Mike Powers Returns: Moving to Ohio, New TV Setup

You're tuned in to Steve Megatron on Altered

Geek Unlimited. Hello and welcome to Altered

Geek Unlimited. I'm your host, Steve Megatron

Phillips, and joining me back from the great

beyond... Oh great. Oh, come on. It's not like

I died and came back. I'm just I'll take it.

You always sound more enthusiastic than I am

when we do these recordings. I think it's just

the way that you start the show off. Yeah, it's

because I throw on the game face and then just

just rip it off like a bandaid. Yep. Let's go

away. Usually my enthusiasm goes down the longer

I record. So, yeah. Yeah, I think that can be

said about most things. The longer something

goes on, enthusiasm just drops forward anyways.

But yes, Michael Powers, I'm here. I don't know

when I'll be back, but I'm here tonight to fill

your ear holes with some of my awesome goodness.

And I'm hoping to have you back in regular rotation.

It's just crazy how life lately. Yeah, and my

life has kind of gotten I'm getting ready to

go through a big change I If I if I really try

I may be able to be on I Don't want to commit

to anything so I want to get anyone's hopes up

But possibly I could probably do the next two

Thursdays so The reason being is all this week

For the next week my wife and I we're gonna be

packing I don't know if I ever brought this up

I think I think at one point you may have brought

up What you were hoping to happen? Okay, I think

that was when it was That was like last year

Well when the job first when this opportunity

first presented itself it was in 2014 spring

of 2014 so it had been two years ago I had an

opportunity to go work for a company called Christie

Digital Systems. And let me just say I didn't

get the job two years ago. So I have spent the

last two years applying for various positions

with the company and various locations throughout

the greater US in hopes of being able to land

a job. Earlier this year, I had a little nibble

on the lure, if you will. It was for an opportunity

to relocate to South Carolina. I jumped through

a number of hoops, and ultimately I lost that

position to a gentleman that was already with

the company. And then a position in Ohio. Oh

God, oh God, Ohio. I've learned something. Okay.

If I mention Ohio to anybody and they cringe

in any way, 99 % of the time, they're a sports

fan. Yep. I think I watched your comments go

on that the other day. And that's true. Me, I

have no... I'm sports agnostic. So I have no...

I don't care. If you're if you're a Michigan

Michigan State, you have M fan and you hate Ohio

State. That's great. That's fine But I got the

job in Columbus, Ohio, which is it it is it's

fantastic It could not be happier. It's a total

game changer for my wife and I Big step not necessarily

like a huge step for me considering how my life

has has gone But it's definitely the biggest

move my wife has ever had. Excuse me. It puts

us about three hours and 45 minutes away from

our family, which is not a deal. And we are moving

down and we don't know anyone in the area. So

it's just going to be her and I. And hopefully

we don't kill each other. Shining style in the

first month of being down there by ourselves.

But to be fair, you know, we exist kind of by

ourselves. I mean, I interact with you, Steve,

every once in a while we get together and go

see a movie. But a lot of my interactions with

friends has been online for the last few years.

So that's not going to change. You know, location

doesn't change that, you know, thanks to the

power of the Internet. Yes. So not too worried

about anything like that, but definite game changer

and really, really excited for the move for a

couple of reasons. One, where we're moving in

Columbus is actually pretty cool. We went down

there for a day. We went and spent a day down

there because we were looking for a place to

live. End of that story is we found a nice place

to live. But we got to see some of the northeastern

side of Columbus, which is kind of around Ohio

State. And it looks really nice. I'm about a

10 minute drive from a shopping center called

the Easton town center It's an outdoor shopping

mall that looks like a 1950s city Main Street

Okay But it was it was planned. It's not it's

not like it was a city. It's not like it was

a main street in Columbus. And then they turned

it into something that it wasn't. This was like

planned to be a giant shopping center. But instead

of having little mom and pop stores or stores

you've never heard of, there's like a Tesla dealership,

a Tiffany's, an Apple store all like all high

profile. Yeah. All high brand stuff. And I was

just like, I'm home. So I'm kind of excited about

that because all the places I like to shop are

so close. Where we live, we usually have to drive

45 minutes to an hour to find those stores. So

it's nice to only have to go two minutes. And

the even crazier thing is 10 minutes south is

where Easton is, and 15 minutes north is where

another giant shopping center is that has all

the same stores. Nice So it that that's cool

because I like to shop um And then the thing

I'm most excited about for I always geek out

over internet. Oh Out over internet and it turns

out the place that we're moving offers 300 meg

internet for $75 a month Wow Yeah, so that's

awesome. I'm stoked to try that out Truth be

told I'm not I'm moving into a townhouse and

not a home Anyone knows how like internet works

and apartments and stuff like that. Sometimes

you can end up with congestion So I'm gonna be

interested to see what my actual speeds end up

being But I'm paying $75 a month right now for

a hundred meg internet. So I'll just keep paying

the same price and Anything over a hundred megabytes

I get is awesome Yeah, really The company is

called Wow. I've never really heard of them.

They actually service, according to their website,

they actually offer services in southeast Michigan.

A couple of southeast Michigan. A lot of cities

in Ohio, some place down in Georgia, South Carolina,

and stuff like that. But what I what I found

out is you know how Netflix always does like

their speed index for ISPs. Yep. They are If

you say if you go to that site and you say I

want to see all available ISPs Wow is listed

third out of all of them The closest name brand

one that I can that I saw on the list was Verizon

bios and they were six So Kind of excited about

that because my wife and I stream everything

yeah, we're kind of at that point now to that

nothing kind of We don't really watch television

unless it's like a new show like a new episode

of a show well even then we don't even watch

it really anymore because my wife really doesn't

watch TV anymore and I I've kind of cut down

on the shows I watch because I was watching about

24 different shows As they were airing of course,

but um, I've cut my list down to 16 So because

I realized I was wasting my life in front of

the television Yeah, that happens. So I'm sure

that'll change when the new shows start up this

fall, but Time will tell I Cut I cut way back

this last season, but what I feel like I cut

back on was downloading my TV shows. Because

if I can stream it legally, I won't download

it anymore. Makes sense. And that's kind of where

I ended up. But what I also found really interesting

was the shows that I ended up downloading, I

didn't really watch all that much of. So it's

almost like I could just stop watching those.

So it was interesting to see that come about.

But, you know, life gets in the way and then

eventually you end up coming back to that stuff

anyways, so. So yeah, long story short, I've

been busy with that. I had some other family

things that I don't really want to get into.

Which I, yeah, I think I saw it, but I'll leave

that alone. So there's that, and then let's see.

So I told my wife, like, I think I have... I

thought of the tournament before my way home

tonight from work, which today was my last day

at Best Buy. Frickin' felt great to be done there.

I'm done with the movie theater. Sorry. How bad

was the, or how was working at Best Buy? Just

out of curiosity. Honestly, because it wasn't

like my job. Not bad. I didn't, I never really

dreaded going in for a shift. But yesterday and

today being my last two shifts, it was just like,

oh, I want them to be over, you know, but it's,

it's that, you know, like the end of the tunnel

and I've got this big life changing event coming

up and I kind of wanted to hurry up and get here.

And like these last two days were just kind of

in the way. So it wasn't like I was irritated

with the job all of a sudden or anything like

that. It was, it was anything. Plus the discounts

were great. Can't go wrong with that But no,

I enjoyed it I like the people that I work with

I actually regretted I regret more leaving Best

Buy than I do the theater and I think that's

because I get to interact with people at Best

Buy Yeah, and you're very knowledgeable And at

the theater I'm stuck in a room by myself for

most of the time unless I go and find someone

to talk to you know But I was it was good, but

it you know, obviously something better came

along so definitely time to move along but That

said It kind of gets me back to what I was uh

Getting ready to talk about though was uh, I

I've dubbed a term Excitement paralysis Okay

I've got like way too many things to look forward

to slash be excited about right now that I don't

know which one to be more excited about than

the other so like i'm just like Come across as

being like nothing like I'm excited, but you

can't tell Because I because I don't know what

to be excited more excited for if you will So

one of those I already talked about because I'm

such a freaking internet snob and nerd. I'm really

excited about that 300 meg internet, right? Also,

I'm really excited to start the new job like

just super excited and then I used, I went all

in. My last week at Best Buy, I decided to use

my discount in a major way and I bought myself

a new TV. What kind did you get? I went with

the, after researching it for a couple months,

I have a Vizio P Series right now from 2014.

And after researching it for the last couple

months and reading the AVS forums, I decided

to go, I went with the 2016. p -series from the

zio um what's so i want 65 what was it again

65 oh wow so i i have a 60 inch right now uh

60 inch p -series and i love it and to be completely

honest with you there's nothing nothing really

wrong with the tv in any way shape or form um

but the new one uh supports more is a little

more future forward thinking In terms of what

it offers on it It has a better better color

in the panel and where my current one has 64

dimmable zones in the TV that help enhance the

contrast of the picture The new one has 128 So

it has more fine -tuned control over, you know

brighter whites and deeper blacks and I I know

talking about that now after saying I've worked

for Best Buy, it sounds like a shill, but that's

not what this is. But I had my eye on it for

a while, especially it's a great gaming TV as

well as for movie watching, which is primarily

what I use it for. Plus they did something kind

of interesting that I'm really kind of excited

to try out. The two high -end Vizio TVs, the

M series and the P series, they aren't classified

as televisions any longer um because vizio took

the uh an apple -like stance if you will and

they removed the tuners from the televisions

so it runs on like an app system now no well

kind of so um basically for something to be classified

as a tv they have to have a tuner built into

it and for anyone that doesn't know the tuner

is that basically that little part that you screw

your coaxial cable into Where you would plug

in like a RF modulator if you're playing an NES

or a Super Nintendo or an antenna Okay, if you

if you have to have one of those in order to

be considered a TV Which is why computer monitors

aren't considered television. It's because I

never knew that so What Vizio did is they took

they looked at their market or what the market

was doing and the way that people were starting

to Consume media and they decided to remove the

tuner to keep costs down Little bit how much

you actually say from removing a tuner. I do

not know Given that they're so ubiquitous. You

could probably throw a stone and hit one for

like three cents, right? But they decided to

remove it. So they're no longer called TVs. They

actually call them home theater displays And

to Vizio's never had the greatest smart TV platform

on the planet their smart TV platform has always

been functional, but not great. And when it comes

to getting the support from companies like HBO

or Netflix or Hulu or anything like that, they

were always last in line to have the apps on

their TVs updated. Okay. And sometimes they wouldn't

get updated at all. So what they did is they

also dropped the smart TV platform from the TV

itself. They partnered with Google And they built

you know the Chromecast is right. Yep. Well Google's

rebranding that as Google cast and They built

Google cast into the TV So now you use your smartphone

or your tablet to find what you want to stream

and then you throw it to the TV And since the

apps on your smartphone or tablet are always

being updated by the people that make, by Netflix

and HBO and Hulu and stuff like that, they're

always up to date. And the TV can always accept

that stuff. So it's a neat idea. Plus the TVs

also, like if you don't have a smartphone or

a tablet or anything like that, the TVs themselves

come with a seven inch Android tablet that is

the remote for the TV. That's cool. And they

have a really cool like there's no menus built

into TV So like if you want to do like like change

the color and contrast settings and stuff like

that None of that show up stuff shows up on the

TV anymore. It's all done on the remote Or on

the tablet so you can make tweaks while you're

watching something without having half the TV

eaten up by menu systems So you get a better

idea of what what you're doing is actually affecting

the picture Wow It's a cool idea It also comes

with like the standard, you know has five HDMI

inputs so you can hook up a ton of stuff to it

Couple of audio out ports for running stuff out

to a receiver if that's what you want to do things

like that It's not but it just doesn't have the

ability to have over the air It doesn't have

the ability to have an antenna hooked up to it

that's not saying you couldn't get an adapter

For an antenna that plugs into an HDMI board.

It's just that you can't Plugging antenna directly

into it And we have we've had a lot of issues

with that at Best Buy Like a lot of them that

have been sold have come back because either

the salesperson didn't inform the customer You

know I'll err on the side of the us Salesperson

didn't inform the customer did that it didn't

have a tuner in it customer gets TV home finds

out They can't hook up their antenna, and they

bring it back Okay It's one of those things where

the consumer needs to be educated and they need

to be asked when they're purchasing said TV,

if they have a cable box or if they're using

an antenna. And if we don't do that, then we're

not doing our job. But no, I get it tomorrow.

I'm really excited. But today, I learned that

we changed our delivery policy, which kind of

bums me out. I have to see how it goes because

I've never had anything delivered from them,

but the delivery policy from Best Buy when you

have a TV delivered is that they would bring

TV into your home, take it out of the box, put

it on a stand, hook up one device to it to ensure

that it's working properly. I rang out a gentleman

today and according to the lingo on the paperwork

that I give them, we just drop the TVs off now.

Oh, so they don't even set them up. No, and it

kind of bums me out because I'm gonna be home

by myself tomorrow, and there's no way I have

to move my old TV out of the entertainment center

and then move the new TV in the entertainment

center And I'm by myself. I can't move a 60 inch

TV by myself And I can't I definitely can't move

a 65 inch TV by myself So I mean I always am

jumping the gun. I don't know what's gonna happen

tomorrow, but I'm kind of bummed but Anyways,

I'm really excited for the TV because I'm just

I'm a video file or I like to pretend to be a

video file I did a lot of research and see they're

gonna be you know, the p -series or the old or

an OLED television from LG and When it came down

to it The Vizio just gave me what I more along

the lines of what I was looking for Plus it's

gonna sound really dumb. I don't think I'm ready

for an OLED television like I feel like that

picture is too good so you feel like you still

need the the LCD I need that look that LCD gives

um and I really don't know how to explain it

but you know if you're a video file you love

movies the holy grail is always pure black and

an OLED television like a plasma can deliver

pure black and I Don't think I'm I'm I Don't

think I'm ready for that Because that's a big

change because everything I have is an LCD panel

like my computer's LCD my iPad's LCD my iPhone's

LCD all of my TVs are LCD like that's how that's

how that stuff looks you know I expect I expect

it to be expect blacks to be like Black but not

quite black, you know what I'm saying? Yeah,

that kind of like almost like extremely dark

gray. Yeah, like a really extremely dark gray

and Like I was I kind of jinxed myself. I going

I don't think I'm ready for pure black I feel

like pure black won't look right and then and

then I kind of justify it to you like the OLED

televisions the input lag on an OLED television

is Twice as long as the input lag on my Vizio,

the new Vizio. So I didn't want the input lag

to go back up. Like, I came from a TV set that

did 50 or 60 milliseconds to a TV that only has

20 milliseconds. And I didn't want to go back

to that. Even if it was going to be better for

movies, I didn't want to sacrifice the game.

I feel like the Vizio is a happy medium between

playing games and watching movies. Yeah, I still

I I have LCD monitors for my computers, but I

I don't have an LCD Television I still have a

plasma Yeah, you're lucky Yeah, it was one of

the last ones on the market I guess at the time

when I was catching in my warranty and Yeah,

I've got a Samsung 50 inch plasma and it's thankfully

it's still working with no issue, but Yeah, I

I kind of wish I would have I when I got the

When I first found out about the vizio p -series

I was researching plasma televisions and I know

I talked about this on the other podcast a long

time ago But my wife and I sat down to watch

Phantom of the Opera And I had just read some

interesting behind the scenes thing about the

movie Seven and how it was filmed or produced.

And I knew that my TV was never going to give

me that image, that my current TV was never going

to give me that image because of it being an

edge -lit television. And I was watching Family

Opera and then I kind of saw that and I... Was

not very happy with the picture of that. So I

began researching plasma televisions And I couldn't

find one that fit in my entertainment center

like buying a plasma television was gonna at

the time was gonna have me Have to get an entirely

different entertainment center And then vizio

dropped the bomb that they were going to produce

4k televisions for a thousand dollars So I was

like sold Done so But I yeah ever since I started

working there. I kept telling the guys, you know

I I was gonna I said I was gonna get an OLED

gonna getting OLED and then Vizio announced the

refresh for the p -series and that that made

me look that way and I was like, okay, I'm gonna

do that gonna do that and I was really good.

I was really glad that Was finally able to put

my money where my mouth was even if it was the

last week I was there So I I don't want to say

what I got the TV for but I will say that I got

the Well people can do the math themselves, but

I won't I won't say what I won't I won't actually

say what I got it for But I got the TV five years

of protection Calibration and A brand new cable

modem that's capable of one gigabit per second

nice for the cost of the of just the TV with

taxes And I before anyone jumps in the comments

and or if anyone wants to jump in the comments

and plastic for getting calibration done on my

TV One of the reasons I got it is because of

one because of the type of TV that it is and

to Cost me practically nothing to get it done

I haven't had it done yet and I won't get it

done until like after September because you have

to wear the TV in a little bit But I've never

had it done and it was so cheap. I was like,

I think I want to try it so Why not because I

mean even if he if you do a proper calibration,

which I don't know if they if they do a proper

calibration That's fine. It's great. It's not

like you can't undo what they did, you know,

yeah Excuse me If you do a proper calibration,

it can theoretically prolong the life of the

TV. It's kind of protecting your investment a

little bit. Anyways, I know I've been talking

and you've been interjecting some things helping

me keep the conversation going. No, I've been

interested. I haven't physically looked at anything

outside of software and the website in ages.

that and various pop culture things that have

popped up. So like hearing a tech perspective

is kind of refreshing. I will say a couple of

other interesting things that have happened to

me. I ended up, I'm not sure if I brought this

up before, but I've been playing a lot of The

Division, which came out back in March. I put

about 20 days into it, which... Put about six

days into fallout 4 so I put 20 days in the division

But I pretty much stopped playing that like cold

turkey Because while they have supported that

game Wonderfully and they've made a lot of wonderful

changes to the game Therefore people the changes

that they made help out people that didn't put

the amount of time into the game that I did So

even after they made the changes yeah, it was

stuff for me to do And it was new and interesting

things for me to do. But the rewards I was getting

for doing those things. I already gotten better

things by putting in 20 days worth of play time.

Does that make any sense? Yeah, like there weren't

any rewards for me. There were rewards for people

like my wife or Joe, who have maybe put in like

a few days worth of play time and they're able

to catch up to what I have for putting in more

time. OK. So I'm excited to get to like more

meatier stuff, which is like the DLC, like the

paid DLC. And that's actually coming in August

to the PS4. It's out now on Xbox One. But I'm

really looking forward to that stuff. So I'm

sure I'll jump back into it. The other game that

I've heard of, if anyone's following online gaming

in general, is Overwatch. Yeah, I've seen people

play Overwatch. It looks really interesting and

very fast paced. I just myself I'm more of the

and I think if if it were free I would get it

I But being that I don't have the income capacity

at this point. I'm playing that'll feel for that

my family bought for me and then just so that

I could play the game with them and and I've

been playing that on the Xbox but We'll get back

to that part later, but I've also been playing

a Now that I can actually tell everybody battlefield

one closed alpha Cool I've been playing that

for about seven days now, and I'm really enjoying

it so Again back to your overwatch. Yeah, no

we can come back to battlefield one because I

kind of want I I kind of want to know about that

game, but I kind of don't. Not to be a white

blanket or anything. But anyways, Overwatch.

It's a hard sell. It's a real hard sell. I originally

had the game pre -ordered and it was set for

delivery and I ended up canceling the pre -order

because it was actually being released on the

same day that Division was releasing one of its

big patches. And I was like, well, there's no

way I'm going to play Overwatch. because I've

got new content coming for the Division, right?

So I didn't want to waste the money. Well, I

ended up selling my Xbox One, and I got $350

for it. Nice. I sold it for $350. It was like

an original one. It came with the Kinect. I sold

it with the three games that I had. So the guy

got a pretty good deal for it, I think, in my

opinion, especially for a system that had only

been on for maybe 12 hours. the entire time I

had it. But I, so I sold mine, all of a sudden

the only one of us of my friends that has an

Xbox One is Sean Z. But Danner also had one because

anyone that also might remember, I bought Danner

an Xbox One so him and I could play Titanfall.

And he said, so now I'm the only one of us besides

Sean Z that has an Xbox One. And I said, yeah.

And he goes, and I said, you can sell it. He

goes, You don't you don't mind because you know

I've got it for him as a gift and I said I I

sat on it for a second I said if you buy me a

copy of overwatch for the ps4 You can go ahead

and sell the xbox one so He ended up getting

me a digital copy of overwatch for my ps4 Since

the first triple a digital game that I have Not

I don't think it's gonna get me to buy You know

digital only or anything like that, but It's

nice to be able to switch between two triple

a games without having to swap discs But so overwatch

is it's a hard sell I don't think I would have

paid 60 bucks for it if I hadn't gotten it as

a gift I probably would have tried to ask for

it for like a birthday present or extorted at

a dinner like I did or You know Christmas or

something like that where you can like I got

like I got battlefront for Christmas I enjoyed

Battlefront, but I didn't pay for Battlefront.

That's kind of like me with Battlefield 4. I

enjoy it, but I didn't pay for it. Right, exactly.

But Overwatch is a hard sell. It's really fun,

though. And it took me maybe two or three days

to realize why it's so fun. You're never penalized

in the game. Everything is positively reinforced

and I understand if you're not a fan of that,

you know the whole no child left behind mentality

everyone gets a Everyone gets a ribbon at the

county fair or you know, we're gonna do a graduation

ceremony because you made it out of fifth grade

Like I understand if you're one of those people

that hates those things. I mean, I'm kind of

there with you But like same time like I don't

mind in a game It's it's it's weird cuz like

you know with the Call of Duty you're so concerned

with your kill -death ratio I Can't tell you

what my kill -death ratio is in overwatch I have

no idea all I'm ever rewarded with is what I

contributed to the game it never shows me what

I did bad it only shows me what I did to contribute

to the win and That is amazing I think because

The one thing I've noticed about overwatch is

that it you only win by playing objectively like

you can't win by killing the other team You have

to capture the objectives that they give you

in the map or you don't win There's you're there

at the capture or defend but there is no winning

by just killing people And that's great and I

and the other nice thing about it too is you

have the ability to play against bots Okay, so

and there's like three different difficulty settings

for the bots There's like easy where they kind

of rush you in like one single direction and

like a horde And you can just mow them down I

usually put it on medium because they move around

a little more They have there's a little more

AI to them, but they're still kind of easy But

that's I want to feel good about myself and put

it on medium, but I've never had a bad time playing

against real people Because like I said, it's

all positive reinforcement even if you do bad

when the match is over All you do is see what

you did good And it's it's it's It's fantastic.

I'm not recommending anyone go go out and like

grab it because there's no story mode to the

game like none whatsoever There is a story, but

it's told in youtube videos like blizzard cgi

YouTube videos and cartoons. I thought that this

was a Blizzard game and typically I like Blizzard

games The sole exception being wow I know I'm

gonna catch hate for that, but I just I could

never get into it Plus the game just looks so

crappy to me I don't I've never even touched

the game, but I don't plan to touch it I had

a buddy I went to high school with that tried

to get me to play it, and I was like dude. This

is just crap It was it was utter utter crap.

I just couldn't get into the game, but I've I've

been a longtime fan of Diablo and Starcraft so

it's mostly Diablo so to me that I'm interested

to play it eventually But I'm not in any hurry

to get it. I think we should see If there's a

night where you can come over and try it before

I leave Yeah, we could do that I Mean any any

day next week, that's not Tuesday looks for me.

I just have to let the alley know but It's it's

fantastic. And I just it feels good. It runs,

you know, it's my stuff on console on ps4 It's

60 frames a second at 1080p. It's bright. It's

colorful. It's fast But it's not like too fast.

They have no idea what's going on you're not

penalized for switching characters. In fact,

if you find that you're getting, you're getting

stomped using one character, like it's a good

idea to switch characters. And then when you're

building like a team, like when you're, it's

six v six. So when you're loading up and you're

trying to create your team. based off of the

characters that are given, the game gives you

little tool tips. It'll be like, there's too

many heavies or not enough builders or no healers

or not enough defense or not enough offense.

Like it gives you little tidbits so that everyone

can try to pick a different role and play a different

role. So you can self balance yourselves yeah,

and you're not penalized you can everyone can

pick the same character There's a there's some

times where I'll be in a lobby playing with just

bunch of random people and I'll be like hey everyone

pick this character and everyone will pick that

character and We'll get destroyed Because everyone's

playing as the same character But it's still

it's still fun so On that I'll say one last little

thing Complete aside, but on my this this just

made my day my wife has been asking me asking

me to Go through a couple boxes to see what I

actually wanted to keep and what I wanted to

get rid of I've been putting it up but not putting

it off Well last summer in an effort to spruce

up the desk in my den I got out all of my iPhone

boxes like I have all the boxes for my iPhones

all the way from the first one To the iphone

6s, okay, except one was missing and it really

bummed me out. I didn't have my box for the iphone

3g Um And my wife has been telling me go through

these boxes go through these boxes. I went through

the boxes tonight The box for the iphone 3g was

in there. So now I have all the boxes for all

the iphones i've ever had That's funny It's such

a it's it's me like I like collecting things

And I it's it's just I don't know. It's cool

to see how the boxes have changed because the

phones have changed so much it's I Don't know.

It's just a little something and I get to stare

at it while I record podcasts and see all the

cool boxes evolution of Package room. Yeah Yeah,

yep evolution of stuff So that's me that's what

I've been up to new job new TV faster internet

speeds Actually, I'm actually feeling a feeling

really good. I'm awake right now. Holy crap Feeling

really good right now. That's good. Yeah So,

what do you got Steve? Um, well I I spent I Don't

know the last six months working on that beat

cast radio site only to have on launch day issues

galore I Had the I launched the site under the

new domain I put a redirect on the old site so

that when you went there and went to the new

site, well, then the problem was we were having

backend server issues because apparently the

host I switched to, and this has happened before,

couldn't handle the memory usage of the website.

And I'm like, okay, but I know several other...

websites that are geek related like us that have

just as much crap running on their backend and

have just as many files and they don't have a

problem. And so they're trying to pinpoint blame

it on the site and I'm like I've never had this

issue on my current host and they were like well

we don't know what to tell you. You know basically

gave me the You know this list of things that

it could be and it was none of those things because

I'd already gone through everything and turned

off anything that didn't need to be on and So

anyways it irritated the crap out of me. So I

spent the duration of the day I found this nice

WordPress duplicator software While I was in

process of moving this week in geek from one

server one Basically, I moved it from Steve Snowball

Sailor's account to Birdman Dodd's account. That

was the main issue. I figured out also how to

move it from a subdomain to a main domain and

keep the site intact. Well, what it does is it

makes a copy of your entire WordPress install

and anything in that directory as well as the

database. I had to move any extremely large files

out temporarily and then move them back in afterward.

after doing the duplication. So anyways, I did

that with all of my sites that are on the same

host that we're using and had moved them all

already doing this. And then I had to move them

all back and all the domains back. And so I was

a bit frazzled and then I rebuilt the site again

for the third time, Geekcast Radio, and I moved

it into a sub -domain and then I moved it into

the main domain and then I... It's just been

a headache and so I killed essentially the one

that's on the other host I have it there temporarily,

but it's got like a redirect so it goes right

back to Geekcast Radio I'm still having issues

with the comments section like as far as it reading

and WordPress, but everything else works great

So I can't really complain too much for having

to rebuild the entire site in under three days

But I really like how it's turned out so far

Yeah, it looks really good especially I mean

the first time I went into look at it was on

my iPhone, and I thought it looked Much better

than it has in the past And I looked at it right

before we started recording actually in a browser

And it did you did a good job looks really good

Thanks. Yeah, one of the big things I was trying

to when I found a theme that I liked was, one,

yeah, I'll come clean on it. I actually bought

one. No. Steve's spending money. Well, this is

what I figured. We've had people donate to the

site over the last year and a half. Oh, I see

you're embezzling money. I'm not embezzling.

I'm reinvesting in the site. I'm doing what I

couldn't afford to do before, which was get legal

software and legal stuff like the Geek Gas Radio

theme that's on the podcast. I got that off Fiverr

using it. I got the website from it. A couple

of the plugins that are like I have this IMDB

plugin that's in there that when you put in the

link for an IMDB entry. it automatically fills

in with the poster and any corresponding information.

So when I've done my top 25s or top 20s of certain

movies or television shows, it auto -populates

the information without me having to host the,

basically organize the data of the film or the

television show. But I have a plan to utilize

that later. In articles every every month that

I'm hoping to get in there plus So I mean there's

there's been a lot of stuff that I've been able

to actually get that we needed that I couldn't

get before So that's that's been very helpful

and then So like everything in the site actually

works Because when I was getting the bootleg

stuff I was running into issues all the time

like one of them specifically was Couple years

ago. We had it didn't matter where you went on

the site there was an occasion here or there

were Some piece of malware that was in it, and

it didn't affect anybody all it did was redirect

the site to like a Justin Bieber YouTube video

I Remember that And it wasn't anything harmful.

It just it was like a malicious like ha ha you

have a bootleg, so I'm gonna send you over here

so I figured out where that wasn't the code and

removed it at one point, but I had to buy legit

on everything. I didn't feel right not doing

it. Maybe it's because I've gotten to the point

where I'm realizing that it costs money to do

things. I don't think that that's a bad thing

to realize, especially when there's something

you can do about it. Created the content, you

know that I'm using Also the one thing I've noticed

Stuff works so much better when you pay for it

I know and that's and I've had no headaches with

it and then I actually had a Issue while I was

testing the site before we launched Where I couldn't

get something to show up like it was in the demo

of the theme and I was able actually because

I have Support for it because I bought it I was

able to ask the guy how to do it and He's like,

oh, yeah, you just do this this this this and

this and then I was like Oh, that's so much simpler

than I thought it had to be and It's it was just

it was spectacular. So like I've I've really

enjoyed This version of the site particularly

I won't be changing the site design for the foreseeable

future thankfully due to this because Uh, the

reason why we switched themes like three times

in the last two years is because again, bootleg

and not working properly in certain areas. Um,

so it's, and plus they just looked cluttered

and this looks like clean. Um, I tried to, I

tried to do away with anything that was confusing

by any means. And, uh, a lot of stuff's tabbed

on the site so you can specifically choose what

you want to see. If you want to see more of something

that way It's not I Don't know. I didn't want

it very cluttered Graphically so and then a lot

of the old imagery from the back end like I purged

like Seven years of the the media library Okay,

it's in and I started over fresh because what

happened is we had so many broken images plus

I purged all of the All of these shows that are

retired are no longer there until I rebuild their

sections because what I was running into too

was the database and the site was so comprehensive

over the last seven years that it was bogging

itself down. Because you figure you get 120 posts

for Tooncast Classic and that show has been retired

since 2011. A lot of shows like that, there were

just hundreds of posts relating to those shows

that were just killing the site. I think it's

going to work a lot better now. Aside from that,

while I was working on the site Tuesday, I want

to say, no, Friday, I got Alpha access for Battlefield

4. or Battlefield 1. I keep saying the other

because I've been playing them. And I was kind

of surprised. I was like, oh, that's really awesome.

Because my brothers and my dad all paid to pre

-order the game. And they bought the collector

edition. It comes with a bunch of extra skins

and crap that I really don't care about. That's

how it always is. And they spent $79 on that

just to get the game itself. If you spend the

$79, you get three -day early access to the game.

But if you spend the $59, you get the game. And

I don't have any money to buy the game. And they're

like, oh, did you pre -order? I'm like, I don't

have any money. I spent six grand on putting

a roof on my house. Recently I had to put paid

almost $400 to have a new front door put on Because

of the type of front door real quick. I'm curious.

Is it you're getting on a PC, right? Yes. Yes.

I don't have I don't have an Xbox one. So I'm

doing PC Strictly at this point. I could be wrong.

Can you? Pre -order PC games on Amazon. Yeah

When you pre -order stuff on Amazon you pay nothing

upfront you pay when it ships. Oh really yes,

I pre -order Everything on Amazon every game

I can think of like the week of e3 I pre -order

15 games See cuz that that's more appealing to

me My wife would have killed me if I spent $600

in one week Yeah, I might actually have the money

by then as opposed to right now where I have

none And there's no penalty to cancel it. So

it's like, if you know it's something you're

going to pick up like the day it comes out, like

there's no reason not to pre -order on Amazon

because they don't charge you until it ships.

And if there's like a, if there's beta access

or anything like that associated with it, you

will, you get it. Like you're signed up for it,

even though you didn't put anything down. Now

the catch is now they've started this thing.

I think they might've caught onto some things.

Also, it kind of depends on how high profile

or what they're actually giving you is There

is a Now they're starting is a pre -purchase

Movement where you actually purchase it where

you actually purchase it and I started noticing

during e3 because Pardon my language here the

South Park games stick of truth You get that

for free when you pre purchase South Park fractured

butthole You get that on like ps4 Xbox one if

you just just for pre -purchasing the game now

that is not the same thing as pre -ordering And

there was something else too that did that so

I don't know if maybe this beta was the alpha

was like the same way Usually betas and alphas.

They don't care if you pre -purchase sometimes.

It's just like here. You know you whatever They

send it to anyone that has interest in the game

you show interest in it by you know pre -ordering

it so And as long as they're releasing like a

physical copy and you can preorder from Amazon

Just just put it in your cart Just make yourself

a reminder to cancel it like a couple days before

it's actually supposed to ship If you don't have

the money Yeah, because I noticed, I'm looking

right now for Battlefield 1, I knew the online

game code, which is how I've been doing things

lately because I just, I don't want the extra

box sitting around my house for games that I

just, I'll install it and then I won't need the

damn disk. So, if you do the online game code,

it gives you a code to origin, which is where

the game can be downloaded from anyway. So I

might actually do that. And it does say that

you won't be charged for preorder until it's

available for download. Like I said, there's

no reason not to do that. Yeah, so I might do

that. And then, yeah, so anyone that had been

playing that game and we had an NDA until yesterday?

Okay, and they just unlocked a new mode for the

game that I don't know if that's public yet So

I can't say what that is but the the overall

NDA is we're allowed to play the game and stream

it now and Take screenshots and the only stipulation

is we can't tell a lot of the you know We can't

tell anything we see in the development forums

and the you know Obviously because it's closed

alpha still and can't tell any of the the major

gameplay things with it So of course not no,

but um I've liked it so far. There's there's

a couple issues I have but it's the same issue

that everyone has with it, so it's not does it

know This might sound kind of weird Does it feel

like? battlefield it does but it feels Let's

put it this way. I was playing it with the intention

of not playing very long because I just wanted

to try it out the night that I downloaded and

I think I played about six rounds of it and I

meant to play one Okay, and I didn't even realize

where the time had gone and then I ended up quitting

after that because I wanted I saw that my dad

was on Battlefield 4, and so I was like, oh,

I'll play Battlefield 4 with him for a while.

And I played about three rounds of that, and

I was like, yeah, I'm kind of done with Battlefield

4. What I liked about Battlefield 1 as opposed

to 4 is when you have people flying, it's a lot

easier to control because it's slower. Whereas

in Battlefield 4 it's all modern tech so it like

goes a lot faster. Yeah, and then of course There's

you know the new tanks and the new spawning of

the the stuff when you you spawn into tanks or

Planes you get to choose which type you want

Okay, so there's like three different classes

of tank and three different classes of airplane

And you get to choose I can't remember for the

life of me what the names of them are right now

But there's different classes like you know you

get like a light version you get a fighter and

you get a you know like a bomber or you know

missile tank, you know, so it's It's really cool

to be able to do that and then when you spawn

into the stuff like you actually get to see yourself

floating from the overview of the 3d overview

of a map and Going right into that spot like

through the clouds and everything right to the

ground Okay, so it's and that's been in the preview

video, so that's nothing new, but um I Really

love the feel of it. It's a lot easier to control

And right now the the alpha doesn't have gamepad

access It's all mouse and keyboard so It's a

little bit difficult for me at this point because

I've gotten used to playing with the Xbox controller

on Battlefield 4 but it's I like the feel of

it. There's a couple things I think they need

to tweak as far as the control bindings are concerned,

because there's some things that they don't use

the mouse for that they used to in Battlefield

4, based on the way that it's set up. I don't

know, it's kind of a nice mix of some features

that people like from Call of Duty mixed in there,

but it's got a very old -school feel to the Battlefield.

Instead of this like modern It doesn't seem as

like high -paced it is is the stuff I mean, yeah,

there's there's the high pacedness of it, but

it's not like you're you're getting killed by

somebody from the other side of the map who shoots

through three brick walls and Sees you on the

ground, you know, it has infrared and can see

through everything so like you very much have

to have skill and actually be able to play and

Know what your your objective is Okay, I know

it's kind of vague and it's not really descriptive,

but it's I it's just I'm kind of fresh to the

the first -person shooters read in recent years

compared to Like the old days of like unreal

tournament and stuff and you figured the last

unreal tournament that was officially released

was in 2007 So it's the last time I actually

played a first -person shooter Besides, you know,

I think I'd played some of the old Call of Duty's

or Battlefield's I think I've played the first

Battlefield and was out on like the Gamecube

Battlefield? I think it came out of the Gamecube.

I don't think it was the first one though because

I was playing Well, I mean like It was an older

one I remember that like the maps been translated

a couple times because they have it in BF4 but

The first one was Battlefield 1940 It that might

be the game that I played even I can't I My buddy

and I put so much time into that game and they

only the demo for that game had online play Obviously

and it was I think it was only two maps and a

cycle back forth between those two maps But it's

a battlefield game. There's so much stuff you

can do We never bought the game. We just played

the demo Like all the time was crazy I think

eventually he bought the game because he got

or like the two maps, but the two maps were just

fine for what I wanted to do with it, which was

just have fun with it. Yeah, this this particular

map they have is the same one they showed at

the E3 press junket where they they played for

like the 45 minutes. The games are a lot faster

because like the tickets are a lot lower, obviously,

and. It's it's a lot more destructive than Battlefield

4 is. which I really like. A lot more stuff can

be blown away building -wise. Being that it's

an alpha, there's still glitches with it, but

it's been a lot of fun. I'm not going to lie,

after we record, I'll probably be playing that

and trying to stream it. I've very much flip

-flopped my stance on playing online. since last

year. It's addicting. Well it's horrible because

I was playing solo for so long and then I tried

the free trial of Xbox Live on my Xbox and that

ran out and then I cancelled it before the end

of it before I could be charged and they sent

me an email saying for 99 cents you can have

it for another month. And then I was like, okay,

I'll do that. And then they sent me another email

when I canceled that for $6 .99, I could get

it for the next month, and then they sent me

one where I could get three months for $14 .99,

and I was like, okay, done. Because I'm inching

into it. I don't think I have to renew until

like September, but it's been so blasted addicting

that I've had a hard time wanting to not play

online. Now have you met people like are you

still kind of just playing by yourself but with

other people? When I play on the Xbox I just

I play certain maps and so Like usually the 24

-7 maps and I do that on Battlefield 4 as well

on the PC but I don't really know anybody on

the Xbox version, but the the PC version I've

been playing since about September last year

I've been part of a clan because my brothers

and my dad all play and they know a lot of the

guys and some of them that have met up before

in real life and whatnot and The the acronym

for our clan is hilarious, but it's a fast -action

response team Okay, so it spells classy where

the fire so It's an Xbox Live clan. It's actually

a PC clan. I know, but that's definitely something

you'd probably find on Xbox Live. It probably

was at one point. I'm the only fart member on

Xbox Live as far as I know. Out of our clan...

We all know each other pretty well. We all play

a lot on the same stuff We did have our own clan

server for a little bit But they opted to save

their donation money to get a clan server when

battlefield one comes out Okay Rather than have

one right now plus There's plenty other maps

floating around right now that people can play

on so we pretty much try and band together when

we're playing on another server and Anytime my

brothers and my dad are playing I joined their

clients automatically And if I'm not like I'll

give them Intel on where the other guys are if

that switches me teams by like auto. Oh You're

a person Well, cuz I try to switch back they

just like sometimes like the admin will send

me a thing saying you have to stay put until

the end of the round Like cuz they break up our

team on purpose Because we're like we're horrible

together So, I'm just like, yep, they're over

here. I can be sadistic when I play. It's not

an RPG, it's an MLaw. I have no idea what the

acronym stands for, but it's an anti -tank weapon

or anti -land vehicle it locks on. I use it as

a sniper rifle because I'm guaranteed to kill

somebody if I hit them with it. Whereas a real

sniper rifle I can't hit the broadside of a barn

Which I can when I play Unreal Tournament, so

it's just It's it's very skill -based. I'm not

very good, but I what I know how to use really

well are the M -Law a Machine gun and I use the

claymores of the wazoo. I I'm one of the most

hated people when I play with the M -Law or the

claymore Just because I set traps everywhere

I go See I I Never care. I always played first

person shooters just for fun to like meet people

That's one of the reasons like I started playing

online like I'm addicted to playing online there

I There are some games now that I can't even

like single -player games. I can't play without

being in a party jet Like I think I did 90 %

of fallout 4 in a party chat Because I just didn't

like I wanted to play the game, but I didn't

want to play I didn't want to be myself I didn't

want to be antisocial like I don't know like

There are certain games were like yeah, I'll

play them by myself, but like if I'm gonna play

them again I'm gonna do some trophy grinding

or something like That's totally gonna be I mean,

I'm going to be in a party chat doing that the

entire time. Or if it's like a I did Bioshock

Infinite. I did that party chat. I did the whole

game in party chat with Sean Z because I was

too scared to play the game by myself. Like it

being in the party chat kept me just outside

of getting completely caught up in the atmosphere

that I was still able to have fun and enjoy the

game versus going like, OK, I can't play this

anymore. We're done. But yeah, online play is

addicting. It's great when you also find a good

group of people too. Yeah, and that's part of

the fun with playing with this clan is a lot

of these guys, regardless if my family's on or

not, I'll play with these guys sometimes. just

to see and It's They they're really good at different

things and it's funny because we'll all play

pranks on each other over in game or throw comments

and we use team speak for our vocals and When

we want to screw with somebody when they're in

the middle of a conversation we'll move them

to another channel in our TeamSpeak folder, and

they're like, who moved me? Blah, blah, blah.

But yeah, it's a lot of fun to play with these

guys in particular, but I've gotten to play on

some of these 24 -7 servers on a single map of

a kind. I like playing Operation Metro 2014 on...

I like Operation Locker and Operation Metro,

probably because those are the first two I started

learning when I started playing the game. Plus,

on the Xbox, I've been on loop on them for a

while because they're just easier for me to master.

I've gotten pretty decent at both of them to

the point that I know the levels in and out and

I know what people are going to do. If I play

on the same server often enough, there's this

one called Metro Massacre, which is Operation

Metro 24 -7 every day. It's usually got a line

of people waiting to get in. The same people

play every week and every night pretty much and

so I I know who's gonna end up on what team and

how they play so it's it's It's it's fun to watch

the tactics going on I lose you no still here.

Oh Yeah, that was the end of it. I'm sorry I'm

curious because now you're playing online against

other people. I know you said that you do some

hijinks and stuff like that. Do you find yourself

to be more of a running gunner or a camper? It

depends. If I've got certain areas that I like

to hide in... Like in operation metro my favorite

area is the locker room because that's the area

that everybody there's like four entrances to

the locker room and Well, there's five actually

but um if you don't It that's like the one area

you want to protect because you can be attacked

on all sides of those entrances and So I like

to set traps in there, and I like to defend it

when they're around But if that's not available,

I'll go in the buildings with other guys and

I'll stand there in camp for the most part until

I run out of a particular weapon. Like if I'm

not the guy that's got the ammo box, I run a

gun. But if I'm the guy that's got the ammo box,

I kind of sit and wait for people to come my

direction or I'll defend an entire building and

run through it. But I'm not one of the guys that'll

like sit there with a sniper rifle and just wait

Yeah, so you know the me personally On the 360

PS3 generation when I would play a first -person

shooter, you know, mostly Call of Duty for the

most part I was a notorious camper always camping

and That's one reason why I'm looking forward

to infinite warfare the new Call of Duty Not

because I want to play Infinite Warfare. I do

not. But because it comes with a HD remaster

of Modern Warfare, which is my favorite Call

of Duty. The best three maps in Call of Duty,

in my opinion, are Crash, Overgrown, and Vacant.

And anyone that says otherwise, I will fight

you. And so I'm really looking forward to play

those again. And I'm pretty sure I'll go right

back into my camping tactics because I was really

good at sniping and camping on those maps. But,

that aside, when the new generation hit, with

the Xbox One and the PS4, I made the conscious

decision that when I would play as shooter, that

I wasn't going to camp anymore. I was going to

do the running gun thing. Not care so much about

my accuracy or my kill death ratio and just actually

enjoy playing the game That's actually worked

for the most part. I enjoyed the the hell out

of Titanfall what little of that I played I'm

really looking forward to Titanfall 2. It's one

of the reasons why I've been really enjoying

overwatch Even playing battlefront like that

running gunning a battlefront and I'm not bad

at it either like I'm better at camping don't

get me wrong camping and sniping but I'm not

bad at doing the running gun thing and it definitely

makes it more enjoyable for my wife to watch

me because she gets to see me move around and

do like cool and have cool things happen on the

screen versus me just looking down a scope at

a narrow hallway for someone to maybe walk past

a door. Yeah that's I can definitely see that.

That's that's one thing I noticed I was doing

when I was streaming because I was testing out

like streaming software a couple weeks ago and

I was camping at one point and like yeah, this

is gonna be pretty boring for you sit there and

watch yeah, but they like but the thing was when

I was playing on the Call of Duty to me is always

like virtual paintball if you will like I'm gonna

get in this match and I'm not gonna so much worry

about how many people I kill or how many people

how many times I die, but I'm gonna just chat

with my buddies like I'd get in a party chat

with people that I was playing with and we just

chatted up and it was way more convenient for

me to lay prone in a hallway looking at a door

and have a conversation and occasionally pull

the trigger than it was for me to try to do that

while running and gunning, you know? But in an

effort to liven things up and I don't know if

I enjoy them more or just differently, but we'll

see what happens when Modern Warfare gets re

-released and I see if I start camping again

then. I was just, I was just curious. I was such

a notorious camper that, um, you know how, uh,

you know, those chervis cups that everyone has,

um, Danner got me one for my birthday. It's my

birthday or Christmas. It's got a camping patch.

Nice. Like the, it's got one of those, uh, I

was just a little black, uh, white, a black pad

with a white stitching on it. That is a tent

with a campfire in front of it. So, um, but yeah,

no, I was, I was, I was just, uh, Just curious

as to what your playstyle was when it came to

first person shooters. I mean, I used to play

like when Unreal Tournament 2004 and Unreal Tournament

2007. I know you can still play them online,

at least 2007. I just, I haven't played them

in years because it just got to be boring and

monotonous. I was so good at some of these levels

that I was playing that I literally didn't need

the rest of my team. On Unreal Tournament, so

I was actually a running gun. I wasn't a sniper

guy Even though I was pretty good with the sniper

on Unreal Tournament because unlike Call of Duty

or Battlefield It doesn't take into consideration

like wind or trajectory changes like if you aim

straight at somebody it's gonna hit him So Yeah,

I had someone told me that there was bullet dropping

Call of Duty and I wanted to tell the guy to

go f himself Yeah, there's bullet drop in Battlefield.

In Battlefield, yes. But not Call of Duty. Yeah,

I know that it's, I know 100 % it's in Battlefield

because I watch it happen when guys like snipe

and I've watched like top five playthrough videos.

Like there's this YouTuber, he's a first -person

shooter like Battlefield and Overwatch and Rainbow

Six kind of player. He's Stone Mountain 64. I

was just gonna ask if it was stone mountain.

Yes. I love his videos. I love his videos I love

his yolo on the battlefield where he's you know

All in it Yankee Oscar Lima Oscar, you know Oscar

Mike Oscar Mike and then he's he's in the videos

and acting like he's actually in the battlefield

but I love his top five videos that he does and

commentaries and everything and then lately he's

been doing all the battlefield one and the fact

that his team won twice on the E3 thing was funny

enough. Watching him on recommendation from some

Brits that I met playing the division, he did

a couple of division videos and they were like

you need to go watch these and sure enough they're

really funny. Real quick aside, I just realized

that the air conditioning was running in my house

and apparently my mic is picking that up and

I've just become aware of it so I'm not quite

sure if I should be muting myself when I'm not

talking, or if we should just let it go? We can

just let it go. I heard a little bit of buzzing

here or there, but it's not enough that it...

I'm not editing, so... Okay, I just didn't know,

like I, you know, and I caught it and so anyone

that's listening, like I was muting my mic so

it went away and would come back, but I won't

mute it anymore so there's at least some consistency

going on with the audio, so... But yeah, like

that guy, I love watching his videos, like he's

one of my, he's actually the only game playing

YouTuber I watch typically. Like there might

be a few others here or there, but he's like

the main one because I just, I like the personality.

I watch, there's a couple of YouTubers I, okay,

Ali and I watch Netflix, Hulu, and then a lot

of YouTube. Yeah, I watch a lot of YouTube. down

for dinner and we get caught up on YouTube channels.

We sit on the couch because we're heathens like

that. If I cook out, then we eat at the kitchen

table or at the dining room table. But if it's

just like we're going to get pizza or we're going

to do this or the other thing, we just sit on

the couch and watch it. But some of my favorites...

The kind of guys that get called out a lot, but

I watch I watch fun house And Jim Sterling Movie

Bob, which I know a lot of unpopular opinions

But I don't really think he's necessarily wrong

in his opinions. I know they're unpopular, but

I don't necessarily think he's wrong We tried

watching PewDiePie. I don't get the appeal of

that. Why is he... Robus is another big one for

us. Love Robus. And then of course Stone Mountain.

There's a whole bunch of other ones here, but

yeah. No, it's... Did anything at E3 catch your

eye? Size Battlefield 1? Yeah, that was the big

one. When that trailer dropped, I was like, oh

my god. Yeah, my brother and I were doing live

texting, commentary on all of that. The Mass

Effect Andromeda I'm interested in. I don't know.

But it really wasn't a trailer, per se. It looked

like 20 seconds of Andromeda and a whole minute

of other crap. before of like oh the development

blah blah blah blah blah and and then they showed

a little bit of it and I was like that really

wasn't as an enticing as I was hoping for but

it'll probably get delayed no but um the The

VR stuff looked pretty interesting the Star Trek

VR and the PlayStation I was like man if that's

anything to sway people from Xbox to PlayStation

Okay Like I I'm not like one of those huge like

VR type people anyway. I just I liked the capability

of the Star Trek VR and the The Arkham VR looked

interesting to me but it really wasn't anything

of a trailer. Okay. Mark Hamill talking. So the

thing, you touched on two things here. I'll do

the Star Trek one first. The Star Trek Ridge

Simulator is cool, but it is the worst looking

virtual reality game I have seen yet. Yeah, I

wasn't going to say it looked... very good it

just doesn't look good at all like I couldn't

even believe they brought that like on what plane

of existence do you bring this to e3 in 2016

with graphics like that it should look realistic

but no Star Trek game in recent history has looked

very good need to look realistic that stuff looks

like it was like ps2 maybe like Xbox one Xbox

classic. Yeah, like we're why did you bring that?

Maybe it's completely different in VR. I don't

know but that did not look good at all like I

Would rather have seen like just some made -up

mock trailer Then then what they showed because

that I did not like the idea is cool But the

way that looked, I was like, no way. As for VR,

I'm 75 % sure that I'm going to end up with a

PlayStation VR. The biggest reason I might end

up with one is because I like new things. But

I like the idea. the This is sound kind of lame,

but the virtual couch Kind of like how you know

Nintendo you with the Wii U you have that off

-screen play like you can leave the TV off and

play a game on the controller PlayStation VR

has the ability to project a certain size TV

in front of you So that you can play your games

Not necessarily in VR 3d but you can play your

games and it's a simulated like 60 inch TV in

front of you With headphones on and you're not

Annoying your wife sitting on the couch next

to you granted you look like a moron with a VR

VR helmet on yeah But still that that kind of

interests me in that regard But I also think

VR kind of clicked with me at e3 and I definitely

100 % believe it's something that you have to

experience. I do not think it is the same thing

as 3D. Yeah, 3D I'm not enticed with. The VR,

like the immersing yourself in it, that has me

more enthusiastic for it. That, but I will say

this. I said, I will say, you know, VR is not

3D, but what is missing from all the videos you

see of VR games? 3d Like you're missing that

the fact that it's because all the videos you

watch are 2d In the fact that not only is that

projected to you in 3d in front of you It's in

3d in front of your entire field of vision in

360 degrees like That is not the same thing as

a 3d television It dawned on me that that's what's

missing when you're watching people play play

VR games and you're watching YouTube videos of

VR games and you're looking at because I I Admit

this I looked at a lot of them. I've watched

a lot of them go. That's really cool But I don't

understand why that's a VR game And then I kind

of have to put on my VR goggles my little you

know, I might you know That little thing you

do when your kids when you make the circles and

then you flip them upside down over your eyes.

Yeah Yeah, I just made that face even though

no one can see me. I had to put those on and

all of a sudden it kind of clicked in my head.

So I'm intrigued to see by what it can do. I'm

pretty sure it's gonna be the smaller things

that make me interested. The one thing I would

really like to see, don't know if it's possible,

I would like to see that Fallout 4 is getting

made in VR or getting a VR patch. Would like

to see that come to the ps4 But So Not to go

too down too far down the e3 packs, I know you

want to get to playing some battlefield Mostly

because I want to hit on something, but I want

to give you a chance to share What was the craziest

or most disappointing thing that you saw? out

of E3. I'm trying to remember, because it's been

a few weeks. I mean, I really wasn't that enthused

with the new Xbox, which I think that was kind

of the general consensus. Mine's in that same

boat, so... Because I... Felt like they were

they were doing like a quick cash grab where

it's like playstations like yeah We're not coming

out with a new box. We're just we're gonna give

you virtual reality That was well and and their

their trailers were like Wham -bam. They were

just instead of having some like ongoing commentary

and Then we got to see like the halo wars 2 thing

and I was like yeah I could I could take your

leave it for a lot of the Microsoft stuff Sony

definitely took E3, hands down, in my opinion,

and I'm sorry we're getting to this conversation

a day late, or like a couple weeks late, but

now people can blow up the comment threads with

how crazy I am or we are. Well, I'm in agreeance.

I mean, I'm not a huge PlayStation fan. I haven't

played PlayStation really since the PS2 days,

and that's only because, and truthfully, I didn't

mind the PlayStation 2, or the PlayStation franchise

itself. I had a experience with it where my save

files died and I just sold it all off and waited

until I could get the Xbox 360. So the Xbox One

S I think is... I think it's gonna bomb. This

is not my original idea of mine, but... It's

a theory that I get behind wholeheartedly because

Microsoft has done it before. Well, they did

it with the 360. They came out with the 360,

then the 360 Elite, then the Slim. Well, that's

different. And the S is exactly what they should

do anyway. The S is a logical progression of

a console as everyone knows it. Sony did it with

the PS3. There are three different versions of

a PS3. There's the fat, there's a slim, and then

there's the super slim. A console redesign is

not unheard of. But what Microsoft is, they got

up there, they announced the S. It's coming this

fall. It's going to make all your games are going

to run in HDR. If you have a 4K TV, they're going

to look great. Not running at 4K, but they're

going to give you the high dynamic range, so

the improved color spectrum, which is awesome.

It's a 4k blu -ray player for $2 .99 Great message

you're on point You've almost got me reconsidering

buying another one just because it's a 4k blu

-ray player But then you end your conference

by announcing a brand new console That's coming

a full 18 months later And it's like you've you've

already screwed the pooch on your next console

release like nobody's gonna buy the slim They're

gonna wait until the 18 months Here's the bug

I want to put in everyone's ear and this is not

my idea. I heard this from somebody else I can't

remember who to attribute it to so I apologize

to that person But I get behind a wholeheartedly

because as I said before Microsoft has done this

before The marketing behind the Scorpio is that

it will play all of your Xbox one games Xbox

one games or Scorpio games will be playable on

Xbox one. I'll be it They'll be they might not

run as well and all this blah blah blah blah.

They're promoting this cross play thing like

one game multiple systems you know what have

you okay theory the negative theory the critic

that popped up and I'm behind this 100 % is Microsoft

has 18 months to see how well the Xbox one s

does against the PlayStation 4 which is trouncing

them all over the place it's not even funny And

so they have 18 months to see how well it does.

And worst case scenario is that the Xbox One

S doesn't sell very well. They don't make up

any ground against Sony. And they cut and run.

They all of a sudden the Xbox Scorpio is a completely

separate console. Does not, you know, has its

own games that are only playable on the Scorpio.

and they completely wholeheartedly launch into

the next generation of consoles. Microsoft has

done that before. They did it with the Xbox going

into the Xbox 360. The Xbox got beat like cold

cocked by the PlayStation 2, and Microsoft, hemorrhaging

money, jumped the gun and released the Xbox 360.

Now when I say jump the gun, I don't see that

release faulty hardware red ring a death aside

They just they were tired of losing So they brought

about the the next generation way earlier than

they were supposed to and they completely obliterated

the Xbox There's nothing stopping them from doing

the same thing if the Xbox one s doesn't sell

like if they don't move Xbox ones There's nothing

stopping them from cutting and running and completely

changing the marketing speak because changing

their marketing speak is All they've done with

the Xbox one since day one. Yeah, I don't I don't

really know what they're going to do like I.

I hope. That they can, you know. I don't know,

I I'm so like not I'm so in that I don't care

mood of of like Xbox at this point. And also,

I don't believe in a second. that the Scorpio

is going to do anything that they said it's going

to do at a reasonable price. I don't buy it.

No, not not for a second. Not for anything I'm

going to be able to afford. No way. Now, I don't

want people coming at me saying I'm a Sony fanboy

because Sony has also confirmed that there is

a PlayStation 4K or a PlayStation 4 .5 or PlayStation

Neo coming. And I 100 % gonna buy that. And the

marketing speak for the PlayStation 4 .5, 4K,

what have you, is exactly what Microsoft is going

from the Xbox One to the Project Scorpio. Like

PlayStation 4K games play on PlayStation 4, PlayStation

4 games play on PlayStation 4K, same chat interface,

same... Friend groups everything the only difference

is because of the position that Sony is in I'm

more willing to believe them than I am to believe

Sony because Or I'm more willing to believe Sony

than I am to believe Microsoft because Sony's

winning like well Sony's track record is so much

better it's It's better, but I and I also think

we're coming into this market I feel like I brought

this up before It happens Well, I feel like we

brought this up before that it's we're heading

into the one big thing that's happened from the

last generation from the ps3 and the 360 to where

we are now the one big thing that happened was

cell phones and People bought cell phones in

increments I brought up earlier today how I have

let's see I've got one two three four five six

seven eight nine ten iPhone boxes on my desk

That is Well to be honest my first iPhone I dropped

in a pot So I have boxes for all nine iPhones

that I've been released that is one iPhone a

year for the last nine years like that doesn't

That does that's never happened except there

are other people out there that have done that

besides me Like lots of people that have done

that besides me And Sony knows this Microsoft

knows this and the idea is if they can sell you

incremental hardware upgrades not everyone has

to upgrade But a certain install base will upgrade

again As long as they maintain the backwards

compatibility of the you know backwards compatibility

is gonna be huge here You know like that's that's

what's gonna drive This this model because there

are apps that I bought on my iPhone 3g that I

still use on my iPhone 6s but and so the only

way type of model succeeds where you can run

the you can run like You know if you have PlayStation

4k, or if you have a PlayStation 4 you can run

all the games They both run the same games the

only way you can do that is if You know you You

know First if you just add backwards compatibility

is basically what I'm saying Everyone can pull

their stuff forward, but you're not really out

anything if you don't upgrade for a couple of

years You know three four years Yeah, and it

helps them keep like a head and what will it

work? I don't know But that's what that's have

that also have that's what also happens with

the PC gaming you buy a new graphics card every

few years It's the same idea. That's the big

shift. That's the big thing that happened from

the last generation to this current generation

is everyone saw what happened with cell phones.

And people were willing to buy a new cell phone

at minimum probably every two years, you know,

due to contracts and subsidies and stuff like

that. So. I'm on board with the PlayStation 4k.

I'm ready for it Mainly because my wife gave

me the go -ahead because I want a 4k blu -ray

player But she was not okay with me paying 399

for the Samsung 4k blu -ray player that only

plays blu -rays But paying 399 for a PlayStation

4k that plays PlayStation 4 games and is a 4k

blu -ray player that she's on board with so That

makes business sense. Anyways, you know the dollars

for a console and $200 for a 4k blu -ray player.

That's not bad. No So yeah that the Scorpio thing

Microsoft was just all over the place and I'm

glad that Sony made the decision not to bring

4k or their the ps4k to e3 My other prediction

is I think we will see it at the Tokyo game show

Which is in September? And the PlayStation VR

launches in October. Some of the little things

that I've read suggest that PlayStation VR runs

better on the newer hardware than on the older

stuff. So to me, it would only make sense to

try to launch the upgrade at the same time in

a short window, because remember, they don't

need to sell them. They just have to put them

on the market. That's that's the thing that people

really don't understand about the plate I think

people don't understand what the 4k is because

Sony is so far ahead in this console race They

just have to put it out there. They don't have

to sell it so We've been all over the place tonight

I Bet you one comment will be about how random

this episode was I'm sure and I apologize that's

partially my fault, but I haven't been on that

much And I had a lot of stuff to share and I

had a lot of ground to cover Which is good and

if I'm on more regularly that shouldn't happen

it shouldn't happen that much so oh I definitely

intend on bringing it back, so I got it like

this this Thursday. We should be okay The following

Thursday, I'll be in Columbus, but I'll have

internet access and I'll be there by myself.

My wife is coming down a week later After that

probably depends on how easily my wife and I

Get into a groove Living in a new place, you

know I'm saying Don't think it would be I don't

think it'll be that big of a problem for me to

do like a regular a regular Thursday night thing

The only thing I can see getting in the way would

be by new job Because well, it's like a standard

eight -hour job seven to four typically I'm the

only person in like Ohio is a one -man market

so if something happens at ten o 'clock at night

at a movie theater and They call and it's like

a major thing I You know, I have to go take care

of it That's the only thing I really seek it

in the way if I because I've been really wanting

to sit down and and podcast again So they haven't

had the nerve to run my own show yet so It depends

lately. I've wanted just game instead of record,

but then I'm like, yeah I'm gonna I'm gonna record

and then I'm like, but I want to game Trust me,

I know exactly how that goes. I think that's

it for me. I don't want to go on too long. I

don't want people to tune out. I want people

to come back. So, as you've no doubt heard, there

were technical difficulties at the end of the

record. There were some issues between the actual

call recorder we use and the one that I was using

because I went reverted to a old version of MP3

recorder. It wasn't an old version, but an old

program that I used to go to to record the podcast

on Skype. So after the call, we were playing

around with this other technology, like ZenCaster,

I think it was called, where it does it all through

the browser. You don't need Skype. You don't

need any of that. It saves the files to your

Dropbox. And it's in kind of a beta right now,

so they're not charging, but it's a new thing

to try out. So in the meantime during that I

upgraded my Skype which apparently it seems to

update about every week now Which is a little

retarded in my opinion Because one I don't get

the notification it needs to be updated and two

It causes incompatibility issues with whoever

I'm on a call with so I can't call for whatever

reason more than one person I think something's

wrong with my Skype anyway because no matter

what I do I can't hear when somebody's trying

to call me I always notice after I see the missed

call I turned it off a long time ago, but it's

it's I Reactivated it and reset everything to

default and it's still messed up so I have that

and then When Skype's out of sync it won't my

call recorder won't record And then this other

one doesn't tell me How long it's been recording

for there's no like numbers or anything. It just

says it's recording Well, I got a notification

that it crapped out During the record and it

actually hadn't crapped out It was in the process

of crashing so it still was recording even though

I thought it wasn't And then I stopped it not

and I couldn't get it to record again after that

so So yeah, the that was the end of the episode

pretty much didn't miss anything I do have a

few Kind of geeky questions to ask Pertaining

to the episode What are your thoughts on the

new website for one like I'm really curious about

that Since I get into more of it and explain

kind of what happened this week the other thing

I have is Then I'm kind of wondering about see

I got the the closed alpha for battlefield one

is Is there anything you guys would want to see

me play on that or do? I did do a live stream

last night after I recorded altered geek with

Mike booth ninja and Streamed it on YouTube live

what I'll probably start doing is I'll probably

start setting an actual record time for my live

streams of Battlefield 1, so if you're interested

in Battlefield 1, I'll be doing that for the

foreseeable future. In addition to that, I'll

probably be doing, I do plan on some Top 5 videos

that I've got kind of in the pipe, ready to record

and edit and everything, and I'm kind of playing

around with some of the stuff pertaining to that.

I'm waiting on... Custom intro that I have for

the the live stream stuff and then or for my

gaming content and So there's that too I apologize

my Allergies flared up. I'm having to record

this the next day because like I said I was recording

for over an hour on on battlefield one when I

was I was doing that so Yeah, it's Little Little

difficulties because like I haven't actually

had to record most of my own calls for a little

bit because like when I have Blanchard on his

usually works and mine does none does not But

what do you guys think that? We should do for

episode 150 of the podcast like I I have some

ideas like I was thinking about visiting older

news articles and telling whether we were full

of it or giving a modern look at that from older

podcast episodes or revisiting old comments and

kind of giving it an up -to -date answer to them

or having you know like you guys could call into

the voicemail line save some stuff or record

an mp3 and send it to us and we'll play it on

the show because this will be the three years

of the podcast this august First week of August

that we record and it'll be episode 150 of the

podcast. I'm really looking forward to the fact

that the show is still going. It's the only podcast

to hit episode 150 at this point and still going.

There's some that have hit close to that, but

without the numbering system. Mine's purely the

numbering system. Then like I said is according

to the battlefield one. What are some games you

wished you'd gotten early access to? Because

like I Wasn't thinking I was gonna get this closed

alpha for battlefield one, but somehow I ended

up with it so I'm really happy that I ended up

with it, but What are some games that you you

were hoping to get access to? And then as always

our episode was sponsored by loot crate It's

a monthly subscription box for geeks, nerds,

comic book lovers. Each box contains at least

$45 in value, and many items are exclusively

created for the LootCrate community. And each

crate is centered around a theme, obviously,

and you get the box for $19 .95. And you can

use the coupon code. TBV when you go to lootcrate

.com slash gcrn and you'll save Three dollars

off any new subscription It's only valid for

new subscribers. So be sure to go check that

out this month's crate is futuristic so it's

things like Rick and Morty Futurama Star Trek

Mega Man valiant comics and then You'll get models

and figures and monthly tees and pins. So be

sure to check out our sponsor and support the

show, as always. So until next week, get altered,

get geeky with the Altered Geeks.