The Web Tech Reviews

Tom Clancy’s H.A.W.X. 2 – AC-130 failed

admin — Tue, 07 Sep 2010 19:53:21 +0000

So Gametrailers post this “AC-130 Massacre Gameplay” and ironically I think this is a massacre for the game, well at least this AC130 part. Although I am a Call of Duty fan, by all means I am not a fan boy since I do have a fair share of negative feedbacks for it. But let’s not go back there again.

So I was not too impressed with the way you get to rain fire from the AC-130, I didn’t hear any reload at all from its cannon like in the Call of Duty version. That alone was enough for me to say no to this game. The sound effect is just isn’t there, even the ones that I could barely hear weren’t engaging enough. The whole thing resulted in a very boring game play in my opinion.

And as for the actual flight mode where you get to fly other figher jets, well, let’s just say after playing the demo over the weekend, I still prefer the Ace Combat series.

This is from Modern Warfare 2:

Vanquish – Will this be another SEGA hit?

admin — Fri, 03 Sep 2010 22:10:26 +0000

Bayonetta was good, I personally thought it was much better than Devil May Cry. This week, the demo for SEGA’s upcoming third person shooter Vanquish, was out and I finally had a chance to try it out. First impression, wow, got to love the demo they picked for us. It is the one that Gametrailers has posted before. You get to fight the ginormous robot boss for this demo, which is basically the majority of the demo. I really love that battle suit (forgot the name of it) of the character you are controlling. The gun can morph into 3 different modes – shotgun, heavy machine gun and assault rifle that shoots quicker than the heavy gun. Only complain here is I wish the guns were louder, that’s it.

I love a lot of things about this game, huge boss, huge drop ships for you to shoot in the demo and you can make your character Tom to have a smoke in the middle of a gun fight. What more can you ask for? The third person system is pretty much the same as other ones so regular third person shooters will feel right at home. Remember Max Payne and its bullet time slow mo? Well its also in Vanquish (I’m sure there are other games that have bullet time), only this time you don’t need to fill up any meter to activate it, it will activate as soon as you are about to die, which opens up a few seconds for you to shoot your way out of harm.

The demo didn’t really let me do the power slide move (or maybe I’m just a noob and haven’t figured out how) which I don’t like, it looks kind of weird to be power sliding your way to cover. It reminds me of what soccer players do when they score goals, they do a power slide in front of the fans.

So after playing this short but sweet demo of Vanquish, I’m half sold. The only hold back right now is the fact there is no online component to it as mentioned in Destructoid. So I might actually wait a bit for this one until the price by half or something. I’m thinking of buying Bioshock 2 since the price has dropped to 29.99 and PLUS it has multiplayer, not that I want to play it though.

Why can’t they sell real Lego Starcraft?

admin — Tue, 31 Aug 2010 11:05:52 +0000

I am still playing Starcraft 2 like crazy, whenever I possibly can. Now that I have found some worthy teammates to team up with instead of taking my chance of paring up with someone “worthy”. My head is full of Starcraft right now, like literally. Then something hit me today, not literally though. I thought to myself, there are official licensed Star Wars Lego models out there, but why not Starcraft 2? I’m pretty sure it will be a hit, at least I will buy them that’s for sure. I’m guessing one of the reasons might be licensing / loyalties all those legal mumble jumble.

But if they did decide to make Lego Starcraft 2, you bet I would be one of the first to get them. Well not the “I will wait in line 2am in the morning” kind of first. Oh you know what I mean.

Google “Lego Starcraft” and you will be amazed by what some people can do with Lego. My god I was mighty impressed. Now if someone could build a 1/8 scale Kerrigan that would be epic!

All images found are © all rights reserved and by no means taking credits for these, but merely sharing them.
Image source: http://www.flickr.com/photos/pepa_quin/

Comparing A3 Printers

admin — Mon, 30 Aug 2010 11:04:13 +0000

A3 printers have been in the market for some time but it was specifically targeted to photographers who need their works printed with excellent quality and professional look. Certain models like the Epson Stylus Photo R2880 offer outstanding print for high res photos and designs. Its ink is pigment-based which is long lasting. The downside is, it is not very accurate in printing text documents. Furthermore, it is not equipped with features such as document scaling and network printing – features that are of great importance for offices.

Taking these customer concerns into consideration, A3 printers have evolved, enabling large format marketing material printing in house. Furthermore, there are more options in the market, each of them having pros and cons. It is up to the user to decide which features fit his or her needs. If an all-in-one printer is what you need, the MFC-6890CDW - a Brother A3 Printer - inkjet multifunction printer is for you. It is a scanner, photocopier and fax machine in one. Although it cannot come up with a lab quality print, this A3+inkjet can produce text and presentation documents. Epson, HP and Canon offers standalone A3 printers that have their own advantages. The HP Officejet 7000 Wide Format prints good color output and has network printing capability while Epson’s A3 printer has a scaling option. Canon’s Pixma iX7000 is also outfitted with a scaling option with an Ethernet connectivity and automatic duplesing for A3 documents. It is quite an investment though as it is pricier than the Epson and HP printers.

It is up to you to decide which among the printers suits your needs. It all depends on your budget, its use and the amount of space you have. Choose wisely before purchasing an A3 printer scanner. There are many to choose from in the market.

First came fire, then came fire and ice

admin — Thu, 19 Aug 2010 04:09:20 +0000

So while I’ve been enjoying playing with my buddies and total random strangers. I’ve also been experimenting more with reflection and refraction in Blender 2.49 as well as some lighting. One thing I found out is the fact that my computer can barely handle higher than the preset settings for the reflections and refractions. That is unfortunate, on the bright side that kind of gives me an excuse to upgrade my computer (right now I’m still using a very old E2xxx series Dual Core chip. I thought my recent 1 extra gb of ram upgrade would help out a bit but I guess it was not too noticable. Starcraft 2 does indeed load faster though so its not too bad afterall. Oh yea, I also bought a new ATI HD5670 just for Starcraft 2 so it turned out to be a $200+ game.

Anyway enough of Starcraft 2, here are the two images resulted from all the reflection and refraction tickering.

First came the fire:

Then came the fire AND ice:

Inspired by Starcraft 2’s Battlecruiser

admin — Sat, 07 Aug 2010 19:42:44 +0000

I’ve been playing Starcraft 2 non-stop these days, first finished the story and now onto the multiplayer world. And that’s the reason why I created this, my own battlecruiser in Blender. Still trying to figure out how to do better lighting for the windows though (the bridge, windows etc.). Hopefully I will figure out in upcoming projects.

At first I was planning to create something similar to Starcraft 2’s Battlecruiser, the normal one. But as soon as I obtained the mercenary version of the Battlecruiser called Jackson’s Revenge. Man, my design changed to follow the lengthier version of it. Jackson’s Revenge is so sexy! I don’t like the dual revolving lasers though, just doesn’t seem fit for this type of ship.

Here is the initial stage of the design:

Mid stage:

Tempted to get Starcraft 2 right away

admin — Tue, 27 Jul 2010 03:42:28 +0000

I thought I could resist not getting Starcraft 2 right away but I was wrong, so very wrong. After watching this campaign overview. This evil trailer is making me have second thoughts. Even if I decided to get it right away, would there actually be any stocks on the shelf? I doubt it!

I`m still debating though, since I won`t be playing the online multiplayer as much (I am still very addicted to Modern Warfare 2), is the story still worth the $59.99 plus tax? Another concern is whether my computer can actually handle it. I think the latter is the bigger question.

I can so see myself giving in to temptation….

Update: I went to EB Games today after work just to see if I was lucky enough. I didn’t get it obviously due to popular demand and everyone pretty much pre-ordered the game, what a surprise! I was told there were still copies at a nearby mall, but I didn’t bother to drive opposite way just to get it since I was 5 minutes away from home. I will try my luck again tomorrow.

Proporta’s solution to the Apple iPhone 4 antenna issue‏

admin — Mon, 19 Jul 2010 21:38:49 +0000

Proporta’s solution to the Apple iPhone 4 antenna issue

If you’ve been keeping up with the Apple press conference from Friday, you’ll know that they’ve generously offered all iPhone 4 customers their bumper case for free.

Guy Monson co-founder of Proporta says “We at Proporta think it’s very generous of Apple and admire their commitment to solving the problem. We believe that it’s good for Proporta as it’ll help open people’s eyes to the need to protect their mobile devices – something we’ve been saying for the past 14 years. CASEFREE at www.proporta.com

As a mobile device accessories company with over 3,000 cases, power solutions and screen protectors, we realise that a free case is a free case and that a lot of customers will still want fully surrounded protection. So we’d like to offer customers 20% off any Proporta Case or Screen Protector for the iPhone 4, if they return their bumper case to us, with the promotion code

Some other Proporta cases available with this offer are:

The Silicone Reception Case with SteriTouch , which kills 99% of all germs and also solves the antenna problem.

The Mizu Shell is a super tough silicone style case with a soft touch finish that will also remedy the antenna issue.

For those customers who don’t want a case at all, Proporta is also offering a Front, Back and Side Protector Film Kit which offers protection from scratches, scrapes and fingerprints, and also helps prevent loss of signal from the antenna by cleverly covering up the reception “hot spot” that can be restricted by your hand when using the iPhone. and is available to pre-order from Proporta today. And don’t forget Proporta ships worldwide so this offer extends to US customers too.

Interior Design with Blender

admin — Tue, 13 Jul 2010 03:11:58 +0000

The first image turned out pretty nicely and so I have moved on to the second render. This time I tried to play around with some interior lighting techniques.

I started out with this initial test just to experiment the some lighting as well as reflection/refractions:

Then I moved on to the actual interior design:

Ended up with:

While I was playing with the lighting I also accidentally generated this rather cool looking effect where most of the light source is coming from the three columns on the left. It was totally an accident though! The space ship to the right is actually an existing model that I created a few years back, I thought putting something long above the rectangular shelf would make a nice decoration piece.

Hope you guys enjoy!

This is why Japan has a low birth rate – Love Plus +

admin — Tue, 13 Jul 2010 02:32:49 +0000

We’ve heard about some kid marrying one of these anime girls a while back, then recently Konami announced Hotel Plus so that these kids can spend some quality time with their dead girlfriends, actually they were never alive to begin with, by the sea. It is sort of like traveling and going on vacation, except by yourself and your DS. Kudos to Konami for knowing how to profit off these poor souls with no real social interaction with real people, especially the girls.

I would love to see these guys get all awkward and stuff when they find out they are dating the same girls since there are only 3 girls in the game, though they have many hair styles to choose from. But they are still the same characters nevertheless. So have fun with that.

This is why Japan has such a low birth rate due to the fact that all the guys over there are obsessed, yeah OBSESSED with virtual girls. I know the game and the series in general offers tons of customization and possibilities but I still don’t think the game girls can ever replace the real thing, errr girls. Bottom line? Excuse my language but I just think they need to get laid. Period. End of story.

I’m so glad I have a real girlfriend and I won’t trade her for any game characters, no matter how cute/hot they are. In the end, they are still god damn pixels.

I mean, come on look at this trailer: