Obviously, there are pictures ahead.

My gaming setup isn't spectacular, but after cleaning and re-arranging my room for the first time in months, I think it has turned out nicely.



I warned you it was small.

On the left is my incredibly comfy bed, where I do most of my gaming, whether it be with the consoles or with my handhelds. In front of that is a computer monitor with speakers, which I bought about a year ago for 60 dollars. I use it as a cheap HDTV of sorts; while I don't actually have a computer connected to it, I use a VGA box (pictured between the wii and pedal) to get the signal on the screen, and use the pedal to "convert" the rca signal to a standard headphone signal. It's a weird way of doing things, but I'm happy with how well it works.

Here's a closeup of the different consoles/handhelds I have in my room:

(Half minute hero <3)

Here's the right side of my room:

(My old washburn guitar is in the hard shell case on the left side, my ovation balladeer next to it, and cases next to that. A clever way of concealing cords, no?)

Here's the middle of my room:

(My amp, a Crate VFX 5212, and my guitar, a Schecter gryphon. I love my amp. It took me so freaking long to save up for it. ;_;)

In case you haven't noticed, all of my games are kept out of direct sight. I've also skimmed down on the space they take up in my drawers ( I'll usually keep them in the drawers under the consoles), putting them in CD cases with partial cover art printed on them. This is good, as I don't have needless clutter in my room, but I have portable games scattered literally EVERYWHERE. I'm also starting to yearn for a large game collection. I've found out it isn't exactly satisfying keeping them the way I am.

Anyway, here are the games I can readily find in my room, I put them on the floor and took a picture:

(Hopefully, you can figure out what games are what.)

Now here's the other room where I game, I will warn you though, it is a basement, and isn't exactly kept well:

I keep the 360 down here for my brother, it's really the only modern console he has any interest in playing. The computer I'm using (pictured in the left corner) was a mid-range computer eight years ago, so it isn't exactly fast.

Here are the 360 games we have (It's a decent collection, I think):


And here are the "oddball" games I have, that I haven't put in my room for one reason or another:

(the orange game box in the corner is the orange box. geddit? ...:()

And here's one more picture:
My dog!


When I get my portable games together, I'll try to post it here.

I do have other consoles, it's just that half of them are currently sitting in my brothers room. (Like a GBA, a Dreamcast, an Xbox, a Gamecube, a Ps1, etc.)

Hopefully this wasn't too bloated. :p

Let's imagine, for a little bit, that you decide to go and check ebay for a new set of legos. You already have legos, but you don't own enough legos for what you are trying to build. You're trying to enter a tournament, you need many more legos than you own now. You see an incredible deal on ebay, a 6000 piece lego set for 50$! Usually, this goes for 70-100$. Normally, you would jump on this deal before anyone else can get their grubby hands on it , but you notice that the seller is Chinese, and their store looks a little shady. After a little bit of snooping, you see that their customers are generally happy about shipping time and the quality of the product. So, you decide to buy it. You pay for it, and wait.

A couple of weeks later, it arrives in the mail! You go ahead, open it up, and each lego piece works perfectly! No scratches, no breaks, nothing that would affect their usability. You leave positive feedback, and get started on your project. You're done with the project and enter it in the tournament, when you hear that the legos corporation (Yes, they are the lego[b]s[/s] corp.) will no longer accept unauthorized lego blocks, and will be creating legos in the future that will not work with the "unauthorized" legos. There are two possible scenarios that can happen now, they will either take your legos away, effectively wasting all of the time that you spent on the project; or (if they are feeling incredibly generous) they will recreate your project with the authorized legos as long as you buy the 100$ worth of legos from them. Neither of the situations seem exactly fair, do they?

What does this have to do with video games, much less the 360, you ask?

http://majornelson.com/archive/2009/10/16/unauthorized-xbox-360-storage-devices.aspx

I think you can figure it out.

http://ir.capcom.co.jp/english/news/html/e090730d.html

Oh my. I knew monster hunter was popular, but this is insane. Hopefully, the quality of the game matches sales. >_>

Starting off, I know I'm late to the party when it comes to black clouds and silver linings, but I just feel I need to express my disappointment. It's kinda long, and probably not very well written, so feel free to gloss over it and keep on your merry way.

I've been a fan of Dream Theater for a long time. I own all of their albums (except for scenes from new york) , and own many of the side bands (Liquid Tension Experiment, Jordan rudess's solo albums, etc.) albums. I love(ed?) their music, and I appreciate how much effort they put into their music. I didn't enjoy their first album, or Systematic Chaos, but their other music managed to make me smile, to make me feel apathetic, to feel hate, and Space Dye Vest even managed to make me cry. The band members are virtuosos at their respective instruments, and manage to create music that reflects that. Long intro aside, I like their music. I do not however, like their newest album, Black Clouds and Silver Linings.

My initial thoughts? This is the most generic sounding Dream theater album to date. Horrible lyrics with largely face value meaning (The count was easily the worst in this respect), cheesy guitar rhythm, and very little venture into time other than standard. Wither was a cheesy track through and through, and seemed to only serve as a track to break into mainstream music.

About halfway through the album:
Trudging through the first few songs of the album, a track suddenly caught my attention. That was shattered fortress. Initial glee from hearing this track quickly wore off and other than petruccis incredible solo, the outstanding parts of the track seemed to be the recycled/improved riffs. This song is followed by The best of times, a song safely in DT territory. Petrucci's solos are less fret-wankish here! Could this be the Dream Theater I know and love? Then, the count starts playing. The previous question is answered with a resounding "no". An incredibly predictable song, trying to be much more than it is. I've already mentioned the lyrics, so I won't venture there. Petrucci manages to keep his solo work excellent though. Labrie also is incredibly consistent with which notes he hits, and this is probably one of his better albums.

I was wanting this to be incredible. I wanted it to match and exceed their earlier albums in terms of musicianship, not speed. Maybe I was expecting too much, maybe this album isn't all that bad compared to their other albums. It may be the band is burned out, or that Mikes fathers death affected him too much. Maybe the new label (roadrunnner) is causing them to feel pressured to sell their albums, Heck, it could be that I'm looking for and drawing notions of depth not present in their earlier albums. After the disappointment that was systematic chaos, maybe I was expecting an album that would completely blow me out of the water, one that would get the band out of the slump they have been in.

Whatever. This is getting too long.

I don't like their album much. [/rant]