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Glyde – Site Review

Jagadish — Fri, 26 Feb 2010 20:40:41 +0000

Glyde is an online portal which sells pre-owned (used) or NEW video games, music, books and DVDs. As far as I know, the things for sale on the site are entirely user submitted. Glyde only acts as a middle man to make the transaction possible. It is sort of like ebay without the whole bidding process. I had recently purchased an item on the site and I thought it would be a good idea to post a review for others curious about the service.

Glyde follows the minimalistic design made popular by Google. There is a big search box in the middle of the page (hard to miss ). It also comes up with suggestions as you keep typing. This is really quick if you are looking for something specific. However, if you want to browse through categories, you would have to click on all items at the bottom. There is also an option to click through daily deals on top of the site. There is no way to sort the games in alphabetical order or in terms of popularity or even by price. You can only filter them through categories and consoles. Again, let me be clear here: if you are looking for something specific, glyde automatically gives you the cheapest price of that product in different condition categories (New, Excelling, Good, Disc only).

If you are looking to sell your products, then all you do is enter the name of the product and pick one of the options (if your game is multi-platform). Glyde automatically picks a suitable price for you. You can increase or decrease the price to your liking. It also tells you how many people have priced the item lower than that. Considering the fact that there are many people trying to sell the same thing, it might be a good idea to price it lower than the prescribed price. Glyde will also ask you to pick the condition of the game. I am not sure about the payment procedure and such. I think the general idea is that your money gets deposit into your account once you request for it or you could use that money to buy other games on the site. I think the commission is 10% on sale price (again please read the FAQs on site for detailed information).

Coming to my experience with Glyde, I have purchased two games from the site and received one of them. I was a little worried about the purchase because unlike ebay there was no option contact the seller for pictures or get assurances about the condition of the item. There was no feedback score either. So, there was really no way of knowing if the seller’s interpretation of Excellent is same as mine. Also the shipping was painfully slow. For some reason, Glyde decided that they would mail the envelope (ala Netflix style) to the seller with the buyer’s address on it. And the seller would stick his game in that envelop and drop it in the mailbox. This means that there is twice as much shipping time involved compared to ebay. Essentially, most games take about two weeks to arrive. There is no expedited option for shipping either. If you are looking to get something quick, this is not the place to go. This is one of the major gripes I have with the service. I do not understand why Glyde does not just allow the seller to print the mailing receipt and stick it on a “Glyde prescribed envelope”. The bubble wrap media mail envelopes are like $2 or less and are available at every USPS store. I have to say, I did not like the waiting but the game I received allayed all my fears. The game was in great condition. It was “Like New” just as it should be . It made me go and buy another game .

I am not sure if I got lucky but my next purchase would tell. If you don’t mind the waiting time, Glyde is a great service to try. They have tons of games for all the current generation and the previous generation consoles as well as the current gen handhelds. You will definitely find a great price on that game you have been looking for. Make sure you search for Glyde coupons online before you click Buy Now. You could easily save $3 by using on these coupon codes: KOTAKU, UGO, HIATI. You could also follow them on Twitter (@Glyde) to get more deals and coupon codes. Glyde is a good service like ebay’s half.com if you are looking to buy something quickly. Just look at both sites and buy it from the cheaper place.

Pros:

Clean simplistic interface
One click buying.
Automatically finds the cheapest price for the product in each condition category.
Easy-mode selling. (no need to package or buy shipping supplies)
Get better trade-in values for your used games (better than gamestop).

Cons:

Long shipping times (2 weeks)
No option for expedited shipping.
Credibility: No way to trust the seller.
No pictures of the product before purchase (Just the stock picture).
No feedback option.

My thoughts on Braid

Jagadish — Sun, 31 May 2009 18:02:49 +0000

I finished playing braid yesterday and as always quite late when it comes to finishing games . Given that I spent about less than an hour every day and no use of walkthroughs, it was quite an arduous task. I have to say as frustrating as it gets playing the game, it is really very satisfying when you figure things out on your own. Jonathan Blow has done a marvellous job in making this game. He had put all the right ingredients to make the game look innovative and yet familiar. Most people would confuse Braid to a platformer but it really is a puzzle game with an interesting time travel mechanic. It has a brilliant sound track and great visuals.

The story follows a typical Mario style adventure, an ordinary guy trying to rescue the princess. But when you get to the end of the game, it is kinda anti-climatic. I wouldn’t want to give too much away but it surprised me. I was shocked to say the least. It is for these kind of moments you become a gamer. You want to be surprised even if it is an unpleasant one. It was the shock that made me love FF6 when the world was destroyed half way through the game. It was the kind of shock that made me love KOTOR when I realized the main character was the Sith Lord, Raven. I could go on and on. The ending is, I would say on par with many great games but the game itself is not perfect.

My biggest gripe about the game is the stars that you have to collect at the end of the game. Having Speed runs is an interesting thing but collecting the stars is a really pain staking exercise. Most of them are hidden in really obscure place and takes a long long wait. I might still try to get them when I am absolutely bored but I wouldn’t try to attempt it otherwise. It also a short game for its price. There is very little to go back for once you done playing through once. Very little replay value. Even with all these complaints, I think Braid is a solid 8.5/10.

5 Must Have WordPress plugins

Jagadish — Sun, 03 May 2009 20:29:06 +0000

When I logged into my WordPress dashboard today, I noticed that there were about 98 spam comments. And thankfully, none of them got through the Akismet spam filter. I couldn’t help but wonder the kind of time I would’ve had to spend if I had not installed this plugin. So I decided to pick a few plugins that are absolutely necessary for everyone who has a WordPress blog. Here is my list.

Akismet: This is an absolute must-have for all the WordPress blogs out there. Spam is one of the biggest headaches on the internet. Akismet acts like the spam filter in your email. It automatically puts all the spam comments on hold, so you can approve them later if you feel they are not spam. You would be surprised how many comments you get are spam.
Ultimate Google Analytics: Once you get on the internet with a blog, I am sure the next thing you want to know is how many people actually visit your blog. Google Analytics is a stats tool that helps you with that kind of information. It tells you where all your visitors are coming from, what browser they use and a lot of other things you might or might not be interested in. To get that information, you have to place Google’s code in your blog in all the pages. This can be a headache if you don’t like messing with the templates. UGA, does it all for you. All you have to do is give your Google Analytics UID in the options page and it will be up and running. It even has the option of not logging your own visits. Use WordPress.com stats plugin if you need a simple plugin. (I use both )
WordPress video plugin: Do you like to embed a lot of videos without copy pasting all the embed tag? Well this plugin is a perfect choice if you like to embed a lot of videos from video sharing sites in your blog. All you need to do is get the video id and knowing how to use simple BB codes. You can even set the height and width of the video.
Google XML sitemaps: This plugin generates a XML-Sitemap compliant sitemap of your WordPress blog. This format is supported by Ask.com, Google, YAHOO and MSN Search. XML-Sitemaps are basically used to index your site. This plugin automatically generates sitemaps for your site periodically telling the search engines.
All in SEO Pack: Search Engine Optimization helps your site get noticed on search engines. This plugin collects keywords from your blog titles, description and tags and sort of increases the volume of traffic you get to your blog through search engines.

I also use YARPP which displays related posts at the bottom of the each post, (C) Feed which puts a footer in the RSS feed to prevent splogging, WP-Cumulus to display the awesome 3D tag cloud in the sidebar, Tweet this for twitter integration.

Motorola S9

Jagadish — Fri, 01 May 2009 16:55:06 +0000

I have been looking for a decent Bluetooth stereo headset for awhile now. A few things that always swayed me away from making a purchase was the bulkiness of the headset and most importantly, the price. Most of the stereo headsets available in the market were in the “$80 and above” price range. I was not ready to shell out that kind of money because I was more than happy to have a wire hanging from my ears to torso. I was never a proponent of Bluetooth technology because the bandwidth offered was not a lot. But Bluetooth 2.0 has made significant advances in the right direction with 3 times faster data transfer, lower power consumption and more.

When I saw Motorola S9 stereo headset for $40 on buy.com, I knew it would be a good purchase. The price was affordable and they looked nice and sleek. I showed the picture to one of my friends and his first thought was that they look uncomfortable. They were anything but uncomfortable. They were not a snug fit as they were kinda hanging behind my neck but there was no pain wearing them for long periods of time. The pairing was a breeze with my smart phone (Sprint’s HTC Touch) as well my laptop using a Targus Bluetooth adapter.

The call quality was also very good both inside the apartment as well as outside. I noticed that people found it hard to hear me when I was outside and I had to speak up a little. The call quality deteriorated considerably during windy conditions but that was expected anyway.

The range was also very good inside the house. I usually leave my phone on the table in my living room and moved around the house without losing the connection to my cellphone. It was a different issue outside the house though. Sometimes, I had to hold the phone in my hand instead of putting it in my pants pocket as the music would start breaking. This only happened during the early days and I haven’t really noticed this happening recently. Maybe its not a real issue, we will see.

The touch sensitive buttons on the side are also really neat. I have heard people complaining in their reviews that sweat activates them during a workout. I haven’t had that trouble really. I was not using my stereo headset at the gym, so I can’t comment on that. They respond very well and I have no complaints.

Overall, I think Motorola S9 is a great purchase for $40. I am sure the prices will reduce further as Motorola is introducing Motorola S9 HD into the market. If you are someone who loves to take your music on the go, this is for you. It has great sound quality, long battery life, comfortable fit and great looks. Buy it. I assure you, you will not regret it.

Will the real spiderman please put his mask back on?

Jagadish — Mon, 21 May 2007 04:34:00 +0000

Spiderman 3 is one of the movies that I have been looking forward to see this summer, so badly. I’ve been checking for the availability of tickets online every day and I must say that I’m really really disappointed. I’m sure everyone who has watched the Spiderman cartoons and read the comics must’ve been really appalled at the way spiderman removes his mask everytime he has to fight someone. It is ridiculous because the comic book hero has always tried to keep his identity a secret rather than flaunt his face around to get attention. I wonder if this had to anything with the criticism from the first spiderman movie where the audience felt that Toby McGuire was not doing the spiderman stunts. If that is the case, “Please Toby, we believe you. Now be a good spiderman and put that mask back on.” Or we audience would want to boot you out of the series forever.

Coming to Toby, this has got to be his worst showing ever. If the script is muddled with too many things, Toby Mcguire just makes it worse with his bad acting. Black spiderman was supposed to be uber-cool. But Toby Mcguire makes him look retarded and gay. Kirsten Dunst has gone from looking bad to worse with every movie. If you think she was bad in the second one, wait till you watch this one. Finally, Venom fans will be in for huge disappointment. Eddie Brock was supposed to be 6 feet tall and hugely built not lean and lanky “That 70′s Show” teenager. Then there is the track of sandman, Harry osbourn and his revenge against Peter parker/Spiderman, Mary Jane Watson and her failing career, the introduction of Gwen Stacy, Uncle Ben’s killer(not again!!!!). Thats a whole lot of things, even for our superhero Spiderman to handle.

Who would’ve thought that after such good movies in 1 and 2, they would’ve screwed a movie with Black spiderman and Venom. Even the way symbiote comes into this world is changed, worst thing is the way Venom dies in the end. Comic book fans.. just keep away, you are not going to like this at all. You will curse yourself for spending your hard earned money on this movie. Who would’ve thought that a Spiderman movie could get so bad? Just keep away from this movie guys.. unless you never knew or read of Spiderman until you saw the movie. Well maybe you will be able to survive the singing of Kirsten Dunst and the dancing of Toby Mcguire.

Updated review: Civ 4

Jagadish — Wed, 02 May 2007 14:38:00 +0000

I probably rushed my judgement there. Agreed Civ 4 is a great game and has the juiciest graphics for a turn based Strategy game but it gets too boring and repetitive after awhile. You research more techs, build more farms and cities, build an army to destroy other civilizations and after that, what? You start another game, probably in another map and do all the same. There is ofcourse the challenge of terrain and other things. But these are small variables to change. It becomes awfully boring to watch other civilizations taking their time with their turns. Moving their tanks around in a 3 tile island gets awfully boring. While you know it, 5 turns took 30 minutes to be done with. Frankly those days when I can spend hours on a game are really gone now. I’m into those quick games where I can make decent progress in a couple of hours, save it and come back to finish it off later. So Civilization is not for me. I am sure Sid Meier is awfully disappointed now.

Sid Meiers Civilization 4

Jagadish — Sun, 29 Apr 2007 15:13:00 +0000

Sid Meier’s Civilization 4 has got to be one of the addictive games I’ve ever played. It is brilliant the way it is made. The way you build up your city in small square blocks and watch your borders grow is really awesome. You develop an unhealthy obsession to obliterate any civilization in and around your vicinity and spread your pink borders all over the map. You would want to go back to the game for another session of 30 minutes, do some more research earn more gold, think of the ways to make your people happy. Its awesome the way the game makes multi-tasking look soo easy. I’m not too far into the game but I can tell this is only going to get better when I invent nuclear technology. I’m getting wicked thoughts already.

Well, there does seem to be some kind of an agenda regarding the addiction that the civilization games cause. There is a site online called Civilization Anonymous. It seemed to some kind of a rehab for all the addicts. It is probably the first of its kind where there is an organization helping addicts of a specific game instead of the gaming in general. While, I agree the game is indeed addictive, I did not find it addictive enough to take all the time off my regular activities to play it. It is good but definitely not that good. So lets hope that everyone keeps it real and instead of blaming the publisher and the game developer for their weakness, it would be nice if they owned up to their irresponsibility and moved on. After all, its just a stupid game. How bad can it get?

300

Jagadish — Sun, 29 Apr 2007 13:46:00 +0000

Alright, by now you’ve heard all the hype and probably read all the reviews or even watched the movie. Unfortunately, being horribly out of touch with the movie news of late, I’ve not heard any of the hype except for the abject dismissal by everyone that it was overly hyped. So my expectations for this movie were literally none, compared to an average movie goer.

Let me start off with the negatives of the movie. One of the things I really hated was the fact that the movie was really really slow. It was like watching the cricket replays in Ultra-motion, where the bat took forever to meet ball and the television people thought it was really cool but it turned out rather boring. Imagine a movie with battle scenes in Ultra-motion, spears being hurled, heads being cut off, blood being spilled.. everything in Ultra-motion. It seems pretty cool in the beginning but then it feels like its being dragged on and on. Maybe if the movie played out at regular speed, it would probably be done in little over an hour.

The good thing is that, there is not too much dialogue in the movie. When they do speak, they utter really brilliant lines. All the actors are brilliant and there are no misfits. Everyone does their job to perfection whether it is sorrow or glory. The story in itself is brilliant, 300 brave Spartans trying to stop waves of Persians from invading Greece. It is a story of freedom, bravery and the glory that is bestowed on the mighty and brave. Its awesome the way the battle scenes are played out(except for the ultra-motion of course ).

For all the people who think there is too much violence. Well this a battle movie, and I dont know what you expect. And it is rated R, so this is no movie for families or little kids. If you think heads falling, arm cut off are a little too much for you to take, then you might as well watch some senti movie. This is not made for people like them anyway. I wouldn’t say this is a must watch but a good movie nevertheless. If you are bored this weekend and have nothing to do, this could be a perfect filler.

Exorcism of Emily Rose

Jagadish — Mon, 17 Apr 2006 08:36:00 +0000

I must say I’m quite disappointed with this movie. It has been more of a courtroom drama than a horror movie. Going into the movie with a title like that, you’d expect that there would be a lot of scary scenes. But that doesnt really happen and most scenes usually dampen your hope. Especially in the scenes with Laura Linney, you’d expect that a lot more would happen but in the end, they only disappoint as nothing would happen.

The movie is all about an exorcism that has gone wrong. Emily Rose believes she is possessed and wants her family parishioner, Father Moore to perform an exorcism. But the exorcism fails and consequently she dies and the DA charges Father Moore with negligent homicide. The cousellor of the defendant Erin Burner, (beautifully potrayed by Laura Linney), fights with Ethan Thomas, in an intense courtroom drama. The scenes in the courtroom were very well done. And the way the movie doesnt take any sides and presents strong points for either side of the story is commendable. It in a way leaves the viewer to decide which is right and which isnt. And you find yourself switching sides every now and then. Probably, the only scary part of the movie is when the tape of exorcism is played in the court.

Jennifer Carpenter does a great job as the possessed Emily Rose. She doesnt get as ugly as Linda Blair in “The Exorcist”, but she does give you the creeps with her acting. Everyone does their job and there are no weak links except for the fact that this is no real horror movie.

To think all this is based on a true story does unnerve you a little bit. Even though, a lot of things have been changed from what happened in real, it does potray the essence of the real story. The real Emily Rose, is Anneliese Michel who was a German girl. She died at an age of 24 on July 1st 1976. To know more about Anneliese Michel. Click here.

A Beautiful Mind

Jagadish — Fri, 08 Apr 2005 08:08:00 +0000

Finally i’ve seen A Beautiful Mind. I make it sound like an achievement or something. It sure is, considering the fact that i never wanted to see the movie because i thought it was a really sad movie. I’ve seen bits and pieces of the movie when it was first released and believe me the ones i saw werent very happy scenes. The part where he is given electric shock, leaving the baby in the tub didnt really give me a good impression of the picture. i was too narrowminded to believe my friends who said the movie was a masterpiece. But i never listened to them. Because once my mind is made up, i would never listen to anyone on anything. Some ppl would call it being stubborn i guess.

Anyways, i dont quite know what really made me change my mind. But i think i just wanted to know, what was all the hype about. Why Mr. Russell “Gladiator” Crowe was blessed with the coveted oscar for the second time in the row. After i’ve seen the movie, i had no doubt that he really deserved this. More than the one for the Gladiator. Never once did i see the man who played the Gladiator in this movie. Thats amazing transformation. Playing a man who wants revenge to play someone who is vulnerable. Suffering from delusions. I must admit my ignorance. I dont know the mathematician John Nash prior to watching this movie. Call me stupid or anything that your intelligent mind can think of. I’ve not heard of him. But i guess this is a movie for ppl like me who dont know of him. To spread the greatness of a man who had to conquer his delusions and weaknesses to be the genius he was meant to be. I think Ron Howard has done a great job. The kid from Happy Days sure has a good head on his shoulders. I personally liked Jennifer Connelly. She was very different from what i’ve seen her earlier. A very different film of her where we get to see her act with her clothes on. She was amazing as the patient wife. I dont think anybody would’ve done better. The devotion she has for her husband is unbelievable. To think that this is a story of a real man makes it even more interesting. I think we’ve seen the best of everyone in the movie. The movie in a way is inspirational. It shows how everyone can conquer their weaknesses and be achievers. I really recommend this movie to everyone who hasnt watched it yet. I’m sure all those guys who believed Russell Crowe was just a handsome hunk would surely change their mind.

Enough movie talk. The other thing that happened today was that i finally got my project letter signed. The project title is..”Arsenic Removal from Ground Water”. Well, the only thing i know is that arsenic can be dangerous in water. Its poisonous. As far as its removal is concerned… i will find out in another 3 months or so when i officially start the project. It sure is gonna be intersting hopefully. Something that i would want to do for the whole year.

Well that said. i think its a wrap for now. The games are on the hold with the deadlines for assignments approaching real fast. But hopefully i would still find some time to complete the Chapter 1 of Neverwinter Nights.