Month: June 2008

Now that the free demo has released I guess I can talk about it.

I managed to score a pre-pre-release of the demo version of the “Creature Creator” for Spore a week or so ago and, if this small taste is anything like the full game, I don’t expect to be putting it down for a *long* time.

The free demo allows you to make creatures, but the body features are limited to just a small portion of what is in the full game.

I’ve had my pre-order in for the game since EA made it available for pre-order, but the free demo of the creator portion of the game is an excellent way to pass the time before release. As soon as EA has it up on the SPORE site, I recommend nabbing a copy of the free demo just for the ear-to-ear grins, belly laughs, and general feeling of well-being you’ll receive as you watch your little creation nod approval at your design decisions, dance around happily, and show off for you.

Once you’ve fiddled with the free demo version, there is a $10 version of the Creator application that has all of the hundreds of body features available to play with. This version of the application will be available Wednesday the 18th, so hours and hours of wholesome and fun godlike powers will be available to the masses this week.

So, there ya go. I don’t endorse too many things but, if you’re reading this go download the free demo when it is available and play with it. It’s good for you. 🙂

Yesterday myself, Zeze, Kalira, and Max which is the same crew from the previous entry, hit the Ren Faire here in Colorado.

It was an excellent day for the hike around the back woods of Larkspur.

So we left the crackerbox at about 8am, stopped by ‘Rosie’s’ for breakfast, and got to the faire grounds at 10am sharp… The south lot was already full and they were redirecting folks to the north lot so rumors of the Faire’s demise seem to be slightly exagerated.

That being said though the changes that have been wrought at the hands of the new management, which took over some span of years ago and since then I have not passed the front gate, are both wonderous and souless at the same time.

The grounds are now far more amusement-esque rather than ‘period’ with the inclusion of the moneytree ‘pirate’ ambiance across most of the grounds… Which is one thing I have to say for the new management, they know their audience and are very quick to capitalize on anything both ‘in the past’ and ‘in the vogue’ as it were. For example, there was a lot of what I would call ‘Cimmerian’ touches to the grounds and from overhearing a lot of the staff it was purely to capitalize on the recent release of ‘Age of Conan’.

Speaking of staff, the current crew seems to be missing most of the old-guard’s acting ability… I think about one out of five folks on staff even had a decent BFA and most were solidly in ‘street talk’ mode and it really blew what little ambiance there was. Additionally, it appears that anyone who can afford the space is allowed to sell wares as there were far more t-shirt vendors than I would expect in a ‘period’ production… There was even a ‘Mike’s Hard Lemonade’ vendor – yes, I remember reading about them from my studies of the middle ages…

But, all of this aside it *is* a business and businesses are there to make money, so I can understand where the change in focus has come from. The general populace isn’t intrigued enough by the period to really participate, but if you make it more of an amusement park, they stop viewing it as a ‘period production’ and look at it more of a ‘day trip to Elich’s’.

I think the biggest thing I noticed was how much either the rent at the Faire has gone up, or the dollar has diminished – or both – since the last time I was there. Pretty much everything purchasable was about 200% of what I would figure it was worth. And, remember, I used to work Faires and conventions, and I know which catalogs most of the booth-filler comes from, and therefore have a pretty good idea what was paid for those fancy dragons goblets and shiny silver unicorn pendants.

Post-Faire I took the crew up 105 and 85 back to Denver via Highland’s Ranch. It was decided upon leaving the Faire that everyone would like to see “Kungfu Panda”, so I figure the AMC there in H.R. would be an excellent place to see it.

Overall it was a very good movie; fun to watch with some really good ‘LOL’ moments. I rate it as ‘worth the money to see it’.

Today’s plans will take me to the North end of Denver to the Flea Market in Commerce City where I will most likely purchase a bicycle to commute to work with. I believe after that I will be at the theater yet again for the latest ‘Incredible Hulk’ movie.

Once that is done I’ll hole up here at home, log into WoW for a bit, and see who from the new guild is doing what and tag along for an hour or two.
 

I went on a bit of a road trip yesterday up into the hills and had a pretty good time with it.

Zeze approached me Saturday morning and asked if I’d be willing to act as a tour guide for him and two of his friends on a trip up ito the mountains. I of course said yes as any excuse I can get to leave Aurora is a good thing, and Zeze was paying for the gas…

Originally it was going to be a caravan of sorts as I gather Jalen and Flyn were going to come along as well, but I guess they didn’t make it so it was just the four of us in Zeze’s new Jeep.

We left here at about 10am and after swinging by a local McDonald’s so that the three of them could grab a bite to eat (I’m a terminally early riser and had eaten breakfast a few hours prior) we headed West.

The trip up the hill was fairly uneventful… The new Jeep is completely gutless though and I had to stand in the stirrups and liberally use the whip to get it up the hill at any semblance of speed.

We pulled in to Edwards at about noon and stopped at a local hangout called Paddy O’Day’s for lunch. Paddy’s was excellent as always and after everyone was well stuffed from the great burgers we headed out along US24 towards Leadville.

I’ve written here before about the US24 route between Edwards/Minturn and Leadville before. It’s a wonderful canyon called “Dark Territory” that winds up to the continental divide at Tennessee Pass and the headwaters of the Eagle river. Along the route there is pretty much an infinte amount of things to look at and be inspired by…

So we drove through Minturn, which is still Minturn – at least for the next year or two. There are plans afoot to widen the main street through the town (US24) for the new Battle Mountain ski resort… Just what we need, another money-soaked ski resort. I kinda feel sorry for Minturn as it’s the last of the small working mountain towns in the central area of the Colorado Rockies.

The first thing we stopped at on the route was the Gilman Mine and townsite, which still looks about the same as it has since it shut down. It’s a ghost-town, founded in 1886, and has this eerie post-apocalypse vibe to it… There is a developer from Florida, Bobby Ginn, who bought all of the land and mineral rights to Battle Mountain and his plan is to tear down Gilman and put in employee housing for the private ski resort they are building across the highway. So if you wanna see Gilman, you’d be advised to travel US24 in the next year or so while it’s still there.

The next thing on the tour was the bridge at Red Cliff, followed by the historic site for the 10th Mountain Division and the Continental Divide.

Next we wound down into Leaville, then followed US24 down into Buena Vista before getting off US24 and onto US285 back towards Denver.

US285 follows the old narrow-gauge transcontinental railway and also has some amazing scenery, including Mt. Evans (from the south side).  We got back to the house after a stop at Sonic for drinks at about 5pm.

All told the route I took them shows off most of Colorado’s 14’ers, three of my favorite towns, 1 awesome burger joint, 1 ghost town, 1 historic site, 2 passes over the Divide, and 4 hours of the best views in Colorado.

I highly recommend the loop for anyone wanting to see what all this “mountain” hubbub is all about.

Additionally I got to spend a few hours in a car with these two friends of Zeze’s… I’ve always said that if you want to really get to know someone, spend half a day in a car with them. Well, I can say that of all of Zeze’s friends, these two seem to be the best of the bunch; They’re well collected, educated, have their heads screwed on right, and have genuine personalities that have depth and breadth to them…

So, that’s about it. I was out of the house most of the day yesterday and while I spent all of it behind the wheel of a car, it was a very nice break from hiding in the house.