like bits and stuff

Greasemonkey fix for Outlook OWA

2012-01-15T05:27:00.000-08:00

I don't know anybody who says "I love Outlook" or "I really like the web-based email client at work". Most people hate it. It would be better if there was a system that allowed users to run their preferred client (like Thunderbird, or whatever) which, given the right settings, would function with work email.

But there's not.

It is possible to set up forwarding, however, so it's not all bad. But there are times when one doesn't want to reply to work emails using a separate Gmail account.

Every now and again, one has to actually open Outlook Web Access in order to send a reply. However, there is no "mark unread" function so if one clicks the wrong thing, there's no easy way to unclick. Googling for a fix, I stumbled across a Greasemonkey script which fixes OWA!

Here's the script:
http://david-burger.blogspot.com/2008/07/firefox-greasemonkey-outlook-web-access_19.html

Obviously, the Greasemonkey extension for Firefox will have to be installed first, and then click on the link in David Burger's blog post to download the script http://www2.hawaii.edu/~dburger/demos/owax.user.js

Install the script when prompted. Under settings, add the URL of the OWA page. Restart OWA and there are several new text buttons: select all, select nore, mark read, mark unread

I've never really used Greasemonkey before, so I'm very pleased to find I can use it for something useful and that my first attempt to use it actually worked!

Hardly Workin'

2012-01-15T04:56:00.000-08:00

It's Thursday, so shut up ...

Bursting Bubbles

2012-01-15T04:45:00.000-08:00

After watching this short TED talk on the personal bubbles that the web creates, I thought that maybe it's time to go back to Alta Vista, quondam search tool du jour, but then again, if people actively choose to get their news and information from one search engine, or from a single entity news site like Yahoo or CNN, and don't supplement it with LiveLeak, Ogrish, etc., then they're asking for a partial, blinkered view ...

Eyeball Massage / Mental States

2011-11-11T02:22:00.000-08:00

There are two exhibitions showing at the Hayward Gallery at the moment, Pipilotti Rist's "Eyeball Massage" and George Condo's "Mental States". Visitors are free to take pictures or make video recordings of Rist's installations, but not of Condo's stuff. While there are signs in the Condo show in the upper gallery warning visitors against touching the exhibits (the "don't take pictures" signs are fewer, and more discreet), there's nothing in the downstairs gallery telling people that they can take pictures, nor anything to warn against touching. I had to point this out to an "invigilator" who objected to my pulling Pipilotti's swimsuit aside in order to get a better look at the video screen within.

ACTA

2011-10-28T13:26:00.001-07:00

Say NO to ACTA!

Download :

MP4,
WebM,
Ogg, Torrent

Looking for the Truth

2011-06-15T03:02:00.000-07:00

My 14" film, "Looking For The Truth", will be screened on Saturday 18th June at Club Karlson in the Netherlands Media Art Institute building, Keizersgracht 264, Amsterdam, as part of the Ma Machinima International Film Festival.

The Festival runs from 1.00pm Friday 17 June to 01.00am on Sunday 19 June (and continues until 04.30am online)

My film, made with Moviestorm 1.2, is in Machinima Film Block 4, which screens on Saturday between 10.00pm - 11.30PM local time (Holland is BST +1)

If you can't make it to Amsterdam on Saturday, don't despair: the festival is streaming live in Second Life and on the world wide web.

Information about the festival, including live streams, can be found on the MMIF website: http://mmif.wordpress.com/program/

Look Back in John Peel's Shed

2011-06-06T05:19:00.000-07:00

I saw John Osborne's one-man show, John Peel's Shed as part of the @PulseFringe festival in Ipswich recently. I liked the show for a number of reasons. First, I was intrigued by the title because I know that John Peel kept his records in various outbuildings around his gaffe in Stowmarket, and also because I used to listen to John Peel as a teenager. It was a bit like Top of the Pops, a cultural fixture at which attendance was almost compulsory. I also used to regularly read John Peel's column in Sounds, and still think of Mrs Peel, aka Sheila as "The Pig" and of offspring William as "William (A Baby)". It's a little odd to think that even smaller Peelings, as then unborn, now speak to me in the earhole through the radio. But I digress.

I enjoyed John Osborne's show for its premise: Osborne, also a John Peel listener, albeit from a different era, had won a competition involving coming up with a slogan as to why the John Peel show should win a Sony radio award, and he (Osborne) was duly rewarded with a prize that consisted of a box of records from John Peel's shed which were delivered by a couple members of the production staff to Osborne's humble student abode in Norwich.*

Osborne had the contents of the box records spread out on the floor of the Wolsey Studio and he regaled the audience with stories about his experience as a radio listener, and he also played some tracks from the records he had won.

I enjoyed the show because of the way it span out into other areas: we learned that Osborne was so burdened with the responsibility of using and sharing his treasures that he inveigled his way into a community radio set-up in Norwich, undertook a production training course and recorded a series of shows in which he played some tracks from his box of records. Osborne conceded that there probably wasn't anyone listening to his broadcasts (I suspect this is true of many if not all community radio stations, but at least their existence allows someone to tick a "community engagement" box somewhere) but I admired the effort and the story it allowed him to tell. The story was interwoven with snippets of information about Osborne's life, radio listening habits and employment history, each of which were inspiring, enlightening or amusing in their own way.

The gig however, may have been little more than a pretext for Mr Osborne to whip out a pile of books (I think he had ten copies under the coffee table which was part of his set) and offer them to the audience at a fiver a time. I had spotted the books fairly early on and anticipated or partly hoped that at some point Osborne would distribute them for free. Ever the optimist, I had assumed that I would probably be awarded a copy, perhaps as a "reward" for asking an interesting or amusing question, or for sharing one of my own radio-related anecdotes. I was a little surprised then, if not ever-so-very mildly put out, that the tomes merely formed the basis of a vulgar transaction. However, my displeasure was somewhat alleviated when, while still sitting in the front row, I looked at the price of Radio Head on Amazon and saw that it was being offered there for some six pounds odd. The bargain-hunter within me was alert to the opportunity to bag a copy for a fiver and also to get it inscribed by the author, which would surely add to its value. However, by this time the swell of the departing audience had swept me into the foyer and then out into the night and the opportunity was past (I didn't fancy battling my way back up the stairs, against the flow of the small crowd, such as it was, to cop a copy for a fiver when the call of the pub was strong and a couple of pints could be had for the same price).

If I haven't already noted the fact, then I have been remiss, but it should be recorded that part of my enjoyment of the show resulted from the fact that it prompted me to recall some of my own radio-related experiences. Here then are some:

1) The only time I ever met John Peel that I can recall was in a bar at a pop festival. I think it was Reading and I think it was 1979. The bar was a tent and I think it was a backstage bar. (I don't recall how we blagged passes, but I've a vague recollection of wearing a black and white sticker on a t-shirt.) It was also an empty backstage bar, apart from a lone bloke standing in the middle of the tent. I was at the entrance to the tent with my mate Leaney. "That's John Peel" he said. So I went up and said hello. I'd like to think that I also mentioned liking his radio programme and that at least one of us offered to buy him a drink, but we were probably skint and wouldn't have had the resources to do so. On the other hand, at least one of us would almost certainly have tried to have blagged a drink, but whether or not this was in fact the case remains uncertain, and that's how this shaky recollection must end.

2) Sometime in the early-to-mid 1970s Tony Blackburn had the breakfast show on Radio 1 and handed over to "Diddy" David Hamilton (no, not the film maker) for the next slot. One day, however, TB announced that they would be taking the radio car to London Zoo so instead of getting the bus to school, when I got to Golders Green station, instead of getting on the 102, I got on a bus going in the opposite direction (2B?) and went to the zoo instead. After wandering around for a while I came across the radio car, with its huge aerial up in the air, and chatted briefly to Messrs Blackburn and Hamilton. Imagine my surprise when I was called into the House Master's office at school the next day and asked to explain my absence. Apparently the House Master's wife had been listening to the radio, heard me on air and had grassed me up. What a cow!

3) Another time in the early-to-mid 1970s a new radio station started, called Capital Radio (194MW). For some reason a nearby VW garage was promoting this launch, or had somehow tied it in with the launch of a new model of one of their cars, and they were giving away glasses of cider (actually, they weren't glasses, but were those white plastic cups) along with helium-filled balloons and Capital Radio (194MW) t-shirts. The promo girls didn't seem to mind who they gave the cider to, or how much they gave, so I took repeated advantage of their generosity. And I got a T-shirt as well.

4) That actually wasn't the Capital Radio-related anecdote that I originally had in mind (it just came to me while I was bashing out the bit about John Peel in the beer tent). The actual Capital Radio-related anecdote that I had meant to recount is this: a DJ called Dave Cash, who I think had the mid-morning slot or possibly the early afternoon show, was inviting people to ring in or send a postcard with amusing tales of how they procrastinate. Capital Radio mugs, pens, pencils, T-shirts and the usual bits of freebie ephemera were all offered as inducements. One of these days I'm going to call them on that and get one of those mugs and t-shirts.

I think that's enough radio-related anecdotes for now. However, I should also record that, during the show John Peel's Shed, I did feel something of a brief if fleeting affinity with John Osborne. Some of it due to the connection we shared in John Peel, but some also because of our shared habit of radio and some linked listening experiences. Osborne talked of Resonance FM, and I was reminded of the time I sought it out for the show "Where's The Skill In That" which was the temporary home of Robert Sandall and Mark Russell's "Mixing It", which was not only a brilliant programme that opened the ears of many listeners (and picked up Sony awards for Radio 3) but was so cruelly dropped from the airwaves that I was moved to write a letter of complaint to the BBC. Osborne also talked about the time he listened to Tommy Boyd who had a phone-in show; I used to listen to Tommy Boyd on LBC when he was bought in to fill the slot previously occupied by Jeremy Beadle (yes, that one) who had either left, or was dropped. It wasn't the same phone-in as Osborne's but I was a listener. And a caller (to both Boyd and Beadle).

So much did I enjoy John Peel's Shed that I actually sought out a copy of John Osborne's book, Radio Head, which I found for 60p via ABE Books. However, the postage was £1.45, so it wasn't quite the bargain that it might have been, although it was considerably less than a fiver so I'm still quids in, or the price of a pint. I'm currently reading and enjoying the book, even though some of the anecdotes are already familiar to me from John Peel's Shed. I'm also considering undertaking a radio production course for the local community radio station, even though it is probably the case that no-one will listen. (I have ideas for a show too, but the community radio idea and a 'speak your brains'-style phone-out were formulated some time before I'd even got tickets for John Peel's Shed, much less seen the show or read the book).

That's all we've got time for pip pip pip pip pip piiiiiiiiip!

* As far as I am aware, all student abodes are humble, not just those in Norwich. If, however, John Osborne's student abode is not deserving of the epithet, I am happy to be advised accordingly and make any necessary corrections.

Mind the Gap!

2011-06-06T05:13:00.000-07:00

Oh golly, I haven't posted to this blog since September last year! How very neglectful of me. Next time I am preoccupied I shall try to remember to take a little time out of my busy schedule to post a little something, even if it's just a short, two-line comment on an otherwise inconsequential scintilla of a thought, for you, dear reader, for you.

The Ipswich Regent: Suffolk'n Ripoff!

2010-09-23T12:50:00.000-07:00

Splendid as it may be that The Ukulele Orchestra of Great Britain will be playing at that most august of venues in the county town of Ipswich, namely The Regent, it's more than a little flabbergasting to discover that the price of each ticket is inflated by an extortionate £2.00 if they are purchased with a credit card, debit card or a cheque.

Four £23 tickets in the stalls should cost £92 (not cheap by any means, but positively inflated when one considers the downbeat ambience of this parochial venue) but it seems nothing short of daylight robbery when the venue bumps up the total to £100.

Just to set this ticket price scam in context, The Barbican (which is neither downbeat nor--except for those living on the Barbican estate--parochial) charges a booking fee of £2.50 per telephone transaction, and that includes first class postage if there's time! (if not, the tickets are held at the box office). There's a charge of £1.50 for online bookings and again, tickets are sent via first class post (in lovely little orange envelopes).

The Southbank Centre doesn't stiff concert-goers either: there's a £2.50 fee per telephone booking or £1.45 for online booking. As with the Barbican, the fee is applied to each transaction, not each ticket.

I think that in order to register my displeasure at the contempt Ipswich Borough Council/The Regent clearly displays toward the ~~mugs who pay their wages~~ ticket-buying public, it would be fitting to buy tickets in person at the box office and offer payment in pennies. Unfortunately, however, as the Royal Mint points out that 1p and 2p coins are legal tender up to 20p, I might have to be a bit more creative. The 5p coin is legal tender up to £5, as is the 10p. The 20p is legal tender up to £10, and so it the 50p. The £1 is legal tender in any amount. It looks like it could be £30 in silver and sixty-two pound coins. Unless I go with my chums and we buy one ticket each, maxing out the disconvenience of paying with 5p, 10, 20p and 50p coins. On the other hand, I could save myself the hassle of getting lots of coins out of the bank and let the poxy Regent stick its tickets where the sun don't shine.

Replay: A History of Video Games

2010-09-23T10:27:00.000-07:00

There's a review in today's paper of a new book purporting to tell "the" history of video games (I always think "a history" is preferable: the definitive ambition of "the history" may be a little hubristic).

Fatal flaw of the title aside, it looks quite interesting. According to Keith Stuart's review,

Replay: The History of Video Games by games journalist Tristan Donovan is a[n ... ] up-to-date and thoughtfully written opus. Beginning with the switching on of the first programmable computer in 1946 and closing with the rise of downloadable indie games, this engrossing work manages to touch on every vital facet of the industry, from the formative battles between Atari and Mattel, through the rise of the home computer to the emergence of the Japanese home console empire.

Apparently Donovan includes a consideration of MUDs, which are often overlooked in such works (I know that when I talk about MUDs to students, it's usually the first time most of them have heard of such things). Clive "C5" Sinclair gets some coverage for his pioneering work in developing computing in the UK.

It's £12.99 in the shops and surprisingly expensive at £12.34 on Amazon. If it was more heavily discounted (under a tenner) I'd snap up a copy without thinking twice (Amazon must love me) but Amazon's piddlingly small "discount" is a psychological block that's cost them a sale. Instead of copping myself a copy, I'll ask the library to add one to stock.

The Social Network: Free Soundtrack

2010-09-22T07:05:00.000-07:00

Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross have scored David Fincher's new film "The Social Network". You can score a free five-track EP of music from the film at http://www.nullco.com/TSN/

Free Audio Books

2010-09-08T13:14:00.000-07:00

The Guardian is running a promotion this week, whereby readers can download free audiobooks from audible.co.uk. A different title is made available each day.

Saturday: The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo by Stieg Larsson [Audible link]
Sunday: Armando Iannucci's Charm Offensive [Audible link]
Monday: Sir Charlie Stinky Socks and the Really Big Adventure by Kristina Stephenson [Audible link]
Tuesday: Matter by Iain M. Banks [Audible link]
Wednesday: Down and Out in Paris and London by George Orwell [Audible link]
Thursday: Rapid French: Volume 1 by Earworms Learning [Audible link]
Friday: Yes Man by Danny Wallace [Audible link]

Each free download is only available for a week, so don't hang about.

The way it works is users have to create an account with audible, and each of the free audiobooks is added to a virtual shopping basket and purchased for a cost of £0.00. Each audiobook is then downloaded using the audible download manager. No purchase is necessary, and no credit card details are required to set up the account.

One problem with this is that Audible uses a proprietary format for the files: they aren't .mp3 or .ogg, but a peculiar .aa format (shame on you, Guardian, BTW, for going along with this .aa malarkey). Another problem is that the files appear to be very heavily compressed. However, the ingenuity of the internets can help those who don't want to be hampered by a proprietary format. The audible account is flexible enough to require users to specify how--ie on what platform--they want to listen to the files. Available options are "iPod", "MP3 & GPS", "Mobiles & PDAs" and "Computer and CD Burning". Select "Computer and CD Burning".

The third problem is that the only way to get the files is to use the audible downloader, so you'll just have to install that and dump it later. So complete the sign-up process, and figure out how to download the .aa file via the downloader.

The next thing to do is to use the google to find, download and install a file called audibleMediaPlayerFilter.exe This is an old application, no longer used by Audible, but installing it will also install an aa-compatible codec, which is needed to open these files before converting them.

You'll also need LAME (Lame Ain't an Mp3 Encoder) so if you don't already have it, go back to the google and find and download LAME. However you get LAME, you'll need to drop a copy of lame_enc.dll into the C:/Windows/System directory. This is needed to convert those pesky .aa files to MP3 format using an application called Goldwave. Note that Goldwave needs to have the lame dll in the C:/Windows/System directory in order to be able to export to MP3, so if you've already got LAME installed, just drag another copy of the dll here.

Go back to the google to find, download and install Goldwave 5.06 Note that later versions of Goldwave will expire, so make sure to get 5.06.

Finally, just open the downloaded .aa file with Goldwave and save it as an MP3.
(This method doesn't work with .aax files, Audible's so-called "enhanced" format. In this set of free downloads, only the Rapid French title uses the aax format.)

As an alternative to exporting as an MP3, export the file from Goldwave as a wav file, then open the wav in CDWave (a shareware app used by audiophiles) which is nicer than Goldwave for tracking, and add track divisions or chapter points.

Goldwave can also be used for tracking, using what it calls "cue points", but it involves quite a bit of scrolling and zooming in Goldwave to place the cue points, while the process is more straightforward in CD Wave (CD Wave only reads lossless WAV or FLAC files).

Last time The Guardian got together with audible.co.uk to give away a free audioboook, there was an embedded player on the page with the option of streaming the file, downloading it as an MP3 or using some subscription service thing called iTunes. While the streaming/downloading options were better than the current offering, the book was Wolf Brother, a fantasy tale aimed at younger readers/listeners, by Michelle Paver. However, it didn't expire after a week and, three years later, it's still available here: http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/series/wolfbrother.

From Gameboy to Armageddon

2010-09-07T14:02:00.001-07:00

This fascinating programme on BBC Radio 3 is a repeat of an earlier broadcast in February 2010.

The programme discusses the use of gaming technology in warfare, combat training, and even recovery and recuperation. The phrase "military entertainment complex" nicely captures the scope of the programme. (According to Tim Lenoir, All But War is Simulation [see footnote #4 on page 292], the phrase (which is a re-working of "military-industrial complex" which refers, literally, to the business of killing people) was, apparently, first used by Bruce Sterling in "War is Virtual Hell" in the first issue of Wired magazine (March/April 1993). While Sterling certainly discusses the developing synergy between the military and gaming technology, he doesn't quite coin that wonderful phrase.)

There is some discussion of the morality of gameplay--for example, having to kill "wounded" opponents or bots to win Full Spectrum Warrior--but interestingly, while the media often raises questions about the morality of videogames, the question of the morality of warfare per se doesn't even appear as a blip on the programme's radar screen.

It hasn't yet hit the BBC iPlayer, but will appear shortly: http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00qps1j. Alternatively, the marvellous RadioDownloader offers a convenient way of grabbing radio programmes that might otherwise be missed.

Dead Good Name for a Cafe

2010-08-25T10:13:00.000-07:00

If you were going to open a cafe, you'd probably want to give it a name. Preferably something meaningful and memorable. Directly meaningful names like "The Cafe", "The Coffee Bar" or "The Snack Bar" are non-starters in a town that sets up a new sixth form college and doesn't call it "[Town name] Sixth Form Centre" or "[Well known historical figure with an association with the town] College" but something entirely random (One, brainchild of Suffolk County Council, I'm referring to you).

Anyway, a cafe in a building that trades in education probably ought to have a name with some sort of "educational association" rather than a bland, straightforward and descriptive name. If it could be a bit ... "exotic" that would be even better. What better then than a foreign word that has some sort of mathematical association? (the institution in question doesn't offer a BSc in Maths, btw, but it should be obvious by now where this is heading).

Here, then, is the name and something approaching a rationale:

UCS Union's new café - Theta - will officially open for business on Thursday 2 September 2010.
[...]
Theta shares the space with the new Waterfront Gallery, managed by the School of Arts and Humanities, which will open on Tuesday 7 September.
Theta is the eight [sic] letter of the Greek alphabet and is widely used in the sciences, in particular as a mathematical symbol, making it an appropriate choice for a café in an educational institution.

Oh gosh. That sounds well impressive. It's foreign, it's got something to do with education (albeit not in a discipline one can actually study at the institution) and err ... well that's it. Or rather it is until one digs a little deeper.

This is from the entry for "theta" in the popular online repository of knowledge Wikipedia (doubtlessly pasted-in from somewhere else):

In classical Athens, [theta] was used as an abbreviation for the Greek θάνατος (thanatos, “death”) and as it vaguely resembles a human skull, theta was used as a warning symbol of death, in the same way that skull and crossbones are used in modern times. It survives on potsherds used by Athenians when voting for the death penalty. Petrus de Dacia in a document from 1291 relates the idea that theta was used to brand criminals as empty ciphers, and the branding rod was affixed to the crossbar spanning the circle.

Seems like the naming committee have pulled a killer name out of the hat then. It should pull in the punters in droves ... unlike its clumsily named predecessor, Couture.

Test

2010-08-20T12:10:00.001-07:00

If you can't read this, it didn't work.

Schelling Out

2010-08-19T07:16:00.000-07:00

Here's a video recording of Jesse Schell's recent presentation on game development at the DICE 2010 conference. Schell considers the economics of online games [particularly Facebook games, including the ubiquitous Farmville]. Here's some interesting facts:

FV > T

There are more Farmville players than there are Twitter accounts.

LG > DP

Lead generation is greater than direct payments (first they hook you in, then they hit you up).

Facebook is strange

Facebook is strange when compared to retail economics.

Schell links various "unexpected" aspects of recent games development (the success of Facbook games, plastic add-ons/input devices, "achievements", etc, by referring to psychological aspects--he calls them "tricks"--of game design.

When (drawing on Jim Gilmore and Joe Pines's Authenticity: What consumers really want), Schell goes on to talk about how contemporary culture has an aspect of "reality" or "authenticity" that is designed to allow consumers to believe they can get beyond "the bubble of fake bullshit", I think he's referring to what the Frankfurt School might have called "false consciousness".

This is such interesting stuff you'll want to watch it twice.

Wii Games - E3 2011 - Guitar Hero 5

Games and platforms discussed include Mafia Wars, Farmville, Club Penguin, Wii, Wii Fit, Guitar Hero, Webkinz.

Looking for the Truth

2010-08-18T01:54:00.001-07:00

I've been working on a machinima project using Moviestorm 1.2. It's the most ambitious piece of machinima I've made to date, involving voice actors and a proper script. The finished piece has a running time of fourteen minutes. I'll be submitting it as an entry for the 2010 MachinExpo, as well as entering a subtitled version in the Stars and Storm competition on TheMovies.fr.

Here's the teaser text interspersed with some production stills:

Harris wakes up naked, scratched and bruised in an abandoned house.

He tells Bengie, his flatmate, that he can't remember much about the night before.

Meanwhile, Amber's friend Jessica appears to be missing.

Is there a connection?

Bengie and Amber want to know what happened.

They're all looking for the truth ...

The film can be viewed on Vimeo: http://vimeo.com/14088489
Here's a link to the version with subtitles: http://vimeo.com/14221744

It contains nudity and strong language.

Notes from a Small Island

2010-06-14T13:55:00.000-07:00

There's an interesting ex-patriate story in a recent edition of The Daily Telegraph about a Scotsman who emigrated to New Zealand and then became a volunteer IT trainer in The Republic of Vanuatu, a group of islands in the South Pacific formerly known as the New Hebrides.

What's particularly interesting is that the ex-pat is using Moviestorm as a machinima platform with the youth group members of an educational theatre group, the Wan Smolbag Theatre, based in Vanuatu's capital, Port Vila.

The Telegraph article is here: Making Movies in Vanuatu.

Some of the youth group's work can be seen here: Moviestorm Animation Club. These young machinimators are modding Moviestorm and using Google Sketchup to create their own props.

Here's the first film they made (it shows the Wan Smolbag Theatre); check out the modding:

Their most recent production is here:

Here's is a link to the Wan Smolbag Theatre group's moviestorm channel: WanSmolbag. The ex-pat in question, btw, is John Herd, better known to those who frequent the Moviestorm forums as Primaveranz.

Keeping it (un) real: Serious Games

2010-06-07T05:07:00.000-07:00

Mike Shaugnessy of Washington & Jefferson College, Pennsylvania, is currently guest-blogging on BoingBoing. He recently posted about "Tactical Iraqi", a language and culture simulation/training application, developed at the University of Southern Califormia using Unreal Technology and funded by the US military's Defence Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA).

Shaugnessy also notes that the Americans have built facsimile Iraqi villages in the California desert "so soldiers can practice their interactions with [pretend] locals and [cod] insurgents and get the authentic feel for life in Iraq as an occupying force". Similar facsimiles have been created in the UK in a forest in Norfolk and in Somerset, but as of yet there is no film version (Full Battle Rattle is set in an American training facsimile of an Afghan village).

What's interesting is the use of FPS gaming technology to recreate real locations to provide simulation and training that *doesn't* have any shooting in (that's right: the interactions are verbal and gestural and don't include rocket launchers!). "Tactical Iraqi" has been around for a while, as this BBC story shows, and has picked up several awards, including a DARPA award in 2005. It was first built using UT2003. Shaugnessy's BongBoing post refers to the latest release (October 2009), but doesn't note if the developers have updated to a newer Unreal engine. There are now several "Tactical Language" spin-offs, including "Tactical Pashto", "Tactical Dari", "Tactical French" and "Tactical Indonesian". While "Tactical Levantine" seems to have been dropped (see that BBC story) a "Tactical Jive" or "Tactical Urban Street Argot" might be useful for facilitating some local integration.

There is some interesting discussion of the development and play testing here: http://www.awn.com/articles/gaming/learning-languages-games-itactical-iraqii

Unfortunately, there's no downloadable demo available (athough anyone with access to a .mil email address can download the software for free) but a video and a brochure can be found on the Alelo website.

Other video clips can be found in all the usual places. This one's from DailyMotion:

The American military has a long history of using games technology for training, as this article by Roger Smith Simulation and Gaming 41.1 (February 2010) shows.

Acclaim for the "Tactical Language" simulations is not universal, as shown by this post on Watercooler Games by academic cum games designer Ian Bogost.

machinima

2010-06-06T06:17:00.001-07:00

DSCN2401
Originally uploaded by collegecollage

That telly's actually quite big when you stand close to it

don't watch that ...

2010-06-06T06:16:00.001-07:00

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Originally uploaded by collegecollage

watch this!

Visitors are mesmerised by machinima madness at the end of year show.

they think it's all over ...

2010-06-06T06:14:00.001-07:00

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Originally uploaded by collegecollage

it is now! final year computer games design and computer games programming students at the end of year show

computer games design

2010-06-06T06:12:00.001-07:00

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Originally uploaded by collegecollage

A visitor checks out one of the exhibits

computer games design

2010-06-06T06:10:00.001-07:00

DSCN2397
Originally uploaded by collegecollage

Visitors check out the Flash games made by some of the L2 students (is that someone looking bored, or just checking out the booze and food table?)

computer games design

2010-06-06T06:09:00.001-07:00

DSCN2396
Originally uploaded by collegecollage

reverse engineering: Worms ported to a 2D card game by daniel shepherd

computer games design

2010-06-06T06:04:00.001-07:00

DSCN2395
Originally uploaded by collegecollage

soundscape exhibit by craig fotheringham

Endangered Species: On Thin ice

2010-06-06T05:28:00.000-07:00

This is one of several DS games that were created by small groups of final year students on the computer games design and computer games programming courses.

Endangered species was created by Dean Leeks (design); Ryan Avent (art); Roger Creyke (programming) and George Daters (programming).

More info here: http://www.facebook.com/endangeredspeciesgame

And here: http://twitter.com/endangeredgame

And on Roger Creyke's website, here: http://www.creyke.com/

computer games design

2010-06-06T05:23:00.001-07:00

DSCN2390
Originally uploaded by collegecollage

Visitors checking out the work on display

caption competition

2010-06-06T05:22:00.001-07:00

DSCN2389
Originally uploaded by collegecollage

What are these computer games design students saying at the end of year show? Witty replies should be sent on a postacrd (or the back of a sealed envelope containing a bribe) to:
End of Year Show Caption Competition,
c/o Anomalous Materials Laboratory,
"A"-Block
etc.

One entry per person.
No correspondence will be entered into.
The editor's decision is final.

computer games design

2010-06-06T05:17:00.001-07:00

DSCN2388
Originally uploaded by collegecollage

Some of the exhibits of final year student work at the end of year show: left: work by Craig Fotheringham (computer games design); centre: work by Kevin Reed (computer games programming).

computer games design

2010-06-06T05:14:00.001-07:00

DSCN2387
Originally uploaded by collegecollage

Visitor's engage with one of the computer games design exhibits (this one belongs to Dean Leeks)

Mods 'n' Rockers

2010-06-06T05:11:00.001-07:00

DSCN2386
Originally uploaded by collegecollage

computer games design - modding Visitors get stuck in to some CTF fun playing some of the L2 student's UT2K4 mods

End of Year Show

2010-06-03T02:04:00.000-07:00

The final year undergraduates in the School of Arts and Humanities at UCS got their End of Year Show on last night, and very impressive it was too.

Pictures to follow.

http://www.ucs.ac.uk/about/News/2010/20100512_DegreeShow.aspx

The Future Looks Dull

2010-04-21T15:13:00.000-07:00

Natalie Alderman, who may be an average social gamer, points out in this post on the Guardian that "dull", "unchallenging", and "not particularly innovative", games are very popular. This, she explains, is because they are played by people who use social networking sites like Facebook.

Alderman goes on to suggest that the ranks of gamers will be swelled by people "who haven't previously thought of themselves as gamers" and, while this growth will result in a more diverse range of people playing games, "more diversity doesn't necessarily mean all the games will be great".

Can't wait!

It's a Mod, Mod, Mod, Mod World

2010-04-16T09:58:00.000-07:00

Palle Torsson make mods. Some of his mods are interiors of film sets, such as Psycho, The Shining and Reservoir Dogs, created in Unreal Tournament 2003. An exhibition of sixteen large format images of the interiors were exhibited at the Andréhn-Schiptjenko gallery in Stockholm in 2003, and the work was also shown in the Try Again exhibition in Madrid in 2008.

Here's his Unreal Silence of The Lambs:

More here: Palle Torsson, Evil Interiors

Previously, Torsson created mods in collaboration with Tobias Berstrup, using Duke Nukem and Half Life [click the links for video clips] to recreate the interiors of art galleries, including The Contemporary Art Centre in Vilnius and Stockholm's Modern Museum of Art. Entitled "Museum Meltdown", the work has been shown at the Lyon Biennale, the Kunsthalle, Vienna and the Try Again exhibition in Madrid.

More here: Palle Torsson, Museum Meltdown

Got game?

2010-03-21T11:36:00.000-07:00

A few days ago boingboing posted a link to games designer Jane McGonigal's TED talk on how spending more time playing video games will help make the world a better place. McGonigal's talk (more on the TED page here) was illustrated by some of Phillip Toledano's Gamers series of photographs.

Several more of Toledano's Gamers pics were used to illustrate an interesting article in today's Observer magazine. In "More Than A Game" writer Tom Bissell reflects on the amount of time he spent playing GTA IV when he should have been writing. As the standfirst puts it:

Tom Bissell was an acclaimed, prize-winning youg writer. Then he started playing the video game Grand Theft Auto. For three years he has been: sleep-deprived, cocaine-addicted, and barely able to write a word. Any regrets? Absolutely none"

As well as affecting his writing, excessive game-play (and nose-play) also affected his reading. As Bissell observes, "Writing and reading allow one consciousness to find and take shelter in another." He goes on to remark "the most consistently pleasurable pursuit in my life is playing video games. Unfortunately, the least useful and financially solvent pursuit is also playing video games".

(NB: Toledano's photos aren't used in the online version of the article.)

Doing it alone versus doing it with others

2010-03-11T01:09:00.000-08:00

Naomi Alderman has endured the travails of watching commercial television to observe that Nintendo is pushing the "social" aspects of gaming by employing the nation's most loved gurning northern lads to pretend to play with a Wii whilst a southern pair of Balls pretend to play with a DS. Alderman remarks that while playing with or against someone else is seen as an inherently "good" thing, she prefers to play by herself.

The original post is here: http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2010/mar/10/naomi-alderman-the-player

Interestingly, in a revised version of the piece, posted a few days later, guilt and the "Protestant work ethic" seem to have excised Alderman's inclination to extol the joys of solo-gaming. The revised version is here: http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2010/mar/17/lone-gamer-no-shame

Also cut from the reworked piece is a link to an interesting article on game mechanics by Jason Rohrer: "Testing the Limits of Single Player". Rohrer discusses game mechanics and tries to devise a single-player game that offers depth without relying on AI or randomness. While he thinks it can't be done, he comes up with something called i45hg which, although "reasonably interesting" for a few turns, doesn't feel like a real game.

Flash educational game competition

2010-03-04T02:31:00.000-08:00

Cambridge ESOL is offering a 32" television and PS3 as first prize in their competition to design an educational game in Flash for 10-12 year-olds who are learning English as a second language. Sony PSP consoles are offered as runner-up prizes.

Ian Cook, of Cambridge ESOL says:

"Creative approaches to education are so important when teaching children new skills. We’re looking for simple, fun games that will motivate children to learn and practise their English – a skill that will be of use to them their entire lives".

Competition judges include Gareth Hughes, Senior Designer at Sony Computer Entertainment's Cambridge Studio, Steve Harris of Anglia Ruskin University and Bafta-nominated games designer Dan Mayers of UCS.

The competition is open to all undergraduate and postgraduate students at UK universities. The closing date is 20th May 2010.

Further details are available here; here are the rules and the entry form is here.

I'm Free!

2010-03-03T04:52:00.000-08:00

There's nothing like a freebie. Here's some free stuff:

Need to convert a file from one format to another?

Free online conversion services

The online graphics and audio suite, Aviary, is now free: it includes applications for editing graphics, creating vector graphics, adding special effects, resizing and cropping, creating colour swatches, and an audio editor

SVG-edit is a free online SVG editor.

Peacemaker

2010-03-03T04:38:00.000-08:00

Israeli novelist Assaf Gavron was one of the guests on this morning's Midweek. As well as pounding plastic keys as a wordsmith, Gavron has also turned his talents to games design and has created Peacemaker, which would be, one supposes, the opposite of a shoot 'em up.

Players take the role of either the Palestinian President or the Prime Minister of Israel and the object of the game is to sort out the mess.

Considering the juxtaposition of this with the previous post, a "new experience" could be had from this by plunging the region into chaos and watching the bullets and stones fly. No, wait ...

Subervting the Game

2010-03-03T04:06:00.000-08:00

There's a nice post on the Guardian Games Blog about "getting new experiences out of old games" which is a circumlocutory way of saying subverting the game. The link in the Guardian blog post to a Rollercoaster Tycoon crash video no longer leads to the video as it's been taken off the site, but there are plenty to be found on the popular video sharing sites.

Other new ways to play old games include trying to get by in The Sims 3 without a house and a job, as related in the Alice and Kev blog by Robin Burkinshaw, and lugging a gnome around in Half Life 2, as descibed by Tom Francis here in order to launch him into space to get the Gnome Achievement.

This Week Only: Indie Love Bundle

2010-02-15T14:12:00.000-08:00

The Indie Love Bundle from hemisphere games on Vimeo.

Boing Boing has posted a piece about a wonderful bundle of six indie PC games, currently on offer for a limited period for a trifling twenty dollars:

Machinarium (Amanita)

And Yet It Moves (Broken Rules)

Auditorium (Cipher Prime)

Aztaka (Citeremis)

Hemisphere (Osmos)

Eufloria (Omni Systems)

There are video previews of all six on Boing Boing: http://www.boingboing.net/2010/02/15/show-indie-game-devs.html

Memory Fox

2009-12-15T15:15:00.001-08:00

I've just found a nifty Firefox extension that drastically cuts down Firefox's memory usage. If, like me, you have several instances of Firefox open, and multiple tabs open in each instance, you'll find Memory Fox gives you back quite a bit of RAM.

To check your current memory usage, open up your Windows Task Manager and locate Firefox on the Processes tab. Make a note of how much memory it's using and note how many tabs you have open. Install Memory Fox, and restart Firefox. After restarting Firefox you should have the same number of tabs open as before. Enable Memory Fox and check the memory usage again: you should see a significant difference. I had four tabs open and Firefox was using 300,000K (around 300MB) of memory. After installing MemoryFox and restarting the browser I checked again and memory usage had dropped to around 90MB!

Read more about it here on MakeUseOf.com: http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/memory-fox-helps-tame-memory-usage-in-firefox/

Currently, there's a minor snag when installing the extension. Instead of installing as it should, there's a minor glitch which results in an error message. After ticking the "install experimental add-on box" and clicking the "install button", an error message pops up.

Just select the line of code and paste it into the browser's address bar; delete the "?confirmed" part and press return and the extension will install. Alternatively, use this: https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/downloads/file/72813/memory_fox-1.03-fx-win.xp

Synchronicity

2009-12-15T02:03:00.000-08:00

Synchronicity: two or more apparently unrelated events occurring together in an apparently meaningful way. For example, earlier this week controversial Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi, a short-haired man in a suit, was hit in the face with an object that broke his nose. There's a BBC news story here: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/8411198.stm

Meanwhile, Tim Hunkin, Suffolk's favourite boffin, was in the news because his new arcade game on Southwold Pier allows visitors to use a mallet to hit short-haired men in suits on the head. Apparently, Tim has to keep replacing worn out mallets (perhaps he should consider swapping the mallets for plaster statuettes of Milan Cathedral). There's a BBC news story here: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/suffolk/8410453.stm

Wow! It's just like a cathedral

2009-11-30T11:15:00.001-08:00

Photo:Eusebius (Creative Commons Attribution 3.0)

In a marvellous article in today's Guardian (just 30p in a student shop near you), Sam Leith likens the popular time-waste 'em up World of Warcraft to a cathedral. According to Leith, World of Warcraft is:

[A] sword'n'sorcery game in which players control virtual characters who whizz about killing monsters, collecting treasure, fighting or ganging up with one another. Azeroth has a functioning virtual economy, and (mindbogglingly) an exchange rate with the real world: a WoW gold piece, enough to buy you some virtual barbecued boar ribs, is currently worth about one and a half euro cents. Also, WoW has some wicked magic swords. Yet grown-ups play it. In fact, seduced by the beauty of this whole new world that's theirs to explore, they find it eats their lives.

Leith goes on to tell us that World of Warcraft is not like a film. What it is like, however, is a cathedral. A great big gothic cathedral, in fact. Just like Chartres. Leith's logic is that the fractured narrative of a WoW session is a repetetive grind, with lots of boar-slaying, getting ambushed and being killed. Quite unlike the oneric experience of sitting in a big dark room full of strangers, gazing upon the projected spectacle of cinematic truth at 24 frames per second.

For Leith, a much better comparison would be to liken WoW to a medieval cathedral: a magnificent work, created by many hands over a great period of time and which remains largely unfinished. "All those programmers", according to Leith, "are the modern-day equivalent of stonemasons, foundation-diggers and structural engineers". Moreover, Leith asserts, there isn't a narrative in a cathedral (that's debatable, but we'll let that one slide) but there is a mythos--a whole system of stories--along with a wealth of detail, and a social space.

Oh, and apparently the number of people who play World of Warcraft outnumber the population of Greece. Now there's a sobering thought.

Machinima Expo 2009 - Map and Schedule

2009-11-21T06:11:00.000-08:00

A map of the site is available on the expo site at machiniplex.net/expo, along with a schedule of screening times. Click the image above for a larger version. Click the image below to open the schedule as a PDF.

Machinima Expo 2009

2009-11-20T12:58:00.000-08:00

Click on the image to open a link to the Facebook group associated with the event. More information about the Machinima Expo is available here: http://machiniplex.net/expo

Alternatively, you can click on the following SLurl to go to the Second Life location if you have Second Life installed: http://slurl.com/secondlife/ucsville/141/124/25

Second Life can be downloaded (for free) from http://secondlife.com/support/downloads.php

Zotero: bibliographical tool

2009-11-18T16:01:00.001-08:00

Zotero is a bibliographical tool available as a Firefox-plugin for Windows, Mac and Linux. Version 2 is available as a beta (ie, not quite finished) but, according to ProfHacker, it is stable.

Zotero is essentially a database that lets you keep bibliographies (and notes) for the different topics, or different projects etc, you might be working on. You can grab information from the web, Amazon, online databases like the UEA electronic journals, etc and Zotero will keep it all organised. When you're working on your essay, all you need to provide is the page number and, with a couple of clicks, Zotero will provide the reference--in any of a number of citation style (Harvard Chicago, MLA, etc) At the end of the essay, Zotero will also insert a fully formatted bibliography of the materials cited.

Suffolk eLearning Forum

2009-11-12T01:45:00.000-08:00

As well as the talks, there were some student games on show, both complete games from some of the L2 and L3 design and programming students, and paper prototypes of games being developed by the L1 Computer Games Design group. The Curiosity Collective were showing some of their curios (I liked the proverb generator) and Matthew Applegate had an installation running too.

Sum Leaping

The Search for The Bloodstone

Sarah and Michael's Picnic

Captured

Dragon School

Whisper Village

Curiosity Collective

Matthew Applegate (Pixelh8)

Suffolk eLearning Forum

2009-11-11T10:03:00.001-08:00

There was a great turnout, interesting speakers and a nice set of prototypes of student games on show at the today's Suffolk eLearning event.

Scott Hewitt of RealProjects kicked off the talks with an overview of the development of elearning, from screen -> screen -> test type-scenarios to current developments that make use of 3D game engines, not to mention a variety of portable devices, including familiar pocket-fillers such as the Nintendo DS, Sony PSP and the Apple iPhone, as well as some examples of how Wii-controller technlogy is being harnessed for training and educational use.

Scott Hewitt has posted his presentation on the RealPrtojects website. View it here: Games-Based Learning. Other resources are also available on the RealProjects site: http://www.realprojects.co.uk/gamebasedlearning/

Dan Mayers and Adam Mayes's presentation on Alternate Reality Gaming (ARG) was really interesting and thought provoking. I'm not that familiar with the concept of ARG-ing beyond it involving some running around and "doing stuff" IRL, but the presentation suggested how ARG-ing can bring a whole new lease of life to things like field trips and guided walks. There are some great integrational (is that a word?) possibilities, directing users/players to online content--web pages, information, clues, video etc.--using QR codes and mobile phones. Truly fascinating stuff.

Adam wasn't physically present--he was in Denmark, so it was great that he took part via Skype with nary a hitch (I've been to several tech-focussed conferences where the inevitable technical hitch leads to non-ironic whoops from the audience after someone gets on stage and manages to get the speaker's Mac to connect to the internet via wifi. Adam's link-up today was so seamless that no-one noticed or, if they did, they were all too cool to whoop or make a fuss).

There was some concern about Matthew Applegate as his last known contact with the world was a tweet last night to say that he was feeling poorly, but he nonchalantly arrived, bang on time, with a laptop and a carrier bag and talked about the decline of programming in the school curriculum and went on to make some suggestions about some ways people could get coding (eg: scratch, squeak, atmosphir, processing) and he also mentioned some projects that will bring basic--beginner's all-purpose symbolic instruction code--to some popular consoles.

Free Presentation Software

2009-11-10T11:47:00.001-08:00

Another nice free thing (with a couple of paid options) is a presentation application called Prezi. It differs from PowerPoint in that it is like a zoomable poster rather than a series of slides of bullet points. Here's a video clip that provides an overview of the key featues:

There's some discussion of Prezi here: http://www.profhacker.com

Free Brainstorming software

2009-11-10T10:00:00.000-08:00

Bubbl.us is free web-based brainstorming application that allows users to:

Create colorful mind maps online
Share and work with friends
Embed your mind map in your blog or website
Email and print your mind map
Save your mind map as an image

Looks like it could be useful for collaborative projects. Click on the little image below to open a bigger Flickr pic to get an idea of what it looks like.

(Picked this up via Realprojects' twitter feed)

Blocking Murdoch

2009-11-09T05:12:00.000-08:00

Apparently, Rupert Murdoch is planning to block Google from displaying the content of the various domains he controls. The idea is that people will then pay to access News International sites (there at least two flaws there, but let's overlook them for the sake of convenience).

Anyone who doesn't want to wait that long, if they aren't already doing it, can exclude content from Murdoch's domains by adding a simple filter to their search terms in the form of a minus sign, the word "site" and a colon, followed by the domain to be excluded. For example:

"balanced news" -site:thesun.co.uk

"celebrity obsession" -site:thetimesonline.co.uk

"cross-media promotion" -skynews.com

If excluding individual domains on every search seems a bit tedious, Google offers a custom search engine option: http://www.google.com/cse/. After setting up a custom search engine, it's possible to add a list of domains to exclude.

Oh look, this post is also on the letters page of today's Guardian.

JFGI: The Boxed Game is Dead

2009-11-08T03:27:00.000-08:00

The mobile gaming market is looking increasingly erm ... mobile. While established mobile platforms from Sony and Nintendo are currently being eclipsed by johnny-come-lately handhelds in the form of the iPod Touch and the iPhone, Google's Android OS may be about to cut a swathe through mobile market and upset the Apple iCart as Android 2 includes free sat nav.

The new Nintendo DSi, which incorporates features commonly found in mobile phones in an attempt to make the platform more appealing and stem the loss of sales, is already redundant as Nintendo prepare to launch the DSi XL in the spring. The XL is a thicker, heavier version of the DSi, with larger screens and bundled apps (see this brief games news piece from yesterday's Games Review in The Guardian's Guide supplement). A visual comparison of the DSi and the DSi XL can been seen in this Wired article. According to this BBC news story, Nintendo DS sales have dipped by 15% over the last year while, in the same period, sales of iPhone and iPod touch have doubled. (That BBC news story, which moots Android 2 as a threat to Nintendo, Sony and Apple, also contains a nice video clip of Android's satnav running on a Motorola Droid but, irritatingly, the video clip isn't embeddable.)

Sony's response to the stiff competition was to restyle the niche PSP as the overpriced PSP Go (at £225, it's almost the same price as a £250 PS3) and introduce "Minis" -- downloadable games at affordable prices. (Click on the image for an insightful review of the PSP Go at ArsTechnica.)

The rise in downloadable content for handhelds may be the beginning of the end of content on a chip in a plastic box, as the overheads and distribution costs are considerably less. This is likely to have a trickle-down effect on the high street for box-based retailers like Game, and also an effect on the second hand market. Just how does one sell-on a download when you've finished with it? What do ~~the people who rent you games~~ games publishers think of the whole second-hand thing anyway? See, for example: Sony's Clampdown on second-hand games; Second-hand games sales are "a huge issue" -- Epic

On a less fraught front, the open source handheld market, specifically the GP2X, is keeping up with developments too, in the form of the GP2X Wiz, available at an affordable £129. There's a five minute video showcasing the Wiz's capabilities below:

Another open source development is the intriguing Pandora. It looks like a great device: a cross between a handheld console and pocket version of the netbook. It looks like a great device for developers and fiddlers, especially as the technical specs refer to an "un-brickable design with integrated boot loader for safe code experimentation". It has a TV-out (composite and S-Video) but not, apparently, a VGA port. The Pandora isn't quite available everywhere yet, but can be had for $330 from limited outlets. Check out the specs on the Pandora website, or see the preview video below.

Games Based Learning

2009-11-07T07:14:00.000-08:00

Some of the level three students on the Computer Games Design and Computer Games Programming courses will be showing some of their key Stage 1 games at the forthcoming Games-Based Learning event to be held at the UCS Waterfront building, 2.00-5.00 on 11th November 2009 in collaboration with Real Projects. Student games on show include Bloodstone, Sum Leaping and Music Man. Additional information about the event can be found on the Suffolk eLearning Forum website.

Some of the level one Computer Games Design students are preparing paper prototypes for the event. I've had a sneak preview of some of the artwork and it's incredibly good. The other thing that's stunning is that the level one students have only been on the course for six weeks and they are getting stuck-in to the development of their games for Key Stage 1 (that's for children aged between five and seven for anyone unfamiliar with the terminology of primary education in the UK). When the level one students' games have been finished, they will be exhibited at a different event.

Other exhibitors/speakers include the delightfully madcap mob known as The Curiosity Collective; the prolific chip-tuner Matthew Applegate (aka Pixelh8); our own Dan Mayers, games designer Adam Mayes, and Scott Hewitt from Real Projects.

Here are some sneak preview images from one of the prototypes:

Unreal Developer Kit

2009-11-05T12:12:00.001-08:00

There's news on the Beyond Unreal site that Epic has released an Unreal Development Kit. This makes the Unreal Engine 3 runtime available free for non-commercial use.

It seems there's also the possibility of releasing mods or total conversions commercially via Steam, in what appears to be something akin to the way in which independent developers can develop and flog apps for the popular apple phone: the vendor takes a 30% cut and the developer keeps the rest. There aren't any details on this yet aspect of the UDK yet, but it would appear to open up possibilities for modders/game developers.

There are a couple of games included too, a ball game and something called Whizzle. There's also a design document and developer's video diary for the latter which should make interesting reading and viewing. Beyond Unreal refer to the UDK "the most powerful game creation toolset there is". Click on the image to read the news on BeyondUnreal.com and get the download links.

GameCity, Nottingham

2009-11-05T04:07:00.001-08:00

The GameCity 2009 computer games festival in Nottingham has just finished. (It ran from 27th-31st October). It'd be great if we could get a trip to the festival organised for next year. Hopefully, costs for transport, accommodation and entry won't be too prohibitive and, if enough people were committed to going, we could see what kind of group rates we could get. They offer student "internships" too ("internship" seems to be the new word for "placement" that appeared to gain popularity after the news was full of stories about a certain Whitehouse "intern" and her infamous blue dress a few years ago). I imagine that, while there would be a lot of interest in securing such a placement, it would be something well worth the effort of submitting an application. There's no pay and you'd have to sort out your own accomodation, but they do feed you, you get to get involved in the festival and, when you're not "on" will get access to the event itself. And just think of how that would look on a CV.

Click on the image to go to the Nottingham GameCity photostream on Flickr.

Machinima Expo 2009 - Student Showreel

2009-11-05T01:12:00.000-08:00

Nicole Small created a great promo piece for the Machinima Expo that's taking place at UCSville in Second Life on 22nd November 2009. Another of Nicole’s machinima pieces will be showing at the festival, as part of the UCS student showreel. The showreel includes the following works:

Ben Deakin, When Mr Deff Comes Calling

Alexandra Burnell, The Tell-Tale Heart

Mark McLaughlin and David Hunter, S.P.A.Z.

Aaron Giles, American Beauty

Alan Salmon, Soldiers of War: Tribute

Aaron Bridgeforth, Dante Vein Interview

Nicole Small, Carmilla

It’s great that these pieces will be seen by an international audience along with some of the most exciting and cutting-edge machinima around. A full list of the films in the running for prizes can be seen here:

http://machiniplex.net/expo/films-screening-at-the-expo/

As well as the film festival itself, and the associated awards to be given by a panel of judges, there’ll be other things going on too, such as discussion panels, Q&A sessions with machinima directors, presentations and various exhibits and stands (it’ll be a bit like the Latitude festival, except it won’t be in a field).

Of particular note is a presentation called “Which Machinima Engine For You?”, which will be of interest to those who want to get started in machinima and who might be wondering which game to use (did I mention machinima is the art of making films using games technology?)

Another highpoint will be an installation featuring the work of machinimator Lainy Voom. Her wesbite is here: http://www.voom-machine.com/

Meanwhile, if you have two minutes to spare, spend them watching her recent film, Push, which was screened at the Cambridge Film Festival.

Virtually Where?

2009-11-04T16:46:00.000-08:00

This presentation, by Andy Powell of Eduserv, considers some of the ways Second Life is being used in education, along with some of the reasons why it isn't always as successful as it might be. Apparently 80% of HE institutions in the UK make some sort of use of SL, even if it is "under the radar". Powell's presentation also notes the various multi-user virtual environments that are now available as alternatives to Second Life.

The presentation, which I found on Vod Pod, was originally made to the UCISA User Support Conference (University and Colleges Informaiton Systems Association).

Virtually where? Are 3-D virtual worlds such as Second Life having an impact on learning? - Watch more Videos at Vodpod.

Understanding Games

2009-11-04T14:42:00.001-08:00

Last time I blogged about Understanding Games (in a blog I since appear to have mislaid--if you see it anywhere, do please let me know where I left it) it was so new that the second episode had only just appeared.

Now, all four episodes are available, and very good they are too. I particularly like the way episode three handles rules and r-ing the fm.

Understanding Games is a student project by Andrea Zecher at the University of Applied Sciences in Potsdam. It is a series of four games--actually interactive tutorials--which explain the basic theory of games. Understanding Games has picked up some awards, including a Serious Game award in 2007.

Where Worlds Collide - Machinima Expo 2009

2009-11-01T03:21:00.000-08:00

Nicole Small, currently in the final year of her BA (Hons) degree in Film and Media Studies at UCS, created a marvelous short promo for the forthcoming Machinima Expo 2009. There's Sims 2, Second Life, and what looks like a bit of Quake III Arena/Machinimation 1 and World of Warcraft all in a glorious green-screened melange of machinima. I particularly like the way a poster advertising the event is just in the background in one of the shots.

Where Worlds Collide:

machinima, Nicole Small, Second Life, ucs, UCSville

Machinima Expo 2009

2009-11-01T02:24:00.000-08:00

I was in Second Life last week for a meeting with various people involved with the upcoming Machinima Expo. Toward the end of the meeting my avatar started to move around oddly and I ended up having to fly around in order to try and regain control. Before things got odd, I took a few snaps of the assembly and post them here. Clicking on one of the small images will open a bigger version on Flickr.

Brains Eden: more pics

2009-10-22T12:34:00.000-07:00

Here are some more Brains Eden pics, these ones kindly supplied by Carol Gant:

UCS Executive as a Wordle

2009-10-15T14:38:00.001-07:00

UCS Twitter Feed as a Wordle

2009-10-15T14:24:00.000-07:00

UCS News Feed as a Wordle

2009-10-15T14:21:00.000-07:00

Lecture Notes as a Wordle

2009-10-15T13:56:00.000-07:00

Wordle is an online application that makes clouds out of words. Paste in your text, or use a link to a blog or a web page that uses RSS or even the URL of a delicious social bookmarking account to grab the delicious tags; adjust the settings for font, layout and colour and then click the £randomize" button to rearrange the words until you find a pleasing layout.

Here's an example of a Wordle of my lecture notes on defining video games. It's so much easier to see what I was getting at, and what the important bits are, when the words are arranged like this:

Click on the image to open a larger version. (Wordles can be uploaded to the Wordle gallery, or downloaded to your own computer as an image file which you can use as a form of textual analysis, as wallpaper for your PC, or just a way of storing the minutes of meetings!

Noodling around until all the little ducks line up in a row

2009-10-10T04:43:00.000-07:00

I was noodling around in the Navi-X folders under XBMC on a modded XBOX, trying to find something to watch and/or something that would work (after half an hour of trying to get stuff to load, and failing, I would have settled for anything) and I was beginning to regret moving on from the Japanese horror film that I had running to see if there was "something else" when I *eventually* stumbled across some video clips of presentations from the recent Future of Web Apps conference which might have been at Kensington Town Hall last week.

Pleased to find something working/watchable, I settled back with Francisco Tolmasky's presentation on Building Web Apps Using Atlas, which was very interesting. (Here's a video of the accompanying workshop; what I saw was FT building an RSS reader on stage, followed by Q&A) Not only had I not heard of Atlas, but I also hadn't heard of Cappuccino, nor 280 Slides, which are some other great things the boffins at 280 North have developed.

I made use of 280 Slides to create an embeddable version of John McMillan's Powerpoint slides that he used at the Brains Eden event last week. I was wondering how to implement something like that with John's slides, and I didn't fancy Powerpoint HTML and was wondering about PDF when it all fell into place. Sometimes everything just joins up, and all the little ducks line up in a row.

Games Eden UCS Ipswich: 1st October 2009

2009-10-10T01:17:00.000-07:00

The Games Eden exhibition went off virtually hitch-free (unfortunately, the black display boards were made of material that was almost impossible to fix the exhibits on to, but everything stayed up for the event itself). There was a very good turn-out. About 70 visitors came to the event, both UCS students and visitors from local schools (several school parties came, which was great).

The UCS games design students who exhibited their work and who were involved in the set-up (Craig, Dean, Amber, Andrew) will have gained some valuable experience that will be useful not only for the School of Arts' End of Year Show, but also for other times they might need to present their work. (The "Get Into Games" feature in the current issue of Edge magazine talks about the games course at the University of Gotland in Sweden, where building a portfolio and exhibiting work are key components of the course: "The exhibition teaches our students to present their work at events and to communicate the value of their games in a competetive climate.")

The speakers at the Games Eden event at UCS were:

John McMillan, McMillan Technology: Setting up a Business.

Martin Deacon, Senior Designer, Sony Europe and Jason Riley, Senior Artist, Sony Europe: Games, Game Design and How to Get Into the Industry.

Matthew Applegate (Pixelh8): A Choice to Compute.

Here's John McMillan's presentation on setting up a business:

Here's a link to Matthew Applegate's blog post about the event:

http://pixelh8.co.uk/pixelh8-games-eden-ucs-waterfront/

John McMillan, who collaborated with Games Eden to help initiate the event, kindly supplied me with these Blackberry-snapped images of the evening:

Magazine Covers and Cover Lines: An Illustrated History

2007-10-04T02:22:00.000-07:00

like bits and stuff

Greasemonkey fix for Outlook OWA

Hardly Workin'

Bursting Bubbles

Eyeball Massage / Mental States

ACTA

Say NO to ACTA!Download : MP4, WebM, Ogg, Torrent

Looking for the Truth

Look Back in John Peel's Shed

Mind the Gap!

The Ipswich Regent: Suffolk'n Ripoff!

Replay: A History of Video Games

The Social Network: Free Soundtrack

Free Audio Books

From Gameboy to Armageddon

Dead Good Name for a Cafe

Test

Schelling Out

Looking for the Truth

Notes from a Small Island

Keeping it (un) real: Serious Games

machinima

don't watch that ...

they think it's all over ...

computer games design

computer games design

computer games design

computer games design

Endangered Species: On Thin ice

computer games design

caption competition

computer games design

computer games design

Mods 'n' Rockers

End of Year Show

The Future Looks Dull

It's a Mod, Mod, Mod, Mod World

Got game?

Doing it alone versus doing it with others

Flash educational game competition

I'm Free!

Peacemaker

Subervting the Game

This Week Only: Indie Love Bundle

Memory Fox

Synchronicity

Wow! It's just like a cathedral

Machinima Expo 2009 - Map and Schedule

Machinima Expo 2009

Zotero: bibliographical tool

Suffolk eLearning Forum

Sum Leaping

The Search for The Bloodstone

Sarah and Michael's Picnic

Captured

Dragon School

Whisper Village

Curiosity Collective

Matthew Applegate (Pixelh8)

Suffolk eLearning Forum

Free Presentation Software

Free Brainstorming software

Blocking Murdoch

JFGI: The Boxed Game is Dead

Games Based Learning

Unreal Developer Kit

GameCity, Nottingham

Machinima Expo 2009 - Student Showreel

Virtually Where?

Understanding Games

Where Worlds Collide - Machinima Expo 2009

Machinima Expo 2009

Brains Eden: more pics

UCS Executive as a Wordle

UCS Twitter Feed as a Wordle

UCS News Feed as a Wordle

Lecture Notes as a Wordle

Noodling around until all the little ducks line up in a row

Games Eden UCS Ipswich: 1st October 2009

Magazine Covers and Cover Lines: An Illustrated History

Say NO to ACTA!

Download :

MP4,
WebM,
Ogg, Torrent