Wasting the rest of your free time.

Someday, probably soon, I'll have to compile all of the browser games I really like and post them here...and ruin your production and LIFE.

Until then, you should check out Entanglement, by Gopherwood Studios, which will keep you busy for either 10 minutes or an hour...before you realize that your boss is standing behind you, or that the music has completely entranced you into thinking you're a monk.

Check out Entanglement here.

FOREVER.

I still don't believe that Gearbox is working on this, and I still don't believe that it's coming out. Everyone has jokes, everyone has cuts and digs. The truth is, I don't think people really give a shit anymore- I think its all morbid curiosity.

But, according to Gameinformer, Randy Pitchford sez:

"...I cannot imagine any better video game news source team than Game Informer to reveal the moment of truth for the most inconceivable, incorrigible and inspiring turn around story in the history of the video game industry – the coming of Duke Nukem Forever on May 3, 2011."

May 3rd. 

welcome back, buddy.

Honestly, I hope that its good, but realistically I don't think that Gearbox has any stake in it, if the game is bad. If Duke Nuke'em Forever fails, if its terrible (which, theres a high level of FAILURE already associated with the IP), then Gearbox still stays golden. At this point, I don't know if I'd care if the rest of the game we haven't seen yet is just filled in Laura Croft: Angel of Darkness levels...I hope we can just get passed it and on to better Duke Nuke'em games.

Nuh-uh

And then, my face.

When he did the hodouken, I cried a little. If this is the type of stuff we can expect from people hacking the Kinect, Microsoft would be wise to "JUMP IN". You're welcome for that Microsoft.

Now this is happening

Your joke? Tell it to my face.

Bet you weren't expecting to pay TWO HUNDRED-FIFTY of your american dollars to play some games in futuristic, super A-fucking-mazing 3D. But, there...there you have it. Yep.../hands in pockets.

I know that portable gaming is a gigantic deal these days, but...I...dunno. Something about this seems kinda boring...or problematic, I'll figure it out later. (future chris: I didn't. Deal with it) When you really look at what the device is capable of and what that means, which is cool, something doesn't add up about how that happens. For instance, say that I live in a city that has mass transit- say I live in fabulous Manhattan, NY.

Say. It.

So I'm riding the bus downtown to have a $14 coffee and see a $25 movie, and since the bus ride will be longer than 5 minutes and I have the attention span of two coked up squirells in a Planters peanut factory, wait, where was I going with this? Oh right, the nintendo 3ds has to maintain a steady angle to your line-of-sight to be used correctly. That means that if you're bumped or nudged or riding on a downtown bus to get a $15 dollar coffee and see a $400.00 movie, it kind of defeats the purpose.

Granted I know that most people will be using their 3DS in their homes most of the time...where they have other, more powerful gaming systems awaiting them. BUT! It plays games in 3deeeeeeeeeeeez!!!! :D lolomgffs! Shame it won't play them "in 3d" for very long. Let me clarify- it won't play 3DS games long enough to justify $250. According to geek.com:

Nintendo has now updated its Japanese 3DS website to include a hardware page describing the different components of the system. Here’s the important bits about the battery:

• 3DS charging time: 3 hours 30 minutes

• Battery life playing 3DS games: 3-5 hours

• Battery life playing DS games: 5-8 hours

Nintendo also state that those times are only approximate and may be shorter “depending on operating conditions”. The 8 hours upper limit stated for DS games requires the brightness of the displays be turned right down.

Just to sum up that I think the Nintendo 3DS is, from what I've read and seen online, (since you have to physically hold it to witness what it does), awesome, but $250 is still pretty steep and I really hope that people who buy a 3DS are patient because like any new tech- its going to have its issues.

Hoping to get my hand in one of those again. The Power Glove, not dreamy Jack Vinson...

Awkward.

I could be wrong, I guess- with each new version of gaming that has been introduced, there seems to be some sort of trade-off. What do you guys think? What, if any, complaints do you think about the 3DS will come about? Do you think it'll be perfect?

Zoolander 2

Zoolander one can Dere-lick my balls.

Thanks, Huffington Post! This is the best news I've heard all week; hopefully he got all of the Fockers BS out of his system and get to real work...to mans work.

Can't catch a break. /sadface

Just before the new year, a group of hackers dubbed 'fail0verflow', (feel free to find out more about them from their twitter, as their site is "down".), finally cracked the PS3 shell during the 27th Chaos Communication Conference.

How big of a deal is that, exactly? Calling it a "fiasco" would be a severe business understatement; "Financial shitstorm" would be closer to the truth. Since we're speaking on behalf of the truth, and incase you didn't watch the video above, I'll quote George 'Geohot' Hotz, as he points out a very undisputed truth:

"They shouldn't have called it an exploit- It's not an exploit. It's an epic fail by Sony...Yeah, they gave us their private key, basically. If you watch the talk they leaked their private key mathematically. So we don't have to exploit anything, we just sign things."

Bet there a lot of unwarm and unfuzzies at the Sony labs. :(

To give a simple explanation: cracking the PS3's firmware in this manner has allowed pirating games to be possible. This was, from the outset of the PS3's release, practically impossible as Sony made an extremely secure console where the 360 and Wii had already failed. I should point out: the intention of fail0verflow was not to begin pirating games, they do not endorse that behavior, they were simply replacing something that was taken from them: an option.


What option could be so serious that hackers would spend lifeforce to retain it? The option to flash the HDD with "Another OS". For a lot of people who actually cared about this option, that meant Linux...which means a lot, to a lot of people.

But Sony had no foresight and chose to remove that option without a lot of reason or warning. Pissing off, like, a million nerds. Oops!

The PS3 is, and has always been, an underdog, whether anyone wants to admit it or not- Sony has lost a lot of money and interest. It would seem one of the last hopes they had was their honest user base, (honest by virtue of legitimately purchased games), and now that's shot because the information on how-to jailbreak a PS3 has been distributed for the sole purpose of being able to boot Linux; but I'm sure thats not going to happen, sadly.

Well, it doesn't really stop there.

According to CVG jail-breaking the PS3 has also allowed people to manipulate the trophy system. Again, what does this mean? It means that community based competition (I.E. keeping track of how much of a game I've completed versus my friends), is completely shot. The trophy system was already so badly mishandled to begin with, and was actually tacked on after the popularity of it was proven on the Xbox360, that a large social portion of what-gaming-is, is sullied for Sony.

Thats a long way to go, just to say Sony's in trouble on multiple fronts. SCEE has made a truly fantastic system, but its full capabilities have barely been utilized as of yet, and, in my opinion, is seriously coming in contact with competition from smartphone games.

Hello there.

Is it vindictive that a group of hackers took advantage of Sony with their own information, because they felt slighted? Or is it consumer base taking control?

Minecraft mini-update.

The popularity of Minecraft doesn't seem to grow the same way that the creativity of the players does, when a new update is released. Not that Minecraft is hard-up for players, but I really think its a game that a lot of people who like open-world, sand-box type games should own. In the most recent of updates, several goodies were released:

New features:
* Note blocks (right click to tune, trigger to play)
* 15 wool dyes
* A new water dwelling mob
* New tree types
* Reeds magically turned into sugar canes. They still make paper.
* A bunch of new crafting recipes
* One secret useful block
* One secret pretty block
* Cake


Since the game primarily uses blocks, "One secret useful block" and "One secret pretty block" may as well have been written in flaming letters with fireworks shooting across the screen the average Minecraft player- people were ready for something else. It didnt take long before the blocks were figured out, but it seems the big winner is the note block.

You could say it was a...huge success. (deal with it.)

Since I found that video last night, there have been many more to pop up with all sorts of variants: Mario Bros. theme, Tetris, self-made beats, even a Duke Nuke'em tune. I have to say, again, I'm impressed gang. 


The creativity doesn't stop there either- take a look at the story over at Kotaku. Awesome!


Though, one of my personal favorites is this:

The first time I watched this video, I was like: 
"Hmm, weird, that guys got his field of vision on way too high."
"Funny, it says 'Free Cake'"
"Wow, it really gives you a cake!"
"Well, thats an odd...WATISTHISIDONTEVEN"


The following explanation of how it works, (still don't fully understand how it works), left me just as surprised. 


I contend that Minecraft is one of the more creative games on the market today, and possibly in a very long time.

Phoenix Jones pt.2

Link to the first story here.

(!!!!!!!!!!)

I know that I'm reading WAY into all of this, and I know that if Phoenix Jones continues in this fashion- it'll likely not end well for him...but...

But...

BUT...

Jones busted up some guys fighting and and and he got his nose broke and and and a guy pulled a gun on him and and and Phoenix Jones...he...called the police?

Whatever. PJ's just playing it cool till he gets his Phoenix-Flashbombs™ or a Phoenix-Freezegun™ or Jones-a-Rangs™. (whatever. let's see you come up with a name on the spot.) Whats a broken nose? Bleh. Even Batman had to start somewhere.

Despite the setback, he's right back out; hittin' the fucking street! Straight outta the comicbook into your law breaking face, scumbag. Goddamnit, I love everything about this guy. I love that the newsreporters are even talking about "Super Heroes problems", you have to know that they love it too- everyone, fucking everyone loves comic books.

I have to believe theres some editor in chief walking around the office with a cigar in his mouth, chip on his shoulder, belittling women and slamming his fist onto his desk with yesterdays copy: "JJOOOONNEEESSSS!!"

Please be real, please be real, please be real, please be real...

Which brings me to my next topic...

Holy cavalcade of comicbook movies, Batman!

First up, something that I'm waiting desperately to see:

He's...he's beautiful.

Thank you, Marvel. Thank you for giving me us this. I just (*whimper*) I just wanna (*sob*) believe that, oh god- hold it together...keep it together you moron...I mean, I saw the Thor trailer and I got scared...Just...please, please, please don't let me us down.

Everything about this picture is a sham.

On the other hand, and this is gonna get awkward, you have...Thor. Dude, I just don't get it. Don't get me wrong, I loved the Avengers- I thought they took it to the X-Men, (*cough*fuckingfanboynerd*cough*), and when Iron Man came out in theaters- I said a tear-filled-pillow-whispering-prayer that Thor and the Captain would be on the way. Hell, I'd love to see what modern twist there could be for Vision and Scarlett Witch- you just know there'd be some awesome tech/mystic effects that Hollywood would love to get their greasy hands on.

To get back on track- Thor looks terrible. I just don't understand how you can have Natalie Portman, Sir Anthony Hopkins, Chris Hemsworth (who fucking killed it, in Star Trek), Stellan Skarsgard and Idris Elba...and make this look so...I can't really put my finger on it- they just look like everyone is going for DRAMATIC POSE-HEROIC DIALOG-POSE-ACTION. Blegh.

Last thing: I know that a lot of people have been upset about Idris playing a black Norse deity, and really I think it's kind of childish to get upset, but within the cannon of the comic story- it's...kind of tough to call. I don't know exactly who he's playing other than a "norse god", but I think I may have opted to give him another role. Meh, whatever, the shame is that he's in a terrible looking movie.

Finally, Spiderman.

Don't know why you're look down, YOU don't have to kiss Kirsten Dunst.

I have to say that Andrew Garfield, at first, did not have my attention as Peter Parker. As a matter of fact, I did, and have all but written off Spiderman movies after the last disaster, and more certainly so soon after they chose to do a reboot of the franchise. But I unknowingly, (meaning I have a short attention span), saw him in The Social Network and suddenly got the connection.

For me Peter Parker is supposed to be a skinny, dorky looking guy. Even though Tobey Maguire was convincing as Peter Parker, I only really believed it when he had the suit on because he seemed like an athletic fit. Spiderman is a strong guy, he's cut, just because he can lift a car- doesn't mean he has to look like a meat-head.

I guess I'm looking forward to what comes from this- I guess if its a reboot, they can do whatever they want; but the public doesn't want to see Doc Oc again- they wanna see something new...you have the entire Marvel Universe at your hands...X-Men was successful and so was Iron Man. I would totally believe that implanting any one of those characters in this movie, if only for a second, will not only help it stand out on its own but begin to ready an audience of people who aren't familiar with comic book cross-overs, to become ready.


Plus it would be badass. (or just have Phoenix Jones as Luke Cage...fucking yeah.)

Considering the alternative.

I'm wondering- what would life be like as a video blogger? People seem to have fun doing it, and there seems to be a great sense of community there as well- I often think about turning on the webcam and spouting out my randomness to the interwebz.

I have my assortment of people who I like checking in with, some about video games and others about random entertainment. Everyone seems pretty laid back and often times, very straight forward about their feelings about the subject their handling. Its kind of nice to see and hear that people can give their opinion in a non-objective way, without a ton of advertising piled on.

Ofcourse there are those who do not:

I guess, mainly, I'm wondering (actually debating to myself) if the idea of video blogging is more worthwhile/fun than good-old text blogging? Seems like I could do it rather easily, I would definitely have to figure out how quickly I could put together a bunch of info and have it ready to say infront of a camera and then edit it all down to 5-6 minutes.

Phoenix Jones

Watch the video first.

While I have to think that this guy and the "Rain City Superhero Movement", affiliated to the RLSH, either have NO idea what they've gotten themselves into, or they're the worlds biggest badasses. Either way, the videos' center-piece, Phoenix Jones, has a fucking suit and a utility belt- would you seriously step to this guy after finding out he's patrolling the street? With other masked "heroes"?

No. No you wouldn't, because you know he's crazy- but the cops are on his side too.

Original suit Phoenix. That's right: he's got multiple suits.

This isn't the normal thing that I'll be talking about here so I figure I'll make it short...but man, this could be awesome. The sense of "what are these idiots doing?" and "I wish I could be that brave" mix together in a way that seems oddly familiar. Something...like this whole situation has chronicled before...

Seriously, read it. Trust me.

I just can't get over it. Imagine the day he actually busts someone. Imagine the day you're watching the news and this Phoenix dude is holding up a crook by their collar! I cannot wait to hear how this plays out in the coming days, months, years. H'oh boy, time to switch to decaf.

Dude he gets changed in a fucking COMICBOOK SHOP. How fucking insane/awesome is that?!?

Give'em hell, Phoenix.

At this point, its a game about amassing players and making them make the game.

Minecraft.

Holycrap. A million people have ponied up the clams to be a part of a game thats about...well, you build...stuff. I have to hand it to Markus "Notch" Persson, he definitely got my money after all. This post is a day late of the million subscriber mark, but it IS on the heels of a very nice update- listed here, at Notchs' personal blog, if you care to read it.


All-in-all the game allows for people to create anything from homes to castles to entire villages - provided that they mine (see what I did there?) for the materials. Searching caves and forests, the woods and beaches, deserts and snow covered areas...even hell itself for materials to build.


You: Build what? For what? Whats the story?
Me: Theres no story, the story is for me to build a castle, because I want to believe that theres some purpose to it.
You: So there are other people who can play with you?
Me: Well, no, not in my game- people can't join me. 
You:  That makes no sense, it sounds boring.
Me: It...It's not boring, I mean it can be...but you have to keep making things to build up areas.
You: Shouldn't you be doing something more productive?
Me: NO I DONT WAHNAH.


Real mature, I know. The truth is that people have done some very creative things within the virtual space of this game: recreated computers, Space ships, modeled the world, recreated entire cities and even made fictional cities. I could actually go on and on about this game and the implications of what this sort of "sandbox" game means to video games in general, but its funnier to make fun of it :D


Minecraft is worth your time: http://minecraft.net/

"...and quite frankly, the result is just phenomenal."

I am so dead-fucking-serious right now.

Before I get to putting up my 2cents- this product was voted People's Voice by cnet as the Best of CES 2011 Winner.

So, yeah. Whats up?

The Razer "Switchblade", (brainchild of CEO Min-Liang Tan) is a portable handheld device that allows for full-fledged gaming...kind of like a laptop. Which is weird, because Min-Liang starts out the video by stating:

"PC gaming has always been impossible, in a portable form-factor."

**COUGH COUGH**

The concept is actually amazing, but I'm having a hard time wrapping my head around the idea that they're shilling out a beefed-up netbook, with an interface that, from what the video shows, doesn't seem like theres much room for customization. Also, the seriousness of Min-Liang is borderline hilarious.

Again, it looks awesome and really I'm not very much into peripherals, so I could way off base- but honestly I think the tech and the setup is a lot like a laptop...maybe the difference will come in at the price level.

Personally I love the idea that they show off World of Warcraft and Quake Live as examples of people who'll use their device, seems like a safe move, but I don't think any WoW player is going to be "jumping-in" for a quick 10-30 minute session. Feel free to give it a look: http://www2.razerzone.com/switchblade

This is why we can't have nice things.

You know what? I'll likely never be great at first person shooters. My want to be really good, and my actual ability will likely never match. I have friends who play Halo or Call of Duty and are leagues above my skill level of gaming- but they get online and get they're asses handed to them.

Well all thats about to change...

...for the worse.

Again, let me re-iterate, as far as First Person Shooter skill goes, I'm average. By average I mean that I'm far below the margin of "good", and by THAT I mean: my chances of doing well in any match actually go down the longer I hold the controller in my hand. This controller, while surprisingly amazing in design, is truly built for a top percentile of gamers...lets be honest. This thing isn't a Game Genie or the equivalent of the Konami Code...The Avenger is for people who already KNOW when they boot up their game of choice, that people will logout based on their actions; Rage Quitters.


I mean look at that thing:

$60 of fooling yourself.

You have no chance against this thing. My career of playing online games of the shooter variety. are. done.

Even the description of the add-on assaults my soul:

"...The adapter transforms the XBOX 360 controller to enhance the gamer’s manual dexterity and situational awareness by improving accuracy and reaction-time. This sophisticated accessory is specially engineered for those who want to push their gaming abilities to new heights. (Chris: Or expand their delusions, and end up crying in a ball later that night.) 

... The Avenger is the ultimate secret weapon in first-person shooters, sports games, action adventure, fighting, and racing games."

(source = www.avengercontroller.com)

In all seriousness, The Avenger looks awesome. I want to buy a set-up kinda badly, plus it has a beergut rest...I mean how forward thinking is that?

The Age of Dragons is looooooooong

The original Dragon Age was THICK with story, it was an amazing amount of angles to play and people to see/kill/pursue and even persuade...to do almost anything you wanted them to. Dragon Age added another layer to the sweet, sweet cake that Oblivion began; a game that reaches back to tabletop D&D days. Thankfully, for guys like me, it was also filled with some killer action sections and character interaction on the battlefield.

Take a look at the "Making of..." video below; theres some pretty cool things to make note of- but I'm not sure if I'll hang my hat on any of what they say, yet. So whatcha think? Theres certainly a lot of rabble around the interwebz about some very finely stated ideas produced from this video. Alot of people are seriously concerned with the gameplay, (not really mentioned in this video, or shown since the game was initially previewed), and think that BioWare is basically making the same game twice. That remains to be seen, since, ya know, the game hasn't been released yet.

I really like the art direction of Matthew Goldman; the aesthetics were nearly the first thing that jumped out at me. The first Dragon Age was tough to really give a credible critique of what was on the screen because of the different limitations of the three systems. Obviously this time around things look crisp, very stylistic- I really like it. As a side-note: I see this shift of high-end games going with an "artistic rendering" with emphasis on detail rather than straight-up realistic EVERYTHING, (rawr). I like the artsy-route, it shows that a) we all know that this level of graphics is easily attainable and b) it gives more of an artistic feel to what we're playing- kind of like a comic book with super levels of detail.

I think this is going to be a great year for the genre- I can't wait to see what Bethesda has cooking for us with the new Elder Scrolls game and theres some other games that seem promising. Theres some MMO's that look cool and of course World of Warcraft, but you can't really include them because...well, by the time they're of notice, you're noticing them because WoW gobbled them up in sales.

More like, "WtF"

Sorry DC Universe Online and Star Wars Old Republic :(

Craziness Abound...

Flexin' it brah.

Today marks a day that I actually said aloud: "I do not want to play a console game, I'd rather play something on my iPhone." Oh wow, that was even kind of tough to write. Imagine a gamer who currently owns a PS3, an Xbox360, a PC, and has previously owned nearly every iteration of video game console before those generations (back to a ColecoVision), saying: "Nah, I'm kind of bored with Mass Effect2/Arkham Asylum/World of Warcraft/Red Dead Redemption, I wanna play Fruit Ninja/Infinity Blade/Plants Vs Zombies." As I write this out, I'm being haunted by Words with Friends, and the temptation of picking up "Queens Crown" AND/OR "Inotia 3: Children of Carnia." (edit: too late)

I'm notorious amongst my circle for loving/playing video games, but for me this is kind of an oddity. Granted that smartphone games are becoming more popular, and even widely accepted as challenging, but stealing *my* interest away from my regularly scheduled time-sinks? Something just seems...its almost like I shouldn't be doing it; almost like I'm wasting the value of my other games. Truthfully though, what I really like about these types of games versus "full sized games", aside from the lack price, is that they get right to the heart of why video games are fun: quick objectives and their easy to jump into, and out of (kind of like your mom).

So whats the point of complaining about a medium of gaming that I'm enjoying? I'm not sure yet. Its just weird having a moment at work/classes where I'm thinking: "Man, I can't wait to get back to Aralon and see if I can grind out the last couple of levels.", in the vein of my normal thinking, which is: "Man, I can't wait to get back to the house and knock out ______ for that ending."

I don't think I could finish this post without mentioning the N-Gage. Seriously- How robbed do the guys at Nokia feel? They took a HUGE leap of faith and wanted to create a commercially viable portal gaming device that tied in with your life, and failed. They failed HARD.

Sup.

What about you? What games do you play? Do you ever think about the social difference in playing a game on your phone, versus playing it on a Console/PC? (I'll allow Facebook games as, for the most part, they have to be maintained through your PC).