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Pay pros for lessons on sucking less at video games
Losing to a 12-year-old in Super Smash Bros. can be a real downer, but there are a few ways to prevent that. You can challenge kids who aren't as good, practice and improve on your own, or, if you have a few bucks to spend, get a video game tutor from Japanese company GameLesson.
The Game Archaeologist: The silent world of Tibia
If I were to tell you that there's a Western MMO out there that's as old as Ultima Online and yet still has a half-million players, would you believe me? Heck, I wouldn't believe me even if I came back from the future of having written this article to talk to the past version of me who had yet to start it! But that's Tibia for you: a weird underdog of an MMO that's cruised underneath most players' radars for over a decade and a half. From its origins as a student project, Tibia jumped in the unexplored waters of the early MMO era and dog paddled for all its worth. This 17-year-old title remains one of the very few active MMOs from the '90s and one of only a handful that stubbornly stuck to a 2-D graphics format even as 3-D swept the gaming genre. And trust me, those aren't even the most interesting facts about it!
The Game Archaeologist: The PLATO MMOs, part 1
In tracing the history and pre-history of MMORPGs in this column, we've spent a lot of time outside of the 2000s and into the explosive '90s, the experimental '80s, and even the extraordinary '70s. Early pioneers like MUD1, Dungeons & Dragons, GameLine, bulletin board systems, Habitat, Island of Kesmai, and even Maze War have contributed to the development of these games we enjoy today. But I think we're going to outdo ourselves this week. We're going to go back further than ever before in the The Game Archaeologist time tunnel. When we arrive at our destination, we'll see that MMOs started germinating within a decade of computers being able to talk to each other. Ladies and gentlemen, I give you 1961.
Insert Coin: Tabber lights up your fretboard, shows you the way to rock
In Insert Coin, we look at an exciting new tech project that requires funding before it can hit production. If you'd like to pitch a project, please send us a tip with "Insert Coin" as the subject line. The idea of a lighted fretboard isn't a new one by any stretch (how do you think the Fretlight got its compound name?), but there's something to be said for not having to buy a brand new guitar for that functionality. The folks behind Tabber are working to make that a reality, having tested a number of prototypes for a product that you can simply slip over the neck of your axe for a quick tutorial. The company is looking to create a slicker version of the concept that it can bring to the market. Tabber's creators need your help to "transform the guitar industry," so naturally they've taken to Kickstarter, with a little under a month to hit their $45,000 goal. The Arduino-powered LED guitar instructor will connect to a mobile device via Bluetooth, accessing information to let you play along with songs, figure out chords and bend your fingers around some scales. Click the source link to send some cash Tabber's way, or to find out a bit more about the project. Update: As a number of commenters have pointed out, there's a similar project currently awaiting your donations on Kickstarter. Great minds, huh?
The Road to Mordor: Entitled
A few days ago I asked the Massively community members what in-game titles they loved the most. Titles have been on my brain for the past week, as I've started to realize just how many -- how bogglingly, terrifyingly many -- exist in Lord of the Rings Online. I hadn't really given them a lot of thought before, because who really stops to read every small paragraph that magically floats above people's heads? "Frodo, Ring-bearer of the One Ring of Power, Fellowship of the Ring, Formerly of Bag End, The Shire." Yeah, we get it. You're Mr. Fancy Pants. But really, titles are kind of neat, if only for the player who puts one on like a fine three-piece suit before an evening on the town. A title tells the world not only of your great (or not-so-great) accomplishments, but also a little about your personality -- after all, you chose that particular title to wear above all the others. A title can tell me if a player is really proud of his crafting achievements, or if he's a raider, or if he has a decent sense of humor. While I'd say that -- like LotRO's hats -- a good bulk of the titles in the game are cosmetically useless, there exists quite a few that are worth procuring if you're into titular collection. Today we're going to look at some of my favorite titles in the game, as well as how to nab them. Please don't pee your pants in excitement.
Voice Tutor puts vocal exercises in your pocket
Whether you fancy yourself the second coming of Pavarotti or just the best vocalist in your own shower, the truth isn't always pleasant to the ear: not everyone can sing. Everyone, however, can learn to sing better -- and that's the point of Voice Tutor, a sharp app from the experienced vocal coaches at IMPACK and Kimad Productions. For US$4.99, it lets your iPhone or iPod touch provide a full menu of workouts, fixes, and expert tools for polishing your voice and fixing the issues that may hamper your rock and roll nights. There's one important point about this app that may not be immediately obvious, and it's the source of some sour notes in the App Store reviews: it does not record your singing performances or do any direct analysis. This misperception isn't helped by the microphone-themed graphics in the app, unfortunately. The initial diagnostic pass on your personal vocal issues is done by manually comparing your sung scales by ear to four sample recordings from the app; it may help to have a trusted friend or straight-faced spouse listen to you and the samples to give an objective assessment. You self-assign a category of practice to your specific situation; whether you sing with tension, breathiness, cracking, or with a connected and smooth tone, there's a full set of exercises for you. A screencast of the app in action is watchable here. I consider myself a reasonably solid amateur singer, with musical improv training and performance experience (not to mention plenty of karaoke), so I was pleased to come up as "connected" on the diagnostic pass in Voice Tutor -- I had my children help classify me. The training philosophy of the app centers around mastering the "break," the transition between chest voice and head voice that tends to divide vocalists into the traditional SATB parts. In Voice Tutor's world, you work toward a "connected" voice to maintain a smooth and relaxed vocal style regardless of whether you're singing from your chest or head voice. Each vocal challenge area includes special workouts to help address the problems or issues you may have when singing, with almost 200 individual program segments in the Vocal Focus part of the tool. Once you graduate from your training session, you can head into the Give Me a Workout section anytime you need to warm up or "clear the pipes" before an audition or performance. The app's final section, Riff n' Run, is designed to give more experienced vocalists the tools they need to handle more complex phrasing and develop an individual style fingerprint. Even in a relatively brief pass with Voice Tutor, I can already feel the exercises and instructional content gently nudging my voice in a better direction; the workouts made me stretch without straining, and I noticed some rough spots starting to come around. It's not pretending to be a substitute for a qualified vocal coach and a tireless accompanist, but consider how much musical instruction is squeezed into the app and how often you might need a warm-up or workout on the go -- at five bucks, you can have it for a song.
TypingWeb gains Safari compatiblity
The biggest barrier to effectively using your Mac (or your iPhone) isn't processor speed or software compatibility -- it's poor typing speed. Who knew back at the invention of the manual typewriter that the QWERTY keyboard layout (alleged to have been designed to slow down typists and avoid jams) would still be our primary data interface more than a century later? Yes, we've got some other options now, but short of upgrading your RAM the best way to speed up your work is to simply learn to type.To enhance that finger business, check out TypingWeb, which now offers a Safari-compatible (both for desktop and iPhone, as we originally noted here) and free set of typing drills. Using the service on my iPod touch, I discovered that my Blackberry-style two thumb technique was actually slowing me down compared to an index-finger approach that leveraged the word completion feature more effectively -- who knew?For a full-scale Mac typing tutor, the classic (not Classic -- it runs in OS X now) choice is Mavis Beacon Teaches Typing, available on a cross-platform CD.
A typing tutor for the iPhone
A while back, we reported on a study that (not only had all kinds of holes in it, but) claimed the iPhone's keyboard was two times slower than other phones. But as many commenters said, the keyboard just requires practice.And there's no better way to get it than to jump into a typing tutor. We've seen one before for the iPhone, but reader Travis (thanks!) sent us a tip about TypingWeb.com's free iPhone tutor (just go to their site on your iPhone, and enter some information to create an account), and I was impressed by how smoothly it worked. During the Basic test, I moved pretty quickly-- a nice 36 words per minute. But on the Advanced test, they throw all kinds of things at you (including intentionally misspelled words, so you have to dodge Apple's corrections), and I dropped down to about 16 wpm.Definitely worth a try. A lot of iPhone typing seems to be situation-- moving around in a car or bus, for instance, makes things a lot harder. But at least this will give you a ballpark figure of your typing prowess.
Virtual teacher understands your frustration, pours on the homework
Okay, so maybe Eve won't really load you down with busywork, but the virtual teacher will sympathize with you, hear you out and alter her teaching style to better match your current mood. Reportedly, the Massey University creation can "pick up body language and facial expressions like a real teacher [in order] to interact and [hold] the attention of students." Additionally, she can ask questions, dole out feedback and discuss problems with pupils, but there's no telling how easily she hands out extra credit. Dr. Hossein Sarrafzadeh, the lead on the project, noted that people should soon expect robots to take note of their feelings and reactions exactly as we expect a fellow human to, but we're left to wonder how many more years our teachers have before they're subbed out en masse for digital replacements.[Via SmartMobs, image courtesy of Primidi]
Emotion-tracking rings to assist in distance learning
Let's face it, not all of us will have the luxury of attending a school where we get to construct massive LEGO machines or learn how to become savvy in SMS, but a developing technology that tracks student emotions could help tutors and distance instructors alike in keeping kids focused while learning. Co-developed by Essex University's Vic Callaghan and Shanghai Jiao Tong University's Liping Shen, the emotion-tracking tutoring software can analyze physical signs to keep track of a student's attention span, their level of understanding, and even the amount of stress a certain lesson produces. Aimed to help tutors become more effective and to add another layer of "personal" to distance-based education courses, the software would receive information about a student's "heart rate, blood pressure and changes in electrical resistance caused by perspiration" via a sensor-laden, Bluetooth-enabled ring worn on one's finger. The information can then be assessed to determine a student's interest level and frustration level, but a decibel meter to measure snoring isn't likely to be included. If all goes as planned, the team intends on testing the system out in "real learning scenarios in China" to further tweak their creation, so it won't be too long now before an interest-tracking ring will become as necessary as pencil and paper a stylus and a tablet PC come class time.
