Happy spooky season, everyone! Here at Stardock, we love two things: Halloween, and desktop customization. Stardock Halloween 2019! Actually, we love quite a lot more than just those two things, but stick with me here! Halloween is on Saturday, and unfortunately this year won't be filled with the usual trick-or-treating hullabaloo (normally I get 400+ kids in my neighborhood!). That doesn't stop me from decorating for the holiday anyway! I'll be turning my porch light off this year, savin...

Before coming to Stardock, I never really had a deep appreciation for Windows customization. I remember downloading the occasional Windows background and all sorts of skins (and frankly, probably viruses - sorry mom and dad!) for WinAmp back in my teen years, but that was about the extent of it.  Since being here though, I've garnered an entirely new appreciation for being able to make my desktop look fun and unique - both my PC desktop AND my workspace desktop, too. My work de...

I’ve said this before, but I struggle with heavy strategy video games like Galactic Civilizations III and Sins of a Solar Empire: Rebellion. For 4X games, it’s usually that I suffer from decision paralysis because there are just too many options. For RTS games, too much happens too quickly and my brain’s swiss-cheese processing power just can’t keep up. That said, I find that if I am playing a strategy board game, I have an easier time of it....

I’ve said it before, but I suppose it bears repeating: I love games - board, video, card, and otherwise. In particular, since the board game scene exploded over the last few years, I’ve found myself neck-deep into the hobby, excitedly following blogs and Kickstarter for the next ‘big game’ coming down the line. With all of the new games, sometimes I forget about the ‘classics’ - you know, the kinds of games that have been around forever but may not be as...

I don’t know about you, but I’m a little stir-crazy at this point. The days are starting to blend together so much that I can scarcely keep track of what day it even is anymore, which becomes especially difficult during the work week since I’ve lost the routine of leaving my house and getting in my car to drive there every day. One of the cool things I’ve seen come out of this quarantine period, however, are the numerous people and companies who have come up w...

Image credit: TechCrunch A few weeks ago, my dad and I had a conversation about how, if we have to weather a pandemic, we’re sure glad it’s happening in 2020. Don’t get me wrong - obviously, we wish we weren’t living through this craziness at all, but to deal with it now versus in, say, 1990? We’re all way better equipped in certain areas. For one thing, the internet has come a long way since its dial-up days and is commonplace in most home...

Monday was Star Wars Day, and as I’m writing this it’s currently Revenge of the 5th, so...I’m just declaring that this week is “Star Wars Week” and so you’re getting a Star Wars blog. Yub nub! I am prone to nostalgia, I fully admit this. Star Wars, in and of itself, is full of those old, wonderful memories for me - my Dad raised me and my sister on the movies, and our favorite Friday night ritual consisted of tackling him when he got home from work, popp...

Next week marks one of my favorite holidays. Unfortunately for me and my office mates, we will be spending it apart from each other in our own homes. For us, May 4th is a day of geeky celebration, of shared memes and, more importantly, shared (and themed!) food. When my first opportunity to celebrate Star Wars with some fellow nerds came around, I started fairly simple. I happened to have cupcake wrappers and decorations that were Star Wars themed, so I made a batch of cupcakes, decked the...

One of the most common questions I think I get about the Multiplicity software is: why are there 3 versions and what the heck is the difference between them? It’s a fair question - one that I also had personally when I started learning about our software - and I’m here to help answer it. A while back, I wrote up a guide to setting up Multiplicity KM . Multiplicity KM is the version that is included in Object Desktop, and lets you control 2 PCs with a single keyboard and mo...

The Internet is a wonderful place - most of the time. You can stay connected with friends and family who live far away, learn new information at the touch of a button, and play games with people no matter where you are! Unfortunately, with every great thing there often comes a vice - and in the case of the Internet, that means scammers. There’s always going to be someone trying some new way to take advantage of others who don’t know any better. Plenty of us have been online lon...

I don’t know about you , but I’m a sucker for cool stuff. I’m a collector. I love to brazenly display my fandoms and hold onto keepsakes long after they’re relevant. My home office is basically completely decked out with paraphernalia from my favorite fandoms, many of which are video games. Several pieces have come from collector’s editions, which have become, much to my dismay, relics of the past. There are a few major pulls that most collector&rsqu...

A couple of weeks ago, I used an internet archive tool and took a look at some of the history behind a few of our now discounted software products. This time, I’m going to look at 3 more classic products that we still have up on our website for posterity, even though they are no longer supported or available. The first one we’re discussing, according to Wayback Machine, first appeared online over 20 years ago. DesktopX DesktopX was a desktop utility program desig...

Since the creation of “ Tennis for Two ” (which later became Pong) by nuclear physicist William Higinbotham, gaming has come a long way. When video games first started becoming a “thing,” there wasn’t a whole lot of variety available, but as technology has advanced, it has opened the floodgates for a plethora of new adventures.  I have talked a lot about different genres - things like Horror , and Open World , and Strategy - but I want...

Stardock has been around for a long time - for more years, in fact, than the age of our youngest employee (I’m writing it this way because I like to make the long-timers feel old. ). I’ve been around for a little over five years now, and sometimes I have fun diving back into history and looking at things we’ve done in the past. I’ve mapped the history of WindowBlinds , dove deep into the evolution of PC icons , taken an ‘over the years’ look at th...

Are you a Microsoft Surface user? Whether you have an older Surface Pro or are up-to-date with the most recent model, take a moment to read on about a snazzy little app called TouchTasks. What is TouchTasks? TouchTasks is a touchscreen app for Windows that creates “zones” on your device so that you can easily access apps and tasks.The zones are conveniently located on the edge of the screen and will work in both portrait and landscape modes. You can customize each zone b...