Website of Doom

I'm really loving this game, it has great graphics, gameplay and some really neat features in spawn and server management.

One of the coolest features of the game is the spawn manager. In most multiplayer FPS games, each team has a definite side of the map that they start on. As they die, they spawn from these same locations to re-enter the battle.

The positive aspect of this is it makes a map easier to learn because there is a definite flow of direction in the map. You always start from a consistent place so it's easier to recognize where you are, where you need to go, and where the enemy will likely be coming from.

However, on the downside, this also means in a game with very unbalanced teams, the stronger team can pin down the other side to their spawn points and kill them before they can even really get back in the game. You appear, and 2 seconds later a grenade rolls around the corner and your dead. This can be really frustrating and ruin an otherwise great game.

Some games have tried to eliminate this by making several predetermined spawn points that you can randomly appear in. This does help in that it's hard for an enemy to predict the exact location of a spawn, however because it is usually still within a confined map area, you will eventually have to run through an area that will have enemies waiting.

What COD:MW2 does is quite interesting. If I am correct (I deduced this just by gameplay), the computer will try to spawn you as close to the location that you died without putting you in harm's way. So you may end up very close to where you died or a little further if there is too much enemy movement surrounding the area.

The interesting result of this is that during the course of the game, the map "sides" can change dynamically. If one team pushes through to the other "side" (where the enemy was coming from at first), and starts dying there, eventually that team will start spawning from that side and the enemy will start spawning from the other side, reversing the map.

This can make it somewhat confusing the first time you play the game, because your spawn point is constantly changing and it's hard to tell which direction an enemy can come from. They are coming from all directions! But the beauty is you will never have to deal with spawn camping again. It makes it virtually impossible to predict where the enemy will come from, which is more challenging and helps balance the game for all players involved.

The other thing I noticed which was interesting was the server manager. In most games I've played to date, you download a list of servers, filtering out the ones you don't want (e.g. too slow, maps you don't like, game types, etc.), and play on the server you select for a while. In COD:MW2 it appears the server system is fully load balancing and managed. It will automatically find the right server for you, balancing teams and selecting the fastest server with the game type you prefer. If your server becomes too slow, the player group is kept together and the server manager will transfer the game - intact - to another server. It's like the group of people and the game are an object or package that can be transported to any server in the network on the fly to provide the best experience possible. I also noticed that when your group loses too many players to stay on a server (e.g. half the people leave the game after a round is finished), it will either try to find a server with the right player limits, find other players to join the game, or even try to find another straggler group like yours and merge them together for a new game.

The entire thing is very fluid and fully managed by the network, likely allowing the server administrators to balance their server loads evenly and prevent bottlenecks in performance. So far from what I've seen it works very well, I've always been able to find a server and game quickly and easily, with none of the connection and lag problems that were so common in other multiplayer FPS's I've played.

Boo-ya to great server tech and innovative ideas!

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The (semi) finished bike

This is the first bike I've ever owned. I was on my way to a fundraising event and saw it in a garage sale on the way. The moment I looked at it, I knew this was going to be my first bike. Funny how that works - I had been thinking about getting a bike for a while before that, and voila, it appears.

The bike was fairly weathered (spent one year outside) and needed some maintenance, but otherwise it was in excellent shape with only 16K on it. Except for the seat cover, all of the original parts were there. The chrome was in great shape and it started up without any problems. It looked like it was dropped once at low speed (or while parked), as there was some damage on the right side. All pretty minor damage - broken choke control, torn rubber boot on the shifter, dent in the front fender - nothing that couldn't be fixed with a few parts and a bit of work.

I bought it in the fall and fixed some of the immediate and easy things on it. Replaced the choke cable, emptied and replaced the gas, plugs, etc. I rode it for that month as-is, basically just learning. This year I spent a lot more time on it cleaning, polishing, fixing and restoring it. I decided against a strict restoration, as this was my first bike and I wanted to have a bit of my own personality in it. I painted it a custom metallic orange instead of the original dark metallic red with stripes. Other than that, I've let it stay pretty true to the original and for the time being, I'm not planning on adding any aftermarket parts or customizations. This way if I wanted to go back to a restoration I basically need a seat and the original paint.

Throughout the process I found that I really, really love riding. I also really love fixing, restoring and working on bikes. I think this is something that I will enjoy a lot of! So I am already on the lookout for my next project... :)

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I think it's a 1974 Norton Commando 850 MKII. I found a picture of it online and it looks pretty close:



The distinctive trait about his bike is the shape of the seat and how it flows into the rear fender. This style of seat is closer to a sport bike which cups to help keep you forward on the bike. The majority of Commandos that I have seen have the classic 70's style bread-loaf seat, like this 1973 850 Commando:



Both of these are great looking bikes. I love the 70's Nortons. And if I find the old fogey that ran it over in the movie, I am going to kick his ass!!!

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Are you trying to connect to a RealVNC Free Edition server on a machine with Vista x64 and getting booted out right after entering your password with the following message?

Connection reset by peer (10054)

The free edition of RealVNC does not support 64-bit operating systems like Vista x64. To get RealVNC server to work on one, you will need to purchase the Enterprise edition of RealVNC.

Screw that, I say! A cheaper and better solution is to get UltraVNC. It's a great open source VNC server with x64 support and has plenty of features and plugins available. Because VNC is based on a standard protocol called RFB, it is compatible with RealVNC, allowing you to use RealVNC viewer on an UltraVNC server or vice versa. The only things that won't work when you do this are the extra plugins and features specific to each program (like file transfers), but everyday remote desktop will work just fine.

You can download UltraVNC from the UltraVNC website.

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I'm tired of my site design again. I need something to inspire me. Something fresh. And most of all, I need time to do it. Hmmm....

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