Category Archives: Techno Geek

I love the stink of my PC in the morning

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I’m following up on my last post, which admired the creative thinking behind a fake product, with one about a real product that seems best delivered as a gag gift to an unwitting recipient: a USB PC addon which adds smellovision. I kid you not. The device bills itself as ‘The Web Connected Smelly Robot’ and you can buy your very own by adding your name to their mailing list over here, or you can head to the MIT Foundry site where there are instructions on building your own.

Ain’t life wonderfully absurd? I’ll pile on by observing that this isn’t actually the first time someone’s tried to market a fragrance emitter for computers (!!!) Perhaps the fear of prankster nephews stank bombing their relatives has kept wary consumers away…that’s just speculation by me though.
;-)

 

Football, halfway through

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Wow!?

Since I last commented, the Giants have rattled off four wins and 1 loss. The loss was an awful game against Seattle, and one of the wins was an almost loss against Miami, but in the same timeframe they beat the Pats and the Bills, both of which are having decent seasons, and both of which I assumed the Giants would lose to.

Overall I’ll upgrade my perception of this year’s squad a bit. They’ve demonstrated that they’re capable, they’ve managed to succeed despite some critical injuries, and several young players are showing promise, particularly Victor Cruz and Jason Pierre Paul. They’ve also shown luck (that win against Buffalo was more down to luck than execution) and grit, with that scoring drive against the Pats at the end of the game.

So, that’s the good news, along with the fact that they’re still first in their division, with both the Skins and Eagles seemingly in collapse and Dallas looking like a mediocre team. On the downside, my read is they don’t match up well against the other NFC leaders – Green Bay and New Orleans both seem likely to crush the Giants, and we’ll see about San Francisco this weekend. Things look much better when compared to AFC teams, but none of that matters come playoff time. Here’s hoping Aaron Rodgers decides to retire ;-)

My updated picks, halfway through the season: Green Bay looks unstoppable, and barring injuries or an ‘any given sunday’ moment, they should take the NFC. The AFC is much more interesting, with the AFC North looking like the crucible that should forge a tough, battle tested AFC champ, with my money on Pittsburgh, but the Pats, Jets and Texans all with the potential to take it.

Three other remarks:

1) Do you think the league has finally figured out what the fans have known for at least 5 years? No one should start Rex Grossman.

2) What is going on with Phillip Rivers?

3) This season I’m discovering a grudging respect for Tom Coughlin. I’ve been hot and cold on him over the years, but he deserves credit for fielding a competitive squad year after year, and this year especially he’s managing to overcome a lot of injury problems. I reserve the right to blow cold on him again if the Giants have yet another mid-season collapse under his leadership.

Example of why Games for Windows Live sucks

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This is not even close to the best example of why it sucks, or the worst experience I’ve had with it (I’m thinking of you, Bioshock 2), but it’s fresh in my mind so I’m going to share it.

I wanted to try the new free-to-play RTS Age of Empires Online. I had been following a ‘No more games that use Games for Windows Live’ policy ever since a set of really awful experiences with Bioshock 2 a year or so ago, but a free game from a studio whose games I’ve really enjoyed in the past convinced me to give GFWL another chance.

I downloaded and installed the game, but when I tried to login to GFWL, which I have to do in order to play, it wouldn’t let me. Tried on the GFWL website and was informed someone has been trying to login to my account with the wrong password so many times my password is invalid.

I reset password, a reasonably straightforward process, hurrah! I am pleasantly surprised.

Try again to login. I’m informed I must provide product key and am unable to login. wth? It’s a free game, and anyway, why should that block me from logging in? Confusion.

Examine email looking for product key. Find none

Examine spam folder looking for email with product key. Find none. Grossed out by contents of spam folder.

Examine Age of Empire Online FAQ and message boards looking for someone with the same problem. Find nothing.

Google this problem. Find nothing.

GFWL lets you specify a backup email address. Look there and in that account’s spam folder for an email with a product key. Find nothing. More hot spam folder grossout action.

Ponder. Wth? With these things you can always find someone with a similar problem via google, and eventually arrive at a solution. I can’t so…what does that mean? It’s unique to me? Seems inconceivable? What out of all the parameters in play would be unique to me? My password. I check. I’ve made a typo. Try to login using the correct password. Eureka! I’m in.

Why the FUCK did GFWL send me off on a 30 minute goose chase looking for a product key when its issue was I had an invalid password?

Because it’s Game For Windows Live, a product seemingly designed to put anyone who tries it off of gaming on windows.

Age of Empires Online is ok – it’s definitely worth a look if you’re into RTS. Pluses include fantastic art direction and a ton of content. Cons are incredibly bad unit pathing issues and a brain dead AI. Message me if you’re playing and want to connect. Meantime, I’m back on my ‘will not buy products which require the use of GFWL’ policy. Developers and publishers, please: spare your customers the agony of this entirely shitty product. There’s no money hat large enough to make this worth the bad mouthing your product will get. Look into steamworks or anything, anything at all*, besides GFWL. It’s shit.

*(Except the stuff Ubisoft is doing, and, err, EA’s Origin stuff…jesus. Software publishing is going to the dogs! Just fucking use Steamworks, they appear to be the only company that recognizes customer experience should be primary).

Minecraft plus Studio Ghibli plus time = brilliance

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So you have to be a nerds nerd to really appreciate this but man, if you fit the bill, this is fantastic. This:

Is the worlds imagined by Studio Ghibli as recreated by a bunch of folks using the Minecraft engine.

If you’re unfamiliar with Studio Ghibli, stop what you’re doing and go watch Laputa, Castle in the Sky, or Grave of the Fireflies, or Porco Rosso, or, well, anything they’ve done, but especially those. Shorthand explanation would be that they’re a Japanese analog to Walt Disney.

If you’re unfamiliar with Minecraft, and you have a computer that’s less than 6-7 years old that can run Java, go spend the $15 or so to register. It’s a 3d lego toolkit with world generation, multiplayer, and zombies, plus a whole lot more, but that should be enough right there. Plus it’s absolutely brilliant.