Articles by Michael Anderson

Baldur’s Gate Enhanced Edition Arrives on iPad!

For the past week or so I have been working my way through the PC version of Baldur’s Gate: Enhanced Edition from Overhaul Games. And it is the same as the absolute classic I played in 1998 – but better. So I was thrilled this morning to see that the iPad version was released! It had been delayed due to a bug discovered just before App Store submission, saying “iOS build had a game-stopper bug. With current estimate for app store approval, that puts us into next week. We’re doing all we can.” Next week arrived – and now the…

Music Diary, News & Features

New T-RackS Custom Shop Available from IK Multimedia

IK Multimedia’s T-Rack software allows you to build custom effects processors as plug-ins to soup up your sound. Now they have come out with the latest version called T-RackS® Custom Shop version 4.0 – and it has a load of new features including five new analog-modeled and digital processors, the Custom Shop, and more. The Custom Shop is IK’s online gear shop, which allows users to purchase gear models from within the T-RackS software itself. Here are some more details: 5 New T-RackS Processors, CSR integration, Improved Sound The new T-RackS CS includes five brand-new processing modules. Four belong to…

Health and Fitness, News & Features

That ‘Warm Feeling’ of Nostalgia Might Just Be Real

Have you ever had a pleasant sentimental thought and felt ‘all warm inside’? Turns out that feeling might be an actual physiological response, at least according to some research cited over at the Greatist. Here are the basics: Researchers conducted five separate studies to see if there was a connection between nostalgia — a sentimental longing or wistful affection for the past — and physical warmth. •In the first study participants kept a journal for 30 days. Results showed they recorded more nostalgic thoughts on colder days. •In the next, volunteers were placed in either a cold, comfortable, or hot…

News & Features, Reviews

Mophie Juice Pack for Samsung Galaxy SIII Hands-On Review

If there is one constant in life, it is that portable electronics don’t ever have enough battery life. With each new product we get new features that beg for more power, so regardless of what the manufacturers do to extend battery life … our usage always seems to keep up! Enter Mophie, a company that has had great success making iPhone battery cases for several years. Now they are branching out with their first non-iPhone case, for the hot-selling Samsung Galaxy SIII. Mophie sent me one to check out – let’s take a look! The Hype: Get the most out…

Gear Bits, News & Features

Virgil Guitars Create The Most Elaborate Custom Made Guitars Ever Built!

Looking for an amazing gift for the guitar person in your life? How about an amazing looking guitar that is also designed by and for guitarists? That is what Virgil Guitars is offering. Here is what Virgil Mandanici says about his inspiration: An artist and guitarist since the 1970’s, Virgil Mandanici set out to make guitars that would be exceptional in tone and playability first and foremost. After 35 years of playing guitar, he decided it was time to craft guitars that would feel, play and look better than anything anyone has ever played before – thus Virgil Guitars was…

Gear Bits, News & Features

Ogaco Gadgets Introduces the iKazoo

There are controllers for just about everything that utilize touch, motion, and breath. Now we get one that integrates all of these, and utilizes the latest Bluetooth protocols to interface with just about anything! The first thing you might think when you hear ‘iKazoo’ is … what IS it? Here is an explanation from the creators: iKazoo is basically a gadget compatible with any electronic device with a camera that lets anyone, from beginner to professional make and play music and a whole lot more. Music, games, art, sports and fitness are just some of the applications you can use…

Gear Bits, News & Features

RIP Jazz Pianist Dave Brubeck at 91

Picture of Dave Brubeck from the 1984 JVC Newport Jazz Festival, taken by my friend Jeff. Chances are you know the song ‘Take Five’. You might not immediately call it to mind, but when you check out the video below you are almost certain to say ‘oh yeah, THAT song!’. Congratulations – you have absorbed a lesson on extended harmonies and advanced time signatures! Brubeck was a major figure in jazz and music for several reasons: – He brought jazz to academia at a time when only classical music was studied, and moreover gave students something to think about and…

Editorials, News & Features

Release Windows ARE Stupid … But They Don’t Justify Piracy

Most people know of the popular trope called ‘Step Three: Profit’, in which an idea is started, no plan is developed, but there is an expectation of profit in the end. A random example from South Park: Step 1. Collect underpants. Step 2. ? Step 3. PROFIT The reason I bring that up is that in a recent article at MondayNote the author basically makes the point that release windows are stupid. What is a ‘release window’? It is the decision by a company to make their content (movies, TV shows, albums, etc) available at different times in different countries…

Game Diary, Reviews

Redrum Dead Diary HD for iPad Review

Integrate a cool story in a solid gameplay mechanic and I’m hooked. And Hidden Object Puzzle games are the perfect vehicle for a mystery story – you have a scenario laid out, uncover clues gradually while viewing specific scenes from the story, and generally uncover the entire story and solve the mystery. All wrapped up neatly in a two to four hour long game! The story centers around Rose, a young girl who can see and interact with dead people who were killed unjustly. She describes them as her friends, and her insistence on their reality lands her in an…

Gear Bits, Music Diary

Cool Video Mashup of 2012’s 50+ Most Popular Songs

Regardless of how you feel about pop music, the dreadful corporate control of mainstream radio, the ’14 songs repeated to inifinity’ playlists, and so on … Source: Buzzfeed

Editorials, Gear Bits, News & Features

Is Apple’s Pricing Scheme Hurting Its Profits?

The strategy Apple adopted a couple of years ago of continuing to sell older iPhone models at reduced prices has helped broaden adoption and penetration at the lower end of the market. But another side-effect is that it reduces the average selling price (ASP) of Apple phones, and also the subsidy that they get from carriers. The implication is that this will lower their gross profit margins from the iPhone business, which has been the leading profit generator for the company. All of this is of concern as new research estimates that the iPhone 5 accounts for significantly lower percentage…

Reviews

Samsung Galaxy Note II from U.S. Cellular Review and Video Hands-On

This is the PDA you would have DIED for in 2002. Last year Samsung introduced the Galaxy Note, which was dubbed a ‘phablet’ – hybrid phone and tablet. To the surprise of many the Galaxy Note sold well, particularly in Asia where the larger screen and stylus allowed for drawing larger characters more easily. Now they are back with the Galaxy Note II, and the folks at US Cellular were kind enough to send me one to test out – let’s take a look! The Hype: With a large, high-definition screen, an intuitive and precise S Pen™, blazing-fast quad-core processor,…

Gear Bits

I Read Everything on this Hipster Lit Flowchart BEFORE It Was Cool

When the New York Times took on modern hipsters in their article How to Live Without Irony they caused quite a stir for a number of reasons, and the reaction was immediate and extreme (this IS the internet after all!). I leave it to you to peruse the article and determine your thoughts – I am in the midst of reading ‘Retromania’ and certainly have thoughts around creativity in popular art in the current generation, but not so much on the entirety of culture in this regard. Anyway, GoodReads took on creating a literary flowchart for the hipster generation. Check…

Editorials, Game Diary

Rampant Piracy Causes iOS Developer to Shut Down Online Game

I had been hearing bits of this on gaming forums for the past few days, but today it was confirmed – iOS online game ‘Battle Dungeon’ has been pulled from the App Store and the online servers shut down due to extreme levels of piracy. The developers posted about it at their site and on their Facebook page: Unfortunately we have taken Battle Dungeon down for the forseeable future. This was due to high levels of server load created by large numbers of pirated copies of the game. The high load revealed technical issues which we don’t feel we can…

Editorials, News & Features

Is ‘Ugly Scan’ The Worst Idea EVER for an App?

I have two teenage boys who have both male and female friends, so I know that the pressures and mean-ness hasn’t abated through the years but has continued in daily life and also online. Since I keep track of my kids online, I often see them engaged in things such as ‘Like my status for … ‘ or ‘Truth Is …’ or ‘Rating …’ sorts of back and forth with friends. Within their groups of friends, I have never seen anything particularly terrible – and certainly nothing mean-spirited. But from a variety of news articles, tragic suicides as well as…

News & Features

Princess Kate is Pregnant and The Onion Wastes No Time Chiming In

By now most of the Western world has heard that Princess Kate Middleton is pregnant, as the official announcement was made on December 3rd: Their Royal Highnesses The Duke and Duchess of Cambridge are very pleased to announce that The Duchess of Cambridge is expecting a baby. The Queen, The Duke of Edinburgh, The Prince of Wales, The Duchess of Cornwall and Prince Harry and members of both families are delighted with the news. The Duchess was admitted this afternoon to King Edward VII Hospital in Central London with Hyperemesis Gravidarum. As the pregnancy is in its very early stages,…

Game Diary, Reviews

Atari Celebrates 40 Years of Pong with Free Pong World for iOS Review

I have always loved that picture of my brother and me playing Pong at our aunt’s house one Thanksgiving back in the 70s. For those of us born in the 60s, Pong represented a revolution – a video game system that we could hook to our TV. By the time the 80s were in full swing Pong was an anachronism, yet there is something fun about the simplicity of the gameplay, the challenge of the head-to-head fun. Now you can get a revamped Pong game made as part of the PONG Indie Developer Challenge for free in celebration of the…

Game Diary, News & Features

Murim Wars Massively Multiplayer RPG for iOS and Android Coming in December!

As more and more mobile gamers are connected to high speed networks and are looking beyond simple puzzle games, genres previously tied to computers and consoles have sprung up on mobile devices. Of course, having the graphics capability to run those apps is also a big bonus! It seems that every few months we see a new game that expands the realm of possibilities for online interaction in a mobile setting. In just a couple of weeks we will see a new MMORPG (Massively Multiplayer Online Role Playing Game) for mobile devices – this is a genre previously restricted to…

News & Features

Look at How Much the Galaxy Market Push Is Costing Samsung

This year has been pretty awesome for Samsung – they have seen huge success with the Galaxy SIII, surprise success with the Galaxy Note and Note II, as well as big wins in all of their other businesses. And as I have said, the Samsung Galaxy SIII is one of the best phones I have ever touched and deserves the accolades … and my wife says I will pry it from her cold dead hands! We have also often talked about ads – Apple, Samsung and others (but mostly Apple and Samsung). Apple does loads of advertising, and has created…

Music Diary, News & Features

AC/DC Finally Comes to iTunes, Posts Big Sales in First Week

I remember that with the rock band I played with in high school, one of the first songs we learned was the (new at the time) Highway to Hell by AC/DC. The following year AC/DC really exploded with their greatest album – Back In Black, with a load of classic rock songs that most people would recognize. It was a solid record with little ‘filler’, but AC/DC was really a singles rock band in an ‘AOR’ (album oriented rock) time. Why do I mention this? Because AC/DC has been a hold out in terms of getting their stuff digitally on…

Crowdfunding, Game Diary, News & Features

Sinister Design Launches a Telepath Tactics Kickstarter!

I have written several times about the cool hybrid indie RPG ‘Telepath RPG: Servants of God’, and while I never finished the review I started, it remains a unique experience and one of the best indie games I have played this year. For a while now developer Craig Stern has been talking up the progress on his turn-based game Telepath Tactics – and now he has launched a Kickstarter effort in order to deliver a game with a robust single-player experience and more graphics content than the original simple turn-based multiplayer game he planned. Project Title: Telepath Tactics game for…

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