commented out

I got a real gem in my inbox the other day. Now, we all know about the dangers of phishing scams, and I’ve gotten them in various forms over the years. The latest attempt, posing as Paypal account security, takes the cake, so I just have to share. The subject line reads thus:

Please Restore Yuour Acount Access

I couldn’t help but laugh. If you can’t tell from that alone that it’s bogus, maybe a couple exerpts will help.

Paypal is constantly working to ensure security by regulary screening the accounts in our system.We recently reviewed your account,and we need more information to help us provide you with secure service.Until we can collect this information,your access to sensitive account features will be limited.We would like to restore your acces as soon as possible,and we apologize for the inconvenience.

That paragraph is just as it appeared in the message, misspellings and poor grammar included. Further along in the message was the explanation concerning my supposed account limitations:

We would like to ensure that your account was not accessed by an unauthorized third party.Becouse protecting the security of your account is our primary concern,we have limited access to sensitive Paypal account features.

Let’s recap for the sake of being thorough. Apparently the folks at Paypal have enough sense to run a (thus-far) successful business but haven’t the slightest clue when it comes to basic grammatical principles such as leaving a space after punctuation. They also cannot spell the words your, account, regularly, and because. Furthermore, since they still haven’t acquired a domain name, I can reach them at the address 62.81.142.158 or I can just login to their account server at 145.236.228.89.

This concludes our lesson in phishing tomfoolery.

Oblivion has been out for several months now, quite long enough for the Elder Scrolls mod community to work their voodoo. Aside from the official downloadable content, here’s a list of mods I’m currently using for my gameplay experience:

• BT Mod - Oblivion’s interface feels much too console-inspired for my tastes. It’s an effective interface, but it feels too limited for my liking. The BT Mod allows you to tweak the interface to your preferences. Download from the BT Mod web site.
• LOD Textures - Replace the distance textures with higher resolution versions for a much nicer look. Download from TESSource.
• Normal Map Textures - Use replacement normal maps along with the LOD textures to further improve the distance visuals. Download from TESSource.
• Short Grass - Shortens the grass. No more getting lost in tall grass, especially if you’re a wood elf. Download from TESSource.
• Advanced Water Modification - Improves the overall quality of water both above and below the surface for a more realistic visual experience. Download from TESSource.
• Illumination Within Revived - Add ambient light coming from inside the buildings around cities. The newly illuminated windows adds an excellent effect at night. Download from Planet Elder Scrolls.
• Book Jacket replacer - Replace the generic book jacket textures with customized textures that display the title of the book. Download from TESSource.
• Natural Environments - Tweaks the environment in various ways for a more pleasing aesthetic experience. The general colors are made a little warmer, vegetation is given a little facelift, and weather is more varied. Download from TESSource.
• Adventurers Oblivion 0.5 - The Adventurers mod intends to tweak the overall game balance. For instance, lowly bandits will no longer come equipped with full glass armor and ebony weaponry. I like the 0.5 version because it tweaks just enough. You can get the latest version from the Adventurers site, or get the 0.5 version.
• Movable Bodies - Tweaks the body physics just a bit to make bodies easier to drag. Download from Planet Elder Scrolls.
• Anywhere Sittable - For the roleplaying type who’d like to kick back and relax anywhere. Relax on the Imperial docks, at the foot of a statue, or anywhere else you can think of. Download from Planet Elder Scrolls.
• Palace Armor - I really like the white palace armor, and think it’s a shame (and ridiculous) that you can’t get it for yourself. This mod rectifies that. Download from Planet Elder Scrolls.
• Reznod’s Mannequins - Display your hard-earned armor and weaponry in style with a posable mannequin. Comes in wood and marble flavors. Download from Planet Elder Scrolls.
• Vagabond’s Better Gold - Improves the look of the gold texture. Download from Planet Elder Scrolls.
• Vagabond’s Real Katanas Part 1 - Excellent katana models both one-handed and two-handed. Add them on their own, or use enchanted versions to replace some unique Akaviri weapons. Download from Planet Elder Scrolls.

Newest additions (as of August 9, 2006):

• Myths and Legends - Search for lost relics in this challenging treasure hunt. Currently it has roughly a dozen new weapons, with more content on the way. Download from TESSource, Planet Elder Scrolls, or TESFiles.
• Decorator Assistant - Is decorating your classy Cheydinhal home a chore? The Decorator Assistant is a useful tool for easily placing your items exactly as you want them. Download from TESSource.
• Harvest Mod - After harvesting an ingredient, the object is removed from the game world. Not only is it easier to tell what you’ve already collected, but it also adds a touch of immersion to the game. Download from TESSource.
• Color Map Mod - Colors the Oblivion map to show grasslands, cold regions, etc. I think it makes the map a little more readable and aesthetically pleasing. Download from TESSource. Comes in omod format so you’ll need the Oblivion Mod Manager, which you can get from Planet Elder Scrolls.
• The Golden Arrow Archer Shop - Need an easy place to refill your quiver? Stop by The Golden Arrow, just east of the Imperial City. After a while, it’s just easier to have one place to come back to for restocking instead of traipsing all over the province. Download from TESSource.

Prey puts you in the role of Tommy, a Cherokee who finds himself fighting for his freedom after being abducted by aliens along with his grandfather and girlfriend, Jen. Aboard the massive ship, called The Sphere, you’ll find yourself in an environment that’s a mix of organic and technological. Within the first several minutes you’re set free by an unknown ally, and with your trusty wrench in hand the battle for freedom begins.

Graphics: Prey uses the Doom 3 engine, which does an excellent job with curvy, organic environments. The texturing is well-done, and appropriately gross in the living parts of the ship. Weapon effects are likewise well-done, from muzzle-flashes to explosions and beam effects. You can expect to find all the standard bump mapping, normal mapping, and whatnot. The engine really shines with the new portal effects; the other side of the portal is rendered completely in real-time with no drop in framerate.

Sound: Weapon effects are well done, both bullet and energy effects are pleasing to the ear. Environmental effects are par for the course, pleasing but nothing overtly special. Jeremy Soule and Julian Soule headed up the soundtrack which kicks in during certain moments of the game and is par for the course for a Jeremy Soule offering (read: excellent).

Gameplay: Prey’s core gameplay is standard shooter fair: get a weapon and shoot masses of enemies in various shapes and sizes. However, the game offers a few added twists that spice things up nicely. First, is the portal technology which enemies will often use to get the drop on you. Moving through portals is a seamless experience and is used to great effect in several instances, such as a transition to a miniature planet in a glass case, or a portal-based maze that where you can see yourself through other portals as you navigate it.

The second trick Prey pulls off is gravity manipulation. As disorienting as it can be, the ability to alter gravity is undeniably cool. Switches can be used to shift the flow of gravity, effectively turning a room upside down, and specialized walkways allow you to traverse an area from floor to wall to ceiling with ease. Objects can even be given their own gravitational properties, so you might find yourself jumping from one place and reorienting yourself to a completely different direction as you land on an object with stronger gravitational pull.

Spirit walking is an interesting ability that allows you to leave your body to deal with otherwise impassable obstacles such as force fields and gaps too wide to jump across. Many puzzles require the use of spirit walking and while some of them feel like filler, most are intuitive. For example, one instance requires two switches to be thrown almost simultaneously in order to unlock access to the next section. By hitting one switch with your spirit, and then the other yourself, you’re able to proceed.

In keeping with spiritual abilities, you can’t actually die. Instead, you fight fallen souls in a spiritual world to replenish your physical health and spirit power. Once resurrected, you pick up right where you left off. It’s an interesting idea, but it sort of removes some of the tension since you’re guaranteed to eventually work your way through even the toughest spots. That being said, I give credit to the developers for removing one of the oldest gameplay hooks ever (the ability to lose due to character death) for the sake of a story-oriented option (strength of spirit and ressurection).

The weaponry is a well designed mix of technological and organic, filling out the usual shooter roles of machine gun, heavy machine gun, rocket launcher, etc. The one weapon that stands out is the leech gun, which takes one of four energy types from wall-mounted ports, and it’s quite a fun weapon to use.

Overall: While Prey’s core gameplay is nothing more than your standard shooter fair, it offers up enough twists and gimmicks to be a worthy addition to your gaming library. The game goes by rather quickly, but I attribute this to being spared from the dreary cycle of dying and reloading a save game.

While cleaning out my attic the other day I came across some old goodies. So, let’s embark on a trek… back in time!

Nintendo has recently made a big splash in the gaming waters with its motion-sensitive Wii, but this isn’t the first time Nintendo’s been involved in motion-related technology. Around 1989, Broderbund released the U-Force, a fold-up motion-sensing device based on infrared technology. It came with a T-bar and two handles that could act as a makeshift flight-yolk, and a sensor bar that I could never figure out. In order to get it to work, you had to configure switches based on the game you were playing. The only problem is, while the idea was certainly novel, it failed miserably when it came to actual execution.

The other major find was the remnants of my old 386 SX20, the second computer I ever took apart, and the first gaming computer I ever had. Before this I had an IBM 8088, complete with state-of-the-art amber-colored graphics. I learned a lot from the 8088, but it was this 386 that became the launching point for a life of upgrades and spare parts.

This machine had a 20mhz processor, four megs of EDO RAM, and an 80 meg hard drive. I later upgraded it with a 4x CD-ROM drive (top of the line!), a Sound Blaster 16, and even a 1.2 gigabyte hard drive (which took no small amount of effort to get running). I had some games on the old 8088, but this is where I really cut my gaming teeth. Classics like Space Quest, SimCity, and Wolfenstein 3D brought the true wonders of PC gaming to my attention.

It’s hard to tell if computing has gotten simpler or more complicated since then. I suppose in some ways it’s simpler, while more complex in others. Back then, DOS was still a primary operating environment for gaming, and you had to configure your system effectively to get the most from your games. Often, a boot disk was necessary to free up extended memory (remember SmartDrive, and himem.sys?) for some games to even load. The hardware was simpler, all you really needed was a fast enough processor and enough RAM. Nowadays, while the act of loading a game doesn’t take as much effort, there are many hardware options to choose from with both hardware and software compatibility to think about. Maybe ten to fifteen years from now I’ll be digging my current machine out of a box in the attic and remeniscing all over again.