Moans and Groans

Moving !

2009-08-19T20:17:00.001-04:00

I'm moving over there. This shouldn't see any more updates unless things really get weird :P

Crazy Japan..

2009-05-19T15:04:00.002-04:00

Looks like WiiWare is opening doors to crazy ideas, at least in Japan :)

New Toy

2009-05-19T13:36:00.003-04:00

Just felt like testing a really wide pic in here, taken with our new toy at home.. We got ourselves a Fujifilm Finepix S1500 yayyy!

KoL Journal: Not Quite 20

2009-05-14T08:19:00.004-04:00

I'm 72 substats away from level 20 ! I've switched my setup to focus on stats:

Hat: Spooky Putty Mitre (+3 substats per fight)
Weapon: Serpentine Sword (+10 Monster Level)
Offhand: Snake Shield (+10 Monster Level while used w/ the sword)
Shirt: Hippo Skin Poncho (+10 Monster Level)
Pants: Buoybuttoms (+7 Monster Level)
Accessory: Ring of Conflict (combat rate -5%, get more Louvre)
Accessory: C.A.R.N.I.V.O.R.E Button (+15 Monster Level)
Accessory: V for Vivala Mask (+1-3 substats per fight, 4 on critical kills)
Familiar: Frumious Bandersnatch (38 lbs, act as Volleyball)
Familiar item: crimsillion jub-jub bird (+5 lbs, focus stat gain to Muscle)
Ur-Kel's Aria of Annoyance: +38 Monster Level
Radio: +10 Monster Level
Manor Band: +5 Monster Level

So in all I'm fighting at +105 Monster Level with stat gain items in the other slots. I nearly managed to get over level 19 today:

Advs used: 344 (Woohoo Feast of Boris!!)
Meat gained (net): 51,907 (better than nothing)
Substats (muscle): 23,091
Muscle (base): 364 (Level 19, one away from 20)

Tomorrow... We dive !

Guild Wars Journal: A New Look !!

2009-05-14T08:04:00.004-04:00

After over 400 hours of wearing the Ranger Druid Armor (can't remember washing it.. but I've been in many lakes) I finally bought something else: the Luxon Armor!

I'm still hunting with the old one until I customize the shiny new one.. Eventually I'll go for the Elite version, but for now any change is a good change!

Kol Journal: Level 19

2009-05-13T16:15:00.001-04:00

Another banking day yesterday, nice day today.

Advs used: 337
Meat gain (net): 283,296
Substats (muscle): 13,020
Muscle (base): 331 (Level 19)

I have 23k substats to get if I want to be level 20 before the weekend.. That would be around 600 turns using today's average gain -- looks like I'll be ignoring meat gain in favor of stats for the next 2 days. I'm out of UPC Stickers anyway and I reached a level of meat I like (not enough for a Mr. A, but still..) so it's all good.

I'll also be getting to 100k turns played.. I don't know if I should really mention that part? ;)

Large Monsters Fighting with... Debbie Gibson?

2009-05-13T14:11:00.001-04:00

Yup, seems to be real, even if its directly to DVD.. Wow.

Kol Journal: Level 18

2009-05-11T11:46:00.005-04:00

Another pretty standard farming day:

Advs used: 243
Meat gained (net): 209,794 (includes Mafia getting some more Soft Green Echos..)
Substats (muscle): 11,303
Muscle (base): 303 (Level 18)

Tomorrow will probably be the first day where I don't level up.. All is still on track to start diving at the end of the week, so I can benefit from the basement stat gains during the two muscle days..

Farming sure makes for boring entries ! It's tempting to just convert $ into meat, but the farming profit is nice so I'll keep at it for a while.. It is eating up stocks of food and booze, which for now I don't really tally, so when I'm out of the good stuff having to buy more is going to show in the numbers.. oh well.

KoL Journal: Level 17

2009-05-10T11:39:00.004-04:00

More farming.. Yesterday we were going out pretty much all day so I just had time to get 60k in meat and bank the rest for today, which has nice numbers:

Advs used: 352
Meat gain (net): 317,022
Substats (muscle): 15,413
Base Muscle: 284 (Level 17)

But it is getting a bit boring.. Tomorrow I'll make Level 18. On Thursday there's the Feast Of Boris. Next weekend we get two Muscle days. I'm thinking I'll farm until I'm Level 20, then start on the basement dive.

KoL: Farming Comparison

2009-05-08T15:25:00.002-04:00

Another day of farming, but today I decided to try another location. An official forum thread linked a spreadsheet to help people figure out where they should adventure optimally. Of course it's not perfect, but I thought I'd give it a shot. Turns out it suggested that the Haunted Gallery would be better than the Castle In The Clouds In The Sky for both stats and meat drop. I was a bit skeptical, but why not. This was after all only if I specified that I could sniff out targets with Olfaction (Cubist Bulls).

I spent the day with the same setup as the previous two, same outfit same buffs (+ML went up to 47 since I got to level 16), with UPC Stickers all the time. I did luck out on finding the right Louvre path to get Muscle on the first shot, so stat gains are as optimal as they were going to get.

Advs Used: 251
Meat Gained (net): 185,668
Substats (muscle): 13,917
Fullstats (muscle): 31 (now at 243, level 16)

Looks like I traded 40k meat for 3k substats. Almost 15% drop in revenue for a 22% gain in substats... The main thing to look at is over time: most stats today came from 29 visits to the Louvre adventure. At 300 subs a pop, that's almost 9k of the almost 14k I got. This is the max that it'll give out... I can't remember if I had reached the max with the Wheel adventure in the castle.. Let's see with the wiki.. Max is at 275. Really not that big of a difference..

Let's see.. If my stat gain stayed the exact same as my last two days for a full lvl 30 run, what would be the difference. 53.3 days with the Gallery vs 66.11 days in the Castle. But it would also mean a difference of over 2.6M meat .. !!

Of course, when I run out of UPC Stickers my +Meat% will drop by 75%, reducing the absolute amount of meat difference between the two scenario. And I don't plan on only farming until level 30. So I guess for now I'll stick with the more meat friendly option of the Castle even if it means levelling slower. The basement should really help with stats..

Duke Nukem Never

2009-05-07T16:25:00.002-04:00

Can't call it vaporware anymore I guess.. or anything else for that matter.

News link.

Oh sure, that makes sense..

2009-05-07T15:29:00.001-04:00

Teachers: don't rip DVDs to show clips, videotape a screen of them.

KoL Journal: Aftercore

2009-05-07T13:31:00.003-04:00

I decided, after my 31st saving of the King, to hang out a bit in the Kingdom instead of ascending yet again. I set myself some goals:

Get the Level 30 Trophy as a Seal Clubber
Farm meat
Open the clan dungeon
Do a 3rd basement dive

My last 18 runs were going for speed (my softcore record is now at 5 days / 884 turns) which ate a bit of my funds to stock up on food booze and quest items.. Most of them were as a turtle tamer so I had already pretty much all the skills, meaning I didn't have to spend meat on getting them again.. Most of the time I finished runs with over 40k on hand, which helped offset the restocking fees.

I was also working on the Professional Tour Guide Trophy.. That will have to wait a bit, I have 6-7 runs left for that one.. Out of 30, not too bad. It does simplify decisions during a run, since you just stick to one familiar.

The last 2 times I went up to level 30, it took me around 22,000 turns. So I'm here for a while. Level 30 is at 845 base main stat, or 714,025 substats. I made Level 15 today, and I'm sitting at 212 Muscle. For comparison, to ascend you need to get to Level 13, which requires 148 main stat.

I'm not really powerleveling - doing so would cost meat, and I want to farm meat. So I'll be patient. No 2,000 clovers uses for me. Right now my farming setup isn't too bad:

Scratch 'n' Sniff Sword: +75% (over 125 UPC Stickers in stock)
Cup of Infitine Pencils: +15%
Duct Tape Shirt: +20%
Spooky Putty Leotard: +15%
Natty Blue Ascot: +20%
Baron von Ratsworth's money clip: +15%
pulled porquoise pendant: +15%
Hobo Monkey (40lbs): +198.88%
Polka of Plenty: +50%
Gnefarious Pickpocketing: +10%

For a grand total bonus of +433.88% to Meat Drop. Neat. I'd need two more run to get the other passive skills to boost it even more, but I'm ok with those numbers. The only equipment slot that doesn't help is the hat, so I'm using one that boost Monster Level to give me more stats after fights.

It will still take a looooooot of farming. Getting the basement dug under the clan hall is a 10,000,000 meat operation. After that you need 1M per dungeon run. The run fee should be in most part financed by reselling some of the drops. I already have some boss drops from my previous clan, so doubles can always get smashes or something.

The last item on the list involves both the trophy and the budget -- getting a 3rd piece for my Telescope involves a lot of work, and meat. My first two dives probably cost me 800k and 300k. The difference is easily the Exotic Parrot at 500k, which helps tons for the elemental tests. A good thing about Basementing is that it'll give me a lot of stat gains, bringing me closer/faster to level 30. I guess I should revised my previous statement about powerlevelling (kinda) and my Level 30 budget...

Today's stats:

Advs Used: 255
Meat Gained (net): 217,794
Substats (muscle): 10,892
Fullstats (muscle): 28

The profit from the last few days will at least already cover the basement dive... woot! I should also have a look at my inventory and dump some crap in my store.. That should help..

Sad news from a great mind

2009-05-06T13:22:00.002-04:00

A friend forwarded me these sad news...

That's one great unsung hero of the internet, in my book. Not that he'd want groupies or anything :-) Still sad I managed to learn too late he was giving a speech in Montreal back in 2005...

-Tx.

Dancing around the NDA...

2009-05-05T14:36:00.004-04:00

Let's see... I'm allowed to mention I'm in the MetaPlace Beta.. and that's about it !

What I can do however, is point you to someone's blog who is lifted from the NDA and can talk a lot more and post stuff..

If anyone is curious to apply, I think I do have some invitation keys I can send.. email me or leave a comment.

Why Am I Playing ?

2009-05-04T21:53:00.005-04:00

On April 1st opened Legends Of Zork. I had seen it annouced before, but still everybody thought a bit that it was an April's Fool. But no, there was really a game.. I had signed up for the beta but never heard from them.

So I jumped in and created an account. I can't say I'm a Zork veteran -- I know of it, have the collector's on the shelf and on the 'todo list', and seen/played bits on the later (graphical) titles at a friend's place. But Zork is one of those name that is revered by old timers, so my curiosity was titillated.

This is not a new Zork game in the sense that it is not a text adventure. It's more of a Zork-inspired game. They started off with some of the lore and built from there. Of course you do start neat a White House. You pick which job you just got laid off from (you were a salesman for FrobozzCo International) - that decide what equipement/skills you start with. Didn't see to make a huge difference..

This is a turn based game, and you start with 30 turns per day. Fights use one AP (Action Point), and going back to Base uses one AP too. You head out to explore and fight monsters, but you do have to get back to base to actually bank your loot. Yup, if you die on the trail you loose all your stuff! This does add an element of risk - if you head back home after each fight you'll eat up AP real quick. But if you only have a couple of HP left do you dare adventure just one more time ? Greed is a bitch.

When I say explore I really mean picking a location. That's pretty much the extent of the exploration part.. You pick a location, you can adjust if you want to fight at, under, or over your level (each location has a level range) and click explore. You don't actually do anything during fights. The screen will show you the monster, your base success %, adjustements made because of your skills, items and fighting stance, and then start rolling between 1-100. If you roll under your final success % it's a hit, otherwise you get hit and loose 1 HP.. At first monsters only have 1 HP but of course they get tougher with time.

You really have no actions to take DURING a fight. It's more like playing a hero's manager than actually being a hero - you decide where to go, but you then wait for the outcome. Hmpf. The fight screen looks more like a spreadsheet than a game screen.. It's really not clear exactly what affects the outcome.. The only way to know more is to deduce that if you're using one fighting stance and it's giving you a boost, that means that this monster is probably using that other stance. Against another one it'll be exactly the opposite - stances work in a rock-paper-scissor fashion.

What decides your stance is your equipment. A sword will have one type, a mace another. The really bothersome thing about items is that there's only one source -- the store. You get all kinds of loot during your explorations, but it's ALL autosold when you get back to base !! There's no feeling of getting an awesome drop that you can use. Everything is converted to cash and you use your gold to shop. So you really don't care what items drop after the fights - you just might be interested in the gold value - it's all pretty random. You also have limited capacity to carry items, so they're another reason to get back to base. If your 100% full, you just won't see any drops until you get back home. Odd. I'm guessing loot becomes more valuable at higher level, but so far (I'm level 19) it doesn't really matter if monsters drop cash or items.

Your defense rating (and your defense stance) is decided in the same RPS way, and depends on the store. The thing with the store is that you're getting diminishing returns for your dollar - the prices go up exponentially for gradually less power boost. We're used to play games with a steep XP curve, but here we see the exact same thing on the equipment upgrade path. Kinda sucks. It also doesn't really matter where you adventure. The monster will probably have slightly different skills and setups but in the end it all feels the same.

You can also equip one attack and one defense spell.. Like other items, it just adds to the fighting spreadsheet, it's not like you can actually 'cast' during a fight.. The prices for spells are astronomical, even more so than weapons and armors.

As you level up, you gain skill points. They're use to buy skills which can add cash drops from monsters, gives you rebates in shops, give you more hp, boosts your win chances against a certain stance or when you use a certain one.

After fights you sometime you'll also get "Double Fanucci" cards. These can be equipped in different combos to boost your stats.. If you don't visit the forums to get spoilers on how they work, good luck and plan a looooooot of time to get anything out of them. The thing is, they're pretty much NEEDED to have any real chance... Odd.

You can also fight in the arena against other players, and put a wager on the outcome. This has been a steady source of income for me, by beating a coworker once daily and betting the maximum! I lucked out in getting better cards and even if we're at the same level I usually get a 70% chance of beating him..

The game is free, and aims to finance itself via a microtransaction model -- you can buy items to give you more turns... I really have no plans of spending a dime on this one.

Thing is, I signed up early April.. We're now in May, and I'm _still_ playing. I really can't explain why. For one, it doesn't take long.. 10-15 minutes a day, that's it. It can fill a break or keep you busy while you're on hold on the phone.. It also has really neat graphics for this type of game - kudos to their artists.. They're also pretty active in making changes, improving things, fleshing out the help screens... Maybe it should have staying in beta a bit longer?

So it is cute, it has a great name to live up to, they seem to be getting better step by step... I'm not loosing anything in the meantime and its mildly entertaining, so for now I keep going back out of pure curiosity...

It has a name ?!

2009-05-03T14:27:00.004-04:00

Something to file under "somehow useless info" (that's a huge part of my brain). Another blog I read just taught me the real name of what I really only used to call "The Benny Hill Song":

Yakety Sax.

Kingdom Of Loathing: Experimental IotM

2009-05-01T10:59:00.004-04:00

May is here! There's a lot more green everywhere, let's all rejoice.

A new month also means a new IotM (Item of the Month) in Kingdom of Loathing. The annoucement was:

May's Wacky-Experiment-of-the-Month is now available in Mr. Store. Details about how the stuff works can be found in this forum thread.

Intriguing. I log in to discover not 1, but actually 2 items in Mr Store. The first one is a "VIP Lounge Key". Seems that nobody knew it, but all clan halls already had such a Lounge, and now this gives you access. Funny. In there you find a spa, which gives 5 free full heals per day that also removes all negative status effect. Neat. There's also an upgraded/deluxe Mr Klaw machine (think UFO Catcher) which drops new collectibles and so far at least 1 new familiar has been available from it. My collector sense is tingling.

The Key is tied to a _player_, not a clan, so you always keep your Lounge access even if you clan hop around. This is good. It also planned that the Key will be made available again in the future, of course. Otherwise building up more stuff around the Lounge wouldn't be possible.

The real puzzler is the second IotM. It's a Pool Table add-on for the Lounge. You can "play pool" against clannies, it keeps tracks of the scores, but the real gain is to get 3 rather nice buffs per day to anyone with access. The official forums are already full with people salivating over this, as it IS usable in Hardcore. On of the buffs gives you 300 free MP each day, which can indeed be a huge boost in Hardcore... My not-so-often-used alts are focussing on HC/BM, so this could be nice indeed. But there's a catch.

The Pool Table can be bought from Mr Store for 3 Mr Accessories!! This means donating 30$US or paying in-game roughly 13.5M meat. Also add that to access it you also need the Key, so that's a 40$US or 18M meat investment.. I'd call that non trivial.

Of course the Table is tied to a _clan_. So if you leave and become clanless or join a clan without it, no access even if you had helped pay for the table. Humpf. Of course there's the possibility of setting up WhiteLists to make clan hopping easier, but then there's the whole Karma issues I won't get into. Switching clans often is possible, just not very practical for most people.

And then there's the cost... Wow. In theory in a big enough clan of course it's not hard to pool (ah-ha) many players to get the darn thing. But a lot of players just setup a small clan for their RL friends or even just their own accounts.. Last year when Hobopolis opened it was rather clear that TPTB (The Power That Be, the KoL admins) didn't really like the idea of huuuuuuuge clans. I was in KoL Addicts at the time, it was an interesting time to say the least..

But now a 3 Mr. A clan item ? I'm quite a bit puzzled.

The forum post by Jick also mention the intention of having more Lounge furniture available in the future, via IotM's or even as Hobopolis drops.. Which is another question mark for small clans..

We'll see how it plays out.

Noby Noby Boy

2009-04-29T11:19:00.003-04:00

This game is... disturbing.. They published a multiplayer update, and now you can also record your gameplay and send it to youtube...! This is me "playing" (still not sure the term is right) with Maze..

Guild Wars turns 4!

2009-04-28T12:50:00.002-04:00

The pay-once-then-free-forever MMORPG turns 4.. Haven't played much lately, but I did go back to play with Toche last week and it was still lots of fun. We had forgotten a lot of stuff and keybindings and I realized my hands did have memory of the game I was doing some stuff automatically, which was a bit creepy.

Since my Ranger was created on launch day four years ago, I opened a present this morning. Didn't get a rare, but a nice Desert Griffon bringing back memories of my first trips in the desert in Prophecies.

I do have to go back and at least finish the Nightfall and GW:EN storylines, and get the Ranger elite skills I'm still missing..

If you have a GW account by all means stop by before May 31st to get free extra in game storage! The site is swamped and kinda slow, be patient or wait a couple of days...

Kingdom Of Loathing

2009-04-28T12:14:00.003-04:00

This is without a doubt the game that I spend the most time on nowadays.. Can be played during breaks, late a night, whenever... It's addictive. Recently they added a sig generator that gets updated about once an hour... it's kinda cute :)

Jughead Jones

2009-04-28T11:34:00.001-04:00

More than you probably ever wanted to know..!

I still read Archie comics.. mostly while doing other.. err.. business.

Back from the dead ... ?

2009-04-28T10:38:00.005-04:00

Dunno yet.. Just that my other blog has taken a family turn since the baby was born.. this morning I remembered I used to have one on blogspot.. might keep this one for gaming stuff.. hmm..

2004-05-31T16:51:00.000-04:00

[MOVIE REVIEWs en rafale]

Saw a bunch of flicks in the recent weeks, let's see what lasting impression they left, if any !

Van Helsing (2004)

Ugh. I was really looking forward to this one, a crucial mistake I guess now. It looked really good in the trailers. And I must say, it really did look very good when I saw the whole thing: this is a B-movie with a 150M$ SFX budget. Twice the looks, half the flavor. Bad script. Bad characters. Baaaaaaaaaaad Dracula wannabe. We're given beginnings of backstories and origin of the characters but they never go anywhere. It's a CGI slugfest but ultimately I didn't care for any of the characters, good or "evil". I don't need to say much more, the web is rampant with examples and reviews of just how bad this movie is. I fell asleep in the theatre.

Duplex (2003)

I love Drew Barrymore, and I love Ben Stiller. At least when the movie is bad Barrymore is eye candy while you wait for the whole thing to finish. The movie had it's funny moments, but maybe it's too PC - they don't go down the torture road nearly enough. Not from the neighbor, and not for their revenge. For any who don't know the premise, Stiller and Barrymore play a cute couple who buy a duplex for peanuts, planning to live downstairs and eventually get rid of the tenant upstairs to make one big house and live happily ever after. Of course they're lucky enough to get the neighbor from hell who won't move and won't even die. Basically it's The Money Pit with a bad old lady upstairs instead of a house breaking down on itself.

The ending plot twist is easy to guess in the first half hour if you've seen more than a handful of movies in the last 20 years. Stiller needs to learn to say NO to some scripts! I like the guy, but come on, his comedy radar needs to be readjusted. Some late night paid advertisements are funnier than this. Or maybe I'm just wanting too much out of a movie. I finished the screening feeling "this was ok". A few chuckles, but mostly wasted time.

Shrek 2 (2004)

Thinking back on this one after several weeks is interesting.. I didn't give much credit to the critics saying it relied too much on pop culture references and spoofs for it's own good - maybe they had more experience because it looks more and more true. The movie was good, but kinda like a pretty shell with not much inside. Funny, but easy to forget. I'll probably pick up the DVD for collecting sake, but I hope they flesh out their next project a bit more..

Paycheck (2003)

Pretty good, even if I don't perticularly like Uma Thurman. At least it won't add another stinker to Ben Affleck's resume. Strong rental, maybe I'll buy it.

Scary Movie 3 (2003)

Ugh. Fell asleep. Bland, overused jokes. Maybe because I wasn't a fan of "Signs". Even the director of "Airplane!" and Kevin Smith couldn't save this one for me. Avoid.

Electra (1995)

A Gem: a super powered teen is wanted for his superhuman seed. Lol. Never mind that in the end it's his mother that runs after him. Rent it now, leave your brain to the OFF position and enjoy! Bad acting, sounds effects, editing, it's all there :-)

2004-05-05T13:25:00.000-04:00

[MOVIE REVIEWs]

Hell Boy (2004)

Like I said earlier, I'm always up for a good comic book flick. I've never read Hell Boy, and the trailer for the movie looked so-so to me, but my gf wanted to see it bad so we went (would have waited for a rental..). No real complaints but far from the best I've seen... I didn't care for the whole Nazi setup (I guess it must have been in the comic - if it wasn't, shoot the moron who though it up for a recent movie.. but since it deals with the origin of the character, my guess is it's from the source material..). The was a lot, and I do mean a _lot_ of scenes that could have been shorter or cut entirely. The movie is some 2 hours long, could easily clock at 90 minutes with some editing imho. Not that it was bad per say, but it would have been a lot tighter and left a better taste in my mouth going out of the screening room (or maybe it was the large purple 'slush' I had..).

The characters were good. The makeup simply amazing. The effects juste nicely dosed. With some slight modifications it would have been really a great movie to me, but as is I can only say 'hmmm.' Rental? an excellent choice. Big screen? if there's nothing more interesting to you. Buy? Probably not.

The Last Samurai (2003)

The first trailers for this one had me cringing - I mean Tom Cruise as a samurai ?? wtf? But the lukewarm reception the flick had on the big screen made me wonder and look a bit more into it.. And then it looked better and better the more I was seeing of the flick (of course that made me wonder if I was seeing _all_ the good bits?). So I wanted to see it. My gf too. But suddenly it stopped playing anywhere in the area and we had missed it. D'oh!

So we saw it as a rental on DVD last night. Damn I regret missing it at the cineplex! It was simply awesome. I'm a Japan affectionado, been there once (so far) and loved everything in the movie. The whole thing was done clearly with a desire to stay true to the real Samurai spirit and there was evident painstaking attention to details everywhere. From what I could tell from my rudimentary knowledge of the Japanese language, everything was excellent and even Cruise put a lot of effort in his pronunciation. I didn't think he could do a good job in a true samurai picture, but the guy has been doing his homework, plus a lot of training, and it shows. I mean it still looks odd by moment to see Mr Hollywood with the white smile a mile long in the middle of rural 1800s Japan, but I'd be hard pressed right now to cast someone else in the role having seen what he's done with it. Amazing.

The story takes place in Japan in the late 1800s. Emperor Meiji is young, wants to modernize Japan with the knowledge and ways of the West, but is caught between the businessmen in his advisors and the last Samurai at his service. Cruise is hired by the Japanese to train an army to combat the Rebels. I'll just leave it at that.

There was _some_ areas I wish they'd go to in more details, dealing with Cruise's back story. He has a lot of nightmares from his 'previous' life in the american army fighting the Indians, but his relationship with the tribes is left to stipulation - was he just a soldier (a captain actually) disgusted by what his army was doing, or did he have contact with the ennemy somehow ? It looks like a parralel is made with the situation in Japan but it's never fully exposed. I haven't watched all the extras, maybe it was in the deleted scenes.

Technically the DVD is excellent. Vibrant colors, excellent surround sound. (I always love when sound from the back speakers make me check if there's something making noise in the next room..) Loaded with extras, included on a second dvd. I might wait a bit for a price drop because the purse is tight at the moment, but I'm definitely buying this one to add to my collection. Just a must.

2004-04-26T14:37:00.000-04:00

[MOVIE REVIEW]

The Punisher (2004)

He slices, he dices, he kicks a lot of ass - he's The Punisher! I'm very happy about comic book movies in the last couple of years. Ever since the first X-Men people finally realized that comics can make good movies if properly done! Ages ago it was a lot more difficult without CGI (especially for series with a lot of fancy super powers) and led to some sub par movies (Toxic The Ravager? Howard The Duck? lol!). Now that they get proper treatment, respect and even ticket sales, it's maybe time to explore some more niche series. Enters The Punisher.

Frank Castle isn't a mutant. He doesn't have super powers. He can't leap over tall building or regenerate quickly from wounds (ok maybe that could be discussed but we'll say it's metabolism). He's just very, very, very pissed off. [No he's not, explained in an excellent scene in the movie!] His whole family was killed. Wife and kid ? Not enough! Parents, uncles, aunts, cousins, _all_ his family is executed at a family reunion in the sun. I guess it's better than dying from lack of food with your toungue glued to a post at the North Pole. Anyway. After the execution, as you might guess or have seen from the previews, Castle survives and goes about punishing those who did him wrong.

And he's darn good at it.

The movie is rating for 16 years-old and over where I live - usually movies rated R in the US get a 13 rating here so I was really surprised. But there's a reason - some parts are rather gory (yeah!). The whole flick is full of really dark humour too. Nice explosive mix. If you like movies going a bit over the top and explore dark paths a bit more this is for you. A friend of mine confirmed it followed closely the character development of the serie series and limited series of the comic book, always a good sign. I liked the book without collecting it, the main interest being a bit one-dimensional for my tastes.. But when you just want action and a lot of killing, Frank is the man for the job.

The flick is 2 hours long but it goes by in a flash. The sound is excellent, and I really liked he casting except maybe for a couple of details: Travolta could have easily been replaced (he was a lot better in Swordfish), Thomas Jane always reminds me too much of Christopher Lambert, and Travolta's best friend always made me think of U2's Edge. Go figure. Oh yeah and there's also a hitman from Memphis who looks like Wayne Newton a bit! There's dark humour dripping from most scenes, almost to the point of making you wonder if you're supposed to be laughing.. Excellent.

So I really liked it, it was much better than what I was expecting from the trailers. Really happy I saw it despite them. I would sure love to meet some marketing ppl making those trailers to give them a piece of my mind...

2004-04-23T15:57:00.000-04:00

[CURRENTLY PLAYING]

It's funny re-reading old entries here.. I'm still enjoying MTG:O......kind of. The game itself is as good as ever and I manage to have fun playing; but the whole Online thing is starting to get to me -- I'm loosing faith in the staff and until further notice I'm not pumping any more $$ into it. I have more than enough cards to make casual decks anyway (about 6600) so that'll get me my fix from time to time. I loved leagues but even that is down now! ridiculous..

I'm still wondering if I want to sell off some cards to make complete sets and redeem them. I nowadays play a lot more 'paper' magic at the office than I do online. But I think I'd regret that.. down the road it's a lot easier to lose paper ppl (moves, switching jobs, loosing interest) so I won't cash my online chips in just yet.. My local comic shop just started doing FNM too so I might give that a shot..

On the PC side, I'm currently having a blast with the second NeverWinter Nights expansion, Hordes Of The Underdark. I've used the same char thru all the official modules (the XP in the 1st expansion was good even if the story could have been a lot more interesting) and now, simply put, I kick ass. Mind you, I'm probably not 'uber' by any means - I don't know the ins and outs of AD&D character creation and I'd bet I'd killed pretty easy by other players on the net - but I'm having a lot of fun killing drows and beholders, and listening to my heanmen's chatter.. I'm a Fighter(15)/Rogue(5)/Champion Of Torm(5) mix and it's pretty solid IMHO. I think I'm about half-way thru the module (would be surprise to come anywhere close to the Lvl 40 cap) and hoping it doesn't end - that's always a good sign.

On the console side, I bought Bomberman Jetters for the GameCube, at 30$CAN. The single player game looks neat (if a bit simple) and I didn't own any Bomberman version so the 4-player classic mode mayhem just screamed BUY ME! Oh the hours I spent laying out bombs on the NES and TurboGFX versions..

Might go see The Punisher this weekend, maybe I'll come back with a review.

2003-01-16T08:48:00.000-05:00

[CURRENTLY PLAYING] M:TGO, Counter Strike (got my own server, check c-strike.kicks-ass.org) and Phantasy Star Online Ep. 1 and 2. Damn I haven't written anything here for so long...

2002-08-16T10:33:00.000-04:00

[RANT] Movies out this summer... Anyone else thinking most things coming out on the silver screen is rather "blah" ? Pretty much only SpiderMan and Austin Powers 3 stood out for me.. Guess it gives me time to catch up on DVDs I haven't rented from blockbuster yet and the few I bought and haven't watched.. With the price is theatres now, I'm thinking more than twice about going there instead of buying a dvd that will last me a lifetime!

2002-08-16T08:23:00.000-04:00

[CURRENTLY PLAYING] Mostly Magic: The Gathering Online and NeverWinter Nights.. Both addictive in their own way!

2002-05-12T10:32:00.000-04:00

[REVIEW] Beavis and Butthead: Do U. (PC) I just rolled my eyes when my brother bought this. I mean, its B&B, really how good can it be ? Beavis and Butthead going on a field trip to visit their local institution of higher learning, trying to score. Well actually I finished it. The gameplay makes it a far cousin to Day Of The Tentacle. The interface is really simple: move the mouse around to see interesting spots popup and then click the left mouse boutting to talk to use. Thats it. You also get a brown paper bag to stash some stuff. The graphics are totally on-par with the MTV cartoons, and the voices are really great. Of course, you need to have some appreciation for the characters and a tolerance for potty humour. But some of the puzzle were really nicely designed, and the shoot em up sequence at the end makes for a funyn ending. It _IS_ rather short, and there's basically no replay value, but it's always nice to see morons make it to the big league.

Conclusion: good laughs - so if you have a brother willing to spend 10$ on it go ahead!

2002-04-30T13:18:00.000-04:00

[Demo] Dungeon Siege (PC) First impressions were really good.. Nice graphics, fluid, lots of colors, easy to learn controls. But after a couple of hours hiking thru the forest and the first real dungeon, there's definitely something missing there. Put simply this game is a mix between Diablo and Gauntlet Legends. I got tired pretty soon of dodging the camera left and right so I could see thru all the trees around me -- the most efficient way to get anywhere is to play from the overhead map, but it's also pretty boring. Walk, bash ennemies. Walk some more, more ennemies. No real story to start you with, no ambiance, and way too many useless objects lying around when you start (you dont need 3 pitchforks that would have problems slicing warm butter). The best use of this game would be the exact thing I did yesterday - use it as entertainment while being on hold on the phone.. Its annoying to have 4 quick use slots with pre set functions (1 melee 1 ranged 2 spells). Managing multiple party members inventory is cumbersome. The final product looks like a techie projet - excellent engine, nice sounds, lots of great things technically and individually, but in the end, the whole lacks a bit of coherence and even more important, purpose. (Based on the demo version, which is supposed to be a short (10%) version of the retail box)

Conclusion: wouldn't pay more than 10$.

2002-04-25T13:03:00.000-04:00

[Rental] The Simpsons: Road Rage (PS2). Fun quirky title - it can be compared to Crazy Taxi but the engine is less tight..This can be good or bad depending on preference. The gameplay is exactly the same as CT but you don't have boosts and jumps (CT2). But the thing that really takes the crown here is the sound and the variety of characters you meet. Almost everybody who's anybody in the series is in the game, and have tons to say to everyone else. So when you get bored of just playing cab driver its still fun to pick people up to see what they'll tell. The sounds bite are really nice in quality too, and some comments wouldnt fit in a PG rating presentation.

Conclusion: if I see it in a clearance bin, or maybe a cheap used copy, I might buy it.

2002-04-24T18:21:00.000-04:00

Bought a Game Boy Advanced.. nice little toy.. I guess you just get used to the glare problem, but I can understand the price + battery life considerations for not putting a back lit LCD screen.. so far I got:

Golden Sun: really looks like a great RPG so far, excellent graphics for such a tiny space.. Havent logged enough hours in it yet to really comment

Zelda: Oracle of Seasons: I'm not a Zelda fanboy, but always appreciated the games.. This reminds me of a mix between the original NES game and the SNES version. The graphics are simple (GBC) but effective.. the inventory management bugs me a bit - you just need to go to the menu too often just to switch items, sometimes a couple of times on the same screen.. but it aint that bad

Castlevania: Circle Of The Moon: Quite excellent so far, with about 5 hours clocked in. You can't help but be reminded of SOTN, but its totally adapted for the GBA. Controls are tight, and I love the new powers you get after each boss. Double jumps, jumping off walls, quite cool. Can't wait to see the rest.

2002-04-24T17:53:00.000-04:00

Just reinstalled EQ.. damn that thing is big now... 1.5 *GIG* for base plus expansions ? Soon they'll want your first born too. Prices hikes coming soon... I reinstalled the thing because of a friend who lured me back to it.. made a Cat dude warrior.. Got to level 10 and wondering if that was a good choice.. If you're on Rodcet Nife, send Epaih a tell!