List of video games notable for speedrunning

Speedruns are popular for a large variety of games. Most high-level speedruns have been performed by members of online communities. The speedrunning community originated on discussion forums in the late 90s and early 2000s, where the fastest routes through early first-person shooters were discussed. Later-on, as speedrunning became more popular, specific video games became known as common speedrunning candidates. Some modern indie games are explicitly designed for speedrunning.
"Doom".
December 1993 saw the release of id Software's "Doom". Among some of its major features, like its then-exceptional graphics, LAN- and Internet-based multiplayer support, and user modification possibilities, it also gave the players the ability to record demo files of their playthrough. This particular feature was first picked up by Christina "Strunoph" Norman in January 1994 when she launched the "LMP Hall of Fame" website.
This site was, however, quickly obsoleted by the "DOOM Honorific Titles", launched in May 1994 by Frank Stajano, which introduced the first serious competition between players. This site would create the basis for all "DOOM" demo-sites that would follow. The DHT were designed around a notion of earning titles by successfully recording a particular type of demo on pre-determined maps in the IWADs. These 'exams' became very popular as the player had to earn each title by sending in a demo of the feat to one of the site's judges to justify their application. "Doom II" was released in October 1994, and the DHT conformed to the new additions as well as the new "Doom" version releases. At the height of its popularity, the DHT had many different categories and playing styles. For example, playing with only the fists and pistol while killing all monsters on a map became known as Tyson mode, named after the heavyweight boxer Mike Tyson. Pacifist-mode was playing without intentionally harming any monsters. Each category had easy, medium, and hard difficulty maps for players to get randomly chosen for.
In November 1994, the "Doom" speedrunning scene, in the form of the COMPET-N website, took off. Its creator, Simon Widlake, intended the site to be a record scoreboard for a variety of "Doom"-related achievements, but unlike its predecessors, they all centered around one key idea: speed. Players were required to run through "Doom"s levels as fast as humanly possible in order to attain a spot on the constantly updated COMPET-N scoreboards which eventually made "Doom" one of the most popular games for speedrunning.
Like the "DOOM" Honorific Titles, this site experienced multiple location changes over time; it was even at Cdrom.com for a while before István Pataki took over as maintainer and moved the site to the now defunct FTP server ftp.sch.bme.hu. From there on, since early 1998, it was in the hands of Ádám Hegyi, who has been the maintainer ever since. It was located for some time at Doom2.net. In 2012, COMPET-N player Zvonimir 'fx' Bužanić took over maintaining the site and re-created a new database for WADs and PWADs. It is currently located at http://www.doom.com.hr/compet-n.
As of March 2006, COMPET-N contains a total amount of 6072 demos (on both official and custom maps), accounting for a total time of 462 hours, 8 minutes and 20 seconds.
In September 2000, Doug 'Opulent' Merrill opened up a new era of "Doom" speedrunning with the Doomed Speed Demos Archive (DSDA). Unlike COMPET-N, which required players to use original executables and restricted competition to a handful of WADs, this new archive supported competition for any WAD, with any executable or source port. For 7 years this initial incarnation of DSDA kept track of the runs submitted by the community, displaying the data in a series of news updates, along with occasional commentary by the maintainer. The work of maintaining the archive was performed manually, and, as time went on, the burden of maintenance increased. To alleviate this issue, and to improve usability of the archive itself, Andy Olivera began working on a second iteration of DSDA, which became available in November 2008. This coincided with a large increase in "Doom" speedrunning interest, with the annual demo count increasing from approximately 750 in 2008 to nearly 2000 in 2009. While a significant improvement over the original archive, this second version still lacked modern features, such as leaderboards and more advanced stat tracking. Work on a third incarnation began in January 2017, driven by Ryan 'Kraflab' Krafnick. The new DSDA currently mirrors the old archive but is still in active development. This latest iteration is located at https://www.dsdarchive.com.
As of September 2019, DSDA hosts 54724 demos with a total time of 4428 hours, 28 minutes, and 23 seconds.
"Quake".
"Quake" was the only game to rival "Doom" as the most popular game to speedrun. People first started recording demos of "Quake" playthroughs when it was released in June 1996 and sharing them with others on the demos/e directory in Cdrom.com's "Quake" file hierarchy. There were two distinct kinds of demos: those in which the player killed all monsters and found all secrets on the map (called 100% demos) and those in which the player ignored these goals in order to finish the level as fast as possible (called runs). All levels were, at that time, recorded solely on the "Nightmare" difficulty level, the highest in the game.
In April 1997, Nolan "Radix" Pflug first started the Nightmare Speed Demos web site to keep track of the fastest demos. The first "Quake Done Quick" of the game, carrying over one level's finishing statistics to the next. The run ended up finishing the entire game on Nightmare difficulty in 0:19:49; an astonishing feat at that time. It received widespread attention from gaming magazines, being distributed with free CDs that usually came with them. This popularized speedrunning for a much larger audience than before and attracted many newcomers. Not all of those newcomers agreed with the old-timers's dogma that runs should be made on the hardest possible skill level. Thus, in August 1997 Muad'Dib's "Quake" Page came to be, run by Gunnar "Muad'Dib" Andre Mo and specializing in "Easy" difficulty runs. One month after that, the famous "Quake Done Quick" movie was superseded by a new movie called "Quake Done Quicker", on September 14, 1997, which improved the game's fastest playthrough time to 0:16:35.
In April 1998, Nolan and Gunnar merged their pages, thus creating Speed Demos Archive, which today is still the central repository for "Quake" speed demos of any kind. Ever since its creation, a large variety of tricks have been discovered in the "Quake" physics, which kept players interested even up to today, more than two decades after Quake's release. Subsequently, "Quake Done Quick with a Vengeance" was released on September 13, 2000, which featured a complete run through "Quake" in the hugely improved time of 0:12:23.
As of March 2006, Speed Demos Archive contains a total amount of 8481 demos (on both official and custom maps), accounting for a total time of 253 hours, 44 minutes and 39 seconds. The fastest minimalist single-segment completion times that have been recorded thus far, as of June 10, 2006, are 0:13:46 for the easy difficulty run and 0:19:50 for the nightmare difficulty run, both by long-time "Quake" speedrunner Connor Fitzgerald. The 100% single-segment completion times are 0:46:02 for the easy difficulty run and 1:09:33 for the nightmare difficulty run, respectively Marlo Galinski and Justin Fleck.
"Quake Done Quick".
An important aspect of the "Quake" speedrunning community is "Quake Done Quick", a collection of movies in which the game is finished as fast as possible with special rules and aims. Unlike the normal records listed above, these movies are created one level at a time rather than in one continuous play session; as such, it is possible for multiple people to help create the movie by sending in demos of individual levels, and much faster times can be aimed for as the segmentation allows one to easily try again upon committing an error. It also allows runners to only have to focus on a small portion of the game rather than all of it.
These movies are by far more popular than the conventional records, both in the community itself and outside of it. Some of them, most notably the movies that feature a fast playthrough of the game on the Nightmare difficulty level without additional voluntary challenges, have even been distributed with gaming magazines and posted on news sites. Slashdot has published an announcement of the then newly created "Quake Done Quick with a Vengeance" movie on its front page. Out of all the series' movies, this one is also the most popular. In it, the entire game is finished in 0:12:23 on "Nightmare" difficulty, the hardest in the game. This run succeeded "Quake Done Quicker" and the original "Quake done Quick" movie, in which the game was finished in respectively 0:16:35 and 0:19:49. The main reason for the latest installment being over 4 minutes faster, an improvement that surpassed the initial expectations of the runners, was the discovery of bunny hopping, which allowed runners to attain a much higher speed in most levels and even made it possible to save rockets or grenades for jumps that could now be done without them. This movie is currently being improved by new and old runners for a production called "Quake done Quick with a Vengeance Part II". As of May 2006, the improvements that have been made thus far would result in a time of 0:11:32 for the entire game, an improvement of 51 seconds.
Some of the productions have been turned into Machinima movies, using so-called "recams" (showing the run from preset camera perspectives rather than the first-person view) and sometimes even custom skins, models, and a script to turn them into films rather than speedrun videos.
"Metroid" series.
"Super Metroid" (Nintendo, 1994) became popular among speedrunners due to the emergence of console emulators with demo-recording features. In normal "Super Metroid" gameplay, the player may find certain items such as "high-jump boots". Since the path through the map is non-linear, it is complicated to find the most efficient speedrunning routes: areas with seemingly essential power-ups can be bypassed at the expense of the improved mobility. This drove the discovery of sequence breaking, in which a player can acquire power-ups before the game design intends, allowing whole sections of the map to be skipped.
Because the "Metroid" series rewards players for completing the game faster, groups of players were inspired to discuss techniques on message boards such as GameFAQs and to capture and post videos of full playthroughs. Despite internet limitations in the early 2000s, the ability to share video footage of "Metroid" runs allowed speedrunners to collaborate and learn from one another. It was during online discussions of "Metroid Prime" that the term "sequence breaking" was first widely used.
"Super Mario" series.
Early platform games of the "Super Mario" series are popular in the speedrunning community. "Super Mario Bros.", "Super Mario World", "Yoshi's Island" and "Super Mario 64" are particularly notable for speedrunning accomplishments. Most notable speedruns of "Super Mario" games are generally carried out without tool-assistance, though speedrunners make frequent use of glitches and even memory corruption to make optimal times.
"" is a game that players commonly speedrun at Awesome Games Done Quick. Charlie Hall of "Polygon" has described speedruns of "Yoshi's Island" as a "great introduction to the showmanship and the rich community" behind the Games Done Quick marathons. Through exchanging strategies and doing theory routing, the "Yoshi's Island" speedrunning community collaboratively work on pushing the completion time down.
It is possible to speedrun "Super Mario 64" in various ways. Though speedruns exist of people playing through the game as intended, it is possible to skip large portions of "Super Mario 64" by using glitches. Using a glitch dubbed the "backwards long jump," (BLJ), with which the player character can move at very high speeds, which allows the player to clip through walls, a player can skip almost all levels of the game and beat it in only a few minutes, collecting 0 of the intended 70 stars that are normally required. As of February 2, 2021, the world record for this category, dubbed "0 star," is 6 minutes, 31 seconds and 520 milliseconds, by Japanese speedrunner Kanno. Additionally, many players run an older route that omits one BLJ in favor of using a different, slower glitch, which requires 16 total stars. This gives an additional challenge over the "starless" route, as players must execute difficult glitches while also obtaining the fastest (and in many cases, most difficult) stars in the game.
Completing "Super Mario 64" 100%—i.e., collecting all the game's 120 "stars"—is also a popular method of playing through the game, as well as completing the game without using BLJ but using other glitches and exploits to obtain 70 stars as quickly as possible. Recently, the 120 Stars category has become much more competitive.
In more recent times, "Super Mario Odyssey", released in 2017, has garnered a community of speedrunners. As of October 1, 2020, the game has the second most speedrunners of any game on speedrun.com, only trailing "Super Mario 64". Many glitches are used to optimize the times, such as out of bounds clips in the Lake Kingdom, Wooded Kingdom, Snow Kingdom, and Seaside Kingdom, and a jump in the Moon Kingdom skipping the Moon Cave and boss fight.
"The Legend of Zelda" series.
The original "The Legend of Zelda" and " are popular speedrunning candidates. Any% speedruns of this game involve a great deal of movement optimization and item drop management, as well as some amount of luck. Speedrunners rely heavily on having bombs with which to defeat high-level enemies. A common glitch used in speedruns of this game involves clipping through walls while the screen is scrolling.
", the third game in the series, can be beaten within two minutes by using particularly advantageous glitches.
The fourth game in the series, "", can be beaten in under two minutes using arbitrary code execution. The DX version of the game, which added colored graphics, an extra dungeon, and more side quests, and removed the well-known "screen warping" glitch, can be beaten in under three minutes using ACE. The world record for the main Any% category, which bans the use of wrong warps, saving and quitting and then re-entering the file, or going out of bounds, is 51 minutes and 56 seconds, held by VlackSR. The game's for the Nintendo Switch has also become somewhat popular for speedruns.
More recently, "" has been a popular subject for speedrunners due to its non-linear format, which allows the game to be beaten in less than half an hour. In particular, the French version of the game is used frequently in Any% speedrunning because the dialogue runs slightly faster than in other versions. The current Any% record is held by rasenurns at 26 minutes and 26 seconds.
"The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time".
Originally, "Ocarina of Time" speedruns took several hours to complete, as the game contains many long, mandatory dungeons. Throughout the mid-2000s, the Speed Demo Archives community discovered various glitches and sequence breaks in the game that allowed players to skip large portions of it. For instance, the Door of Time Skip allows the player to skip the child Link dungeons by doing a precise sidehop through the Door of Time, which has a slight opening in the corner of it. In 2012, the "Wrong Warp" glitch was discovered. The complicated trick has many uses, the most famous being the wrong warp from the Great Deku Tree, the first dungeon, to Ganon's Castle after Ganondorf has been defeated. This allows the game to be beaten as child Link, which allows for the game to be completed very quickly.
Speedruns of "Ocarina of Time" are dependent on the console the game is played on and what language the game is being played in. There are many different Nintendo-released versions of the game on a plethora of consoles, with each console having many advantages and disadvantages over each other. For the Any% category, runs have primarily been done on the Japanese Wii Virtual Console version of the game. The Virtual Console has both faster loading times and less lag than the Nintendo 64 version of the game, although it takes longer to reset the game on Virtual Console. Runs used to be done mainly on the English version of "Ocarina of Time" until runners realized that in order to compete with Japanese players' times, they would have to use that version of the game because the text scrolls faster on the Japanese version of the game than it does on the English version. In that regard, the Chinese iQue Player version of "Ocarina of Time" has both faster loading times and faster scrolling text than the Nintendo 64 and Virtual Console versions of the game. This was the fastest version for Any% until the discovery of Get Item Manipulation, a glitch that crashes the game on this system. In 2019, Stale Reference Manipulation, and subsequently Arbitrary Code Execution (ACE), were discovered, thus bringing the Any% time into the single digits. ACE was originally thought to be possible only on the Nintendo 64 version, which is where the record was brought down to about 7 and a half minutes in mid-2020. The current record was achieved on the Japanese Gamecube Master Quest version of "Ocarina of Time". This version of the game has a video file in place of the credits that gets triggered upon the game's completion, and it was discovered that this function can be executed in Kokiri Forest, which cut the record by another 20 seconds.
"Ocarina of Time" has been described as "one of the most intricate and well-documented games for speedrunning" because of its familiarity, as it is one of the most popular games for both speedrunning and casual play, and its wide array of glitches.
"Dark Souls" series and related games.
"Dark Souls", a 2011 game by From Software, is known for its unforgiving gameplay, but despite this, the game is very popular among speedrunners. Through the use of several intricate skips, glitches, and wrong warps, it is possible to complete an Any% run in under 35 minutes, though average players take dozens of hours playing through the game once. 20-minute speedruns are possible because of a glitch dubbed the "Kiln Skip", which can be used to skip almost the entire second half of the game. The original method for this exploit was removed in an update, but a new method of performing it, which requires the current game update, has also been devised.
Any% runs of its sequel, "Dark Souls II", can be done in under 20 minutes, as it is possible to avoid almost all battles in the game and to move around the world at a "ridiculous pace" using the "binoculars" item. The tricks that make a run this short possible were patched out in "Scholar of the First Sin", but can still be used if current patches aren't downloaded.
"Spelunky".
"Spelunky", a 2012 indie platformer created by Derek Yu, has been a common candidate for speedrunning, with its fastest runs taking between one and two minutes. As "Spelunky" features a large amount of random procedural generation, speedrunners cannot solely rely on memorization. To have a chance in beating the current record, a speedrunner must get a specific random seed, though despite this, skillful players may recognize repeating level patterns and know how to optimally use the game's items, such as a difficult to use "teleporter" that allows a player to skip large chunks of a level.
Despite the high difficulty of the game, even "Spelunky" "Hell" levels have been used for speedrunning, with the world record sitting under four minutes. Another highly difficult run of the game is the so-called "eggplant run", in which a player has to go through a specific set of objectives to turn the final boss into an eggplant. This was done solo for the first time in November 2013 by speedrunner Bananasaurus Rex, though it took him 90 minutes. Douglas Wilson of "Polygon" dubbed this run "2013's most fascinating video game moment."
"Cuphead".
"Cuphead" is a run and gun indie video game developed by StudioMDHR, inspired by the rubber hose animation style of the 1920s and 30s. The game features one or two players taking control of animated characters Cuphead and his brother Mugman to fight through several levels that culminate in boss fights in order to repay a gambling debt to the Devil. "Cuphead" has been noted for its notorious difficulty, and has spawned a dedicated speedrunning community, with The Mexican Runner running the game at AGDQ in 2018 and 2019.
"Cuphead" runs fall under multiple categories, such as Any%, All Flags, All Bosses and Full Clear, and are usually divided by difficulty - "Simple", "Regular" and "Expert". Cuphead runners have also invented many creative categories, such as only using one gun type, completing the game in pacifist mode, and completing the game as fast as possible using the character duplication glitch.
"Minecraft".
"Minecraft" is a sandbox survival game developed by Mojang and released in 2009. The goal of traditional "Minecraft" speedruns is typically to defeat the Ender Dragon, but there are several other possible criteria, such as obtaining a certain item, collecting all of a certain type of item, or reaching a certain build height. "Minecraft" speedruns are split into 4 main categories based on the platform: Minecraft (Classic), Minecraft: Bedrock Edition, Minecraft: Legacy Console Edition and Minecraft: Java Edition as well as other extensions based on whether the world seed is set or random.
There is also a separate speedrun page for speedrunning fan-made content, such as maps, servers, fan-games, etc.
Luck plays a major role in "Minecraft" speedruns and consequently, there have been several instances of players cheating, most notably by prominent YouTuber Dream.


Leonard Dawe

Leonard Sydney Dawe (3 November 1889 – 12 January 1963) was an English amateur footballer who played in the Southern League for Southampton between 1912 and 1913, and made one appearance for the England national amateur football team in 1912. He later became a schoolteacher and crossword compiler for "The Daily Telegraph" newspaper and in 1944 was interrogated on suspicion of espionage in the run-up to the D-Day landings.
Early career.
Dawe was born in Brentford in west London and was educated at Portsmouth Grammar School, before going up to Emmanuel College at the University of Cambridge. In his final year at the university, he earned his football "blue" when he played in the 1912 match against the University of Oxford, scoring in his side's 3–1 victory.
Football career.
In March 1912, he signed on amateur terms for Southampton of the Southern League, making his debut in a 1–0 victory over Plymouth Argyle on 30 March. On his debut, he laid on the game's only goal for Percy Prince. The local daily paper, "The Echo", reported that "Dawe was decidedly plucky to 'get in it'." Dawe always took the field wearing spectacles and one of his lenses was broken during his debut game.
Dawe continued to make occasional appearances for Southampton over the next twelve months, although his studies and teaching career prevented him from appearing more often. In his eleven league appearances for the "Saints", he scored three goals, including two against Watford on 13 April 1912.
Dawe was a member of the Great Britain squad for the 1912 Summer Olympics in Stockholm, Sweden, but was not selected to play. He did, however, make one appearance for the England national amateur football team when he played against Ireland in Belfast in October 1912.
By the end of the 1912–13 season, Dawe had severed his connection with Southampton and had joined Ilford in north-east London.
Teaching career.
In 1913, Dawe obtained a teaching position (teaching science) at Forest School in the Walthamstow area of north-east London before joining St Paul's School based at Barnes. In 1926, he joined Strand School in the Tulse Hill area of south London, progressing to become the school's head teacher. Dawe was described as a "disciplinarian and a man of extremely high principle". At Strand School, he was known as "'moneybags", in allusion to his initials, L.S.D. (pounds, shillings and pence).
Military career.
During World War I, Dawe was commissioned as a second lieutenant for service with the Forest School Officer Training Corps on 20 February 1915, transferring to the Hampshire Regiment "local reserve" on 9 May 1916. Whilst with the Hampshire Regiment, he served in the Mesopotamia campaign from September 1917.
After the war, he transferred as a lieutenant from a service battalion of the Hampshires to St Paul's School OTC on 29 April 1920, being promoted to major with St Paul's OTC on 25 August 1926, but resigned that commission on 16 October 1926.
Crossword compiler.
In 1925, he commenced compiling crosswords for "The Daily Telegraph" newspaper and was one of the first compilers to use "cryptic" clues. The first "Daily Telegraph" crossword, compiled by Dawes, appeared on 30 July 1925 – he continued to compile crosswords until his death in 1963.
During the Second World War Strand School was evacuated to Effingham in Surrey.
The Dieppe and D-Day crosswords.
In 1944, several codenames related to the D-Day plans, such as "Utah" and "Mulberry", appeared as solutions in Dawe's crosswords in "The Daily Telegraph". The inclusion of the codewords was initially suspected by the British Secret Services to be a form of espionage, but it was determined that Dawe had got the words from boys at the school, who had overheard them from soldiers.
"Quest".
In 1992, Dawe's life was the basis for an album, "Quest", by the neo-progressive rock band, Final Conflict – the album is about an ordinary man like Dawe imagining he is on trial for the failings in his life.


Garson Yu

Garson Yu is founder/creative director of yU+co in Hollywood, California.
Born in Hong Kong in 1961, Garson attended the Yale School of Art on the Norman Ives Scholarship in 1985. Upon graduating with the Alexei Brodovitch Prize in 1987, Garson started his career in New York as a freelance designer at R/Greenberg Associates.
Garson taught graphic design at the School of Visual Arts and exhibited as an artist in New York. He has had group exhibitions at the Artist Space, PS1/Clock Tower Gallery and The Dia Art Foundation. Garson’s design entry won the International AIDS design competition. He was then commissioned by the New York Public Art Fund to design and produce a 30-second television Public Service Announcement on AIDS. In 1992, he worked with Muriel Cooper at the MIT Media Lab to design IBM’s ‘Future Interface Demo’.
In 1993, Garson moved to Los Angeles and served as co-creative director alongside Kyle Cooper for what was, at the time, the West coast branch of R/GA but would later be reformed as "Imaginary Forces". In 1998, Garson founded yU+co, a design company specializing in motion graphics for film and television. Since the company’s inception, Garson has collaborated with many filmmakers for his title design work including Steven Spielberg, Ang Lee, John Woo, Sydney Pollack, and Ridley and Tony Scott.
Garson has won numerous awards and honors for his title design and motion graphics work including a Daytime Emmy for Outstanding Achievement in Title Design for Dora the Explorer and five other Emmy nominations, the New York Art Directors Club Award, three BDA Awards, Monitor Award, ID Magazine International Design Award, HOW Magazine International Design Award, AIGA Design Award and the Eyes and Ears of Europe Award.
Garson is also a visiting lecturer for film title design at Carnegie Mellon University, USA, Cologne International Film School, Germany and Central Academy of Fine Arts School of Design, China. He is also a member of Alliance Graphique Internationale, Switzerland.


World War II GI

World War II GI is a first-person shooter video game set during the events of World War II. Developed by TNT Team and published by GT Interactive Software, the game was released in 1999 as the direct sequel to "NAM", which was released on July 31, 1998. "World War II GI" was the last commercially released game to use the Build engine until the release of "Ion Fury" in 2019. The player takes control of 101st Airborne Division G.I. Corporal Gerardi, sent in to wipe out scores of Wehrmacht and "Schutzstaffel" soldiers. "World War II GI" was later re-released on Steam on November 13, 2015, with Retroism and Night Dive Studios as the publishers.
Gameplay.
The game sets the player in the middle of World War II scenarios such as the D-Day beach landings during the invasion of Normandy, assaults on equipment and supply depots, and other scenarios. "WWII GI" consists of 30 levels divided into four episodes; there are two single player episodes with seven levels in each episode and two multiplayer episodes with eight levels in each episode. The game was built using the Build engine, with 3D environments and 2D character sprites. It shared similar gameplay elements to its predecessor, "NAM".
Reception.
The game received "mixed" reviews according to the review aggregation website GameRankings. IGN felt that the game was not keeping up with the rest of the market and was using an outdated engine and was too obsolete.


Paul Hotte

Paul Hotte is a Canadian production designer and art director. Known for his work on films "The Fly" (1986), "Catch Me If You Can" (2002), "The Aviator" (2004), "300" (2006), "The Fountain" (2006), and "Arrival" (2016), for the latter he received numerous awards and nominations, including the Academy Award for Best Production Design for the 89th Academy Awards with Patrice Vermette.


Janene Higgins

Janene Higgins is a graphic designer and video artist based in New York City. Her work spans several genres, from video performance in the experimental music scene to videos for Saks Fifth Avenue, and the design of several hundred CD packages for such record labels as Sony, BMG, PolyGram, and a wide variety of independents.
Higgins moved to New York City to design magazines, working for such publications as "Esquire", "Working Woman", and "Fame", culminating in three years as a designer for "Vanity Fair" magazine. While at VF, she began designing CD covers and videos for friends in the downtown music scene, which led to an ongoing series of music/video performance collaborations with some of New York's preeminent composers and improvisors of new music. These include duos with Elliott Sharp, Ikue Mori, Mari Kimura, Alan Licht, Nurit Tilles, Okkyung Lee, Aki Onda, and Zeena Parkins. She has directed several short experimental works, often with sound design by notable avant-garde artists including Sharp, Parkins, Christian Marclay and John Duncan. Projection design for theatre include the operas "Binibon", "Port Bou", and "Filiseti Mekidesi". Her work has been performed and exhibited at The New York Video Festival at Lincoln Center; documenta in Kassel, Germany; The Kitchen, NYC; Musée d'art contemporain de Lyon; City of Women festival, Slovenia; The Chelsea Art Museum, NYC; HiTeca Festival in Porto, Portugal; Art Institute of Chicago; Konzerthaus Berlin; The Hamburg Short Film Festival; and at The Impakt Festival in The Netherlands.


Stefan Meyer-Kahlen

Stefan Meyer-Kahlen (born 1968, in Düsseldorf) is a German programmer of the computer chess program "Shredder". , his program had won 18 titles as World Computer Chess Champion. Four of the titles were blitz championships, and one was a Chess960 championship. He also invented the Universal Chess Interface, a chess engine protocol.


The King of Fighters 2000

 is a fighting video game that was produced by SNK for the Neo Geo arcade and home consoles in 2000. It is the seventh installment in "The King of Fighters" series for the Neo Geo and the final game in the series SNK produced before the original company's bankruptcy. The game was ported to the Dreamcast (in Japan only) and the PlayStation 2 in 2002. The game's story, a sequel to "The King of Fighters '99" and the second part of the "NESTS Chronicles" story arc, focuses on a new tournament held by the commander of the Ikari Warriors, Heidern, who seeks to capture and interrogate former NESTS agents K' and Maxima into revealing crucial and critical information about the NESTS cartel. The gameplay retains the Striker system of the previous games in the series, but the assisting character can also cooperate with the playable character to generate combos.
SNK entered into bankruptcy while "The King of Fighters 2000" was still in development, resulting in glitches and bugs remaining in the game because staff members—most notably producer Takashi Nishiyama—left the company before the game was complete. SNK attempted to add further depth to the NESTS cast with K's new enemy Kula Diamond; other new characters like Vanessa and Seth were intended to attract different audiences. The PlayStation 2 version of the game was released in North America in a two-in-one bundle with its immediate sequel, "The King of Fighters 2001", as the first two games to be published by SNK Playmore USA.
Critical reception to the game's fighting system and characters has been mostly positive due to the improvements SNK brought to the franchise. There were mixed reactions to the company's handling of the graphics and backgrounds, which divided reviewers opinions about its status as one of the best games of the series. Two novelizations and an audio drama have also been published in Japan.
Gameplay.
The gameplay in "The King of Fighters 2000" is based on that of "The King of Fighters '99"; it expands on the "Striker Match" format introduced in its predecessor. The game has an "Active Striker System", which allows the player to summon a Striker member in any situation, whether the player is attacking or being attacked by the opponent, allowing the player to use his or her strikers in combos. The player can also replenish Strike Bombs by either losing rounds or taunting the opponent.
The player now has two choices after selecting the Striker member of the team; he or she can choose to use the regular character or an alternate character officially known as Another Striker, a character used exclusively for striker attacks. These alternative Strikers are characters from previous "KOF" games and other SNK franchises such as Fio Germi from "Metal Slug 2" and Duke Edwards from "Burning Fight", as well as alternative versions of in-game characters such as Iori Yagami and Robert Garcia. There is another set of alternative Striker characters known as Maniac Strikers, which are selected in the arcade version by entering codes for notable characters only. The console versions includes additional Maniac Strikers by completing a certain number of matches in the "Party Mode".
Plot and characters.
After an incident at the previous tournament, the commander of the Ikari Warriors Team, Heidern, is determined to investigate the objective of the NESTS cartel and stop it from achieving its ruthless ambition. Ling, a fellow commander and long-time friend of Heidern, tells him that K′ and Maxima were once NESTS operatives and that they may hold the key to locating the whereabouts of the mysterious organization. Using this information, Heidern decides to focus his efforts into using the next KOF tournament to lure both K′ and Maxima out of hiding so that they can be captured and interrogated by him for crucial and critical information about the NESTS cartel.
Depending on the player's performance during the tournament, Kula Diamond might appear to eliminate K', but fails from within her mission. Shortly afterwards, Ling and a couple of his associates suddenly attack and betray Heidern near the end of the tournament, the former revealing himself to be a clone of the real Ling who was murdered in the past and being replaced via the machinations of a high-ranking NESTS member named Zero, who seeks to destroy NESTS itself and create a new world order under his own rule. Through the accumulated fighting power he had gathered during the tournament, Zero initiates and utilizes a space-based satellite weapon named the "Zero Cannon", with which he sends a powerful energy blast from it straight towards Earth, destroying most of South Town via the energy blast's explosive impact upon it. After Zero's defeat in combat, he attempts but fails to use the cannon again while Heidern swiftly and forcibly removes the clone Ling's remote control of the cannon while dispatching him in the process. If the player defeats Kula previously, her supporters Diana and Foxy stop Zero while Kula destroys the Zero Cannon herself.
Hero Team
Benimaru Team
Fatal Fury Team
Art of Fighting Team
Women Fighters Team
Ikari Warriors Team
Psycho Soldier Team
Korea Justice Team
Single Entry
Mid-Boss
Final Boss
Development and release.
SNK began making plans for "The King of Fighters 2000" in June 1999. Former producer Takashi Nishiyama was absent from the team for the first time in the series. Because previous regulars from "The King of Fighters" games were not playable, SNK took advantage of the striker system and give players the choice of using Goro Daimon among others as alternative assisting characters. SNK found the Bogard brothers, Terry and Andy, unbalanced in the previous game because one of them was overpowered as a striker; the company joked that this was also a result of the love between the siblings.
One of the game developers said the team originally wanted to use more of the characters from "The King of Fighters '99" but due to licensing issues it was not possible. The arcade version was nearing completion in mid-2000, with the staff becoming excited at the quality of the game. Despite early negative thoughts about the game's state, SNK was pleased with the completed title, citing the arcade as an appealing game. Following its release, SNK thanked the fans for their support. During the game's development, SNK went bankrupt, leading to the designers of the game causing multiple glitches, extra animations, and balancing issues. Some of the developers left the company, which resulted in the team in charge of the game becoming smaller.
New characters were created to appeal to different audiences. Mexican wrestler Ramon was made to appeal to South Americans because Neo Geo's was very popular in South America. Ramon's designer loved pro-wrestling fighting moves but the character's techniques were made unrealistic. Vanessa and Seth were originally set to appear in "The King of Fighters '99" but they debuted on its Dreamcast port as strikers, while becoming playable in "2000". Vanessa was created to appeal to women; she is slightly older than the other characters, which players found appealing. Both the debuting Lin and the unplayable Ron generated a major surprise to the SNK staff because their addition to the story was not overlooked. Kula Diamond was created to give a major expansion to the NESTS cartel, while Zero was made to contrast with the NESTS agent Krizalid from "The King of Fighters '99", who had a darker personality. SNK, however, was disappointed with Zero, leading to the creation of stronger new character connected with him in the next game.
The arcade version of the game was released on July 26, 2000, for the MVS Circuit Board. The game was then ported to the Neo Geo and released on December 21 of that year. The Sega Dreamcast port was released on August 8, 2002, while the PlayStation 2 version was made available on November 28 that year. The ports included new striker characters and new backgrounds. For the North American version, the game was not available to the public until 2003 and released the PlayStation 2 game alongside "The King of Fighters 2001" was the one of the first games published by SNK Playmore USA. There has been censorship, including the removal of Whip's gun and the movement of Mai Shiranui's cleavage. The Neo-Geo and Sega Dreamcast versions of the game were included in "The King of Fighters NESTS Hen", a compilation released for the Sony PlayStation 2 in Japan. The PlayStation 2 version was re-released on May 3, 2016, for the PlayStation 4 through the PlayStation Network. The game was later released on the Nintendo Switch through the Nintendo eShop service on August 10, 2017.
Reception.
In Japan, "Game Machine" listed "The King of Fighters 2000" on their September 1, 2000, issue as being the second-most-successful arcade game of the year.
The PlayStation 2 port of "The King of Fighters 2000" sold 37,316 units in Japan during 2002. In 2017, it became one of the most downloaded games of the PlayStation Classic collection.
Critical reception for the game's fighting system has been mostly positive. "GameSpot" said SNK improved most of the problems of its predecessor "The King of Fighters '99" by adding more gameplay features such as new attacks and new additions to the Striker system. The reviewer said fans might either like or dislike the new characters based on the differences between them and the characters from "The King of Fighters '99", and said the boss Zero is less overpowered than Krizalid but lacks his appeal. "IGN" agreed with "GameSpot" in terms of the Striker system and liked the additional characters, making it one of the best games of the franchise. In another review, "IGN" stated that the game offered many good new characters, particularly Lin. "Nintendo Life" also liked the addition of the Striker system because of the newly possible combos but said the game did not live up to the previous games. "Pure Nintendo" compared it negatively with Capcom's fighting game "Street Fighter II" but still said "The King of Fighters 2000" provided enough depth thanks to its character roster and gameplay mechanics, making it a good addition to Nintendo Switch's games. "Bonus Stage" regarded it as one of the best games from SNK, saying it might appeal to gamers who previously enjoyed the predecessor and "".
The game's presentation drew mixed reactions. While "Pure Nintendo" enjoyed the character designs, backgrounds, and theme songs, "IGN" said these elements appeared dated due to similarities with those of previous installments and the improved graphics of new consoles. "GameSpot" said while SNK attempted to improve the designs of the characters, the quality was still not as appealing as it should have been and that the background stages felt hollow. Echoing "IGN" comments, "Bonus Stage" stated that despite being a fighting game, the plot amazed fans because of the further exploration of NESTS organization, which is briefly explored in "The King of Fighters '99", and said the game's storyline offers such an appealing dark ending that most of the fans wanted to play the following and final game from the NESTS saga to see its conclusion. "HardcoreGaming" found the PlayStation 2 port of the game superior to the Dreamcast version because the former fixed some slowdown issues and said Kyo Kusnagai's theme "Goodbye Esaka" was one of the best themes performed by SNK.
An audio drama CD was released by Scitron Digital Contents on September 20, 2000. It features two storylines: one exploring the first encounter between K' and Kula Diamond; the second story focuses on Athena Asamiya as she meets rivals in an airport. Series' writer Akihiko Ureshino wrote two light novels published by Kadokawa Shoten. The first novel, "Strikers Strike Back", acts as a self-parody of the game's storyline and was released on February 19, 2001. The second novel, "Icicle Doll", was released on December 20 the same year and features a more serious storyline.


Orange Factory Music

Orange Factory Music (also known as OFM) is an American production team formed in 1999 by record producers and songwriters Jeremy "JRemy" Skaller and Robert "Bobby Bass" Larow. OFM also has three writers signed under its corporate umbrella; Jamil 'Digi' Chammas" and Jonathan 'Perky Rain' Perkins. Most noted for their discovery and development of Jay Sean, the duo met at the University of Vermont, before moving to New York to pursue their musical career. Skaller and Larow, professionally known as "J Remy" and "Bobby Bass" also continued to produce, write, and remix songs for Fabolous, Monrose, Eva Avila, Ricki-Lee and Jay Sean.
The duo first charted with the No. 1 Billboard Dance song “Don’t Want Another Man” by Tina Ann. In the next few years OFM consistently charted on the "Billboard" charts with production, remixer, and writers credits with Britney Spears, Justin Timberlake, Beyoncé, Kelly Rowland, Seal, Usher, Blue Cantrell, Backstreet Boys, Birdman, Alanis Morissette, Janet Jackson, Annie Lennox, Dolce, Tina Ann, Fabolous, Bone Crusher, Shakira, and Jessica Simpson.
In September 2013, OFM writer/composer Jonathan Perkins expanded the company's operations to Nashville in a joint publishing venture with OFM Publishing and Reach Music Publishing. In 2015, Skaller signed singer/actor Kiana Ledé. Since then she has signed a recording deal with Republic Records and a publishing deal with SonyATV.
They have produced, remixed and or written for Jay Sean, Britney Spears, Justin Timberlake, Beyoncé, Seal, Usher, Birdman, Blue Cantrell, Backstreet Boys, Alanis Morissette, Annie Lennox, Fabolous, Janet Jackson, and Shakira. Most recently they produced the No. 1 Aria Chart hit, "Boom Boom", by Justice Crew.
Artists.
Jay Sean.
OFM discovered British artist Jay Sean and helped to develop his sound, stage show, and story leading to a multi-album, multimillion-dollar record deal with Cash Money Records/Universal Republic. OFM then produced his internationally successful album "My Own Way" (No. 1 R&B Album on the UK Charts).
OFM produced and co-wrote the five times worldwide Billboard No. 1 single “Down” (Featuring Lil Wayne) as well as the second single, “Do You Remember” (featuring Sean Paul and Lil Jon), peaking at No. 10 on the Hot 100 and rapidly selling over a million units, itself. These two platinum selling singles charted in the Billboard top 10 and the Billboard hot 100 at the same time, which had not been accomplished by a male artist since 2003. OFM is currently involved with touring, sponsorships, TV appearances, and clothing lines with Jay Sean, as well.
Kiana Ledé.
Kiana Ledé is signed to Republic Records. Her first single is due in early 2017
Thara.
Former Desert Storm artist Thara.
Israel.
Australian R&B singer, songwriter and producer Israel.
Other Orange Factory Music related ventures.
Silverbridge Media.
Silverbridge Media is a music licensing and supervisor company. They have worked with MTV/Viacom on such shows as "Room Raiders", "Cribs", and "Sweet 16". They have scored three mini-movies for Fabolous. In 2010, their writer/producer Jonathan "PerkyRain" Perkins won an Emmy for his documentary scoring work in 2010.
Orange Factory Publishing initiatives.
Orange Factory Music (under the name Orange Factory Repertoire) has a publishing JV with Primary Wave/BMG, for the producer/songwriter, Khaled Rohaim (a member of the production team Twice As Nice).


William Poduska

John William Poduska Sr. is an American engineer and entrepreneur. He was a founder of Prime Computer, Apollo Computer, and Stellar Computer. Prior to that he headed the Electronics Research Lab at NASA's Cambridge, Massachusetts, facility and also worked at Honeywell.
Poduska has been involved in a number of other high-tech startups. He also serves on the boards of Novell, Anadarko Petroleum, Anystream, Boston Ballet, Wang Center and the Boston Lyric Opera, and is a member of the National Academy of Engineering.
Education.
Poduska was born in Memphis, Tennessee. In 1955, he graduated from Central High School in Memphis. He went on to earn a S.B. and S.M. in electrical engineering, both in 1960, from MIT. He also earned a Sc.D. in EECS from MIT in 1962.


Engineer boot

Engineer boots, also known as engineer's boots or engineering boots, are an American type of traditional leather work-boots. Their lace-less, rugged construction made them popular among motorcycle riders. Originally developed in the 1930s for firemen working on steam locomotives, the boots gained substantial popularity in the post–World War II era during a growing motorcycling culture. They became popular symbols of teenage rebellion in the 1950s and a common component of greaser wear. They were later adopted by skinheads and punks in the 1970s. By the 2010s, engineer boots were being popularly worn for fashion purposes, especially by non-traditional customers such as women, young urban professionals, and hipsters.
Description.
Engineer boots are typically made from thick, stiff, full-grain bull hide. The leather is often oiled to add durability and flexibility, and may be brown or black in color. The double-layered shafts may be anywhere between 7 inches to 17 inches in height, and are gusseted at the top and relatively loose, though they can be tightened by a steel-buckled strap. Another steel-buckled strap is placed at the instep of each boot. As per their rugged construction, the footwear is relatively heavy.
Original engineer boots were almost always black in color. The toes were bulbous and the soles were made of thick leather. The heels were about one-and-three-quarter inches in height with a slight forward slant, with the edges being concave. Some were customized with studded straps or with cleats. Modern engineer boots vary in toe shape, heel height, sole material, or in the use of steel reinforcements.
History.
Origins.
Around 1860, the Frye Company produced a popular line of harness boots. Quickly adopted by the United States Cavalry, they featured an ankle strap that attached to metal rings, a style which may have served as inspiration for the design of the engineer boot. During the 1930s, the Chippewa Shoe Manufacturing Company developed a pair of boots with stovepipe shafts based on the style of English horse-riding boots. The West Coast Shoe Company (Wesco) began manufacturing their "engineer boots" in 1939. Engineer boots were originally meant as protective gear for firemen working on steam railway engines (i.e. "engineers"), as their minimal stitching and pull-on design made them ideal for working in conditions with hot coals, embers, and sharp edges. This is a probable source of the name. Wesco's boots were immediately popular with welders in Portland, Oregon-area shipyards, who needed looser fitting shoes that could be quickly removed if embers landed in the shafts. Engineer boots were overtaken in the shoe market during World War II by the production of lace-up combat boots and demand dramatically decreased.
Widespread use.
Both Chippewa and Wesco heavily increased sales of engineer boots in the late 1940s. There was a post-war production boom for the boots, with high demand coming from returning veterans and bikers. The latter adopted engineer boots because the laceless design would not interfere with motorcycle drive belts, the shafts were well insulated from heat, and they provided full lower leg protection in case of an accident. The footwear's popularity was furthered by its use by celebrities such as Marlon Brando and James Dean in their respective films "The Wild One" (1953) and "Rebel Without a Cause" (1955).
The boots would become heavily associated with the American greasers and bikers who wore them in the 1950s. Overall, they contributed to the "rebellious" look of many teenagers of the era. This aesthetic was utilised in the 1961 crime drama "The Young Savages", with this footwear being worn by the antagonists, three young urban gang members. From the 1950s through the 1970s engineer boots were frequently advertised in retail mail order catalogs. By the late 1960s, engineer boots were being frequently worn by hustlers and members of the gay leather subculture for fetishistic purposes. In the 1970s, they were adopted by skinheads. From there, they became a part of punk fashion, where they were used to express power and an industrial style. By the 2010s, engineer boots, along with other industrial footwear, were worn popularly for fashion purposes, especially by non-traditional customers such as women, young urban professionals, and hipsters.


Virgo (software)

Virgo is an open source, OSGi-based, Java application server. Virgo supports the deployment of OSGi bundles and unmodified Java web applications as well as OSGi-influenced Shared Libraries WARs and Shared Services WARs.
Virgo is based on the Equinox OSGi implementation, part of the Eclipse project. A few different distributions of Virgo exist: Virgo Nano, Virgo Kernel, Virgo Server for Apache Tomcat (embedding the Apache Tomcat servlet container) and Virgo Jetty Server (embedding the Eclipse Jetty servlet container). Virgo Server for Apache Tomcat is the primary distribution for OSGi development.
Virgo uses Spring Framework which is embedded and made available as a run-time dependency to deployed applications. Virgo is licensed using the Eclipse Public License.
Virgo was originally developed as SpringSource dm Server by SpringSource and is currently maintained by the Eclipse Foundation. SpringSource is now a division of VMware.
History.
The SpringSource dm Server was originally announced as the SpringSource Application Platform on April 30, 2008. Version 1.0 of the SpringSource dm Server was released September 30, 2008. Version 2.0 was released January 12, 2010.
SpringSource donated dm Server to Eclipse as the Virgo project later in 2010.
In 2013 SpringSource contributions to Eclipse Virgo came to an end and the team members got reallocated to different projects. In absence of a lead, the Virgo project was about to be archived until Florian Waibel stepped in as the new project lead.
IDE Tools.
Eclipse Virgo is supported by a set of Eclipse plug-ins called Virgo Tools which allow using the Eclipse IDE for the development and testing of OSGi applications against an embedded Virgo test environment. The tools support hot deploy of individual bundles and allow deployment of plan files.


Kelly Harrell

Kelly Harrell (September 13, 1889 – July 9, 1942) was an American country music singer in the 1920s. He recorded more than a dozen songs for OKeh and Victor Records and wrote songs which were recorded by other artists, including Jimmie Rodgers and Ernest Stoneman, in his own lifetime.
Biography.
Harrell was born in Draper's Valley, Wythe County, Virginia and from his early teens worked in various textile mills. In early 1925, when Harrell was already 35 years old, he went to New York City and recorded four tracks for Victor Records, among them "New River Train" (also recorded that year by Henry Whitter, a decade later by Charlie and Bill Monroe) and "The Roving Gambler". He recorded for OKeh later that year, including a version of "The Wreck of the Old 97" and "I Was Born 10,000 Year Ago" (the latter often known as "The Bragging Song" and recorded by Elvis Presley, The New Christy Minstrels, Odetta and several others).
He made more records for Victor in 1925, 1926, 1927 and 1929. "The Butcher's Boy" and "I Wish I Was A Single Girl Again" on Victor 19563 on 1/7/25. "The Dying Hobo" (1926) is a variant of the traditional English folk song "George Collins". "My Name Is John Johannah" was recorded in 1927 at RCA Victor's studios in Camden, NJ, with Posey Rorer on fiddle, Alfred Steagal on guitar and R.D. Hundley on banjo. Bob Dylan used the tune of "John Johannah" as the basis of his song "Long Time Gone". In a prose piece, "For Dave Glover" (Newport Folk Festival programme 1963), Dylan writes: "I can't sing "John Johannah" cause it's his story and his people's story."
After 1929, his recording career came to a halt, owing to his inability to play an instrument — Harrell always required backing by other musicians, and the Great Depression had so damaged the recording business that Victor was unwilling to pay the cost of hiring backup musicians.
Harrell's "My Name Is John Johannah" appeared on Harry Smith's "Anthology of American Folk Music" (1952), which was extremely influential on the folk revival of the 1950s-60s. Harrell's complete recorded music was reissued by Bear Family on a triple-LP set in the 1970s, and he is also represented by an LP on the County label. More recently, "Worried Blues" was released 2006


Dragon Quest Heroes II

Dragon Quest Heroes II is a hack-and-slash game developed by Omega Force and published by Square Enix for PlayStation 4, PlayStation 3, PlayStation Vita, Nintendo Switch, and Microsoft Windows. It was released in Japan in May 2016, and worldwide in April 2017. The game is a sequel to "".
Gameplay.
"Dragon Quest Heroes II" mixes the hack-and-slash combat of Koei Tecmo's "Dynasty Warriors" series of video games with the characters, monsters, universe, and lore from Square Enix's "Dragon Quest" series. The game is heavier on the RPG elements than most of Omega Force's other titles. World exploration was changed to resemble the typical "Dragon Quest" experience. Players can move their party to visit towns, wander the world map and initiate battle stages (similar to dungeons). Seamless random monster encounters may break up the pace between locations. Special ingredients and treasure boxes can be discovered across the world map. Weather can fluctuate and sometimes affect the party's status.
Characters are able to dash to wherever they please, but certain areas are blocked until the player proceeds with the main story. As the players proceed with the main story, they can unlock Zoomstones on the world map. These monuments allow the party to instantly warp to previously visited locations.
Accordia acts as the new main town. One major change from the previous game's features is the class change feature for the main protagonists Lazarel and Teresa. Switching classes changes equipment types and potential skills for each protagonist. Known classes include martial artist, mage, monk, thief and warrior. A new Martial Master can teach new weapon skills to the protagonist, depending on their proficiency with each weapon type. Individual weapons and outfits have all been changed to only provide aesthetic changes. Accessories can still be strengthened to alter stats.
Battle stages are mandatory for progressing the main story and behave like battle areas from the previous title. Parties can still be changed by talking to Patty in her bar. Two player co-op is now available for the main story by selecting the "Assist" option in the main battle menu.
Alternatively, players can work together to complete the new "Time-Space Labyrinth", a series of multiplayer exclusive stages aiming to appeal to longtime "Dragon Quest" fans. It is unlocked by finding labyrinth map pieces scattered throughout the main story. Erinn can be spoken to in the town inn to set up online matching or send invites.
Up to four players can play together for multiplayer missions. Online chat is not available, but players can select common stock phrases to communicate. Fallen party members can either be resurrected by Yggdrasil Leaves or raise their alive companions' health and Tension by cheering for them. Players can work together to find more map pieces or defeat difficult bosses. Metal Slimes have a higher chance of appearing in these missions.
Cross-platform play options and save data sharing are present. Having save data from the previous title grants Luceus and Aurora costumes for Lazarel and Teresa. Dragon Quest Builders save data grants "Builders Mallet" for the protagonists' use.
Plot.
The story takes place in the Seven Realms, multiple kingdoms which surround the capital of Accordia. One thousand years prior to the start of the game, the Seven Realms were locked in a brutal war that was brought to an end by the wisdom of a great king named Unos, and his descendants would continue to maintain this peace to the present day.
In the port kingdom of Harba, cousins Lazarel and Teresa (the main protagonists) fend off a sudden and unprovoked invasion from the neighboring kingdom of Dunisia, where their friend Prince Cesar lives. Accompanied by Desdemona, royal guard to the King of Accordia, the cousins travel to Dunisia to confront Cesar, who blames the king of Harba for the murder of his father. The matter is taken to the King of Accordia, who suggests that the four of them launch an investigation into the realm of Ingenia to find the true murderer.
During their travels, Lazarel and Teresa cross paths with various heroes who claim to have come from other worlds (the worlds of past "Dragon Quest" games). They agree to accompany the cousins as they investigate the growing discontent throughout the Seven Realms, culminating in a full-scale war with the Kings of the Beastlands. After a long and arduous battle, a cease-fire is finally reached and Accordia celebrates the end of the war.
The King of Accordia suddenly appears, accompanied by whom appears to be his twin brother, and declares that humankind is to be sentenced to death. Lazarel and Teresa confront the Kings in Accordia's castle and fight them until one of the twins kills the other. The "twin" is revealed to be Fractos, Unos's brother who triggered the war 1,000 years ago and manipulated all the recent events (among them killing Cesar's father) so he could plunge the world into darkness. During the chaos, Lazarel and Teresa realize that they are not cousins as originally thought, but twin siblings and descendants of Unos. Joining their power together, they destroy Fractos and later become the new rulers of Accordia.
Development.
"Dragon Quest Heroes II" was developed by Omega Force, who are better known for their "Dynasty Warriors" hack and slash series. "Dragon Quest" series creator Yuji Horii stated he wanted to have more playable characters in "Dragon Quest Heroes II" than the first title had. The voice acting was done by the same people as the first title, and two also voiced their respective characters in "Dragon Quest VIII".
In an interview, series producer Ryota Aomi detailed feedback about the original game, and it was distilled down to requests for multiplayer, a more "adventurous" battlefield, and the ability to change jobs. "Dragon Quest Heroes I·II", a compilation featuring both games in the series, was released as a Japanese launch title for the Nintendo Switch in March 2017.
Reception.
More than 580,000 copies of the game were sold in Japan. "Game Informer" praised the graphics and the controls, but noted the games thin plot and repetitive gameplay. "IGN" was more complimentary, praising the improved story over the original, and praising changes to the combat system, but not enjoying the addition of further RPG elements to the game. "GameSpot" loved the open world aspect being pair with more intense story-driven "war zones", and further enjoyed online multiplayer for letting players encounter very powerful monsters to team up against. "Polygon" stated that the game was not great at either combat or its RPG elements, citing slow enemies and uninteresting quests. "Destructoid" called the game an improvement over the original "Dragon Quest Heroes", noting that there is more exploration freedom than before, but saying there are not enough interesting things to do in the open world or "points of interest". "Famitsu" awarded it four scores of 10, 10, 9 and 10, which equaled a total of 39 out of 40.


Ashen (2004 video game)

Ashen is a first-person shooter video game for N-Gage developed by Torus Games and published by Nokia in 2004. It was first shown to the public at Cebit 2004.
Gameplay.
The game is divided into 8 levels, which,for a handheld, are enormous in size and structure. Levels take place in a prison, over rooftops, a city-scape, and even in the sewers. The environments are quite varied and is one of the best performing FPS titles on the N-Gage.
There are 9 different weapons available in the game, including 2x pistols, alien weapons, MG, sniper rifle, and a rocket launcher. Unfortunately, enemy variety is lacking.
There is also the ability to enter your score in the game into the N-Gage Arena. A direct Multipayer over GPRS is unfortunately not present. The game offers an offline multiplayer mode for up to four players, however only four levels are selectable. Nevertheless, they offer a lot of fun for multiplayer fans.
Story.
In Seven River City, mysterious phenomena begin to happen. Jacob Ward, along with all of the residents, flee the city. Jacobs sister did not make it out, however, and he decides to return to save her.
Reception.
The game received "mixed" reviews according to the review aggregation website Metacritic.


John Mercanti

John M. Mercanti (born April 27, 1943) is an American sculptor and engraver. He was the twelfth Chief Engraver of the United States Mint until his retirement in late 2010.
Biography.
Mercanti was born in Philadelphia. There, he attended the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts, the Philadelphia College of Art and the Fleisher Art Memorial School. He also served in the Pennsylvania Army National Guard for six years.
In 1974, Mercanti joined the United States Mint as a sculptor-engraver after working as an illustrator. On May 19, 2006, he was appointed Chief Engraver of the U.S. Mint (also known as Supervisor of Design and Master Tooling Development Specialist). The position had been officially vacant for 15 years following the retirement of Elizabeth Jones, the Mint's eleventh Chief Engraver, in 1991.
In June 2011, Mercanti became a paid spokesperson for Goldline International and appeared in a television commercial for the company.
Work.
Mercanti has produced more coin and medal designs than any employee in United States Mint history (more than 100 as of 2006). Among these are the 1984 Olympic gold ten-dollar coin, the 1986 Statue of Liberty dollar coin, the 1989 Congress Bicentennial gold five-dollar coin, the obverse of the 1990 Eisenhower Centennial silver dollar, the obverse of the 1991 Mount Rushmore five-dollar coin, the obverse of the 1991 Korean War Memorial silver dollar, and the obverse of the 2005 John Marshall commemorative dollar. In addition to designing and sculpting a number of Congressional Gold Medals, Mercanti worked on quarters for the states of Arkansas, Iowa, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, and West Virginia for the 50 State Quarters Program.


Electric Youth (band)

Electric Youth is a Canadian synth-pop/synthwave duo from Toronto, Ontario consisting of Bronwyn Griffin (vocals, songwriter) and Austin Garrick (producer, songwriter, synthesizer, drums).
Career.
Garrick and Griffin have been dating since the 8th grade. Their initial breakthrough came in 2011 when their song "A Real Hero", created in association with College, was prominently featured in the movie "Drive". The song was written by Garrick, in part about Chesley Sullenberger and the crash landing of Flight 1549. "A Real Hero" was nominated for a 2012 MTV Movie Award in the category of "Best Music".
"Spin" magazine named "A Real Hero" one of the 20 Best Songs of 2011.
Contrary to some reports in the press, the group did not name themselves after "Electric Youth", the 1989 album by pop singer Debbie Gibson. Garrick explained to "Rolling Stone" magazine about the group's sound:
In late 2013 Electric Youth signed with Last Gang Records and Secretly Canadian. On September 30, 2014 the band released their debut album "Innerworld" through Last Gang Records in Canada and Secretly Canadian in the rest of the world, debuting at #13 on the Billboard Top Dance Electronic Albums chart. "Innerworld" was produced by Electric Youth. Vince Clarke (Erasure/Yazoo/Depeche Mode) and Peter Mayes (PNAU/Empire of the Sun) provided additional production, and the album was mixed by Mayes. "Innerworld" includes previously released tracks 'The Best Thing' and 'A Real Hero (feat College)' It received wide critical acclaim including "NME" and NPR "First Listen".
"Rolling Stone" declared Electric Youth one of the Ten Artists You Need To Know in 2014.
Electric Youth carried out their first headlining tour across the US and Canada in November, 2014.
In 2019 Electric Youth released their second studio album “Memory Emotion”, receiving a Juno Award nomination for Electronic Album of the Year.
Discography.
Studio albums
Singles/EPs


FlatOut (video game)

FlatOut is a racing video game developed by the Finnish developer Bugbear Entertainment and published by Empire Interactive in Europe and Vivendi Universal Games in North America in 2004 and 2005. Gameplay in "FlatOut" places emphasis on demolition derby-style races, and features a sophisticated physics engine. 16 different cars are included, each with 5 different skins for them. The game is most known for car drivers flying through the windshield.
In 2014, a Linux version of the game was released on GOG.com as part of the launch of Linux support.
Features.
Modes in "FlatOut" include standard lap races, in either open environments or stadium laps, and demolition derby deathmatches, in which the driver of the sole-surviving vehicle declared the winner; both modes pit players against 7 computer-controlled opponents. The game also includes special events which require the player to toss the driver off of his/her vehicle and meet certain requirements. In career mode, pick up your future top racer from the junkyard. Winnings come in the form of cash, which allows players to purchase vehicle upgrades and new vehicles.
"FlatOut" is noted for its extensive use of physics in vehicle damage and collisions; dents on vehicles may vary based on the type of accident, object and angle of impact (falling objects, for example, will damage mostly the upper areas of a car), while many roadside items react better to collisions from other vehicles.
Ragdoll physics is also present in the game, with drivers capable of being tossed out of their car after high-impact crashes. This feature is extensively used in several special events, when the player is required to "toss" a driver to a specific distance, height, or target.
Reception.
The game received "average" reviews on all platforms according to the review aggregation website Metacritic. In Japan, "Famitsu" gave the PlayStation 2 version a score of all four sevens for a total of 28 out of 40.
"The Sydney Morning Herald" gave the game a score of four-and-a-half stars out of five and stated: "The handling is remarkable, and the fact the tracks are littered with obstacles that bounce and crash realistically makes it all the more fun. Throw in excellent damage modelling and it's plain to see that this game has nailed the core mechanics of an addictive racer perfectly". "The Times" gave the PS2 and Xbox versions a score of four stars out of five and wrote that the truly suicidal "will be in awe of the driver's ability to launch himself fatally through the windscreen, screaming, while the rest of us will love the game's easy and responsive controls, and the authentic feel of the cars". "Detroit Free Press", however, gave the Xbox version a score of two stars out of four and said that "if [the game] were only a $20 title, I'd heartily recommend it. But $50 is a lot of money to pay to turn yourself into road splatter over and over again. It's flawed, though fun". "Maxim" gave the game a score of two stars out of five and said it was "about as interesting as a public service announcement for seatbelts".
"FlatOut" was selected in 2017 for a collection of 100 classical Finnish games, which were presented on the opening of the Finnish Museum of Games in Tampere.
Sequels.
A sequel, "FlatOut 2", was released first, in Europe, on June 30, 2006. A larger variety of vehicles (including contemporary cars and pickup trucks) are included. The North American version was launched on August 1.
In 2007 Bugbear released "", an enhanced remake of "FlatOut 2", for Xbox 360. The Microsoft Windows version was released on August 1, 2008.
On November 2010, Team6 Game Studios released a new game titled "FlatOut" for the Wii. This game was met with poorer reviews than the original game by Bugbear.
"" for Microsoft Windows developed by Team6 Game Studios was released in America in December 2011. The game was met with overwhelmingly negative reviews.
"Flatout Stuntman" is the Android-exclusive ragdoll game in the series. It was developed and published by Team6 Game Studios, and released in November 2013.
"" developed by Kylotonn for Xbox One, PlayStation 4 and Microsoft Windows was released in March 2017. This game was met with average reviews.


Evelyn E. Smith

Evelyn E. Smith (25 July 1922 – 4 July 2000) was an American writer of science fiction and mysteries, as well as a compiler of crossword puzzles.
Profile.
During the 1950s, under her own name, Smith regularly published short stories and novelettes in such publications as "Galaxy Science Fiction", "Fantastic Universe" and the prestigious "The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction". Her short fiction ranges from satires set in a post-apocalyptic setting such as "The Last of the Spode" and "The Hardest Bargain", to "BAXBR/DAXBR", where she explores the dangers of Martian crossword puzzles. Her science fiction novels, which chiefly deal with questions of gender identity and, like all of her work, are characterized by their wit and humor.
Smith is probably best known, however, for her Miss Melville Mystery series, which chronicles the exploits of a middle-aged socialite-turned-assassin.
Under the pseudonym of Delphine C. Lyons, she authored a number gothic romance novels and the non-fiction works "Everyday Witchcraft" and "Love Potions & Spells", which collect folklore and magical spells, and "Fortune Telling", eight ways to read the future.
Smith's short story "At Last I've Found You" was adapted into an opera by Seymour Barab; it premiered in Charlotte, North Carolina in 1984.


Hiroshi Fujiwara

 (born 1964) is a Japanese musician, producer, and designer.
Life.
Fujiwara was born in Ise, Mie. He moved to Tokyo at eighteen and became a standout in the Harajuku street fashion scene. During a trip to New York City in the early 1980s he was introduced to hip hop; taking American records back to Tokyo, he became one of Japan's first hip hop DJs, and is credited with popularizing the genre in Japan. He subsequently went into music producing, specializing in remixes.
He is known as a godfather of Ura-Harajuku fashion and is a globally influential streetwear designer, including being the pioneer for Nike's "HTM" line, and the "Fenom" line for Levis. He launched his first brand, Good Enough, in the late 1980s.
Good Enough eventually gave way to a new project: Fragment Design, the brand which Fujiwara dedicates most of his time as a creative to in today's time.
In 2003, he appeared in the film "Lost in Translation". As a musician, he has collaborated with many artists, among them are his friends Kahimi Karie, Janis Ian, Ua, and Eric Clapton. In 2003 he designed a guitar for Clapton which was custom made by Martin Guitars for some performances in Japan. After an initial run of eight, Martin built a total of 476 of these ornate black guitars. Another Fujiwara-Clapton guitar followed in 2006.
In 2008, Fujiwara made a rare public appearance in the U.S. and participated in the Imprint Culture Lab's Cult of Collaboration panel.


List of first-person shooters

This is a comprehensive index of commercial first-person shooter video games, sorted alphabetically by title. The developer, platform, and release date are provided where available. The table can be sorted by clicking on the small boxes next to the column headings.
List.
Initially items sorted alphabetically by "title". The table can be sorted by a different column via clicking on the small box next to column heading.


James Ernest

James Ernest is an American game designer and juggler, best known as the owner and lead designer of Cheapass Games.
Career.
Prior to founding Cheapass Games, Ernest worked as a juggler at various venues, including Camlann Medieval Village, and as a freelancer with Wizards of the Coast. He also worked for Carbonated Games. He has also created games for other publishers including Rio Grande Games and WizKids. In 2005, Paizo Publishing created Titanic Games with Ernest and Mike Selinker.
Ernest's games include "Unexploded Cow", "Kill Doctor Lucky", "The Big Idea" and the game originally known as "Before I Kill You, Mr. Bond" (that game was eventually renamed after complaints from the owners of the Bond franchise). He has had success with Kickstarter, successfully crowdfunding games like a new version of "Unexploded Cow" and "Get Lucky" (which takes the concept and core mechanics of "Kill Doctor Lucky" and adapts it as a card game), among others.
Ernest wrote, produced, directed, edited, and created music for the short film "The Man Between" (2003) and wrote the book "Dealer's Choice: The Complete Handbook of Saturday Night Poker". His first publication was the book "Contact Juggling" in 1990.
In 2014 James began collaborating with Patrick Rothfuss to create an abstract strategy game called "Tak", based on a game described in Rothfuss's 2011 book "The Wise Man's Fear". In April 2016 they launched a Kickstarter campaign to bring the game to actual publication. The campaign ended on May 20 to great success, with 12,187 backers pledging $1,351,142.


Henry Franken

Hendrik Marinus (Henry) Franken (born 1966) is a Dutch engineer, enterprise architect and co-founder and former managing director of BiZZdesign, known for his work in the field of systems and control engineering, and business process management.
Biography.
Franken received his MA in Electrical Engineering in 1990 from the University of Twente. He specialized in systems and control engineering, and in 1994 received his PhD with a thesis entitled "Control system design for walking neuroprostheses."
After graduation Franken started as researcher at the Telematica Instituut, where from 1996 to 2001 he participated in the Testbed research project to develop a virtual test environment for business processes. In 2001 he founded BiZZdesign with Harmen van den Berg and Harm Bakker In 2001 to 2003 he was also Enterprise architecture consultant for the ING Group. Since 2009 he chairs The Open Group ArchiMate Forum, a working group that guides the further development of the ArchiMate modeling languages.
Selected publications.
Books:
Articles, a selection:


Paul Gilger

Paul Douglass Gilger (born October 13, 1954 in Mansfield, Ohio) is an Ohio architect, set designer, and playwright.
Playwrighting.
Gilger conceived the 2003 off-Broadway Jerry Herman musical revue "Showtune".
Architecture.
In 1991, Gilger was the project designer for the Industrial Light and Magic film studio building in San Rafael, California for filmmaker George Lucas ("Star Wars", "Indiana Jones") and in 1989, he helped prepare conceptual designs for the Disney/MGM Film Studios in Tokyo, Japan.
Gilger's architectural work includes:
Gilger has been a Senior Project Designer with Hedgpeth Architects in Santa Rosa, California, for over 30 years.
Set design.
With Nomad Productions Scenic Studios in San Francisco, Gilger worked on concert touring sets for Madonna (1985 "Like a Virgin" Tour), Kenny Loggins, Crosby Stills & Nash, Carlos Santana, Alabama, Dio, and Petra, stage sets for Whoopi Goldberg and Anthony Newley (the 1983 musical "Chaplin"), set pieces for the Super Bowl broadcast, and numerous sets for television. He has designed numerous stage sets for theatre companies in Ohio and California, and from 1975 thru 1981 was the set designer and associate producer of the Miss Ohio Pageant.
Lincoln Highway.
Gilger is the chair of the Lincoln Highway Association National Mapping Committee. In 2012, Gilger completed the cartography of the entire Lincoln Highway, creating the online Official Map of the Lincoln Highway, a 20-year project involving research by 25 members of the committee.
Background & education.
Gilger is a 1978 graduate of the University of Cincinnati College of Design, Architecture, Art, and Planning, with study in theatrical set design at University of Cincinnati College-Conservatory of Music.
His sister, Joan Gilger Stear, was Miss Ohio 1978.
Gilger resides in Santa Rosa, California.


Flor Minor

Flor Minor (born 1961) is a Mexican sculptor and graphic artist, known for bronze sculptures and graphic work that generally depict the male form. Her works often are based on the concept of balance or lack thereof. Minor has had individual exhibitions in notable venues in Mexico and abroad, and her work can be found in a number of public and private collections. She has been recognized in Mexico with membership in the Salón de la Plástica Mexicana.
Life.
Minor was born and raised in the city of Querétaro. From 1978 to 1980, she studied at the Escuela Nacional de Pintura, Escultura y Grabado "La Esmeralda", and 1979 to 1982 she studied at the Centro de Investigación y Experimentación Plástica (INBAL), where she researched non-conventional funding support for the arts.
Career.
Minor has participated in notable biennials and triennials such as the Bienal de Pintura Pedro Coronel in Zacatecas, The International Print Triennial Kanagawa Prefectoral Gallery, Kanagaxa Arts Foundation, Yokohama, International Print Triennial at the Museum of Contemporary Art for Oslo and the Print Biennial (Modern Art) at the Ljubljana Gallery.
Her work can be found in public and private collections such as those at the National Autonomous University of Mexico, the Secretaría de Hacienda y Crédito Público Museum (which has 34 pieces by the artist), the Museo de Arte Moderno, the Museo de la Estampa, Centro Wifredo Lam in Havana and the Museo de Arte Moderno in Ceará, Brazil.
She has had individual exhibitions at venues such as the Museo Dolores Olmedo (2014), the Galería Arte Contemporáneo in San Miguel Allende (2013, 2014), the Universidad de Guanajuato (2013), the Mexican Stock Exchange in Mexico City, (2013), the SCHP Museum (2006, 2011), the Museo de Arte Moderno (2011), the Universidad Autónoma Metropolitana (2009), Museo Universitario del Chopo (2002, 2009), Museo de la Ciudad de México (2001), Museo de la Ciudad de Querétaro (2001) and the Contemporary Art Museum of Aguascalientes (1997) .
Minor was a founding member of the Neográfica workshop with Oliverio Hinojosa and has received various grants for artistic projects from FONCA and the Sistema Nacional de Creadores.
Minor's work has been recognized with membership in the Salón de la Plástica Mexicana.
Artistry.
Minor is a sculptor, especially bronze using the lost wax method, and according to the Salón de la Plástica Mexicana, one of the best graphic artists in Mexico, working in lithography, etching, drypoint and charcoal drawing. In many of her drawings, her use of charcoal is such that little, if any, color in needed. She admires and her work shows influence from Leonardo Da Vinci.
A main focus of her sculpting and drawing work is the search for balance. She creates bronzes in various sizes in which she explores the contradiction of needing to lose balance and security to take a step. Some of her works revolve around man in search of himself, why we exist; nonetheless, her figures tend to be serene and solitary, missing tension. Her work is known for its depiction of the human form, but she does not generally refer to the feminine in her work. The male figures in her graphic works are in work settings.


Omina no Chichihaha

Omina no Chichihaha (女之父母) is a description used in the "Man'yōshū", a classical Japanese "waka" anthology, for the authors of poem 3815 contained therein. The "name" translates to "the woman's father and mother", and their poem was a reply to the young man who wrote 3814, requesting the hand of their recently divorced daughter in marriage. They wrote to him that, unfortunately, their daughter had already left to marry someone else.
 has compared the anecdote recounted by these two poems and the surrounding notes) to chapter 24 of the "Tales of Ise".


Piero Tosi

Piero Tosi (10 April 1927 – 10 August 2019) was an award-winning Italian costume designer.
Biography.
Tosi's film credits include "Senso", "Bellissima", "The Leopard", "Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow", "Death in Venice", "The Night Porter", and "La Traviata".
He was particularly known for his exhaustively researched and intricately detailed historical costumes.
He won the David di Donatello for Best Costumes twice, as well as the 50th Anniversary David in 2006. He also won the BAFTA Award for Best Costume Design twice, and was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Costume Design five times.
For his personal achievements in costume design over 75 years, he was awarded an Academy Honorary Award on 16 November 2013.
He died in Rome on 10 August 2019, at the age of 92.


Eufloria

Eufloria (formerly Dyson) is a real-time strategy video game developed by British studio Omni Systems Limited, consisting of independent developers Alex May, Rudolf Kremers and Brian Grainger. It was named after the Dyson tree hypothesis by Freeman Dyson that a tree-like plant could grow on a comet.
The game was released for Microsoft Windows in 2009, the PlayStation Network in 2011 and the iPad in 2012. Mac, Linux and Android versions of this game was pre-released along with Humble Indie Bundle for Android 4 on 8 November 2012. According to the official FAQ for the game, the final release for Mac and Linux was to be provided in the late summer of 2013. Eufloria HD was released for Android on the Google Play Store on 15 December 2012. The BlackBerry PlayBook version released on 29 December 2012.
It is set in a futuristic space environment, where the player assumes the role of the commander of interstellar lifeforms called Euflorians, who live and gain their resources on asteroids. The player has to use basic units that are grown on Dyson trees and are called "seedlings", to colonize and conquer asteroids. On asteroids, Dyson trees may be planted and as the tree grows and gets stronger, it will produce more seedlings with certain attributes. There are also flowers, defensive trees, and other units later in the game. Players battle other empires and seek to discover the origin of a mysterious grey menace, to speed up the return of the mythical Growers.
"Eufloria" has been described as a simple but charming game with calming music, graphics, and gameplay.
Versions.
There are two versions of "Eufloria": the original was released for Windows PCs and subsequently rewritten for PlayStation Network. This is now referred to "Eufloria Classic". "Eufloria HD" is the actively maintained build, and was first released on iOS and later on for BlackBerry. The Humble Bundle 4 for Android made it available on Android, and also in pre-release form on PC, Mac, and Linux. Owners of the original "Eufloria" could upgrade for free once "Eufloria HD" was released on PC, Mac and Linux. This version was released October 2014.
Gameplay.
Graphically, "Eufloria" is simple, with minimalistic graphics, and a simple design. The colour of the Euflorian empire is customizable.
At the start of the game, the player has one tree, called a Dyson tree, on an asteroid. The tree has a number of branches and leaves that fall off and become seedlings, which can be used to either create trees or fight other seedlings. Each tree is unique, the growth of its branches based on a fractal algorithm.
To create trees, 10 seedlings are needed in orbit of an asteroid. These seedlings then plummet into the ground to grow grass and the trees' roots. A plant called a defense tree may also be grown that attacks invading enemy seedlings by releasing explosive fruit. Over time, the plant's health, damage, and spawn rate increases. The player can also customize their asteroids with add-ons called 'flowers'.
If a dyson tree has a flower added, dysons with a vastly enhanced firerate and range are produced. If a defense tree has a flower added, lasermines are produced. These are powerful seedlings which can take on multiple enemies with multiple lasers, and a suicidal explosion.
The seedlings can attack enemy asteroids, and take them over by burrowing through the roots to the core, and sapping the energy of the asteroid.
All levels are partially randomly generated, meaning each playthrough is slightly different. Also, each asteroid is unique in size and values, and produces seedlings with different stats. There are three stats: Speed enhances the rate of movement of seedlings, Strength enhances the damage of seedlings, and Energy increases the speed at which seedlings can convert enemy asteroids. The stats also affect the appearance of the seedlings.
Plot.
The game begins in the far off future in space. The player controls a force of seedlings, and take more asteroids for the growers, mythical beings which spawned the seedlings. The mothertree hopes that by taking enough colonies for the growers, they can make them return. Early in the game, the player encounter an enemy, the greys, which has brutally attacked one of their colonies. Soon the mothertree learns that the greys have been driven mad by a disease, which forces them to attack. They also learn that another empire is attacking their empire and so the player is sent beyond the borders of the empire to find out why the greys are attacking, and deal with them. The player continues, gaining new technologies and rescuing allies along the way, to find that their enemies produced the greys, despite the danger that the greys would destroy them too. Eventually, the home asteroid of the greys was found. After conquering them, the mothertree analysed their remains, and found that all the enemy seedlings had the same DNA as the Euflorian's seedlings.
Development.
Originally called "Dyson", the game started as a simple single proof of concept level. Levels were originally designed with the XML markup language, and later the Lua programming language for increased flexibility.
The game was renamed "Eufloria" after a contest on IGN's Direct2Drive. Over 400 names were sorted through, with Vernon Sydnor giving the winning name.
The game has since been upgraded with a campaign, substantial AI and graphical improvements, and has been translated into English, French, German, Italian, Spanish, and Dutch.


BPCS


Java BluePrints

Java BluePrints is Sun Microsystems' best practices for Enterprise Java development. This is Sun's official programming model for Java Platform, Enterprise Edition (Java EE) Software Development Kit (SDK). It began with Java Pet Store, the original reference application for the Java EE platform. This became the "de facto" source code for using Enterprise JavaBeans and all the latest components of the Java EE platform.
History.
Java BluePrints began as J2EE BluePrints and was started by Connie Weiss, Jeff Jackson, Jim Inscore, Nick Kassem, and Rick Saletta. The original engineers included Inderjeet Singh, Greg Murray, Sean Brydon, Vijay Ramachandran, Elisabeth White, and Nick Kassem. Nick Kassem is the author of the original book. The idea of Java Pet Store came from Connie Weiss and Greg Murray who were both animal lovers. After the first year, Nick Kassem left the team and Inderjeet Singh became lead architect. The Java BluePrints team was led by Larry Freeman from J2EE 1.2 in 2000 up until Java EE 5 in 2006.
Throughout its existence, Java BluePrints has offered all of its content for free and has been focused on promoting developer success. Java Pet Store became the symbol for J2EE's ascendency; Microsoft created a competing .NET Pet Shop to showcase its competing technology. Since then, many technologies such as Tapestry, Spring, and others have implemented their own versions of the Pet Store application as a way to demonstrate best practices for their given technology.
With the arrival of J2EE 1.4 technology, web services became a standard part of the Java EE specification. Java BluePrints came out with a second application: the Java Adventure Builder reference application. This application never became as popular as Java Pet Store but then again, it never became as controversial.
Books.
There have been three Java BluePrints books, and the Core Java EE design patterns which are hosted on the Java BluePrints site have become the standard lingua for Java EE application development. Java BluePrints was the first source to promote Model View Controller (MVC) and Data Access Object (DAO) for Java EE application development. Before this, the MVC design pattern was widely promoted as part of Smalltalk.
The latest Java BluePrints offering is the Java BluePrints Solutions Catalog. It covers topics as diverse as Java Server Faces, Web Services, and Asynchronous Javascript and XML (Ajax). Articles are smaller and more focused and include sample code that shows how a solution is implemented. Its focus is on the J2EE 1.4 SDK.


Tensilica Instruction Extension

Tensilica Instruction Extension refers to the proprietary language that is used to customize Tensilica's Xtensa processor core architecture.
By using TIE, the user can customize the Xtensa architecture by adding custom instructions and register files, instantiating TIE Ports and Queues for multiprocessor communication, and adding pre-configured extensions (such as Tensilica's DSP). Software applications can greatly benefit from properly targeted user-defined instructions, while TIE ports and TIE queues facilitate multiprocessor communication by adding separate input and output interfaces to the processor core. Using the TIE language and Xtensa Xplorer toolkit, the generation and verification of the instructions used to extend the processor ISA are automated. Such automation helps to reduce the hardware verification time that typically consumes a large percentage of the project duration of a typical hardware developed for the same functionality.
History.
TIE was added by Tensilica to extend the instruction set of the Xtensa processors.
TIE Creation.
TIE code can be created in two ways. TIE can be:
Manual coding is similar to programming using Verilog, a Hardware description language. Automatic generation of TIE code is done using Xtensa Xpress tool. This is done by first compiling & executing the code using the Xplorer and Xtensa Xpress tools. Xpress analyses the code that will be executed on the processor and generates additional TIE instructions for the processor core. These additional instructions will be automatically substituted when the C/C++ compiler generates the assembly code, preventing any manual intervention. This provides a complete user abstraction to the automatic TIE generation process.
Interface to C/C++.
TIE extended instructions are called "operations" in TIE language. Since TIE compiler generates compiler intrinsics for each TIE operation, the TIE instructions can be invoked directly using the function call semantics of C language. The C compiler takes care of translating the TIE intrinsics into the appropriate instructions to be executed in the assembly code that is generated.
TIE Compilation.
The TIE compiler is used to compile code written in TIE language. TIE compiler automates the generation of the designer defined hardware instructions additions to the processor core.
TIE compilation produces the following outputs:
TIE Testing & Verification.
Once the code has been compiled using the TIE compiler, there are minimum two levels of verification & testing required to verify the functionality.