I'm pretty much going to stop blogging from now on, or should I stopped blogging 2 months ago ? In any case I have grown tired of blogging on Gamespot and pretty tired of Gamespot altogether. This website used to be something years ago when it was active and full of life. Now the only thing it's full of is 13 yrs old kids who think they know something about gaming or whatever they talk about.

For those who read this and are 13 yrs old don't take it bad I'm not necesseraly talking about you but rather those who speak in your name.

In this blog I have interacted with many amazing people and discussed many topics regarding video gaming and some stuff happening in my life. Gamespot has been something, now it's just a dull place.... broken behind the scenes (unions and such) and it lost all of it's meaning to me. I don't think I'll come back so often to Gamespot anymore, or at all. I still post (very rarely) in a union and (even rarer) in forums, but beyond that, you should pretty much consider me gone.

I used to say that there is no such thing as ''quitting Gamespot'', I still stand by that and that's why I'm not saying that I quit, just that you won't notice me here any longer...

Gone are the days of the unions, vibrant little communities within gamespot. Gone are the amazing video features by key reviewers, those we have now are just generic. Gone are the days of the good ol' gamespot, where you always wanted to go to the site, post, watch videos and etc...

I'm still gaming, still want to become a game developer and so I will still visit this site for reviews but for news I pretty much use only Kotaku. It's been a long run, I've met a lot of great people (murlow12, Phantom5800, REVOLUTIONfreak just to name a very few) but most of them (if not all) have already quit or have been MIA now, some have been gone for a very long time now.

So for all of those who made my experience on Gamespot a great one, thank you, it's been fun.

PS: I also deleted my union (The Nintendo Online Community Union), once again thanks to all those who made this union possible and helped me build it and make it the great Nintendo community that it was. It's time was done long ago and now I gave it the kiss of death and it's gone. Thanks for everything everyone! I'll never forget all the great moments I've lived within that union and how happy I was to lead it and manage it.

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Away from the computer, not sitting much on video games even if I had my PSP was a nice change. But I wasn't always away from the city, it's been a long time since I've been away from North America. To sum it up: It was a nice change. Chances are, I might return there next summer.

But despite all that I wasn't completely shut off from the gaming news and so I've heard about pretty much everything since E3. 2 new Metal Gear games, Project Natal and finally some new information about a new Zelda game! I finally have many games to look forward to on the Wii.

Still a month until College starts again, let's take advantage of it.

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So I'm packing stuff already and getting ready for it but my laptop isn't coming with me. It's having some problems so I'll have to send it for repairs (I bought a warranty for something). So that's about it, I'm really excited about the thought of going to Lebanon again. Hopefully it'll be problem-free this summer so we can all enjoy some well-deserved vacations.

I'm only bringing my PSP along as far gaming goes, my 16GB memory stick and three batteries (don't ask ) will provide me enough playtime. Sadly I can't just plug the DS to the wall in Lebanon so I've decided to leave it behind. BUT I WANT TO FINISH PHOENIX WRIGHT FIRST . But yeah I want to finish that one before going . I've been also playing Ninja Gaiden Black on my 360, pretty good game but hard and frustrating as hell .

So have some good vacations guys and see you in two months!

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But aside from that I've disliked the Wii for it's raw power, graphics, poor selection of games to my taste and so on...

Just recently, for no apparent reason, I turned on my Wii for the first time in God knows how many weeks (or months) after coming back from College. I insert Wii Sports and decide to play some tennis (my favourite on the disc). And guess what? I had fun! That was Monday, and ever since then I have played some Wii Tennis after coming back from College for about 20 minutes and had lots of fun with it.

I have actually started to look at the Wii with a different point of view for quite some time and finally decided to turn it on this Monday. I don't know why this sudden interest spark. I'm still playing with my 360 in case anyone wonders. Right now I'm on The Orange Box and playing Half-Life 2 which isn't too bad so far.

Am I back at Wii gaming? Yeah I guess so. But still there's a serious lack of interest with it's games (outside what I already own of course). Maybe I'll take a different look at them. In the meantime 2 other games have joined the lonely The Conduit on my Wii wish list; Red Steel 2 and Resident Evil Dark Chronicles something. We'll see if anything else gets added but I'm in no hurry. And yeah E3 is coming soon but I won't be in Canada with my laptop to watch any of it. In fact I'll be on vacation in Lebanon. I will try to come online, read about what happened just so that I can be up-to-date but that would be pretty much it. Hopefully some good announcements for the Wii, 360 and most definitely the PSP.

The PSP is my favourite handheld this gen and there are rumours about a so-called PSP Go!. All what I can say at this point is that if Sony makes it right, makes it something significant for existing PSP owners then I might buy it. Everything I've heard about it sounds interesting but I'll wait to see it and hear official words about it first.

So College is almost over, I've got 4 exams next week and two on the week right after. I'll be busy that's for sure. Once that's done, time to pack our stuff and get the **** out of North America for the first time in 6 years. I love Canada but I can't stand it for that long, I need some change and going to Lebanon will provide me all the change I need for a good vacation. Provided that Israel doesn't have any plans for this summer, if you catch my drift. No discrimination intended, just saying I want some peace this summer, I don't want to find myself in the middle of a battlefield. I've got Halo 3 for that...

So you guys got any big plans for this summer?

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But rather then speak about Home Consoles, I want to speak about Portable consoles, which I largely prefer. One day (not in the near future though) all will be portable including videogames. So handhelds are our first glimpse of the future.

Now I do prefer my PSP to my DS for numerous reasons and one of them is DD. Sony is the first to embrace DD this gen on handhelds with the PSP, heck even Wipeout Pure (one of it's launch titles) has DLC! Nintendo is slow to catch up with the DSi store and what it has to offer so far is nothing worth mentionning. But the DSi store will grow big and strong at some point that's for sure.

The PSP has had it's own version of the PS Store for about a year now and that service is also growing well. It's already offering full PSP games for download and also PS1 games, demos, videos, music, etc...... All what's left is the movie service and I'm kissing that PSP . But since the PSP is already offering full games through it's service, and Sony saying that they plan on offering more and more full games (Patapon 2 is rumoured to not even come out on UMD!!) I think it's safe to say that at least one of the handhelds next gen might go fully DD.

I mean look at the iPhone, sure it's a joke as far as qualifying it as a handheld game console, but it's fully DD and it has already met a lot of success. Now one might say that this is because most iPhone users have permanent access on the net. But what about those who don't? and what about Ipod Touch users? Well they don't have permanent access and they're all over the App Store last I checked.

If the PSP2 can appeal just as much as the iPhone, then it's a success, no argument there. But would it really work for Sony if the PSP2 was fully DD? Well the UMD sure is a failure and it's already a pain in the ass to play these things into the PSP without draining the battery life. I've got a couple of downloaded titles and I can pay these for about 6 hours whereas with a UMD I can only for like 4 hours.

UMD is going out, that's for sure, but is Sony preparing a new media or the definitive jump to DD? And for this matter what about Nintendo? I doubt they'll go fully DD for some reason. And Microsoft? Will they make a handheld?

What do you think?

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All I've been reading recently is what announcement one should expect from GDC. Will it be MGS5? Or perhaps a release date for Halo ODST? WTF!?! This isn't what GDC is even about! GDC is a place for knownledge, learning and sharing for all game developers. It's the one place where developers set their rivalry aside and help each others with their knowledge about game development. It's not E3 or TGS or whatever.

Hearing these same discussions just makes me sick, honnestly. The same kids over and over again talk about what announcement they expect only to say that GDC was a big letdown for them. Well I most certainly hope it'll be so that they can stop hype it for game announcements. GDC has never been and will never be a failure for what it's supposed to do and hopefully others like me will understand whatever it's about.

What about you guys? Please don't tell me you expect announcements aswell? While developers can most certainly talk about their upcoming games (from a development point of view), it's really not the place to announce the next blockbuster and I can't stress that enough.

So what are your two cents about it?

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I can understand the visual part, the game's graphics look good from an artistic point of view but are I also find them totally inappropriate for a game since you can't always distinguish what's happening on screen and well.... to put it short; it's a black-and-white-lines chaos. But still pleasing to the eyes when you look at a screenshot...

Now on the gameplay front, what's actually going on here? You run around, kill some people in totally unrealistic and unfashioned ways? Is that it? Also I do find the violence obviously way too over the top and..... there's too much blood! What exactly is fun there? Why is this getting so much praise for? I'm totally confused. If anything this seems like a broken game plus it's running in 480i which is a sign of lazy Wii development.

Some people have compared it to No More Heroes stating that it's just as fun or perhaps even more. No More Heroes was fun on the first playthrough but eventually it got boring with it's very repetitive gameplay and there was just no replay value into it. I sold my copy. So if this is anything like No More Heroes then I'm not getting it at all.

Honestly the game looks totally not interesting to me but I still don't understand how some people do find it interesting. Is anyone here getting that game? Somebody please clear up my mind about this....

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Rock Band, Assassin's Creed, Motorstorm, Little Big Planet... all that was announced today. This adds up to Resistance and Kingdom Hearts which were the only games I was looking forward to on the PSP for this year. Sure beats the crap out of the DS and Wii. I'm only looking forward to Pokemon Platinum on the DS and for the Wii.... ugh.... only The Conduit is worth mentionning.

I thought Assassin's Creed was an amazing game on the Xbox 360, so anything about this series gets me excited for sure. Motorstorm looks really nice and hopefully will be a great racer for my PSP (only have Wipeout Pulse which is still good though). Little Big Planet was an interesting game for the PS3 but I saw nothing special into it, we'll see about the PSP version. Finally there's Rock Band. From what I've read, there won't be any accessories like the DS version of Guitar Hero (thank God), instead you would have the press the buttons at the right time, kinda like Parapa the rapper. If they allow us to use the songs in our PSP then this would nice. Otherwise there's always Beats from the PS Store.

And then of course you still have the impressive looking Resistance Retribution and Birth By Sleep to look for. This is really shaping up to be a great year for the PSP . It's a good feelling after the pathetic year it got in 2008. Oh and there's also 2 new packs for the PSP coming: One for the Assassin's Creed game and another one for Hannah Montana.

Hannah Montana!?!?!? Oh come on guys this is now the perfect opportunity to get a PSP !!

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Many things have happened ever since my last blog in 2008, where to begin? Well College has started up since 2-3 weeks now.... I still love my 360 and...... oh yeah! I'm selling many of my games.

I never thought I'd be doing this someday but yes I've taken every bad games and every game I don't want to play anymore and I'm selling the whole bunch. I've already made 380$ by selling my old DS and more then a dozen games. Most importantly Wii Play is gone . I can't explain how this has gotten into me but it's been this way ever since I got my 360, I just took a different look at my collection and decided it was time to sell some of those games. This explains the drastic decrease of my collection .

More so, I've also sold a couple of Xbox 360 games as well like Devil May Cry 4, Kung-Fu Panda and Lego Indiana Jones. My Wii collection suffered as well with the loss of games like Fifa 08, Wii Play, Mario Kart Wii, Medal of Honor Heroes 2 and Sonic Secret Rings. The DS and PSP weren't spared as well, not to mention the GBA.

So that's what has mostly been going on with me these days. Also I finally got back to my Wii with the purchase of Super Paper Mario. Don't worry I didn't pay the ridiculous price Nintendo it proposing, I paid 20$ for my copy . I haven't played an awful lot of it but so far the game isn't bad, but not too great either. I think the lack of the former RPG gameplay really killed it the most.

Also I'm playing GTA4 at the moment, that game is totally sweet! I love the perfected GTA gameplay, the story and characters and pretty much all about it. I still don't see this as a AAAA game but it's in no doubt a AAA and I've been enjoying every minutes and frustrations about that game. Rent it if you're not too sure about it, it's worth a purschase for me. I've also got Fable 2 waiting around the corner once I finish GTA4 and I got Fable The Lost Chapters on Xbox for free from a friend who's selling his Xbox (he couldn't sell that game). I already have the PC version but since my laptop isn't too gaming friendly I couldn't play so well on it, this Xbox version should be great for me.

So that's all what's happening plus some other stuff I won't discuss on this blog. I don't post blogs on regular basis, I just post one when I feel like it. Ain't life so great ? Take care everyone and game on.

PS: BTW Halo 3's online is magnificent XD

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But really, this thing is incredible; not only am I getting the best online around but I'm also getting the best games. Just today I got Halo 3, GTAIV and Mass Effect all for 80$. Today was Boxing Day (Canadian equivalent of Black Friday) and I just had to get these deals. I'm not a big Boxing Day guy, in fact that was the first one where I went to actually shop something in oh-so-many-years. I went to Best Buy.... it was horrible.... really you wouldn't see a difference between that and Dead Rising... but enough of that!

When I got in I quickly went to find the games I wanted, got them, bought them and got the hell out of this crazy place. Whew! Now I've got more then enough games for me to enjoy playing the 360 for, well, months. I've got some XBL points left on my account, enough to buy myself some more games online.

The console truly is great; after playing that much around with my 360, I'm ready to call it the best 7th Generation Home console (the PSP being my favourite handheld this gen). So far my 360 has shown no tech difficulties (aside from freezing twice which isn't a big deal for me) and if things get too corny I have my warranty . I really recommend this console above all else to anyone.

So the year is ending, happy holidays .... yeah I'm late I know, can you blame a guy for being to busy enjoying his vacations to update his blog ? So when a year ends, you know what that means? GOTY!

While I don't care what GS or any websites says, my 3 top games this year are:

3- Okami (Wii)

Yeah I know it's a port of a 2 years old game but still, the game is simply amazing from start to finish (even if the start is a little clumsy). It's a great Action/Adventure game with a great story, great graphics and great gameplay. What more can you ask?

2- Super Smash Bros Brawl (Wii)

I've played the first, the second and now the third SSB and so far this one is the best in the whole franchise. Perfecting the gameplay found in Melee (while remaining largely the same), Brawl has managed to break the boundaries set by SSBM when replay value is in the talk. Charming graphics, tons of characters to chose and so, oh so many things to do and collect make Brawl a must have for this year if you own a Wii.

1- Metal Gear Solid 4 (PS3)

Yeah I know I just spoke about how awesome the 360 was and there I am saying that a PS3 game is my GOTY. Well that's the only PS3 game I would ever play and thanks to my cousin for lending me his PS3 for a week during summer, I was able to play (and finish) MGS4, the best game this year and so far, this generation. Yes I love it that much . An engaging story from A to Z, stunning graphics, great music and perfected gameplay formula make MGS4 a rare gem this generation.

Konami, PORT IT ALREADY!!!

So yeah, that's probably my last blog-post this year, hope you guys (and gals) are enjoying video games and just about everything else with your family and friends. Sit back and relax for this holiday break, I now I will after everything I've been through this year .

HAPPY HOLIDAYS!!

Now to get back to that Xbox 360...

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So besides Kung-Fu Panda and Lego Indiana Jones (which both came free with it), I also got Bioshock and a 2 years warranty for only 20$! I was supposed to have Assassin's Creed and Rainbow Six Vegas as a special promotion but .... they're out of stock...... **** .

It's ok, Bioshock seems so far a great game so I'll be cool for the couple of weeks to come since I'm also getting a Gold subscription and some XBL points. I've explored the Xbox 360 so far and it all looks very great. Deffinitely a great console and I sense hours and hours of fun coming very soon.

If you wish to add me, my Gamertag is right here in my profile; it's lebanese boy without the underscore. And yes, I'm still not using capital letters, sue me.

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While reading on Kotaku (super duper cool video game website), I stumbled across a post about a Kojima teaser... like we haven't seen one of these before. But this one is pretty interesting, it's all green and shows a power symbol which looks strikingly the same as the Xbox 360's power button when the console is turned on. When I saw that, I smiled.

Why? I have always said that MGS4 (or any other Metal Gear game) would eventually come to the Xbox 360, this teaser just comes to back me up. Of course nothing is proved and all is speculation. But let's take a close look at this picture together:

So there's an 'i', its not the letter but rather a flipped exclamation point. Then there's an actual exclamation point (something very popular in Metal Gear games). At the end there's this power symbol which looks like the 360's power button when the console is turned on (flashing green). So you take the flipped exclamation point and how do you get to the next image? By rotating it in 180 degrees of course. Maybe that ''power symbol'' just wants to show the 180 degrees rotation. Do the math, 180 + 180 = 360. Also the whole thing is green and that colour can only be associated with the 360 this generation. In fact the whole Xbox family is associated with green.

I've heard many people say that this could be a Metal Gear Ac!d game (I think its obvious why --» look at the name) but the problem is that this theory can't stand since there's ''MGST'' in the page's URL. So this means it's in fact a Metal Gear Solid game and has absolutely nothing to do with Ac!d.

I also heard about the possibility of an iPhone game. Konami has not made a game for the iPhone yet to the best of my knowledge and I don't know why they would begin with the Metal Gear series. True there's Metal Gear Solid Mobile coming to the N-Gage which is the first Konami game on the service but still... the only thing people are basing their opinion on is the ''i''. Again, it's not the letter; it's a flipped exclamation point. Also they would say that ''MGST'' could stand for Metal Gear Solid Touch. It could just as well stand for Metal Gear Solid Teaser. There are also DSi rumours..... Hell no.

So really the only one that seems to fit this equation is the Xbox 360 and the Metal Gear franchise is in high demands on that platform. With the PS3 being the biggest loser this generation in terms of sales, I don't see how any developer could still make exclusive games on that platform. So is MGS4 finally coming to the Xbox 360 or are we looking at a Teaser for the next Metal Gear Solid game?

Also this could just as well be nothing at all and just a lame joke from Kojima. If this is teasing us about an upcoming game then my guess is that it definitely has something to do with the Xbox 360. A port or brand new, the Metal Gear franchise will definitely see the light of day on the 360.

Speaking of the Xbox 360, it's highly possible that I will finally get mine this week! More precisely; this Wednesday. There's an ongoing deal at Best Buy which will grant me Assassin's Creed and Viva Pi»ata for free with the console (along with the 2 other free games). So buying it 5 days earlier isn't going to hurt much but I won't be playing it next week, I just can't let that promotion pass. It's about time!

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Pop (Wiiware)

Wiiware finally launched, it was a day I was anticipating but sadly all the games offered right now are simply not interesting at all. So I had a few points to spare and I decided to buy one game, Pop. Boy was I stupid.... not only is it dull and repetitive but there's practically nothing into it. The WFC logo would make you think that there's online play but no it's just a ****ing leaderboard! Who cares about a leaderboard when there's no online play? Well ok some games such as Megaman 9 are at least interesting enough to include a leaderboard without online play but this game is just trash. Spend your Wii points elsewhere my friends. In fact buy XBL points instead, there's much better games on XBLA then on Wiiware anyway...

Sonic Adventure 2 Battle (Gamecube)

This game has mixed up reactions, some liked it some just want to vomit at it, I'm the latter. Don't get me wrong, I absolutely love Sonic and always did since the Genesis games (he's part of my childhood), this is the first Sonic game I've ever owned in fact and it's the worst I've got. The controls are dull, the graphics are crap and just about everything else about the game is trash. I already did a review about it, feel free to smash as much as you want with the ''Not recommend'' option like the rest of the kids did.

Spiderman 2 (DS)

I didn't buy that game but received it as a birthday present from my aunt (does she hate me that much? ). I clearly never asked for this piece of **** and although the intentions behind the present were good, I'd be more then glad to get rid of this crap. Problem is that I'm not able to sell this thing, and if I want to sell it to EB games, I doubt they'll pay any higher than 50 cents. Oh well at least I can buy gum with that...

Medal of Honor Heroes 2 (Wii)

I'm stupid, I'm an idiot and I'm telling myself all that for listening to others for my games recommendations. Gamespot's game reviewer must have really been drunk while making the review for this game. He said it has surprisingly good controls................... THE CONTROLS SUCK SO MUCH IT MAKES ME WANT TO STRANGLE MYSELF WITH THE NUNCHUK!! No kidding those controls are completely horrible and you have to handle the controller in a weird way to play decently. Plus the online play is just....crap. There's much lag and other players feel a little too robotic, kinda makes me think they're bots and not humans...

Age of Empires: The Age of Kings (DS)

Oh my God... this game looks boring, plays boring and controls and an extremely boring way! Everything about it is so boring, dull and just crap. Best of all? They're making another one as we speak! While it was pretty interesting that Microsoft brought one of it's properties to the DS (not to mention Mechassault) but I just couldn't even stay more than about an hour playing this game. Plus every time I tried coming back to it and being virtually ''interested'' in it, it just repels me off. This is obviously not your PC Age of Empires.

Fifa 08 (Wii)

While I didn't really buy this game directly, I did however technically spend money on it. When my cousin sold me his Wii last year he also gave me 3 games, one of which was Fifa 08. Now I'm a huge Soccer fan and I've been playing soccer ever since I was young and still love the sport more than ever.....but this game was just not for me and for even the hardcore, die-hard fans of the sport either. The controls were crap, so were the graphics. Online play was a joke but what made me laugh pretty hard is that lacking of a proper single player mode, all it has is quick play. So really it felt like a demo of the real deal rather than a real game....what a shame.

Mario Kart Wii (Guess what platform)

This comes to a shocking eh? One of the mostly praised games this year for the Wii is one of the games I regret buying the most. After Mario Kart DS you'd think that Nintendo finally got it right and perfect about Mario Kart games, no? Well no! They downgraded the franchise with this boring crap. Many boring characters added in (Birdo, Baby Mario, Funky Kong...... who the hell wants these in?!? ) and the exclusion of snaking really killed it off in my opinion. Sure the online is pretty decent (better then Brawl anyway) but lately I wasn't able to get a single person to play with online, thanks once more for the crappy service Ninty. Plus I really need to mention this, but the graphics are uber crap compared to other Wii games. One of the bright sides of the game is that it had some pretty interesting stages and I also loved the addition of bikes in the game. But the Wii Wheel....... OMG Nintendo stop it! At the very least we can play with other control schemes.» Also the leaderboard is another ''good'' thing about it, I'm saying it this way because I don't give a crap about leaderboards.... really. Also I just want to get back to snaking, it made my experience with Mario Kart DS so amazing and I just couldn't put the DS down back then.... but why exclude it? I just don't understand. Also all those who call snaking cheating should really get a reality check.... it's an advanced technique, not an exploit of the game. This was put intentionally by the developers (who strangely also snake) and so therefore all those who call it cheating are just sad of getting their ass handed to them online.

---

Not such a big list huh? Well I'm a guy who generally loves the games I buy but there are some exceptions as you now know. I did state earlier that these were not put in order, but here is the one I truly regret the most having spent any single portion of my money on:

Wii play (Again guess the damned platform)

This is the absolute, biggest crap I have in my house that is categorized in the video games section. This game is boring, crap ****y and just plain wrong from Start to Finish, A to Z, Left to Right and Top to Bottom. This is another one of the 3 games I received along my Wii from my cousin. I didn't buy it directly but did spend some money on it technically. The controls suck, the gameplay is a real freaking joke and really, the only spark of fun I had was that reference to Duck Hunt, but even that portion blew. This game felt nothing more than just a freaking flash game and really putting any price tag on this thing is crime. What really makes me cry at night is the fact that this is one of the best selling games EVER!! If such a crap sold so much is there a place for quality in this industry anymore? This is a perfect example of Nintendo ruining our industry. No the Wii itself isn't ruining the VG industry, on the contrary it's doing it a lot of good. But Wii play IS in fact ruining the industry. Such a piece of junk selling just has got to be the biggest joke of this generation. To tell you the truth this is the only game I'm ready to sell, really. For the first time in my life there is a game I really want to sell... gotta go find someone I hate. Also please, for the love of the children, whales, dolphins, forest and everything else... DO NOT BUY THIS GAME!!

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So recently I've had nothing but cold feelings towards Nintendo mainly for focusing 100% on casual gaming. What else is new? Pretty much everyone is this way now. Sure the Wii does have its share of fun (otherwise it wouldn't even sell) but when about 95% of the library is crappy ***** games then I don't really find it really reassuring. Yes I'm not exaggerating, about 95% ! I can only think of about a dozen of great Wii games, not any more than that. Also VC games don't count, since they're logically from past consoles. Plus Wiiware has yet to produce something virtually interesting in my opinion. Sure Nintendo is making tons of cash because of the Wii, and well I'm not an analyst or anything but I know Nintendo's investing in a temporary market. Casual gaming should never be your main focus or else you're just going towards self-destruct.

The casual/non-gamer isn't as interested in gaming then the hardcore gamer, meaning that this person wouldn't buy any more then maybe 3-4 games per year (no jokes) whereas the hardcore would buy about 8 or more per year. So who would be in the best position at the moment? Nobody! But Microsoft seems to be doing ok in these kind of terms and so far is the clear winner of the 7th Generation of home consoles (for me at least).

Honestly who judges a winner based simply on sales numbers? Only an ignorant if you ask me. The PS2 was the clear winner in the 6th generation based on quality(for me) and sales numbers (for the idiotic masses). Yes sales do matter at some extent but it's always all about the games. And so far, the Xbox 360 has the games. The Wii has some great games such as Brawl, Mario Galaxy, Okami, No More Heroes and such. But these games sadly represent the extreme minority of the Wii library. Let's all be honest with ourselves here, who is looking forward to any game on the Wii? I'm looking forward to The Conduit..... and the next Zelda game.

At that point this Zelda game has become an urban legend, I'm beginning to even doubt that we'll see it on the Wii and not on the next Nintendo console. Right now Nintendo wants to make us think that they've launched a true Wii Zelda game with Zelda TP. That is simply a GCN game (an excellent one, for sure) with Wii controls tacked on. It's nothing close to a Wii game. Link's crossbow training was a joke and personally I think it should have never even seen the light of day but Nintendo just showed us that they're ready to ''casualize'' even Zelda.

I'm going to come out honest now; I'm losing interest in Zelda, I'm losing interest in Nintendo and I've almost lost complete interest in the Wii. I never even thought that I'll lose a slightest interest in Zelda someday but Nintendo has managed to do it.... to me! The biggest Zelda fan-boy in the world! They actually have managed to do it!
The 7th Generation began very well for Nintendo with the DS (and is still managing to be great so far in that zone) but with the Home consoles..... I'm ready to call the Wii a failure if this keeps up.

I'll be done complaining soon when I get my Xbox 360 by the end of this year, I honestly can't wait. I know this console at least won't disappoint in terms of games and content. The Wii is really nothing short of a joke compared to the 2 other consoles and no matter how much millions it'll sell, if it doesn't get the games, it's a total failure.

PS: BTW I finally changed my banner! Even further shows me losing interest in Zelda. I think it looks better than the previous one and sort–of blends well with the current Gamespot background color.

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So basically here's the story:

Some people, while playing a beta version of Little Big Planet, have found out that at some section of the game there's a music track that contains 2 lines that could also be found in the Koran (Islam holy book for the 10 people who don't know). So they took that as an offence and wrote to Sony about it so they could correct this issue. Sony responded in recalling all the copies worldwide (thus delaying the game by a week) to remove that track.

So this has caused quite an uproar for Sony fans, Cows, Chickens and avid forum nerds. Quite a controversy I must say, but was it all necessary? Well it's a good thing that Sony cares about the well-being of their Muslim customers (or maybe they're caring about their own) but is this whole thing truly offensive to Muslims? Well as you would know, I'm a Muslim and I'd be glad to answer that question .

After much reflection and after listening to that track and asking questions to my father who knows more about the religion then I do, I have come to this conclusion: What was the subject to this controversy is in no way offensive to my religion. Yes putting verses of the holy Koran in a song or any music is offensive but see.... they're not really using verses of the Koran; well actually they are but.... Look at it this way: The words used are included in a verse of the Koran but it doesn't mean that it's somebody who's reciting the Koran, plus it's not the verse in its entirety. So these are Arabic words that could be used in everyday's life. Well actually you wouldn't be saying that every day.

What are those verses? Well here's the English translation to both:

- ''Every soul shall have the taste of death''
- ''All that is on earth will perish''

Now before anybody jumps over the gun, table or whatever, this isn't an order from God to kill infidels or whatever you'd hear from those youtube-quality terrorist videos. As far as I know these would be referring to judgement day or anything in the similar. Point is, they're taken out of context. I mean here's my translation to both of them:

- Everyone (at some point) will die - If you don't believe that, then good luck in life.
- One day, the earth will go BOOM. - Go and make a search on the lifetime of a planet.

My question is, why did the programmers put in these parts of their respective verses in particular? Strange don't you think? I listened to the track but didn't find it offensive for myself. If it was someone reciting the Koran or if it was clear that we were hearing a verse then that WOULD be a serious offense but right now it is not the case. So why was another fellow Muslim gamer so much offended that he asked Sony to take actions?

Actually we just got to the funny part, Sony's actions. The guy asked for a patch and the correction of all future copies. How did that translate for Sony? Recall all copies worldwide and delay the game another week! So whose fault is this in reality? Sony or the Muslim gamer? Answer is pretty obvious if you ask me... Yes there was no real offence in there, thus no need for all this drama, but Sony really just needed to release a simple patch and that would have been the end of it. But if we see this from another point of view, the game has been delayed for only a week. Yes only 7 days.

*transforms back into Zelda fan-boy* I HAD TO SUFFER THROUGH 3 DELAYS FOR ZELDA TP WHICH RESULTED IN NEARLY A WHOLE YEAR WORTH OF WAIT AND YOU ******* ARE WHINING FOR ONLY A ****ING WEEK OF DELAY!?! WTF IS WRONG WITH YOU???

So that was my two cents about this whole thing. I kind of felt obligated to point it out since I've seen my religion being assaulted left and right (what else is new?) over this story. Someone had to come out and say how silly this whole thing was and when I'm saying someone I, of course, mean a Muslim who would say that it's silly. I didn't make that blog post to fit in or anything, what I said was true and I'm a very believing and practising Muslim and I try to be the best I can be.

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Results yesterday gave the conservatives 38% of the power, Liberals 26% and the Neo-Democrats 18%. The rest of the power is in the hands of people I'd prefer not even talking about in my blog. These are the people who want to separate Quebec from Canada. They're downright stupid as you would imagine. I was sitting in front of my TV until 12:30am today watching the elections, live results and speeches at the end. At first the Liberals enjoyed a small lead on the Conservatives (mainly because where we began to count votes were Liberal strongholds). Afterward the Liberals and the Conservatives were practically neck and neck when votes began to pour from Quebec and Ontario. After that, it's as if everything was frozen for the Liberals and the scariest thing happened: Conservatives began to take a lead which was only widening throughout the night until it almost doubled the number of seats that the Liberals had. In Canada we count power as the number of seats each party gains in the House of Common (where everything federal happens in Canada), there are a total of 308 seats and to hold a majority government a party needs at least 155 seats. The Conservatives ended with 143 seats, Liberals 76 and the NPD 37. The Bloc Quebecois (darn it I mentioned their name) has 50 and there's 2 independent seats, the Green Party has none.

So congratulations Canada, you just showed to the world how stupid you are by re-electing the psycho that we all know and love, Stephen Harper. Seriously, I'm simply disgusted that there were that much people who voted Conservative. It's as if Canadians haven't learned their lesson those 2 years. Kind of reminds me of the Americans in 2004 but let's not go there.... He won, he actually freaking won. Good job once again Harper, you just wasted nearly 300 000 000$ for these elections which simply brought us back one month in the past and hasn't changed a darn thing. And nobody's saying a thing about it. I hold a lot of respect for Stephane Dion, especially after the speech he delivered last night. Anyway, now that it's all over, everybody is looking at the Liberals (the only losers) and most expect Dion to resign soon.

I think Dion is a very smart man and he'll do the right thing, no matter what he does. If he stays then this must mean he can get the party back to what it used to be. If he resigns, he gives his party a chance of perhaps getting a better leader. I'll respect whatever decision he'll take for the Liberals. I salute you Dion, you put up a great fight! Until next time my friend. Liberals won't give up, and I'll keep supporting them for the next elections (which should probably be in the next 2 years or so). Anyways that was my two cents, anybody else watched the elections?

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Yup that soon and Canada is already psyched about it as you can imagine. Well time for me to explain to you guys the very complicated Canadian system when it comes to elections...... not. Actually I'll just make a run-down of all the parties in the election and give my opinion about them, that'll be more fun and easier to read.

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Liberal Party of Canada [American counterpart: The Democratic Party of America]
Leader: Stephane Dion (pictured)

In case you don't know already, this is the party I'm voting for. I've always been Liberal ever since I got interested in politics and I will vote Liberal on October 14th. My father is actually friend with Stephane Dion believe it or not because he worked with him in the past (my father has been in Canada for over 30 years now) and he also fully supports him for the elections. He says that no matter what anybody says about Stephane Dion, he's the right man for the job and would make a formidable Prime Minister. I believe those words and also granted my support to Dion who's a former Environment minister. I believe we can have a richer, greener and more prosperous Canada with this guy, or at least let's hope so. He's not quite the Barack Obama of Canada but he'll do the trick .

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Conservative Party of Canada [American counterpart: The Republican Party of America]
Leader: Stephen Harper (pictured)

Current Prime Minister of Canada is this ******* right there. Harper (commonly known as George W. Bush's *****) is probably the worst example of a conservative leader and also of a leader. Following Bush's policies on almost every aspect, this guy has made of Canada basically America-junior over the last 2 years. At least he reduced the taxes.... but worst of all probably is the fact that he put us up for 2 more years with the Americans in Afghanistan! WTF are we still doing over there? Good-bye Harper, make place for Dion will ya?

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New Democratic Party of Canada [American counterpart: God help America if they ever have something similar]
Leader: Jack Layton (pictured)

Please get the **** out of here....

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Green Party of Canada [American counterpart: Green Party of America I guess?]
Leader: Elizabeth May (pictured)

Sure the Green party may seem like the ideal group to vote for when it comes to the environment. But hoping for them to win is as hopeless as..... Well it's just damn hopeless....

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So that pretty much sums up all of the parties (those not included aren't even worth mentioning). So I'm voting Liberal next week and hopefully they'll win so we go back at being Canada again and not America-junior (I can't stress that enough). I was planning on having a sig for support but I ran out of time to make one (heck I still have my Super Mario Galaxy sig) so instead I'll just included a sentence with a link. Go Liberals!

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My impression? I love it! I love it and I want it! Not only does this DS have the possibility of inserting a SD Card and thus also will have it's own version of the Wii Shop Channel, but it also has a crappy ****-ass camera of .3 megapixel. How can the world get any better?

But seriously, I'm really excited about the New DS coming next year for us in North America. Downloadeable games on the DS, apps? Congrats to you Nintendo, you've won my heart! No GBA slot? No problem! Who really needs one anyway? Chances are you already have a GBA and/or any of the other DSes so why would we need that on the second redesign?

This one is coming in both black and white but when we'll get to the NA launch we'll decide on the colour. In overall this little baby looks impressive and we're finally getting a significant upgrade to DS (I still think the DS Lite is merely a physical update and nothing internal has really changed) much like the PSP Slim was to the original PSP.

PSP Brite and DSi, such fierce competition. It's a good time to own a handheld console and thank God we live in it .

Also let's not forget about the Wii! Gamecube games are getting re-released (thus hoping for any titles I've missed) and games such as punch-out got announced (not interested, sue me). But most importantly, we'll soon be able to save VC/Wiiware games on a SD card! I think a HDD might not really be needed that much afterall. Just go and get a 2GB SD card and you'll be fine. Of course when I said ''soon'' I really meant next spring .

Is Nintendo finally returning to it's former self? All of these announcements at the same time? Well let's hope so .

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But even much more important then that, today I did what so many would ever dream to do: I visited the inside of one of the world's best video game developer studio! Most precisely Ubisoft Montreal, makers of Prince of Persia, Assassin's Creed, Rainbow Six Vegas and so on......

So I walked for an hour before finding Ubisoft Montr»al (no kidding!) and by the time I got there (10am), I was surprised to see a huge line just waiting to get in. And by huge I really mean it, it was covering a whole street and 4 intersections! So I got in line without even knowing how in the world I'll get in when I noticed that the line wasn't actually going towards the Ubisoft studio, but rather a tent. But I did know that all of the people next to me where here for Ubi so I stayed in line. When we did get to the tent, I was happy : there were unreleased Ubisoft games being demoed such as FarCry 2 (which I played and enjoyed) and also they were selling some Ubisoft branded wear. I picked up a Prince of Persia shirt which I found to be really great for 10$ but decided not to spend any more then that since well, I wasn't here for shopping .

I also picked up some pamphlets (and got a Assassin's Creed picture frame as a souvenir) for information on video game careers and on the Ubisoft Campus (where I want to study to become a game designer). After that (actually before that), I was given a ticket with the time of my visit and then proceeded to wait in another line again. They called my time, got into yet another line. And after nearly 10 minutes, I finally went in! Entrance looked ok (it is a more-then-100-years-old building) and then we got introduced to our guide and finally began our tour.

First we got to see how exactly looks like a desk when you're a game developer, looks quite messy. Also he mentioned that when somebody is done with his/her part of the project, that person would clean up his desk of everything (absolutely everything) and move on to another floor and setup their own desk there, wow . After that we went to see a brief presentation of how video games are being developed (not too much new stuff for me there but it was still pretty good and informative). And also during that, I actually got to see the Naruto team working on the Naruto game that's supposed to launch soon, sweet . Later on we went to see how motion captures are done with a example from Rainbow Six Vegas 2 (again not so much new stuff to me but still good) and along the way we passed right next to the Prince of Persia team room (*drools*) BUT THERE WAS NOBODY . And finally we visited a little more and got done with our tour.

In overall I really loved that day since I got to visit for the first time ever the place where I'm hoping to work in the future. Ubisoft Montr»al looks amazing and I'm really hoping to join this incredible team someday. Also no, I didn't see either Jade Raymond or Ben Mattes, it's Saturday people! They're at home!

I included this small video mix of footage that I took outside Ubisoft Montreal (like promised) but I really couldn't take anything from the inside, sorry . Hope you like it anyway.

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My mom came home with a newspaper and I just had a quick look when I just noticed, oh nothing special, I mean this always happens and well..... UBISOFT MONTREAL ARE HAVING A OPENHOUSE EVENT!!!!!!

Yes Ubisoft Montreal is the very studio responsible for games such as Prince of Persia and Assassin's Creed and it's all happening in the very building where every single one of those games were developed. For the records, Ubisoft Montreal is precisely where I'm hoping to work in the future. So yeah I had my happy dance as soon as I pinched myself and pretty much got my confirmation that this wasn't a dream.

Open-house is this Saturday from 9am to 5pm and I'll be first in line . Plus they're having openings for game testers and I might apply since I am, well, jobless . At the beginning of this year I went to an Open-house for the Ubisoft Campus, where I'll study to become a video game designer, and now this! Am I lucky or what?

If I can take pictures (which I'm certain that I can't) I'll take as many as I can but most importantly I'll go there to see first-hands how it is to develop games and get to ask questions to true video-game developers! I'll be sure to tell you all about the experience.

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