The man who planted trees

For Cat's 30th I got tickets for a few plays from York theatre royal's Takeover 09.On Tuesday we saw the first of the plays, The Man Who Planted Trees.

At first I was a little apprehensive, I knew this was a family play (hell it involved puppets), but the crowd was decidedly... young.

I shouldn't have been worried! The play was utterly beautiful, a wonderful little ecological tale performed brilliantly by the actors/puppeteers involved. They had a fantastic combination of a lovely tale and plenty of silly comedy to keep even the attention of even the shortest of attention spans (I'm talking about the kids', not mine).

Young or old, I definately think you should go see this, especially if you can take some young kids with you. :D

The stuff of nightmares

Teletubbies and left 4 dead mashup.

So very very wrong

Balloon pictures

Photo of one of the first balloons to go up.

Unfortunately ours didn't go up quite so gracefully. the woman in front of us on our side of the basket really struggled to get over the edge of the basket and took ages to climb in. I'd only just climbed in when the pilot shouted for everyone to sit down and grab the handles and it tipped over! It then righted itself briefly, before tipping over again. Felt a little squashed with two people on top of me! At this point poor Cat had had to get clear and was worried it was going to take off without her! Luckily the pilot got in control and everyone else got in, and the balloon behaved itself after that!

Fantastic view of York including the minster

We saw quite a lot we recognised. We flew east from York, and spotted York's maize maze which was fun as we'd only just visited that a month or two ago. Could confirm that yup, it really is shaped like an astronaut. Schools are especially fun to spot as you get to see all the patterns in the playground. Oh and there was a football pitch at one point with lots of tiny dots chasing a tinier one :D

More of the view

The most stunning thing about flying in a balloon is the absolute silence (other than the roar of the burners every couple of minutes or so). It really is peaceful.

All the fields looked like a fantastic patchwork :D

Our less than graceful landing :)

The landing was fun, didn't realise they came in at quite as high a horizontal speed as they do! slid along the stubble field we landed in for quite a while before gently tipping over :D

Definitely recommend taking a balloon flight! It's a fantastic experience.

Ballooning adventure :)

Had an ace trip on a balloon this afternoon / evening!

Will fill in the blanks tomorrow, as am a bit tired this evening, but for now I will just say: scary take off, blissful journey, comical landing, tasty champagne :)

Okay I give up.

From now on I'm not even going to try working out which way t-shirts and things go on, it always ends up in failure and the time spent deciding is a waste.

From now on they're going straight on and I'lll swivel it round if necessary!

(image from http://store.xkcd.com/reddit/#Jawsbackwardstshirt)

Classic knock-off console :)

Saw this in a shop in Scarborough a few weeks back.

What I particularly liked about it, was the maker's audacity in not pretending that this was the next console in the series, but the next NEXT one.

Overall though I hate knock-offs like this. Not because someone out there is making a living off of some other persons brand, but because you know there's some poor kid out there that's the only one with a Wiii 3 instead of a Wii in his class.

Dusting off the CCGs

CCGs (Collectible Card Games) are something that I sunk a whole lot of time and money into at various points in the past.

• From 1995->1998 it was Vampire : The Eternal Struggle
• In 2001 it was Lord of the Rings and a bit of Harry Potter for something a bit lighter :)
  

They are horrible horrible evil things. I cannot stress this enough. Do not get involved with them! The amount of money you put into them is absolutely insane for the amount you play them. Don't even buy a starter deck. That's like a crack dealer giving you your first hit free.

Seriously, it's like if someone tried to sell you a car, but in order to get the most out of it you had to buy individually boxed extra parts, but you can only buy parts in identical looking sealed boxes containing a random part, and the best part can only be found in a few random garages in the UK... You'd just tell them to bugger off in that case, but for some reason in the shape of a CCG the concept is somehow really appealing.

Despite all this I found myself getting them out of the cupboard. At first the Vampire cards as there's talk of a few of the guys from Garforth Tabletop Gaming getting together for a game or two. Then I thought it would be fun to get the Potter cards out for a couple of games with Cat. They originally got put away around 2002/2003 when Cat developed an unbeatable Hermione deck and I got in a strop ;) . Luckily with my new gaming experience I managed to put together a better deck, and we're currently at 1 game each this time (plus I'm a much better loser now :D).

But still, I stand by my original opinion. I'm never buying another card again. These things are pure evil and should never be bought. There's so many great games out there that will cost you far less than getting into these things, there's really no justification for them! For those that really do love building decks try Dominion instead.

Back to work

Got some contract work this week, and I have to say I'm enjoying it. I think the break from work was really beneficial, as I'm feeling a new enthusiasm for the stuff that I was previously feeling fed-up and frustred with.

Been a little too efficient and have almost finished the project I was brought on to do in around half the estimated time, but luckily they've decided that it's worth keeping me on for the rest of the week to help out with some other projects. :)

I'm also hopefully going to be in again next week for another project, so that should help with my funds. I can probably consider going to Essen this year now... very tempting!

A few things I would really like to see dropped from JRPGs

Items / Endings / Areas that can only be found from following strategy guides from the start of the game.

E.g. The god damn Zodiac Spear in Final Fantasy 12. This item could only be got if you avoided opening 4 chests early on in the game, which had no marking, clues, or warnings to differentiate them from any of the other thousand identical chests. Nice.

Also see: Some of the missable quests in Last Remnant. I have to go back to a distant area and talk to a guy before and after each of 6 connected missions in order for a quest to open afterwards or it's missed forever?!?!? WTF.

No further explanation needed :)

70 hour+ game times.

Long gone are the days where good games were few and far between, or I just couldn't afford more than one game every 3 months. Nowadays I don't need my games artificially stretched out. Once I've seen every game mechanic around 100 times, and you've not got anything new in the
gameplay to surprise me, it's time to wrap up the plot and show me the credits.

Again, The last Remnant is a hideous offender in this respect. It's main way of stretching things out is unskippable extra long battle animations for any action (even swinging a damn sword). I've taken to reading a book whilst letting the battles play out, stopping occasionally to issue orders.

Personna 3 is an absolutely brilliant game in most respects, but suffers badly from this. I've been playing it on and off for around a year now, because the battle sides of it do get horribly repetitive until the boss shows up :| Does that freaky tower really need that many floors?

Unskippable, slow moving battle animations.

Already mentioned this above a little regarding The Last Remnant's (Seems like I'm picking on it, but honestly there is a lot to like about that game) gameplay being extended by the long winded battle animations . Final Fantasy is a well known offender for this as well (Knights of the Round being a move taking 1 minute 21 seconds to execute).

Yes we love eye candy, but is there really any reason to force it upon us the 10th time if we want to skip it?

Disgaea showed the world how it's done. You can turn all animations off! Now this may seem like it's taking the fun out of it, but when you're just fighting through an item world to level up you're glad of any time saving device the developers give you!

Alchemy

Oh how I hate alchemy in JRPGs. Some people might love the idea of alchemy in RPGS, but to me they're yet another mechanic to sell the strategy guides and prolong the game.

They're never intuitive, combinations being either trial and error, or done to fixed recipes you have to find in the world. Not that having a bloody recipe helps, because it's never obvious which is the only place in the whole frigging world you're going to find that piece of necrotic metal.

Even once you have all the ingredients, you usually don't dare make the ruddy thing. You never know if that ingredient you're using to build that slightly better sword is the only one of it's kind, and it might be the core ingredient of the even better (but only slightly so) betterer sword you'll get the recipe for in the next part of the game.

Seriously, what is alchemy bringing to the game? Sending me off to the other side of the world (via a strategy guide) for a piece of item that only drops from monster X if I have item B and have killed 300 of them. THAT'S NOT FUN. Give me shops with gradually improving stock and nice item rewards for doing side quests. IT WAS LIKE THAT FOR A REASON.



Got any pet JRPG hates of your own? Comment!

Image Credit : "Moogle" by Christina L. Frazer

Miracle berries? More like curiosity berries....

This week we finally got round to having cat's Miracle berry tablets. They're the ones that affect your taste buds for about an hour, making sour & bitter things taste sweet instead.

We tried a range of different things:

• Lemon & Lime - I loved these, tasted nice and sweet to me, but they were still a bit sharp flavoured for some of us.
• Goats Cheese -tasted a lot lighter and creamier
• Guinness - didn't taste like chocolate milkshake like advertised, but definitely took on a sweet almost milky taste. Very nice :)
• Banana bread beer - win win win! So tasty, the sweet banana flavour really took over and made for a lovely drink.
• Salt & Vinegar crisps - tasty good, not sure how to describe the flavour, kinda like a sweet peppery sort of flavour I think.
• Pickled onions - I love pickled onions anyways, but the tablets really brought out the sweetness and gave them a very moreish quality.
  

Overall it was fun, but hardly mind blowing. I think whoever named them miracle fruits needs to get out and see the world a little more :D

Limited Connectivity :(

Struggling to do a post this evening as I can't seem to connect to half the Internets :(

Something's blocking my tubes, so I'll try again tomorrow.

Brought kicking and screaming into the 21st century.

I finally upgraded my phone.

I'm not talking my usual upgrade, i.e. whatever's free if I stay on my small-usage, off-peak, same network contract. I'm talking proper UPGRADE.

This was mainly driven by the fact that I'm supposed to be a techie web developer by trade, and it was getting a bit silly that I had never used mobile Internet, let alone developed for it! Luckily there wasn't as many choices as their might have been, as many of my friends were singing the praises of the new Google Android powered phones. That pretty much narrowed it down to 3 choices, and I eventually opted for the HTC Magic.

It's absolutely blown me away. I can't believe how far mobile technology has come. I'm now constantly connected and am finding it so convenient. How did I manage before? Will definitely have to try and make a web app that's designed for a mobile device as a learning experience.

Only niggle I have is it doesn't seem to like my home wi-fi network. When I have it connected to the Internet by wi-fi it can be very very slow. Any tips Android users? Before anyone says anything yes this problem was the same BEFORE I managed to drop it in my rum & coke. Amazingly the thing seems to have been totally unaffected by that experience (I don't recommend anyone repeating this with theirs though). Sturdy little bugger.

A fight between logic and love - dealing with insects

I'm generally a very logical sort of bloke. I don't let sentimentality or superstition get the better of me. However when it comes to dealing with insects I have been conditioned by my girlfriend to rescue them and gently escort them out of the house. I find myself doing this even when she's not in, or when I'm at other peoples homes.

I guess it's not a bad thing. I definitely think the principle "First, do no harm." is a very good one to live by, but I know that insects are just efficient little impulse driven little robots. They don't have feelings. In fact I completely ruined ants for Cat one day by telling her how I learnt that most ants spend a huge percentage of their lives doing absolutely nothing. Literally nothing. Not even moving. Which if they really are self-aware, terrifies the living bejesus out of me.

Was reminded of this last night after a daddy longlegs spent most of the evening annoying me by flying between our two sets of lights like a maniac. Impossible to catch until it tired itself out and landed on a nearby wall (several hours after it's appearance), I was struck by how utterly ridiculous it was that I didn't just bash it with something nearby, as I'm probably more than entitled to given my much larger brain.

Still rescued the little sod though didn't I.

All you need is love (and a lot of plastic instruments)

Should I buy it.. Shouldn't I buy it? It was a massive dilemma considering my current situation. I'd already turned down Batman : Arkham Asylum this month despite a very impressive demo and it getting great rave reviews. Did I really need another Rock Band?

I was mainly undecided because it seemed to go against everything I liked about the Rock Band concept: you buy the software once (okay maybe twice - Rock Band 2 was a pretty upgrade), and then all you buy after that is songs you want. Alarm bells sounded when they buggered it up with the AC:DC branded version, whereby they provided a severely crippled version of Rock Band, which even if you export the tracks to Rock Band / Rock Band 2 worked out much more expensive than a track pack would have been. Then I head the bad news that the Beatles version would go a step further and not allow you to export the songs, or play any non-Beatles DLC.

Not good. I decided I wasn't going to buy it. Then the trailers hit and I realised this wasn't going to be a crippled version of Rock Band, but an entirely rebranded, re-worked game. It showed a proper story mode. Lots of unlockable photos and videos and stuff. Plus: It's the frigging Beatles.

Combine this with a sudden discovery of a cache of Tesco Clubcard vouchers and of course I caved.

Do I regret it? Not at all! I have to say this is the slickest version of Rock Band so far, the presentation is gorgeous and there's lots of neat interface tweaks, for example a difficulty display on the screen where you choose between Guitar & Bass which is a huge help for avoiding tedious bass lines / obscenely tricky guitar tracks. So far we've only played a little way through the Story mode (Cat's still suffering with post-viral fatigue, we have to take things easy) and browsed the track listings but we've really enjoyed it. In fact I practically had to wrestle the controller off her last night and use the classic parenting line "It'll still be here tomorrow" ;).

The bonus content really is something special. We've only unlocked a little, but so far the photos and accompanying text are very interesting and we've learnt quite a few suprising things already. An impressive "prize" extra we unlocked today was the content of a very limited edition Christmas record that was sent out to Beatles fan club members in... 63 I think? Was very silly but incredibly fun to hear, the quality of the recording was outstanding!

Need to have a gathering at some point and see if we can get enough xbox microphones to try out these 3-part harmonies some of the tracks support. Then again I think most of me and my friends struggle to find the right pitch when solo :D

But is this going to happen? I honestly don't know. Even with 45 greatly varying tracks, I don't know how this would go down with my Rock Band buddies. The only couple of friends I know that are definitely Beatles fans don't normally touch Rock Band, and the friends I have really into Rock Band definitely aren't Beatles fans. Perhaps this isn't a match made in heaven?

For me and Cat though it's going to be a fantastic experience, and that's all we need.

WHUPS - got distracted

Oh dear, very late with this post.

Got really into a new PHP project I'm using to get back up to speed. Enjoyed it more than I thought I would, and before I knew it it was 10pm. Have a quick game on the xbox and then went to sleep, completely forgetting that I have a daily blogging challenge.

Ah well I've not done badly to keep going as long as I did, and I won't give up just cos I missed one!

If you're interested the PHP project is just a simple card game that you can play against the computer, I'm hoping it'll include all the different technologies I want to make sure I remember how to use with PHP. Stuff like XML, Databases, File streaming etc.

Once I get it in a usable state I'm sure you'll see more details about it here :)

Why do we enjoy messing with our heads?

Today I have finished Uzumaki, watched Dead Man's shoes, and nearly finished reading Grotesque. All three with very dark themes making for an uncomfortable read / watch.

I'm certainly not a very dark and gloomy sort of person overall, I'm just as likely to watch Spongebob Squarepants or read a manga involving a kung-fu fighting panda as I am to watch a horror movie, but sometimes I just get in the mood to get all dark.

Why do we enjoy this sort of things? What is it in us that makes us seek out these kind of experiences?

They don't make them like this anymore - EVIL

A friend of mine used my laptop whilst he was over, and when I turned it on I found this on one of the tabs: Rick Dangerous - Flash Remake.

It's incredibly faithful, i.e. totally unforgiving with death often striking from nowhere. There's no way to beat the game but to memorise every trap, every enemy, and get those pixel perfect jumps right every time. Everything that would be flagged up as bad design nowadays.

I love it.

How appropriate, you fight like a cow!

So tonight me and Cat finished playing Monkey Island - Special Edition.

Point and Click adventures are one of the few games that Cat enjoys playing with me, so when Monkey Island appeared in the xbox live arcade I couldn't resist buying it again for us to play. We weren't dissapointed as it's a very good remake. The graphical style works well and is a good bridge into the style used for the 3rd game. It was very clever of them to include the ability to switch back and forth between the original graphics and the new, both for nostalgia's sake and the fact that on some of the screens it's easier to spot items in the old graphics (how did that happen developers?).

As far as gameplay is concerned there's not much to complain about, Monkey Island was always one of the better designed point and click games of the 90s, so there's very few frustrating puzzles and only one part in the game where you can die (and frankly if you do die at that point you deserve it, in fact you actually get an achievement!). There's a couple of bits later on in the game that frustrated us, but luckily the remake contains a very handy hint guide. Try not to rely on the guide too much though, you'll ruin the fun of suddenly getting that light bulb moment!

If you've played it before... well actually I wouldn't recommend it if you don't have someone to it to share it with. It really is exactly the same game. Monkey Island veterans wont find any new challenges, and you'll get diminishing returns on the laughs. Pair that with the fact that we managed to finish it in less than 6 and a half hours with Cat doing the vast majority of the puzzle solving for the first time, and you don't get that much for you moneys. We also came across a couple of weird bugs where dialogue seemed to be left out, and we solved a puzzle without really knowing how it worked or what happened.

Playing it with someone new to the game is where the fun's at, especially if you're patient and let them solve the puzzles. Overall I really enjoyed it and really hope they do a special edition of the sequel as I never managed to finish that when I was younger!

weekend of fun -> so so tired

Not writing much today after a monster weekend gaming (and drinking) marathon has left me exhausted!

Spent this evening brain dead in front of the TV. Luckily had the fun and easy-going Kung fu Panda to watch, and followed it with the awesomely retro and over the top Zu Warriors from the Magic Mountain.

Might just watch an episode of Ghost in the Shell before crashing for the night.

GiftTRAP - a brilliant game for friends!

As usual had a fantastic day at Beyond Monopoly in York today, played plenty of interesting and varying games.

Finally though I've visited enough to be able to borrow a game, so grabbed the one I've had my eyes on for ages: GiftTRAP. The reason I've had my eyes on this for ages, yet haven't played it at Beyond Monopoly is it's very much a social game and only really works with people you know.

The whole thing revolves around how well you know people, you have to pick out gifts from the available gifts that round for every player, then rate the gifts, then scoring is done based on how well matched the gifts are with the person.

As you need to both give gifts other players want, and receive gifts you do want to win the game this is a game that totally will not work with people you don't know, and will drag on as you receive heavy penalties if you give presents people don't want.

Amongst friends this game was fantastic. There were plenty of laughs as you can't give everyone everything they want every round, and it leads to some very strange pairings :D. It's a shame it's impossible to get hold of now, and the reprint they're doing has the adult content removed (night with an escort / year supplies of condoms / chocolate boobs - that sort of thing), as those presents probably caused the biggest laughs..

Even with those cards removed though I'm sure it will still be well worth getting. You can do far worse if you want a new party game!

Oh My God

Friends over this weekend.

This is the spotify playlist (in reverse order) of what they've subjected me to so far.

Someone please help me!

Emails from crazy people

Was going to write a little opinion piece up here this evening, but ended up a lot more tired than I expected after a trip to Leeds and a few chores.

So instead, here's a link to another fun website: Emails From Crazy People.

Enjoy.

SMBC Theatre - LOL Cats: 50 Years later

Here's an amusing sketch predicting the future of LOLCats courtesy of SMBC Theatre, a comedy sketch show created by Zach Weiner of the awesomely funny www.smbc-comics.com and friends.




Find more here : www.smbc-theater.com and don't forget to subscribe to their RSS feed!

Are JRPGs really worth playing?

I love JRPGs. Well at least I think I do.

Secret of Mana planted the seed (for anyone that's actually played it the pun was unintended), and FF7 really fanned the flames (mixed metaphors ahoy!).

12 years later and I'm trying to get back into Persona 3 on the PS2 again (clocked 60 hours on it so far, probably about 5.6 through so another 10 or 15 hours left I reckon) and I'm finding myself asking myself if it's worth my time... Persona 3 is a well-executed critically acclaimed, innovative example of a JRPG. So why am I thinking of packing it in?

It's all about pay-off for hours put in. It has a great plot, but only about the quantity you'd find in an average anime series, probably less... so if I want plot I'd be better off watching something. How about the game play? Well fun at first, with lots of new mechanics I'm not used to... but at the 60 hour mark I really am not going to see anything new. Perhaps this could have been said at about the 10 hour mark too...

I've lost that compulsive need to uncover every secret, max out all the characters skills, see every line of dialogue that I used to have when I was younger and I didn't have that many games to play. Now I don't need and perhaps don't want a game that lasts 20 hours +. My best kicks seem to come from short and sweet little indie games (see a lot of my previous blog posts), action blockbuster type games (e.g. gears of war & halo), and casual stuff (I'm beginning to think I'm Popcap's bitch now).

Maybe it's an age thing.

Bang goes the theory

Finally, TV gets some science again.

Tonight I watched an episode of Bang goes the theory, it's kinda like Braniac in that you get lots of zany experiments being done, but they also have quite a lot of documentary style investigations into how tech's being used in the real world.

An especially impressive experiment was a challenge to take the theory behind smoke rings, and attempting to up it in scale until it was a vortex cannon powerful enough to knock down a wall several feet away:



Doesn't really go into the detail of the science enough really for me, but is very enjoyable and you can always delve in deeper if you want to later.

Definitely worth a watch!

I do like to be beside the seaside

I live in a tourist city and this probably has contributed largely to my hatred of being seen as a tourist. Usually I actively avoid doing touristy things and don't even really know what attractions are in the area.

This isn't very helpful when I have family or friends visiting and they want to know where to go for the day. My usual answers are "the pub", "town", "Leeds", "cinema". However this week my dad's been visiting, and we'd already exhausted my normal suggestions. Luckily Cat has had a lot of foresight and had gathered up a lot of attraction leaflets, and we started by spending a great afternoon at the Yorkshire Air Museum a couple of days ago.

Today my dad wanted to go to Scarborough, having never been before. I was feeling a bit more open to the whole touristy thing but was still a little apprehensive as I thought it might be a little bit of a disappointment as the front is surprising small so there might not be much to do and it can be a pain in the ass to get to by car.

I needn't have worried. Had an easy journey in and by taking advantage of Scarborough's great park & ride service we avoided the usual problem of trying to find a parking space. As for there not being much to do, we just had a really good time slowly meandering up the sea front and taking in the atmosphere. It's amazing that despite the constant progression of technology and the tendency for corporations to take over everything independant and replacing it with identikits stores, a lot of Scarborough still feels very old-fashioned.

We saw old fairground equipment, donkey rides, deckchairs for hire, hideous traditional seafood (anyone for jellied eels or whelks?), people flying kites, and the classic bucket and spade for sale. We also partook in Fish & Chips and a Mr. Whippy 99 ice-cream. It was ace and a real nostalgic trip :)

Must go again soon. :D

1vs100 - I love it then I hate it

Well this is a surprise. Today I planned to write about how much fun I'm having with 1vs100 on xbox live. But then this evening's live event was so frustrating and tedious, now I really don't know how I feel about it.

At first I loved it. I really enjoyed answering along with the questions, competing for score, the tension of whether the "One" would take his currently earned prize or push his luck. Also would I or someone I know get picked to play? However today's episode was dreadful.

They say they select people for the "One" and the hundred-strong "Mob" for him to play against based on players past-performance. But there's no way this can be true as tonight the general performance was terrible. The easiest questions were being incorrectly answered, or at least being dragged out with lifeline uses. The questions get more interesting and harder the longer the current player has been playing, so when you get people consistently being knocked out early / taking the low prize you can get very bored.

It's also feeling very disjointed. Near the end of the game I felt like I was only getting to answer a couple of stupid questions before being shunted off to see the instructional videos / stat reports over and over again.

It's still in beta, and still shows a lot of promise so I'll try to keep an open mind. Definitely recommend trying it out, especially the live shows as it's certainly a unique experience and a good indication of the new kinds of entertainment we're going to see being offered on the current generation of consoles.

Rediscovering drunken poker

Today I rediscovered the fun of poker!

Too long I have been playing for money, regardless of fun. Today, me and my dad and Chris got absolutely drunk and had the most fun I've had for ages. Generally, I've taken poker a little too seriously, because of the cash I've been playing for.

This evening, we played for fun. And oh what fun it was!
Play poker. play it without money. You'll be surprised!

Mmmm curry

I love curry and cooking curries, but just can't keep all the ingredients you need to cook them
so I usually have to rely on those sauce in jars.

Sometimes they just don't cut it, so then I use Rafi's spicebox. You choose the curry you want and they measure out all the fresh ingredients for you, customised for the amount of spiciness you like, and put it in an airtight heat sealed bag for you to take home.

All that's required is then for you to cook it up with the meat and vegetables of your choice, add in some creamed coconut and/or tomatoes, and preferably leave it overnight to let all the flavours come out (not compulsory).

The closest thing I've ever had to restaurant/takeaway curry. If you're even in York, pop down Goodramgate and grab a curry or order online!