you ranted 19 times without using the word 'squeegee.'

You know something? I hate achievements. I hate trophies. I hate them because they reward me for doing or finding little buried things inside a game, they push me to do things that I might not have thought of on my own, or even better, getting them while I'm just messing around in a game and unlock something on accident, then I scream a high pitched "EEEE!" in delight, and I can't wait to get the next one.

"EEEEEEEE!"

I hate them because I love them, some of you may understand what I mean, and might even know where I am going with this – and hats off to you, because I'm not entirely sure myself yet, but let's just see where this train takes us.

I see nothing wrong with this picture being taken out of contex.... oh.

On the minor points, as I said before, it's great that you can see this list of goals and things to do outside of the normal play, but I have a problem with them being listed out for me, games have a tendency to give out achievements/trophies for completing the game over the course of the story, which is fine. Some of them have clever titles that are silly, but still somehow sum it up in a few words. Whoever decided it would be a good idea to have these listed out BEFORE you've achieved them, and why everyone around them agreed is beyond me. You get a cliff notes version of the game and you risk spoiling plot points for yourself if you decide to check it out to see what you get if you collect the 8 billion shiny pebbles scattered throughout the game. I hate that, and it IS getting better, but still, this seems like a no-brainer, or maybe a little bit of brainer.

Pictured: Very little brain.

This one is more game specific and requires a bit of background first: I've let a good friend of mine move into my spare bedroom while he saves up some money and gets himself back on his feet… being a primarily (read: ONLY) single player gamer, I don't have much in the way of two or more player games, on top of that, he himself is the absolute definition of casual gamer as far as I'm concerned. He doesn't himself own any consoles, and to my recollection he has only had a PS2 in his possession once for about a month like 6 years ago. IF he games, it will be a current gen Madden game. Personally, I hate sports games, as I've no interest in them. The only sport I can even follow is Baseball, and even then I'm not thrilled with it. I just don't care and I doubt that I ever will. In any case, in an effort to cheer him up a bit as well as give us something to do, I went and bought Madden 2010 and an extra controller for my PS3. This was the second game I had ever purchased for my PS3, the first being Infamous, which I managed to get ALL the trophies for (something I'm quite proud of for inexplicable reasons beyond me being easily pleased and sating my need to see that 100%) I had decided at that point that I would not buy any more games for my ps3 until the current games were beaten, the idea being to not have a shameful backlog like on my 360. And PS2. And Gamecube. And Xbox. And PC.

I didn't think about this when I put the game in, I SHOULD have created a new gamer account, I SHOULD have just not bought the stupid thing in the first place. I SHOULD have stopped after that tequila s—wait what was I talking about? Oh yeah – so my friend is a very skilled Madden player, his knowledge of the sport AND the game is frighteningly encyclopedic, I tried but it was just too much for me. (To me, all those lines and squiggles mean zilch, usually when I state this, I'm accused of being gay… remember, I live in Texas, and there is a whole different breed of stupid down here. Fortunately they tend to stay out of the cities for the most part. However, I find it immensely amusing to point out to these angry redneck homophobes out there that they are themselves getting a little too excited about a sport where large men in tights jump on top of each other as much and as often as they can manage. This also gets me into a lot of trouble&hellip

No comment.... orgy.

Anyways, he gets plenty of use out of the game. However, not.one.bloody.trophy has been earned. We've had this game for over 3 months and the big fat goose egg is an eyesore to me. It's not like he hasn't tried either - I looked at the list, not only is a large portion of them online only, a lot of them are RIDICULOUSLY specific. Things like a certain player intercepting a pass to another certain player. WHILE it's SNOWING. There's several like that – and that annoys me, and the rest are earned online. I will never play the game myself, I know I won't – and he'll be moving out soon. Bah.

Now, let's get to the nitty gritty. The whole reason for this nonsense and what I believe to be my initial gripe, although there's no telling with me. This is kind of a dual blog, single player games and their online modes and the trophies and achievements that can only be gained through online… *groan*… 'multiplayer'.

I've said this many times, I hate, hate multiplayer. Specifically the online variety… I don't mind a co-op every now and then, and I've done my share of death matches. However, once again, something in Kelly's blog pushes me into a seething rage – not at her, mind you… just call it angry enlightenment, like "Yeah. …. YEAH. DAMNIT. EXACTLY! #*&$*$!!!1!"

If Kelly got me started, it was our own soapboxed JohnSteed (congrats by the way, it's a good read and glad it got out there) that knocked me over the cliff with his take on Dragon Age, and his theory on the split of MMOs and RPGs vs. say the FPS games which more and more rely on a multiplayer element as a primary game play function and tack a SP mode on incase Xbox live is down that day.

No indeed.

Lengthy, meaningful and VALUABLE single player experiences are hard to come by. Value is key, in Johns blog, he talks about paying full price for Dragon Age, and getting more value out of it than games he waits for the price drop. I'm paraphrasing, but that speaks volumes to me. This is not a cheap hobby we all share, I don't want to think about the thousands I've spent on it over the years. It's a money pit, and we all know it. If you didn't, well – now you do…also, PM me your bank account information. So getting value for my dollar means a lot. Multiplayer means nothing to me, I detest it and it's disheartening to me to see the online modes starting to take up so much of the spotlight. I'm looking at Dragon Age myself. It is SINGLE PLAYER ONLY. How often do we get to say that anymore? Sure there are always some in the pipeline, the next few months are actually starting to look really good to me, which contradicts everything I've just said, but this is an oddity rather than the norm and the majority are sequels – so let's talk numbers. The ratio given to me by the highly paid research team that I just pictured in my head is 34 to 1. (citation needed)

"Okay, but let's go ahead and make the velociraptor way more dangerous. We're kind of stupid that way anyhow."

Okay so I don't have "real numbers" per se to back that up, but its "common knowledge." You can't argue with me on the grounds that putting things in quotes makes them "vague enough to mean several things."

Not Pictured: Sharks with frikken laser beams attached to their frikken heads.

More often than not, I buy a game because it looks to be entertaining, (except Madden) I'm not one to pick up a crappy game on the cheap in a bargain bin for easy points a la 'Barbie's Super High Fashion Adventure on a Pony II'. (Part I was better anyway) For example I picked up Brutal Legend, played through it, beat it, and like many games, it has this BS multiplayer element tacked on. I'm fine with ignoring that, nothing says I HAVE to play it, and god knows I don't want to - unless of course I want those %&*$# Trophies! This, friends, irritates me to no end. Place 1st in a ranked game, Compete in 100 matches, Beat Opponent in some specific and frustratingly difficult manner 10 times. I get that this is a pointless gripe – I'm not holding my breath for a change, but am I alone here? Why must I allow a 10 year old (boy?) to scream into my ear how awesome his mommy tells him he is so I can have 100% completion on one of my games? I would submit the solution is to keep multiplayer trophies separate. Playing within the SP mode will allow for 100% completion and the multiplayer can have its own set beyond that. That makes sense right? Play the game to completion and its reflected on your card, and multiplayer is separate, as it's not part of the main game anyhow, so it stands on its own. If you don't play it, then you just never see it. Makes sense to me anyways. Right, that will happen.

Achievement Unlocked : Went online for an ultimately meaningless trophy, now your girlfriend hates you.

Cursed chastity belts.

oh yeah. I went there.

The hot topic in the industry lately seems to be 'Digital Downloads' – This is partly spawned from Kelly's post on the topic, but it's something I've wanted to sound off on myself for awhile.

The short answer is simply this: I can't get behind DD.

The not short answer is :

Call me old fashioned, but I prefer having a physical copy of my media, be it game, movie, music or otherwise. EBooks? HA. My inner gamer is not threatened by this idea, I don't see the industry switching entirely to DD anytime soon - they would cut their own business down by a huge amount - I'm clearly not the only one who prefers a physical product, but also most people with anything less than a high speed connection are not going to try to download a massive game over a period of what could be days or even weeks depending.

Not only that, but what about the ever looming presence of next gen? When we all invariably upgrade to the PS9, Xbox9000 or whatever phallic joke Nintendo comes up with, are we supposed to just forget about all the money we've sunk into our old DDs? Surely they won't maintain those servers for all time, and we will eventually run out of room on whatever console we have, and fairly quickly too if current hd space is any indication. "But V, you amazingly handsome manbeast!" I hear you exclaim, "Surely you don't care about games that you've already played through and beaten (or not beaten) enough to play them again when you have a shiny new Nintenboxstation with TURBO GRAFIX!!"

Here's the thing, I am a gamer, and like most gamers, my nature is to horde the **** out of my favorite games. The majority of us I'd wager are collectors to one extent or another. The developers know this – How many of you went and found all those damn stars in Mario 64? Or every blast shard in Infamous? I did. I can't help myself. I love that feeling of 100% completion, and I love having a good library to run my fingers across when I'm trying to decide what to play, sooo sexy… but I digress. The point is that I still fire up my NES or my Genesis from time to time - I love those old games, Somewhere in my collection of junk there is a box with an Atari 2600 in it with a modest collection of games. It's where I started, and I enjoy going back there every now and then just to remind myself what it's all about. Particularly when I find myself losing interest in games, it's good for me to go retro for awhile and get a little taste of the old school. There's a huge nostalgic factor with gamers and their games. I still have an old 36" tube in my guest room that's main function is retro gaming. Whether you are reliving the first time you picked up a NES controller and squished a goomba, or arguing with an unsettling amount of passion about spelling her name Aeris or Aerith, we all have games that we think back to and say "yeah that's the good stuff". That said, there is a very high chance that I will feel the same about some of the games I've played through in the last few months. Maybe I'll break out my PS3 to play some Arkham Asylum, just to show some young upstart what games were like before you just downloaded them into your brain. Okay, that's pushing it – but DDs would take all this away from me eventually – As I said in the beginning I'm old fashioned, and I have the preferences to match. I'm sure that 20 years from now none of that will matter to the modern day gamer, but as for me, I'll be the creepy old man with a huge stash of the old school and I'll love every bit of it.

In the meantime, if they want to offer the OPTION of a DD alongside the pressed disc, then that is perfectly reasonable, it's a great way to distribute independent games, and budget titles… little gems that otherwise wouldn't see the light of day… it just opens up the market that much more, and those that want to deal with it, great. Those that prefer the box have their cake too, or a combination. Everyone wins.

Blog is posting... come back in 3 hours.

My already infrequent post schedule will become even more sparse and random, the reason for this is that I have told Comcast to kindly go **** themselves. I was paying over 120 bucks a month for digital cable and internet. I had no movie channels at all, and internet by itself with no tv package is about 60 a month. So, I once again find myself without television or internet that would keep my otherwise deviant mind pre-occupied with Family Guy and youtube videos of idiots setting their pants on fire.

I may chance a foray into the world of Satellite TV when next I decide I can't go another day without channel surfing, I can get ALL their movie and sports packages for like 80 bucks a month. I just have to stick an ugly dish to the side of my condo. However I will *NOT* get DSL. I'm using a DSL connection right now... and I seriously want to strangle a kitten. Sure, it's broadband, (more like dialup2.0)but it's aggravating since I'm so used to cable, the difference is just shocking. This must be how the Jetson's felt when they traveled back in time from the distant year of 2002 to visit the Flintstones. Damn you Hana-Barbera. Who decided that every move a character makes, from blinking to peeking around a corner requires a crappy sound effect? WHO?

Anyways, I've just about beaten InFamous, I'm holding off on the last mission to get all the damn shards. Suffice to say the game is extremely fun, and I've really enjoyed it for my first PS3 game. When I've finished, I may post something a bit more in depth for no other reason than to take up space on your list for a brief time.

As an aside, I had been really looking forward to Prototype, and most of the reviews I've read have been positive, except they all come with a 'BUT' and proceed to make a laundry list of technical problems. This makes me hesitant to purchase it, since I've no access to XBL right now, and getting any forthcoming patches, etc. would be impossible.

I miss my internet. She loved me like no one else could.

*heart*

Do you know what sucks? I mean, really, really sucks?

Not having any superpowers, that's what.

Oh sure, I have *a* power... I can talk to fish, but honestly, it's hardly "super," and for that matter, how many of you out there have I saved using my telepathic link to seasnails? Show of hands?

I thought so.

Don't think I don't know that I am forever relegated to the punchline side of the Superfriends. I see your snarky comments on the internet, and the mocking references in the media. I can get OUT of the water you know. Even the cheapest motels have internet access. (I can't afford swanky caves like SOME superheroes... that prick)

I notice that pretty much everyone is getting a movie deal now. I was actually approached myself, but it was by that Uwe Boll guy - and even Aquaman has standards folks. Frankly I'm holding out for a part in Harry Potter. I love that fuzzy little wizard! I bet Batman won't ever be in a Harry Potter movie. Maybe Twilight, he's certainly moody enough to be a gay vampire.

It's not that I hate Batman, or that I'm bitter... I just, you know, wouldn't mind if he died more often. Seriously, that ****** has more money than he knows what to do with, having money basically IS his superpower! He uses it to build these ridiculous, completely impractical gadgets that Rube Goldberg would call complicated, swing around like some kind of emo bat-monkey, and then goes and broods on top of a building... a building he probably owns, yet he can't lend me twenty bucks to get a hot meal and wash my uniform at a Laundromat. Suck it, Bruce. You billionaire jackass.

Anyway, I was crashing at Robin's pad on Castro Street in San Francisco, which I generally don't like to do... he always finds some reason to touch me in some way, which is profoundly unsettling. I slept over 2 times before I realized he was lying about it being a one bedroom apartment and insisted we share his twin size bed. (He covered the door to the guest room with a full length mirror) You don't know horror until you've been spooned by a 93 pound man in a mask. On the bright side, he has a Playstation 3 which is fun to kill the time while he's off... doing whatever it is he does. (Don't ask, don't tell) On this occasion, I noticed he had a new game, this one is called "inFamous" - I wasn't sure what it was about to be honest, but the box looked neat, so I threw it in and, wow. Just wow. Like I didn't already have enough of a complex about my own lack of impressive powers, especially compared to everyone else and their mom... and dog. (Even Underdog is more impressive than I am, what is THAT all about??) Now there's a videogame character with awesome electro-sparky-magic shooting out of his ass. Are you guys TRYING to make me kill myself with this crap?

I have to admit though, this game is a lot of fun. Once I got past the fact that I now have that much more competition to overshadow me, I am in control of this digital bastage. As such, I took it upon myself to unleash the evil Aquaman like you've never seen (or cared about) before!

...........Except less dolphins and more mayhem.

*dusts off blog*

Okay, so it's been awhile.

Not that it's imperative that I post on a regular basis, or that it really matters. The short version of my excuse is that I've been ridiculously busy. Even for me!

So originally, I wrote out a blog that was going to be my 100th blog blowout bash superfunhappytimestravaganza! TM I was ready to rip into my own beloved RPGs with all the whinybi*ching that I could manage. The blog was written; I got sidetracked, and came back to a laptop with no power. I had left it unplugged and thus lost it all. Not unlike that crazy game of poker. (Points if you get that reference)

So, what else is there for me to do but spout off the random happenings of my life since February... ish. We will go in order so you can put yourself in the moment. Prepare for an assault of a bunch of very tiny and uninteresting blogs: (remember my life is not all that interesting at the moment)

February 20, 2009

Dear Diary,

Yesterday I tried paying my Comcast bill. They made it very difficult and I cried about it. Later I wrote a blog.

February 29, 2009

Dear Diary,

The weird part about this entry is that this isn't even a leap year, but I'm writing under the date anyways. HA. Take THAT society!

March 3, 2009

Dear Diary,

Work sucks. I do it a lot. It seems like I do very little else. Perhaps I should drink more to numb the pain

MarH 4q, 03984

DERr DIARHeahh!@

BOOOoozwE! Heeeeeeeee ^_^

March 9, 2009

Dear Diary,

I apologize for my last entry and my unwelcome forwardness. I will never touch you like that again... unless you ask first.

March 19, 2009

Dear Diary,

I shouldn't complain about working so much I guess... at the end of the day I'm pretty lucky I have a job.

March 20, 2009

Dear Diary,

GOD****** MOTHER******* WORK SUCKS!!! If I lived on or near a cliff, I would certainly throw myself from it. Or at least someone I could do without.

March 29, 2009

Dear Diary,

I have food poisoning. My whole body is so weak, I can't even move without exerting a tremendous amount of energy.

April 3, 2045

Dear Diary,

I've traveled to the past to warn myself about eating that tuna sandwich. It seems I've miscalculated and I've shown up a few days too late. It is rather amusing to watch my younger self struggle to make it to the bathroom, only to trip and fall halfway and stuff his (mine? our?) head in a bucket and give up. I've taken pictures to show my prostitute turned wife, Elizabeth Hurley. (Things get very bad for her in about 6 years)

April 5, 2009

Dear Diary,

The food poisoning seems to have passed, it must have been pretty bad, I was hallucinating. I could swear I saw myself laughing at my situation while dancing around taking Polaroid's. Man. No more tuna sandwiches for me. On the bright side, I made it downstairs today just in time to see that movie where Elizabeth Hurley is the devil. Man, if she was a prostitute, I would buy her for a LIFETIME baby! Wooo!

April 16, 2009

Dear Diary,

You know, I just realized that outside of work, I don't really know anybody anymore. That is profoundly sad... great now I'm depressed. Thanks a bunch DIARY. Stupid diary. You can't come to my birthday party.

April 27, 2009

Dear Diary,

Stupid Mondays. I hate Mondays. They're a plague.... A weekly death plague. Tuesdays suck too. If I had the power, I would drown Tuesdays in a deluge.

April 28, 2009

Dear Diary,

No work today, as my office has been flooded in a deluge. Apparently I have that kind of power. I'm just as shocked as you are.

April 29, 2009

Dear Ndugu,

I had to go back to work today, but not to my office. No, instead I had to bring my personal laptop in and hang out at a satellite office, in a tiny little room that was not designed to be inhabited for more than maybe 10 minutes at a time, by one person. We have four, with several fans for purposes of air circulation. It's not working, the end of the month is approaching and I have no access to our main servers, and thus none of my reconciliations, spreadsheets, or any other information I need to make April, you know... balance - which means the first part of May will suck as much as the end of April. Oh, Ndugu, you may not understand what is going on here, or maybe you do. I can only imagine as you spend your nights playing the latest version of Pong, or perhaps Space Invaders that you look up into the night sky (I'm assuming there is a hole in your roof) and wonder what it is that I am doing. Well, the answer to that, young Ndugu is : I am getting drunk. Very, very, very drunk.

-----------------------------------------
Anyhow, you get the gist. Mostly nothing except work and my office flooding.

In gaming news, I picked up Street Fighter IV, which promptly kicked my ass rather mercilessly, I did finally manage to have some fun with it though thanks to a rather severe ass whipping from our own GodModeEnabled. Seriously. We played like 70+ rounds straight, of which I won 30ish, and he won 40ish. It was a marathon that had my thumbs bleeding. Fortunately, I didn't notice as we had also started drinking during this smashathon. Good times.

I grabbed Wolverine for the 360 as well last week, and I have to say, as far as movie games go, this is by far the best. In fact I would argue that it's better than it's movie counterpart in a lot of ways. It's just a fun beat'em up. Not particularly challenging on the 'Normal' mode, and I beat it over the weekend. I may go through it again on the newly unlocked hard mode just for the heck of it while it's still fresh in my mind, I could probably tear through it pretty quickly.

Well, that was all pretty anti-climatic wasn't it?

..... and that's why I don't date. *zing!*

SNIKT.

You wish I was YOUR Valentine

I hate Comcast. For the blessedly uninformed, Comcast is the internet/cable service that is taking over everything digital slowly but surely across the United States. I miss Time Warner. They still sucked, but.. well let's put it this way, if you're going to be raped, you want the one that uses lube.

After reading over my email sent to Comcast, I realize that they have driven me further to the depths of insanity. Not in a dangerous, Godmode kind of way, but more of a giddy cartoon monkey sort.

I was limited to a 1500 character maximum in their message field. I was suprised I fit it all in, particularly with the ending being total madness/indifference. Behold my nonsense:

I've been trying to pay my bill since last week, but your site stops working right when I click Pay Bill or when I click continue after putting in my payment info. So I decided to pass on the online payment and phone it in. When I call, I'm told if I want to pay by phone I will be charged a $4 "Convenience Charge" - which I find nothing convenient about, by the way. I am then given a number to call for an automated system. Here I am told I was given the wrong number, but they can take my payment for a $4 "convenience charge" this time I am transferred to the automated system. My payment is declined, at which time I am transferred to yet another rep who discovers that my phone number is not updated on my account, despite having updated it with your company TWICE before. Once again, I'm told that my payment can be taken for a $4.95 convenience charge, why it's more is beyond me. I said no, and this time I am given a number which does, in fact, take me directly to your automated system where I am once again declined. My account has the funds required to pay this(on which I am now late) I have become extremely frustrated, all I want to do is give you money! Why must this be so difficult? Everyone else will take it. AT&T loves my money, so does Visa. Hell, ask my ex, she took it all the time and never once charged me convenience fees, presumably because she loved me so much. Where is the love Comcast? Where. Is. The. Love?

Love,
Aaron
Daytime#:***************

....for he is a woman that used to be a man.... in a dress.

I completed Fable II (finally) over the weekend. Despite the disappointing and abrupt ending, I really enjoyed the experience. It smoothed over the cracks from the first one (and made a few new ones all its own) and made it overall a very good game. My time with the game was artificially extended with my side quest indulgences, my two previous blogs about this game kind gives you a rundown of what my character was up to... He started as an overweight alcoholic gambler paying for his vices with money made from working as a really crappy blacksmith. Which was amusing, but ultimately I was just messing around. It was during this time that something happened - something I did not expect.

The dog. The dog managed to endear himself to me. At first, it's just more of a "okay, there's a dog, whatever..." but he really grew on me. Mostly I think because he was always there. So I was surprised that Molyneux's gimmick managed to do what he intended it to for me. Bravo.

In any case, as time went on and the story progressed, I would get distracted for long periods of time on these little sidequests - finding gargoyles, buying properties, opening the demon doors, the crucible, the shooting range, etc., etc., all of it was fun - although the property income eventually makes the games a lot less challenging since it's perpetual, game on or off. You're making money.

At some point, I started a family with a hooker I met outside of a hotel in Westcliff. Whether or not I have prophesized my own future or not remains to be seen. Anyhow, I left her to her own devices for the most part and kept on doing what I was doing. On my first visit back she gave me an experience potion that was gave over 60,000 xp. My trips home became much more frequent, which finally generated some kind of demon, red headed stepchild. I say this, because 1 - the kid was redheaded and 2 - looked nothing like me. This means that she must have cheated on me while I was away, and now I had to pay for the result. Maury, where were you on that one!?

From that point, I had all but finished the story, expecting something on an epic scale, as I was told returning to the mansion in Bloodstone meant that any active quests I had going would not be able to be completed afterwards - I spent a lot of time wrapping things up, and maxing out all of my abilities. I completed everything I could with a few exceptions; I thought would surely still be available in the end game. (I was right)

Off I went to finish this....

The story kind of lost me here - it took a weird question mark-like turn into the land of "WTF?" I mean, I got it - I understood what was going on, I think, but I still had to ask... WHY?

After that whole debacle - I picked up Lost Odyssey again - I was on disc 4, and very near the end... however it had been SO long since I had last played it, I had NO CLUE where I was, or what I was supposed to be doing. I quickly lost interest and moved on.

While I should have probably tried to figure out LO so I could get it out of my backlog, I opted for Assassins Creed on a technicality. I have played and beaten this game already - however, I did so on a guest account late 2007 when live was down for like a week after xmas. So it is not reflected on my Gamertag. I will now remedy this.

The key to enjoying AC, because it's so repetitive, is moderation, which works out nicely for me since my gaming time is severely limited, and that's precisely how I enjoyed it the first time around.

A hangover from hell.

Is it not enough that humans are forced, by nature of their own bodies, to pay a pennance for enjoying themselves through the use of alcohol? We all know what a hangover is (assuming you, dear readers are of age) We know it's coming.... we know the price that must be paid, but we do these things to ourselves anyways. From the outside looking in, I know the idea of drinking excessively both looks and sounds completely idiodic. I, having stood on both sides of the proverbial looking glass, can tell you. You are absolutely right. It is completely, 100% stupidifferific.

HOWEVER, it is also FUN.

Now I know there are preachers amoung us whom like to lay it on real thick about how they don't NEED alcohol to have a good time and we just love to hear about it. Here's the thing though : No one NEEDS alcohol to have a good time - some people may think that they do, and you know what? It's their business. I am very much an advocate of the live and let live policy. If you don't like what I do, that is fan-*******-tastic, please adjust your contact list as necessary and leave me alone.

This is not to say if you or a friend has a problem you shouldn't tackle, or be tackled to the ground and beaten with stale bread until you or your friend snap out of it. (the bread is purely optional, and of course interchangeable with other humorous objects including, but not limited to: pretzels, funnel cakes, slim jims, or banjos.)

I have a pretty high tolerance myself, which, provided I don't change up my drinks too much (meaning going from whiskey, to vodka, back to whiskey, etc.) and stay the HELL away from tequila, generally allows me to bypass the hungover state that I currently find myself in. I broke this rule last night, and I am now suffering for it. I can't complain - like I said, it's my fault I asked for it the second I switched from crown to grey goose, and I really ran the point home when I started shooting tequila. =X

So I've paid my dues. Several times. Over the course of the entire morning. I am now past being hungover and I should be good to go. Free to use my day as I please....run and frolic in the fields, playing catch and chewing bubble gum.

"But Aaron!" I hear you ask. "Whatever are you doing at home on your laptop!?"

Well kids, I'll tell you.

It seems that somewhere between that first shot of tequila, and the peak of my hangover, I contracted some kind of death virus that has run my temperature up to 103 degrees (roughly 39 celsius for those that care) It seems my body feels that in order to teach me a lesson it has to kill me.

Great.

Last week, I commented on one of JohnSteed's blog about how I stay away from top 10 lists and such, as it often ends up with me just ranting against the FPS genre. His response, to paraphrase, was basically to say it must be difficult to be a gamer that hates that sort of game, since they make up such a large part of the market.

This got me thinking - where exactly did all this start? I've not really thought about WHY I hate the things in a long time, it's just one of those accepted facts. Sort of like tying your shoes, you probably don't remember when or how you learned - but you did, and you don't give it any thought every time you tap into this knowledge. It's a stretch for an analogy, but I'm still kind of drunk from last night, so bear with me.

This is going to be a very long entry - so I won't be offended if you aren't up to reading it. I make no promises that this won't end up just another angry rant at the rotting carcass that is the FPS genre, stinking up the gaming Indus.... *ahem* I'll do my best to show that my opinion actually has a background with some merit and keep away from the ranting as much as possible.

That said, the best place to start, I suppose, is the beginning.

The year is 1992. My PC gaming days were still ahead of me, and I was entirely focused on my precious console systems, the NES and the Genesis. My experiences were firmly planted in side scrolling platformers, vertical scrollers... basically "go right" games. I had a few computers in my life at this point, but all of them were hand-me-downs from my grandfather's office, which meant they served no purpose other than to allow me to say "yes, I have a computer." I could play SimCity in glorious monochrome or CGA madness, or Commander Keen in similar color schemes. Incidentally, playing SimCity without a mouse is a *****.

The PC gaming was left to my best friend - He always had the latest available tech in his system. He was the first to get a CD-rom, he was the first of us to upgrade to an independent graphics card, blah blah blah, you get the idea. So it was no surprise when he calls me up and tells me I *HAVE* to come check out this new game he got.

So I hop on my bike and off I go. I can't say I wasn't intrigued - new games were few and far between for me back then, so I had to get my fix through my friends. What he showed me was by far the most badass thing I had ever seen.

The game was of course Wolfenstein 3D. I think there may have been one or two other games before Wolfenstein that used the first person perspective, but for me, and most gamers I'd wager, this is the first of its kind, and certainly my first exposure to it. That said, my reaction was probably similar to a lot of gamers back then... it was something completely different, you were IN the game - looking through the eyes of the character! "HOLY MONKEYS! This is sweet! Is that supposed to be me there!? What's the story!? Oh well who cares! This is AWESOME!" bam bam bam!!

As luck would have it, my parents had decided around that same time that it was time we had a proper computer in the house, and it wasn't long after that I had my own copy of Wolfenstein 3D, and life was good.

For a little while anyways... You can only play one game so many times. Fortunately, my mom saved the day, and gave me one of those Sierra 10-packs. Among these ten games was King's Quest V. The remake with the awful voice actors (curse you stupid owl!!) and full color, and it was also my introduction into the point and click adventure games, as well as the beginnings of what would evolve into a very unsettling obsession with RPGs, gaining levels, and deep storylines.... That's another blog.

Around Christmas time in 1993, I was unceremoniously dragged to a Christmas party by my parents. They had kids also, but they were an infant and a 4 year old. I was 12. Socializing was out of the question... so I sat quietly as the adults talked about... whatever it was that adults talked about at Christmas parties in 1993. I went outside and amused myself playing fetch with the dog. Woo. Bill, the man half of the couple who was throwing the party stepped outside. "Bored?" he asked. Not wanting to be impolite, I said no. "Yeah you're bored. Come on in, I'll set you up on the computer" I followed him into his office, and there sat the biggest screen I had ever seen. When he turned it on, it was like a turbine revving up. I stood at his shoulder and watched the system load itself to the c prompt. He handed me some headphones, and typed something in. He had me take his place in the chair and simply said "just press enter when you're situated." I looked at the screen and this is what I saw :

C:doom

Ooooookay. So I pressed enter, not sure what to expect, and was met with a whole new level of badassery. Holy crap! This is awesome! Is that me!? What's the story!? Who cares! This is freaking AWESOME!!

This game was MUCH darker than Wolfenstein, there were more guns, more enemies, more levels, and frankly just MORE of everything. The environment was creepy, with the headphones on, in the dark, I could hear the heavy breathing of the demons that may or may not have been hanging around the next corner. I did not leave that chair until my parents came to collect me several hours later to go home. So delighted was I with this new found magic, I told them allllll about it on the way home... and wouldn't you know it, for Christmas - I got my own copy. I also asked for a BFG9000, but that was strangely absent from under the tree.

My best friend got one as well - and it was then we discovered that we could connect our games together... it was also here that we discovered the beauty of the deathmatch.

Doom grabbed a larger part of the market, all my friends had this game, it was THE game to have if you were a gamer. If you didn't have it, you were a lesser being... you were tainted, your mother hated you, your dog blamed awful smells on you, and basically, you just flat out sucked. I would argue the elitist attitude that you run into with some gamers in online FPS's has its roots here, but I think it's more to do with people liking to be **** with the cloak of internet anonymity protecting their precious egos.

In any case, many, MANY morning hours were spent deathmatching, and we had a great time. This online aspect gave it a much longer life, and it carried it to its successor in 1994, Doom II.

NOW we're in the thick of it! The upgrade was a no-brainer. Doom and Wolfenstein were not even a blip on the gamers radar when this gem hit the shelves, and I was all over it. My first reaction set me apart from my friends for the first time. Theirs was "HOLY ****! This is ******* AWESOME!!" (We were older and cursing had become infinitely more fun) Whereas I was much more on the "This.... This looks the same as Doom." And, having become semi-spoiled with my moonlighting as an RPG'er "Where is the story!?"

"WHO CARES? IT's DOOOOOOM TWOOOOOOO!" cried my friends in unison.

Okay, fine. I'll go with it. So we play through the single player campaign separately, and we are back to deathmatching. Now I'm getting burned out on this sort of gameplay, but it was popular - and if I wanted to play my friends, then this was the only option. Eventually, I gave up - as much as I kept telling myself I liked Doom, I just couldn't take it anymore, and I distracted myself with the Sierra's Hero Quest. (Later renamed Quest for Glory for reasons of copyright)

Enter Heretic. This game was doom all over again - and when my friend showed it to me I gave a very audible sigh. "no no! it's not the same! Look!" With that he brought up an inventory screen.

Do my eyes deceive me!? An INVENTORY SCREEN!? Good heavens! This element reminded me of my Sierra games, and immediately I was intrigued.... It was short lived though. The inventory was clunky, the story, while they tried on this one, was still unintelligible, and it quickly passed from the forefront of my mind and into this vague recollection I've just given. As a side note, it's the first game of the genre I can recall being able to aim up or down. So in that respect, it made use of, if not started a new gameplay mechanic.

As luck would have it, Blizzard came out with a little game called 'Warcraft : Orcs and Humans' - this game more than sated my desire to play friends, not to mention to build my own little mini empire. It appealed to me to start from the absolute minimum, and every map I made in the editor was always on the largest available, and each player started with one Peasant (or Peon if you were Orc) and building up the cities or whatever and blitzing your opponent was WAY more fun than deathmatching...Well, I thought so anyways. I love the RTS genre, and it starts here with one of the pioneers of its kind.

Meanwhile, the FPS genre had established itself, and was growing. Rise of the Triad came out and my cousin bought it for some reason. I played it, and my first thought was.... "This looks a LOT like Wolfenstein" Turns out it pretty much was. It was based on the engine behind Wolf3D, and it was incredibly dated for the time, it was the last game to use the Wolfenstein engine I think... and it vanished as quickly as it came.

This made room for a game released about the same time that actually pulled me back into the genre for a time. Dark Forces.

This game did some new things (at last) The environments were multi level, and for the first time you could actually look all around. Time was actually spent on having a story line, which you got with cutscenes and briefings. There were a good number of weapons to choose from, and a lot of items that were handy, most notably the headlamp.

This game took all the good things about Doom, expanded on them, and added its own touches as well. I had hope again. Limited as it was.

It was with this game that I also discovered something new to hate. Jumping in a first person view is a pain in the butt. Trying to jump from ledge to ledge and not being able to gauge where you are standing relative to where you are trying to get to is something that plagues these games to this day... and also made me realize these games are just a camera with a bobbing gun in front of it. When I look down, I see legs. Period. Despite my growing list of complaints, it was a good game, and, despite a growing excess of poor quality FPS, I would argue that Dark Forces was the start of this genre's golden age.

Hexen. Back like a case of herpes, this was Heretics sequel. This game suckered me in almost the exact same way its predecessor did. This time with the advent of being able to choose a c_lass just like in my beloved Quest for Glory series, Mage, Fighter or healer (Thief in QfG).... And once again, it was just another run of the mill FPS based on the Doom engine. Again. Ugh. The game apparently warranted some expansions but I didn't touch them.

On to Duke Nukem 3D! I know there were a couple of games before it; Duke Nukem I and II, but I never played them. This game subjected a lot of us to our first look at pixilated bewbs, and man did that sell. It was the only game you could go into a strip joint, watch a dancer, and the OJ Simpson car chase on the TV. Good times. As a game I suppose it was decent, but beyond the adult themed gimmicks, it was just another shooter to me.

That same year we got Quake. As soon as I heard about this I could feel shards of glass or something beginning to dig into my temples. My computer was beginning to struggle anyways, and just barely ran Duke Nukem. Quake was out of the question. However, like I said, my best friend always had the best crap, so I got to play it over at his place. This game was graphically superior to any before it thanks to its Quake engine, which helped, but as usual the story was barely present. This game eventually pushed my friend to get the first 3d accelerator I had ever heard of. I didn't notice much difference, I think it made the water look more.... Watery or something.. it was minimal. The big thing with this game was that it finally made use of the internet connectivity, and allowed for computers to connect to a server, and thus several players could be in one game at once, deathmatching to their hearts content. It was here I was introduced to the obnoxious world of 'other people.' For someone like me who had been trying to escape this festering genre, I had quite the handicap when playing against those who devote their lives to this. If I managed to frag someone, it was luck and I will suffer for my insolence, if I myself am fragged, then it's because my mother beat me with a brick and my dog blames awful smells on me, and I just flat out suck. Wow.

As compelling as it was to play with these charmers, I passed. I appreciated what the game was doing on the multiplayer level, but I decided at that point that I just want to play my friends, or play by myself... and I did try to play through Quake on the single player, all I could think was "... this is just.... Doom. AGAIN." Just as well, my computer, as I said, couldn't handle it anyways.

Then came Jedi Knight : Dark Forces II, I took my first stab at building a computer from scratch for this game. I saved up my weekly paychecks from working at a grocery store for 2 months... which gave me a budget of like 600 bucks. (yeah minimum wage is balls)

Oh BLESS you LucasArts! You have shown me the light once again, THANKYOU! This game was the definition of awesome. It was FPS... or was it? This game gave you the ability to switch to a 3rd person perspective, which that alone was breath of fresh air to me - but then the game hands you a lightsaber.... And then force powers! This may as well have been labeled porn. It was the greatest thing ever. It had story, it had weapons variety (why? You have a LIGHTSABER!) puzzles, and a main character that you could finally start to invest in as he was being developed. A FIRST. Plus, taking a page from the book of Quake, it allowed for online connectivity for up to 4 people, which was perfect for my cadre of misfits. This game clicked with me, it didn't force me into the first person perspective, it didn't make me use guns, and it had a great story. I know it had its flaws, as no game is without them on some level - but for the life of me I can't think of any.

This game was awesome enough to make the release of Quake II go relatively unnoticed by me and my friends, which looking back I'm very thankful for. I never played Quake II, so I'll leave it alone.

As it turns out, it doesn't matter... consoles had a big push back into the spotlight, Nintendo 64 hit the market, the Playstation was making its own splashes, and the Dreamcast was trying it's hardest to keep up. (I miss my dreamcast.... *sniff*) One of the breakout hits from that generation of consoles was Goldeneye. This was the first time I got to play an FPS using an analog. It made the overall experience more enjoyable, but....I kept getting that awful feeling of déjà vu... "this is just... Doom.... AGAIN."

I'm sure you get the point by now.

DEAR HOLY LORD MONKEY **** BALLS, does no one else notice this!? It's the same ******* game over and over and over and over and over again!!! It's been this way for over a decade! How do you not get tired of this!?

Now, I realize that the same could be said for most any genre of game, but with the FPS - and this never fails, there is little to no story, and for me it takes away immensely from the game - if I am to play doom over and over again, at least give me something more engrossing than "there are aliens/demons here. Kill them all." Conversely, a great deal of RPGs have basically the same story, but for me, I can still be involved in it - even in the crappy ones, there are always a few little twists or something that change it up juuuust enough to make it bearable.

So another decade has passed, and in that time, I've seen stealth FPS, (which is a complete contradiction, but I'm not going there) the team based FPS, i.e. Rainbow 6, etc. and one type of FPS that I think should just be a genre all by itself at this point, the ENDLESS barrage of WW2 shooters. The whole genre is completely over saturated; it's like dipping a stick of butter in a vat of lard - which is not only extremely unhealthy, but all kinds of gross.

Sure they've all upgraded their graphics, they add new weapons in from time to time that do different things, and try to pass it off as a 'groundbreaking' game mechanic, but frankly - it's just Doom.

Is it easy to be a gamer that hates FPS in a time where there are so many? Well, yes. It is easy. We have a lot of options. It's true, I think there are WAY too many shooters out there, but that's what most everyone likes, and I'm in the minority here. Which is fine... one of the great things about being a gamer today is we have so many choices, a lot of us just don't even know what to do with ourselves. I will never be the one to get between a gamer and their controller, whatever game he or she chooses to play, more power to them. Just don't ask me for a deathmatch.... Or I will seriously kill you.

With a spork.

Look at me!

I've been promoted to Bionic Commando!!

I guess I'd better look the part.

*takes off boxers*

weeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!!!!

*and yes, this IS my first blog of 2009.*

Wishing you all the best, hope for those of you that partake in the various festivities around the world that they do not at any point include a police officer named Biff. That guy sounds like he'd be a TOTAL jackass.

Happy new year everyone! Here's to a great 2009!

Love,

V

Zero Punctuation. The guy behind it is Ben 'Yahtze' Crowshaw. He has a sense of humor I really enjoy, specifically cynical, sarcastic, and he lets loose on a game every wednesday. He's not for everyone - you either enjoy it or you don't.

Anyways, he's working on a new project now called Game Damage.

www.gamedamage.net

Their pilot episode clocks in at just under a half hour - it serves no real purpose, and is a bit outdated, but if you like ZP, you'll like this. I think they have a forum up and running, I haven't really looked around much on the site past the video.

In other news, I've got my tree up, it's decorated, and my life continues to revolve around me being at work or weeping softly in a corner like the freshly beaten stepchild of a roidraged alcoholic.

My wife is a whore, and she hates me. It's the family of tomorrow, today!

Fable II has been the game of choice when I've got the time to play - which is mostly on weekends when I'm not out being drunk. More on that in a moment.

My character rode the grey zone wave for as long as possible, I was really trying to keep away from horns and/or halo's... they looked pretty stupid in the first game, and man - some things just never change. I'm much farther a long - and it's kind of difficult to stay in the middle of the road in this game. So I'm a goody goody paragon... saint.... guy.... That's married to a hooker... and she finds me hideous if I'm without clothes... all those scars I got from the guards and bandits in the early part of my game are apparently not all that attractive. There's a kid now which was automatically named James - but I'm considering changing it to Booger.

As for me IRL... what can I say. It's the "holidays" ..... apparently I'm not allowed to say christmas time anymore, but I could really care less either way. While this is my favorite time of year, the commercial side of things has really become too much to handle. It's honestly enough for me to just hang out with my family, get lots of food and lots of booze in me and call it a day. The gifts seem more of a forced sideshow to me now than anything. It could also be that this holiday bankrupts me and I'm more than bitter about it. In anycase, this week I'll probably be getting a tree - which is actually a first for me - I've not bothered to get one since I moved out of my parents house, so that should be interesting.

On Friday, I had my company party. We had it downtown in a really nice restauraunt - we ran up a 6 thousand dollar tab (mostly booze - and I have no doubt a good chunk of that belonged to my table) then my boss and I, after finally ditching the less desireables headed off to paint the town all sorts of red. We went to a bar called Howl at the Moon, which is a dueling piano place - lot of fun, it's different from my normal faire of traditional bar scenes and I was happy to change it up... I actually enjoyed myself, I normally can't STAND downtown. It's far away, parking is a HUGE pain in the butt, and the prices are ridiculous. In any case, we shut the place down at last call - and wandered off into the night thinking we'd jump in the car and we'd cap the end to a successful night out with some hookah.

I then was given a sharp reminder of WHY I hate going to downtown Houston. My SUV had magically vanished. As in it was not where I left it... "Oh... right... THAT'S why I never come out here" I mumbled.

So into the nearest bar I went. I had no fear of my vehicle being stolen - I've been through this so many times - and it's so commonplace down there, it was just going through the motions. I had to find out who the local towing company was for that particular section of downtown, and I needed to get cash from an atm then call a cab. So I got the number from the bar, I walked to a gas station and got out the cash while my friend flagged down a cab.... We gave him the address - and off we went. 220 bucks later I was back in my car, weeping quietly to myself about being separated from money I had originially had no intentions of letting go of in this manner, and becoming frustrated at all the one way streets that kept taking me in directions I didn't want to go. I got home at 5am.

I hate downtown.

The majority of Saturday I spent in a coma. I woke up once around 9am, and promptly went back to bed until 6:30 that evening at which point I played Fable II until like 3 in the morning. Sunday was more of the same, I actually had every intention of getting my car washed, but on the way I got distracted by a text from a friend telling me to meet him up at a bar. Hilarity ensued once again, and today was spent in a zombie like state staring blankly at my laptop screen from my zombie like state.

My car still has the towtruck lot numbers written on the windshield.

Okay - Let's try this whole "blog" thing again.

I almost did one last week in response to some fairly nasty blogs regarding politics that popped up here and there, but ultimately deleted what I wrote and didn't post in the interest of not dragging it out. Suffice to say I think very poorly of anyone who backs up their opinions with racism and flat out stupidity.

ANYWAYS

So I've been playing Fable 2. I'm not "far" in the game, but I've put some hours into it, mostly just doing nothing. I started my game as morbidly obese man with gambling and drinking problems second only to fruitless attempts to lure women to my room. All of this was paid for by my job at the blacksmith's shop. Which I started out fine with, but eventually got so tedius, I stopped caring. I chalk it up to being drunk.

At some point, while I was vomiting in an alley - someone kicked my dog, my reaction was to swing a sword in his general direction, and that of course attracted 4 or 5 local lawmen... I resisted arrest and hilarity ensued. I got knocked out like 15 times trying to run my fat butt out of town. Outside of town, I proceeded to get the crap beat out of me by bandits.... Eventually, after deciding I'd had just about enough of people pushing me around, I starting putting some effort in. (which, given the games simplistic combat - means I started pressing buttons)

I bought a bunch of celery, fought, lost weight, and returned to Bowerstone with a bone to pick. Sure enough as soon as I set foot in to town, here come the 5-0's. So I kill one or two of them, and in the process I apparently accidentally killed that bard. My bad... with the remaining 3 guys I just sat there and blocked everything, and eventually started swinging again. Finally I got a second chance to 'not' resiste arrest. Of course, I now had quite the laundry list of charges and the price was much higher than I could afford, so I took the community service. Shockingly - I was told to go kill bandits in the gypsy camp which had apparently been preying on them for awhile. Funny, as I had just LEFT there and they were fine, but whatever. I went back and killed the bandits which apparently had MY ability to resurrect over and over and over again. Eventually I managed to stab them in the "super regeneration organ" which I guess is somewhere in the groin region. Whatever it was, they finally stopped getting up. Back in Bowerstone, I was thinking I could try to get on with the game now - but no. Apparently one of those damned guards was holding a grudge or something. He attacked me out of nowhere, which I was not having any of. I let him chase me to what I thought was a hidden area so I could make with the killin' - as soon as I tried the alarms went off. Alarms that are obvioulsy sentient/omnipotent beings. I killed the guard anyways. Another two ran up the stairs and I got the familiar dialouge to pay the fine, community service, or resist, blah blah blah.. I just paid it this time.

I went on to Oakvale. I find myself trying desperately to find some remnant of Fable 1 for some reason. I don't know why. In any case, I'm not having much luck aside from the chamber of fate. I'm not real far, I'm sure something will turn up. It better.

Overall, I'm enjoying it... but I can't say I'm super impressed. Not yet. I'm keeping an open mind for it, I purposely kept away from all things Fable for the duration of it's development so I could go in to this one with no expectations. That said, I'm not let down either. Weird gray area. Not unlike my character! Yay!

Alright. Moving right along... it seems I'm incapable of not throwing some hate around.

Guitar Hero : World Tour

I have not touched a guitar hero game since it's first incarnation, which I loved, by the way. So I was pretty excited to get this. I put up some feisty debate with myself though - Rock Band 2, or Guitar Hero 4? Choices, choices. I decided on GH4 because I figured hey, there are some great songs, AND it's the brand that got me into the genre, so "if it ain't broke, don't fix it" was my basic thinking.

Okay, there are some good songs on here. I won't deny that, however for those of you, who, like me, didn't play Rock Band - the drums are a punishing difficulty.. and worse than that - the songs. The aforementioned 'good songs' are completely drowned by total crap. My friends and I waded through like 20 songs that were, to us, absolutely NO fun - just to get to one Sublime song. It was awful.

Back to the drums. When I'm playing them, it's a sound that I can only equate to a toddler that's beating on pots and pans that have a blanket over them. They sometimes respond perfectly, and sometimes not at all. I hate them. I hate them like I hate First Person Shooters.... (that is a LOT) The guitar isn't bad, I like the slider board, I'm not good at it, but I can see it being pretty awesome once I got the hang of it.

The real tragedy here is there's no buffer for buyers remorse. I wanted to return this crap and get Rockband 2, alas, Gamestop won 't take it back, as if to say to me "HA! We don't want it either!" So I'm stuck with it. I know I could just buy the game, and have it work with these instruments, but I'd MUCH rather have the RB2 guitar/drum set. I'm stubborn like that.

My life continues to relentlessly revolve around work. My time spent gaming is in the dark hours between midnight and sunrise on weekends. Of course out of exhaustion, I never make it very long, and my days somehow become booked, whether I want them to or not. You know how like you finally get some time to yourself, then your phone rings, and by someone elses whim - your plans of doing nothing are shot down before you press 'answer' or 'ignore'.

I've also committed a great gaming sin. My precious laptop has as of last Friday aquired the title of dual purpose. Gaming and.... God help me... work. By sacrificing something that was intended to be purely for my entertainment to my career seems to have made me admit to myself that I've crossed the threshold into responsible adulthood.... Sure I went kicking and screaming, and fought it for as long as possible while doing so.. but ultimately it won out. Gaming has been unceremoniously lowered in rank - which is kind of depressing. Hopefully, I'll get it back up there, but I don't see it happening anytime soon.

So there it is... yet another update. Good times

you clicked a second too late. You get nothing. NOTHING.

While I wish I had something exciting to write about ala the life and times of Aaron the Party Monkey, or at the very least talk about some game that has consumed my soul and left nothing but a bloated corpse and a controller - it is just not so.

What have I been doing in this ongoing stint of not being around ever?

Working.

I have worked no less than 60 hours a week for the last two months, and it is TOTALLY ******* me up. I worked a lot before, and it was no big deal to have a hectic week here and there, because I had my weekends to recover, and the following week would almost always be on the light side, and thus not kill me. However, NOW - it's day after day of endless meetings, paperwork, debits, credits, ledgers, reconciliations, depreciations and frankly, I'd like to just fling myself off a cliff. However, I think I'm starting to see the proverbial light at the end of this tunnel of never ending projects and perhaps I can get back to living a life with free time that doesn't get categorized as naps between work sessions.

That said, I picked up a new toy last week, I got an iPhone. Which I love.... This is saying something as I am never particularly fond of any cell phone I have. If I have a top of the line or a cheap p.o.s... until now I never really cared. The makers of all these phones always lay claims to checking your email with ease, or support for this or that - what they don't tell you is to make those things work, you must be prepared to rip your hair out, probably while being buried alive. And on fire. I may just not be particularly adept at cell phone management - but therein lays the point. My iPhone is every bit as functional for me on a basic level as my laptop. I can sign onto all my messengers, check my facebook, my email, stocks, and play any number of readily available free games that amuse me for any length of time. It's certainly not a replacement for my laptop, but it certainly complements it. However - there is one demon. A rather significant one at that... anyone that has an ipod of any generation or the iphone itself will know what I'm talking about, and will love it or hate it.

iTunes.

It was tolerable when it was just my iPod. I could deal with the minor frustrations by it not finding album artwork, despite the fact that Windows Media Player finds EVERYTHING no matter how obscure.... But now, not only does it leave out a lot of my album artwork - very annoying when using coverflow - but when I add one of my CDs to the library, iTunes makes not one, but TWO copies of the cd. One on my D drive where it's supposed to, and to where I've directed all my music, and another one on the C: drive in an itunes library that is not supposed to exist. I've deleted that file many times, but eventually it comes back, and itunes just copies everything back to it from D. I finally gave up the fight on that one. I should have reformatted this laptop after I bought it, and got rid of that stupid partition. So until I go back and do so, I'll just live with 2 of everything. As if that weren't bad enough - when I sync the iphone back up to the laptop - iTunes suddenly decides it no longer has a huge chunk of the library, and randomly deletes 100-200 songs off of the iphone, despite the songs being right there, plain as day. Stupid iTunes, when I am famous, I will make it a point not to like you.

Let's see... Games. Fable 2 came out today, and where it not for my abomination of a schedule, I'd have picked it up. It's pulling down some pretty solid reviews, both pro and gamer alike. I've been careful to stay away from all things related to the game this time around so I can go in with no expectations, unlike Fable 1. I think that will be a good addition to games that will ultimately file to my backlog.

Other than that, the only game that sort of has my interest is Saints Row 2. That series appeals to me over GTAIV because the character gets to really progress, sure it's silly and over the top - it's supposed to be on the wacky side of things. In GTAIV, you could have all the money in the world, and still have to go save your game in a dingy studio apartment covered in questionable stains. I know the argument is "Oh it's more true to life though!" On this point I call bs - why have a life of crime if all it's getting you is what you could get far more easily working full time at mcdonalds? The draw to crime is the potential to make it really big, as quickly and easily as possible. Al Capone did not live in a one bedroom ****box. Maybe Niko just wanted all those ladies to feel sorry for him. In retrospect it was a bad strategy. It clearly didn't work.

I guess that's about it as far as updates go. If you're looking for something more interesting, GodMode has some turtles which are probably right up your alley.

This is here to take up space and let you guys know that I am still breathing somewhere on this planet.

Star Wars : The Force Unleashed
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This game has pulled down some pretty mixed reviews. I've beaten it, and have sort of started through my next play through with my more powerful character - which is intensely fun on one hand, but on the other, it's the same thing I just did the other day. It's hard for me to pin this game down with a number, I'd say it's worth a solid 8, but then again, I'm a fan of Star Wars so it's probably skewed - I found the story in this game to be pretty awesome, as it really bridges the gap between the two trilogies. It is sort of ridiculous to drop this kind of story in there with this crazy powerful apprentice, and then he's never mentioned again, considering his apparent role in things. I think I would have much preferred Darth Vader's story, and how he came to be the most feared character in the series... I have to say, my favorite stage in the game was definitely the first one. Everything else was fun, but.. I dunno... meh. The characters were great, but like I said the game is very short, and there's just not a lot of time for deeper development - so when It's over you're left with this kind of... "good movie" feeling - but you could probably go a few years without wanting to see it again.

Spore
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I think I've sunk enough time into this game to be able to comment on it a bit more fully. There seem to be a few different camps of players here. Some are extremely disappointed, some are pleasantly surprised, and others are somewhat disappointed, but enjoy the game, and take what they can get at this point.

I'm probably more in the third category. This game taunted me for years - The depth that was in the original concept, or I should say perceived depth - was far more interesting to me. The first hurdle for me was being given a semi developed cell right at the start. I was really kind of counting on starting with literally nothing... like I said though - it's take what you can get. A lot of people keep breaking the game down by its five stages, which I think is a mistake - because individually, they're fairly uninteresting for the most part. I think it's better to try to view the game as a whole. That said, I wish they wouldn't have made them so separate. I'd have preferred a more subtle transition between the stages. Instead of the bar at the bottom filling up and showing me where I am and clicking a button to progress, I'd rather just keep moving closer to the beach until I eventually develop my creature to a point I can walk out on to land. I've already given a general overview of my first game in a previous blog, and now my focus is entirely in the space stage.

It is truly a lot of fun to play - it can pass the hours like minutes, and you have no clue where the time went. However, there are some major frustrations for me. I'm to the point where I'm kind of tired of running on endless errands, spice trading, forever solving the problems of everyone else, and fending off pirates every few minutes. Now, I just want to go find a planet somewhere and terra form it the way I want. I want to go explore, and look at all the other content out there... but as soon as I try - 3 minutes into my adventure, I'm getting the obligatory s.o.s. from someone needing me to help.

I tell you, I want so desperately to open that cheat console and turn this stuff off so I can be left alone. Except that a part of the reason I want to be left alone is so I can go earn more badges... by cheating I remove achievements from that save, and therefore negate my reason for doing it. Developers can be so cruel sometimes. I wish they didn't put those damned badges in there. I'm such an achievement whore though, so I must have them. I know there is a mod floating around out there that adjusts this, but with my luck, I'd screw up my game, and I'm one install closer to turning my Spore disc into an expensive coaster.

The recent official patch seems to have slowed down the pirate attacks and eco-disasters, but it might also be because I've loaded everything I own down with turrets and bio shields and endless swear words so as to keep it to a minimum. I'm very close to just blowing up all my colonies and getting myself back down to just the home world with one city on it, and just ignore it forever. It can't be destroyed and the city on it would just re-spawn if it were blown up, meanwhile ignoring any alliances I have, I'd eventually lose them as my pals, and they'd leave me alone too. Gold.

Too bad that completely offsets the idea of building empires and expanding everywhere ever.

SO.FRUSTRATING.

....thats what I did.

This is an extremely, extremely long blog by anyone's standards I think. This pretty much is my experience from the recent hurricane 'Ike'. For those of you that hate the walls o' text - I won't be offended if you don't want to read or comment. I'm a big boy, I can handle it.

......

For those that do read this, please note that I've had to post it in two parts, so the previous blog beneath this one is the second half.

My life is slowly pulling itself back together. Things are a wreck - but nothing precious is lost, just shaken up a bit. My house here in Houston suffered some mild damage, a tree on the roof, which Is my home owners association's responsibility. The sheetrock which now sports waterstain marks all over my ceiling will have to be replaced soon, which will fall to me. My grandfathers house here in town didn't fare so well, two trees fell on it, but still nothing compared to his bayhouse down in Galveston. It made it through... one of the lucky ones. The downstairs is filled with mud though, and is pretty much trashed. Our boat we think is probably sunk somewhere in the canal beneath our docks. Not that we'd keep it if we found it. It's probably better it's just gone speaking in terms of insurance. Most of this city is still without power, and cell phone service is still a bit spotty, but Houston is slowly healing itself. Galveston will be on the rocks so to speak for some time to come, since large chunks of it are severely damaged if not wiped out completely.

On September 10th, we got a warning memo sent out that BP was effectively shutting down for the duration of the storm at the close of business on Wednesday, and all were encouraged to evacuate, or prepare provisions. "OOOH... another big ol' storm is comin' to get me!" I said in mocking jest.

A hurricane hasn't been strong enough to make it into Houston since the early 80's... Which knocked out some windows in the downtown area, but nothing more than that. During Rita, everyone took off coming in the wake of Katrina, there was a lot of paranoia - and I stuck around thinking "pssh. Whatever. I'll just deal." I didn't even lose power... and I got to do the I told you so Dance for everyone that spent 20 hours on the road trying to drive 80 miles away. (that's not even an exaggeration) Sort of the same deal with Gustav... some evacuated... some didn't. Ultimately when it hit the shores, Hurricane Gustav was nothing more than a pleasant breezein the afternoon summer heat.

Enter Ike.

Honestly, who is it that comes up with these names for Hurricanes? If they want to scare me into protecting myself from these things, name them 'Whirlwind of Death' or 'Storm the Destroyer!" ... perhaps not on that level.. that sounds like a crappy Saturday morning cartoon. You know.. where they play cards, and theres a monster with those names that pop up, and the mock-anime characters are always surprised at things that happen to them every 32 seconds?

..... I had no cable for a long time alright? Backoff.

Anyways.. Ike. Sounds like a guy that comes over and has a drink with you. "Aw don't go yet guys! Ike is on his way!" Ike is the name of someone that is always the life of the party, and lends you a 20 for gas if you're a little short. Not a ******* serial killer.

So anyways, as far as I was concerned, I had a 4 day weekend. Thursday I played Spore. I played Spore ALL DAY... and it was awesome. Friday came and I drove around a bit.. most things were boarded up, gas stations were all sold out of gas, stores were closing their doors at 1pm if they had opened at all. It was pretty much a ghost town. Which was kind of eerie in that Silent Hill sort of way.... But it was daytime so I didn't worry about nurse zombies or anything.... I went home after deciding that I should go ahead and save my last quarter of a tank of fuel until gas stations reopened after the "storm." I went on home and grilled up some chicken, made an awesome lunch - and hit the sofa ready for a channel surf.

The TV was covered with nothing but Hurricane Ike updates. It was around 5pm or so, and Parts of Galveston were already under 4 feet of water. Bear in mind it wasn't raining yet, and in fact, the storm was still a long ways off. The tides were being PUSHED into the gulf by Ike. "Okay - so he's got some muscle. Pssh. That hurricane will die off when it hits the land. They always do." Oh how young and foolish I was two weeks ago. None the less, I made one precautionary provision. My mom had sent me this thing after hurricane Rita, which I put in the top of a closet thinking I'd never use. It's called a 'Waterbob' or something like that. What it is: is basically, it's a giant bag in the shape of a bathtub. You attach this valve to the faucet, and let it fill up. You seal it off, and there's another valve where you attach this hand pump, which makes for easy distribution of the H2O. Hooray!

After finishing this activity, I returned to watching TV when a friend of mine called me up...

"Dude are you watching this?"

"Yeah, but not by choice - it's the only thing on. I could watch a movie I guess.. but I dunno... that sounds like a lot of work"

"Yeah, I'm tired just thinking about it."

"The hell do you want man?"

"Haha oh yeah - so hurricane party at your place tonight or what?"

"Good call! Bring over whatever you've got, I have plenty of stuff to mix with."

So it was. My friend was on his way, and I was resolved to keep being a lazy bastard.

Upon his arrival, as is tradition, the glasses were ready to go with ice and an assortment of alcohol and various mixer choices, to which he added his own stash. We cranked the music, fired up my hookah, and proceeded to "chill." Good times.

The next several hours were filled with a drinking game we made up where everytime someone said the word 'hunkered' - as in 'we are all hunkered down' on TV - you have to take a drink. First deciding that this is the silliest word ever, and promptly follwed by the declaration of our collaborative genius, we texted this awesome drinking game to everyone we knew. We obviously had been playing this drinking game for awhile before all this.

Around 11, the wind had picked up quite a bit... The trees outside were shifting with a rather alarming range, which I could see clearly through the two windows in my living room. Keep in mind that these windows are about 6 feet wide and 2 stories tall. That is a a lot of glass that would cut me to tiny pixels if a tree came crashing into one or both. (See how I did that? Pixels... because it's a gaming website. Now it's relevant )

Regardless of the looming threat just outside, we continued to sit in the living room for another 3 hours. My crown was gone, and his vodka was down to maybe one more round with a short glass. The power had flicked off and on a few times, but nothing major - still just wind and rain.

He headed off to the guest room, and I packed up my laptop and headed to my room, where I settled in for one last check of the email before hitting the pillow myself. Then I heard the transformer explode. Everything was dark except for the light from my laptop, now operating on battery power.

"Damnit. Now the power is going to be out for like 2 days." I said this to myself thinking that was the worst case scenario. HA. I then heard two more transformers explode in succession. The entire power grid was out for sure at that point. I shut off the laptop, and lay there. Listening. I could hear the trees outside still blowing around, some were beginning to creak as they gave way to the wind, and finally they began falling down. I could hear them crashing. Car alarms going off were muted by the wind and rain, but after each tree came down there was this creepy silence followed in which they'd come through clearly. I eventually passed out, but even with that it was a LONG night.

I woke up early the next morning. I avoided looking out the windows or going outside for awhile as I collected myself. My friend remained passed out in the guest room, so I went about trying to put together breakfast for myself. Easier said than done with no power. This was to be a recurring theme with me for the next few days... trying to do things that require electricity, but never coming to the realization that I can't do them until the moment of truth. Like plugging in my DS to charge it.

So I went outside, car keys in hand. The ground was COVERED with leaves. Everything was actually. Everything was covered in green leaves. I got in, and started to drive out of the neighborhood, trees were down EVERYWHERE. People were standing around outside surveying the damages, and it was just a total mess. As I got onto the main roads, there wasn't a single one in the city that didn't have a tree blocking atleast part of it. Everything was closed in my area, but I drove around, feeling certain someone would be open. Streetlights were hanging by a single wire, while others had come down and smashed into a thousand pieces on the ground, there were cars turned over in some places. Business signs were ripped up, and thrown around, brick walls crumbled, some buildings caved in...It was post-apocolyptic, considering the area as it normally looks. There were indeed some places open, but the lines were out the doors and around the various corners. No thanks. I have many virtues, and patience is in fact one of them... unlimited amounts of patience however is not something I'm blessed with, and have thus far been unsuccesful in finding that particular cheat code for my life. (See? Still relevent... cause... games have cheat codes... and.. shutup.)

ANYWAYS, on my way home, I checked on my grandmother, who despite being wheelchair bound, and reletively frail, still lives alone regardless of the family's protests. She is armed with an unbreakable spirit and inner strength that is really nothing short of amazing. Her husband died in 86, she kept going. Her body is basically a cancer factory, and has to undergo regular checkups every 3 months, and endears cancer removal surgeries several times a year, she keeps going. She had a massive heartattack, and several small strokes all at once (hence now being wheel chair bound) but came out of it all fighting after a quadruple bypass. I have nothing but love and admiration for this woman. She may be stuck in a wheelchair, but she's still the strongest person I know. She hadn't bothered to get out of bed - "Well it's dark - I can't even see to read, let alone watch tv - I'll get up when I get hungry." I chuckled at the notion that even she found futility in trying to accomplish anything that day. After that, I went on back home, where my friend was STILL asleep. I looked out the windows to the forest that my living room faces. The whole front section had been pretty much brought down. One tree had fallen towards my place, and missed it by what looked like about 10 feet. Plenty of room really, but still a little too close for comfort. Everything else had been blown away from me.

At this point, I was now getting extremely hungry. All I had that I could really do anything with was ramen. Or so I thought. Not long ago, I was living just north of the poverty line, evidence of my income lies in my pantry, where can be found the last package of ramen I bought. For those that don't know what ramen is, it's the cheapest asian noodles known to man. Each package contains 6 individually packaged servings. Heat in the microwave for three minutes, add your seasoning, and you're golden. This crap got me through college alive. (arguably) It also contains roughly a years worth of sodium, and will not hesitate to kill you if provoked. Long story short. I have had WAY too much of the stuff in my life - and would live happily if I never saw another package of the stuff again. You can tell the one's who've had too much of it by the way, because we all develop "recipes" for this crap. I'll spare you the gory details.

No ramen for me, as I now discover I not only am without power, but also without water.... "oh wait! The bathtub! Sweeeeeet!"

I filled up a big cup with water, and returned to the kitchen. (The fact that I am in the dark is apparently lost on me at this point) I opened the ramen, and placed it inside the bowl, poured the water over and put it all in the microwave.

"Damnit." I slapped my head.

"Yeah you need power to operate those new fangled machinacles." Said a voice.

"You still here? I left your money on the dresser. Your services are no longer needed."

"Aw, c'mon! Everyone needs a manwhore."

"Good point. Alright Deuce - help me clean up around here and there's an extra shiny nickle in it for you. That's probably worth a hit off of someone elses crack pipe."

He took to cleaning up the living room still littered with alcohol bottles and glasses from the night before, while I drained the water out of my bowl of ramen, and cleaned up my kitchen. I keep my a/c on most of the time, so my house stays pretty frigid. The slowly rising temperature was barely noticible. At first.

My friend went home, and I was left to my own devices. Which consisted of napping, and playing my DS. I had it in my mind I'd be back in business by the next morning.

Sunday morning did in fact come around, but my power, alas, did not. I knew that right away because I woke up drenched in sweat. I promptly went and turned the dial down.

"AUGH!"

Power loss apparently also causes me to have selective alzheimers.

Bear in mind that I also at this point have not eaten since Friday afternoon. All the food I had required cooking of some kind... "Aha! My grill! You thought you could starve me to death Ike? Well the jokes on you!" I smiled to myself as I opened my freezer to retrieve some of the still frozen chicken I had in there.

Outside, I lean In to adjust the knob and get it pre heated.

"You're kidding me. You have GOT to be kidding me."

If you're still reading this far, then I'm sure you've already figured out the punchline of this running joke.

My grill is electric.

I angrily throw the chicken back into the freezer, grab my car keys and decide to trek out once more to try to find something to eat. I searched EVERYWHERE. Nothing was open, no one had power. My mom had called me to let me know they were taking my grandmother to San Antonio. My grandmother is a diabetic, along with everything I already mentioned above - and her insulin has to stay refrigerated.. plus it's not real great for an elderly lady to live in sweltering heat. She asked if I wanted to come along - hotel is on them.

"OH DEAR GOD YES!"

I pretty much teleported back home, and started throwing a random assortment of clothes into a bag... then my phone rings. It was my boss.

"Hey man, you come through okay?"

"Yeah I ..... think.... (looking up and seeing the water stains in my ceiling for the first time) ****. Apparently not completely unscathed.. I just noticed there's a leak in my ceiling."

"That sucks."

~idle conversation about how everyone did through the storm~

"Well the reason I'm calling, aside from checking on you - we have corporate payroll hitting tomorrow, I'm going in to handle a few things - do you think you can meet me there and take care of payroll, and catch up the accounting department from last week?"

"yeah... I guess I can do that."

So I reluctantly called my mom back and declined the offer of a free trip out of what was quickly my own personal hell. I sat in a chair in the window, hoping for a cool breeze for the rest of the day, and that is where I slept.

Monday morning was ridiculous. No one else was in the BP buildings but our team. I understood why I was there, and I understood why my boss was there. However, for some reason - our fearless leader thought it prudent to have EVERYONE come in and work. So everyone is sitting in their offices, those with children have them along. Sitting idle in their offices surfing the net. I suppose it was nice having a bit of a/c - and I can tell you the kolaches someone brought in went to a good home. In mah belly. I must have eaten 5 of them in like a 10 minute period.About 10am, having realized the stupidity of trying to be "open" - we closed, and everyone left except for my boss and I. Where we worked until about 2:30 wrapping everything up. When I got back, my house had heated up to 90 degrees.... Which for me, it may as well be in a fire. I have grown up in a family who all have a preference for weather no warmer than 75. My house stays in the 68-71 range. (when it's functioning) However, my hunger had more or less been sated by the kolaches. Normally, I don't partake in the junk food, but it's hard to be picky when you're considering eating your own hand... so.. more naps in the chair.

I was informed I was off until Thursday. Sort of a bummer since I was kind of thinking I'd like to just go into work and soak up the a/c. Then I realized I had to do something about the ever growing water stains over my head. I moved my living room furniture all around to clear the area beneath it. I ended up standing everything on end, tables and couches, it looked like a bomb had come down. This whole ordeal was an assault on my OCD. The unorganized... unclean look , to me, is maddening. I think I've swept the floors about 500 times in the last week alone.

Food continued to be an issue. Monday night I was obviously hungry again. I paced the house, turning my flaslight off and on. It was pitch black at 8pm. Hard to notice with all the lights from the city sort of illuminating everything. I again, out of a combination of desperation and boredom head out to search for food. My fuel gage is now reading about 1/8th of a tank. I found a Taco Bell on the other side of the proverbial tracks that had a line in the drive through. "SUCCESS!" I quickly joined in, and was astounded at my luck.

Finally my turn came. "Sorry - we can't serve anymore... we need to get home before the curfew."

Apparently, unknown to me - the city of Houston had a 9pm curfew. Talk about being 16 again.

"What!? C'mon man, I have cash - please - just a TACO. PLEASE"

"Can't serve you."

With that, the window was shut, and that was that. My own personal hell had now taken on an Orwellian tone.

I was becoming ravenous. My windows down, and music as loud as I could make it - I drove in circles looking for some fast food joint that dared defy the curfew law as I did. I was almost hoping I'd get arrested so they'd have to feed me. Naturally, the cops on the road during all this didn't give a crap about some guy driving around looking for food. Even if he did have his head out the window screaming:

"I'LL EAT A BABY! GET IN MAH BELL-EH!"

So back at home, in my chair, in the window. Staring at nothing. Hungry. I then had a thought...a horrible, awful, evil thought.

"I do have something.....oh god. No. *eat it* NO! *yes, you have to* but.... "

It helps if you head the parts between the asterisks with a demonic voice to get the full effect of what was going on in my head.

I walked reluctantly in the kitchen and shined my light on the counter. There sat my bowl of ramen. Raw. Just as I had left it the previous morning. In a last ditch effort, I tried calling my friend to see if maybe he had some food at his place... but the phones had stopped working. Which moved my location from my house in Houston to precisely the middle of nowhere in .08 seconds. I ate it. I ate every last crunchy noodle, and I loathed every second of it. It then occurred to me I have 5 packs remaining, and is the only food in the house I wouldn't have to throw out.

.....and people wonder why I have trouble with religion.

The next day I began the dreaded cleanup. I emptied my fridge and freezer out completely. Opting to get rid of everything before it rotted. I knew damn well I'd never eat anything from there now, even if the power had come on right at that moment. Next was sweeping up the outside. My table outside had apparently shattered - something I hadn't noticed in the several times I'd passed by it since the storm... all the glass was covered by leaves, and I guess I just didn't notice the table had no top. The chairs just had been zip tied to my balcony by one of the maintenance guys I guess before the storm, so they were fine.I got the outside cleaned up for the most part, and went inside to start scrubbing the floors. Dirt and debris had been getting blown in with all my windows open, which was driving me nuts... and my thermostat was reading closer to 100. Time for another nap.

So it went. Cleaning and napping in the window. That's all I did... that's all I could do. Thursday rolled around, and I returned to my office - a total wreck. Not only that, but I had apparantly come down with some kind of alien death virus that had me vomitting non stop for 3 days... just this morning being the last of it. On the bright side, Friday when I returned home, I hadn't been home for an hour.... Sitting in my chair, my trusty bucket beside me - then I heard something. Like a turbine powering up on a jet.

I sat up, my nausea holding me in place in a daze while my mind dared itself to hope. The sheet I had thrown over my entertainment center to try to protect everything from the humidity started showing little lights behind it as the various components came to life. In the corner of my eye I saw my kitchen lights come on, and then the a/c finished it's startup, and the house was instantly filled with a sigh inducing, glorious, healing breeze. I wandered zombie like from room to room, clutching my bucket. In the bathroom I saw myself clearly in the mirror for the first time.... Whatever virus I had, combined with my strict rationed diet of raw ramen noodles had pretty much turned me INTO the zombie I felt like. It wasn't a pretty sight. I went upstairs, and took a shower. An extremely COLD shower - but god - it was good.

I've spent this weekend with the a/c cranked, and I've been wrapped up in my blankets, and today, started the laundry process... trying to get the weird humid/heat smell out of everything. I went shopping Friday evening, I spent almost 200 bucks on food. (Never shop hungry if you can help it, kids.) I also went to Best Buy and picked up the Force Unleashed. I'll leave that for another blog.

So like I said - it's coming back together, I can't wait to get back to my normal routine - it's slow going - technically, I still don't have internet or tv, since apparently something happened to my equipment in that last surge my house experienced... but thanks to technology, and my trusty laptop - and someone's kind generosity of not securing their internet for some reason... I can jump a signal and bring you this extremely long blog. I promise not to do this to you again. Unless I find myself again thinking about going on a rampage GTA meets Stubbs the Zombie **** (relevant.)

Braaaaains.