It Means 'Cave Explorer'.

I like the word 'spelunker'. It's not exactly in common usage but it crops up sometimes and I usually get to tell this story.

See, a while back, I was watching 'Who Wants To Be A Millionaire' and the question for £125,000 came up thus:

"What does a 'Spelunker' do?". I don't recall the possible answers but one of them was 'explores caves' and I knew that was it. The reason why I knew this was correct is due to the South Park movie, in which one charaxter is referred to as an 'ass-spelunker' and, well the other options available didn't make sense in that context!

So yeah, South Park knowledge can be worth many thousands of pounds. They should show it in primary schools.

ANYWAY, the reason I bring it up is due to a game called Specter Spelunker Shrinks and (despite being more of a demonstration of a neat concept than a fully fledged game) it features a nifty growing and shrinking character dynamic and some awesome alliteration, also!

So go play it. Although there's a chance you'll need to download something called the 'Unity Web Plug-in' which is totally legit so don't worry!

Earth, Fire, Wind, Water, Heart!

Hello.
I'm here on eco-business today. It hasn't been very well advertised but tomorrow night at 8.30pm, it is Earth Hour. If you've not heard of it before, it is a global attempt to get 1 billion people to turn off all their lights at the same time for an hour. Admirable!

They had a decent amount of success Last Year. Naturally, however, they want to beat that this year. So get involved!

They are using a pretty neat method to inspire people to sign up this year. Namely, pitting the different parts of the UK against each other! Nothing wrong with a bit of well-intentioned jingosim, says I. Check it:



Right now, the English are getting their arses handed to them by our neighbours to the north. Clearly this will not stand. Also, my home county of Hampshire is in danger of being overtaken by Wrexham! So yeah, if you're a local boy or girl. Sign up now. We will NOT be overthrown by the Scotch or the Wretches (pretty sure that's what people in Wrexham call themselves, yeah?)

Anyway, it should go without saying that you shouldn't sign up if you don't intend to participate. So take part! Turn out the lights, set up some candles and enjoy the twilight. For the good of the planet. Your powers combined...

Citation Needed.

Hey, you're a busy man right? Or a busy woman. I'm not discriminating.

Point is, sometimes you need to know about something (frogs, bananas, helicopters, jazz, batman, electricity, beer) in a hurry. Firing up wikipedia is all well and good, but it's just not quick enough.

You haven't got time for history lessons or uses in popular culture. You just need the essence of your chosen subject.

Step up, 10 Word Wiki.

If it can't be explained in 10 words, you don't need to know about it.

Anticlimactastic!

So yeah, I've been putting off doing my 250th post until I had something worthy to show you, but it turns out it'll probably take a while. So I have made a few cosmetic changes and I will continue to do so. You may have noticed the 'pages' up top? Yeah don't click 'em, there's nothing to see. But one day... Oh, one day. You'll see.

So, yeah. That's about it.

Except no, there is a star of this show. Take a gander to the right of this jaunty text. That there is a shoutbox and it was coded for me by my good friend Mat who has said he requires no credit but I think should be shaken warmly by the hand. Essentially, it allows you to leave me a message without any of the tiresome 'comment' malarkey, so I urge you to do so! Enjoyed one of the links? Give me a shout! Want to direct my attention to something? Give me a shout! Want to tell me I have a stupid beard and girly hair? Er, give me a shout, I guess!

Woo!

Hmm, this seems wrong without some sort of link so I'll leave you a video. In case you've ever wondered why the URL for this place is 'kickpunchblock', well check THIS out...

Yeah, But Is It Art?

Cast your eye over the piece below. It is by a struggling young artist using an emergent technique called 'Bomomo'. It may look like nothing at first but if you really look, you will see the myriad intricacies. It is nothing short of a masterpiece.



Yeah, so it was me that made this monstrosity. It took about 2 minutes. I call it 'Fiddling With All The Buttons In This Cool Piece Of Online Image Creation Software I Just Found Called Bomomo'. Catchy, eh?

Try it yourself, it has surprising depth despite all being controlled using a set of floating balls. I'd like to see what someone with talent could do with it. Consider yourself challenged, dudes and ladies. Wow me.

Bomomo.

Plinx Quickie.

I'm not proud of myself here but I can't help giggling at this. I'm supposed to be a grown up for christ's sake.

Look, just click it and see for yourself.


Click!

Paul Is Games.

Hiya. I'm gonna make this quick because I'm supposed to be studying.

It's been a while since I showed you some games you didn't have to pay for. So today, I'm essentially letting you loose in an arcade with a never ending bag of 20p coins.

It's killing me that there isn't a way to combine 'plinx' and 'arcade' in a satisfactory manner that I could then use to describe posts like this from now until the end of time. Ideas on a postcard, kids.

Down to business. Earlier in the year, I linked you to a game called Blosics. Well now there's a sequel which improves on the original in every way, like a good sequel should but rarely does. There are more ball types, more block types, more of everything basically. So go play Blosics 2.

Onwards and upwards, quite literally. to a fast-paced platform game in the skies! It's called G-Switch and bears some resemblance to the previously plinked Canabalt but with a couple of important differences. It has a neat gravity-switching mechanic AND if you happen to be surrounded by enough people, you can play it in a frankly manic 6 player mode!

Finally, and to round out a trio of 'games that can be linked to other games previously featured in the blog' (now THAT is catchy) here's Mogo-Mogo. From the makers of Little Wheel, and if you remember that game, you should have all the reason you need to play this one. Stylistically fantastic and well thought out. it's a pointy clicky masterclass.

That's your lot. Have fun! I'm off to stick my nose in a book about computers. I think we know who got the better deal here.

Representin'.

Evening.
Tonight I am giving mad props to some friends and their projects!

Cast your eyes to the right, you should see an animated .gif. If you click it, you will be directed to a place where someone has managed to combine the wonderful worlds of dinosaurs and warm clothing! That someone is Charlotte, a friend of mine. She makes Dinohoodies. They're exactly what they sound like and that's why you should want one. But don't take my word for it, have a click, look in the Gallery!

Want one? Yeah, me too.

However, you may be one of those people who only buys something after watching a short cartoon that is loosely connected with said product. How do you get by like that? It must make life pretty difficult. Why bother? Weirdo.

ANYWAY, even your ridiculous life choice has been catered for. Because Edd, another friend, has prepared this comic vignette for the dinohoodie cause. So watch it:



Edd also makes lots of other animations, comics, sounds and smells. Check them all out HERE!

Indie Cred.

Hey.
Today I am setting up my travelling salesman booth again to let you know about an unmissable deal on some award-winning indie-designed games.

It's called the Indie Love Bundle and features 6 games for the low price of $20 (that's £12.80 to you, squire!). Bought seperately, these games would set you back $85. So however you slice it, that's a bargain. Plus, all profit goes to the game designers so you'd be helping to support the fledgling studios of tomorrow.

Included in the list are Machinarium (a full length game from the creators of beautiful point and click free online game Samorost and Its Sequel), And Yet It Moves (a puzzle platform game set in a hand-crafted paper world that won best indie game in an IGF awards ceremony) and Auditorium (an audio-visual feast of a puzzle game which you can play the scaled-down free online version of Here)
Also included are the games Aztaka, Eufloria & Osmos which I'm afraid I can't tell you much about because I had not heard of them until i purchased this bundle.

Anyway, I bought it. You should too. There's a preview video on the official site if you need more convincing. But hurry, this deal runs out on Friday!

The Indie Love Bundle.

Datablast.

How'd you like to learn something? How about many, many things? Reddit recently ran a thread called 'What is the craziest fact you know that most people won't know?'. Not the most elegant question ever constructed but we'll let it go. What followed was a landslide of 'facts', some of which proving to be urban legends. One of them was so compelling that MY GOOD FRIEND (he's replied to at least 3 emails!) Ryan North of Dinosaur Comics fame wrote a Comic about it.

Anyway, it's a bit like every series of QI condensed into a forum thread (with all the nerdy humour and dick-facts that implies) and there's no way you could read even a small section of it without learning something or several somethings. Like I say, not everything in there is factual but in those instances, the internet pedant brigade are on hand to sort things out.

So yeah, read it! HERE.

Oh. Also, if you know where the name of this post comes from, you're a great big geek and you should be ashamed.

Thwack!

Hi!
Since I started this blog, I'm hoping I have picked up a couple of regular readers at least.
But I'm sure some of you just don't spend enough time online to be able to afford a few minutes to peruse the stuff that I tirelessly winkle out of the overstuffed internet for you. That's fair enough, right?

Well now that I am approaching TWO HUNDRED AND FIFTY posts, I have composed something that I hope will convince you to pop in more regularly.
Check it out!



Yeah, that oughta do it.

Made it HERE.

Having Some Barney.

Well, I can walk again, just about. Hooray! *does a feeble dance*

Anyways, normal service resumes and what could be more normal than linking to a Nitrome physics game. As plinx go, that is a standing order. This one is called Rubble Trouble and it involves knocking down buildings with some slightly suspect 'builder tools'. When the dynamite is the most standard thing on a list, you've got yourself a pretty special list.

So yeah. Detonate, mutilate, aggravate.

Cause some Rubble Trouble.

Injury Bloggers 4 U.

Evening. If you and I are well enough acquainted then you'll already know this, but I recently injured myself playing an extremely rugged and manly sport.

My ankle went and it hurt quite a bit. I assumed it would be fine and went home to bed, thinking it'd be fine after a night of rest. It was not. By the morning, it was badly swollen and I could not walk. So after a trip to the cruelly-named 'walk-in centre' at the hospital, it was determined that I have a grade-one sprain and am now in a cast and on crutches.



Fun times. The cast comes off tomorrow but I have no idea how long I will take to fully heal. In the meantime, I imagine I'll be doing a lot of sitting about.

Anyway, it just goes to show. Sometimes this blog can function as an actual weblog. Oh also, standing on one leg washing your hair in a kitchen sink is NOT. EASY.

Self Satisfaction.

Whoops, not sure how I've let it get past a week with no plinx. I'm getting sloppy.

To distract you from my failings, here's a game! It's been around for a while but got passed over for plinking for reasons I no longer remember. Thanks to Andy for reminding me of its existence.

It's called The Company Of Myself and it manages a pretty unusual thing of being both fun and sad. It's a solid puzzle/platform game with a neat 'replay past actions' mechanic. This in itself is nothing new but rarely is it handled with such (and believe me, I know it's a weird thing to say about an online game) emotional intensity. It's a story of loss and loneliness, but as these things so often are, it's compelling. If you're a games geek, you'll appreciate the similarities to Braid.

Anyway, go and play it. Soak in the ambience.

Learn to enjoy The Company Of Myself.

The Dude Abideth.

Every so often. I add something to plinx that would be of interest to, essentially, nobody but me. But hey, it's my blog. It's my perogative.It's my perblogative! Ahem. This is one of those times, gentle reader.

I'm going to come right out and say what the link is, if you read it and your first instinct is 'meh', I'll forgive you. See you next time.

It's an interpretation of the film 'The Big Lebowski' (my favourite film in the whole wide world) as if penned by Shakespeare. Yeah.

It's called 'Two Gentlemen of Lebowski' and it's bloody marvellous. Here's a snippet:

THE KNAVE
Thou err’st; no man calls me Lebowski. Yet thou art man; neither spirit damned nor wandering shadow, thou art solid flesh, man of woman born. Hear rightly, man!—for thou hast got the wrong man. I am the Knave, man; Knave in nature as in name.

BLANCHE
Thy name is Lebowski. Thy wife is Bonnie.

THE KNAVE
Zounds, man. Look at these unworthiest hands; no gaudy gold profanes my little hand. I have no honour to contain the ring. I am a bachelor in a wilderness. Behold this place; are these the towers where one may glimpse Geoffrey, the married man? Is this a court where mistresses of common sense are hid? Not for me to hang my bugle in an invisible baldric, sir; I am loath to take a wife, or she to take me until men be made of some other mettle than earth. Hark, the seat of my commode be arisen!

WOO
Search his satchel! His words are a fantastical banquet to work confusion upon his enemies. There sits eight pounds of proof within; surely he hides his treasure on his person.

BLANCHE
Villainy! Why this confounded orb, such as men use to play at ninepins; what devilry, these holes in holy trinity?

THE KNAVE
Obviously thou art not a golfer.

Hee!

Read the whole shebang Here.