High Definition Ninja

One down, three left

2011-12-02T12:39:00.001-08:00

So the Nikon V1 is out. It was a great cam and a system I'd like to revisit once they get some fast primes and new bodies (lower prices wouldn't hurt either).

You can read the full story here.

Right now the FZ150 is the other cam on the bubble. The a850 and Nex-5N aren't going anywhere for awhile. Whatever my decision, I'm not sure I should part with the FZ150 too soon. The price has come down aggressively and stayed down since Black Friday so I would take a considerable loss if I sold it now.

The most prudent course of action is to shoot and enjoy the cam as much as possible until I greatly need the funds for something else. I could get lucky and the camera might run into shortages and the value comes back up a tiny bit. Either way, it's better to hold on. Especially since it's a great camera that produces wonderful shots...in great light.

The current line up

2011-11-18T14:03:00.001-08:00

Not all can stay for long.

I’m still shooting mainly with the Sony Nex-5N and lately, the Panasonic FZ150. The Nex-5N is giving me pleasing photos, but there are three things that bother me:

1)    The AF speed is not very fast. It’s good for most shots, but I’ve missed some prime moments due to AF hunting.
2)    The HVL20S flash uses the battery power from the camera so the recycle times can get very slow. Not only that, it can only tilt upwards so you can’t shoot vertically if you want to bounce the light.
3)    Most lenses are too big. The kit lens is fine although still not that compact, but the 55-210mm and the 18-200mm are monsters.

Are these deal breakers? Not yet. While the AF speed is not great, it is miles better than the Fuji X100. I do miss the amazing X100 files as the 5N doesn’t quite match it, but it just got too frustrating using the Fuji. I’ve seen a lot of samples from the Fuji X10 and I’m not blown away. They are definitely good, but its smaller sensor is a noticeable step down from the 5N and X100.

Amid all this Nex-5N testing I added the FZ150 which has a generous 25-600mm zoom. The image quality is very, very good. Much better than the HX100V or HX9V. It’s still a compact cam sensor though so it has severe limits. The AF is actually very fast, maybe a hair faster than the 5N and the burst 5.5fps mode is wonderful as it autofocuses between each shot. I’m not sure how long term the FZ150 will be, but it’s a lot of fun to play with for now.

The surprise
I thought the new Nikon 1 system looked like a dud, but it does appear to deliver most of what it promises. What’s got me intrigued about the Nikon 1 system is that it addresses all three annoyances of the Nex-5N.

The AF is super fast with leading class object tracking, the V1’s external flash recycles fast AND can twist as well as tilt, and the lenses are much more compact with the exception of the super zoom.

I’ll be trying one out soon and will have to see whether the 5N, Nikon V1, or FZ150 stay.

The disappointment
Panasonic just announced the GX1, the true successor to the pro-friendly GF1. The features that are attractive to me are the wealth of buttons and dials, the fast AF speed, the nice grip, the promise of better high iso performance, and the availability of a kit with the newer compact X zoom lens.

The buzz kills are that early samples of the X zoom lens appear to have focus/stabilization problems, there is no 1080p 60p option, the rear LCD is still 480K and not tiltable, and it has no built-in EVF.

The lower spec video is probably my biggest grip. That said, it uses the same battery as the G3. I still have two spare batteries for that camera (knock-offs), so if Panasonic hasn’t locked them out in the GX1, that could be enough of an excuse to give the camera a try eventually.

Nikon V1 will get a shot

2011-11-07T16:12:00.000-08:00

I’m still shooting mainly with the Sony Nex-5N and lately, the Panasonic FZ150. The Nex-5N is giving me pleasing photos, but there are three things that bother me:

1) The AF speed is not very fast. It is good for most shots, but I’ve missed some prime moments due to AF hunting.

2) The HVL20S flash uses the battery power from the camera so the recycle times can get very slow. Not only that, it can only tilt upwards so you can’t shoot vertically if you want to bounce the light.

3) Most lenses are too big. The kit lens is fine although still not that compact, but the 55-210mm and the 18-200mm are monsters.

Are these deal breakers? Not yet. While the AF speed is not great, it is miles better than the Fuji X100. I do miss the amazing X100 files as the 5N doesn’t quite match it, but it just got too frustrating using the Fuji. I’ve seen a lot of samples from the Fuji X10 and I’m not blown away. They are definitely good, but its smaller sensor is a noticeable step down from the 5N and X100.

Amid all this Nex-5N testing I added the FZ150 which has a generous 25-600mm zoom. The image quality is very, very good. Much better than the HX100V or HX9V. It’s still a compact cam sensor though so it has severe limits. The AF is actually very fast, maybe a hair faster than the 5N and the burst 5.5fps mode is wonderful as it autofocuses between each shot. I’m not sure how long term the FZ150 will be, but it’s a lot of fun to play with for now.

The surprise

I thought the new Nikon 1 system looked like a dud, but it does appear to deliver most of what it promises. What’s got me intrigued about the Nikon 1 system is that it addresses all three annoyances of the Nex-5N. The AF is super fast with leading class object tracking, the V1’s external flash recycles fast AND can twist as well as tilt, and the lenses are much more compact with the exception of the super zoom. I’ll be trying one out soon and will have to see whether the 5N, Nikon V1, or FZ150 stay.

The disappointment

Panasonic just announced the GX1, the true successor to the pro-friendly GF1. The features that are attractive to me are the wealth of buttons and dials, the fast AF speed, the nice grip, the promise of better high iso performance, and the availability of a kit with the newer compact X zoom lens.

The buzz kills are that early samples of the X zoom lens appear to have focus/stabilization problems, there is no 1080p 60p option, the rear LCD is still 480K and not tiltable, and it has no built-in EVF. The lower spec video is probably my biggest grip. That said, it uses the same battery as the G3. I still have two spare batteries for that camera (knock-offs), so if Panasonic hasn’t locked them out in the GX1, that could be enough of an excuse to give the camera a try eventually.

A New Challenger Appears!

2011-10-05T13:59:00.000-07:00

Kind of ugly compared to the elegant X100 and X10, but I still want it.

Wow, as if answering my last post for the perfect travel camera, Fuji has just announced a 26x zoom fixed lens camera with a 2/3 sensor (the same as their upcoming X10)! It won't be available till early 2012, but I don't have any major travel plans this year anyway.

The camera has a ton of buttons and a hi-res EVF that enthusiasts demand.

There aren't many specs beyond that, but on paper the performance should be quite good for photos. If the video features are competitive and the price is right, this could be a seriously amazing camera.

Image Source: http://dc.watch.impress.co.jp/docs/news/20111005_481838.html

Family/travel camera showdown

2011-09-22T13:26:00.000-07:00

I’ve decided I want my photoblog to concentrate on actual photos and the new home of gear ponderings will be here since it’s been a ghost town for a while.

With that out of the way, my latest thoughts concern the ideal family excursion camera. The key criteria for this category are in order of importance:

1.    Size/weight – Nothing too big or heavy
2.    Operational speed – Has to be very responsive so I can catch action as it happens
3.    Video quality – Minimum 720p @60p with stereo sound. 1080p 60p is even better
4.    Image quality – I’m willing to take a hit in this category, but not too much
5.    Reach – This only factors in when visiting places like the zoo or ball game where zooming is the only way to get close to the action
6.    EVF/OVF – For sunny days, this can be a lifesaver although not critical for some situations
7.    Discreetness – It certainly helps if the gear you wield is as unintimidating as possible, silent shutter is a plus

My two current cameras for this are the Sony HX9V and the Sony Nex-5N. The HX9V nails #1,3, 5, and 7. Operational speed is not great, image quality is average to below average, and it has no EVF.
The Nex-5N pretty scores points on everything except for reach and discreetness. I could add a 18-200mm lens, but then the size gets a bit out of hand. I also prefer the video of the HX9V over the 5N mostly because the smaller sensor keeps more things in focus which is important for family movies.

The new contenders

Panasonic FZ150 ($499, available October 2011)
Panasonic recently revealed the FZ150 superzoom camera. I owned the previous model, the FZ100 and was mostly pleased with it. I wasn’t surprised by noisy pics in low light since the cam had a small sensor, but the videos also suffered from excessive noise in lower light. On the other hand, the HX9V handles low light video like a superstar. Panasonic was aware of this problem and has reduced the megapixel count of the FZ150 from 14 to 12 which is great.

Initial photo tests on DPReview look extremely promising. The sensor of the FZ150 holds its own against larger sensor cameras quite well. The FZ100 nails 6 out of the 7 criteria points (it’s not very discreet looking, especially with the lens hood on). If the video quality of the FZ150 is up to snuff in low light, this can be the camera I’ve been waiting for.

The initial asking price of $499 is high for a camera in this range these days though. Also, the active steady shot feature of the HX9V is the top of its class so the FZ150 has its work cut out for it if it’s going to convince me that the large size of the FZ150 is worth ditching the compact HX9V.

Fujifilm X10 ($599-699, available November)The Fuji X100 is a great camera, but it didn’t suit my needs in this category. Its little brother is looking very interesting on paper. It’s smaller, has a nice zoom range, better video capability, and faster operational speed. It’s going to come down to how good the image and video quality is and if the camera is actually more responsive than the X100.

Sony Nex-7 ($1199 body, available November)The only way I would pick up the Nex-7 is if I sell BOTH my Nex-5N and Sony a850. That scenario is unlikely, no matter how heavy the a850 is. More high quality e-mount lenses may eventually force the issue, but that is quite a bit into the future based on the known Sony lens roadmap.

Nikon V1/J1 ($899/$649 available October)Just recently announced, Nikon’s first foray into compact mirror-less cameras is a bit of a head scratcher. On the plus side, the size of the camera and lenses is relatively compact and the shooting/video performance is looking interesting. The big sticking points are the small sensor and high price compared to its immediate competition. Time will tell if they catch on, but it’s not really in the running for me.

Panasonic GFX1 (Rumored)
The hottest rumor that comes from reliable source EOSHD is that Panasonic will unveil the GFX1 camera in November. If this follows suit of other Panny announcements, the camera will be available 2-3 months later. The most exciting aspect for me is that rangefinder styling with a built-in EVF. The G3 was great, but the body was dog ugly. For me to go back to micro four thirds, the performance would have to again take a good leap that the G3/GF3 made from previous generation in terms of photo quality. The video performance is already there in spades. Because of the vast lens selection, a well specified GFX1 would be the ultimate high performance compact travel camera whenever it’s released.

Olympus?I have a big soft spot for Olympus cameras as I’ve owned the E-P1, E-PL1, E-620, and the legendary E-1. As primarily a JPEG shooter, I love how the Oly cameras handle the processing of the image and deliver wonderful colors. The Sony cams can come close after some post processing though. I would give Olympus another chance if they were able to deliver a Pen-styled (read: rangefinder) camera with a built-in EVF and top notch video. I have no doubt they can do it. They would have to work on the video part though as the AVCHD implementation on the latest Pens is still not as good as on the Panasonic cams.

Third String

2011-08-08T14:03:00.001-07:00

Bit of a dry update spell here, but I have some fresh updates on my two other blogs on game outfits and photography. Enjoy!

Gaming For Japan

2011-03-18T10:17:00.000-07:00

Outright donations are fantastic, but it's also great when companies donate the profits from your purchase to the cause. Below are some of the companies I've found that are holding benefit sales for Japan Tsunami/Earthquake relief (image from the official SFIV blog):

Capcom and Sega iOS sales, Street Fighter IV, Sonic

Aksys Japan Benefit sale (100% of profits from all games in the Aksys store will go to relief)

Mac Games for Japan relief bundle - 15 games for $20, worth $200 retail

More gaming places that are taking donations

October Blu-ray Haul

2010-10-19T10:43:00.000-07:00

You won't often find all three of these movies in one collection unless you have tastes like mine.

Wow Project Sword/ Epic Citadel!

2010-09-02T10:21:00.000-07:00

The Apple product announcements didn't do much for me, but the software side was fantastic. iOS4.1 sounds great and Project Sword from Epic Games looked cool. What's even cooler is that you can download a playable tour of the game right now from the App Store. It's called Epic Citadel and there is a version for both the iPhone 4 and iPad. They both look fantastic although the iPad one gets the slight edge because of the large display.

Where is my River Monsters App?

2010-08-24T10:24:00.000-07:00

I love me some big fish and Jeremy Wade on the Discovery Channel show River Monsters delivers the biggest ones I've ever seen. Sure the structure of the show is predictable and Wade's melodramatic narration tries to squeeze every last ounce of suspense before the big catch reveal, but it works. It works damn well.

The second season is in full swing and promises Wade's biggest catch to date, a Sturgen.

Now all I need is a cool app where I can see on maps where all the catches were made, more info on the locations and fish, and of course a sweet fishing simulation with running commentary-like tips from Wade himself.

Chaos Ring for iPad

2010-08-13T10:07:00.000-07:00

After a succesful run on the iPhone, Square Enix has finally released Chaos Ring on the iPad. Yay! I'm very close to finishing StarCraft II so CR will get some playing time soon.

To commemorate the launch, other Square Enix titles are discounted for a limited time and Sliding Heroes is FREE!

What About Zinio?

2010-07-29T15:16:00.000-07:00

Zinio is not as flashy as the Wired or Popular Science apps. In fact, it’s not flashy at all, but the current selection of magazines and prices for single issues and subscriptions is far superior to any dedicated app at the moment.

So why is there no buzz on Zinio? Is it sales?

On the app side, I purchased an issue of Time, Wired, and Popular Science. For Zinio, I purchased multiple issues of iPhone Life, MacWorld, Amateur Photographer, T3, Rolling Stone, ESPN, and American Photo. The last two are subscriptions.

Maybe Zinio is keeping things quite on purpose to keep Apple’s hands out of their pockets. Time is certainly having quite a battle over profit sharing.

Threat of camera site fulfilled

2010-07-22T14:58:00.000-07:00

I mentioned a camera blog may be in the works and now it's happened! Check out Art vs. Gear when you have a chance HD Ninja friends.

iPhone 4

2010-06-25T11:13:00.001-07:00

It was a long day, but one filled with fun and great news. Here's how it played out:

6/24/2010

11:30AM

I'm thinking the early morning crowds should have thinned by now at the Bay Street Apple Store in Emeryville. It's nice to have positive thoughts isn't it? I scan the faces of the reserve line as I make my way to to back. There's a mixture of despair and excitement. It's quite cold out. I'm already thinking of bailing.

12:10PM

Wife joins me in line during her lunch break since she works close by. This is her phone after all. Mine got delivered in the morning. I'm thinking I'll have to stay in line no matter how long it takes because if mama is not happy, nobody is happy.

12:30PM

The Apple store folks bring out free chicken sandwiches from Bake Sale Betty's! Even though it's not warm, it still blows away the majority of chicken sandwiches I've had in my life. I probably would have wet myself if I ever ate one straight from the kitchen.

1:00PM

Wife leaves.

1:15PM

The guy in front of me hears me speaking Japanese on the phone to my mom who is watching my son at home ("I'm gonna be here a while" basically), and tells me the Japan is up 2-0 against Denmark! I totally forgot with all this iPhone line stuff! He's from South Korea so we start chatting soccer. Conversation erupt with folks in front and in back of us and it's getting fun and lively.

1:30PM

Two hours in we round the corner. Japan wins 3-1! We're in the round of 16!

3PM

We're very close to the front and honestly the last hour and a half kind of flew by because of the banter and perhaps my high from the Japan news.

3:30PM

iPhone 4 in hand and activated. Wife happy. It's not until I get home that I realize how tired I am.

Early Impressions

The more time I spend with the iPhone 4, the more it impresses. It's so fast, especially with apps that are designed for iOS4. My photo uploads are way quicker as well. The screen is a thing of beauty. Web browsing is gorgeous and speedy. Photos pop. The quality of snaps from the camera are great and it starts up very fast. Fast enough to capture those sudden photo ops.

More soon.

Bracing for iPhone 4

2010-06-18T07:21:00.000-07:00

Good news: My iPhone 4 will be delivered to my house. Yay!

Somewhat inconvenient news: My wife's is reserved at the local store for pick up because I could not get her order through before the deliveries rollled to July 2nd (and then quickly to July 14th).

I'm hoping things go smoothly as there will be two lines, one for reserves with a confirmation email and another for the unwashed masses who did not pound their keyboard and curse at AT&T's server all day June 15th until it yielded either an order or a real reserve.

I'm already having night sweats about waiting in that line. The 3 hour wait to get the 3G iPhone was not so bad, but the hype and technical problems surrounding iPhone 4 could result in post-apocalyptic levels of chaos. I'm also hesitant to bring my iPad to pass the time in line because it can be dangerous. Yes that was two months ago, but this happened last week.

Image above taken from Apple Insider.

DIY Beauty Dish

2010-05-18T15:14:00.000-07:00

There’s just something about the soft, glowy light from a beauty dish that is simply irresistible. I had to have one, but the most affordable one I could find was around $100+. Way too pricey for an item that wouldn’t be used very often so going the do-it-yourself route was the only way to go. I found this tutorial to be the most accessible.

Now that link above (and another link from within that article) provide most everything you need to know, but I ran into obstacles that forced me to alter things a bit.

First change, no epoxy glue. I’m not a fan of using it unless there is a project that absolutely requires it, especially with a super curious toddler in the house. I tried some super glue, which was a disaster.

The solution then was to use leftover screws from my “extra things from Ikea” bag. That worked like a charm and they were protectively covered with the little plastic studs you usually place inside of walls. It looked funky, but the paint would make it all nice in the end.

The convex mirror I found did not cover the entire end of the CD spindle so painting it was necessary. I decided on white since that’s what the inner dish would be colored. To make it neat, you must use some sort of painters tape. It’s a good idea to use keep the tape handy when painting the actual dish for a neat separation of the outer black and inner white.

I just have to add some Velcro to the back which will happen on the next run to Wal-mart or the 99 cent store, the supply HQ of affordable Velcro.

Here’s a quick snap with the beauty dish. The effect looks even better on people.

Sony NEX cameras

2010-05-11T14:13:00.000-07:00

Last night Sony officially unveiled the NEX5 and NEX3 cameras, their first shots in the semi-compact mirrorless camera market currently occupied by Olympus, Panasonic, and Samsung. It's been a hot segment for folks like myself who have longed for better quality photos, but in bodies smaller than traditional DSLRs. I currently own the Olympus E-PL1 and Panasonic GH1. Why two cameras? I'll get to that later. All photos on this page are from Impress Watch.

Above is the higher end NEX5 model with the "pancake" 16mm f2.8 lens. The camera will come in several colors with my favorite being the silver body since it matches nicely with the metal lenses.

This photo illustrates where things get complicated or should I say, less attractive. The whole point of mirrorless cameras is to have smaller and lighter things to carry around. While this combo above with the 18-55mm lens is indeed much more diminutive than a similarly capable DLSR, it's not exactly compact. Even though it looks unbalanced, I still kind of think it looks swell. This is mainly because I had a huge crush on F7 series (originally released 8-10 years ago), but didn't have a spare $1000 bill lying around.

The large lenses will also work a new line of camcorders. I prefer to use just one camera to take photos and video, but creates an interesting alternative should I be interested.

So why do I have two cameras? The E-PL1 takes AMAZING digital photos that come out looking great right out of the camera. You do not have to mess around with photoshop or anything like it for tweaks. Skin tones look pleasing, trees look lushly detailed, and the colors just pop in the most pleasing way possible without looking overcooked or unnatural. Unfortunately the 720p 30fps video is just ok.

On the opposite side, the GH1 takes some of the best looking video I've ever seen in super smooth 720p 60fps or I can go 1080p 24fps if I want that cinematic look. The photos can look as good as the E-PL1, but that is only if I take it in the RAW format and process them. This can take a while. Even then I like the color renditions better on the E-PL1 so I'm sort of stuck with both cameras for a while.

Will the NEX5 be able to replace either of my current cameras? I'll have to wait till late June or July when the camera is released to find out. Just looking at the specs and reading the initial impressions, it has a chance on the video side of things for sure. You can read more here.

Favorites

2010-04-21T06:10:00.000-07:00

The Olympus VF-2 for the E-P2 and E-PL1 cameras is AMAZING. The tech for electronic viewfinders has been getting better over the last year and the VF-2 is the best example yet. I prefer a built-in EVF like the SLR-styled Panasonic GH1 instead of an add-on, but the word is that they will start to appear in slimmer non-SLR-like cameras like the Pen series later this year.

It'll work just fine for now. This is what it looks like on the E-PL1 (yes I took the two pics above).

Operation Anchorage

My iPad Camera Connection kit shipped from Hong Kong a few days ago and is currently in Anchorage Alaska according to the tracking info. It’s exciting to be able to back up photos directly to the iPad, but I’m wondering if it will save them at full res or downsize them the way iPhoto does before syncing. It’s also the first accessory that is basically a USB plug for the iPad. It would be a huge missed opportunity if Apple and other app makers don't use it for things other than photo transfers. I’d really like the plug in my regular Mac keyboard please.

App update

If you haven’t purchased Magic Piano, do so now! It’s only a buck and it’s a great musical diversion for any time of the day. You’re not going to be playing like a normal piano and that’s the whole point. It’s about touching and making noises while being visually stimulated.

Guardian Eyewitness serves up one new stunning image a day along with details of the photo and photographic tips on how the shot was accomplished. Even if you care little for the technical details, the photos will mesmerize you for hours.

I finally got around to messing around with the Zinio magazine app and it’s a good first step. It’s certainly more comfortable to read magazines on the iPad vs a monitor. These are bare bones without the enhancements like the Time magazine app. The upside of less interactive elements is the cheaper prices. The magazine selection ranges from good to extremely random (Lots of Russian magazines for some reason). The Achilles heal of the thing is the speed of the reader. It takes a hair too long to navigate and sharpen each page.

iPad weekend impressions

2010-04-05T11:50:00.000-07:00

The iPad's initial battery charge has lasted about two and a half days of fairly heavy usage. I plugged it in to recharge now to finally put out some thoughts. I'm going to try to avoid the same impressions filling the net so will keep things focused on my niche interests.

iWork Pages on the iPad is awesome. I've been doing loose creative writing and some basic page layouts with ease. I got the Apple case and it's perfect for placing on your lap and typing away.

The ComiXology comic reader is a bit buggy, but it features almost all of the Walking Dead series. The first issue is free so give it a whirl. I think the latest issue is #70 and the last issue available on the app is #57 or so. Hopefully they get the rest up soon. It's very nice that they offer the first four collected volumes of Walking Dead though. A very economical way to get into the series. The Marvel app is the most polished of the official comic readers. It really just needs to add more recent comics and offer graphic novels and it'll be complete.

If you want to transfer files and read various documents like pdfs, the Goodreader is a massive steal at 99 cents. I actually bought Airshare HD because I used the iPhone version a ton, but in many ways the Goodreader is superior and costs $9 less. Man I could have saved some money!

I ended up purchasing Sketchbook Pro and half regret it. It is a very good drawing/painting program, but doing something really spiffy takes a ton of time. If there was some sort of stylus that worked with the iPad this program would totally rock.

Out of the four apps I actually paid money for, only Airshare was a total bust. Even if Goodreader didn't exist, Airshare has not been fully optimized for the iPad so there are some problems with the resolution of some documents and large file transfers.

Many old iPhone apps don't look great blown up on the iPad, but there are some exceptions. One is Monkey Island. It looks very very nice still. I never got around to playing it much on the iPhone, but this is the type of game that is aces on the iPad. Speaking of which there is also a Sam & Max game on here too that I will eventually check out.

iPad apps downloading

2010-04-02T19:52:00.000-07:00

The iPad should be here sometime tomorrow, till then I have to settle for downloading apps to iTunes and syncing later. All the free stuff is a no-brainer, but what to do about the ones that cost real world moneys?

There are quite a few drawing/painting choices already ranging from 99 cents up to 10 smackers. Sketchbook Pro looks like the best of the bunch and seems way feature packed for $7.99. There is an iPhone version that only very patient artists have thrived. The iPad one should be a lot more user friendly just based on screen size.

Photo retouching makes so much more sense on the iPad than the iPhone and Photogene looks pretty decent for $5.99. CameraBag is a little less flashy looking with an asking price of $2.99. This is going to be a super competitive market so it's going to be worth waiting just a while longer for a better selection.

I already bought MLB at Bat 2010 for the iPhone so it's a tough sell for me to shell out another $15 for the big brother. Might wait till the all-star game when the app usually drops closer the $5.

At $12.99, Command and Conquer Red Alert would be the highest priced app I'm considering. Looks snazzy though.

I was a long time subscriber to Time magazine and would gladly do so again on the iPad, but $5 a pop seems way too much. Can't tell from the description if that covers the entire month of April (4 issues) or just this week. I'll give it a chance if it's the whole month.

I'm a huge Geometry Wars fan so I'm totally jumping on this if the iPad version controls are right. $10 is the same price I paid for the full fledged Xbox live version so it would have to control very well indeed.

More soon!

iPad has shipped...from China!

2010-03-29T09:49:00.000-07:00

I was super surprised to see a shipment email from Apple this morning that the iPad is on its way! I looked up the tracking and it's shipping from China, same as my Macbook Pro from a while back. Is is possible this will get here before the Saturday release? I doubt it. Pretty sure all deliveries will be held for Saturday, just as a Harry Potter book or anything like it is locked up pre-official release.

Excited!

Great timing

2010-03-23T06:38:00.000-07:00

I sold off my DSi this past friday since I barely use it and would probably get the DSi XL somewhere down the road, but the announcement of the 3DS makes my decision seem prescient.

Oh and the iPad is only a week and half away!

5:30AM. iPad. Crazy.

2010-03-12T07:45:00.000-08:00

The Apple iPad was offered for pre-order at 5:30AM Pacific time today. I was at my computer hitting refresh on the Apple store and bought one. Then I went back to sleep. I feel silly, but I didn’t even need my alarm as I woke up several times during the night. Of course all that was unnecessary since several hours later it is still available for order.

On a related note, I got to play around more with the DSi XL today. For games like Metroid Pinball, the larger screen is really great. For most others it wasn’t quite as dramatic. I definitely won’t be picking one of these up anytime soon or perhaps at all unless someone starts a very good trade-in program for my current DSi.

The Schedule

2010-02-16T06:08:00.000-08:00

Here's a quick look at what I've played so far in 2010 in the order played:

Muramasa: The Demon Blade (Wii), Mass Effect 2 (Xbox 360), Fallout 3: Broken Steel DLC (Xbox 360)

And the plan from now till as far as I've thought about:

Bayonetta (Xbox 360), Heavy Rain (PS3), Yakuza 2 (PS2), Yakuza 3 (PS3), God of War III (PS3), Red Dead Redemption (Xbox 360), Resident Evil 5 Gold (PS3 or maybe Xbox 360, haven't decided).

Nothing is really for sure beyond Bayonetta and Heavy Rain though. Just thinking out loud.

Heavy Rain demo

2010-02-12T05:37:00.000-08:00

Man I'm really tempted to download the Heavy Rain demo, but I already have the game pre-ordered and want to experience everything then. I've also read (non-spoiler) that the beginning parts or the game are very slow and that's what the demo consists of.

Then again, I could play the demo making many different choices just to explore which is something I wouldn't do the first time through. Do I even want to do that right away or wait till I had played through the game at least once?

Few more iPad thoughts and the March budget nightmare

2010-02-03T07:37:00.000-08:00

Forgot to mention two more things that make an iPad appealing to me:

On-site photo back-up – On an important photo shoot or on vacation, it’s nice to be able to back-up your photos right then and there to avoid losing everything. Many expensive devices that range from $200-800 do this now, but they all have relatively small screens (largest is 4 inches). You can review all your photos nearly full size which is great when you don’t want to bring a full laptop to tether the camera to.

Drawing/ White board – The various doodling apps on the iPhone are interesting, but you really need more screen real estate to make it worth your time. At the very least it makes for a neat portable white board.

The E-PL1
The E-PL1 was officially revealed last night and is the third camera in the Olympus E-P line. It’s designed as the entry level model, but it has features that the two upper-tier E-P cameras lack. I was a satisfied E-P1 owner for many months, eventually upgrading to a Panasonic GH1 for practical reasons such as better HD video and faster performance (The E-P2 was not that much of an upgrade).

The GH1 is fairly compact, but not as small as the E-P cameras and the E-PL1 is the smallest yet adding to its appeal. Priced at $599 (the original E-P1 sold for $799), it’s very tempting. I would have to sell my smallest compact camera, the Canon S90, to fund it and I’m not sure if that is a good trade-off in features at this point.

Budget?!
The list of potential purchases for March now consist of the iPad, E-PL1, Yakuza (PS3), God of War III (PS3), Toy Story 1 & 2 (Blu-ray), and Yojimbo & Sanjuro Criterion collection (Blu-ray). There is only so much older items I can sell off which will dictate what new stuff I can afford.

iPad plus game releases

2010-01-27T05:02:00.000-08:00

I’m convinced Apple planted the $1000 rumor out there just so they could shock people with the actual price of $499. The Kindle DX is $489 and is now officially dead. The cheaper $250 kindle is on borrowed time.

I’ve had a cheap slate-style (no keyboard) tablet pc for 3 years now (on eBay for less than $200) so I know how cool it is to read comics or browse the web portrait oriented. I never browsed much though because the processor was ancient so it was all about reading anything I could get on the device. It is also quite heavy.

Here are the features that have me excited:

Photos - I enjoy looking through my iPhoto library on the MacBook and iPhone, but the experience is not ideal. The iPad is perfect for enjoying the photos like you would a proper photo book except you can have ALL your photos at any time. This makes it perfect for bringing over to relatives houses or use it like a digital photo frame at parties. This is coming from someone who takes an insane amount of photos.

Books - Kindle on the iPhone was serviceable, but books really need a larger display. I wasn't interested in the full size Kindle because I want an e-reader to handle all manner of reading material like magazines or full color photography books. The iPad can do this. I have a lot of books taking up physical space that would have a better home on the iPad.

Movies - Most of the Blu-ray discs I purchased have come with a digital copy of the movie for iTunes (Wall-e, Up, Nightmare Before Christmas, etc). I've only accessed some of them because I don't watch full length movies on the iPhone, but I certainly would on the iPad.

Work - Not iWork, but actual office work. I use my iPhone quite a bit for work email, but the small keyboard is not ideal (although I'm pretty fast on it now). The iPad is perfect for this as well as general work related writing I might need to do. It sure beats having my laptop on all night. There are other great perks, but none that stand as tall as the above. The main thing holding me back is that none of the above are absolutely crucial to my life. I guess the same can be said for many things I won though.

In 60 days, we’ll see if I end up picking one up or not.

As for games, it’s going to be all about Mass Effect 2 for a while. Beyond that, this is what the picture is looking like:

FEB
Bioshock 2 (Xbox 360)
I’m going to wait and see what the reviews look like before committing. I want to believe the sequel will be as good or better than the original.

Heavy Rain (PS3)
Reviews won’t matter as much to me on this one. Want to try it out for myself to figure out if it speaks to me or not.

MARCH
Yakuza 3 (PS3)
This is a must get. I’m so psyched this got picked up for US release. I just have to find time to finish Yakuza 2.

Resident Evil 5: Gold Edition (PS3)
I probably won’t bite initially since $50 is kind of high for a re-release even if it has cool DLC. Very much want to play through this game again.

God of War III (PS3)
Definitely will play this eventually. Question again is when.

APRIL
Red Dead Redemption (Xbox 360)
Will only stay away from this if the reviews are universally bad.

OUT NOW
Bayonetta (Xbox 360)
I can pull the trigger on this one whenever the mood to play strikes. Just haven’t had the time.

Ninja Gaiden Sigma 2 (PS3)
Price is the biggest barrier on this. Should be $40 or less.

XL? I'm in

2009-11-24T06:07:00.000-08:00

Perhaps the reason I've barely played with my DSi is because it needed a bigger screen? Certainly the screen of the iPhone puts the DS to shame. I look at my DS library and there are plenty of great games that are begging to be played. Hmm...I'll have to see what the mood is when the DS XL comes out next year, but it looks like a winner in terms of my needs. The final US price will have something to do with my desire as well. Importing at this point is not an option.

New blog coming maybe

2009-08-17T06:04:00.000-07:00

So what do you do if you have two blogs you update once every few weeks? Start a new one! Well, not sure if I'll really follow through, but the photography bug has bitten me pretty hard recently and a lot of my free time has diverted from gaming to shooting photos. Will definitely plug it here if it happens.

As for gaming, the iPhone has been getting most of the attention. Secret of Monkey Island is so damn cool. I've only dabbled before so most of it is all new to me. The new art is gorgeous and the trademark humor holds up completely. It's really a steal for $7.99.

Speaking of steals, Doom Resurrection was on sale over the weekend for $2.99. I've been waiting for a discount on the Resident Evil 4 iphone shooter so Doom fit what I was looking for. The graphics are surprisingly great and shooting action feels good. It's on rails so no direct control where you go. Good fun.

The one game I've been dying to get back to is Fallout 3. I haven't downloaded the last two DLC and probably won't until I complete Broken Steal. Thanks to the level cap increase, I've also been exploring more of the standard game and there's a ton I haven't seen. It's amazing how many little stories they packed across the map.

Super deal alert

2009-07-17T13:42:00.000-07:00

I meant to post this earlier, but if you send in $50 worth of trade-in games to Amazon and its postmarked by tomorrow, you get 50% off a game or accessory. I did it and got a crazy discount on RockBand Beatles. So a $250 bundle is now $125.

If you have joined the ECA ($20 membership), you can also get an additional 10% which will bring the Beatles bundle down to $99!

Let's talk about cameras

2009-06-17T21:24:00.000-07:00

I've always loved cameras and photography, but never really took things "to the next level". By that I mean really studied up on techniques or invested in expensive equipment. I was lucky that my first camera was a Canon EOS 650, a big and sturdy SLR that took amazing pictures. The only downside was that it was rather large for a young dude to heft around all the time. It was constructed very well and lasted me years. When I finally got into digital, it was all about the coolest, smallest thing available.

Now that I'm taking tons of photos and videos of my son, image quality has taken greater importance. At the same time I wanted my cake and eat it too by having a camera that can take great HD video. My current camera does a great job at both, but it's a super zoom so it's almost the size of a large DSLR. I'm kind of in the same situation where I don't feel like lugging the thing around all the time.

Enter the Olympus Pen EP1 which was officially announced yesterday and comes out in July. You can read everything you need to know about it here and here. The big news is that it is a fairly compact camera, but with a SLR sensor for maximum picture quality. Much greater than I have now. It takes the HD video I need (720p at 30 fps) and it looks DAMN sexy.

Of course the camera is a bit on the pricey side, but it's not outrageous for what it is. You do have to buy a flash for it since there is none built in.

It also comes in white, but I definitely want the silver one with the cool brown casing and strap. I just recently went through a cycle of selling off my older camera for the one I have so it's very early to think of upgrading already. Still, it's going to be hard to resist come July.

Currently I'm halfway through my second book on photography and looking to read through at least two more soon. Already that extra bit of knowledge is paying off with some much better and interesting photos. The one downside is that knowing a lot more really exposes the limitations of my current camera and the exciting possibilities of using something like the EP1.

Go or no go

2009-06-12T06:02:00.000-07:00

The last thing I need is another digital device that plays games since there isn’t time to play what I already have. Still it’s fun to weigh the pros and cons. Keep in mind that I owned a launch PSP, sold it a year later and haven’t missed it at all.

Me like list
- The white PSP Go is cool looking and it supposed to be available at launch
- Tekken 6 and Soul Calibur this fall. Both look very good
- Lunar for PSP looks really damn good. The original is one of my top 3 favorite RPGs of all time
- 16GB built in and expandable with memory stick micro, I greatly prefer having a game library available inside the system
- Always wanted to play God of War Chains of Olympus

No so much list
- The overall design is kinda blah
- The screen is not OLED like the Zune HD
- As good as Lunar looks, will never have time to finish a RPG
- Digital only game prices are still too high. No package product and ability to resell means prices need to be lower

Back in action

2009-05-13T07:20:00.000-07:00

Only took about 2 1/2 weeks to get my 360 back after it red ringed. It seems to be working good so far. I was really angry at the time, but now it's fairly mellow. Maybe because I started playing Outrun and the Pitt.

Thanks to a discount coupon, I also took the plunge on pre-ordering the Beatles package. Not sure I'll keep it on order, but could always cancel if I change my mind. I think it will hinge greatly on how the drum kit looks. The bass and guitars shown so far look great although the latter are grossly overpriced. Actually, it's all over priced.

RE5 save file fail? Time to move on

2009-04-21T05:38:00.000-07:00

My save file for RE5 on the 360 somehow corrupted while I was doing a speed run to get the rocket launcher. It's sad, but I did finish what I needed to get done for work before the save fail.

The bright side is that it made me get to some Fire Emblem action on the new DSi. Up to this point I've mainly just messed with the camera. The audio is a tad punchier than the Lite and I definitely notice the extra screen real estate. Was it worth the upgrade? Probably not, but I'm pretty happy with it anyway.

The sneaky DS backlog

2009-04-03T06:52:00.000-07:00

I’ve been whittling down the games backlog to a fairly manageable point…or so I thought. A handful of 360, PS3, and Wii titles with only the PS2 packing a somewhat larger library (retro/fighting game collections that are evergreen). Very nice work I thought to myself.

With the launch of the DSi, I took a gander at the games I had for the DS. I already knew the collection would be fairly large since the portable nature made it the go to entertainment device when traveling or doing anything away from the house. There wasn’t a problem with that line of thought until late last year when iPhone games started getting good. Now it just seems clunky to lug the DS to doctors appointments or wherever.

With that in mind, I need to start making some hard choices. What makes it even tougher is the huge amount of great DS games that came out the last few months and are coming still. I picked up Fire Emblem, but haven’t purchased buzzed about titles like Henry Hattsworth, Rhythm Heaven, Valyrie Profile, GTA Chinatown, etc. Then there are the quirky games like Tokyo Beat Down, Steal Princess, uh, I guess most of the games Atlus is releasing.

Two tips for PS3 owners

2009-03-03T06:34:00.000-08:00

I recently upgraded my PS3 hard drive to a 320GB model and wanted to pass on an invaluable recommendation. In some PS3s, the tiny screws are extremely hard to remove without stripping them. I was super careful using screwdrivers that fit perfect and even cooled down the hard drive casing so no parts were expanded from heat.

I was able to remove one without problems, but all the others were super stubborn and started lightly stripping. That’s when I went to the local hardware shop looking for the perfect pliers that can help. Some forum posts suggested needle nose pliers (which I already had), but they didn’t work for me. What did work and work very easily were “groove-joint pliers”. The way they can grip the screws from the sides in an even manner was perfect. The screws loosened immediately. I put a pen next to the pliers so you can get a sense of scale.

My second tip is for folks who recently picked up Street Fighter IV. I got both the 360 and PS3 versions, but I might end up playing the PS3 version the longest because of these Sega Saturn USB controllers. They were released several years ago in Japan and are still available on eBay. I first read about them on Street Fighter forums claiming how they work perfectly on PS3s. There is some doubt whether these are bootlegs, but the consensus seems to be that the build quality is still top notch either way. This pad is also amazing for the Sonic Genesis collection.

I also tracked down the fairly decent Madcatz Fightpad for the 360, but the Saturn controller blows it away. The only drawback to the Saturn pad is that the USB cord is not very long so you’ll need to pick up an extension cord. It would be so sweet if there was a Saturn controller made to be compatible with the 360 without serious wire modding.

Unfortunately the Saturn USB pads also don’t work on PS2 games played on backward compatible PS3s, so I’ll have to keep on the look out for the limited Saturn pads they released for the PS2. Saw one on auction the other day for well over $200. That’s bananas and probably means I’ll never get one.

Feb 2009 pre-orders

2009-02-04T06:17:00.000-08:00

Wow who decided to release so many games in feb? Here's what I pre-ordered so far:

Sonic Ultimate Genesis Collection (PS3)
I was very tempted to go with the 360 version for the achievements, but it will be so much easier to play these games with the PS3 controller.

Onechanbara Bikini Samurai Squad (360)
Embarrassing, but yes this is considered a must play in my book. Super wacky, over-the-top zombie slashing action is instant win.

Killzone 2 (PS3)
I’m in the camp of players who loved the original despite its flaws. I thought it was just too ambitious for the PS2. All the early reviews of Killzone 2 verify that it is no longer hampered by the hardware and flat out rocks. I’m psyched.

On the verge of pre-ordering:

Street Fighter IV (360)
There’s no question I’ll pick this up, it’s just a matter of when.

Fire Emblem (DS)
I love the Fire Emblem series and it’s such a perfect fit for the DS. I haven’t finished Sacred Stones, so might wait till I do before grabbing this.

Retro Game Challenge (DS)
I love the concept of playing retro-style arcade games competitively. It’s getting purchased unless it receives horrible reviews.

Podcast debut!

2009-01-23T20:14:00.000-08:00

My good buddies Miguel, Gabe, and Sterling invited me to be a special guest on today's GameSpy Debriefings podcast and it's already available for download! You can find it here.

I had a complete blast chiming in on some current topics and telling some old timey game industry stories circa 1994-1995. If they have me on again, I won't say "like" so darn much.

Thanks guys for having me on! The iTunes link is up!

Happy Holidays!

2008-12-24T14:41:00.000-08:00

It's been a challenge finding much time for games over the past few weeks, but hopefully I can get some larger chunks of play time.

What I've been playing:
Gear of War 2 - Almost finished with the single player. I doubt I'll play much multi-player online although I'd love to try out the co-op.

Fallout 3 - This was the only thing I played for a long time. It's between this or Metal Gear Solid 4 for my personal game of the year. I can't wait for the DLC!

What I hope to play:
Yakuza 1&2 - New video of Yakuza 3 for the PS3 (create a Japanese PSN account, it's not hard) have me super psyched. I'm about 2 hours in on the first Yakuza and it's great.

Persona 3 FES - I played about 20 minutes (the shortest amount of time before the first save point I think) and it's super cool. If I ever manage to finish this, I will pick up Persona 4 right away.

Valkyria Chronicles - I was bummed to hear this didn't sell so well, but I'm glad I paid full price to support this game. The demo on PSN is so damn good!

What's on your holiday playlist?

Recent gaming

2008-10-28T06:50:00.000-07:00

It sounds like a lot, but all this game playing was spread out over the last month and a half or more:

Castlevania Dawn of Sorrow/Order of Ecclesia – I finished this last week in anticipation of Order of Ecclesia. Dawn’s reputation as a top of the line Castlevania is very well deserved. I decided to skip over Portrait of Ruin because I was so excited to get to Ecclesia and the verdict so far is…I need a break from this type of game. I’ll come back to it later, maybe even start over too.

Fallout 3/Little Big Planet – If all goes well with shipping, I should have Fallout 3 and LBP in my hands tomorrow. Even with the great reviews, I’m very worried if Fallout 3 will do it for me because Oblivion bored me. It does sound like the story is much better and game is more focused so fingers are crossed. I was really in the mood for LBP last week, this week not so much. I’ll pop it in for a quick taste when I can.

Wii Music – Amazon was handing out $20 back for buying Wii Music, so at $30, I took a chance. My mom seemed to like it ok, but the wife was not digging it. The mode everyone did love was Hand bell Harmony, but you can only unlock five songs for it. I gave the game a shot, but it has since been resold.

Rock Band 2 – I didn’t play much of Guitar Hero III (difficulty balance was way off for me) and completely skipped the original Rock Band. I guess that made me really want to get back into something and Rock Band 2 is fantastic. I’m playing with the wireless guitar from GHIII right now and want some drums badly. Guitar Hero World Tour Band Kit is on my Christmas list so hopefully Santa will let me get my drum on over the break.

Valkyria Chronicles – Downloaded the demo the other day and liked it a lot. The free movement and manual aiming are interesting mechanics for a tactical RPG. The game was already high on my wanted list and this demo pretty much sealed the deal.

Future prospects
There are way too many games to check out, but it would be great if I magically had the time (and money) to play the new Prince of Persia, FarCry 2, Gears of War 2, Quantum of Solace, Tomb Raider Underworld (demo is out today!), Dead Space, and Mirror’s Edge. As a super dark horse candidate, the PS3 Naruto game looks damn good. I know nothing of the anime or manga. All I know is the PS3 Naruto looks exactly like a controllable cartoon. It's not just the graphic quality, it's how the characters move and react to your input. And it’s mostly a fighting game and I like me some fighting.

GBA surgery

2008-10-13T06:32:00.000-07:00

I’ve always wanted to use the classic NES GBA SP more, but the screen was just so much darker than the newer SP model. I still have a good number of GBA games and prefer to play them on a proper GBA instead of the DS.

After a quick bit of internet research, I found it was possible to transplant the innards of the newer SPs with the NES GBA. Although the focus of this article I found is about removing the guts in order to paint the shell, it was still invaluable since it included photos and very good instructions.

All told it took me a good hour to delicately replace the screens and circuit board (you can’t just replace the screens or it won’t work). I also switched the batteries to be on the safe side. If you plan on doing this yourself, definitely refer to that link in the paragraph above. You’ll also need to order a Y-screwdriver (don’t pay more than $6 shipped). Other bits of info I can share from my experience is that re-connecting the screen to the circuit board is very delicate work.

I’m super happy with how everything turned out. Highly recommended!

Throwing the PS3 some love this weekend

2008-09-25T17:44:00.001-07:00

The PlayStation 3 has been giving me the stink eye due to all the PS2 software that's been purchased recently. Even though it's a 60GB model and can play these games too, I prefer to use the PS2 Slim for this purpose.

To make ammends, two packages are enroute as you can see above. I've read great reviews of the pic quality of Nightmare (one of my all-time favs) and was just waiting till they lowered the price closer to DVD levels.

A friend brought over the original Buzz quiz game for the PS2 a year ago and it was a huge hit at this house. Ever since, I've been waiting for the PS3 version with wireless remotes to get released. It came out this week, just in time for company that's coming over this weekend. Yay!

(Amazon Note: In case you were wondering, I'm enrolled in Amazon Prime, the 2-day free shipping program. Stay away from it if you are a compulsive shopper like me!)

PS2 Fever + Metal Slug face-off!

2008-09-24T06:27:00.000-07:00

I still can’t believe Sega actually released Yakuza 2 here so I did my part and picked it up right away. Also tracked down a new copy of the first Yakuza for good measure. Now it’s just a matter of either playing through them now, or waiting till Yakuza 3 gets released in order to get the full experience. I’m thinking this upcoming Christmas break is the ideal time. Maybe Thanksgiving.

In case you haven’t heard, the controls on Metal Slug Anthology Wii suck. All the options they give you are unsatisfying. Luckily the PS2 version was marked down to an affordable $20, which happened to be what I was able to get for the Wii version. Score!

I didn’t take a picture of it, but I also picked up Singstar 90’s which was also on sale at Amazon for like $18. I really should just upgrade to Singstar PS3 and have all the songs on the hard drive, but it’s hard to pass up the song per dollar value of the PS2 Singstars. I wonder how many other Singstar owners are also putting off the upgrade?

Been playing the import version of Metal Slug 7 (so far, very good) and wanted to visually compare it to the other original creation for a portable, Metal Slug Advanced. Why? Because I’m a big nerd who obsesses over these things is why. As you can sort of see from this side-by-side photo, the characters and objects are slightly larger on the GBA version. Slug definitely “feels” more like an arcade game though.

Best Xbox Live bargain ever

2008-09-03T05:28:00.000-07:00

Rearmed has secured a place in my top ten games of 2008. It’s challenging, long, rewarding, looks great, fun, etc. There’s not much more to say other than that the 800 points it costs is a fantastic bargain. Remakes of side-scrolling 2D action with “new” 3D graphics are usually earmarked for the PSP. I would have skipped Rearmed on the PSP at the most likely initial price of $29.99 and waited for it to hit $19.99…or maybe skipped it entirely. Regardless of what might have happened on the PSP, I would not be playing it as maniacally as I am now for one simple reason – online leaderboards.

I can’t tell you how many hours have been spent re-playing Challenge levels to shave split seconds off my best time to topple a friend’s score. Last I checked, only one person on my list has completed the entire game so that is my next goal.

I’ll also play Geometry Wars 2 every now and then, but it just raises my blood pressure too much. Haven’t gotten around to checking out Braid, but I did purchase Castle Crashers. Just a minute into the demo had me sold. I really wish it was disc-based because I’d love to be able to take it over people’s houses or bring it to work because it’s so much more fun playing four players in the same room.

PSP? Hmmm maybe… (UPDATE)

2008-08-21T06:27:00.000-07:00

Last year I sold off my launch PSP with the intention of buying the PSP Slim once it was released, but I ended up getting rid of all the games and pretty much abandoning the platform. It was always in the back of my mind though that I would jump back in if there ever was a really radical redesign, like adding a second analog stick.

The PSP-3000 has very few new features, but it boasts one that is dear to me-a better LCD screen. To be more specific, it is brighter, has double the color gamut, has five times the contrast ratio, and double the response time. How that translates to real world improvements in the visuals is yet to be revealed, but it sure sounds hot.

Tempting, but what's really tipping the scale is the announcement that a new Parasite Eve game, Third Birthday, is coming to the PSP. I’m quite the Parasite Eve fanboy even though the first two games were average at best.

For my travels, my iPhone and DS have me pretty well covered, so it would really take several more big things to make the new PSP a must have. Of course if the screen really does look insane…

UPDATE!That is a pretty snazzy comparison pic. The new PSP is the one on the bottom. Courtesy of Famitsu.com.

Catching up

2008-08-12T05:00:00.000-07:00

I greatly desired the original iPhone, but the high price was just too much. Now the price is right even though the data plan eats up the savings. At least it’s spread out. I was lucky that I only had to wait a little over 2 hours on launch weekend to get my 3G iPhone and it was a brisk 5 minutes to activate. I use the damn thing so much! Now they just need to release better games and I’ll be set.

This is somewhat old news, but I beat Metal Gear Solid 4. Absolutely loved it. I actually started another game to fully explore the levels and unlock more items. I have yet to try MGS Online, but it sounds neat and they already released an expansion that lets you play as Meryl! The expansion did cause some crashes with the system, so it’s probably best to wait a bit before jumping in.

Aside from MGS 4, the remainder of my gaming is all about Soul Calibur IV. I’m totally addicted to unlocking new items for character customization/creation.

I’m very excited Power Pro is back again this year. I’m planning on picking up the PS2 version (can’t beat $19.99) and perhaps the DS version when it’s released later this month. The PS2 will be used for quick pick-up games at the house while the DS is going to be more convenient for me to enjoy the deep Success, Season, and MLB Life modes when traveling or similar situations.

I’m also very happy that the PS2 in general is getting some great support. The PS3 plays my games just fine, but I just really still enjoy using the PS2 slim. While it’s nice that most of the top franchises make a latter gen appearance (Call of Duty, Bond, Tomb Raider), it’s the niche titles like Eternal Poison and Persona 4 (basically anything from Atlus) that are most appealing. I’m also looking forward to Yakuza 2 (yay for Japanese language with English subtitles!), Samurai Shodown anthology, and most any other SNK collection they can manage to release. There are also no shortage of titles already out that I haven’t picked up yet like Rule of Rose and Persona 3 FES. Great games for affordable prices!

MGS, DS and Genesis!

2008-06-27T06:34:00.000-07:00

Started Metal Gear Solid 4 on Father’s day and now I’m in the middle of chapter 2. Love it so far. I kind of skipped GTA 4 since it seemed like it would be a much larger time suck than MGS 4, but hopefully I’ll get to it sometime this year. After MGS, the only thing I want to play is Soul Calibur IV (wow lots of fours this year).

The DS has come in handy for recent travel. Played little bits of:
- Izuna Unemployed Ninja (great character art, very tough dungeon crawler, may play again)
- Touch the Dead (decent, probably won’t “touch” again)
- Meteos Disney (The sound effects are not as compelling as the regular Meteos and the Disney tunes are a bit too subtle for my tastes)
- Sonic Rush (The most satisfying one out of the bunch. Exactly how I wanted a pseudo 3D Sonic to play. Fast action and wild level designs. Excellent)

The PlayStation 2 has become my go-to retro machine thanks to Taito Legends 2, Capcom Classics, and the SNK Arcade collection. These collections are also massive bargains compared to paying $5+ for single titles on the Wii or Xbox Live. Over the weekend I added the Sega Genesis Collection to the group. It’s been on my want list for a while so it was great to finally grab one. It’s a fantastic group of titles and they all have supplemental trivia, tips, and box art. Lots of good unlockables like the arcade version of Altered Beasts and developer interviews. I think there are like 28 games included, but you’ll get your money’s worth just for Shinobi III and Phantasy Star IV alone. (Shinbo screen taken from Console Classix)

Baseball cards and dried fruit

2008-05-22T06:07:00.000-07:00

So what’s been going on? It’s kind of all over the map. So in no particular order, some other random stuff since the last post:

Dried fruit – I don’t know why, but I was eating a lot of it for awhile. Pineapples, papaya, whatever. I think that craving has passed mostly.

Subway’s Pastrami sandwich – I haven’t eaten at Subway regularly in years, but their new pastrami is great. The combination of decent hot pastrami and loads of subway veggies is quite pleasing.

Baseball cards – I was cleaning out my stuff from my mom’s house and happened across a ton of my old baseball cards. On paper (and according to some grading sites) I have some decently valued cards, but they can be had for far cheaper online. eBay is the real bellwether of card value and it appears the industry still has not recovered from the crash in the early 90s. It does put what cards I find most valuable in perspective. Even though the values have gone way down, my favorite cards are still my Will Clark rookie collection. You gotta collect what you like and not chase after players as an investment because you never know.

Rummaging through all those old cards got me in the mood to check out some new cards. I picked up a few packs of 2008 Topps and Upperdeck. Although they were all very shiny and nice looking cards, that same magic just wasn’t there. Then I decided to try out buying specific players. Bought a quartet of Ichiro rookie cards (Upper Deck, Donruss, Bowman, Topps) for pretty cheap. Like Will Clark, Ichiro is one of my favorite players and the value of the cards doesn’t matter to me. Looking at the Ichiro cards finally did bring back the good baseball card feelings. After that mini-spree though, I think I’m done for awhile. I might start buying some more whenever Kaz is old enough to be interested in baseball cards. He’s certainly going to inherit a decent stash of older cards from me. Maybe at least a handful will be worth more than $10 by then.

PS2 lives on

2008-03-24T06:11:00.000-07:00

Persona 4 was recently announced in Japan…for the PS2! There’s definitely a part of me that is quite happy to see big releases continue on the platform. I still keep around my PS2 slim (it’s just too cool looking to get rid of) and it has plenty to keep it spinning. For domestic releases, I have on my radar Persona 3 Fes, Arcana Heart, SNK Arcade Classics vol. 1, and Yakuza 1 & 2. That’s not counting the few PS2 titles I still have to get to on the shelf.

I’m probably most looking forward to the SNK Classics collection. I sold my NeoGeo home system a while back (got it used for under $100 in Japan) so it’ll be great to play these games again and at a stupendous bargain price. Hopefully the emulation is good.

HD film festivals and pricey tech

2008-02-05T06:02:00.000-08:00

Clive Owen wasn’t in Bourne Ultimatum, but I wanted to watch the trilogy in order and he was in the first one.

After that, the Children of Men HD-DVD I had on Netflix for seemingly forever finally got sent. Fantastic movie. Will probably purchase it whenever it moves to Blu-ray. After that, Shoot’em Up on Blu-ray arrived. This was also another minor miracle as most every newish Blu-ray disc on Netflix is tagged “Very Long Wait”. The movie is quite enjoyable if you can turn your brain off and go along for the ride. It’s definitely not for everyone though.

By the time I got to Inside Man, it struck me that I’ve seen a good amount of Clive Owen in a short time frame. An accidental CO film festival if you will. I saw Inside Man in theaters and have been wanting to re-watch it at home to see how much held up. It totally does and I like it even more now.

If you haven’t seen any of the above, all are highly recommended except for Shoot’em Up. If you only had time for one, I’d go with Children of Men.

iPod Touch 32GB
Apple today released a 16GB version of the iPhone and a 32GB iPod Touch. I’ve been very tempted by the Touch and 32GB is the minimum happy point in terms of storage for a video device. Both of the higher capacity models weigh in at a honking $499 which is about $200 more than I feel comfortable with. Finances are totally baby-driven now so there is no way I could make it work anyhow.

The good news is that this totally sets up a much larger upgrade and price adjustment for both the iPhone and Touch for later this year.

The Cool
I’ve been taping random stuff so I have things to watch in the middle of the night for baby feedings and fussy times. Bullit has been playing on the Universal HD channel, so I took that in last night. The movie oozes style from the very first frame. The film has a deliberate, lazy pace punchuated by a jazzy score and of course the legendary car chase scene. Even now the car chase is impressive and the realness of the danger is impressive. Actors don’t come any cooler than Steve McQueen and he carries an otherwise uneven movie. Maybe I should do a Steve McQueen film festival next?

Pure Love

2008-01-23T06:21:00.000-08:00

I became a father for the first time earlier this month to a bouncing baby boy. The amount of love I feel for him is indescribable. It’s been hard going back to work and not seeing his face and holding him and trying to figure out why he is crying at any particular time.

My late father didn’t spoil me much (my mom on the other hand is another story), but one thing he would never deny me was books. As a writer, he obviously loved books and had tons of them. He even bought me comic books on a regular basis, since in Japan, they are read by people of all ages and not viewed as junk literature. One thing that was hard for me to get either of my parents to buy me was videogames. For one, they were expensive and two, I’m sure it all looked like a waste of time to them.

This won’t be a problem for my son. He’ll have plenty of access to games and I can’t wait till he’s old enough to play some with me. I’ll know which ones are appropriate for his age and what is not. Of course if it turns out he doesn’t like games much that’ll be fine. Who knows what kids will want to do with their free hours in the future. Probably something that looks like a waste of time to me.

A quick one

2008-01-07T05:38:00.000-08:00

Short thoughts:

Blade Runner 5-disc collection on Blu-ray –You don’t need me to babble on about it with all the rave reviews out there. Suffice it to say I’ve watched my older DVD copy at least a dozen times and the older theatrical cut on VHS at least as many so this collection was Xmas in a box.

New American Gladiators – Love it. They might have kept too many of the older games, but the tougher eliminator is good stuff.

Resident Evil Umbrella Chronicles – It’s not the best game in the world, but I was super obsessed with getting S rankings on every stage.

Video camera – I might be needing a new video camera soon. Leaning towards a hard drive model and it will have to be HD. CES is happening just in time. New models = lower prices for existing stock.

New computer? – My plan is still to wait till StarCraft 2 actually comes out before committing to a new computer since I don’t want to pay much for it. The only snag will be if Apple unveils a touch enabled Mac Book. I have a super cheap refurbished Tablet PC I’ve been using to mainly just read comics/manga (check out Marvel’s Digital Comics!) and I love the form factor. So basically I’m looking for a larger iPod touch, except it’s a real computer. If they manage to release one this year, I’m totally in.

Love me some Mass Effect (Spoiler free!)

2007-12-05T06:59:00.000-08:00

I’m already into my second Mass Effect play through and will eventually play at least one more time after that (perhaps one more on top of that depending on DLC). I’ll list the details of what I’m doing/planning at the very end of the post so folks not wanting spoilers can just stop reading. So is it my “Game of the Year”? It’s a pretty solid lock. It just hits everything I wanted a follow up to KOTOR to be and then some.

There hasn’t been much time for any other game except for King of Fighters XI since it can be enjoyed in very short bursts. If you still enjoy 2D fighting games at all, you should absolutely pick this up for the PS2. It’s packed with new characters and little touches for fans to discover. I have to admit that I’m not getting as much enjoyment out of XI as KOF 2006, the last 3D installment of the series. Having owned many of the earlier 2D KOF games, there isn’t enough new in XI to make me want to play a ton. At $14.99 though, it’s priced right. Very much looking forward to KOF XII which is supposed to be a total reboot of the 2D series with all new sprites.

The plan for the rest of the year involves mostly going back to finish games I started. I “beat” Mario Galaxy, but didn’t get all 120 stars. I held off on playing through Bioshock a second time on the harder difficulty in anticipation of some DLC and glad the wait has paid off. I really want to finish HL Episode 1 and 2 and maybe complete some more achievements for Portal. I’m probably one or two long sessions away from completing Phantom Hourglass. The mood has sort of passed me, but it would be great to go back and beat Odin Sphere.

I would certainly love to pick up some of the other hot November titles like Uncharted and Rock Band (game only), but there’s no way I’m getting anything new till next year. By then, there should be some great discounts and price reductions. I’ve already done my part in pumping up the game economy with large amounts of day and date purchases this year, so I need to give my wallet a big break for the first half of next year.

MINOR MASS EFFECT SPOILERS FOLLOW
I completed my first game as female/soldier/paragon. Second game decided on male/all biotic/renegade. I’m thinking for the third play through to go back to my female soldier so I can get the level 50 and 60 achievements. I also want to try out an all Tech character too (I’m not big on characters with split specialties). I didn’t get the completionist achievement the first time (finished the game around the 30 hour mark) so debating whether I want to try to explore everything on this renegade play through or wait to till I go back to my soldier.

Feather Stylus arrives

2007-11-15T06:49:00.000-08:00

Registering your copy of Phantom Hourglass and answering a survey on Nintendo’s site rewarded you with a feather stylus. I just got mine in the mail yesterday.

I was impressed that the box had a fancy outer sleeve and the stylus is held in place by molded foam. The stylus itself is a very elegant clear solid plastic and feels nice. I haven’t had a chance to use it on the actual game, but I will soon. Hopefully Nintendo starts ramping up more of these bonuses for its fans here like it does in Japan.

Busy Season

2007-11-12T05:02:00.000-08:00

It’s been tough to find much time to do anything besides work, but here’s a round up of what I’ve been able to squeeze in over the past month:

Phantom Hourglass – I think I’m just about at the halfway point or maybe a tad further. Still loving it and the ability to write notes on the maps is super handy since I need to be reminded what I was supposed to do after being away from the game a few days. Going to take my time with this one and not rush.

Orange Box – For me, Portal is right up there with Bioshock in the “Best of 2007” games race. You MUST play Portal. Avoid spoilers! Slowly making my way through Episode 1 and waiting for them to patch Team Fortress 2 before playing some more.

Guitar Hero III – I love the set list. Perfect game to pick up when the mood strikes and not feel rushed to finish.

Call of Duty 4 – Finished this over the weekend and I think I’m completely done with it. I loved the campaign, but the mp requires too much time commitment for me to truly enjoy.

Buzz Mega Quiz – Some friends brought this PS2 game over the other night and it’s a ton of fun. Quite a fun party game and supports up to 8 players if you buy another four buzzers. This might be a worthy pick-up for upcoming Thanksgiving/holiday gatherings. Fairly noob friendly.

Mario Galaxy – With any luck, I’ll be able to pick this up tomorrow. Can’t wait.

Mass Effect – After Mario, this may be the last game I have time for this year. Especially since there are other older games I’ve been itching to get back to. That would probably be the smart move allowing me to snag the rest of the interesting Oct/Nov titles when they are discounted next year.

Demo report

I also got around to checking out a few demos that have long been downloaded, but forgotten on the 360 and PS3 hard drives.

Sega Rally Revo (360) – What a surprise! I was a big Sega Rally fan back in the day so it’s with great relief that it maintains most of it arcade-style flavor. The two tracks available in the demo look good and the controls are nice. Even so, racers aren’t at the top of my play list these days (with the exception of Mario Kart which I am up to play anytime). This might have a chance if the mood strikes me.

Conan (360) – I like how Conan can pick up new weapons to change his move set and the voice over work is solid. There’s enough “story” in the demo to intrigue me, but the combo system hasn’t won me over. Seems like a solid rental.

Puzzle Quest (360) – If this was released in the summer, I would have been all over this.

Every Extend Extra Extreme (360) – The PSP version has long been on my want list, but this demo is a real let down. Mostly because I have no clue what I’m doing, but the musicality of it isn’t as immediately engrossing as Lumines or Rez either. I’ll certainly give it another chance eventually.

Fatal Fury Special (360) – Very great port. I have the Neo Geo cart and this one has a slight visual edge. I really wish there was some way to get the CD arrange soundtrack to play with this, but for $5 it’s a steal. Not sure if the price has gone up at this point since I bought this the week of release.

Ratchet & Clank Future (PS3) – Very solid, but doesn’t feel like there’s enough new things to draw me in. This was in my day one purchase list for the longest time, but now I’m not so sure. I know I’ll like it, but in this crowded holiday I might have to skip for now.

Bladestorm (PS3) – The super cheesy voice work is entertaining. Other than that, it’s a snooze fest.

Gran Turismo 5 Prologue (PS3) – It suffers from some aliasing issues, but still looks great. Although it’s a real showpiece, my enthusiasm for the game is lessened a bit by this demo.

Uncharted (PS2) – Out of all the demos I’ve played, this was the only one that changed my mind from a “wait and see” to a “must purchase”. The only thing holding me back is it comes out the same week as Mass Effect. Depending on when I can put down ME, Uncharted may be able to sneak into 2007.

Gave in to Orange Box

2007-10-19T06:18:00.000-07:00

Despite not wanting to dive into another fps, a full week of peer pressure and rave reviews destroyed my resolve (not to mention interrupting my pure Phantom Hourglass bliss). Loooove Team Fortress 2, especially since Halo 3 mp hasn’t done much for me so far.

Played some Ep 1 briefly and have been told I will be underwhelmed. With expectations in check, I was actually extremely impressed…with the audio. I played Half-Life 2 on my PC equipped with 5.1 surround sound, but Ep 1 sounds so much better. It’s probably a case of my crappy pc card/speakers vs. a full on AV receiver/surround speakers, but the result is I’m very happy so far.

All that and I haven’t even started Portal yet.

Time to enjoy DS is now

2007-10-12T06:44:00.000-07:00

Aside from Jam Sessions, I haven’t been using my DS enough. I need to fight the urge to squirrel games away to enjoy only while traveling or for a time when playing on a TV is impossible. I intend to break mental block by popping in Phantom Hourglass this weekend and perhaps another DS title right after that.

What’s caused this renewed resolve to start enjoying the DS? The announcement of Advance Wars 2 and Fire Emblem. The Fire Emblem announcement is loooong overdue. I have the GameCube FE, but it’s hard for me to embrace that experience on the big screen. It doesn’t help that the graphics aren’t spectacular either. I guess the point is that strategy games are my favorite travel genre and knowing two gems are enroute free me to get to playing. I haven’t even touched the first Advance Wars for DS (finished the two GBA ones though).

Craving some whimsy

2007-10-04T07:02:00.000-07:00

Finished solo campaign Halo 3 last night and...it was fun. Any portion with vehicles was great, but the rest was just average. The levels feel very much like they are meant to be played co-op. Haven't played multi-player matches yet, but I just haven't been in the mood for that.

I'm much more looking forward to tracking down Phantom Hourglass (seems like it's sold out at a lot of places) and Folklore (for PS3 next week). I'm craving some whimsy and fantastical magical worlds now. Had enough of the shooting for quite a while. That means HL2 Orange Box is gonna have to wait, perhaps till next year or even till episode 3! That's probably fps burn out talking.

3rd FPS Game of the Year contender in a row

2007-09-25T18:02:00.001-07:00

I pondered very briefly for a few seconds at midnight last night whether I should get dressed and head down to the GameStop a few miles away. That moment passed without much regret.

I stuck to my original plan and hit the nearby Costco as soon as they let in the non-exclusive business members (11AM) and enjoyed the best price in town - $49.99. I would have gone at lunch, but I did sort of panic at the thought of it getting sold out. They had at least 60+ on display and perhaps more in the back. Still it was nice to get in and out before the larger crowds wandered in.

It is very, very strange that not only am I playing three fps games in a row (BioShock, Prime 3), but they are all uber fantastic (the jury for me is still not in for Halo 3, but it'll be good I'm sure). I finished Metroid Prime 3 just this past weekend so the timing is perfect.

So if you have a Costco membership, grab yourself some Halo 3. They also had the Halo 3 Xbox 360 which comes bundled with the special edition of the game.

My favorite podcast right now is…

2007-09-21T06:58:00.000-07:00

…Smodcast. If you are a fan of Kevin Smith’s movies or have seen any of his “An Evening With” DVDs, it’s a must listen. For everyone else who enjoys his style of humor, it’s still absolutely worth checking out. It’s Kevin Smith and his producer/buddy Scott Mosier talking no-hold barred about every topic imaginable and it almost always get insanely raunchy. It’s not for the sensitive types.

I have a 40 min to 1 hour plus commute each way so I listen to a ton of podcasts. There has never been one that has made me laugh hard and often as Smodcast. I started with episode 24 (it’s up to 29 right now), but I’ve gone back and downloaded all of them. Unlike many podcasts that start slow and build their style and rythm with each subsequent episode, Smodcast is guns blazing right from the first one. Check it out!

Rock Band Shocker!
I was dead set on buying only Rock Band this holiday and skipping GH III, until I stopped and actually looked at the track lists. GH III has a ton more songs I want to play! It’s not that I hate GH, but I really want that Rock Band 360 wireless guitar and at this point, it’s not for sure it will work with GH III. I’ll have to think about this one right up to release day.

The rest of 2007

2007-09-12T06:40:00.000-07:00

I’m almost finished with Metroid Prime Corruption and debating whether I have enough time to play through Bioshock one more time before Halo 3 comes out. Corruption has been so enjoyable that I may play that again too (word is you unlock a harder mode after completion). I’ve even managed to sneak in sessions of Odin Sphere in the bedroom when the TV that the Wii is attached to is in use. Playing great games really makes you hungry to play more games all the time.

That got me thinking about the line-up for the rest of this year. This list will have to undergo more painful pairing down, but as of this moment all these games are on my buy right away list. Everything else will get picked up further down the line…maybe.

DS
Jam Sessions
Legend of Zelda Phantom Hourglass
Phoenix Wright: Trials & Tribulations

Xbox 360
Halo 3
Mass Effect
Virtua Fighter 5
Rock Band
Call of Duty 4 Modern Warfare

PS3
Ratchet & Clank Future
Folklore
Singstar
Uncharted: Drake’s Fortune

Wii
Super Mario Galaxy
Resident Evil Umbrella Chronicles
Super Smash Bros. Brawl

Metroid holds its own (Spoiler free)

2007-08-30T06:56:00.000-07:00

After coming off the visual and story laden feast that was BioShock, I was very concerned how I would receive Metroid Prime Corruption.

After only two hours in, I can safely say Corruption is rocking my world. There is far more story than I expected and it looks good enough. My only regret is that I never got around to playing Echoes and it’s just not going to happen now that I’m used to the Wii controls.

I definitely plan on going back to BioShock on hard difficulty and being “bad”, but Metroid should keep me busy for a long while. Especially since I’m scanning everything like a madman.

If you have a Wii and were on the fence about Corruption, relax and go get it now.

Everything is cool now.

2007-08-23T06:22:00.000-07:00

All is not well in the land of new receivers. The Onkyo 605 I got a few weeks back suffers from audio popping/cracking. It appears to be a problem that plagues the entire line of recent Onkyo receivers. The tragedy of this is that the 605 is the most affordable option for next gen audio playback on the market today. The list of features makes it as future proof as possible and the sound quality is awesome.

So, I had the option of shipping it back and hoping the replacement was better (owners who have done so have reported mixed results) or explore an alternative solution. A message board post on the AVS forums recommended using PC cooling fans. Normally I would not pay my own money to fix something the manufacturer messed up, but I have several items that could use cooling. My DVR runs really hot (the last DVR literally burned out last summer), the PS3 runs also quite hot at times and the 360 is an ever worrisome overheating bomb.

I decided to take the plunge and order the power supply and three fans. One for the receiver, one for the DVR, and one for the PS3/360. WOW. The impact was immediate. It completely solves the popping problem. The DVR is running smoothly and I’m not as worried about the long term health of my consoles. Plus the fans are SUPER quiet. Despite being fairly large, you can’t hear them at all unless you put them next to your ear. You’ll want to follow the advice of the poster and get the rubber feet for maximum noise cancelling once you place the fans.

The biggest side benefit was for my PC. Yes, that same desktop I thought was dying just a few months ago. I cracked it open for a cleaning and was shocked to discover the fans in there are quite small. The fan I was going to use exclusively for the PS3/360 (I just move the DVR fan to the console in use) now sits inside my PC. It no longer crashes and now starts reliably.

In any case, I can’t recommend enough turning to outside cooling to improve the mileage of your gear. The life of the fans is listed at 150,000 hours, which is roughly 17 years of continuous use. That’s certainly a better investment than any warranty.

A tale of two demos

2007-08-16T06:38:00.000-07:00

It only took 5 minutes of playing the BioShock demo to convince me I had to own this game. I even stopped playing because I want to save the as much of the experience for when the game comes out next week. It would be great if I happen upon a store that has leaked it early, but whatever. I would have bought it anyway I guess, but the demo has me psyched out of my head.

On the other hand, I now know for a fact that Stranglehold will be totally skipped over, but not for the reasons you might think. I actually liked the demo a lot. It’s great fun, looks good, etc. The problem was that it made me dizzy as hell. The only games that ever made me dizzy were the first Turok on the N64, Half-Life, Half-Life 2, and Prey. Out of those, I only finished HL 1 and 2. I’m willing to deal with headaches for HL Episode 1 and 2, but I didn’t enjoy Stranglehold enough to warrant getting sick.

Does anyone else get selective dizziness from certain games?

Putting a hold on Stranglehold

2007-08-01T06:54:00.000-07:00

I was out of my mind psyched when the initial news broke that the PS3 Collector’s Edition of Stranglehold would contain the HD version of Hard Boiled on Blu-ray. As the weeks passed, several serious questions and concerns nagged at me:

- How good will Stranglehold actually be?
- Will the HD mastering of the movie be up to snuff?
- Do I really want to keep the Stranglehold game forever in my library the way I intend to keep Hard Boiled? (very important since they are on the same disc)
- The CE is supposed to be very limited so you almost have to commit now to make sure you get one. This removes the possibility of waiting for the reviews to come out before purchasing.

As I was thinking things over, I happened across this interview that explains the movie will only play on a PS3. Since it is one Blu-ray disc, that is sort of understandable, but it really limits where I can playback the movie. The interview also mentions that the production run of the CE is in the six figures, so at least 100,000 will be available.

Let’s digest that number shall we? Now 10,000, that there is a limited number. 10,000 happens to be the US production run of Panzer Dragoon Saga for Saturn and that (plus the fantastic quality of the game) justifies the $100+ asking price on eBay for the game. Most games are lucky to even reach the 50,000 sold mark. Very few do. But 100,000?

For 100,000 to truly be a limited number, the game would have to be a massive, massive hit. Let’s put this in perspective. Final Fantasy XII sold/shipped 1.5 million copies in the US. I couldn’t find how many of those were the Collector’s Editions, but I do know that they sat around unwanted on the shelf long enough for me to pick it up at a hugely discounted price a few weeks back (this discount was across all EB/GameStop stores). This happened even though FF has a huge fan base and tons of people own a PS2.

Combine the installed base of PS3 owners with the fact that the Xbox 360 and PC versions of Stranglehold come out three weeks BEFORE the PS3 version and you begin to question just how scarce the PS3 CE will actually be.

I’m going to wait until Hard Boiled makes a stand alone appearance on Blu-ray. I want the whole disc to be dedicated to the movie for optimum audio and video quality. I also am hoping Criterion will enter the HD market by that time since their regular DVD version of Hard Boiled kicked all kinds of ass (except in the video department, but that is only compared to the higher picture standards of today. Back then it rocked hard. It also contained a huge amount of special features).

If Stranglehold turns out to be a must play, I’ll rent the 360 version. Problem solved.

I should also mention that part of the skittishness about paying an extra $10 for a CE is partly the fault of Ninja Gaiden Sigma. I soooo should have just bought the regular version, but the excitement got the best of me.

You are a DVD retail buyer. What would you do?
While we’re on the subject of movies on discs, did you ever wonder just how many DVDs are released in a given week? Digital Bits has a weekly collection of what is out along with super handy images of movie covers. Wow. There are weeks where this list is three times larger.

It’s actually quite easy to pick out what will be the most popular, but look at all those smaller scale releases! It’s amazing. I would love to physically visit a shop that stocks every single DVD that has been released. That would be quite a trip.

Weddings and HD purchases

2007-07-23T06:30:00.000-07:00

Thinking about how many DVDs I regret buying, I’m looking at the upcoming release list for both Blu-ray and HD-DVD with a super critical eye. I’m on the fence about Shaun of the Dead and Hot Fuzz. I loved Shaun, but not sure if I really need to own it. I haven’t seen Fuzz, so most likely will rent it from Netflix first.

Of course 300 is a definite buy. Even though the HD-DVD version has some extra interactive content, I have to go Blu-ray because of the audio. The Xbox 360 HD-DVD player does not support Dolby TrueHD (even with the HDMI on the Elite), but the PS3 does. For me, the best possible audio is more important than extra special features I’ll view only once.

Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within will most likely get purchased although I might wait for reviews on pic quality to pop up. The story wasn’t that great, but damn it should look and sound amazing on Blu-ray. I’m glad I waited on the special edition of The Wild Bunch since the Blu-ray version was finally announced last week. It comes out September 25th with all the content from the SE. Very excited.

Wedding Season
I went to my friend Pete’s wedding two weeks ago, but hadn’t gotten around to getting the pics off my camera till now. It was an awesome wedding and I got to see a lot of people I haven’t talked to in a while.

Tops on that list is the man of many talents Nate Denver.

There were also other shady characters floating around.

E3 2007 Quick Takes (UPDATED Fri)

2007-07-12T06:22:00.000-07:00

There’s tons of news on E3 out there so I’ll keep my observations brief and ordered by what I’m loving and not loving.

Loving
1. Xbox Live/PSN downloads – I can’t tell you how awesome it is watching the MGS 4 trailer right on my own HDTV. Meryl looks so damn cool. The Killzone 2 trailers is great too. PSN really needs some demos though. Both services delivering so far. Looking forward to tonight. UPDATE - After a strong start, the PSN store had three more items as of today/fri, the last day of the show. Very sad. The live content has been steady with a very long Too Human trailer being one of the highlights. Let's hope we'll see some updates this weekend and early next week.

2. Call of Duty 4 – I haven’t been this psyched for a Call of Duty game since the first one.
3. Slim PSP – I sold off my older PSP a month ago in anticipation of this. Not as radical a change as I might have liked, but I made back more than enough to cover the new slim since I pulled the trigger early. Being able to play PSP games on a TV is killer. Suddenly I’m extra excited about God of War and popping in old favorites like Lumines. The raised D-Pad is a welcome addition as well.
4. Rock Band – How awesome is this game looking? You get four games in one, a guitar that kicks the hell out of the guitar hero one (yes even the newer one), entire albums that will be available for download, and a wider variety of songs. I’ll still get GH III, but maybe I won’t be rushing out to do so.
5. Resident Evil 5, Soul Calibur IV and Halo Wars – 2008 games have been very low profile at this E3 (MGS4 doesn’t count since it was previously 2007), so it was very nice to see how impressive RE 5, SC IV and Halo Wars could potentially be.

Not loving
1. Halo 3 – I can’t believe how mediocre this is looking so far. I’m positive it will still be a great game, but the excitement level is at an all-time low.
2. The pre-E3 press conferences – No really big news or surprises other than the new Mario Kart and Killzone 2 redeeming itself. The logical side of me knows that there are tons of hot games for this fall, so the usual teases of “future” games would be counter-productive.
3. PS3 holiday outlook – With MGS 4 delayed till 2008, the only games to look forward to are the new Ratchet, Uncharted, and possibly Heavenly Sword. Will any of those rock my world the way MGS 4 would have? Where the hell is Tekken 6? Is that 2008 now too? Boo!
4. Wii 2008 – Mario, Metroid, Smash Bros, and Wii Fit are sure to be enough for this holiday, but I’m getting more worried about the 2008 picture. Mari Kart looks super rad and…well, what else will fill the void? Maybe Tokyo Game Show will shed some more light.
5. MGS 4 trailer – Mind you, I loved it overall, especially how much Meryl was in it. When comparing it to past E3 MGS trailers though, it kind of comes up short.

July 4th dilemma

2007-07-03T06:16:00.000-07:00

The good news is I just picked up Ninja Gaiden Sigma. The bad news is I'm still neck deep in Odin Sphere. The pace of the two games are so different, it would be tough playing them alternately. Also, NG is the type of action game you really have to devote your full attention to. I might finish out the current character arc (The Pooka Prince) and come back to it after I finish Sigma. There is a story viewer in Odin Sphere I can use to refresh my memory.

In other Tecmo news, they just announced DOA Online for release in China. It's going to be more of a casual MMO type of deal and feature characters that are more cartoony. Bizarre.

Evangelion almost pulls me back in (spoiler free rant)

2007-06-25T06:07:00.000-07:00

I’ve been selecting random DVDs from the shelf to check out how they looked upscaled on the PS3 and last night it happened to be Evangelion. This was the Platinum release with the slightly cleaner transfer and 5.1 audio mix. I just wanted to enjoy the opening theme music and random scenes, but I ended up watching all five episodes on the first disc. The pacing of these first shows is so stellar, it just grabs you instantly.

I’ve only watched the series through once back in the day on VHS. I skipped the first batch of DVDs and ended up picking up the first three Platinum volumes.

Now I’m stuck. Do I go pick up the other four platinum DVDs? For the same price, I could get the collected Platinum box and sell of the three volumes I already have. I also have to consider that a Blu-ray or HD-DVD release can’t be more than two years away and it’s not like I can’t wait till then.

But wait, it gets more complicated!

So say I start re-watching the entire series. There is the matter of the post series Evangelion movies that sought to clarify and give some better resolution to the whole affair. The movies were considered “still confusing”, “terrible” or “not that bad” depending on who you asked. I never watched them for a variety of reasons like bad transfer quality, fan reaction, and mainly because I had moved on at that time.

Most of this info is old hat and you can read up at length on the series here.

And still it doesn’t end there.

A brand new four movie re-telling called Rebuild of Evangelion is set to be released later this year. Geez…I think its for the best I go back into Evangelion hibernation and re-emerge when the Rebuild movies are all out on Blu-ray.

#1 Pac-Man CE player (UPDATED!)

2007-06-18T06:29:00.000-07:00

Not #1 worldwide, but at least on my friends list I am. It probably has changed since last night, but I was at #231 overall (score was 285K+). I’m not sure how many people are playing it, but the lowest ranked person on my list is #40,000. Feels pretty sweet to be #231 out of at least 40,000+ players.

Big credit has to go to my man Erik Harte who reveled a crucial portion of his strategy (he was formerly tops on my list at 270K+) that filled in some holes in my route. At this point I feel I’m reaching the max of what I can do with the game. There are a few more tricks I want to try that may get me over the 300K mark, but burn out is starting to set in.

UPDATE: Last night I hit 310K+. I wish xbox.com would let you check your scores and not just basic live info. At the time I hit that mark, I was ranked #131 in the world. After checking 1 hour later, I was at #140. Oh well, still in the top #200. I felt like I would take a break for a bit, but this morning in the office everyone was buzzing about challenging my score. It's got me amped again to keep getting better. Still, I feel I'm close to my max ability in the game. We'll see.

Super PlayStation 2 Haul

2007-06-11T05:55:00.000-07:00

Finished off Command & Conquer 3 this weekend. Final verdict: I liked it. Wasn’t wild about it, but it was worth playing through.

Within the past week, I picked up more PS2 games in a concentrated span than I can remember. It started with EB’s clearance sale where I got Final Fantasy XII Limited Edition for $29.99 (marked down from the $39 sticker you see on it). Then came Odin Sphere in the mail from Amazon. I’ve talked about those two before so up to this point, no surprises.

I own Karaoke Revolution 1 and KR Party which actually come in handy when folks come over. The most recent American Idol version has, in my opinion, the best song selection yet in the series. Normally stores only carry the package that comes with the mic, but I managed to find a regular “game only” copy so I snagged it.

I’ve been intrigued by the retro game compilation Taito Legends 2 since its limited GameStop only release a few weeks back. It’s loaded with some great titles I’ve played before, but the true joy is trying out the more obscure ones and hoping to find some gems. It’s only $20, so grabbed one on Sunday. Having an absolute blast so far. With Xbox Live Arcade/VC/PSN retro games selling anywhere from $4 - $10 a pop, it really feels like the deal of the century to get so many quality games. There are a good number of titles that look almost as good as Neo Geo games, or at worst, far better than what the Genesis or Super NES was capable of. Violence Fight and the three Final Fight clones fall into this category.

I’ve been especially haunted by the music in Rastan Saga II. It’s like a synth-heavy version of the Conan movie soundtrack interspersed with bizarre female voices. It changes what would normally be a mundane, albeit incredibly difficult, sidescrolling hack & slash into a psychadellic descent into barbarian hell. The hell part is very apt because the game is very terrible, but I can't stop trying to beat it (Above pic taken from this source). Elevator Action II/Elevator Action Returns was previously only available as a high-priced import Saturn game and it’s totally worth $20 by itself.

Speaking of Xbox Live Arcade, I can’t stop thinking about Pac-Man Championship Edition. I downloaded the free trial and was ready to purchase when the $10 price scared me away. Well, that was four days ago and not a minute goes by where I don’t wish I was playing it. Looks like I’ll have to pay up. I know a lot of my friends are playing so I can’t wait to see what their scores are. I still hold the top spot for Galaga scores in my group, but have been severely outpaced on the Geometry Wars rankings.

The Elite, HD-DVD, and C&C 3

2007-06-01T06:13:00.000-07:00

There are times when I think I absolutely hate Command & Conquer 3, but then I go right back and play it obsessively. The game has to be doing something right I guess.

I polished off the GDI campaign on medium over the Memorial Day weekend getting both the campaign achievement and the one for finishing on medium with all the bonus objectives. I quickly started into the Nod campaign and I’m about 5 missions in. I was really hoping the Nod forces would be more fun, but so far there are only a few units I like. The commando is cooler than the GDI one, the fanatics are fun, and I like the dudes who can hang glide into areas.

After spending way too many hours getting all the bonus objectives for GDI (which only amounted to 25 more points) I decided to just beat the Nod campaign sans bonuses. The way the game is structured, you can always return to earlier missions so I can always go back and get them if I felt the need.

I did take a break from C&C since I got Ouendan 2 in the mail. I finished everything in the normal mode and started into hard. Great stuff, but so far some of the songs aren’t really sticking.

I finally got a chance to try out the 360 Elite and HD-DVD attachment on my home 1080p TV. Right away I could see a difference in appearance of the menu blades. Game and movie trailers also looked sharper although it depended greatly on the material. The only game I tried for a bit was C&C 3 and it did look a touch sharper. I’ll have to play more to know for sure. King Kong looks really good. I’m not sure if a new firmware improves this, but the menus and load times are much slower than watching Blu-ray movies on the PS3.

I’ve been mildly tempted to go out and pick up one or two HD-DVD discs, but that would be silly. I’m not sure I would ever own a HD-DVD player of my own. There’s been buzz recently with Toshiba lowering the price on their entry level player to $299. Combine that with offers of 2-7 free discs or other discounts like Amazon’s recent sale at $243 and you have lots of people on the fence jumping in. The only problem for me is that the entry level players are only 1080i. Ha, I can hear the chorus of 1080p is overrated already. Shut it. It matters to me and that’s all that counts in this vote.

What would have to happen for me to commit to TWO formats? Well:

1. HD-DVD would still have to be going strong holiday 2008
2. A good, stand alone HD-DVD players with 1080p drop below $200, $149 is the magic number
3. The Lord of the Rings Trilogy HD-DVD box set is released well before the Blu-ray. This would also have to be the brand new HD extras packed version Peter Jackson has been talking about and not another “milk the early adopter” release
4. The library of available Blu-ray titles is not satisfying enough by holiday 2008

Even so, I really hope one format is close to dead by early 2008. I thought HD-DVD was near dead, but these price cuts have really done a number on that perception. Even so, this news just came out regarding how much better the two Pirate movies on Blu-ray outsold the two Matrix collections.

Home audio about to blow up

2007-05-22T07:05:00.000-07:00

The two previous Pirates movies are out on Blu-ray this week to coincide with the third theatrical release. All the reviews I’ve read about the Blu-ray discs are glowing. Top-notch video, audio quality AND tons of bonus features. Couple that with the release of Curse of the Golden Flower next week and 300 in July and you have one happy PS3 owner. Of course Ninja Gaiden Sigma will make me happiest, but we’re just talking movies right now.

A key piece to this movie happiness is the impending release of the new line of receivers from Onkyo. The most affordable is the SR605 which is among the first to decode ALL of the new HD audio formats. MSRP is $599, but most sites list it for $499. I’ve seen some early deals that offered pre-orders at $399 although I can’t find them anymore. Since the PC purchase has been pushed well back to sometime next year, this receiver purchase is a no-brainer. Thank goodness I didn’t bite too early on the earlier Onkyo.

Making equally big noise is the Matrix Trilogy on HD-DVD. I really, really want the original in HD, but I can wait for Blu-ray, whenever that will be. It’s a real shame that the Animatrix is still the same old DVD version. A crime really.

The biggest Blu-ray release for me this year is definitely going to be Blade Runner: The Essentail 25th Anniversary Edition. The flyer included in the Matrix box set teases the HD-DVD version, but the Blu-ray one is supposed to come out on the same day. Blade Runner was the title that made me adopt the original DVD format so quickly and it’s still in my top five movies of all time. The wait for this is going to be painful.

Another Blu-ray surprise is that the PS3 version of Stranglehold will also include the HD version of Hard Boiled. At first I thought this premium extra would raise the price of the $59 game to somewhere around $79-89, but it's only ten bucks more, $69! Wow. I will take the HD version of a movie over achievements every time.

Some new screens surfaced from the recent Square/Enix event in Japan. There were tons of interesting news and photos, but again, this particular pic from the Final Fantasy I remake on PSP has me psyched. I mean, the sprites are just soooo colorful and gorgeous. I really hope to see some more movies of this in action to either completely sell me on it or potentially frighten me away for good with crappy animation.

One last RTS note and we’ll be done with that business for a while. I greatly disliked Age of Empires III and naturally had no interest in the first expansion. The second expansion, The Asian Dynasties, is another story. I can’t ignore a game with my peoples in it. At least I think Japan is in it. It’s out this Fall, which means I probably won’t play it until next year when a new PC (or Mac?!) comes into play to prepare for StarCraft II.

StarCraft II revealed = PC/Mac purchase to follow

2007-05-19T10:26:00.000-07:00

So yeah, all that hemming and hawing about whether to give up on PC gaming is at a clear and decisive end. Whenever StarCraft II is about to hit stores is when I buy a new PC. Or perhaps a new Mac? I played the original StarCraft and Diablo II on Macs so that combo does give me the warm fuzzies. I'll cross that bridge when I come to it, but I can't tell you how psyched I am (as are millions of other SC fans across the globe).

I was almost dreading logging on this morning. If the next StarCraft was a MMO, I don’t know what would have happened. It’s probably going to become a reality eventually, but at least there is one last hurrah like Warcraft III to go back and play.

Now the long wait for release date info begins. With previous Blizzard games, the release of the title can be upwards of 2+ years after the initial announcement. Knowing the stakes involved to make sure SC II is well balanced for multiplayer, that wait could potentially be even longer.

I’m just hoping SC II has been in the cooker for so long that it’s pretty much done and public/closed beta testing will start soon. Is an early 2008 release or (gasp) December 2007 bow an impossible dream?

Alternative RTS action

2007-05-17T06:24:00.000-07:00

I’ve pretty much decided to wait until later this year for a PC and at that time get the cheapest of the new Direct X10 cards available. I'll just survive with my office laptop if/when disaster strikes my home PC. My hope is that by the Fall, such a rig can be had for the magical $1000 or less mark. My fingers are crossed very hard.

In case that doesn’t materialize, I looked over the RTS landscape for consoles and (gasp) handhelds. The outlook is pretty darn good actually. The big headliner is of course Halo Wars, but that is probably not coming out till holiday 2008. In the near term, Tom Clancy’s End War sounds promising and Universe at War could be good too. There are rumblings that a port of Warhammer: Mark of Chaos will be announced for the 360 soon. Even less reliable are grumblings that Relic is preparing a RTS for consoles. Whether that’s a new IP or a port of Company of Heroes or the Dawn of War series, I would be a happy camper either way.

On the less traditional RTS front, we have Grim Grimoire for the PS2. If you can believe it, GG is a side-scrolling 2D RTS. Wild. Though not scheduled for US release yet, Shining Wind for the PS2 is also lurking having just come out in Japan this week. Then there is FFXII Revenant Wings and Heroes of Mana both for the DS.

So whatever happens, my RTS cravings should get satisfied.

The power of demos
I downloaded Area 51 Black Site the other night and was completely taken by surprise. I had heard relatively good things about the last FPS Area 51 game, but could not have cared less during that period. Having played through the fairly short demo level of Black Site, I can safely say that a purchase of the full game is highly likely. Correction, a purchase “was” highly likely until the release date of Halo 3 was announced a few days ago. A scant two weeks after Area 51 hits stores. If money is tight that month, it will be no contest. Sorry Area 51...again!

The other demo I checked out was Forza 2. Admittedly, I’m not the core target for this game. I like racing games, but favor the arcade-style affairs. I was definitely impressed with the smooth car handling, and I really like the visual brake assist arrows. Even so, the graphics whore in me just could not get past the visuals. I haven’t played with the Gran Turismo HD demo since it was released, but I have been downloading the time trial and car highlight videos from the Japanese PSN store. There is just no comparison. Forza looks like a shiny, too brightly lit “game” and GT HD looks like real life. I mean really, really looks like real life. Stunning is not an understatement.

A demo that I do constantly boot up is Ninja Gaiden Sigma. It’s great that you have access to multiple weapons and difficulty to help hone your skills till the game comes out. Perfect use of a demo to keep your fans happy I'd say.

Weekend gaming report

2007-05-14T06:35:00.000-07:00

I have some mixed feelings after playing Command & Conquer 360 over the weekend. On one hand, I was having a great old time and got right back into the RTS groove. Using the control pad works just fine and playing the game on my couch with big TV + surround sound is fantastic.

The biggest annoyance so far is how easy it is to mess up the bonus objectives. They can even pop up after it’s too late to do anything. I save quite often, but usually don’t keep more than five or six during a mission. Now I have to keep like a dozen just to make sure I don’t have to replay huge chunks of it. I’m maybe half-way through the GDI missions on Medium difficulty and I’m not sure if my enjoyment level will sustain me for all three campaigns. I’m really hoping the NOD campaign is more fun than the GDI.

The week’s releases
I stumbled across Etrian Odyssey for the first time last week and it’s kind of intriguing. From what I’ve read, it sounds a lot like Wizardry with a heavy dose of map making and anime art. There are no formal reviews yet, which makes me nervous because the last quirky Atlus game I almost bought was Izuna: Legend of the Unemployed Ninja. Everything pre-release about Izuna like the art and the wacky premise screamed “must purchase!”. Then the reviews hit and it turned out it didn’t have much of a story or characters after all. Worst of all, it was an unforgivingly difficult bitch of a dungeon crawler.

I’ll skip on Etrian unless someone tells me different. Especially since Oendan 2 comes out in Japan this week and I have that bad boy pre-ordered. Woohoo!

PC conundrum round 3
I priced a few more PCs online and I just hate the configurations. Especially since there were a lot of renewed rumblings over ATI’s upcoming Direct X10 cards. I’m definitely going to wait and see what their low-end card will cost in PCs from Dell and HP. Until then, I have to use my home rig sparingly.

Life could be so simple and cheaper… (UPDATED!)

2007-05-08T06:04:00.000-07:00

…if I could only let go of PC gaming. I bought my previous PC a week after viewing the demo of Half-Life 2 at E3 2003 and believing their promise of release later that year. It still ran near perfect when it did ship in September 2004, but there were games released at the time that I already could not run at the maximum setting.

The last game I tried to play was the expansion to Dawn of War and it was an extremely painful process. I gave up gaming on my PC altogether after that, which was a shame since RTS games are my fav on the platform and I could only guess at the goodness that was Company of Heroes, the second Dawn of War expansion, and C&C 3 (well not so much the last one because of the 360 version).

My new PC plan was airtight - sit back till Crysis ships. By then, Vista will be better, there should actually be DX10 cards readily available, and I’ll reap the obligatory CPU gains. That plan got shot to hell in recent weeks. MY PC is experiencing a start-up problem that not even re-installing XP will fix. It doesn’t happen all the time, but ultimate death can’t be too far behind. I started scanning current deals and Sunday circulars and the outlook was bleak. To get something that could stand a chance of running Crysis at this point in time is damn expensive. Minium 2K, but really it would be more, much more. That is simply out of the question. I’ve got 120k miles on my car so that would take priority.

Do I even need to play PC games anyway? I haven't gamed on my PC for almost two years. I can play a dozen games like Crysis on the 360 and PS3 as well as RTS on the 360 and the DS (Heroes of Mana looks really good and it’s only a matter of time before we see more RTS action on the Dual Screen...I know I'm really reaching here).

If I settled for a graphics card that was just good enough to unleash the fancy Vista features, I could still run a number of games I missed out on (Company of Heroes, Titan Quest, etc) and only spend $600-900 tops. And then a scarier thought cropped up – If I can let go of PC gaming, why not get a Mac? Those new MacBooks are pretty nice and I can still run XP at least. Then again, all the software and RAM upgrades I want would cost more on a Mac driving up the costs back closer to mid-level PC gaming rig.

I have no clue what to do at this point. Just have to wait and ride this PC till the wheels fall off.

UPDATE
I decided to dig through some older PC games to see what I might still actually play if I were to get a new rig soon. First game cases I flipped through were StarCraft and Diablo II plus their expansions. I know I would re-install either at a moments notice if the mood struck me. Ooh what do we have here…Myth I, II and III. I had always meant to go back to these (hmmm maybe not III). They were darn hard if I recall correctly and I never finished any of them. It was tough to stop my grenadiers from blowing up my own troops. I wonder if the games hold up though?

What else do we have here, ah Rise of Nations. I think this could still be good. Next. Oh man totally forgot about Rome Total War. I remember being into it for a few days and then wanted to restart because I had messed up so bad. I’m sure this could be fun still too.

Ha, well if it isn’t Emperor Battle for Dune. I doubt this would be that great. It got mixed reviews back in the day. I remember Sean playing it and marveling at the hilarious live action clips. Maybe it is worth looking at again.

Hmm Age of Mythology. I already tried to go back to this one after Dawn of War. It didn’t have enough personality to make me overlook how tediously old school it is.

Looks like stores are finally getting in copies of C&C for the 360 (none I checked had them yesterday). We’ll have to see if it helps me in this decision.

Go Warriors!

2007-05-04T06:11:00.000-07:00

I moved to the Bay Area around 1998/99 and up to that point followed the Knicks. That was primarily because of Patrick Ewing and the team of that era. John Starks, Charles Oakley, Anthony Mason and later on Allen Houston, Larry Johnson and good old Charlie Ward. But it was really Ewing that I liked and my Knick love had waned greatly since his retirement.

Since they were on local TV more often than not, I started casually watching the Warriors. Ticket prices weren’t as outrageous as other teams so I started going to a few games too. The arena was usually half to 2/3 full (depending on the opponent) and most nights the biggest excitement was getting a free Taco Bell Chalupa if the Warriors scored over 100.

Fast forward to the 2001 season when…IT happened. I can’t remember which game it was now, but after hitting a wide open three pointer, I jumped up and proclaimed Bobby Sura to be a great addition to the Warriors. You heard me, Bob Sura. It was at that moment that I realized I had become a true desperate, rose-colored glasses wearing Warriors fan. There was no turning back.

Fast forward again to last night. The Warriors make history and advance to the 2nd round. It’s almost too crazy to believe. This whole season has been such a wild roller coaster ride. There were a lot of great games in last year’s playoffs, but maaaan…it is so much more exciting when your team is in there and playing tremendous ball. Go Warriors!

Already looking to the future

2007-04-26T05:45:00.000-07:00

I’m about 10 hours into Oblivion and so far…meh. I’m going to give it more time of course, but titles I’m insanely excited for are just around the corner. This weekend will be all about the Ninja Gaiden Sigma demo. I’m sure it won’t be a very long, but I’m fine playing whatever is there over and over again.

May 8th sees the release of Command & Conquer for the 360. Long time readers know I loved Battle for Middle Earth on the 360 and this is supposed to control and run better.

Dropping May 22nd is Odin Sphere for the PS2. The game hits my old school 2D sprite-like (not sure if they are sprites or colored 3D objects) buttons in a major way. The art looks cool and the action seems really fun. I’ve basically seen enough that I’m getting this no matter what and abstaining from further info.

In terms of stuff already out, I’d like to pick up Super Paper Mario. I’ve also had a weird craving to get some use out of my PSP lately. Popped in Ultimate Ghosts ‘N Goblins the other day and forgot how much I liked it. I wasn’t even one-third of the way through before I stopped initially. Also need to play more than 10 minutes of Metal Gear Portable Ops. In other words, plenty to play without having to buy anything new.

Mega Update

2007-04-19T06:31:00.000-07:00

Lots of random bits here and there. Enjoy!

Valomilk
Saw these things featured on the Food Network and had to try it. I got some other folks in the office to go in with me since shipping costs made the chocolate goods a bit on the pricey side. They arrived just fine and were pretty good. Very rich. The marshmallow inside is super runny since it has extra vanilla in it. I can’t say that it was awesome, but it was interesting.

Rhythm is gonna get you!
Since I never seriously played the PS2 version, it’s been non-stop Guitar Hero II action for me on the 360. Even though I’m not familiar with a lot of the songs, it’s still great fun and many of the tunes just get stuck in my head. Even though I have some MS points just sitting around, there is no way I’m using any of them to buy new music tracks. Way, way overpriced. Actually, the majority of the content on marketplace is overpriced. I know there will be something worth purchasing later, but for now I’m hoping enough users are also saying no to outrageous content charges to make a difference. I haven’t even renewed my gold subscription which has been done since December.

Getting back to the musical theme, Play Asia had this awesome 20% off sale a few weeks ago so I was able to pick up Rhythm Heaven (Tengoku) for the GBA. This has been on my want list since forever and I was wishing it would get released here. A year later, there are no signs it will. It doesn’t matter now as I’m enjoying the hell out of the import. Rhythm Heaven is a music button tapping game from the WarioWare folks and even uses some of the same sound effects in spots. It’s super wacky, very challenging, and utterly addictive.

360 back compat
On a more topical matter, the latest Xbox 360 back compat list was released today. Tops for me are Panzer Dragoon Orta, Phantom Dust (from the Panzer Dragoon team), and JSRF. All games I never played more than 10 minutes due to various reasons and each are games I have been dying to get back to. Dead or Alive Ultimate and DOA 3 look great upconverted to 720p, so I’m excited to see whether there is a noticeable boost for these other games. The last of my Xbox games not back compat is finally getting smaller! I just need Silent Hill 2 and, um, blanking on the others, but it’s not that many anymore.

OBLIVION
Yes, I am finally, finally playing Oblivion on PS3. Haven’t gotten super far yet, but looking forward to exploring the world. I spent a lot of time reading up before even booting it up to make sure my class choices were as good as they could be. I usually choose pure melee tank characters, but decided to go with a character that uses mostly magic with some proficiency with blade weapons. Love the combo so far.

It did dawn on me that the only two games I own for the PS3 are games already available for the 360 (Oblivion) or will soon be (Virtua Fighter 5). I’ve also been wondering if I should get the 360 version of VF5, but it seems like that would strictly be an achievement points move. If the 360 version were to look identical to the PS3, I might consider trading up since I like my DOA4 hori stick vs. the PS3 hori arcade stick. It seems highly unlikely, although they could get close if Sega specifically supports the HDMI output on the elite models.

Final Fantasy PSP
As much as I was looking forward to FFIII for the DS, the old school nature of its gameplay made me think twice, not to mention the time sink RPGs represent. I happened across screens for the updated FF I & II (they are two separate releases!) and I have to say I’m tempted to get them. I really love the upgraded sprite graphics.

They appeal to me more than the aliased N64-like 3D visuals of III DS. Even so, $30 each for these remakes seems like highway robbery no matter how much extra work was put into them. You can get three Phantasy Star games on the Genesis collection for PSP for $30 ($20 or less if you get lucky).

Farewell Doug Perry!

2007-04-13T19:13:00.000-07:00

Today was long-time IGN editor Doug Perry's last day in the office. He is moving on to a new place that apparently will be revealed "soon". In any case, it's friday and I'm feeling lazy so here's a fun photo post of his farewell lunch. I love the candid feel of the pic above. Like a frozen moment in time...eating chips...thinking of the future...

Quite the crowd turned up. The lone person who mugged for the camera back there is video editor Tyson Root.

This side of the table were the lucky ones who got food and drinks first.

Three shady characters. This pic turned out a bit blurry so sorry that it's smaller than the others. It's better the young readers can't see what's on the bottle anyway. No really, it's root beer!

PS3 very active

2007-03-29T15:51:00.001-07:00

Ever since the 1.60 firmware update was released, my PS3 has been getting a lot of attention. What a huge difference background downloading makes! Went ahead and grabbed a bunch of trailers from both the US and Japanese PSN store.

Currently playing on the system are God of War II, Virtua Fighter 5, and Tekken DR. If my craving is intact after finish GoW II, then I’ll finally go pick up Oblivion. Yup the PS3 version. I would have normally gone straight to Super Paper Mario, but not sure I’m in that sort of mood just yet.

On the 360 front
Finished Lost Planet last weekend and liked it a lot. Very satisfying weapons, sweet visuals, and a decent story. It has its share of problems, but all in all a good time. I’m definitely going to be picking up Guitar Hero II for 360 next week. It’ll be one of those games you can play off and on for the next few months, especially if they keep a good schedule of downloadable songs.

Upgrade to uncompressed PCM?

2007-03-16T06:39:00.000-07:00

The PS3 already made me get a 1080p TV and now it looks like I also have to invest in a receiver that can process uncompressed PCM via HDMI (“process” being the key here and not simply pass the signal through). You can read more about it HERE.

I was able to get a small taste of uncompressed PCM via the optical cables, but it downgrades it to stereo instead of full surround. So I started looking around for receivers and they aren’t cheap. Decent ones start around $300 and go skyward from there.

At this point, I don’t think I can justify it. I only have a handful of Blu-ray discs and the only PS3 game that features uncompressed PCM is Resistance. Two good reasons to wait are that receiver prices fall quite quickly, and one of the other new audio standards DTS Master Audio is not yet available in current receivers. Such receivers will come out eventually and it would pay off to wait I think.

Blu-ray grabs hold (UPDATED!)

2007-03-05T06:48:00.000-08:00

After getting a PS3, my plan was to completely avoid Blu-ray movies becasue the majority of releases in the first year will be fairly bare bones in terms of extra features. More importantly, superior picture and audio mastered versions are sure to follow much later.

Unfortunately that plan didn’t last long. So far, I picked up the Corpse Bride and The Departed. I’ve seen only a few minutes of Bride, but what I saw looked great. The Departed had a lot of buzz regarding the picture quality and it totally lives up to the hype. I already saw it in theaters, but all the twists still hold up. The majority of the audio doesn’t stand out as being much better than a standard DVD, but the gunshots are some of the crispest, realistic sounding I’ve heard. I also borrowed Underworld Evolutions and found it mildly entertaining. The picture and audio were nice, although not enough to make me want to buy it later.

Now I find myself anxious for another truly awesome Blu-ray disc. For the first time since the arrival of the original DVD format, I’m browsing Blu-ray/DVD sites for the latest nuggets of release info and reviews again. Even so, the level of fervor isn't quite at the same level. For one thing, I’m not going on wild buying sprees. In the heyday of DVD, I would pick up at least 2-3 discs every Tue. Heck, I even bought DVDs BEFORE I owned a DVD player. Having always lusted after expensive Laserdisc players and LDs, the affordable and better quality DVD format was like a dream come true.

Today is a vastly different story. I’m weighing each purchase heavily before making a decision. The next for sure pick-up is Casino Royale. Beyond that, I’m not sure. People are excited about Sin City, but I would only want the extended and re-cut version (which I already have). All indications are that it will be the bare bones theatrical version. Of the movies that are currently out, they all have things that give me pause. Black Hawk Down is not the director’s cut and has missing features from the three-disc DVD. Kingdom of Heaven does feature the director’s cut, but has absolutely none of the extras of the DVD set and it’s very expensive ($39.99, maybe $29 if you look real hard, still $10 too much). I’m sure Ice Age 2 looks fantastic, just not sure I’ll enjoy it enough to want to own it. And the list goes on.

There are lots of exciting titles planned for late 2007 release including many Warner Bros. titles and the long awaited Blade Runner super special edition (Blade Runner was the first DVD I bought and was a big motivator into me becoming an early adopter.) I just have to…be patient….gasp.

Epilogue
For some reason, I was really in the mood to watch a western last night. My all-time favorite is Sam Peckinpah's The Wild Bunch. I own the first gen DVD released was back in 1997. It was one of the dreaded “flipper discs” meaning the movie was split over both sides of the dvd (dual layer discs were still a year away), had very few special features, and it was not anamorphic widescreen. The quality of the video is just ok and the audio is a bit sub par. Regardless I was sucked in within minutes of popping in the disc. I had to tend to other things, so couldn’t finish watching it all the way through.

Initially, I wanted to update this post with the goal of conveying how great movies can make you forget about picture and audio quality. However, that point was derailed as I learned via a quick online search that early last year a 2-disc special edition finally appeared…nearly 9 YEARS after the initial release. That’s quite a long wait.

Now comes the new dilemma – pick up the special edition now (seems like it can be found for $15-20) or wait for it on Blu-ray and risk buying yet another featureless copy. After some more online digging, The Wild Bunch is not currently planned for release on Blu-ray or HD-DVD this year…yet.

I would like nothing better than to go out and find the movie at lunch today and enjoy a sparkling re-mastered experience as well as soak in the documentary features. Maaaaan…what to do, what to do?

Twilight update

2007-02-27T06:27:00.000-08:00

I finally finished Twilight Princess. I need some time to fully process my thoughts, but at this point it’s easy to say the game was awesome. Fantastic characters, good story, and interesting things to do all add up to one very solid Zelda game. Best Zelda ever? I think my favorites are still (controversial choices ahead) Zelda II and Windwaker. I still need to play Majora’s Mask though.

VF5
Already I’ve moved on to Virtua Fighter 5 and loving it. When I’m not in the fighting mood, I’ll most likely split time with Lost Planet. MLB 2K7 came out today and I’d really like to check that out. I need to download the demo. I checked out the Crackdown demo and had a decent time with it. It appears there are still plenty of copies of the game with the Halo 3 Beta key at stores, but I think I’m passing on this one. I can wait till Halo 3 is finished actually.

Of course I can always go out and get Oblivion, but the timing is definitely not right at this point.

Rocky path to Oblivion

2007-02-12T17:01:00.000-08:00

Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion for the 360 was easily in the top 5 of games I wished I could have played last year. I was so sure a purchase was imminent I bought the Prima guide for it a week before the game came out. Then...I don’t know what happened exactly. I was always busy with another game or work or whatever. (Note: I was going to buy the regular edition and not the limited one that came with a map and mini book. The reasoning was instead of paying $10 extra bucks for useless LE crap, I could pay $20 for a huge 400 page guide).

Now that the PS3 version is less than a month away, I have a new choice and renewed incentive to check that world out. So which version to get? Let’s look at the known stats:

Price
360 - $59.99
PS3 - $59.99
Winner – PS3
It’s hard to believe there hasn’t been an official price drop for the 360 yet. If you look really hard for sales, the 360 version might be had $49, but the PS3 gets an extra edge when you factor in the $20 it costs you to add Knights of the Nine to the 360 version (it’s included in the base PS3 game). Nine was free for a week during Christmas, but that doesn’t help me now.

Graphics
This is impossible to judge until the PS3 version comes out and people start doing apples to apples screen comparisons. The PS3 will have new shaders and further draw distances. Many of this will be implemented in the 360 expansion pack, but I’m not sure if these upgrades will affect the original game. Due to the HDMI cable, I’m inclined to think the PS3 will look sharper by a hair regardless.
Winner – Too early

Loading
According to the latest developer interviews, the PS3 loads much faster than the 360 version. This is easily the most compelling bonus so far. There are few things more annoying than long load times.
Winner – PS3

I’m going to break down the other deciding factors by system.

Xbox 360
- Controller is far better than PS3
- Achievement points baby
- Ability to buy add-ons right away if desired
- Shivering Isles expansion available in March
- I can go out and buy the game right now if I want
- Some cheat/glitches I could exploit if I wanted that are fixed in the PS3 version (doubt I would want to do it though)

PS3
- Whenever add-ons are available, spacious 60GB drive will be handy
- Again, 60GB will be lovely for Shivering Isles expansion
- Lots of fixed bugs

Hmmm. I’m still not sure what I’ll do. The point is moot until I beat Twilight Princess and that is still 20+ hours away. It will be hard to jump right back into another game with a massive time commitment.

My goal is to jam and finish Zelda before Virtua Fighter 5 drops on PS3.

UPDATE: As I was posting this, news came out today that Super Paper Mario for the Wii has an official release date of April 9th. Considering I'm definitely going to be playing God of War II on March 13, Oblivion just can’t seem to catch any breaks.

Castlevania Redemption

2007-02-02T08:11:00.000-08:00

Flashback many moons ago when I was but a poor college student trying to feed my gaming habit. At the time, I had in my possession a Turbo Duo, Dracula X: Rondo of Blood, Fatal Fury Special, and the turbo arcade card (which added extra RAM allowing great ports such as Street Fighter II CE and Fatal Fury).

You probably have an inlking of how coveted the Duo Dracula X was, but I also greatly loved the Duo version of FF Special as it contained an excellent CD arranged soundtrack (which was more robust than the NeoGeo CD version and didn’t have ridiculous loading times) and was graphically very close to the original coin-op. There was talk of near perfect ports of Samurai Shodown and other Neo games supporting the arcade card, but it never happened. But I digress.

Like many budget gamers, I eventually had to sell this prize package off to buy new games. Even then I dreaded that day and it was magnified as time went on. After entering the full-time work force, I was able to soothe my Fatal Fury Special loss when I secured a NeoGeo home system (getting one used in Japan was fairly cheap, as was all the early Neo games I wanted like Samurai Shodown 1 & 2, Magician Lord, etc). By this time, the asking price on the Duo Dracula X was just ridiculous. I told myself to get over it because I had probably played through that game at minimum 30-40 times. At most, I would want one more play through for nostalgia sake. Is that one time worth hundreds of dollars?

Thankfully, there have been many great Castlevania games such as Symphony of the Night, the three GBA versions, and now two DS entries.

I didn’t realize how that past regret still gnawed at me until I heard the news today that not only is the original Rondo of Blood coming to the PSP, but it will also be remade in 3D/2D. To top it off, Symphony of the Night is also included. A simultaneous relief and excitement washed over me.

It wasn’t long before conflicting feelings arose. I still have Symphony of the Night for the PlayStation. Plus, I was thinking of going for the 360 version because achievement points are a great excuse to play through the entire game. I guess it depends on what the proposed bonus/updates are for Symphony PSP.

I clicked back at the sample gameplay video for the Rondo remake and everything became simple again. That sweet, sweet soundtrack was all I needed to re-assure me that the game is a must have. Plus the added alternate paths in the remake are awesome.

Sticks and Axes

2007-01-22T14:37:00.000-08:00

EB/Gamestop had a special this past week where you could trade-in your PS2 for $100 credit towards the purchase of a PS3. Having the older, larger PS2 sitting around (I only use the slim PS2 these days) it was a deal I couldn’t pass up. The only catch was the store had to have it in stock, but that was no problem at the three places I called.

It’s kind of odd buying a system and not getting any games. I’m definitely getting Virtua Fighter 5 and a stick later in Feb. I’ll probably end up borrowing Resistance and Ridge Racer whenever I finally beat Zelda. Until then, the various downloadable demos have been enough for now. It would be nice if they officially released Tekken DR in the US since I’m not sure I want to try the Hong Kong work-around.

I’ve been wrestling with which arcade stick to get and it came down to availability and economics. The official Sega stick looks killer, but it costs $88 before shipping and you have to wait for it to get sent from Japan to the retailer who then sends it to you. The real deal breaker is that it comes out a week AFTER the game ships.

Thankfully, Hori is releasing their version of the stick in the US Feb 1st, a full 2 ½ weeks before the game comes out. It’s not quite as cool looking, but Hori sticks are quality gear.

As if adding yet another arcade stick wasn’t enough to clutter up the area, I have to find some place to keep the Guitar Hero controller for the 360. It doesn’t come out till March, so there’s some time to plan perhaps. I’m so happy I waited for this version.

iPhone = OSX Trojan Horse

2007-01-10T19:11:00.000-08:00

I have to say, the iPhone unveiling was one of the most exciting keynote presentations ever. This is coming from a person who has attended all (well except for one) of Nintendo’s legendary E3 presentations.

The fact that Cingular is involved and the steep price was a bit of a buzz kill, but I think I’m over that now. It’s ultimately going to depend on available finances in June, but I really, really want one. The reasonable voice inside me insists I should wait a year for the obligatory upgraded version with more storage, lower price, and perhaps a few new features. If I were really patient, I could wait a little longer for the completely redesigned model that would appear after that.

Obviously the market potential for the iPhone is huge as is the ramifications for companies like Palm, but there is another plus for Apple that I’m sure is no accident. Millions of new users will be interfacing with OSX. Millions who will become VERY comfortable with it and come to love using it. Millions who would be much more interested in buying a desktop or laptop running OSX. Several years from now, that could translate to an impossible dream becoming a reality – Macs outselling PCs.

That brings us to the product all technology lovers want, a computer interface like the one in Minority Report. The iPhone UI is the closest we’ve seen and it’s not a stretch to see them carry that over to their desktops.

Games of 2006

2007-01-04T18:08:00.000-08:00

I somehow managed to play a good amount of games last year. Still, there are a number of games I couldn’t find time for one reason or another. For what it’s worth, my humble list ranked in no particular order (although I will say Elite Beat Agents is my game of the year followed closely by Okami).

2006 favorites
Elite Beat Agents (DS)
New Super Mario Bros (DS)
Okami (PS2)
Dead Rising (Xbox 360)
Brain Age (DS)
Gears of War (Xbox 360)
Rainbow Six Vegas (Xbox 360)
NBA 2K7 (Xbox 360)
LotR: Battle for Middle Earth II (Xbox 360)

Games I finished in 2006, but released at other times
Killer 7 (GC)
Shadow of the Colossus (PS2)
Metroid Zero Mission (GBA)

Games that may have made my tops list if I had played them, but have a chance at making next year’s list
Elder Scrolls IV (Xbox 360)
Yakuza (PS2)
Final Fantasy XII (PS2)
Metal Gear Portable Ops (PSP)
Castlevania Portrait of Ruin (DS)
Zelda Twilight Princess (Wii)

The most pleasant surprise of the year was easily Dead Rising. It certainly had its flaws, but man did I enjoy every minute I played. It looked great, had a ton of replay value, featured some decent voice acting to go along with the zany story, and had some inventive achievement points that were fun to do. From what I’ve heard, it sold pretty well, so I’m psyched to see what they do for a follow-up.

January 2007 outlook
I shouldn’t be paying attention to January releases with the backlog of titles that cry for attention, but it’s hard. Leading off things is Lost Planet, which keeps looking better and better each time I see new footage. Wario Ware Smooth Moves is a must though. Although I will spend a lot of time with it, it’s spread out in little chunks so it’s okay to grab now. Hotel Dusk for the DS will eventually get purchased, but no rush at all on that one. Winning Eleven 2007 for 360 is intriguing, although this version still doesn’t feel like it takes advantage of the advanced hardware it’s on. I’ve been keeping an eye on Rogue Galaxy as well, but I would squeeze in FF XII before this though.

My craving for Twilight Princess, which I’ve managed to suppress for the past month and a half only because I’ve been insanely busy, has been raging out of control lately. If I don’t start by this weekend, I may explode.

Ikea Speaker Stands and Virtual Quandary

2006-12-22T13:22:00.000-08:00

I’ve preached the importance of making sure your speakers are at the right height, but couldn’t follow-up in my own set up due to a combination of having to use existing furniture, the high cost of speaker stands, and the trouble of mounting on an apartment wall without damaging anything.

I stumbled on these Gaje speaker stands at Ikea the other day and they have made an immense impact in my audio enjoyment. It feels like I have new speakers actually. They are only $25 a pair and have these sticky holders if there are no proper screws on the bottom of your speakers. I really can’t recommend them enough if your speakers aren’t too large to fit on them.

Virtua Fighter 5 Xbox 360
Wow. I saw the news yesterday morning. The funny thing is, the day before that I was talking with someone about how VF5 and Ninja Gaiden Sigma would be enough to justify a PS3 purchase. Now that it’s down to Sigma, I’m not so sure.

On one hand, I do believe VF5 on the PS3 will hold at least a slight graphical edge over the 360 version (call it the HDMI difference for those that can see it). On the other hand, I already have a nice arcade stick for the 360 and getting achievement points for the months I will spend playing this game would be nice. Plus, it sounds like there will be no domestic PS3 arcade stick released, forcing me to import the nice, but pricey Japanese Virtua Stick.

$500-600 for a PS3 plus $100+ for an arcade stick, or wait 5-6 months for the 360 version. Practicality versus impatient love for VF5 are on a collision course!

Dragon Quest IX to sells zillions

2006-12-13T19:25:00.000-08:00

That the next official installment of DQ is moving from a home console to a portable is an extremely significant event. I don’t think it’s ever happened to a series of this stature, and it couldn’t have happened at a better time, for me that is. There is no way I will ever have time to play DQ VIII on PS2, but DQ IX on the DS is another matter. It’s relatively easy to squeeze in time with the quick booting DS, plus the graphic look established in VIII can be achieved to an acceptable degree on the portable system.

There is plenty of differing opinions on this, mostly by the vocal community of RPG fans who would rather have seen the series move to the PS3 or even continue on the PS2. I’m as big of a graphics whore as anyone out there, but there are some experiences I must have on the couch and HDTV, and others that are more accessible on a portable. Take Blue Dragon as an example. It looks pretty sweet from what I’ve seen, but will I ever play it on my 360? Highly, highly doubtful.

I know what you’re about to say, “How come you had time to sink 40 hours into Okami and potentially 70+ into Twilight Princess?” That depends on the way a game keeps my attention. I did wish Okami was a little shorter at times, but I loved playing it and the ending was a great. It was a well-thought out journey that never bored me. I expect Twilight Princess to be the same.

In any case, the installed base of the DS, especially in Japan, is going to send DQ sales through the roof. I bet they charge a lot for the game too. Can you say "the first $60 DS game"?

Yakuza
Lately, I’ve been getting the craving to pick up Yakuza. It was high on my list for most of the year, but videos containing the US voices really turned me off. I think that disappointment has died down for the most part and I’m ready to accept it and enjoy the game. There’s also a part of me that wants to import the Japanese game and its sequel for the purer experience. The problem is my import PS2 is on the fritz and my alternate plan of picking up a Japanese PS3 (as a means to play imported PS2, PS3, Region 2 DVD and Blu-ray) is at least two years away.

Plus, even if it’s late, I want to support Sega for bringing out the game here. I really believe the game had the potential to be a big hit in the US, but it seems the game didn’t have the marketing budget to lure in the general audience. I mean, why go through the trouble of hiring Hollywood voice actors if you aren’t going to court the masses?

I would have loved to see how a web-sales only, limited edition featuring the original Japanese VO with English subtitles would have sold. I would have even paid a premium $59.99 for that version. Oh well.

Maybe they’ll do that for part two if they decide to take a chance on that release. Here’s a free idea Sega, set up a pre-order page for Yakuza 2 Special Edition featuring Japanese voice and English subtitles. Also included is Yakuza 1 with Japanese voice and English subtitles for $79.99. That would be one killer set, especially since the first game will see price drops to the $30/20 level soon, if it already hasn’t happened.

Cool things like that rarely happen though, and having been a lifelong Sega fanboy, I’m used to being let down by them time after time.

2006-12-08T12:17:00.000-08:00

Namco recently announced they will release an arcade port of Tekken 5: Dark Resurrection for download on PS3. I love this idea for three reasons:

1) The Tekken 6 PS3 gameplay snippet from E3 earlier this year was underwhelming to say the least. Especially compared to how incredible Virtua Fighter 5 looked. Releasing DR buys Namco more time to keep working on Tekken 6.

2) I really wanted to buy DR for the PSP. Tekken 5 for PS2 is my second favorite Tekken ever (part 2 still holds the top spot for sentimental reasons), so I was very tempted even though the additions didn’t add up to much. I think the hit in graphics and the clunkiness of playing a fighting game on the PSP held me back. Now DR will look as good as it can and on a system I can hook an arcade stick to.

3) DR for download potentially opens the door for 1080p Soul Calibur 3. That rumored 360 version didn’t materialize (or was that an April Fool’s joke?), so having that game achieve it’s full potential visually would be nice. Having spent so much time with SC II on the Xbox, I was deeply disappointed by the visuals for 3 on PS2. The broken gameplay didn’t help either, but I could have stuck with it longer if it looked better. Yes, such are the whims of a graphics whore.

Aside from that, just trying to finish Gears on hardcore and play some Rainbow Six online (it’s not as popular among my friends as I had thought). I’ll be able to borrow a PS3 here and there, so maybe I’ll finish Resistance before Xmas. During the holidays is when I’ll embark on my Twilight Princess campaign. I’ve been waiting until I can concentrate fully on that game before starting, and that time is nearing.

I’ve seen the comparison between the 360 and PS3 versions of Ridge Racer that make it look about the same, if not better on the 360. On my TV, the game looks much better on the PS3. Maybe it’s the 1080p that’s making it look ultra sharp? Whenever I eventually buy my own PS3 (probably next Xmas), I’ll grab Ridge Racer 7 for my library.

NBA 07 looks and plays much better than I would have imagined, but it’s really no match for NBA 2K7.

I applied the 1080 update to my 360, but it’s not like I will see any real difference until games that support it get released. I definitely decided the HD-DVD add-on was not for me. The selection of HD-DVD titles is what sealed it for me. There is maybe one movie out of the currently available bunch worth buying. Even on Blu-ray there aren’t more than a handful I want, mainly because these are first run editions. Hardly any special features and over-priced. Plus, many sport mastering that is drawing mediocre reviews from the home theater crowd. Better HD authoring and “real” special editions are still one to two years away most likely.

Instead, I opted for the Oppo DV-981HD upconverting player. It was just released this week and already drawing rave reviews. The previous models were big hits, but I’m excited about this new one since it now upconverts to 1080p (perhaps I should change the name of the blog to 1080p Ninja).

Turkey Weekend

2006-11-22T12:28:00.000-08:00

Despite having a Wii, my 360 is getting the most love. I’ve been switching between Gears of War, DOAX2, and Rainbow Six Vegas. It’s also because I’m saving Twilight Princess until I have a good chunk of time to devote solely to it.

Wii Sports is a ton of fun. It’s definitely best in short bursts, but I would love a variety of titles like Wii Sports that I could select from depending on my mood. Other than that, I’m not too tempted by the other Wii titles out right now. Wario Ware is probably my next purchase and perhaps Wii Play if it comes out here soon.

Nintendo Wii Component Cables!

2006-11-17T11:50:00.000-08:00

I jumped as soon as I could when I heard that the Nintendo online store had a few thousand Nintendo Wii component cables for sale earlier this week. I resisted paying the extra $10 for overnight shipping, content with 2-day even if it meant I would get the cables a day after I got my Wii.

Thankfully, I still got the cables this morning. I saw some pics of the component cable boxes online, but my order came in a plain plastic bag.

Kind of dissapointing at first, but I would have chucked the box later anyway.

OPM memories

2006-11-15T14:52:00.000-08:00

The sad news came out yesterday that the January 2007 issue of the Official US PlayStation magazine will be its last. It’s very sad when something you had a part in goes away and even sadder knowing people personally who were directly effected.

This should have been a much happier time for the mag having celebrated its 100th issue earlier this year and the launch of the PS3 this Friday.

Good luck to everyone there. I totally know what you’re going through right now, and my heart goes out to you.

Twilight Princess = 70+ Hours

2006-11-07T22:17:00.000-08:00

I thought Okami was a long game at 35 hours, but the new Zelda is reportedly a whopping 70+ hours. Sounds like I won’t need to add anymore Wii games to my shopping list till next year. Considering how sidetracked I get with any game that features a fishing mini-game, my hour total might be closer to 100 hours. Thank goodness the holidays are going to allow me some quality game time.

Downloaded the Rainbow Six Vegas demo the other night and it’s pretty much everything I was hoping for. It looks great and has the feeling of Rainbow Six 3 on the Xbox, but with just enough new GRAW-like tweaks to make it all nice.

I was thinking I would play Vegas mostly until DOAX2 came out, but it looks like that will ship on time, arriving the on the same day as R6. Team Ninja games usually suffer a delay or two, but the news that DOAX2 has gone gold is awesome.

There’s lots of excitement about Guitar Hero II coming out this week. It’s almost enough to make me crack and get the PS2 version instead of holding out for the 360 release (no clue when that’ll come out). Luckily, Elite Beat Agents will be the only music-related game I need for a while. I’m so psyched to play it. I sampled it a little here in the office, but I want to wait to play through my own copy.

Speaking of releases this week, the other game I’ll check out is Gears of War. The reviews are just bananas. I mean, it’s getting 9s and 10s all over the place.

I was thinking of sneaking in another new game this past weekend, but decided to try and finish off Killer 7. I’m maybe 1 or 2 hours away from that goal. I have absolutely no clue how it’ll end and that’s the way I like it. I might have to play through it again in one sitting at a later date to better absorb the deliciously bizarre story.

Holiday 2006 Final List

2006-11-01T19:40:00.000-08:00

My earlier “Buy” list has been greatly paired down. From the titles that have already been released, I picked up NBA 2K7, Okami, and Cooking Mama. All are awesome in their own way.

From the remaining upcoming games, the following are in the “for sure” column:

Nov
Elite Beat Agents - DS
Rainbow Six Vegas – Xbox 360
Dead or Alive Xtreme 2 – Xbox 360
Wii console w/ Wii Sports
Twilight Princess – Wii
Metal Slug Anthology – Wii

Dec
Metal Gear Portable Ops – PSP (pre-ordered to get the cool case)

Bubble Games
These three are probably getting purchased, but are on the bubble:

Gears of War – I’m still very much on the fence on this. I will be looking at reviews closely as well as checking it out in the office.

Splinter Cell Double Agent – After devoting so much time to Okami, I kind of need a slight breather, so I haven’t picked this up yet. Then I find out the Xbox version has a ton more content and story than the 360 version. WTF?! Now I don’t know what to do. I kind of want to play through Okami again actually.

Super Monkeyball Banana Blitz – I’m actually fairly certain I’ll pick this up.
Out of all the other Wii launch games, this one speaks to me the most, but I’ve been known to change my mind quite a bit so it’s in this section for now.

Long Shots
Like the title says, these will be hard to squeeze in.

Final Fantasy XII – This is oh so very tempting. I could certainly go for an epic story, but 60+ hours is going to be hard to squeeze in before Wii launch week.

Bully – I was not that interested in this game, but the word-of-mouth post release has got me excited.

Xmas Presents or 2007
I’m in no hurry to get the following, so I’ll wait to see if I get any of them for Christmas or whenever I’m in the mood for them.

Every Extend Extra - PSP
Gunpey – PSP/DS

Loco Roco - PSP
Capcom Classics Reloaded - PSP
Gitaroo Man Lives - PSP
Castlevania Portrait of Ruin - DS
Final Fantasy III - DS
Yakuza – PS2
Rule of Rose – PS2
Oblivion – 360 or PS3

Okami baby

2006-10-24T18:42:00.000-07:00

I had no idea Okami would take like 30-40 hours. I’m getting close to the 15 hour mark, but probably not that close to being halfway. It’s hard to know for sure without spoiling things by looking at a guide. I keep getting distracted by exploration, fishing, you name it. It’s just such a gorgeous world that I want to really enjoy it and not rush so much.

I finished Shadow of the Colossus right before this, so you could say I’m scratching my arty game itch. It’s also nice to get so much mileage out of the current generation. These last two years has been amazing in terms of software for the PS2. It’s really too bad the games are getting overshadowed by the next gen hype.

Up next is either Final Fantasy XII for PS2 or Splinter Cell Double Agent for 360. I’m really going back and forth on whether to try to fit in a RPG. Whatever happens, I need to be done before the week of November 14th. From that week on, I figure to be playing a mixture of Rainbow Six Vegas, Dead or Alive Xtreme 2, and various Wii games well into the New Year.

Actually, Metal Gear Portable Ops for the PSP comes out early December. Snake Eater is my favorite Metal Gear of all time, so this sequel to that storyline has got me jazzed. My PSP will finally get some extended play time! If you haven’t gotten around to playing Snake Eater, get to it. Once you get a groove for how the stealth system works in the jungle, it gets so damn good. I know, I know, it can be annoying at first, but please stick with it. One of the most rewarding game experiences and memorable characters of recent memory hands down.

Wiixperience

2006-10-13T12:13:00.000-07:00

10/12/06
Thur morning - I get an email from EB/Gamestop that Wii pre-orders happen tomorrow. First come, first served, same as PS3. Quantities extremely limited. Message boards are already buzzing over how many each store will get. Some stores as little as 8 units, others as much as 32.

Thur afternoon – I momentarily forget about things since work is very busy right now. I have to get a lot done if I’m going to be late to work tomorrow.

Thur night – I finally get around to calling the three closest EBs near my house. Since the system gets released Sun, these are way closer than the ones near my office. The first two stores were getting 32. The third didn’t want to give exact numbers. Jerk.

10/13/06
Fri morning 7:45AM – I decide I can’t bring myself to line up longer than an hour before 10AM, which is when the stores open. I do a quick scan of some boards and see that most places had lots of people lined up already. I get a little nervous. I quickly decide that I can wait 1 hour and a half then. Even if I rush out the door I couldn’t get out any earlier.

Fri 8:50AM – I reach Gamestop and there are at least 25 people in line. This location has 32. If any of these dudes are saving places for their buddies, I’m screwed. Without getting out of the car, I decide to go to the nearest EB.

Fri 8:55AM – Ahhhh sweet, sweet success! Only five people in line. This store has at least 30, so it’s all good. Over the next 15 minutes, four more people arrive and we’re all chatting and having a good time. Everyone is here to buy the system for themselves, no eBayers.

Fri 9:15AM – Tons more people start arriving so we form a proper line.

Fri 9:45AM - There has to be over 20 people. I can’t really tell from where I am.

Fri 9:55AM – The doors are open just a tad early. As the first couple people are waiting near the register, the excitement is really making everyone giddy. The amount of jokes increases. Mind you the jokes aren't very good, they are made funnier only because everyone is in a good mood. Material like "thank god Happy Feet is a launch title!" or "where is Sudoku Master for Wii?!". You get the picture.

A warm glow surrounds people. I can see other people staring in from the outside. The farthest I can see from inside the store I guess is customer #25. He looks a little nervous. It's almost a desperate look. I wonder if he knows there are at least 30 available (minus 2 each store is allowed to set aside for employees).

Fri 10:10AM – My Wii is pre-ordered! I got an extra Wii remote, nunchuck, classic controller, and Zelda. I was really debating with myself whether to get the classic controller since I can just use my Gamecube controllers, but it’s only $20 and one of the launch games I want is Metal Slug.

At this point, I’m pretty sure I’ll get Metal Slug Anthology, Super Monkeyball, and Excite Truck. Still on the fence about Red Steel and Rayman. I should probably space out the game purchases anyway. It’s not like I can play ten games at once. Especially since there are 360, DS, PS2, and PSP games I want around the same time.

There are supposed to be 1 million Wiis available at launch and 3 million more by Christmas. I’m sure it won’t be extremely hard to get, but you never know. 4 million is more than enough for the initial batch of early gamer adopters. Then again, if the general public catch the Wii fever in the same manner they’ve fallen YET AGAIN for Tickle Me Elmo Super duper version this holiday, well, 4 million isn’t even close to enough.

This is the one console I’ve been wanting super bad, so I feel very at ease now that one is reserved.