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EGX 2018

24 September 2018 / Sinead

After enjoying my visit to Insomnia63 last month, I was looking forwards to visiting similar events in future. However, I wasn’t expecting the chance to attend another one quite so quickly. On Sunday I went to the final day of EGX 2018, alongside two of my friends. Danny, aka Adoboros, has also written up his thoughts on EGX here if you want to read them.

The Arena

As Insomnia took place so recently, and in the same building as EGX, I instantly noticed the visual contrast between the two events. While EGX had a similar number amount of stands, it appeared less visually cluttered and more organised. Its fairly dimmed lighting made navigation easier by allowing colourful stands and lights to stand out. From an audio perspective, EGX also had fairly good sound balancing, where loud displays didn’t spill over into quieter displays too often.

Finally, the ratio of game displays to merchandise displays was weighted far more in favour of gaming at EGX. Merchandise was given a fair space, but games were front and centre.

The Games

I can’t go to a games expo and not mention the games, so here we go. The first game I tried was Soul Calibur 6. I’ve previously enjoyed Soul Calibur 2, 4, and 5, so I had a fairly good idea of the newest instalment might be like. SC6 delivered everything you would expect from a 3D fighter – fluidly-animated character models battling in beautifully rendered backgrounds, accompanied by flashy weapon effects. It slightly refined and polished every part of SC5 …. However, that’s all it did. To me, SC6 felt like an update rather than a new game. The only gameplay difference I saw was an increased use of dramatic slow-motion hits and special attacks which took away my camera control. For me, that was a negative change. It increased spectacle and drama, but at the expense of player control.

Then, I played Team Sonic Racing. The core aspects of arcade racing, drifting to gain boost, and using item pickups to take out opponents were all present, and they felt just as satisfying as they did in Sonic & All-Stars Racing Transformed. The ability to trade items also seemed helpful. With my play time limited to one race, I couldn’t get much information about the team interactions, or how much strategic play the team ultimate mechanic may offer.TSR is enjoyable, and I appreciate that Sumo Digital are building a more co-operative racing game, given that previous attempts at this style, like Onrush, have struggled.

Review | Onrush

17 September 2018 / Sinead

The ingredients of Onrush are simple. Start with the frenzied speed and crashes of Burnout: Revenge, and mix in the co-operative objectives of Overwatch. Add cartoonish, Fortnite-styled character models and emotes, then finish with cosmetic loot boxes.

Onrush is a co-operative racing combat game, where players succeed by carrying out team-based objectives. It promises relentless speed and chaotic battles. It vows to keep you in the action at all times. So, how does Onrush achieve the goal of continual speed? And what does it feel like to play?

Research Update | Submitting my research article

11 September 2018 / Sinead

Yesterday, I finally pushed the big green “Submit” button on the research article that I’ve been working on sporadically for nearly two years. Pressing that button provided a relief, though an anticlimatic one; seeing years of my life summed up in a file just 46kb small felt more painful than joyous.

But for now I’ve done what I can, and I need to wait for the journal staff to give their verdict. However, that could be a slow process. When I and two other students helped with another study during our undergraduate degree, it wasn’t fully published until three years later. Hopefully my paper won’t need too many revisions, but I’m not naive enough to think it will be waved through unchanged.

I’m glad to have completed a version of the paper, and I’m fairly happy with my work. So far, I’m annoyed about only one aspect. As part of studying science communication, and from my own interests, I’ve read quite a bit about the failure points of academic writing — how it can be jargon-laden, hard to read, and artificially exclusive. I’ve read about how to make academic writing more lively and well-crafted, and how to make it better do its job of communicating. After diving into this new topic, I wanted to try out those new techniques and approaches. But in the end I stuck with the conventional approach, the passive, impersonal “view from nowhere”.

Insomnia 63 Gaming Festival

28 August 2018 / Sinead

This weekend I had the brand new experience of going to the Insomnia Gaming Festival. Having never been to any gaming events or tournaments, I wasn’t sure what to expect. I had a full weekend ticket, so I was there from Friday morning until Sunday afternoon.

As families often attend over just Saturday and Sunday, Friday was a fairly quiet introduction to the festival environment. We were able to get our bearings and explore the arena, and we could try all but the largest activities without queuing.

Layout and Content

The front of the arena hall was dominated by upcoming AAA games such as The Division 2, Shadow of the Tomb Raider, Assassin’s Creed Odyssey, FIFA 19, and Marvel’s Spider-Man. A large Nintendo Switch zone, with playable pre-release and already-released games plus live stage shows, was hugely popular all weekend. A major sponsor was Belong by GAME: they provided a gaming space of ~80 PCs, which were used for pre-booked team tournaments and impromptu public tournaments.

Much of the arena was reserved for people with bring-your-own-console tickets, rather than for publicly-accessible gaming. However, there was a retro gaming space with arcade and pinball machines, older consoles such as the PS1, original Xbox, Gamecube, and Dreamcast, plus Japanese music games with peripherals I’ve never seen before. Other activities included a tabletop gaming zone, a laser maze, and an emerging sport called Flightball which was essentially Rocket League with drones.

PC parts manufactures such as Corsair and Razer were also present, but one glaring exception was Microsoft. There were no Xbox One consoles and no Xbox or Microsoft stands anywhere in the festival. The most visible game was Fortnite, to a surprising degree. A dedicated Fortnite zone was always busy, as was the small Battle Royale zone, yet every other playable space also contained Fortnite setups. Also, an entire merchandise stall was dedicated to plushy llamas.

IQ | What does someone’s IQ say about them?

6 August 2018 / Sinead

I previously talked about how scores on an IQ test are developed, and what they mean mathematically. Now, I’ll look at what they can mean for individuals.

IQ scores can be seen as the mind equivalent of BMI scores. Although both numbers can provide useful information when averaged across large groups, they shouldn’t be used to directly compare individuals, or used to sum up a person in one statistic. BMI can be helpful for an average-height and middling-framed Western person, but it is near-useless for athletes, who may score as overweight or obese due to their increased muscle mass. Similarly, IQ measurements may be an accurate representation for a neurotypical person who is familiar with Western education systems and standardized testing. But they are not an accurate summation for people with neurodevelopmental disorders, or people who aren’t used to standardised tests and solving problems in a room with a stranger.

3) IQ tests cannot always measure someone’s ability accurately. Health conditions and neurological differences result in people having uneven patterns of ability, which confuse IQ tests.

IQ | How do IQ tests work?

4 August 2018 / Sinead

The Intelligence Quotient- or IQ- is one of the most popular subjects in psychology. Yet despite us often using IQ as a shorthand for intelligence, and even using it to define others, misconceptions about IQ are often louder than explanations.

So how do IQ tests work, and what does an IQ score mean?

1) An IQ test does not directly measure your ability. It uses maths to estimate your ability in relation to other people.

Language and Duolingo

1 August 2018 / Sinead

I went to a secondary school which at the time emphasised language teaching. Students were encouraged to take two different language GCSEs – one in Year 10, and one in Year 11. My class had Italian, then French.

Even though I had completed 4 years of French by the end of secondary school, I never clicked with the language. As I learn most readily through reading and writing, I found the gaps between spoken and written French confusing. So while the written side of GCSE French came easily to me, trying to speak in French was frustrating.

Italian was far more enjoyable – the logical connections between how words are pronounced and spelt made the language easier for me to understand. I enjoyed the language so much that I’ve repeatedly considered revisiting it.

At the moment, I’m practicing using Duolingo and Tinycards. I have a 109 day streak on Duolingo right now, which is probably the longest I’ve ever consistently done something. However, this isn’t 109 days of full attention. I have used streak freezes to skip some days, while I’ve also had “bare-minimum” days where I just repeated early lessons to fulfill my streak instead of actively trying to learn. But I’d estimate that at least 80 days have been legitimate.

Review | The Integration of Psychology and Theology – John Carter and Bruce Narramore

28 July 2018 / Sinead

When I was a psychology student and in my “learn everything about Christianity” phase, I discovered a book called “The Integration of Psychology and Theology”. Then I forgot to ever read it. By the time I eventually started reading the book, it logically shouldn’t have meant anything to me. But I found value in how the book was written and how it approached both topics.

Integration… does exactly what you would expect; it talks about why people perceive conflicts between psychology and theology, and whether these conflicts can be overcome. It was written by the Rosemead School of Psychology, an APA-accredited University which aims “to train clinical psychologists from a Christian perspective”. The book lays out four potential ways in which someone can view psychology and theology:

Psychology and theology are in direct and irreconcilable conflict, so one must eventually override the other.
Both fields appear to have common ground because psychology is a subset of theology.
Psychology and theology are like two trains on separate tracks, which don’t need to interact or to confront each other.
Psychology and theology are separately valuable fields which have the potential to work together based on their underlying principles (This is the book’s main argument).

Personality Disorders 101: Obsessive-Compulsive PD

20 June 2018 / Sinead

The final personality disorder in the current diagnostic system is Obsessive-Compulsive Personality Disorder (OCPD). First, I’ll explain why OCPD is not the same as Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder (OCD).

In OCD, someone’s obsessions and compulsions are entirely subjective, and individual to them. While the person knows their obsessions and fears are irrational, they feel forced to listen to those fears. At the core of OCD are ingrained if-then loops: if the person does not listen to those fears, something bad will happen to them or people they care about. If the person carries out their compulsions – either activities or rituals of specific thoughts – then they have briefly stopped those negative things from happening

As a stereotypical example, consider a person with OCD whose particular obsession and compulsion centres on locking doors. The person may need to spend an hour checking that every door in their house is locked before leaving, to prevent the overwhelming consequences of leaving one unlocked. However, they will not think differently of their family members for being able to leave after checking once. They may envy their family for being free from that worry and may feel guilty over how the time spent checking intrudes upon other family members.

In OCPD, the person’s rules and beliefs are not subjective and personal. They see their rules and methods as “objectively” correct, regardless of how complex, rigid or time consuming their approach may appear to others. Someone with OCPD who had specific rules about the correct location of every item in their house would require everyone else to abide by those rules exactly. If a housemate wanted to do things differently, the person with OCPD would see them as incorrect, illogical, or even morally wrong.

Personality Disorders 101: Dependent PD

18 June 2018 / Sinead

Dependent Personality Disorder was introduced in the first version of the DSM in 1952. Originally, it was seen as a subtype of an now-unused condition named “Passive-Aggressive Personality Disorder”, but it was quickly changed to being a separate condition.

The core symptom of DPD is a person’s belief that they are unable to function independently. A person with DPD is compelled to rely excessively on either one person (often a significant other) or multiple people (such as a close group of friends) to help them navigate most or all parts of their life. This reliance is not out of laziness, nor a wish to delegate responsibility. Instead, it is to escape a primal fear of inability. A person with DPD sees the world as a cold, dangerous place, and usually believes that they are deficient and unable to survive on their own. Therefore, they will seek out others who they view as stronger and more capable to help them navigate through life. They are terrified of losing that support or angering their support network, as they believe they cannot function alone.

The DSM-5 describes DPD as a pervasive and excessive need to be taken care of, which leads to submissive and clinging behaviour and fears of separation. To be diagnosed with DPD, someone needs to have at least 5 of these criteria:

They have difficulty making everyday decisions without excessive advice and reassurance from others
They need others to assume responsibility for most major areas of his or her life
They struggle to disagree with others because they fear a loss of support or approval.
They have difficulty initiating projects or doing things on their own. because they lack self-confidence in their own judgment or abilities (Not because of lacking motivation/energy etc)
They go to extremes to get nurture and support from others, even to the point of volunteering for uncomfortable or dangerous situations
They feel uncomfortable or helpless when alone, as they are convinced they cannot care for themselves
They must urgently seek out new relationships to provide care and support when a relationship ends
They are unrealistically preoccupied with fears about being left to take care of themself alone

Sinead Harold

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