Roy Klein on games, life and webcomics

Why you can't find me on myspace

2008-02-09T04:56:00.000-08:00

It recently came to my attention that myspace is deleting Atheist groups and users. While groups and profiles propogating hate against groups of people and countries exist peacefully on their system, they choose to discriminate against a large group of people representing some of the most tolerant, intellectual and accepting people humanity has to offer.
I deleted my account today. I have to admit that I've been getting nothing but junkmail through my account for the last year or two anyways, but I'd delete it even if it was more active.

"Osu"

2008-02-03T14:38:00.000-08:00

Aikido is a 20th century born Japanese martial art, a relatively new, yet powerful player in the martial arts world. The founder of Aikido was a student of Koryu (a general term referring to ancient Japanese martial arts), and from what I've read and seen, a traditionalist.
The stress on tradition can be seen in modern day dojos, where the students and the instructors follow a strict line of "how to's", from general behavior etiquettes, through class structure, and down to how may repetitions of each single move during warm up are performed.

However, despite having visited a whole bunch of different Aikido schools through my 3 years of training, and attending more than several seminars outside my own system, I've never been to a dojo that follows a similar guideline, even in dojos of the same system!
Oh, the differences are not that big most of the time, but when you're trained to count how long to rotate each individual toe on your legs during warm up, every little detail matters.

The whole thing came to my mind when I recalled how during the time I was cross training in Yoshinkan, I got so used to say "Osu" after being addressed, that I accidentally blurted it in my Aikikiai dojo (Yoshinkan and Aikikai are two different 'schools' of Aikido). No one said anything, but I could see the displeased look on my instructor's face. "Eww, foreign influence", it said

Isn't it weird, how in a martial art that's been around for a little over half a century, where you can find many people who have trained with the founder of Aikido, where every little detail matters, and still, no one school of Aikido follows the same guidelines of another one?

What the heck's wrong with us as a species?

New year

2008-01-01T03:27:00.000-08:00

It's finally 2008. I'm terrible with dates, so every year around October I start confusing the current year with the next one, and when the digits finally switch it's always a huge relieve. I'm confusion free for 8 more months!

It's been a while since I updated. It's hard to update a blog that has no real focus. Should I post a comic, should I write what's going on with me, should I post stupid pictures I take with my cellphone? I think my new years resolution is to find a focus for this blog.

Anyways, I've attended and won the first two official Israeli footbag competitions, freestyle division. The first competition was a small scale event in some high school gym. The only crowd were my family and the other competitors, and I was very nervous and performed poorly. The second event, taking place only two weeks afterwards, was in conjunction with the Israeli freesbie club, a much bigger club that drawn around 200 people to its event. This time more people showed up to compete and the event felt much more serious. I circle kicked with some of the freesbie players (they all showed an amazing knack to it) and performed much better in this competition. I had an almost tiltless run with 2-3 drops.

I may start instructing footbag at junior highs. At first I was skeptical I'd be the right person for the job, but the more I think about it the more I realize that it's the right thing to do for myself and for the future of the sport.

That's it, happy new year!

Footbag competition on December 10th!

2007-11-25T08:32:00.000-08:00

In about two weeks (a day after my psychometric exam), I'll be competing at the first Israeli footbag championship! I'm pretty excited, and thanks to this event I'm getting back to daily practice after more than a month of neglecting footbag for the sake of that damned exam.
I hope to have someone there to videotape it. If it won't suck, I might even upload the clip!

Wish me luck !

(comic) A puzzling first contact

2007-11-02T07:57:00.003-07:00

The here and now

2007-11-01T15:48:00.001-07:00

For some reason i feel obliged to post a comic before I write something personal, as if I'm obliged to entertain you while you're taking interest in my life. Really, it should be its own reward!

I've been unemployed for about two weeks now I think, and so far I've been tremendously enjoying my freedom. It's almost tragic that I already found a new job! I won't reveal where the new job is until they sign a contract saying they have to give me money, so hold on to your pants, we'll get back to you in a few days when the deal is sealed.

Besides studying for the psychometric exam, playing Team Fortress 2, footbagging and reading, I've been also playing X-Com Terror From the Deep (which was on sale at Steam for 2$!) and learning 3d modeling in Maya. I feel like getting a good grip on drawing and modeling is vital if I ever to become an independent games developer or start my own studio. As you can see, I've also improved my efforts with Photoshop. It's amazing to me that I am very proficient at modifying art yet a complete noob at creating it from scratch.

Well, that's it. See you all soon when I have a job again!

Big changes

2007-10-18T14:42:00.000-07:00

I've noticed it hit the news and various blogs already, so why not here? I got laid off from Oberon Media this Tuesday, together with lots of other people, with no prior warning whatsoever. The company brought two development studios in cheap areas (Eastern Europe) so they basically outsourced our job and my entire department got shut down.

Don't worry Ladies and Gentlemen, I've got a few things lined up already, and in the meantime I'm spending my days getting owned at Team Fortress 2 and finishing up various projects.

So I can't say at the moment that my job is writing games, but doggone it, after almost 3 years in the biz I now KNOW that this is what I'm going to do, within a corporation like Oberon or not. Probably not!

Poison or Cure? Religious Belief in the Modern World

2007-10-16T19:06:00.000-07:00

I have stumbled across a video of a debate between Christopher Hitchens and Alister McGrath, one an atheist anti-theist journalist and another an ex-atheist Christian doctor.
Hitchens provides very powerful and straight forward arguments that should be heard by anyone who takes interest in the subject of religion. All I can say is that after watching the video I ordered Hitchen's book ("God is not great")

Here it is: http://richarddawkins.net/article,1752,n,n

(do yourself a favor - Skip the McGrath parts, he doesn't say anything worthy of your time)

All steamed up

2007-10-12T08:29:00.001-07:00

I purchased the Valve Orange Box this week, thinking I could enjoy Portal and TF2 this weekend. However, thanks to the amazing steam service, this has been my exact download progress for almost 48 hours now:

I wish I could just go purchase a stupid hardcopy.

Finally, the wait will soon be over!

2007-10-09T09:24:00.001-07:00

(Comic) A new breed of dating sites!

2007-10-09T05:20:00.000-07:00

New South Park episode up!

2007-10-08T18:14:00.001-07:00

Go get it!

Intolerance to intolerance

2007-10-08T14:23:00.000-07:00

I have recently decided to completely adopt the status of Atheist. It's not that I believed in a god until now, but there was something nice in the thought of belonging to a special heritage, the underdog of monotheism - Judaism.

However, I recently came to the realization that all Theistic religions have the premise of intolerance towards non-believers and believers of other faiths. Since I have long established to be intolerant of intolerant ideologies, I think theistic religions have to be included in my intolerance list, otherwise I'm a big phony hypocrite.

The problem is that a part of the intolerance will probably include actions that will offend others (like not wearing a yamaka during religious holiday prayers). Being intolerant towards an anonymous mass is way easier than being intolerant to grandma. However, I am already veteran at this due to my Veganism phase, so the shock value shouldn't be as massive for this one.

Some of you may have seen my messenger title "I'm not an Atheist, I'm an a-Theist". It was a little pun intended at having people talk to me about atheism, so I could refine my perspective on it, and it totally worked! Thanks for the help, everyone!

(footbag) 2 new 4-add tricks!

2007-10-07T04:43:00.001-07:00

Last night I had a good session with Ohad and Roy2 from Raanana. Towards the end of the session me and Ohad started footbagging separately. He was working on Legovers and Butterflies (I was planning on making them start doing freestyle shit so I'm glad it happened!) and I hit 2 new 4 add tricks:
Ducking butterfly and
A regular butterfly but with two bags!

My plan for this week is to drill Osis because I'm sick of not being able to hit this move more than 50% of the time, even though I feel I totally understand the body mechanics.

(comic) Funny Invasion

2007-10-02T03:44:00.000-07:00

The bible is the real good news!

2007-10-01T16:17:00.000-07:00

I want to present a quote that summarizes my feelings towards the negative effects of religion throughout history and in modern times:

"With or without religion, you will have good people doing good things and evil people doing evil things, but for good people to do evil things, that takes religion."

The quote is by Steven Weinberg, a Nobel Laureate in physics.

My work is mentioned somewhere! Wheee

2007-10-01T16:14:00.000-07:00

During my usual run on various games related news sites, I've noticed onean article that mentioned EXACTLY what I've been doing for the last year or so.

The quote(found here): "Oberon has already launched their multiplayer game platform with a partner in Europe..."

The partner is Orange and the multiplayer games there were written by me. Neat.

Haha, sweet!

2007-09-26T13:59:00.000-07:00

http://www.dailygalaxy.com/my_weblog/2007/09/okay-we-will.html

(comic) In the zone

2007-09-26T07:22:00.001-07:00

(footblog) Dimwalk!

2007-09-25T13:43:00.000-07:00

Today I had a great session on my new jigsaw surface. It's a little small (4 squares) but to enlarge it I need to buy 5 more squares and at the moment I think it'll be an over kill.
Anyways, great session! I hit DIMWALK which I believe is my very first 4 add trick! Yay me.
I also hit several clean Pixie legovers (learned those two days ago), several datw and a very clean flipside osis. Wow, I can't believe how impossible all this seemed only 2 months ago. I'm still working hard on improving my flipside clipper and trying to learn infinity butterfly, but I'm very happy with what I can do already! Footbag is great. The more you play, the more fun it is to play!

(comic) netsism

2007-09-25T08:41:00.001-07:00

Feeling young!

2007-09-25T01:53:00.000-07:00

Yesterday on the way home, I was listening to some hardcore full volume, windows rolled open. The shotgun seat was full of boxes (from food deliveries I volunteer at), the windshield dirty with avian litter and dry dust, and for a fleeting moment I felt like I'm in highschool.

Paper mario 64

2007-09-23T02:07:00.000-07:00

Props must go to Liviu for pointing me out to this adorable downloadable for the wii, that got me through this weekend without touching my psychometric books! After several disappointing downloads(Super mario 64, gunstar heroes) I haven't touched my Wii in months, but Paper mario turned that upside down.

In short, it's a pretty ingenious combination between the platform mario and the RPG of final fantasy. I was skeptic at first, but once you get the hangs of it, it's pretty interesting. Plus, the presentation of the game is a work of art and needs to be studied.

One thing that bugs me, though, is that it appears that these "oldies" (6-7 years old games) are way harder than any new game I've played recently (Twilight princess for example). i kind of got used to passing a level without trying more than 3 times, and I wasn't even aware of that.

(comic) it sucks being a noob

2007-09-21T04:10:00.000-07:00

(music) AFI

2007-09-19T03:09:00.000-07:00

I've noticed that ever since I started listening to AFI, a bazillion years ago, I've always been skeptical at first when they released a new CD, thinking "they must've gone downhill like everyone else", and every time I dig the new CD better than the last. DecemberUnderground is no exception, even topping the Avalanches this week.

From now on, no more skepticism towards AFI.

(comic) An ex-snail

2007-09-18T02:29:00.000-07:00

(Or : What is a slug)

(Comic) A woman pilot? God forbid!

2007-09-10T02:01:00.000-07:00

A little pun at NASA's alcohol problem.

(Music) Viva la NOFX!

2007-09-09T01:03:00.001-07:00

So NOFX played 3 shows in Israel this week. I originally planned on attending two, but pussed out and went only to the Tel Aviv show.

I never thought that being smashed against countless sweating male bodies would prove to be one of the best experiences of my life!

Here's a picture from YNET with yours truly:

And here's a video of the show, courtesy of Useless ID, who I suppose I should thank for:

Reclaiming the blog

2007-09-02T00:55:00.000-07:00

for the past couple of months I felt like my blog is owned by the web comic. Once I got tired of drawing it I felt like I can't post about anything, even though there was much to post about.
So from now on the blog is reclaimed in the name of all that is Roy, and no more web comics, it's too intrusive!

See you all in the NOFX show!

(Comic) T-shirt idea

2007-08-01T05:39:00.000-07:00

When I was drawing this in zoom X10 I thought it's gonna turn out huge, but it looks more like a badge than a comic :( oh well, the T-shirt says, "Fucking stupid", I know it's hard to read.

Sorry for the lack of comics lately guys, I only have ideas that involve complex drawings (like a guy riding a bicycle) that I depress myself trying to draw them.

(comic) Concept shop

2007-07-18T02:30:00.001-07:00

(footbag) Footblog

2007-07-17T01:08:00.000-07:00

Tricks I can
1) Around the world (both sides, both directions)
2) Legover (both sides)
3) Pendulum (only right side)
4) Mirage (two sides, yay!)
5) Hop over (only right side)
6) Butterfly (both sides)
7) Same Side butterfly (both sides)
8) clipper butterfly (right side)
9) Clipper mirage (both sides)
10) Paradox Mirage (right side)
11) Double Around the world (right side)
12) Pickup (both sides)
13) Illusion (right side)

Updated at 10th of September 2007

(comic) The retribution

2007-07-09T02:37:00.001-07:00

Click to see finer details!

(footbag) First butterfly!

2007-07-05T12:48:00.000-07:00

Yep! Today I've hit my first Butterfly (and my second, and third...), it was kinda very sketchy but it still feels good to improve! That also mean I've hit my first 3 Add move. I am a proud Sumerian.

Kickass IPhone video!

2007-07-05T07:50:00.000-07:00

Check out this funny video ! Related to the hype surrounding the release of the new IPhone. Will make you chuckle, guaranteed.

(comic) Common sense

2007-07-05T05:38:00.000-07:00

Click for normal size

This isn't supposed to be funny, it's a complaint about what I see on the roads every day, getting my life risked every time someone choses to talk (or even SMS) instead of paying attention while driving.
There oughta be a law!

(comic) Moral of the story

2007-07-02T03:17:00.000-07:00

You definitely want to click on this one to see it in normal size.

(footbag) Hitting mirage (almost) every time!

2007-07-01T14:22:00.001-07:00

I'm aware that this trick is very basic but I'm super excited that tonight I started hitting it almost every attempt! I hit it 4 times in a row, while just yesterday I couldn't hit one to save my life!
And to think I was about to skip training today due to a sore Achilles tendon. Thank goodness for lack of common sense :)
I took a video of it on my phone camera, but since it was in my boxers I decided not to upload it.

I think what helped me get it was setting it lower than I thought I should, and starting the hip twist as early as during the delay. Now, to get it flipside..

(comic) Lucky

2007-07-01T09:37:00.001-07:00

(flash) A great looking 3D game prototype in flash

2007-07-01T05:52:00.000-07:00

this just in: I just ran into this uncompleted, yet 3D looking game, made entirely in Flash! It's also relatively slim to load, and runs pretty smoothly on my computer.
Check it out: renderhjs 2k6

(flash) Using two different classes with identical names is a bad idea

2007-07-01T05:23:00.001-07:00

I'm working on a game that has a pretty complicated Help screen, so we separated the game SWF and the help SWF. Both the game and the help should run in different languages, so I wrote a helper class that translates text fields automatically. Each SWF has its own version of the class, with the same name.

Now, I had to modify the translator class in the Help a bit to accommodate HTML parsing, and it ran beautifully standalone. But when I load the Help from the game SWF, I suddenly see that every textfield that should go through HTML parsing just doesn't show any text!

A little tracing reveals the culprit: I placed a trace on the constructor of the translator class of the Game and a different one at the translator class of the Help. When the help was loaded, the game's translator class constructor was called, instead of the Help translator class!
Changing the name of the help translator class fixed the problem, of course.

To summarize, the second class is simply overridden by the first class!
This is how I found this out:

Wow now when it's down on chart it seems so obvious! But I haven't read about this behavior anywhere yet.

This may sound like a little anecdote, but I'm thinking about the Hasbro project I was involved in, where we had a game system SWF that loads all kinds of different game SWFs onto itself that were produced by all sorts of different companies. If one of these SWFs had a class with a name the game system used, there would be DISASTER!

Like my Boss, Itay, said: Prefix = good idea.

Game Developers conference in Beth Berl (In Hebrew)

2007-06-29T05:38:00.000-07:00

Sorry for writing this in Hebrew. I started writing down my feelings this weekend, and ended up summarizing them allot better on a Hebrew games forum (vgames.co.il). I'll translate it if anyone is interested.

הייתי רק ביום השני של הכנס. קודם כל אני מסכים שהפרוייקטי סיום לא נראים לי הוגנים בשביל אנשים שלמדו שנתיים פיתוח משחקים. חוץ מזה שרובם היו בפלאש, רובם לא היו גמורים. בשביל תוצאות כאלה לא צריך שנתיים לימודים.
דווקא המשחק שנועד לפלאפון נראה לי היה אחד היותר מוצלחים מבחינת יכולת התמחור שלו.
אבל אני מניח שכל מחזור ראשון של מסלול יסבול מחבלי הלידה של המסלול.

הייתי ב2 הרצאות - הראשונה היא של בני נוער שמדברים על התעשייה. בני הנוער דיברו מאוד יפה והיו מעניינים, אבל לדעתי הם לא מייצגים את בן הנוער הממוצע, שאפשר לומר שהוא קהל היעד של תעשיית הקז'ואל בארץ(שנראה לי ברור שרוב האולם התעניין רק בזה), אלא מייצגים את הגיימר הכבד, שהתעשייה בארץ לא צפופה מספיק כדי להציע לו שירותים. בכל זאת היה נחמד לשמוע שהם גם נהנים ממשחק פלאש פה ושם.
בנוסף, למרות שהיה נסיון יפה לעשות סדר בשאלות עם מקרופון נע, היה בחור אחד שהתפרץ כל הזמן והמנחה הרשתה זאת, כך יצא שהרבה אנשים לא הספיקו לשאול את השאלות שלהם.

ההרצאה השניה, שהשאלה שהועלתה בו היא האם משחקי מחשב זה אומנות, היתה פטתית לגמרי. מלבד המרצה הראשון, שהציע כמה רעיונות מעניינים (למרות שהם לא היו קשורים לדעתי לנושא בעצם), שאר המרצים דיברו לא לעניין, הראו חוסר בקיאות עמוקה בתחום המשחקים (ואף לא התביישו להודות בכך), והשיא היה בעיני בחורה אחת שהטריחה אותנו בוידאו ארט בן 5 דקות מיותר שבעיני הוא בכלל פרסומת עצמית עבורה, ובחור אחד שטען שמשחקי מחשב הם לא אומנות כי אין קלאסיקות. הקהל כולו התרעם, ובצדק. בכל מקרה, השאלה אם משחקי מחשב זה אומנות היא בת הרבה שנים כבר, היא טחינת מים, ובנקודה זו בזמן היא בעיקר עניין של דעה אישית.
נקודת אור היתה ההרצאה של המוזיקאי מ DNA - חבל שלא קיבל קצת יותר זמן במה, הרגשתי שהוא לא הגיע לנקודה שהוא ניסה להעביר.
שיא העליבות היה בסוף, כשאחת המרצות (שגם הציגה סרטון לא מוצלח) נכנסה להתנצחות עקרה עם מרצה אחר והקהל. אני אפילו לא זוכר על מה היתה ההתנצחות, אבל תרבות דיון לא היתה שם..

Where did the comics go??

2007-06-27T00:55:00.000-07:00

You may have noticed that I didn't upload a comic yesterday and will not upload one today either. First of all, I never said they'd be dailies! Second, I'm not out of ideas, I'm out of spare time to implement them. Work has become a little busy lately and I hope to catch up with some of the comic ideas this weekend.

Stay tuned!

(comic) Mistakes happen

2007-06-25T08:08:00.001-07:00

Pastafarian religion

2007-06-24T08:04:00.001-07:00

this is just too funny! An open letter to the Kansas school board, claiming that if the Christian idea of intelligent design is to be taught at schools, another version of intelligent design, claiming a FLYING SPAGHETTI MONSTER created all that is.
Cleverly written, with sketches and a graph that proves that the amount of pirates is inversely related to Global temperatures, this is something you definitely want to see.

The link

(comic) Crossing

2007-06-24T06:05:00.000-07:00

(Comic) The modern black knight!

2007-06-21T04:08:00.000-07:00

Footbag - Hitting a Mirage

2007-06-20T07:29:00.000-07:00

Now that I feel I have a good grasp with the basics (stalls, atw etc) I'm trying to kick it up a notch and nail a Mirage. I've been trying to do this trick not-so-seriously for quite a while now and gotten nowhere. So today I read some forum advice on footbag.org, seen some several videos, and really concentrated on what the body should be doing, and literally 5 minutes of hacking at the hall and I nearly got it! I'm planning, this weekend, to hit my first Mirage.

MagicMatch 2 online is online!

2007-06-20T05:45:00.000-07:00

After like a bazillion years since I finished developing it, MagicMatch2 online is finally up. I ran into it completely at random at shockwave.com and initially thought they stole my version because I didn't know it's up yet!

Go check it out: I recommend playing it at ICQ since Shockwave.com has a really long commercial before it starts:
Magic Match 2: The Genie's Journey
(In the game info page, click "Try it online");

(comic) Superman's Secret

2007-06-20T01:13:00.000-07:00

(comic) Jon's last straw

2007-06-19T00:57:00.000-07:00

Naturally all drawings are stolen from original Garfield comics, except for the table lines, I drew those myself.

Blurred fame is mine!

2007-06-18T03:11:00.000-07:00

How cool is that: Another major Israeli newspaper wrote an article mentioning the Seminar with Suganuma Sensei, and the main picture has me in it! Somewhat on the side, and somewhat blurred, but still awesome!
The picture:
The link: http://www.haaretz.co.il/hasite/spages/871906.html

The breakup

2007-06-18T02:38:00.000-07:00

Footbagging by myself at the park

2007-06-17T05:49:00.001-07:00

This week, the small footbag group that we got organized couldn't meet. However, I went and played at the park anyways. I heard someone telling his wife to look at how I play. I must be improving :)

I hate wearing shorts though, and since my game is so much better when I'm wearing them, I should probably go shop for some good looking ones, just in case someone wants to take my picture!

(comic) Daddy's Favorite

2007-06-17T01:03:00.000-07:00

Based on many true stories!

My alter egos

2007-06-14T17:58:00.000-07:00

I think it's befitting that my blog keeps watch on people around the world who share my name.
Today I'm bringing the interesting story of two Roy Kleins who are not me:

In the 2nd Lebanese war, an Israeli soldier named "Roy Klein" died, apparently a hero's death. you can read his story here: http://www.jewishtimes.com.au/content/view/700/190/.
On a personal note, I was totally creeped out when the newspaper headlines had my name and R.I.P afterwards.

The other Roy Klein would've been a real nice guy, if it wasn't for the fact that he registered the domain http://www.royklein.com/, leaving my fans high and dry in case of opening a fanclub website. He's got some pseudo-witty writings there that actually kind of remind me of my own writing. I guess Roy Kleins don't know how to write, but can't help themselves

(comic) Sweet talking girls at the GDC

2007-06-14T11:11:00.000-07:00

I realize this comic might raise a question among the gamers and a different question among the non-gamers.
I'll start by answering the non-gamers: GDC stands for the Game Developers Convention
And to answer the gamers: No, there weren't any girls there.

Unintentionally funny comics

2007-06-13T09:52:00.000-07:00

This is a good one!
Classic comic panels that probably made sense 30-40 years ago, but nowadays sound totally ridiculous. Don't read anywhere you can't laugh out loud!

(comic) A raver gets his wings

2007-06-13T04:52:00.000-07:00

Just to be clear, I have nothing against Redbull or vodka.
Au contraire, I think they're killer drinks

Great showoff video for a T.V talent show

2007-06-12T06:12:00.000-07:00

Check out Jorden Moir's video submission for an American talent show.
What I like about this video is the smooth style and the progression from simple to hard that camouflages Jorden's incredible skill and talent with an air of laid backness. That's how you can tell this guy is a hard working pro.

Click to see the video

If you think that's bad ass, may I direct your attention to the following video of Jorden, where he shows off some insane moves:

Insane Jorden video

(comic) Every religion is wrong!

2007-06-12T00:37:00.000-07:00

2007 Aikido Seminar with Suganuma Sensei

2007-06-11T15:44:00.000-07:00

I was going to wait until I get some pictures and gather my thoughts before I write about the seminar, but since the Israeli newspaper Ma'ariv did a full page article about it, I feel like I was beaten to it.

The article (Hebrew only, sorry)

(comic) The invisibles

2007-06-11T01:21:00.001-07:00

(comic)Menachem backed off

2007-06-10T05:09:00.000-07:00

(click the comic to enlarge it a bit)

Portfolio

2007-06-03T06:58:00.000-07:00

You asked for it (or not) -

Here's the list of all published games I worked on. Most of these games were made mostly by yours truly, with the exception of two or three where I took over the work from someone else. Links, where available, lead to the game's description page on the ICQ channel.

In Oberon Media (2005 till present)

Magic Match 2: The Genie's Journey (Single Player)

Pool (multiplayer)

MagicMatch: enchanted arena (multiplayer)

Pool: 9-ball (multiplayer)

Aces of space (multiplayer)

Darts: Cricket (multiplayer)

Sudoku Titans (multiplayer)

Belote (multiplayer)

Tarot (multiplayer)

MagicMatch: Online (single player)

Mahjong Match: Online (single player)

In Itoons (2003)

SpongeBob's Obstacle Odyssey (Downloadable)

SpongeBob Nick Clickable (Desktop Toy)

Nickelodeon Kids Awards (Desktop Toy)

The list is updated for June 20th, 2007

Suspension of disbelief

2007-05-30T04:19:00.000-07:00

As I grow older, I notice that the core market of gamers grow in age with me. When I was a kid, games were for kids. When I was a teenager, games were for teenager. Now I'm 25, and gamers are, again, considered within my age group.
Is it that in order to enjoy computer and video games you need to grow up with them?

Perhaps, but I'd like to offer an additional explanation. I think that games are growing up as well, not in the sense of becoming more mature, but simply becoming, well, better, in terms of audio visual experience and the encompassing experience they provide.

(1984 - AlleyCat by IBM) AlleyCat could not catch the attention of a 20 years old like it can of a 5 years old. In order to capture the imagination of more mature people, complex games are needed. As games grow complex in graphics and content, so does the age group of the people who find them enjoyable.

In short, it's all about the effect of Suspension of Disbelief. As we grow older our Suspension of disbelief threshold grows with us. As the ability of games to draw us into their universes grew, so does the age of the people who are mesmerized by them.

This thought came up after a conversation I had with Shirley, regarding why I find theater boring in relation to Television or Movies; I had to excuse my lack of cultural sophistication to the fact that when I see theater, that's all I see: Actors, a stage, and a script, I never buy into it, because I've been exposed since the day I was born to mediums that suspend my disbelief much better.
It came to me that the same process takes place with computer games, after 3 days in a row that I spent all my free time playing Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion, first time in years that I found myself drawn so powerfully into a game.

Pendulum - very live!

2007-05-28T07:37:00.001-07:00

Out of curiosity I ran a search on Pendulum to see how they sound live - turns out these guys (who produce electronic DnB) do their shows with real instruments on the stage - and pull it off beautifully.
Check it out:

Another Planet (live) by Pendulum

Webcomics!

2007-05-28T05:06:00.000-07:00

Were you aware of the abundance of free, high quality, often vulgar entertainment that exists online in the shape of a webcomic? I certainly was only vaguely aware of this phenomenon until recently. After reading my Calvin and Hobbes from cover to cover for the tenth time, I've decided I'm ready for a new relationship, so I started searching the web for interesting, free comics. To be honest, I didn't expect much, since the comics I did see up until that point weren't so hot, but boy did I find some pearls to make my day.
For those of you who've been missing the train of webcomics, like myself, I present here a list of my current favorites, just to get you started:

Cyanide and happiness
The Perry Bible Fellowship
Dueling Analogs
Ctrl+Alt+Del

All of the above have RSS updates that lets me know whenever they update, I don't know how I lived before I knew what RSS was all about! But that's a topic for another post.