My Top 100 Video Games
A list of my top 100 games of all time (in alphabetical order). Expect this page to be intermittently updated over time.
- Ace Combat Zero : The Belkan War (PS2)
- Advance Wars (GBA)
- Armadillo Run (PC)
- Baldur’s Gate: Dark Alliance (Xbox)
- Baldur’s Gate: Dark Alliance 2 (Xbox)
- Battle Chess (PC)
- Battlezone (PC)
- Bejeweled 2 (Xbox 360)
- Bomberman (Saturn)
- Burnout (GameCube)
- Colin McRae : DiRT (Xbox 360)
- Command & Conquer 3: Tiberium Wars (PC)
- Defcon (PC)
- Desert Strike : Return to the Gulf (Megadrive)
- Doom 3 (PC)
- Dropzone: United Peace Force (PS2)
- Enigmo (Mac)
- EVE Online (PC)
- Falcon 4.0: Allied Force (PC)
- Far Cry (PC)
- Flashback: The Quest For Identity (PC)
- Forza Motorsport 2 (Xbox 360)
- Fury of the Furries (PC)
- F-Zero GX (GameCube)
- Gauntlet (ZX Spectrum)
- Gears of War (Xbox 360)
- Microprose Grand Prix 2 (PC)
- Geometry Wars: Retro Evolved (Xbox 360)
- God Of War (PS2)
- God Of War 2 (PS2)
- Goldeneye (N64)
- Gradius V (PS2)
- Gran Turismo 3 (PS2)
- Half Life 2 (PC)
- Halo: Combat Evolved (Xbox)
- Halo 2 (Xbox)
- Hexic HD (Xbox 360)
- Ikaruga (GameCube)
- Indiana Jones & The Last Crusade (PC)
- Leisure Suit Larry (PC)
- Lemmings (PC)
- Links 2004 (Xbox)
- Loom (PC)
- Mario 64 (N64)
- Metal Gear Solid (PS)
- Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty (PS2)
- Midnight Magic (2600)
- Midtown Madness 3 (Xbox)
- Monkey Island 2: LeChuck’s Revenge (PC)
- Moto GP (Xbox)
- n (Flash)
- Neo Turf Masters (Arcade)
- New Super Mario Bros (DS)
- Nibbles (PC)
- Outrun 2 (Arcade)
- Perfect Dark (N64)
- Pilot Wings (SNES)
- Police Quest: In Pursuit Of The Death Angel (PC)
- Prey (PC)
- Puzzle Quest (DS)
- QuackShot (Megadrive)
- Quake (PC)
- Quake II (PC)
- Quake III: Arena (PC)
- Rainbow Six: Vegas (Xbox 360)
- rRootage (PC)
- Samarost 2 (Flash)
- Sega Rally (Arcade)
- Sim City 3000 (PC)
- Solsuite (PC)
- Sonic The Hedgehog (Megadrive)
- Soul Calibur II (Xbox)
- Space Quest III: The Pirates Of Pestulon (PC)
- Splinter Cell: Chaos Theory (Xbox)
- SSX (PS2)
- Streets of Rage 2 (Megadrive)
- Stunt Car Racer (Atari ST)
- Super Cars 2 (Atari ST)
- Super Mario All Stars (SNES)
- Super Mario Kart (SNES)
- Syndicate (PC)
- Tetris (Gameboy)
- The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion (PC)
- The Legend Of Zelda: A Link To The Past (SNES)
- The Legend Of Zelda: Four Swords Adventures (GameCube)
- The Legend Of Zelda: Ocarina of Time (N64)
- The Red Star (PS2)
- The Secret of Monkey Island (PC)
- Thief: Deadly Shadows (PC)
- Thunderforce III (Megadrive)
- TimeSplitters 2 (GameCube)
- Turok: Dinosaur Hunter (N64)
- Ultima 7 (PC)
- Virtua Fighter 2 (Saturn)
- Virtua Tennis 2 (Dreamcast)
- Wipeout 3 (PS)
- World of Warcraft (PC)
- Xenon 2: Megablast (Atari ST)
- X-Plane (PC)
- Yahoo Pool (Java)
Eco Google
As part of my ongoing obsession with redesigning Google, I knocked up this eco friendly version of their homepage which displays the results on a black background, thereby supposedly saving energy.
How much energy it saves is probably debatable, but the main interest for me was playing about with the logo and making a customised start page for myself (which I have called “Eco Google“). Don’t ask me how the results pages are displayed in black. I lifted the code from Jabago.
For those interested in such things, the font is Adobe Myriad Pro, and the globe icon comes courtesy of Agua from The Iconfactory.
Visit Eco Google.
25 Online Chat Acronyms
25 acronyms that I often use in email/IM with friends.
- AFK - Away From Keyboard
- ASAP - As Soon As Possible
- ATM - At The Moment
- BRB - Be Right Back
- BBS - Be Back Soon
- BBL - Be Back Later
- BFN - Bye For Now
- BTW - By The Way
- EOM - End Of Message
- FFS - For Fucks Sake
- GTG - Got To Go
- IRL - In Real Life
- JK - Just Kidding
- LOL - Laughs Out Loud
- NP - No Problem
- OMG - Oh My God
- OTP - On The Phone
- ROFL - Rolls On Floor Laughing
- RL - Real Life
- TTYL - Talk To You Later
- TBH - To Be Honest
- TY - Thank You
- WB - Welcome Back
- WTF - What The Fuck
- YW - You’re Welcome
PS. Don’t worry, I’ve got some posts coming up which are actually useful/interesting!
My Computer / Console History
I thought it might be fun to document the computers I’ve had over the years. I always find it fascinating to see the route others took into computing, but then maybe that’s just me.
- ZX Spectrum 48k
- Amstrad PC 1640
- Atari STE 520
- Atari STE 1040
- PC Amstrad 286
- PC 386 DX 40Mhz
- Pentium P90
- Commodore Laptop Pentium 60Mhz
- Pentium 2 200Mhz
- Apple iMac G3 300Mhz
- Pentium 3 500Mhz
- Apple Quicksilver PowerMac G4
- Acer TravelMate 240 Laptop
- Sony Vaio
- Apple iMac Intel Core 2.0 Ghz
Then there are the games consoles..
- Atari 2600
- Megadrive (Genesis)
- Gameboy
- SNES
- Saturn
- Gameboy Color
- Playstation
- N64
- Atari Lynx
- Atari Jaguar
- GBA
- Dreamcast
- Playstation 2
- GBA SP
- GameCube
- Neo Geo Pocket
- XBox
- DS
- Gameboy Micro
- XBox 360
- GP2X
That list doesn’t even include the multiple times I’ve bought the same console (the different coloured versions of of the GBA SP or the smaller versions of the Megadrive, Playstation, DS and GBA) or the numerous times those various PC’s were upgraded through the years.
It’s scary to think how much I must have spent on this stuff over the years.
How To Destroy Data
Identity theft is one of the fastest growing crimes in the world. Today, more than ever before, you should be practicing good data destruction techniques.
Paper
Most people now are probably aware of the need to shred old bank statements, but what else should you shred, and when?
And did you know there are numerous types of shredders, and numerous standards of security, depending on the level of sensitivity of your files (and your level of paranoia).
Personally, I wouldn’t use any shredder that didn’t cross-cut (versus strip-cut).
Computer Files
Securely erasing a file on a computer is not quite as simple as moving it to the recycle bin and then emptying it.
Rather than removing the data from the drive itself, most operating systems merely remove the mention of the file from whatever index it uses. This has the effect of freeing up that space on the drive, ready to be overwritten with new data, while appearing to the end user as having deleted the file.
If you accidentally delete a file, you can often recover your data using tools such as Recuva. Go ahead and try it. It even works on USB keychains and flash cards used in cameras, organisers, etc.
However, if you intentionally delete a file using standard methods, it is quite possible that other unscrupulous users of your computer might be able to unerase that file. Worse still, if they’re determined, they probably have more powerful tools to do it than I’m covering here.
The good news is that armed with this knowledge, you can use any one of a number of tools which securely erase a file by repeatedly overwriting it with random data. Tools such as Eraser for Windows, or the built in function “Secure Empty Trash” on Mac OS X (it’s on the Finder menu).
Hard Drives
So we can securely erase files from a hard drive (or flash card), but what if you need to erase an entire drive.
DBan is a Linux based auto-booting CD which will permanently destroy data on a hard drive, regardless of the OS you have installed. It’s all you’ll ever need, and it’s free.
Depending on the method you choose and the size of the device, it can take anywhere from a few minutes to a number of days to complete the process. That’s the price you pay for peace of mind.
CDs and DVDs
CDs and DVDs can be surprisingly resilient. Have you ever tried to snap one in half? Doing so would ensure the data was gone, but there are easier ways which are less injury prone.
A CD punch is a good way to solve this problem, by removing the lead-in area on the CD making it impossible to read the disc contents. These devices are cheap, but can be hard to find. I managed to pick one up at my local Maplin store for £2 (GBP).
Alternatively, there’s a CD destroyer which is a bit more pricey, but worth considering if you have a lot of discs to destroy.