Technology and You - Games

Optimus Maximus - A Keyboard on Steroids

nospam@example.com (Rohan Dayal) — Sat, 15 Sep 2007 14:20:03 +0200

Sometime back, I mentioned how using the keyboard (as opposed to the mouse) dramatically increases the speed of interaction with a computer. Well, the biggest drawback to using the keybaord is the lack of visual cues. A computer screen gives visual cues to what clicking an icon or button does (for example, clicking on the desktop icon in the Quick Launch toolbar will show the desktop, and clicking on the B button in the Word toolbar will bold selected text). That the same actions can be done easily and much faster with the keyboard (Win-key + D and Ctrl-B, respectively), are less known facts.

Well times are a-changing, and so are keybaords. The Art. Lebedev Studio in Russia obviously identified this shortcoming and came up with a (very effective) solution shown below. The Optimus Maximus has LCD screens under each key. The key displays change with keypresses and software events. You press Ctrl on the keypad, and the key displays change to show the options available to you.

One place I immediately see the advantage - games. I could never remember what all the buttons in a game such as Quake III, Half-Life, CounterStrike and the FIFA football series stand for. The keyboard can be configured according to any game and the displays change to help you change weapons, view your surroundings, move slowly and crouch.

Another area is graphic design and CAD, although I have yet to come across a graphic designer worth anything who does not know his/her keyboard shortcuts like the back of his hand.

Of course, the yet-to-be-released keyboard comes at a good price. It is currently slated for release in March 2008 at a price of more than USD 1500 - Ouch! Till the prices come down, I'm better off with a printout of this.

See a demo here. Read more here.

The Power of Open Support - Facebook

nospam@example.com (Rohan Dayal) — Thu, 13 Sep 2007 14:26:38 +0200

Let's face it - Orkut is slowly becoming passe. I took one look at Facebook and I admit, I'm hooked. Not because of the visual interface (frankly, Orkut's light blue color and link arrangement is better). Nor by the ease of use (both are pretty much the same). Not even by the wall-to-wall feature (takes the fun of piecing information together away).

But by the applications or widgets that you, me or anybody can make and add to our profile. I show the cities and places I have visited (log in to Facebook before clicking), send free gifts (digital, of course), show-off the books I have read, display a new LOLcat everyday (you don't know what a LOLcat is? Shame) and invite people to play games. I even proudly display a reason for which I will drink today :)

The difference - Facebook took the meaning of Web 2.0 different from Orkut. It's not only about letting the community interact with each other, it's about letting the community define the whole platform. Facebook's base site is painfully featureless (even fewer features than Orkut). However, giving programmers the tools and APIs to interact with the base database opened a world of innovation far beyond what even the maker could have imagined.

Are you on Facebook yet? If you are, do not, repeat do not install Jetman. Now that I've warned you, do not blame me later. If you still go ahead and do it, do let me know your Jetman score :)

Back to the Basics - Super Mario 64

nospam@example.com (Rohan Dayal) — Mon, 05 Jun 2006 22:36:46 +0200

In case you were wondering where I had disappeared off to, here's the answer: Super Mario 64! It started with a quest for finding more about the New Super Mario Bros. game. Before I knew it, I was hooked.

The Super Mario Brothers legacy started in 1983 with the release of Mario Brothers - an arcade game from Nintendo. It was designed by Shigeru Miyamoto - the man behind many of Nintendo's legendary video games. In 1985, the cult status was established with the release of Super Mario Bros., a side scrolling, first person action game for the Nintendo Entertainment System. This game holds the Guinness record for the best-selling video game of all time. Most of you would have grown up with Mario (I for one have spent a small fortune playing it at neighborhood arcades). For the rest - if you still don't believe the cult status - check out the Mario Wiki which has 1072 articles written by Mario enthusiasts detailing every game in which Mario has featured (including guest appearances), every character, every place, etc. etc.

I have never been good at playing games that require more than three buttons (apart from the joystick, of course). This is pretty much why I had shunned gaming for quite some time. All of today's popular games - FIFA, NBA, Counter Strike, Quake III being good examples - require a complicated controller/keyboard configuration to play.

Super Mario 64 took me back to the good old days. It takes the Super Mario Bros. game play and gives you all you were really missing in the original. The world is 3D now - giving Mario a plethora of new moves - triple jumps, long jumps, slide attacks. Mario can also fly in 3D. Along with your old enemies - goombas, koopa troopas, piranha plants, bowser - there are tons of new ones. The levels are much more exciting. Last but not least - the graphics are fantabulous (screenshots follow).

Ever wondered what jumping into the green pipes in Super Mario Bros. felt like? You can actually see Mario fall into one in Super Mario 64.

Get your hands on it today. But be careful - Its very very addictive! Check out the screen shots below (click to enlarge):

Continue reading "Back to the Basics - Super Mario 64"

Death of the UMD

nospam@example.com (Rohan Dayal) — Fri, 31 Mar 2006 14:55:32 +0200

I was introduced to the Sony PSP six months back. My friend proudly showed me his whimsical purchase. I myself was quite surprised as I knew he had no interest in computer gaming. His take on it - "It plays UMD movies, which is what interested me." Seemed quite a nice idea.

Quite naturally, we looked for the AV out cable in the PSP box - to connect it to a TV. If the iPod video can do it, so should the PSP, shouldn't it? Finding no such cable, I pulled up the user manual and was, quite frankly, disappointed. There was no such feature.

Recent reports confirmed our basic deduction. The UMD as a media for movies will not work. Further, games for the PSP can also be loaded onto a MemoryStick. So there's not exactly any requirement for the UMD.

I still quite appreciate the PSP. It's quite slick. The game titles are quite interesting. It immediately detected and connected to my WiFi router, and my friend checked his mail quite effortlessly.

Another parting crib regarding the PSP, they could include at least one pre-installed full version game when shipped. Something like the default Mario cartridge that shipped with most NES and its emulators. The default pack included only unplayable demos.