Somewhat Manly Nerd

…but procrastination blows.

For the most part you can get away with it, and it’s awesome. You write 5-page papers the night before they’re due. You cram for a final for a whole day and night and manage to pull out a decent grade, never having to admit to yourself you would have done better if you studied more over the course of the semester. You scoff at people who make plans and schedules and keep tabs on deadlines and announcements. It doesn’t come back to bite you in the ass until you have to register for classes – especially when you attend a big state college that has thousands of Asians who are eagerly awaiting the second they are able to sign up for 20 credits of classes.

By the time I realized what was up, I ended up having 8:00 AM classes from Monday to Thursday. Fucking shit. It looks like I’m going to have to learn to love coffee.

The only choice left:

   

Courtesy of Firstshowing.net.

On July 4th, John McClane is back – but this time his head is shaven and he has the “I’m a Mac” guy as a sidekick. What the hell? I still eagerly await this movie, but those two circumstances alone put a damper on the whole thing. And then I saw that ridiculous spinning CG car that crashes right above McClane and Mac guy. It looks like something straight out of the Transporter 2. This is what happens when you have a Die Hard movie directed by the guy behind Underworld.

If you want to shoot back and say that there’s been equally ridiculous stuff in the first three Die Hard movies, maybe you have a point, but just the way that segment was shot screams “generic CGI action scene” I will admit that McClane driving a car into a freaking helicopter is pretty badass, though.

Die Hard With A Vengeance really set up the way this movie seems to be going. The first Die Hard was praised for its portrayal of a mortal hero and for its authenticity compared to the over-the-top movies of the 80s like Commando and Rambo. The second one is arguably even more realistic than the first, except for this scene:

But then Die Hard 3 came out and it was much more ludicrous than the first two. What saved it was Samuel L. Jackson as the sidekick, a pretty awesome script, and John McTiernan (the director of the original) back behind the camera. Granted, I can’t judge whether this fourth installment will deliver in the story and dialogue category, but the fact that it appears to be “John McClane saves the World” is another strike against it, in addition to the stuff already mentioned.

Here’s to hoping I’m wrong. I’m still going to be there opening weekend. Screw Transformers.

This is a pretty cool website that has cryptic representations of movie scenes with regular office supplies. You have to the guess the movies, though. Really fun, if a bit hard at times.

http://www.stationerymovies.com/

Scroll down for the answers:

Ok

I

can’t

get

this

website

to

let

me

just

make

a

long

space…

Alien, Bridget Jones’s Diary, Edward Scissorhands, ET, Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom, Jaws, The Wizard of Oz, Piranha, Reservoir Dogs, Saturday Night Fever, The Birds, The Hunt for Red October, The Shining, The Terminator, The Usual Suspects, Spinal Tap, Titanic, American Beauty, Moonraker, Star Wars,

According to Gamespot:

The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess (Wii) = 8.8

The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess (GC) = 8.9

Yet, in the new GC review Jeff Gerstmann states:

“If you’ve played the Wii version, that’ll trip you up a bit, but considering that the most likely candidate for the GameCube version of the game is someone that didn’t get a Wii, this isn’t a problem in any way. You can’t go wrong with either version of the game, but if you’re still trying to decide, the Wii version is just a bit better.”

What a cop-out.

Castlevania: Portrait of Ruin (DS)

This game rocks pretty hard, even though I am getting a bit sick of the yearly Metroidvania releases. It’s turning into Maddenvania. I’ve only gotten up to the obligatory crappy ending, and it didn’t take long at all to get to – only a bit over 3 hours. From what I hear, there is MUCH more to the game, including a ridiculously brutal final boss fight. So far, the game has been the standard GBA/DS Castlevania fare, with one standout level with a strong emphasis on platforming.

The game’s main setting is Dracula’s castle, as usual, but much like Super Mario 64, there are paintings that have levels inside them. These range from a mediocre desert-themed level to the aforementioned awesome level called “Nation of Fools” that was obviously inspired by someone’s imaginative dreams, and there’s more that I haven’t gotten up to yet.

The game’s new mechanic for this game is a dual-character system that adds some cool possible techniques and strategies to the game. At some times, it sort of breaks the game in making fights extremely easy, but this game on the whole seems harder than the previous GBA/DS iterations, so it evens out.

Like I said before, it’s still pretty much standard fare – if you enjoyed the last few, you’ll enjoy this one – but the formula is wearing a bit thin.

Tetris DS (DS)

That screenshot above is from the game’s new mode – push mode. I frankly barely play it, but it’s a fairly cool mode. Both players build up on the same blocks, just from opposite directions, in an attempt to push the other player into the fiery pits on each end. The other ways to play include touch mode, which is just a terrible attempt to utilize the DS’s stylus and touch screen, puzzle mode, which I’m pretty sure most puzzler vets know of, and mission mode, which is…ah screw this. All I play is good old Tetris online. That’s all you need. The utilization of the Nintendo WiFi Connection for this game makes it impossible to put down. I end up playing it for at least an hour if I pick it up before I go to bed. For the most part I play 2-player, because it takes longer for a 4-player game to get setup, but 4-player is probably even more fun and frantic, as it includes the use of items like shells, mushrooms and stars (yea, they have cool applications in this game). So while 2-player is ideal to show off true Tetris skill, 4-player is just crazy fun.

Ninja Gaiden Black

It’s one of the best games on the Xbox, but I haven’t been able to bring myself to finish it. Maybe because I’ve played through 1/3 and 2/3 of it on previous run-throughs and it’s getting a bit old by now, but it almost feels like a chore to finish. Or maybe it’s the fact that my friend’s Xbox only reads the NGB disc 10% on the time. Argh. I really just need to beat it so I can give him back his Xbox and get it out of my room, as it takes up so much damn room.

By comparison, I ripped through God of War in a few days, and even though its fighting system isn’t as deep and its graphics are technically not as good, I enjoyed that game more than NGB, and just about as much as any game I’ve played this gen. It was the definiton of short and sweet. I have yet to play the DMC series, but I just picked up the 5th Anniversary Collection, so I shall see if it lives up to the hype.

The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess (GC)

Just picked up this version of the game for $38. Sure beats paying $300 bucks for a Wii and the waggle-infested version of Zelda. My Gamecube deserves to have this game spin inside it. It’s only been waiting over two years for it. That’s all I have to say on that matter at this time.

Scott Boras really fucks everything up. In this case though, I’ll allow it, as it might result in the Red Sox getting dicked over. There’s still a few days left until Boston collectively flips a shit, but right now all reports are saying that negotiations between Matsuzaka and the Sawx are not too peachy. The Red Sox are trying to low-ball the Japanese pitcher even after they bid $50 million just to get the rights to potentially sign him. I figure they don’t want to get into a bidding war with themselves like the Giants did with Bonds, but Matsuzaka can go to Japan and come back later and take that $50 million for himself. It all rides on his willingness to disappoint his entire nation like that.

The Red Sox are sitting at around $8 million a year at last I heard, while Boras was asking for double that at around $15 million. I wish I could say I disagree with Boras, but Gil Meche just got 5 years, $55 million from the Royals. If they can cough up that amount of cash, surely the Red Sox can go up a bit more for Matsuzaka. Not to mention some of the other ridiculous signings the Red Sox have already accomplished this offseason. I mean, J.D. Drew is worth $14 million a year? That’ll probably add up to $500,000 a game. Boras could also pull some other sneaky stuff if this deal falls through.

Nevertheless, even with all these factors, I see a deal being made by Thursday – just like everyone else is saying. The Red Sox need this deal. Matsuzaka needs this deal. It’ll get done, unfortunately.

Personally, I could not care less about this announcement by SquareEnix because I’m not a RPG fan, much less a Dragon Quest fan. Hell, I still remember playing the first Dragon Warrior on NES as a kid and hating it with a passion. I thought it was the worst game ever. Nevertheless, this shocking decision may have a ripple effect across publishers in Japan. The DS is an absolute phenomenon in Japan on a scale never seen before. It seems that the Japanese just love handhelds; they’re not into massive HDTVs and Xbox 360s and PS3s.

Nintendo is king again in Japan.

But with the DS getting a high-profile game such as DQIX, does that mean a move of the main Final Fantasy games to DS is not far behind? I doubt it, but it might mean more Japanese developers will try to take advantage of the DS’s massive userbase. Consoles might play second fiddle to the monster that is the DS. And the PSP? Yea, it’s dead.
Damn, I still don’t know what to make of this news. Except….

This book by Brian Greene about string theory is one of the most interesting books I’ve ever read. If you haven’t heard about it already, string theory is a relatively new area of physics and mathematics which is working hard to integrate general relatively and quantum mechanics. In case I’ve already lost you, general relatively is that thing Einstein thought back almost 100 years ago to explain gravity across the massive cosmos. He conceptualized gravity as the curvature of space. Quantum mechanics is the seemingly random science that describes the workings of the microscopic universe. These are two theories are mutually exclusive, but most scientists just ignore the inherent contradictions due to them usually just working with one theory of the other.

String theory attempts to bring these two theories together into a “theory of everything.” It proposes a 11-dimensional universe made of infathomably tiny one-dimensional strings that vibrate at different frequencies to create all matter. Sure, it’s pretty far out there – but Greene explains it well enough that almost anyone can understand it (somewhat). He builds up from Einstein’s theories, all the way through the future – which in some cases, is now the present – of string theory. (For example, the Large Hadron Collider he refers to is almost ready for use.) Through the use of diagrams and charts, along with imaginative analogies, Greene is able to conceptualize in everyday terms and experiences a theory that only a few hundred people in the world truly understand.

After reading this book, you can’t help but be amazed by such a ludricious theory that has proven invaluable to physicists across the world. The math just works out, and it does seem a bit elegant, as the book title states. Experiments that will soon take place at the LHC at CERN in Switzerland might possibly offer strong evidence for the legitmacy of string theory. It might also deal it a weakening blow. In short, string theory requires the existance of supersymmetric partners of the particles we know exist. We have never seen any of these supersymmetric partner particles. LHC just might accelerate particles with large enough energy to create them.

You should read the book so you understand what I was just talking about. Maybe then you’ll be excited like I am. I’ll even give you a link to Amazon right now. Buy It.

There’s also a 7-hour show made by NOVA based on the book and I hear it’s pretty good too.

Sony has had the trait for years – the invaluable ability to hype products so well that people are clawing at each other to buy their stuff. Frankly, I think the PS3 has lived off the Playstation name so far, but they might have contributed a bit with that Killzone trailer from a year and a half ago and the always impressive MGS4 footage. People have loved the Playstation brand from about 1997, and Sony has always been able to take advantage of it with ridiculously good advertising. They’ve pushed their product into the collective mind of the world youth and made sure it was synonymous with gaming, displayed by the ability of the PS2 to kill the Sega Dreamcast before it was even released.

Sony is still attempting to hype up their new machine, led by the insane statements of Ken Kutaragi, the chairman and mind behind the Playstation brand. A few choice statements from Kutaragi include:

“The PS3 will instill discipline in our children and adults alike. Everyone will know discipline.”

“If processors of high performance and wide bandwidth like the Cell were linked together without sufficient security, a worldwide system crash could occur with one attack.”

and possibly the best:

Bernie Stolar, a former Sony executive, remembers Kutaragi, CEO of SCEJ, asking him as early as 1994 where he thought the nascent PlayStation console’s main competition would come from. Nintendo, Stolar guessed. Maybe Intel. Kutaragi looked him squarely in the eyes. “No, Bernie, you are wrong,” he said. “It is Microsoft. And I will kill them.”

But this is not about Sony, it’s about Bungie. They’ve probably been helped and prodded by Microsoft to start the hype train so early, as with the PS3 out this holiday season, Microsoft wants people to hold off potential PS3 buyers by making sure they know of Halo 3 on the horizon. The commercial during Monday Night Football was seen by college kids and young adults across America. For months, you have not been able to walk into a Gamestop or Electronics Boutique without seeing at least 5 flyers telling you to pre-order Halo 3. The game is a year away. Is it really going to be that tough to find the game? Or maybe people just want the LEGENDARY EDITION that comes with a mini helmet for $99.99. I think this motivational poster sums up that situation pretty well:

It’s true and you know it. Even though Halo 2 was a pretty big disappointment to the people that bought into the hype, you know in your heart that Halo 3 will not do the same. Right? But remember that mindblowing city level shown in that first Halo 2 demo? It was nowhere to be found in the final, seemingly unfinished game. And Halo fans know this. I really don’t need to say this. I just don’t want people to buy into the hype again. I’ll admit that the commercial shown a handful of days ago during MNF was pretty damn awesome, but at least Bungie has made it known that it was CG. (Not like Sony and their bullshit of a Killzone trailer.)

I think Halo 3 has real potential with the shield grenades, the energy walls I’ve heard about, and just the massive power of the Xbox 360. The A.I. will hopefully blow away even the first two games. The environments will be more expansive and the vehicle physics more realistic. The game still has a year of tweaking and upgrading in front of it and I hope it is everything gamers across the world (except Japan) want it to be. I just have to keep telling myself not to get excited whenever I watch that amazing commercial. You should too.

P.S. I have one request to Bungie for Halo 3 online. If you want to keep the matchmaking service, fine – BUT I WANT A CHOICE FOR ALL ROCKETS. There’s snipers, SWAT, but no rockets. Maybe there was a choice during the months when I never played Halo 2 online (I don’t have an Xbox myself, just my friend does – it just so happens that at the present time it resides in my house), but why would it be taken off? Surely everyone across the world loves rockets. There’s not much in gaming that is more frantic than 16-player rockets in Prisoner in the original Halo. So awesome. You hear me Bungie? TEAM ROCKETS. ROCKET FREE FOR ALL. I want them. I really just want more choice, period. Ranked games you can keep the matchmaking system, but there should be much more freedom when it comes to non-ranked games.

Here’s a gif of that Halo 3 commercial to get you hyped again. I’m sorry.

Courtesy of Tieno over at NeoGAF.

Apparently, during the week of December 17 – 24, Toys R’ Us will be giving out free $100 Gift Cards with the purchase of an Xbox 360. Basically an early price drop for the holidays. Although, Microsoft will be putting new, less failure-prone chipsets into 360s sometime next year. Still a ridiculous deal.

Those stores are going to be complete madhouses.