You open Minecraft, enter your Username and Password, then get the Login failed window.

Searching Google for this problem I came up with posts about passwords being hacked/stolen. So I diligently went and reset my password.

After which I was about to login to the Minecraft site, but still getting errors from the Minecraft game! And if you try to report it on the support page failed, nothing appears if you click the My account was hacked button!

There is a happy end to this story

With nothing else seeming to work I downloaded the game again. Starting the new copy of Minecraft I found it was 1.8.1, with a slight change in login interface, and it accepted my username/password combo.

I can play Minecraft again!

Minecraft 1.7.3 not downloading 1.8 update

It would appear that the problem is that Minecraft 1.7.3 can no longer login. And also is not downloading the update to 1.8. You have to go do it yourself.

This should really have been handled better by the developers. If people expect Minecraft to update itself and it just fails to login you are going to have quite a few people panic.

Developers, please think about providing better error messages next time.

No, is seem not.

Searching Google only found one other mention of this.

Maybe everyone else is just too interested in playing the game to look at the box?

I’d just like to thank my movie fanatic sister for pointing this out.

Seems nice. You have to login to Battle.Net, and tick an ‘opt me into beta testing’ box. But I can’t seem to remember what my Battle.Net password is, and it says my credentials for getting it reset are not valid.

After some chasing details. Searching how to install StarCraft on Intel Macs. I discovered that I wasn’t actually registered on Battle.Net, just the Battle.Net you access via the game (which expires after not using it for 3 months anyway).

Along the way I found this nice guide for installing StarCraft and Diablo II on Intel Macs. And I got to play a game I haven’t for a while.

To put yourself down as a potential beta tester you need:

1. to register a Battle.Net login (and login)
2. Add a game to the Manage My Games list, using the CD key from your game
3. check the Beta Profile Settings and tick the games you want to be down to test.

After registering I found that you can download CD images of StarCraft and Brood War from the Battle.Net site. Quite nice if you still have your CD key, but lost or damage your game CDs.  You need a bit of spare bandwidth though, about 1.4 GB for StarCraft and wasn’t Diablo II in 5 CDs?.

It is also nice to see for a change that Australian games get to have a go before everyone else. Reading the StarCraft II FAQ I noticed that Australia will be in the first batch of countries offer beta testing.

When does the StarCraft II beta test start?

We don’t have an exact start date to share at this time, but note that when it does begin, we will be adding additional regions to the beta test in phases. North America, Australia, and New Zealand will be the first regions to begin beta testing, and other regions will follow afterward in phases. We will have more information to share about all of these phases in the future.

Are people starting to see the worth of Australia as a good English speaking test bed with its fast uptake of technology? Or is it just that being such a small region it was easier to set us up first?

read more | digg story

read more | digg story

Someone pointed me in the direction of Newgrounds. Go watch some silly movies or play web games.

Xeno Tactic
So I found Xeno Tactic. A defence game where you have to stop all the aliens from walking from one side of the screen to the other. On the first level they just walk from left to right, and on subsequent levels from top to bottom as well.

Turrets
You start with 80 gold and buy weapon turrets to wipe out the aliens. The cheapest is the basic Vulcan Turret at 5 gold. More expensive turrets include plasma, freeze rays and missiles. These have a greater range and/or rate of fire. You can also upgrade existing turrets, increasing their damage/range/rate of fire.

Each alien you kill earns you gold. The harder aliens earn you more of it. You can build new turrets or upgrade existing ones as you have the money. But building and upgrading takes time, and turrets won’t fire while upgrading.

Tactics
So you put down turrets, they shoot the aliens, should be easy. Well not quite so easy. Some aliens are quite tough and need to be shot quite a bit.

Since the aliens just take the quickest route across the screen and don’t attack the turrets, I found the best way to deal with this is to create a maze so the aliens walk back and forth next to the same turrets a number of times. Which also increases the turrets cost to effectiveness ratio. Only problem is the waves of flying aliens.

Overall
Over all an ok game, but very addictive if the you are into that sort of thing. I have spent a bit too much time trying to finish some levels.

Xeno Tactic
http://www.newgrounds.com/portal/view/382321

(Started a month a go when I initially found the game, and only just finished now)

More than just a letter, ‘N’ is a Load Runner esk game written in Flash. With 3 keys you control a ninja, running, jumping and climbing your way around each level.

Ninjas have a “god-like speed, dexterity, jumping power, and reflexes“, unfortunately due this being being the result of a ultra fast metabolism the ninjas life spans are much shorter. 90 seconds to be exact.

In these 90 seconds your ninja must dodge mines, turrets, lasers and drones; flick switches, open doors and the exit; and collect gold. Through the 5 levels of an episode. Due to the “sickeningly materialistic attitude” of the ninja, each piece of gold collected adds 2 seconds to their life.

An interesting game. Looks simple, but it is quite hard.

References:

• N (game) – Wikipedia

This version of Lemmings has been written in JavaScript. And for a program written in an interpreted language it runs quite smoothly.
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