Category: Geekery

  • Mythological Ursine Action

    While I was visiting the rugrats this evening, and after I fiddled with The Ex’s computer for a while, Erica and I decided to play some Age of Mythology. (I let her pick the game.) We got it over with fairly quickly, since on account of not having several hours to spare we set it on Easy and divided up our opponents. As a change of pace and slight bit of challenge, I played as the Egyptians and chose Set as my totem god.

    I knew that playing as Set gives you summoned animals at your temple and the ability for your pharaoh to summon more, but what I didn’t know is that your priests can convert random animals that would otherwise be either food, or threats to your villagers.

    And so, we have the following screenshot at game’s end:

    Hint: I’m “Grey, the Duck”, and the pertinent figure is near the upper-right corner. Susume would be the younger child.

    I have got to try that again some time. I wonder if I can convert all of them? (That is, the ones who aren’t morons, like the one that attacked my Titan all by itself. Yeah, Ben, swipe the Titan’s toenail with your paw a few times, see if that hurts it any. Stupid bear.)

  • We DO need some stinkin’ taglines!

    Okay, so the slogan thing was cute while it lasted, but popular opinion indicates that the good old taglines randomizer is the preferred form of under-the-logo funny here at Hue-Impaired Waterfowl Central. While I was at it, I tackled a lot of the tagline backlog. Yes, that’s right… the tagline file is now even bigger (and, arguably, better) than ever.

    Share and enjoy, won’t you?

  • It’s more fun this way, isn’t it?

    Getting to play a City of Heroes character through to Level 50 in under five minutes is, in a way, quite a fun experience. In the last day or so I’ve built a half-dozen characters, thanks to the CoH Planner.

    I suppose now I should actually… er… play the game, huh?

  • TV Wonder? Wonder why it sucks, you mean.

    The Project: See if using external USB devices for TV tuning and quality audio I/O is a viable alternative to cramming PCI cards into crowded 2U rackmount computer chassis, so we can intelligently order appropriate gear for the next batch of production studio computers.

    After several workdays during which ATI’s tech support insulted my intelligence by suggesting I try things that I already told them I’d done, they finally came through with a sensible suggestion that helped me get their TV Wonder USB 2.0 device working.

    (James Burke Voice:) Well, sort of.

    I had to dial down the USB bandwidth setting in order to get video that didn’t look like the actors on TV were experiencing severe and prolonged epileptic seizures. And then I made the mistake of actually hooking up the Digigram USB audio device. Bzzzt. That was it, no more ATI television viewing. At all.

    Believe me, I tried a lot of things to make it work (again). No go.

    My verdict? This solution isn’t even remotely ready for prime time. Once again, USB devices fail to live up to their glorious advance billing…

  • Gone Wall-Eyed.

    In a fit of getting-things-done, I’ve finally posted my slowly-growing collection of photographic computer desktop wallpapers in the gallery. While I was at it, I also posted some of my favorite collected anime wallpapers.

    Share and enjoy. Please don’t hotlink, however. I don’t want to have to start doing Stupid Apache Tricks, hmm?

    Photographic Wallpapers
    Favorite Anime Wallpapers

  • Who had the bright idea of putting ME in charge?

    All I was going to do was check email. Then I was just going to check my RSS feeds.

    Suddenly I’m the head of a small nation. What the hell happened, here?

    It’s all her fault, I tell you. Bah.