tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4191102509613814533Thu, 03 Jul 2008 01:22:03 +0000http://www.sphinx-sanitarium.com/noreply@blogger.com (Sphinx)Blogger54125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4191102509613814533.post-6330394268221148338Thu, 03 Jul 2008 01:21:00 +00002008-07-02T19:22:03.751-06:00Gamespy's review of Mass Effect was sponsored by EA, that's the only conclusion I can make. What a knob slob.http://www.sphinx-sanitarium.com/2008/07/blog-post.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Sphinx)tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4191102509613814533.post-2058858403023993421Thu, 03 Jul 2008 01:05:00 +00002008-07-02T19:06:53.698-06:00This sums up comics nicely. I think I fall in the category of not being able to draw so I throw words around and maybe one or two will form a sentence that might (doubtful) make someone laugh or open dialog in the chat area. http://www.sphinx-sanitarium.com/2008/07/yup.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Sphinx)tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4191102509613814533.post-4922548405496080909Mon, 23 Jun 2008 23:22:00 +00002008-06-23T17:39:41.908-06:00Did you love Knights of Old Republic (KoTOR)? I sure as hell did so when Mass Effect came out I was filled with glee since I would have the opportunity to play another lite RPG. I actually prefer lite RPGs over their heavyweight counterparts since having to make Excel spreadsheets comparing armor ratings is not my idea of a good time. But getting some gear, credits and a few party members http://www.sphinx-sanitarium.com/2008/06/mass-effect-review.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Sphinx)tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4191102509613814533.post-6565035693322905352Fri, 30 May 2008 00:32:00 +00002008-05-29T18:44:29.904-06:001. The tutorials are not adequate. 2. There is no single player campaign. 3. Even though it is in space it appears you can only play along the X and Y axis. 4. It's a bit slower paced but much more open ended when you start playing. Even a four player size map is HUGE and if you don't play on an impossible difficulty level you can at least have some time to amass your forces and play around http://www.sphinx-sanitarium.com/2008/05/sins-of-solar-empire-2-hours-of.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Sphinx)tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4191102509613814533.post-9130140850176071831Wed, 07 May 2008 23:19:00 +00002008-05-07T17:26:14.636-06:00Ignoring for a moment that they are not talking about the next Castle Wolfenstein but this announcement for Doom 4 gets me quite excited. I know some didn't like Doom 3 but I did. Things jumped out, I shot them, they fell down dead and I moved on to the next little thing. That's all I ever asked from Doom and that gorgeous tramp never let me down. Straight up shooters like Doom are just like http://www.sphinx-sanitarium.com/2008/05/what-doom-4-you-say.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Sphinx)tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4191102509613814533.post-717591093549812941Wed, 26 Mar 2008 11:43:00 +00002008-03-26T05:47:52.323-06:00$1,931 is the cost of a midrange system to Tom's. I guess between their tee times and their squash matches, $1931 must seem like a reasonable price for a new system. They also list that they will have their top of the line system tomorrow. What will that be, the newest diamond encrusted IBM mainframe?http://www.sphinx-sanitarium.com/2008/03/thats-mid-range-system.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Sphinx)tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4191102509613814533.post-192229032622362782Wed, 26 Mar 2008 11:28:00 +00002008-03-26T05:30:15.795-06:00I don't think so. The list makes no mention of Serious Sam. If levels full of skeleton bulls and headless kamikazes doesn't make your list there truly isn't much point to your list.http://www.sphinx-sanitarium.com/2008/03/59-levels-to-play-before-you-die.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Sphinx)tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4191102509613814533.post-2328171040490086824Wed, 26 Mar 2008 11:24:00 +00002008-03-26T05:26:53.181-06:00I don't agree with this Firefox guy who says Safari is malware. I thought malware was placed on your system without consent, this Safari browser is given to a person as an option for installation. When I saw this update for Safari appear I simply closed the window and didn't update any of my Apple software. Sort of like what I do when a Firefox update is first put out and I'm told to update http://www.sphinx-sanitarium.com/2008/03/safari-on-your-hard-drive.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Sphinx)tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4191102509613814533.post-6318825681065436424Wed, 26 Mar 2008 11:19:00 +00002008-03-26T05:22:22.344-06:00This article makes me feel better about what happened last night and about what is soon to probably happen. I come home from being out Tuesday night and even though its getting late and I have to get up at 4:30AM I decide to fire up EQ2 and check out if anything is going on with my teammates. There isn't anything going on so I start up a group and we don't get done until 11:30 clearing out a http://www.sphinx-sanitarium.com/2008/03/sleep-at-work.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Sphinx)tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4191102509613814533.post-1061574250470665911Mon, 24 Mar 2008 13:48:00 +00002008-03-24T08:02:28.908-06:00Okay, I was away for a while, or at least not posting. No excuses. As consolation, I'll give you all a brief review of the various games I've been playing. 1. Portal -- By far the best game of the past year. The end credit music and final boss fight are their own reward. 2. Half-Life 2: Episode One -- Meh. 3. Half-Life 2: Episode Two -- About 1000 times better than Episode One. Car chases, http://www.sphinx-sanitarium.com/2008/03/yeah-i-was-out-now-im-back.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Sphinx)tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4191102509613814533.post-6542254420960598703Sat, 29 Dec 2007 22:10:00 +00002007-12-29T16:12:21.071-06:00Most of you have probably already played Portal so this is for everyone else. Go play Portal. As the guys at Penny Arcade have stated, it has zero replay value but the one time you play it will leave you a happy gamer. For everyone who has played it: That was some good cake!http://www.sphinx-sanitarium.com/2007/12/portal-from-valve.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Sphinx)tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4191102509613814533.post-4069219923466636427Sun, 02 Dec 2007 01:15:00 +00002007-12-01T19:27:48.492-06:00Back and madder than ever. This times my cockles are in their uproariest due to the apparent firing of an editor at Gamespot since he gave a negative review for Kane and Lynch. Should we be surprised by this? No of course not. When a site gives Black and White (still one of the worst games ever in my book) a 9+ rating you know they are in serious cahoots with the developers. But the apparent http://www.sphinx-sanitarium.com/2007/12/all-right-dammit-im-back-for-more.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Sphinx)tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4191102509613814533.post-7502437760455665432Tue, 25 Sep 2007 11:52:00 +00002007-09-25T05:54:20.691-06:00Why the hell would I post something about Tetris? Because after watching this video I didn't know you could BEAT Tetris. But this guy did it appears. The video starts getting really interesting at about the 3:30 mark. It reminded me of those last few minutes in the old movie War Games where WOPR starts fighting itself.http://www.sphinx-sanitarium.com/2007/09/tetris.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Sphinx)tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4191102509613814533.post-6057894985485174116Thu, 30 Aug 2007 17:43:00 +00002007-08-30T11:48:35.807-06:00Quake Wars is gold. Let's hope it isn't a brick of something else. Someone still needs to explain why there is no in-game voice over IP. http://www.sphinx-sanitarium.com/2007/08/finally.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Sphinx)tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4191102509613814533.post-3986578068721807284Thu, 23 Aug 2007 01:18:00 +00002007-08-22T19:45:45.359-06:00People are going nuts about Bioshock but I don't think I'll be one of them right now, at least not at full price. Oh it looks great of course and some people put some loving detail into the environment to capture the 50s vibe of overtly happy white people with a hint of drab on the underside, but since you're crawling around in dark corridors using robots to help you fight, how is that differenthttp://www.sphinx-sanitarium.com/2007/08/bioshock-demo.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Sphinx)tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4191102509613814533.post-4661169690303378533Mon, 06 Aug 2007 01:15:00 +00002007-08-05T19:18:14.721-06:00This ZIP file provides some game menu screenshots I grabbed with all 12 map names for QuakeWars. While you can't play the maps against the computer right now this at least shows you a little tease of the map names and their overall theme. There appears to be several fights occurring around buildings, one near a slipgate, and one urban fighting map. A pretty good mix of stuff.http://www.sphinx-sanitarium.com/2007/08/little-bit-more-info-for-quakewars.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Sphinx)tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4191102509613814533.post-9135746850461737206Sun, 05 Aug 2007 19:05:00 +00002007-08-05T13:09:52.155-06:00Quake Wars went down what I consider a bad path by putting some of the config files for the games in a person's Documents folder in their profile. To me, that's just an extra layer of complexity when previous games simply put the config files with the rest of the game. Perhaps there's a reason but I don't comprehend it. Regardless, between Beta1 and Beta2 of QuakeWars it appears the config http://www.sphinx-sanitarium.com/2007/08/quick-config-heads-up-on-quakewars.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Sphinx)tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4191102509613814533.post-1898235185947386535Sun, 05 Aug 2007 16:28:00 +00002007-08-05T13:14:00.725-06:00Another good year of Qcon has come and gone and so here comes my little write-up about Quakecon for all of those who don't want to swim through the bigger sites rundowns. First and foremost, let's talk about Left4Dead. Time did not permit me to stay and try the game (sorry Chet!) but I did watch others play and this game presents some excellent possibilities. In the kiosk setup they let four http://www.sphinx-sanitarium.com/2007/08/lowdown-skinny-from-quakecon-07.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Sphinx)tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4191102509613814533.post-6931936262328319480Sun, 29 Jul 2007 05:19:00 +00002007-07-28T23:44:13.144-06:00Well, it appears that it is that time. The time when the Sanitarium will get some actual hands on testing of new software and try to post some original content rather than my usual bit of pablum. Quakecon 2007 is in town starting Thursday and of course I'll be there. With no Quake Wars officially out yet though there's no need to go to the BYOC so I'll eschew that in favor of just going to a http://www.sphinx-sanitarium.com/2007/07/quakecon-07-fast-approaching.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Sphinx)tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4191102509613814533.post-4556231338511825793Mon, 23 Jul 2007 23:47:00 +00002007-07-23T17:49:21.688-06:00While I will freely admit that I had planned to go the Quakecon LAN Party this year (no Quake Wars now though so no reason to haul equipment up there), I'm completely and totally befuddled as to why Gabe over at Penny Arcade would admit and even follow through with going to a Pokemon tournament. They've posted a lot of weird stuff on their site over the years but those posts for 7/23 actually http://www.sphinx-sanitarium.com/2007/07/look-behind-you-you-done-crossed-line.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Sphinx)tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4191102509613814533.post-8902155779381625904Wed, 11 Jul 2007 12:42:00 +00002007-07-11T06:59:24.341-06:00The following is my working theory as to how Spielberg and EA are teaming up to make a game or two. Spielberg and EA CEO John Riccitiello are sitting by the pool of Spielberg's place being fanned with one thousand dollar bills by Jamaican helper girls. They're both having a good laugh about how well each of them is doing. EA has been taking larger and larger chunks of the game market and http://www.sphinx-sanitarium.com/2007/07/spielberg-and-ea.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Sphinx)tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4191102509613814533.post-2421642347740120511Tue, 03 Jul 2007 13:06:00 +00002007-07-03T07:09:26.450-06:00Techspot gives a heads up about a little known patch Microsoft put out for their operating system if you are a user of a dual core Intel processor. I would suggest setting up a system save point on your machine or doing a full backup before running this since this type of patch is getting into some deep stuff with where Windows and the hardware interact. Microsoft site has the patch herehttp://www.sphinx-sanitarium.com/2007/07/unnoticed-windows-patch-for-x2-cpu.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Sphinx)tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4191102509613814533.post-1451023531811033362Wed, 27 Jun 2007 22:46:00 +00002007-06-27T16:47:56.964-06:00This site is a must read for everyone if you want to tweak the game.http://www.sphinx-sanitarium.com/2007/06/tweaking-quake-wars.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Sphinx)tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4191102509613814533.post-25612351904264014Wed, 27 Jun 2007 03:01:00 +00002007-06-26T21:08:05.145-06:00It's all the rage right now so let's gripe about Quake Wars. Actually I'm not going to get all angsty so if you're looking for someone to bleed their spleen you might want to hit the Quake Wars community site. Some people there really should get a gold star for their levels of yelling. I was able to acquire a license key to the beta test and so far it's living up to a lot of the expectations http://www.sphinx-sanitarium.com/2007/06/hey-everbody-lets-bitch-about-beta-test.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Sphinx)tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4191102509613814533.post-240475440434592611Sun, 17 Jun 2007 23:30:00 +00002007-06-17T17:31:33.695-06:00This makes me feel a little better about Quake Wars. Carry on.http://www.sphinx-sanitarium.com/2007/06/well-okay.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Sphinx)