Tools Of the Trade

EDIT: This is work in progress. I'm saving at intervals so the errors you might see are more than likely only temporary.

Ok for ease of use and to save myself the effort of retyping the same things time and time again I will up a list of some of the main tools that I either use or at some time have used but still recommend.
Note1: Once done I will link to this in the main page.
Note2: Most are for windows, Although a lot are multi platform or linux ports.

Video/Anime/Media:


• VLC
  
  The swiss army knife for media playback.
  
  Because it uses intergrated codecs you do not have to install these yourself. This also makes it a great troubleshooting tool to hunt down codec conflicts.
  
  URL:www.videolan.org/vlc/


• Foobar 2000
  
  Foobar is my favorite audio player. Small footprint. Fast, great tools and what is very important to me: It has real unicode support.(Unlike say winamp.)
  
  This might not mean anything to some of you. But what this means is that it can handle Tags/Names that have non English characters in them.(Say Japanese,german)
  
  URL:www.foobar2000.org


• FFDSHOW
  
  Ffdshow is probably the only directshow codec set you need to play most files floating on the net. It eats less resources and works well on older machines.
  
  For a full discription and list of supported formats follow the link.
  
  URL:http://www.free-codecs.com/download/FFDShow.htm


• RealAlternative
  
  So you want to watch a realmedia stream/file but you do not want to install Real One?
  
  This package will install all the filters/codecs to play those real files on your favorite video player.
  
  It is bundled with Media Player Classic. Another great tool.
  
  URL:http://www.free-codecs.com/download/Real_Alternative.htm


• QuicktimeAlternative
  
  Same as above, but for apple's files. Also includes HD video spport.
  
  URL:http://www.free-codecs.com/download/QuickTime_Alternative.htm


• VirtualDub MOD
  
  My trusty partner. Without a shadow of a doubt the best free bit of video editing software out there. Great for (Fan)subbing, making AMV's or editing home movies.
  It does take some knowhow to get you going but well worth the effort.
  
  URL:http://sourceforge.net/project/showfiles.php?group_id=65889


• WinLAME
  
  Audio conversion for lazy people. Especially great for quick and/or dirty conversion from wav's to .ogg or .mp3 to ogg.(You can go for max quality too of course.)
  Or downsampling your mp3's to cram more music on that mp3 player.
  
  "Why not LAME?" Because this has built in Ogg Vorbis support. is easier to use than LAME even with a frontend is. And because newer LAME versions have worse sound quality.
  
  URL:http://winlame.sourceforge.net/


• Audacity
  
  Free fully functional and damn good audio editor.
  
  URL:http://audacity.sourceforge.net/


• CD-DA X Tractor
  
  Great CD ripping tool. Directly encode to mp3 or OGG Vorbis.
  
  URL:http://xtractor.sourceforge.net/download.html

INTERNET:



• Opera
  
  My personal favorite when it comes to making my way over the digital waves.
  
  Built in download manager, RSS reader, Zoom Functionality, fast and Tabbed browsing.
  
  URL:http://www.opera.com/


• Thunderbird
  
  Overall the best mail client.
  
  Plugins let you add the features you need.
  
  The best spell checker system I've ever seen. Quick and easy switching between languages.
  
  URL:www.mozilla.com/thunderbird/


• GNU PG
  
  GNU Privacy Guard. Combined with Thunderbird and the Enigmail Plugin the perfect email encryption solution.
  
  There are several frontends available to make file/disk/data encryption and key managment easier.
  
  URL:www.gnupg.org


• Azureus
  
  Torrent client that works for me. And I really do like the animal they took their name and logo from.
  
  Yes, the frog REALLY IS BLUE and very VERY poisonous.
  
  "Why not another file sharing method?" Because BitTorrent has a thousand and one legit uses.
  
  It is your best friend when getting new linux builds.
  
  Encryption and hash checking support.
  
  URL:http://azureus.sourceforge.net/

Broken Sword 4: Angel of Death.

let me start by making it perfectly clear that as a whole adventure games are my favourite game genre. Especially good old point and click.

The broken sword series as a whole has never appealed to me that much. Mainly because of the rather bad acting and characters that annoyed me.
The 4th installment in this series of rather successful adventure games has managed to reach an all time low.
Not only is the acting just as bad as ever, but this time the game itself in the form of the interface is downright detestable.

One of the common themes in point and clickers is pixel sifting. Or in other words going over the entire screen looking for an item or person to interact with. Usually this is made slightly easier by making the interactive bits stand out. However even the most basic of games from the early days of this genre gives either a text description or a visual indicator in the form of an icon change.
This has been the case since the first monkey island and the first mouse driven king's quest.(Obviously not the first kq games that required the player to type interaction commands.)

But NOT bs4: Climbing ladders/walls/ledges or jumping gaps is most of the time done by blindly double clicking until something happens.
In an attempt to make the most annoying game experience possible.
This is compounded by the worst case of linear scripting I have seen in ages. You can for example only perform set action on inventory items in one, AND ONLY ONE, location in the game. On rare occasion s this makes sense in the form of NPC field of vision (After all it would be silly to call someone on the phone while standing in front of them.) Such bits of logic are sadly rare.

Camera control is nonexistent. Icons to help walking trough doors or indicators to find exits are not in the cards either. Keyboard control is but it's done in such a way that steering the main char trough a door is tricky at best. And it is very possible to get yourself physically stuck requiring a reload from an earlier save.

The game has 0 replay value. Your character has no choices in conversations or other actions. There is only one possible way to get through the game. So there are no optional bits, no alternate endings.

Coding wise this is another example of how not to do it. The readme file is a testament to poor testing. It only officially supports XP. That in itself says enough right there.
The number of supported video cards is extremely limited. It sometimes runs on others but there is a whole lot of reported Direct X errors out there already. Considering DX is supposed to be this wonderful unified API to prevent silly compatibility issues and the number of whql certified drivers out there it makes one wonder just who is fooling who.

On the matter of compatibility there is one other brilliant bit of coding present in BS4. Namely a a known and documented problem with the world's most commonly used sound chip from Realtek. Found integrated on motherboards from just about every brand except those with Nforce audio.

All in all if you want to play a good adventure game go dig up one of the classics. Quite a few are still sold as value/budget packs. Point and click is a dying art, not a dying genre. You cannot blame the genre for lacking sales, when the products offered are inferior to dos titles while requiring modern day high end systems.

Darkstar One

At first I had high hopes for this game. Can't say it managed to meet my expectation. This is a game that is best compared to freelancer. Some try to compare to the X series but that doesn't work if you ask me.
DS1 is a super linear single player game. You can get upgrades for your ship and customize it a bit using special items. Although even in that respect your choices are extremely limited.

There is a reputation system, but that means little to nothing. Because of the story missions and the side missions you need to do if you want to get the upgrades you will without fail be pushed into a specific class. There is some room for trading and piracy, oh yes. Because of the linear nature of the game you have no choice, but to get into a lot of fights. You're not given alternative ways of completing your objectives. There is no room for bribes or diplomacy.

What I hate the most about this game is being forced to do things I have no desire to do. Like helping out a couple of criminals get away with stealing. Why you can't just say bugger this and give up on the reward is a good question.
Flak turret missions is another horrid aspect. There is no cunning or skill involved. In dog fights you can use some level of skill, but in these missions you just have to aim at groups of things and shoot them with a poorly performing flak turret. I hated these in Knights Of The Old Republic and I hated them just as much now. If i wanted to simply shoot things i would play an FPS. But even there you have freedom of movement and there is an amount of strafing and jumping involved these days.

the graphics are ok. I wasn't impressed because stations from each species looked identical and there was little variation in enemy ship design.
The sounds are unimpressive. No proper surround what so ever. You won't be half turning in your seat when an enemy fighter zooms overhead in this one.
The dubs are pretty bad and very limited. Yet again a tiny cast is used to provide voices for an entire galaxy. It's not quite as bad as in oblivion where 2 NPCs talk to each other in the same voice. But very close to that.

All in all, if you're very bored you might want to play this. But if you haven't played them get “Freelancer”, ”Freespace” or “Wing Commander”. Hell go dig up “X Wing” in one of its many incarnations. If you want multiplayer don't bother with Darkstar One: there is none what so ever.