Deck16

(Click the image to expand.) These two heroes of the NC deserve...

Sat, 18 May 2013 17:36:01 +0800

(Click the image to expand.)

These two heroes of the NC deserve a mention. CasperGoose and sargedan held Leopardwood Nursery pretty much entirely by themselves while it was deep in Vanu territory. Which is pretty damned good as their rank suggests they are fairly new players.

As the image shows I mistakenly thought I’d dealt with them early on, as I moved away for a while. After a dogfighting death elsewhere I saw they were still there, attacked from the air from a while then landed to move in on foot.

In the end some other Vanu and I secured the point. But not before I witnessed these two blow up two Scythes (one of them mine, luckily after I’d gotten out of it), one Sunderer, at least two Harassers and goodness knows how many Vanu infantry. And that was not with any special weapons unlocks.

I direct-messaged them with my congratulations, but neither would reply. (I wasn’t being sarcastic-sounding, honest!)

For parts of today and yesterday I’ve been working on...

Thu, 16 May 2013 14:46:33 +0800

For parts of today and yesterday I’ve been working on adding elevators to Vox Venio.

Regarding this:

Like doors they are triggered, and come in three colours.
They are just placed in the level file, they have to intelligently figure out how far up and down they’re meant to go. These two are “sensing” that they need to go from the ground up to the top of the crates. The specifics regarding this algorithm may need tweaking.
Elevator speed is defined per-elevator.
I don’t like the “bouncing down” thing riders on the elevators do when descending. That’ll need to be fixed.
Safety first! The elevators won’t crush things, as shown.
Relax! They’re programmer art. With some proper art and some nice background tiles behind them they should look quite nice.

A lightning-fast Vox Venio update. Pausing is implemented! Yes,...

Tue, 14 May 2013 16:31:31 +0800

A lightning-fast Vox Venio update. Pausing is implemented!

Yes, pausing stops the music (and ideally ambient sounds, when they get added). The game also automatically pauses if the game loses focus.

(Click the images to see captions.) When I make YouTube videos,...

Tue, 14 May 2013 03:05:27 +0800

How do these parties get away with saying they "own" things in the public domain? Surely that is a bigger crime than putting Justin Bieber music in your video (excluding crimes against taste).

I like how the first three options are traps. I've no idea what happens if you click on them. I *hope* YouTube just explains why they aren't valid, rather than instantly failing your dispute for you.

Scary bolded termination text! Digital signatures! Anyone would think I did something wrong...

I often use public domain music. I am frequently accused like this but always win the dispute. It seems wrong that I can be accused so freely by something that can't be arsed defending its accusation.

(Click the images to see captions.)

When I make YouTube videos, I use public domain music from MusOpen. Yet pretty much every time, YouTube’s automated robot comes along a week or so later and kicks me in the teeth.

Here we go again, this time for this video.

Is the robot right? Copyright law is so damned confusing. I couldn’t figure it out one way or another for Holst’s music, though I don’t think MusOpen would be lying when they say it is public domain.

But for the Rossini music the robot can’t be right. Rossini died in 1868, way before copyright’s long reach (at least, for now). That means the music score itself can’t be copyrighted. But what of the recording? It was performed by a US military band, so no copyright can be claimed.

Now I file a dispute on YouTube. I’ve done it before, for other public domain music, and it’s always come back in my favour.

So what’s my problem? Things work out in the end, right? Well, I don’t think it’s fair that some automated robot should be accusing me of copyright violations so flippantly. If it won’t back it up when disputed it shouldn’t accuse me in the first place.

Yes, I know it’s pretty small potatoes compared to other IP travesties out there. Yes, I’m sure YouTube doesn’t like the fact it has to use this robot.

It’s symptomatic of a larger problem, though. Copyright is increasingly a one-way street. If you get things wrong as the little guy, you can pay millions. But when the rights holders get things wrong (as they have with this robot, repeatedly) they can get away totally free.

I was playing some UT2004 death-match recently. Nothing that...

Tue, 14 May 2013 01:06:00 +0800

I was playing some UT2004 death-match recently. Nothing that I’ve come across since comes close. Ah, for the days when “shooter” didn’t mean “Call of Duty”!

But I don’t bring up UT2004 to harp on about its gameplay. I want to highlight the other things it did right:

Non-reliance on a master server or match-making server. You can keep playing in 2104 long after Epic has shut all official servers down. (Well, assuming you have some sort of Windows or Linux emulator on your super-futuristic computer.)
Ability to host your own server, even a dedicated server, for free and on your own machine.
Subnet agnosticism. Join any server at any valid IP address or hostname, doesn’t matter if it’s LAN or internet.
Decent DRM. True, it had a CD-check, but this was removed in the expansion packs.
Free expansion packs with heaps of content.
Extremely mod-able.

This is opposed to PC games of today, which:

Require connection to a remote server, even for single-player content.
Disallow, or charge for, dedicated server hosting.
Force you to use an online-only match-making service instead of entering an IP, sometimes even for LAN connections.
Have terrible DRM, either requiring a permanent internet connection, or other insane restrictions.
Charge for DLC, sometimes for trivial things, and sometimes for content supplied on the disc gamers took home from the store.
Disallow modding, even when previous versions of the game had massively successful modding communities.

♫ Founders come first, then profiteers. ♫

Remember Sidwig Kerman, first Kerbal on Mun? His mission...

Fri, 10 May 2013 17:27:51 +0800

Remember Sidwig Kerman, first Kerbal on Mun? His mission unceremoniously dumped him on the far side of Kerbin, hardly fitting for such a hero.

Recent plans for a crewed Duna return mission have led to the Sosaria. In the sprit of over-engineering it seemed sensible to test its ability to land and take-off from Kerbin (which has more gravity and a thicker atmosphere than Duna). And while we’re at it, let’s give Sidwig a ride home.

Lessons learned:

Big craft are tricky. Lots of places for things to snap or break. (And this isn’t even a big craft compared to what other people have done!)
Payload fairings can really be a pain if you don’t account for them in your design. They can fly about and hit other components when jettisoned.
It’s very hard to land precisely on planets with atmospheres when approaching at a shallow angle.

Click here to see all Kerbal Space Program posts.

Poker Night at the Inventory pits video game characters against...

Tue, 07 May 2013 00:00:00 +0800

Poker Night at the Inventory pits video game characters against each other and you in, obviously enough, a game of poker. It’s more about the characters’ banter than any serious poker challenge.

But what’s up with the sequel, letting TV and movie characters in? A lazy grab at populism! Bah! May as well include Oprah next time!

So here’s my pick for proper video game poker opponents. Are you listening Telltale?

(From left to right)

Augustus Cole of Gears of War. Boisterous, loud, self-sure and foul-mouthed. Apparently, Cole’s voice actor Lester Speight went above and beyond, ad-libbing extra content that the developers loved so much they included in the game. You may find him annoying, but he’s never boring.
Max Payne. I’m talking about Max from his original game. I’d love to see his “film noir” dialogue turned to a poker game. Plus, he’s got the greatest poker face.
SHODAN from System Shock, not a player but taking the role of referee and MC. Leagues more evil and demented than GLADoS, especially in the original System Shock, SHODAN is far more suited to keep unruly meat-creatures in check.
Sly Boots of Anachronox. Basically what you get when you take a sci-fi rogue like Han Solo and add years of personal failure and crippling debt. He comes with quite a back-story and so would have a tale or two to tell.
Dracula from Castlevania. Mixing purple prose with Engrish, all washed down with overwrought voice acting… what a combination! I’d love to hear him talk poker. “What is a full house? A miserable little pile of numbers and symbols!”

Honourable mentions:

Sgt Avery Johnson from Halo. Sort-of like an Augustus Cole, but less loud and more witty.
Ultima’s Avatar. RAISE. FOLD. BYE.
Gordon Freeman from Half Life. Because he doesn’t talk.

Trying to do e-sports on a public server is like trying to play...

Mon, 06 May 2013 11:37:00 +0800

Trying to do e-sports on a public server is like trying to play beach volleyball on Omaha Beach. Strangers are going to interfere in your game.

But that’s what Major League Gaming is doing with PlanetSide 2. They pick a point on the map and the three clans have to try to capture and hold it. It’s about as far from competitive play as you can get — the teams are unevenly sized to start with, strangers can interfere, the map is asymmetric, and its not even a fair fight as someone starts off holding whatever point is chosen.

But you know what? I don’t care. It’s fun to watch.

Indeed, it may be fun to watch precisely because it is not your typical “pro gaming” affair. There’s no alienating bizarre strategies going on (as per StarCraft), there’s no off-putting hero-worship of individual players, and there’s none of that fake-sounding over-enthusiasm. Okay I lied about the last one, there is still a bit of that.

All that aside, might I suggest you watch a few minutes of the video? Be sure to watch in HD! More than anything it shows PlanetSide 2’s visually spectacular battles (a shame it’s night-time in-game). It’s interesting to see a battle from a spectator’s (rather than participant’s) view. The first half is more open combat with vehicles, the second half is close-up infantry-only.

A Vox Venio update. Nothing much to say about it. It does show...

Wed, 01 May 2013 21:06:20 +0800

A Vox Venio update.

Nothing much to say about it. It does show off some new art from kcilc, especially with regards to player and rover animations. The point of the video is to show two different background layering approaches, can you spot the difference?

I should mention that music in this video, some previous videos, and no doubt for future videos is by Nebyoolae. Nebyoolae did much of Impulse’s music, and is Vox Venio’s composer (and maybe sound effects guy, too).

Project Zomboid Revisited: RC2.9

Tue, 30 Apr 2013 17:27:36 +0800

Project Zomboid has come a long way since I reviewed version 0.2.0q. Just recently version RC2.9 came out; it’s the first version the public has had access too for a long while.

After the jump, my thoughts on this new version.

Well… it’s broken. I cannot play for more than about thirty minutes without a crash.

There are also bugs, mostly very minor interface things. I did find an amusing one, though. My character was over-sleeping, wasting precious daylight hours, so I tried to wake him by moving the mouse around and clicking. He kept sleeping but it also appears he did respond to my commands: when the game loaded he was outside. It seems he got out of bed and phased through the bedroom wall. Unfortunately the bedroom was on the second floor, so when he awoke… crunch! Ouch.

But hey, its a pre-release version, so crashes and bugs are to be expected.

Onto positive things. The game is leagues ahead of 0.2.0q. The map is larger, the graphics are smoother, the interface is orders of magnitude better. Core game-play remains as tantalisingly moody as ever.

The game is a little harder than 0.2.0q. Houses are locked up meaning you often have to prowl around looking for an unlocked window, or risk the noise of breaking and entering. Carrying capacity is much lower (but far more realistic, especially when it comes to using bags). Decent weapons are damned rare in the suburbs; they may be more common in non-residential buildings but then so are zombies, so I never really found out. Zombies are more resilient, and combat is slightly harder (but, again, in a realistic manner).

My favourite starting position was as a shirtless man in a filthy men’s toilet in an abandoned building at dusk. The zombie apocalypse effects everyone alike.

All this means few or lone zombies can be much more of a threat if they get you by surprise. My most embarrassing death was against a zombie I bumped into while searching a house. Not having fully explored the house its layout was blackened to me and I fled through a door that turned out to be a dead end. The window was jammed so I tried to bull-rush the zombie to escape, it didn’t work, I was bitten, bleeding and generally not in the best of shape to avoid the sparse but encroaching zombies outside.

Personally I think it’s about the right level of difficulty. How things change after the initial half-hour though… I don’t know. I’m pretty damned hopeful though, and eagerly await the next release.

Vox Venio progress report. I’ve been refining doors and...

Fri, 26 Apr 2013 19:32:00 +0800

Vox Venio progress report.

I’ve been refining doors and switches. This video shows the how switches and doors have a colour-coding thing. I quickly knocked up a really basic puzzle that shows how the hero and his rover will need to co-operate to get through levels.

The video also shows some new animations for our hero, courtesy of kcilc. Don’t pay too much attention to the door and pad art, that’s all my doing.

Next I’ll probably be adding more switches other than pressure pads, as I talked about in the last post.

For anyone curious, the level’s map is shown below. (Read this post for more background on mapping).

.......................................................................
..............................CCCOO....................................
..............................CCCOO....................................
..............................KKKoo....................................
..............................KKKoo....................................
........CCCOO.............................................CCCOO........
........CCCOO...........e.......G.......l.................CCCOO........
........KKKoo.........CCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCOO.............. KKKoo........
........KKKoo.........CCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCOO.............. KKKoo........
........CCCOOP.V..........................................CCCOO........
,_BB__,_CCCOO__,__,____,E_,____,g_,____,L_,_BB_,___,______CCCOO,_BB__,_
RrRRRRRRRRRrRRRRRRRrRRRRRRRrRRRRRRRRRrrRRRRRRRrRRRRrRRRRRRRRRrRRrRRRRRR
RRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR
RRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR

Off the Beaten Track: Pre-Cataclysm Places in Eastern Kingdoms A...

Wed, 24 Apr 2013 19:03:05 +0800

Ironforge Airport. (See main text.)

Old Ironforge. An unimplemented area which can be accessed by exploiting certain game mechanics.

Isolated murloc hut on the coast south of Swamp of Sorrows.

Newman's Landing. (See main text.)

Northern tip of Eastern Kingdoms. (See main text.)

Isolated dwarven farm on the east coast of Arathi Highlands. Complete with two farming dwarf NPCs!

Silvermoon's back wall. Someone actually bothered to put a modest amount of scenery and creature spawns to the north of Silvermoon.

Silvermoon's back door. The Dead Scar stops on the other side, near the Blood Elf starting town. Theoretically, the Scar should continue onwards through this door and into the sea to the north.

Off the Beaten Track: Pre-Cataclysm Places in Eastern Kingdoms

A month or so before the Cataclysm expansion to World of Warcraft, I took a tour of the lesser-visited places across the regions that had been part of the game since its inception (Kalimdor and the Eastern Kingdoms). These regions were about to be modernised, and even if the locations in my tour did survive the remodeling, the upcoming ability to use flying mounts would render them far less isolated.

For me, it was a last huzzah to the unknowns and exploration that made the old World of Warcraft great. I think exploration and out-of-the-way places are important to MMOs; I’ve spoken about this before regarding WoW and also Guild Wars, so I won’t retread the topic again here. It’s a major reason why I stopped with WoW not long after Cataclysm.

I wanted to share my tour here for two reasons. Firstly, it’s to dump the screenshots here, where they will be safer. Secondly, other people may be interested. These are pictures from the Eastern Kingdoms; Kalimdor pictures will be available in another post.

Most of these locations are accessible by sea. I used my shaman’s Water Walk ability (which recently had been changed to work with mounts) to (relatively) quickly travel across water, circumnavigating both continents and taking screenshots at interesting locations.

Click the pictures to see captions. Further information is shown below for some images.

Ironforge Airport. This location was in the heart of Alliance territory. As a Horde player, it made sense to take a stealthy character. There was also a tricky mountain traverse that required some sort of slow-fall to cross. So I took my rogue engineer (with parachute cloak) to do it. A friend’s rogue engineer also joined me for this expedition. The location itself was normally visible to players only as they flew over, but there were details there that suggest that, for a while, it was intended to be an actual questing area. In a way this “half-developed” aspect made it spookier to visit than a totally empty location.

Newman’s Landing. An isolated cove north of the human capital Stormwind. Supposedly it’s where newly created human player characters appeared in the world before being teleported to their starting area, some say you could see them for a split second. There are other strange stories about this place, including ghost sightings.

North tip of Eastern Kingdoms. The original game didn’t allow players to travel north beyond a certain point on the Eastern Kingdoms. Rather than waste resources on inaccessible land, the developers did the sensible thing and truncated the landmass, but left the map showing the lore-friendly continent continuing on. The pictured ruins, accessible only by a long walk over the ocean, were on the northern tip of the truncated Eastern Kingdoms. Later, when the Burning Crusade opened up the lands to the north, the developers used dimensional trickery to connect the new land to the old. These ruins still existed “underneath” the Ghostlands.

Making a Unique-Voiced Follower in Skyrim -- Addendum

Mon, 22 Apr 2013 13:26:21 +0800

It’s approaching a year since I originally wrote the voiced follower guide. This post is about relaying lessons learnt and links that are useful. It may be especially of use to anyone about to undertake the guide.

Read on…

First may I say that the feedback has been great! Thank you for that.

The feedback has taught me one thing above all others: Skyrim and especially its Creation Kit are buggy. They’re buggy in the worst way: bugs aren’t usually reproducible and often happen to only a luckless minority. This isn’t a criticism of Bethesda — better they share their buggy tools rather than feel a need to hide them — but it is a warning for newcomers. Here be dragons.

In addition to Creation Kit’s strangeness, it has moved on from underneath my guide. Things have changed and I haven’t kept up. The voiced follower guide was the last Skyrim modding thing I did. The smaller problem is that my guide doesn’t quite match the modern Creation Kit. The greater problem is that there have since been introduced new bugs, horrible insidious ones, that I’ve never had to deal with myself so I don’t know how to combat them.

So, what’s the point of this post?

Firstly, if you’re newly approaching the guide, go in forewarned. You know things are buggy, so take it slow and easy, test things step by step. If you have problems try looking through the comments at the bottom of each part of the guide; there are lots of useful ideas there. Know that I am no master of the Creation Kit, and while I’m happy to try and help you, I may simply not be able to. Many followers of this guide have ended up far better Skyrim modders than I ever was.

Secondly, be aware that followers made using my guide:

May or may not be compatible with mods like Ultimate Follower Overhaul.
May or may not be compatible with other mods that add extra followers.

Does that worry you? Then may I suggest you make a rough, simple version of your follower and test compatibility early on.

Thirdly, I’d like to link to other tutorials. I’ve not personally looked at any of these in detail. But it’s good to have options, right?

Stephanie’s Dialogue Tutorials

And finally, I’d list to list some “alumni” of my guide. Some of these people used the guide just a little, some of them used it a lot. Hopefully these will provide some inspiration to counter my pessimistic warnings above; it is possible to make great followers!

By the way, I intend to update this post if more links or useful information comes my way.

Roll Reversal, Part 1: Strength Checks

Sun, 21 Apr 2013 15:00:00 +0800

If you’ve ever played an RPG of any sort you’ve probably wondered to yourself, “What statistics would I have?”

This is what this series intends to find out. By performing tests on a real-world test subject’s capabilities, we can “reverse engineer” what statistics are. Or, we can at least try.

I’ll be using Dungeons and Dragons Edition 3.5 as the RPG system, because it is both popular and not-so-cutting-edge that Wizards of the Coast (or their evil overlords at Hasbro) come after me for giving out glimpses of their rules systems to people who mightn’t own the books.

Click here to read all articles in this series. Otherwise, click below to read on…

The Assumptions and The Rules

I am assuming that anyone taking these tests:

Is human.
Is able-bodied (at least for the more physical ability scores).
Is level one.
May possibly have purchased skills.
Has not purchased any feats.
Is not under any kind of magical effect.

Some of the tests below are dangerous, be warned. If you hurt yourself doing these tests we may have to limit your Intelligence score in a later article.

Tests which are illegal, impossible or open to wide interpretations are not included here. So no testing out how quickly you can kill someone with a broadsword, no casting of spells and no climbing walls whose difficulty might be subjective.

You may notice that many of these tests return a minimum Strength result — that’s the best that can be done in certain situations. Carry out as many tests as you can to narrow down the possibilities. And if you get conflicting results, well, sorry!

You can repeat the tests as many times as you like and keep only the best result for each.

The idea behind the test should be obvious and you should be able to intuit what would be cheating and what wouldn’t. I don’t go out of my way to explicitly forbid every way to cheat. So, cheat if you want… I just hope your DM doesn’t find out.

Strength, in a Nutshell

First up is Strength!

Strength is about muscles. Lifting things, breaking things, and certain types of athleticism. In D&D, humans generally have between 3 and 18 Strength; the higher the better.

For reasons that are not worth elaborating on here, every value of an ability score has an assigned modifier. Some tests will tell us the score (e.g. Strength), some will tell us the modifier. Here’s how they relate:

Score 1 = Modifier -5
Score 2 or 3 = Modifier -4
Score 4 or 5 = Modifier -3
Score 6 or 7 = Modifier -2
Score 8 or 9 = Modifier -1
Score 10 or 11 = Modifier 0
Score 12 or 13 = Modifier +1
Score 14 or 15 = Modifier +2
Score 16 or 17 = Modifier +3
Score 18 or 19 = Modifier +4
(etc)

Destructive Tests

These must be performed bare-handed, an in a single swift action.

Break a 1-inch diameter rope: Strength Modifier ≥ +3

Bend an iron bar: Strength Modifier ≥ +4

Break a sturdy chain: Strength Modifier ≥ +6

Encumbrance Tests

Load the subject up with weight, but allow it to be carried as easily and comfortably as possible. Use of load bearing equipment (straps, packs, harnesses) is permitted. All weight must be lifted off the floor while moving. Determine the heaviest load the subject can carry while also being able to complete all of the following tasks:

Move 90 feet (27.4 metres) in six seconds.*
Move 30 feet (9.1 metres) in any direction and return to the starting position. Get there and back within six seconds.*
From a prone position, stand up and move 30 feet (9.1 metres) in six seconds.*
Move 3 miles (4.83 km) in one hour.

* These tests should be repeatable, and only tiring over the longer term. I would suggest 5-10 repetitions.

Strength 1 — 10 lb (4.54 kg)
Strength 2 — 20 lb (9.07 kg)
Strength 3 — 30 lb (13.6 kg)
Strength 4 — 40 lb (18.1 kg)
Strength 5 — 50 lb (22.7 kg)
Strength 6 — 60 lb (27.2 kg)
Strength 7 — 70 lb (31.8 kg)
Strength 8 — 80 lb (36.2 kg)
Strength 9 — 90 lb (40.8 kg)
Strength 10 — 100 lb (45.4 kg)
Strength 11 — 115 lb (52.2 kg)
Strength 12 — 130 lb (59.0 kg)
Strength 13 — 150 lb (68.0 kg)
Strength 14 — 175 lb (79.4 kg)
Strength 15 — 200 lb (90.7 kg)
Strength 16 — 230 lb (104 kg)
Strength 17 — 260 lb (118 kg)
Strength 18 — 300 lb (136 kg)

Determine the heaviest load the subject can lift over their head. They must be able to move 5 feet (1.52 metres) in six seconds while carrying the load over their head. Halve the weight of this load and compare to the results table above.

Jumping Tests

These tests should be performed unencumbered.

Long jump, running start:

Strength Modifier ≥ distance covered in feet - 24

Long jump, standing start:

Strength Modifier ≥ (distance covered in feet * 2) - 24

High jump over something, running start:

Strength Modifier ≥ (height of obstacle in feet * 4) - 24

High jump to touch something, standing start:

Strength Modifier ≥ ([reached vertical height in feet - 8] * 4) - 24

Jumping on top of an object at waist-height:

Should be possible for any subject.

Jumping down 10 feet (3.05 metres) without injury:

Should be possible for any subject.

Swimming Tests

Swim in calm water, staying on the surface, covering at least 15 feet (4.57 metres) in any six second period. Do this over a long duration (say, 10 minutes).

Strength Modifier ≥ -4

Swim for over an hour, with an average speed of at least 15 feet (4.57 metres) per six seconds, without getting fatigued:

Strength Modifier ≥ -4

The Results…

Stay tuned. The plan is to test these out on a real-world subject. (Click here to see all articles in this topic.)

A Vox Venio update, with a very short video. It’s a...

Sat, 20 Apr 2013 22:48:47 +0800

A Vox Venio update, with a very short video.

It’s a door!

In the video you see the door is being opened by a pressure pad (it may be a little tricky to spot). That pad detects the weight of the hero, the rover, or even creatures that aren’t implemented yet (they should automatically “just work”).

So far, pretty simple, right? But what I’m planning to implement:

Different “colours” of doors that are opened only by switches of the same colour.
Various types of switches. There’s the pressure pad that I’ve mentioned. Also: traditional switches that only the player can use, near field communication antennae that only the rover can use. More ideas are sure to come.
Various door settings. A door might just open and stay open, or it might toggle between open and closed, or it might stay open for a limited time. You can probably imagine how this kind of thing will force co-operation between our hero and his rover!
More than just doors. Other things could be switched: lights, lifts, hatches, etc.

In the last post I mentioned a performance problem. I tracked it down. During loading a level, I check every tile’s neighbours (this is to help with improved collision detection). Some of these neighbours don’t exist — this happens for tiles at the map’s edge. I was just trying to reference them anyway, and handling the resulting out-of-bounds exception. Turns out exception handling is really slow in C# (and probably other languages). The improved code now has a bit of smarts and won’t look for tiles that don’t exist, rather than relying on exceptions.

The code before and after does exactly the same thing, but the new version works probably about 100 times faster. So the lesson is: use exception handling only as a last resort in loops, or when time is otherwise an issue. Seems kindof obvious in retrospect, but hey, don’t a lot of mistakes?

I was sad when Fox News closed its comments section. But lately...

Sat, 20 Apr 2013 02:42:00 +0800

Threats: a totally valid debate tactic as long as God is the one busting kneecaps and not you. (Douglas Schane)

I don't know, those blokes in 300 did alright and they were ancient Greeks (know-what-I-mean wink-wink nudge-nudge). (Aube Rouge)

Seeing Red. (Kevin Neace)

A liberal AND a teacher? Yuck! (Mark Broderick)

You loved the hit series M*A*S*H, now coming this summer is the sequel F*A*G*G*O*T (Field Army Gasteroenterology, Gynecology and Operating Theatre). (Rudy Horbol)

Thought I'd leave this on positive note. Could more Christians think like this, please? (Joe Earnhardt)

I was sad when Fox News closed its comments section. But lately I have come across at least one corner of the site where comments are flowing freely!

Click the images for a better view, and for captions that include my thoughts.

I decided not only to leave the names visible, but also go to the extra effort of typing them out in the captions. Why? Because I think people should be held responsible for the shit they say. Here, Google crawler, take these names and file them away! In the future, someone searching for these people by name might just possibly stumble across this page.

(And if any of them are poes… firstly, good work you sure tricked me. And secondly, you’re not posting that crap under your real name right?)

As for the comments themselves, they’re (mostly) so hateful and/or nutty that context hardly matters. But here it is, if you’re interested.

Quick Review: The Hurt Locker The Hurt Locker is basically a...

Fri, 19 Apr 2013 18:08:00 +0800

Quick Review: The Hurt Locker

The Hurt Locker is basically a handful of “day in the life” scenes of a US Army bomb disposal squad.

Overall, it’s pretty good. It captures the terrors of asymmetric warfare and it’s exciting and entertaining to boot.

The movie keeps away from tired tropes. It tells a story without taking sides or without playing like a recruitment video. I appreciate this can’t have been easy, it’s a bit like walking a knife edge.

So its a bit unfortunate that, after doing so well on the harder stuff, it goes a bit silly here and there. Professional soldiers say the movie poorly reflects operating procedures, and even I as a civilian suspect bomb techs don’t go about chasing insurgents on their own no matter how reckless their personality is.

Worth watching, but in my opinion it doesn’t live up to the piles and piles of awards it won.

My rating: Good ★★★★☆

A mission to send probes to Eve, using (nearly) the same design...

Mon, 15 Apr 2013 20:12:00 +0800

Approaching Eve. This is the same ship that took probes to Duna, except it has three atomic engines instead of one. No more ten minute burns!

Aerobraking. First few times I underestimated the thickness of Eve's atmosphere.

Release the first probe! (I'll keep the second probe attached, for now.)

Aerobraking. The crater in the distance was not my planned target, but it was the closest site of interest to the eventual landing zone.

Touchdown. Eve's thick atmosphere makes parachute descents quite slow...

Goodbye sky-crane! This is a good time-of-day to drive: the solar panels are getting plenty of sun and the wheels are fully powered. (Later shots in the evening were time-accelerated for scenic-ness.)

Hello again sky-crane. Have you lost weight?

After a long drive, the crater's edge. Rovers are very stable in the high gravity and thick atmosphere of Eve. It is safe to drive at top speed in 4x time acceleration.

A mission to send probes to Eve, using (nearly) the same design that went to Duna. Click the images to see captions.

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Quick Review: Oblivion Some people will criticise Oblivion for...

Sun, 14 Apr 2013 21:00:00 +0800

Quick Review: Oblivion

Some people will criticise Oblivion for its pedestrian middle, its somewhat flat climax, and the fact that it enriches a Scientologist. These people have valid points.

But I was impressed by the hardest science fiction that’s been on the silver screen for years. This was not a mere action movie dressed up with lasers and spaceships and technical MacGuffins.

Well-developed characters are often casualties to hard sci-fi, and Oblivion is no exception. But it more than makes up for it in an intriguing setting and hard-working visuals.

I was teetering between a Good and Amazing rating, but I think the general dearth of decent sci-fi in the cinema tips it…

My rating: Amazing ★★★★★

This is impressive stuff. I admit I’m way out-of-date with...

Sat, 13 Apr 2013 21:00:40 +0800

This is impressive stuff.

I admit I’m way out-of-date with sound technologies. I have fond memories of EAX. I vividly remember hearing EAX-enabled Rainbow 6 for the first time, with terrorist shouts reverberating in the underground chambers and guns that were, you know, actually loud. I also remember being mightily impressed by Drakan when sound would echo off distant hills, but only from directions where hills existed (though Drakan is not listed as having EAX support so maybe I am making that up?). Oh… and Half-Life was just all-round great sound-wise.

But in more modern times, I’m rarely impressed by a game’s sound engine. EAX died because sound processing no longer requires dedicated hardware — any modern CPU can do it with ease. Have advanced sound libraries have died with it?

The comments of that video suggest that the technology can be back-fitted to UT2004 (which I still play on occasion, unlike UT3). I tried it a year ago and had no luck.