Dates For Your Diary 2009

If you where wondering when the big industry events where taking place this year, I have you covered.
I have included the 3DTV Conference on my list because that is looking to be the big technology this year with 3D-Ready TVs hitting the market.

January
8th to 11th Consumer Electronics Show (Las Vegas)

Febuary
10th to 12th Casual Connect Hamburg (Germany)
18th to 20th Dice Summit (Las Vegas)

March
17th GamesGrads North (Manchester UK)
19th GamesGrads South (London)
23rd to 27th Games Develop Conference (San Francisco)
24th to 26th Game Connection America (San Francisco)

May
4th to 6th 3DTV (Germany)
12th to 13th GDC Canada (Vancouver)
19th to 20th Nordic Game (Sweden)

June
2nd to 4th Electronic Entertainment Expo (Los Angeles)

July
14th to 16th Develop Conference (Brighton UK)
17th to 19th Gcdc (Leipzig)
21st to 23rd Casual Connect Seattle (USA)

August
3rd to 7th Siggraph (New Orleans)
17th to 19th GDC Europe (Cologne Germany)
19th to 23rd Leipzig Games Convention (Germany)

September
4th to 6th Penny Arcade Expo (Seattle)
14th to 18th Austin Games Develop Conference (Texas)
17th to 20th Games Convention Asia (Singapore)

December
8th to 10th Game Connection Europe (France)

The Manipulator

There is this game I have been playing called The Manipulator, it is a platformer with puzzle elements. You play a Manipulator, someone who can take controle of a person's mind, read their mind and even kill them with your power of through. It reminds me of Scanners in this respects, but also Metal Gear as you have to sneak around guards and take them out before they realise you are there.

The Manipulator will take about an hour for a complete play through, but you can't save your game (this is deliberate). The thing I like most about the game is that none of the puzzles solutions are obscure, or at least I found all the solutions myself through experimentation. There also isn't a tutorial, just some simple text queues for the controls.

The Manipulator is a surprisingly mature game with many lessons for budding game designers (note the narration, visual setting, environmental setting along with the audio and the simple control scheme).

If you are quite smitten by The Manipulator, you might want to try Messiah (David Perry, 2000) or Oddworld Abe's Oddysee (1997), which have a very similar gameplay concept of playing a weak character with the ability of possession to solve progression obstacles.

The Umbrella Umbrella

Think Geek is Selling An Umbrella that resembles the Umbrella Corporation logo from Resident Evil. So it's the Umbrella Umbrella. The funny thing about this is that it isn't official Resident Evil merchandise so they are being very coy in their description.

The red and white alternating panels? It just says "corporation" and "umbrella." Umbrella. Corporation. Doesn't that just have a nice ring to it?

If sued I think it would come down to who had the better lawyers.

P.S. Merry Christmas

Man Killed in Black Friday Stampede

Black Friday is the day in America after thanksgiving when all the Christmas Sales start. Where as in the rest of the world Christmas shopping becomes gradually more intense from October through to Christmas day, in America Black Friday is when Americans try to get all their shopping done. This is mainly because they are afraid of not being able to find presents and because the big shops encourage shoppers to binge spend just after thanksgiving.

So it does not surprise me that a temporary Wal-mart employee, Jdimytai Damour (34) Was Stampeded To Death in a rush by some 200 shoppers. Here are some photos of the crowed.

I understand that the crowed of people where in a frenzy and their actions are part of Human nature, but it is a part of Human nature that has always sickened me.

Team Fortress 2 Video - Mass A.I.

I was reading the excellent Rock paper Shotgun and seen the below video posted there. A very impressive video put together by Manta Engie, a group who seem to have an affinity for good music.
The track in Mass A.I. (the video below) is Propane Nightmares by Pendulum. A band that has been growing on me very much recently.

Some People Just Enjoy Christmas More Than Others

I would dearly love to do something like in the below videos, but it is so very much out of my skill set.

Mirrors Edge Music Video

I love the music in Mirror's Edge, so when I seen the title for this video, Mirror's Edge Music Video, I was a little excited, but still sceptical because I thought it could be a fan made project. However it isn't, so enjoy.
Available in Standard and High Definition resolutions.

Pizza Machine

I watch looking around the BBC news site and I seen This Video About A Frozen Pizza Factory.

I didn't realise that some frozen pizzas receive such little human contact. I always imagined they are all made on a conveyor belt system with people sticking stuff on as a pizza base went by.

Activision Do Some Creative Guitar Hero Marketing

Activision has done some creative marketing and created a video called Bike Hero. They have tried to disguise it as a student thing, but the cuts between takes can be seen when the rider looks away from the path. Nice video though.

Mr Blazinskie Has A Twitter Feed

Cliff Blezinsky creator of such titles as Unreal Tournament and Gears Of War has a Twitter Feed and it is so awesome.

Some of my favourite quotes so far:

Mark is trying to instate a "no high-five" policy here at Epic. He says I'm hurting too many people that need their hands.
- Cliff

I'm a renaissance man. My goal in life is to make everything I do bigger, better and more badass. If that means opera, so be it.
- Cliff

I keep having this reoccurring dream where my future-self rides in on a badass bright red fire-unicorn and tells me how awesome I am.
- Cliff

Everyone keeps telling me I'm a better Mark Rein than Mark Rein is...
- Cliff

Sometimes I catch a glimpse of myself while walking around Epic, and I start to cry at the beauty. If someone asks, I say my eye itches.
- Cliff

Interactive Fallout 3 Map

Fallout 3's main quest might be a little short, but there is a lot to see in the wasteland. Planet Fallout has put together an Interactive Fallout 3 Map With Google Maps, making it easy to navigate and find something of interest. And when you find something you can always look it up on the Fallout 3 Wiki, that has guides and descriptions to most things in the game.

[The escapist]

99 Blocks Is An Interesting Take On Tetris

99 Blocks is a twist on the traditional block stacking game of Tetris. Instead of stacking blocks to clear lines your objective is to create the highest tower you can with just 99 blocks. The twist is that this is a Tetris variant with physics. So if you don't stack carefully, your tower will fall.

I myself have come back to 99 Blocks a few times after first playing it to try out different stacking strategies, but ultimately 99 Blocks remains a very casual experience with possibly a too steady pace of gameplay.

[Source Wired]

Fallout 3 Graphics Comparison Guide

I like This Graphics Comparison Guide they did that shows you what all the game's graphics settings do and wither it might be time for an upgrade.

One of the main arguments about PC gaming is the need to upgrade every six months, but that isn't true if you buy good hardware and certainly isn't true if you are prepared to run a game like Fallout 3 with some of the settings turned down.

Nintendo Talks Again About Price Cuts

I thought this was funny.
Nintendo President Iwata Said In An Interview:

This is my personal thinking, but when the model's price-tag drops over time, manufacturers are telling consumers it's better to wait, and I've always thought that was a mistake.

I have to partially agree with him as I have traditionally (as well as a lot of other people who aren't myself) waited for a console's first price cut before running out and buying it. Nobody likes to buy a console and then just after a price drop is announced. But that reminded me of something. When the N64 was released in the UK in March 1997 it was only a few weeks before the price was dropped by £100 (The Only Reference I could Find) so Nintendo are uniquely positioned to talk about such things.
However the N64 unlike the Wii and DS, doesn't print money.

Some nostalgia:

Grim Fandango Design Document

Tim Shafer has unleashed the Design Document for Grim Fandango onto the web. It is an interesting read, but ultimately Grim it suffered from a couple of the symptoms that Caused The Death Of Adventure Games although Grim was hardly the worst offender. And I also don't think Grim was as good as Tim's other works, buy maybe that is just me.

Obama Won!

And The Resident did a dance.

McCain Voters

Next week is the US Elections where the United State's Federal Subjects, vote for a new president. At the moment Obama is the favourite to win and why not. Obama is a young (for a presidential candidate) charismatic leader who has a background in community projects, comes from a diverse background giving him a broad world view (something America desperately needs), has a very optimistic view of the future, wants forward thinking changes made in the US, is softly spoken and is an exceptional speaker. Clearly these are a fantastic combination of qualities to have in a politician. All I know about McCain is that he is old, he spent a few years in a prisoner of war camp and no idea why he feels that he is qualified to lead a country.

President Bush has been one of the worst presidents in American history. I am still reeling from when the American people re-elected him four years ago. I keep telling myself that is was because Kerry didn't put up a fight, but if I take a bight out of an apple and it tastes sour, I will not take another just because another apple in the bag doesn't compete as much for my attention.

If the American people vote for McCain and elect him, although they will have a new President, they will not have changed the party that is running the country. McCain doesn't seem to want change, so I don't feel that McCain will be much better than Bush.

So I ask myself, who would vote for McCain?



I have voted on the If The World Could Vote website, but if I could vote for real, I would vote for Obama

[source Digg]

Random Fact

Fingernails grow slower as you get older.

One Hundred Days Before Bush Leaves

FYI, Bush is leaving soon. I just hope that they don't make a mistake when choosing his replacement.

Wii Music Is Just Lame

Rarely do I use the word lame to describe anything, but for Wii Music I think I will make an exception.