Screenshots from My Dev Team

I remember I used to say that I started development on a new game. Attached are some screenshots on the current progress of the project which is going along rather on schedule. We are working on making maps of Hell, and below are some of the screenshots of the game.


The picture above shows a first person viewpoint of the a certain scene in the game showing the hot lava and copper pots were sinners are boiled in.


Just a scenic viewpoint and the character rendered in 3rd person. As noted my game has actually 6 types of custom cameras in addition to the 2 systems that are already included. As you know, I like to tinker with things :P



In this picture I was just showing some strange color particles, nothing much more than that.

Oh well that sums up part of what has been a very busy last forthnight.

Jamming Session

During the last week one of my old friend Saj popped over from England for a visit and we just had a short jamming session. If you looked at the photo, you can notice its a pretty strange session :P

Winning the Virtual World Cup

One of my favorite sports is Football. However playing football in the real world is pretty hard considering many factors like finding at least 11 football players in our team, finding an opponent to play against, finding a football field, and figuring how to get everyone there. Due to all those issues, we found that playing virtual football as a team is certainly a easier thing to do. A few days ago, our football team assembled at my home, and we played Winning Eleven which is our favorite football game on the PS2.

In Winning Elevenwe usually compete in the World Cup(International Cup) and all of us would be playing in the same team. As being in the same football team, most of us have good knowledge on positioning issues. In this time around, we decided to create our players in Saudi Arabia and create arab sounding variations of our nicks. The last time we played this game, we were in Japan, and we made some seriously strange variations of our names. One example was like my little bro who was called Dan, and his character was called Danimaru.

After a number of matches we won the tournament and looking back at it I have to admit that stuff is something only homies would be proud of :P


The picture above is our team just strutting around before the award ceremony.


The captain of the team, Dan Shirani waiting to lift the trophy.


Lifting the trophy.


Starting the celebration. My character is just left of the captain. My largest contribution in the team was in the finals were after falling behind my 1 goal and 1 assist we managed to win the tournament :)


Who let the monkeys out?


Going for a lap of honor...


before partying throughout the night :P

Recommended Site: AweZoom - Flash and Music

During my younger years when I was composing music, I happen to like to listen to lesser known musicians from all around the world. One of the music scene that I was intrigued by was this MOD format. For those who don't know, the MOD format is the Amiga format for music. Amiga is one of the world's most popular computers during its days, and is known for its high quality audio and video production software. One of the formats used in music was called the MOD format or module format. What the MOD format was in essence was that in the MOD file, it contains samples of the music and also how it is played similar to the MIDI file. What the MOD file was famous for was the ability to provide high quality music (by using the in file sample) at a small size. It provides higher quality music than the MIDI format (as the sample in the file is usually higher quality than the synthesized sound of the MIDI soundcard), and is a fraction of the size of an actual sampled recording. As the MOD format being a fringe format, the format was never popularized in the PC users, and later with soundcards such as the SoundBlaster Live! having programmable wave tables (SoundFonts), the MOD file were of less relevance.

Many earlier online and computer musicians used this format, and I've managed to hear many great songs from many different artists who have been sharing their work through the Internet through this format. One of the artist that I remembered his music well was a DJ (or trackers) named Awesome (or Awezoom), in which I had the pleasure to happen to find one of his gems - For a New World, which is one of my favorite musical pieces up to this day.

Anyway, a few days ago, I decided to take a look around to see if any of these trackers I've listened to earlier had any web presence. During my searches, I found the website of the tracker Awesome at http://www.awezoom.com/. Do take some time to visit his site, it is pretty interesting :)

A Tribute to the Thai Postal System

I just wanted to dedicate this blog about how great our Thai Postal System is. During the last few years, I have usually ordered books that cannot be bought in Thailand. During the last few years and with over a dozen orders, I wanted to point out that the postal service between countries isn't as bad as many people suspect or usually assume it to be.

Let me begin by talking about some of the bad points. I had a few bad experiences with Amazon.com by using the default free shipping. The first case that I had a problem was about a broken CD along with one of the textbook I bought. In this case, since the book was a soft-cover, it was broken during the shipping as the box that was delivered had inadequate padding. In this case, I could easily reclaim the CD. On another bad case I had, the box just simply collapsed during the shipping, and practically destroyed the whole binding of another hardcover book. In this case, I asked for another copy, but since they ran out of copies in stock, Amazon actually gave us the book for free - which was an example of great customer service! My comments for people using Amazon.com is to go for the better shipping service. Though it is more expensive, I do want to point that it is certainly worth the time, trouble, and grief, though I comment that their customer service is good for an online service :)

Anyway, about other services, I don't really have to much to comment except for the last book I bought. The last book I bought, I extremely careless during the part I had to fill the mailing address that I actually forgot to fill in a few very important fields. Let me illustrate.

Suppose my home address(notice the addy is imaginary) was:
512 Clover Street Soi 51

I was so careless I dropped out the house number and the addy turned out to be
Clover Street Soi 51

By the time I managed to contact the customer service, they already had shipped the item. At that time I knew that I was probably about a few thousand baht poorer, but somehow beyond my wildest expectations, the Thai Postal dude managed to actually deliver the book directly to my door address. Now that is why I must dedicate this post to the Thai Postal System. Though many people had bad impressions about them, I do want to point that I could never been happier :)


What I figured was the default Amazon.com shipping isn't really that good due to packaging reasons. I found that Amazon.com usually tries to package books in the same box, and since some of them may be different sizes, some of the boxes

Strange Scenes

This snapshot was taken at my home. Strange isn't it?

Snapshot

Here is a random snapshot of what I'm feeling today.

Mood: Hungry, Hot, and Indifferent
Wants: Delicious Food!
Needs: To get back in the mood.
Biggest Happiness: Home sweet home!
Biggest Concern: The crazy weather (insanely hot)
Health Concerns: Slightly Injured Finger from Jarring my finger at a basketball
Learning: Cg Programming
Vices: Playing Computer Games
Productivity: 2/10
Happy: 5/10
Plans: Get back to working mood soon, and clear some of the back logs. Go to the bank and transfer some money between my different accts. Go eat some really good food.

Messing around with Mambo

Two weeks ago I was asked to come up with the website of the Faculty of Science and Technology Alumni Party (TelnetSci 2006). One of the requirements I was asked to work on was to make a registration page so that alumnis can register if they wanted to join the party and one of the staff would contact back. Since I was a little lazy to create the site completely from stratch, I've decided to work with modContent Management Systems (CMS). Some of the requirements I had to fulfill was that the registration system must be relatively flexbile as the fields for every user was not fixed yet. Another important info is that the site must be able to list all the registered members sorted by the ID. The last part is that it should relatively easy for the administrator to change or edit the site.

What I used was Mambo and the Community Builder modification. I kind of liked the Mambo CMS because of its simplicity and ease of design. Initially I had some minor difficulties to set up Mambo on my test server, but as usual the subtle difference between MySQL 4.0 and MySQL5.0 does cause some strange errors from place to place so its alittle irritating on the first go. Anyway, the site is nearly up, just waiting for final approval on the workflow and later on to mod the template just a little bit more.

Anyway, haven't been doing websites for a long time. Its such a long time, I have to admit that its easy to be rusty without constant practice :)

Dictionary of Programming Languages

I just found an intereating site called Dictionary of Programming Languages while browsing the net. This site lists the major programming languages and a short description that includes the language origins and also some coding sample. If you are a computer science student, I'm sure you'll appreciate it :)

Rant about Lords of the Ring - Battle for Middle-Earth II

I just bought myself a new game. The game I got was Lords of the Ring - Battle for Middle-Earth II. That game was an awesome RTS game (graphical-wise). On the hindsight, I finished all the single player campaign in about a day and the game kept on crashing. Now I wonder why should they rush the game out if it proves to be so unstable I have to save at every 20 minute interval so that I don't have to replay the stage over again.

In a hindsight it does remind me that the autosave feature is one feature that is indeed very useful and a great fallback to have.

Fashion Statement at the Local Election

During election time, I usually come back with a few strange observations from the voting booth. In today's Senate election, I found one of the volunteers with a strange T-Shirt which seem to have some white tape covering a huge part of the shirt. Initially I thought it was some sort of new and weird fashion, but after a short deliberation, I finally figured that the shirt actually had a number on it, and election committees are not supposed to suggest any candidates directly or indirectly. In other words, the shirt she wore was illegal technically, so the tape was there just to cover up the shirt.

On a strange note, I was wearing a sports shorts to the election, and my pants had a number on it. Is this violating any election laws? Thinking about it, I did. Now that is one fashion that I'm not planning to wear the next time to the elections.

RGB Loading Screen

Try looking at the following flash animation. This reminds me of the games played on some old computers/consoles. During the loading time, we would see a random RGB animation much like the flash piece linked below. If you wonder how long it took, a single game takes between 2-5 minutes to load in those ancient computers! Talking about it, that was such a long time ago LOL

http://www.albinoblacksheep.com/flash/rgb.php

Top's Car Basketball Team Report

For the last few months or so, I've been playing basketball at my old highschool, EIS (Ekamai International School), with a group of old friends and alumni members during Monday nights. After many months of casual basketball playing, many of the members wanted to have a competition between the 4 major groups in the court, which is divided into the Jek team (consisting mostly of old EIS school basketball team members who happen to be all of Chinese origin), Top's Car (our team, with an assortment of people from all backgrounds, including the only team that has a crippled player), Proflex (incidentally their team leaders are excellent sportsmen who happen to sell the muscle building supplement - proflex), and the Sundae team (a group of Thai Sikh players). After the division, we had a quick laugh that this was similarly to the old International School Alumni Basketball tournament :P

In the course of the last 6 weeks, our team finished a respectable 2nd place, giving the champs a run for their money. Not that the finishing position is important, but the most important thing was that we had a fun time, and it was a great excuse for us to socialize.



The photograph above is the picture of the team I'm in. We call ourselves the Top's Car team, in a short tribute for Top who happens to drive the majority of the members to court. From the top row, me, Bob, Eak, and Top. The bottom rows, Joke, Pong, Nek.

True or False?

Do you think the following conversions are true or false?

------------------------------------------------------------------------
Customer: "I've been ringing 0700 2300 for two days and can't get through to
enquiries, can you help?".
Operator: "Where did you get that number from, sir?".
Customer: "It was on the door to the Travel Centre".
Operator: "Sir, they are our opening hours".
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Samsung Electronics
Caller: "Can you give me the telephone number for Jack?"
Operator: "I'm sorry, sir, I don't understand who you are talking about".
Caller: "On page 1, section 5, of the user guide it clearly states that I
need to unplug the fax machine from the AC wall socket and telephone Jack
before cleaning. Now, can you give me the number for Jack?"
Operator: "I think you mean the telephone point on the wall".
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Tech Support: "I need you to right-click on the Open Desktop".
Customer: "OK".
Tech Support: "Did you get a pop-up menu?".
Customer: "No".
Tech Support: "OK. Right-Click again. Do you see a pop-up menu?"
Customer: "No".
Tech Support: "OK, sir. Can you tell me what you have done up until his
point?"
Customer: "Sure. You told me to write 'click' and I wrote 'click'".
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Caller: "I deleted a file from my PC last week and I have just realised that
I need it. If I turn my system clock back two weeks will I have my file back
again?".
----------------------------------------------------------------------
This has got to be one of the funniest. I think this guy should have been
promoted, not fired. This is a true story from the Word Perfect Helpline,
which was transcribed from a recording monitoring the customer care
department.

Operator: "Ridge Hall, computer assistance; May I help you?"
Caller: "Yes, well, I'm having trouble with WordPerfect."
Operator: "What sort of trouble??"
Caller: "Well, I was just typing along, and all of a sudden the words went
away."
Operator: "Went away?"
Caller: "They disappeared."
Operator: "Hmm. So what does your screen look like now?"
Caller: "Nothing."
Operator: "Nothing??"
Caller: "It's blank; it won't accept anything when I type."
Operator: "Are you still in WordPerfect, or did you get out??"
Caller: "How do I tell?"
Operator: "Can you see the C: prompt on the screen??"
Caller: "What's a sea-prompt?"
Operator: "Never mind, can you move your cursor around the screen?"
Caller: "There isn't any cursor: I told you, it won't accept anything I
type."
Operator: "Does your monitor have a power indicator??"
Caller: "What's a monitor?"
Operator: "It's the thing with the screen on it that looks like a TV.
Does it have a little light that tells you when it's on??"
Caller: "I don't know."
Operator: "Well, then look on the back of the monitor and find where the
power cord goes into it. Can you see that??"
Caller: "Yes, I think so."
Operator: "Great. Follow the cord to the plug, and tell me if it's plugged
into the wall.
Caller: "Yes, it is."
Operator: "When you were behind the monitor, did you notice that there were
two cables plugged into the back of it, not just one??"
Caller: "No."
Operator: "Well, there are. I need you to look back there again and find the
other cable."
Caller: "Okay, here it is."
Operator: "Follow it for me, and tell me if it's plugged securely into the
back of your computer."
Caller: "I can't reach."
Operator: "Uh huh. Well, can you see if it is??"
Caller: "No."
Operator: "Even if you maybe put your knee on something and lean way over??"
Caller: "Oh, it's not because I don't have the right angle - it's because
it's dark."
Operator: "Dark??"
Caller : "Yes - the office light is off, and the only light I have is coming
in from the window."
Operator: "Well, turn on the office light then."
Caller: "I can't."
Operator: "No? Why not??"
Caller: "Because there's a power failure."
Operator : "A power...................................... A power failure?
Aha, Okay, we've got it licked now. Do you still have the boxes and anuals
and packing stuff your computer came in??"
Caller: "Well, yes, I keep them in the closet."
Operator: "Good. Go get them, and unplug your system and pack it up just
like it was when you got it. Then take it back to the store you bought it
from."
Caller: "Really? Is it that bad?"
Operator: "Yes, I'm afraid it is."
Caller: "Well, all right then, I suppose. What do I tell them??"
Operator: "Tell them you're too stupid to own a computer".

You might be surprised, but all the conversions are true.

Blessings For Our Father

http://www.thaiking.org/

Plans for Today

- Go to the Elections wearing all black to protest at the current state of Thai Democracy.
- Bring along a pen and vote my usual No-Vote category in the parlimentary election that I've done in every occasion for nearly the last decade.

On a side note, during the last month, I've been completely irked by the state of democracy in Thailand. There are a few major points that I want to highlight:
1) You MUST VOTE in the Election - the quote before here is what is being played on the radio. I find that vote to be extremely ignorant. In a democratic society, you SHOULD NOT BE FORCED TO VOTE, though I find it ironic that many people choose not to go to vote, when they can. If people can't stand politicians like I do, then the best way in a democratic society is not to abstain but to vote for no-one. This gives a clear message that you don't trust politicians enough with our tax money.
2) Buses opening the radio in extremely high volume - As we know, the BMTA has received a huge handout from the PM. Due to that reason, it seems most of the BMTA is pro-Thaksin. What I hate the most about them is that lately they have resorted to turning up the radio (especially the pro PM FM94) in the bus to an abnormally high volume. The reason is that they wanted to shove the rants of many of the Pro-PM DJs there. Though I admit there are a number of interesting points, I had the urge to junk the Radio when I heard the following phrase:

"The academia are hopeless people. They are people in the Ivory coast and they want to force their ideals on the people. They say Thaksin is bad and poor people stupid. Now I want to tell us that these academia are ridiculing us, and they don't know what is best for the country. They don't know what the people want, like what we people want. What is wrong with Thaksin? I'm not closing my ears to the academia, but these people are so aloof, that they can't even explain me what Thaksin did wrong with the Temasak deal in a way normal people can understand, then I will not change my stance."

Hmm... No point arguing with stupid people because they will drag you down to their level and they will beat you with their experience in stupidity.

3) Business Books - Here is a few things I learnt from most business books in a bullet point:
1) Business is the art of maximizing profit (at the expense of others)
2) Increase shareholder value (at the expense of others)
3) Reengineering is a good way to turn the company around (and an excuse to fire workers to increase shareholder value)
4) Workers are just resources (does this ring of slavery?)
5) Managers should keep raises low (so that they can get a high raise by minizing cost)
My opinion? Read the Dilbert's Principle by Scott Adams. This book summarizes what business books are teaching today without all the water.

4) Democracy is Overrated - Democracy is just a system of governing. Its way overated especially when you have a country that is uneducated, uninterested, and divided through key issues. In these cases, Dictatorship might be a better option isn't it? Though in most cases Dictatorship are corrupt, at least we can save money from not having to arrange elections and also don't have to live with the irony of a dictator in the guise of a democratic elected leader.

5) Freedom of Speech is Simply a Mirage - The freedom of speech is stupid. Let me just say it straight that Freedom of Speech is desirable if you aren't on the receiving end of it. What I would suggest we should use is called Decency of Speech. Instead of warranting full freedom of speech, we should put in a fine-letter explaining the limits of what is allowed. Let me point out that there is no real freedom of speech. If I was to say if I was the moderator, I would point out that there is no Freedom of Speech, and as the moderator, I dictate what is the limit of the discussion. End of Story.

6) Who is the Villian in causing the Mob mentality? - Today, there are numerous discussions on who is the major cause of political impassie in Thailand. Many of the people blame Thaksin. Many on the other side blame Sondhi and Chamlong. Me? I blame all politicians, and I want to especially point out Chamlong as the huge curlpit. Why do I say that? Let me just say that Chamlong started the mob mentality. He did that in 1992. After that a while, he got Thaksin into politics. Thaksin is related with Sondhi as they were business associates back. Sudarat is one of Chamlong's protege, and she taught Thaksin about the art of appearing good in public without the requirement of substance. Later Chamlong revived his forte in mobilizing the mob by joining up with Sondhi. Soon afterwards Thaksin, Chamlong's heir, used the same art to mobilize his mob.

7) How to Solve the Political Situation in Thailand? - I would suggest creating a military dictatorship, declare martial law, and crush both the Pro-Thaksin and Anti-Thaksin factions. This blickering has gone far enough and also is extremely dementrial to our country. I do not believe we can no longer trust politicans to do good for the country. I do not believe that Thai people in general know what is best for their country. Democracy and Freedom of speech is overated. All we need is a strong, ethical, and morally sound leader to turn things around, and based on my rambling rant today, you know that I'm planning to arrange a coup and take over the country.

Regarding the above post, I'll let you decide if I was serious, or not :P

Experiment at the MRTA Subway System

A few days ago, I happen to stumble into the MRTA subway without planning to. To be exact, around Fortune Town at the Rama 9 station, I was planning just to cross over to the other side of the street through the subway walkway. However due to my natural instincts, I happen to enter into the subway station instead of just crossing it.

Due to that reason, I had an experiment with the subway system. It seems that if you exit the same station as the one you entered, you will lose the same amount of money as going to the closest station.

The lesson learnt is that if you happen to enter the subway by mistake, its best to call a staff to assist you and hopefully you'll get your refund back.

Notice Great Teacher Pisal!

If you happen to be a fan of GTO (Great Teacher Onizuka), you can notice that Onizuka likes to make a long face when things go wrong. Oh well, check the following Luigi's Newsletter and spot GTP!

Fork!

I'm in an extremely bad mood today. All I can say is that I can't stand incompetent, irresponsible, and inept ******ers.

Just Extremely Bored...

..... Can't figure what to do, so decided to waste my time doing something...

1. What time is it?
10:43

2. Name? The name which appear on ID card?
Pisal Setthawong

3. Nickname?
Chang

4. Piercing?
None

5. What is the most recent movie you have seen at the theater?
...

6. Eye color?
Black

7.Place of birth?
Bangkok

8. Favorite new food?
...

9. Ever been to Africa?
No

10. Ever been toilet papering (rolling)?
?

11. Love someone so much it made you cry?
...

12. Been in a car accident?
Yes

13. Croutons or bacon bits?
Bacon Bits

14. Favorite day of the week?
Friday

15. Favorite Restaurants?
Many Places

16. Favorite flower?
Anything that blooms is fine.

17. Favorite sport to watch?
Football

18. Favorite drink?
IceTea Peach Flavor

19. Favorite ice-cream?
Strawberry

20. Disney or Warner Bros.?
No preference

21. Favorite fast food restaurant?
Arby's

22. What color is your bedroom carpet?
No carpet

23. How many times you failed your driver's test?
3

24. Before this one, from whom did you get your last email?
MSN Notification

25. Which store would you choose to Max out your credit card?
Never maxed my credit card

26. What do you do most often when you are bored?
Zzz...

27. Bedtime?
When I feel like it.

28. Who will respond to this email the quickest?
...

29. Who's the person you sent this to that is least likely to respond?
...

30. Who are you the most curious about their responses to this questionnaire?
...

31. Favorite TV shows?
Dr. House

32. Last person you went to dinner with?
Work Related

33. Ford or Chevy?
None.

34. What are you listening to right now?
BGM From a game

35. What is your favorite color?
Gray

36. How many tattoos do you have?
None

37. How many pets do you have?
None

38. Which came first the chicken or the egg?
Waste of time to answer