Giving to the Stephen and Melinda Gates Foundation

So I decided to help out with the Stephen and Melinda Gates foundation. It's setup to help American teachers by simply posting a photo.

Here's how I did it.

Truely though I was trying for this when I made the picture.

Fun with character creators..

I've been playing around with the Champions Online character creator as I unlocked more costume parts.



I can make a Forsaken look good in there and I never have to worry about horrible armor drops some Blizzard art designer thought was good.

More Outragous Character Fun

Behold Roadcone!



He has beastial powers which fit right along the zombie fighting style of clawing and such. His super travel power is digging in the ground like Bugs Bunny.

Games

So recently I stopped playing World of Warcraft. After six years of fantasy gaming wearing me down and losing my Dad in February I decided to try something completely different.

I tried the free to play Lord of the Rings but it was boring. I looked over some other games and they didn't perk my interest. Then I looked at super hero games like DC Universe and City of Heros but what I settled on was Champions Online. They have a free to play silver package that just beat out the other two.

Meet... the Negotiator!



He's one of my many little characters I spent lots of time on setting up since I decided to subscribe. I also have another guy which is a zombie from Plants vs. Zombies. He's got a road cone on his head.

The best part about the whole game is you can spend HOURS customizing the look of your character and no matter what gear you get they will retain their look unlike in World of Warcraft. You can also setup other RP clothing slot sets and have tons of outfits. It cost game tokens per set but it's nice not having to worry about crappy looking gear. :D

Old games gone new!

If you are a gamer of old, you'll remember such names as Quest for Glory and Kings Quest. Look no further old timers, Anonymous Game Developers Interactive has released Kings Quest 1-3 and Quest for Glory 2 FREE! These games are remade for newer versions of Windows while remaining true to the originals.

Check it out!

Lunch

So... I was thinking I'd have the egg salad sandwich but the yoke was on me and I grabbed tuna.

Things that make you go wow...

More Map Madness!

Check out this isometric view of my compound in the map I posted yesterday. Pretty fun stuff!



Top left side of the map has a small building that is the spawn area for the world. I made that safer to spawn in by building around it. Lower right by the water is the docks. Both spawn building and docks are linked by a service tunnel to the central compound.

Running to the left is the rail tracks for mine carts to my mine. In the compound itself is a Greenhouse in the upper left, house just under it, mine cart station below the house. On the right side of the compound is a workshop with about 10 ovens and a fountain down and to the right. Between the fountain and mine cart station is the monster pit which farms monsters. :P

Maps, maps, maps...

I found a program that lets me make maps of the areas discovered in Minecraft. It's a pretty slick little program and can do everything from general surface mapping to cave mapping based on the save file. The program is called Cartograph by someone named ZomBuster.

Check out this map of one of my saves below, you will have to zoom in to the pixel level in an image viewer to make out some really small details. Larger things like buildings and stuff shouldn't require as much zoom.



See if you can make out my settlement in the map. Should look like a goofy pipe with the tail going to a snowy peak near by. That tail is a dual mine cart track which allows me to ride a mine cart roller coaster of sorts over mobs safely as well as carry extra ore back in carts with trunks.

Minecraft Monster Grinder

So I've had an itching lately for blowing things up. I want to play with a TNT cannon that I've only been able to gather enough gunpowder for one shot in the past month. That means I need a LOT more gunpowder but I don't want to cheat to get it either.

So whats the best way to get gunpowder? Kill Creepers. What's the safest way to kill em? Drown em! So I did some research and came across this monster trap in these two videos. Props to Colbycheeze for the videos.

Video #1

Video #2

So now I have a basic blueprint, time to build! First I need a place to build my trap, hmmmm.. time to dig!



I won't go too deep for this.



The bottom of the trap, that is where I stand so all the drops float right to me.



As you can see, the monster will sink to where the glass is in the distance and drown. Their drops will float out from under the glass to me. Notice also how I have the ladder above the water so it doesn't interfere with the current?



The room above is the second safe zone, notice the cactus plants in the wall? They catch spiders since spiders are so big and can't fit down the drowning hole. Spider drops fall in to the hole as they die and float to me. I also made good use of lighting and storage chest placement so I don't hurt myself accidentally against the cactus.



It's hard to see in this shot, but notice how the water stop just at the edge of the drowning pool drop? That is a key thing about the whole water trap. Also those above floor glass walkways make a nice safe way to pull monsters from the back of the trap area.



This final shot is a view of what a monster would see if they spawned back against the far wall. The lights leading up to the water wouldn't normally be there so it'd be pitch black in this area with the exception of the center trap area shining the in the distance.



Notice my service tunnel in the ceiling near the edge of the water on the right? That lets me go out in the dark zone and mine the area surrounding the trap further back. I'm collecting a ton of gunpowder now and I've had some nice explosions along the back walls clearing out space. The more empty dark space you have the more monster spawn up to 200 I think.

More Minecraft Pics

Showing off my greenhouse second floor and someone I found in my mine!

Green House



The Blob!

Minecraft Addiction

I'm hooked, it's not as flexible as NWN was when making things but what it gives in return for that lack of flexibility makes it much more enjoyable. I remember posting earlier on this blog how I was looking for something to not only be fun but challenge me to think and be creative. Minecraft has accomplished this nicely.

I've been doing the single player survival game ever since I purchased the alpha. While I've not built anything massive except a mine shaft and a large mining area square shaped at the bedrock of the Earth. I'm slowly figuring things out and trying different things.

I'll post a screen shot of my mining project as well as other shots later on. :)

Six Years

Someone said it in Tawa chat yesterday, "Six years playing WoW." My first thought was, "Damn, they're right. It's almost six years come November." So I did some thinking and thought of what I got out of six years of playing WoW.

Over the past six years I've met and hung out with some really great people. My social life has revolved more around online then off line. Personally I don't think it's too big a deal since everyone I know off line is married and in their own world and I'm still single. There's a weird thing that happens when friends get married, part of it is me, part of it is them, but over all its just life as people drift apart.

The game itself really hasn't been all that bad or good as time wore on. I think Wrath of the Lich King has been the most boring it's been for me as far as content goes. There isn't anything that really caught my interest like in Vanilla and BC.

Cataclysm actually strikes me odd even though there are some things I see that I like. (31 point talent trees from 51?) A lot of the preview stuff I've seen so far shows not much new talents, just a few odd abilities. Whatever, and the armor preview I saw was a yawner since I know it's going to be replaced quicker then ever if I progress through raiding again.

The only thing meaningful I got out of the game over the years was the friendships I made online. The game itself has grown to be more of a disappointment as time wore on. I like PvP but as I get older the twitch I used to have when I was rocket jumping off peoples heads in Quake just isn't there like it used to be and Blizzard's ability to balance classes don't help things in that regard very much. You also just can't jump in and hope to do much without getting some gear first.

The thing I really miss the most though is being creative while having fun. You can't do that in WoW. I used to do that a lot in NWN and it was a hoot building things for myself and other people in the Toolset. Part of me really wants to go back to that or play a new game that recreates that. These days though MMOs are all game companies seem interested in.

I can still run NWN but as time goes on it's not going to run on the latest and greatest very well or at all with new OS updates and no updates on it's end. There won't be anything as simple yet fun to replace it either. Bigger and better will also bring more complexity and less access for the end gamer to be creative and have fun.

Meh.

It's dark, I think I'll shine a Torchlight...

Sometimes a game comes along that is just really good. This is one of those times, like Plants vs. Zombies this game is the bees knees.

Check out a trailer for Torchlight here.

Check out the Torchlight game sight here.

And yes, it plays just like Diablo 1 only much more updated. :)

World of Goo

Physics and fun wrapped in to one! The goal is to get as many goo balls in to the pipe by shaping them in to various forms so they can reach the pipe! Think of it as Lemmings with physics. :)

World of Goo

Argent Tournament

Behold! Sir Clucks'A'Lot!

Easter Eggs!

A list from Computer World of neat Easter Eggs in software.

Some neat ones:

In Firefox type either "about:robots" or "about:mozilla" in the URL bar.

In Open Office Calc (the spread sheet program). Type =game() and then respond to it's question with =GAME("StarWars").

If you're running Ubuntu for your computers operating system. Hit ALT-F2 and type "free the fish".

My god!!!

It's full of action figures!

Crayon Physics Delux

The game Crayon Physics Delux has been released. Check it out here.