Just saw this (from a Tweet by Mr Stephen Fry):

http://www.myhandle.com/

Is it going to be the next big thing? Who knows... But the amount of spam I get every day to all of my accounts means I’ll be trying it!

Al

So it was the first Signals summer bbq of the year lat night and it was supposed to be a chilled affair in the sun. However in the middle of our game of rickets (think a combination of cricket and rounders with a navy blue ball which was impossible to see at dusk - well that's my excuse....Jo made up the rules as she went, weirdly she won...) we ended up berating a bunch of teenages for leaving a huge pile of rubbish in the middle of Mill Meadows. I then proceded to chase one of them (not sure what I was going to do if I actually caught him...). It really really winds me up when people litter - they were sat about 10 metres from a bin.... Not only is it environmentally unfriendly (we ended up recycling about 20 cans on their behalf) but it makes chilling by the river unpleasant for everyone else. I don't want to sound like I'm preaching about this but it's such a simple thing to avoid - and maybe Signals shouting at them made them think twice for next time?!

Lydia

I was enjoying a Halo 3 session when one of my fellow (computer controlled!) marines utter something with an amazingly familiar voice:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kTd4KNxnu3U

I wonder how many other cameos there are hidden away in modern games?

Al

If you have a spare few minutes check out Wolfram Alpha. It went online on Friday so this is just the beginning, but from the introduction demo it looks like it could be a really powerful new search engine. 

Standard search engines rely on information that has already been created by third parties to provide answers to our search queries. So if it doesn't exist on the net in a format that can be indexed and easily found then it won't reach you as an answer. This is where Wolfram Alpha is different - it essentially 'creates' the answer using knowledge from data sets which have been organised so they are computable. It intelligently builds the answers itself.

This may just rock the socks off of the future of search.... have a look for yourself. 

http://www.wolframalpha.com/

Jo

Got sent this link... I had no idea games like this existed!!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p6_VyQLzVU4

I’d love to give it a go, but I have a feeling that it is a genre I would have enjoyed more in my early teens! I just don’t have the time to dedicate to gaming anymore!

Al

When every animated film churned out nowadays uses CG, it's surprising to hear a film that doesn't. Disney have decided to go a bit old school and make The Princess and the Frog using hand-drawn animation, what's more the quality is absolutely superb!

A selection of videos in various resolutions if your pc can take it!

1080p
720p
480p

- Scott

When I embark upon a new project it's rarely necessary to start completely from scratch, however, recently I have found myself spending a considerable amount of time copying, emptying and renaming the same files over and over again. Not really my idea of fun, wouldn't it be nice if I could automate the process in some way? If only Flash could just open and saves files then I could...

What's this? Adobe AIR? And that lets me do work with the file system? What a stroke of luck.

AIR isn't particularly new anymore but I/we here in multimedia land have had reason to use it on a number of occasions and I'm pretty happy with what it has to offer, mainly because of the impressively small learning curve (for anyone who already familiar with ActionScript at least!). The AIR player understands ActionScript 3 with some additional AIR specific code so I can use all my time saving library tools to create more traditional style applications which really is just a case of reading up on the 'open/save' commands and click the publish as and AIR file button.

The result: An AIR application that is capable of recognising a Flash Develop project directory, copying it's contents and pasting it to a new location with all renaming done for you - well, me. I can put my feet up and relax for a bit now.

On an entirely different topic I'm currently most pleased that the mighty Leicester City have finished the season as Champions of League One and will be back in the Championship next year. Good work but I seriously hope we've learned our lesson!

Also I have been exploring the world of VST plugins lately and stumbled across the following page:

http://www.audiomastermind.com/browse-free_vst_plugins-5886988-1.html

Lot's of free plugins for all purposes.

Greg

I’m one of those cinema goers who will still be in their seat when the ushers come round to vacuum up the popcorn, watching to the end of the credits. Part of this is some kind of strange ritual I formed as a child; my theory being that if I enjoyed the film I should recognise those who toiled to create it. Also, these days, you get little teasers to possible sequels or funny Easter eggs to enjoy. So why don’t I do this with games?

Having just found out that, in a fit of inpatients I noted in my last blog, I managed to miss a little scene after the main credit to Halo 2...

While not vital to my enjoyment and understanding of the game, I wish I’d stuck to my guns and watched in its rightful place, so to speak.

So next time you complete a game, wait till the credits finish! You owe it to the people who made it and you may just get a little reward!

Al

I know that I am way behind the times on this one, but over the long weekend I finally managed to finish Halo 2 and move on to Halo 3.

For a game released in 2007, it’s taken me a long time just to get to the point of actually playing Halo 3. I refused to play it without playing the first two games in full (on easy of course!) so I was very lucky that my girlfriend gave me a helping hand in co-operative mode. This experience has made me realise that I don’t spend half as much time playing games as I used to!

So far it has been worth the wait, and worth the time it has taken to play both of the first games. To jump from the 2004 Xbox game Halo 2 to a next-gen 2007 Xbox360 game was amazing. So much progress made in 3 short years in terms of graphics, sound, presentation and storytelling techniques. It was like jumping from the first Star Trek movie to the most recent release in one leap!

It was also pointed out by a member of my team that he had to wait 3 years for an answer to the cliff-hanger at the end of Halo 2.

I had to wait 3 minutes! :)

So once I’m done with Halo 3, which series should I play through next?

Al

There has been talk over the last few months of Twitter taking on Google in the realms of search. Can Twitter really match up to the titan of the search arena? I would say unlikely at best.

For a start Twitter is based on real time conversational topics and when used to request information is heavily dependent on whatever is being 'tweeted' in the 140 character max. snippet you are allowed to post at any one time. Google on the other hand has a huge amount of information just ready and waiting to be launched at you whatever you ask of it, in a matter of seconds - something Twitter will find hard to replicate given current limitations. 

However...

...that doesn't mean Twitter has no place in search. If you are searching for a recommendation or for a niche specific piece of information then asking your fellow 'Tweeters' maybe the way to go. Much like an opinion poll.

So, Google vs Twitter?  Not really, no. I think Google may be safe where search is concerned. Live Search and Yahoo shouldn't worry too much either, however things move quickly so watch this space!!!

Jo