Pentatonix – Daft Punk

Marty Friedman and AKB48 – Death Panda Death

Japan will make anything cute. To make metal cute, ex-Megadeth lead guitarist Marty Friedman brought in pop idol group AKB48 to create Death Panda. Friedman loves J-pop’s complicated song structures and how bands like Babymetal apply them to metal.

Source: YouTube via the Lost Gamers Japanese metal panel at Matsuricon

Frog Fractions

Frog Fractions is an epic journey masquerading as an edutainment game. I played this blind on my stream for eleven fifths of an hour, and it was a trip. Sure enough, by the time I was done, I had gotten better at investing money based on how flammable my warehouse is. The only proper way to play this game is with at little prior knowledge as possible, so just play it now and look stuff up later.

What are you doing reading this old post? Go play Frog Fractions already.

Source: Frog Fractions | Twinbeard Studios

Masashi Kageyama – Happy Birthday

30-Day Video Game Music Challenge (Super Hard Mode) Day 21: Music you associate with frustration From Gimmick! (Famicom + 5B , 1992)

To a special someone: May you navigate life’s brutal platforming challenges with more finesse than I have.

Retro Game Audio did an episode on Gimmick and its Sunsoft 5B chip. They're good!

Source: YouTube, challenge by OverClocked ReMix I think?, via NintendoCapriSun

Buying Gift Cards for the Discounts

Grocery stores chains like Giant Eagle and Kroger like to give discounts on fuel when you buy gift cards. If they have gift cards for places I’m already going to anyway, I use them as much as possible. I even buy GameStop gift cards that I take to GameStop to buy gift cards for other places, earning points twice. Gift cards have their own problems but save money when you can by buying them for yourself.

The real reason for this post was to show off this wall of Fuelperks discounts I just got. Half of that gift card balance was spent before I even left the Giant Eagle parking lot.

Source: the receipt from my Giant Eagle visit just now, scanned with my printer

Keiichi Matsuda – Hyper-Reality

Oh no, is this how augmented reality will end up? Graphic designer Keiichi Matsuda imagines Medellin, Colombia with a glitchy layer of graphics, apps, and ads covering it from top to bottom. These things are fine on my phone because they go away when I put my phone away. With augmented reality, there’s no escape.

Source: Hyper-Reality via TwistedSifter

Jun Ishikawa – Staff Roll (Milky Way Wishes)

30-Day Video Game Music Challenge (Super Hard Mode) Day 30: Credits music From Kirby Super Star (SNES, 1996)

Our journey around the gaming universe has come back home. I had fun with this one-game-per-system restriction, and I hope some of you liked my picks. Maybe I’ve inspired someone else to try it? Please use “Super Hard Mode” in your titles if you take my challenge. I’ll be watching…

YouTube playlist All picks with descriptions Google Sheets including alternate picks

Source: YouTube, challenge by OverClocked ReMix I think?, via NintendoCapriSun

Canvas for Pebble

UPDATE: I made another Canvas screen called Wallpaper Watchface. Go get that one instead. It’s better.

Wearable devices are the next big thing in tech. I’ve jumped on the bandwagon with a Pebble, and I want to develop for it. On Android, Canvas for Pebble lets you quickly make watchfaces that nicely display the time, date, weather, and your phone’s unread message and missed call counts. I took a few hours and made a watchface I like that displays seconds, and you can have it too.

If you want to try on the Dr. Mo Day 1 watchface, you’ll need a Pebble running  firmware 2.0 beta and Canvas for Pebble 2.0 beta. These should still work when Pebble 2.0 and Canvas for Pebble 2.0 are released. Once that’s installed, visit this post on your phone and click the version you want below.

Dr. Mo Day 1 Imperial Dr. Mo Day 1 Metric

Ever notice how almost every watch ad has the time set to 10:10? Analog watches look better that way, but I'm not so sure about digital watches. It's a lot harder to fake the time on a cell phone.

Source: My blog’s first ever selfie, Numberphile, and Canvas for Pebble

Phonebloks

I like a good half-baked design every now and then, and this modular cell phone caught my eye. Each of my past few cell phones have met their end from just one component failing. With a Phonebloks phone, you could simply replace the bad component and be good as new. Motorola’s on board with this now, and I hope the project continues to gain traction. How about blocks for buttons and a D-pad?

Source: Phonebloks – YouTube via WebUrbanist

Today Phonebloks is launched!

Mindless Self Indulgence – Never Wanted To Dance

A couple days ago, I stopped by Gotcha Gachapon’s awesome new arcade. It has DJMax Technika 3, Jubeat, Dance Maniax 2nd Mix, DDR Supernova 2, and other Japanese music games that Columbus arcades have never had before…but it’s in basically a storage unit in a bad part of town. Yeah, it’s pretty much this music video. It’s Mindless Self Indulgence, so the lyrics are NSFW.

Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UR0UkTiKxmc and https://mindlessselfindulgence.bandcamp.com/track/never-wanted-to-dance via Spotify via some OLd THPS videos and other friends

Asano – Taisho 103: Battleship Island

This reminds me of the Imperial Boy background art I posted here several months ago. So much detail! I'd make this my wallpaper but I can't crop it to 16:9 without losing lots of details.

Source: 「大正一〇三年・軍艦島」/「浅野」のイラスト [pixiv] via pixiv每周排行 – 前50

大正一〇三年　軍艦島

TBS様「WADAIの王国」 という番組で別ver.をセット背景に使って頂きました。