Later, dudes. I’m out to New Zealand for a few weeks. If you want to keep up with what I am doing, check out our blog for the trip.

BLOG FOR THE TRIP

I’ll be blogging as regularly as I can to recount our adventures, so until then, peace.

Some time ago, I was talking with Dan Amrich from Official Xbox Magazine. It was a general AIM conversation that somehow strayed towards Peggle. At the time, I had no interest in Peggle. I’d played the demo and was fascinated by it, but not as a game. I made a witty comment to Dan to the effect of “it’s a sandwich making simulator. I click the mouse and then I leave the room. When I get back from said sandwich making I have points.” He gave me many question marks and exclamation points after an “are you fucking crazy”-esque question.

Yeah, dude. I am wrong, too.

I shrugged off Peggle as a game because I found that there was no skill in Plinko-With-Unicorns, but fast-forward six months and I’ve purchased the iPod version of the game, and have sunk probably 10 hours of my life in to it. There is a certain skill, I realized, because I fail a lot. It’s a physics simulator, like many other tech-demo-y look-what-I-can-do games out there, and if you don’t account for momentum, rebounds and arcs you’re screwed.

I think the word for this is “erratum”, but that sounds too pretentious to say, so I’ll say this: I messed up, Mr. Amrich. Peggle is fucking sweet.

I had to pause Grand Theft Auto IV to write about this right now. As is the usual in GTA, I was running around jacking cars, doing missions, and tooling around by beating the crap out of harmless civilians. I was punching randoms in hopes of getting my “Finish Him” Achievement (10 counter attacks in four minutes) which I eventually did nab.

Afterwards, for whatever reason, I stabbed a guy. I don’t know why, but I did. I had this though about GTA leading up to its release that it would be more difficult for me to kill innocents because they looked and acted real, but up until this point I didn’t ever think about it. I’d seen people hold papers over their head when it rains, and I’ve seen women carrying groceries — very normal stuff. This wasn’t “human” though, so when I accidentally ran them over when in hot pursuit I didn’t really care.

Back to the guy I stabbed, he was on his phone, minding his own business. I ran up to him, and stuck my knife in his back, and something unexpected happened. He didn’t turn around and try to punch me while yelling “Fuck you, man!” or something else that the idiotic AI pedestrians would have in previous iterations. He didn’t whip out a gun. He didn’t even try to fight back.

He fell to the ground and began to sob.

It took a minute for that to sink in. I stabbed him. He fell, started to sob, and tried to run away. He started to yell for help as he did, and I felt bad. I stabbed him a few times before that sank in, and I had this feeling of pity and regret. I didn’t know whether to let him go, or put him out of his misery.

I wanted to help this poor guy that I had no reason to stab, but I did.

Well played, Rockstar.

I tend to do my best to try and like games, and I’m not fond of physically throwing my controllers. NBA Ballers: Chosen One, seen in all of its malicious evil above, is a game that defies my attempts to like games and my resistance to hurling my gamepad. I’ve thrown it more than once, been frustrated to the point of literally throwing the instruction manual, and an empty can of iced tea on top of my 360 controller.

The fundamental gameplay mechanics of this game are built to make you lose. I’m in the fifth chapter now, and I’ve got the feel for the game. It involves a lot of me-using-superpowers, but no matter how many times I try, the opponents ALWAYS have the upper hand. It seems to me, as a player, that the AI is built to cheat, and that the mechanics of the game are deliberately built against you. I don’t know how many times I’ve failed to steal, block, or even PICK UP the basketball in this game, but it’s getting a little fucking ridiculous. I can’t fathom how a company like Midway would ship something that is so frustratingly broken. Seriously, I am not kidding when I tell you I can not pick up the basketball in this game… It just doesn’t happen.

Also angering is that you’re kicked to the main menu after a 90 minute epic ladder climbing match, only to lose in the final tier because the game didn’t give me the win, despite my having correctly followed the criteria. I’ve seen more than my fare share of bullshittery in this game, man, and I’m getting tired of it. Opponents teleporting in front of me, the ball mysteriously disappearing from my hands for reasons unexplained, my slam dunks (that DO go in) aren’t counted, missed rim-shots from in the key count as 3 pointers for my opponent — it’s all here, and it’s enough to drive me batty. It has. I am going to bed to avoid kicking my fucking television in its stupid, smug, Baller displaying face.

There really is nothing redeeming or remotely fun about this game. I am not joking. This is the worst game I’ve played in 2008, and I dealt with both Turok and Turning Point. Turning Point is Bioshock in comparison to this rubbish.

Anyways, off to bed. It’s probably a poor choice, logging on to the blog and ranting. It’s pretty late, and I’m super tired on top of being choked about losing 90 minutes of play time because I was screwed by the game. That sounds like “Oh waaaaah, I really suck so I’ll blame the game” banter, but it’s not. This is some shitty shit, man.

I’ve updated my resume here on the blog so it looks a tad more professional, as opposed to its original catastrophic-atrocity form. That’s cool, but you don’t care.  As I write this I’ve got Universe at War (360) on pause. It’s a cool game, and I’m enjoying it a lot. It drives me nuts waiting five minutes for a worker-unit - courtesy of the god-awful slowdown the game experiences when you’ve capped your buildings/units - but the controls are slick as hell, though there are a few things I miss. I don’t like that I can’t set “modes” for my dudes, like patrol, guard, or attack. I’d love to have them run full force to an objective as they blast everything along the way to hell, but they mosey on passed everything.

Also, If I hear “The unit Mirabel has been destroyed” one more time, I am friggin’ done. I hate babysitting Hero units, I’d rather build a base and wreck some alien invaders, but I’m forced to escort my giant anime robot to a beacon, or protect a human colony with her… But if she dies, it’s Game Over. I appreciate the addition of a PC-like save-anywhere option, it’s really come in handy. I’d recommend it, though only for the patient. I guess it’s an RTS, so you already know if you care about it or not.

It’s my birthday today, too, apparently. My sister walked in to my room and gave me a fifty-dollar filled birthday card - the card is the real gift. It’s an “A long time ago…” Star Wars-y card that friggin’ sings the theme song when opened. Holy shit. - which is a bonus. I can bank that cash for the New Zealand trip that’s coming up. Speaking of that, I’ll be taking a month long vacation to Peter Jackson-land, so if you want to know how that trip is going, we’re going to be blogging our antics at this blog. Check it out, it’ll be an interesting read. Less videogame talk, more “we got too drunk and went Zorbing”.

Sorry to DJDrastic, my one and only reader who comes here to read my reviews on a regular basis. I’m busy dude, so calm down, put down the knife and just keep makin’ your podcast for me to listen to. I’ll get a review or two up before I go I think. I’ve got to lay the beats on Escaflowne.