Forget paying big money of the Xbox 360, I’m going a different route.
I bought a Diet Pepsi yesterday with a cap that directed me here. That’s how I’m getting my new Xbox!
Holy Sith!
I know I may forfeit my claim to geekdom by admitting this, but I saw Star Wars Episode 3 for the first time tonight. (In my defense, having two kids does make it tricky to see movies very often). Don’t think I’m not a Star Wars fanboy, though, because I am. I saw Episodes I and II opening night, saw all the remakes in the theater, and have pretty much all the dialogue from episodes 4-6 memorized. I just never made time for Episode 3, for which I am sorry.
After Attack of the Clones, I thought to myself, “there’s no way Lucas is going to be able to wrap up all those loose ends in a nice neat package in Episode 3. The movie would have to be 4 hours long.” Color me surprised and impressed that he pulled it off. Revenge of the Sith is everything we wanted the first two movies to be. I thought Phantom Menace was okay and AotC was decent but they didn’t live up to what I imagined in my mind’s eye. RotS did. (I know it’s pretentious as a fan to “expect” certain things from a movie, but Star Wars fans don’t exactly abide by such norms.) It had moments that made me cringe but overall it succeeded at what it was – a segue into A New Hope.
I was also impressed with Christensen. His performance in AotC was wooden. I’ve seen two-by-fours with more personality than his Anakin in that movie. In episode 3 his acting seemed much more geniune. Poor Anakin/Vader was a troubled soul. His relationship with Padme seemed strained but everything else he did worked. When Vader’s helmet was lowered and he took his first breaths as “more machine than man,” I felt chills.
And can we all agree that Yoda is one bad mamma-jamma? Is he Lucas’ favorite character or what? Again, chills.
So yeah, I was late to the party but I’m glad I came. Revenge of the Sith made up amply for whatever trespasses Lucas may have comitted in the first two movies. All is well in the Star Wars galaxy.
(Oh, and sorry about the post title. It’s late, I’m tired, and that’s all I got. Sorry)
Tinkering under the hood
Things might look wonky for a bit as I tweak my theme. I am growing tired of the current look. I’m looking to spruce things up. I’ll also be installing some new plug-ins over the next couple of days (WordPress is teh truth!). Hopefully I don’t break anything expensive.
“I break, I cry. You break, you buy.”
(For now I’ll be leaving the old theme up. I’ll still be tinkering with it later)
Gather ’round, carnies
It’s that time again — Carnival time. The Carnival of Gamers #6 will be setting up camp over at AFK Gamer. This month’s ringleader is the illustrious Foton, one of my favorite bloggers. You can hit up the Carnival link up above if you’ve got questions about the Carnival. If you’ve got something you want to submit, you can do so by sending an email to carniegrue@gmail.com. I look forward to what Foton has in store for this Carnival.
I’ve updated the Carnival HQ page, but if you’re interested in more information about blog Carnivals, this is a good place to start.
I am not an atomic playboy, either!
When I first switched over to WordPress, I was surfing over at Binary Bonsai, since Kubrick is the default theme and BB is Michael Heilemann’s site (the author of the Kubrick Theme). As I read, I noticed a blog entry titled “I am not an atomic playboy”. Now, that may not mean anything to you, but if you’d been following the demo scene in the early nineties, you’d know exactly what that refers to. It is from Future Crew’s Second Reality Demo. Second Reality was an amazing achievement in 1993. Back in those days (my BBS dialup days), I was way into Assembly, the Demoscene, ANSi Art (like ACiD and iCE). While I didn’t have the talent to program like these guys, I definitely recognized the skill it took to do what they could do.
Back to the BB post. In the comments there’s a link to the open source project called DOSBox which basically emulates DOS for different operating systems. It works perfectly with Windows XP so I downloaded the old FC demos and had a huge nostalgia trip watching them. I got chills, I’m embarrased to say. That was months ago. Just recently I noticed a couple links over at Waxy.org – this link to the Assembly 2005 awards and this link to the overall winner of Assembly 2005 browser demo (you may have to use IE to see this link). Man, there are still a bunch of talented cats out there.
I lost track of the demoscene years ago but it’s great to see it’s still alive and kicking. It may not demand the same respect it did when I was younger, but it’s a great place to see some talented people do some really cool things. Their influence on video games is undeniable (and vice versa). Watch the Che Guevara clip and you’ll see what I mean.
So, what about you guys? I would imagine this will be new stuff for the younger buttonmashers, but perhaps some of you “mature” readers may have fond memories about these demos. If you do and you’re looking for a stroll down memory lane, hit up DOS Box and download those FC files from scene.org. You be happy you did.
(On a side note, now that I have DOSBox working, I’m looking forward to loading up some old-school DOS gaming. There are a handful of sites popping up recently with downloads from old games. I can’t wait)
Update: I often wondered about what the significance of the “I am not an atomic playboy” quote was. I figured it was just a sample from some random europop song I would never had heard of. As Jake points out in the comments, it is actually a quote from a military commander, referring to the power of the atomic bomb. You can read about it here. Or here. Thanks, Jake. I think I have a new email sig:
“The bomb will not start a chain reaction in the water, converting it all to gas and letting all the ships on all the oceans drop down to the bottom. It will not blow out the bottom of the sea and let all the water run down the hole. It will not destroy gravity. I am not an atomic playboy.”
Vice Admiral William P. Blandy
Commander of Operation Crossroads
The 360 Interview
This interview with J Allard of the Microsoft 360 Hype Machine is making its rounds through the gaming sites and blogs (yeah, there’s quite a few comments on Major Nelson’s site). I read it with a big cube of salt, so not much really surprised me, except this little nugget:
J Allard (Expert):
Q: Why even offer the core package, its seems quite useless
A: great question! the thing to remember that while we designed a no compromises game system, a huge percentage of our customers are not like the folks in this chat room. recognize that more than 75% of the folks on xbox have not played halo. by introducing the core system we are sending a signal to the market that we are committed to this part of the market just like with the xbox 360 premium bundle that we are committed to you.
I call Bull-oney on that one. 75% have not played Halo? That just does not sound right. Perhaps that’s not including Halo 2. If Halo and Halo 2 are considered, it has to be close to 50% — Bungie has sold over 11 million copies of Halo and Halo 2. With 20 million Xboxes, you do the math. So it may be semantics, but a lot of people have played Halo. 25% my foot.
There’s more marketing double-speak and the the like, but I’ll let you read the poorly formatted chat. Still, like I said, it’s making it’s rounds in the gaming blogsphere. Here’s a smattering:
Major Ynos’ Mark Creig lived blogged it, cutting through the crap. He gives it to ya straight. (I’d avoid the comments there, they may cause spontaneous combustion)
Joystiq as usual provides great coverage, also highlighting the fact that Allard answered a lot of the questions with “We want to hear what the gamers think”. This could be call for input that will be given thoughtful consideration of it could be desperation. Maybe they don’t know what the heck they’re doing and they need some help.
Kotaku mentions the interview in passing (thinking the same I did – why did they hold this on Sunday?) along with the results from his poll.
Evil Avatar, often accused of Xbox bias (which I no longer agree with) had a pretty lively conversation about the chat as well.
More Buckeye Blogging
Well well, lookie here. Who does SI’s Stewart Mandel think will be making a Run for the Roses this year? None other than your Ohio State Buckeyes. Excellent. I couldn’t agree more. I still think it’s weird that Texas is ranked #2 in most pre-season polls while OSU is found in the sixth spot. Of course that all changes around the third week of the season.
A.J. Hawk and Ted Ginn Jr are the #4 and #2 players in the Big Ten (respectively), also according to SI. (Is TGJ not looking that pass in? How un-Tressel like.)
Have I mentioned how excited I am about College Football?
Nintendo, why do you toy with us?
The life of a Nintendo fan is rough. I didn’t mention the recent news that The Twilight Princess had been delayed until next year mostly because I was saddened by it and I grow tired of being set up by Nintendo, only to be let down. I love the big N as much as anyone, but like Tom says, it is going to be a long winter. There are still games to be played but, to be honest, all I was really looking forward to was getting down with some Zelda. It isn’t easy being a Nintendo Fanboy.
Looks like Resident Evil 4 will be the Game of the Year for 2005.
Calgon, take me away!
Behold, the soothing power of video games.
If you’re ever feeling a bit spread thin, remember: Playing Nintendo may be just what you need.
Xbox 360’s price tag
There was a lot of hub-bub over at Evil Avatar today when word of Xbox 360 pricing hit the net. Over four hundred comments that span 3 different topics was pretty impressive. A lot of people were proclaiming the downfall of the 360 and bemoaning the fact that there were two different Xbox 360 setups. 300 bucks for the barebones system and 400 for the deluxe model. There was much wailing and gnashing of teeth.
I personally didn’t think much of the announcement. My next generation plans are to wait for the price drop of the 360 (rumored to occur when the PS3 hits the market). I’ll probably pick up a Revolution at launch but I definitely will be waiting on the 360. Especially if there will be another model that sports a HD DVD drive.
I agree with most of the EA posters. I really do think Microsoft is fracturing their audience and playing fast and loose with people’s expectations. Not being straightforward about their plans for a HD DVD drive (or Blu-Ray, as if that were gonna happen) is another big mistake. And the prices on the peripherals? Sheesh, if the Revolution sports wi-fi out of the box and Microsoft wants to charge me 100$ for a wi-fi adapter? Goodnight! It will definitely be Revolution and PS3 for teh win.
A lot of things still have to happen before any of this is set in stone, but the path Microsoft has chosen definitely looks iffy at the moment. Things just got a lot more interesting.