Games

I just came across this geography game called Globetrotter XL. They give you a city name, and you try to figure out where it is on a world map as quickly as possible. Points are calculated by how accurate you are in terms of distance, and how much time you used. As you advance through the levels, the game gets harder and harder (country border lines disappear from world map).

On my first attempt, I made it to level 7 with 7287 points. I'll see what I can do to improve it. I thought my geography was pretty good, but apparently I need a lot of work. I played a lot of war strategy games growing up, and it was pretty important to be able to know what country you were targeting. My knowledge of Western African countries is severely lacking.

Time well wasted

I stumbled upon the United Kingdom's Secret Intelligence Service website, home of the MI-6. What's interesting is that in their careers section, they have two different tests to see what type of career path you may be proficient at.

First test is for the position of Operational Officers.
Second test is for the position of Administrators.

I did the test and looks like I could do either position.

I have to admit that I did browse through their careers section, and their benefits are quite something. 25 days vacation plus 10.5 days public holidays! Unfortunately you have to be a British citizen to apply, so I'm very unqualified in that area. I wonder if they take loyal subjects from the Commonwealth though.

As you may know, I generally dislike cellphones. Talking on a cellphone while driving is even more concerning. However, texting while driving takes it to the next level, and I'm disturbed when I see that happening.

In either case, I came across a game simulation from the New York Times that measures how well you multitask while driving and texting. It's called, "Gauging Your Distraction."

Every time I come back to Victoria, I get a little shocked when I see people on their cellphone while driving because this practice has been banned in California. Then, a couple seconds pass, and then I remember that it's legal here.... for now.

Enjoy.

I came across this amazing Eve Online fan-made movie entitled "Day of Darkness II." It covers some of the epic history between the different races within Eve. The graphics are quite beautiful, and the creator chose a pretty awesome soundtrack. Enjoy.


I'm still playing Eve Online fairly casually these days. Currently I have two characters in the game. One of them is a trader who I derive most my wealth from; he buys and sells goods, trades in the marketplaces, and delivers goods. In less than 8 months of playing, I am making enough cash to never have to pay to play the game anymore. Eve Online allows you to spend in-game money to buy game time cards. My other character is a PVP pilot, specializing in flying stealth bombers. He's working towards flying capital ships, but this will take quite some time.

One of my co-workers was sending me a ton of YouTube video of old 80s cartoons that we used to watch like He-man, Transformers, and Tailspin. That led to a discussion about computer games we used to play as kids. One of the main games that I remember playing was The Oregon Trail, where you're trying to take your family across America in the 1800s.

I found an awesome site that actually has The Oregon Trail game. This is great because when I was a kid, I always had to wait my turn to play this game, but now I can play it as much and as long as I want. On first attempt, most my oxen and kids died during river crossings. I had no idea that man's deadliest predator were rivers.

Anyway, I am very much amused.

I came across this on reddit. It's a Flash application called the Daft Punk Console. Basically you hit buttons, and it'll play words from various Daft Punk songs. I'm currently listening to the Daft Punk - Alive 2007 album, so this was a timely find.

I'm hoping to try to use this thing on some conference call as a prank. I want to use it to say, "Do it, over", "Make it, faster", or "Never make it harder." Here's "Around The World / Harder Better Stronger Faster" from Daft Punk's Alive 2007 album:



Time well wasted.

This week has been extremely busy and chaotic, hence the lack of blog updates. In either case, a couple months ago, I picked up Eve Online which is a scifi massive multiplayer game. Don't worry, I am not hopelessly addicted to this game as the game isn't a massive time sink.

Anyway, a few people have been asking what it's like, so here's a video that highlights the combat aspect of the game. The video is entitled "War Has Come to Eve", and the graphics are absolutely gorgeous. Everything you see in the video is apparently from actual game footage. I say apparently because I'm on a much older and slower computer, so the graphics I see are no where near as pretty as this. This video scored bonus points for me because it features music from "All Along The Watchtowers" by Bear McCreary, which is one of my favourite songs from the Battlestar Galactica soundtrack.

I'll end this post now because I think I've exceeded my geek quota for the day.