loonyblog.

HBO is apparently developing a series based on Preacher. I was never a big fan of the book (although I have read a lot of them), but I do think this is kinda cool (even if it does tread some of the same ground as the failed Carnivale). I don’t know what to make of the involvement of the director of Daredevil (for the record, a movie I didn’t hate), but the involvement of the creators is pretty cool.

Still, I can’t help but wish HBO had chosen a different comic for a series. I know there’s still a movie in pre-production, but Watchmen will never work as anything other than a 12 episode (or six, if it’s rushed) miniseries. Unfortunately the budget for that would have to be astronomical, so it’s very unlikely it’ll ever happen. But I can dream.

Yep, I got my Wii this morning.

Mine was a pretty mellow experience. Having already waited in line to get my pre-order, I just strolled down to my local GameStop, waited in line with the rest of the pre-order folk (and a handful of newbies, who had no problem getting systems, but Zelda was for pre-orders only) and picked it up.

The GameStop employees were clearly overworked, but I did catch them making a major mistake…apparently there was a shipment error somewhere along the way, which prevented them from getting their Wii-branded SD cards (and the Classic Controllers as well). That accessory is entirely pointless, but you’d never know that from talking to them. But what really ticked me off, was when I overheard them telling a woman that it was perfectly fine for her to just buy a PSP-branded Memory Stick, because that would work just as well. WTF? I spoke up and corrected them, but lord only knows how many people were suckered into buying an unnecessary memory card in the wrong format.

Read on for the rest.

Read the rest of this entry »

My new favorite bookmark these days is Overheard in New York, a collection of random quotes people have overheard around the city. Anyone can submit one, and there are some real gems. Here’s a recent example:

Blonde Teen: So I’m taking that religion class.

Brunette Teen: Oh yeah? The one where you read the Bible right?

Blonde teen: Yeah that one. And get this, we are about to start reading the Book of Proverbs.

Brunette Teen: Oh My God! I didn’t know the Bible had a grammar section.

Blonde Teen: Me neither!!

Brunette Teen: Oh man, I bet it totally tells you how to speak like God… Except properly, you know?

Blonde Teen: [Gasp] I bet it totally does.

Brunette Teen: Ugh! I wish I had taken that class.

I know I browsed the web before this site existed, but I can’t imagine how. grouphug is so 2003.

The results are in, and my entry in this year’s IFComp came in at number 11, with an average rating of 6.08. I’m pretty damn proud of that, all things considered. While several of them entered under aliases, some of the biggest names in the IF community entered this year, including Emily Short (who won for Floatpoint, her unbelievably polished entry), Andrew Plotkin and Jason Devlin (winner of last year’s IFComp).

I’ll get around to launching the official site for my game one of these days, but in the meantime, it can still be downloaded from the IFComp site. Now that the results are out, I get to look forward to all those scathing reviews to be published. Whee!

GameDaily’s list of “The ten lamest game consoles, ever” includes the Saturn and Jaguar alongside duds like the Gizmondo. What the heck? Come on Steinberg…you can’t really think those two are as bad as some of the omissions from this list.

Like, oh, I don’t know, a laserdisc system like the Pioneer LaserActive. Or two gems from Tiger: the Game.com and (shudder) R-Zone.

Years ago, I got flack for including the 3D0 in my list of Spectacular Console Failures, but that’s nothing compared to including the Saturn (my favorite system ever, by the way) on a list of “lame” console systems. That’s just wrong. And them’s fightin’ words, punk.

Now the Halcyon, there was a lame console system. Ooh yeah.

Far be it from me to criticize CNN Money’s gift guide (the other one…I have no beefs with the games one, other than my own games not being on it), but if I gave someone a gift from Tiffany’s, and they open up that bag/box and inside are two decks of playing cards, I think I’d be sleeping on the couch for a few weeks.

Care of Warren Ellis:

According to Warren Ellis, Alan Moore (that’s right, the Alan Moore) is going to be appearing on The Simpsons. I don’t know if I find this awesome or just plain scary. I mean, he looks like the mystical demon father of Ted Kaczynski (and would probably consider that comment a complement, too). Wacky.

I just finished an excellent game of Lumines Live!. I mention this, not to brag, but for an entirely different reason. See, I thought I had done pretty damn great in this game. I unlocked a new skin, I hit a new record score (40,000!) and generally, I kicked ass.

Then I took a look to see how many skins I’ve unlocked. As of this game, I’ve unlocked six. Of twelve.

When I mentioned that I decided to get the full version of LL!, I said it was a pretty stupid thing to do, and I did it despite repeated warnings from online reviewers telling me how “little” was in this game. Just out of curiosity, I decided to check and see how much time I’ve logged in LL! so far.

To get me to 40,000 points and unlock 50% of the game’s skins has taken me over four hours of gameplay. That’s four times as long as Jeff Gerstmann said it would take to run through all twelve skins in his review.

So I started thinking…is the answer just that I’m really bad at Lumines? Or is it something else entirely? I don’t claim to be good at this game, but you put four hours into anything and you’ll get to be somewhat decent at it. I was thinking about this, and then it dawned on me.

For the first time in my life, I believe I’m seeing what it’s like to be a casual gamer.

As anyone who knows me will tell you, I am not a casual gamer. I’ve got 100% achievements in Oblivion, I’ve played through Morrowind from start to finish on PC (with expansions) and Xbox, I spent more time playing id Software games in college than I did in classes, I own every major console system released in North America since 1985, and so on. I spend all day at work helping to create games, and then I go home and play (and sometimes write) games all night! So you could safely call me hardcore.

But when it comes to Lumines, I think I’m more like your “average” gamer. I read all the general “help” info, so it’s not like I’m playing this game the “wrong” way. I’m just not super-amazing-awesome at it, like I suspect the reviewers for the major online sites are.

And you know what? I like this game. I’m having fun with it. I’ve spent four hours unlocking six skins, and I barely unlocked number six before my game ended. At this rate, it’ll take me eight to ten hours of gameplay to unlock all twelve, possibly more. And I haven’t even attempted any of the other modes yet!

So yeah, I take back my statement about my intelligence. I might be a moron, but this isn’t proof of that. Lord knows there’s plenty of evidence out there to prove that. If you’re thinking of getting LL!, ignore the hate, and try the demo for yourself. It’s fun. And worth the $15 (or equivalent in Microsoft Points) it costs.

Twitch Guru (yeah, I’d never heard of it either) has posted the transcript of an interview with Ronald Moore (of Battlestar Galactica fame), conducted by none other than Harlan Ellison. The interview was conducted after Moore accepted an award for his work on the show. It’s a great read if you’re into the show (and how could you not be?) or sci-fi in general. I especially liked this quote from Ellison:

“You were given swine and you made pearls out of them,” Ellison said. “This award is for the astonishing job of making one of the worst television series ever made into one of the best television series ever made.”

The best part is that that line isn’t a gag, it’s 100% true. I never thought I’d use the words, “I can’t wait to watch Battlestar Galactica.”