More shots from the front lines…
February 7th, 2010
The siege of 9UY continued this weekend with the infrastructure hub coming out of it’s first reinforcement timer Friday Morning. I couldn’t make the Op, but from what I heard CVA didn’t put up a fight. I did manage to make the Call to Arms on Saturday for the Station’s first reinforced timer. Same thing as before, CVA was a total no-show except for a 7-10 man stealth bomber fleet that managed to kill… nothing. (AFAIK)
The view coming into the U’K POS is pretty. I had been living in 9UY for the last couple days, so it was nice to finally get a home base of sorts.
A dread getting in place a few days before the timers were up. First Minmatar dread I’d seen.
The CAP/BS fleet forming up on the -A- POS. I proved my inexperience by broadcasting for armor reps while I was a) cloaked and b) still inside the POS’ shield.
The station in 9UY goes boom. 10 minutes of shooting and not a single scrap of resistance from CVA… Starting to wonder if they’re going to bother to show up for the final reinforced time on Monday night. The more tactical decision (at least in my opinion) would be to put up your strongest resistance for the first timer… We only had 400 or so in system, with only 200 of those in Caps, Super Caps, or Sniper BSes. I anticipate double those numbers on Monday as it will be the final blow to turn the system over to -A- sovereignty. We’ll see. I’m hoping to make the fight, but it all depends on how things go with work, and whether or not this tree screws up our power:
Providence burns…
February 3rd, 2010
I arrived in 9UY and did like I normally do, warped to the sun to start to create some bookmarks. (I suppose I’m going to have to change my tactics now that I’ve announced that, huh?) Thought this was a nice artsy-fartsy shot with the reinforcement timer in the background and the foreground looking like it was on fire…
I caught up with a bunch of Against All Authorities and Ushra’khan pilots on a gate. Our corp’s ex-ceo was among them. Somehow I’d managed to forget to exclude people in my corp from my “reds” tab… He woulda just bombed me if I locked him, I’m sure.
After warping into an enemy fleet we took the last hostile as a pet. He had the entire fleet’s disruptors on him and he even got some repair drones to keep anyone from accidentally popping him. Note that I still haven’t managed to remove Maestro from my overview…
another shot of our pet…
More to come as the campaign continues. The I-hub should exit reinforced on Friday morning, and the station will follow on Saturday afternoon. Should be a great weekend.
whisky related blogs OPML
January 4th, 2010
I’m of the opinion that if you can’t write at least once a week about something you probably don’t belong in the business of blogging about it. I break that rule far too often when it comes to my blog, but as a New Year’s resolution I’ll be attempting to blog about whisky AND games at least once a week. Each.
I’ve been gathering my tasting notes on the Glenfiddich 15yo Solera Reserve as that’s the bottle I have that’s closest to being retired. (empty) but I’m not quite ready to finalize and publish them. As an alternative today I offer you a collection of some of the finest whisky related blogs the internet has to offer. If you’re using google reader you can subscribe to this group here. The same address will let you subscribe via ATOM to the group.
The OPML file can be found here. (you’ll want to right-click/save as…) This XML file should let you bulk import these RSS addresses into your feed reader of choice.
I’ve been using this group for close to two weeks and it provides me with 1 to 10 articles a day. If you have a whisky related blog that isn’t listed, let me know by leaving a comment, emailing me (dan[at]autumnrayne[dot]net) or hitting me up on twitter. I’d ask that you have at least 3 whisky related posts and have been running for a few months before submitting your blog (this blog is not included yet.) This prevents spam, etc. I’ll let you know when the OPML file updates in my weekly posts, but if you’re subscribed to the ATOM feed or through google reader it should be automagically adding any new feeds I put in.
Cheers.
to new hobbies (and an understanding wife)
December 29th, 2009
Over the last year or so I’ve discovered fine liquors. That’s not to say that I wasn’t aware there were whiskies out there besides Jack Daniels and Jim Beam, I just didn’t any reason to pony up the extra cash to get drunk on fancy spirits. Mostly because my drinking habits were single-minded: get drunk with friends.
In my old age I’ve found it to be more satisfying (and easier on my morning-afters) to enjoy a small drink of exceptional quality. Much like my college room mate who spent a small fortune on micro and foreign beers to line the kitchen walls, I’ve been bitten by the “malt bug.”
It started innocently enough. We were in the habit of buying gin and gradually found ourselves weary of the simple offerings of the corner liquor store. Luckily there’s a bigger liquor store that lies directly on my route home from work and soon enough we were drinking Hendrick’s gin and tonics. As the weather grew colder, I started buying little bottles of cheap whiskies when I went to the store as a treat. I became interested in what separated a bourbon from a Kentucky Bourbon from a scotch from an Irish whisky from a whiskEy so I turned to wikipedia. Wikipedia led me to searching for an entry-level, modestly priced scotch to try.
Soon there was a new bottle of Aberlour a’bunadh (batch 26) on our kitchen table as an early Christmas present to myself. It was shortly followed by an Ardmore traditional and a Glenfiddich 15 y/o Solera Reserve… My wife eyes me suspiciously when I walk in the door these days, looking for the tell-tale black bag that means I spent more money at the liquor store.
We had the opportunity to go out to dinner with Elena’ s grandparents last night, and her grandmother was entertaining us with tales of all the people she’d met over the course of the year, and suddenly she stopped and said “you know, I wish I had written down everything we’d done with them so I could remember all the details and plan for their next visit.” In that spirit (pun intended) I’m going to be adding a whisky category to autumnrayne.net to keep track of my tasting notes and experiences. I will also probably pull the whisky content out into a “new” blog so that people who are only interested in following that facet of my writing can do so without being bogged down by the video game stuff. (and vice versa.)
redesigning my favorite flash game
December 14th, 2009
In an effort to keep my brain from leaking out my ears any more than it already does I’ve decided to take some proactive… err, action towards building my game development/programming/design skills.
Enter the best flash game of all time, Curveball: http://www.curveball-game.com/
Curveball was one of those games that got me through my Senior Year (aside from WoW, which I couldn’t exactly play in class.) The goal is simple, engage in a game of 3d pong against a computer opponent who grows faster with each round. The twist is that if the paddle is moving when it connects with the ball, the path of the ball will warp like you’d expect a real object to. (think four-square or pool) Points are scored for the amount of curve applied to the ball, the accuracy of your hit, and for getting it past the computer’s paddle.
This is the first problem with the game. It would be possible to stay on level one and get an endless amount of points for curving the ball at slow speeds. I think there should be an exponentially increasing point cap to the level. For example on level one you can either get the ball past the computer’s paddle three times or gain 1500 points to move to level two.
Problem two: zee scoreboard, eet does nothing!
Problem three: while I can certainly appreciate the “Tron” aesthetic, in an effort to showcase my uber UI design abilities, I’ll be updating the look a little bit.
First and foremost however, I need to get a working game. Here are my steps:
1. Player paddle movement
2. Ball movement (straight lines)
3. NPC paddle movement
4. Ball physics implementation (curves, increasing velocity, friction?)
5. Scoring
6. Level gating (3 rounds or X number of points to advance)
7. increasing “intelligence” of NPC paddle movement (faster reaction time to ball position changes.)
8. Central scoreboard
9. Art/UI update
10. Evaluation
I’ll post updates with a current build of the game as I progress. I’d welcome all your comments along the way.
escorts (not the dirty kind.)
December 9th, 2009
I think I’m about halfway through the main Fallout3 narrative. I just hit level 11 last night while finishing up the storyline bits in Vault 112. (I’m doing my best not to say anything that might spoil the game for people who haven’t played it so bear with me.)
It was after Vault 112 that I ran into the first game design issue that made me want to turn off my PS3—escorting NPCs.
Basically you are joined by someone who tells you that you need to go all the way across the map to get to the next part of the quest. Um, ok… the game has taught you by now that you can travel instantly to any place you’ve already been, but this NPC takes off running at break-neck speed across the map and the story is such that I’m inclined to follow. So we run and run and run and run and finally I’m like “fuck this guy, I’m teleporting my ass to Rivet City.”
So I do. (being sure to save before hand incase I happen to break the game by doing so…)
I pop on over to where he told me to go, and he’s no where to be found. I walk outside the city and note that I can see where he is on my little radar doohicky. Rather than go back and find him, I decide to go talk to the scientist he’s coming to see. Oh wait, there he is! As soon as I talk to sciencechick he descends the staircase and proceeds to have a long conversation without any subtitles (which was awesome since I was playing with the sound practically off because my wife was sleeping.)
So now we’re joined by sciencechick to go off somewhere else. Knowing now that I might not break the game by teleporting to the destination I do so. Ok, so they aren’t here yet. No worries, says I—I’ll use the “wait” feature. So I wait 2 hours, nothing. I wait another 2 hours and still nothing. Super. So off I go to find them.
I end up killing some super mutants (milk bottle to the face, sucka.) and the game updates my quest saying “go tell the people who were supposed to be with you that it’s ok to come in now.” Um, sure. Just one problem-I don’t know where they are.
I mosey around the building looking for where they might be hiding, or maybe a phone/intercom to call them and let them know that it’s ok to come in, but nothing. I head out the door to save and teleport back to my house when its “OH HAI, HOW ARE YOU?!” there they are.
So now I have to “escort” them to the center of the building, which is possibly the most annoying thing in the world. MMOs have taught me that when someone asks to be escorted anywhere you should expect ninjas to appear from nowhere and try to kill them. So I stay close. Here’s the issue with this: when your targetting recticle passes over the NPC, they stop to say something inane like “what can I do for you?” and pause for a full 10 seconds before continuing to move at the slowest pace in the history of the world. I know you can move fast, Mr. NPC-man. I watched you book it across the wasteland for a good 10 minutes before I ditched your ass. Stop talking to me and get to where you’re going… and keep an eye out for ninjas.
We get to the center of the building ninja-free, and they begin to mingle amongst themselves. Um. Guys? Guys? Over here. I had a quest that you need to let me finish now please. No, you can’t do anything for me. Stop talking and finish my quest so I can go to bed. Finally, he positioned himself in front o f a computer and I decided that maybe I should talk to him. Voila! My quest was done.
I went outside, saved, and went to bed.
Ugh. Make interacting with NPCs beyond just dialogue not suck please.
While we’re on the subject can we discuss why/how I can teleport across the Capital Wasteland? I appreciate it, don’t get me wrong—but how does it fit into the game world? Has the radiation broken down my body like Sandman (from spiderman 3) allowing me to dissassemble myself and move through space at an increased velocity? I wish they had explained it somehow.
Relearning to Game
December 1st, 2009
I recently picked up a copy of Fallout3 at a Blockbuster going-out-of-business sale and have been having a blast over the last two days putting in every second I could spare playing.
I was reading through my feeds this morning when I stumbled across this post.
You can actual ruin a good part of the game if you ‘game’ it too much. By that I mean it’s easy to destroy most of the challenge if you stack your party with Cone of Cold-tossing mages, kite mobs around, or save/reload to make sure you get the ‘perfect’ dialog responses every time. Once I shut the gamer part of my brain off, and just played the game as it was meant to be played, it was a far more enjoyable ride that still remained a good challenge.
I realized that I’ve been doing this to myself for every single game I’ve played since I started raiding in WoW. I spend countless hours researching on the internet to figure out game mechanics and other bits and pieces of “essential” information that allow me to succeed at playing.
Couldn’t 100% a level in Little Big Planet? Look it up online. Problems finding all the flags in Assassin’s Creed? Look it up online. Can’t figure something out in EVE? Look it up online.
So here’s my new goal. I’ve read the walkthrough for Fallout 3 through the end of the “Following in his footsteps” quest. I know where to find the Galaxy News Radio, and that Three Dog is going to ask me to go get a satellite dish (from where I work in real life…) I’m going to try and get to Three Dog tonight and from here on out, there will be no more guides for anything. I’m going to relax and enjoy the game as it comes to me. I don’t know that I’ll be able to apply this philosophy to all the games that I play (no loadouts from Battle Clinic for Eve?!) but I will not spend my free time browsing the interwebs for anything and everything about each minutia for any game I pick up.
Call it an early new year’s resolution.
you might have noticed…
November 21st, 2009
… that there was just a huge influx of new posts. They’re not entirely new, but instead copied over from my video game blog. I’ve decided that since I managed to screw up most of the behind the scenes stuff over there by updating wordpress through my hosting provider’s backend (which deleted all files that weren’t directly associated with wordpress…) that I’d take the opportunity to expand the scope of this site back into gaming with a focus on interaction design which fits with my new five-year plan.
Sorry for the sudden flood of posts if you happen to have this blog subscribed to by RSS, but I hope you enjoy the new content and direction I’m headed.
What is a game?
November 20th, 2009
I’ve alluded a few times on Twitter to this project “which shall not be named” and it’s getting to the point now where I can’t keep it all in my head and I want your help. Prepare to be underwhelmed:
Where I work is thinking about creating a game.
Mushy and vague enough for you? (note: typing out the entire name of the place attracts our public affairs office’s attention… look here maybe: http://americanhistory.si.edu )
We’ve accepted the fact that while we have great content, unparalleled collections and (historical) resources-we could use some help to design a game. To that end it looks like we’ll be hosting a sort of brain-trust with folks who are qualified to design games. (Don’t bother asking me for an invite or an invitee list as I can’t supply the former, and I don’t have a final version of the latter.)
That’s a bigger step than most of you probably realize. I think that frequently educational/non-profit organizations like the Smithsonian assume that because they’ve got the content/message they’re qualified to design the perfect delivery. What ends up being created is a not-so-compelling web-based activity that’s targeted at middle schoolers, but is so poorly executed that it gets pushed on elementary kids. (nothing’s quite as brutal as honesty, eh?)
There are exceptions to the rule, but you’d be hard-pressed to qualify most of these activities as a “game” at all. Which brings me to my point and question:
What is a game?
Here’s a wikipedia link since that’s the place most people will probably turn to first: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Game
I’m genuinely interested to hear any and all of your thoughts about this. Some additional things you might consider:
Does a game require multiple players?
Does a game require the ability to interfere with other players?
Does a game need to be “fun”?
What’s the relationship between “play” and “game”?
To what extent can you accomplish (or task the player with) “work” within a game?
Who you gonna call?
November 18th, 2009
When your website crashes?
Evewarrior’s recent bout of computer problems has prompted me to take a hard look at what I’m doing for disaster prevention and recovery. To solve all problems with my local machine I’ve started playing Eve on the Mac side of my laptop which is set up to dual-boot XP and Snow Leopard. Easy ’nuff. (ok, ok, I did also change my password…)
Casiella posted this link up on twitter: 10 ways to secure your wordpress install. Which is a great start to hardening (TFU) your blog. I decided to take it a step further and figure out a way to back up all the sites I’m running off my single wordpress database. (there are more than 6 on one DB) Enter the CRON JOB.
A cron job is essentially a scheduled task. You tell the server what to do and when to do it and it takes care of it all by itself. I stumbled across this page that details a great, easy way to set up your own cron job to back up the essential data in your wordpress database.
blog safe! o7