New Strategy I found out about a new (err… the article was dated 1993, so I guess it's not so new) strategy when playing the normal Type A game: start from level 9. I've always known the value of the lines is dependent on the current level, but it's always been my custom to start from level 0.Apparently, when starting from level 9 you must aquire 90 lines before the game moves to level 10 (which makes the game more difficult). In contrast, when starting from level 0 you move up a level every 10 lines or so and the value of the lines isn't worth nearly as much. I figured it was more beneficial to rack up as many Tetris's as you can while the pieces were moving slow, even though you're sacraficing points. I've heard stories of people posting 300,000+ scores using this strategy. One of over 500,000, but I'm not too sure I believe that one. I'm definately going to give this one a try.
New Tetris Record! By far the best video game ever made was Tetris. It's a game so simple, yet so complex. Not reliant on killer graphics or bleeding edge hardware, but on a timeless concept. As such, it is a game that cannot be beaten and will never be mastered, offering countless hours of fun. Or, in my case, over 15 years of it!There have been a lot of variants of the classic over the years. Some made for console systems, computers and PDA's, and I've even seen some made for calculators. All of these fall short, however, of the version designed for Nintendo's original Gameboy. As many of you may recall, this was the first game offered for the Gameboy back in 1989; it was included in the package when you bought the system. I highly doubt that Nintendo realised then that would be giving away the best game they (or anyone else for that matter) would ever produce. It'd be like Microsoft including Halo with the Xbox! I received my Gameboy Christmas day 1989 and I remember, for that day at least, it was the only game I had to play (as I couldn't get to the store to get anymore since they were all closed for the holiday). I must have sat around all day playing that thing, even though I was terrible at it! Back then, before I knew anything about strategy, I was lucky to break 1000 points (on the Type A game). Then my older cousin got a Gameboy and enjoyed playing Tetris as much as I did. He enlightened to the ways of the Tetri (I just made that word up by the way, it means, "one who plays Tetris"). He showed me how playing for Tetris's (I didn't make that word up) was the way of the champion. Almost instantly I was able to break 10,000, and was soon after hitting the 100,000 mark. I began to practice regularly and even kept track of my hi scores. To this day I scramble for a pen when the game concludes and I think I may have set a new record; there's something about that that just doesn't cease to be exciting. I realise that I'm not actually breaking a world record or anything, nor will I win a prize - hell, to be honest no one has ever cared about me breaking a Tetris record. But it gives me further confidence that <sarcasm> I am the best Gameboy Tetris player in the world </sarcasm> :P I can confidently say this for two reasons: a) I've never actually met anyone who keeps records of their scores to the extent that they can discredit my own records, and b) I don't think there are many (okay, any) people in the entire world to give a shit about a game that came out 15 years ago (or at least as much of a "shit" as I do). But alas, that has never deterred me… And now for the point of this post: last night I broke a Tetris record! A record that stood for over 10 years! I was able to score 9,198 points on the Type B game, beating my old record set in 1994 by all of 69 points. If you're wondering why this is such a big deal, read on… The "Type B" game in Tetris is a little different than traditional Tetris (known as "Type A" on Gameboy). Under the normal Tetris, the objective is to acquire as many lines as you can, thereby racking up points, but increasing the difficulty of the game as you do so. In Type B, however, it's the opposite: once you get 25 lines the game is over, and you remain on the same level for the entire game (it doesn't get more difficult as you acquire lines); thus, there is a finite limit to the number of points you can score. For reasons beyond the scope of this post, once you get a score above 8,400 you're beginning to come close to this maximum. So back in 1994, when I obtained a score of 9,129 I was pretty confident that I'd played the "perfect" game. As such, for the next several years I didn't play Type B at all. Then, for some strange reason, a couple nights ago I decided to give it another try. It had been so long I'd almost forgotten how to play under Type B rules! I quickly got my bearings back and realised just how difficult it was to reach the level I'd set back in 1994. You really do have to play a better than perfect game to get above 9,000 (that's 7 Tetris's in a row with a ton of drop points to boot). But after several tries I did it :) There were no crowds or TV cameras or post game interviews, but it was still some exciting stuff, believe you me! Now onto the ever elusive 9,200 club.
Mailing Woes I've normally had good times with the post office (USPS that is). Over the past few years, I've sent all sorts of stuff to all sorts of places. But recently, I got a chance to see the darker side of this organization.Before I left New York I mailed a bunch of stuff that was in my apartment; random crap really, but enough to fill up one medium sized box and two small ones. When I took it to the post office, the lady said it should be to Pasadena in a week to 10 days - fair enough. When I arrived in Pasadena 9 days later, I was surprised to see that only 1 of the boxes had made it. Usually the post office says 10 days, but usually delivers in like 3. Not this time. The next day my second small box arrived, but the medium was still MIA. At first I didn't think anything of it. Maybe the hurricanes had disrupted their service. Or maybe the Labour Day holiday threw them off. But as the days passed by, and then the weeks, I started to suspect something wasn't quite right. Then out of nowhere I go home yesterday for lunch only to find a beaten, battered, war-torn medium sized box at my door. Three weeks after I'd given it (and $30) to the post office, they'd finally delivered. There are a couple things I've learned from this experience:
Origins of The Report The RomeReport was something I came up with as a freshman at RPI. When I left for college, there were a lot of people telling me to stay in touch. I figured what better way to do that than with a news letter; thus, in the spirit of the RobbReport, the RomeReport was born.My first issue was released in late September/early October of 1999. It had about 20 subscribers (I use the term "subscribers" loosely). The second issue went out just after Thanksgiving of that year. They were both one page in length, containing about six stories with varying topics. People seemed to like them and would sometimes ask when the next issue would be released. After the second one, however, I stopped producing them. I didn't have any particular reason for stopping, I just did. I tried to pick it back up at various times over the next couple years, but was unsuccessful. This blog should carry on the legacy. I just hope it can reach the almost <sarcasm> cult status </sarcasm> of it's predecessor :)
Old School Celly's I've wanted a throw back cell phone for a minute. And when I say, "throw back," I'm not talking about one that doesn't have a high resolution colour display, megabytes of memory, and a digital camera to boot. No, I'm talking about the 1983 Motorola DynaTac - a true classic. I've always thought it'd be cool to walk down the street talking on the "brick" :) I was watching New Jack City last weekend and when Nino Brown pulled out his, I was like, "oh yea, that's wassup!"Finding the things, however, is incredibly difficult; hell, they're even foreign objects to eBay and Froogle. And even if I could pick one up, the mobile service providers probably wouldn't know what to do with it. But alas, it seems the engineers at Motorola have been thinking the same thing I have. According to the Mobile Gazette, Motorola is remixing the brick! That's right, there's a DynaTac for the 2G!
I'm blogging! I've contemplated the idea for a while, but I've finally gotten my ass in gear and started a blog :) I first heard about these things during my undergrad days (circa 2001) from a media arts teacher I'd had. I didn't quite understand the concept, nor did I realise just how popular the idea would become, so I didn't really give too much mind to what he'd said. Little did I know…As I went through college I always told myself I should start a journal. It's always cool to read old thoughts; and hell, it might turn out that someone actually finds your life entertaining. The trouble was I didn't want to actually write stuff; I mean, who "writes" anymore. I've been typing so long, I can barely remember the last time I wrote a complete sentence. Thus, it was inevitable, my journal had to be digital. So, naturally, the next road block was coming up with some good software to keep up with my thoughts. I could write my own, but that would take time, and I didn't want a journal that bad. It wasn't until years later that I realised blogging could essentially be the software I was in search of. At that point I'd considered starting a blog, but I'd managed to find another reason to put it off: I needed a place to host it. There are several sites out there who's sole purpose to provide people with a way to blog (analogous to Yahoo! giving people a way to have email), but I didn't want to use those. I think anyone with a CS degree can relate: when it comes to computing services, I'd rather do it myself. Unfortunately, this kind of attitude isn't very productive when you're unable to "do it yourself," so documenting my thoughts continued to be put on hold. Then last week I noticed a couple of friends here in the CS department had their own blogs. Being that we're like minded people, I'd known instantly that they'd used some open source software, and were probably even hosting it themselves. In asking them how/where they did it, they informed me that I didn't need my own machine or domain, all I needed was cgi (and I didn't even really need that). Realizing that my undergraduate department provided such a service, I figured I'd give this blogging thing a try. They recommended some good blogging software, and after a few days of configuration ("initial" configuration that is, as I'll probably be configuring this thing for years to come) I was off!
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