OK I am a little late but it’s the thought that counts, right??
I am ashamed to admit that I have been neglecting the blog lately. I guess I haven’t really had very much to say of late. Nothing has changed there I hear you say! Even so, I thought I’d give a quick round-up of the year to date…
Development
The new year has been a busy period. We have just finished the development phase of our next major release, my first since joining last year. Its been a step learning curve but we have managed OK. The next release will be a lot more involved so I am looking forward to getting going with that. It should see us through the rest of the year.
I have also lined up a few interesting side projects to keep myself off the streets at night. They are mix of web and iPhone apps using Ruby on Rails, the iPhone SDK and OpenGL ES. I am also hoping to take a look at Android development at some stage. It’s a very interesting time for independent developers. Every day seems to bring a new platform or app store announcement lately (Nokia’s Ovi Store, Palm’s App Catalog and as well as others by MS, O2 and Orange!). I guess with the amazing success of the iPhone’s App Store, it was inevitable that the other smart-phone makers would follow suit. It will be interesting to see how things shape up once the dust settles. I’m also hoping to climb out of my cave and go meet some other developers.
Gaming
It was a quiet Christmas in terms of gaming. I have been playing Uncharted: Drake’s Fortune on the PS3 when I find time. Its a 3rd person action-adventure game, similar to the Lara Croft series with a Gears of War style cover system. Its fun to play and the graphics are excellent, considering its over a year old. Overall, its fantastic value for money on the budget Platinum series. I will definitely be picking up a copy of Uncharted 2 when it is released later this year. Also, the much anticipated Killzone 2 is due for release on the PS3 very soon. Unfortunately the Wii didn’t even get switched on over Christmas due to the dearth of quality titles. I am toying with the idea of trading it in for a DS or more PS3 games.
Football
Since I last posted, Stevie G was arrested, Rafa Benitez cracked, Arsenal have disappeared and Chelsea sacked their manager of 6 months. Meanwhile, Man Utd have went on a record breaking run of 14 clean sheets (and counting) and have stormed their way to a 5 point lead at the top of the English Premier League. They are currently English, European and World Champions, own the world’s best footballer (at least for now) and have an unprecedented quintuple in their sights. It’s a pretty good time to be a Red! I could be smug about it but I really don’t expect them to do a clean sweep. Barcelona are looking really strong at the moment and must be favourites alongside Utd for the Champions League. Also, it only takes one bit of bad luck (As Utd saw against Portsmouth in the FA Cup last year) and you can be knocked out. Everyone thinks the Carling Cup is a foregone conclusion, but I expect Spurs to be really up for it against some of the younger members of Utd’s squad. It should make for an exciting run in.
I have talked before of the troubles I had with my old XBox 360. Well the infamous RRoD claimed another victim – my brother. He has had his 360 just over a year now. As I have heard a number of times, he claimed Microsoft had fixed the RRoD problem now with new chipsets, lower powered PSUs, smaller processers etc etc. Last week he told me that he got three red rings but that it restarted OK after that. The exact same thing happened to me a week before mine died. I told him to pack it up and swap it for a PS3 before its too late. Unfortunately he didn’t take my advice and yesterday his XBox 360 died on him, just in time for Christmas!
The thing is, in my family there have now been a total of 7 XBox 360s bought in the last 2 years. To date, 4 of them have died while all those that are still living are less than 12 months old. Maybe Microsoft have fixed the problem with the new hardware but maybe not – only time will tell.
Moral of the story: Microsoft don’t care if they make rubbish hardware because people are still buying it. Just don’t do it!!
Update: My brother managed to get a lend of a brand new 360 over Christmas. Unfortunately, it wasn’t working so he had to bring it back to the store and exchange it for another 360. Rubbish!!
It is coming up to a year since I bought my Wii to fill the Christmas gaming void left by my RRoD XBox 360. Having always steered clear of Nintendo hardware, I had finally given in the the cutesy world of Mario and his friends. One of the biggest problems I had with Nintendo was that they constantly churned out the same old characters such as Mario, Donkey Kong and Zelda.
Now however, Nintendo seemed to be trying something completely different. The Wii promised a new era of gaming with its Motion sensors and accelerometers giving life to innovative gameplay instead of ever increasingly realistic shooters and racing sims. In the beginning it did deliver. Wii Sports was great fun, for 30 minutes. WarioWare was a riot, for about an hour. Luckily I had Super Mario Galaxy to keep me happy and content until my 360 was repaired in the new year. Since then the only Wii game of any real interest for me was Mario Kart. I had never been a big fan of the hugely popular racing game but thought I would give it a shot, especially with the steering wheel controls. It was ok. Not great. Not very exciting. Just ok. Exactly like every other MK I have played over the last decade, except the steering was a bit different (though not actually better IMHO).
After that, I stopped playing my Wii. Days turned into weeks, weeks into months. Every now and again I’d take a walk into the Game store to see what new and nothing seems to change. Super Mario Galaxy, Mario Kart, Zelda and the like are still in the top 10, still selling at full price. You get the odd new game of interest but most of them are cross platform titles that probably run a lot nicer on my PS3 or dodgy old 360. OK, Wii Fit was a big release for Nintendo and I tried hard to get one when it was released. Try as I might, all stores were sold out for weeks, until I eventually lost interest. After the hype had died down, £70 seemed an awful lot of money for a set of scales.
We are constantly bombarded with tales of how the Wii is outselling every other console by 10s of thousands of units every month. I’d be interested to see what the figures are in terms of game sales. It just seems like the trickle of new Wii games are either cross platform titles with a few Wii-mote gimic controls or strange Japanese titles aimed at teaching kids and non gamers how to cook or fish. The Wii was supposed to be a revolution in gaming but all I see is a cheap lump of white plastic gathering dust next to my PS3.
The Falcon is a futuristic-looking PC game controller from Novint that can provide a greater sense of realism to your favourite FPS game. Using a pistol attached to the main base, gamers get feedback from gun recoil, when getting hit, and environmental feedback from collisions and vehicles. It supports all the main FPS titles you are likely to care about too. At £165, this is probably for hardcore gamers.
I am a big fan of using the mouse for FPS games with its fast and intuitive control but I would love to try this out. I can’t imagine it being comfortable for hours of gaming, which is irrelevent now as I am lucky to get 1-2 hours a week these days.
Looks like everything our mothers said about spending too much time in front of the TV was true. Check out this poor soul who spent too much time on his Xbox 360. Don’t feel too sorry for him though, with his 37″ LCD head, he has become very popular amongst his peers.
As it turns out, Microsoft weren’t making rubbish hardware that died after a couple of days gaming after all. The infamous Xbox 360 RRoD is actually a failsafe switch added to prevent us all from ending up like this guy.
With the gorgeous Sony Reader being launched this Friday, it is starting to make some headlines. The Times is questioning whether it signals the death of the paperback. Though, I think that a 70 year old librarian might not be the demographic that Sony are going after. Asked for her opinion, she brings up a good point “If you dropped it in the bath it would do terrible damage”. That’s right people, be warned. If you drop your Sony Reader in the bathtub, Civilisation as we know it will come to an end!
It has been a long and painful summer for many Man Utd fans. After the giddy highs of Moscow, we have had to endure a never-ending stream of rumours and hearsay. For three long months nothing really happened. Ronaldo succumbed to Fergie’s iron will. Spurs complained bitterly about Utd’s pursuit of Dimitar Berbatov, with some justification. That was it!
Finally at midnight last night, it all came to an end. The final hours of the final day were the complete antithesis of the rest of the Transfer window. Man City threw the cat amongst the pidgens yesterday morning. Their new billionaire Oil Sheiks, who make Roman Obramovic look like a second hand car dealer, wanted to announce their presence with £300m worth of bids, including an accepted £35m offer for Berbatov.
City had permission to speak to him, Utd didn’t! Were Utd’s biggest rivals going to gazump them at the last minute? Then it emerged that Berbatov was picked up by Fergie from the airport and had a medical, even though Utd still didn’t have permission to talk to him. The minutes ticked by and still no announcement. Then the news broke of City’s £32m purchase of Robinho from Real Madrid. What was going on?! He had spent the last fortnight begging to be sold to Chelsea. It had become a complete farce! City fans were dancing in the street, claiming they were going to win everything. The deadline passed with nothing more of a dodgy sighting of Berbatov walking alongside Fergie in Old Trafford. Finally, at 20 minutes past midnight, Utd announced that the £30.75m deal was complete.
City had done to Chelsea what Chelsea had done to so many other teams over the last 4 years. Utd had finally got Berbatov, 2 years later and for £20m more than they initially wanted to. Ronaldo was still a Utd player. Utd had finally gotten rid of the man with the glass knees, Louis Saha. Real Madrid, after all their attempts to steal Ronaldo from Utd, ended up being bullied into selling Robinho. Let’s just hope the rest of the season can be as exciting as transfer deadline day.
As for Berbatov, he will be a fantastic buy for Utd. A tall, skillfull, classy forward was just what we were looking for to try and retain the Premiership and Champions League. He reminds me of the great Eric Cantona in the way he struts around. He turned down higher bids to play for the Reds, which is a great sign. His signing has more than made up for our summer of discontent. Come on the Reds!
Last weekend was a bit of a film-fest for me. I managed the grand total of 3 films in 3 nights. Lately, I have struggled to find the time and desire to watch movies. I record them on my Sky+ box, and they sit there for 3 months until I either force myself to watch them or delete them to make more space for newer ones.
These days, I have a very small window of opportunity for entertainment/hobbies. So, its not easy to sit down for 2 1/2 hours to watch a film when you have so many other things vying for your attention (PS3, learning, working, blogs, surfing, exercise, photography, Heros, etc etc).
So on Friday night, I decided to watch Shooter (Mark Walhberg). Its a good old fashion action movie in the mould of Rambo/Jason Bourne. An ex-army sniper, recruited by a government agency to help foil a Presidential assassination, but is set up to take the fall. He goes on the run and sets about clearing his name and getting bloody revenge. If you like action films then you should definitely check it out.
On Saturday night, we picked another film that had been on the planner for a while, Lords of Dogtown (Heath Ledger). The film portrays the group of kids from Venice, CA who revolutionised Skateboarding in the 70s and went on to become superstars overnight. It is a fascinating look into the origins of extreme sport as we know it. Ledger was excellent as the hippy surf shop owner and mentor of the kids, but its the skateboarding that steals the show. I wish I had heard of these guys when I was a kid
On Sunday night, I finally got the chance to see The Dark Knight (Christian Bale, Heath Ledger). I don’t think I need to explain this one. I thoroughly enjoyed the film (though maybe not as much as Batman Begins). Ledger portrayed a darker and ultimately more sadistic and believable Joker than Jack Nickolson. I would have liked to see his character developed more though. I also think the film could have used a bit more of a storyline, especially with Bruce Wayne. The love triangle between Bruce, Harvey Dent and Rachel dawes didn’t exactly set the screen on fire. The emergence of Two-Face was a real highlight of the film but was almost a side story.
So 3 nights, 3 great films. I am in the process of changing how I get my movies. Now that I have a BluRay player, I am going to trial the LoveFilm.com rental service instead of Sky Movies/Extra Vision. They have a bigger selection of BD titles and are possibly a good trade off between the convenience of Sky and choice of a video shop. I will let you know how it goes.
Last Friday I got my hands on a brand new 80GB PlayStation 3, having traded in my troublesome Xbox 360. As well as the PS3, I bought GRID, Metal Gear Solid 4, Gran Tourismo 5: Prologue, an extra rumble controller, HDMI cable and a rented BluRay Movie. Here’s how I got on: Continue reading →
At the start of the month, I wrote about the launch of Sony’s sexy new eBook Reader. I managed to get my hands on one of these for 5 minutes while in the US last week.
Its very slim and light, while still sturdy. Great for throwing into a bag when travelling. The display was really clear and very readable. The non-backlit display meant that it was very similar to reading a real book with very little strain on the eyes. There is no scrolling, so if you zoom in, it repaginates the book. There were 3 levels of zoom, the middle one I found to be the most readable. The only minor issue was the response lag, taking a second or two to respond to a page turn or go back to the menu. Its a slow transition too, with a fading effect from the previous page to the next. Though, once you are used to it, it doesn’t cause any major problems. I heard rumours that colour displays are not that far away, which would be a major bonus, especially for reading non-fiction books such as text books.
For my 2 cents, these things are going to have as big an impact as mp3 players did a few years back, maybe not this Christmas but definitely in the next year or two. The question is, are Apple going to get in on the act?
but I really don’t expect them to do a clean sweep. Barcelona are looking really strong at the moment and must be favourites alongside Utd for the Champions League. Also, it only takes one bit of bad luck (As Utd saw against Portsmouth in the FA Cup last year) and you can be knocked out. Everyone thinks the Carling Cup is a foregone conclusion, but I expect Spurs to be really up for it against some of the younger members of Utd’s squad. It should make for an exciting run in.
