Random Posts
  • Notice: this blog is...
    As some of you have no doubt noticed, due to personal reasons I've been fantastically lax at writing...
  • When this baby hits ...
    After rather more false starts and cockups than I'd have liked, and seven years of having the idea...
  • Mods I've playe...
    Mods are something I've seldom played with, historically speaking, but more and more lately I'm...
  • Don't cross the...
    I'd been meaning to pick up a copy of Ghostbusters: The Video Game for quite some time, but had...
  • We need new techies...
    The recent Guardian article by Tom Watson on why MPs need to play videogames to understand them got me...
  • Ay Pee Bee...
    Now that the first phase of beta testing for the long-awaited APB is almost at an end, I thought it was...
Recent Comments
  • Steve Says : I Like it... Suggestions? having no idea what you ha...
  • Beardy Says : Frankly I'll be amazed if I manage it, but it's worth a...
  • Paul Potter Says : A fantastic idea. I couldn't do this myself....
  • Paul Potter Says : Pure awesome. And love that flashing RAM....
  • Paul Potter Says : A superb bit of blogging there. Spot on. I was brought ...
  • Shinola Says : Instead they should put all the MOD funding into formin...
  • Shinola Says : the REAL reason they shouldn't make a sequel is i havn'...
  • Beardy Says : Thank you! It's nice to be back :)...
  • David Nikel Says : Welcome back :-)...
Lifestream

  1. Today

    1. RT @ghalfacree: The current episode of NCIS on FX uses Tom Lehrer's Chemical Element Song as a major plot device. This pleases me. [Beardy]

      3h ago via Twitter

  2. Yesterday

    1. RT @deathboyuk: Sick of reading the press regurgitating the government's plaintive cry "wikileaks put our troops in danger". NO. *YOU* did. [Beardy]

      3:46pm via Twitter

  3. July 27th

    1. RT @gilesgoatboy: http://www.last.fm/robots.txt [Beardy]

      10:32pm via Twitter

    2. RT @onecondoms: We’re rewarding 1 lucky @onecondoms follower a year’s supply of condoms on Friday. RT this to enter. [Beardy]

      10:30pm via Twitter

    3. Is it just me who really doesn't give a toss about Starcraft? [Beardy]

      5:11pm via Twitter

    4. Surprised that Royal Fail's tracking facility claims my package is 'out for delivery' at this hour, as it was when I checked at lunch. [Beardy]

      11:20pm via Twitter

  4. July 25th

    1. Wow. Absolutely adored #Sherlock. Best thing on TV this year, apart from that other @steven_moffat thing. [Beardy]

      9:32pm via Twitter

    2. RT @steven_moffat: Sherlock is on at 9.00pm tonight on BBC1 - I've been too modest to mention it thus far. [Beardy]

      7:13pm via Twitter

    3. Well, BH was supposed to be the warmup for a night of gaming, but ended up being all I played. And bloody hell, is that the time. Whoops. [Beardy]

      2:53am via Twitter

    4. I've been playing Beat Hazard for about 2 hours so far. Got half the Steam achievements and ranked up to Captain. Safe to say I like it. [Beardy]

      11:02pm via Twitter

  5. July 24th

    1. Night of gaming has so far been spent cultivating epilepsy - or to put it accurately, playing Beat Hazard with some disco in a dark room. [Beardy]

      9:27pm via Twitter

    2. Eating dinner with family at the table, but since they insist on having Alan Carr on the radio, I've put my headphones on. [Beardy]

      6:32pm via Twitter

    3. I've been so very busy lately I've not played a game in like a month. So fuck it. This is my day off. Who's up for a game of something? [Beardy]

      5:37pm via Twitter

    4. Though the notion of a free BBC app damaging the rest of the market is nonsense. I still have 11 other news apps and will still use them. [Beardy]

      12:05am via Twitter

    5. Wow. The BBC News app is quite impressively good. May even surpass my previous favourite news app (Guardian). [Beardy]

      12:03am via Twitter

  6. July 23rd

    1. Remind me never to come here again. Ever. [Beardy]

      1:18pm via Twitter

    2. I appear to be in Driffield. Quite why, I'm not entirely sure. [Beardy]

      12:51pm via Twitter

  7. July 22nd

    1. LOL, minor logic glitch in my Core Graphics code here. http://twitpic.com/27mp5i [Beardy]

      6:09pm via Twitter

    2. Shared 2 photos.

      6:09pm via TwitPic

    3. Have just returned from the post office, where I've sent off the forms for company registration. Huzzah. It's a good afternoon. [Beardy]

      3:18pm via Twitter

    4. RT @Boris: Quora wants me to change the QuoraStats.com name. Twitter allows us to use TwitterCounter. Quora doesn't want to go there. [Beardy]

      12:39pm via Twitter

    5. And one I didn't screencap, but would totally play if it existed - Trivial Pursuit and Zombies. [Beardy]

      12:30pm via Twitter

    6. The label on this app icon creates some amusing juxtaposition possibilities. http://twitpic.com/27jxu5 [Beardy]

      12:21pm via Twitter

  8. July 21st

    1. It's ridiculous how much more I smoke when I'm programming. Can't concentrate without it. [Beardy]

      4:45pm via Twitter

    2. Dad: "Can you spot what's going wrong here?" Me: "Yes, you've typed an email address into your web browser." Nurse! [Beardy]

      9:00am via Twitter

  9. July 20th

    1. TfL are having a laugh with their licensing fees. £1500 to put a tube map in my app? Maybe not then, eh. [Beardy]

      7:03pm via Twitter

    2. Starting to realise the sheer magnitude of the project I'm working on. Oh well, might be finished by christmas. [Beardy]

      4:53pm via Twitter

  10. July 19th

    1. Quite surprised to find an episode of I'm Sorry I Haven't a Clue from 1985 on iPlayer. [Beardy]

      1:30pm via Twitter

  11. July 18th

    1. Why does my brain think this is an appropriate time to wake up? Stupid brain. [Beardy]

      3:46am via Twitter

  12. July 17th

    1. Tainted Knob #changelovetoknobsongs #shouldprobablyseeadoctoraboutthat [Beardy]

      9:07pm via Twitter

    2. ... for the iPhone app I'm working on. However I've written it down and will see if it still makes sense tomorrow. Alcohol and C do not mix. [Beardy]

      8:26pm via Twitter

    3. I have discovered that old writer's conceit of alcoholic inspiration. Albeit for programming. After five pints I've had a *genius* idea... [Beardy]

      8:24pm via Twitter

    4. We're making a summer bonfire. At the pub. Waiting to be escorted from the premises. http://twitpic.com/267urp [Beardy]

      7:37pm via Twitter

    5. Beardy: http://twitpic.com/267urp We're making a summer bonfire. At the pub. Waiting to be escorted from the premises.

      Shared Beardy: http://twitpic.com/267urp We're making a summer bonfire. At the pub. Waiting to be escorted from the premises..

      7:37pm via TwitPic

    6. Heading out for yet more drinks with the delightful @harmonyhex despite having had no sleep whatsoever. Larks! [Beardy]

      3:04pm via Twitter

    7. Can't help but notice it hasn't rained at all since I brought the laundry in from the rain. Fuck you too, weather. [Beardy]

      12:38pm via Twitter

    8. Giving actual, serious, proper consideration to how much my only real PC (yes, the time machine) would fetch on eBay. [Beardy]

      8:26am via Twitter

    9. BOFH: Little ups and downs • The Register

      3:56am via Facebook

  13. July 16th

    1. RT @seldo: In a brilliant move, Apple announces that it will be sourcing raw material for the millions of new cases by skimming the Gulf ... [Beardy]

      10:23pm via Twitter

    2. Oh and there's the server rack in the corner of my room, for completion's sake. No idea what that's doing. Running Skynet, for all I know. [Beardy]

      5:21am via Twitter

    3. ... laptop is showing me news, iPhone is providing streaming music, GP2X in my hands playing Sonic. If you were wondering. [Beardy]

      5:14am via Twitter

    4. I love living in the future. I have three computing devices about my person, despite the fact that I'm in bed. [Beardy]

      5:13am via Twitter

  14. July 15th

    1. Oh, new iPhone SDK as well. Still no Xcode 4 though, grr. [Beardy]

      7:19pm via Twitter

    2. Ah, splendid. iOS 4.0.1 now on my iPhone 3GS, to fix the reception issues I wasn't having. Erm, alrighty. [Beardy]

      6:59pm via Twitter

    3. iphone 4 bumpers - the shocking flaw : ryan mcmanus's blog : : the barbarian group

      12:36am via Facebook

  15. July 14th

    1. For those not watching BBC news, he just came out of his hole to tell us the England team lost cos they didn't play very well. Very astute. [Beardy]

      5:28pm via Twitter

    2. What actually is the point of David Beckham? [Beardy]

      5:24pm via Twitter

    3. Correction: thunderstorm. [Beardy]

      4:57pm via Twitter

    4. It's quite an optimistic ice cream van driver who comes by playing his music during a torrential rain storm. [Beardy]

      4:55pm via Twitter

    5. Would I blow everyone's mind if I ate dessert first? [Beardy]

      1:02am via Twitter

    Upstream



Notice: this blog is closed

As some of you have no doubt noticed, due to personal reasons I've been fantastically lax at writing any content for SmokesWithWolves for some time now, and have therefore decided the best thing to do is take it down until I decide what to do with it.

Ay Pee Bee

Now that the first phase of beta testing for the long-awaited APB is almost at an end, I thought it was high time to share my experiences with it. I've had a whale of a time testing it, so much so I've been shunning other commitments – gaming or otherwise – to make way for the limited play windows. For those of you who haven't heard of APB, it's an MMO from Realtime Worlds, the relatively new software house founded by the chap who invented Grand Theft Auto – and the lazy but somewhat accurate description I've often heard of APB is that it's GTA: The...

Don't cross the streams

I'd been meaning to pick up a copy of Ghostbusters: The Video Game for quite some time, but had never quite got round to it – until I noticed it as part of Steam's recent 5-day long 1-day only spectacular sale, where at £7.50 it would have been rude not to buy it. So I did, and three days later I'd completed it. Finishing a game at all is an incredibly rare occurrence for me, never mind within a few days of buying it, so I just thought I should mention that and perhaps attempt to explain why. Just to be clear, this won't be a review – partly because I don't...

When this baby hits 8.8GHz…

After rather more false starts and cockups than I'd have liked, and seven years of having the idea to do this in my head… Ladies and gentlemen, may I finally present the Delorean time machine PC, complete with flux capacitor.

We need new techies

The recent Guardian article by Tom Watson on why MPs need to play videogames to understand them got me thinking. If you haven't already read the article, go read it then come back. Done? Good. This sparked a conversation on a messageboard I visit, specifically regarding the comment that kids aren't taught programming any more, they're taught Office. This is sadly very true, and something that led me to another realisation – at one point, kids *were* taught programming, but not by their school. I can only speak from a British perspective on this, so if you're an American...

Mods I've played

Mods are something I've seldom played with, historically speaking, but more and more lately I'm stumbling on interesting-looking conversions for games I own that are too compelling to pass up. A case in point, and the mod that prompted me to raise the subject, is the superb tech demo for Ashura: Dark Reign, a Sonic the Hedgehog-themed total conversion for Unreal Tournament 2004. Having played this for only a few minutes, I was amazed by the technical achievement and attention to detail – had I not known it was a mod, I could almost have believed I was playing the latest Sonic Adventure...

Welcome

Hello and welcome to my new blog, SmokesWithWolves. Some of you may know me already, or some of you might be backreading old posts at some point in the future, in which case I've prepared a little introduction below. I thought I'd start by explaining the idea behind this site. I've loosely maintained a blog in some form since early 2003, initially on LiveJournal, then through Windows Live Spaces and ultimately WordPress on my former website – and if having a personal blog about my life for six years taught me one thing, it's that nobody gives a shit about reading tales...