Tuesday, January 30, 2007

Nintendo Wii modchip soon available?

Buy Wiinja
QJ.NET - Nintendo Wii Modchips

Dopefish's Latest Movie Recommendations

The Prestige - 8.1
The Prestige, is a tale about a friendship that turn into a rivalry. It's about two magicians who compete against each other, and when one of them performs his ultimate trick, the other one risk everything to find out the secret of that trick. But the more he tries to figure it out, the more it seems like it wasn't a trick at all.

Great atmosphere with a really compelling story that makes you take a moment and think about it afterwards. The only set back is one major flaw in the story. I can't reveal it here since it would spoil the movie, but let's just say it was a little too much fantasy for my taste.


Children of Men - 8.2
A surreal dystopian future, yet very believable. 18 years have passed since the last human child was born, and mankind has realized it's on the verge to extinction. The world have turned out to a world of chaos, with only a few that still remains civilized. It's as much about a Big Brother society as it is about the war on terror.

To be honest, the first fifth of the movie didn't seem appealing to me at all. Although very well made, it was really a gray portrait of a future London, and it was progressing at a really slow tempo. But if one just gives this movie a chance, one will be pleasantly suprised. Also, I couldn't help but think of Half-Life 2 when watching this movie. They share plenty of resemblances.


Pan's Labyrinth - 8.5
The trailer for this movie makes it look like a sugar sweet fairy tale story, that could be enjoyed by the whole family, but that's not the case. This is actually one of the most brutal movies I've ever seen. It's the story about a little girl and her pregnant mother who travels together to live with the new husband, a fascist military officer.

It all takes place in 1944, a rural area of Spain, and the story gives me alot of vibes from Alice in Wonderland and the Grimm's Fairy Tales. It's not without reason this movie have been nominated for 6 oscars, and 49 other awards, aswell as they've already won 15 awards, which best costume, cinematography and foreign film is among them.

Monday, January 29, 2007

Game Developers' Evening #2 - DICE

Game Developers' Evening #2 - EA Digital Illusions
Our second Game Developers' Evening will be held January 31 in cooperation with EA DICE. The event will focus on the Battlefield franchise as well as their new unannounced game. The speakers and topics of the evening are as follows:

- Ben Cousins, Creative Director: Low Level Game Design: the Foundation of Great Gameplay
- Alex Peters, Senior Development Director: Postmortem: Battlefield 2142

The program for the evening is as follows:
17:00 Event opens
17:30 SGA Project Manager John-Philip Johansson presents the competition and the evening
17:45 Ben Cousins from EA DICE talks about "Low-level game design: the foundation of great gameplay"
18:30 Break
18:45 Former SGA jury member Patrick Bach from EA DICE gives his best tips for winning SGA
19:00 Alex Peters from EA DICE talks about "Postmortem: Battlefield 2142"
19:45 Prizes awarded
19:50 Mingle with the other visitors, with a chance to play Battlefield 2142 and speak to recruiters and game developers from EA DICE
21:00 Event closes

When: January 31, 17:00-21:00
Where: Kårhuset Nymble, Drottning Kristinas väg 15, KTH Campus Valhallavägen. View map.
Registration: Fill in the form at the main page
-Swedish Game Awards

Complete NES Collection on eBay

eBay - NES - EVERY GAME EVER MADE

No GDC'07, aims for GDC'08 instead!

Due to bad timing, I won't be able to make it for GDC this year, but I'll aim for next year insstead. The good news is that I get plenty of money left over to spend on other fun stuff :)

GDC'07 - San Francisco for a week

Sunday, January 28, 2007

DS-XtremeOS (Firmware) 1.1.0

Changelog
+Multiple skin selection/support (Holding B during startup forces system backup skin to be loaded)
+Entirely new skin!
+Scroll-bar widget
-New loading and top screen
-Cosmetic change to App loading transition

-Previous (1.0.x) skin is now available as "OS10"
+ "Preset" directories searching option
+ "SkinApps" Skin engine based applications support
+Sudoku, Pwng, and Calculator examples

* Instant boot MBR handling bug fixed
* Instant boot LED handling bug fixed
* Better eeprom emulation mode detection
* Fixed an issue with graphics engine display quality (line skipping)
* Dpad release events are now properly placed into event queue

Hardware Change-log:
* Resolved QKIN timing issue
- Changed default IO state on CPU bus which should help improve reliability all-around.

Legend:
+Addition
*Bugfix
-Change

Download
Update Tool (Win 32)
Skin / Skinapps FW 1.1.0

Latest DS-XtremeOS (Firmware)

Operation: Bullar for Matthies

Every so often, it happens that we have to crunch over the weekends. It's rather cozy here when it's not soo many people, and when it's soo cold outside anyway. On those weekends, we're usually given buns, just for the sake of it. But there is one guy that has to work here more on the weekends than everyone else, and he's one of those veggie/vegans, so he can't eat buns since they have milk, buttar and eggs in them.

(They don't eat hamburgers either. Thought I just should fill that one in aswell...)

This makes me sad, that he's going to be the only one who doesn't get any buns on the weekends, so I decided to do something about it. And so "Operation: Bullar for Matthies" commenced!

  • Google for recipe on "bullar"
  • Print it out and take it with you to the store

  • Ingredients: Vetemjöl (Flour), Solhavre (milk replacer), Laktosfritt smör (milk-free butter), Jäst (Yeast), Syrup, Kanel (cinnamon) and Pärlsocker (pearl sugar)
  • Observe: I used replacements for milk and butter

  • Pour 5dl flour into something
  • Take 50g butter and split it up in pieces that you put in the same something as the flour
  • To make it look more funny, take one half yeast cube and shred it above the other stuff
  • Pour like 2dl milk into it, just for kicks
  • Since I didn't know what else to do, I took a orange that I squished above it, to get some juice in the mix
  • And to make it all gooey, you can just massage it with your fingers
  • Place a towel above it, and let it rest for 30mins after the massage
  • (I didn't have a towel, so I took paper towels...)

  • To make it more funky looking, cover it with cinnamon
  • Since I didn't have any forms for the dough, I just made some interesting looking forms of it, that I spread across a oven plate
  • Let them catch their breath for another 30mins
  • Since they were looking kind of ugly, and something were apperantly missing, I decided to go back to the store and buy myself some pearl sugar

  • Once back from the store with the pearl sugar, I decided to smear something on them, and since I couldn't use egg, I brushed them with Solhavre (the replacement milk) instead
  • Then it was just all about sprinkling them with the pearl sugar, and they started to look atleast a little bit more attractive

  • Put them in the oven, on 225 degrees (celsius, please) for 10-15mins

  • Serve them to a Matthies, and stand a safe distance away and observe in awe as he decides to devour them
  • Operation successful, and it didn't taste like crap as I thought it would, but actually better than most buns/bullar

Saturday, January 27, 2007

GDC'07 - San Francisco for a week

Alright, shame on those who goes belly up after a few setbacks. Nintendo Wii, Twilight Princess, a new mobilephone can all wait, since I've decided to cruise on low steam this month, saving up my economy. After plenty of calculations and googlinating, I've come up with this price plan:

Game Developers Conference - Classic Pass: $945
Olympic Hotel - Double with shared bath: $280 for a week
Resecentrum - Stockholm to San Francisco: 2816 SEK (~$400)
Total: ~$1625

I'm also going to have a money buffer for food and taxi. Although economically viable, this is still a pretty steep price to pay. But don't despair, I still got a few schemes up my sleeve, that I hope might lower the cost for an entrance pass. If my scheming delay too long though, beyond the end of this month, the entrance pass fee will rise to $1450!

Game Developers Conferance 2007
San Francisco, where are you? :'(

TOSE: Shadow Game Development

"What we want is to support publishers in creating good games and help them make lots of money. We want to be a strong hidden crew that helps them achieve their goals."

How many NES, Super NES, Genesis, Saturn, Dreamcast, or PS1 games have we played that Tose had secretly worked on? Never mind that -- how many titles are we playing today that these guys have had a hand in?
TOSE: Gaming's Dirty Little Secret

Black Mesa - Half-Life 2


Black Mesa: A Half-Life 2 modification

Mods of 2006

Dystopia - Half-Life 2

The SoulKeeper - Unreal Tournament 2004

Drawn to be alive - Unreal Tournament 2004

Katana - Max Payne

Darsana - Quake (Darkplaces engine)
Mods of 2006 - Editors' Choice
Mods of 2006 - Player's Choice

Thursday, January 25, 2007

Wednesday, January 24, 2007

LumaLive!

No Sealand for Pirates

When the interviewer asked Prince Michael about his awareness of PirateBay.org’s intentions, he spoke quite clearly on how he was against file sharing. “It’s theft of proprietary rights, it doesn’t suit us at all,” he said. “In fact, I’ve written a book and Hollywood is making a movie out of it, so it would go right against the grain to go into the file sharing thing.”
-Marcus Yam, January 22, 2007

Sealand Prince Says No to PirateBay.org
The Pirate Bay wants their own nation

Tuesday, January 23, 2007

Making my bed, sleeping my night

Someday, the older generation will die of old age

Emotions are running high again after two 17-year-old men killed their friend's parents in an extremely violent attack last Saturday in the village of Tessin in the state of Mecklenburg-West Pomerania.

In the absence of any clear motive, police are investigating the gaming background of the two high school students. Both were actively involved in their school's after-school computer club, reports the regional newspaper Schweriner Zeitung. Police are now checking their hard drives to determine whether the two -- described by locals as "friendly and polite" -- also used to play "killer games."
-mkp, Spiegel Online, January 19, 2007

The stories about politicians and their lack of insight only gets worse for each month that pass. How man teenagers don't play "killer games"? I would be suprised if they didn't find any. But this is just absurd. I mean, "we have no motive, let's check if they got any violent games"...

EU Targets Violent Video Games

San Francisco, where are you? :'(

"We regret to inform you that all volunteer positions have been filled for the 2007 Game Developers Conference, and we did not have room for you.

The quantity of excellent applications continues to grow each year and we would like to thank you for applying and offering your time, energy, and enthusiasm to the conference and the volunteer program. Our toughest job is turning away so many quality people!

We anticipate that we will have openings as the conference grows nearer and circumstances change, forcing already-accepted volunteers to cancel, so we maintain a waiting list.

Note: We had to turn away over 500 hundred applicants and just don't have time to answer e-mails from all of them. We can't predict with much accuracy what your chances of being picked off the waiting list are but we always have a fair number of cancellations to fill, so it's worth a shot to be on the waiting list. We will most definitely and enthusiastically contact you if we have an opening for you."
Tim Brengle and Ian MacKenzie
Conference Associate Managers

Saturday, January 20, 2007

Fallout 3 for Xbox 360

In an exclusive interview with the UK Official Xbox Magazine, Bethesda have revealed more details about Fallout 3, the legendary post-apocalyptic RPG franchise they took over in 2004.

And whilst the title has only been confirmed for the PC thus far, judging by the comments below, an official word on its Xbox 360 release could be imminent...

Speaking to Todd Howard (Executive producer of Oblivion, Morrowind and Fallout) with regard to Bethesda's plans for 2007 and beyond, he told us; "We started work (on Fallout 3) in late 2004 with a few people. We only had about 10 people on it until Oblivion wrapped, but most of our staff is on it now." Is it wishful thinking that Fallout 3 will eventually be released on Microsoft's next-gen machine? With the game itself utilising the same Gamebryo engine as Oblivion, perhaps not. And promised to be as huge and open-ended as their multi-award winning 2006 effort, demand for Fallout 3 on the Xbox 360 would be huge.

"We have pretty long preproduction phases on our stuff," continues Howard "doing concepts, design, building prototypes, and such. We should be ready soon to show it off, but we'll see."

For more details and the full interview with Bethesda, check out issue 18 of the Official Xbox 360 Magazine, on sale from the 15th of February.
The first exclusive interview about Fallout 3 goes to a Xbox 360 magazine? Do I need to say more?

Fallout 3 headed to XBox? Not unlikely says Bethesda

Wednesday, January 17, 2007

The Pirate Bay wants their own nation

Swedish file-sharing website The Pirate Bay is planning to buy its own nation in an attempt to circumvent international copyright laws.

The group has set up a campaign to raise money to buy Sealand, a former British naval platform in the North Sea that has been designated a 'micronation', and claims to be outside the jurisdiction of the UK or any other country.

According to a website set up to secure the purchase of Sealand, The Pirate Bay plans to give citizenship of the micronation to anyone willing to put money towards the purchase.

"It should be a great place for everybody, with high-speed Internet access, no copyright laws and VIP accounts to The Pirate Bay,"

"If we do not get enough money required to buy the micronation of Sealand, we will try to buy another small island somwhere and claim it as our own country,"
-James Savage, The Local, 12th January 2007

They've already managed to gather $17,000 in a week. It will be interesting to see how things develop from here and I personally would vote on using the Free Software song as a national anthem :)

Free Software Song (mp3)

Buy Sealand
Wikipedia - Sealand
The Pirate Bay Free Nation Wiki
The Local - The Pirate Bay plans to buy island

Loose weigth with 30 mins of gaming a day

"To be honest, I was genuinely surprised by my end results, so I’ll just get right to it. I lost 9lbs! Obviously this doesn’t compare to Jared and the Subway diet, but I started out at a weight that I’ve been at for the past 2 years. My weight has really never fluctuated from 180lbs. in those two years, this makes the weight loss that much more of an accomplishment for me, considering I did not change anything I ate or did. Also, this experiment took place during the holiday season, where I ate holiday dinners like I normally would and drank what I would normally would have drank."
Wii Sports Experiment Results

Thursday, January 11, 2007

My Nintendo DS-Xtreme

1. Download latest Update Tool (includes firmware)
2. Download latest Skin
3. Plug-in DS-Xtreme to the USB port
4. Let Windows fool around some with the hardware
5. Run Update Tool and flash the card
6. Wait for it to state that the update is completed
7. Open up the DS-Xtreme drive in explorer
8. Remove the old skin folder and replace it with the new one
9. Just copy the .NDS files to your Apps folder and have fun!
"After you've finished the update I recommend you to format your DS-Xtreme to FAT16 (also known as "FAT") and copy the new skin onto your DS-Xtreme."
Nintendo DS-Xtreme 4GBit (512Mbyte)
Latest DS-XtremeOS (Firmware)

Emulators for Nintendo DS
Nintendo DS Roms
The Legend of Zelda: Parallel Worlds
Super Metroid Redesign
Mario Adventure

Wednesday, January 10, 2007

The Legend of Zelda: Parallel Worlds

Parallel Worlds is a fully hacked version of Zelda 3 (aka A Link to the Past). A majority of the game has been changed. There may be a few rooms which can be said to be similar to some from the original game.

General changes involve:

  • Brand new Overworlds, I promise you won't find an area which is unchanged!
  • Brand new Dungeons, all dungeons are completely different from the original!
  • New house indoors and caves, some of these you may find similar to the original game.
  • New Graphics, a lot of the graphics has been changed.
  • New Screen layout, similar to Ocarina of Time yet not exactly the same.
  • Some new music, the original game had great music, these are not to be changed :)
  • New Story, while some events maybe similar to the original game, but it's intentional.
  • A lot of other changes, and surprises!
The Legend of Zelda: Parallel Worlds
The Legend of Zelda: Parallel Worlds (rom)