Cosplayers and larpers are the same!

Appolyon from For Honor game is in fact
a fictional character, that only seems historical

As usual, I'm gonna write as first, what was the motivation to write this post.
I made chainmaille for my cosplay of Appolyon - just 30 cm of it, but still, it caused a lot of people to question the type of weaving I used, the types of rings I used and the overall characteristics of the whole maille.
And as I like the critique (since it moves me forward in lot of ways) from some point, it started to be kind of annoyning, that I had to describe to each and everone who commented things like that, that I am making a cosplay armor - not reenactment or larp armor, that I do not plan to fight in the maille, and that I wanted to achieve some lightness of it all whilst being true to the character - Photorealism.
Follow me on my social sites @datgermia for progress on this cosplay, I am working on it right now!

I spoke with my friends, that told me something like: "They are just larpers, the don't know nothing about cosplay..."
I feel like the (historical) larp community was always argueing and fighting on social media with cosplayers community and it is really not necessary - we are the same, guys, and we have to help each other!


Disclaimer: In this article, I speak as a cosplayer, I am no reaanactor, no larper. I consider myself armor-enthusiast. So even I'm trying to make cosplay armor, that is not historical and was never meant to be historical, I still admire historical armor, it's function adn look and I always try to learn about it as much as I can.
If I say something wrong, it is not intended to offend anyone and feel free to correct me.
I just wanted to point out, that our communities do not have to fight each other, that we can behave respectfully and  we should not force anyone in making stuff they don't want to.



Let's jump to this video by Metatron, that is a good insight into differences between armor (chainmaille) for reenactment, larp and cosplay just to explain the issue mentioned above:

Why are we the same?

1) We make costumes

It's great, that because we both make costumes, we can share knowledge about the costumes we made, what materials did we use and why did we use them. Share what are our plans with that costume and what material is the best for that purpose (larp, reenactor, cosplay).

2) We do roleplay

Isn't larp all about roleplay? Cosplayers love it too. Some less, some more, but we are the same in that matter!
Btw. the word cosplay even contains the world roleplay in itself!

3) We love our communities

Loving one community doesn't mean you have to hate others. We are not competing in any way and both our communities can coexist without a problem.
Always try to respect people from the other community and their choices even it is not something you like.
If you try to join the other community, try to respect others even more and learn from them and about them.

4) We are imitating a theme 

Both cosplayers and larpers (and reenactors - I'm not forgetting abotu them, but usually, their community doesn't fight on social sites as much as larpers adn cosplayers) are imitating something. We both are usually not designers with free chosing of materials, colors or look.
Cosplayers have to follow the characters they want to bring to real life - their color palette, they try to imitate the look and the feel of the materials they are wearing in game and at the same time make it comfortable to wear (as much as they can/is possible) and epic looking.
Larpers are trying to imitate the feel of the world they want to imitate and their garment has to fit in their world and has to be "practical" at the same time. If we are talking about historical larpers, they do not usually study a certain character, but a certain time in history - what materials were used for the garment, what colors and how to make the garment durable to withstand several days of rough time on larp.
Reenactors has to follow only historically accurate and historically used garments and equipment. They go for practicality and accurancy. No fantasy element is included.

Both cosplay and larp worlds can connect in some ways, both can be really different in other ways. What stays is, that we make similar stuff with different approach and the most important thing is mutual respect.

5) We are misunderstood by "common" people

Both cosplayers and larpers are often misunderstood by media and "common" folk. Both communities' activities are often regarded as weird, the behaviour as childish and the costumes we make and wear as wasting our time. Do not prove them right in their childish meaning about us by behaving childish on social sites ;)

What is the main difference in costumes for cosplay, larp, reenactment

Cosplay 

COSPLAY
Overwatch group at Animefest by Creative Wolves

Cosplayer makes costume. It has to be accurately portrayed certain character or original design in to (maximally) be photorealistic. The material chosen for making the costume is up on the cosplayer, but whatever you choose to make the costume, the material should be portrayed the same as in game/movie or TV-show.

Larp 

Festival with LARP features
Junktown

Larp costume has to fit in the fantasy world, where larpers spend their time (Postapo, Hobbit, ...) and has to withstand their fights and their lifestyle during their convention.  That means they have ot go beyonf photorealism here and practicality shakes hands with look and feel of the costume. Some larpers go more into reenactment and the borders are not very firm there.

Reenactment 

REENACTMENT
guilfordbattlegroundcompany

Reenactors try to portray a historical time. They use historically accurate materials, they try to learn more about history and what was really used in history to make a garment. They try to imitate the historical look as accurate as they can. Sometimes using real historical armor or uniforms. And because reenactment involves even fighting, a lot of reenactors put a big emphasis on practicality, that is actually involved in making historical accurate garment.

What are we doing wrong?

1) Distinguish between your goals and goals of others

Some people do costumes, so they can party in them. Some people do them, so they can pose for photographers. Some people want their costumes to defend them in a fight. Some do them so they can walk around conventions without problems. Some people want to present them as museum exhibits...
Each and every person has different goals by making a costume of their own and they have to make the costume fitting for their goal in terms of used materials, durability, historical accurancy, ...

2) Distinguish between history and fantasy 

Even a armor can be inpractical,
 the cosplayer has to follow the design

Some people love historical armor, some people love postapo, some people fantasy, some sci-fi. I love all the things above and I know making an accurate costume in a community is hard. But let the people have freedom with their costume, let them work with their fantasy. If your historical community has some rules, do not apply them on other communities with more fantasy approach.

Even a game character can look historical, in fact most of the historical looking games are fantasy games and their armor is usually a mixture of different centuries, different styles and some part are often non-historical at all. Only few games are trying really hard to be as much accurate with armor and garments as they can (for example Kingdom Come: Deliverance).

For more about this, I highly recommend video under this text, or two historical channels - Shadiversity and Metatron for getting more knowledge about historical and fantasy armors, arms, garments and buildings.

3) Respect the material choices

If a material isn't fitting for you and you prefer wearability, do not force others to use that. Other people can prefer durability or other characteristics.
Remember the goal of a cosplayer is different than a goal of a larper. Try to think about choices of other people before telling them what is best for them.

4) Respect the community

If you are and experienced cosplayer and you come to larp community, do not tell them what materials they should use to make the costume look better or feel better. Do not try to tell them what is right.
As a larper, do not come in cosplay community telling cosplayers, that there is no costume without a proper blacksmithing or that you don't need a wig for your costume, since it is not natural for a woman in 12th century would wear a wig. You only piss people around you and with telling others what to do you would be regarded as really annoying.
The good approach either way is to study a community, to learn from it. Why cosplayers/larpers use this material: Is it because they are dumb or because they know what is the best thing for their purpuoses?
If you are a really good learner and you stay respectful, you can try to teach others (for example by holding panels, making tutorials) about techniques or ways of your community and let other choose if they want to use them or not.

5) If you still want to tell others what to do, know your stuff before hand

If you didn't listen to my advices above and you are still trying to force others in using your materials and your ways, listen to that:
From my point of view, everytime I got into conversation with a guy telling me what I should and what I should not use, what is more durable and what is more historical, I was able to catch them on their lack of historical armor knowledge like:
Why are you having issues with this armor with boobplates, but not with this other very unrealistic armor without them - it just looks more historical but it is actually not.
Why are you insulting my work put into my unrealistic chainmaille telling me that I should use stronger wire for historical look, but  in history, butted chainmaille was used very rarely?
Why are you highly regarding leather as authentic material even leather wasn't really used for making armor in history?

Haven Paladin Armor
Unrealistic shoulders, too big sword, boobiecups and a lot of decorations
but true to the original design

------------------------------------------------------------------------------
And what do you think about it?  Let me know on my social sites :)



This article was made with the support of my patreon followers and I'm really greateful to them!
If you want to take part in this and support me in making more of the content like this, you can join my patreon here :)
Thank you!


Yours
Germia

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Don't be a cosplay jerk?

I've seen a lot of pictures and comments lately, that emerged on social media supporting the "nohate" and "cospositiveness" by cosplayers. It says cosplay has no rules, just fun. I don't want to say I don't agree with that idea, BUT I cannot agree with everything, that has been said, because there actually ARE some rules of cosplay:


What is cosplay?
Just looking at some definition of cosplay, the word combines "costume" and "play" in its name and involves someone dressed as a character from games, anime, movies, sci-fi, fantasy, that carries similiarities in appearance (clothes, hair, props) and in behaviour (known as roleplay).

"Cosplay is for fun, let everyone cosplay whatever they want."

1) Accurancy of cosplay

If you' re cosplay positive, you can agree everyone can cosplay whatever they want.
But if you want to cosplay Wonder Woman, wear glasses because you don't bother to buy lenses or survive without glasses for a while, don't bother to buy a black wig, beacuse you're proud of your blonde curls, don't wear blue skirt, because the local store had only green, don't bother to make headress, because you have both hands left  - then you're not doing cosplay, because the level of similarity with Wonder Woman is very low.
This is only one example, that inspired me by looking at the first picture. If you look at the last picture of this article, there is a woman on the fifth one, that wanted to look like iron man apparently, but the level of similarity with iron man is so low, that I'm not sure if it could be called cosplay.
If I take the first picture as inspiration for my next thought, even if you're on a wheelchair, you can use your disability to your advantage and make some epic costumes without interfiering with accurancy and faithfullness of the character just by using your brain and phantasy. Look at the pictures HERE. But simply wonder woman in a  wheelchair without an actual idea for the wheelchair itself is already interfiering with the character.
Let's take it from perspective of the definition of cosplay. You have to carry similarities in appearance with the character - this is one of the main RULES of cosplay - Yes, it seems cosplaying has rules after all.
Let's take it from perspective of cosplay contests - the accurancy and dedication to the artwork/character is one of the main  things considered by granting points. So of course, you can make your cosplay your way, use your creativity (sometimes there are awesome results!), but you can't expect people recognizing your character, calling your costume "cosplay" or admiring your work in masses. And you have to understand people disappointed with your costume, if you are changing their beloved character too much...
And the changes can envolve "sexying" the costume to show more naked body, simplifying the costume because of  inabilities or lack of funds, or just using too much phantasy (but as I said - phantasy can turn things in awesome new creations or on the other side - destory the character completely).

2) Body of a cosplayer

If you' re cosplay positive, you can agree everyone can cosplay whatever they want. 
First you have to think about if you can transform into the character, if you can achieve the first rule - to be similar, to look the same. And if your skin tone is white and you want to cosplay Lucian from League of Legends or Black Panther, you'll need a good makeup, or you will never be so convincing and so similar like the the cosplayers with natural black skin. The same works for your eyes, hair, weight, body type, height, ...
If you want to have a nice cosplay and want to look like a character, you have to choose your cosplay wisely, think of your body weaknesses or adjustments, that would be necessary. You just have to choose the cosplay to ideally look (and behave) like you, to suit you.
For example, I'm quite high for a girl, i have black eyes, black long hair and "curvy-muscular" body. I am a serious person and love dark and strong willed chars. What character should I choose? Vayne from LoL or Lux from LoL? Yes, whatever I want - but for Lux i would have to buy blond wig, blue lenses, adjust my behaviour to a laughing naive girl and still - because of my rather strong and high body i wouldn't look convincing as Lux. So Vayne it is.

Second reason, why to wisely choose the cosplay corresponding to you and your body type, is just the decency. You have to be aware of your weak spots and hide them and to know your strong spots and show them. These are the rules, that apply the same on the real life and that should be held in cosplay.
For example - you are very curvy/have more kilograms than average/are fat and you are in the choosing of the character - what would you choose - the closefitting half naked cosplay showing your orange skin on the thighs and three tires on your belly, or your proud big breasts in a fitting cleavage and the rest of the body hidden in a sophisticated dress? Simply, if you have more kilos here and there, it's not necessary to show everyone. And the same can be applied on other people too - you don't have to show more (hair, skin, fat, ...) than is necessary, especially if it is not regarded as desirable for your character.

I didn't really wanted to post some example pictures, but if you look at the worldcosplay page of Matsu Sotome, she's really the kind of curvy cosplayer, that can choose a fitting costume and knows how to wear it, showing only her strong spots! (On the picture as Ursula from The Little Mermaid)

3) Cosplay borders

The cosplay has no borders like your imagination.
Yes, but there are some borders between cosplay and bodypaint and halloween costume, ...
As you can see on the picture, the first on is a body painted model holding a helmet. I wouldn't look into if it is or isn't a cosplay, but I doubt she would spend a day on a con as a cosplayer, take part in a cosplay competition, or she would be let to go on some lectures with smaller children. But I consider it a piece of art and if someone calls it a cosplay, I wouldn't argue with him over that matter.
The second and third picture are halloween costumes. I think the cosplay and the halloween costume can merge together in some points, but they have a lot of own specifications, that split them. Halloween costume is often bought, dosn't cling to a level of accurancy, represents not only known but unknown characters and is weared only on Halloween. The cosplay on the other side is often made by the wearers, it should resemble or carry similarities with the character, represents only known characters (and their modifications) and is weared on different occasions like cons, gaming events, showcases, but definitely not to some kind of party.
The fourth picture is a example of a money, effort, sweat and tears invested in a great cosplay, fifth picture is already mentioned on the start of this article and the sixth costume should represent the "oversexying" of cosplays I've mentioned before, but it is actually a spot-on cosplay of Ironette - a hostess of Tony Stark. So it seems the one, who made this apparently cosplay-positive picture was the real jerk after all...

And why I've written this? I don't mind people having fun by cosplaying, i love the idea of cosplay positiveness, but if you don't follow the things I've mentioned in this article, you cannot be then offended by people critisising your cosplay, pointing at you at cons or saing they don't like your work. You have to count with it. If you're showing unnecessarly lot of skin, making someone's favourite character slutty, if you' re not decent or your cosplay doesn't resemble the character, don't be surprised, that the reactions on your work are not positive.
There are cosplayers, that are working hard to lose a weight to be able to cosplay something, that are undergoing a lot of uncomfortable things to be as much as similar to the character as they can, just to be proud of their costume and pay a tribute to their favourite character.
Be decent, choose your cosplay wisely and try to make it as good as you possibly can - then you can be really proud of it and enjoy the most of fun!

And to be sure everything was understood well, I support invence by cosplayers, I support cosplayers making statements, breaking borders... I just hate these silly cosplay positive pictures, that distort the reality of cosplaying and are saying, that even your poop can be a great cosplay (only if it is Mr. Hankey!)

Have a nice day, cosplayers!

Yours GERMIA

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Women in gaming #1 - Why are there so few of them? (EN)

Several events in recent time has motivated me to write a series of articles dedicated to female players and answer such questions as why there are so few female gamers, why don't they reach to men's performances in gaming, or how should the female and male behave to each other.


And now: What motivated me to write these articles:

1) The article about female players, that stated women can't achieve such performance in e-sports as men do, because they have a "different brain".
2) The leave of my long-time teammate kRAViCkA_ from my team eSuba.ladies and both negative and positive people's reactions to this fact.
3) The ongoing "recruitment" to fill the missing spot in our team eSuba.ladies CS: GO and observed growth of domestic women's scene.
4) The report on my fb page for support of female players in the game itself, in which the face of bullying by male players.
5) Deficiency of any tournament, offline and online, for the female CS: GO scene, both foreign and domestic.

1) Women and computer games - why are there so few of  them?

My whole online-gaming career, (that started about 9 years ago, in my 16, when I had finally technical support to go online - otherwise I play games from an early age), I¨ve always heard similar questions, Even I myself have thought about similar questions before. So: Why are there so few women in online games? Are computer games rather a male hobby? And if yes, then why?
A lot of people before me searched for the answers to these questions, and research shows, that the computer games are played by more than 40% of women. Thus, the numbers are not so unequal, are they?!

The problem probably lies only in the type of games most women play. And like every product specifically produced for a particular group (car, that looks like shopping bag for women vs. sports cars for men, romantic movies for women vs. action movies for men, etc.) - this simple market determination functions by computer games as well. They come in various types and each type is targeted on a specific group of people. For example, action, strategy games, and certain types of simulators are being developed primarily for men (Call of Duty, Red Alert, World of Tanks), social  games and certain types of simulators for women (Sims Wildlife Park), and then there are other games, for example for children and younger audiences are developed games with not so high skill-demands that are used to develop thinking and creativity. Logical and card games are then universal for all groups. And even the products target specific audiences, there are also men who drive the Nissan Micra, watch the movie Notting Hill and play The Sims, and there are women driving BMW Z4, loving Expendables franchise and playing CS: GO. And that's just because your interests are not determined by your sex, but a majority of both women and men have a tendency to tend somewhere.

So you can simply explain why when you play Starcraft ,2 Dota 2, or CS: GO, you will meet female player at an estimated maximum of ten percent of (and I probably overrated even this number). This does not mean that women aren't interested in computer games. It means, that the majority of women doesn not play exactly the kind of game like you, simply because Farmville may be more attractive for them. They may not even know computer games can be played online, and perhaps they do not even know the concept of e-sport, because they didn't encountered online gaming or e-sport at all. This situation could be changed  by penetration of e-sports in major media. At first as entertainment for a samller circle of people, and eventually even entertainment for the masses, after all, e-sport is a sport too (although, can we speak about entertainment for smaller circle of people? Maybe these pictures from recent European gaming action speak for themselves: IEM Katowice 2015 ESL One Cologne 2015 Dreamhack Open Cluj-Napoca 2015 Road to Blizzcon Prague 2015)

In my next article I want to answer the ongoing question: "Why there are gaming tournaments divided into women's and men's? Is it possible for female players to play like male players?
Hope you'll like it!

Yours   germia!

Special thanks/source:
http://nerdybutflirty.com/

https://www.reddit.com/r/truegaming/comments/224hsj/if_we_exclude_people_who_are_exclusively_mobile/

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/7796482.stm

http://usabilitynews.org/video-games-males-prefer-violence-while-females-prefer-social/

http://venturebeat.com/2013/09/19/gender-inequality/2/

http://explosm.net/¨

http://www.theatlantic.com/entertainment/archive/2015/06/women-and-sports-world-cup-soccer/395231/

https://www.reddit.com/r/MensRights/comments/3377q3/apparently_its_sexist_to_say_women_are_worse_at/

https://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20110106061657AAMJAaH

http://www.buzzfeed.com/annanorth/7-sports-in-which-women-have-beaten-men#.qwVDMxdGd
https://www.flickr.com/photos/radekvebr/
https://justinsoup.files.wordpress.com/2015/01/strong.jpg
http://www.americanhealthandbeauty.com/articles/3276/men-are-naturally-stronger-than-women
http://images.ientrymail.com/webpronews/notinthekitchen.jpg
http://www.migranttales.net/wp-content/uploads/2014/02/yes-we-can.jpg
http://vignette3.wikia.nocookie.net/mortalengines/images/8/8e/Rip.jpg/revision/latest?cb=20140807221244
http://www.gamasutra.com/blogs/WaiYenTang/20130208/186335/Reactions_to_a_womans_voice_in_an_FPS_game.php

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Něžné pohlaví v herním světě #1 - Nízký počet hráček

Několik událostí v poslední době mne motivovalo k napsání série článků věnující se ženským hráčkám a k zodpovězení takových otázek jako proč je jich tak málo, proč nedosahují mužské výkonnosti, nebo jak se k nim vlastně chovat.

A nyní už k tomu, co mě motivovalo napsat tyto články:

1) Článek o ženských hráčkách, který tvrdil, že ženy nemohou dosáhnout takových výkonů v e-sportu, protože mají "jiný mozek".
2) Odchod mé dlouholeté spoluhráčky kRAViCky z eSuba.ladies a negativní i pozitivní reakce lidí na tuto skutečnost.
3) Probíhající "nábor" na zaplnění chybějícího místa v našem týmu eSuba.ladies CS:GO a pozorovaný růst domácí ženské scény.
4) Zpráva na mé fb page s žádostí o podporu ženských hráček v hraní samotném, při kterém se setkávají se šikanou ze strany mužských hráčů.
5) Absence jakýchkoliv turnajů, offline i online, pro ženskou CS:GO scénu, a to zahraniční i domácí.

1) Ženy a počítačové hry - proč je jich tak málo?

Po celý čas toho, co se pohybuji ve světě online her, tedy cca od 16 let, (kdy jsem měla konečně technické zázemí k tomu, abych hrála i online - jinak jsem hrála hry už od útlého věku), se setkávám s podobnými dotazy a sama jsem si podobné dotazy pokládala. Tedy: Proč je žen v online hrách tak málo? Jsou počítačové hry spíše mužským koníčkem? A pokud ano, tak proč?
Odpovědi na tyto otázky už hledali jiní přede mnou a z výzkumů vyplývá, že k počítači si sedne za účelem hraní přes 40 % žen. Tedy ta čísla nejsou až zas tak nevyrovnaná!

Problém asi tkví jen v typu her, které většina žen hraje. A jako je každý produkt cíleně vyráběn pro určitou skupinu (auta typu nákupní taška pro ženy vs. sportovní vozy pro muže, romantické filmy pro ženy vs. akční filmy pro muže, atd.), tak i počítačové hry se vyskytují v nejrůznějších provedeních, které je cíleno pro určitou skupinu lidí. Například akční, strategické hry a určité typy simulátorů jsou vyvíjeny převážně pro muže (Call of Duty, Red Alert, World od Tanks), sociálně laděné hry a určité typy simulátorů pro ženy (The Sims, Wildlife Park), a pak jsou další hry například pro děti a mladší publikum s menší náročností sloužící k rozvoji myšlení a tvořivosti, nebo logické a karetní hry, které jsou univerzální pro všechny skupiny. A i když jsou produkty na určité publikum cílené, najdou se i muži, kteří řídí Nissana Micru, jejich oblíbený film je Notting Hill a hrají The Sims, a stejně tak se pak najdou i ženy, které řídí BMW Z4, milují Expendables franchise a hrají CS:GO. A to prostě proto, že vaše zájmy nejsou určované vašim pohlavím, jen většina žen i mužů má tendence někam tíhnout.

A tak lze jednoduše vysvětlit, proč se při hraní Starcraftu, Doty 2, nebo CS:GO setkáte se ženami tak odhadem maximálně v deseti procentech případů (a i toto číslo jsem asi přehnala). Neznamená to, že by ženy neměly o počítačové hry zájem. Znamená to, že nehrají zrovna ten typ hry jako vy, protože je prostě pro ně třeba Farmville lákavější. Možná ani netuší, že se počítačové hry dají hrát online a třeba ani neznají pojem e-sport, protože se s tím ve svém okolí ani nesetkaly. Tento stav by mohl změnit průnik e-sportu do většch médií nejdříve jako zábava pro úzký kruh lidí a časem třeba i zábava pro masy, přeci jen i e-sport je sport (i když, možná budou tyto obrázky z nedávných evropských herních akcí mluvit za vše: IEM Katowice 2015,  ESL One Cologne 2015, Dreamhack Open Cluj-Napoca 2015, Road to Blizzcon Prague 2015)

V dalším článku se budu snažit zodpovědět věčnou otázku hráčů na hráčky, a to "Proč se dělí herní turnaje pro ženy a pro muže? Mohou hráčky dosáhnout na úroveň profesionálních hráčů?" :)

Vaše germia!

Speciální dík/zdroje:
http://nerdybutflirty.com/

https://www.reddit.com/r/truegaming/comments/224hsj/if_we_exclude_people_who_are_exclusively_mobile/

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/7796482.stm

http://usabilitynews.org/video-games-males-prefer-violence-while-females-prefer-social/

http://venturebeat.com/2013/09/19/gender-inequality/2/

http://explosm.net/¨

http://www.theatlantic.com/entertainment/archive/2015/06/women-and-sports-world-cup-soccer/395231/

https://www.reddit.com/r/MensRights/comments/3377q3/apparently_its_sexist_to_say_women_are_worse_at/

https://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20110106061657AAMJAaH

http://www.buzzfeed.com/annanorth/7-sports-in-which-women-have-beaten-men#.qwVDMxdGd
https://www.flickr.com/photos/radekvebr/
https://justinsoup.files.wordpress.com/2015/01/strong.jpg
http://www.americanhealthandbeauty.com/articles/3276/men-are-naturally-stronger-than-women
http://images.ientrymail.com/webpronews/notinthekitchen.jpg
http://www.migranttales.net/wp-content/uploads/2014/02/yes-we-can.jpg
http://vignette3.wikia.nocookie.net/mortalengines/images/8/8e/Rip.jpg/revision/latest?cb=20140807221244
http://www.gamasutra.com/blogs/WaiYenTang/20130208/186335/Reactions_to_a_womans_voice_in_an_FPS_game.php

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What grinds Germia's gears #4 - CS:GO female cups (EN)

And that´s what really grinds my gears.

To organize an online gaming cup could not be an easy task. But organizing a cup for females could
be a lot harder than you think. Or isn´t it?

I have to say, i have participated in a lot of cups in CoD 1, CoD 4 and in CS:GO and i have seen both well organized and poorly organized cups. But the fact, that i have seen a lot of poorly organized tournaments lately, forced (or inspired?) me into writing this small guide for any organizer of a cup or tournament, even it is only from the view of a common player.

1) Learn from other cups and tournaments

If something functions, there is a reason why (it is just well made, well thought of), so if you´re trying to be somehow original, keep in mind it could harm your tournament and discourage future participants. If there are any rules, why think of new ones just for your cup? If there is a good system, why to think of a new one?
I don´t want to discourage you from innovations, but every innovation has to be well calculated and there has to be a reason, why there is an innovation. Use the rules, mappool or any other idea from other cups, change only things, that are not well made or you don´t like.

Example: Our team played a cup, that didn´t have a check-in prior cup start (caused lot of problems), there was no mappool like in other cups, the maps wer given by the admin (Dust2=OK, Mirage=OK, New Cobblestone= RLY?-not even in ESWC mappool, finals = third map is chosen by the admin - how strange?), there was no voicecheck, no written rules... Why not to learn from other female cups not to make mistakes like that?

2) Make sure you can do it in the given time

Choose your deadlines a terms wise. If you´re organizing your first tournament, there is no rush to organize it. Always have a plan B, but for planning twice, you need time. And if you want to offer some decent prize for the winner, you have to find some good sponzor and that takes time too!

Example: New qualification cup was planned and announced. Deadline to enter it was arranged in a week and the cup was planned in two weeks. The cup was poorly planned, bracket was built from teams, that entered in the first week and there was no check-in prior cup start. So there were a lot of changes, that related to time and opponents and the whole bracket had to be changed anyway. But it was changed so many times noone had a clear idea, what awaited the team for a match and when and even which map to play. Noone even knew, if the finals should be played that day or the day after...

3) Rules

Don´t forget to make detailed and meaningful written rules. Or just respect the first point i did and inspire from other cups and tournaments and copy their rules. But be careful to forget about something. It could cause a lot of problems and a lot of negative reactions from the players, that could be so disappointed not to take part on your tournaments anymore. The rules should be clear to everyone prior match starts, any changes has to be said both capitains of the teams.

Example: In a recent female cup, the rules were following:
"Coaches are allowed to be on servers. The matches must be played on ESL 5on5 config. One player from each team must record ts3 talks to avoid cheating*. Demos must be recorded."
Wow, what a detailed and meaningful rules description! Let´s look on the word meaningful: Why there is a coach allowed? It is not normal to have a coach enabled in an online tournament, in addition to it, why should be TS3 recorded, if there is anyway a guy=coach speaking? It is not a training to have coach there. It´s a game of five players, from which one of them is a strategic leader. With coach in there, it is a great advantage to have this on player be free from telling the strategies and thinking of them. It is like playing 6v5 then. Now let´s take a look on the word detailed: Map pool info is not included in the rules, but written in the continualy changing brackets, there were no info about playtime of finals, no info about stand-ins/hosts, no info about knives, no info about taking a pause, no info about time allowed to wait on a match, no info about amount of players needed to start a match, no info what to do if the server stops, on whose server to play (pings)... and much much more. My team had to start playing on a server, I´ve sent ours and everything was ok (but what if they didn´t like our server?), but then the capitain of the enemy team said: "Btw. we have a stand-in, one of our players couldn´t play, just letting you know." - I said like what? Just letting you know? You have to ask us for god´s sake! What is the host and why we don´t know about her? - "It´s blahblah, already allowed to play by admin, he´s my friend, you know." - Huh, things get stranger and stranger. So the admin allowed a player to stand in in the match against us not telling us a god damn word about that and that stand in is a freaking Global Elite rank. Mkay. Nice thing to find out prior match starting. So I´ve told her, it´s not polite to say it only to let me know, it´s polite to ask me and the same thing i´ve said to admin. Fortunately the stand in played like a sheriff and it was no problem playing against her. And fortunately, there weren´t any more problems during the matches, that we needed to solve with help of the rules, because unfortunately and obviously, there were none. There was just the word of the admin, that is apparently friend of our opponents (good thing to know, i say!).

4) Keep in mind special cheating precautions for female players

There are many cheating precautions in the game already. And if you´re playing cups organized by big gaming portals, there are special anti-cheats, that for example make screens of what you see during the match (ESL-Wire, ...). Additionaly you have to record your match demos in order to look on your in game performance. Check of Steam-ID´s should be a matter of course...
But if you´re a female player playing a cup only for females, there should be a check, if you are a real female and not only some guy playing for you. If you´re playing some esl cup, you have to play on a given teamspeak server, where the admins visit your room during the match and listen to your voices. That is called voicecheck. So checking at least STEAM-ID and voice of a female player should be a sure thing in cups like that. Sometimes some gaming portals demand even a real photo in the profile from female players to avoid any fake accounts.

Everytime getting beaten by an apparent unknown girl gamer

Example: In a recent female cup, there were no TS servers given, so admin said, every team has to record their TS conversations during the match and record the demo in game. What a great precaution of cheating! If there was a guy playing, noone could prove it. They could record some other match together and exchange it for the original match recording (noone speaks hungarian, or czech from the admin team, so how could they know?). In addition to that, a coach was able to be on the server during the match (I still cannot really comprehend why was this even possible...), so how could we know the guy, that you could surely hear on the teamspeak recording, didn´t play instead of some of the girls?

5) Casters

Casters are always a good thing for an online cup or tournament. Casters should orient themselves on female scene, should speak at least on of following languages: english (international), language of the first team, language of the second team. It would be nice if the casters were neutral by casting and if they are professionals and speak without cursing, laughing or making fun of players. Casters should know, what is their time schedule and what teams they will cast. Casting doesn´t mean only spectating (then it´s no need to have a caster, just send the gotv to the public), it actually involves commentary of the game.
A cup or tournament shouldn´t be subordinated to the time management of casters, the players are the most-important participants.

6) Admin team

Mkay, admin

The admin team has to be present and visible during the whole cup. It should controll the whole cup schedule, inform the teams about changes personally and update the data to inform the public constantly (but not spam). The information given should be always final and the changes kept to minimum. So don´t inform everyone about a change if the change is not confirmed, don´t organize a tournament, if you´re not able to be present and solve eventual problems. The admin team is there to keep track of following the rules, not to invent the rules on the place. The admin team should be neutral and their decision should be neutral as well.

7) Give decent information about the cup prior the start

All the information should be clear, well-arranged and complete prior the cup starting. As I´ve already written above, the info should be always final, changes too. If there is always a change in something, it could confuse and enrage the players and discourage them from taking part on your cup.
So what you should always say to the participants and public:
1) General info
What is the cup for? In which game? Is it only for female players? Is this only a small night cup or is is a qualification? If it is a qualification, how many qualifications there will be? For what tournament? Is it online or offline? Which teams are already qualified? How many slots are in the main tournament? Who is organizing it? ...
2) Time
When is the cup? How long will it take? Is is Bo1 or Bo3? When does it start? When is the second qualification? Are the finals played the same day? When will be played the main tournament? ...
3) Info source
Where we could find the best and actual info about the cup? Where we could speak to the admins? (Please, choose always only one place to tell info, don´t spam the info, the important thing should be always on top)
4) Rules
Where are the written rules? What rules are there - mappool, stand-ins, cfg, anticheat, servers, ...?
5) Prizes
Why are we competing in the cup? What is the purpuose of the cup? Are there any prizes - online steam gifts or skins, games, hardware, money, or only prestige?



I hope you like my entry!
Yours

germia


http://cf.chucklesnetwork.com/
http://assets.diylol.com/
http://memecenter.com/
http://quickmeme.com

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World War II games and their impact by GERMIA

Some games teach us to appreciate the common soldier

Do you know it´s 70 years from the end of the World War II in Europe today? I´m really into the history of this conflict and one of the factors, that played a role in my interest in it, were computer games, which are based in this war.

I have written this entry to introduce you into these games, that serve among other things to introduce young people into the history and reality of  WW II in a "fun way" (=by playing the game).
You could say these are only computer games, but it could help the people imagine, how it looked like and how it felt to be a soldier. This is really important and it teaches people to appreciate all soldiers (not only) from the WW II and it´s paying tribute to their achievements and efforts.

I am showing you screenshots from these FPS games, that feature the moments, which had a real impact on me (or should have on any other gamer) playing it. Be careful, there are lots of spoilers on the pictures, in the videos and in the text!

1) Wolfenstein 3D 

Final boss - Adolf Hitler

One of the first games I played in my life was Wolf 3D. I played it with my older brother dividing the keyboard into two sections: I was shooting with mouse and opening doors, he was moving. One of the best moments in game was the final boss. I was Adolf Hitler himself dressed in an iron armor. It was a really good feeling to be able to kill him in game and hearing him say: "Eva, auf Wiedersehen!". It was a feeling of satisfaction and excitement. "How weird!"
Just look on the video (expert playing, it´s really hard to kill the boss):

2) Medal of Honor: Allied Assault

D-day on Omaha beach 

The game, that had a huge impact on me as a player was Medal of Honor:Allied Assault. Not the whole game, but the mission on Omaha beach in Normandy. I really felt like i was there. The feeling of helplessness in the boat, from which was nowhere to flee, sick and praying soldiers all around you, sound of flying bullets next to your head. And the mist. You couldn´t see anything...

Each little black dot on this aerial picture from

D-Day Utah beach is a dead body of a soldier

You just ran out of the boat praying to make it to the fist anti-tank barrier and hide behind it. Dead soldiers everywhere, no medkits, no help, no axis soldier, that you can shoot and so help you from this situation, to be seen.
It was just you running in the mist from one barrier to another. In the middle of the beach, there was a medic taking care of a mad soldier, The only thing awaiting on the end of the barriers were machine-guns, snipers and mines. And the only chance for you was the moment of them reloading. It really left a big impression in me. This game taught me a lesson about being a soldier.
Just look at the walkthrough video. Even it is an old game and doesn´t look so real for us now than it looked for me when i was younger, it still serves like a good example of how it looked like:

3) Call of Duty 1 

Stalingrad mission

The whole game Call of Duty 1 had a big impact on my life. It was the first online game I´ve played and it´s still my favourite online game so far.
The mission, that really left a mark on the player is the Stalingrad mission. The feeling of fear on the boat crossing the river Volga. That feeling was even more helpless than in MoH:AA. As you´re arriving to the city, you´re seeing other boats with your comrades being destroyed by playne bullets and bombing and you´re really fearing for your life. Your fellow soldiers try to escape from the boat and are shooted by the soviet commisars as traitors... As soon as you get out of the boat, you could get either a weapon, or only a bunch of bullets. Yes, that was a reality: The manufacturing of weapons was far behind on what the soldiers needed, so it could happen you were as a soviet soldier left on the field without weapon forced to search for some gun from your dead comrades. I´m not mentioning a lot of details like notes from the families on the pillars and other historically interesting facts.
The next mission is starting on the Red Square in the city of Stalingrad, where you had to run forward without a weapon facing the machine guns of your enemies. If you go forward, you have to hide a lot not to be killed and if you run back, you will be shot by soviet forces for treason. The only thing you can depend on are only the wast number of your comrades - that´s what really happened in there. "Maybe the enemy will shoot him and not me."

4) Call od Duty: World at War (5)

Stalingrad mission

In the fifth Call of Duty game, you´ll return in Stalingrad once again. You have to secretly kill a bunch of enemies with a sniper rifle. Together wit an epic soundtrack, it was the most impressive moment from the game and you get a feeling the live of you and your fellow soldier depends on your aim and abilities (finally!).
Just see yourself waking up in the middle of a fountain surrounded by dead soldiers seeing a german soldier making sure they´re dead. But it is you and your friend he forgets to shoot...

Both Stalingrad missions (in CoD1 and CoD:WaW) were probably inspired by the movie Enemy at the gates.

5) Return to castle Wolfenstein

Return to castle Wolfenstein was one of the games I´ve enjoyes the most. It was one of the first games, that had good enemy AI, great and suspense soundtrack and first stealth missions (i love stealth missions!). It has even elements, that are far beyond of what we could imagine Nazi Germany was capable of. And this portion of phantasy inserted in the background of a real war was something, that made this game original. You could fight female german special commando, surprise attack a compound with your silenced sten gun, fight nazi zombies or big mecha-soldiers with tesla weapons,...

This game is worth mentioning not even because it was a great game for its time, but it was the first game showing what could happen, if the secret research of Nazi Germany actually worked, or if the technology of this time was better. The Wolfenstein games are still making great WWII games exploring various possibilities, occult worlds or advanced technology in their franchise like the Wolfenstein 2009 with other dimensions and ghastly soldiers, Wolfenstein: New Order exploring the possibility of Nazis winning the war and accomplishing their research and Wolfenstein: Old Blood with time travel.

Helga von Bullow and her female commando

Here are some of my favourite missions:

• Stealth mission: forest compound 

Played it about 100+ times to make! :D

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k49vUGXGE10

• Advanced technology mission: Ubersoldat

Once again, it seems really easy, but I had to play it several times :D

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uQvBd1Zj-_4

• Female commando mission + Helga von Bulow

Girls jumping and shooting! Though fight!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ULB9_Pp3TLs

6) Other WWII worth playing

H&D: You have to decide which soldier to take,
what to wear and what to equip before starting a mission.

• Hidden and Dangerous

H&D introduced a great game by allowing you to choose and control 4 soldiers at once, dressing them up and equiping them with weapons and others stuff, riding vehicles, switching between aerial controlling, 3rd person view and first person view, giving commands and making the best strategic steps on every map. You have to be stealth most of the time, because the game was realistic even in the damage taken.
Second thing I like about this game is that it´s a czech game from czech developers containing a map taking place in Prague, Czech republic.

• All games from Wolfenstein franchise

Wolfenstein is the kind of game i don´t want to miss. It has a lot of good ideas (secrets-you can finally use the gold from secrets to enhance weapons, eater eggs, phantasy worlds) and it can still surprise with new ideas and new gaming mechanisms. Just look at this animation from Wolfenstein 2009 - ghastly officer, that is capable of moving in different dimensions:

• Mortyr

Mortyr is the first WWII game introducing the time-travelling possibility, that lead to destroying the whole world.

German dinosaur from Dino D-Day

• Dino D-Day

Online multiplayer FPS game introducing dinosaurs, that helped Nazi war efforts. It´s a real fun to play in a group of friends!



These games, that I´m recommending all only the games I ´ve played and I personally like. There are a lot of other games from the WWII, which could be even better than the games I´ve mentioned. The whole list of WWII-themed games is here.



Special thanks:

http://photosofwar.net/

http://www.geocities.ws/
http://www.vg247.com
http://www.wargamer.com/
http://www.mobygames.com/
https://www.youtube.com/user/LightningBoltForever

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What grinds GERMIA´s gears 2: "Velké" gaming projekty (CZ)

And that´s what really grinds my gears.

Hah, věřte-nevěřte, den po tom, co mě namíchne interview mám hned další materiál, o kterém napsat...

Řeč bude dnes o projektech. Ale abych to upřesnila, jedná se o projekty, které ještě vůbec nejsou, ale člověk, který na ně láká ví, že budou "big", že tam nesmíme chybět, že jsou v projektu zapojeny i osobnosti jako bla1, bla2 a bla3, a že proto bude ten projekt nesmírně kvalitní a my prostě NESMÍME chybět!


Ale vraťme se na začátek.

Dnes náš tým eSuba.ladies kontaktoval manažer nejmenovaného ladies týmu ze zahraničí s tímto sdělením:

"A polish project want to start something for the female scene, check this site: (následuje odkaz)"

Mkay, moc jsem se toho z jeho zprávy nedozvěděla, snad bude tedy více info na těch stránkách. Rozkliknu odkaz a přečtu si o projektu následující info:

"The main idea of the project is to help the female scene grow as soon as possible."

Aha, grow, tedy růst, bude ženská herní scéna tím, že se jí dostane větší pozornosti, dostane více sponzorů, nebo se rozroste o další hráčky? Hledám tedy na stránkách dál. A najdu pouze článek v polštině (grrr) a seznam účastníků projektu, kde najdu mnoho známých ženských týmů... Dosud tedy nevím o projektu vůbec nic kromě toho, že už pár týmů nalákal, ale co to *** za projekt je???

Píšu tedy zpět manažerovi, který mi hodil link, jestli by mi nevysvětlit, o co se v projektu jedná. Odpověď si můžete přečíst tady:

"they have big plans.. and nearly all fem teams are in the group. bmg, epsilon, atn, ex.3dmax, cm storm, ....."

Po mé námitce, že STÁLE NEVÍM, o co v projektu jde, jsem dostala kontakt na admina celého projektu, který mi prý vysvětlí více - mám si ho prý přidat na steam:

"sooo you better add him and ask. the want to create sth new for the female scene, big stuff"

A jako třešničku na dortu jsem se dozvěděla, že je v tom super projektu i jedna slavná streamerka. Co mi to říká? Jsem z toho moudřejší? Prosím, tohle mi opravdu drásá nervy, PLEASE, STAHP.

A teď co dál - přidám si neznámého týpka na steam a budu mu psát s tím, že bych měla zájem o projekt, o který třeba ve finále vůbec zájem nemám? (a budu tím tak pouze ztrácet čas) Makes sense! (Btw. občas se stává, že si chlapci vymýšlejí jakési berličky, aby si mohly hráčky přidávat do kontaktů, ať je to berlička v podobě rozhovoru, pro jakýsi herní portál, ze kterého se pak stejně vyklube www.lukyskovo-blogisek.cz, nebo pofidérní iniciativy k podpoře hráček...) Druhou možností je pak to, že se prostě nechám odradit a o něco přijdu jen kvůli něčí neschopnosti a mé nevoli se někomu vnucovat?

A nezapomeňme na poučení na závěr:
Pokud se rozhodnete vytvořit nový projekt, ať to bude projekt třeba na propagaci vložek do háracích kalhotek pro fenky, to je fakt úplně jedno, prosím, už od začátku viditelně prezentujte, o čem ten projekt opravdu je, co je jeho cílem a jakým způsobem tohoto cíle chcete dosáhnout, nebo se vám stane, že případné účastníky a důležité osobnosti odradíte od svého projektu už od začátku a jen těžko budete jejich důvěru ve vaše schopnosti získávat zpět.

Special thanks:

http://weknowmemes.com/

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My theories about AVATAR

Is Avatar so great and original?

I DON´T THINK SO...


What about the main creatures?

And what about the tree?

And what about the foating mountains?

But this i think is original!

 I´d like to see your comments!


Avatarize your FACE!

<----------      This is my face avatarized

 

Whose face is this?       ------------->

(click HERE to discover the answer)

AVATARIZE ME!

sources:
http://blogs.voices.com/voxdaily/figure-connecting-two-wires.jpg
http://brokenbullhorn.files.wordpress.com/2010/01/chinese-floating-mountain-01.jpg
Facebook - Happy Aquarium Application
http://www.tomgiffin.com/images/The-Birthing-Tree.jpg
official avatar site
and others

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