Untitled Page Win Customize.com Magazine November 2006    What's in this issue GUI Championships Wraps Up WindowBlinds Beta For Vista ObjectDock 1.5 Released Skinner of the Month Beta Test WinCustomize 2007 November Skinning Highlights More Premium Content Available Articles of Note WinCustomize Sponsored Podcasts GUI Championships Wraps Up The end of Novemb...

The year is 2226 and the Epsilon Quadrant has an uneasy peace between the three major powers in the sector -- the Terran Alliance, the Drengin Empire and the League of Worlds. The war, intrigue, and destruction that follows came as both a surprise and yet preordained. This is their story. My role in this is to act as the observer for the AI.  How they play, are the super abilities in Dark Avatar working? How are they balanced?  The goal of the super abilities is that they be exploit...

A couple of years ago I wrote this blog about my own personal origins . In various debates on JU I know I come across as a total jerk. And there is a reason for that -- I am a jerk.  I'm not proud of being a jerk, it's just something I've come to realize over the years.  There are worse things than being a jerk though. But what exactly is a jerk? A jerk, like most epitaphs, is someone who is not conforming to some rule of our society.  As a society, we have an unwritten set ...

Each civilization is really unique at doing something. The super abilities are:   Super Diplomat . Civilization is able to secure much better deals through negotiation that other civilizations. Super Dominator . When they go to war, they receive a group of Corvette class ships. The number they receive is based on their military power. Super Organizer . When they are attacked, all races of the same ethical alignment will come to their aid. Super Warrior . W...

I'm in the process of updating the Galactic Civilizations II manual for Dark Avatar. The first manual was, as some know, written primarily by Tom Chick. The good stuff was by him and the whacky humor stuff by me. Well, because time is short, I'm doing the updates myself so there will be more whacky humor stuff this time around. Here's the description of the races in the rought draft.   The Terran Alliance . The humans. Or at least, humans from a United Earth in the 2...

In many Islamic countries, intentionally murdering innocents in the name of Islam is considered acceptable by significant portions of the population. By significant, I mean near majorities or outright majorities. Read the full report for the horrifying full stats.

The idea behind the Epic Generator feature of Dark Avatar is pretty straight forward: Turn your game into readable story complete with HTML and images showing how your empire grew.  But implementation, woha.  By far, this has been the most expensive single feature of Dark Avatar requiring an immense logging system to put together keys that can later be turned into a story.  And after 5 months of work, I have a feeling it may end up getting cut from Dark Avatar. &nb...

I'm weary. Weary to the marrow of my bones. It's been a long time since I've been this fatigued.  Part of it is obviously getting this beta out but things have been really busy elsewhere with Windows Vista ready. This whole year really is absurd. But November to January in particular is just out of control.  Windows Vista ships in January and is already starting to perkle out there.  Nintendo Wii this month. Playstation 3 this month.  There's just SOOO much going on that t...

The first public beta of Galactic Civilizations II: Dark Avatar is nearly ready to go out. Now we're in the final testing phases for getting something that functions. It's not done but it's definitely playable. A good portion of the challenge has to do with packaging. There's a LOT of stuff in there and we have to make sure that you can play Dark Avatar or Dread Lords together which means making sure the directory structure is in place. What I'm about to show you is a brief walkthru of the...

I can't say I'm happy that Republicans have lost the house of representatives.  I went out and voted today. My votes tended to be for Republicans overall. I don't consider myself to be a Republican but given the choices, I'm going to vote for the people who come closest to representing my views as long as they have worked within a certain threshold of what my expectations are. Since I'm in Michigan, in Wayne County, that basically means that the incumbants are Democrats anyway. Nation...

In the classic book, Atlas Shrugged, the government begins a program in which wealth is distributed based on need rather than merit. This requires that wealth is confiscated by those who are producing it to be handed to those who aren't.  The more productive a citizen you are, the less of what you produce you get to keep. The less productive you are, the more you receive. Eventually, the producers of America go on strike and the country collapses. The points made in the bo...

I have a lot of friends. But I try to keep the number of close friends down to a very small group. So what does close friendship mean to me? 1) I am always glad to hear of the success of my close friends. I take personal pride (for no rational reason) when my friends are doing well. The better and more successful they are, the happier I am about it. Their victory is my victory. Their good fortune is mine. 2) I try to be very loyal to my close friends. I keep their confidence....

They say you shouldn't talk about politics, religion, or money with friends. Naturally, I violate all 3 rules regularly.  I have some friends I've learned not to discuss politics with while there are others I can heartily talk about politics. Here are some of the rules I've come up with over the years. #1 DO NOT discuss politics with people who feel that a political disagreement is tantamount to a moral failing on your part.  There are people out there who believe that a disagree...

One of the many reasons I'm not a fan of Bush is that he continually allows his opponents to re-define his own objectives.  How many times has the "Mission Accomplished" photo-op been thrown back in his face? And yet, what was the mission that was accomplished? Deposing Saddam Hussein.  That was the mission. That was precisely what the war was about - to remove a dictator in a critical part of the world that was an open enemy of the United States. Period. But now, "success" is b...

Here is what is new in Galactic Civilizations II 1.4 over 1.31. 1.4 will be known as 1.4X on Stardock Central and in game. + Initial Colony buildings have less maintainence. + New colonies start out with a population cap of 6 instead of 5. + Farms provide less food. + Each citizen provides more tax income than previous. + Morale buildings have been increased in benefit but techs to get to them cost substantially more (ex: Virtual Reality Center now provides a 40% morale improve...