Broken Xbox controller
Bah! It seems my Xbox controller is kaput. The left thumbstick doesn't relay left and upwards movements properly anymore. It's not that it doesn't react at all, but pushing the thumbstick left or up only translates in a very slight reaction on the screen. The thumbsticks are analog, meaning that if you move the stick further to the left the car you're steering on the screen will be turning left more sharply than when you move your thumbstick just a little bit to the left, in which case the car will only drift to the left a little (handy for those long curvey parts of the track). The thumbstick seems to be stuck in the just-a-little mode and the extreme left and up positions of the stick are not communicated to the console anymore.
It's no fun trying to win a race in Project Gotham Racing 2 when you can't make any left turns nor is it much fun trying to navigate the Grand Theft Auto cities driving backwards and being able to only make left turns!
I opened up the controller and removed some cat hair from its innards, looked pensively at the little gizmo on the printed circuit board that holds the thumbstick, wiggled it around a bit, and screwed it all back together. Sometimes just giving a piece of technology this kind of attention works wonders, but unfortunately this time it didn't. My other controller still works but I made the mistake of not buying an official second Xbox controller and the non-official controller is not nearly as sensitive and direct as the official one.
Guess I'll have to buy a new Xbox controller then, but a new problem presents itself... I have one of the original, big Xbox controllers and those are a lot bigger than the new "S" (for Small) controllers that come with the Xbox nowadays. I've tried those "S" controllers in the store and they feel so, well, tiny and all the buttons are so close together. The original, big controllers have either been discontinued all together or they're just really hard to get, because I've been able to track down only one shop that appears to sell them. I suspect though, that the listing of that item in their online store is mistake, so I just phoned them if the otherwise featureless item "xbox controller" really is the original, big Xbox controller and they'll get back to me on that. Fingers crossed.
Oct 1, 2004 @ 15:56 » 2 comments » Games
Halo 2 'finished'
Drool, splutter, gargle, cough... BBC says that Bungie have finished coding on Halo 2 and that Microsoft is now doing final testing. European release date is November 11... just 5 more weeks before I just got to have a new controller for my Xbox then.
Bungie has had a team of 55 people working on the game for at least 16 hours a day to make sure it was ready in time.
Now it seems they are planning to take a short break.
"Folks are taking off on vacation," said Bungie.
"Most people will take a week or two, some up to a month, but almost everyone will be back here in time for the game launch, to witness it first hand."
In an interview with the BBC, Bungie studio manager Pete Parsons said the team were looking to do something different after Halo.
Oct 4, 2004 @ 16:09 » no comments » Games
Tap tap tap
It's attention to detail that can make a great game brilliant. Still fiddling with my Xbox controller (it sometimes works okay, but most of the time it doesn't) I loaded Halo. Here's a little test: stand up and make a 360 degree turn. Unless you swiveled around on your heels or toes, you've probably moved your feet three times to make a full 360 degree turn. I must have played Halo A to Z at least three times, but today I noticed for the first time that if you use the right thumbstick to make a 360 degree turn you will actually hear the Master Chief move his feet 3 or 4 times. How many first person games actually supply that level of detail in aural feedback? I don't think there were many when Halo came out.
Oct 5, 2004 @ 14:02 » no comments » Games
Not sticking to the norm
A Webwereld item says that 45% of Dutch households now have digital cameras with which they on average take 580 pictures per year. 12% of those pictures is printed out at home, while another 15% is being printed through various photo print service providers, meaning that 73% of the pictures is never printed.
I guess that with taking 3664 pictures in one month during our holiday in Japan means we're not sticking to the norm. We'll print about 100 of those and when I get a decent piece of photo gallery software running, more of them will go online.
Oct 6, 2004 @ 15:50 » no comments » General
Mozilla product naming
I've been installing Windows on a couple of computers for normal, non-geek, but certainly not dumb users. One of them my dad. I've installed the latest Mozilla Firefox and Thunderbird for them and I've used the Win2k/WinXP "Set Program Access and Defaults" to hide Internet Explorer and Outlook (Express) from showing up on the desktop and in the Start menu. There are just too many security issues with these programs to leave them out in the open for the users and I do believe in a bit of gentle coercion to protect these users from themselves and the evil lurking beyond their routers.
Looking at the desktop and the Firefox and Thunderbird icons sitting there, it struck me that the names "Mozilla Firefox" and "Mozilla Thunderbird" don't convey to the user what they're good for. "Firefox" says nothing about the internet or browsing and "Thunderbird" doesn't say anything about the internet or e-mail.
"Internet Explorer" in contrast is a brilliant name that says exactly what the program will do for you. Admittedly "Outlook" doesn't really say what it will do when you open it, but its corporate omnipresence ensures it has enough mindshare. In the Windows 95 days, before Outlook was Outlook (Express), it was simply named "Internet Mail."
So, in order to make life simpler for the users whose computers I'd reinstalled, I renamed "Mozilla Firefox" to "Internet Browser" and "Mozilla Thunderbird" to "Internet E-mail." That way, even if the icons on the desktop don't look like a blue E or a yellow-greenish envelope, their function is crystal clear.
Oct 10, 2004 @ 17:32 » 2 comments » General
Game ratings in everyday life
I was queuing for the cash register in an electronics store and in line before me was a mother with two boys, who were maybe 8 and 10 years old. The oldest boy handed the cashier the game he had picked and I saw it was Grand Theft Auto: Vice City. While the cashier was busy getting the disc that belonged in the case from one of the drawers behind the counter it became clear that the boy had taken the PC cd-rom version from the shelf and not the PlayStation version. While the cashier put the disc back in its protective sleeve and into the drawer behind the counter, the boy ran to the PlayStation shelves, only to return looking disappointed, because there were no more copies of that version of the game left.
The mother and her boys left the store without a new game and I stepped up to the counter. I asked the cashier if he knew he had almost sold a mature (17+) rated game to a couple of young kids. He said he knew GTA was rated mature, but that there was nothing he could do if it was an adult buying the game. I then asked if he didn't think he should have explicitly told the mother that she was about to buy a game for her kids with quite a bit of random mayhem, blood, violence and sex in it. He started to mumble something about people's own responsibilities and with a growing line of people queuing behind me, I left it at that and paid for my purchase.
I've been thinking about what annoyed me most about this situation. It's not that I am opposed to blood, violence, or sex in videogames, but I do think that these themes, if they are handled the way they are in GTA, are not suited for young children. It's not that I think that age ratings are an unmitigated good, because publishers will force certain decisions on developers to achieve a certain rating (as happens with movies) and I do think that a responsible 15 year old can safely enjoy GTA whereas I'd rather not see certain 20 year olds play that game. I do think that the mother should have been more aware of what her children wanted her to buy them, but I can't really blame her too badly for maybe thinking that all videogames are kids stuff.
I am rather annoyed by the cashier who didn't think it was/is his duty to tell parents they're about to buy a mature rated game for their young children. This sort of thing must happen all the time and consequently a fair number of (too) young kids are playing pretty serious games. What annoys me most though, is that these kids' parents probably don't play videogames with their children. If your kids want to watch a good, but scary or mature movie, you'd watch it with them and talk to them about it. What's different about videogames that you shouldn't do that as well? Then again, maybe parents who buy GTA for their ten year olds don't care about what movies their kids see or books they read.
Oct 12, 2004 @ 15:29 » 1 comment » Games
MT Image upload borked, again
Bah. MT's image upload is borked again. If I tell MT to use the NetPBM graphics library it will upload the image, offer me the possibility of creating a thumbnail, and then it throws me a "Resource temporarily not available" error. If I tell MT to use the ImageMagick graphics library, it simply refuses to offer me the possibility of creating a thumbnail. How annoying. Time to step up my Wordpress efforts and switch sooner rather than later.
Oct 17, 2004 @ 15:30 » no comments » Sitestuff
Poor Willem
Willem is not well. We took him to see the vet, our brother in law, today because he's very short of breath, his chest heaving and his breath ragged, and in general showing all the signs of not being well, although without any obvious symptoms. The examination left him drooling, gasping for breath, and totally exhausted. Most probably he's anemic and there might be something pretty badly wrong with his lymphatic system. In or around his kidney there appeared to be some tissue or growth that didn't appear entirely normal to the vet. Tomorrow I'm going to have to make an appointment for an ultrasound of his abdomen and chest and when we have that in, we'll know more.
Poor Willem. Those who've met him know he's one of a kind, incredibly smart, strongwilled and sporting a personality that's several sizes bigger than his physical self. But... no eulogies till we're at his grave, which I hope is still a long way off. Fingers crossed.
Oct 17, 2004 @ 15:50 » no comments » Photo
Hunting grounds
This morning Willem passed on to the eternal hunting grounds. He remained his smart, alert, feisty self until the last minute. At ten years old he died too young and his spirit wasn't yet ready to go, but unfortunately his body could not carry him further. Dear Willem, you will be missed very much. Sleep tight and happy hunting.
Oct 19, 2004 @ 11:52 » 2 comments » Photo
Closer to Cyberpunk 2020
The late 20th century futuristic Role Playing Game Cyberpunk 2020 plays out in a dystopic, highly technologized future. Characters can opt to "chip in" and have a wide variety of mechanical/electrical and biological enhancements installed in their bodies. In the 1990s the year 2020 was a long way off and the technology, while plausible, was mostly in the realm of the fantastic. Now 2020 is another 16 years away, but Boing Boing links to two articles describing scientific developments that put the technology described in Cyberpunk 2020 in the grasp of the realm of actual, everyday possibility.
Wired reports that researchers have created a silicon based chip that
mimics the hippocampus, an area of the brain known for creating memories. If successful, the artificial brain prosthesis could replace its biological counterpart, enabling people who suffer from memory disorders to regain the ability to store new memories.
Meanwhile, Wired also reports, other researchers have managed to grow 25.000 rat neurons in a petri dish, hook them up to electrodes, and provide them with a 'virtual body' in the form of a F-22 flight simulator. The 'brain' so far has learned to control its 'body's' pitch and roll and keep it level in varying 'weather' conditions.
Initially these developments will have mostly medical applications, but it makes you wonder when we'll see +3 Initiative roll Speedware neural implants. The next question is whether "cyberpsychosis" really only was a leveling play mechanic in the CP 2020 universe or whether cybering up really does affect one's "humanity." 2020 doesn't seem so far off anymore and you can't start asking questions too early.
Oct 23, 2004 @ 14:19 » no comments » Tech
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