Still Rock and Roll

So I got a new phone today. Still not sure what to think… on the one hand I love new tech and have already spent all day fanoodling about on it. On the other hand I’m very much against what I see as the duplicity of softwares on multiple platforms. I want my phone to do only a few things: call people, text, play music, take photos, and tell the time. As far as I’m concerned internet and video ought to be left to laptops.

However, it seems this shift towards smartphones is a natural progression in the increasing power and decreasing size and cost of processing strength. Though I prefer my dumb phones, it’s become almost impossible to even buy them in most stores. Thus, I make the shift and step off the cushy ground of a phone that serves strictly the functions I want portable, into the abyss of too many devices all doing the same thing.

I dislike this only because I preach proper relegation of tasks. The things I look for in a phone are the only functions I need portable, just like I keep gaming homebrew on my Wii instead of my laptop. Though I imagine eventually we’ll do everything from a single pocket-sized device, that dream is still a loooong way from being realized.

Until then…

Everybody’s talkin’ bout the new smartphoney but it’s still rock and roll to me~

ALSO. Actually embedded videos once again! Hells yes.

Skyrim for Netbooks

Though I’ve postponed almost all hacking of Frankenetbook, I’ve been absolutely DYING to try Skyrim on it.

Suicide, I know, but the modding community is diverse and apparently not everyone plays games on bajillion dollar, monthly-swapped towers. Hence, several performance boosting mods. HD texture pack? Screw that! Reduced Texture Pack shrinks everything by half! Fog and smoke particles? Who needs em! But…this one truly takes the cake, and gives me hope for a playable Skyrim with on-board graphics.

When I saw the guard I absolutely died laughing.

Combined with the HialgoBoost GPU framerate buffer, Collorful Lights – No Shadows, and the basic particle and object reducing mods…I think it’s conceivable that we could reduce the system requirements of TES5 considerably. TF2 stylized Skyrim running in 800×600, 30fps…you know, I think I’d be ok with that just for the novelty of portable Skyrim.

You can check out the creator’s video here. It’s so self-aware…and for all the right reasons. I love it. “I replaced ALL the plant textures, so now they all look like garbage. WHOA! That was creepy…again this is optional…so you don’t have to look at stuff like that.”

Skype

As someone more used to using skype for text than for talking, I have to actively resist the urge to type at people when we hang up. This becomes a problem when talking to a friend I haven’t seen or heard from in months during finals week.

I’ll just type a quick sentence… Resist! Resist!

Wow! Rytlock Brimstone!?

As a once-fan of Guild Wars 2, how did I not find this? My god, I haven’t laughed so hard in months.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=60TCwX11PVw

Deeep breaths.

I miss that game. But they promised it would grow deeper and it just grew wider. I wanted to actually get invested in character classes but they built them for PvP instead of PvE. Nerfs for everyone! Meanwhile in world completion…………..