Once in a while, everything comes together just right. Donkey Kong Country 2 (SNES, released in 1995) was one of those moments. The sound and visuals were great then and great now. The game design remains a landmark to this day. The game introduced the concept of the DK coin as a huge golden spinning *hidden* item, and executed that concept perfectly. It's also full of different game mechanics and gimmicks that come at just the right pace to make it interesting all the way through.
I'm not music expert by any means, but the game's music always stood out to me. The sheer quantity of tracks was unusual for a SNES game, for one. More to the point, I still remember those tunes to this day and just plain like them.
Today marks another landmark in Donkey Kong Country 2's history. 15 years after the game's release, OC ReMix (who you might remember as the creators of the music for Street Fighter HD Remix) just released a remix of the DKC2 soundtrack. It has over 30 tracks, was made by over 30 remix artists, and contains over 2 hours of music. Hundreds, if not thousands of hours of work all-told. And the price? $0. It's free and you can get the torrent right here, right now.
But there's more. The game's original score was created by David Wise, and amazingly, he contributed the final track of this remix. Wise is actually part of what is basically a tribute to his work. Pretty cool!
You know, I really don't know why these guys did all this, but I think it's pretty damn awesome that they did. The least you could do is check it out and keep the spirit of Donkey Kong Country 2 alive. Oh and here's a plea:
"Dear OC Remix: how about we create album of tracks for Fantasy Strike, the someday fighting game from Sirlin Games. There's already plenty of art for the characters and three card games of them fighting, nearly done now. The music could go in the online version of those card games, in development right now."--Sirlin
What to get for someone who has everything? Answer: a laptop for someone who has nothing. The One Laptop Per Child initiative is an audacious, worthwhile goal. The idea is to create an inexpensive, yet well-designed laptop for children in developing countries. It's the ultimate in inclusive thinking, really. You may wonder why poor children who are still struggling with basic needs would want laptop computers, but the answer is that it's not about laptops--it's about education. Education isn't something you start on only when all other needs are met--it's something you give in parallel to other aid.
If you want to play around with one yourself, you can "give one, get one" for $399, so that both you and an underprivileged child each get one. Or you can simply give as many as you want.
The Value of Education
If you'd like to explore that line of thought, I recommend the web game Ayiti: The Cost of Life. On the one hand, it's a simulation game where you make optimization choices about resources. On the other hand, it's education for rich people about the value of education for poor people. In Ayiti, I found that the the struggle of just getting by in life under such harsh conditions was overwhelming. Furthermore, I found that education was best way out of the downward spiral. Yes, I know that this is a simulation game made to have a message, but sometimes it helps to "feel the message in your bones" rather than have someone just say it.
I like that OLPC has these requirements that they won't compromise one.
1) Kids MUST own these laptops and be able to take them home. In order for them to really learn, they need time to tinker, and play with them as much as they want. There can't be any schemes where really the school owns them and takes them away.
2) It's for young kids. Their target is 6 - 12 years old.
3) Saturation. Entire schools get these laptops all at once. It's not one laptop per school or per class, but one laptop per CHILD. No one is left out.
4) Internet connection. The laptops must be able to connect to the internet. If this is not possible where the children are, then OLPC will help build the network there, making it possible.
5) Software must be free and open source. If the needs of children change, the software can change to suit it. Also, it's important to allow children to modify the software itself as part of the learning process.
Back to this $100 laptop. It's currently $188 if you buy by the 1000s, or $199 for one, so they haven't reached the target yet. (In 2010, the second model is projected to cost only $75, so they're getting there!) What they have achieved is remarkable though. The laptop has longer range networking than the laptop you're using right now. Those cute ears it has create an ad-hoc mesh network with other laptops of its kind, greatly extending the range of net connections in villages that have lots of laptops. (Cleverly, you have to flip the ears up to even open the laptop.) It has two screen modes: a color mode and a black and white mode with 3x the resolution, made for daylight viewing. It uses solid state memory, so it has no hard drive with moving parts. It does not require an electrical outlet: you can power it with a hand-crank or a solar panel. For that to even work, it has to an amazingly low power device. It runs on only about 2 Watts(!) because that's about the amount of power you can generate with your upper body strength. To top it off, it's a lot more rugged and durable than the laptop you're using now.
The Operating System(s)
The OS is called Sugar, based on Linux. In a controversial move, some versions of the laptop can also dual boot to Windows XP, a move that OLPC felt was necessary to convince education ministers of some countries to buy the laptops. The software isn't based on folders, hierarchies, and applications like we're used to. Instead, it's divided into "activities", each with their own data management in an effort to be easier for non-technical users to understand. There's no need to save and the system is designed to prevent any accidental loss of data. Even though it's meant for young kids to be able to figure out easily, it also has an incredible feature that allows users to see and modify the code of the programs running right in front of them! I can already imagine the excitement that will spark in kids all over the world as they discover the power to modify and create software.
Nicholas Negroponte
Nicholas Negroponte is the driving force behind this initiative. I think the earliest seed of this project was probably planted at MIT in 1997 while I was a student there. In that year, the MIT Media Lab held the 2B1 Conference. It was about how to use technology to bridge the education gap between developed and developing countries. In 2005, Negroponte finally went public with his new, big idea and it's been snowballing ever since.
If you want to see a man completely driven to make a project happen, a man surrounded by controversy, a man doesn't care what people think of him, a who simply won't give up--study Nicholas Negroponte.
A few people have asked me what gifts I think gamers might want. That's pretty hard to answer, but I'll try. First, gamers want Sirlin.net merchandise (also here) like T-shirts, mouse pads, or a Yomi tie.
Games
Once that's out of the way, pretty much everyone likes Xbox Live Arcade so a gift card with Microsoft points is a good bet (assuming they have an Xbox 360 to begin with). A gift card will let them buy amazing games like Street Fighter HD Remix, the masterpiece Rez HD, or that new Civilization game. I haven't tried it but I bet it's good.
If anyone is playing Street Fighter HD Remix with a pad, they'd do well to stop doing that and get a joystick. I used these Hori sticks throughout all of Street Fighter's development, and I used one to reach #1 on the ranked leaderboards. I hear some people complain that this stick isn't good enough, but apparently it is! I've also heard people complain that the buttons break, but I've never had a problem with any of my hori ex2 sticks, so maybe I'm just extremely luckly. You could always hold out for this higher quality real arcade pro hori stick, but it won't be a holiday gift anymore.
Everyone seems to like theseshootinggames, and this RPG. But don't forget about Wii games. For actual gamers, Mario Galaxy and Resident Evil 4 are still as awesome as ever. I haven't played the new Lego Indiana Jones, but I loved the first Lego Star Wars and people tell me this one is even better. It can really bridge the gap between gamers and non-gamers (hint, play with your girlfriend). And things like Wii Music and Endless Ocean will also get non-gamers involved. [Edit: Wii Music is probably best for kids, while something like Guitar Hero is probably better to rope in adults.] There's also Wii Fit of course, but it's really hard to get right now.
As some general life advice, I recommend not using Microsoft Windows anymore. The most amazing material good that I have ever owned in my life is a Macbook Pro. It's a magical wonderland. No viruses exist for Mac, so there's no need to muck around with anti-virus software. The OS isn't DRM crazy like Vista, so it doesn't check all my hardware components 30 times per second to see if I have connected a device that might try copy DRM video. Above all else, it really does "just work" and have so many nuances of software design that are wonderful. It's also amusing that I can't even figure out how to network my two old PCs, yet my Mac can automatically see both of them and transfer files between them. So yeah, try out those new Macbook Pros that are even better than mine (get 4 GB of RAM so you can have 50 things open at once like me). They make them out of a single piece of carved aluminum these days, so even construction-wise they're pretty amazing. And you can run Windows on them too, in case you're developing a game with some bad person who keeps making a Windows-only version.
The 13" Macbook is even cheaper, and also worth every penny.
Books
Books can change the way people think. Last year, I gave Flow and Blink as gifts to several people. Blink is a little more entertaining, but Flow is a little more important. Flow describes an important psychological state that we feel when we are challenged and it's tied to the process of achieving mastery AND plays in to people's overal, general happiness, if you can believe that. Blink shows the tip of the iceberg of the idea that we make decisions by only consciously knowing about tips of icebergs, yet those decisions are often very good. These books are important enough that it scares me that these subjects aren't regularly taught in school.
Gladwell (author of Blink) also has a new book called
Tuesday, March 16, 2010 at 7:47PM 
Once in a while, everything comes together just right. Donkey Kong Country 2 (SNES, released in 1995) was one of those moments. The sound and visuals were great then and great now. The game design remains a landmark to this day. The game introduced the concept of the DK coin as a huge golden spinning *hidden* item, and executed that concept perfectly. It's also full of different game mechanics and gimmicks that come at just the right pace to make it interesting all the way through.
