Youtube | The Don's Craptastic World

23Mar/092

Tom Clancy’s H.A.W.X. HD gameplay clips!

H.A.W.X. is out! Folks are playing it and the game is getting mixed reviews!

Folks who are die hard fans of simulators a la IL2-Sturmovik or similar ones WILL be disappointed by HAWX if they hope to get a modern substitute for their good ol' simulator.

Tom Clancy's H.A.W.X. is by no means a flight simulator game. It is an arcade flight simulator. Emphasis on ARCADE. The whole game is made so easy with its arcade elements it's ridiculous.

Still the game offers a great deal of fun if you like the occasional dogfights against your friends or if you want a quick co-op session.

Get it if you can't be bothered with it being an arcade flight simulator; ditch it if you are a die hard realism flight simulator fan!

I play it too and got you a few game-play clips:

All flyable planes Overview Part 1 of 2
All flyable planes Overview Part 2 of 2

Operation Adder Part 1 of 2
Operation Adder Part 2 of 2

Operation Backfire Part 1 of 2
Operation Backfire Part 2 of 2

PS: Screenshots are up on the gallery!

Filed under: PC Games 2 Comments

1Mar/0989

VirtualDub 720p HD settings for YouTube! [Good quality, small file size]

I often record gameplay clips from video games I'm playing with FRAPS. Usually in 1920x1080 resolution depending on the game and the FPS I get with FRAPS running. For transcoding the raw footage to something bearable to upload I usually use only VirtualDub.

Lately I've experimented with settings, and I think I found some good ones. Good video and sound quality with small file size were my goals. I think roughly 100 mb for a 5 min. clip and about 300mb for the full 10 min. in full 720p HD quality is awesome.

I'm still experimenting with sound compression but I think with 192 kb/s AC-3 ACM I have a good start.

Please bear in mind that the higher your resolution is the bigger your file size will be and vice versa. Those 100 mb respectively 300 mb are based on my 1920x1080 resolution!

This guide is intended for 16:10 and 16:9 resolutions. If you're playing on a 4:3 resolution, do not resize down to 1280*720p without maintaining aspect ratio, because the end-result will otherwise look over-stretched/-squeezed.

My settings for VirtualDub are in the picture below. If you want a very detailed explanation what each option does, check this out!

By the way, you have to have the H.264 codec installed to get it working. Download and install the latest VFW-version build here. PAY attention which version you're downloading, x86 (=32bit) or x86_64 (=64bit).

A warning about the Option "Multithreading" -> "Threads" don't set it higher than [# of your CPU Cores * 1.5] because then your whole system will start chugging. For example a Core 2 Duo would be 2 Cores * 1.5 = 3, a Q9550 would be 4 Cores * 1.5 = 6 and an AMD Phenom II X3 would be 3 Cores * 1.5 = 4.5 4.

This is by no means a guarantee that it will or will not work on your system. Each system, its components and its software are unique. You'll probably have to experiment a bit on your own. But those mentioned numbers are a good start.

It also might be necessary for you to adjust the audio volume to your liking. I have -10 dB, because the sound I record is terribad. My onboard sound sucks, period. Some people also experience asynchronous sound, here's how you can fix it.

On a side note: When you have uploaded your clip on YouTube and YouTube processed it the quality then will be lowered again. There's nothing you or I can do about that, it's up to YouTube.

The whole tutorial is also available on YouTube as a video:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o9XOgnaJ_Hs

A few links to my own HD clips:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nxijbXfIs4A&hd=1
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3yt35f2WFFY&hd=1
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Oe4jCQ8zzz0&hd=1
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eNLlobJbrm8&hd=1

Addendum 16.September 2009: Enabling GPU acceleration
Since version 1.9.4 it is possible to use the GPUs processing power (if your GPU supports it, which most modern GPUs do) as part of whole the transcoding process. This way you can speed up the transcoding process significantly (depending on your compression settings!).

On my computer this cut my transcoding time from an average 1h for a 10 min. clip down to some 40-ish minutes. Under "Options" -> "Preferences" enable "3D accel".

Addendum 23.10.2009: Crashes during encoding
There's currently a problem causing VirtualDub 1.9.4/5/6/7/8/9 to crash under Windows 7 while encoding sometimes. The culprit is 3D accel! Turn it off under "Preferences" -> "3D accel" and enjoy VirtualDub once again!

Addendum 16.05.2010: Option "3d accel" slowing down encoding
I've been getting mixed messages. Apparently using "3d accel" causes it to render slower than usual on some systems. I can confirm that. With 3d accel turned on, a 10min video takes about 1 hour 10-20 minutes, while turned off it takes about 1 hour max. You'll have to experiment on your system!

And if you are running on a multicore cpu, don't forget to enable threading via "Option" -> "Preferences" -> set "Threading" to 1!

Update 27.01.2011:
Updated Setting Screenshot

Filed under: Software, Tips and Tricks 89 Comments

27Jan/090

Status Quo!

Howdy folks,

my apologies for my very long absence. I've got a full plate (exams over exams over exams with attendance seminars over seminars over seminars coupled with practical courses and some more practical courses), absolutely no time to maintain my blog. I'll try to do better this year, I promise. No half year breaks in between.

With that being said, I want, again, to apologize for such a huge gap and absolute radio silence. Now I leave you with a few (ok, I'm kidding!) of my game clips.

So long, Don Salva

PS: Oh yea, I know it's an oxymoron. I've got time to play but no time to maintain a blog? Strange priorities, ain't they?

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IqyHaD8itNc

Filed under: Random-ness Continue reading

14Dec/070

Drink up, me ‘earties, yo ho!

It's time for the 1st entry in this, oh so wonderful, blog!

I got so much time on my hands I don't even know what to do...so I decided "Heck, let's do something completely boring and utterly stupid. Let's frap and youtube the animated emotes of the MMORPG to come "Pirates of the Burning Sea" !

It took me about 6 hours of frapsing, cutting, deleting, swearing, smashing the keyboard, insulting in-game /tell, editing, uploading on YouTube, getting 500 Error while uploading and losing all data for all 171 average 9 seconds clips to be done.

Here's the emote /yoho which actually fits the mood I was after the 6 hours of torture:

But I gotta tell you it was an interesting experience in all, in fact it was my 1st serious "project" for my YouTube account. I hope to have some more ideas in my so uncreative and apathetic (NO! I mean apathetic not pathetic!) brain for this blog in the future.

Enjoy!

Filed under: MMOG No Comments