Sunday "Video": Blood by The Dears

This was the first song I ever played through on coop on Beat Hazard, and it has sort of stuck with me through thick and thin in that game.

There are some live versions, but I think I like the studio version the best.

Katamari X-Men

Slow Applause.

So, There Is A Trailer For Battleship Now

So let me get this straight: the upcoming Battleship movie is about an alien invasion? No scratch that.

A giant alien robot invasion on the sea.

Basically they are making Transformers at sea.

Why is it branded with the Battleship name though aside from some marketing gimmick?

I mean, with Clue, it made sense... it was a group of characters from the game in a setting that was like the game played by some really good comic actors.

I think if I wrote this movie, I would have made it a political thriller with two fleets sitting out in the ocean on a collision course to destroy each other in the middle of the Pacific while an intelligence agent in the American government tries to prevent all out war by exposing the conspiracy that brought these events to bear.

And I would have cast some better actors for most of the lead roles. Because I'd actually want to see actually acting rather than a hot ass or great abs in a movie like that.

But you know, that's just me.

Midweek Video: After Hours: The Best Superpower

Once again, my favorite segment on Cracked delivers.

Gene Simmons Is Getting Married?

Anyone else think it is strange that after 25 years Gene Simmons popped the question to long time girlfriend Shannon Tweed.

I don't generally write about this sort of thing, but it is just weird.

I mean, aren't they technically married due to common law anyway?

Part of me (ok, most of me) thinks that this is just something that they have cooked up for that stupid reality show Family Jewels. It has to be. Because really, why would he suddenly have this massive change of heart.

The other reason I can think of is he feels intensely guilty about something he has done recently and he is trying to make amends without disclosing the actual deed in question.

In either case, it seems sort of suspicious for one reason or another.

Too Much Awesomeness In One Picture

Oh GOD! The Raptors have Portal Guns now.

Via: The Daily What

Sunday Video: Bubblegum Crisis: Streets Of Fire

A few days ago, I got into a series of conversations about Streets of Fire, anime, Blade Runner, The Warriors, and a bunch of other things (and I can't forget about the Cracked article that morning about scenes thankfully excised from movies which included The Terminator and Alien) and later in that same day, I came across this video:

I can't believe how many of those things were in this short mashup trailer.

Oh, Revenge Of The Nerds, How You Have Warped My Life

I don't know what it is about this particular moment in pop cultural history, but somehow the Alpha Betas in Revenge of the Nerds yelling NERDS in my mind feels so good and it feel so good to yell out too.

It is especially weird since I am a nerd myself. They are yelling out the term in disparagement and anger, but it seems like a sweet hook from a hard rock song. It is so wrong, and yet it feels so right.

If you've never tried it, go ahead and yell it while you are doing something nerdy with other people.

Name As Destiny

With a name like Victor Von Doom, was there any way Dr. Doom could not have become a supervillain?

Or kickass?

Midweek Video: Half of Once

I've been looking for this video for a while. I really like the song, and the video sort of has the same kind of paranoia that Bowie's I'm Afraid of Americans does.

CNBC Reporter Believes Wrestling Storylines Are SEC Offences.

When you tell someone you watch wrestling, one of the first things someone who doesn asks you is "You know it's fake, right?"

Apparently no one has ever said this to CNBC sports business reporter Darren Rovell.

There was a storyline on Monday where Vince McMahon was being pushed out of the top spot in the company by HHH. And Darren Rovell ran with it.

Right. A clearly scripted entertainment show where a real life personality plays a character based on themselves is breaking an SEC rule by playing out a story based scenario.

It is like me taking what is happening on 30 Rock to be a reflection of what is going on at NBC. If I went on CNBC and stated that Tracey Jordan was the real power behind NBC Television decisions, I would be politely asked what I was on and they would cut away to someone who wasn't insane.

Or that Seinfeld was all real.

Really? Did anyone outside of Rovell's head think Vince McMahon was really being replaced during a live telecast? By former wrestler (and yes, his son-in-law too)? How often does that ever happen in any business.

If you were a stockholder and you believed that was real, then I am sorry, you just haven't done your due diligence in the company and you deserve whatever you get.

Then again, Rovell also thought that stockholders would somehow believe that during a live broadcast, Vince McMahon was blown up in his limo and that again should be subject to an SEC investigation.

And the sad thing is, WWE wrestling is programming on NBC-affiliated networks, so Rovell is in essence using his platform on CNBC to rip on programming on sister stations and in doing so, he is using up whatever credibility he has talking about sports business, because I am sure that outside of sports entertainment, he knows what he is talking about.

Then again, he is on one of the networks that didn't see the downturn coming, so hey, maybe he has as much expertise as his peers in predicting things in his field. Who knows?

Because Charlie Sheen Is Getting A New Show

I've decided to post this:

It is certainly the truth.

The Venture Brothers' Henchman 21 Is A Geek Hero

If you've never watched The Venture Brothers and you plan on doing so (or you haven't caught up with the 4th season, there will be spoilers, so be forewarned).

When I used to watch the old episodes of The Venture Brothers, I sort of idolized Brock Samson because he was a superbadass on that show. Hypercompetent, prone to awesome feats of endurance, strength and let's face it violence, Brock Samson seems to represent a certain ideal. He's tough, a hit with the ladies and a pure killing machine when he is unleashed, and it is like he was born for the job of an OSI superagent, and is genetically that guy down to the very core.

But when I thought about it really, Brock Samson is sort of a dick when it comes down to it. When you see flashbacks of him in college, he was always sort of one. Yes, he is a good guy, but I think he is what you expect from that universe's man's man.

But Henchman 21 started off as the antithesis of that model. He was a wimpy, cowardly geeky guy who just had an incredible run of luck and enough genre savvy to know how to survive his various errands for the Monarch. And he is really a geek. Like super geeky, and especially with Henchman 24.

And then Henchman 24 was killed and 21 vowed to change and become someone capable on the battlefield so no one close to him would ever die again under his watch. He turned himself from a flabby geeky nobody into a superbadass. He went from being one of many henchmen to becoming The Henchman, and even though he still works for a villain, he has become heroic and epic and perhaps more powerful than the lord he serves.

As a geek, he is sort of aspirational. He doesn't have the gifts that Brock Samson has, but he doesn't care... he devoted his energy to becoming a badass on his own terms and there is something noble in that, even if part of the reason he did so was to exact revenge on the people he felt were responsible for the death of his friend.

But if that formerly flabby tub of cowardice could turn himself into a superman who can kill his peers as needed, fight monstrous supervillains and make out with his his boss's hot wife in a short period of time, all while maintaining his essential geekiness. In that regard, he is still the same guy that hung around with Henchman 24 dissecting pop culture and arguing about how Smurfs propagate their species.

In the end, Henchman 21 represents a particular ideal. He went far beyond his formerly meager personal resources and became the embodiment of geekish success, and if he can do it, then any geek can. Huzzah!

Sunday Video: Bill Bailey's Message To Metallica

I really believe he would actually do it too.

Dexter's Got A New Target

You know people who never watched the series before would probably tune in if that was his target.

Do All Kids Play Video Games Like This?

Cracked has an article today called the 5 Crucial Lessons Learned By Watching Kids Play Video Games, and it got me to thinking about my own experiences playing games as a kid and an adult... because I've played games for over 25 years now, and I have seen some of these changes happen over time. I am not really going to reiterate what John Cheese has said, rather I am just going to comment on the 5 things he discussed.

1. They Don't Tolerate Losing. You know, I don't mind dying in a game if it is a learning experience, even if that death ends the entire game for me (like Way of the Samurai, which was literally one life and it deleted your save file too). I can deal with difficulty based on the gameplay dynamic. No, the thing I discovered as an adult that I can no longer tolerate is chinzy, cheap puzzles. You know, the kind of puzzle or quest to find an item or whatever that requires pixel precision or advanced knowledge of an area you are visiting for the first time... the kind of stuff that is unintuitive and designed specifically to stretch out a game. I will give one of these missions/puzzles only so much of my time before I look up the solution in text form or on Youtube, because with so many other things I could be doing, or even so many other games I could be playing, spending unproductive time solving an arbitrary puzzle isn't worth it. I just want to get to the next thing in the game.

2. They Have No Tolerance for "Grinding" I remember back in my SNES days playing Final Fantasy IV, and there was a particular sidequest where you had to climb a tower and fight a boss to get a special item. Well, there was an easy way you could win by using a particular combination of spells. I didn't know that at the time. So I just kept playing the game and building up my levels until I could take whatever that boss was going to dish out and survive long enough to kill it. And this was not some isolated incident... I mean, I did stuff like that recently in both Disgaea and Persona 3 FES. But then I hear stories about games that discourage you from grinding by either making your enemies level up with you (and gain additional skills which will make them much harder) or they keep decreasing the amount of experience you get for killing them (Borderlands does this). Don't get me wrong... I don't enjoy grinding, but at times it is a necessary evil in a role playing game. It is something I am willing to put up with in moderation.

3. If They Want to Read, They'll Buy a F'ing Book You know, I was all set to disagree with this point. Then I thought about the sidequests I've been playing in the aforementioned Borderlands and I realized that while I wasn't pushing a button to skip through a lot of text, I was just looking at what a quest entailed and not reading the backstory or the in-game, in-character reason why I was doing something. But I think this is something that I've only recently started doing in games, since I used to be married to lots of text and narrative in a game. And I don't mind reading information in a game at all. I mean, I spent 4 months at the beginning of the year playing a game that was predicated on just looking at lots of numbers and making decisions based on your interpretation of them. But I do think that lots of reading may be a thing that is rapidly becoming a thing of the past in most games.

4. They Press "Y" to Skip, as Fast as They Can I think I might be in the minority here but generally the first time I am going to see a cutscene, I watch the whole thing. On subsequent playthroughs, I may skip it, but when I am playing a game which a narrative, I sort of want to see how things play out in the cutscenes, even if they take forever to watch. It is part of the overall experience for me, so even the bad ones are still worth watching in my opinion. Like I said, I know others might not agree with that, but that's how I play things. I can see how to some people if you aren't actively participating in the action, then you aren't really playing a game, but I think of cinematics as part of the grander experience. I don't think they are going to go away for a while.

5. Don't Like it? Break It. I have been known to go full psycho with tweaks and cheats in a sandbox. But I never save whatever I am doing... I just use those kinds of codes when I am blowing off some steam outside of the game's larger narrative. But I generally don't cheat in the way the author discusses when I am playing for keeps. Cheats are for fun in my eyes, not plowing through games. If I wanted a tank in GTA:SA to have, well, I'd steal it. If I wanted one just to see what would happen if I drove it off the top of a mountain, then I'd spawn one. I do like exploring how far you can go within a game's programming, with and without cheats, it's true. But I too find myself on the goal-oriented side of things.

Now the thing I am wondering is if I am going to notice my niece doing the same kinds of things when she gets older. She already plays games on the DS/PSP at age 4, so her skipping a wall of text is understandable. However, are those activities something that all kids are doing or just the author's?

And has anyone else who played games as a kid and adult noticed some of these shifts in the medium?

Midweek Video: Lunch Hour Pops

With the sudden death of Broadcast frontwoman Trish Keenan in January, there was a lot of sadness in the music community and amongst fans of the band.

One enterprising fan decided that as a tribute to her, he would create a video for a song from the band's second full length album, and the end result is a great meeting of a classic film with a memorable song.

The Steam Summer Camp

I am sure that some of you notices that I hadn't been posting with the same frequency or depth as I usually do the past couple of weeks, and there is a good reason for that. I was playing around at the Steam Summer Camp.

You see, when I have a little money and a sale... well, I can really stretch those dollars.

I knew there was a summer sale on Steam coming up before I got a new video card, so I squirreled away some money for that eventuality. They happened to call the sale the Steam Summer Camp, and I certainly had a lot of fun.

This is what I ended up getting with the funds I had set aside (which truth be told, wasn't a huge sum of money).

Oblivion GOTY Deluxe
Knights of the Old Republic
Dragon Age Origins: Ultimate Edition
Fallout 3 GOTY
Fallout New Vegas's DLC
Batman Arkham Asylum GOTY
Neverwinter Nights 2 Platinum
Left 4 Dead
Anomaly Warzone Earth
Torchlight
Killing Floor Bundle (minus the newest DLC)
The Magicka DLC
Half Life 2: Death Match
Hoard
Zombie Driver
Beat Hazard Complete (which was the game I've enjoyed most during this sale)
Flight Control HD (stupid messed up achievement)
Atom Zombie Smasher
Garry's Mod + Counterstrike Source
Audiosurf
X-Superbox (I am looking forward to getting wrist deep in X2: The Threat soon)
Terraria
Post Apocalyptic Mayhem
AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH! and The Wonderful End of the World
Just Cause 2 and its DLC
Poker Night at the Inventory
APOX and its DLC
Gratuitous Space Battles and its DLC
Shatter
The Polynomial

And I was gifted copies of Stubbs The Zombie and Sanctum. I don't know about you, but that ended up being a really good haul.

There were also prizes tied to getting a particular number of specific achievements, and I ended up getting 8 additional prizes (mostly DLC for games). I spent a lot of free time working on getting those tickets (and helping other people get theirs), and I really enjoyed the community aspect of the sale. A lot of the fun came from knowing you were in the middle of a communal struggle to get tickets with other people. So I think I ended up playing about 30 hours of games during the 10 day sale to get those wonderful golden tickets.

I already miss the Steam Summer Camp and I sort of hope that the Steam Holiday Sale has that same kind of community feel. It isn't the deals I miss... it is the camaraderie.

Anyone Looking For A Google+ Invite?

I can totally hook you up with an invite if you want it. I know some of you might not want to join another social network, so I didn't arbitrarily send you an invitation.

So if you do want in and we've had some form of contact in the past (because I just got a couple of emails from strangers)... I will invite you.

I am just starting to get the hang of things over there.

Random Strangers: Stop writing.

That Is Indeed Sort Of Disturbing

Makes me wonder if I missed the eating of sausage or bacon in Babe.

James Franco Blames Everyone But Himself For The Oscars

Gah! James Franco just keeps playing the blame game when it comes to his cohosting stint at the Academy Awards.

First he sort of insinuated that Anne Hathaway was the problem at the Oscars during an appearance with David Letterman, which wasn't cool.

Now he is blaming the writers. Granted, there may have been some problems with the material, and I am not denying there were some execution problems, but still... he is protesting way too much.

I am thinking about some of the other people who went down in flames hosting an awards show and you know what... they almost all totally own it and they laugh about it, but Franco isn't.

If James Franco owned it, people would let it go. But because he keeps trying to pass the buck on everyone else, it is just making it worse.

Sunday Video: Christmas on the Block

I've been playing a lot of this game called Beat Hazard Ultra (which is totally awesome and I recommend it highly), which creates shoot'em up levels based on music on your hard drive.

Well, last night, while I was looking at the leaderboard, it pulled a song from Go Home Productions out of my folders, one which I hadn't heard before.

It combines Wonderful Christmas Time by Paul McCartney and Jenny From The Block by Jennifer Lopez.

I laughed at first, but then I realized... they go together so well!

You Just Don't Get Entertainment Like This Anymore

You wouldn't even see this in a cartoon today. I feel sorry for today's kids.

I don't care if this came from the 1970's, I would watch that today.

via Endless Geyser of Awesome

Midweek Video: Every Michael Bay Movie Ever

I think College Humor nails it.

Is This Wrong?

Is it wrong that I sort of want to punch people who wear eyeglass frames with no lenses in them right in the face?

Seriously, right in the nose.

His Patheticness Makes Me Feel Better About My Own Inadequacies

Someone sent me a link to this video where a dude is trying to pick up a girl on Xbox Live. And it is as sad, pathetic and painful as it sounds.

As a geek/nerd, I know I've never been that bad, but I have had some pathetic moments in my life that I was reminded of.

Like the time I went to the launch party for a local monthly I was working for and I didn't know anybody and I happened to bump into a friend of a former coworker and I latched onto her conversationally like I was in the middle of the ocean and I was drowning. The fact that she was a very attractive woman who was dressed in a stunning way likely made it seem like I was trying to seduce her. In retrospect made it especially awkward because after the fact, when I wasn't in that situation anymore, where she politely tried to disengage herself from my company and I was completely oblivious to it. It was a tough lesson to learn, to be sure.

And then there was the time I was becoming friendly with this girl on a web design forum around 2002, and we decided to try chatting on ICQ, and we had what has to be one of the most awkward conversations I have ever had online. Like it we both knew it was awful. I wasn't flirting, she wasn't flirting... it was just uncomfortable for both of us. Over the next few days, I didn't really know how to approach her, so when she would pop on the service, I would say hi, and she wouldn't respond. Happened a couple of times, and I had decided that she didn't want to talk to me anymore so I was going to stop saying hi. Well, she decided that she was going to start a thread on the forum where she said she didn't appreciate the attention without mentioning my name (and really, when did saying hi to someone online 3 times over the course of a week turn into harassment). Since she was the established member who had other established members as friends, and I was the relatively new member, the whole situation made me feel all weird and exposed, like it wouldn't have mattered what my side of that story was. We eventually got past it after a forum incident which I chastised someone for being a sexist asshole to a third party.

And naturally, that is merely the tip of the iceberg. My only real consolation from stories like the ones above is I learned something from them.

So, does anyone else have stories like this from their past so we can all share in the cringing?

Sunday Night Video: Man Vs. Katamari

Freddie Wong meeting Katamari Damacy... awesome.

As a side note, is it just me or does this blog look strange when I don't post on the weekend (my excuse? A bad storm and a wonderfully tempting steam sale with golden tickets!)