"Black Ice, Ice T, (mumble) navigator. **** Soulja Boy. This kid singlehandlely killed hip hop. Soulja Boy, lemmie talk about Soulja Boy. I know you're young enough to be my kid, but you singlehandlely killed hip hop. You know what I'm sayin'. I can't **** from it. That **** is such garbage. You can't do that, man. We came all the way from...(Stopped by Soulja Boy)" - Ice T. [Youtube Source: Soulja Boy's Responce]

I just watched an old episode of One Nation Under Hip Hop [July 2nd] from Mun2, a Spanish channel filled with music from the United States and Latin America. As a proud listener to hip hop, rap, gangster, and Reggaeton, I agree with this statement, accept with the nonstop cursing.

Does Soulja Boy know how to rap without saying "YAAAAHHHH" or "JOOOOO"? Sure, he adds a dance to the song, but people like Soulja Boy make nonrap listeners think that rap is all garbage. I personally don't listen to either artist, but of course I side with Ice-T on this debate.

(Click for video)

holamun2.com had a poll on this debate with the following question.

Which one of these statements do you agree with?
A. Soulja Boy is the death of hip hop.
B. Ice-T is looking way back into the game.
C. Some of these artists have too much time on their hands.

I wish I could find the results, but they are no where to be found on the website.

The topic has been closed for all submissions of Gamespace banners of June 2008, and now Gamespace judges will see which banners will move on to the final round of judging. Gamespace banners are banners that are placed underneath the title, game creator, and date of release of video games on the Gamespot website. Many banners found on this site are truly amazing, and I admire the creator's work.

I looked through the topic to see what other people have came up with. The second page of submissions was the one that caught my eye. One user thought it would be okay to use one of my submissions.

Here's my submission for Twelve Sky, a game hosted by Aeria Games. I used one of the wallpaper artwork from the Aeria Games website. I added scan lines into the background that you can clearly see.

Here's the other user's submission. For this banner, the only thing that has changed is the quality and more blank space. You can't really see the scan lines, can you? Wow, even the file name has changed slightly, TwelveSky2.jpg. My banner was TwelveSky.jpg, not a second copy.

For some monitors, you may not be able to see the difference, so I will save you the horror of squinting! Here's how I really know it's my design: I'm still looking up different pen tablet PC's to feed my desire of graphic art and drawing, so I can't be perfect with a mouse in Photoshop.

When I was working on this Twelve Sky banner, I believe the time was 3 AM. I wanted to finish this banner because I knew in the morning, I would not have the feeling of using Photoshop, so I would never finish the banner. (The blue lines are guide lines where tabs and words are placed, and the white circle is the detail area. If you clickage the pictures, you can see the whole pictar.) As you can see, I missed a few parts of the pole/staff/sword/whatever! I did not take the time to zoom in on the artwork, and use a small pixel erase. In the other user's banner, you can clearly see my mistake. (Wewt wewt! Chica's mistake saves her in the long run!)

Still not impressed? Chica has inserted her banner into the other user's banner. It fits perfectly. =)

I can truly say, case closed. Today is the 4th of July, a happy day to celebrate the United States independence, but instead, I find insulting topics on the Off Topic forum and my precious effort stolen.

Meh, I get to see fireworks, and my mother got me more Mountain Dew: Supernova. Yeaaaaah. So not all of it's bad.

Nexon has currently released a new game that will appeal to a wider audience of gamers. The first person shooter, Combat Arms, is a game in which you play deathmatches, free for all, or planting the bomb. The more kills you earn, the more experience points you earn. You also get a small boost of experience points if your team wins.

I found out about this game from a gaming forum called OnRPG. A topic was created in the General section called Nexon's Combat Arms. At first, I thought, Nexon is creating a FPS? I have always known Nexon has a cute-Anime-type of company. I used to play Maplestory until I reached level 24, and Nexon did not seem to care about hackers and flamers. I visited the site: combatarms.nexon.com, and I watched the trailer and looked at the screenshots. The game seemed like a free version of Battlefield 2 and a Warrock ripoff. I was wrong about the ripoff.

I downloaded the game, installed it, and loaded it up. When I came to character creation screen, I was able to select four different characters. I chose the smexiest guy out of the four (I believe it was the first one on the left).

I had 9,000 GP (Game Points?) in my account, and I bought a few 7-day items. A vest that increased my health and armor by 10%, a new gun with extra ammo and a scope, and a cute red veteran's hat with a microphone attached. I was ready to kick some noob's ass!

Noobs is my next detail of this game. This game is full of noobs who do not know how to shoot quick. I entered my first deathmatch map, Junk Flea, and started to take out players with head shots left and right. (Most of them were swearing, and since I created my account with my real age, every curse word is censored with **.) Thankfully, the leader of the server turned off friendly fire because I kept hearing the same phrase coming from my character over and over. "Watch your ****ing fire!" I start laughing like a maniac because this game is so easy! Did all MMO players transfer over to this game?

There are some huge problems in this game. Even though this is Open Beta, community and bug issues need to be fixed. One community problem is that in the middle of a match, if one team is losing, that team will quit until the match is 8 on 3. One suggestion for this problem is to implement a system that would pause or restart the match if teams are uneven. Another problem that I am having is laggers. I usually see players skipping around or not moving at all. The question I always ask myself is, Am I lagging? Maybe a ping system might help one see laggers? One bug issue I am experiencing is spawning with another teammate in the same location. Usually the other player needs to move because I cannot. This can be solved by adding more spawn points. The maximum players one server can hold is 16 (8 per team). I do not think adding more spawn points is hard.

I think Combat Arms is a great game, and can have much potential if effort is put into management of hackers, misbehaviors, and bugs. This game is a fast pace shooter like Return to Castle Wolfenstein, and a realistic shooter like Battlefield 2. I would recommend this game to shooter fans.

I subscribe to LifeHacker Photography RSS Feed, and they have recently made a new post. A great video called 101 Photoshop Tips in 5 Minutes. This video includes music he sings himself. The video is a mixture of learning and rock and role. The main tip that struck out to me the most was:

Ctrl+Alt+U brings up last Hue/Saturation settings.

The method I was using was saving the Hue/Saturation to a file, and opening the file when I wanted to use the same settings on a different layer. This saves my wasted time! Thank you to Deke and his amazing way of teaching others. I personally do not like watching videos of Photoshop tutorials because the voice is monotone, the video is really tiny, and the teachings are slow.

(Click the picture to direct you to the site)

Note- If you want to learn all or most of the tips, I recommend watching this video over and over.

Aeria Games is gaming company that hosts free to play games, mostly from Korea. Games such as Project Torque, Dream of Mirror Online, 12Sky and Last Chaos, and also some closed betas are supported.

I play the game, Dream of Mirror Online from the start of Closed Beta to the present. When the Cash Shop was first introduced, many items were available for purchase, and you can choose what you wanted.

I did not want spend money for some Aeria Points, the currency used to buy items, to use in the Cash Shop because many players were having trouble receiving Aeria Points when they placed their purchase. Those players were constantly sending emails to contact support and no help was given. I did not want to be one of those players who ended up with no Aeria Points, but wasted money.

I, instead, entered contests on the forums that gave free Aeria Points. In one contest, I was one of the lucky players, along with nineteen others, who received 1,000 AP (Aeria Points) for having the best profile. I also did other contests that gave me 100 AP each.

In total, until now, I have 1,200 AP. I want to buy many items, but most of these items are in Mystery Chests. As I said before, when the Cash Shop was introduced, many items were available, but now, all items that are desired are kept in a Mystery Chest. The Mystery Chest is a way to gamble your luck for receiving the item wanted. This raises Aeria Games's profits because players will keep buying chests to grab the item desired.

The two items I want are the Auburn Hair Dye and the Camoflauge Outift. The hair dye is in the chest, but the Camo outfit is not released in the Item Mall. However, the Camo outfit was released in a certain promotion which brings me to Aeria Games's next money profit scam.

If you purchase [three] Reset Skills (each 500 AP) you will receive a Non Tradable Camouflage Costume!!

A Camouflage Outfit for $15?! The common price for a Permenant, Non-Tradable Outfit is $9. I skipped this promotion with frustration. Aeria Games does not care about their players. Dream of Mirror Online is a free game, but if you need to gamble your money to try to obtain the item you want, then there is a problem. Many other DOMO players feel the same way and have made a stand to boycott Mystery Chests.

I leave you with one players' quote.

I don't mind item malls. I think it's cool, but Aeria runs it like a friggin casino.. - DarksunG