Time: 23:17:26 CET 14:17:26 PST 17:17:26 EST 06:17:26 Seoul 05:17:26 Beijing
BLOGS
SK GAMING HISTORY
All abaut sk gamingSK Gaming was formed in 1997 as a German Quake clan named Schroet Kommando by seven young people who all lived in the town of Oberhausen, among three brothers: Ralf "Griff" Reichert, Tim "Burke" Reichert and Benjamin "Kane" Reichert, supported by Musa "Kila" Celik, Kristof "Speed" Salwiczek, Carsten "Storch" Kramer and Sven "Ramses" Tümmers.[1] Initially, the clan was called Schroet Kommando; according to Ralf "Griff" Reichert, clan mate Celik (a.k.a. Kila) used to shout "Schrööt!" (literally meaning "shrapnel") when he took the double-barreled shotgun; they decided to incorporate this into their name and named their clan "Schroet Kommando" which translates into English as "Shrapnel Commando". This has been changed and the clan now refers to itself as SK Gaming, stating that this is their name now, and not an abbreviation for the original name.[2]
Initially, the house of the Reichert family was the SK headquarters. At first, Schroet Kommando played mainly Quake, Quake 2 and Quake 3 Arena. SK became one of the first clans to feature an all-female team. A major step forward towards professional gaming was the entry of Andreas "bds" Thorstensson in the early 2000s. He made SK the first clan to charge payment for premium services ("SK Insider", a virtual marketplace where paying members could download demos, mods and add-ons better and earlier than others, talk directly to SK gamers etc.),[3] SK became a Counter-Strike-oriented clan. Their major international successes came when they took the players of the successful Swedish Counter-Strike clan Ninjas in Pyjamas (NiP for short) into their organization. The SK Counter-Strike team have won most of the major international tournaments at least once, and have been a dominant team in the Cyberathlete Professional League. Other SK Gaming teams are also notably successful in their respective games.
On February 1, 2003 SK Gaming became the first club in FPS gaming to contract their players when SK Sweden became contractually bound to the clan.[4] Having begun contracting their players, SK also set other precedents regarding contracts: on May 18, 2004 they were the first team to receive a fee for a player transfer after rivals Team NoA bought SK.swe player Ola "elemeNt" Moum out of his contract.[5]
At the beginning of the 2005 season, the Counter-Strike players decided not to renew their contracts and to re-form Ninjas in Pyjamas, because of the distribution of the prize money and disagreements with the management.[6] However, later some of the original players returned to the club in summer 2005. [6]
The 2006 season brought no successes to the Counter-Strike team. Most notably, the team failed to qualify for the Electronic Sports World Cup, in which Sweden was represented by rivals fnatic and Ninjas in Pyjamas. The team did manage to qualify however for the KODE5 finals, now unsuccessful at beating their two rivals. At the KODE5 finals, they won two matches and lost to team MiBR in the group stages. They then lost to wNv in the single elimination round, placing 5th-8th overall. Success did come for the Quake 4 squad, as Swedish star player Johan "Toxic" Quick managed to win eight out of the ten major tournaments this year, including four out of five World Championships. Also the FIFA 06 squad had a successful year, the team managed to win the prestigious ESL Pro Series twice, and German player hero won the World Cyber Games championship.
Shortly before the release of the Sunwell Plateau in World of Warcraft: The Burning Crusade, SK Gaming gained partnership with Curse, one of the highest-ranked guilds at the time [1]. However, on October 1, 2008, their PvE team was dismissed due to differences in interests and on November 10, it was announced that the PvE team would merge with Nihilum, which was leaving Mousesports as well.[2] [7]On July 28, 2008, SK Gaming dismissed its Call of Duty 4 team. [3]
SK has been dominating the 6.52e dota scene for 2008.
[edit] Business model
As of 2008, SK Gaming is organised as a so-called Gesellschaft mit beschränkter Haftung. The owners of SK Gaming are Andreas "bds" Thorstensson and Alexander "TheSlash" Müller-Rodic, who both work full-time for the clan and are head of further 10 full-time professional SK members. A minority stake is still held by founder Ralf "Griff" Reichert. SK Gaming is sponsored by AMD, ATI, SteelSeries and Adidas, and used to also finance itself by the "SK Insider" zone on their own website, which has not been around for quite sometime. However, according to Rodic, 85% of the clan's funds comes from their sponsors.[8]
[edit] Current roster
[edit] Counter-Strike
* Flag of Sweden Kristoffer "Tentpole" Nordlund
* Flag of Sweden Jimmy "allen" Allén
* Flag of Sweden Dennis "walle" Wallenberg
* Flag of Sweden Robert "RobbaN" Dahlström
* Flag of Sweden Marcus "zet" Sundström
[edit] Counter-Strike Female
* Flag of the United States Alice 'ali' Lew
* Flag of the United States Jane 'janeosaur' Wie
* Flag of the United States Jennifer 'jso' So
* Flag of Canada Lidia 'lidy' Poulin
* Flag of the United States Christine 'potter' Chi
* Flag of the United States Benita 'b^' Novshadian
[edit] Warcraft III
* Flag of South Korea June 'Lyn' Park
* Flag of Germany Daniel 'Miou' Holthuis
* Flag of South Korea Seo Woo 'ReiGn' Kang
* Flag of South Korea Sung Sik 'ReMinD' Kim
* Flag of South Korea Seong Deok 'SoJu' Lee
[edit] DotA Allstars
* Flag of Sweden Jonathan "Loda" Berg (Team Captain)
* Flag of Sweden Alexander "Snow" Nystrand
* Flag of Sweden Tommy "Tompa" Andersson
* Flag of Sweden Mikael "Hailo" Grinsvall
* Flag of Sweden Edvin "KwoM" Börjesson
[edit] World of Warcraft
[edit] European Team
* Flag of Sweden Stefan 'zeksy' Baudin (Team Captain)
* Flag of Sweden Michael 'Dosferra' Tofer
* Flag of Sweden Thomas 'Lomas' Lindmark
* Flag of Sweden Jonas 'Tarde' Jakobsson
* Flag of Sweden Erik 'daimx' Olofsson
* Flag of Sweden Liam 'Steinaz' Steinberg
* Flag of Sweden Andreas 'Zumrok' Östman
* Flag of Turkey Gokhan 'Laflamme' Akinturk
* Flag of Spain Enrick ' Laden ' Viñolas
WCS - Western Connecticut Stars
* Flag of the United StatesFlag of Brazil WCS | hazard Raphael
* Flag of the United StatesFlag of Brazil WCS | gore Tadeu
* Flag of the United StatesFlag of Brazil WCS | yoshi Rodolfo
* Flag of the United StatesFlag of Brazil WCS | kotic Aislan
* Flag of the United StatesFlag of Brazil WCS | crasher Yago
* Flag of the United StatesFlag of Brazil Manager ' Leonardo Pupim
[edit] FIFA
* Flag of Germany Daniel "hero" Schellhase
* Flag of Germany Dennis "styla" Schellhase
* Flag of Austria Mario "mario" Viska
* Flag of Germany Mohamed "TornAdo" El-eter
* Flag of Germany Daniel "eNnu" Ennulat
* Flag of Germany Jannik "Era" Huber
* Flag of Germany Joshua "Kr0ne" Begehr
* Flag of Germany Alwyn "s1lence" Kotze
[edit] Notable alumni
* Flag of Germany Tim "Burke" Reichert
* Flag of Germany Benjamin "Kane" Reichert
* Flag of Germany Musa "Kila" Celik
[edit] Notable achievements
SK has placed in the top 3 at the following major international tournaments:
[edit] Counter-Strike
* 1st * World GameMaster Tournament: @ DreamHack 2008
* 8-16 [King of The Hill]: Winter Championships 2008
* 1st WCG SEC 2007
* 1st CPL: Winter Championships 2005
* 1st CPL: Summer Championships 2005
* 2nd Electronic Sports World Cup 2005
* 2nd CPL: Summer Championships 2004
* 1st CPL: Winter Championships 2003
* 1st CPL: Copenhagen 2003
* 1st CPL: Summer Championships 2003
* 1st CPL: Cannes 2003
* 1st World Cyber Games 2003
* 3rd Electronic Sports World Cup 2003
* 1st CPL: Summer Championships 2002
* 3rd CPL: Winter Championships 2002
[edit] World Championships
* Cyberathlete Professional League (2002, 2003, 2005)
* World Cyber Games (2003)
* World GameMaster Tournament (2008)
[edit] Zonerank Rankings
* Top Ranking: 2nd (03-2008)[9]
* Current Ranking: 2nd[10]
[edit] Deathmatch
* 1st KODE5 Finals 2006 – Johan "Toxic" Quick (Quake 4)
* 1st QuakeCon 2006 – Johan "Toxic" Quick (Quake 4)
* 1st World Series of Video Games Intel Summer Championship 2006 – Johan "Toxic" Quick (Quake 4)
* 2nd World Series of Video Games Sweden 2006 – Johan "Toxic" Quick (Quake 4)
* 1st World Series of Video Games London 2006 – Johan "Toxic" Quick (Quake 4)
* 1st DigitalLife 2006[11] – Johan "Toxic" Quick (Quake 4)
* 1st World Cyber Games 2006[12] – Johan "Toxic" Quick (Quake 4)
* 1st World Series of Video Games Finals 2006 – Johan "Toxic" Quick (Quake 4)
* 2nd 2005 CPL World Tour: Istanbul – Benjamin "zyz" Bohrmann (Painkiller)
* 1st 2005 CPL World Tour: Spain – Stephan "SteLam" Lammert (Painkiller)
* 3rd 2005 CPL World Tour: Brazil – Benjamin "zyz" Bohrmann (Painkiller)
* 3rd Electronic Sports World Cup 2005 – Fox (Quake 3)
* 3rd 2005 CPL World Tour: Sweden – Benjamin "zyz" Bohrmann (Painkiller)
* 3rd 2005 CPL World Tour: United Kingdom – Benjamin "zyz" Bohrmann (Painkiller)
* 2nd CPL 2005 Winter – Johan "Toxic" Quick (Quake 4)
* 3rd Cyberathlete Professional League: Summer 2004 – Stephan "SteLam" Lammert (Painkiller)
* 1st Cyberathlete Professional League: Summer 2004 – Team (Unreal Tournament 2004)
* 2nd Electronic Sports World Cup 2004 – Christian "GitzZz" Hoeck (Unreal Tournament 2004)
* 1st Electronic Sports World Cup 2003 – Christian "GitzZz" Hoeck (Unreal Tournament 2003)
* 3rd World Cyber Games 2001 – Stephan "SteLam" Lammert (Quake 3)
[edit] World Championships
* KODE5 (2006, Quake 4)
* World Cyber Games (2006, Quake 4)
* World Series of Video Games (2006, Quake 4)
* Electronic Sports World Cup (2003, Unreal Tournament)
[edit] Warcraft III
* 2nd ESL Extreme Masters 2007 – Flag of Ukraine Mykhaylo "HoT" Novopashyn
* 1st WCG SEC 2007 – Flag of Ukraine Mykhaylo "HoT" Novopashyn
* 2nd World Series of Videogames, Finals 2006 – Flag of South Korea Jung Hee "Sweet" Chun
* 3rd World Cyber Games 2006 – Flag of Ukraine Mykhaylo "HoT" Novopashyn
* 1st KODE5 2006- Flag of Russia Andrey "Deadman" Sobolev
* 1st World Series of Videogames, China 2006 – Flag of South Korea Jung Hee "Sweet" Chun
* 1st World Series of Videogames, Sweden 2006 – Flag of Russia Andrey "Deadman" Sobolev
* 2nd NGL One Season I 2006 – Team
* 3rd Warcraft 3 Champions League V 2006 – Team
* 1st EuroCup 2005 – Flag of Ukraine Mykhaylo "HoT" Novopashyn
* 3rd CPL Summer 2005 – Flag of Sweden Björn "ElakeDuck" ödman
* 2nd Electronic Sports World Cup 2005 – Flag of Russia Andrey "Deadman" Sobolev
* 3rd ACON5 2005 – Flag of Russia Andrey "Deadman" Sobolev
* 3rd Warcraft 3 Champions League VII 2005 – Team
* 2nd World E-Sport Games I 2005 – Flag of South Korea Tae min "Zacard" Hwang
* 3rd Warcraft 3 Champions League VI 2004 – Team
* 2nd World Cyber Games 2004 – Flag of South Korea Tae min "Zacard" Hwang
* 2nd Electronic Sports World Cup 2004 – Flag of Sweden Fredrik "MaDFroG" Johansson
* 3rd Electronic Sports World Cup 2004 – Flag of Sweden Alborz "HeMaN" Haidarian
* 3rd ACON4 2004 – Flag of South Korea Jung Hee "Sweet" Chun
* 3rd Warcraft 3 Champions League V 2004 – Team
* 1st Blizzard Worldwide Invitational 2004 – Flag of Sweden Fredrik "MaDFroG" Johansson
* 3rd Cyber X Gaming 2004 – Flag of Bulgaria Zdravko "Insomnia" Georgiev
* 1st World Cyber Games 2003 – Flag of Bulgaria Zdravko "Insomnia" Georgiev
* 1st Euro Cyber Games 2003 – Flag of France Antoine "FaTC" Zadri
* 2nd Euro Cyber Games 2003 – Flag of Bulgaria Georgi "Zeerax" Marinov
* 1st Electronic Sports World Cup 2003 – Flag of Sweden Alborz "HeMaN" Haidarian
* 2nd Electronic Sports World Cup 2003 – Flag of Sweden Fredrik "MaDFroG" Johansson
* 3rd Clikarena 2003 – Flag of Bulgaria Zdravko "Insomnia" Georgiev
* 2nd CPL Cannes 2003 – Flag of Bulgaria Zdravko "Insomnia" Georgiev
* 2nd CPL Oslo 2002 – Flag of Sweden Sven "Kovax" Running
* 3rd CPL Oslo 2002 – Flag of Sweden Fahad "DsCo" Hamid
[edit] World Championships
* KODE5 (2006)
* Blizzard Worldwide Invitational (2004)
* World Cyber Games (2003)
* Electronic Sports World Cup (2003)
[edit] World of Warcraft
* 1st european kill of Brutallus
* 1st world kill of Felmyst
* 2nd world kill of Eredar Twins
* 1st world kill of M'uru
* 1st world kill of Kil'jaeden – (final boss of The Burning Crusade.)
[edit] External links
* Official SK-Gaming Website
* SK endorses NVidia
[edit] References
1. ^ Die Killer aus dem Kinderzimmer, focus.de (German)
2. ^ Clans @ eSports: Schroet Kommando - Eine Erfolgsgeschichte, giga.de (German)
3. ^ Interview with Andreas "bds" Thorstensson
4. ^ brunk leaves SK.Swe, SpawN joins for WCG, ukterrorist.com
5. ^ Ablösesummen im eSport? ElemeNt macht's vor!, poerk.com (German)
6. ^ a b SK.swe is back, giga.de (German)
7. ^ "Ensidia". Mark Laursen.
8. ^ Spieler-Firma gründen: Das Unternehmen Clan, tomshardware.com
9. ^ ZoneRank
10. ^ ZoneRank
11. ^ "DigitalLife 2006 Final Standings" – GGL
12. ^ "WCG 2006 Invitational Quake4 All Stars – Final Results" – WCG
History of Cs
Counter Stirke D:Counter-Strike is a first-person shooter in which players join either the terrorist or counter-terrorist team (or becomes a spectator). Each team attempts to complete their mission objective and/or eliminate the opposing team. Each round starts with the two teams spawning simultaneously, usually at opposite ends of the map from each other. A player can choose to play as one of eight different default character models (four for each side, although Counter-Strike: Condition Zero added two extra models, bringing the total to ten). Players are generally given a few seconds before the round begins (known as "freeze time") to prepare and buy equipment, during which they cannot attack or walk/move (a player can still take damage, having the player drop from a certain height during freeze time was the only way somebody could control the players starting "HP"). They can return to the buy area within a set amount of time to buy more equipment (some custom maps included neutral "buy zones" that could be used by both teams). Once the round has ended, surviving players retain their equipment for use in the next round; players who were killed begin the next round with the basic default starting equipment.
Screenshot of a player using a Desert Eagle on the map de_dust in the original Counter-Strike (left) and Counter-Strike: Source (right).
Standard monetary bonuses are awarded for winning a round, losing a round, killing an enemy, being the first to instruct a hostage to follow, rescuing a hostage or planting the bomb.
The scoreboard displays team scores in addition to statistics for each player: name, kills, deaths, and ping (in milliseconds). The scoreboard also indicates whether a player is dead, carrying the bomb (on bomb maps), or is the VIP (on assassination maps), although information on players on the opposing team is hidden from a player until his/her death, as this information can be important.
Killed players become "spectators" for the duration of the round; they cannot change their names until they spawn (come alive) again, text chat cannot be sent to or received from live players; and voice chat can only be received from live players and not sent to them (unless the cvar sv_alltalk is set to 1). Spectators are generally able to watch the rest of the round from multiple selectable views, although some servers disable some of these views to prevent dead players from relaying information about living players to their teammates through alternative media (most notably voice in the case of Internet cafes and Voice over IP programs such as TeamSpeak or Ventrilo). This technique is known as "ghosting".
Distribution and service
Sierra
When Counter-Strike was published by Sierra Entertainment/Vivendi Universal Games, it was bundled with Team Fortress Classic, Opposing Force multiplayer, and the Wanted, Redemption and Firearms mods."[4]
Steam and the WON gaming service
Counter-Strike was originally played online through the WON gaming service, which was shut down in 2004,[5] forcing players to switch to Steam. The non-Steam version of Counter-Strike (version 1.5) can still be downloaded from sites such as FilePlanet.[6] Due to the closure of WON, part of the player community responded by creating their own WON network, dubbed WON2.
Addition of in-game advertising
In March 2007, Valve implemented mandatory advertisements through Steam in official maps and in the game's GUI overhead. Customers have expressed frustration with the ads, including an over 200 page thread on Valve's official forums, saying that they violate original terms of service and distract from the game.[7] The thread was later deleted by an unknown moderator.
Counter-Strike Online
Main article: Counter-Strike Online
As of February 2008, Counter-Strike Online is only available in South Korea and is now in open beta test. It is being developed by Nexon Corporation with oversight from license-holder Valve Corporation, and is an attempt to increase market share of Valve's games in the Korean gaming market.
Version history
On 24 March 1999[verification needed] Planet Half-Life opened its Counter-Strike section. Within two weeks, the site had received 10,000 hits.
On June 18, 1999, the first public beta of Counter-Strike was released, followed by numerous further "beta" releases.
On April 12, 2000, Valve announced that the Counter-Strike developers and Valve had teamed up. Counter-Strike 1.0 was released around Christmas 2000.
On January 25, 2003, a world wide competition was held by Valve and hosted by Dell. Numerous Dell desktops and laptops were awarded in the competition which attracted over 10,000 participants. The competition was held over a two week period, with the winner ("b0b") being announced on February 15 on Valve's website.[citation needed]
On 15 September, the current version, 1.6, was released.
Condition Zero
Main article: Counter-Strike: Condition Zero
In 2004, Counter-Strike: Condition Zero was released. It contained a single player campaign and bots, as well as other changes.
Culture
Counter Strike is famous for the culture surrounding it, which includes everything from professional gamers and leagues, to excessive cheating and disruptive behavior. Certain professional teams (such as SK Gaming, alternate aTTaX, Team-Avtomat Kalashnikov, mousesports and fnatic) have come to earn a living out of it, while other clans and community based groups neither lose nor earn money via member donations which are self sustaining in return for administrator rights in servers involved in the community.
Legacy
Counter-Strike remains extremely popular to this day. There are currently professional online leagues supporting Counter-Strike, such as the Cyberathlete Amateur League (CAL), and CyberEvolution, a pay-to-play league. Various LAN tournaments are held throughout the world, with the largest being the Cyberathlete Professional League (CPL), the Electronic Sports World Cup (ESWC), the World e-Sports Games (WEG), and the World Cyber Games (WCG). Championship matches in these events are televised with commentary and analysis.
Half-Life and other contemporary games took full advantage of hardware graphics acceleration in the late 1990s, replacing earlier software-rendered games such as Quake. The continued popularity of Counter-Strike has meant that older video cards such as the 3dfx Voodoo3, ATI Rage 128, and Nvidia RIVA TNT2 remain useful.
There have been a multitude of games claimed by their developers, reviewers and fans to be "Counter-Strike killers," but none have seriously been able to dent its overall popularity.[citation needed] Server statistics in 2002 showed that Counter-Strike servers outnumbered their Battlefield, Unreal Tournament 2003 or Quake III first-person shooter counterparts at least 3 to 1.[8][not in citation given]
However, as criticism of Condition Zero showed, the GoldSrc engine has already been surpassed by several generations of newer engines. Even Counter-Strike: Source has been criticized for not progressing the gameplay enough and failing to take full advantage of the Source engine.[9]
Use by the Chinese government
The Chinese government has used Counter-Strike as a tool for tactical training. [10].
Mods and scripts
Though Counter-Strike is itself a mod, it has developed its own community of script writers and mod creators. Some mods add bots, while others remove features of the game, and others create different modes of play. Some of the mods give server administrators more flexible and efficient control over his or her server. "Admin plugins", as they are mostly referred as, have become very popular (see Metamod, AMX Mod and AMX Mod X). There are some mods which affect gameplay heavily, such as Gun Game, where players start with a basic pistol and must score kills to receive better weapons, and Zombie Mod, where one team consists of zombies and must "spread the infection" by killing the other team (using only the knife). There are also the Superhero and Warcraft III mods which mix the first-person gameplay of Counter-Strike with an experience system, allowing a player to become more powerful as they continue to play. There is also a Star Wars mod, where you get a lightsaber instead of a knife, have special abilities according to a starwars character, also receive a rank based on the U.S. military ranks, and the objective is to capture the flags. The game is also highly customizable on the player's end, allowing the user to install or even create their own custom skins, HUDs, sprites, and sound effects, given the proper tools. Also some mods have a feature called rollthedice, where something bad or good happens to you when you type rollthedice.
Cheating
Counter Strike has been a prime target for exploitation by cheaters since its release. In-game, cheating is often referred to as "hacking" in reference to programs or "hax" executed by the user.
Typical cheats are:
* Wallhacks, which allow the player to see through walls. These work by altering the display driver to display objects that are normally obscured, or altering game textures to transparent ones. The only objects seen on the hackers screen are those close by. The server will not send you the characters of the whole map, so you can not see across the whole map.
* Speedhacks, which give the player increased speed. These work by sending false synchronization data to servers.
* No recoil, which keeps the players gun shooting straight on the y axis without a kickback by removing gun physics. No spread is used to make a players gun shoot straight along the x axis.
* Aimbots, which helps the player aim at enemies. These work by moving the player's view to anticipate an enemy's position.
* ESP, which shows textual information about the enemy, such as, health, name, and distance, and also information about weapons lying around the map, which could be missed without the hack
* Barrel hack, which shows a line that depicts where the enemy is looking
* Anti-flash and anti-smoke, which remove the flashbang and smoke grenade effect. This branched off the wall hack.
Valve has implemented an anti-cheat system called Valve Anti-Cheat (VAC). Players cheating on a VAC enabled server risk having their account permanently banned from all VAC secured servers.
With the first version of VAC a ban took force almost instantly after being detected, and the cheater had to wait 2 years to have the account unbanned.[11] Since VAC's second version, cheaters are not banned automatically. Rather, they are banned according to a delayed banning system, and bans are permanent. Many cheats are still not detected by VAC, and often the only effective anti-cheat solution is a human administrator watching an online game. (Some servers implement a vote system, in which case players can call for a vote to kick or ban the cheater.) VAC, while being effective in some ways, has also provided a boost in the purchasing of private cheats. These cheats are updated frequently, as to prevent detection, and are available to those who pay to use them or to those in the community or clan.
Skate Blog
army skating :DHelp for Heavy Skaters - how to not break so many skateboards
Thursday November 13, 2008
I just got an e-mail from the mom of a solid young skater who keeps breaking skateboards. She was wondering what to do - are there tougher, stronger skateboards out there? Is there anything he can do differently?
This is a GREAT question! I myself am a more solid guy - I got into working out back in college, I'm a little tall for a skater, and cookies don't help. I have four ideas to help - read this new skateboarding FAQ, "What should heavy skaters do, to not break so many skateboards?" to get some great insights for you or your kid. There are a few things that the skater can do differently, and there are a couple of companies that make stronger skateboards.
And if you are the heavier skater, reading this, don't get down on yourself! Some great skaters are tall or stocky. There are some huge benefits to being a bigger skater! If you are having a tough time learning to skate, read this other FAQ, "What should big or tall skaters do when learning to skateboard?" And seriously, dude, bigger is better! It can be nice to have some presence to throw around the skatepark. Enjoy being who you are!
If you have any other suggestions to add, or know of any other tough skateboard brands, leave a comment!
* Comments (1)
* Permalink
Skateboarding in the Military
Monday November 10, 2008
Photographer's Name: LCPL Christopher L. ValleeTomorrow is Veteran's Day, and in celebration and honor of our troops, I thought we could talk a little about the rich history that the military has had with skateboarding.
You might be confused. You should be. But, as you can see by this cool photo, the military did once have in mind to actually use skateboards in combat situations. Click the photo to check out a much larger version of the picture at the Defense Visual Information Center. Here's the caption for the photo:
LCPL Chad Codwell, from Baltimore, Maryland, with Charlie Company 1st Battalion 5th Marines, carries an experimental urban combat skateboard which is being used for maneuvering inside buildings in order to detect tripwires and sniper fire. This mission is in direct support of Urban Warrior '99.
Too bad this plan got cut! Man, can you imagine? Honestly, I can't see how riding a skateboard would actually be useful in a combat situation, but if it was, how sick would that be?! War movies would have looked way different ... I'm impressed that our military thinks so outside the box.
Even though Urban Warrior didn't turn out with skateboards after all (as far as WE know ...), I'm stoked that the military was, and is, not anti skateboards and anti skaters. For example, tomorrow there will be a Veterans Day All Military Skateboard Contest in Coronado, California. The link tells you little more than that it exists, and time and location. I bet it'll be fun.
So here's to our veterans! If you are a veteran and a skater, or if you know of other military skateboarding stories or contests, please post a comment below!
By Arlind 'Lennox-_-' Veseli
Dec 3, 2008 05:30
All abaut sk gamingSK Gaming was formed in 1997 as a German Quake clan named Schroet Kommando by seven young people who all lived in the town of Oberhausen, among three brothers: Ralf "Griff" Reichert, Tim "Burke" Reichert and Benjamin "Kane" Reichert, supported by Musa "Kila" Celik, Kristof "Speed" Salwiczek, Carsten "Storch" Kramer and Sven "Ramses" Tümmers.[1] Initially, the clan was called Schroet Kommando; according to Ralf "Griff" Reichert, clan mate Celik (a.k.a. Kila) used to shout "Schrööt!" (literally meaning "shrapnel") when he took the double-barreled shotgun; they decided to incorporate this into their name and named their clan "Schroet Kommando" which translates into English as "Shrapnel Commando". This has been changed and the clan now refers to itself as SK Gaming, stating that this is their name now, and not an abbreviation for the original name.[2]
Initially, the house of the Reichert family was the SK headquarters. At first, Schroet Kommando played mainly Quake, Quake 2 and Quake 3 Arena. SK became one of the first clans to feature an all-female team. A major step forward towards professional gaming was the entry of Andreas "bds" Thorstensson in the early 2000s. He made SK the first clan to charge payment for premium services ("SK Insider", a virtual marketplace where paying members could download demos, mods and add-ons better and earlier than others, talk directly to SK gamers etc.),[3] SK became a Counter-Strike-oriented clan. Their major international successes came when they took the players of the successful Swedish Counter-Strike clan Ninjas in Pyjamas (NiP for short) into their organization. The SK Counter-Strike team have won most of the major international tournaments at least once, and have been a dominant team in the Cyberathlete Professional League. Other SK Gaming teams are also notably successful in their respective games.
On February 1, 2003 SK Gaming became the first club in FPS gaming to contract their players when SK Sweden became contractually bound to the clan.[4] Having begun contracting their players, SK also set other precedents regarding contracts: on May 18, 2004 they were the first team to receive a fee for a player transfer after rivals Team NoA bought SK.swe player Ola "elemeNt" Moum out of his contract.[5]
At the beginning of the 2005 season, the Counter-Strike players decided not to renew their contracts and to re-form Ninjas in Pyjamas, because of the distribution of the prize money and disagreements with the management.[6] However, later some of the original players returned to the club in summer 2005. [6]
The 2006 season brought no successes to the Counter-Strike team. Most notably, the team failed to qualify for the Electronic Sports World Cup, in which Sweden was represented by rivals fnatic and Ninjas in Pyjamas. The team did manage to qualify however for the KODE5 finals, now unsuccessful at beating their two rivals. At the KODE5 finals, they won two matches and lost to team MiBR in the group stages. They then lost to wNv in the single elimination round, placing 5th-8th overall. Success did come for the Quake 4 squad, as Swedish star player Johan "Toxic" Quick managed to win eight out of the ten major tournaments this year, including four out of five World Championships. Also the FIFA 06 squad had a successful year, the team managed to win the prestigious ESL Pro Series twice, and German player hero won the World Cyber Games championship.
Shortly before the release of the Sunwell Plateau in World of Warcraft: The Burning Crusade, SK Gaming gained partnership with Curse, one of the highest-ranked guilds at the time [1]. However, on October 1, 2008, their PvE team was dismissed due to differences in interests and on November 10, it was announced that the PvE team would merge with Nihilum, which was leaving Mousesports as well.[2] [7]On July 28, 2008, SK Gaming dismissed its Call of Duty 4 team. [3]
SK has been dominating the 6.52e dota scene for 2008.
[edit] Business model
As of 2008, SK Gaming is organised as a so-called Gesellschaft mit beschränkter Haftung. The owners of SK Gaming are Andreas "bds" Thorstensson and Alexander "TheSlash" Müller-Rodic, who both work full-time for the clan and are head of further 10 full-time professional SK members. A minority stake is still held by founder Ralf "Griff" Reichert. SK Gaming is sponsored by AMD, ATI, SteelSeries and Adidas, and used to also finance itself by the "SK Insider" zone on their own website, which has not been around for quite sometime. However, according to Rodic, 85% of the clan's funds comes from their sponsors.[8]
[edit] Current roster
[edit] Counter-Strike
* Flag of Sweden Kristoffer "Tentpole" Nordlund
* Flag of Sweden Jimmy "allen" Allén
* Flag of Sweden Dennis "walle" Wallenberg
* Flag of Sweden Robert "RobbaN" Dahlström
* Flag of Sweden Marcus "zet" Sundström
[edit] Counter-Strike Female
* Flag of the United States Alice 'ali' Lew
* Flag of the United States Jane 'janeosaur' Wie
* Flag of the United States Jennifer 'jso' So
* Flag of Canada Lidia 'lidy' Poulin
* Flag of the United States Christine 'potter' Chi
* Flag of the United States Benita 'b^' Novshadian
[edit] Warcraft III
* Flag of South Korea June 'Lyn' Park
* Flag of Germany Daniel 'Miou' Holthuis
* Flag of South Korea Seo Woo 'ReiGn' Kang
* Flag of South Korea Sung Sik 'ReMinD' Kim
* Flag of South Korea Seong Deok 'SoJu' Lee
[edit] DotA Allstars
* Flag of Sweden Jonathan "Loda" Berg (Team Captain)
* Flag of Sweden Alexander "Snow" Nystrand
* Flag of Sweden Tommy "Tompa" Andersson
* Flag of Sweden Mikael "Hailo" Grinsvall
* Flag of Sweden Edvin "KwoM" Börjesson
[edit] World of Warcraft
[edit] European Team
* Flag of Sweden Stefan 'zeksy' Baudin (Team Captain)
* Flag of Sweden Michael 'Dosferra' Tofer
* Flag of Sweden Thomas 'Lomas' Lindmark
* Flag of Sweden Jonas 'Tarde' Jakobsson
* Flag of Sweden Erik 'daimx' Olofsson
* Flag of Sweden Liam 'Steinaz' Steinberg
* Flag of Sweden Andreas 'Zumrok' Östman
* Flag of Turkey Gokhan 'Laflamme' Akinturk
* Flag of Spain Enrick ' Laden ' Viñolas
WCS - Western Connecticut Stars
* Flag of the United StatesFlag of Brazil WCS | hazard Raphael
* Flag of the United StatesFlag of Brazil WCS | gore Tadeu
* Flag of the United StatesFlag of Brazil WCS | yoshi Rodolfo
* Flag of the United StatesFlag of Brazil WCS | kotic Aislan
* Flag of the United StatesFlag of Brazil WCS | crasher Yago
* Flag of the United StatesFlag of Brazil Manager ' Leonardo Pupim
[edit] FIFA
* Flag of Germany Daniel "hero" Schellhase
* Flag of Germany Dennis "styla" Schellhase
* Flag of Austria Mario "mario" Viska
* Flag of Germany Mohamed "TornAdo" El-eter
* Flag of Germany Daniel "eNnu" Ennulat
* Flag of Germany Jannik "Era" Huber
* Flag of Germany Joshua "Kr0ne" Begehr
* Flag of Germany Alwyn "s1lence" Kotze
[edit] Notable alumni
* Flag of Germany Tim "Burke" Reichert
* Flag of Germany Benjamin "Kane" Reichert
* Flag of Germany Musa "Kila" Celik
[edit] Notable achievements
SK has placed in the top 3 at the following major international tournaments:
[edit] Counter-Strike
* 1st * World GameMaster Tournament: @ DreamHack 2008
* 8-16 [King of The Hill]: Winter Championships 2008
* 1st WCG SEC 2007
* 1st CPL: Winter Championships 2005
* 1st CPL: Summer Championships 2005
* 2nd Electronic Sports World Cup 2005
* 2nd CPL: Summer Championships 2004
* 1st CPL: Winter Championships 2003
* 1st CPL: Copenhagen 2003
* 1st CPL: Summer Championships 2003
* 1st CPL: Cannes 2003
* 1st World Cyber Games 2003
* 3rd Electronic Sports World Cup 2003
* 1st CPL: Summer Championships 2002
* 3rd CPL: Winter Championships 2002
[edit] World Championships
* Cyberathlete Professional League (2002, 2003, 2005)
* World Cyber Games (2003)
* World GameMaster Tournament (2008)
[edit] Zonerank Rankings
* Top Ranking: 2nd (03-2008)[9]
* Current Ranking: 2nd[10]
[edit] Deathmatch
* 1st KODE5 Finals 2006 – Johan "Toxic" Quick (Quake 4)
* 1st QuakeCon 2006 – Johan "Toxic" Quick (Quake 4)
* 1st World Series of Video Games Intel Summer Championship 2006 – Johan "Toxic" Quick (Quake 4)
* 2nd World Series of Video Games Sweden 2006 – Johan "Toxic" Quick (Quake 4)
* 1st World Series of Video Games London 2006 – Johan "Toxic" Quick (Quake 4)
* 1st DigitalLife 2006[11] – Johan "Toxic" Quick (Quake 4)
* 1st World Cyber Games 2006[12] – Johan "Toxic" Quick (Quake 4)
* 1st World Series of Video Games Finals 2006 – Johan "Toxic" Quick (Quake 4)
* 2nd 2005 CPL World Tour: Istanbul – Benjamin "zyz" Bohrmann (Painkiller)
* 1st 2005 CPL World Tour: Spain – Stephan "SteLam" Lammert (Painkiller)
* 3rd 2005 CPL World Tour: Brazil – Benjamin "zyz" Bohrmann (Painkiller)
* 3rd Electronic Sports World Cup 2005 – Fox (Quake 3)
* 3rd 2005 CPL World Tour: Sweden – Benjamin "zyz" Bohrmann (Painkiller)
* 3rd 2005 CPL World Tour: United Kingdom – Benjamin "zyz" Bohrmann (Painkiller)
* 2nd CPL 2005 Winter – Johan "Toxic" Quick (Quake 4)
* 3rd Cyberathlete Professional League: Summer 2004 – Stephan "SteLam" Lammert (Painkiller)
* 1st Cyberathlete Professional League: Summer 2004 – Team (Unreal Tournament 2004)
* 2nd Electronic Sports World Cup 2004 – Christian "GitzZz" Hoeck (Unreal Tournament 2004)
* 1st Electronic Sports World Cup 2003 – Christian "GitzZz" Hoeck (Unreal Tournament 2003)
* 3rd World Cyber Games 2001 – Stephan "SteLam" Lammert (Quake 3)
[edit] World Championships
* KODE5 (2006, Quake 4)
* World Cyber Games (2006, Quake 4)
* World Series of Video Games (2006, Quake 4)
* Electronic Sports World Cup (2003, Unreal Tournament)
[edit] Warcraft III
* 2nd ESL Extreme Masters 2007 – Flag of Ukraine Mykhaylo "HoT" Novopashyn
* 1st WCG SEC 2007 – Flag of Ukraine Mykhaylo "HoT" Novopashyn
* 2nd World Series of Videogames, Finals 2006 – Flag of South Korea Jung Hee "Sweet" Chun
* 3rd World Cyber Games 2006 – Flag of Ukraine Mykhaylo "HoT" Novopashyn
* 1st KODE5 2006- Flag of Russia Andrey "Deadman" Sobolev
* 1st World Series of Videogames, China 2006 – Flag of South Korea Jung Hee "Sweet" Chun
* 1st World Series of Videogames, Sweden 2006 – Flag of Russia Andrey "Deadman" Sobolev
* 2nd NGL One Season I 2006 – Team
* 3rd Warcraft 3 Champions League V 2006 – Team
* 1st EuroCup 2005 – Flag of Ukraine Mykhaylo "HoT" Novopashyn
* 3rd CPL Summer 2005 – Flag of Sweden Björn "ElakeDuck" ödman
* 2nd Electronic Sports World Cup 2005 – Flag of Russia Andrey "Deadman" Sobolev
* 3rd ACON5 2005 – Flag of Russia Andrey "Deadman" Sobolev
* 3rd Warcraft 3 Champions League VII 2005 – Team
* 2nd World E-Sport Games I 2005 – Flag of South Korea Tae min "Zacard" Hwang
* 3rd Warcraft 3 Champions League VI 2004 – Team
* 2nd World Cyber Games 2004 – Flag of South Korea Tae min "Zacard" Hwang
* 2nd Electronic Sports World Cup 2004 – Flag of Sweden Fredrik "MaDFroG" Johansson
* 3rd Electronic Sports World Cup 2004 – Flag of Sweden Alborz "HeMaN" Haidarian
* 3rd ACON4 2004 – Flag of South Korea Jung Hee "Sweet" Chun
* 3rd Warcraft 3 Champions League V 2004 – Team
* 1st Blizzard Worldwide Invitational 2004 – Flag of Sweden Fredrik "MaDFroG" Johansson
* 3rd Cyber X Gaming 2004 – Flag of Bulgaria Zdravko "Insomnia" Georgiev
* 1st World Cyber Games 2003 – Flag of Bulgaria Zdravko "Insomnia" Georgiev
* 1st Euro Cyber Games 2003 – Flag of France Antoine "FaTC" Zadri
* 2nd Euro Cyber Games 2003 – Flag of Bulgaria Georgi "Zeerax" Marinov
* 1st Electronic Sports World Cup 2003 – Flag of Sweden Alborz "HeMaN" Haidarian
* 2nd Electronic Sports World Cup 2003 – Flag of Sweden Fredrik "MaDFroG" Johansson
* 3rd Clikarena 2003 – Flag of Bulgaria Zdravko "Insomnia" Georgiev
* 2nd CPL Cannes 2003 – Flag of Bulgaria Zdravko "Insomnia" Georgiev
* 2nd CPL Oslo 2002 – Flag of Sweden Sven "Kovax" Running
* 3rd CPL Oslo 2002 – Flag of Sweden Fahad "DsCo" Hamid
[edit] World Championships
* KODE5 (2006)
* Blizzard Worldwide Invitational (2004)
* World Cyber Games (2003)
* Electronic Sports World Cup (2003)
[edit] World of Warcraft
* 1st european kill of Brutallus
* 1st world kill of Felmyst
* 2nd world kill of Eredar Twins
* 1st world kill of M'uru
* 1st world kill of Kil'jaeden – (final boss of The Burning Crusade.)
[edit] External links
* Official SK-Gaming Website
* SK endorses NVidia
[edit] References
1. ^ Die Killer aus dem Kinderzimmer, focus.de (German)
2. ^ Clans @ eSports: Schroet Kommando - Eine Erfolgsgeschichte, giga.de (German)
3. ^ Interview with Andreas "bds" Thorstensson
4. ^ brunk leaves SK.Swe, SpawN joins for WCG, ukterrorist.com
5. ^ Ablösesummen im eSport? ElemeNt macht's vor!, poerk.com (German)
6. ^ a b SK.swe is back, giga.de (German)
7. ^ "Ensidia". Mark Laursen.
8. ^ Spieler-Firma gründen: Das Unternehmen Clan, tomshardware.com
9. ^ ZoneRank
10. ^ ZoneRank
11. ^ "DigitalLife 2006 Final Standings" – GGL
12. ^ "WCG 2006 Invitational Quake4 All Stars – Final Results" – WCG
History of Cs
By Arlind 'Lennox-_-' Veseli
Nov 21, 2008 19:20
Counter Stirke D:Counter-Strike is a first-person shooter in which players join either the terrorist or counter-terrorist team (or becomes a spectator). Each team attempts to complete their mission objective and/or eliminate the opposing team. Each round starts with the two teams spawning simultaneously, usually at opposite ends of the map from each other. A player can choose to play as one of eight different default character models (four for each side, although Counter-Strike: Condition Zero added two extra models, bringing the total to ten). Players are generally given a few seconds before the round begins (known as "freeze time") to prepare and buy equipment, during which they cannot attack or walk/move (a player can still take damage, having the player drop from a certain height during freeze time was the only way somebody could control the players starting "HP"). They can return to the buy area within a set amount of time to buy more equipment (some custom maps included neutral "buy zones" that could be used by both teams). Once the round has ended, surviving players retain their equipment for use in the next round; players who were killed begin the next round with the basic default starting equipment.
Screenshot of a player using a Desert Eagle on the map de_dust in the original Counter-Strike (left) and Counter-Strike: Source (right).
Standard monetary bonuses are awarded for winning a round, losing a round, killing an enemy, being the first to instruct a hostage to follow, rescuing a hostage or planting the bomb.
The scoreboard displays team scores in addition to statistics for each player: name, kills, deaths, and ping (in milliseconds). The scoreboard also indicates whether a player is dead, carrying the bomb (on bomb maps), or is the VIP (on assassination maps), although information on players on the opposing team is hidden from a player until his/her death, as this information can be important.
Killed players become "spectators" for the duration of the round; they cannot change their names until they spawn (come alive) again, text chat cannot be sent to or received from live players; and voice chat can only be received from live players and not sent to them (unless the cvar sv_alltalk is set to 1). Spectators are generally able to watch the rest of the round from multiple selectable views, although some servers disable some of these views to prevent dead players from relaying information about living players to their teammates through alternative media (most notably voice in the case of Internet cafes and Voice over IP programs such as TeamSpeak or Ventrilo). This technique is known as "ghosting".
Distribution and service
Sierra
When Counter-Strike was published by Sierra Entertainment/Vivendi Universal Games, it was bundled with Team Fortress Classic, Opposing Force multiplayer, and the Wanted, Redemption and Firearms mods."[4]
Steam and the WON gaming service
Counter-Strike was originally played online through the WON gaming service, which was shut down in 2004,[5] forcing players to switch to Steam. The non-Steam version of Counter-Strike (version 1.5) can still be downloaded from sites such as FilePlanet.[6] Due to the closure of WON, part of the player community responded by creating their own WON network, dubbed WON2.
Addition of in-game advertising
In March 2007, Valve implemented mandatory advertisements through Steam in official maps and in the game's GUI overhead. Customers have expressed frustration with the ads, including an over 200 page thread on Valve's official forums, saying that they violate original terms of service and distract from the game.[7] The thread was later deleted by an unknown moderator.
Counter-Strike Online
Main article: Counter-Strike Online
As of February 2008, Counter-Strike Online is only available in South Korea and is now in open beta test. It is being developed by Nexon Corporation with oversight from license-holder Valve Corporation, and is an attempt to increase market share of Valve's games in the Korean gaming market.
Version history
On 24 March 1999[verification needed] Planet Half-Life opened its Counter-Strike section. Within two weeks, the site had received 10,000 hits.
On June 18, 1999, the first public beta of Counter-Strike was released, followed by numerous further "beta" releases.
On April 12, 2000, Valve announced that the Counter-Strike developers and Valve had teamed up. Counter-Strike 1.0 was released around Christmas 2000.
On January 25, 2003, a world wide competition was held by Valve and hosted by Dell. Numerous Dell desktops and laptops were awarded in the competition which attracted over 10,000 participants. The competition was held over a two week period, with the winner ("b0b") being announced on February 15 on Valve's website.[citation needed]
On 15 September, the current version, 1.6, was released.
Condition Zero
Main article: Counter-Strike: Condition Zero
In 2004, Counter-Strike: Condition Zero was released. It contained a single player campaign and bots, as well as other changes.
Culture
Counter Strike is famous for the culture surrounding it, which includes everything from professional gamers and leagues, to excessive cheating and disruptive behavior. Certain professional teams (such as SK Gaming, alternate aTTaX, Team-Avtomat Kalashnikov, mousesports and fnatic) have come to earn a living out of it, while other clans and community based groups neither lose nor earn money via member donations which are self sustaining in return for administrator rights in servers involved in the community.
Legacy
Counter-Strike remains extremely popular to this day. There are currently professional online leagues supporting Counter-Strike, such as the Cyberathlete Amateur League (CAL), and CyberEvolution, a pay-to-play league. Various LAN tournaments are held throughout the world, with the largest being the Cyberathlete Professional League (CPL), the Electronic Sports World Cup (ESWC), the World e-Sports Games (WEG), and the World Cyber Games (WCG). Championship matches in these events are televised with commentary and analysis.
Half-Life and other contemporary games took full advantage of hardware graphics acceleration in the late 1990s, replacing earlier software-rendered games such as Quake. The continued popularity of Counter-Strike has meant that older video cards such as the 3dfx Voodoo3, ATI Rage 128, and Nvidia RIVA TNT2 remain useful.
There have been a multitude of games claimed by their developers, reviewers and fans to be "Counter-Strike killers," but none have seriously been able to dent its overall popularity.[citation needed] Server statistics in 2002 showed that Counter-Strike servers outnumbered their Battlefield, Unreal Tournament 2003 or Quake III first-person shooter counterparts at least 3 to 1.[8][not in citation given]
However, as criticism of Condition Zero showed, the GoldSrc engine has already been surpassed by several generations of newer engines. Even Counter-Strike: Source has been criticized for not progressing the gameplay enough and failing to take full advantage of the Source engine.[9]
Use by the Chinese government
The Chinese government has used Counter-Strike as a tool for tactical training. [10].
Mods and scripts
Though Counter-Strike is itself a mod, it has developed its own community of script writers and mod creators. Some mods add bots, while others remove features of the game, and others create different modes of play. Some of the mods give server administrators more flexible and efficient control over his or her server. "Admin plugins", as they are mostly referred as, have become very popular (see Metamod, AMX Mod and AMX Mod X). There are some mods which affect gameplay heavily, such as Gun Game, where players start with a basic pistol and must score kills to receive better weapons, and Zombie Mod, where one team consists of zombies and must "spread the infection" by killing the other team (using only the knife). There are also the Superhero and Warcraft III mods which mix the first-person gameplay of Counter-Strike with an experience system, allowing a player to become more powerful as they continue to play. There is also a Star Wars mod, where you get a lightsaber instead of a knife, have special abilities according to a starwars character, also receive a rank based on the U.S. military ranks, and the objective is to capture the flags. The game is also highly customizable on the player's end, allowing the user to install or even create their own custom skins, HUDs, sprites, and sound effects, given the proper tools. Also some mods have a feature called rollthedice, where something bad or good happens to you when you type rollthedice.
Cheating
Counter Strike has been a prime target for exploitation by cheaters since its release. In-game, cheating is often referred to as "hacking" in reference to programs or "hax" executed by the user.
Typical cheats are:
* Wallhacks, which allow the player to see through walls. These work by altering the display driver to display objects that are normally obscured, or altering game textures to transparent ones. The only objects seen on the hackers screen are those close by. The server will not send you the characters of the whole map, so you can not see across the whole map.
* Speedhacks, which give the player increased speed. These work by sending false synchronization data to servers.
* No recoil, which keeps the players gun shooting straight on the y axis without a kickback by removing gun physics. No spread is used to make a players gun shoot straight along the x axis.
* Aimbots, which helps the player aim at enemies. These work by moving the player's view to anticipate an enemy's position.
* ESP, which shows textual information about the enemy, such as, health, name, and distance, and also information about weapons lying around the map, which could be missed without the hack
* Barrel hack, which shows a line that depicts where the enemy is looking
* Anti-flash and anti-smoke, which remove the flashbang and smoke grenade effect. This branched off the wall hack.
Valve has implemented an anti-cheat system called Valve Anti-Cheat (VAC). Players cheating on a VAC enabled server risk having their account permanently banned from all VAC secured servers.
With the first version of VAC a ban took force almost instantly after being detected, and the cheater had to wait 2 years to have the account unbanned.[11] Since VAC's second version, cheaters are not banned automatically. Rather, they are banned according to a delayed banning system, and bans are permanent. Many cheats are still not detected by VAC, and often the only effective anti-cheat solution is a human administrator watching an online game. (Some servers implement a vote system, in which case players can call for a vote to kick or ban the cheater.) VAC, while being effective in some ways, has also provided a boost in the purchasing of private cheats. These cheats are updated frequently, as to prevent detection, and are available to those who pay to use them or to those in the community or clan.
Skate Blog
By Arlind 'Lennox-_-' Veseli
Nov 19, 2008 20:37
army skating :DHelp for Heavy Skaters - how to not break so many skateboards
Thursday November 13, 2008
I just got an e-mail from the mom of a solid young skater who keeps breaking skateboards. She was wondering what to do - are there tougher, stronger skateboards out there? Is there anything he can do differently?
This is a GREAT question! I myself am a more solid guy - I got into working out back in college, I'm a little tall for a skater, and cookies don't help. I have four ideas to help - read this new skateboarding FAQ, "What should heavy skaters do, to not break so many skateboards?" to get some great insights for you or your kid. There are a few things that the skater can do differently, and there are a couple of companies that make stronger skateboards.
And if you are the heavier skater, reading this, don't get down on yourself! Some great skaters are tall or stocky. There are some huge benefits to being a bigger skater! If you are having a tough time learning to skate, read this other FAQ, "What should big or tall skaters do when learning to skateboard?" And seriously, dude, bigger is better! It can be nice to have some presence to throw around the skatepark. Enjoy being who you are!
If you have any other suggestions to add, or know of any other tough skateboard brands, leave a comment!
* Comments (1)
* Permalink
Skateboarding in the Military
Monday November 10, 2008
Photographer's Name: LCPL Christopher L. ValleeTomorrow is Veteran's Day, and in celebration and honor of our troops, I thought we could talk a little about the rich history that the military has had with skateboarding.
You might be confused. You should be. But, as you can see by this cool photo, the military did once have in mind to actually use skateboards in combat situations. Click the photo to check out a much larger version of the picture at the Defense Visual Information Center. Here's the caption for the photo:
LCPL Chad Codwell, from Baltimore, Maryland, with Charlie Company 1st Battalion 5th Marines, carries an experimental urban combat skateboard which is being used for maneuvering inside buildings in order to detect tripwires and sniper fire. This mission is in direct support of Urban Warrior '99.
Too bad this plan got cut! Man, can you imagine? Honestly, I can't see how riding a skateboard would actually be useful in a combat situation, but if it was, how sick would that be?! War movies would have looked way different ... I'm impressed that our military thinks so outside the box.
Even though Urban Warrior didn't turn out with skateboards after all (as far as WE know ...), I'm stoked that the military was, and is, not anti skateboards and anti skaters. For example, tomorrow there will be a Veterans Day All Military Skateboard Contest in Coronado, California. The link tells you little more than that it exists, and time and location. I bet it'll be fun.
So here's to our veterans! If you are a veteran and a skater, or if you know of other military skateboarding stories or contests, please post a comment below!
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