I have an absolute weakness for physics games, and while Civiballs isn't the strongest physics-based game, what it lacks in the physics department it makes up for a few times over in style and fun.
In Civiballs, you are presented with a few colored balls, and your goal is to get those balls into the same-colored urn on the level. The "civi" part of Civiballs is that there are 3 sets of levels to play, each representing a different civilization. While the civilization doesn't affect gameplay, the artwork for each level is beautifully themed to it's appropriate era.
To play the game, you are given only one tool - a sword with which to cut the chains that are holding the balls. The puzzle part of the game is in figuring out what order, and with what timing to cut each chain. Do it right, and all the right balls end up in the right urns, with no stray balls entering an urn (a no-no). Do it wrong, and you get to start over again.
Civiballs is not terribly deep on gameplay; the entire game can be completed in about 15 minutes. But if you enjoy this type of game, it will be a very enjoyable 15 minutes.
View more Time Wasters
by Brad Linder Nov 25th 2008 at 4:30PM
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
Jenn said 5:40PM on 11-25-2008
Misleading headline? I was under the impression that it no longer convert directly from DVD anymore.
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Michael Rose said 1:25PM on 11-27-2008
It actually can still convert from both standard & commercial (CSS encrypted) DVDs; ripping commercial DVDs requires that the free VLC Player (http://videolan.org) be installed on the same Mac, and Handbrake will use the decss library from VLC to assist the DVD decode. Previous versions of Handbrake had the decss code built-in.
Windows users will need DVD43, AnyDVD or the like to accomplish the same task with Handbrake.
Jenn said 1:25PM on 11-27-2008
@Michael Rose: ohh so in Windows its just the css decryption. I thought it meant dvd copying in General. Thanks for clarifying :)
Jenn said 5:40PM on 11-25-2008
Misleading headline? I was under the impression that it no longer convert directly from DVD anymore.
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Mark said 9:08AM on 11-26-2008
How is it misleading? "Not just" isn't the same as "Just not".
Khuffie said 6:07PM on 11-25-2008
Can it join video files? That wpi;d ne awesp,e
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James said 10:52PM on 11-25-2008
WoooOOOO!! It's a Christmas miracle! At Thanksgiving!
Seriously, though, I use Handbrake for all my DVDs and really needed something to batch-convert MythTV recordings with similar easy-to-quality ratio. I'm thrilled about this!
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Christopher said 11:43PM on 11-25-2008
Unfortunately Handbrake appears not to be able to handle ISO. One reason to buy DVDFab. VLC can play them. I rip all my dvd's as ISO's then use DVDfab to create a smaller file my Xbox360 can play.
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Kevin said 6:20PM on 1-18-2009
I use HandBrake on Linux and it handles ISOs perfectly.
Eric said 9:07AM on 11-26-2008
I've tried several times in the past to do this with HandBrake, assuming it already did. I was quite glad to read that now it really does.
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ruby said 9:07AM on 11-26-2008
Though it can convert videos. I think Visualhub and iSkysoft are better.
http://www.moviesmac.com/video-converter-mac
VisualHub, the popular video converter on Mac OS X have now gone open source. They also has got new names, Film Redux (VisualHub) and PunyVid (iSquint). As you may or may not know, the developer, Techspanion has closed shop and after an outcry from fans, it has released the source code.
http://www.wikihow.com/Use-Open-Source-to-Build-Isquint-and-Visualhub
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stephen said 9:08AM on 11-26-2008
Looks like they forgot to include the new Microsoft Vista Media Center TV Pack 2008 .wtv file format...
So the headline should include "almost".
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Macmatt said 7:21AM on 2-17-2009
Ya, handbrake is my favorite dvd ripper, better than mactheripper, from my point of view. :-)
And there is another handbrake tips for Mac user:
Rip DVD on Mac Using Handbrake
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Macmatt said 7:21AM on 2-17-2009
http://applemacvideo.com/articles/rip-dvd-on-mac-using-handbrake.html
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