I’m back.
I was going to explain where I
was all this time, but it’d involve me explaining the practicalities
of the legal system and frankly, no one gives a shit. Instead let’s
go with “sorry, I was at a Gamespot protest and lost my plane
ticket home.” By the way, Manhunt 2 rocks!
Here’s a look at some recent
gaming news.
Pre-ordering my pre-order
Earlier this week, Amazon offered
pre-orders for Gears of War 2. Here’s the catch, Gears of War 2 hasn’t
been officially announced yet, let alone given a release date. Unfortunately,
soon after Amazon started taking pre-orders they had to stop
due to the volume. How did people find out about this in the first place?
Did they just check the site everyday?
Imagine the routine of these people:
Well, still no Gears of War available.
Now, the rest of my checklist:
Knife – check
Duct tape – check
Puppy – check
Shovel – check
Gas for the ice cream truck –
check
Mapquest directions to RFK Elementary
– check
Off to work!
Excuse my remote boner
A few months ago, I dreamed that,
eventually, the Remote Play features for the PS3 and PSP would allow
me to remotely power-on my PS3. Weeks ago, that dream came true. Now
with the new PS3 and PSP firmware updates, PSOne games will now be operational
via remote play.
While I love being married (it’s
not rape if you’re married), there are some drawbacks, like sharing
space. Our house, unfortunately, is not big enough for my 8 or 9 consoles,
so the PSOne currently resides at my parents. My games, however, were
gathering dust in a spare bedroom, until now.
Being able to play Chrono Trigger
or still refusing to play Final Fantasy VIII on my lunch break is an
absolute godsend. Thank you, Sony!
I like my Gaming Conferences
like my Country Clubs, restricted.1
E3 announced that the once “best
target to eliminate every Gamestop employee in the greater 48” convention
is returning to its former home, the LA Convention Center. But before
you get your hopes up, it’ll still be invite only.
From what people have told me about
last year’s show, while getting around town was donkey penis, the
scaled down nature of the event alleviated many past complaints.
And if you’re still depressed
about missing out on all the action, G4 will have wall to wall coverage,
featuring the best in American Idol rejects.
EMI 360
A recent PC World article reported
that the IT staff at Morrisville State College (resisting the Ann Arbor
snobbery compelling me to make a joke) discovered that radio signals from
the Xbox 360 (specifically the signals connecting the controller to
the console) caused interference with LAN devices, including some Bluetooth
devices.
The article continues, reporting that when
the staff synced a Bluetooth headset to the 360 waves, they
could hear the word “murder” being repeated over and over.
I might be kidding, but there is
no way I’m letting my 360 anywhere near my Green Goblin tractor-trailer
anytime soon.
In case you were wondering where
Jack Thompson would be this Holiday Season
There are two things that can cause
twenty emails to immediately pop-up in my inbox, the release of a hot
video game (especially around the holidays) or a news story about video
game violence.
While I’m glad to respond to
the former, I can’t stand dealing with the latter. If you haven’t
heard, two teens have been charged with killing the 7-year-old sister
of one of them, by beating her with imitations of moves from Mortal Kombat.
The two Colorado teens (oh, Colorado
teens, fan-fucking-tastic) tried reviving the girl by putting her under
running water and attempting CPR before they called her mother and 911.
The girl died at a hospital.
And wouldn’t you know, my email
exploded with “did you heard about this?????” subject lines.
The news of the year in video games
should be about the artistic strides made in games like Bioshock and
Portal, but instead, the Discovery Channel documentary series has to
spend an entire episode, described as "games move into
three dimensions," covering violence in video games. Now I get to
spend the next two weeks of having in-laws (and direct family) question
whether my video game playing is "healthy."
I know I bitch, but let’s not be blind. Video games,
movies, comics, hell, even the Shakespeare can be someone’s violent inspiration.
But that doesn’t mean that they are the problem. The guy who
shoots up a school has some sort of problem our society hasn’t figured
out yet. The video game that he re-enacted is merely a tool, like the
gun or the car he used to get there.
And that’s the problem with how we, as a society, react. If we take
the guns away, these people would use knives. Take the knives away,
they’d use a board with a nail sticking out. We’re not curing the
TB, we’re just muffling the cough.
By the way are we sure Linden Ashby
isn’t somehow involved? I’m just saying, we’re still not
sure who was handling the props on the Crow that night.
On the bright side, at least they
didn’t try to pull out a sea-slug.
That’s all for now.
1. I don’t care if I’ve used
that joke before, I love it.