Battlefield 4 - Naval Warfare incoming?

BF4 hype train (boat?) is rolling. Yesterday, EA released a new teaser video that hints at the return of submarines or other big boats:

They also revealed a new piece of artwork that 

shows an aircraft carrier on fire:

Could this mean the return of naval warfare as seen in BF1942? You could control carriers and destroyers, which served as spawn points for soldiers and landing crafts.
 Or, maybe they could take this one step further and combine naval warfare with the Titan mode from BF2142? You would have to fight on land in order to capture missile silos, which would bring down the defenses of enemy ships. Then you'd have to infiltrate the enemy ship and blow up it's reactor core.

This is of course wishful thinking. It is possible that we only get to see naval war in the singleplayer campaign, and in multiplayer we have those puny little inflatable boats. Still, if that was the case, why would EA's marketing campaign hint at watery stuff so much? One can only hope...

Battlefield 4 Reveal is nearing - Expectations, wishes

BF3's last DLC is now out, so it is the time for EA to start hyping up the next installment to the Battlefield franchise. According to the latest news, EA has invited gaming media to a reveal event that takes place in 26th of March 2013. Supposedly the public release trailer will be released the next day, if we are to believe this short sneak peek. Tank tracks, water. What could it mean?

In BF4's official artwork we see a man running in the rain and a couple of tanks behind him. Very clearly the game will be yet another modern day shooter, with United States Army/Marine Corps. Nothing surprising.

However, in the small orange rectangles there you can see some interesting stuff. Skyline of a Chinese city Shanghai. Does that mean we'll get to play as People's Liberation Army in the multiplayer? Not necessarily. As you remember, in BF3 MP there are only US and Russia, no sign of any Middle Eastern or French soldiers.

I'm interested in what DICE has in store. However, I must remain sceptical since it's EA we're talking about here.

What I want to see in BF4 multiplayer:
- More factions (EU, China, MEC)
- Built-in VOIP (seriously, how could they miss that in BF3?)
- Better UI (less clutter, no 720p loading screens)
- 6 man squads
- Proper commo-rose
- Battlerecorder
- Commander
- Conquest Assault and Double Assault

What do you want to see?

Black Mesa release date 14th of September 2012!

Today very exciting news appeared on the internet: Black Mesa: Source, the Half-Life remake on Source engine, will be released in 12 days. First release takes place from tram ride to the Lambda Complex portal, so only Xen is missing.
I personally can't wait to step in the HEV suit once again.

See the real-time counter there:
http://blackmesasource.com/

And of course Gordon's Employment letter: http://blackmesasource.com/bmrf-employment-letter.pdf

Heroes & Generals - An Upcoming Vehicular WW2 FPS (free to play)

Heroes & Generals hasn't gotten much attention yet, as it's in early beta stage. Still, the game is awesome and shows a lot of potential.
You could call it a MMOFPS, although it doesn't exactly have massive-scale battles like Planetside 2. Instead, it's instanced and has two different sections: a map view, and FPS game.

Map view is where you begin; it works in web browser. It shows you the Western Europe, including France, England and Germany. Most significant towns are listed. In this view, players can make strategic large-scale moves.

When the other team attacks a town that is occupied by enemy army, players can join a battle in FPS mode. It's quite similar to Battlefield games; there are vehicles, big maps, objectives and classes. Player count per battle in beta is 20, but it will grow much, much higher in the future.

I'm not so good in  explaining how this game works, but you will easily find information on internet. Let me give some links which will help you get started. And remember to sign up for beta.

Heroes & Generals   IndieDB

Oh, and watch my short gameplay video:

Just Cause 2 Multiplayer Mod - Bubble Blasters and Rocket Launchers

Just Cause 2 Multiplayer Mod is still in development. In the current beta test, they've enabled random weapon spawn. This opens up some new possibilities. This is a video I recorded during the testing:

Easiest way to run Linux inside Windows - Virtualbox Seamless mode (tutorial, guide)

Virtualbox is a great application that allows you to run basically any operating system in a virtual machine. One of it's features is Seamless mode, that integrates guest operating system's desktop into your host system's desktop. In this screenshot I have Linux Mint running inside Windows 7:

How to do this? First, download a compatible Linux distribution. Mint is a good one, it's fast and simple.

1) Get Mint 13 MATE .iso from here. (Look for newer version if available)

2) Install Virtualbox and Extension Pack. You can get both from here.

3) Next, open up Virtualbox and click "New". Now you have to get trough a simple wizard that creates your virtual machine. Select "Linux 2.6" if you're using Mint 13. Also, determine your virtual hard drive and RAM.

4) Now you can start your virtual machine. At first, it'll ask for installation media. Select the .iso you just downloaded.

5) Click "install" on the desktop that opens up.

6) Go trough the installation, there shouldn't be anything difficult. Choose the virtual hard drive.

7) After installation you'll usually have to re-boot the virtual machine.

8) Now, go to seamless mode. Either press "Right control + L" or click "view -> seamless mode".

9) That should be all, feel free to ask if there are any issues.

How to fix Radeon HD6870 grey screen/crashing when watching Youtube videos (disable Flash hardware acceleration)

I recently had issues with my HD6870 crashing often when watching videos from Youtube and other sites. Apparently this was caused by hardware acceleration in Flash Player, because for some reason AMD's drivers cannot use it properly.

Disabling hardware acceleration on Flash settings fixed the issue for me, although other video players might still have issues.

Go to Adobe's Flash site and right click the following part:

Now click "settings" in the context menu.

Deselect "Enable Hardware Acceleration, and the problem with Youtube should be fixed.

Of course, this is just a workaround until AMD releases better drivers. Until then, there seems to be no other solution that I know of.