Sorry, for the lack of updates lately. I know I haven’t been making the kind of commitment to this blog that I thought I would but I promise that there will be more frequent updates from now on. There will still be a Top Ten this week as well as an on-time F-Bomb. There have been a number of post E3 happenings since my last update so yo can expect to hear my opinion on those as well.

And now, onto my entry for the evening.

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For those of you living under a rock, Soul Calibur IV was released these past couple of weeks. I’d be playing it right now, but, unfortunately I don’t own an Xbox 360. I preordered a copy of the “Premium Edition” but I won’t be able to afford the console to play it on until Wednesday.

Sure, I could have waited and got the game with the 360, but I wanted that Premium Edition, damnit! Even if the free DLC isn’t all that great, I still got a neat looking poster, a comic book and a t-shirt all packaged within a nice limited edition tin case, all of which was well worth the extra $20 I spent on it.

But anyway…

It’s kind of ironic that I would make such a big fuss over a fighting game, considering I used to really suck at them. I remember getting my ass handed to me at the arcades as a kid playing Mortal Kombat and Street Fighter II, always suffering a severe beating usually followed by my opponent ripping my head off with my spinal column in tow (as was the case with MK, at least). Usually, the aforementioned ass-beatings were by older kids who had a much better understanding than I did of the game. I was little. I had no idea what I was doing so I just mashed buttons. As I got older, however, I began to appreciate more complex games and decided to give the fighter genre another chance and it resulted in me discovering two of my favorite games ever: Super Smash Bros. and Marvel VS Capcom 2 (there is another game in this category but I’m getting to that and you probably already know what it is anyway).

It was around the time of new found love for fighting games that the Sega Dreamcast was nearing the end of it’s short-lived life cycle. I was pretty pissed at the news considering that I had just bought a new DC after my roommate’s dog chewed through controller cable and shorted it. Being a former hardcore Sega fan, I ventured on a quest to acquire as many of the console’s worth while titles as I could before they disappeared from store shelves only to be sold at outrageous prices on Ebay.

Among the many games I bought were Shenmue, Skies of Arcadia, House of the Dead 2 (packaged with a light gun) and Soul Calibur. I bought SC on impulse because I couldn’t find DOA2 no matter where I looked (I eventually settled for DOA2: Hardcore for PS2). A friend of mine spoke highly about the game so, being the trusting person I am, I decided to give the game a whirl. It’s not until you actually played it that you discovered that this was no ordinary fighting game.

Soul Calibur was a game of epic proportions and has one of the most unique takes on a fighting game ever. Taking place in the 16th centure, Soul Calibur features a diverse cast of characters from all over the globe in search of the mythical blade, Soul Edge: An ancient sword of great power that corrupts all who wield it.

For a fighting game, the story is surprisingly detailed. Each character has a detailed background and they all have their own motivations for seeking the sword. Some seek it for good, some for evil and some wish to destroy it. It’s a fantasy epic set in an era of history where some still lived and died by the sword. Samurai face off against Athenian warrior chicks and dancers with Chinese blades duke it out with an undead pirate armed with twin swords.

And if that’s not diverse enough for you, you also have the option of choosing a nunchuk wielding Elvis pirate (it’s the hair), a blind bondage freak with claws, the demon-possessed wielder of Soul Edge and a buxom British dominatrix with a sword that turns into a whip. A mother fucking whip.

And that’s what seperates Soul Calibur from other fighting games. Instead of hand to hand combat, the fighters use a variety of different weapon based fighting styles and in place of the usual techno/heavy metal music is an epic soundtrack worthy of a good fantasy flick. It’s near flawless in its presentation and it’s easy to pick up and play. So much that it ended up becoming a family activity. Well, at least among my siblings and I.

We’ve kept up with every game in the series since then and it’s usually a must play whenever we get together. It also started the sibling gaming tradition of shit talking. “Oh, you’re gonna be Talim? Alright fine, I’m gonna be Raphael. Yeah, keep spamming the same fucking move over and over. Oh, ring out. That’s bullshit.”

Just a few more days and I’ll be able to do that via Xbox Live. I look forward to laying the smackdown on you, Panda.

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Tomorrow, in an attempt to avoid going nuts over having a highly anticipated game that I can’t play for another day or so, I’ll discuss my top ten favorite characters in the series.

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*ahem*

Fanboys.

The term alone is enough to make most gamers roll their eyes in disgust.

Yes, it’s perfectly understandable that people support the things they enjoy in the industry, but some people develop such an obsessive loyalty towards a certain franchise/console/developer that it borders on insanity.

Case in point, this dumbass.

Of course, the story in question could very well be fake. That particular mental illness is a running gag among the forum goons at Something Awful. But the sad part about it is that Fanboy behavior is, most of the time, so extreme that that particular post seems almost plausible.

Need an example? Since we’re talking about Final Fantasy in this case, go to any FF fansite and start a forum topic stating that you think Final Fantasy VIII is the best game in the series and see what kind of a response you get.

Did you get flamed? Well, then there you go.

To put things into some kind of perspective, most gamers that troll the intertwebz are young kids who’s parents make only a decent amount of money. Therefore, chances are they aren’t going to own all three of the major consoles at one time. They’re going to have to settle for a Playstation 3, an Xbox 360 or a Nintendo Wii. As a result, they will vehemently defend their position among the other kids who think they’re console is so cool and point out all of the pros of their platform of choice.

One of the arguments that the Sony fanboys hold against the 360 owners, in terms of available titles, is that they will always have way better exclusive JRPG titles then the 360 guys ever will. And the franchise that dominates the hell out of all other JRPGs is, of course, FINAL FANTASY. So you can imagine the sort of impact it had on these guys when they found out at this year’s E3 that their cherished exclusive title suddenly became not so exclusive anymore.

It’s this sort of schoolyard bullshit that I don’t miss. Though I must say I liked it better when it was just down to Mario and Sonic.

I will admit that there are certain developers and franchises that I am a fan of. I put my faith in them but I’m hardly what most would consider a rabid fanboy. Yes, I love the hell out of Nintendo but that didn’t stop me from getting a Playstation; a console that I have more games for than my PS2 and Gamecube libraries combined. And as much I love Sony, I’m too pissed off at the PS3’s price as well some of the decisions on Sony’s part that I’m settling for a 360 instead (at least, until God of War III comes out).

The ironic thing about all of this is that Final Fantasy was, for the first six entries in the series, a Nintendo exclusive franchise. By that logic, you think the idiot in question would have killed himself because of the series’ shift from Nintendo to Sony after Final Fantasy VI (one of the biggest holes in his argument). Plus, it’s not as if the game still won’t be available for PS3. I fail to see how a particular franchise going from an exclusive to becoming multi-platform could possibly ruin anyone’s life.

There are so many great titles for all of the major platforms at the moment that I don’t see the point in all this bickering. But, then again, I have my own place and work two jobs. Unlike most of the people on the GameFAQs boards who, if not teenagers, probably still live with their mom.

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While the “major” announcements of the THE BIG THREE may not have been all we hoped for, that isn’t to say their weren’t any decent third party titles on the show room floor (hell Konami, Capcom and High Voltage did a better job at representing the Wii than the Big N did).

Castlevania Judgment

I was a bit skeptical at first about the idea of a Castlevania fighting game, but the footage of the same game actually looks pretty good. Only four playable characters have been revealed so far: Simon Belmont, Alucard, Maria Renard and, of course, Dracula himself.

The gameplay looks very different from most fighting games. Of course, it includes many of the iconic elements of the series; such as those whatthefuck heartz and chances are we’ll here some variation (remix) of this song in there.

Megaman 9

What can I say? It’s old school Megaman. And, in my opinion, that’s the best kind of Megaman. Well, except Megaman Legends. BTW, Inafune, we ever gonna get a sequel to that?

Mirror’s Edge

Oh, hey! It’s that innovative FPS I won’t shut the fuck up about!

Seriously, it’s shaping up to look pretty good and the news that it isn’t a PS3 exclusive (unlike what I had originally heard) adds a plus one to my decision to get 360. I’d prefer to play this on PC but I seriously doubt my computer would even run it. Hopefully, the console version will have some kind of keyboard/mouse support.

The Conduit

Probably the best looking Wii game ever and a welcome addition among the constant wave of crap titles that plague the console. High Voltage is being pretty ambitious with this title, especially considering that the Wii is considered a more “casual friendly” console than the others. Hell, some publishers have even questioned why they’re making a title like this in the first place.

Um, gee. Maybe because not all of us are interested in party/mini-games and would rather blow the heads off of some fucking Aliens. Y’know, the sort of thing most of us who bought the Wii were expecting to do in the first place.

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Tomorrow’s Top Ten will be the “no shows” of E3. Some good titles were shown off but there are still some games that were missing in action at the event. And no, I’m not talking about Duke Nukem Forever.

Speaking of, check this out.

Best game of E3 without a doubt. It’s so fucking bad-ass, they couldn’t even show any of the actual game. It’s that good.

(honestly, I shouldn’t even have to tell you that I’m being sarcastic)

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XP

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So… Mega Man 9 was announced a couple of weeks ago. It’s the latest sequel to the old-school classic Mega Man games that center around the original Blue Bomber and his fight to stop the evil mad scientist, Doctor Wily and his army of killer fucking robots.

It was also revealed that the game would be created in the style of the old 8-bit NES Mega Man titles. And there was much rejoicing. For me, as well as most Nintendo fanboys all over the world, this was the only thing on the planet that could top SEX. While the last three titles in the NES era games sort of drove the series into the ground, the original three titles still hold up today as some of the greatest games ever made. When I learned that the game was going for the retro 80’s look I almost shed a tear.

Of course, it was inevitable that there would be an uproar from some gamers who are used to their games (good or bad) looking all nice and shiny. To paraphrase the majority of the comments seen on most gaming blogs “ZOMG THE GRAPHICS ARE TEH SUXX THIS GAME IS GOING TO B HORRIBL WHY W00D J00 STEP BACKWRDZ & KNOT MAK IT AT LEAST 2.5D!!!1 DIS IS JUS AN ATEMPT FOR DA CORPRATIONZ TO ROB J00 OF UR MONEEZ BI MILKIN NOSTALJIA!!eleven”

Look… I’m not going to get into a rant about how games used to exercise your imagination or how this game is going to be judged more on its gameplay than its graphics. I have better things to worry about than some dipshits on the internet who think that the game industry owes them each of their first born children. But I will say this: IF YOU DON’T LIKE IT, THEN DON’T FUCKING BUY IT! Let the rest of us fanboys who want our childhoods back have our way, too. It’s not going to have that big an impact on you anymore than the casual gaming crowd has. Get over it.

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Some of you may remember my rant from awhile back about the announcement of Mortal Kombat VS DC Universe. Skeptics have every reason to approach this particular title with caution. 3D Mortal Kombat games have a reputation for being average at best and DC Universe rarely gets any decent representation in video games. The only game I can think of off the top of my head would be Batman for the NES, but that was actually a movie tie-in. Plus, it was a Ninja Gaiden clone.

The mash-up of the two looked interesting, but my expectations were pretty low. Then I saw the latest gameplay trailer.

I see the stiff animation from MK:A is still present. Other than that, it looks like it might shape up to be a pretty decent fighter. Hopefully we’ll learn more about it at E3 this week.

Of course, there is the persistent argument from the more anal retentive gamers out there that the cross over “just doesn’t make any sense,” then turn right around and hail Marvel VS Capcom 2 as one of the greatest 2D fighting games ever made.

Crossovers aren’t anything new to either games or comics. We’ve seen Simon Belmont go up against Optimus Prime and Batman face off against the Predator. Yes, the “GET TO DA CHOPPAH!” Predator. Hell, Marvel even as far as to put the X-Men in the same room with Kirk, Spock and McCoy. So the argument that the two universes don’t quite match is kind of ridiculous. If Katamari Damacy has taught me anything it’s that games don’t have to make sense.

And don’t get me started on the “Superman would own everyone” bullshit. Anyone who says that Superman would slaughter each and everyone one of the warriors from the Kombat universe obviously isn’t familiar enough with comics. He’s been killed once already and even Batman beat the crap out of him in The Dark Knight Returns. Not that it matters. The one thing games and comics have in common is that death is just a minor inconvenience. Dracula’s been brought back God knows how many times and even Albert Wesker managed to cheat the grim reaper.

So let’s wait on passing judgment until we actually get to play the damned thing.

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Turns out that the rumored Xbox 360 price drop is true… and just in time for the release of Soul Calibur IV. Awesome. Now if I just had money…

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The time of E3 is upon us once again and obsessive gamers, like myself, will likely spend all of their time refreshing their favorite websites waiting for major announcements of old favorites and new concepts. Sony is rumored to give us the first glimpse of God of War III and Nintendo is rumored to announce Animal Crossing Wii as well as a new Kid Icarus game (and hopefully they’ll give us some kind of long term storage solution for the WiiWare games).

As usual, there is a ton of hype regarding the event and the unveiling of new projects, so expect to see some posts in the coming days on these announcements as they come.

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While looking for videos of No More Heroes for my review, I stumbled upon a series of rants from a blogger named Game Overthinker.

I fucking love this guy. He makes a damn fine point and he echoes my thoughts on modern gaming exactly. And he asks and interesting question: What the fuck happened?

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Before I post today’s F-Bomb, there’s something I need to get off of my chest…

Why is it that when I put my headphones on, everybody wants to talk to me? Before I started using my PSP as a portable MP3 player, people would usually leave me alone and I’d go about my business. I don’t consider myself anti-social and if you try to start a conversation (this is assuming I don’t have headphones equipped), I’ll be more than happy to talk to you as long as you’re not a bigot/racist or trying to push your beliefs on me. But for the most part, I’m usually left alone.

Then all of a sudden, the instant I put on a pair of headphones and try to tune the rest of the world out, everybody and their goddamned Grandmother wants to bug me. It may just be me, but if I see someone with an iPod listening to music, it seems a pretty clear indication that that person wishes to be left alone. Apparently, not everyone agrees. Because when I put on a pair of headphones, everyone seems to take this as an opportunity to beg for change/ask directions/talk to me about shit that I don’t give a fuck about.

Normally, this wouldn’t bother me except that I always seem to attract the attention of some of the most bizarre mother fuckers in the city. Nothing is more annoying than jamming to some Nightwish only to be interrupted by some dip-shit who thinks that my PSP is going to give me cancer. He then proceeds to try and convince me that there was no moon landing, there is no terrorist threat and that I should really consider voting for Ron Paul.

So please. If you see somebody out there with a pair headphones, chances are they don’t want to be bugged so just leave them alone. Nobody cares about your fucking petition to ban skateboarding in your neighborhood and we care even less about your half-baked conspiracy theories.

And now for some game-related tidbits…

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RUMOR CONTROL

Ok, so this one really isn’t a rumor anymore since it was confirmed, but it’s still interesting. The Wii is finally getting some Castlevania action but not in quite the way we had hoped. Castlevania Judgment is going to be a 3D fighter and will use characters and elements from most of the games in the series. Yes, you read that correctly. So basically, we’re getting a Smash Bros. clone where you play as Simon Belmont and Alucard. Oh, and the game will continue the proud tradition of using Hearts as currency for your sub-weapons (crosses, holy water, daggers, etc.). No screens or gameplay impressions yet, so I’m approaching this one with “casual optimism.”

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MEGA MAN 9! W00T! The best part: Its being designed in classic 8-bit NES retro flavor for release on WiiWare. YUMMEH!

No, I’m not jumping the shark. This is fo’ real, yo.

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Sony has announced that God of War III will indeed be present at this year’s E3 this coming July. Hopefully we’ll get to see Kratos’ next outing by 2009. For me, this is the game that justifies owning a PS3. Until this game comes out, I have no interest in buying one.

That is until I heard the rumor on Joystiq and Kotaku that the PS3 version of Soul Calibur IV might be getting yet another exclusive character: Everybody’s favorite Angry Spartan, Kratos.

Normally, I’d be skeptical about this considering that each of the two versions of the game already has an exclusive character. But then I remembered a statement from the development team that Senor Vader and lil Green Jedi might become available as DLC for either console. In short, they’re temporarily exclusive. By that logic, it would make sense for Sony and Microsoft to negotiate a deal opting for a TRULY exclusive character for each system to motivate console sales. Supporting this theory is a scan I saw of Famitsu magazine that showed Ryu Hayabusa of Ninja Gaiden fame (currently an Xbox exclusive franchise) facing off against what looked like Cervantes. However, I have no way of knowing if it’s pure photoshop magic or a legitimate screenshot. I haven’t seen anything confirming Kratos’ appearance though, so I’m going with the former for now.

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There is a thin layer of dust on the consoles that I have hooked up right now. Between my two jobs, regularly updating this blog and my addiction liking to Team Fortress 2 I haven’t really done much gaming outside of that. One of the reasons I haven’t posted a review for No More Heroes is because I haven’t even finished it. It’s not that I don’t like it, I just don’t have the time for it. The only gaming I get in is when I’m on the bus or at my evening job (I get paid for pushing a button at the right time).

Oh, and did I mention that I’m on my third play through of Chains of Olympus and my 106th of Symphony Of The Night? Did I also mention that, as awesome as these games are, I’m getting kinda tired of them (yet another excuse to hack my PSP <and no, not for pirating games I don’t own>)?

So y’know what? I’m taking a break from this crap. I’ve got a break from my part time job so I’m dedicate some time to finishing up some of my games. I’ll have more to write about in the long run. That also means I’m going to be taking a break from this blog for about week. But I’ll be posting again on Monday after next and I’ll have a pretty lengthy story for you (no exercises, no Bite-Sized Story, I’m talking an actual fucking story).

And now for something completely different!

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*Sung to Survivor’s Eye Of The Tiger*

It’s the Night of the Pyro and he sets shit on fire!

He’s out roastin’ the flesh of our rivals!

And the last known survivor is about to expire! *cuz, y’know, he’s on fire*

And he’s toasting them all on the Night of the Pyro!

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Yes, I was one of many who participated in the Million Pyro March with Thursday’s update and it was quite fun. I had work the next day though, so I only had time for a few rounds of Dustbowl and Goldrush. I haven’t unlocked any of the new gear yet, but I did get to see the Backburner and and Axtingquisher in action. I have yet to see the flare gun I’m only a few achievements away from earning it myself.

The server I played on was pretty friendly. Of course, all the slots for Pyro were taken when I joined so I just played Demoman until one of the slots freed up (which didn’t take long). Eventually, I got my turn as Pyro and joined the other three Pyro players in having a Blue Team Barbecue. I may not have gotten any of the new shit but at least the requirements for unlocking them isn’t as bad as the Medic achievements.

In the end, I’m glad I chose to play on a normal server as opposed to a custom farming map (unlike this dumbass).

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I must say, I’ve been loving the hell out of my PSP. I just recently bought a USB cable for it and put a good sized chunk of my music collection on the 1GB memory stick, as well as various wallpapers, themes and a few short movies I managed to convert to MP4 format. The fact that it doubles as a portable music/video player gave me an excuse to not hack my original model DS (which I refer to as The Phat) and it’s gotten to where I know take it with me wherever I go.

However, in my quest to customize the hell out of it, I encountered a brick wall.

I downloaded a bunch of non-official software to further push the PSP to its lmit only to discover that none of it worked and it kept giving me a corrupt file error. Turns out the PSP firmware doesn’t allow the use of non-proprietary software. So no emulators and no flash player for the web browser.

After a little more research, I discovered that the only way to get the software running is to - yup, you guessed it - hack it.

I’m not going to buy myself an “I void warranties” t-shirt just yet. Very very few have experienced problems doing such a thing but I’d rather not take the risk of turning my expensive electronic hand-held into a worthless brick. Still, the idea of playing many games from old generation consoles on the go is very tempting.

Fortunately, if I do decide to go that route, it doesn’t require me to do anything to the hardware. From what I’ve read, the process involves downgrading the current firmware to an older version and then upgrading to a custom firmware. If there is a way to back up the current firmware so I can return it to its original state, I’ll have to look into it (in case I fuck up). But if not, I’ll probably just settle for what I have.

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The first ever screens for Soul Calibur IV’s Create a Character mode were released on Kotaku a few days ago. So far, it looks like a pretty good improvement over the CAC introduced in the last installment. Custom characters that were in the screens ranged from Afro-Ninjas to Cowgirl Samurai. I’m a sucker for customization in games (whether it be character profiles, simple-but-fun level editors or just custom decals) so I was already stoked about this game way back when it was announced. If the next announcement includes the words “create your own Jedi,” my head may explode.

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Earth sucks.

The crew of the Galactica and the remains of the Twelve Colonies of Kobol found this out the hard way.

After three years on the run from killer robots and facing crisis after crisis along the way, they’ve finally reached their destination: a new world they can call home…

Only to discover that it’s a nuclear wasteland.

Bummer.

Because the show’s creators were so vague as to when in Earth’s time-line this all takes place, there is a debate as to whether this is our future or our past. Some think that the Cylons beat them there and others think that this may not even be Earth at all (pffft! yeah, you keep telling yourself that). But those with a keen eye know better.

In the final scene where the crew of Galactica has landed, the camera pans across the distant horizon. It becomes obvious that where they’re standing is a beach and in the distance are the ruins of what look like skyscrapers. The camera pans further to the right and before the camera cuts out we see what looks the remains of a bridge. Phil and I did a side by side comparison of the final shot and certain photos taken of the Brooklyn bridge.

Yup, they’re staring at a former New York City in the middle of a Nuclear Winter. We, the descendants of the 13th tribe of Kobol, nuke the shit out of each other in World War III.

YOU MANIACS! YOU BLEW IT UP! DAMN YOU! GOD DAMN YOU ALL TO HELL!!!

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Yes, I know the date says “posted June 14th” but until my head hits the pillow and I pass out, it’s still Friday.

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As you are aware, I, like most fighting game fans am looking forward to the awesomeness that is Soul Calibur IV. Last time I talked about this game, I was ranting about the irrational boob hatred being spouted across gaming sites everywhere.

This past week, it was revealed that, in addition to playing as either Yoda or Vader (depending on your console of choice), you can now also play as Darth Vader’s secret apprentice from the upcoming game The Force Unleashed. Suddenly, there was a disturbance in the Force and the hatred was then focused on the inclusion of Star Wars characters… again.

The primary complaint is that the characters just feel out of place in the Soul Calibur universe. Or at least that’s the argument among the more casual fans of the series. The geekiest of the geeks, however, have decided to take this up a notch by asking the following question: Why do the light sabers not cut through the swords?

Gee, I don’t know. Possibly the same reason that a well crafted, authentic Japanese Katana can’t cut through a pair of wooden Nunchuks. I imagine it would be pretty unbalanced if those characters gained an advantage simply because their wielding fucking laser weapons that are, themselves, unrealistic. And if they decided to take that kind of realistic approach (and successfully pull it off), then it would just be labeled as a Bushido Blade rip-off.

It’s obvious that at some point people forgot this one simple fact: it’s a fucking video game. A FIGHTING game. Does there really need to be any reason for them to be there other than “They’re totally fucking awesome?” Mitsurugi fighting Darth Vader is no more odd than Link fighting Solid Snake, or Strider fighting Wolverine…

Or Sub-Zero fighting Batman.

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I haven’t seen last night’s episode of Battlestar Galactica yet, but word on the street is, things get really fraked up in this one. I called Phil to ask if he had Tivo’d it but his wife answered saying that he was curled up in a corner, crying and sucking his thumb after watching it. Hopefully it will be online tomorrow when I get home from work.

UPDATE: Holy crap…

SPOILER WARNING SPOILER WARNING SPOILER WARNING

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They find Earth…

And we’ve nuked the shit out of each other.

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I went with a friend to go see The Strangers last night. It was a decent horror movie. Nothing ground breaking but it was good. While we were there, we saw a trailer for a movie called Quarantine and it looked pretty interesting. So, naturally, when I got home I ended up doing what I always do when it’s the weekend, I’m drunk and it’s 1am: perform endless strings of searches on Wikipedia, IMDB and Google on the subject of interest.

Turns out Quarantine is a remake of a Spanish horror movie titled [REC]. From the Wiki:

“REC revolves around a television reporter, Ángela, and her cameraman, Pablo, who cover the night shift in one of Barcelona’s local fire stations. The firehouse receives a call from an old lady trapped in her house. When they arrive, and the firemen and the police break down the door, the old lady suddenly attacks and bites one of the policemen, and it is revealed that an unknown but virulent disease is infecting people, causing them to turn into zombies. The police and the military quarantine the building and the camera crew is trapped inside, constantly recording the mayhem that ensues. By the finale they uncover the horrifying truth of the situation and realize the infection may be more than a mere virus.”

The film is shot entirely with a hand-held camera, so the Blair Witch and Cloverfield naysayers will want to stay away from this one. The trailers on Youtube for REC look pretty sweet and some consist entirely of audience reactions to the film (through a night vision lens), crapping their pants and jumping out of their seats.

Word of mouth has been almost entirely positive for REC so I wasn’t surprised in the least that IMDB message board for Quarantine was flooded with an ocean of Haterade by rabid REC fans. I’ll reserve my judgement for Quarantine until it comes out in October, but I’ve gotta get me some of that REC. I have a thing for foreign horror movies and the only the one that’s managed to disappoint me so far was Ring.

It doesn’t look like the movie is available on DVD in the US yet, but chances are somebody has it split up into multiple parts on Youtube.

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For the past two weeks, I’ve been telling you what games to play. In this week’s Top Ten, I’ll be telling you which games to stay the Hell away from and you’ll also see rants about Arnold Schwarzenegger fighting midget in pink jump suits and Resident Evil rip-offs.

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Thank God it’s Friday Sunday.

Last week, I mentioned that there was no new episode of Battlestar Galactica supposedly because of Memorial Day weekend. The new episode aired Friday and Sci-Fi channel usually makes the episode available on their website the day after it airs. So I was really looking forward to watching it when I got home from work.

I just checked the site again and it’s still not up yet. Oh, and I don’t have cable.

On a somewhat related note, I’ve decided to save the word Frak for BSG related discussion. Fuck may be offensive to some but frak just makes me sound like a dork… So from here on out, it’s Fornication Under Consent of the King.

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Alrighty, here’s a load of new videos recently released that I’ve been wanting to share for awhile. Lots of really good games coming out proving that 2008 is a good year to be a gamer.

Castlevania: Order of Ecclesia

Look’s like Dawn Of Sorrow is gonna get knocked off that Top Ten list. Any game that allows you to crush a Giant Enemy Crab with an elevator is an instant buy. Details on the game’s story are scarce right now but will likely contain the words resurrection, of and Dracula. Probably in that order.

Resident Evil 5

Holy crap, I think I saw zombies in there that were white! I guess this game isn’t racist after all! The idea that people would think that in the first place still makes me shake my head in shame. But anyway, the game looks fantastic. Yet another reason for me to get a 360.

Golden Axe: Beast Rider

I’m still not sure how I feel about this… The game looks great but it has a “been there, done that” feel about it. Still, I’ll give it a whirl when it comes out despite the lack of co-op (what the hell were they thinking).

The Conduit

The Wii needs more first person shooters. After playing Metroid Prime 3, it’s hard to go back to using a dual analog setup and the wii remote is easily the next best thing to a mouse. Hopefully this game gets a publisher.

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This coming Tuesday, I’ll have a Top Ten list of “stress relief” games. These are the type of games you want to play after you get home from a long day at work and have somehow managed to not bang your head against the wall or any other scenario that would cause you to consider committing an act of violence… like kick a puppy or something.

Speaking of, I have work in an hour and a half so I’m gonna make some Spies cry in Team Fortress 2.

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Well, there was no new episode BSG this weekend. My friend, Phil and I were discussing this the other night and, somehow the conversation led to a discussion about the original series which in turn led to a discussion about an old episode of Mystery Science Theater 3000 where they make fun of the film Space Mutiny: a crappy science fiction movie so low budget that the space battles all consist of recycled footage from the original 1978 Battlestar Galactica. If you’re at all a fan of BSG, it’s worth checking out the vids on Youtube of Space Mutiny if for no other reason than to see how absolutely horrible it is.

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A few new characters have been announced for the upcoming fighting game sequel Soul Calibur IV. Despite my love for all things SC (the exception being the crappy Wii game), I’m really starting to get a bit irritated at some of my fellow fans. Every time new details/screenshots emerge, people find something to bitch about. One of two major complaints about the game has been the blatant sexualization (is that even a word) of the female characters. I can’t look at a single forum thread on the game without some asswipe bitching about the amount of boobage in the game.

I, personally, am a big fan of boobs as well as Soul Calibur. So everytime I hear a complaint about scantily clad clothing or “breast upgrades,” I can’t help but pound my fist on my desk because it’s like hearing a complaint about a candy product that contains chocolate and peanut butter. How do you go wrong with that? And I don’t want to hear the bullshit excuse about how the female fighters are demeaning to women because of they’re perfect figures and lack of clothing. The game is pure fantasy and the same could easily be said for the male characters. Don’t believe me? Go back and play the previous installments. Damn near all of the male characters in those games have perfectly athletic bodies and have at least one costume that has them with their frakin’ shirt off.

Seriously, it’s like a fraking beer brewery their are so many goddamned six-packs.

We’re not even going to discuss the massive codpiece on Voldo’s crotch…

Another series of complaints I can’t stand are regarding the inclusion of Yoda and Darth Vader in two different versions of the game. Soul Calibur is one of the very few fighting games in which things like “story” and “continuity” actually matter, but the continued belief that the game’s bonus characters will have any effect on this is absolutely ridiculous.

Let’s look at Soul Calibur II for a minute: Each version of the game had an exclusive bonus character. Xbox owners got to play as Todd McFarlane’s Spawn, PS2 owners got Heihachi from Tekken and gamecube owners were blessed with Link from the Zelda series. Now lets go to Soul Calibur III. Do you think any of these characters had any impact on the continuity of the series? Were they at all mentioned in any way during the game?… No, I didn’t think so.

Darth Vader and Yoda’s inclusion in the game is not an attempt on the part of either Namco or LucasArts to merge the two universe’s. They’re just there.

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Those of you that know me personally are aware of my love for First Person Shooters. Those of you who keep up with my blog are also aware that I have a thing for the more obscure games in the genre. One of the games that I planned on writing a review for was a gem from a few years ago called Painkiller.

However, it appears that Yahtzee of Zero Punctuation has beaten me to the punch.

About a day or two after this video was posted at Escapist Magazine, an advertisement popped up on Steam for Painkiller: Gold Edition and contained the quote from Zero Punctuation “All you really need to know is there is a gun that shoots shurikens and lightning…” So, yeah. If you’re the type of person that likes good old fashioned “kill a bunch of shit” first person shooters, then Painkiller is for you.

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My first Top Ten Tuesday this week will be about my favorite Castlevania games. I’ve been playing the hell out of Dracula X Chronicles on my PSP and, as a result, I’ve been on a big CV binge.

That said, it’s time to whip it good.

Until tomorrow’s Bite-Sized Story Time…

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So… I got No More Heroes this past Tuesday. I haven’t been able to put it down. It’s that good. I haven’t finished it yet but I’ll have a review up once I’m done. If you’re a Wii owner who’s been itching for a game that’s a little more on the mature side than you owe it to yourself to get this game. You won’t be disappointed. And if you are, you have no sense of humor and you’re an elitist prick. Go play GTA or Halo or something… ya prick.

Some new media was just released recently for Konami’s Silent Hill: Homecoming, the latest game in their dark, creepy, I-think-I-just-shit-myself horror series. The latest installment has been outsourced to an American development team which has lead to some concern as to whether or not the game is going to be any good. Considering that Team Silent’s last game was Silent Hill 4: The Room, I don’t necessarily see this as a bad thing. Silent Hill 4 was a so-so game in my eyes and the general reaction for Silent Hill: Origins on PSP was pretty much the same. Still, I’ll reserve judgment for when I actually get to play the game (same goes for Origins).

Also, we now have some first impressions from game blogs regarding Golden Axe: Beast Rider. Sadly, the game is a single player only affair and you’re limited to only one of the original characters. That kinda sucks. Hopefully the game itself will more than make up for these small short comings.

The Nintendo Wii gets a lot of flak for being a “kiddy system” and the fact that the majority of the people buying it are non-gamers who pretty much use it solely for Wii Sports doesn’t help much. Still, there are a lot of Nintendo fanboys (like myself) who still have faith in the little white box and hope that Nintendo or some third party developer will turn the tide with some knock-your-socks-off game aimed at the more hardcore gamer.

I thought No More Heroes was going to be that game but, unfortunately, I think I’m one of only eight people that actually own a copy. Then, today, I saw this.

Looks to me like somebody stuck No More Heroes and Sin City in a blender. Considering that Platinum Games is composed of most of the people from the now defunct Clover Studios (Okami) this game looks promising. I bet Capcom is really frakking sorry they let these people go (hehe).

In other news, id Software recently announced that development on Doom 4 is under way. Here’s hoping that they address the inability to attach the flashlight to your gun with duct tape. Doom 3 was a good game but when I have to switch back and forth between my weapons and the flashlight just so I can see where I’m going there is a frakking problem. Maybe they’ll do the smart thing and NOT expect the mod community to fix their mistakes for them.

Alright, I’m done. It’s No More Heroes time.

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