Lamest. Title. Ever.

Sponging

2010-06-12T11:20:00.003-04:00

I was originally going to call this post "My Reculturification", and acknoweldge that this is both the best word to describe what I'm currently doing, and that it's completely made up.

However, I was discussing this very act with a friend and she referred to it as Sponging. As a hack journalist and admirer of words, I had no problem admitting that Sponging was the more accurate term.

You see, recently I've had both a lot of time on my hands and a renewed attention span. While writing hasn't come easily, I have been interested in augmenting my experiences with new culture I feel I've missed.

In the last couple of years, I've been so focussed on one type of media, the video game, that I ended up mostly shutting out all others. So right now I'm trying to absorb as many new experiences, thoughts and theories as I can lay my hands on.

And as an avid fan of movies, television and books, naturally my focus is there.

It's mostly an attempt to never use the phrase "nah, it's not my thing" ever again.

Which, consequently, means that some of the items on my list may seem out of place. It may be both surprising the movies I've not seen and books I've not read, or even that I've decided they're important enough to view.

But the point of this exercise is to expand my cultural knowledge in all directions, not just what others have deemed 'culturally significant'.

I'm trying, in effect, to remember every suggestion I ignored from friends and family previously and find inspiration for writing in new places.

So, with way too much introduction, here is the list of what I've watched and read in the last month. In future, I hope to continue to finish at least one book and one movie per week and keep track of it on this blog. I may also post my reading and watching lists (future consumption) later on.

Books:
- Slumdob Millionaire
- Eats, Shoots & Leaves
- Bloodletting and other miraculous cures
- The Nanny Diaries (don't judge me)
- Mother Night
- My Booky Wook (Russell Brand's autobiography)
- The Sirens of Titan
- The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo
- Dreamseller (Brandon Novak's autobiography)

Movies:
- Raging Bull
- Taxi Driver
- American Movie
- Sneakers
- Tron
- Fletch
- Troll 2
- Annie Hall
- UHF
- Kiss Kiss Bang Bang
- Wall Street
- World's Greatest Dad
- A Few Good Men
- Bruno
- In The Loop
- Date Night

TV Shows:
- Top Chef Seasons 1-3

yes, you can now call this blog neglect

2009-02-13T14:27:00.005-05:00

i realize it's been an inhumane amount of time that i've left this blog un-updated.

i apologize if anybody was still reading or subscribing through rss, it's been a busy and rough time.

after leaving my last job i took a bit of a break from writing but i've got a new project that is almost ready to start. it's not huge but will likely be the next place to find my writing online.

when it's ready, i'll put a link to it here.

in the meantime, you can follow me on twitter @jamesspeedy. (although i'm hoping to take over the abandoned @jdspeedy as soon as i get a go ahead from twitter, so if that link no longer works try that).

and maybe, after a while, i'll come back and re-invigorate this blog. i still love it, i just don't love love it right now and with my incredible excitement over doing some more writing now, it should only be a matter or time before this will be absolutely filthy with posts again. that just may not be tomorrow or the near future.

for now,

stay frosty,

JD

oh no! my littlebigplanet!

2008-10-17T15:47:00.004-04:00

in all seriousness, this has got me feeling pretty cagey.

littlebigplanet has been delayed. and not a, 'the shipment was slow to canada' kind of delay where you wait one to three days to get a game they're already playing in the states or on illegally modded consoles.

it's delayed as in, you offended a giant portion of the world by including inflammatory passages from the q'ruan in the background music to your game.

that's right, in the background music to the first level of the third world (swinging safari) you can hear two selections from the religious book, something that muslims take as offensive.

according to Nsider's open letter to media molecule (producers' of littlebigplanet) via kotaku, they say that:

We Muslims consider the mixing of music and words from our Holy Quran deeply offending. We hope you would remove that track from the game immediately via an online update, and make sure that all future shipments of the game disk do not contain it.

as someone who's not muslim, far be it for me to weigh in on whether or not they should be reprinted, all i can say, is that as a littlebigplanet beta tester, next week is going to be a long one.

i was planning on making a design document for a few levels that i would start on tuesday but, according to shacknews, i'll be waiting another week after that to finally get my hands on a full version.

i'm sure i'm not the only one who will be sweating the extra week's wait. i just gotta pray that eb doesn't pull their usual nonsense with getting in my pre-ordered games late once the edited disks get shipped.

sadly without sackboy,

JD

interesting...interesting

2008-10-10T09:25:00.002-04:00

now i don't quite feel so bad for sucking at halo.

there's always a positive spin you can put on anything...

JD

properly implemented achivements= sales?

2008-09-30T15:46:00.003-04:00

this is probably the most interesting video games study i've heard of in a long while. it's not just some slapdash gathering of sales charts that compares microsoft to sony to nintendo made games, trying to figure out if master chief could out arm wrestle mario.

no, this breaks down whether or not the proper implementation of achievement points in a game, that reward the player just enough for their hard earned time and money, and tries to discern how much that affects their sales.

in fact, the study, featured on gamespot, seems to link games where developers spent time and effort developing incremental rewards with over 30 achievements (or trophies, if the ps3 is your bag) with better game sales.

as a rampant consumer of video games I can honestly say that this is not only one of the smarter uses of bar graphs that i've seen used to take apart game sales metrics, but also the most interesting study period.

yes, we know more girls are playing games than ever before, and old people like the wii. but proper implementation of a reward system to foster a relationship with the user and encourage them to not only see all the different aspects to your game, but show them that you appreciate their time. wow. didn't see that coming til i pulled it off my google reader.

bloggin' and loggin',

JD

i don't even know what to think

2008-09-03T13:39:00.004-04:00

so grand theft auto has been generally observed as a scapegoat for modern pontiffs of fear news (ie. 'video games are making our children kill/violent/eat human flesh, what can you do about it?').

just today i stumbled across this story on kotaku:

Grand Theft Auto Helps Preteen Save Family's Lives

???

well, that's certainly...good? i don't really know what to think about this one. i mean, great! she saved her families live potentially, but wtf? it's because of GTA? i thought kids weren't supposed to play that game?

maybe if she'd played burnout, she'd just be waiting for the car to reset on the road and reduced boost...

missin' the movies,

JD

downloadable games that don't suck

2008-08-28T11:14:00.006-04:00

in the past, i've kind of ignored the downloadable games available to me with my three consoles, unless they're explicitly given to me for free and i test them for a couple days.

i played a couple capcom shooters (1942, wolf of the battlefield, the space one) and was left unimpressed. but recently there's been a spat of actually really good games that i find myself playing more than full disk titles. that is, until the next wave of killer games comes out; force unleashed, nhl 09, etc., etc.

here are a few i'm currently loving and a couple older ones that are great too:

bionic commando: rearmed (XBLA & PSN)

this one came out of left field for me because, admittedly, i'd barely played the NES original (read: never).

the swing mechanic (by which this title would succeed or epically fail) feels perfect and the combo of the incredibly inventive ways to kill the bosses, the upgradable and satisfyingly designed firepower with that perfect swinging makes for a game that feels like it could deserve a stand alone release.

this is a remake that doesn't feel like a remake (like all those frogger incarnations) and outdoes just about any other game on either psn or xbox live arcade right now. it's fun and has a free demo so check it out.

my only gripe= why is this not downloadable to PSP yet?

special note: pick up the PSN version if you have the option because it's much more fun to play with a proper d-pad and not the xbox's failed attempt

castle crashers (XBLA)

this nifty little game is barely out and the buzz around it is huge. it has one of the best multiplayer implementations out there in the arcade games and a tremendously addictive gameplay reminiscent of the old TMNT arcade games and double dragon style beat em ups.

the art style is wicked, there's cutesy blood and gore and really, most important of all, it's fun. it's not so challenging as to scare off new gamers (who don't love frustrating shoot em ups). it's just wacky and weird and violent and cool, it hits all my bases. i look forward to downloading the full version once i get together somewhat of a team to play through the full campaign with.

various boardgames and card games (XBLA)

the only ones i can truly recommend are UNO and carcassonne, and that's because they're fun, easy to pick up and great to play on live.

one thing to note, however, people are really talkative in the UNO rooms and to me, that's a good thing. if it's anything like when the game was available free on live back in last year, carcassonne is just full of people grinding out the 200 achievement points in complete silence. boring.

notable mentions

here are a few that might be worth your time, at least for a few seconds. they're not perfect and won't steal a ton of your time but they're cheap and quite fun, depending on how much you get in to them:

- geometry wars (1 or 2) (XBLA)
- super stardust HD (PSN)
- pain (PSN)
- soul calibur (XBLA)
- kirby's adventure (VC)

arcadin' and lovin' it,

JD

must read: todd levin's history of 'his' gaming

2008-08-25T15:07:00.004-04:00

this guy...this guy.

i don't know how to even phrase this, but i'd have to say that it enters the shortlist for this year's 'media that seems to have been written expressly for me'.

this dude knows how to write, and has a confidence in admitting a personality that i have slightly less confidence in admitting closely resembles my own.

consoles i have known was a multi-part chronicle of todd levin's adolescence and early adulthood through the gaming consoles he has owned, from the radioshack pong clone forwards.

it's funny, scathing and incredibly self-deprecating and surely worthy of the short bursts of attention required to get through the entire thing.

please give it a shot, especially if you ever found yourself in the unique position of not caring about sports or school dances but not having enough attention to even fit in with the magic card playing or D&D nerds.

laughing my way to the poor house,

JD

now that everyone and their mom has 4.1...

2008-07-17T08:29:00.004-04:00

playstation

playstation has released their version of gamercards. see exhibit a in the right column.

they've also pushed back home again, as of E3 this week, but supposedly it will be worth the wait (and from what i've heard, it's looking quite a bit better than the beta did).

more news

more stuff has been happening, though, than the release of another inconsequential status symbol...

the wedding is in like two weeks, and i'm totally stoked for it. actually, at this point, i just want to get there and get it done. i mean, i'm going to have a great time, it's just that this has been a long process and i can't wait to hit the finish line.

oh, and we moved again. the new place is sweet though, even though i've been relegated to the psp since all my consoles are still packed up and most of the apartment is in boxes.

e3

and speaking of changes, has anyone been kind of bored by this years' e3 announcements?

i mean, i know it's been tapering off for a couple years, but microsoft's biggest announcement was jumping on the gui redesign bandwagon (though i am a little excited for the fall update, but not at all for the 'avatars'), and sony really didn't have much to show.

all the games we saw were well known for a while, and i'm getting bored of nintendo announcing more and more casual games that i'll play for about a week. i mean, the wii motion plus looks neat, and 1:1 for the wii remote would be cool, but isn't this what the wii remote was supposed to be on launch?

2 years, and now they've built the perfect wiimote by plugging a chunk of plastic into the end?

yikes.

anywho, off to a fab thursday (i'm sure),

your partner in crime,

JD

i guess i'm the only one with ps3 firmware 2.40 now...

2008-07-07T14:45:00.005-04:00

so this is an unofficial test drive as no one else seems to have the 2.40 firmware since it was recalled shortly after being released.

i downloaded it with no complications the morning of so here are my impressions.

to be completely honest, the list of things it can't do is as long as my arm, and if you're expecting xbox live level of usefulness and interactivity, prepare for disappointment.

short list of fails:

- no access to ps store in game
- can't stream music in game (but can play music on the console hard drive)
- can only play music in games that support it

they've also introduced an ~~achievement~~ trophy system. to put it bluntly, so far, it's completely safe to call it half-cocked.

i got ahold of a copy of super stardust hd (don't let anyone else tell you different, this is the only game that currently supports them) and not only is the sound kind of lame (nothing compared to the now classic xbox *bing*) but everything about it is low-key.

quiet unlock noise, small upper-right hand logo for trophy notification, and so far, they're all pretty hard. i think the balance of achivements is lacking, but again, this is only one games' impression worth, so take it with a grain of salt.

*bing!*

JD

we're out of beta, we're releasing on time (ds download)

2008-06-18T10:30:00.006-04:00

someone made an oh-so-delectable version of portal for the ds which is not only fun and intuitive to play with the stylus controls, but also supports customizable maps.

download the game and the map editor here.

it's called still alive ds and you can catch me playing it on the bus and subway from now until motion sickness kicks in.

still alive (mostly),

JD

edit: you will need some way to mount this little bit of software to your ds, like an R4 or something like that. just don't go using it for pirating ds games! i'm sure they're all worth $40...

and the hits keep coming

2008-06-18T09:56:00.004-04:00

a lot of people say there are three main stresses in life (not including children).

- Moving House
- Getting Married
- Changing Jobs

i think they should add maybe one more.

- Helping someone cope with changing jobs

if you haven't guessed already, jen is going through the top three, and me the top two and my suggested fourth.

we signed our lease monday night, so it's official, we are vacating the basement apartment that has caused us so much grief (mold, leaks, non-sealed windows for prime allergy attacks) but was so cheap, and moving on up to the southside.

it's certainly not a deluxe apartment in the sky, but it does have a private deck, which is rad. i'm definitely going to be getting my bbq on.

the wedding is coming up at an alarming rate, which really just means, oh shit, that's less than two months away, SNAP!

i'm not fearing it, or even sweating it, it's just odd that it's actually happening, kind of like how both gta iv and metal gear solid iv actually came out this year. bizzaro.

so really, right now, with jen moving from the cbc to the toronto star, and with a move planned for july 12, and a wedding for august 3rd, things are starting to heat up for us.

just hope everything goes as planned...

sweating the small stuff,

JD

what i did over the weekend

2008-06-09T10:52:00.001-04:00

pac-man shoes = win.

JD

more updates to follow

2008-05-21T15:34:00.002-04:00

i know i've been lax in my blogging (which i seem to find continual excuses and apologies for) but i've been a busy cat and i intend on ramping it up a bit now.

i have also managed to forget my blackberry today, so any unboxing or box shots of wii fit will have to wait until i have my phone back in my sweaty palms.

looking forward to checking it out tonight, giving my impressions tomorrow, and possibly doing a full GTA IV review for the blog since work farmed that review out to a freelancer.

fitting my wii (god, so many dirty sounding puns are created by this game),

JD

newsy news

2008-05-21T15:24:00.004-04:00

well, it happened.

i mean, two things happened to be precise. i guess it was three. aww f-it, i'll just start breaking it down.

1. video game deprevation therapy.

first, i took a week off from gaming. it's not a big deal, but i wasn't getting much sleep, i was getting fairly irritable and my hair was getting long. so i got a haircut, and left my xbox packed up for a full week.

2. dusted off wii.
then came the re-awakening of my interest in the wii.

it was just boom boom boom, with mario kart wii being actually a fun online wii game (go figure!), then boom blox with it's physics-based awesomeness and now i'm sitting beside an un-opened copy of wii fit.

i think i pissed off some people today, though, because i didn't pre-order it and i guess people were turned away in the morning at my local eb because they had no pre-orders.

i walked in at 11:45 and the manager (whom i've gotten to know) grabbed one for me. i mentioned my lack of pre-order (which is unlike me for big release games that i'm not sure i'll be getting) and she hesitated for a second and then said 'it's cool' and sold me one of her three non-pre-ordered copies.

rad.

jen will be chuffed.

3. playstation whatnow?

oh, and three, i'm breaking down and getting a ps3.

you see, they've bundled the larger harddrive, backwards compatible, 80GB version PS3 with a copy of metal gear solid 4 for $500 and i can get it shipped to me.

this means a guaranteed copy of mgs4 without having to worry about konami or lines and i can get a ps3 that will play ps2 games all for a not too steep price.

i will now be a three console giant who answers to no man, but still answers to one woman.

peace be the journey,

JD

ranting: this is why games (and movies) get a bad rep

2008-05-05T12:12:00.004-04:00

i know i've spoken out about this before, but this weekend, i was given a whole lot more fuel for my fire on parents (and retail stores) responsibility for children's media consumption.

that's a fancy way of saying, wtf parents?

hmv

jesus. with all the media coverage around gta iv, you'd think that hmv would have some sort of a talk with their employers to watch out for kids when selling the game. but no, that would be too easy.

the whole reason that people still listen to wingnuts like jack thompson is that kids are still able to (easily) get the game.

i was in hmv on friday, picking up a copy of the new kooks album, and i look to my left to see a male employee of the scarborough town centre location, not only selling the game to an obvious minor (under 5 ft tall, and looking to be around 12 years old, no adult accompaniment) but also discussing the finer points of the game. namely, how realistic the driving and gunplay are.

for god's sakes. when i go to such lengths telling people the merits of the great story in the game, and how it's intended for adults, which is why it's given the 18+ mature rating by the esrb, it pisses me off that people go and ruin it for everyone by pulling this kind of crap.

going to the movies

when i finally calmed down from seeing this spectacle, i went on to have a decent weekend.

but then, when jen and i were out shopping on saturday, we decided to go catch a flick at the mall. we went to harold and kumar escape from guantanamo bay.

now, this is not a kids movie.

i don't want to say it's not funny, or a good movie, but seriously: nine year olds should not be there. there was lots of drug consumption, a hefty portion of nudity (male and female, tops and bottoms) and while it's all in the name of jokes, there is a reason the movie is rated r in the states.

but, not only was there a dad who took his 9 year old son to the movie, but some woman in our row had a god-damned baby in the theater! what?!?!? she had a car seat propped up in one of the theater chairs.

now, not to mention the content of the flick, but isn't it really bad for a baby's hearing to be in a really loud movie theater? aren't their ears still developing at that stage and super fragile?

this weekend i was supremely disappointed by the human race and if you work at a games (or music) store and sell to minors or are a parent who doesn't take your kid to age appropriate movies or give them age appropriate video games, shame on you.

what's at stake: kids staying kids and adults getting adult content easily

seriously, you're just making it harder for of-age people to keep getting the things they want without a hassle. by being bad parents and lazy employees, you're making it harder to make and distribute interesting, envelope pushing entertainment.

and to boot, your kids are missing out on the best parts of childhood, innocence.

i know it sounds cliche, but games like GTA and movies like harold and kumar are so much better consumed when you've got a bit of ~~maturity~~ life experience under your belt.

and in the end, all we'll get is a homogenization of our culture because politicians and crazed parents will think that they have to save children since no one else will. and to me, that's crap.

parent your own children so that the government won't try to do it for you.

and hmv, read the esrb labels, understand them and follow them. it's really simple, you just have to believe that you can still make enough sales without a 12 year olds allowance. suggest another game, something that won't get you in trouble for selling.

/rant

JD

now how am i going to divide my time? (mario kart wii)

2008-05-01T16:48:00.005-04:00

and here is a box open image of the statue of happiness (from gta iv) that rockstar sent, unboxed...

and i'm out, because i have a lot of playing, writing and whatnot left to do,

seriously, no joke here, got to get my work on,

JD

i'm being bribed (and i love it!)

2008-04-30T16:27:00.005-04:00

much like my new ~~xbox~~ friend, brian crecente, i received not only a copy of gta iv from rockstar games (who up until this point, i didn't think i would get anything from), i also got neat reviewer prizes!

i call them reviewer prizes, because editorial perks, giveaways and all other descriptions seem lame.

i prefer to think of them as prizes. that way, i win.

i got two copies of the game (one on 360 and one on ps3) as well a miniature of liberty city's own statue of happiness...

and a bunch of wicked cool stickers for my bike!

i don't actually have a bike and i don't want to let my tone fool you, these are actually really sweet and i'm so excited to add them to my already large pile of gta iv stuff that came with my collector's edition.

livin' large and in charge (of his cubicle),

JD

p.s. many apologies for all the kotaku links but the unboxing pics from luke plunkett were so good, i don't think i could do any better.

gta iv is... (a quick explanation for media exposed peoples)

2008-04-30T16:21:00.005-04:00

great.

i know you'll read everywhere that it's great, but seriously. g-r-e-a-t.

and for anyone who doesn't get gta, here it is in a nutshell:

take your favorite mob/gangster flick (the departed, goodfellas, casino, basically anything scorsese) and make it interactive.

it's not a murder simulator. it's like a choose your own adventure. you play the game to progress the plot. i mean, as a former teenage male, and as a current early twenties guy, i can identify with the sheer glee associated with destruction and violence but at it's heart, the main appeal of gta has and always will be the underworld of crime, gangs and the story of one man.

just an fyi for your internets,

JD

what's wrong with this picture (actually, it's a screengrab...)

2008-04-30T16:02:00.005-04:00

ok, ok. i get planet earth. and i can tolerate young indiana jones. heck, i like juno and dexter.

but 27 dresses? joey!?!??!!?

seriously canadians. we need a culture infusion in our tv purchasing decisions, badly.

/rant

JD

who wants an n64 in attractive packaging?

2008-04-28T16:42:00.005-04:00

when i was asking about the probability of another super mario strikers (ie. failed canadian street date) while making the manager of my local eb (where i'm now considered a regular) very nervous about me running into the back and stealing my copy early...i noticed this:

you can get an n64 for $15!!!!

who needs GTA IV when you can play goldeneye or mario kart 64?

i remember when i was buying one for $200! and it was only because my grandparents had bestowed upon me and my brother large sums of money in pounds which we had brought back and combined to buy our first current-gen system (as in, not one they had stopped supporting).

it's kind of depressing.

what am i, old now?

JD

gta iv tomorrow? huh.

2008-04-28T09:14:00.007-04:00

ok, yes, it's the biggest game of the year. there's little question of that.

and yes, you've probably seen game footage already, seen the opening credits or maybe even played an illegal copy of the full game (which has been circulating the net on torrent downloads for over a week now).

i mean, i'm excited, and with good cause.

but it's taken me a while to get here.

back in the day

i'll take you back two years and a bit to halifax and my third year of j-school.

i was living in the city in my first home away from res and around...i don't know exactly, but probably february or march, i saw a very subdued and subtle display that only showed the preliminary (and subsequently discarded) box art for a fourth GTA game.

while i was a little excited by the prospect of a new GTA, I wasn't that stoked, because i'd been a little disappointed by san andreas, and wasn't sure about another GTA on the PS2.

but then i saw the release date. 2008.

i'm the kind of guy who can obsess over things, so i knew i had to just let it drop. at that point, there wouldn't be any real info on the game for another year, and even then, no sign of it being good or bad for another year after that.

now, today, and in 17 hours, tomorrow

somehow, it's finally here. but now, a day away, i'm giddy like a kid on christmas eve, wondering how i'll sleep tonight or last through tomorrow's work day.

in other GTA news, my hot tip got picked up on kotaku and i know this makes me a huge nerd, but i was super stoked. to the point that i actually showed it to jen, who just shook her head in what looked like a mix of horror, shame and 'i'm marrying you this summer?'.

a tidbit for the tense,

JD

p.s. for those of you who don't know, jen also likes hockey.

blogging about not blogging

2008-04-18T11:04:00.003-04:00

i was just going to post a very tiny post apologizing for my blogger neglect, but i figured i'd try to muster some energy and get out a decent post.

i had another late night last night, but this one for a purpose (other than watching all 24 episodes of real world: las vegas in under two weeks, only watching between 11:30 and 2am).

i was fixing the internet.

the rogers debacle

ever since we switched our services to rogers we've had issues of one kind or another.

and because of that, we've actually hung on to our bell internet (which they were supposed to be sending us a return kit for).

but last night, i attacked it with fervour.

should i even call it tech support?

after having to get a tech in twice to fix our cable, and then having an incredibly unsuccessful call with a tech over the fact that our modem lit up but didn't provide any actual 'surfability', where he told me to call apple because it was probably a 'mac problem' i'd had enough.

not to mention the fact that they've charged me the installation fees that i was told would be waived if i bought a $20 pack in store when i booked my installation.

so last night i was not going to take no for an answer.

earlier in the week the modem had begun working plugged straight into jen's laptop, but i couldn't get it to work with our wifi router or with my xbox.

method and results

last night i started by trying out the bell internet with the router.

aha! the router worked. so it was not the bad link in the chain.

then, in between the first and second overtimes (i know! seriously tense!) i started testing all the cables i had used in my chain. i had 4 different ethernet cables going and was convinced that if the router wasn't the problem, one of the cables must be.

i was right and ended up throwing away the s**ty cable the came with the router.

hooked it up with the bell internet, it worked, so hooked the entire thing up with the rogers and presto! working wireless internet.

warning! overly technical section coming up next!

now, since i'd received complaints from jen in the past as she didn't like my security methods (wpa2 with password and invisible ssid) because she said she doesn't like having to write out the ssid each time or having to remember two things, i finally figured out how to use mac ids in wireless security.

so i kept the wpa2 and made it a visible ssid, but changed the security to allowable only from an assigned list. this makes it just as safe (i hope) but easier for jen. and that makes my life easier. hehe.

end of technical jargon-y section! phew!

so that's why i'm groggy and cranky today. all because of a useless tech at rogers (who should have just told me one of two things: a) that i should wait a couple days because rogers internet is testy and sometimes doesn't work right out of the box and b) that I should have tried another cable) and because it takes a long time to troubleshoot wireless internet that is designed to be used with windows, and a router that is designed to be used with windows, with a mac.

but it's all hooked up and working now, now if i can just get back my installation fees they inadvertently charged me...

JD

new stories/reviews

2008-04-14T00:51:00.003-04:00

stories

check the side bar under 'stories' for all my new stories, including the 'ambitious' bell gps nav conversation review i did with jen.

i think it turned out pretty rad, but feel free to leave a comment on pcworld.ca, on the blog, or on my facebook page and let me know what you think.

there's also new reviews popping up every week so be sure to keep track of what's going in there every few weeks as i'm constantly writing, constantly publishing.

hockey

after a shakey start on friday, and a second visit from a tech, we have our digital cable up and running.

and, like the cable, after a shakey start (with a heart-breaking 5-4 loss to the caps in game 1) philly stormed back and took a shutout 2-0 win, in washington.

i promise i won't fill this blog with all my hockey obsessive junk, but it's a big deal for biron to pull out the shutout in game 2. now they get to take it back to philly and win a couple in front of the home team crowd.

enjoying my rogers 'on demand' eps of the real world,

JD

what i'm playing this week (crackdown edition)

2008-04-11T14:17:00.006-04:00

well, in the tradition of playing games i missed out on when they were new, and going even further back i've been revisiting an impulse buy i made when i got the xbox, crackdown.

i forgot how much fun it was just traveling around in the game, and i'm looking forward to finally leveling up my agent and getting to see what level 4 agility, guns and driving are like. sounds like fun in italics.

i'm also excited to announce that, since it is impossible to avoid any longer-with the start of playoff hockey-i have buckled and bought cable.

i was avoiding it for a number of reasons, one being the writers strike at the end of 2007, and another being cost.

but i've picked up rogers vip service for $52 a month as well as bundled it with internet for under $100 (which is close to how much we were shelling out to bell just for internet-they hadn't mentioned that we were going over our bandwidth and paying almost double the cost of a regular bill!).

last weekend was a blowout in terms of actual rest since jen had visitors from out of town and i had a s***ton of work to get done for monday. hopefully this weekend, with the inclement weather, will let us veg in front of our newfound 125+ channels (probably less in reality) and enjoy a weekend of inactivity.

from my couch, salutations,

JD

quick note: pc edition

2008-04-04T11:15:00.002-04:00

so i decided, after painstakingly trying to edit out the errors on that post with the device, that it wasn't worth it and left whatever is left there in.

it was an experiment and i feel satisfied that i tried and succeeded in blogging 'off-computer'.

in all seriousness, however, i don't know if i've ever been more excited for a weekend of nothing.

just chilling. i think there may be some apartment cleanup and wedding stuff, but barring that, there is just chill-axing in my immediate future.

come on 5 o'clock, stop being so damn slow and get here already!

coutin' down the minutes,

JD

quick note: mobile edition

2008-04-04T10:05:00.003-04:00

so, i've been trying to review this mini tablet pc that nokia sent me for quite some time and just today i managed to get it on the net.

the odd thing is it's virtually useless without an internet connection.

if you want to checkit out, it's the n810 by nokia. it's a weird little device that i've already taken far too long to review, and i still can't decide if i like it or if it's useful at all.

the good news is that i finished portal last night and am finally 'in' on the biggest inside joke in gaming.

i was trying to explain why it was so important to jen last night using an analogy from my grade school days:

remember when if you missed a show that was in at the moment you would have nothing to say at school the next day and you would be scared of not being 'cool' if you missed it?

my analogy failed because where she grew up, in a small nova scotian town, they didn't get cable til she left for university...

so i tried to get her to watch the portal credits with me and get excited about still alive. she didn't really 'get it', portal or the song, and remains unimpressed.

have i really become that nerdy?

taping the nose piece on my glasses,

JD

p.s. typing on this thing takes FOREVER...though it might take longer if i cared about capitals.

what i'm playing this week (orange box edition)

2008-04-03T16:03:00.002-04:00

what i'm playing now

in my illustrious tradition of trying to catch up on all the great games that everybody played months ago, i just grabbed a used copy of the orange box for my 360.

super stoked to finally play portal and figure out what this means:

hehehe. if you're going to try to ruin it for me, however, i must warn you that i'm almost done-it's not that long a game, and i don't suck at games that much...

what i just finished playing

i finally got my last achievement for bully:se, making it my first 1000/1000 gamerscore game in my collection, and the first game i've played 100% through since my obsession with the godfather game on wii.

really a satisfying game, despite the technical hardships-freezing, stuttering and missing audio, etc. i also am offically done with assassin's creed as i somehow missed one conversation with lucy, therefore meaning i'll have to play through the entire game again for that achievement. f the flags. f lucy. f any more time achievement point grinding on that game.

liked the game, hated the emphasis on dumb collecting challenges.

bully got that one right. while you have to collect three different types of things in the game-smash gnomes, grab g&g cards and rubber bands-they put them on the map for you and each one disappears when you get it.

there was no guessing as to whether you got it, consulting a faq for help, and then getting even more annoyed because you couldn't figure out on the map which one you had and which you were still missing!

argggh.

either way i'm done with them and on to good times with new games on the horizon too.

can you say gta iv?

gouranga!!!

JD

and the winner for best april fools joke is...

2008-04-01T16:03:00.003-04:00

microsoft gaming division of all people!

it turns out that i was wrong on two counts...

1) they DO have a sense of humour at microsoft (also proved with bill gates' last day video, quite good)

2) they inadvertently created their own version of the mcfly 2015's, an xbox i desperately want to own, minus the 35 button remote:

special mention goes to the first april fools i saw today, the google/virgin venture, virgile, a mars colony that isn't quite 'safe' yet.

"...Sure, the work will be hard, the broadband rates low, the commodes decidedly open source, and yes, your life might be extinguished in a fiery instant of catastrophic technological malfunction..."

there were many more, but just wanted to list my two faves.

best holiday ever!

JD

it's here! (another game i can't play edition)

2008-03-26T13:54:00.002-04:00

oh yeah, it happened again.

while i really appreciate the thought and hooking up with a new company is rad, sega of america skimmed my e-mail requesting review copies and information and plunked a ps3 version of condemned 2 into a ups envelope and sent it through the wonderful courier network.

so we're at this again.

the real issue here is that i'm forced into a corner where i have to question my dedication to the craft i'm so badly trying to break into.

a) i can just say 'f-it', leave the game and go on to one of the many other reviews i still need to write.

b) i can tell sega that they sent me the wrong platform for this game, and probably receive no response or potentially piss them off so they don't send me more (which is a probable case in choice a as well).

c) i can try to find a way to get a ps3.

but the third option has me troubled. while i knew i would eventually need to figure this issue out, i didn't know it would be this fast.

i'm at a point where it may be an issue of committing to this crazy venture to the point where my other hobbies become subjugated by my job. i may have to get rid of a piece of guitar gear to fully commit.

see, i've got a tube amp i've stopped using and it would probably sell for about the same price as a ps3. it's like that scene in back to the future iii. the point of no return.

if i make that decision, there's no turning back. i've got to get that De Lorean back to the future or crash and burn in ~~clayton~~ eastwood ravine.

or better yet, work might pay for one.

either way it's feeling kind of symbolic like a training montage in a rocky flick.

will give deets when there are some to give.

peace be the journey,

JD

really hope this is the last time i mention the bully patch...

2008-03-26T13:48:00.002-04:00

but unfortunately i have to report that it basically doesn't do much.

while at first, i thought, hey, no freezing, i failed to think about the fact that, patchless, i hadn't had a freeze since i got out of chapter one.

my audio was still wonky in some cutscenes, the graphics are far from perfect and stutter at the oddest of times but i was happy.

then, last night, it happened.

i was playing the final level, which i won't divulge the content to for fear of spoiling the game for others, but after i had completed 90% of my tasks, it froze.

i was entering a building (which goes to a quick loading screen every time) and the screen went black and my 360 was out cold.

i tried to get the 360 menu, restart it with the controller and even waited 2 minutes to see if it was just a stall. but no, it froze...again.

so i guess the patch needs to be patched, and i'm kind of bored about writing on it now.

wishing for a flaw-free game to play,

JD

rock band for wii questions answered, and how!

2008-03-25T14:44:00.002-04:00

this came out this morning so i'm sure it's old news, but after all my speculating yesterday, ea have put the niggling questions i had to rest.

- still no dlc, but there may be some day
- it's basically a port of the ps2 version, and lack everything that version lacked
- there will be no 'waggle' wii-specific controls
- no wiimotes are necessary
- it will ship with a usb hub like the 360 version
- the instruments will come in 'wii' colours (ie. white)
AND
- you can't use your guitar hero iii guitar(s)

so there you have it folks. you can play rock band on wii, but you've gotta get all new peripherals and hope that the regular setlist plus the five bonus songs, will keep you interested enough to merit the $169 price tag.

it really is a good game, and i'd be hard pressed not to recommend it to wii owners thinking of grabbing a copy. my only issue is still with the guitar hero iii guitar compatibility and the lack of additional songs available through dlc.

they're small points but still annoying since the 360 and PS3 versions are fully featured.

JD

neat finds: rock band on wii

2008-03-24T14:45:00.003-04:00

forever rumoured, but only recently confirmed, rock band is indeed coming to wii.

the best fake guitar game that adds drums and ~~downloadable content~~ five bonus songs, will be out on june 22nd.

and, what's that? you want a second guitar to go with it?

as part of the release announcement, harmonix also said that the peripherals for wii will come out the same day.

it also doesn't mention whether you can use the gh:iii guitars that were made for the wii with rock band for wii. but that seems like dangerous waters to tread after last time.

rockin out with my wii out,

JD

first notes: rainbow six vegas 2

2008-03-24T13:16:00.002-04:00

checked out a small little bite of rainbow six vegas 2 this weekend and i was of two minds.

first off - wow. cool. i really didn't know that a tactical shooter could be fun and not too complex for my anti fps/third person shooter brain.

i was using snake cams, organizing flash bang breach entries and hitting head shots within an hour of play. it got really fun.

but just as quickly, it got damn hard.

second - level of difficulty. now i know i'm not the best gamer out there and this is new territory for me but damnnnnnnnn!

it's just so easy to die in this game.

i even have the skill setting on 'casual' but you can still die in 2-3 shots and the ai (while dumb every so often) has super human sight which makes planning a must. this can either make or break each scenario.

the puzzle solving side of my brain is delighted that there is more than one approach to each task, but the frustrated 5 year old inside me can only take about an hour or so of this game at a time before getting disgruntled and annoyed.

i cleared a chapter fairly quickly, but am now stuck in a stand off that has me on the top floor of a night club, not able to descend down the stairs without being picked off. i have a feeling it has something to do with some cover down there i can't see, but because of the fact that i can't see it, how the hell can i get down there?

argh.

i do like it though, and my final thoughts will be encapsulated in a review in another week, once i'm further through.

sniping ur dudes in ur base,

JD

bully patch redux mk. ii

2008-03-20T16:45:00.002-04:00

so i guess i gave you guys geese too early.

supposedly, according to kotaku, bully is patched as of today at 4:30pm Eastern.

have at it and get to some ~~boy kissing~~ wedgies!

happy easter,

JD

bully patch redux (and geese too!)

2008-03-20T14:57:00.008-04:00

so, just a quick last note.

once again, rockstar are being jerks about this whole bully thing.

firstly, they've made another announcement that they will make an announcement (WHAT!?!?) tomorrow concerning the bully patch.

huh?

i guess they're all playing fully-patched versions of bully on 360, in between marathon gta IV sessions (which has probably long-ago gone gold, in glitch free versions) sipping margaritas and getting ready for the "BEST EASTER EVAR!!!".

or maybe i'm being a little harsh, but that note still seems cryptic.

i hope it means they're going to release the patch and maybe a small gift for those that have been waiting...like maybe some free dlc? a chance to beta test gta IV?

i'm not hopeful, but otherwise this is just a whole lot more teasing.

i may pull out my hair if they announce that we have another week left since they already fell through on their other promise.

to cheer you up, you bully fanatics you. here are some pictures of real live CANADIAN GEESE which i saw walking a few feet away from me in the parking lot near my work.

GEESE!

JD

it's here! (rainbow six vegas 2 edition)

2008-03-20T14:46:00.003-04:00

finally got my copy of rsv2! pretty darn excited to get it up and running as i've heard good things.

i may not be a good fps-er (or third person shooter), and i may have sucked the big one at the original rainbow six-which, to be fair, i played a total of 1 time(s)-but i've been told they've scaled the play a bit so that even the worst fps-er who didn't play a call of duty, rainbow six or anything of the like, can have fun playing.

so even i have a chance!

i will definitely be booting up the campaign mode this weekend when i go back home for some family visit time at least in between rounds of bully and rock band.

gonna love me some vegas tactical shooter.

will post impressions once i get it in the ol' 360.

later days,

JD

three (fairly obvious) reasons why i think xbox will win the (2008) console war

2008-03-20T11:46:00.005-04:00

so this is a weird topic for me, i realize, as most times i keep my opinion to myself (ha!) but i was thinking about this topic and it suddenly dawned on me.

i have a wii. i have a ds. i have a 360 and i will probably have a ps3 before too long. but there are a few select reasons why i just can't stop playing 360 and i think they're fairly universal.

even though, as i've mentioned, they're patently obvious, i thought my stunning insights were worth a blog post for those wii-ers who don't understand the appeal of a 360 (me 8 months ago) or diehard sony fanatics that have either blindly adopted the ps3 or couldn't let go of the ps2 (me 2 years ago).

achievement points, price of used games, sheer catalogue,

1) achievement points

i know. i know. i didn't want this to be a factor. but after only a scant few months of playing games on my 360, i've found out one important fact.

achievement points are addictive.

that's just a fact, like cheese-strings are awesome and the pope has to have 6'9" doorways so he won't hit his hat.

i swore to myself that i would never become a slave to achievement points or even care, but i've become addicted to that little 'boop' noise and the phrase 'achivement unlocked!'.

sony and nintendo have no counter to this and haven't even bothered to copy it.

2) catalogue

the 360 has just been around longer. there are more good games on it than any other console because of that.

that, and the fact that the wii had an extremely rough start for everything but first party-ie. nintendo-made-titles because of how new the platform was and how difficult it was to design for.

the ps3 has little excuse as they somehow went from the most sought-after console that everyone was willing and wanted to design for to the one with the bad reputation for being hard to design on and that everyone actively avoids.

3) price of games

and this is the clincher for me and many other people. even if you set aside used games, which some people do, because it's a dirty business where eb (or gamestop if you're in the US) make a ton of money and developers still struggle to stay afloat, there are the platinum titles and price cuts galore.

wii games never go on sale. and the good ones don't even depreciate more than $5 to $10 as used games! as of now there is no such thing as a wii greatest hits title, and therefore great games like super mario galaxy, no more heroes and even excitetruck (which was a launch title!) stay the same price forever.

ps3 games just seem expensive in general, they've not been around long enough for greatest hits and like the wii games, don't seem to get into the 'easy to buy' category because of high prices.

it's easy to walk into a game store and leave with a couple $10 or $20 games that are still great but came out in maybe 2006. it's harder to leave with a couple of $50, $60 or even $70 (on the ps3) games. you have to be way more choosy.

just a thought,

JD

tid-bittal update

2008-03-17T14:24:00.003-04:00

just a few notes to keep the brain juices flowing.

bully patch?

first, rockstar proved both themselves and me to be liars as the bully patch has still not surfaced.

after surfing various forums on this topic it seems that the general mood can be summed up into three categories:

1) exceedingly upset that they mentioned a date they couldn't stick to-which was a week and should have had it out by friday.*

2) refusing to open their copy until the patch is released-so, i guess, they can take it back if the patch isn't released?

3) are imploring everyone to remain calm as the patch is still on it's way, rockstar just shouldn't have promised it would be out so soon. supposedly it's already with microsoft QA-which i believe i mentioned in an earlier post-and that can sometimes take a couple of weeks.

smash bros. brawl

so i finally dug into the subspace emissary mode in earnest this weekend and i can safely come to the conclusion that it was not designed by a platformer designer.

crap if it isn't flawed.

it just seems that every other level you have impossible jumps, lose all your men, and have completely ambiguous goals.

the most important part to understand in platform video game design (to me) is that everything should serve a purpose in telling the 'story' of the game. nowhere recently has this been most evident to have been ignored than in smash bros sse mode.

there are times when you go through a door and just walk a short distance until the level fades out. i was left yelling at the tv, why is that there?

and sometimes, like in the snake challenge, you're not quite sure what you have to do to open a door you just see lights flashing. at first i thought i was doing it wrong because i kept seeing alarm lights, but then i figured out that was actually me unlocking one of the four sets of doors to progress further.

too often am i backtracking un-necessarily because nothing in the game is explicitly clear.

that said, now that i've tried some more characters and had some time to brawl a little more, it is fun.

the fighting is great, snake works-which was unexpected-and it's a good buy. it won't be a 10/10 for my review like everyone else, but there is a lot to do in brawl, even if they actual combat hasn't evolved that much.

rock band

so, after having my copy of rock band for a few months now, this weekend was my first real multiplayer experience.

my buddy andrew was over and we went through a nice little chunk of the game with him on guitar, my fiancee jen on bass and myself helming the band from the drum throne.

definitely a better experience than the single player venture and i'm beginning to understand why it's such a guitar-hero killer even though we bombed the jet song.

will rock out with my...uhhh...maybe i'll just rock out for now,

JD

*one guy even said he was going to boycott GTA IV because rockstar didn't come through with their promised patch date. i'm sure they'll be hurting when that one guy doesn't buy what will most likely be the biggest and best-selling game of 2008.

what i'm playing this week (carcasonne edition)

2008-03-14T13:17:00.004-04:00

carcassone

so you may be shocked by the title because yes, i am indeed getting hooked on that free xbox live title that was sent out in november of this year. it was the 5th anniversary of live! and ms wanted to show some love.

either way, i'm just beginning to realize how sweet and fun this game is, but i won't digress into actually explaining it. it's basically (oh well, a little exposition never hurt anybody) a city building board game where you drop pieces and try to get them to connect and close off properly to build roads, cities, monestaries and farmland. you get points if you leave a follower on the land and it gets finished.

either way, it's really fun once you get used to it, and i have the strange suspicion that i've played it before.

brawl

sadly, between this newfound obsession and not being able to let go of some of the more annoying goals in assassin's creed (flags and templars) i've been completely remiss in my brawl time.

it's not that i don't like brawl, it's just that the more i'm forced to play through the sub-space emissary mode, the more i hate nintendo for making it such a long process to unlock all the characters.

i'm just impatient and feeling a slight addiction to achievement points which i'm hoping to just as quickly curb.

reviews

other than that i've been busy writing and publishing some more reviews. just got up my hack and slash review of tony hawk: proving ground where the best thing involved was the music, and i've got an ace combat 6 (i know, old!) review in the bank for next week.

expect reviews of phones, some more games (mostly old) and other reviews to come churning out in the next couple weeks.

the (infamous) rocketmen

oh, and i got my review code for rocketmen last night. jeez. that game kind of sucks. i'm going to keep at it for now though, as i've heard that, like dead rising, it gets a lot more fun when you've upgraded your character enough to be competitive. will get a full review up of that probably next week too.

i'm a busy busy busy bee,

JD

bully patch imminent

2008-03-13T10:53:00.003-04:00

well hear it here first (or second if you frequent the site rockstar watch)...

the much lauded and completely real issues with the 360 version of bully, the scholarship edition, are nearly over.

the patch, that rockstar exec sam houser said would take a week (from last friday) is completed and just awaiting go ahead from microsoft QA.

while this news comes third hand, via a nameless rockstar contact that rockstar watch contacted, it's definitely good news.

the issues left the game virtually unplayable for some, with huge framerate issues and worse, freezing problems.

for some it just meant being a little more careful and saving every couple of missions so as not to lose a couple hours of work. for others, what is stated as a problem with the rockstar team developing on newer xbox hardware, not even entire missions are playable before freezing occurs.

the really scary thing is that it seems so random. this is almost as bad as the smash bros. crashes, except that nintendo leapt right up and told everyone to send their consoles away for 'cleaning' and would get them back within a week.

for bully 360 owners, i sincerely hope this patch is as good as they say it is.

but jeez, between guitar hero iii for wii, smash bros. and bully, it's seeming more and more dicey to buy a new game at launch.

sad sad sad,

JD

added! - a new link in the right nav

2008-03-12T16:03:00.002-04:00

just wanted to give a quick update that i've added a new link in the 'friendly links' section on the side bar.

jeff gerstmann and ryan davis, of the gamespot-gate debacle fame, have arisen from the ashes and replaced their podcast-arrowpointingdown-with a website and podcast called giant bomb.

i'm a big fan of the podcast and jeff's writing pre-firing, so even though this site is in the infancy stages, i think it's going to be great.

also check out their video series, the aptly titled 'how to build a bomb'-which will no doubt garner them some negative reactions from google, which is a neat insight into what it takes to start your own games website (and the thousands of dollars they appear to be investing.

smash bros. impressions

just wanted to give an update that smash bros. is indeed fun. not sure how much more fun it is than the last two games, but it's neat.

i think it's gotta be the depth of interaction that's stemming the good early reviews because for me, the platforming part of the game just ain't cutting it.

tried to play a little while with jen last night but we both got bored and quit to take up our respective couch hobbies. assassin's creed for me and surfing/blogging/e-mailing for her.

the actual 'smashing'-which is how i refer to the brawl element-is fun but without a big group of people or trying the online play, there's not much to report.

meta knight still kicks ass and i've concluded that the sideways wiimote, and the wiimote and nunchuck combo control schemes are useless. it's wavebird of classic controller all the way.

if anyone thinks any different i'll ~~cut their arms off~~ ~~smite them with all my might~~ be interested to hear about it.

have a smashing and stealthy evening, i know i will,

JD

p.s. i've also figured out how to put my gamercard in the sidebar...so that's new. i know i've not got much in the way of gamerscore but i've only had the 360 2 months, lay off.

it's here!

2008-03-11T11:23:00.004-04:00

well, now i feel a little silly about my excitement, but i really am dying to get another crack at this game-SSBB.

the small delay in getting it only further whetted my appetite. it ended up arriving at 5:15, 10 minutes after i left work, and 15 minutes after a receptionist was there to receive it.

another employee on my floor took it in, shoved it in my mail folder in the mailroom, and was goodly enough to leave me a voice mail to tell me it was here (since he didn't know where my desk was).

in my haste to grab it out of the mailroom, i forgot to take down his name and deleted the message. so here's a thank you to the anonymous dude that saved my smash.

arm and legfuls of gratitude,

JD

a rockstar contact

2008-03-10T16:31:00.004-04:00

i'm going to need you all to hold your breath right now.

i may have found, through the wonders of google, a pr contact for rockstar games.

for me, this is a little like finding the freaking holy grail.

not that rockstar games are a be-all end-all for me, but it's just that i've been trying to find any form of contact for them for months.

even before my ea/rock band hunt, rockstar was on my list of 'definitely need to get in touch withs'.

oh, and i'm getting semi-jazzed over gta iv. it's shaping up to be quite the game, and a possible return to form for the cats at rockstar. they lost me with san andreas, have kept me unimpressed with the shabby bully port but i'm hoping they rehook me with IV, and make me all misty eyed for the long nights spent awake playing the first GTA and skipped classes in high school to get in some GTA: III action.

if anybody has navigated their site, you'll understand why it caused me so much grief, but huzzah, i will be elated, at least until i figure out that it's a dead e-mail address.

in other news...

here's my review for lost odyssey, as promised.

now that didn't take so long, did it?

anxiously anticipating some brawling,

JD

the waiting game (ssbb edition)

2008-03-10T13:38:00.008-04:00

so it's been said before, but is worth noting again that i'm not that excited for super smash bros. brawl.

that is, at least i wasn't.

this weekend i absorbed some of the fever-and stupidity-of the smash bros. fanatics when i visited a larger mall eb games on sunday.

yes, i realize that i was remiss to forget nintendo's decision to release a game on a freakin' sunday, but i nevertheless managed to block out all the nerdling-more than me even-conversations concerning whether stores were sued if they broke street dates and whether or not eb had any copies that weren't already pre-ordered/spoken for.

through that haze of ugliness i did pick up a little excitement-seeing the wall of copies behind the cash at the big mall eb-and now am eagerly anticipating my review copy and starting to worry that the pr firm weren't lying that there is a 'waiting list' and that some folks will have to wait for copies to filter back before getting their hands on one.

i know it's all just anticipation osmosis, but it's fun to be part of it sometimes, isn't it?

i was also contacted by capcom this morning with a new one, an xbox live game review for their new ip, rocketmen.

weird. i've never dealt with review codes or live games before so it'll be interesting if they ever send it to me.

other than that it's just the norm, pumping out a few more past-due reviews (lost odyssey full review and tony hawk: proving grounds should be up this week) and gliding effortlessly through my recently acquired copy of assassin's creed.

stalking the shadows (god that sounds lame),

JD

p.s. just ran into the runner/courier guy for the pr firm that handles nintendo's stuff as i was handing back a very late held copy of the wii fire emblem game and he had nothing to hand me. not a good sign. not a good sign at all.

issues of parenting and bully(ing)

2008-03-05T16:31:00.004-05:00

so rockstar has re-released bully on two new consoles and with it comes the controversy.

oh rockstar, where would you be without controversy?

i mean, i get it, teachers want to protect children from bullying. they want to see violence that is too close to a schoolyard and they want to think that somehow it will be another columbine, or somehow just a widespread increase in locker stuffing, slingshot toting bart simpson wannabes...

the real truth in this, at least to me, is that all they're doing is highlighting a small genre of game and helping rockstar shift copies.

after a quick check, it seems the esrb rated this one teen.

there's no guns, no sex, no alien boobies on gritty looking soldier (a la the mass effect controversy). nope, this is a fairly clean game for rockstar.

but what seems to still cause controversy is that it happens in a school, with a 15 year old protagonist who takes vengeance on people who mistreat him.

now i'm not saying that this is admirable or even tolerable behaviour and i had my share of beatdowns in elementary school. but it's hardly the kind of content to get up in arms over.

oh yeah, and you can kiss dudes in this. not sex, not anything particularly lascivious, but you can have same-gender boyfriends.

it's hardly worth even caring about, seeing as how most 13 year olds i've met play call of duty 4 (which has a lot more than slingshots) and grand theft auto: san andreas (which subs actual prostitutes for girlfriends and grenades for stink bombs).

i know, i know, i agree. they shouldn't be playing those games, but the reality is, most of them are. most of the male (and female) younger set are getting their grubby little paws on these games and they're doing it younger than ever. they're not playing carnival games, no. they're playing games with guns, sex, and whatnot and i don't think actively trying to take them away is the right way to fix the problems.

i think it's all on the parents.

sorry, parents, i love you, but you have two duties towards video games and that's it.

1) know what your kid is playing.

it's dead easy with the current generation of consoles. i know specifically that both the wii and the xbox 360 keep a log of the games played and the wii even shows how much time was spent on each.

but that's not just what i meant. you should also know what your kid is playing. i know they think you're uncool and you want to be. but for god sakes, just play the game once. play it with them, or sit with them and have them explain it. if that fails, look it up on the internet.

2) contextualize.

now, some would take that first point and run off and take the games away. i'm against this kind of behaviour because a) it makes whatever you're taking away seem more desirable and b) they're going to find a way to play it anyways.

all kids have friends whose parents are less observant (or more open) than you.

just because you take it away doesn't mean it's gone.

so, in light of this, along with playing the games, try to explain the context to your kid. let them know that, while in a game it's ok, that in real life, it's not as simple.

this may seem like common sense, but you have no idea how many kids can't see the blurry lines between media and reality.

in my day, it was kids copying wrestling moves and injuring and killing each other. now it can be just as dangerous if there's no adult figure there to explain it.

the bottom line:

if you make games taboo, it just means kids will do it behind your back and at times when they've got no help understanding the images they see.

game with your kids, and stay educated. as always the best offense is a good defense, and the best defense knows the other teams plays.

sorry for the preachiness,

JD

when it rains...(podcast list)

2008-02-28T15:21:00.003-05:00

so i've been thinking.

i think it's fair to assume that most people have an ipod or an mp3 player (note the distinction that no, an ipod is not just an mp3 player) these days.

to get the full use out of it, one cannot subsist on a diet of fallout boy, pearl jam and cobra starship alone...

for me, i filled the gap that comes when you can look at 6 gigs of music and not find anything that you haven't listened to in a while, with podcasts.

podcasts can be anything, but for me they need a few elements to be listenable.

i like recordings that don't ignore audio rules, like quality mics, mixing, levels and planned topics and i like personalities.

so here is my short list of podcasts that make me laugh and look a little crazy on the subway:

1) radio bam - yes, this is not a podcast. it's actually a ripped (see: stolen) mp3 of bam margera's radio show on sirius satellite radio, but because it's on sirius, there are no holds barred as to the content or language on it. it's always funny, always interesting (if you find skateboarding or jackass antics even remotely funny) and sometimes he gets some rad guests.

2) smodcast - another pseudo celeb podcast here. kevin smith (auteur of clerks, mallrats, dogma, chasing amy, jersey girl, jay and bob strike back, clerks ii and now filming zack and miri make a porno) and his longtime friend/producer/fellow canadian scott mosier make a properly recorded and well produced podcast with only their own banter filling almost an hour. while it's toted as being weekly, expect busy smith times (like now, since he's currently filming the previously mentioned flick starring seth 'the man' rogen) to have blackout weeks where no podcast surfaces. always racy, most often funny, a quality download.

3) arrow pointing down - a great little find and it's brand new to boot. jeff gerstmann (formerly of gamespot until a very scrutinized and very public firing*) and another former gamespot editor, ryan davis, make a very odd-topic and quick moving podcast about, ostensibly video games, but they often spend more time talking about gatorade, candy bars, and sleeping til 2 now that they're both out of work. if you like video games and funny dudes shooting the shit, this is another great one.

that's it. three. but i'm sure there are more good ones out there, possibly better than my picks, but for some reason i thought that maybe people might like to see what i was listening to.

layabout love to you all (as in, that doesn't involve moving from a prone position in front of the tv, controller in hand),

JD

*for more on gerstmann-gate read: here and the one below it. there are some links.

long time no update

2008-02-28T15:04:00.003-05:00

well, i haven't updated in a while because...well...i have very little to say.

i mean, it's rare that i ever have nothing to say about a topic, it's just that there isn't a whole lot going on that interests me right now.

smash bros.

smash bros isn't out til march 3rd, and i'm not guaranteed a copy right then either. i guess, as opposed to fire emblem and other less desirables, the pr company that front nintendo in canada has been inundated with requests for loaners of this particular game.

now, if i were nintendo, i would want every person who could write about smash, to have a copy in their possession before launch, but that's just me. they're so super secretive about the unlockables in the game, the new characters, and basically everything but the main brawling that i don't think exposure is even a concern.

with the dojo and the fact that most American (or Japanese i guess) companies put very little money into Canadian press, i've not got my hopes up.

gaming these days

but it's not to say that i'm not gaming. in fact, the predominant use of my time recently has been plugging away at a few select games.

i've given up on mass effect entirely, so that's one thing i've stopped worrying about. there's just too much talking and too much walking. it's too much like real life i guess, but with more aliens and guns.

nhl 2008

i am almost through my inaugral nhl 2008 season finally! i've had the game for many moons but always played a few games here and there. i mean, i love the game and the new controls, i just kept getting rad games to take up my time.

lost odyssey

i've also breached the third disk in lost odyssey and i'm finding that, with a good chunk of the game done, i'm still loving the combat but finding it hard to sit down and play.

why? because once you get into a dungeon or new area, it's damn hard to put down.

for one, the save points later in the game can be few and far between. now, i rarely die in these instances, but the situation between me and my fiancee tends to detoriorate as i keep saying 'just one more minute...i seriously just need to find the next save point...'. this problem is documented here on kotaku.

skate.

and when i'm not playing hockey, or defeating giant bugs and enchanted thugs in lost odyssey, i'm battling xbox live and ea nation to get some online skate action in.

i don't think i've been this obsessed with a sports game since the first two tony hawks came out. it's really really good. course, connecting to games is a pain in the arse and i can't figure out if the matchmaking fails so many times due to ea, live!, my internet connection or some combination of two or three of those ingredients.

so, i can say that at least i'll keep busy until smash, mario kart wii, or anything else compelling are released.

later days,

JD

and now's my time to chime in...

2008-02-21T14:04:00.002-05:00

so, the much rumoured commodore games to vc move has happened.

annouced at GDC (games developers conference) today and reported on kotaku, it seems that there will indeed be commodore 64 games on the wii's virtual console.

my first thoughts were 'yeah! i get to play all those games i loved playing in grade 3 on huge floppy disks with that worn out joystick in ms. davis' class!'. but then i read a little lower.

The first titles to appear on the VC will be International Karate and Uridium, priced to go at 500 Wii points each.

excuse my french but, pardon eh moi?

you're saying that games that ran on a computer i wouldn't use as a paperweight now...well, maybe as a paperweight actually, but anyways, games that run on a computer that's over 20 years old are going to cost the same as NES games? in my first-and hopefully only use of internet lingo in this blog-WTF!

i mean come on! how is that the same value as an NES game. i'll gladly pay $5 for a working and easy to boot version of blades of steel or kirby, but commodore 64 games? f no.

just had to chip that in there. i think it's patently ridiculous.

either way, i've had not much more success with lost odyssey this week, haven't touched rock band for that same amount of time and got the skate. glitch i've heard so much about.

but that's about my week as it stands. the rest of it? there's a guy coming to look at our pipes (not like that you dirty minded jerks) tonight to try and fix the persistant wet patch in the middle of our living room (yay for carpet!) and i'm going to try to get off the first disk of lost odyssey by the weekend.

happy trails, pardners...

JD

what i'm playing this week (whatchoo playin'?)

2008-02-19T15:48:00.003-05:00

so, as the man who is always at least a year behind the times, i'm digging on two games that are way old, and one that is brand new this week.

right now, i'm dedicating the majority of my time to completing every last offline objective in skate. holy crap is it good. but i'm guessing you know this, as it came out like 6 months ago.

and even further back, dead rising came out. yes i've had a 360 for only a couple months, so give me a little credit, but oh man, once you get above around level 14, this game becomes fun defined. i've plateued as of late, but i may go back to it for a few more achievements and unlockables.

but most recently, i was sent, without asking for it, a copy of the 4-disk epic lost odyssey.

now, before i got ahold of a copy, i was seriously making fun of this game.

i mean, not only was it made by mistwalker, the company behind the atrociously long and boring blue dragon, which i have infamously not spent more than 2 hours on, but it was rumoured to clock in at 4 disks long, and was touted as 'too simplistic an rpg to be exceptional'.

well, take everything you've heard so far about lost odyssey and forget it.

like the protagonist in the story, get amnesia, and then pick up this game.*

i mean, if you hate rpgs, or if you've never played ff vii (or don't know what that means) then skip it.

but for everyone else, this is epic. it's a lot of reading, yes. and it's a lot of long cut scenes. there's also a fairly simplistic fighting and weapon/skill management system, but this is what makes the game so fun.

it's not just about the battles and the collectibles (though those themselves are still really, really fun), the game is as much about the story as it is about the journey.

it's just a rad rad japanese cinema epic, housed in a four disk game. i really expected to hate it, but i've been missing out on precious hours playing skate for this game. and as for value, it's 4 disks, which i've heard are almost 10 hours apiece if you're not snooping around too much, so you get a pretty nice ton of gameplay.

it may be a little too much like ff vii, and that may have something to do with why i'm so infatuated with it, but either way, the implication of a game being too much like ff vii is preposterous to begin with. it just increases its cred.

either way, i'm having fun with a game i expected to yawn at and place neatly in the pile marked 'don't open til bored and poor' with tony hawk: proving ground and blue dragon.

dreaming dreams of a thousand years,

JD

*if you need help with this, there is a rad episode of south park where cartman attempts to knock himself out so he can travel back in time in a vision to see the signing of the declaration of independence and not have to do research for his report. it's f-ing fantastic! it'll give all you kiddies loads of great ideas for conking yourself out, amnesia or no...

suh-suh-suh-suh... SUPER SMASH BROS BRAWL

2008-02-13T09:48:00.002-05:00

i know that's a little more emotion than i'm prone to show, so i'll calm it down there.

count to 10 and backwards.

there are a few different reasons i feel this way. partly it's out of excitement because smash is very fun to play. i don't think anyone needs to set aside any time for worrying about whether or not they've done the series justice or whether or not there is enough inside the game.

trust me. it's giant. it's giantess is not exceeded by any other offering. and it looks like nintendo is mopping up the mistakes they've made previously, both in smash offerings and in wii versions of cult series (ie. strikers).

but without further ado, here are my impressions, replete with *SPOILERS*, which aren't really spoilers unless you're intent on knowing absolutely nothing about the game before launch day. and really, who managed that so far?

premise

not as different or as crazy as you'd expect barring the obvious disappearance of master hand as an adversary. there's a new evil boss in town changing our heroes into helpless statues.

the polygons, once the faceless and mostly shapeless fighters for a group of weird looking dudes called primids.

but all of this info is useless for two reasons: 1) because i've forgotten the name of the bad boss - a fact i was told but failed to write down and 2) it has little to do with whether or not the game played well.

gameplay

this is a true smash game. i tried every controller configuration in my 45 minutes battling with other game journos (of which i was victorious about 30% of the time).

the sideways wiimote style is actually functional and a great intro for mums, dads, kids and the like as it doesn't lend itself to the 'there's that many buttons james? how the hell do you expect me to do that' kind of look.

from there you can add a little extra control and comfort by adding a nun-chuk or classic controller.

for me, though, the best feeling controls came from a wavebird (or wireless gc controller) that took me back to the good old days of melee and the original.

the controls feel tight, if not a little too tight - as i was constantly sending starfox off the sides of small stages with him jumping around like a madman.

but when you finally connected a smash attack, it felt legen...wait for it...dary.

the final smash, i'm still not sold on. for those of you who've seen video of this device, where you have to run around and kick/hit/punch a glowing orb to activate your devastating final smash, it's just as weird in the game as in the video.

i really hope you can tune the game to not include this feature because if you can't, it may get old fast.

features

but features and customization are where this game take off and leave other wii games feeling quite un-featured.

firstly, there's the expanded and involved single player campaign, the subspace emissary. according to the nintendo rep, it could be packaged as a game in it's own, and is a multi-hour jaunt of sidescrolling action.

the great thing about it is, much like teenage mutant ninja turtles ii: the arcade game on the NES and double dragon a second player can jump in at any time to help out the 1st player.

their role and the character they play will change based on the goals of the mission, but it's a nice feature, especially when you consider how rad it was to have a second player be able to hop on during galaxy.

there's also the biggest feature that i haven't touched on yet that is going to blow some minds...

a level editor.

that's right, nintendo has gone mod-tastic with this game. not only can you create your own levels, with your own music and pieces, but you can send them to friends over wifi and play on them.

oh, but that's not all, you can also submit them to nintendo, much like miis in the look at mii channel, to potentially become the featured download of the month that will be automatically shipped to smash owners who are subscribers to the smash service

now, while this sounds amazing, my first question after this announcement went unanswered and is still burning a whole in my brain. how much space do these levels take up?

i mean, i know they're not going to be as intensely detailed as a normal map, but the wii doesn't have an external 20 gb hard drive (the minimum size of hd for competing consoles) so how many maps can we keep at a time. this is especially a concern if we're being sent extras as part of a download service.

i also asked about possible featured dlc (downloadable content) straight from the developers at nintendo, and while i was told this was a possibility, i was also told it's not planned right now.

there's also the regular features in the stadium section, like multi-man marathon fights, homerun challenge and target smash. when i asked about race to the finish, i was just told that there are some cool unlockables in the game with a wry grin. no idea what that means.

chars

so, as some people who have already talked to me on the subject know, this was the only really disappointing part of the whole demo. while i got to try a bit of the single player campaign (FUN!) and brawled with my fellow journos (WHEE!) we were only shown a fraction of the game and were certainly not shown any of the sought after, unlockable characters.

this was a little heartbreaking for me as i was really looking forward to seeing snake and sonic in action, but i was told i'd have to wait until march like the rest of you schmucks for that privilege too.

the ones i did try were cool and i'll give a brief rundown on some old favorites and new ones too:

pokemon trainer

god, i hope this guy doesn't suck as much as he seemed to when i played with him. for one, it's not completely obvious how to change pokemon while you're fighting, and bulbasaur sucked. i also found out that you can't plug in a new attachment while playing, which may have affected my experience with the pokemon trainer. there was a five minute stretch where i couldn't move horizontally, only vertically and attack.

basically, it seems as if all his attacks are too simple and the variety is supposed to come with the different pokemon. lame.

link

ahhhh, link. one of my old favorites from melee, who as an old favorite from smash bros. 64. he handles just as he should, a little on the heavy side but with some fantastic attacks. that, and he comes in a wicked 'dark link' colour as one of his alternate costumes. rad looking to say the least.

he also won me the first battle of the afternoon, which was super rad. i immediately established my dominance. it was quickly taken out from under my feet by the guy who was there who actually competed for mlg in smash bros. melee, but i had a nice and brief reign of dominatingness...

bowser

the first character i got to perform a final smash with. giga bowser has to be seen to understood. it f-in' rocked.

overall, his attacks seem comparable if not the same as melee, but it kind of felt like his up and b (the shell spin) attack's power was reduced a little.

marth

loved him in melee. indifferent to him in brawl. just doesn't feel as quick or as powerful. had a hard time performing regular smash attacks with him. doesn't mean he's written off, but wasn't a particularly fun time. will need to spend more time with him when i get a copy.

metaknight

left this little dude for last because of how much ass i kicked with him. holy crap. i can't even remember what series he's from (i think maybe kirby?) but he's got this arial spinning attack that is devastating. and it's not just a straight line or a diagonal attack. it's sort of like a combo of fox's firefox with captain falcon's kick, but with a suck-in drilling action.

i know that makes no sense but he's really fun to play with and that attack i just detailed goes in a straight line, but can be bent downwards to follow a moving target slightly.

overall

loved it. still disappointed over the lack of secret characters on display at the demo, but i guess it just makes me more eager for the march drop date.

i hope the multiplayer is better, faster and more reliable than strikers and i'll let you guys know the minute i know if the world play is for real, or a lie (like strikers was).

hugs and kisses (during the retardedly delayed post i've been working on since tuesday) and happy v-day,

JD

a little smash bros. brawl anyone?

2008-02-10T10:43:00.000-05:00

just a quick weekend update because i forgot to blog about this on friday.

i was too busy running around trying to get stuff ready for another wedding-prep weekend and missed an important point.

tomorrow, at 4pm i will become one of the first people in canada to try out nintendo's new smash bros. game.

i know, i know, it's already out in japan, but since neither i, nor any of my friends are in japan, this is kind of a big deal to me.

got the invite last week, but it's just starting to set in. i was a pretty big smash fan back when it debuted on the 64, and i liked the gamecube entry quite a bit as well. didn't put nearly as many hours into that one as the original, but that doesn't mean brawl won't hook me back into it (at least until soul calibur iv comes out).

will post impressions on tuesday as i'm sure i'll have something to say about it (or at the very least about what it's like to play as solid snake!).

excelsior!

JD

demo'd - the club and turok edition

2008-02-06T10:32:00.000-05:00

so it's a two-fer to make up for missed days today, and here are two games that i had unexpected reactions to.

being that i'm really not much of an fps-er (due in part to my massive amount of suckage in the genre that stems back to early attempts at doom and quake in the mid-nineties) i had two expectations coming into these two:

1) i would like turok, since i didn't mind the 64 game, way back, and i couldn't see a foreseeable way to not like a game with raptors and guns.

2) i would hate 'the club' since the premise and gameplay sounded kind of stupid, basically a tony hawk style multiplayer combined with killing people using semi-automatic weaponry.

as is expected i was wrong on both counts.

demo'd: turok

scenary

well, for the demo, they went with the tired old beef of mine, the underground/closed in space level where there is nowhere to hide or run.

it looked ....alright i guess, but because of the lack of light and constantly being jumped by vicious velociraptors, it was hard to appreciate my surroundings.

chars

the dude, for this i'll call him john turok*, as i can't remember if that's his name or not, is another 'deep-talker' carrying a big stick, or automatic weapon really.

he's not big on the personality, but more on the ridiculously obvious statements like 'be careful' or 'this looks strange' when he sees a corpse.

gameplay

not only is he a little shy, mr. turok can't fight worth s**t. at least not with me at the controls. it may have been partly due to my suckage at fps games, or the fact that i'm tired or playing claustrophobic levels with monotone backgrounds (see. cave) that don't feel fun in any way.

i started off with a partner in crime, and very quickly, he too was seperated from me, leaving me to be quickly taken down by 4 raptors, while i shot bullets that must have been made of pillows or marshmallows, because they didn't seem to effect or slow down any of the dinosaurs i was shooting.

so, yeah, i felt that maybe the gameplay wasn't balanced. again, i concede i may just suck, but it wasn't fun...really at all.

controls

there were some. they were pretty much what you'd expect. right trigger shoot, left stick move.

verdict

this is a big miss for me, which is a shame, because i was decently anticipating this one. i just don't see a reason to track down someone to try out a game with a miserable, predictable and un-fun demo.

demo'd: le (the) club

premise

for this one, i feel the premise (or lack thereof) for this game is important to understanding it.

the plot, i guess, is that you play one of a number of differently skilled assassin's, mercenaries, former cops and soldiers and just plain whack jobs that have been offered a sum of money (or to be taken away from their debts and criminal records) to compete in a tournament where man-hunting and killing is the name of the game.

if this sounds a lot like the premise to bruce lee's last and greatest work, enter the dragon then you and i are on the same page.

gameplay

the club - or le club as i've come to refer to it - plays a lot like a game of pinball, or tony hawk. while the aim is the same as most fps's in that you need to get from point a to point b while shooting a bunch of guys, there is one fundamental difference.

like a game of pinball, but more like tony hawk and other 'extreme' sports games, for each kill you get, you get another bar of multiplier to your score. but to keep this multiplier going, you need to keep getting kills. it will slowly tick down for every second you spend not killing. after a certain amount of time, it will move down to the next lowest multiplier until eventually bottoming out.

you still have to balance this against health concerns and eventual exit of the level, but you are also rewarded, much like tony hawk, for variety of kills - headshots, zoomed in snipe shots, explosive shots, etc. - and penalized for doing a lot of the same.

while i don't think i'll be checking out the full game, it's at least nice to see some innovation in the fps genre beyond fancier weapons and nicer graphics.

controls

it has some but you probably won't need to worry about most of them besides the different location of the 'jump' or 'roll' commands and the 'zoom' one. these will just give you a boost in your killing if you work them into your 'lines'.

verdict

a cool little shooter that, for fans of the genre, may well be worth checking out, though without more details on the depth of the full game, i'd hesitate before buying it new.

and that's my little taste of demo'd for today, i hope it satiates your burning desire for information on gaming for now.

will update later when there's more news to report.

cha...

JD

*during my search for photos to illustrate the 'bullets that do nothing' in turok, i found out the main character in turok is actually called joseph turok! so i really wasn't far off...

i just want to blog!

2008-02-05T15:28:00.000-05:00

honestly i do! unfortunately, i'm knee deep in it right now, so my first impressions on the 'turok' and 'the club' demo, and final thoughts on metroid and fire emblem on wii will have to wait for a less busy day.

but i promise that they're coming! and not like i promised to put up a huge update about san francisco, replete with a story chronicling my stay, promise. no, these will actually come to pass soonish!

later days and lazier times (missing),

JD

demo'd - devil may cry 4

2008-01-31T09:22:00.000-05:00

there's been a couple of very interesting, very hyped demos that have arrived on live in the last little while. as part of a new thing i'm going to do, i'm going to grab em while they're still hot, cool em off in my xbox hard drive, boot them up and give them a go.

then, initial impressions of these unifinished balls of clay will come to be.

so, for my first demo'd, i took a crack at devil may cry 4.

this is a series near and dear to my bro's heart, having loved up all the ps2 entries of the series and ranting and raving about how i should 'definitely check them out though they can sometimes be a bitch to beat'.

this is my first toe dip in dmc water, so i grabbed my muted green xbox controller and started it up.

locale

now, first off, the settings in this game exude cool. they're super old looking (great adjectives, i know!) but in the kind of run down, shadowed way.

chars

the bad guys, in all their f-d up mutated glory, are really cool and got me excited about this game from the get go. but then came the combat.

gameplay

now, i'm not saying the combat isn't deep, because as a dmc newb, there may be subtleties that i just don't know about. but to my mind this was a button masher at it's core.

one button for punch, another for your 'devil-bringer' sword and another for your gun. throw in a jump button and you're playing a platforming beat em up.

again, i could be missing something, but while the combat felt 'fun' for the 10 minute intro ride, it didn't feel like it would last. not to mention that nearing the end of my 10 minutes (which they've tailored so you can't get tooooo far in the game) i came to some enemies that were the first to do actual damage to my character.

that was the weird thing. it didn't feel too balanced. i took no damage and was f-ing guys up left and right a moment before, and then suddenly WHAM! i was between two intimidating looking mother f-ers on a field of ice (whereas i was previously in a burnt out city) who i couldn't do a whole lot of damage to and who seemed to suddenly be smacking me around like a cat with a 3 armed mouse.

overall fun-acity

the overall fun-ness of this game, will completely rely on getting the balance right between the strength of your character and that of the bad dudes (surprise, surprise) and i sincerely hope there is some form of level upgrade to make you a little more prepared for the bigger and stronger guys.

demo'd!

JD

a new link

2008-01-28T15:15:00.000-05:00

if you check the right hand sidebars, and there are a few there, one of the tables is called 'friendly links'.

it's not always easy to find good stuff on the web. but i've found a few cool things in my travels and try to help those cool things out all i can.

i thought i could do a quick bit of explaining why those links are there and why they're worth checking out.

well, they're not in front of me right now, so if i miss one, forgive me:

jen the journalist - a lady friend of mine who is in the very relatable position of trying to find a full time job in journalism in an unfamiliar city. good read when she remembers to post (though i'm sure after this post she'll remind me that i need to keep checking).

hockey girl - the same lady friends' alter ego blogging for a paper on, you guessed it, hockey. very fun column that has a loyal fanbase and i hear that it's now being syndicated in the chronicle herald in halifax.

glenjm - a nice 'ol guy from halifax who's an actor by trade and a thief by necessity. well, i'm only guessing about the thief part, but his acting chops are way good! you may have seen him in the hobo with a shotgun trailer that won the grindhouse competition. checkout his travelogue - 'stupid foreigner', 'jog or die' or really any of his vids. they're a good time and he's not a bad blogger either.

zero punctuation - a new addition that i've been a fan of for some time. it's ben 'yahtzee' croshaw's alter ego. if you like video games, swearing and random images this is for you. but as long as you don't mind swearing, random images and the occasional reference to beastiality, this guys videos are ridiculously funny. he reviews games, but in a completely off-the-wall kind of way. i'll stop slobbering now, though.

penny arcade - a webcomic that defines what is good about web comics. cutting, snarky and almost always video game focussed, these are well written, well drawn and come out 3 times a week. always good for a laugh or if you're only mildly concerned with games coverage, good to keep up on what's hot in the gaming community.

kotaku - my bible. i have a tab open with this blog all day and refresh it every 20 minutes or so. they have constant updates on news, rumours, and previews of all the games you want to hear about, but they write them in such a way as to keep it fresh, funny and interesting. they also wield a medeivel weapon called the 'ban-hammer' to keep the commenters in their discussion section for each article productive and less 'fanboyish'. i am a proud member and commenter (going by pggb as my handle).

wired.com's game|life blog - a lot of content is duplicate between kotaku and game|life but there are still some nuggets of gold on here like Chris Koehler's all night Rock Band preview party live blog. that was sweet. they have a large assortment of different writers who have really cool takes on video games and industry changes.

i will probably change, edit and add to my list of links as days go by and will try to always keep you, mr. reader, abreast of the changes.

excelsior!

JD

a slow day

2008-01-28T14:59:00.000-05:00

another dreary monday for games. not much new on the horizon to get excited for just yet but it can all change.

for one thing, rez hd comes out this wednesday on live. and with 3 controller vibration support, this will be the best ~~sexual stimulant~~ shoot em up in the live library.

but honestly, i have heard that the game in mind-blowing and fun in the geometry wars, everyday shooter type of way, and that the vibration does add a certain element to the game.

in other news, i found the free live apology game to be quite boring, as underwater 2D fighting, that looks kind of 3D was never high on my priority list to play. really not into it right now.

i am, however, slowly getting into dead rising, a game i am woefully late to get a chance at first hand, but i'm finding the whole 'play over and over again until you can survive and win the main story line' thing kind of tedious. dying has never been easy for me to take in games, and it seems that the only way to get high enough stats to survive for long stretches of time is to do just that. it's counter-intuitive.

lastly, the king of kong: a fistful of quarters dvd has been dated, and it's coming out on the 29th in america. please check it out, gamers and non-gamers alike. it's another 'drag your girlfriend or dubious fiancee to movie' that will win them over. the plot line, while maybe not 100% accurate, as i stated before, is hard to not get dragged into.

hoping for more exciting developments down the line,

JD

force unleashed?

2008-01-25T12:33:00.000-05:00

well it's fairly free, but still a little domesticated...

just joking, but honestly, this game looks re-frigging-diculous!

this is the equivalent of star wars porn for any nerd that holds the original trilogy near and dear to their heart (like me) - so long as you don't count the actual star wars pornography that probably exists out there.

follow the link. thank me later. it not only looks fun to play, it looks like crackdown meets frigging episode v! the only troubling bit in the entire clip is the white rancor and that dopey looking plant planet.

besides that, i'm sold lucasarts. take my wallet now as you will own it whenever you are gracious enough to streetdate (wikipedia says august 26, 2008, but who knows) this game.

please let it play as good as it looks! please!

help me obi-wan kenobi, you're my only hope,

JD

rock band has arrived in canada...in a BIG WAY

2008-01-23T10:28:00.000-05:00

after numerous reports that rock band quantities were negligible and fears that you should start getting worried about getting a copy, it seems like everywhere you look, those big blue boxes are staring you in the face.

i know, that i, like everyone else, grabbed one the instant i saw it, fearing i might never have another chance to own one.

for the benefit of the few people to read my blog, i've documented my excursion, and disappoint/glee that there are now copies of rock band everywhere, where there were none a week prior (at least none that were on sale):

wal-mart near the cash.

wal-mart again, this time above the game accessories.

wal-mart the third, i guess they ran out of room on the floor and over the 360 stuff, to they stacked some extra boxes above the old ps2 cabinet that's in the back corner of the electronic's section.

this is the stack they now have in eb, after they guy told me they had 'a couple' in stock. they were receiving another shipment as i took this picture...

and this was in starstruck, a lame movie store in the scarboro town center. they too got a late shipment.

and don't delude yourself into thinking that these were only the ps3 versions that no one was buying before, there is an almost 50/50 balance, if not more of the 360 versions out there now.

i guess the droughts were just speculation and rock band won't turn into the next wii consumer frenzy.

loving the rock, but hating the block,

JD

*edit*

you can see for yourself how many are xbox360 versions by clicking the pictures.

i had no idea how detailed the pics were that i can take with my blackberry.

also, by block in my sign off, i meant how sometimes it kind of feels like stores hold out supplies until they can shelve a ton of merch. so 'block' is as-in how eb c**k blocks me everytime something good comes out. peace.

tidbits and news

2008-01-22T12:58:00.000-05:00

so i guess i jumped the gun a little saying that activision had sorted out that whole eensy weensy guitar hero iii for wii problem. you know...the one where they didn't get stereo sound? you don't remember that because guitar hero iii came out a while ago?

well, i had said that it was cleared up, and in reality, only now have they said that replacement disks are being shipped out...in february.

so don't get too excited guitar-wiiers, you will have to deal with mono sound and unfun guitar face-offs for another little while.

bad santa

i also procured two of the things that were on my most wanted list from well before christmas. santa may have come late for me (between december 26th to january 19th) but he sure came up big!

- a 30" hdtv - as described below
- a halo 3 version xbox 360 - complete with 0 copies of the game included!
- and a copy of... wait for it.... ROCK BAND!

i was cruising my 'near-work' eb and saw some boxes around of the ps3 version so i casually asked 'got any rock band special editions for the 360?' and was told that my lucky ship had arrived.

so yes, i'm now in the midst of trying to sync another rhythm game to my hdtv, having just kind of figured ghiii out a week ago.

but in the fun-factor rating system, it measures a whopping 11.5 our of a possible 10 fun-ness points.

jen and i have been rocking out to many hits, and like all other reviewers, i found the single player experience a dish best served in one bite, quickly. it's not very deep is what i'm saying.

playing in a 'band' however, is sweet. we've even taken turns singing-to moderate success-and still had fun. need to get over a proper group to do it up right though...

rocking the free and domesticated worlds,

JD

re: gaming news update: 1/4/08

2008-01-18T15:58:00.000-05:00

guess who was right?

so what do we get for the rampant and persistant xbox live! outages up to, including and since christmas?

like i said earlier, a crappy-or from what i've heard, pretty good-old-ass xbox live arcade game.

not exactly blowing my socks off microsoft. why couldn't they just give us a bunch of points, like a significant amount of points, say...enough to change your gamercard name-800-or maybe get a couple of arcade games you have wanted to for a while, maybe some rock band dlc...

either way, i'm not too impressed. although silver members can get it too...

angry in my passiveness,

JD

big update coming

2008-01-16T13:41:00.000-05:00

sorry, forgot to mention that i would be mostly incommunicado whilst in san fran and would be completely remiss in my blog posting.

i will post a couple of updates with pictures from my san fran adventures, the steve jobs keynotes-complete with horrible pictures taken in the dark-the macworld show floor and other randoms.

i've had some really interesting experiences while here-a lot of which i didn't have the foresight or quickness to document on film-and i'm really excited to try to remember some of them and get them down in print.

thinking of you all fondly and in various dirty ways,

JD

oh, and check here for the pcworld.ca blog. i'm going to put up a few updates from macworld-and a couple from home about macworld-so...READ IT!

the microsoft saga has come to an end

2008-01-10T13:13:00.001-05:00

they want it back.

officially, that is.

the console i was so graciously loaned at first is now requested back POSTE HASTE!

no amount of avoiding replying to e-mails and not picking up the phone saved me as a strongly worded e-mail called my bluff and i responded.

i've now got my sights set on the halo 3 branded xbox's that best buy is liquidating as we speak for the same price as the pro model.

why the halo 3 model?

well, not because of a great affinitiy for the brand, but because it isn't another white console (like my wii), it's different looking than most other people's and it comes with a quick charge kit and rechargeable battery for the controller. Those kits cost around $30 or more new, and the whole package is only $399. we'll see if i can get one before they sell out, though.

also finalizing all plans for san francisco and macworld now. looking like it might be a bit cooler than i thought (temperature wise and fun-wise). i was under a great mis-aprehension that every day in san francisco looks like the opening credits for full house. 28 degrees and sunny is reserved for the summer months, and that's just when it's not raining. i was dismayed to find out that it's a lot like vancouver weather (not that i've been there either).

the big disappointment (while not being THAT big a deal) is the pretty much wholly lack of gaming prescence at macworld. CES would have had a number of big names with a few products to see (like soul calibur iv and it's misused star wars licenses *shakes head slowly in depression*).

but maybe steve will come up big with a new product, like the i-rack, or the i-ran i keep hearing about.

*image probably copyrighted, used without permission via flikr...don't tell anybody;)

thinking golden gate thoughts,

JD

tidbits

2008-01-09T16:17:00.001-05:00

i know this is the second one for today, but sometimes, you just can't resist!

it's just that i have a few more things to mention and they don't really fit anywhere in particular, or even with each other for that matter...

FIRSTED - the king of kong

this movie rocks. if you haven't seen it, find a way to. there are some dubious editing moves, but hey, can't be any worse than michael moore, can it?

i'm sure if you're a gamer, you know the story already. some guy called billy mitchell held the world record for donkey kong (old school arcade version) for like 20 years. this guy was one of the gamers who was around the first time gaming got popular, in 1982 on. he was even photographed for time magazine when the gaming craze was reaching it's first peak, when the only place you could really play games was at an arcade, and arcades were everywhere.

well this guy is still rocking an 80s haircut, is super into himself, and surrounds himself with yes men and people that seem to adore him no matter how stuck up he is.

along comes small town science teacher, steve wiebe (pronounced WEE-BEE), who breaks billy's record and that's when the controversy starts. it's a runaway plot, with deception, clique mentalities and the lot. it's a lot like high school but the nerds who never grew up own the keys to the clubhouse. see it, but take the plot with a grain of salt, and/or take into consideration the reasons the plot has been challenged by some of the people the movie makes look bad.

SECONDER - suicide dude

i claim no credit for this find. my buddy mark was telling me the stuff he was waiting to come in the mail from ebay and mentioned this little guy. i can't decide if it's hilarious, disturbing or hilarious that it's disturbing!

it's at least the cutest little suicide i've ever seen!

but don't you all go out and get one, because i don't think mark would be too chuffed if everyone had it;).

THIRDEDED - midway open ice

*sigh*

why do i have to be a responsible adult? WHY?

while i was looking up ways to be a better christian, i somehow ended up on kijiji, looking up old arcade cabinets. this is ~~the first~~ ~~the second~~ becoming a persitent habit of mine, even though i know that my place has no room for it.

it's the equivalent to nba jam, but with hockey! and FOUR PLAYER!!!!

i also can't afford it, since i now need to buy a 360 to replace the one microsoft wants back.

either way, ain't she a beaut! and at $400, i could maybe afford it, at least until jen kicks me out and i have to pay for a new place;).

begrudgingly growing up...

JD

ces.....

2008-01-09T15:59:00.000-05:00

no, it's not me misspelling a common html style sheet again, or trying to spell case but reversing the 's' and 'e' and taking out the 'a'. got it? never mind.

it's the major electronic's convention in las vegas. how major? well, it's probably the biggest convention of it's kind in the world, and the show floor is bigger than multiple (i've been told 100s) of football fields!

what does this mean for me? well, i was supposed to go this year, but our macworld plans got in the way. so this time, i'm watching from the sidelines.

just a few quick things i spotted in the ces coverage, i mean, other than pcworld.ca's own ces blog from correspondant ted kritsonis:

- the new street fighter iv character is revealed (not sure if this was actually at ces, but it's hella weird/interesting)

- can you saylawsuit? new gaming knockoffs that play real old school games, multiple platforms on each unit...

- nyko has fixed the whole ps3/rockband/guitar hero peripheral compatability issues, but it's butt-ugly.

- and tvs are getting hella slim, greener and turning into frigging wall-art.

thanks for tuning in, i'm outie,

JD

getting in those last precious hours of gaming

2008-01-08T15:22:00.000-05:00

i'm shipping out to san francisco, for those of you who don't know where i'm going this weekend.

it's 2008 macworld convention time there, and i've got to get in on the action;).

but i'm still left with one question:

how am i always the last one to find out how cool some things are?

i mean honestly. i played and beat mario galaxy before some people even got their copy, but i just started playing metroid prime: corruption this weekend, and man, is it ever fun!

kind of a gritty story that reminds me so much of ~~halo 3~~ starship troopers. great implement of the shooting with lock on targetting, even if the enemies take way too many shots to down. i mean, they've made samus' arm cannon feel pretty damn weak.

but the platforming is solid, and navigating as the ball (sorry, forgot the proper name) form is wicked fun too, with neat puzzles.

but how is it that i'm the only reviewer that played mario galaxy before metroid prime 3?

anyhow...

i'm also desperately in love with my new tv now.

oh, you've not been introduced...

here she is (via futureshop's site):

The LG 32LC7D is designed to fit your life and your space. It features LG's exclusive XD Engine, high-definition resolution, fast response time and high contrast ratio which mean no blur or trails, even in fast action sequences like sports. It also causes spontaneous ejaculation!* So bring the big game to a new level of play and everything you watch to a new level of quality with this 32-inch Widescreen LCD HDTV.

It complements my stereo, fits the room, makes movies look good and hd games look even better. I mean, i couldn't have picked/bought a better gift for myself for christmas.

not to say my other gifts weren't rad, but i've been waiting for this one for a while!

seeing the world in HIGH DEFINITION!

JD

*this may not be true for all users, but the increased chance of one is...

gaming news update: 1/4/08

2008-01-04T09:32:00.000-05:00

two big stories i just had to kick my two cents in on early today are:

microsoft rewards live players for their patience

so my worst fears are confirmed. it's just a crappy live game. and not just that. it's going to be one game that everyone gets, so you might already own it and they aren't going to replace the couple of weeks that we couldn't use live (and it's still sketchy now!).

m$ says it's because of too many people joining (and using) live over the christmas holidays, other people don't agree.

and almost as big a story, though not half as exciting:

activision is finally handing out new stereo copies of guitar hero iii for wii

i guess all the whinging finally worked.

but to be honest, this was a stupid mistake to make and think that people wouldn't notice. when you're playing battle mode, or any multiplayer mode, the first thing you notice is how cool it is when the audio goes from one side of the screen to the other depending on who's playing. not to mention that most of the music in the game was recorded in stereo!

good to see them finally start cleaning up that mess though...

here's hoping there's some good news today, like burnout paradise will have an optional menu, or that i won't be sick all weekend...

cheers, beers and weirs,

JD

p.s. again, my undying appreciation to kotaku for kicking ass and taking names at getting this stuff up so fast. oh, and the link for replacement disks is only a pre-register, i guess they're still not ready to send them out yet.

street fighter iv

2008-01-03T11:02:00.000-05:00

has pretty much not got me stoked at all at this point.

but i guess that was pretty much what i had expected all along.

it's not that i think it will suck, it's just that after all the iterations of street fighter two, and all the iterations of street fighter iii, i really thought they would at least try something new.

oh well, check out the ~~crazy 3d graphics~~ ~~new gamplay elements~~ ~~brand new characters?~~ same old same old with a 3d skin. go ken and ryu!

hadoken!

JD

sidebar: for some actual, honest to goodness, retro street fighter action, i highly recommend the street fighter: the later years videos on collegehumour. they will satisfy your sick interest in chun-li and are amazingly humorous with great production values for independantly made vids. way better than that jean-claude van damme piece of crap from the 90s.

christmas 2007/2008: a good time

2008-01-03T10:11:00.000-05:00

well, it's sure been a long while now, hasn't it?

there are many things afoot, including a stint of wins for my philadelphia flyers, an impending venture into the US for MacWorld 2008 and a brand new tv in my living room.

the unfortunate news is that microsoft has asked for their console back. this means a few things that i've been putting off are coming to play:

- firstly, i need to figure out how to get my own 360
- secondly, well, really there's only really one problem, but it's going to piss me off quite a bit

i'm also intrigued as to what prize microsoft will be giving gold subscribers as a reward for ~~being so awesome~~ ~~paying lots of money~~ suffering through a weeks worth of live multiplayer glitches. cash reward? supermodels to feed me grapes on a couch, i think not. maybe some ms points to spend in the arcade or, if they really don't like us, a free rental from the useless selection of movies in marketplace now.

have played the burnout paradise demo that i was pushing so hard and am divided on it.

here are my initial impressions:

the bad:
- i kind of miss the burnout menu system, but it's just a demo right? you'll be able to hit retry in the full game if you want, right?
- there is a lot of slagging you off when you lose, and subsequently drive back across town to retry it, but no fanfare at all if you win
- the star system, that rewards less than first place (as in, you can still get some upgrades or rewards without winning absolutely every race) is gone. gold is gold is gold and this isn't too good
- the missions start of incredibly hard, with a very steep learning curve. took me more than a couple tries to beat my first race, which is not like revenge at all...

the good:
- but it's not all bad with the new burnout demo
- the graphics blew my eyelids open. i seriously can't look away
- the crashes look fricken fantastic! crumple zones all over the car and the windshields shatter too
- the cars handle well and the new trick system is quite fun

so overall, it was a positive experience but has not grabbed me at all in the way that burnout revenge did. it has the potential to be awesome in it's final form, but as of the demo, i'm sitting a little more worried than i was before. i just have a hard time with the new driving around in free space system. i didn't hate the menu system in revenge. it kept the game fresh and varied gameplay for a long time.

but i'm trying to keep my pregidous' out of this until i see a final version.

hope everyone had a very merry christmas and a spastic new years,

JD

ba hahaha!

2007-12-19T11:42:00.001-05:00

an actual comment on in response to my most anticipated games on pcworld.ca. these just keep coming in, to my endless amusement:

oh i do hope this is not the last one of these i get.

the only real downside is that it exposes how stupid a lot of the gaming community is. or at least the digg trolls who are supposedly into gaming.

what they don't get is that i chose my list under no pressure whatsoever.

these were the games i felt held the most promise.

i know about spore and i know about starcraft ii and killzone 2. but i don't care. spore looks boring, to be honest. it almost doesn't look like a game. a great simlution maybe, but it seems to be the opposite of what i look for in games. it doesn't look fun to play.

starcraft is not the surest bet for 2008, much like re5. plus, they haven't released a ton of details, so it's hard to put on a list as anticipated. i'm not even anticipating details about starcraft 2 until march.

but i hope these comments keep coming, because they let me know that there really is no hope for fanboys and gamers online.

lol'ing,

JD

is it wrong to digg a dude?

2007-12-18T12:32:00.000-05:00

i know this may make some uncomfortable. self promotion -- like self love -- is kind of frowned on in most areas.

it's the kind of thing you do in private. the kind of thing you don't do in front of others, well, that is, unless you've go something wrong with you.

well i do. or at least, once someone's started me, i've got to have some friends finish it off.

wow. that got way more dirty than i wanted, way more quickly...

either way, i just wanted to call attention to an article i wrote for pcworld.ca that is gathering steam on digg.com:

The Most Anticipated Games of 2008

the lovely gaming community on digg is belittling and arguing over my choices -- which, to the chagrin of some posters, are wholly my own and i made them under no advertising pressure at all -- and it is proving a windfall for traffic.

since i'm all about the attention -- as many of my friends will attest -- i'm calling out for a little hand in keeping this on the top page of the gaming section on digg.

if you don't have a digg account, please register. it's one of the most fascinating time-wasters on the web.

and in the meantime, you can help a dude out.

i'm just trying to launch a writing career, so every little bit of exposure -- and bad as well as good comments -- can help me.

plus i'm a little attention whore, so i wil be forever grateful.

in other news, i now have january 22nd 2008 booked solid in my calendar. why?

you know.

dugged'ed?

JD

gaming present count="0"

2007-12-17T16:33:00.000-05:00

i know this little html joke will be lost on countless people, but i just thought i'd outline a growing trend.

it seems that while i get tons of delectable gifts for christmas, that most people shy away from gaming gifts for me.

now, part of this is the inherent cost, which admittedly stops me from asking for many of the things i desire, but part of it i think is the tech gap syndrome.

it's not that my parents and fiancee know nothing about gaming, it's just that they know less than me. they're not experts *he says smugly into the camera*.

i think the holidays can be an intimidating time of year for non-techies who are shopping for techies, and i don't know if there's a solution in site.

i guess one way would be to go the old-fashioned route of posting your christmas wish lists online (via ign, facebook, amazon, etc). this is the proverbial 'letter to santa claus' in the form of wants, but still lacks the surprise christmas polish.

but is there a workaround? can i subtley and pyschically send messages to all my friends about my want for cash (or purchases) of/for rock band, a 360 pro, some 360 controllers and assassin's creed?

is there no way to broadcast my wants without sending valuable demographic info to advertisers everywhere? not yet i presume.

well, i will content myself to make mental lists of the things i want and think of future years, when i can just put it all in a t-shirt and use my portable silk-screen to broadcast it to my peers and elders.

looking to the future,

JD

running out the clock

2007-12-17T16:21:00.000-05:00

it's not that i dislike my job. far from it. i consider myself lucky to be in a job and career that i like 90% of the time. there's stuff that peeves me off every once in a while, but for the most part, it's a barrel of f-ing monkeys.

but there's always that time of the year, those last couple of weeks, or last couple of days before a real break, when you start counting every minute and trying to just last to the end of each day.

you get stuff done, sure, but you also goof off a little, and get distracted by virtually anything and everything. all i'm saying is that i will be more productive in 2008 than i will be this week.

in life news, my ticket is booked for macworld expo 08. this is great news, which has softened the blow of earlier news, that i wouldn't be attending ces 2008 in las vegas.

i'm trading in bill for steve, and las vegas for san francisco, but either way it'll be sunnier and 'not-t.o.' for a couple days in january.

hopefully steve jobs will unveil an apple entrance into the console race...but that's ridiculous...isn't it?

dreaming ludicicrous dreams,

JD

adendum

2007-12-13T12:12:00.001-05:00

this also made me fantastically happy the other day:

so if anybody wants to be my bffevar that would be a good start.

you can get them here, but a working knowledge of japanese may help...

JD

gaming news/a little help understanding 'dudes'

2007-12-13T11:59:00.000-05:00

so first things first, if you, unlike me, own an xbox 360 and a ~~gold~~ ~~superior~~ ~~master race~~ better than silver live account, go right now and download the burnout paradise demo. then report back and tell me how awesome it is. i'll cry, but feel better knowing that it has succeeded in being awesome.

with that out of the way, i'd like to go a little offbase and inform everyone of a fact that should help understand the guy mentality during the holidays.

all men, if they're over 6 and under...dead, think they are super spies.

really, all men think of themselves are extremely stealthy, bond-esque spies, and at no time is this more obvious than at christmas.

you see, we all believe that we are way more sly than we probably are, and i have a suspicion that our companions (females, if you're of that persuasion) probably know more about what we do than they let on.

we think we're oh-so-sneaky, and we love doing it.

but at christmas, it doesn't hurt anybody. you sneak around the mall, checking behind corners, hiding your receipts and bags. you make little hiding spots in your living space that you both share, and you do everything extremely on the DL.

i don't know the reasoning to this, but it's extremely satisfying to have a scheme succeed. and fooling women is no easy feat. which is why i suspect that we get away with less than we think we do.

at christmas especially, there is no advantage to them finding us out. so no matter how sloppy liars we are, no matter how bad our hiding spots, no matter how lame our excuses, these qualities are endearing, and not just deceptive and cruel.

it's a hilarious combination of one sexes fascination with deception and mystery and the other's probable amusement by the effort.

it's a great effort that is worth it on both sides, but suspect in it's honesty (if that isn't the most confusing way of putting it).

under cover,

JD

welcome back kotter

2007-12-10T14:32:00.001-05:00

now that was a ~~weekend~~ ~~kind of fun~~ pure and unadulterated double heaping spoonful of hell.

if you can count the hours of sleep you got on the weekend on your fingers, is that good?

and why, might you ask, was i losing sleep and getting grumpy with anyone who would listen?

to bring you this -- only 4 days after the Christmas Tech Guide -- the 2007 Video Game Roundup.

i spent the better part of saturday, and all day and night sunday creating this monster. i did have help, however, from one key freelancer and one key editing fiend -- thank you ted and jen respectively -- but most of the writing, editing, and publishing was done by yours truly.

my portion -- aside from the unappreciated games story that is now coming out later this week -- was:

The Most Anticipated Games of 2008
A Review of SceneIt! for the 360
A Review of Halo 3
and a review of the Wii Zapper and Link's Crossbow Training

now, you may have some idea of why i'm so tired and cranky today. check them out, leave some feedback here, or there, and enjoy!

elsewhere, the world continued to move without me...

manhunt 2 won it's appeal -- or at least the first part of it -- against the British Board of Film Classification. don't know what this will really mean in the end, but it seems like a good step for less -- or at least more intelligent and informed -- censorship of games.

manhunt 2 was banned by the review board earlier this year by giving it an ao rating -- or adult's only -- which prevented any stores from stocking it.

also, i must insist that anyone with a 360, functioning hands and an internet connection download the burnout paradise demo -- featured in my most anticipated games -- that hits the Xbox Live! marketplace this thursday.

now, i guess i have to decide whether i'll continue to wait for the live gold membership to get in at the pr place that provided my console, or suffer the ~~wait~~ punishement that microsoft was kind enough to give silver subscribers for free content...

and that's about all i can stomach for today. sorry kids, it's just the way she goes.

drinking moonshine in the sunshine,

JD

a blustering cold

2007-12-06T16:21:00.000-05:00

the above title i only used because i seem to recall this being a catch phrase too often used by weather people on network news. i always picturing blustering as being kind of like bumbling, and it's far colder than any weather could accidentally cause.

as for news, today hasn't been that eventful, or yesterday for that matter.

microsoft released the fall update for Xbox 360 consoles in North America. You can now see the friends of your friends, just like on Facebook. Neato!

but they are also harassing silver level Live! subscribers, not letting them get their hands on free content (like demos and such) until gold subscribers have gotten a week to play/download/talk snootily about them.

As always, resident Xbox representative, Major Nelson, says on his blog*:

This is not done to annoy our Silver members—limited time exclusive access to content is just one of the many benefits of having a Gold Xbox Live account.

yeah, that's it. we're just giving those gold subscribers a pat on the back for handing us shovels-full of money. it's not a punishment per se, we're just not rewarding the unwashed filth who only paid at least $400 for our console and at least $70 for Halo 3. it's a little off-putting.

elsewhere, capcom sent me an e-mail letting me know that the new street fighter was indeed a 2D fighting experience, with updated 3D graphics. sooooo, like soul calibur 2? Oh, it's exactly like street fighter 2, but with polygonal fighters. And about the same control scheme. forgive me if i'm not jazzed.

this week has not been my favorite gaming week really. i'm getting into mass effect, like really getting into it, but like a dumbass, i still can't seem to navigate swiftly through all the things i have to do. once i learn something, they through another new thing at me without full explanation on how to do it.

now, i seem to be stuck on the ship, not able to actually get aground. so we'll see how that pans out. either way, it's getting interesting enough that jen is looking up from her laptop glazed over news watching to watch cutscenes with me and is following the plot closely. i've got the suspicion that she knows more about what's going on than me...

everything else is going good, got some christmas shopping done, most of jen's stuff is in the bag-well, in hiding specifically, but really in the bag as our apartment is really quite small and without hiding spaces.

so i head into the weekend now, with another full feature due on monday-of which i'm writing 4 or 5 articles-and i've got to attend a pr party tonight. whee.

thinking of you all fondly-and with a bit of a dirty mind;),

JD

*link credit to kotaku, my bible

a telling sign

2007-12-04T10:25:00.000-05:00

i'm almost feeling slightly bad for gamespot at this point, well...not too bad, but i had to share this screen cap of the story that gamespot posted on their website to control spin.

i think that their site tags stories using dynamically generated tags from both the comments and the stories. a picture tells a thousand words gamespot, and you had better watch how you proceed next...

this just in: Jeff speaks about the review and getting fired-but without any messy, and delicious details-courtesy jostiq.com.

a return to form

2007-12-04T10:07:00.000-05:00

as promised, this post will actually be about games, i just had to get that story off my chest.

and what a time to weigh in opinions when the biggest gaming press related story of the last ten years is taking off as we speak...

it's obviously not the firing that is the story here, but the ~~implications~~ ~~rumour~~ facts, that Jeff Gerstmann, a controversial and brutally honest reviewer for gamespot, was let go just after he slammed Kane and Lynch: Deadmen, and gamespot lost an advertising campaign that had the entire site branded by the Edios IP.

everyone is chipping in on this, including my favorites, the dudes at the penny arcade, and it's becoming a riduculously hot topic. the lines between advertising and editorial in online have always been thin and maybe even blurred. if gamespot aren't telling the truth, and this was because of jeff's review, or even if they are, and it really is his 'tone' that got him fired, this may set a dangerous precedent and scare good reviewers into doing not-so-honest game reviewing.

it's a very slippery slope, and of course, edios are doing nothing to help themselves in the situation. absolutely nothing.

i don't know if there is a real cause for concern at this particular moment, but i do think that awareness should be raised. gerstmann wasn't the perfect reviewer, i mean hell, he gave tony hawk 4, a game that took the stupid score-orientated challenges of the first three games to a height that was un-fun and barely playable, 5 stars, but he was an honest reviewer. he took down xxx bmx for what it was, and his review of kane and lynch-if you can find the video on youtube-looks like he's trying to like the game but there were a few fundamental flaws that prevented this.

given, i've never played it, but from what i've heard elsewhere, he can't be far off.

this is a story i'll keep my eye on, so stay tuned. this is not the end of it.

looking shiftily at the advertising staff,

JD

i kinda hate people

2007-12-03T10:31:00.000-05:00

the weekend on a whole was great. it was mellow, i got a copy of sceneit! and after some false starts, began my trivia domination.

but i'm first going to blog about the ridiculousness that is the ttc, specifically, the elder crowd on the ttc.

now, this is not an overarching, all the elderly should be banned from the ttc, or the incredibly popular facebook group's title 'i secretly want to punch slow moving people in the back of the head' type of rant. i have a legitimate complaint to make with a specific incident that happened last week on friday.

so i was coming home from work, via downtown since jen wanted to show me some new wedding related stuff before we trudged to the homestead.

i was more than overleaden with crap to carry, because i had graciously accepted a six pack of energy drinks (which i really never have anyways) from my boss before leaving. this was one more heavy thing to carry on top of my backpack (full of the ridiculously heavy 360 i lug between work and home these days) and my satchel (that carries my regular work stuff) and my brand new copy of sceneit! that managed to be courier'd to the office right at 5 o'clock. so i had the backpack and satchel on my shoulders, and both hands full on the subway. don't worry, there is a point to all this exposition.

what i'm bascially trying to say is that i had my hands full by the time i got downtown, and after we looked at the wedding stuff, we got back on the subway and headed for our station. a quick nip to pizza pizza for dinner, and we were back in the station waiting for the bus home.

we just managed to grab one before it left and tried (badly) to snake through the passengers to the middle of the bus and not get in anyone's way, but with backpack, satchel, pizza, sixpack, jen's purse and sceneit!, this was no easy feat. jen wanted us to move inwards (much to my complaints that we wouldnt' be able to get to the doors and we only had 3 stops to go) because there was an old lady that followed us onto the bus.

the old lady followed us to the middle of the bus, and i guess jen overheard her muttering and saw her glaring at us, though i was completely oblivious to this...that was until she pushed me.

yeah, no frigging way you say. that doesn't sound like old people i know, you say.

well, it's true, i couldn't believe it, and tried to convince myself it was an accident, that she didn't mean to shove my bag violently and twist my body, but then...WHAM, again, she pushes my bag.

so this time i turn to her and ask 'what's your problem!'.

she yells right back in my face, 'you're hitting me with your bag!' which was complete bs, and i was trying very hard to compact myself as much as possible and was nowhere near her.
'you should in the seats at the back of the bus with your big backpack'.

now here, i should refer to the reasoning that i wrote three paragraphs on all the stuff jen and i were carrying. there is me with a full backpack (that's really heavy!), a satchel (so double duty on right shoulder), the sixpack of tall-boy energy drinks (that i didn't even want, but carried out of guilt) and one arm barely free for holding a stability bar on the bus. jen is carrying the pizza, on which is stacked the sceneit! box, because she felt bad for me having to carry all of it.

back to the bus...i got pissed at the point that the lady had the audacity to shove me and yell at me in front of a bus full of people when i clearly couldn't move three feet let alone to the back of the frigging bus, so i yell back 'why don't you go the back of the bus!'

she just starts losing her shit talking about 'i have to deal with this all the time, you people should make room for me, i can't believe you, you should use the seats and get your backpack out of my way' though i can't tell you this is accurate because i was fuming by now, and i only had one stop to go.

so i asked her 'why don't you just get a car if you don't like the bus?' which i thought was a fair question. she retorts, cleverly 'maybe if you were nicer to your teachers, you'd be able to get one, i can't afford one' and then she kicks me in the shin!

well, she really barely grazed me, but in her backswing, kicked some defenseless woman behind her to which she told 'it's his fault'. not sorry, not didn't mean to, but 'it's his fault' and points to me.

at this point, some nice guy made some room for me to move a little further back, and it was my stop, so i gave up, muttered 'crazy bitch' under my breath and exited the bus. the entire population of the bus was so dumbfounded by her arrogance and insanity, that they didn't want to meet eye contact with this beast.

i have no idea if this is an average experience on the bus, to meet such f-ing rude, entitled, a-hole elderly people, but i'm going to think twice before stepping out of the way or holding open doors from now on.

it may just get you kicked.

losing my faith in humanity,

JD

i miss you

2007-11-30T14:39:00.000-05:00

it's not that i don't like you, people who read my stuff, it's just been a hard time. too much going on, too much to do, not enough sleep, but i love you. you're my special friend. you specifically.

now, with that out of the way, here's the hizzy-haps no what's happening in games land.

firstly, my quest to get a copy of rock band is getting desperate. like, random ebay bids that i know will never win (but secretly show that i'm contemplating a purchase) bad.

sent my 4th e-mail regarding a review copy today to a slightly higher up EA contact, but don't expect a reply on that either. oh, and best buy are supposedly not taking pre-orders and EB will gladly take my money, but no guarantee me a copy of the game, seemingly ever. they told me to come back and check to see if i can get a guaranteed copy of the game. seeing as how i leave for home the day after it comes out here, it's not looking good at getting it legitmately. it's possible to get a copy for slightly over retail (plus $50 frigging dollars for shipping) as there are so many copies on ebay, i'm just still hesitating because of cost, immediacy to christmas and desperate hopes that someone at ea/harmonix will actually respond to one of my pleading e-mails.

i'm still going at ace combat 6, and for anyone looking to try it, it gets much better after the first level. the only problem it does suffer from is really shitty looking backdrops when you're up close (ie, when i crash;)) and very long, repetitive gameplay. i'm over half way and most of the game ends up being chasing around planes-shoot missle-missle misses-shoot more missles-get hit-take too much damage-fly for five minutes to land and get new craft-keep going. the missions can take up to 30 min to complete! it's kind of ridiculous but as the planes i buy get better, it does get slightly more enjoyable, i just can't stand playing more than one mission in a row.

i'm now looking forward to christmas very much, not for the presents, but for drinking scotch and beer with my parents, watching good movies, trying to convince my parents to play games (unsuccessfully of course) and various other sundry activities.

i promise to be more faithful to you people in the future but for now all i can offer is my undying affection, and my body. (or maybe the affection will do?)...

unceasingly faithfully yours,

JD

120 stars/desert bus for hope

2007-11-26T15:18:00.001-05:00

still with the quick posts, as i emerge from the horrific carnage that was last week.

not much time for gaming, and i've come to a bit of a crossroads with which games to cover.

i'm still sitting on 3/4 of a halo 3 review, but, like the lazy person i am, lacking inspiration to finish it. i want to have a couple more to through into our gaming feature in a couple weeks (though it should be more like 4-5 ready by then).

here's which ones i'm currently working on:
-tony hawk proving grounds-not finding anything really new or innovative, mostly it's just pissing me off like they all have to some extent since th4
-battalion wars 2-played this a total of 2 times so far and it's hella fun just not as addictive as hockey-mario-or ghiii
-ace combat 6-andrew and i played this for an hour or so but found it desperately boring and long winded
-mass effect-loaned to drew for a couple days but still need to crack it in earnest.

but on the flip side, i'm nearing the 120 star full completion in mario galaxy. this is taking up way too much of my time, but it's the only game my fiancee jen will actively watch/participate in willingly;). it's true, the gameplay does not get boring or old after the star 60 and the original quest is done, it maintains and stays challenging and fun. though i've now started working down from the hardest to the easiest, and few games have illicited more expletives and shouting from me this year-unless you count multiplayer games of nhl 08, but who does?

lastly i want to draw people's attention to a charity that i really support (with money too!) called child's play. in a quick nutshell, instead of just raising more money for research into illnesses that are affecting children, they attack the main immediate problem of kids stuck in hospitals with nothing to do. they get hospitals near most big cities to submit wish lists of systems and games so that kids can get stuff they wouldn't' be able to afford or obtain normally, and allows them some self-sufficiency in entertaining themselves and having some fun.

an off-shoot event being held in victoria bc, is desert bus for hope. it's a hilarious concept. these guys have taken the released code from the never released penn and teller pseudo game, which was more a bunch of tricks you can play on your friends that was meant to look like a game, and they've decided to play one of the most gruelling modes for as long as people continue donating money. all the funds go to child's play, and they're now up to 98 hours of driving time they must spend on the road.

the game 'simulates' driving a bus along a real highway route along the desert for the actual amount of time it takes to do it. there is no end, and the road is slightly curving mixed with straight sections the whole time, making it impossible to cheat. it's one of the biggest 'in-jokes' in video gaming.

they guys who've been handling the 'bus' have already crashed 3 times (meaning they had to restart the trip that many times) and have been running the desert bus relay for 2 days already. you can watch a livecam from their site and donate money to keep their torture going and support a good cause.

revuuuuuss!

2007-11-22T22:14:00.000-05:00

check em out me boyos!
http://www.blogger.com/img/gl.link.gif

Guitar Hero III Review

Super Mario Galaxy Review

let me know what you think. i'm kind of excited about this stuff, but i'm still learning, i always feel like i am...

love and bricks,

JD

blatant craziness/zapper first impressions

2007-11-22T08:50:00.000-05:00

today is shaping up for another doozie (doozy, doozi?). either way it's going to suck.

if you're wondering why no post last night/day it's because i was in the office til frigging, 7 o'clock, working on these 5 contests and a huge feature for PCWorld.ca.

On the plus side, one of you lucky people could walk away with a Fujitsu ScanSnap Scanner, a Palm Treo 750 Smartphone, a Brother WiFi MFC, a Kodak Digital camera or a frigging Viewsonic HDTV. choice products.

check out PCWorld.ca's contest section for that noise.

as for the zapper, this is a tough one for me.

when i heard they were making a gun peripheral for the wii, i was stoked. i was stoked beyond measure. all i could think about was house of the dead style action, or virtua cop, or some other arcade experience that would be amazing with a gun that's better than a light gun, wireless and that has rumble (kickback or just regular rumble features).

in reality, it's a solid gaming experience, but i'm not completely sure about the gun. it's only that the aim isn't one to one. if that were the case it would be perfect. i mean, don't get me wrong, i'm seriously enjoying link's crossbow training more each time i play it, but i think it will be a more full featured game (like umbrella chronicles, or my most anticpated house of the dead 2-3 comp. and ghost squad) that will be the decider.

well, it's been a rough day, so enter the contests, read my new reviews (there's three of them!) and take er easy on the roads. it snowed.

later motivater,

JD

i'm gonna zap things! zap, zap.

2007-11-20T16:52:00.000-05:00

the hell week continues to be relentless. if you weren't aware, we are simultaneously running two websites this week: www.pcworld.ca and beta.pcworld.ca, so our viewers can write rude comments on both at once from the 20th to the 30th.

we're also putting together a fairly sizable feature on thursday (which is being organized by moi) and 5 contests for thursday (to go with the contest that launched today). as promised, here's the link to win an ipod by telling us what you think of the NEW pcworld.ca.

i sincerely hope everyone i know enters (except family, who are unfortunately not eligable) and if you don't want to read the blog, or go on the site (though shame on you to not even look for my articles;)), i've started a facebook group to let people know what contests are on pcworld.ca and will continue to put up links to each contest as we launch them.

on the games front, two reviews come out thursday, and links will be added to the sidebar when that happens. i finished up the main quest of galaxy (truly an amazing game) and got my guitar hero iii review done and ready for print.

i also picked up my zapper peripheral (almost solely out of a sick interest to try it and for the zelda shooting game).
!!!!!!!!
will post some first impressions tomorrow (or later tonight if i'm feeling antsy.

hugs, kisses and white fake plastic guns,

JD

don't adults get snow days?

2007-11-19T15:10:00.000-05:00

this is going to be an extremely short post for me, as i've been excessively verbose as of late and i have way too much to do right now. i also have noticed that this post has nothing to do with the title, i'm just jonsing for the good old ontario blizzard and getting to stay at home all day, drinking hot chocolate, eating chips and gaming.

quick newsy news about me and others...

the PCWorld.ca beta site launches officially tomorrow and...

you could win an iPod Nano for telling us what you like/don't like about the new design. (assuming you're a) a resident of canada b)18 c)not related to me:), sorry mum and dad). link to follow tomorrow when the contest goes live.

i got a copy of Tony Hawk Proving Ground from the good folks at activision-along with a press kit full of photos and videos. Other devs, take note from activision, i shouldn't have to take my own screenshots of grab from offical websites.

I'm very excited to compare this to the Skate demo i downloaded to the 360 a couple of days ago. They seem like they're nothing alike, and after playing many hours of NHL 08 (with EA's improved skill stick - somewhat like the skate controls) and many hours of the skate demo, i don't know how the old tony hawk formula will hold up. and i've played every hawk game since the original on the 64. hell, i bought a ps just so i could play hawk 2. it was a defining moment for skateboarding and sports games when the th series blew up, and i don't know if there is enough room for two skateboarding franchises (much like the new NHL EA games have turned 2ksports hockey into a fringe series).

Later days, and faster rays,

JD

delayedness - rock band style

2007-11-15T09:58:00.000-05:00

what's with the new fad in game design these days, delaying product and telling people that there's going to be stock shortages.

how is it that we can make 1000s of tvs, never sell out of cds, yet video game consoles and software are constantly running out or being delayed.

well the latest hit here is rock band. this is a game i've been super excited about, though still unwilling to reserve, due to it's steep price - in the over $200 for a game range.

well, now, after telling everyone that there would not be enough copies to go around, like virtually none, chris kohler, a man i usually enjoy and respect on wired.com's gaming blog, gamelife, broke the news that rock band was delayed for canada.

i don't understand the hositility chris. and i'm trying hard not to shoot the messenger, but dammmit. this is some b.s.

shell-shocked at best,

JD

i blame super mario galaxy

2007-11-15T09:39:00.000-05:00

for missing a day yesterday. i knew it would happen. but staying up til 2 on the first night i got it, combined with a really long work day, and then more galaxy last night and poof! the window for a post was gone.

but honestly, i can tell you this, that you will not find a better looking, more satisfying wii experience this year than super mario galaxy. i'll let that sink in for a second.

i was not a fan of super mario 64. in fact, i was almost an enemy of the game, constantly crowing about how disappointed i was. i mean, there was some novelty at first (hey, mario in 3d! look, a goomba in 3d! is that...a gigantic bob-bomb...in 3d?) but the level design and poor camera hampered the game experience for me. it was just too difficult, too repetitive and too poor a follow up to the supremely excellent super mario world and super mario rpg on the snes.

but everything that mario 64 did wrong, galaxy has gotten dead on right.

let's do the list, shall we?

easy to pick up controls? check.
moderate learning curve? check.
easy first couple of levels that are still fun to play? yes.
satisfying goals that progress at a quick rate (as in unlocking doesn't take you half a day?) definitely.
great graphics (not just for the wii, in general)? yes.
awesome music, bringing old mario themes back in symphonic renditions? oh, hells yeah.

this is mario back to form. given, i haven't yet finished even the last boss, but this is not the same 3d mario at all. he runs and jumps way better than mario 64, more like the mario in strikers (the running, that is). and the puzzles are fun to do. there is the odd "that was so hard i don't want to do it again" one, but i'm having tons of fun getting somewhere in the game. not to mention the 2 player mode.

anyways, i have to leave some gas for my review next week. although, if you have a wii, and like mario reviews, we're giving away a copy of the game in conjunction with the release of my review...not that you should need any reward for supporting a novice reviewer, but definitely check out our contests, thursday of next week.

surprisingly full of headachy goodness, and now motrin...

JD

it'sa me!

2007-11-13T14:56:00.000-05:00

if you can't tell from the title, that means that i'm mere hours (hopefully) (EDIT: IT's HERE!!!!) away from getting my hands on my review copy of mario galaxy. this may just pre-empt my going through metroid prime 3, battalion wars 2, and anything else. i'm super stoked.

the premise didn't grab me, a newer, next gen mario 64, a game i basically despised after the first few stars for it's horrific repetition. but from what i've garnered from early previews and reviews, this game does not suffer that at all. it's being touted as the best game since super mario bros 3 on nes (which is perpostorous, since super mario world was better...) but it's a good sign. i also know that jen is excited too and this will be a lot of fun (not to mention the available co-op mode!).

also got a copy of ace combat 6 last night, and it's another game i'm really excited over.

however, when i told jen that i was super stoked for it since i hadn't played a good dogfighting game in a long while (like since the good ol' x-wing vs tie fighter days during the first multiplayer online games) she thought i meant Michael Vick's Pitbull Challenge. i was a little disappointed, because yes, i want to play that game, but it infers that her first thought of me was as a watcher and not as a doer, like Tom Cruise in Top Gun.

Anywho, Super frigging Mario Galaxy just showed up, so in the immortal words of Eric Cartman;

Screw you guys, I'm going home *gestures towards door*

love,

JD

gaming news - update

2007-11-12T10:58:00.000-05:00

two things i just noticed about the whole rock band/guitar hero thing (besides the fact that i can't get harmonix/ea to send me a copy):

1) cherub rock (smashing pumpkins) and probably some other songs are in BOTH games. is this legal?

2) rock band is now slightly higher on my list of must haves as, according to video evidence on ign, info which no previewer has yet to touch on;

you get to play the song that Timmy sings on the South Park episode where he joins a band (Timmy and the Lords of the Underworld).

Link

EDIT:

here are all the cross over songs JUST from Guitar Hero III and Rock Band (as in i'm too lazy to look up the set lists for ghi and ghii):
cherub rock - smashing pumpkins
mississippi queen - mountain
reptilia - the strokes
sabotage - beastie boys
paranoid - black sabbath
when you were young - the killers

rest guilt

2007-11-12T10:36:00.000-05:00

i don't know what it is about my life now, but i honestly feel guilty if i come out of a weekend feeling rested and not more exhausted then when i went in.

i got a ton of stuff i needed to get done, but i also tried to take it a little easy and get more than 4 hours of sleep a night (as per my weekly routine).

finally finished halo 3. interesting ending. in fact, i was downright disappointed with the second last (more like third last) chapter of the game. but maybe i'm just not all about halo like a lot of people. the last two movements were pretty satisfying (sorry for the vagueness but i'm trying to avoid spoilers if anyone reads this post who hasn't finished the game). i'll try and formulate a real opinion on this before i have to write my review (which will be out very soon, will let you know).

got to play my first couple of xbox live games and was thoroughly satisfied with the experience. how is nintendo not watching this. this is how you do multiplayer online. no friend codes. and full chat. after my first nhl 08 game with my buddy will, i went out and picked up the messenger kit (so i could get a headset and not sit in silence listening to the announcers). in another bit of best buy gold, the messenger kit, with the brand new chat pad and original wired headset bundled, was the exact same price as the wired headset on it's own. wow, that's a great way to market the chat pad, but what about the poor guy who buys a headset only to figure out he could have got two things for the price of one. what the hell?

but really, i love xbox live, and it's going to be very hard to give back the system when the loan runs out...

started in on blue dragon right after. i asked for this game before i had received any (so i was a bit desperate) and knew nothing about it. suffice to say, this is a big learning experience for me as jen googled it and found out that it is an rpg that is over 50 hours of gameplay (created by the guy behind final fantasy) and is the first 360 game to span eight disks!!!!!!! dammit!

so, basically, between that and fire emblem, i may not be leaving my apartment for anything but work for a while. but i shouldn't complain, because it is fun, i just wish there were more hours in the day.

hoping to start battalion wars 2 as well tonight, and finally finish jen's and my save the dates for our wedding coming up this summer.

stay frosty,

JD

never trust a game store employee. ever.

2007-11-09T09:39:00.000-05:00

this may not be a revelation for most, but i do have a new annoying story to add to the pile.

yesterday i was out looking for guitar hero iii extra controllers. this, was not a big deal. in fact, i wasn't sure i even WANTED to buy one, but i wanted to see if they were in stock and if it would be hard to get one (as i really wanted to try out the co-op career mode and battle mode in ghIII before i submit my review).

i checked the interweb before leaving the office for my lunch retreat (not for eating, as i work during my real lunch, but i sometimes go for a walk and window shop). eb is always a no go as they stock literally nothing, and you can never get a straight answer, but i thought for sure that i could get my regular level of ~~great~~ ok mediocre service at best buy. was i wrong.

the website said they had stock and sure enough, when i got into the store, they had nothing. i asked a sales associate, or ass as i'll refer to him henceforth, if they had any.

he told me 'we had a bunch earlier, i guess they sold out'. i thought about asking ass if he knew when the next ones would be coming in (as i wasn't sure if i even needed another one quite yet) but i quickly asked him if he was sure there weren't any since it said they had some on the web site. to save ass's feelings, i quickly qualified it with 'i guess the site could be wrong, or you could have just sold the last one...' but he got a perplexed look in his eye.

he said, just wait here, i'll check. check what? i thought you knew that the last one was sold? or perhaps you were just telling me what i would hear and get out of the store the fastest. no, not today...ass.

he comes back and tells me they have a couple and that if i'll wait here, he'll get me one. just to show that people want to buy their products, but they're too stupid to stock then, i hang around.

ass goes up a ladder and comes back with a stack of four.

i'm really eating this up now, shit-eating grin and all. in a complete dick move, though almost comical, i ask him 'so how many were up there?'.

'16' he says.

yeah. so when someone tells you that they don't have any, make them check. like every time. whether it's eb, bestbuy, gamestop, or whatever, gamers aren't given much respect. so make sure you ask if it's something you really want. chances are, we assume that they know and care.

JD

halo is finally getting interesting...

2007-11-08T12:21:00.000-05:00

Don't mean to double post as a daily thing, but this is today's formal update.

Halo is finally showing some promise. The first couple levels (or chapters, i guess) were kind of ho-hum, find the switch, 'oh, i can just WALK through that' and general getting lost-ness. but now it's getting interesting with, and i'm sure i'll be corrected because i can barely follow the plot at all, but the 'flood' which are these wicked looking zombie like creatures, but more like the brain suckers in futurama. They grab unsuspecting corpses and re-animate them. they're a little freaky when you're in close quarters, but thoroughly more satisfying to fight than just sniping the brutes.

Am writing, currently, a review of the LG Shine, which is in notes stages right now. It's a pretty badass looking phone, if i do say so myself, though i'm not sold on bell's set of features (not really the phones fault i guess). they let you 'download' movies for $8 a pop, but i only figured out after that it doesn't even display the full screen of the phone and it's a one day rental. yep, for the cost of a movie at the WESTIN where i stayed in boston on a business trip, you can watch a horrible quality STREAMED movie on your phone, and only for one day. awesome.

but the phone seriously is pretty bitching, will post some pics tonight if i can remember.

now my only issue is finding enough hours in the day to get through the stack of games beside my couch. it's almost as intimidating as the stacks of books beside my couch during university. though they were easier to ignore :).

should probably get back to my work right now as i'm also writing a piece on the impact of the new youtube Canadian portal on Canadian companies and sponsors. it's kind of interesting but my guitar hero iii review, which will probably come out next week, should be a better read.

til then, my homies,

i pour a fifty on your behalf.

JD

oh! and i added links to some other cool blogs you should check out of my friends Jen the Journalist (who likes spelling and capitals WAY more than me) and GlenJM, a rad up and coming actor from Halifax I met while in school.

it happened on the way to work/crazy gore psychos

2007-11-08T09:49:00.000-05:00

this won't be a full post, as i'll update later in the day, but i have to divulge on a crazy occurance on my way to work.

some dude, i guess who was discharged from the pysch ward a few days too early, went a little nuts on the subway platform at the stop where i get on to get to work.

i guess this kid, maybe 13 years old, threw a candy wrapper or something onto the tracks and this guy spots him (didn't see that part).

well he just launches into an incredibly intense expletive ridden diatribe that the kid 'better never do that again' because he's tired of 'little s**t's like you making my subway dirty'. then he asked the kid if he thought he 'was joking, because i'll rip your head off and s**t down your throat!'.

yeah, i'm seriously not paraphrasing here. 8am on a thursday morning and this pyschopath is telling a kid he'll defecate in gaping neckwound he will create, all because of a little litter. i think this guy has been taking al gore a little too seriously. it's not YOUR job to discipline every person with threat of death and corpse desecration.

well some guy invariably tells the guy to f-off and leave the kid alone, which was especially important as the guy had moved so that the kid was between him and the tracks. i was honestly getting concerned that he might push the kid in to get the wrapper. so kudos to you, the guy on the other end of the platform the risked being punched on his way to work to stop the dude yelling anymore at the kid.

just can't really comprehend how this all happened before i was really even awake. it just made me sick to my stomach.

slower day/new blog

2007-11-07T11:04:00.000-05:00

I have decided that if I'm going to write something new everyday, and have no one read it, that I may as well do it in a larger format with fancy colours (black) and have it auto-feed into my facebook rather than keep writing notes and pretend it's not a blog, which is what it is.

The purpose of this exercise, barring someone who will listen to my every random thought as i come up with them, is also to let people know what i'm up to, how my job/career is going and what's going on in general.

It's meant to be informal and trivial and everything most people DON'T look for in reading material, but that i value at the utmost.

The news today is that I've caught wind that Activision are going to be getting me on board and providing games (following in suit with Nintendo and Microsoft's in house studios). This is GREAT! I will get a copy of Tony Hawk: Proving Ground and Call of Duty 4 to peruse on the loaner 360 i got.

The bad news is I'm starting to feel the pressure of such a large pile of games, all waiting to be beaten and subsequently reviewed.

This will sound like crap to anyone who is slightly envious of my self-defined role. Mostly, I'm having trouble justifying my complaints to my inner child, the 12 year old that thought video game reviewing would be the greatest job on the planet. He's pissed. He keeps telling me to suck it up.

But as it stands now, this is the damage (and I really will enjoy it, but the sheer hours are getting daunting...):

Xbox 360
- Halo 3 (don't think I'm even a 1/4 in. long game!)
- Guitar Hero III (beat on easy, almost done on medium, but need to find someone to try co-op with and go online)
- Blue Dragon (random rpg i asked for when I had no games lined up, haven't even broke the shrink wrap...)
- Tony Hawk: Proving Ground (just confirmed it today, will be coming soon)
- Call of Duty 4 (another epic, and a game that will take some time to beat. me=suck at first person shooters)

Wii
- Metroid Prime 3 (another big fps...)
- Battalion Wars 2 (really excited about this one, especially online)
- Fire Emblem (long rpg, what was i thinking asking for all these...)

I've also made a s**t-ton of inquiries about other games (particularly 3 e-mails already about a certain 4 player band simulation...) so there may be more coming.

And i've only finished 1 review so far. Jeez.

On the home front, we met the new landlords tonight. Other than a couple qualms about price (as they're not continuing our cable 'deal' that the last landlords gave us) they seem nice. Teachers. I think that sums it up if you know my family...

More soon, but have to start an article on the new youtube.ca Canadian portal.

Watch "It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia". You'll thank me later.

JD