GTA IV

Since I have a Playstation 3, I obviously have to have Grand Theft Auto 4! I haven’t played it too much so far but it’s a dramatic improvement from the last one (obviously) with a more realistic look and feel on the city, and tons of new features to keep you busy for days, or even weeks! On the other hand the car controlling is much harder, and it always seems that you end up taking out a few pedestrians and mailboxes when you try that e-brake turn around the corner to loose the cops. But that’s the only bad point I could find. You play as Niko Bellic, a Serbian veteran of the Bosnian War, who comes to Liberty City in search on the American dream or so he thinks… One of your most useful features in the game is the ability to access your cell phone. This is where you can call your friends, access online play; enter cheats, and do much more things. An other cool new feature is your GPS, you can still add waypoints, but now it actually tells you what road to take. The police system is totally different, now you have to exit a round zone with ought being seen, and the police cars do appear on your radar screen. The game itself runs in 1080p so it looks great on a HDTV and sounds awesome on surround sound. All in all this is the greatest game you could get for Playstation 3 and defiantly a recommendation for everyone to buy it, so BUY IT NOW!!!

Eudemons Online

A friend recently told me to download Eudemons Online. Its a free 3D MMORPG (Massively Multilayer Online Role Playing Game) available here. The game itself it I find sort of like World of Warcraft you make a character and go around the map killing monsters and completing quests, except here you find eggs and hatch theme into Eudemons that you use to kill monsters. As your Eudemons level up they can evolve into different, more powerful forms, that lets you kill bigger more powerful monsters. You can also join and create legions (clans) and complete quests in groups of friends. The game is easy to play and to understand, even tho it might be a little confusing at first. The maps are quite big so there is lots of room to explore and fight. There are updates and addons released periodically that add new character classes, items, and Eudemons to the game. All in all its a great game, even for me who doesn’t usually play RPG games.

HDTV

    We just got a 46 inch Panasonic HDTV. It runs at 1080p so the PS3 really looks great on it. And with surround sound, Rock Band and Warhawk never sounded better. We got a new HD satellite receiver, that runs two TVs so now we can record up to 30 hours of HD video and up to 200 hours of SD video. Now that our PS3 is on a HDTV I might try installing Linux, Because I got my mouse and keyboard working on it.

And an other quick fix for the Rock Band drum set. If your Drum Set Keeps on sliding across the floor, Two way tape mouse pads to the bottom, the rubber side has to face down. It will still slide a bit but not as much. Or if your like me, and don’t want it to slide at all, put a 50 pound lead weight in front of it.

Pata Pata Patapon

I recently bought Patapon for PSP. Its a 2D side scrolling rhythm game. At first glance it doesn’t really look like much fun, but once you start playing and really get into the game its quite addictive. The gameplay is very different from any other game I’ve ever played. You start of as the great patapon (the patapon’s god). You control a primitive tribal army of eye ball shaped creatures (patapons) using drum beats. Using the Square, Circle, Triangle, and Cross buttons you hit the different drums in the right pattern to control your army. There are only a few simple commands like forward, attack, defend… The more you progress through the game the more types of patapons, and weapons you unlock. The player can customize his army by equipping amour and weapons found in the game, and choosing different squads of patapons to play with. Other than the actual game there are some mini games that you can play to receive items and ka-ching (money), like hunting where you guide your army through a level with no enemies and only animals witch you kill to receive meat to build more patapons. GameSpot gave this game a 9/10 and cited its excellent art and gameplay. I recommend this game to everyone who are looking for the rare few good games for PSP.

Fixed Rock Band Pedal

A few weeks ago we noticed that our rock band pedal had a crack in it. Soon after that it broke in half. We tried gluing it back together and it broke again. We tried fixing it again and this time we took a strip of aluminum and wrapped it around the hinge of the pedal and then we bolted it together.

Rock Band Drum Set Silencer

The Rock Band drum set is great but its really loud, sometimes just the sound of the drum pads over power the real song. So here is a good cheap mod to silence the drum set. First you’ll need 4 rubber mouse pads, you can get them anywheres for cheap. The thicker the mouse pads are the quieter they will be, but the thicker that they are the harder you’ll have to hit the drum. Then you need to find something round thats close to the same size as the gray part of the drum pad, the drum pad is roughly  7 inches or 17.8 centimeters. Once you find or make a circle the right size trace it onto your mouse pads. Cut the circles out with a pair of scissors, and then two way tape or Velcro them to the drum pads. There you’re done and now you have a quieter drum set to rock out on!

Old village Counter Strike: Source Map

I am working on a new custom map for Counter Strike: Source. Its based off an old remote village next to the sea. Some of the thing that there will be in it are a restoraunt, market, town square, wine cellar, old houses, a forested area, and a few secret rooms, and passage ways. The Terrorists are going to spawn in the town, and the Counter Terrorists are going to spawn in the woods and will have to rescue the hostages from different spots in the village. The hostages are going to be randomized in different buildings. To make the map feel old all the buildings will be dark or lit with torches. Once I release the normal version I might release a zombie mod version.

Flying V (work in progress)

I am currently building a Gibson style Flying V. The body is made of Maple and Walnut, and the neck is Maple. I still need to order the electronics, Bridge, fretboard, and other various parts from Stewart MacDonald. This is what I have done so far.

The first picture is the wood as I bought it, the dark wood is Walnut, and the light wood is Maple. The second picture is an example of the strips I cut to make the body. The third one is what I have done so far. You can se how I glued the different strips together to make the body. The headstock and pickup holes aren’t exactly even right now but I am going to fix that over time.

PlayStation Eye

I got a PlayStation eye the other day. Its a great camera for $45. I haven’t bought any games for it yet, but I did use Eye Create to try out some different video effects, some of them are pretty cool. I also found that the camera works very well in poorly lit rooms, the light from a TV set is usually enough to see.

All these pictures were taken with the PlayStation Eye, and were edited with Eye Create.

Double Pedal in Rock Band

To play Rock Bad with a double pedal all you need is a 3.5mm headphone jack splitter, stereo or mono, it doesn’t matter, and a second Rock Band pedal. Then you just plug both pedals into the adapter and the adapter into the same plug as you would with a single pedal. And now you can play with 2 pedals.