So, I've been meaning to post about a lot of cool things that have happened to me lately. I am now the owner of two arcade machines I bought for ubercheap off of Craigslist, for instance (A Neo Geo MVS and a Mortal Kombat II cabinet! It's like I got the local pizza diner's experience in my very apartment now! Pics and story coming soon, I swear.) I will be attending Dragon*Con very very soon and am wondering if any of the other members of the Destructoid force are attacking it as well, since you're all lovable bastards and I want to see you there. I saw District 9 and Inglorious Basterds, which pleased my movie senses greatly.

But no, I decide not to talk about any of that. Instead, I'm going to talk about Persona 4. I'm really liking it thus far, though it's up in the air on whether I've obsessed over it more than Persona 3 or not. The characters are very fun, as is the dungeon crawling. Furthermore, Persona remains one of the few RPGs where I'm happy grinding for a few more levels if necessary. Usually I'm trying to wriggle my way out of getting those last few levels GameFAQs totally swears I need (This explains why I beat stuff like Final Fantasy I on the PSX Origins disc at Level 26. It's surely a sign of madness.)

However, there's been a song I've listened to in game for the past 50 hours or so that I couldn't help but make a slight edit too. Restless from waiting to get out to Dragon*Con and having nothing better to do, I opened my favorite sound editors and began working on... Something.

The end result? Well, Let me be the first to apologize to both fans of Persona 4 and fans of Queen..

. . .

Yes, that is a mashup of "Backside of the TV" from Persona 4 mixed with "We Will Rock You" by Queen. Here's hoping you enjoy, or at least are amused as I am over it.

Finally, if anyone going to Dragon*Con and is not wanting to punch me for the above*, the sketch comedy group I am with, Channel Z, will be doing a Podcast Party somewhere at Friday at 10 PM. We're not sure on the location, but if people are digging it, I will update here shortly as soon as we figure out where that will be. Do not be surprised if I make you read bad fanfiction for the internet to hear later or if copious Shaq Fu references are involved in some way.

* - I'm just kidding. You punchers can come too! Just punch softly. With love.

So, I apparently won a contest on Destructoid not too long ago! This one, to be precise. I have determined that this is the bee's knees, if not only for the fact that there's now an envelope sitting in my living room with the Destructoid logo on it. Hurrah!



Mostly, it's just little Hudson swag. Demo discs for Marble Saga Kororinopa, Deca Sports and Help Wanted, a Help Wanted ID thingy (With about 50 cards in it, one for each job in the game I assume. I don't think I'll take it off Action Hero.), A Miami Law badge and a Marble Saga Kororinopa beanie in which people claim is supposed to placed on the head. The beanie was especially important in teaching me that I look incredibly silly with a beanie on my head.



There. I am now completely out of my element. Home and Garden Associations! I am here to look suspicious, to get out of your yards and stop playing that darned rock n' roll music!

(Yes, the 3D Glasses are absolutely necessary. Do not question the red/cyan spectrum. You will only get severe eyestrain!)

I would do the full unpacking thing, but I have determined it far too boring to release onto the masses. The narcolepsy that would befall this land would be nigh unrecoverable from.

INSTEAD, a post on the main Destructoid site about the Missile Command vinyl album today made me remember that I had not only heard it before, but have a link to snag the whole album for download! The Missile Command songs are surreal in of themsleves (Remember the plots you would make based on the covers of Atari 2600 games? It's sort of like that, but with a chorus phoning in "Missile commannnnddd!" every few seconds), but the real gem on this page is the Asteroids drama vinyl.

Meant for a younger audience eager to pay over their allowance to have even a twinge of the game at the close reach, it details the adventure of Captain Jim Stanton and his plucky trainee kid as they fight the shit out Asteroids and inevitably gets sent backwards in time to the 1980's (You know, like Star Trek IV, but with less funny and less whales.)! Captain Jim Stanton is also kind of a dick, threatening to blow up Saturn moments after meeting his apprentice and proceeding to mock all of the eighties before (of course) saving it. Come for the asteroids, stay for the nonsensical technobabble!

So there you have it. Add this stuff to you MP3 players, kiddies, and make sure you make everyone in your car listen to it three times each! They'll be sure to thank you!

BONUS - Continuing the Pro Tip Hotline stuff from my last post: have you ever wanted to try to improve your Dig Dug game via more ancient technolog than VHS tapes? Well, now you can with "Conquer the Video Game Craze!"! It's worth it just to hear the audio summary of each game. (As with Centipede: "You - are - a - gun - who - is -also - a - snake - head!" So awesome.)

So, I haven't been able to post on this thing for awhile. My bad. Things have been hectic. Real hectic. Family emergency hectic. Might make for a good post someday, but it's definitely not video game related. It's calmed down since then, thankfully. The important thing is that I have returned to you, the viewers at home, and I am ready and fully willing to rock anyone's face off who dare get in my way.

And when those people, who wish their faces to be rocked off, dare to challenge me, this will be my weapon:


A little bit of backstory: Game Player's Magazine, long ago, commissioned a research company to make a bunch of "Game Player's Gametapes" with lots of Pro-Tips on them. Mostly, these tapes filled up space in the Scholastic Book Ads that all elementary schools got. When we weren't trying to figure out how to con our parents into getting us the latest Calvin and Hobbes collection (Which always seemed to be the only decent thing in these catalogs, next to the Far Side Books), we were trying to con them into getting us one of these tapes. "It'll make me awesome mom! It'll teach me how to beat Blaster Master!" If you followed these tapes carefully, you would learn one thing very, very quickly: That goddamn mutant frog of yours is gone forever, boy. They were, in fact, lies.

Anyway, I found a bunch of these tapes long ago for cheap at a thrift store back in college. Among the "helpful" tips were commercials such as the Freedom Stick. And I have decreed them hilarious enough in retrospect to preserver and throw up on the youtubernets. Which means you get more joy/pain in this world. It's a happy day for everyone!

So, hey kids! Did you want to learn how to master Mega Man 2? Apparently not, if you listen to Mr. Announcer Face! Remember, if you can't run through it, it must be too hard! Just keep running through it instead!

Don't believe me? No, seriously, check out what he does during Bubbleman's stage. Watch carefully; these tips could save your life!



A bunch more of these videos, each segmented by game, can be found here.

BONUS ROUND: (Also found on one of the tapes)


BONUS BONUS ROUND:

So, a while ago, I wrote this blog post about the Daily Life of a Doritos Delivery Man in the hellish world that involves T-Rexes, Spoilers and the Renegade Drivers Who Love Them. People seemed to dig it, which I think is pretty cool! Definitely makes me want to do more random entries at 3 in the morning when I should be sleeping. There were a couple of things I didn't expect coming out of it though.

Yesterday, I woke up to the following on my 360:



(Gamertag blurred to protect the awesome.)

For those who don't want to wait and load the image, the message was as follows:

"Hi. John, right?

I'm Steve Taylor, one of the people at NinjaBee. I just now read your blog post about Dash of Destruction, and I just wanted to say:

Hahaha! nice work! :)"

Considering I was having a pretty crappy weekend, this absolutely made my day. Plus, it's always nice to see a developer with a sense of humor. Just goes to show who may be reading this AT THIS VERY MOMENT. Thumbs up!

In other news, I'm finally on the final dungeon of Persona 3's "The Answer". When it's done, I will most likely respond the same way as I did for Dragon Quest VIII and be extremely tempted to start it up again. Or finally get going on Persona 4. Well, so much for free time again!

Yeah, yeah, I know this is under NVGR. It doesn't exactly fit in any of the other categories, I say with a sad emoticon on the screen. :(

But anyway...

October 1, 1997: THE END DAY-- Oh. Wait. Um. Nevermind.

January, 2009: Finally finish Persona 3 after making the mistake of starting it on my vacation. Spent the majority of my Christmas vacation rocking out and loving it. Will probably hemorrhage at battle theme when coming into minor contact with it in later months.

February: Relieved that I have finally completed everything in Persona 3 FES and realize that I have Persona 4 waiting for me. Simultaneously thank and curse the heavens for this inevitable fate. Also, play a lot of Street Fighter IV and new Star Ocean that both come out right before my birthday. This is a major hint towards those in the business of giving me gifts which will guide you towards the best ending in JohannHat Land.

March: Probably make some headway in my backlog, which is kind of scary looking. I've got no real quips to add here. I've got the entire Atelier Iris series to get through!

April 7: Complete transfer to Gekkoukan High School. Notice that electronics stop working at midnight. Also, things may be a slightly greener tint during this time. Huh. Weird. May use new found powers in this time period to finally beat Mars Matrix and not, you know, save the world.

May: Be sad as Mars Matrix kicks my ass still. Ikaruga joins him, kicks some dirt in my face and takes my girl for good measure. Will consider that comic ad in the back of Archie Comics to get buff in a matter of weeks for one low, low price.

June: Hopefully get a game project off the ground and finished by then. We shall see! So far, it's going pretty good!

July - August: Magical Island Hopping Adventure. It's certainly not because it's too early to realize what may be actually going on during this time. By the way, tell Mike to dip my letter in water.

September: Dragon*Con. Spend the rest of the month recovering from massive intakes of awesometanium radiation (This may also be called "Booze".)

October: LAVOS 1999 CATACLYSM TEN YEAR REUNION TOUR hits my town, whooo! I'll see you in the spawn pit!

November: Both Dread and Anticipate another onslaught of possibly good games I would like to play as they tsunami across the entire internet. Few wallets will be saved from being ripped apart with the sheer and utter force of consumerism. Many donations will be made to a charity organization that most companies call "Profit" for some indeterminable reason.

December: Prepare for Publishing of Cliched Duke Nukem Forever Joke Book for release in oncoming year. Possibility of game actually coming out will not alter plans in any way.

Day 1: I got this sweet new job today! I'm going to be an Official Doritos Delivery Man Person! Yeah, I know, it's not the most glamorous thing in the universe, but a job's a job. Sounds pretty easy in any case. I don't even have to enter stores! I just drop them off at indescriminate circles all over the city and they "Do the Rest". I'm about 94% sure it isn't a mafia front this time. I mean, I wrote "Delivery Man" on my W-2 and everything!

Anyway... My boss, Mike Borland, seems like a nice enough guy. Said he already had a special vehicle lined up just for me. That sounds kind of neat, but I'm not expecting much. He kept going on and on about improving my gamerscore or something? I don't know, sounds like some sort of seniority circle jerk within the company or something. If I'm to get anywhere in this job, I better just keep them happy. Smile and nod. Smile and nod.

Tomorrow's the big day! Hooray, job!

Day 2, 10:02 AM: Wow. Already this job is boring. Traffic slowed to a crawl up ahead, so I'm updating this on the road. Get up, get in, drive, drop the packages off, etc. etc. etc. Nothing I didn't expect, but yawwwwwwn.

Radio's going on all morning about dinosaur sightings. Damn morning show. They're all "panicked" and "horrified", but they not even trying to hide the fakeness of it all. They even got the listeners in on the hysteria. Really, stop with the crappy T-Rex sound effect, guys. Screw the "Zed and Reba in the Rockin' Morning" Show. You heard it here first!

Hold on, I think this traffic jam is about to break free. Something's going on, anyway... BRB.

Day 2, 10:04 AM: HOLY GAWD THERE'S A T-REX ON THE LOOSE OUT THERE OH GEEZ HELL DOES OUR PRESIDENT KNOW!?!

SHIT I NEED TO UPDATE TWITTER WITH THIS SHIT HOLD ON: @twittersaurusrex: OH MY GOD IT'S LOOKING RIGHT AT MEEEEEE.

Day 2, 4:01 PM: I survived. I don't know how I did it, but I survived. If there's a world record for Most Times Survived a T-Rex Attack while Driving a Delivery Truck award, it belongs to me now. I've done it once.

Mike called in the middle of the whole thing too! Asked me if a T-Rex was chasing me. What the hell, man? He didn't even sound phased when I responded by screaming incomprehensibly. He just told me to finish my deliveries and get out of there. I don't know what the hell I was thinking actually following throw with his orders, but I delivered it to every last stop. It's like I had some Worksmanship Honor Adrenaline Rush going on or something. By god, I earned my pay today.

Mike threw in an extra five bucks to commend me for my efforts. Probably to shut me up too. He also promised he'd try and fix the problem and that I should take tomorrow off in the meantime. It sounded like he knew some people in the government used to this sort of thing, since he started going in on some high-tech stuff. Well, whatever, man. I just never want to go through that again.

Bought a large bag of Doritos with the money. Tasted like processed cheese powder, which is weird since I specifically got the Cool Ranch ones. Ah well.


Day 4: Mike Borland added a spoiler to my van.

I DON'T CALL THIS FIXING THE PROBLEM, MIKE.

Also, change my T-Rex Record to two, now.



Day 6: I don't think I've seen this much chaos and city destruction since I went to Angel Grove for my summer vacation.

T-Rex Attack Count: Something like 48 now? Beats me these days.


Day 8: Today, some asshole in a blue delivery van tried to steal my own delivery spots. I wasn't aware blazing rivalries came with the job (And their own respective T-Rex, apparently) but I also didn't read beyond the first two sentences in my contract either. I'm just now starting to wish I did. But it did prove to me that they drawn primarily to vans carrying junk food products. It concerns me greatly, this development.

Tomorrow is "Bring Your Daughter to Work" day at the company. I don't think it's a very good idea, but the wife is insisting. Show her a positive role model in action and all that. I can't say no to her, so I guess I'm stuck. Bleh.


Day 9: Look, I told her it wasn't a very good idea. Fortunately, we hid her in a pile of a competitor's brand chip supply, which the T-Rex refused to touch. I fear the Salt and Vinegar Chip smell may never leave my daughter for the rest of her natural life.

Also, now the T-Rex has armor plating? Fuck, man. Know what? I don't care. I blame PETA.


Day 13: Beginning to suspect Mike Borland is playing both sides for his own gains. When I went to my vehicle, there were these tiny little cybernetic claws on each side where the rear view mirrors used to be. I pointed them out to him and he just laughed it off. Said it was an office prank. Last I checked, office pranks did not claw the sides off the van in an effort to get into the contents. By this point, I've learned just to stop asking questions.

At least turbo boosting is fun.


Day 17: Tried to get my old job back at Toyota. Wasn't there anymore. Suspect T-Rex had something to do with it, much like rest of city.

You know, thinking back on it, it wasn't so bad. I shot robots in the face all day. Let me repeat that. I SHOT ROBOTS IN THE FACE. ALL DAY. ... Well, it would have been all day if it wasn't for the fact I got bored of the job within five minutes. Who sleeps at the wheel in an awesome half-pipe? I do, apparently. So did everyone else who got the job after me, too, so I hear.

Sighhhh. BRB. T-Rex chasing me. I think this one has cybernetic arms on it. HMMMM.





Day 18: I now know too much. It was all before my eyes and I was far too blind to see the reality veiled behind the madness. Mike Borland knows all. Mike Borland controls all. He has all this time and we never knew. Mike Borland is the alpha and the omega and he wields a future vision fueled by nothing more than sheer EXTREME. He will climb to the top of our corpses and sit in his throne made from his chips and our blood. He will rule and WE WILL DESPAIR.

... Oh god. It found me. I don't know how, but it found me. Run for it, Internet!

I HATE YOU, MIKE BORLAND. I. HATE. YOUUUUU--


Day ??: Geezus Christ, this dino's stomach is DISGUSTING.. What has he been eating?

... Oh. ... Wait. ... Yeah.

...

AFK, being digested.


[With apologies to the real Mike Borland, who is probably a nice dude. Unless this is his diabolical plan all along. In that case, I would like to be dragged to my grave screaming "I WAS RIGHT! I. WAS. RIGGHHHT"]

[Also, Dash of Destruction is pretty okay for being pretty free.]