Author: Ether Sol'Rac

Day 1 Tumblr Dump

Alright so you may have noticed that some of the posts up till now have had some odd text with the wrong dates. That’s because up till now all the posts have just been copy/pastes of the content I already posted on Tumblr. That means from now on all content will be fresh as I move forward to make this the official home of Ethereal Geekdom. I’ll likely post copies of my new posts on Tumblr as well until that ship finally sinks but you can be sure to find all the content on this site. Here’s hoping to a bright future of geeking out together.

Minor Mixer Modification

This is a rather small post, but the idea came to me rather recently. For anyone not familiar with Mixer, it’s a streaming platform like twitch that is owned by Microsoft and has been slowly gaining popularity. Recently they introduced what they’re referring to as “season 2” for their content. What this means is that for their partner programs, they introduced a system that generates revenue for streamers that if a partnered stream receives spark interactions in their stream chat. (sparks are earned for watching streams and can be used to spawn fun effect and stickers in the chat.) While this is certainly a great improvement and a neat way to support streamers, it does leave a gap for those who haven’t achieved partner status yet.

I can understand that they simply can’t hand out revenue to every streamer that receives spark interactions, so I recommend a different path. While mixer is much less competitive than the current twitch environment, it can still be a challenge to get noticed as you make your attempt to reach partner status, so perhaps sparks could be used to bolster viewability. Currently there is an up and coming section on the main site but ultimately it is a little hard to understand how this system selects who gets to be shown. My suggestion would be to introduce a “hot spot” system in that the more sparks a non-partnered streamer receives, the more likely they are to be seen in another division of streams. This way viewers can donate sparks to lesser known streams and help their favorite streamers receive the attention they otherwise wouldn’t get and thus aid them on the path to becoming proper partners.

While it may not be perfect, I feel as though it could be a possible improvement to help get new dedicated streamers started and give the community an extra tool to support their favorite content creators. If you have any of your own ideas or suggestions, then feel free to add them to the comment section.

N7 Day Sketch

Happy N7 day everyone! To celebrate I figured I’d try my hand at drawing Jane Shepard (a.k.a. FemShep). As my favorite video game series of all time I couldn’t resist. Feel free to share your favorite mass effect moments in the comments or talk about what you hope to see from the series in the future.

For me I actually hope to see more from the Andromeda spin-off. I know the game is far from perfect but I actually really enjoyed my time playing it and I would love to see them either release the quarian arc DLC or a new game altogether. Other than that I wouldn’t say no to a trilogy remake/remaster.

Fortnite Cube Event

Screenshot of my character during the fortnite event today. I may not be a fan of battle Royale games in general, but the events in fortnite really are something special. While these one time events may be somewhat of an inconvenience to players who simply can’t take the time to participate, it’s still an interesting mechanic that I kind of hope to see other developers aspire to create.

Ben 10 Sketch

Drawing I did of Ben 10 from the original series. (The original image I got the design from on the left.) it’s not perfect but it’s definetly the best thing I’ve managed to draw so far so I’m still proud. I might go back and try to add more details like a full background so I can make it into a cool wallpaper for my phone, but for now I feel like I can share it as is.

What Ifs #5: Can’t Stop the Music

Odds are you’ve seen at least one musical or musical number. They’re fun, spontaneous, and logically they pretty much make absolutely no sense whatsoever, but we tend to love them anyway. Even if you try to avoid them these little gems tend to make their way into some unlikely programs. This lead me to my current what if.

The spirits of musicals can’t be stopped! To appease them you have to choose one show or game to get its own dedicated musical episode or level. Bonus geek points if you can either come up with a crazy enough scenario for the musicals to happen or even imagine some of the things the characters could sing about.

for me I think I’d pick Doctor Who to receive its own musical episode. The Tardis crew would land on a planet or galactic entertainment center where everyone speaks in song and they find themselves getting dragged along by the crazy choreography and music. And just to make the entire thing more epic, the enemies could be the cybermen who spend the episode singing with synchronized auto-tune voices and electronic music in the background. 

What Ifs #4: Frankenstein’s Reboot

We all have shows, games, and fandoms that we wish we could bring back from the dead. Maybe they never got a chance to finish properly or maybe there’s just nothing like it out there now and you feel like it’d make a spectacular comeback to fill the void. So this lead me to this particular what if scenario.

You have now been given the chance to bring back any finished/canceled show/movie/game franchise back from the grave. The catch? You must combine it with one or more other canceled media to bring your new Frankenstein’s monster reboot to life.

I think if I had the opportunity I’d probably go crazy and combine Danny Phantom, Kim Possible, Ben 10 (alien force), Generator Rex, and American Dragon: Jake Long all into one epic avengers type team up show that has them working against all of the major threats to earth, both supernatural or extraterrestrial.

What Ifs #3: A Particular Set of Skills

So here’s a quick one in honor of National Video Game Day.

If you could use the set of powers/skills/gameplay of one game for any games you play, then what would you choose and why?

As tempting as it may be to choose something like the Doom Slayer or Kratos to just go on a rampage through normally difficult games, I think I’d actually choose my Splatoon inkling for my one set. The idea of laying down turf and using ink to do tuff like scale walls or stealth through levels (if a cardboard box or barrel can work then I don’t think NPCs will care about paint on the ground) just sounds unique and cool to me. Plus I like the idea of an inkling stealing clothes from the different worlds they go to so can they add to their style and “freshness.”