At the height of the popularity of MMORPG’s here in the Philippines, otherwise known as momorpagas, there became a demand, for better or worse, of magazines that blatantly publish ads have articles about our local MMORPG scene. Of course, this wasn’t exactly what they claim to be doing – they claim to be writing about games in general, with MMORPG’s gaining a bit of the attention with their major-sponsor-funded unbiased reviews. From which comes a total rant about the overall quality of such publications from yours truly:
I think you’re expecting way too much out of our dying local magazine racks.
I remember I tried checking out local mags before and upon reading it realized these shmucks have no business writing for anything. And sadly all the “news” were older than rock-solid 3 day old pandesal (a bread roll).
It’s like they thought of writing about something, put it in Google, copied all the things the first page says, including errors, or maybe they add errors of their own because they’re too dumb to understand it, then pass off some lame screenshots with captions that are semi-sexual or semi-trying-to-be-smart-funny-but-end-up-being-overly-lame-and-cricket-inducing-tumbleweed-rolling-awkward-silence jokes instead.
The writing reeks of uninformed biased crap that every time I hear that the PS3 has some superior graphics, or that Gran Tourismo 5 “will be out sometime this year” or some wild shit that is blatantly untrue, I cringe and say I want my money back and change.
To expect anything better out of our newsstands is probably much too much. We want real unbiased opinions and what we get is regurgitated fake online writeups with no real professional opinions behind them.
I don’t know if local media just needs to grow some balls or they really just have no business writing anything at all.
We didn’t start the flame war. Peeps were hatin’ on it ‘fore I left my comment:
Yes, exactly. Nevermind that half of the games you mentioned are unproven and haven’t even been shown in full playable form.
Ninja Gaiden Sigma 2 – remake of an Xbox 360 exclusive with pathetic sixaxis boob jiggling addon.
Uncharted 2: Among Thieves – great game.
EyePet – WTF EYEPET!!?!? WTF (Are you 5?)
Gran Turismo 5 – vaporware. Remember GT HD? Remember they planned on releasing a basic game then let you buy a ton of cars? They they thought, “oops maybe we shouldn’t do that”. Then remember Prolouge? Gran Turismo is a myth.
Heavy Rain – game looks good, unproven genre, game not shown enough to public
Star Ocean: The Last Hope International – isn’t this an old Xbox 360 game?
White Knight Chronicles – Another Squeenix JRPG. Didn’t their last non FF RPG’s suck?
Final Fantasy XIII – Not PS3 Exclusive
God of War III – God of War is great
Atelier Rorona – What the F is this? Hey what about Bohaasyeiaid Lebaru? That’s an Xbox 360 exclusive. If you wanna import this title go ahead. I bet it doesn’t review very well.
Playstation Motion Controller – BEST GAME EVER. Hey, remember the sixaxis motion controller? THAT WAS THE BEST GAME EVER TOO! Also, I love how the technology basically has no name, (kind of like Massive Action Game) and that all we’ve seen are tech demos. Game comes out 2010! Believe it! Because Sony said so! Sony never lies!
MAG – unproven 256 player online shooter with generic name and generic shooting. Tiered command system obviously will fail due to people not following orders. Under the huge map and multiple groups will you even actually see 256 players playing in the same screen? If not, then what’s the use of actually having them all in one map? 256 Players. Only 3 with headsets. TOTALLY WINS OVER HALO RITE!?
Agent – Agent coming in 2010? Don’t think so. Heck, I haven’t seen anything about this game at all.
Final Fantasy XIV – BEST MMORPG EVER!!!! Remember FF11? Subscription fees are teh awesomesauce! 2 day bosses FTW
The Agency – The Agency!? Another MMO by Sony Online Entertainment? Haven’t they learned their lessons? Sony is horrible at online.
DC Universe Online – Dude seriously? Another MMO. By Sony. I wouldn’t even compare this with a random XBLA exclusive.
Free Realms – Free Realms?…. mmo. Holy crap and it looks bad.
The Last Guardian – ICO team makes great games
Sony Motion Controller – DID I MENTION THIS IS THE BEST GAME EVER!??!
Think very deeply before you compare a bunch of MMO’s and promises to some hard hitting REAL, and very PROVEN console exclusives, sir.
The list that was given you was:
Mass Effect 2 – Bioware. Proven.
Halo: Reach – Bungie. Proven.
Alan Wake – Demo proven.
Fable 3 – After 2 games, proven.
Splinter Cell: Conviction – Proven.
Crackdown 2 – Proven.
Gears of War 3 – Very Proven.
Project Natal – Has a name, technology Proven. Games already run on it. Proven.Let me just add one or two that are actual, physical, proven releases:
ODST – Proven.
Forza 3 – Real. Proven. And this time, 2 Forza’s will be out even before Gran Turismo 5 even has a hope of coming out. Has car damage, has reactive AI, has online auctions, good online play, great online community.I seriously do not know what you are smoking when you compare.
Yeah. Seriously. (Its a PS3 vs. 360 flame war. Except the dude was mentioning PS3 exclusives that didn’t have a history of greatness. Think Lair and you’ll see how unproven developers and games become utter crap and fail.)
So here I am, thinking – hey, I should update my Friendster’s Featured Friends today. Sounds fun, right? No.
I realized this point when, I browse through my friends, click on their face to “add” them on the list, then I choose to pick another page – what happens? Well the friend I just added, would disappear. Why? Because I need to click “Save Featured” first. Cool? Ok.
I add my friend up again, and I click “Save Featured”. That’s cool right? No. It brings me back to page 1 of my friends – at least the one I added is still there – but now I have to page through my friends again, past the one I last added, and pick another friend. Then I have to save, and repeat this process from page 1. Nevermind the fact that the damn friend list frame is so small you can only see a fraction of the friends anyway. I’m no expert, but I thought putting things in pages meant you wouldn’t need to scroll. Also, having a scrollbar means you never need to put things in pages. Ergo, you’ll see me going WTF over and over.
Now, we all know Friendster is a stupid dying dinosaur of a social network, but this is ridiculous. Someone in the FS offices should be shot dead for this User Interface fuckup. I’m sure, if you worked for any software or web development company, you’d be fired outright for this piece of garbage. And given all of Friendster’s strides towards “a better user experience,” (I call BS.) this sort of thing should have been fixed immediately between forthwith and right fricking now.
This whole concept of Featured Friends is ancient anyway. It seems to emanate from the fact that, long ago, before the interwebs was born, Friendster stood alone and had no way to show, possibly, any random friends on your page. (Through apps or other ways, ridiculous, I know.) I fear the fact that maybe Friendster didn’t have a random () function in its code.
What am I getting at here? Well, hear my productivity solution out – and I’ve figured this out from experience:
Pick your Featured Friends from the very last page. Start from there so every time you click on Save, you go through less pages of friends each time.
Thank you Friendster for ruining the internets for me again, and possibly, giving me productivity problems to solve in my spare time.
We’ve all wondered what it would be like – to own more than one console. In fact, maybe some of you don’t even need to wonder – since you live it everyday. But ask me the same and I will tell you a completely different way of seeing it.
Now, this is not to say that, given the opportunity to own more than one console, if given for free, I would not agree to. However, if you were to try to convince me that buying and maintaining more than one console is something I would call practical – then I would call you a “fucking idiot.” And here is why.
I only own a 360. I don’t believe in having 2 consoles in a practicality/time standpoint.
We, as consumers want one thing from our consoles – entertainment. Regardless of game, as long as both have quality games (ahem PS3 has way less amount) then entertainment of any sort can be gained from any system. Having two consoles only means that you’re getting entertained by one while the other wastes away waiting to die a dusty death.
Mathematically, that is just a waste of time, money, and space.
You can argue “well this has that and this has this” all day, but in the end, picking your games is secondary to the ability to extract entertainment from just one from any of the other extremely amazing games a console has. And, as far as I can tell, nobody has maxed out the amount of potential entertainment hours on the 360 alone. (PS3 you might get bored after all of the 5 games on it.
)
Who cares if I don’t get to play Kojima Gear Solstice? While you buy a PS3 and have fun with that, I’ll play another amazing game on my xbox. Both of us get entertained the same amount of hours except you had to buy another console. I don’t give a rats ass about how the story ends, because hey, its just a damn game. Let’s face it, you will need to make decisions on what games to MISS, otherwise, you should quit your job and play games for the rest of your life – and even that won’t suffice. Choose to miss out on some games exclusive to a console, and you’ll be thankful for it.
If, at some point, you fail to attain entertainment from just one console, then sir, you did not buy the right console for the job.
And my rambling is done. Excuse me while I boot up my SNES to play Super Metroid. Because I had to buy an SNES so I could go back and play this game because I missed it and I wanna know how it ends. Hey, look, its my xbox – maybe I should be playing games on that instead? NAH! We’ll have plenty of time to go back to the Xbox360 10 years later after we’ve finished all my backlog of games I missed back in the 90’s.
Touché. Booya. Farewell.
P.S.: Samus is a chick.
Hey here’s a new blog feature: Video blogging by yours truly! (WEWT!?!?!)
Here’s a brief history video of what I’ve been through fixing my repeatedly-breaking Guitar Hero drum kit.
In case you haven’t noticed, Guitar Hero drum kits aren’t very durable. I’ve been fixing the snare on and off for about 7 or so times now. The left cymbal broke this week, sort of fixed it now but there’s a small chance of double hit, so I swapped with the right cymbal. The kick pedal has undergone more than 10+ sensitivity mods and fixes. One drumstick holder snapped off. There’s the usual problem of the whole kit sinking down during gameplay, which I plan on drilling a hole through the stand for, to keep it from collapsing.
But now the actual plastic thing under the rubber pad is split in half on my snare. Which is total lolz. I’m still trying to determine if it will affect gameplay or not, but the snare now sounds more hollow when you hit it, and I might be getting double hits on it rarely. Oh well.
Hey, want to ask me how many times I had to fix my Rock Band kit? Hint: its less than 1. (Kinda. I forgot that I snapped my Rock Band bass pedal and added a metal plate to reattach it. Ever since then, I’ve had zero problems, and not like this.)
Hey! Have you heard? The Playstation 3 is crap, and this is another link to prove it. But this time, an industry game publishing giant will tell you.
You might have heard of a certain company called Activision, the largest third party game publisher in the world. (They recently beat Electronic Arts from being the largest.) They publish and make some of the biggest, most popular game franchises around. You may have heard of them too: Guitar Hero, Tony Hawk, and Call of Duty – you know, the good stuff. Let’s also not forget, that Activision is owned by Vivendi games now. Vivendi also owns Blizzard, which you remember, makes small, casual, not million-selling PC games like World of Warcraft, Diablo, Starcraft – you know, solitaire-like games. (Non-Sarcastic Version: Blizzard makes some of the most highly rated games on the PC and have sold millions of copies on any one of their franchises.)
So, we can definitely say, that whatever Mr. Activision Boss Bobby Kotick says, would hold to be a lot more credible than just regular opinionated do. Am I right? Good. Now, hear what he has to say.
I’m getting concerned about Sony; the PlayStation 3 is losing a bit of momentum and they don’t make it easy for me to support the platform. It’s expensive to develop for the console, and the Wii and the Xbox are just selling better. Games generate a better return on invested capital on the Xbox than on the PlayStation.
They have to cut the price, because if they don’t, the attach rates are likely to slow. If we are being realistic, we might have to stop supporting Sony…When we look at 2010 and 2011, we might want to consider if we support the console – and the PSP [portable] too.
Source: Kotaku and UK Times Online.
My Quote?
BOOM GOES THE DYNAMITE!
This June, gaming news has been a blur. The Electronic Entertainment Expo (E3), also known as the largest gaming convention in the world, came and went. Among the huge stories that came about in the conference was a shocking announcement for Left 4 Dead 2 – coming this year on November 17.
We all remember Left 4 Dead 1 like it was yesterday. In fact, it was yesterday – November 18, 2008 to be exact. Left 4 Dead is an amazing cooperative multiplayer game against the Zombie horde (referred to in-game as infected, not actually zombies). Yours truly have spent many a late nights (and early mornings) playing L4D1 on my Xbox 360 with my friends, and for a short time during a free weekend, on the PC. (There is no PS3 version of most Valve games because the PS3 architecture is too complicated. Source.)
Left 4 Dead has been immensely popular to a ton of people and a huge pop culture following has shown up with interesting cosplay, shwag, fanart, and various other rabid fandom culture paraphernalia.
Which makes this announcement even more shocking. Left 4 Dead 2 seems like it will usher in a new era too soon. While everybody still holds their 4 survivors near and dear to their hearts. Valve came out trying to rip away those beloved characters from you and replace them with new ones. It does seem quite early for a sequel – And too early to stop supporting L4D1. Its highly unusual for Valve to stop supporting its games post-release though, so either they’ll support both or what gives?
Some fans have not taken kindly to the announcement and have gone petition public with their grievances. Valve has then come out with a response citing that people will understand their reasons for making a full blown sequel and possibly separating the fanbase from L4D1 players and L4D2 players. I for one, will be very sad if I see half of my friends playing L4D1 and half of them playing L4D2, both sending me invites to their game.
Based from that same response though, it seems that Valve, as the great software programmers that they are, (they brought us the last bastion of PC gaming, Steam) is trying to come up with a solution of possible inter-operability. Which is great, and reminds me of Rock Band 1 and 2.
Rock Band 1 was a great game, and Rock Band 2 was even better. The great minds at Harmonix Systems came up with a great way to import all your songs from RB1 to 2 in a quick-and-easy $5 importing process. Not only that, all the songs you’ve downloaded for both games are playable on the other. This gives tremendous amounts of replayability for the games, especially for Rock Band 2 (which gets the bulk of all your RB1 songs anyway). What this means is you only need to have the RB2 disc in to play all the songs from across all the games you have.
My idea for Left 4 Dead 2 is almost similar. What if L4D2 allow you to import L4D1 and allow you to play against owners of both games without needing to switch games? Assuming you own both games, switching between them would be a hassle nobody would ever want to go through. If L4D2 allowed you to play on both games at once, (provided you prove ownership of both games) then both L4D1 players and L4D2 players won’t lose their respective coop friends. The only real limitation here would be that the owners of L4D1 wouldn’t be able to play L4D2 unless they buy it, which is pretty much assumed. The great part here is that the L4D2 community wouldn’t be split from the L4D1 community – and that would make us all a lot more zombie-ready when the real apocalypse happens in 2014.
Here’s a funny 3-part link-chain that’s pretty damn awesome, if you happen to like Team Fortress 2, and more importantly, Horatio Caine one-liners. YEEEEEEEEEEEEAAAAAAAaaaaaaaaaaaa!!
First, watch Team Fortress 2’s “Meet the Spy”.
Then, check out this little picture. If it doesn’t make sense, watch part 3.
(Pictures/Comedy stolen from Kotaku commenter: BubbleF**kingBuddy)
Finally, if you still don’t get it, watch this:
Ok, seriously.
Someone needs to take that Spy video…
*puts on sunglasses*
then record and edit the dialouge in.
YEEEEEEEEEEEEAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!!!!1111
Remember Jose Rizal? Ogie Alcasid Says He Got Shot Because He And His Blue Eagle Ilk Are Douchebags.
…and apparently not because he was trying to free the country from 333 years of Spanish rule.
And I thought La Sallistas were classier than this:
And the original Ogie and friends rendition can be found here.
I was about to leave this alone as another childish college flame war video/song, but the comment on Rizal is seriously just wrong. You can burn all the college students all you want, don’t diss on heroes. They shit you for breakfast mofo. You diss college students, they fight back. You diss heroes, they’re dead. They’ve died. They died so you can make make crappy videos on the internet dissing them in your pathetic life of freedom.
Rizal? O ya?! Someone busted his cap. Probably cause he was an Atenista, not because he was doing anything else, like taking a bullet for your sorry ass.
College flame wars is already retarded on its own. In fact, college flame wars is like the special olympics, win or lose, you’re still retarded. But unlike the amazing respect I have for special olympians, you get none at all. If you’re going to go at it, at least have a little class and leave the national heroes out of it.
At this point, my dear La Salle friends, I’d rather be Blue than be you.
Word.
While talking to a friend today, after all the Mother’s day festivities, (Mom doesn’t like big mom day shenanigans, so I said I was hungry and so we drove off and took home some MickeyD’s for the family. It was her special day so I made sure we got Coke Zero, instead of the usual sugar for us, Zero for her and dad.) we got into the discussion of how he could best sell his cars from the Mitsubishi dealer he works for. (Mikko Ambrosio, Mitsu sales)
So I got to talking about network building, (to increase the amount of professional and personal contacts that you have) and the topic soon turned into my Mom’s amazing social network skills:
My mom is big on this stuff. When I was a kid she’d bring me along to her network building stuff, and obviously I didn’t really understand it. I was a kid, I get bored. Why am I here spending 5 hours waiting for my mom to stop talking to missus number 93?
But yeah, these days. I do the same to some extent. It helps with small details and maybe information gathering. Sometimes if you’re friendly, and spend some time with people, they’ll give you information. Like people they also know that they can refer you to.
My mom built her network on that. And when she was done, she’d have all kinds of professionals in her list so if we ever need anything from an experienced carpenter to the best brain surgeon in town, she’d have already talked to them to an extent and know them and/or their families.
Did you know the doctor who did my knee surgery, is the husband of the sister of the husband(?) of my cousin in Pampanga? Got the price down so low from that. More than halved the price of the surgery. All thanks to Mom’s super network skill.
Yup. Mom’s crazy.
Happy Mothers Day!
