Shot Down In Flames

I am not surprised in the least.

Sony, you’ve been doing this long enough, you should know at this point how to market a platform. Or failing that, you should look at Nintendo, or Microsoft (the Xbox part, not the rest of it) and learn from them. Let’s take a look back at what you’ve done in your ill-conceived attempts to convince people your platform is the one they need:

• Dismissing the Wii as a “toy” and a “fad”. Yeah, them youngsters and their rock’n'roll music and their fancy computators, eh?
• Despite the fact your console is quantifiably in last place, claiming you are winning the console war. Cognitive dissonance much?
• Refusing to pay up to keep DLC from being platform exclusive. DLC is no longer considered a bonus, especially if you charge for it. It’s integral now. Swallow your pride and pony up.
• Yanking out the backwards compatibility, claiming it’s costing too much to produce. Can’t help but notice you haven’t announced a price cut yet. I know I love paying the same price for less features.
• Those creepy commercials. Seriously, who approved those? Is your advertising agency on LSD?
• A noticeably lacking library. Wasn’t so bad before you cut BC, since you could just play PS2 games. Now that you’ve moved to make the PS3 a separate platform, you need more titles. In other words, “LOL no gaemes on PS3!!1!”
• Making your console hard to develop for. This is so ridiculous I can’t even think of something funny to say.

I’m not saying you didn’t do some things right; the PS3 is, in terms of raw power, superior. The combination BluRay player and console is appealing to lots of folks. Games are not region locked. And you did finally break down and put together a decent online network.

Make it happen, Sony.

But right now, your console is in last place, behind the machine it was supposed to replace, and even Microsoft has more goodwill from gamers right now than you. Cut the price and soon, throw money at developers, have your PR drones focus on your verifiable good points rather than badmouthing your competitors and making things up. Things will turn around if you make an effort. Or you can be the next 3DO, it’s up to you.

Maybe there on the edge is your hope
But you don’t look down

Fire Up The Blades

I have not yet picked up any of the splat books for 4th Edition, as I figured it was easier and smarter to do so on my infrequent visits to the English side of the world, rather than paying the book’s cost in shipping fees. So instead, I have been checking out information on the books, and found an interesting tidbit in a review of the Adventurer’s Vault:

One useful inclusion is a “move the magic” ritual, that allows you to move an enchantment from one weapon to another, so if that +2 Sunblade drops on a scimitar, but you want it on a khopesh, you’re good to go.

Well, finally. I’ve been frustrated with that sort of thing for years, and it’s nice they finally added a little something to take care of it. How many times have you heard something like this during a game?

“Awesome, a +5 Holy Avenger of Ultimate Destruction! Oh wait, it’s what kind of weapon? Damn, nobody’s proficient with that, put it on the sell for healing potions pile, then…”

That whole scenario has never been in keeping with the heroic conceit in D&D. It’s difficult to feel like an epic warrior when the Sword of Angel’s Tears that you risked your life to wrench from the Hellstone turns out to be a tulwar and no one can use it without slicing their own arm off. Accidental amputations are not the things sagas are made of.

Cut down by a Demon’s Blade
By strange forces it was made

This Is Why I Hate Hollywood Redux

When I read this I actually gagged a little.

Seriously people, if you are ever tempted to watch I Am Legend, just go watch the original with Vincent Price.

You will delight to the abilities of one of the greatest actors Hollywood has produced, and as a bonus, you won’t ever have to roll your eyes at Mister Smith’s “acting”, if you can even call it that.

I’m not being elitist here; I’m just trying to prevent another Wild Wild West.

In Blackest Day, In Darkest Knight

Oh, not this shit again.

Seriously, I sometimes thought to myself when I read Batman comics, “Well, at least they haven’t pulled that ‘Let’s kill off the Hero!‘ bullcrap with the Dark Knight. That’s why I keep coming back for more, ’cause this one title, at least, has a little integrity.”

No really, I thought that. It was kind of like brand loyalty with me. I’d dabble in other superhero books, but in the end I’d always come back to ol’ Bats. He was as believable a character as you can get on the comic book page. A normal person, who saw something no one should ever have to see, and became a little….unhinged. His exploits were incredible without being ridiculous. You can’t really relate to someone like Superman or the Flash, since they’re something other than human. But Bruce Wayne, there’s something every little boy can imagine himself as.

Now you’ve gone and tainted him for me, DC. The way I see it, this can go two ways:

1. You come up with a deus ex machina to bring him back at some point in the future. Which makes this another cynical cash grab. Also, I hate you DC.

2. Bruce Wayne is really, really dead, and he’s replaced with someone less interesting, like say (gag) Robin. Sales spike for the death issue, and then plummet to earth like Superman in Kryptonite underoos. Also, I hate you DC.

I don’t care if Grant Morrison is involved, you are seriously screwing with the franchise here. I can only pray someone over there will return to their right mind long enough to put a stop to this monstrosity. Or maybe Darkseid can just go knock some sense into them.

Didn’t you hear him? He’s the goddamn Batman.

Na na na na na na na na, na na na na na na na na,
daaa daaaa!

This Is Why I Hate Hollywood

I shouldn’t be surprised. After they butchered my favorite video game, fireballed my favorite tabletop, and made a movie so bad I almost built a deathray, I should know better than to give Hollywood the benefit of the doubt. But then they go and do this to Dragonball:

Yes, this is supposed to be Goku.

Now, don’t get me wrong; I hate Dragonball. The show is a coordinated assault on aesthetics, nay on rational thought itself. It does not only reject cohesive storytelling, it seems actively hostile to it. Because I appreciate good storytelling, I must loathe Dragonball, with every fiber of my being.

Even worse, it is often the first show that leaps to mind when you say anime to someone in the West. “Oh, you mean like that Dragonball show?”. I want to breed a skunk-porcupine hybrid to maul these people. It’s the same when I say I like weird fiction, and I get, “Oh, you mean like Stephen King?”. Are you actually trying to enrage me, or are you just that nescient?

But the point, as I belabour my way around it, is that only Hollywood would go and take something that is already terrible, and make it worse. Are they clever enough to aim for a cinematic version of arithmetic overflow, where the movie becomes so execrable that it wraps around and turns out awesome? Or are they as I always suspected, bizarre mindless creatures that spring forth spontaneously from a pool of radioactive ooze and filth somewhere beneath the streets of California?

The mind boggles. It boggles, dear reader.

Brilliant!

From the comments here:

I would love World of Warcraft if it weren’t for all the other people.

Preach it brother. And the rest of you can take your Illidan Stormrage and shove him up your Murlock Breeches.

…And Then You’ll Beg

You may have already heard about this, but check out the 8.31.2008 post here for some righteous indignation. To quote:

The fine folks at GenCon raised over $17,000 for [the Christian Children's Fund] charity, which helps starving children in impoverished areas of the world–only to have that money actually turned down by the charity. The charity refused due to the fact that the money was raised partly by the sales of Dungeons and Dragons materials, which as we all know, puts an irrevocable taint of evil on the filthy lucre that us demon-worshiping gamers might want to use to, say, donate to starving children.

…

GRAAAAAHHH!!!

Yeah, you stay classy there, CCF. With all the strides gamers have made to show the world, hey, we’re NOT the insidious cult or violence-bent lunatics that the media and religious leaders paint us out to be, it’s nice to see that that you can still go ahead and make irrational decisions based on fear, hearsay and your own ignorance. Bravo!

The best part, of course, is that the only people who lose here are the kids. I’m sure they’ll feel much better knowing that the money that could have been used to provide them with food and clean water was turned down because it came from people who like to wear funny clothes and say “prithee” a lot.

Fuck you, CCF, fuck you. I’m too pissed right now to come up with a better way to express my anger, your stupidity has literally rendered me incoherent with rage. To make up for you being jerks, this year I’ll donate extra hard to Child’s Play. Maybe I’ll send them a few copies of the D&D Core Rulebook Gift Set just to spite you.

ossuary for the misinformed
you’d end up being amazed of what you’d see inside
the wisps of knowledge denied
and to think that someone’s implied it’s a better place to reside

What’s Going On

I’m still here. I’m finally over my cold, and I’ve got stuff to say. It’s just so much to say, that I haven’t had time to get it all down on (digital) paper yet. I’ve got a bunch of pictures too, from Canada and from the latest festival, so I’ll be putting them up soon.

For now I’ll just leave this right here. It’s nice to see there’s still someone in America who’s as quietly outraged as I am. Or was at least; now that I’m out of the US and I can’t see a good reason to return, I honestly don’t give a crap anymore. Let King George declare martial law and re-sculpt the Statue of Liberty in his own brilliant image, I’d rather go back to the Frozen North and risk being eaten by polar bears. Or just stay here in Japan; if I can’t understand what the news or the politicians are saying, I can’t get so goddamn angry I go cross-eyed and start to snarl and bite people.

And no, it’s not going to change one way or the other after the election. As Lewis Black once put it, “When you walked into that voting booth, you had a choice between two bowls of shit. And let’s face it, the only difference was the smell.”

Alright, I’m done with my disingenuous railing against American government. As I said, not my problem anymore. I’ll be nice* from now on, I guarantee.

* Not a guarantee.

Peace or annihilation?

 

I Don’t Wanna Grow Up

You know, I always felt a little awkward when I picked up a new toy or gewgaw just because I thought it looked cool. “Is this really the sort of thing an (insert arbitrary number here) year old should be buying? Aren’t I too old for this by at least several decades?”. I have always been very insecure about myself, and especially the parts of my personality that I thought the public in general disapproved of. Then today, I stumbled across this little morsel of wisdom:

I think the problem a lot of people have is they think they need to outgrow toys. I really don’t think getting older matters as long as you never stop playing.

This is a grown man about my age speaking about his love of Pokemon and Star Wars, and how he hopes to share them with his son. And it’s hard for me to find fault with his position.

So you know what? Fuck it, I don’t care anymore. I’m going to take the fact I look half my age and really start acting like it, only without the teenage angst and awkwardness. You hear that, haters? I’m going to play with my Gundams and my video games, read my comic books and watch my cartoons, and headbang to Iron Maiden, while you sneer at me for acting weird and juvenile. I will bounce from cool thing to cool thing and share my love with those I care about, while you just get older and more spiteful. And when we both die, I’ll have enjoyed my life at no one’s expense but my own, whereas the rest of ya probably have nothing to show for your existence but 2 divorces and the clap. HA HA!

And just so you can see I have already begun to embrace this:

What’s better than a giant robot? Giant Robot Samurai!

Can’t read ‘em, but the pictures are pretty

Call me Solid Snake.

Assembled Strike Noir. Kickass.

How the hell did I get here so soon

Oh, You Go To Hell, PBS

That man was practically the Second Coming.

Seriously, Mister Rogers was one of the best role models for children ever, and one of a truly rare breed; decent human beings. I really respected the man and everything that he did. Perhaps mentally flipping off PBS isn’t the best way to honour his memory, but damn it, they are enraging me, and not in my usual “I don’t really care, I just like getting angry” way. It probably won’t help, but you can try making your voice heard. It’s better than doing nothing.

Anyway, I have a collection of random pictures from the last week or so, and I will post them, as soon as I can figure out how to get them off my fancy Japanese cellphone. Maybe I can throw it at the wall and hope the pixels leak out.