By Ben Wochinski on November 5, 2011
The title of this post pretty much sums up things for the past couple weeks. Well that and neglecting my blog.
This past week I picked up a new iPhone 4S after the volume button decided to fall off my 3GS. It’s a really nice upgrade and I’ve actually been able to “write” this entire post using Siri’s dictation feature. It is saving me a ton of time tapping on the tiny little touch keyboard. I haven’t found any other particularly good uses for her yet, but I’m sure things will pop up over time.
As for what I’ve been up to its mostly been coding Java over the last few weeks. I’ve been working on a project with a friend and things are coming along great. We’re nowhere near ready for a demo yet but I’ll certainly keep you updated here when that comes about.
On the Minecraft front I haven’t played very much lately, the only thing I’ve accomplished is digging a long tunnel. I also played just a few minutes of Dwarf Fortress this past week. I think I only quit because I got bored with the particular fortress I’d been playing. The problem is I play too carefully and end up not having much fun. I’d like to start a new fortress if I can find the time.
The rest of my time has been filled with working, sleeping, and spending time with my family. Overall things are great, and I will try to be more diligent updating my blog, I would hate to see another one die.
Until next time, happy gaming!
PS – No matter how long I pause, Siri will not insert a comma, or any punctuation at all for that matter. So she’s not quite perfect yet.
Posted in Dwarf Fortress, Minecraft, Personal, Programming Tagged 4S, Coding, dictation, Dwarf Fortress, iPhone, Java, Life, Minecraft, Programming, Siri
By Ben Wochinski on August 4, 2011
Over the last extended weekend I was away on vacation, part family, part just my Wife and I. We went up to the Wisconsin Dells and had some fun and relaxing time at the water parks there. A good time and nice to do some relaxing, but I’m certainly glad to be back in my own bed!
Shortly before leaving, and now that I’ve returned, my eye has once again been caught by Dwarf Fortress. The large amount of coverage in the NYT magazine helped get me back into it a bit. If anyone is aware of my first fortress, Fatallash, it still exists. I haven’t played it anymore since the last goblin siege I posted about, but for a few minutes the other day just to see how it was holding up. The Dwarfs are quite hardy and haven’t given up. In fact, it appears that everyone has emerged from their horrible depression and the fortress can get back on track!
The current state of the entrance to Fatallash. I have a lot of extra clothing from deceased dwarfs.
Aside from Fatallash I started up a new fortress recently, (which I cannot currently recall the name of) to allow me to correct a few of my oversights in the first fortress design. One thing I still messed up was the embark location. I didn’t think about my wanting to mess with water and such, so I didn’t choose a site with a river. It also seems I may have chosen too peaceful a location, as my fortress has already surpassed a population of 170 dwarfs and been declared a barony. In all that time, not a single attack, not even a snatcher, has threatened the fortress. I do have plans to rectify that problem, as I’ve begun digging much further downward. Still, I’m about 50 levels below the surface and still haven’t found a cavern.
Now that I’m back onto my more regular schedule I really need to get myself back into the habit of posting more often! I know I’ve been neglecting Minecraft a bit, but I must go where the brain takes me! I’ll be back with more gaming randomness soon.
Happy Crafting!
Posted in Dwarf Fortress, Personal Tagged 0.31.25, Dells, Dwarf Fortress, Dwarves, Fatallash, fortress, Fun, Minerals, Mining, Mode, New York Times, NYT, PC Gaming, Simulation, Single Player, Survival, Vacation, Water Park, Wisconsin
By Ben Wochinski on May 29, 2011
Well look at Notch go, practically setting a Minecraft update schedule! I guess I’m glad that the Mojang guys all took that Gaming Friday to play Terraria (even though we were all stuck with 1.6.4), since it seems to have inspired Notch, as he admits on twitter.
Coming up in the next week or so patch 1.6.6 is planned to finish up fixing a lot of the bugs still present in 1.6.5. This includes the problem with ghosts curling up in any bed they find. Or I mean beds always claiming to be occupied. It’s not that terrible a bug, as far as things have gone in the update to the 1.6.x series, and everyone got along fine without beds fine before they were added to the game. I haven’t run into any other bugs that bother me as of yet, other than some general lagginess sometimes.
The other patch we have to look forward to is version 1.7, which Notch describes as “the Adventure Update“. He doesn’t elaborate on exactly what it will contain, but I hear a lot of comparison to the Dwarf Fortress adventure mode. The update should make the adventure map crowd very happy, and hopefully there will be actual game mechanics enforcing the rules of adventuring. It would make building an adventure map much more attractive.
Since 1.7 is all about Adventuring I imagine that means still no pistons! Automating my gigantic wheat farm will have to continue to wait.
Happy Crafting!
Posted in Minecraft Tagged 1.6.5, 1.6.6, 1.7, Adventure, Beds, Beta, bug fixes, bugs, Dwarf Fortress, Fixed, Minecraft, Mojang, Multiplayer, Notch, Online, Patch, Server, SMP, Terraria, Update
By Ben Wochinski on February 22, 2011
While I feared that Fatallash had entered an irreversible spiral of death, it appears that the city has managed to recover over the course of the summer. I have uploaded a new map at the DF Map Archive so that you can see the condition of the city. There has not yet been a full count of the death toll but I suspect it may be as high as 70 Dwarfs.
You can see on the city map the expansion of the burial chamber as well as the creation of a morgue. The Dwarfs have done their best to ensure no one is forgotten after the chaos, but the whole operation is disheartening. The hospital at least has cleared of the dying, and the hallways are no longer crowded with bodies.
The Dwarfs learned a very hard, but important lesson from the nearly final summer of Fatallash. Namely that the world wants them dead. Construction has begun on some much heavier fortifications. The new drawbridge is already complete (visible on the map), and work is nearly done on a moat covering the front entrance. Along the moat, fortifications have been built to allow marksdwarfs to attack anyone laying siege. A proper barracks has been dug out and there is a small militia training.
And so, it seems, Fatallash shall continue on. The cleanup effort is still massive, and coffins are still being produced almost constantly. Hopefully, the city will be able to sustain some growth and get to some good dwarfy exploratory mining.
Posted in Dwarf Fortress Tagged Dwarf Fortress, PC Gaming
By Ben Wochinski on February 20, 2011
Well a lot has happened, and very quickly, since my post about the Dwarf city of Fatallash. I fear that name has finally come back to haunt them.
Continue reading »
Posted in Dwarf Fortress Tagged Dwarf Fortress, PC Gaming
By Ben Wochinski on February 19, 2011
After the previous post I made about trying out the game Goblin Camp, I couldn’t help but end up checking out Dwarf Fortress. I had heardabout it a few times but never really looked into it.
Once I got the game downloaded and started it up, I was instantly lost. Like most games of this type, you have to make some fairly important decisions before you even get to start playing. In this case, the supplies you will start with as well as the skill sets of your seven starting Dwarfs. Plus you have to pick the location in which you will start in your newly generated world. All of these factors can play a big role in how much difficulty you will have in getting your Dwarfs established… Continue reading »
Posted in Dwarf Fortress Tagged Dwarf Fortress, Goblin Camp, PC Gaming
By Ben Wochinski on February 12, 2011
I didn’t have a chance to jump on Minecraft at all today. Days are almost completely full when I work. But while I was looking around a bit at some blogging stuff I stumbled across the game Goblin Camp.
If you’re at all familiar with Dwarf Fortress it’s a very similar game, though I hear the interface is an improvement. I’ve only played a bit of Goblin Camp on my lunch break today, but from what I’ve experienced the game is a sort of city-builder. You have a population of goblins and orcs which automatically carry out tasks as you assign them. And this of course means you have to worry about feeding and otherwise providing for them in return.
My camp so far.
In the picture above you can see my camp just beginning to thrive. Though I can’t for the life of me figure out where to get any wicker for baskets, which causes my fruit and seed storage to be horribly inefficient. To the left of my camp center you can also see the blueish slime beginning to spread from the spawning pool, where new goblins and orcs come from as more and more filth is dumped in. Hopefully it’s expansion doesn’t reach my settlement too soon, or I’ll have to relocate the entire camp.
I haven’t yet been attacked, though I’m aware it’s coming. I’m hoping that I can get some palisades set up by that time but I’m mainly going to concentrate on growing my population in preparation to fight back.
It’s a fun game to waste a bit of time and certainly doesn’t tax even a pitiful system. I’m sure I’ll play it here and there for a while, and hopefully the developer keeps adding additional content to keep things fresh.
Posted in Other Games Tagged Dwarf Fortress, Goblin Camp, PC Gaming
