Come see the DUCK!!

Haven't been up to all that much lately, really. Just work and stuff. And when I don't work, I sit in front of the computer and surf for nothing in particular.

Well, I guess that's not quite true. I've been doing a lot of webcomic reading and music downloading. I added websnark to my bookmarks which probably helped. And I added websnark because I was switching over to Firefox, so maybe all the thanks should go to Firefox. Firefox really is quite lovely. Yes I know that I really use really and quite quite a lot.

Websnark is just some guy talking about webcomics. Doesn't sound all that exciting, and it isn't really, (there's that word again) but the guy isn't an idiot and has some fairly good points and I have this odd compulsion to read other people's thoughts about things.

Websnark led me to Questionable Content. In addition to being a fairly decent li'l webcomic, the author/artist is always recommending music I've usually never heard of. And I've liked almost all of it. I'm getting all indie and shit. I never would have heard of Deerhoof otherwise. But I heard of The Go! Team via Nintendorks. I love The Go! Team, they're like a great soundtrack to a fantastic 70's movie. Or something. I'm not quite sure of the best way to describe them.

TOUCH!!!!

I bought a DS. A few days ago already. My original plan, I think, was to take pictures of me opening the box and all that good stuff. Document this momentous occasion. But I didn't, I just kind of tore into the box and started playing. Pictochat alone kept me amused for over an hour. Dear Christ do I love Nintendo. They just put crazy amounts of thought into everything. Like the startup noises. Starting up a GameCube makes me happy. Hearing the distinctive wash of sound and Bing! that accompanies the powering up of a GBA makes me happy. And now, the discordant and echo-y p-ping of starting up a DS brings me joy. And the pictochat sounds. A lot of developers might have just let it be silent, but not Nintendo, they gave almost everything a sound. The perfect sound. There might be people who find the sounds annoying, well they can just turn down the volume can't they.

I didn't pick up the Mario rehash with my DS, nor Feel the Love. Man, them games is old hat. I'm live in the now, baby, not in last fucking month. I live in Japan, not in North fucking America. Why buy games that can be bought in Canada, when I can buy games that are only available over here? So I bought the Wario DS game.

I can say now, without a shadow of a doubt, that this game is the best game on the DS right now. For me, personally, it was worth buying a DS for. But that's me. I'd also say that the N64 was worth it just for Mario 64. I'm going to assume that we've all of us here played Made in Wario. This game is just like that one, but played entirely with a stylus. It is divine. This is a game you could give to just about anyone and they would figure out what to do. It is the most "pick up and play"able game ever. Except maybe for pong. Hell, I couldn't read most of what was going on and I still beat it. Yep. I beat it. I beat it on the second day of ownership. But that's okay. Shit, I beat Mega Man 2 on the second day and it is still my favourite Mega Man game.

Like I say, it's about the little touches. These Wario games are comprised almost entirely of little 5 second chunks of gameplay. 5 seconds ain't all that long, but Nintendo still manages to cram so much personality in there. The way a toupee shifts slightly, the victory poses, "A Chance Encounter", snippets of old Nintendo game music. It surprised me that I still knew the music from Hogan's Alley and that Skeet Shooting game. It may have been called Skeet Shoot. It's like this game rewards me for a lifelong love of videogames.

I also bought Zoo Keeper. It's your basic move around the different blocks to line up three of a kind type of puzzle game. Nothing mind blowing. But it's well done, and the stylus really helps. You can still use the control pad, but all that does is show you how much faster and easier the game plays with a stylus. And the female announcer has , like, the cutest voice I have ever heard.

I haven't seen my credit card statement yet, but I saved a fair bit of money buying the DS here in Japan as well. The only drawback to that is that the Japanese DS doesn't come with the Metroid: Hunters demo. That kind of bummed me out a little. But then I played some Zoo Keeper and that girl's voice cheered me right up.

I Tell You What To Listen To

Use your music finding software and tell it to find songs by the following people/groups: Asian Kung Fu Generation, Bennie K, and Utada. DO IT!!!

I Always Think of Good Titles When I Don't Need Them

I don't have a DS yet. I tried. And I failed. But, BUT I was a part of this...

This was one of the many TOUCH! displays set up around Osaka, encouraging people to try out this crazy new DS doo-hicky. The way it works is as follows: you go up to any of the cute, mini skirt clad girls and she would place the DS into your hands, lean over your shoulder, show you how to play and then offer words of encouragement. They smelled nice.

Nintendogs is one of the games I played. Basically a pet simulator. Pet dog simulator. You can pet them and play with them and talk to them. It was very cute. A very gimmicky, shallow game but one that compels me to own it.

Since I didn't manage to pick up a DS on the launch day, I am hoping to maybe pick one up on the 12th. That is the PSP launches here in Japan. That's right: Fuck you Sony!

Touch this!!!

Sorry

I can tell when I've been lax in my blogging. If Kelley's blog has updated since the last ime I've blogged, I've been lazy. That's not so much a knock on Kelley as it is an indicator of my slightly competitive nature.

I have been busy trying to find work. And getting into a bit of a funk about not finding any. It sucks that morons who come over solely for the pussy are getting hired instead of me. They should either give me their job or their girlfriend.

I still don't know how to continue the story. I want to go back and re-write the last entry, add a lot more detail. Describe the stable in depth. But I won't. I'll figure something out. Or I'll give up.

More Festa

But now it has been over a week since the Festa and I just can't seem to get myself all worked up over it again. It was a good time. But I'm not sure what else I can really say about most of the games I played. But, for you kids, I'll give it the old college try.

I didn't really try that hard in college.

Christ, I'm having trouble remembering all what I played.

Mario64x4: Didn't like it as much as I thought I would. This game needs analogue control. I mean that in the most serious, literal way possible. This was the game that introduced analogue control to the consoles. I know that you can use the Touch! screen to effect quasi-analogue control, but it wasn't nearly as responsive as it needed to be. Without the faint resistance of an analogue stick, it was much harder to get the precision I wanted. And the control pad? Forget it.

All that being said, the game was still great. But a great port of a fantastic game is still disappointing. The minigames were fun. I didn't get to try them all out, but the ones I did try took great advantage of the system and were easy to pick up and play. I didn't get to try the multiplayer though.

I tried the Wario Ware DS game and... wario games are just fantastic. Pure genius! You know how you can tell when a game is pure genius? Tommy Tallarico doesn't get it. Fuck that midget is dumb pile of fuck. But back to WarioWare (Called Made In Wario over here): back before the DS, I was a bit worried that they might run out of ideas. Cuz every new games needs at least 300 mini games in it, at least half of those new, that's a lot of little games. When I saw that the GameCube game didn't really add anything but multiplayer, I got a bit concerned. The game was still stupidly fun, but I was afraid it might Ware out its welcome sooner than I would like. Did you see what I did there? With the pun? Yeah, I'm just that good.

But all my doubts were for naught. The new GBA game that was just released a little while ago here in Japan has a motion sensor which opens up all sorts of new games. The DS offers nigh-limitless possibilities. Silly me, I had forgotten all about that Nintendo innovates.

So yeah, Wario DS is fantastic. Is it a launch game over in North America? It should be. This game is a system seller. Way more than Mario 64x4. I love the little touches in this game. When rounds are only 5 seconds long, why would they even bother with the little touches? Because they are Nintendo. There's a minigame where all you have to do is draw a line between two buildings so a stick man can escape a fire. Easy. But the line is almost never perfectly straight, there's bumps and dips and such. And the stick man moves along these bumps and such perfectly as he moves between the buildings. I love that. Tonnes of minigames, the likes of which you've never had to do before in a video game.

I didn't get to try out Pictochat because my Japanese is crap.


Played Shadow of Rome by Capcom. I enjoyed it. But I sucked at it. I think the buttons corresponded to your limbs, but I never really got used to it. Mainly I just threw my sword at people. Not on purpose. Lots of blood, that was nice. The camera was a bit crap though, so that was not so good. I didn't play any of the stealth sections, but I think I've mentioned my thoughts on stealth missions before.

If not, here they are in quick form. Unless it's Zelda, Metal Gear, or a game involving ninjas, spies or Sam Fisher, leave stealth the fuck out of my game. For some reason, developers seem to think that it adds variety to their games. Mainly it just adds frustration.

The best part of playing Shadow of Rome was that I was right next to the Devil May Cry 3 machines. There are some cool ass real time cinemas in that game. The combat looks pretty good too. Resident Evil for is still god-damn gorgeous and still controls a bit sloppy for my liking.


The other thing I should mention about Capcom's section is that it's weird seeing the Capcom logo on Tom Clancy games.


I guess since I mentioned it in my last post, I should probably talk about Metal Gear Solid 3. I can't say that much about it because I didn't play that much of it. I picked up the controller, started a new game, skipped the opening cinema because I just wanted to play the game damnit. Then the codec screen popped up. I jammed on the buttons to skip through the dialogue, but it just kept going. And going and going and going and going and going and going and going and going. And going. I finally gained control of Snake, so I tried doing all sorts of things. I succeeded only in shooting some alligators, watched them lamely disappear and then drowned myself in a swamp. That was my experience with MGS3:Half as Much Talking as Last Time, But Still 5 Times as Much Talking as This Game Actually Needs.



I played some DOA:Ultimate and was dismayed that I forgot most of Tina's moves. But she still had boobies, so I wasn't that upset.

Can't really think of what else I played. Viewtiful Joe 2 was good. DS was god. Rogue Agent was crap. All the Japanese girls were cute and hot.

Love Jam

Look closely at this picture. It is the cover to this girl's new C.D called "Love Jam". Her face and tongue are covered in 'love jam' and she seems to like it. Dear god I love this country.
I'm tired. I go now.

Why No Pictures?

I meant for there to be some pictures in my Game Festa entry, but my uploader program is a little moody right now. I'll put them up some time soon. Japanese chicks is hawt!

Japan Games Festa

So, it was mentioned on my other blog that Carla and I attended the Japan Games Festa. And that it was good. Both those statements are true. If that is all you need to know, then you can probably stop reading now. Cuz I'm gonna go way more in depth about it. Geeky crazy more in depth. Or maybe I'll get tired and do a really half-assed job.

As I mentioned on my other site, the first game I tried out was one from Sega called kimi no tame nara shineru. Loosely translated, it means "I would die for you". The American title is Feel the Magic: XX/XY or somesuch. And it was good. As were the shirts that the people wore to promote the game. As was the cute Japanese girl who whispered words of encouragement as I tried to get the guy in the game to vomit up goldfish. She clapped when I succeeded. That made me happy.

The game was harder than I was expecting, mainly because the people in line in front of me didn't seem to have nearly the problems I did. Maybe because I held the stylus funny, I don't know. I still had fun. The DS, I am willing to state right now, will be pantloads of fun.

While I was waiting in line to play the DS, (the DS games had the biggest lines in the show. Followed closely, or tied, by Capcom's Biohazard 4 and Devil May Cry 3) I looked at some of the other games on display around where I was standing. There was some kind of RPG that looked cute and good, full of hand drawn sprite-y goodness. Shining Tears it may have been called. Next to that were some Altered Beast demo units. I meant to go back and play them later but I never did. Looked like a 3-D beat-em-up with gruesome CG transformation cut scenes. There was some Outrun 2 which I also didn't play and some fighting games that I also didn't play. Wow, I really didn't play a lot of Sega games, really only the one, because it will be released on a Nintendo system. Man, Kelly must hate me right now. To be fair, I meant to go back and play Altered Beast, and I didn't want to be embarrassed in front of elite Japanese haxxorz when I suxxored at Outrun 2 and the 2-D fighters. I didn't want to loose face.

Opposite all these Sega games were a whole lot of EA games and a dating simulation game. I didn't play the dating sim, but one time when I looked over, an anime girl in a short skirt was sitting on some guy's face. Looked like fun. Anyhoo, EA had a fair few games on display. The Lord of the Rings RPG was there. It looked nice, from what I could see when other people played it. I didn't play it myself, as the menu screens were full of kanji that I couldn't read. There was Need For Speed Underground 2 which looked much like the first. I wasn't interested in the first one either. Burnout 3 was there, but I own that game. It rocks. I meant to play that game at some point during the day as well. Then there were a lot of sports games. Then there was Goldeneye: Rogue Agent. It was playable on both the PS2 and the Gamecube. Every other game in the whole hall had line ups except for the Rogue Agent demo units. I know that the Japanese aren't all that fond of First Person Shooters, but this was kind of ridiculous. Plus, as I later saw, the Halo2 section of Demo units always had a line and all 5 of their machines were always in use.

I'm gonna break from strict chronology here. You see, I didn't play Goldeneye: Rogue Agent right away, Carla and I wandered the floor after the Sega DS game (BUY IT!). I came back to Rogue Agent (I refuse to call it Goldeneye) much later in the day. I'm gonna talk about it now though, because it was easily the worst game I played all day and I don't want it bothering me later.

So yeah, when I went back to play it the first time, the Cube version wasn't working. It was on some kind of error message and no combination of button pushing would get it to do anything. Maybe I am a bit biased, but I think the GameCube is the most stable console on the market right now. The PS2, and my feelings towards it are fairly well known. I think it sucks. I think PS2s are manufactured with built in obsolescence. And not the regular, "Have to buy the PS3!" obsolescence, but having to buy multiple PS2s cuz they crap out obsolescence. The XBox is flaky as well. I've lost count of the number of demo units I've seen in game stores with error messages on their screens. The GameCube is not without it's faults but it's a sturdier piece of hardware. I'm willing to bet that the error message from the Rogue Agent game had nothing to do with a malfunction in the Cube. Rather, it was some crap code that EA missed cuz they shit out crap product. Or maybe there wasn't a memory card inserted. EA, unlike every other publisher/developer out there can't seem to figure out how to make their games run without memory cards. It's fucking annoying.

The second time I went back, it was stuck on a different screen.

Why didn't I play the PS2 version? Because I am biased, that's why. Plus I prefer the Cube controller for shooters. To be honest, I think the XBox controller is best for shooters. But that may have something to do with Halo being on that machine. Plus you couldn't play multiplayer on the PS2. There were 4 controllers hooked up to the Cube only one to the PS2. Wow, I'm spending entirely too much time on Rogue Agent. Especially since I might write a later blog entry about how much EA sucks.

The third time I went back to try the game, one of the Festa staff members was trying to get it working. He waded through menu screen after menu screen. I think he went through the same ones a few times over as well. That EA, they sure know how to craft a user friendly front end! He eventually got it working, but only in multiplayer. No one wanted to play with me. Not even Carla. So I gave it a go on my own. This game sucks. It sucks hard. This game looks like crap in mulitiplayer. Like a non-blurry N64 Goldeneye. That ain't a compliment. And it moves so slow! Slower than the N64 original. And when I say original, I do not intend to infer that Rogue Agent is in any way a sequel. No one who worked on the N64 game had anything to do with this piece of shit. This game has nothing to do with the movie. It is called Goldeneye because the main character, an evil guy, has a Golden eye. How fucking stupid is that? So yeah, the multiplayer plays worse than a seven year old game. How is that even possible? I mean, they could have just added some new characters to the N64 game, maybe a couple new weapons and speeded it up a bit and it would have been just fine. But no, they manage to fuck it up completely. From what I saw of the single player version, it fares only slightly better. The enemies seemed dim, and the animation was fairly crap. So bad. Fuck EA. Carla, who took pitty on me, picked up another controller and played for no more than 2 minutes before setting the controller back down and declaring that the game sucked ass. When the lady is right, she's right.

Let's lighten the mood a little. Halo 2 rocked. I'm sure a most of you already know that. Looked gorgeous. I only saw one instance of texture pop in, but who the fuck cares man, those grenade explosions are divine! And if they propel someone into a wall, where they realistically slide to the ground and crumple in all sorts of interesting ways, so much the better. And it controls like a dream. It wasn't configured to my liking at all, but still I was killing and evading like a pro. Only occasionally staring at the ground or the sky. I didn't play my best, in fact I out and out sucked my first round, but I did okay. That sword is awesome. As is double wielding. I didn't carjack anyone, nor did anyone else. Man, I can't wait to get home and have Seve smite me over and over and over in that game. The gaping chasm of quality between Halo 2 and the Bond game could not be bigger.

Dragon Quest 7 was there, but I didn't play any of the role playing games on offer because that is just too much reading and I read too damn slow. There were other SquareEnix games on offer, including one that no one was allowed to take pictures of. It was some kind of strategy card game starring super deformed versions of all sorts of characters form all sorts of Square and Enix games.

There was an Incredibles game for the GBA and one for the PS2. The GBA game looked like a run of the mill beat em up with a fairly limited arsenal of moves. The PS2 game looked really good and played fairly well. I beat up a bunch of goons in a very nice looking roof top level and then caught some explosives and threw them back at the flying bastards who had lobbed them at me. The I triggered a cinema that froze. So I slunk away. There was some kind of quasi Matrix-y looking game from Taito. It looked lame but fun. I didn't play it.

I played Rumble Roses. And I urge you all to do the same. Seriously. All of you who have access to a PS2, go play this game right now. This game makes Dead or Alive look tame. It is so over the top in its objectification of the female form that it's impossible to take seriously. So much jiggle. And the game engine under all the eye candy is pretty solid. You need to experience a mudwrestling match in skimpy bikinis. Every time there is an excuse for the camera to zoom into one of the girls' crotch or chest area, it does. Man. It almost makes me want to get a PS2 when I get back home. Almost.

I've gone on for a fair bit here, and Carla and I have an excursion planned for tomorrow so maybe I will split this coverage into two parts, maybe more.

I guess that's all for now. Tune in next time where I will bitch about Metal Gear Solid!

Perverted Ramblings

Dear God. I mean seriously.

The girls here (not all of them) wear their skirts so damn short. They have to be a certain length during school hours, but once they leave school grounds, they just hike em up to nearly their armpits. It is a wonderful sight.

Carla and I were walking around Kyoto, enjoying the lovely weather and enjoying the sights. We were walking along a pleasant little stream. We approached a corner, and that was where I saw it: a schoolgirl foot. As we walked closer, the leg came in to view and what a wondrous leg it was! Pale, smooth, unmarred, unblemished. We kept walking, more and more of the leg was revealed. How far up is this leg going to go? I wondered to myself. ALL THE WAY UP! My mind nearly shot out my nose as I saw the gentle curve of her thigh melt into the glorious calypigian roundness of her behind. She was sitting on the ground, knees bent, skirt only long enough to protect her ass from the ground, but not my gaze.

But it got better, she was sitting and chatting with her friend. Her friend who was also wearing a short skirt. Her friend who was sitting with her feet on the ground, knees sharply bent, legs wide open. Her friend who didn't seem to realize what she was shareing with the world. Or, even better, she did know and got off on that knowledge. I can now understand the Japanese male's obsession with undergarments.

I always think that I have pictures of what I saw, so burned into my mind's eye are they. But I don't. But the memories will last a lifetime.

I know I sound like a complete perv, but I don't fucking care. I saw what I saw and I liked what I saw and there is nothing I can do to change it. Listen to me, defending myself. I must be getting old.

Flin Florn and Flarn

I seem to be like the Star Trek movie with my recent blog novel or "Blovel" updates. The Even Ones (of which there is only one) are good, whilst the Odd Ones (unfortunately, there are twice as many) are less so. This irks me. What irks me even more is that I have no idea where the hell the story is going. I have a few ideas of what I might do next, but I don't think I like any of them. Here are my options so far: Lucky finds a switch that lowers a section of the stable floor down into a futuristic tunnel. Lucky is awoken by someone who thinks he is Steve/Dave. Lucky goes back out into the storm, Peaches knows the way. Jane finds Lucky in the stable and wither fucks or shoots him, maybe both. Lucky wakes up in some other time and place entirely.

A fair few options, I just don't know which one, if any, I am going to choose.

Damn.

Wherein The Plot Gets Lost, Maybe

"Hey Peaches." Lucky said as he patted his horse's muzzle. The horse made a happy noise. Lucky smiled, though it hurt his nose to do so.

"It's a good thing you came along when you did, Peaches, these legs o' mine are filled with a fair bit of hurt." The horse, who Lucky couldn't really see on account of the storm, flipped Lucky's hand off of it's nose and sounded a dismissive snort. "You heard that did ya?" Lucky said as his face turned a little pink. "Sorry Peaches, you know how I can carry on sometimes."

The horse didn't 'say' anything in return, it just stuck its head under Lucky's armpit and nudged him upwards. Lucky slowly took to his feet, feeling the pain howl through his lower legs. "mph." he said, not wanting to upset his horse. The horse licked his left ear affectionately. "Thanks, but what I really need for you to do is kneel down for me, these legs can barely keep me standing. They ain't gonna let me hop on your back."

The horse did as it was asked and Lucky eased himself onto its back. "Oh man! That's worlds better!" Lucky collapsed forward, eyes closed, enjoying the fleeing of the pain. He patted Peaches' neck. I don't know how you found me, buddy, but I'm glad you did. Maybe you can find us a place to wait this (Lucky's first word choice was bitch, but he demurred) storm out." Before he was even finished talking, Peaches was moving.

It was an odd feeling, the horse moving underneath him. Lucky remembered being nearly raised on horseback, but those memories seemed almost unreal. The muscles working beneath him uncovered old memories, just to have them blown away with the wind. Lucky sat up and gave his head a shake. "It seems like you know where you're going."

The wind died down just enough for Lucky to see Peaches' head motion ahead and to the right. Lucky hoped maybe the storm was dying down, but the wind picked right up again, nearly tearing him of his horse's back.

A few minutes later they were out of the wind. Peaches had brought them into a stable. Just like in the bar, the wind and dust and grit seemed to stop at the door.

Lucky was debating whether or not to get down when Peaches made the decision for him. The horse kneeled down and turned its head to look at Lucky. "Right." Lucky gingerly dismounted and was relieved to find that the pain was much more bearable. He wouldn't be sprinting any time soon, but he could walk fair enough. As soon as Lucky was off, Peaches stood up, shook out it's mane and cantered over to a dead horse. Peaches gave Lucky a meaningful look and then began tearing into the horse's guts.

"Looks like you've been busy." remarked Lucky as he walked over to join his horse. "Real busy." as he saw the other two horse corpses. One of the horses had been hitched to a railing, so its head was stretched out at a most unpleasant looking angle. It was fairly obvious that these horses belonged to the posse that had found Lucky in the bar. One (the hitched) looked like it's owner didn't take good care of it, one looked like it's back was bowed and one (the one being eaten) just plain looked like a dick. "I understand that one," Lucky indicated the jerk horse with his head, "but did you have to kill these other two?" Most people have never seen a horse shrug. Lucky was not one of those people.

Lucky hunkered down on his haunches, inhaled sharply, then plopped his butt on the earthen floor. He went through all the saddle bags. Nothing all that terribly useful. A bit more money, some bullets, a slightly chewed chunk of jerky. Lucky packed away his findings then set out to look around the place a bit. It wasn't all that big a building: four stalls, two on either side, two large, open spaces, one on each side of the stalls, one filled with a few dead horses, the other one empty but for hay. Other than outside the only place left to check was up in the loft, and Lucky's shins didn't welcome the idea of going up or down that ladder. Lucky's stomach didn't much relish the thought of staying down on the ground with Peaches gnawing away and that horse with its awkward angled head and dead staring eyes.

"Fuck it." said Lucky, in his head. He started up the ladder, quite relieved to find that his legs didn't hurt near as bad as his shins had led him to believe they would. He found three bedrolls up in the loft, along with some masticated corn cobs, plenty of cigar stumps and cigarette butts, and a half full flask of unpleasant tasting hooch.

"Why the hell were they camped out up here?"

Lucky thought the best way to get to the bottom of all this was to sleep on it, so he finished of the flask in one great gulp, rolled himself up in Steve/Dave's bed, and closed his eyes.

Better, Maybe

See, that's what I like about writing. I just kinda started typing, with a very vague idea of what I wanted to say, of what I wanted to happen, and all sorts of other shit came out. I'd talk about the cool shit I mean, but this post will come before the post I'm talking about so I will ruin it for whoever reads this chronologically. Which is not that many people, but I am nothing if not considerate. I'll talk about the Wherein Doubts are Had bit as an example instead. That whole waking up naked in a military base popped into my head as I was typing out the sentence. Hell, other than the fact that Lucky was going to have doubts about leaving the bar, I had nothing else in my brain. (oh fuck it, I'm gonna talk about the wherein I just just wrote)SPOILER!! That part with all the Fucks in the last bit, totally came out of nowhere. END SPOILER!! I'm not all that pleased so far with the way I'm handling the plot so far, but I like all my little asides. Of course those will be what pisses most people off, I'd wager. But I'm having fun. I like writing. Which comes in handy when trying to write a novel in a month.

Wherein Fuck Is Used More Than Once

Still, there was a chance that Lucky might end up back in the bar. And not after he makes a heroic return, having vanquished whatever Great Evil is plaguing this land either. There was a good chance that Lucky might've stumbled back into the bar whilst wandering blindly through the dust storm.

Not to say that there was a Great Evil plaguing this land. Lucky had no idea if there was or wasn't, but he was leaning towards was. It just seemed to always happen that Lucky found himself in the position of being the one to stand in the face of Great Evil. And of him being lucky enough to make it out of said position alive. Lucky couldn't count how much evil he had vanquished. Partly because he had a very spotty memory. And partly because as soon as he began thinking of such things, his mind invariably started debating with itself about the nature of evil; of how maybe Lucky himself was the evil one and all the people he killed were not so bad really, once you got to know them. And partly because he really had vanquished a lot of evil.

Still, Lucky had no idea what to do with himself. His only option, as far as he could reckon, was to walk. It didn't matter what direction, since the wind would knock him off any course he might vainly choose. Mindlessly walking had served him well. Sure, it usually brought him into the path of the aforementioned Evil, but it also brought him back out again relatively unscathed.

So Lucky started walking. One foot in front of the other. Fairly big strides. He wasn't the type to inch forward. The wind blew him this way and that. It tugged at his clothes, his guns, his/Dave's/Steve's hat. Lucky tried to pay it no mind. Which was not a problem as his mind was dwelling on other things. On Jane's lap, on Steve being a Dave and/or vice versa, on half memories and fragments of other lives and other times. His mind was so far away that he didn't notice how much his shin hurt until his nose was bleeding.

Lucky's shin had run right into the boardwalk, and Lucky's momentum pitched him forward, nose first onto the walk. Lucky assumed it was a boardwalk, what with him being the old west and with it feeling like a bunch of boards beneath his sore face. He took a few moments to assess the situation and then took the course of action he thought most appropriate.

"FUCK! FUCK! FUCK! FUCK! FUCK! FUCK! FUCK! FUCK! FUCK! FUCK! FUCK! FUCK! FUCK! FUCK! FUCK! FUCK!" He screamed as he rolled onto his back.

"FUCK! FUCK! FUCK! FUCK! FUCK! FUCK! FUCK! FUCK! FUCK! FUCK! FUCK! FUCK! FUCK! FUCK! FUCK! FUCK!" He screamed as he sat up and began rubbing his shin, feeling it already beginning to swell.

"FUCK! FUCK! FUCK! FUCK! FUCK! FUCK! FUCK! FUCK! FUCK! FUCK! FUCK! FUCK! FUCK! FUCK! FUCK! FUCK!" He screamed as he gingerly touched his nose, checking to see if it was broken.

"FUCK! FUCK! FUCK! FUCK! FUCK! FUCK! FUCK! FUCK! FUCK! FUCK! FUCK! FUCK! FUCK! FUCK! FUCK! FUCK!" He screamed as he found that it was not.

"FUCK! FUCK! FUCK! FUCK! FUCK! FUCK! FUCK! FUCK! FUCK! FUCK! FUCK! FUCK! FUCK! FUCK! FUCK! FUCK!" He screamed, not caring if Jane heard. No, to be truthful he did care a little but not near enough to stop screaming fuck.

In fact he would have kept screaming that world for a good long while if not for the wet pinkness that attacked his face.

Yeah... Sorry About That

That little bit of story (Wherein Doubts Are Had) wasn't that great and I'll be the first to admit it. The idea behind it still has some merit to it, I reckon. The hero of the story worrying about he will be perceived. I like that thought. If I would have just kept writing the story way back when the idea first occurred to me, I think it would have turned out better. But I took a long ass break and I forgot how goddamn tall this horse I have to get back on to is. Plus I'm allergic to horses. But no matter. Not that I think I will actually complete this story within the month, and not that I think this story will even be novel sized when done, but the spirit of this NaNoWriMo is to just say FUCK IT and keep writing. So I guess that is what I should do.

Wherein Doubts Are Had

Lucky strode with purpose into the storm. That purpose fled with the surroundings. Whithin seconds he was ensconced in swirling brown-ness. He turned around. The bar was no longer there. Oh, it was still there, Lucky just couldn't see it. This wasn't like that one time when the world tore itself down and then rebuilt itself in front of Lucky's horrified eyes. It took a week for his voice to come back, he screamed it away so violently. The next day Lucky had no voice and no recollection of why it had gone away. These two problems made explaining to the unpleasant men with guns why he was naked and inside a military base.

But getting back to this now, this now has almost nothing in common with that then. The world was not changing, it was just blowing a lot.

Lucky thought about retreating back to the relative safety of the bar. There was less wind in there. A conspicuous lack of wind, now that Lucky thought back on it. Why hadn't the saloon doors been blowing and banging in the wind? Why hadn't there been dust all over the place. These were interesting questions and Lucky very much wanted to find out the answers to them. By sitting inside the non-blowy, non-dusty bar. Preferably close to Jane. Jane's lap was warm. Lucky missed it something fierce, in spite of the fact that he had only just met her. Thinking of Jane brought another thought to his mind.

"I left the bar looking like such a bad ass." Lucky said to the wind. "Iconic. I can't just scamper back in there complaining about a little wind. Fuck." Lucky half hoped that the wind was swallowing up his words half hoped that it was carrying them straight to Jane's ears. He whole hoped that she would come running through those doors oddly unaffected by the storm and yell after him. Beg him to stay a spell.

But she didn't.

"Still," Lucky thought out loud, "maybe walking back in there wouldn't look that bad. Maybe even laugh about it later. Her and I, naked, content in the afterglow. Drinking and laughing, glad and embarrassed that I came back. Fuck."

But Lucky knew that he wouldn't stroll back into the bar, he had his pride. He had chosen a path of action and he wasn't going to turn from it so quickly.

Plus he had no idea how to get back to where he so longed to be.

"Fuck."

See Below

It is now officially National Novel writing Month or NaNoWriMo. I figured that since I already had a story started on this here site, I might as well use NaNoWriMo as an excuse to do some more work on it. Just to refresh your memory, seeing as I've been lax with the new story bits, all new bits of story shall have a title of "Wherein..." Fer instance, right after this post, I shall knock off the next chunk o' prose and it shall be called "Wherein Doubts Are Had." and it will be universally hailed as where my story turned to shit. I have no idea what I'm doing here, guys. This will be total seat of the pants improv. Try not to throw sharp things at me.

Ewwwww...

I am a little creeped out right about now. One of our neighbours is an American named Tim. Right now he is trying to seduce a Japanese girl. He's got some crap slow R&B music playing, heavy on the bass, and he's laughing way too much. A real creepy laugh. Like you'd hear coming out of a twelve year old boy who's pretty sure he's about to see a boobie, but coming out of a leacherous old man. High and desperate and forced. Creepy. I don't like it. I don't like how it's a student of his that he's trying to fuck. That's a little wrong. At first I thought he had hired himself a lady friend, but then I heard some of their conversation and it was about speaking English well.

Maybe I should describe Tim a bit. He's a thick man. I'm trying to think of an easy comparison. A name or actor that would make everyone go "Oh, I know that guy!" But I can't. He's about 5'10, older than me(but not by much), with short dark hair. He looks like he used to be in shape but has just been coasting these last few years and most of his muscle has turned to fat. He'd still be able to kick the shit out of me, but he'd be really winded at the end of it. His most striking feature is his birthmark, it's on his face. A violent pink splotch that covers about a fifth of his face, centered around his right eye. He struck me as a creep right off the bat, so maybe I'm judging him a bit harshly. But my gut is usually not wrong.

God, there's that laugh again. I really don't like the sound of it. There's a greasy, evil undercurrent to it. Like the twelve year old is thinking to himself, "If I don't get to see that boob, I'm going to go drown a kitten."

I hope he moves.

Mickey loves the cock.

Tekken 5

Tekken 5 is out now in the arcades here and everyone is all in a tizzy.We stopped by an arcade, a Namco arcade to check it out. The first thing we saw was this promo video, showing off the new features of the game. Basically, anything that was good about Virtua Fighter 4 in the arcade, Tekken rips it off and pretends it came up with the idea all on its own. You can play against players all over Japan via TekkenNet. You can unlock stuff, new costumes and such, and save it to a memory card. You are graded on how well you fight. Plus, there's new characters. At least three. Probably more. Not that it matters. It seems all Tekken Players in Japan use Paul. In the short time we were in that arcade, we saw countless Paul vs. Paul matches. Other than his hair, I just don't see Paul's appeal. It is common knowledge that Paul is a shit name and only stupid people who eat their own waste are called by said name.

All that being said, there were a fair few people waiting in line to play Tekken. From what I could tell from the sidelines, the game looks like a prettier Tekken 4. Which was a prettier Tekken 3, which was a prettier Tekken 2, which was a hell of a lot better looking than Tekken 1. As you can tell, I ain't the world's biggest Tekken fan. I've played them all, save for 5, and I like them all. But I don't own any of them. I wait until they are released on a home console, I rent them, I unlock everything and then I go back to playing Soul Calibur, DOA3 and Melee.

Here is a picture of Paul in action. He's a bit blurry, in a vain attempt at disguising how lame he is. But we all know his terrible secret. He's a Paul, and always will be.



There was plenty of other stuff to play other than T5, including some more really interesting games that will never make it to North America. Like this here sword fighting game. Meaning, you pick up the sword attached to the machine and swing it around to dispatch the enemies on screen. Like a light gun game but with a sword. There's a bit of skill involved too, as you can dodge, parry and even perform combos. Pretty Nifty.

Pretty Fucking bizzare is this game. A comedy game, if my understanding of Japanese is to be trusted (and it is not!). Basically, you follow the action on screen and slap and beat the crap out of the dummy provided in order to make the audience laugh. Never saw anyone play it and I didn't play it myself as there's now way I would be able to read the onscreen prompts fast enough.

Quest of D was there in full effect. I still don't know much more about this game than what I related last time I spoke of it, but now I have pictures of it! Woot! I even have pictures of the touch screen being used! LOOK! Look there! She is touching the screen, making magic with her fingertip! Truly a powerful wiccan is she! Behold her vast command of the arcane arts!


Virtua Cop 3 was there if you wanted to shoot things. There was also a strange ping pong game. That's all for now.



Wait, I wanna give a shout out to my good friend Paul. He loves the cock almost as much as Mickey. Not that there's anything wrong with that. Except that Paul likes the shit encrusted cock, which I think is a little unhygienic.

This One Is For the Kelley

This is the post where I rub Kelley's face in the fact that I am in the land of videogames and he is not. Sure, he then might try to rub my face in the fact that the DS gets released in North America first but I'll still get to play it before him. There's a free videogame festival happening here in the middle of November. So there!

Anyhoo... whilst out wandering today, I stumbled across Sega World. "A world of Sega?" I thought to myself, "If it's anything like Sega games, it'll be better in theory than in actual practice." Using that logic, I almost didn't investigate. But then I figured what the hell and went in anyway.

It was full of stuff. All sorts of videogames, arcade games to be more specific. Also, a lot of UFO Catcher games. Including one that had really wiggly jelly. It was weird. I tried to take a picture, but how does one convey the un-natural jiggly-wiggliness of jelly in a still photo? Enough about the non-arcade games though.

There was a whole section devoted to arcade Mah Jongg. Not all that exciting. Rows and rows and rows of Virtua Fighter: Final Tuned machines. Virtua Fighter is crazy popular here in Japan. Tonnes of machines everywhere, and most of the machines are always being played.

There were a lot of multiplayer arcade games going on, and I bet none of them will ever come to North America. First up is this game, whose name I never bothered to learn. It's a card-based strategy turn-based RPG. Utilizing the large touch screen in front of them, players pick and use their various cards. The screen in front of them then shows what's going on around their character's immediate area whilst the massive screen up front shows the big picture. I believe this game can be played co-operatively or head to head.

Next up is this here football as in soccer game. Once again multiplayer. Once again multi-screen. Once again touch sensitive. See those little fields next to every unit? Those are part of the control layout. Nuts huh? Once again, the player's screen shows them the close up action, the big main screen shows of the big picture or highlights particularly cool actions.

There was other stuff of note. Including... The dog walking game. I didn't play it. But I will. Oh yes. I will.

I loved Typing of the Dead on the Dreamcast. It's because of that game that I can type more than 3 words a minute. Well it's not just a play at home game any more. That's right. Now you can type in the safety and comfort of your local arcade. Chicks dig typing. Chicks dig killing the undead. Finally a game that brings the two together in the most chick friendly place of all: the arcade.

Here's a picture of a couple of light gun games. One is an underwater type game, the other is based on the Lupin The Third anime.

When speaking of light gun games, you have to mention Virtua Cop. It's the game that made the genre popular again. I've always loved the Virtua Cop games, they're like John Woo video games. Lots of guns, lots of bullets, lots of non-descript guys in dark suits. Virtua Cop 3 is more of the same, but now even more John Woo-Y. That's right, now there's plenty of slow motion. All sorts of bullet time craziness. I took a picture, but it's too blurry to post. That's okay though, cuz I live in a land where there are crazy cool arcades every which way I turn.

Plus hot chicks who want to have sex with me. I swear to god, if you want to fuck a Japanese girl, fly over here to Japan and go to a club. Any club. You'll be good to go.

F Zero

Within a few block radius of where I am staying right now, there are at least four full-sized, sit down arcade cabinets of F Zero. They are gorgeous.
The whole damn game is gorgeous so I suppose it's only fitting. Actually, seeing this game again, and in an arcade context makes me realize how truly fantastic this game is.

Japan

Yep, I'm in Japan. Nihon. I'm surrounded by Japanese people. It's nuts.

The hotel room we're staying in is about the size of my bathroom back home, and that's including our Japanese bathroom. Fucking tiny.

The bad part about being in Japan is that you see a lot of ugly Japanese girls. Their are people here with serious genetic issues. It's just wrong. But then you see the lovely ones and everything else just fades away. Everything but your fiance of course.

Saw some cool shit in the videogame shop I wandered in to. Fuck. I want it so bad, but games over here are not cheap. Factor in the exchange rate and it really sucks.

Went to a part for English and non English people. The second question out of every Japanese girls mouth was about my availability. God damn.

If you want to read more in depth about Carla and me in Japan, with less swearing and mentioning of hot Japanese girls, you should click over to my other website.

If I ever get around to putting a link up that is.

More Minibosses

Ａｓ　Ｉ　ｍｅｎｔｉｏｎｅｄ　ｉｎ　ｔｈｅ　ｌａｓｔ　ｐｏｓｔ，　ｔｈｅ　Ｍｉｎｉｂｏｓｓｅｓ　ｗｅｒｅ　ｓｏ　ｍｕｃｈ　ｍｏｒｅ　ｔｈａｎ　ａｌｌ　ｔｈａｔ．　　Ｙｅａｈ．　　Ｓｏ　ROCKIN！！！　　Ｔｈｅｙ　ｊｕｓｔ　ｌａｉｄ　ｉｎｔｏ　ｔｈｅ　ｍｕｓｉｃ　ｍａｎ．　　They didn't just play the music,　ｔhey set out to destroy it. One of the guitarist spun around so much he might still be dizzy. Have you ever tried playing 8-bit videogame music on a real instrument? Me neither, but seeing these guys play made me realize how complex it was. Repetitive yes, but complex. Their fingers were flying through the chords.

And god damn if the audience wasn't lapping it all up. They (we) were singing along. Humming or making various noises in time with the music. It was a little spooky. Then... I love this part... they played the Metroid medley. This was the defining moment of the con for me. The part that made me proud to be a geek, to be a associated with the masses around me. The Metroid medley is fantastic, and they played the fuck out of it. There are plenty of fast parts, but the slow part near the end is where the magic happened. Geeks don't smoke much. It's hard to hold a cigarette and still play to the best of your abilities. Hence, most geeks don't have lighters. But we've got plenty of stuff that glows in the dark. During the slow part of the Metroid medley, geeks pulled out their cell phones, their PDAs, their Ipods, and their GBA SPs (fuck me, why did I have to leave mine back at the hotel?) and waved them back and forth in the air. Plus we were all singing along. Spine tingling. To be a part of a crowd that not only doesn't mock you for waving your GBA SP proudly in the air, but thinks that is a great idea, that thinks that you are cool for doing so? My geek batteries have been recharged. Fuck man, they will never go empty ever again.

And you know what? I think that that night was the best night of the Minibosses career. To have a room so in tune with what they're about. So in need of what they have. It was a perfect circle of supply and demand. We demanded their best and they gave it, they demanded our attention, our appreciation, our participation and we fell all over ourselves to give it to them.

There was no way that MC Frontalot could top all that. And he didn't. He was still really good. I enjoyed the hell out of him, but nothing could beat the bosses. The audience thinned out noticeably by the time the Front hit the stage. Tellingly, it filled back up near the end of his set. I wasn't sure what to expect from Frontalot, but the live backing was cool. I don't really know how to describe Frontalot, because the Minibosses were so overpowering.

Sorry Front. You'se cool and all, but damn. The Minibosses. The fucking Mini-fucking-bosses. fuck.

If I ever mange to finish blogging about PAX, there will be a fair bit of bitching. A lot could have been done better, but for those of us who got to see the music, all the stupid shit was worth it.

Also, I apologize if this post looks a little weird, I'm typing it on a keyboard not meant for English hands.

PAX: Were The Bands Any Good

So...

Were they?

No. Not really.




Just fuckin' witcha.

The bands were... god damn... fucking... duck... laundry...

It appears that words fail me.

It all started with the PA guys coming out and introducing the first act. The first act was a hot Asian chick who played Final Fantasy music on the piano. I forget her name, but I remember that she was hot. Slim and small and talented. I didn't recognize a lot of the music, but I liked all of it. Do you have to take a special class to flip pages of music for the people playing? Do you get to have intimate relations with the people you flip for? I only ask cuz a change in vocation might be in order. I liked watching her play, the way the fingers and her hands and her wrists moved. So fluid.

Afterwards, the guys came out and swore.

Optimus Ryhme was next. I had been meaning to listen to their stuff ever since I heard that they would be playing. I'm glad I didn't. Not that they weren't good, they were very good. I just mean that they sound much better live than on the disc of theirs I bought or the stuff I found online. The guy who raps can say a lot of words in a short amount of time. And the fat guy in the white ensemble who played the bass, somehow made his weight and his white work for him. It was at some point during the OR (Optimus Ryhme, not Organized Ryhme) set that I noticed the fat dude seated across the aisle from us. We had aisle seats you see. Better view of the stage, you see. So this fat guy did not seem to be grooving on the whole scene, man. He was seated, his bulk all scrunched up. As was his face. He looked cross. I'm sure his arms would be crossed, in disapproval, but for the fact that his fingers were jammed into his ears. He left before The Minibosses, and someone who actually enjoyed the music took his place. I managed to snap a picture of him before he left. I'm quite proud of it too, it's framed just right even though I took it without looking.

Oh yeah, there appeared to be some empty seats near the back of the auditorium, WTF?

When The Minibosses were introduced (make like Jesus and throw up the fucking horns), the god damn place fucking exploded. Geek-gasmic. Holy shit. They, the bosses, said some greetings and thanks and then asked what they should play first. Everybody tried to outgeek each other. Blaster Master! Ghosts and Goblins! A Boy and His Blob! Astyanax! (I was impressed that someone even remembered this game, let alone pronounce it correctly) The Minibosses decided on Megaman 2. Now I've heard their rendition of this song before. I got it off the internet. I don't know if it was recorded in a studio or what. Alls I know is I liked it. Now I know one other thing. You have not heard the Minibosses until you've seen them live. Sweet zombie Jesus they rock. Listening to their internet stuff, I couldn't be sure how ironic they were. If they distanced themselves from the what they were playing. They don't. They go balls out. I've seen a few punk bands. Young, raw punk bands with something to prove. Non of them played as hard as the Minibosses. See them live. Do it, or you have not lived as full a life as I. Even if I fall into a coma that lasts for the rest of my life and you somehow fuck every girl you've ever had a sticky dream about.

They played more songs and people yelled out other game names. There was a sizeable Zelda chant at one point. They said they would play it later. They never did. That would be the only thing I could even think about complaining about. But I won't because that would be like meeting Jesus and bitching him out for that one time he lost his shit in the temple.

I can't think of how to go on. Just remembering that evening is warming my geek core.

But, I think the best way to go on is to stop. I have to be up in three hours. And on a plane a couple hours after that. The first step to Japan is hours away. Fuck, I'm freaking myself out.

I just had to mention the nigh-godliness of The Minibosses before I left the continent. I hope to finish the write up once we touch down over there.

West Coast Super Trip part 3: The Line-ening!

I always want to start off every post with So. Today for example I wanted to start with "So we walked the four or five blocks to the convention centre." Always all the time with the So. Maybe I should just do it. Always start with So. It'll be my schtick. But I get annoyed by my So dependence, and I assume my readers would too. Of course, all this self debate about it isn't annoying at all. You know what? Fuck it.

So we walked the four or five blocks to the convention centre, enjoying the nice weather. About half away, we noticed a line. "Odd." thought we. "Must be for people who didn't pre-register." We concluded. As we got closer, we saw that there were two lines. The ends of both snaked away beyond our view. We began to worry. Picking the line that was closest to us, we took our place and began waiting.

Luckily, two nice guys from the Seattle area got in line behind us and really helped pass the time. I've mentioned them before, but they deserve as many shout outs as I can give them: Dwraith, TheFunkyFist, you guys is da bomb, yo!

Also luckily, there were plenty of people to talk about. There were very large people who ran, mayhap for the first time in their lives. I'm loathe to admit it, but the swirling bosoms of a running fat man are quite hypnotic. There were a lot of geeky shirts. Some were good, some made no sense. "Your mom is a face?" What the fuck is that? There was a big, fat red haired man in a costume with a cape. No one knows why. There were skipping goths, which is (I'm pretty sure) against the goth charter.

There was also a big, hot sun. Sometimes, we had to stand in the sunshine. Sunshine is hot. Also, the sun got the fat geeks sweaty even quicker than usual.

So yeah. Lots of waiting. Over an hours worth. I think maybe two. Sometimes, people in "Enforcer" shirts would come around and yell things that only a few people heard. Maybe they were telling us how things were supposed to work, that people who were pre-registered should go to the front of the line. Maybe, I guess I'll never fucking know. Seriously, the only thing out of their mouths that I understood were, "Did you get that?" and "Pass it on." To be fair, no one in our group went to the front of the line to see what was going on. No wait, DWraith went up and asked someone what was going on, she yelled at him.

Oh yeah, near the beginning of the 'line experience' a dude with a video camera came around doing interviews. We all got interviewed. Well.. not so much Carla, she thinks video cameras steal her soul. Not so much steal as cut it out and sell it on the black market, leaving her in a bathtub full of ice. The question was, "What game are you most looking forward to?" We all answered Halo2. If they ever put out a PAX video, look for us. We'll be the most attractive people on it.

We eventually got in. There were a lot of people. The place was swarming. The exhibition hall was already packed. Playable on the floor were Conker: Live and Uncut, Mechassault 2, Forza, Jade Empire, Fable, Matrix Online, Rainbow 6: Black Arrow, and Doom 3. Of those, all I played was Conker. There was almost always a free seat. All the other games had lines at least three geeks deep. Conker was good. Gorgeous. But the multiplayer seemed a bit off. The levels were too big for the amount of people playing. I spent a lot of time wandering around the nice looking environs. Non-playable appearances by: Splinter Cell: Chaos Theory, the new Ghost Recon, and a video of Prince of Persia 2. They all looked good. The Frag Dolls were also supposed to be good looking. The Frag Dolls were a team of quasi-attractive females who competed in Rainbow 6 tournies and demo'ed the Ubisoft games on display. Their demoing consisted mainly of crouching, standing up (in the game, it would have been nicer if they had done it in real life) and zooming their scopes in and out. Woot. But I heard they were quite skilled at Rainbow 6. I never did see them in action. I was entered in one of the tournaments, but I was stuck waiting in a line when the time rolled around.

Here's some quick math for you: around 1337(oh, the irony) people pre-registered, around 3700 actually attended. There were around 40 demo units. That's one unit for every hundred people. That ain't cool. There will be more math later.

We checked out everything else in rather short order. The console room was smaller than the exhibition room, and filled with all sorts of consoles. There were a lot of people there who were better than I am in my dreams. Stupid dreams. It too was overcrowded. The PC room was smaller than the console room. I ain't a PC gamer, so we didn't spend much time in that room at all all weekend. The bottom floor, or 'basement' was where the boardtop games were. Fitting.

Carla was kind of disappointed by the lack of stuff to do. Me too. I reckon that'll improve next year. Hope there's more than just Microsoft stuff next year.

With nothing much to do, we got some seats in the auditorium for the Penny Arcade Q and A. More quick math: the auditorium only seated 410. Remember how many people were in attendance? Slightly more than 410. In fact, the panel was delayed a slight bit, as there were too many people in the auditorium, sitting in the aisles and such, and we had to wait as they got cleared out.

The panel was fantastic. Those Gabe and Tycho fuckers is funny. The panel started with them receiving a bunch of applause and hollering (with some hoots thrown in for good measure), then they abruptly threw to a cartoon? "hey, wanna see the cartoon we made?" Riotous Applause. "Okay, here you go." The Cardboard Samurai cartoon was pretty decent. Very flashy. In the sense that it was obviously made using flash. Not that there's anything wrong with that. Not that flash is gay.

After the cartoon, they opened it up for Q&A. Being as I waited to goddamn long to write this shit up, I forget most of all the good nuggets and morsels. A lady in the audience asked why Gabe didn't like Sonic Heroes, his response, "What's wrong with Sonic? Why can't I play as Sonic?" That got applause. Hell, everything they said or did garnered applause. Twisp and Catsby were created with the sole intention of not being liked. That kind of backfired. They sold the publishing rights to PA to some guy who then moved to Alaska. They would really like to sell out, if given the opportunity. Gabe: "you could send all your letters bitching at me about to selling out to Gabe at Sandy Beach. I probably wouldn't read it though." About the process of writing the comic: "We just surf the internet, riffing on everything we see until one of us laughs. Then we're like 'Shit, should I write that down?"

You know, this stuff doesn't read as funny as it was in person. I guess you had to be there (or go to the forum about this very topic). Laughing at Gabe and Tycho as they stalked about the stage, never stopping, always moving. Wondering what was under the black throwcloth. It was a surprise. Not to be revealed until the end of PAX.

After the panel was over, we all got booted out. Carla and I, and I'm sure a fair amount of others, were planning on staying right where we were so we could see the next panel. The Red vs. Blue panel. This was not to be. A line for the RvB panel started forming as soon as the PA Q&A started. There was no chance we were going to get back in. Crappy. If we had known that we couldn't sit for both, we probably would have given this one (the PA one) a miss. Just because RvB only happened on Saturday, the PA Q&A was scheduled for both days. But really,
there was no guarantee that we would have gotten in on Sunday.

The organizers were nice enough to show the panels on all the TVs throughout the convention centre, but you couldn't really hear much of anything. Which kind of sucked. So we went for lunch. We got back just as the RvB thing ended. The dudes were selling DVDs. It was crazy busy. We figured we'd wait until it died down a little and then go grab ourselves a season 2 DVD. We were fools. DVDless fools. I wandered around the convention centre for a bit, starting to come around to Carla's way of thinking. There just wasn't all that much to do. As I was wandering, a Frag Doll asked if I wanted to sign up for a Black Arrow tournament. I told her I wasn't that good. She countered with "Trust me, most of the people we've played against aren't either." Plus she mentioned that there were prizes. Okay then sign me up. For a tournament for a game I've never played before. Whatever.

I went back and found Carla, who was waiting in line for the next panel. How to Break Into the Industry, I think. I waited in line with her, then waited in the auditorium with her. I wasn't going to stay for the panel though, the Black Arrow Tournie was about to start. I was going to get on the escalator to go up to the console room when I saw that the line for the evening concert had already begun, and it was already quite long. Fuck. Leaving all hopes of winning prizes behind, I took my place at the back of the line. Made some small talk with some of the geeks around me and watched the line grow and grow and grow. It was halfway across the basement floor when someone somewhere had the great idea of handing out tickets for the show, so we wouldn't have to wait, in line for the next two hours. That's right, the line for the bands started at least three hours before the bands were to take the stage. I tried to get two tickets, but they weren't having any of that. I told them the other one was for my fiance, the girl handing out the tickets didn't seem to care. I hope she dies childless and alone.

So I ran into the auditorium and appraised Carla of the situation. She ran from the auditorium and managed to get herself a ticket. Thank God. But man, this was turning out to be a gong show. Only slightly more than one out of every ten pre-registered people would get in to see the Mini-bosses (and friends). Not that only pre-registered people were eligible for tickets. I'm just saying that a crapload of people were going to be upset.

Once word got out that only people with tickets were going to get to see the concert, and that all the tickets were already given out, a crapload of people got very upset. The announcements, you see, were not broadcast within the auditorium, and were not very audible in the rest of the building. I'm surprised people didn't come to blows. I mean that both ways, people kicking the shit out of other people to get their tickets or sucking cocks to get tickets. The tickets were in high demand. There were people with signs wandering around, begging for tickets. "Terminally Ill, please give me your tickets" and such. It was interesting to watch the maladies grow more and more severe as the starting time grew nearer.

We watched all this from the line we were standing in. Even though all the tickets had been given out, this was now the line for getting good seats.

Was the show any good?

I think it deserves it's own entry.

Busy Lazy Life

I don't really do much of anything anymore, yet I always seem to be busy. I dog-sat my dad's pug again this weekend, which involves driving out to Regina Beach and back all the time. Dad's Audi is a very nice car (much better than mine, which no one trusts to make it out there and back on a regular basis), but the CD player irks me. The random is just too random. It'll play a whole CD then one song of a different CD and then go back and play the whole first CD again. Irksome. And you don't want to be futzing about with an irksome CD player whilst driving in the middle of the night, overly tired, with deer prancing out from the damn bushes.

The dog's eye goop, as ever, was disgusting.

On Saturday, an old high school/uni acquaintance got married. The wedding was nice. Over real quick, and full of people to mock. Plus I got to dress up in my new clothes. I didn't get mocked. Which is rare. I liked it.

As I drove out to feed the dog and back, Carla and James got stinking drunk. James was screaming at random dogs on the street. Dude can hold his rye, beer and gin, but red wine knocks him on his ass. As for Carla... she wouldn't agree, but I think that beer was a mistake.

We went out for dinner. Carla and James were loud, Trev, Kim and I were embarrassed. Then the food came and James left. Good times.

The reception had too much country music, but cheap booze, so let's call it a draw. Better than a draw, to be fair. Got to catch up with some old freinds I hadn't seen in ages. They all had babies. I always did think they were sluts.

When you're in Regina Beach, wondering where to eat, may I suggest Cafe De Rosa. Really good paninis, and the owners all look like hippies. Not old hippies, those are depressing; but hippies younger than I. I really liked their beards.

Dad and Dianne went on their trip with another couple from Regina Beach. Their son was dog sitting, I went over to his place on Sunday for a barbecue. It was nice. Good food, free booze, pirated porn, political talk and ruminations on why we aren't famous yet.

Then I went back to the cabin, at around two in the morning, and played Burnout 3 until 8 in the morning.

I'll try to cut down on my Burnout 3-ing and finish my PAX report. And maybe reivew Burnout 3 for my other site.

Super West Coast Trip part 2

We woke up and helped ourselves to the complimentary breakfast. With free eggs!! We should have showered first. It's been less than two years since we last hostled, how could we have forgotten? Always shower first! While waiting for the showers to free up, we met a couple of fellow Canucks down for the PAX. They were nice. Of course I forget their names. One reminded me of Kevin Smith. We also found out that the annoying guy from last night was a roommate. Another roommate was a real friendly stoner. He had long blonde dreadlocks and was debating on whether or not to go barefoot for the day. We suggested he wear something on his feet.

Something I forgot to mention about yesterday: as we were sitting in the common room, a whole lotta people riding bikes zipped by, ringing their bells and yelling. As they rode by someone (out of our range of sight) whipped a water bottle at one of the bikers, hitting him in the head. Luckily, the person on the bike didn't wipe out.

We had planned on catching the bus to Bellvue with the other Canadians, but one of their number was lagging a bit behind, so we left. We caught the bus without any problems and spent the majority of the ride talking to a nice guy who used to live in Bellvue and was going back to bartend at a friend's wedding. He was also half Japanese, and had been to Japan a few times. What's crazy is that until he mentioned that he was half Japanese, I never would have guessed it, but after he mentioned it, it was completely obvious. Weird how that works. His voice was raspy and cool and he was full of good advice. We got off the bus and hiked a few blocks to get to the hotel. We later found out that we could have waited a few stops and gotten off much closer. Oh well. We might have missed the cosplayers if we had. We passed a Sophitia along the way. Also, I'm pretty sure we saw Gabe and Tycho walking to the convention centre.

Checking in was a breeze and we got free cookies. Almost as good as free broccoli soup and eggs, but not quite. The room was nice; on the main floor, spacious, the T.V. had HBO , and there was a nice view from the balcony. There was also a main traffic artery just behind, blocked actually, by the nice view. I couldn't see the cars, but I could hear them. Carla and I changed into some cooler, lighter clothes. The weather was heating up, and I imagined that the convention centre would be full of sweaty geeks. I also plugged in my GBA, as I had just about drained it on the trip down yesterday. I would live to regret my lack of Game Boy Advance later in the day.

I need to get my lovely and talented fiance to show my how to post, or at least link to, pictures in this blog. I have some pictures of the weekend, and they sure would help break up all these boring words.

I thought I would wrap up this trip in three parts, but I reckon now's a good a place as any to stop for the night. My next entry will probably deal exclusively with waiting in the line to GET IN TO the Penny Arcade Expo. Which is fitting, because line waiting figures prominently into the whole experience.

Shopping

I sat around today and did get much of anything done. Other than play a lot of video games. Not that I played a wide variety, I mainly focused on two: Day of Reckoning and the new OXM demo disk. I made a Strong Bad in DOR. He still needs some refining, but that is half the fun of a decent create-a-whatever... you're never finished, there's always something you can fiddle with. But I didn't set out to talk about Day of Reckoning, that's what STUFFS is for, I just wanted to blog real quick before I went to bed so that I wouldn't forget about the lady we saw tonight while out shopping.

Carla and I went shopping tonight. I didn't really want to, as I was feeling lazy, worthless and greasy (my shower didn't take), but I went anyways cuz I'm a trooper. And I'm glad I did, cuz there was this lady there... I don't quite know how to describe her... It's not like she had growths or was hideously malformed, she was just... burgundy. Her skin was the colour of wine. I have never, ever seen a person with skin the colour of hers. I don't know if it was the results of tanning gone horribly, horribly wrong or what.

All I know is that I will never see another human being EVER with the same skin pigment as hers. I wish I had had my camera with me. And was a either rude enough or sneaky enough to get a good, clean, close-up shot of her.

Also, Terry Gilliam is shooting a movie here. Crazy, man, ker-azy.

People Are Great. People Suck.

My brother was playing some Rainbow 6 on XBox Live yesterday, when he recieved a friend invite from on of the guys I stood in line with at PAX. I talked to DWraith and The FunkyFist for a bit. They are really nice goddamn guys. I'm glad they took charge of the situation and sent the invitation to ME, cuz I haven't been on Live since I got back from our trip. The trip that I am currently writing a different entry about. You know what? Fuck it. I'll just chop my trip recap into a few pieces, I'll post the first bit right after this one.

Yeah, talking to those PAX guys was great, made me wish I had gotten more people's GamerTags...

I didn't actually get to play online with them though, cuz: a)I don't own Black Arrow and b)I had a movie to get to. Carla, myself, Trev, Kim and James finally went and saw Hero. I was quite looking forward to it. And was disappointed. I found it to be a little boring. It looked very, very pretty. GodDamn beautiful is what it was. There were shots in there that I just fell in love with. I'll be picking up the DVD just for them. But the rest of the movie was... just... kind of... meh. I didn't really get involved with the characters. I liked the whole Rashamon style story thing, but I didn't like that that meant that all the fight scenes involved the same people fighting in the same styles over and over and over again. Trev said it best, "There's only so much spinning you need to see."

Plus there were some real fucktards in the audience. After a trailer for Taxi, a movie starring Jimmie Fallon and Queen Latifah, a mental giant behind us opined "They probably showed all the best parts." If you have not seen the trailer for Taxi, let me assure you that there were no best parts. After a scene where Jet Li moves so fast, he ran through drops of water as if they were just hanging in the air and then stabs his foe, some guy way in the back wondered aloud: "What happened? Did the water kill him?" I was suprised he strung together that many words. To be fair, water DID kill his father. After a woman fatally stabbed her lover and let out an anguished scream, some guy in the audience laughed out loud. Really loud. I just wanted to stand up, walk back to where the shithead was sitting and punch him in the fucking face. I may not have liked the movie that much, but... grrrr!

In conclusion: most people can go to hell.

As can the spell checker.

West Coast Super Trip part 1

Crap man, this happened two weekends ago, and I'm just getting to it now. I thought I'd be less busy after Japanese class, but that hasn't happened yet.

Carla and I jetted off to Vancouver on the 25th of August. It seems that you have to apply for your Japanese working holiday visa in person. You also have to make up a resume and write an essay and plan out a detailed itinerary. For my Australian working holiday visa, I applied over the internet. Easy as. Basically, I just had to prove that I had enough money to get there and back and they were like "She'll be right, mate."

So we went to Vancouver to apply in person. Also to visit with Carla's brother, my friend Eric and my newly transported to Vancouver friend Nate. The Visa application was a joke, I have no idea why it had to be in person. We basically handed the clerk our stuff, he confirmed a few details and that was that.

That's okay though, that just gave us more time to bum around Vancouver. We did some shopping and a lot of eating. There is so much freaking sushi in Vancouver it boggles my mind. My mind is still somewhat boggled, actually.

Caught up with everyone: Eric is still studying. He is never not going to be a student. Darren is about finished his degree. And Nate is involved in some citywide water gun assassination thing. {UPDATE: Nate hurt his neck or somesuch and had to drop out. His roommate is still in the running, even managed to avoid an assassination attempt. Go roommate whose name I forget, possibly John!}

But the Visa thing and the visiting of people weren't the only reasons we head out to the coast. No, we had other business further south. Down there in the Americas. The first ever Penny Arcade Expo. How often does a person ever get to attend the first annual of anything? How could we not go?

Actually, when it was first announced, we had no plans on going. I liked the thought behind it, but the pot was not all that sweet. But then those fuckers just kept adding cool shit. The musical acts are what did it for Carla, Halo 2 was just icing on the Carrot Cake. The playable demos were the milk poured over the cut up carrot cake. Lack of funds and desperate need of what funds were left for our Japan sojourn be damned!

So we hopped on a Greyhound bus and headed for sunny Seattle. It seems the god damn west coast has stolen all the prarie's good weather. I got more of a tan in Seattle and Vancouver than at the cabin. That ain't right. But back to the bus: we were a bit worried about crossing the border. Not because of our side business of being drug mules, but because we had to surrender our Passports to the Japanese consulate. I was okay cuz I always carry my birth certificate with me. For when I doubt my own existence. But Carla left hers at home. Would we make across the border to the land of milk, honey and free healthcare?

Yeah. With no problem whatsoever. We checked into our hostel: the Green tortoise. Seemed nice enough. Looked like a hostel. After dumping our crap, we poked around the neighbourhood. Saw Pike's Market. Big. Lots of people. Smelled of fish. Didn't buy anything. Except for Peroshkies. Which aren't perogies. They're Russian pastries. Pretty okay, but the apple cinnamon roll was the highlight of the snack.

Also bought some international junk food. Marzipan tastes like... Crap I forget what I thought it tasted like. That'll teach me for waiting two weeks before writing shit up. It tasted like some kind of liqueur. And I forget the names of the other stuff we tried. One was like wine gums, but much chewier, not an improvement. The other was a plain chocolate bar with a great slogan "NOT for GIRLS" I let Carla try it, just because I don't like being told what to do by packaging, which is also why I only ever lather once. Repeat my ass.

Our hostel had a free dinner: all you can eat baked potatoes and mashed potatoes and broccoli soup and some sort of rice. All really good. Best broccoli soup I've ever had, and I'm not trying to damn it with faint praise, it just kind of works out that way. Some nice girls sat at our table before, during, and after our meal. There was an American girl whose name escapes me who was going hiking and camping up North. Then there were two Japanese girls Misako from Tokyo and Misa from Osaka. I get the impression that there is a rivalry between those two cities. So we talked about various things, stuff to do in Japan, how much work sucks, how much traveling rocks, and so on.

Then this... Not a man, but no longer a boy asked if he could sit with us. Sometimes being nice polite Canadians bites you in the ass. This was one of those times. I don't have a brain for names, so I also forget this kid's name. He's nineteen, took a little Japanese in high school (but doesn't remember as much as he thinks he does), draws, enjoys improvisational acting and photo taking. He was keen to show off his new camera, but had problems getting out of the packaging. I think maybe he was trying to dazzle us all with his worldliness, and his renaissance man-itude. But none of us were, we were to polite to ask him to leave, but none of us were enjoying the conversation with him in it. Luckily: free beer. They had tapped a keg at the reception desk, so we all bolted for the brew. Thank god the legal drinking age in the states is so stupidly high. It felt weird being carded tough, it's been so damn long. I didn't usually get carded when I was underage. Not like my friend Trev who gets cracked all the time, usually by people at least half a decade younger than him. Oh how we mock him.

Misako seemed to be a little ticked that she had to show I.D. She really wanted to drink. There was almost a rumble. Luckily cooler heads prevailed. Heads cooled by beers. The Green tortoise was turning out to be a pretty cool hostel. Except for that guy. He found us out on the patio and talked at us some more. He asked the Japanese girls who their favourite Sumo wrestler was. (for those of you who don't know: Sumo isn't all that popular in Japan, especially with younger girls). He then asked them if they've ever wanted to kill a boyfriend. Because boyfriends cheat, although he would never cheat on them. The talkative, non hint-taking jerk drove us away from our free beer. That takes talent and determination. We went to bed early. Fucking jerk.

So ends part 1...

Join me for the somewhat exciting middle part and boring conclusion!!!

I like Carla's Laptop

I do. I can blog on it. And hopefully edit my films on it soon, too.

"Meh" or "Insert Stupid Dragon or Oar Pun Here."

This Labour Day weekend, I partook in my first Dragon Boat race. And second. And third. The Dragon Boat Festival is a yearly occurrence here in Regina (but not just here, I hear that they have Dragon Boat races and festivals in other cities and countries. Who knew?). The company Carla works for thought it would be a good idea to enter a team. Build company spirit and all that. So of course I got myself volunteered. My asthma has been acting up as of late (and I let all my medication run out. All part of my 'ignore it and it'll go away' approach to healthcare), and Carla gets seasick very easily (remind me to tell y'all 'bout the time Carla used up all the seasickness bags on our trip to the reef. Also, remind me to stop using so God Damn many parentheses!).

Where the fuck was I? Right. An asthmatic and a seasick cutie were about indicative of what our team brought to the table. According to the rules every member of the team had to attend two practices. Most of our team members averaged one. Yep.

Also, Dragon Boating is hard. It's not much like canoeing. I can canoe. I've canoed in every hemisphere this wacky ole globe has to offer. But Dragon Boating is less about arms and more about abs. And back. Not my strong suits.

Now that I've set the table, let's cut to the chase: we didn't come in last. Our goal WAS to come in last, and we failed even at that. Which seems fitting. We came in last in our first heat. And in our second. But there were stupid jerks in other races who were worse than us. Our third race was against those other losers and we aimed to lose and lose hard. And we succeeded. We just about rammed another boat. Serves 'em right, they booed us. Fuckers.

What did I learn during our day of Dragon Boating? I learned that puns involving dragons or boats or oars or paddles are even less funny than normal puns. I learned that I quite like African cuisine. And I learned that I don't much care for Dragon Boating.

Also, I sunburned my massive forehead.

Technology Blows

So I can't unpdate Netscape cuz I don't have OSX and I don't feel like poking around Microsoft's Explorer webpage until I find the ghetto where they keep their Mac stuff. So I don't think I'll be blogging much from my computer anynmore. Luckily, I have access to others.

Almost Done

Had my Japanese final Speaking and Listening test today. Didn't go that bad. Not bad at all. Now I just have to get through the reading and writing final on Saturday (at 8 in the freaking morning!) and it'll all be over. Then I get to spend the next few days after that finishing off our rough Japan travel itinerary. And getting set for our West coast adventure. Once Carla and I get back from that it'll be less than a month untill we fly away to the land of the rising sun. Fuck. Time goes by pretty god damn fast.

Also, Zatoichi was a pretty fun flick. The digital blades and blood were distracting and there were scenes that went on longer than I thought necessary. But I reckon that is due to the whole Japanese aesthetic. Most Japanese movies have a much different pace than I am used to. Which is probably why their horror movies seem so scary. They don't conform to the usual horror "beats".

But back to Zatoichi: good.

manoman

Japanese is taking upp all of my time. It's not an easy language to learn. Hopefully I will be able to blog a bit more in a week's time.

SUNUVABITCH!!

This whole blogspot problem is getting to be a real problem. I've blogged twice since the eighth, but the posts seem to have vanished into the ether. Not that they were any good, I can't even remember what they were about. They were probably shorter than this one as well, but that ain't the point. The point is that they are gone. Grrrrr.

What I've been up to: not failing Japanese, planning trip for 2 to PAX, getting Japan trip stuff sorted out, attended an engagement party, Taste of Regina, other various sundries.

I still can't spell check my posts.

The Problem With Blogging

Maybe it's just me, but my main problem with blogging is that you have to go online to do it. "Duh!" you say, but hear me out. I cannot go online without wasting vast amounts of time, it's just not in my nature. So I might come online for the soul purpose of blogging, but there's a good chance that I will log off 3 hours later having not blogged a whit.


And here's some irony for you, I was in Netscape and I tried to type this post but couldn't. For some reason I couldn only type in the title of the post, the body setion of the post writting screen was not available to me. So I couldn't write my post about the problem with posting.

I'm realizing, just now, that there's now no spell checker. I can't type in Netscape and I can't check my typing in Explorer. Methinks it is time to get a different browser.

Also, sorry about the typos.

My Tongue Feels Like A Flaming Sponge

Today is my birthday. To celebrate, I got my wisdom teeth out. I was also supposed to have a Japanese exam, but I don't think that is happening.

My mouth feels weird. It's actually starting to hurt now, so I'm going to go.

On the up side: I haven't drooled on myself yet!

2 Posts Away From 150

But man, these things are becoming even more sporadic. Stupid busy life. Saw Dodgeball and Farenheight 9/11. Liked Dodgeball better. It didn't seem as pandering. Taking an intensve Japanese course. And going to see some Rockin' the Valley and then spending the weekend at the cabin.

I'm so, so, so behind in my blogging.

Prelude

I know that I have been somewhat lax in my updates. And a lot of stuff has happened. Saw Spiderman 2, had my last day of work, was an extra in a sci fi film, scrutineered and my dad is now a member of Parliament. Hopefully I'll get to blog all about all this soon.

But not now. It's storming out, and the dog is freaking out.

Chronicles of Riddickulous

About the title: I saw this movie on opening night and the title for this review popped into my head about half-way through the movie. Then I started seeing other people use the same pun. Not wanting to let the terrorists win, I decided to stick to my guns and use the title anyway. So there.

I liked Pitch Black. A lot. Even all the times we saw some of it in Australia (they really seem to like that movie down there) couldn't dampen my feelings towards it. It was well made, stylish, and it took advantage of its small budget. And I quite liked the character of Riddick.

So I was intrigued by the idea of a sequel.

Then I saw the teaser trailer. I wasn't so intrigued anymore.

But as I saw more trailers, my interest began to build back up. It was directed by the same guy as well, I found that to be a plus. He did such a good job with such a small budget I wondered what he would do with a massive one.

Too much, it would seem.

Pitch Black worked because of its energy and style. The story was simple and propulsive: We gotta get off this planet. Chronicles of Riddick's story is too intricate for it's own good. And it ain't that intricate. There's all sorts of political intrigue and plotting that didn't really need to be in the movie and Dame Dench's only real purpose is to get all sorts of exposition out of the way.

That's my biggest problem with the story, it tries to cram too much in. Not only that, it crams it in in the worst way possible: by having characters just talk about it. Film is a visual medium damnit. To be fair, most of my films have shit loads of dialogue, but that's their point. This is a big budget action movie, I don't need no political in-fighting. What is up with all this political bullshit in sci fi lately? Episode 1 was lousy with it, The Matrix sequels had too much of it too.

They say that a good half hour has been cut out of this movie, so maybe that extra time will help better explain the story, give it room to breathe. Seems odd that while my main complaint is there's too much extraneous crap, I look forward to seeing more of it. It's not so much that I dislike all the intrigue, I just think it was handled most inelegantly.

Which fits in with the dialogue and such. This film has some really bad lines in it. "It's been a long time since I smelled beautiful." being my favourite. What's more, its based on some really hoary old cliches. Riddick is the chosen one, the last of his race, it has been prophesized that only he can defeat the Necromongers. Yep, the Necromongers (ooooooohh scaary, eh kids?). And you know what race Riddick is the last of? He's a Furyan. And before he defeats the evil bad guy of doom, he stops off on Crematoria to pick up an old friend. Crema-frikkin-toria.

I got sidetracked by the stupid names. Sorry. What I'm trying to say is that the propulsive energy of Pitch Black is no where to be found in this movie. It should be, but it isn't. It should be because Riddick is a propulsive character. He's a wanted criminal, he's always on the run. Most of this movie moves forward due to him running from bounty hunters or being taken somewhere by them. But the old energy just ain't there.

Even the action scenes are a bit lackluster. Riddick barely ever uses his ole' shiny eyes thing to his advantage. Once, right near the start, to be exact. And that fight in the dark is a quickly edited piece of crap. The intent might have been to show the chaos that Riddick is capable of causing, but it didn't work for me. The opening scene where he turns the table on his pursuers worked well. And the big fight on Crematoria was very well done and stands apart from most other fight scenes I've seen the last few years. The sound effects kind of fade away and the music takes centre stage. Twohy and his editor take the fight scene into the realm of the montage here and it works. Roger Ebert said the fight scenes in this film have no sense of space or location, but I think he's just getting old. Fuck man, he liked the Garfield movie and admitted to laughing at Family Circle (circus?)

So how does it look? The visual style of this film is easily its best attribute. If the Roman empire never collapsed and just kept spreading through the galaxies, it would look a lot like the Necromonger's empire. It's a different look, full of mean looking faces and such and I liked it. All the planets had their own distinct looks, and none of them sucked. All the ships and such looked both cool and feasible. And run down. Which is always cool. Which George Lucas forgot somewhere along the way.

And of course Vin Diesel looks cool. Riddick is a bad mother fucker and he looks the part. But Diesel edges real close to self parody in this one. I liked the Riddick in Pitch Black more. Maybe cuz Pitch Black was rated R.

In summation: looks nice, some good action, some bad dialogue and too much story.

If you liked Pitch Black and want more, play Escape From Butcher Bay instead.

Miss You

I have a problem. Not a big one. Fairly small, really. Inconsequential some might even say. I cannot seem to hold on to a pair of nail clippers for any prolonged amount of time. I always misplace them. Or my brother steals them.

Also, I do most of my nail clipping at my computer, for that is usually where I notice that my nails need to be clipped.

I mentioned once to Carla, as we chatted on the phone, that what I needed was to chain some nail clippers to my computer. So before Carla left for Newfie Land, she gave me a pair of nail clippers with a little chain.

She's a keeper she is.

I thanked her for the gift and put it in my pocket and kind of forgot about them there. Then as I was fishing for my keys after work, my fingers brushed against the nail clippers and I was filled with happiness and joy and love and I missed Carla so completely I thought I might cry.

She can't get home soon enough.

Procrastastic

I've been meaning to blog since about Tuesday. But, obviously, I have not. I have not been in the best of moods. My job is basically done. Which I find oddly saddening and maddening in equal amounts. I mean I had planned on taking a year off from work starting around now, so it really couldn't have worked out better for me. But. But.... But I don't like the thought of being replaced by a machine, of being made obsolete. I was working when they packed up the hard drive that will take the place of me and four others. About the size of a 20" TV. That bothered me.

What also bothers me is the fact that the traffic and promotions people (the people in charge of making sure all the shows get filled up with commercials and such) are so upset about losing their jobs. I'm good at my job, therefore I have reason to be upset about losing mine. They suck. They are horrible. They are incapable of doing their jobs with any small degree of competency. They should have been jobless years ago. Fuck them. Fuck them in their stupid asses.

See, that's me being bitter. Grrrrrr! (picture me scowling and shaking my fist) I don't mean to be quite so bitter. But Carla is in Newfoundland, so that makes me a sad panda. Put these two things together, and man o man, this week is full of the suck.

I know! I'll end this post and star a new one, a happier, more uplifting one.