My Life Philosophy in Comic Form

I think this xkcd comic, entitled Nihilism, perfectly describes my personal life philosophy.

Now you know me a teeney bit better.

Opera Browser Security: What Exactly Are They Protecting Me From?

Although I am a FireFox user, I have never heard anything bad about the Opera web browser. It is supposed to be fast, powerful, secure, and all-around one of the best browsers out there. I never tried it, though, because it cost money.

Recently, I learned that Opera no longer charges for their PC browser. I’m not sure how long this has been the case, but it definitely has prompted me to give it a try. I have downloaded the installer, and I’ll poke around with it a bit and maybe report what I find here, if anything.

While I was browsing their site, however, I clicked on the link to the page highlighting Opera’s security features, and I was struck by the silliness of the pictures in the banner.

It seems the average Opera user is a pensive, impeccably-dressed, high-finance banker with a major case of five o’clock shadow; and the average Internet cracker is a gay S&M biker who, judging by the shameless leer on his face, is looking to anally rape our poor banker avatar. Fortunately for us, Opera’s myriad security features will save our collective bums from the impending travesty.

Seriously, Opera should consider just giving away free condoms like DC Snacks.

New Music: The Format – Dog Problems

Unlike most of the people who frequent Murky with their laptops, I normally do not put on my headphones unless their is no music playing, bad music playing, or obnoxious people talking loudly. I enjoy the exposure to the new and different groups, albums, genres, and styles that the ecclectic mix of people behind the counter choose to play; most of the time it is nothing too special, but occasionally I discover something new.

I was working there a few days ago, and I found my concentration consistently broken by the music playing in the background. I approached the counter and inquired as to the artist and album, and was informed that it was “Dog Problems” by The Format. I quickly purchased the tracks on my favorite music store, and have given it a more thorough listening.

Verdict: Damn Good. Highly recommended.

Their sound is a crisp alternative rock, with some great instrumentals standing out in every part of the music. Think of the clever instrumental use by Modest Mouse, and then make it a bit less edgy and a lot more integrated and harmonious. The tunes are catchy, the lyrics are intelligent and interesting, and the rhythms are clever.

Teabagged!

So apparantly the Lt. Governor of Illinois is publicly encouraging people to mail teabags to the utility company to protest a rate increase.

Do you think he’s realized yet precisely what he’s asking? I have no doubt this is going to become the next big Internet meme, with friends from around the world mailing one another teas of various flavors.

For their part, the post office notes that it is legal to send a tea bag through the postal system, but discourage the practice for fear of gumming up the sorting machines or being mistaken for some agent of biological terror. It seems a bit ridiculous to think a postal employee might mistake a bag of tea for anthrax. However, in the case of the peach detox tea I just sent one unsuspecting friend, I might be forced to agree if it were classified as a bioterror weapon.

(Picture cropped from the original by Andrew Coulter Enright, used under a CC license.)

Mario & Luigi: Partners in Time

After a couple of of months of Metro time, and a few weekend hours here and there, I’ve finally beaten Mario & Luigi: Partners in Time for the DS. It was recommended to me by Greg as a pretty good RPG for the DS.

I partially agree. In many areas, the game makes some neat innovations, but in others it falls short. Let’s start with the good.

The graphics are good. Nothing spectacular, but an RPG’s graphics don’t have to be. They get the point across, and there are some fun niche animations that are used to good effect throughout the story. The sound is not much more than bleeps and bloops, leaving much to be desired.

The gameplay is an interesting twist on the standard Mario bop-the-enemy-on-the-head fare. The map is strewn with question blocks to be hit. These blocks usually yield coins, but also offer power ups and items for battle. A neat feature is the ability to get the drop on almost any enemy (except for ones with spikes sticking up) by jumping on them as the wander around world screen. When battle initiates, Mario drops in from above with a pre-emptive hit.

The battle is where this game really shines. Every attack in battle requires some form of interaction. To begin with, each of the four party members – Mario, Luigi, Baby Mario, and Baby Luigi – are assigned one of the four buttons on the DS. Successfully attacking requires hitting the appropriate character’s button at the right time based on the on-screen action. For example, imagine Mario is to make a standard attack. The basic attack is, of course, a bop-on-the-head. In order to successfully execute the attack, you must hit the Mario’s button (the A button) as he stomps on the head of the enemy. Failure to do so will do significantly less damage, and Mario will bounce to the floor in an embarassing display.

More advanced attacks are accomplished similarly. Utilizing the special Bros. Items, so called because they require the brothers to work together, can often demand great concentration and timing to rack up big damage. For example, Mario and Luigi can kick a green shell back-and-forth against an enemy. Whenever the shell reaches one of the brothers, you are required to hit the button for the character. Failure to do so sends the shell spinning off the screen, but success allows for massive damage to be accumulated. The catch is that the shell speeds up slightly with each successive hit, thus becoming consistently more difficult.

Enemy attacks tend to be rather basic, from simply running into a character to spitting a fireball, but in another fun twist the brothers can defend and counter-attack. Each enemy gives some slight indication of how and who they are about to attack just before doing so, and a well-timed jump can not only repel the attack, but deal some damage in return. It’s a lot of fun trying to figure out the patterns to the different enemies throughout the game.

Overall, the combat system is very clever, and is the highlight of the game. It’s somewhat reminiscent of the old Final Fantasy VIII combat system, except that in Partners in Time it doesn’t suck.

What does suck is the story. The initial plot hook is not completely terrible, but it’s executed poorly from thereon. Most of the plot devices come out of nowhere, for no reason. More often than not, you head to a newly opened world simply because you’re told to. The maps are horribly linear, meaning most of your wandering serves no purpose but to kill time. Sure, there are the aforementioned blocks found throughout, but the rewards from those blocks rarely graduates beyond some additional Bros. Items; so it loses its luster after the forty-third time. And clocking in at just over fifteen hours, all the mindlessness previously mentioned makes the game even shorter in reality.

Also, the dialouge is simply terrible. Clearly this game was written for a young audience. Much of it is silly, and there is a ton of drawn-out slapstick that ends up being almost painful to watch after the ninth time. One particular highlight, though, is a scene where the Hammer Brothers get Shroob implants in them, and end up talking in l33t speak. I almost fell out of my chair laughing.

So overall, is this worth playing? Probably not for a seasoned gamer. There are some neat things done, but the pain required to enjoy those moments makes it a game I just cannot recommend. It might be worth it for a younger player who is just getting into RPGs, but not for many others.

GenCon 2006

Were you wondering where I was? Me, neither.

In case you were, however, I was on holiday with Hedda. Ostensibly the Great Midwest Family Tour of 2006, the only part anybody beyond my immediate family might care about was GenCon 2006. Like previous years, we crashed the homes of various friends who live in Indianapolis. Extra-double thanks to Nate & Kathie for putting up with all of us!

So, what were the highlights?

• Apples to Apples was a huge hit with me, and everybody else. I bought the party box and the second expansion, to add some currently-relevant cards like “Gas Prices” and “Iraq.”
• Once again, we hung out with Jeff, the creator of Killer Bunnies, and the Quest for the Magic Carrot. Of course, I also came home with the Perfectly Pink and Wacky Khaki expansions, as well as the sub-game Kinder Bunnies, which can be mixed in with the original game. Also, we got to playtest Jeff’s newest super-secret game. I can’t say much more than that.
• The big surprise was Gloom. In this game, you control a family of five misfits, and the point is to make them as unhappy as possible and then kill them. Whoever’s family is most depressed wins the game. Of course, you also spend plenty of time trying to make your opponents’ families as happy as possible. The game is cleverly printed on transparent playing cards, and although there are some issues with the ink sticking and ripping off onto other cards, it really is cool to be able to play bonuses on top of other cards and just have them show through appropriately.
• To my dismay, the latest expansion to Munchkin sold out before I could buy it. I’ll be ordering The Need for Steed online, I guess.
• There were some really great costumes this year. My favorite without a doubt, though, was the Ghostbuster. His proton pack looked so awesome, and he even had a trap! The Star Wars slave costume was a close second, though.
• We took a little side-trip to the Ratskeller for some beer and live music. Nate and I drank a lot of Poorter.
• I played Evil Stevie’s Pirate Game for the first time. There were too many people playing, but with a smaller group it would be an awesome game.

If you’d like, feel free to browse all of the photos in my GenCon 2006 Flickr set. Also, here are some highlights in case you’d rather not wade through them all.

The rest of the trip was spent with Hedda’s family in Mishawaka, and with my Mom at her vacation spot in Michigan.

Guster at Wolftrap

Hedda and I just got back from seeing Guster out at Wolftrap. The show was opened by Rouge Wave, a rock group with a pretty good but fairly average sound. They were followed up by Ray LaMontagne. He has a fantastic voice, although his songs are a bit too ballad-y to really open for a group like Guster. He’s got some country twang mixed in with a folk rock feel that’s pretty good, though.

And then there was Guster. They have really come into their own as a headlining band. Hedda and I were remembering when we used to see them opening for other groups like Barenaked Ladies or John Mayer. We used to be the only people in the crowd cheering for our band. When I saw them play at the Riviera, they were excited to have some Chinese dudes outside selling bootleg T-shirts, as though it were a milestone on the way to stardom. (Thanks, Ted, for helping me remember the name of the Riv.)

Now, the roles have reversed. The entire crowd is there for Ryan and Adam and Brian (And Joe? What’s up with his limbo status, anyway?), and boy do they ever feed off of it. It’s not that they are huge – they still work their asses off touring and such, but they have a very solid fanbase these days. We were shocked at how many teenagers they still draw.

The show started off a little shaky, perhaps due to the stifling heat. They quickly got on track, though, playing a good mix of old and new. Highlights included a fantastic version of Airport Song. (I really don’t like that song, but man this version kicked ass.) There were also some antics involving a roadie named Scooter, as well as some fevered cowbell. Oh, and Adam played the trumpet.

The show was solid, although it lacked the awesome group dynamic from the last time Guster was in town with Ben Folds. The worst part is that Hedda and I had to duck out early in order to get back to the Metro before it closed.

Which suprisingly turned out to be one of the best parts of the evening. After the driver closed the doors of the shuttle bus back to the Metro station, he came on the loudspeaker and asked, “Does anybody have a car parked at West Falls Church station? This is very important? No? Then this bus is going all the way to Rosslyn station!” Which elicited cheers from the entire bus, since we would get way closer to our final destinations. We got back home probably 1/2 hour earlier thanks to this awesome bus driver.

But it gets better. He had been cracking jokes over the PA system, and after we were on the road, some girls apparantly convinced him to give over the microphone. They got the whole bus singing, with the highlight being a Build Me Up Buttercup. The dude in yellow is a riot.

Best. Metrobus. Ride. EVAR!

Oh, and Guster is for lovers!

Flickr Is Down, and Yet Still Awesome

So Flickr is down due to a storage failure. As somebody who works on digital libraries trying to keep terabytes of storage online and available, I can empathize with the difficulty of their plight.

However, their downtime message is absolutely hilarious. Flickr is definitely an awesome company.

(If you don’t get it, read up on how Ted Stevens thinks the Internet works.)

Draw a dragon? That’s easy!

In Brain Age, one of the things you are asked to do is draw things from memory without any reference. You’re just up and asked to draw a giraffe or chainsaw or rhinoceros from memory, and then you can compare what you’ve drawn with a real drawing of the item. It’s supposed to activate your pre-frontal cortex or some such.

Anyway, this morning, I was asked to draw a dragon. A dragon? That’s easy! First draw an S. Then, draw a more different S. Close it up real nice, and then add some teeth using consummate Vs. Add some legs and some wings, and …

Apparantly, that’s not what they had in mind.

Nintendo DS Surprises Me

Our good friends Greg & Kat came to visit us this past weekend. Greg is a video game junkie, and works for Cranky Pants Games.

So naturally, I seek his opinion on what’s hot and what’s not in the video game world. His answer? His favorite system on the market right now is the Nintendo DS.

I had always been a little leery of the DS. It felt gimmicky to me, with the two screens and the stylus. My gut reaction made me think of the infamous Virtual Boy. But Greg offered me a whirl free of charge on some of the best games the system has to offer.

Was I ever surprised! The graphics are far superior to any of the other Nintendo handhelds, probably on part with something the PSP has to offer. What was truly shocking, though, was how naturally the two screens and touch screen fit into the gameplay. For example, in many games, like the fantastic New Super Mario Brothers, the second screen isn’t really used for much other than a map. However, there is a spot on the second screen where you can store an extra power up which can be intuitively retrieved by simply tapping at it with your thumb. In other games, like Brain Age, the stylus is the primary input mechanism for the entire game.

Greg had just bought a new, shinier DS Lite, so he sold me his old one for cheap. He didn’t have to work hard.