I absolutely love a good joke. As long as the joke doesn’t hurt or disparage someone, I’m 100% for April Fools' pranks. While some corners of the internet are to be avoided on April 1st, I personally always look forward to some of the funny prank products that game and tech companies come up with for that day.  I got curious about the origins of April Fools' Day, so I did a bit of searching online and found a few different accounts. The most credible explanation of it...

I normally don’t mind change. Change means progress, new and exciting experiences, interesting people, and so on. Change is good! Unless it’s your Start menu. Look, I spent a lot of time on Windows 7. I skipped Windows 8 entirely. So when Windows 10 came around and handed me a brand new Start menu (not to mention a bunch of other new stuff that I wasn’t used to), I wasn’t a huge fan. Like it or not, though, I’m a Windows user and I’m pretty mu...

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...

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...

Do you remember when you (or a family member) brought home your first computer? I do. It was right around 1995 when my dad purchased a Packard Bell (when I called him to talk about this blog, he informed me that his first PC was a Commodore Vic 20). At 10 years old, this technological marvel that he brought into our home fascinated me and drew my attention right from the second it was plugged in. The main draw? Packard Bell’s Navigator, an alternative shell for Windows 3.1 - sp...

When it comes to teaching a person how to play a video game, there have been two extremes over time that have been prevalent in gaming: “too much hand-holding”, and “throw you to the wolves and see how many times you get shredded alive.” Earlier video games - long before gaming became a mainstream hobby for millions of people - typically skewed toward the latter category. Old school NES games would drop you right into a situation with no explanation of how to play -...

I love open exploration. This fact is actually relatively newfound information for me. I have always enjoyed RPGs and the “exploration” they offer - by that, I always meant whatever new world tidbit or experience I had as I progressed through a linear storyline.  But as open world exploration started to permeate several different game genres, I found myself finally at a place where open-world sandbox and RPG intersected: Skyrim. As far as my immediate recollectio...

The weather in Michigan has started to turn colder, though for the time being we've dodged any real abundance of snow (I know, I know - I just cursed us). As we enter into the holiday season, I find it impossible not to reflect a bit on how fortunate I am to have become friends and share so many experiences with my inredible colleagues at Stardock. The last two-ish years have been a bit strange, to say the very least. The pandemic forced us all into remote work and kept us from seeing each ot...

The Internet can sometimes be a cesspit of vitriol and negativity, but no matter how gross it can get there's always something that manages to shine through the murk. This story from Kotaku a couple of weeks ago about a couple who put out an ad on Craigslist asking for someone to help them beat The Last of Us 2 is definitely one of those things. Karen and Bruce Klein retired and took an interest in video games in 2021 after looking into things that they could do to keep themselves active. T...

I have long known that I work with plenty of people who love games - that's not news to me, and if you've been reading these blogs at all, it isn't to you either! What did surprise me, however, was just how many of my colleagues actually love Dungeons & Dragons and other table-top RPGs. About two months ago, we were coming off the high of having a fantastic in-person game night . Raeann - a member of our amazing operations team - said in one of our chats "Stardock D&D night, when?", ...

We absolutely love Halloween here at Stardock! Frankly, there are a whole bunch of us who will jump at any excuse to dress up in a costume and have fun - Halloween just happens to be the time when everyone  else  is doing it, too.   Our operations team here is amazing and they always make sure that we have everything we need to have a good time! They played Monster House on our big TV downstairs and had lunch catered from a local company - everything was absolutely deliciou...

I am in a unique and wonderful position here at Stardock in that I genuinely enjoy spending time with my colleagues. Many of us spend time outside of work hours playing board games, slaying monsters in Dungeons & Dragons, or critiquing new and popular films out at the theater together.  Once in awhile, our amazing operations team plans an outing for us so we can all get out of the office and enjoy some teambuilding activities. Autumn is widely celebrated in Michigan as cider season, ...

I am a lover of soups, stews, and chilis. The very  second  the weather dipped below 60 here in Michigan, I popped my head out the door and bellowed "SOUP SEASON!" ...you think I'm exaggerating or being dramatic, but I'm not. My friends (and my poor neighbors) will attest. Anyway, I'm not the only one who loves this time of year around here! Fall sees all sorts of fun activities popping up at Stardock, from visits to Cider Mills, to Halloween costume contests, and of course al...