Josh Reviews: Frozen Synapse

I'm back! Sorry for the days I missed, I had a bit of a writers block problem. Clearly I'm not cut out to blog every day for a week! There go my hopes of doing one of those 'blog every day in X month' type things

Anyway, review for today is Frozen Synapse. Frozen Synapse is a turn based, top down, tactical strategy game where you control a squad of men in an attempt to vanquish the other guy's squad of men. All of the maps are randomly generated too, so its always a shiny new map to work out the best way to play on.

You can issue incredibly detailed to commands to your men so that they do exactly what you want, from movement to aiming to ignoring the bad guys on sight so you can move faster! Your men come in a various styles too, from machine gun guy to shotgun guy to rocket guy, and many others too! Your teams are randomly selected on the generation of the map (identical to the other team though!) so each match is quite individual. Just hope you don't get a team full of grenade guys! Explosions everywhere....

The style of the game is great too, as you can see from the screenshots. Nice clean lines with a cyber-punky style that carries over to the really nice soundtrack as well. Yet another very well produced indie game! What is the world coming to....

This game is definitely multiplayer focused, I mean they only sell it in packs of two copies! That way you always have someone to play with! The turn based nature of a game means that you can start a game, make your first moves then close the game and wait until the other player has completed their first turn too and await the outcome! You even get emails when a turn is ready, its rather marvellous really.

If you're the type that agonises over tactical decisions then Frozen Synapse really is the game for you! You can buy it from Steam or from the developers website here for about 20 pounds currently, its probably better to wait for it to go on sale. I still have my second copy though, so comment your Steam username (if you have one!) if you want me to gift you my spare!

Josh Reviews: Postponed

Hi internet people, this is just a note to say that Thursday and Friday's reviews are being postponed until Monday/Tuesday. They will be up then! Figures I wouldn't manage the whole week....

'Til Monday, stay classy internet

Josh Reviews: Desktop Dungeons

Day 3! I'm not doing too badly I think, haven't missed a day yet! Though this is a late one, blame my cousin for being born 14 years ago today.....

Desktop Dungeons is a game that you can play a full session of in about 15 minutes, and is great as a short time waster/something to do whilst you drink your choice of hot (or not!) beverage. You start by choosing a class to play as (anyone who's played some form of RPG will know what I'm on about) and you get put into a randomly generated dungeon to fight your way through and kill all the monsters! Simple enough...

Or is it? You start at level one and as such you can only effectively fight characters who are level one too! Maybe level two if you're careful about it. Monsters of various levels between one and ten are strewn throughout the dungeon and you need to fight them in a way that lets you level up to match the levels of the remaining monsters. I probably haven't described that well at all, but it's late so cut me some slack please :). Just play the game! Its pretty self explanatory in the end

As you complete dungeons with various classes you unlock new classes to play with, so there's always something to do. There's a lot more to the game than I'm getting into here because A) There's a lot to it and B) I'm very tired. Again, just go play it!

The developer has two versions of this game, the first is freeware which you can just download and play, or the paid version which has more content, but obviously costs money. Both versions are available at www.desktopdungeons.net. Personally I just caved and bought the paid version, but my download link hasn't arrived yet... Even so, the free version is good enough to convince me to part with money, so take from that what you will!

Just play it! Takes about 15 minutes, has tactical gameplay and the random element that keeps the game fresh. Play it!

P.S Fraps is playing up, so I can't get screenshots right now. I'll update this when I've either fixed it or have the patience to screenshot it all and crop it manually....ugh

Josh Reviews: Kerbal Space Program

So, day 2, review 2.

Kerbal Space Program is a game, but its also sort of not a game either. I suppose you could say its a space program simulator with flight simulator elements? Lets go with that....

You start in Kerbal Space Program with a command module for your spaceship in the hanger, and a list of parts that you can attach to make a functioning multi-stage rocket! This is definitely a game for those people that spent their youth building Lego spaceships....

Simple rocket! Won't get you to space though....

Once you have built your magnificent ship to sail the stars, you then move to the launch pad to see if you can actually get the command module into space, which is rather hard... I've found the controls to be a bit hard to use when actually steering the ship, but it is possible to get the hang of it. Adds to the fun anyway...

This is more like it! 

Well that's it gameplay wise, it's in the beta stage of development at the moment and doesn't have much in the way of structured gameplay beyond 'build a ship then launch it.' The developer is updating the game frequently however, so hopefully soon there will be some kind of mission structure in place to make the game more goal oriented.

The game starts off with a limited number of parts available for you to use, but there is a healthy part creating community at the game's forum that made lots of new interesting bits and bobs, including new engines, couplers and other ship-parts.

I've had a lot of fun with the game just messing around with the ship creation part of the game then seeing if it can actually make it off the launch pad! Here's the best part though, its free! At least it is in this stage of development... Regardless, you can download it from www.kerbalspaceprogram.com/ and tinker to your heart's content! It's not exactly rocket science....

Made it! Now the long wait until re-entry...

Josh Reviews: Osmos

It's been a while since I've done this!

So, Osmos is a....you know I'm not all that sure how to classify this game with the usual game labels. It's a.....thing. Steam labels it as a 'Casual, Indie, Family' game which is no help whatsoever. I suppose its a physics based 'chillout' game. Bear with me....

In Osmos you play as an organism (of some sort). This organism moves by expelling mass and utilising Newton's third law of motion (Every action has an equal and opposite reaction) to propel itself around the play area. You as the player do this by using the mouse to control the direction and rate of mass ejection. The aim of the game is generally to get bigger, which you do by absorbing other organisms until you reach the required size. The thing about absorbing other organisms is that you can only absorb ones that are smaller than yourself! Any organisms that are smaller than you will be blue, any that are larger will be red. If you try and absorb a red organism, it absorbs you instead! That means game over.....

Sometimes the aim of the game is to simply get bigger to reach a goal set for the level, other times it is a means to an end to achieve some other goal. One such goal is absorbing an organism that actively tries to avoid you! Very hard seeing as you lose mass in the chase, you might get it only for it to absorb you instead!

Visually, Osmos is a rather pretty game, with a clear minimal visual style that works incredibly well with the game's soundtrack, which is as chilled out as chilled out can get! Together both the graphics and soundtrack make the game a really relaxing experience to behold. All of these factors make Osmos a really great game to play for those who aren't of the inclination to shoot/maim/blow someone up and are more looking for an interesting game that is well produced with fun gameplay mechanics.

I'm now going to completely invalidate everything I've written by posting a trailer for the game below (If a picture is worth 1000 words, how many words is a video worth? Depends on frame-rate and resolution I suppose!)

Why is blogger making the player so small?!

Osmos is a great game to play if you want a bit of a mellow but fun gaming experience and is good value for money at around £6/$10. However if you're a cheapskate (or simply wish to try before you buy) there is a demo available both on the developer's website or on trusty Steam! If you purchase the game from the developer's site, you get a totally DRM free copy of the game that will work on Windows, Mac AND Linux! Bargain if you ask me! You can also buy it on those wretched iPhone things too....

I'm back! This time I plan to be back with more regularity too!

Oh my it's been a while.....

When I left off I was planning on writing a review for the game Osmos, but that was indefinitely postponed due the the impending doom related to my undergraduate computing project/dissertation! Safe to say that's all over now and I managed to graduate with a 2:1 under my belt. I have successfully made the transition from lowly student to lowly unemployed leech on society! As a side note, finding a job is really rather hard! But this isn't a blog where I complain about the bad things in my life! Besides, there are far far more good things in life that I am exceedingly happy about!  

With Matt and Hannah having one of their contests (feeling somewhat left out guys!) I too have felt the need to set myself a blog related challenge to get back into the swing of things! After my computing project was over I had the idea of posting a game review each day for a week to make up for the absence of content, so I'm going to pilfer my own idea and use it now. This week shall become:

Josh's Most Excellent Game Review Week Spectacular! 

Starting this Monday and ending on Friday I plan to post a review of a game each day (that's rather self explanatory though). The games are as follows:

Monday: Osmos! (Finally getting round to it)

Tuesday: Kerbal Space Program

Wednesday: Desktop Dungeons

Thursday: Frozen Synapse

Friday: Minecraft! (I have something special in mind for the Friday, keep an eye out!)

So there you have it, I'm back and I have plans for content! This blog has never been so organised....

TTFN Internet! 

Josh Reviews: Machinarium

This is the problem with starting up a new thing and setting yourself a goal - you immediately forget about it until about 10 minutes before your self imposed deadline. That's exactly what happened to me on Saturday night, so I failed one week in! Still, it's my deadline so I can do whatever I wish with it. This week I'll try and do it on time, I promise.

Seeing as I've been busy with work this week, I haven't had much time for playing new games, just the old standbys. I did however boot up a game I received in a game bundle called Machinarium. Seeing as I haven't spent that much time with it, this is more of an impression than a review.

Machinarium is an old school point and click adventure game with a lot of charm for such a simple game. Well, I say simple, sometimes the puzzles that you need to solve can be a tad infuriating! In the traditional point-and-click style, you walk around the environment (by pointing and clicking no less!) trying to work out how to advance to the next part of the story by solving the puzzle that you are presented with.

 The difficulty of these tasks is largely subjective, one person may spend forever trying to solve a level while another person might just 'get it' instantly. Even on the most difficult levels, the one thing that can keep you going is the absolutely gorgeous game art. It's like playing a game that's been made inside a painting. The size of the screenshots here really don't do the game justice. The soundtrack is well written as well, it really fits with the atmosphere that the game produces. It's easy to see that a lot of love and care has gone into making this game and that effort has paid off! The game is really worth giving a go.

You can find a demo of the game and more information at the game's website - http://machinarium.net/demo/
The game is written in Flash, so it will run on most operating systems with flash support. You can buy the game from the website for $20 which includes the game's soundtrack, or the game is available for £14.99 from good old Steam sans soundtrack.

Next week: Osmos. Of course by next week I mean this week, look for the next review around Friday

TTFN

Josh Reviews: SpaceChem

Seeing as I am often bereft of ideas for what to write about for my blog posts I've decided to write a little mini-series of blogs consisting of reviews or impressions of games that I've recently played. I'm also going to challenge myself to write one review a week, with it being posted by Saturday evening. Considering how much work I have at the moment that's a pretty big deal!

The game that actually inspired me to write this series is the one that I'll be posting about today. The game is called SpaceChem and if you like puzzles and not sleeping much, this is definitely the game for you.

SpaceChem is a puzzle game made by Zachtronics Industries, which is a small indie dev that you probably wont of heard of and I hadn't heard of until I found this game, but I'll definitely be looking closely at their future titles from now on. The premise of the game is that you are a Reactor Engineer for the SpaceChem corporation, a company that specialises in producing valuable chemical products from raw materials such as water and air. The idea behind the game is that you take those raw materials and through a series of processes turn them into a useful product.

This is what I'd call a programming game, as what you end up making is a sequence that will execute and produce the desired molecule from the given raw materials. In the game is design the paths for two 'Waldos,' which are machines that can grab and drop atoms as well as execute other functions such as synchronising with the other, executing the bond command or outputting the current content of an area. These simple base functions have to be used in increasingly complex ways as the difficultly of the games ramps up and ramp up it does! Every new set of levels has a new mechanic introduced with it, so just as you think you have some semblance of understanding everything that's going on, the game introduces a new element to the game which makes things complicated all over again. 

The game sets you to task on either Research or Production assignments, which is just it's way of saying that you either have one reactor to produce a chemical or you use multiple reactors to achieve a more complex goal. The game achieves the very fine balance of being very complex and frustrating whilst still being enjoyable. Some production assignments have as few as 2 reactors available to use whereas some have as many as 6 available to achieve your goal! I can say from personal experience that one level of the game kept me up until 3 in the morning one night, only to get me up again because I had thought of the solution after trying to get to sleep! That's the kind of creature that the game is, it's the kind of game that occupies your every thought until you find that elusive solution that makes everything work. It's a lot easier to enjoy the more complicated production assignments because the amount of craft that goes into them evokes a very rewarding feeling in the same way that completing a hard piece of work might do.


There's really not that much to the game mechanically, but the complexity of the puzzles that the game throws at you really stretch your thinking until the puzzle is finished. If you're looking for a puzzle game that will give your brain a good exercise, look no further than SpaceChem.


You can find out more about the game at it's website - http://www.spacechemthegame.com/
The game is available for Windows, Linux and MacOS for whatever $20 is in pounds these days.


___________________________________________________________________________






Well that's my first review in this new series! Please leave comments to tell me what you thought of it, what you think I could improve about my writing and recommend any games that you think I should review!


TTFN       

I made a video! Well I say me, I mean I helped ^_^

Another blog?! So soon?!

Really I'm just posting a link to a video that I just uploaded to my YouTube channel, so this isn't really a blog if you think about it, more a complicated hyperlink. The video is part of a project module that I am doing as part of my third year at university. We had to make 3 videos associated to a game we were making in another module, an Advert, a Crossover, and an Ident. It fell to me to make most of the Advert but In the end it was a team effort, as is everything really.

Seems like I cant make it widescreen like the video actually is though, click through to YouTube to see it in the widest of widescreen formats!


Tell me what you thought of it in the doobly-do/down below/describey/comment section!

I'm Back!

Surprise! I am indeed alive! I'm back after a lengthly 4 month absence. My laptop imploding caused the absence in the first place, then after that got replaced I just wasn't in the swing of it to keep up blogging, what with all the work I'm trying to get done, as well as all the new games are getting played instead of the work that I'm trying to do. However, seeing as my brain is in overdrive tonight and I cant bring myself to start another level on SpaceChem(a new awesome game I've discovered, I might review it at a later date) I decided to complete a challenge that Hannah set me quite a while back now, which was to write and upload my testimony. Here goes nothing....

I started life as a baby, much like everyone else. Like a lot of English children, I was Christened at an early age at my parent's and grandparent's church. As soon as I was old enough, my grandparents started taking me to church and to Sunday school, where I learnt all the things you learn at Sunday school. This continued up to around the age of 15 for me, as the church had a more discussion oriented group for people 14-16 or so. As my GCSEs loomed on the horizon, I stopped going to church under the premise of working during the time, but really I think I had just decided that church was too young for me anymore. Instead of seeking out the next level of church, that is going to the main service and listening to the sermons, I continued to not attend. All through this time I still considered myself a Christian, although now looking back I would not say that I was. During that time my understanding of God, Jesus, and the natures of sin and salvation were only skin deep, they had no greater impact on my life than any other piece of knowledge. Time passed, until I met Theresa, a Christian, and we started 'dating' when I was 17. Seeing as I still thought I was a Christian, everything was okay, until one day Theresa confronted me and told me that she didn't think that I was a Christian. She took the time to explain to me the difference between just knowing the facts and actually having salvation from my sins. It was after this that I started searching for my own personal salvation. It took a very long time for my search to come to an end, almost 1 and a half years. In the summer of 2009, me and Theresa went on a study trip to Israel. During the week, I mentioned to the leader of the trip, Paul, that I wasn't yet saved, information that he passed on the the man doing the speaking that week, Micheal Ots. On the last night of the holiday, Theresa convinced me to go and talk to Micheal about everything. We sat on the edge of the Lake Galilee and really discussed all the 'issues' that I had with becoming a Christian, and he explained each one away to the point where I really had no choice but to pray for the forgiveness of my sins. After that he prayed with me and I felt really positive about the whole experience, as you might expect! Since then I have been trying to learn more about my God and have been trying to become more like Jesus. Its not always been plain sailing. Me and Theresa broke up a year after my conversion, which was a pretty tough time. I was helped through it by prayer and the support of my Christian friends. More recently, my aunt has been diagnosed with terminal brain cancer. I cant comprehend any kind of good coming out of that situation for anyone involved and it's really testing the limit of my faith to try and keep hold of the fact that God works all things for good. Nowhere in the Bible does it say that once you become a Christian everything becomes easy. If anything, life gets more complex and a lot lot harder. All we can do is rely on God to pull us through, and that's what I'm trying to do now. 

Your Questions Answered! If you happen to be Hannah or Matt...

The number of replies to the 'tell me what to blog' post exceeded expectations, I wasn't even expecting one reply!

So, as I said, I will answer your questions, first is Hannahs list:


- First pet?

Really I had 2 first pets, if that makes sense. When I was 8 or so my aunt's cat Patsy had kittens and Mum and Dad decided we could have two of them, we called them Tom and Tilly. Sadly Tilly died in a car crash :'(. Her brother Tom is still going strong though, he's the bestest cat evar!

- What colours are you wearing now?
I'm wearing navy blue jeans, a blue top with a red/white/slight hint of Union flag even though it isnt a colour. so basically, I am wearing blue.

- Weirdest thing you've eaten?
Liver. Definitely liver. Mum tried to feed it to us one night but didn't tell me and my sister what it was. I worked it out though! I know thats not all that wierd, but when it comes to food I stick to what I know 

- Where've you gone on holiday? (or favourite holiday)
Best holiday is Root Hill camp, by far. It might not be fancy but it feels more like home than anywhere else. The most exotic holiday I've been on? Egypt

- Close your eyes and grab an object near you. What is it?
Xbox controller!

- Closest pink thing?
The closest pink thing to me is the dvd box set of The Simpsons, season 3

- Most awesome thing you own?
That really depends on your own perception of awesome to provide some kind of scale to measure my awesome possesions against. Tis a hard question for that exact reason. Time for a top 5! In no particular order:


1. 11th Doctor's Sonic Screwdriver
2. A scale replica of Master Cheif's MJOLNIR MK. VI Helmet
3. My phone! Theres nothing it can't do!
4. A fully automatic belt-fed Nerf gun
5. My newly aquired Gameboy Colour

- On the pointless scale of 4-12, how pointless is this?
I'd put it somewhere in the vicinity of 'Fish'

- Why?
Because!

- "Well do ya, do ya do ya wanna?"
Yes? It depends if you're actually asking me something or simply quoting Franz Ferdinand

- How many times have you listened to the whole DFTBA playlist now?
I'm about halfway through the second playthrough I believe, its hard to tell exactly.
 
- What's your favourite song on the playlist?
There are too many made of awesome songs to decide on a single favorite! All Caps are shaping up to be my favorite artist though, they do it just right.

- "Do you like me, yes or no? Do you think that I am cute? Would you date me? You can say maybe. I just have to know!"
Again, this is out of context! Is it an actually a slew of questions or are you simply quoting All Caps at me?

I've put in some check boxes for you to mark your answer:
        
Yes: [] or No: []

(This song came on on the playlist as I was writing this! Spooky)

- Where is your phone atm?

Taiwan :(. My lame replacement phone is beside me though, in all its £10 glory

- Is pineapple meant to be on pizzas?
I wouldn't ever say it was meant to be on Pizza and I'd never order it, but if a hawaiian was put in front of me, I'd probably still eat it.

-Chocolate or sweets?
Sweets! Haribo FTW!

- Where is your favourite place to be?
With my friends, I couldn't care less as to physical location so long as they were there with me

- Would you like a hug?
Always :)

- Close your eyes and think of a colour. Did you really close your eyes?
Yes I did! because if I didn't close my eyes I would have to answer no :(. The colour was Teal btw.

- Favourite colour?
Teal! or if you want specifics, 'Hawk Turquoise' from the Games Workshop line of miniature paints

- Favourite animal?
Thats a hard one! I think some kind of bird would be my favorite animal, I'd love to fly! In reality though, it's probably cats

- Favourite youtuber?
Saving the hard ones til last eh? I think the Vlogbrothers hold that title for now but wheezywaiter is a very close second!

- Should I stop asking questions now? :)
 You seem to have answered that question yourself by not asking anymore questions! I will allow this however


As for Matt C's question: which bothers you more, Russell T Davies' destruction of Gallifrey or JJ Abrams' destruction of Vulcan?

Destroying Vulcan made no sense! yeah Nero was mad, but he didn't need to do that! What I mean to say is that the destruction of Vulcan wasn't really necessary, but then again neither was the destruction of Gallifrey. The difference is that Gallifrey being sealed in the Time War added to the overall narrative of Doctor Who, whereas I dont think that destroying Vulcan really added to anything to Star Trek. That's just my thoughts on it anyway, what's your opinion Matt? Let me know in the comments

So that's the questions I revieved answered, if you have more, feel free to ask more! 

DFTBA

I feel the need...

I think the one thing worse than not knowing how to start a blog is not having an idea for a blog when you really want to blog! Its so frustrating!

Before I go on, I point your attention thus >>>>>>
I set up a poll! The sidebar of my blog was looking a little sparse so I'd foster some blog/audience interaction. If you read this, I command you to state your allegiance to one of the great internet clans! I think I'll be doing a poll every two weeks to give people a chance to respond to it. Hopefully my next poll will be a bit more imaginative! The old internet standby of 'Pirates or Ninjas' is a bit worn, so I thought I'd throw in a DFTBA reference for good measure.

Well, that's wasted some space in this non-blog. I still don't really know what I'm writing here. I want another spark of genius to come like it did for Monday's blog about how much I cant stand pirates, but I think that's this month's creative spark worn out. Fortunately next month is just round the corner!

Seeing as I currently have absolutely no idea what to blog about....

That's right, its participation time! 

If you want, you can leave a comment and I'll try to write a half decent blog about what you suggest. That or ask me questions and I shall answer them to the best of my ability. I don't expect I'll get that many topics, but just one would be awesome!

If you've gotten this far I seem to have successfully made you read a blog post that isn't really about much, so yay me! Also yay you for getting all the way through! This is your reward:

A blog about Doctor who perhaps?

DFTBA

I am a Ninja by association

(I think I'm going to drop the pun idea, I can't seem to think of any anymore!)

Starting blogs is hard! I know exactly what I want to write about, but I always have trouble starting things off. Is it just me that has that problem?

Rather conveniently, my complaining about how I never know how to start off a blog has started off my blog! This weekend I met up with a bunch of my awesome friends from Root Hill in London and it was a barrel of fun. A great time was had by all, or at least I hope so! I might retroactively update this blog to include a link to Hannah's blog (because she was there too) for a more detailed account if she writes one.

Which brings me on to what I wanted to blog about in the first place: Pirates. Not the old fashioned 'yo-ho-ho and a bottle of rum' kind, but the technological kind. Seeing as my phone was my mp3 player also, I was left without awesome noise to fill my ears. Having told Hannah this (yes, that's twice in one blog I've mentioned her. You owe me for all this name-dropping Hannah!) she took it upon herself to find one of her old mp3 players and load it up with the awesomest DFTBA music she could find and made an awesome playlist, an act for which I'm super grateful. Whilst I was listening to it, the thought 'I could just copy all of this music to my laptop' crossed my mind. I quickly banished that thought and this is why:

I just can't stand piracy.

Everyone says that piracy doesn't hurt anyone and the artist/developer/software engineers wont miss the money because they are already super-rich. Maybe if you happen to be Lady Gaga you wont actually miss the 99p that someone would have spent on 'Poker Face' instead of downloading it, but when you think of artists like ALL CAPS or Chameleon Circuit, they might miss the money. I don't know for sure as I don't have their exact sales figures, but they might!

Besides, the money isn't why I hate piracy. I hate it because people put so much work into music albums or games or pieces of software, and the general public think that they can just take that work without paying for it. Aside from the fact that it's straight up theft, aren't those artists and programmers entitled to some money for the work they have put into the product you just stole? That's the reason I never pirate CDs or Films or Games, because those people deserve to be paid for what they have made. Paying for things is my way of saying that I appreciate the effort that has gone into that person's work.

I realise now that most of what I wrote wont really make that much sense to people that aren't me. However I leave you with the age old internet argument - Pirates or Ninjas. I stand firmly on the anti-Piracy side of things, so in my eyes that makes me a Ninja. Whose side are you on?

Josh and the case of the mysterious crack

On Friday my phone broke. Again!

This happens far more than I would like, and following that theme I thought I would regale you with tales of my broken phones past and present

Exhibit A: Nokia 70-something 

I got this phone for Christmas or a birthday or something a while back, I was still at school at the time; year 9 I think. I distinctly remember when it broke, I was in a drama lesson and I'd just sat down to listen to the teacher and I heard a 'crack'. My phone was in my back pocket - you do the maths! I took it in for repairs but sadly, it was not possible. I had to go back to my old phone, turns out it wasn't the first time I'd have to either.

Exhibit B: Sony Ericsson 80-something-i

This is the most epic fail of phone breakages ever I think, or at least I hope it will be for me! This phone broke not once, not twice but three times! The first break wasn't even that bad....I sat on it again! Fortunately only the keypad broke, which could be repaired! I sent it off (I say that, my dad did) and it got fixed...except it didn't! I went to turn the volume up and the button caved in! Now I had no volume button, this wouldn't do! So I (read dad) sent it off again to get fixed, which took an age! I finally got it back shortly before a family holiday. When we got to Egypt I thought 'I should take my phone with me to take pictures, I never do that.' I went and put the phone in the pocket of my swimming trunks and went to go and see my parents down at the beach. Dad said we should go snorkelling. I should point out that the red sea in Egypt is the second saltiest sea in the world or something. I went swimming in it..with my phone. That didn't end well for me at all, it was totally fried!

Exhibit C: HTC Desire

Most people reading this will know this one! Seems like my phones have a predisposition to getting drowned! On camp this year we all went to Littlehampton for the day, a nice seaside place with a funfair and a beach and...a boating lake. We all went out on pedalos for a laugh had a great time on the boats, then the time came to go back in for the next lot. As I went to get off the boat something fell out of my pocket... surprise surprise, its my new phone! Was completely wrecked by the time I got it out of the water, but this time it was insured! (Learning from my past mistakes you might say) I sent it off for repairs and it came back all shiny and new looking..but then.....

Exhibit D: HTC Desire...again

This was the break that happened on Friday. There I was, minding my own business on the Internets, when I went to go and pick up my phone from next to me. It had a massive crack in the screen! No-one knows how it got there either, its just a big crack in the screen. It's a total mystery...that's cost me another 50 quid in excess charges! Hopefully I'll learn and start keeping it locked in a tiny box so it cant break again! Unless I drop said box in a lake, which I wouldn't put past myself

'Til next time when I blog about something that might actually be interesting for a change

DFTBA All

It's Blogger-ing time!

Puns are a bit thin on the ground at the moment, so I take what I'm given when it comes to ideas

Things are ramping up a bit in my world at the moment. Third year is officially in swing for me, and that means work! So far me and my group have had countless meetings and gatherings and things to sort out the design of out game and associated paraphernalia for this year's big projects - Making a game in the 8-bit style, then making a trailer and stuff for it in another different module that ties in with the game-making one. The group has had awesome ideas all round and I'm really looking forward to putting it together!

In other news..AAAAHHHHHH!!!!! That scream was brought to you courtesy of my Computing Project. The computing project is like a dissertation except it has a practical element as well as a written element! After a long hard time trying to think of what to do, I have come up with the following (rough) title: Creating a Crowd Simuation using Swarm Intelligence. Doesn't that sound super-clever! Basically I'm trying to create a semi-realistic crowd simulation for use in sandbox games like Crackdown of Just Cause. It will be complicated, but I think I can pull it off. I'm having a brief meeting with my supervisor tomorrow to see if it is adequate and if it is, I get to start work proper.

In yet more news, I have been playing a game a lot recently called Minecraft, which is an AMAZING indie title that really warrants peoples attention if you have some spare time. The URL is www.minecraft.net. The game is so simple in premise you'd never think it would work, but if you are even the slightest bit creative, the game is your oyster. The idea is that you (the player) goes around mining blocks, breaking them up and collecting them. Each block takes up a 1x1x1 space in the world. After you have collected blocks, you can then place them wherever and however you wish, basically like bricks in a house. Eventually you start digging down (MINING!) to reach precious ores like iron, gold and diamonds! You can craft these, as well as other materials in to useful items like pickaxes, weapons and armour. Some of the more ambitious minecraft projects include:

-A 1:1 scale replica of the USS Enterprise-D
-A scale model of the whole world!
-A WORKING COMPUTER! It actually works - Minecraft Computer!

The possibilities are endless! I really haven't done the game justice in my description, so I really do urge you to go and give it a try!

I'll draw this to a close, because there's some mining that I desperately need to do!

DFTBA readers

No, get your own dirt!

I've just started my third year at university and as such I've had a load of new textbooks to read. YAWN!

However, I came across this brilliant little dialogue at the beginning of the section about genetic algorithms:

One day a group of eminent scientists got together and decided that Man had come a long way and no longer needed God. So they picked one one scientist to go and tell Him that they were done with Him.
The scientist walked up to God and said "God, we've decided that we no longer need You. We're to the point that we can clone people and do many miraculous things, so why don't You just retire?"
God listened very patiently and then said "Very well, but first, how about this, let's have a Man-making contest."
To which the scientist replied, "Okay, great!"
But God added, "Now we're going to do this just like I did back in the old days with Adam."
The scientist said "Sure, no problem" and bent down and grabbed himself a handful of dirt.
God just looked at him and said "No no no, you go get your own dirt!"

Despite a few theological inaccuracies, I thought this was golden :). Yeah, we understand the universe more than we did 100 years ago, but we still didn't create the universe did we!

Quote-Tacular!

Begin the Quoting!

Firefly + Serenity:

'My food is problematic' - River Tam, The Funeral

'I swallowed a bug' - River Tam, Serenity

'This is the captain. We have a...little problem with our engine sequence, so we may experience some slight turbulence and then...explode.' - Malcom Reynolds, Serenity

'Preacher, don't the Bible have some pretty specific things to say about killing? - Zoe Washburn, War Stories

'Quite specific. It is, however, somewhat fuzzier on the subject of kneecaps.' - Shepard Book, War Stories

'I swear by my pretty floral bonnet: I will end you.' - Mal Reynolds - Our Mrs. Reynolds

Star Wars:

'Help me, Obi-Wan Kenobi; you're my only hope.' - Leia, A New Hope

'Aren't you a little short for a Stormtrooper?' - Leia, A New Hope 

'Use the Force, Luke' - Obi-Wan Kenobi, A New Hope

'Luke, I am your Father' - Darth Vader, Empire Strikes Back ( SPOILERS! :p )

'Impressive, most impressive' - Darth Vader

'I love you!(Princess Leia)'  'I know (Han Solo)' - Empire Strikes Back (Two Parter)

Star Trek:

'Space. The Final Frontier. These are the voyages of the starship Enterprise. It's continuing mission to explore strange new worlds. To seek out new life and new civilisations. To boldly go where no-one has gone before' - Captain Jean-Luc Picard

'Engage' - Captain Jean-Luc Picard

'Make it so' - Captain Jean-Luc Picard

'It is a good day to die!' - Lieutenant Worf

'What would Captain Picard do?' Commander Will Riker

'KHHHAAAANNNNNNN' - Captain James T. Kirk - Wrath of Khan

Monty Python:

'What is the airspeed velocity of an unladen swallow?' - The Bridgekeeper, Holy Grail

'Is that a European or African swallow?' - King Arthur, Holy Grail

'We are the Knights who say "Ni"! ' - Knights who say Ni, Holy Grail

'Bring Forth the Holy Hand Grenade!' - King Arthur, Holy Grail

'Your Mother was a Hamster, and your Father smelt of Elderberries!' - French Taunter, Holy Grail

'There are some who call me....Tim' - Tim the Enchanter, Holy Grail

'He's not the Messiah, he's a very naughty boy!' - Brian's Mum, Life of Brian

'And now for something completely different' - John Cleese, film of same name

DFTBA:

"Pokemon, what happened to you?" - Alex Day, song of the same title

"Yes it's true that I once went through life as a guy who always had to rhyme life with strife

 Yes I've been burned and I've been spurned and through all this I have learned that love is not

 about whether you get stabbed but how slow the knife gets turned" - Hank Green, A song about an Anglerfish

Other:

'88 Miles per Hour!' - Doc Brown, Back to the Future

'I'll be Back!' - T-1000/Arnie - Terminator 

'If I were a Megalomaniac, and I'm not, THAT's where I would be' - Cortana, Halo 2

'This city is afraid of me. I have seen it's true face' - Rorschach, Watchmen

'Transform, and Roll Out!' - Optimus Prime, Transformers

'If you guys are us guys, what number are we thinking?....69 Dudes!' - Bill and Ted + future Bill and Ted,  Bill and Ted's most excellent adventure

'Most Excellent!' - Bill and Ted, Bill and Ted's most excellent adventure

'Snakes, why did it have to be snakes' - Indiana Jones, The Raiders of the Lost Ark

'Go Go Gadget Rollerskates!' - Inspector Gadget

'You smeghead!' - Lister, Red Dwarf

'The story so far: In the beginning, the Universe was created. This made a lot of people angry and has been widely regarded as a bad move' - Narrator, Hitch-hikers Guide to the Galaxy.

'So long, and thanks for all the fish' - Dolphins, Hitch-hikers Guide to the Galaxy

'I wouldn't want to go anywhere without my wonderful towel' - Arthur Dent, Hitch-hikers

'D'oh!' - Homer Simpson

'You take the blue pill - the story ends, you wake up in your bed and believe whatever you want to believe. You take the red pill - you stay in Wonderland and I show you how deep the rabbit-hole goes.'-  Morpheus, The Matrix 

'Vegeta, what does the scouter say about his power level?'

'It's...OVER 9000!'

'What?! 9000!' - Nappa and Vegeta, Dragonball Z

This is as many as I could get down between yesterday and now, Apologies for the late post, stuff happened to slow me down. Im fairly convinced that Hannah will win, but its up to you commenters! Do me proud :)

Pun?

The title is a question. The answer is no. Curse my lack of Pun oriented titles!

This is an announcement in a way, me and Hannah (read her blog, its better!) are having a nerd-off!

We are having a competition on how many nerdy quotes we can remember and write down between 8am Wednesday and 10pm Thursday. The blogs will be up here by 10! Its up to you lot to comment and decide who wins!

May the Nerdiest nerd win!

And now for something completely different

I am aware the title is again not a pun, but is in fact a super-awesome nerd reference. Super-TRIPLE-Title-Spectacular next time!


So, Cutlery! Cutlery comes in many forms, Spoons, Knives, Forks etc. And every type of cutlery has a number of subtypes and then there's hybrids and everything! Cutlery is a lot less boring than it initially seems!(no really, it is!) In this post I want to describe the epitome of cutlery, the spork!

Sporks are clearly the best item of cutlery ever, due to being a spoon and a fork AT THE SAME TIME! The only thing that would be better than a Spork is a Sporfe... A combination-spoon-fork-knife! Sporks are also the only item of cutlery that you can both eat soup AND chicken with. (seriously, soup and chicken are the only things I could think of :/). Sporks are so awesome, sometimes they are made out of Titanium. I think you can still buy them from selected internet stores, I have sadly never purchased one though, so Im off to search for an indestructible spork!

So, internet, what do you think of sporks?



I will return to my regular, less random blog format shortly :)

Decisions, Decisions

A week is far too long a time to not blog, so its bloggering time! When I was thinking about what to write, I considered decisions and what makes us choose the things we do over other things we don't do, which took me down an interesting thought path, and this is what I came up with:

After a length of thought, I discovered that my decision making process seems to be oriented around 3 initial-isms. Cue the subheadings!


Criteria 1: W.W.J.D
This is a pretty obvious one to be honest, as a Christian, all my decisions should focus on bringing God glory and the best example we as humans have of this being done well is the account of Jesus' life in the Bible. Jesus lived a perfect life on Earth, so as a Christian I need to do my best to emulate that, impossible as it is. This is the first criteria for decision making - What would Jesus do?

Criteria 2: W.W.C.P.D
This is not so obvious I think, I'm really flying my nerd colours here when I say it stands for...

What would Captain Picard do?

In all seriousness, Captain Picard, despite being fictional, is one of my heroes (and is clearly better than Kirk). Picard always made the right choice for his crew and his ship and in every episode he always sorted everything out. Master diplomat, master tactician and generally master of everything he put his mind to (including Ocarina playing and awesome dancing). Some of you, (and by some I mean Hannah, who is woefully uneducated in all things Star Trek) might say, 'Why not someone else? Like the Doctor maybe' And to this I say this: Captain Picard is just a man (like Flash). Yes the Doctor is awesome and always sacrifices his own well-being for those around him, but he's an alien. Plus he has the unfair advantage of a)Time Travel, B)Regenerating and C)Having scores of girls falling at his feet. Emulating Captain Picard is a lot easier than emulating a Time Lord because he may be larger than life, but hes still just a man. He didn't get bitten by a radioactive captain to become captain Picard, he worked for it. You get out what you put in I suppose

Criteria 3: DFTBA
This isn't so much a criteria as it is an order after reaching a decision, like saying 'Right, now you've decided, Don't Forget To Be Awesome about it' As a junior Nerdfighter and all round nerdy guy, awesome factors into my life in a lot of ways, so I need to output a lot of awesome to maintain the awesome quota. Whatever I decide, it need to be done Awesomely


So, my decision process laid out for all to read! Hope that wasn't completely uninteresting

DFTBA readership, thats an order!


P.S. I am aware of the lack of pun in the title, its hard to think of puns about decisions! Next post will be a double-pun-title-spectacular!