Kombatant's Lair

A journey through the labyrinth that comprises my mind these days...

Easter holidays!!

So I am off tomorrow morning to Georgitsi, a beautiful village in the Taygetos mountain near Sparta. I’ll be heading there with some friends to have a good time, and spend the Easter holidays. So unless excessive amounts of food and alcohol take up all of my time, I plan to do some reading as well; I’ll take Dexter by Design with me, the new novel by Jeff Lindsay, to see what happens when Dexter returns from his honeymoon in Paris Winkgesouth

I return to Athens on Monday, but I don’t plan on sticking around. I’ll probably go to Larissa on Tuesday, and then to Kavala on Thursday to meet up with the gang there. And, of course, on Saturday, 25/04 I’ll be in Thessaloniki. The reason?2817_1135921641171_1321232029_385891_2617952_n

Yup, one week after ASOT 400 Armin van Buuren is back in Greece, this time in Thessaloniki and I plan to be there. A night to remember for sure, as only Armin can deliver. My next blog post will probably contain lots of info about that particular event, so until then, I want to wish everyone a happy Orthodox Easter and see you soon!

Braid – one of the most original games in recent years.

To be honest, it has been a while since I’ve played any game – mainly due to the fact that I got tired of them. You will of course argue that there have been many titles that deserved my attention the past year, and I fully agree. The only game that actually got some attention was NBA 2k9, and that’s because I could simply play a couple of games, leave it be for a while, and then pick it up again. It was funny, because even thought I was aware of all the new releases, I never actually played any of them; I used them for benchmarking, comparative analysis as far as IQ is concerned, but game playing? Nope. Even after I got myself lots of free time, I couldn’t find myself willing to install a game, and just play. Hence, I watched all 7 seasons of 24 in about 20 days (but that’s a different story altogether Tongue out)

Braid: World 4 screenshot Well, a week ago I decided that this was going to change. I spoke to a dear friend of mine (and Catalyst beta tester) that I know is a game-a-holic, and asked him for suggestions. He recommended several titles, and I thought I should start with Wanted – Weapons of Fate. It seemed like a good choice, so I started playing, and I quite enjoyed it I must say. But then one day, I was browsing the Rage3D PC Gaming section, and one game was getting rave reviews : Braid. So I said, what the heck, I’ll try that one too, see if it’s any good. So I got it from Steam, and started playing. It was only when I looked at my watch and realised that 5 hours had passed, and it was 6am, that I knew this one was a true keeper.

For those of you not in the know, Braid is a platform/puzzle game. With a twist: you manipulate time. And that exact manipulation is what makes the puzzles brilliant, you have to manipulate things to your advantage, so that you can get all the map puzzle pieces. While you progress, you encounter even more complex puzzles, more time-manipulation variables (I am on World 4 right now, and when i go right, time goes by normally, when I jump, time freezes and when I go left, time rewinds; crazy Tongue out). Its graphics are excellent (you really need to see it in motion to appreciate it), and the music is also very atmospheric. Definitely one of the sleeper hits of the year, it’s getting rave reviews everywhere. So check it out and you will definitely get hooked, just like I am right now PartyThumbs-up

Life after AMD… and a new theme!

As many of you know, I haven’t been a part of AMD PR for the past three months. The economic crisis that hit out industry took a toll in my (former) company as well, and many capable people were left without a job. So these three months served as a much-needed break from all this; after all, when your beloved subject becomes your job 24/7, sometimes you need to step back away from it all in order to fully appreciate it again. So, apart from some posts in Rage3D’s Off Topic, I stayed away from everything, on purpose.

Well, that’s about to change. I intend to start writing again, just don’t know whether it will be for a magazine, website or just post thoughts in this blog, which I have neglected the past two years. We’ll see. I do want to write a piece about the current state of the graphics card industry, so that’ll probably appear here first, and we will see where that takes me.

So all I wanted to say is that, I am back, and intend to be back :) I also updated the blog theme again, so bear with me while I customize it to my heart’s content as usual.