| From The "Why Didn't I Think Of That" Dept |
[12 Jul 2009|04:22pm] |
Today I heard about Swoopo, an auction site with a twist. It's so mathematically evil I wonder why I never thought about it before.
Here's now it works. All items are sold by Swoopo, so they're all brand new. Each auction starts at 0 cents, and are relatively short in time. Every bid ups the auction by 12 cents, and adds up to 20 seconds back onto the clock for others to decide if they want to outbid that price. So it's as simple as hitting a "bid" button, as you cannot say how much you are willing to pay for the item.
You can also set a "bid butler", which is a script the site can set for you to auto-bid if you're not the high bidder and there are only a few seconds left.
Routinely, the end cost of the item is insanely cheap. Like $125 for a brand new Wii. Or $323 for a brand new MacBook Pro. Obviously, there's a catch right?
Well the catch is that you pay money to bid. Every bid on the site costs 60 cents. So if you bid 10 times and don't win the item, you owe $6 and get nothing in return. This does two things, keeps winning prices low for the winner, and makes a TON of money for Swoopo.
Lets take that $125 Wii. The actual winning amount was $125.16. At 12 cents per bid that means there were 1,043 bids. Since people paid 60 cents for each of those bids, Swoopo made $625.80 on the bids alone! Add in the cost of the actual winning price, and Swoopo made $750.96 on the sale of a Wii! Insane.
But they also get trickier. On bigger ticket items, they'll make the bid price lower. For the MacBook Pro, it was a 2 cent auction, which means bids raise the price by only two cents. This "seems" nice because the end price ends up being super low, but in fact it means Swoopo makes even more money.
The MBP above ended at $325.98 (retails for $1700). Amazing savings, but check the math again. At 2 cents per bid, $325.98 means there were 16,299 bids. At 60 cents a bid, they made $9,779.40 on bids! Add in the sale and that MBP made Swoopo $10,105.38!!
This almost feels like a pyramid scheme. If you bid once at the end and happen to win, you get items at insane prices. If you're one of the 16,000 bids that wasn't the winner, you just threw your money away for nothing.
I'm actually somewhat amazed that people actually use this site but then again most people suck at math and only see expensive items selling for uber cheap. I guess a sucker is born every minute.
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| Mother 3's Battle System |
[28 Jan 2009|10:16am] |
I'm obviously obsessed with game music as well as just music in general with odd time signatures. So this post by Dan Bruno taking an in depth look at Mother 3's Battle System just floored me.
Unless you've played it before you may not be aware of how it works. Basically you get combos by hitting the attack button in time with the music. Many of the songs are 4/4 time and not overly difficult. However, as you progress in the game, the music gets harder. Each enemy has it's own theme music, but twists to their music are added in as you play. Pauses are added, notes are dropped, tempo changes, etc.
Combos towards the end of the game get insanely hard. You may start with the same 4/4 song from earlier in the game, but then it changes to 9/8, then to 5/4, and then back to 4/4. Some of the end songs have signatures like 15/8 and 29/16! What's interesting is all of these variations actually sound good, they fit, and it's an incredible challenge. Personally, I think it's genius.
Dan describes this in his post much better than I ever could (he works at Harmonix on Rock Band after all). If anyone is at all interested in music theory and games, you need to read this. It's one of the best gaming posts I've ever read.
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| Game of the Year: Yoomp |
[28 Dec 2008|08:42pm] |
My game of the year this year is not a typical game. I've become more and more removed from the normal game scene as I've gotten older and perhaps this just nails that home. My pick this year is Yoomp for the Atari 8-bit computer. Yes, I said that right. It's a brand new game released this year in limited production (though the ROM can also be downloaded).
Yoomp is sort of a cross between Stun Runner and Gyruss, but without the fighting and set to music. It's kind of an obstacle course game. You have a jumping ball that goes down a tube. Your object is to get the ball to the goal. Certain blocks you land on affect the ball in different ways and how you move the ball onto them also affects your score. The fire button will "charge" your ball to make the next jump twice as big.
All of the ball jumps are part of the music. Each individual block has it's own note that will change the musical score a bit as you play. Think Rez here for a similarity. It adds a lot to the game, and gives it more atmosphere than just a ball going down a tube.
The levels can get tricky and I love games like this. It in some ways reminds me of how I felt playing Super Monkey Ball. I also can't get over how well it's programmed. We're talking about a system that is, what, 25 years old? The game will run on the stock Atari 800 XL, but also has features that become available if you have an upgraded system (like stereo sound if you have dual Pokey chips).
Anyway, I really enjoyed this game, probably more so than any other that I've played this year. It's just simple and fun, which I think I need more of in my gaming diet.
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| New Xbox Experience |
[20 Nov 2008|12:32pm] |
Personally, I'm not a big fan of the new Xbox "experience"? Sure it's prettier than the blades, and the blades interface had its own issues, but the new UI has a myriad of problems.
First of all, spacial functionality. The vertical menu selection is fine, but then you switch to horizontal sub menu or item selection. The biggest issue for me here is that the "top" item takes up too much space. You have to rifle through your items like flash cards, one at a time, with no real knowledge of how many there are, or how far to the end of the list you are.
If it was a simple list view, you could see more than one option on the screen, as well as a scrollbar if the list is long, giving you both a high level view of where you currently are in a list and how long the list is. This is absent from the new Xbox UI and it's frustrating.
This hurts doubly hard for people like me still on SDTV. Things are really packed in tightly, and they are not at all compensating for overscan. This means the edges of the screen have content missing (and my SDTV is not as bad as some on overscan). It's as if they are expecting full bleed even on old TVs and that's just wrong. And there's no way to compensate for it in the preferences. Another bad oversight.
The avatars...yeah, I'm not an avatar guy, and mine looks nothing like me. They don't seem to really serve any purpose at all (perhaps they will, I don't know). And there's also the stupid bug still present where it logs me when I turn the console on, yet it doesn't. When I try to do certain things it says I need to log in, yet when I select my profile it's grayed out like I'm already logged in. I have to log in as Annette's profile, log her out and then log myself in in order to *actually* be logged in.
That said, the Netflix streaming is nice. I will be getting a lot of use out of it. Copying games to hard disk is also nice, as are one or two more options it introduces. Still, overall I expected a bit more. The design seems typical Microsoft. Great in concept, poor in execution.
In the end perhaps it doesn't much matter. I'm having a hard time getting excited about any games on consoles these days. This goes for the Xbox as well as Wii and PS3. There is way more to be excited about for me in the PC realm, which is the first time I think I've said that since 1994. But maybe I'm just getting older and more particular, I don't know.
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| GLITCH: Designing Imperfection |
[30 Oct 2008|06:34pm] |
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This book has been about 2 years in the making, but it's apparently getting released "any day now". GLITCH: Designing Imperfection is I believe the first book on Glitch Art. I was asked to be a part of it and they are featuring AXBX in it. Lots of really good artists in this one. Can't wait for it to come out. You can pre-order it on Amazon if this sort of thing tickles your fancy.
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| Mega Man 9 |
[22 Sep 2008|08:26pm] |
Just downloaded Mega Man 9 (didn't realize it came out today). Holy shit is it awesome! It is basically everything I thought it would be and more. They did such an incredible job on this game. I really cannot say this enough. They faithfully recreated an NES game without using an NES and made it great to boot.
I've only just begun playing it, but damn, if you at all liked Mega Man 2, you have to download it. It's not often that you get a new NES game like this one.
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| WotLK Nov 13 |
[15 Sep 2008|09:56am] |
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For those who having heard, Wrath of the Lich King comes out on Nov 13. Anyone else taking the day off? :)
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| Ys Book I & II |
[07 Sep 2008|08:21pm] |
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I haven't turned on my Wii since probably May. I decided to today to do a system update, and also checked out what was on Virtual Console on a whim. And holy shit Ys Book I & II is finally out!! I know what I'm doing the rest of the night...
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| End Of Year Gaming Plans |
[25 Aug 2008|10:03am] |
Since everyone is posting their final quarter of '08 gaming plans, figured I'd post the same. Here's the list of what I want to play that's coming out:
- World of Warcraft: Wrath of the Lich King [PC]
- Mega Man 9 [VC]
- Tecmo Bowl: Kickoff [DS]
- Korg DS-10 [DS]
Yes the Korg thing is not a game but it just looks too damn cool. Obviously I'm not too hot on many games this year. I've got much more of a wait-and-see attitude as I get older. I think Mario Galaxy was the last draw of a hyped game I got and ended up hating. So I'm much more cautious.
That said there are a couple classics I want to play through this winter. They are:
- Phantasy Star IV
- Skies of Arcadia: Legends
- Metal Gear Solid 2
I've been meaning to play all of these for a while, just haven't gotten around to it. There are so many good old classics out there, it doesn't bother me much if the new stuff doesn't excite me. There's plenty to play.
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| All You Ever Wanted To Know About Laserdiscs |
[13 Aug 2008|08:45am] |
I love the MAME guys. I really do. Many of these guys are among the brightest in their field and I love the fact that they're not only working on MAME but also documenting the progress they make.
Case in point, this post by Aaron Giles on Laserdisc games. It's the second part of several but it covers many of the tricks and techniques game designers used to make games like Dragon's Lair and Space Ace, and how emu authors have been trying to figure out how this all works for many years when all along it was just staring them right in the face and they never noticed it.
Perhaps it's just the fusion of me wanting to know how things work and my love for gaming, but this sort of stuff is really fascinating to me.
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| Portal "2" |
[20 Jul 2008|10:26am] |
One of the things that caught my eye at the MS press conference at E3 was the new Portal game "Portal: Still Alive". Since I can't play FPS's on consoles I figured I'd just wait until the PC version was released. Then I read the actual description of the game:
Portal: Still Alive is a standalone version of the original Portal that can be purchased through Xbox Live Marketplace. In addition to Portal itself, it will include a number of levels that are not part of the game’s story, and do not feature story-related elements such as GLaDOS voiceover.
Well, so much for that I guess. Looks like the only two games I'm really looking forward to now are Mega Man 9 and Wrath of the Lich King. I'd add Thunder Force VI, but I'm going to assume that's not coming to america.
Maybe I should finish redoing my console emulator and play through some old games I never got to when I was younger.
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| Ten Fingers |
[17 Jul 2008|05:06pm] |
If humans had 8 fingers instead of 10, our number system would be Octal, instead of Decimal. I'm wondering how this would have affected civilization with the advent of computers and binary, given conversions in Base 8 is a lot easier than Base 10.
I wonder if we would have had certain scientific discoveries sooner, and if it would have made those discoveries more palatable for the average person.
Just something that crossed my mind today.
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| My E3 Reaction |
[16 Jul 2008|10:01am] |
Microsoft knows how to spend money.
Nintendo knows how to make money.
Sony doesn't know how to do either.
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| Netflix on 360 |
[14 Jul 2008|03:11pm] |
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So you'll be able to stream movies from your Netflix queue to your 360 in the next fall update. That's amazingly cool. I certainly can't wait, though needing to have a Live Gold membership kinda sucks. I'm now debating whether the selection of instant watch movies on Netflix is worth the extra $40 a year for a Gold card. :/
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| PVP vs PVE, Horde vs Alliance |
[11 Jul 2008|03:29pm] |
I recently started an Alliance toon on a PVE server that a friend plays on, just to dick around. Other than a Pally I got to lvl 6 a few years ago, I've never actually played Alliance, and I've certainly never played on a PVE server. So after 3 1/2 years of playing Horde side on a PVP server what's it like?
It's odd. First of all, Alliance is easy mode. And I'm not just saying that because I still hate the Alliance but rather because it is. All of the quests seem to be in one small area near a town. You barely have to walk anywhere to complete them. There is certainly nothing like the Barrens around.
Alliance also get little touches that I never feel Horde gets. When we did Magister's Terrace on our PvP server, there's a section where you see a cutscene. I thought this was super cool, until I saw similar stuff at lvl 10 on Alliance side. Why does Horde not get anything like that?
There's more interesting things going on as well. Orcs attempt to sneak to an Ally town slowly. They'll pop out behind a stone, look around then run to the next closest stone and hide behind it. You can't see them when going up the road and if you go by too close they jump out at you. How cool is that? Nothing like that on Horde side that I recall.
The Tram from Ironforge to Stormwind is awesome because it saves running around to get there. Yet Horde has to run from TB to Org to get the flight paths between the two. Even in Outlands, you can fly from Honor Hold right to Shattrath, there is no middle step to get like Horde has to get with Falcon Watch. These are little things but stuff I've noticed.
That said, the quests do seem harder. There seem to be more random drop quests, less kill quests. Mobs seem to be grouped up, I've had a few 4 pulls in the mid teens just to kill a named mob or grab something I needed. Don't remember much of that on Horde side. Perhaps that makes up for it, I dunno. I suppose in small spaces you have to fit more concentrated mobs.
Stormwind sucks as a city. I'd say it's my least favorite in the game by far. Ironforge on the other hand, rocks. It's probably my new favorite. Exodar is just too damn massive for its own good, especially since it's empty.
As for PVE...I hate it. Now that I'm in contested territory it totally ruins the game. Yes it's nice not to worry about getting ganked, and my hair stands up a bit when I see a horde member, but it hard to get scared when their nameplate is blue. They can't do anything to you! It actually makes the game seem like we're all one big happy family and all on the same side. It totally sucks!
There are several people in our guild on the PvP server who hate PvP. I hate it some times too, but it certainly adds a distinction between the factions and makes it feel like a living, breathing world. PVE to me just makes the entire game feel like it shouldn't even be an MMO. It takes the war out of Warcraft. There is no reason why it couldn't just be a standalone, single player game at that point.
I've wondered at times if I would have had more fun if I started on a PVE realm instead of a PvP one. Now I know. I probably would have hated the game. I hate being ganked as much as anyone, but it adds to the game and makes it more interesting. People want to get flying mounts at 70 just to not get ganked! The real life consequences and back and forth between the factions is great, as annoying as it can be at times. It beats the boredom of the alternative in my mind.
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| The End |
[25 Jun 2008|05:26pm] |
To wrap up my hatred for no talent musical phonies, here's an article in the Torontoist that is everything the Pitchfork article should have been and more. It actually does *gasp* research, and doesn't just copy/paste quotes from other lame blogs.
Man, look at all those sad marks in that crowd shot.
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| Official: Crystal Castles Are Posers |
[24 Jun 2008|10:13pm] |
![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif) ferricide alerted me to a Pitchfork article on the Crystal Castles debacle of them ripping off chiptune artists. They admit to using the samples, yet play it off as some really old, never released stuff, and much ado about nothing. Yet before I read this, I was reading up some more on the entire affair at 8bitcollective, where the rips were first discovered. Basically, none of their shit jives, they're straight up posers.
From the Pitchfork article, Ethan from CC says:
"These infringing songs are early unreleased tracks which were never performed. They are the most awful tracks associated with the band and [vocalist] Alice [Glass] herself hasn't heard most of these tracks. I put these tracks together myself and then discarded them because I thought they were too poor for release."
Really? "most awful tracks"? "discarded"? That doesn't quite explain this screenshot of their myspace page on May 2nd, 2008, showing "Insecticon" in their playlist, one of their songs that rips off chiptune artist Lo-Bat, without credit.
So do they really want to say this song was "unreleased" and "too poor for release"? If these songs are too poor for release, then why did one of their label managers say this to the site administrator of 8bitcollective?
"We are hoping to have the songs on a future release (maybe a rarities/demos/remixes compilation) and would love to clear this with Lo-Bat. If you can get a contact for him through the 8bit forum that would be great and we can finally release these tracks."
What, now if they can get permission they are willing to release these "most awful tracks"? Something doesn't add up.
And what about Lo-Bat? What's his take? CC says this about him:
"Crystal Castles also insist that Lo-Bat has contacted their manager and expressed that he does not mind the sample and finds the controversy 'ridiculous.'"
Lo-Bat himself responds on 8bitcollective:
"..it looks like CC make a sport out of thieving
Just saw this one: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j4vWlbO_qoQ
A nice mix of bibibi, my little droid needs a hand and probably a bunch of other songs of me (don't feel the need to listen it twice right now)
Just wanted to let you guys know that I want to react on this and not just let it fade away.
After discussing it with M-.-n I think the right approach is to play it on the fact that CC didn't respect the creative commons license I choose for my work. It is NOT ok to consider Creative commons web-releases as a free pool for sampling and thieving to spice up your own wallet."
Seems this isn't the first time CC has been caught thieving. Artist Trevor Brown made a drawing of Madonna with a bloody eye. CC stole it, put it on a 7", and on a bunch of t-shirts they sold at concerts. CC's excuse?
"We found the image on an old flyer, with no credit, so we didnt know who it belonged to or who to ask. We figured if we used it, the artist would eventually make him/herself known"
Trevor did make himself known, and said he'd like them to stop selling t-shirts and making money off his work. They didn't. They've been selling the shirts now for 2 years. What makes matters worse, is now CC is saying they actually commissioned Trevor originally to do this drawing:
"We found this Madonna drawing on an old flyer for a punk gig. The artist re-drew it for us back when we were just a little band, and now that we have some sort of fame, he writes everywhere that we stole it."
This would almost make sense except for the fact that the drawing is on the cover of one of Trevor's books from 1999. If you're gonna lie, at least get your shit straight.
I'll leave you with two quotes from CC:
"We’re using sounds that no-one else can get."
Unless you pay attention to the chipscene and steal it.
"I do not regret this, the publicity we are receiving four years later is priceless."
Yeah, making money off the backs of other artists would be priceless if you got away with it as much as these posers have.
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| Who Is Crystal Castles And Why Do I Already Hate Them? |
[24 Jun 2008|10:47am] |
Someone recently told me about Crystal Castles. I had never heard of them. They said they're pretty big now (are they? I don't know). The next day someone mentioned them again, only this time about how they ripped off some chiptune artists (namely 8bitpeoples).
I haven't always been a fan of all of the artists at 8bitpeoples (too much reliance on Gameboy's I think, though RushJet1 is great), but at least they're original. And I have a real problem with people stealing tunes from chiptune authors. It seems to be happening more these days (see Timbaland, Nelly Furtado).
Most of these chiptune authors are just doing it for the love of the craft, not to make money, and then these creatively bankrupt musicians come in and take whatever they want for their major label albums like it's no big deal. That's just shitty. The resulting music is amazingly horrible, which just makes it that much worse.
Sorry for the rant, I just hate poseurs.
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