Happy Birthday!
Incredibly, Dwarf Fortress was first released ten years ago today.
I've mentioned before that the DF patch notes are my favorite gaming reading and have been for years, and PC Gamer collected their favorites here:
The most ridiculous patch notes from 10 years of Dwarf Fortress.
I'd also like to mention that there's a Patreon here:
Bay 12 Games is creating Dwarf Fortress and other video games. I can't think of anything better than supporting the most unique and interesting game ever made.
Fighting Eleven #3: Recruiting Prototype
Well, I have what I think is a solid starting design for the recruiting process in Fighting Eleven, and I'm going to build a prototype of that first.
That way, people can start playing the recruiting portion and offering comments early in the process.
The problem right now is my work environment, which is, in a word,
terrible. It seems like I have an endless stream of non-programming work tasks scheduled every day, mostly related to moving. I just can't get out from under the pile, and until I do, I can't seriously pursue making the prototype.
The design is compact enough that I think I could complete the prototype with two weeks of serious work, but it's difficult to get two minutes a day right now.
Having complained about all that, though, I like the design. I think I've learned quite a bit about controlling the programming difficulty by controlling the design, without taking any of the fun away.
Quadrilateral Cowboy
I had an odd reaction to this one.
I love Brendan Chung's games, and the worlds he creates. They're unique and incredibly charming. He looks at the world sideways, which seems the correct way to look at it nowadays (maybe it's always been the correct way).
Having said that, though, I bounced off Quadrilateral Cowboy hard and haven't gone back to it yet, even though I think I will.
Hacking. Heists. It all sounds thrilling. What I found thrilling, though, was all the detail in unimportant things. The hacker base has all kinds of absolutely unimportant details that are entirely wonderful and unique.
There's something very organic and real about the gameworld that I don't find in the gameplay, unfortunately.
Plus, it's relatively short, although it appears that more content is being added.
That's why I hadn't posted impressions. I think my current play time is less than two hours, and I wanted to wait until I had done more before I wrote anything. But not feeling compelled to play more is, in itself, an impression.
I still recommend this, curiously enough. I'm sure there's something there, something else, that I just haven't found yet.
Random Olympic Notes
1. Rugby sevens is the bomb. It's very fun to watch in either the male or female versions.
2. DirecTV has fixed my problem with finding out where everything is showing. They have an Olympic mix channel (205) that shows you panels from every station currently showing the Olympics. Seeing everything that's currently on is incredibly convenient in terms of finding something to watch, and if you want to watch eight channels at the same time, you can just stay on the mix channel.
3. The archery target is 70 meters away, and they're still nailing max-point (10) shots with regularity. Absolutely incredible.
Random Olympic Conversations #1
"Lots of grabbing and pulling."
"It looks like ten-year-olds arguing over a piece of candy."
"This is incredibly dramatic for reasons I do not understand and cannot explain."
"Overtime is the referee opening a bag of Skittles. Whoever has the most when time runs out wins the match."
Autocorrect #1
Eli 15.0: "I tried to type 'yesterday' and it auto-corrected to 'yeast sedan'."
Alternate history:
Get Outa My Dreams, Get Into My Yeast Sedan
Little Red Yeast Sedan
Brand New Yeast Sedan
I'm In Love With My Yeast Sedan
Jerry Was A Yeast Sedan Driver
Friday Links!
From Steven Davis, and this is very Orwellian:
Dark Patterns are designed to trick you (and they’re all over the Web). This is quite a surprise:
The AP asked the government for proof that flossing works. The answer: ¯\_(ツ)_/¯. Also, and this is thought-provoking:
How we think about e-waste is in need of repair. Here's one more:
The $3500 Shirt - A History Lesson in Economics.
From Tim Lesnick, and yes, it's a stuffed frog museum:
Froggyland.
From Wally, and this is terrific:
Nightwork: the extraordinary, exuberant history of rulebreaking at MIT. This is tremendously ingenious:
Smart Parking Solution.
This is from C. Lee, and Norway is very cool:
Norway considers giving mountain to Finland as 100th birthday present. Also, and this is an excellent read, it's
When Design is Hostile on Purpose: Intentionally Unpleasant Structures are Designed to Shape Human Behavior.
From Brian Witte, and this is fascinating:
Humpback whales around the globe are mysteriously rescuing animals from orcas.
From Matt Kreuch, and this is amazing:
ROCK'ING FOR 30 DAYS: One Man's Journey to Eat and Train Like Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson.
Living in the Bubble
Goalie camp weeks tend to be a long tunnel from which very little enters or leaves.
You probably noticed the version change, but Eli 15.0 changed major version numbers on Sunday. He's 5'11 1/2" and 135 lbs.
He deadlifted 205 lbs. last week after a series of lifts to build up to it (with his trainer), and said afterwards that he could have done a bit more.
I still see that little boy version 9.0 when he plays now, remembering all that mismatching gear and his consistent determination.
It's hard to imagine that what he is today came from that little 9.0 guy, but it did.
For him to keep progressing, though, things need to happen quickly. It's a bewildering maze of leagues once you hit the 16U age (next year), and kids go on distinctly separate tracks depending on the aggregate scout perception.
I'm grossly oversimplifying the process, but kids have to distinguish themselves by the time they're 16. If they don't, it's hard to recover.
Believe it or not, after five years at goalie camp, I finally did something during the two-hour lunch break. Because we didn't fly this time, but just drove down (only two hours!), I brought my golf clubs (all four of them) and played nine holes at a course just minutes away from the rink.
When I play by myself, and the course isn't crowded, I get very, very absorbed. I think I'd forgotten how much, since I haven't played in a few years, but it's a place I can go and not think about anything else except what I'm doing.
I find that increasingly difficult to do these days, so it's a particularly good feeling when I do.
Ugh, Sorry
The day totally got away from me (staff responsibilities, as it were), but I'll try to make up for it tomorrow.
Eli 15.0 got to work out (off-ice) next to six NHL players today. It was amazing.
The Sync
We were playing tennis on Sunday morning before we left for goalie camp.
"I'm going to try to explain something to you, but it's a difficult concept," I said while we were hitting.
"Okay," Eli 15.0 said, skeptically.
I had just missed an easy volley.
"The ball has a physical existence," I said. "In your head, the ball also has an existence. When the ball in your head is perfectly synced with the ball in reality, you'll almost never hit a bad shot. What just happened now is that the ball was coming toward me so slowly that the tracks of the two balls became de-synced--the ball in my mind got ahead of the physical ball."
"Dad, just hold on, I'm calling for help," Eli said. "Hello? Can you come right away? I think my dad is having a nervous breakdown."
"It's not easy to explain," I said, laughing. "But it's true."
"Hello?" Eli said, picking up his imaginary phone again. "Please hurry!"
You can feel this while you play almost any sport. It's exceptionally difficult to focus just on what is, instead of something else.
Eli does that almost every moment in hockey, and he doesn't even realize he's doing it. It's a kind of absorption.
It's not just sports, either. I've also found it very true in terms of the creative process. There's a kind of flow that can be achieved if your absorption reaches a certain point.
Windows 10 Privacy (update)
From Curtis, and it's an addendum to my Windows 10 upgrade post:
There are several apps out there that will automate the disabling of the snooping services with Windows 10. I personally use Spybot Anti-Beacon. I've used Spybot for many years, removing malware and I trust the company enough to use this other app. It doesn't disable everything 100% but will do some things that manually disabling, doesn't do.
You can find the link here: Spybot Anti-Beacon.
I run this every couple of weeks as Microsoft has been re-enabling some of these items without letting anyone know, through Windows Updates.
Overlays
Back at goalie camp.
This year, Eli 15.0 went from the Jr. Elite camp to the High School Elite Camp. It's a big move, but he looked totally comfortable this morning.
I noticed an odd phenomenon this morning on the way to Barwis for dry land training. I know very little about Detroit, so when I drive, I'm basically in unknown mode. However, occasionally we'll drive through an area and it's like a familiarity overlay snapping into place--I go from being in the complete unknown to the complete known.
For the next half-mile, I'll know exactly where I am, what's close, and how I get to anywhere in that little area.
Outside that space, I'm totally lost again.
Movie Series Summarized In One Line Of Actual Dialogue From the Movies #1: Jason Bourne
"We lost him, sir."
Friday Links!
Leading off this week, and it's awesome:
Ethan's Make-A-Wish. DQ reader Ken Dean's son Ethan has Cystic Fibrosis, and his wish was to be a garbage man for a day. You may recognize this from the annual link I put up when Ken participates in the Great Strides event, which raises money for CF research.
DQ VB.NET Advisor Garret Rempel has a gaming company now, and a website, and here you go (and I know it will be excellent, like everything else he does):
Tricorn Games.
From Geoff Engelstein, and boy, this is discouraging:
N.F.L.-Backed Youth Program Says It Reduced Concussions. The Data Disagrees.
From C. Lee, and what's the Japanese word for "dirtbag"?
In first, Tepco admits ice wall can’t stop Fukushima No. 1 groundwater.
From Wally, and this is an excellent read:
The Ghost Towns That Were Created by the Oil Rush. This is fascinating:
What Things Cost in Ancient Rome. Next, and this is the most expensive cheese in the world:
A cheese made from... donkey milk? Next, and this is one of several things that are more disruptive than anyone can imagine today:
Yes, you can totally use beer, coffee and hemp for 3D printing. This is just funny, with good detective work:
Diablo Sandwich / "Diablo & Doc" From Smokey & the Bandit, Identified!
From Steven Davis, and this is just stunning:
Functioning ‘mechanical gears’ seen in nature for the first time.
Here are two long, excellent, and very sad reads to close out the week: first, it's
A tragic fight between college-bound basketball stars changed lives forever. Next, and man, this one is going to stay with me for a long time, it's
Jonathan and Aaron and ... :No one but Aaron Hernandez will ever fully grasp how a millionaire tight end came to gun down a friend three summers ago. But Aaron's older brother, Jonathan, was there from day one, and he witnessed all the little moments, all the poor choices, all the unwise associations that led to murder. That perspective cost Jonathan his way of living—but that's O.K. He understands.
Windows 10 Upgrade
All right, since I'm sure some of you are doing this at some point in the next three days (while it's still free), here's a quick summary of my experience.
1. Clean up your crap
I consolidated everything I could, deleted everything I should have deleted two years ago, and uninstalled apps that I should never have installed in the first place.
2. Backup your important stuff
Probably, it will be fine. If it's important to you, though, put it on Dropbox or somewhere, just to have a copy if the upgrade goes sideways.
3. Microsoft can be startlingly inept at times
When you start downloading the update, depending on how you choose to do it, you may not have any information on how much of the download has completed. And when it's finished and you try to install, you might get this "preparing to install" message for--in my case--about 8 hours. With absolutely no additional information about what the hell was going on. So don't expect any clarity during the download/preparation steps. It's embarrassing, really.
4. Microsoft can also be startlingly competent at times.
However, once the actual upgrade process started--with an actual percentage complete indicator--the entire upgrade was very quick and utterly competent. No device issues (although I recommend unplugging everything you can, like a printer, and adding it after the upgrade is done). No program issues. It appears to be a very, very clean upgrade.
I've used Windows 10 on my Surface Pro 3, and the way I use it is that I never go anywhere but the desktop. I don't go to whatever the hell Microsoft calls the multi-panel UI, because I can't imagine anyone ever producing anything in that environment. It's fine for being entertained, but I want to produce things, too.
The upgrade didn't start me out on the garbage panel. I don't even know if that panels exists, because all I've seen is the desktop with my familiar screensaver and my desktop icons, which didn't move at all (that drives me nuts). Totally familiar and comfortable.
5. Privacy is seriously messed up.
You need to read this (thanks, Theo) to understand how nefarious some of the default settings for privacy are in Windows 10:
Broken Windows Theory. It will take 10-15 minutes to change all the privacy settings for the better, but it's well worth it.
6. Windows 10 is sleek, fast, and very easy to use.
I was a big fan of Windows 7, but this is better. It's slick and very fast.
Do I have any complaints, now that the upgrade is complete? Not one.
That's A Big Hand
Eli 14.11 can't really hold seven tennis balls for long, so the picture is slightly misleading, but he can hold six for as long as he wants.
I've been teaching him (somewhat) for years, but it had gotten to the point where I really felt like I was holding him back. Tennis circa 1985, and the proper instruction, is not very relevant in 2016.
Good coaches know when to step back and let someone else coach.
In an incredible stroke (awful pun there) of good fortune, though, we met someone here who is an absolutely terrific instructor, and he teaches the way Eli learns--like an engineer.
He's taken four lessons so far, and I can't believe how much better he plays already. All the good qualities of his game--athleticism, intelligence, power, and touch--are still there, but they're now in a more fundamentally sound package, with strokes better suited for this century than last.
Plus, I think he's serving 100 MPH on his first serve at this point. Not kidding.
Still hasn't beaten me yet, though. Old Man Garbage Tennis is still competitive for a little while longer.
