Hand Coding

LiveScience reports on a study which concluded that “action video games that involve firing guns can improve your eyesight”:

A group of 10 male college students who started out as non-gamers and then received 30 hours of training on first-person action video games showed a substantial increase in their ability to see objects accurately in a cluttered space, compared to 10 non-gamers given the same test, said Daphne Bevelier of the University of Rochester.

[…]

First-person action games helped study subjects improve their spatial resolution, meaning their ability to clearly see small, closely packed together objects, such as letters, she said. Game-playing actually changes the way our brains process visual information. […]

I think this may be just the motivation I need to play Doom 3 more often — it’s for my own good, right? ;).

Via Joystiq, I discovered that GoGamer is offering Doom 3 for $30 as part of a 48-Hour Madness Sale. That sounded like a good price, especially since most other stores are selling it for $60 or so. But, before ordering, I first checked ResllerRatings to see whether it was worth buying from them.

As it turns out, GoGamer has a 6-month rating of 7.50/10 along with a “Gold” Elite Customer Excellence Award. That was good enough for me, so I placed an order. And, shipping was only $5.99 for FedEx 2-Day (bringing the total to about $36). If you’re thinking about ordering one for yourself, just keep in mind that there are about 12 hours left in the sale (as I write this).

IT publication The Inquirer reports that Doom III won’t include multiplayer, apparently as an economc measure (as in “if there’s not enough time to do it right, don’t do it at all”).

In other games with a deformable/destructible environment the graphic technology was not in place so the modeling was much easier. In older games a plain-jane texture could be applied to the box, it could split into several chunks and dissipate into the air, and that was acceptable to the gamer as previously shot bodies disappeared, blood did not spray and the list goes on. Because of the realistic nature of Doom 3 (and I saw a preview video. Hold onto your hats.) id decided to leave anything out that would detract from the overall game. First to go? Multiplayer.

Because of the nature of multiplayer games, where individuals have to be able to traverse a map in any direction, often times level designers make several changes to enhance the multiplayer experience. With Doom 3, because of the workflow, an artist would create a room and it would take a week and a half to program. Any changes to the room would require reworking so id chose the economical route. […]

I was disappointed to read that, as I really enjoy multiplayer FPS games — and id makes the best. Then again, I’ll probably buy it anyway ;). And, perhaps I’ll just have to try Return to Castle Wolfenstein for id multiplayer goodness.

There was a Slashdot story recently with a parody-history of the character Q*Bert. Seeing an opportunity, I asked about Q*Bert clones for the PC (since I know of none).

I also asked whether there were any decent Arkanoid clones for the PC (Arkanoid must be my favorite arcade-style game). I didn’t get an answer about Q*Bert clones, but entrippy pointed to Jardinains as a viable Arkanoid clone.

I had previously discovered DX Ball on my own, but Jardinains is even better. Though DX Ball is also fun (be sure to give it a try if you like the Arkanoid/breakout genre), its chief disadvantage is the scarcity of levels — I think I completed the game within a few days.

Jardinains doesn’t necessarily have more levels (I haven't finished the game, so I can’t be certain), but its levels are more intricate so they last longer anyhow. And, like any good Arkanoid clone, Jardinains has plenty of cool power-ups from laser-gun shooters to 1-Ups and ball-goes-through-everything powers.

As an interesting twist, Jardinains also features gnomes — yes, gnomes. The little guys “live” in some of the blocks and throw flower-pots onto the player’s paddle (these count for negative points if you run into them). However, if your ball hits the block housing a gnome, he falls of his perch — and, at this point, you can bounce him around for some extra points.

I’ve enjoyed Jardinains so far and I’d be rather temped to register it (as it is shareware) if I were properly employed. Its only disadvantage, perhaps, is that there is no save-game functionality nor level-codes; so, even advanced players that may have made it to level 9 in previous games still have to trudge through the easy level at the start of every game :-/.

I see that SimCity 4 has been released. Ahh, such memories of youth, playing that game (and its silly code-key on that red paper). I’m curious whether the game logic has changed much since the original, or whether the graphics are the primarily updates. Oh, I see that IGN has a review:

For the most part, gameplay follows suit with the earlier SimCity games, but this time around you can build on slopes and hills, which is a necessity for a landscape like San Francisco. Slopes have their drawbacks, though. While residents like the view from hills, industrial complexes won't locate on hills because they prefer flat, wide-open spaces.

Another nice feature is the addition of automatic roads when you built a block. Since all buildings must have street access, the game automatically builds side streets around your defined blocks. This really saves you time since you don't have to plot out your road system before laying down blocks. […]

(Link from MetaFilter)

I was amused by this article at MSNBC about the worst video games for console systems. Though it wasn’t even rated as most-bad, “Universal Studios Theme Park Adventure” was still impressively bad:

[...] Jaws, Jurassic Park, Backdraft, and Back to the Future have lines in front of them, and the only way to get in is to buy hats specific to each attraction.

And how, you may ask, do you buy the hats? Why, by picking up garbage.

I am not making this up. Walking around this virtual version of the Universal Studios Theme Park, you will find wadded up garbage littering every street. Picking this garbage up and hauling it to trash cans earns you points that you can redeem to purchase hats. […]