Play Solitaire Online Free

Posted on July 13, 2012 by Nerdr| 4 Comments

Solitaire free online, the most addicting game of solitaire you will ever play.  Better than worldofsolitaire could ever dream to be, play it here.

Here is the link to solitaire-free.com.

At Solitaire Free you can play a live game of solitaire to your hearts content. You will receive 10 points for each card placed in the solitaire pile and can refresh the game by pressing the F5 key on the keyboard. Move cards with your mouse genius.

The game of solitaire has a long winding history that you can read all about on the solitaire wiki page. The common version of solitaire everyone enjoys these days is known as Freecell solitaire among professional players. Second on the popularity list is Klondike solitaire, followed from a significant distance by old one leg spider solitaire. There are no professional solitaire players.

Do Solitaire tournaments exist? In a single word, no. Solitaire means single player and since the challenge of a game of Solitaire is mostly random it would be unfair to hold tournaments. Unless every player started with the same deck and the competition was a timed test. With the player who completes 3 predetermined decks to the solitaire end condition fastest being given the trophy. There’s a million dollar idea for you, you’re welcome.

Solitaire is predominantly played by office ladies and bored secretaries looking to spice up their lives between serving “The Man”. It’s also played by bored I.T. Staff who’ve been banned from playing counter Strike on the office network. Solitaire being the safe option, leaving no trace of play except in the minds of the chosen few who complete it and see the “card rush” sequence.

Coming back to the startup of the week, solitaire free is well worth a look and given a well deserved 5/5 stars and an ace to the face.

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Frisbee Forever 2 App Review

Posted on July 7, 2012 by Nerdr| 5 Comments

Frisbee Forever 2 review. It’s a great game, smooth and fun five stars while it lasts.

The core gameplay of frisbee forever 2 is you play as the frisbee, in first person flying mode. You can move either left or right only and fly through rings to catch stars and coins. There is also a mission system with achievements and some in-app purchases. You do not need to buy the in-app purchases to complete frisbee forever 2. There are about 6 worlds with about 10 missions in each world. Plus two bonus worlds, one with super hard challenges and one with unlock-able levels.

Graphics

Frisbee forever 2 comes with full 3D graphics, beautiful colorful courses and is certainly easy on the eyes. It’s gorgeous to look at and runs at a smooth frame rate throughout gameplay. Full marks for graphics.

Sound

Sound in Frisbee forever 2 is great. It has a wonderful relaxing mellow flow, while still capturing the spectacular vistas, just nice music to play the game to. I like the music in the chinese levels best and the music adds a lot of atmosphere to the game. Menu music is also great. Music for two levels and the menu of Frisbee forever 2 was made by Jeppe Karkov.

Gameplay

Frisbee forever 2 took me 6 hours to complete and I needed no in-app purchases to complete the game. It’s addictive and fun throughout and I was never grinding or frustrated at any point. Some levels are difficult, but they remain fun because you know if you keep trying you can eventually pass them easily.

I have not played frisbee forever 1 and still picked up this games controls very quickly.

The key point for me is fun. If the game is fun to play and not grindy then it gets good review scores and frisbee forever is definitely fun while playing. Once the main campaign is completed and you have seen all the levels you can go back and replay for fun and to 100% complete the game, but I deleted once I had completed all the levels.

In summary then, Frisbee Forever 2 by Kiloo games is a great game and well worth picking up! It’s currently free on the App store.

I give it 5/5.

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Spellsword App Review

Posted on July 7, 2012 by Nerdr| 2 Comments

Spellsword app review. Spell sword, developed by FireFruitForge and published by Everplay intersctive Games, on the iPad and iPhone, is a fun and addictive little game. An easy five out of five stars.

Graphics

Could be better. Spellsword has the pixel look we’ve all seen before and it looks nice enough but is lacking in detail and readability. Spellsword almost looks like Everplay took the games detailed photoshop images and ran them through a pixel filter rather than pixellating the graphics from step 1. They do grow on you eventually, but imagine blurry huge pixel graphics and you get the idea. Not pleasant, but acceptable for a platformer like this. For reference I was playing on an iPad 3 with retina graphics. Spellsword might look better visually on a lower end device like the iPhone.

Gameplay

Few games are as amazingly fun as this one. Spellsword has that “one more go” element nailed just right. I couldn’t put it down. Deliciously addictive and just plain fun, with no grinding and a 5 hour start to finish. This is where Spell sword earns those five stars and in the end it’s the gameplay that matters most. Perfect.

There are power ups to pick up, upgrades to your character and money to buy. In-app purchases are not necessary at all, except to support the developers who are small time indies Everplay. The game is based on card power ups you find on each level. Touch the cards and events happen on screen from them and another power up appears in a different location. Things like fireballs, a black hole that sucks enemies in and ice shards blasting out. It’s fun.

Spellswords upgrade system is just right, you never feel the levels are too easy or too hard. You get the feeling the guys at Everplay really took their time with play-testing every level for difficulty and sorting them perfectly.

Spellsword comes with 3 mission packs of 20 levels each, with more “coming soon”. No grinding or in-app purchases required to finish all missions.

Sound

The sound effects in spellsword are simply stunning, perfect and with oomph. I love the music too. Some of the best pixel bit tunes i’ve heard in a game app to date. They never get tiring or repetitive. The sound in Spellsword really is something special and worth the buck just to hear it alone. If I was making a pixel app or game and needed music and fx, i’d hunt Duncan McPherson down and hire him.

Spellsword costs $0.99 on the Apple app store.

Speelswords core missions take about 5 hours or less to complete, and there is an endless mode for those wanting more. Although once you’ve finished the main missions available (about 60) it’s ripe for deletion as the leader boards are owned by guys with 5,000+ points.

Definitely a great price and well worth the cost. I’d buy Spellsword again knowing what I now know.

Review scores:
Graphics 3.5/10.
Sound 10/10.
Gameplay 13/10. Deal.

Overall: Spellsword gets a five out of five stars for just plain blasting that gameplay right out the park.

Recommended.

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Microsoft surface tablet

Posted on June 19, 2012 by Nerdr| Leave a comment

My quick review of the Microsoft surface table announcement.

Reasons I want a Microsoft surface tablet

  • looks cool!
  • I like the kickstand.

reasons I don’t want a Microsoft surface tablet:

  • That horrible UI. Not just the dated 80’s faux retro bland monocolor boxes, or the must be different from Apple iPad swipe system, but also the general xbox 360 feel of it all. i just find myself consistently hating that UI and now that’s what they’ve chosen to use for their entire world of technology? At this point that UI is a sunk cost and I understand their reluctance to letting it go after working on it for so long, but they need to make a fresh design. I find glow neon effects are always nice and pretty, how about that?
  • Smart cover keyboard on the surface tablet from Microsoft is pretty cool to look at but to use will be dreadful. For those that remember the Sinclair spectrum zx81 with it’s 80’s microwave touchscreen controls, the bluetooth keyboard on the surface tablet will be the same. Cute, but not useable at all.
  • Continuing with the bad keyboard theme, what about motion? How sturdy is that thing while typing? Will the Microsoft smart pad keyboard be slipping while you type up that master thesis?

The Microsoft tablet computer is also confused as to what it is trying to be. It’s too flimsy and unworkable a keyboard for laptop work, and not very useful as a tablet either without apps. Useless really. And for that reason, it will do poorly in sales. Microsoft no doubt knows this and will repeat the xbox 360 strategy once again, which was to make an average product followed by regular and consistent iteration. That strategy works, in general, but it lacks impact like with Apple products.

Microsofts marketing strategy has been interesting in the buildup to the surface tablet announcement. Last week a future Microsoft strategy document was “leaked” which lead to sizeable discussion and hype building up. Then today we have the announcement. Perfect marketing and PR. I want one, but where to I go to buy one? Sorry. It will be released some time in the future. Well my credit card is going back into my wallet and I’ll have forgotten all about the Microsoft surface tablet by the time its gets its official release.

Apple release the products for purchase the SAME DAY as the announcement. Get them while they’re hot, and it works. Thats why Apple is sitting on $100 billion in cash right now. What they do works. Microsoft need to just copy it.

The question everyone will have is “what can I do with it?” this is something Apple answered on day 1. Get apps, make music, movies, create, do stuff. What can I do with the Microsoft surface tablet? Internet…okay. Anything else? No idea.

Congratulations to Microsoft for trying with the surface tablet concept, but this is not how to do it. They should have copied the iPad hardware exactly, one upping them in the areas that matter like screen resolution and speed. Created some awesome UI and software to go with it to make the Microsoft surface tablet truly an amazing, game changing, work or art.

But they didn’t and now they lose again. Flop.

Typed from my iPad.

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Macbook Pro or iMac for programming?

Posted on June 1, 2012 by Nerdr| Leave a comment

Macbook pro with Apple cinema display or iMac for programming? Which is the best setup?

With the new Apple iMac and fresh macbook pro due for release any week now I’ve decided it’s time to upgrade my programming setup. It’s either macbook pro + Apple cinema display or 27″ iMac.

Windows is not allowed because I hobby program for IOS, so it has to be a mac unfortunately. Mac mini is out due to being underpowered and needing to buy a monitor separately, making it similar in price to just getting an iMac. Macbook air is out because the screen only comes in 11 and 13 inches. Too small for the multiple windows required for programming.

Macbook pro costs $1600.
Cinema display $800.
IMac $1800.

$2000 is maximum happy spend, $2500 would feel too much for what i’m getting and at that price It’s worth dropping the mac requirement and getting a very serious power rig on windows.

It’s a tough decision, but for future reference to my future self, here’s a few key decision factors to help me decide:

  • Macbook pro does not have home/end/page up/page down keys on the keyboard.
  • iMac has a glossy screen which means headaches if near a window.
  • 27″ iMac is not portable, so no programming on the beach or balcony or garden. No holiday programming either.

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