Game Review: Blackguards

Title: Blackguards
Classification: Tactical Turn-Based RPG
Developer: Daedalic Entertainment
Publisher: Daedalic Entertainment
Release: Nov 6, 2013 (Early Access Release)
Similar Games: XCOM, Fire Emblem, FF Tactics, Onimusha Tactics
Co-Op?: No

Description:

"
What happens when the only hope of a threatened world lies not with heroes in shining armor, but in the hands of a band of misfits and criminals? Blackguards, a new turn-based strategy RPG, explores this very question. You will discover over 180 unique hex-based battlegrounds within a dark and mature story of crime, drugs, and murder.

Play as a warrior, mage or hunter and customize your character's skills as you see fit. The challenging campaign delivers a story of doubt, treason and loss. You decide the course of the story at key turning points and determine its outcome.

• More than 180 unique battlemaps provide ever-evolving and novel challenges. 
• Make sure you have plenty of snacks, as this dark fantasy adventure has 40+ hours of exciting play time. 
• Lead up to five characters in your party to glorious victory or devastating defeat. 
• Enjoy enchanting hand drawn backdrops. They're beautiful even when your party members get their asses handed to them. 
• Your choice of spells, skills and abilities determine your battlefield tactics. Aggressive? Defensive? Tactical? It's your call how to tackle each challenging encounter! 
• Use interactive objects like bee hives or barrels to your advantage in combat, or blow yourself up by carrying a torch into flammable swamp gas. 
• Dish out some serious damage with 40 special abilities and more than 90 spells... or find yourself on the other end and get obliterated.

"

Summary:

I'll add on to this as I play more but for right now I have the following:

The first thing I have to say about this is I really, really like these types of games. I really enjoy games like Fire Emblem & Onimusha Tactics on the GBA and XCOM on the PC, which are specifically turn-based games. Blackguards also gives me the vibe/atmosphere of old school RPG games I love like Baldur's Gate I & II, Path of Radiance: Ruins of Myth Drannor , Icewind Dale and Neverwinter Nights + expansions + mods (The old bioware game, not that new MMO). While the games I just listed are not turn based, they do have pause button tactics, and they share the fantasy setting and RPG skill allocation, feats, that sort of thing. The most recent game of this genre was Dragon Age Origins but it has been a while since that came out.

Anyway, since then, I have been waiting for another game to grab my attention the same way all these massive titles did. I decided to pick up Blackguards, and I will admit that I was scared because it was Early Access. I will tell you now this game has not disappointed me in the slightest, even though it is Early Access. The characters are fun, the gameplay is exactly what I wanted. I have to say they won me over pretty quickly. I wrote down a few pros/cons that were most apparent for me.

Pros:

• I personally love the turn-based gameplay/combat system
• Nice artwork and environments
• Plenty of voiced dialog
• Fun characters  

Cons:

• Kind of easy even on hard difficulty, but I like these types of games so.....yea
• Graphics are a tad dated so this might bother some
• Some features are kind of buggy but it is still Early Access so calm down (using bandages ect...)
• I would like some cooler / more tiered armors and weapons
• Seeing the reference tags on characters/objects is distracting
• No in depth character customization (but it is to be added later!) 

Verdict: 

YES. This is a fun game to play even early access. I am glad I did it and I think the RPG community will come together to love it. 

Torchlight 2 Camera Mod / Point of View Changer

I thought I would put this down:

I really wanted to change up the angles to play my character from behind like a 3rd person game. Turns out there is a mod for that.

Youtube Vid Demo: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1CGqMBRIJl4
Find the Mod Here: http://forums.runicgames.com/viewtopic.php?f=48&t=40402
Download Link: http://www39.zippyshare.com/v/96628732/file.html


Here is the readme file I made myself to use the mod:

---------------------------
start the cam program
start TL2

once you're inside TL2 press and hold Shift and your Middle mouse button at the same time then move your mouse

that changes the camera angle

you can make the camera very low and behind you
you can move the camera left and right
---------------------------

Enjoy

Temporarily Stop Windows Update from Restarting the Computer

So lets say you are working on some stuff, copying some files, running a simulation, synthesizing a design, aaaand its late night. You then see that damn windows popup saying it will automatically restart. Drat! The temporary quick fix is to do this:

--------------------------------
Windows Vista/7: Open Start and search for cmd. Right click on the found program and click Run as administrator. Enter the command net stop "windows update" and you're good to go. Likewise, you can suspend the process with PsSuspend and the command pssuspend wuauclt.
--------------------------------

Source: Link

Protection with Varnish

So normally I would use a gloss varnish on metal/armor ect, and then just matte varnish for the rest. As I was painting my first garage kit, it occurred to me that I might want to just varnish certain sections as I am painting just in case I bump it or something. Anyway, while googling around I came across several articles that suggest for additional protection, you can gloss varnish first, and then spray over it with matte and this will take the glossy effect away

http://www.warseer.com/forums/showthread.php?249298-Ard-coat-question

Dragon Commander Screen Resolution Stuck

So my Screen Resolution is stuck for Dragon Command which I just bought on the -40% Steam Sale

My native resolution is 1600x900 and they apparently don't like it.
The fix for it is as follows:

1. Launch the Game, then go to options>video and select windowed [note I didn't have any other resolutions available]
2. Go to C:\Users\[YOURUSER]\Documents\Larian Studios\Dragon Commander
3. You should see a file called "graphicSetting.lsx" open it in notepad or np++
4. Search for the lines with variables "ScreenHeight" and "ScreenWidth" change this to what you want I changed back to 1600x900

Good Luck!


Sources
[1] http://steamcommunity.com/app/243950/discussions/0/846960628345147746/#p6
[2] http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=156708832#102862

Game Review: Enclave (PC) 2013

Title: Enclave (Not to be confused with Fallout Enclave!)
Classification: 3rd person hack-and-slash RPG
Developer: Topware
Publisher: Topware
Release: March 10, 2003 (Original Release) Oct 4, 2013 (Steam Release)
Similar Games: Champions of Norrath, Gothic, Eldar Scolls, Fable, Kingdoms of Amalur ect...
Game Modes: Single-Player
Co-Op?: No

Description:

Experience incredibly atmospheric and intense medieval combat action!
Go ahead and enter a new world, the award-winning world of ENCLAVE!

The people of Light and Darkness are divided by a bottomless rift that split the earth many millennia ago. The lands of light are an Enclave of truth and order surrounded by the twisted and barren lands of the dark, known as the Outlands. Over the centuries the rift has started to close…

And now it is only a matter of time before the forces of Light and Darkness will clash in an unprecedented, merciless struggle for survival!
Remember... When a storm comes up, for some it’s better to keep out of its way… while for others it’s time to block its path!


Summary:

Enclave is a muuuuuch older game that I must have missed a decade ago. Although it definitely shows its age it is still a lot of fun.

I'll add on to this as I play more but for right now:

Pros:

• Fun Gameplay despite being horribly out of date
• Challenging

Cons:

• Dated Graphics 
• Punishing deaths 
• Lame Green Crosshair when shooting

Verdict: 

Pick it up on steam while on sale for $2.50, I didn't think I would like it but give it till the end of level 2 you might find you enjoy it.

[Common-70] Application Exception: couldn't create run dir xilinx

[Common-70] Application Exception: couldn't create run dir xilinx

Got this error today when I changed the floorplanning on a PR design for my ML507 in 13.2 I re-ran the design and it broke D:

All you have to do is close out of plan ahead and reopen it. geez.

Game Review: Agarest: Generations of War

Title: Agarest: Generations of War
Classification: Tactical JRPG
Developer: Ghostlight
Publisher: Ghostlight
Release: Oct 3, 2013 (PC Release)
Similar Games: Fire Emblem, FF Tactics, Onimusha Tactics
Co-Op?: No

Description:

"
At the dawn of time, a terrible war raged between the forces of good and evil, ending in the destruction of the world of Agarest. After their victory, the Gods of Light unified the decaying bodies of the Gods of Darkness and created a new world.

Now, the forces of darkness are awakening once again…

• Choose the path of Darkness or Light through a truly epic story, spanning multiple generations
• Battle hundreds of different creatures using an array of character abilities, in a compelling and innovative turn-based combat system
• Build your ultimate army of warriors and master Extra Skills, Special Arts and Over Kills to defeat colossal enemies!
• Unite with your chosen heroine and use the “Soul Breed” system to shape the fate of the next generation of heroes
"

Summary:

I'll add on to this as I play more but for right now:

Pros:

• Japanese Voice Overs! 
• Interesting take on Tactics Battle Systems 
• Great Music

Cons:

• I really just want to play this on the Vita
• Graphics is weak for a PC game (totally understandable on a mobile platform)

Verdict: 

Pick it up if you ever liked Tactical RPGs... For those that were digging the generation thing from Fire Emblem this is probably for you! 

Store Review: SMcG Customs

Store: SMcG Customs
Website: http://66.147.244.127/~smcgcust/Prestashop/
Type: Online Retailer
Description: 

SMcG Customs specializes in any and all 1/6 female items from PHICEN to TTL-TRIAD to HOT TOYS. They also offer many custom made 1/6 scale clothing items and accessories for all styles of bodies, from male Tees to trenchcoats and Female lingerie to Superhero outfits.

SMcG Customs also offers a special order service for almost any 1/6 item imaginable. Originally, they started out with just custom commissions but have in the past couple years grown and expanded. You can also find a lot of their products on ebay.

Background:

I will say when it comes to 1/6 figures I am totally new to the market and hobby in general. I recently fell in love with the idea of them because of the Steamless Bodies that don't show any joints. Originally, I had purchased some larger VMF figures and realized how much I liked them. Then on AmiAmi there was a random link to Phicen and those awesome bodies. I knew I had to have one. The real trouble was learning and reading about them and thinks to OneSixthWarriors I learned a bunch. The next biggest problem was finding a dependable retailer to even think of purchasing stuff from and thats where SMcG comes in.

My Experience:

I first heard about SMcG when I was researching the Phicen Line of bodies on onesixthwarriors. Everyone there keeps talking about some guy named "Chad" and "SMcG" anyway I ended up finding his website and he had some of the things I was looking for in stock. On the forums Chad offers a wealth of experience and commentary about different products. The one thing that really caught my eye was his post about Phicen Nina:

"As many of you know, I stand behind the quality of the PHICEN. When you purchase from me, I dont leave you high and dry if something is wrong.

I still deal directly with PHICEN and take care of all of my customers.

If anyone has a question about NINA, I will do my best to help you out." 

^Link

I am pretty big on stores having good customer support and that pretty much had me sold. In addition, I had been reading reviews about Phicen bodies breaking ect...I have pretty terrible luck so I didn't want that to happen to me.

Anyway I ended up ordering some stuff from Chad, it was well packaged and came in with USPS Priority which means 2-3 days from when I ordered. I didn't have any problems with my order and it was great!

Customer Support: 

I can actually comment on this! I randomly emailed Chad through his support email just asking for information. He responded back pretty quickly and answered my question. In addition, my second order from him got messed up, but he contacted me in advance and definitely made the effort to make everything right. So A+ from me for customer service.


Verdict:

If you are going to order any 1/6 dolls / accessories ect... definitely give this store a shot first. Ebay can be sketchy at times and at least you know here Chad has your back.

7zip cannot unzip .zip and .z01 split archive files

So I discovered that 7Zip was having a problem with my split archives. Instead of using 7Zip, just click on all the split archives and select Extract All... using the built in windows feature.

Xilinx ISE 14.x Design Summary Window does not update or refresh

I have had this one project and I have moved the directory around multiple times. The main issue here is that I can fully go through all the stages of Sythesize - XRT, Implement Design as well as Generate Programming file and the "Design Summary" does not change, ever. The design completely runs and I can find all the reports, but that design summary always stays the same.


This is solved by right clicking on the shaded in reports . Right clicking on "Design Overview" and then "Reset Report List..."

Total number of in the design exceeds the capacity for the target device.

 Occasionally,

You may run into this:

Pack:2925 - The total number of RAMB18s andRAMB36s in the design exceeds the capacity for the target device.

Map:237 - The design is too large to fit the device.  Please check the Design Summary section to see which resource requirement for your design exceeds the resources available in the device. Note that the number of slices reported may not be reflected accurately as their packing might not have been completed.

The best way to check how much you design exceeds capacity by, especially if it is BRAMS is to generate the files on a larger device and see how much resources it uses, this will give you a better estimate of how much to trim your design by.

Unexpected error while launching program: Error while running ps7_init method

This error comes when you have imported your SDK project to another computer. All you have to do is rename the SDK folder. Re Export the project in Planahead, and then copy over the files again.

Adding proc_common_v2_00_a or proc_common_v3_00_a to an ISE Project Navigator Design

I have a specific project I have been working on that requires me to synthesize a design fully in JUST Project Navigator. Unfortunately, for me you really kind of need some of the stuff from the edk like proc_common. Here is the easiest way I found to add it:

You get the error if you have:

library proc_common_v2_00_a;
use proc_common_v2_00_a.proc_common_pkg.all;

Somewhere in your code

1. Switch to Sources/Source Libraries tab
2. Right-click and select "New Source..."
3. Select "VHDL Library" as the type and "proc_common_v2_00_a" as the name
4. Right-click this new library and select "Add Source..."
5. Navigate to and select /path/to/EDK/hw/XilinxProcessorIPLib/pcores/proc_common_v2_00_a/hdl/vhdl/proc_common_pkg.vhd

Source:http://forums.xilinx.com/t5/Embedded-Development-Tools/Library-proc-common-v2-00-a-cannot-be-found/td-p/14738

PE - Quick Reflection

To do a quick reflection

1. Duplicate Layer
2. Flip Layer around vertical
3. change opacity of layer

http://tv.adobe.com/watch/adobe-beginner-classes-with-dennis-radeke/episode-39-photoshop-basics-series-creating-an-image-reflection/

Skyrim Dawnguard 3rd Person Crossbow Animation Not Working

So a huge amount of disappointment today when I discovered my game seemed to glitch when I tried to fire the crossbow in 3rd person. Super lame.

At first I was really mad at Bethesda for making it so glitchy, but then I realized it is only really glitchy because of all my freaking mods.

To get it to work I ended following the steps here: http://skyrimforums.org/threads/dawnguard-crossbow-glitch.13637/

1) FNIS (RE-)INSTALLATION fix (should work in most cases):
- remove data/meshes/actors/character/behaviors/mt_behavior.hkx
- (re-)install Fore's New Idles in Skyrim - FNIS. Make sure GenerateFNISforUsers.exe is run
FNIS will overwrite the most common cause of animation glitches (due to old defaultmale.hkx, and defaultfemale.hkx)

2) BEHAVIOR CLEAN-UP:
delete the following files, or move them to a different folder:
- data/meshes/actors/character/*.hkx
- data/meshes/actors/character/behaviors/*.hkx
- data/meshes/actors/character/characters/defaultmale.hkx 
- data/meshes/actors/character/characters female/defaultfemale.hkx
Now of course all animation mods which need behavior files need to be re-installed

Now it works just fine and I am having a great time with it.

[NgdBuild 1037] The logic for imported Partition using previous implementation has been modified. This situation can occur when the source for the Partition was modified but the Partition was not re-implemented and exported. You must re-implement and export the Partition before it can be imported into this design.

This error is soooo obscure it is crazy.

All you have to do is close and reopen the synthesized design view:

http://www.xilinx.com/support/answers/41889.htm

NgdBuild 1407 BUFG 'pin_name' cannot be route through Reconfigurable Partition 'reconfiguarable_partition_instance'. Partition output pin 'pin_name' must be driven by logic internal to the partition.

So this super obscure error is caused by having a clk routed within a PR region. I found an AR record that discussed this here (http://forums.xilinx.com/t5/Design-Planning/Partition-output-pin-BramClk-must-be-driven-by-logic-internal-to/td-p/171508):

The basic idea is do not have a clock as an output. You will get this error if you EVER have a clock that is an output but is not connected at some point, like chained reconfigurable regions.

Find Account Information and Redeem Codes on PSN Network

I am posting this because that website is so fucking unintuitive it takes me several minutes every time I visit to figure out what the hell is going on.

1. Sign on to your account at us.playstation.com
2. Click on "My Account"
3. Click the small text that says "Manage Sony Entertainment Network Account"
4. Sign in again on the page it takes you to

From there you have access to the following things 

1. Redeem Codes 
2. Add Funds to Wallet 
3. Manage your Sub Accounts 
4. View Your transaction history

Damn Sony, I really love my Vita, but make that website better.

To Add funds to the Sub Account
You actually just add funds to your account and set a limit on the Sub

ERROR:HDLParsers:856 - No default value for unconnected port

Yea, I should have seen this error coming. I was actually trying to look up where I could used 'open' because I didnt think I could use it for outputs and inputs. Looks like I was right.

This is caused from putting 'open' on an input port. You can only do that on output ports, for input ports you can make a dummy signal which will be synthesized out:

http://www.xilinx.com/support/answers/18415.htm

INFO:Xst:2261 - The FF/Latch XXX in Unit XXX is equivalent to the following XXX FFs/Latches, which will be removed

I got this error the other day and it really caused me a lot of frustration. I was only building a simple core too.
Anyway I found this AR which would lead me to solving it http://www.xilinx.com/support/answers/38239.htm

I was frustrated because I could synthesize the lower blocks with no trouble, but the second I put them all into a top level it synthesized half the design away.

The bottom line is a lot of my logic was synthesized out and I am unhappy. Turns out it had to do with my output and I was connecting it to the wrong place because the controller basically would need the output from a different signal.

the TLDR: If You get this you messed up your logic, possibly in a top level because of a sm controller

ERROR:HDLParsers:812 A Value is missing in case

If you get the following error:

ERROR:HDLParsers:812 - "file_name" Line ###. A value is missing in case.

The first reason is covered by the AR record http://www.xilinx.com/support/answers/14430.htm

This just means you forgot to add when others => to your case statement. The other way to solve this is really freaking weird but I ran into this in ISE 13.2

 when "11" =>      
      TOKEN<= "0000";                
    --synthesis translate_off
    when others =>
      null;
    --synthesis translate_on

Also caused this error, unbelievably just moving the commends down after the when others solves it

 when "11" =>      
      TOKEN<= "0000";                
 when others =>
      null;
     --synthesis translate_off
    --synthesis translate_on

Play Arts Kai Commander Shepard Repaint

I went into this whole situation knowing that Commander Shepard from Play Arts Kai was bad, but man, his face was freaking AWFUL.  The figure itself is really cool and intricate, but damn, that face. The bottom line is the face is so terrible it completely breaks the figure.

Normally, I would never be so cocky as to repaint the face of a figure, but this was so bad, I had no choice.

Okay so take a look at the AmiAmi page for him

http://www.amiami.com/top/detail/review?scode=FIG-KAI-3861&page=top%2Fsearch%2Flist%3Fs_keywords%3Dplay+arts+kai%24pagemax%3D100%24getcnt%3D0%24pagecnt%3D1

Okay so here is my shepard at the start

That's pretty freaking bad.

Okay and now here is me painting him

Here is him after!

 And Finally a Side by Side

Play Arts Kai Tomb Raider Single Player Model Conversion

So I recently was suckered into purchasing the Play Arts Kai Tomb Raider Figure. This is the same one that comes with the collectors edition. Honestly, it is an awesome figure, but while I was in the store, I noticed the WIDE range in Quality of the figures.

The main differences I noticed was:

1. On the forearm, some figures have uneven plastic, where the arm must have been broken off from the mold.
2. The dirt looks like it is painted on free hand with a brush so almost every figure is slightly different. 

I went through all the boxes of Tomb Raiders until I found the one I was most pleased with in quality.

I really liked the figure, however, the one thing that bothered me was they seem to have painted the figure based on the multiplayer Lara. Shes great and alll, but the Lara I know is the poor college kid that got thrown into the action, she got cut, hurt, and really beat up.

I don't suck at the game by any means, but the Lara I grew to like really got freaking messed up and injured. The figure I bought, wasn't my Lara from the game. Well... Since I am a miniature painter in my free time, I whipped out my paints to fix it.

The first thing that needed to happen was that intense stomach wound where [SPOILER] Lara gets impaled at the beginning of the game. 

The next thing was, my bandage on her right arm was VERY poorly painted. I repainted it, and added some blood on it because [SPOILER] She get shot in the arm! 

I also added a bunch of scrap marks after a screenshot I had in game

Here is another view of her stomach wound, arm scrapes, and wounds on her upper chest

And can't forget the wound in her back that came from the impalement! 

Another view of my more messed up Lara. I also added some extra dirt painting to make her more dirty because lets face it, in the game she gets so filthy you wouldn't want to come within 10 feet of her! 

Windows 7 Phone Error: Can't connect to your phone. Disconnect it, restart it, then try connecting again

I recently got this error after I changed my computer name. There are a bunch of different ways you can end up with this. The solution that worked for me is listed below:

It seems that you are having problems with your personal digital certificates! I'd suggest you to create a new certificate as described in KB 2468307 and the steps below:

1.	If it is running, close the Zune software and disconnect your phone.
2.	Open Certificate Manager. To do this, click Start, type certmgr.msc, and press Enter.
3.	Expand Personal, and then expand Certificates.
4.	Click the heading for the Issued By column to sort the column, and then look for one or more certificates that is issued to "zune-tuner://windowsphone/...".
5.	Right-click that certificate and then click Delete. Click Yes.
6.	From the File menu, click Exit.
7.	Click Start and in the search box enter %userprofile%\Application Data\Microsoft\Crypto\RSAand click OK.
8.	Find the folder that begins in "S-1-5-21-".
9.	Right-click the folder and then click Rename. Rename the folder so it ends in .bak.
10.	Start the Zune software and connect your phone to create a new certificate.

Please keep me informed if this procedure helped you out to resolve this issue.


Source: http://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/winphone/forum/wp7-sync/trying-to-connect-a-windows-phone-7-samsung-focus/fc7b885e-e069-4426-958a-84816e8a19e4

FATAL_ERROR:Portability:PortDynamicLib.c:408:1.33

Ran into a new Xilinx error today.

All my projects now fail when I try to generate netlist in the EDK or in Plan Ahead.


FATAL_ERROR:Portability:PortDynamicLib.c:408:1.33 - dll open of library
   <C:/Xilinx/14.2/ISE_DS/ISE/lib/nt64/libXst2_Interf.dll> failed due to The
   specified module could not be found.  .   Process will terminate. For
   technical support on this issue, please open a WebCase with this project
   attached at http://www.xilinx.com/support.

This error is extremely strange because I have done nothing differently in the past few days.

There are several AR records regarding this including:



http://www.xilinx.com/support/answers/36383.htm
http://www.xilinx.com/support/answers/32123.htm


After closely following all the suggestions nothing worked.

My OS is not some foreign version. ISE was working fine before.

I have tried to:

• Re-install the ISE Suite 
• Open ISE directly from the program folder instead of a short cut
• Copied the .dll in question from a co-worker

As a last resort, I did a System Restore to a few days ago. 

This time when I ran it, my anti-virus stated that it was detecting the files I needed as a virus. I guess something changed in my Avast Free-Antivirus, I must have accidentally, hit the Free try on Avast Pro or something and it was now picking it up as a virus. 

I uninstalled Avast in safe-mode using this: http://www.avast.com/uninstall-utility

You can make your computer launch in safe-mode without messing with the function keys on boot up by doing:

Typing msconfig in the start menu to bring up System Configuration and then select [Boot] and click the box for safe mode. 

After restarting in normal. I just re-download Avast Free as normal. 

My ISE works again! Yay.

Here is the Virus Chest that Avast picks up for ISE:

Japanese/Chinese Characters do not appear in Media Player in Windows 7

So if you have songs or CDs that have information like song titles or artists as symbols they may appear just as boxes on your system. To get them to appear correctly you must do the following: enable hidden fonts in windows

1. Hit the Windows key and go to Control Panel 
2. Click Fonts 
3. Font settings 
4. Finally uncheck the box that says "hide fonts based on language settings" 
5. Restart your computer

Source: Link!

Convert Cue and FLAC files into MP3

The process to do this is actually Relatively simple.

First Download
1. Foobar2000 (http://www.foobar2000.org/download)
2. Lame (http://www.rarewares.org/mp3-lame-bundle.php)

Steps
1. Install and then launch Foobar and Extract the Lame ZipFile
2. File > Add Files...
3. Select the Cue and FLAC Files, It will automatically load them all into the screen and parse the songs
4. Ctrl-A or Manually Select all the songs
5. Right Click > Convert > Quick Convert > MP3
6. Select or Make a folder to store the files in
7. When it asks for Lame navigate to where you extracted
8. Happily wait for everything to complete

Cheers.

Too many bonded comps of type "IOB" found to fit this device

This error is generated during the MAP of Implementation of the design.
If you are designing a core that goes inside the design you can safely ignore this error.

What it means is the number of pins at the top level is more than the total available pins of the design, that's why it happens during the implement design phase.

Map fails because the selected FPGA doesn't have enogh resources (I/O pins). 

See this Thread:
http://www.edaboard.com/thread205544.html

Impact Crashing from PlanAhead " i_impact4.exe has stopped working"

If you get an Error Launching Impact from Planahead in your project you simply need to navigate to:

Project.data/impact/

Look for the file called " impactdefaultproj.ipf " 

Then Delete this file and impact will launch again:

Original Source: Link

[EDK 24-166] (generate_target): Failed to execute XPS Script

If you receive the following error:


[Edk 24-166] (generate_target): Failed to execute XPS script. Please check for any errors reported by the XPS application in the console: [C:/Users/User/Documents/project_folder/project_name/project_name.srcs/sources_1/edk/proc_mod/__xps/pa/_proc_mod_synth.tcl]

it means your design has an error. Open up the EDK and try to generate netlist. It should tell you where your error is.

Powerpoint Set Transparent Color

This option in powerpoint saves LIVES. I keep forgetting where it is so here is a picture!

If you cannot read that.

1. Select a Picture
2. Click on the Format Toolbar
3. Go over to "Adjust" 
4. Select Color
5. Set Transparent Color is at the bottom

Java is not recognized as an internal or external command, operable program or batch file

This basically means that Java is not installed or it is not in the path.

Remember that that the Path is in Start>Control Panel>System>Advanced System Settings>Environmental Variables

Scroll down in the bottom box and look for the line that says 'path' click edit.

At the end add the path to java which is typically something like: C:\Program Files (x86)\Java\jre6\bin