Braid

Braid (blog) is one of the most interestingly different games I’ve played in a long while. It’s a plataform/puzzle game (mostly puzzle) with the particularity that the puzzles are solved by manipulating time.

It is available on the Xbox 360 via Xbox Live Arcade and costs 1200 MS points (15 eur) which is a lot for an arcade game but it’s worth it. The game plays differently, looks different and sounds different. It’s fun and some of the puzzles are indeed challenging.

Watch a video review.

Listen to the game music (from magnatune which I’ve mentioned before).

Download Braid icons and wallpapers.

The iPhone SDK

It’s been months since I was insulted by Apple fanboys for saying that the iPhone needed an SDK and now Apple has officially released a beta version of the iPhone/iPod Touch SDK.

I can’t access developer.apple.com at the moment but Levi Figueira was kind enough to upload both screenshots of the pages and the PDFs of agreements involved during a twitter discussion with me and David Rodrigues (also read his post on the iPhone SDK in Portuguese).

The good news is apple provides the App Store to distribute your applications with the iPhone Developer Program and all you have to do is pay them $99 and 30% of what your customers pay for your app.

The bad news is that, from what I understood, there’s no other way to get apps on an iPhone, even if it’s your own apps on your own iPhone or if they’re Open Source apps.

The other good news is that if they’re free apps, they don’t charge the 30% (30% of 0 is 0 so…). So as long as someone paid $99 to be part of the Developer Program, they can put free apps on the Store at no additional charges.

The other bad news is there won’t be porn games on the iPhone I wonder if they consider hentai (Japanese eroge visual novel) games “porn”.

I think the iPhone Developer Program is a really Great Thing (TM), think Steam for the iPhone/iPod Touch but more open. I just wish it were “optional”.

Game Of The Year 2007

For me, the game of year is without doubt:

Halo 3 (IGN Review)- the only truly epic game, complete with the best soundtrack I’ve heard so far in a video game.

Note that I wasn’t a Halo series fan. I thought Halo 1 was a mediocre game, Halo 2 was just “good”, mostly because of the energy sword being so much fun. But after playing Halo 3, I’m now a fan of the series. I even bought Halo 1 for Xbox (I had originally played it on the PC), would’ve bought Halo 2 too if it wasn’t way too expensive for an Xbox game even though a friend of mine has it and I could borrow it anytime, and will probably read at least Halo: The Fall of Reach [wikipedia].

Last time I played (sadly, more than a week ago) I got the Hayabusa armor. I’m definitively going for the Katana that requires 1000 GS (unlocking all achievements). Already setting a team to play through the campaign in legendary with me. Legendary is too hard for a casual gamer like me to play in single player.

Runner Up: there’s just nothing that comes even close to Halo 3! Sorry Bioshock.

A List of Open Source Games

A List of Open Source Games (wikipedia)

Many of these games are lightweight multiplayer and multi-platform (Linux, Mac, Windows)

Personal Picks:
Assault Cube
Armagetron
BZflag
FreeCiv

Must try:
OpenArena
Nexuiz

Max Payne 2

I played through Max Payne 2 (Gamespot Review, IGN Review) this weekend – yes I finished it in 3 days (from Friday night to Sunday night early Monday). It’s the best game I’ve played since FEAR. I have no idea why the hell I didn’t play it before since the game has been out for more than 3 years – especially since I liked the original Max Payne.

Jade Empire

Last week I was looking for a game to play (cuz STALKER ain’t an option – it’s one of the worst games I’ve ever played, second only to a playstation game that featured a little ninja dude in “2D rainbow world” jumping at gold coins which could be described as old school Sonic meets Ninja in happy crayon land).

I was given Jade Empire (IGN Review) and told it’s “KOTOR in Ancient China” or something like that. I already knew the game from when it first came out as an xbox exclusive but I wasn’t sure what to expect.

I really liked it. I finished the game in under one week – mostly by cutting into my sleep time and playing it a few times till 3-4 AM. Hehehe. Anyway, I liked the story/plot, even if nowhere as good as KOTOR’s. The game is an RPG but it’s my kind of RPG – items aren’t anoying (i.g. no boring inventory or weight system), talking to people is only a small, mostly optional part of the game, combat is fun and the style system keeps it from getting boring. The game achieves a decent level of “immersion” (that hard to quantify/define quality that I find so essential in a videogame).

I recommend Jade Empire (if you like the genre – kotor-like rpg) and give it a score of 7/10 (maybe even 8/10 – it has some kickass evil stuff like being able to kill all the anmoying NPCs in my that “help me” throughout the game and I really liked Death’s Hand, he’s one badass mothaf… a Kung Fu Darth Vader).

Rockbox

I switched to Rockbox on my old, trustworthy iRiver H340. In case you don’t know, Rockbox is an open source replacement firmware for mp3 players.


Advantages (I actually care about, i.e. not little games & apps):
– Themes. I’m using a DGT theme.
– Actually usable Database playing;
– Ability to play other music formats (FLAC comes to mind);
– Having an actually beautiful interface can’t be understated (themes again);
– It’s Open Source (which also means you’ll probably get new firmware long after the player manufacturer stops bothering with it.

In case you’re wondering, Rockbox was very easy to install, at least in my player. Despite the fact that the instructions look relatively long, the actually steps needed are quite simple and easy (though it might be a bit confusing figuring out exactly what you need to download). And it turns out it’s even easier to uninstall (just delete one file).

In case you want to do it and got confused or if you’re wondering just how easy it is but don’t want to read the full instructions, here are the steps:
(NOTE/disclaimer of sorts): this is a summary, read the full instructions at the rockbox website)

1. Download the firmware;
2. Download the firmware patcher;
3. Patch the firmware you downloaded (the .hex file) using the firmware patcher (duh);
4. Put the just-patched firmware file on the root of your iRiver H3xx player;
5. Tell the player to install the new firmware ([hold Navi] -> General -> Firmware Upgrade).

Pretty straightforward right?

[Updated: I forgot to mention the ability to play other music formats such as FLAC]

Black Carbon

Samsung’s latest and greatest is the SGH-D900 better known as Black Carbon. You can see a small video of it here. To match the amazing design it also has what looks like a great interface. It’s not easy to judge from 1 minute of video if the interface is as cool as it looks. It does remind me a bit of the interface of my sony camera (the p200).

I’ve been looking at possible replacements for my Nokia 6230i (which I didn’t actually chose in the first place). It’s a bit slow and I don’t like the interface but my main problem with it is that it just feels like a huge brick in my pocket.

While my 6230i and it’s limitations can sometimes annoy me, I’m in no hurry to switch. But when I do, I’ll probably switch to Samsung: I never liked the Nokia bricks, Motorola sucks in both hardware and software quality and I have yet to meet anyone happy with their Motorola phone, Sony-Erickson seems more interested in selling Walkmans that actual phones and do other brands even exist nowadays? Besides I like the Samsung design and features – even if their interface is still lacking… I wish they’d license Palm or something. The thing is, I don’t want to listen to music, watch TV, play games, browse the internets or whatever manufacturers and carriers are trying to push these days. I want to make/receive calls/SMS and it’s is extremely convenient for me to have a camera on my phone since I don’t usually carry around my camera. That’s it. How hard is it to make a phone with those features that looks good, feels good (i.e. doesn’t feel like a brick) and has a decent, fast, responsive, easy to use interface? Apparently either I’m the only one to have these requisites or it’s mysteriously hard because manufacturers sure seem unable to do it though the only one that seems to even be trying is Samsung.

UPDATE:
Review: http://www.mobileburn.com/review.jsp?Id=2733

New Toys Part III

Yeah I know I jumped Part II

Last week I got myself a Nintendo DS Lite (black)! I’m very happy with it so far. It’s a fun way to spend some time while waiting (waiting in a line, waiting for someone,…). So far I only have one game: Brain Age. However I plan to get more next week. Namely Meteos and other puzzle games and also Bomberman as my preferred multiplayer game – I spent my high school classes playing Bomberkids, a bomberman “port” for the TI-83P calculators. Ah! the good old times… I’ve also been recommended Advance Wars: Dual Strike though I’ve never been a fan of turn based strategy games, I might give it a try.
The Nintendo DS Lite is a good looking, sleek device. Fits well into my pockets and doesn’t feel clunky. The touchscreen/stylus is a really great way to play games and very easy to get used to (at least for games like Meteos) – it feels right.

I got pwned playing Brain Age in (wireless) VS mode. Wireless playing and “download and play” make the DS a really badass portable console.

Conclusion: I like it. )

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