Archive for December, 2007
Bah.
Apologies for the lack of updates lately. Been in the process of a move, and I won’t have a good Internet connection available until the eighth of January, so expect sparse updates until then.
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Merry Christmas.
[Insert obligatory Christmas-related greeting of good tidings and cheer here.]
No commentsSen Tango coming back up.
I’m restarting the Sen Tango database and getting it back up as I write this. Hopefully by Monday (the 24th) I can get it up and running again. I’ll also be tweaking the registration page a bit to require acceptance of the Terms of Service before registration can be completed. I’ll update once it’s up for registration.
No commentsSwitchBlade for World of Warcraft released.
SwitchBlade is an application that enables you to use your Xbox 360 controller (wired or wireless) to control World of Warcraft.
SwitchBlade is intended to make the typical “hunched over the keyboard” style of gaming World of Warcraft induces a more laid back experience, enabling one to relax with just a controller. I sat down for about an hour or two today and started playing on my little level 11 Undead warlock to give this app a try (no way in hell am I going to subject my other characters to the risk of such high repair bills).
It starts out simply enough. You download the program through Xfire (Xfire is required to get this application) and install it. A quick install that updates your 360 controller drivers should they need it, updates your .NET framework 2.0, and updates your DirectX 9.0c installs. Then it brings you to a wizard for quick setup to double-check that your drivers and the SwitchBlade app are up to date. Easy enough. The application then shows you the window for options.
The “Ready to Play! (Default)” option sets up the controls in an ingenious way - the right bumps is right-click, the left bumper is left-click. A is used as pressing the button 1, X is mapped as 2, Y is mapped as 3, and B is mapped as 4. Holding the right or left trigger enables the face buttons (A,X,Y,B) to use different keypresses. For example, holding left trigger while pressing A maps it to the “5″ key in-game as opposed to the “1″ key when the left trigger is not being held.
The controls by default are great. I made some minor modifications, like increasing mouse sensitivity because I like to be able to whip around my surroundings as quickly as possible. I also mapped the “Up-Arrow” on the controller to be a Shift-Right Click for full auto-looting, and the “Down-Arrow” to Control-1 to make my pet (my Voidwalker) attack my target.
In-game, this works surprisingly well. The commands are lightning responsive. I noticed no delays or issues from button press to reaction on-screen. I was quite pleased with the results. I did a few quests on my warlock using the controller (the majority of the Agamand Mills quests, for those of you who are familiar), and it worked pretty well.
Definitely a cool idea, but in reality it makes the process a lot less efficient. The quests I did do on my warlock took me about double the time they would’ve taken without the controller (using my mouse and keyboard). The learning curve for the controls is quite simple, so don’t get me wrong on that. It took me about ten to fifteen minutes to get totally comfortable with the controls. But after actually getting to where I needed to be, the killing was not as effective as it could’ve been. Granted, when I ran towards the town Brill, I stopped at a farm littered with zombies that were just asking to be annihilated. I was able to clear the farm in a matter of minutes, which leads me to believe that farming is pretty effective (and really laid-back) with the controller.
To sum up this review, while SwitchBlade is definitely a cool application (and makes handy use of the Xbox 360 controller on the PC), it truly wouldn’t be the best choice for a high-end World of Warcraft player to use. I can only imagine the nightmare this limited control scheme (I say limited because reaction times to events wouldn’t be nearly as quick, especially getting to potions and stuff unless you have them mapped on to your bars) would cause in a raid for a DPS. I shudder to think how healing would be done. I would recommend this application for a casual player, or one who farms frequently, as it makes the casual side of the game (solo questing, grinding, and farming) relatively easy and a little bit lower stress.
Pros:
- Very responsive
- Learning curve’s not too bad
- Great for soloing/farming
- Easy setup
- Totally free
- Customizable controls
- Updates .NET 2.0, DirectX 9.0c, and the 360 controller drivers for you
Cons:
- Wouldn’t be the best for high-end raids/dungeons
- Requires Xfire to install
- Less efficient for questing (looting takes more time without mapping auto-loot to controller)
My rating: 8/10
Links:
SwitchBlade release notes
SwitchBlade download page on Xfire
Final notes:
I would download it and give it a try. If it’s something you like, dive right in. But it’s not worth getting excited and changing your bar layout for it right away until you know if it behaves to your liking. It’s free, so there’s no real risk to you as a user for trying it. Happy gaming!
Image from http://www.switchbladegaming.com/whatis.cfm.
Electric bike owner owns himself.
The owner of an all-electic drag bike which hits 158MPH in the quarter-mile and goes from 0 to 60 in .97 seconds decided to show off some burnouts at a tech fest. Unfortunately, he caught pavement, speed, and eventually a minivan.
Take a peek at this site and watch the video. It’s a little more than halfway through, and totally worth it.