I have a new camera

Today I decided I needed a new camera. After much investigation I narrowed the choice down to a Fuji S8000fd and a Canon SX100IS. In the end I went with the Canon for two reasons. Picture quality and size. The Fuji was just far too big.

Here are some sample shots

I'm back

I've been gone for a couple of weeks and I've had things to say but quite frankly I couldn't be bothered.

Here's a quick update. GTAIV is good but not 10/10 good, Space Ace on Blu-ray is excellent, I start in the Age of Conan open beta tomorrow, Transmetropolitan is the best comic ever, Stephen Fry writes good sci-fi, my PC arrived in the end and is very fast indeed, Lego Star Wars is still good, House of Suns is cracking sci-fi, Doctor Who is back and better than ever, Pushing Daisies is the weirdest show I've ever seen and Miley Cyrus has had a photo taken of her that looks like she's just finished fucking. Disney is horrified.

Delivery companies are all crap

I'm waiting for a new PC from Dell to be delivered. Dell hire Walsh Western to deliver who in turn subcontract the the clueless Business Post.

I have tracking info for the WW side of things but their tracking system has been broken for about a day and the automated phone line isn't answering. I phone up my Business Post depot (Where the parcel should be now) but they can't help without a consignment number. Because of the subcontracting I have no consignment number.

2 years ago Business Post were supposed to deliver a Dell PC to me and used the "We tried but you weren't in" excuse.

So I can easily see a clusterfuck approaching rapidly.

Eee. Now in XP flavour

I used Nlite to install a stripped down copy of XP on my Eee PC on Sunday. It works really well and I still have 2gig free on the SSD for apps. A 2gig memory upgrade arrived for it today that I'll fit tonight and I'm waiting for a 8gig SDHC card to arrive from Play.com for my data. I think I'll fill it up with Sid tunes and a selection of Mame games.

Sadly Dwarf Fortress doesn't run fast enough. It maxes out the CPU and has a very low frame rate. It would have been the perfect portable DF machine too.

In other news Rockband for the 360 and PS3 will cost a taking the pisstastic £180 so they can fuck right off. GTAIV continues to look insanely great.

Dwarf Fortress the second coming

I took the sum of my acquired DF knowledge and started a new fortress tonight. After getting three dwarves killed by fire imps early on things settled down and I currently have a thriving fortress. Ore mining expeditions to the lower levels have begun and my stonecrafters are keeping the fortress wealthy. Trading is no longer an issue.

Here's the current layout

Kobolds have been sighted

Kobold thieves have been sighted in the area apparently wanting to steal children. I've activated a crack squad of dwarf recruits, armed them with crossbows and stationed them at the entrance. I've also armed my fishermen with crossbows since they tend to run into these buggers on their travels.

I have a crafterdwarf churning out stonecrafts non-stop (This is the way to buy stuff from the traders folks) and I'm still waiting for my puppies to grow up so I can turn them into sleek killing dog missiles.

I think something must have died in dining room number 2 since it's currently filled with a purple miasma cloud. Not good if you need to eat your lunch.

The mess in full

I discovered how to take full screenshots of my fortress so here it is in all its chaotic glory

Dwarf Fortress Update

My first wave of immigrants has arrived. I now have 28 dwarves of various skills and work is moving much faster now. I have lots and lots of food and booze, cattle culling has begun and I've started sending hunters out into the landscape.

Fortress expansion has begun in earnest. First step is new dining and bed space for everyone. I'm hoping I can get enough resources together to buy an avil soon but I'm not sure if I can.



I'm not sure where the tame bear came from though

Fortress Update

So far my fortress is progressing nicely. I have farms, workshops, large storage areas, plenty of sleeping and eating facilities and the capability to make much booze. A slight mixup means I won't be able to train wardogs for a while but hopefully I'll evade notice by the elephant armies for a while longer.

It did take about an hour for my dwarves to clear all the spare rock I had scattered around the place but all the rooms are clear now and I have plenty of room for expansion. I'm looking forward to the first wave of immigrants moving in. Things should move a lot faster once I have more pairs of hands. I didn't have enough craft items ready for the first traders this year so I couldn't afford an anvil. Metalworking will just have to wait until later.

A donkey and a horse seem to have taken up residence in the fortress but nobody will claim ownership of them. The dogs, cats and cows have all given birth to a new generation and the cats are doing a good job of keeping the rat population down.

Next job is to create more barrels and bins for storage and to try and get enough food and booze supplies for when the immigrants arrive.

Best game ever

For quite a long time now I've wanted to play Dwarf Fortress and every time I've tried the almost vertical learning curve put me off.

Until last night. Last night I put in the extra effort and it paid off. I only played for a few hours but I'm afraid I'm hooked. For those not in the know Dwarf Fortress is a Dungeon Keeper type game done in the style of a real time Roguelike. You take your merry band of dwarfs into the wilderness and attempt to start a new settlement there.

It has a user interface designed by the devil himself and gives you almost no guidance on how to play. There's a halfway decent first player guide here but it misses out on some critical information that caused me to need to restart 3 or 4 times before it clicked.

So it's hard, unhelpful, difficult and ugly but persevere and it's so very, very rewarding. Like Nethack and Roguelikes before it I fear I'm now a lifetime convert to the way of Dwarf Fortress.