I’ve been wanting to see Transformers 2 since it was released, but noticed that every few days I watched the IMDB score, it would drop farther and farther down.

Checking out Metacritic was even more dissuading, with a 35% overall score. I couldn’t believe how bad this movie sounded. I read comment after comment about how the movie was nothing but “balls jokes”, or how immature the use of Megan Fox’s beauty was or how 1-trick-pony Shia LeBeouf was… fortunately my curiosity and desire to see big robots do battle got the better of me and I went and saw it, and here are my thoughts:

1. I laughed for the first hour — Shia LeBouf is hilarious with his neurotic interactions with his parents, little spats with girlfriend Megan Fox or  delivery of 1-off snarky comments.  Whoever cast Kevin Dunn and Julie White as Shia’s parents was brilliant. The chemistry between the three of them is fantastically enjoyable and really a good fit as a family. As a side note, Julie White steals the spotlight as Shia’s neurotic mother for about 30mins of the movie and is absolutely fantastic at the roll — putting me close to tears twice.
2. Well done special effects are awesome — I don’t know what it takes in Hollywood to do effects like these or if you have to have special relationships with the industry’s best animations or something but Bay delivers — big time. There is so much robot awesomeness going around this movie with explosions and scene-interactions that at no less than 6 epic scenes I found myself floored with “Jesus… how did they film this scene?!” It is really impressive to see the coordination of 50 extras mocking a battle with huge building set pieces blowing up and everything being choreographed such that when the CG transformers are added later, the entire scene is completely fluid.
3. Story — For the die-hard Transformers fans out there, I have no idea how accurate this story is behind Transformers 2 (I won’t mention any details in case you haven’t seen it), but it drew me in pretty good. Only 1 or 2 parts struck me as pretty corny and the rest of it flowed with enough pace and accuracy that I had no qualms with it.
4. Characters — They got rid of the ridiculously good looking hackers from #1, which I was thrilled about, and seemed to remove about 20% of the cheese that #1 had in it. I felt the characters in this one were much more realistic and enjoyable — obviously I’m not comparing these characters to Shawshank Redemption anytime soon, but for a big-budget robot action movie, I didn’t find myself trying to rake my eyes out of my head once — which is a good sign. I also like the new Agent Simmons — I hate him from the first movie because he was such a neurotic simpleton even though he was suppose to be the head of some clandestine Sector 7 group — in this one he plays his character much better and isn’t annoying at all — I actually enjoyed his comedic relief in the 2nd half of the movie quite a bit. I also liked the portrayal of the military more in this one. Typically sci-fi movies paint the military as bumbling idiots as a story mechanic to get around the impossibilities of hacking and breaking in, and it ends up annoying me how inept and unrealistic the military is usually made to look — casting of Glenn Morshower as a general in this helped bring a lot of cred to the military picture painted. It felt much easier to get into the story than in #1 where the military was more inept and incapable.

Overall I have no idea what movie critics want… This is exactly what happened with The Matrix (Reloaded and Revolutions) — the followups were bigger, badder and brought way more awesome to the table, but they get dinged in the reviews.

I loved the Matrix trilogy — the 2nd and 3rd movies were awesome. I really liked Transformers 2, better than #1, and think movie critics don’t know what they want out of these movies.

Harmonix has been selling a lot of music tracks for Rock Band and Rock Band 2 for a couple years now.  This week they mentioned they would also be interested in selling the corresponding music tracks with the Downloadable Content Songs. Ars technica got the scoop at CES this week. If you had the option to buy a combo that includes both the actual songs as well as the Rock Band playable versions?  Personally I don’t buy a lot of music because we have great local radio stations so, but I know a lot of people spend a nice chunk of change on both iTunes and Rock Band so maybe it would save them some money.

Harmonix seems to be doing a brisk business in selling songs to Rock Band customers, but with younger gamers being introduced to new music, why can’t there be a way to buy the song for the game, along with the actual track to listen to outside of the game. At CES 2009, Harmonix CEO Alex Rigopulos had mixed thoughts on this idea.

Rigopulos claimed that selling the songs directly would drastically “change the tenor” of the relationship they have with record labels, but he isn’t ruling out a partnership with another entity to create a package of the game track along with the song itself.

“People want to buy recorded music,” he told the crowd. “I think it does make a lot of sense to find ways to offer up the game level along with a recorded version of the song as a single offering.” He stressed that this idea is something in which they’re “very much” interested and are actively considering selling the game levels and the song for a single price. Without giving many details about who they would like to partner with, it’s clear that this idea has gone beyond idle conjecture.

It’s an interesting idea, to be able to buy a song to play with the game and then have a copy to listen to on your computer or mp3 player for a single price. Rock Band is already in the business of selling music, although it’s music locked into the game. With music fans plugged into the Rock Band’s music store, it seems like a natural progression to simply sell them the music itself as well. This would be a good opportunity to draw in new music fans, and for an existing music store to leverage the power of the Rock Band experience.

I enjoy watching NFL games.  I enjoy watching them in High Definition a lot more than watching them in Standard Definition.  However, more than watching the game even in HD I love watching games at the actual stadium.  A few years from now it looks like that may change.

The NFL is looking into broadcasting games in 3-D.  If I can watch the game in nearly as much detail as being there without having to battle traffic, without buying very expensive tickets, and without having to worry about the weather I would surely pick that option just about every time. The Wall Street Journal has details about the NFL’s first attempt at broadcasting in 3-D this coming weekend:

With sports fans still getting used to their high-definition television sets, the National Football League is already thinking ahead to the next potential upgrade: 3-D.

Next week, a game between the San Diego Chargers and the Oakland Raiders will be broadcast live in 3-D to theaters in Los Angeles, New York and Boston. It is a preliminary step on what is likely a long road to any regular 3-D broadcasts of football games.

The idea is a “proof of concept,” says Howard Katz, NFL senior vice president of broadcasting and media operations. “We want to demonstrate this and let people get excited about it and see what the future holds.”

The several hundred guests at the three participating theaters Dec. 4 will include representatives from the NFL’s broadcasting partners and from consumer-electronics companies. The event will be closed to the general public. Burbank, Calif.-based 3ality Digital LLC will shoot the game with special cameras and transmit it to a satellite. Thomson SA’s Technicolor Digital Cinema is providing the satellite services and digital downlink to each theater, and Real D 3D Inc. will power the display in the theaters.

This isn’t the first time the NFL has participated in a 3-D experiment. In 2004, a predecessor company to 3ality filmed the Super Bowl between the New England Patriots and the Carolina Panthers. When Sandy Climan, 3ality’s chief executive officer, shows the footage, “people crouch down to catch the ball,” he says. “It’s as if the ball is coming into your arms.”

Technology has advanced considerably since then, and now makes live transmission possible. Boxing in 3-D, Mr. Climan says, particularly “raises your blood pressure.”

Real D, which has rolled out 3-D systems in 1,500 theaters around the world, has long advocated the transmission of live events to theaters in 3-D. “We look forward to giving fans of live events the opportunity to feel like they’re in the front row,” says Michael Lewis, Real D’s CEO.

Some live events, including opera broadcasts and circus performances, already pop up on screens at theaters across the country.

Next week’s demonstration will also include television displays, to show what might one day be available in homes. While 3-D television sets are already available in stores, mainly for the handful of DVDs available in 3-D, the industry is still working on technical standards for 3-D.

That process raises the possibility that 3-D TV sets purchased today might not be compatible with programs aired in a few years’ time. Just as in theaters, home viewers must wear special 3-D glasses.

We’ll explain, but first some perspective…

PC Gaming Alive and Well

This continues to support our rant against the “PC Gaming is Dead” claim that console vendors and publishers have been making for years as a way of trending people to more closed/controlled platforms that provide larger margins and easier access to streamlined payments.

You continue to see console publishers say that PC gaming is dead or that they will “analyze the market” to see if it makes sense to release a Triple-A title to the PC. You even have some folks spouting useless drivel, like Epic’s Cliff Bleszinski stating that Gears of War 2 will not be released on the PC like Gears 1 was.

Besides Bleszinski being unqualified to make that claim (I think Mark Rein, Michael Capps or their head of business development are more qualified to make these statements), Gears of War 2 opened to record sales that will move a number of Xbox 360 consoles this holiday season; exactly what Microsoft wanted. Once that revenue stream trickles down and Gears 2 is done moving consoles of course Microsoft will go back to Epic for a PC release that will follow up and push Vista/Windows 7 sales come Fall of ‘09 – I’ll eat $1000 if I’m wrong.

Do you remember this was exactly what was said with Gears of War 1? There was “no PC release”, then low and behold as we approached Fall, a surprise announcement with exclusive content and hand waving. There are no technical hurdles to bringing Gears of War 2 to the PC, if Microsoft has a strategic angle for pushing Windows on the PC market, they will use Gears 2 as the tool to do it with. Remember Halo? Was that even a game or just a marketing tool?

If Microsoft’s play is to push Xbox 360 in replacement of desktop gaming completely, then they won’t renew the Epic contract to bring Gears 2 to the PC – this has nothing to do with what Epic wants or what Bleszinski wants. If Microsoft approaches them with $75 million and some residual agreement on sales for a PC version of Gears of War 2, guess what we’ll see in a few months? A PC release of Gears of War 2.

I’ll make the claim now that we will absolutely see Gears of War 2 on the PC come Fall ‘09, again, with bits and pieces of exclusive content and likely some sort of Windows 7 tie-in; either a newer Games for Windows that works or a DX 11 highlight.

The console/media center platform is not a forgone conclusion yet, and Microsoft would be jumping the gun if they tried to push it as such this early. That being said, Windows 7, assuming it’s not a disaster, will likely be the last big OS-centric push we see from Microsoft. Assuming it’s a success, we will see a service-push by Microsoft after Windows 7 is sufficiently rolled out.

It’s All About Control

The battle between Console and PC gaming markets has nothing to do with gaming… games are just the stepping stone for what is coming.

When the Nintendo set out and sold millions of units, companies took notice; but the technology wasn’t there to do more than just games. When the PS2 sold 10s of millions of units world wide, everyone took notice; and we suddenly had a machine that sort of had the power to do more than just games… that’s when “next gen” consoles launched and the picture became much clearer.

Suddenly we had PS3s and Xbox 360s with the capabilities of computers, but out of the box support for a single, vendor locked-in publishing and delivery channel. This is any vendors dream come true: controlling the choke point for digital distribution to millions of customers; a channel that publishers will pay you handsomely to get inside and sell through and on the receiving end consumers will pay you again to receive it.

Enter PSN and Xbox Live

These are the cash cows… games, and gaming machines are the edge of the funnel, the “teaser” to get you buying a console, hooking it up and using it… feeling comfortable with it.

At some point you will begin navigating through the menus and see a movie you want to watch, a TV show you enjoy, a graphics pack you think looks cute or an Arcade Game you loved… and you’ll buy it.

You’ll buy it and you’ll notice how easy the process was. Once your credit card information is typed in, it’s a 1-click endeavor to buy more content through this channel.

It gets easier and easier with each release, adding value to your life, money in Microsoft’s and Sony’s pocket, and providing a completely new audience to publishers to sell directly to; you cannot stock an icon pack or PSN theme on a store shelf. You cannot sell bonus levels of Gears of War 2 in a store using a boxed copy. You cannot sell new clothes for your Playstation Home avatar at EB Games… there are going to be new products to new customers that didn’t exist previously.

{smartads}

The PC Gaming Market slows down the adoption of these distribution and sales channels. It’s the original digital platform and therefor a bit sloppy; there are a lot of different ways to do the same thing.

Do you use Steam? What about Greenhouse? What about Direct2Drive? What about <insert the 10 other services>?

These services all compete, chopping the PC digital delivery and sales channels into tiny pieces. In addition to that, some publishers are hesitant about delivering different kinds of digital media on the PC (e.g. movies and music) where as on the consoles it’s more straight forward along with a smaller threat of piracy. Publishers prefer this because there are less choices to make (PSN or Xbox Live?) and the platform-providers prefer it obviously because they have funneled business away from the fragmented PC market into 1 of 2 pots… of which they get probably somewhere around 30-50% of everything that transpires inside that pot.

The console is a much easier value proposition for content publishers and much more profitable for the channel owners (Sony and Microsoft) – that is why they have been claiming that PC gaming is dying for years, that is why there are lagged releases of games on the PC or some not done at all, that is why all these big companies want to move the consoles forward. It isn’t about games, it’s about what comes after games.

If It’s Not About Games, What is It?

Movies, Music, TV Shows, Voice Chat, Communication, Synchronization, Socialization… these are all the next steps for consoles.

The next replacement for Facebook will be on the consoles, the next replacement for Skype will be on the consoles, the next replacement for TiVo or your cable DVR will be on the consoles, synchronization with your events, tasks, friends, families, favorite shows… will all be on consoles.

The primary way for people to watch movies will be renting them over their console, the primary way to watch TV will be over your console. Your stereo will be your console. Your NAS will be your console. You’ll share pictures easily across family members by all syncing your consoles… services like Flickr and SmugMug will be hosting hubs for the content that is delivered on these consoles. Much like we saw NetFlix just do with Xbox Live Experience update and their new streaming service. NetFlix is the backing storage for this stream services, just as SmugMug will be in the future for pictures… I doubt those websites will directly do much business, but they will become critical members of the console content provider family.

This is the future that will become more defined in 5-8 years and a reality in 10. The goal is to funnel everything, all your activity down to what used to be a game device, but is now a “media center” for all forms of entertainment and socialization.

Sony jumped the gun with Home, but their 10-year vision is actually a good one… it just doesn’t make any sense now because the lifestyle and infrastructure isn’t there for Home to seem interesting. It is sort of like Valve releasing their Steam service (clearly a success now) back in 1990 when everyone was on dialup… it just wouldn’t have made sense and no one would use it because the infrastructure/life style of digital downloads wasn’t there to support it.

You can also see Microsoft’s version of this move towards “everything on the entertainment console” with Xbox Live Experience… it’s still more of a classic Xbox Live experience than it is a Sony Home/Second Life/Facebook experience, but you see the colors starting to bleed through.

At the point that these companies finally get all our entertainment activities from one box, controlled by one vendor, getting paid by the publishers to push their content through those channels, and us consuming that content with micropayments, then it finally becomes comes clear why these companies want the PC entertainment (right now referred to as “PC Gaming”) market to die… it’s to wild, it’s not predictable enough and not controllable enough; that translates directly into less revenue, which is what they want to avoid.

A good case study of this is again, with NetFlix. Before the Xbox Live Experience update with integrated NetFlix Streaming, Microsoft didn’t see a dime from NetFlix for their “Watch it Now” instant streaming service, but now they do because NetFlix has seen the value in cross-promoting their service (and their original business plan) on the gaming entertainment consoles. At some point Queue management will find their way onto Xbox Live (and likely PSN) and the reason to visit the NetFlix site disappears… effectively making NetFlix nothing more than a content provider; almost like a higher-level version of Amazon’s S3 service.

Conclusion

So PC Gaming is not dead, but big publishers and platform developers want it to die and will slowly widdle it down to nothing. Triple-A titles will continue to be pushed to consoles, and big money will continue to move consoles towards a ubiquitous “entertainment and communication center” experience.

What will spring up on the PC are brand new opportunities for indie developers to step up to the plate and redefine how PC gaming looks. Unfortunately TV and Movies are on such a heavy lock-down by big name publishers that I doubt reinvention of the PC as a powerful entertainment platform that rivals the consoles is not likely to happen in the longer term. There is content to be had however, with the advent of YouTube and other media services like it, those may play a part in what of PC entertainment looks like in the future.

So next time someone says “PC Gaming is dying”, you can say “Nope, it’s just changing”. Just follow the money-potential to see where it’s likely headed.

Thanks Edge-Online!

Harmonix CEO Alex Rigopulos also said that it’s not just a “Rock Band” song expansion pack; it will be “a new, full-grown, custom game built from the ground up.”  Game analysts are already speculating that the game will be similar to the AC/DC RockBand Video Game that was announced a month ago.

Here is the full press release:

THE BEATLES INSPIRE NEW MUSIC VIDEO GAME; APPLE CORPS LTD., MTV AND HARMONIX COME TOGETHER FOR UNPRECEDENTED DEAL

Exclusive Agreement Set to Bring The Beatles Music to Fans for the First Time in Interactive Form Here, There and Everywhere in 2009

New York, NY – October 30, 2008 – The Beatles’ extraordinary music and phenomenal legacy is set to rock across the universe in the form of a video game through an exclusive partnership between Apple Corps Ltd., Harmonix and MTV Games, a part of Viacom’s MTV Networks.

This partnership marks the first time that Apple Corps, along with EMI Music, Harrisongs Ltd, and Sony/ATV Music Publishing, has agreed to present The Beatles music in an interactive video game format. Published by MTV Games and developed by Harmonix, the world’s premier music video game company and creators of the best-selling Rock Band®, the game will be an unprecedented, experiential progression through and celebration of the music and artistry of The Beatles. The game was creatively conceived with input from Sir Paul McCartney and Ringo Starr, along with Yoko Ono Lennon and Olivia Harrison, and enjoys their full blessing. In addition, Giles Martin, co-producer of The Beatles innovative LOVE project, will provide his expertise and serve as Music Producer for this groundbreaking Beatles project.

“The project is a fun idea which broadens the appeal of The Beatles and their music. I like people having the opportunity to get to know the music from the inside out,” Sir Paul McCartney said.

“It gives me great pleasure to be part of The Beatles / Apple and Harmonix / Rock Band partnership,” said Ringo Starr. “The Beatles continue to evolve with the passing of time and how wonderful that The Beatles’ legacy will find its natural progression into the 21st century through the computerized world we live in. Let the games commence.”

“It’s cool. I love it and hope it will keep inspiring and encouraging the young generation for many decades,” said Yoko Ono Lennon.

“People are having so much fun playing Rock Band. Combined with The Beatles tracks, it is a great way to either listen or participate,” said Olivia Harrison. “If you like the music, it doesn’t take much persuasion to get you to play.”

“Introducing the genius of The Beatles to a whole new generation of music lovers through original and inspired ways is extremely exciting to us at Apple Corps,” stated Jeff Jones, CEO, Apple Corps. “We are truly pleased to be working with the innovative forces at MTV and Harmonix as they embody our mutual passions for music and creativity.”

“Many of us have been part of a generation that has long enjoyed an enduring love affair with The Beatles and now we’re looking to extend that love affair for future generations to enjoy,” said Van Toffler.” “Our inspiration for this project comes from a keen sense of history and a place of utmost reverence and respect for the band, their music and their heritage.”

“The impact of The Beatles is forever ingrained in the hearts, minds and souls of millions the world over,” said Judy McGrath, Chairman and CEO of MTV Networks. “The Beatles are the reason many of us are WHERE we are, and some of us are WHO we are.”

“We are honored to be part of this new way for people to discover the timeless music and art of The Beatles – the most creatively and commercially successful, critically acclaimed, and influential band in the history of popular music,” stated Paul DeGooyer, MTV’s Senior Vice President of Electronic Games & Music.

“By presenting their music and artistry through the creative filter of a groundbreaking video game, we are giving legions of fans and music lovers all over the world a profound, new way to experience The Beatles,” said Alex Rigopulos, CEO and Co-Founder, Harmonix. “This game will be a celebration of the Beatles undeniable legacy.”

Personally, I think these types of games fill a nice void. They give fans of these bands the option to get more than just a handful of their songs in the game, but spare the rest of us from having to play a ton of songs by the same band.

It was announced yesterday that YouTube (Google) is partnering with both Amazon and Apple to begin selling video games and music respectively.

The idea is that content on YouTube identified as belonging to a certain video game or song would be associated with what amounts to a “Buy it Now” button that would take you over to the Amazon or Apple page to purchase said media immediately. I’m sure there is some Google Checkout tie-in in here somewhere as well.

This is surely the beginning of what will become complete online media dominence by a few companies in the near future.

The barrier to entry for online distribution has always been building out the infrastructure capable of doing those things reliably. Even if a company, like Warner Bros, wanted to get into online distribution, the hurdle was always that they didn’t have the experience, infrastructure, consumer-trust or name recognition in the game that other online companies have had.

Google, Amazon and Apple certainly do.

It will be interesting to see how this fragile alliance unfolds. If things go well and the profit-sharing works out between the companies, we might see a future where the movie studios and record labels bend over backwards to get into the good graces of Gamapple (I just made that up) to get their content into those networks for consumers to consume.

Of course if the alliance falls apart due to greed (that always seems to be the issue) then it’s back to square 1 where it’s every-man-for-himself, with every major studio trying their own “next best thing”.

Then again, sometimes the networks will nail the nail right on the head and create the next best thing… but mostly not.

Fortunately it looks like Netflix has inked deals with NBC, Starz and a few others, helping increase the Watch Instantly lineup.

After clicking through and checking the Starz Play list of movies, I have to say that the Watch Instantly service from Netflix just got about 20x more interesting, finally getting back some of the classic favorites that I’ve been missing like:

• No Country of Old Men
• Gone Baby Gone
• Ratatouille
• Superbad
• Grindhouse
• L.A. Confidential
• Silence of the Lambs
• Happy Gilmore
• Alien/Aliens
• etc.

Very interesting tid-bit I ran across today. First I happened to catch this post over at GameTrailers, which lead me to Anna Torv’s (pictured above, on the left) IMDB page, which confirmed that she was the voice behind Nariko in Heavenly Sword (an awesome game).

So there you have it… Nariko didn’t die, she just got a new role on a new TV show. All joking aside, I’ve been enjoying Fringe, the Pilot blew me away, but each episode after that has been a bit cheesey at parts, but still enjoyable.

I’m hoping the show starts taking itself a bit more seriously and stops scripting in retarded crap like Agent Dunham (Torv) running off into the woods solo to recover an artifact and take down a crazy gunman… not usually how the FBI rolls (would have been cars and helicopters galore).

It’s those little convenient story-line mechanisms that annoy me, because Lost seems to be over scripting that type of stuff in, and is a pretty serious show… I think Fringe should do the same.

Download audio file (However%20Bottomless.mp3)

Direct Download

Local Music Presents

The “Break it Down” Blog wants to help support local musicians and artists. While we are bringing you bits and pieces from Arizona’s local artists we would encourage the community to participate if you have a favorite band or artist you would like to share with the world.

If you have a favorite local band that you would like to promote, grab a link to an MP3 of theirs online (must be an MP3) and use the following format to post a player to their song down in the comments section, like this:

[audio:http://www.flergville.com/song.mp3]

Be sure to include information about the band as well so anyone interested can learn more or find out where to buy music from that band.

Another punchcard-style Scream Tracker track attempting to recreate human-like musical expressiveness entirely through programmed commands. The guitar solos took a really, really long time to input.

Download audio file (Fight%20On%20(Remix)%20v1.01.mp3)

Direct Download

Local Music Presents

The “Break it Down” Blog wants to help support local musicians and artists. While we are bringing you bits and pieces from Arizona’s local artists we would encourage the community to participate if you have a favorite band or artist you would like to share with the world.

If you have a favorite local band that you would like to promote, grab a link to an MP3 of theirs online (must be an MP3) and use the following format to post a player to their song down in the comments section, like this:

[audio:http://www.flergville.com/song.mp3]

Be sure to include information about the band as well so anyone interested can learn more or find out where to buy music from that band.

A constantly evolving dream of slowly drowning in a pool of water. Originally conceived as an acoustic guitar solo played in bell tones, it was moved to electronic medium in Cakewalk for orchestral score. The score later migrated to Sonar XL and eventually to Logic Pro where it was resampled with 24-bit synthesizers. It has been remixed in over a dozen different orchestrations along the way, though most have been lost.

All drum tracks were manually sequenced using an Alesis SR-16 for live play, and imported via MIDI for remixing. Organs, pianos, mallets, strings and all other instruments were originally recorded from live performance and later synthesized using EXS24, Sculpture, EVB3, EVP88, Ultrabeat and other tools.

Download audio file (Drown%20(Radioactive%20Mix).mp3)

Direct Download

Local Music Presents

The “Break it Down” Blog wants to help support local musicians and artists. While we are bringing you bits and pieces from Arizona’s local artists we would encourage the community to participate if you have a favorite band or artist you would like to share with the world.

If you have a favorite local band that you would like to promote, grab a link to an MP3 of theirs online (must be an MP3) and use the following format to post a player to their song down in the comments section, like this:

[audio:http://www.flergville.com/song.mp3]

Be sure to include information about the band as well so anyone interested can learn more or find out where to buy music from that band.

Download audio file (Christmas%20At%20War%20(Iraq%20Mix).mp3)

Direct Download

Local Music Presents

The “Break it Down” Blog wants to help support local musicians and artists. While we are bringing you bits and pieces from Arizona’s local artists we would encourage the community to participate if you have a favorite band or artist you would like to share with the world.

If you have a favorite local band that you would like to promote, grab a link to an MP3 of theirs online (must be an MP3) and use the following format to post a player to their song down in the comments section, like this:

Download audio file (song.mp3)

Be sure to include information about the band as well so anyone interested can learn more or find out where to buy music from that band.

Tickets for BlizzCon 2008, Blizzard’s annual convention taking place on October 10-11 in Anaheim, were sold out last night.

There were so many people trying to acquire tickets that the Blizzard store was temporarily unavailable several times over the past couple days.  Tickets for the convention were priced at $100 a piece and included access to discussion panels, hands-on play, tournaments, and the coveted goody-bag.

Obviously, there are going to be many new announcements and new footage shown.  Can’t wait to see some more of Starcraft 2, Diablo 3, and hopefully we’ll hear what the new Blizzard MMO is going to be.  And let’s not forget the infamous sound-alike contest.

2005

2007

When I was a kid, I always thought it would be awesome if I could get paid to play video games.  There couldn’t be a better job in the world!  Up until within the last few years, the only viable way to accomplish this be a tester, spending hours and hours slaving over a screen trying to find bugs and glitches.  But things are changing fast.

Last week, the Birmingham Salvo captured the title of World Champion in the second season of the Championship Gaming Series (CGS) after defeating the San Francisco OPTX.  The CGS is one of the very solid up and coming venues for gamers to earn a living by doing what they love.  With major corporate sponsorships, including gamer fuel Mountain Dew and Microsoft, the CGS is bringing a competitive and entertaining broadcast to both DirectTV and G4 audiences

CGS caters to many types of gamers by combining games from a wide array of genres.  FIFA 08, Forza Motorsport 2, Dead or Alive 4, and Counterstrike: Source are the games being played this season, covering sports, racing, fighting, and first person shooters.  The CGS also adds the unique approach of playing as localized teams to mimic sports teams, making the competition more about overall team performance and less about individual efforts.

Can competitive gaming industry become a mainstream attraction?  It may not be there yet, but the CGS is making a very strong and solid attempt at making this childhood fantasy become a reality.

Otherwise looks pretty action packed and has that Ukrainian girl (Olga Kurylenko) from Hitman in it and she got nekkid in Hitman sooooo… fingers crossed!

NOTE: Correction below…

We are very pro-naked around here; in fact, I wrote the Vatican asking for them to declare the last Sunday of everything month as “Topless Church Sunday for Jesus”, but got no response.

I bought plane tickets and am probably going to go meet with the pope directly about this though, so I’ll keep you guys posted. I guess if I had to wrap up my feeling about this in one word… I basically feel like I’m doing God’s work.

So your welcome, God.

DOH, I’m wrong! It was actually Mila Kunis in the movie I guess… man doesn’t this look like Olga though?

Check out the trailer and see what you think… there is a scene towards the end where she finally looks like Mila Kunis; I just assumed the movie had evil-love-interest and good-love-interest, and at some point they fight each other covered in oil for Max’s love. Which is sort of like my real life, except more like Hugh Hefner’s life and nothing like mine.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Click here to view the embedded video.

To boot, apparently you can play it on Guitar Hero 2 as well, ha!

Click here to view the embedded video.

Thanks Brian Fernandes!

It also looks like the movie is going to be getting the fast-track treatment to get this puppy done and out by Summer 2010. Hope they don’t skimp on the story… word on the street is that IESB, folks who did the script review, loved it and said it rocked some socks off.

NOTE: IMDB seems to be still listing the original director for the remake and hasn’t updated it with Leterrier’s name yet.

Thanks Latino Review!

Let’s take a break from all the Diablo III news and concentrate on what is really important: Sex and the Internet.

I am announcing a world-wide moritorium on ugly celebrity sex-tapes… just stop… please god stop. We are going to click those video links out of curiosity and we don’t want to see somethings.

If you haven’t heard Mini-me (Verne Troyer) had a sex-tape with his girlfriend leak out on the internet and Up My Own Ass has a small clippet of it… it’s SFW, but still… getting stabbed in the mouth with a dwarf-tounge… that looks… oh god I’m going to stop thinking about it now.

I’ve never been a huge Carlin fan until I got older and started appreciating his cynical performances discussing the shit that makes us crazy today (where Us means mildly intelligent citizens… if you are an under-educated KKK member from the deep-south, you probably don’t think much of Carlin).

For the nostalgic folks reading this, you might dig this booking picture of him from the 70s, had no idea it was him at first… Carlin, the early years:

Thanks MSNBC!

For a kick-ass blast to the past, check it out… you probably watched most of these (if you didn’t then you might suck real bad… check with your doctor):

Click here to view the embedded video.

That is a really interesting tactic… that’s like being a dentist and having a reputation for blinding your patients because you get jimmy-arm when you drill teeth.

Anyway, check it out for yourself (Safe for Work)…

Rick Saldana sends in a link to MUTO, which was a wall-painted animation by BLU recorded using stop-motion over the period of god-knows-how-long. It makes the wall painting look like it’s crawling along the wall doing things when in reality this is some dude painting an entire wall, taking a single snapshot of it, then erasing it and repainting it in a slightly different position… I can’t even imagine the patience required for this.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Thanks Rick!

I had originally been concerned at the size of the NetFlix Watch-it-Now library as well as the picture quality, but Matt does bring up a good point… that if you aren’t a freaky Movie/TV junkie already, there is a ton of stuff for you to watch that you likely haven’t seen.

Here’s the full mini-review, thanks Matt!

Recently, Netflix announced that they and Roku had created a little device to allow you to stream Netflix “Watch Instantly” stuff to your TV over the net. Here’s the URL for the device:

http://www.roku.com/netflixplayer/

Using it is free as long as you have a Netflix subscription, and use of it is unlimited. The catalog of what’s available, however, is pretty severely limited, but they *do* have an awful lot of older movies, tv shows, etc… I had no trouble finding a bunch of stuff I wanted to watch… some Hitchcock movies, “The Orphanage”, a bunch of old tv shows (Voltron )

The device is pretty awesome… just hooked it up to power, ethernet, and HDMI to my monoprice switch. Setup was a breeze… it updated itself. You use your computer to fill the queue, and the device see the stuff instantly. Streaming quality was fantastic and completely uninterrupted. It’s nice to be able to decide what you want to watch just by browsing on your computer and not waiting for anything. Well, you wait about 15 seconds for the initial buffering. For $99, well worth it.

Downsides: You can’t rip the DVD and keep it forever (but now I know I want to get the Orphanage and download it to scare other people with), not many new releases (though apparently they’re trying to broker a lot more ‘watch instantly’ arrangements), not BD quality – just DVD quality. Good for old stuff, but I still want Blu-Ray delivered by Netflix.