Entry 41: "Halo Kitty"

Yo!

Three things. One: Sorry, I couldn't think of a better parody-title for this week that halfway fit the topic. Two (forgot to say this last week): Two weeks ago, I probably should've waited until that episode of 24 finished airing before I posted that entry. How silly of me to doubt the dramatic power of that writing staff. Also, how silly of me to think Curtis would appear in at least the final season of the show, if not the movie, before getting killed off. Was really rooting for him. Come to think of it, I don't really know much about gunshot wounds, but that looked like the kind of neck shot that, depending on the angle I guess, he could have survived somehow. Maybe the bullet was like a single micron to the left of an artery or something, making the shot non-lethal. I really don't know. All I know is, as far as 24 goes, unless the person dies from a gunshot to the brain on camera, there's no telling if the person's really dead. As evidenced by the end of season four. Rent the DVD. Keep it up, writers.... Oh, and thing three: I've added a new area to the right-side navigation to let you take this blog with you using not one, not five, not ten, but sixteen different RSS feeds, custom-setup for whatever RSS reader you use, even one that sends a preview of the new entries to your cell phone the instant I publish them (Cingular/AT&T, T-Mobile & Sprint only)! Also, the symbol gives you the raw RSS feed, so whatever reader your browser's configured to default to, if it's not on the list, it'll pick it up. More improvements to come............

Moving on... Last week, video game developer Bungie ended phase one of the entrance requirements to let members of the public into a beta version of the single most anticipated game of 2007, Halo 3. Phase one was to wait until the newest (aired once) game trailer aired during Monday Night Football early last month, and then go online to Halo3.com to register with your Xbox 360 "Gamertag" (as in cyberlord1019, etc.) and MSN Passport account. Then, last week, they screened through the entries to first see how many of them met the minimum requirements for entry this way:

-Xbox 360 Premium console (or Core unit with Hard Drive)
-Gold Xbox Live account
-MSN Passport,linked to the aforementioned Gold account
-Been born before January 1990 (17 and older only)

What they neglected to mention was the fact that you needed to have a gold account in place before the email invites were sent out, it turned out, last Monday. Not before you download the beta from Xbox Live Marketplace on the still as-yet unannounced date. I did get a confirmation email Monday saying I was in their system, but some people I was playing online with late last week were saying I did need the account Gold-ified before that first email was sent out. Also, one friend of mine who did get selected for this beta confirmed last Wednesday that I needed Gold before Monday to be considered. But then how did I get the confirmation email if the registration wasn't successful? There were just too many conflicting statements between the Halo 3 website, Bungie's official message boards, other gaming websites, and various Live players on why I was/wasn't inevitably screwed over by Bungie because of the wording on their entry page. But what's (not) done is (not) done, and rather than scream out a long rant on how extremely anal Bungie is being on admittance into what's supposed to be a PUBLIC beta... PUBLIC BETA, Bungie.... I'll just have to--- Sonofa-- I just now found this message board poster who showed off the text from his invite email (name censored here; dunno why he didn't do it himself on the original board, but whatever):

Congratulations ##########, you have been chosen to participate in the Halo® 3 beta.

In order to participate, you must have access to:
-An Xbox 360TM Pro console or Xbox 360 Core console with hard drive
-A valid Xbox Live® Gold subscription

Keep an eye on your inbox, we will be sending more information about this opportunity soon.

That wording on the second requirement says that even Silver membership users got them, because if the only accepted members are already Gold, why add in that sentence suggesting they upgrade?

Darn you, Bungie.

Well, I'll just have to wait with the rest of the XBL community for...

Phase Two: Playing three hours of multiplayer games of Halo 2 between 12:01am EST Thursday, and 11:59pm EST Saturday. Also, after that three hours, you must be one of the first 13,333 (yes, exactly that many) to register on Halo3.com with the X360 Gamertag you were logged in as to do it, which is why Original Xbox-ers are definitely sitting this one out.

.................Um........

As popular as this event is/will be, do they really think it'll take all of three days for less than 14,000 people (out of a total community of over four million players globally) to play three hours of ten-minute-a-pop multiplayer games
and race over to their computers hoping to get in this way? Better question: Does anyone reading this think there will be a single spot up for grabs past 3:45am Thursday? ...Which brings me to 3:46am, and.....

Phase Three. The only non-rigged entry method. Buy some game called Crackdown. A demo was released last week on Marketplace. I've done it. It plays well, for a loose cross of sorts between Grand Theft Auto 3-and-two-thirds, TRON 2.0 and Mercenaries. Well enough to sell plenty even after this beta is closed, and enough to warrant a sequel, remains to be seen. But....

The Bottom Line is.... I, and most of you sensible gamers and Halo fans out there, am probably better off forgetting about this crazy beta, simply pre-ordering one of the three (?!?!) full retail versions of this game and marking my calendars. It's just an early build anyway that may/may not hit Marketplace on schedule. It doesn't even have a single-player demo level. It's straight multiplayer, from what I understand.

Sometimes, just being a gamer these days is more trouble than it's worth.... In more way$ than one....

....But that's just me.

See ya next week.

-D.

Entry 40: "Download All About It!"

Yo!

So apparently the internet is causing the death of printed media as we know it. Most of you pretty much saw it coming, right? All the news organizations have converted over to publishing their content online as well as in print (less and less) by now, and the old-fashioned ink-on-paper is paying for its own obsoleteness. It's sort of like when you live in a small neighborhood full of mom-and-pop stores that one day gets its own Wal-Mart Supercenter. ....And Blockbusters. ...And Home Depot. ....And McDonald's. ...Well, those guys are everywhere anyway, but the point here is there's just no way that the old stuff and the "new hotness" can coexist. It's just never worked out that way.

Part of the blame can go to the print companies selling out on their established media outlet(s) in favor of the 21st Century e-publishing method for the sake of keeping up with the changing times, but most of it arguably does rest on our culture; as American consumers, we're always looking for the better, bigger, faster, cheaper way from A to B. But the simple fact is, even though we're almost 3/4 of the way through the first decade of the 2000's, there are still a lot of people who don't have internet access and can't get to a library for one reason or another. No, I'm not just talking about outside America.

According to 2003 U.S. Census data obtained by MaisonBisson.com, Sixty-two million people (55% of American households) had internet access then. It's probably closer to seventy or seventy-five percent now, but of those web-ready people today, ConsumerAffairs.com said in September that more people who have access don't have broadband cable or DSL, but rather "narrowband" dial-up. By excluding all the people who use dial-up because it takes them too long to access the page, and the twenty-five percent or more American households who don't have access at all, you're dealing with a pretty big group of newspaper/magazine readers getting intentionally left out of the loop.

I'll give you an example: the US Official PlayStation Magazine, a publication known for its monthly playable PlayStation 2 demo discs, was canned by publisher Ziff Davis Media because of reason one, the fact that PlayStation 3 is able to get the demos online through their PlayStation Store and download them through the system itself without touching a PC, making the disc distribution method... What's the word, kids? OBSOLETE. Reason two was, of course, because gamers get most of their news online anyway, and since OPM having to use the discs as a crutch to keep them going and in business wasn't necessary anymore, they got the axe. That's not the end of Ziff Davis' major business matters either, because as QuickJump reports, there's a big sale going down any day now that puts the fates of flagship gaming website 1up.com, and sister magazine Electronic Gaming Monthly in jeopardy. And not the kind Ken Jennings makes three million dollars knowing a lot about. Furthermore, I'm sure some of you have heard about certain major newspaper companies considering discontinuing the paper process entirely and using some new flexible plastic screen you can download news to and read just like a newspaper, except you'll presumably be able to see more than text, visually, sort of like every newspaper in every Harry Potter movie, I guess.

Bottom Line.... As Bob Dylan once sang, the times, they are a-changin'.... but in a world where corporations quick to jump onto the next big thing at any cost quicker than the very people they make their money from are ready to do it so quietly, the websites they're trying to steal traffic from are the only ones expressing concerns.... It just kinda seems like the wrong kind of change.

.....But that's just me.

Now, if you'll excuse me, I've gotta check tonight's TVGuide.com listings.

-D.

Entry 39: "24 Hour Pernicious People"

Yo!

Finally, the series that Kiefer Sutherland built is back in action this week, bringing us 24 fans another thrillingly bad day in the life of Jack Bauer. Season Six started last night, and part two of the premiere is airing literally right now (East Coast time) on whatever your Fox affiliate is, but even having seen only the first two hours of this latest day, I've noticed a couple things I feel I must talk about this week.

Obviously, this series is best known for its political undertones and topical references to then-front-page current events in world affairs, starting with season two's nuclear bomb. Three was the bioterrorism season, four was the holy-crap-what's-gonna-get-blown-up-next by Imhotep from The Mummy season, and five was the "Who really killed the President?"/"How do we stop the Russians?" season. This year is all about a bunch-- a BIG bunch-- of Arab-led terrorist attacks, and the return of a shaky, tense, and almost unexplainably physically battered Bauer. See, at the end of last season, Bauer was abducted by some Chinese agents working for their government, out for revenge after Bauer led an attack on... I think it was their Embassy back in season four. In fact, the last scene of the season was Bauer getting tortured on this big boat en route to parts unknown and--- oh, HOLY CRAP!!! The local Fox station's audio cut out again!!! For the second time tonight!!!!!!! For some reason, this never happens during the significantly less popular shows on this channel (cough, Trading Spouses).... Hope those Peer-to-Peer users get this episode up soon... Before iTunes tempts me with $1.99/episode. Anyway, also this year, the dead President Palmer's brother is now the President, and you can count the number of returning regular cast members on one hand, give or take a finger or two, since almost all of them died or were written out last year.

...But getting to the two things worth mentioning... Thing one, as I said, this season is VERY Arab-heavy. In fact, one of the subplots this year involves this Arab teenager freaking out after his dad's arrested by the FBI for reasons unknown, and getting roughed up by a paranoid neighbor when the teen's actually one of the terrorists, and he winds up taking over his best friend's family's household because they know too much about his first murder, the paranoid neighbor, and the still as-yet undiscovered big plan. Putting aside the fact that this family's being held hostage by Taj from National Lampoon's Van Wilder, this year's actually shaping up to be pretty good. The problem I see lies with the way that the aforementioned side story was executed. It makes sense from a realistic standpoint, in that if this were to happen, this is how it would probably go down, but this can't be taken too well by the Arab community who were up in arms during season four's airing over the fact that all Arabs on the show happen to be terrorists. The writers tried to mix it up this year by making one of them good, but only after introducing the character as a terrorist. And frankly, as a regular fan, I'm not sure about this guy's good-guy status, and if you saw the way he out-interrogated Bauer last night (Well, it's okay. I'm sure the guy wasn't using that kneecap much anyway), you might understand why I'm a bit concerned about what this guy will bring to the story long-term. I mean, this is 24 we're talking about. This could be another Nina Myers we're dealing with here. Guess old habits die hard, huh, writers?

Thing number two, Bauer's really beaten down now, after everything that's happened over the last five days/seasons, plus the twenty months of Chinese torture, and now I just saw a promo that actually has the guy saying he can't do this anymore..... and the promo ended with an announcement of a supposedly super-SUPER shocking ending to the premiere tonight. Well, that narrows things down nicely for us. Yeah, if we can figure out for ourselves that the main character is literally hours away from being written out somehow, and you practically tell us upfront with that kind of promo ad who just might be the first main character to go this year.... it's just not that shocking, Fox. Sorry, it's just not.

Wrapping up with the Bottom Line, I must say this Arab-heavy storyline is an extremely risky path for the writers to take, especially about two weeks or so after Saddam Hussein's execution and the sudden over-focus from other bloggers, the liberal media, and most of the general public on going after Osama bin Laden now that the Bush administration's prize distraction is history-- FINALLY! Fox just got the audio back on 24!!!!!! Okay, I gotta go now and brace for this ultimate cliffhanger at 9:55. Um..... quickly ending, I apologize for that brief snippet of politics I had to include, but that was hard to avoid completely with this topic. My regular readers know I deliberately try to avoid politics here normally, but hopefully you get my point here: Unfortunately, this season of 24 can only go down from here.

.....But that's just me.

Comments are always welcome..... Let's get some discussion going......

-D.

Entry 38: "360 Degrees of $eparation"

Yo!

Readers, I'm pleased to announce I have joined the next-gen gaming community, by picking up an Xbox 360. So far, Gears of War is the only game I have right now, but I'm working on grabbing a couple more by the end of Spring, depending on if I can budget them in by then. Lately, though, I'm hearing a lot of controversy surrounding the emergence of what are now known as "microtransactions;" extra content purchaseable from Microsoft's Xbox Marketplace used to add content to your games, like weapons, characters, stages, maps, etc. for what amounts to a cell phone game's cost on average, but paid for in a new currency called Microsoft Points.

Most of the time, the catalog of content, item-by-item is only worth anywhere from about a buck to almost ten dollars, but considering Microsoft's recently announced plans to put out special cheats and video walkthroughs (the latter is already up and running as I type) for games at a cost, it leads one to believe the future of console gaming is paying for a single game twice over. Between the game itself and the gotta-have maps, characters, system themes, profile icons, cars, teams, and now cheat codes....... and the fact that Nintendo and Sony are doing the same thing with their respective WiiStores and PlayStation Networks...... That's not a very pretty penny you're dealing with there. In fact, that's probably the not-that-unattractive- per-sé-but-just-cute-enough-for-your-wingman-roommate-to-party-with-for-a-
couple-hours-while-you-hook-up-with-the-hotter-and-younger-sister penny. Thank goodness those downloads aren't required as part of these already expensive games. ..........Yet.

In fact, the Points themselves are also quite controversial, since people are now realizing Microsoft only put them out like that to disguise the true value of the content in real money. To use my good buddy Mr. Wikipedia's example, a song on Microsoft's Zune Marketplace costs 79 Points. Realistically, that 79 Points in fact does equal iTunes' per-song charge of 99 cents anyway. I guess MS made those points hoping people wouldn't catch on to that scheme to trick people out of more money by putting a deceptive price tag on it, instead of simply charging the real money to a real credit card just like everyone else. At least until public knowledge of the logic behind the scheme begins to get known on the web a little more thanks to, say, some teenager's weekly blog of some kind. Whoops.

The Bottom Line... Oh, God, I hope they don't implement the pay-per-cheat system on Xbox 360. I know Microsoft's kinda trying to make up for the original Xbox's lackluster lifetime sales and expensive (for them) recent, free repairs of the year-one 360s that were always malfunctioning last year. But at least I know I can restrain myself from ponying up for that and turn the game off. Sorry, Microsoft.....

.....But that's just me.

See ya next week.

-D.

Entry 37: "Auld Lame Syne"

Yo!

Helloooooooooooooooooo, and welcome to 2007! Before I begin, I just want to say welcome back to the Blog; It's been about five weeks since the last post on the old website, but now I'm back and ready to get things going again, with this new setup! In case you're new, I had to move this blog from my MySpace page, and then the Yahoo 360 page, because the entry writing system's kinda lame and glitchy, and there's no way for you, the reader, to give talkbacks and counter-opinions without being a MySpace member and going through all that registering inconvenience, so I made ABSOLUTELY sure this site could let anyone read AND post replies on all entries posted here on out. Yahoo or MySpace membership not required. Hopefully THIS should prove a lot more of an easier Blogging-ground than The-Site-That-Tom-What's-His-Name-Built, or Y360, so.... here's to the future (*hypothetical cheers and consuming of non-alcoholic beverages)!

So, my first topic of the new year is, (*imitating Jerry Seinfeld) what's the deal with new year's resolutions, anyway? We all try to better ourselves a little every day anyway, but for some reason, around new year's time the drive for personal betterment seems much more universally.... well... done, I guess. Sorry, I don't have my thesaurus in front of me right now. Anyway, so after Christmas every year, we start planning out the new year to come. Whether it includes big trips, new jobs, new opportunities, a lifestyle change, what have you. But even though that stuff happens anyway as part of everyday life, you still have to overcome the problems and try to come out better than when you went in. Whether you purposely plan a way through beforehand under the title of "resolution" is, to me, irrelevant because it's just a changing of the calendar. If it was June 1st, and you were coming up with mid-year resolutions, it'd still be the same thing. Everybody knows the trials and tribulations that occur through life don't have a concept of timing, so "they" don't care if you're trying to quit smoking, or lose weight, or get around to fixing that infernal dripping in the bathroom sink. Okay, cheezy example/metaphoric personification of life problems, but you get my point.

That's why I never make resolutions. Because if for some reason I don't meet my goals for the year, and December 31 comes around, it just doesn't feel really like the year was used to its full potential. Sure, you go in with a positive attitude at the start, thinking to yourself, "It only gets better from here!," but-- and this is something I talk about with people often-- one person's optimistic attitude DOES NOT... DOES NOT affect the world around them and make things any better. It doesn't. Say you start on a new job, and you go in happy, ready to tackle any task, but the boss is a total butt-head (gotta keep this blog G-rated), and no matter what you do to make things go smoothly, sometimes that happy attitude just doesn't rub off. There could be personal drama happening in that boss's life to cause him/her being so butt-head-y, or maybe they're just the Kevin Federline of the workplace; no matter how hard they may try, they can't stop putting out bad stuff. ......I think that joke works. Same holds true in other people you may encounter. Sometimes they're just off, and the only way they cope with the suckiness of their situation is by spreading misery and sucking the happy out of the room. There's one in every office. But I digress. Make no mistake, I'm not saying resolutions are a bad idea, and I'm not trying to be pessimistic, I'm just saying keep a cool head, try to look on the reasonably neutral side, if no bright side is really there, depending on the situation, and do what you can without limiting-- yes, limiting yourself to accomplishing x-y-z in twelve months' time. At least, I wouldn't.

...........But that's just me.

Thanks for visiting, and feel free to post your opinions on this or any of my blog entries and-- Oh, one more thing: A running thing on the old blog was my hinting occasionally at a big media project that's gonna revolutionize a lotta stuff.... I still can't say much right now, but..... well, stay tuned 'cause the best is still to come............... So happy 2007, and good luck in the new (*resolution-free) year!

See ya next week.

-D.

ADDENDUM TO BLOG (1/5/07): I've moved over all 36 blog entries (plus a retitled #33) from the original MySpace blog page too, all searchable, bookmarkable, emailable and commentable. Geez, the last part of that sentence is a SpellCheck program's nightmare right there. Anyway, enjoy the new site, and I hope to see you here again Monday!