Greetings, Madballs!

Holy crap.

I’m sure those of you who own one of the “fat” PS3 systems (like me) became quite acquainted with the issue that occurred last Sunday on the right and straight on ‘til Monday.

In short, the non-slim PS3s all took a huge dump.

In a major snafu that most-assuredly gave Xbox 360 owners plenty of ammo in the “Which system is better?” war, a simple glitch with the internal clock ended up wreaking havoc for about twenty-four hours.  For some weird reason, the older PS3 models tried (unsuccessfully, I might add) to turn over from February 28^th to February 29^th, 2010 on Sunday night.  Of course, the system that only does everything (including ride the short bus) did not get the memo that 2010 is not, in fact, a leap year.  The side effect of that?  February still remains short-stacked against her fuller siblings (I’ve always thought of February as a woman – she sure flirts like one).

So, when that internal clock rolled over to the obviously illegal date, those “fat” PS3s immediately wet the bed, making online connection impossible.  Also affected?  Trophy data was either corrupted or non-existent and almost all PS3 games were completely non-playable.

Sony’s response was amusing, yet horrifying at the same time – “Stay off your PS3!”  Sounding like an septuagenarian who just confiscated your Frisbee (do people even play with Frisbees anymore?), the company that uses the same font for Playstation and the Spider-Man movies admitted that they were at a loss, but that the problem was bad enough to warrant treating your system like a red-headed step child (what a sad moniker – I happen to like gingers).

So, like the stalwart troopers that they are, Sony set their tech experts (who obviously have no concept of the Gregorian calendar or this wouldn’t have happened in the first place) to task to find and fix the problem.  Meanwhile, Xbox folks were laughing at our misfortunes right up to the moment when their 360s got their fifth or sixth “Red Ring of Death”, at which point they swore profusely and immediately throw themselves onto some jagged rocks.

At the same time, I was going through a steady decline as withdrawals started to kick in.  It wasn’t noticeable Sunday night, as the problem didn’t occur until after I had already signed off for the evening.  But by the time I got home from work Monday afternoon?  Well, let’s just say that I never realized just how much I use my PS3 until I found out the hard way that about two-thirds of my couch time in the living room requires the use of the third generation Playstation.  I couldn’t play any video games.  I couldn’t watch any movies.  Every time my instincts automatically queued up my arms to reach for the power button on my system I had to stop myself.  In the end, I was forced to “channel surf” – a past time that I’m pretty sure became obsolete right around the same time that Frisbees stopped being something cool that you did in parks and backyards.

Fortunately for me, the Winter Olympics were just over enough to return one of my 8 PM viewing staples to its proper time slot.  After watching the show I bought a Subway sandwich to keep on the air, “Chuck” returned the favor and kept me distracted long enough for Sony to figure out how time is actually kept track of in modern society.  By 9 PM I hesitantly fired up ol’ Bessie based on some positive rumblings I had read in one of the forums I frequent.  Sure enough, my sleek-black beauty was fine and dandy.  She was a little disoriented, still thinking that it was Sunday, February 28^th, but after a gentle correction I was able to play Fallout 3 with only my usual operational glitches and irritations.  All was now right in the world once again.

At least, until all game systems everywhere instantly self destruct while trying to reconcile December 21^st, 2012.

The Don survived the PS3 Blackout of February 29^th, 2010.  He didn’t even get a lousy T-shirt.

Greetings, Station!

The other day I was listening to the Tenacious D song “Beezleboss (The Final Showdown)” from the soundtrack to Tenacious D in The Pick of Destiny, a movie which no one saw (as evidenced by the abysmal box office numbers).  Despite its lower-than-lackluster performance, I found the film to be a fun romp in the spirit of the rock band misadventure movies of old.  And being a fan of Tenacious D itself (comprised of Jack Black and Kyle Gass), it was only natural that I picked up the soundtrack to the film.  While it isn’t as good as their first album, “PoD” still contains plenty of little musical gems.  One of my favorites is the afore-mentioned “Beezleboss”.

The song retells a slightly altered version of the story regaled in the previous D song “Tribute” – JB and KG get involved in a “rock-off” with the Devil.  The stakes?  If The D wins, Satan must go back to Hell… and he has to pay Jack and Kyle’s rent.  If Beelzebub wins, he gets to take KG back to Hell with him to be his slave (and not the indentured servitude kind, either).

With the stakes in place, the rock-off commences.  Satan begins with an epic, dark mass of metal proportions.  Tenacious D reciprocate with a fairly inspirational effort, but to no avail.  The Devil wins and prepares to take Kyle back to his domain for eternity.

But wait!  At the last minute, Jables intervenes, causing the Beezleboss to break off a piece of his own horn.  With that piece in Black’s possession, he is able to command the Devil to go back to Hell once more until he is “complete again”.

So, I’m listening to this song and the thought occurs to me – most tales that chronicle Ol’ Scratch competing for a mortal’s soul seem to paint him in the same manner in order to sell the message that good always triumphs over evil.  He’s almost always painted as an honor-bound entity that can be easily beaten by someone with enough talent, hard work, and moxie.

Wait, what?  Hold on a minute.  This is the same guy who had the molten stones to challenge The Big Man.  Sure, he lost and was cast out of St. Peter’s jurisdiction, but he obviously had enough power to challenge George Burns in the first place.  You don’t make such a bold gesture unless you know for certain that you got the Mana to do so.

Plus, Lucifer is also a master of deception.  He managed to fool the first man and woman with fruit.  The guy’s got some serious ad executive powers going on if he can sell a couple of nudists on foliage sweets.  Come to think of it, this isn’t all that different from the supernatural ability Steve Jobs has to convince people to buy things like iPads.

Wait… Steve Jobs… Apple…

Mind = blown.  Where was I again?

Oh yeah… So, The Dark Lord is obviously a master manipulator.  There’s a reason why he is called The Master of Lies – the guy uses words to confuse, deceive, delude, dupe, fool, gull, hoax, hoodwink, kid, snow, take in, trick, intrigue, machinate, plot, scheme, arrange, contrive, devise, finesse, mastermind, cheat, chisel, defraud, fleece, gyp, hustle, and swindle (thanks, Merriam-Webster!).  He’s always in it for his own ends and he does whatever is necessary to get what he wants.

This means that there is no way in Hell (pun intended) anyone like Charlie Daniels or Ralph Macchio could ever hope to defeat him in a one-on-one.  It doesn’t matter how hard you try or how much spirit you poured into your efforts.  The Devil can say whatever he wants.  He could play two plunky chords off- key while you play Vivaldi backwards with your butt cheeks.  He’ll declare himself the winner no matter what.  It’s what he does.  Say goodbye to your soul, Karate Kid, because no amount of Crane Kicks or Drum Techniques or Lipton Brisk Iced Tea will save you from spending an eternity waxing on and waxing off The Prince of Evil.

Now, I’ll give “Beezleboss” some credit.  Despite the fact that the Source of All Evil adheres to a “demon code”, the song (as well as the final scene of the movie, which is where the song comes from) does finally illustrate that The D had no chance of winning a rock-off against The Dark One.  Even the “Real Ghostbusters” episode “Night Game” had a better understanding of how things should work when you compete against dark forces.  Granted, Winston was playing baseball against your more run-of-the-mill demons, but the ump still recognized that evil was free to cheat and play as dirty as it wanted (well, at least as dirty as a Saturday morning cartoon can get).  Of course, in the end good still won, despite the fact that the evil demons cheated the hell out of that game.

Don’t get me wrong.  I completely understand the intention behind the way these stories are told.  Triumph of the human spirit against the forces of evil and the belief that we are inherently good enough to conquer our own (metaphorical) inner demons is a popular trope that’s never going away.  As a society we need to be able to watch movies and television shows, listen to music, and read books and comics that remind us no matter what dark paths we go down or what nefarious entities we meet, we still have a chance and the power within us to punch old Beelz in the front-flow and scream “Adrian!” in triumph.

It’s just that every once in awhile I would like to see Mephisto with his Adamantium cup on.

The Don went down to Georgia.  Her mother didn’t approve.

It’s that time again! And seeing as all my previous notes for Spwug articles, webcomic reviews, and other whatnot are still inaccessible to me (and no, we can’t just transfer them to this computer right now, for reasons), you get a new batch this week…of filler!

Entirely by coincidence, I’ve seen more of Adam Baldwin in one weekend than I’ve seen over the past year, via Firefly and the season premiere of Chuck. I’ma gonna ramble about the first of those two shows—yes, I really did go this long without seeing Firefly and its movie, Serenity. This article is really an Opinion After the Fact and not much of a review at all, since there’s probably no need for me to go into character descriptions and plot for a show that you’ve likely already seen, or at least heard about, and you’ve probably already made up your mind on its merits.

What was my verdict, after watching the Joss Whedon work that was repeatedly urinated upon by FOX (c’mon, is anyone REALLY surprised that a network now hiring Sarah Palin screwed up?), resurrected by the fans, then killed again? Well, I had a blast watching it. I can see why it’s so loved. The character dialogue and interactions were brilliant for the most part. When you watch the show, you stick around because the scenes are so wonderfully written. Great jokes, deep insights, usually realistic reactions to dangerous situations…the characters really are people and not just characters, and that’s what make the show truly live. My better half and I did spend the series playing the “Hey! I saw that part in Cowboy Bebop/Outlaw Star” game, although of course it could be said that those two shows in turn lifted some of their own moments from previous works, and so on down the line. (The “game” is not a complaint, by the way. It was fun.)

At the same time, though, I can see why it got cancelled (twice). What didn’t I like?

There were times when people behaved slightly against their grain so as to not to move the plot along too quickly, which would occasionally bring things into cliché territory. This usually happened via Malcolm Reynolds not living up to the “shoot first” attitude that made him such an interesting character in the first episodes.* Naturally, the Bad Guy that Mal didn’t kill would then come back to haunt the ship’s crew, only to end up getting killed by Mal after all, roll credits. Not terribly original. Meanwhile, this being a Joss Whedon creation, you of course had the required “main character dies a stupid death for absolutely no good reason” in Serenity. (HARPOON!) Maybe it would have made more sense and had more impact if we’d had seasons and seasons of episodes and character development leading up to it, instead of a single random act?

* Some of the villains Mal “killed” were supposed to come back later in the series. But since the series HAD no “later”, this little point becomes moot.

In other issues I had, the worlds visited were all largely identical, being mostly either barren dustballs or barren ice worlds due to lack of budget—on the flip side, the inside of the ship Serenity was so detailed that it really was, as a DVD extra calls it, the tenth character. Then there’s River Tam, the very annoying know-it-all character whose mental imbalance shouldn’t be an excuse for her behaviour–and really, The Mysterious Girl Is Always the Key to Everything has already been done in nearly every sci-fi creation known to man. And of course, the “united government that rules everything on all worlds is evil and corrupt” recurring theme is another standard sci-fi cliché. It didn’t seem to fit in so well with the episodic unrelated criminal capers the main cast got up to regularly.

And I think that was the show’s Achilles heel. All the brilliant dialogue in the world can’t save you from a story that’s been done many times before and doesn’t give any indication of being done in a unique manner this time. I really believe that, if the show had lasted, it would have been a FUN ride and more than worth the price of admission. But at the end, it likely wouldn’t have been the space dramedy roller coaster to end all space dramedy roller coasters. The show deservedly has a lot of rabid fans. But I also think that intense love for many is bolstered by the “absence makes the heart grow fonder” sentiment as only the word “CANCELLED” can bring.

I still think anyone who likes a good sci-fi show should watch Firefly, because it was very good. Yeah, I just wrote a list of complaints up there, but for the most part, they’re pretty minor. Besides, that’s what I DO. I warn you what to expect. The show is awesome. But if you haven’t seen it, don’t go in expecting any surprises. Expect fun dialogue, fun Western-style shootouts, fun criminal capers, crossdressing, fancy guns, toy dinosaurs, and, if you’re just the shallow type, eye-candy in the form of naked Mal (according to many fangirls) or the lovely Companions (according to many fanboys)…just don’t call them whores. (The Companions, that is. Although I’m sure Mal would take some offense to the term himself, despite using it on his own Companion comrade/not-so-seekrit love interest regularly.)

Yep, if you’re like me and you never get around to watching something unless everyone you know is still raving about it years later, the Firefly series is an excellent one to add to your Netflix queue. But don’t take my (many) words for it. How about some YouTube examples of the previously-mentioned great spoken lines?

A Powerful Ugly Creature – posted by gouhibiki

“Curse your sudden but inevitable betrayal!” – posted by foxabulous

“What’d y’all order a dead guy for?” – posted by gouhibiki

Join us next time, when I’ll probably have yet another random article whilst waiting for the new computer’s parts to arrive!

Happy New Year to all you Spwuggerifics out there!

I know all (none) of you out there who are(n’t) reading this are(n’t) saying, “What kind of way is this to kick off the new year? We were waiting for your article since last night!”

Well, kids, I only just rolled in home from a trip that I should have been back from Sunday night,* and I’m exhausted, hungry, and have a lot of laundry to do. But I owe you all a Spwug article, and a Spwug article you shall have.

*Never tell your family or car you have to be back home by a certain date. They’ll take it as a challenge.

Some people do the resolution thing for New Year’s. I don’t, figuring that if it’s so important you have to promise yourself you’ll do it, then it’s worth starting as soon as you think of it instead of waiting for a day on a calendar. So what I offer you here is more of a mission statement, or a preview of what you can see here in 2010. I think I’m finally getting the hang of this webcomic writin’ thang, so you can expect to see more streamlined (hah!) reviews. You can expect to see better utilization of graphics (and me spending a whole lot more time in Paint Shop Pro to make them better fit WordPress’ incredibly odd formatting).

Additionally, you’ll see a different kind of article showing up. So far I’ve only talked about the webcomics that I’ve been reading for a good while because I like them and know their content pretty well. Since starting my illustrious Spwug career, I’ve started going through the “to be read” links in my bookmarks. And, well, I’ve added some new comics to my regular reading list, but I’ve also run across a few comics that make me want those wasted hours of my life back. So, yes, friends, you can expect negative reviews to start showing up here. I’ve already got three ripe candidates in mind, two of which surprised me by actually being very popular comics on the Internet.

And that’s about it from me for now. I’ve got a hot sweet bun and a warm bed begging to be utilized. May your New Year be as stocked with full bellies and sweet dreams as mine is about to be!

Greetings, Banana Splits!

There comes a time in every child’s life when they must put away childish things and become an adult…

…or they can say “To Hell with that” and continue to have fun by going to conventions like Nekocon.

Guess which one I did this past weekend?

To be fair, I was there in an official capacity, as my partner-in-crime Danny Valentini and I were invited to the convention again this year to be guests.  Supposedly, we do this web comic together called “The Draconia Chronicles” that grows in popularity every year.  Now, I would just chalk this up to rumor for now, because everyone knows that there are no such things as web comics.  That’s just a story parents tell their children at night to scare them so that they won’t grow up to get online degrees.

You should know the drill by now – I do a quick recap of my weekend at a convention, you skim over it feeling unfulfilled, then we both reluctantly agree that we need to see other people as we give back all the items we borrowed or gave to each other.

I’m still waiting to get back my copy of the “The White Album.”

As con Fridays go, this year’s Neko offered pretty much the standard fare – I show up at the convention center about two hours before the Opening Ceremonies.  Heading up to the “Con-Ops” room, I procure my Guest badge.  After some spirited conversation about topics I have no recollection of discussing, I make a dotted bee-line for our table in the Artists Alley.  I say dotted because one can never just go to where they are going at a convention.  Invariably, there will be many stops and restarts as you run into old friends for a quick chat, pose for pictures, stop to take pictures, notice something shiny, pause to ponder the secrets of the universe, stop because you’re chewing gum, or hesitate because the all-powerful con gods sent a messenger to you with a gift consisting of this confection called “Pocky”.  And no, I don’t mean the owner of Spwug.

As I survey the landscape of the cavernous region known as the Artists Alley, I catch up with more fellow AA (not Alcoholics Anonymous) commoners as I wait for my cohort to arrive.  I also wait for time to slowly transport me into the future, for that is where the Opening Ceremonies await me.

When the Hour of Trying to Fool People Into Thinking You Are Someone Important in Front of a Medium-Sized Crowd is finally at hand, my recently arrived partner-in-crime and I make our way into the even more cavernous region where the Ceremonies are to take place.  After a series of horrible attempts at humor that are the reason my parents gave me up for adoption, Danny and I – fully convinced that no one knew who the heck we were – remove ourselves and head back over to “Con-Ops”, where we trade our silly old Guest badges for shinier and cooler “Neko Bazaar” badges.  With renewed vigor, we return to the first cavernous area of which I had already mentioned previously.  From there, we set up our table, and begin the attempt to peddle our wares for the rest of the evening.  And that, little Christopher, is how babies are born.

Saturday finds us arriving early, long before noon’s rising sun can greet us.  We have a panel to host and candy tied to strings so that we can lure entice the con masses to our little panel room.  We are able to capture accrue a respectable number of individuals despite our outlandish buffoonery on display.  In fact, I do believe that a couple of them even stop screaming long enough to ask us questions about our web comic.  I call that a success.  Then again, I call not getting maced in the face when I ask a woman the time a success.

From there, we return to our temporary abode in the Artists Alley for more shilling, more debauchery, more talky-talky…blah blah blah…  You’re already asleep, so we’ll skip ahead…

Two in the afternoon!  We have another panel!  But our princess is in another castle!  Dejected from finding yet another one of those stupid Toadstool weirdoes (where do they all come from?  Do they multiply like rabbits?), we make our way back to the same room our last panel was in.  In a strange case of déjà vu, the room looks exactly the same as the last time we were in it.  In fact, maybe this really is the first time we are in it, and the first time really wasn’t the first time, but instead a strange message from the future telling us what lie in store for our fates.

Nope, same room, different panel.

This time we are joined by real artists and writers as we try our best to sound like we know as much as they do about making web comics.  I think we have them fooled right up to the point where I mention something about the right amount of tension needed on a loom when interweaving the threads of a web comic.  I’m not sure where the audience got the pitch forks and torches, but it makes for an exciting conclusion to what I think was a successful panel.

As my counterpart and I make our escape back to the Caverns of AA, we easily slip back into our respective roles – he’s the DJ and I’m the rapper.  Sales seem to be going well on our new “Men of the Quadratic Equation” calendar, as well as a few other items we have somehow managed to fool the commonfolk into believing have magical powers – mainly some Shamwow!s, as well as a few pounds of Mighty Putty.  Throughout the afternoon and evening we get several con-goers who stop by claiming to be fans of our web comic.  But, I know the truth.  After being visited by them as often as I am, you tend to recognize evil spirits when they show up to haunt you and ask you for favors.

It is at this point that I also have a vision that my wife is in an 80s glam-pop band.  I shiver from the delusion, then down a couple burgers that are really cookies.  My life is strange.

The greatest highlight of Saturday has to be in the evening when we go to dinner.  It isn’t often when an evil spirit actually tries to get you drunk so that they can take advantage of you.  Joke’s on him, though.  I would have said yes sober.

Sunday seems to be a blur.  No, I mean every Sunday seems to be a blur.  I think my brain just hates living in my cranial cavity so much that it just decides to shut down every seventh day as a middle finger to me and my ancestors.  I can’t fathom why.  I mean, it isn’t my fault that the Waltons aren’t real.

Now that I think about it, I do seem to recall some events took place on Neko’s Day of Sun.  We have a final panel wherein we are usurped by dark forces who yank the proverbial rug out from under us by yanking the actual rug out from under us.  I think we still manage to do a fairly adequate job of teaching the wailing masses how not to create or develop characters.  At least, I pray to Bill Cosby that we did.

A few more hours of trying to prove to the con folk that we are not wax statues and the con is officially over.  As my main squeeze who is not my wife but is really the artist who draws the web comic I scribble words for and I break down and cry our set-up at the table in the AA Caverns, we say our goodbyes to a few of the fellow artists who were crazy enough to talk to us.  We make our way to the bar in the hotel that is across the way from the convention center.  I remark as we head over that a way looks an awful lot like grass and asphalt.  Once inside the bar, a friend buys me an apple pie – except that this pie is really liquid and I have to drink it instead of eat it.  But hey, in today’s economy everyone has to make sacrifices – even our American icons.  I heard that baseball is currently just gardening in order to save money.

With the evening now upon us, we make our way to Olive Garden.  There, a free meal awaits all of us who were sneaky enough to convince the staff that we were Guests Neko Bazaar attendees.  But first we stand outside the restaurant to play a game called “Parking Lot-to”.  The object of the game is to stand out in the parking lot until the number of people in your party matches the number called.  Our group makes it to the bonus round, where we win some fabulous prizes – including our meals, as well as a copy of the home game.  I can’t speak for those who are still in the parking lot after we are seated, though I’m told that “manicotti formaggio” is Italian for “convention stragglers”.

I’m glad I ordered the chicken alfredo.

The Don would like to give his heartfelt thanks to everyone at Nekocon for their gracious generosity and hopes to be invited back next year!

Andrew Dobson, skilled artist and Nintendo fan of old, gives his take on Project Natal and the Sony Wand in “Danny and Spot” (I’m showing you two comics that were uploaded together, but it’s the second comic that’s relevant here.) Check out his amazing work at the link above!

Fall has, uh, fallen upon us here at the Casa de Marlink, according to the bright red tree outside our door. Halloween rushed in and blew out with the speed and force of six three-year-olds on a sugar high, leaving us with just the leftovers of candy for trick-or-treaters, decorations to be taken down*, and some form of minor plague that some generous soul donated to the big Halloween party.

*Decorations were left up into November to ensure we did not incur the wrath of Sam by taking them down too early.

While I soothe my aching head and raw throat with honeyed ginseng tea, let’s get down to brass tacks. Or thumbtacks. Who even uses brass tacks anymore?

You might notice this isn’t the monthly webcomic review I’ve normally been doing the first Tuesday of the month, although a comic on the Web still makes a feature here. I’m switching up the way things are done, but since how a writer works is only of interest to the writer, I’ll spare you the details and get to the topic at hand. Well, topics. I’m gonna get random and complain about a few things here. This post was inspired by the Dobson comics you see here and the gripes they reminded me of.

This isn’t NEW-news; we’ve all heard that the Playstation 3 and Xbox 360 are keen on adding motion controls to their systems. The response from the gaming community so far has largely been a big yawning “Meh.” My, the enthusiasm of disapproval sure has fallen since Nintendo announced the Wii Remote a few years back! (Read the “2006″ panel of the above comic to see the reaction I got a few years ago, when I expressed delight at the proposed Nintendo motion controls that have since come to rule the world.)

But, even though I posted a comic here that’s mocking the Wiimote-mockers, I’m not going to tread…too much…into that old territory of how it’s “cool” to hate the big N because they always seem to come out on top (funny, I would think that would be a reason to LIKE them. We’re supposed to like winners who provide quality products for the consumer, right? Or maybe I’m the only one who still values substance over style. Wait. Said I wasn’t gonna go there. I also said I’d call you after last night. Get used to disappointment, kids.) No, my problem with the gamer-dubbed “copycat” motion technology announced by Sony and Microsoft isn’t relevant to the “copycat” part.

We don’t have a 360 in this house, due to there being nothing we wanted to play on it. We do have a PS3, which I pretty much only use as a DVD/Blu-Ray player. I spend basically all of my gaming time on the PC, the Wii, or my older Nintendo systems (and much of my PC gaming is playing Nintendo ROM’s when I’m not playing Oblivion). It’s not that I’m just obsessed with everything Nintendo does to the point that I won’t touch the competition. It’s that I’m obsessed with Nintendo BECAUSE they produce the games I actually like to play and replay, an area in which both Sony and Microsoft have been severely lacking for me. Let’s have another set of Dobson comics to illustrate:

Before anyone says anything, A Boy and His Blob falls under the “third-party” category, not the “new intellectual property” one.

Yeah, I’m not a big first-person shooter fan, nor am I diggin’ the dull “realistic” brown graphics that make backgrounds and items largely indistinguishable and have become the gaming norm. Don’t think I’m ignoring that Nintendo has been known to fall into this trap too (Twilight Princess, why you gotta hurt me so bad with your muted colours? Can’t we go back to the vibrant pallets of your NES and SNES glory days when I could tell one object from another? Even your N64 forays were more vivid!) And many of the PS3 FPS offerings are pretty much all the same thing, graphics-/gameplay-wise. Even the rare stand-out FPS games like Call of Duty: World at War and Battlefield: Bad Company tend to look alike…and play alike in a bad way, which I’ll get into and ties into the motion-control thing….

I can’t comment on the 360’s proposed motion controls beyond quoting a few gamer responses of “Way to do what Nintendo already did!” since I’ve never played a 360, but I’ve got a big problem with Sony’s take. Which is, how can PS3 developers be looking at new types of controls when the ones they’ve been working with for years are still so loose and unresponsive?

There aren’t that many PS3 games I’ve been excited for and actually played. There was Metal Gear Solid 4 (more brown futuristic FPS with a scruffy hero!), Eden, LittleBigPlanet, and the minigame LocoRoco Cocoreccho!, and that’s pretty much it. And I probably would have liked those games a whole lot more, had the controls actually freakin’ worked.

The battle against Vamp in MGS4, for example, took about five times as long as it should have because the CQC maneuver to put someone in a lock-hold only works when it wants to. And let’s not forget the other times during the game that Snake wouldn’t grab what he was supposed to or go where he was told. (Cranky old man.)

In Eden, the controls work like you’re playing underwater with slow response time, which leaves your little character missing easy grab-jumps and constantly falling to the beginning of the level while the timer ticks down. I can generally only play one level at a time, before getting so frustrated at the controls that I quit playing it for the next two months.

LittleBigPlanet…do I even need to get into the controls and hit detection that are so sloppy, even the game’s designers admit there’s something amiss–and then completely reneged on their promise to repair the broken controls by Christmas 2008? I have tried so hard to love this game with all my heart because it’s extremely unique and obviously a labour of love (see also: Stephen Fry narrating), but it’s another one that leads to migraines. I still recommend to friends that they play this game–but as a rental. I can’t justify buying it until you’ve seen if you can love it despite the crappy controls.

LocoRoco…another game that would be so creative and so much fun, if only the damn LocoRocos actually did what they were told, instead of bouncing in place and ogling the pretty butterfly that is clearly telling them to jump on each other and form a stack. Many friends have seen this game on the PS3 and wanted to try it, only to give up after ten minutes of yelling at the screen and shaking the controller.

Ever since the PS3 entered my home, I’ve had this theory that game developers aren’t making games harder–they’re making games harder to play. (Or perhaps making the games themselves “stupider” so that they don’t recognize what you, the player, are trying to do with that weird little alien “controller” thing your PS3 has heard so much about.) And there’s a big difference between the two. People like a challenge. People don’t like watching themselves fail even though they hit the right button at the right time. If developers can’t get regular old button-dominated controls to work as they should, how can they expect to re-revolutionize gaming with a new(ish, *ahem* Nintendo) type of control? Do me a favour, Sony. Get the old right before you move on to the new. Make me love you, as Nintendo made me love them over two decades ago, and continues to make me love them, by getting it right the first time. And Microsoft? At least try to catch my interest next time, okay?

I now end this largely nonsensical ventilation to pop pills for the headache and more tea for the throatache. Catch you on the flip–or catch you at Nekocon this weekend for those who are going, provided I’m not dying of the zombie plague by then!

…congratulations to Richard and Katy, the supreme rulers of the Spwugniverse!!!!!

They are the essence of everything that is Spwug.  Without either of them, this site wouldn’t be here to bring you a daily dose of all things geek.

It was an honor and a privilege to witness the joining of these two forces of good.  They are my friends.  They are my family.  I am proud to be the head writer of something they envisioned, and I am proud to be a part of their lives.

My best wishes to both of you, Pocky Rich and Katy.  Here’s to bigger and greater things.  With your powers combined, anything is possible.

When I’m on the phone with family, my housemate is usually a few feet away, blowing zombies to pieces in Call of Duty 5 or racking up headshots in Battlefield 1943. A common phone conversation goes like this:

THEM: I hear a lot of noise over there. Is he playing games again?
ME: Yep, he’s playing online with some friends.
THEM: Everyone’s staying home to play?
ME: Yeah, no one wanted to waste time and gas driving over to someone’s house, and then we’d still have to drive back home later ’cause we all have work tomorrow.
THEM: So do you guys ever actually hang out anymore, or do you just all stay home and play video games without ever seeing each other?

Gamers are reclusive, shunning the light, not to mention all other people. Surviving on chips in order to gain one more level before work, one more rare drop item, as their chair strains under the player’s ever-increasing bulk. It’s a common myth about gamers, and one that’s probably had most of us rolling our eyes at some point (and had the guilty gamers struggling to get their respective behinds unstuck from their chairs). Ladies and gentlemen, allow me to raise a counterpoint. Not with the fact that you can actually socialize with friends while gaming, via headsets like you’re talking on the phone. No, this is about a much more physical type of gaming interaction.

The Sunday LAN Party. It’s become a sort of tradition amongst my group, only failing to take place when most of us are out of town or have to work. We pick a house, and everyone lugs over their computers and consoles, their handhelds, their huge flatscreen monitors, movies, drinks, and a whole lot of potluckin’-good food. People take turns playing games, since it almost never happens that everyone owns the game currently being played on the local network. While a group game is in session, anyone not playing eats, chats with whoever’s nearby, watches movies, plays cards, or mucks about on a Nintendo DS or a PSP. Even the people who are engrossed in multiplayer gaming are talking with one another–that is, when they’re not yelling instructions like, “ZOMBIE BEHIND YOU!” or “Crap! I need a revive!”

In other words, it’s a real party, full of real party activities (some of which are fueled by real alcohol), and real party people (who may or may not be raisin’ their hands in the air like they just don’t care). It just has the word “LAN” in front of it.

And that bit about us gamers shunning the light? I took this photo at the last LAN party (only had my cell phone camera, sadly). Check out the full-size version, and….Why, just LOOK at all that sunlight coming in through the patio door! Okay, so that part’s a bit tongue-in-cheek….Still, though. It’s natural light. I think it counts.

The boys were gracious enough to reveal part of their screens for this photo, to showcase the variety of gaming we get up to at these things (albeit they’re all on PS3s at the moment. Some Nintendo and PC gaming was going on outside of camera range.) Can YOU identify all the games being represented here?

That’s all for this installment. Tune in next time for…I don’t even know what, but it’ll be here!

…I found them!!

They were at a Big K-Mart down the street.  I was tempted to buy the whole box, but in the end I just bought six.

My search is over.  We now return you to your regularly-scheduled program, already in progress…

Greetings, Holograms!

I’m feeling a little muddled lately, due to my workload at, well… work, my various writing projects, and getting everything geared up for 2wcOnline’s appearance at this year’s Nekocon as guests (seriously -  they’ve stepped up their professional game with contracts and everything!).

So, today’s installment is going to match my current brain contents – cluttered and random.  My apologies, but I’m hoping that this actually benefits you as you all get to have a rather nice laugh at my expense.

First, I’m sure you are all aware that Disney is buying Marvel comics.  I won’t go into details too much, as I’m sure the three of you that read this column you’ve all read about it ad nauseum from the various sites and news outlets that make a regular play at this sort of thing.  What I want to address is some of the fallout that has occurred from fans and general appreciators of Marvel Comics.

A lot of you have automatically jumped to the conclusion that this is a bad idea, it sucks, or that it means the unavoidable amalgam of the two heads of entertainment.  I can assure you that this is not so.  This deal is actually quite lucrative for everyone involved, including us.  What the deal boils down to is this: Disney will increase their sales, as well as be able to distribute content that targets a demographic that they’ve been sorely neglecting while they focus on the tweenies and girlies – boys.  The plus side for Marvel is that not only will this increase their sales, but now they have a guaranteed distributor for any project they want to get off the ground.  It’s very similar to the arrangement DC has under Time/Warner’s ownership.

Except that Disney has promised that they will not assert complete control over Marvel like Time/Warner has done with DC.  Notice that creative control has made it so that Marvel has been steadily successful with their films, while the micromanaging position T/W has assumed over DC has ensured that the only hit they’ve had so far has been that guy with the pointy ears and cape.

And if none of this convinces the nay sayers and the doubters that things will be fine, let me add the cherry on top: remember the sweet deal Disney made with John Lasseter to get Pixar back?  It also brought back the 2D animation studios, and it made the Pixar/Disney relationship even better.  Good things like this will most likely be mirrored in the Disney/Marvel deal.  Plus… think about it… John Lasseter and Pixar doing animated Marvel films.

Let me say that again: Pixar doing animated Marvel films.  Possibly in 3D.

What I can promise you won’t get is this.

So, everyone just relax.  Everything will be fine.

Next up on my agenda – remember the trailer for the Plan 9 remake I was in about a month ago?  The official website has gone live with the countdown to said trailer.  September ninth, everyone.  Come check it out, if only to see me get eaten by a zombie.

And speaking of that shoot – while I was in West Virginia filming the Plan 9 trailer, I was playing the role of customer in a 7/11 up there when I stumbled across the most incredible candy bar spin-off that I have ever eaten.  It’s a limited edition offshoot of Whatchamacallit called Thingamajig.

And it.  Is.  Delicious.  Instead of peanut-flavored crisp and a layer of caramel covered in chocolate, this confection has chocolate crisp and a layer of peanut butter wrapped in chocolate.

I have no idea why I italicized that last word.

Nevermind!  This candy bar is awesome.  I enjoyed it so much that as soon as I got back home I immediately started looking for it in several of our local convenience stores and pharmacies.

Fast forward a few weeks, and I still have yet to find this chocolate/peanut butter ambrosia.  I have no idea why I can’t find it around here, and it’s quite disappointing.  Hershey doesn’t even have it listed on their site.  The only way I’ve been able to find any info on it is through other peoples’ blogs and articles on it.  And none of them seem to have any info on where they found it, either.  So, my search continues…

I leave you with my last scatterbrained thought of this installment.  PBS has pulled the plug on “Reading Rainbow” for good, with last Friday being the last episode it would air.  I, like many of you, grew up with that show.  That was the show that introduced me to LeVar Burton before I even knew what “Roots” was, or before he got to be chief engineer on a starship.  It’s a sad day when the reasoning behind such a move is “to focus more on teaching children how to read (grammar and phonics) instead of teaching them to WANT to read.”  Don’t the two serve each other?  That’s the most ridiculous thing I’ve ever heard.

Of course, you don’t have to take my word for it.

Butterfly in the sky, The Don can go twice… as many times depending on how much he’s had to drink.