Madden NFL 10

I always know the summer is coming to a close and football season is about to kick off when a new Madden video game comes out. Now is that time of year as Electronic Arts’Madden NFL 10 just released. All new Madden games include a few features that set them apart from the previous release, and Madden NFL 10 keeps that tradition alive.

The first thing I noticed was the details - it’s the best-looking Madden game that I’ve seen to date. From the way the players look on the field to things you see in the background, this is as close as you’ll come to playing a real game of football with a video game. You’ll see players getting yelled at on the sidelines, referees debating touchdown calls and pre-game warm-ups on the field with commentaries from Tom Hammond and Chris Colinsworth.


Other main attractions of Madden NFL 10 include Pro-Tak, Fight for Online Dominance and Online Co-op. The Pro-Tak System is basically for better gang tackles. It gives you control over the outcome of every play. You can drag defenders toward the first down marker, including up to nine-man gang tackles, fight for a fumble at the bottom of the pile, and evade the rush with all-new quarterback avoidance actions.

The Online Dominance mode lets you compete with up to 32 teams in an online franchise. You can propose trades, draft players and even do a fantasy draft. You can also do real NFL scheduling and have access to league message boards. It also is controllable from your computer - and soon an iPhone app.

A first for Madden, the Online Co-op trait allows you to team with a friend and battle against the CPU. This makes it easy for you to work on your game strategies, practice plays and see how it is playing from a different position with custom camera angles.


In addition, the interactive Fight For the Fumble makes a loose ball beneath the pile live as you fight for the fumble through a new rapid-button-press mini-game. Mash the button displayed on the meter to battle for possession of the ball. There’s also a quarterback pressure alert, and your controller will warn you with a rumble when a defender is near you while your quarterback is in the pocket.

Overall, Madden NFL 10 packs in a ton of good football to start you off this season. The graphics and the look of the game are a nice step forward from Madden 09. The game’s improvements mentioned above make the game attractive, but there’s nothing too massive that would reshape the title. It’s still a good football game that I had a difficult time wrestling away from my husband.

Madden NFL 10 retails for $59.99/PlayStation and Xbox 360; $49.99/Wii; $39.99/PlayStation 2 and PlayStation Portable (PSP). Visit your nearest Best Buy, GameStop or Toys N Joys to buy a copy of your own.

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Click Chick’s iPhone App of the Week: Camera Genius

The recently released Camera Genius app gives your iPhone camera the capability it should have had from the beginning. Just about all the missing features I would want to see in Apple’s real camera app are a part of Camera Genius. It includes Camera Zoom, Sound Capture, Anti-Shake, Big Button, Guides, Self Timer and Camera Manual.

The zoom is pretty self-explanatory, but the Sound Capture isn’t what you probably think it is. It snaps a picture when the noise it hears reaches a certain level (i.e. say “cheese!” really loud and it snaps your picture).

Anti-Shake is good for restless keiki or pets. Big Button turns the whole screen into a shutter release button. Guides helps you level your pics against the horizon.

Self Timer gives you the option to do two, five, 10, 15 or 30-second timer options. Lastly, Camera Manual gives you a quick reference guide of photography right there within the app.

Camera Genius is worth the nominal 99 cents. Find it at the iTunes App Store or visit www.codegoo.com for more information.

Seeing The Light On Plant Care

“Hellooooo, time to water me!”

That is exactly what I need to hear from a plant if it wants to survive. Plants and I don’t exactly mix well. If I’m caring for one, it usually ends up in death for the plant. It’s not that I forget to water it; I just can’t seem to add the correct amount of water. I think I have a tendency to be stingy with the water I pour into it because subconsciously I don’t want to “waste water.”


The funny thing is my friend just asked me to water her plants while she’s gone on a monthlong trip. I don’t think she realizes that I’m probably the worst person to trust with plants. Lucky for me, her plants are still alive for now (after two weeks), but I hope they are still at least green when she returns. I’m making a conscious effort to put more water in than I usually would. All this jogged my memory about a little gadget called the Thirsty Light. This is the Click Chick’s solution to successfully living with a houseplant.

This cool invention is an intuitive digital plant moisture sensor that flashes an LED light to let you know your plant is getting dry. It’s designed to be unobtrusive when you leave it in the plant’s soil, as it continuously monitors the moisture level once per second. It contains a circuit called DryPoint, which can sense five different levels of dryness and blinks faster and faster as the soil becomes more dry. When it reaches level five (completely dry), it puts the device into standby mode to conserve its energy, and it double blinks every three seconds.


While there are many soil detectors on the market that detect the conductivity of the soil (if there’s enough water, the salts in the soil dissolve and send a tiny current through the electrodes), the Thirsty Light uses a patent to actually interpret the readings it receives. These are not cryptic readings. If it blinks, you’d better give your plant water. The Thirsty Light is probably the most appropriate for indoor plants, but I suppose you could use it on your outdoor plants if you live in a dry area and have no sprinklers. You can turn it on and off, move it around from plant to plant, and you can change the battery when it gets weak.

For more information or to purchase a Thirsty Light, check out http://www.thirstylight.com. It’s $12.99 for one, $32.97 for a three-pack, $59.94 for a six-pack, or if you want to be safe, a 12-pack is $107.88.

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App of the Week: Ukulele Chord Kumu
If you grew up in Hawaii, chances are you learned how to play the ukulele at some point in your life. Sadly, the last time I even picked up one was most likely in intermediate school, so it’s been a long, long time. Ask me to play a song for you now and I’ll just give you a blank look. Maybe this new app, Ukulele Chord Kumu, can help refresh my memory.

A Free Language-Learning Tool

A free solution to language learning, Livemocha is a learning tool that combines fun self-study lessons, motivational tools and a community to help you learn the language of your choice. Unlike potentially boring CDs and books, Livemocha brings you useful everyday language from native speakers. It reached a whopping 3 million users in June, yet it’s been out there for about two years.

I started using it about a month ago and, as you probably know, learning another language can be difficult. I find that dealing with a native speaker is the best way to pick up any language. Livemocha allows you to do exactly that by putting you in touch with people who already speak the language you’re trying to learn. So far, Livemocha has a community from more than 220 countries and is the largest language-learning community. The site continues to outpace the growth of traditional classroom and CD-based language courses since it appeals to every age and nationality.

“The contributions of our enthusiastic community allow us to make language learning more accessible worldwide, thereby expanding the size of our community,” said Shirish Nadkarni, founder and CEO of Livemocha. “The viral growth we’ve experienced is a testament to the effectiveness of our unique social learning experience. Livemocha members learn new languages more effectively by accessing lessons online and tapping into a large network of native speakers for real-time practice and helpful feedback.”

Livemocha’s sign-up is quick and easy: You enter in your name, e-mail, password, etc., and choose what language(s) you want to learn. You then choose a course, and there are four steps you need to pass in each lesson: Learn, Review, Write and Speak. There are optional exercises, too: Read, Listen, Magnet and Quiz. Overall, the lesson plans include more than 160 hours of beginner- and intermediate-level content that teaches you everyday useful conversational language along with a wide range of practical reading, listening, writing and speaking exercises. I find the pictures with each phrase useful and easy to remember, as well as the option to choose to see either the characters or romanization (when learning Chinese or Japanese).

In addition, Livemocha encourages members with Mochapoints. You can earn points based on completing lessons, writing submissions or speaking submissions. Once you earn a certain amount of Mochapoints you receive medals. The points are just a way to motivate you to do more and more. Try Livemocha at http://www.livemocha.com.

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Click Chick’s iPhone App of the Week: Rowmote
Rowmote lets you control any Mac or Apple TV from the convenience of your iPhone or iPod touch via your Wi-Fi network. It works just as those little Apple Remotes do, but it does so much more without having to worry about a line-of-sight infrared connection with your computer.

Before you can use Rowmote you’ll need to download and install the Rowmote Helper on your Mac from rowmote.com. After that, you’ll be able to control a variety of programs on your computer including Front Row, Boxee, DVD Player, Hulu Desktop, iPhoto, iTunes, Quicktime, Safari or xbmc (Xbox Media Center), to highlight afew.

I have a Mac mini hooked up to my TV for the sole purpose of being a media server, and I’ve been using Rowmote to primarily control Boxee, Hulu Desktop and iPhoto. The combination of using our HDTV to watch streaming media along with Rowmote makes my home media experience very efficient and enjoyable. Download Rowmote for 99 cents at the iTunes App Store.

A Serious Challenger For Google

The first time I saw one of those Bing commercials on TV, I thought, “Oh no. Another search engine trying to copy Google.” The online critics and cynics joke that Bing is an acronym for “But It’s Not Google.”

Believe it or not, in some ways Microsoft’s Bing may actually be better than Google, depending on what you’re searching for. I noticed Bing comes back with better results when searching for travel (perhaps it’s because it uses the farecast.com engine).

Bing initially launched in early June and Microsoft describes it as being a “decision engine” designed to empower people to gain insight and knowledge from the Web, moving more quickly to important decisions. It was developed as a tool to help you easily navigate through the Internet’s information overload you may see in a typical online search.

A comScore Inc. study across core search engines showed that as many as 30 percent of searches are abandoned with an unsatisfactory result. The study’s data also showed that approximately two-thirds of the remaining searches required a refinement or re-query on the search results page.


“Today, search engines do a decent job of helping people navigate the Web and find information, but they don’t do a very good job of enabling people to use the information they find,” said Steve Ballmer, Microsoft CEO. “When we set out to build Bing, we grounded ourselves in a deep understanding of how people really want to use the Web. Bing is an important first step forward in our long-term effort to deliver innovations in search that enable people to find information quickly, and use the information they’ve found to accomplish tasks and make smart decisions.”

From Google, you’ll usually see a long list of blue links with an occasional photo. Bing does this as well, but instead of the plain white background you see on Google’s homepage, you’ll see a pretty picture on Bing’s.

Bing tries to make sense of your search with a list of common-sense links pertaining to your search (i.e. with a typical medical condition you’ll see a list with symptoms, causes, remedies, treatment, prevention and news).

Related searches are easily pulled up with a single-click and match your word(s) as well as subject matter. Additionally, when you do an image search, it’s nice that the pictures scroll forever instead of having to click Next, Next, Next as you do with Google.

The next time you need to look for something online, try Bing for yourself: http://www.bing.com. And, if you feel up to doing a comparison, check out http://www.bing-vs-google.com. It offers you a side-by-side view of the two search engines.

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Click Chick’s iPhone App of the Week: RedLaser
Occipital’s RedLaser app is the first bar code reader application that actually works. It works as one of those red-laser scanners you see at the checkout counter, hence its name. It uses your iPhone’s camera as the scanner.

RedLaser supports all standard UPC and EAN bar codes (the most common formats used around the world). It recognizes just about everything you scan. Scan your items and the app instantly will have access to various online pricing and information. (For example, you’ll typically see the item and price pop up on amazon.com.) The best part about it for programmers is that they’ve made a software development kit so others can integrate it into their apps as well. Find RedLaser at the iTunes App Store for $1.99.