buttonmashing

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Big site announcement!

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I’m extremely excited to announce the first addition to the blogging team here buttonmashing.com! Frequent commenter Nat (aka agentgray) will be joining me as a co-blogger here at buttonmashing.com. Even thought we’ve never actually met “in person,” I’ve “known” Nat for a while now. Through the wonders of the internet, we’ve played a bunch of Guild Wars together, spent time in each other’s Animal Crossing DS towns, and had quite a few chats about all things video games. We’ve tried unsucessfully to get together on Xbox Live, but I imagine that will change now that we’ll be colloborating on many things, including games on the Xbox 360.

As of right now, we don’t have any fixed plans as to what type of things Nat will blog about, so he’ll basically join me in various discussions about whatever games/gaming related material that we find interesting or that we hope you readers will find interesting. While we have a lot of gaming interests in common, I think Nat will bring a different point of view and experience in areas I don’t necessarily have the background to cover.

So join me in welcoming Nat to the site! Welcome aboard!

How long until?

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I am in no way minimizing the horrible shooting that occurred this morning on the Virginia Tech campus. It’s an awful mess and I feel terrible for those that were involved.

I’m just wondering how long until it’s blamed on video games. I haven’t read many news stories recently — maybe it already has.

Update: Just as Josh pointed out in the comments, Kotaku mentions that Jack Thompson was on Fox News spewing his tripe all over the place.

Here is a link to a video of his appearance on Fox News: Jack Thompson on the VT shootings. (I couldn’t make it past the first minute)

More: Rush Limbaugh, the voice of reason.

HDTV incoming!

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I did it! After hemming and hawing for the better part of six months, I have finally taken the plunge and decided to enter the High-Definition TV era. I had my eye on a few TVs, but I kept coming back to the Samsung brand. The cost of LCD and Plasma were a little out of my price for the size I wanted, so I went with a DLP television. After reading various home theater forums, magazines, reviews, and talking with friends, I decided on the Samsung HL-S5088W, a 50 inch DLP.

Samsung HL-S5088W
She’s a beauty, ain’t she?

We belong to a “wholesale club” (not Sam’s or Costco) so I got a tremendous price on it. Problem is, it could take up to six weeks to arrive. A bit of a pain, but, for the price, I can wait. I’m secretly hoping it shows up before January 8th, as there’s a little college football game that I’d love to see in high-def. Plus, I’ve heard 24, Lost and a host of other programming looks pretty good in HD. Not to mention the 360 in glorious, glorious 1080p.

I’m a little worried about having the little buttonMashers running around, abusing it. My Sony TV has been covered with little fingerprints for about three years now, so I’m not hopeful. We’ll just have to teach them to respect daddy’s new toy. I don’t break their stuff, they don’t break mine. Seems simple enough.

So I’m excited about joining the HD generation. I’d love to hear what kind of set-ups you guys have (HD or not). If you have any experiences (good or bad) with Samsung DLPs, I’d love to hear them. I’ll definitely be posting the unboxing, whenever it arrives. I’m as giddy as a ten year old on Christmas eve.

Bully watching

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So Jack Thompson wants to see someone play Rockstar’s new game, Bully. And it looks like he and his buddy-pal-judgey are going to get their way.

Thompson said that he and the judge plan to watch the game played in its entirety, no matter how long that takes.

Of course, anyone paying attention to the initial reactions to the game knows that there isn’t all the much violence in the game, at all. It’s rated “T”, afterall. So what’s Jack really after? Of course he doesn’t care if there’s violence or not. We haven’t had any substantive controversies lately, so he’ll just make one up. He wants needs to reinsert himself into the public eye and finds his perfect target, another game by Rockstar. He “bullies” his way into this public display, hoping for resistance and the chance to point fingers. And that’s exactly what he’s going to get.

How ironic. Here’s to hoping it blows up in his face. (Figuratively, of course)

Read “Bully for You” at Wired for more info on Bully.

Game Politics has some more information about Thompson’s hearing being denied.

Contact

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There are a few different ways you can contact me (and please, feel free to contact me).

The quickest and easiest way is using the following contact form:

I can also be reached via email at buttonmashing@gmail.com

I can also be reached via Yahoo! and AOL Instant Messenger:

Yahoo! IM (preferred): cholo_75

AIM Screename: IaintYerPapa

k2 0.9

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I’m finally making the transition to K2 0.9, which was released last week. Things will look hairy during the transition.

This message will self-destruct in 24 18 hours (I hope)

Update: So far things have gone pretty swimmingly. The two coolest additions that I’ve made (so far) are the Sidebar Modules (which will be mostly transparent to the reader) and the Subscribe to Comments.

The SBM plug-in makes adding, editing, and removing content on the sidebar much easier, including the ability to choose which modules show up on the main page and what modules show up on individual post pages (like this one) and static pages (like the Carnival HQ).

The Subscribe to Comments plug-in is quite nifty. After commenting on a post, you can check the little “notify me” box and you’ll get an email anytime someone else comments on a post you’ve commented on. Very cool and very handy.

I should wrap up the rest of the tweaks, time permitting, before the weekend.

Buttonmashing.com turns 2!

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candles.jpgHelp me blow out the candles on buttonmashing.com’s second birthday cake! It’s hard for me to believe that another year has passed, but two years ago to the day buttonmashing.com went live.

A lot has happened in the past year, both here at Buttonmashing and in the gaming community as a whole. Some highlights:

  • The GTA Hot Cofee scandal (which will not go away!)
  • My blogger validation came as I obtained a “stalker” (who is really just a friend that wanted me to discover Harry Potter)
  • I noticed a lot of posts trying to refute all the crap that Jack Thompson spewed. I’m particularly fond of this one, which also helped on a poor gamer to convince his mom to get him Resident Evil 4 and helped another lost soul with his homework.
  • The 360 was launched on the world, and I didn’t get one. Poor me.
  • A whole year of Carnivals, including one held at Slashdot Games.

A crazy year, indeed. Thanks again to all you who’ve stuck around through the thick and thin, to all the Carnies, and to everyone who’s ever read/commented on/linked something here at buttonmashing.com. I appreciate all the feedback. It’s been a great two years. Here’s to another great year.

Before I blow out the candles, I should probably make a wish… (DS Lite… DS Lite… DS Lite…)

House Cleaning

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Things might get a little wonky around here, I’m going to be tinkering under the WordPress hood. I’d like to update the look of my site with a more appropriate banner and color scheme. I’ve also got a backlog of posts that I need to tag. I hope it doesn’t make the feed go screwy. I apologize in advance if it does.

I’m also going to upgrade to the most recent WordPress install and update any plugins that may have been updated.

We’ll get to our regular scheduled program shortly.

A quick follow-up

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Gamestop posted a summary of the Senate hearing on video games, which is referenced in my earlier post about the proposed video game legistlation.

From the review (you can get all the pertinent links, including testimony transcripts here), it seems like the testimony was stacked in favor of the legislation, but there was some heartening quotes, like this one from Paul M. Smith, a partner in the law firm Jenner & Block:

The attorney went on to explain that “Every court to have considered the issue has found ‘violent’ video game laws would not pass constitutional muster because the government lacks a legitimate and compelling interest in restricting video game content. Under well-settled First Amendment principles, expression may not be censored on the theory that it will cause some recipient to act inappropriately, unless it falls into the narrow category of speech ‘directed to inciting’ and ‘likely’ to incite ‘imminent’ violence.”

Unfortunately, that is countered with this argument from Kevin Saunders, a Professor of Law at Michigan State University:

Saunders’ second legal basis will likely prove the most troubling to gamers. This approach would argue that “is that video game play, like the play of pinball machines, is not an activity protected by the First Amendment.” It would legally differentiate the expression of a game designer, which would be protected, from the playing of games, which would not be. As an example, he compared a sexually provocative dancer’s movements, which is a performance and therefore expression, to a gamer playing in an arcade, which is not, even though others were watching him.

This definitely far from over, but there seems to at least seem to be a level of civility between both sides. No one attacked (verbally or otherwise) the otherside, so I guess that’s a good thing.

I guess they’ve never played Grand Theft Auto.