Left 4 Dead

This game reminds me a lot of the "Dawn of the dead" 1978 version. A story evolves around four survivors immune to a virus infection that has spread around infecting and turning people into bloodthirsty zombies.
There are are 4 maps in total and not really linked. Each map is split in 5 chapters. You basically play as one of the survivors trying to get to safety. One of the strongest side of this game is AI. Zombies will spawn and behave unexpectedly so each map will always play different.
In terms of weapons you can use pistols (one or two), shotguns, riffle, semi and sniper. You will also find molotovs and pipe bombs.
The game is great on it's own but it really gets better when played with friends. Players can join and leave as they please without effecting the game. You feel like you need to go a get a drink of water so you can calm down your fear Very Happy, press start and choose take a break and bot will take your place.
Even better then co-op is the multiplayer versus. Mpas are the same as single player and co-op and you can have up to 8 players in the game. 4 will start as survivors and the other 4 as specially infected. Infected can respawn but survivors once dead they can't respawn for that segment. Each chapter players alternate from being survivors to being zombies and vice-versa. There is a lot of sneaking, tactics and strategy involved as zombies can choose where to spawn and they can see survivors all the time.
Hard to find any negative features but if one wants to be picky I could say that I wish there were more weapons and more maps available. Animations of zombies and other survivors is great but I don't like the character you play movement much as it feels to me like you're gliding rather then walking/moving (similar to Half Life 2).
All in all great game SP - 7/10; MP - 10/10
Final score 8.5/10

Guitar Hero World Tour

There are many games I’ve been playing and never had a time to write about them. So here we go, I'll try and write abit about each the next few days.
Firstly I got Guitar Hero World Tour with a guitar bundle. I guess you could argue that it is a matter of taste but there are far les songs in this game that I really like than in Rock Band and there are far more songs that I dislike too. You’d think that after the big Rock Band success they would go a put some effort in making this game better a notch but in fact I find it worse and unattractive. Not really major differences just little things like the screens – the way the score etc is displayed, the star power in drums, ugly loading screens, etc. In my opinion if you don’t have any of the “band” games get Rock Band 2 or Rock Band and only consider Guitar Hero World Tour if you want to appreciate the Rock Band games more. The guitar on the other hand is brilliant. I like the size, shape, weight, the buttons and the strum key. So on the hardware area Guitar Hero have done very well probably better than Rock Band. So ideal solution would be getting Rock Band (1 or 2) game with Guitar Hero World Tour controllers.

Gears of War 2 - Game of the Year IMO

Where do you start with this game. Brilliant graphics, brilliant story, sound effects and above all brilliant game play. Big guys with big guns sorting out some big problems. Managed to finish the story on co-op with a friend (thanks TL) and feel like starting all over again. It is a bit hard to explain but there many bits and pieces that make the game very enjoyable - the maps, the guns and creatures. Details such as the tip of the gun getting red if fired for a longer time. Maps with impressive atmosphere. Head shots, executions, achievements, variety of weapons and the easy of using them are just some of the features that Gears 2 got it spot on, better then any other game I ever played. I think every one that like shooter games should get this game.

Gears of War 2 and 1 map differences

Wondered how will maps compare between the two Gears games and found this great video that shows some of the differences. Haven't received the game yet (3 hours to go until I get home) but it looks great so far so me well excited :).

Modern day Rapture

I was reading an article in the BBC website 'The Retalin express' and thought where are we going; will it ever end and if it does where does it end? If young people today use performance enhancing drugs what will their children use? Will we get new types of drugs that will allow people to use telekinesis maybe :) Are we heading towards the same destiny as Rapture in Bioshock? How is the world going to look like many years after we have gone?

Extremly funny video - "Front fell off"

My thanks go to Punk74 for publishing the link to it on TCK forum.

Stop to Xbox Live abuse

Had an interesting conversation today in The Console Knights Forum about an article from xbox360.au.com about some roomers that of the possible introduction of censorship on Xbox Live covering Racial, Sexual, Religious and obscenity.
Personally can't see this working. I think it would have been much better if they introduced the "record" option similar to "mute" option we get now. This'll allow users to trigger "record conversation" and upload to some processing unit able to ban or warn users as necessary. Also they could get every day gamers to join some sort of official Xbox Live moderator group, trusted users possibly on a small salary to moderate, educate, warn and ban users if necessary. Similar to Live forums. I really think this would have been easier to implement at present.

Ninja Gaiden II - one hard game

Button bashing hard game and at times very satisfying. Some of the moves are amasing but got to the second boss and I got really stuck. Totally insanely difficult. So it went back in the envelope to the rental service.

Fifa 09

I have been enjoying Fifa 09 a lot lately. Great game! Not perfect by any means but there is lods in there to enjoy: you can play single player any league in the world, create your own player and go through your career until you become a pro, online games against another player or join a multiplayer 10 v 10 which can be fantastic. You can also create or join a club and play with other clubs in Fifa 09 league. So if you have friends to play it with and you like football, you absolutely going to love this game. Here's a goal I scored 2 minutes ago :-)

EA SPORTS™ Football World: MANCHESTER UTD - BLACKBURN RVRS 2 - 0

Taken Movie

Had a pleasure enjoying this great movie recently. Without wishing to give too much away, the story is about retired CIA agent whose 17 year daughter is kidnapped. Liam Neeson is great and really gives a lot of weight to the movie. Very highly recommended and a must see for parents.

SharePoint 2007 error message

I got bombarded with emails and my phone started buzzing this morning with users complaining they can’t update docs on the intranet or upload new ones. Everyone was getting a very simple and “informative” message:
Error
Unable to complete this operation. Please contact your administrator.
It turned out to be the SQL (2005) Server was out of disk space (bloody log files!). Anyway, fixed easily by freeing some disk space but was really surprised by guys in Microsoft. How hard can it be to display a message “disk full” or similar?

Duke Nukem 3D

"It's time to kick ass and chew some bubblegum and I'm all out of gum".

Yes, it's here (Xbox Live Arcade)- finally. Used to play this game a lot some 12 years ago a had lots of fun with friends on coax lan network. If I remember rightly it looks pretty much the same on Xbox as it did on the 486 PCs. I was quite surprised that I could remember plenty of hidden places. Good stuff...

My new toy

After hesitating for a while I got my self a PicooZ helicopter from Amazon. I only had it for two days now but I'm already hooked. It's a great little toy to relax with. It is difficult to explain but soon as you start flying it is like you're consumed by it. Shame you can only fly it max 10 minutes at a time aa the little Lithium battery does not last longer than that. However you can fully charge it in around 20-30 mins so you can get around 20-30 minutes flying in a evening in three sessions which is a great excuse to have a break from a boring essay ;). All in all well worth the £15 I paid for it.

Outlook 2007 spelling not working

Last week Outlook 2007 decided to crash and I got a message that spelling is a problem and that it will be disabled. I thought fine, reboot should enable it back. But no, reboot did not help. So I tried Control Panel/Add Remove Progs and Repair for Office 2007 and did not help. After this I uninstalled Outlook and reinstalled it but no good. The solution (at least temporarily until it crashes again!) was much simpler:

• In Outlook 2007 go to Tools and Trust Center
• Choose Add-ins on the left pane and then at the bottom of the right pane next to Manage label choose Disabled Items
• Click Go and it should display a list with one of the items disabled the speller
• Enable it, click OK and that's it! Fixed!
  

Lantern Procession Photos

Some photos from the Lanter Procession in Ulverston 20/09/2008

Tomb Raider:Legend

One of latest games I rented and I must say even though I did not expect it I really enjoyed it. The game is smooth, relatively good story and some of the puzzles are very cool. Finished the game on hard and collected most rewards in just under 10 hours gameplay. It would have most probably took me twice as long if I did not have the following walkthrough handy which helped enormously. I read some comments that the game is short but I don't think it's short at all. I think if it was longer I'd get bored, not finish it and get disappointed. It was similar with COD 4 single player. I thought it was long enough and I read many people saying that the single player was short. I guess I like "shorter" games.

The Why Are You Here Cafe by John P. Strelecky

Recently had a pleasure to read The Why Are You Here Cafe by John P. Strelecky and I loved it. It is an eye opener and a book you want to go back to again and again. A small book in number of words or pages which ever way you want to look at it, but a book that will make you think about your priorities in life. If you read The Celestine Prophecy by J. Redfield you will most probably like this book too.

Ulverston Lantern Procession

Today was 26th Ulverston Lantern Procession a showcase of my town's imagination, artistic creativity and community spirit. There was a grand finale with magnificent fireworks. I took over hundred photos and will post a few here very soon.

Mercenaries 2: World in Flames

Open game covering relatively tight missions in cities and rural areas, various weapons, land, water and air vehicles sounds like great features for a unique game. To a degree they did it but fell short on some important points. The story is not that good. Starts ok but does not follow very well (at least to 40% I completed until today). Acting is just shameful and very very very... did I say very?... very repetitive. How hard could have been to use more phrases and randomize it a bit??? Anyway, all in all, I think it is ok game, entertaining at least for a week IMO but can't see going back to it much after that. Probably will trade it in when I get Fifa 09 beginning of October.

P.S. You can download game single free for a limited time from http://www.pandemicstudios.com/mercenaries/downloads.php. Cool and catchy song! :-)

Almost there with the Open Uni

Right! The last two TMAs done. Mighty proud of myself :-). Now I need to write two more essays which are my end of course assignments and that's it for this year. Got my 60 points and the certificate which I think it is enough for this year. Next year might take it further and get a diploma but that's too far ahead to plan for me <grin>. For now I'm looking forward Fifa 09 and Gears of War 2 in the beginning of October and November. Happy times :-).

Fifa 08 - good game

I was pleasantly surprised by this game. Rented it to check it out not expecting to be anything special but after 3-4 games I got hooked. The game can be very hard and the controls frustrating but overall a satisfying game especially when you get enough of shooting or playing "instruments" on GH or RB. I've returned the game now but intend to buy it soon as I find it under £15.

The Dark Knight - no so impressed

Just came back from the cinema. Finally found time to go and watch The Dark Knight movie with great expectations. I really liked Batman Begins and read some fantastic reviews about this one. I was really impressed with Heath Ledger performance. A great actor that was just getting better and better. I wish he had more dialogs in the movie and I'm really am sorry he lost his life. Overall the movie was ok but not as good as the previous one.

Battlefield Bad Company stats

Cool thing form the BBC people - gamers can see their stats online similar to what Bungie has done for Halo 2 and 3 but not as good. Still better than COD 4 you get most basic info about the number of games, win/loss and kill/deaths ratios. Check mine at (you need to create a free account and loog in first) http://badcompany.ea.com/myprofile/xbox/dreri/ or you can check any other by just replacing the tag name in the end.

Ace Combat 6: Fires of Liberation

The latest game to get from the rental subscription proved very disappointing. Back in the days of PC gaming used to love flying games so I thought this one might be worth trying as my first ever Xbox flying game. After 30 minutes or so of acrobatic flying, shooting and firing rockets it down to me that, as RPGs, flying games are not my thing any more. I think I'll blame games like Gears of War, Call of Duty and Halo for this.

I'm getting tired of my Open University courses :-(

I'm currently working on my 3rd and 4th Open University courses: Y159 - Understanding Management and Y157 - Understanding Society. I've finished B120 Introduction to Business Studies and TU120 - Beyond Google. This will give me 60 OU points in total just enough for a Business Management certificate. Can't wait to have a break from it all!

Battlefield Bad Company

Gone ahead and made the purchase today. Rainbow Six Vegas 2 + £10 = BBC. Had about one hour play on the single player already and so far looks ok. The reason I delayed getting it because I was renting plenty new games recently and I kind off expected to have lot more humor in the game. It looks like there are some jokes here and there but not as many as I was expecting. Anyway it is just the beginning and I haven't tried the multiplayer yet so will get back with some more thoughts...

"Digital Fortress" by Dan Brown

Having read both "The Da Vinci Code" and "Angels & Demons" from D Brown I thought I give this one a go and I whizzed through it in 4 days. It's now years since I read the other two books so can't remember the exact writing but I do remember I read a lot of bad reviews of the writing style (or the lack of it). I also remember that at that time I did not agree with most of these reviews and my feeling was that it was ok. I enjoyed the previous books I read as both were interesting stories and even though it wasn't Shakespear it was dynamic writing that kept me reading for longer than I was supposed too (eating my sleeping time occasionaly). I kind of went through this book equally fast but I had many disapointments. Without wishing to spoi it for anyone I'll just say that, for my taist, there were too many things in the plot that spoiled it for me considerably. D+

Renting, renting, renting...

Got the chance to rent some new games recently. Bully Scholarship Edition which was ok in a way. A lot like GTA IV but on the cutdonw version and more suite for yung teenagers. Some of the pranks and tasks vwere fun but eventually got repetitive and boring. Guitar Hero Aerosmith was much much better choice. Great songs, well animated and some great online modes versus and co-op. Played the carrier on medium and it is just right for my unskilled fingers. I would recommand Guitar Hero Aerosmith if you like Guitar Hero or Rock Band games - must try. Bully only if you like GTA IV and like to try something different.

Oblivion proved that I'm not into RPGs anymore

Rented Oblivion recently. Many people have said to me that this game is great. I read many reviews praising this game as one of the best on Xbox. Mass Effect was also another part RPG part shooter game which I couldn't get into so I was delaying trying Oblivion because I just did not I'd like it. Some years ago (too many to count) I would have absolutely loved playing Oblivion but now I don't think it made any impression on me. It seamed dull, boring, complicated with poor animation and fight controls. So I played 4 quests and sent it back. I'm sure if you like RPGs Oblivion would be a great game for you but on my scale it only gets 4/10.

Raibow Six Vegas 1+2=1.5

I've signed up with a DVD and game renting service so I can catch up with some titles I missed before. So the one at the moment is Rainbow Six Vegas (the first one). I had a chance to play and enjoy RSV 2 a month or so ago and thought I check the original one. Very similar gameplay. Graphics for one are better on RSW 2 and maybe sound is a bit better. Otherwise looks like playing same game on new maps.

Lego Indiana Jones great family game

I got Lego Indiana Jones recently and been playing it with my daughter few times now. Great family game. It is easy for my daughter to play because the way the game perspective works (2D and 3D morph) you only need to use one of the pad sticks to move your character. Lots of puzzles and a bit of humor here and there. Very well linked to movies so really must see the movies before you play the quests. Any which way - well recommended!

Just finished COD 2

It took me 2 weeks but I managed to finish it in the end. Very good game overall. The last two levels I done on hardcore because I was lacking patience and wanted to move on to other games. There is a huge difference between hardcore and veteran difficulty IMO. I think veteran is simply too hard, it's like it was made for masochistic gamers (not like me really ;-)).
PS Put on COD 4 soon after I finished COD 2 to compare whiles the experience was still fresh and... I find COD 4 about 30% better than COD 2.

Gears of War 2

I've recently pre-ordered GoW 2 and I'm looking very much forward to November, 114 days to go from today. Especially looking ford to play one of the new characters Dizzy Wallin or Tai Kaliso and I quite like to know what role will Chairman Prescott have. Locust Horde, here comes dreri! Muahhahahaha...

Call Of Duty 2

I finally got to play COD2 and I'm impressed. Very hard on veteran specially on American missions but am enjoying it thoroughly. The sound is 8/10 and graphics 7/10. There is a really good variation in maps and weapons so no way you get bored of it very easy. Enemy AI is very very good but can't say the same for the allies. In more than few occasions they moved in the line of fire and got killed by my bullets. Couple of times got in from just as I was throwing the grenade! I also don't like it when they stop in the certain spots and it is expected for me to go and clear the upper floor but no order is issued. You just have to kind of know what you need to do.
In the end I think I would give it a solid 8/10 and recommend it to every FPS fan - "a must play" game.

Survived in the end!

I had some health problems and an End Of Course assignment to submit today so I was really struggling. But I did it - survived in the end! Managed to sort my health problem and squeeze my assignment with Open University 90 minutes before the deadline. And what makes things better I'm quite happy with the way I wrote it. And what makes things even better I can spend some time on my XBOX these next few days.

"Wanted" - 10/10

Just came back form the cinema and wondeful experirience watching Wanted with James McAvoy, Morgan Freeman and Angelina Jolie. A must see!

Browser compatible InfoPath form linked to a web service

I had to create an InfoPath form to submit data to a SQL 2005 database and was surprised you can't submit to SQL directly if you run the form from the web browser. Instead you need to write a web service which will link InfoPath form and SQL database.

So I write a simple webservice and create the InfoPath form which I link to this service. Run the form from InfoPath to test it; submit data successfully and checked on the database that the web service done its bit. Published the form to MOSS 2007 so everything done... Not!

I had to:

• In the form options
  - under Compatibility tick "design a form template that can be opened in a browser or InfoPath and enter URL of the MOSS with InfoPath Form Services;
  - under Browser Choose to show toolbars and Submit command;
• In Tools / Data Connection convert the data connection and store it on the same MOSS (link type Relative to site collection);
• In Tools / Submit Options tick "Allow users to submit this form" and set it to send form data to a web service;
• Publish form to the SharePoint server.
• In the SharePoint library on the lib settings go to Advanced Settings and make sure that under Browser-enabled Documents that browser-enabled docs are displayed as a web page.

Now it's done. I think... It works anyway...

Team Fortress 2 - Excellent game

Wish the day had more hours. This and incredible game with stunning visual style. The game has nine well balanced character classes: Spy, Pyro, Soldier, Heavy, Medic, Sniper, Demoman, Scout and Engineer each with different abilities which gives you lots to try and bound to have few favourites. There's also great variety of maps. I can see myself spending many many hours playing this game in the comming months...

Can't submit data direct to SQL Server using browser-compatible InfoPath form

Apparently you need to write a web service that will accept the data on the SQL Server's behalf. Not happy!

Portal song "Still Alive" in the Rock Band

As I was playing Rock Band with my kids last night I was very pleasantly surprised to see "Still alive" as one of the songs in the list of songs. Absolutely brilliant! I've been humming it for a week now and to be able to play it on Rock Band it's a real treat. Well chuffed...

Download and print Lyrics to Still Alive from Gamespot site

Gaming Community

If you are playing XBOX 360 games on-line on XBOX Live you'd have noticed that there are always a lot of people playing most games. But as with most things with "a lot of" there is bound to be one or two uneducated, rude, racist, unfriendly or unsporting people (ussually pre or early teens). It helps a lot if you have a lot of friends in your friends list and that way you know who you're playing with. I was lucky to find some good friends on the o35s.net - Gaming community for the elderly. Check it out regardless of your age; there are lots of members from young teens to their 60s. ;-)

Finally done it! COD4 Mile High Club!

Last night I made my third attempt to get the "Mile High Club" achievement on XBOX 360 and after about 30 mins I done it. Must have died over 100 times on this level alone. In the end got very, very, very... (did I say very?) very pissed with them guys wearing winter hats on the plane and so I shot them all and threw the hostage from the plane. Nice! ;-)

My strategy was:

1. Switch to pistol and run past the guy coming out of the toilet;
2. Shoot the shotgun guy on the left and whiles walking forward flash the end of the corridor;
3. Soon as you flash run and grab the shotgun; If loaded use it to clear this 1st corridor; If not switch to MP5;
4. Run to the next corridor left or right behind the chairs and flash bang towards the middle of the corridor;
5. Run and stay low behind wooden cover on the left and whiles waiting for your two mates load your shotgun;
6. Up the stairs on the right and flash bang through the door on the left and go straight in towards the last corridor whiles unloading your shotgun;
7. Flash the last corridor and grab another 4 flash bangs just before the last corridor whiles reloading or switching your weapon;
8. Flash again down the corridor and go in;
   
9. Don't rush to shut the last terrorist holding the hostage;
10. Aim slightly above his head and shoot! Job done...
    

Installing Visual Studio 2005 Business Intelligence Project templates

I had to change my PC recently. I installed Visual Studio 2005 in my new PC and later on tried to install BIP templates from SQL 2005 Server disk but I wasn't able because SQL install application was detecting as already installed.

Problem solved by removing SQL 2005 form my PC/Control Panel/Add Remove Programs and installing it again from SQL 2005 Server disk.

SharePoint Portal Server 2007 lost the global navigation bar

I thought I might have to do a restore due to a corrupt database when the global navigation bar disappeared from all sites.

In the end the problem was fixed in no time at all after restarting WWW Publishing Service which incidentally was the first service I decided to restart.

Battlefield: Bad Company

Didn't think much of this game but after seeing this trailer I will most probably get it ASAP.

Portal

Played this game for the last 3-4 days and it is brilliant. Short but sweet. Well recommended!