Category: Ludology

How Card Counting Works and How to Identify Hot Streaks When Gambling

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Counting cards is quite simple, as long as ones memory is sharp. Low cards (e.g. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, and 6) are assigned a value of +1, mid cards (e.g. 7, 8, and 9) have a value of 0, and high cards (e.g. 10, jack, queen, king, and ace) have a value of -1. The player counting desires a positive count as it indicates multiple high cards in the deck and on their way toward the table. Counts above +7 is when a table is considered hot providing the player with multiple good hands in succession. Streaks although appearing random, occur in a wave like function, so when a down streak is observed, smaller bets should be placed until a hot streak is observed at which time higher bets should be placed

The Etymology of “Tetris” and the Block Shapes Available to Players

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The videogame Tetris was named as such due to its creator, Alexey Pajitnov, amalgamating the Ancient Greek prefix “tetra” which means “4”, a direct reference to the various block shapes of Tetris which always have 4 cubes, and the term “tennis” as this was Pajitnov’s favorite sport. The shapes are referred to as “tetrominoes” and consist of an S-shape, Z-shape, T-shape, L-shape, line-shape, 7-shape, and a square-shape

The Reason the Entertainment Software Rating Board (ESRB) Was Created in North America

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It was the Fatality feature of the Mortal Kombat videogame series that prompted the creation of the Entertainment Software Rating Board, a non-profit organization tasked with reviewing and rating all videogames (e.g. console, online, mobile etc.) made available to North American consumers. The concept of the Entertainment Software Rating Board was created within the U.S. Congress in 1994 and the original intent of the agency was and continues to be, to provide caretakers of minors with pertinent in game information so that they are able to make informed decisions as to the type of content these minors consume

The Origin of Pogs

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The game of Pogs originated in Japan during the 17th century and was originally referred to as “Menko”. The Pogs game was adopted once again during the 1960’s in Hawaii, United States of America and was played using cardboard juice and milk bottle lids. The name “Pogs” was chosen for the game due to the popular juice flavor in Hawaii of “passion fruit orange guava”, making “Pogs” more so an acronym rather than a name

The Reason Aritifical Intelligence Differs From Traditional Software

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Recently, many of the improvements made within the artificial intelligence sector have been due to the technology of “deep learning” which is also referred to as an “artificial neural network”. Traditional software is not intuitive as it simply follows a set of instructions predetermined by a programmer. If the software runs into a new problem which it has no answer prewritten for, it crashes. Deep learning is different as software can now write its own instructions instead of reading the instruction(s) of a programmer. Currently, as of 2021, deep learning is the equivalent of an all powerful, dim witted genie as it has the ability to evaluate the pixels of a photograph of a bottle of water, and can recognize with astonishing accuracy photographs of other water bottles, however it has no idea what the concept of water or the water bottle itself is, what the end user does to drink from the water bottle, what the end user needs the water for etc. This differs in human beings however as humans learn from a sample size of one, and are able to surmise the purpose of water and everything else which is relevant from witnessing it being used upon a single occasion

The Business Rationale Behind Videogame Pre-Order Perks

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Videogame production companies focus heavily upon pre-order sales as these provide the best path to generating revenue, income which is then re-invested to make even more profit. Production studios spend a lot of time and effort trying to come up with appealing pre-purchase packages because the quicker income is generated, the quicker it can be re-invested, but perhaps as important, pre-sales are sold at the full retail price point unlike delayed sales which are often sold at a discounted rate. Video game production companies spend an immense amount of time developing demonstrations for conventions (e.g. E3, Comic Con, Blizzcon etc.) because this is considered the best opportunity to attract gamers and have them purchase on the spot. These demonstrations are often over the top and include features which won’t be in the final version set for release (e.g. advanced graphical shading features), akin to a bait and switch technique in which the best face is presented with the actual product which is less polished actually being delivered. This deception is intentional as it helps generate revenue which helps fuel the production of future gaming titles and franchises

Super Mario’s Super Human Jumping Capabilty

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The Nintendo mascot Mario has a vertical jumping range of 11’5” within his own world which equates to 27’ upon Earth as Earth has a different gravitational pull than that of Mario’s world. Mario is capable of leaping 2.25x his own body height however his exact agreed upon height when converted to a real world measurement is unclear. Statues erected of Mario tend to be 4’10” – 5’1” in length and Nintendo has stated that Mario’s official height is in fact 5’1” however different video games portray Mario with a varying degree of physical characteristics (e.g. height, weight, speed etc.). Mario falls back down to the ground within 0.3 seconds of his take off which means that the gravitational pull of his fictional world is 8x stronger than the gravitational pull of Earth. If this world were physically real, Mario would need to have legs powerful enough to allow him to jump at a speed of 22.2 meters per second, an incredible feat of physical prowess as the average person standing upon the Earth is only able to jump at a rate of 2.24 meters per second, resulting in an almost 10x difference in terms of Mario’s physical capabilities to that of a typical human being

The Development of Modern Institutionalized Psychological Torture as a Means of Interrogation

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In the 1950’s, Scottish psychiatrist Ewen Cameron started experimenting upon his own patients which ushered in the modern age of the psychological techniques leveraged by governments to extract information from high value targets and low level targets alike. In 1951, the U.S., the U.K., and Canada began developing the Survival Evasion Resistance Escape program, abbreviated as “SERE” (pronounced “sear”) designed for when domestic soldiers became captured by enemy forces (e.g. aircraft shot down over enemy lines) as well as techniques which could be used against captured Soviets. This research became dominant within Canadian universities for almost a decade, with researchers beginning similar psychiatric experiments within psychiatric hospitals in the U.K. In the U.S. The U.S. Central Intelligence Agency dominated most research and had over 160 secret projects within 80 institutions, comprising a total of $25,000,000 ($25 million) allocated for human experimentation. This project was code named “MK Ultra”. In 1963, many of Cameron’s psychological experiments were codified for the first time and compiled within the Kubark Counterintelligence Interrogation hand guide, a book which is now declassified and freely available online. The term “kubark” is a cryptonym, the name for the Central Intelligence Agency itself. This content became the foundation for the method of psychological interrogation and psychological torture which the Central Intelligence Agency disseminated across the U.S. intelligence community and worldwide among allies for 30 years after its initial release. Since the 1950’s, confirmed cases backed by evidence and testimony of these techniques of torture being used have been recognized or admitted to by governments in 28 nation states including Afghanistan, Argentina, Australia, Borneo, Brazil, British Guyana, British Cameroon, Canada, Chile, Cuba, the UK, Guatemala, Honduras, Iran, Iraq, Israel, Lithuania, Morocco, Northern Ireland, Pakistan, the Philippines, Poland, Romania, Thailand, Turkey, Uruguay, Vienna, and Yemen

Whilst I rarely if ever will submit an opinion upon this blog, I feel that it is important to state that the Kubark Counterintelligence Interrogation hand guide is now declassified and been made public. To educate yourself so that these techniques cannot be used against you, click here to read the Kubark Counterintelligence Interrogation hand guide

The Reason Body Builders Are Overly Tanned

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The reason body builders use fake tanning products is because on stage lights are designed to show the maximum definition possible, as they are not traditional stage lights, rather they are extremely bright lights designed to show every single bump and groove. If the body builder was not tanned, very little definition would show up, regardless of how defined the body builder is in reality therefore causing them to look underdeveloped from what their true physique actually is