First the pictures -- http://picasaweb.google.com/jonfolkers/Spring2008 -- then the thousand words:
I've posted some of our new pictures. It's been a while, so a lot has happened! If you don't think we've really been busy, here's some photographic evidence:
- Mira's first airplane trip to Arizona, where we celebrated her Grand Tutu's 90th birthday, and had a nice long visit with her Tutu Jan and her husband Dan. Mira was *almost* able to roll over by herself at this time.
- Folkers family visit in New Jersey featuring Cousins Olivia and Isabel, Aunt Kate, Uncle Steve, Uncle Greg, Aunt Sheila, and Grandma and Grandpa. Just a week later, Mira found that rolling over was easy for her!
- First tastes of solid food, including yummy rice cereal. Since then, she's had peas, sweet potatoes, and carrots! Doggie Kody and kitty Trixie have had some, too.
- A first birthday party for a little friend, Brianna, featuring an indoor moon bounce and about a zillion pastel bears;
- Our neighborhood Easter Egg hunt on a chilly March day. All of those kids in the pictures live on our block.
- Dinner out for Mommy's birthday with proud Grandpa James;
- A walk through the DC cherry blossoms;
... which brings us almost up to the present day. Sorry, no pictures of us doing the taxes this year.
We're still taking pictures and I will endeavor to update more frequently. :-)
That link again is http://picasaweb.google.com/jonfolkers/Spring2008, and you can subscribe to the RSS feed on public gallery page if you're so inclined.
Love,
Jonathan, Drennan, and Mira
P.S. Mom and Dad -- I will send you prints on photo paper, no need to make inkjet copies unless you simply can't wait. :-D
Saturday, April 12, 2008
Friday, April 11, 2008
Progress Quest
Progress Quest is brilliant, the ultimate statistical RPG. It has the best graphics since the Windows 98 defrag program, and a plot that rivals that of the U.S. tax code.
Sent to you by JindoFox via Google Reader:
via Play This Thing by RobertAugustdeMeijer on 4/11/08
Insert pun on "progress" and "paradox".
State rhetoric question about loving numbers. Proclaim Progress Quest as the game for readers. Describe today's subject has perfect gameplay. Mention perfect controls. Mention zero loading times. Mention intuitive interface. Mention lack of bugs. Mention balanced classes. Mention ability to play on weaker computers. Mention addictive nature.
Switch to serious tone and rhetorically ask if the reader was expecting a "catch". Acknowledge and highlight the lack of visuals and interactivity. Describe how Progress Quest completely plays itself. Mention lack of challenge. Mention lack of decision making. Mention lack of consequences. Mention lack of breathtaking graphics. Describe paradox of game using the term "progress" because the player in no way progresses in "skills".
Switch to enthusiastic tone and emphasize how games can offer the illusion of "progress". Mention other roleplaying games. Mention gambling. Mention fantasy sports. Describe how games can let players feel like they are progressing without having to lift a hand. Applaud efficiency of Progress Quest. State that as long as a game is addictive, it's still being fun.
Add that the lack of visuals help stimulate the player's own imagination, not unlike a book does. Mention how Progress Quest lets the player completely decide what a "Half Halfling" and "Revolting Cloud" would be like.
And you know what really makes me love this game? It shows in so many ways how games differ from other forms of media. It's extreme in so many ways. It shows how important decision-making is in games. It shows how much pride a player can take in their "progress", even if it's such an easy task. It shows the impact graphics and sound can have on a game. Progress Quest is a wonderful experiment for theoretical aspects of game design and ludology.
Insert remark how game is most of all the ultimate smorgasbord for people who love numbers.
the99th sez: Mi amigo de Argentina hecho' un juego que es mejor, y Jon Blow dice la miasma! Hunter RPG.
N.B.: It's a PC title, but the developer reports that it runs fine on Linux under Wine.
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Tuesday, April 1, 2008
Dragon's Lair Blu-Ray review
Dragon's Lair for Blu-Ray players, including the Playstation 3, is $20 at Amazon right now. Short verdict: if this is the kind of thing you like, you'll like this too.
Would you like to see a cartoon character die in dozens of comically gruesome ways, again and again? Then this is for you!
Are you a fan of former Disney animator Don Bluth ("The Secret of NIMH," and "Pete's Dragon" are most illustrative of his style)? Then this is a must-have!
Are you looking for a cutting-edge game with retro roots to play on your Playstation 3 console? OK, give this a try -- but be careful. If you're under the age of 30 or so, you're unlikely to put up with this old style of game.
This game was a revolution back in 1983 when it launched in arcades. It was simply stunning to see branching digital video in this pseudo-interactive form back then. The novelty wore off quickly when the game's high price and limited replay value came through, though. At fifty cents a play, it was a better deal to watch someone else suffer through the trial-and-error gameplay while you watched the beautiful video.
The game has never looked better. This edition is leaps and bounds over any other edition yet released, and there have been dozens, including platforms you'd never think would work, such as the black-and-white Macintosh on multiple floppy diskettes, the GameBoy Color, and the low-color, screen-door graphics of the Sega CD. Even the original LaserDisc and deluxe DVD editions are trumped here.
Controls are fast and responsive, and the gameplay is true to the original The original scene selection order has been preserved and the controller timing feels accurate to me. You can play with your Blu-Ray remote or a Playstation 3 controller if you're on that system.
Sadly, while it's beautiful and is the best version of the game yet, it's not perfect. The menu items don't work properly on the Playstation 3, which is the most popular BD player at this writing. When you select the "5 lives" option, the machine conveniently forgets this and you have 1 life forever, as if your arcade machine were set on FREE PLAY. That's not a bad thing from my perspective, but it would be interesting for people to simulate just how annoying a quarter-snatcher the arcade version was. The disc seems to request access to the internet, so there's a possibility this could be patched, but I have a feeling this disc will remain as-is unless they do another publication run.
There are ARCADE and HOME options so you can choose to see the shorter clips as originally presented, or as seen in home versions (like the playable drawbridge scene at the beginning). Since there is no effective limit on your lives, you just play until you finish or can no longer take any more. Each scene is presented at least once (sometimes flipped left-to-right) and you can't get to the ending unless you have beaten them all. Pauses to access the disc are imperceptible, much faster than any prior home version running off an optical disc.
The extras are nicely done. There's a "watch" mode in which you can see the solution for each of the screens, as well as the MANY different ways your hero can die. From what I can tell, it's the only way to see the animation where Dirk crumbles to bones, because of the "5 lives" bug above.
There are some interviews and a commentary track with 3 of the game's creators looking bored. I only glanced at the opening, but turned it off when I felt that I could read Don Bluth's mind. He seemed to be thinking "I'm tired of this 25-year-old ****, give me my check so I can go home." Good for the sake of completeness, but I doubt you'd watch it again and again.
There's a lovely clip showing the endgame with graphics from the rasterized Amiga version, the early PC version, the deluxe PC version, the original LaserDisc version, the DVD version, and this new HD version. Each one is added as a stripe on the screen until you see them all side-by-side. The comparison is stunning. When you looked at the fisheyed monitor in the 1983 arcade, you had no idea the game could ever look this good.
Finally, there are some previews of similar games that are coming soon, namely Space Ace and Dragon's Lair II: Time Warp. In my opinion, they're completely non-essential because they're so much more annoying. They're so much more annoying because there's a lot more speech in them, which means you get to hear the same silly dialogue again and again and AGAIN! Perhaps they'll be bundled into a value package with a fixed version of this disc in a few years. Given the publisher's penchant for reissuing this content, I think that's a pretty sure bet.
Would you like to see a cartoon character die in dozens of comically gruesome ways, again and again? Then this is for you!
Are you a fan of former Disney animator Don Bluth ("The Secret of NIMH," and "Pete's Dragon" are most illustrative of his style)? Then this is a must-have!
Are you looking for a cutting-edge game with retro roots to play on your Playstation 3 console? OK, give this a try -- but be careful. If you're under the age of 30 or so, you're unlikely to put up with this old style of game.
This game was a revolution back in 1983 when it launched in arcades. It was simply stunning to see branching digital video in this pseudo-interactive form back then. The novelty wore off quickly when the game's high price and limited replay value came through, though. At fifty cents a play, it was a better deal to watch someone else suffer through the trial-and-error gameplay while you watched the beautiful video.
The game has never looked better. This edition is leaps and bounds over any other edition yet released, and there have been dozens, including platforms you'd never think would work, such as the black-and-white Macintosh on multiple floppy diskettes, the GameBoy Color, and the low-color, screen-door graphics of the Sega CD. Even the original LaserDisc and deluxe DVD editions are trumped here.
Controls are fast and responsive, and the gameplay is true to the original The original scene selection order has been preserved and the controller timing feels accurate to me. You can play with your Blu-Ray remote or a Playstation 3 controller if you're on that system.
Sadly, while it's beautiful and is the best version of the game yet, it's not perfect. The menu items don't work properly on the Playstation 3, which is the most popular BD player at this writing. When you select the "5 lives" option, the machine conveniently forgets this and you have 1 life forever, as if your arcade machine were set on FREE PLAY. That's not a bad thing from my perspective, but it would be interesting for people to simulate just how annoying a quarter-snatcher the arcade version was. The disc seems to request access to the internet, so there's a possibility this could be patched, but I have a feeling this disc will remain as-is unless they do another publication run.
There are ARCADE and HOME options so you can choose to see the shorter clips as originally presented, or as seen in home versions (like the playable drawbridge scene at the beginning). Since there is no effective limit on your lives, you just play until you finish or can no longer take any more. Each scene is presented at least once (sometimes flipped left-to-right) and you can't get to the ending unless you have beaten them all. Pauses to access the disc are imperceptible, much faster than any prior home version running off an optical disc.
The extras are nicely done. There's a "watch" mode in which you can see the solution for each of the screens, as well as the MANY different ways your hero can die. From what I can tell, it's the only way to see the animation where Dirk crumbles to bones, because of the "5 lives" bug above.
There are some interviews and a commentary track with 3 of the game's creators looking bored. I only glanced at the opening, but turned it off when I felt that I could read Don Bluth's mind. He seemed to be thinking "I'm tired of this 25-year-old ****, give me my check so I can go home." Good for the sake of completeness, but I doubt you'd watch it again and again.
There's a lovely clip showing the endgame with graphics from the rasterized Amiga version, the early PC version, the deluxe PC version, the original LaserDisc version, the DVD version, and this new HD version. Each one is added as a stripe on the screen until you see them all side-by-side. The comparison is stunning. When you looked at the fisheyed monitor in the 1983 arcade, you had no idea the game could ever look this good.
Finally, there are some previews of similar games that are coming soon, namely Space Ace and Dragon's Lair II: Time Warp. In my opinion, they're completely non-essential because they're so much more annoying. They're so much more annoying because there's a lot more speech in them, which means you get to hear the same silly dialogue again and again and AGAIN! Perhaps they'll be bundled into a value package with a fixed version of this disc in a few years. Given the publisher's penchant for reissuing this content, I think that's a pretty sure bet.
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