Michael’s Blog

Well, it does!

I’m currently writing a draft of this whist sat waiting to demo my last assignment for the year, and once this is through with I have 3 exams between myself and a 2 month holiday. This last week I have caught a bug that’s been going around, which is an absolute pain; Que Sera Sera, hey…

Today the dates for my placement in Eurocopter have been confirmed, which is nice as I can now start to plan things such as travel and how to get my stuff over there. The more I think about this placement, the more I cannot wait until July. Its true that friends and family will be missed dearly (who, if your reading this, are more than welcome to visit!), but the experience will be quite something. 

On a gaming front, the new Left4Dead Survival DLC is out. It really is such good fun, if you have the game I recommend you go and play it now, don’t worry, I will wait…

…fun? I told you it would be! For all those without L4D, rather than fighting to find a safe house, your goal now is to last for as long as you can, before the zombie armada becomes just to much. The best time myself and 3 friends managed was 11 minutes and 43 seconds, which considering that by ~15mins your getting a tank every 15 seconds, is quite something I think.

TV series are now coming to a close; one more episode of Heroes, five of 24 and not many more Scrubs left. Its all getting very good however, especially 24! “How will Jack get out of this one?” is a question asked a lot in our house, and it is so very true.

I will be adding a pictures section to the links at the top, don’t expect it to be fill up any time soon, I just want to have a play with some plug-ins

Placement, University Eurocopter, Placement, University

I am currently testing/playing with new themes so this site will be changing slightly for the next few days.

Edit:

I am back to the old theme, a little bit more edited however.

Uncategorized

This last month has been quite a roller-coaster. I have had two exams, two assignments, three placement interviews, FIVE GOOOLD RINGS and a placement offered and accepted in Munich (Ok, I am still working on sorting out the rings, but its in the works).

I have, about two weeks ago, been accepted onto a 12-month placement with Eurocopter in Germany which I really cannot wait for. Adding the cherry on the cake, Andy has also been accepted to Eurocopter! Come July I will be jet-setting away to work for a year. I am really, really looking forward to this!!

Because of this new placement, when I am over there this website is going to under-go some changes. It will become much less about games and more about myself and my time in Munich. This will be mainly to keep friends and family updated, as it will be quite the adventure and I want somewhere to share it!

So now, I am sat on my couch at home typing this, having just last week finished my last lecture for the next 16 months and between myself and a 1 month holiday sits one assignment and three exams.

This last year has been an interesting one; friendships have been made, changed and tightened and I feel that as a programmer I have shot forward by a ton. I understand most, if not all, of the OpenGL concepts we have been taught and have learnt 2 new languages and at least one more framework. Sample of this years work can be found at the ‘My Applications’ link at the top.

This is the first post in another effort to keep this website more up-to-date and it will be successful this time!!

Placement, University Life, University, update, Work

One month without an update… whoops!

I -will- get around to writing a large update, Soon™

Lots of news to share however!

Uncategorized

Well, its Saturday now and I’m getting sorted for a fun night of playing Halo.

This week has been quite eventful, it started with a trip up to my parents last Saturday to say hello and pick up my suit, and in between now and then I have gotten two games I have been waiting for, a new flashy G15 keyboard and a placement interview!

On Monday I was in a bit of a spending mood, and started noticing that my keyboard was on its last legs, after doing a bit of online comparison I decided to get the Logitech G15 Gaming Keyboard, which I am enjoying thoroughly so far. It has a small LCD screen which can be used for displaying PC statistics, download meters or game statistics (among many other things). The keys are alot nicer to use then my old keyboard, and the whole thing has a much nicer feel to it. It also has ‘G’ keys, which are basically very powerful macro keys. 

This brings me quite nicely onto my next topic, Darkfall. This week Aventurine have been opening up a certain number of orders per-day and myself and quite a few Sturmgrenadiers were lucky enough to get in. So far I have been contributing to the building efforts and playing a role in our defence efforts. Its really living up to my expectations and I highly recommend giving it a go, so very enjoyable. 

Using my new G15 and Darkfall together has been quite interesting. The Profile Manager which comes with the keyboard allows you to setup an infinite amount of key-presses, mouse clicks and delays in order to chain together interesting macros. For Example; very quickly you can put together a macro that will swap actionbars, equip a staff, cast a heal spell, then go back to the other weapon. Having this power really opens up a lot more opportunities. 

This week has also seen the release of ‘Empire: Total War’ the next game in the long line of Creative Assembly’s Total War series. The main game is set in the 1700’s with an additional scripted campaign set as America battles for its Independence. If you have not seen this or other Total War games before then there is a demo out on Steam, you should also check out the video review below:

So far I am working my way through the Road to Independence campaign and am loving it so far. Its very strategic, detailed and in-depth. Despite some initial problems we had, myself and a few friends have had quite a few online games against each other and some AI. Unfortunately so far we can only have 1v1 sieges, however new maps may unlock later.  Definitely pick up the demo for this!

Gaming Darkfall, Total War, update

So this week I have been able to get in some good play time with the Empire: Total War demo. So far its really been good and my pre-order of the game still stands. 

Naval combat is a little awkward to get used to, but is so nice to look at it quickly makes up for that.

Darkfall is also technically released, however the servers have been up and down all day and my account isnt activated yet  

For some reason as-well, I have been playing alot of Bejeweled on my iPhone, damn addictive games….

(Scout Pack is also Live)

Darkfall Online, Gaming