(while holding my watch to figure out how much time I have to print my paper and shower)
"Hm, it's 8:45." (turns watch over) "No, wait, it's 3:15." (turns watch back over) "No, 8:45." (repeat)
p.s. WHAT!!!!!!!!!
In a recent interview, Metal Gear Solid director Hideo Kojima talks about how the series has developed, drops some tantalizing hints about Metal Gear Solid 4, and presents his opinion on the next wave of consoles with this crazy analogy:
If you allow me to express the three hardware platforms in a funny example, PS3 would be like a dinner that you only have once a year or twice a year on your anniversary etc. Xbox 360 will still be a special dinner so you might go there two or three times a month on the weekend or something. Revolution is the kind of great dinner that you have everyday at your home. What I want to emphasize is that all three are dinners meaning that they have a salad, they have a soup and maybe have a dessert but they are a little differently, maybe other dinners have two salads or two appetizers or maybe extra coffee on top of that.
That goes on for another entire paragraph, ending with him wondering whether he'll have to take a cab or a train. WHAT.
I can't wait for MGS4.
(Possible spoilers.)
The harder I try to come up with an opinion on Revenge of the Sith, the more I wonder if I really only went to see it for the same reason I saw The Matrix Revolutions—for completion's sake. I blame the incredible badditude of Episodes I & II for destroying any idea I had of what quality I can expect from a Star Wars film.
On one hand, I'm leaning towards saying Episode III was good, since I found myself actually invested in the characters, hoping that maybe Anakin could stop himself from turning completely to the dark side, or that maybe Mace Windu or Yoda would finish off the Emperor right then and there, even though I knew none of that would be happening. The whole Jedi betrayal montage was also quite powerful. On the action-y side of things, the lightsaber duels did not disappoint, although Phantom Menace's final battle remains my favorite of the films.
Still, I think back to the original trilogy and remember when characters delivered amusing, natural dialogue, and wonder what happened. Almost every scene between Anakin and Padmé was embarrassing to watch. Even Obi-Wan's final lines to Anakin, while truly emotional, sounded like Lucas was just sticking in trite quotes to make the scene extra-tragic. And is it just my mind going, or did Yoda at least have some lines in the original trilogy that didn't use his goofy syntax?
For now, I'll give it a B, with the points lost for dialogue and clunky editing redeemed by all the scenes of Obi-Wan Kenobi lightsabering things up.
(Post-script: Speaking of Obi-Wan and said lightsabering, what was the deal with General Grievous? According to Lucas, he was supposed to be this terrifying überdroid (sorry) of doom, and instead he comes off as a hobbling, wheezing robohorse. When he pulled out the four lightsabers I was like, oh man, Obi-Wan has no chance. Then, a few moments later, two of Grievous's hands are on the floor. What?)
Possibly sort-of not-really half-spoiler may follow.
(from a comment on this post) Best explanation of how Obi-wan Kenobi is still able to completely trash Anakin Skywalker, despite Anakin's new dark side powers:
Maybe it's like starting over though, [Anakin's] main job is now with the dark side so after killing the separatists he gained like Level 2 in the dark side and Obi-wan is like at Level 55 in the good side.
WHOA!! Here's a less-trumpted snippet from Nintendo's Revolution press release (via Boing Boing):
Freedom of design: A dynamic development architecture equally accommodates both big-budget, high-profile game "masterpieces" as well as indie games conceived by individual developers equipped with only a big idea.
WHOA!!!!!!!!
Also, I would like to submit this brief food review: Chocolate Calorie Mate: good! Fruit Calorie Mate: horrible. (BUT I ATE IT ANYWAY)
OK, time to head out.
I'm skipping out of town to catch the last couple days of the EEE, so I'll be out of touch until Friday evening. Actually, make that Saturday morning, since I have tickets to see that new Star Wars movie Friday night. I'd offer to take all my fan calls at the convention, but when I was there a couple years ago I tried taking a few calls and they all went something like this:
<me> Hello?
<probably Noah> Sup.
<phone> GGMHHZMMXXXHHGHGHLGLLRHRRKRKKXHHXGGGHH
<me> Hey look, Gradius V.
I swear this year I'll actually post my photos.
So apparently last night some Sony fanboy broke into my house and started typing on muh Weblug. He made some interesting points, but I'm going to wait until we can at least get a little more gameplay shots out of the PS3... Wait, did you SEE the Killzone demo?? Sign me up!
Anyway, today at E3 Nintendo finally revealed its very mysterious Revolution console. Ever since Nintendo started promising that this would revolutionize videogames, the rumors have been flying: gyroscopic controllers, 3D projection, touch screens, Wi-Fi connectivity, take your pick. I was half-expecting the thing to have little moons orbiting it. I have a feeling that Nintendo is keeping the console's most radical features under wraps for later, but the stuff they've talked about so far is extremely promising. Sure, there was some mention of an Xbox Live-type online service, including a Smash Bros. sequel, which sounds great. (With all the characters and weapons flying around on the screen during a typical match, you probably won't even notice any lag-induced frameskipping.)
The most shocking thing about the system's online capabilities, though, was the announcement that Nintendo's entire past library of games, all the way back to the NES, would be made available for download. Just imagine: No more having to blow the dust out of your ancient cartridges or scouring eBay for that last existing copy. Just download the thing from an iTunes-ian online store. (That's just speculation, of; they've mentioned nothing about pricing or how the download service will actually work.) Nintendo knows decades of classic characters and games is its greatest asset, and something Sony and Microsoft will never have. Even if the prospect of having hundreds of old titles available for download turns out to be little more than a novelty feature, it is indeed a revolution in game delivery and the medium itself.
As if that's not enough, Nintendo has effortlessly beat out both Sony and Microsoft in the form-factor war. Look at that thing. Who wouldn't want a shiny, black monolith next to their TV? You can't go wrong with blue and glowy, either.
On a more peripheral note, there's yet another Gameboy: the Gameboy Micro. I was mistakenly calling it the Gameboy Mini for a while, but Micro really is appropriate: It is tiny. Maybe too tiny, in fact. I was actually really excited to read that it would have an actual backlit screen, since, after trying a few GBA games on the DS's backlit screen, it is a difficult and truly saddening ordeal to go back to my beloved, frontlit GBA SP. Bring on the tiny backlight, I thought, even knowing that it would be just another attempt at making the SP obsolete. However, take a look at the dimensions: 4" by 2" by .7"? The thing is SMALL. You can sort of get an idea of the scale if you take a look at the Micro blingin' it with the' California quarter above. (It's actually just a tiny bit smaller than life-size on my monitor.) The screen is maybe 1/2-2/3 the size of a regular GBA screen. If the PSP has taught us one thing, isn't it that big screens are not only possible on a handheld, but also very, very desirable?
Of course, it would be quite a coup if they could pull this off at $50 or less. Come on, Nintendo, I dare you.
So the E3 conferences began today, and what a start. It's hard for me to gauge what the general reaction to last week's Xbox 360 unveiling is like since I don't live in a frat house, but I was rather unimpressed. (Although, yes, you can turn the thing both on and off with the wireless controller. Amazing!) I don't know if it's because of the lackluster Xbox unveiling, but Sony's atom bomb of a PlayStation 3 unveiling completely floored me. Where to begin?
I guess the unit itself is a logical starting point. The console looks slick... slick!! You can't go wrong with shiny silver, and even then, there are black and white alternative models. It's not quite as dramatic of an evolution as the PS2, but five years ago we were all expecting to just toss the next PlayStation onto the shelf with all the other consoles. Console design never really was that big of a big deal until PS2. Granted, the PS3 has a weird convexity thing going on, and, come on, it's slot loading now? Oh well. Maybe that means and end to my fears of snapping off a disc tray by glancing at it too hard. And speaking of disc trays and design, I hear Microsoft is going to make a limited-edition graphite Xbox 360 faceplate so the front of the system and the tray will finally match. Ooh, haha! Zing! Zingg!!!!
Of course, much of the community is, as expected, bitterly divided on the whole design thing. However, there are two points on which the entire Internet seems to agree:
To which I reply: Yeah, pretty much.
But anyway, forget what the thing looks like. Sony cut right to the chase and tossed out a number of clips of, get this: actual games. And for the most part, they're not just any old games, either. There's Gran Turismo 5. Tekken 6. Metal Gear Solid 4. The demo showcase list is filled with triple-A titles, not random filler like Dead or Alive 4: Now with Depth-of-Field. Unfortunately, gameplay footage was scarce, but just the possibility of what they'll be showing off for the rest of the week makes me giddy.
That's not to say there aren't a few amazing gameplay clips out there, though. The new Killzone demo features unbelievably lifelike characters, effects, and animation. The few minutes of footage hint at an unprecedented level of immersion, as well. And this is just Killzone I'm talking about. Wait till they start showing off a game I actually care about, and we'll see how long I can blather on about it.
The really, really impressive demo, though, was Square Enix's surprise Final Fantasy VII tech demo. While the Squenix was quick to clarify that they have no plans for a PS3 remake, the demo served to show how far things have come. Basically, it was the entire opening movie from Final Fantasy VII, beginning with Aeris walking out of the alley, then the camera pulling out to show that famous shot of Midgar, and then finally zooming back in to catch Cloud jumping off the train. (And this wasn't the old, block-handed Cloud from 1997, either.) I can only assume this was all rendered in realtime, as difficult as that is to take in. I can't wait to see Square's plans for its actual PS3 games.
Lastly, almost as a footnote in their PS3 article, Gamespot mentioned that Sony is planning to have Xbox Live-esque online functionality. Xbox Live is one of the main strengths Xbox currently has against the PS2. If they can finally launch a similar service, they should have the next gaming generation in the bag. They'd have the titles, the hardware, and, finally, the connectivity. And if Bill Gates really insists on doing something really devious, like the Halo 3 counter-launch, or sending J Allard to assassinate Ken Kutaragi with his Billy Corgan impression, they've still got Batman on their side.
I just got back from the first 15 minutes of MTV's world exclusive unveiling of the Xbox 360. I was watching it mostly to humor them, but what I saw just reinforces this idea that Microsoft and the Xbox are moving away from the concept I've always had of the gaming industry and its spectrum of demographics and into some bizarro dimension where people only play Halo, Dead or Alive, and EA games.
As if the fact that they selected MTV as the staging ground wasn't enough indication of their new target audience, the opening minute offered a few more nudges in that direction. I may have been a few moments late tuning in, but the first actual event footage I saw was Frodo Baggins Kevin heralding "the future of gaming!" Then some model walks out carrying a laptop bag, from which she removes the same box that's been on the Internet fot weeks now. She places it on a stand, the camera zooms around it as some green lasers go off, and then they cut to The Killers performing.
At this point I switched back to watching parts of Spartan on one of the cable channels. (You go, Val. You pull that scarecrow switcheroo.) I turned back to MTV in time to see one of the guys from Pimp My Ride airbrushing a skull onto the top of the original Xbox. I turned it off after he instructed his audience to "check out the bling."
It's clear that Microsoft is forging a completely different path for this next console generation than Nintendo's plan to innovate game design. Most of the new features they're touting (HD, Xbox Live... console skins?) are more tweaks to the delivery of the medium and not the games themselves. But that should be fine with their MTV crowd. Bring on Need for Speed: 3 Fast 3 Furious!
Also, maybe they explained this in the latter portion of the program, but what's the significance of the 360 name, anyway? I was half expecting the console to be a sphere.
[Post script: I had this semi-objective observation, but couldn't figure out where to insert it into all the jaded rambling above, so here you go: Gamespot's saying that you can use the wireless controllers to turn the console off. That's actually pretty cool. Bonus points if the controller also turns the thing on.]
So I guess today's big videogame-tunes-hitting-the-online-music-scene news is that a whole load of Final Fantasy soundtracks are now available on the iTunes. Even with the swarm of FF concerts sweeping the nation, it still strikes me as totally-super-mega-crazy-random to see Tidus's grinning mug pop up between, who's on there this week, Dave Matthews Band and, what is this, Gorillaz are still making albums? Maybe this is a step up.
I guess this is nice for all those fans who love the game music and are scared off by the frightening costs of importing discs. There's a pretty good selection, too; they've got every game in the series except Final Fantasy III (don't worry, the Japanese one), plus the two Black Mages albums. (Not sure if that's good or not.) I was hoping that the FF1 & 2 soundtracks might be the retooled versions from Dawn of Souls since they sport the new logos as album art, but it is, quite unfortunately, not so.
That brings up one question: Will people really shell out for MP3s of 8-bit NES music? I mean, currently they have the music from when you sleep at an inn going for the standard 99¢. It's six seconds long! Apparently Apple's solution is to charge a discounted rate ($5.99, even less than the normal full-album cost of $9.99) for each of the NES albums. Interesting. I guess I'll just have to check the Scrobbler in a few weeks to see if the iTunes-ified track names are popping up.
Oh yeah, they changed some of the song titles in re-translation, I guess. It's no big deal since you can change them easily, but it's still sort of funny to see all these new names listed in the store. "Sprouting," for instance, is now "Movement in Green." Whatever!!!!
Also, sup random dude IMing me trying to sell me Uematsu concert tickets. Facebook is such a stalking implement.
The new Newsweek has a pretty good article on the rise of China into a new superpower, with a bunch of interesting looks at different aspects of the culture over there, including a blurb about an efficiency-crazed CEO who sometimes likes to smash flawed refrigerators with a sledgehammer.
Here's an excerpt by a Malaysian writer talking about Bush and Chinese President Hu Jintao's concurrent tours through Asia in 2004:
Bush talked obsessively about terror. He sees all of us through that one prism. Yes, we worry about terror, but frankly that's not the sum of our lives. We have many other problems. We're retooling our economies, we're wondering how to deal with the rise of China, we're trying to address health, social and environmental problems. Hu talked about all of this; he talked about our agenda, not just his agenda.
Kind of inspiring and still so, so depressing.
What's up dude!!!!
Last week was my Japanese art history midterm, then on Monday we had our quarterly character test/midterm in Chinese, which I believe I kicked in the face (imagined reenactment). The rest of the week is all review, and I just got through my drawing midterm critique today, so that means it's time to relax for a while. I'm going to try to prevent that "relax for a while" from turning into "do nothing until week nine," but we'll see how that goes.
About the drawing midterm: I was able to finish up four out of five of my slabs series in time. Reference images for the fifth slab are proving elusive, so that one will either be further delayed or replaced. I'm happy with how the series has turned out so far, though.
I also got a huge box in the mail today, containing loads of COMICS. Yes, Origin Story, the comic Nathan and I started way back over the summer has finally physically manifested itself. I take some comfort in knowing that the last few months of delays were actually not our fault, as comiXpress, our printers, just like to do things very slowly, unless prompted by incendiary Yale-ian emails. Also, I noticed that only two days after said emailing, they put up a notice on their Website telling people to expect delays. Ooh, you can almost feel the heat!
So yeah, I have tons of these comics just sitting around, so stop by and I can hook you up. I'm actually going to be back in das Bay Area for like ten seconds this weekend to check out the Morgan's new place, so I could possibly cart some along. Otherwise, I hope to have ordering information here soon. Or, you could visit the official Origin Story Website, although be warned that it is quite insubstantial at the moment.
Did I mention that Mr. Nathan did quite a job packing the comics into that box? I'm talking professional quality packing. Seriously, if you ever need to purchase books, or magazines, or rocks or frogs or other items that can be shipped via box, try to buy them off him secondhand. They will arrive expeditiously and neatly-stacked, ready for your enjoyment.
So here's the first image out of the gate in my Slabs of the World series (introduced here). The rest of these should be popping up in the next few days (or whenever I get around to scanning them), since they're scheduled to be presented Wednesday. HOO-OOH.
This one is from PERU.
(Yes, it's just a tiny preview for now. I'll put the full-sized versions up when they can all be together.)
