Some interesting points regarding consumer goods…
Joy Dish Soap:
For years I had a giant bottle of some Dawn-branded dish detergent. It worked great. Eventually it ran out, so while at the store I bought a bottle of some Lemon-scented Joy. Well, you know that musty / moldy / mildewy smell that dish clothes and sponges get when they are left to sit in a too-moist state for too long?
For some reason since switching to Joy, I’ve had my dishwashing sponge turn rancid once a week. Previously with Dawn I could use the same sponge until the scrubby side had worn flat and it was replaced because of wear, not stink.
Currently, after having been replaced a week ago, the sponge smells so bad that I can’t wash dishes with it, lest the stink permeate my hands for the next 24 hours. (Washing doesn’t get it off.) I guess I’ll be buying some Dawn on the way home and throwing out another perfectly good sponge.
Space Giraffe:
It really is a fun game. It will absolutely, completely piss you off until you understand what is going on, but after that it’s a good bit of fun. Definitely worth the 400 points. It’s one of those games where once you get it you want to keep playing it. Too bad I had to go to bed last night… I wanted to play more this morning, but I was close to running late for work.
Other XBLA Demos I’ve Tried:
· Alien Hominid HD: Like the original, but without the bugs (it’s playable!), better graphics make the cartoony-ness even better, and still absurdly hard.
· Beautiful Katamari: A HD version of Katamari Damacy, which is good. What is bad is that instead of cheesy, poor translations there is intentionally bad English in the dialogs, reminiscent of LOLCATS type crap. Hopefully it doesn’t cost more than $30.
· Geometry Wars: Retro Evolved: Fun, Robotron-like (but not), hard, cheap. I forgot to actually buy the full version last night so I’ll do that tonight.
· Viva Piñata: Cute, just not fun for me. Seems like Danielle would like it. Basically you maintain a garden in order to attract very well rendered piñatas. There may be more, but I only gave the demo about 30 minutes.
Xbox 360 UI:
This is typical Microsoft crap. It is not easy to find where demos vs. downloaded XBLA games vs. whatever else is located. I don’t understand why I shouldn’t be able to be in the downloadable game store, where it says that I have already downloaded the game, and start it from there. Instead you hit a button and it tells you how to launch the game. (Go to this menu, then that, then pick this.) It’s somewhat shiny, but a bit too busy for me. Also, I don’t like the built-in banner ads, even if they are just for other games.
iPod w/ Apple Lossless
Sounds really, really good. The DAC in the iPod is actually pretty nice. However, battery life on an iPod is greatly decreased when using lossless. I think this is because the iPod has (if I remember right) a 32MB buffer which it fills before spinning the disc down. This is plenty big for a couple of lossy tracks to fit in, but not lossless. Therefore the disc has to spin up a lot more. Perhaps this will be changed in future iPods.
To work around this I might make a new iPod cable with built-in charging bits for use on my desk along with the headphone amp.
E 74 on my brand new Xbox 360