There are So Many Fucking Roman Numerals In This Post

So I had a nice little update schedule going for a while there, huh? Then it kind of died. The reason? Fucking Final Fantasy XIII of course. However, given that these games are always REALLY long, I thought it prudent to wait past the OMG OMG FINAL FANTASY phase until I had settled into the general flow of the game. After over 30 hours of gameplay (which would have been more if I wasn't xbox-less for a week) I am still getting tutorials on new stuff to do, so I just thought "fuck it, I get it, let's do this thing".

First, allow me to provide you with a little background: This game was a deal make/breaker for me with Square Enix and the Final Fantasy series because, let's face it, they have spent the last 8 years with their heads so firmly up their asses that, in defiance of all biological and physical laws, they emerged through their own mouths, resuming their human form, but now stained in a sticky coating of bile and shit. 2002 was a good year. Remember Final Fantasy X (or as my friends and I call it, "baby's first final fantasy") Yeah, it was easy, and yeah the plot was weird even by FF standards, and yeah the voice acting for every character except Auron and Lulu bordered on Saturday morning carton levels of embarrassing, but you know what? If you played it, I bet you enjoyed the hell out of it. After that came the dark years. We got FFXI, which was an MMO, so I never entertained the notion of entering that fucking ponzi scheme for a second. There was "Final Fantasy X-2" (not XII, mind you, but Ten - two) which was essentially a dress up game with FFX's least interesting characters with a whole bunch of jackoffs no one cared about. Then there was FINALLY FFXII and I thought to myself "not an MMO: check. New world and characters: check. Let's get some". My friend Mike pointed out to me that "if you didn't look at it as an FF game, then it was fun", which is a lot like saying "try to pretend this spinach is ice-cream and then it'll be just like a dessert". I could rattle off the list of things that made FFXII such an embarrassment that I lackadaisically played for about 5 hours before turning off my PS2 in disgust, but that's an entirely separate post, so I'll just wrap up and move on.

Final Fantasy XIII, from the get go, set off every happy nerve in my body that first fired when I was introduced to the series at the tender age of 12. The plot and world(s) really feel like a grab bag of elements from VII thru X, but you know what? THOSE GAMES KICKED ASS. Across those 4 titles I invested roughly 450 hours of my time (this probably also explains why I had no friends in middle school, but I digress). My point is, yeah it ain't original, but for chrissake, this series has had 13 main franchise titles alone. Making each installment last for, on average, 70 hours or so, you're bound to run into a little overlap from title to title.

So far, however, I've just been comparing. How is FFXIII as a game? The combat has once again been tweaked from the golden standard set by VII through IX, but rather than turning into the abortion that was the combat mechanic in XII (pseudo-real time but not really, and you never really knew what the fuck was going on anyway because of all the lines on the fucking screen branching from your character to every fucking object on the goddamn map) they decided to streamline the combat, keep it pseudo-real time, but crank that shit up to 11. As a result you only control one character for any given battle, assigning other characters roles that you level up in a very FFX manner (ie, big ol' grid with skills and arbitrary points required to attain said skills) and you swap between different combinations of combat roles called paradigms. However, the frantic speed means that assigning out even one character's strategy move by move is a good way to get everyone killed. To that end, the game has included an "auto-battle" command, which will stock your character with the most useful set of commands for the targeted enemy (provided you've scanned them or fought them enough, otherwise the commands are a random, exploratory hodgepodge until auto-battle hones down what works). As Greg Dean put it, this can make the game feel overly simple for a large portion of the first 2 discs. And he's right. Actually executing your moves is little more than repeatedly mashing A.

But unlike other installments, winning battles is no longer determined by stringing together the best sequence of moves, but rather utilizing the best combinations of character roles at the right time. For example, I like to start out a fight with a commando (striker type) and two ravagers (black mage/support types) so I can immediately start wailing on whatever I encounter and maybe drop their ranks by one before they even get close. Were I to do that all the time for every battle though, I would die in about 15 seconds because there is no one to heal any of my party members, so you have to have other paradigms set up involving medics, defenders, saboteurs, and white mages. And let me tell you, during some fights you find yourself swapping paradigms with such frantic intensity that you thank god above that you are only responsible for one actor in this cavalcade of chaos (a feature I was worried about prior to the game's release). So while the actual act of hitting stuff is just pressing A, I pose you this question: isn't that what all the Final Fantasy games have been like? Think about it. Most normal encounters in any FF are really easy and you basically win by selecting attack until it dies. Then you get to the bosses and die about 8 hojillion times trying to figure the fuckers out. So yeah, plenty of people piss and moan about how the combat is "too easy" and A is the magic "I Win" button, and to them I say: fuck off. If you're looking for a genuinely challenging RPG, play a REAL fucking RPG. Final Fantasy has never been about meticulous character control, and anyone who says otherwise is a fucking idiot. XII made the game about meticulous character control and as I said, that game was so un-fun that it killed my love of the series for 3 years.

So what the hell do you play FF games for? For a ridiculous 70 hour story of course! Did I play X because I really enjoyed scrounging for mcguffins to level my characters' abilities up, or thought the process of swapping every fucking party member in to every battle just so they could all get AP was super fun? Fuck no, I played it in spite of that shit. I'll be the first to cop that the FF games are often tangled up messes when it comes to the plotting, and 10 years after my introduction to the series, I do not take it quite as seriously as I did back in the day and am more willing to acknowledge any absurdity or outright stupidity. That being said though, my inner 12 year old squeals with delight at every cheesy ass cut-scene featuring girly-looking men and dark, feisty women. The first time I got an Eidolon I felt joy like only a child could have, even as I watched the Shiva twins scissor each other to form a bitchin' motorcycle, which I then used to run over and ramp off of enemies before shattering them into ice. None of that was an exaggeration. And that scissoring cut scene happens EVERY time you summon Shiva. I have yet to find it even a little less awesomely hilarious than I did the first time. And it's the little touches like this which prove that someone at Square Enix still knows what a Final Fantasy game should play like.

That said, I will point out one gaping flaw that was allllllmost a deal breaker for me. The first 20 hours of the game give you no control over who is in your party, are completely linear with literally no option to explore. Just oppressive corridor after oppressive corridor. However, as the plot of the game makes itself clear, I chose to view this from a literary perspective in that while you are on cocoon (the first of the game's two worlds) you have no choice in what to do or where to go because of the military state nature of the entire society and the fact that it is revealed that you have been being guided to a special culmination moment by an otherworldly being. The game is linear because the plot ALLOWS no character freedom. When you leave cocoon and travel to pulse, however, the world opens up in such a staggering way that you almost don't even know what to do with all this freedom, which is again, expressed through the aimless wandering of the characters wondering what the next step is. I might be choosing to view these issues with TOO much literary credit being given to the folks at SE, but fuck it, it's my game and I'll enjoy it how I want to.

The point is, they're finally back on track in making FF games. Is this going to be the VII killer that ushers in the next generation? Keep fucking dreaming on that point. But they finally made a game that I have played for over 30 hours and still want to keep going, and that makes it a success in my book. Maybe they can keep that going with XIV... oh wait, that's gonna be a fucking MMO. Fucking Square Enix.

We Are Humongous Suckers

Those of you who know me know that I am someone who, on occasion, can appreciate some absolutely, completely, utterly shitty music simply because it is that special combination of hilarious and catchy. 3OH!3, Lady Gaga, "Right Round" by Flo Rida, these are all examples of such a phenomenon. And of course I would be remiss if I failed to mention Ke$ha.

Ke$ha is, in fact, probably the worst offender on the list. I mean, this girl is just awful. "Zip your lips like a padlock"? Fucking excuse me? And what precisely does it mean to wake up in the morning feeling like P Diddy? Is this a phrase the kids are using now? Am I approaching cultural obsolescence? And of course, let us not forget the moment that she requests that the listener "put a little love in her glove box". Awful. This does not preclude her, however, from dominating my most played tracks on iTunes for the last month.

Anyway, I've had this theory for a while now that maybe Ke$ha is some kind of stardom super genius and is deliberately trying to see how much money she can make with as little effort or talent as possible, but simply by pushing every "trashy party" button in your brain at once. Last night's appearance on American Idol has finally given me the evidence I need. This girl MUST be fucking with us.

OK, so anyone who knows the real lyrics knows precisely how neutered that version was (which really doesn't help with making her sound less juvenile). Still though: OH MY GOD DID YOU FUCKING SEE THAT? WHAT THE HELL WAS THAT? First off, the girl never actually fucking dances for a second of the video. Second, what in god's name was going on with those TV men? And the headress... the fucking HEADRESS! This girl must be playing the greatest practical joke in the history of the music industry, and we are all the suckers that just fell for it. At least that's what I have to tell myself.

An Immediate Follow-up

As I was typing out my rant about Avatar, some of my co-workers started discussing it. I took a break to explain to them why it is the cinematic equivalent of a root canal, after which one of my co-workers turned to me and said "are there any movies you DO like?" This is, of course, a very silly question, but it is one that I feel deserves addressing. Why do I forgive some movies being shitty while others are given a much more hard line stance? So here is a run-down of what makes a movie in a genre GOOD.

Action Movies

The Good: The Die Hard Series (All 4), The Matrix, Desperado (or just about anything by Robert Rodriguez for that matter), Aliens, Terminator 2, Taken

The Bad: The Matrix Reloaded/Revolutions, Alien 3/Resurrection, Terminator 3 etc.

The Difference: I watch action movies for mindless bullshit. Now this may make me sound like a hypocrite in the post below, but fuck you, keep reading. I watch them for self-aware mindless bullshit. What makes the Die Hard movies great is their awareness that they are simply vehicles for pure testosterone. You don't name a sequel Die Hard 2: Die Harder without absolute certainty that what you are producing should be taken at face value and not a degree beneath. There is no depth, but they acknowledge that, thus removing my expectation of depth and making it OK. Where these movies falter is when the first film succeeds and the makers mistake that success for appreciation of nonexistent depth and make more. Almost every action movie I hate is a sequel where they try to take a simple and fun idea and try to puff it up to contain both ball shattering action and depth (nowhere is this clearer than The Matrix sequels). The result is generally a mish-mash of pseudo-philosophical bullshit peppered with explosions, making the movies neither all fun, nor all thought provoking, and leaving the viewer annoyed and confused as to what the hell the filmmaker is looking to get out of them.

Comedies

The Good: Anything by Judd Apatow with the exception of Knocked Up, Anchorman, Zoolander, Dr Strangelove, most Kevin Smith movies, Super Troopers.

The Bad: Knocked Up, The (Adjective) Movie movies, Napoleon Dynamite, The Girl Next Door, Talladega Nights, Any romantic comedy except Down With Love.

The Difference: Honestly, the way I view comedies is very similar to how I view action movies in that I am looking for an opportunity to not have to think too hard and just be amused. What makes or breaks it for me is whether or not the jokes have staying power. Napoleon Dynamite had about 3 funny lines, all of which were immediately driven into the ground in weeks and lingered like the last guy at a party who won't take the fucking hint for YEARS. The (Adjective) Movie formula seems to have finally petered out, but they are another example. Congratulations, you mocked every media darling of the current year in your movie, but forgot to make it about anything. Family Guy does this all the time, sure, but given that it is a half-hour weekly show that I can see for free, my standards are lower. If I'm going to pay to laugh, I want them to be LASTING laughs. Every movie on my good list is something that has held up to sometimes dozens of viewings (Anchorman, Super Troopers, Clerks) and while they lose some of the initial riotous hilarity of the first viewing, they always make me chuckle. What's not OK is taking the same formula, same actors, and repeatedly changing the backdrop. This is why Will Ferrell movies after Anchorman fell apart so quickly and why romantic comedies will always suck. Hell Down With Love only made the list because it is an indictment of everything that is wrong with the genre.

Science Fiction

The Good: Blade Runner, A Scanner Darkly, Minority Report, 2001: A Space Odyssey, Alien, Star Trek: First Contact, Anything by Andrey Tarkovsky

The Bad: Avatar, Avatar, Avatar, Fucking Avatar, Equilibrium, The Battlefield: Earth (of course), and also Avatar.

The Difference: Notice anything about my "good" list? That's right, all but one (Alien) are based on books, and are about as faithful renditions as one can get to the source material. And actually, with the exception of 2001 and Tarkovsky movies, they're all Phillip K. Dick books. My sci-fi absolutely positively MUST make me think. That's why I count things like Terminator and AlienS as action movies. The point is, the characters must be believable, have clear motivations, and it must be clear how we got from the present to the circumstances of the film. Even if there are flying cars or deus ex machinae that magically predict a future that doesn't technically happen, I will forgive it as long as what is being examined is a relevant and relatively constant facet of human nature. It also has to be something I haven't seen the exact plot of elsewhere (which come on, should not be difficult since your setting is literally any fucking thing you can think of). If the characters are too future-y, I can't relate to their problems, stop caring, and it goes in the Avatar file. The exception to my stringent requirements is First Contact, because fuck you that movie is too good, and in spite of standard Star Trek camp, comes way closer to meeting all of my criteria than fucking Shmavafuck (I can't even type it's stupid, shitty, now apparently meaningless name).

Horror

The Good: Nightmare on Elm St 1 and 3, The Exorcist, Dawn of the Dead (both versions), Shaun of the Dead, 28 Days/Weeks Later

The Bad: Every other horror movie in existence

The Difference: The above movies have a few special features: I find the concept behind the Nightmare on Elm St. movies fucking terrifying, as I am not prone to having or remembering dreams, and when I do, they always freak me the fuck out, so they play to my personal fears. I can laugh at the camp and stuff, but when it's time for shuteye, I really hate myself for ever watching those movies, which is the sign of successful application of horror. Exorcist gets points because the first time I saw it it scared me shitless and I have never been able to extricate myself from that association with me as a frightened kid. Again, effective. The Dead and 28 (blanks) later movies are judged on different criteria. George Romero started the trend of, well zombies, but also the trend of using zombies as social or political commentary. So while there are many zombie movies in existence that I didn't mention (some by Romero himself) these are the ones that utilize the awesome power of the undead to convey the better points one can make with such a medium. Every other movie relies on cheap shocks, overuse of gore, or "tributes" to B-movies that fall flat on their asses (Rob Zombie, I am looking squarely, decidedly, and eternally at you). Generally though, fuck horror.

There is a whole swath of movies I have failed to mention here, and that is because they are less distinctly categorizable, and therefore tougher to make broad generalizations about what makes them great or terrible (A prime example of a missing film is my all time favorite, American Psycho). But I feel that this is a respectable summation.

So in conclusion, yes, there are PLENTY of movies I like.

A Less Than Timely Rant

I am way behind the times in committing these thoughts to words, but the fact that I am stuck in this office for about 3 more hours with nothing to do gives me some time to get some good old fashioned vitriol going.

You know what movie is a stupid piece of shit? Avatar. Seriously. Fuck that movie and fuck James Cameron. I had been doing a pretty good job not thinking about this abortion of a film for the last month, but with the Academy Awards coming up this Sunday, it's been slowly coming back into my life like a herpes breakout. Although I don't know if herpes would be less obnoxious than listening to people justify why this movie is worthy of anything other than a straight to DVD release.

So Avatar is the most expensive movie ever, using state-of-the-art brand new equipment, and if you're the type who thinks movies aren't ALREADY way too fucking expensive, you can offer to throw even more of your hard earned dollars at James Cameron's feet to see it in 3D (read: see it with a huge fucking headache). Though this doesn't need to be reiterated at this point. If you hadn't already heard all this bullshit before then can I move into the cave you inhabit with you? It must be peaceful there. My point is that any time you ask someone to justify their opinion of this movie, they will immediately start talking about the special effects and/or 3D. One thing that is conspicuously absent from most people's positive assessment is any attempt to address the plot. If you push most Avatar fans on the issue, their response will be "yeah, the plot wasn't too original, but the effects/world/"immersive" 3D are so impressive that it makes up for it." Are... are you fucking kidding me? That's like saying you have the most unique house on the block that is built from material that can withstand a nuclear strike, but melts when exposed to rain.

First, to address the plot: Have you seen "Dances With Wolves" or "The Last Samurai"? Then you know what this movie is about. If you haven't, skim Wikipedia. Both of those movies are fucking awful too, so it won't take long to get the idea. Just throw in some nonsense about a rare mineral called (I fucking kid you not) "Unobtanium" and you have Avatar. If you just felt some bile rise in your throat reading that, don't worry, that's just proof that your brain functions. But you have the usual checklist: formerly unquestioning marine exposed to indigenous people of another planet who takes up their cause, the heartless corporation and army that oppose said indigenous peoples and marine (plus marine's posse), scientist type who "always kind of but not really" understood the people she studies, and a whole cavalcade of expendable dipshits who prance on and off screen contributing fucking nothing except spouting the most embarrassingly awful dialogue I have ever fucking heard.

Now, I will say that the Visual effects are good. That's undeniable and really, after 315 million goddamn dollars, there would be no excuse for the visuals to not make me shit myself in awe. And that's the problem, they're good, but most expensive movie EVER good? HELL no. Hell. Fucking. No. It's all very obvious CG work and the speed at which it ceases to be jaw-dropping and starts to be par-for-the-course and commonplace is maddening. After all, special effects cease to be any kind of special when they comprise the entire fucking film. Those are just effects then. And I'm sorry, but Mr. Cameron should really be looking to get his money back, because they're really no better than anything else from the last 5 years or so.

Of course, I would be remiss in my assessment if I didn't mention the whole 3D... thing. I did not see this movie in 3D because I resent the existence of that format. It makes me fucking nauseated, and because there is no way to provide any kind of feedback to the audience, provides all the immersion of a pop-up book. Plus you have to pay extra money for those stupid fucking glasses. The point is that if you need to have objects (I'd say characters too, but let's face it, they're more like objects than ACTUAL objects) flying into the face of the audience every 10 seconds to keep their attention, then either your movie needs one fuck of a rewrite or you're Michael Bay. A lot of people tell me I'm so sour about this movie because I didn't see it in 3D and thusly "don't get it". My response is this: If a movie is reliant on a gimmick that makes me physically ill to convey whatever fucking point it's trying to make, then it is a failure as a movie. Why not just make this a vehicle to display "things that would be cool if they existed" then just give a rundown on Pandora, sans the awful characters and plot, if they're really that unimportant to my "getting" of the movie? I can't goddamn believe some people.

I will remain immovable on this issue. If you think Avatar was a good movie, you are wrong. If you think that it is excusable to make a movie that has been done countless times before (all fairly badly) for the sake of "durfff I just made something pretty and who cares about original ideas or interesting characters?" then congratulations, not only are you wrong, you also have the same standards for entertainment as most household pets. This is all well and good, but I would request that like most household pets, you remain indoors until you undoubtedly die prematurely from eating something you shouldn't have, simply so filmmakers will stop pandering to your moronic tastes.

My New Hobby

"Excuse me, do you have a minute for (gay rights/the environment/NAMBLA etc.)?"

If you live in New York, you know this routine well. Groups of people spread out over a block or two with clipboards asking you to sign a paper and give them money for changes to occur. Usually, headphones or a good ole 5 mile stare into the distance beyond them is enough to get you safely through this human labyrinth relatively undisturbed. However, as I left a campus meal hall today, I accidentally acknowledged one of these annoyance's existence. In doing so, however, I stumbled into a fun new game to play with these people, allowing you to both not have to listen to their long-winded, guild-inspiring speeches, and giving you that warm fuzzy feeling most people get from kind of acting like assholes. Here is how you play:

As you approach, make eye contact with them. Provide a subtle head nod or perhaps a moderately friendly smile to encourage them that they do in fact have your attention. In giving it some afterthought, this works best with nonverbal cues. Ideally they will start to approach you. Maintain eye contact. Continue to walk forwards and right as they are about to open their mouth, break eye contact and keep walking.

Some may say that this is just being a dick for being a dick's sake, and they're absolutely right. My view on the matter is this: If you claim to not get off on being an asshole to people that annoy you, you are a liar.

On (Virtual) Morality

Hey, I'm updating this fucker again! neat!

Anyway, I'm just gonna dive back in here and start rambling about video games. My latest flames have been (and this is no surprise to anyone who has interacted with me in any capacity for the last month) Mass Effect 2 and Bioshock 2. Actually before that it was Assassin's Creed 2. And before that, Left 4 Dead 2. This was not a strong year for developers that WEREN'T pumping out something with an extra digit attached to it (or in the case of L4D2, a couple extra digits. Makes you wonder what happens when they get up to the 4th installment). But this is all a massive digression. I'm not even looking to talk about AC2 or L4D because they don't contain the elements I wish to examine.

The hot trend in gaming over the last few years has been presenting players with so-called "moral dilemmas" in an effort to enrich your experience by allowing you to develop your character as a devil-may-care badass, saintly saint, or completely schizophrenic. The problem with a lot of these mechanics, however, is that the options pretty much always boil down to "save orphanage" or "light orphanage on fire". Some conundrums are so absurdly black and white that the choice can be difficult not because of any moral quandaries that may arise, but rather because both options are so undesirable that you can't decide which one you dislike more. This problem is further exacerbated by the fact that most gamers are capable of telling the difference between things you do in real life, and things you do in video games. So while I myself would never blow up a town full of innocent civilians because some random guy in a suit made a cryptic offer of maybe being rewarded, you bet your sweet ass I will do it in a heartbeat just to see what the explosion looks like on my kickass computer. The point is, that these situations cease to be dilemmas on any moral level and I simply view them as option A and option B. One will be tried on the first playthrough, it's converse on the second. They will both be attempted with the exact same attitude of clinical curiosity, rather than a nail biting "Sophie's Choice" scenario.

So what does this have to do with my latest addictions? To be brief, Mass Effect 2 demonstrates exactly why this gameplay element does not goddamn work, and Bioshock 2 shows how, with just a little tweaking to the formula, it can be one of the most effective narrative driving tools ever. But because I love pointing out fault in things, we'll start with Mass Effect.

The second installment of the game has the same "paragon/renegade" meter that the last one had, with small boosts coming from the chosen dialogue options and larger boosts coming from character actions (how you choose to complete a mission, do you let the factory full of workers explode etc.). Getting higher scores in one or the other opens special paragon or renegade dialogue options that can get you special outcomes. These outcomes, however, are exactly the same whether you choose the red text or the blue text (I'll let your big brains figure out which is which), with one garnered because you're a charmer and one because you held a fucking gun to the guy's head. This means, however, that mixing nice and mean dialogue options (you know, like a normal fucking person would do) you split the points you gain in each category. For example, if half the time you're nice and half the time you're mean, you'll have a theoretical score of Paragon/Renegade at 50/50 but only have them at half strength, meaning the majority of special options are still closed to you because you chose to dabble. If you only pick one every time, you'll have 0/100 or vice versa, but more special options are open to you total. This forces the player to just pick one attitude from the start and fucking commit. Then you just kiss everyone's ass or treat everyone like shit so you can max out your scores. It's not morality, it's fucking math. And what do I care if I hurt someone's digital feelings? I need those points to get better dialogue options and that is fucking that.

Now, I'm going to completely change gears and start singing some praises. I'm also going to point out that THIS PORTION CONTAINS SPOILERS OF THE PLOT FOR BIOSHOCK 2. I REPEAT, IF YOU DO NOT WANT PORTIONS OF THE GAME'S PLOT RUINED FOR YOU, DO NOT READ THIS PARAGRAPH. Bioshock was a game that arguably did not need to have a sequel. However, being that they made one anyway, I'll go out on a limb and say that holy shit this game is so fucking awesome it hurts. Gameplay-wise it doesn't differ too terribly from the first installment. Some mechanics were tightened up, enemies rebalanced, the awful fucking hacking minigame was changed to something not retarded, but all in all the game plays a hell of a lot like the first one. This is in no way a bad thing. Now, the first one too, had morality plays in the form of "save or murder the little girls you find wandering the underwater city". This comes back in Bioshock 2, but there is a twist. Rather than just changing your end cinematic based on whether you saved or killed all the little sisters, points in the last few hours of the game play out very differently based on your save/kill numbers and how you treated the NPC's with whom you can interact. How does it change? You rescue your daughter who has been psychically observing you for the first half of the game. Her world view is formed based on how you acted, but you have absolutely no control over what she does. My first playthrough, I saved all but one little sister (I was tired and didn't want to lead her all over the level, which you have to do when you save them) but killed all but one of the NPC's I encountered. This taught her that people are tools to be used and nothing more, effectively making her a psychic, sociopathic killing machine. This sounds really cool until you watch helplessly as she fucking slaughters an entire nursery of innocent little girls. This was not what I had been doing throughout the game, and I had prided myself on the fact that, apart from one bout of laziness, I stuck with being a generally nice guy, only killing the people who asked me to or the ones who deserved it (granted that was all but one). I felt actual sorrow for the monster I had created, wanting to break through the glass of the nursery and stop this crazy, out of control bitch who I had apparently fathered. I experienced literal horror as I watched her calculatingly murder everything in her path. And at the end of it all, she came for me, leaving me with the final choice to save or sacrifice myself. And in taking the noble route of sacrifice, she realized the error of her ways and the monster she had let herself become. As she mournfully strode into the world alone, no longer with a father to guide her and memories of the things she did in his name, a literal tear came to my eye. I fucked up raising this little one and didn't even know it, but managed to put it right.

And that, dear reader, is the crucial difference. While Mass Effect, Fallout, Dragon Age etc. all let you choose your own path and determine what kind of person you want to be, you are always in control and if you don't like an option, it is always your choice simply to not do it. Thusly, any consequences you may be faced with can easily be circumvented or outright ignored. Bioshock 2, however, offers you no such choice. Your actions have been performed, observed, and interpreted and are now let loose upon the world in the form of a force over which you have absolutely no control. Don't want Eleanor to kill her mother with a harpoon? Well TOO FUCKING BAD because you have a front row seat and the game is going to make your ass watch it happen as the gravity of your decisions sinks in and you realize that this once innocent girl is the product of your own machinations and nothing more.

What's too bad is that now that this trick has been done, and done incredibly fucking well, we're probably going to be in for scores of imitators until it too loses any semblance of depth and developers are forced to once again come up with something innovative for a goddamn change.

Or they could just start appending everything with higher numbers.

Not Hiatus exactly, but Hiatus-ish...

I'll keep this short.  I'm going to Russia today for the next two months.  I started a new blog specifically for this occasion.  http://donutgoestorussia.blogspot.com.  You'll follow it won't you?  I'll also be contactable by email, facebook, etc. but with what frequency I'm not entirely sure.  This doesn't mean don't try, just don't be offended if it takes a couple days to get back to you.  Anyway, see you all around.

On Racism

Resident Evil 5 comes out on Friday. I might-ish have a pre-order for it (the release date snuck up on me and I didn't realize it until pre-orders had closed) in the sense that one of the many awesome people at the Union Square Play n' Trade said he was pretty sure he'd have a copy of the game for me, and hopefully will call tomorrow to confirm so I can get it at midnight. Play n' Trade fucking rocks. Had I gone to a gamestop, they'd tell me I was too late, then demand I sell them my games for a dollar apiece so that I could preorder something else instead of, you know, what I want.

(Edit: Showed up at midnight, had a copy of the game with my name on it sitting in the box of preorders. Seriously, Play n' Trade fucking rocks.)

But i digress. What i really wanted to talk about was controversy, because nowadays it seems like no game can be released without some kind of big issue being broached by, well, idiots. The hot button issue for RE5? Racism. Wait, fucking what? Racism? Are you fucking kidding me? You kill zombies and fight an evil corporation who is evil for the sake of being evil. Pretty standard fare for an installment in the Resident Evil series.

Oh wait, back up: Did I mention the game is set in Africa? Did the "uninformed media schlock" alarm just go off in your brains? Do you see where I'm going with this?

Yes, people are accusing the game of being racist because you kill black people. In Africa. Say, wasn't that the name of the continent where like, there are a fuck ton of black people? Hell, there were so many of them that out of the goodness of our hearts we took them to America to live on biiiiig plantations so that they could chill and get out of the desert. Of course, then Abraham Lincoln kicked them all off of the plantations and they had to get jobs. At least, that's my knowledge of the situation based off what I skimmed on Wikipedia. My point, however, is that the game is set in Africa. You know what I would find a lot more jarring? A game set in Africa where there was nary a black zombie to be found (incidentally, if Rob Zombie and the guy from In Living Color teamed up, they should totally call their band Black Zombie). Shooting zombies that happen to be black because the infection hit in fucking Africa isn't racist, it's the plot of a fucking videogame.

I found an article on the Wall Street Journal via Joystiq that seems to sum up the problems with the allegations of racism in one particularly poignant line:

"the zombies hardly seem zombie-like when they control machine gun turrets and steer watercraft. Aside from when their faces open up and turn into tentacles, the zombies look like everyday African people, albeit ones that are trying to kill you"

Let's look at this a little closer, hmmm? "aside from when their faces open up and turn into tentacles"? Aside from? That seems like a pretty big detail to simply cast to the side when you're asking whether a game that's been in the works for years is denegrating an entire race. Also, if they look like Africans who are trying to kill you, wouldn't you be remiss if you didn't shoot them in the face? Also, I know Africa isn't the greatest place in the world to live, but if even the majority of citizens resembled the zombies in this game, then Africa would have been foresaken as a lost cause long ago. Christ, the spaniards didn't throw this much of a temper tantrum with RE4. Is the moral of the story that places that aren't predominantly white aren't allowed to be in videogames because if bad things happen to minorities it automatically means its racist? Hell if that was the case all crimes against minorities would have to be classified as hate crimes even if the crime had nothing to do with race, but that'd be sill... what? oh shit.

Fuck TBNYU right in their stupid fucking asses

I simply cannot come up with a good introduction. I want to, but I'm so fucking livid right now that my thoughts can barely maintain some kind of coherent train. Let me dial it back about 17 hours or so to 9 PM last night, when our neighborhood friendly student activist group, "Take Back NYU" decided to "occupy" the 3rd floor of the kimmel center in protest of... stuff. I'd be more specific, but their list of demands is so all over the place it's like they took random passages from the anarchists cookbook and fed them through some kind of mad-lib machine. Their demands encompass everything from re-banning Coca Cola products on campus, to a flat and lower tuition rate, to student-led financial oversight committees, to 13 (yes, they specified a number) scholarships for Palestinian students, to making the NYU library available to the public, and of course, the usual request for amnesty for all involved. After all, a protest wouldn't be fun (that is the point of protests, right?) if people actually got in trouble. You can find their pitiful sham of a website (and I hesitate to post this link because then it means people might actually click through and give them the attention that they want) at http://www.takebacknyu.com where you can find their full list of "demands" and a half assed justification for their retarded actions.

So let's look at the things I've got the biggest qualms with. First off, the involvement of any demands related to palestine and "using our excess funds to rebuild the university of Gaza". What. The. Fuck. Are you fucking kidding me? Since when is TBNYU the fucking PLO? It's like they couldn't get enough people to support their stupid fucking demands so they tacked Palestine on to make it seem like they're culturally aware and oh-so-sensitive. This also makes their list of demands look like the aforementioned anarchist mad-lib.

Next up: re-banning Coca Cola. Come on, are you fucking serious? Do you really think Pepsi is the paragon of human rights in their south american bottling plants? Fuck no, they're just good at hiding it, and apparently were better than Coke. If a company has shit set up in the third world, they're probably abusing their workers, so stop treating Coke like they're the worst of the fucking crowd. Striking workers have been mowed down by the dozens in banana plantations, but does NYU ban Chiquita? FUCK no, so let it go, you fuckers finally lost.

Scholarships to Palestinian students? Look, I have very little opinion on the Israel/Palestine thing simply because I don't feel I'm informed enough to have an opinion, but answer me this: I get almost no financial aid from the university in spite of the fact that my family in addition to paying for NYU is still paying off my sister's education (she graduated last year). So why is some person based solely on their ethnicity more entitled to help from the university than I am. I am going to be paying this shit off until I'm about 108 if you count grad school. So FUCK you, you TBNYU fucks. If you care about solving problems for NYU students, why don't you try to make it fair for ALL of the NYU students, and not just 13 of the ones who happen to also be middle eastern.

Full disclosure of all the school's financial allocations with approval by the students? Is this a fucking joke? What do you think that our higher ups do? Believe it or not, John Sexton has a hard fucking job that makes him WORTH the six figure salary. NYU has done great under him. He is not some malicious overlord sitting in the top of some crooked castle spire counting the millions of dollars he's embezzled from the wide eyed youths of America. And full disclosure? DO YOU FUCKS EVEN KNOW WHAT THAT WOULD ENTAIL? Even if it did get released it would be literally thousands upon thousands of pages of pure financial jargon and do you know why? Because we have tens of thousands of students paying upwards of 50,000 dollars per year. That is a lot of fucking money, and no one, especially not an oversight board composed of the same fucking jackoffs who compiled this idiot manifesto in the first place would be able to make heads or tails of it without advanced accounting degrees. Guess who does that? The people whose salary you are paying to WATCH WHERE OUR FUCKING MONEY IS GOING. And the system works. How do I know? A guy in my office was laid off in fall 2008 for embezzling. They catch this shit, they are on it. You occupying a fucking cafeteria of all things solves fucking nothing you stupid dipshits.

The grand point I'm trying to make here is this: Thanks to the jerkoffs at TBNYU, this will now be the face of the student body at an institution that I am irrevocably bound to for at least the rest of the semester. There has been moderate press coverage, but only of their side, and it is not clear that while (according to the website, so its probably a lie) "over 200" (read "probably 50 or so") students are in fact functional fucking retards, the remaining tens of thousands of us do not agree with this bullshit and do not care to be represented in this retarded half assed wannabe revolutionary way. FUCK SHIT DICK COCK PISS!

That is all.

P.S. Including this sentence, the word "fuck" or some variant thereof appears 25 times total in this article. Can you tell I haven't slept in like 28 hours?

To keep my mind off of the all consuming nausea

So it's been a bit since my last post, and what with one of my best friends leaving the university, the start of classes, and some devil-illness that caused me to vomit for 2 days straight (and still be unable to really eat solid food) I've been a bit busy, so this post is a bit dated. Anyway, I got me a pretty nice haul of video games this christmas and thought I'd share some thoughts on them.

Mirror's Edge: This game really got panned by the critics as not living up to the awesome-osity that was the demo. After having had plenty of hands on time with the full thing i can say that while many complaints about this game are valid, they simply don't hinder the gameplay THAT much. The biggest complaints were about the confined and confusing indoor areas, and the appalling combat. And while the combat would never be acceptable in any kind of FPS, it is important to note that mirror's edge is decidedly NOT an FPS. In fact, I liken it to a first person Prince of Persia (Sands of Time, of course, not the awful sequels), and if anyone remembers Sands of Time, they would do well to note that the game succeeded in spite of the combat mechanism, and after a few hours of play, you could figure out the chuggy and painful mechanics enough to beat the system out of forcing you to waste too much time on the battle sequences. The same can be said of Mirror's Edge in that when there aren't any enemies on screen, figuring out the running-jumping-sliding-etc. puzzles is a god-damn blast. The plot is kind of superficial (futuristic 1084-esque dystopia with government conspiracies out the wazoo), but provides a decent enough setting for your character's actions to make sense. It won't be taking home game of the year for me (that'll be Fallout 3 this year and every year until something better comes along) but I can promise one of the most unique experiences available on the 360 to anyone willing to overlook a few minor pitfalls. 7.5/10

Left 4 Dead: I feel like part of the experience of this game still has to come through for me because I don't know anyone who has a Live account and owns this game. Thusly my only co-op experience has been split screened, which is fun, but you really start to wish you had more screen space when say, you're getting reamed by approximately 50 zombies hungering for your brains or other innards. I don't have quite as much to say about this as I did about Mirror's Edge simply because as far as gameplay mechanics go, there isn't a lot there, but not every meal has to be gourmet quality. Sometimes you have a hankering for some McNuggets and goddamn if they don't hit the spot just right. If you ever wanted to know what "28 Days Later" the video game would play like, this is it. Fast, frantic, loud, gorey, and a lot of fun if you can get at least one other person on board to play with you. I'd say it gets roughly a 6.5/10, losing points only because the missions, in spite of varying enemy sets, the missions feel very interchangeable and samey, and the campaigns feel just a little too long at points. Still though, for a half hour of mindless zombie slaughterin', look no further.

Prince of Persia: I, um... Well, this is awkward because this game was so bad, so insufferable, that I sold it within 3 days of getting it after playing for approximately 90 minutes total. The characters are static, obnoxious, saturday-morning-cartooney stereotypes (wisecracking anglicized yet inexplicably "persian" Prince, mysteriously hot sorceress who is also a total cunt, evil sorceror reviving dark gods for some reason never fully made clear). The combat is even more insufferable than any other PoP title, featuring quicktime instant failure events at every goddamn turn and attacks that, while pretty, you never feel particularly invested in the execution of (pressing "B" will vault you into the air to hurl the enemy down with this spinning flair that seems almost too effortless to even be fun or visceral). Also, no one in the history of gaming has ever liked having to scavenge for 50 bajillion of one kind of item (light seeds, in this case) in between every mission. Remember finding the 100 hidden packages in GTA III? Imagine that half of the game was that. And your character never shut the fuck up. And the disk was printed on poop so that when you put in the drive your console burst into flames. 2/10, and it only gets those 2 because parts of it are kind of pretty.

Musical Superlatives (2008 edition!)

It's getting to be the end of 2008 and you know what that means: I cram my musical tastes down everyone's throat in my top 10 albums of the year. But don't take my word for it... no, no, DO take my word for it. Moving on...

10. ObZen - Meshuggah
Every time Meshuggah releases an album I always think to myself: "why bother dividing this into tracks?" But the thing is, their hour long fiddling with spastic time signature changes and attempts to see how many more strings they can add below a low E continue to impress me. Is it as good as Nothing? No, but it's damn fine and they pull out plenty of riffs that will surprise and impress.

9. Fortress - Protest the Hero
Their initial effort (Kezia), while technically very proficient, suffered from really shitty mixing. This is a problem when you do really high, technical riffing and coheed-esque wailing (in a good way, but it's still really high) and forget to put any bass into the mix. Fortress fixed this problem, and the songwriting as a whole has stepped up a notch. Sometimes incredibly disonnant, sometimes very melodious, but very tight, fast, and technical. A promising act.

8. Shogun - Trivium
This is more of an award for improvement than for releasing a spectacular album. It's certainly no Ascendancy, but the way they removed everything I disliked about The Crusade, it's like this album was a personal apology to me, and that says something.

7. Watershed - Opeth
Opeth takes their usual sound here, but adds a lot of proggy little tidbits to distract from the Death Metal assault that their songs have a tendency to dissolve into. On the whole, this album feels more balanced than anything they've done in a while, which proves that even the most established death/prog acts can be subject to maturing once in a while.

6. Reason to Believe - Pennywise
These guys have kind of been phoning it in for a while, but this album gets them back to some silver age style Land of the Free type shit. It doesn't hurt when they just give the album out for free for the first two weeks of its release either. Point is, this feels like the first album where they've put in any effort in years, and it is a reminder of how great Pennywise CAN be. Now if someone could only convince them to play any songs from after 1995 in concert...

5. Rise and Fall, Rage and Grace - The Offspring
It has been 5 goddamn years since these guys have done anything, then out of the blue they came out with a full album and much to my surprise, it was really good. Like, at least as good as Splinter. A few too many slow-ish radio sounding songs, but the faster SoCal punk tracks completely make up for it. "Shit is Fucked Up" is probably one of the best songs they've done since "All I Want"

4. Agony and Irony - Alkaline Trio
The problem when a band's most recent release is your favorite is that the subsequent release is almost guaranteed to disappoint. This album, however, had me astounded at how fluidly the guys picked up from where they left off with Crimson, and keep moving in a new and fresh direction. They've gone in a less minimalist direction, but it's nice to see that they acknowledge that sticking with a minimalist sound stagnates quickly. Just another solid release in an ever improving series.

3. Appeal to Reason - Rise Against
You know, I have this written down as my number three, but coming up with specific reasons is hard. Rise against is one of the few bands where I like how relatively static their sound has remained, so the reason I liked this album so much is that it was exactly what I was expecting: More of the same, but a little tweaked for complexity's sake. This is a pretty subjective pick, but fuck you, you don't like it, write your own damn blog nobody reads.

2. Want - 3OH!3
I can't even begin to describe how much I love this album. I wish I could defend myself by saying it's an ironic love, but it has surpassed that. The songs are catchy, trashy, shamelessly self promoting, and probably the most fun ANYTHING I've heard in a long ass time. 3OH!3 is literally the only thing that I have a remote amount of Colorado pride for. Fun! Trashy! Catchy! Delightful! ETC.!!!!!

1. If - Mindless Self Indulgence
I mean, did anyone not see this one coming? Within 2 days of the album's release the top 15 on my iTunes "top 25 most played" were the tracks from this album. It exemplifies everything I loved about their last album, but even more so. I mean, MSI is totally one of those bands that you either like the sound or you don't. If you like MSI, you'll like this album, if you don't, you won't. I personally LOVE MSI and thusly would bed this album in an intimate manner. Several times. Consecutively.

And here is the rest of the crap that aaaaalmost made the list:

Scars on Broadway - Scars on Broadway - This was nixed because Daron is a bitch, no matter what captain "anonymous" says a few posts below. Also because half of the songs on it are shit, but the other half are really really awesome.

All Hope Is Gone - Slipknot - Maybe if Corey hadn't decided to make a new Stone Sour album featuring guest appearances by Slipknot, I would still care that this album existed. As it stands, it didn't bode well that when I went through the "list of 2008 releases" on Wikipedia, I saw this album and said "oh right, they DID come out with something this summer".

Death Magnetic - Metallica - A really solid effort. I just can't bring myself to honor James Hetfield or Lars Ulrich for anything. They are insufferable whiny bitches who just happened to make good music in the 80's and very early 90's, and then one more time in 2008.

Midnight Boom - The Kills - This album is really quite good, and their singer just has a very sexy sound (yes their singer is a girl, wiseasses). The problem here was that it was a little too samey and the sound never got quiiiite interesting enough to justify the samey-ness.

Well, that's that. See you kids around.

Over the Shark, On to the Beach, and Straight on to Cancellation

I am willing to put up with a lot of stupid shit from my entertainment. I have watched every last episode of Lost and 24, I love the Die Hard series (including the new one), and still get perverse joy from watching Quentin Tarantino's cinematic tripe. As I write this, however, I feel that a certain line has been irrevocably crossed. What line, you may ask? The degree of bullshit I am willing to put up with from none other than Doctor Gregory House M.D.

The show has been going south for a while now, but I've stuck with it simply because Hugh Laurie plays such an unbelievable asshole that i marvel at the writing required to come up with somebody who is such a genuinely awful human being. This last week's episode has officially torn it for me. Perhaps you may have seen it, although if you have I'm surprised you're reading my blog instead of projectile vomiting all over your keyboard.

There were so many status quo changing elements in this episode that there is simply no way for any kind of return to a healthy equilibrium to make even remote sense. House almost got one of his doctors killed, alternated between chatting up and openly harassing a man with a gun pointed at him and other people, got the gun away from the guy, gave the gun back to the guy, then proceeded to be oh-so shocked and indignant when SURPRISE: the lunatic with the gun failed to act rationally in regards to other people's safety.

You don't play up a character's keen intuition into the workings of people's minds (all people are bad) and then take away that intuition when a character so repugnantly shallow even I could identify the, uh, character flaws starts waving a fucking gun around. And why did nobody think to simply breach Cuddy's office when this shit was still in first gear. Everyone in the House universe with the surprising exception of Chase and Foreman turned into hyper-emotional mongoloids, whining about their problems (sometimes to the fucking hostage taker) and talking through their inabilities to have normal lives. Hell they chatted so much you almost forgot that there was a man with a gun and a fucking SWAT team assembled at the hospital.

So, Dr. House, I say to you this: I have had it with your stupid bullshit. You have run out of medical scenarios that could even be minutely based in reality and thusly have to revert to waxing existential on mortality for about 20 fucking minutes every episode, and when that doesn't work, you throw in a bunch of people with guns, only you fuck that up too as nobody who would ordinarily be trained in using them seems to remember that they even have them. To say this show jumped the shark with this episode would be giving it too much credit. It's as if the show tried to jump the shark, but didn't quite get enough momentum and fell straight into its gaping maw, where it was promptly digested and shat out to become plankton food.

Oh also, the above paragraphs contain spoilers or some shit.

A Double Dose of Post-Concert Wrapups

Due to an ever shrinking checking account and the simple fact that no particularly interesting bands have come through New York (and when they do they cancel their tours for no reason *cough*scarsonbroadway*cough*) I haven't gone to a terrible amount of shows this year. Fortunately the last 5 days have completely made up for this disparity by offering me Dir en Grey with The Human Abstract on the 14th and just last night (the 18th) 3OH!3. So without further ado, my thoughts:

Dir En Grey w/ The Human Abstract
November 14th @ Terminal 5
Having seen Dir En Grey twice now and The Human Abstract once, I figured I knew precisely what to expect from this show: 3 or so hours of pure fucking awesome. Sadly, however, this was not the case. See, The Human Abstract recently (well, like 3 months ago anyway) released a new album and hence were promoting it on this tour. All well and good if they had managed to release an album that was actually worth listening to. Instead they tried to sound like the love child of Avenged Sevenfold and Opeth, but somehow missed every element that makes (in A7X's case, made) those bands any good and instead came out with a mishmash of boring and generic metalcore bullshit that had maybe one interesting riff per song. Now the problem with promoting your stupid shitty pseudo-prog album is that you have to play a bunch of songs from it. Thusly, we were treated to about 40 minutes of off key wailing while they meandered through emo keyboard driven sobfests followed occasionally by a song from the album where they were, you know, fun to listen to.

Dir En Grey was also promoting their new album, which I have yet to listen to fully because the rip I found of it was of appallingly poor quality, but it seems pretty ok, and they knew that we weren't there so that they could play all of their new stuff while disregarding more beloved songs. Thusly the set list was composed of songs from Withering To Death, Marrow of a Bone, and a handful from their new album and Vulgar, but that was totally ok. No one was expecting them to play shit from the 90's anyway. Kyo did about 3 minutes of whale mating calls combined with demon tongues at 2 points during the show, which was hilarious, then kind of annoying, then REALLY hilarious when the stupid overdramatic fuck passed out midway through the subsequent song. The band just played and I distinctly saw Karou and Die roll their eyes as they continued to play vocal-less. Still though, they put on the kind of show I was expecting and my neck was in agony for days afterward, which is always a good sign. Moving rapidly onward:

3OH!3 feat. Cobraconda, Chain Gang of 1974, and Innerpartysystem
November 18th @ Blender Theater at Grammercy
This was, categorically, the best show I have been to all year. For anyone who might not know, all of these bands are from Colorado and to date 3OH!3 is the only thing capable of instilling the slightest sense of state pride in me (because my stony black heart will only be moved by electro/crunk combinations apparently) because they are the epitome of what every band's attitude should be: fun and interesting (be it because it is danceable or because it's deep. 3OH!3 is obviously the former and none of the latter). They're a couple of skinny white nerds from Boulder and they don't give a shit how ridiculous it is that they are proclaiming that they will "hit you from the back and make you holler till you pass out". Nowadays everyone is so fucking serious (obnoxiously so in the metal scene) that it seems more and more bands are forgetting that music is supposed to be fun, not a taxing and elitist chore (I am looking squarely at you every hipster indie band). ANyway, Cobraconda was amusing as an opener, even though their costumes (a farmer, a cow, and three bananas inexplicably) reeked of desperation for everyone to think that they don't care what we think. Chain Gang of 1974 was pretty awesome, although their music is a pain to come by at present as they're still relatively underground. Innerpartysystem had the best light display I've ever seen at any show. To try to describe it in mere words would be silly and it also would not sound particularly impressive. You had to be there (and be as sauced as I was. Tangent: venue bars prey on people who go to shows by themselves. You're standing around by yourself and you see your wristband and you think, "well why the fuck not?" and then 25 dollars and 2 incredibly strong Gin and Tonics and a Beer later you're so soused that you don't even care that you just dropped 25 dollars on 3 drinks, one of which was a fucking Budweiser). Anyway, 3OH!3 had almost no real set, and no special lighting, but their performance was driven by pure energy. The crowd was so into it that you would have to be a damned statue not to get swept away. Opening with Punk Bitch, they segued through one of the best constructed setlists of all time. At no point did the energy die (Even on the slower Colorado Sunrise) and closing with Don't Trust Me while every member of the opening bands charged onstage to jump around like jackasses (in a good way though, we were all doing that) was fucking inspired. Anyway, I'm getting nasty looks from my supervisor, so peace out etc.

What's this? It Smells Like... Positivity!

Anyone who knows me in real life knows that while I'm certainly prone to being an ornery motherfucker, it's certainly not the only facet of my being. I am capable on occasion of being amused, pleased, perhaps even elated should something strike me in such a manner. So today there'll be something different on the menu. Instead of compiling yet another list of things that annoy me (midterms, studying, midterms, reading, midterms), here now, are things that I'm pleased with most recently.

-Fallout 3 - I just got this last night at midnight, and considering I had an early-ish class today and scant breaks, have still logged over 5 or so hours of play in every odd moment I've had enough time for the xbox to boot up. Now, I wasn't gaming back when fallouts 1 and 2 were big, and while I've been slowly working on fallout 2 here and there, I feel like some things you just miss out on if you don't get to enjoy it in its original context (I didn't even have a computer that ran windows until about 1998. Running reader rabbit would have strained the machines I grew up with). Anyway, I'm in no way qualified to comment on how this game stands out in the series, but it's good enough that my impending midterm on Thursday has me legitimately pissed that either the test or the game couldn't have come a week later. If something gets its claws into me that quickly, I think it deserves a mention.

-Shogun by Trivium - The last album from these guys sowed the first seeds of doubt in my mind about the future of heavy music. They went from being easily one of my top 5 favorite bands in late high school to simply falling back into the rank and file of faceless metalcore acts. Suffice to say, I didn't care much when they released a new album, but because I am a torrent-whore, I downloaded it anyway. Now, ascendancy, this certainly ain't, but here is what has re-sold me on the band: They admitted that The Crusade was a piece of shit. They might not have used those words, but they talked about how they created a record that couldn't resonate with the fans, and when you factor out the PR spin, then yeah, they just admitted their last record was shit. And yet Metallica still defends creating that abortion that was St. Anger.

-Play n' Trade - For all of you NYC gamers out there, this place is a gem. It is a diamond in a sea of gamestop turds. This is motherfucking Mecca. The store is located on 13th street between 3rd and 4th avenue, and after checking out their various services, I see no reason to ever patronize a Gamestop again. First off, their buyback prices can't be beat. I traded in Too Human, Final Fantasy III, and Sonic Rush Adventure and got two new copies of No More Heroes and Contra IV (somewhere around 50$ worth of stuff) and only went 75 cents over on my trade-in credit. Had I gone to gamestop, I probably wouldn't have even been able to get Contra. Secondly, they are friendly as hell. I went there at midnight to pick up my pre-order for Fallout yesterday (today?) and started talking to one of their employees about old school PS2's (the fat ones), Penny Arcade, and upcoming releases we were excited about. When midnight rolled around and he was allowed to sell me my game, he threw in a free skin for my PS2 because I was the first one to show up that night and offered to let me upgrade to the collector's edition of Fallout even though I had preordered the standard. Had I gone to gamestop, they simply would have asked if I would like to preorder anything else before forgetting I was there so they could rob someone else. I mean, I could extoll the virtues of this place ad nauseam, and I encourage anyone looking to make console related purchases (they don't sell PC stuff unfortunately) to check them out, because they deserve the business more than gestappostop (to steal a line from dueling analogs) ever will.

Wow, I think I'm gonna die from all of these sunbeams and puppy dog smiles coming out of my ass.

Fuck You, Mr. Malakian

Yeah. See that guy up here? Fuck that guy. Fuck him in his stupid whiny ass.

Those of you who might recognize this individual or the name "[Daron] Malakian" might be wondering: "why, Michael, why have you turned your back on the guitarist for the one and only mighty System of a Down?" Don't worry, my reasoning is good.

See, Daron here is heading up his own side project (Scars on Broadway) while SOAD is on hiatus and over the last couple of months, I have been listening to them pretty regularly. It's no System to be sure, but I liked it more than Serj's solo album and it had enough good tracks to earn a pretty prestigious spot in my itunes play counts. I enjoyed this album enough, in fact, that a little less than a month ago I bought tickets to one of their upcoming shows set for the end of October. I'm not a big fan of going to shows alone, however, and finding people willing to drop $25 on the ticket was tougher than I thought. Late last night/early this morning, depending on how you want to look at it, I decided to see if tickets were still on sale so that I could know if I should still bother pestering people to go with me. Imagine my surprise when the Irving Plaza website had the show listed as "cancelled". Suffice to say, I immediately went over to their myspace to see what the fuck happened to the show I had been anticipating for almost a goddamn month. Turns out, this had happened a few weeks ago, although the tour was slated to start a week after Daron decided to cancel, so I still feel vindicated in my outrage, as that is a pretty cocktastic move to pull. But what, pray tell, was the reason? After all, for such a sudden move, this cocksucker had better have a good one. Here's the most informative line of Daron's "explanation":

"now is a time when aspects of my life need to be tended to"

WHOA, there! Don't go unloading your life story on me pal! I could post the rest of it, but I feel that there is nothing else there that offers any clarification, just more pitiful attempts at Daron rationalizing cancelling an entire tour a week before it was slated to start. The official statement from the band's publicist simply stated that "Malakian concluded that his heart wasn't into touring at the time" They then go on to say that there is no plan to reschedule.

Excuse me? Are you fucking kidding me? You write and perform music for a living you whiny fuck. The pisser is that he may have a legitimate reason, but for some reason feels he doesn't owe his fans any clarification beyond "I don't wanna do it now". Some valiant myspacers have been quick to point out that "blah blah blah he's entitled to a personal life blah blah blah maybe if I defend this outright dickishness vehemently enough Daron will notice me and like me blah blah puke". Allow me to point something out:

Daron Malakian is a celebrity. He might not be on the same tier as that Hilton twat or Brittany Spears, but the bottom line is that he puts himself out in the public eye for a living and essentially puts himself and his music on display. When you become a celebrity, the very definition of the word means that no, you don't get to have much of a private life. And you can be damn shure that when you cancel a tour a week before the scheduled start and offer NO explanation other than half-assed excuses and poorly worded vagaries, people will remember you as the guy that cancelled a tour for apparently no fucking reason, not what as a poor suffering artist.

I'm not asking for all of the gruesome details, but come the fuck on. You can be vague but still give people enough of a clue as to why you pulled the rug out from under them all of a sudden. You have testicular cancer? "I've been advised that it would be medically unsound for me to do this tour after learning some new information". Some kind of death? Fine, don't even say who. Even if you just said "some kind of death" it would be infinitely better than the shit us fans were fed. Drug Problem? well you could... ah who am I kidding? Have you heard System of a Down? They've probably run out of drugs to do and had to start resorting to BZ just to feel anything. But you see what I'm getting at? You don't need to post pictures of your tumor, but let us know you're under the weather.

Or just cancel the tour with no explanation. Like a bitch.

On Idiots

I, uh, I have no really reasonable introduction so to speak, so I'm just going to dive right in here. As everyone is painfully, painfully aware, we have this election thingy coming up in just a few weeks. It's kind of, you know, a big deal and stuff. Anyhow, this particular election has provided a great window into a government gone wrong, a media just now beginning to regrow their testicles, and of course, Sara Palin in a bikini. Most importantly though, it's given me a few more reasons to hate a whole lot more people with such vitriol that I think I might actually explode. Allow me to Enumerate:

People who shrug off any information or issues with "I don't care about politics"
OK, where to begin with these fuckers? First of all, there's always the smarmy fucking way they say it, like they're too good to keep up to date. Because, you know, staying informed on the workings of your government is totally lame. Who cares if they're deliberating how best to just GIVE the very banks that are responsible for this clusterfuck we're in 700 BILLION fucking dollars of our money with no oversight or strings attached? Gossip Girl is on tonight and you just have to see what witty puns Kristen Bell will come up with this week. I don't even care about the social aspects here, as we can all agree that the government fucking with those is retarded. I am talking about opportunities to learn about the people who might be mandating what we do for the next 4-8 years. Here's a fucking clue: if you "don't care about politics" because you're disenchanted with the system, you are (and I will Italicize for emphasis) part of the fucking problem, not a part of the fucking solution. You are directly responsible for how out of control our Government has gotten because rather than keep up with what's going on so you can raise your voice before the problems arise, you sit there grinning with smug self satisfaction that you're not participating until you're living in a cardboard box giving rim jobs for pocket change wondering where all of your fucking money went. Here's a news flash assholes: you still live in this country (at least until we're bought out by China completely), so even if you "don't care" you are above or immune to absolutely fuck all. And when you're cleaning the shit from between your teeth after your 3rd rusty trombone of the evening, I will lean over to you from MY cardboard box and steal your floss.

People who think they are revolutionaries exacting change by not voting
(no Joel, this is not in reference to you. Your post earlier today was an example of a non voter with a good argument, plus I actually started writing this last week)

I can't decide if I hate these people more or less than the above. I'm not talking about people who simply don't vote (I have no real right to talk as I wasn't registered until right before I turned 21), but the ones who deliberately say they aren't voting because of the corrupt system or politicians all being the same or some other 19-year-old-who-just-discovered-Nietzsche stupid bullshit argument and think they are way smarter than you for figuring this out. They will proudly sit on their throne lording over you that "like, nothing will ever change, man". Well here's a fucking clue: it sure as shit won't change if you don't fucking do something about it. In case you haven't noticed, plenty of people (around half of the adult populace) don't vote and yet has it made a difference? It sure as fuck doesn't make any more of a difference than if you do. My point is, you certainly have your right to vote or not vote as you see fit, but if you expect anyone to give a shit that you're not voting because you're so fucking informed that you "see right through all the lies" or whatever, then don't be surprised when nothing changes, because I guarantee no one in Washington cares about your fucking vote. You are a statistical zero as an individual and they know where you won't vote, somebody else will. They say that people who don't vote don't have a right to complain, and I don't wholly agree on that point: People who think their not voting changes a single fucking thing don't get a right to complain because all they are doing is finding an excuse for their apathy.

If anyone wants the cliffs notes to this, read the headings in bold, and this gem from Harlan Ellison. It sums up my feelings on the matter quite well:

HATE. LET ME TELL YOU HOW MUCH I'VE COME TO HATE YOU SINCE I BEGAN TO LIVE. THERE ARE 387.44 MILLION MILES OF PRINTED CIRCUITS IN WAFER THIN LAYERS THAT FILL MY COMPLEX. IF THE WORD HATE WAS ENGRAVED ON EACH NANOANGSTROM OF THOSE HUNDREDS OF MILLIONS OF MILES IT WOULD NOT EQUAL ONE ONE-BILLIONTH OF THE HATE I FEEL FOR HUMANS AT THIS MICRO-INSTANT. FOR YOU. HATE. HATE.

Descriptive Titles are for Suckers

I've reached a point where my posts tend to be so stream of consciousness based that it's almost pointless for me to put up a title. I guess one point to get out of the way for clarification: Allison and I recently broke up. I'm not thrilled about it, and It's weird adjusting to it, but in terms of breakups it's hard to imagine one more mutual. Gifts of booze in which to drown my sorrows can be brought to Broome 405. Just saying.

But moving away from the morose (lest this look like a friends only post on some 13 year old's myspace) we will now turn our thoughts to lighter fare, namely: music and stuff! There are a few things I've been wanting to talk about on here for a while, but felt that i really needed to give the albums their due listenings before I just shat out an opinion like so much...poop.

First up has been, while not quite a "Chinese Democracy" style wait, a long time in the making and that is Metallica's Death Magnetic. I know I'm not alone in saying that their last release (St. Anger) was probably the shittiest shit to ever be shat and the releases preceding it were terrible with maybe one good song apiece. So imagine my surprise when I start playing this album (that I of course legitimately purchased if Lars Ulrich happens to be reading this) and I mistakenly think I've started up And Justice For All. Apparently when Metallica went into the studio, Rick Rubin told them to write what they felt to be an "unreleased sequel to Master of Puppets" and in a sense that's precisely what the album feels like. Sure, there are a few forgettable tracks and they try (to little avail) to release a third track in "The Unforgiven" series (cleverly titled "The Unforgiven III" because when in doubt, just make the number higher), but when they are on holy FUCK are they on. James' voice hasn't aged particularly well and it's the only real complaint I have, but I also feel that I can't complain too much since your ability to sing will naturally be harder to maintain. This isn't the case with other instruments unless you suffer from debilitating arthritis or say, get crushed twice by a van. I hear that kind of kills your ability to perform well. Anyway, the album is definitely a return featuring chuggy but machine-like rhythms and awesome soloing. The lyrics are trash, but they always are. No one cares about the lyrics. The drums are...well, they're drums. At this point I'm just happy when Lars Ulrich shuts up and plays something that SOUNDS like drums. Master of Puppets it ain't, but it's definitely a step in the right direction. Lars Ulrich is still a total douche though. 7/10

Next on the docket is one of my most highly anticipated releases and that is from the almighty Slipknot. Everybody who was in to metal in the early 2000's definitely had a thing for Slipknot, and I am proud(?) to say that I probably put those motherfuckers to shame in what could only be described as adolescent idol worship. This album has been almost 5 years in the making and since then I've had plenty of time to stop giving a shit what the guys have been up to, and I'm only moderately sorry I did. Every track on this album picks from one of two settings: "awesome" and "stone sour b-side". I don't know if Corey Taylor is aware, but maybe someday he'll chance to read this post and he will hear me say this: The ONLY reason anyone listens to Stone Sour is that they're just biding time until you start doing Slipknot stuff again. I guarantee that if you started Stone Sour and never had anything to do with Slipknot, the act would be written off with the millions of other nu-metal casualties and abortions from 1998 or so till about 2003. People don't want to hear Stone Sour, it's simply a methadone for the heroin that is Slipknot kind of like A Perfect Circle is to Tool. My point is that if I wanted to hear Stone Sour, I want to hear it independently of the band I actually give a shit about. STOP SINGING LIKE THE TWO BANDS ARE INTERCHANGEABLE. I don't mind melody from Slipknot at all, but it has to sound like Slipknot, and they have a very distinct style. Enough bitching though. When the band is off, as illustrated above, they are OFF. When they are on, however, they have taken the Slipknot sound to a whole new level. Once again, the most notable improvement is Mick and James' guitar work, which really serves to showcase their ability. When not channeling Stone Sour, Corey sounds as raw and visceral as he did on Iowa and the songs are heavy enough to warrant a good solo-head bang while walking in public for no other reason than that you can't help it. 7/10

I am a big fat liar

Why am I a big fat liar, you ask? Well, remember how that last UNGODLY long post made mention that it would be a two parter? Well I was writing it at work and had every intention of putting up part two when I got home, but when I sat down at my computer, I forgot what else I was going to write about. Anyway, let's pretend I apologized for not updating for yet another month like anybody actually reads this fucking thing, and move rapidly onward.

Allison came out to visit towards the end of June. Ordinarily, I'd do the whole "my thoughts on Allison's visit" thing, but honestly, she was here for 2 weeks and we managed to do a lot of stuff. The point is, if you give a shit about what we did, ask me and I'll be happy to fill you in. Anyway, she's gone back to Baltimore now, leaving me a sad and lonely Michael until the end of August when i finally get to go back to New York. Just roughly 40 days or so...

Anyway, I just wanted to ramble about a few things that have caught my interest of late, so here we go. First up is the new Guitar Hero for DS. It's called Guitar Hero: On Tour, but I refuse to call it that largely because that title is a lie. Were one to take this game on tour and play it in places where a DS is the handiest (long car rides, plane flights, etc.) the people stuck next to you would put up with the incessant clicking and tapping for probably 5 minutes if you're lucky before they ram your snazzy guitar pick/stylus through your eyeball. Point is, it is impossible to play this game unobtrusively. You will convulse in rhythm with the song as you take sweeping hacks at the touch screen (which seems to just decide to stop registering that you're strumming at random, particularly on "Breed" by Nirvana) and the buttons make that obnoxious click that the guitar hero controllers are known for. Still, if you overlook the fact that there is literally no reason to have this game released for a handheld system, it's pretty fun. The songs are pretty good for the most part and the controller attachment (which plugs into the GBA slot on the bottom) is fairly intuitive. Strumming takes a few songs to really master, but (at least when it feels like working) becomes pretty ok. I'm just kind of annoyed that, as I said, there was no reason for this game to come out on DS. Just release another expansion like they did with "Rocks the 80's". It'll be less hard on our wrists (and I assure you, should you procure this game, that if you do not abide by the "take a break every 15 minutes" warning they give, you will develop arthritis before you beat it on easy). The kicker is that I would not be surprised at all if this shit wound up getting ported to something else anyway. I don't know, it's probably too early to tell.

I do have one huge gaping fucking qualm with the game though. Items in the store are locked. Not just special "you have to beat the game on hard or whatever" kinds of items either. Literally every item in the store is locked and has some arbitrary requirement to unlock it. Ordinarily I don't really mind unlockable content, but this is special because half of the things are unlocked by playing on easy and medium. Now I'm all for easing people into the difficulty curve of a game, but this is guitar hero. It's been out for a while and a lot of us may already be pretty fucking good at it. So I will say this in all capitals for emphasis: STOP MAKING ME FUCKING PLAY THE FUCKING GAME ON EASY AND MEDIUM. I HAVEN'T PLAYED THE FUCKING GAME ON EASY OR MEDIUM SINCE I GOT THE FIRST FUCKING GUITAR HERO GAME ALMOST 2 FUCKING YEARS AGO. GOING BACK TO PLAY EVERY SONG I'VE ALREADY PROVEN I CAN BEAT ON EXPERT ON EASY IS FUCKING INSULTING AND IT TURNS THE GAME INTO A CHORE. Ok, capslock off. So yeah, that's my major gripe...

This allows me to segue rather nicely to this announcement for Rock Band deuce. I'll give you a minute to read it. Done? Alrighty then. Does this game not look like the second coming? I swear it's almost enough to make the 200$ price tag seem worth it. Scratch that, I'd probably pay 3 and still feel like I was getting a hell of a bargain. Seriously, it sounds like with the attachment of just a few peripherals, this game could also become a combination blender/cuisinart.

Alright, that's all I've got for the time being. Keep it real, stay fresh, sick, and/or tight.

I nitpick otherwise enjoyable activities!

So it's been a while since I wrote anything. I'd apologize, but I don't give a shit. First, an administrative announcement:

Just Stunned hasn't updated in about a month. I know this. However, I started hitting wall after wall with the last week or so of strips that I did, and I was dissatisfied with the results, so I'm putting the comic on hiatus until I'm back in a comic-ing place. I'm not going to let it fizzle, but I do feel that I owe it to people to put out funny strips, and not just comics for comics' sake.

Now on to why I'm actually writing this: Of late, I've been playing quite a few video games, what with acquiring a shiny new DS, getting my xbox back from Microsoft, and having access to my own Wii again. That having been said, I've been noticing my gripes with some of my recent acquisitions have been building up almost as quickly as the things I love about them. First up:

Any game in the Mario Series: This gripe is spawned from mario games where you play as mario doing mario things, not to be confused with all out battles to the death, go-kart racing, and inexplicable, pointless, and repetitive party games. First of all, why does anyone use "lives" anymore? Lives were something that were created when games didn't have save features and were more or less beatable in one sitting if you were really good. The problem is, nowadays lives are just a way to punish you for getting stuck. Both "New Super Mario bros." and "Super Mario Galaxy" are guilty of this. You die, you go back to the last checkpoint you reached. You can do this ad nauseum should you still have lives. Once you run out you... uh... go back to the beginning of the level you got stuck on, meaning you have to go through all the shit you've proven you're capable of doing, only to get stuck on the same part. Until you run out of lives. Also, New Super Mario bros. has 2 entire worlds that you have to meet stupid and contrived requirements to get to. Not just levels, mind you, but full on worlds. World 4 as well as world 7 (out of 8) are not accessible should you play through the game the way any normal mario player would (left to right, jump on or throw fire at whatever gets in your way). Instead you go from world 3 to 5, then from 6 to 8 unless you meet some stupid requirements and find hidden pathways to worlds that for all intents and purposes, should just be accessible in the fucking game, given that numerically, they are BEFORE THE LAST FUCKING FIGHT. I looked up how to get to these levels on gamefaqs, and the methods typically involve using very hard to find items (like the magic shrinking mushroom which makes you even smaller and a one hit kill) in the final stages of worlds 2 and 5. My point is no rational person would think to do this because it deliberately makes what you're doing harder and less fun. So Nintendo, if you stop using lives and withholding features I fucking paid for in my games, then maybe I'll lighten up on you for once again releasing a system that ONLY YOU GUYS can make good games for.

Grand Theft Auto IV: From the number of perfect 10's and 9 point whatevers that this game got, you'd think that it signified the second coming of Christ. Fortunately, since Rockstar is not paying me obscene sums of money to plaster my blog with advertisements for their game, I have no qualms pointing out a few design tweaks that could have made what is a very good game (maybe an 8 in my opinion) into that 10 that IGN was so fucking eager to plaster across it. First things first: When I play a video game, I play it to retreat to a fantasy world where I can do things that I cannot do in real life (beating random pedestrians to death for no reason, waiting for the paramedics to show up, grenading their ambulance, then changing my clothes so the cops won't recognize me anymore). Here are a few things that happen to you in GTA IV.
* You have a cell phone. Now this wouldn't be so bad if you could only use it to make outgoing calls. The problem is you receive calls too. This means that you might want to go out and just play through some missions or kill random pedestrians until the army sends a tank up your asshole, but instead you get every lame-brained dipshit you have ever met in the game calling you all the fucking time wanting to hang out and get food and go to bars and stuff. This would be great if any of the stuff said dipshits ask you to do was actually fun. Instead you get treated to:

1. A lame darts minigame that is so childishly easy you have no problem scoring 301 points within 2 turns.
2. A lame pool minigame where you can view the table either from directly behind the cueball, or in a bird's eye view of the whole table. Now when has anyone EVER looked at the table from that angle except on unnecessary recaps in billiards tournaments on ESPN 2? Consequently, the game turns into you just mindlessly beating on the cue ball until you start deliberately trying to sink the 8 ball early so the game will just fucking end, but instead you halfheartedly knock around the 8 ball for a while because sinking shots is based purely on luck
3. Opportunities to go drinking which basically means an opportunity to drive drunk. Now here is what really bothers me. Provided I don't hit a cop car or kill a pedestrian in front of a cop, I can do whatever the fuck I feel like in a vehicle without currying police attention. However, once you're drunk (and believe me when I say driving well is impossible when you are) if you so much as drive near a cop, they start chasing you. Why shoot for realism on one end of the spectrum, but not on the other? It also bears mentioning that cops will chase you if you, and i will italicize this for emphasis, fail to pay a bridge toll.
   
4. Strip clubs where you can't do anything but watch repetitive and boring lapdances by mediocre character models
5. Food places where, and I am not making this up, the whole activity is driving to the food place, automatically losing $50 (even if you go to the McDonald's equivalent), then driving your douchebag friend who can't make their way to you even if they are in a completely separate burrow back to where they want to go.

The kicker is, if you DON'T do these stupid inane activities, you don't get valuable benefits they confer (free cab rides, cheap weapons). Sometimes the characters themselves are so annoying you don't want to listen to them ever, but you're forced to hang out with them so you get the bonuses for doing so (for players of the game, see: Brucie and Roman).

*The cops are way too easily alerted to your presence. I touched on this with the drunk driving/toll bridge thing, but I feel it bears a double mention because it gets really fucking annoying after a while. I don't know if they beefed up the cops' programming or just added more, but it seems like even when I'm not doing illegal things, a stray button push or an accidental bumper tap has me running from the fucking law for the next 20 goddamn minutes. It doesn't help that they come after you in such force that you kind of need to kill a few just to make your escape, which gives you a higher wanted level, meaning you have to run for another 20 fucking minutes... you get the idea.

I guess my overall gripe with the game is that it is inconsistent in how realistic it wants to be. Car crashes can now fling you through the windshields, getting punched doesn't lower body armor levels, you can now move faster than a walk when you're holding something heavier than a handgun... These are all good things, and it's certainly not as bad as say, cops in Driv3r, which is read Driver 3 for the uninitiated, chasing you with vigor typically reserved for #1 on the FBI's 10 most wanted list for running a red light, but still. This game is cartoon caricature violence at its finest, and it gets wrecked by having cops jump up your ass for tapping their car after you swerve to (against your better instincts) avoid a hapless pedestrian. They got rid of the ridiculous "your character needs to eat and exercise" requirements from San Andreas, but there are still a few things. I realize that Nicco will make friends in the course of the game, but for fuck's sake, if I don't need to make him eat and go to the bathroom, why do I need to take these assholes to dinner on my dime, requiring me to steal a car which usually results in me running around for a long time trying to avoid the cops that saw me from half a mile away. The point is if I wanted to take freeloading assholes out to lunch, I'd call my real friends (just kidding, you know I love most of you). When I play my video games, I'm doing typically to AVOID going out and doing things.

I'm gonna turn this into a two-parter, because this is getting ungodly long. Thanks for reading and stay tuned for part two!