Friday, April 29, 2011

Razer Carcharias Test

Two days ago, the audio in my stream had an obnoxious clicking sound that I was able to trace to the microphone input. I've been using a cheap $20 headset and mic that I got more than 3 years ago so I figured it might be time to upgrade to something a little better. I read a bunch of reviews online and decided that the Razer Carcharias would be worth trying out so I went to Best Buy and picked one up. The headphone part was fine and was definitely nicer than what I had at home. However, the problem I was trying to solve was getting a better microphone sound for my stream. It turns out that the microphone on the Razer Carcharias is worse than the one on the cheap set and does a worse job of picking up my voice. In addition, I found a lot more static in the signal coming from the Carcharias mic, so I decided to return them.

This morning before I returned them, I gave my old set another try, and the clicking noise was gone from the mic. My recommendation would be to only get a Razer Carcharias if you don't care too much about the microphone and plan to only use it for gaming with the occasional communication through steam, ventrilo or teamspeak.

Wednesday, April 27, 2011

What the Birds?

I was looking at the iOS app store today and I noticed that of the top 5 paid games, 2 of them are Angry Birds and 2 of them are games with icons that look very similar to Angry Birds. I think if you want to get a top selling iOS app these days, the best way is probably to create an icon for your app that has a cute chubby bird on it. That gives me a good idea for yet another project to work on when I can find some time...

Monday, April 25, 2011

Nintendo announces Wii 2

So I guess today Nintendo announced the Wii 2. Sounds like a good idea to me except for one or two things. First of all, the name doesn't follow Nintendo's regular naming scheme for consoles. Until the Wii, they'd always used Nintendo somewhere in the name for the console. The only time they reused the name of their previous console was in the Super Nintendo (SNES). This time, they seem to have followed the pattern set by their competitor, Sony, by just adding a number to the end. Come on Nintendo, couldn't you come up with something original? It sounds like you're just saying, "We too." I'd even settle for it being called the Super Wii over Wii 2.

Actually, I can't really come up with anything else to complain about other than the name, especially since there really aren't that many details about it yet. We will definitely get to hear a lot more about it at E3 this June and then I might have more to say. I've always liked Nintendo, and I'm sure this system won't be a big disappointment, especially since I already have a 3DS and they will probably do some things together.

If you want to read more about it, here is a list of recent blog posts about the announcement: ZDNet, PCMag(talks a little about hardware), 2D-X, T3, NDTV

Update: It appears that the official name of the project from Nintendo is Project Cafe, which is much less silly than the name that is being reported in most of the media.

Saturday, April 23, 2011

ryAnime Texture Pack

My friend Tharesan recently made a texture pack for Minecraft that I thought I should show off. The pack can be downloaded from his page on planet minecraft. The change that you notice most immediately is that fires from furnaces and torches are blue instead of red, giving the lighting a cooler feel. The major changes are with the items and the skins for some of the mobs. Bows and arrows instead show up as shurikens. Swords have different blades and handles depending on the material, and all of the armor feels much more like it's out of some anime, with holes in places that reduce the practicality of the armor but make it just that much more awesome.

In terms of the changes to mobs, wolves have different skins, and tamed wolves look like huskies, but I wasn't able to find any wild wolfs in my short test to see what they look like. Skeletons look like bandits or ninjas wielding shurikens and are definitely fearsome. All in all, it's an enjoyable texture pack that leaves most of the terrain untouched for people like me that enjoy the look of terrain, while changing the feel of the items to keep the game fresh and engaging. Good job Tharesan! Check below for my video review.

Thursday, April 21, 2011

What is missing from motion-controlled shooting games

When I got my Wii way back when it first came out in November of 2006 I was really excited for the new gameplay possibilities it would provide. In particular, I believed that shooters would finally be playable on consoles. No offense to anyone that exclusively plays shooters on consoles, but a mouse just provides much better accuracy and control than a thumb-stick ever will be able to. With the Wii remote, you can just point at the screen and pull a trigger to fire, much like gun-wielding arcade games.

In order to try out the motion-controlled shooting experience, I got a game called Elebits. The aiming at the screen works well, and the player quickly becomes accustomed to pointing to get the cursor to move. The one big downfall of this targeting scheme comes when the player needs to change the direction of the camera. The only way to move the camera is to move the pointer to the edge of the screen and wait there until the camera has moved far enough and then return the pointer to the center of the screen. This method of controlling the camera is just as bad as using a joystick, and in fact a little bit worse. For instance, if you move the cursor just a little bit past the edge of the screen and leave the screen entirely, the sensor no longer knows which direction to turn, so it either turns the wrong way or doesn't turn at all. Maybe that's why all the shooting games in arcades are rail shooter (a game where the camera control is scripted, and the action is always where the camera is looking). Unless something is done to improve the current state of motion-controls for consoles (and most arcade games), rail shooters are the best kind of motion-controlled shooters we will have.

The way I would implement a motion-controlled shooter to make the controls non-frustrating and intuitive would require hardware that is more expensive and perhaps less practical to have in one's living room. Most importantly, the player would need to have a surround display system. I mean that a set of displays, or one large, curved display, would need to be placed around the player to allow for a 360 degree view at all times. The player could then point the wand/gun/whatever in any direction and use a joystick to move relative to that pointing direction. The result would be an intuitive, accurate, and easy to control shooter with motion controls. The only downside is that the display technology is much more expensive than people are willing to pay. One might also want more displays to look up and down in addition to the horizontal directions.

Tuesday, April 19, 2011

Should I return to LoL

I recently decided to take a break from League of Legends. This happened at the time I made my previous blog post about competitive gaming. I uninstalled the game because a particular interaction I had in the game got me quite upset, and I didn't like how I felt. Since then, I haven't missed the game very much, and I've gotten much more interest in my stream from playing Minecraft. However, I do still think the game has good things to it, and would like to play it again at some point. Recently I've been trying to think about the things that would need to happen for me to be able to handle playing again.

First, I think everyone would have to only focus on the good things during the actual gameplay. This focus would be much more positive and help everyone on the team to be friendlier and more supportive of each other. Second, after the game ends, I'd be willing to accept comments about how everyone who played could improve, but I don't believe most interactions with the enemy team would be useful. I find that almost all the time, conversations with the enemy team are just a stream of insults and destructive to the morale of everyone. However, even when bringing up areas for improvement, I think there should be a clear message that good things did come from that player, and that they could be just a little bit better with this change or that change.

The primary motivation for these changes is to keep myself motivated and prevent me from getting so angry again. I will admit that my anger wasn't fully justified, but I also had many stressful things coming up in my life that kept me from keeping as level a head as I normally try to maintain. I also think that these changes will make me a more enjoyable team mate, and a better person at life in general.

Sunday, April 17, 2011

Are consoles holding back PC gaming?

People close to me know what my answer to this question is. A resounding yes. I've played a variety of games in recent years and I own a couple consoles (ps3 and wii) as well as a decent gaming PC (though it is a couple years old now). One game from the last few years that really got me interested was Borderlands. I'm one of the people that is of the opinion that FPS games are best controlled with a keyboard and mouse, and are therefore always better on a PC. I got the game for PC and as I played it, I noticed a huge annoyance in the way the menus worked. It was almost always better to take your hand off the mouse when in the menus and use the arrow keys and enter key to navigate them. This is terrible. The mouse was designed to make user interfaces better and more accessible but in Borderlands, the mouse is unusable for the interface entirely. Sadly, Borderlands is not the only game that I've played in the last few years to have this problem.

Today I found a blog post from the developer of Battlefield 3 about their position on this subject. They believe, like I do, that pc games in recent are plagued with engines, graphics, and user interface designed for consoles with minor changes to the PC version. To quote the Battlefield 3 blog, "console games are generally ported to the PC with some higher resolution textures." It is good to hear that Battlefield 3 is being developed in the opposite way. The PC version is the definitive version while the console versions are going to be ports with scaled down textures. I hope that more developers will see the light and develop for the PC when the game in question makes more sense as a PC title. They can still release console versions, but PC games should be PC games primarily, and console ports second. I suppose mobile phone ports could come third since people only really want to play angry birds on those platforms, but that's a discussion for another day.

Friday, April 15, 2011

How we use TNT in Minecraft

UPDATE 4 Aug 2011: People might be coming here to find out how to activate TNT. A patch since this video was made requires the use of redstone to activate TNT blocks. I hope that helps.



azmyth gives us an explanation of how to use TNT in Minecraft. Very educational and fun to watch.

Thursday, April 14, 2011

Games vs. Toys

There's some difference between games and toys. Traditionally, games are defined by a set of rules which award points to the players to determine a winner based on some combination of skill, strength and luck. Toys on the other hand are merely an object usually intended for a child to play with. Games provide a set of restrictions on their users that typically increase the opportunity for fun as long as the right boundaries are chosen. Toys on the other hand can be used in any way that the user can come up with. An individual playing a game repeatedly can develop skill or strength, or just attempt to happen across better luck while repeated use of toys allows the exploration of a new world of possibilities each time.

Video games are a relatively modern kind of game, although I believe they regularly fill in somewhere between the traditional view of games and toys. In recent years, there has been a great increase in open-ended gameplay. Sometimes, there are products that are called video games, that are really just video toys. For instance, Garry's Mod (for Halflife 2), is a modification of the Source engine that allows the user to place a bunch of objects and interact with them. Often this interaction is very similar to ones that I had with my G.I. Joe figurines when I was younger. I believe there is great value in the interactions we have with toys, and the possibilities are endless when we are allowed to include our imagination in experiences. While I don't always think that adding more open-endedness to video games is a good thing, I do believe that there is a very useful and constructive place for video toys in our lives.

Saturday, April 9, 2011

Easy Sphere Tutorial for Minecraft



I just want to emphasize that spheres made with this technique are not the most high quality, but they should be easy for anyone to make without downloading an extra program. I hope you find this tutorial useful. Here are the links relative to this video:


Thursday, April 7, 2011

Multiplayer Gaming

In case you haven't noticed, my poll for this week has to do with what kind of multiplayer gaming people prefer. I know which I prefer, but I don't want to reveal it until after the poll expires. However, I do want to talk a little bit about the good things that come from each type of multiplayer gaming without discussing the combination of the two.

First, competitive gaming in this context consists of games that directly match their players against each other as opponents. When on player does well, it is typically at the expense of another player. While players are assumed to follow a set of rules that describe the conditions of the game (assume hacks and cheating don't happen), humans are frequently capable of executing highly unpredictable behavior that can create a huge variety of experiences. A few examples of competitive games are Halflife 2 Deathmatch, Starcraft 1v1 matches, Street Fighter, and Super Smash Brothers.

On the other hand, cooperative games get a group of players and put them on the same team in order to overcome a shared opponent. Players who do well usually assist their team mates, causing them to also do well. Often the opponent or challenge to overcome is scripted, or has some predictable behavior that can be learned and overcome. Some cooperative games are World of Warcraft dungeons and raids, The Legend of Zelda: Four Swords Adventures, Little Big Planet, and Contra.

Both cooperative and competitive gaming have good things about them that can provide varied and satisfying experiences. Both allow for social interaction, which I believe to be an important part of life. Many of my close friends live some distance from me these days, so it is valuable to my life to be able to continue to enjoy my friendships through multiplayer gaming experiences across the internet. Between the options of competitive and cooperative multiplayer out there, I'm sure there's a gaming experience for everyone.

Sunday, April 3, 2011

Why does competitive gaming bring out the worst in people?

So today I started wondering about why the players in all of the competitive games I play end up treating each other like trash. I mean, we're all people, and in fact we're all part of a small subset of society that tends to be looked down on for isolating ourselves in our mothers' basements and playing games online all day. If anything, we should be supportive of each other and avoid causing extra hardship when there are plenty of other people telling us that we're wasting our lives away by playing video games at all.

Part of it may be that many players allow themselves to get too close to the game, and identify too closely with the character that they are controlling. It could be that the players stand to lose or gain something by the results of a given match, whether it be achievements, or points or whatever. Perhaps some players are just angry at life, and are happy to take out their frustration on strangers across the internet.

While these all might contribute to the irritability of many gamers, I think a huge part of the problem is that gamers forget to recognize each other as human beings. In some sense, many games present the opposition in a similar way that war propaganda would discuss whatever country happens to have a differing point of view to our own. For instance, when you choose to identify with the Horde, you immediately become a part of an endless conflict with the races of the Alliance, even if you have no idea what they did wrong. Pretty quickly, some Alliance member will pick on you causing your hatred to grow, even when there is not necessarily a cause for such hostility between a particular set of two individuals (I want to add that I think it is very good that opposing factions in World of Warcraft only have limited communication options to reduce the anger).

While competitive athletics also have some pretty hostile encounters from time to time, I think that the practice of greeting your opponents before a sporting event, and congratulating the winner after help to contribute to good sportsmanship. At least at some point, players are able to see their opponent as a relatable human being with similar interests. Tempers can still run high at times, but at least good behavior is encouraged by the rules of engagement. Youth sports tend to have coaches that ideally teach their players how to be a good sport, and a gracious winner (or loser).

If I could make a proposal for all competitive video games to at least consider in the future to attempt to improve the sportsmanship of their players it would be the following 3 things:
  1. Give players a chance to hang out with each other in a non-competitive environment. This could be a lobby, or a cooperative game mode.
  2. If possible, provide some sort of training to players that describes the kind of behavior that is good, and what kind of behavior is unacceptable. This should include rules that are clearly listed.
  3. Enforce punishment for players that violate the sportsmanship rules. Even better than punishment would be to provide rewards to players that are good sports and increase the quality of the community.
Competition is frequently a good thing for people. Competition is often what keeps people working to improve and better themselves. Competition is the basis of the free market, and is a huge part of the world economy. While competition is an important part of life, everyone needs to learn to manage their anger and frustration and keep an eye on the good in every situation.

Darkspore Beta

So I got into the Darkspore Beta by using the "click here" link on the steam page and I thought I'd share a few of my thoughts on the gameplay. The first thing I noticed was that the game was actually and action RPG, which I didn't really expect. I saw that it was from Maxis (known for simulation games) and I expected something kinda like Spore. It was a very pleasant surprise to find that the core gameplay is essentially a hack and slash class-based RPG much like Diablo, or Torchlight. Without going into too much detail on other games, Darkspore stands out in the genre by having 100 different classes to choose from. That is actually a slight exaggeration I believe because they reuse a lot of the same types of skills but mix them up differently for the different classes.

A feature that Darkspore borrows from the original Spore game is the character editor, although it is much more restricted in Darkspore. Each class has a preset structure to it, but the player can customize many of the features in the same way that creatures in Spore could be modified. The textures on each monster that you control can also be varied, making it possible for each player to use a set of avatars that are entirely unique to that player. The one downside to this huge level of customization is that, with 100 classes, the player can quickly feel overwhelmed with the huge number of things that must be done to play all of the classes.

Another interesting thing about Darkspore comes in the way you choose which classes to use in a given level. Each player chooses 3 classes, and those classes can be switched to from whichever is the active one on a relatively short cooldown. That means that there are 100 choose 3 possible class combinations for a player to pick from on a given level. It also means that for a player playing the game alone, he can bring a healer, and tank, and a damage dealer class all together and switch between them as needed.

Probably the best thing about Darkspore is the automatic matchmaking system. If you want to play a game, you can choose to have the game pick people for you to play with, and the game quickly forms and starts. That also means that you don't have to dig through pages of password protected games just to find one that you can get into. I believe that automated matchmaking is a must for a title to be a quality multiplayer experience these days. Maybe I'm just spoiled because of how easy it is to get a good matchup quickly in other recent online games.