CounterStrike Go

For a CounterStrike Franchise fan , it doesn't get better than this : CounterStrike Go Trailer on Steam

BRINK : DLC : pre-order bonuses

Oh . My SD just didnt do that :( .

Thats greedy my beloved Game developers. The pre-order bonuses are supposed to be bonuses and not to be sold as DLCs later on unless they are map packs.

Brink DLC: Fallout®/SpecOps Combo Pack is available on steam for $1.99

pouce vers le bas Ubisoft

Ubisoft lied.

Google offers

Re-affirming the fact their three Generals are in for world domination , Google has added one more service to their arsenal : Google offers. I am not sure if this has been live for a while. But I saw this as an ad in gmail :

Currently the service is in beta and so there is nothing for Columbus,Ohio and so I am waiting for this to replace the Groupons.

Google-ing too much ?

From the office network , Google seems to think I am bot or some other crawler or something which is abusing Google.com. 


From the captcha page : 

About this page

Our systems have detected unusual traffic from your computer network. This page checks to see if it's really you sending the requests, and not a robot. Why did this happen?

This page appears when Google automatically detects requests coming from your computer network which appear to be in violation of the Terms of Service. The block will expire shortly after those requests stop. In the meantime, solving the above CAPTCHA will let you continue to use our services.

This traffic may have been sent by malicious software, a browser plug-in, or a script that sends automated requests. If you share your network connection, ask your administrator for help — a different computer using the same IP address may be responsible. Learn more

Sometimes you may be asked to solve the CAPTCHA if you are using advanced terms that robots are known to use, or sending requests very quickly.

IP address: 

Time:
URL: http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&source=hp&q=rss+feed+for+Quality+Center+updates&btnG=Google+Search&aq=f&aqi=m-sD1&aql=&oq=

Dota2 Beta

Interested in Dota 2 beta ?


Try your luck with this link which will direct you to sign in via steam to get things started.

Firefox 6.0 out

Didn't Firefox just release FF5 ? Got the prompt that Firefox 6.0 is out and is available for download. Whats happening in the FF camp ?
 

Witcher : Director's cut : $3.99

Witcher , the director's cut is going for $3.99 @ gamersgate. Thats the CHEAPEST I have seen this game go for. The regular version was on for $4.99 for a month or so in gog.com.

Vader's song : Sword of the Witcher comes to mind as I write this.

to bite or not to bite

Having played all the Assassins Creed series , Brotherhood was an obvious buy @ $50 ( or so ) when they released it. With backlog of games from steams sales , I waited. And thank God I did :

Direct2Drive has the game for $15.95 :).

Arkham city : Aint no place for a hero

Hidden recovery partitions

The Dell laptops usually come with a recovery partition which in some machines are hidden by default.The laptop which I bought from India had the partition visible and I was surprised when i didn't find one in my fiance's laptop. In case you are wondering how to see if Dell has hidden the recovery partition in your machine :

• Click on Start -> Type in "cmd" without the quotes which should give you a command line exe in the search results. 
• Right click and Run as Administrator.
• Enter diskpart in the command line.
• DISKPART> Enter "list disk" without quotes.
• Select the disk number . I had only one connected and so "select disk 0"
• Type in "list partition" . This 
• Type in "select partition 2" ( 2 was the recovery partition in my case)
• Type in "assign" : this should assign a drive letter to the recovery partition.

You are all set. The recovery partition should be visible now.

Minecraft : BOGO

Well , the humble bundle ended and Minecraft is opening doors to a whole lot of folks with their latest sale :

• $21.95 for two copies( free gift code for someone you wub) 

From the official website :

When Minecraft is finished, it will sell for €20.00.
If you pre-purchase now during beta, you pay just €14.95!

Here's what you get:

• You get early access to the game to a discounted price!
• You help fund the development of Minecraft
• Custom skins in multiplayer
• Once you've bought the game, it's yours. No DRM.

EA insider deals

EA insider is throwing another one at the gamers with their 70% off deal on the games below. I am not sure on the details ( Facebook likes of 500 or so).If the expected prices are as below , there will be some happy faces seeing bulletstorm going for $9. Its an INSANE deal for the game though.

• Dead Space 2 [origin.com] (PC-DD) - Expected Price $9
• Crysis 2 [origin.com] (PC-DD) - Expected Price $18
• Bulletstorm [origin.com] (PC-DD) - Expected Price $9
• Battlefield Vietnam [origin.com] (PC-DD) - Expected Price $4.50

TRINE2 soundtracks preview

If you bought the Humble Frozen bundle , the TRINE 2 ( which is due for release this year) soundtracks preview is added as an extra. As always , the three songs which are available are just soothing.

• Trine2 main theme
• Thieves Guild
• Waltz of the temple forest elves

D2D : 60% off , Steam : Elder Scrolls pack

Direct2Drive has a decent set of games @ 60% off . The list includes :

• Crysis 2 $29.95
• Bulletstorm $11.95 ( the lowest I have ever seen this game for : Its a fun game but wasn't worth the intial price of $50)
• Section 8 - Prejudice $5.95
• FEAR 3 $29.95
• Borderlands GOTY $11.95

2nd day of Steam Quakecon sales has Elder scrolls GOTY bundles for 67% off :

• The Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind® Game of the Year Edition
• The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion® Game of the Year Edition Deluxe
• Bundle price : $14.99

HB3 update : Atom Zombie Smasher

Humble Bundle is getting sweeter by day. The latest game to be added to the bundle is blendo games' Atom Zombie Smasher .

Bastion for PC : Aug 16th

Supergiantgames in their latest blog post & twitter updates revealed the PC release date for Bastion : Aug 16th .

The game has only had great reviews in Xbox and I wouldn't hope for any thing lesser for the PC version. The game has garnered a lot of appreciation for the hand painted environment, narration , gameplay & the soundtrack.


I was especially interested in this bit " .., remappable controls created for PC – plus gamepad support. " The recent purchase of Wired X360 controller has been rewarding. :) 

Available on steam for pre-orders  for 14.99
Official post here.

Gmail : Preview pane

Google blogs revealed the latest addition to Gmail's features : Preview pane , like you have in Outlook. The latest updates on tablets for Gmail had the three pane view and it was a no-brainer that we would see this very soon for desktop users.

Details here .

RAGE : Trailer

Oh , yes : I am still pissed off at Bethesda & SD with what they did with BRINK till now.But this trailer for RAGE which was shown today @ Quakecon is BADASS. And yes, as they : This is just the beginning .

Quakecon 2011 Steam Sale : Aug 4th

Steam is rolling out new set of sales from today till Quakecon ends (Sunday , 7th Aug)


Quake 4 is up for grabs @ $ 19.99 with steam slashing the prices of BRINK to $ 24.99. BRINK is free to play till Sunday 1PM PST with the DLC included. The 50% off with the recent patches , fixes and free DLC is the best you can get BRINK for ( at least for the moment). Splashdamage sites are abuzz with the fact that player numbers have gone as high as 3900 right after the F2P announcement. I still consider that it is a desperate attempt from SD to sustain the game and improve the playerbase. The fact that I got slammed for the above statement is an other thing.

Some of the deals below :

• Quakecon Pack 2011 $70
• DOOM 3 Pack $12.50
• QUAKE III: Team Arena $10
• Quake III Arena $10
• DOOM 3 $10
• Heretic + Hexen Collection [7.50
• The Ultimate Doom $5
• QUAKE II $5
• Final DOOM $5
• Master Levels for Doom II $5
• DOOM 3 Resurrection of Evil $5
• DOOM II $5
• QUAKE $5
• HeXen II $3.74
• HeXen: Deathkings of the Dark Citadel $3.74
• Heretic: Shadow of the Serpent Riders $3.74
• HeXen: Beyond Heretic $3.74
• QUAKE II Mission Pack: Ground Zero $2.49
• QUAKE Mission Pack 2: Dissolution of Eternity [steampowered.com] $2.49
• Wolfenstein 3D $3.74
• QUAKE Mission Pack 1: Scourge of Armagon $2.49

QuakeCon

Quakecon 2011 will commence in a few minutes.

QuakeTV/BRINK TV with GreasedScotsman & Mattcom will be shoutcasting the event live from Texas.

Official stream here.

Update:
From Mattcom :

Connect with QuakeCon

own3D.tv
Our exclusive page for the live stream. Tune in starting Thursday at 1pm CDT (19:00 GMT)
http://www.own3d.tv/quakecon

YouTube
View videos from around QuakeCon all in one official destination.
http://www.youtube.com/quakecon2011

Twitter
Get the latest updates from the coverage team.
http://twitter.com/quakeconcvg
Other official announcements will be available at http://twitter.com/quakecon

Machinarium

Machinarium is now on sale in Steam for $2.5.

Strangely humble bundle website announced the addition of HB2 games ( including Machinarium) to the list of games in the HB3 bundle. This makes me wonder how steam sales work ?

One thing to be noted here is that some of the folks who bought HB3 didn't realize that they already owned Machinarium as part of the bonus and went ahead and bought the game from steam as well.

Borderlands 2

 2K games in their latest blog entry announced Borderlands 2 for a April 2012 release.Amazon has the  pre-order going for $ 49.99 right after this announcement came in.

Release date as per Amazon :  December 31,2012 .
Promotion at this moment : Pre-order price guarantee

Image courtsey : gameinformer.com

Bundle in a Bundle

The Humble Indie Bundle 2 games: Braid, Osmos, Machinarium, Cortex Command and Revenge of the Titans have just been added to Humble Indie Bundle 3. Everyone who purchased Humble Indie Bundle 3 before 10:30am PST today will automatically see the extra games on their download page. New purchasers will have to beat the current average on the site to unlock the extra games.

This is a smart move considering the low average that was persisting across Windows compared to Mac & the generous Linux contributions.

Kindle with special offers

I have been using the Kindle for nearly 1.5 months and I have grown fond of it. I was a bit skeptical about this  since I always loved/liked the idea of  holding a book and reading it rather than some electronic gadget which stores all my books. I had to buy the Kindle at one point in time since it was clear that I wouldn't be able to carry them all back when I head back to India.

The part where it said "ads" in the initial launch made me wait for the reviews and judgements compared to the one without ads. Several YouTube videos reviews later , i opened my wallet to Amazon.

• The one interesting thing I started noticing about was that the offers which were displayed were not spam and were real deals in Amazon which has benefited me a lot.Yes , for the argumentative mind you are subduing yourself to buying more stuff from Amazon. Cycling through the ads for the day has become more of a habit these days with the good deals I saw in my Kindle.
• To name a few : $10 for $20 Gift Card in Amazon , $10 off on games in amazon (which worked on accessories as well) , buck a book ( though not the most impressive collection , you wouldn't go wrong with $1 : Water for elephants added :) ) , 25% on selected cameras ( bought a Nikon cool pix  for 62$ ) and so on. 

•  The ads doesn't show up when you read and it is only visible in the bottom most portion when you are in the home page or as a screensaver.

With the offers added , those $ 114 is worth the money spent.

Note : There is a whole thread in slickdeals forums on the offers from Kindle

Click

I rely heavily on the AUTO mode of the camera that I wield with some exceptions where i feel the manual focus and control adjustments would benefit. Lately I have been thinking about getting serious about using the camera the way I am supposed to. Oh , the manual options are a pain and my judgement of light ( almost , 95%) laughs back at me when I click a picture to see the point of my interest ruined by a shadow or the overwhelming darkness which i never can account for.

Countless are the times I have ogled at a picture that a friend took.Don't even think about the ones on the Flickr homepage.

Things to do :

• Start looking into the settings which I am comfortable in and learning to use it- oh , the curve already looks so steep.
• Buy a set of filters for the camera :
• Main intent is to protect the lens than looking for better shots. I am content with that for now.
• Buy a better lens : That is if I believe I can do anything better on this front.

BRINK DLC , Ohio State Fair

• The BRINK DLC is still not available in the US/UK for Xbox or PC . PS3 got some love yesterday when PSN users were reporting the DLC being available for download.Sony went ahead and made the content available yesterday , 2nd of Aug , which was consistent with the speculations which took roots considering Sony releases new contents on Tuesdays. I am not complaining. The DLC screenshots make for some good wallpapers. That is all what i have to say at this point :)
•  Ohio state fair opened up a week back and the concerts list looks awesome :
• Trace Adkins : Aug 3rd ( which is today)
•  Brad Paisley with Blake Shelton and Jerrod Niemann ( Aug 7) . Now I need to coax my friends to change the Saturday plans to one for Sunday :)
• Kingston & Sandisk 8GB flash Drives are going for around $8 in Amazon. The kingston one goes on and off with the free Super Saver shipping. 
• Update: They only have SS for the 11.99 Frustration free packaging one for the drive than then retail one.Funny how amazon is charging you $4 for changing the packaging.

LIMBO

Priced at 9.99 in steam from today , this monochromatic  indie puzzler has already captured the attention of gamers and critics for the mood & art style .Originally released as an XBLA exclusive, the game was re-released by the Danish developers playdead.

The trailer which i chanced upon months back when it was not even announced for PC gave me an eery feeling with the background score , continuous buzz of a bee and a  boy like figure running around in search of something in a dark world. The name somehow seems very apt.


From the steam page :

Winner of more than 90 awards, including GameInformer’s “Best Downloadable”, GameSpot’s “Best Puzzle Game”, Kotaku’s “The Best Indie Game”, GameReactor’s “Digital Game of the Year”, Spike TV’s “Best Independent Game”, X-Play's “Best Downloadable Game” and IGN’s “Best Horror Game”


One strange thing is that the official site for Limbo doesn't state that the game is available on PC till you get to the game store.

Diablo3

Gamespot in their recent interviews with the Jason Bender , one of the senior  game designers in Diablo 3, revealed couple of things :

• Diablo 3 would require a persistent internet connection. Why are all these games requiring an internet connection ? Gone are the days when you could buy a game , load it into the drive and just play. You get to hear the same story again and again: Its fun with your friends. Its so better in co-op mode. :( . I just need a standalone game which i can play without the internet connection.
• There will be a public beta. Glad they are doing this.Considering the fiasco with BRINK I had , I wouldnt dare to buy a game on the game day unless its TRINE's sequels. 
• Something which gives me the irks " We have learned a lot from the ..". Heard this bit of statement in BRINK from SD about ETQW and the game had none of the so called "learned" stuff when they laucnhed the game. Then again , its a relief that Blizzard are releasing a beta which should give you a good picture of whats in store.

C418 : 72 minutes of fame

Minecraft fame C418 :

Bezene & netbanking

Now I know what Friedrich August Kekulé von Stradonitz felt when he zeroed in on the Benzene formula. Or sort of.

·         January 17^th 2011 :

o   log into Net banking

o   Access Denied, incorrect password.

o   2 attempts completed.

o   3^rd try failed and the account is locked out.

o   Wait for 24 hrs for the account to be active again.

·         Friday the 28^th of July ,2011

o   Log into Net banking

o   Password expired

o   Password modified

o   Logged in successfully.

All I needed was around 6 months of sleep

TRINE + Fedora + X360

The dmesg shows that Fedora recognized the X360 controller. Now if only I had a linux game which supported the controller.

After a quick check , I realized that TRINE had linux support and so I downloaded the 64 bit Linux version which was an .run file.

• 32 bit file has some issues which i am not sure of ( Not being able to install being one ).
• 64 bit TRINE setup installed fine , but the launcher doesn't work at all . I click the launcher , run the launcher from terminal. No response. 

Tonight will be a long one if i cannot find the issue with the launcher.