Posts Tagged ‘lifestyle’

Wii have fun

Monday, December 22nd, 2008

This year we celebrated studio X-mas in the studio with our own home-made food and playing Nintendo Wii games in front of a projected screen. That was my first longer experience at Wii console in spite of Games Convention last year.

Wii controller

The eyes of the adults were twinkling as much as of their kids. My eyes would twinkle too if I hadn’t been tired after my deadline and a night of baking kūčiukai. :D So I glanced at everything critically evaluating both, advantages and disadvantages.

Nintendo Wii is played by a distant controller with motion detection, vibration, and a speaker inside. Some games require an additional attachable smaller controller. Before beginning a new game, instructions are usually shown in the screen how to play (unless the controlling is absolutely intuitive, i.e. boxing into the air). Usually, you have to imitate real-life actions, for example, if you play tennis, you wave the controller as if it was a racket. Up to four people can play at once.

During the party, we played three different games. They were “Rayman: Raving Rabbids 2“, “Wii Sports“, and “Mario Kart“. We had fun and it looked funny taking a detached view, when adult people were swinging hands, jumping, and performing in front of a screen. I’d say, that Wii games are perspective for parties. But also a lot depends on the games themselves. For example, racing game “Mario Kart” seemed to me oriented to small kids and didn’t rule to me as much as to some colleagues. “Wii Sports” was put in a boring shape, although everyone could create a personalized avatar. All avatars were like plastic characters from some toy building bricks with American strained smiles.

Rayman Raving Rabbids 2” was the best for parties, in my opinion. It contained much humorous animation and hooligan tasks. You had to choose a rabbit in the beginning which you will play with and do different things in different levels. They say, there are 50 minigames. For example, you have to phone to each other in the cinema while a supervisor doesn’t see you. The players raise the controllers up and listen to some humbling, until the lights go on in the hall. Then they let them down and write text messages quickly pressing the main button [A] in the controller. Another level gives you another task. You have to shake a bottle of aerated drink (shake a controller), pop it up (press [A]), and pour it into your mouth. After that the rabbit gives such a belch, that the stream of air not only throws nearby standing pigeons, but also messes half of the city. The rabbit which makes most harm wins. It’s very funny when solid and polite people temporarily being rabbits belch.

Wii-game parties at work are probably the only way to give vent to your anger on your bosses so that everyone stays happy. :D To play with your friends is also funny. It’s only important to choose the right games.

Sunday Celebration: Brick Exchange Program

Sunday, December 21st, 2008

Soon I have to go to an air port, so I am writing in a hurry.. I offer you two different games based on the same engine for this Sunday. They are “HDOS Databank request 01” and “3 Minutes on the Beach“.

HDOS

The gameplay follows. There is a pile of bricks in the screen. You have to point a target to two of the bricks which you want to exchange and the you click. The row of column of three or more bricks of the same color will disappear. The ones that were above will fall down.

HDOS Databank request 01” is a game of progression, consisting of 35 levels where for each of them you have to terminate all bricks in a limited number of exchanges. These are good puzzles.

3 Minutes on the Beach” is a game of emergence, where you have to terminate as many bricks as possible in a limited time. That’s a relaxing clicking around.

I like the HDOS case more, because it’s presented with a story and humor. You have to break 35 security layers in order to access a secret file of the government. :cool: The messages after each level are cool. And I like puzzles since my childhood when I bought every release of puzzle magazine called “AHA” (I am not sure whether it still exists).

And the beach crashes my browser today for some reason (therefore I haven’t taken a screenshot of it). Maybe the 9.0 r115 version of Flash plugin is unstable?

So try them and tell which one you liked more, and I am going out now.

Sunday Celebration: a Crow in Hell

Sunday, December 14th, 2008

We all feel like in hell in the face of crisis. Let’s learn how to get out of water dry. Let’s move the stress of life to the stress of playing a game before the beginning of the new week, new decisions, and the new bunch of optimism. This weekend I offer you a game where a shot raven flies in the dungeons of hell trying to get out back to life and take its revenge on the offender. That’s “A Crow in Hell”.

A Crow in Hell

The gameplay kinda combines another two good games: the flash-based NoName Game where you have to move a dot throughout a maze without touching any walls, and Ecco the Dolphin on Sega where the avatar controlled by the arrow-buttons has its momentum and acceleration. The player of “A Crow in Hell” has to use arrow keys to fly throughout a labyrinth separated by screens, and collect keys, but touch no other objects. Even when the progress of the game is saved into a browser cookie every two screens, it seems silly that the crow can’t alight on a bench, stairs, or other safe objects.

The hell of the last week was kind of painted. This one is graphic and two-colored. The details are done very precisely and nicely, but the crow itself reminds me a buzzard more than a crow from its face. If I didn’t hear the cawing from time to time in a tragic background music, I wouldn’t believe that I am flying as a raven. The area of the game is of 650 pixel height, so if you want to play it in the resolution of 1024×768, you have to hide all browser bars, go to the full-screen mode (by pressing [F11]), or play in a popup window.

Games of progression like this one usually don’t attract you when they’re completed once, unless the player is offered different branches of scenario or levels, or if the player is motivated by competing against other players. Until the end of October the players of “A Crow in Hell” were offered to compete against each other who would fly throughout the whole hell fastest. The winner got a T-shirt with the branding of the game (I’d actually like to have one).

The game is quite difficult. I completed just a little further than the screen in the illustration. Anyway, it’s fun, that I can continue from where I finished and I don’t have to start from the beginning all the time. I suggest you to try it!

Sunday Celebration: Pragaras

Sunday, December 7th, 2008

Once in a morning I found indie games blog presenting a new Lithuanian game “Pragaras” (the word means “hell” in Lithuanian). That was a collaborative work of three 17-year-old guys called 3j. I suggest you to try it as well as other games of the same creators this Sunday.

A scene from the game "Pragaras"

“Pragaras” is a unique painted game. Ink, water-color, cutouts, and the narrator’s voice joined together with user interaction implements a strong concept: “We are living in a world with lots of mud and unfairness, but each of us can change something”. The game touches such topics as social inequality, war, and freedom. The interest in the game is kept by well managed contrasts between the beauty and the ugliness, or the good and the selfishness. Sometimes the avatar mutates to a freak of Picasso style. That supports the idea that those who go against the flaw, are not accepted. And I liked that. But the playability could be still improved. You can control the avatar with the arrow keys, [Z], and [X]. The character collects things, combines them and uses them in different ways. While playing, I was stuck a few times without finding what to do next. Fortunately, there was a workthrough of the game. It’s not always clear which elements are active, and which of them are just the details of the background. The descriptions of controls in white letters on a motley background was not readable at all. Some screens were lack of interactivity. Sometimes I missed logic (for example, why do you have to blow a balloon in order to get inside of a building in the beginning?).

But as Rasa has told me in the past, everything in art is possible and forgiven. The creators of the game present it not as an adventure game, but as an interactive journey:

This is an interactive journey through twisted and unusual world. During this journey you will see various social and global problems. Your objective isn’t to solve them all, just simply pay some attention.

I talked to 3j about the development.

Archatas: Did you use the same engine or core code for all your games? What sources did you use for help?
Jurgis: Miestas ([lt] city) and Mėnulis ([lt] moon) were made using the principle “make it work”. But Pragaras ([lt] hell) was made with a cleaner engine which was programmed by Justinas. Probably we’ll be using it for the next projects too. We didn’t use any external sources.

Archatas: One could not only walk but also run in “Miestas”. Why was the possibility of running not included into “Pragaras”?
Jurgis: We had not enough time for that. We just wanted to finish the game on time.

Archatas: How long did it take to create those games? What was the most difficult? What was the most interesting?
Jurgis: It was much smoother to develop earlier games. “Pragaras” was the first common game of the three of us, and often we had problems of organization. It took longer to create it, but also it gave us much useful experience. It was both difficult and interesting to develop a common project.

Archatas: Don’t you think that the texts written in the images should also be translated into English if you publish a game worldwide? “Pragaras” has subtitles, but I guess the word “Taika” ([lt] Peace) wasn’t translated.
Jurgis: The game was dedicated to Lithuanian audience. We didn’t translate everything for a reason. We wanted the players from abroad to experience something exotic.

Archatas: Who was the narrator in “Pragaras”? (the credits went so fast that I was not able to notice that). Was she a friend, a relative, or an acquainted professional announcer?
Jurgis: That was the actor of “Keistuoliai” theater Aldona Vilutytė. We really appreciate her for help.

Archatas: What next game are you planning to create? Is there anything started?
Jurgis: We have plenty of new thoughts and ideas. Time will show what we do next.

Archatas: Are you going to participate in ludumdare (create a game in 48 hours), pravda one minute, or some other competition or festival happening soon?
Jurgis: We are participating with “Pragaras” at IGF (independent games festival). We don’t look to other festivals at this moment.

Archatas: What studies do you plan after the school?
Jurgis: Probably, we will go towards future with those arts. We a going to study animation and programming.

Archatas: Do you have your personal websites, blogs, or myspace profiles, where you expose your works of art? (To tell the truth, I’ve found some myself, while searching for the contacts, but you can tell them anyway)
Jurgis: jurgis.newgrounds.com, jurgis.deviantart.com, kaukolike.newgrounds.com, youtube.com/ska25ld7k, jtpedcsakas.deviantart.com, teshla.newgrounds.com.

Archatas: So good luck in the festival and have much enthusiasm in creativity! I am looking forward to play more of 3j games in the future.

Sunday Celebration: a Brick Down to Your Head

Sunday, November 30th, 2008

Girded myself tightly after the feast for stomach, I return back to my childhood and play tetris. But no! That’s not tetris. These are bricks. I’m building a house. Unfortunately, it’s falling down all the time. That’s almost Jenga game at the Play club in Vilnius.

While playing 99 Bricks

99 Bricks” looks like tetris from the first sight. Colorful constructions of four squares fall down one by one and you can rotate them by the right angle and finally place on the base. Just in the beginning of the game all the well experienced strategies of tetris come to your mind. But the rules are different. You have to build as high tower as possible out of 99 bricks. It would be quite easy if you could simply send all the pieces down onto each other. But you can’t! Each brick is affected by gravity, friction, and other laws of nature. Each brick has its center of gravity. Then you’ll notice that you can move the pieces more continuously than in the past. And the width for your building is unlimited. If you can build many balconies which don’t fall, then you’re gold.

The swinging of a high unstable tower, camera following the upper line, and scale switching by key “2″ vitalize the game a lot.

The results of 99 Bricks

The game fits to architects, building engineers, and everybody who are longing for their childhood. The highest tower of mine was worth 428 points. Can you overtake me?

Sunday Celebration: How to Roast a Turkey!

Sunday, November 23rd, 2008

Last weekend we got high to the galaxies. This time let’s get down to the ground, return to the reality and cook something extraordinary. Let’s have a stuffed turkey for the dinner, in fast and easy steps, even if you have not enough self-esteem in culinary.

Cooking Mama

The game is propagating. The idea is the same as in the Banksy’s pet shop and grill as well as in the McDonalds game introduced earlier. The game is divided into levels. One can control by a mouse clicking here and there and dragging objects in the screen. It’s possible to accomplish it all in less than a quarter, unless you catch interest in the bonuses or want to improve your points. The gameplay is vitalized by humorous animation and illustrations about plucking, cleaning, cutting heads, and similar tasks… In the last third of the game, propaganda kills, but at least I will know how to cook a turkey for a holiday.

Mmmm.. I got hungry. What about you?

Sunday Celebration: Gravitee

Sunday, November 16th, 2008

Everybody needs to have rest after stressful studies or work and when the weekend parties are finished. I suggest to play in order to relax and to prepare morally for writing university papers or other homeworks. And at the same moment, I present a new theme, where each time I will introduce you to a browser game I like. This time it’s physics-based game “Gravitee”. Yup. It’s pronounced the same way as a famous night club in Vilnius.

Gravitee

If you follow my notes at tumblr, you have probably tried this game. That’s an inter-planet hybrid of golf, pool, and cricket. One has to throw a ball, residing in one planet, to the space so that it goes through a metal loop in another planet. That has to be done in as few steps as possible. The flying ball is influenced by gravitation of all planets. After hitting a planet, it goes back to the space. If it goes into a star, it burns. The game is controlled by a mouse. One has to click and drag the ball to set the direction and the force. The gameplay ir originally combined, simple, and not boring at least for half an hour.

So what? Let’s fly?

Flash Mob with Balloons

Tuesday, November 11th, 2008

I took photo and video cameras to my rucksack and hurried away to Alexander Square. According to my knowledge, there had to be a flash mob at half past two on Saturday. I said to myself that I had to see that for the first time live.

Flash mob is a short mass action by a crowd of people who usually don’t know each other. They do some unexpected activities shortly and then disappear among others. For example, sometimes people freeze or start dancing in a supermarket, or worship a fountain in a park, or fight with pillows in the city center, or go around streets in cloths of a famous character. The activities of 100 people open new fooling opportunities. The meaning of such performances is the same as of secret-camera shows. It’s all about making fun and surprising the passers by. A social or political message is transferred rarely in such actions.

Flash mobs have been happening for five years in the world. But I got a chance to see all that closely only now. So I took some junk food on my way to fill up my stomach and went to the Alexander square at the fountain with a cup of coke in one hand and a photo camera in another one (The battery of video cam was not recharged). There were many colorful people in a crowd. Then all the yellows and reds moved to one side of the square and the others moved to another side. After that they blew up many balloons and the war began:

In my opinion, such actions give much vitality to cities and also create good mood and let people get rid of monotony. BTW, they are sometimes organized in Lithuania too. Once I got an invitation to clap hands in front of TV sets in a shopping center. Flash mobs tend to be fun. I will certainly participate there some day in the future.

Footsteps Abroad: Mode of Life

Friday, August 29th, 2008

So you come abroad. The local language isn’t well known to you at the moment. You avoid communicating with the locals. But you still need to do the daily tasks. Various automated systems particularly help in such cases.. I’m continuing the series of writings about surviving in a foreign country.

The world gets modern and many jobs that have been done by people, currently are done by robots. For example, buyers can use self-service desks in shopping centers more and more often. The purchaser scans the goods herself, puts the cash or a card to the machine, and happily goes home with the buys. Just one supervisor can work at multiple self-service machines. Much of work power is saved. And the foreigner like you can get new things evading the communication in a foreign language. I have already used such a self-service desk in Lithuania in the IKI supermarket near the night club “Gravity”.

What I haven’t seen in Lithuania was the machines for deposited bottles and cans. You bring a sack of bottles or cans to the shop, put them one-by-one into the hole in the machine, press a button when finished, and get a receipt which you can spend buying something or just reimburse. Once after giving my Red Bull cans, I purchased my dinner and got a few cents in addition. I’ll need to repeat this process as the bag under my table is already full.

The other good thing is automated laundries (Marla was stealing cloths from them and selling the stolen ones for second-hand-shop keepers in the movie Fight Club). I am using such a laundry at the moment (while writing this post in Lithuanian). You come, put the cloths into a free washing machine, go to the cash machine, drop coins or slip bank-notes, press the number of the washing machine, put some more money, press the button of washing powder, get the definite amount of it, which you pour to the machine, start it, and go to a cafe nearby to sit at a book or web for an hour. If you have some more coins and time, the washed cloths can be dried in special driers after all.

Once I had an adventure in that laundry. A woman who couldn’t see very well and poorly understood the automatics, payed for the washing in my machine where the money had already been payed.. Then she fell into panic and pressed all the possible buttons on the washing machine and started the washing still without washing powder. I started using bad English language (the influence of KoЯn), so she thought that I am an Englishman, apologized many times, continued panicking, and tried to call to the information service and get back her 2.50 €.

And then the other day I met two Spanish girls in the same laundry who were traveling around Europe via InterRail. They stripped just there in front of my eyes and washed as many cloths as possible, :D because a long journey was waiting ahead.

The instructions of various automated machines are usually written in the local language, but current technologies solve such a problem easily. You just have to make a photo of the instructions and translate it on the web, i.e. http://translate.google.com.

Be2gether @ Norviliskes, LITHUANIA

Wednesday, August 20th, 2008

On the weekend I visited the biggest Lithuanian festival of music and arts. It’s called “Be2gether”. Here are some of my impressions..

Be2gether Logo (a castle and letters “be2gether” drawn in orange)

About ten kilometers of the road to the festival was graveled, so the traveling was a little bit disturbing and dusty. Everyone had to have his passport or ID card to show to police at a security checkpoint, because the location of the festival was almost on the border with Belarus. It was the Norviliskes village with a castle.

Tents

The weather was really extreme. There was never-ending storm on Friday and burning heat on Saturday. The tents had to be constructed on the wet ground, but there was impossible to sleep at the daytime because it was hot like in a greenhouse.

It’s good that I had a raincoat purchased already for a festival I had attended before. It saved me and the tickets of the whole crew from the rain, while I was standing in the long row at the exchange of tickets to hand bands. Unfortunately I had no boots, so my feet were swimming in wet shoes all the Friday.

Zuokas, unheaded, and Savickas

They say that there were about 70 bands from all the World in the festival (personally I have heard about 20 of them during all those days). The main performer who I wanted to listen to was Tricky. His show wasn’t impressive or something, but the cool thing was that Tricky was having fun among the spectators listening to famous Lithuanian punk-rock band BIX before his own concert. The best music-and-arts-related thing on Friday for me was the performance of Etienne de Crecy Live where techno beat was accompanied visually on a lightning cube in which the DJ was sitting. The best audio-visual show on Saturday was the concert of Groove Armada (even lunar eclipse happened in the sky during that concert). And the best musical discoveries at all were the Latvian hard-rock band Coming Soon and Lithuanian rock’n'pop band Živilė Ba having their concerts on Sunday.

Joint

In the tent of Tamsta club

Be2gether wasn’t just about music. There were plenty of different kitchens to eat and drink; floors for learning Indian dances, breakdance, or quickstep; ramps for bmx bikers and skateboarders; a screen for watching basketball at olimpics; dirty dancing in the mud; and plenty of other things. People were peaceful, creative, and humorous. While dancing by the music of LTJ Bukem feat. MC Conrad in the tent of Sobieski Uogos Club, I noticed a group of people repeating my moves. “WTF?” – I thought. After a while the leader of them pointed to another person and everybody started repeating the moves of that person. That was really funny. Another funny thing I found was a mask made from a Chinese paper lamp and some packages for a drunken sleeping guy who became a photo-shooting star later that evening.

Mask

“Zivile, I love you too!” – shouted a funny guy to the singer during her concert.
“I love you all!” – she answered to the audience.
“It’s OK if you call me in singular” – the guy continued…

Shower

On Saturday I was taken about 20 km from Norviliskes to the Poskoniai lake where there were already many celebrators from Be2gether. We spent there half a day and I burned my skin, but it was fun anyway. The only thing I didn’t like was that fat local village people dipped single girls from the festival into the water with their cloths by force against their will. It was really hot that day, but people should respect each other.

Me, myself, and I

Anyway the festival was cool and thanks to Ina & Giedrius, Aivaras, another Giedrius, Viktoras, Monika & Dima, Rasa, Igne, Viktorija & Dominyka, Agne & Inga, Deimante & Justas, Vaida, and all the others for a great company and good time!

Evening