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!

Lies, damn lies, and information on PC hardware boxes

I don't really understand how PC hardware manufacturers get away with writing the rubbish they do on the boxes.

Apparently, according to the box on my new wireless ADSL router, wireless G is only good for Web surfing or email.

If I want to download an MP3, I need wireless G+.

If I want to do online gaming I need wireless G+ MIMO.

Streaming video? My goodness I'll need N1 MIMO.

According to this I shouldn't have bought the router. Completely inaccurate sales spiel on a box that tries to dissuade me from buying it? Why and how do they get away with these lies?

Going to the doctors rarely achieves anything for me

It often takes a lot to get me to go to the doctors. It's not that I'm scared of going to the doctors, or don't like doctors. It just very rarely produces any results for me. Usually I'll go in with something like a weird black mark that didn't use to be there, an ache, maybe problems with stomach pain or general lethargy, and I'll get a big 'ol MEH from the doc.

Today I went to the doctors for a muscle pain in my chest (resulting from buzzcocks gig moshpit) that if anything has been feeling worse rather than better. I've also got a long-running problem with feeling bloated and burping too much. Was told bumps to the chest area often take a while to settle down so it's probably nothing to worry about that it's feeling worse rather than better, oh and try eating slower and see if that sorts out the stomach thing. Not particularly convincing...

When I talk to the doctor I always feel that I get run through the "is it going to kill you" checklist. As soon as the doctor rules out symptoms that might be something dangerous you can see them instantly lose interest. Still eating? Not bleeding anywhere weird? Probably fine then, carry on, see if it changes.

At first this annoyed me and I felt like they weren't giving me proper attention or even being neglectful. Then I came to the realisation... they're tech support. They're tech support for my body and like most tech support and support programmers they don't have time for the small niggly stuff you can work around. They just want to make sure they have the time to debug the bigger problems.

When I came to this way of thinking I kinda had a bit more sympathy for them.... So I'll wait until these low priority bugs persist long enough for the priority to be increased ;)

Doing nothing is underrated

Today I achieved absolutely nothing. Nothing new there you'll all be thinking, but usually I'll get done a couple of jobs I've been planning to do, or enjoy something I've planned to read or watch, or get on the Xbox with something I've been meaning to play.

Today I just didn't really do anything. I listened to what happened to be on the radio. I ate whatever I happened to have in the house. I read whatever articles happened to be in my news reader, but I didn't really do anything in a planned way and it was so damn relaxing.

Not everyone can do that. Some people when they aren't achieving something "worthwhile" start to panic and start planning the next grand ideas. Must build something. Must rewire something. Must bake something. As soon as it gets to a point where nothings left in the task queue they panic. These are also generally speaking the same people that are always complaining about how they're so busy all the time and don't have time to enjoy themselves. *sigh*

I think it comes down to one of two things.

1. People being scared. If they're not constantly doing these projects, they might start to think about things. Might start to think about what they're doing in life, and how they're not entirely happy about it. Rather than confronting these difficult questions they constantly distract themselves from them, needing an insurmountable list of things to do to avoid leaving a gap.

2. Guilt. Some people have it drilled into them if they're not doing something "worthwhile" then they're sinning or at the very least being selfish and decadent. I find this idea rubbish because in the grand scheme of things we're going to all be dust at the end of our lives. Most actions are just as worthwhile as others. Obvious exceptions being noble things like charity work and stuff, but spending time re-organising your books / doing all but the most fundamental of housework is just as worthwhile in the long run as sitting on the toilet doing sudoku. Even if there is a god, I find it hard to believe he's petty enough to care whether you spent that weekend in July building a new section of your garden or watching the clouds go by.

Take a moment. Relax. Realise that doing nothing is fine. It's very liberating. :)

Passage - proof for me that games can be art

Passage is a 5 minute long game (if that) that produced more emotional response from me than 95% of the media I've read, watched, played or listened to.

Firstly go here, download the game, and play it. You might need to press B a few times to reduce (increase?) the resolution of it as today's monitors blow it up a bit too big and make it a little blocky to see whats going on.

After playing it, if you didn't really get it, try playing it again.

Then and only then read what I thought:

This is an incredible piece of art that takes a theme and explores it in a way that wouldn't be possible in any other media. At first it's confusing as the graphical style just looks a mess and you can't tell what's going on. Then you notice it. You see the way the character's position has moved relative to the passage. You notice how the the compression of the pixels has subtly shifted.

Seriously, if you haven't played it yet, play it before you carry on reading this.

At first you start near the left of the screen at the beginning of your journey. Ahead of you is everything you will experience, compressed together in a tight pattern. Gradually as you move through the passage, you encounter these things & events. You might meet someone that will accompany you through this passageway. As time goes by your position on the screen has moved further right, and the things you have encountered have become compressed in a tight pattern behind you.

The passageway represents life. This is you travelling through life. Behind you are your memories, ahead of you is your future.

Eventually you notice the characters starting to age, soon you notice that there are more past events behind you than there are future ones in front of you. That's when I started feeling a little apprehension but there was nothing to do but carry on. Older and older, less and less to encounter ahead. The girl I was travelling through the passage way changes into a gravestone. My character can do nothing but carry on down the passageway, now travelling in a much slower way until he does the same.

I cried. I started crying again when I wrote this. I think I need a drink.

A wedding in Italy

So a wedding in Ravello Italy eh? Certainly a bit different!

First thing, I hope none of you ever have to wear a suit in that kind of weather. Not pleasant in the slightest. A very good job the wedding organiser insisted the service couldn't be any earlier than 5 p.m. otherwise I might have actually melted.

The service was well... religious, so not really got much to say about it. Did get a holy water shower during the unexpected "Memory of baptism" part of the ceremony. Oh and I accidentally gave Cat a fit of the giggles by saying "Mmmmm Pie Jesu" during that particular Hymn. Luckily Cat had already done her reading (and very well) so I wasn't killed on the spot.

Very nice drinks afterwards. Actually come to think of it very nice drinks was a theme of the whole day, so it's no wonder I had an amazing time ;). Fantastic 6-course wedding breakfast and some wonderful heartfelt speeches that gave me a great warm fuzzy feeling or maybe that was caused by more of the very nice drinks... A highlight of the breakfast for me was an unexpected power cut which caused a break in the music to be quickly filled by some incredible and impromptu classical singing from the brother of the bride and one of the bride's friends from uni.

So all that was left was the traditional disco part of the wedding, could this be where it goes wrong? Not in the slightest! A very sweet first dance, followed by the Baywatch theme tune (the groom being a fan of the Hof being a well known in-joke). Add in an amazing air guitar performance to "Sweet child of mine" and it was a sure thing the rest of the evening was going to be legendary.

Back from Italy!

Had a fantastic few days in Italy this week, more specifically in Ravello on the Amalfi coast.

Beautiful weather, great food & drink, brilliant company, and attended an incredible wedding to boot.

Might write more details about it later, far too tired to right now.

Beautiful short art "game" - Today I die

Today I die is another interesting little art game from Daniel Benmergui.

Daniel's games tend to revolve around how small changes in position or context can completely change a scene or story. I can't really say anything more about it without spoiling the experience, so dive in and have a play. They're very short so you've got nothing to lose!

Also be sure to check out some of his other games: I wish I were the moon and Storyteller.

And along the same lines Gregory Weir's amazing (I Fell in Love With) The Majesty of Colors

Got any recommendations for games along these sort of lines? Please post them below!

Erfworld - a comic for tabletop gamers

Erfworld is a fantasy web comic which takes the conventions of tabletop gaming (hexes, turns, leveling etc.) and applies them to a world with narrative and characters.

The absurdity of these rules in a real-world context is well noted by the protagonist of this story, "Parson" who has somehow ended up transported into this world from ours, finding himself in-charge of commanding the power-mad Stanley's troops.

Throw in troop types assembled from a mix of pop culture such as children's TV characters, marshmallow sweets, and Internet memes and you've got yourself a very odd-sounding cocktail that somehow works.

One of the things that really makes the story work is that the characters never break the fundamental rules of the world, however absurd they are, and this somehow gives everything a sound continuity, and makes the twists all the more clever.

Definite recommended reading, and they've just come to the end of Book 1 so there's no better time to start catching up!

Odd habits - overly complex shopping lists

Since taking a break from work, I do a lot of our food shopping. I wasn't brilliant at it, it took me ages and I almost always used to miss some things we needed.

So started doing shopping lists. But I found using a shopping list meant that shopping would take soooo long, as I'd always end up travelling back and forth the same aisles repeatedly getting items one at a time. I'd still almost always forget things too, and using a pen to cross things off was a pain as I'd be constantly putting it in different pockets and having to search for it!

So then I tried doing shopping lists a different way. Starting with a traditional list I'd then write the list out again, but on a A4 piece of paper, putting the items on the page in a way that roughly mapped the location of the items in the supermarket.

Sounds bonkers and overly complicated, but it's amazing how much more efficient it's made my shopping trips.

Reading this back it sounds like something my friend Bytey would do. That's probably not a good thing. ;)

Off to Italy we go!

Off to the Amalfi Coast today for a few days in Italy to attend my brother-in-laws wedding. Never been to Italy before but sun, pasta, and good wine? Sounds great. :)

Here's hoping for a straightforward flight :). I'm queuing up a few blog posts so I can hopefully keep this daily streak going! Never expected me to carry this on for so long!

Indication #134 you're getting old - Moshpits

Ouch ouch ouch.

I ache all over and have at least two minor injuries :D ... Still worth it though, the buzzcocks were awesome and getting into the heart of the moshpit was great fun at the time. Always nice to get a little of the aggression out of your system ;).

The rest of the day was great too. The Ukulele orchestra did not disappoint (see yesterdays post). Captain Backfire were a fantastic new discovery bringing shed loads of funk to the festival, I'll definitely be looking out for them in the future. Aerosoul were unbelievably good for their age and I hope at least some of them carry on with playing music. The only disappointment were Chumbawamba, they've really changed direction in a big way and that's fair enough, but perhaps a name change is in order to save on the number of confused faces at their gigs? Their new more mellow acoustic sound still contains the same political drive, but you could just feel everyone there was waiting for tubthumping and it's ilk, which they not only refused to do but rubbed the crowds face in it by throwing one or two of the lyrics into their other songs.

All in all fantastic day and really great value, hope next year is as good! Oh and it's always amusing looking back at the photos and realising just how silly you looked :)

Garforth Arts Festvial's Playground Party

Early post today as I'm off to the Garforth Arts Festvial's Playground Party to see amongst others the ukelele orchestra of Great Britain :)



Oh and Chumbawamba and the Buzzcocks too :D Should be fun!

Sims 3 - The odd couple

Got a request to share my sims online so people can get a copy of the Nick & Bytey experience.

So here you go

Recently Bytey-sim has took up gardening. In this picture he hadn't had a chance to change from his mad scientist job, I guess the wig is compulsory.


And Nick-sim's took up painting. Though despite me giving him a brilliant landscape view, he insists on drawing stick figures:


*sigh*

RepRap will be to patent infringement what computers were to media piracy

RepRap is an incredible open source project to create an affordable Replicating Rapid-prototyper. In simple: imagine you could connect a printer to your PC that could print solid 3D objects.

Sounds like science fiction doesn't it? Amazingly the project already allows you to build a RepRap that will create plastic objects for around €500, and most the parts for the RepRap can be created using a RepRap (spooky eh?), so the more people that have them the easier and cheaper they'll be to build!

Some of the objects it can already build are already pretty useful. You've got coat hangers, iPod mounts, fly swatters, door handles, shot glasses, rings, water filter inserts, and other things.

First thought - awesome.
Second thought - when the revolution happens, some corporations are going to lose a lot of money.
Third thought - corporations don't give up without a fight.

And what has the recent music debacle taught us? That's right! The way forward isn't to evolve and embrace new technology, the way forward is to sue the crap out of your customers. When RepRap takes off, whether it's this year or in 10 years time, people are going to share files online that will allow you build useful objects with your RepRap.

And some of these designs are going to be for objects already patented by big companies.

Imagine Dyson have a patented plastic doohickey that makes their vacuum cleaners work. If you started manufacturing these plastic doohickeys and selling them at a cheaper price than Dyson do, you'd suddenly find a lawyer appearing at your door with a cease & desist. Taking into account the costs involved in setting up a production run & sales channels, no-one is going to risk it.

But put a RepRap design for the plastic doohickey online and suddenly Dyson have lost a source of income. Everyone just creates their own plastic doohickeys at home. (Yes this assumes the revolution has happened and the RepRap is as common as the iPod). Other examples of grey areas include models of copyrighted characters such as Pokemon, or the latest brand-name designs for vases & glasses.

So who's going to get sued? Is it the person creating the plastic doohickey? Is it the person creating the designs? Or the person sharing the file containing the instructions for creating the plastic doohickey?

Or is it the creators of the RepRap?

It's mp3s all over again :)

Multiplayer games are great. Shame most people aren't.

It's so frustrating. I love multiplayer online games like Halo, Gears of War, Left 4 dead. I was into a MMORPG for a while too.

Unfortunately at the moment I can't stand 90% of the people playing them. This wasn't always the case, I don't know whether it's got worse due to the technical barrier being lifted, or maybe my tolerance has dropped dramatically in the last couple of years.

Here's my main frustrations:

Problem 1: Kids

Can't we have some kind of adults only tickbox when we're joining games? I don't want to have to put up with someone filling my headset with random high pitched screeching sounds, or shouts for their mum to bring their favourite E-number filled snack treat.

Why are these parents letting their young children play these murder simulators anyway? ;)

Problem 2: Bad losers

Almost every time I play a game online I seem to be put on the same team as the guy who has to flood the chat with the latest injustice that caused him to die. Only a combination of lag, hacks, camping, and glitching can kill the bad loser. It's never because the other guy did something right. Face it guys, unless you're in your teens and unemployed or a student, 90% of the people out there are going to better than you. I've accepted this, you should too. No-one likes a whinger.

Problem 3: Bad winners

You won, congratulations is in order. It doesn't give you the right to really insult everyone in the lobby afterwards. Chances are they're just gonna give you negative feedback. It's just a game so enjoy playing it rather than bragging about it afterwards. Incidently bad winners and bad losers tend to be the same people a lot of the time.

Problem 4: The silent loner

If you like playing online games pretty much solo that's fine, there's plenty of deathmatch based games designed for that. Just don't join objective-based games like Left 4 Dead, and Halo's objective based game types. If you're going to play a team game plug your damn mic in!!!!

I think this is probably my rantiest post yet :D

The Ten

Ran into an interesting piece of text, well just a list really, called The Ten. I found it by following some links on a fun little music video called Why don't bees go to heaven that was kicking around on reddit.

It's a really nice and positive take on atheism, stressing that just because there is no god that doesn't take any of the magic out of life. Take a look at the site and give it a read and see what you think.

I'd skip 10:9 if I were you though, that'd take a lot of the fun out of this infinite universe for me ;)

Epic weekend

Weekend was fantastic. Amazingly we managed to time things brilliantly with the crazy weather throughout so it never really put a dampener on things. I say we, there was an expedition to a nearby cafe that returned back soaked after it went from sunny to stormy and back again in about 15 minutes, but luckily I was hiding inside away from the pollen so didn't get caught out. :)

Plenty of good food, good drink, and great company, with a fun day at Alton Towers to finish things off in style.

Will see what photos we have on Cat's new camera to post tomorrow.

Big thanks to everyone that organised and contributed to the weekend. You are all made of win.

If only this picture was real

If only this picture was real. It would be super-epic-awesome.

That site has a lot of ace pictures on. Another one to add to the Google Reader methinks.

Ben There, Dan That

An English point and click adventure.

An English point and click adventure that's funny & has good puzzles.

An English point and click adventure that's funny & has good puzzles and is FREE.

Why are you still reading this? Go play it!

Then go and buy the sequel for a measly £2.99!


WARNING (Or recommendation, depending on how childish you are):- Contains swears and fart jokes.

Off to the cottage we go!

Huzzah, it's that time of year again where me and a big group of buddies go off somewhere in the countryside for a weekend of booze, BBQs, sunshine (though maybe not this time), and lots of fun!

This does mean I might not be able to put any entries up whilst I'm away, we shall see what the wonders of mobile internets allow. Might just end up with some back-dated entries once I return if not. :)

Have a great weekend everyone!

The Wozard of Iz

Having obviously no first-hand experience of the 60s, I really enjoy finding those rare oddities that give you a small taste of the extremes of the culture born in that decade.

The Wozard of Iz is one of those oddities, something a friend pointed out to me a while back, but I've just had a chance to listen to again in full. A fantastical synthesizer-driven alternative version of The Wizard of Oz. Full of crazy sounds helping to put forward some interesting thoughts and ideas.

Download it here for free, give it a listen and see what you think.

Auditorium

This extended break has given me a chance to trawl through the hundreds and hundreds of starred news posts in google reader that I didn't have time to read when they first hit. Most of them weren't worth the time, the item well out of date, or the items just plain boring. Hidden amongst those however are several gems.

Auditorium is one of those gems.

A decidedly minimalist game, all you're presented with when you start playing is a thin stream of light, a circle, and what looks like a bar from a graphic equalizer. Quickly you realise you can move the circle, and dragging it into the stream of light affects the direction of the light. Experimenting further a few beams of light hit the equalizer bar, and a haunting piano melody starts to play.

OK, it's got my attention.



Next level, I have two circles, but with different direction arrows. No problem. Next level I learn that you can affect the power of your circles by dragging the edges. Oh and more equalizers for more instruments, nice. It starts to get a bit samey, I guess to make sure that people are comfortable, but I began to lose interest. Eventually they throw in some additional gameplay elements and my interest piqued again. Didn't take long before I'd finished the levels in the free flash game, and a teaser level from the levels available in the full version clearly shows the developers have more tricks up there sleeves.

I'm going to pick up Auditorium when I have the time to play it, it's a really beautiful game both visually & aurally and is a perfect puzzler for spare moments where you fancy a chill-out. Helps that the price is a very reasonable $10.99 too.