This list is a bit late because I have been migrating the site to a newer, cheaper server. Hopefully this new server will be able to handle the crush of 12 people accessing my blog. This list also may includes books, movies, games, etc that didn’t actually come out in 2011. That is because I’m old and it takes me awhile to get around to things so just deal with it.
Best Novel: EasilyEast of Eden, Steinbeck’s grand tale spanning three generations. Absolutely loved the book and can’t recommend it enough to others.
Best History (or otherwise scholarly) book:Battle Cry of Freedom: The Civil War Era, this massive tome delves deeply into the politics, military, and social history of the Civil War. A great starting place for anyone who wants to learn more. McPherson’s prose never bores but keeps you engaged through 800+ pages.
Best Comic: I read a lot of comics this year and enjoyed the majority of them. The ones I have been looking forward to the most though have been X-Men schism/regenesis storyline particularly Uncanny X-Men, Wolverine and the X-Men, and Uncanny X-Force.
Best Movie: Winter’s Bone. Yep I was about 8 months late on this one but still it was one of the best movies I saw this year, much better than The King’s Speech.
Best Movie (that I expected absolutely nothing from): Hall Pass. Hah! Seriously, I got this movie on Netflix and expected one or two funny jokes but it was hilarious and had one of the funniest/grossest laugh out loud moments of any movie I’ve seen for a long time.
Best TV Show: Damn there was a lot of good TV this year: Breaking Bad, Game of Thrones, Board Walk Empire, Louie, Modern Family, and I could go on and on. However, I think the show that I enjoy the most, can’t wait to watch every week, and am disappointed when the season ends is Justified. It’s easily one of the best/funnest shows on TV that literally no one watches or knows about.
Best Game: I slacked on the game playing this year but the most enjoyable game I played was Batman: Arkham City. GTA style Batman fun with tons of side missions and plenty of bad guy skulls to crush. Plus Mark Hamill reprises his role as the Joker. What’s not to like.
Best Album: This may be because I have been listening to it constantly for the last couple weeks but by far (and I admittedly didn’t listen to a ton of new music this year) my favorite album of the year is The Black Keys’ El Camino. The quality of their albums doesn’t seem to diminish with time or listens and it never seems like they release a lazy album. Pick it up.
Best Gadget: This is a tough one because I have picked up quite a few gadgets this year but I’m sticking with the latest one, my Kindle Fire. I absolutely love it. Full review coming soon but so far it’s fast becoming my go to gadget.
Next up my worst of list, because the only thing better than things you like are things you hate and get to trash.
Today I drug myself to my computer to begin the process of writing more cover letters and to scour the internet for more jobs. It never happened though because I made myself a pot of coffee and turned on the TV and as I was searching around I saw that G4 was having their E3 coverage. Some days it is down right fantastic to be a nerd and today was one of those days. I spent the better part of the day watching Microsoft’s XBOX 360 E3 presentation. It was two hours chalk full of surprises that whetted my appetite for the fall releases. So for those of you that are gainfully employed here are some of my favorites (in no particular order).
The Beatles Rock Band–even though I generally suck at Rock Band I will think about getting this game just because it looks great and I love The Beatles. Besides how cool would it be to play Drive My Car in Shea Stadium in front of 50,000 screaming fans?
Modern Warfare 2–the first Modern Warfare was awesome and I didn’t even explore the multi-player features, a mistake I won’t make again. It looks like Infinity Ward upped the ante on this version and the level displayed at E3 looked great–especially when you get to drive and fight on a snowmobile, which had a Bond feel to it. The 360 version will also have two exclusive map packs.
Halo: ODST–Bungie is one of those developers that I will pretty much buy anything they make because they are one of the best out there. The fact that this is a new Halo game, which plays differently than previous incarnations, and you can count me hyped and excited to play this game. Also Bungie teased a prequel to the Halo series entitled Halo: Reach.
So I have been hard at work on my paper this entire weekend. Actually, I was supposed to be working on this paper all weekend. However, instead of doing actual work I have been procrastinating, well, like it’s my job. So Sunday I turned on my XBOX 360 so I could listen to some music whilst writing, but before I started playing my writing music, I started looking at some of the new arcade games. One game in particular caught my eye, The Dishwasher: Dead Samurai (and also check the developers blog). I decided to check out the demo, and damn I was hooked with a quickness. Although $10 can be a steep price for a broke ass student like myself I didn’t think twice about buying it. This game is amazing and I spent the better part of my Sunday afternoon furiously killing some fools.
The game is about some dude who washes dishes–amazingly I don’t think he is Mexican haha–who dies or something and somehow lives and wants revenge. Someone also kidnaps his sister and he needs to save her. The cut scenes are done as comic strips and the whole style of the game is very comic booky. The game does a very good job of feeling like a comic book come to life. Each level feels like individual frames of a comic book that you are slowly progressing through. Obviously this is all part of the design, but the fact that it comes through so clearly, and works so well, speaks highly of the designer not dropping the ball on his vision. The actual gameplay though is kick ass and the closest approximation for it is Ninja Gaiden. If you like Ninja Gaiden you’re going to like this game. If you like the action of Ninja Gaiden, but your fingers aren’t nimble enough to hit the combos (coughneverbesocialcough), you will most likely enjoy this game. It has all the cool action without the mind-numbing and finger contorting combos of Ninja Gaiden (although if you play for long enough your hands will cramp up like the caretakers). Oh yah by the way did I mention that there are zombie in the game? No? Well there are, so bonus points for the zombie slayage, and you even get a chainsaw in the game to slash those zombies back to hell. Also of note there are sweet executions that you can perform to finish off your enemies. One of my favs is when the Dishwasher grabs the psuedo-FBI agents gun and uses it to splatter said agents brains onto the wall.
Yesterday after I got back from school I decided to take a break from studying for the night and play some video games. I downloaded the new MLB 2K9 demo and hoped that it would be a vast improvement over the previous incarnations. My hopes were shattered as the 2K series continued its tradition of suckery. For some reason the powers that be decided that competition amongst sports games was a bad idea and so they embarked upon all these exclusivity contracts. Unfortunately for baseball fans 2K received the exclusivity on Xbox and the MVP series ceased to exist, and because of that I haven’t played a good baseball video game since MVP ’05.
My main gripe with the 2K series is that there are way too many layers. Back in the day video game baseball used to be fun when all I had to do was worry about pressing a couple buttons in conjunction with the D-pad. Now things have just gotten ridiculous; let me count the ways. Swing stick = lame. You know I don’t want to sit there and decide if I want a 40 degree downswing, or 55 degree swing, or a 30 degree upswing. I just want to swing the fucking bat. I don’t need to ‘mimic’ a real swing. I just want to hit the ball. Pitch stick is likewise lame. I don’t want to ‘mimic’ a slider, curve, circle change, or whatever. If I wanted to mimic the real motion of a slider I would go outside and throw sliders on my sidewalk, and if I was any good at it I wouldn’t have to play the goddamn video game to begin with. So what else is annoying? Running the bases with any degree of skill is pretty much impossible and usually I end up getting two players tagged out at one base–a la J.D. Drew and Jeff Kent in the ’06 NLDS–because I didn’t have the manual dexterity to hit the required 12 button combination to advance the lead runner but not the other runners. How did they fuck this up when I never had any problems with this on my old Nintendo? It’s because 2K is terrible and they make everything as complicated as possible. Speaking of the Nintendo at least they had a good excuse for crappy looking four pixel characters, but in this day and age how does 2K keep churning out shitty models. Why does Prince Fielder look like he weighs 180 lbs.? Why does Ryan Howard look like Jimmy Rollins? Seriously are you guys even trying anymore?
I’m assuming that next year they will go beyond baseball simulation, and do something a bit like this:
Yesterday I awoke bright and early and immediately turned on my Xbox so I could download the new GTA IV DLC: The Lost and Damned. (I never realized how long it takes to download 1.7 gigs of content. It must have taken me at least 3 hours.) Once it finished downloading, however, I jumped right in and started it up. I got in about an hours worth yesterday before class, a few hours after class, and most of the day today (I finished up the main storyline today). All told I have 11 hours of game play and I am at 71% completion. So is it worth the $20 (1600 MS points)? Personally, I think it was definitely worth the money, but then again I really like GTA IV.
The Lost and Damned follows the story of Johnny Klebitz the Vice President of The Lost Motorcycle Club. The story is vintage Rockstar complete with crooked politicians, drugs, sex, the Mafia, and everything else we have come to expect from a good GTA game. Although Johnny’s story is new it does take place at the same time as the events of the original GTA IV. So you will see some familiar faces and you will play a couple missions from the original except you will play from Johnny’s perspective instead of Niko’s (this helps flesh out some of the details from the original without coming off as cheap or lazy). This all leads to a rewarding gaming experience. Although the main story is only 10+ hours long there are still plenty of other things to do. There are gang wars, 12 new races, sea gull killing, and other side missions that Rockstar has put in. So there is plenty more game play past the main storyline–as long as you’re the type of gamer that likes doing side missions. By the way the motorcycle races are loads of fun. Racing a bunch of other chumps and then bashing them with an aluminum bat as you pass them by never gets old. Speaking of bikes I rarely rode them in the original, and this game forces you to ride a chopper (obviously), but after a couple missions on the bike it felt like an old friend, and I really enjoyed riding it around. It’s way easier to lose the cops on a bike, but you can’t pick up hookers on a bike (but you can still blast them with a shotty haha).
I think the shortness of the game adds to its single-player re-playability, and I will probably play it again sometime soon. There are three missions in particular that are extremely fun to play and worth the price of admission in and of themselves. On top of that it there are new multi-modes. So a good story complete with humor, intrigue, drugs, and sex; and the over-the-top violence of giving some chump the ol’ shotgun blast to the mug equals a kick ass gaming experience. I forgot how much I enjoyed rampaging around Liberty City. Thank you Rockstar!
Now check out some screen shots, then go download this add-on, and then start blasting away at some chumps:
The last 24 hours have been a whirlwind for me. Yesterday was Evacuation Day and I had some friends in town so I went to go celebrate with them. I ended up meeting them at a TGI Fridays (because the girls were at some ballet show) in Midtown, and we commenced to drinking some beers. Nothing crazy just a few beers, some chicken wings, and a lot of bullshitting. Around 11 we got ready to leave and asked for out check. Holy shit did we get a surprise. I’ve been to quite a few bars in and around midtown and in Times Square but none of them were ever as expensive as this shitbag TGI Fridays. I’m used to paying 6 bucks a pint for any beer including Guinness. This place charged us over $8 for each of our coors lights, and our wings were outrageously priced at $15. Sure I guess I should have looked at the menu first, but you expect all TGI Fridays to be priced similarly. On top of that most of the nicer bars, and restaurants I have been to in the city have been way cheaper than this place. So if you live in the area or you’re going to visit the city DO NOT go to the TGI Fridays on 49th and 7th Ave across from the Winter Garden theater.
After getting fleeced at TGI Fridays I took the train back home, and when I got back to Queens I had a 40 minute wait for my bus so I decided to wait for the bus at my local neighborhood bar. I was planning on only having a couple beers whilst I was waiting for the bus, but I ended up staying there until closing time. So I stumbled out around 4:00 am and walked to the bus stop, and started to wait. It was brutally cold and I had to wait about fifteen minutes for the bus to come, and once I jumped on I promptly passed out. I awoke after 5:00 am, and I was over 100 streets past my stop. By the time I got home it was past 6:00 am, and I finally was able to pass out.
I didn’t rest long, however, as I got up at 11:00 so I could go get a new TV. I got up and even though I was tired I was excited and full of energy. I took the train to Best Buy and within an hour I was standing at the check out line with my new Samsung 40 inch HDTV. I was so excited to plug it in and see what I’ve been missing. So I carried my new tube down to the street, hailed a cab, and then started my trek home.
Yesterday I got a little bit of a Veterans Day surprise. When I walked up to my house there was a package waiting for me at the door. So I hurried to my room grabbed my knife and started cutting open the box. What awaited me was just another, in a long line of, verification of my nerdiness or more nerd credentials (like I needed more). If anyone didn’t know or wondered about the veracity of my being a nerd, well then, this package just shattered any perceptions of my un-nerdiness. I opened the box and this big jewelry case was awaiting me. Oh man what could it be.Continue reading
Over the last two days I have been engaged in an epic struggle for life and limb. In the course of two days my kids have been take by Child Protective Services–because I murdered my wife, how lame–my other two wives have divorced me, and taken my kids, and I have finally and fully capitulated to the dark impulses that have haunted me. I know that I have ostracized friends and family, but I don’t care because I am now a person with one singular purpose, evil. I want to spread pain and terror to as many people as I can. I care not for the living or the dead, the young or old, guilty or innocent. I am a killing machine that’s murders unflinchingly and in my wake I leave death and despair. I am the fourth horseman of the Apocalypse.
I am currently doing research for a paper that will talk about the history and impact of id Software, and more specifically DOOM, on culture. In working on finding academic sources I stumbled upon the site how they got game, which is maintained by Stanford University. There is a lot of cool stuff there, and it is encouraging to see a major University look into the larger impact that games have had, and not just treat it as something trivial that only greasy nerds participate in. If you have time check out the site; it’s well worth you’re time.
They have a whole section devoted to machinima, which is where I found this video. A student made a short video about the Holocaust using Halo 3. It’s a good video, and worth a few minutes of your time.
Today I dusted off my XBOX 360, and checked out some of the new games and demos. One game that I ended up buying for the arcade was Castle Crashers. So what’s good you say? Well, honestly, pretty much everything from top to bottom. If you can’t tell from the above picture it is an old-school side scroller that is slightly reminiscent of the old TMNT’s arcade game–complete with the retro cell animation look. The plot of the game is pretty simple. You’re a knight (of various colors, but there are a ton of extra characters that you can unlock) who have to go save four princesses who have been kidnapped. You will travel throughout all different kinds of terrains to look for them–volcano, desert, forest, ice et al–and all of the terrains have a distinct look and feel. They really did put a lot of details in all of the different areas–which brings me to the art work.
The art work and character design is completely rad, with characters that look new but also familiar (personally I’d say some Futurama, Simpsons, and Ren & Stimpy influences–and probably even more that I don’t get). The gameplay is furious. It is not quite a straight button mashing game, but there are times where it is close, and after a few hours of playing you will be hard pressed to use your hands for anything but the most pedestrian of tasks. There is also a ton of items that have to be collected and found, which some people don’t like, but I have always like collecting items in games. I’m weird like that. Also there is a ton of humor, and hidden easter eggs throughout the game. Stuff that you might not catch until your secon or third time through.
One of the best parts of the game, however, is that you can play 4-player online co-op. More games need to include this feature, because it adds immense replay value to the game. I’m already looking forward to some long seshs hacking and slashing my way through the game whilst drinking some nice cold Colorado Kool-Aid. Besides the main game–that has 20 levels–there are a couple of mini games that it comes with. One is “All You Can Quaff” which is a game where you have to mash buttons to eat food faster than the other knights–this game absolutely kills the hands. The other game is an Arena fighting game where you have to fight a bunch of enemies. Each round you play they increase in number.
So that’s pretty much it. It’s a great game, and if you have a 360 you should definitely buy it because it is worth it. Castle Crashers is a great addition to you XBLA, and it’s an even cooler throwback to the old side scroller days. Go get it…now.
