Miscellaneous meanderings and myriad mumblings

[advent games] December 4th : Tactical RPG

Fri, 04 Dec 2009 12:52:38 GMT

For the free program, there was really only one choice

Nethack is, in my opinion, possibly the perfect balance between Roguelike accessibility and depth despite the fact that ADOM may have more features, SLASH'EM may be a rather extended version of Nethack and Dungeon Crawl and ZAngband may have a different feel and approach to them, but it's generally Nethack I keep coming back to.

The aim of NetHack is to retrieve the Amulet of Yendor from the bottom of the dungeon, bring it back up beyond the surface and sacrifice it to your deity to ascend to Godhood.This is made difficult by the sheer complexity of the dungeon in terms of monsters, items and effects, the randomly generated nature of the dungeon (although note, this is only partly random. For instance, there is always an extra downwards staircase to the gnomish mines randomly placed between levels 2 and 4 and there's always a luckstone on the bottom Gnomish level. There's the Sokoban level, the Quest levels and more) and the fact you gain attributes by eating corpses.

Classic Nethack (so called, because it's created by a number of hackers around the 'net) is not about to win any beauty contests. Whilst it will run on practically any 32 bit system with 8MB+ memory and a terminal, colour is definitely recommended. There are also various tilesets and even isometric addons to make it look relatively modern. A lot of the atmosphere is generated by the turn based nature and planning, especially when faced with dangerous foes.

The original Rogue was created in the days when graphics were not as sophisticated as now, and neither were the games. Slowly the premise evolved to include a series of increasingly difficult randomly generated dungeons with an objective at the bottom of the dungeon.

Critically there's the fact that many items are initially unidentifiable - you figure out what rings, wands, scrolls and weapon effects are by trial, error and cunning use (such as using it to write on the floor) and also there are no save games. When (not if) your character dies it may leave a bones file, enabling the next adventurer to pick up the items left behind (most of which will now be cursed). Characters die a lot, and terms like YASD (Yet Another Stupid Death) are commonly used in discussion.

It is far, far more complex than described above, so the only real way to experience it is to download and play, and then die. And die again. and again. and again.

Commercially, I could only think of a few equivalents that don't make me want to slam my (or the developer's) head, repeatedly against a wall. Whilst I like a little combat in an RPG, I do not like it to be the complete emphasis. Nethack avoids this issue by being so complex and variable; most other combat focused RPGs are either varied, but not complex or fixed and frustrating. Diablo 1/2 was apparently heavily inspired by Nethack, but as it is a clickfest rather than being tactical in the slightest, it doesn't qualify.

Still, I have two suggestions.

First up, is the Icewind Dale collection. An Infinity Engine game, the same used by Baldurs Gate/Baldurs Gate 2 and Planescape:Torment, it is highly combat focused with just enough story to push the game along. The pacing is almost perfect and the varied art really helps progress the story. Icewind Dale 1 and expansion are AD&D 2 based, whilst IWD2 is AD&D 3 based (more flexible, skills based). It's real time with pauses instead of turn based, but that's quite a good approach in my opinion. Icewind Dale 1 is getting on a little bit now (640x480 only) but IWD2 is a bit more modern (Still playing, not finished). If IWD1 becomes boring I'd recommend skipping straight to IWD2. Additionally, IWD2 takes diplomacy and character attitudes into account properly. Don't send your highly annoying Lawful Paladin to turn down the completed quest reward - send in the mercenary thief to grab the cash instead..

£12 from Amazon. Slightly cheaper second hand.

Second, is the Temple of Elemental Evil. This is closely based on the classic AD&D paper based module. How closely I don't know, as I've never played the pen and paper version, but by all accounts the role playing and adherence to the module is superb. It's certainly very pretty and sounds good, there are plenty of spells, the ability to finely control your battles and a wide selection of things to do. It's a bit more hardcore than your average RPG, though - this is strictly turn based once battles start.

However, it is very buggy. Be certain to apply the bugfixes and enhancements created by Circle of Eight prior to play.

£6.49 new. Second hand from £2.50.

IWD/IWD2 and ToEE are all Windows based. IWD2 supports some OpenGL effects, whilst ToEE requires 3D acceleration.

[Advent games] December 3rd addendum

Fri, 04 Dec 2009 11:06:54 GMT

Last night I had a brief play of eDuke32 and the high resolution pack - bringing the old Duke Nukem 3D up to the modern age. It's a huge improvement and definitely well worth looking at.

Requires the original DukeNukem3D files, so fits in the commercial category. Supports Windows, OS X and Linux.

[Advent games] December 3rd : First person shooters

Thu, 03 Dec 2009 14:12:19 GMT

Today, I'm going to be a bit naughty.

Starting with the commercial game, I recommend Ultimate Doom - close to forty levels of classic shocking FPS action. £2.48 upwards, used.

It's getting on a bit now, but was the first decent first person shooter out there. It wasn't the first successful FPS (there were several games before it, including Wolfenstein 3D), or the most technically advanced (Ultima Underworld, released the year before had a far superior engine) but it did have the best multiplayer and level design at the time.

It's available on more platforms than you care to imagine, and iD software still sell it albeit at ludicrous prices.

Alternatively, try locating a copy of Doom 3, which is a re-interpretation of the original DOOM, but was released to mixed reviews. Sorry, no really serious FPS recommendations here, as I'm badly out of date with what's good.

Of course, the real reason for selecting Doom is that it gives me a chance to link to the free DoomRL - it's Doom, but as a Roguelike..(!)

A little explanation, prior to me covering Roguelikes properly, may be required. A Roguelike is a game like Rogue, to whit : a turn based interactive text glyph based dungeon exploration game. These games can be surprisingly sophisticated even if they are not graphically intense (there are some graphical tilesets for some roguelikes, but if you did that to DoomRL it would probably be missing the joke..)

DoomRL, on the other hand, is not very sophisticated - but neither was Doom. It does feature full sound effects, proper handling of projectiles, auto targeting of enemies and varied layouts. The weapons, barrels and so on can be used as in proper Doom. It is very silly and a surprising amount of fun. Supports Windows and Linux.

[advent games] December 2nd : Platformers

Thu, 03 Dec 2009 13:06:17 GMT

Platform games haven't done that well over the past few years. Whilst both Mario and Sonic managed the transition to 3D quite well, there's always been the niggling suspicion things weren't quite perfect - even if the games still are fun.

The freeware offering for December 2nd is Eversion created as part of a certain competition. It looks very retro (and mostly is), but there's some slightly unexpectedly more advanced technology in there, a game that really isn't as predictable as it first appears and a good degree of twisted humour. Plus, it's damned addictive - I can attest to the lack of sleep trying to complete the damned thing. Requires Windows, works in WINE.

Alternatively, check out the free online flash game cat gets 100 stars. It's quick to finish and fun.

On the commercial side, I'm suggesting Braid - a renowned platform game where you manipulate time to solve the levels. I've admittedly not played this, yet, but considering the reviews and the fact the developer gave up his job for a year to create it, it has to be worth a look. £7-10 depending on where you buy it from. Windows and Xbox 360

[advent games] December 1st : Adventure Day

Thu, 03 Dec 2009 11:34:29 GMT

December 1st is Adventure Day (this will probably be re-visited) and we're going all retro.

First up in the free category is Beneath a Steel Sky, courtesy of SCUMMVM. SCUMMVM was originally written to run old Lucasarts games and now runs much more. It supports more platforms (including mobile games consoles and phones) than you can shake a stick at, there are a couple of other free adventures on the site, plus the ability to replay all your own favourites.

This is a mild cheat, because BASS was commercial in 1994, released for the PC, Mac, Amiga and more, and is now free. Nevertheless it's quite a good adventure, is British and features a wise cracking robot, a post apocalyptic storyline and plenty of intrigue. What's not to like?

In the commercial arena, I've selected possibly the finest Lucasarts adventure ever - Indiana Jones : Fate of Atlantis. Right from the interactive credits sequence featuring the Indy theme tune, the game hits a high note. Witty dialogue, multiple paths to the end, plenty of mythology and drama and multiple endings make this a game worth playing.

£2.99 on the fairly unintrusive Steam DRM, £6.99 including The Dig , Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade and LOOM. It is 320x200x256 colours and getting on a little, but it's still a magnificent game. Alternatively, buy The Staff of Kings for the Wii - Fate of Atlantis is an unlockable sub game.

The 24 days of gaming christmas

Thu, 03 Dec 2009 11:05:17 GMT

Rock Paper Shotgun are currently doing a Advent Game-O-Calendar 2009 of the best games of the year in their opinion.

Therefore, I have decided to shamelessly steal this idea and provide a not entirely daily updated Advent Games of Annual Present Giving and Large Meal Day. Each day will contain both a quality free game (for my definition of quality) and a commercial quality game, not limiting it to this year.

I quite like some retro games, so don't expect them all to be recent.

Festive vegetable bake

Thu, 03 Dec 2009 01:42:48 GMT

I'm not entirely certain what's festive about it, but it's not bad. I did adjust the amount of smoked paprika used, however - I thought tablespoons must be a tiny bit excessive.

Probably also needs baking for a bit longer than specified, but not too bad as is.

Signs of the impending apocalypse

Mon, 30 Nov 2009 13:08:24 GMT

&deity;, it's a funny Garfield cartoon!

Jura

Wed, 25 Nov 2009 14:39:43 GMT

An overdue writeup : Jura was good, and thought provoking.

First, there was the travel. Weirdly, if you want to go via public transport, it is in some ways more convenient to go from London than Manchester. To go from Manchester and arrive on Jura in the same day is impossible via train, and requires a staggeringly early (1am) coach journey. Via London it's possible to take the overnight sleeper train , which leaves slightly earlier and arrives marginally later than a coach.

Anyway, I quickly dumped the idea of public transport and decided to drive up complete with mountain bike. If you go via the Jura Passenger Ferry (operates spring->summer) it's possible to do it in a day. There was a very fast drive up to Glasgow, and then a slightly more sedate drive to Tayvallich. Annoyingly, the drive along Loch Lomond is actually very boring (long road, lots of trees), but once you get beyond that there are some lovely mountains and lochs.

From Tayvallich I purchased a map of Jura and popped onto the Stormforce 11 power boat to dash over to Jura. This was fun, although I was slightly concerned over the bottles of wine I brought being affected by the jumping around of the boat.

My cousin was there to welcome me to Jura and the long weekend (Thu->Mon) began. This break featured :

A couple of meals at The Antlers including venison, unsurprisingly.
Lots of meat. My cousin's husband was running the burger van that weekend so various breakfasts and lunches ended up as bacon and egg innabun. nom.
A fair bit of wine, but not excessive amounts, surprisingly.

Good music - it was the Jura Music Festival after all. Starting off with music from all the community (Friday) and moving on to professional musicians including the winners of the traditional Scottish music competition (Saturday), pipers, running various workshops (I went to the Salsa - it was fun after I figured out some of the moves) and finishing off on Sunday with the children's play - a combination of costumes and shadow puppets.

There weren't really many low points. The pub was pretty busy, and the field next to the hotel was a bit loud (average thumpy music) for my liking. The ceilidh was lively, but I decided not to indulge due to lack of experience.

I also spent a fair bit of time on the island - both cycling up to Tarbert to see the inland Loch (this knackered me out on Friday - there were a number of hills in the way. As a result I had a pre midnight bedtime!) and cycling to the gardens at Cabrach, forgetting that the 'long walk' was supposed to double back and instead going on a detour cross country including neck high bracken.

Wildlife - there were plenty of deer, and I saw wild stags for what I think is the first time (I suppose Dunham Park might count). Seals, buzzards and Highland cattle were also in evidence.

Jura is an interesting contrast to other places. In terms of facilities it's pretty modern - there's no mains gas (and thus central heating in the houses. I'm don't think there was hot water either, but an electric shower solved that problem), but there is electricity, phone, broadband Internet and mobile phone access across a fair bit of the island. Not everyone delivers to Jura, but places like John Lewis and Amazon do, and there are specific delivery firms to get round other issues.

Craighouse is the main town on the island and has one shop and one pub, plus the distillery, Antlers restaurant, a school, village hall, petrol station and a community centre which also provides communication facilities I believe. Probably other places too, but I didn't ask! Islay is a short ferry ride (<1Km) away, and is a considerably larger island (3,200 people vs 200) with a number of extra facilities, but is not always loved by Jura residents (obviously.. otherwise they'd live on Islay).

People pop in to say hullo and there are plenty of community activities. Of course, there are some tensions and not everyone likes each other, but that's a fact when more than one person (and sometimes just even one) gets together. If this is the sort of life you're looking for, it is a deeply lovely place to be.

Car occupancy is quite high, as one is needed to get around Islay or take the ferry from Islay to the mainland and drive onwards. Craighouse itself is reasonably busy, although it was one of the busiest weekends of the year!

Once outside Craighouse things are somewhat more sparse; only five or six houses in clusters with a couple by themselves until you reach the north of the island I believe. The island is unsurprisingly quiet - it's a bit of a relief to get away from the sound of the motorway for a few days, even if Horwich is generally quite quiet. I did manage to see the Milky Way better than I have previously, I believe, although Jura isn't quite as dark as you'd expect - the glow from Glasgow is still visible at night.

It does make you think about just how much infrastructure is required for modern living, and the fall in living standards if you wanted to be truly self sufficient. I do, at times, think of buggering off and being a misanthrope on an island, but this is not really very realistic, owing to the fact I am quite social, need an income and require a fair bit of power for my computing kit, to name just three out of many factors.

Who knows, one day I might move to a (smaller) island, but I suspect I would have a somewhat different lifestyle and be in a stable longterm relationship. This also leads me to wonder on the cultural differences between islands and countries inside large continents, although technically I suppose it's possible to walk all the way from Lands End to Korea now.

It was a lovely experience and I will be back again sometime. Perhaps next time I will sea kayak around, and also visit Colonsay (West of Jura), Islay and others.

Pictures to follow

Machinarium bonus EP

Tue, 24 Nov 2009 17:21:48 GMT

If Machinarium was bought directly from Amanita Design, it included the soundtrack for free (although it is now possible to buy the soundtrack by itself).

Now, there's also the bonus EP for free which features a few shorter tracks (and the fairly long Wall track) that didn't make it into the official soundtrack, for one reason or another.

Weekend, holiday

Tue, 24 Nov 2009 11:47:04 GMT

Over the last four days I have :

Been on a bike ride three times. Managed to miss most of the rain, but still got wet and muddy. Cleaning the bike is not my favourite activity. Still, good for maintaining fitness and weight.

Tidied the study. The desk is now as tidy as it will ever reasonably get, the floor has been somewhat improved and decent inroads have been made both into chucking out old crap and re-organising the chest of drawers. A tidy and organised kitchen and study should be achievable by xmas (leaving really only the 'library' in need of an organise, even if the bedroom and the lounge need a bit more furniture).

Had drinkies with friends, both locally and in Manchester.

Sorting out my photos from Jura and a few other places. Will post soon.

Fettled lots of computers including doing most of a Vista to Windows 7 migration, plus installing a multiboot of Solaris, NetBSD and OpenBSD. From that I note :

Windows 7 needs updated manufacturer SATA and network drivers to prevent some odd behaviour such as temporary network loss and inability to open the disk management (has worked so far).
The Subsystem for Unix Applications (SUA) is limited to Windows 7 Ultimate/Enterprise, just as it was in Vista. SUA 6.1, complete with 64 bit versions of most apps should arrive imminently.
All tape backup packages suck. Tried the one in SUA (worked in Vista, failed to restore in 7), Novabackup Pro (randomly decided not to see tape drive) and Genie Backup Manager Pro (said it restored data, then that there were errors, no error log visible, cannot find files).
OpenBSD does support installation to a logical partition and its installer remains clean and trouble free, even if the exact incantation to fiddle with logical partitions takes a small amount of effort.
Solaris 10/09 feels unfinished. CDE (deprecated) has the Solaris admin tool easily shown, the Java Desktop System does not. Even if there are historical reasons for it, would it not hurt too much to be able to add users without running into automounter and other errors? Still have to use the text based (terminal window in X) install to install Solaris to a predetermined partition. Trying OpenSolaris next - I note logical partition support is now slowly going in tree, so its annoying primary partition requirement will go away soon.
Multi monitor in Windows 7 works flawlessly, right from the start. X in Solaris works fine (Nvidia binary driver), but saving the parameters appears to be an issue. X in OpenBSD (4.6-current, so a moving target) is currently not working at all - possibly upset by multiple adaptors. X in NetBSD is working but only in clone mode across two monitors.

It's also notable, just how much of an arse backing up Vista is. Application data is typically stored in the local and roaming appdata directories, the Virtualstore directory, the documents folder and in some cases the actual application directory (for cases where it is badly behaved and has to write there instead of Virtualstore).

Cats have been hibernating more than usual due to the crap weather.

Holiday, cats

Thu, 19 Nov 2009 13:55:12 GMT

I have Friday and Monday off. Whee! :). Some bike riding, tidying and chilling may follow. Possibly also kayaking on a river on Sunday.

A cat update : both cats are unsurprisingly still happy little kitties. Maisie has especially come even more out of her shell and is much more playful with toys and also happier to whinge. She's still a bit of a vommy cat and doesn't like being held, but things are good.

Cairo is as adorable/annoying as usual, and late night games of fetch are quite common.

The litter tray has been changed from a standard big tray to the space age covered tray with the door removed (they don't like the door). I have also taken the opportunity to move from hideously expensive cat litter to cheapo cat litter, on the grounds that the covered tray mostly stops it from being kicked onto the floor. Unfortunately Cairo does like rolling in dusty litter, but at least they're both using it.

The only downside is that the tray is a pain to clean. The designer who created it has obviously never kept pets, or expects everyone to use litter that does not clump at all. This, I submit, is a fantasy scenario.

Techieness

Thu, 19 Nov 2009 11:05:10 GMT

Finally got round to installing Windows 7 last night. It installed without hassle apart from not supporting the Adaptec 29160 SCSI card (got drivers off Vista installation) and needing to download Audigy drivers. Correctly detected and set up all four monitors (aside from getting the refresh rate wrong on the non plug and play one).

Pondering going back to the era of dual boot and dual booting it with OpenBSD.

In other interesting techie links :

Redhat fucks up security. Discussion ensues. OpenBSD users gloat a little.

It comes to something when it's easier to configure Windows to ask your permission when applications are installed, than to get Linux to do the same thing.

You thought reasoning about signals was bad, reasoning about a total breakdown of normal functioning is even worse - from OldNewThing, the Microsoft blog about the workarounds they do to keep shitty software (including their own, no doubt) working.

Also need to revamp my backup strategy. I have a DDS4 tape drive I've not used much, and also last night found that all my photographs pre 2008 appear only to be stored on my OS/2 system using an elderly 80GB(?) HPFS disk. Eeep. Backup tonight, methinks..

wtf advertising campaigns

Tue, 17 Nov 2009 23:23:50 GMT

gold, frankincense and phwoar! Advert for manchester arndale

What the fuck? It doesnt even rhyme with myrrh!

Surprise Dinner

Tue, 17 Nov 2009 17:17:32 GMT

This week, I am mostly having : surprise dinner.

This happens when you're asked how much food is in your freezer and realise it's in the region of twenty meals or so. Furthermore, not all of it (actually, none of it, but it's easier to guess in some cases) is labelled.

Chick pea, sweet potato and spinach curry on Friday actually turned out to be African Peanut Stew. Last night I thought was some form of vegan chilli and was, I think either a vegan roast or casseroley type thing of some kind. Pretty certain tonight is meat chilli..

Who knows what the rest of the week will bring?

(actually, at least one day is going to be meat burgers with a type of melty vegan cheese I hope is not that disgusting. Despite the fact I'm not that keen on meat substitutes - either have meat, or don't, I'm pondering trying to create a good veggie burger using wheat protein)

Weekend : drinkies, Oblivion, biking

Tue, 17 Nov 2009 14:29:22 GMT

Weekend included very muddy biking on Sunday (cleaning my mountain bike really is a pain in the arse), and drinkies and a meal with T on Saturday. Much silly and moderately serious discussion was had.

Part of Sunday was spent doing a bit more Google Maps/Earth-ing. After lots of speculation about Afghanistan and politics and suchlike it was diverting to do some geography of both Afghanistan and all the surrounding Stanstannystans. It's no surprise things are a nightmare there and that security is a major hassle, purely based on the geography..

A fair bit of the rest of the weekend (apart from some tidying, pub on Friday night) was spent with shiny shiny Oblivion. I succumbed to a second hand 8800GTX - AMD are currently experiencing driver issues with their new cards so I'm waiting until things settle down before I upgrade properly.

Oblivion on a 7600GT wasn't really bad - I was running at 800x600 or 1024x768 on medium quality. On an 8800GTX it's at maximum quality at 1600x1200 - having heather covering much of the scenery and enhanced lighting is definitely lovely. The quests are continually inventive : what at first glance seems to be a simple fetch quest, turns out to be a betrayal and manhunt of the protaganist!

Some people have been rather sniffy about Oblivion from a role playing point of view, calling it a 'hiking simulator'. It really is a fantastic hiking simulator, and whilst perhaps the story is nothing exceptional and the role playing is lacking (there's no real character class limitations - you can cast magic with full armour on, there's not much customisation based on the character's class, race etc) the implementation is technically brilliant and quite inventive.

It still doesn't grab in the same way as Planescape:Torment does, but then again, not much does..

Bad and wrong conversations

Wed, 11 Nov 2009 13:24:20 GMT

During unexpected drinkies after finding out a friend's son was having a birthday. More drinkies Thursday after the bi social, as another friend has hidden their birthday till the last minute and I tend to forget dates.

Anyway, it is commonly known in mythology that muses help in the creation of great works. These are beautiful and inspiring goddesses who drive the artist to create their masterpiece..

However, to extend the idea a bit further, what if - in addition to the classical muses, the artists who aren't quite as good get a correspondingly lesser muse.

Then consider just what horror is lurking in the corner when certain popular songwriters are 'composing' ;)

Lateral thinking : one appears to possess a modicum

Mon, 09 Nov 2009 19:47:33 GMT

You have a pastie, you have chutney or pickle. Said chutney or pickle will not open with use of hands or tea towel and there is no jar opener in the house.

Can't be bothered trying to heat the lid, what do you do?

That's right! You open up your rucksack and pull out your Sealskinz ultragrip waterproof gloves. It works.

Weekend

Mon, 09 Nov 2009 13:54:12 GMT

Shiny, shiny kitchen cupboard of capaciousness! :)

Friday night was spent putting the legs on the kitchen cupboard and tidying before the pub.
Saturday I put the doors on it and started to fill it up. Curry and drinkies that night.
Sunday - more tidying and chucking all the unsightly plastic storage into the shed now the items are in Shiny Larder Cupboard. Tidied under the stairs. Tidied and organised parts of bedroom.

It's all coming together nicely - next on the list are a pan hanging rack (possibly a circular one), a laundry rack hanging from the ceiling and shelves on the wall for speakers in the kitchen.

Also read crap books and had fun with Google Maps and the Internet looking at Scottish islands and other bits of the UK.

This week heralds kayaking, computer fettling, drinkies and other stuff.

Great British explorers.. or not

Sun, 08 Nov 2009 22:57:17 GMT

Today, I have been tidying and relaxing by reading about Scottish islands. This has led on to finding a new British explorer.

There are many outstanding British explorers - those who push the limits like Ranulph Fiennes, those who take part in splendid travelogues like Michael Palin and then... there's Stuart 'Captain Calamity' Hill..

Railroading? Don't know what you mean squire!

Thu, 05 Nov 2009 10:16:10 GMT

Very briefly played Vampire the Masquerade : Redemption last night (cheap ebay purchase) - the Xplosiv 1.1 patched release works fine in Vista x64, incidentally.

After the intro shows a crusader being injured and cared for in a church, you are thrust into the action to slay two monsters attacking a nun, barely being able to drag yourself out of bed and sinking to the floor after defeating them.

The next morning, the nun casually mentions that the silver mine is infested with monsters and you have two conversation choices :

1) I'll go tomorrow and slay them all!
2) I'd love to, but perhaps in a month or two when I'm better.

As an amazing player, you are probably expected to chose 1). I chose the more realistic 2). The nun told me 'month or two? more like a year!'.

*ert* *ert* *railroad alert*

Enter the deacon or similar. 'The church is not safe. Tomorrow you will go into the silver mines and fight the monsters therein' (and undoubtedly get bitten by a vampire providing the whole point of the game).

Gee, thanks, railroad man..

Weekend : drink, more drink, biking, computer games, cooking

Mon, 02 Nov 2009 13:50:34 GMT

Was rather tired on Friday so didn't make it to Midlife Crisis and instead went locally for pubbage. Got to bed at a reasonable time for once.

Saturday featured Soup, shopping for a mask for the halloween party and a bike ride (not a huge success - chain came off twice and I lost my rear light..). Halloween party featured nice chat, wine and more wine.

Sunday - utterly foul outside. Stayed in and fiddled online, played a bit of Oblivion and cooked shedloads of pasties.

This week is fairly busy. Kayaking tonight, biphoria tomorrow, K Wednesday, kayaking fireworks do Thursday, probably pubbage Friday and meal and trip on the Manchester Wheel Saturday.

Computer gaming : this is very, very silly

Thu, 29 Oct 2009 14:00:56 GMT

Doom roguelike

Yes, it's Doom as a roguelike(!).

Don't know what a roguelike is? Well, it's a game like Rogue ;).

Rogue is ancient though, try Nethack instead.

Yes, it looks unbelievable primitive, and then you try and play and find it's a bit more complex. There's much more advanced examples than Nethack too..

African peanut stew is yummy, muesli

Thu, 29 Oct 2009 12:46:53 GMT

Last night I cooked African peanut stew. It's rather yummy and fairly quick to cook, although the preparation is a bit lengthy.

In particular myself and K accidentally shelled 3x as many peanuts as required. Shelled, unsalted peanuts don't seem to be stocked in Tesco and other places.

This was also the first time I'd used yam, possibly the first time I've used okra and one of the rare occasions I've used cabbage. Yam is really quite different from sweet potato and was worth the effort in finding one.

In difference to other recipes, the one linked appears to feed four extremely large people. I had three portions left over, and didn't even use all the yam they suggested.

Need to find other yam recipes to use the remainder up.

In other exciting food news, I was rather put out to find Tesco no longer sell muesli base. The remainder of the muesli is either filled with milk or hideously expensive. Muesli Quest has begun!

I shall probably find some oats, bran etc in large quantities, but until then I've been trying various supermarket offers that feature no milk or banana.

Somerfield do not score well.. They meet the criteria, but it's pretty tasteless. Next up, Asda organic muesli and Asda smartprice muesli.

I object to spending lots of money on cereal; all the decent tasty cereal is correspondingly expensive. Muesli is a good alternative. The other option is toast, but I prefer muesli in general, even if toast gives me the opportunity to try gooseberry jam. mmm.

2dboy - World of Goo sale now on, including publicised sales figures

Wed, 21 Oct 2009 14:01:49 GMT

2D Boy are having an 'any price you want' sale until October 25^th for World of Goo (neat indie game, supports Windows, OS X, Linux. Also available for Wii, but that was ported by a third party).

Now, even by itself it's unusual for companies to run experiments like this and there are discussions over whether this is a thank you to fans, an experiment in pricing, a canny attempt to squeeze more profit out of it after a year of $20 sales or a combination of all three.

What's really interesting, however, is that they've revealed their sales figures including the break down of payments and comments. There's an interesting analysis of the raw data here.

You can draw your own conclusions, or better still check out the World of Goo demo and throw them a few quid or more if you like it.