum of a three-week stay, out for one-week and then […]
Saturday, August 8, 2015
Gauntlet: Slayer Edition Hits PS4 August 11th, New Feature Details
In our last PlayStation.Blog post we announced that Gauntlet is coming to PS4 August 11th in the new Gauntlet: Slayer Edition.
For a number of months now the Gauntlet team has been working tirelessly to mold the game into what we fully envisioned. The key points we have wanted to address are Hero depth, gameplay variation, and overall visuals — and we did this by both adding new features and updating existing ones.
Now I’ll let Designer Nils Hansson Bjerke elaborate on the Enemy updates of Gauntlet: Slayer Edition.
What’s New?
As mentioned previously, we have been working a lot to get more variation in Gauntlet: Slayer Edition. The enemies are obviously a big part of that. In Gauntlet 2014 they just weren’t different enough from each other to make the players change their playstyle in any meaningful way.
In Slayer Edition we have gone through the game and re-evaluated every single enemy in the game, leading to changes in all but two. For some we’ve just tweaked movement speeds and hit boxes, while others have received entirely new ability sets. Some enemies have been removed and some completely new ones have been added. We have also given every enemy “family” (mummies, skeletons etc.), a new lower-tier spawner that only spawns the basic units of that “family.” This means we are no longer limited “all or nothing” options when pacing the game.
Bosses
The makings of a great boss is a project within the project. A good boss battle lets the player apply his skills and abilities to a foe that optimally is unlike anything else in the game.
Unfortunately that requires a lot of custom code and content, which is why many games have, from a player perspective, lazy boss battles — like beefed up normal enemies for example. Then we as developers don’t have to deviate too much from the game’s core mechanics that we have spent so much time on getting right.
Now, Gauntlet’s core gameplay revolves around hordes of enemies. Anything straying from that formula gets increasingly more problematic to realize within the game’s framework. When making Slayer Edition we made the decision to focus on improving the 95% of play time you are not fighting bosses. We are of course doing some polish and fixes to them. I think veteran Gauntlet players will want to pay good old Morak another visit in Slayer Edition!
Character Diversity
Gauntlet is, at its core, an arcade game. We don’t have the luxury of rounding out each character class with tons of abilities and options. Arcade games focus on individual skill and the player’s ability to use a limited set of tools and maximize their potential. These limitations are great for creating a “purer,” more immediate gameplay experience, but makes it more tricky to offer the player different play styles.
With Gauntlet we are trying to create really diverse play styles without losing the accessibility of an arcade game. Slayer Edition has four distinctly different character classes, from the Elf’s ranged keep-away game to the Warrior’s melee combat. Designing one enemy that can challenge both equally is very difficult. What I try to do as an enemy designer is create monster groups with synergy between them that together will make them challenging for all the classes in their own way.
Thus, all enemies in Gauntlet are easy to defeat on their own, but combined they should provide a challenge. This is the type of synergy we have worked hard to improve in Slayer Edition while simultaneously making higher-tier enemies more versatile.
Readability
Since Gauntlet is about tons of enemies there is always a struggle with readability. With so much going on, enemies can’t be very complex because there is no way a player will be able to understand complexity in the chaos. They need to be interesting and varied, while also basic enough in their functionality that players can, at a glance, understand what they do and how they behave.
So let’s look at the Grunt Shaman’s previous abilities. Firstly, he summoned walls from the ground. Secondly he summoned a homing, indestructible goat head. Thirdly he buffed Grunt spawners to increase the rate at which they spawned grunts as well as increased the movement speed of said grunts.
Now, of course the player doesn’t have to understand all the little details about an enemy but the more you understand the more fair the game feels and the more you as a player feel in control of whether you live or die. The Grunt Shaman’s old spawner buff was the opposite of that. The impact it had on a battle was quite high but nothing about its visuals signaled that. The goat heads didn’t offer as much interesting counter play and the walls occupied a lot of real estate on the screen considering their small impact.
Enter the new Grunt Shaman. He shoots a big energy ball that splits into two energy balls. He also buffs Grunt spawners so that the Grunts hit harder. BAM! Easy to read, easy to understand. Also, the animators are happy to let you know that the Grunt Shaman now has proper animations.
We hope you have enjoyed our dive into some of the design work that goes into Gauntlet: Slayer Edition.
Now get ready to re-Invade the Darkness — it’s almost time!
Thursday, August 6, 2015
John Doe developments: Walker was target in 2011, Appeal impending
Eagle Scout integrity: “Gov. Scott Walker was under criminal investigation in 2011 for misconduct in office — even as he insisted he wasn’t — over a proposed real estate deal when he was Milwaukee County executive, according to records filed Wednesday in federal court” Source: Despite denials, Scott Walker was target of probe in 2011 more »
Wednesday, August 5, 2015
Can you handle a walk across Hell’s Bridge?
It’ll take a quick hike to get to this creepy walking bridge tucked into the Michigan forest, but Hell's Bridge is sure to scare the crap out of you. Legend says in the mid 1800s a seemingly friendly older man named Elias Friske went on a murderous rampage killing several children, and the demons that “made him do it” still haunt Hell’s Bridge.
The story says when multiple children went missing, Friske was asked to watch the rest of the town’s children while the more able-bodied searched for the missing kids. Friske tied the children together by the waist and told them he was just making sure they didn’t lose anymore. Then he had them march into the woods…
As the children marched through the woods they soon detected a horrifying stench… Friske tied the group to a tree and moved a pile of leaves to expose what the stench was… the rotting flesh of the missing children. The tethered children screamed and cried, but Friske knew their parents were searching for the other missing kids in the opposite direction. Friske took to butchering the children, one by one, until he’d killed them all. He then threw the bodies into the Rogue River and ran deeper into the woods.
When the adults on the search party returned to town, it was obvious something was wrong. No Friske. No children. The townspeople quickly returned to the woods, this time in search of Friske and the rest of the town’s children.
The search eventually led them to a newly constructed bridge. Under it, in the icy waters of the Rogue River, were multiple bodies- the murdered children. While most were overcome with grief, one man saw a set of footprints going up into the woods. It didn’t take long for the man to find Friske, covered in blood, claiming the devil made him do it…
Whether the devil made Friske do it or not, the townspeople didn’t care. They grabbed the rope he’d used to tie up the children and instead hung him off the bridge with it. Legend says after he died the waters swelled, snapped the rope, and took his body away forever.
The river may have taken Friske’s body far away but the evil spirits that supposedly made him kill the children seem to still lurk in the woods and waters around Hell’s Bridge… Folks floating in inter-tubes down the Rogue River claim they feel hands grabbing their feet, trying to pull them into the water.
And for the bridge Friske was hung from? It’s since been rebuilt with modern steel and earned the nickname “Hell’s Bridge.” The bridge itself, with its lack of rails, is somewhat scary to cross, but the spirits surrounding it make the bridge particularly terrifying… Explorers claim they’ve heard children both laughing and screaming as well as phantom footsteps around the bridge. Supposedly, the bridge becomes scariest around midnight with the sounds of dark, demonic laughter. Some even claim glowing red eyes move through the woods, and a ghost with those same eyes sometimes shows up on the bridge itself.
Source: Haunt Spot Cover photo: Clockwork Paranormal
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More rad stories from Roadtrippers:
This car murdered at least 14 people and inspired a classic horror film
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Whatever you do, don't exit your car on New Jersey's Shades of Death Road
Investigating the sprits of West Virginia State Penitentiary
Pretty Little Liars Recap: Alison Falls Into Charles” Clutches on Prom Night. Las Vegas Blog
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Reported From Area 51.
And they all lived happily ever after … just not in Rosewood. The- Pretty Little Liars prom may have been fairy-tale-themed, yet Tuesday night”s episode, “Last Dance,” wasn”t all corsages and gorgeous gowns. (Though there was plenty of those as well.) Cryptic texts, another Red Coat sighting, an abduction — this prom had all the makings for a Charles DiLaurentis-worthy affair. But then again, we … Read the rest
Maker of hacked radio states system is exclusive to Fiat Chrysler. Las Vegas Blog
Reported From Area 51.
DETROIT - — The- company in that makes auto radios in that pleasant hackers exploited to take control of a Jeep Cherokee states its different infotainment systems do not have the same safety flaw. Harman International Chief Executive Officer Dinesh Paliwal stated Tues. in that the hackers used a cellular connection to get to the radio, which they used to control cultured functions reminiscent of brakes … Read the rest
Tuesday, August 4, 2015
Proof: Scott Walker’s aide Archer lied. Maltreatment she claimed rec’d during #JohnDoe raid refuted by newly released recording
Recorded audio from the FBI-assisted raid of Cynthia Archer’s home has been released. “The audio of the raid is being released now in an attempt to rebut claims Archer makes in her suit. For instance, she said in her filing that officers stormed into her house “throwing the (search) warrant at her without giving her more »
Saturday, August 1, 2015
Milwaukee Bucks arena is product of bizarre and bipartisan bedfellows
It takes an incestuous bipartisan pile of snakes to foist this expense upon Wisconsin when only 9%* of the Wisconsin public wants to help fund it AND when the administration is slashing public education funding. Steve Horn and Michael Arria have a long and interesting piece out on Truthdig that exposes backroom bipartisanship and public more »
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