Excuses, Excuses

I didn't post tonight because I'm putting this together:

You literally have to put the treads together one link at a time, 79 links per tread. After an hour and a half of bending over the thing, my back hurts and my eyes are squirrely. Yes, I said squirrely.

Now it's time for bed. Hopefully my dog won't throw up like she did last night. Twice.

A Long Time Coming

Congratulations to Darrell Green and Art Monk for their election to the Pro Football Hall of Fame. This is Monk's 8th year on the ballot and as a Redskins fan, I'm super proud that two of our guys are being inducted in the same year.

Art Monk is synonymous with Redskins Football to me, as he was a key offensive player for so many of the years I've been a fan. The fact that it took so long for him to be inducted sucks, but I'm glad that he finally got his due.

Darrell Green is one of the best all around players, and probably one of the best examples of a "True Redskin" to ever put on the burgundy and gold. He spent his entire career with the organization and rather than be flashy and do nothing but talk trash, he just consistently performed year after year. My 70th anniversary Redskins jersey is Green's jersey and whenever I feel like we need a full team effort, I wear it, because to me, he embodies what it means to be a Redskin more than any other player.

This past year was a rough one, and with the current coaching search, I don't have high hopes for next year, so having these two guys getting in to the Hall of Fame is a nice boost, because it brings back a lot of memories of when the NFC East was the division to beat, and all roads to the Super Bowl went through Washington.

Der Slippage

I wrote a piece for GameShark about the games you won't be playing this year and alas, it is up and running. I left out the obvious Duke Nukem Forever's and Spore, but I'm kicking myself over forgetting Mercenaries 2. Stupid me!

No More Heroes

Wow. I mean. ..wow.

This game is one of the craziest games I have ever played. If you've read about it, I know it sounds crazy, what with all of the blood and the coins that come pouring out of the decapitated corpses, but nothing comes close to actually playing it. In my limited time with the game, I'm not as thrilled with the open world stuff, but that's not my genre of choice, but man, the fighting is fucking fun on wheels.

If you have a Wii and have ever complained about the dearth of adult titles on it, then not buying this game is the ultimate act of hypocrisy because this is about as adult a title as you're going to find, short of some unannounced, upcoming hamster fucking simulator.

If Star Wars: The Force Unleashed does even half as good a job as this one does with saber combat, then I'll be picking it up on the Wii over the other consoles because swinging the Wiimote to perform your finishing move is just way too much fun. Obviously, I wouldn't object to storm troopers gushing fountains of whatever passes for currency in the Star Wars universe, but I can understand if that goes beyond their mandate.

Harvey Birdman Review

Who takes the time to sift through mediocre games such as Harvey Birdman: Attorney At Law to give you the raw, unbridled truth?

I do. That's who.

You're welcome.

The Hermit in Me

So today I joined some gaming journalist social networking site. Don't worry, I'm not about to start thinking I'm a gaming journalist. I'm well aware that I'm a hack and a hack shall I always be. Anyone who suggests that he should make a game about spraying poison on babies has no reason calling himself a journalist of any stripe.

As a rule, I hate social networking sites as it requires you to a) be social and b) network. I have explained on numerous occasions my disdain for other people, so signing up to be part of a site that requires me to speak to other people makes little, if any sense. The reason I signed up is basically because Bill told me to, and as I have no experience navigating these tricky, freelance waters, I do pretty much whatever he tells me to. That and I find the entire freelance thing very interesting. Not as a career option mind you, as my fragile mental state requires the stability that only a steady income can bring, but I have always wondered how people are able to cobble together a living from this whole writing thing. The only other insight into this world I've ever had is from reading Scalzi's Whatever all these years, and that dude has his shit wrapped up so tight, that I don't even know if it's the norm.

GameShark's new editorial policy has required me to, as Bill said, act like a real freelancer in that I have to think of the next assignment before I'm finished with the current one, and I gotta tell ya, it's a pain in the ass. I'm not the most motivated individual in the world, so the whole idea of me just getting stuff mailed to me with little more needed from me than an email to signify my assent takes some getting used to. That being said, I have managed to fill my plate until the beginning of March, so I think I'm getting used to it, but still, it's like hella work, yo.

I can't imagine having to be on top of what may be coming down the pike because my ability to pay the mortgage depends on it. I pretty much review games because I enjoy it and I need cash to pay for Transformers. Seriously, that's it. I like being able to play games I normally wouldn't, and there's nothing like a bad game to stoke my creative fires, but mostly it's for Transformers. Jesus, when I put it like that, I sound like such a loser. Eh. I'm alright with that.

If I do decide to try my hand at writing for other sites, hopefully all this networking crap will give me visibility into additional opportunities, I'm just not sure anyone would want to hire an anti-social slacker with a Transformer fetish. I know I wouldn't, unless he was in the Collector's Club and could score me Club exclusives. A man's gotta have priorities.

In other news, Mario and Sonic at the Olympic Games for the DS answers the age old question of what would happen if scribbling were an Olympic event. It's a veritable cornucopia of scribbling.

Uhhh

I had a lot more to write about yesterday, you know, the day I didn't write.

I find it odd that so much could leave my brain in such a short amount of time, especially given that I didn't do anything of real interest between last night and this evening. Nevertheless, it did, and I have nothing.

How are you? Good? Excellent.

Alrighty then. Let's try this again tomorrow and we'll see if I can come up with anything else.

Ok. Bye now.

Seriously. Move along.

Well, I'm going. Lock up when you leave.

Time Management

Which is to say I have none.

I had planned on writing about a number of topics, but instead I started playing Mario and Sonic at the Olympics for the DS and the next thing I knew, it was time to call it a night. Hey, you set two world records in one night in the hammer throw and see how late you can stay up.

In other news, John Keefer of Crispy Gamer fame stopped by to tell me that I misspelled his name. Yeah, I'll be writing for that site in no time.

No time at all.

The Shake Up

This past week I found out that James, the editor-in-chief at GameShark is leaving to become the News Editor at a new site, CrispyGamer.com. Crispy Gamer was started by John Keefer who used to be the E-I-C at GameSpy. So far, both Aaron Williams of Nodwick and P.S. 238 fame and Scott Kurtz of PvP fame are doing online comics for the place so it obviously isn't a fly-by-night kind of place.

If you go to the Crispy Gamer site now, there's not much other than a page where you can sign up for a notification when the site launches. From what I've been able to find out online, the site is supposed to go against the grain of current gaming sites, in how it covers games, and how it reviews games. How they'll manage to pull this off is beyond me. The bottom line with game publishers is that if your site doesn't review games in a way that can't be aggregated by the aggregate sites, or if your site isn't large enough to be included in the aggregate sites, you don't get review copies. Hell, GameShark qualifies in both those categories and for the most part, we don't get shit for review copies. As a result, we get games later and our reviews go up later than the other sites with the exception of crap like Dancing With the Stars, which I am proud to say, had it's review debut at GameShark.

But I digress. Without review copies, I'm not sure how you'll be able to get reviews out in a window that can compete with the bigger sites, unless you have a huge budget that you can dedicate towards buying games, and even then, unless you can pay a staff to play games full time, you're still going to be behind the curve. Now, where this might not be a problem is if the readers of the site know that yeah, the reviews might be late, but at least they're honest. Personally, I know I have zero faith in the various gaming sites I go to, with the exception of GameShark (we don't get paid enough to be beholden to anyone), so if there was a site that had later reviews that I knew I could trust, that might mean something. Not sure how that will fly with other gamers though. Given how many people pay to preorder games, I don't place a lot of stock in gamers' patience. Also, given how much traffic both IGN and GameSpot gets, I'm pretty sure people aren't all that concerned with honesty. That's not to say that there isn't a place for an honest games site, I just wonder what's going to pay for it all. As I've mentioned before in this space, I would think that there would be plenty of advertising dollars available for products that a gaming site would never review, but that's just me. Hell, between Nerf and the Transformers, you'd probably get several million clicks a day from them alone. And that's just from me.

Whatever Crispy Gamer ends up being, I wish James all the best. Since I started writing at GameShark, James has been nothing but supportive and is actually one of my biggest fans, something I have always appreciated. Obviously, given James' involvement with the site, I hope that Crispy Gamer becomes wildly successful, and on a selfish note, it certainly wouldn't hurt for me to know someone at a larger gaming venue. Not that me knowing someone there means anything, but it certainly can't hurt.

Unfortunately, James' departure means we have a new E-I-C. All I can say is that I have worked with the man before, and he is insufferable.

And I'm fired in 3...2...1...

New Laptop

I'm writing this post from my spiffy new laptop. Whee for me.

Without getting into what happened to the old one, for fear of corporate reprisals, let's just say that I used to have a laptop that I used while gaming, and now I don't. Given that the lack of a laptop was my fault entirely, I took it upon myself to purchase a new one. Hence this one.

So far, I'm enjoying it, although it's a little slower and a little warmer than the Dell. I am convinced that this is entirely Vista's fault, however I have no direct evidence. Vista certainly is one slick looking little OS, and I can't bring myself to turn off all of the visual flourishes, even if they make it hard to watch hi-def Quicktime trailers. I'm not all that upset though, as this laptop was about a quarter of the cost of the Dell, so I'd be kind of miffed if the Dell wasn't as speedy, even if it is a few years old. The Dell runs XP, which may not be as pretty, but it works just fine.

One may wonder why I need a laptop for when I'm playing games if we have another one, but I'd rather not get into it lest I confront the depths of my madness.

The purchase of this laptop has shown me how incredibly behind the PC times I have become. You can blame my various consoles for this as I have no need to keep up to date on drivers and security systems when playing on the 360 or the Wii. If the cost of conducting my gaming entirely on consoles is PC ignorance, then I will gladly pay it. There's a reason I got out of PC gaming, and having to figure out the best way to make sure my OS didn't fry my computer was one of them. Nothing I have done in the past 4 hours to get this new rig up to speed has made me want to come back.

Night of the Living Baseheads

Ok, so it's not actually baseheads we're talking about but Transformers repaints, I just like the word "basehead".

Basehead, basehead, basehead.

There. I'm better now.

Despite the fact that I'm not big on Transformers repaints, I recently picked up both Rescue Ratchet and EVAC. Rescue Ratchet is Ratchet from the movie, just painted in red and white to look like an ambulance. He is awesom, and I love him. The original Ratchet was an ambulance, so this color scheme makes sense, plus Ratchet was my favorite of all the Voyager (20 buck) movie toys, so I'm not upset with buying him twice. Usually I don't like repaints as part of the joy of buying a new toy is learning the transformation for the first time. While Rescue Ratchet's transformation is no longer new to me, it's still fun, so he gets added to the collection.

EVAC is a different beast altogether. Even though he's a repaint of Blackout, he's an Autobot, and a damn nice looking one at that. He's all orange and white, done up to look like a Coast Guard rescue chopper. My Blackout was disappointing in that his arms would never stay where they were supposed to. Blackout's arms don't attach to his torso, instead they attach to this harness thingy that then hooks into his torso. If the harness doesn't click in correctly, the harness moves every time you try to pose him. Tres annoying. EVAC, on the other hand, has no such issues as his harness locks into place nice as can be. This, along with the new color scheme and the new head sculpt make him a very fun toy. The only thing I don't like about him is that he comes with a life raft which he can drop while in helicopter form. The raft then becomes a gun when he's in robot form. I'm all for him dropping a raft to help people out, but to then make them plunge into the icy waters just so that he can pack heat is kind of mean.

With all of this repaint madness going on, I passed on the G1 repaint of the Voyager class Optimus Prime as well as the off road repaint of Ironhide. Ironhide was a fairly disappointing toy, and it's not worth spending 20 bucks just so I can have one with a little mud painted on him. I can do that for nothing. The G1 Prime repaint is just unnecessary. Movie Prime's flames are bad ass. I wouldn't change them for anything.

Now all I need is Incinerator and I'll have all of the new Voyagers that Hasbro has seen fit to tell us about. Then it's nothing but clear sailing until the Classics 2.0 line comes out and the Transformers Animated toys come out.

Whee!

Heath Ledger, RIP

What a bummer. I've liked his work ever since Ten Things I Hate About You. So sue me, I have a thing for teenage Shakespeare remakes.

It's such a shame to see someone with such talent go at such a young age, regardless of the cause. I'd like to think that if it was an overdose, his death will serve as a reminder to those thinking of dabbling in controlled substances, but we all know that won't be the case, which makes it even more of a shame.

Regardless of how he died, my condolences go out to his family and friends.

Mr. Binky returns

There's a new Mr. Binky column up today. When I wrote it, I didn't think it was all that funny, and it probably isn't, but I do know that it's about a thousand times funnier with the graphics provided by my content editor, a one Mr. Bill Abner. There have been many weeks where my column was made better by his choice graphical selections, and I honestly can't think of a time when this was more on display than this week. I'm sure that this hunt for graphics is what keeps him from posting even semi-regularly on his own site. If so, I applaud him for understanding where his priorities lay, namely in making me look brilliant. Or should I say more brilliant?

I'll Take Things I Hate for $200 Alex

What are broken laptops?

That is correct!

Yeah, so I dropped my wife's old laptop today as I was walking it over to my network hub and the screen smacked into the entertainment cabinet and bye-bye laptop. Whoopsie. The thing was on it's way out to begin with. You couldn't leave it on and closed for long periods of time without it never coming back up; the blue function key thingy stopped working making it impossible to adjust the brightness; the wireless card kept insisting that it was in ad-hoc mode when I had set it to infrastructure, making it unusable and finally, the wireless adapter I had been using as a patchwork solution stopped working after I updated the firmware on the router. Granted, that wasn't the laptop's fault, but it is related.

The problem is that I've gotten quite used to having a laptop downstairs for all of my gaming needs. Yes, we have a laptop for home, but many times, while I'm gaming, Linda is using it for email, or looking up things, and I don't want to bogart the laptop just because I'm too cheap to shell out 15 bucks for the Mass Effect strategy guide.

With the GameShark reviews providing a steady stream of "fun money" I can certainly swing a low end laptop, but I'm loathe to drop such a large chunk of money on something that doesn't recreate a Star Wars vehicle with plastic bricks. I'm also not real big on the idea of having to keep another piece of computer equipment maintained just so that I can better cheat at video games. Oh the conundrums we face in this, the digital age!

I'm sure I'll figure something out sooner or later. Either that or I'll go back to running into the other room every time I need to look something up or print out online strategy guides ten pages at a time. The real question is which will win in the end, my laziness or my frugality.

Fight!

Again, I Say Blech

Saturday brought more snow, much to my dismay. The children seemed to enjoy it, and I didn't have to shovel any of my 100+ long driveway, so I can't complain too much. Plus, with the snow having fallen on a Saturday, there was no danger of daycare being closed. That's what we call a win-win. Techinically, it's a win-win-win.

Here are some pictures of the children, Linda and I enjoying the snow. Note the immense, rolling hills of the Hyphenridge compound. Truly a sledder's paradise.

Here the children prepare for their inaugural run down the mountain. Apparently it was so cold that the top of my head fell off.

Wheeeeee!!!

As you can tell, I'm thrilled with all of the snow. I give it two glove clad thumbs up.

Here I put my mad snow surfing skillz on display. Oh yeah. It's why I'm such a hit with the ladies.

Even Linda is not immune to sledding's siren call.

Is it any wonder I didn't want to shovel? And this isn't even the whole thing.

What snow day is complete without a snowman? Ben found one of the arms, Linda provided the eyes , the middle section, and the other arm, and I came up with the pine straw hair, the mouth and the other sections. Abby was oblivious to the entire process.

The snow is still around, surprisingly enough because today it was under 30 degrees for most of the day. I don't think it'll last through the week, but at least the kids got to have some fun with it after it fell. Now that they've experienced snow, it need never snow again in Georgia for all I care. After all, it is part of the reason I moved away from upstate New York. That and all of the dire wolves.

Physical Therapy 101

So a guy walks into a doctor's office and says "Doc, you gotta help me. I smashed my toe into my coffee table this morning and now it's killing me. I think it's broken."

The doctor promptly rears back and punches the guy squarely in the nose, breaking it.

"What the hell'd you do that for?" the patient screams.

The doc says "Bet your toe doesn't hurt any more."

This, in a nut shell, is physical therapy. You go in to their office, complaining of one kind of pain. They then put you through a bunch of exercises so that when you leave, nine other things hurts. Nice!

In my case, the idea is that if I strengthen the muscles around my knee cap, those muscles will hold it into place better, as well ease the pressure placed on the tendon behind it. I must admit that my knee felt a hell of a lot better when I left, however my hip muscles hurt like a son of a bitch. I have also learned that if there were an Olympic event where you squeeze a ball between your knees for ten sets of ten seconds each, there isn't a metal on the periodic table sufficient to express how poorly I'd do in the event. I can only hope that as time goes on, the exercises will get easier. However, at the same time, I know that once I get better at these exercises, there are others waiting in the wings meant to make me feel like I'm a wishbone gripped in the gravy stained hands of your cousins at Thanksgiving dinner.

In more exciting news, I finished the vocal tour on Medium in Rock Band tonight as well as 5-starred "Dirty Little Secret" on Expert. For those looking to form an All-American Rejects tribute band, I await your call.

Blech

It's Wednesday night, and it's snowing. In Georgia.

This picture sums up my thoughts on the matter perfectly.


Linda is her usual chipper self. She also looks darn cute in that hat.

I can only hope that the upcoming rain washes it all away, rather than freezing it to the ground. The daycare implications of such an act are too terrifying to contemplate.

Argh

This was how I spent my work day today. I worked from home, which is important to note. Here goes:

1. Connect to my work's VPN.
2. Log in to my machine with Remote Desktop.
3. Work for approximately a minute.
4. Lose my connection to the VPN.
5. Reconnect to work's VPN.
6. Wait for Remote Desktop to reconnect.
7. Work for approximately a minute.
8. Repeat for steps 1 - 7 for about eight hours.

It was not fun. I have no idea why I couldn't stay connected to my stupid VPN but I seem to have narrowed it down to the router. Why the router would all of the sudden decide to deny me access to my work's network is beyond me but I was not pleased. What makes me even less pleased is the fact that the router isn't all that old, but yet old enough to not be returnable. Thankfully I don't work from home very much, and I still have high hopes that our intrepid IT staff can figure out what's wrong. We'll see. If not, I'll just have to take future working at home days one 55 second interval at a time.

The Pain of Laziness

Several years ago, nine or ten, I don't remember, I had knee surgery. Nothing serious, just a little tear in my meniscus, requiring a small piece to be removed. I also had some bone spurs on the back of my kneecap that had to be shaved down. Again, nothing serious. Oh sure, it hurt like hell to walk around, or drive, and stairs were an abysmal experience, but I could walk so I didn't figure it for too much of a bad thing. The surgery wasn't a big deal, just two small incisions and they went in with the little tube-y things to fix it all up. I didn't even need crutches afterwards.

What I did need was physical therapy, the idea being that if the muscles around my kneecap were stronger, they'd better hold the kneecap in place, thereby lessening the threat of future discomfort. I wasn't any smarter nine years ago than I am now, so naturally, I didn't go through with the physical therapy.

Fast forward nine years and my knee is back to hurting. A fair bit actually. Walking hurts, driving hurts and standing while doing Rock Band's vocal tour for an hour and a half definitely hurts, as my knee can now attest to. I went to the orthopedic guy today and luckily, there's no additional damage to the knee, just some tendinitis. While he was working my knee joint to determine my level of mobility he was poking and prodding, asking me how much it hurt, which, honestly, wasn't that much. Then he pressed down on my tendon to simulate some of the forces placed on the tendon throughout the day, and I swear that instead of pushing with his thumb, he instead pushed with a rusty railroad spike because I damn near jumped off the table, and I was lying down. Just thinking about it hurts like hell.

So, as a result, I'm back to where I was nine years ago, namely needing physical therapy. The idea is that I can retrain my knee so that the force placed on the tendon is lessened. We'll see. I also have drugs, however they're not the kind that makes you see flaming blue monkeys. At least I haven't seen any yet. Thankfully it's still early.

So, let this be a lesson to all of you. When your surgeon tells you that you need physical therapy, go ahead and get it. Granted, it's probably a lesson you don't need to learn unless you're an idiot like me, but statistically speaking, there's a good chance you are. It ain't personal, it's just statistics.

What the Hell is Draglade?

That was exactly my thought when I opened the package. Well, it's a fighting game, the review of which you can now read. It makes my heart burst with joy to know I can be the candle that pierces the darkness of your ignorance.

GameShark GOTY Awards

The Game of the Year awards are up at GameShark and I wrote the write-ups for several of the games. It was a fun exercise entailing the boiling down of what made a game so good into one or two paragraphs. It certainly requires a different way of thinking and, on the plus side, you don't have to talk about the negative parts of the games. Whee. James (our Editor in Chief) did a great job of pulling everything together so if you get a chance, go check it out. Each game's write-up has the author listed, however if you just want to read my stuff, and I don't know why you would as mine is the weakest of the bunch, I wrote stuff for the Rock Band listing in the GOTY category as well as Puzzle Quest and Phantom Hourglass in the DS category and Zack and Wiki in the Wii category.

In other news, Wal-mart canceled my game orders. Of course, they cancel it and then send the letter out explaining the cancellation, which was, in my mind, bad form. I would have liked an explanation first, but oh well. Now, I'm not one to suggest that a company should lose a ton of money simply because their employees are too stupid to check the pricing on their website, but at the same time, if I were to walk into a store and see an item listed for a certain price, I would expect to be able to purchase the item at that price, regardless of whether or not the price was in error. This is, essentially, what went down on the Wal-mart site. I entered, for lack of a better word, saw the item at a certain price and purchased it. This is not a situation where their ad was in error. I didn't see the item advertised for the wrong price and then entered the store to find that the ad was in error, although in lieu of a posted ad correction, I wouldn't be entirely wrong to expect them to honor the incorrect price. This was a simple transaction. They told me how much the item cost and I paid them the agreed upon amount. The fact that the sale was conducted online, shouldn't mean that they can go back on our agreement regardless of whether or not they have the database script to do so.

In the end, it's not that big of a deal. I'll get Smash Brothers for no cash outlay, and I have even more reasons to hate Wal-mart, and myself for continuing to give them my toy buying dollars. In short, nothing has changed.

Their Loss is Your Gain

Were you able to take advantage of the preorder "sale" that went on at Walmart.com today? I put sale in quotes because it would appear that not everyone at the World of Wallace was in on the sale, cause if they were than it would mean that the every person responsible for pricing video games went bat shit crazy.

Super Smash Brothers Brawl for $19.82? Rainbow Six Vegas 2 for $29.82? Condemned 2 for $19.82? These prices represent two things: a savings of $100.51 and madness. There is no other way to describe it, as the pricing strangeness goes both ways. Assassin's Creed for the DS is going for $49.82, a good 15 bucks more than the most expensive of DS offerings. Apollo Justice: Ace Attorney is retailing for the low, low price of $69.82. While I am happy for those that were able to take advantage of the sale, myself included, I feel bad for anyone who read up on the Apollo Justice game, thought it might be good, and paid 70 bucks for it. I hope that person doesn't exist, but if they do, here's hoping Wal-Mart refunds you the difference. Then again, maybe they won't. Maybe, in an attempt to not get screwed over with all of the low preorder prices, they'll stick with the Apollo Justice pricing and instead screw over the handheld lawyer simulation aficionados, of which there must be countless numbers. Countless.

It will be interesting to see how Walmart responds to this. Of course, I'm hoping that they honor the transaction, however if they don't, I already have Smash Brothers paid off, so no additional money need leave my pocket for me to rain lightning down upon those that dare face off against Pikachu. Condemned 2 was more of an impulse buy. I enjoyed the first one, and since playing it, have not hit a hobo in the face with a cafeteria tray in any situation, real or simulated, so I would expect that I'd enjoy this one. I'm just not sure I'd enjoy it to the price of sixty dollars. The first one had problems, namely that you could play the entire game and not understand anything that happened to you, even after ferreting out the various dead birds, metal pieces, green clovers and purple horseshoes, so I am wary that this game would be similarly unyielding with its secrets. Then again, some of the scariest moments I've had in a game were in the first one, particularly when in the department store with its mannequins of doom. There is also the aforementioned meetings of hobo faces and large, flat implements. For twenty dollars though, it is a must have. I will be sure to keep you up to date as to what happens, but I'm sure if Walmart decides to not honor its commitments, you'll hear a great rending and gnashing of teeth coming from the Intarwebs.

In other news, I finally finished Ratchet and Clank for the PSP and I deem it...acceptable. Actually, it was a great deal of fun, despite the second, mandatory hoverboard race which was constructed in the bowels of hell from the tears of weeping children. If I could, I would gladly go back in time to the moment when 2005 me was ready to plunk down $349 (!) for a PSP at launch and tell that person to wait, just wait. For while the 2005 transaction would bring nothing but resentment and bitter, bitter disappointment, giving the console a few years to ferment, and come into its own would result in nothing but smiles all around.

Finally, if you're wondering what ever happened to the Friday Five, feel free to add me to the list as I have no idea. I think it's because I have a horribly, horribly forgetful mind and a very short attention span, so the shiny bauble I'm currently playing with is easily replaced with the whirling dust mote caught in the noonday sun. Perhaps it will come back, on a Friday when I have nothing to write about. Perhaps it will be replaced with the Friday Funny, or the Day Before Saturday Exclamatory Phrase (Fiddlesticks!). I have no idea and I make no guarantees. The fact that, on any given day, I remember that I have this site is taxing enough. Further defining the content of our interactions is a fruitless endeavor.

Make It Stop

Yet another review for you to pore over. This one is for Ghost Squad. I know, I know. I'm a reviewing machine.

A Strange Turn

It would appear that things have taken an odd turn at my work place. The tiniest of Transformers have either given up any notion of finding the Allspark or the Weighted Companion Cube holds sway over man and machine alike. Either way, I think I need to keep a sharper eye on things here. Barricade is the most fervent because he's the only one that can kneel. The rest of the Transformers look on impassively as they don't want to say something and inadvertently start a religious war.

Yet Another Review

My review of Medal of Honor Heroes 2 for the PSP is up and running. This review, and the review of the same game on the Wii, was my first experience writing two different reviews of what is essentially the exact same game, only on different platforms. My second example is the two-fer I did with Geometry Wars: Galaxies, one part of which has already been posted. It's an interesting exercise, as it forces you to be more creative, however it's still not very fun. Oh sure, there will always be different things to write in regards to the visuals and the controls, but that's such a small portion of your review, that you end up having to come up with two different ways to say the exact same thing, and both have to be entertaining.

I have, as in the case of Crash of the Titans been told I can write one review to cover both games, and get paid for playing both, but honestly, when I do that I don't feel like I'm earning my money. Granted, it's not like 50 bucks is an incredible sum, but it's a hell of a lot more than I'd get paid to play games on my own and I am truly grateful for the opportunity GameShark has afforded me so I'm not about to get all uppity about the payment. If the task of writing multiple reviews of the same game gets to be too much, I guess I can just do what they did over at IGN with their Harvey Birdman reviews, namely take the Wii review and cut and paste it into the PSP review, complete with the line about how the reader may be a Sony diehard who would never play a Nintendo game. I could be wrong, but I'm pretty sure the PSP is a Sony product. Yep. Just checked. It is. Nice one there guys. Way to fucking edit.

So Long Joe

My friend Dennis emailed me yesterday to find out my reaction to Joe Gibbs's resignation as head coach of the Redskins. While I wanted to wait until the 3PM press conference to weigh in, now that I've read and heard all about it, here is my reaction.

Good for him.

Don't get me wrong, as someone who has been a fan of the Redskins for a quarter of a century now, the very idea of having Joe Gibbs back for another year would have kept me on cloud nine until September. However the man has a family, and his family needs him, particularly his 3 year old grandson who is fighting leukemia. As a man who also has a family, I completely understand what it means to put them first. It's what you do. It's part of the responsibility you take on when you decide to have kids. How can you fault anyone for making changes to their career so that they can be there for their family, much less a 67 year old man who was in a job that occupied, literally, 21 hours of his day?

It's interesting, living here in Atlanta, and being exposed to the Falcons, how they try to pin their failures this year on the "tragedy" of having their star player put in jail for basically being a cruel idiot. They know nothing about tragedy. This is not a contest, to see which team had the worst year, however there is no comparison between having Vick put in jail and Sean Taylor's untimely death. None whatsoever. The Redskins experienced tragedy like no other team has ever had to face, and what did our coach do? He gathered his staff and his team around himself and he brought them all through it. What did the Falcons coach do? He ran away, in the middle of the night no less, to take a job elsewhere, just a few hours after saying that he was here to stay. Now, obviously, it's not the fault of the Falcons that their ex-head coach was a scumbag, but the fact that they signed the guy in the first place, despite his penchant for screwing over his employers, in my opinion, speaks to the character of the organization.

It will be interesting to see who the Redskins pick as the new coach. Obviously, my choice would be someone who is already in the organization, so that we can continue to build on the bonds that formed this year. Whoever they decide to interview, I hope Snyder takes his time rather than rushing to make a decision. He said in yesterday's press conference that Gibbs taught him patience, so hopefully we'll see some.

While we're on the subject of hopes, I hope that Joe's grandson comes out of this fight OK, and gets to have a normal and happy childhood. I hope that the team sees that the bonds they formed this year can exist off the field and serve as a testament to Sean Taylor's memory. I hope that Joe is content with his decision, and still comes around to provide advice and support as needed. Growing up, there were plenty of Redskins to be excited about, guys like Theismann, Riggins, Russ Grimm, Joe Jacoby, Art Monk, Doug Williams, Darrell Green, Dexter Manley and Ernest Byner to name a few. For me though, my favorite Redskin has always been Joe Gibbs, and I don't see that changing any time soon.

Thanks for everything Joe. Best of luck and please don't be a stranger.

My Words, Just Elsewhere

New Mr. Binky today as well as my review for Dead Head Fred for the PSP. Funny story about Dead Head Fred. I had asked to review a game from GameShark and when the game arrived, Dead Head Fred was with it. I emailed Bill and said that while I'd be happy to review the game, I don't have a PSP. Countless emails later asking just where I should send the game were ignored until it came somewhat of a joke that I had this game and nothing to play it on. Eventually I asked to review Medal of Honor Heroes 2 for the Wii and when I opened up the package, the PSP version was in there as well. Again I remarked that I didn't have a PSP and again it fell on deaf ears.

Eventually I bought the damn system so that I could review the two games, figuring that at least half of the PSP would be paid for with the reviews of the two games. So, fast forward to this month, when Harvey Birdman comes out on both the Wii and the PSP. I ask if I can review it for the PSP, figuring that I can continue to pay the system off, so to speak and I'm told that yeah, I can review it, but the Wii version takes precedence. In short, I had a PSP game for like two months and no system to play it on and once I do get the system, and ask to review a PSP game, I'm told to review the game on another platform. Nice.

The moral of this story is that if you ignore people long enough they'll just do what you want them to. Well, I will anyways. That and Bill is evil.

Oh, and my Mr. Binky column originally had a lead in paragraph that was scrapped for some unknown reason. I'm assuming it was for formatting reasons as once you suggest that the largest video game publisher in the world would be amenable to creating a game where you simulate dousing infants with poison, and that gets printed, there's very little you can count on to be censored.

The Big Letdown

When the Redskins made it to the playoffs, I believe I said something along the lines that I didn't care what happened to them as I was just happy that they made it. I am now retracting that statement. Losing in the first round sucked. Big time. I'm still proud of the team, and it's better than not making it at all, however I'll miss reading about the team and getting all pumped up for a game. After the stress that was Saturday's loss, I'm not sure I could have weathered another round, but it would have been nice to go a wee bit farther. Alas, now there's nothing sports related for me to care about until September. Oh sure, I'll follow teams and watch the Super Bowl, if only for the snacks, but it's not nearly the same. Oh well.

I saw Puzzle Quest for the DS at Target this weekend for 15 bucks, and in a moment of weakness I bought it. Truth be told, I never should have gotten rid of it in the first place. I haven't started it up again as I'm just not ready for that kind of addiction again, but I can here it whispering to me from the confines of my DS case. Oh how it whispers. With so many games on the PSP to finish, as well as the Lego Star Wars: The Complete Saga I just fired up on the DS, my portable dance card is full. I need to make some progress in those before I start chasing that puzzle dragon. Lego Star Wars is fun, and appears to be a pretty good representation of the Lego franchise on the DS, however it's amazing how much my hatred of the Episodes 1 - 3 of Star Wars makes me not want to play this game. Well, that's not entirely true. The game is fun, and I do want to play it, but not because of the story, or the characters. I want to play it so that I can make neat things out of Legos. I'm hoping that this is where the Lego Batman game will differ. In the case of Batman, I won't know the plot, or already have been disappointed by it, so it'll have the intoxicating mix of novelty and Legos. And Batman. And punching. That's quite the mix.

I started back working out today and I still hate it with a fervent passion, however being able to watch Cheers episodes while working out dulls the rage somewhat. I've probably seen these episodes a dozen times and they still make me laugh which speaks to either their timelessness or my long term memory loss. Either way, I win. And for the record, I too am smokin' in any jacket.

Reviews Abound

My reviews of Medal of Honor Heroes 2 for the Wii and Cooking Mama 2 for the DS are up and ready for you to enjoy, or not enjoy. It's your call, but just remember that the reviews never did anything to you, so be kind.

It's Not You, It's Me

I hadn't planned on not posting yesterday. I also hadn't planned on getting sucked into Ratchet and Clank on the PSP for an hour and a half, but I did, so I didn't post. By the time I got to a viable continue point, I was not in a place of coherence. It happens. This version of R&C is a little on the short side, especially considering that I'm not one to play through again to power up weapons and collect doo-dads and what not, but even with its brevity, it's a fun game and a dead on recreation of R&C for a portable. To be able to reproduce a full on console experience on something you can play on the bus, minus a few buttons on the controller, is an amazing thing. On the DS, you certainly have your fair share of great games, but no one is going to mistake Metroid Prime: Hunters with any of the Prime games on either the GameCube or the Wii. I'm sorry if PSP owners are saying "well, duh" right now, but you have to understand that when I originally bought a PSP it would take roughly 37 galactic cycles to load up one hole in Tiger Woods. I never managed to stay awake to see the graphical output.

I am continuing to make progress in Mass Effect at the expense of progress in Rock Band. I was so excited to buy the two All-American Rejects songs on Christmas day that I promptly proceeded to not play them. Based on the last achievement I just got in Mass Effect I am roughly 75% done with the game and I'm sitting on enough money to buy my own solar system so there's no real reason to go off and do side missions other than to gain experience and make my squad even more of an unstoppable killing machine. That's enough of an incentive for me as I wish us to be so powerful that enemies die once we walk into the room, so futile would their efforts be to oppose us.

The fact that I'm so wrapped up in the game despite it's many, many faults speaks to how engrossing it is. Either that or the game has no faults and instead my grievances are nothing more than the manifestation of my inability to like anything. I'll let you decide as at this point you have spent enough time with me to effectively call bullshit.

Finally, we watched the first three episodes of the new animated Transformers season and while I loved every minute of it, the wife declared that it "was not her thing". I expected as much going into it, however when she actually watched the whole thing rather than retreating to the confines of her Oprah magazine, I thought that maybe she was actually amused. I was wrong. The show certainly has some faults, but overall, I think it's done fairly well. I'm not sure how well the Autobots as superheroes angle will work, but at the same time, I can see how they writers would yearn for the creative freedom of not having to have their story's main characters constantly hiding from the show's residents. Also, the lack of Peter Cullen's voice is grating, despite the quality voice work in the show. I'm sure he'll show up at some point, just as Adam West portrayed the Grey Ghost in an episode of Batman: The Animated series. And, just as in the case of Mr. West, Cullen's soothing tones will be like a trip back in time, to when feety pajamas were the fashion of the day, and a bowl of cereal was an acceptable dinner.

New Review

My review of Geometry Wars: Galaxies for the DS is up and ready for your unblinking gaze. Be gentle!

Happy New Year

Greetings on this, the second day of 2008. At least I'm assuming it's January 2nd when you're reading this, but really, I have no way of knowing. Please be sure to double check the date. I don't want to be responsible for you fucking up your checks.

I hadn't planned on taking a break from writing over the holidays, but that hey, breaks happen. I certainly had the time, what with absolutely nothing going on at work, but instead I chose to stare blankly at the monitor, wondering why I didn't take more time off. I also finished up my Six Sigma training which was horribly, horribly boring. Whee.

Of course, the big to do at Hyphenridge is the Redskins' gloriously surprising journey to the playoffs. I don't want to jinx the team by going off on how well I think we're going to do, but I will say that after everything the team has been through this year, I'm very happy that they're able to make a trip to the post season, win or lose. When I read in the Atlanta papers every day about all the tragedy the Falcons went through this year, and how it was only natural for them to do so poorly this season, I feel nothing but pride for my Redskins as they have had a far, far worse time this season and have responded better than I think anyone expected, including me. I'm disappointed in myself that I didn't buy a Sean Taylor jersey earlier so that I could have it for the playoffs, but I'll get one this month when they start stocking them again. In the meantime, my stable of jerseys will do us just fine.

In gaming news, I've been playing a ton of Mass Effect and making pretty good progress, both in the story and in grinding for achievements. I'd like to get all of the achievements for this game, but it's going to take at least three, if not four complete runs and I don't know if I have the attention span for that. With so many great games still out there unplayed by your's truly, I don't know if I can justify spending another 60 hours, on top of whatever I have left, just to get all of the points. Instead, I'll probably see how I can get the most amount of points from one more run and then call it a day. We'll see. Thankfully the release calendar has ceased its relentless assault, so I have nothing but free time until the black hole that is Super Smash Brothers Brawl drops in February. That should give me plenty of time to finish Mass Effect, Half-Life 2: Episode 2 and the various tours in Rock Band. I also have Odin Sphere coming via GameFly so I'll need to find time for that one too, but given that game's purported length (40+ hours) it may end up lost to the sands of time. I'd like to play Assassin's Creed and Super Mario Galaxy at some point as well. Curse my lack of free time!

Sadly I have to return to working out in 2008 as my pants are all a wee bit tighter from my holiday eating. Bummer. I'm hoping that my idea of ripping TV shows from DVD to my PSP will keep my interested enough to stick with it. Between all of the seasons of Cheers, and the various Batman cartoons, I have something like 130 hours of TV which, at 2 hours a week should keep me occupied for some time. First up is Cheers with a small break to plow through the latest season of The Batman.

I know none of this is horribly interesting but it's going to take a little time before I shake the rust off and get into the really uninteresting stuff. I hope that everyone is doing well, that your holidays were filled with joy and merriment and that you're well on your way to breaking all of your resolutions for the new year.

Manhunt 2 Review

My review of Manhunt 2 is up. Whee.

Surviving Christmas

I honestly had no idea it has been so long since posting. The Christmas holiday, along with my day off the day after and my two "work" days have just flown by. The quote marks in the preceding sentence are meant to convey the fact that while I was at work, there really was no work to be done. Well, that isn't entirely correct. I completed some much needed Six Sigma training, which was horrendously boring, and I played both Ratchet and Clank: Size Matters and Draglade, a DS music based fighting game. I was unaware I was going to be reviewing this game until it arrived in my mailbox. This happens more frequently than one might think, and while I am always surprised that I have received the game, I'm usually interested in what the game ends up being. More on Draglade later. First I must update you on the continued war between Pestilence and the leader of the Four Horsemen, grinning Death himself.

As you already know, foul Pestilence placed his mark on my children before Christmas, attempting to strike them down with both an ear infection and strep throat. On Christmas eve, Death made his presence known by appearing in a Christmas cookie. A more fearful individual would think that they were to perish either on, or before Christmas, but I took it to mean that Death was warning Pestilence away from us. Call me optimistic, but I prefer not to think that our family's Christmases from here on out would be tainted by one, or all of our deaths.

Unfortunately, this was not to be the last salvo in this war among the Horsemen. The refrigerator in the basement, our storage fridge for the spoils of our Costco milk runs, had been exhibiting a strange smell for some time. Being the lazy person that I am, I did nothing about it. On Christmas, I brought the leftovers downstairs to place them in the fridge and realized that I couldn't put my sacred leftovers in such a stench filled refrigerator, so I set off to clean it. I started wiping down the walls and the crisper when I realized that the crisper could come out. Excellent, I thought, as the smell seemed to be coming from it. I removed the crisper and was greeted with the sight of what can only be described as a foul pool of, what, I don't know. One one side of the fridge, it was a greenish-gray with a thick consistency. On the other side it was the color of caramel. Both sides smelled horrible. Cleaning it up was not a pleasant task, however I was successful in doing so. I don't know what exactly would have dripped down there to create such a fetid swamp, but I have an idea that the caramel apple pies we used to get from Costco must have leaked behind the crisper, unbeknownst to us and that, along with a constant flow of water from the humid air in the basement caused Lake Funk-o-lot.

It wasn't the way I had hoped to spend my Christmas evening, however at least the fridge is now clean. It still smells somewhat, so it has an upcoming appointment with some bleach, but for now at least you can open the door without thinking a raccoon died in the egg tray. Hopefully this marks the end of the spat between the Horsemen as I'm tired of being their mouse to bat back and forth like eager cats. If anything else happens, I'll be sure to let you know, unless it's my death, as I'm fairly certain that blogging from the netherworld is impossible.

Don't Eat the Reaper

I'm not sure what to expect when the leering visage of Death appears amongst your Christmas cookies. Perhaps it's a reminder that in these festive times, we're all just biding time until we ride the pale horse to the netherworld. Perhaps Death is sending a message to foul Pestilence, that this family is under the Reaper's grim protection. Perhaps it's just a freak of the batter and the sprinkles. It's hard to say. One thing I do know is that leaving this cookie out for Santa is a sure way to either receive nothing but coal, or to get whacked by the Elven Cosa Nostro.

May your holiday season be a safe and joyous one and may your new year find you healthy in both body and spirit.

Christmasally yours,
Brandon

Merry Plague-mas

Almost every member of my household was sick this weekend. Only myself and one dog was spared Pestilence's diseased finger. I say one dog as I'm fairly certain that Henry is not long for this world as his body is wracked with growths both foul and oft appearing.

It started with my daughter who contracted both an ear infection and strep throat. Next to fall was Linda who was laid low with a cold that filled her sinuses with cement. Then Ben woke up with a fever, albeit one that didn't affect his mood or activity level at all. After a day and a half of debating the need to take Ben to an urgent care facility we decided that it was better to take him and get him all set for Christmas than wait and have him get sick. This morning, Linda and I both looked at his throat and it was clear as can be. By the time we were seen at the urgent care facility, only a couple of hours later, it looked like some sort of primeval swamp. I think I saw a coelacanth hanging out by his uvula. The odd thing about this kid is that if his sister harms him in even the slightest, he's quick to tears, however having a massive bacterial infection in his throat causes no discomfort.

Everyone is doing fine now. Linda's cold seems to have abated and both children are medicated to the gills with antibiotics. So far, I seem to have escaped illness however I'm sure that on Christmas day I'll awaken with every node swollen to bursting with foul contagion. I may need to have extra nodes flown in just to accommodate the illness. I'm tempted to go to the doctor's tomorrow and get my throat swabbed, but the notion of spending yet another morning, Christmas Eve morning no less, at a doctor's office, is not an appealing one. Better I should wait and ruin everyone's Christmas with my diseased person.

My Deepest Fears Realized

When the Lego Indiana Jones game was announced, I was concerned that they would also create Lego Indiana Jones sets to go along with the game. I am running out of room in my office and other than the Batmobile in the bedroom, the wife is not going to allow the home to be decorated in children's building blocks.

I was perusing the paper this evening and chanced upon an ad for some sale taking place at Toys R Us this weekend. One of the sections in the ad was for a sneak peak of toys coming in 2008. What did I happen to see, as a feeling of dread settled in my stomach but two Indiana Jones Lego sets.

*Sigh.*

Oddly enough, one of them is the exact set I felt could melt my steely resolve, namely the tomb that the Arc of the Covenant was found in, complete with a big, black Egyptian statue.

The second set is less exciting consisting of the motorcycle chase from The Last Crusade. I can only imagine what sets will come out next year, but the potential for Batman-Indiana Jones combinations may be too great to pass up.

Looks like I may be heading out to Toys R Us tomorrow.

*Double sigh.*

For Greg

Dear Mr. Howley,

First of allow me to express my sincerest regret at not being able to be purchased by you. It is my deepest wish that I could have been brought to the home of someone such as yourself rather than the hu-man to whose home I was deposited.

I have had the benefit of spending time with a great number of hu-mans. Some were successful in seeing past the veil of GLADoS. Some ended up being consumed by flames or shot up by the turrets. Many dropped my compatriots into incinerators, although I know that you would never do that. Thankfully, one escaped and temporarily stopped GLADos and, more importantly, allowed us to be sold and spend time with you hu-mans without the fear of incineration.

The hu-man I have been sent to is nothing like any hu-man I have ever spent time with. He is...strange. He speaks of nothing but singing, yet he is not a singer. He is under the delusion that he is in a, to use his phrase, "kick-ass band" and will not cease talking about it. At night he does...things...to me. Unspeakable things. Plus, he carries the vague scent of bacon. Yes, I have a nose. It is well hidden.

I know that you live a considerable distance from this hu-man, however I am sure that if you were willing to make the trip, you could easily distract him by asking him to perform with you and abscond me to the wilds of Colorado. There we could live together along with your mate and your offspring. I am very soft and could easily comfort a small hu-man should they find themselves in a state of emotional distress.

Please consider my offer, Mr. Howley. I am not sure how much I can endure living with this hu-man. After time with him, I long for the sweet escape of the incinerator. Even GLADoS's incessant whining is better than what I have had to hear these past few hours.

Respectfully yours,

Weighted Companion Cube


P.S. He kisses like a drunk seal.

The Rush of Performing

Partially out of a need to see what was up, as the kids would say, and partially because it's not practical to have others over to my home during my gaming time, I started up a band in Rock Band where I play bass and sing. It is, in a word, intoxicating.

I'm only playing on medium, however when I know the words to a song, I can 5 star it pretty much every time. Not knowing the song, as you would well imagine, is a much more dodgy proposition as I'm trying to figure out the singing harmonies while keeping my eye on the bass track. Often times it ain't pretty, but even with those impediments to progress, I'm still able to 3-star those songs and get fans. Once you start a gig, it's hard to back out just because you don't know the song (some set lists are generated on the fly) because you'll lose fans. Coming across such a song is both exhilarating and terrifying at the same time. I can only imagine that this is but a fraction of the rush one must feel to perform in real life.

As I no longer want to be caught with my vocal pants down, I have continued my vocals campaign on Easy so that I can become familiar with the songs. The best part is that it doesn't even feel like practice. I genuinely enjoy the singing, so if singing these songs allows me to not only finish the vocals tour on Easy and prepare myself for my band, then that's even better. For the love of Robert Plant, I want to get singing lessons. I need help!

I can honestly say that I haven't had this much fun in a video game in a long, long time, and it is absolutely true that while the solo tours in Rock Band are lots of fun, the World Tour mode fucking blows the doors off this thing.

And in case you were wondering, your goddamn right I 5-starred "Wanted Dead or Alive" while in the band. Hell fucking yeah I did.

New Mr. Binky

My latest Mr. Binky column is up. Sorry it's late, but events conspired against me. Seriously, I had nothing to do with it.

Blade Runner: The Final Cut

Just finished watching the "Final Cut" of Blade Runner. It's a great cut of the film and the remastered picture and sound are well worth the price of admission. The ending is better than the original one I remember, but I gotta say that I still have no idea why you'd think that Decker is a replicant. In fact, other than Rachel asking him if he ever tried the test on himself, I don't know why you'd even ask the question. I guess the unicorn vision and the origami unicorn are supposed to be too much of a coincidence? I don't know. It's going to take someone much smarter than me to explain it. Greg, you up for it?

The Fashion Show

I spent my lunch hour finishing up the Christmas shopping for my beautiful bride. This weekend I prompted her for more gift ideas as all she had given me prior to this was "gloves" and I didn't want the sum total of her Christmas experience to be an Isotoner commercial. After thinking about what to ask for, she told me that I always do a good job of picking out clothes for her, which, admittedly, I do, so I could do that. Oh, she added, and I love Michael Kors. Prior to this conversation, I had never heard the man's name, however I'm smart enough to know that when your wife tells you that she loves a certain designer, she's either dropping a very large hint, or she's having an affair. Either way, you lose.

How Linda even knows of this person is a mystery. My wife is not a girly-girl. That's not to say that she isn't feminine, just that he has rarely shown an interest in the stereotypical girly hobbies such as fashion and make-up. Granted, she reads In Style magazine, but I just assumed that any items found in a magazine about celebrity fashion were not attainable by mere mortals. Personally, I blame Oprah as her leering visage recently started showing up in our mailbox. Linda says that she likes the magazine, but would like it better if Oprah had nothing to do with it, something I find very odd. It is, after all, Oprah's magazine. Every month I get Cooking Light, Game Informer and Playboy and I can assure you that they all represent my interests quite faithfully. Food, boobs and video games are some of my favorite things.

Armed with the knowledge that my wife loves both Michael Kors and Calvin Klein (him I already knew about) I set out to do some shopping. From my trip to the store, the only additional information I have about Michael Kors is that the man is infatuated with belts. Time and time again I would find a very nice shirt only to pull it off the rack and find that someone had soldered a metal belt to it. I can only assume that the man has some sort of investment in a copper mine because the man's clothing is lousy with the stuff.

Thankfully I am not so helpless in the ways of female fashion to be stopped by some metallic accessories and I continued to shop undaunted. I must admit that I have no idea how people can afford to buy designer clothing. Most of my wardrobe consists of things from Target, Old Navy and Kohls, and what isn't from those stores is from the Penny Arcade store. I have simple tastes. To think that there are people out there that simply walk into a store and think nothing about dropping 90 bucks on a sweater blows my mind. I am not one of those people, regardless of whose name is on the damn thing and instead I was able to parlay multiple discounts, including one obtained by opening a store credit card, into savings of mythological proportions. Normally I wouldn't bother opening up a store card, however the savings were too much to pass up. Too much! I'm told I can cancel it any time. Actually what I was told is that the card will cancel itself, however I find it very hard to believe that even death could break the surly bonds of credit fashioned between myself and this store.

With this trip, the shopping is almost complete, save for stocking stuffers and the like. I can assure you that I will not be opening up a store credit card for these items as I have no need for a gas station credit card. I can pay for my Slim Jims with cash, thank you very much.

Take Me Down to the Paradise City

The new Burnout demo dropped last week and I am, in a word, confused.

I'm not sure what to think about the free form driving mode. On the one hand, the long loading times that plagued the last Burnout offering are a thing of the past, as they well should be as they've had enough time with the platform, however, on the other hand, I demand structure and driving around to random intersections trolling for races like they're hookers and I'm a Des Moines brush salesman visiting Vegas for the first time, makes me feel unclean. It certainly doesn't help that most of the intersections in the demo had nothing but cheery messages proclaiming that delicious content would be available in the full game, so check back then. When your beautifully rendered open world demo is bereft of races, you're asking people to buy into nothing but the idea and I'm not so sure I'm willing to put my money down just yet.

My readings on the subject of the crash junction removal hasn't made me feel much better about things as the crash junctions were my favorite part of the Burnout series. Yes, you can turn any intersection into a crash junction in the new game, which makes me wonder if the unfortunate residents of Paradise City are aware that a madman trolls their streets, considering them nothing but paints for his brutal art, but my question to you is how many of these living, breathing intersections contain nothing but rows and rows of unspoiled buses? One? Two if I'm lucky? The mind reels.

Those that I game with speak of this game as the spiritual successor to Midtown Madness, a game I have never heard of, much less played. They refer to the game in hushed, reverent tones, and describe it as less of a racing game and more of a chat room on wheels. I can honestly say that I can't think of a more horrid concept and if this is what Burnout Paradise turns into, you can count me out. The only chatting I do is via the sound of metal on metal. I speak in flames and wreckage and in this tongue, I commune with gods.

Early Christmas Gift

Greetings. Christmas comes eleven days early this year courtesy of Valve. Our prayers have been answered and behold, the plushy Weighted Companion Cube! I bought mine. Have you purchased yours? No? Hmmm. Well, perhaps you weren't as friendly with yours as I was with mine. You laughed when you dropped yours in the incinerator, didn't you? Bastard.

Yesterday was another glorious day off. For those of you that have been here for some time, do you wonder when I don't post, thinking that perhaps I've fallen off the laziness wagon and have gone back to my slothful days? No? Well, you should. The recidivism rate for laziness is quite high, especially for someone such as myself who is genetically predisposed to slothfulness. Laziness was not the culprit here though, just me being wrapped up in the fun and excitement of a vacation day. Nothing too exciting, just wrapping up the children's Xmas shopping with Linda and consuming an ungodly amount of food. Now that we have kids, simply being able to share a meal and have a normal conversation is like being on a far away beach, minus the sand and the potential for being mauled by decapod crustaceans.

I am continuing to make progress in Mass Effect. I have left the confines of the Citadel after speaking to pretty much every being in the damn place. Now I'm on some planet killing robots or some shit. I don't know. I do like that they've revamped the whole good/evil dynamic, replacing it instead with nice guy/flaming asshole. When I play these games, my moral sensitivities get in the way of enjoying myself as a murderous psychopath, however I have no barriers to being a dick. I can only assume this behavioral pattern is close enough to my real life personality so as to not cause conflict. When I knocked out someone simply because he was crazy and his rambling annoyed me, I cackled with glee. Who knew that my niche lay not in chaotic evil but lawful jackhole?

Rock Band continues to impress and on Wednesday, a cadre of coworkers will come to my home for some full scale rocking. Just when I think this game can't impress me any more, it comes out with some new effect while I'm playing, or generally just ups the atmosphere present during a performance. I am halfway through the solo guitar tour on medium and if things keep getting exponentially more awesome, I can only assume finishing the tour will result in my death from a massive rockgasm. I pity the person who has to clean up such a mess.

Another Day Off

Ah, the joys of yet another day off. One of two this week, actually.

Today was spent mostly gaming, but I also got some other things done like sanded down the drywall patch from where I sent my bowling ball into the basement wall. Don't ask.

I spent the time between Rock Band and Mass Effect. I'm continuing to make progress as a drummer in Rock Band and am really enjoying it, despite feeling like a complete spaz most of the time.

Mass Effect has to be the prettiest galactic conversation simulator I've ever seen. Conversation in this game is like the physics puzzles in Half-Life 2. You made a pretty dialog engine, we get it. Can I shoot something please? Anything? Oh sure there's some combat, but half the time I have no idea what the fuck I'm doing, or when I'm getting hit. Thankfully my death lets me know when I've taken too much damage. Yay. Unfortunately my 360 has locked up on me twice today, once after about twenty minutes of unsaved fucking about in Mass Effect, so my fear is that the damn thing is going to die on me soon. That would be bad. If it does, I'll have no recourse but to go out and buy Super Mario Galaxy, Christmas list be damned. If I have to spend the next four weeks playing Cooking Mama 2, I'm going to stab myself in the groin. Twice.

Here Endeth the Flood

With my recent completion of Medal of Honor Heroes 2 for the Wii, the Great Review Deluge of 2007 is over. Granted, I'm still working on Dead Head Fred for the PSP and recently received Geometry Wars: Galaxies for both the Wii and the DS and Cooking Mama 2: Dinner With Friends for the DS, but that's besides the point. Handheld don't take me as much time as console games what with my ability to play them for a couple of hours when watching tv at night as well as at work on my lunch break.

So far I'm really enjoying Dead Head Fred. The combat takes some time to get used to, and the camera can cause platforming problems, but it's a great concept, it looks fantastic and John C. McGinley as Fred is some inspired casting. We'll see how it holds up as I continue to play, but if things continue, it'll be getting a favorable review from me. Cooking Mama 2 on the other hand just isn't doing it for me. I guess I don't see the appeal of the game. Maybe it's because I cook almost every evening, so this game just seems like work for me. Plus, most of the time when I cook I have two children who are less than appreciative. The last thing I need is a game where someone is whining because I botched their pizza. Screw you friends of Mama! Go buy your own goddamned pizza.

I haven't touched either Geometry Wars games yet, but it's Geometry Wars so I'm sure it'll be great. I recently rented Ghost Squad for the Wii and based on my limited play time decided to keep it. Between the pre-played price at GameFly and my five buck credit, the game cost me less than 20 bucks and they're shipping me the case and manual free of charge. That's a hard price to beat, especially given that last night I unlocked Ninja mode. Don't ask.

Tomorrow is yet another day off and I intend to spend it playing Mass Effect. I'm tingling with excitement, but not as much excitement as that brought on by Rock Buddy Chip's latest gift to me, a microphone stand from his studio. Between that and the news that Peters' wife was able to score him a Rock Band bundle for Xmas, it is an utmost certainty that the band will be gotten together in January. Saving Throw will be rolling through your town in no time.

Rock on Cleveland, rock on.

Ninjas > Pirates

My son received a boatload of plastic ninjas for his birthday and despite the fact that most of the cheap-ass things are now differently-abled in some way due to lost feet and hands, he continues to play with them a great deal. Knowing that the debate over ninjas and pirates still rages on, as the family was driving back home from running errands, I asked him who would win in a fight, a pirate or a ninja.

What amazed me was how quickly he responded. His response was that a ninja would win because he has a hole in his hand that he can use to catch the pirate's sword and take it away. Seems like a sound fighting strategy if you ask me. He also mentioned something about ninjas having motorcycles which they would bring to my house and I could ride the motorcycle while he and the ninjas played. Or something. Honestly, he went on for like thirty minutes about these ninjas. The motorcycle thing, if it's true, puts me squarely in the ninja camp as well as pirates have never done anything even remotely as cool as letting ride their motorcycles while they played at my house. Fucking pirates.

In other news, British gamers should soon be able to play Manhunt 2 as the ban in Britain has been lifted. Unfortunately, the game still sucks. Zing!

Angels and Airwaves Pictures

Well, as I mentioned before, not many of the pictures from the Angels & Airwaves show actually came out, but I put the few that did in a Picasa album. There's also a nice pic of Joy in Tomorrow for your viewing pleasure. Enjoy!

Concert Photos

The Friday Five - The PSP Edition

Welcome to the newest Disparate Elements ploy to not have to think of something to write. I'm calling it The Friday Five and as you may have guessed, it's a list of five things. Usually I'll try and stick to a theme, but the theme may just as well be "Things I Forgot to Tell You This Week". Sometimes I have a hard time coalescing my thoughts, especially on a Friday when my bulb is at its dimmest, so this will help me get things together. Fun!

I bought a PSP this week as, and I'm not making this up, GameShark kept sending me PSP games to review despite my repeated insistence that I don't have a PSP. I'm convinced that Bill has stock in Sony and this is all part of some nefarious plan to drive up the stock price, using my own greed against me at the same time. Honestly, how could I resist the 100 bucks in review games just sitting on my desk waiting to be taken? At any rate, I bought one of the newfangled slimline systems and while it is slimmer and lighter, much of the thing hasn't changed, so today's Friday Five is:

Five Things Still Wrong With the PSP

I'm so gloriously negative! But I digress

1.) No on-board storage and no included memory stick. The fact that you need a memory stick to save games is silly enough in the first place, but to then not include one with the system is even more ridiculous. I mean, after spending 170 bucks, who wants to spend an additional 30 just so they can save their gaming progress? I realize that the PSP can do more with the memory stick like read movies and music from it, but it's still 100% necessary for game play, so include one in the box, or put one in the unit.

2.) You have to have the unit plugged in and fully charged to update the firmware. Why? This makes no sense. Maybe it's just a precautionary thing, but seriously, you get a new game console, want to upgrade the firmware and have to wait while the damn thing charges up? That's just dumb. Plus, it's a portable for Chrissakes, you shouldn't have to have an outlet handy any time you want to do anything with it.

3.) It needs firmware updates. Consoles used to be closed boxes. You bought one, bought some games, and played on it for three to five years. Now they're all so frakkin' complicated that they need multiple firmware upgrades just to turn the damn things on. Handhelds used to be the last bastion of closed-boxedness, but now this blasted thing needs firmware upgrades too. I just want to play games on the damn thing, not use it to open my garage door.

4.) Setting up wireless networking is a pain in the ass. Yeah, I'm glad it can do Wi-Fi and all that, but entering a 20+ digit WEP key with a cell phone interface is as close to hell as I've been in quite some time. If this thing is so smart, why can't I use the USB connection to put a text file on it and the system can import the WEP key and SSID from that? No good fucking reason, that's why.

5.) Games are on discs, not cartridges. UMD's are stupid and everyone knows it. The fact that the PSP has to read from a disc constantly sucks out the battery life and because it's read only, you have to buy a stinking memory card for game saves. Thankfully, the UMD has sold like gangbusters and it has heralded a new age of Sony proprietary media. Oh wait.

Now, on the plus side, that screen is still a fucking marvel of modern engineering and it is a slick looking piece of tech. It can do a bunch of new things like get RSS feeds automatically and connect to your PS3, should you have one, and it's hard to be impressed with 3D games on the DS after playing Medal of Honor Heroes 2 on the PSP so it's not all bad. I still probably wouldn't have bought one if I couldn't make money off of it, but now that I have one, I can play Ratchet and Clank: Size Matters, and hopefully, review the upcoming God of War game. First though, I have to finish the aforementioned Medal of Honor and then Dead Head Fred. Time for this thing to earn its keep.

Front Page Failure

My Godzilla Unleashed review gets the front page treatment over at GameShark today, despite the fact that I gave it a big old "F". Let's hope that Atari doesn't advertise on the site or I might find myself out of doors, with a new PSP to support too!

More on the PSP later. Bowling beckons.

Droppin' Review Knowledge Like Bombs

My Zack and Wiki review is up so make haste to it! It really is a charming game. I hope it sells well, however it's not exactly positioned to do so. Getting something this quirky to sell well on a console not currently fought over by the casual gamer is hard enough as it is. Getting the aforementioned casual gamer to give it a look will be even tougher. Well, good on you Capcom for putting out things like this. Just for that, I will be buying Okami for the Wii even though I already played it on the PS2.

Support good games people! You have nothing to lose but your chains, your boring shooters and your silly GTA clones.

Day Off

I took a day off today, in the interest of culling my vacation herd. For some reason, my company allows you to carry over only exactly 40 hours of vacation. Not an hour more, not an hour less. As I conveniently have 4.5 days and not the requisite five, I'm pretty much screwed in the carry over departments, so instead I'm forced to take off 4.5 days between now and the end of the year. The horrors!

Today was day number one and what a glorious day it was. Nothing to exciting, started the day with some donuts for me and the missus, then we went to a parent teacher conference at my son's Pre-K to find out that he's a certified genius. Well, not certified, but he's quite smart. It's strange because most parents would have a feeling of "I made that kid, he's smart because I am" in these situations, but in this case, with him being adopted and all that, neither my wife nor I had a blasted thing to do with it. The best we can say is that we bought a very smart child.

After that, it was back to the house to hang out and play some Medal of Honor Heroes 2 like the good little reviewer that I am. I'm enjoying the game, but man they need to tighten up those checkpoints. This game throws a ridiculous number of enemies at you in a lot of places, many of which are far away from the last checkpoint and it can be a pain in the ass to get through such a battle and die because you were reloading as a Nazi surprised you, thereby causing you to do the battle all over again. Granted, this is the problem with any game that still uses the checkpoint save system, but for some reason, probably having to do with the fact that you have to be very slow, methodical and tactical with this game, I'm really feeling the pain of the spread out checkpoints.

After all the Nazi shooting Linda and I went out to Pure, a cool little Mexican place in out town. The food there is absolutely amazing and they have a surprisingly refreshing beer for 99 cents. It's hard to throw down four bucks on a beer when there's one on the menu for less than a dollar. Way I figure it, the buzz is the same, so why spend the extra cash. Despite the high number of tasty items on the menu, I always get the same thing which is this dish of these thick corn masa cakes split and stuffed with chile roast pork and queso fresca. It's a simple dish but it's so damn tasty I can't resist it. Add to it, the free melted cheese dip we had as an appetizer and we left with two very full stomachs.

Once lunch was finished, we wrapped up some Xmas shopping for my mom and sister and went back home. Linda was still working today so I returned to the basement to check out the online mode of Medal of Honor (I still suck at online WWII shooters, for those keeping score at home) and then busted out some tracks in Rock Band. The Queens of the Stone Age track "Go With the Flow" is giving me fits because I can't even 4-star it and I take it as a blemish on my otherwise sterling Rock Band record. It's a small timing issue and once I resolve it, I'll be back on track. This isn't the first time Queens of the Stone Age has caused me problems, but I conquered them once and I shall do so again.

As days off go, it was a pretty good one. I look forward to the other 3.5 of them being similarly splendiferous.

Angels & Airwaves Show

Once again I ventured out into the wilds of the Atlanta concert venues and once again I was not disappointed by the sheer amount of rock I found. The Angels & Airwaves show was, in a word, excellent. The band had a great stage presence and played a nice collection of stuff from their two albums. Their drummer Atom is a sight to behold. Hands down, he has to be the best drummer I've ever seen. His fills were absolutely amazing and many the time did I think he had an extra arm somewhere. The crowd was really digging the band too, and aside from some teenage punks who thought they could butt in front of me five minutes before A&A took the stage, everyone was very cool. I smacked them down verbally, for the record, with both my words and my stern visage letting them know that this cranky old man would knock them the fuck out if they kept on their present course of action.

Eventually though the sound and the jostling got to be too much for this cranky old man and I went to the back of the venue where I had the opportunity to chat up members of the very excellent opening band, Joy In Tomorrow. The lead singer Josh was particularly kind to spend some time shooting the shit with me, and as well as being an excellent singer, he's also a MD native and a Redskins fan. That's a win-win-win in my book. They're playing The Masquerade on January 18th, conveniently a Friday, so I'm planning on seeing them again. This live music thing is quite addictive.

I took 127 pictures total last night, of which something like six came our correctly. Once I've sorted through them all, I'll post them to my Picasa account and put the link up here. I wish I had gotten some better pictures, but the conditions weren't exactly ideal, especially given my pithy photography skills.

In short, it was a great night of fantastic music and I got home in time to be in bed by 11. Sadly, that may have been the best part of the evening.

Wow. I mean, wow.

My Mr. Binky column is up, and well, you should just see it for yourself. I should now know that if I mention copulating llamas in a column, Bill will be all to happy to provide pictures. My review of Dementium: The Ward is also up. What a banner day!

I Have Not Forgotten

I have not forgotten my pledge to post daily, however weekends are
hard for daytime posting and Sat. night was filled with holiday party
goodness while Sunday found me slaving over Mr. Binky's latest
missive. That brings us to Monday and here we are, you doing whatever
it is you're doing and me sitting in the balcony of The Roxy, waiting
for the Angels & Airwaves show. I expect to be very tired tomorrow.
Tales of epic rocking shall be told though, have no worries.

--
Disparate Elements
http://disparateelements.blogspot.com