Gabe & Tycho are my heroes

Joss Whedon may be my master, but Gabe & Tycho's massive pwnage of Jack Thompson this week earns them my completely unworthy worship for at least a good while. Remember how Thompson pledged 10,000 dollars to charity if anybody made a videogame according to his specifications? Well, somebody actually went ahead and did it; and big suprise, Thompson claimed he was only joking. Gabe & Tycho's response-donating 10,000 to charity in Mr. Thompson's name!







Jack Thompson's response-Trying to have them arrested(just what failure of a University gave this moron his law degree anyways?):







Yes he is a senile old coot that us gamers should laugh at. Here's the problem as Gabe & Tycho have pointed out-People are giving this guy some fucking attention. He was on CNN Monday night telling more blatant lies. Specifically that the NFL wanted nothing to do with Midway's upcoming Blitz: The League game because of it's edgier content than a normal football title when the reality is that the only reason the game is even being made is in response to EA's buying the rights to any & all NFL games. This man needs to be taken seriously, called on all his total bullshit, and recognized for the dregg of society that he truly is.

Moving on, game demos can be a very crucial thing, as they can make or break a game. That's why I was very disheartened trying out the new Dragon Warrior VIII demo I got by reserving said game. With all my highly anticipated rpgs quietly slipping to 2006 (Kingdom Hearts 2, Final Fantasy XII, Shadow Hearts 3, etc.), I was really hoping the latest Dragon Warrior would be able to fill my rpg needs. If the demo is any indication, it will fall way short of that. Not only do the characters look like Dragonball Z rejects:










, but the preview is very oddly put together, seperating a story quest where all you do is talk to people until you find the right one, and showing off a very basic battle system that shows little to no innovation along with very bad translation. There is nothing here to indicate why in a country where they release rpgs as often as we release sports titles, why it is the best-selling PS2 game ever. Granted the Japanese have very quirky taste when it comes to their gaming, but this seems like some relic dressed up with fancy artistry that I personally don't care for.

Finally today, I got some time in with Nightmare Before Christmas: Oogie's Revenge. I wasn't sure what to expect of a title based of such an awesome movie but made nearly a decade later, but Capcom has pulled off a fairly decent effort with it. Presentation-wsie, the game is flawless, the characters & look of Halloweentown are represented very well, and it features great original music & lyrics with some help from the legendary Danny Elfman. Combat-wise, it's really not much different from Capcom titles like Devil May Cry where you work up massive hit combos with a few very cool weapons. And just for the sake of weirdness, which sort of fits, boss battles really depend on how good you are at Parappa the Rapper-style sequences. It's nothing I would highly reccomend, but worth a rental.

That's it for today, but I'll be back tommorow with views on all the big games hitting this week.

Jack Thompson-Video game maker?

That's right, Jack Thompson, senile insane crusader, wants to make a video game! The catch? It's a video game that blatantly supports his view that video games are bad for you. If this guy is actually responsible for anything significant ever (instead of just latching his name on to reasonable legislation he had nothing to do with) I am moving to Canada.

Even more bad news-After confirming Edler Scrolls IV for Xbox 360 launch, developer Betheseda is quickly correcting that, just sticking to vague "holiday release". Not only that, butthe PC version is currently listed as 10 bucks cheaper. Selling my 360 for a hopefully insane profit is looking like a better option all the time.

Moving on into movies, although an official announcement will suppossedly be made sometime today, word is that Craig Daniels is the newest James Bond.



In my opinion he looks the least right for the role out of most of the other supposed front-runners (Hugh Jackman, Clive Owen, Jason Statham, who would've been my choice). But maybe this also means a new direction for Bond, which is probably badly needed at this point.

Three movies open this weekend that I could really care less about. Sure, Elizabeth town is a Cameron Crowe film, but his last few films all seem to be roughly the same movie-Young man rediscovers what he was missing in his life by meeting a vibrant young woman. It was pretty much the theme in Almost Famous, moreso in Jerry Maguire, and it just seems to be the only point of this movie.
Then there's Domino with Keira Knightley playing a real life model turned kickass bounty hunter. This initially looked somewhat promising, but further ispection by early reviews seems to indicate otherwise.
And finally the Fog. A remake of a fairly stupid John carpenter orignal with a cast of known but not big name actors (Tom Welling from Smallvile, Maggie Grace from Lost, Selma Blair) and yet another cheesy bad horror theme. I think I'll go catch History of Violence or Wallace & Gromit instead.....

MCcarthy, that was one of the Beatles, right?

Although it isn't a direct quote from anybody, I guarauntee you most of today's youth sadly has no fucking clue who Joseph MCcarthy is, and that's just sad. All the more reason they should go see George Clooney's Good Night and Good Luck-All about MCcarthy and his insane vendetta against imaginary enemies, and the one guy who had the integrity and spine to take him on-Edward R. Murrow. From all accounts it is an excellent portrayal of the events and rings shockingly relevant to current events as well (just goes to show that the world never changes all that much).

But, if like me, your ony major theater isn't even carrying that film, a pleasant alternative might be Wallace & Gromit: The Curse of the Wererabbit. Anybody who has seen Wallace & Gromit's video effrots knows that it's as very clever show even for adults. The movie has also gotten ridiculously positive reviews, so I'll hopefully check it out in the next couple of days.

The weeknd's other offerings seem much less promising.Two for The Money seems like a stupid carbon copy of just about any movie about a young hot protege who screws up big time and doesn't realize he's in way over his head (i.e. The Firm, which was also a horrid film). Waiting seemingly has a great cast, but glaringly bad reviews across the board, which usually means something, and In Her Shoes screams chick flick in every way possible.

The other big movie news this week is that Peter Jackson is taking the job of Executive producer for the upcoming Halo film. Let's pray this guy didn't just get lucky with LOTR. I ghighly doubt it, but we'll really have to wait til Kong is out to be sure. But it does seem like Halo is destined to be the first videogame movie that is more than just decent, and may actually be awesome.

Finally, the Xbox 360 launch limeup is starting to take form, and i'm offiically pumped. Perfect Dark is looking great if you've seen any recent videos and it's confiremed for launch day, along with Dead or Alive 4, Project Gotham Racing 3, Kameo, and several solid sports titles. But in my opinion the true killer app will be Elder Scrolls: Oblivion, which has officially been confirmed for launch day. Between that & WOW, assuming I'm still playing it, I may dissapear from the face of the Earth for several months, if not years....

Dying is easy, Good TV is hard

I haven't really mentioned the new fall season much, mainly cause there hasn't been much worth tlaking about. Most of the shows I have had high hopes for have sucked royally-Prison Break, Bones, Reunion Martha Stewart's apprentice (ok, I was expecting that to suck, but not because Martha is playing faux nice and not being the heartless bitch she's known for). But two shows have surprisingly seemed to rise about the rest of the fall garbage.

First, My Name is Earl with Jason Lee-It's about a slimy loser who lead a bad life, until he started believing in karma and decided to right all his past wrongs. It sounds cheesy & hokey, but smart writing truly makes this show work for now, we'll have to see if they go anywhere with it, though.

Second, Kitchen Confidential-This is what the big surprise for me was. I only even bothered checking it out because it has Xander(Nicholas Brendan) from Buffy in it, and it's an amazingly fast & sharp show that captures very well the intensity of running a five-star restauraunt. And it's already shown some good character development in a few episodes, which is a good sign as well.

Now, let's talk about Serenity. I saw it this weekend, and it was brilliant. I was hoping the opening take would be some huge suprise, thus guaranteeing the future of the franchise, but it made a very solid showing, and if most fans are spreading word and going to see it at least a few more times (I'm seeing it at least two more), it should do very well. But if for some reason it doesn't continue, it's a very fitting sendoff for fans. But just don't take my word for it, take Orson Scott Card's, the writer of the Sci-Fi classic Ender's Game

Ok, that's it for today. Go see Serenity! Again!

Joss Whedon is my Master now...

It's not just a motto, it's a T-Shirt! But finally, after what seems like forever, the long-awaited space western Serenity hits theatres tommorow. I can easily say that my expectations on this movie are going to be extremely high, simply because nothing Joss Whedon has ever done has ever been short of excellent. This is not just the dude who created Buffy the Vampire Slayer & Angel. He wrote Toy Story (still Pixar's best film IMO), made the X-Men script not suck(along with countless others as his early career as a script doctor, wrote some truly great episodes of Roseanne in its early years, and wrote the screenplay for the extremely underrated Titan A.E.

History is also in Joss' favor on Serenity. Failed TV shows or movies that by some miracle keep going tend to become huge successes. Star Trek, Naked Gun(which spawned from the failed Police Squad series), Family Guy, and even Joss Whedon's own Buffy the Vampire Slayer, which he turned from a mediocre campy comedy box office flop into a critically-acclaimed show with a huge cult fanbase. Mark my words, this will be the next Star Wars if people actually give it a fucking chance (hopefully without the crappy prequels 20 years down the line)

A movie like Serenity would also pretty much be the only thing that could pull me away from this weekend's other offering-Jessica Alba in a bikini! That really seems to be the only thing Into the Blue has going for it. Paul Walker is more wooden than Keanu Reaves could ever aspire to be (and Reaves has occasionally pulled off a good performance every now & then) and it really seems like your standard cheesy action flick.

In the video-game side, I have gotten some quality time with X-Men Legends II and I can say it is definitely a quality sequel. I'm only dissapointed in the character selection (not with who's available, just should be a lot more) and the character designs actually look somewhat horrendous on certain characters.

And it's yet another week of several high-profile videogames. I'm starting to wonder if they are even saving anything for November.

Far Cry: Instincts for Xbox should be in stores now. The game supossedly is fairly revolutionary for having virually no draw-in (meaning nothing magically starts appearing and you can literally see miles off in the distance) and a good balance between stealth and pure action gameplay since you can set traps for enemies as well as blast the hell out of them. Maybe if I get an itching to play an FPS other than Half-Life 2 (which granted, I've barely touched), I'll pick it up on PC.

The Suffering: Ties That Bind is out on PS2 & Xbox. If you never played the original, it's essentially Resident Evil with a whole lot more ammo, which is why I really enjoyed the original. I'm sure this one will be equally as good.

Possibly the last remaining quality platformer series-Sly Cooper comes out with its third installment this week. All I'll say is this is pretty much your only option is you still enjoy 3D platforming action that doesn't look like something your younger sibling would play with.

And finaly, yet another Pokemon game is out for the Gamecube. Granted, Pokemon XD: Gate of Drakness is only the second game for the GC, but it's about the billionth game in the series. I've always said that if you actually got a solid story behind the game, I'd gladly buy a Pokemon title, but they all seem to focus on collecting the animals rather than having a story with good characters.

That's all for today. GO SEE SERENITY!!!

Necrophilia at its finest....

Although it's obviously just another wonderfully weird Burton fantasy, one could look at Corpse Bride and see a rather disturbing underlying theme there. But as Nightmare Before Christmas is one of my favorite films of all time, I've definitely been eagerly awaiting this long overdue follow-up (although I'd prefer a new movie starring Jack Skellington and Co.). Even if it doesn't live up to its promise, like all Burton films it will be one weirdly fascinating ride.

Another film opening this weekend I badly would like to see is A History of Violence with Viggo Mortensen, Ed Helms & Maria Bello. The trailers look excellent, and it's gotten all kinds of film fest awards already. Unfortunately, it's only in select cities (which never means smaller ones like Chico), so I'll probably have to wait for video.

And finally, Jodie Foster comes back to the screen in Flightplan. Although it looks like a solid thriller, the ads are a shining example to trailers revealing far too much. Because either they are going to totally screw with the audience and actually have that the daughter never got on the plane, or any explanation as to why no one on the plane believes her is going to be so ridiculous it'll pretty much kill the film.

Ok, that's all for today.

It's like I'm in some new bizarro world....

"I want to give kudos for Nintendo for its attempt at innovation with the new controller," Moore commented, saying that the new device would -"bring people in that, as Iwata-san said, are either lapsed gamers or gamers that are intimidated by the complexity of the controller." That would be Microsoft's Peter Moore actually praising the Big N's radical new controller. Very odd to hear that when all the companies have just been trash-talking each other since around E3.

And while I promised this wouldn't be a column completely about WOW (although it pretty much occupies all my free time now), I will post occasional tidbits that seem interesting to me. Apparently, a plague has hit WOW, and it was completely unintentional. There is this powerful god that can infect players with a disease. The disease can be cured/survived, but it's also contagious, and many players have apparently been running back to a town before the disease is purged from their character. It then infects other players, and unless you are fairly high lvl, it will quickly kill your character. GMs have even been reportedly quarantining afflicted characters in an attempt to get a handle on it. I haven't run into it yet, but it's sort of interesting how these things can develop unintentionally.

And after a few months of barely anything for gamers, no less then 12 noteworthy titles have come out for the consoles and PC this week. YIKES.

First up are two titles that you might have already played, since they were actually released last year-Ninja Gaiden Black for Xbox & Fable: The Lost Chapters for PC. Now, the key thing about Ninja Gaiden:Black, in addition to new content, is that now it has an easy mode, just to make you feel like a total pussy for not being able to beat its insane difficulty last time. Fable:TLC is all about new content, as the biggest complaint was that the Xbox version was too short. Since the game was actually designed with the Xbox controller in mind, it'll be interesting to see how it performs on your standard keybooard mouse setup, but it should be a nice way to fill the time til Elder Scrolls: Oblivion comes out.

Myst V is out this week on PC. I hate the Myst series. It's always been a stirring example of what's wrong with the whole point & click genre, and why it's probably better left off dead (although I'll change my tune if a new King's Quest, Space Quest, Monkey Island or Sam & Max game comes out).

And what might be the answer to slow-moving adventure titles like Myst, Indigo Prophecy is out this week for consoles and PC. It's about a man who apparently committed a murder, but doesn't remember doing it. The key feature here is that the game plays out very differently depending on your actions (i.e. you can hide the body, or just run) and it's also played from different perspectives. Everyone is calling this the sleeper hit of the year so far and I can't wait to try it out.

Although it came out last week, I didn't really mention Evil Dead: Regeneration, cause I wanted to wait till a few reviews came in. Now they have, andf its pretty much confirmed my suspicions. Despite the fact that it features some damn funny orginal duialogue, and a dead midget sidekick that you can actually kick, it's still a crap game just like all the Evil Dead titles. I know Evil Dead simply survives on its psycho cult fanbase, but a good game might help build it (and maybe build momentum for a long overdue movie sequel!)

Kingdom Under Fire: Heroes for the Xbox is out this week as well, and it might be the last option for Xbox live players looking for something outside the usual sports & FPS titles on Live. It's essentially like Dynasty Warriors, but with a lot more emphasis and squad strategy and taking place in a medieval fantasy setting. My only complaint about the rather brilliant original was that the battles can be overly long, so if you don't mind that or are looking for a break from the usual fare, this would be a good pickup.

The sequel to Katamari Damacy, We Love Katamari is out this week on PS2, featuring more rolling-ball insanity and a fully fleshed out two-player mode. It also comes with a higher price tag than the original, at $30 instead of $20. Probably still a bargain, but If I'm going to pay significantly more, I'd expect a wider variety of modes (online, minigames, etc.).

The latest Mortal Kombat Game, Shaolin Monks is out. It's a spin off action title featuring Liu Kang & Kung Lao. Generally speaking, fighting game characters starring in their own titles always turn out poorly. The reviews so far have been suprisingly solid, but given my loathing for all things MK the last few years, I'll wait till I play it to pass judgement one way or the other.

Finally, three huge super hero-based titles come out this week, Ultimate Spider-Man, X-Men Legends II & Marvel Nemesis: Rise of The Imperfects. Ulitmate Spider-Man takes a distinctly new look from the newset comic, and also lets you play as Venom, his coolest arch-enemy. The same great web-swinging acrobatcis are back, but supposedly, they left the lame combat in as well, so I'm taking a wait and see attitude on that one. X-Men Legnds II is one I have been waiting on for quite awhile now since the original was such a blast. You get some old favorites like Wolverine, Gambit & Cyclops; but this one has the X-men teaming up with Magneto & his usual cronies, so you also get to play as Magneto, Pyro, Sabretooth etc. It also features online play, but given that it's a story-driven title, that may not work out very well. Rise of The Imperfects is the most iffy-looking of the bunch. The oringal characters look cheesy & generic & the fighting looks very shoddy. It also intantly removes the main reason we enjoyed previous fighting games featuring Marvel's mightiest-we enjoyed seeing established characters fight each other, it's a long-standing geek tradition to ask whether Cyclops could beat Mega Man, or Spider-Man can beat Wolverine. This title seems to totally ignore that fact. And it's an Electronic Arts title, which says enough in and of itself.

Ok, that;'s it for now, but given that it's officially thursday, I'll be back later on today with my thoughts on this weekend's movies (and any games that I mightve forgotten)

The revolution is here. And can someone explain to me what the hell it is?

Nintendo has finally revealed the Revolution's revolutionary controller, you can check out the pics and details here. I'm sure the initial reaction is "why does it look like the remote for my TV?" Leave to the Big N to go way out there. I'm sure the MS & Sony fanboys are already relentlessly mocking it, but I'll hold judgement til I actually get my hands on it. Odds are it'll be pretty damn cool.

The other "big" game news this week is that MS announced the release date of the 360-Nov. 22, which is around what everyone was expecting. There are also rumors of a massive shortage already much like when the PS2 came out. I'll be the first to say if I can get a $1000+ on ebay for my 360(which PS2s were easily selling for when they were scarce), I'm selling it and I'll get another one when they are plentiful if not slightly cheaper.

I played Squarenix's latest this week-Radiata stories. It's a suprsingly mediocre effort. The graphics are nice enough but the characters and voices are extremely annoying and the battle engine is just clumsy. It's a good thing X-Men Legends II is out next week.

Moviing on, a couple of actually good-looking movies open this weekend. Just Like Heaven, with Reese Witherspoon & Mark Ruffalo (along with John Heder from Napolean Dynamite). It's your standard romantic comedy movie, but it's got a good cast, and it's from the director of Mean Girls and the Freaky Friday remake, so I think it will be better than most of he lame generic ones that come out.

And there's also Lord of War, with Nicholas Cage. It's an interesting angle to take a look at the guy who supplies the madmen of the world with weapons, and Cage usually puts on a good show when he needs to.

That's really all for now, I hear WOW calling my name....

And the emmy goes to.... Microsoft?

That's correct. ladies and gentleman, Microsoft can now claim they have the emmy-winning Xbox live service as they have been awarded that statuette by National Academy of Television Arts and Sciences in the category of Outstanding Achievement in Technology and Advanced New Media. You can bet that's something they will be pushing for a long time to come.

I saw Transporter 2 on Sunday, and it was a mixed bag at best. It featured some truly awesome fight sequences, but that isn't enough against the horrid acting, the ridiculously awful characters, some truly ridiculous driving stunts and a plot that makes XXX look deep. So I'd reccomend waiting for the DVD so you can just watch the cool fight scenes.

But now the big news of the week (for me anyways)-I have finally joined the ranks of PC gamers! I now have a fairly kickass PC gaming rig and have just started a character on World of Warcraft (look for a Night Elf Rogue named Suria). Now, I've seen where many a blog I used to enjoy reading has suddenly become all about one game (including WOW) and I promise that won't happen here. If anything, this will only expand the variety of my posts, since it gives me reason to be interested in PC happenings as well.

Ok, now I'm off to plunder more treasure in WOW....

You're all a bunch of fairies!

SquareEnix's latest rpg, Radiata Stories, hits stores this week. It's from Tri-Ace, the developers of last year's Star Ocean: Till the end of Time, which was pretty cool game. This one focuses on a war between humans and the fairy races (for some reason that includes elves, dwarves, and several other races that look nothing like fairies). I should have it in my hands by Monday at the latest, so I'll let you know what I think.

I did get some playtime in with Incredible Hulk: Ultimate Destruction this week. It's basically the same as the last Spider-Man game. Which means when you are freely roaming about the city, using Hulk's abilities as you like, the game is a blast. But when it gets down to actual story missions, the game quickl becomes tedious and annoying. But I'd still reccomend it for any major Hulk fan, as it captures him and his abilities so well.

The PS turns 10 years old this week. It's sort of funny how everyone basically thought when Sony launched their initial system that Sega and Nintendo would crush them. I'm no Sony fan, but there's no denying that they have smartly dominated the home console market and unless they pull some major fuckup with their next launch, it'll probably stay that way for awhile. It's also funny to think that with the huge void of good games lately, I've been going back into old PS games for entertainemnt. I just recently beat Lunar: Silver Star Story yet again and am no going through FF IX for at least the tenth time since I've owned it.

I have not seen Transporter 2 yet, but that's only because this weekend's offerings seem so dismal, I purposely saved it (which I'll get into on my next post).

That's all for now.

I want a golden ticket! Uh, I mean Xbox 360!

Really the only big thing happening this week in games has been the official launch of Mountain Dew Xbox 360 giveaway. Like many contests, you buy one of the Dews, and it has a code you enter for a chance to win. The big difference? There is a winner every 10 minutes, which may cause some nutso fanboys to go a little overboard and spend more than they would on an actual system. I plan to regularly put in codes, but since I already drink an unheatlhy amount of Mountain Dew as is, it won't change my spending much.

The only movie worth talking about opening this weekend is a sequel I'd never thought I'd see-The Transporter 2 starring Jason Statham. I loved the original movie, but it wasn't a hit here in the states (apparently it did very well overseas). And it seems to feature the same kickass action sequences that I loved in the original. The next couple weeks look pretty slim however.

Oh well, only 29 days till SERENITY......

Let the fleecing begin!

We knew i t would happen. As with the launch of any new big eletronic toy, the impulse for the stores is to really cash it in by offering bundles, but the Xbox 360 is already at an historically steep price, and now bundles from $700 to a whopping $1200 dollars have popped up. But usually bundles include some sort of savings. These bundles from all accounts seem to just package the stuff together at no savings whatsoever. Bottom line-your better off getting your own bundle package at this point.

An early review of Uwe Boll's (Alone in the Dark, House of the Dead) latest masterpiece, Bloodrayne, is up at IGN. They call it his best work to date, giving it a generous two stars out of five.

Now onto this weekend's offerings. First up is The Cave. A really stupid looking horror film. I mean seriously, a bunch of dumbass spelunkers enter a mysterious cave that another bunch of dumbass spelunkers mysteriously dissapeared in. Featuring a C-list cast and effects that are on par with low budget midnight movies. I'd be suprised if this takes in more than 2 mil.

Then there is Terry Gilliam's latest-The Brothers Grimm, starring Matt Damon & Heath Ledger. The reviews are sort of mixed, but I really like the concept and Ledger & Damon usually put on an entertaining show, so it's hopefully going to be a fun time.

Nothing else really go on today, but if something earth shattering happens, I'll be sure to comment on it.

How much is that doggy in the touch screen?

Out this week is the title that Nintendo's Reggie Fills-Aime has pushed as the second coming, Nintendogs for the Nintendo DS. I've never really gotten into these "virtual caretaker" games (i.e. Seaman, Tamagotchi, the Sims) where you basically substitute a real pet for a fake one. They aren't even really games, with no clear goal or end in sight. But despite that I'm sure this'll be a huge success based on the cuteness factor. And from the reviews I've read somebody finally realized that it' not fun to have to respond to a virtual pet's every whim and need, so most of that is eliminated. It'll be interesting to see if the public really picks up on this as it's meant to appeal to the non-gamer and really makes the DS take off. Personally, I'm far more interested in the new Lunar & Mario & Luigi rpgs coming out soon. If those are good, I may have to finally break down and get one.

But if the utter cuteness of Nintendogs makes you feel like unleashing some rage, also out this week is reportedly the first Hulk title that's actually good-Hulk: Ultimate Destruction. Someone finally got the idea that it's probably best to just let the game be a "sandbox" type like GTA (or more appropriately, Spider-Man 2) where while there's a story and missions, you also can just run around causing massive destruction. I'm hopefully getting it in the mail next week so I'll let you know my verdict then.

And finally, the other big release this week is 187-Ride or Die. It sounds like another GTA-themed rip-off, but instead it's like a poorly done urban version of Twisted Metal with poor controls. I'm really getting sick of these urban games, there shuld be some kind of moratorium on them & any game based on a war in the last 100 years.

That's it for today, but I'll defnitely be back tommorow with my thoughts on this weekend's movies. Until then....

Microsoft's official pirate speaks....

Regardless of whether or not you think the recently announced two-tier pricing system for Xbox 360 is a good idea, MS does have plenty of explaining to do. Around the time of E3 (and for a few weeeks after) they were fairly adamant that not only would the hard drive be a standard built in deal, but they also claimed that at least at first their would be one set price for the system. J. Allard (he would be MS' official pirate, having the shaved head and earring to look the part), was somewhat ready to field the public's questions, as he set up an online chat. I thought he defended the decision fairly well, but at the same time, was backpeddling about alot of things he claimed would be necessary for the next generation. This along with another top MS exec claiming that 95% of 360 games would not need the hard drive. But this statement is a bit misleading in itself. While a vast majority of games may not need the hard drive, the fact of the matter is that even if you never downloaded content or saved music to your hard drive, standard memory cards are notoriously small and can only store a handful of game saves (especially any game that has career or season modes to save), so odds are you would probably need at least two memory cards, thereby making the hard drive again a more than worthwhile purchase since it costs about the same as two and can store a helluva lot more.

But some hopefully good news has leaked out-MS is supposedly pricing their first party 360 games at $49.99, meaning we hopefully won't see any hike in price (although who knows what 3rd parties will do) from current games.

I picked up the first season of Lois & Clark: The New Adventures of Superman last week, and as campy & cheesy as I remember the show being, time has made it seem even more so. But somehow, it still retains a large amount of it's charm. It's also sort of interesting to see where all those then young up & comers have ended up. Last I checked, Jonathon Shea (Lex Luthor) was on some syndicated Sci-Fi show called Mutant X, Dean Cain was hosting Ripley's Believe it or Not, and Teri Hatcher is on one of the top TV shows right now.

Finally, I did see both Red Eye & 40-Year Old Virgin over the weekend. Red Eye was a solid thriller, but gets a little silly and over the top at the end. It's worth seeing for Cillian Murphy's performance; between this and being the Scarecrow in Batman Begins, he'll have a nice long career as a creepy psycho. 40-Year Old Virgin is easily the funniest movie I have seen all year, it's an absolutely flawless fun comedy, Everyone is the cast is absolutely hilarious, and Carrell really shines in his first lead.

That's really it for now, but I'll defnitely be back later today or Wed. with some more thoughts on what's happening in the world of entertainment.

A tale of two 360s

Well, after weeks of no real news for gamers, several big announcements have come to light. The firs two being bad. One of the premiere games for the 360-Full Auto(think Burnout with guns), has been officially pushed back till next year. No one really knows how much This will affect the launch until we see what else is actually available, but it was something I had fully pre-ordered, so I'll have to think about what else I'd want to put that money on.

But much worse for Gamecube owners is that Zelda: The Twilight Princess has officially been delayed until at least the middle of 2006. This is realistically the one great game that was worth holding onto your Gamecube for, now with it possibly being pushed relatively close to the launch of the Revolution, they may even just move it on to their next system, as it would be a garaunteed system-seller.

And now for the big news-The 360's price was finally announced, and the rumors about there being a stripped-down and deluxe version were confirmed. The basic $299 model will not come with a hard drive or wireless controllers, but you also apparently won't need the hard drive to play most games (inlcuding the new Morrowind title, which is probably my most anticipated 360 game). But for only a $100 more (which it will cost to buy the 20 gig hard drive seperately), you will get a wireless controller, the hard drive, a head set and a dvd remote. In addition, the 360 only becomes backwards compatible with the hard drive, and obviously any downloadable content or media files you'd want to store and use for games or other purposes would very quickly fill up the standard memory card.

But the bigger implication here is that the hard drive will not be a standard in every 360 bought, possibly even only a small minority, meaning that most 360 games really won't take advantage of the possible features (i.e. save a game anywhere, faster loading, downloadable content, etc.). For me personally, things like downloadable content and backwards compatability aren't really a big deal though, so I'll have to see what if any affect the hard drive will have on any launch or near launch titles. If all it's good for is getting extra money out of me through downloadable content, I'll probably skip it.

Moving on-after a couple of weeks of mediocre offerings, we finally have some good-looking films open this weekend. First up is Wes Craven's Red Eye. This actually looks like the first promising thriller in a few years, but the previews already have given too much away, showing that Rachael Mcadams gets off the plane. Sure, it would've been harder to pull off, but a thriller taking place entirely in the confined space of a plane that has nothing to do with terrorists or prisoners would be a very cool idea.
And then there is Steve Carrell's first starring role-The 40-year Old Virgin. Normally, I would toss this off as another bad sex comedy about a total loser, but the great cast and suprisingly funny previews give me hope that this will be a great comedy.

Ok, that's really all for today, now excuse me while I readjust me 360 launch day budget.....

Same Ho, Same low.

Couple of fairly noteworthy game tidbits this week, so I'll address them first. Out this week is the forst NFL game with no competition, Madden 2006. I'll sum up my feeling s about this with a quote from Scrubs: Dr. Cox: You'd better go ahead and enjoy this while you can, Bob, because if your evil genie goes ahead and grants your wish and I'm gone forever, then the only one you're going to be able to contend with around here is yourself. And when you really get to know *that* person, oh, dear God, you'll scream so loud that Satan will want to tear up that contract he made with you at birth just so he can get some sleep.

The other big tidbit is that supposedly on August 17th, Microsoft will finally announce a firm date & release price for the 360. Hopefully they'll also announce what that standard price will definitely include as rumors are again picking up that the hard drive will actually be a seperate purchase. We'll just have to wait & see on that one.

Now onto the movies. We have 4 fairly underwhelming ones opening this weekend. First up is The Great Raid-Another true story about another small group of soldiers that faced great odds during a war. No dissrespect to the actual soldiers, but this seems so similar to the last 40 billion movies of this type that I have no interest in it.
Next up is Four Brothers which just has one of the silliest plots I've heard in awhile. 4 adopted kids come back home for their Mom's funeral. She was murdered and they want to take out revenge on whoever did it. The thing is, the previews hint at some huge citywide conspiracy, which given that she was some little old lady in a very poor neighborhood makes me laugh.
Then there is The Skeleton Key. The latest in a long line of particularly unscary and just plain horrendous horror films. In fact, it pretty much looks like a direct rip off of The Grudge, just with a Voodoo twist.
But all these seem like oscar contenders compared to this weeks biggest stinker-Deuce Bigalow: European Gigolow, starring talentless ass Rob Schneider. It'll be the same horrible jokes as last time, only in a different country (Deuce is a big loser, he only gets strange & freakish women, throw in some fart jokes). The box office has been in a huge rut this year, I seriously hope that trend continues this weekend in order to show that nobody wants to see this crap.

Perhaps the best thing to do this weekend is pick up a copy of the first season of Muppet Show. It's a good reminder of real family (meaning anyone of any age) entertainment when almost nothing is geared towards the entire family anymore.

YEEEHAAAWWWW!!!!!

Ok, pretty much the only thing worth talking about is this weekend's only major release-The Dukes of Hazzard, starring some of our greatest thespians-Sean William Scott, Johnny Knoxville & Jessica Simpson. In case you can't tell, that's complete sarcasm, but the fact is that there are few actors I could imagine fitting the roles better, and it looks like an incredibly fun popcorn movie, which is probably befitting the series (of which I've seen maybe half an episode ever). I know there has been some controversy stirred over keeping the confederate flag on the General Lee, but this is yet another example of PC gone too far. The confederate flag stood for a lot of things, not just slavery. It's more a representation of the rebel attitude, and removing it would be far too conformists for true troublemakers such as the dukes...

Speak No Evil

I seem to be doomed never to play FFXI. My old PS2 was barely working, and the new one isn't compatible with the required hard drive add on. But I figured that was fine because it's coming out for the 360. It was a big reason I wanted to buy the system. It's still coming out for the 360 and by the end of the year, but it won't support a crucial feature-Voice Chat. You'll still have to buy a USB keyboard if you want to play FFXI on your 360. They claim it's to help keep track of player abuse through the chat log, but this is complete bull. I refuse to play a game that only supports keyboard chat, there's no excuse for it these days, and neither will most other xbox live users who have been weaned on the good old headset. If Bungie & Blizzard can keep track, why can't Square? It's just really ridiculous and they just lost themselves a sale...

The only other big news this week so far is also from Square. Seem that Square may be going truly multi-platform, as there a big rumors that they may bring their biggest franchises (i.e. Final Fantasy & Dragon Warrior) to all 3 next gen consoles. It would be cool, but Sony would lose plenty of their pull if they could no longer claim to be the only system with most of Square's most popular titles, so my guess is they'll do whatever it takes to lock down at least a few exclusives.

And that's really all for today, but I'll definitely be back tommorow to talk about the weekend movies and if anything else pops up....

Fast Times at Superhero High

Really not a whole ton to talk about today, so I'll just briefly discuss the movies. First up is Stealth, which looks like some horrible combination of Top Gun and Knight Rider (or possibly 2001). I mean seriously, haven't we had enough of the whole machines gone horribly wrong? And notice that at least from the previews that much like any other machine, it's instantly evil. I also know they are pushing it as a Jamie Foxx film, but that's only cause of Ray. It's not a Jamie Foxx film, he's a supporting player, which means he'll be minimal if not die halfway through the film leaving us with Jessica Biel and the other dude who I am too lazy to look up.

Then there's Must love Dogs with Diane Lane & John Cusack. Now, putting these two wonderful actors in anything is almost enoug hreason to buy a ticket, but this is the same lame ass Sleepless in Seattle crap they've pulled a million times and nothing in the previews seem to indicate anything funny or remotely interesting.

Finally, there is the week's one bright spot-Sky High. The concept of superhero high is a little over the top and since it's a Disney film, probably can't be as edgy as I'd like, but it has a pretty stellar cast, and looks very slick, so I'll definitely check that out this weekend.

That's really about it for today, I'd post more if there was more to post about :), hopefully there'll be some more newsworthy stuff next time!

Jack Thompson is an idiot...

Jack Thompson, for those who don't know, is a sleazeball lawyer who basically is trying to make a career of suing the game industry. He is the nutball of all nutballs. He has been constantly quoted as calling anybody who even dares to disagree with him A Nazi, a towel-head, and much worse. But before last week's historic deicision to make GTA: San Andreas a AO title, he was merely another in a sea of scumbag lawyers attaching himself to the latest trendy thing to censor. Now, that he has declared "victory" over GTA (something he really had nothing to do with, if you can even call it victory over a game that has already sold millions and will be in circulation for years thanks to this publicity), he is leading one of the most screwball causes I've heard in years-Thompson, being backed by of course some idiotic fringe religious group, has attacked the most popular series in PC history-The Sims. Specifically the Sims 2. The reason? Because of the ability to put different looks on your Sims, specifically, make them nude. But it's not really the nudity he's objecting to. He claims the skins make it a "paradise for pedophiles" because they can look at little digitized kids. WHAT THE FUCK IS WRONG WITH YOU? I am literally at a loss for words at the sheer stupidity of this statement. If I ever meet Jack Thompson, I fully promise to beat the holy hell out of him using moves I saw on WWE. How's that for bad influence, jackass?

Moving on, two big press conferences were held by both Sony and Microsoft last week, and the most suprising thing is that no new information was really given. Sure, some more meaningless specs and BS about how their system is superior to all were said, but no announcments of pricing, no release dates, and no gameplay was shown on either system. I know these companies love to piss away their money, but this is ridiculous.

Finally, I did see both Wedding Crashers & The Island this past weekend. Wedding Crashers was absolutely brilliant, not original by any means, but every single actor brought their comedic a-game to the table, and that made it extremely funny. The first 25 minutes of The Island borders on excruciating (real proof that Michael Bay has no idea how to develop story or characters) but as soon as the action gets rolling, it becomes an excellent action film, so I'd reccomend it.

That's really all for now, but I'll hopefully be back tommorow...

Remember kids, massive sweraing and homicidal violence is ok, but we draw the line at sex!

This post is quite a bit later than I expected to do it, but given the big news this week of GTA: San Andreas being the first major game to get an Adults Only rating, I wanted to wait for all the initial reactions to come out and see what progessed before I posted my thoughts on the subject. Now, if you weren't aware, this is all due to some creative programmers with too much time in their hands that discovered some leftover code that the public was never really meant to see. Rockstar, acting much like our current administration, started out by blantantly lying that it was strictly the work of some hackers, but finally admitted that it was something left in the game after mounting evidence had piled up. Now granted, probably less than one percent of people who actually own the game would actually get this hack, but odds are at least of few of them would be kids, which would make GTA a bigger scapegoat than it already is. And bottom line, Rockstar dropped the ball here. They should be punished in the wallet, where it hurts them the most. But the reasoning behind the new rating is pretty goddamn spurious. Seriously, this is already a game where you can mercilessly beat the hell out of innocent people, have sex with hookers and run them over, as well as run your own drug cartel. But one little minigame pushes it up a whole level? Right. The game probably should've been rated AO to begin with, but that's the kiss of death since no major retailer will carry it, and money talks.

Moving on to movies; we have yet another unecessary remake in The Bad News Bears. My guess is that this will be worth it just for Billy Bob Thorton, as he is possibly the only one who could do justice to a role the great Walter Matthau defined. That being said, I'll wait for video.

And then there is The Island. Now either you love Michael Bay's cheesy action formula, or you think he's pretty much responsible for the downfall of Hollywood in terms of creativity. He made some true stinkers the past few years (namely Bad Boys II & Pearl Harbor), but The Island seems to have him back in his element and back on track. I'm seeing it tommorow so I'll let you know.

And that's pretty much it for today. It's been a hectic weekend, but hopefully I'll get another post in Monday to write about anything I might've skipped over.

CG killed the Animation star

Traditional animation has been just barely hanging on for awhile now (I think what officially killed bid budget animation films was Treasure Planet, brilliantly animated but a horrid film). More and more TV shows are cropping up as CG style (which in my opinion mostly looks blocky and awkward), but I always figured that the right movie could bring it back to the fore front (even Pixar heads said they'd be willing to do traditional animation for the right film).
Now, two movies have been announced that seem like a perfect fit for traditional animation, but instead they are going the CG route because of course, that's what is popular with the little kids now. Both the Smurfs and the Ninja Turtles are coming to the big screen sometime in the future, but it has been announced that they will be CG films, which seems like a poor fit. I really don't think either of these films will have a smooth transition over, and any fans will be annoyed and turned off by the choice, which seems to be a lose-proposition.

I did see Charlie and the Chocolate factory, and while it was quite enjoyable, I did have two major issues. The effects that happen when the kids do something stupid that nearly gets them killed (i.e. Augustus in the Pipe, Violet blowing up like a blueberry) seemed far more fake than the pratical effects used in tghe original, and Charlie seemed to win more by sheer luck than character in this version. But I still highly reccomend it overall. I didn't really get around to seeing Wedding Crashers yet, I figure I'll do it Friday at the latest.

That's really all for now (slow news week so far), but I'll be back by Thursday with thoughts on this weekend's movies.

A Chocolate Factory by any other name...

Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory is pretty much sacred ground. Lord only knows who would dare even attempt to remake it, and of course the question is why bother? This isn't like the several bad versions of Dune that exist out there, they got it perfect the first time. But, if anybody's got the stuff to make another version and do something different with it and have it not completely suck, it's got to be Tim Burton, the master of wonderfully weird. And someone like Depp is sure to put a unique stamp on the eccentric candyman.

And while I'm interested to see how Charlie & The Chocoalte Factory turns out, I'm actually much more interested in this weekend's other offering-Wedding Crashers with Vince Vaughn & Owen Wilson. Why? Because it's the first big budget comedy in a couple of years (I think the last one was American Wedding) that's clearly aimed at a non-middle school audience with an apparently hard-earned R rating. And while guys like Wilson & Vaughn don't need to be raunchy to be funny, it's when they are really allowed to let loose in adult fare that you see their best stuff. It's also good to know that no sacrifices were made for the bottom dollar. I'm really expecting this to be the first great comedy of 2005 (not hard considering the only even good one so far has been Hitch).

In the realm of WHY GOD WHY?!?!?-Sony pictures has apparently greenlighted three more sequels that nobody asked for in the first place. Roadhouse (without Patrick Swayze, because apparently he's too busy being a janitor in a pet store), Hollow Man and I Know What You Did Last Summer are ALL getting sequels. Road House and Hollow man were pathetic, and Last Summer was entertaining, but c'mon it already has one horrible sequel, it doesn't need a second. It's just amazing how people love to burn money in Hollywood. You can't claim brand recognition because they don't have any with these titles, and I doubt anyone who was in these movies and still has a career would bother signing up, so there goes any star power. I would just love to sit in on these pitch meetings where someone came up with this idea, someone else thought it was great, and nobody else in the room had the brains to say "ARE YOU FUCKING INSANE?"

Finally, The primetime emmy nominations were annoucned today, and it was nice to finally see Scrubs and especially Zach Braff get nominated (although John C. McGinley does such a great job as Dr. Cox that he should've also been nominated as well) considering how hard NBC has made it to even find out when the damn show is on. But otherwise there weren't any really good suprises (although I like that the guy from House was nominated, he's awesome, actually he's like Dr. Cox if he was in a drama) and mostly old favorites (only reason Sopranos didn't scoop up all the nominations possible was because it was taking the year off). But I was geniunely delighted and suprised to see Arrested Development win for best comedy last year, so maybe if they start giving awards to shows and people that actually deserve it, I'll start tuning in again.

Yo ho Yo ho a Pirates Life for Me!

Ok, first up, I did see Fantastic 4 over the weekend, and it was actually quite enjoyable. It wasn't quite up their with the cream of the crop like Spider Man or Batman Begins, but it was far better than disasters like Daredevil & the Hulk. It's a fun mindless blockbuster film with a good sense of humor and the entire cast filled their roles surprisingly well (with Chris Evans as the Human Torch being the highlight). I will definitely be buying a ticket for the inevitable sequel (and being that the movie not only did far above expectations, but can be credited with lifiting the box office out of a 19-week slump, it's almost a given).

Any Xbox owner should be forced to walk the plank if they don't do themselves the favor of picking up Sid Meier's Pirates!, which ships out tommorow. I was a HUGE fan of the original version which popped up way back in 1987 and I last played the pretty awesome Genesis version back in 93. I was planning for this to be my last Xbox purchase originally, but I fully plan to pick it up to really test out the 360's backwards compatibility when it comes out in Novemeber. It's the perfect title for anybody who's a fan of ship battles, swashbuckling and/or treasure hunting. And really, how many good pirate titles are out there, anyways?

Although a couple of fairly noteworthy movies are opening this weekend (which I'll talk about later in the week), easily the biggest release of this week (possibly of the whole year) is the new Harry Potter book, The Half-Blood Prince. I unabashedly worship the Harry Potter books. It's one of the few series where I will actually turn off everything in my room (I usually have at least two electronic devices on at any given time) and just read silently for hours. That being said, I'll pick one up this weekend if it's easy to find, otherwise, I may just wait till the hysteria dies down a little, as I've never really been one to do fanatical things like wait days in line or pick things up at midnight (aside from Halo 2, and only because a friend was willing to give me a ride). Course, that's one of the good things about living in a relatively small town, it's probably not gonna be that hard to find :)

I pretty much decided to pass on Killer 7, so you'll have to get word from other sources. Mainly because of just about every review, even the positive ones, ask you to look at the game strictly as "art in gaming" not as an actual game. Well, I'm sorry to be a spoilsport on edginess and creativity, but I believe that a game can have good, involving gameplay and also be a good artistic expression as well (i.e. Pyschonauts or Viewtiful Joe). I want art, I'll go to a museum (hell, there's even a gaming art exhibition touring right now called "I am 8-bit").

And lastly, I'd like to leave you with a better look into the diseased mind that is Uwe Boll.

BRING ME THE HEAD OF UWE BOLL!!!!

The whole "bring me the head" line may become a runner if enough people start pissing me off, and this is a LONG overdue one. Uwe Boll is the talentless prick who brought us the unimaginable horrors House of the Dead & Alone in the Dark. Now, I wasn't as mad about these horrible films as most people because of two main reasons. First, they were both based on practically dead game series that weren't that noteworthy to begin with. Second, it's not like he was hurting any good actor's career (Christian Slater & Stephen Dorff have been barely hanging on to their career for years, Alone in the Dark was just a possible final nail in the coffin).

But with only two major films under his belt, Boll has officially become one of the most reviled directors in history, with MANY websites and columns continually pleading or threatening him to stop making films, and with his latest projects and announcements, I am officially on the bandwagon.

First up is the movie Bloodrayne. Now, while I am not a big fan of this game series, it has some potential as a fun action film with it's interesting mix of Vampires and Nazis (in the games, Bloodrayne is actually a good vampire that hunts down evil Nazis). But of course Boll is making the biggest mistake he can by completely ignoring the storyline and instead making it some lame tale about Bloodrayne taking on her vampire father. The real kicker? Her vampire father is Ghandi! No, not the character of Ghandi(though at this point, it wouldn't suprise me), but the actor who is best known for portraying him-Ben Kingsley! That's right, Uwe Boll has somehow blackmailed Ben FUCKING Kingsley into one of his movies (although with his last two movies being Thunderbirds & Suspect Zero, Kingsley may have just lost it completely). And that's not all! Kristanna Loken, Michael Madsen, Michelle Rodriguez and Billy Zane are all in this certifiable brain hemmorage of a movie.

Then there is the recently announced cast for the Dungeon Siege movie. Jason Statham, Ron Pearlman, Lelee Sobieski & John Rhys-Davies have all signed on the dotted line (and Loken is in this one as well). Let's keep in mind that his movies combined have not even grossed $20 million! How is this guy getting all these films and mostly talented actors other than witchcraft?!?

And that's hardly the end of it. He's snapped up the filiming rights for Far Cry, Fear Effect, and Hunter the Reckoning. He's also mentioned in at least one interview he'd like to destroy several other popular franchises, specifically naming Hitman & Warcraft.

I think we should all start running a pool on who's career could actually survive a Uwe Boll film (although apparently Boll's own career is thriving through some sort of evil ritual where he sacrifices 10 bunnies a night to his dark gods).

What's better than Halo 2? MORE HALO 2!!!!

Most of my gamer friends know that although I've been trying to keep myself busy with whatever games PS2 currently has to offer, I've definitely been suffering Xbox live withdrawal in a major way, and it's really hit bad this week with the release of the Halo 2 expansion pack. For $12.00 online you get a bunch of new maps to play with that should massively extend the shelf life of the best FPS of this console generation. And for $20 at your local software dealer, you get all of the recently released maps (although half should be free online by now) along with useless extras like artwork and videos (hey, I appreciate the stuff, but if it'll keep costs down, chuck it!). But the thought that I'll probably be able to get all that stuff for pratically nothing and pick up Halo 2 again for dirt cheap if I feel like it in November (which will probably only happen if Perfect Dark Zero is a letdown) helped calm my nerves a bit.

In the realm of "I want to believe": Although Xbox live was clearly a far superior service, the PS2 had it won hands down in one online arena-The online RPG. Between the Baldur's Gate games, Everquest, the upcoming Phantasy Star Universe and especially FF XI, Xbox gamers were left wondering why our only option has been an old Dreamcast game (Phantasy Star Online). With the 360 focusing even more on it's likely online advantage, rumors are flying about what Live will offer in the online RPG arena. The only confirmed offering is once again, a game that's been available to PS2 and PC owners for a couple of years already-FFXI. But strong rumors for City of Heroes and World of Warcraft along with some other original properties have been floating around. The interesting thing is that Microsoft recently renewed the trademark for their high-profile MMORPG cancellation True Fantasy Live Online. Now granted, this most likely is just because Microsoft just wants to keep the rights so no one else can use them, but we can dream!

Moving on to this weekend's movies, neither of which I have high hopes for. Fantastic Four seems to have a pretty good cast going for it. Michael Chiklis, Chris Evans & Julian McMahon all seem perfect fits for their respective roles. Jessica Alba is a decent actress and undeniably the hottest woman on the planet, but just seems miscast as Sue Richards (maybe in about ten years she could do the role). And although Ioan Gruffudd looks like Reed Richards, he's hardly been tested in terms of carrying a film, with only a major role in the forgettable King Arthur under his belt. Add to that cheesy-looking special effects and a large majority of poor early reviews and it looks like we have the next League of Extraordinary Gentlemen rather than the next X-men.
But it seems like a much better choice than this week's other big release-the latest crappy Japanese horror flick turned into an even crappier American one; Dark Water. And once again we have the latest in a string of high-profile Oscar Winning actors/actresses slumming it in the cheesy horror genre with Jennifer Conelly starring. She must be getting bored of all her acclaim and serious work, either that or it just doesn't pay enough.

That's it for today, but my copy of Killer 7, the latest bizarre release from Capcom (you play a wheel-chair bound assasin who has seven personalities that can manifest themselves, going up against an invisible gang known as the Heaven's Smile, ooookaaayy) should be in my hands by Monday, so I'll definitely have some thoughts on that if nothing else earth-shattering comes up in the entertainment world over the weekend.

Just because you're crazy doesn't mean you're wrong...

Behold the latest pearl of wisdom from Sony's Ken Kutaragi, on the goal of the PS3-“for consumers to think to themselves ‘I will work more hours to buy one’. We want people to feel that they want it, irrespective of anything else.”. This has already caused some ire among gamers and added more fuel for the anti-Sony fanboys, because they rightly believe this means that the PS3 may come out at a ridiculously high price (note that most current rumors point at $400, which doesn't seem unresaonable, but a bit too pricey for my taste, especially when they will most likely drop significantly by next Xmas). Anyone who reads this blog knows that I personally think they need to put a muzzle on Kutaragi, as almost everything he says is paramount to shooting yourself in the foot. But I'm actually defending this statement, because in reality, it is the ultimate goal of all products, especially pricey luxuries like game consoles. Kuturagi just had the balls to say what no one else will. They want you to want the system so bad that you will ignore bills, work longer hours, starve yourself, etc. in order to afford that system if that's what it takes. Company execs would slit their own mother's throats for this kind of brand loyalty, so don't kid yourself that this isn't also what Microsoft and Nintendo really want.

That's really all I have for today, but I'll be back tommorow with thoughts on this weekend's movies and anything else going on in the entertainment world.

BRING ME THE HEAD OF STEVEN SPIELBERG!!!

That was pretty much my gut reaction today after suffering through what is easily Spielberg's worst movie and may also be Tom Cruise's (although it's hard to top stuff like Cocktail & Days of Thunder in terms of pure crapulence). I have never been so bored watching tons of Earthlings be brutually eliminated. The special effects were just loud, noisy and clumsy. There was no plot to speak of (you can tell because they keep repeating the same lines over and over throughout the movie). Any dramatic moments or character development feel horribly forced and hollow. Cruise is horribly miscast as some normal kind of jerk dockworker, and Dakota Fanning literally just spends the whole movie being an annoying whiny kid. And to top it all off, Senor Speilburgeo felt it was a good idea to stick with the original ending, and to add on top the ultimate mushy happy Hollywood ending. I was expecting something at least equal to Independence Day (dumb, but pretty entertaining), but this is more on the level of Plan 9 from Outer Space, just with an actual budget which makes it all the sadder. I wasn't expecting it to be a great film, but the fact that it wasn't entertaining on ANY level makes this easily the biggest dissapointment of this year (but The Longest Yard still beats it out by a little for worst movie I've seen this year).

After subjecting myself to the pure torture that was WOW. I definitely needed a pick me up. Luckily, this same day the newest RPG from the brilliant minds at Nippon Ichi came out: Atelier Iris: Eternal Mana. The story is nothing new (mana is dissapearing from the world, blah, blah, blah), but it's main feature is the alchemy system. It sounds a little intimidating and limiting at first, since you have to combine elements you collect in order to make powerful attacks that are necessary to beat even the standard enemies in the game. But luckily the system itself is pretty simple, and since you can turn many enemies and inanimate objects that respawn into elements it's hard to run out. This also adds plenty of strategy and variety to otherwise mundane battles. The encounter rate is also suprisingly low, which can be trouble for big boss fights since you may be underpowered, but it's a refeshing chancge of pace. But like any really good rpg, the key to AI:EM is that the characters are chraming and interesting and you like spending time with them (really, it's important in all forms of entertainment, but since RPGs usually ask for much longer commitment, it's more important that the characters are at least not annoying and preferably entertaining). That's really it for now

We should've killed E.T. when we had the chance

Seriously, that little bastard got on the mothership and nearly 25 years later, he's brought back all his buddies to slughter the human race! It would be cool since Spielburg did the ultimate friendly alien movie and now he's doing the big theatrical version of War of the Worlds. I have faith in the combination of Cruise and Spielberg (Minority Report is one of my favorite movies of the last few years), but there's a lot of big question marks behind this film. War of the Worlds was a radio broadcast, so how do you expand that into a movie (yeah, it's been a couple of movies and a TV show, but this movie seems to have no relation)? And honestly, on the surface, it looks a little like Signs, which was such an asbymal waste of time. And hell, last time the aliens were beaten by our own atmosphere, so I hope that's not the ending here. I guess we'll all find out in two days, but if I see any police aiming walkie talkies at the aliens (in case you forget, he altered the DVD release of E.T. so that the police only had walkie talkies instead of guns), I'll know Spielberg has been drinking from the same kool-aid mix that Lucas has been on the last decade or so.

Although it's not even out yet, the upcoming 25 to Life is already the favorite whipping boy of several senators (including Hilary Clinton) and one idiotic CNN analyst. Off course they are complaining about the violence level, and the fact that you can live the life of a gang-banger, setting up ambushes and drive-bys. Of course, they forget to mention that EVERY preview so far says you also have the choice to play as a police officer. And they are mostly doing the usual song and dance of protecting little Billy from things he'll learn about from his friends at school anyways, but they are taing it one step further and pleading with major retailers to not even carry the title. This is a nifty little way of getting around the first amendment, because they aren't trying to pass anything, but unless a better election issue comes up, come release time they may actually resort to protesting outside stores that carry the title (while ignoring plenty of other equally violent titles that are releasing in the same time frame), which can be just as bad as any legislation. Wal Mart has a pretty good history of having no spine, but I hope other retailers will take a stand and tell these morons to stop being such assholes and focus on important issues like oh I don't know, the war effort or social security or the drug war or the defecit or gas prices. I could keep going but I'll spare you readers.

There's been a lot of fairly unholy unions in entertainment, but I think this latest one tops them all. Midway, maker of overrated recycled crap like 5 million similar NFL Blitz titles and the mostly laughable Mortal Kombat titles (MK II was the only worthwhile one of the whole series) has teamed up with MTV to make games. Take a few minutes to let the horror of this news sink in. MTV is officially in the games buisness (and they are making their own game division called MTV games). This means we'll be forced to be subject to horrors like Pimp My Ride The Game, The Ashlee Simpson Game and whatever other crappy shows they have. I can see a Real World game right now, hopefully it's an FPS.

And finally, if you thought Jack Bauer had a lot of bad days before, it's about to get even worse for the most beleagured federal agent in TV history. A movie is supposedly in the works, although I don't know how they squeeze what's normally 24 hours of TV into a two-hour movie. But more pressing is 24: The Game. It takes place between seasons 2 & 3, and it looks pretty damn cool. I just hope it's not actually based on a clock, because I loathe time-based titles. I'll most likely be back on Thursday, so until then....

Funerals & Birthdays

Ok, let's start off with the bad news. The voice of Tigger is dead. Paul Winchell died on Friday, and while Tigger will live on, it's a very well established fact that when the original voice of a cherished character dies, the character loses something. Most likely because the originator of the distinctive voice (Mel Blanc for example) had enough power and concern for the integrity of the character they were portraying. Then some new person who most likely could really use the job on their resume comes in as a replacement and simply becomes the company's latest "yes-man". Mainly because their are thousands of people who can do a more than adequate impersonation of at least one well-known cartoon character, giving the new guy no reason to rock the boat. The the character slowly turns into a bad combination of catch-phrases and simply pushing merchandise. And given that Tigger is the one character in the 100-acre wood I wouldn't set on fire and then do a happy dance if given the chance, I consider this a sad day since he will most definitely go the route of corporate schmuck soon. You need to see no further example than the fact that the best thing the Looney Tunes have done in the last decade or so is Space Jam for evidence of this.

As for happier news, the original gaming icon, Pac-Man (yes Pong came before, but it isn't really an icon) turns 25 this week. Actually, that makes me feel old, since I'm actually a full year older than the little yellow ghost gobbler. But, anniversaries of this sort do sort of make you take a look back and see how far gaming has come as a medium. It's been quite a trip if you've been along for the whole ride. Also makes me think anybody who says games were better in the "good old days" has completely lost their mind.

Alright, that's really it for now, but seeing as it's officially Monday, I'll be back later today with thoughts on War of the Worlds, the newest game rattling politicians' chains and whatever other news seems to creep up during the day. But for now, checl out the awesomeness of this trailer for The Transporter 2, due out in September

So a foul-mouthed alcholic squirrel and a homicidal alien walk into a bar...

Best described as a Bizarro world version of Disney Land, the original Conker's Bad Fur Day was one of the last great releases on the Nintendo 64 (hell, it was one of the few good ones). You played a wacky squirrel who got piss drunk on his 21st birthday, and woke up with a hangover in a stange land that included things like flowers with huge breasts and a giant living mound of poo that sang opera. But for the time it was also a brilliant platformer thanks to what at the time was a fairly original take on your normal cute and cuddly platformer and an extremely robust single and multi-player mode. And years later, when Rare was snapped up by Microsoft, one of the first announcements would be that they were porting over the nasty and twisted tale of Conker to the Xbox, with a huge online mode. Problem is, they didn't change anything, so a lot of the balance and camera problems that were forgivable when the game was new just seem annoying now. And the witty movie jabs have aged really terribly, as have the bad fart jokes and toilet humor. I'm sure it will sell well, but I'd rather they have a real and creative sequel (especially since the damn game took at least two years) than some game I played years ago that seems rather dated now.

Also out this week is Destory All Humans, an homage to campy sci-fi classics (so much so that there was a special offer where you could get a free copy of Plan 9 from Outer Space). You play an alien whose ultimate goal is to get DNA to save your planet from dying, but the real purpose is to use all the cool weapons at your disposal to blow the hell out of every human and cow in sight. It probably won't offer much in terms of original gameplay, but running around with an alien death ray causing major havoc is always fun.

Going with the philosophy if it ain't broke,fix it anyways; the Big N is apparently considering revamping the look of the classic games that it will have available to download on its upcoming Revolution system. This is a HORRIBLE idea. The whole reason people are excited about this concept to begin with is to play these classics in their orginal pixelated glory. The only games I would support doing this on is the N64 games because they all looked horribly pixelated and blocky, so they could use some smoothing out, but not any kind of real upgrade. I really hope Nintendo at least offers the original version as an alternative or this may turn off a lot of the old school hardcore crowd they were hoping to attract.

Finally, I saw The Longest Yard today, and I can say it is easily the worst movie I have seen this year. The jokes are all painful, the performances are horrible, it badly needs at least 30 minutes cut out, and by the time they get to the big game, you just don't care. I have rarely ever wanted 113 minutes back so badly in my entire life.

I see lots of dead people...

Ok, since I have several planned posts on specific topics this week, I thought I would talk about this weekend's movies a few days early, especially since none of them seem particularly appealing. First up is Lindsay Lohan in yet another tepid remake of a mediocre original-Herbie Fully Loaded. Granted, it's probably the last chance you'll get to see her as a hot curvy redhead as she's become a bad Paris Hilton imitator, but that's not really enough reason to go see this pathetic attempt to milk money out of a franchise that nobody cared about to begin with.
And then we turn to the latest TV show turned movie-Bewitched. Granted, unlike most remakes, it's actually got a pretty solid cast behind it-Nicole Kidman, Will Ferrell, and Michael Caine, but again, the question becomes does anybody care? Bewitched wasn't even that good of a show to begin with.
Finally, there is George Romero's return to the genre he created with Land of The Dead. Now I loved Night of the Living Dead and Dawn of the Dead, and the last few zombie films (28 Days Later, the new Dawn of the Dead) have been pretty entertaining. But Romero is insisting on the traditional slow-moving zombies, which have always been a huge plothole to me-If these zombies are not only incredibly slow but completely brainless, how is it that they haven't just been eliminated? And as good as Romero's first two zombie films were, his third, Day of the Dead was a complete joke and he hasn't really done anything worthwhile since then, so I'm not too sure it'll be worth checking out either.
Although Batman Begins hasn't even been out two weeks, there is already a huge buzz about the sequel. Apparently, all the key actors will be back, except Katie Holmes (which is probably a good thing, as she was at best ineffectual), and it's most likely that the new villain will be the Joker, and early reports indicate that there is a push to get Mark Hamill the role. This may seem like an odd choice, but anyone who is a Batman fan knows that Mark Hamill has been the animated voice of the Joker for years in various shows and movies, and he's done a brillaint job, so it wouldn't be too much of a stretch (although given Hamill is in his mid-50s, they may opt for someone younger).
Halo is coming to a theatre near you. But all that has really been decided so far is that Fox and Universal are teaming up to make the film. Now, even though he's far from a brillaint director, I think this is material that is straight up Jerry Bruckheimer's alley, so it would be smart to get him on it, and I think The Rock would also be a good choice for the role of Master Chief. But just don't let Uwe Boll (House of the Dead, Alone in the Dark) anywhere near it, and it should have a decent chance of being the first good video game movie (I have little hope for the upcoming Doom movie).
That's really all for now, but I'll be back later on in the day with thoughts on the newest game releases and some other news that has happened recently...

Those who do not learn from history....

One of the oldest and most true adages of all time, yet we constantly see people who flagrantly ignore it and suffer the consequences. With that in mind, it appears that Sony & Toshiba's talks about coming up with some sort of compromise between the Blu-Ray Format & DVDHD format have compltely fallen through. Now, there's going to be a winner and a loser here for sure, but the suprise is that it will most likely be Sony. Why? Let's hit the way back machine and go back in time to the betamax vs. vhs wars.
Sony was fully behind their format betamax, and why shouldn't they be, it was better quality than vhs, surely people would want better quality, right? But betamax was more expensive for both the studios and the consumer, so vhs won out. Once again, we have the exact same situation coming up. DVDHD has far less capacity than Blu-ray, but it's far easier to develop for and significantly cheaper to make, so when the average consumer looks at a DVDHD and a blu-ray dvd and notices the price difference, they'll go for what leaves a little more in their wallet, especially when they have to pick a dvd player that will play just one format (wanna bet the Blu-ray players will cost significantly more as well?). Heck, if DVDHD's are noticably more expensive than the current standard format, the average comsumer may just say screw it and stick with what they've already got.

Ok, I completely forget to mention last time that I did see Mr. & Mrs. Smith over the weekend, and it was a very fun popcorn flick without a whole lot of rhyme or reason, but plenty of good action to make up for that. I also saw Batman Begins today and I think it's easily the best Batman movie done yet and could be argued as the best superhero movie I've ever seen (that's right, better than Spider-Man 2).

Ressurecting the Dark Knight

It wasn't the Joker, It wasn't Bane, hell it wasn't even some laughable villain like The Ventriloquist. In the end the one who was finally able to basically kill off Batman was Joel Schumacher and his insistance on a campy, nipple-suit filled film with horrid acting and ridiculous casting choices (Ahnuld as Mr. Freeze? a very non-athletic Alicia Silverstone as Batgirl?) that really did in the caped crusader's movie career. After all, although Batman has still thrived very well in comics and TV, it took nearly a decade to get him back onto the big screen, and it was a long and ever-evolving journey. How do restore faith in a franchise that left such a thoroughly bad taste in everybody's mouth?

There were probably a ton of ideas. Maybe leaving Batman dead and buried and showing what Gotham was like without him would've been an ideal choice? Really, no idea seemed too out there in breathing badly needed new life into the franchise. For awhile there was even serious effort to get out a Batman/Superman film to pump new life into both franchises. But what's coming out tommorow is more a result of Christopher Nolan's vision. Going back to the beginning, showing how and why Batman is Batman, and making Gotham a more real and gritty place, where Batman would really standout rather than seem right at home like he did in previous films. And the early reviews seem to indicate that this approach has worked in bringing back the franchise from beyond. I'm hoping they are right, and the previews do look very impressive, but I did see one preview where Christian Bale's scary Batman voice sounded more like he just had a really sore throat, which causes me to worry some.

I finally picked up the first season of Scrubs & the first two seasons of Newsradio, easily two of the best comedies of the last decade, and both were not given enough of a push by the now dead last NBC (granted, Newsradio lost an integral cast member when Hartman died, the show was definitely never the same and somewhat deservedly slowly died off after, but there's no excuse for them not pushing Scrubs as their premiere sitcom if not the best show on their network). Any fan of truly brilliant comedy needs to go pick these up. That's all for today....

Nothing solves marital issues like a little espionage

A lot of different movies open this weekend, but honestly the only one that seems worth seeing is Mr. & Mrs. Smith with Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie. It's a real shame a film that looks almost guaranteed to be the slickest action film this summer has been overshadowed with the nation's disturbing obsession with famous people's sex lives. The reviews of been really good so far and anything from the director of The Bourne Identity is gonna be awesome.

The other offering just seem like pure dreck. Hooneymooners is an insult to Jackie Gleason and Art Carney and everybody who made that brilliant sitcom that basically set the standard for guys like Fred Flinstone, Al Bundy, Homer Simpson and every lovable loser since then. The mere fact that the studio wouldn't even put in Ralph's famous "Bam! Zoom! Right to the Moon!" line (and all his variations on it) because they feared it would be seen as supporting violence against women makes it a certainty that this will be a humorless, painful affair to anyone unfortunate enough to waste money on it.

High Tension is yet another thriller from a foreign land, this time France. Now, the reviews have been solid, but any horror film I've seen over the last decade, American or otherwise, has been laughably awful at best(for some reason critics have a weird reverance for foreign & independent films, even though they make just as many crappy films as big budget Hollywood does). Plus it looks like a bad Texas Chainsaw Massacre rip off.

The Adventures of Shark Boy & Lava Girl in 3D is the latest family offering from Robert Rodriguez, and like his other family offerings, it should fill you with dread. The Spy Kids series was severely overrated and Rodriguez just seems so much more in is element when he is doing extremely visceral and violent movies like Sin City, From Dusk Til Dawn & Desperado.

And then there's Howl's Moving Castle, the lastest from Miyazaki, which I think will be like all of his films-Brilliant animation, but thin plot and atrocious dialogue. More evidence of the sacred cow that reviewers to think foreign films are.

Video Game wise-two big releases are out this week-Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas for Xbox, I more or less said what I thought about this way back when I first started up this blog, but I"ll expand on it a bit here. I think the GTA series has more or less peaked with Vice City. It had just about everything you could ever want to do in a violent crime game, and had incredibly cool nostalgia feel to it. San Andreas by comaprison, just felt like it added tons of stuff that wasn't necessary and was really boring-namely exercise & calorie-counting. It's bad enough we have to do this stuff in real life if we want to live past 40, we don't want it in videogames.

The other would be the latest WWII shooter Medal of Honor: European Assault. Forget banning violent video games, let's at least put some kind of moratorium on historical shooters. These things seem to be multiplying like tribbles, and they won't stop till all other genres are ingored completely.

All right, that's really all I have for todya, but I'll most likely have an update Saturday or Sunday as well.

They shoot horses....

So for a long while now I've been thinking about trading in my Xbox. Sure, there would be a couple of games I might miss out on and a few months of live I won't be able to take advantage of, but I thought I'd best do it soon. And upcoming games for the current platform will most likely be playable on the new one. Also, by showing a little patience I can probably also save a few bucks and pick them up for my new console at a nice used or discounted price. Then I pretty much realized the same thing applies to my Gamecube, so this morning I traded them both in. Now for the Xbox, this was a fairly easy decision as I think a few months away from live will only make me enjoy it more, and there are only a couple of Xbox titles I might initially miss out on and pick up a little after they are out. For the GC, it was a pretty painful one. Even though the system is clearly pretty much on it's last legs (despite what any insane fanboy will have you believe), they already have an early favorite for Game of the Year with the new Zelda game, and anyobody will tell you that it will most likely be worth buying a cube just for that game, and while I don't disagree with that, the economist in me reasons that no ONE game is worth keeping or buying a system for, especially when it's only going to go down in value, and probaly pretty damn soon. So, it will royally suck to wait a year after the game comes out to play the it on the Revolution, but it'll great to pick it up for only about twenty dollars or less.

Suprisingly, it's easily my PS2 that still has plenty of life left in it (at least gamewise, I finally had to trade in my old one that just barely works for a nice used slim PS2, good way for Sony to completely gaurauntee that there's no way I am picking up a PS3 at launch), as there are quite a few upcoming games I want for the system (mostly rpgs like Atelier Iris, Shadow Hearts 3, Kingdom Hearts 2, etc.). And if Sony keeps to their word, my PS2 will probably still have a couple more years before I really put it out to pasture (and with a 90 million+ user base, they have very good reason to keep supporting the system).

Ok, that's really all I have time for today, I'll finish up by saying I saw Cinderella Man on Sunday, and I'd rank it as an overall excellent movie that captures boxing really well with tremendous performances by Russell Crowe & Paul Giamatti (as for Renee Zelwegger, well...)

Why the 360 will fail

Looking back through my last few posts, I realize I've probably lately sounded at best like a cautiously optimistic Microsoft fanboy, when in actuality I am far from it (heck, if anything I'm a diehard Sega fan, secretly hoping that they will one day return to consoles with a new system that will smite all opposers!!, ok that's probably saying too much). But the reality is that out of the 3 current consoles, I've probably gotten the best overall experience out of my Xbox. A steady flow of quality games(which the Gamecube seriously lacks in), an excellent online service(which both the GC & PS2 lack), and I've never had any serious problems with playing dvds or certain games that use certain types of formats that should work(this happens a frustrating amount on my PS2). But all the same, I got far more games for the PS2, and the same will probably hold true for the PS3 because they tend to have every type of game under the sun (especially in the rpg area, which is by far my favorite genre), and when you look at the Xbox library in comparison, it's marketing seems clearly designed for mostly drunk frat boys as it's filled with an overabundance of mostly mindless shooters and sports titles. So, while I honestly believe Microsoft will give Sony a much better run for their money in the next round of the console wars, their is a serious chance that they will be scrapping for a distant second with Nintendo just like this round, and here's why:

1. Too much belief in online-Now, I honestly believe that online gaming is the next big thing, but it's not there right now (out of over 20 million Xbox users, less than 2 million have live, not exactly a number to boast about), and it may take awhile to get there. And as someone who is recently new to the waters of online gaming (at least in it's current incarnation), it can be very rough going at first. Although I've met quite a few good friends, you definitely meet a large share of cheaters, idiots and total assholes (sadly, a large number meet all that criteria at once). I have a few friends who actually refuse to go online even though they have months of Xbox live left specifically because they've just dealt with way too many jerks to make it worthwhile. Also, while I love the potential idea of Microsoft's marketplace, where you can get demos & custom items; there's also a lot of potential for gamers to be pissed off by companies nickel & diming gamers to death, therefore turning them off the service and the 360 entirely. Microsoft is banking on this being their biggest gun in the next round and they could fall flat on their face because of that.

2. Coming out first-Just because Microsoft will be there first doesn't gaurauntee anything. It may give the impression that they are afraid to compete head to head with Sony. Sony is the gaming equivalent of the 800-pound gorrilla right now, they will launch when they want on their terms and they have no reason to think otherwise. It gives both Sony and Nintendo a chace to look at Microsoft's launch and plenty of time to see what they can do better. It's also a good bet that the PS3 games (at least any exclusives) will look noticeably better than any first gen 360 games (at least if Sony's reps aren't completely talking out of their ass), and better eye candy will do a lot to sell systems.

3. The Price war-We know the 360 will launch in the range of $300-350, which means it will probably be cheaper than the PS3, whose price could be significantly more, or it could be a lot closer in price with some Sony reps claiming it would probably be around $370-$400. And those numbers aren't that far apart, so who could blame someone who has to choose one system for spending just a little bit more on one that's supposedly significantly more powerful?And then there's Nintendo. We know that next gen games for the PS3 & 360 will likely hit the $60 range. With Nintendo's system being far less powerful, not only the system, but the games might be significantly cheaper. And With system exclusives becoming less & less common these days, There might be a huge backlash against both Sony & Microsoft for their high prices compared to Nintendo's.

4. The stagnation of the gaming industry-I know, with all the billions the gaming industry makes, the idea of the entire industry having another big crash like they did in the 80s seems nearly impossible. But they thought it was impossible back then too. And while I'm generally excited about what the next generation has to offer, we seem to be getting into a rut of "safe" titles-Lots of shooters (especially WWII-based ones), lots of games based off of TV shows or movies, or cookie-cutter sequels to already popular franchises. And that's mostly what we are seeing in the next generation as well so far, so why buy a new system that doesn't offer anything new in terms of gameplay? Seriously, if all the next gen systems offer is the same games with shinier graphics, the whole industry will pay for it. And while I believe Sony & Nintendo could easily survive a crash, Microsoft may pull out completely if the industry goes south considering how much of a bath they've already taken.

5. Concentrating on the American market-Gaming is a global thing, and while Microsoft has acknowledged that just concentrating on American gamers (and specifically virtually ignoring the very different Japanese market) was a mistake, and they are supposedly working to rectify that. But I'll believe it when I see it. Grabbing the cooperation of Squarenix (as well as acquiring Mistwalker studios, which is made up of former Squarenix alumni) is a big step foward in that direction, but the PS2 has always had a nice balance of big name titles and odd quirky ones, if Microsoft really wants to succeed, they need that sort of balance.

6. Everything to everyone-The more things a system can do, the more things can go wrong with it. I don't really intend to use most of the 360's "features", and I'd prefer it didn't have them to begin with. Besides adding to cost of the system, if something goes wrong with one particular feature, it could potentially affect the entire system, leaving gamers with a busted system because of a feature they don't even use and feeling ripped off because of it. Granted, Sony's doing virtually the same thing, but having crappy hardware that barely works didn't stop them last time.

7. Lack of HD-DVD or Blu-ray capability-One of these will be the next step in storage capacity, and despite J. Allard's claim of it being the "HD era", the 360 still uses a standard DVD drive, not compatible with either HD-DVDs or Blu-ray, both of which are capable of a lot more storage capacity. And Sony has clearly cast their vote in the Blu-ray corner, which can hold a massive amount comparatively. It's way too soon to tell whether HD-DVD or Blu-ray will become the definitive format, but since the 360 doesn't really support either, they could easily be left in the dust.

8. Lack of strong launch titles-With every current system, the initial launch sucked complete ass in terms of games. Usually one or two pretty good titles, and it was months before we saw a steady stream of quality titles start to turn up on a regular basis. And what do we have promised for launch? We can expect 15-20 titles, but we don't really know what aside from EA's 2006 sports titles (which you can pick up on all systems, and for ten bucks cheaper if the price raise actually happens) and Perfect Dark Zero & Kameo from Microsoft. That's really it. If the launch lineup doesn't deliver some mind-blowing stuff, it may be enough of a blow that Microsoft is never able to recover from.

9. Bill Gates is the devil-At least that's the perception in a lot of people's minds. At best, he's an outsider, just burning his company's money on another wacky idea and doesn't really care if it's succesful or not. After all, he's worth a couple billion all by his lonesome, how much capital do you think the damn company has stashed away? And with that perception in mind, alot of people may steer clear of the system just because it's supporting Gates, which plenty of people don't feel all that comfortable doing. Granted, it's the least likely legitimate reason, but any fanboy for Nintendo or Sony will probably use it as an excuse.

10. Abandoning their current user-base too early-Sony plans to fully support the PS2 for at least a couple more years, most likely so gamers can more easily transition into the next generation of hardware. Microsoft is pretty much abandoning their current console, thus burning some loyal customers in the process, and making them extremely weary that Microsoft may do the same thing next round.

So, as you can see, there are a lot of pitfalls Microsoft has to avoid if they really want a serious chance of duking it out and becoming the top dog in the console wars. Bottom line, it's going to take a lot of well-thought out strategy and plenty of good luck. But serious competition is good, so I'm hoping they (or by some miracle Nintendo) are able to pull a tight race because close competition will be good for ALL of us gamers.

Battle of the biopics

Two very different biopics open this weekend-Cinderella Man & Lords of Dogtown. Cinderella Man is the latest shot at Oscar from the powerhouse assembly of Russel Crowe, Paul Giamatti, Renee Zelwegger, Ron Howard & Brian Grazer. It's about depression-era fighter Jim Braddock, who pulled off a miracle comeback in the boxing world. I expect it to be a fairly formulaic sports movie, but as long as it's done well, there's nothing wrong with that.
Lords of Dogtown is actually based off the documentary, Dogtown and the Z-boys, which featured a group of skaters that revolutionized the sport in the 70s and made it possible for guys like Tony Hawk to make a living off skateboarding. Skateboarding movies are usually pure garbage, although the superb directing ability of Catherine Hardwicke (Thirteen) may make this the first one actually worth checking out (although critics seem to be saying otherwise so far).

The movie Serenity takes place 6 months after the last episode of Firefly that was made (this is another show I HIGHLY reccomend picking up, it's just a shame only 13 episodes were made). But a guy like Malcolm Reynolds can't possibly stay out of trouble that long, so if you want to know what happened between the end of the show and the start of the movie, Joss Whedon is making a short run (three issues, I think) comic that shows what adventures the crew of Serenity have in the mean time. I haven't read comics in over a decade, but I might pick these up if they are by some miracle able to capture the humor and spirit of the show.

I've already beaten Advent Rising on easy(that's right not even a full day!), so while I had fun, I wouldn't reccomend a purchase. It was a very fun 10-hour roller coaster(like most good action games these days), although admittedly the frame rate could've used a lot of smoothing out. But I can't wait for the next two entries as the story, cinemas and music were all top notch.

The big shocker of game news this week has been that the PS3 may not come with a hard drive. Now, if you want to just play games on it (like I will), it probably won't be a huge deal and like the PS2 you can probably pick up a rather inexpensive memory card of some sort. Unfortunately, the problem is that you won't be able to do all the things out of box the 360 can do with it's standard 20 gig hard drive (stream music, record videos, not have to buy memory cards in the first place), and I think Sony will probably charge a ridiculous price (just look at any decent storage device for the PSP, they are ridiculously overpriced).

All right, that's really I have for today, til next time....