OK, so much for my updating at least once a week idea. Work has been a little busier lately and Michelle hasn’t been feeling 100% all the while Kira seems to be developing a temper as a couple more teeth start ripping through her gums.
I’m glad I don’t remember that process. They say that is one of the worst pains ever but truthfully how would you know? Babies can’t tell you how it feels or how it compares to childbirth, root canals or drawn and quartering. You can’t hook them up to a meter and see the pain on a graph. I guess it’s like most things… a guess.
Michelle and I took a little time last weekend away from the baby and went to have lunch at Red Lobster and then off to see Zombieland. If you haven’t seen Zombieland yet then you are truly missing out. It’s funny, goofy, scary (stupid clown), self-deprecating, a bit gory and full of action. There’s even a touching moment so there’s something for everyone. Meaning emotionally touching… not inappropriately touching… you know what I mean.
I’ve got a bunch of vacation days that need to be taken before the end of the year so I am figuring out how to plan that out. Everytime I think I have it all sorted something new comes up. It happened again today. Urgh.
Oh, I have a Playstation 3 now! Yay! Although I really don’t have any games for it. I got it used on eBay and it did come with Street Fighter 4 (which I really don’t like surprisingly) and Singstar (which is kinda fun but quite limited compared to other music games). So I don’t count those. I’m hoping to get the Game of the Year edition of Little Big Planet for Christmas because that just looks fun to me. Maybe I should download the demo and try it out first but it seems interesting. Plus God of War 3 will be out eventually although since the main guy involved in the first two is no longer part of the franchise I’m not holding my breath.
I got the old 60GB PS3 which is why I got it on eBay instead of going to the store. I picked that one specifically because it is the only model that has the hardware emulation for both PS1 andPS2 games built-in. So of course the first thing I did was play We Love Katamari. Because I just can’t get enough of rolling stuff into balls. Don’t ask because I don’t know.
Now there’s strange headline for you. Venezuela… land of tropical beauty, drug lords, corrupt governements, rebellions, murder, more guns than Mexico City and one of the more violent places to try and take a liesurely stroll down the street on any given day. And how did this paradise become such a haven for crime and death? The answer is obvious: Video Games.
Yes, the long-running president of Venezuela – Hugo Chavez – is pushing through legislation to fully ban violent video games in his beloved country. This makes sense of course. I mean it has to be the fault of violent video games that put poor Venezuela into it’s current situation. Just because drug cartels have been murdering each other and civilians since long before Pong was created is no reason to look at this rationally.
In addition, this new legislation would ban toy weapons. Which is a smart economic move when you think about it. I mean, why let your people buy cheap toy guns from China when you are building the largest machine gun factory* in all of South America in your country? Keep that money in country and sell those kids real weapons instead. Besides, that will keep them safer on their way home from school than that old toy would have anyway. ( * This is an older link but this still seems to be on-going. I just can’t find any articles online.)
In related news, the Vatican is also calling for an end to all violent video games. According to the Pope, the Crusades were not the result of theocratic greed and corruption but by early video games. It seems that demos of Grand Theft Carriage caused quite a stir with peasants and drove the knights to slaughter. A lesser known but more revolting game called Messenger featured a messenger who had one too many bad days at the Messenger Office and started shooting all his co-workers with a cleverly hidden crossbow. It is said that this game was an allegory to the Muslims and how mean they were for not giving back land to the church that was never the church’s in the first place. The rest, as they say, is history.
Telepathic requests for comment to the Pope were not returned by the time I posted this entry.
UPDATE: The Sony press conference at the 2009 Gamescom in Germany just confirmed both the PS3 Slim and the price cuts. The new pricing of $299 for current models and the soon to be available slim goes into effect tomorrow.
There have been rumors floating around like crazy for the past few months about a new and slimmer Sony PS3 video game console. And Sony has been denying it just like the rumors of price cuts. Even when pictures were leaked of the packaging from a new PS3 Slim, they denied it. Now, online retailers are putting up the pre-order pages for the new Sony PS3 Slim available on August 24th globally September 11th (per the Sony press conference going on right now). Will Sony continue to deny this? Yeah, I doubt it.
There’s some big industry conference going on and Sony is supposed to be presenting today. I assume that the newly released $100 price cut and the new Slim unit are on their agenda but FYE and K-Mart have beaten them to the punch. Seems to happen a lot these days.
Here’s the description for the PS3 Slim pre-order from K-Mart:
PS3, SLIM High-Definition Blu-ray player for the best movie experience. Free PLAYSTATION Network membership. 120GB HDD for downloading games, music, videos, and photos. Includes DUAL SHOCK 3 controller. HDMI output for 1080p resolution.
Notice something strange about that? The newest console has a 120GB hard drive where the current high end model has a 160GB drive. OK so my XBox 360 has a 120GB drive so no big deal right? Well that depends. Unlike the XBox 360, the PS3 often requires games to be “installed” to the console’s hard drive to play the game. I’ve heard that this is neither a tiny install or a short amount of time to do this either.
Also consider that games and media are increasingly paid for online and downloaded directly to the system. I imagine you could easily fill up a drive that size if you wanted to do so. I understand that the PS3 hard drives are easily user upgradeable but I have no information or experience with that so I can’t say. Who knows if the new Slim will be as easily taken apart as the old beast of a PS3 was either.
What I’m really wanting to hear about from that aforementioned conference is that there is another rumor that Sony may be reintroducing PS2 backwards compatibility to the new Slim models. One of Sony’s big hype points when the PS3 was first coming out was their inclusion of the Emotion Engine that allowed perfect backwards compatibility of Playstation and PS2 games on the PS3. They released one model with that function – the coveted 60GB model. Sony then switched to software emulation on a few 80GB models which worked for many games but not all. Then they dropped the compatibility completely.
I am always on the lookout for a used PS3 60GB console for this very reason. I have a ton of PS2 games that I would still like to play but I only have so much space and the TV can only accept so many connections. Combining those functions is ideal – almost necessary – for me. So if the Slim ends up containing the Emotion Engine or even functional software emulation, I may be sold. Especially with the new $100 discount.
You are a criminal. You may not have known that but if you are fairly media savvy then most likely you are a criminal based on this conviction of a comic book collector.
Here’s the quick summary: a man who is a prolific collector of Japanese manga (comics) was found guilty of child pornography because of artwork in a series of manga that he was importing depicting depraved sex acts with children. According to the article, this is a man who collected ALL types of manga and not just this style which puts him in the realm of what should have been considered an art collector. He faces up to 15 years in jail.
So here’s the problem – this is a victimless crime. There is no one who has been hurt… no one who has been wronged… no one to be compensated. These are drawings of fictional characters. And the law has been left purposely vague (although less vague than the first iteration) so that it can cover things it was never meant to cover. So now a comic collector is being put in jail and resources that could have been used to catch and prosecute real child pornographers has been wasted.
Welcome to the new world that allows for an idea to be illegal. The most common anology to this is that if we play a video game that has us kill a virtual person are we then considered a murderer? Sounds far-fetched doesn’t it? Now think about every school shooting over the past few years and how many times video games were blamed as influencers of the mentally flawed people who commited these crimes.
So where does the line get drawn? Do we need to burn every copy of Lolita? Should fans of Dakota Fanning get thrown in jail for watching Hounddog? I guess we can’t make any more gang movies… ya know, unless no one dies of unnatural causes in them. Slumdog Millionaire should have been X-rated based on this kind of thinking (oh wait, everyone loved it and it won awards).
What’s your opinion? (please read the article or be familiar with the case before venting)
You may have read my previous post ranting about Valve and Steam and their support staff. Well, I’m not taking back what I said about the support staff because I was treated poorly. However, the issue has been resolved in an acceptable manner.
After asking twice to talk to a manager, I got an e-mail signed by a different person that repeated the exact same policy without even bothering to look into my case. No introduction, no indication that were indeed a manager or anyone other than the same person as before but signing a different name. I got pissed.
I drafted a nice reply to them stating that I was sending the details of my case to the founder of the company and all the senior management listed on the corporate website that had e-mail available to the public. I also told them that I was going to be contacting every gaming forum and news and review site and writing letters to the editors of every mainstream game magazine I knew of. I let them know that they had one week to fix this before I started because I really didn’t want to go through all that work. After sending the reply I sent the same to three execs at Valve and gave them my contact information.
My mobile phone was ringing within five minutes.
Doug Valente from Valve called me himself and we chatted for about 15 minutes. He tried to explain the problem and why they have the policies that they do. He pointed out some vague wording on my game box that is supposed to say that it is restricted but really only says that the game can only be sold in Hong Kong or Macau. No restrictions. He relented. I read him off a few more things from the box and the discs to prove that I indeed had a legal copy of the software.
He told me that the issue would be resolved and I would have a new CD Key by the time I got home that night. Sure enough, when I logged onto Steam, there were a bunch of new messages waiting for me.
Doug Valente was very nice to talk with and I really appreciated him taking the time to listen to me unlike his support staff. He admitted that the Steam support guys are a bit jaded when it comes to people trying to pull the wool over their eyes and sometimes can lose sight of the big picture. I hope that he addresses that with them.
Thanks Doug!
So I’m satisfied – although I dread ever needing to work with Valve or Steam’s support again. At least I have Doug’s e-mail address and direct phone number if I ever need it.
Are you familiar with Valve and their Steam software service? Are you a user of their service? If so, here’s some information you may want to know. Because Steam is really starting to piss me off.
In general, Steam is a decent way to buy games online. It had a horrible start with the launch of Half-Life 2 and the industry had all but written Steam off at that point. But Valve was able to fix the problems and make Steam into what it is today. Normally, I would be generally satisfied with that.
Unfortunately though it seems that Steam has felt the need to use region restrictions on their retail software just like the movie industry does with DVDs. This doesn’t affect most people who only buy their games and software locally but for those of us who travel or order from online retailers, this can be a serious issue.
While I was living in Hong Kong I purchased Valve’s The Orange Box because I wanted to play Portal and Team Fortress 2. So I took a train to a software store and picked up a copy. Nowhere on the box or packaging does it say it’s region restricted and everything is in English like I would expect back home in the States. Excellent. So I install it and play and all is well.
Now I’m back home and this past weekend I decided that I wanted to play Team Fortress 2 again. I’ve had to get a new PC since my previous one died after the move so I needed to reinstall. So what happens? When I try and install any of the games in The Orange Box, it pops up a message that says that the CD Key I used is region restricted and unusable in my territory. WTF?
I tried changing my time zone and my location in Steam but nothing helped. I guess it must key off of IP addresses since it is an online service. So I contacted their support for help. The answer I get? That they can delete the region restricted key from my account so that I may be so priveleged as to purchase their software again. Uhhh… NO.
They referred me to a very unhelpful FAQ entry on their site that says that the message I got was from region or territory restriction and that I should return my software to the retailer. I’m not sure if these guys at Steam have ever had to buy and return a piece of software but it’s not possible. Stores do not allow returns of opened software. Idiots.
And that unhelpful FAQ entry also states that all region restricted retail boxes are clearly marked that they are restricted. I still have the case and everything that came in it. There is not a damn thing on it that says restricted in any way. So my next step is to scan in the sleeve from my retail box and send it to them.
I’m not asking for much. They recently sold The Orange Box on sale for $9.99 USD. I’ve already invested almost $50 USD into buying this software so I don’t see why they can’t just give me a new key code without the restrictions that are not listed on what I bought.
I’ll let everyone know what happens. Because if this doesn’t end with my getting what I paid for, then I will figure out every SEO trick just to see what $9.99 USD worth of BAD PUBLICITY can really do. Which should be interesting since I work at a PR and communications company.
Bachelor life is starting to get to me I think. I’ve played so much Beautiful Katamari that I think my hands have permanantly contorted into grasping claws. Which is actually rather convenient for playing XBox games to be honest. Makes typing hard though.
Add to that bizarre Japanese game the fact that I have been watching nothing but Japanese language movies and TV (with English subtitles of course) and I’m relatively sure I can here The Vapors invading my internal soundtrack. And that’s never a good thing.
As you can see from my Most Recently list over on the right, it’s been kind of crazy. I’m also watching Kagemusha but I didn’t get to finish it last night due to various phone calls and laundry, but that’s another that will be added to the list. I actually haven’t completely finished watching Haibane Renmei yet either so please do not post anything about that or any spoilers (that pretty much means Insomnic). I would hate to have to kill you in your sleep.
I’m currently downloading Neon Genesis Evangelion so I can continue this craziness. I can’t get an English version here in Hong Kong, so… well… piracy to the rescue! Don’t worry MPAA, it’s still on my Amazon Wishlist.
Perhaps I’ll get some sushi for lunch today. Hmm….
I’ve spent the past three hours playing Condemned: Criminal Origins on my XBox360. I played it for a few hours just a few days ago too. I knew what I was getting myself into. Except it was daylight when I played that day. Tonight I started at 11:00pm. After the first half-hour I reluctantly turned off the overhead light because the game is so dark, the light in my room just makes it harder to see. Most of the game is spent walking through corridors and checking every corner for crazed madmen… in the dark… with only a small flashlight and a single weapon.
Now, three hours later, it’s 2:15am and I want to go to sleep. My blood pressure and adrenaline are up. I heard all sorts of creaks and other odd noises as I went to use the toilet and then brush my teeth. I kept watching the bathroom door reflected in the mirror for any movement or shift of shadows beyond the crack of an opening. More noises… more blood pressure. I had remembered to lock and bolt the door to the flat before I started playing. I knew I would be paranoid after playing.
I found myself looking around the bathroom as I brushed my teeth. Looking for makeshift weapons like you do in the game. I decided that the shower curtain rod was my only real option. I could get that down in a hurry if I needed to. I touched it… it seems sturdy.
This flat makes a lot of strange noises now that I’m alone here. My imagination loves that. I hope it’s just my imagination. I’m going to go run to the bed and hide under the covers now. I’m just glad that the wardrobes are gone so nothing can hide in them while I fall asleep. And the bed has storage underneath instead of being open space. Something might otherwise grab my ankle as I get in bed.
Maybe I’ll just sleep right here… in front of the computer. Safer that way. I hope….
Yoshi over at Hello! Yoshi is having a contest this week which you should definitely check out. He’s been planning a contest for the Blogathon ever since the last Blogathon, but they have decided to cancel it this year. So what is Yoshi to do with his fabulous prizes that he bought for this event? He has two brand new MP3 players just itching to be given away. That’s the reason for the seemingly random contest.
The rules are simple and you only have till this coming Sunday to enter. So hurry up and head over to enter the contest today!
So we’ve watched the new Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull movie (which I still say is an outrageuosly long title for a movie). Before that we refreshed our Indy knowledge rewatching Raiders of the Lost Ark, Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom and Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade. [Have you noticed that the first move now has "Indiana Jones and" prepended to the title on the newer releases? It wasn't like that when it released.]
So you would think I’d be all work out at this point of anything with a fedora and a whip. But I really want to play the new Lego Indiana Jones game. Muse and I played the Lego Star Wars II game on Playstation 2 for a bit but we never really got very far. I thought it was a lot of fun though and I can see how the Indiana Jones franchise could really take advantage of the Lego game formula.
I just need to add it to the ever growing list of games I want to buy before I leave Hong Kong. XBox360 and PS3 games are quite a bit cheaper here since the market won’t support the ridiculous $60 USD per title price that is charged in the United States. Most games releasing in Hong Kong start at or around $39 USD per title when they come out and you can always find some older/cheaper ones too. I will definitely miss that when I’m gone.
October 16, 2009 12:24 pm | 
