Icy Tower

The following are gameplay mods by RamboBones, which work only for version 1.2:. See List of XM Satellite Radio channels. Some of them are graphical mods, and some of them change the gameplay. See XM's footprints for the US and Canada. A few mods exist for the game. On November 29, 2005, XM Canada officially launched. The Icy Tower resource page or Icy Tower fan page offers some of them. XM's Canadian channels appeared on US receivers on November 17, 2005.

Characters can be downloaded from the internet. After a lengthy debate, Cabinet rejected the appeals on September 9, 2005. Icy Tower also comes with a template character, allowing fans to create their own characters, with their own graphics, sound effects, and background music. The groups objected to the satellite radio applicants' approach to and reduced levels of Canadian Content and French-language programming, along with the exclusion of Canadian non-commercial broadcasting. Icy Tower comes with two default characters: Harold the Homeboy and Disco Dave. The decisions were appealed to the Canadian federal Cabinet by a number of broadcasting, labour, and arts and culture organizations, including the Friends of Canadian Broadcasting, CHUM Limited, and the National Campus and Community Radio Association. Version 1.2 introduced the ability to play with custom characters. On June 16, 2005, the CRTC approved all three applications.

Note: You must have Icy Tower installed on your computer to view downloaded replays.. Along with Sirius Canada and CHUM Subscription Radio Canada, CSR was one of three applications for national subscription radio services submitted to the CRTC. The offspring of this ability is the global High Score List, which lists the best Icy Tower scores, combos, and floors, and allows internet users to download replays of those events. In November 2004, Canadian Satellite Radio filed an application with the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission to bring the XM service to Canada. This gives the player the ability to provide proof of their highest scores, combos and floors. Unless they unaminously agree otherwise, control of the company remains with the preferred shareholder and noteholders of the company, including Hughes Electronics, GM, Honda, and several private investment groups. Version 1.2 introduced the ability to save replays of games. At that time, GM owned 8.6% of the Class A common stock (a voting percentage of less than 1%) and Honda owned 13% (with a voting percentage of 3.6%).

Icy Tower features the ability to start the game with a floor type of your choice, but only after you have successfully landed on the actual floor where that particular type begins. Four additional directors are investors, and two are not affiliated with any significant stockholders. Version 1.3 features one more floor type (called "chain-floor"), which starts off from floor 1000, and can not be unlocked or seen in lower floors. The company's May 2004 proxy statement notes that four directors are subject to director designation agreements with GM, American Honda, the chairman, and the CEO. As of version 1.2, there are a total of 10 floor types, type 1 being floors 0-99 and type 10 being floors 900 and above. XM manufacturing partners such as Denon, Onkyo, Pioneer Electronics (USA) Inc., and Yamaha will introduce home audio systems capable of playing XM HD Surround powered by Neural Audio in 2006. Every 100 floors, the floor type (the way the floors look) changes. XM channels XM Pops and Fine Tuning will broadcast in XM HD Surround 24/7, while XM Live will broadcast the format for new live concerts and events.

As of 1.2, rewards are simply a flashy message along with the following words, spoken after the player has successfully finished a combo. The technology, titled XM HD Surround, is a partnership between XM and Neural Audio Corporation which provides content with six discrete channels of digital full fidelity audio powered by Neural Audio technology. The bigger the combo, the greater the reward. Beginning in March 2006, XM will begin broadcasting select channels in 5.1 surround sound audio quality. After making a combo-jump, you are given a reward as well as points. Due to bandwidth restrictions and a large channel load, the maximum bitrate XM broadcast from its satellite per music channel is limited to 64kbs. Players either thrive for the highest score they can achieve (by making the biggest combo they can jump), or to reach the highest floor they can. Audio channels on XM are digitally compressed using the aacPlus codec from Coding Technologies for most channels, and the AMBE codec from Digital Voice Systems for some voice channels.

To be really victorious, you will have to make cool jumps, combo-jumps, for which you will be awarded n² points for every n floors jumped in one combo. American Honda also retains the right to some of the company's bandwidth to transmit coded traffic information directly to navigation systems using TMC technology. This alone will not gain you any great scores however. XM has agreed to provide 128 kilobits per second of its bandwidth to OnStar Corporation for use with XM-enabled GM vehicles, regardless of whether their owners are XM subscribers. You will get 10 points for each floor you reach. The XM signal uses 12.5 MHz of the S band: 2332.5 to 2345.0 MHz. There is a clock in the upper left corner of the screen that shows how much time is left until the next speed-up. XM-1 was then moved over next to XM-2, where each satellite operates only one transponder to conserve energy.

This is not so hard in the beginning since the scrolling is very slow, but every 30 seconds, an alarm clock will sound and the scrolling will go slightly faster. To compensate for this flaw, XM-3 was launched earlier than anticipated and moved into XM-1's previous location. As the player escalates the tower, it will start to scroll upwards slowly and the player will have to keep up in order to not fall off the screen. Unfortunately, XM-1 and XM-2 are suffering from a generic design fault on the Boeing 702 series of satellites, which means that their lifetimes will be shortened to approximately six years (instead of the design goal of 15 years). Hitting walls (the sides of the tower) and immediately turning around generally maintains your character's speed. The combination of three satellites and a ground-based repeater network is designed to provide gap-free coverage anywhere within the continental U.S. The faster it runs, the higher and longer it will jump. XM-1 ("Roll") and XM-2 ("Rock") are co-located at 115 degrees west longitude and XM-3 ("Rhythm") is located 85 degrees west longitude in addition to a network of ground-based repeaters.

Your character will constantly accelerate as long as it moves. XM provides digital programming directly from three satellites in geostationary orbit above the equator. jumping but missing a floor and falling past the bottom of the screen), as well as to keep ahead and above of the ever-faster upward scrolling of the game (explained under 'Scrolling'). DirecTV now gives listeners as part of its service the music and talk channels of XM, but not the news or traffic channels. The player's goal is to reach higher and higher floors without falling (i.e. XM also provides data services such as weather information for pilots and weather spotters through it's XM WX Satellite Weather datacasting service, in addition to real-time weather and traffic updates aired every two minutes for major metropolitan areas on some of XM's audio channels. The Tower consists of floors in different sizes and is of infinite height. XM is currently the only satellite radio service to offer true mobile services, utilizing the built in antenna in its MyFi to transmit a live satellite signal to Ipod sized battery operated devices.

. The Internet-only subscription fee is US$7.99 per month; those with an active satellite subscription do not need to pay an additional charge. In the game, the player controls Harold the Homeboy whose goal is to climb the tower as high as he can by jumping up floors, and earn points while doing so. XM Satellite Radio produces the majority of its channels, as well as a few others that are not available via satellite, available on the Internet. Icy Tower is a freeware video game created by Johan Peitz of Free Lunch Design, inspired by Xjump. Subscribers may opt to purchase one-, two-, three-, four-, or five-year packages, in which the average monthly cost would be under US$10.00 per month. RamboMod - enables customization of the speed and floor sizes of the game. If opting for the month-to-month plan, service fees are US$12.95 for the first receiver, and US$6.99 each for up to four additional receivers on the same account.

SolidFloor - floors are completely solid, so you can't jump on them from below. XM-capable receivers cost US$30 – US$300. ProFloor - the floors are shorter. . FastFloor - the game goes slightly (~120%) faster. XM was founded in 1992 as American Mobile Radio Corporation. “XM175”, “XM4”, “XM32”).

XM channels are identified by Arbitron with the label “XM” (e.g. Their service includes 67 different music channels, 39 news, sports, talk and entertainment channels, 21 regional traffic and weather channels and 23 play-by-play sports channels. XM provides pay-for-service radio, analogous to premium cable television. XM Satellite Radio NASDAQ: XMSR is a satellite radio (DARS) service in the United States and Canada based in Washington, DC and controlled by News Corporation's DirecTV, General Motors, American Honda, Hughes Electronics, and several private investment groups.

Also, Oprah's team of personalities who appear on her television show will also host programs on the channel. Oprah will host an original weekly XM program. A new channel called "Oprah and Friends" will launch beginning in September 2006. On February 9, 2006, XM announced that they had signed Oprah Winfrey to a three-year contract.

On January 9, 2006, XM wins top honors at the 2006 Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas for their two new portable units that also offer live programming on-the-go. On January 4, 2006, XM announced that it has passed the 6 million subscriber mark. On January 2, 2006, XM launched "Fox News Talk", news, analysis and the pulse of the nation from Bill O'Reilly, Tony Snow, John Gibson, Alan Colmes and more. On November 29, 2005, XM launched its service in Canada.

"Lex and Terry", a popular nationally syndicated morning radio program, delivers a unique blend of lifestyle advice, humor and on-air community, especially for men, beginning November 28, 2005, on Extreme XM. "Home Ice", part of XM's sports lineup, featuring NHL games. "Franc Parler", the place for Canadian news, talk, and information. "Canada 360", and "Quoi de Neuf", a 24/7 news and information channel with the latest news, weather, sports, business, entertainment and issues making headlines in Canada and around the world.

"Laugh Attack", Canadian comedic talent. "Sur La Route", a blend of modern and classic pop, folk, rock n' roll, "chanson" and soul featuring the stars of yesterday, today and tomorrow. "Air Musique", French punk, hip-hop, metal, electronic and alternative rock music. "unSigned", which now plays new and recently discovered Canadian artists.

On November 17, 2005, XM launched their new Fall lineup of channels. These include music channels, but not news or sports channels. On November 15, 2005, DirecTV began carrying 72 channels of XM programming. On October 18, 2005, XM announced that it will launch "Fox News Talk" Radio in January 2006.

Additionally, XM Radio drops two of its Talk and Entertainment channels: MTV and VH1. This channel is geared toward Women's Programming and features replays of "The Ellen DeGeneres Show", "The Tyra Banks Show", syndicated and original programming, as well as programming from Food Network and HGTV. On October 3, 2005, XM Radio launched channel "Take 5" (XM 155). On October 3, 2005, XM announced that it had added more than 617,000 subscribers in Q3 2005, pushing their total subscriber base to over 5.03 million.

This includes music channels, "Home Plate" (XM 175), and "High Voltage" (XM 202). On September 27, 2005, XM announced that starting on November 15th, 2005, DirecTV will carry 72 channels as part of their audio programming. On September 27, 2005, XM announced that it surpassed the 5 million subscriber mark. On September 13, 2005, XM announced a multi-year deal to carry National Hockey League broadcasts beginning with the 2005-06 season, initially sharing the coverage with Sirius but gaining satellite-radio exclusivity from 2007 onward.

They join Opie and Anthony on High Voltage XM 202 on September 12th, 2005. On August 1, 2005, XM announced the addition of popular radio hosts Ron and Fez. On July 1, 2005, XM announced that it had added more than 640,000 subscribers in Q2 2005, pushing their total subscriber base to over 4.4 million. On June 07, 2005, XM partnered with Audible.com to offer downloadable audio show archives of The Opie and Anthony Show, as well as The Bob Edwards Show.

On May 28, 2005, the Wall Street Journal reported that XM had awarded the contract for the XM 5 spacecraft to Space Systems/Loral (see also [1]). In 5 weeks time, they have added 230,000 subscribers — almost 50% the subscribers added in the previous quarter. This indicates exponential growth for the company. On May 16, 2005, XM announced that subscribership topped the 4 million mark.

On April 11, 2005, XM announced that a deal had been reached to be the official satellite radio network of Air America Radio. On April 1, 2005, XM announced that it had added 540,000 subscribers in Q1 2005, pushing their total subscriber base to 3.77 million. On February 28, 2005, XM's third satellite, Rhythm, was launched successfully. On January 5, 2005, XM announces the introduction of two more XM2go™ models: Pioneer's AirWare™ and the Tao™ from Giant International.

As of the 2005 season, XM had exclusive satellite radio broadcast rights to all Major League Baseball games. On December 30, 2004, XM announced that it had 3.1 million subscribers. On October 26, 2004, XM presents its first XM2go™ portable XM receiver: The Delphi MyFi™. On October 4, 2004, former National Public Radio host Bob Edwards broadcast the first Bob Edwards Show on XM Public Radio, channel 133.

On October 4, 2004, "shock" jocks Opie and Anthony began broadcasting on a premium ($2.99/month extra) XM Satellite Radio. The Acura TL was the first luxury automobile to offer XM radio as "standard" in every vehicle. The company partnered with both luxury automakers: (Acura and Audi) as well as others: (General Motors, Honda, Isuzu, Nissan, Toyota, Volkswagen, and SAAB) to offer in-dash XM receivers on an OEM basis. On August 11, 2004, XM's subscriber base broke the 2.5 million mark.

On March 1, 2004, XM Radio launched Instant Traffic and Weather Channels for major metropolitan markets in the United States. In July 2003 the company had nearly 700,000 subscribers. In December 2002, revenues were lower than expected, and the company obtained $200 million in new funds and a $250 million payment deferral from General Motors. In 2001, XM service was launched, first in San Diego and Dallas/Fort Worth and then nationwide.

In July 2000, American Honda joined several private investors in a $235 million preferred stock investment in the company. Both Clear Channel and DIRECTV agreed to develop services for XM. In June 1999, Clear Channel Communications, DirecTV, General Motors, and a private investment group invested $250 million in XM Radio convertible debt. In October 1997 the company obtained one of only two satellite digital audio radio service licenses offered by the Federal Communications Commission.