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Affilliation
Wishlist 2008.12
Time to make a wishlist again, and again I am hard-pressed to generate a list of needs. I have practically everything I need, so there’s not much I can come-up with on that front. I’ll have to settle with “nice to haves”.
This year, instead of thoughtfully trying to come-up with the list of “nice to haves”, I’ve decided to make it a bit more spontaneous, so I’ll probably be updating the list throughout the holiday season.
[http://darthvid.com/2008/11/wishlist-200812.html]
Here it is, in order of desirability (as of 2008.12/22):
- [PC game] The Orange Box - Either as a Steam Gift or a retail copy. Given that Unreal Tournament 2004 ECE’s online play worked for me, this is probably what I really really want in preparation for Left 4 Dead. I asked a branch of DataBlitz regarding the availability of the retail version, but they said that they were “phasing-out” this particular games due to some problems. If this is the case, one might be hard pressed to find a retail copy of Orange Box in the Philippines that will work when registered online, unless the other video-game retailers here have good copies (it better have a return policy to be sure). A Steam Game Gift, though, won’t ever run out of copies (since it’s basically a license transfer) and are automatically registered online.
- Got this already to compensate for not getting my new PC in time for the holidays. - [book] The Zombie Survival Guide: Complete Protection from the Living Dead by Max Brooks - What I really want is Left 4 Dead, but since my PC can’t take it yet, I’ll have to settle for other zombie stuff to get me in the mood. I think I saw this at FullyBooked.
- LEGO Star Wars Death Star, or any bunch of LEGOs that will help me make steampunk stuff (mind you, I’ll be starting from zero).
- [tabletop gaming miniatures] Warmachine Cryx Bile Thralls Unit Box Set (can be found at Fortress Toys and Hobbies Shop)
- [book] Quicksilver (The Baroque Cycle, Vol. 1)
by Neal Stephenson
- [book] World War Z: An Oral History of the Zombie War by Max Brooks - Got it already. I wanted to start digging a little deeper into the whole zombie culture thing.
- a Moleskine plain notebook (not the sketchbook since it has less pages)
- [book] Einstein: His Life and Universe
by Walter Isaacson
- solar panels for small electronics projects
- [PC game] Capitalism II - I was thinking or getting this thru ImpulseDriven to try the service out, though it seems that DataBlitz still has copies.
- [book] The Player of Games by Iain M. Banks - Something I want to try, but I’d rather try the stuff above.
- [tabletop gaming miniatures] Monsterpocalypse starter and 2++ boosters (should be available at Fortress)
- AA, AAA, and 9volt battery charger (hopefully with 9 volt rechargeable battery as well) - Got this from an officemate! Thank you! ^^
- [book] Consider Phlebas by Iain M. Banks
- [tabletop gaming miniatures] Warmachine Cryx Pistol Wraith (or the Alternate Version) (can be found at Fortress Toys and Hobbies Shop)
- [RPG book] Iron Kingdoms World Guide: Full Metal Fantasy - This is extremely hard to find, even outside the Philippines, since it’s currently not being reprinted. Fortress might have had it before. This guy had it, not sure if he’s sold it already.
- a 8-16 gb USB stick
- 100% cotton socks - Yep, sometimes I’m that easy to please.
- assortment of resistors, capacitors, and LEDs for small electronics projects
Get Half-Life 1 for US$0.98! Today only!
I’ve been wanting to try Steam out (and ImpulseDriven too, actually) for quite a while now, mainly to see for myself what the concept is like. I’ve been hearing about it being much better than when it first started out, and quite a few seem to prefer it than purchasing video games from retail. I almost got Portal, but I keep stopping short of going for it somehow.
Now, I got my excuse.
Getting wind from GamerDad, I learned that until Friday, 2008.11/21 12:00 PST, the original Half-Life will be avaliable in Steam for a measely US$0.98! This is apparently in celebration of the game’s 10th year (it was released for the PC in 1998.11/19).
An old game considered by many as one of the best for a buck? Now there’s the excuse I was looking for! I signed-up and got the game.
Depending on when and what time you read this post, you might still be able to get this deal! So hurry up!
Tags: SteamHow many books have I left out…?
I got books all over the place, and that’s partly by design. I tend to want to have a book within reach wherever I am, so I typically have a few at the living room, around the bedroom, at the car (some nearby and some at the back), and a few at work.
Of course, like most avid readers, I have attempted to catalog my collection. I remember setting-up a little dBase thing when I was a kid, maybe even tried to use FoxPro (but that particular attempt I really can’t remember for sure). Of course there was the Excel sheet attempt.
When the internet came along, you used online tools. I first tried it on Amazon.com (the obvious starting point), but the thing just wasn’t built with cataloging in mind, at least in the beginning (and Amazon.com has kept it’s basic layout pretty much stable). It’s also annoying that the different versions/editions of the same book are treated too separately, efforts to combine them (like links to various editions) are inconsistent.
Now, online social cataloging is the thing. You just can’t catalog online without the ability to add “friends”. I think I tried GoodReads first, based on an invite from a friend. I tried it a bit, but it just didn’t take me in at the time. Then, I got a Shelfari invite from another friend (or was it the same one?). I kinda liked it a little better, but it not by a lot. It had a nice little shelf feature, which I liked, but it also felt clunk to use, and it was real slow.
Yesterday, as I was giving Glue a test run (amusing so far) by browsing around Amazon.com, I noticed that some people checked-out certain books via LibraryThing. Curious, I took a looksee. Given that the previous two social book cataloging stuff hasn’t gained any traction on me yet, I decided to give LibraryThing a test run as well.
LibraryThing is supposed to be in beta right now (it went live in 2005! Really?! It’s still in beta? Or did it re-beta itself?), but at first glance, it seemed to have most of what I was looking for. It didn’t have an exact shelf thing which I liked in Shelfari, but it does have the ability to display your library book as the book covers, which is practically the same.
More important than the exact rundown of features (the major ones being avaliable in the others anyway), I liked the UI better than the two others. MOST of what I wanted to accomplish I was able to do intuitively and easily, which scores big points with me. Oh sure, there are nitpicks, like the fact that I can’t click on a book cover when I list my library in book cover mode, but things like that are bound to be easily added in the future. More importantly, I found that the common things I wanted to do (importing, adding, listing, tagging, rating, and searching) was easier to me.
This was the first book cataloging service I felt like obsessing over, which is a good sign.
One major caveat, LibraryThing has a 200 book limit for free users! That’s pretty annoying given that the other two (and even Amazon.com) has no tracking limit and they’re all free. There’s a US$10(+)/year option, and a US$25 lifetime option. I don’t understand why one would opt for the per year thing, unless the extra US$15 is just too much, or people don’t see the site being around in the long run (in which case, why bother?). Also, Amazon.com acquired Shelfari. LibraryThing is 40% owned by AbeBooks, which is being aquired by Amazon.com (or has it already been acquired?). Will we see a feature merge in the future?
In spite of this, LibraryThing has managed to interest me more than the previous ones I tried. Let’s see if that’s gonna stick.
In the meantime, why don’t you take a gander at my current library? I wonder how many of the books from my younger days I’ve left out…
No tags for this post.What I’ve been up to…
So, what’s been eating my spare time lately:
- Penny Arcade Adventures: On the Rain Slick Precipice of Darkness Episode 2 - Got it from Greenhouse. Finished the game at “difficult” setting. Now I’m going for “Insane Mode”.
- World of Goo - Got it from Greenhouse too. I play it as a filler. It’s definitely a ton of fun and worth the purchase for me.
- Battlestar Galactica - When I watched the 1st episode of the reimagined series a week or so ago and I couldn’t stop! I’m working my way through the 3rd season now, trying not to rush it so I can savor the story. (side note: Was that the same Lucy Lawless as the one in Xena? She looks very different from what I remembered.)
- After being benched due to other books, The Elegant Universe: Superstrings, Hidden Dimensions, and the Quest for the Ultimate Theory
steps back to the plate. I wanted to review my basic physics. Regardless if you believe in string theory or not, the book does have a reasonably good recap of a bunch of physics theories.
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