matt’s

I’m going to move this blog to a new server soon. This is particularly because I want to consolidate all my servers and services. For years, I had a little barebone running in my kitchen where I had my personal Subversion repository etc. setup, but taking noise, connection speed and power consumption into consideration, a [...]

Google has announced the second Android Developer Challenge and I’m seriously considering taking part. They have ten different categories with three attractive prizes each and one overall category with three even more attractive prizes. Given the facts that there were only 1788 submissions last year, that I have already gathered some experience in mobile device [...]

Want!

I’ve written plenty of book reviews, so why not try a little music review? This time, though, it’s a pretty objective one.
I love live music, I really I do. But I don’t really like German music. And normally I don’t have exceptions to rules. But… well… here’s one: If you ever get your hands on [...]

Since I enjoyed this beautiful spring Saturday, I thought I could blog something personal once again. Sarah and I finally visited the Schokoladenmuseum (Chocolade Museum). It’s one of the places in Cologne every tourist guide recommends, but eventually I didn’t find it that spectacular. We took a tour around and it was interesting to learn [...]

(via fscklog)

…one sophisticated opinion on the whole “killer game” discussion which is evolving again due to the recent killing spree tragedy in Germany.
Glücklicherweise haben Politiker bis jetzt darauf verzichtet, ‘Killerspiele’ zu verbieten. Nicht Spiele machen Jugendliche zu Tätern. Es sind Defizite in der Familie und in ihrem Umfeld, die sie in die Welt der Spiele und [...]

While I’m at it, I could also post a great wallpaper I use on my Mac.

Comes with multiple color themes.

People seem to like posting their favorite plugins and software these days, so I thought I could add my little list of useful stuff here, too. I’m open to suggestions for other good extensions, of course.
Here’s my list of Firefox AddOns I am using actively:

Adblock Plus
Firebug
A powerful debugging aid for web developers. Comes with e.g. [...]

It’s amazing to see that there are still so many fans active, even after 25 years after the original show was aired.

(Found in the German Tripods fan forum.)
I’m still looking for a keyframe- or bone-animated lowpoly version of a Tripod. If you ever come across one, let me know.

One of my favorite game projects which started as an indie effort (afaik) is currently available for 75% off at Steam. Should I? Should I not?

Now that ELFrun is finished and I’m on holidays, I’ve finally some more time to surf all the (indie) gamedev pages in my bookmarks again. One particular posting catched my attention and I nearly had to shed a tear when I heard Alec Holowka, one of the two people behind the highly respected Aquaria, playing [...]

mattin posted at mac-tv.de and one particular comment gives a quite comprehensive feedback. Also, there’s a pictured review on a Swiss site, apfelkraft.ch.
Oh, and btw., version 1.5 is in the store and we’re working on version 1.6.
Did I mention the ELFrun review on iphonegamenetwork.com?

mattin found ELFrun featured on “Englishtwist’s” Christmas Countdown for December 3rd. If you want to see the whole ELFrun intro video (because you don’t have an iPod/iPhone, of course, otherwise you would indeed buy the game to watch it), have a look at his footage starting at about minute 4 :-)
There’s another video from “ipodtouchlab” [...]

mattin created a new video which shows ELFrun from starting it up on the iPhone to finishing a level (and most of a bonus level). It’s one of the easier levels at the beginning (level 5), so there are not many obstacles and the speed is still pretty low. I guess playing a higher level [...]

ELFrun is available in the AppStore. Just follow this link.

And now, dear colleagues, please spread the word! Feel free to use one of the shots mattin posted and do some advertising. Greatly appreciated!

I nearly shed a tear when mattin finally made it after 12 hours of struggling with code signing and stuff. Imagine that: a 3D artist builds, signs and deploys a whole C++ application using XCode and command line tools by himself. I couldn’t do something like that the other way round. I’m really proud to [...]

The ELFRUN developers are fighting for the highscore during their last tests with the game. mattin, here’s my reply.
Now I’m stuck in level 20.

Since mattin has let the cat out of the bag, here’s what we’ve worked on in the past weeks.

Head over to dermattin for more.

I didn’t talk to my girlfriend very much lately. I didn’t read many blogs. I didn’t watch any movies. I didn’t breathe much fresh air. I didn’t use my PC for anything more than listening to music or fetching mails. I didn’t sleep much more than four hours the last two weeks or so. I [...]