The Man Who Wasn't There

Because I saw a LJ friend do it and it sounds like a great idea!

BOOKS

1. Off Season.
2. Old Flames.
3. Fool
4. Lamb: The Gospel According to Biff, Christ's Childhood Pal
5. The Stupidest Angel: A Heartwarming Tale of Christmas Terror
6. The Watchmen
7. The Full Catastrophe
8. Breathers: A Zombie's Lament
9. Blood and Ice
10. The Rite
11. Hater
12. Way of the Shadow

NEW MOVIES

1. Slumdog Millionaire (Amazing)
2. The Unborn (sort of terrible)
3. My Bloody Valentine 3D (sort of terrible...but in 3D! And fun!)
4. Underworld: Rise of the Lycans (Campy, but ultimately good fun)
5. The Curious Case of Benjamin Button (Didn't care for it...)
6. The Uninvited (Terrific ghost story!)
7. Sex Drive (Surprisingly funny)
8. College (unsurprisingly stupid and not funny)
9. Milk (easily one of two best movies of 08)
10. Coraline (scrumptious visuals; very faithful. Fun)
11. Friday the 13th (I liked it)
12. Burn After Reading (funny and surprising)
13. W. (what is there to say?)
14. The Watchmen
15. Waltz with Bashir
16. Knowing
17. I Love You, Man
18. Monsters v. Aliens 3D
19. Changeling
20. Saw V
21. Adventureland
22. Let the Right One In
23. Tell No One
24. Donkey Punch (Why the fuck did you recommend this movie, Netflix?)
25. Bolt (Why does Disney still hate cats?)
26. Observe and Report
27. Splinter
28. Nobel Son
29. Sunshine Cleaning
30. Wolverine
31. Star Trek
32. Angels & Demons
33. Up
34. Drag Me to Hell
35. Land of the Lost
36. The Grudge 3
37. The Hangover

GAMES

1. Braid
2. Fable 2
3. Dead Space
4. Metal Gear Solid 4
5. Resident Evil 5
6. House of the Dead: Overkill
7. Gears of War 2

I hope everyone had a great 4th of July. Mine was very low key. The most exciting thing was picking up a friend from the airport who just returned from a vacation in Peru. It was good to have her back home. This weekend was also another weekend of Aion beta and my first glimpse at the game. A little personal history. When Aion was announced back in 2006 (I think), it sounded vaguely like a prettier Lineage II with wings. Having played Lineage II for about a month before determining that the game wasn't for me, I immediately lost interest in Aion and kind of forgot about it. Well, I'm not one to turn down a beta invite, so since I had a four day weekend, I decided to spend at least a little bit of time with the game to give it a fair shake. I come away from it pleasantly surprised.

I'm not a fan of Asian MMOs. I've played more than a few (RF Online,Maple Story (for about a minute), Ragnarok Online, Flyff, a variety ofbetas for free MMOs, Lineage II, FFXI...) and I've come to the decision that it's not a gametype that I like. These types of MMOs focus more on grinding and less on quests, less on structured advancement and a feeling of story. While most Western MMOs have very little story, there are usually smaller stories told via quests that give some reason for you doing what you're doing, even if it is because some farmer is lazy and doesn't want to touch pig guts. And there's movement. A lot of time I've spent in Asian games has focused on finding a place with enemies around my level and then sitting there for hours, killing them. A quest system helps keep you moving, going from place to place and it gives you a sense of accomplishment that I feel is lacking from grind sessions.

Aion is an Asian MMO, developed in Korea. It's been released in various Asian countries and is coming out in September to the United States. However, Aion is not a traditional Asian MMO. It's certainly not Lineage II. And it has more in common with westernized games like World of Warcraft and Lord of the Rings Online than it does RFO. The premise behind the game is that there's two sides, both angels I guess, that live in two opposing lands. There's the Elos living above and the Asmodians living below. They are obviously very much opposed to eachother and that conflict is the center of the game. Now, that doesn't mean there's open PvP between the two sides. From what I can see, that conflict takes place in an area called The Abyss which seems to be between the two sides and is where you both meet to duke it out for control of castles. But that's getting a bit ahead of what I've seen and want to talk about.

( Read more... )

The take away:

Positives

* Very beautiful
* Very smooth beta; could have been released as far as playability is concerned.
* Nice character customization
* It has that "fun" quality that's hard to describe
* Very nicely localized (no noticeable "Engrish" and everything make
sense)
* Westernized MMO structure/not grindy/tons of quests and rewards
* A neat crafting system
* Flying is cool and fun
* ...did I mention it's beautiful?

Negatives

* Right now flying is very limited. Most of the areas I've been in are noted "flying not allowed." Sometimes it feels like a gimmick. I'm hoping for more inclusive areas.
* Not a lot of areas to play in. Each side has about five zones and one big city. You don't go into the other side's zones as far as I can tell. The Abyss has another three zones, I think.
* Longevity. I was level 16 by Sunday and while I did play a lot the first day and a half, the rest of the weekend was casual. Is there enough content to keep the game interesting in the long run?
* What's the end game like? From what I've seen, it focuses on raiding instanced dungeons and PvP. Not a lot of small scale dungeons are available, it seems. And I don't care for raiding.
* Classes seem cookie-cutter. You choose a class and that's that. No skill trees, no other options to customize your character. One spirit master will be the same as another spirit master.

Wanna see something gross and disturbing? Take a look at The North Carolina Sewer Creatures. I'll wait...have you thrown up yet? Okay, good. When I first saw this, this morning, I immediately thought, "this has to be some viral marketing video for an upcoming movie, right? .....right???" I started googling it because, obviously, if someone posted that video on Youtube it should be all over the place. And there are other articles about this.

First of all...it's fraking real! Seriously, no shit. Really.

Wired talked about it and said that Raleigh city officials say it's a "colony of tubifex worms." Now, when you Wikipedia tubifex worms, you get this and I'm here to say that one of these is not like the other ones...but then io9 has updated their site with a new article, confirming (?) the tubifex colony here. Whatever the case, tubifex worm colony, slim mold or sentient slug thing sent to take over the world, it's disgusting and apparently really real.

Now just imagine...that's supposedly in the water system. EWWWW!!!

Yeah, I know. Late to the party. But I do like this song.

I'm starting to see how TV addiction begins. Last week, I finished catching up on Lost. I've watched five seasons in...a month? Two at the most? I can't honestly remember, but it's a short period of time. And when I was done, I immediately thought, "...now what?" As if I needed some other show to fill some unnoticed void. I haven't decided whether it fills this void or not, but I started watching Battlestar Galactica. Watched the miniseries and about five episodes of Season One. Right now, it's not grabbing me in the way that Lost did, over and over. Mostly I think it has to do with the fact that I'm not a huge space sci-fi fan. I'm not a big sci-fi fan by any stretch, so any of the sub genres, like space stories, have even less of a chance of thrilling me. BSG is interesting, though, and has some good characters and drama, enough to keep me interested. But I don't find it as exciting and awesome as some people I know do.

Today is the first day since Wednesday that I've felt semi-good. Allergies/sinus issues struck like a mighty fist on Wednesday and I've been a congested, sniffling and exhausted wreck since then.

Yesterday I played a demo for Trine, a game that I'm becoming increasingly interested in. Take side-scrolling fantasy action, add a dollop of LittleBigPlanet-style physics, some RPG-lite leveling systems and three characters and you have a recipe for a fun game. Add a side of beautiful graphics and I'm becoming sold. In Trine, you play as three different characters (warrior, rogue and wizard) to work your way through levels that have puzzles based on physics. Each character has his or her own abilities that you'll need to combine to get through the puzzles. The warrior has a sword and a shield, useful in defeating the skeleton enemies you'll face and defend against both the enemies and environmental attacks (you can raise your shield above your head to protect yourself from falling debris, or hold it in front of you to defend against fireballs, for instance). The rogue has a bow to attack enemies, but she also has the ability to shoot out a grapple of sorts to swing from place to place or to get to areas you normally couldn't. Then there's the wizard who's able to use his magic to move objects and he can also summon boxes by drawing them.

It's an interesting gameplay system and it creates some very fun, pseudo-LBP type gameplay. And it's pretty damn stunning, from a graphic perspective. Beautiful, 2D mixed with 3D. The demo's available on Steam right now and it's coming to PC, Xbox and Playstation soon I think. Check it out!

So the Oscars announced that they're increasing their Best Picture nominations to 10. This hearkens back to the older years of the award, where the Best Picture nominations had anywhere from 8-12, depending on the year. On one hand, I think this is a good thing because it will give some pictures more visibility. There are some great films that could benefit from having the decree "Best Picture nominee," on it since those with that distinction end up seeing an increase in revenue usually. It also might help bring the pictures to areas where they normally won't go. Here in Nebraska, movies that wouldn't even air here end up being showed when the nominations come out. And maybe this change will actually allow animated films to be nominated. Up would be a perfect addition to the nominees this year since that film had more tenderness and pathos than any live action film I've seen in years. Wanna talk about affecting, take a look at the first ten minutes of that film that encapsulates an entire lifetime in mere minutes.

On the other hand, though, this really seems to be simply pandering. The thought is that more commercial films might end up being nominated. Would The Dark Knight have been in that category last year, people ask. Regardless of who gets the final five slots, I'd be willing to posit that those films, be they commercial films or animated films or simply lesser known indies, have as much chance of being the winner as I do of winning the lottery...that I don't play. But say that this year, the tenth nomination is Star Trek. When the Oscars comes upon us, how many more people will turn in, to watch the telecast with the hopes--regardless of how slim those hopes actually are--that it will be the winner? The biggest Oscar telecast of the last I don't know how many years was the night when Lord of the Rings: Return of the King smashed the Oscars, winning every award they were in. That was also the last time a hugely commercial/mainstream film was a Best Picture Oscar nominee. Who knows, maybe the over-hyped Avatar, the new film by James Cameron, will be in the nominations...would that be a first? A 3D movie as a Best Picture nomination?

We are officially playing Vanguard: Saga of Heroes now. I'm not sure how long we'll play it but with nothing on the horizon that everyone is interested in (without trying it beforehand, I won't pony up for Aion, for example) it might be for a little bit at least. Honestly, the content in the game is completely typical MMO stuff. There's nothing in the quests or structure of the game that makes it standout. It definitely doesn't have the graphics (though, in its favor, it is streaming an entire world instead of zoning them off). What it does have is interesting character classes. Every class I've played has been interesting and there's intricacies to each one that makes playing them a real joy. It's fun to play. So that even though we're doing the standard "kill 20 insects" quests, there's enough in the classes that makes it entertaining. I also love two systems Vanguard has introduced: Brotherhoods and Caravans.

The Brotherhood system allows you to basically share experience points between up to six people. You're splitting your experience points for killing monsters and accomplishing quests, but you're getting it split for each person, whether you're online or not. So if you have to log early for the night and your friends keep playing, when you log back in you'll gain some experience points. It's a great way of keeping your playing group together, even if you can't play together all the time. The Caravan system allows you to travel to your Caravan leader's place if you logged off. This means that if you log off and your Caravan leader goes somewhere else while you're offline, when you log back in you can either choose to spawn where you are last at or where your Caravan leader was. Another great way to keep your playing group together.

I still want to play Champions Online but I think I might be the only one of my gaming group. I loved the pen and paper rules system for Champions and I think it's offering some really cool features. I already have my character's name picked out.

Just learned that a new The Mars Volta album came out yesterday! Whoo hoo!

Last night I made an awesome dinner. It was pork with mustard lime vinaigrette and sour cream & chive mashed potatoes. I used this recipe to make the pork, but with a couple changes. I didn't put the onions in. I'd done that before and it was over-powering. I really think recipes call for too much onions. An entire onion?! And it's not even cooked, just raw onion mixed with the vinaigrette. I left that out this time and it was awesome. For the potatoes, my mom introduced me to this new thing. Ore Ida has a frozen mashed potatoes bag where you put it in the microwave and it steams the potatoes, then you just mash them and add milk and whatever else. I tossed in some sour cream with chives and it turned out great. Very good meal. Tonight, I'm using the leftovers, making some cilantro-lime rice (tastes like the rice at Chipotle) and creating burritos with the leftover pork and some black beans. Toss some sour cream and salsa on it. Yum!

I enjoy cooking and I'm usually pretty good at it. I just don't have the time make the time. Last night was a good indicator of why I don't do it as much as I'd like. I'm currently watching two people's houses, my parents and a friend's. Well last night I didn't go check on my parent's house, but I had to stop by the friend's house. Then I had to swing by Baker's, our supermarket, to pick up miscellaneous groceries that I didn't have and would need to cook. By the time I was eating, it was after 7 which made the evening evaporate so quickly afterwards. Oh well, it's a give and take and I guess the upshot is that I don't have to cook tonight (other than using my rice cooker to cook the rice)!

I couldn't resist. After going back and forth mentally over the new
iPhone, I decided to put it into the hands of fate: I would show up at
the AT&T store on Friday around 8:30 AM. If they had some black 16 GB
iPhone 3GS, I would take the plunge. If they didn't, it was a sign.
Well, they did. And so now I have a shiny new iPhone to replace
my...less shiny old(ish) iPhone. In my defense, I had the original, 2G
model so the upgrade was quite substantial. I really don't think it's
completely worthwhile to upgrade from the 3G to the 3GS. Other than the
speed increase, there's really nothing super substantially different
between the two, in my opinion. What made me laugh and kind of
frustrated me was that all of the online articles discussing the 3GS
compared it to the 3G. I understand this, because people with the 3G
were probably wondering if it's worth it, but every single article out
there (like the Arstechnica review of the 3GS as well as the engadget
one) came from the perspective of the 3G user. I guess the implication
is that if you have the 2G then of course it's a worthy upgrade. But
for people on the shelf, like me, who were wondering whether the bump up
in speed and functionality was truly worth dropping $200 when you
probably already dropped $400 for it two years ago, you get the shaft.

Engadget has this cool little chart showing the browser speed between the 3G, 3GS and the Pre (as well
as the T-Mobile G1). There's a substantial difference between the 3G
and the 3GS which means that the difference must be astronomical for the
2G that I owned. I have to say that I love my new phone even more than
my old iPhone, even though it feels like I have the exact same phone.
It's incredibly fast, very sleek, weighs less, has better reception (I
could actually get a phone call when I was at my parent's
house...something that didn't happen on my previous iPhone) and is the
same thing I've grown to love, except faster. Now, AT&T needs to get
their heads out of their butts and release MMS so that when people send
me pictures I can actually, you know, view them.

Season Two of True Blood has started and I have to admit that Alan Ball
has kicked it up a notch. I wasn't completely sold on the first season.
It was enjoyable, had a pitch perfect cast and some great
sequences...but it still felt too much like a harlequin romance to me.
I have to say, though, that reading the book and watching the first
season was an interesting beast. The book isn't very good I didn't
think because it felt very shallow. The murder mystery wasn't anywhere
near the focus in the book; once the heat kicked up between Sookie and
Bill, the whole fact that friends were dropping left and right didn't
seem to be as important as the question of "do I love Bill?" which was a
disappointment for me. But the TV series, by not being in first person,
allowed the characters to grow. And while sometimes it went off in
directions that had me rolling my eyes (the whole exorcism sequence)
there was still a reason behind it and it gave life to characters who
were only shallow plot points in the book. This is, of course, thanks
to Alan Ball (Six Feet Under, American Beauty) who has the ability to
really expose and dig into characters. Season 2 has been fantastic so
far. We're seeing some more character growth; the honeymoon is over for
Sookie/Bill and their relationship isn't as big of focus; there's more
myster; cliffhangers abound...it's pretty fantastic and exciting to
watch. I love Tara in the series. Her sarcastic character is perfect.


I had to sneak to the plot synopsis at Wikipedia to learn of the fate of
one of my favorite characters.

Vanguard: Saga of Heroes has a 14 day trial which some of my friends
downloaded, spurring me to do the same. I had played the beta of
Vanguard, towards the end and close to when it was going to be released
and found the game unplayable. Unlike some people who play betas, I
understand that a beta is a testing phase and not representative of the
final product. However, I've also been involved in enough betas to know
that if the game is still virtually unplayable a few weeks out from
release, then the game isn't ready to be released. It's interesting to
look at betas; for instance, Lord of the Rings Online had a terrific end
of beta that was launch ready almost a month before it launched. Smooth
transition, smooth launch. Vanguard felt like I was playing a
PowerPoint presentation, where I got stuck when I was trying to harvest
crafting materials and where I'd just find myself dead because some
monster was killing me and the game hadn't caught up. It was terrible.


When Vanguard launched, it was heralded one of the worst launches (if
not the worst) and was compared to the abomination that was Anarchy
Online's launch. It's really too bad because a lot of people
understandable quit, the game kind of started fading away and,
surprisingly, the only thing that helped it was Sony Online
Entertainment (SOE), MMO gamers' whipping boy. Vanguard launched in
2007. It's been two years since I dipped my toes into the fetid water
of Saga of Heroes so I was really surprised that I found myself enjoying
it. In some ways, it's an extremely ambitious MMO. In other ways, it's
an incredibly rough-around-the-edges game that, even two years later,
has minor issues that you would think would be squashed (e.g. when
hovering over an item to compare it to your equipped items, the sides
flip-flop so it's difficult to tell which is actually equipped; when you
level, you gain hints about having a new skill/stance that you actually
don't get for another two levels+; etc.). When you look at what it has
simply based on text, it definitely sounds impressive: 19 races, 15
classes, something like 35 different mounts, crafting systems to create
huge items like ships (!), housing, a diplomacy system that's kind of
like a card game like Magic.

It's very involved and in some ways "hardcore," but it also eases you in
pretty well, I think. And a lot of the crazy systems (like crafting a
galleon and the diplomacy system) are optional. I've only gotten to
level 9 so I'm still on the "newbie island," but I was surprised at some
of the things I've gotten to do towards the end of my stay. For
example, I got to control a flying mount. A Pegasus! And I had to fly
around the island, locating certain scouting points. And then I had to
land the Pegasus at a temple in the mountains that was unreachable by
foot. The fact that at level 8 I was flying to an instance just seemed
really cool to be doing at such a low level.

I think a lot of the complexities will probably come from the classes.
The actual content seems to be pretty standard for MMOs, but the one
class I've played so far has a few complexities that makes it
interesting a little bit on the skill-based side. My character is a
Dread Knight so I have standard melee attacks, a couple spells, some
threat aggro abilities, etc. But there's also reactive skills where if
I crit with a specific skill, I can launch a finishing attack or if I
block a skill I can launch a counter attack. Additionally, the Dread
Knight has a few stances that makes him effective as a tank or a DPS
class, for instance. Then, on top of it. there's an aura that surrounds
him and increases in potency the more special attacks you do...so
there's a lot to keep track of which keeps the game interesting.

I'm not sure if we're going to continue with the game past the trial but
right now I definitely wouldn't mind. It's keeping my interest.

Fox, doing something that actually makes sense?? What is this world coming to. When I first heard reports that Alien was getting a "remake" or a "reboot" or whatever the hell you want to call it-I'm waiting for the day in which a reboot brings groans to those who hear it as much as the word remake does-I wasn't surprised and, of course, I wasn't happy. Then came the news that it wasn't really a reboot, but that it was kind of a prequel. And that Tony Scott and Ridley Scott would be involved in some capacity. Then it was announced that it'd be the first movie for Carl Erik Rinsch, a music video director. Music video directors often get a lot of hell from people, but some of them end up creating award-winning movies, like one of my all time favorite films. So, it's not necessarily the fact that a music video director was tackling one of my favorite movies as a prequel...but it was kind of the fact that it was happening period. That said, if Fox sticks to their guns and Ridley Scott comes back to the material, I might be reduced to a gushing fanboy.

As an aside, if someone can inform me what Ain't it Cool's current flash icon concerns (look at my first link above), I'd be grateful. It's a half of a house with Harry's head bobbing out and then making it disappear. Each flash icon made has something to do with movies and I just don't know which movie this one is referencing...do you?

As much as I really, really wanted to play Heavy Rain this year, the news that it's being pushed to early 2010, is happy to me for a couple reasons. The first is that it won't be as lost in the shuffle of end of the year releases. The other reason is that there's just too many games coming out this season (Brutal Legend, Bioshock 2, L4D2, Borderlands, Max Payne 3, Silent Hill, Dead Space: Extraction, etc. etc.) that I really want to play. I think publishers rely too much on selling games during the X-Mas months when, honestly, a dry spell in the middle of January to March is a perfect time to drop high quality games. It worked for Capcom and Street Fighter IV and Resident Evil 5, among many others. But for some reason publishers don't get that usually. Next year is already shaping up to offer some great titles. Heavy Rain, God of War 3, Alan Wake have all been mentioned as 2010 titles, not to mention the fact that I'm sure Project Natal will release next year, under its new name.

I broke out the PSP again for the first time in a year to download a few demos. I know some people don't really like Rock Band Unplugged for the PSP based off the demo, but I found it very exciting even though the demo was lame. Instead of giving you one song to play through, the demo gives you three songs...but only about 30 seconds of each song. This results in not really getting the satisfaction of completing a song. I guess, in Rock Band's defense, you probably know after playing for 30 seconds whether the game is for you or not. Music-based games have the same gameplay from beginning to end so it's not like you have to worry about the plot or if the gameplay gets better or worse as the game goes along. It'll most likely be the same as the first 30 seconds you spend with it. I think I'll like Unplugged because it's very frantic. I've already mentioned how it more closely resembles Frequency/Amplitude than it does Rock Band (think of it as a Rock Band skinned Amplitude 2) and that's basically the gist of it. I think I'll probably end up purchasing it.

Patapon 2 was another demo I downloaded and I gotta say, I don't get the fuss. It's another music game involving timed button presses that correspond to your little army and what it does. But the demo felt awfully slow. I didn't care about the story (especially in a demo) but I found myself getting throttled by it every time I tried to do something. And then I spent most of my time Pata-Pata-Pata-Pon'ing to make my characters move an inch. Rinse and repeat. I'm sure it gets better as you learn new moves, etc. But it just doesn't feel like something I'd stick with.

I'd heard great things about Resistance: Retribution's story so I also tried that demo. Ugh. What a probably great game foisted onto a terrible control scheme, not that it's the game's fault. The PSP needs two analog nubs. That's all there is to it. Playing Retribution was like trying to play a FPS on the Nintendo 64 and not using the Southpaw controls. You move/strafe with the analog nub and my right hand kept instinctively looking for a second nub to control looking. Not so fast! Looking/moving is handled by the face buttons! Talk about imprecise! In order to combat that, the game relies on heavy auto-aiming. It's a necessity, giving that if you didn't have it and needed to shoot at the fast-paced monsters, you'd die in a heartbeat. If that game gets ported to the PS2, which a lot of PSP games seem to be doing these days, I might buy it.

You may or may not know that I'm watching Lost from the very beginning. A couple friends have been pressing me to watch it and since I powered through three seasons of Dexter in about a month or so, I've grown attached to binging on TV shows that I've missed. In some ways, it's kind of like reading a book; you get all of these episodic stories in one place and just binge on it. I'm growing addicted to that. And it goes without saying that I've grown addicted to Lost.

What's funny about Lost is just how saturated our pop culture has become with Lost-related snippets. I'd never watched a single episode of Lost and already I knew about the hatch, about "The Others," about the smoke monster and, of course, the polar bear. I know that sometime in the later episodes there's flash-forwards as well as the normal flashbacks. All of this I knew before I even watched a single episode. Before I knew about Locke and Jack and the craziness of the story. All because it's been spread everywhere, even in places where you wouldn't think a Lost-related article would pop up like this article which had a different title awhile ago. I immediately stopped reading it, thinking it was an article about a new show for Dominic Monahan, and realized exactly what it was about very quickly into the article. Kind of an indirect spoiler. Then there was something very benign, or so I thought, which ended up giving me some spoilers.

For instance, when a character gets introduced in Season 2 and captured, I was trying for the life of me to figure out where I had seen him before (the answer? Saw) and so to figure out where I knew him from (because it was killing me) I went to IMDB which, helpfully, lists the actors in Lost but also, in this case unhelpfully, tells you the number of episodes they're in. That's not necessarily the problem with this particular person (though it is with another, which I'll get to in a minute). No, the problem was instead that I had to look up the person by the character's name...and couldn't find it. Instead, the picture of the guy that I was looking for was attached to a different name entirely. I did that with another character in the first season because I was sure I had seen him in a movie (I had, it was Rules of Attraction) and discovered how many episodes he was in which seemed to indicate said person's final episode, leaving one to assume he dies.

Even now, I can't stop seeing spoilers. A good friend helpfully provided the following advice: "Just avoid the internet. Seriously." Haha, she's funny. But...sadly, she's also true.

First of all...YAAAAAAAY!!! The news that Microsoft was half-way getting rid of their abysmal MS Points system and instituting the real price and the ability to just buy the product outright and not purchase blocks of points is something that should have happened a long, long time ago. But I'll gladly take it
now.

I've been saying for years that some horror games should just scrap the combat and now we're seeing a couple experiments in that direction. Think about it; back in the late 90s we had a couple choices in the so-called survival horror genre, in Resident Evil, Silent Hill and, depending on the year, Alone in the Dark. At that time, combat was a clumsy thing that was nowhere near as precise or thrilling as an action game. Because the games were operating with some limitations (pre-rendered backgrounds which necessitated horrible controls, mostly due to processing power, etc.), combat was a difficult addition that resulted in some annoying situations (quick monsters that couldn't be shot at very easily due to the "tank" controls).

As the processing power increased, changes were made to the games. You could see the progression in Resident Evil, for example, based on the game. Resident Evil: Nemesis (the third game) took a bit more of an action-oriented take, even though the controls and the gunplay were imprecise. Code Veronica added fully 3D environments, getting rid of the pre-rendered settings and providing a slightly better combat experience. Fast forward to RE4 and you're presented with a game that goes completely
combat-oriented, with aiming reticules and a game that has more in share with third person action games than the slow burn survival horror games. Once we've hit RE5, the transformation is complete and the saga has become a big blockbuster action movie rather than a survival horror opus.

Because Silent Hill relied on melee weapons more so than gunplay, it was even trickier from a combat perspective. It had a similar progression from Resident Evil, though it continued to hold onto the survival roots. Last year's Silent Hill: Homecoming was a terrific game that was marred with horrible combat. I still think Homecoming is probably the second or third best game in the series (after Silent Hill 2, then SH1), but the entire time I was playing the game I kept thinking...why am I fighting these beasts?!

A handful of games have come out that rely less on combat and in recent years I've found them more intense than the recent iterations of RE and SH. I think it probably started with Clock Tower, a side scrolling adventure game that had you trying solve a mystery/find someone whilst being chased by a deranged madman. You couldn't fight him, all you could do was hide and hope that he wouldn't find you and stab you with his over-sized scissors. It wasn't very elegant and grew repetitive, but for awhile it harkened to horror/slasher films. That formula continued in other games, like Haunting Grounds. Haunting Grounds was an effective little horror game that had a deranged madman also chasing you through a castle, giving you only a dog as a way of protecting yourself. It could be very intense when it was at the top of its game. The problem was the video game nature of the beast where you'd be chased by one guy until a boss fight in which you defeat him/her, then another person would take up the chase. Again, the repetitive format of a video game started to get in its way (similar to Clock Tower 3).

But this year, I think we're seeing some experiments in totally forgoing combat in favor of a more anxiety-laden approach. The new Silent Hill, Shattered Memories, is ostensibly a remake of the original Silent Hill but it re-imagines it as a combat-less game in which you run from your monsters. Aside from Homecoming in which you play as a someone coming back from the war, none of the characters in Silent Hill strike me as someone who would stand and fight against monsters that look ripped from your most terrifying nightmares. It's always seems surprising to me that these people would stay and confront their enemies, especially giving the psychological underpinnings of each story.

Also coming out is Juon, a game based on The Grudge series. I know, you're groaning already and I don't think it'll be an exceptional game by any means. But I've read a couple hands-on reports and both have been positive. In Juon, you have a flashlight and not much else to protect you, so it's based around scares and non-combat. I obviously have a much higher expectation for the new Silent Hill but I hope that either game is a
successful attempt to instill fright without a terrible combat system.

Are you serious? Activi$$ion has turned into a ridiculous company. They have taken the mantel Electronic Arts had at one point, wrapped themselves up in a cloak of evilness and have progressed to the point that I don't even want to buy an Acti$$ion game. They are suing Double Fine Productions, Tim Schafer's company that was working on Brutal Legends. You might remember Brutal Legends as the game that was at Activi$$ion and, when the merger happened and games were dropped, it too was sent packing. Well, Electronic Arts picked it up, helped them get back on their feet and the game's coming out this year.

The only bright spot in this whole mess was Schafer's response: "if Activision liked it, then they should have put a ring on it."

In other news, this is good and I hope Sony follows through. I've been in a predicament over the PSP Go. I don't like UMDs and the Go seems right up my alley. But the price ($250) and the fact that I have some UMD games (and there are some coming out, like Rock Band Unplugged, that I want) makes it a difficult purchase for me. So if they had a way of transferring the UMD games to the Go's 16 GB HDD that would make it a bit more amenable to me. But that is, of course, after the $250 price tag goes down.

My job is having a picnic today and it couldn't have come at a better time. My stress level is through the roof.

So what if it'll probably be Castlevania: God of War, it looks fricking awesome

http://www.gametrailers.com/video/e3-09-castlevania-lords/50687

Within the span of two days, I got into two betas both thanks to Fileplanet. I tried out Huxley for about 10 minutes (which turned into 30 minutes) yesterday and came away genuinely surprised. Last night at midnight, the Uncharted 2 multiplayer beta went live so I'm going to give it a go today hopefully. If anyone else has it (either via Qore, Fileplanet or inFamous) let me know!

Huxley is a game that I heard about maybe 4 years ago. It's gotten lost in the shuffle and I think it's changed its direction and scope so many times that I can't quite honestly tell you what it is and what it originally was. All I know is that there's two sides, a human side and a more mutant side, it's a first person shooter and it's a MMO with some RPG qualities. You can choose a class (of which there are apparently three: Enforcer, Avenger and Phantom) and level up, earning licenses that allow you to equip better equipment. You purchase weapons and armor. There's PvE questing and PvP matches that play like a typical Unreal Tournament-style death match (Huxley uses the Unreal 3 engine).

Webzen is the company that's developing it which is why I was a little hesitant about it. I'm not a huge fan of Asian-developed MMOs (Lineage, RF Online, FFXI etc.) because they tend to focus mostly on grinding and less on the PvE quest structure favored more by the Western market (WoW, LOTRO, WAR, etc.); just a personal opinion based on the types of games I've played. But Huxley has surprised me so far. Some of it is not as polished as games I'm used to playing (the UI could use some tweaks), but as of right now the gameplay is a fun mix of UT/FPS and MMOs...it also looks pretty good thanks to the Unreal engine.

So far the biggest curiosity out of E3 that has captured my mind is this
Project Natal. All three companies now have some form of motion control, obviously spawned from Nintendo's fast selling console but the ways in which they are going about it is interesting to me. Nintendo has become a casual gaming market and it's working for them. I haven't personally touched my Wii in months because there's really nothing on it that appeals to me as a single player gamer, but there's plenty of casual and multiplayer games that are really connecting with the general populace. Sony's motion controller seems to ape Nintendo's style, using a wand controller that looks like a ball-type rolling deodorant stick and their EyeToy which someone at Sony is enamored with. Say what you will about Microsoft, but they have shown aptitude in locating what the consumer wants and then piggy-backing on it when it comes to their game division (not their OS division, mind you). So for me, Project Natal has some serious potential as a camera-based device that uses your body as a controller.

Obviously, E3 is not the best place to demo this type of device since it's a fairly controlled demonstration and the reality will be when the retail version hits and we're able to try it without the supervision of people like Peter Molyneux. But there's something quite cool and fairly creepy about what they want to do. They've showcased a demonstration of a Burnout game where you actually steer with your hands, mimicking a steering wheel, use your foot on the gas and break and use arm motions to shift gears. If that works as well in practical use and not a demonstration floor piece, that's some awesome program. I have faith that Molyneux's game of Milo and Kate or whatever it'll ultimately be called will be interesting. He's always better at the simulation side of things and this is definitely moving forward to a life simulation he's attempted to do with his Fable series. I'm still a little creeped out about the videos showing this seemingly intelligent AI that addresses you, converses with you, picks up changes in your mood via voice and facial expression and has this "life" inside of a game. That verges a little into the uncanny valley and screws with your mind. Given Molyneux's penchant for making you care (evident in the dog in Fable), I'm really concerned with what he wants to do with this game (for he's said it is a game and not just a simulation).

Overall, though, Project Natal has capture my imagination in ways Nintendo's waggle stick and Sony's deodorant doesn't.

Today, both Square Enix and Konami are holding their E3 conference. I'd hazard to guess that Square might shine some light on Final Fantasy XIV, their next MMORPG that's apparently being released next year on the PS3 and PC. With how big "restarts" are in Hollywood right now, I'm thinking that Square might want to start from the scratch soon and "restart" their Final Fantasy series. It's getting a bit ridiculous when you think that we're in the teens in roman numerals. I can't wait for XXIX. Pretty soon, the roman numerals will out-length the title. Maybe they can just start putting roman numerals on their disks and forget the moniker Final Fantasy.

I know a couple of my friends are super excited for FFXIV. I wish I were one of them, but I just don't think it's going to be my cup of tea. I played FFXI for about a year and a half, off and on, which ranks as either the longest I've stayed with a game or barely second to World of Warcraft. The difference between the two, though, is that in WoW I was pretty much done with everything in the game (at the time) and with Final Fantasy I was only level 30. Out of, what, 70? I don't honestly remember but I still have to give kudos to anyone who made it that far. In some ways, FFXI was fantastic. I love the job system, where you could pick two different classes eventually and really make a character your own. I also loved the community. I've played many, many MMOs before and after FFXI and with the possible exception of Lord of the Rings Online, I don't think I've discovered a better community. This wasn't WoW with its prejudice and demeaning discussions. This wasn't a harsh PvP-centric community where name-calling and e-peen sizes were measured. It was a community that helped each other. It wasn't rare that someone would offer to trade me and give me some awesome food item that probably cost them a lot in materials and time to create. In a way, the group-centric nature of it demanded you either be nice and a good player or you usually were on your own.

Other than those two things, everything else in FFXI I disliked. The problem was that, at the time, I didn't know any better. It was my second MMO, after Shadowbane, and it was slightly concealed in, at the time, fanboy zeal for all things Square. Square usually is off doing their own thing, regardless of the market and other games. What I'm afraid of is that FFXIV will basically be XI 2.0 and be a retread of what came before. I'm also completely positive that they won't have learned the difference between a PC and a PS3. The controls in FFXI made absolutely no sense on a PC...until you plugged in a controller. Once you have a controller in your hands, the game makes brilliant sense. Problem is, when people play a PC they want to use a keyboard and a mouse. Not a Xbox 360 controller. It's a PC, not a console.

And I don't think Square has learned their lesson. I say this because they ported Last Remnant to the PC and the button presses in the game were based on the Xbox 360 controller! During Quick Time Events, it actually told you to press X and B...and they weren't talking about the letters on a keyboard. I couldn't believe it. It's 2009 and their ports to PC don't include PC language?! That's a bad error for a small company; I couldn't imagine someone like Square making the same mistake. But they did it, anyway. So, I have this sinking sensation that when XIV comes to the PC, it will also be based around a controller. And that won't sit well with me or some of my gaming brethren.

One quick note about Konami: I wish they'd stop their Metal Gear Solid progression. I'll admit I'm curious about Rising, the game that will feature Raiden. I've known since MGS4 that they'd do something with Raiden as the star again; how could they not? But seriously, let's stop MGS. You had a great saga, you ended it on a good, albeit not great, note and let's focus on other things. Like Snatcher.

Microsoft was the winner, for me, at this year's E3. Sony's conference was filled with videos, almost verbose with them, and not a whole lot of new information. It also helps that Microsoft opened E3, so Sony's motion controller paled in comparison. Sony seems to be taking the Nintendo route with their motion presentation; archery and other concepts that felt like (and looked like) they belong on the Wii. Contrast that with Microsoft's motion camera that had the visionary Molyneux who could sell ice to an Alaskan with his creepy Milo/Millie game concept. It's just a completely different way of approaching the problem of Nintendo. Microsoft came out strong and showed some great applicable programs whereas Sony showed lazy concepts that looked like stripped down games. The announcements Sony had were pretty weak, too. I seriously think they had Ubisoft's Assassin's Creed in their conference simply as filler. There wasn't enough wow factors.

The one wow thing I was looking forward to hearing about was the PSP Go! And here again Sony failed. It's coming out this Fall and it costs $250. I understand the need to try to recoup costs, but when you can get a PSP for around $150-160, why would you pay $90 more for one that has storage but renders your UMDs useless. I expected it to debut for under $200. I think a lot of people did, since my Twitter feed exploded with "$250?!" exclamations (from journalists, even). I guess some people will go crazy for another Final Fantasy MMO...I am not one of them. Once burned, twice shy. Likewise, I could care less about Home or the racing game. I am intrigued about Team Ico's latest game. I was hoping for some information concerning Heavy Rain...there was nothing. I'm starting to be afraid that it's not coming out this year. Maybe they are planning on waiting until the Leipzing conference since it is designed by an European company.

Nintendo's console again focused on the casual non-gamers gamer market. It had a couple good announcements, like the New Super Mario Bros. Wii (stupid, stupid title) that's going to have 4 player co-op/competitive. Little Big Mario it seems like to me, without the level creator...or the graphics. But it'll be fun. I guess Metroid fans will salivate over the new Metroid game coming out next year. I've never been a huge Metroid fan. And Super Mario Galaxy 2 is interesting to me solely because it'll be the first time there's been more than one 3D Mario game on a Nintendo console's lifecycle. Other than that, though, there's the heart monitor dongle thing and Motion Plus (which should have been included in the damned system from the beginning and pisses me off that not only will we have to buy a controller but also a dongle for each controller to use it; money grubbing!) and more Wii sports-type games. Meh.

I'm not really a console fanboy for any particular company. I think the concept of being a fanboy for a mega-company is silly. Last generation, Sony's PS2 was my favorite console even though it was easily bested in terms of horse power by Microsoft and Nintendo's console. In this console generation, though, Microsoft reigns supreme for me. Their console seems perfectly targeted to me by giving me not only the gaming experience but the social and media experience I want. Whether it's Netflix, Xbox Live usability or games like Fable, it's still my favorite console of this generation, which surprises me. At any rate, I'm looking forward to some of the things coming Xbox 360's way over the next year or so.

That said I am super excited I received a Uncharted 2 multiplayer beta key!!!!!

Lots of announcements yesterday from the Microsoft conference. Not as many out of the Ubisoft one, unfortunately. I didn't really watch it/read much about it but it doesn't seem as if they talked about the one Ubisoft game I'm interested in: Beyond Good & Evil 2. Therefore, I think it was kind of a bust. The biggest, shocking announcement for me was Left 4 Dead 2. Considering that Valve is the epitome of "it'll be done when it's done (and when it's done is usually later than you want)," I not only was surprised to hear that they were working on another L4D so soon but that it was coming out this year! Rock Paper Shotgun had the first exclusive (it seems) look at the game since all the MS conference did was announce it (an its exclusivity to the 360 and PC).

I think Valve walks a kind of tricky line with this. People are used to Valve's support of Team Fortress 2, with its myriad of free updates, modes, class updates, etc. They've done an exceptional job of supporting that game, post release, and have done so freely. I think people are a little surprised, then, that L4D isn't getting the same attention it seems. Which is completely understandable. And I was briefly on that page, until reading the RPS article above. Valve has created an entirely new setting (the south, eventually climaxing in New Orleans), new heroes and new infected, five new campaigns, a newly improved A.I. Director that has a bit more control over things and, most importantly, frying pans! Okay, with the last one I meant melee weapons but seriously, how cool is it that one of the weapons is a frying pan?! And a chainsaw! With so many updates, I'm okay with shelling out money. If it was just "here's a couple new campaigns," I wouldn't be happy. But this announcement actually sounds like a new game, as if they are taking everything they learned and all of that data they collected from people playing L4D and are improving on the formula. I hope I'm not proven wrong. As an aside, the guy on the far left in the cast pic I linked above reminds me of the male hero in the Dawn of the Dead remake.

I wish I had caught some of the announcements at the EA conference, but no one I had access to was writing about it. The one big thing is, of course, some information about Star Wars: The Old Republic. I think the majority of my friends are interested in the game but so far it just can't quite excite me. I'm not 100% sure. I do love Bioware. I'm all about adding story to MMOs. I'm not a huge fan of Star Wars but it should create an interesting setting...I guess one of the things I'm nervous about is that this is Bioware's first MMO. Making an MMO isn't the same beast as creating a story-centered single player game. Bioware is untested in this arena and while they've proven that they can handle creating A+ game after A+ game I'm still unsure whether that success will translate to an MMO.

The other big concern I have is the length and content. One of the biggest problems with MMOs is that there's never enough content. And for me, Bioware makes shorter RPGs. The longest I've ever spent in a Bioware RPG was with Jade Empire at around 25 hours, which is a good length...but every other one I've played has been in the teens in terms of length. This isn't necessarily a bad thing for a single player game but is absolutely a killer in a MMO. Even factoring in side quests, how are they going to craft a game that has the content to keep people playing their character for years if they have a hard time creating a single player, story-centric game with a long playtime? I'm also curious about the announcement that everything in the game is voiced. If there's a lot of content, there's going to be a lot of voice acting...just how big is this game going to be, GB wise?!

At any rate, today is both the Nintendo and Sony conference. I'm expecting the official announcement of the PSP GO, and probably some announcement of a new Mario and/or Zelda game.

Lots of cool things announced at E3 today...but this was by far the weirdest and creepiest I have to say.

http://www.gametrailers.com/video/e3-09-lionhead-milo/50015

It's Lionhead's new...simulation? It uses the motion camera Microsoft unveiled today but it creates this world inhabited by a kid named Milo. And you...interact with this kid as you would any normal person. It's a bit creepy, if you ask me.

Busy weekend!

Saw Up Friday night, which was an incredible film. Very sad, though; the first ten minutes alone will ensure that most of the audience will be overcome with tears. After that, it was a touching movie that reflected on loss and living your life, but with a very poignant touch towards the end that brought everything together. The point being to look not at the loss but at the adventure your life experienced prior to it. Very touching. I cried.

Saturday we went to an early matinee of Drag Me to Hell, which was entertaining. As a horror film, I don't think it was a great movie. But as a movie, it was very, very entertaining. Wildly humorous and oftentimes imaginative. But it's no Evil Dead and I don't mean that in a "nothing can live up to his former years!" I think Raimi leans too much on loud noises in Drag Me to Hell instead of creating surprising and scary sequences. Boogeyman was a movie he produced through his Ghost House pictures and I remember walking into that movie with slightly higher than I should have had hopes because of Raimi's involvement. In some ways, Drag Me to Hell felt like Boogeyman; lots of flash cuts, trumpeted by loud booming noises and with the theatre's sound system cranked to ear-drum-bursting levels...most of the times I jumped in either film, it was because of the auditory response to a loud boom. One or two genuine scares did abound in Drag Me to Hell, but most of them were the "of course I'm going to jump, there was a loud noise that threatened to deafen me!" variety.

That said, it was very entertaining the entire way through and I have to give it to Raimi, he managed to surprise me.

( Spoilers on how it ends! )

Saturday night we went to see Wicked. I used to be a huge musical fan but recently I've kind of lost my affinity to them. I wanted to see Wicked but I wasn't exactly very excited to see it. What a wonderful musical, though, filled with lots of terrific songs, some cool special effects and some very funny moments. If you have a chance to see it, I'd recommend going.

Sunday, I went to lunch with my parents and it was a very, very frustrating experience. Things start out fine but the conversation ultimately turns to Fox News and just how rotten the world is. It's really draining for me because I'll find myself saving up conversational moments throughout the week and mentally go over them before lunch. As long as the conversation keeps up, we're good. But the moment there's a lapse in conversation, my dad dives into the latest and greatest that Glen Beck and Fox News has to give. It's exhausting because I'll try to keep the conversation going as long as possible but there comes a time when it invariably stops. This isn't the way lunch with the parents should be. And it makes it really difficult for me to want to see them each week when I know that the conversation is a ticking time bomb.