Me, an Apple user?
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I’m not quite sure when it happened, but after my Dell laptop died a few months ago, I secretly began lusting after an Apple computer. A MacBook, to be exact. It seemed unnatural, me being a PC guy since the days of my parents’ 286 (it had a Turbo button, people!) and 4-color monitor. For 18+ years, it was DOS and Windows. Sure, my uncle had a Macintosh, but that thing was weird. The screen was black and white! I couldn’t use one of those things. I had four colors, man. And so continued my blind devotion to the “PC” world unabated, even mostly unscathed by Windows ME. Nevertheless, gears were recently set in motion that I could not control.
Somehow, I ended up here, typing this post up on my brand new MacBook. Something happened. I’m pretty sure it’s not all that bad.
Apple copying Nintendo?
When the DS Lite and the Wii were unveiled, there was a lot of chatter of how Nintendo and Apple had a lot of similarities. There was even talk of how the two companies would benefit from working together. Now it looks like Apple could possibly be copying the Wii concept for Apple TV gaming.
It doesn’t seem like that’s going to happen any time soon.
GTA IV microblog
I just picked up my girlfriend for a date. In a city bus I hijacked on my way to her house. She did not seem bothered by this.
I believe she is what they call “a keeper.”
She was, however, bothered when my Uzi went off accidentally inside the Cluckin’ Bell during our previous date. I’m getting mixed signals.
Mario Kart Wii First Impressions
This picture says it all:
When a game can produce “the smile” (parents of young kids will know what I mean by “the smile”), it is okay in my book.
A lot of Mario Kart was played this weekend. It was played by kids 5 years old and 65 years old. Everyone had a great time. They say Nintendo has “dumbed down” Mario Kart for the Wii. They’re wrong. They didn’t dumb anything down. They distilled an already great game to its essence and made it accessible to the masses.
This is not a bad thing.
Nat and I will have more Mario Kart thoughts later.
(Look how much concentration this game takes!)
That social thing
Usually, I’m a pretty early adopter for new technologies and what-not. I started blogging before it was really “blogging,” for example. But sometimes I resist new things, usually for no good reason. Services like Twitter and Tumblr just didn’t seem to make sense to me. I already had a blog — why would I want a micro-blog (Twitter) or a mini-blog (Tumblr)? Then I found a few interesting Tumblogs and signed up for one myself. Then I tried out Twitter and was instantly hooked. How did I not latch on to these earlier?
So I’m now addicted to Twitter. I’ve already hooked a couple friends on it and am actively working on a couple more to catch the wave. I tried to explain it to my wife, but that didn’t go over as well as I’d hoped. Regardless, I’m now a Twitterer (Tweeter?) and completely hooked.
I’ve already started following some of my fellow bloggers and some of you have already found my Twitter feed, but those of you interested in seeing what the fuss is and want to follow the absolutely riveting minutia of my day-to-day life, can follow me on Twitter here.
Beyond Twitter, I’ve looked into Friendfeed, which basically becomes a life-stream of everything I do online. It borders on creepy-stalkerish, and it is complete information overload. I actually hesitate to post a link to my Friendfeed, because it’s a little weird. Does anyone really care what stories I digg? Or what video I recently favorited on YouTube? Maybe someone does. For the truly intrepid, my Friendfeed is here.
Finally, I’ve recently been following a handful of people’s shared items in Google Reader. It’s a great way to find information other people find useful. I haven’t been using it as often as I’d like, but if you’re interested in seeing things I’m sharing, my Google Reader Shared Items feed is here. Yet another form of micro-blogging.
Do you Twitter? Do you Tumbl? Do you share? As resistant as I was at first, now I can’t get enough. Let me know what services you use/like. And of course post links to Twitter feeds and the like in the comments.
A Wonderful Weekend
Let’s tally.
- Our youngest (2) is going on his fourth day in the hospital with a rotavirus.
- Our oldest (5) has a double ear infection.
- My wife and I have not slept in two days. I get the hospital shift tonight.
Mario Kart Wii helps pass the time. I’ve not played it, but my son keeps me informed.
It’s snowed off and on all day. A weird weekend is more like it. A Monday Madness would pale by comparison.
Second Skin, an MMO documentary
I haven’t posted much in the way of MMO’s since I quit EQ2 a few months ago, but this just popped up in my Google alerts and looks interesting: Second Skin, “a quirky documentary about the world of Massively Multiplayer Online Role Playing Games and the people who anchor themselves to computers for up to 18 hours a day.”
Weekend Gaming, at last!
I have been swamped (SWAMPED!) at work the past couple of weeks on a project that has sucked up a large portion of my free time. When I finally to get a free moment, I’m so spent from my other duties that I haven’t had a desire to do much gaming. I’m finally seeing the light at the end of the tunnel at work and my mood is already lifting. I’m ready to pick up the familiar controller and get back in the game.
In order to gear up for a great week of gaming when GTA IV and Mario Kart Wii are released, I figure I should knock out another game in my queue before everything gets pushed back to make room for the newcomers. I got very close to finishing Bioshock last year, so I figure now would be a good time to get back to that and finish it up. I really want to see how it ends.
I’m also making my way through Super Mario Galaxy, which I am still thoroughly enjoying. The kids love to watch me play it, so that’s our bonding game. I can’t get over how much fun platforming is again.
I’m also eying a couple DS games, but I’ll probably hold off on those until the real gaming lull hits this summer. I’ve got enough on my plate.
What are you guys playing? Planning on picking up either Mario Kart Wii or GTA IV?
Too good to pass up
You’ve probably already seen this, but I can’t help myself. I’ve been consuming a lot of retro game music lately, so this seems appropriate:
http://view.break.com/487616 - Watch more free videos
Oh, that’s where they come from!
Just what the doctor didn’t order
Gaming addicts with sore eyes and tired brains may be able to perk up with “Game Suppli”, a new Japanese supplement developed specifically for the country’s thousands of fanatic players.
For some reason, this doesn’t strike me as the greatest idea.
Something to think about
I bet this is something you’ve never considered: Gaming while Color Blind. (via Instapundit)
Eventually I realized there were blue, green, AND red people in the game. *sigh* Green and blue guys are teammates. Red guys are enemies. That seems simple enough, except that I couldn’t tell the green guys from the red guys.
So the rest of the night went like this: “Oh it’s a green guy, I won’t shoot him. Arrrgh!!! I’m dead; again. He must have been red.” Or, “There’s a red guy! I’ll take him out. Oops, lost more points for killing a team member.”
RTWT.
No Wii puns here
That last post was kind of a downer, so here’s something a little less depressing: General Petraeus playing Wii Golf.
(Click to enlarge)
This pic and story are a bit old, but I saw it for the first time this morning on Deadspin and it made me smile.
Hmmmm…
It would appear a certain gaming blog was left off this list. A mere oversight, I’m sure. Certainly it will appear on there the next time around.
On my Radar: Bangai-O Spirits [Nintendo DS]
I haven’t done this for a while, but that doesn’t mean there are a bunch of games on my radar. (Gamedar, if you will) The one highlighted this week is Bangai-O Spirits. I was blissfully unaware of anything about this title until I read Tim Rogers’ review over at Action Button. A good read, if you can get past the weird sex metaphors.
After reading such phrases as “Bangai-oh Spirits is “Brain Training” for God” and “Bangai-O Spirits is a puzzle game, a shooting game, a fighting game, an MMORPG. It is Pac-Man and Super Mario Bros. and Street Fighter III at the same time…” (you get the idea.) I was intrigued. So I did a little research:
1UP has a preview and you can see a bunch of videos, including some gameplay videos over at Game Trailers. I can’t tell if this game is nothing but a cluster of unplayable, uncontrollable madness or pure gaming heaven. I mean, you can use a baseball bat to deflect missiles! Who does that? Who thinks of that? It’s insane.
Bullets bouncing of walls ballistically and barreling into barricades, blowing them away? Sold!
Seriously, what other shoot-em-up has baseball bats?!
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