As I’ve mentioned here before, Kings Langley is a haven for loads of wild birds. I have recently discovered a great spot to see Red Kites and Sparrowhawks. Here:
So if anyone comes across this and wants to know where to go to see birds of prey in Kings Langley, there you have it.
I have now be shanghai’d into this other blog, http://thepubisalie.com. The Pub peoples are fantastic but… I am not the hero they deserve. I am the hero they need. They will set the dogs on me. But sometimes, the people deserve to have their faith rewarded. Watch this space.
JOLLY GOOD SHOW OLD CHAP
I was thinking about innovations in gaming, and I realised that thanks to Nintendo we have actually pretty much lost an entire generation of graphics and physics progress and increased immersion as a result.
If you look back at 2003 or 2004, to run the latest games at full graphics on your PC, you had to have a very high end card. Approaching 2006 and 2007, you had to at least one VERY high end card, maybe even two to run games at maximum. Now you can run all the latest games at full spec with only a mid-range card. Even a cheap low-mid card like I have now can run Crysis 2 at nearly full graphics with an average framerate of 40fps. Why has this happened? Nintendo.
When Nintendo released the Wii, they didn’t progress to the next generation. The Wii uses the same hardware as the Gamecube. Sony and Microsoft made next-gen consoles with HD gaming and full online features. The amount of features the Xbox and the PS3 offer compared to the Wii are staggering. The Wii, however, outsold them both due to its gimmick. A motion controller. This led to the advent of ‘casual gaming’. When MS and Sony saw the success of the Wii they made it their business to also enter the motion control market. This is where progress stagnated. Money, Engineers and Time which should have gone into developing the NEXT generation of consoles, went into developing their motion controllers. Game developers have no choice but to continue developing for existing consoles, and thanks to Nintendo, by 2010 these consoles were trapped, at a hardware level, half a decade in the past.
Software progress used to drive gaming hardware. Now the hardware has far outstripped the software, and this WILL slow hardware progress due to lack of pressure. If current job positions at Microsoft are any evidence, Microsoft is only now starting to push the development of the successor to the Xbox 360.
Nintendo, you have cost us an entire generation of gaming progress.
As usual it’s been a long time since I posted anything. It’s been extremely cold the last few weeks, and I’ve been enjoying a frozen Kings Langley and London. I went and did some real touristy things in London last weekend. Photos went up on Facebook but here’s me in front of the London Eye:
And a cool picture of Charing Cross from the top of the Eye:
Aaaaaaand maybe I’ll add more to this post later!
This is pretty much for anyone who has audio to visual synaesthesia like I have. I found that the constant sound of a hair drier seems to overpower other sounds, and helps get rid of strong flashes and patterns. Makes sleeping at night much easier. I recorded a hair drier and trimmed it down to a few seconds which when looped correctly sounds like a constant sound (foobar2000 does this perfectly for me). It’s pretty big for 6 seconds of audio but it seems to lose effectiveness when compressed, probably due to loss of upper frequencies.
Got a job in PURE Digital, a division of Imagination Technologies.
I moved to Kings Langley so I’m within walking distance of Imagination. So far, so good!
I really should update this thing more but it’s hard to motivate myself when I pretty much put everything on my twitter. Microblogging ftw.
Love:
Old school RTS: The resource model and annihilation victory requirement is reminiscent of classic C&C and original StarCraft (I guess, I’ve never actually played the original). Makes a nice change from the take-and-hold model of most recent RTS games.
Races: They’re all really unique and although I’ve only played as Terran, the units all look really well thought out.
Battlecruisers: Terran Battlecruisers are just fantastic.
The sound of their Yamato Cannon charging and firing is savage.
Hate:
Not much! It’s a really great game. I wish I was better at it!
I wrote this post in Word 2010 which is just fantastic. Also, ‘Starcraft’ isn’t in the dictionary but ‘StarCraft’ is. WACKY
The beta is over now so I can no longer trek through the stars. Cryptic did a fantastic job fixing bugs over the two weeks or so of the open beta. It was a different experience altogether at the end than on the first day. The interface had been overhauled and made far better, graphic glitches had pretty much all vanished. I will miss tearing into battle and unleashing all forward torpedo bays on my foe. I even got to take on a Species 8472 ship at one stage along with a combined Federation/Klingon fleet. If I didn’t think my college work would suffer greatly I would certainly purchase and start playing it properly.