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PixelJunk Monsters

PixelJunk Monsters, my beloved.

PixelJunk Monsters Ultimate HD PS Vita

early am 2013-08-24-065537
Early morning screen.
daytime 2013-08-26-115024
Day screen.
late afternoon early evening 2013-09-02-181723
Evening Screen.
night 2013-09-09-205522
Night screen.

On my PS Vita as Lock Screen (for a long time now, even today.) Screenshots from longer ago, and today.

Screenshots of Screenshots proving dates. FWIW.

Originally screenshot taken May 11, 2012 PixelJunk Monsters on my PS Vita screensaver
Originally screenshot taken May 11, 2012 PixelJunk Monsters on my PS Vita screensaver
Originally screenshot taken May 28, 2016 PixelJunk Monsters on my PS Vita screensaver
Originally screenshot taken May 28, 2016 PixelJunk Monsters on my PS Vita screensaver

I first saw PixelJunk Monsters in June 2009, on the PlayStation PS3 Store. I bought it June 18, 2009. I loved playing it frequently, did everything over and over except for the challenge levels, which I finally tackled to get the trophies in 2013. PixelJunk Monsters Deluxe on PSP which was an absolute buy ASAP available. Waited and waited for it to come to PS Vita natively, Played PJM Deluxe PSP on my PS Vita again (I deleted save files to start over how many times, between PSP and PS Vita?)

Finally PixelJunk Monsters Ultimate HD was out for PS Vita. Even came to Windows (which was a distressing time for me, I loved the exclusivity of it on PSN, kept it neat and intact. But the point is DoubleEleven didn’t drop the ball on PS Vita, it’s great there, can be played classically, just buttons, hurray! Windows, just not suitable for a classic PJM lover.)

I know it also was distorted as a FB game, horrible, something I know of but no experience with.

Now it comes down to: I’ve wanted PJM on PS4 all along, no hint of it coming to PS4, and what do my weary eyes behold in an email, near the bottom, PixelJunk Monsters Wii U. WHAT???!!!!!!!

So I bought it immediately and, of course, it’s a great game. You can play it on your TV, using the Wii pad buttons or set the screen to mirror the tv, and play it right there on the Wii pad. You can touch the screen to move, touch a tree, etc. Touch or buttons when mirrored. I like button play entirely still.

Another nifty thing is setting the Wii pad to display the Tiki Hut inside. Buy towers without having to move Tikiman to the hut. Great when you are playing on the TV.

I’ve been mostly playing mirrored, if the TV is in use by something else, no problem, if not, then my game is on the big screen for anyone else to see. I can’t look at both, my near-sighted eyes appreciate the Wii pad mirroring, most especially.

The way you take screenshots on Wii U is useful, odd, but useful. Home button>open MiiVerse>save screenshot>continue using miiverse>choose photo>make a new post with it in your PlayJournal. I haven’t always “saved screenshot” … often just PlayJournal it right off. Trying to not do that if I really want to have the picture in more than just PlayJournal now though.

Get- Medieval-Challenge-5-27-16-Wii-U-WVW69jPkQTUNGZ2BYQ
Get Medieval Challenge -Wii U – May 27, 2016

At any rate, there’s one screenshot, Get Medieval Challenge on Wii U.

What I do want is more though, more levels, islands, etc. release another “encore’ like pack for every version please! Q-Games/Double Eleven and please release a platinum fully HD packed with great trophies and challenges on PS4! Pretty Please!

Note the one difference from PS Vita PixelJunk Monsters Ultimate HD to Wii U PixelJunk Monsters Ultimate HD … Ice Tower … oh my, on PS Vita (as well as PS3 and PSP versions) it’s only ground monsters whom it targets. On Wii U it also targets flying monsters. Mistake? Or on purpose? I don’t know, but it sure makes difference on the Wii U. Which brings to mind whether or not difficulty ratings were changed anywhere. Questions.

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Dual-Booting and Data Reclaiming

I have a Seagate GoFlex Desktop 3TB drive, I wrote a post about it previously to this one.

I was able to get a live Ubuntu DVD going which proved via Testdisk that I did have harvest-able data on it. That just wouldn’t work on my big Desktop computer though.

I finally just bit the bullet and went to the HP All in one in the kitchen, shrunk the main partition, and got Ubuntu 14 to dual boot on it. It’s not great, Ubuntu is scrunched onto the computer. It’s great to take bits of my data via Testdisk though.

I actively have to copy files that will go onto the measly 5gb partition for Home. Then once there I have to chmod 777 them so I can copy then delete or just plain move them immediately.

I’m only copying my HD Videos right now. I did an entire years worth, not watching all of them, but a lot of them to verify they were OK. They are all OK.

Occasionally I have to re-copy from the Seagate GoFlex data, so there is some kind of problem with the drive.

At any rate, the drive was fine last week, and then one day suddenly not.

I’d be so happy to get another external NEW drive. Bad timing, is all I can say. Not a penny to throw at it.

I did install STEAM there on Ubuntu today. It was a horrible process, then come to find out Terraria isn’t Linux capable. Oh well.

That HP All in one computer has a problem that didn’t show up the last two days in Ubuntu, but did today. Windows loses wi-fi. It’s not an easy fix, you have to set it to troubleshoot connections and it’s a pain.

In Ubuntu it happened, no wi-fi suddenly. I right-clicked the wi-fi indicator at the top right of the screen, unticked “enable wifi” then reticked it. Bingo. Wi-Fi radio working and online again. Much easier. But Ubuntu isn’t going to be our main computer. It just can’t hold a candle to Windows ‘any flavour’ still. I find that all Linux flavours are good for troubleshooting and changing things …. hard drives, data corruption, rooting devices, etc.  I enjoy using Windows and when I want/need something else, it works out.

As it goes, I used to use Fedora, dual-booting. I am trying to figure out if I can get something like that going on my now older HP Envy 4-1115dx UEFI boot and no HP Recovery partition any more. Then I’d have more use for that machine.

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Funny: How I View Operating Systems

It’s funny how things go. Not so long ago in the past I was using Fedora to dual boot and then finally gave up on it. I’ve never tried it with Win 8 at all, and don’t want to. The thing about Linux is that I lastly had experience with Ubuntu’s newest main version, and mostly purely did not like it.

What did I like about Linux via Fedora? Making things work, bleeding edge keeps you on your toes. I had more solid feeling OS with Fedora 12 and 13 that I last had used, than I ever felt with Ubuntu.

Why? Using Terminal and Su suits me, but I don’t even know what to do without looking it up. I am good at figuring it out, but don’t want the hand holding of Ubuntu at all. it felt flaky and every machine I ever put it on had to be re-installed over and over every so often. Not the same with Fedora. FWIW sometime same machines. I just felt Ubuntu was flaky and not for me.

So why do I like Windows? I just use the computer and updates are automatic. Who knows. It’s just funny.

No, that’s not it. Win 7 and Win 8 are solid computing systems. Auto-updating is good in such an environment.

Ubuntu is not solid, it’s flaky, that’s just my own experience and I find it funny. 🙂

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Sound Problem in Windows fix

I finally figured out my stupid computer sound problem. Windows thinks there is some kind of communications device asking for control or something and suddenly, for no reason, the sound volume goes down. You can’t quite figure it out. I have my computer with the problem being a Windows 8 Pro new build (by me) and it had several HDMI enabled sound plugins, but that’s nuts, as I only have plugged into one of those HDMI port with my montitor on this install of Win 8.

I uninstalled all of the extra hdmi devices. So I had a few things here and there that were confusing. Mostly I do think it came with the built in sound on the board, a build in HDMI port for the cpu, using 2 video cards with HDMI ports in SLI mode.

I’ve got my monitor plugged into the first video card.

I have a Razor Black Widow keyboard. It has headphone and microphone plugs. Plug into the back of the computer and there on the keyboard you can plug in really easily.

My motherboard has back plugs, but my case also has front controls tied into that sound. For some reason the back just wasn’t working for me. It was something I figured out, to get sound out of the keyboard port. But in my computer it made no sense. No headphone profile.

So I had disabled everything but the one HDMI profile that I was using. Then in Device Manager I scanned for hardware changes. That put back the regular things. Thank God!

So I then made HDMI default.

Then I got my nice headphones, plugged them into the front headphone jack on the computer. In the playback devices window I then made that the default device.

OK!

So when I unplug, Monitor takes over the sound.

But the reduction in volume was still happening. That’s on the Sound window, Communications tab.

Windows can automatically adjust the volume of different sounds when you are using your PC to place or receive telephone calls.

When Windows detects communications activity:

  • Mute all other sounds
  • Reduce the volume of other sounds by 80%
  • Reduce the volume of other sounds by 50%
  • Do nothing

To fix the sound thing, select the last option. My was on the second, reducing my sound by 80% for seeming no reason on my end. I had no incoming or outgoing anything going on.

So now it’s set to “DO nothing” and if I want to use Skype or something, then I can control the volume myself manually. Mostly though, I’ll just be using my actual phone. FWIW.

So this isn’t really a fix. I just am using that word since it seems to fix it. It’s just setting the control to nothingness. I don’t know what Windows is thinking, it’d be nice to fix it, but that’s a whole different thing that will only happen if I want to figure it out to keep my music on when making or taking a call… uh, not gonna happen. So forget it. Manual only. Since I know when I want it to go down, and Windows doesn’t know at all.

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Windows Live Writer Test

I just upgraded my old desktop using a Media Center XP disc I have. It’s not on the machine it used to be on, and it activated and validates just fine. I call it an upgrade, though it was a clean install, not really much of an upgrade, same OS, just a better flavour.

I am testing WLW to show myself and my children why this is or isn’t good to use.

I have used it before. It’s OK. It’s different, and I hope they will see it’s beneficial-ness … not be such a “blank slate” like the browser web blogging interface is.

I’ve used this and other blog clients, but usually just use the WP interface connected to each blog I have. Anyhow, this is not my main computer. I only have a laptop, have for a long time, my desktop being relegated to being the old old old machine that HAS to be the family machine and as the children get older it’s getting older faster than them. Other old laptops we have had are dying off as well, and that makes this old desktop even more precious and delicate.

It doesn’t have it’s own monitor anymore either. It’s either connected to the big flat screen tv in the living room, or the small one in my bedroom. Neither place is really good for it. FWIW it’s just so important to keep it working, it has all my stuff archived on it and I’m down to one working disc again, and so this windows install is on the same disc, different partitions, but it’s still trouble. I’ve had trouble with every hard drive in this machine the past couple of years, no matter how old the drive is it just …. augh! Not again! My stuff … my hubby promised through Christmas present 2010 to let me build my dream desktop. Oh well, it’s not to be. I have the shell (case) and data that is in jeopardy.

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Testing Using Windows Live Writer to post here

I am trying Windows Live Writer on my Windows 7 laptop. I have used a similar product some years ago, but always seemed to prefer publishing directly from my blog admin section. I decided it’s worth it to try it out again to gain perspective on how different it is now, and how beneficial it might be to use sometimes. I do see the value of it in case I want to post something on a private blog & the same thing or something similar on one of my public blogs.

 

Smoky

 

Picture added via Windows Live Writer. I chose Borders, Instant Photo ¦ this is a kitten of a feral cat that has adopted us. Smoky is nearly 1 year old (Apr 20). We had the kittens in our house since they were very young, they were born under our house. We tried to find homes for them but couldn’t. We got them all spayed/neutered in January, they have flea collars and 1 yr. Rabies and now are living in our backyard. Prince, Aurora, Marie, Smoky, and Tiger Lily. Smoky is pictured above. They love it outside more than being inside. We had to let them out since we have 5 fully adopted cats in the house and can’t keep 5 more in the house, and that feral cat has a new litter of which I am trying to keep at least 2 of, keeping them very much house cats from birth since their mother tamed enough to bring her into the basement & laundry room to birth and raise them. We are keeping her in, if we can, to get her spayed soon. The kittens are a month old today. So cute!

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Last.fm dump & Libre.fm import

I looked at the issue of the Python methodology of getting my Last.fm profile data to my Libre.fm profile today. I can happily say I have completed this task already.

I followed the instructions on the Wiki about it. It wasn’t as straightforward as that, since I use Windows Vista. Most of the instructions are geared towards Linux users. I got the correct Python install for Windows. That was easy enough. Then when that was installed I had to use cmd to set the path to Python, to make it easier to use. That much I got easily.

Then came the understanding of how to run a Python script, which I eventually did get going, the lastscrape.py which is the first part of the job, the getting of the information from last.fm. That was a bit heady, all that info streaming in the small black cmd window. I was mostly frazzling myself over what was to come, the worst part, the “deleting duplicate entries” deal. I haven’t done this sort of work before, and doing it from instructions not really meant for Windows users was frustrating, and searching the web for help, as directed from the libre.fm wiki, had me still not knowing what to do. I finally gave up on that angle and searched for a Python script to do the job. I found something, and I fiddled around with getting it to run, and finally did. It re-ordered the results, but that didn’t seem to matter, as everything uploaded fine, but I can’t tell on my profile if the dates go back to 2005 or not.

My biggest struggle after the duplicates thing was to get import.py to work. I ended up having to type the full path to the script and to the file, I guess whatever I did in the beginning I made work to make it easier then, but that was pre-29,313 tracks dumping from last.fm, I hadn’t written it all down, as I SHOULD have, thus I can’t be sure as to what I did that was different beforehand.

I did get the import.py to work though, it went fine for 7,386 tracks, then errored. I found a blank line in the file right there. The only thing I had on hand to open the file and jump to a specific line was Firefox (view source) where the “jump to line …” command is available. It worked out fine. I copied the remainder and put it into a new text file, and gave it a new name, then started the Python import script again. It works for 16,198 tracks, then hiccupped again, but this time I couldn’t find anything in the file where it stopped, that seemed to indicate anything … so whatever. I just did what I did before, copied the remainder of the file that wasn’t uploaded yet into a new file with a new name and re-started the Python import script. That part was 5,729 tracks.

The total tracks that uploaded to Libre.fm were 29,313. The dump included a couple of days of multiscrobbling, so I deleted those from the top of the dump before deleting dupes and importing it to Libre.fm.

Overall:

  • Last.fm reports that I have 29,817 track listens.
  • Libre.fm reports that I have 29,359 track listens.

    • That’s a difference of 458 tracks. I’m not sure if it’s real or not. Absolutely my top several artist show the biggest discrepancies, on last.fm my The Cure listens is at 4,057 while the same group at libre.fm is 3,985 listens, for instance.

    I figure I’ll make a comparison chart for myself tomorrow. It’s just one of those weird things I like doing, charting things. I used to make index cards of my last.fm stuff as it changed week by week. In the old days I’d keep lists of songs on the radio, and their ranking with the weekly top whatever shows. It’s cool to look at data that changes. I guess it’s not everyone’s thing, to be so into it, I have to admit that I’m overly into it. FWIW, so I’m tyring to push myself into some kind of coding stuff, learn something new & useful on the computer, as I’ve been wanting to, but just haven’t. This little exercise in Python scripting use had awakened my PHP understanding wishes, my desire to use SSH into my websites but haven’t done it, setting up a dual-boot with Linux on the second boot portion … being able to write programs for solutions to things I’d like is what I want, to make a nice script that would take my rockbox .scrobbler.log and submit it to as many services as I want easily. That would be great. How about things to aide putting music on a player, moving certain data, solving wishes and desires in how things work. Not waiting for others to do it.

    I’m there. I guess so since I put myself on libre.fm the day I truly looked at it, and got myself multiscrobbling that very day, and just a couple of days later I’ve gotten my data moved to the new service, while it remains at last.fm, I can multiscrobble as long as I want to. I just need to get my rockbox problem solved, so that I can multiscrobble. I made myself not look into that, to write this tonight instead. Which is good, since tomorrow some of the fuzzy details right now would be only even fuzzier.