free games for free(?!) time

Mario´s Picross (Man!ac 6/95), originally uploaded by Kantenflimmern.

there's been a slight slow down again round these parts due to the usual pre-christmas insanity, but also exciting things afoot in the future of crafty/gamesy/internetty stuff - you'll hopefully hear more soon :)

in the meantime, i thought it might be good to provide some flash game links to distract everyone from the lack of blogging:

Small Worlds is an exploring game. some people have said that it only takes 30 mins to complete, but as someone who is sadly lacking in the basic videogame skill of jumping, i've obviously gotten more value out of it and still have only seen 3 of the gorgeously pixellated worlds that lie through the mysterious teleports.

Continuity is a weird one - it's like they took a really simple game and watch level and turned it into one of those slidey puzzles (which, for the record, i hate. i absolutely suck at them and still haven't completed the ones in professor layton, even with walkthroughs.) it's immensely clever, although takes a while to realise the nuances of why exactly you aren't allowed to go through the wall to the next screen yet, and soon ramps up the difficulty - just wish it had a save game.

but mostly i've just been playing Wii Picross. now i've finally completed Picross DS, and 3D Picross isn't out over here quite yet, this completely free website is keeping me more than occupied - I'm addicted to the daily puzzles and their advent challenge is proving quite interesting this time (is it sad to realise i've been playing this site long enough to remember the last two years' worth of christmas specials?) i bought a book of puzzles recently to carry round but the majority of them are logically incomplete, full of mistakes, or plain broken, which makes me appreciate wii picross even more. have to say i much prefer to use it on the pc than to the wii browser though.

and finally... not exactly a flash game, but i downloaded world of goo recently as part of their 'pay what you want' promotion - at first i was most intrigued by the experiment, and to be honest i still haven't got round to installing the mac version. however, they've also gone on to offer the first chapter as a free demo on wiiware, which *did* hook me in, and i finally got round to realising what i suspected all along: it's ace fun :) highly recommended, and yay for wiiware demos!

i've got the key, i've got the secret

collection of keys, originally uploaded by spugmeistress.

it's quite disgraceful that i've been trailing this for over a year, but look, new collection! these keys are taken from various 8bit nintendo games (well, mostly legend of zelda, but one random mystery one in there too) and put on a necklace in order to make cheesy jokes like 'you've got the key to my heart!'. Link would be proud of such a chat up line, i'm sure...

i've always wanted one of the keys from the latchkey project, not only because they look so damn cool, and each one is unique, but also because of the unknown story behind each one - the mystery of knowing that a key must belong to an item that it unlocks and trying to reunite the two. is there a super secret prize at the end of the quest, or is the joy in the journey (that to be honest, i doubt many people have ever completed. but i'm not sure that's the point...)

on the subject of games and puzzles and fun with almost pointless point scoring, i just found out about noticin.gs and it looks awesome. just like with wii fit or singstar - the points/games/rules help give the experience some sort of legitimacy against time wasting, but they're really only a framing device for the real fun - such as shedding inhibitions with friends, interacting with the world around you.

anyway, if you want a key, they're available here:

etsy ($) : gold key necklace, silver key necklace, bronze key necklace

folksy (£) : gold key necklace, silver key necklace, bronze key necklace

the best things ever

photo borrowed from angelsk's flickr

*before we start: the blue wig is there for a reason. we were on our way to a hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy party and i dressed up as a hooloovoo (i like to think being a hyperintelligent shade of blue quite befits my personality ;) )

best umbrella ever: by squid london

i do like smart textiles. so when i saw this hydrochromic umbrella, i *had* to have it. the silhouettes start off white and change colour when they get rained on, kinda like those kids water painting things :) a couple of days after it arrived (in a package with butterfly print packing tape and some wallpaper samples by my *favourite* wallpaper designers - how did they know?!), technabob kindly pointed out that the umbrella owner can't actually see how awesomely colour changing it is when they are underneath it, but i don't care - at least everyone else gets to see and know that my umbrella is better than theirs :P it doesn't hurt that it has a london skyline on it either - manchester would have been nicer but at least it's not MK (not that MK really *has* a skyline...)

best watch ever: by nixon

i love my watch. it's not new - i've had it probably nearly 7 or 8 years and it's currently sporting a paperclip as a strap loop, but it's still the classiest watch i've seen. i'm pretty sure i was influenced towards the nixon rocker by its inclusion as a 'create a skater' option in one of the tony hawk's pro skater games (maybe 3 or 4?) but i can't for the life of me find out which one. even recreated in pixels it looked amazing, and then even more so when i realised dave grohl had one. cedric diggory sports something looking remarkably similar in the lake scene in harry potter: goblet of fire too, but i'll let him off ;)

best live band ever: muse

nothing more really needs to be said. but i will anyway ;) as much as i love radiohead to bits and they are probably my favourite band of all time, muse don't half kick their ass. went to see them for the 7(?)th time at the 02 in London a few weeks ago, and they rocked so hard that i almost don't care that i never got to see queen live. utterly ridiculous, utterly sublime and i've already bought tickets to see them again next september at wembley. cannot wait :)