Tuesday 26 March 2013

Dear Adobe: Stop Sucking So Much

What the hell has happened to Adobe software?

At one point they were best-known for producing high-end, professional design software, such as Photoshop, Premiere, InDesign, and Audition. These days, however, they seem better known for producing software that's bloated, overpriced, and horrendously buggy.

Tuesday 12 March 2013

How To Enhance Your Edition of Baldur's Gate

After the release of the latest patch for Baldur's Gate: Enhanced Edition (version 2014) I finally shelved it. The most recent patch ended up introducing several more bugs, so until that game finally gets all the issues ironed out, I went back to my GOG.com copies of Baldur's Gate 1 & 2. In all honesty, I've come to conclusion that BG:EE isn't really worth the $20 admission cost. Baldur's Gate is a very long game with a massive amount of content to experience, so do we really need yet more content? Because three new characters, a handful of new areas, and an arena mode are the only features that BG:EE adds that cannot be found through mods (which, I might add, are completely free).

So here is my own personal list of modifications that I use for Baldur's Gate 1 & 2, and the order in which I install them:

Saturday 9 March 2013

I Hate Job Hunting

Is there any worse experience than job hunting?

I've been unemployed for about a year and a half, and having sent into dozens upon dozens of CVs, I've had two interviews, and a whole lot of bugger all! And the longer you can go without work, the bigger that dreaded gap on your CV gets, which only makes employers more gun-shy about hiring you. Really, there are no words in the English language (or any other language) to describe my complete and utter disgust at just how much effort and just how much preening narcissism and self-serving whoredom is needed just to get an interview...at which point you're told, "Sorry, you're just not what the company's looking for."

I...fucking...hate it all! It's having doors slammed in your face over and over. It's being told again and again that you're a worthless piece of rubbish. It's being told that there are a thousand people who are willing to do this job, so what makes you so special? Having to pad the CV. "Personal Branding." "Networking." Polishing up the LinkedIn profile. It's all so bloody narcissistic and yet dehumanising at the same time. I'm told that I just have to work on "selling myself" when "selling myself" is something I typically associate with prostitutes. I think the worst decision our civilisation ever made is when we decided to let market forces dictate everything we do, so now we're forced to turn ourselves into pretty little commodities to be sold on some cold, inhuman job market whose only aim to get as much out of you as possible whilst giving as little back as is humanly possible. You're just a resource to be exploited; hell, the word is right there in the moniker the hiring department chose for itself: human resources.

Tuesday 5 March 2013

Great Games That Actually Suck: Fallout 3

And now we come to the very nadir of my "Great Games That Actually Suck" series - Fallout 3. Now, don't misunderstand me - Fallout 3 is far from deserving the title of "Worst Game Ever;" instead, it's simply mediocre. But in a way, that makes it all the worse, especially considering that Fallout 1 & 2 are considered some of the greatest RPGs ever developed. Had Fallout 3 been a true stinker, we might have laughed at it as we would an Uwe Boll film and thought no more of it. Instead, it's practically offensive with its mediocrity, like following up a masterfully-prepared filet mignon with stale bread.