Thursday, May 5, 2022

How to Fix The Manhunt Memory Card Error on PS2

 


If your copy of Manhunt running on the PlayStation 2 hangs at the save screen, the solution is to simply use an 8MB memory card. Even though the error message that eventually shows up says that an official Sony memory card is needed, the issue specifically has to do with the size of the memory card for some reason. According to the current reverse engineered documentation of the PS2 hardware: for unknown reasons, certain games do not work if the memory card is larger than expected. If you are using Open PS2 Loader (OPL) virtual memory cards WILL work, they just need to be set at 8MB. Due to the bug mentioned above you should only be using virtual memory cards of 8MB for all games.

I was not going to do one of those recipe website moves where I provide a whole background story before giving the answer people are looking for. If you're confused as to why this is posted here, I felt that this post fell in with a lot of the one off technical solutions I have been posting as of late. I ran into this issue about a year ago, meant to share a broader explanation to the solution online, and am only now getting around to it. So if this post saves one person hours of trouble because they're able to find this on Google, great!

(And if you're asking why post something like this in the first place:) Manhunt was a niche stealth PS2 game developed by Rockstar Games in 2003. The stealth mechanics developed in the game have been implemented  in just about every Rockstar game released after. Even in their most recent release, Red Dead Redemption 2, the stealth mechanics and games play and feel exactly like Manhunt. Due to the violence and subject matter of the game, there was an ensuing media circus and the game was outright banned in some countries. Users are unable to play the game on other platforms today because the re-releases and ports are considered inadequate and buggy compared to the original release. As a result many, users run into the above error early on when trying to run the game on the original hardware. For the sake of media preservation and to humor those with an interest in the forbidden or obscure - I think this is important information to share.

Klarna Postman Collection

Here is a collection of Postman calls I made to use in conjunction with the Klarna API. It simply needs to be imported into Postman. Please note I removed the test credentials and you will have to provide your own. This collection will allow to you generate an order_id for placed, captured, cancelled, and refunded Klarna Payments orders.

You can use this Codepen to complete the client side requests.

Integration guide for Klarna payments.
API reference for Klarna.

Wednesday, January 12, 2022

Resetting The Domain Admin Password in Windows Server

The below steps are confirmed work on Windows Server 2016. Please comment below if you are able to get this to work on different versions.

Download server 2016 ISO > attach to VM > reboot into ISO > Repair your Computer > Troubleshoot > Command prompt

> cd C:\Windows\System32

> ren osk.exe osk.old

> copy C:\Windows\System32\WindowsPowerShell\v1.0\powershell.exe osk.exe

Reboot the server, launch the on screen keyboard and Powershell will open

> Net user Administrator PASSWORD

Make sure you reverse the file changes after.

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This is assuming you have the Bitlocker key, or you don’t use Bitlocker. If you're trying to get into a Windows user account and the drive is not encrypted:

From the login screen you can hit shift five times to launch Stickykeys - a system accessibility app to keep shift and control on when pressed instead of having to hold them down.

You can rename/overwrite that app (c:\windows\system32\sethc.exe) with cmd.exe and you have system root shell at the login screen instead of stickykeys. Of course havig access to an unencrypted drive, you can do just about anything, but this can be a quick hack in time sensitive situations.

Be sure to always encrypt your hard disks!

Saturday, October 16, 2021

Ultimate Weird Al Tournament Enters Round 4

Over at the Subreddit /r/WeirdAl the users have compiled a head to head bracket of every Weird Al song that has seen an official release in some capacity, and every day for the past few months, they have been whittling down the list from 218 songs down to 32.



Today they've entered round 4, be sure to head over to their community and vote!

Sunday, April 21, 2019

Unichusetts of Massaversity Shirts Now For Sale!



Well they've actually been for sale for a while, but I'd like to keep the momentum going. Grab one before Subbaswamy and the board send me a cease and desist despite the University of Massachusetts being a public university. You know it's gonna happen...

p.s. You can still get Always Avoid Alliteration shirts from Whale Computer well.