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The Beatles Rock Band!

Filed Under Video Games | 2009-09-14, 16:54

I haven’t had a chance to play, but I hear The Beatles Rock Band lives up to the awesome intro video I enjoyed a few weeks back. We’re planning to jam this weekend, but I was curious to know what songs were available. After finding out, I figured others might want to know more info too, so I put together a song list for The Beatles Rock Band of what’s available now and what will be available via downloadable content later. I had the intent on linking to individual mp3 purchases since I often find myself wanting a copy of music from video games for listening even when I’m not playing. Unfortunately I was reminded that The Beatles aren’t available for legal download anywhere yet. *sigh* Oh well, I’ll update the page when iTunes finally offers them. In the meantime you can purchase the actual CDs (I know, physical media, right? ick) or acquire the songs through various other means. If you still haven’t picked up The Beatles Rock Band, Amazon’s got it for $53.99-56.99 depending on your console (Xbox 360, PS3, or Wii). That of course is just the game and not the custom wireless guitar controllers they made which you can pick up for $99 apiece or get them in the Limited Edition Premium Bundle. Or you can always hit eBay for cheaper prices.

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Fallout 3 LARPers = awesome

Filed Under Geek, Video Games | 2009-07-10, 16:12

Anyone that checks my Xbox Live stats (Gamer Tag: edrabbit) will see that I’ve spent a bit of time playing Fallout 3.  And the love for the expansive world that Fallout 3 weaves is probably why I enjoy these photos of a bunch of Russian LARPers (Live Action RolePlaying).  I don’t read (or speak) Russian, so I have no idea what the post is about, but the time and attention that they’ve put into their costumes and environment are impressive.  And come on.. hot Russian girls with guns, need I say more?

Check out the full gallery of pics over on the LiveJournal post. If anyone can translate and fill us in on the story, that would be appreciated!
via Wonderland

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AudioSurf looks incredible

Filed Under Art, Movies and Music, Video, Video Games | 2008-03-03, 15:24

AudioSurf is a “music-adapting puzzle racer where you use your own music to create your own experience” says Steam. In short, you choose the music and the game creates a board and game-play experience that is related to that music. I’m always a bit wary of all these games that say your own music can affect game play and think that they’ll never be able to compare to the synaesthetic experience of Rez, an all time classic. A friend had mentioned the game in passing, and I didn’t think much of it other than to notice that it has the Orange Box soundtrack, including “Still Alive”. But after seeing the video above I instantly loaded up my Steam and purchased this. Review to come soon.

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Nintendo Tattoos

Filed Under Art, Body Modification, Video Games | 2007-07-25, 15:11

More “Gamer Ink” at www.thebbps.com.

via BehindTheInk. Picture source: www.thebbps.com.

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Nintendo Light Zapper + Wiimote

Filed Under Hacks and Mods, Video Games | 2007-07-08, 16:17

I told you how the old school Nintendo Light Zapper works, but now cyberpyrot over at AcidMods shows you how to modify one for use with the Nintendo Wii. Pretty simple, yet slick and a nice merging of old school with new school.

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Using Lumines to hack your PSP

Filed Under Gadgets & Hardware, Video Games | 2007-06-25, 00:46

Want to run homebrew apps on your PSP? For the past couple of years, it’s been a game of cat and mouse with homebrew hackers coming up with ways around Sony’s updated firmwares. The latest uses one of my favorite games to exploit a loophole that will let you run homebrew apps on any version of the firmware, from v1.00 up to v3.50. Up until know hacking your PSP required all sorts of hoops to jump through with steps specific to each firmware and quite often actually downgrading your firmware. Not anymore! In uhhh unrelated news, sales of Lumines on Amazon have skyrocketed!

Info on how to hack your PSP with Lumines
via Engadget

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How does the Nintendo Light Gun work? (with video)

Filed Under Video Games | 2006-10-29, 17:05

Ahhh the old Nintendo Zapper, aka the Nintendo gun. An object of great joy and entertainment from our childhood. Something we played with day in and day out, but most of us had no clue how it worked. We’d make up stories about it shooting lasers off the tv or it changing the TV screen so that it knew where the gun was pointing, and accepted one of these highly uneducated explanations and continue with the game of Duck Hunt on the old NES, wondering why we could never shoot that stupid dog when he laughed at us.

In the past I’ve read explanations about how the Zapper actually worked, but that wasn’t enough for me. I wanted to see what was inside that plastic shell. So I found some tiny screwdrivers, exacerbated my mild carpal tunnel removing them and managed to get the thing apart. But before we get to the gory, err geeky pictures, a quick explanation for those that are still curious about how it works.

No, the gun does not shoot light. In fact it receives light. When you pull the trigger, the video game quickly changes the screen, so fast that most people don’t even notice it. By using the alterating of color and white light from the tv, the gun uses a photodiode to detect whether it’s scored a hit or not. So in short, the gun decides if you hit your target, not the Nintendo system. Here’s a brief explanation from Wikipedia:

When the trigger was pulled, the game blanked out the screen with a black background for one frame, then, for one additional frame, drew a solid white rectangle around the sprite the user was supposed to be shooting at. The photodiode at the back of the Zapper would detect these changes in intensity and send a signal to the NES to indicate whether it was over a lit pixel or not. A drop followed by a spike in intensity signaled a hit. Multiple sprites were supported by flashing a solid white rectangle around each potential sprite, one per frame.

So, with that said, here’s the picture of the gun mostly dismantled. Click on the image to jump to flickr to see the parts identified.

And here’s a video of what’s happening inside with that familiar “pang!” when you pull the trigger:

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