Apple Sucks! There...I said it.

Before I owned any Apple-brand hardware, their ads used to annoy me.

Since buying an iPod, their ads annoy the ever living fuck out of me.

You see, their main selling point for all their products is how easy they are to use and how they never crash or break.

I call shenanigans. They crash, they break and they’re just as unreliable as any Microsoft product.

My iPod has frozen up at least once or twice a month since I bought it. I’d try to play a song, I’d press play, and the screen would change to that song for a nanosecond before snapping back to the menu.

It was on, I could look at all my playlists…I just couldn’t play any music, which kinda defeats the purpose of carrying it.

The only way to fix it when it did that was to hook it up to the PC, start up iTunes and do a complete reset…meaning every bit of content I had on the iPod would go bye-bye…and I’d have to sit there and wait for everything to re-synch again.

“It just works?”

Bollocks. It’s just like every other piece of consumer electronics out there. It breaks, it crashes and it stops working for no reason.

However, what happened just now took the cake.

I was sitting on the couch playing Uno, when I decided that it was the perfect time to listen to this week’s Webcomics Weekly podcast while playing. One of the great things about a 360 is you can connect an mp3 player to one of its USB ports and stream music through it.

I like it because it puts my iPod on my surround sound speakers and charges the ipod at the same time.

So I turned on the PC so I could sync up the iPod. I hadn’t put this weeks episode of Webcomics Weekly onto the iPod yet.

I plugged it in, and instead of hearing the usual chime and iTunes recognizing the iPod like and old friend and uploading lots of nice podcasts to it, it wouldn’t recognize it at all. I checked the iPod and the battery was dead.

Now, this shouldn’t be a problem. You have to plug it in to synch it anyway and it can draw power from the 360 just as easily as it’s supposed to be able to do from my PC. Only the problem was the good people at Apple hadn’t figured on one thing:

When the iPod battery is out of juice, it won’t turn on via the power button. When it is turned off, plugging it into your computer will turn it on, but because it’s plugged in before it’s booted up, it won’t recognize that it’s plugged in, and won’t draw any power from the USB port.

At least mine won’t.

Great, Apple, you’ve designed a device that won’t charge when the battery is empty.

In the end I solved the problem, but it honestly made me laugh at the ‘ultra reliable, ergonomic and easy to use’ mantra Apple love to recite over and over in their TV ads..

To fix it I had to connect the iPod to the PC, wait for it to start up, then as soon as the screen showed ‘low power’, I had to disconnect it, then re-connect it in less than two seconds. If I took longer that two seconds and the iPod would turn off and I’d have to start all over again.

It took a few attempts, but I finally got it to recognize it was plugged in and got it to draw power.

“It Just Works!” My ass.

Assassin's Creed...."Don't Offend Anyone"

This week I spent my ex-cigarette money on a copy of Assassin’s Creed for the 360.

This game made me thoroughly confused. The only way I could explain it at first is that when the game was half done, they turned production over to the studio head’s idiot grandson. Either that, or they called a meeting and decided to smoke a shitload of crack to get ‘inspired’.

You see, when I first saw Assassin’s Creed demoed, I saw an assassination game set during the Crusades. Now that was a good idea, for the simple fact that the medieval middle-east is perfect for a little cloak-and-dagger gameplay…and it’s a setting that’s just never been used before.

Then, I saw the game in action and my jaw dropped. Not only was it stunningly gorgeous, it had an amazing combat system, some great AI and a ‘free running’ game mechanic (go do a google search for ‘free running’ or ‘parkour’ if you don’t know what that it).

Then I bought the game, started playing it, and within five minutes had the mother of all WTF moments.

You see, this game isn’t set in the Middle East during the crusades. It’s set in the not too distant future.

Here’s the basic storyline, without giving too much away):

You play a guy who gets kidnapped. Basically the bad guys are looking for some treasure and one of your long dead ancestors had information about where it is. The bad guys have a machine called an ‘Animus’ that lets you relive your ancestor’s memories which are passed on to you through your DNA. They’re forcing you to use this machine and relive part of your Ancestor’s life to get at the information about the treasure.

Why? Dear God, why?

So, while we have that same awesome game we all saw demoed at E3, right from the get go, the level or immersion and the overall story takes an almost fatal hit because right off the bat we’re being asked to accept one of the most ridiculous premises ever (Genetic memory? Maybe it does exist to let birds know to fly south for the winter…but having your entire bloodline’s memories in perfect detail stored in your genes? Come on!)

Secondly, we have this wonderfully rendered version of Damasus and Jerusalem…that has futuristic ‘glitches’ superimposed over it, you know, just to make sure we get thrown out of the experience every five minutes.

I just couldn’t figure it out. I mean, this ‘twist’ is something that’s almost universally hated, so surely someone during development would have said “Uh, guys? This ‘animus’ crap? Genetic memory? It sucks balls. Why don’t we just do a straight forward medieval assassination game?”

Then, two things made it become crystal clear.

The first was I saw an interview with one of the creators of Assassin’s Creed who went to great lengths to explain the sheer amount of effort they put in to make the game as historically accurate as possible, even thought the story is completely made up. The bad guys you assassinate are all real historical figures who were either killed or went missing around the time the game was set.

An awful lot of effort considering the average gamer doesn’t have a masters in Medieval history and the game is a self confessed work of fiction, right?

Then, I turned the game on today, and caught something that came up in the screen just after the first loading screen:

“Assassin’s Creed was made by a multicultural team of various faiths and beliefs”

DING! I get it!

Can I have “Going way too far and damaging your own game to cover your ass from a minority of religious crazies” for two-hundred, Alex?

It finally hit me. This game was set during the crusades. A full on Christian versus Muslim holy war. That’s bound to rattle a few cages, right? Fox news would have a field day with it.

Tonight on Fox News. A murder simulator that teaches your kids how to kill minorities and people of different religions. Could this lead to another 9/11? Tune in at ten!

Yeah, a game where you play a Christian who goes around killing Muslims or vice versa might draw a little negative attention, so being complete and total pussies, they decided to almost ruin a perfectly good game.

You see, this way, the character doesn’t actually kill anyone. He’s just watching something that happened hundreds of years ago. It’s also ‘historically accurate’, so this is no more offensive and a TV documentary on the Crusades.

Hey, if the Germans aren’t getting mad about all those historical World War II shooters, no one can get upset about this historical game from the Crusades. Oh, and did we mention that your character kills people on both sides of the war instead of just muslims?

Am I right?

Man DIY Rides Again....Again.

A few days ago, we had a day-long storm hit us. It wasn’t a particularly bad or violent storm, but it did rain heavily for over 15 hours. It was during this time I noticed a leak in our roof just outside our bedroom.

So today, I got Sunny to give Frank a call, and we set out to repair the roof.

Before I get started I want to make it clear that I’m not afraid of heights. No way. Not in the slightest. Heights don’t bother me a bit. I can look up at them all day and not get even the slightest twinge of fear!

When I’m climbing a rickety, unstable ladder to stand on a roof I’m not 100% sure will take my weight that has no hand rails or anything to stop my clumsy ass falling off said roof…I find it a fun, exhilarating experience…and not brown-trousers terrifying at all. .

It was so much fun! Especially when I was halfway up the ladder when the damn thing started to shimmy from side to side. I laughed and laughed when Frank nonchalantly pointed out that the ladder had a crack in it near the top.

“Gah, look at that.” He said. “This thing could just fold up at any second.”

I let loose with my Shaolin Warrior-Monk Cry of Manly Happiness, to let the world know I was enjoying every minute and wasn’t even slightly scared.

Yes, it’s true… the Shaolin Warrior-Monk Cry of Manly Happiness is very similar to the sound a five year old girl makes when someone throws a big spider on her…but it definitely was a Shaolin Warrior-Monk Cry of Manly Happiness… no matter what that lying bastard Frank says.

I made it onto the roof and started to unscrew the siding we’d need to remove. I did this mostly because it was a job I could do sitting down. You see, when you’re absolutely not terrified and completely comfortable, it’s just showing off to do the jobs that require you to stand up or walk near the edge.

In fact, the most brave and manly thing you can do when up on a roof is to lie down, spread your weight over as wide an area as possible, and softly weep while holding on so hard you’re leaving permanent fingerprints in the shingles. You see, most people aren’t nearly as at home in high places as I am, so acting like you’re terrified is a way to make them feel better.

We did the job. Well, I say ‘we’ did the job, I didn’t do much myself, mostly because of Frank.

You see, I could tell Frank was terrified by the way he walked around with the ease and comfort of a man in his own living room. So to make him feel better I just did as much as I could from the very center of the roof… flat on my stomach with my arms and legs splayed out… with my eyes tightly closed… thinking as hard as I could about my happy place.

Frank laughed once or twice, which just shows how me pretending to be scared helped him through his own terror. Yeah, he’s a total wuss, but he’s family, so what can you do?

Getting down the ladder was almost as fun as getting up it, because this time it involved dangling my legs out over the gaping, hungry, sucking void of empty space between me and the ground. Awesome!

I contemplated how totally not scared I was, thinking about how I wasn’t the least bit concerned about how one slip would see me plummeting towards the earth with enough time to write my Last Will and Testament and compose a witty, self-deprecating speech to be read out at my funeral (where the casket would be a weird shape because the doctors would be unable to remove the two-by-four I landed on from my anal cavity).

I got on the ladder and it started to shake uncontrollably again. Some lying bastards (mostly called Frank) would say this was down to me shaking with terror…but Frank’s always been a great big dirty fat liar anyway. If I was shaking, it was only because my muscles were unable to contain the sheer power contained within them.

I got to the ground, crying my Shaolin Warrior-Monk Cry of Manly Happiness a couple more times for good measure…which is absolutely nothing like the cry of a toddler who’s just dropped his ice-cream or lost his helium balloon…and I want to state for the record that I slipped and fell when I reached the ground, and certainly did not hug and kiss the ground and beg it never to leave me again.

So, long story short…I’m ultra brave and manly and fixed the roof. Frank is a big fat liar, who’s pants are on fire, so don’t listen to a damn word he says.

Powerful odors and other stories...

One of the big things I’d heard about quitting smoking is that your sense of smell and taste improve dramatically.

Having not smoked for well over a week now, I was beginning to think this was a myth…until I got out of bed this morning.

You see, I assumed that if my sense of smell and taste was going to improve, it was going to improve gradually. Not so.

Have you ever been on a plane or something and your ears pop…then a few hours later you yawn…and your hearing returns to normal so suddenly that everything is unbearably and painfully loud? That happened to me, only with taste and smell instead of hearing.

Basically, it’s like I woke up this morning with an almost Superhuman sense of smell and taste.

Now this can be a good thing (For example, the Chicken Ciabata sandwich I had for lunch was awesome)…but when it started raining and I let Buddy in the house, the smell of wet dog was so powerful it almost made me throw up.

It’s like the world has become booby-trapped overnight and I have to be on constant guard for unexpected smells.

We went to Walmart today and a woman was wearing so much perfume I could smell her coming from thirty yards away. This is not an exaggeration. When she passed by me, I thought I was going to choke.

Hopefully this will ‘normalize’ a little over the next few days and I’ll get used to it. Otherwise I’ll have to make myself a costume and use my new-found superhuman senses to fight crime.

Now I just need a name… Olfactory Man? The Sniffler?

Gaming for Non-Gamers

Not surprisingly, I’ve been writing a lot of gaming related posts lately. If you’re one of the people who normally turns up here, says “Not another bloody gaming post!” then leaves…don’t…at least not this time.

This is a gaming post, but it’s one written specifically for non-gamers.

I got the idea for this post when I was first trying out the new 360 when my parents were here. My Mum watched for a few minutes and asked:

“So…what exactly are you doing?”

I wasn’t sure what to say. It was all there on the screen. I was controlling Darth Vader and killing Wookies with a Lightsaber and very large rocks.

“What do you mean?” I asked.

“Well…are you steering that guy or is he just following a path?”

I instantly had a flashback to the early 90’s when my Mum was telling my to let my four year old cousin play X-wing on the PC. I tried to explain that it was a complicated game that would be too difficult for him…and she answered “Don’t be stupid, just tell him which button to press!”

I tried to explain that it wasn’t as simple as that. For X-wing, 90% of the keys on the keyboard did something, not to mention the five separate buttons and the throttle on the joystick…but my mum had it firmly lodged in her head that all videogames basically boil down to pushing a button at the right time.

I think this is the number one reason there aren’t more games consoles in homes. Non-gamers have one of two reactions:

1) They look at a controller with it’s two thumb-sticks, D-Pad and twelve buttons and decide instantly that it’s way to complicated and not worth the effort.

2) More commonly, they assume that all games are incredibly simple exercises in pushing buttons that are boring no matter how pretty the eye candy.

From that, I can understand why a lot of people don’t play games. If they truly were that complicated, I wouldn’t bother…and if all games where as simple as just pushing buttons, they wouldn’t hold my interest either.

Let me talk about ‘learning to game’ for a few minutes, then I’ll go on to why you’d actually want to.

Here’s the deal. If you can drive a car, use a phone or work a TV remote, you can learn to play a videogame. The problem is that when you look at a controller with all those buttons, you’re not seeing them ‘in context’, meaning it looks far more intimidating and complicated than it really is.

Think of it this way. The average controller has a couple of thumb-sticks, a D-Pad and anywhere from six to eight buttons. That’s a lot right? Well, yes…but not compared to the average TV remote.

My TV remote has exactly 46 buttons on it. I also have a separate remote for the DVD recorder and another one for the surround sound system. In other words, if you have a TV you use a controller with around five times the buttons of a control pad…yet you don’t find it intimidating.

Long story short, I’m not saying it’s super-easy, but if you pick a game a persevere for an hour or so, while you won’t suddenly be an expert gamer, you’ll be comfortable with the controls…and everything you learn in one game translates to most others.

The other thing to point out is that while controllers have all those buttons, not every game actually uses all of them. While there are some complicated games out there, there are also plenty that are nice and simple that anyone can just pick up and play.

So now we’ve talked about the mechanics of it, why would you want to game?

The problem here is that most non-gamers seem to be stuck in the 80’s when it comes to their ideas aboutgaming technology. They assume all games are about as deep as Space Invaders or Pac-Man.

While there still are a good few simplistic, button-mashers out there, with today’s technology and production values. it’s better to think of it not so much as buying a ‘game’ as buying an ‘experience’.

Games like Bioshock, Mass Effect, Half-Life and Oblivion are incredibly well written, atmospheric experiences that would be just as at home on the Silver Screen or at the top of the New York Times Best-Seller list as they are on a games console.

If the last game you played was Pac-Man, it might be difficult to think of videogames in these kinds of terms, but think of them as movies or novels that you play the leading role in. They’re worlds that you not only get to play in, but worlds youbecome part of and emotionally invested in.

Again, it can be difficult to imagine getting ‘emotionally invested’ in a videogame if your only gaming experience is Pac-Man…but it’s no different than becoming emotionally invested in a good book or movie

For example, Bioshock has an absolutely astounding plot-twist that would make M. Night Shyamalan crap his pants and feel like a complete amateur. I don’t want to spoil it for anyone who’s not played it yet…but it made my jaw hit the floor and I shouted ‘NO FUCKING WAY!!!’ with my Mother-In-Law in the room.

Then, when Alyx Vance got seriously wounded in Half-Life Episode 2, it came as a real shock…and not because I thought a major character might get killed off, but because the game had made me care about Alyx and what happens to her.

Of course, the other major problem right now is the sheer number of fame-hungry morons who are using videogames as a nice soft target to attack in the name of ‘morality’ and ‘protecting the children’ in order to get on TV or secure support from uninformed voters.

I could go into this myself, but I’ve done that ad nauseum in the past, and the whole point of this post was summed up perfectly by Wil Wheaton in his PAX keynote speech. So to end today, here’s an excerpt:

(Talking about his Son’s experience with Grand Theft Auto 3)

“…he did, however, get emotionally invested in the characters and their stories. He was sad when the game was over and felt a sense of loss because he wouldn’t get to spend any more time with them.

I had an identical reaction when I finished San Andreas. I knew these characters, I cared about these characters and I was genuinely sad when their stories came to an end.

I frequently feel this way when I finish a long novel and occasionally when I come to the end of a movie trilogy…but never so acutely as I did after about a hundred and fifty hours of San Andreas.

So whenever I hear one of these aforementioned douchebags pontificate about how dangerous and anti-social and devoid of redemming quialities videogames are, I get a little stabby, because these games that we love to play so much are way, way more than the simplistic bloodbaths mass-media likes to portray them as during sweeps.

Just as the multiplayer games are social activities, so are the single player games narrative works of art, and they deserve to be treated that way.”

So, in conclusion, if you’re not a gamer, find someone who is and ask them to show you the ropes. If you don’t, you’re just cheating yourself out of an awesome experience.