The best thing about atheism is that I don't have to devote much energy into being an atheist. Recently read Richard Dawkins' The God Delusion (well, I gave up towards the very end... section didn't concern me). I was particularly interested in one area where Dawkins highlights particular sections of the Bible which aren't so nice. Long story short, I wanted to see what the religios would offer regarding incidences where rape is supposedly condoned.
One particular blog refuted that the taking of virgin women does not equal rape. Atheists see what they want to see. No rape is mentioned at all in the Bible, they say. It's called reading between the lines. But that takes me back to how I started this entry. I don't give too much care. Religious crazies can do what they want. While it is rather regrettable that I can't save any precious children from religion, in truth, I think human stupidity is going to win the war anyway. Maybe that's what being human is all about. Gah, that's kinda stupid, haha.
But yeah, I'm going to go on not caring. If I come across someone close (nah) who is religious, maybe I'll try beat it out of them.
I've been playing nice with these Jehovah's Witnesses. Next time they come up, I'm going to admit myself as a sinner. A huge sinner. If they try to save me, I'll proposition them. We'll go to Sodom. On my bicycle.
Monday, June 22, 2009
Can't think of an interesting title
Crash (1996)
That was hot. I was turned on. I'll never have sex with a car accident victim the same way again. Couldn't make much of the plot though... it was high brow pornography! Made for compelling viewing, probably because I'm a sick, sick pervert.
Very nice to see Elias Koteas. As someone on IMDB pointed out, he "was awesome as Casey Jones and looks like Christopher Meloni". Koteas is my godfather. He's been there for me since I was a child, haha.
MASH (1976)
This was confusing. The humour went here, there, then back here again, and then took another diversion.
Juno (2007)
The lingo killed me. The delivery of the lingo was worse. Juno is so quirky, so out there, so wicked. She's also too quirky, too out there, bla. There is no inate coolness about Juno, everything about her felt forced. I blame Ellen Page. She played "pretend cool", rather than "cool".
- I bet that half of the appeal to audience viewers was that burger phone. Teenage girls dig that sort of stuff.
- Michael Cera as a runner? Get the fuck out of here.
- Jennifer Garner is hot.
Poor human's Napoleon Dynamite. I also dislike this film because on Buddy Holly's last.fm artist page, "Dearest" is the top track instead of "Peggy Sue". Why? Because "Dearest" was on the soundtrack to the film. Great.
That was hot. I was turned on. I'll never have sex with a car accident victim the same way again. Couldn't make much of the plot though... it was high brow pornography! Made for compelling viewing, probably because I'm a sick, sick pervert.
Very nice to see Elias Koteas. As someone on IMDB pointed out, he "was awesome as Casey Jones and looks like Christopher Meloni". Koteas is my godfather. He's been there for me since I was a child, haha.
MASH (1976)
This was confusing. The humour went here, there, then back here again, and then took another diversion.
Juno (2007)
The lingo killed me. The delivery of the lingo was worse. Juno is so quirky, so out there, so wicked. She's also too quirky, too out there, bla. There is no inate coolness about Juno, everything about her felt forced. I blame Ellen Page. She played "pretend cool", rather than "cool".
- I bet that half of the appeal to audience viewers was that burger phone. Teenage girls dig that sort of stuff.
- Michael Cera as a runner? Get the fuck out of here.
- Jennifer Garner is hot.
Poor human's Napoleon Dynamite. I also dislike this film because on Buddy Holly's last.fm artist page, "Dearest" is the top track instead of "Peggy Sue". Why? Because "Dearest" was on the soundtrack to the film. Great.
Saturday, May 30, 2009
Tony Hawk's Underground
I bought Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 2 back in the day. Spent many hours playing that. When I bought a PS2, the first games I bought were THPS3 (and then THPS4 when it came out). Also many fun hours with those games. Recently, I got myself the PC port of Tony Hawk's Underground. My spider sense should have gone off when I read on wikipedia that the port was a "budget release" and only released in Australia. Port sucked.
First thing I noticed, browsing through the in-game menus, the sound effects would routinely disappear. Not sure if it was the game's problem or my computers - better to blame the game in these situations.
One of the bew features of THUG was the ability to upload a photo and then use it as a custom skater's face. I dug out a high school photo of myself, scanned it and popped it in. Pretty cool feature, though it probably would have looked better if I didn't have that gawky, exaggerated smile on my face. As a result, my custom skater was constantly smiling.
Unlike the Pro Skater series, the main part of the game no longer sees you completing different levels with your skater of choice. Here, you go through a story mode with a custom skater, starting as a local unsigned skater and working your way up. Sounds good. Only problem is that because the other pro skaters are no longer the main object, their graphics have been downgraded. Quite visibly as well.
Some notes from skating around in the first level:
- More sound problems. Various sound effects would drop out, then return later on.
- The new ability to get off your board and walk around doesn't feel comfortable. There's no sense of control. A lot of guesswork is needed to get from point A to point B (particularly when jumping to climb ledges, roofs, etc).
- The rejig of the controls was quite a jarring learning experience (mainly with the shoulder buttons).
- Gameplay motion felt fast. Add the fact that I found it hard to see much, and it felt quite chaotic.
The in-game missions are similar to objectives of previous games. Collect this, get this amount of points, hit this combo, etc. Stats could be raised by achieving certain goals. Getting new trick slots involved visiting a pro skater who would also offer a challenge. As with THPS4, you'd have freedom to select from whichever mission most tickled your fancy.
Easy going really. In no time, I was on the third or fourth level. Which was annoying, because I was wanting a challenge. I was wanting to fall in love with the maps. Instead, I was getting nothing. Rewards weren't rewarding, the story was ultra lacklustre (unaided by dull voice work and dialogue).
I gave up and uninstalled the game. No hesitation.
[IMG]http://i723.photobucket.com/albums/ww240/eztr/TonyHawksUnderground.jpg[/IMG]
First thing I noticed, browsing through the in-game menus, the sound effects would routinely disappear. Not sure if it was the game's problem or my computers - better to blame the game in these situations.
One of the bew features of THUG was the ability to upload a photo and then use it as a custom skater's face. I dug out a high school photo of myself, scanned it and popped it in. Pretty cool feature, though it probably would have looked better if I didn't have that gawky, exaggerated smile on my face. As a result, my custom skater was constantly smiling.
Unlike the Pro Skater series, the main part of the game no longer sees you completing different levels with your skater of choice. Here, you go through a story mode with a custom skater, starting as a local unsigned skater and working your way up. Sounds good. Only problem is that because the other pro skaters are no longer the main object, their graphics have been downgraded. Quite visibly as well.
Some notes from skating around in the first level:
- More sound problems. Various sound effects would drop out, then return later on.
- The new ability to get off your board and walk around doesn't feel comfortable. There's no sense of control. A lot of guesswork is needed to get from point A to point B (particularly when jumping to climb ledges, roofs, etc).
- The rejig of the controls was quite a jarring learning experience (mainly with the shoulder buttons).
- Gameplay motion felt fast. Add the fact that I found it hard to see much, and it felt quite chaotic.
The in-game missions are similar to objectives of previous games. Collect this, get this amount of points, hit this combo, etc. Stats could be raised by achieving certain goals. Getting new trick slots involved visiting a pro skater who would also offer a challenge. As with THPS4, you'd have freedom to select from whichever mission most tickled your fancy.
Easy going really. In no time, I was on the third or fourth level. Which was annoying, because I was wanting a challenge. I was wanting to fall in love with the maps. Instead, I was getting nothing. Rewards weren't rewarding, the story was ultra lacklustre (unaided by dull voice work and dialogue).
I gave up and uninstalled the game. No hesitation.
Wednesday, May 6, 2009
Cornershop - When I Was Born for the 7th Time
I often use Google's image search to look for a cover of an album. For Cornershop's When I Was Born for the 7th Time though, I couldn't find a large cover of the UK version, with appropriate colouring. So I scanned my own copy:
Click me for better performance in bed!!!
Click me for better performance in bed!!!
I'm curious to see whether this will eventually pop up in the images search results in the future.
Shining Force
What a confusing series of video games. There are all these different series (with different styles of gameplay) under the umbrella name of Shining Force, so I'm trying to get my head around what I've missed out on. Well, I know I've missed out on quite a bit. I'd been going by FantasyAnime's Shining Force information, and seeing that there was only four games listed, I thought that those were the only ones with English translations (either official or fan translated). Seeing that one Japan-released-only game had been translated by fans, I'd thought there be more out there.
But no, those four are the on FantasyAnime are the only old games in English available. I've only finished two of those four, and have visited a third briefly.
Mother, brother and I visited family in the US back in the day. An aunt bought us a Sega Game Gear console, Shining Force: The Sword of Hajya, and this tetris like game. Man, that Game Gear sure was thirsty. Six AA batteries gave you a pittance of game time. It really pains me to think of all the batteries that I went through.
The Sword of Hajya was the first RPG I played, and was rather fun to boot. The 'cinematic' action sequences were probably the drawcard of the game. Characters would be depicted as cutesy manga-like characters in portraits and on the map, but when it came to battling, they'd suddenly be depicted realistically. 'tis an interesting idiosyncracy - kinda like the US cover shown above (you wouldn't expect to be dealing with manga characters in the game based on that cover).
Ah, that's more like it! The odd assortment of characters was entertaining. Humans, centaurs, dwarves, bird-men, and other anthromorphs all made for an interesting looking army. Ah, yes, that was another feature - you'd build an army as you beat levels and gathered new allies. Also, just as it was getting visually boring, you'd have the opportunity to promote your characters, so that they'd receive a new title, something like 'Knight' to 'Paladin'. This would coincide with a new look for the character. New and better weapons could also be discovered or bought.
The game had its share of oddities though. The colouring of characters would be counter-intuitive - say on the map, a character would have brown armour, but in their battle sequence, their armour would be green. Next up, our main protagonist is named Deanna. That takes the epicness out of everything.
I've just remembered something that plagued me back in the day. Certain characters would have a spell called 'egress', where you could retreat from a battle. The whole point of the spell was to allow characters to be able to level up, since you kept any experience points earnt. I didn't know back when I was a youngling. Thus, I'd go through a game without levelling up, eventually getting stuck on a certain map, when the difficulty level of the map would overcome my undeveloped characters. Every time I reached that point, I'd restart the entire game. More dead batteries =(
Recently, I discovered Game Gear emulators and ROMs, and so, I wiped my slate clean of that particular unfinished game. Hurrah!
Seeing that there were was another Shining Force game on the Game Gear, I decided to give it a go.
Final Conflict I didn't enjoy as much as The Sword of Hajya. Besides the lack of nostalgia driving me on, the characters seemed dull and the gameplay was very much the same. By dull characters, I mean another silent main protagonist but with blonde hair this time. Blonde! While Deanna had a bad name, at least he had pitch black hair to make a difference. Ian (not a bad name, but not one suitable for a game hero) is just plain stereotypical (tbh, I don't know of many main RPG characters with blonde hair... just my intuition writing here).
The fact that I didn't complete the Shining Force: The Legend of Great Intention ROM on the Sega Genesis probably didn't help. A few characters (or many, I'm not sure) from that game feature here (I've a feeling that there's quite a bit of character sharing in this series*). No nostalgia points for me. Mmyes, despite the Genesis games appearing to have slightly better graphics and more extensive gameplay (town exploration in particular), I just fancied the more simple graphics and gameplay of the Game Gear games.
Returning to Final Conflict now, it was pretty much more of the same. One small difference actually was that there more difficult levels, there'd be stronger enemies and tighter spaces to work through. Required more egress action.
I don't plan to explore the other games in the series. My experience with Final Conflict suggested to me that the fun experienced with The Sword of Hajya was feeding off nostalgia, and my anger regarding the Game Gear consuming so many batteries.
*The Sword of Hajya, called Shining Force Gaiden II in Japan, is actually a sequel. Unfortunately, there's no English translation of Shining Force Gaiden.
Pictures are all sourced from Shining Force Central.
But no, those four are the on FantasyAnime are the only old games in English available. I've only finished two of those four, and have visited a third briefly.
Mother, brother and I visited family in the US back in the day. An aunt bought us a Sega Game Gear console, Shining Force: The Sword of Hajya, and this tetris like game. Man, that Game Gear sure was thirsty. Six AA batteries gave you a pittance of game time. It really pains me to think of all the batteries that I went through.
The Sword of Hajya was the first RPG I played, and was rather fun to boot. The 'cinematic' action sequences were probably the drawcard of the game. Characters would be depicted as cutesy manga-like characters in portraits and on the map, but when it came to battling, they'd suddenly be depicted realistically. 'tis an interesting idiosyncracy - kinda like the US cover shown above (you wouldn't expect to be dealing with manga characters in the game based on that cover).
Ah, that's more like it! The odd assortment of characters was entertaining. Humans, centaurs, dwarves, bird-men, and other anthromorphs all made for an interesting looking army. Ah, yes, that was another feature - you'd build an army as you beat levels and gathered new allies. Also, just as it was getting visually boring, you'd have the opportunity to promote your characters, so that they'd receive a new title, something like 'Knight' to 'Paladin'. This would coincide with a new look for the character. New and better weapons could also be discovered or bought.
The game had its share of oddities though. The colouring of characters would be counter-intuitive - say on the map, a character would have brown armour, but in their battle sequence, their armour would be green. Next up, our main protagonist is named Deanna. That takes the epicness out of everything.
I've just remembered something that plagued me back in the day. Certain characters would have a spell called 'egress', where you could retreat from a battle. The whole point of the spell was to allow characters to be able to level up, since you kept any experience points earnt. I didn't know back when I was a youngling. Thus, I'd go through a game without levelling up, eventually getting stuck on a certain map, when the difficulty level of the map would overcome my undeveloped characters. Every time I reached that point, I'd restart the entire game. More dead batteries =(
Recently, I discovered Game Gear emulators and ROMs, and so, I wiped my slate clean of that particular unfinished game. Hurrah!
Seeing that there were was another Shining Force game on the Game Gear, I decided to give it a go.
Final Conflict I didn't enjoy as much as The Sword of Hajya. Besides the lack of nostalgia driving me on, the characters seemed dull and the gameplay was very much the same. By dull characters, I mean another silent main protagonist but with blonde hair this time. Blonde! While Deanna had a bad name, at least he had pitch black hair to make a difference. Ian (not a bad name, but not one suitable for a game hero) is just plain stereotypical (tbh, I don't know of many main RPG characters with blonde hair... just my intuition writing here).
The fact that I didn't complete the Shining Force: The Legend of Great Intention ROM on the Sega Genesis probably didn't help. A few characters (or many, I'm not sure) from that game feature here (I've a feeling that there's quite a bit of character sharing in this series*). No nostalgia points for me. Mmyes, despite the Genesis games appearing to have slightly better graphics and more extensive gameplay (town exploration in particular), I just fancied the more simple graphics and gameplay of the Game Gear games.
Returning to Final Conflict now, it was pretty much more of the same. One small difference actually was that there more difficult levels, there'd be stronger enemies and tighter spaces to work through. Required more egress action.
I don't plan to explore the other games in the series. My experience with Final Conflict suggested to me that the fun experienced with The Sword of Hajya was feeding off nostalgia, and my anger regarding the Game Gear consuming so many batteries.
*The Sword of Hajya, called Shining Force Gaiden II in Japan, is actually a sequel. Unfortunately, there's no English translation of Shining Force Gaiden.
Pictures are all sourced from Shining Force Central.
Thursday, April 30, 2009
Unobservant
- Holy crap, Sean Malone (Cynic, Gordian Knot) has a blog. I'm surprised it isn't inundated with fans (*cough* fanboys/girls). Heck, if I were a fan, his blog would be my homepage. Instead, I'm in objective awe, rather than subjective awe, haha.
- Masterchef Australia is iffy. It isn't beautiful, compelling reality television. The judges haven't had much experience on the screen and it shows. But... it is a relief from what viewers are probably accustomed to. That is, wild, exaggerated, predictable, eye-catching drama.
- Swine flu. Everything has its purpose. Humans aren't sacred.
Friday, April 24, 2009
Update
Been a while since I last posted. Too lazy to gather pictures, so here's a lazy rundown.
Flims
Les Diaboliques (1954) - Enjoyable French suspense/thriller.
Masque of the Red Death (1964) - Not so enjoyable adaptation based on Poe's short story. Vincent Price was too ridiculous for me. Wasn't particularly scary or pretty. Could have used pointless nudity.
Misuc
Coheed and Cambria - In Keeping Secrets of Silent Earth: 3 - Pretty cool. Wish the vocals were mixed down slightly. Lots of nice melodies.
The Jimi Hendrix Experience - Are You Experienced - Prior to just recently, my conception of Hendrix's music was just of crazy guitar wankery. Not the case. Lots of great songs here.
General Patton vs. The X-Ecutioners - General Patton vs. The X-Ecutioners - Nice. No fart noises from Patton here, good job all around. Wacky, but never stupid.
Bob Marley & the Wailers - Exodus - Again, I had a preconceived notion about reggae music. Again, my mind has been opened to its variety and capabilities.
Trivium - Ascendancy - Mmm... besides "Pull Harder on the Strings of your Martyr", album isn't doing much for me. Don't like Heafy's vocals either... there's no bite to it (besides in the song mentioned above, of course).
Emperor - Anthems to the Welkin at Dusk - Hmm... quite different to In the Nightside Eclipse. Nothing here has had any impact on me.
Madvillain - Madvillainy - MF DOOM bores me. He doesn't rap, he talks. Madlib's beats don't strike me as being particularly special either. Cynic in me says: "underground cred, DOOM wears a mask, hipster music".
Sunn O))) - Flight of the Behemoth - I dig the aesthetic. I don't dig the 'everything sounds the same' ethic. I could make my own drone music. If I labelled it as a Sunn O))) product and threw it out there, people would eat it up.
Massive Attack - Mezzanine - Not a big fan of trip-hop. More than listenable though.
Bolt Thrower - War Master - You don't get fans of Death on Bolt Thrower's last.fm shoutbox trying to advertise Death. You do get fans of Bolt Thrower on Death's last.fm shoutbox trying to spread the word. Sounded like what I'd think generic death metal would sound like.
Run-D.M.C. - Raising Hell - Some nice stuff here, but overall, I don't favour the overall sound of the group's hip-hop.
Flims
Les Diaboliques (1954) - Enjoyable French suspense/thriller.
Masque of the Red Death (1964) - Not so enjoyable adaptation based on Poe's short story. Vincent Price was too ridiculous for me. Wasn't particularly scary or pretty. Could have used pointless nudity.
Misuc
Coheed and Cambria - In Keeping Secrets of Silent Earth: 3 - Pretty cool. Wish the vocals were mixed down slightly. Lots of nice melodies.
The Jimi Hendrix Experience - Are You Experienced - Prior to just recently, my conception of Hendrix's music was just of crazy guitar wankery. Not the case. Lots of great songs here.
General Patton vs. The X-Ecutioners - General Patton vs. The X-Ecutioners - Nice. No fart noises from Patton here, good job all around. Wacky, but never stupid.
Bob Marley & the Wailers - Exodus - Again, I had a preconceived notion about reggae music. Again, my mind has been opened to its variety and capabilities.
Trivium - Ascendancy - Mmm... besides "Pull Harder on the Strings of your Martyr", album isn't doing much for me. Don't like Heafy's vocals either... there's no bite to it (besides in the song mentioned above, of course).
Emperor - Anthems to the Welkin at Dusk - Hmm... quite different to In the Nightside Eclipse. Nothing here has had any impact on me.
Madvillain - Madvillainy - MF DOOM bores me. He doesn't rap, he talks. Madlib's beats don't strike me as being particularly special either. Cynic in me says: "underground cred, DOOM wears a mask, hipster music".
Sunn O))) - Flight of the Behemoth - I dig the aesthetic. I don't dig the 'everything sounds the same' ethic. I could make my own drone music. If I labelled it as a Sunn O))) product and threw it out there, people would eat it up.
Massive Attack - Mezzanine - Not a big fan of trip-hop. More than listenable though.
Bolt Thrower - War Master - You don't get fans of Death on Bolt Thrower's last.fm shoutbox trying to advertise Death. You do get fans of Bolt Thrower on Death's last.fm shoutbox trying to spread the word. Sounded like what I'd think generic death metal would sound like.
Run-D.M.C. - Raising Hell - Some nice stuff here, but overall, I don't favour the overall sound of the group's hip-hop.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)