Headless Moron

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THE LAN CRATE
jawapro
Mon 04/08/2008 08:04 PM

Ok - for those who know me very well, you’ll know that I do a fair bit of LANing.

So I’m often trying to improve my LAN experience.

When I first started LANing, it would take me hours to sort of the stuff that I wanted to take, and then I’d lug bags and bags of stuff to the LAN, only to have to sort it out there, and then again when I go home after the LAN.

Eventually I got myself a LAN box. Not what most people think of as a LAN Box, which is a smallish PC that’s easy to carry. I got a plastic box to put all my LAN gear in. Most of the gear didn’t need to come out at home either, it could just stay there until the next LAN.

But there was still a problem. I had a PC, a monitor, the LAN box, and a shopping bag of food. That was my minimum load for a LAN. And because you couldn’t carry them easily together, it meant at least 4 trips to the car and back.

So my ultimate goal was to get it down to 2 trips. I could get smaller if I wanted a small PC - but that’s a pointless move if you ask me. So 2 trips was my goal.

So I kicked off Project LAN Crate.

First up - I bought myself a large black plastic box thing from Supercheap. It’s a Stanley brand, which means it would make a good knife.

Now - I realize this is a lot more than most people take to a LAN - but I seem to have inherited the role of the person who brings everything. It’s extremely rare to go to a LAN where no one has forgotten a power cord, network cable, or powerboard. So I always carry spares.

I wanted to keep things organized, so with some help from my Dad I made some wooden dividers.

This slightly odd design has a purpose.

The small section closest to the camera is for the keyboard. The section on the right is for food, drink, and other non-computer stuff.

And the two other pieces are the right shape to support my monitor.

So I added some foam to the wood.

And then finally loaded it all up.

Here it is mostly loaded. Still missing the food, the monitor, and my mouse etc (hole on the left).

The final result!

And it works. I took it to a LAN on the weekend. It’s really heavy - but not so much that I can’t lift it. I think there are still too many cables in the spares section - so I’ll ditch some of them before the next LAN which is give me a little more space, even if it won’t help the weight much.

At the LAN, it looked great. And I could finally arrive in only 2 trips from the car.

Mission accomplished!

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Lego Animation
jawapro
Tue 29/07/2008 07:37 PM

So you want to know what I've been up to?

This will be replaced by the player.

Well - last night I played around with some brief lego animation again.

And today I adjusted my blog script so I can actualy post it.

I plan to do more lego animating - this was just a demo to see if I could still do it.

It was also the first time in years that I've bought new lego (I actually bought it 6 months ago when I was on the mainland but I havent opened it before).

Lego's changed the sort of plastic bags that lego comes in, and it doesn't have the famous 'new lego' smell that I remember so well.

Ah well - stay tuned for more - tea's burning so I'd better go...

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Cally of Duty 4
jawapro
Wed 23/07/2008 07:54 PM

Ok - so Call of Duty 1 was a good game. CoD 2 was also great.

CoD3 was lame. From what I hear, it was a lousy game anyway, and it never came to PC - so I never played it.

So when CoD4 came out - I figured I'd give it a miss. There are too many games to ever play them all.

And Cod4 was no longer set in WWII, it was set in the current era. That just felt wrong. CoD was a World War II game - how could it be anything else? It would be like a Jurassic Park movie without dinosaurs.

Ah - how wrong I was.

Thanks to the LANs at Johns, I've been forced to play it now. And it is brilliant.

Not without it's flaws (single player can end up being just a duck-shoot where you keep gunning down infinite respawning enemies) but it has brilliance enough to over-come them.

Multiplayer is fantastic - and Single player is epic. The first single player mission just blew my mind.

It feels more like a movie than most movies I've seen lately.

So after playing it at a second Martianleader LAN (on the weekend) I decided I had to own this game. Partly just cause it's brilliant. But also because everyone else has had more practice at it, and have unlocked better weapons etc.

It still costs over $100 at EBGames - but I was able to snag it on ebay for half price (brand new) from a local seller. None of this Honk Kong business. And postage was quick - it arrived today!

It's Axon LAN next weekend, so I'd better go and get some practice.....

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Batman Begins Again...
jawapro
Wed 23/07/2008 07:46 PM

Last night, some of my friends and I went to see The Dark Knight.

It was good. Like Batman Begins - this was a very good movie for a superhero flick.

And yes, as everyone has said, Heath Ledger did a good job.

But it wasn't the amazing awesome movie that people seem to think it was.

IMDB is currently listing it as the single best movie of all time (it was only third on the weekend). http://www.imdb.com/chart/top?tt0468569.

And they arn't just comparing it to the other recent movies that are on everyone's mind - it's up against classics like Casablanca, Godfather, and movies like that.

Although - it was better than Casablanca and I havent seen The Godfather - so it might be accurate - but there are still far better movies.

So will this last and become a classic - or will it be the sort of movie that gets forgotten about in a few months?

Either way - it was enjoyable - and a great excuse to catch up with Steelman and some of my other friends.

And for the record - Serenity is the best movie in existance!

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LANNING - Finally!
jawapro
Sun 20/07/2008 09:27 PM

It might have been post-poned 4 or 5 times over the last 4 or 5 weeks, but finally John's LAN actually happened.

And was it worth the wait? YES!

There arn't many better ways to spend a cold winter's Saturday than to spend it with a group of geeks trying to kill each other.

It wasnt all violence though - we also played a Farcry map that Henry made that was essentially a massive 4x4 track. Apparently it takes 2 hours to complete the challenging course - but we didnt manage that. Initally we didn't quite understand the concept of not killing each other - and blew up all the cars - which left some of us (me included) on foot for ages until we found another car.
I wasnt doing too badly until someone ahead of me stopped in the middle of a steep downhill section so I hit them, and then fell off the cliff to my death - which means I start at the very beginning again!
And then after an hour or so, someone accidentally unplugged the switch and killed the server so everyone got kicked out (it wasn't me!)
Maybe next time Henry - it was fun.

We also played some Age of Empires 3 - which I am pretty hopeless at (having never played it before) and had the smallest army - but still managed to help my team storm to victory.

We played some CoD4 - which is brilliant. So good that I've ordered a copy and it should be on its way shortly. You can play multiplayer with only one copy - but you need your own for singleplayer and internet play.

And of course - some Flatout. That game is a given at a MartianLeader LAN.

And in two weeks it's Axon. Can't wait!

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