A retrospective review of the often overlooked Warlock supernatural horror movie trilogy and its curiously loose translation to the realm of SEGA and Nintendo console gaming.
Tuesday, 16 June 2020
Saturday, 6 June 2020
Fight fire with marshmallows
Toys - the 1992 satirical fantasy film directed by Barry Levinson, starring Robin Williams - is the most bizarre, yet intriguing commercial flop ever committed to celluloid. Fight fire with marshmallows is my (no doubt inadequate) effort to make sense of it, as well as its unlikely adaptation to the world of licensed video games.
Published in 1993 for the SEGA Genesis/Mega Drive and Super Nintendo Entertainment System, it was met with an equally bemused critical response. Many gaming aficionados aren't even aware it exists. Those who are, like to pretend it doesn't.
download ebook in epub format
Published in 1993 for the SEGA Genesis/Mega Drive and Super Nintendo Entertainment System, it was met with an equally bemused critical response. Many gaming aficionados aren't even aware it exists. Those who are, like to pretend it doesn't.
download ebook in epub format
Wednesday, 1 April 2020
Coming soon - the Kookosity Retro Geek Gear Box Loot Crate
Very shortly all you lucky readers will have the unique opportunity to purchase a hand-selected assortment of retro-gaming related collectables such as crocheted Amiga characters, bead art, Lego dioramas of famous game scenarios, key-rings, badges, t-shirts and so on. All officially endorsed by your favourite blogger. That's me. Shut up.
African orphans enjoying their complimentary, prototype retro crates. Note the beaming smiles - I put those there, proving this is a genuine offer.
The icing on the cake will be high-fidelity MP9 versions of my videos, complete with director's commentary, and Ludovico-style speculas to accompany my RetroWaffle game reviews.
Plus. PLUS!!! The first three early adopters will receive an exclusive, signed, glow in the dark Funko Pop Vinyl Bobblehead of yours truly, and a first edition Coleco Chameleon console (subject to availability).
This tricked-out shoebox-sized manna from heaven will be shipping in early June, so don't delay, subscribe today!
Yours for an entirely reasonable $299 per month!
You'd be a fool to miss out!
Friday, 27 July 2018
I'm now an international movie producer!
Having spent about twenty years writing articles for the web that no-one reads, in November last year I finally made the transition to producing videos for YouTube… that no-one watches. So far these all revolve around retro gaming (Amiga-based mostly) and often its connection to the movies.
I started out translating my written articles to audio using a text to robot voice synthesiser, without necessarily synchronising it with the video, though now record my own voice-overs and ensure the two elements complement one another. I'll let you decide if it's an improvement or not. ;)
I've learnt a lot in the last nine months or so, the biggest lesson being... never ever use entry level free video editors (I can't vouch for the high-end pro ones). For projects more complicated than a single video track with a single audio track they're rarely fit for purpose, and even then they tend to fall over in the wind. You'll read glowing reviews of some of them online… written by top 10 compilers who have only spent five minutes playing with each editor before deciding they're awesome. I'm sure half of these lists exist purely for click-bait purposes.
Secondly, if you're editing video via Linux, stop it now. If there's one thing Linux spectacularly fails at delivering, it's a means of editing video… without being pushed to the brink of insanity. I could go on, but the memories are too painful, and therapists are expensive.
I started out translating my written articles to audio using a text to robot voice synthesiser, without necessarily synchronising it with the video, though now record my own voice-overs and ensure the two elements complement one another. I'll let you decide if it's an improvement or not. ;)
I've learnt a lot in the last nine months or so, the biggest lesson being... never ever use entry level free video editors (I can't vouch for the high-end pro ones). For projects more complicated than a single video track with a single audio track they're rarely fit for purpose, and even then they tend to fall over in the wind. You'll read glowing reviews of some of them online… written by top 10 compilers who have only spent five minutes playing with each editor before deciding they're awesome. I'm sure half of these lists exist purely for click-bait purposes.
Secondly, if you're editing video via Linux, stop it now. If there's one thing Linux spectacularly fails at delivering, it's a means of editing video… without being pushed to the brink of insanity. I could go on, but the memories are too painful, and therapists are expensive.
Saturday, 12 March 2016
T-Mobile mobile broadband image compression meddling revisited
If you're an idiot like me you may well be relying on T-Mobile to provide your internet access at home or on the move via their mobile broadband dongle. Since EE swallowed up T-Mobile and Orange, the new conglomerate seem to have forgotten that we actually exist and specific support is practically non-existent.
Eight years ago people began noticing that the quality of images viewed on the web via this service had been drastically degraded. It wasn't a one-off blip, but something that was being deliberately inflicted upon users by T-Mobile themselves in an effort to save bandwidth, and affected every image on every web site.
With a bit of research we discovered that T-Mobile provide an on/off toggle for this 'feature' at accelerator.t-mobile.co.uk and that worked for a while, despite resetting itself on a whim from time to time.
The problem went away for a good while, though just recently it appears T-Mobile are up to their old tricks again, only now the 'accelerator' is as dead as a dodo. We're told this is a bonus and we should be grateful since the upshot is faster browsing. This being T-Mobile of course, web browsing remains as slow as molasses, and we are hamstrung with grainy, 8-bit images by default.
An alternative way to coerce your browser to display images in their optimal resolution is to modify your browser's headers via an extension. The instructions for doing this with Firefox have been known for a long time, though until now I wasn't aware you could achieve the same results with Chrome, which is great news for me as this is my preference.
All you have to do is install the add-on, Modify Headers for Google Chrome, and follow exactly the same steps as provided by Ben Vallack.
This should tide me over nicely until I ditch these clowns and subscribe to a proper ISP.
Eight years ago people began noticing that the quality of images viewed on the web via this service had been drastically degraded. It wasn't a one-off blip, but something that was being deliberately inflicted upon users by T-Mobile themselves in an effort to save bandwidth, and affected every image on every web site.
With a bit of research we discovered that T-Mobile provide an on/off toggle for this 'feature' at accelerator.t-mobile.co.uk and that worked for a while, despite resetting itself on a whim from time to time.
The problem went away for a good while, though just recently it appears T-Mobile are up to their old tricks again, only now the 'accelerator' is as dead as a dodo. We're told this is a bonus and we should be grateful since the upshot is faster browsing. This being T-Mobile of course, web browsing remains as slow as molasses, and we are hamstrung with grainy, 8-bit images by default.
An alternative way to coerce your browser to display images in their optimal resolution is to modify your browser's headers via an extension. The instructions for doing this with Firefox have been known for a long time, though until now I wasn't aware you could achieve the same results with Chrome, which is great news for me as this is my preference.
All you have to do is install the add-on, Modify Headers for Google Chrome, and follow exactly the same steps as provided by Ben Vallack.
This should tide me over nicely until I ditch these clowns and subscribe to a proper ISP.
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