Kernel Panic

Superlatively awesome nachos

2009-10-27T19:19:09Z

Nachos. THE party food. Whether watching a film, the big game, or just having a geeks night in (yay!) nachos are something everyone can get their teeth into. They're incredibly easy to make as well, and you can go from ingredients to chomping in about 20 minutes if you prep on-the-go (or have everything prepped beforehand. Even better is if you have leftover chilli, then the cooking time is down to 5 or 10!)

The key ingredients in nachos are: nacho chips, chilli con carne, cheese, soured cream. Some people choose to put quacamole on them too, but I'm not a fan of avacado so they won't be featured here.

Everyone has their own recipe for chilli, based around their tastes. It's such an easy dish to change. But I'm not going to cop out and tell you to use your favourite chilli (though you can if you like); I'm going to finally give up my own recipe for your delectation.

You will need:

For the chilli:

500g minced beef
1 large white onion
1 green pepper
3 or 4 bird eye chillis or similar strength (more if they're weaker, less if they're stronger, it's not rocket science)
1 small tin of kidney beans
1 small tin of sweetcorn
1 small tin of chopped tomatoes OR a couple handfuls of cherry or plum tomatoes
2 cloves garlic (crushed)
cayenne pepper
paprika
salt
tomato puree

For the nachos:
1 large bag nacho chips/tortilla chips. Plain are best but lightly salted or spicy if you can't get unflavoured ones. Stay away from strong flavours.
3 handfuls of grated mature cheddar
soured cream

If you bought fresh tomatoes, you'll need to peel them. Easiest way to do this is to boil a pot of water and place the tomatoes whole into it for a few seconds; then transer to ice cold water. The skin should come right off, and then you can chop them.

Turn the oven on to about 200.

Chop the onion roughly and fry it in a pot with a little oil and a tablespoon of cayenne pepper, the crushed garlic, 2 teaspoons of paprika, 1 teasOH GOD I CAN'T GO ON LIKE THIS. COME ON, YOU KNOW I DON'T DO MEASUREMENTS. Seriously, you should have enough cayenne pepper to coat the onions, half of that of paprika, half of that again of salt, and 2 crushed cloves of garlic. Fry it up until the onions are getting brown and then add the chopped chillis.

Keep stirring the mixture for about a minute, then dump in the chopped pepper and sweetcorn. Remember to drain the sweetcorn first! Stir until both are coated.

Mix a little salt into the mince to season it, then add it to the pot and stir until cooked through.

Add the (again, drained) kidney beans and the chopped tomatoes. You don't want TOO much juice but there should be some liquid in the pot.

Stir the mixture through, then add a squeeze or two of tomato puree. Stir, then let it all reduce down. Provided you didn't put any bean/corn liquid in, and not too much with the tomatoes, we're only looking a couple of minutes here. The puree will help thicken so if it's not reducing, add some more. Once it's nice and thick and not sloppy, remove from the heat.

Spread the nacho/tortilla chips on the bottom of an oven-proof dish. A lasagne dish is just about perfect for this. The "bed" of chips should be 2 or 3 layers deep, and evenly placed. You shouldn't see the bottom of the dish.

Spoon over some chilli, keeping an area around the edges dry (you'll want some crispy chips to pick up and dip). You should be close, if not at, the top of the dish now. Hot chilli is better to use than chilli that's had a chance to cool as it lowers the oven time needed; thus reducing the chance of burning the chips or cheese.

Spread the grated cheese over the top of the chilli, and don't be too careful! Melted cheese won't turn the chips soggy so feel free to coat some of the outer ones.

Place in the hot oven for about 5 or 10 minutes, or until the cheese has melted. Remove from the oven and either served in the hot dish or transfer to individual dishes for consumption.

Spoon a few dollops of soured cream over. Have some kitchen towels at the ready; these are not going to be tidy! And we wouldn't have them any other way....

You can vegetarianise this quite easily; instead of mince use refried beans, or the spicy bean salad from a few posts back. Mushrooms can go well too in this. Like I said, everyone has their own chilli recipe; so play around and experiement!

Perfect =)

What to do, what to do...

2009-09-19T13:57:29Z

So, my new pc is here. My old on is now lying on its side on the floor, exposed to the world, with everything i need off the harddrive. On one hand, it's given me 6 years of faithful service. On the other hand, the last few weeks ahve been a living nightmare. Do I give it a quiet send off, or abuse the bejeesus out of it?

Tired of potatoes?

2009-09-14T20:11:55Z

Try celeriac. Celeriac is the tuberous root of celery, from 10-12cm in diameter, but sometimes bigger. They're hard to prepare because of a very thick rough skin, so using a knife might be better than a peeler. Steaming takes a while too long to cook, so boiling is the best way of preparing. You can prepare it just about any way you would prepare a potato. They're especially tasty mashed, a bit of butter, nice and creamy.

Try making a soup from them as well. Boil up diced celeriac, then drain and blitz with some butter and milk or cream.

The best gravy for pork you will ever taste

2009-09-09T19:03:46Z

Like many of the dishes here, gravy has an unfair slight against it when in reality its simple, and sometimes quicker than instant, to make. It should be the last part of the dish you make, because a proper, delicious, out-of-this-world gravy requires bits from the other ingredients.

This recipe assumes that you've been boiling some sort of vegetable to go with your pork; potatoes are the most common donater here, but carrots, parsnips (especially for that little sweet edge) and just about any kind will benefit.

1. Empty the water from your veg into a pyrex jug; you'll be looking for around 400ml of water although you probably won't use all of it.
2. Remove the meat from the pan/roasting dish/whatever you cooked it in (a word of warning: this is one time you don't want to be grilling, the rack will hold onto a lot of fat & juice and it's more trouble than it's worth) and place it somewhere to keep warm; the oven or low grill will do nicely.
3. Place the pan/blah de blah on a hot ring and add a splash of the water, and stir the hell out of it. Make sure to pick up all the little burnt bits on the bottom of the pan.
4. Remove pan from the heat and add a little flour on its own, or cornflour MIXTURE. (A good cornflour mixture should still run freely, but be thicker consitency than water). Stir into the gravy and return to the heat.
5. Add a splash of lea & perrins. Add another splash. In fact, keep splashing madly for a few seconds.
6. If the gravy is too thick, add more water. If it's too thin, more flor/cornflour mixture. Remember to take the pan off the heat when adding flour or you may get lumpy gravy.
7. Taste. Add a little salt if you need, or other flavoured good (lea & perrins, veggie water).
8. Remove meat from warm place, drain the juices that collected into the plate into the gravy and serve everything up.

Unless you're making gravy for a family, you probably won't use the full 400ml of water. The whole process takes about 5 minutes or less, tastes a lot better than instant. If the gravy is too light coloured for your liking you can add a slittle drop of browning to it. Browning is a mostly flavourless colourant used for darkening any and all foods (gravy, stew, broth, beer, cakes...) but too much and you WILL taste it, and it isn't nice.

Try to resist the urge to drink this straight from the gravy boat if you're in polite company, though I understand if you find yourself weak ;)

Ok ok, I know this is kind of a cop-out recipe. "Gravy, Chris? GRAVY? Where's the curries and exotic dishes and what have you?" A discussion with a friend today revealed he had no idea what went into a gravy or how to make it, aside from putting hot water over granules. And being able to perform a simple step such as this can not only add an extra depth to a simple dish (like pan fried pork chop, which is what I had here) but it can greatly increase your confidence in the kitchen. Start small, finish big.

ftr2k5 @ 2009-08-16T13:51:00

2009-08-16T12:54:46Z

This is a very quick dish to knock up, and perfect for getting rid of some leftover beans & pulses if you've made a pot of chilli recently. I did, and had far too many kidney beans & sweetcorn to put in it (the local shop only sells large tins of kidney beans, twice as much as I needed), so I quickly thought this one up for a little lunch. It's tasty enough for everyone to enjoy (unless you don't like hot food), and with a bit of rice also makes an ideal dinner for vegetarians and (if I'm not mistaken) vegans too. You can use almost any bean or pulse in here; try adding chickpeas and lentils, though I wouldn't recommend butter beans as they mush up easily.

You need:

1/2 small can sweetcorn
1/2 large can kidney beans (or 1 small can, if you can get them)
1 tablespoon tomato ketchup
1 tablespoon tomato puree
pinch of salt
1 teaspoon white pepper
1/2 tablespoon hot chilli powder.

Add all the ingredients to a pot and heat gently, stirring constantly to mix the sauces. If the sauce is looking a little thick, add more ketchup & puree in equal quantities (too much ketchup will sweeten the sauce too much, and too much puree will make it not sweet enough).

The sauce will warm quickly enough, so the checking point is when your beans are hot. It should only take 10-15 mins at most. If the sauce is too mild, add more chilli powder to taste.

See? Simple!

Netbooks

2009-07-13T11:42:14Z

So, I'm in (or will be once I sell my old one) the market for a new netbook. I was thinking of one of the current generation EEEPCs, but there's a whole host of others out there so I just do not know! My main worry is that Intel Atom CPUs, which power most of them, are max 1.6GHz and usually around 1.3, and that's just not quite enough to comfortably play WoW on the move YES I WENT THERE.

Does anyone have any recommendations? I don't particularly want to pay too much for it, as my 2G Surf was £190. Around the £300 mark would be my highest I think.

Recipe: Peppered Pork Loins

2009-05-03T17:43:52Z

Picture after cut!

Peppered anything is pretty easy to make, and you'll usually get a pack of them for only a small bit more than the loins themselves. But there's great satisfaction making it yourself, and it can be easily customised to your taste. Want more spice? You got it. Got a wuss in your midst? Wind down the spice and add some garlic.

Serves 2 (or 1, if you're greedy like me)

You need:

2 pork loins
Equal measure of:
   Black peppercorns
   Allspice
   Mixed herbs
   Garlic
1/2 of those measures of cayenne pepper & salt

1. Place the herbs, spices etc into a pestle & mortar and grind up smoothly. Add more cayenne pepper if you want more bite.

2. Pour over the loins and rub in. Turn them over & repeat.

3. Fry on a medium heat in a little olive oil until cooked through.

4. Turn the heat up full and hold the loins fat side down, to crisp it up

5. Serve with veg of your choice.

It's seriously yummy!

Recipe triple whammy!

2009-04-26T16:48:58Z

It's been a while since I posted any recipes here, so here's 3 to make up for it. 1 very simple, 2 a little more effort required but still VERY simple! Very much not vegetarian or vegan friendly though... they are:

1. BBQ Chicken Stacks
2. Chicken Kievs
3. Seafood Risotto

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BBQ Chicken Stacks

This is about as simple as it gets, really, but it sure fills a whole. A grill diner's favourite, for good reason! You need (for 1 portion):

Cayenne pepper
1 Chicken breast fillet
1 Slice of unsmoked bacon
Cheese (sliced, not grated), enough to cover almost all the breast top
1/2 Jalapeno, coarsley chopped
1tbsp oil (any will do, vegetable oil works best. olive oil is a little overkill for this dish)
BBQ sauce. I prefer to use Budweiser BBQ sauce for its slightly sweeter flavour, but if you want a real smokey taste, Jack Daniels Extra Smokey BBQ sauce is sublime

1. Rub a little salt into the chicken breast, chop the jalapeno and prepare the cheese & bacon slice(s).
2. Add the cayenne pepper to the pan and toast over a medium heat, until it starts to smoke
3. Add the oil to the pan and bring to heat, mixing the pepper into it thoroughly
4. When hot, place the chicken breast in the oil and cook on one side for a few minutes, then turn and cook the other side. Ensure it is cooked throughout, but don't let the outside get too burnt (a medium heat works well for something so thick)
5. Once the chicken is cooked through, and nice and brown on the outside, remove from the pan. Pat dry and preheat the grill.
6. Add the jalapeno slices to the top of the breast, followed by the cheese and then the bacon.
7. Place under grill until the bacon is cooked and the cheese is melted. Remove, slather in BBQ sauce and serve!

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Chicken Kievs

Kievs have a bit of an unfair rap for being difficult to make, mainly due to many recipes insistence on making them croquette-shaped by rolling the breast etc. There's no need for any of that nonsense, but you're still going to get your hands dirty! you need (for 1 portion):

1 Chicken breast
1 Egg
Breadcrumbs (a slice and a half of white bread usually yields enough, with plenty left over)
1 clove garlic (crushed)
50g butter
1/2 tbsp mixed herbs
Plain flour
Oil (you're going to be using a lot of it here, so stick to cheap oils like vegetable or sunflower)

1. Place the butter in a small pot with the garlic and herbs and gently heat, stirring, until melted. Alternatively, cheat and put it in a bowl in the microwave.
2. Slice the chicken breast in half along its length (horizontally), and press each half thin. Rub a little salt into the meat.
3. Use a food brush to brush the inside of each half with the garlic butter. Add to taste; the more butter the stronger!
4. Press the halfs back together, using extra force on the outside to help seal. It should look close to the original breast when done.
5. Coat with flour, making sure to cover up the joins
6. Beat the egg in a bowl, and dip the chicken breast in it, covering it completely. Pour the breadcrumbs over and give it a good coating.
7. Heat enough oil in the pan to cover half to three quarters the kiev.
8. Cook the chicken in the oil, turning regularly to ensure even cooking. Don't worry about the breadcrumbs that fall off.
9. Once cooked through, remove from the heat and pat dry. Plate up, and pour any remaining garlic butter over the top as you inevitably lost some in the oil (it's the rule with kievs, unfortunately!)

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Seafood Risotto

This is another surprisingly simple dish, but not quite as messy as the kievs! Because smoked haddock & fish stock are quite salty, the only salt used in this dish is to add a little flavour to the rice when boiling it initially. You will need (for 2 meal-size portions):

250g rice (Arborio rice is the one most often associated, but many other rice types will do. I had some basmati left over from making Kedgeree, so I used this)
250ml Fish stock (You may not use all of it, but it's a good idea to have some spare. It freezes, so it won't go to waste)
2 spring onions
8 cherry tomatoes
1 salmon fillet
1 smoked haddock fillet
1 handful of mussells
A pinch of saffron
1/2 clove garlic
75g unsalted butter
1 tbsp olive oil

Prep:
The only real difficulty here comes in the fact that once you start cooking, at least certainly once the rice is in the pan, you don't really have time to stop and breathe, so it's a good idea to prep everything beforehand.

1. If your mussells are fresh & in their shell, remove them. Ignore any that won't open; these will not generally be safe to eat.
2. Skin the haddock and the salmon fillets (the smoked haddock will generally be easier than the salmon). Cut them into fairly large chunks, about 1 inch cubed.
3. Chop the spring onion and cut the tomatoes in half
4. Cut the butter into 3 chunks
5. Thinly slice or crush the garlic

Cooking:
Once the rice goes into the pan, you need to keep your eye on things closely, and work quickly. At this stage you will only be working with 1 pan anyway, so it won't be hard.

1. Bring 250ml water (and a bit of salt) to the boil, and cook the rice until all the water is absorbed. Remove from the pot, place in a bowl, and mix the saffron. Leave to sit for now.
2. Gently heat the olive oil and garlic in the pan, then add the fish & mussells and cook until almost done through. This will only take a minute each side. Don't stir, otherwise the salmon will break and flake off. The haddock will do this too, but to a lesser degree. It may be worth considering cooking the fish in batches and using tongs to turn, as you will be removing the fish from the pan anyway.
3. Remove the cooked seafood from the pan and drain most of the oil off. In a seperate pot, bring the fish stock to a boil, then reduce heat to simmer gently.
4. Place one chunk of butter in the pan and cook over a high heat until frothing. Add the spring onion to the pan and cook for 1 minute.
5. Add the rice and the remaining butter to the spring onion and stir. Ladel the hot stock into the pan and stir gently. When the rice is cooked, stop adding stock.
6. Reduce the heat and add the seafood and the tomatoes to the mix. For a more kedgeree-like texture, you can fork the salmon & haddock through the rice, or you can leave as the chunks.
7. Remove from the heat and plate (bowl?) up. The food should be very moist but with no visible liquid. Top with a small knob of butter and some flat-leaf parsley.

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So there you have it, 3 very tasty recipes for you to try out! As always, fresher is better, and often it works out cheaper too. Hunt down a local fish market if you can. Your local fishmonger may also be able to skin the slamon & haddock for you, as this can be quite a fiddly task to do.

Shining Light

2009-04-13T22:53:14Z

Roman candles that burn in the night
Yeah, you are a shining light
You lit a torch in the empty night
Yeah, you are a shining light
Yeah, you light up my life

You’ve always been a thorn in their side
But to me you’re a shining light
You arrive and the night is alive
Yeah, you are a shining light
Yeah, you light up my life

We made our connection
A full on chemical reaction
Brought by dark divine intervention
Yeah, you are a shining light
A constellation once seen
Over Royal David’s city
An epiphany you burn so pretty
Yeah, you are a shining light

You are a force, you are a constant source
Yeah you are a shining light
Incandescent in the darkest night
Yeah you are shining light
And all the blood I would sacrifice
For you are my shining light
Sovereign bride of the infinite
Yeah, you are a shining light
Yeah, you light up my life

We made our connection
A full on chemical reaction
Brought by dark divine intervention
Yeah, you are a shining light
A constellation once seen
Over Royal David’s city
An epiphany you burn so pretty
Yeah, you are a shining light

These are days you often say
There’s nothing that we can not do
Beneath a canopy of stars
I’d shed blood for you
The north star in the firmament
You shine the most bright
I’ve seen you dressed in an electric veil
Shrouded in celestial light

We made our connection
A full on chemical reaction
Brought by dark divine intervention
Yeah, you are a shining light
A constellation once seen
Over Royal David’s city
An epiphany you burn so pretty
Yeah, you are a shining light
You are a shining light
You are a shining light

Everything is right with the world

2009-03-27T22:07:26Z

She loves me.

That is all.

(ok actually she said it a good while back, I just haven't mentioned it til now)

A long time coming...

2009-03-07T17:23:15Z

It's been a long time since I posted here... with my main blog up & running, I haven't really had anything personal to blog about. But now I do.

I love her. 100%, beyond shadow of a doubt, unequivocaly love her. It makes me so damn happy, yet it hurts so fucking much. She likes me too, I know that. Really likes me. In fact I believe she does love me too. But she's too scared to say it because of what it would mean for her & her bf. It hurts me to see her upset, and what we have seems to upset her so much. But she also makes me so happy. You should see me walk down the street... grinning from bloody ear to ear.

Why oh why do I always fall for the wrong person? Why do I fall for the cheats, liars, or best of all, the unavailable-and-live-so-fucking-far-away-from-me...

Blargh....fuck. this. shit.

Blog moving

2008-11-11T09:31:51Z

Hey subscribers (all 4 of you!)

Just a heads up that this blog will no longer be updated and will instead be moved to blog.ftrdev.co.uk.

As LJ's entry exporter is a steaming sack of ass, I'm going to have to manually copypasta the old entries myself, so I'll be doing that over the next few days.

See you on the other side!

p.s. if anyone wants to contribute to the new blog, drop me a line with a brief on the typical content you'll be talking about. If I like it, I'll get you a login and you can post. The blog uses wordpress (what doesn't these days...) so if you're not familiar with it, it might be a good idea. It's not hard, I know my way inside out after about 15 minutes...

The 10 Commandments of Video Game Design

2008-08-31T20:12:42Z

We see it every day: moments in gaming that make us slap our heads in frustration, asking "why oh why did they do that?” The following 10 are some of the biggest follies game designers make. They are not in any particular order.

1. Thou shalt not make enemies respawn infinitely.

Progression can, in many games, be measured by combat levels in a certain area. When you find the combat dying down at a certain point, that’s usually your key to push forward. Games which respawn enemies in a single place over and over again remove this element of decision-making, though it’s never clear at first if it's just a drawn-out set piece or a commandment being broken. This means a player is sitting behind cover, popping out to fire over and over again before they can realise they won't be making a dent in the enemies numbers, wasting ammunition and possibly health. This could have disastrous effects on preceding areas.

Major sinners: MGS4, CoD4, Medal of Honour

2. Though shalt make each area of your game easily recognisable and identifiable.

It's really not a difficult concept to grasp. If the player gets disorientated and cannot figure out which way to go because all your corridors look the same, someone in the team needs fired. It's not hard to change a few things here and there to add a bit of individuality to areas. Games such as Metal Gear Solid, Half Life and World of Warcraft are all incredibly detailed and varied, resulting in the player never feeling lost. Simply because the design team used their heads. And it's no use hiding behind "budget" arguments; a large amount of low cost and even free games don't suffer from this problem.

Major sinners: Clive Barker's Jericho, Grand Theft Auto 1, 2, 3

3. Thou shalt not rely on random chance instead of skill for a key set piece.

The player should always feel like their input is of the utmost importance: they are playing the game, not the other way round. If your set piece relies on something being random, instead of the player’s skill, then you remove the player from being the driving force of the game, which is one of the worst crimes a game can commit.

Major sinners: That god-damn dice puzzle in Devil May Cry 4

4. Thou shalt not port games without optimising for the target console.

This is becoming more apparent in this generation of games, with major variations between input devices. The big problem here is that whilst the back shoulder buttons on the XBox 360 controller are in a perfect position to act as triggers, the back shoulder buttons on the PS3 controller are NOT. Coupled with the spring-loaded sponginess of the analogue system clearly aimed at driving games, and you have a recipe for major hand cramp if you rely on R2 acting as the shoot button. The previous generation effectively hammered home the idea that R1 was perfect for gunplay, so why are so many developers choosing to use R2 now? Simple laziness. A game designed on the XB360 will have its shoot button mapped to R2 when ported to the PS3 because that's the "equivalent" on the control layout. Sure, most games allow you to customise the control layouts, but most demos do not (which will only help to provide a negative image of the game), and even the ones that do provide limited customization.

Major sinners: Just about every FPS game that’s out on 360 and PS3.

5. Thou shalt not overuse impressive camera work and set pieces.

It's fair to say that we like being amazed, astounded, gobsmacked and have our flabbers generally gasted. When the player does something rather stylish and the game cuts in for a close-up of the resultant bloody mess where an enemy once stood, we can't help but throw our controllers in the air and yell HOLY SHIT DID YOU JUST SEE THAT for the first few times. But if the process is repeated too often, or too easily come across, the effect is lessened to the point where you simply wait for the game to hand control back to you so you can get on with whatever it was you wanted to be doing. It's another example of needlessly removing the player from the game experience.

Major sinners: Fallout 3 (Not released yet), Burnout, Stranglehold

6. Thou shalt realise that the world is not comprised of two colours: brown and grey.

Do me a favour. Look out the nearest window right now. List as many colour as you can see (don't worry about individual shades). Done? From my window, I can see:

Brown
Grey
Black
White
Red
Blue
Orange
Green
Pink
Silver

and as such, my view is vibrant and detail is easily made out. I can see people walking up and down the street because their clothes are all sorts of colours. Now, boot up a current generation game with a pretension of realism and count the colours. Notice anything? Exactly. This commandment is usually directly related to the first. After all, with a small colour palette it's hard to pick out differences in detail. This lack of detail means enemies are hard to pick out among the scenery or the route forward is obscured or any other number of game play issues. A lot of games try to hide behind a pretension of being gritty and set in war-torn environments. The people who make these excuses must never have watched a news broadcast in their entire life. Thankfully, Konami seem to have some sense among them, and MGS4 had a very gritty war-torn environment that was also highly vivid and vibrant, and felt alive. And this STILL allowed for excellent use of camouflage.

Major sinners: Just about every game released these days

7. Thou shalt hold on to the differences between NPCs.

A major sinner here is recent FPS release Haze. Midway through the game, your character realises the government he is fighting for may be just a little on the evil side, and defects to the guerrilla-warfare style enemy. Nothing wrong with this overall, it's certainly an interesting new direction to take things, and is relatively original. However, the developers seemed to forget how the two sides fought at the start of the game, and the only real change is that the teams switched jerseys. At the start of the game your teammates were bullet-absorbing badasses, and your enemies had obvious shortfalls in armour and firepower. Yet that gets reversed when you change sides. There was a great chance to change the game play completely and base it on sneaky guerrilla warfare, but the developers got lazy.

Major sinners: It's hard to single anything but Haze out for this, as not many games go for this type of twist. But it's bad enough to warrant a commandment.

8. Thou shalt not invoke the daring method of story telling device of telling us bugger all.

Story telling is an important part of games. Not all games, of course. But many games. And yet so many developers feel that we need to know nothing at the start of the game. Why are we fighting? What are we fighting for? Why do we need to kill enemy x? We aren't told...we just do. By all means twist and contort the story as you go. Make our jaws drop with “holy crap, I did NOT see that coming!” moments. But give us something to twist at least.

Major sinners: Heavenly Sword, Haze

9. Whilst thine enemies must not be made from paper maché, they must also not be hewn from blocks of steel.

A game with enemies that die in a hit or two feels too easy. But we shouldn't need to unload a whole clip into the grunts just to fell them. It's an example of false difficulty (covered below) that has no real place in a game. It removes the element of serious gunplay and replaces it with forced tactical reloading. While tactical reloading has its place, it should not be the only element of strategy.

Major sinners: Actually I'm having a hard time coming up with titles for this. I know this problem exists. I've screamed when I come across it. But I just can't think of the games. Oh wait, some come to mind now. Grand Theft Auto, Devil May Cry, Heavenly Sword.

10. Thou halt not make thine difficult by false means.

"False difficulty" is a difficult thing to define. What some people call genuine difficulty, others regard as cheap tricks. It also encompasses a few parts of this list already. I'm not a brilliant gamer. I've been playing for years, but many people can kick my ass in just about every game. I'm neither superb, nor bad. I'm in the middle. I'm your average gamer. And I feel that make me perfectly suited to comment on problems that arise in games on difficulties aimed at us. Some of these problems can be forgiven on harder difficulties where better gamers may not be hampered by them. But, here we go.

Endlessly respawning enemies
Enemies that can take a whole clip to the head and keep coming
Enemies that can block all but the slowest, hardest attacks, yet attack you with great speed themselves
Pitting the player against impossible odds and forcing them to take damage
Enemies that can use special attacks as often as they like
Enemies that use unavoidable attacks, forcing the player to be hit by it
Making the enemies blend in to the background too well
Giving the enemies perfect vision at OVER 9000 yards and give them weapons that can snipe at that distance even though they use the same weapon for close-quarters combat
Enemies that have bottomless clips and therefore don't need to reload

Those are just a few of the problems that comprise "false difficulty". It's sheer laziness on the AI programmer’s side. Instead of making smart enemies that can make good tactical decisions, we so often find ourselves coming up against unfairly balanced enemies.

Major sinners: Contra, Devil May Cry, Haze, Just about every Nintendo game ever made that isn't some colourful shovelware

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So there you go. If your game breaks any of these commandments, you had better have a good reason for doing so.

A selection of gems from my Gmail spam box

2008-08-25T15:07:16Z

My Gmail seems to be under a lot of spam these days, more so (oddly) than my hotmail. However, its excellent spam filter means I don't ever have to bother with them. However, I decided to have a laugh at what ridiculous rubbish was being sent to me. I was not disappointed. Among the usual torrent of duplicate watches and penis enlargement products, there were some real gems that were obvious attempts to get my attention. Most of them are the usual "celebrity x and celebrity y have sex here's the video" nonsense, but it seems some people have gone out of their way to make absurd subject lines. They did not fail! Below is a selection of some of the more absurd ones. Bear in mind I didn't open the emails, as I assumed they would have nout to do with the subject.

"Paris toilet phobia blamed on swallowed stash"
Yes, apparently our "favourite" socialite is not only scared of toilets, but swallowed a "stash" that incites such fear. Which begs the question, what was it a stash of? Scratch that, I'd rather not know.

"Ron Paul, Vikki Carr, Andy Roddick & Paris Hilton have foursome"
A politician, aging singer, tennis player and socialite walk into a bedroom...

"Paris Hilton returned by aliens"
Well, that might explain a few things

"Britney steals Jamie Lynn's fetus"
I don't even know where to start with this one, aside from the fact that it’s not fetus, it’s foetus.

"Britney Spears' vagina attacks warder and escapes rehab"
Britney's sentient vagina shines some new light on the previous one... perhaps there's a B-movie here? On second thoughts...no.

"25% discount on your penis"
Ok, this is obviously another "enlarge your penis" email, but the wording of the subject is confusing. Do I have to pay tax on my penis? Rent? Insurance? Have I been a tax evader for 22 years?

"Use it for improving your love life XD"
Anyone who uses the internet for long enough knows that XD is a smiley for hysterical laughter. So to use it in the subject line must acknowledge it as a scam? I don't know who's thicker, the people who created this message, or the people who go for it...

"Never be ripped off by a doctor again"
I'm certain this is targeted for Americans, where healthcare isn't free. But it's impossible to take this seriously when your doctor's treatments are paid for by the NHS...yes, I shall make sure to never get ripped off by my free healthcare.

"Subject :)"
YOU'RE NOT EVEN TRYING!

"do u want Good Pay Job? World recognized University Dip1oma/Degree/Bacheloor for you mjtuyi nd"
Why yes, a good pay job would be nice. I don't know of anywhere that accepts diponeomas, or bacheloors though. And I don't think this was meant for me. My name is Chris Finlay, not Mjtuyi Nd.

"The dimension you've dreamed about"
Ooooh the fourth dimension? Fifth? Tenth? Nope, larger penises again. Damn, I thought inter-dimensional travel had been invented. God damn you Anibal Snider for getting my hopes up.

"Britney loses ear in freak accident"
So, back with our favourite bat-shit mad pop singer. Perhaps this freak accident involved her mutant warden-attacking, foetus-stealing vagina?

"Michael Jackson gives up being a pedophile"
A couple of things spring to mind here. 1) He was never convicted, and 2) its not really a job, or something you give up, is it? "Sorry boss, I've decided to give up paedophilia and move on. I've had a good salary offer from Necorphiliacs Ltd."

"Pitcher's skull split open by pitch"
Somehow, a baseball player threw the ball so hard that it turned round and struck him in the skull. Mind you, the lack of a celebrity name drop is confusing in this one.

"Mad woman screams at man"
Well, who would have thought it? Who would have thought that a woman would have gotten angry and yelled at a man? My goodness, stop the presses! A cat mewed! A dog barked!

"rifle modest"
This one was confusing enough on its own, so I just HAD to open the message to see what it was about. Inside was the following text:

hyde tuberculosis holster

moneywort endogamous strum? kinky, chalcedony miles.
percept abash ileum besmirch pantomime somerville, fountain
abash tetravalent abash strum elaborate.

fallacy orwell.

I...uhh....what?

So, there we go. A selection of some of the oddities that collect in a Gmail spam box. I hope they entertained you as much as they did me.

Resistance: Fall of Man & Skate: First Impressions

2008-08-11T00:42:38Z

First off, some praise for the Playstation Store: A fabulous collection of demos, downloadable games and content.

And now, some bitching: It's really annoying when the demos are tossed in with everything else, and you have to go hunting for things. Anyway, that’s enough of that. Onto the games.

Short reviews this time, because as I'm sure you have guessed, I've been checking out a load of demos of late, and these are the 2 I've been playing the most.

Resistance: Fall of Man

R: FoM was a launch title for PS3, so it seems odd to be reviewing it after so long. But with a sequel on the way, many people will be looking to pick up the original at cut price, so there is method in my madness.

Let me state for the record that I am horribly biased against console FPSs. I feel lost without my keyboard and mouse, and a multitude of key bindings. I hate how aiming with analogue sticks feels so vague and I have a burning hatred for the cheapness that is auto-aim. I hate how so many seem to be plagued my endlessly respawning enemies in a false attempt to make the game more difficult. I glaze over console FPSs in the same way I glaze over the Daily Mail or The Sun in the newspaper rack. So understand just how fun R: FoM is when I say this is one of the best FPSs I have played this year.

I'll give you a minute to pick your jaws off the floor...done? Good.

Obviously, it's not on par with Portal or HL2:E2, but considering it was an early 2007 title for Europe (late 2006 for America), it still gives everything else a huge run for its money. To get at why this game is so good, let’s have a look at what it does to address the things I hate in most console shooters.

First off the bat, it follows neither of the 2 most hated faux-difficulty strategies of making you carry only 2 weapons, or face endlessly respawning enemies. There's no moment where you think "crap... I would have been better off with a sniper rifle, but I only have a pistol and assault rifle, now I must backtrack". Admittedly from what I can tell in the demo you start off with every weapon you're going to pick up in a certain level, which means you feel a little spoilt for choice at the start, but you soon begin to get a feel for what gun suits what situation. Running into close combat with multiple monsters? Whip out the double-barrelled shotgun. Find an enemy that refuses to come out from cover, or you daren't face head on? Pull out a nifty little weapon that penetrates most form of cover.

The game is set in an alternate timeline in 1951, with an alien or mutant invasion in full swing. A lot of guns are based off weapons from that time, but a lot of them are alien technology, adding a bit of spice and variety to what could have been a stale selection. The environments are well-rendered, an excellent mix between structures from that period (some very recognisable) and futuristic installations.

The action is thick and fast, refusing to let up for very long, creating a real urgent sense of panic. You are never felt lost about where to head next either, as objectives are pretty clear. Unlike the rest of this generation's shooters, R: FoM also doesn't fall into the trap of giving you bugger all in terms of a HUD. Ammo counts and health bars are all present, thankfully.

In terms of controls, they layouts are pretty intuitive. It still suffers a little from vague aiming, but the auto-aim plays enough part in helping you hit an enemy, without ever being overbearing.

Perhaps this game is flawed horribly. I don't know, I was too busy fighting for my life against a mutated army from hell, and having a damn good time doing it.

8/10.

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Skate

Normally for every genre of game, you have a pick between a lot of solid contenders. FPSs have Half Life, Halo, and all that, football games have FIFA and Pro Evo, both of which offer a solid experience aimed at different people. However, the skateboarding game genre is one that's been a bit of a monopoly for Mr Tony Hawk. Sure, a couple of games have challenged, but most have fallen flat on their face. MTV Sports Skateboarding attempted to forgo the arcadey OTT-ness of THPS and focus on a more realistic style, but it was plagued by poor level design and control issues. Now, EA have decided to get into the fray with Skate, and it certainly has designs on flipping the genre on its head.

THPS has always been about the skater: your character, your story, and your tricks. Even after it went completely off it tits and thought it was GTA for a while, it still tried to remain centred on the skater. Skate, however, is taking a different approach. With its lowered camera and odd controls, it seems set to make the game more about the board than the mass of flesh on top of it.

Things looked a little off in the loading screen, when the game gave an overview of the controls. Two buttons for pushing? No ollie button? What is going on? Thankfully, all is explained in the tutorials, where you discover that square and x cause your skater to push the board with his left and right foot respectively, allowing you to skate in a style that matches your real life style. The left analogue performs the usual turning and shifting weight forward and backward on the board. Where the game innovates heavily though, is the right analogue stick. By pushing it down, your skater will crouch, readying for an ollie. Flicking straight upward from here will pop the board into the air, the height determined by how long you crouched for; and flicking off-centre will cause the board to spin, flip and rotate accordingly, allowing a number of flip tricks to be accessible straight off. The more creative you are with the stick, the more creative the flip trick. Pressing R2 or L2 grabs the board with the right or left hand, and then the right stick lets you "tweak" the grab.

Another area that sets Skate apart from THPS is in landing tricks. In THPS you will bail if you land on a poor line or continue to hold a grab all the way to the ground. However, in Skate the landing is more forgiving, and landing with the board facing sideways will normally cause you to slide over the ground and lose all speed instead of bailing. And, more realistically, you can grab the board all the way to the floor if you like.

Grinding is a simple matter of landing on a rail, with the angle of the board determining the grind. Variations are achieved with the right stick, and balancing is not really a concern on most rails.

The controls are mind boggling at first. Speed and momentum are easily lost if you don't keep pushing, but you need to stop pushing to prepare your ollies, and you find yourself realizing that you're not skating like you would in a game, you're skating like you would in real life.

It took me some time, but I fell in love with it.

8/10

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So there we have it. Two 8/10 games. There are more demos to review, some shit and some good, and I shall report back soon!

Gran Turismo 5: Prologue

2008-07-26T20:45:17Z

"The Real Driving Simulator" returns for another instalment on everyone's favourite big black Spiderman-typeface monolith, the PS3. Not quite the full game, Polyphony Digital have chosen once again to whet gamers’ appetites by giving them a gentle push into the shallow bit of the unheated & unforgiving plunge pool that is Gran Turismo.

In PAL regions there have been 2 previous cut-down GT games in the name of Concept and GT4: Prologue on the PS2. Both featured a more arcade-style of system (aside from the racing, which was not arcade-like in the slightest) by letting you unlock cars as you went, instead of purchasing them. However, this time PD has seen fit to give us a "GT-light", in that you do normal races to earn cash and buy faster cars. The licences have been thrown out this time round, thankfully, letting you jump right into the action in whichever car under 35000 credits you see fit.

Of the changes made to the series for GT5, there were 3 that received the most attention from fans worldwide: a proper in-car driver view with fully functioning dashboards and whatnot, improved AI along with more cars on the tracks, and the inclusion of Ferrari. Early editions of Prologue featured only a handful of cars with working dashboards (others were static), but recent software updates have brought the entire range to life. And good news on the other fronts: the AI seems a LOT smarter this time round, along with having more personality (no longer will you see cars driving single file up a road in a predetermined order. Instead driver personalities and car performance mean there is a lot of jostling for road position), and you can have up to 16 cars on a track (rally stages are limited to 12). And yes, Ferrari is brought in kicking and screaming, with models both old and new making up the repertoire: F430, F40, 599, 512BB and the 2007 F1 car.

The physics have undergone a large overhaul too. Now you have a choice between standard and professional physics for your car (the latter being more realistic and more challenging), and players are advised to start off on standard to get to grips with what feels like an altogether more real driving experience. Cars feel properly heavy this time round, and in professional mode care must be taken to drive smoothly or else you'll under steer horrifically (front wheel drive) or find yourself screaming through the pearly gates backwards at 120MPH (rear wheel).

Graphically, the game is very pleasing to the eye. The in-car camera gives a surprising level of detail (including the rear-view, which shows the back seats and view through rear window) and you can see in the replays the wake of your car blowing the greenery about. The cars are well-rendered, and the courses look (to coin a phrase) the shit. The experience is bettered by switching to an HD mode, which renders in true 1080p. To get the best out of this however, you will need a widescreen HDTV. Any non-widescreen TV will make things look a little narrow.

Car wise, the selection is sound, featuring a range of talent from all over the world. Some manufacturers are curiously absent (no Toyota, for example) and others are a little under-represented (Jaguar, for example, feature the standard 4.2 XK Coupé as opposed to the supercharged XKR), but there's something here for everyone.

Where the game shoots itself in the foot though is the amount of tracks available. Essentially there are 6 tracks, with some being available in reverse and the others having slight variations (Suzuka full and Suzuka East for example). Not counting reverse courses or minor changes (Fuji Speedway F and GT differ by one corner), there are 8 different tracks to race on. An odd inclusion is Daytona speedway, especially in the early races when you won't be racing anything particularly powerful, and the 2 new courses, Eiger Nordwand and London, are fantastic and irritating respectively. Personally I find myself confined to Eiger and Suzuka for most of the time, as these are the most interesting courses.

The online play is also a bit of a letdown. Connection problems plague the service constantly, creating large amounts of lag, which turn leads to some interesting behaviour from some of the cars. And it seems that the people racing online have had half their brains scooped out, as they drive round the courses in the most retarded fashion possible, bumping into anything and everything and ramming you off the road if you dare to get close to them.

The news channel and GT:TV option are there to keep you up-to-date in the world of Gran Turismo and motorsport, but the TV channel seems woefully underused with only a small handful of videos on offer, and the news section is a little light compared to what is available on the official website.

Thankfully GT5: Prologue wades into battle sporting a budget price tag, so you can forgive it some of its flaws. A few more tracks would be nice, but PD say they will be constantly updating the game with new content, so chances are high this will be increased.

Overall, Prologue is a worthy addition to the GT ranks. A good look at what’s to come, and a worth standalone budget game. 8/10

Super Smash Bro Brawl

2008-07-13T16:01:17Z

Well, seeing as how Dave has posted his review, I think it's about time I gave my $0.02 on Nintendo's latest offering, in which you choose a character from a wealth of previous Nintendo titles and duke it out.

The Smash Bros series has been one that's sat in the back of my mind, and never really come to the fore. I remember playing Melee when it was released in my local Game and vaguely enjoying it, but I've never really been overly interested in getting it for myself. In fact when Scott acquired a US import of Brawl and brought it round to play, the result, from me at least, was a resounding "meh". Perhaps it was the fact that Dave's TV wouldn't play NTSC games in colour and so we had to view it all in black and white, or perhaps because playing with the Wiimote on its own felt clumsy and unintuitive, but I just didn't see the appeal. Sure you run around beating the living daylights out of characters you didn't like, but it didn't seem as deep as other fighters and so I really didn't see the point.

However, 7 months (Seven? SEVEN? What the fuck were Nintendo doing for that long?) after being released everywhere else in the world, Nintendo saw fit to finally grace Europe with SSBB, and I decided to treat myself to a copy and see what all the hype was about.

At first glance SSBB seems rather overwhelming, especially if you're new to the series like me. There are a whole slew of modes to try out, including a handy training option. So I made that my first port of call to get to grips with the controls and check out which of the characters I wanted to play as. Oh and by the way, if the man in the game store offers you a classic controller with the game, take it. Unless you have a GameCube controller sitting about already. Seriously, it's so much better to play with.

After gleefully smashing the ugly out of some stupidly bright opponents, I decided to head over the new "Subspace Emissary", a single player campaign which seems like its only purpose is to add some much needed depth to what would be otherwise a very repetitive game. To its credit, it looks very good, especially the cut scenes. However my fears about how much depth there would actually be were quickly reinforced by the fact that there is no dialogue whatsoever. Characters are introduced with a quick action freeze frame and a banner telling you their name, with no explanation as to why all these people with no prior connections are all suddenly in the same place. Without warning, some green cloaked...thing flies down with some robots and arms a bomb of some description, with the timer set for 3 hours. However, after a very short cut scene and an even shorter fight, the timer is down to a few seconds...huh? But that’s the least of the worries in the SSE.

What this single player "campaign" amounts to is boss fights that play like a standard brawl interspersed with some bland platforming that commits a large number of cardinal gaming sins. Scrolling levels are bad, okay? Especially when you wind up in a troublesome spot through no fault of your own. The "puzzles" are poorly thought out and are either too easy or so bloody vague it’s unfair.

The inclusion of stickers is another puzzling aspect. Different stickers provide different buffs, and you can only apply so many to a single character at a time. What’s worse is that if you decide you no longer want to use a certain sticker on a certain person, you don't get that sticker back to apply to someone else, the game removes it. There are hundreds other to choose from though, so I wouldn't worry. In fact, I wouldn't worry about stickers in general at all. I gave up keeping track of them after the first couple of levels, and I'm not having any trouble with the game.

It seems unfair to rattle Brawl just for the SSE though when there's so much else to do. There are standard brawls, an arcade-style classic mode, challenges, multi-man brawls, online play, stage creator, unlockable demo of past Nintendo games...but that last bit seems like a farce. Yes Nintendo will end up offering all of them on Virtual Console at some point so they don't want to give them away for free, but why restrict us to a minute, minute and a half of game play? And that’s if you’re lucky. Some games get even less time. It would make more sense to let us try a few levels, instead of making us stop just as the action gets interesting.

The problem with so much in the game is that Nintendo seems to have taken the philosophy of "if we throw everything at it, something will surely stick". However, it means that so much of the game winds up unpolished. The combat is far from perfect, mainly due to the fact that it doesn't flow very well when compared to other fighting games, and a lot of the extra modes seem tacked on in a hurry. The online mode is lacking in depth (and is also marred by Nintendo’s bizarre decision to give every game you own a different code, so instead of someone asking simply for your screen name, you find yourself writing down 5 or 6 different 12-digit codes depending on how many games you want to play online with friends), and the stage creator is horrifically limited. You start off with precious few parts, though you can unlock more, but you always yearn for something bigger and better thought out.

Speaking of combat, Smash Bros has been famous for its "tiered" game play, where some characters are far superior to others. If you took two players of equal skill, the winner would be the one who chose a higher tiered character. Brawl apparently attempts to take a few steps back from that and make it more balanced, but oh how it has failed. With so many characters to pick from, and so small a move set for each one, it can't help but be unbalanced. This is fine when playing against the computer, because it can be described at best as a little bit dim, and at worst described as window-licking retarded (until you get to the higher difficulties, that is), but when you being to play Brawl the way its meant to be, with friends, you can feel the horror of tiered game play rearing its ugly head.

Once again, Nintendo has served up a large slice of poorly conceived fan service. Not as long in the tooth as other their other series' (this is only the 3rd iteration in the franchise), but when you consider that there is only one original character in the Smash Bros series (Master Hand), it once again feels like a lame cash-in. Its fine in small bursts, admittedly, and very fun to play at times. But if you try to play it for too long at a time, all it's problems come jumping out at you and you begin to wonder if your £37 was well spent after all.

6/10.

DRM, The BBC and you.

2008-05-30T14:50:38Z

It took quite some time, but recently I’ve been getting into the whole iPlayer/4-on-Demand thing that’s taking the internet by storm (and lying somewhat at the heart of the net neutrality debate, but that’s another blog for another time). Keeping up to date with some of my favourite shows, such as The Apprentice and Have I Got News For You is a good way of keeping entertained, and for once I’m doing it in a perfectly legit manner.

Recently, whilst watching the latest HIGNFY, my dad asked if I would be so kind as to copy the show to his pen drive so he could watch it later (presumably in work or such forth). Unfortunately, this wasn’t possible, and I responded that I would have to break the DRM (Digital Rights Management) in order to do so. The next words that escaped my lips surprised me…

“And I have no intention of doing so”

Wait, what? Surely I jest? A company telling me that I can only watch the programme on one device, for a certain number of days and I DON’T want to kick them in teeth? Indeed. You see, where the BBC has prevailed here is by finally compromising with the userbase. Where other companies have fallen is that they will charge for the product, and still tell you where and how to use it. To my mind, once I pay money for the product, I should be able to do so as I please, within limits of course. A fair use policy is fine, and I agree that companies should ask you to not make copies or distribute their product in a manner resembling piracy. But at the same time, I would like to be able to backup my own product, play my games from disk images to preserve the hard copy, and let my friends have a taste of a band’s latest release as I see fit. This is why DRM has fallen foul of just about everyone who uses it: it doesn’t protect YOUR rights; it only attempts to protect the industry’s profits, although it fails at that if you look at the figures. And this is what drives people to piracy. However, I digress.

So, why am I so happy having similar restrictions lumped onto me by the BBC? Well, because it’s a fair compromise. The BBC spends millions bringing us the entertainment we crave, and normally we must pay a licence fee to view it legally. However, with the iPlayer, they are now distributing their latest (and in many cases, best) shows for the best price of all: free. With no licence required. You can’t say fairer than that. The BBC have bent over backwards, and no doubt as this platform takes off it will put a serious dent in traditional viewing figures and thus the BBC’s profits, and all they are asking in return is that you delete the show 7 days after watching it and only view it on the one computer. I say asking, because there are people out there who have cracked the DRM and can do as they please. But if people want these shows so badly, why put them on torrent websites? If they are going to download them, they obviously have the internet. So why not point them in the direction of the iPlayer?

This, for me, is the direction we should be heading. No doubt that as the internet matures as a distribution platform, we will see charges brought in. So, this is my plea to the beeb: stop here. You have a fantastic application, fantastic programmes and a fantastic compromise. You’ve won favour with many, even me (who isn’t a big TV fan).

But what about the other service being offered, 4oD? Channel 4 has stepped into this arena with a view to build upon and improve what’s on offer. It looks good so far, too. Even when you consider that some shows aren’t free, especially films. But most of C4’s main heavy-hitters (Hollyoaks, Peep Show, Kitchen Nightmares and the like) are free. And the costs are low. Consider the cost of a movie on DVD. 4oD lets you download movies for £1.99. That’s cheap. However, and I’m not sure about this so don’t quote me, even the paid products on 4oD have similar DRM restrictions built in. So while its huge library and extensive archives give it an edge over the BBC’s offering, it still seems a little unfair unless you focus on just the free shows.

The TV industry isn’t the only one attempting to break the mould though. Radiohead and Nine Inch Nails have all released free material recently, although a number of underground acts such as Machinae Supremacy had beaten them to it by a large number of years. Now we all know I’m not exactly a fan of NIN or Radiohead, but I applaud their efforts to reward their fans by offering them free, DRM-less content. This is the direction the industries should be taking: rewarding their fans, not penalizing them.

To be honest, this blog is turning into more of a ramble, so I’ll cut it off here. If you want the quick sum-up: iPlayer near perfect, 4oD getting there, music industry has a lot to learn.

Oh and by the way: I found out a bit more about 4oD’s restrictions. The same time limit for files being on your system as the iPlayer applies. They charge for shows that aren’t made by C4, as well as films. Shows older than 30 days in the archives may or may not have a charge applied to them, depending on the show.

Salted Chilli Beef

2008-02-15T18:33:17Z

It's been a while since I gave you a recipe, so here we go!

Inspired by the front of ben's crisp packet, I decided to make chilli beef. I however made a few additions and a bit of guesswork!

Serves 3-4, or in my case 2 dinners worth!

600-800g frying steak
2 small onions (or 1 rather large one!)
1 large green pepper
2 cloves garlic
2 red chillis
tumeric
paprika
cayenne pepper
salt
pepper
noodles
white wine, a medium works nicely

There's a lot of handwaving, as usual. Everything is to taste. The important thing to notice is that the salt isn't just to bring out the flavours, i.e. don't lightly sprinkle. Open the biggest hole in the shaker and use as much as you can without the taste being overpowering.

Cut the beef and peppers into long strips, and the onions into large chunks. Chop the chillis coarsley: leave them in nice big thick circles. Crush or finely chop the garlic. Heat a little oil and add all the ingredients together, except the noodles and the wine. It's best to add the salt in stages, tasting as you go.

(If you have a large enough mixing bowl, mix all the ingredients and coat them in the seasonings and spices as much as you can before adding to the pan to ensure even coverage)

once the meat is half-cooked, pour in a splash of wine and bring to full heat.

Once all the ingredients are cooked through and you're happy with the balance of spices, add the noodles and cook until soft (of course, if you have a preferred way of cooking noodles, you may do that. Or if your noodles take a while, you may want to start them alongside the main dish)

Serve using a HOLED spoon (the wine makes a very thin sauce, and all the flavour will be in the meat etc anyway) and eat, served with a glass of the wine =)

LARGE IMAGE IS LARGE!

Assassin's Creed DS - First Impressions

2008-02-07T18:19:38Z

There's always something unnerving about a game released on multiple platforms. Those released on, say, 360 and PS3 are fine, as they are of the same generation and as the game comes from a third party source, it's to be expected. However, when a game gets released not only on 360 and ps3, but the Nintendo DS as well, to paraphrase Ben 'Yatzhee' Croshaw it all smacks of someone trying to have their cake and eviscerate it too. This sort of cross-system devilrey is usually the domain of movie/tv tie-ins and EA games, neither of which rank very highly on a list of reccomendations.

Assassin's Creed, however, seems to be different. To navigate the obvious power difference between the black and white collusses and Nintendo's little blue console that could, Ubisoft have changed the scope of the game somewhat. Instead of being forced to relive Altair's memories through some virtual memory, you ARE Altair. Instead of giving you free scope through each city, each level is fairly linear.

That's not to be taken as a bad thing though. Each level moves along at a fairly deent pace, and while the number of NPCs on the ground has dwindled, you still feel as if you're in some part of a living breathing city. The game continues the tradition of dicking about on rooftops as much as it can, although there are usually 1 or 2 paths through each are depending on if you wish to stick to the ground or not, and the movement as a whole feels fairly fluid. The jumping is especially satisfying, with Altair having a good range. Possible jumps are obvious - the level design is nice enough to make any jumps that you may not be able to make a blatant no-go area by making them effing huge.

The guards still have the odd tendency to tell if you're an assassin or not by the rate at which you move. Run around a lot and Johnny Law will be tapping you on the shoulder faster than you say "move out of my way", however slinking around at walking pace means they remain completely oblivious, even if the citizens are yelling "IT'S THE ASSASSIN!" at you.

The combat feels fairly fluid so far, with a small number of skills at your disposal, which gets increased as you go. Varying attack strenghts combined with a solid counter-attack system means you will rarely find yourself in a pickle you can't get out of.

In terms of behaving as an assassin, you have 3 other abilites: interrogate, pickpocket or assassinate. The A button becomes context sensitive depending on what the objective for each target is. Pickpocketing involves rummaging around in a bag to remove an item, although bumping the item you're trying to steal into other items in the bag alerta the owner. Interrogate invovles applying pressure to various parts of the victims body in what appears to be a blatant rip-off of the Elite Beat Agents game play style. Assassinations happen right on the spot, with some funky camera angles and sound effects to accompany.

Ubisoft seem to have learnt their lesson from the home console version, and cut the dialogue down in this game. I'm only a few levels in, and so far no-one has spouted their life story at me as they die. It gives the game a better sense of urgency and helps the pace move along.

Overall, AC on the DS is not a perfect title. It plays more like a platformer than an adventure-action game, and thrown in with this are the usual platforming issues. However, it remains fun to play in bursts, which is best for a handheld game.

7/10

Why no love?

2008-02-07T04:35:22Z

Why no love for the apple and mars bar sandwich?

http://www.google.co.uk/search?hl=en&safe=off&q=%22apple+and+mars+bar+sandwich%22&btnG=Search&meta=

returns no results, and flipping the phrase round so mars bar comes first only yields 3.

WELL NOW IT WILL BE 4

APPLE AND MARS BAR SANDWICH

MARS BAR AND APPLE SANDWICH.

I DECREE THAT YOU SHALL EAT ONE.

Games everyone should play

2007-11-05T16:05:22Z

At first, I was considering making this a top 10 list. But then I remembered:

a) I suck at figuring out which things are better
b) What's the point in limiting it to 10? Money isn't really an issue here, as a lot of these games are very cheap now, or abandonware, or so old that the only real way you're goin to play them is on an emulator for free anyway...

So, games everyone should play. Or, games I think everyone should play. Maybe it's more a rundown of some of my favourite gaming experiences. Who knows. I won't describe them in too much detail, thats for you to find out and play. Anyway, without further delay, here we go, in no particular order:

1) Stunt Car Racer (ZX Spectrum, C64, Amiga)

This game defines hard. Simply put, you have a stunt car and a number of roller-coaster-like tracks, with no sides. Do x amounts of laps in x amount of time without falling off too much. It sounds simple, but given the fact that even a hard landing on the track over a jump would damage your car, you quickly find yourself wondering how on earth you can possibly beat the game. But the sheer ludicrousness of the track design kept the game immensly fun for so very, very long.

2) Sonic The Hedgehog 2 (Megadrive)

When Sonic 1 was released, it was a new era for platform games. The world of platforming had been ruled by games like Mario. Whilst there was SOME emphasis on speed (SMB world 4-1, anyone?), it was mostly "take your time, A-B, stomp on a few things". Sonic 1 changed that. It's levels were designed to get you from A to B via the sound barrier. I was hooked when I played it. And when Sonic 2 arrived, bringing with it new special stages, new character, 2 player mode and SUPER SONIC(!!!!), it was gaming nirvana. The blistering pace was still there, the level design was top-notch, and the soundtrack...oh god the soundtrack...

Sonic 3 may have been, to some people, the best 2D sonic game around, but personally I think there's too much immemorable sections in the level design, meaning you can't run from start to finish as fast as you could in 2.

3) World Cup Italia '90 (Megadrive)

The "official" game of the 1990 World Cup. It was...unbelievably bad. You need to play this game just to understand how NOT to make a football game. No fouls, no offsides, horrible AI, horrible graphics (the "cut-scenes" were still images with a dreadful colour pallete), and all too easy to beat Brazil in the final 9-0 with Scotland. On your first attempt.

4) Super Mario Brothers (NES)

For many people, this is where it all began. Unforgiving, simplistic, and oh-so addictive. And quite possibly one of the most hacked roms ever.

I really don't need to describe this to you. Everyone knows this. Everyone knows the warp zone cheats. Everyone knows the god damn line "Our princess is in another castle" HOW MANY PEOPLE DOES BOWSER NEED TO KIDNAP!?

Whilst I may have been a Sonic man at heart, and still am, Mario holds a special place for just being a no-guff, great platformer.

5) The Legend Of Zelda (NES)

The original LoZ. You are link, small...elf...boy...thing... out on a quest to save Princess Zelda, by traversing many dungeons, aquiring many powerups and items, and listening to one of the most memorable scores ever for a game.

What made this game so unigue was it's open-ness. It was truly "go wherever you like". You didn't even have to get the first item, the sword, if you didn't want to (though this made the game unbeatable). This was both a blessing and a curse. It made the game rediculously hard, so it was very easy to get frustrated.

Speaking of frustration...don't walk into the lost woods without a guide. You will be lost for hours...

And then when you beat it,you do it again. But harder.

6) Star Wing (NES)/Lylat Wars (N64)

Let's face it, these two are pretty much the same game. Andross is attacking the galaxy, blah blah blah, start at Cornelia, your path (and thus difficulty) is chosen by how well you do on each stage. But both are stellar examples of outright fun on-rails gameplay. Frustrating when things don't quite go your way, the memorable cast (Fox is you, Falco is the cynical "cool" guy, Peppy is the old veteran, and Slippy just pisses EVERYONE off) adds a running commentary to things going on. And it's not just 4 ships taking on the enemy, following a leader. Your teammates look out for you and themselves, as must you. Frequently in each level, you'll have to help shake some enemies off a teammate's tail, or one of them might come to your aid. And you feel the frustration when one of them gets taken out.

Except Slippy.

Because he sucks balls.

Seriously.

Worst. character. ever.

7) Command & Conquer (PS, Saturn, PC)

oh look, the screenshots are getting bigger!

My first experience of this game was on my friend's Sega Saturn. We roared through the campaign on both sides, and loved the NOD ending.

Perhaps the best experiences came with the commando. Armed with a Desert Eagle, as much C4 as you can imagine, and a bag of one-liners, he epitomised cool.

And the ion cannon....BOOM!

Simplistic real-time strategy. No serious number crunching being done here, no adapting units and buildings to different purposes. Just you, a base, a wad of cash and some units with which to wage futuristic World War.

And speaking of World War...

8) Command & Conquer: Red Alert (PS, PC)

What would happen if Hitler was taken out of the picture before WW2 ever began? Einstein creates a time machine and goes back to achieve just that, in order to save the lives of countless millions. His plans go horribly awry, however, after the Soviet Nations take advantage and start their own campaign...

RA took what was good about the first game, and brought it back in time a bit, and beefed the rest up. Gone were the ion cannons, but in came a lot of new technology. Tesla coils became prominent, being a power-hungry pest to infantry and tank alike. Dogs could take out soldiers in one go, provided they got close enough.

The game also came with a built-in rules and map editor, so you could tip the balance very unfairly in your favour. However, despite this, most people chose to play the way Westwood wanted it, and it remains one of the greatest RTS experiences you can imagine.

9) Duke Nukem 3D (PC)

Sure, Doom may have brough the FPS kicking and screaming into everyone's mind, but aside from a cool portrait on the HUD, "Doomguy" had very little character. He had no lines, no persona. Kicking ass was fun, yes, but it needed...something else.

Enter Duke. A man's man. So manly he shits Chuck Norris. Armed with 10 weapons, including a massive boot, a square jaw, rock-solid hair and enough one liners to make Arnie beg for mercy, Duke was the personality FPS's needed. The game was seedy, gratuitous, not very deep, and as much fun as you can possibly have with your clothes on. The only real story is that some aliens have invaded for whatever reason, and Duke decides enough is enough, drops whatever manly task he's doing (probably getting laid) to go do more manly tasks, all the while paying girls to take their bras off.

Oh, he's got balls of steel too.

10) Comix Zone (Megadrive)

Prepare to get schooled. This is, without a doubt, one of the hardest games ever made.

You play as a comic creator, who gets sucked into one of his comics, and has to fight evil villains with the help of your pet rat. Along the way you'll learn just what humiliation means, as every single damn enemy tears you a new one. A range of items and moves helps, but you have to be lightning fast to get to the end.

Oh, and as of this day I STILL haven't achieved the good ending.

11) Streets of Rage (Megadrive)

You may be noticing a theme here. Duke Nukem, The Commando, the SoR cast...all of them quite manly. These are games from an era when heros where loud, obnoxious and knew how great they were. Featuring 3 playable characters (2 manly men and a manly girl), a load of fucked-up enemies attacking you with everything from broken bottles to hair, and a lot of punching and kicking and throwing. It's up to you to clean up the streets. But you and your buddies aren't alone. The police force are just a call away, ready to fire whatever god-forsakenly huge weapon they are wielding at whoever is on screen. There is senseless destructon, lead pipes, eating food right off the ground and kicking bullets out of mid air. All in the name of the law.

12) Street Fighter 2

Street fighter is one of those series that has a million games, and you can never keep up. Stick with what you know, and in this case for me, the outstanding memories are of the 2nd one. then pick a number of really messed up characters, and enjoy some of the slickest, most frantic and smooth 2d fighting action ever imagined.

13) Soul Calibur (Dreamcast)

Not the first in the series (that was Soul Edge), SC was just what was needed in 3D beat-em-ups. Previously, the king of the ring was Tekken, but it was hugely flawed. It was not smooth in the slightest, combos felt poorly linked, and the characters were just crap. Soul Calibur changed all that. Everything links into each other so well it's like a choreographed film. The sound effects, character design, stage design and music are all superb. Admittedly hr game descends at times into button bashing, but then what beat-em-up doesn't?

14) Shenmue 1 & 2 (DC)

To have never played either chapter of these games is to commit a crime. They are exceptionally slow paced, but the story unfolds in such an epic manner you do not care. It sounds clichéd, but Ryo Hazuki sets out to avenge the murder of his father, only to discover that the rabbit hole goes a little deeper than he thought.

It is a simple exhange. You give up your own life, and play Ryo's. You train, you fight, you even have to get a job to get money. Do it all quick enough and you get the good ending (although there's a lot of leeway, you have to TRY to get the bad ending). Shenmue 2 took all that was good about the first one and threw out a lot of the waiting around. There is so much to do, so much to see, and the modelling of the environements is ecstatically great. And true-to-life. When I visited Hong Kong I was able to visit some of the areas represented in the second game, and I was blown away by how well done it was.

Not the longest games in the world, but the sheer greatness of the tale warrants a play. Word of warning: The series is not, and never will be, finished. Shenmue 2 ends abruptly, lining it up for a sequel, which never got made.

15) Skies of Arcadia (DC/GCN)

Forget Final Fantasy. Do it. Seriously. In terms of turn-based RPGs, SoA rules king.

Or, it would had anyone actually bought it. Releasing it on a failing console wasn't a great move, but then SEGA never seemed to make great decisions in their later years. This, however, is a pure gem. An epic story, 50+ hours long, that twists and turns more than a snake. And combat isn't just limited to on-foot. Massive airships fight for command of the skies, and your tactical decisions can win or lose the battles.

The cast is a little clichéd, and as the game progresses, they become quite predictable (although the game seems to acknowledge this in a tongue in cheek manner.. "Drachma has left your party....again"), but they remain totally lovable. The world is huge, and the story drives forward at a suitable pace. The game is a little linear, however, although there's plenty of side-quests to keep you busy.

16) Metal Gear Solid (PS)

Prior to MGS, the solution the world's problems was guns, more guns, and bigger guns. But what happens when the biggest gun of all, Metal Gear, is the target? It's time to take a new approach: stealth.

Featuring the unforgettable Solid Snake, you must infiltrate an enemy base and find out just what is going on. But all is certainly not as it seems. If I told you the story, you wouldn't believe it. So just go play it.

The game had some problems. A camera that was at times dodgy, an insane difficulty curve, and no ability to move in first person mode. These were addressed in the 2nd game, but for me, the first one is where it all began. It is astonishing, and so immensly playable to this day.

17) Phantasy Star Online (DC, GCN)

Not quote an MMO, as you could only play with 3 other people at a time, PSO made it great fun to grind the same monsters day in, day out. This game is responsible for numerous high phone bills in my house (curse you dial-up!), and a lot of "ooh" and "aah"ing at the screen when something cool happens. Which it invariably does.

Featuring 3 races, each split into 3 classes, there was a wealth of characters to choose from, and a lot of customization. A lot of games mollycoddle you at first, even with the first boss, but not PSO. Whislt the first enemies may be silly, the first boss is not. Pictured above, that dragon is a bitch to kill if you go in even slightly too early. And it keeps getting harder. The last fight is even harder, and the ending is amazing.

Plenty of quests keep you busy, and there's usually enough money coming in to keep you in new armour and weapons.

Admittedly now the online play is hell. Hackers flood every possible server, if there are still any up, so it's best to play solo.

This is a great game to play, even if you avoid online play (it's very playable solo, there's just a hell of a lot more grinding)

18) Grandia 2 (DC, PS2, PC)

This is tied with Skies, IMO, for best RPG ever. Unlike many RPGs, Skies included, this game does away with the annoying reptitive random battles. Instead, like MMOs and action RPGs of today, the enemies are already on the field, and you can choose to ignore them if you wish, or get in close and aggro them. How you approach them influences the start of battle as well: approach from behind, and you get a timing bonus, able to strike them sooner. They get you from behind, and you get surprised, and find yourself defending quite quickly.

The combat system is also near-perfect. The problem with many TBRPGS is just that: rigidly turnbased. Character A takes a turn, then B, then enemy A, then character C, and that pattern remains until one group is dead. Not in Grandia 2. The slider bar has 2 sections: wait, command, action. Depending on their stats, characters move from wait to command faster or slower than others. And certain attacks can also delay actions, or completey disrupt them.

As well as a new timing system, characters can also be moved around the battlefield, as opposed to games like FF where you stand facing the enemy and always return to the same spot. You can use this to your advantage, getting out of range of an enemies attacks (if a character has to move too far to hit someone, it returns to wait status). Characters also run to the nearest point after striking, instead of just waiting where they stood.

The story, characters and settings, while clichéd, are all exellently pulled off. And as well as that, most of the crew that did the voice acting for Metal Gear Solid worked on this, so there's a lot of quality.

19) Half Life (PC, PS2)

HL is one of those rare things: A near perfect game. A perfect story, a perfect character (although he never speaks), perfectly designed enemies, a perfect collection of weapons, perfect amount of blood, perfect gameplay...it's all here. Many people thought this could never be improved...they were wrong.

20) Half Life 2 (PC, XBox360, PS3)

One of the only ames to be better than Half Life. Halfe Life 2 (screenshot from HL2: Ep 1). Set in the future, an alien race is enslaving mankid, but no-one knows the reason why. Black Mesa is no more, but a band of rebels are helping to push back the invasion. Our silent hero, Gordon Freeman, must once again help save the world. But it's not easy. Not by a long shot. And it sure as hell ain't over yet.

Honoury mention for the gravity gun: A superb piece of physics.

21) World of Warcraft (PC)

There's something to be said for a game that I'm only getting bored of after non-stop playing for TWO YEARS. Yes. Night in, night out playing, levelling, grinding, questing, raiding. Admittedly I no longer want to play it, I'm so bored of it now, but 2 years. How many games can you think of that you played every day for over 700 days. For hours a day. It sucks at your life. It's too damn addictive... And it's immense fun while it lasts.

22) Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion (PC, XBOX 360, PS3)

The fourth game in an iconic series. Fixing the problems that plagued the third game (horrible aiming, guards that knew EVERYTHING and usless magic), Oblivion is one of those few games worth near 10/10. A superbly rendered world, more customisation than you can shake a stick at, and more side quests than you can possibly know what to do with, it is a resounding success. an add-on and expansion just keep adding more to what is a sensational game.

And Sara, get over your fear of the Oblivion Planes and complte this game. That is an order.

23) Resident Evil 2 (PS, DC)

This game takes what was so great about the first game, and makes it 10x better. Whilst future installments may have been better (Code Veronica is my favourite, and I hear great things about 4), 2 is just such a great experience that it needs to be played. You do not know fear until you play this game.

24) Serious Sam (PC)

When the world of FPS's has gotten to the point where each game seems to just be a pisstake, what's left to do? Why, take even MORE piss, that's what. Featuring a manlier hero than DN3D, and more enemies flooding at you from every direction than Doom, Serious Sam is the biggest oxymoron since Microsoft Works. Of course, given the slew of enemies coming your way, you never stop firing, and the difficulty is through the roof. But oh god, what an experience. Just disconnect your brain, and hold down that left mouse button.

25) Rez (DC, PS2)

Rez will blow your mind. It will pound your ears. It will make your eyes its bitch. And, if you play it too long, will temporarily induce synaesthesia. It is the trippiest sober experience you will ever have. Based around the concept of sound, you fly through a computer system killing a major virus before it kills you. 2 parts Hackers, 2 parts Tron, 4609274078357 parts LSD, this is one game you cannot be without.

also: http://www.gamegirladvance.com/archives/2002/10/26/sex_in_games_rezvibrator.html

good or bad?

So there you go. 25 games that everyone must play, IMO. I'm sure you have some more to add I'd be more than welcome to take your suggestions and comments.

Things I LOATHE on the internet

2007-10-10T19:18:49Z

Stumbling through the infinite web with firefox's wonderful "StumbleUpon" addon, you see a lot of web design, and web content. Some good...some horrendous. Here's a list of the things that drive me bat-shit INSANE on the web...

Web 2.0

Yes, the entirety of web 2.0. There is NO web 2.0. No-one has released a new version of the internet. There is nothing on the net now that you couldn't have done a few years ago. Myspace, livejournal etc are nothing new. Community-based websites are nothing more than some rather well-thought out code THAT ALREADY EXISTED.

And most of all, I hate the 2.0 design language. It's all the same look. Blue and green in a 50:50 ratio, with white text, a bubbly logo, and a bunch of pretentious asswank.

Autoplay

Autoplay is the spawn of the devil. It is it's seed. It is everything that is wrong with the internet. Ironically enough, it is massively prevalent in one of the worst sites ever, MySpace. WHY OH GOD WHY MUST I HAVE YOUR CONTENT FORCED UPON ME? When I'm listening to my music I don't want to hear your videos or music or flash blasting out over the top of it. YOUR content is coming onto MY computer. It obeys MY rules. If I want to watch/listen to it, I will do so when I am damn good and ready. Not when you think I'm ready.

Excessive Flash

Flash is a great tool. It allows you to create easy widgets, or even a whole site, that look great and have some great transitions, colour etc. But when your site decides it's going to do about 50 things once I click a link, I lose interest very quickly. Is there a reason you're making it take so long to get to your content? Oh, and one more thing: STOP WITH THE GODDAMN SPLASH PAGES.

"Out-there" Art Sites

Ok, you've got some great artwork you want to share with the world. That's cool. I have some thoughts I'd like to share, so I have this blog. But what purpose does making a site that looks like a retard with a paintbrush designed it have in presenting your art? I don't want to have to click the dot in the middle of your elippses to see your drawing of god-knows-what.

Digg

Digg is like communism. A great idea in theory. Ruined by the userbase. Nearly everyone's site these days has a "Digg it" link, to post a copy on the Digg website. So if someone wants to find something neat, in theory all they have to do is visit digg, and they get presented with a ton of great content, right?

Wrong.

There are 2 types of digg user now. The 13 year old who "diggs" their friends blogs and the stupidest crap around, and the exceptionally nerdy people who digg the latest star trek info. No-one really gives a toss. There's only one thing Digg has done well recently:

09 F9 11 02 9D 74 E3 5B D8 41 56 C5 63 56 88 C0

If you don't recognise that, go look it up. And, of course, Digg administrators are now banning anyone who digg's pages with that on it.

"Free the web/IE sucks/Use firefox/reclaim the internet" logos

Ok, one last time. MY computer. MY rules. MY browser choice. Yes, I use firefox (except when I'm on my laptop, because FF can't handle memory for shit, and my laptop is so old it doesn't have a lot to spare, so Opera is the better choice) but I'm not going to go on a crusade to convert everyone to a different browser. It's their choice. And it may be a good example of open-source software but for the love of Christ, IT'S JUST A BLOODY BROWSER.

Also, if firefox is so great, how come the people who work on it are such dicks? An annoying feature in FF is that alt-text on images can only be displayed to a certain length, so most cut off. The amount displayable can be increased with add-ons, which use memory, so I asked the developers if there was any plans to amend this. That was all. Just asking for one simple fix, offering praise about the other areas of the browser. What was the response? Was I politely told that I was not the first person to raise this concern, and that they were working on it? No. I was flamed to hell and back, and told that "if I could do a better job, I was more than welcome to fucking try", among other things.

People get so worked up about IE being from an evil mega corporation...why are we telling them to use a browser seemingly programmed by 13 year olds with permanent PMS?

Right now I've got so worked up that I can't think of any others... Feel free to add your own annoyances to the list!

Sweet Chilli Apple Pork

2007-10-02T15:59:51Z

I was tempted earlier today to get myself some pork chops, when I realised I was completely bored by them. There's not a lot to do with them: grill em, cover in Lea & Perrins and some cooked apple and enjoy. So now I'm contemplating the following recipe that I came up with in my head:

2 x Pork medallions (not enough meat on chops!)
2 x cooking apples
1 crushed clove of garlic
pinch cinnamon
pinch salt & pepper
a bit of water
1 x bird eye chilli

Finely chop the chilli, and put half the chilli into a pot
Peel, core and dice the apples, and place them along with the cinnamon, salt, water into the pot.
Cook over a low heat, covered, stirring every now and again until sauce-like and the apple is soft. Small chunks of apple is the aim here

Cut the pork medallions into strips, and fry in some oil, along with salt, pepper & garlic and the remaining chilli.
Once cooked through, or nearly cooked through, add the apple sauce and crank the heat right up, and fry the hell out of it until the sauce reduces.

Serve..with...something...rice? Fried cabbage? Hopefully this will be lovely and sweet but with a bit of a kick.

I might try this tonight...I might not. Anyone fancy being a guinea pig and trying it first?

Landing A Scramjet...

2007-09-25T14:49:42Z

Those who know me are aware (though perhaps only slightly) of my aviation fixation. I love aircraft, especially modern ones, and whilst I don't consider myself anywhere near an expert in any field, I do have a decent grasp of how lift, ailerons, rudders, elevators, jets and props etc work.

Recently I've been looking more and more into a technology that, whilst not new, is still very much experimental in most cases.

That technology is the funnily-titled SCRamJet (Supersonic Combustion Ramjet). A basic ramjet is an engine with little-to-no moving parts that works by feeding air in one side at high velocity and using that velocity to compress it, after which standard jet engine practices of injecting fuel and igniting the mixture out the rear nozzle propel the craft. The "ram" compression, so named because the air is simply rammed into the intake, with no turbine or compressor present, is usually enough to equal that of a standard jet engine, or even higher.

A SCRamjet is simply a supersonic version of this. There are of course key design differences, such as the blockage size inside the engine is redicued in order to decrease drag. This also presents the problem that there is less control over engine speed (A ramjet uses these blockages as a convenient control mechanism). This lack of control orces the craft to only fly at a specific altitude for any given speed.

Many countries have their own SCRamjet programs, each with varying degrees of success. Wikipedia has an excellent list of SCRamjet programs here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scramjet_Programs

So, while the boffins are figuring out how to get the thing in the air under its own power (SCRamjets don't work under 0.5mach, or at least not very well) or how to get it to do exactly what they want, I've decided to turn my attention to the problem of getting the thing back on the ground without making a controlled crash landing, as most, if not all, projects have ended in.

This is a difficult topic to approach, especially for someone with as little grasp of physics as me. There are a number of problems, and it's difficult to know which to address first. Perhaps a brief outline of the restrictions is in order first?

1. Speed and altitude are dependant: the engine can only maintain certain speeds at certain altitudes.
2. Lack of engine speed control: This is the big one. With the only moving parts being the inlets for fuel, the only way to really vary the speed of the craft is to restrict fuel flow. Whilst feasible, you can only modify the air-fuel mixture so much before you begin getting unexpected behaviour.
3. The engine itself doesn't work at low speeds, usually anything lower than 0.5 mach (~380MP/H). You can't physically land at 380MPH.
4. Guidance. Current SCRamjet programs are unmanned. I certainly wouldn't want to be in a manned craft approaching mach 17 under testing conditions, would you? How exactly do you get it to go where you want?

Well, these, at least to my mind, appear to be the big problems facing landing such a device. I'll tackle these in reverse order, and perhaps even throw in a diagram or two at the end. They'll be horrible MSPAint jobs, but better than nothing, right?

Well ok, in fact there'll be one gif at the end summarising the lot.

Guidance

As stated, the current programs are unmanned. However, there must be some element of control after launch. For the purpose of testing, remote guidance, coupled with mounted cameras, could perhaps be enough.

However, given that the craft is going to be doing speeds you and I can't even comprehend, accurate landing becomes...tricky. My mind is racing though a laser guidance example. You would need a few different lasers, on different angles, to create the glideslope and landing path necessary. This technology already exists for guiding missiles, so why not guide down an unmanned craft with it? Or use this to guide it on-target and let a remote controlled guidance take over?

Low speeds

380MPH is a pretty nasty speed to make a landing. Most commercial airliners won't land any faster than 200, and they have a full complement of flaps, air brakes, wheel brakes, spoilers, reverse engine thrust (or as near as dammit. It's not true reverse, but it chops up the airflow so as to make any forward thrust fairly scarce). Even the space shuttle, which uses a drag-'chute, only lands at about 213MPH (source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Space_shuttle#Reentry_and_landing).

And let's not get into the prospect of using a drag-'chute on a smaller craft. I don't actually know how big SCRamjet-powered craft can be, but most are based on missile designs, so I'm assuming not very. A 'chute would throw the craft off course as soon as it was deployed, especially at 380MPH with no-one inside to control it.

As stated in the above paragraph, most SCRamjet-propelled craft are based on missile design. This is very sleek, with very little wing. My solution to this problem is a very fast glider. A VERY fast glider. Once the engine has reached it's lowest effecient speed, it cuts out, acting simply as somewhere else for the air to flow through. This will of course screw horribly with lift, but we're not going up, are we?

The lack of wing surface area would meddle with this idea. However, it would, or should, or might be, or perhaps might not be at all and I'm just talking rubbish, possible to create 2 very long wings that close into the body for powered flight, and are opened up for the glider phase. This would give the craft the profile it needs to make a controlled gliding descent. Hopefully...

Lack of engine control

There are two ways you can control, or could control, the speed of the craft from within the engine. One, you simply lower the amount of fuel being injected into the engine, which results in less combustion, and less power.

Two, widen the rear nozzle. Wider nozzle = less pressure on the air makin its way out, which results in less force generated. This would serve to slowly reduce the airspeed of the craft, allowing it to gently descend until it reaches the aforementiond glide phase. Then the nozzles would close up fully, and there would be no ignition.

Another method of slowing the craft outside of the engine would be feasible once the craft has reached more stable speeds. A combination of air brakes, spoilers etc could be gently manipulated in order to create drag, further shrugging off speed.

Speed/altitude dependancy

In this case, the dependancy begins to work in our favour. At high speeds, even minute changes to the profile could be disastrous, so elevators and ailerons and rudders are out of the question. Luckily, as the speed drops, so will the altitude. Once the speeds are lower, the plane could be maneouvered via conventional mechanical means into the laser guiding path.

So, some solutions to the problems. Viable? Perhaps. Obviously all the moving mechanics would have to be able to withstand the incredible speeds. Do we have such parts? I'm not sure. All this, in case you haven't noticed, is mere speculation.

So, in this little gif, is the overview of how my plan comes together. Ignore the crappy art, I can't draw. Also, MSpaint sucks.
Each frame is roughly 5 seconds long, and there are 10 frames. If it's finished by the time you get to the bottom, which it most certainly will, click on it to open it up in a new window and replay it. I forgot to stick on the looping...