Wolly Bully

So, before I get into the meat of today's post, I will say that I was able to snag a pre-order of a Wii along with going ahead and ordering Rayman: Raving Rabbids & Zelda: Twilight Princess, as they seemed like the best options for launch. It was a fairly grueling morning, but there was plenty of fellow gaming nuts there to make small talk with and play many rounds of DS while we waited several hours outside of the mall. It is sort of an on phenomenon waiting in line just for a preorder, especially since Wii will probably be the most available console in history. But I definitely like that I'll just be able to walk down anytime I like on Nov. 19th and just stroll in and pick one up as opposed to potentially going all over Seattle and possibly a couple of outer-lying cities trying to snag one.

Weren't able to procure a Wii preorder on Friday? May want to try your luck at Toys R Us. They aren't doing any preorders, but they are giving away 25,000 Wiis. After my extremely short stint as an employee at Toys R Us when I first moved up here, I was weary about ever going back, but this might be enough to tempt me...

Now, onto this week's hugely controversial game release: Rockstar's BULLY. Before even being released, Jack Thompson wanted to make it so the game wouldn't even reach retailers, sure that it would cause a massive up-rise in bullying incidents. Luckily, it was reviewed by a judge who has that increasingly rare ability called COMMON FUCKING SENSE and deemed it no worse than anything you could see on TV. I highly doubt this will be Thompson's resounding defeat that finally makes him go away, but it's good after his constant blustering over the last year or so to see him soundly beaten. Now, the real question is if Bully is worth all that controversy? Early indications are that it is, as it's gotten really strong reviews all across the board. I'd love to play it if i had any time...

Also out this week is Sam Fisher's latest spy mission-Splinter Cell: Double Agent. Although this looks to change up the standard Splinter Cell formula a bit with Fisher starting off in an undercover prison, it still doesn't seem like that much of a leap from the last few games (and the rather unforgiving multiplayer has been massively dumbed down, which has tricked off many fans of the last installment.

Looks like there will be no sequel to Okami, or even any more Viewiful Joe titles, as Clover studios has been shut down. People keep crying about industry homogenization, but those same people don't buy amazing games like Okami in even halfway decent numbers, yet buy the latest sports titles or GTA-style game in droves...

Good news for lazy fatasses! One of the complaints that has been launched against the Wii is that it will be exhausting to play for more than a couple of a hours at a time (obviously these people have never played intense button-mashers like Ninja Gaiden or Devil May Cry...). But it's been confirmed by UK mag Entertainmentwise that the "huge" motions you've seen in the videos are not what is actually required in order to play.
. Course, it's probably a lot more fun that way...

And while Nintendo's Wii remote is getting mostly positive reaction, IGN has written a rather scathing review of the Sixaxis, Sony's much touted "revolutionary" controller for the PS3. It's odd how it looks exactly the same as the Dualshock, yet apparently plays and feels so much worse. If it's really as crappy as IGN reports, this may be what truly dooms the console, as no one will want to play pretty but virtually unplayable titles on any system.

All right that's really all for today, but here's the SCRUBS CLIP OF THE WEEK: