The Gadgets Page

One of the side effects of being a geek is that you like geeky things, like Star Wars, Chess, and Legos. Of course, combining three of those things together is an opportunity a mildly obsessive geek like me can’t pass up.

It would be prohibitively expensive to buy all the necessary sets to get a decent collection of the right mini-figures, but Lego’s new Star Wars magnet sets provides the opportunity to get many of the right figures without the overhead of buying full sets.

For about $180 (thanks to some Black Friday sales prices on Lego.com) I put together all the mini-figures necessary to make a “Light vs. Dark Star Wars Lego Chess Set”. MSRP for everything is $250. I put together this set using just one actual Lego set, a number of magnet sets, and one Star Wars Lego Watch.

Here are the Lego part numbers, all of which can be purchased on shop.lego.com:

(1) 6212: X-Wing Fighter (Luke parts, Leia, Han Solo, Chewbacca, R2D2)
(1) 2851192: C3PO Child’s Watch (C3PO)
(8) 852553: Magnet Set Storm Trooper (Storm Trooper, Rebel Pilot, AT-ST Driver)
(1) 852554: Magnet Set Chewbacca (Chewbacca, Obi Wan, Darth Vader)
(1) 852552: Magnet Set Royal Guard (Boba Fett, Imperial Royal Guard)
(1) 852715: Magnet Set Darth Vader (Emperor parts, Snow Trooper, Shadow Trooper)
(1) 852551: Magnet Set Darth Maul (Emperor and Luke parts)

Light Side:

King: Luke (constructed from Luke Pilot & Anakin mini-figs: see photo above)
Queen: Leia
K Bishop: Obi Wan Kenobi (pants swapped with Luke)
Q Bishop: Han Solo (Shirt swapped with Anakin)
K Knight: Chewbacca w/crossbow laser
Q Knight: Chewbacca w/blaster
K Rook: R2D2
Q Rook: C3PO
Pawns: Rebel Pilots

Dark Side:

King: Emperor (constructed from Darth Vader and Darth Maul mini-figs. See photo below.)
Queen: Darth Vader
K Bishop: Imperial Guard
Q Bishop: Boba Fett
K Knight: Shadow Trooper
Q Knight: Snow Trooper
K Rook: AT-SD Driver
Q Rook: AT-SD Driver
Pawns: Storm Troopers

The leftovers are: Child Anakin hybrid, Princess Leia in Slave Costume, Darth Maul/Damaged Vader hybrid, six AT-ST drivers, and two extra Rebel Pilots left over from Luke in Pilot suit and Wedge Antilles. Oh, and an X-Wing fighter and watch.

The choices of some pieces are driven by what can be purchased inexpensively: The AT-ST Driver rooks are there simply because they came free with the pawn pieces. I could obtain an “actual” Emperor as a Lego keychain, but he’d have a metal knob in his head and come glued together, whereas the mini-figures that come with the magnet sets are the real McCoy. I actually like my constructed Emperor better anyway.

I am considering demoting Han Solo to Q Knight and introducing Yoda as Q Bishop from another magnet set, eliminating the “extra” Chewbacca. This will leave Count Duku and Mace Windu leftovers.

With a little bit of Lego Know-How, you can have a full Star Wars Lego Chess Set. Not only is this a fun project to construct with your family, but it will be a workable chess game that they can enjoy for years to come. Not to mention the serious geek cred you’ll get from displaying it!

When I downloaded the update to Bejeweled 2 [iTunes link] about a month ago, I found that there was a new game that had been added. It was called Bejeweled Blitz. Although it looked very similar to my normal Bejeweled game, it had some very different features. Firstly, the game only lasted a minute. I only had sixty quick seconds to make as many matches as I could before the entire game exploded in a sparkling array of jewels. You might think that I would play LESS because the game only lasts a minute, but the exact opposite is true. Since a game is only one minute, I can tell myself, “One more game,” for minutes upon minutes. An hour later, I’m still playing and I’m still telling myself, “Just one more game.”

The more significant difference between normal Bejeweled and Bejeweled Blitz, however, was that it is connected to my Facebook friends, so I can compete against everyone I know. I cannot tell you the joy I have when I beat my friends and see myself at the top of the list. I know it’s just a silly game, but that competitive spirit in me is an angry beast when I can’t beat someone. I actually considered unfriending some people on Facebook just because I couldn’t beat them. I didn’t and boy am I glad I didn’t because when I actually beat their score, I feel like I’m the king of the world. Sure, it’s an imaginary world filled with diamonds, but I’m the king of it, if only for a brief moment before Ernie kicks my butt again.

I Think It’s Just Random

“I’m beginning to think the high scores are just random. When I get a high score, it feels the same to me as when I get a low score,” Dan said.

My entire family is playing this game either on Facebook or on their iPhones. We were discussing the high scores at great length.

Mike replied, “I would think it was random too, except that Laura ALWAYS beats me.”

I chimed in, “And Ernie always beats me. It’s not just random.”

“So, how are you getting such high scores?” They all wanted to know. (Continue Reading…)

Mike and I visit the Mt. Hood area in Oregon every year. It’s a quick drive from Portland, but ever since they closed the Swatch store, we don’t bother driving into the big city. Now, we have a reason.

Ground Kontrol Classic Arcade has over 90 video game consoles and a bunch of pinball machines as well.

• Ground Kontrol Classic Arcade

It has all of my favorites from years past like Centipede, DDR and Tetris, in addition to games that I love, but never saw in an arcade when they were at their height, like Arkanoid, Dr. Mario and Columns.

It’s not just an arcade, however. It’s a bar with food and they have cool events EVERY night. Rock Band Tuesdays, Atari parties and even Free Play parties (pay a fee to get in and play all the games for free).

Suddenly, Portland just seemed worth the drive up from Welches!

Via: The Ward-O-Matic: Electronic Games Mag: December 1982

Where: Ground Kontrol Classic Arcade
511 NW Couch St.
Portland, OR 97209 Google Map
Phone: (503)796-9364

Before my mom bought us an Atari, my Dad was the hero. One weekend, when we were visiting, he had this game connected to the television and waiting for us.

He had found it at the local Deseret Industries. It was broken, but he had been able to solder it back together. Stacey and I played “tennis” all night long.

We played with that simplistic video game for months until my mom and Carol gave us the Atari for Easter. After Atari, the Sears Tele-Game was just a cheap knock-off.

I have no idea what my dad did with that video game he rescued from a thrift store and nursed back to health, but he was the hero for those few months before Atari entered out lives.

Advert via: vintage_ads:

Mike and I moved from a tiny house to a huge house last July. All of our things that have been in storage for the last six years have been brought out of the storage unit, dusted off and reclassified. One of those finds were these:

I bought these stickers from Scholastic Books when I was in grade school in the early Eighties. I cannot remember what the two missing stickers were, but they must have been the coolest of the bunch. If I find them in my old sticker books, I’ll post them here as an update.

The most laughable sticker is in the bottom right hand corner and reads, “Terminal Video Fever.” I guess they were worried that Buckner & Garcia would sue them if they printed, “PacMan Fever.” If you’re unfamiliar with the song, here it is:

Video games were so new and cool when I was a kid that it was all I thought about sometimes. I was a lot like Marshall in this episode of Square Pegs, except I played on the Atari at home instead of the arcade.

Video games are so ubiquitous now that it’s hard to imagine there was a time when they were new, but these video game stickers in my box of old stuff brought the memories back full force.

Sims always seemed like a strange game to me and I never really liked playing it. Reading this blog, however, makes me interested in the new version of the game, Sims 3.

• Alice and Kev

The premise of the story:

This is an experiment in playing a homeless family in The Sims 3. I created two Sims, moved them in to a place made to look like an abandoned park, removed all of their remaining money, and then attempted to help them survive without taking any job promotions or easy cash routes. It’s based on the old ‘poverty challenge’ idea from The Sims 2, but it turned out to be a lot more interesting with The Sims 3’s living neighborhood features.

I have attempted to tell my experiences with the minimum of embellishment. Everything I describe in here is something that happened in the game. What’s more, a surprising amount of the interesting things in this story were generated by just letting go and watching the Sims’ free will and personality traits take over.

The beginning of the story: Alice and Kev « Alice and Kev

Just wandering around the neighborhood and talking to the various animal characters was my favorite part of playing Animal Crossing. I wonder if Sims 3 is finally a game I could enjoy.

A few months ago, I talked about the Wham-O Fun Fountain. It had been one of our favorite toys of all time.

• Gadgets Page » Retro Gadgets: Fun Fountain by Wham-O

If you are unfamiliar with the toy, here is a commercial describing it:

With summer finally here, I’m wishing for a Fun Fountain, or something else to cool off my days.

In that entry, I had mentioned that we used the clown hat for every kind of dress up play. After months of searching, I finally found a picture of Stacey, my sister, with the Fun Fountain clown hat on. It was held on her head by some yarn passed through the holes on the sides of the hat where the water splashed out. We had a parade on our street that day, so I dressed up Stacey like a clown. She looks adorable, doesn’t she? (Click on the photo to see it full size)

It’s funny how versatile toys can be. I don’t think the Wham-O people ever thought that we would be using their toy all year round for sprinkler fun AND dress up play. The same toy can function in many different aspects of our play life, none of which were conceived of by the manufacturer.

We make our gadgets our own by the way that we use them, with or without the permission of the manufacturer.

As if talking teddy bears weren’t creepy enough, My Home 2.0 DIY has made a Teddy Ruxpin be able to speak the tweets of your friends. Here is a video showing how they did it:

This appears to be a viral marketing video for Verizon, but it doesn’t make it any less cool.

The science fiction blog, io9 had a great entry:

• io9 – My First Microchip

They listed the computer embedded toys of the early Eighties, including: Speak & Spell, Simon and Teddy Ruxpin. They forgot MY first microchip, however.

Merlin The Electronic Wizard

Merlin was a handheld game that had six different games:

1. Tic Tac Toe
2. Music Machine: A rudimentary synthesizer. The first electronic music I ever made was on a Merlin.
3. Echo, a game similar to Simon
4. Blackjack 13
5. Magic Square, a pattern game similar to Lights Out
6. Mindbender, a game similar to Mastermind

I played with Merlin for hours. Here is a family photo of my dad playing with my Merlin. He loved that toy as much as I did. That was actually a very geeky holiday year. My sister got a Raggedy Ann radio that allowed you to talk into a microphone and broadcast your voice. God, I loved that toy. You can see all of us playing with those toys here:

• Merlin The Electronic Wizard – a set on Flickr

In fact, Merlin was the dawn of the casual gaming market. I could pick up Merlin, play a couple games of Mindbender and then put it down. It predated the GameBoy by almost a decade.

I still have my old Merlin in a box in the basement. Amazingly, it still works with fresh batteries and I can play all my old games just as well as I could back on New Year’s Day in 1980.

Here is an old commercial showing how Merlin was played:

After Microsoft announced Project Natal for the Xbox at E3 this year, I just shook my head in disbelief. Here is what I thought about the exergaming side of the marketing.

• Starling Fitness » Felicia Day Tries Out Xbox Project Natal

People have been saying that Project Natal is going to give the Nintendo Wii a run for their money in the exergaming market. I’d love for it to be true, but I think we’re going to have to wait ten years before technology is good enough for this to work in any living room.

My bullshit detector might have been pinging when watching Felicia Day play with Project Natal, but it’s off the scale with this Milo demonstration:

I want to believe in this Milo “game,” but I just don’t believe that it will work. I don’t believe that the A.I. can understand what I’m saying. I don’t believe I can interact with it like they show in the video. I can hardly believe that the game will be able to recognize me from one day to the next. What if I wear my hair curly or put on my glasses? Will Milo still be able to know who I am?

I’d love for Project Natal to be a reality, but I’m not buying it either in concept OR hard earned currency.