Lone Wolf & Other Books Available Free Online!

Long before the emergence of virtual worlds, many of us had played in make believe worlds framed by books like Advanced Dungeon & Dragons and other Role-Playing Games book. Among the more successful ones include those Lone Wolf books by Joe Dever. I personally have played the whole Lone Wolf series till book 12, as well as the 'World of Lone Wolf', Freeway Warrior and 1 or 2 Combat Heroes books. I still have a number of these books packed away somewhere in storage boxes.

So in part nostalgic, in part curiosity, I visited the Project Aon site when I heard that they are putting all Lone Wolf books online, and for free!

It seems Joe Dever has given his permission to re-work all the books onto online version. I tried the 1st book "Flight from the Dark", and I must say the experience is not bad. There is a Java script of the character sheet, which makes updating of items easy. The script also include a combat function, so no more need to 'point the tip of the pencil' at the random number page of the book. For those who want to run everything online concurrently, the Project Aon team also provided a 'StatsKeeper" program that displayed the character sheet on the left while the player plays the game using the right panel. Cool!

The Project Aon team took on this role when they realised that the books are no longer published, and ever since then there is a renewed interest in Lone Wolf. Perhaps there is limited publication of the books, but I can still find a number of these books in the second hand bookstores. Moreover, I think the Lone Wolf game may be made as an online MMORPG soon, based on news that Joe Dever is working with Ksatria Gameworks on the project.

MyMinicity reaching 51 population

After 7 days of play, MyMinicity has reached a population of 51. The rate of growth is nothing great, but along the way I discover a few things. Here's a gif of the different screen-shots I took. Gif was created using online gifninja. The gameplay is very simple, and I guess that's what attracted people. With each population growth you could see little changes on the map that is quite interesting. (afternote: blogger doesnt support direct gif file upload so i break it into a few jpeg files.)

Firstly, those tools I recommended earlier could be used to grow the village by 1 population each. This is because these tools will 'query' the website about the statistics, and thus contribute to 1 population. Thus I've searched around, and also found this Japanese website which does comparison of two cities, and could be used to grow the population as well. Just key in the name of the two cities at the bottom of the site will do.

Secondly is that once the city hits population above 50, there are other options available for growing industry, transport...etc. I only have the option of industry so far. Once I reach other options, I'll do an update of what each means. :)

Simple Review of MyMiniCity

I was first attracted to the MyMiniCity when I saw the MSN message from my MSN buddy. Then I did a simple Wiki search and found the description of the game. After a couple of months, I finally decided to give it a try.

Signing up for the game is very simple. First you select a country (I couldn't find mine, apparently the selection is not comprehensive), and then you give your city a name. Voila! That's it! The starting city would have 1 inhabitant, and you need visitors daily to help the city grow. That's the simple mechanics of the game, i.e. attract visitorship. The more visitors per day, the faster it grows. Once a certain size is reached (i.e. 50), there will be other options available.

After starting the city, I searched around for various tools. Found a couple of tools and simple tricks to help grow the city. Other than asking for friends to visit the page, a player could also put up a java script of the minicity onto his blog to monitor the development. One good example of the script could be found at the WidgetBox. Here's a pic of the widget.

There are other sites that provide pop-up windows for blogs that automatically link to the MiniCity. I think that is not as good a suggestion though for the blog visitors since many people do not like pop-ups.

Another useful tool for monitoring the statistics of the MiniCity could be found here, where the website offer comparison between two different MiniCities. Another site that offers statistics could be found here. After 'playing' the game for 2 days, and irritating my friends with requests for 'clicks', I got the city to a size of 13 population. Guess I'll explore more about MiniCity and provide more comments next time.

Computer Games & Allied Technology 08

I went to the Computer Games and Allied Technology 08 on day two of the event. The particularly interesting sessions to me would be the ones on the rights ownership in virtual worlds, and the use of virtual worlds for scientific collaboration. Paul Bourke from the University of Western Australia presented an interesting example where scientists collaborated on the creation of a replicate site in Australia for a telescope. He also gave examples of how 2nd Life could be used to visualise 3D molecules. What is interesting to me is how we could model virtual objects using real world data. Incorporate this concept with existing mapping tools like Google Earth, it is highly possible that we could experience 'mirror worlds' creation much sooner than we thought.

Pic of a booth at the event

Virtual worlds are also no longer just platforms for recreational games, as evident from the numerous news articles and developments in this area. That was also quite well covered by the different CGAT sessions about the use of such tools for learning. What is remarkable is that people have been talking about it since 2002 or earlier (see this BBC article), but this concept is still not widely adopted.

Oh well, having more of such seminars / conferences would definitely profile the benefits of virtual worlds to more mainstream audience. Of course, after these uses become mainstream, the difficult questions of who owns what rights, and how much of the revenue should go to which 'creators' would be a big headache for consideration. :)

Rise of the P2P Economy

Peer to Peer (P2P) systems, where computers (or nodes) are linked up within a network into a mesh like configuration, have its beginning in newsgroup for spread of news. Subsequently P2P is used for sharing of music, video, and even voice data in real time. There have been many controversies involving P2P, where companies are sued, and network providers like the ISPs decide to 'manage' traffic for P2P. This even resulted in some suggestion of a legislation just for P2P, i.e. the P2P Bill of Rights.

Interestingly, the evolution of P2P has reached a new level, and now the concept has even evolved to include direct e-commerce. We have the Havard Business Review listing P2P Economy as one of the breakthrough ideas for 2008. The HBR listing feels that P2P economy has come, when consumers become consumer-producers that transact on a micro-scale with micro-incomes for individuals.

Personally I feel this trend has existed before 2008, since we have already heard of the term 'pro-sumers' sometime back. The only addition is the use of P2P concept, and the direct involvement of micro-income streams. Micro-income stream as a business model, is made more popular with Zilo. Zilo allows individuals to easily add a shop front on their blogs and websites, and essentially acts as the middle man between the actual goods manufacturers and the 'pro-sumers', i.e. retailers. Individuals are now retailers, with their own peers, e.g. blog visitors,as the consumers. Zilo offers over 6 million products for 'sale' and each sale results in about 10% commission for the 'pro-sumer'. Not bad, I bet the 10% commission paid is cheaper than what an actual shop rental would have cost.

Is this trend going to continue? I bet it will, and I think the industry knows this as well. Seems like Amazon banned Zilo. Not too surprising. Would this invite more 'protest' and barriers from those who feel threatened or who want to have a share in this new revenue pie? Yes again I think.

At least I think the ISPs who want to 'manage' P2P traffic will have greater justification now to charge more for P2P traffic, since the P2P traffic is used to generate income by the subscribers. Since ISPs generally charge different broadband rates for consumers and businesses, they will want to charge some 'P2P rate' in-between these normal rates for the 'pro-sumers'. If they cannot charge the individuals directly, they will want to charge the service providers, i.e. Zilo.

Next would be the tax authority. Individuals selling small items online at auction sites are not big worries for the tax authority, since how much could they make? A few thousands per year for the minority of successful sellers? If the amount is significant, the authorities can easily track the individuals down. However, using such P2P economy concept, the manufacturer of goods / products could be overseas, while the 'local' shopfront of 'pro-sumers' are technically not subject to any tax. Traditionally the wholesale providers who bring in the good have to declare and pay tax. The retailers who sold the products have to pay corporate income tax. 'Pro-sumers' belong to neither categories, and it is almost impossible to track the transactions of 'pro-sumers' nor are the 'pro-sumers' require to maintain accounting books. This would be an interesting mess.

Despite these 'barriers', I still think P2P economy is the way to go. Maybe Zilo wouldn't be the most successful case, but there will be others. Napster failed (in a way) but Bittorent came along and now it is a mainstream activity. There is no way for any corporates or government to stop Internet development driven by the whole of Internet users. They can stop one or two, but others will spring up. Internet users would embrace such P2P concepts for the simple reason that they can participate in these activities, and also cut down the middle-men (for the commerce part) for better profits. Since there is a demand from the Internet users, someone will come in to fill the gap.

As for how far such a concept of P2P economy would go, and what forms it will take in the years to come, it is anyone's guess. Those who ride this tide early will be the next successful Internet icon. :)

Google Sky Maps

The Google Sky maps are sort of old news since it is made available since last year on Google Earth (Google Earth just released the latest version 4.3 with a lot of features, e.g. integrated streetview & more realistic buildings). You could also get the html version via the http://www.google.com/sky/ Playing around with the site is quite fun, since it simply reveals the view of whatever you can see in the sky. Search for a planet, or constellation and you can get it easily. Once you are bored with looking at the sky, you could also view the moon and Mars. The 'About Google Sky' page also gives you a lot of interesting information about how the pictures are obtained...etc. Looking at Google Sky is like experiencing another different world.

So far so good.... and here comes the not so good part.

I want to look at what is happening to the sky right above me! Using the html website, I can't! Or at least I need to get some 'Right Ascension and declination' thingy figure out first. Now that is the difficult part. I know using Google Earth will solve the problem, but realistically I don't really want to load that software just to see my sky (and the objects) right? zzz.

Did some search using Google hoping to find a conversion tool or something so that I can find out the exact "right ascension and declination' but couldn't. Found this YouTube clip instead, that makes me more irritated actually. If anyone knows of such conversion tool, drop me a comment k? Thanks!

For those interested in Google Earth 4.3, where Google Sky is already earlier integrated inside, you could have a preview of it on YouTube:

A Singapore Mirror World (not yet but coming)

Imagine a virtual world that parallels the real world. This virtual world will have buildings, streets, objects that exist and are located at exactly the same reference as the real world. This virtual world will have an Orchard Road, a Suntec City, a Junction 8, with shops, walls and objects just exactly as the real Orchard Road, Suntec, and Junction 8.

Fantasy? No, it's actually an old concept.

The concept was first explored in the book "Mirror Worlds" by David Gelernter in 1991, i.e. 17 years ago! Back then technology can't put such a concept to reality.

Today it can. Yes, it can! Look at Google Earth. The software already allows a full rendition of good satellite maps that allow for zooming. Add 3D buildings to it, and viola there you have it! There is at least one such city around, i.e. Berlin.

In Singapore, we also have a group of people trying to put virtual buildings that match the real ones. The group discuss their findings (and offer many other mash-ups) at the SinGeo website. Of course, having a rendered object doesn't give the same feel as the real ones, i.e. some features (like botched paint job, or faded tiles..etc) wouldn't be reflected. But technology is improving, and there are other initiatives around that could help. There is Google Street View, but that's only street level view of real world. Google Street View is not the only initiative around, there are others, e.g Microsoft's similar project.

Personally what I feel is lacking is the interactivity between these Mirror World objects and their real life counter-parts. I don't think there is any actual example yet of a Mirror World avatar shopping through, say, Borders, browsing a virtual book at a book launch, and be given the choice of either a) purchase a digital copy (e.g. pdf format) of the book, or b) order a real hard copy that will be delivered to a physical address. In such an example, the book launch could take place simultaneously in both real and Mirror World, with the latter reflecting the buzz and happenings in real-time. I reckon the 'feel' will be very different than watching a real broadcast of the event. You can't interact in the broadcast at least, and neither can you 'move' and view the event from multiple angles. Such a Mirror World service will allow for many more people to be present and interact at the event, a value proposition that is both commercially as well as socially appealing.

I guess the developments in these areas still need time, and I wouldn't be surprised that Mirror Worlds become as common place as existing virtual worlds (e.g. 2nd Life) in 4-5 years time. In the mean while, here's a YouTube video of a virtual F1 race through a somewhat Mirror World area of Singapore, done by Earth@Sg folks. Enjoy!



Here's another version done using Google Earth. Heh... eh both done by same group of people?


Afternote (23 Apr): SingTel released a plyable F1 simulator, which could be downloaded here. So you need not just watch the YouTube, but you could play the simulator and experienced the night race yourself!

What type of a MMORPG gamer are you?

Sometime back a friend passed me this website done by the Daedalus Project, where after going through 39 questions, a profile of the gamer could be generated. An analysis of the profile is done against 3200 MMORPG players. Profile includes Achievement, Socializing, and Immersion with 3-4 subcomponents and there is this chart that marks out the component:

The Daedalus Project is interesting because it also showcases the preference of many MMORPG players, which I feel maybe a subtle reflection of how they may want themselves to be seen in real life. Example, many players reflect an average height or slightly taller height for their avatars, and they choose average or attractive looks for their characters. The site has more opinions by the organiser.

Worth a read, some of the comments (for example role reversal) are especially interesting.

Population of Online Gamers in Singapore

I am very curious just to find out how many online gamers are there in Singapore, primarily because I'm one of them. After attending the Cabal event at Suntec, and also other previous online games events, I do think there is a sizeable online gamers population here.

So I do a simple search, and got some statistics from the Infocomm Development Authority website, which gave only percentage figures. These are what I got from their survey done in 2006. Still not used to making tables in blog, so the centre figures I'll fill in brackets instead.

Age (Internet Users) % of Users who use Internet for games
10 to 14 yrs (84%) 58%
15 to 29 yrs (81%) 40%
30 to 44 yrs (66%) 24%
45 to 59 yrs (46%) 26%
60 yrs and above (21%) 0%

But these are just percentage terms. So I went to the Department of Stats and drew out the population figures for 2006. The figures for the 5 groups are 134.3k, 362.7k, 462k, 407.7k, and 166.2k respectively. So I multiplied them together and got this:

Age Online Gamers (sort of) (in thousands)
10 to 14 yrs 65.4
15 to 29 yrs 117.5
30 to 44 yrs 73.2
45 to 59 yrs 48.8
60 yrs and above 0

Total of 304.8k online gamers in small population of 4.5 millions! Wow!! Heh heh heh, so I can tell people that online gaming is indeed a culture now, especially with more generous government fundings to create virtual worlds for us the online 'residents'.

South Park Episodes - Legally Free Online!

You can watch South Park for free now! Of course, it would be the latest episode. The latest episode will first air on TV, then they will it online for a week, take it down, and put it back up on the site permanently.

Heh, the website is http://www.southparkstudios.com/

Apparently the creators struck a deal with Viacom cos' the creators themselves are 'really sick of having to download our own show illegally all the time', and so the site is created.

This is a good business model that will work better than forbidding anyone from downloading any copies of such creative works. The reasons are simple, merchandise and viral marketing!

There is more money to be made in merchandise, so offering the episodes for free is a simple and good way to popularise the associated brand. In this case I'm sure South Park is already very popular and doesn't need any more publicity, but heh they could definitely earn from these merchandise.

Offering free downloads online aids viral marketing. Telling your friends that a particular show is good without showing the friends the product is less effective. The friends still need to find legal copies of the show, or borrow yours for a good preview. Offering free views online simply means you can point them to the site, and almost immediately get a good preview!

Hmm wonder if others, e.g. Jap animes... etc would follow South Park? Heh.

Blizzard versu Botters - Who is right?

Just read the news on Virtually Blind about the court case between Blizzard and the botters, i.e. WoWGliders. What is most interesting is the enclosed Castronova's expert report on botters.

Firstly I must say that I dislike botters, and secondly, I like and I play World of Warcraft (without use of any bot programs!).

However, there are many parts of Castronova's arguments that I disagree with. He argues that there is unfairness felt by players when other players use the bots. Unfairness stemmed from two perspectives, i.e. that the botters level much faster which makes others feel inferior, and the botters can farm for gold and items that cause inflation to the in-world economy. This unfairness then cause damages for Blizzard. The actual arguments are longer and worth a read.

Sure, the botters can level faster and farm much more effectively compared to real players. However, this does not in itself necessarily cause unhappiness among players. WoW is not a game with an end goal such that the first player who reaches level 70 wins and everyone else loses. People play WoW cos' of the immersive environment (mentioned in his arguments) which includes graphics, design of quests, music...etc etc. So what if there are many botters who reached level 70? The people simply missed out the fun of the journey, i.e. the quests and quest rewards along the way. There are many other games who provide the legitimate options of letting players having 2x experience or 2x gold, e.g. MapleStory, in recognition of such a demand from players with limited game time.

Level 70 onwards for WoW is a different game-play where the focus is on raids, and bots can't participate in raids. Let me know if you are aware of bots in raids, the details would be interesting.

Thus the only issue is about the grinding in-between level 1 and level 70. Quests helps, and Blizzard can definitely do more to cut down the grinding time. Have more interactive quests that give good experience points, rather than those 'get 10 stone slabs' types of quests that do nothing but require players to grind! Reduce the disincentive of grinding, and players will not have the need to pay separately for bot programs. It is the grinding portion, that makes players feel unhappy when they see the botters in the game. It's a case of "I'm suffering from the grind, why aren't you?". But why the need to suffer in the first instance? Personally I find the grinding from level 40 to 50ish especially tedious.

I think Blizzard knows that, thus the reward experience and items for Burning Crusade reflect it (I think). Quests in Burning Crusade gives much better items compared to general mob drops. Generally bots don't do quests, and so would miss out on the items. So I guess they are already fixing that in the game.

The second portion of in-game inflation is also something I disagree with. So bots cause inflation? Lolz, step into the Auction House (AH) and take a look. When bots are around, the prices deflate! This is a case of supply and demand. When there is a huge supply of goods from bots, the prices of these goods fall in the AH, especially for those craft related items like gems. Picture of a AH below. For non-WoW readers, AH is an auction mechanism that allows trade among players.

Sure, gold buyers can have access to a lot of gold from the botters using real cash. Then gold buyers use their large supply of gold to buy items / enchantments...etc. Isn't this good for the actual players, i.e. those normal players who then have a ready supply of clients for enchantments, jewel-making ... etc etc? Worried about gold buyers' demand that cause a price increase for armours, weapons...etc? Just make the better items 'bind on pick-up', i.e. can't sell these items in AH. Gold buyers would be stupid to pay lot of gold for a more inferior item. For non-WoW readers, here's a pic of what you see when you click on the auctioneer in AH.

So, it's a matter of incentive again much like the 'grinding' case above. Reduce the incentive for gold buyers, i.e. give better items for quests which gold cannot buy, and the demand for these quick gold would drop.

I think Blizzard is smart enough to understand these since the dynamics for Burning Crusade, i.e. items drops versus quests or 'bind on pick-up' are different from pre Burning Crusade game-play. Blizzard can sue the bot software developers whatever ways it wants, but let's have even better game dynamics for the next game expansion ok?

Cabal Online Launch @ Suntec Atrium

Cabal Online was launched by AsiaSoft on 3rd March 2008. Today at the Suntec Atrium, there is a Cabal Online Carnival (o.k. it's not a launch but still within the same month)! Only realised at the Carnival that 'Cabal' is pronounced as 'Kar Bal' and not 'Cable'. Lolz.

There was a huge crowd, especially in the morning around 11am. Queue for the freebies was especially long, snaking out of the Atrium area. Most of the crowd came in black and/ or green, since wearing the 'Cabal' colours entitle you to a lucky draw coupon.

There were quite a number of games at the Carnival. One of them was the 'combo' competition. For the 20 hits combo, only a few made it to the scoreboard. Another game was the 'showhand' where each person tried to match his card to the one display on the big screen.

I stayed around for a while, watching the demos of the game. The demos are mostly (if not all) level 101 avatars, so the skills demostrated are of course impressive lah. Those without an AsiaSoft account could also sign up for one at the 'aClub' shop on level 3. Organisers are quite thoughtful and had marked out the direction on the ground with these signs:

I went to take a look, and there was also a long line of people waiting to 'verify' their accounts. Actually, if not for these signs, I would never be able to find this shop hidden in that obscure corner of Suntec.

Overall it was a nice experience going to the carnival. There is quite a large group of online gamers around, especially the students group. Seen a few more matured adults as well. Compared to the two other 'carnivals' / 'launches' (MapleStory & WoW Burning Crusade) that I've been to, the Cabal Online carnival was not as crowded. I guess it's the nature of the games, those games with less grinding needed would attract more gamers, especially casual garmers who may be more willing to participate in such offline activities. Just my 2 cents worth of thought.

Oh yah, I got the goodies when the queue shortened sufficiently. Since I was not among the first, I didn't get the bags with a t-shirt inside. Got the free CDs, lanyard, poster & a few other kit knacks. Here's the pic of what I got. Guess it pays to go earlier to queue, at least you will get the T-shirt!

NUS has a Second Life Campus!

I've just read on the tomorrow.sg site that NUS (National University of Singapore) students had set up a virtual campus in Second Life! It is not that big a deal since there are many other universities (e.g. Ohio, Princeton...etc) who already experiment with such a concept sometime back. The idea of using virtual worlds as educational tool has also been covered by many others.

Heh, but it's still worthwhile to go in and take a look right? I went in, and well the campus looked quite empty except for a NUS team member (I took a pic of his avatar, see below). The objects are quite well done up, and hopefully there will be more activities inside the NUS island soon.

According to the Campus Observer, the NUS campus was launched only fairly recently. So perhaps in a couple of weeks time there will be more folks in the virtual campus. It will be interesting to participate in the virtual world market place and the dance floor once the students start coming in. I wonder if there will be a parallel Union Bash in Second Life as the real one proceeds?

Here's the place where I first teleported to:

Here's a view of the University Hall, and I got into the Tan Chin Tuan wing for a closer look of the area:

There are nice posters on the wall detailing the NUS life.

Maybe I should log on during school hours, and hopefully I can sneak into one of the lectures? Will visit the place again, especially when it's fully completed in June 2008. I saw this dancer in one of the areas inside the island, and he passed me a website, with more details about the NUS Second Life project. It seems he is the Chief Administrator of the NUS Second Life. The website has news highlights, blog highlights, and calendar of events.

There are also other interactive objects at the NUS Island, including this bot who gives away tokens. For a moment I thought they will give away Linden Dollars, lolz.

Went to this colourful area which I suspect is the dance floor? Oh well, I will explore more of the area the next time.

Afternote:
They did more publicity and here's one of the posters found around the NUS campus.

File-sharing via P2P - Japanese ISPs as judges?

Have just read the article about how Japanese Internet Service Providers, i.e. the ISPs, will cut off the Internet access of subscribers found in illegal sharing of computer games, animes and music files. This is quite a recent development, i.e. in March 2008. In the proposed plan, it seems that

...copyright organizations would notify providers of Internet protocol addresses used by those who repeatedly make copies illegally, using special detection software. The providers would then send warning e-mails to the users based on the IP addresses of the computers used to connect to the Internet. If contacted users did not then stop their illegal copying, the providers would temporarily disconnect them from the Internet for a specified period of time or cancel their service-provision contracts.

What is interesting is that the court is not involved. Thus copyright organisations would play the role of judges? This cannot be, since technically speaking these copyright organisations play the role of plaintiff when they first complain about infringements. Thus, to put it more accurately, the ISPs will be the ones playing judges.

Dangerous.

In any copyright regime, there will always be circumstances for fair dealing clauses where using a copyright works without the explicit permission from the owners are allowed. Examples include news reporting, and educational uses. If we ask the ISPs to play the roles of judges, it is likely they will simply ignore the 'fair dealing' uses, since it will be too much trouble for them.

Compare the Japanese case with the Sweden case where the court is involved, it seems to be more prudent actually. In this article on Wired News about the Sweden development, a spokesman for the Swedish ISPs said that

"It's good in the way that we don't have to judge whether an Internet activity is legal or illegal," he said.

I agree with him. Leave the ISPs to do what they know best, i.e. provide Internet access, and let the courts and judges come in for the legal matters. It is only natural to get some checks and balances to prevent any systems from being abused. In these whole scenarios of ISPs, copyright owners, and uses (both legal and illegal), it is tough to determine what is right or wrong. Take a look at this discussion about the class action suit against the RIAA in the States for some different perspective.

Samorost 1 - equally interesting game

After playing Samorost 2 (review of the game here) and finding that it's a great game, it is only naturally to play Samorost 1. Overall I would think that Samorost 2 is better, with more interesting graphics and background music. The 'tricks' in Samorost 2 is also more challenging, which requires more 'thinking'. Nonetheless Samorost 1 is still worth a try.

In Samorost 1, you play a character on a 'rock' who realises that another 'rock' is heading for a collision with the same rock. So you set out for a rescue project to change the course of the alien rock. I realised that some readers may want to have a 'walkthru' of the Samorost 1. So I added the tips at the end of this post, but it's in 'dark grey' colour. If you need the tips, highlight to reveal them. Else scrolling down to look at the pictures still will not spoil the fun of the game.



When you landed on the planet surface, you will find a colony of farmers. Wonder if the face of the farmer belongs to one of the game creators?


Here starts the trip to the centre of the Earth, oops, no, it's the centre of the rock!


Don't worry if you're stuck. You got birds and squirrel as company.


The creature is more interested in ants than you. Heh, I guess humans in weird colour pajamas is less appetising.


You'll reach the main steam engine room. You will save your home!


Change your fate, change the direction!


It's not that hard isn't it?



Tips:
click the tower!
The burning tobacco. The Ski line. Press the button. Adjust the direction! Pinch his butt. Click me to fly!
Fish is biting. Get rid of pests! Shoo the bird.
Rotate the rock. Black hole is fun. Black holes are really fun. Light bulb. Open the hatch and get in!
Worms are irritating. Squirrel likes records. There are many records. Dancing owl is cute, don't you think so?
Don't block the ants! Open the hatch. He is busy during meals. The box. The lights on the door.
The blinking light. It says Q.50. Middle. Where the ladder points.

Samorost by Amanita Design

Read about this excellent Flash based games Samorost 2 by Amanita Design. This game has won an award, the Winner for Best Web Browser Game, Nominee for Excellence in Visual Art at the IGF, the Independent Games Festival. Try the game, it's quite fun. A point and click game with no need for any instruction.

In the game you played a human who lost his dog to a bunch of aliens. The aliens are picking your pears for their big boss, and you embarked on an adventure to get your dog back. That's Part 1, which is free to play. To play Part 2, you'll need to pay for the game. Here's the starting planet where you live.


Here's when the aliens arrived to steal your pears.


You have to think of a way to feed the snail properly, such that it will sleep after its meal.


Here you meet the aliens again, who is filling the bottle of pears to feed his boss.


Here you meet the alien boss who is eating your pear, while making your dog works like a hamster to fan him!


Do something to trick the alien boss and your dog is saved!


However, when you are on your way back, the fuel runs out and you will crashed onto another planet. That's where part 2 of the game starts.


The company also produces the Samorost 1, as well as other games and flash animations. This is an interesting company to watch.

Beijing Olympics vs The Pencil Farm

Earlier I mentioned that China is quite big about virtual world and games development. Apparently they still have some way to go in the area of respecting intellectual property.

Read on the Slashdot website about how Beijing Olympics website has a game that is very similar to the 'Snow Day' from Pencil Farm. Went to both the website and took a look. The similarities are striking, very striking indeed. Pencil Farm noted the similarities and has taken some actions.

Here's the link to the original Pencil Farm's 'Snow Day'. It is a nice game and worth a try when you have 5-10 minutes to spare.


An Update:
Seems like the Pencil Farm managed to get the game removed from the Beijing Olympics website. Pencil Farm also provided a link to Sydney Morning Herald article covering the issue. A happy turn of event for Pencil Farm, don't you think so? Though I don't think he will get much compensation out of the Olympics.

Travian Guide Part 2

Not much to add since different travian players have different style of play, which is also dependent on which race you choose. There are two more points for reference, one on the Gaul traps, and the other for End Game.


1) Gauls Traps
Travian Gauls are the only race who can build traps. Plus the point that they have double cranny size, they are a good defence race to have. To attack a Gaul village, try to have more than 200 troops. This is because a fully extended trapper can have only 200 traps at maximum. Try to use attack as well instead of raids, since attack may free up the trapped troops.

No worries if your troops are trapped, they are still alive. The player cannot kill them and the trapped troops consume your crops. So it may be good to have a chat with the person to release them, or simply wait till the player's village get attacked and the troops are freed. The players can release the imprisoned troops by clicking on the rally point and select "Release".

2) End game
Towards the end of the game (some said it happens about 1 year or less from the start of the server), there will be news about End Game. Many Natars villages will sprint up, at quite predictable locations, e.g. -125, -125 or 0, -1. Once the natars villages are captured, the owner can change the name of the village. During End Game session, there will also be a 'WW' (World Wonder) tab under the "Statistics" button where you could see who are the natars village owners, and the level of WW that they have built.


Since there about about only 13 Natars villages, only 13 players can compete in building the World Wonder. There will be plenty of competition among alliances and players to capture and hold each village. Once all natars villages are conquered, the old Natars Ruin at the 400, 400 will start sending troops to attack these original natars villages. Some said attacks will come in waves when WW reaches certain fixed level, e.g. every 5th level, others said it's per level of WW built from level 90th onwards. This I'm not completely sure. What is sure is that the owners of these natars villages will need plenty of crops to feed their troops. This is how their alliances can come in, other than providing high level defensive troops.


It is also worthwhile to look at the marketplace. If there is large shift in demand where certain players stop asking for crops. It could be a sign that they lost their troops in the WW defence or from other enemies. This could be time to farm or destroy them.


Travian tools:
Other than the inactive player trackers, there are two more useful tools for travian players. Here's battle reporter
http://travilog.org.ua/en

Here's a Travian map function to view player / alliance details.
http://travianmap.nl/?ln=en

Related Posts: Travian Guide - In the Beginning - Protect Resources and Build Up Defences, Simple Review of the browser game - Travian

Travian Guide in the Beginning - Protect Resources and Build Up Defences

After playing Travian for some time, here's some tips that I've gathered from other players and various online forums.

Resource Building
In the beginning, build the resource fields and crannies (more on crannies below). Continue the process until the villages reach levels where you need more resources than your storage allows, then it's time to upgrade the warehouse and granary.

It makes more sense to upgrade the resource fields in sequence, i.e. no point building a level 6 fields when you can upgrade other level 4 to level 5 fields. Some feel that for crops, you can make an exception and build one field to level 5 as soon as possible in order to get the Grain Mill. Depends on players I guess.


Build Crannies
There will be other players who want to farm you. If they can get resources from the farming, they will be back for more. So build crannies and once they can't get any resources from you, they will just find another farm. Of course there are crazy players who come back with catapults to destroy your buildings when they can't get any resources, but these players are few. Do note though that Teutons can capture about 1/3 of the hidden resources in crannies. So it is better that you use up all the resources in your villages and don't build your warehouse to a extremely high level before your defences are up. No point having your resources stored in the warehouse, unused and only to be stolen right?


Add to the population
One way that other players used to detect farms is the population size. If the size remains constant, there is a likelihood that the villages are inactive and thus good targets to farm. Good targets because it is likely that once the initial troops are wiped out, the inactive village wouldn't build more troops. There are software to track inactivity, where players can see scan any inactive players with distances indicated.

Protect your army
Troops are needed to bring the resources raided from your villages. So if you can kill the enemy troops, you reduce the losses in your resources. If the attacker loses sufficient troops, your villages look less attractvie to him as farms. For defence, try to build up your wall till as high as possible. Different races require more of particular types of resources for their walls. E.g. Gauls need more lumber while Romans need more iron.

A high wall level will give your troops a higher defence bonus, such that small amounts of enemy troops will be killed even when there is only a wall with no troops in your villages.

After the wall, build traps if you are a Gaul. Else start building your defensive troops. Click through the 'Instructions' on the left of the screen to scroll through your troop types and know which are the defence type troops. E.g. for Romans the praetorians are the best defending troops against infantry and the legionnaires against cavalry.


After you have sufficient troops (some say the figure should be near hundreds), you should start to build an armoury and upgrade the armour. High armour give the troops a greater defensive bonus.


Diplomacy & Others
When you are ready, get an embassy so that you can join an alliance. Also, get the rally point build up. It's in the centre of the village. Next is to get a scout. You will need the academy to research such scouts. Scouts are useful to detect scouting from others, and of course, for you to scout others.


Well, this is a war game and so you will be attacked at some point in time. Try the following when you are being attacked. Some pictures of the attack messages (and others) are shown in an earlier post on the Review of Travian.

Safeguard the resources
Resources are what help you to re-build after an attack. The paragraphs above should have sufficient tips for safeguarding the resources.

Contact the attacker
There are times when soft diplomacy works. Write a message to the attacker and ask him to look for other farms. Heh. Sometimes, point him to the inactive player tracker software and he might just leave you alone. Else you can also ask your own alliance leader for diplomatic assistance if you have an alliance.

Defence Strategy After the First Attack
Your troops are greatly weaken after the first attack, or they could simply have been wiped. While you are starting to build the troops, the attacker send more waves of attacks. Don't leave your weakened troops or those small clusters to die! Send them to a nearby village, could be yours or another friendly player. Simply 'reinforce' that village and build up your troops to a sizable amount again before sending them back. Just note the crops consumption in that temporary village and make sure there is food for the troops. If that temporary village belongs to another player, send some crops along as tokens of appreciation.

Ask for Help
There are times when we all need help, that's what friends (and alliances) are for. Contact your alliance leader and ask politely if anyone has troops for assistance. Most ideal if you could post some previous history of the battles for others to gauge the strength of attacks.

Related Posts: Travian Guide Part 2, Simple Review of the browser game - Travian