Tag Archives: Computers

May 26 2008
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On The Rain-Slick Precipice of Darkness, Episode 1 (Demo)


I downloaded and played through the demo of Penny Arcade‘s new game, On The Rain-Slick Precipice of Darkness, Episode 1. It’s pretty fun, and easy to get into. It has the comedy of a Penny Arcade comic, and the look of one, too. The graphics are not impressive, but they work. They’re very similar to the Sam and Max games, if anyone has played them.

The gameplay is very easy to understand. The exploring portion is point-and-click, while the battle screens work by selecting your attack and then the enemy to attack. Sounds simple, but it’s real-time. You have to manage up to 4 characters at once (maybe more?), while the enemy is also attacking you. It can get pretty hectic, but it wasn’t bad.

I would recommend downloading the demo to anybody, and buying the game if you like it, since it’s only $20 and available for Mac, Windows, and Linux, as well as on the Xbox Live Marketplace.

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May 26 2008
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Ubuntu 8.04 and the Realtek 8185 (Update)

Ok, my last post actually was not completely flawless, that method has been giving me some issues, so I found these instructions instead:

  1. Open Terminal
  2. sudo apt-get install ndisgtk
  3. Download the Windows drivers (I’ve only tested it with the XP drivers)
  4. Open System>Administration>Windows Wireless Drivers
  5. Select the .inf file from the unzipped folder you downloaded in step 3

That method worked perfectly for me, and has lasted through numerous reboots, unlike the previous way. I’ve only tested it with a WPA Personal network, no idea if it works with WEP or WPA2. If it doesn’t work, try rebooting…And you might want to install wpa_supplicant if you’re going to use WPA, but I’m not sure if that’s necessary.

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May 22 2008
3 Comments
Life in general

Ubuntu 8.04 and the Realtek 8185

I have Ubuntu 8.04 (Hardy Heron) running on Artemis (my desktop), but until a few minutes ago, it had no internet connection, due to lack of drivers for the wifi card in the machine, the Realtek 8185.

I’m used to not knowing how to do anything on Linux, and usually my attempts to make things work on the open source OS end in failure, so it’s pretty cool that I figured out how to get this to work.

First, I found this tutorial [link dead], which I followed word-for-word, with no results at all. Then I checked my chipset on the wifi card, and realized that the article is for the 8187, not the 8185. So I decided to take a leap of faith, and downloaded the Win98 drivers for the 8185 (Win98 because they are the version of the 8187 drivers the tutorial uses), and then followed the tutorial again, but with the new drivers instead of the original ones.

Guess what? It worked. Flawlessly. Artemis now has wifi under Hardy Heron, and I couldn’t be happier. Now for the graphics card and my mouse…

Edit: If this doesn’t work, try this method instead!

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May 12 2008
2 Comments
Life in general

Spore/MassEffect to Use SecuROM DRM Scheme, EA Descends to Ninth Level of Hell

Apparently, Electronic Arts is planning on releasing two of their biggest PC titles this year, MassEffect and Spore, with the SecuROM DRM Scheme. For those of you who don’t know, the SecuROM DRM was included with BioShock, gave owners of the game living hell. For example, should you have to reinstall the game, you would have to call SecuROM to get a new registration code. There was also a lot of fear that it was installing a RootKit on systems (which would allow it to execute commands under the root, or administrator, user account without requiring any passwords or notifications).

Obviously, the announcement that SecuROM was once again going to be used as the copyright protection in popular pc games sparked an outcry from pc gamers. Originally, EA said that SecuROM would check with its servers every 10 days to re-authenticate the game, but they recently took back that statement, and are now saying that it will only re-authenticate the game when you download additional content off the internet, meaning fewer unwanted internet connections.

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May 03 2008
Life in general

Iron Man Released

The Iron Man movie came out yesterday, and it is quite possibly the best superhero movie I have ever seen. The only competition it might have would be Batman Begins, but even that seems cheesy and weird in comparison to the highly polished, well-built Iron Man movie. Any nerd will greatly appreciate the amount of gadgets in the film, and even if you get completely lost in the steady stream of geekspeak, the movie is really enjoyable. The action is awesome, without being too unbelievable, and the special effects are unbelievable. It really is completely seamless, as one would expect it to be. Even the comic relief provided by Tony Stark’s assistant robots is acceptable, given the sheer awesome of the movie.

There were two moments in the movie which made the fanboy in me flip out, because they were references to aspects of the Iron Man comics I had completely forgotten about. I haven’t read many Iron Man comics, so I’m not that well-versed in Iron Man lore, but I knew enough to recognize how awesome the references were.

Protip: Stay through the credits.

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Apr 28 2008
Life in general

Boston Apple Store Shaping Up (Again)

When I was on the IFO Apple Store website today, I came across this picture of the soon-to-be Boylston St. Apple Store:

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Apr 26 2008
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Fan Ages and Drizzle

Fan ages – that is, custom-made, unofficial ages for Uru – have certainly progressed a long way. From my first age, Galamay:

To the Fan City of Ahra Pahts:

And now, Eh’ko and the Book of D’eux:

The two ages seen here, Eh’ko and The Remote Age Viewer, look absolutely stunning. They really are Cyan-quality work, and incredibly impressive.

Also, the Drizzle Project is a pretty impressive feat of fan work. Some hackers have managed to decrypt the MO:UL age files, and re-encrypt them using the old Uru encryption methods, meaning that we can put the ages that were once exclusively for MO:UL into URU:CC. I tried it out myself, and after one failure the first time, I got it working completely the second time around. It’s very fun to link to the ages and mess around with the settings just by tapping keys on the keyboard (such as swap the winter Delin for the summer one by pressing Q or W, or make animals appear in Negilahn), plus it includes the flymode patch, which means you can use flymode in these ages and see everything from any angle. It’s very fun, and I’d recommend it to anyone with Uru:CC and the MO:UL files.

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Apr 25 2008
Life in general

New Stuff From the Apple Store

I took a necessary trip to the Apple Store today, and picked up a new power cord for my computer. I noticed the form factor is smaller, it looks like the iBook adaptor now:

In other news, I picked up a Slider Case for my iPod, and it looks pretty good:

I also got some screen protectors, because I thought having a matte screen would look pretty cool, plus protection from fingerprints would be nice. However, I got a few specks of dust on the inside of the film, and I have not been able to remove them. Since the thing holds itself on using static, and dust or debris, no matter how small, produces a large air bubble. Plus, the matte finish makes the screen look grainy and weird. In the end, I took off the one on the screen but left on the back film, which has no matte finish, and is covered up by the case anyway.

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Apr 23 2008
2 Comments
Life in general

Power Cord Blues, Again

Well, it happened again. My Macbook Pro’s power cable has, once again, ceased to function due to overheating. This time, the cable obviously melted at the point where it connects to the power brick. Unlike before, nothing I do makes it work, which makes me think it’s been completely fused together. At the moment I’m using my Windows box, since both of my batteries are dead…Hopefully I’ll be able to get to an Apple Store tomorrow and pick up a new cable.

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Apr 09 2008
Life in general

Uru's Final Day

Well, this is it. The final day of Myst Online: Uru Live. Tonight, at midnight (mountain time), Cyan Worlds and Gametap will pull the plugs on the game servers, shutting down the game for the foreseeable future. I plan to be online up until the very last moment, should anyone care to join me. Also planning on video recording the last 5 minutes or so, for the memories. You can expect that to be up sometime tomorrow.

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