Mortal KomBat

Now you were either a MK boy or a SF boy. You couldn't possibly like both. That's just wrong.
Those of you in the SoB club (ie MK fans) would remember the seminal (and greatest) MK3, and especially it's rumoured fatalities, babalities, animalities, and friendships.

Codes and tips on how to do fatalities and all that would circulate in magazines, rumours of long and elaborate rules to get one thing done were usual. Of course, it was great fun once you found a code that actually worked. I personally used to know Kung Lao's shredding fatality: FORWARD, FORWARD, BACK, DOWN, HIGH PUNCH.

Anyhow, some one on the ever entertaining youtube has posted a video with ALL possible MK3 fatalities, babalities, animalities, and friendships. Enjoy this 8 minute medley of gory, shocking, and now crap animations. Still a great game though :)

India, you might like this - what with all your old SNES magazines you used to bring with loads of codes in them.

R.I.P. Anas

This really is sad news... had a phone call from a friend earlier to say hi, and he was telling me about the death of a friend of mine that was younger than me by a year.
His name was Anas, I'd known him from primary school, we went to the same one, same high school, and same medical school. His dad was a university teacher.

He was kidnapped from outside Al-Kadhimiya hospital and a ransom was given to his dad. His dad went to deliver the money and the kidnappers killed them both. Their bodies were found shot dead on 22/12/06.

It really makes me sad and angry. Poor Anas, was such a nice and calm guy, never hurt anyone or anything. What have they gained from killing a father and son, both pillars of the community and academics? A doctor and a teacher now dead in a torn FUCKED UP land. FUCK THEM ALL.

R.I.P. Anas and father. I sincerely hope your family get the patience they so desperately need.

FUCK THEM ALL.

Merry Christmas!

All you lucky SOBS out there (note the big O in that, SoB is me, SOB is all you mofo's!). Am working for the 3rd christmas in a row, but I had the senses to bring the macbook with me, cos they've recently installed a wireless network in our mess.

So, am sat here watching Grease on the TV while typing this. It's 14:45 and I finish at 22:00... poor me :( here you go - a snap of me sat here to cheer you all up (or hopefully depress you so am not the only one).

On How Christmas Came Early

For the 3rd year in a row I am working Christmas Day!
2 years ago I was doing nights, last year I was doing a day shift, and this year I'm doing a long day shift (0900-2200)! Sigh.

So, I'm going to Kelly's parents' house on Boxing Day (like last year), but me and Kelly decided to open our presents together today, and what a surprise I was in for!
I got her a book (cookery! heh), a DVD (Jim Henson's Story Teller), a Casio Exilim Z70 camera, and a LG Chocolate mobile phone (and I'm really jealous of that last one, it's awesome!).
I got her parents a Nintendo DS with Sudoku and Dr Kawashima's Brain Training. Why? cos they're both Sudoko geeks and her dad plays video games, so I thought it's a good idea. For my mum, I sent money (typical Arabic shit eh?)

Kelly, as usual, got me tons of stuff (like my last birthday, remember?):

1\ A Nescafé Dolce Gusto Coffee Maker: YES! YES! I can now finally do like they do in those coffee shops, make a coffee and go "tap tap" while cleaning the filter on the sink! heh. Seriously though, the thing makes excellent coffee, and it really gives professional results.

2\ Two tickets to see the awesome Blue Man Group in The New London Theatre: Sorry Zzz, I know you really wanted to see them when you were here, but I'll let you know how good the show is :p

3\ A Gorilla-pod: Now this is one thing that I saw ages ago and nearly bought but thought it was just a gimmick. How wrong! It's a mini-tripod that has bendable legs, you use it to fix your camera on to any surface you like. You can also use it to stabilise the camera to reduce that shake that's impossible to control when taking night shots. I have to say, the thing is brilliant and is very well built. One really good thing about it is that it comes with a little detachable base that you screw on to your camera and it stays there, that way you can just slot your camera in and out of the pod with ease. Highly recommended.

4\ A blue jumper from Debenhams

5\ Why Don't Penguins' Feet Freeze: The follow-up book to last year's "Does Anything Eat Wasps", a book full of trivial questions and their scientific (and not-so-scientific) answers. The cool thing about the book is that it's a compilation of reader questions and reader answers submitted to "The Last Word" column of New Scientist. Makes for really cool trivial reading, recommended to those people that want to have an answer to most things, and those that want to have something funny/cool to talk about in parties (or pubs).

6\ But best of all, something that I really was amazed about, I recently found out that Kelly studied art at school. She learnt how to draw things and she's shown me stuff she's drawn (from her little sister to tigers!). This year, she took 3 days to draw me DONKEY KONG! awesome stuff! the picture is going up in my computer room (read: den, geek room!) and is a really nice personal touch.

So there you have it, Xmas came early for me and it's been a cracker. Hope it's the same for everyone out there, particularly those in Iraq. Be safe.

Finally, as I type this I can smell the roast turkey, mmmm Christmas lunch here I come!

Videogames Live

I should have blogged about this earlier :)

One Saturday morning (25th of November) I was in London when I saw a news article about a once only concert in The Hammersmith Apollo, called Videogames Live. The show was about celeberating the music that's come out of our favourite addiction.
It was very popular in America, and that day was their only UK show before going back to the states.

I called a geek friend who I knew couldn't say no (Wisam) and he booked the tickets for us both for the show at 19:00. I took mum to some big shopping centre she wanted to go to (Blue Water), and then met Wissam in Hammersmith.

The place was full of stereotypical gamers, ie sweaty, over weight-ish men with glasses and T-shirts that say things like "I Zelda You" and the like. Anyhow, we the concert started and we were in for a great treat! They played live orchestral music from loads of games, like Warcraft, Halo, Beyond Good and Evil, and tons more. The show started with a 10 minute Medley of all the classic games, starting from Pong and ending with Tetris!
There were also some nice on-stage effects, like a real-life Solid Snake + guard and loads of lights/lasers etc. A big screen was also showing clips of the games which the music was coming from.

As a nice surprise, some guests came on, like Michael Ancel (Rayman, Beyond Good and Evil), and that awesome Japanese dude who can play 10 Final Fantasy tracks on piano blind folded!
They also had on-stage live competitions like Frogger and Space Invaders. One lucky mofo even won an Acer "ferrari" laptop!
At the end we were all given a free promo CD which had studio recordings of the most famous Ubisoft games tracks.

It was good fun. The tour is now back in America but will be touring other places next year. If you do have the chance to watch a great show with great music, don't miss it!

Wii have games

Wii are gameless

Quick post: for those of you wondering what's happening with the Wii and why I haven't ranted on and on about it, well that's cos I HAVE NO GAMES FOR THE DAMN THING!

Sure it's got Wii Sports in the package, but that's more like a tech demo than anything, and really needs 2 players to be fun. I only have one controller.
So, why no games? well my original amazon order had a Wii + Rayman, Red Steel, Zelda, Super Monkey Ball (wooohooo!), and Wii Play (which includes a free remote). Due to Wii Play being extremely short of supply, the package was only sent out by courier yesterday.

I was meant to receive it today. I had the day off (bliss, been playing EVE most of it, and GoW), but the stupid courier somehow couldn't ring the bell, cos their website now says (Delivery failed, recepient not home). RECIPIENT NOT BLOODY HOME?!!! I haven't seen the sun since yesterday!

So, the depot is open tomorrow (saturday) between 8am to 12.30pm. Am gonna ring them to see if I can pick the damn thing up, otherwise I'll have to wait till Monday as they will attempt redelivery!

As you can see, if I don't get the package tomorrow I'm gonna be one VERY UNHAPPY bunny, ravingly rabid perhaps :p

Wiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiii!

This is a very quick post: YES I did get the Wii on launch day (Friday 08/12/06), but what I didn't get with it is lots of new games (damn Amazon! The games order is separate and still hasn't shipped!). It does, however, come with Wii Sports, which is great to sort of ease you in to this new controller method.

Anyhoot, a more detailed post later once I've got my hands on Red Steel, Zelda, and Super Monkey Ball... oh and the component video cable :)

In the mean time, here's the Wii next to it's big brother

PS: got some new wireless headphones too that I HAVE TO tell you all about - they are absolutely awesome.

Later

Remember That Police Academy Guy...

... the one who made amazing noises with his mouth? black dude?
Michael Winslow was his name, and we all wanted to grow up and be just like him, making funny noises with our mouths and pretending to play video games :)

Anyhow, he does stand up now, and here's a great clip of him in action... gotta love that rave party sketch!

Tomorrow

we get Wii!

Funnily, I'm getting 2 (by mistake). I pre-ordered from Argos and Amazon, and both are gonna deliver! Am gonna refuse the Argos one and get my money back - am not THAT greedy.

Only worrying thing is that I think Amazon are gonna deliver the games and component cable the next day, so might just end up playing Wii Sports all day tomorrow.... that's if I can pull myself away from EVE :D

Updates and impressions later. SoB out

Animator vs. Animation II

Click here to see one of the coolest flash animations you have ever seen in a while.
Remember Icon's Story? well, this one takes the concept way beyond that.

Watch what happens when our Animator decides to call his stick man "The Chosen One".

Pure genius