A week or two ago, I was a phone-in guest on the WNYC/NPR talk show, The Takeaway. The segment went on for about three minutes long, it was early, last minute, and I actually fucking said "Nintendo Wii." It's called "Wii," not "Nintendo Wii." I know that. God damn it.
Anyhow, the segment is now up online. Take a listen, and feel free to tell me if I sound like a douche.
Here
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Along with copies of the game, I also received:
A Statue of Happiness miniature
A Liberty City Police Department sweater
A Liberty City Police Department t-shirt
A ton of stickers
A GTA IV pool cue (for serious!)
Photos in the gallery for those interested in this kind of stuff.
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I was thinking about doing a feature where we'd more or less "review" videogame instruction manuals based on their content, design, art, etc. I came up with this idea when I opened up my copy of Battle of the Bands last week and it was four sheets of black and white paper with little to no instructions on how to actually play the game.
As far as I'm concerned, that's complete bullshit, and companies need to get called out for putting zero effort into their manuals. Nintendo almost consistently has some killer booklets that are both thick and colorful; this has been the case since the NES (picture the brick I shit when I opened up my copy of Legend of Zelda for the first time as a kid). The latest Grand Theft Auto IV is a good example of how to do it right -- it comes with a map, a nice manual, and other stuff that is essentially useless, but at least makes you feel like you're purchased a substantial product that a company cares about.
Does this idea appeal to anyone else?
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So I fired this up for the first time tonight and yeah well ... I guess I'm not playing this any time soon. How big is this FIRST update (of two?), and why in the hell is it taking so long? I've estimated, at the rate it's moving now, that I will have finished downloading it in three hours. Three. Hours.
I'm not sure I care enough about Metal Gear to put myself through this. Or do I? I was given this beta key by Konami, and I'll feel kind of bad if I don't actually ever play it.
6% done.
Great.
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As promised:
5455 9743 3055
Add me, please, and give me your code in return. I'm not sure how much I'll be around today, but I hope to get in some online play. It would be cool to play with people I know/recognize.
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Our review copy of Mario Kart Wii just landed. The box had skid marks on it (GET IT?), and came packed with an air-freshener. The box smelled great.
I'm going to be busting this one open in a few hours, and will post impressions if I feel its necessary. Otherwise, keep your eyes open for the review.
[Update: Not that I think Brian trolls my Cblog, but I thought this was funny.]
Attached photos:
 
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As some of you may know, I got an Xbox 360 Elite to replace my broken Rock Band machine. This was not too long ago, either. I want to say it was Friday, April 4 that it arrived.
That evening, I popped in a copy of Universe at War, and midway through the game's tutorial, the system locked up. Hey, shit happens, so I rebooted and played through the tutorial and one campaign mission. This morning, my son complains to me that Rock Band is taking forever to load; what he meant was "Dad, this shit is frozen up." But he's only ten, so he doesn't say that. He then tells me that the game has locked up on him a few times, but because he's ten, I don't believe him and continue do the dishes or whatever exciting thing it was that I was doing at the time.
But when it came my turn to play Rock Band, it did indeed lock up halfway through a song. And then I watched it lock up on a loading screen while my son tried to play Burnout Paradise. I checked the disc and noticed that it had a number of scratches on it -- my son doesn't really know how to take care of MY games (much less his), so I figured maybe that was the issue. Well, this evening, Condemned 2 locked up after about ten minutes worth of playing.
Conclusion: There is something wrong with me new hotness. Already. Honestly, if it weren't for a) all of the money I've dumped into Rock Band DLC and b) the fact that I needed it to do my job, I'd probably be at the point where I'd say fuck it and resign myself to playing everything on the PS3. Which wouldn't be that bad, would it? My wife and I just finished Uncharted this afternoon, in fact.
So I guess I'll be calling Microsoft Customer Service tomorrow to report not one, but TWO broken Xbox 360s. I can't wait to fuck through an obnoxious menu tree only to have to speak with someone who doesn't listen to what I'm actually saying and is only trained to read from a script.
"So ... your name is, uh Nick? Can I call you Nick?"
"Yes, sure, that's fine."
"OK, so I am going to call you Nick, OK, Nick?"
I once called after I had swapped out my first 360 through retail, and I asked them why I couldn't play certain XBLA games unless I was online (this was before I realized their DRM was a clusterfuck). After explaining to them the issue (this is about XBLA games, remember), they person on the other end of the line asked me if I had downloaded the games on my original Xbox or the Xbox 360. I just hung up.
This is going to be great.
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I scanned this image from the printed itinerary I received when I checked in for THQ's Gamers Day. Something about it made me giggle -- I've always had a soft spot for Crypto, the tiny, ill-tempered alien from Destroy All Humans. Something about him being passed out after "last call" at a bar strikes me as a funny.
Not sure if this art will show up anywhere else, so before I tossed it away, I decided I'd scan it. Hope you <3 it as much as I do.
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Just got a quick email from Harmonix's PR letting us know that there will be no announcement for next week's Rock Band DLC today. For whatever reason, they're going to have to wait until Monday.
Now don't go speculating about some huge DLC announcement. Any number of things could have prevented today's announcement. This doesn't necessarily mean that they just haven't yet gotten clearance to announce Reprise Records' entire catalog of music for next Tuesday. But you never know. We have been waiting patiently for those albums, haven't we?
(No, I don't know anything about it.)
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Great lighting. Some parts sure are very ... dark. According to the achievements, I'm through 3 of the game's 10 missions, and I've only played for about an hour and a half. There was one instance where one of the enemies appeared to be wearing Wheelies, and he rolled/slid past me in the middle of a fire fight. I also fought/dodged a giant monster. The bald dude who plays Lex Luthor on Smallville is a pretty good voice actor. The lighting in this game pretty stellar. The default aiming sensitivity is shit (I had to turn it down significantly).
Am I having fun so far? Sure.
Review up by Wednesday, if all goes as planned. Thanks to Kevin (sorry, I don't know your Dtoid user name) for letting me borrow his working Xbox 360. No thanks to the universe for making mine the broken.
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