Bioshock + start of college football = BUSY
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I just did the unthinkable — I attacked a Big Daddy (an Elite Bouncer, to be exact) with my pipe wrench. I was near a vita-chamber (a respawn point) and decided to pound a Big Daddy to a pulp with my wrench. It actually took a while but I did it. I’m not sure why I did, maybe I was hoping it was one of the secret achievements or something, but I took him down. Down to Chinatown. Sure, I went down a dozen times myself, but that’s beside the point.
So, ya, I’ve been busy playing Bioshock. Absolutely excellent game. If you want to read more about the game, I suggest you read Tom’s piece over at G-pinions.
I’ve also been busy posting at my other blog, Men of the Scarlet and Gray. College Football started tonight and we’ve been in preview mode all week over there getting ready for the 2007 Ohio State Football season to begin.
But I am alive and I believe my co-bloggers are as well. We’re still playing games when we can and regular posting should resume shortly. As far as games go, I think it will be Bioshock with a dash of Everquest 2 until Halo 3 for me, and then copious amounts of Halo 3. I’ve been actively recruiting work-mates to get in on the Halo 3 bandwagon. The more the merry! Hard to believe it’s less than a month away.
New Kids on my Block, Part 5
I hadn’t realized it’s been over six months since my last “New Kids” post, so it’s time for another one. Here’s the drill: I find a new blog, I add it to the NKotB folder in Google Reader. Then I tell you about them. If I find that I’m still reading them after a while in the NKotB folder, they get added to the blogroll. I try to keep up with as many blogs as I can, but it just isn’t possible to read everyone’s stuff. Maybe you’ll find something you like. The list is long, so all I can manage is a one-line blurb for each of these. Check them out!
Bit bytes pixels & sprites - Worst luck with 360s than anyone else.
EBStone - Plays on Xbox Live and has a lot of friends. Will you join him?
Aelon.net - A little bit of everything.
Bush Mackel - You had me at the Bruce Lee header.
A Link to the Future - The future can be found in the previews.
Gamer Babble - Xbox 360 galore. Do you think he gets red rings?
Gamerpunch - Who knew games were so crafty?
Hawty McBloggy - Run! It’s a girl!
Shindakun.net - The interweb, gaming and some other stuff.
I’ve actually been reading (or listening to) these guys for a while, but never linked them here. They’re in the folder I call “The Pros”
MTV Multiplayer Blog - Yes, even MTV has a gaming blog.
N’Gai Croal’s Level Up - Everyone pronounces his name wrong, which is a shame. He seems like a nice guy.
Garnett Lee’s My1UP Page - One of the guys from the 1UP Yours podcast.
John Davison’s My1UP Page - See above. Just add a funny accent.
Action Button - Sure wish I could get a Cliff Notes version of their reviews!
Sexy Videogame Land - Yikes! It’s another girl! Their cooties are everywhere!
When I was going full-bore with Everquest 2, I subscribed to a handful of EQ2 blogs. A few of the goods one:
The Ancient Gaming Noob - Loving his noobness.
Eyes Like Ours - Wii and EQ2. What’s not to like?
MMOQuests - Live the EQ2 life vicariously at MMOQuests.
Cuppy Talk - MMO-Girl in the house.
So check ‘em out, see what you like. You never know what you’ll find. I’m always on the look-out for new kids on the block. Let me know of any I’ve missed!
Previous New Kids:
Part 1
Part 2
Part 3
Part 4
In my fridge
I’ve got Bioshock in the 360, now I have some Bioshock fuel. Bio-fuel?
In my hands
I won’t get around to playing this until the little mashers are tucked in bed, but I’m pretty stoked about how I got it for a killer price. You can read the details of what happened in this CAG forum post, but the gist of it is I had to go to Wal-mart since Circuit City had sold out. The CC ad had two prices, one for the 360 version of the game and one was for the PC version, which is ten dollars cheaper. I walked out of Wal-mart with Bioshock costing me $39.99. Not too shabby.
Update: I played Bioshock way too late last night and all I can think about now is getting back to Rapture. Never mind I have a conference tomorrow at 7:00AM! I can survive on four hours of sleep!
So Bioshock, native wide screen or not, is an amazing game thus far. My brother in law was in town last night, so I had a partner in crime for the first few hours in Rapture. Playing with others watching is always more fun. Visually, it’s stunning. The atmosphere feels perfect. The whole steam punk/dystopia motif works very well. Sounds and voices are equally up to the task. So far, so good.
I never really get into the “Are games Art?” debate because I don’t feel anywhere near qualified to say anything of value. But a lot has been made of Bioshock and the choices you’re presented with as a way to evoke emotion. I didn’t think much of it until I was actually presented with the “choice.” For those of you who have played it, you know which one I mean. What did you think of it? It actually made me pause to consider what path I should follow. For a brief moment it stopped being a fun game. That hardly ever happens to me.
So in short, Bioshock (moral choices or not) is a great ride so far. I hope to get a few more hours in tonight.
Bioshock on sale
I was just perusing the Sunday ads and noticed that Circuit City will be selling Bioshock for $49.99 (10$ off). Even though I haven’t played the demo and am packaging up my dead Xbox 360 as we speak, I will still be picking this up (I’ll be playing it on a borrowed 360).
I think it’s safe to recommend this game to everyone who loves videogames.
Another excellent “hardcore” post
Just wanted to link another good blog post looking at who the “hardcore gamer” really is by psu at Tea Leaves.
Along a similar vein as the Dubious Quality post I linked earlier.
This is something I’ve been thinking about, as well, but from a different angle. I’ll hopefully be able to flesh that post out soon.
Really hot things
I like to make lists. They’re fun. I decided I’d make a fun little list of “Things I own that Get Hot but don’t Stop Working.” Here are a few I came up with:
- My water heater. This is an easy one. It’s never stopped working for me. One time the pilot light went out, but the water stayed warm for a while and it was easy to fix. That puppy is a huge tank of really hot water. It gets nice and toasty and keeps on chugging!
- My Easy-Bake Oven. It’s a simple cardboard box with a big ol’ light bulb inside. It’s gets pretty darn hot in there, but it makes me delicious snack-sized brownies with nary a break down. It’s like it was built to handle the heat or something.
- My Jeep Cherokee Sport. It has an internal combustion engine, meaning it’s powered by high temperature explosions of gasoline mixed with oxygen. The engine is cooled with water and uses oil to reduce friction because it gets so damn hot in there. I know it gets hot in there because I have a little temperature gauge on my dashboard that tells me when it’s getting too hot. You know what else gets hot in my Jeep? Me. Because the air conditioning doesn’t work. So on a nice hot August day, after the Jeep has been cooking in the sun all day, I get to ride in a hot box of stagnant air. I often get real hot. But guess what? I don’t stop working! I’m fricken amazing.
I also thought I’d make another list: “Things I own that Get Hot and Suddenly Stop Working.” It’s a pretty short list:
- My Xbox 360
Of course, this isn’t the first time my little white heat-sissy died. But it’s dying at the most inopportune time possible. 360 Euphoria is almost upon us. Everyone is already lavishing praise on the Bioshocks demo and hearing the guys on the 1UP Yours podcast give it a lot of love is killing me. I want to play Bioshock! I also have family visiting next month and we were planning on a bunch of NCAA 08. I don’t even have to mention that little game coming out at the end of September. I’ll probably get my 360 back a week before it drops, giving me precious little time with Bioshock. This sucks!
So my 360 box is on its way. Then I’ll be 360-less for a while. The wait will be painful.
DO NOT WANT.
Must… resist..
… making a Wii joke about this. (via Autoblog)
The Angry Nintendo Nerd (Very funny but very vulgar)
I was listening to Opie and Anthony the other day and was introduced to the beauty that is The Angry Nintendo Nerd (AKA The Angry Video Game Nerd) on Youtube.
Before I start to get into this hilarious series I must warn you if you are easily offended by vulgar language or have little ones within earshot of your PC speakers DO NOT WATCH THESE!
Know your roots!
Music has Motown, Basketball has James A. Namesmith, and videogames have the coin-op arcade cabinets. It is important to every man, woman, and child to know where they come from, what it is that makes them who they are. Videogames are no different.
When Micro$oft rolled out the Xbox Live Arcade to go along with the 360 and the Wii followed suit with it’s Virtual Console hundreds of previously forgotten about classics had new life breathed into them, and justifyably so.
Legendary titles like Golden Axe (my personal all-time favorite) and Super Mario Bros. should never be cast aside for the sake of polygons and Blu-Ray HD-DVD Players.
Seriously, what is more kick ass than a 7 foot dude with an axe named Death Adder?
Without these titles, which laid the foundation for the mega-success the videogaming industry is today, who knows what would’ve come of our little 1’s and 0’s. After Atari single-handedly crashed the market in 1983 with colossal stink-a-roo’s like E.T. and Raiders of the Lost Ark things looked pretty bleak until Nintendo came on the scene in 1985 with their NES and upstart Sega, previously a division of Tonka Industries, released the Sega Master System.
Thankfully the developers of Raiders of the Lost Ark held true to the movie right down to Indy’s pink warmup suit and the scene where he transverse the blue void to get the ancient Hockey Stick of Rah.
Ok, enough with the history lessons. The point is not only were these classic titles needed in the mid-80’s but they are need now as well. We need to remind the newer generations of gamers that not everything was about how maxxed out your Pokemon was, how many hours you logged into Final Fantasy VII or your worldwide rank in Rainbow Six: Las Vegas’ multiplayer. It was about getting that high score, maximizing every last second from that quarter, and fun.
For anyone with these consoles that offer a trip back to the Golden Age of Gaming sans a tricked out Dolorean you owe it to yourself to check out where gaming came from.
Let the marketing onslaught begin!
There’s a post over at the Gamerscore Blog listing all the upcoming promotions that will accompany the Halo 3 release next month (they’ve already sold 1 million pre-orders! This is insane!). They’re going to market the heck out of this game. Mountain Dew, 7-11, Burger King, Pontiac (Wait, what?) and others.
I don’t understand this. Is Microsoft paying for this? Halo 3 sells itself, it really seems like their marketing money could be better spent marketing other games that are juggernauts like Halo 3 is. Or, I don’t know, redirected to make a better system that doesn’t overheat. That sounds like a good idea, right?
Maybe it’s the other way around? Do these other companies/brands want to be associated with Halo 3? I’m pretty sure I’ll be no more persuaded to by a Pontiac car because it was tangentially related to the Halo 3 video game. I’m also positive my Whooper with cheese (extra tomato, onion, no lettuce) will not taste any better because it came in a Halo 3 wrapper. I just don’t understand marketing.
I guess that’s why I’m an engineer.
Men can multitask!
This might be old (and it’s for a soccer game, not Football) but it still rings true!
Confessions of a Gamerscore Whore
ad·dic·tion –noun the state of being enslaved to a habit or practice or to something that is psychologically or physically habit-forming, as narcotics, to such an extent that its cessation causes severe trauma.
My name is Dark Reyule, and I am an achievement addict. I’m not sure when it happened… well, OK I know exactly when it happened. According to chart on my 360voice.com blog it started around 2/20/07, around the time Xbox had their first little boost your gamerscore contest for crappy prizes. My addiction, seemingly dormant before, came out in full force then and has manifested itself into something I cannot control.
Xbox 360 price drop!
Major Nelson (and the rest of the free blogging world) is discussing the price drop across all the Xbox 360 models. Throw in the 3-year warranty and you’ve got a pretty good looking deal.
For people on the fence, the 50-dollar drop of the Premium 360 should be very tempting. Even with the horrific failure rates, you’ve got three years of protection and a fall lineup that is absolutely loaded. If you’ve been considering the 360, consider no more. Go forth (on August 8th) and purchase.
Bargin Bin Review - Earth Defense Force 2017 (360) - By Dark Reyule
A new feature I’d like to introduce to the Buttonmashing community where I give you the 411 on some of the gems that may have fell through your gaming cracks
THE GIST: A few months ago I rented Earth Defense Force 2017 on a whim, what I got was pure balls-to-the-wall action for 53 carpal tunnel inducing levels. Throughout my entire time with this title I was continually astonished at both how large in scope and how wonderfully detailed it was.
The idea is simple, take on a seemingly endless horde of alien bugs, ships, mechs and mega-mechs en route to saving the world for the umptenth time in digital fashion amidst some of the best lighting and explosive effects on the 360.
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