I've been a big fan of music games for years now and rarely pass over a new offering no matter how expensive or unwieldy the necessary peripherals might be. Just this morning I downloaded Phase for the iPod hoping to further appreciate my newly culled iTunes library. Fun little game and I thought it would pass the time until Harmonix decides to release Rock Band in Australia (which is going to be so cool).
The most common question I hear after I've subjected someone to gush vomit of my latest rhythm game du jour is "Why bother spending so much time with a music game when you can just learn an instrument?". Personally I think this is really missing the point of playing music games in the first place as I find it to be a completely different experience (in a good way) to plucking on my six string.
Playing "real" music in my opinion, for better or worse, just feels more cerebral. Composition, dynamics, emotion are all driven off decisions that you make as the musician and while thoroughly gratifying can be emotionally and mentally draining in long sessions. Rhythm games on the other hand are a more passive experience by comparison which usually involves entering a receptive state of mind where the "notes" just wash over you as you react unconsciously by pressing the appropriate buttons or stepping on the marked foot pads. Anyone that's felt an uncontrollable urge to physically respond to music (I've been known to gyrate embarrassingly on occasion) whether it be tapping a foot or head banging will hopefully catch a glimpse of my elusive point when I suggest that Rhythm games offer a structured framework within which the player can "safely" participate. Wildly strumming an air-guitar with (paradoxically) a physical guitar.
To force one last awkward analogy on the subject, I'd liken playing a musical instrument is like driving a car on a race track while a music game would be sitting on a roller coaster. You get to go really fast in either case and have heaps of fun but the fear of dying horribly in a crash should hopefully be minimised when you're on a track.
Anyway, the trigger for this introspective mood of mine was stumbling over this game called Guitar Rising which is currently under development. It's the closest thing to a music game with real music instruments that I've seen... well ignoring Keyboard Mania and Drum Mania. So it's the first music game I've seen for real instruments that I can actually play then. Excitement all round!
Saturday, March 29, 2008
Monday, March 24, 2008
Geeky Easter
A happy belated Easter to everyone. Bucking tradition, we decided to have a quiet long weekend at home this year rather than burdening John and Sheena in Toowoomba with two chocoholics to feed. Not that we could have done that this year anyway as the Parentals had planned a trip to Sydney to see other children in need of attention. Much to my delight, the Rabbit managed to leave us both a tasty treat before hopping onto the plane.
With no big plans for four days we decided to embark on a crusade of home improvement, albeit with a decidedly geeky slant. Well... to be honest it was probably all my idea really but Alison was especially supportive.
The first project on the list was to convert good old Gemini into the new DVR. My original plan was to reinstall Windows and to use Sage TV software to act as a media recorder. Early tests had already discounted using Linux/MythTV (as I couldn't get Ubuntu to recognise the bluetooth adapter on the laptop) and free alternative GB-PVR (as the software refused to recognise the Toshiba internal hybrid tuner) so I was short on options. In the beginning I was pretty happy with my choice as the interface was pretty snazzy with cool features but half a day of light use immediately uncovered some troubling stability issues with the program.
Gutted and desperately looking for a means to validate my decision to turn a perfectly working laptop into a glorified set top box, I resigned myself to giving Windows Media Centre a shot. I had dismissed WMC due to the dismal support for Australian EPG which is a pretty big part of Digital TV in my book... but then I found out about this free service. It's not 100% perfect but it's certainly good enough for light use and it seems like the developers are keen to improve the content they provide. On top of that I've even found a way to launch Joost from the Media Centre menu which is pretty darn nifty. Now if the Joost developers would just implement decent support for the MCE remote I'd be a happy chappy. While I'm writing a wish list, it'd also be grand if Hulu could come to Australia sometime this century... just a thought.
I'd like to pick up one of these babies for some couch bound surfing and typing but till then I'll just have to squat by the laptop with a mouse plugged in. Might pick up a mini keyboard to sit on top of the lid too.
The only other major technical snag I hit in the setup was trying to get HDMI to output to the LCD TV consistently. For some reason, the Windows NVIDIA driver refuses to keep output going to the TV when I switch the TV to standby. Not claiming to be a driver expert by any means but I would have thought keeping output from a "set top box computer" going to the TELEVISION to be pretty crucial. As a temporary work around I'm piping the video out through S-Video instead which is a slap in the face given that I was looking forward to watching HD content in... oh I dunno... High Definition maybe... *sigh*
Second Easter project was to dispose of the fish tank that was once home to our little friends. There were two sucker fish that managed to survive the genocide so we bagged them and donated them to the pet store at Indooroopilly where they'll hopefully be re-homed to another loving family. Amongst the waves of melancholy we can't help but feel a little pleased with the reclaimed counter space.
Third Easter project was to finally clean out the study. No words, certainly not my own clumsy writing anyway, could describe the monumental feat this was so I'd definitely be underselling it by saying we're a little chuffed with our accomplishment. To give you an idea, there were bills on the floor from 2005 that needed to be filed alongside photos and material from the Wedding in June last year. Piles of random documents meant that what little bare carpet space we could walk on was now coated with an insulating layer of dust and dirt desperately in need of a vacuum. Then there was the glass desk which I was fairly certain was bought clear but had now taken on a "frosted" look due to the rings of mug marks and sweat stains.
Not a pretty picture...
Never one to miss an opportunity to wrangle a new purchase, I convinced that the Herculean effort of cleaning up the study would be a complete waste if we had to put back my ageing 19" CRT monitor. Thus we had to pick up a cheap LCD monitor to grace the freshly Windexed desk. I find it amazing that a 19" widescreen is the smallest LCD you can get these days (which we managed to pick up for a tidy sum of $200). Mind boggling considering I paid considerably more for the 19" CRT all those years ago. I think the end result is an improvement if you'll excuse the dodgy low-light photography.
Last but not least, I've been wanting to address the woeful WiFi reception in our house for some time by testing it out in the library upstairs. I'd always put the crap signal down to the brick in the house but it's lovely to see what a little elevation will do to boost your range. Reception upstairs has now gone from Very Poor to Very Good or even Excellent, if the WiFi evaluation in Windows XP is anything to judge by. I had to navigate the miniature paradigm shift of not having ANY computers directly plugged into a router (not sure why but it was hard for me to swallow) so now the Study computer is hooked up via a discarded Wireless Bridge that I bought years ago. Knew that hoarding would have its advantages.
Still not quite fast enough to stream videos across the network unfortunately. Guess that'll have to wait till the day I upgrade to 802.11n with an Airport Extreme and maybe Time Capsule.
With no big plans for four days we decided to embark on a crusade of home improvement, albeit with a decidedly geeky slant. Well... to be honest it was probably all my idea really but Alison was especially supportive.
The first project on the list was to convert good old Gemini into the new DVR. My original plan was to reinstall Windows and to use Sage TV software to act as a media recorder. Early tests had already discounted using Linux/MythTV (as I couldn't get Ubuntu to recognise the bluetooth adapter on the laptop) and free alternative GB-PVR (as the software refused to recognise the Toshiba internal hybrid tuner) so I was short on options. In the beginning I was pretty happy with my choice as the interface was pretty snazzy with cool features but half a day of light use immediately uncovered some troubling stability issues with the program.
Gutted and desperately looking for a means to validate my decision to turn a perfectly working laptop into a glorified set top box, I resigned myself to giving Windows Media Centre a shot. I had dismissed WMC due to the dismal support for Australian EPG which is a pretty big part of Digital TV in my book... but then I found out about this free service. It's not 100% perfect but it's certainly good enough for light use and it seems like the developers are keen to improve the content they provide. On top of that I've even found a way to launch Joost from the Media Centre menu which is pretty darn nifty. Now if the Joost developers would just implement decent support for the MCE remote I'd be a happy chappy. While I'm writing a wish list, it'd also be grand if Hulu could come to Australia sometime this century... just a thought.
I'd like to pick up one of these babies for some couch bound surfing and typing but till then I'll just have to squat by the laptop with a mouse plugged in. Might pick up a mini keyboard to sit on top of the lid too.
The only other major technical snag I hit in the setup was trying to get HDMI to output to the LCD TV consistently. For some reason, the Windows NVIDIA driver refuses to keep output going to the TV when I switch the TV to standby. Not claiming to be a driver expert by any means but I would have thought keeping output from a "set top box computer" going to the TELEVISION to be pretty crucial. As a temporary work around I'm piping the video out through S-Video instead which is a slap in the face given that I was looking forward to watching HD content in... oh I dunno... High Definition maybe... *sigh*
Second Easter project was to dispose of the fish tank that was once home to our little friends. There were two sucker fish that managed to survive the genocide so we bagged them and donated them to the pet store at Indooroopilly where they'll hopefully be re-homed to another loving family. Amongst the waves of melancholy we can't help but feel a little pleased with the reclaimed counter space.
Third Easter project was to finally clean out the study. No words, certainly not my own clumsy writing anyway, could describe the monumental feat this was so I'd definitely be underselling it by saying we're a little chuffed with our accomplishment. To give you an idea, there were bills on the floor from 2005 that needed to be filed alongside photos and material from the Wedding in June last year. Piles of random documents meant that what little bare carpet space we could walk on was now coated with an insulating layer of dust and dirt desperately in need of a vacuum. Then there was the glass desk which I was fairly certain was bought clear but had now taken on a "frosted" look due to the rings of mug marks and sweat stains.
Not a pretty picture...
Never one to miss an opportunity to wrangle a new purchase, I convinced that the Herculean effort of cleaning up the study would be a complete waste if we had to put back my ageing 19" CRT monitor. Thus we had to pick up a cheap LCD monitor to grace the freshly Windexed desk. I find it amazing that a 19" widescreen is the smallest LCD you can get these days (which we managed to pick up for a tidy sum of $200). Mind boggling considering I paid considerably more for the 19" CRT all those years ago. I think the end result is an improvement if you'll excuse the dodgy low-light photography.
Last but not least, I've been wanting to address the woeful WiFi reception in our house for some time by testing it out in the library upstairs. I'd always put the crap signal down to the brick in the house but it's lovely to see what a little elevation will do to boost your range. Reception upstairs has now gone from Very Poor to Very Good or even Excellent, if the WiFi evaluation in Windows XP is anything to judge by. I had to navigate the miniature paradigm shift of not having ANY computers directly plugged into a router (not sure why but it was hard for me to swallow) so now the Study computer is hooked up via a discarded Wireless Bridge that I bought years ago. Knew that hoarding would have its advantages.
Still not quite fast enough to stream videos across the network unfortunately. Guess that'll have to wait till the day I upgrade to 802.11n with an Airport Extreme and maybe Time Capsule.
Sunday, March 16, 2008
There is one fruit...
I realise that I've considered switching to the dark side before, only to bow out at the last minute due to chronic impatience. Might be making excuses here but I've been looking at turning Gemini into a High Definition DVR and media centre for a while now which obviously meant buying a replacement main laptop. Preferably something to supplement little Edna with more media functionality.
The initial obvious choice was to pick up a Dell XPS M1330. Good specs, decent price and a pretty nice design for a Dell. Somehow I just couldn't get excited about the purchase though. I'd also be stuck with Vista and no option to install XP.
Then Apple went and updated their MacBook line up to bump it up to 2GB of RAM and a 250GB hard disk which borders on usable. The sub-par integrated graphics card was hard to swallow in the beginning but on further consideration I can't think of a single upcoming PC game that isn't also coming to the Xbox 360 which I'd rather play on a laptop. The promise of improved battery life, portability and a lick-able OSX interface was enough to push me over the edge.
I've dubbed the new girl Braeburn and she's playing nice with everyone else in the house so far.
The initial obvious choice was to pick up a Dell XPS M1330. Good specs, decent price and a pretty nice design for a Dell. Somehow I just couldn't get excited about the purchase though. I'd also be stuck with Vista and no option to install XP.
Then Apple went and updated their MacBook line up to bump it up to 2GB of RAM and a 250GB hard disk which borders on usable. The sub-par integrated graphics card was hard to swallow in the beginning but on further consideration I can't think of a single upcoming PC game that isn't also coming to the Xbox 360 which I'd rather play on a laptop. The promise of improved battery life, portability and a lick-able OSX interface was enough to push me over the edge.
I've dubbed the new girl Braeburn and she's playing nice with everyone else in the house so far.
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