Welcome to FittsWorld!
"Serving the internet for over a decade"

FittsWorld has moved!!   Please update your FittsWorld bookmark to http://fittsworld.home.comcast.net/.

FittsWorld Internet Theme Park is a personal website devoted to computer games and other recreational activities.  This site began as a project to learn HTML, and soon got out of hand.  The "theme park" features individual content modules ("attractions") that were developed as independent projects.  Many of these attractions are timeless monuments to activities that have captured my interest (and free time) over the years.  The attractions now have a common interface and layout, but a few special pages have been preserved in their original state.

Please start your tour of the park by entering the attraction of your choice from the site map on the left, or select an item of interest from the classic attractions menu on the right.  The body of this page contains general information about the history and content of the site.  We hope that you enjoy your visit to FittsWorld, and please follow all safety rules.

Warning:  FittsWorld contains high-speed adventure attractions designed to be
viewed with a version 5+ browser at 1024x768 resolution and 16-bit color.
Management is not responsible for injury and/or incidental damages caused
by the use of viewing equipment that is obsolete or improperly installed.

FittsWorld News & Events Message Board
This site was last updated on August 1, 2007

FittsWorld's Tenth Anniversary!!!
The park first opened for business on June 1, 1997.  I never dreamed that it would still be around ten years later, or that it would have entertained over 250,000 unique visitors.  Thanks to our friends who helped with construction and/or content over the years, some of whom receive special mention at the bottom of this page.

Site Updates
The acquisition of the Houston Time-Warner cable market by Comcast caused FittsWorld to pack up and make a hasty move to new digs.  We are used to this by now, since the webmaster has always been too cheap to pay rent on a permanent location.  I have included a paragraph a little further down the page entitled "Best Of FittsWorld" to assist you in finding your way around the park.  First though, a few updates about other topics...

Music Gadgets
You might remember last season's cliff-hanger episode where our hero discovered portable music devices.  The hobby has become an obsession (what else is new) and the digital music library has now grown to over 3,000 songs.  The audiophile in me re-emerged from its two-decade hibernation, and I began to research ways to improve the sound quality of the iPod.  Unfortunately, in my world, research usually leads to spending. :-)

In the process, I discovered a place called Head-Fi.  I should have known what was coming when I saw that the regulars welcome newcomers by saying, "Welcome to Head-Fi, sorry for your wallet".  My simple iPod was soon expanded into what we now refer to as a portable rig by the addition of a battery-powered headphone amplifier called "The Hornet".  I also purchased a set of Sennheiser HD600 headphones for critical listening at home.  The improvement in sound quality is quite significant (not just louder, but better), and the geek factor is off the charts.  I can't really do the subject justice in the space allotted here, so I will direct you to this Head-Fi forum post entitled New Hornet! where I discuss the upgrades at length (complete with pictures).

Current Games
I refer to this quote from last year: "It appears that my days of playing MMORPG games (Everquest II & City Of Heroes) are declining to an occasional spurt."  Errr... guess not.

I decided that 9 million people couldn't all be wrong, so I gave World Of Warcraft a try.  More than one year later, I am still at it.  I have a character that I enjoy playing (Sevihn's stats can be seen here) in a game world that suits my playing style.  The quests are fairly short duration and a solo player can advance easily without joining a guild or wasting time trying to find a pickup group.  I also discovered that Player vs. Player (PvP) action can be fun in small doses, and when I get beat up I can always call my big brother (in-law) to bail me out.  There are no new games on the horizon that interest me, so I expect to continue playing WoW for the foreseeable future.  I don't have as much time to devote to gaming these days, so the content in one of these massive online games can keep me occupied forever.

Computer News
Nothing new on this subject since my 1995 Dell XPS gen 1 machine stills runs my two primary applications (iTunes and the afore-mentioned World Of Warcraft) just fine....

Best Of FittsWorld
I am no longer changing and updating this site on a frequent basis.  I am quite happy with the format now, and I have no interest in learning new HTML techniques.  The content of the BG & Diablo pages is no longer changing, and many of the other pages are finished products in their current form.  This doesn't mean that the site is dead; quite the contrary.  However, I sometimes go for months without an update if there is nothing new to add.  Don't be alarmed, the park has always been designed to function completely unattended :-)

I have written a brief description of my favorite FittsWorld attractions below, in order to assist any first-time visitors who want to go directly to the best content on this site.  This is only my opinion of course, and your mileage may vary, so please feel free to click all of the links!  The most popular attractions probably consumed the majority of my time, but they are not my favorites and probably don't represent my best original work either.  I prefer the attractions listed below, in no particular order.

The BG and Diablo pages are still of interest to people who are just discovering those games, but I believe that my Diary of a Gamer page is a better place for the casual game fan to visit.  This page is a chronology of one gamer's path through some of the best games of the past 25 years, and I am sure that you will find some of your favorites listed among them.

I am always excited when the Baseball Simulation page generates an e-mail.  You would be surprised how many people are still searching for that perfect simulator, or want to know where to get a copy of the old games (sorry, but I don't know), or just want to tell me how similar their story is to mine.  If you have any interest in baseball and/or are over 40, you will probably like this page.  Please don't ask where to get that Earl Weaver Baseball code wheel though, because I really don't know!

A few years ago, my son and I produced a page, called Eric's Sports Den, to showcase my baseball card collection.  Eric gained an appreciation for the rich history of baseball during this project, and we spent some quality time together in the process.  Eric included statistical highlights of the player's career in his content, and I provided some insight into why I chose to collect that particular card or player.  It was a lot of fun to do, and I am still quite proud of the result.

And, last but definitely not least... Once upon a time, my daughter had a page to showcase her art for family members who were far away.  Alas, she grew older and had no time for such a project, and the site was soon covered with digital dust.  One day, I decided to resurrect it in a manner of speaking, and The S.Fitts Gallery was re-born in a timeless format that allowed me to wrap a new story around the old content.  I still think that it is one of my best ideas.

FittsWorld Facts and Figures
A bunch of other stuff at the bottom of the page

FittsWorld Internet Theme Park is located on the World Wide Web.  The park occupies over 10 square mb of cyberspace, and operates completely unattended 24 hours per day, 365 days per year.  FittsWorld is proud to continue its policy of FREE ADMISSION with Children Half Price!!  We encourage all patrons to place a comment card in the mailbox before exiting, and don't forget your free Slushee!

A brief site history
FittsWorld opened June 1, 1997 to a small but happy crowd.  The park doubled in size in May 1998 when it moved from AT&T WorldNet to PDQ.net, but maintained the original layout until the spring of 1999.  The park entrance (you are here) has been renovated several times since, and nostalgia buffs can view the older layouts via the "Archives" links in the left column of this page.  This latest layout has survived moves to EV1.net in January 2002, Road Runner-Houston in 1994, and now this fifth address at Comcast.  The site history page chronicles most of the major content additions and format changes that have led up to the sprawling park layout that we have today.

FittsWorld Attendance Records
Largest crowd for one day:  Baldur's Gate Page - 424 unique visitors, 10/15/2000
Most visitors in one month:  Baldur's Gate Page - 9,118 visitors, October 2000
These dates coincide with the release of Baldur's Gate II: Shadows of Amn.

FittsWorld safety rules
This site is designed to be viewed using a version 5+ browser at a minimum of 1024x768 resolution and 16-bit color.  If you are still using 640x480 resolution or an outdated browser, well... it probably doesn't look very good.  Please notify the webmaster if you have any problems viewing or navigating this site.

FittsWorld primarily uses Tahoma and Verdana fonts.  These fonts were chosen because they are easy to read.  If the specified fonts are not installed on your system, the pages will default to Arial.

Special Friends of FittsWorld
Here I would like to recognize and thank a few people who have given support and assistance to this site over the years.  First of all, Bill Stoneberg, who has provided some advanced coding and expert moral support.  Also John Larrison, who is the only person aside from the staff members to have content (the Replicator story) on FittsWorld.  And last but certainly not least, our official beta tester and muse, who is known by many names: El Paso, Wanderer, RogueWarrior, Ysorc... to name a few.  There are so many others who helped with content and links during the years that this was a gaming site that they are just too numerous to mention.  I have not forgotten them however, so THANK YOU ALL VERY MUCH!

A statement on hit counts
The visitor tally shown on this page is a cumulative total of all page views on all FittsWorld attractions, including the Baldur's Gate and Diablo pages that have their own separate counters.

My E-Mail Address
I love to get my mail from people asking about the content of my site.  But I LOATHE AND DESPISE SPAMMERS!  So I do not intend to EVER put my e-mail address on a webpage or forum post again.  EVER.  I'm really sorry that I have to do this.  However, if you are clever enough to solve the puzzle, you can still send me an email at [name of this site] @ [host server].

For those who wish to contact me about using materials on my site, here's the deal.  You are NOT permitted to publish anything from my site on the Internet in any form.  Do so, and I will hunt you down like the thieving dog that you are.  BUT if you wish to use my content and/or images for a school project and the product of your work is NOT published on the Internet, feel free to take what you need and use it as you see fit because you hereby have my permission.

Please link to FittsWorld using this official logo button.

Thanks for visiting FittsWorld!  Please come again soon.

Baldur's Gate is © BioWare Corp.  Diablo & DiabloII are © Blizzard Entertainment.  All original content and HTML code in FittsWorld is copyright © 1997-2007 Ken Fitts.  No materials from this site may be used or reproduced in any form without the written permission of the webmaster.