Author: Jared Cash (Page 12 of 41)

The iBand and the future of wearable computing

February 12, 2013 / Jared Cash

I recently signed up for App.net (a paid Twitter alternative) and have quite enjoyed the conversations in which I’ve found myself involved. Two of the more interesting discussions have been about the future of the Apple TV (more on that later) and Apple’s rumored wearable iOS device that Michael Norton (@zenimpulseÂ – ADN) recently dubbed the iBand.

If you haven’t seen the hundreds of posts about it yet, let me fill you in. On Sunday, The New York Times published a blog entry about Apple’s rumored ‘iWatch’ and suddenly the Internet exploded with theories, rumors, and various people shouting that they know a guy that knows a guy, etc. Is it true? Only Apple knows for sure, but that hasn’t stopped speculation from clogging up the Interwebs.

Today, a group of us on ADNÂ were discussing the possibilities of a wearable device that paired with our iPhones, iPads, and Macs and enabled us to do things that we currently can’t. It’s all wild speculation, of course, but it didn’t stop us from dreaming. As the discussion progressed, it became clear that what Apple might be building is much more than a watch, but an entirely new accessory to existing computing technology. It’s no surprise that most of us had already read Bruce Tognazzini’s thoughts on the rumored device, so it directed much of our discussion.

We were quickly divided into two reasonable (and polite) camps: those that believe an iBand would be an amazing device capable of changing how we interact with the technology around us, and those that believe it would be unnecessary in a world where we’re alreadyÂ too connected. One of the fundamental differences of opinion came from how each person views the rumored device: Do I need more from a watch? Can this even be consideredÂ a watch or is it something more?

Here are a list of items we discussed as potential features for the rumored iBand:

Syncs with iPhone, iPad, iPod, and Mac
Can be used as an authentication key for any of your devices, optionally disabling passcodes and passwords on your device when in proximity
Uses biometric sensors and/or an identification challenge to remain secure, preventing a thief from gaining access to your devices (or your house, or your car, or any other compatible tech-integrated object)
Captures data in a fashion similar to a Nike FuelBand or a FitBit, storing accelerometer, locations, elevation and more for synchronization with your devices when in proximity
Can be used to receive notifications from your devices including app notifications, email notifications, iMessages, phone call alerts, alarms and calendar events, and other items of interest (such as the restaurant you like is only a block away and is having a lunch special; you have plenty of time before your next scheduled meeting to have lunch, pick up your dry cleaning, and get back to the office)
Can tell time
May eventually come in multiple colors or have a removable band so that 3rd-parties can design new ones that fit your lifestyle and sense of fashion
Will have a simplified interface that is focused on receiving data from your devices, not replacing them entirely
Could serve as an external FaceTime camera and speakerphone (Dick Tracy would be proud!)

So there you have it. While it may not be everything to everyone, it certainly hits on a need or three of many humans out there. One of the biggest arguments against such a device is that you already have your iPhone with you, why can’t you just take it out of your pocket and do all these things? In the case of notifications, the benefit would be so you could see who is calling or messaging you without having to do those things, which would be very useful if you’re in a business meeting and are waiting for an important call from another client or are receiving an emergency message from a loved one. Plus, with control over what does and doesn’t get pushed to the iBand, you could ensure that important notifications show up on your wrist and other notifications are simply ignored in your pocket and left on your lock screen or in notification center to be reviewed at a later time.

I’d love to hear your thoughts. Do you think Apple should release an iBand? Do you have other ideas on what could make it better that I haven’t listed?

The trouble with BlackBerry

January 30, 2013 / Jared Cash

Today, the company-formerly-known-as Research in Motion, creators of the once-dominant smartphone BlackBerry, announced a name change to match their flagship product. In other news, nobody cares.

Okay, that’s a little harsh, but it’s more true every day. BlackBerry is no longer relevant, except as a case study of what not to do when a competitor launches a paradigm-shifting product. As if determined to prove that the company lives in a bubble, a recent radio interviewÂ from across the pond made me laugh today. Unfortunately, it also made me cringe.

Marketing buzzspeak is poison, but it’s downrightÂ mephitic (That’s right! I learned a new word today!) when an executive refuses to answer a simple question. One of the most frustrating thing about corporations today (aside from The Evil™) is that they use a lot of fancy words to say nothing. Rather than give a straight answer to a question, they focus on redirecting the conversation to a fanciful edition of their press release.

The problem BlackBerry is facing right now and that they just don’t seem to recognize is that they are no longer in control of the market. As such, they need to stop behaving like a large corporation and begin acting like a startup again. Make bold decisions, challenge the largest of your competitors and ignore the long-standing sithspit that you shouldn’t acknowledge your competitors. You’re the underdog now. Act like it.

Of course, BlackBerry could vanish into the Ã¦ther and I wouldn’t care at all.

Today in Letterpress

January 29, 2013 / Jared Cash

Technically, I think that’s a proper noun (to my knowledge, the clearing of four lines at once, is still written as a Tetris, not a tetris), but it’s a good one, so I’m not complaining.

Best Apple links of the day

January 18, 2013 / Jared Cash

I came across a decent number of good articles today about Apple, all of which are worth a read, even if you don’t like Apple. Why? Because if you’re the type of person that expends any amount of energy repeating the misinformation that passes for journalism these days, it’s important to know when you’ve been had.

So, in no particular order, the best reads of the day are:

‘Every empire crumbles’ from John Moltz’s Very Nice Website

Swallowed whole from The Macalope over at Macworld

How Apple Is Destroying Android From The Inside Out (and why it’s difficult to see) from Kate MacKenzie over at Mac360

Of Myths and Market Share from Michael J. Tomlin’s obviouslogicÂ (my personal favorite of the day)

Apple Investors ‘Dissatisfied’ With Life? from CNBC (this is a video, not an article), courtesy of MacDailyNews, which has transcribed key paragraphs from the video (if you prefer to read)

I was directed to most of the articles above byÂ Daring Fireball and The Loop. I highly recommend reading both sites daily.

RetroforceGO! Podcast Archive

January 18, 2013 / Jared Cash

RetroforceGO! was a podcast from Destructoid that talked about classic video games. It ran for several years and to date remains my favorite podcast of all time. Unfortunately, the Destructoid website didn’t exactly do a very complete job of keeping the episodes online and available. Fortunately, I saved every episode on my computer long after I had listened to them.

I’m not the first person to put up an archive of the show, but I did put the entire contents online a couple years ago so that I could publish a link to them on here for others to download, in case they were looking for a specific episode or just wanted to listen to the podcast again or for the first time. I had always meant to set them up with an RSS feed for those that wanted to “re-subscribe” to it and get it into their preferred podcast player, but I never got around to it. So anyway, here they are in all their downloadable glory. When I have free time, I’ll try to come back in here and link to each individual episode, but for now I’m just going to present you with a link to the folder where they’re contained. If you want a more detailed download option, then I suggest you check out Wasted Seconds’ own archive of the podcast. They’ve also got links to a torrent to grab all of them at once.

RetroforceGO! podcast archive

Qualcomm’s CES keynote: The perfect shitstorm of crazy

January 9, 2013 / Jared Cash

Qualcomm’s insane CES 2013 keynote in pictures and tweets

Honestly, it’s like when Steve Jobs died, necromancers from every tech company on the planet worked together to trap his soul on this plane and then tore it into pieces, passing them from company to company, binding them with dark magicks in a vain attempt to capture the Apple keynote for themselves. And this abomination is what happens when more than one Jobsoul is brought into proximity with each other. The warping of reality can’t sustain the dark energies as the strain to coerce a fractured genius into bestowing its greatness on something unworthy is simply flung outward into reality around it.

If you want to witness the entirety of the most frakked up thing to ever come out of CES (or if you just want to see what it looks like when a hellspawn is birthed upon an unsuspecting populace), you can watch the whole thing here.

UPDATE: After having watched the first 30 minutes of the video, I’ve come away with a few realizations. 1) Steve Ballmer is every bit as crazy as before and he looks like a reptile. Specifically, a raptor of some sort that has grown too old and fat to hunt anymore. 2) The CEO of Qualcomm, Paul Jacobs, looks like he just ate my family, thinks it’s funny, and is failing big time to hide it from me.

The world gets smaller every year

December 20, 2012 / Jared Cash

As the year winds to a close, we start to think about all the remarkable things that have happened and look forward to what is to come next year. I can honestly say that 2012 will be one of the most memorable years of my life as I look back at all the amazing things that brought the entire world closer together. And on that note, check out this amazing video that captures a rather large majority of them here.

Today in iOS: Wit, rhythm, and fantasy

December 13, 2012 / Jared Cash

Three things:

One, The Bard’s Tale for iOS is free for a limited time. It’s a birds-eye view dungeon crawler similar in style to the Baldur’s Gate: Dark Alliance, X-Men Legends, Champions of Norrath, and Marvel: Ultimate Alliance. While the originalÂ The Bard’s Tale series was a western-RPG in the vein of Might & Magic and Eye of the Beholder, the 2004 release for consoles and PC had nothing in common with its namesake due to licensing rights. However, the iOS version was released as a sort of “collector’s edition” and comes with the ability to download the original Interplay classics for free inside the app. Plus, it includes 60beat support if you feel like you simply must play this game with a controller.

Two, Square-Enix released Theatrhythm Final Fantasy for iOS late last night. It’s a rhythm game that was originally released for the Nintendo DS. However, it seems that Squeenix’s recent-ish release ofÂ Symphonica, another rhythm game with a rather verbose story and beautiful hand-drawn anime artwork.Â Theatrhythm Final Fantasy is a free download, but that will only get you two songs and a handful of characters with which to play the game. In order to unlock more content, you’ll have to pay for it. Unsurprisingly, unlocking all of the content that the game has to offer will set you back $88.11 plus taxes. But, if you just can’t live without your Final Fantasy fix, or you’ve got $100 burning a hole in your pocket, check it out.

Lastly, Google Maps for iOS is now available, if you’re the type of person that cares. Personally, I’ve never had any issues with Apple’s Maps that were more serious than the issues I had with Google’s, so I won’t be using it. Especially because I had forgotten how ugly Google’s map tiles were. However, if you need transit directions on your iPhone, Google’s app is the way to go.

Wii U: First Impressions (SPOILER ALERT: It’s a pain in the ass, but fun to play)

December 11, 2012 / Jared Cash

The majority of this post was written as part of a survey for Nintendo about my first impressions of the system (some parts were edited or added later). Since writing it, I’ve finally been able to play the device and it’s quite fun. But, I’m still furious about the transition of purchased content from the Wii to the Wii U and will unlikely ever be happy unless Nintendo provides a way to restore lost functionality to particular games and/or allows for the re-transfer of content back to a Wii (highly unlikely). I look forward to seeing new games for the system, but will rarely, if ever, purchase digital content from Nintendo again due to their poor legacy support.

——-

I have rather mixed feelings about the Wii U. I love the GamePad and am really excited about the potential for new gameplay elements (as I always loved the GameBoy to GameCube connectivity of Zelda: Four Swords Adventures and Final Fantasy: Crystal Chronicles), but am a little disappointed in a number of execution missteps with a new system and legacy support.

First, having to download an update that takes over two hours just so that you can have full access to all the features of the Wii U when you take it out of the box is ridiculous. If a product isn’t ready, don’t ship it. Forcing someone to essentially download an entirely new software/firmware to their system before they can even begin using all of its features is ludicrous. Especially when that update loses connection repeatedly during the download. Thankfully, it picks up where it leaves off in the download rather than starting over or I would have simply returned the system.

Second, the transfer of content from the original Wii to the Wii U is clunky, slow, and treats original Wii owners like criminals. On top of that, it’s dangerously simple to lose all of your content that you paid money for during the transfer process. Since transferring the content to the SD card removes it from the original Wii and disables it from being used on that Wii entirely, if something happens to the SD card after, or if the Wii U crashes during import, all of your content is not only lost, but completely inaccessible. I was fortunate that, during my import of content, my Wii U only froze up while it was downloading a WiiWare title, which appears to be the final step in transferring content. Thankfully, my purchase history and save data had already been copied and I didn’t lose anything. But that doesn’t change the fact that this is a horrible way to transfer content when companies like Microsoft can simply access your online purchase history tied to a specific account and allow you to specify a new console as yours and begin downloading your games to it. While this does allow the old console to continue playing games that were on it, it still prevents them from being redownloaded if they are deleted, thus ensuring that a person can’t simply purchase a new console and reliably sell their old one with all of their content intact, essentially “pirating” their content (which is, I’m sure, the primary reason why the Wii U’s transfer is so ridiculous).

Further, I’m a longtime Nintendo fan and I’ve always likened Nintendo to my other favorite company, Apple. However, the Wii to Wii U transfer is decidedly un-Apple and worse, it’s anti-consumer. Ignoring the fact that Apple lets you use purchased content on multiple devices for free, Nintendo has made the entire process such a hassle that it is easier for most users to simply repurchase the content they most want on their Wii U. Especially as they can continue to use the original Wii afterward. As it stands now, my Wii is completely unnecessary, since I can’t do anything with it except play Wii and GameCube games. Which means, it will only ever be used to play GameCube games, which is a huge waste of its awesome potential. On top of that, I’m not even sure I want to play any of my WiiWare and Virtual Console games on my Wii U as my only controller options are the Wii Remote and Classic Controller, which limits my gameplay options and restricts me to 4 players rather than 5 for TurboGrafx-16 titles and 8 for some WiiWare titles. This is beyond ridiculous and just highlights how poorly legacy support was implemented. Rather than forcing me to load an entire Wii emulator (or is it virtualized? not that it matters from a usability standpoint), legacy content should have simply been accessible from the Wii U menu and without all this painful jumping through hoops that leaves your original Wii a shell of what it used to be.

I truly hope that Nintendo has learned a valuable lesson from this system launch and recognizes that they are no longer playing in a world where they set the example and the rest of the industry follows. Microsoft is a terribly managed company that makes boneheaded decision after boneheaded decision, yet they have handled their console upgrade/transfer business significantly better than Nintendo has. Apple doesn’t even make consoles, yet they are consistently outselling and outperforming the competition because they know that what is most important is making life easier for their customers and treating them like responsible individuals. I have never pirated content for my iPhone or iPad, despite how easy it is to do so. Nor have I done so for my Xbox, even though it’s only slightly less difficult to transfer content to a new Xbox and sell the old one with a bunch of games still installed. I am not a criminal. Don’t treat me like one.

Third, the very day after installing a several gigabyte update just so I could use the damned thing, a new system update was required before I could play disc-based games. This one was a little over 2 gigabytes in size, so it only took a little over an hour to download and never disconnected during the process. But it didn’t change the fact that the system I purchased was unplayable for 2 straight days because I had to wait for system updates each time I sat down to play it.

I am a longtime, and loyal, Nintendo customer. Unfortunately, due to the current state of affairs for a Wii to Wii U owner, I may not be able to say that for much longer. As it stands now, IÂ highly recommend that anyone purchasing a Wii U leave their Wii content intact so that it remains a useful piece of hardware and simply ignore the Wii Menu channel on the Wii U except to play Wii games. You can always transfer your content in the future if you so desire.

The Opera House at the End of the Universe

October 23, 2012 / Jared Cash

I’ve been a fan of Japanese roleplaying games since I was a young child, when I first played Dragon Warrior (originally, Dragon Quest, in Japan) and Final Fantasy on the NES. That love did not fade throughout the years, and I still love to play a good, old-fashioned melodrama now and then. The Final Fantasy series is probably the most famous RPG in the Americas, so it’s no surprise that they hold an extra special place in my heart.

About a year-and-a-half ago, I finished playing Chaos RingsÂ (also for iPad), the first in a new RPG series published by Square-Enix but developed by Media.Vision exclusively for the iPhone and iPod touch. Soon, it was released for the iPad and even recently was made available for Android. I loved the game and had many glowing praises to sing of it to friends and family. Unfortunately, despite how much fun it was, it still didn’t feel as epic or robust as many other RPGs available for consoles. There was a definite level of polish to the graphics and animation, sound effects and music, and combat system that was missing from other RPGs available for iOS, but it certainly wasn’t up to the same level as a Final Fantasy title.

When I finished Chaos Rings, I took a break from the series for a while. Even though I had Chaos Rings Î© (also for iPad) already installed on my iPhone, the game felt more like an expansion than a new game. It used the same tile sets, enemy models, skills, and even music of the first game. The story was the biggest change, however. The game follows the lives of two characters from the original Chaos Rings. As a prequel, it dealt with how those two characters won the previous Ark Arena combat. What really made the story stand out was how instead of simply playing through the same game concept as before, several serious issues occurred that completely derailed the traditional Ark Arena tournament.Â Unfortunately, after having spent hours and hours grinding my characters in the original Chaos Rings to max level, I couldn’t bring myself to play Omega right away.

Thankfully, after taking some time off, playing Omega started to feel more like a whole new game. I recently finished it and felt that it was a better game than the original and that the story was a lot better, as well. I still feel that the overall plot of the original is a much better tale, but the storytelling in that game is not as good as in Omega. That may have something to do with the original being 4 different stories, each told by a different protagonist couple. The best feature of the original Chaos Rings was the quantum nature of the story. Each time you played as a different couple, various elements of the story were significantly different. This was most notable when playing as Olgar and Ayuta. In fact, Ayuta’s story was my favorite of them all, because it reveals so much about the Ark and how it came to be. Olgar’s story is also better than the others because of the way the Ayuta in his timeline has become twisted and evil.

Omega, instead of having multiple scenarios to play through, has an Extra mode that can be entered after finishing the primary story. In this mode, there is an entirely new story that is a parody of the series as a whole. Everyone lives and is happy, despite the original storyline. Plus, it marks the return of two characters that get killed at the beginning of Chaos Rings (in every scenario you get to watch them die before they even have personalities). They’re actually quite charming in that cluelessly insane way that so many foils are in Japanese RPGs.

Now that I’ve finished Omega, I’ve begun to play Chaos Rings II (also for iPad). Simply put, the game is beautiful. I purchased this one on the iPad because I wanted to see what kind of difference it made. The visuals are incredible, despite the fact that they aren’t Retina-display quality. This is a true sequel, in every sense of the word. New characters, new conflicts, an entirely new story to unfold. One of the biggest changes to the game is the skill system. In Chaos Rings and Omega characters unlocked Gene Plates that they could equip to use new skills. These Plates would fill up with new skills as they fought enemies, eventually giving them a whole bevy of skills to use that would heavily influence combat. In Chaos Rings II, characters can now equip Sopia (or souls) of the monsters that they defeat. They fill up in the same way as before, except once a specific Sopia is equipped on a character, it must be removed before being equipped by another. Further, the protagonist of the story can equip the Sopia of fallen comrades to get their unique skills and summon them into battle, similar to the Eidolons of Final Fantasy IV and the Espers of Final Fantasy VI.

Every character also starts combat with a specific element already attached to them, making them strong or weak against specific elemental attacks. This results in a lot more strategy to the combat, as it can sometimes be impossible to damage an enemy at all without Pairing attacks (both party members attackâ€”and take hitsâ€”together) or changing your element. As Sopia skills are unlocked, characters can equip Sopia to change their starting element. This can be a life saver if you are traveling through an area filled with Blaze (fire) monsters and you start every fight with the Gale (wind) element.

The story certainly has a similar tone to the rest of the series. There’s a very fatalistic feeling to every Chaos Rings game. The world is at an end and your characters must kill innocent people to prevent a more tragic event. However, Chaos Rings II provides you with some incredible characters to lead you through this story. I will definitely play the game more than once to make different choices to see how the story plays out.

Another significant change to the game is the way you are no longer tied to a single party throughout the game. While Omega did have you switching between two supporting characters throughout the story, it was scripted and your primary hero always remained in the party. In Chaos Rings II, you can often leave different characters behind to go grind some monsters with whichever characters you choose (so long as they’re still alive, of course). While I haven’t finished the game yet, I am greatly impressed by the improvements and consider it to be a console quality combat system and storyline. I look forward to seeing the series continue for many years, as I think it’s a solid hit for Square-Enix and Media.Vision.