Neography 2.o

New NFG site: NFGcontrols.com

Mon, 11 Aug 2008 18:06:00 +0900

My love for game controllers knows no bounds. I've created a website that will focus solely on controller reviews, theory, tech details etc.

Please check it out if you love controllers as much as I do!

Neography: Moving on!

Tue, 05 Aug 2008 21:04:00 +0900

I've moved Neography to a new place! Sort of. I've started a new forum which is where I'm doing all my posting these days. If you want to stay up on the madness and hang out with a really groovy set of people, check out NFGworld!

Banned in China!

Fri, 11 May 2007 08:59:00 +0900

Add this one to the list of quality-assured awards for NFG Games: Banned in China!

At least, according to the Great Firewall of China tester.

[update] It turns out the GWoC tester doesn't work very well. This site remains accessible to users within China. for now...

Parkour

Sun, 15 Apr 2007 07:20:00 +0900

Every Saturday is parkour day. They get to practice their moves, and I get to practice my photography. It's a good situation, at the end of every jam they've got a record of their activities and I've got some more experience to work with.

Today's jam was a short one. I foolishly made plans for the early afternoon and had to bail early. Not many pics as a result, but you can check out the full day's gallery.

This is an average shot made better by great lighting. I really like the sky and clouds in the background:

Australian Sunset

Tue, 10 Apr 2007 20:48:00 +0900

Just a quick photo for ya.

A new toy

Mon, 09 Apr 2007 09:03:00 +0900

I was in Japan last week and while I had a fantastic time I didn't find much to buy. A man can only eat so many メロンパン or メロンソーダ, ya know? I bought a couple of cheap trinkets for the camera, but was otherwise prepared to go home with total expenditures of less than two hunnerd bucks.

So I bought something ridiculous.

Click for larger

That's right kids, a Konami Beatmania IIDX Arcade controller, for PS2. What a behemoth it is, a real monster. It very nearly caused me to go overweight with my luggage, but the kind girls at the JAL counter didn't give me any flack. Or, thankfully, that 'wtf, what a geek' look.

Now I just need a game to play with the bloody thing. I tried to burn one, but my slimPS2 won't touch it. Looks like I'm stuck with legit software, which wouldn't bother me except that, well, the controller itself cost as much as pretty much the whole IIDX library. =/

So I'm back in Japan!

Tue, 27 Mar 2007 10:32:00 +0900

I love it here. Screw australia. Consider the two 7-11 breakfasts:

Australia:
Sausage Roll
Coke
Cost: $6.60

Japan:
Koala March chocolate snacks
Fanta Melon Soda
Vanilla Cream Crepe Roll
Indo-Chicken-Curry steamed bread
Georgia European iced coffee
Cost: 609円 ($6.37 AUD)

Twice as much stuff, twice as good, the same price!? I ran into a very friendly Japanese couple returning from an Australian honeymoon, and even they were shocked to find Australia so expensive. I mean, come on, when the Japanese think your prices are high you're doing something wrong!!

Australians are so laid-back and easy-going that they just sit there and take it too, which is infuriating. Their normal response to complaints is "if you don't like it, leave." That's right, it's not just americans who say that.

Here's a clue, Australia: if you don't demand change, nothing changes. You're getting screwed, stop accepting it.

Anyway, back to Japan. You can't get pepsi here anymore, except for Pepsi Max (Called Pepsi Nex here for reasons I don't begin to understand). You can't get RedBull here either, I guess their big roll-out last April didn't go so well.

Lots of things have changed, lots of things are exactly the same. New businesses here and there, my favourite Joyful Honda has expanded again, now they're roughly 6x larger than they were when I moved here in 2000. One store with practically everything you need for your house. It's amazing.

The people here are friendly. I'm finding that thanks to my newly rediscovered confidence in my abilities (Thanks Australia for making me feel awesome) I'm more willing to try out some Japanese on the people who remember me. The guy at Family Mart and the lovely couple at 7-11 both smiled when they saw me and we had good conversations.

I really dunno if I could live here, the things that used to piss me off still do, but... Where's better? I like Australia, I like my friends and my car and the people, I can't stand the prices and the 3rd-world shopping.

Ah well. More updates soon!

An interesting day.

Wed, 31 Jan 2007 10:59:00 +0900

Recently someone told me I was not updating this page often enough. Well Mr. Fodder, this one's for you.

Today I received my new fisheye lens. preliminary results lead me to believe it was $500 USD spent very well indeed.

Today Hudson USA emailed me about my book, asking if they could feature it on their site in exchange for a few copies of it. I guess they're too cheap to buy one, but still, Hudson knows I exist!! That's pretty cool.

Yesterday in the early evening my screaming neighbors were screaming again. Unusually this time they were in front of my place screaming bloody murder at the people across the street. I dunno what happened, there were plenty of half-intelligble accusations flung about, but while I had the camera ready they never came to blows. These were adults with grade-school-aged children, brandishing at least one stick and generally just freaking the fuck out at each other.

In other news, apparently we are now old.

Nintendo's chairman speaks!

Sun, 02 Jan 2005 00:01:00 +0900

Hiroshi Yamauchi is famous for his tirades against whatever bugbear of the day he selects to take blame for Nintendo's ills. He bashes competitors, developers and even his customers with equal abandon. In today's episode he isn't at all suprised to find the DS is selling very well. I'm sure the complete lack of compelling software for the platform was all part of his plan.

Hardcore Gamer

Mon, 27 Dec 2004 19:31:00 +0900

This one is from the wayback archives, it appears to have never been linked on the list, and while I'm not sure if it was really worth the effort or anything, here it is for your enjoy.

The Local Pervert

Mon, 27 Dec 2004 19:26:00 +0900

You might remember a little comic I made a long time ago (though you probably don't) which featured me as the local peeping tom. Here's the next in that vein. I think I fucked up the punchline a bit, but meh, you get the idea.

Kids + Tattoos = NO!

Tue, 24 Aug 2004 17:05:00 +0900

I swear this actually happened. Every word is true!!

Mangling English

Fri, 28 May 2004 00:50:00 +0900

Behind the Scenes

Fri, 28 May 2004 00:45:00 +0900

I hear birds singing!

Fri, 28 May 2004 00:43:00 +0900

This conversation really happened.

Where'd she hear that?

Fri, 28 May 2004 00:42:00 +0900

Hands Off the Dome!

Fri, 28 May 2004 00:41:00 +0900

Adjust Your Brightness

Fri, 28 May 2004 00:40:00 +0900

Lots of people can't see this comic, it's very dark. It's supposed to be, the streets of Japan are VERY dark at night. They use what seems to be regular indoor flourescent lights to illuminate the streets, and... It's dark!

Now that my good monitor has fried itself I can't see the comic either. =(

Humming Birds

Fri, 28 May 2004 00:39:00 +0900

I thought this one was hilarious. No one else agreed.

Cams. Illness? Research!

Fri, 28 May 2004 00:38:00 +0900

Sound of Horns

Fri, 28 May 2004 00:37:00 +0900

Pretty Lady! C'mere!

Fri, 28 May 2004 00:36:00 +0900

Valuable Research

Fri, 28 May 2004 00:35:00 +0900

This one's more autobiographical than I care to admit.

Ikaruga 2-pack

Fri, 28 May 2004 00:30:00 +0900

When Ikaruga was announced for the DC it was a huge deal. When it was announced for the GameCube I think I half expected it to go the way of a certain fighting port with 1-button specials. Easy Operation indeed.

Sony's PS3 = Suck

Fri, 28 May 2004 00:28:00 +0900

This one made a lot more sense in my head. The suited chumps are always in different positions, check out the ties. Their little comments didn't come through well, I've since come up with a better method for making small text (And Paintshop Pro's a little better with the text handling, it must now be said).

Nintendo Fears Change

Fri, 28 May 2004 00:27:00 +0900

Nintendo still hasn't gotten their online shit together. Sega did it best with their multi-lingual PSO, Microsoft has the best reliable experience, Sony sucks with online, and Nintendo doesn't even try.

Tron Revisited

Fri, 28 May 2004 00:26:00 +0900

When I was a kid I used to daydream about being able to turn the world into vectors like in the Tron movie. I never developed this mutant skill, tho it's probably for the best.

Rain in Japan

Fri, 28 May 2004 00:24:00 +0900

You'll notice in this one I experimented with a different face angle. It didn't turn out well, and I never tried it again. Fear Change! Fear it!

Stealing Quarters

Fri, 28 May 2004 00:07:00 +0900

This is really real. A confessional of sorts. My dad really didn't seem as impressed with it as I was, maybe he didn't know?

The Intro

Thu, 27 May 2004 23:58:00 +0900

Dig that Retro Style!

In the beginning I wasn't sure how I was going to do this, and this ugly mess is what I tinkered with. It was a case of "just do SOMETHING, or you'll never do ANYTHING". Some people prefer it, but they're stupid.