Nexus 5 First Impressions

The Nexus 4 was my favourite phone to date, so it wasn't an easy decision to upgrade to the Nexus 5, but the 1080p screen and addition of 4G was enough to make it worth the relatively small upgrade cost.

Whereas the N4 was a massive design improvement over the Galaxy Nexus, after a week the N5 has left me feeling less impressed. The decision to ditch the overly flashy chrome trim and sparkly back are understandable and help make the phone look and feel more premium, but in other ways I feel that Google went too far. The curved edges of the N4 felt great in-hand, but the N5 replaces these with more mundane square edges which catch when you swipe the screen, not unlike most other smartphones, but still a design characteristic I'll miss. The new buttons are also much sharper on the edges, all in all the design isn't worse than it's predecessor, it's just less friendly - even less Googley.

All these concerns are nearly forgotten when the screen is powered on, because the new 1080p displays looks incredible, as good as the best out there. It may only be a small increase from the N4, but the transparent toolbars and more colorful OS help make it look bigger and brighter than specs alone.

KitKit is generally a much nicer looking OS, with most of the dreary blacks replaces with semi-translucent whites. The new launcher adds more customizability options without making it more complicated, and most of the stock apps have simpler, cleaner UIs. There's a few inconsistencies, the integration of SMS into hangouts is flaky and the Gallery app seems to have been only semi-upgraded to a new Photo app, but it's a step in the right direction and, for now, feels fresh for the first time in a while.

I've been a big advocate of Nexus devices for a long time, their simpler, more consistent UX is worlds away from most other Android phones without sacrificing customization options, but they've always felt like they lack 'something' that more expensive skinned phones do. With KitKit, that something has been mostly fulfilled on the software side and the hardware is closer than ever - maybe next year Google can bring it all together into a perfect package.

Meteor Blast HTML5 - Game Complete

In my last post talked about my HTML5 game Meteor Blast, now I've finished it and released it in both tge Chrome Web Store and Play Store for Android

To start with the good, I'm pretty happy with the Chrome version. It's a new-style packaged app which was easy to create, 99% of the code was unchanged, the only unsupported feature of the web version was localStorage which needed changing to Chrome storage, which took a bit of code restructuring but works in a similar way.

As a packaged app it works offline by default, and launches in a standalone window, which looks more app-like than a hosted app. I developed the game to work with touch so I expect this version works nicely on the Chromebook Pixel, but I haven't had a chance to try it yet.

Less successful was the port to Android via Phonegap. It took a long time to get this working, I hit some resizing bugs that I had to edit the Cordova source code to get around. I managed to get performance on my Nexus 4 reasonable by stripping out some effects but it's far too laggy on most other devices to call it a success. I can't say for sure that I optimized the game as much as possible, but I wouldn't attempt making an Android game with Phonegap again - at least not one that requires a good frame rate to play well.

So my dreams of developing fully cross-platforms with HTML5 have been slightly tarnished, but I'll be interested to look into other solutions for porting across platforms.

Meteor Blast HTML5

Since starting work with HTML5 several years ago and prototyping several games, I'm now starting work on my full game that I intend to release cross-platform. It'll be called Meteor Blast and is loosely based on my Flash game of the same name, but with a new input mechanism that will work with both touch and keyboard devices.

I'm using the CreateJS library from Adobe in addition to jQuery, which makes coding the game similar to Flash, especially where animation is concerned. The library lacks a class structure so I'm relying on prototypes for OOP, not an ideal solution for a larger project, but so far has been sufficient for this project.

The game's killer 'feature' is that is should work across all platforms - all modern desktop browsers, HTML5 OS's such as Windows 8, Tizen and Firefox OS, as well as Android and other mobile OS's through Phonegap. So far I've found Phonegap to be fairly headache-free, my only worry is how much performance will suffer - I had to make considerable optimizations (and some sacrifices) to get it running smoothly on my Nexus 4, so older devices may cause problems.



I'm fairly happy with how well the game is turning out though, it's feeling more like a 'proper' game than an experiment, and I hope people will enjoy playing it. I still have to add sound, preloading, menus and a difficulty curve so it'll be some time before release, I'll post back soon with updates.

Chromebook (late 2012) Review

When I won an original Series 5 Chromebook a couple of years ago I wouldn't have expected to use it as much as I did, but the quick boot time made it a handy device for quick browsing session or email. My main problem was that although it was relatively light, it was still too bulky to slip into a bag without noticing it in the same way as a tablet, so I didn't often take it out the house. With the new 2012 ARM-based model, Samsung have trimmed off enough weight to make it a truly portable device, so with the added temptation of 100gb free Drive space, it felt like a worthy upgrade.

Samsung's Chromebook design has changed a lot in a short time, from the glossy black toy-like Series 5 to the premium feeling 550, with this model they've gone back to plastic but it still feels like a premium machine, largely due to it's thin, clean profile. I wouldn't feel ashamed getting this out in a cafe full of Macbooks, and much prefer it to the original.

Performance has increased significantly from the original Series 5, previously I'd found Flash and high-performance HTML5 apps out of the question, but now they run smoothly and there's no lag with a few tabs open. I can't think of many scenarios where it wouldn't be enough power to get the job done.

There's a few compromises that come with the lower price, most notably the screen, which is slightly smaller and doesn't seem as clear. It's not inappropriate for a device of this price, but if Samsung could fit a larger, higher-res screen into the same profile, I'd happily pay a bit more. Battery life isn't as insanely long as the original but can still make it through a few hours, much more than an equivalent Windows netbook.

Connection options are more up to date this time round, with HDMI output replacing VGA, and one of the USBs updated to version 3.0. The touchpad feels more responsive and the keyboard is still great, but I'd have liked to see backlit keys added.

Chrome OS itself has come on leaps and bound since I first got the Series 5 Chromebook when it was just a single window of Chrome. Although I had mixed feelings about the Aura window management when it first rolled out, improvements like the Android-esque app launcher have made it feel more like a fully fledged, modern operating system. There's still weak areas - media playback is basic and file management is clunky - these aren't a huge problem on a cloud-based OS, but improvements in these areas could still go some way to improving the overall experience.

The concept of a cloud-based OS has also become more realistic in the past year, largely due to Google's additions to it's own web app suite, such as Play Music, Drive and offline Docs. Offline support in external apps is still poor and some users will still miss certain native apps (for me Spotify is a sore loss, but a web version is rumoured to be in the works). I hope that Chrome's new packaged apps, NaCl and ever improving HTML5 will help fill these gaps.

It's still hard to say if or when Chrome OS will become a true replacement to a traditional OS, but for many people it could already be close enough, and it's a handy secondary laptop if your main machine is too heavy to carry around. In making the new model cheaper and lighter without sacrificing much functionality, Samsung have made a near-perfect piece of hardware for Chrome OS and it's a great time to give it a go.