A music search engine. Literally, in the same sense that we have text search engines. The user would be presented with a flash keyboard and attempt to input a tune he’s got rattling around in his head. He’d be allowed as many takes as he needed; a sign would advise to wait four seconds then try again, between takes. At the end, the user would select which take is closest and submit it. (There would of course be an optional advanced user interface, for people who know something about music theory.) The performance would be sent in MIDI format, and interpreted. The site would then search its database of midi transcriptions for approximate matches. It would output titles, composer names, years, and albums (if applicable). The user would click on the responses to hear the MIDI files (or perhaps associated digital samples). If the user finds what he’s looking for, there would be unobtrusive yet obvious links to iTunes or Amazon or whatever.
A “name that tune” engine. It’s completely feasible, in theory. The largest hurdle that I can see would be the RIAA.
(April 22nd, 2007 @ 5:52pm)
(April 19th, 2007 @ 11:05pm)
Time was, Nintendo was a company was a game. Then Mario was a commodity was a template was a cult.
The guy who dragged Japan’s oldest hanafuda manufacturer into videogame design was a quiet, oddball toy inventor named Gunpei Yokoi. Thanks to Yokoi, Nintendo had already been making “inventive and strange” toys and arcade amusements; in the late ’70s, videogames were just the next logical step. He rounded up a posse, agreed to babysit a slacker friend of his boss’s family, and built from the ground up Nintendo’s first design studio: R&D#1.
Before long, the kid — an art school graduate named Miyamoto — set the editorial tone of bold colors, bolder concepts, and boldest character design. Then he graduated again to set up his own internal studio, and over the next five years completed and refined the two or three ideas he would ever have as a game designer.
(April 10th, 2007 @ 6:45am)
Odorless durians? Heavens no!
“To anyone who doesn’t like durian it smells like a bunch of dead cats,” said Bob Halliday, a food writer in based Bangkok.
“Most Thais don’t like too strong a smell, except some old people,” Dr. Songpol said.
“I don’t think it’s possible to make a durian that doesn’t smell,” said Somchai Tadchang, the owner of a durian orchard on Kret.
“Anyway, durians actually smell good,” he said.
(April 7th, 2007 @ 10:57pm)
By no means is Altered Beast a highbrow game; by neither means is that important. The game’s problem is that no one finished putting it together.
The premise: one or two players, formerly living Roman centurions, are reanimated to interfere with Greek mythology. They do this by punching and kicking zombies, and a touch of randomized lycanthropy. Today you’d call the game a “walk-and-punch”. Not a brawler like Double Dragon; think Bad Dudes. Punch, kick, jump. Press up and jump to jump to a higher platform. Duck and kick to attack upwards. It’s clumsy and stupid, and there’s nothing wrong with that.
(April 3rd, 2007 @ 1:47am)
pubs
