Painting by ~luke-chueh on deviantART

As far as I can remember in my life, like every music lover does, I’m relating specific songs or sometimes whole albums with events, places, emotions etc. Even working on a project is not an exception.

Recently, it came into my attention that in every project I’m working on, there are two albums that are always part of my playlist, so they can qualify to be called my projects’ soundtrack. On certain times in a project, especially when a lot of mental engergy and even fantasy is required, I find myself listening to those two albums because their music inspires me and provides me with a rhythm that helps me think without distracting me at all.

The fist one is from a Greek songwriter called Konstantinos Vita and it’s the music composed for Dimitris Papaioannou’s (the art director of the Athens 2004 Olympic Ceremony) theatrical production called “2″. Below is the video of his song called “Funky Beep”.

The other one is Moby’s famous album called “Play”. Below is the video of his song called “Natural Blues”.

What do you prefer to listen while working?

no comments | belongs to: urban legends | posted on February, 2010

Machinarium is a point and click adventure game which brought me back to the good old days of such games. You control a small and cute (this is my feminine side speaking) robot through its journey to find its lost beloved one in a cruel robot world!

It has beautiful hand-made style graphics (as you can see on the screenshots) and the robot world is designed almost as I would have imagined it. Its music is a great company to the graphics. Note that when you buy the game you also receive its soundtrack in MP3 format! There is a lack of speech, but the communication is being done well using speech bubbles which explains everything clearly. After all, in a robot world English (or any other human language) can’t be an option!

It incorporates a large number of puzzles, in a great variety, from simple games (e.g. a large tic-tac-toe variation and an arcade asteroids game) to more complicated puzzles. Some of them are hard enough even for an experienced adventure games player (maybe due to the lack of explanation) but everything is solvable with some attention and patience.

After successfully using an item, it is disposed so the inventory isn’t full with unusable items (actually when I finished the game, I had 2 items left in my inventory but it wasn’t annoying at all).

But enough with the praise, let’s talk for the bad stuff: It’s a little bit annoying that you cannot just deselect an item in use and instead you have to return it to the inventory. Also, it might become boring at some point to have to watch the full animation of the robot walking up the stairs to go to another floor etc.

The only actual downfall of the game is the use of Flash as the development platform. Right-click does nothing (actually it displays the frustrating Flash player menu) when it could be used for example to deselect an item of the inventory (if another development platform was used since Flash doesn’t support right-click functionality as far as I’m aware). Also, the point-and-click system isn’t as precise as someone would expect it to be, so you might find yourself at some point clicking in the wrong place and making a wrong move.

But these facts couldn’t prevent even a huge Flash hater like myself to play and enjoy this amazing game! Before I forget, you cannot die in the game, so feel free to explore and try anything that you can think!

You can download the demo and/or buy the full game from its official website.

no comments | belongs to: games | posted on January, 2010

Creation by ~lbsquat on deviantART

After my first collection of useful android applications, here’s another one:

AK Notepad: Set a reminder based on your note, share note with others through SMS, email & stick a note on your home screen. You can customize the note’s appearance, organize by label(hash tags),sort & search notes.

Astrid Task/Todo List: Astrid is the highly-acclaimed open-source task list that is simple enough to not get in your way, powerful enough to help you get stuff done! Tags, reminders, RememberTheMilk sync, Locale plug-in & more!

mAnalytics: Is a program to view your basic Google Analytics stats on your Android phone. Supports multiple accounts, profiles, basic statistics and charts for visits and pageviews.

eBuddy IM: One of the best instant messaging apps. Fast and reliable messenger. Chat with multiple MSN, Facebook, Yahoo, AIM, ICQ, GTalk & MySpace accounts. All IM friends in one buddy list. Run in background. Messages sent as data, not SMS/Text.

twidroid for twitter: Twidroid is the leading full-featured Twitter client for Android.

Dolphin Browser (Social&Smart): Dolphin Browser gives you a better Mobile Internet experience. Gestures, Sync Google bookmarks, Download youtube videos.

Flashlight: Grow small plants in your pocket. Build a new Pharos of Alexandria. Interrogate suspects. Find your keys. The only limit is your imagination! This app maximizes brightness and keeps the screen on while in use. Look elsewhere if you want colors, streamers, and wacky sounds… This is a flashlight.

Some of the applications listed here have also a paid version, but this post refers only to their free versions.

Do you have a favorite android application? Feel free to share it by leaving a comment!

no comments | belongs to: android | posted on November, 2009