Well, it is Friday, and none too soon I think. Rantwick Junior is testing for his Red belt in Karate at 530 today, so I'm hoping nothing delays me. Friday afternoons seem to have a special knack for surprising / delaying me.
Speaking of Rantwick Junior, I thought of him while reading the comments section of BSNYC; people were discussing this computer game called Minecraft that seems to be crazy popular right now. He's 11 and loves it too. The thing is, the game looks terrible and seems to have little point compared to most modern games, so people on the comment board were wondering why kids seem to like it so much.
I have had the exact same thought, and my theory is that kids like it because it has no "story" or "rules" or "levels". You just do stuff and make stuff and collect stuff and try not to die. Like life, except without school or work. The lack of structure and story and good graphics allows kids to use their imaginations to fill in the blanks. That combined with just using the computer seems enough to keep 'em hooked real good.
When I looked for a video to describe Minecraft, what do you know, they sell it based on precisely what I had thought, which makes the preceding paragraphs a pretty big waste of time, I guess. Sorry.
Minecraft seems to be almost open source stuff. Rantwick Junior sometimes asks about mods and plugins available out in minecraft forum land, and since I am a computer guy, I have tried to help him download and install mods and hacks and plugins with very little success. I think I need to devote more time to figuring out the platform and how these extra things work. Or not. Maybe it is just fine as is. Like trees. Trees are fine just the way they are.
Speaking of trees (he he he), I have some new ones for the contest! I have added them to the album and slideshow found on the entrants page.
Rlove2bike sent me these, with the following note:
I thought I would send you these two for entry into TARATS. These were taken in Bayfield, WI., home of the http://bayfield.org/bayfield-activities/bayfield-apple-festival/ I can see now that I am going to have to take TARATS a little more serious as the competition is a might bit stiff. But just like Cheese, Beer and Packer Football, how can we not take a tree in Bayfield seriously...I mean really.
I'm taking those trees seriously, for sure... you had me at cheese. Nice trees RL! Way to plug that apple festival too! I love apples and trees and festivals. Apples grow on trees and Bayfield has an apple festival and is not far from where I grew up, really. Wrong country, but still... if I were you, I would attend the apple festival in Bayfield WI if you can. I bet it is awesome.
Yer Pal,
R A N T W I C K 
6 comments:
My son runs something on minecraft I think it's called the tech-it or tekit server. whatever the case it is pretty cool. he builds nuclear power plants with reactors that you have to keep the water covering them or they'll heat up. Battery banks and solar panels and all kinds of technical things. He has upgraded all his tools so they dig super fast and through the toughest materials.
mind boggling.
OK off to check out the new trees.
If you want to know how to install mods for Minecraft, I made a video
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qk7rAjzjqJI&feature=youtube_gdata_player
No games here. Tried Mario Brothers on the Nintendo for a while.
And on another note...It's FARATS that I need to take more seriously. Not TARATS, as its too late here in the north of WI. There is going to be a FARATS next year isn't there? hehe
Thanks for the post,
RL
RCT - Thanks for putting me on to that thing... I downloaded tekkit and we are fascinated.
RL - Oops. I corrected what I thought was a typo. Since there has already been a farats, (i.e. the first smackdown), I have been favouring ARATS4 as a name.
Digital waffle is my oldest son...I mentioned the Minecraft thing to him, and both our boys are soooo into that game, well he had to comment.
annie - thank the waffle for me; that was cool.
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