When I restarted the blog I promised some crafting-type posts about making 'stuff'. I've not really covered much of this yet, so I though I'd start posting a regular update on what I've been up to. I did think about doing something once a week, but I know this will last for about two weeks before I fall behind, so I'll start with aiming at once a month!
Sunday, 27 September 2015
When I restarted the blog I promised some crafting-type posts about making 'stuff'. I've not really covered much of this yet, so I though I'd start posting a regular update on what I've been up to. I did think about doing something once a week, but I know this will last for about two weeks before I fall behind, so I'll start with aiming at once a month!Wednesday, 23 September 2015
Cardboard - King of Tokyo
[Salvaged and updated from the old blog, here's a review for King of Tokyo, the kaiju-monster-smashing dice game by Richard Garfield. Since writing the original review we've added the Power Up! expansion to our collection, so I've updated the post to include this. Working on this really makes me want to try followup King of New York!]
When it comes down to it, I'm pretty sure that most nerdly-types like nothing better than rolling a hand-full of dice. If possible, two hand-fulls of dice. Even better, giant dice. Especially if those dice happen to roll up some damage and cause chaos for your friends...
If this is true of you, then I'm sure you'd love King of Tokyo.
When it comes down to it, I'm pretty sure that most nerdly-types like nothing better than rolling a hand-full of dice. If possible, two hand-fulls of dice. Even better, giant dice. Especially if those dice happen to roll up some damage and cause chaos for your friends...
If this is true of you, then I'm sure you'd love King of Tokyo.
Sunday, 20 September 2015
The Handmade Fair - September 2015
This week I spent a lovely Saturday with my friend Pam visiting The Handmade Fair at Hampton Court Palace, in the hope that we'd pick up some new craft skills and get inspired to make more shiny things!
Friday, 18 September 2015
Podcast Love - The Black Tapes Podcast (Pacific North West Stories & Minnow Beats Whale)
Adding another creepy documentary-style podcast to my list of subscriptions, The Black Tapes follows investigator Alex Reagan as she gets caught up in an investigation of Dr Richard Strand (a paranormal investigator who doesn't believe in the supernatural) and his collection of unexplained cases.
I've been listening to Serial recently, a brilliant and critically acclaimed (factual) podcast by journalist Sarah Koenig that re-investigates the murder of an American teenager and subsequent conviction of her ex-boyfriend. Listening to The Black Tapes at the same time, you can't help but compare the two podcasts for style; even the music sounds the same. This is no bad thing - the episodes are professionally produced, interesting and well written (if a little over-scripted at times during the 'spontaneous' interview dialogue).
As well as the Serial influence, The Black Tapes is a little bit X-Files and a little bit found-footage horror. If you liked Limetown from my previous review, you'll love this. Head over to theblacktapespodcast.com and have a listen (in a well lit room - I made the mistake of starting to listen in the dark and did actually manage to creep myself out!)
I've been listening to Serial recently, a brilliant and critically acclaimed (factual) podcast by journalist Sarah Koenig that re-investigates the murder of an American teenager and subsequent conviction of her ex-boyfriend. Listening to The Black Tapes at the same time, you can't help but compare the two podcasts for style; even the music sounds the same. This is no bad thing - the episodes are professionally produced, interesting and well written (if a little over-scripted at times during the 'spontaneous' interview dialogue).
As well as the Serial influence, The Black Tapes is a little bit X-Files and a little bit found-footage horror. If you liked Limetown from my previous review, you'll love this. Head over to theblacktapespodcast.com and have a listen (in a well lit room - I made the mistake of starting to listen in the dark and did actually manage to creep myself out!)
Tuesday, 15 September 2015
Pokémon Go announcement!
Otherwise titled 'How I end up helplessly lost with a flat phone battery in 2016'!
How had I not heard about this sooner?! Pootling through my Google+ feed I came across a Pokémon themed post by 8bitoctopus featuring this Nintendo trailer announcing Pokémon Go for Android and iOS devices:
Oh my goodness! I can catch a Pikachu on my way to work?! I am far more excited than I should be about this, but eee!
It's over 15 years since I first played a Pokémon game, and I was probably too old then. Now I'm charging into my mid-thirties and still planning to have fun with ridiculously age-inappropriate games! I hope whoever intercepted the memo I was supposed to get about growing up has fun with it, because I definitely never saw a copy. Luckily I know lots of other like-minded people, and these days I even have a small child to share with/blame...
I'm encouraged by the Niantic association with the project - this former Google startup was responsible for Ingress, the augmented reality sci-fi mobile game that splits the world into two opposing factions fighting for control of 'portals' made from real-life landmarks. I played this a lot for a while, and it was really good fun until the annoyance of constant phone battery drain made it impractical. The game itself was well implemented and supported by a raft of other media that you discovered as you played. Lots of clever ideas in there, only limited (for me) by the hardware it was implemented on.
This could make or break Pokémon Go for me - the constant GPS and screen-on time must hammer any current smartphone battery. From what I understand the little Pokéball wearable peripheral (Pokémon Go Plus, apparently) is intended to minimise screen time, letting you know (via Bluetooth from your phone) when something is going on nearby. Perhaps this will help with the energy consumption, although I can see this being consigned to the 'random stuff' drawer along with my old Pokéwalker (remember those?!), amiibos and pretty much every other gaming peripheral I've ever owned that wasn't a controller.
I suppose I'll have to wait and see when the game comes out in 2016. I so want this to be good! After all, gotta catch 'em all...
How had I not heard about this sooner?! Pootling through my Google+ feed I came across a Pokémon themed post by 8bitoctopus featuring this Nintendo trailer announcing Pokémon Go for Android and iOS devices:
Oh my goodness! I can catch a Pikachu on my way to work?! I am far more excited than I should be about this, but eee!
It's over 15 years since I first played a Pokémon game, and I was probably too old then. Now I'm charging into my mid-thirties and still planning to have fun with ridiculously age-inappropriate games! I hope whoever intercepted the memo I was supposed to get about growing up has fun with it, because I definitely never saw a copy. Luckily I know lots of other like-minded people, and these days I even have a small child to share with/blame...
I'm encouraged by the Niantic association with the project - this former Google startup was responsible for Ingress, the augmented reality sci-fi mobile game that splits the world into two opposing factions fighting for control of 'portals' made from real-life landmarks. I played this a lot for a while, and it was really good fun until the annoyance of constant phone battery drain made it impractical. The game itself was well implemented and supported by a raft of other media that you discovered as you played. Lots of clever ideas in there, only limited (for me) by the hardware it was implemented on.
This could make or break Pokémon Go for me - the constant GPS and screen-on time must hammer any current smartphone battery. From what I understand the little Pokéball wearable peripheral (Pokémon Go Plus, apparently) is intended to minimise screen time, letting you know (via Bluetooth from your phone) when something is going on nearby. Perhaps this will help with the energy consumption, although I can see this being consigned to the 'random stuff' drawer along with my old Pokéwalker (remember those?!), amiibos and pretty much every other gaming peripheral I've ever owned that wasn't a controller.
I suppose I'll have to wait and see when the game comes out in 2016. I so want this to be good! After all, gotta catch 'em all...
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| Polymer clay Pikachu modelling his retro Pokéwalker! The battery may have died long ago... |
Monday, 14 September 2015
A long time ago in a shoe shop far, far away...
This is the shortest post ever, but I needed to put these up:
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| R2-D2 awesomeness! |
I thought I loved Irregular Choice shoes before, but these R2-D2 themed Star Wars shoes are awesome; I can't wait to see the rest of the range!
Here's a link to the Irregular Choice blog post:
http://shop.irregularchoice.com/blog/2015/09/11/r2-d2-where-are-you/
Here's a link to the Irregular Choice blog post:
http://shop.irregularchoice.com/blog/2015/09/11/r2-d2-where-are-you/
Cardboard - Hanabi card game
The sky is dark, the party is underway, but somebody forgot to set up the fireworks display... Time for 2-5 people to save the day (in around 25 minutes)!
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| Hanabi - a co-operative fireworks card game |
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