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Dungeons & Dragons Online: Stormreach – Initial Thoughts

By on Nov 19, 2005 in Blog Posts, Games | 0 comments

The DDO stress test is over and I find myself blankly staring at my notebook pondering what I will do with my spare cycles. Due to the non-disclosure agreement that was agreed to by me and all of the other participants, I am not allowed to go into detail about the game. I will however point a few things out for those of you wondering what it is all about.I’m not a D&D fan. I have never played the pen and paper version, nor the board games or even the electronic versions. DDO has been my first experience with the genre. The DDO world is an immersive and entertaining one, rich with content and attractive to see and hear. Being that this was a stress test, one cannot hold against it any server issues that occurred. I will say that the developers were the most responsive I have ever seen to server crashes. Not only did they quickly resolve issues (I don’t recall being...

Guess what this is!

By on Nov 12, 2005 in Blog Posts | 0 comments

  

Civilization 4 Review

By on Nov 2, 2005 in Blog Posts, Games | 0 comments

I have been playing Civilization since the original game was released in 1991. I love the series. Many hours of my life have been happily spent positioning cavalry and capturing enemy tiles. Needless to say I have extremely high expectations for any game in the series and Civ 4 does not disappoint.The best way to describe Civ 4 is to say that it’s the best of all of the previous games and then some. Units and technology that we are so fond of are all present and accounted for, with some additions to mix things up. As with previous versions of Civ things are bigger, better and more polished in the latest release. The new graphics engine provides a clean and attractive interface for governing your people. The game has excellent sound effects as well as music. I feel as if I’m watching The Lion King every time I open the game. Tim Rice and Sir Elton would be proud.Single...

Thoughts on Tivo

By on Oct 31, 2005 in Blog Posts, Hardware | 0 comments

I’ve spent some time playing with my new 80GB Tivo Series2 DVR. The primary reason for purchasing this was not for the ability to pause live TV or even to record it, but simply to enhance the video and audio quality while adding the aforementioned features. Generally speaking the Tivo unit increased the quality of both the audio and video output from my cable connection (over the standard Motorola Cable Box). Unfortunately the Tivo unit does not support HD content, so the difference between HD and standard definition broadcasts is slight, although noticeable. It has an intuitive and near flawless interface, although there are delays between screens which will annoy anyone not used to this. Delays are also present during channel changes. There are also long load times for software and TV listing updates, although you can continue to watch Live TV during these periods. Initially I...

Tivo & Civilization 4

By on Oct 29, 2005 in Blog Posts, Games, Hardware | 0 comments

Wendy and I just got back from dinner at Ultra Bistro in VA Beach and buying some new toys. Ultra Bistro = meh (so-so). Tivo & Civ 4? Working on setting those up now:) If they are any good it may take me a while to add a new post…

Me vs Age of Empires III

By on Oct 28, 2005 in Blog Posts, Games | 2 comments

Well folks, I am furious again. After dishing out more dough for the latest whiz-bang game I’ve been disappointed again. After playing the AOE 3 demo I decided to give the full version a whirl when it was released, thinking there would of course be more content in the full version. Wrong. Sure, there are different nationalities and they have unique units, but as far as tech trees and unit types go, you pretty much have them all in the demo. OK, so now that you know that you’re throwing away your money, let me tell you what will really piss you off. Multiplayer blows. AOE 3 is the same rush-fest that all of the other AOE games have been. The forums are full of ways to get the cheapest units the fastest, or to get the best unit to the enemy base before he can mount a defense. Most games don’t last 30 minutes, and an hour long game is considered extraordinary. What a sad...

Jamie Cullum’s new album – better than his first

By on Oct 24, 2005 in Blog Posts | 0 comments

Just thought I’d mention Jamie Cullum’s new album, Catching Tales. It’s very good, even better than his first!

Consumers prove that the ROKR is garbage

By on Oct 23, 2005 in Blog Posts, Hardware | 0 comments

Here is an article validating my post (here). The article lists some of the same concerns I had. It’s interesting that companies can still get away with releasing bug ridden products. A Cingular rep told me that the phone automatically updates its software, but gave the impression that updates are rare on the Cingular network. Other networks, such as Alltel require that you dial a special number to recieve the firmware upgrade.