So I’ve been crazy excited for iOS 7 to arrive and today at 11AM (Mountain Time) it did! I had no problems downloading and installing it on my iPhone 5, but so far I’m having issues with my iPad 4. It downloaded the update but when I try to install it it says ‘software update unavailable’.
Anyway, I love the new look and feel of everything and the way it switches between apps now is awesome. I’m particularly in love with iTunes Radio. I love the design and I’ve been listening to ‘Ra Ra Riot Radio’ for the last hour and have discovered more amazing music than I ever have on Pandora and Spotify. I’m pretty certain I’m going to end up subscribing to iTunes Match as a result.
I don’t have much else to say right now, but I just LOVE the look:
I’ve recently started to play around with streaming to Twitch in the typical ‘Let’s Play’ video format, and I find it adds a bit of enjoyment to playing games. Even though I know for a fact no one is watching my streams it still feels different to be playing in front of a “potential” (however unlikely) audience, whether it being someone watching the live stream or watching the recorded video on YouTube later.
I’m using OBS to stream and record my videos locally. I may put together a sort of tutorial video in the future for those who want to see exactly what the process looks like (it’s not incredibly difficult, but it may not be common sense either). Anyway, for whatever reason the actual stream on Twitch of this video was pretty choppy and ugly looking. I was downloading a few things on Steam and on my Xbox so I’m hoping that’s the culprit and next time the stream will look better.
For now, enjoy my first “Let’s Play” video for Dead Island, and feel free to follow me on Twitch [http://www.twitch.tv/jdh5153] (I’ll follow back).
The mic audio needs adjusted, I didn’t realize it was that low until after I uploaded it to YouTube.
I am! Took advantage of Gamestop’s 30% extra trade in value toward GTA V and traded in 16 games that I never play for $95. Covered GTA V and walked out with Red Dead Redemption and a $20 Steam Wallet card.
The 2013 NFL season kicked off Thursday night in Denver with the defending Super Bowl champions, the Baltimore Ravens, taking on Peyton Manning and the Denver Broncos. Unfortunately the game did not go well for my Baltimore Ravens.
Today I’m enjoying my NFL Sunday Ticket online pass I received from Amazon’s Madden 25 Anniversary Edition ($99). It was well worth it as Madden 25 is in my opinion the best Madden game yet, and then $40 extra for the 2013 season of NFL Sunday ticket on PC and mobile? Winning!
So I’m going to crack open a beer and continue enjoying football. While you’re here, check out this crazy fumble / TD in Detroit:
So I picked up Diablo III on its PC launch day and played through it on Normal and enjoyed it, however it wasn’t as fun as I wanted it to be because I was never really playing with people I knew like I did with Diablo I and II and often played with random strangers. Today I picked up Diablo III on its console launch day for the 360 and this time I’m much more excited.
The console version of Diablo III features 4 person local co-op. You can fire it up, hand out 3 other controllers and sit on the couch drinking beers as you hack and slash your way through thousands of demons together. This is the way a Diablo game should be played.
So far I’ve played a bit of it online with random people just to get a feel for the console controls and I’m absolutely in love. No more hovering over a keyboard, I can kick back in a recliner and play through Diablo with a controller in hand on the big screen. That is what I loved about Torchlight on the 360 and I’m glad Blizzard has finally brought Diablo to consoles (again).
Diablo III on the 360 plays quite well so far. I’ve never played a wizard character before so I created one tonight and it’s quite easy to play. The aim assist works wonderfully and it’s not difficult at all to hit your intended target with spells. Attacks / skills are mapped to the right trigger and face buttons and you can flick the right stick to dodge attacks and it all feels very comfortable and natural while playing.
Some of the most fun couch co-op games from my high school years were Baldur’s Gate: Dark Alliance 1 and 2 on the original Xbox and I’m quite excited to relive that kind of gaming experience with Diablo III on the Xbox 360.
Sunday night we saw Three Days Grace with Otherwise at the Knitting Factory in Boise and it was an awesome time. I’ve seen Three Days Grace a handful of times before in Pennsylvania, but this was my first concert since being stationed in Idaho. Otherwise was really awesome to see live and they put on an energetic performance that worked perfectly to excite the crowd for Three Days Grace.
Three Days Grace played an amazing show, which was a relief because I wasn’t sure how I’d like Matt Walst (the bassist’s brother who happens to front My Darkest Days) who took over on vocals after Adam left the band. He performed their songs superbly and put on an incredible show.
Many people are proud to call themselves “cable cutters” and as time goes by it seems more and more are cutting cable. Netflix, Hulu and Crackle are great services but for awhile now Vanessa and I have been wanting to get cable. Sure there was plenty to watch on Netflix, but it was always a chore deciding what to watch. It would be nice to be able to throw something on, or channel surf.
We started looking into DISH and it seemed like the best option. So far it seems like we’ve made a great choice. We got the Hopper in the living room and the Joey receiver in the bedroom. The Hopper features three tuners, so we can live TV in the living room and the bedroom while DVR’ing one show, or watch live TV in one room while DVR’ing two concurrent shows. It also has the Primetime Anytime feature which only uses one tuner to DVR ABC, CBS, NBC and FOX all at once during primetime.
One of the most important features of DISH for me is the Dish Anywhere feature via the Hopper with Sling. With the hopper connected to our WiFi I can login to my account from anywhere and watch live TV or any show we’ve DVR’ed. It’s pretty cool to be able to login and watch anything when you’re on the go, or even over at a friends house.
The video is kind of low quality right now…Will have a 720p version up soon.
Below are some pictures and brief overviews of some of Dish’s features.
A look at the three tuners, watching CNN on the living room TV, Comedy Central on my iPad and recording Pink Floyd: The Wall.
With the Dish Anywhere app for the iPad you can watch any channel live and even program your DVR, from anywhere.
Watching a show from our DVR on the iPad
The Dish explorer app is another great iPad app which is essentially a TV guide app that’s socially connected. As you can see from the Facebook icon it will display shows your Facebook friends like (the number next to the icon shows how many friends like the given show).
Gumballs Plays Games 