Well, their homes exist anyway. WTFsrsly reports that a family in Wales has built their house out of natural materials, and it closely resembles a home for hobbits! The house was built to keep the visual impact on the land minimal, so it is built into a hill. Check out the article and photos.
Starting today and running through Monday, February 25th, Turbine will be holding a free open stress test for Lord of the Rings Online. What does this mean? It means that this test is open to anyone who wants to play. A stress test is meant to stress the servers in order to find weak spots. You can expect long wait times, crashes, and other issues, but it is a great chance to try out the beta early before open beta begins in April. The population must be much higher than usual in order to properly stress the servers, so go try it out!
Turbine is also running a contest for stress test participants. Anyone who plays at least two hours each day (including time spent waiting in the server queue) will be entered into a drawing to win one of three NVIDIA GeForce 8800’s. Read more about the stress test and the contest on the Lord of the Rings Online stress test page.
Check out my Beta First Impressions article to read about my experiences in Lord of the Rings Online.
Andrew Lipson has created a number of models of M. C. Escher’s illustrations using Legos. My favorite is “Relativity”, but he has also done “Balcony”, “Belvedere”, “Ascending and Descending”, and “Waterfall”. Many of these are physically impossible, strictly speaking, so the use of perspective is required to “trick” the viewer into seeing the impossible as possible. Not only does Andrew show photos of the finished models, but he also shows progress photos and explains how he constructed each one. They are quite amazing!
Microsoft has recently made Virtual PC 2007 available to download for free. This version supports Vista, so if you have a Vista license, you can run it on Virtual PC without installing over your current OS. However, it looks like it will only run on XP Pro, XP Tablet PC, and Vista OSes.
IGN has posted 9 video clips from the movie 300. Each video is an actual scene from the movie, unlike trailers where it is a mix of different scenes. I especially like the use of primary colors in the cinematography. Hopefully this movie will be what Troy could have been.
View the videos on IGN.
My last experience with an MMORPG beta (Vanguard) was less enjoyable than I expected. The game wasn’t very fun and did not seem ready for release. Now I’m playing in the Lord of the Rings Online beta. Since the NDA (non disclosure agreement) has been lifted, I’m free to discuss my experiences. So here are a few of my first impressions.
GeekMonthly.com has posted a three part interview with Tim Minear, co-creator and executive producer on the upcoming Fox show Drive. Tim Minear is known for his writing on shows like Angel, Firefly, and Wonderfalls. In the interview, Tim Minear discusses some of his experiences with the show and plans for it.
GEEKMONTHLY.COM: Do you see a wide range of possible stories?
TIM MINEAR: You can have the mystery of the missing wife or the mystery of the sick father. You know, the different mysteries, the different information being transmitted about the different characters, the different agendas they have and the sort of larger story character stuff for each. But once the starting pistol is fired, the agendas become the same and it’s difficult to cut away and do something different because they’re all racing towards a goal.
“Welcome to The Lord of the Rings Online: Shadows of Angmar (LOTRO) Beta Program!” It’s not open beta yet, and I managed to get into another closed beta. Woohoo! Hopefully this one will go better than the last one (Vanguard).
Lord of the Rings Online is an MMORPG based on J. R. R. Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings trilogy scheduled to be released on April 24th, 2007. Lotro is set in Middle Earth after the time when Frodo leaves the Shire with the ring. Players can play Humans, Elves, Dwarves, and Hobbits. Apparently evil races like Orcs and Goblins are not playable since there is no good/evil alignment among players. Read more about Lord of the Rings Online.
Ben & Jerry’s has named a new ice cream flavor after Stephen Colbert: “Stephen Colbert’s Americone Dream”. The ice cream is vanilla flavored with fudge-covered waffle cone pieces and caramel. Yum! Ben & Jerry’s called it, “the sweet taste of liberty in your mouth.” Read more on Yahoo News.
SoundtrackNet has posted their Pick of the Week - the soundtrack composed by Harry Gregson-Williams for the movie The Number 23 starring Jim Carrey. There are 30 second sound clips available for each track, and the soundtrack will be released on February 20.
The Number 23 is not much different from his recent score to Deja Vu in its elements, but they are utilized in a different way. This score is less thematic and uses the electronics as the primary rhythmic tool rather than the moving string lines that were one of the thematic elements in Deja Vu. That having been said, there are a few moments where the strings do pick up a moving line, for example at the beginning of “Finishing the Book”, in a similar fashion to Batman Begins.
Check out the article on SoundtrackNet. The sound clips are very interesting… it sounds like an intense movie. I swear I heard a dog bark in the second half of the track #6 clip, “Finishing the Book”!