Bil-pakeit, Part 2

It's 12:00 British Summer Time, Saturday afternoon. I'm sat typing this in my bathrobe, having just come out from an extended shave and scrub session (the longer version of the infamous Shit, Shower, and Shave).

This morning at around 10:00 I finished the final leg of my "week" of nights, ie the last 3 shifts. As always, it wasn't too busy and wasn't too quiet, just normal medical crap that has to come in each night (Chest pains, overdoses, epilepsy etc).
I got home, and instead of going to sleep first then scrubbing second, I decided to get it all out of the way, so I can go to sleep happy (and clean). The difference this time is that Kelly also clipped my hair (the universal NUMBER ONE cut that I've had for yonks). So, in addition to shaving my face and trimming my beard, I've also clipped my hair. This is seriously Bil-pakeit.

Now: Gonna have a hearty "celebration" breakfast (aka A Good Old British Fry Up), and then sleep for 3 hours. This evening I'm hoping to watch Stranger Than Fiction with Kelly and then do some 360 lovin' with The Boy and his "al EmaraTi" friend, who's also called Ali and owns all 3 consoles.

SoB out.......

Mario And Sonic At The Olympic Games

No, it's not a trick. It's not a rumour either, and it definitely is real.

Mario and Sonic, the pinnacle of 16bit rivalry and loads of play-ground arguments, are to appear together (for the very first time) in a game!

Mario And Sonic At The Olympic Games is a Wii/NDS title by Sega, and that's all we know. Do they compete in normal games or does it require Mario to try and do some gravity-defying 360 loop-the-loops or Sonic to pick up turtle shells and PUT WEIGHT ON?

Who knows. But finally SNES and MEGADRIVE Fanbois can bury the hatchet and play a game featuring their favourite mascot. Whether it's any good remains to be seen, if it isn't, I double Nintendo's fat plumber will be affected, it's the blue hedgehog that's been getting a load of shit lately.

Finally!

Today, after a four-and-a-half hour session, and a total of bloody 46 gameplay hours (waaay too long for me!), we finally managed to finish The Legend Of Zelda - Twilight Princess on the Wii!!

Don't get me wrong, it's a great game - awesome even, just too long. Mind you, absolutely non of it was boring, and some of the levels and dungeons were awe-inspiring in design.

Worst bit was the last boss battle, as in traditional Zelda style it wasn't just one battle and you're done, but more one boss merges into another etc. When you reach the stage that you're gonna chuck your Wiimote at the screen, you actually finish!

Twilight's final battle(s) were as follows: Zant (who goes from one previous boss location to the other, emulating how they fought you, so he was like 5 battles in one), then Ganon Puppet Zelda, then Ganondorf Dark Beast, then Gannondorf horse chase/battle, and then Gannondorf Sword Fight (toughest of them all). Remember, there's no saving or shit in between, so a booboo is a BIG booboo. Luckily, we managed it all in one go (we did have only 1 heart container left at the very end but who cares!).

So that's that. Zelda is done and dusted. Now to get Red Steel out of the way (shit game), then I want to get some new Wii goodies (Kororinopa, Eledees, Sonic and The Secret Rings, Mercury Revolution and Excite Truck). It's gonna be busy.

Teo and Tea have arrived

One of 5000 limited-edition CD/DVD combos, which is becoming the norm for recent Jarre releases.

I hated this album when I heard the promo, I now love it. Jarre has moved, not up, but sideways, and has gone for a more dancey, main-stream kind of feel. It works for the majority, but has also managed to upset loads of fans.

I personally really like the album, first few listens didn't impress me but then you realise that even though the songs would work in a sweaty night-club, they also retain a lot of Jarre-ology.

Some tracks are pure genius, while others are so Eurodance/techno they'll make even Scooter cry (Teo and Tea being the worst offender).

If you do decide to give it a twirl, listen to it more than once (it's only 50 minutes), don't skip tracks and don't give up listening cos you think that the track isn't good. Just listen and forget other Jarre albums (after all, the golden classics are 30 years old!) and listen to Teo and Tea afresh, like a new band you've just discovered.

A quick tip

for those wanting to burn DL DVD+R discs

USE ONLY VERBATIM DISCS! (MEDIA CODE MKM001 OR 003). Yes, they're way more expensive than other blanks (cheapest .uk is £1.50) BUT they are brilliant. Absolutely brilliant. And no, DATAWRITE, BULKPAQ, TUFFDISC etc aren't worth the effort.

SoB - has loads of cheap DL coasters

Disappointing

We saw 300 today.

We were both disappointed by 300 today.

Why? cos all it is is ONE BIG FIGHT SCENE. True the gfx and fights are awesome, but that's about it. There's no plot to follow, no characters to relate to, and nothing that hooks you.

All you see is one fight, which finishes, and then guess what? another fight, and then another, ad nauseum.

Heck, one guy watches his son's head get chopped off in front of his own eyes and you feel nothing for the dad nor the boy. The characters are that distant.

Don't get me wrong, I know the film is just telling the story of a battle, but surely someone could have dramatised it a little bit, and actually made a SCREENPLAY. Even Sin City had more story than this, and that was about prostitutes and yellow men.

This film will appeal to 2 kinds of people, those that are die hard Frank Miller fans, and those that wet themselves thinking of Brad Pitt as Troy jumping up to kill the challenger and then saying "are there anymore" or something to that line. If you're in that camp then 300 is the best film ever made. It's just like that scene repeated for 1 hour and 57 minutes.

For those that like to actually follow a story, relate to a character, or actually like to listen to some dialogue now and then, stay clear. Watch Gladiator instead.

Bil-pakeit

(In the packet)

That's how I feel right now. Fresh, new, and bil-pakeit :)

Let me digress. I embarked on a week of nights on Saturday. I say a week though, but due to recent EU working hour regulations it is illegal to do 7x12 hour shifts in a row. So, to bypass that, my hospital decided to split the week of nights: you do 4 nights in a row (Sat. to Wed.), then you have a WHOLE WEEK OFF (not annual leave, not time owing, nothing. Just off) and then you're back on Wed. night till Fri.
That way, you do 4 nights, have 7 days off, then do 3 nights.

Anyhow, so I finished my first 4 nights this morning. Got home really early (around 9:30) and managed to stay awake till about 11:30. I then entered a deep coma until my alarm clock woke me up at 15:00. I have to force myself to get up so I can sleep again tonight and try to return to normal. Usually, I'd have a shower before going to sleep so that when I get up I don't have to rush to start the next shift.
This time however I jumped in to the shower after waking up, and man did I need a full body scrub! All that grime of hours of staying up all night, and I refuse to shave on nights so I was starting to look like I was going to blow myself up any second (:p), oh and my nails were a bit too long too.

So, after about an hour of shaving, clipping, scrubbing, and showering I am out a new man. Brand new. BIL PAKEIT. I actually don't stink any more.

In other news, I am listening to Pan's Labyrinth OST as we speak, and it JUST DOESN'T WORK. It's a very picture-centric score, doesn't really mean anything without the movie. I also bought the 2 disc special edition DVD, even though I had a copy ages ago. The movie is so good it had to be bought. They deserve me £11.

Oh, and I've pre-ordered Jarre's Teo&Tea album (CD + DVD), which I hated initially (been listening to promo) but now I can't stop listening to it and thinking that it's actually one of his best albums.

SoB out - off to eat some pizza, then text hani for some PES6 lovin'. He kicked my ass yesterday. REEEEVEEEEEEEEENNNNGGGGGGEEEEEEE!!

Black 360 This April!

Kotaku the gaming blog has scans of Game Informer's April edition, which has a story about the black HDMI-ready 360. Rumours of this have been floating around for ages, but now it's been confirmed!

Engadget have the web exclusive.

Now THIS is how it's meant to be done

I'm ranting about Xbox Live again. Why? cos yesterday me and Hani met up online at some late hour (since he got his 360 his sleep pattern has practically been reversed), and decided to have a go at some Pro Evo 6 (I know I know!).

Anyone who remembers me will know that I am not generally a fine of sport games, except a few exceptions (eg Tennis, and Speedball if you can count that in :p). So with reluctance I got PES6 and we tried it out last night. And man what a night! We were both really shit at it, but game after game we started learning the tricks and ended up scoring some great goals!

But what's really amazing about it is its great online function. For the majority of our PC gaming Hani has had problems with higher than average pings (cos of UAE-UK links), and has had to put up with some mild lag on Quake. Amazingly, every game we've tried on Live has no lag whatsoever, except now and then like normally expected. I have no clue how Table Tennis manages to keep us playing at blazing speeds all the time. With PES6, the first 30 seconds of every game we played chops up a bit (I presume it's syncing and calculating what it needs to compensate) and then we're playing EXACTLY as if we're on the same machine, or on a LAN.

Best thing is, whenever a goal is scored it is replayed from 2 angles, and then the scorer has about 1 minute to manually control the replay, including slow-mo, reverse, camera control etc etc. And this shows on both players' machines! So for that sweet post-goal one minute, you have the opportunity to really annoy and charge-up your opponent, by showing him the goal over and over again. Sweet.

Of course, all of this is with lag-free voice chat throughout the whole game. It really is amazing how MS got the Live servers so good.

I say again, those that are considering getting a console (or have recently settling in .eu *cough* india *cough*) I seriously recommend a 360. Get it and relive the golden oldie days were gaming was simple, and fun.

Finally, here's a video of something I was hoping would happen way back here: a 4 player Command and Conquer 3 skirmish, on Live, with full video/voice chat while the game's playing :) I can't wait for other games to have video conferencing built in (imagine it in football or tennis games or anything really, seeing your foe as you battle!). Good times are a-coming!

GameSpy To Power Wii

[Joystiq QUOTE]
In a press release sent out today, GameSpy has announced it will provide "multiplayer technology" to publishers developing games for the Wii. The middleware allows the same online functionality found in DS games but will include friend rosters, matchmaking, and ranking data similar to Xbox Live. It's about time! Looks like Nintendo is finally willing to share their online service with 3rd party developers.

Nintendo has had a toe in the online world since Nintendo Wi-Fi Connection launched in 2005, but game-specific friend codes and the lack of a central hub have made the service a cumbersome experience. Could this mean the end of friend codes and the beginning of a beautiful online experience?
[QUOTE]

Could it be true? Have The Big N finally realised that having game specific friend codes and all that crap makes it stupidly difficult to play games with your friends, without a certain degree of offline co-ordination first? I mean, when me and Kelly used to play MarioKart vs online, we had to CALL each other to start the game and find each other!!

Compare that to Live!, where you just turn your 360 on, and you get a list of your friends that are online, and what they're doing. To play with them, it's just a matter of sending an invite. Easy as pie. Nintendo, to keep their family-kid-friendly image don't show you what your friends are up to at all. You gotta speak to them in the real-world to get them to start an online game. Works yes, SUCKS BIG TIME though.

Here's hoping.

Which reminds me, India you still haven't fixed that wireless router? we were gonna duke it out on Tetris-DS-Crack.......

Commodore Are Back!!

(Source C&VG)

The Commodore brand is returning to the videogame world as Commodore Gaming, which is focusing on building high-end gaming PCs.The company is to unveil its first range of machines at the CeBIT show which takes place on Germany on March 15. Attendees will be able to "play the high performance purpose-built machines with the latest PC games", it's stated."We are privileged and excited to bring the Commodore brand back to the gaming community and mark a new chapter in its history with this exceptional machine. We're sure that it will deliver what gamers need and want", Bala Keilman, CEO for Commodore Gaming, has commented.

Lapoonia is NOW ONLINE!!

It has FINALLY happened. The unthinkable has happened, and one of my friends has bought an Xbox 360, AND gone online with it, AND played with me for a good while!

And to think it's Hani of all people. I say that cos he's the last person I thought would get one, cos he went "off" games ages ago...

Anyhow, he rang me a few days ago to chat about 360 or Wii, and I recommended 360 for him... lo and behold he got a UK PAL one today for a good price, with 10 games!
This evening, he set it all up and then we voice chatted and I ran him through how to get Xbox Live! up and running, and sure enough he was on it in no time, and we moved our voice chat over to the Xbox. I have to admit it all worked at first attempt, which is something of a miracle in the tech world, as all you people that visit this blog will surely agree with.

Then, we played the only game we both have (Table Tennis), and there was a teeny bit of lag but nothing major, all this while still voice chatting. It really was great fun and I am very happy that he got one, cos as much as I love playing online with strangers and "friends" I've met in games, nothing beats playing with golden-oldie real life friends that you shared this interest with 10+ years ago. Hopefully, he'll keep the gaming spirit. He gets Gears of War tomorrow, and am hoping he'll get as addicted as me to it's excellent online matches.

So, if you're reading this and now and thinking about getting one, then YES! PLEASE DO! It's an excellent system, with great power and capability, and awesome games especially if you're online with it. The Live! system (as I've ranted before) is so easily and properly integrated in to the system that even Haniboy can use it :p

Also it's cheaper than decent PC but can do just as well, if not better. No need to worry about pings or IP addresses or drivers or new VGA cards etc etc... just plug in, play, and be amazed at it all.

NILE - PLEASE GET ONE - ME AND HANI WOULD LOVE YOU FOREVER.

Here's hoping.....

D'Oh!