By Tom Fotherby on July 1, 2003
XBox,RPG,5/10 – June 2003
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I got this because it was the first 2-player co-operative RPG for the XBOX that I’d seen. It’s not a deep game, it’s a simple hack and slash with very little inventory management or character progression and a shallow dis-joined storyline.
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The graphics are state-of-the-art with vegetation blowing in the wind, rippling water and sparkling ice caverns. The choice of characters is the biggest let down, The choice between a retard, queer or tart wasn’t good enough for me. Multi-player co-operative mode is the games only redeeming feature, I like the way your forced to work together since the game-play isn’t split-screen. It did supply 12 hours of co-operative entertainment and was satisfying to finish, but I expected buckets more from a baldur’s Gate title.
Posted in Game Reviews |
By Tom Fotherby on July 1, 2003
GBA,Turn-based strategy,9/10 – June 2003
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Nintendo does chess. This is a game of tactics and like chess things aren’t left to chance, you can get to know the exact outcome of a clash between 2 units. Unfortunately it seems to be geared towards kids but you wont be able to win by force-in-numbers rather than skill. The units all have strengths and weaknesses and a attack-range and the key-to-success comes in balancing your forces so they are strong together. Victory over the opponent is satisfying.
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It’s a great game, very addictive and perfect for the handheld.
Killer App Award! > A reason to own a GBA
Posted in Game Reviews |
By Tom Fotherby on July 1, 2003
Fantasy, 8/10 – June 2003
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Voldemort is gaining strength and building an army but no one believes Harry about it except Dumbledore. The Ministry of Magic has made it their job to discredit them both, using the wizarding newspaper The Daily Prophet for slander. Dumbledore is avoiding Harry because Harry’s mind is linked in some way to Voldemort and Harry might accidentally give away the plans of the Order of the Phoenix.
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I enjoyed there being a meaner teacher than Snape and Harry continues to suffer under Umbridge’s Oppression. Despite this, he gains in power and starts building an army of pupils called the DA. Even though Voldemort and his followers are obsessed with purity of wizard blood (i.e. racist), Voldemort is a half-blood himself (In the same way Adolf Hitler was allegedly part-Jewish).
Posted in Book Reviews |
By Tom Fotherby on June 1, 2003
Chloe and I went to Maplins and bought a window kit (£10). Combined with a cold cathod tube (a crimbo present from martin) I think your’ll agree it is a good way to make the computer a more interesting feature of the house.
This wasn’t easy to do. A jigsaw was used to cut the hole but lineing it with rubber rim and shoving in the perspex was really fiddly.
Posted in Tech Journal | Tagged Hardware |
By Tom Fotherby on March 20, 2003
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Digital photo albums cannot compete with the magic of a normal album in your bookshelf but they can save money and are good if you want to put photos on a website. This is a 3.3 Megapixel camera but the big problem with it is that there’s a massive delay between pressing the button and it taking a photo. I always seem to lose the moment.
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Posted in Toys |
By Tom Fotherby on March 20, 2003
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Normally shows the time but can show my heart rate if I wear the special belt. I use it to exercise in a zone that is not too high or low (120-140). It’s really helpful.
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Posted in Toys |
By Tom Fotherby on March 20, 2003
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This big fat American beast is my first ever console and DVD player. The higher hardware spec, internal hard disk and promise of XBox live is why I chose to get this instead of the competition from Nintendo and Sony.
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Posted in Toys |
By Tom Fotherby on March 1, 2003
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We got ADSL broadband at 512k and at the same time we got a proper computer network. Broadband not only allows us to surf on two computers at the same time but because it’s “always on”, it allowed me to run this website from home for free!
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Posted in Toys |
By Tom Fotherby on February 1, 2003
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As a computer programmer, with my hands at a keyboard for up-to 12 hours a day, I practice Pen-Fu to exercise my fingers and prevent RSI.
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Pen-Fu is like Kung-Fu but with pens rather than combat :-). Think of Boris, the computer hacker in 007 Goldeneye… He was a novice pen ninja. Check out www.pentrix.com and www.superhandz.com to see some real stationary samurais. It is an addictive trick to pick up and can be annoying as hell to anyone who sits next to you.
Posted in Journal |
By Tom Fotherby on December 25, 2002
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Kix got me this flaring starting kit. I broke lots of things practising, except the bottle – which is unbreakable. I got quite good at it without water in the bottle but can’t do it for real.
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Posted in Toys |
By Tom Fotherby on December 25, 2002
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Kix got me four pub optics that dispense 25ml of anything. I’m not actually a big drinker but I like to make cocktails and these help me to keep track of appropriate measures.
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Posted in Toys |
By Tom Fotherby on December 25, 2002
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My travelling buddy with a friendly multi colour display which flashes and pulses with the music. MiniDisk might not be a hot technology any more but I’ve got lots of disks and it’s better than CD (much better).
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Posted in Toys |
By Tom Fotherby on September 1, 2002
XBOX,FPS,9/10 – August 2002
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There’s so many good things about Halo but if I was to name the best I would say it was the vehicles. When you get in a vehicle the view moves from 1st person to 3rd person and the feel of the game totally changes increasing variety and pace. Other AI players on your side can hop onto a vehicle that your piloting and fight along side you.
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Enemy AI is the 2nd excellent feature making combat so much fun. Each enemy offers a challenge which you have to tackle in unique ways. The storyline is classic sci-fi, full of twists, you are the “Master chief”, a rock-hard cyborg and of course you have to save the universe. There’s enough atmosphere in the game so that the storyline is able to be quite scary in places.
Killer App Award! > A reason to own a Xbox
Posted in Game Reviews | Tagged Halo |
By Tom Fotherby on September 1, 2002
XBOX,sport,9/10 – August 2002
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When you break these games down it is really just a exercise to memorize sequences of buttons. But with todays zillion-buttoned controllers, this is made difficult. There’s something about Tony Hawks games that gets you addicted so that you feel you have to complete all the tasks (but your’ll never be able to).
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Each task can take more than an hour of practising until you pull it off. But when everything comes together and you manage to string together a bunch of tricks in the right place it’s brilliant. A great game series.
Posted in Game Reviews |
By Tom Fotherby on August 1, 2002
The Afterburner is a do it yourself kit that lets you install a transparent lighted plate over the GBA’s LCD screen. Installation is pretty scary, you have to do some modification to the shell of the GBA itself and some soldering onto the GBA circuit board. It’s quite easy except for applying an adhesive strip of anti-reflective film to the LCD screen.
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The effect is an even and thorough illumination of the playing screen no matter what the lighting conditions.
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Posted in Tech Journal | Tagged Hardware |
