Quick Start
Tom McDonald has been covering games for countless magazines and
newspapers for 11 years. He lives in the New Jersey Pine Barrens.The Annual
Year-End
Binge n’ Purge
+GAME THEORY BY^ THOMAS L. McDONALD
Every year around this time I emerge from my spider-
hole, having just spent a month with almost every
video and computer game that I can get my hands on,
and shout “Don’t shoot, I am the President of Iraq.”
Actually, I usually just murmur “mommy” and
collapse into a heap of Zatoichi DVDs for a week.
The end of summer marks the end of the holiday
issue season for most magazine editors, and as
editor-at-large for the old-school puzzle/gaming
magazine Games , I have to produce a guide to the
top 100 PC and video games of the past year, which
means I have to look at a goodly chunk of everything
released over the past year. Frankly, either my brain
has gone soft or the quality of games is generally
improving, because this is nowhere near the painful
task it used to be, when bad games were the rule.
More likely it’s a sign that the art of electronic game
design is maturing. Sure, for every one Far Cry there
is still one Catwoman —but there used to be two.
This is progress.
One thing has not changed over the past few
years, however, and that is the slow but undeniable
downward arc of PC gaming. As the quality of titles
increases, the number decreases, which is frankly not
that bad a development. Ten good games are certainly
better than 20 mediocre ones. Numbers do tell a tale,
though. On my list this year, there were 40 PC games,
with 25 of these being exclusive to PC, and 14 of
those 25 being strategy games, a genre where the PC
always has and always will remain dominant.
No, this does not mean the sky is falling or that
PC gaming is dying. Not at all. As proof, in my Top
100 list, which spanned all platforms, I named City
of Heroes as the best game of the year, Far Cry as
the best action game, and Rome: Total War best
strategy game. (For the fi rst time in a long time the
RPG title went to a console game: Fable for Xbox.)
City of Heroes earned its bones based on the sheer
joy that it exists and plays as well as it does. Far Cry
and Rome are, in fact, better examples of pure and
perfect design in their categories, but, fl aws and
all, City of Heroes spans categories and does it with
immense skill—the difference between the best
action or strategy game and the best overall game.
What this annual survey tells me is that PC
gaming is neither dying nor thriving, but settling into
a mature and comfortable niche. This year was the
sushi of PC gaming: There hasn’t been much on the
plate, but it sure is fi ne.MA XIMUMPC NOVEMBER 2004
S
ure, you could hope your
router manufacturer will
release new firmware that
might upgrade the hardware with
added functionality. But waiting is
for chumps—especially if you own
a Linksys router. The Linux-based
OS used in the Linksys routers has
proved irresistible to some power-
users, who have released custom
firmware that adds new features and
functions to the otherwise buttoned-
down boxes.
Before we tell you what the
coolest hacks do and where to get
them, you should know a couple
things about flashing your firmware.
First, the documentation for these
unauthorized firmware upgrades
ranges from nearly undetectable to
never existed, so if you can’t figure
out how to install the firmware,
well, you probably shouldn’t even
be trying. Second, using a third-
party firmware will void your war-
ranty and could render your router
unworkable. One more time— using
a third-party firmware will void your
warranty and could render your router
unworkable.
These three hacks all work with
the Linksys WRT54G series of rout-
ers. If you have another Linux-based
router, spend some quality time with
Google to see if there is third-party
firmware for your hardware.SVEASOFT
Sveasoft charges for its firmware,
and doesn’t even make it very easy
to buy, but it’s tough to find another
third-party firmware that’s this
comprehensive. This upgrade bulks
up the firewall and adds a static
DNS, which lets you route connec-
tions from the Internet to multiple
machines on your internal network.
But our favorite addition is called
“bandwidth shaping.” If your room-
mate is hogging all the bandwidth
downloading Reno 911 off Bittorrent,
you can cut him off by putting lim-its on specific users or applications.
You have to register on the
Sveasoft forums before you can
purchase the firmware. Go to http://www.
sveasoft.com , click Firmware under
the Links column to the far left,
and then click Register at the top
of the subsequent page underneath
“Sveasoft Forums.” A full year of
firmware upgrades costs $20.WIFIBOX
Static DNS is even more fun when
it’s free, so if that’s all you need, skip
Sveasoft’s wacky registration process
and get WiFiBox instead. Remember,
Static DNS lets you assign each
computer on your network a name,
which external users can then use
to access more than one machine
on a single IP address. To try out
this firmware, go to the Sourceforge
Download page ( http://wifi-box
.sourceforge.net/ ), and grab the latest
version under the WRT54G firmware
heading.OPENWRT
OpenWRT is more ambitious and
flexible than WiFiBox. It offers a
basic level of functionality to make
a network work, then gives you
access to a system that lets you add
new functionality via packages you
download from the net. These pack-
ages add everything from bandwidth
shaping to Static DNS routing. You
can even specify quality of service
settings for time-critical applica-
tions—like VoIP phone calls. Heck,
using the Kismet package, you can
even turn your WRT54G into a Wi-
Fi sniffer! It’s a crazy world. Find out
just how crazy at http://www.openwrt.org.Upgrade Your
Wi-Fi Router
Turn your plain-Jane Linksys
box into a super-router with
one of these third-party
firmware upgrades Did you know that many
inexpensive Linux-based routers—
like the Linksys WRT54GS
pictured here—can use third-party
firmware, which add loads of
exciting new features?