Macgasm

I am sure you all remember that game we used to play as kids: “Simon says.”  Category 5 games put out their own version for the iPhone in the app Simon Classic.

The verdict is: Simon says I can count and remember up to 14 steps!  Although I found the game to be almost too simple, my competitive nature mixed with the frustrating nature of this relatively easy game made it that there are a few minutes hours of the past week I’ll never get back.

Concept of the game is quite easy; “Simon” will light up and make sound on one of four colors, your role is to remember the sequence and repeat after. Rinse, repeat.

The game features:

• Classic Simon Style Gameplay
• Four Speed  Levels
• Four Sound Options

Verdict: A fun game to kill time on the go as long as you can handle the frustration of the game.

Photo Credit: secretlondon123

Braid is a modern incarnation of the classic platformer genre. It pays homage to games like Super Mario Bros. without being redundant. This incredibly rich game is fill to the brim with mind-bendingly clever puzzles, beautiful environments, and classy writing.

The game has been available for Windows and Xbox 360 for quite some time, but it was ported to Mac OS X and the Playstation 3 much more recently. If you’re interested in other platforms, check out the main website. If you’d like to know a little bit more about the minds behind this wonderful game, check out their bios.

Audiovisual

This game is beautiful. As you go through the different worlds, the mood is changed simply by gorgeous environments. If you’re under the impression that 2D gaming can’t be artful, you’re misinformed. As you go through the game, you have the feeling that you’re inside an interactive painting. I can’t think of a game off the top of my head that is prettier than Braid.

The soundtrack is right on par with the astounding scenery. The music is actually a fundamental part of the game. As you solve puzzles by altering time, the music reflects what you’re doing. If you’re going reverse at eight times your original speed, the music plays just as you’d expect. Great care was taken in the craft of this game, and it shows in the soundtrack.

Gameplay

Don’t get the impression that this game is all potatoes, and no steak. The gameplay is indescribably clever. You control time with your Shift key. That might not sound clever, but you’ll see what I mean once you experience it. Time control is pivotal in solving the game’s puzzles. Once you understand that you’re playing as time itself as much as you are the main character, you’ll truly understand Braid.

Each world within the game has different rules that time works within. In one level, there are certain objects that aren’t affected by time control. Your objective is to then work everything else around that one stubborn object. In another level, you’re tasked with controlling your character in multiple dimensions. A secondary version of you is spawned when you alter time. Insanely imaginative puzzles ensue.

I cannot give this game enough credit for the puzzles that you must solve. After spending a half hour on trying to gain a collectable puzzle piece, you might start to get frustrated. As soon as you figure out the trick to solving the problem, pleasure will wash over you, though. The level design is simply perfect.

Summary

Go buy this game. For the price of $9.95, you get to experience a unique event in gaming. There has never been a game quite like this before. If you don’t believe me, you can go try the demo out for yourself. If you like it, please buy it. Greatness deserves to be rewarded.

Photo Credit: LollyKnit

Have all your media on one computer, and you want to stream your media across the network to your laptop or media center Mac? Some people manually mount the drives every single time they boot the computer. While it’s simple enough to reconnect manually, we prefer having OS X automatically connect the drives every time we log in.

It’s very simple to do, and it’ll save you a couple of minutes every single day.

1. Open your System Preferences
2. Click on the Accounts icon, under the System section
3. Click the Lock to unlock your options
4. Insert your administrator password
5. Click on the user you want to assign the automated network mounts to
6. Click the login items tab
7. Click the plus button
8. Click the computer you want to mount in the sidebar under “Shared”
9. Select the folder you want to mount
10. Click the Add button
11. Click the lock again to lock the preferences, and close the system preferences window

Tout Finis!

You now have the ability to navigate your media remotely. Without having to authenticate every single time.

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As an iPhone user all of my major OS updates are free.  However, major OS updates for my kid’s iPod Touches are not free.  Apple usually charges between $5.00 to $10.00 for their major OS updates.  I remember when I had my first generation iPod Touch I paid $20.00, so that I can have Calendar, Contacts, Notes, and Weather.  So I was basically paying $5.00 per app, which is not a bad price when you think about it.  It appears that the iPad will follow the same model as the iPod Touch when it comes to charging for major OS updates.

Ed Sutherland of Cult of Mac, is reporting that Apple has announced that they will be charging iPad customers for major OS updates. Now I’m not trying to scare away new iPad customers, because the iPad will ship with iPhone OS 3.x.x, not the new 4.0 OS that will be released this summer. In fact Apple is giving new iPad customers a free upgrade to 4.0.  Cult of Mac explains how Apple will be charging for upgrades:

““Apple will provide you any iPad OS software updates that it may release from time to time, up to and including the next major iPad OS software release following the version of iPad software that originally shipped from Apple on your iPad, for free,” the company said.”

I’d like to take a step back and explain the upgrade and charging process.  iPhones are exempt from being charged a fee for a Major OS upgrade or a minor upgrade.  From what I understand it’s a Sarbanes-Oxley accounting law.  Because you pay a monthly subscription or carrier fees for your iPhone you are exempt from these fees.

However, with an iPod Touch, and now with the iPad, you are not paying a monthly fee for your iDevice.  You made a one time purchase, and there are no other fees attached to the iDevices.  In this scenario Apple has to charge something for the Major OS upgrades.  What Apple doesn’t charge for is minor OS upgrades.  For example when you upgrade from iPhone OS 3.1.1 to 3.1.2, this is a minor upgrade.

Now some might be saying, “If I get the iPad Wi-Fi/3G version, I’ll have to pay a monthly fee to use the data plan.  This should exempt me from paying for the major OS upgrade.”  You might in-fact be correct, however, because you can pay as needed, and are not on a monthly schedule, this might exclude the iPad from getting free major OS upgrades.

Some people might think that charging for the major OS upgrade is unfair or not right.  But, Apple is giving us the first upgrade free of charge.  They could be charging us, but they are not.  You’re paying for a major upgrade to your iDevice, and you don’t have to pay monthly fees.  So, if you think about it,you’re paying a lot less than an iPhone customer that has to pay a monthly voice and data plan.  Personally I’d take the once a year upgrade fee over the monthly voice and data plan fees.

Photo Credit: iPad launch event

Article Via Cult of Mac

Apple has officially released iTunes 9.1 for Mac OS X and Windows. You can now fire up your Software Update to get the latest version. Here are the release notes:

iTunes 9.1 comes with several new features and improvements, including:

• Sync with iPad to enjoy your favorite music, movies, TV shows, books and more on the go
• Organize and sync books you’ve downloaded from iBooks on iPad or added to your iTunes library
• Rename, rearrange, or remove Genius Mixes

For those of use not getting iPads, this still offers a very useful feature. Instead of only dealing with what iTunes gave you, you can now tweak the Genius Mixes. This is a welcome addition in my eyes.

The update weighs in around 102 MB on Mac OS X.

Photo Credit: Ferrari + caballos + fuerza = cerebro Humano

When Apple was courting carriers for the iPhone in the early stages of its development, Verizon was the first carrier they dealt with.  Unfortunately, Verizon did not want to meet Apple’s guidelines for selling the iPhone through them.  For example, Apple wanted sole control over how the phone would be serviced, or if needed, be swapped out.  Verizon wasn’t having any of this, because they, like Apple, control how the phones they sell are serviced.

Enter AT&T.  Apple’s next carrier they spoke with was AT&T.  AT&T was more than happy to accommodate Apple.  This proved to be most fruitful for AT&T as a cell phone carrier.  Verizon must have been kicking themselves after they saw how well the iPhone was selling through AT&T.  Since then, rumors of the iPhone being on Verizon’s network were rampant.  With every new model of the iPhone, there was a rumor attached to it that this year it would be on Verizon’s network.  Well, it appears that the wait is over.

Yukari Iwatani Kane, Ting-I Tasi, and Niraj Sheth of WSJ.com , are reporting that the iPhone is coming to Verizon’s network.  AT&T however is stating that this is speculation as stated below:

“An AT&T spokesman said: “There has been lots of incorrect speculation on CDMA iPhones for a long time. We haven’t seen one yet and only Apple knows when that might occur.” Apple declined to comment.”

In light of this news WSJ.com goes on to comment how Apple is planning on releasing a new iPhone this summer, in keeping up with their upgrade cycle.  They kind of state the usual, that the iPhone will be thinner and have a faster processor.

As for the Verizon iPhone’s production and release, WSJ.com quotes a person familiar with the situation:

“…Pegatron is scheduled to start mass producing CDMA iPhones in September. Other people said, however, that the schedule could change and the phone may not be available to consumers immediately after production begins.”

I seriously doubt that Apple would break their cycle for iPhone releases, by releasing them at the end of the year.  This to me sounds like speculation.  If anything they would release the Verizon iPhone along side the AT&T iPhone.  This would give consumers a choice to pick their carrier, plus most consumer’s contracts would be up.

I think it would be an excellent idea if Apple had more than one carrier for the iPhone in the United States.  It would be extremely helpful in load balancing AT&T’s already over-saturated cell network.  Exclusivity doesn’t always have it’s perks.  Would you get a Verizon iPhone?  Leave a comment in the comments section below, and let us know if you’ve been waiting for the iPhone on the Verizon network.

Photo Credit: iPhone 4

Article Via WSJ.com

Acorn is a great $49.95 image editor for Mac OS X from Gus Mueller over at Flying Meat. Instead of trying to make a Photoshop competitor, Flying Meat decided to make a great image editor that uses the latest technology (64 Bit, processing data with the GPU) that works for everyone. While it has a familiar interface, the steps to make your photos better are much simpler.

Today, I want to give you my tip for making your images pop when you don’t have all day to tweak them. Let’s start off on a random picture from my iPhoto library:

This is a nice photo, but it could be better. With the image open in Acorn, go to Image > Auto Levels. This will fix any minor exposure issues. It won’t bring an image back from the dead, but it’ll make a decent image better.

Next, go to Filter > Sharpen > Unsharp Mask. This wonderful little tool is your best friend. It will make your photos look hyperreal. I am guilty of unsharp mask abuse. You can fiddle with the sliders, but the default settings will work fine. If you’d like to know how this wonderful filter works, check out the Wikipedia article that describes it in detail.

Now you end up with your results: A photo with richer colors and crisp lines. It isn’t a panacea, but I swear by this methodology for quick and dirty photo manipulation,

If you have any recommendations for making your photos pop without doing a load of work, comment on this post or hit me up on Twitter.

Photo Credit: AMagill