Talk about power to the people!
Interesting developments, Random Musings June 22nd, 2009
Or in this case power to the students…
In light of the ever increasing number of H1N1 cases in Singapore, Channelnews Asia is holding a poll on its site, asking what schools should do in such a situation.
The results are… staggering.
Most of the 30K people who voted for holidays to be extended must have been students (including me).
I even got a chain SMS asking me to go to the site to vote in the poll. Whoever started it must be dreaming if he thinks a CNA poll has effect on governmental policies.
But of course, here’s hoping it does affect governmental policies… *crosses fingers*
For those who wanna vote in the poll, it’s located at http://www.channelnewsasia.com/singapore/index.htm
This is a quick round up of what happened at Microsoft’s E3 Press Conference. The highlight was undoubtedly Project Natal. See below for slight details, but do go google it up for new information that gets released about it. Project Natal is the thing I’ve been waiting for all my life…
But first:
All the games announced/showcased
- The Beatles Rock Band – 3 singers at once
- Tony Hawk Ride/ Skateboard Peripheral
- Modern Warfare 2 trailer/gameplay video – 2 map packs to be released on Xbox Live
- Final Fantasy XIII gameplay video – possible Spring 2010 release date
- Epic shows off Shadow Complex
- Joyride – cartoony racer that’s free to download/play
- Crackdown 2
- Left 4 Dead 2 (Total surprise!) – out November 17th 2009 (Xbox 360 and PC)
- Splinter Cell Conviction (seems like complete overhaul of series, and seems very very cool) – Uses broken glass shard to look under door
- Relatively more time spent on this game, sounds really really epic. Xbox 360 exclusive (no PC) this Fall
- Forza Motosport 3 – shipping in October
- Halo 3 ODST – September 22 2009
- Halo Reach – 2010, Access to multiplayer beta when you purchase Halo 3 ODST
- Alan Wake – Gameplay footage, has a real “horror film” feel to it. Out Spring 2010
Xbox Live
- last.fm coming to Xbox Live, by end of the year, free for Xbox Live gold membership
- Netflix integration to Xbox Live improved – No need for PC, directly add movies through Xbox Live
- UK and Ireland get streaming TV, partnership with Sky TV
- Zune Video – 1080p HD, every TV show/movie instantly accessible
- Live Party – “virtual cinema”, watch movies/TV shows with your friend’s avatars
- Facebook on Xbox Live – glorified user interface, post game screnshots to your profile – Fall 2009
- Twitter on Xbox Live – glorified user interface, post from your console – Fall 2009
Metal Gear Solid Announcement
- Metal Gear Solid: Rising – no Solid Snake, trailer features Raiden, completely new and different MGS game
Project Natal
- Words cannot begin to describe what this is
- Controller-less gaming, voice/facial recognition, full 3D motion detection
- Steven Spielberg contributing to the project somehow? (No nevermind he was just on-stage to promote the project…)
- Lionhead Studios have created a character called Milo, he’s a boy who can interact with you, show emotions, you can draw something and “hand” it to him when the camera instantly scans it in. He reacts to the emotion in your voice, what you say, etc.
- Just imagine RPGs with a world full of such characters, imagine literally walking through cities, approaching people physically, tapping them on the shoulder, asking them stuff with your own voice. I never imagined I’d see something like that in my lifetime.
Project Natal has completely blown my mind.
Tags: e3, microsoft, project natal
Windows 7 Release Candidate Coming
Interesting developments May 3rd, 2009
Woots, it’s finally arriving. I just got an email from Microsoft saying that the Release Candidate is going to be available to the public for free starting 5th May till at least 30th June 2009. Not to mention it’s going to be available for download without any limits, that means to say you can download it as many times as you want without having to worry about product keys and the like.
I did try out the earlier public beta of Windows 7 back when it was released in January, and I left my impressions here. On the whole, I really liked Windows 7. It loses a lot of the bulk that cluttered Windows Vista (I don’t use Vista at all, still sticking with XP) and adds plenty of new features. That being said, I don’t think I’m going to bother with the RC this time around. Mainly due to the fact that I’m just too lazy to reformat an entire partition just to install an entire OS which I’ll stop using after a few hours. I’ll stick to my Mac now, till the final version of Windows 7 is released, and even then I’m going to pick it up purely for the fact that I need it to run all my games. Furthermore, it has DirectX 10, which I’ve been missing out on thanks to the bloated Vista.
Thus far, Microsoft has certainly been going in the right direction with Windows 7. Everything from features to the way they’re considering user feedback, to the way it’s being distributed. Except for one big problem of course: if only they’d get rid of the gazillion different versions of Windows 7 which just serve to confuse the consumer.
Tags: release candidate, release date, Windows 7
Starcraft 2 Battle Report 2 Is Up!
Interesting developments April 19th, 2009
Yeah just thought I’d give a quick post about it here seeing as how it just came up less than an hour ago. It’s as good as the previous one was, and with new units and abilities introduced (some just a few weeks ago), it certainly makes for a much more exciting match. Go check it out at:
http://www.starcraft2.com/features/battlereports/2.xml
Or you could just watch above.
For those who don’t know, Battlereports are videos that are released by the Starcraft 2 team that feature a match between 2 players from the dev team of Starcraft 2. There’s also commentary by other designers of SC2, which provides for an even more entertaining experience. Anyone who loves Starcraft and is anticipating Starcraft 2 should definitely watch this video.
For those of you who don’t know what’s Starcraft…. you shouldn’t even be reading this…
Tags: battlereport, starcraft
Starcraft 2 Release Date in 2009?
Interesting developments April 11th, 2009
So, a Polish gaming site is reporting that some journalists are invited to an event held by a Polish games publisher and the invitation includes a list of all games which the company will receive by the end of this year. Surprise surprise, Starcraft 2 is among that list. Other games that have already been confirmed to be released in 2009 are also on the list, like X-Mens Origins: Wolverine and Modern Warfare 2. So there could be some credibility to this reveal yet.
Still, this is nothing solid yet, seeing as how Blizzard themselves haven’t even made a comment about when the game will be released, sticking to “it’s done when it’s done” mantra. However, us Starcraft fans will just have to cross our fingers and hope for an imminent release date for the sequel to what is undoubtedly the world’s biggest RTS games. With it still being competitively on a large scale even 10 years after its release, Blizzard sure has a lot to live up to with the release of this sequel. Here’s hoping
One’s thing for sure though: Diablo fans sure are disappointed.
Story and image from here.
Tags: release date, rumor, starcraft 2
Hotmail server problems?
Interesting developments April 10th, 2009
Hotmail is suddenly acting up really strangely for many people. Personally, I can’t even sign in to my hotmail account. When I enter my email and password and hit enter, it just seemingly refreshes the page and asks me for my password over again over again. It’s really strange, though I haven’t tried any POP3 or push email stuff yet.
My friend on the other hand states that he can log in to his account, but they something about him not having an inbox at all, when he’s been using hotmail for years.
However, strangely enough, everyone can still log in to MSN Messenger without problems, my contact list is as long as it usually is, meaning people aren’t having problems with it.
Let’s hope that this bug is just temporary and not everyone’s emails got deleted. If that were so, Microsoft just screwed up… big time.
Moral of the story? Use Gmail.
UPDATE: Seems like everything’s back to normal. One of those bugs as per usual I guess…
What It’s Like To Be An Asian Gamer – Part 1
Interesting developments, My 2 cents worth March 26th, 2009
So, I’ve recently started writing for DarkZero, a site about video games that covers news, reviews as well as articles. I stumbled upon it through N4G and really liked the setup, so after emailing them, I (surprisingly) got into the team over there. Really excited to be part of the staff. 
Anyway, as my first piece over there, I decided to rant about how annoying gaming can get when you’re located in Asia. I’ve been wanting to write about this for a long time, but never really wanted to do so on a personal blog of mine since very few people would read it anyway. However, hopefully by writing about it over at DarkZero, it’ll gain a little more exposure.
Of course, the annoyances of being Asian in the online world hardly stops at gaming, there are a whole ton of other annoying things I’ve encountered throughout the years. But that’s a story for another time, for now, here’s a short excerpt from my post as well as a link to it.
Read more @ http://darkzero.co.uk/blog/what-its-like-to-be-an-asian-gamer-part-1/
Problems Playing Online
The biggest example? Game servers. Every single time I refresh my server browser in practically any game, I’ll see dozens, if not hundreds, of USA servers available. Of course, living on the opposite side of the world means it’s impossible for me to play on those servers, seeing as how I’ll definitely have a ridiculously high ping. Of course, the same applies to UK servers as well, though there are probably slightly fewer servers available, but it’s still a substantial amount.
In contrast to Singapore, it’s a pain to search for game servers that give me a reasonable enough ping. And it’s not just small games that have insufficient Asian servers, I’m talking about the major, so called Triple-A titles that don’t have enough Asian servers as well. When Left 4 Dead was first released last year, I almost always had to host games locally just so that I could play without any latency. But then again, my computer itself then proceeds to lag because I’m hosting the game. It wasn’t until roughly a month later that a group of Singaporeans managed to sponsor a couple of servers for us to play properly. However, the demand for local servers was so high that they were almost always full as well and I had a hard time trying to play online.
For Team Fortress 2, I can count the number of servers available on 2 hands. Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare? I can count the number of servers available on just 1 hand.
This problem isn’t just present in Singapore. For example if you went over to Game Tracker and searched for Call Of Duty: World at War servers:
Country
Population
Number of Servers
USA 303 million 1375 UK 60 million 505 In comparison:
Country
Population
Number of Servers
China 1.3 BILLION 8 Japan 127 million 5 Korea 47 million 4 Malaysia 25 million 1 Not to mention Japan and Korea are probably the two Asian countries with the most active gaming communities. Oh and at the time of this writing, only 1 out of the 8 Chinese servers have 29/38 people playing, the other 7 are completely empty.
Thus, you can see how frustrating it is for us to come online and see people discussing about how great the multiplayer aspect of a certain game is, yet we’re simply unable to enjoy them in the same way.
Stupid, Stupid, Stupid, STUPID Apple (iPod Shuffle)
Interesting developments, My 2 cents worth March 12th, 2009
So my exams are finally over, (hurrah) but I come back to find Apple introducing a new iPod shuffle.
To me, this is Apple’s stupidest/dumbest/lousiest/crappiest/most idiotic product in its 32 years of existence.
No controls = only Apple’s earbuds
This, to me, is the epitome of stupidity. You don’t allow your consumers to use their own preferred earphones because you decide to take away ALL THE CONTROLS, COMPLETELY.
The very fact that the iPod Shuffle is lacking this “feature” makes it completely inferior to every single other MP3 player on the market, both past and present.
Do they really think customers will be attracted to buying something which has no controls and which you can only use with Apple’s earbuds? For people like me whose ears just won’t earbuds to stick to them without falling out every 5 seconds, it’s impossible for me to use the new iPod shuffle. The fact that they’re probably going to release an adapter that adds a remote doesn’t help things because
- I hate using remotes, they’re just clumsy and gimmicky
- I HAVE TO PAY FOR IT
Think about it, I have to pay to be able to control my MP3 player, and not to mention in a way which I detest.
It’s smaller… WTF?
Seriously, did they think the previous iPod Shuffle was not small enough? To me the previous iPod Shuffle was pretty darn good, it was just the right size, felt solid enough, and had a clip. All you could ask for was more capacity, which Apple could add over time.
But come on, was there really a need to make it smaller? What’s the point, are people really going to get all excited over it because it’s like 1 or 2 cm smaller? I certainly don’t need it.
I don’t want someone talking in my ear
Basically, Apple came up with this “brilliant” idea that a robotic voice would read to you the title of your song. I used to own a shuffle and l-o-v-e-d it, and it never had this feature, because it’s completely unnecessary. The original tagline for the iPod Shuffle was “Life is Random”, which was perfect. The whole point was that you didn’t know/bother about what the title of the song was, you just enjoyed whatever music that started randomly playing.
There was never the thought going through my head that “damn, I wish I knew what this song was”, more often than not I already did because the songs I put in my Shuffle were all my top-rated songs which I listened to constantly.
All in all, I really don’t see the point in this new “VoiceOver” feature.
Imagine this conversation…
Customer: Oh this is interesting, what’s this?
Apple guy: This is our new iPod Shuffle!
Customer: Oh I see… wait there aren’t any buttons?
Apple guy: Yup, that’s right!
Customer: So it has a touch screen or something?
Apple guy: Nope!
Customer: Then how do you control it?
Apple guy: Using Apple’s earphones!
Customer: Oh, then what if I want to use it with my own headphones? How do I control it then?
Apple guy: You can’t!
Customer: You’re joking right?
Apple guy: No! What’s wrong?! Look! It’s SMALLER!
All in all…
Apple’s going down the drain if they continue to produce products like this. Honestly, when I first saw the story about how the new iPod Shuffle has no buttons, I thought it was an Onion article.
Oh the horror when I found out it wasn’t…
Tags: apple, fanboys, ipod shuffle, sucks
Quake Live’s Coming!
Interesting developments February 24th, 2009
It is kinda of exciting, even for me. Even though I’ve been in the closed beta for awhile now, not to mention there won’t be any Asian servers even when the Open Beta is released, it’s still pretty exciting that the game which I loved to play since years ago is finally being revived and the masses can now enjoy it. It’s really really sad that I won’t be able to play online at all when the new people come in.
I don’t want to mess up my stats, so I won’t bother playing on any servers since I’ll get 300+ ping on all of them. I used to do that just for fun so that I can talk smack with other people, since it’s boring to play with bots like 100% of the time. However, I won’t be doing that when Open Beta starts, since stats are never going to be wiped again, I don’t want ending up with shitty stats and being matched with noobs all the time when Asian servers actually DO come (assuming they ARE going to). Not that I hate that, just that it won’t be fun for them. I’m no pro by any standard, but beating anyone new to the game is pretty darn easy for someone who’s been around the game for years.
Still, it will be fun to see how the community grows, how Quake Live grows, how the in-game advertising works out, etc.
Unfortunately, when Quake Live actually goes open beta, it’ll be 8am my time and I’ll be stuck in school, though I’ll still be checking things out during my Computing lesson Provided the servers haven’t actually crashed by then of course 
Tags: asian servers, open beta, ping, quake live
NOT AGAIN!
Interesting developments, My 2 cents worth February 23rd, 2009
Seriously, Sony really doesn’t seem to get it. They recently released more colours for the PSP, and now there are rumours that they’ve got a PSP-4000 in the works, this time with a sliding screen in front. From the rumoured pictures, it seems like they’re heading in a completely new direction for the PSP. This isn’t PSP 2, just a “complete aesthetic overhaul” apparently, meaning old PSP games will still work on it.
Seriously, does Sony not get it that the PSP isn’t doing well simply because most of the games SUCK. Maybe they need this guideline below:
- PSP games suck
- No one buys PSP games
- No one buys PSPs, everyone flocks to DSes
- Developers see the trend
- Top developers stop developing for the PSP
- PSP continues to get shitty games
- therefore, redesigning the PSP won’t help things.
Just Make a PSP 2 Already
In my opinion, if Sony really wanted to make such a move and revamp the PSP, they should have done the same to its insides as well. They might as well have designed a brand new PSP 2 from the ground up, with a faster processor and better graphics and whatnot, and admit the PSP is going nowhere. But no, instead Sony decides to just do an aesthetic overhaul.
COOL! for like 5 seconds…
I have to admit that if the final product is anything like the pictures, it will be pretty cool. Unfortunately, this will excite people for about a few weeks, then they’ll remember the real reason why they stopped touching their PSPs (like me): the games just aren’t fun. Making us play a shitty game on a larger screen (and hence at a lower resolution) just isn’t going to cut it Sony.
The Simple Solution
So what can they do to help? I’ve already said time and again in this really really long rant of mine about the PSP. They need to attract more top developers to develop high quality games for the PSP that people will actually bother to play. And cut the bullshit about it being a “portable media device”. I use my iPod for photos, videos and music and my PSP solely for gaming.
That is… when I still bothered about my PSP. Seriously, it’s probably collecting dust somewhere in my house. Not sure where exactly though…
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