The Protomen

I'm a storytelling enthusiast. One of the most interesting ways to tell a story is the Concept Album. I guess that's why I'm one of the few people who think MACHINA was one of the Smashing Pumpkins' better albums.

In 2007, the metal band The Protomen released their eponymous debut album. It is a concept album that takes the form of a rock opera based on the Mega Man video game. The band is completely engrossed in their tale, touring the nation in their "protobus" and stopping in various cities to do shows, or "battles". The band wears masks to show the character they are singing as. Mega Man is known in Japan as "Rockman", and this band shows you why.

The album paints a picture of a dystopian future where the people are oppressed by Dr. Wiley's army of robot masters. The first track, "Hope Rides Alone" is a Prog Rock track that establishes the background to the current story. Dr. Light labored to build a machine that could over throw Dr. Wiley's regime. In the year 200X, he hits a breakthrough, and builds Proto Man. A powerful robot designed to cut through the robot army. An epic battle against Dr. Wiley's army ensues. Proto Man fights valiantly, but in the end, as the denizens of the city look on, Proto Man is overwhelmed. As Proto Man dies, humanity fails to attempt to save him, looking on as Dr. Wiley orders the coup de gras.

The next track is "Funeral for a Son". A slow instrumental track that represents Dr. Light burying Proto Man, whom he had invested 12 years in his creation.

"Unrest in the House of Light" has a kind of Johnny Cash feel to it. Dr. Light had gone on to build a new robot in the mold of Proto Man. His name was Mega Man. Now Dr. Light is faced with the difficult task of explaining to his new "son" what happened to his brother, and why he refuses to let Mega Man attempt to finish the fight of Proto Man. Dr. Light is bitter about the Kitty Genovese-esque actions of the people of the city.

"The Will of One" is a rock song that noticeably incorporates the old school Mega Man 8-bit theme. Mega Man explains to Dr. Light that he's going to go fight Wiley, against Light's wishes. Mega Man refuses to leave the humans who are unwilling to help themselves to their doom. He also wishes to avenge the death of his brother. As he contemplates the situation, he notices that someone has defaced Proto Man's gravestone with the phrase, "Hope Rides Alone".

"Vengeance" is another fast paced rock song, where Mega Man smashes through Dr. Wiley's forces with ease. As he cuts a swath towards Dr. Wiley, his last defender steps forward from the shadows to challenge Mega Man.

The pace slows down for "The Stand (Man or Machine)". Dr. Wiley's final defender steps foreword. Revealing himself to be Proto Man, thought dead. Proto Man explains why he chooses to stand against humanity. Like Dr. Light, Proto Man is bitter about the apathy of the people that he gave everything to fight for. No one is willing to fight for themselves, expecting a "hero" to step forward and save those who would not save themselves. Mega Man is forced to choose between fighting his brother, or forsaking mankind.

"The Sons of Fate" is probably the heaviest song on the album. Proto Man and Mega Man face off against each other. Proto Man castigates the people for their inaction, as they call for Mega Man to destroy his brother. As the music slows, Mega Man finishes off Proto Man, and defeats Wiley. As the crowds praise Mega Man as a hero, he looks down upon the remains of his brother, and distraught by his actions, turns his back on the people.

"Epilogue: Due Vendetta" is a fast, hard, and heavy track that doesn't really have any bearing on the story.

All in all, the album is an impressive showing for an indy band. The mastering could really use some tightening up, and the guitars and vocals have some harmony issues, but, for me at least, the audacious concept makes up for it. I'll give it an 8/10.

Really illustrating both the feel of the story The Protomen are telling, and the atmosphere of the band live, are the two music videos they've released.




The video for "Hope Rides Alone" really drives home the atmosphere they're trying to construct.




This is the video for "The Will of One", and it's a recording of a live concert. Complete with the Mega Man helmet.

Both Videos can be found in higher quality at the Protomen's website.

Some people are never happy...

As I'm sure you're aware of by now, Diablo III has been announced by Blizzard. As a former Diablo II player, I'm excited. I simply pray that I'll be able to play it without buying a new computer.

However, there are some fans who are not as happy. These angst ridden souls are so outraged at the thought of sunlight penetrating their Gothic Wonderland that they've formed a petition. They claim that the new graphics don't match the games dark mood, and that they take too much after World of Warcraft.

Cry me a fucking river. I, for one, welcome a game that doesn't require me to jack the contrast and brightness all the way up to eleven in order to make out what the hell it is I'm doing. The art changed slightly? Meh, I enjoy it when a game series evolves. It takes after WoW? Perhaps true, but that's just good cross marketing business practice. Perfectly understandable.

I will say this though, if one of the three unreleased classes isn't a paladin, Blizzard shall tremble...

Dammit All...

Now I'm going to have to buy a DS...

Fuck You, Yvonne, Fuck You.

In a column released in the Boston Globe today, Yvonne Abraham decides to respond the the recent rioting in Boston by lambasting the everyone as "Neanderthals". Even more infuriating to me, is her opening paragraph...

You're back at your desk now, tapping away. Or you've gone home for a summer as a lifeguard or a retail associate. Or back to your mother's basement to play "Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots."

I don't condone the rioting, but what I don't like is the typecasting of the people who play video games as dimwitted fools who only extricate themselves from their caves to commit random acts of violence.

Then comes this extract...

To help make sense of this, I turned to an expert: Dave Czesniuk of
Northeastern University's Center for the Study of Sport in Society.

He does not mention the most salient fact, which is that you are dumber
than bricks.

Apparently sports fans are all drooling, uneducated psychotics....

I wish you'd get your press credentials yanked for this one. That column isn't reporting, it's ranting, and lacks even a modicum of the decor needed to pull it off. You're writing for the Boston Globe. That isn't some stand up comedy act, it isn't some radio shock jock show, it isn't a blog, and it's not right. You're no better than Don Imus, but at least people know what their getting when they turn on his show.

When you deal with sports, you are dealing with a phenomenon that affects the lives of millions of people. When there's a major event in the sports world, there are always going to be people who take things to far. It's wrong, but it's a fact. But what it isn't, is an excuse to insult everyone based on those overreactions.

You have disgraced your profession today, Yvonne. I hope it was worth it.

Misadventures on Fort Lewis.

Wow, real long drill this time.

The entire battalion hauled themselves up to Fort Lewis, the nearest major Army base, for some heavy duty training. Being already in Washington, I got the go ahead from the platoon sergeant to report directly to Ft. Lewis, rather than driving 7 hours to Corvallis, spending 5 hours going back to Ft. Lewis, riding a bus for 5 hours back to Corvallis, and then driving 7 hours back to Port Townsend. Thank God, he saved me about $200 worth of gas.

We rolled up Thursday night, and immediately racked out. My platoon had to pull guard duty that night. I was practically dripping with excitement... no, wait, that was just the rain that night. I was tabbed to pull guard from 0400 to 0430, and wake up was at 0600. That does wonders for my energy levels the next day.

On Friday morning, we started the day with Short Range Marksmanship, or SRM. It was our only Live Fire range of the drill, and as such, the most dangerous. SRM consists of learning to shoot out of muscle memory at short ranges in different positions. Facing various directions, on the move, behind cover, and through portals. Because my own weapon was deadlined, I didn't get the opportunity to have a weapon that was zeroed to my particular style, so I had to use Kentucky Windage to account for that. It didn't look too pretty. To make the portal firing even more complicated, I couldn't just shove the barrel into the portal like some people could, due to my underslung 203.

After we wrapped up the SRM, the Brigade commander came and spoke to us about the upcoming deployment. I'll cover that in another post.

Because our platoon finished up early, the Platoon Sergeant decided to take us over to the adjacent sewer mock up, and show us how to clear a sewer system. There was no sewage in it, thank God, but the pipes started at a 4' diameter, and got smaller from there. It was hell on my knees.

After the company had their fill of SRM, we were loaded into a few deuce and a halfs, rucks and all, and shipped to our next training. While loading the deuce, one of the NCOs yelled for all the privates to pile on top of the rucks in order to seat all the NCOs. I knew that promotion to E-4 would have it's perks. :)

The next training was the HEAT, or Humvee Egress Assessment Training. One of the leading causes of deaths in theatre nowdays is a Humvee roll over killing the gunner. So they built these simulators. They're a mockup of the interior of a Humvee, but it's mounted on a gimbal so they can flip it and roll it. They stuffed us inside it, and showed us the rollover angles, 25% for an 1151, 30% for an 1114. Then they roll it over, and tell us to get out. If you've ever been inside a Humvee, you know it's a pretty cramped ride. I could barely move, and it took some contortionism in order to sort out how I was going to get out of the thing once it flipped over.

After everyone had their runthrough in the flipper, we piled back onto the deuces, and rolled out to the Convoy Fire range. Once there, we ate dinner, and sorted out who was riding in what truck. As a 203 gunner, I was relegated to being a dismount. Which essentially meant that I sat in the back of the vehicle, and tried not to look too bored. Things happened, other things exploded, I got out, stood by a tree pulling security, listened to other people shooting at the opfor, tried to keep the ants off of me, got back in the Humvee, and that was it. I was thoroughly bored with the whole thing.

Thankfully, that was the last training of the day. We racked out, and second platoon got to pull guard, and I actually got to sleep. Yay.

On Saturday morning, We kicked things off with a mounted traffic control point, or TCP. We rolled out to the site in our vehicles, and rushed to set up the signs and concertina wire to create the checkpoint. As usual, I got to pull lateral security. After the first vehicle passed through the check point, my squad leader came by and told me that they had found a railroad running parallel to the road on the other side, and they wanted me to go secure it to ensure no one could bypass us. Ok. As I pushed through the brush to get to the railroad, I saw a head pop up. The Opfor. I lit him up, and then SPC Munch, who was pulling short security on that side lit him up. In response, he pulled out a grenade sim, and threw it at me. I decided at that time it would be prudent to seek less dangerous grounds. As I pulled back behind cover. The opfor disappeared back into the woodline, never to be seen again. We rolled up the TCP, and called index.

Next on the menu was a dismounted TCP. We came upon our site, and established security. To prevent a situation like had occurred on the last iteration, I got tasked with immediately scouting the woodline for any avenues of approach. I found a nearby road about fifty meters out, so my new task was to pull security on that road. In a grove of Scotch Broom so tall I could barely see over it. Apparently, the search team got hit with a car bomb, then they dialed in some mortars in on us, and the whole time, I there, standing in the scotch broom, not seeing a damn thing. Oh, and trying to keep by partner from dying from his allergies. How fun. We broke contact after the mortar fire became sustained, and headed back to the TAA.

Back in the deuces... I think my foot was sawed off by a displaced KABAR... No, just numb.

We arrived at Leschi Town. Leschi Town is the most awesome urban combat range I've ever seen. Every building has furniture, every door can be breached, it's amazing. We ran a negotiation mission, where we were supposed to march into this neighborhood, while the PL conducts negotiations with the mayor. The goal was to convince the mayor to let us search the houses for weapon caches and insurgents. Each team got assigned to guard a building, and proceed to search it once the mayor arrived. My team got tasked with the two story behemoth. Which also turned out to be crawling with all the insurgents in the village. Fun!

As soon as the Mayor came out of his house, the insurgents decided to try and attack us. My team rolled right into the house, and cleared the bottom floor, leaving a trail of dead opfor in our wake. We killed 3 opfor on the first floor, and went to secure it so the adjacent teams could come in and clear the second floor. As I went to secure a room, I saw a flash of movement outside the window. I went and checked it out, thinking it was another opfor. Then I saw an M-107 strapped to the guys back, and decided that I was outclassed. Turns out that a special forces group was conducting a live fire sniper exercise in Leschi Town, and the sniper team decided to stalk through our AO. They also had the medics doing their training to the east. You don't want to know how the Special Forces Medics get practical experience. Those poor animals...

On the second iteration, things got a little uglier. The insurgents were spread to two different buildings. One was adjacent to the house we were guarding. When we took contact, we stacked at the side door. That door had a window nearby, I took a quick glance, and spotted one of the opfor inside. She pointed something at me, and I ducked back around the corner. A nerf football went flying out the window at incredible velocity. Turns out she had the simulated RPG. The simulated RPG was a piece of PVC Piping attached to an air compressor, with a nerf football crammed down it. It actually launches them pretty fast, and I'm sure it would hurt to get pegged with it. I sprayed her down through the window, and linked up with Corporal McGuffie inside to clear the rest of the first floor. Things quieted down after that, and I spent the rest of the iteration pulling security on the building.

Once again, back into the deuces. This time came with a twist. Because of the live fire sniper exercise, every road for five miles down range was shut down. So the drivers had to find new and exciting routes to get to our next range at Reagansville. They also had to hit every pothole and bump in the road on the way. Deuce and a halfs have no suspension for the rear beds, so every bump is really jarring. After we went up a hill, around the hill, down the hill, only to hit the exact same pothole as we had 20 minutes ago, people lost it. People either started laughing, or cursing, or both. It was hilarious.

After almost an hour crammed into the back of the dusty, overheated, and uncomfortable deuces, We arrived at Reagansville. Our mission was to conduct a raid on a two story building. We moved out into the woods, and setup an ORP out there. As the Platoon Sergeant took the squad leaders on a recon to scout the objective, the NCOIC came by and asked me why I was on a knee, and not in the prone like everyone else pulling security. This lovely little exchange occurred.

"You need to get in the prone, specialist."

"Do you see that, sergeant?" *Pointing at nearby plant*

"Yeah, so?"

"Do you know what it is?"

"No."

"That's poison oak, Sergeant, and it's all over the place."

"Oh... Carry on, specialist."

Yeah, I'm not planning on repeating last time I encountered that foul plant. The PSG returned, and we set up our raid. The three key principles of urban combat are Speed, Suprise, and Violence of Action. We had all three in spades. We rolled up on them, and our pointman, SPC White, managed to shoot every last opfor there, before any of us had a chance to get in on the action. We ran in, charged up the stairs, and cleared the whole two story building in about 20 seconds. Personally, I didn't like the lead element going straight to the second floor without clearing the first floor, because if the second element gets bounced before securing the first floor, you have no where to go, and will most likely get killed. But it worked out well.

we went to sleep the night, and woke up the next morning for a battalion formation. Nothing special happened. I got released to return home. Being hungry, I stopped at an IHOP for breakfast. I had a pair of banana walnut pancakes, two sausage links, some hashbrowns, and two eggs sunny side up. So good. I need to eat there more often.

Upon my arrival home, I said hello to the family, dropped my gear, and immediately dunked my sore and filthy body into a bathtub full of near boiling water. Once I was numb to the scalding heat it felt so good.

I fell asleep at 5 PM out of sheer exhaustion. At 8PM, my adorable little sister knocks on my door, launching my nude form out of bed from the sheer power of suprise. I wasn't sure of anything, who I was, where I was, what was happening, or how to speak english apparently. She got enough out of my raved babbling to figure out not to open the door. She sweetly informed me that Jeff was here. What the hell? Oh well, I put on some clothes, and staggered out to hang out with him.

We went over to his girlfriend's place, and played Super Smash Bros Brawl, and eventually got a raging campfire going outside. We hung out around the fire, smoked some cloves using unorthodox lighting methods, and discussed many random things, including the most morbid, yet ingenious business plan I have ever devised. Jeff produced a flint magnesium block the size of a hand eraser, and chucked it into the fire. That shit burns bright. It was hilarious. Before we knew it, it was 2 AM, and we realised we should probably get some rest.

Moving On...

My God it's been a long weekend.


Things started on Thursday. Having finished my finals the previous day, that most glorious day that I've had circled on my calendar arrived. The release of Metal Gear Solid 4! Hot damn. This was the first game I actually pre ordered, ever. Nothing short of the Second Coming of Christ would keep me from getting this game. I actually woke up at 7 AM on a day where I was not required to, in order to get this game.


Except perhaps... The sun. After my earlier post, it seems the sun had seen it's shadow, and doomed us poor souls to an eternity of bleak Oregon weather. That is, until the day Metal Gear Solid 4 came out. As a person of Brasilian descent, who has spent a good chunk of his life living in the tropics, I am addicted to sunlight. I can tan beautifully, and it takes months for said tan to wear off. I literally cried when, after over a year in the Pacific Northwest, I was as white as a ghost. I went through withdrawal.

So now you can see my conundrum. Sunlight? Or the awesome power of Metal Gear? These are the decisions that try men's very souls. Fortunately, in a move that had me almost certainly looking like a complete moron, I could have my cake, and eat it too. The most wonderful thing about the seventh generation of consoles is the advent of practical wireless controllers. I turned the TV around, and sat outside my apartment, in the sun, playing the game through the window for several hours. The game is amazing, expect me to drown you with it as soon as I find the time.

As the day went on, I was invited to my friend Alexa's going away party. She was moving on to bigger and better things, like flight school. Lucky bitch. Because of some unrelated purchases, I was in the neighborhood, and stopped by a 9 PM sharp. Apparently I was the only one who showed up on time. Even Kristen, who lives in the house, wasn't ready by the appointed time. How very German of me. I brought along a bottle of Level Vodka. We had some shots, and tried my best to avoid accidentally crushing Kristen's hideous free range cat, Momo. Alexa baked some bread, and made a nice dip out of balsamic vinegar and olive oil. It was damn good. She also laid out the remainder of her alcohol, and begged the party goers to consume it for her. She had a shaker, and I went to town on it. I constructed this monster.

2 parts parrot bay coconut rum.

2 parts Grenadine

2 parts bacardi 151 rum.

1 part cran-blueberry juice

Add liquor and shake hard, strain into a frosted pint glass, add juice, fill with club soda, and stir.

That beast was essentially six shots of 90 proof liquor, and it tasted like absolutely nothing. Slight hint of grenadine, but other than that, it was like drinking down thick water. I was terrified, because every sip I took, I wanted to just chug it down because my tongue tells me it's not strong enough. However, my brain, which watched me construct it, knows how strong it is. And after I develop a pretty heavy buzz off of 2/3s of the glass, I know how strong it is.

I met up with Ed, Amy, and Andy, and we talked about Andy's motorcycles, our mutual alcoholism, and the fact that Ed looks uncannily like a 10" shorter me. The conversation continued in interesting directions, until I got looped into a few beer pong games. I would like to think I acquitted myself quite well in those games, despite a terrible foul. I even dragged out a victory with Kristen as my partner, a feat thought impossible. During one rather entertaining game, Jordan had to skip out to puke mid game, and got replaced. An act I later used to sub myself into a game to help Lacey's terrible team.

After my idiot foul got us bumped of the table, I saw CJ had shown up, with Michelle and Bryan in tow. Apparently Michelle no longer wishes for my agonizing death via cancer. Yay! I'm moving up in the world. We shared shots of Level Vodka, which was quite smooth, and I began to set the stage for CJ to come help me move my junk from my apartment to storage. Seeing as he's the only person in our mutual circle who owns a truck, he was doomed to spend the entire weekend moving stuff for literally everyone he's ever met.

At about 1 AM, my friend Tony crashed the party, not knowing I was there, sporting an awkwardly faked Australian accent, and a little blond girl on his arm. Well, I'm not about to try and cock block my friend based on something as little as faking being Australian. So I let them drink in bliss. All of a sudden, Tony grabs me, and mentioned to the girl that I used to live in the south. She asks me where, and I told her New Orleans, Alabama, and Georgia. She saw fit to correct me, "You lived in N'awlins, 'Bama, and that other state."

Dammit woman, not everyone who's lived in the south speaks with the accent of a fucking idiot. She mentioned she lived in Shreveport. Whatever. Then she saw my dog tags. "Oh, you're in the Marines? You know Camp Pendleton? That's me."

At that point I was getting angry. "Don't confuse me with a Jarhead, girl."

She proceeded to go on a rant about how the Marines are her family. I asked her bluntly, "Are you in?"

To which she replied an unqualified no. "Then don't lecture me on service."

She got all indignant about how she couldn't believe I was showing so much disrespect to her family. "What your great grandfather did has no bearing on how I treat you. There is no royalty in America, you earn your respect. You aren't given it."

At that point, she was a awfully flustered, and asked my if I lived here. When I said no, she told me that she thought I should leave. She was trying to kick me out of my friends party, that she crashed? Incredible. I refused, and she grabbed Tony, and dragged him out of the party. Good Riddance.

Immediately afterwords, a guy who was standing nearby, Mark, looked at me. I realised that I was pretty drunk, and I might have been a real jerk. So I asked for a third party perspective from Mark and his wife, Lacey. She was a bitch, and they were surprised I didn't drunk toss her ass out at the word go. Vindication. To be honest, judging from her accent, and lack of any knowledge of military principle, I'd say she's probably some puffed up bitch who was trying to back me down without any actual truth to her stories. Either that, or General Pendleton is rolling in his grave right now. She certainly sounded more like she was from Salem than Shreveport.

The party wound down after that, and the rest of the night was saying goodbyes, and making sure the really drunk people got home safely. Aaron gave me a ride home, and I passed out on my couch.

Friday became game day. I spent pretty much the whole day devouring MGS 4's amazing story.

On Saturday, I prepped my apartment for the move back to Washington.

On Sunday, CJ rolled by, an I traded him two bottles of Irish Cream, a Bottle of Sake, and a bottle of Merlot for his help moving my stuff. As we hauled my futon to the storage facility, we discussed stuff such as Dave Mustain's amazing hair, bands that are essentially a cult of personality around one person, and woodland firefighting.

Monday morning, I rode back up to Washington, and am now frantically attempting to avoid letting the Guard ruin yet another summer. Wish me luck.

Video Game Humor.

Luckiest Halo 3 Kill Of All Time - Watch more free videos

Rube Goldberg decided to play Halo 3.

And for the PS3 owners...

Hideo Kojima slaps Microsoft in the face.

The Last Weekend.

In more ways than one.

On Friday I met my friends at American Dream Pizza for our usual pre salsa meal. American Dream's latest claim to fame was Obama's struggle to keep their pizza in his mouth. :) The pizza's good, and it's the only place I've found that's willing to put salmon on a pizza. However, the part of the place I like best is the Crowbar.

I found the Crowbar on my 22nd birthday, having no clue about it's connection to American Dream. It has a back alley entrance, and a wrought iron overhang sign that screams old school dive. It looked as good a place as any to finish off my birthday. We staggered in, and it was... surprisingly post modern. However, the bartenders are actually good, and they serve ten different varieties of the Kamikaze. Plus, you can have good pizza, and good booze at the same time. Yum.

However, I digress. We had pizza, and I had a kamikaze. We talked and ate, and laughed at the connotations of the combinations of Tristan and Willow's names once they get married, the names of other people, the fact that my mom wanted to name me Raphael, and as always, time passed. We soon found that it was nine o'clock, and meandered our way to Platinum.

Latin X kicked off, and I drank far too much. Unlike the Crowbar, the bartenders at Platinum are... less than proficient. However, I used that to my advantage. They run a deal that before 11, well drinks cost $1. I managed to convince them that a caipirinha is a well drink. Essentially 3 shots of rum for one dollar! Hot damn. I had 4 of them, and wound up buying rounds for the whole table. I threw in a couple of Vodka and Tonics, and I was unusually drunk, on less than $15.

The hilarious moment occurred when I was talking with Tristan about our experiences in the military, mine in the Army, his in the Marines. As he regaled me with tales of a Marine SGT who was too dumb to live, Chris walked up, and slapped me on the shoulder, and caused me to spill my drink. Oh, well. I switched the drink to my other hand to avoid further traffic from disrupting my alcoholism. Twenty seconds later, Bill walks by, and hits my other shoulder, causing me to spill more of my recently relocated drink. Tristan cracked up. I chugged my drink down, to prevent any further problems.

I drank, and danced, and talked. I tried to find Simona's camera to take some pictures. Someone beat me to the punch, and the camera disappeared for about 2 hours, and Simona got all overprotective of it when it was found. C'mon, I'm trustworthy...

I decided to have a Mint Julep for my final drink. I talked to the bartender, and as usual, he had no clue how to make it. As I walked him through it, this exchange occurred...

"Add Bourbon."

"Which kind?"

"What kind do ya'll stock?"

"We have Irish, Tennessee, Kentucky..."

"NO. Just use that bottle of Jim Beam."

Irish Bourbon? I died a little inside when I heard that. I also cried a little when he strained the mint out of my drink. What the Hell. No tip for you.

As usual, time passed, and before I knew what was happening, the lights got turned on, and Simona kicked us all out. Talking with Nate on the way home, he and Dave invited me over to La Conga for late night Mexican food. At 2:35 in the morning, La Conga was packed. I'd love to see their hourly business estimates. While we were devouring our burritos, we were joined by Roger and Alana, and a couple of Roger's friends. After the food was gone, we went to Nate's house, and danced a little bit more. Dave, being our resident Hawaiian, showed us some Maori dances, and Nate and Alana showed off their rumba skills. I danced a little casino with Alana. Fun was had, and I didn't wind up home until 4:30.

I spent a good chunk of Saturday sleeping. I woke up at 1, and dragged myself over to the TV to watch the Belmont Stakes. This was supposed to be Big Brown's triple crown victory lap. As I was watching the warm ups, I was bouncing around on a football message board I frequent when bored. In an off topic thread about the Belmont, I called Da'tara winning. Take that!

Saturday night, well, Sunday morning technically, Mike IM'd me, demanding food. He swung by, and we hung out at his place, as he ordered pizza. Pizza Pipeline said that it would be about an hour for delivery. We figured it was a Scotty-esque overstatement to keep us from getting our expectations up. 55 minutes later, our pizza arrived. Wow. Mike had gotten his hands on a leaked copy of Beast With a Billion Backs, so we watched that. I wound up passing out on the couch.

I woke up at about ten o'clock, and none of Mike's roommates really cared about the giant curled up in their living room. That just goes to show what kind of house it is.

After shaking off my grogginess, I fired up their 360, and played some Halo 3. That's my one regret about going with a PS3. MGS4 completely outweighs it, but I do miss Halo. I love the mythology of the game, and the soundtrack is glorious. I might buy that soundtrack. When Mike woke up, we played some Metal Slug 3. Old school, nintendo hard games, designed to suck the quarters out of you pockets. I went through 39 continues. At 50 cents a pop, you're looking at damn near $20 gone, to beat 5 levels.

After ordering another pizza, we hunkered down to watch the NBA Finals game 2. That game went from a massive blowout, to inexplicably becoming a game at the end. That just goes to show, you really only need to watch the 4th quarter of an NBA game.

I wound up getting home at 10:30, and went pretty much straight to sleep. A good end.

The People's Mario

In case you were wondering how dark a cutesy game like Mario can be...




Pretty Fucking Dark.

The End of an Era.

With Metal Gear Solid 4 looming on the horizon, one of the funniest webcomics out there has closed it's story arc. The Last Days of Foxhound is a Metal Gear Solid inspired webcomic, drawn by Chris Doucette, which focuses on the Foxhound unit of the first Metal Gear Solid game. The art is a little pedestrian, but the humor is top notch. Doucette has a sharp sense for sarcasm, and manages to draw together the most convoluted plotline this side of Chrono Cross in a very hilarious manner.


TLDoF ran for 500 comics, and managed to incorporate each of the bizarre super squads from the MGS series. Foxhound, Dead Cell, and the Cobras all make an appearance, as does the most Magnificent Bastard, Big Boss. Solid Snake is never seen directly, but his presence is felt throughout the story arc.

The premise of the story is the background of the Foxhound unit, a super powered black ops team which works in secret for the government. The storyline covers from when Liquid Snake joins Foxhound, up until the events of MGS1.

While Spider Man would say "With great power comes great responsibility", in this case it's more like "With great power comes great insanity." Each member of Foxhound, while supremely talented, also has a psychotic personality flaw. Liquid Snake is an super soldier, but he suffers from an inferiority complex that would take up several floors of a building to catalog. Vulcan Raven is a shamanistic Inuit giant, who is smug beyond belief. Sniper Wolf is the world's greatest sniper, but she actually develops a crush on each target she's assigned. Decoy Octopus is a world class spy and master of disguise, he's also a trickster worthy of Loki, and a complete coward. Psycho Mantis is the world's strongest telepath, but he's also omnicidal. Revolver Ocelot is a master of subterfuge, and world class marksman, but he's also a pathological liar, and suffers from Chronic Backstabbing Disorder.



The interactions of these outlandish personalities tie into the extensive metaplot of Hideo Kojima's grand design, and provide nonstop hilarity. Please, check it out.

A Flash Full of Wing Wong.

I woke up on Saturday morning with what seems to be the beginning of a sinus infection. Well, shit. However, my friend Mike had a "surprise" birthday party, and it was my job to get burgers to the barbecue, and I'd be damned if I would let there be a barbecue without burgers. That's just unamerican. Salt water gargles do miracles for cleaning up the throat.

So off I go to Fred Meyers, to purchase 34 burgers and 32 buns. Stupid packaging disparity. I rolled up to the house, and dropped off the food with Sarah, and we got the party preparations set. There was pizza, chips, hot dogs, hamburgers, dirt cups, beer, and lots of other good stuff.

When Mike arrived, the festivities started in earnest. Thanks to the decent weather, we set up shop outside. I played a game of outdoor beer pong. It's a whole different animal outdoors, accounting for windage wreaked havoc on everyone's shots. Fortunately, I'm used to dealing with windage, so I played pretty well. We got the grill fired up, and soon the scent of formerly frozen beef patties crackling over a charcoal flame wafted throughout the yard. I put together a nice cheeseburger, with colby jack, lettuce, horseradish sauce, mustard and ketchup. Delicious.

Nick had brought over his full Rock Band setup, drums, bass, guitar, and mike. Everyone had snapped up the instruments, and as soon as I walked in, I got pegged with the vocals. I made it through the songs I knew pretty well, In Bloom, The Hand That Feeds, Creep, all went well. The songs I didn't know... Not so much.

Andy unveiled his new toy. A 3 foot long blow gun. We had a field day with that one. We shot pretty much everything we could spare, and even popped each other with the blunt tipped slugs. It was fun, in a sadistic sort of way.

Forrest Gump came on TNT. I love that movie, and believe that it is possibly the best movie of our generation. There's so much innuendo that I never picked up the first time I saw it.

After some of the party drew to a close, we headed over to watch the acapella show. The ladies of UO opened, and were pretty damn good. The Divines, the OSU womens group, went on next. As much as it pains me to say it, I think the Ducks did a better job. Outspoken, the OSU mens group came up, and did an excellent job. acapella shows, by their nature, are a little campy, but Outspoken embraced it. Their rendition of Life is a Highway was superb, marred only by the feed cord accidentally being pulled from the mike, making it sound like someone had been shot.

After the show ended, Mike came up with a crazy idea. It was 11PM, and we were going to a hot spring. Serena rolled in with her mom's minivan, we piled the eight of us in, and we were off before we really understood what happened. Half of us didn't have bathing suits, and shamed the other half into ditching theirs. It was pretty dark out, starlight only, so we really didn't see anything. But hey, skinny dipping in a sulfur hot spring is always fun. We passed around a bottle of cheap red wine, and played the stupid games that inevitably happen when you mix nudity, alcohol, and steam. Truth or Dare, yippee. Fortunately, things didn't get too inappropriate or uncomfortable. We played two rounds, and I picked truth once, and dare once. For truth, I got asked if I ever wished I was shorter. I certainly wish I had a more standardized body type when it comes to buying clothes. And for a dare, I was challenged to hop into the spring above us, which was much hotter, and occupied by a couple that was getting a little *ahem* friendly. Good for them, I just hope that the sulfur killed off anything that got released.

As we were trying to get back to the bench from the spring, Serena turned around with Mike's camera, and FLASH. Well, there goes my modesty. Thank God for my Brazilian side. On the ride back, we discretely checked which pictures were appropriate, and which weren't, and deleted the one's that didn't spare someones dignity. The others were kept for posterity, and no, they will not be posted here.

Mike drove us home, and the rest of us slept in the most uncomfortable positions possible, we made it back in town just before five AM, and began the frantic race against time to get everyone back to their homes, and more importantly, beds, before the sun rose, and screwed up any chance at sleep. It was so worth it.

Doubleyou Teeeee Ef.

Now, I enjoy playing video games. However, what I don't like is the industrial advertising complex that has arisen. Sites like IGN, Gamespy, and others, that feel like they can review ,advertise, and market video games in the same way as people review, advertise, and market a static medium like film and music. I'm going to tell you right now, you can't. A static medium is fundamentally different from an interactive one, especially when you get into the blockbuster level games like GTA IV.

I don't like the way that GTA IV was marketed. The reviews ooze preferential treatment and gloss over flaws so they can give the game a perfect score for the sake of having the exclusive. GTA IV has a 100 on metacritic? Nothing's that perfect. Think of the best movie you've seen in recent years. Pan's Labyrinth? 98. Tarantino's Opus, Pulp Fiction? 94. The Oscar Juggernaut that was Return of the King? 94. Schindler's List? 93. Think about the best games of the past 3 years. Super Mario Galaxy got a 97. The Ayn Rand Epic, Bioshock? 96. Call of Duty 4? 94. Apparently GTA IV is better than any of them. But when you consider that it has noticeable flaws to a casual gamer like me, I start to question what might have gone on in the review session. Sometimes it's even counter intuitively obvious, like in the GamesRadar Review, where they note that the game's not flawless, and then proceed to give it a flawless score of 100/100. Excuse me?

Questionable practices aside, what infuriates me even more is the assumptions that some sites make about the people who come to them hoping for information. This is what put the what the fuck in this post. As in, Is this what the fuck these guys think their constituency is solely interested in? I'm done with IGN, and it's sister site Gamespy. It's not that they showed this stuff, as EA says every time I boot up Madden, it's in the game. But it's not the ONLY thing in the game, and you couldn't tell that by watching that video. It's only gonna cause more problems down the road, more so than the game itself would make.

Rant aside, I think GTA IV is a good game, and if you like any of the previous installments in the series, you'll love this one.

New Games!

I picked up three new games today, Warhammer 40K: Dawn of War: Soulstorm, Army of Two, and Turning Point: Fall of Liberty.

I haven't had too much time to play them yet, and I haven't cracked open Turning Point, or installed Soulstorm, but I've put in about an hour on Army of Two, and I'm impressed.

What impresses me about the game is the teamwork aspect. You find you and your partner pinned down in an urban environment, while in most games you would either try to snipe the opponent or grenade him into submission, Army of Two is no ordinary game. While those remain viable strategies, AO2 encourages more team oriented solutions. In this case, I ripped the door off a nearby car and carried it like a riot shield, while my partner fired over my back. Other situations find you outnumbered and outgunned with no cover in sight, so you go back to back with your partner in an adrenaline filled shootout with the enemy.

Also interesting is the incorporation of aggro into a shooter. Aggro's normally a staple of MMORPG, but the way it has been implemented makes sense. For those who aren't in the know, Aggro is essentially the enemy's attention. If you start shooting, then the enemies focus their fire on you, if your partner is shooting, they focus on him. If you both shoot, they focus on whomever has the biggest gun.

Stylistically, the game looks real good. It's got a real edge to the characters appearance, the masks kind of make them look like Jason goes to War. The Characters have real character, however, the enemies are kind of bland. If they were in Star Trek, they'd be wearing a red shirt and be dead by now. In AO2, they were turbans, and are dead already.

The controls could use some tightening up, but that's really my only major complaint. It's soo much fun in Co-Op mode though.