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Begin 2010 with Turbine's wallpaper calendars and more
Happy New Year from Massively, and from Turbine! Whichever of their two popular games -- Dungeons and Dragons Online or Lord of the Rings Online -- you prefer, Turbine has just the thing for your desktop to ring in the new year. Both games are offering free quarterly wallpaper calendars featuring some of the gorgeous screenshots that Turbine is known for providing to its fans. Three different choices are offered for each game, depending on your preference: flashy new Siege of Mirkwood, or good old dependable Gollum? Close-up character shot or faraway landscape shot in Dungeons and Dragons Online? If a calendar's not really your thing but you still love the artwork from Turbine, some nice alternatives are offered on each site. A full Siege of Mirkwood shot is available with no calendar, or you can try the three different pieces of concept art from DDO. An extensive archive of past wallpapers is available too, if this is new to you, or if you missed any. You can get the LotRO wallpapers here, and the DDO wallpapers here. Enjoy!
LocoRoco wallpapers make for a cute Christmas
Our biggest problem when not playing LocoRoco is that we wished we were playing it. Sometimes, you're stuck in a situation where you just can't game, but that doesn't mean you can't have those cute and cuddly little blobs a mere glance away. That's where the PlayStation Blog comes in, as it's just posted some festive LocoRoco wallpapers for all to enjoy, which differ somewhat from those posted by the American site yesterday. Feel free to slap 'em on your computer or on your PSP. And if anyone catches you staring and asks why you're crying, ignore them because that just means they don't get it at all.
EVE Evolved: Postcards from EVE: Reader Submissions
As a tribute to EON Magazine's "Postcards from the Edge" feature, last week I started this two-part series of postcards from all around EVE Online. In last week's first part I presented a gallery full of postcards from my own travels in EVE. I then asked readers to email in any of their own screenshots that they wanted to appear as postcards. This week, I finish the series with a mixture of reader submissions and my own remaining postcards. As with last week, they're all high-resolution shots suitable to be used as widescreen backgrounds. Feel free to save them out from your browser to get them at full resolution. Thanks go to Massively readers "Mike", "Mark Pittam" and my corpmate "Retalus" for their submissions. Included are some shots of the new planets coming with the Dominion expansion in December and a lot of pictures from Sleeper space. Hope you enjoy! %Gallery-76973%
EVE Evolved: Postcards from EVE: Wish you were here!
Whether you love EVE Online or hate it, there's one thing people tend to agree on - it makes for some great screenshots. EVE has a history of players producing some amazing videos, screenshots, artwork and fiction. YouTube is filled with intense PvP action videos and over four hundred players write the stories of their travels on personal blogs. People have even created some incredible papercraft ship models. Because we all love eye candy, screenshots from EVE even make a regular appearance in Krystalle's daily MMO screenshot column "One Shots".EVE's Official magazine EON runs a regular feature called "Postcards from the Edge" where players write in with a screenshot and a short story about it. As a tribute to EON, who I wrote for before coming to Massively, this week and next I present galleries full of postcards from my own travels in EVE. They're all high-resolution shots suitable to be used as widescreen backgrounds, feel free to save them out from your browser to get them at full resolution. %Gallery-76482% Do you have a particularly awesome screenshot you'd like to see as a postcard? Email it to me at brendan.drain AT weblogsinc DOT com along with a few words describing its contents and I'll make it into a nice postcard for next week's second part of this gallery piece.
Saving the old world with wallpapers
I don't know that we've ever quite posted about this, but here you go: given that we're going to be losing old Azeroth forever (sometime in the next 12 months, if the guessing is to be believed), Too Many Annas is stepping up the wallpaper project, aiming to put together pictures of every single zone in the World of Warcraft. Before, this was just a bit of idle fun, turning some scenic views into desktop-sized files, but with the recent Cataclysm-ic news, this is almost a public service, saving these classic old zones from extinction. We've got time yet, surely, but if you like the way anything looks in Desolace or The Barrens, now's the time to screenshot it for good.TMA is even taking requests, so even if you just have a suggestion for a great view, you can send it along and it'll get into the wallpaper database. Only a matter of time until the world is completely shattered; probably a good idea to admire these old zones while we can. World of Warcraft: Cataclysm will destroy Azeroth as we know it. Nothing will be the same. In WoW.com's Guide to Cataclysm you can find out everything you need to know about WoW's third expansion. From Goblins and Worgens to Mastery and Guild changes, it's all there for your cataclysmic enjoyment.
Earthrise wallpapers show Eastern Gardens denizens and tamed mutants
Masthead Studios just got in touch with us and sent over two new wallpapers for their upcoming post-apocalyptic game Earthrise. One image shows off a group of kabuki-masked freaks denizens of the Eastern Gardens, one of the more outwardly utopian zones to be found in Earthrise's island setting of Enterra.
Snow Leopard out in September, wallpaper available now
Snow Leopard is going to be uber cheap, so there's not really any reason to not pick it up -- if you make good, regular use of your Mac, odds are that you'll also make enough use of a copy to justify the value. But even if you're not taking the $30 plunge, Macenstein has the most important part of the OS upgrade covered: the wallpaper. Just like the OS itself, Snow Leopard's wallpaper is only an incremental update from the current version (Macenstein says it looks "faster," and we can see what he means), but just in case you want to at least make your old G5's look like they're all upgraded, just "Set as Desktop Background" and there you go.Rumors that the wallpaper will actually make your computer faster (or give you back that 6GB of hard drive space that the actual upgrade will give you) are unfounded, and probably shouldn't be trusted. But then again, you never know.
Celebrate a legendary Scribblenauts moment with this wallpaper
The two aspects of Scribblenauts that get the most attention are its absolutely irresistible concept, and the robust lexicon that backs it up. But one underappreciated aspect of the game is the art. Not only is there artwork for those myriad items in the database, 5th Cell's Edison Yan has developed an eye-catching style for the game that highlights, rather than hiding, the jointed nature of the sprites. On top of that, he's given the main character a rather quirky, memorable look.Yan created this image in celebration of the vaunted "Post 217" of a NeoGAF Scribblenauts thread, in which poster "Feep" regales the forum with a tale of bringing a dinosaur through a time machine to fight robot zombies. As a result of this searingly awesome chain of events, "Post 217" has become a sort of shorthand for the infinite possibilities in Scribblenauts. As a gift to the NeoGAF community, Creative Director Jeremiah Slaczka had Yan whip this up. It's now available on IGN in wallpaper form, and we predict that it'll be on your desktop in about ten seconds.%Gallery-39784%
MyCal: custom calendars for your iPhone
Here's the question: what day of the month does next Friday land on? You pull out your iPhone, turn it on, unlock it, navigate to the Calendar and switch to Month view. Got it. March 20th. Of course, being the self-proclaimed efficiency expert that you are (isn't everybody?), you quickly decide that was way too many steps for such a simple task. If you regularly need this particular type of information, you're going to have to find an easier way. You could (A) carry around a printout of the calendar for the month, or (B) check out MyCal. MyCal is a single-purpose app from Chillix, the same developers to whom our faithful readers offered their offbeat to-do lists a while back. It allows you to pick a background -- from a wide variety of built-in images or from your own collection -- select a calendar style and set transparency levels. When you're done, it outputs a wallpaper image you can use to get a quick view of the month without even unlocking your phone. To be clear, it won't show you any appointments or tasks, just a good-looking calendar that's readily accessible. A recent update to the application fixed some issues with blurriness, and I give it two thumbs up for simplicity and usefulness. If you fit into the description in the first paragraph, you might just want to check it out. The user's guide offers a comprehensive preview, and it's available in the App Store for 99 cents (US). Chillix has built up a fairly extensive collection of iPhone apps; check out their website for some other gems.
House of the DIY: Make your own Overkill wallpaper
Even if you're already playing The House of the Dead: Overkill today, we suggest you take a few minutes off from clicking the Wiimote at zombies and click the mouse at them instead. Overkill Poster Creator, Sega's new promotional site for Headstrong Games' spinoff, is an online tool that lets users arrange official backgrounds, art, and slogans into a wallpaper image, which is then made available for download in three different sizes. All the art assets can be resized, and everything can have separate filters applied, all from a simple Flash interface. The image above is our humble effort, made in about five minutes. It wouldn't even have taken that long, except we kept trying to make funny ones and they kept coming out cool. We eventually just gave up on trying to subvert the thing and made one we actually like.%Gallery-29952%[Via GayGamer]
Wonderful Apple wallpapers to wet your whistle
Whether you've got a new Mac and you're looking to replace the tired "Aurora" background, or perhaps you just want to spice up your desktop with something a little Apple-flavored, this site's for you! Francesco Mugnai has up at his blog over 60 different Apple-focused wallpapers that he has found at various and sundry locales from around the web.Many of the wallpapers are from DeviantArt and Flickr, so if you have spent any length of time perusing Apple wallpapers from either site, then you have likely run into a couple of them. Some of these I have seen a few times before and some of these are a new take on an old favorite; but many are completely new to me. In other words they are all worth checking out and possibly adding in to the desktop wallpaper rotation.What about you, dear friends? Do you have any stand-out, Apple-related desktop imagery that you've created or found which you would like to share with others? Post some link love in the comments and pay it forward; after all, everyone loves finding new Apple stuff! My personal favorite, you ask? I suppose you will have to click through to find out.
Yippie-Kye-Aye! New Halo 3: ODST wallpapers to dress your desktop
Bungie.net has updated the Halo 3: ODST page with a pair of fresh wallpapers. Game Informer subscribers might remember these two pieces of concept art from a recent issue of the magazine. Looking to dress up your desktop with some Halo flavor? Check them out. Halo 3: ODST follows a lone soldier, crash-landed in New Mombasa. While Master Chief can be considered Superman, this ODST soldier is more comparable to John McClane. One guy with some sweet firepower versus insurmountable odds. Hopefully, he'll complain about as much as McClane did.
Doors to official Retro Game Challenge site creak open
Retro Game Challenge's official site recently opened to the public, with a design that is particularly righteous, to use appropriately '80s parlance. By using the on-screen TV remote to navigate the site, you'll be able to view the above trailer, read a synopsis of the utterly daft story, and browse screens of (some of) the games you'll have to beat to overcome the creepy Game Master Arino: games like Cosmic Gate, Guadia Quest: Feast of the Mad King, Rally King, and the very awesome-looking Star Prince. Feel free to peruse the 30 new English language shots in our gallery. Oh yes, and there are wallpapers. Very, very rad wallpapers. Wallpapers that are so unlimited in their supreme radness that they have totally replaced our self-made Josh Groban tribute background -- at least until tomorrow. %Gallery-27519%[Thanks to everyone who sent this in!]
Little apps I like for the iPhone
The iPhone can certainly make life easier on a number of levels, and that has greatly increased with the advent of the App Store. There are thousands of selections for every taste, even bad taste. In 2007 Steve Jobs told us web based apps would do the trick, but he finally relented and we all benefited from the tremendous success and variety of the App Store.So, without further ado, here are some little apps you may have missed that have made my i-life better. Backgrounds [App Store link] A nice little app that points you to large collections of wallpaper for your iPhone or iPod touch. You can select a category such as Movies or Nature, and browse away till you find something you like. When you are happy, download the image and it will show up in your camera roll. Do the usual tap, and select it as wallpaper and you are ready to go. The pictures are generally of very high quality, and are sourced from Flickr. The developers claim about 50,000 images are there for the downloading. The app is free, although some unobtrusive ads do show up on the margins of the images. There are a lot of other ways to find iPhone wallpaper, but this is quick, easy and free. I like it. Open Table [App Store link] Using your GPS (if your iPhone has one), or simply by giving your location, find the nearest restaurants that have, you guessed it, open tables. Then click on the time you want, and you have a reservation. It doesn't get any easier than that. It works in many U.S. cities, and in London, Toronto and Vancouver B.C. I gave it a go here in Southern Arizona, and found many restaurants with tables available You can set up an account at the Open Table website, but it is not required. Without an account you can select the restaurant, the time you want, and give your name, email, and phone number. Then click on 'confirm' and you are good to go. If you do sign up for a free account with Open Table, you can collect 'Dining Reward Points' when you book a meal at a member restaurant. Collect enough points and you can get some hefty discounts off your next dinner. Open Table also works on the iPod touch. Things that should be added are search by type of cuisine, and I think there should be a direct link to restaurant websites. Open Table is free. Distant Suns [App Store link] I love to star gaze, and here in Arizona we get about 300 clear nights a year. There are several nice star map programs for the iPhone, but I am very partial to Distant Suns written by Mike Smithwick. This program goes way back to a PC version in 1985, and there have been Mac ports for OS9 and now there is an OS X version. The iPhone/ iPod touch version is scaled down from the big computer versions, but has excellent graphics, location awareness, and does the math to tell you what is visible at the moment and what is not. It is an impressive way to explore the universe above you. Distant Suns is $5.99 and well worth it.
First screens and video from Blood of Bahamut
After that glorious concept art revealed for Blood of Bahamut, we've been hungry for more of Square Enix's latest, and since the website has updated, we're happy as pigs in piggy poop. Not only do we have the first two non-scanned shots of the game in our gallery below, and the first trailer after the break, but the official website has more action shots, as well as a beautiful downloadable wallpaper that features the aforementioned concept art. If Square Enix is trying to whip us into a froth for this one, well, it's working. Not that they have to do much to get us going. %Gallery-36800%
Aion enters open beta in Korea
NCsoft has just announced that the highly-anticipated Aion: The Tower of Eternity MMO will be entering open beta in Korea on November 11th of this year. Not only is this exciting news for Koreans, but also for the rest of the world, as it means our betas are drawing near. NCsoft addresses this in a recent press release: "We are currently in the process of localizing and culturalizing the game for the western market in order to reach the same level of quality that the game provides for the western world, and are in heavy planning for our testing phases in North America and Europe. We are taking the utmost care in the localization process and we're dedicated to releasing the very best product in NCsoft West territories. With the ball now rolling, expect to hear much more, and see much more out of Aion in the coming months."To help us get even more excited about this game, they've sent along 2 new videos and a ton of new wallpapers in our gallery below. The first video is a CG cinematic (second video down), and the next video is an amazing 4-minute walk through some breathtaking in-game footage. This game is obviously much more than just winged combat, as these videos will prove.%Gallery-35608%
Star Trek Online wallpapers are 75% generic, 25% gorgeous
There's been a dearth of Star Trek Online news or information these past few weeks. We've been upset about it. Cryptic just broke radio science at long last, though: four Star Trek Online wallpapers have been posted at the game site. We've got all of 'em here for you to see, but head over to the official gallery for the full breadth of resolution choices. One of them is a rare in-game glimpse at a planet surface. It looks gorgeous, although we're suddenly worried about the minimum system requirements. Hopefully those nice lighting and shadow effects will scale back for low-end desktops and notebooks. %Gallery-33932%
American PC Store update for September 4th
Wallpapers! You like them? Good, because that's all your getting in your PC Store update today. Not just one, not just two, not just (ok, that's enough - Ed). Nine entire wallpapers are now available, for your downloading pleasure. That's nine whole images, that Sony has uploaded to the store. How's that for a quality update? Valhalla Knights 2 wallpaper (x4) Hot Shots Golf Open Tee 2 wallpaper (x2) PSP Wallpapers Series #2 (x3)
Take a visual tour of EverQuest II: The Shadow Odyssey's new dungeons
EverQuest II's The Shadow Odyssey expansion is set to launch this November. In addition to heritage quests and the shard reward system, the expansion will add an EverQuest classic -- the dungeon of Guk. And in the days leading up to the launch, EQ2 players will get to start exploring another dungeon: Veksar.To build up anticipation, SOE is rolling out articles, screenshots, and concept art related to the two new dungeons. For Guk it put together a series of lore-oriented postcards and images explaining what the place is all about, culminating in some concept art wallpapers. The Veksar article is a little more traditional in its presentation, but the substance is all there. We've put together in a gallery all the images from both of those tours.SOE also released concept art for guild halls, which will be implemented soon. Guild halls date back to Meridian 59 and text MUDs before it, but for some reason they've been out of vogue in the 21st century.%Gallery-30866% Well met, fellow Norrathian! Make sure to check out all of our coverage of the next EverQuest II expansion, The Shadow Odyssey as well as Seeds of Destruction, the next expansion to EverQuest!
Download the Secret Agent Clank fan pack
PSU members had a chance to show off their artistic side by crafting some posters for the PSP-exclusive Secret Agent Clank. The developers at High Impact and Sony took a look at their creations, and chose their favorite ones. The best entries were bundled into a Fan Pack, which includes all sorts of avatars, PSP themes and wallpapers for fans to enjoy. Secret Agent Clank fan packDownload (2.74MB)