Barcamp Bournemouth 5

Posted on by Jonathan Ginn

After enjoying and speaking at Barcamp Bournemouth 4, I decided to do a mad thing and organise this years. With previous organisers busy with new jobs and new directions in life, there was an opportunity for people to jump in. And I did. I am never doing lanyards again.

Before this, the only event I’d organised was HACKBMTH 1 alongside Adam @skattyadz. To go from a one-day hackday with 20 people to a weekend-long event with up to a hundred attendees is quite a jump. And I’m proud to say it went pretty damn well. And of course, it wasn’t all me – I couldn’t have done it without Tim @timofetimo and Paul @paulalbinson as well as the input from @tombuildsstuff and of course advice from @alukeonlife. Hats off to you guys. And of course @andytouch and @tombuildsstuff for bringing cake.

We had some worries beforehand. A lot of puzzle pieces needed to fall into place before the day would be a success, and luckily they all did. Some of them only fell into place days or hours before the event was due to begin. Initial planning for the event was rocky, with many organisers dropping out and leaving it up to fewer and fewer of us. I don’t blame them, though.

But it all went brilliant. Everyone had a blast, especially me. My face was used in a game, in a HTML demo, and in God knows what else. We had a HUGE variety of talks, including one on Kennedy Space Centre, a Raspberry Pi Tank, social media storytelling, the fail swap shop, Kinect, and loads more besides. Every session was a difficult choice between competing things of equal awesomeness.

I also did a talk about CSS Pre-Processors, namely SASS, and my recent obsession with them. Many people left feeling like they were more prepared to explore the scary world of CSS Pre-processors.

Thanks to all for coming along. I’ll post some pics up when I’ve got some. Here’s some choice tweets from the event:


Eventifier Archive for the Event, with pics.

Thanks to everyone for coming along. Of course, the event would be nothing without you guys and your brilliant, varied talks. THANK YOU.

And of course, thank you to our sponsors. Bournemouth Uni hosted us, and BCS provided funding, along with Freshleaf Media and Campaign Monitor. Without them it couldn’t have happened.

Games of 2012

Posted on by Jonathan Ginn

2012 has been a hell of a year for games. It’s the year where indie developers got a chance to destroy us with beautiful visuals and solid gameplay. It’s the year where triple-A high budget games got firmly put into the shade by intimate, lower-budget classics. It’s a year where the AAA games that shone through were paragons of freedom and player-choice. And it’s the year Kickstarter blasted itself into gaming, annihilating my wallet in the process.

2012 is the year where the best games showed you that every moral choice was wrong and every decision will be regretted.

Here are my highlights.

Most Likely To ‘Holy shit, did that just happen?’

Far Cry 3

Far Cry 3 snuck up on me, a bit like that time I was scouting out an enemy base and a tiger snuck up on me. Hearing a growl, I swore under my breath before turning around and pulling out the first gun I could to blast the stealthy tiger away. Before I could fire a shot, he was on me, snarling in my face, and I could only stab him in self-defense.

The commotion drew the guards over from the base, and before I knew it I was fighting off an army of guards and had incoming reinforcements to deal with, all while on the back foot. I took the only route out – a nearby hang-glider on a convenient cliff, diving off the cliff into the forest below, releasing my hold on the hang glider while still flying fifty metres in the air, dropping into a river below. That’s just one moment out of a thousand that I have from Far Cry 3.

It’s hard to describe what makes Far Cry 3 brilliant without turning to anecdotes, but that’s exactly what makes it amazing. Everything feels personal, every moment, every gunshot, every fire that spreads is a chain reaction to something you’re the cause of. Every animation feels perfect and just right, whether diving out of a high-speed car and onto the ground and quickly up again just in time to see it careen off a cliff, or diving into a cenote into the depths below, your momentum carrying you far into the water.

Every approach onto an enemy base is dripping with tension. As you scout out the enemies, marking them, perhaps taking a few out with your silenced sniper rifle, then you sneak in, stabbing a couple, dropping from heights onto others, and sneakily eliminate them all. Or maybe you accidentally release a caged bear and everything suddenly goes insane.

The main storyline isn’t that amazing, but it’s about the moments of quiet before the storm, the moments of standing on a cliff edge and just taking in the view. Or clambering up a radio mast and jumping on a zipline down. And just when you get bored, a truck full of enemies turns up and leaves you scrambling for cover.

It’s everything that made Far Cry 2 one of my favourite games but turned up to eleven. It’s everything that made Far Cry 2 rough but sanded down until it’s smooth. It’s everything that’s perfect about gaming.

Most Likely To Make Me Cry

The Walking Dead

I’ve been recommending The Walking Dead to everyone I can – gamers and non-gamers alike. Across the 5 episodes it weaves a more personal, gripping, haunting tale than the TV show ever does. In The Walking Dead, every step towards your destination means another sacrifice has to be taken. Every decision comes with horrifying results. The characters you grow attached to are snatched away in heartbreaking, harrowing scenes. Every episode makes you gasp with twist and turns and horrifying events.

I’ve been waiting for a game to offer me a heartbreaking, bittersweet ending (see Mass Effect 3 below) and The Walking Dead comes the closest. I can’t wait for season 2.

Most Likely To Make Me Shout at my PC

Hotline Miami

What is there to say about Hotline Miami that no one has said already? When I preordered Hotline Miami, I was already convinced it would be amazing. I didn’t know that it would be even better than I imagined. Even the soundtrack is one of the best I’ve ever heard.

Sun-drenched Miami in 1989 is a horrible place. It’s filled with murderers, psychos, angry russians with guns, bikers with deadly-accurate cleavers, dogs that tear your throat out, mysterious phonecalls, haunting dreams… and you. By the time I had finished the game I had the achievement for killing 1,989 enemies and I hadn’t even noticed.

Your rampage through seedy Miami doesn’t come easily. Hotline Miami is hard as nails. Every level takes 20, 30, 40+ attempts, each turn gripped with tension and knowing that the slightest mistake will get your brains splattered all over a motel carpet.

Hotline Miami is this scene from Drive but looped 50,000 times. It’s relentless. You’ll die, you’ll hit ‘R’, and you’ll try again. And again. And perfect your knife throwing and your crowbar swinging. Until you’ve got it nailed. And at every turn, the game will make you question your motives.

And the ending… Where to even start? I sat back at the ending, shocked at the brilliance of the game. And then it carried on. And on. And subverted everything I’d done. Brilliant, truly. And that soundtrack…

Most Likely To Make Me Feel Like I’m on Acid

Frog Fractions

So, Frog Fractions. A flash game. How could this be in my favourite games of the year? That’s a good question. Maybe you should go play it and find out. It’s free.

It is undoubtedly the best way to learn about fractions in 2012. If you find yourself getting stuck… just tweet me.

Most Likely to Horrify Me

Spec Ops: The Line

At the end of Spec Ops The Line, I felt broken. If 2012 is the year of making you commit horrible acts and feeling terrible about them, then Spec Ops The Line is King.

When you first enter the wasteland of Dubai, you’re anticipating a simple shooter. A simple mission in a gorgeous, destroyed landscape. This rapidly changes as you descend into horror and madness, questioning what’s right and what’s wrong. It pokes holes in modern shooters and their propensity for horror. It makes you feel terrible for the decisions you make, or believe you make. Every step is another step into horror.

It’s been the game I’ve read most about, too – I’ve spent just as long reading about it as I did playing it. Brendan Keogh‘s Killing is Harmless is the pinnacle of that, bringing in multiple articles into one mammoth 50,000 trek through the sand-worn world of Dubai.

Do I feel like a hero yet? I’m not sure.

Most Likely To Make Me Feel Like A Superhero

Dishonored

Dunwall is a world oozing with character. I loved every moment I spent in that world, stabbing and teleporting around. Every nook and cranny held a new secret, a new revelation, and every room was filled with beauty and corruption. Sprinting across tiled rooftops to dive off and onto an enemy below, before zipping across the street and into the shadows, every moment was filled with awesomeness and precariousness in equal amounts.

It’s a game that rewards the explorers, those that search every room they can. Those that use the morbid Heart to understand the people around them, to probe their desires and secrets. Those that look at every painting, every hand-drawn sketch, and every book. A second run-through of the game enlightened me to secrets that I would have seen earlier if only I’d opened my eyes.

The Blink spell is a phenomenal tool, letting you zip across areas in seconds, up onto balconies and onto trains. It’s one of those things that I wish was in every game – imagine Assassin’s Creed with blink. Just let that sink in.

Most Epic

Mass Effect 3

Amidst all the griping about the ending, people lost focus of what an achievement Mass Effect 3. The first game to properly carry over a character, and the first game to truly feel like your actions matter. All of your choices in the past two games have been leading up to some emotional and dramatic endings to the tales.

Mass Effect 3 is the end of one of the best series to date, and it grabbed me throughout and made me feel for every comrade I lost on the way.

Yeah, the ending sucked. But how else can you wrap up something like that? It didn’t give me the heartbreaking ending of loss that I so desired, but the rest made up for it.

Best Shooter

Max Payne 3

I was worried that Max Payne 3 wasn’t going to be up to the standard set by its predecessors. I didn’t need to worry.

It’s the ultimate action game, and the ultimate badass game. Whether you’re diving over a table and blasting people in the face, or throwing down your rifle and pulling out both pistols in a moment straight out of an of action movie, every movement, every animation is a triumph.

It’s one of the few games I can enjoy others playing, too. Just seeing Euphoria being pushed to its limits is hilarious.

Max Payne is runner up in ‘Best Soundtrack of 2012′, after Hotline Miami. Spotify album here.

Best Simulation of Dying Horribly In Space

FTL: Faster Than Light

FTL sounds boring. It’s a game about managing your spaceship. Except it’s not boring. It’s one of the most tense games I’ve played all year. Constantly being chased by dreaded rebels, every FTL jump is filled with terror and venturing forth into the unknown. Of my 39 attempts, not a single one has ended in victory. Each attempt is full of moments to remember amidst moments of terror.

And that time I killed an enemy crew by disabling their life support and then setting fires in their rooms, sucking all the oxygen out? That was good.

Best Unexpected Karaoke

Sleeping Dogs

I only just started playing Sleeping Dogs last night, so I’m a bit late to this one. But so far, it’s superb. Hong Kong feels alive and dripping with atmosphere. The combat is superbly well done. The action hijacking is awesome. It’s a wonderful game.

Also, Karaoke.

Sony’s Cyber-shot™

Posted on by Jonathan Ginn

The following is a Sponsored Post.

I’m not the most prolific photographer, instead choosing to let the pros take over when it comes to taking the best shots. I’m happier editing photos than taking them. And you’ll certainly be lucky to find me on the other end of the lens!

But I still like to carry around a small portable camera in my bag for those moments I really need to treasure, for when a phone’s camera simply won’t do. A camera also needs to be able to survive the depths of my bag, sharing the bag with my MacBook Air, notebooks, pens, and other assorted items.

From the whole wealth of cameras available, the Sony Cyber-shot™ ‘Slim and Stylish‘ cameras totally fit that bill. Apparently, it can survive almost anything. While I don’t plan on finding myself on the side of a mountain anytime soon, that’s always reassuring. If it can survive a mountain, it can survive the horrors of my messenger bag.

And as a design-obsessive, the classic design hearkens back to classic cameras from the 90s with the sliding front. A classic, timeless design. And with its Carl Zeiss lens, it’ll take some amazing shots for such a tiny package.

Of course, that’s not the only camera in the Cyber-shot™ digital cameras range. There’s also the Professional Compact which manages to cram a full frame 24.3 megapixel sensor into a small chassis, which certainly blows my phone’s camera.

The whole family is rounded off by the Portable and Powerful and the High Performance camera families. There’s something for everyone there. The 20x optical zoom on the High Performance camera would be invaluable for grabbing details from the furthest of targets out in the countryside, or you could go for a HD video of the cityscape around you. And the Portable and Powerful family are perfect for those nights out when you need a reliable, light camera that can capture every unforgettable moment.

If only I could get them all. (But I don’t have enough hands.) But for me, the Slim and Stylish camera fits the bill. What one do you think works best for you guys?

Don’t Blink.

Posted on by Jonathan Ginn

This post contains rampant speculation about the future of Doctor Who’s Season 7. It may contain spoilers, depending on how accurate my imagination is.

The Doctor Who episode Blink may be Stephen Moffat’s greatest hour. Filled with superb writing, time travel wrangling, one of the best conversations in TV, and an ingenious twist (see video below), most importantly it introduces the most horrific villain in Doctor Who, ever.

Continue reading →

Shocktor Who

Posted on by Jonathan Ginn

Asylum of the Daleks was a brilliant start to the new series. I’m often harsh on Doctor Who as I hold it to a high standard, but Asylum was a corker. Hit the ground running (or falling), didn’t slow itself down with guff, was full of twists and turns, and had a single moment that had me in awe of Moffat, if only for a few minutes.

I genuinely thought that Doctor Who had done something immensely clever. (Spoilers for Asylum of the Daleks ahead.)

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Why I don’t like app.net right now

Posted on by Jonathan Ginn

Let me start by saying that while I don’t like app.net, I also don’t dislike it. I support the values of app.net, that of being for the users, not for commercial purposes. Compared to the shit Twitter is pulling recently, it’s a refreshing approach. But the way app.net is going about it seems… wrong. Here’s some of my thoughts why.

It might never even get anywhere. This is a possibility. If it was cheap, I’d take a gamble. But at the price it is, I can’t get behind it.

It isn’t finished. It needs work. This wouldn’t be a problem if it didn’t cost…

…$50. That’s a mighty large amount of money. Sure, that equates to about 9p a day, an amount I’d happily pay for Twitter, but the value of app.net is far less. With Twitter I can access people from around the world, a vast network of intellectuals and idiots alike, and hear about news before it’s even reported on the news. With app.net I can access the people I already know. Joy. And with app.net that’ll never change, because…

…It’ll never get the userbase that Twitter has. Sure, it won’t get the 14 year old Bieber lovers who don’t know who Neil Armstrong is. That’s certainly an advantage. But you won’t get the average joe, the person who just happens to be in the right place at the right time to capture an iconic moment. These moments aren’t captured by web developers sat in their office. Twitter will still be the first to report everything, because Twitter is open to everyone. App.net isn’t open to everyone, and…

…It runs the risk of being an exclusive club. The $50 per year entry fee makes it very likely that it’ll be reserved for the elitist, those who are bothered enough to cough it up. I don’t ever want to be part of such a club, too busy staring up it’s own arse to see the world outside, existing in it’s own bubble. It’s just an ‘I have $50‘ club.

…there’s no room for failure. Or experiments. The $50 suddenly makes it serious. You can’t just set up a joke throwaway account for an event, nor can you make a comedy account because it’s likely it’ll fail. On App.net, there will be no horse_ebooks. There would be no @big_ben_clock. There would also be no ‘bad’ spam, which is good, but I’ll take the crap because there’s diamonds out there. On app.net, everything will be the same. No shitness, no brilliance.

Promises mean nothing on the internet. If there’s one thing my cynical hardened self has learned, it’s that promises mean nothing, especially on the internet. App.net is promising a lot – privacy, user data, and so on. Actually providing a product is a different story. I have no idea who the CEO is and his word means nothing to me. Even if Gabe Newell promised me something for $50, I’d probably turn my nose up at it. Unless it was Half-Life 3.

The CEO never looks at the camera. Come on, if you want the viewer to cough up $50, at least look at the camera. Just once. Come on. At least acknowledge the viewer exists.

 

I want to get behind it, I really do. But I can’t right now. Not at the price it is. Not every year.

Right now it just seems to be just like Path – a way of interacting with people you already know, telling you things you don’t really care about like the food they’re eating or the beach they’re on. And Path is free.

spinning on a sheet of ice it all makes sense

Posted on by Jonathan Ginn

The tale of @horse_ebooks, aka “Learn“.

If you know me, then you know I love @horse_ebooks. I often get a lot of questions along the lines of “What exactly is this bloody horse and why do you keep retweeting it?”, so I thought I’d summarise it in one post.

@horse_ebooks is a spambot. There’s no way around it – it’s a spambot, a dirty dirty spambot. It’s been designed to sell shitty ebooks and set up by some Russian guy. No one really knows what it is, and that’s part of the fun of it. Some have tried to find out, but it doesn’t really matter. What matters is what it posts.

@horse_ebooks attempts to promote and sell crappy ebooks by posting completely random snippets from them. By posting sentences completely out of context (and often with broken grammar/styling) it manages to make mundane sentences completely laughable. Often sentences are cut short abruptly, suddenly making a mundane sentence a complete mystery, and often with completely hilarious results. Every tweet is a real quote from a real ebook, which only makes it more hilarious.

And it is consistently funny. Every tweet makes me giggle, and I have to resist retweeting every one.

I love horse_ebooks because it’s utterly absurd. It’s a bot that is fulfilling its purpose well but in a completely useless fashion. Absurd, insane humour is always welcome in my world, and horse_ebooks is the epitome of that humour.

I highly recommend you follow the account for a slice of bizarre, absurd fun on a regular basis.

What runs horse_ebooks?

Often under tweets you’ll see the source, such as “web”, “Twitter for iPhone”, etc. In the beginning, horse_ebooks ran from the source of “Horse ebooks”. At some point in September 2011, it abruptly changed to “web”, leading to a lot of confusion. This change could mean that a real person is manually putting in the tweets, pasted from real ebooks. But the sheer volume of tweets and ‘feel’ to them doesn’t seem right to me – it feels like a bot.

Either way, it doesn’t matter to me. I don’t need to know if it’s a real person or a horse typing on a keyboard or a bot. It doesn’t matter and I don’t feel like I should have to find out. It would ruin the mystery and absurdity of it all.

Further Reading

So now you know.