I use Gimp, and I've got it running on OS X at the moment.
I'm not trying to be an idiot, but I've never used Photoshop. Ever. Just never had a need to. When I was running Linux and I finally had to do some graphics tweaking, Gimp was right there.
So if I were to consider Photoshop, what would it give me over Gimp?
Yes, leaving an obvious diatribe of "you only use your OS because your an elitist, and you only watch anime because your a pedophile" wasn't an insulting way of stating "I don't get the appeal of Linux and anime - can someone explain that to me?"
Please excuse me. Next time someone says "Well, the reason you live in Utah is because you want to rape babies" to me, I won't take it as a personal insult.
Sorry, at first I was going to ignore this as the troll it is.
Then I figured "Eh, my pot roast is still cooking, I might as well respond."
Ah, yes - people only like anime and Linux because of an elite attitude. I used Linux for 2+ years after being exposed to it not because of the great tools (Gimp, Image Magick, able to set up a mail server, fetchmail), or because I had it running 10 months without a reboot, or even on the day that a physical hard drive died, the system kept running so that when I got home I could do something to fix it.
I only watch anime because I have bad taste and I'm a pedophile. Not because of fascinating shows (Lain, Utena, Boogiepop Phantom) that challenge conventional ideas with symbolism, or for heart wrenching shows (like Grave of the Fireflies), or works of art (Princess Mononoke, Porco Rosso), courageous tales (Magic Knights Rayearth, Gunsmith Cats). Yes, there is the crap (Bastard), but I only watch it because I like to watch young girls getting nearly naked (let's see, I don't like Sailor Moon, but I do admit to liking Jubei Chan because it's so damn funny).
Sorry. I have seen the error of my ways, and I will now only comform to the crowd.
I just have a problem with MMRPG's in general. Maybe it's because I have a 3 year old in the house, or that I'm leveling up without a real story, or that I'm antisocial.
Either way, I prefer a game I can pause, a game that tells a story, and a game that makes me feel like I've done something other than gotten my Mage up to level 50.
Look at any large organic chemistry group around the country, and I guarantee they'll have power macs up the wazoo, origin 3000 machines configured as mail servers, stereoscopic visualization goggles, etc. And they generally have no idea what to do with them....
I discovered the whole "command-click background screens" as I've read through OS X: The Missing Manual. It's an interesting idea, but for pure web browsing, I like the focus-follows-mouse (multiple windows), or, barring that, tab browsing. (I haven't installed Mozilla in OS X yet. Still debating if I'll byte the big one and go IE (blech), or install Mozilla and redo all of the Helper apps (blech, the return).
At home, I run fetchmail, UW Imap/pop3, and postfix. (Some excellent instructions for installing it are here at Stepwise), Image Magick, Gimp, and some other Open Source programs on OS X. I also use BBedit and Microsoft Office X. (And I can say that Entourage is a far superior program to the one I have to use with Windows.)
The good news: Nothing broke. 10.1.3 didn't rewrite any mail settings, so all of my mail continued to come in/get sent out just fine.
The bad: Still no focus-follows-mouse, multiple desktops, or the ability to connect to my wife's printer on her Windows 98 box.
I did have a problem with Samba for a little bit (I have another computer running Win98 I use just for games playing). Once I turned off the SMB service and turned it back on, it worked fine.
Some of these things comes from a former KDE user (ie: focus-follows-mouse, etc), but overall, since it didn't break anything, I'm assuming all went well. As person who used Linux 90% of the time up until last week, OS X is still surprising me by all the little nice things they put in.
Good for some, nightmare for others
on
Peek-a-Boo(ty)
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· Score: 5, Interesting
I can see both the good and bad of this application.
On the good side: China. Folks over there who have to deal with the gigantic "Firewall O' Death" (also known as the "Damn it, Communism works so stop reading about how it doesn't" Firewall) can possibly use this tool to get to the outside information they need to keep spreadin' the news that "Information good."
On the other side, as a Security Manager in a bank who's sometimes asked to go find out if person XYZ has been accessing nakedhairyeyebrowedcheerleaders.com, I can see how this utility might make it impossible for me to do my job.
I read a lot of books on my Palm Pilot (an m505, if you must know), and I would be delighted to have Harry Potter V (or I-IV (er, um, legally, that is *cough*)) on my Palm Pilot.
I don't see any reason why they wouldn't want to. The publisher would do well (since there's no paper cost) and can even reduce the price a few dollars (see "there's no paper cost"), Ms. Rawlings stays the Richest Woman in All England, and I'm happy, because I can read Harry Potter and the Order of the Pheonix in my meetings while looking like I'm taking notes on my Palm.
There is a difference here. There are two ways to do this:
The operating system logs into a remote site, and checks for new files. It then checks a local list/database/registry/etc and decides "Ah, that's a new patch. I need that." See Windows 98/2000/Sierra Auto-Update.
A remote server logs into a workstation computer, scans a database/files/MP3's (yes, fear on the last one, but it's always fun to take these to the far extreme), then recommends upgrades.
The difference between the two is who has access to my files. Right now, with my Windows 98 machine that I use for games and video capture, I don't mind hitting the auto-update as long as that message saying "We're not sending any information to Microsoft" stays on.
As soon as I sit down to my computer, and it by itself says "Oh, Hi, I just checked your stuff, and we noticed that you need patches. And while we're at it, we checked your MP3 list, and we don't think you legally own 'Rinbo Revolution'."
Extreme? Yes. But it's no different in my mind between letting the plumber in to fix my pipes, or giving him a key and saying "Come in whenever you like and just look around and tell me what I need." I don't trust anybody (except my wife;) well enough to just give them the key to my house. Or my computer, for that matter.
I agree with this 100%. I realize that the price of the book will probably rise an extra 5-10% for this feature, but the ability to lay a book flat as you're typing/eating/making love to your (very) understanding wife is a huge feature in technical books.
Back in the day, people believed in the 4 elements of earth, air, fire, and water. Why? Well, because somebody said so.
They believed that frogs came from mud, that life just arrived, that the sun went around the earth, and many other things.
Then the Scientific Method came along, and it was a simple idea:
1. Conduct an experiment with two groups, and only change 1 thing in each group.
2. Compare the results. If the majority of the groups with the different variable are truly different, you can possibly attribute that result to your variable.
3. Publish your results and show the world exactly what steps you took.
4. Other people recreate your experiment. If they get the same conclusions, then your theory may be correct.
5. If others find a different way to prove/disprove your theory, then eventually the Truth can be decided.
In the end, that's what science and the scientific method are all about. The search for the Truth. Is it the only method? Probably not - there are many truths in the universe we can't prove under the microscope.
But is it the best way that fallible humans can use to attain Truth? So far, yup. And as long as the real scientists don't forget that, we don't have to worry about "science by press release".
The product (to the best of my knowledge) was only sold in Russia.
This is equivalant to someone from the country Mary Jane where the wacky tobaccy is legal. When they enter the US - not carrying the product, mind you - to talk about the benefits of marijuana (or however you spell it) at a medical convention, the DEA shows up at the convention and takes them to jail.
Same story, only the difference is that it was about ebooks, not drugs.
And anybody's who's going to split hairs, it's a damn anology, so shut the fuck up unless you have a good counter argument.
I'm sorry, and I don't mean to engage in a flamewar or anything, but I totally disagree.
Marketing is as important to a business as the product is. Sadly, some companies (Microsoft) have only good marketing (which is the only reason why they're still around), while other companies (Novell) have crappy marketing but great products (which is the only reason why they're still around).
But a true business (ie: people who expect to get paid for what they do) needs advertising just as much as it does good products. And as a consumer, I can't be expected to call up these companies all the time and say "Gee, I *love* NDS! But would you get your heads out of your asses and try putting some public commercials on that make sense instead of a bunch of damn goldfish that would probably eat each other if you put them in one big tank?"
The store should find out when people don't buy their fucking product. That means either a) the product is bad, or b) their marketing is bad. I'm sure if McDonald's had an advertisement that showed Michael Jackson raping babies, then discovered that their McKid's meal didn't sell, somebody would say "Hm...is it the meals or the ads? Let's change one and see what happens." And if that didn't work, they'd finally try changing the product. Or hire people to do polls.
*It is not my job to tell companies how to sell things. My job is to decide if I want to buy it based on the product and their marketing.* If they ask me and offer me $5 to tell them what's wrong (or a free toaster, or one of those red vibrators), then I'll be happy to tell them. Otherwise, they can kiss my ass if they think I'm just going to look all over their site for an email address and say "Hey, I couldn't find your Raspberry Flavored Snack bites because your system uses IE based javascript tags my browser couldn't read. Could you alter these pretty please?" I don't get paid to do other people's jobs.
Those that adapt and learn live. Those that don't die, and good riddance to them. If there's anything I've learned from the dot.com bust, it's that marketing without product doesn't mean shit (unless you've got $32 billion in cash, not stock), products without marketing is shit (because nobody buys it), and that Linus Torvalds gives me a damn woody.
Actually, it it *not* my "duty" to tell e-businesses that their sites suck.
My voting is done with my dollar. If I can find what I want, I buy it. If I can't, I go somewhere else that can do the job for me.
That's all the information they need from me. Last time I checked, McDonald's doesn't go "Gee, nobody complains that the McCrap Burger doesn't sell", they say "Gee, nobody fucking buys the McCrap Burger - cancel it!".
Than again, I'm also a typical american bastard who feels my time is too important to waste it telling other people how to do their job.
One of my personal frustrations with some Internet shopping is how terribly some sites are put together.
In too many cases, it's an event of "I want to buy this - where do I go to find it?" And after wading through too many pages just to figure how how to buy an additional battery for a laptop, when all I should have to do is click on "laptops - maker - model - accessories" I'll finally give up and call my CompUSA (hey, not my choice - my company has an account with them) just to get the job done.
Then I go over the Amazon. And while I complain about the whole "targeted ads" market, I like how they do it. They show new anime titles I might not have heard of, or books that I may be interested in, and occasionally buy when I say "Hm...Niel Gaiman's American Gods - I've been wanting to read it anyway", filter out the ones I tell them I own, and generally make it *easy* to find what I'm looking for. I'll usually check them first even if I don't think they carry it, just in the hopes that maybe they do.
The most important thing any online company can do when selling products: Let me find what I'm looking for. That's all I ask for, and all I expect. I don't want shockwave, or animated.gif files, or anything that takes away from me *finding what the hell I want to spend my money on*.
I just can't figure out why so many online stores are dead set on keeping me from buying anything.
Even worse, this leaves Mac folks in the dust. I can almost understand the "hacker" OS Linux (yes, that's sarcasm, folks) out of the dust - but what did Steve Jobs do to get excluded from the list? (Oh, yes - he supported iTunes, which *likes* MP3s).
I could - but my P-II 450 does just as well, and if I'm going to spend $2000, I'd rather do it pumping up my gaming rig than just replacing my Linux box with...Linux in a Power PC chip.
I'm wondering if the purchase of BeOS will help with this.
Since Palm is making their move to the Strongarm processor, and BeOS was touted for having a great interface, cool filesystem, etc (and not having used BeOS before their demise, I can't comment on how good or bad it is), but it should be possible to imagine a Palm system which actually does some cool multimedia, and with the Metadata part of the filesystem, can make things like document editing/mp3 playing, etc a snap for developers and users.
Remember - Palm did well first because it takes one button to get to whatever you want. If they can use the BeOS pieces to their advantage with the more powerful processors (without sacrificing battery power), the game might still be an interesting one to watch.
About the only thing that's helping Palm right now is that they still have the majority of the market share - mainly because:
They were first.
They're still cheaper.
I noticed the new Clei (Clie? whatever) lines have built in Word/Excel ability - something that shows that Sony at least gets the basic idea.
I have a Palm 505, and I've been lusting after the Clie (of course, I've been lusting after a Mac too, but I'm not sure if I want to spend $2000 to give up Linux. Separate topic.). About the one thing that would help is if Palm would force everybody to standardize on compact flash, since no add-ons for any Palm OS device work with any other. (Grrr...)
This is to the people who feel the need to bring their 2 year olds to midnight movie premieres. You shitheads are going to rot in your graves the next time you do that. If you're too fucking cheap and lazy to get a babysitter, then stay the hell home and don't ruin it for the rest of us. I like kids, but I do not want to hear them crying their eyes out because the movie gets loud, or when I go kick in their parents teeth for being selfish pricks.
Thank you. We now continue with the review.
Holy Fucking Shit
When I was 15 years old, I dated a girl named Denise. Denise was a tall (3 inches taller than myself) redhead, full of curves up top, a flat belly in the middle, and blood as hot as fire. When she graduated and left for MIT (she was a senior, I was a junior) it broke my heart.
I'll always remember one spring day in Washington, when she drove her car (she was 16, you realize) to the park. I won't go into detail, but the next 90 minutes in the backseat was one of the most incredible moments of my life, and the only thing that went through my head during the experience (which left windows fogged and two teenagers slick with sweat) was "Holy Fucking Shit".
13 years later I'm watching Peter Jackman's adaptation of "The Fellowship of the Ring" (FOTR). I'm not even going to pretend that it was even close to making out with Denise in the back of her car. But only one thought went through my head when the closing credits aired.
Holy.
Fucking.
Shit.
For those who have missed the last 50 years
Once upon a time, there was this bad ass named Sauron, and he made this bad ass Ring. This wasn't just any Ring. With it, he could control all of these other powerful rings and the people who used them. It also turned him into the ultimate kick ass guy. He'd sweep his sword once, and 20 men would go flying. Entire buildings were built with the force of this ring. The ultimate in evil, The Spice Girls weren't created from the Ring - but the Backstreet Boys were.
Well, one day Sauron decimating people left and right gets his fingers chopped off (not so invincible now, are ya?) and he gets destroyed. No, not really. Turns out that he put a large part of his own soul into the Ring, so as long as the ring exists, he exists. And the Ring wants to return to his master, for with it great and terrible things can be done. (Like Austin Powers 3.)
For the Ring is evil. Not as in an evil thing, but as in an intelligent thing, one that tempts and corrupts all who touch it. (Kind of like Don King. Only without the stupid ass hair.) People just looking at it lust after it (like Denise and me), they need it, and only those pure of heart can hold it for long - and even these will ultimately become corrupted by the Ring.
The ring, after betraying it's new wielder, passes from hand to hand, to Gollum who hides in the mountains, to Bilbo Baggins, who just happens to get lost in the mountains, and finally to Frodo, a young man who has no idea of the can of whoop ass he's holding in his hand.
And this is where the story begins.
Where the hell is page 53?
"The Lord of the Rings" is a very long, and in my humble opinion, rather slow series of books. Events can take months to happen, and most of the books are spent with people talking their lips off at each other. Yes, it's all cool and good and the story of nobility and betrayal is the basis for pretty much all our fantasy today. But damn, it's long in getting there.
The movie for FOTR gives the story a much needed jolt in the ass. Months are shortened to days, but they don't lose the core of the story. Just moves it along a little faster. We see Gandalf, master wizard and know-it-all at large, discovering that this magic ring his friend Bilbo has is The friggin' ring, and everything goes to hell from there. Frodo's on the run from a psychotic black-clad collection agency called the Ringwraiths - immortal bad motherhumpers who are just about unstoppable. Gandalf is being betrayed by a former friend and trying to get his old bearded ass out of the trouble he's in, and the audience isn't dragged into it, we sell our damn souls to be taken along this ride, and we love every second of it.
Yes, there are moments that are over the top. When some Elf King guys tells the 9 they are the Fellowship of the Ring and the music climaxes, it's hard not to think "All right, that was camp city". Or other moments when the dialogue is there to explain, and we have to wait through it. But the moments are few and in between. Like getting a bitter bean in your chili - it's gone before you make a bad face.
Probably the biggest problem with this is with the non-standard names that are thrown out. Just a part of the movie, but there were a few moments like this:
Legolas: Gollum escaped from the la-le-lu-li-lo dungeon!
Me: The what dungeon?
Fanboy on right: From [I can't spell it] dungeon. It's where the elves took Gollum when he was being questioned by Gandalf and Aragorn, where they learned, blah, blah, blah, I want him to shut the hell up so I can enjoy the movie.
Fangirl on the left: Let's hop in the back seat of my car, Dark Paladin and make sweet, sweet love.
Me: (Dang, that Liv Tyler doesn't look half bad.)
It's scary. People get dirty, leaves in their hair, blood in their faces, and we jump in terror when something comes around the corner and goes "Boo", because Jackman is a friggin' genius who really makes us think that the Good Guys are about to have their asses handed to them on a plate. And even when they prove what bad asses they are, we can see the odds are just so way against them, they'd better stock up on life insurance.
It's also beautiful. In the beginning we see The Shire, Bilbo's home that rolls like like the British countryside that we all dream about - full of long, green hills and farms. One of those places you want to take a vacation, then a shotgun to shoot any bastard that starts talking on their cell phone.
Then we see the rest of the world, and we're overwhelmed by its size. Inside the mines of Moria, we see miles upon miles of excavated rocks and bridges and columns, and just go "God damn, that things huge!". Or a look at the creation of a new castle crawling with tens of thousands of orcs like ticks on a dog, and it's mind boggling that anything could be so big. It's an incredible effect - and yet, we never notice it.
The Effects that weren't there
For the past 5 years, folks in Hollywood have been engaged in a circle jerk to decide who can make the best special effects. Take "The Mummy 2", a movie which had a bad plot, bad dialogue, bad action, bad concept - but the special effects were cool, so the producers figured they could feed us shit by covering it in honey. And that's just scratching the surface.
In FOTR, we never notice the special effects, because the movie isn't based on them. When we see Bilbo turn into something awful for a split second, we don't say "Wow, nice effects!" We think "Damn, what happened to that nice old guy that we've come to love?" There's none of the slow-motion, camera turning crap that doesn't do a thing for the story. But we do see a river swollen with water that turns out to be horses - but it's gone so fast and the story keeps on, we don't have a director so in love with himself that he forces us to watch computer animation for 5 minutes just to prove how cool it is. It's there, in, out, and done.
It's the subtlety that show how well the movie is made. Later in the movie a Balrog appears - a demon made of smoke and fire (kind of like the Republican party). But we don't see it for a long time - just a red glow coming towards the characters, as we watch their eyes get big, and finally Gandalf says "Let's get the fuck out of here." All right, so it's not that, but we get the idea, and without seeing this thing, we know it's bad news.
The best special effects are placed to enhance the rest of the world, and make us forget that this whole thing was made up from somebody's brain case. The hobbits aren't midgets - they look just like regular people, only shorter. I'm sure the guy who plays Frodo isn't really 4 feet high - but when he's standing next to Aragorn, he looks just 4 feet high with hair-covered feet.
Or when Galadriel, the elf queen, who is a beautiful woman (not sexy, like I want to jump her, but a noble beauty that is to be looked at, terrible in its power) turns around and reveals her own lust for the ring, her visage is still beautiful - and awful. We want to look at her and hide from her. She is the Mother God and Demon Bitch rolled into one.
It's called Acting. Look it up
So without the special effects to hinge on, that means we have to rely on the acting to carry the story. And this is where the movie is at its best.
First, Ian McKellen is Gandalf. No, he doesn't play Gandalf, he is Gandalf. Here's an old guy with a big white beard who seems just that - old, absent minded, into simple pleasures. It's a guy with crinkling blue eyes, the grandpa you want to sit in his lap while he smokes a pipe because he's a cool old guy.
He's also a bad ass motherhumper that if you cross, he will reach down your throat and pull out your spine, then feed it to you on a plate. You do not want to mess with this guy, old hair and all. There's steel in those bones, and you'll break yourself before they bend.
He's a man who suffers, who watches others and feels their pain. When he sees Frodo taking up the Ring, because Frodo is the only one who can, we can feel Gandalf's torment at the loss of innocence. When the Ring is offered to him, we know he's terrified to touch it, terrified of the temptation to use it for good, and the evil that would follow.
Elijah Wood plays an amazingly good Frodo Baggins. He's not a teenager, but an innocent young man who's thrust into this situation. We see how he suffers because of the Ring, because of how others react to the Ring, and how it preys on him and strips away that happy man we saw earlier. We suffer right with him as he moves towards Mordor and his destiny.
Each of the rest of the cast know their place is to act and entertain us, and they do that. Men cry when their companions are hurt. People actually act like they like each other, not that they met 5 minutes ago and say their lines. And I don't know what happened to Liv Tyler, who normally doens't do anything for me (something about those lips that make me think she's going to eat me - and mind out of the gutter, you), but damn, she looks lovely in here. I still don't want her naked in my bed, but I wouldn't mind snapping a picture of her on the horse and hanging it on my wall. The girl looks good
There's plenty of action to be had. Fights with orcs underground, above ground, swords flashing, arrows flying - you name it, we've got it. And there's blood, limbs and heads hacked off. Not gratuitous, a little over the top at times, but it's there for the sake of the story, and we're never quite sure if the good guys are about to punch out their tickets. Even folks like me who have read the books still get that "Dude, they are so dead" feeling, even though I know they show up later.
I'm stingy with my 10 ratings. If you want a 10 from me, you're going to friggin' earn it. Is this movie as good as sex with Denise? Nope. But it's good, it's entertaining, and it's the first 3 hour movie that 90 minutes into it I checked my watch - and was glad there were 90 minutes more to come. This only bad thing is that when you leave the theater, there's 12 months to go before the next movie.
When I was down at E3, the differences were pretty evident, and as time goes on, I expect those differences to tone down a bit, but never really change.
Sony's main market is 16-25 year olds, which is the same as Microsoft's. Nintendo's is a little odder - they hit 9-16, and 25 and older. Aka, more of a "family" demographic. Granted, there is bleed over from one to the other (Nintendo's getting the Resident Evil remakes, while Sony's getting Kingdom Hearts from Square, a Disney/Square collaboration).
What's going to be interesting is to watch how all 3 use their powers. Sony's got shares into some very powerful game making company (Square, Enix, Verant (who has the Star Wars Galaxies game under their belt), as well as quite a bit of cash. Microsoft has cash, and the ability to swing PC game makers to the Xbox (since the Xbox uses DirectX 8, and it's easier to design a game for one system than for the 40 billion different kind of PC's out there).
Nintendo has two ace in the holes. First, they just make some great, fun games. Super Smash Brothers Melee, more Pokemon games (and I don't care what folks say - I enjoy it), and other licenses that aren't going away. And they're GameBoy Advance has no practical challengers out there, which gives them the ability to look at developers who want to make a GameBoy Advance game and say "Sure, you can make a game for the GBA - if you promise to make a game for the GameCube".
Either way, I don't see any of the three vanishing for some time. Nintendo will hold their position as a provider of fun games, Sony will probably stay on top (and the upcoming 40 Gig hard drive addition to the PS2 won't hurt), and the Xbox will continue to fight with Sony for whatever they can get, and push the other two guys to keep innovating.
Either way, the consumer wins from competition, and I'm eager to see what happens.
Here's my whole deal on the GameCube. It's long. Sorry about that. But I wouldn't feel fair if I said all that stuff on the Xbox in a previous post, then left the GameCube swaying in the wind. So this whole thing is my honest opinion. Take it as it is.
The size of the past
About a month ago, I bought my first Nintendo Entertainment System.
Growing up as a child, I never had a Nintendo of my own. My parents waited until I had left home to stop being poor, so I didn't know the joys of the little sister. That means no Kid Icarus, no Castlevania, and especially no Final Fantasy.
Until a month ago, when a chance run into a Software Etc made me notice the Final Fantasy (not II, III, or otherwise) - an original Final Fantasy game. 20 minutes later I bought it, and went out to find myself a Nintendo to play it on.
20 years is a long time to wait, and its interesting how Nintendo's systems have evolved over the years. Some things, like the output plugs for the systems, have remained the same since the Super Nintendo Systems. The cartridges have gotten a little bigger and could hold more memory, but they were still cartridges, made to deliver their information as quickly as possible so game players could focus on playing games rather than waiting for the information to load.
That also meant there was a trade-off. Companies that went with the PlayStation system could use disks that held far more information, which means more cinematic gameplay, sometimes at their benefit, sometimes to their detriment.
But now Nintendo has joined the rest of the disk based world with their little square wonder, the GameCube. And in true Nintendo fashion it's brutally efficient at doing one thing: providing gaming entertainment.
Hip to be Square
The first thing I noticed when I opened up the box was my little black GameCube is small and perfectly square. Actually, the first thing I noticed was the handle that let me pull it out and walk around the house going "Look at this little thing?"
The GameCube weight between 3-4 pounds, and while it's small, it feels solid, and the little guy is quiet when you turn it on. To be honest, Nintendo did cheat - the power cord has a large brick on it that's used for AC/DC conversion, and that big brick is a slight problem when you're trying to find a place to plug it in. (The power brick alone is almost as heavy as the GameCube itself!)
The GameCube is a simple system. On the top are 3 buttons - On, Reset, and Open so you can insert the mini-DVD's (more in that in a moment). The front as 6 slots - 4 controllers, 2 memory. The back has inserts for the power and Video Out (which uses the same plugs as your old Nintendo 64, which uses the same plugs as your Super Nintendo), as well as another plug for Digital Out - and since I don't have a system that supports that, RCA works just fine for me, thank you very much.
The bottom is where you upgrade the system. Two serial ports and one high speed port are covered by smooth covers, set up so that when you do plug in future add-ons (like a broadband adapter or modem), they'll be perfectly flush with the system so you won't notice them in the way.
The system is made to play games, so forget any ideas about putting in your music CD's or movie DVD's inside. The individual games come in small, 3 inch disks that are burned with DVD level technology (so they can store lots of information in a small space). Nothing else is going to fit inside, and while there are reports of a GameCube compatible DVD player in Japan being released sometime in the next few months, the unit you buy from Nintendo doesn't aspire to any of that.
It just plays the games, kids. I can't stress that enough, because it does it so well.
It's Flipper!
The original code name for the GameCube was the Dolphin, and it makes sense that the ATI graphics card that powers the GameCube was named Flipper. (Unless you haven't been born in the last 30 years like myself, you might remember that Flipper was the dolphin star of a popular TV show. Like Lassie in the water.)
ATI proves they know how to do graphics, because so far the first set of games for the GameCube look incredible. I've been playing with Super Monkey Ball, and the game looks incredibly smooth. The spheres look perfectly round, colors and textures are bright and colorful, and the other little tricks like lens flare and so on never slow down the system at all.
Or another game sure to be popular this year, Rebel Assault II. The first mission alone, a recreation of the Battle of Yavin where you get to destroy the Death Star, looks like you're inside the movie. But the next mission after that which has you flying through a nebula, and I was impressed by the sheer beauty of space, the distant stars shining through interstellar gas in a sight any science fiction fan would sell their soul to be a part of.
Quick Load
One problem with most CD or DVD based games is the long load times, or the wait to load or save games to memory cards.
The opposite is true with the GameCube. Somehow, maybe because the mini-DVD's are so small the seek time is less, games load up very quickly, and games saved to the small memory cards (which resemble the PlayStation 2 memory cards, only half the size (and at 4 MB, half the storage space)) quickly store their information so you can get right back into the game.
Either way, the near lack of wait between the time you say "Start Game" and the time the game launches keeps you from getting bored.
Fits like a perfect, tiny glove
You know what they say about a man who can drive a stick? Yeah, me neither.
As much as I've tried to avoid it, sooner or later I have to mention the recent review of another console's controller, the Xbox. Like the Xbox controller, the GameCube's contains several buttons and features:
* Two analog sticks
* One D-Pad
* 3 finger triggers (two on the right, one of which is the Z button, one of the left)
* 5 buttons - A, B, X, Y, and Start
And while the controller is made for hands slightly smaller than my own, it was still very comfortable. I could reach every single button (except for the Start button, which really doesn't count) with my thumb, and the finger triggers were pretty accessible, except for the Z button which was a further stretch for my right index finger. I believe that there's a larger model made by another company, but as it is the default controller is comfortable enough to use for long stretches. (In fact, I recently bought a second during Thanksgiving so me and the kids could play the games together. Made me a big hit in the family, I can tell you.)
The buttons give a good response so you know they've been pushed down. The main finger triggers also have a "click", which means that just pressing down the trigger means one thing, while "clicking" it all the way down can mean another. For example, in Rogue Squadron II, pressing down the right means to accelerate, while clicking it can activate the S-Foils or hit a Turbo Boost.
The controller has rumble technology, which means it can vibrate depending on what's going on in the game. It isn't terribly strong, but it's effective enough.
Inside the Cube
When the GameCube is first turned on, even its boot-up sequence is cute as it "rolls" a purple cube on the screen to form the GameCube logo.
The menu system is also made of a cube, and moving the controller in each of the four compass directions gives you the various options, like sound, video, time, memory, and launching the game itself. The cube menu is transparent, and each item is clearly depicted in little squares that make up the letters, continuing the cube tradition.
There's nothing outside the ordinary, so let's move onto the big event.
The Games
Compared to the Xbox or the PlayStation 2, the GameCube doesn't have a lot of games available at its launch, and if history is a key, it probably won't have as many as its competitors. (Take a look at the games for the PSOne compared to the Nintendo 64.)
But those games that are out, the two that I've been playing with are both incredibly fun. Listed here are "Gut Level" reviews of the games - these aren't final scores, but just my general impressions after spending around 24 hours with them and the system.
Star Wars Rogue Squadron II: Rogue Leader:
For fans of the Star Wars game, this is as close to flying the X-Wing and other crafts as you're going to get. The controls are simple enough - the left analog controls your direction, left and right trigger buttons decrease/increase speed, A to fire the primary weapons, and B to fire the secondary weapons.
It was evident from the beginning that the Factor 5 crew was interested in fun. When it first starts, you see a group of StormTroopers dancing to the Cantina Theme before the camera pans back to reveal the LucasArts logo. It's cute, and just ads that grin to your face before the game even begins.
The missions are fairly simple in and of themselves, usually spent blowing up the Imperial Forces in the various crafts. But expertise in being quick, accurate, or not getting dead are rewarded by giving out Gold, Silver, and Bronze awards that can be used to collect points for better ships in other missions.
As far as the graphics, it is amazing. Flying down the Death Star Trench with the Tie Fighters roaring after me, it almost looked like the gray, dominating trenches of the Death Star trench.
The other interesting graphical feature depends on the time of day. On planet based missions, the sun moves depending on what time the GameCube reports, so missions flown in late afternoon will have the sun setting, while missions played in the middle of the day has the sun high overhead. It was a surprising detail, and one that just adds to the cool factor of the game.
Probably the most aggravating thing is the radar system. I'm used to the old Tie Fighter/X-Wing system, where the left circle is the back and the right is the front (or is it the other way around?), but for Rogue Squadron II there's the only the one on the upper right, and I often had problems knowing if something was above me or below me.
Gut Level Score: 8 or 9
Super Monkey Ball:
Oh, yes, I'm sure that PETA will just love this game.
Sega, I love you. This game is a blast. Imagine one of those marble mazes, where you'll tilt the maze about to move the marble through the hallways, avoiding the tiny holes.
Except in this case, the mazes are huge, the size of a football field, and the marbles are encased with...monkeys. Cute little monkeys that try to run and keep up with the marbles as they race down the ramps at 70 mph, while you try and grab the bananas (I believe sponsored by Dole) while keeping them falling off the edges down into oblivion.
First, the graphics are even better than Rogue Squadron II. It's bright, the balls are perfectly round, the the little monkeys have all sorts of expressions as they're rolled around, expressing shock or glee as they race about your tilting world.
The game has that "Ah-ah-woah!" feeling as you just barely keep your Monkey from falling off the edges so you can get that one extra banana, or the sudden fear as parts of the mazes break off to float away, leaving you to make split second decisions of whether to play it safe, or go for broke.
Then there's the party games and mini-games mode. I've only played one of the party games, Monkey Fight, where you control a monkey with a boxing glove and try to punch the other monkeys off the board. Boxes will drop down that will give your monkey's various abilities, but primarily it's a romp to move around the board, trying to keep a wall at your back so you aren't knocked off.
Sega captured the very essence of gaming with Super Monkey Ball - it's just flat out fun.
Gut Score: 9 or 10.
Closing the Box
I like the GameCube, and I'm not going to be ashamed of that. It's almost half the size of its competitor, but it's like looking at a puppy around some big dogs. It's cute, it wants to please you, and it's got the charm and energy to make playing with it funner than playing with the bigger, dogs that might know a lot of cool tricks, but they don't make you want to scratch the back of their lids. Er, ears. I like the system, I like the games, I like the controller, and I'd gladly buy it again, and gladly recommend its purchase to anyone who just wants to have fun.
Slashdot Mirror
I use Gimp, and I've got it running on OS X at the moment.
I'm not trying to be an idiot, but I've never used Photoshop. Ever. Just never had a need to. When I was running Linux and I finally had to do some graphics tweaking, Gimp was right there.
So if I were to consider Photoshop, what would it give me over Gimp?
Yes, leaving an obvious diatribe of "you only use your OS because your an elitist, and you only watch anime because your a pedophile" wasn't an insulting way of stating "I don't get the appeal of Linux and anime - can someone explain that to me?"
Please excuse me. Next time someone says "Well, the reason you live in Utah is because you want to rape babies" to me, I won't take it as a personal insult.
Sorry, at first I was going to ignore this as the troll it is.
Then I figured "Eh, my pot roast is still cooking, I might as well respond."
Ah, yes - people only like anime and Linux because of an elite attitude. I used Linux for 2+ years after being exposed to it not because of the great tools (Gimp, Image Magick, able to set up a mail server, fetchmail), or because I had it running 10 months without a reboot, or even on the day that a physical hard drive died, the system kept running so that when I got home I could do something to fix it.
I only watch anime because I have bad taste and I'm a pedophile. Not because of fascinating shows (Lain, Utena, Boogiepop Phantom) that challenge conventional ideas with symbolism, or for heart wrenching shows (like Grave of the Fireflies), or works of art (Princess Mononoke, Porco Rosso), courageous tales (Magic Knights Rayearth, Gunsmith Cats). Yes, there is the crap (Bastard), but I only watch it because I like to watch young girls getting nearly naked (let's see, I don't like Sailor Moon, but I do admit to liking Jubei Chan because it's so damn funny).
Sorry. I have seen the error of my ways, and I will now only comform to the crowd.
Asshole.
I just have a problem with MMRPG's in general. Maybe it's because I have a 3 year old in the house, or that I'm leveling up without a real story, or that I'm antisocial.
Either way, I prefer a game I can pause, a game that tells a story, and a game that makes me feel like I've done something other than gotten my Mage up to level 50.
*SNIP*
Look at any large organic chemistry group around the country, and I guarantee they'll have power macs up the wazoo, origin 3000 machines configured as mail servers, stereoscopic visualization goggles, etc. And they generally have no idea what to do with them....
Like running a Quake server?
I discovered the whole "command-click background screens" as I've read through OS X: The Missing Manual. It's an interesting idea, but for pure web browsing, I like the focus-follows-mouse (multiple windows), or, barring that, tab browsing. (I haven't installed Mozilla in OS X yet. Still debating if I'll byte the big one and go IE (blech), or install Mozilla and redo all of the Helper apps (blech, the return).
At home, I run fetchmail, UW Imap/pop3, and postfix. (Some excellent instructions for installing it are here at Stepwise), Image Magick, Gimp, and some other Open Source programs on OS X. I also use BBedit and Microsoft Office X. (And I can say that Entourage is a far superior program to the one I have to use with Windows.)
The good news: Nothing broke. 10.1.3 didn't rewrite any mail settings, so all of my mail continued to come in/get sent out just fine.
The bad: Still no focus-follows-mouse, multiple desktops, or the ability to connect to my wife's printer on her Windows 98 box.
I did have a problem with Samba for a little bit (I have another computer running Win98 I use just for games playing). Once I turned off the SMB service and turned it back on, it worked fine.
Some of these things comes from a former KDE user (ie: focus-follows-mouse, etc), but overall, since it didn't break anything, I'm assuming all went well. As person who used Linux 90% of the time up until last week, OS X is still surprising me by all the little nice things they put in.
I can see both the good and bad of this application.
On the good side: China. Folks over there who have to deal with the gigantic "Firewall O' Death" (also known as the "Damn it, Communism works so stop reading about how it doesn't" Firewall) can possibly use this tool to get to the outside information they need to keep spreadin' the news that "Information good."
On the other side, as a Security Manager in a bank who's sometimes asked to go find out if person XYZ has been accessing nakedhairyeyebrowedcheerleaders.com, I can see how this utility might make it impossible for me to do my job.
So I've got mixed feelings on this utility.
I read a lot of books on my Palm Pilot (an m505, if you must know), and I would be delighted to have Harry Potter V (or I-IV (er, um, legally, that is *cough*)) on my Palm Pilot.
I don't see any reason why they wouldn't want to. The publisher would do well (since there's no paper cost) and can even reduce the price a few dollars (see "there's no paper cost"), Ms. Rawlings stays the Richest Woman in All England, and I'm happy, because I can read Harry Potter and the Order of the Pheonix in my meetings while looking like I'm taking notes on my Palm.
The difference between the two is who has access to my files. Right now, with my Windows 98 machine that I use for games and video capture, I don't mind hitting the auto-update as long as that message saying "We're not sending any information to Microsoft" stays on.
As soon as I sit down to my computer, and it by itself says "Oh, Hi, I just checked your stuff, and we noticed that you need patches. And while we're at it, we checked your MP3 list, and we don't think you legally own 'Rinbo Revolution'."
Extreme? Yes. But it's no different in my mind between letting the plumber in to fix my pipes, or giving him a key and saying "Come in whenever you like and just look around and tell me what I need." I don't trust anybody (except my wife
I agree with this 100%. I realize that the price of the book will probably rise an extra 5-10% for this feature, but the ability to lay a book flat as you're typing/eating/making love to your (very) understanding wife is a huge feature in technical books.
Back in the day, people believed in the 4 elements of earth, air, fire, and water. Why? Well, because somebody said so.
They believed that frogs came from mud, that life just arrived, that the sun went around the earth, and many other things.
Then the Scientific Method came along, and it was a simple idea:
1. Conduct an experiment with two groups, and only change 1 thing in each group.
2. Compare the results. If the majority of the groups with the different variable are truly different, you can possibly attribute that result to your variable.
3. Publish your results and show the world exactly what steps you took.
4. Other people recreate your experiment. If they get the same conclusions, then your theory may be correct.
5. If others find a different way to prove/disprove your theory, then eventually the Truth can be decided.
In the end, that's what science and the scientific method are all about. The search for the Truth. Is it the only method? Probably not - there are many truths in the universe we can't prove under the microscope.
But is it the best way that fallible humans can use to attain Truth? So far, yup. And as long as the real scientists don't forget that, we don't have to worry about "science by press release".
Except for one thing:
The product (to the best of my knowledge) was only sold in Russia.
This is equivalant to someone from the country Mary Jane where the wacky tobaccy is legal. When they enter the US - not carrying the product, mind you - to talk about the benefits of marijuana (or however you spell it) at a medical convention, the DEA shows up at the convention and takes them to jail.
Same story, only the difference is that it was about ebooks, not drugs.
And anybody's who's going to split hairs, it's a damn anology, so shut the fuck up unless you have a good counter argument.
I'm sorry, and I don't mean to engage in a flamewar or anything, but I totally disagree.
Marketing is as important to a business as the product is. Sadly, some companies (Microsoft) have only good marketing (which is the only reason why they're still around), while other companies (Novell) have crappy marketing but great products (which is the only reason why they're still around).
But a true business (ie: people who expect to get paid for what they do) needs advertising just as much as it does good products. And as a consumer, I can't be expected to call up these companies all the time and say "Gee, I *love* NDS! But would you get your heads out of your asses and try putting some public commercials on that make sense instead of a bunch of damn goldfish that would probably eat each other if you put them in one big tank?"
The store should find out when people don't buy their fucking product. That means either a) the product is bad, or b) their marketing is bad. I'm sure if McDonald's had an advertisement that showed Michael Jackson raping babies, then discovered that their McKid's meal didn't sell, somebody would say "Hm...is it the meals or the ads? Let's change one and see what happens." And if that didn't work, they'd finally try changing the product. Or hire people to do polls.
*It is not my job to tell companies how to sell things. My job is to decide if I want to buy it based on the product and their marketing.* If they ask me and offer me $5 to tell them what's wrong (or a free toaster, or one of those red vibrators), then I'll be happy to tell them. Otherwise, they can kiss my ass if they think I'm just going to look all over their site for an email address and say "Hey, I couldn't find your Raspberry Flavored Snack bites because your system uses IE based javascript tags my browser couldn't read. Could you alter these pretty please?" I don't get paid to do other people's jobs.
Those that adapt and learn live. Those that don't die, and good riddance to them. If there's anything I've learned from the dot.com bust, it's that marketing without product doesn't mean shit (unless you've got $32 billion in cash, not stock), products without marketing is shit (because nobody buys it), and that Linus Torvalds gives me a damn woody.
Actually, it it *not* my "duty" to tell e-businesses that their sites suck.
My voting is done with my dollar. If I can find what I want, I buy it. If I can't, I go somewhere else that can do the job for me.
That's all the information they need from me. Last time I checked, McDonald's doesn't go "Gee, nobody complains that the McCrap Burger doesn't sell", they say "Gee, nobody fucking buys the McCrap Burger - cancel it!".
Than again, I'm also a typical american bastard who feels my time is too important to waste it telling other people how to do their job.
One of my personal frustrations with some Internet shopping is how terribly some sites are put together.
.gif files, or anything that takes away from me *finding what the hell I want to spend my money on*.
In too many cases, it's an event of "I want to buy this - where do I go to find it?" And after wading through too many pages just to figure how how to buy an additional battery for a laptop, when all I should have to do is click on "laptops - maker - model - accessories" I'll finally give up and call my CompUSA (hey, not my choice - my company has an account with them) just to get the job done.
Then I go over the Amazon. And while I complain about the whole "targeted ads" market, I like how they do it. They show new anime titles I might not have heard of, or books that I may be interested in, and occasionally buy when I say "Hm...Niel Gaiman's American Gods - I've been wanting to read it anyway", filter out the ones I tell them I own, and generally make it *easy* to find what I'm looking for. I'll usually check them first even if I don't think they carry it, just in the hopes that maybe they do.
The most important thing any online company can do when selling products: Let me find what I'm looking for. That's all I ask for, and all I expect. I don't want shockwave, or animated
I just can't figure out why so many online stores are dead set on keeping me from buying anything.
Of course, I could be wrong.
Even worse, this leaves Mac folks in the dust. I can almost understand the "hacker" OS Linux (yes, that's sarcasm, folks) out of the dust - but what did Steve Jobs do to get excluded from the list? (Oh, yes - he supported iTunes, which *likes* MP3s).
I could - but my P-II 450 does just as well, and if I'm going to spend $2000, I'd rather do it pumping up my gaming rig than just replacing my Linux box with...Linux in a Power PC chip.
I'm wondering if the purchase of BeOS will help with this.
;).
Since Palm is making their move to the Strongarm processor, and BeOS was touted for having a great interface, cool filesystem, etc (and not having used BeOS before their demise, I can't comment on how good or bad it is), but it should be possible to imagine a Palm system which actually does some cool multimedia, and with the Metadata part of the filesystem, can make things like document editing/mp3 playing, etc a snap for developers and users.
Remember - Palm did well first because it takes one button to get to whatever you want. If they can use the BeOS pieces to their advantage with the more powerful processors (without sacrificing battery power), the game might still be an interesting one to watch.
I love competition.
You're right - my bad. I forgot about the Newton and other such devices.
Oh, yes, that will work just fine - I won't carrying around my palm, just a Powermac G4 - it emulates well ;).
I noticed the new Clei (Clie? whatever) lines have built in Word/Excel ability - something that shows that Sony at least gets the basic idea.
I have a Palm 505, and I've been lusting after the Clie (of course, I've been lusting after a Mac too, but I'm not sure if I want to spend $2000 to give up Linux. Separate topic.). About the one thing that would help is if Palm would force everybody to standardize on compact flash, since no add-ons for any Palm OS device work with any other. (Grrr...)
This is to the people who feel the need to bring their 2 year olds to midnight movie premieres. You shitheads are going to rot in your graves the next time you do that. If you're too fucking cheap and lazy to get a babysitter, then stay the hell home and don't ruin it for the rest of us. I like kids, but I do not want to hear them crying their eyes out because the movie gets loud, or when I go kick in their parents teeth for being selfish pricks.
Thank you. We now continue with the review.
Holy Fucking Shit
When I was 15 years old, I dated a girl named Denise. Denise was a tall (3 inches taller than myself) redhead, full of curves up top, a flat belly in the middle, and blood as hot as fire. When she graduated and left for MIT (she was a senior, I was a junior) it broke my heart.
I'll always remember one spring day in Washington, when she drove her car (she was 16, you realize) to the park. I won't go into detail, but the next 90 minutes in the backseat was one of the most incredible moments of my life, and the only thing that went through my head during the experience (which left windows fogged and two teenagers slick with sweat) was "Holy Fucking Shit".
13 years later I'm watching Peter Jackman's adaptation of "The Fellowship of the Ring" (FOTR). I'm not even going to pretend that it was even close to making out with Denise in the back of her car. But only one thought went through my head when the closing credits aired.
Holy.
Fucking.
Shit.
For those who have missed the last 50 years
Once upon a time, there was this bad ass named Sauron, and he made this bad ass Ring. This wasn't just any Ring. With it, he could control all of these other powerful rings and the people who used them. It also turned him into the ultimate kick ass guy. He'd sweep his sword once, and 20 men would go flying. Entire buildings were built with the force of this ring. The ultimate in evil, The Spice Girls weren't created from the Ring - but the Backstreet Boys were.
Well, one day Sauron decimating people left and right gets his fingers chopped off (not so invincible now, are ya?) and he gets destroyed. No, not really. Turns out that he put a large part of his own soul into the Ring, so as long as the ring exists, he exists. And the Ring wants to return to his master, for with it great and terrible things can be done. (Like Austin Powers 3.)
For the Ring is evil. Not as in an evil thing, but as in an intelligent thing, one that tempts and corrupts all who touch it. (Kind of like Don King. Only without the stupid ass hair.) People just looking at it lust after it (like Denise and me), they need it, and only those pure of heart can hold it for long - and even these will ultimately become corrupted by the Ring.
The ring, after betraying it's new wielder, passes from hand to hand, to Gollum who hides in the mountains, to Bilbo Baggins, who just happens to get lost in the mountains, and finally to Frodo, a young man who has no idea of the can of whoop ass he's holding in his hand.
And this is where the story begins.
Where the hell is page 53?
"The Lord of the Rings" is a very long, and in my humble opinion, rather slow series of books. Events can take months to happen, and most of the books are spent with people talking their lips off at each other. Yes, it's all cool and good and the story of nobility and betrayal is the basis for pretty much all our fantasy today. But damn, it's long in getting there.
The movie for FOTR gives the story a much needed jolt in the ass. Months are shortened to days, but they don't lose the core of the story. Just moves it along a little faster. We see Gandalf, master wizard and know-it-all at large, discovering that this magic ring his friend Bilbo has is The friggin' ring, and everything goes to hell from there. Frodo's on the run from a psychotic black-clad collection agency called the Ringwraiths - immortal bad motherhumpers who are just about unstoppable. Gandalf is being betrayed by a former friend and trying to get his old bearded ass out of the trouble he's in, and the audience isn't dragged into it, we sell our damn souls to be taken along this ride, and we love every second of it.
Yes, there are moments that are over the top. When some Elf King guys tells the 9 they are the Fellowship of the Ring and the music climaxes, it's hard not to think "All right, that was camp city". Or other moments when the dialogue is there to explain, and we have to wait through it. But the moments are few and in between. Like getting a bitter bean in your chili - it's gone before you make a bad face.
Probably the biggest problem with this is with the non-standard names that are thrown out. Just a part of the movie, but there were a few moments like this:
It's scary. People get dirty, leaves in their hair, blood in their faces, and we jump in terror when something comes around the corner and goes "Boo", because Jackman is a friggin' genius who really makes us think that the Good Guys are about to have their asses handed to them on a plate. And even when they prove what bad asses they are, we can see the odds are just so way against them, they'd better stock up on life insurance.
It's also beautiful. In the beginning we see The Shire, Bilbo's home that rolls like like the British countryside that we all dream about - full of long, green hills and farms. One of those places you want to take a vacation, then a shotgun to shoot any bastard that starts talking on their cell phone.
Then we see the rest of the world, and we're overwhelmed by its size. Inside the mines of Moria, we see miles upon miles of excavated rocks and bridges and columns, and just go "God damn, that things huge!". Or a look at the creation of a new castle crawling with tens of thousands of orcs like ticks on a dog, and it's mind boggling that anything could be so big. It's an incredible effect - and yet, we never notice it.
The Effects that weren't there
For the past 5 years, folks in Hollywood have been engaged in a circle jerk to decide who can make the best special effects. Take "The Mummy 2", a movie which had a bad plot, bad dialogue, bad action, bad concept - but the special effects were cool, so the producers figured they could feed us shit by covering it in honey. And that's just scratching the surface.
In FOTR, we never notice the special effects, because the movie isn't based on them. When we see Bilbo turn into something awful for a split second, we don't say "Wow, nice effects!" We think "Damn, what happened to that nice old guy that we've come to love?" There's none of the slow-motion, camera turning crap that doesn't do a thing for the story. But we do see a river swollen with water that turns out to be horses - but it's gone so fast and the story keeps on, we don't have a director so in love with himself that he forces us to watch computer animation for 5 minutes just to prove how cool it is. It's there, in, out, and done.
It's the subtlety that show how well the movie is made. Later in the movie a Balrog appears - a demon made of smoke and fire (kind of like the Republican party). But we don't see it for a long time - just a red glow coming towards the characters, as we watch their eyes get big, and finally Gandalf says "Let's get the fuck out of here." All right, so it's not that, but we get the idea, and without seeing this thing, we know it's bad news.
The best special effects are placed to enhance the rest of the world, and make us forget that this whole thing was made up from somebody's brain case. The hobbits aren't midgets - they look just like regular people, only shorter. I'm sure the guy who plays Frodo isn't really 4 feet high - but when he's standing next to Aragorn, he looks just 4 feet high with hair-covered feet.
Or when Galadriel, the elf queen, who is a beautiful woman (not sexy, like I want to jump her, but a noble beauty that is to be looked at, terrible in its power) turns around and reveals her own lust for the ring, her visage is still beautiful - and awful. We want to look at her and hide from her. She is the Mother God and Demon Bitch rolled into one.
It's called Acting. Look it up
So without the special effects to hinge on, that means we have to rely on the acting to carry the story. And this is where the movie is at its best.
First, Ian McKellen is Gandalf. No, he doesn't play Gandalf, he is Gandalf. Here's an old guy with a big white beard who seems just that - old, absent minded, into simple pleasures. It's a guy with crinkling blue eyes, the grandpa you want to sit in his lap while he smokes a pipe because he's a cool old guy.
He's also a bad ass motherhumper that if you cross, he will reach down your throat and pull out your spine, then feed it to you on a plate. You do not want to mess with this guy, old hair and all. There's steel in those bones, and you'll break yourself before they bend.
He's a man who suffers, who watches others and feels their pain. When he sees Frodo taking up the Ring, because Frodo is the only one who can, we can feel Gandalf's torment at the loss of innocence. When the Ring is offered to him, we know he's terrified to touch it, terrified of the temptation to use it for good, and the evil that would follow.
Elijah Wood plays an amazingly good Frodo Baggins. He's not a teenager, but an innocent young man who's thrust into this situation. We see how he suffers because of the Ring, because of how others react to the Ring, and how it preys on him and strips away that happy man we saw earlier. We suffer right with him as he moves towards Mordor and his destiny.
Each of the rest of the cast know their place is to act and entertain us, and they do that. Men cry when their companions are hurt. People actually act like they like each other, not that they met 5 minutes ago and say their lines. And I don't know what happened to Liv Tyler, who normally doens't do anything for me (something about those lips that make me think she's going to eat me - and mind out of the gutter, you), but damn, she looks lovely in here. I still don't want her naked in my bed, but I wouldn't mind snapping a picture of her on the horse and hanging it on my wall. The girl looks good
There's plenty of action to be had. Fights with orcs underground, above ground, swords flashing, arrows flying - you name it, we've got it. And there's blood, limbs and heads hacked off. Not gratuitous, a little over the top at times, but it's there for the sake of the story, and we're never quite sure if the good guys are about to punch out their tickets. Even folks like me who have read the books still get that "Dude, they are so dead" feeling, even though I know they show up later.
I'm stingy with my 10 ratings. If you want a 10 from me, you're going to friggin' earn it. Is this movie as good as sex with Denise? Nope. But it's good, it's entertaining, and it's the first 3 hour movie that 90 minutes into it I checked my watch - and was glad there were 90 minutes more to come. This only bad thing is that when you leave the theater, there's 12 months to go before the next movie.
And it's going to be a very long year.
As always, I'm John "Dark Paladin" Hummel. And that's my opinion.
PS: The Spider Man trailer kicked ass. That's all I'm going to say on that.
When I was down at E3, the differences were pretty evident, and as time goes on, I expect those differences to tone down a bit, but never really change.
Sony's main market is 16-25 year olds, which is the same as Microsoft's. Nintendo's is a little odder - they hit 9-16, and 25 and older. Aka, more of a "family" demographic. Granted, there is bleed over from one to the other (Nintendo's getting the Resident Evil remakes, while Sony's getting Kingdom Hearts from Square, a Disney/Square collaboration).
What's going to be interesting is to watch how all 3 use their powers. Sony's got shares into some very powerful game making company (Square, Enix, Verant (who has the Star Wars Galaxies game under their belt), as well as quite a bit of cash. Microsoft has cash, and the ability to swing PC game makers to the Xbox (since the Xbox uses DirectX 8, and it's easier to design a game for one system than for the 40 billion different kind of PC's out there).
Nintendo has two ace in the holes. First, they just make some great, fun games. Super Smash Brothers Melee, more Pokemon games (and I don't care what folks say - I enjoy it), and other licenses that aren't going away. And they're GameBoy Advance has no practical challengers out there, which gives them the ability to look at developers who want to make a GameBoy Advance game and say "Sure, you can make a game for the GBA - if you promise to make a game for the GameCube".
Either way, I don't see any of the three vanishing for some time. Nintendo will hold their position as a provider of fun games, Sony will probably stay on top (and the upcoming 40 Gig hard drive addition to the PS2 won't hurt), and the Xbox will continue to fight with Sony for whatever they can get, and push the other two guys to keep innovating.
Either way, the consumer wins from competition, and I'm eager to see what happens.
Here's my whole deal on the GameCube. It's long. Sorry about that. But I wouldn't feel fair if I said all that stuff on the Xbox in a previous post, then left the GameCube swaying in the wind. So this whole thing is my honest opinion. Take it as it is.
The size of the past
About a month ago, I bought my first Nintendo Entertainment System.
Growing up as a child, I never had a Nintendo of my own. My parents waited until I had left home to stop being poor, so I didn't know the joys of the little sister. That means no Kid Icarus, no Castlevania, and especially no Final Fantasy.
Until a month ago, when a chance run into a Software Etc made me notice the Final Fantasy (not II, III, or otherwise) - an original Final Fantasy game. 20 minutes later I bought it, and went out to find myself a Nintendo to play it on.
20 years is a long time to wait, and its interesting how Nintendo's systems have evolved over the years. Some things, like the output plugs for the systems, have remained the same since the Super Nintendo Systems. The cartridges have gotten a little bigger and could hold more memory, but they were still cartridges, made to deliver their information as quickly as possible so game players could focus on playing games rather than waiting for the information to load.
That also meant there was a trade-off. Companies that went with the PlayStation system could use disks that held far more information, which means more cinematic gameplay, sometimes at their benefit, sometimes to their detriment.
But now Nintendo has joined the rest of the disk based world with their little square wonder, the GameCube. And in true Nintendo fashion it's brutally efficient at doing one thing: providing gaming entertainment.
Hip to be Square
The first thing I noticed when I opened up the box was my little black GameCube is small and perfectly square. Actually, the first thing I noticed was the handle that let me pull it out and walk around the house going "Look at this little thing?"
The GameCube weight between 3-4 pounds, and while it's small, it feels solid, and the little guy is quiet when you turn it on. To be honest, Nintendo did cheat - the power cord has a large brick on it that's used for AC/DC conversion, and that big brick is a slight problem when you're trying to find a place to plug it in. (The power brick alone is almost as heavy as the GameCube itself!)
The GameCube is a simple system. On the top are 3 buttons - On, Reset, and Open so you can insert the mini-DVD's (more in that in a moment). The front as 6 slots - 4 controllers, 2 memory. The back has inserts for the power and Video Out (which uses the same plugs as your old Nintendo 64, which uses the same plugs as your Super Nintendo), as well as another plug for Digital Out - and since I don't have a system that supports that, RCA works just fine for me, thank you very much.
The bottom is where you upgrade the system. Two serial ports and one high speed port are covered by smooth covers, set up so that when you do plug in future add-ons (like a broadband adapter or modem), they'll be perfectly flush with the system so you won't notice them in the way.
The system is made to play games, so forget any ideas about putting in your music CD's or movie DVD's inside. The individual games come in small, 3 inch disks that are burned with DVD level technology (so they can store lots of information in a small space). Nothing else is going to fit inside, and while there are reports of a GameCube compatible DVD player in Japan being released sometime in the next few months, the unit you buy from Nintendo doesn't aspire to any of that.
It just plays the games, kids. I can't stress that enough, because it does it so well.
It's Flipper!
The original code name for the GameCube was the Dolphin, and it makes sense that the ATI graphics card that powers the GameCube was named Flipper. (Unless you haven't been born in the last 30 years like myself, you might remember that Flipper was the dolphin star of a popular TV show. Like Lassie in the water.)
ATI proves they know how to do graphics, because so far the first set of games for the GameCube look incredible. I've been playing with Super Monkey Ball, and the game looks incredibly smooth. The spheres look perfectly round, colors and textures are bright and colorful, and the other little tricks like lens flare and so on never slow down the system at all.
Or another game sure to be popular this year, Rebel Assault II. The first mission alone, a recreation of the Battle of Yavin where you get to destroy the Death Star, looks like you're inside the movie. But the next mission after that which has you flying through a nebula, and I was impressed by the sheer beauty of space, the distant stars shining through interstellar gas in a sight any science fiction fan would sell their soul to be a part of.
Quick Load
One problem with most CD or DVD based games is the long load times, or the wait to load or save games to memory cards.
The opposite is true with the GameCube. Somehow, maybe because the mini-DVD's are so small the seek time is less, games load up very quickly, and games saved to the small memory cards (which resemble the PlayStation 2 memory cards, only half the size (and at 4 MB, half the storage space)) quickly store their information so you can get right back into the game.
Either way, the near lack of wait between the time you say "Start Game" and the time the game launches keeps you from getting bored.
Fits like a perfect, tiny glove
You know what they say about a man who can drive a stick? Yeah, me neither.
As much as I've tried to avoid it, sooner or later I have to mention the recent review of another console's controller, the Xbox. Like the Xbox controller, the GameCube's contains several buttons and features:
* Two analog sticks
* One D-Pad
* 3 finger triggers (two on the right, one of which is the Z button, one of the left)
* 5 buttons - A, B, X, Y, and Start
And while the controller is made for hands slightly smaller than my own, it was still very comfortable. I could reach every single button (except for the Start button, which really doesn't count) with my thumb, and the finger triggers were pretty accessible, except for the Z button which was a further stretch for my right index finger. I believe that there's a larger model made by another company, but as it is the default controller is comfortable enough to use for long stretches. (In fact, I recently bought a second during Thanksgiving so me and the kids could play the games together. Made me a big hit in the family, I can tell you.)
The buttons give a good response so you know they've been pushed down. The main finger triggers also have a "click", which means that just pressing down the trigger means one thing, while "clicking" it all the way down can mean another. For example, in Rogue Squadron II, pressing down the right means to accelerate, while clicking it can activate the S-Foils or hit a Turbo Boost.
The controller has rumble technology, which means it can vibrate depending on what's going on in the game. It isn't terribly strong, but it's effective enough.
Inside the Cube
When the GameCube is first turned on, even its boot-up sequence is cute as it "rolls" a purple cube on the screen to form the GameCube logo.
The menu system is also made of a cube, and moving the controller in each of the four compass directions gives you the various options, like sound, video, time, memory, and launching the game itself. The cube menu is transparent, and each item is clearly depicted in little squares that make up the letters, continuing the cube tradition.
There's nothing outside the ordinary, so let's move onto the big event.
The Games
Compared to the Xbox or the PlayStation 2, the GameCube doesn't have a lot of games available at its launch, and if history is a key, it probably won't have as many as its competitors. (Take a look at the games for the PSOne compared to the Nintendo 64.)
But those games that are out, the two that I've been playing with are both incredibly fun. Listed here are "Gut Level" reviews of the games - these aren't final scores, but just my general impressions after spending around 24 hours with them and the system.
Star Wars Rogue Squadron II: Rogue Leader:
For fans of the Star Wars game, this is as close to flying the X-Wing and other crafts as you're going to get. The controls are simple enough - the left analog controls your direction, left and right trigger buttons decrease/increase speed, A to fire the primary weapons, and B to fire the secondary weapons.
It was evident from the beginning that the Factor 5 crew was interested in fun. When it first starts, you see a group of StormTroopers dancing to the Cantina Theme before the camera pans back to reveal the LucasArts logo. It's cute, and just ads that grin to your face before the game even begins.
The missions are fairly simple in and of themselves, usually spent blowing up the Imperial Forces in the various crafts. But expertise in being quick, accurate, or not getting dead are rewarded by giving out Gold, Silver, and Bronze awards that can be used to collect points for better ships in other missions.
As far as the graphics, it is amazing. Flying down the Death Star Trench with the Tie Fighters roaring after me, it almost looked like the gray, dominating trenches of the Death Star trench.
The other interesting graphical feature depends on the time of day. On planet based missions, the sun moves depending on what time the GameCube reports, so missions flown in late afternoon will have the sun setting, while missions played in the middle of the day has the sun high overhead. It was a surprising detail, and one that just adds to the cool factor of the game.
Probably the most aggravating thing is the radar system. I'm used to the old Tie Fighter/X-Wing system, where the left circle is the back and the right is the front (or is it the other way around?), but for Rogue Squadron II there's the only the one on the upper right, and I often had problems knowing if something was above me or below me.
Gut Level Score: 8 or 9
Super Monkey Ball:
Oh, yes, I'm sure that PETA will just love this game.
Sega, I love you. This game is a blast. Imagine one of those marble mazes, where you'll tilt the maze about to move the marble through the hallways, avoiding the tiny holes.
Except in this case, the mazes are huge, the size of a football field, and the marbles are encased with...monkeys. Cute little monkeys that try to run and keep up with the marbles as they race down the ramps at 70 mph, while you try and grab the bananas (I believe sponsored by Dole) while keeping them falling off the edges down into oblivion.
First, the graphics are even better than Rogue Squadron II. It's bright, the balls are perfectly round, the the little monkeys have all sorts of expressions as they're rolled around, expressing shock or glee as they race about your tilting world.
The game has that "Ah-ah-woah!" feeling as you just barely keep your Monkey from falling off the edges so you can get that one extra banana, or the sudden fear as parts of the mazes break off to float away, leaving you to make split second decisions of whether to play it safe, or go for broke.
Then there's the party games and mini-games mode. I've only played one of the party games, Monkey Fight, where you control a monkey with a boxing glove and try to punch the other monkeys off the board. Boxes will drop down that will give your monkey's various abilities, but primarily it's a romp to move around the board, trying to keep a wall at your back so you aren't knocked off.
Sega captured the very essence of gaming with Super Monkey Ball - it's just flat out fun.
Gut Score: 9 or 10.
Closing the Box
I like the GameCube, and I'm not going to be ashamed of that. It's almost half the size of its competitor, but it's like looking at a puppy around some big dogs. It's cute, it wants to please you, and it's got the charm and energy to make playing with it funner than playing with the bigger, dogs that might know a lot of cool tricks, but they don't make you want to scratch the back of their lids. Er, ears. I like the system, I like the games, I like the controller, and I'd gladly buy it again, and gladly recommend its purchase to anyone who just wants to have fun.
As always, I'm John "Dark Paladin" Hummel. And that's my opinion.