Category

Gaming

Saturday, June 07, 2003

200 miles of disappointment

Had to start the day off with Six Flags training.  I’m trying to get a job as a ride operator there.  I couldn’t go to sleep the night before so I was really tired.  So the only thing that got me through that was knowing I was going to go to the Whempys LAN in Columbus afterwards.  Well, we all drove down in Tim’s car and after the hour long trip there were like 30 people there.  We didn’t want to pay $15 for a 30 person LAN for only 8 hours or so.  We went to Wendys to decide to go or stay.  We left, so the trip consisted basically of driving 200 miles to go to Wendys.  It was some damn good Wendys though.

Friday, June 06, 2003

Oh I’m such a blogsnob

Now I’m not a fan of the X-Box too much, but Dead Or Alive 3:Extreme Beach Volleyball is probably the only reason I would get one.  I went to James’ House Last night (this morning?) with Jo and Anthony because it had been a while since we were all together for an x-box party.  It was a lot of fun, and like all of our parties, it included a trip to Giant Eagle.  Even though there was much obnoxious-ness, it did not result in us getting arrested, so I consider it a success.  Jo actually let James drive his car which really surprised me.  I got in the car thinking we weren’t really going anywhere, but maybe I should know better by now.  We speeded off down 59 and turned around at the airport when we saw a cop.  The rest of the night was spent playing x-box, talking, and yelling (and spitting) at James’ neighbors.  I don’t share the same flair for getting into “trouble” as he does, but whatever.  It was fun.

Wednesday, June 04, 2003

Speaking of LAN Parties

Whempy's LAN Party is this weekend, the 7th. Link
LANOhio's LAN Party is next weekend, the 14th.Link

Whempy's: Columbus OH, 2 hour drive, $15
LANOhio: Kirtland OH, 45 min drive, $12 ($9.60 prepay)

Let me know who is interested.

Oooh, this site layout is almost complete.

Tuesday, June 03, 2003

Whempy’s Wireless Project

    The problem:  To fit 4 people and 8 computers (including 3 laptops  ) into 2 cars and arrive at the Whempy's LAN Party in Columbus, OH.
    The solution: Establish a wireless ethernet connection between the two cars and Microsoft NetMeeting for voice communication.

    Situation: Two cars, My (Eclipse's) Car took the point because I had driven there before, although it was last year, so we weren't too sure where we were going.

    Equipment List:
        Eclipse's Car:
            Passengers: Eclipse, Codex
            Computers: Eclipse's Desktop, Eclipse's Laptop, Codex's Desktop, Codex's Laptop, Codex's Server
            Wireless Solution: Codex's Laptop with external antenna placed on top of car for extended range.
        Swiftwulf's Car:
            Passengers: Swiftwulf, Krhainos
            Computers: Swiftwulf's Desktop, Krhaino's MiniDesktop, Krhaino's Laptop, AC Power inverter, Access Point
            Wireless Solution: Krhaino's Laptop next to access point, powered by AC Power inverter.

Figure 1: Access Point.  Obviously the backbone to a wireless network.  We chose to power an access point rather than connect the two wireless cards directly so we could get a larger wireless range.  Even with Swiftwulf's car directly behind, 802.11b doesnt have a whole lot of range.  Because Krhaino's laptop doesn't have a long lasting battery, the power inverter was used in Swiftwulf's car so he could use it to power the access point and laptop.  The access point was placed on the passenger sun visor for optimum range and we didnt trust it to be taped to the outside of the car.

Figure 2: Performance. Performance over the mobile wireless network was marginal.  This picture shows Krhaino's laptop which was right next to the access point.  The strange thing was he got pings of around 45-50 to codex's laptop, while codex got pings of around 2000 to krhainos.  Voice over the network worked after a brief setup period, however.  File transfer between the two cars also worked, as tested by copying the directions back and forth.

Figure 3: Netmeeting. Because there was no DHCP on this relatively simple network, static IPs were used.  The lead car was assigned 10.10.0.1, and the the other was 10.10.0.2.  Netmeeting was chosen as the communication software due to its simplicity, smallest setup time, and the fact that we didn't have much choice.  The problem we ran into was that Codex's laptop runs linux, and doesn't have netmeeting.  To solve this, we downloaded Gnome Meeting for him.  This connected with the windows laptop, but the two could not text chat to each other.  Voice chat worked though, and we ended up using that instead.

Figure 4: Execution Both cars did an excellent job of staying close enough for the LAN to work.  Codex had some problems connecting to the access point at the beginning, but it worked and the two computers could talk.  We found out that sony microphones must suck because we were having some problems hearing krhainos, but overall it was cool.  Even had a radio station going for a few minutes :D.  Next time, some improvements can be made and we hope to have wireless gaming during the 2 hour trip back and forth from Whempy's

Figure 5: Success! We arrived at the LAN Party just in time for Codex to get a winning ticket.  He won two Cold Cathode Lights.  Congrats, Codex.   View the short movie! Click here!

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Sunday, May 18, 2003

My Rant, Reloaded

Ok, it seems my rant against the Matrix was a little harsh.  All in all, I really like the Matrix Reloaded.  It’s just that this trilogy has such high expectations that it unwillingly created for itself.  The producers obviously saw how much potential the first movie created and they are cashing on on this big time.  There’s no denying this.  The animatrix, the video game Enter the Matrix, selling out to powerade in commercials, its capitalism at work, baby.  They even opened the movie early on the 14th to make their opening weekend figures appear larger.  If you pay attention to all these, you can even catch subtle things in the movie like what happened to the Osiris and why the kid is following Neo.  Little things that you can probably guess what happened, but are there simply for the people who shell out the money to feel elite.  I saw the movie for the second time today and I’d like to go over the things I liked and disliked about my favorite movie’s sequel.  Spoiler alerts ahead, but if you haven’t seen it yet, you suck.  I’ve seen it twice.  I’ve given them my money, so I can feel elite.

What I disliked:
1.  The first thing that I disliked was also the first thing in the movie.  I hate it with a passion when movies or stories start with dream sequences.  Maybe I just think its overdone or something, but I always hate dream sequences.  This started the movie on a downward slope for me.
2.  I know Link is supposed to be the comic relief to the movie, but it got damn annoying after a while.  And the puss- joke was out of place.  There wasn’t much comic relief in the first movie, and it should have stayed at the same level.  At least he wasn’t as bad as Jar-Jar Binks.
3.  The Adventures in Zion, as I like to call it, took a long time and had too many corny jokes.  Once again, it should have been either more serious or less boring.  And don’t say I’m too stupid to catch what they were saying.  I understand it perfectly but its boring to listen too.  This is why DVD technology is so great, you can skip past this stuff
4.  I will never in my life retract what I said about the “Rave / Neo Ass” scene.  This is trash that pushes the movie from a PG-13 rating to an R rating.  Producers do this because of a preconception that people won’t go to anything rated beneath R rated movies because it’s childish.  Lots of movies will add meaningless profanity or sex scenes to make the movie seem more adult.  Personally, I think this usually detracts from the movie experience because it seems out of place most of the time.  It is especially evident in this movie.  I think the motive to this make this scene was that they assume you will watch all three movies back to back to back eventually, and you will need an intermission with some cool music.  :D
5.  Morpheus mentioned that they have freed more minds in the last 6 months than the last 6 years.  This goes against what they said in the first movie about most minds not being ready to be freed.  It’s about enlightening the chosen ones, not simply meeting quotas on freed people.
6.  I still think the part with the Merovingian was a little uncalled for.  We could tell what was happening to her without the need for matrix code.  And the part where Persephone wants to kiss Neo is stupid.  It would have worked if she just gave them the keymaker because she was mad at her husband.
7.  The fight scenes, while still awesome, were different than before.  The fights in the first movie used a lot of guns with was awesome.  Also, the fighting revolved mostly around who was stronger in the second one, as opposed to the first.  In the first, they were very creative about how they beat agents.  I liked the old way much better.
8.  I don’t like the fact that Neo can fly.  It’s just weird.

I’m sure there’s more, but i forget at the moment.

What I liked:
1.  I liked the main point about whether it is choice or causality that controls us.  I liked how the Merovingian saw through them, showing that they were just doing what they are told to do by the Oracle.  They are helping that which they are trying to destroy.
2.  I liked the double matrix theory, but I hope it doesn’t go too far.  For example, if it turns out that Neo or any of the others are programs, or if the entire Matrix is just a part of some other program, I will be mega pissed.
3.  The fight scenes were awesome, of course.  But there was still a lot of CGI used.  In the first movie they didn’t get attacked freaking every single time they were in the Matrix.  I know. someone will respond with “Upgrades”.  To that, I say “Upyours”.  Another thing I don’t get is why Neo even bothers beating the shit out of people.  If he’s the one, shouldn’t he be able to rewrite the matrix?

I can’t wait to see the next one in November.  I will have tickets to the first showing then too, so don’t label me a Matrix hater :D.

On to the next topic: the Whempy’s LAN in Columbus was on the 17th, and I went with Krhainos, Swiftwulf, and Codex.  We set up this cool wireless network between our cars as we made the two hour drive.  More about that on its own special page here.  The LAN was exactly as I had remembered it from a year ago.  Must be doing something right then, huh?  No.  I still hate every single thing they do there.  Their tournaments are always FFA or TDM (including CTF and gameplays like this), never 1v1.  They always have the worst rules that you have to follow, like a certain number of people have to be offense and defense.  Offense players are not allowed to chase people entering their bases down.  Also, they have this obsession with playing the oldest games around.  HLDM is fun, but they couldn’t get it working due to some HL virus that I was accused of having.  BS!  They obviously don’t know who they are dealing with, right?  I asked at the beginning of the LAN if the UT tourney was UT or UT2k3 and they said it was UT2k3.  It ended up being original UT, so it was not fun.  The tourneys ended up being HLDM, UT, Quake2, and Starcraft.  I hate their tourney system soo much I don’t know why I keep doing them.  It’s this reputation I gotta keep up, eh?  Right.  I had fun at the LAN though, simply because of the amount of people there.  The unorganized gameplay there is way more fun than than anything else.  I barely had any time when I was not playing anything.  Got to play a little BF1942, though not as much as I wanted.  Got to play a LOT of Q3, and a (almost) 1v1 against Ecrivian that lasted 92 minutes.  Good God!  :D Maybe we’ll go back again next month or the one after that.  Gotta play some more with the mobile wireless!

Well, I guess I am done writing for now, Peace.

Special Link Update! (thanks Swiftwulf):  http://www.macstation.com/whatsnew/monkeyboy/