Video Roundup (12.09.06)
The best videos I’ve come across today:
- A day in the life of a Battlefield 2 team. Golden. (thanks Peter)
- XBOX 360 laptop.
- How video games are made. Completely simplified. Vaguely funny. (via Kotaku)
Of course, you’ll want to keep an eye on this one.
Taiwan: Pixel by pixel
If you like pixel art then this huge image will excite you. The sheer size and level of detail is astonishing. The space shuttle is particularly great. (via Retroblast)
Credible iTunes Alternative?
The BBC is running a story about a new music download service for us Europeans, eMusic. eMusic has been around for a while, but downloads were restricted to US customers. Their subscription rates seem reasonable, with the cheapest being £8.99/month for 40 tracks. The major selling point is that the tracks are in MP3 format and are encoded at 192kbps VBR. They are also DRM free - a nice change from iTunes restrictive policies, not mention their lower bitrate. Apparently they aim to make money from the fact that not everyone will download all their allocated tracks each month. They do have a download manager and I’ve yet to work out if it is required to use the service. However, it seems that once downloaded the music is in plain-old MP3 format.
Update: It seems that the eMusic experience is not as good as it appears (thanks Vicky). I’ve also been dismayed at the choice of tracks on offer after checking out the site a bit further. The catalog is restricted mainly due to the fact that they don’t have deals with record labels who demand DRM. A noble effort but the end experience is far from ideal.
Oh money where art thou
Two things which demand to be bought have come to my attention today. First up is the second volume of Penny-Arcade, just recently released over at Think Geek. When I ordered the first volume I wonder why exactly I was paying for comics which I could read for free online. Then I remembered that I am weak. While wandering around TG I also notice these cool Atari Keychains which actually contain 2-3 old Atari games. Just hook up your keychain to a TV and off you go. Geeky? Yes, but a bit cool too…
