Category → Site
Another facelift
iNove WordPress Theme. Gone but not forgotten
WordPress, how I love thee!
The iNove theme I’ve been running this site with for a considerable amount of time has done a fantastic job. It’s been a decent balance of swishy graphics and open space for lengthy, ranty content. The time has come, however, for a change.
I’d been looking out for something rather spacious and generous with how it presents text. So many sites seem to use teeny-tiny text in cramped spaces. I can understand that you need to keep a lot of supplemental content on major sites, your “Follow me on Twitter” icon, your adverts and so forth.
As for me, I have none of that concern. Just a nice spacious bachelor-pad of a website to lounge around in and do as I wish. Hey, it’s not like anyone ever visits this place directly anyway, right?
The issue I face is that many of the typography-centric WordPress themes were a little too spartan in their design and, more often than not, completely monochromatic. Yes, I could play with the CSS and tweak another’s theme to suit my own ends but I’m not sure I have the energy and I tend to find that if you ever upgrade your modified theme with a new release of the original you have to take care to re-apply your edits. It rather dents the convenience of snap-on, snap-off themes. Even more so given the convenience with which WordPress lets you install, preview and apply them.
So, if you’re reading this in your RSS reader go and have a quick visit to the actual koffdrop.com site. See? I even linked it for you just now. Aren’t I nice? It’s graphics-lite so will load reasonably quickly and I’m sure it’ll add a momentary splash of colour to your day.
And if you’re wondering why anyone should give a hoot about typography then there’s hundreds of designers that’d like to talk to you. But, perhaps a more immediate example will give you an idea of the impact it can wield:
Going for gold
Woo! Six (or is it seven?) months of inactivity.
I think that’s a new koffdrop.com record!
Upgrading
WordPress, the fantastic free software that powers this site has had a major release. I’ll be installing this a little later and there’s a chance that it’ll upset some of the extensions I’m running.
If you’re reading this and the site looks wonky or is running a basic-looking theme it’ll be for compatibility reasons.
No doubt, the strong support that WordPress has from its users and developers will see any incompatible extensions updated to work with the new release fairly shortly.
Thank you for your patience.
This is not an April Fools.
Hibernation
Yes, hibernation is my excuse for the lack of updates this time. I suppose I could play on some religious subtext about coming back from apparent death to create a new post on koffdrop.com and give a sly wink and a nod to Easter but that’d be a bit vulgar so I won’t bother. Ho ho.
Did you know that I’ve been working on a game for a little over twenty-three months? Two years of my life gone! As yet, the game has not been announced but I’m sure the world will learn of it soon enough. I’m genuinely excited by the game. Far more than I ever expected to be. A lot of that comes from the talent and dedication of those that I’m working with. I’m a total fanboy about it all and I feel absolutely no shame. I also think that the game has some genuinely cool stuff going on it it. It justifies itself as a truly next-gen could-not-have-been-done-on-older-machines game too. I’m fantastically lucky to be involved in such a title. There’s nothing more that I can really say about it other than it’s going to be awesome and that everyone should buy themselves a copy or ten.
Generally speaking I’m pretty chipper. I’m sure there’s a long angsty-ridden rant inside of me somewhere but right now I’m feel ok with most things. So, let me bring a few things to your attention.
Firstly – The timeline gizmo in my sidebar. I installed this at the start of my Christmas holiday in 2007. I realised I’d seen lots of movies and played lots of games but not really kept track of anything. This gizmo is actually very detailed and capable but I’ll mainly use it to plot of movies, games and other events. It’s not linked to posts made on this site (although I’m sure some tinkering could make that happen) but it’s pretty groovy nonetheless. Clicking an event opens a bubble with some details. All the movies and games I mark have a brief comment on them and a link where relevant.
To learn more about the timeline gadget, go to it’s site.
Secondly – I’m rather busy these days. Yes, yes, I keep saying that but it’s still true. Work is likely to becoming increasingly hectic/exciting and equally likely to impact on any extra curricular activities I engage in. Particularly those that involve effort. Like updating my website. It’s all good though – I’m having the time of my life.
Thirdly – stuff that I’m interested in at the time of writing:
- Grand Theft Auto 4 – I became a huge fan of San Andreas and I’m literally counting the days until GTA4′s release.
- Forumwarz – It’s very silly, quite rude, rather funny and a great lunchtime distraction.
- Movies – How great is this year going to be? SO GREAT, that’s how great!
- Metal Gear Solid 4 – I’ve loved all the Metal Gear games, I’m expecting to love this. If you were disappointed by MGS2 then this study of it may make you reconsider.
Finally – not that anyone should really care apart from me but I think I may have dealt with the influx of comment-spam that koffdrop.com was drowning in.
And that’s it for now. All is good. I’m involved in one or two web-projects that are in their infancy but will hopefully turn out to be worthwhile. More on that soon. (ish).
Odds! Ends! Osu!
This will be a shorter post than some of my recent epics and really serves to just give a quick update on some things.
Firstly, following yesterday’s post I recieved some criticism of the final point about using the mentality of “great sales = great game”. It was pointed out to me that this was a twisting of the original message. The correct message would have been to state that, had the games under discussion not been great games then they wouldn’t have sold like they did (we’re primarily talking about Halo here). Which, whilst an easier to swallow mentality is just as flawed as the sales=greatness one. A good game should sell well. However the suggestion that its quality is the driving factor for it’s sales is far too idealistic to be taken seriously – particularly of a game like Halo. This notion is further disproved when you look at the current game charts and see a game that’s scored very average reviews dominating the charts in the way that the Spiderman 3 game is. At the end of this week the poorly reviewed Pirates of the Carribbean 3 tie-in game will be released and I wouldn’t be at all surprised to see it mimic Spiderman 3′s performance. We have Shrek 3 to look forward to next. A game like Halo benefits precisely from the same status as a film-tie in – it’s profile has been manufactured to be very high indeed. Far higher than the quality of its content. Halo 2 and, of course Halo 3, will sell because they’re called Halo more than anything else.
Quality should sell a product – but it doesn’t. It’s a factor but it’s not going to make a difference if the carefully calculated positioning of media, tie-ins, promotions, publicity, and sheer might that some companies wield. Sorry, but that’s a fact and examples are everywhere. Now, it’s nice when that works in your favour and you’re a Halo fan. But gamers will argue the exact same things when they feel a game they like isn’t getting sales it ‘deserves’ due to a game they don’t like dominating the charts. Remove your emotional attachment to the game and look objectively at the product, the market and the economics and you’ll see how it works. Choosing examples selectively isn’t really a watertight argument.
On a less controversial note I’d like to let regular readers of Koffdrop.com know that the site will soon be publishing it’s first guest-written piece. At this time I have absolutely no information to share with you as to the tone or content. All I can say is that I know the author very well and have always appreciated his input into topics we discuss. Look out for it!
Finally, the Ouendan 2 soundtrack is available to you via the Koffdrop.com files area. This isn’t an official soundtrack but a collection of all the individual songs that feature in the game (yes, there’s a difference between the two). I’m enjoying this soundtrack as much as the original and favour tracks 19 and 16 in particular. 16 is an especially good example of some absolutely batshit bonkers over-the-top j-pop-screaming. The game’s not bad either. Enjoy.
Fixed!
I’m sure you’ve all been wondering when I’d get around to fixing my archives page. You’ll be thrilled to read it’s now back to it’s former moo.fx-powered glory. You can now re-live great koffdrop.com moments all over again!
Hooray!
Vanilla
Following a recent post I’ve been having a bit of a discussion with a commentator via the comments section (duh!).
Well, it’s worth pointing reader’s attention to the top menu bar at koffdrop.com and, in particular, to the item called “Discussion“.
Clicking on it will take you to the discussion area of this site (duh!, again) which is a type of forum. The forum software is quite different from many that are seen on the internet but it’s simple appearance shouldn’t be regarded as a mistake.
I’ll be looking at how these two areas of koffdrop.com can be integrated in the future but, for now, if you’ve got something lengthy you wish to discuss then why not give it a whirl?
http://www.koffdrop.com/vanilla/
Who said February was a short month?
I’ve been fairly busy at work recently and only been making minimal posts onto koffdrop.com. I suspect you’ve noticed that.
Games-wise, I’ve not been playing much. I’ve had a stab (literally) at the God of War 2 demo and, I’ve got to say, it lives up to my expectations. There’s a fairly cool “Road to E3″ documentary on the demo which gives a little insight into what it’s like trying to get something like a demo together for a big event. There will be more of these style of features on the final game (a 2 disc release) and I’d encourage any potential ‘developers are lazy’ critics to look at how shattered Cory Barlog is in this video (or in any recent appearance). Crunch time is a killer!
Anyway, to cheer some of you up and in keeping with the positive news of a DS sequel to Ouendan (which will, I hope, retain the best parts of Elite Beat Agents without the insiped track selection) I offer you the complete soundtrack to the original Ouendan game. Don’t kill the server please.
Whilst you’re here you can have a look around my little discussion area. It’s different from the sort of layout and featureset you may be used to – but that’s very deliberate.
Finally, you’ll have noticed that, due to popular opinion, my older theme is back in place.
I’ll be making an interesting discussion point soon – honest.
TGFC WTF?
All will be revealed at the start of 2007.
Hacked
Koffdrop.com finally hits the zeitgeist!
Yes, I know I’ve truly arrived once my site gets hacked. I noticed some strangeness a little while back and today I checked things out and everything was gone! Yup, all the files that make up the site, all my hosted files, all image files – the works!
Not only that but my site admin panel had been changed – effectively locking me from my own site.
Fortunately, my host is not only extremely helpful but very thorough in his work. He’s been able to provide me with a lot of information relating the the trail of breadcrumbs the wiley little scamp left.
What I find highly suspcious is the rather blunt methods used. A mass ‘delete’ was done of all my unprotected files.
Most interestingly my last two posts – the one laughing at the tantrums thrown by Zelda fanboys and the one belittling a community that was taking itself far too seriously – both those posts have been mysteriously deleted from the database that holds the koffdrop.com site data.
Makes you wonder, doesn’t it?
