• 11Jul 09

  My short-lived life as a mobster

  Huh. I guess it's been a while, eh? My last post was after E3, which was like, forever ago it seems. I should really post more often.

  Anyway, I just got back from playing 1 vs. 100 Live, and I got to be in the live mob tonight! I had a chance to win a copy of Worms and up to 800 Microsoft points. Unfortunately, I was knocked out on the second question. I was one of the first ten eliminated. The question I missed was about lyrics to a Billy Joel song, who I don't listen to. I felt better after the next question though, when the one (and about half of the remaining mob) missed a question about Barbie, which I also didn't know the answer to. So I was pretty much destined to fail that round. But even though it was only for two questions, it was a lot of fun actually being a part of the game. And now that I know it's possible, I'll be trying even harder every week to qualify.

  Anyway, that's all I have to report for now. Hopefully in the weeks to come I can get this blog revitalized.

  • Posted Jul 11, 2009 7:40 pm GMT
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• 11Jun 09

  Post-E3 impressions, part 1

  This is going to be a two part thing, because I haven't seen the Sony press briefing yet, and only part of the Microsoft one, and I already have so much to talk about.

  First off, Nintendo. Nintendo's press briefing was pretty good, if only because they showed at least 3 games that I want RIGHT NOW (as opposed to 1 last year) and that Dunaway lady wasn't nearly as annoying this year. In fact, she dropped a lot of good news. First off, New Super Mario Bros. Wii looks like it's going to be my new favorite offline multiplayer game, although the name is blah. Can we get a little more creative here? Speaking of uncreative names, the direct sequel to Super Mario Galaxy is called Super Mario Galaxy 2, and... wait, two 3D Mario games on one console?! This is unprecedented! I want it NOW!

  And to top off the list of poorly-named games that look awesome, there's Metroid: Other M. Terrible subtitle, but the trailer looked good. I'm a little wary of the continuing trend of using voice actors in Metroid games (Metroid Prime 3's voice acting was sub-par), and I'm not sure if teaming up with Team Ninja will be a good or a bad thing for the franchise, but I'm cautiously optimistic about this title. (Well, the game; the title still needs some work.)

  All in all, Nintendo's press briefing did exactly what I hoped it would do: make me glad I own a Wii again. Since last E3, I have purchased one Wii retail game (Animal Crossing: City Folk) and I've already grown tired of it. It's nice to see there's some software coming in the near future that will give my little white rectangle something to do.

  On the Microsoft front, I had a chance to play the first episode of the 1 vs. 100 beta, and it was a ton of fun. I didn't get to play as the 1 or in the mob, but crowd players get matched up with three other opponents, so it's still competitive even if you're not on stage. Chris Cashman is a great host. Some of his jokes had me laughing out loud. Unfortunately I couldn't hear him all the time. My opponent's would say he was talking sometimes but all I could hear was background music. It's a beta, so there's sure to be bugs, but I hope this is one that gets fixed soon. Cashman is a funny guy, and I'd like to hear what he has to say.

  And then there's Project Natal. The features shown in the video are pretty impressive, and I hope most of them make it to the final product. It's still probably more than a year off, but Jimmy Fallon got to try out a working prototype on his show last night:

  http://www.hulu.com/watch/77038/late-night-with-jimmy-fallon-project-natal-demo

  Just to be clear, you don't need to wear red jumpsuits to play Project Natal. The Xbox rep was clear on that after the commercial break.

  It's an ambitious project, and if it does what it promises it could easily blow Wii out of the water. The only concerns for me are: how much is it going to cost, how well is it going to work, and how many games will actually use it?

  Well, that's about all for now. I'm off to play some World at War (my new maps just finished downloading) and then I'll watch the rest of the Microsoft press conference. And then I'll watch the Sony one too, just for completion sake.

  • Posted Jun 11, 2009 8:23 pm GMT
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• 31May 09

  Pre-E3 thoughts

  Hello Internet. It has been a while.

  Last time I posted it was the week before finals. I did... um, well I did ok on some of them. I think I might need to retake a few classes though. Eh, it's summer now. No need to worry about tomorrow's problems today.

  In the meantime, I've been busy at home, super busy at work (McDonald's sucks), and have been trying to make time for games in between. Unfortunately, that doesn't leave much time to update my blog. As such, I have been gathering thoughts for a while and have not shared them. So I shall.

  First of all, I've been playing Fable II and I LOVE it. The co-op play is... well, it's not good. But the single player is more than enough to keep me occupied, to be honest. I've had a ton of fun trying to unlock some of the more off-beat achievements, like sleeping with more than one person at the same time or kicking a chicken a certain distance. (Why kicking chickens? Is that some sort of inside joke?)

  Second of all, 1 vs. 100 is debuting on Xbox Live on Monday, and I couldn't be more excited. I've been looking forward to this since it was announced at last year's E3. For anyone who's never seen the show, it works kind of like this: there's one solitary contestant, and they're facing off against a group of 100 people known as "the mob." The player and the mob are shown a multiple choice trivia question, and each member of the mob has a few seconds to lock in an answer before the player is asked to answer the question. If the player gets it right, all the mob members who got it wrong are eliminated. For every 10 people eliminated, the player goes up one prize rank. If the player gets a question wrong, however, the player's earnings so far are split up amongst the remaining mob members. This show was originally designed for TV with a jackpot of $1 million, but they've adapted it for play on Xbox Live, and instead of money, the players are playing for Microsoft points. I have no idea what the jackpot is, but the idea of free MS points has me intrigued. I don't know how contestant selection or prize payouts are going to work, but the premiere episode is Monday night at 10:30 pm Eastern Time, so if you've got Xbox Live you should check it out. (Beta season is free, by the way, so there's no charge.)

  Thirdly, I am all kinds of excited for Modern Warfare 2, which is totally unfair because it doesn't come out until November, but the trailer they released last week has got me all worked up. I'm hoping they tie the "Mile High Club" chapter from CoD4 into the story somehow, because that part of the game always seemed so randomly tacked on to me. (Not to mention extremely difficult.)

  And that's about all I got. I haven't been paying attention to the pre-E3 hype this year because in year's past it's only led to disappointment. I will be watching the press conferences next week, though, and I'm looking forward to what the big 3 have to show us. (Nintendo can't possibly disappoint me more than it did last year... can it?)

  • Posted May 31, 2009 1:02 am GMT
  • Category: Games
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