The Spam Thread!

[cpd2009]

I have grown used to WMP for most videos and music, with VLC for screencapping DVDs and playing Ogg Vorbis files. Given how Windows 10 just recently added support for Matroska MKV video, you'd think they would have also added native Ogg support too...

Speaking of media players, I found a very odd bug with Windows Media Player, or perhaps any legacy MS app that has an old style Help button.

Normally, if the Help button is clicked in WMP, Paint, or some other legacy app, your browser will open to a general Windows 10 help page on MS' site. I done this by pure accident a few times, and I just ended up closing the tab that opened. For whatever reason, when I closed the browser and restarted/cold booted Pearl, my browser magically reopened and displayed the same help page I closed earlier.

I reproduced this issue by restarting the PC after I clicked the WMP help button and let the browser do it's thing. I closed the browser and rebooted. Edge opened up and displayed Help again on it's own.

I then restarted without clicking the help button in WMP. Rebooted, and Edge didn't open at all.

Very strange state of affairs with Win10. I do understand sticking with Win10 gives my PC the most secure Windows OS, but with all the bugs that Win10 now seems to have with Modern apps and other things, it makes me want to roll back to Windows 8.1 despite it's declining support and still being in mainstream support until April 2018, and extended support until 2023.

Then again... I do want to play Cuphead. It's available via Microsoft Store but requires Win10.

[cpd2009]

So, one of the last remaining facets of Nintendo's dork age, Miiverse, has come to an end as of midnight central time, this evening.

I completely forgot about it. :/

I didn't participate in Miiverse much, but when I did look through it, I found some rather neatly drawn posts. Wii U games also gave you stamps for Miiverse posts as well.

[cpd2009]

I'm starting to dig MS' new Fluent Design motif. Gone are the solid colors and here come cool translucent effects. Reminds me of Aero, but still remains far from the skeumorphism that Aero was built upon. And I didn't mind skeumorphism in the past.

Apple used to run with skeumorphism until they began to remove it with the most recent macOS releases. They also use the mild translucent effects in many of their new apps, so it's no wonder MS is trying the same thing with Fluent Design.

[huckleberrypie]

I'm starting to dig MS' new Fluent Design motif. Gone are the solid colors and here come cool translucent effects. Reminds me of Aero, but still remains far from the skeumorphism that Aero was built upon. And I didn't mind skeumorphism in the past.

Apple used to run with skeumorphism until they began to remove it with the most recent macOS releases. They also use the mild translucent effects in many of their new apps, so it's no wonder MS is trying the same thing with Fluent Design.

I do like the revised Metro/Aero blend as well. While some do lament the rather Bauhaus-esque, sterile design language developers and artists are into these days, this goes in line with the rather minimalist approach I tend to subscribe to at times.

[cpd2009]

It's getting down to the wire when it comes to my move to my new apartment.

Because of that, my internet access will be limited starting on Saturday. I will really only have my mobile data or free Wifi from the library for access, until I get a proper internet connection set up sometime next week.

[huckleberrypie]

It's getting down to the wire when it comes to my move to my new apartment.

Because of that, my internet access will be limited starting on Saturday. I will really only have my mobile data or free Wifi from the library for access, until I get a proper internet connection set up sometime next week.

Wishing you luck on that one, mate. I've been having quite a field day as of the time of this writing. Kinda' ticked off but what can I do?

[huckleberrypie]

Firefox Quantum has been something of a case of TheyChangedItNowItSucks lately, as a number of features were either nulled out or tucked away, not to mention the news feed being shoved up my arse by default. Not that I am mad though, as the less desirable settings can be changed with some tweaks.

[huckleberrypie]

Random crap post to make things far less stale:

[cpd2009]

I'm back, finally. I have had internet since last Thursday, but just now getting back to the forum. My new ISP is CenturyLink DSL. Sounds like a downgrade, but I can still stream HD video just fine. Too bad my rather nice apartment can't have cable internet yet.

I'm bit of a sucker for shovelware. Not all shovelware, obviously. I tend to stay away from shovelware known to be bad and most licensed movie/TV show tie ins. I'm referring to the more obscure and quirky shovelware titles. Prime example is Castle Shikigami 2, a bullet hell sh'mup. It was an arcade game in Japan, ported to the PS2, and a small company in America quickly imported the game here, and it shows. CS2 has one of the most notoriously bad Japanese-to-English translations in a game, with wooden voice acting to go along with it. It's SoBadItsGood. The game itself is very challenging, of course. I can't get past level 4 myself before I get a game over.

Currently, I'm playing a Wii shovelware, Doctor Fizzwizzle's Animal Rescue. Sounds like a crappy virtual pet game right? Wrong. It's a rather cute Arkanoid/Breakout clone where you grow your "Fizzball" by gathering small fruit and acorns, until it's big enough to rescue the animals on the play field, whilist breaking crates, fences, and other objects like Breakout. There's even powerups and money to collect, necessary for the ferry fees later on. But as with most shovelware, there are obvious signs that QA wasn't the best. There are a few spelling errors in the game, along with a massive game breaking bug.

After you clear all the levels in an island, you will need the money you collected to pay the ferry fee to unlock the next island. Pay the fee, and you are playing the first level of the next island. However, if you lose your last "Fizzball", and then select "Continue", the ferry dialogs will appear again, glitch out, and will crash your Wii. (or at least, Wii Mode on my Wii U). This is because whenever you lose all your "Fizzballs", your score and money amount are reset. Thus, when that ferry dialog appears again, you have no money to pay the fee, yet the game still tries to pay it anyway, causing the game to crash. And when Wii Mode crashes on the Wii U, the only way out is to unplug the power cord. Long pressing the power button is no use.

I'm also starting to plan my future Wii Shop purchases. There are several Wiiware and VC titles I want, and I need to get those before the end of March 2018, when Nintendo will stop you from adding Wii Points. I also upgraded the SD card to a 16gb SDHC Class 10 Duracell card. It hasn't seen much use, so this particular card should last a long time after the Wii Shop closes for good.

[huckleberrypie]

Thinking about implementing a TV Tropes link tag of some sort here, but I dunno. And I honestly couldn't imagine the Duracell brand being used or licensed for memory cards of all things. It's a bankable brand so I guess it wouldn't hurt to slap the name elsewhere (there was even an energy drink licence which was later found to be a scam or something), though from what I've read Duracell batteries have earned a rather bad rep due to numerous horror stories of leakages and so on.

As of now I am more or less engrossed into this fine sport of rallying (i.e. video games such as Colin McRae/DiRT and more recently Richard Burns), and I kinda' wonder why hasn't the WRC considered the Philippines as a venue for their races. I mean we do have jungles and forests here if that's their thing. Not to mention that RHD vehicles can't be driven here and the bureaucracy involved. Not to hate on them NASCAR fans but I seem to be more or less entertained at these off-road time trials involving a pair of drivers buzzing their way through a stage.