When Halo 2 came out in 2004, it was a watershed moment in videogaming for me. The culmination of a sequel to one of my favorite games, but with online play you say??? It was just an electrifying time to be playing games at the time, and checking my game’s stats on halo.bungie.net was an… Continue reading Halo: Data Evolved
Space Engine Zen
Space Engine is an absolutely jaw dropping space exploration experience for free. Being able to see what a lunar eclipse looks like from the surface of the moon, explore the surface of Pluto using the latest observations from the New Horizons spacecraft, and seeing accurately modeled solar systems for exoplanets are just the tip of… Continue reading Space Engine Zen
2020 top 10s
Hot on the heels of my long neglected 2019 top 10’s list is my list for the long year of 2020: Top 6 books (out of 7 read): This year I have a lot of digital games played because pandemics don’t play well with in person board game activities. Top 10 Steam games (out of… Continue reading 2020 top 10s
2019 top 10s
I had been sitting on a top 10 ranking of things all last year and decided to post it now, if I was going to post a 2020 top 10 list as well. So here’s the top books and games I enjoyed for 2019: Top 5 books out of 13: Top 10 digital games… Continue reading 2019 top 10s
Recommendation Systems with Python: steam_augury
*** For those just interested in the code and running it, you can find it off my github here: https://github.com/ScottBurger/steam_augury I’ve been interested in recommendation systems for a while and I thought I’d try my hand at a new implementation in Python. My previous version, built in R, leveraged lots of data pulled from… Continue reading Recommendation Systems with Python: steam_augury
Attribution Modelling with Google BigQuery and R: Credit Where Credit is Due!
Tonight I had another great speaking opportunity, this time at the lecture series Machine Learning for Enterprise Operations hosted by Grid Dynamics: The slides presented on how to use Google BigQuery with R to see how marketing channel attribution credit is shifted through the use of various statistical models can be found below: … Continue reading Attribution Modelling with Google BigQuery and R: Credit Where Credit is Due!
Time to buy an AC unit in Seattle yet?
Yesterday was hot. Like really hot. According to reports, a new hottest June 12th in Seattle was recorded at 95 degrees (35 C). This is roughly how it felt walking outside briefly yesterday for me: Many in other parts of the US where it regularly gets that hot in the summer will laugh from… Continue reading Time to buy an AC unit in Seattle yet?
How About a Nice Game of Chess?
I had the fantastic opportunity to give a talk about the history of chess computation before a showing of the indie film Computer Chess. This was done in collaboration with Science on Screen, a series that hosts lectures related to a topic before a science-themed movie. For those interested, the slides from the talk can be… Continue reading How About a Nice Game of Chess?
How Interested In This Thing Am I Really?
It’s obvious that my previous blog posts show that I’m a little obsessed with tabletop board games at the moment. Like all people waist deep in their hobby, I’ve been having to steady myself multiple times in the Amazon shopping cart thinking “hmm…am I really interested in this game, or is it just that I’m… Continue reading How Interested In This Thing Am I Really?
A War of the Ring (with data)
War of the Ring is about as close to getting the entire Lord of the Rings experience in a single board game. It’s a masterpiece of theme and well designed game play mechanics where there’s never a dull moment. For such an epic game, I’m dedicating an entire blog post to the first over-the-board play… Continue reading A War of the Ring (with data)
