Jolly-o-Time in minecraft
My friend Matt (who provides me with this great hosting, check out his site http://www.HostMist.com) has been talking about this game called MineCraft for the past year. He always suggested that I get it. I looked at the screenshots, and videos of it, and noticed how ugly the graphics were. Too blocky, so I put it off.
However recently, I discovered that its like playing with legos, which I used to love (now I’m way too lazy to get them out because I’d have to pick them all back up when I’m done), which made me wanna try the game.
I am now inlove with it. I found myself one night staying up til around 4am just mining resources, and building my house, tower, bridges, etc. Was having so much fun.
I first started working on my tower. I made it so high that it goes to the very top of the map (the highest you can build in the game), so since I couldn’t go any higher I decided to see how long of a bridge I could make. I ended up making a sky bridge that connected to another mountain, which was very long actually. I died about 50 times while making it, but it was fun.
After that I decided my tower was too big to call my house, and decided to make a house in the middle of my bridge. Only problem with that is I can’t build it upwards due to height restrictions of the game. So I had to build house from the top down, which is way complicated, and dangerous in he game. But, I was able to pull it off. Now my sky house is about 4 stories.
I even put a huge waterfall on top of my glass deck, which also works as a quickly way to get down to the ground (you can jump in the water fall and it’ll take you to the ground).
I then got bored with all that, and decided to see how big of a mine I could make. Turned out to be pretty huge, but I’m going to try to make it even deeper.
Anyways here are the screenshots.
(click thumbnails for larger pics)
My Tower, Bridge, and house: 
My Hole: 
My Bedroom, and waterfall! 
Anyways, this game is super amounts of fun!
You can check it out and buy it here:
http://www.minecraft.net/
Loving my iPhone!
I’ve been wanting an iPhone for years, but being with Verizon meant that I couldn’t get one, unless I left them and went to at&t. I never wanted to switch carriers so I stuck with it.
I wanted an iPhone because of my previous ownership of an iPod Touch, which was the most amazing device I’ve ever owned! So having the iPhone would be even cooler, and a much better deal since I can have my music player, phone, camera, etc all in one.
In 2009 I got the Droid, which I thought was going to be a good alternative. First thing I realized when I got the Droid is that the Android OS is no where close to being like iOS, which is beautiful and polished.
Android didn’t have a decent media player, no equalizer (which is a must have), and the over all feel of the OS was just cheap and half assed made. It really reminded me of the Linux Distros on PC. How cheap and just lame they seem to be (hard to get to work, have to hack it, hard to find quality programs), and just pointless when you can just use Windows. I must admit though that I have found it fun in the past to install a linux distro and have fun getting it to work, but using it full time never crossed my mind, because I’m always wanting to go back to windows when I do that.
Also Android lacked many quality apps. The android market is spammed with tons of apps, but most of them are useless, and very pointless, and blatant copies/rip offs of other people’s work and apps.
The Droid hardware itself was awesome though. It was the first droid, and it was Very solid. Which always impressed me. I’ve dropped that phone many times, and it never had a problem, or received dents, NOTHING. Loved that aspect of it.
The droid wasn’t a horrible device over all, android wasn’t THAT bad. It’ was better than the alternative on verizon at the time, such as blackberry, and the other cheap phones, So I did love it. But my experience with iOS was much better, and I still longed for the iPhone, mostly because it was beautiful, and simply worked. I didn’t have to go find alternative apps in iOS to for the device to be usable, as I did with Android. iOS had a lot of what I needed built in.
Anyways skip a year or so later. Verizon finally got the iPhone in February 2011, I was super happy, but at the time I was debating whether or not to keep my contract going, or to just let it end, and move on to cheaper offers (such as $50 unlimited pre paid phones).
People also keep rumoring that the iPhone 5 is about to come out, so I shouldn’t go with the iPhone 4, but these are simply silly rumors. Some sites say that it won’t come out til 2012, and so on, so who knows. iPhone 4 is very usable. I could upgrade for only a few hundred, so why not? If the iPhone 5 does come out, I can easily sell the iPhone and use the money to help pay for the 5 if it was really much of an upgrade.
In the past month my Droid started acting up. It would keep clicking stuff on its own, moving things around, and opening stuff. Like it was alive.
It kept doing this over the weeks and seemed to get worse, and worse, and worse. Until I had enough and threw it on my bed and smashed it with my shoe, ha. I really didn’t feel that bad afterwards even though I had done it in a fit of rage.
I was so done with that phone, so done with Android. So done with the short battery life (phone would only last a couple hours of use ahh!) and was so happy that it was all finally over. 
So fast forward another week or two I decided to go ahead renew my contract and get the iPhone.
Verizon provided free Over Night shipping via fedex, so I got it the next day (which was yesterday), and so far I am so inlove with it. I got the beautiful music player back, everything works on its own, not sluggishness or lag, I just love it.
Most of the apps that I used on Android were also available for iOS, and it’s weird because they do look much better on the iOS. I hear that apple has guidelines about apps needing to be attractive, but im not too sure about that.
I am having trouble getting the contacts and everything to work right. Android only seemed to import contacts with phone numbers to my contract list on it. iOS on the other hand wants to put everything on my contact list, so I have like 1000+ contacts that it imported from my various email accounts (mostly my windows live), and doesn’t separate them from ones with numbers, which is odd. Also it lets me text contacts that don’t even have sms numbers. So I dunno, Maybe there is a way, I’ll figure it out. I think maybe that I’ll just delete the entire contact list, and disable the sync, and manually add contacts and numbers myself. Seems like the best solution, but then again I wouldn’t be able easily contact via email the contacts who only use email, so I don’t know, ha.
I was happy to get my Simcity back! But annoyed at the same time! Back when I had my iPod touch (did I mention that I sold it to help cover the cost of the Android? big waste). I had bought the SimCity game app from the store. it was $10, and it was pretty cool.
So when I got my iPhone I went to searching for it on the market to download it, and it no longer exists!
EA Games seems to have gotten rid of it, and made a new version called SimCity Deluxe, which is total bullshit. They only want 99cent for the new version, but still.
I was able to find the old file for Simcity on my hard drive, so luckily I still had it and was able to put it on my iPhone, It’s just annoying how a $10 app that was created by a large company, can be deleted from the store, and replaced with another version that costs more money. The new version is only 99cents, so its not too bad, just annoying. I’d be pretty pissed if I wasn’t able to find the SimCity file on my pc. Even if it is old, we should still be able to download it from the market for years. $10 isn’t cheap for an app 
I’ve been playing with the camera on the iPhone. It’s only 5 megapixel, which is the same as my droid, but it has some nice features such as the HDR. It can take some very beautiful pictures! I love it as well. Also the camera is very smooth, and quick. My droid would take ages to turn the camera on, and then ages to take a picture.
Here is an example of the HDR feature on the iPhone:
The first picture is the normal one, the second is the same picture, but with HDR enabled, I LOVE IT! 
Worst thing about the iPhone: YOU HAVE TO USE ITUNES!
I think itunes is the worst program ever created. It’s ugly, works weird, is always freezing up, and AHH! I just hate using it. But it’s a must if you want an ipod or iPhone. Sadly.
I need to end this post, but I wanted to mention something else that is a let down with iOS. On Android I could easily install a last.fm scrobble plugin that worked with any player on the device including the stock media player (which was shit). This would allow me to scrobble all of the songs that I listened to to my last.fm profile. I’m finding it a bit more complicated on the iPhone.
Last.fm does have an app that lets you listen to their stations, and listen to your library on there, but it’s not the same. I want to be able to listen to songs in my library, and have them scrobbled. I found an app called iScrob which replaces the default iOs player with its own, and seems to work great, but I really want to use the stock player in iOS. It’s just too damn beautiful to not, and it works flawlessly. So I don’t know.
It might not be a major problem for a while because I have been debating whether or not to just delete my last.fm account. I’ve been getting way too silly with it. I never want to listen to music unless it’ll be scrobbled to my account, which is just lame, and weird, ha. so I might have to just delete it. But then again, last.Fm is a great way to discovery great music.
Anyways, I am leaving a lot out, but also rambling a lot, ha, so I’ll end this post here.
overall I love the iphone. SOO MUCH. It’s way better than any Android device I’ve ever messed with, and it SIMPLY WORKS. I left my phone on all night last night and it didn’t die, and was still about 95% or higher charged this morning. I could never do that with my droid.
So I’m very happy 
By the way, I should mention that I am in NO WAY an Apple fan boy. I really don’t like Apple as a company, I can’t stand OS X, I’ve actually owned a macbook pro, and couldn’t stand iOS (loved the hardware though), and resold it a month after I bought it. I love my windows 
I can’t stand many apple products (itunes, safari, os x, so on, and so on.
For me, the iPhone seems to be the best phone that you can get! and if you don’t need a phone, I’d suggest the iPod touch, which is just as cool.
I’d recommend the iPhone to anyone who is looking for a new phone and debating between the iPhone and android.
- Happy iPhone customer.
Stress release: Running over people in GTA IV!
Back when I was a teenager, driving a real life car was so relaxing, and such a stress reliever. I remember I could cruise around in a car and be at total peace. Now driving pretty much is a chore and I hate it so much.
For the past years I have found a new way to relieve stress: Running over people and objects in Grand Theft Auto IV. Now this isn’t some sick twisted thing like I actually want to kill people in real life, because I don’t, but there is just something super fun about doing it virtually.
I mean, even without running over people, cruising in GTA IV is just plain relaxing, like it was back in the day before gas prices went through the roof.
My normal cruising car in GTA IV is the Comet. You can easily get this car by dialing 2275550175 into the cell phone, which spawns it right in front of you – Don’t worry, it wont ruin your saved game with a cheat as many other cheats will. This is the fastest car I have found in GTA IV so far. Also the engine is in the rear of the car, so the car doesn’t die to blow up very easily unless you damage the back of it. So you can run into many things and the car won’t explode, such as in my screenshot below:
As for running over people and crashing into things:
(click images for full size versions) 
If you want to run things over and crash into things – STEAL A BUS!
the engine of the bus is also in the rear, so you run into many objects, cars, people, and the bus will rarely ever explode or die. However though if many cops are shooting at you, the bus still receives damage from that and can eventually catch on fire.
Usually I can go forever in the bus and the front of it is completely smashed in but still running smoothly.
The other night though something rare happened, the cops some how cornered me and I was stuck, and couldn’t escape, this was the only time the cops have ever won on me (besides me running into something which made me fly out the windshield).
in the screenshot below you can see how the cops cornered me!
(click images for full size versions) 
Random pictures of my bus rampages!
(click images for full size versions) 
So bascially, if you need to relieve some stress… Load up GTA IV, steal a bus, and have some fun!
RollerCoaster Tycoon 3 is awesome!
Some one may remember my post from last year about RCT2 http://www.joshx.com/rollercoaster-tycoon-2-love-it/878/ and how I mentioned RollerCoaster Tycoon 2, but hated the newer version 3.
Disclaimer: this isn’t a review really, its just me blabing and rambling about stuff. 
I am finally inlove with RollerCoaster Tycoon 3! this game was released in like 2004 or 05, and I’m just now starting to love it. I put off playing it for so many years because I hated the way the camera controls worked. the views seemed clunky and just ugly! I preferred the classic way of RollerCoaster Tycoon, which lets you be above everything while you build, and manage it. Which is the best view for many games such as this. Some people love the entire 3d Thing, but it doesn’t really fit in with a game like this, unless you only use it to explore your park/world, and not in the building phase, which I’ll talk about later on in this entry.
I finally found out that you could actually enable this view in RCT3, something I haven’t noticed before years ago when I tried the game after it was released.
Now with this view enabled I can play it just as I would play the original game, which is AWESOME!
You can see the big long “SHIZNIT” coaster, ha. looks and works the same as it did in the old titles of RCT.
The coaster you see in the background is my “Shiznit”.
I’ve been waiting a while now and hoping for a new version of the game with the classic gameplay and controls. Better/updated graphics, and AI, but the same gameplay, and this entire time I never realized that it already existed in the 3rd game in the series, but all I had to do was enable it.
Last week I started playing RCT3 last week, and I’m so glad that I did. I really can’t see myself going back and playing RCT2 again, unless I discover some huge weird bugs, and limits in RCT3 that I haven’t noticed yet, which might happen.
I’ve been playing in SandBox mode, which is what I always play the game in, same as in the first 2 versions of RCT (in RollerCoaster Tycoon 1 you had to hack the maps to have a open/sandbox park to build whatever and play in),
So far I’ve only encountered little bugs with making the paths, and land scaping, but nothing major. I don’t know if you can do as much with landscaping in RCT3, as you can in the previous titles, I haven’t really seen any complex parks that people have made online for download, all seem flat, but I know RCT3 comes with a hill/mountain making tool, which way outdoes the sample land raiser/lower tool in RCT1 and 2.
The Guests in RCT3 are way more intelligent than those in RCT2, The park staff are as well. In RCT1, and 2, Guests would ALWAYS get stuck and lost on the path some where. They would get stuck in the weirdest places, which makes no sense, and any realistic guest would be fine finding their way to a particular ride, or finding the exit of the park. So far I haven’t had any problems with this in RCT3, which makes converting from rct2 to 3 really worth it.
Also you can import most of the Coasters/rides that you custom built in the previous titles. I’ve imported my “Silver Bullet” and “The Shiznit” coasters, and they work just fine. I’ve imported my “Magic” coaster, but it crashed in RCT3 and would’ve killed guests, so I’ve given up on it, ha.
What’s even cooler now, is you can still take advantage of the 3d world of RCT3, and walk around inside of your park as a guest would, and also RIDE THE RIDES IN YOUR PARK! Nothing is cooler than being able to realistic ride a custom rollercoaster that you build! You could use third party tools to ride coasters you designed in previous titles, but the feature in RCT3 is so much better!
View of park while on the “Silver Bullet” coaster I designed.
So, if you love RCT1 and 2, and hate 3 become of the views, just simple change the view to “isometric”, and it’ll be just as it was in the original games, but with better graphics, simply goto the options menu and click the camera icon, and from the drop down menu under “control mode” select “Isometric”. Walla!! Now you have the classic view!
It’s actually really sad that I only just now discovered that I love this game. Atari recently announced that that they are working on a version 4! Which is even cooler.
Oh well, this game will give me something new and fresh to do until version 4 is releases. 
New Email addy :( bye hotmail
I’m going to have to start using another email service. Which means, yes another email address. Which really sucks.
I love my super short @live.com address, but Hotmail’s spam servers suck so much.
This happens randomly, but increasingly more frequent lately. Everything will be fine. Days can pass by without a single spam mail. Then all of a sudden for hours I get spam mail after spam mail.
What even magnifies the situation is that I get at least 2 alerts per mail. 1 ) Hotmail alerts me via messenger, my phone alerts me, and the mail box alerts me. (another mail just popped up, ah!).
I have the Hotmail settings on high or whatever, is the default settings. I’ve never touched them. it just seems the Hotmail spam service breaks down randomly.
I’ve tried many times to contact hotmail regarding the spam, but at no avail, and I’m just really fed up and annoyed.
Example of my inbox: 
.
This screenshot was just taken before I started writing this entry. And since I’ve started writing this mail I’ve been notified of several more, ha one more just popped up…. This is so ridiculous.
I’m very sad though about having to start using another mail service and address because I do really like hotmail and the way it works with Windows Live Mail (desktop application). Especially how good it works with Live Messenger. Live Messenger actually isn’t even that great anymore, but that’s another issue. one problem I have with hotmail and live messenger is it keeps saying I have at least 3 emails in my inbox, which I do not. blah!
So I started looking at my alternatives for free email. First I needed my address to be short, which rules out Gmail. At gmail your username must be 6 characters. All the good 6 char names are taken, and I’d be stuck with using a bunch of numbers, which is lame. I have gmail accounts from 2004 already that are too long, and I don’t want to use.
I registered a short @ymail.com address when Yahoo! announced that you could get @ymail.com and @rocketmail.com addresses, but meh, I really dislike Yahoo! mail. The web interface is ugly in my opinion, and from last I heard, they still don’t allow you to use your mail client for IMAP or POP mail access. So Yahoo! is out.
I do really like GMX. They allow both IMAP and POP mail access, and have a beautiful Web User Interface, But, a lot of servers block GMX mail, such as Craigslist. Sometimes I like to sell or buy stuff on Craigslist, and I don’t want to have to use a different email for it. So GMX is out at no fault of its own.
After going over these mail options, I suddenly remembered a month ago I applied for the AOL Project Phoenix mail beta. So I randomly went to my old AOL email account, and WOHOO! I had an invite that was sent to me on December 14th!
So I signed up, and got a super short email address. It’s actually ***@wow.com (I didn’t put the actually email address because I don’t want Spam bots to pick it up 
.
The Project Phoenix Web UI is so beautiful. It’s nice. GMX is a bit more appealing, but Phoenix is more clean, simple, and just elegant. I like it. Better yet, AOL gives you free IMAP and POP access, so I can still use my Windows Live Mail client.
So I’m super happy that I found a new mail solution. I don’t know how well the spam filtering is going to be, but it can’t be any worse than Hotmail’s horrible filters.
You can check out Project Phoenix by visiting http://phoenix.aol.com/main . I did get 10 invites to share, but sadly I already used them all. If I do get more, I’ll post them here for people to grab.
AH! Never buying Canon again! warning!
I sold cameras for a few years, and always suggested Canon cameras to the customers. I used to think that they were solid, and returned much better results for the customers. I now think that i was so wrong.
A few months ago I bought a SD780 IS 12-mega pixel Canon camera. I bought it because it was super slim, and took great pictures.
Soon after I bought the camera i noticed spots on the pictures. I knew instantly what this was because I had the same problem with a Sanyo camera that i actually replaced with the Canon.
Some how dust gets inside the camera lens, and onto the sensor, which cannot be cleaned yourself, because there is no way to actually take apart the lens to clean the sensor, and if you attempt to you risk ruing the entire camera.
Having spots, and crap all over my digital pictures really ruined the want for me to even take pictures with the camera.
I was actually shocked that something like this could happen to a Canon camera. I wasn’t around dusty or dirty areas with the camera, and i hadn’t been throwing it around or anything. I’ve been protective of my Cameras since I LOVE taking pictures.
The Sanyo camera had it worse. I mean there were about 10 spots on each picture. I just assumed it was because Sanyo is a cheap discount like brand.
Never even thought I’d have any related issues with the Canon.
So, I immediately returned the camera to the store and exchanged it for another one. I should’ve got a whole different brand, but I just figured that i was unlucky and got a bad camera.
Instantly when i started taking pictures with the brand new replacement, I noticed a spot on the left side of the screen. Luckily this one didn’t show up in the pictures. Maybe it was just a screen defect.
A little bit ago i went out to take pictures, and guess what?!? A big huge piece of dirt on top of the image sensor. AH!
I was able to finally get it off the middle of the picture by flicking the side of the expose lens barrel.
I contacted Canon via email, and they said I can mail them the camera, and they’ll attempt to repair it. Which i think I may do. Usually I don’t bother with that sort of stuff, but i spent a couple hundred dollars on this camera, and Canon owes me a perfectly fine working camera that produces beautiful clear pictures. AHH!
Im just so annoyed and let down.
You can kinda see the spot in this picture. imagine trying to take a picture of a bright blue sky, or anything with a solid color. It shows up clearer in those pictures, which is horrible.
I should’ve took more example pictures, but im too annoyed and pissed at Canon to even touch the camera right now.
Here is a picture taken with the first camera i had gotten, which you can clearly see the spots: 
Just watch out for these slim compact Canon Cameras. I can’t imagine that i just got unlucky twice.
dammit! oh wait, it’s cool
I’ve been working on another site of mine (Qeoz) for the past few days. The site like almost all of my websites is very graphical, meaning its very stylish and graphics make up most of it. So the main layout is basically one Photoshop file.
After spending hour and hours working on the design, I some how managed to flatten the Photoshop file (merge all layers, which removes any ability at all to really edit the design), chop half of the image off, and then save over the original, and closed the image, which removes the ability to undo the history. I didn’t notice any of this happen until i reopened the image seconds later. 
So then i went through this hectic stage, and some disbelief that i actually had just done that. I could’ve redesigned the layout, and possibly made it a little better, but i had already spent hours and hours on it, and thought it looked good already, I searched all over for the Photoshop temp folder. Sure it creates a temp folder of everything you had open in Photoshop during that session. I couldn’t find any individual temp files for the files i had opened, but i found one huge file called “Photoshop Temp49707814660”, which was almost 400mb in file size.
I figured it’d have all those temp files within it. So i started searching around the web for ways to extract the contents from that, and found absolutely nothing. I don’t know about everyone else, but I think google is crap and gives me alot of random results most of the time.
So that was a no go. I then decided to find way to scan all of the recently deleted files on my computer. I figured this would find the temp files that Photoshop creates sometimes. SO i downloaded a program called “Recover My Files” and begin scanning the hard drives on my computer.
I didn’t find any temp files, but what i found was an actual solid copy the Photoshop file itself, that was saved hours earlier in the day. I was super shocked, happy, and excited!
click image to view full picture 
I didn’t know this, but i guess when Windows saves a file, it must delete the older copy of the file, and replace it. Because i hadn’t ever deleted the original Photoshop file, and yet a whole copy of it was deleted, and the program was able to pick it up. Weird. I’m not too sure how that works, but I’m super excited that i got the file back.
So basically i guess I’m posting this so others will know that there is a way to recover files if you had messed up, and saved over the original. The original un messed up file could still be on your system! of course this will only work if you scan for it soon after its deleted, or accidentally saved over, because of the way Windows writes over the deleted data.
I am still so happy that I was able to recover the file. HAPPY HAPPY HAPPY.
By the way, if you’re into music, check out my new site at
-site deleted – Also if you were a fan of the old design and feel that I had on the old MJ site i used to one, you will love Qeoz. Continuing that style!
** 6/19/2010 9:23am : removed Qeoz links. Decided to use a different domain. Testing the new layout for use at damnidunno
Piwik – Open Source Alternative to Google Analytics
I am trying to rid my life of Google services and products. I mean they are everywhere now – harvesting my personal info and whatever other data that they can get from me, and its just getting too creepy.
Today I was looking for an alternative to Google Analytics, and found Piwik!
For those of you who do not know what Analytics is: It a service ran by google that tracks everything about your websites. Such as user visits, what the users do on your sites, how long they visit, and what they read. All that info is set and stored in Google’s database. It is helpful to webmasters and site owners. But what its really doing is helping google mine more data from users, and meh!
I posted the following on several forums, and decided to go ahead and post it on my site.:
Has anyone here ever heard of Piwik?
Turns out that its an open source alternative to Google Analytics, and works just as good.
I just took google analytics off all of my sites, and installed Piwik, which is basically php and mysql based.
It was actually pretty simple to install and get running. You install it like you would any other php script (forums, etc), then add your sites to it, and insert the tag into the footer of your sites.
I haven’t had much time to play with it since i just installed it, but so far its picking up hits instantly, and working quite well.
The load is actually much faster than Google Analytics. If anyone has ever used Analytics then you know about the random pauses and freezes during page loads while your site connects to google. That is now gone with Piwik! 
The admin UI is similar to Google Analytics. So you’ll easily find your way around.
Even if you don’t use Analytics, and are interested in visitor stats on your site, i’d suggest over the awstats and others that usually come with cpanel and such.
I’m excited to rely on one less google service.
quick download and install here
http://piwik.org/
provide feedback. i’m interested to see if others enjoy this as well.
Desktop May-27-2010
(click thumbnail for larger image) 
So this is my desktop now. Ha.
Info:
Windows 7 – Ultimate x64
Wallpaper – Made by me, you can download it here.
Windows 7 Shell Theme – Longhorn Evolution X.
* But the start menu icon is provided in this theme pack. Which you can easily change using this tool: Windows Theme Installer. (I guess it installs themes too? I dunno about that, i jus use it to easily replace the explorer.exe, which used to take forever).
Desktop Gadgets – Okay, so this is where it gets complicated. I’ve got rid of everything.
Last time I posted my desktop I was using a program called Rainlendar. I completely got rid of that program, and now use one called Rainmeter. Rainmeter had a cool weather skin that I wanted to use, which i no longer do, but anyways it has much better and cooler themes.
So here are the Rainmeter skins and gadgets now some of these I heavily modified, so they may not look the same, but mostly will:
Weather Gadget: Large Clean Weather
Time, Date, Folders: Speed theme – I changed several icons, and paths.
Hard Drives: 2nd theme – I changed the icon.
Recycle Bin: GlassBin.
woot hmm.. yea
RollerCoaster Tycoon 2! love It!
This is going to be a random entry where i just blab about RCT. I just wanna start up discussion on this game. Many people haven’t played it yet, and i think they’d love it if they do. Plus im just bored and tired.
This has got to be one of the greatest games ever! At least for me it is. I don’t think I’ve played any other game as much as i have this one.
I used to play RCT (RollerCoaster Tycoon) for hours and hours, and really never got bored of it like i do with most games.
It’s very awesome how you can build a realistic theme park, and the little peeps can ride your rides, and seem to have fun.
I’ve always been into the games where you can build and create stuff. Um, for some reason i’ve never been in to the sims. dunno why. I just hate it and get so bored playing it. But games like SimCity, and RCT i love!
So, i played the original RCT, and bought the expansions and everything for it, and it seemed really cool. Then i remember when RCT2 came out. I think it was around 2002 or 03. I think i got it on release day, or at least the same week, and it was even better than the originals because i baiscally play in a sandbox mode, where you start out with a blank map, and do whatever you want. In the original RCT you had to use third party tools that would hack RCT and the current map, and let you control everything. But there were problems with that such as tons of bugs and errors. Well the first RCT would crash all the time anyways.
Thankfully RCT2 came with a sandbox mode, which basically lets you design your own map, and create a scenario out of it, which i do.
The stupid thing about RCT2 is the ride limit. You can only have so many rides and scenery in the park. Which is so lame.
Now, i know RCT2 is a pretty old game now. Almost 10 years old, and the graphics aren’t the best. But the game play is amazing! and that alone makes it awesome and worth it. I love it. And so far there hasnt been any other game like it.
I wish the guy who made the game (Chris Saywer)would make another one, WITH THE ORIGINAL GAMEPLAY, just with smarter peeps, staff, and rides. He did help make RCT3, which is bascially a whole different game, and was 3d, but i couldnt get into it. I tried it again a few months ago and it was so buggy, and just wasn’t as fun as the original. So he just needs come out with a new improved RCT game with the classic game play.
I actually haven’t really played RCT2 in years. I just couldn’t get it to work right with 64bit vista or windows 7, so i didn’t even bother. But, i’ve been bored lately so i decided to give it ago, and finally got it to work with 64bit windows 7! WOOT. I basically had to run it as administrator, and it works okay. Crashes alot, but works ha.
For the past few days i’ve been playing RCT2 again. Just like the old days, and loving it.
I still have my park from a few years ago that I’ve been building on, and was going to continue, but the map on there is full, and it wouldn’t have been too much fun, so i decided to start fresh.
I named my new park ‘Joy World’, ha it came to my mind first, so i just went with it, lol. I thought of Joy Land, but that’s been so over used.
I basically start with a blank map, and start making a path way, and build some rides, and open the park up. Then I just build as i go, and add areas and rides whenever.
This is what my park started like:
(click thumbnail for full picture!
these are zoomed out over head shots, so the quality isnt the best)
Then as i went i added mountains, water, and some more rides:
And as of now, this is what my park looks like:
So you can see how much has changed, and how much you can do with the game.
ITS REALLY FUN!
I created several custom rollercoasters for this park. Here they are:
The ‘Spitting Cobra’ – haha came to my mind first, so i used it. dunno where it came from though.
it all wont fit in the screen shot without zooming too far out and making it look crappy, but you kinda get the idea. And they love it
And the miner:
As you can see in the pictures, i do have alot of money. I use a few different cheats:
Money – The Money part of the game has never interested me. Im into the building gameplay. So i use a money cheat.
Handyman – Cleans paths, fixes benches, and mows grass.
Mechanic – Renews rides, and makes them reliable (or else they break down all the time, which ruins some fun ha).
Those 3 cheats are in this trainer, along with alot of other cool cheats, which i never use.
This is the best trainer/cheat program i ever found for RCT, and it works great.
The creators site no longer exists, and i doubt he’s updating it anymore. But it works as it is, so its cool.
I uploaded it here so you all could get it, and have some fun!
Download:
8 Cars Per Trainer: http://www.joshx.com/stuff/8cars.zip
Screenshot:
So, even though this is an old game, you should still get it! Especially if you’re into the sim type games, and love building stuff.
The graphics might not be the best anymore, but you’ll get used to it, and love it anyways.
Grab a copy of it, ha lets start building some parks!
only $9 at amazon!
http://www.amazon.com/RollerCoaster-Tycoon-2-Pc/dp/B0000695GX