Just when you think PETA can't possibly do anything even more idiotic than they already have, they always come up with a new way to surprise you. Today in fact, we have two. First up, PETA president Ingrid Newkirk has drawn up a will stating a list of abominable and atrocious acts that are to be committed with her remains upon her death. These feats of idiocy include barbecuing her flesh, using her skin to make leather products, turning her feet into umbrella stands, and as a personal request she wants her heart buried near the Ferrari pits at the Hockenheim Formula One racing circuit in Germany. Oh, she says it's not totally selfish, because Michael Schumacher once actually signed a letter for PETA against experiments on monkeys, right, of course. I'm sure he really wants your heart in his Ferrari pit as a thank you memento. Anyway my question is, what exactly does she hope to accomplish with all this? The only thing I can think of is publicity for PETA. I cannot see my life being strongly affected by some nutcase having some bizarre instructions carried out with her carcass. In fact, these acts are so outlandish they only distract from the message they are attempting to convey. "We hope it will start a trend," Newkirk said. Sure, I'll hop on the bandwagon. I'm going to write in my will that when I die, my ass is to be mounted on a plaque and delivered to PETA's headquarters, with an engraving reading "May the moon forever shine upon all your endeavors." Oooh, I feel so trendy.
As long as we're on the topic of PETA and barbecuing, they have also approached the city of Hamburg, NY with the request to rename their town to Veggieburg. The offer was immediately declined, in spite of PETA's "generous" offer to donate $15,000 worth of veggieburgers to the city's schools. I'm sure the kiddies would have loved that. This is not the first time PETA has sought for a New York town to change it's name and forsake it's history and heritage for the ridiculous purpose of a avoiding conjuring up images of animal abuse at their mention. Before confronting the birthplace of the hamburger, it was Fishkill in 1996, a town of Dutch heritage, where "kill" is the Dutch word for "stream". Again, instead of walking away wanting a veggieburger as PETA would hope, I instead come out of this story with a new appreciation for Hamburg's heritage, and craving a nice big juicy cheeseburger. Looks like you botched up another one, PETA.
When will PETA learn that negative attention does not equate to good attention?
4.29.2003
NEWS - A tribute to Florida schools
A Florida high school teacher failed the math portion of the state teacher's certification six times. Not like she can count that high anyway. They're threatening to take her job away if she can't manage to pass it on the seventh try. Thinking like a Floridiot, I can see where they would say, hey, what's it matter? She's an English teacher. But you'd think even a Floridiot would appoint someone else who can perhaps count as the secretary-treasurer of their Teacher's Association...
4.24.2003
COMMENTARY - MMORPG's: The final nail in the Geek's social coffin
FACT: Geeks usually suffer from a serious lack of a social life.
FICTION: Playing games online is the best way for geeks to correct this inadequacy.
For those not familiar with the lingo, MMORPG stands for Massively Multiplayer Online Role Playing Game. It's a perpetual online fantasy world, a game that never ends. These games are beginning to come in a variety of flavors, from fantasy to sci-fi to reality based worlds, from role playing to first person shooter styles. It is my belief that games of this nature will single-handedly destroy the geek's hope of ever becoming accepted in the real world.
To the geek, it seems like the perfect solution. A way to interact and have fun with members of the outside world, without having to go to the trouble of leaving their house. Wrong. All you are in fact doing is socializing with other geeks who also think this is the perfect solution to their social shortcomings. Like lobsters in a tank, they only keep pulling each other back to the bottom.
Then the addiction sets in. Soon this fantasy world becomes more real to them than the real world. They play the game with every spare moment of their life, and when they're not actually playing it, they talk about playing it. They start speaking a different language, using some absurd vernacular that has evolved out of their fantasy world. They then cease to socialize with what friends they had in the real world that don't play the game as well, as they are incapable of communicating with them in this new dialect which has become their common tongue. Now not only have their chance at gaining a social life diminished, but they are also destroying what connections they had with the real world to begin with.
Then there's the money sinkhole. This is assuming you haven't quit your job or even had one to begin with, of course. You are shelling out a monthly fee to play these games. Not too big of a deal if you have a decent job, but if you're already working for low pay or not working at all, this is the difference between your own studio apartment and moving back into your parent's basement. It's kinda hard to get a date when you don't have any money to pay for dinner, not to mention it's difficult to seat two on your bicycle, and you can't exactly take her back to your place and expect any privacy with your parents there.
Let's recap. MMORPG's take up all of your free time, limit your social interactions to only those that are also familiar with it, and rob you of all your money. So there you have it. MMORPG's have all of the effects of a woman on a man, without any of the real benefits. Do yourself a favor. Ditch the game, get out into the real world, and find yourself a girlfriend. While you'll be in the same predicament, at least you'll be getting more out of it in return.
4.23.2003
NEWS - Now back to monkey business
Now that all this backend work with the site is done, we can get back to important current events in the news. Yesterday, being Earth Day, Jane Goodall spoke against deforestation at the State Department. "Whoo whoo whoo oogh oogh oogh oogh oogh oogh oogh oogh ooh ooh oooh oooh," Goodall stated before the crowd. Well met, Jane, couldn't have said better myself.
NEWS - More Site Updates
Syn is in, Hot or Not is out.
You may have noticed my site loading insanely slowly over the past week or so. Apparently Blog Hot or Not is out cold. You may remember I had that little script linked from their site showing my current rating on their service. Since their site apparently no longer exists, the script obviously wouldn't load, thus causing the whole table it was in to stall until the script timed out before displaying anything, hence my ridiculous load time. I don't know if or when it's coming back, and frankly I don't care. It's gone now. While I was at it, I also reversed the order in which my page loads, so my content on the right should appear first, followed by the links on the left.
You may have also noticed my new XML button as well. That's right, I now have my own RSS feed. Maintained the good old fashioned way, entirely by hand. It's hard to automate RSS generation on a free service like Blogger, and even if I could I think I'd still favor the anal retentive level of control provided by writing it by hand anyways.
Anyways, that's it for site updates. I think things are looking pretty good now. Time to focus on actually posting again. In other good news, the last missing parts to my PC are shipping and should be here by tomorrow. I may be able to post from home as early as this weekend. Of course I'll probably be too busy playing Tribes again, but that's beside the point...
4.21.2003
REVIEW - MOVIE - "Chicago", aka "Our movie sucks! Quick, take your clothes off."
As a general rule, movies that the critics hold in high regard are the very films I absolutely despise, and the films I really love are the same movies the critics loathe. There is, however, that rare gem of a film on which we can both agree upon. This movie was not one of them. This poor excuse for a musical was really nothing more than 30 minutes of weak plot loosely tied together with the sudden and frequent interjection of similar musical numbers only roughly relating to the current scene in the sub par storyline. One should have a strong case to sue for mental whiplash after watching this film, with it's abrupt stops and starts from storyline to song number and back again. Don't get me wrong, I love a good musical. While good ones have been few and far between the past couple decades, they are still one of my favorite types of movies (behind a good bloody action film, of course). I was thrilled with Moulin Rouge, although I won't deny being skeptical to the point of completely missing the film while it was in theaters. It had been such a long, long time since Hollywood had produced a good musical, I was absolutely certain the film was going to be dreadful. 
Yet I was very pleasantly surprised when I finally did watch it when it came out on video. It is off the steam of its success that I even bothered to see Chicago in the theaters, to which I am now sorely disappointed that I wasted $8 and two hours of my time. Simply put, Chicago completely lacks the proper formula to even be considered a musical by my definition. A musical should have smooth transitions into and out of musical numbers, as I have already stated Chicago painfully lacks. It should seem a surreal world, where it appears perfectly natural for everyone to spontaneously bust into well choreographed song and dance for five minutes and then return to their daily lives as though this was their normal routine. Also, musicals are not solely about the big song and dance numbers. There should be some solos or duets interspersed as well, perhaps some with no dancing at all. I understand why they largely neglected to do this with Chicago however, seeing the general lack of real vocal talent in the cast. Lastly, the musical numbers in a musical should be part of the plot, not a break from it. Perhaps Chicago took too much of an influence from MTV, with the majority of it's musical numbers being nothing more than some flashy nonsense and half naked women. If it weren't for the clever camera work focusing solely on the bare parts of the female dancers through the majority of the film, the audience might have been more aware of the many, many other things the movie totally lacks. I was extremely disappointed with the casting in particular. Catherine Zeta-Jones, the only actor in the film who showed any real singing talent, was shafted with only a couple of songs to herself. Meanwhile the absolutely talentless Renee Zellweger, who ironically enough portrays a young woman who can't break into the entertainment industry because she's a crappy singer and dancer, unfortunately gets the majority of the spotlight. While I didn't think much of Richard Gere's performance either, he did at least have the two most entertaining numbers in the film, the only moments of true inspiration in the whole movie, with the marionette news reporters and the courtroom tap dance scenes. There was also a total lack of diversity in the movie's musical themes. All the songs were of nearly identical style and while musically quite good (minus Zellweger's voice), the film definitely needed a broader range of styles. All in all, this is more what I expected from Hollywood for a modern musical. A piece of crap. It's unfortunate to think that movies like Moulin Rouge will likely become the exception, not the rule, when looking at modern musicals moving forward. It simply takes too much time, money, and effort to make them, and the standard requiring all actors to be able to sing and dance no longer exists, making even finding the talent for such a film far more difficult. I should've just followed my first instinct and saw Bulletproof Monk instead...
Yet I was very pleasantly surprised when I finally did watch it when it came out on video. It is off the steam of its success that I even bothered to see Chicago in the theaters, to which I am now sorely disappointed that I wasted $8 and two hours of my time. Simply put, Chicago completely lacks the proper formula to even be considered a musical by my definition. A musical should have smooth transitions into and out of musical numbers, as I have already stated Chicago painfully lacks. It should seem a surreal world, where it appears perfectly natural for everyone to spontaneously bust into well choreographed song and dance for five minutes and then return to their daily lives as though this was their normal routine. Also, musicals are not solely about the big song and dance numbers. There should be some solos or duets interspersed as well, perhaps some with no dancing at all. I understand why they largely neglected to do this with Chicago however, seeing the general lack of real vocal talent in the cast. Lastly, the musical numbers in a musical should be part of the plot, not a break from it. Perhaps Chicago took too much of an influence from MTV, with the majority of it's musical numbers being nothing more than some flashy nonsense and half naked women. If it weren't for the clever camera work focusing solely on the bare parts of the female dancers through the majority of the film, the audience might have been more aware of the many, many other things the movie totally lacks. I was extremely disappointed with the casting in particular. Catherine Zeta-Jones, the only actor in the film who showed any real singing talent, was shafted with only a couple of songs to herself. Meanwhile the absolutely talentless Renee Zellweger, who ironically enough portrays a young woman who can't break into the entertainment industry because she's a crappy singer and dancer, unfortunately gets the majority of the spotlight. While I didn't think much of Richard Gere's performance either, he did at least have the two most entertaining numbers in the film, the only moments of true inspiration in the whole movie, with the marionette news reporters and the courtroom tap dance scenes. There was also a total lack of diversity in the movie's musical themes. All the songs were of nearly identical style and while musically quite good (minus Zellweger's voice), the film definitely needed a broader range of styles. All in all, this is more what I expected from Hollywood for a modern musical. A piece of crap. It's unfortunate to think that movies like Moulin Rouge will likely become the exception, not the rule, when looking at modern musicals moving forward. It simply takes too much time, money, and effort to make them, and the standard requiring all actors to be able to sing and dance no longer exists, making even finding the talent for such a film far more difficult. I should've just followed my first instinct and saw Bulletproof Monk instead...
4.18.2003
COMMENTARY - Golf spelled backwards is Flog
I dislike sports in general. I think they're dumb. But I don't really have problems with most sports. The jocks can go about doing their athletic thing and people like myself can continue being perfectly content ignoring them. There is, however, one "sport" to which I am morally opposed. Golf. What kind of sport is golf? Any other sport can easily contain itself in it's own field or arena. But no, that's not good enough for golf. It has to span miles to be satisfied. What's more, the entirety of that massive acreage it hordes has to be green. Even if the course is in the middle of an arid desert, these idiots waste millions of gallons of water on grass so they can smack a tiny little ball as far as they can on it. To make this abominable use of property even more wasteful, only one person can actually use a specified chunk of it at any given time. Forget about teams, when someone's about to get their whack at their ball, you better leave them alone. They will tolerate other idiot golfers standing around and respectfully watching, but if you are not a member of their precious little club and they spot you on their turf sans the requisite percentage of plaid in your ensemble, you'll be in for some trouble. It's the only sport I can think of that doesn't like spectators. Also, when I think of sports, I think of physical activity. All there is to golf is swinging a club every so often. Most golfers are such lazy bastards they can't even walk to their ball after they hit it, they have to ride a damn cart. Imagine if they did that in other sports, baseball for example. The batter hits the ball out into left field, hops in his cart, and guns it for first base at 5mph. Ridiculous. A sport that involves no physical activity, no teams, no audience, and takes up miles of space. Does anybody else see something wrong with this?
Of course, I have several suggestions on how to improve the sport. By combining elements of golf with football and NASCAR, we can have a sport to be enjoyed by everyone. First, start out with two teams. Large teams. They will start on opposing sides of the course. The object of the game is to get your golferbacks to the designated tee zones and hit a ball into one of the opposing team's nine holes. The first team to sink all nine opposing goals wins. The sport will involve lots of full-contact roughness, souped up golf carts going 60mph+, and haphazard projectiles. All the things that make sports entertaining. Screw this pansy golf crap.
4.16.2003
NEWS - Site Update
Well, there you go. The new look is up. Much better, eh? I'll customize the commenting script and the search engine and stuff in the next day or two to match, but don't have time right now. Well, drop a note on what you think, or vote in the new poll for the new look. That's it for now.
NEWS - Site Update
According to the recent poll results, 50% of you voted that you would definitely like to see a commenting feature added to my site so you could share your opinions on my opinions. There were no votes against such a feature, however there was an unfortunate 16.7% who opted for "What do I care? Not like I'm coming back to this site again...", to whom I can safely say go rot in hell, since they're not going to be coming back this way to defend themselves anyways. The remaining 33.3% of the votes were interesting enough cast in favor of "Inane isn't a word. You must have misspelled insane." To those individuals, I would like to briefly direct you to Dictionary.com, thank you very much. So without further ado, your commenting script. Simply click on "Hailing Frequencies Opened" at the end of any post and put in your two cents. Then as long as you're being so generous, feel free to toss another two cents at my paypal link. ;-) Oh, and since the overwhelming majority finds my halfassed color scheme hideous, I'll be reworking that today too. I probably won't have time for a substantial post then, so I'll just leave you with another case of Floridiocy, with a sixth grader getting arrested for stomping in a puddle.
4.15.2003
NEWS - Floridiot's Guide to Shoplifting
Attention all small-time criminals hailing from the Sunshine State, please listen carefully! Next time you plan to go out shopping at the five finger discount, be sure to leave your child at home. Also be especially careful that you do not leave behind your infant and diaper bag with enough personal identification in it for you to be tracked down and incarcerated for the additional charge of child neglect on top of shoplifting as you flee the scene of the crime without them. All that for a DVD player...
NEWS - What to do with 30,000 sickly chickens and a couple of wood chippers
Q. What did one old retired hen say to the other? A. My, don't you look chipper today!
Today's feature news story is about as good as they get. A pair of California poultry farmers found themselves with 30,000 unproductive chickens. The hens could no longer lay eggs, and due to a quarantine on the entire county for a poultry virus, they were unable to send the useless birds to a "kill facility" in the northern part of the state to be "properly" disposed of. They sought the consultation of the USDA on the matter, where a senior veterinarian apparently gave them the OK to use the wood chippers to dispose of the birds themselves. The Humane Society obviously threw a fit. The District Attorney's Office however concluded that the charges of animal cruelty would have to be dropped, as the farmers had sought advice from officials first before acting, although they very well may have been ill advised. Our favorite animal rights organization, PETA, is strangely absent from the scene. Perhaps because we're at least not eating the chickens? Anyways, what I find utterly ridiculous about this is, one way or another these chickens are going to die. What does it matter if it's in a wood chipper? Here's a short list of "approved" methods for murdering the birds: Carbon dioxide, gunshot, a projectile through the brain, or breaking their necks. What makes any of these methods any better? Any way you look at it, the chickens are dead. I'd imagine a wood chipper would provide a similar experience of nearly instantaneous death. Plus, you can kill more of them faster, so it's far more efficient than breaking their necks one by one. Are these animal rights activists worried about the chickens dying in pain? Personally, I can't fathom why anybody would be concerned with the electrical impulses from a bird's primitive nervous system to it's pea-sized brain. But if I were, then I think I'd also have issues with some of the "approved" methods too, like blasting them with a shotgun. Yet I don't hear any complaints about that one. I don't hear of any protests outside these "kill facilities". Well, short of PETA making the ridiculous comparison to Nazi death camps. The whole thing doesn't make sense to me. I think I'm gonna go to lunch and ponder this topic over a bucket of KFC.
4.14.2003
COMMENTARY - Tech Support
I hate working on archaic PC's. Being an obvious geek at work gets me a lot of people asking to fix their crappy computers. For some reason I always say yes. Perhaps I think I'll enjoy the challenge. Perhaps I figure this piece of crap will be different than all the other pieces of crap and actually work correctly. Whatever it is, I'm now going to adopt a new policy. I'm going to write a set of minimum system specs by which all future machines I work on will be measured. If a system does not meet these requirements, I will give it a benchmark test which I've named the "high velocity percussive resistance test". This benchmark involves taking a series of mallets to the system and measuring the effects on its ability to boot up. First we start with the rubber mallet. If the system proves resistant to the rubber mallet test, we move on to the rock hammer. If it also passes that test, we bring on the sledgehammer. If the system still boots after completion of the sledgehammer test, I will then fix their PC as requested. Otherwise, I will return their computer, or what's left of it, informing them that "the system was unable to boot after a routine percussive resistance test, due to insufficient minimum system requirements. Purchase of a new computer that isn't a POS model is recommended. Please inform your computer salesman that your last system crashed with an ID10T error. He'll be able to direct you to their Apple selection."
4.10.2003
COMMENTARY - The Laws of Layoffs
Sorry for not posting the other day, they sprung a fourth set of layoffs on us here yesterday. While it only hit about half a dozen people in our particular center, a chunk of the center support team got nailed by it, meaning I had to give up my temporary promotion and return once more to my position as payroll/supply room/mail room/clerk of all trades. Thank God. People have been apologizing to me all day, "Oh, heard about your demotion, that's too bad..." Ha. I knew it was bound to happen anyways, since they made a point to tell me my promotion was temporary to begin with. So I lose about $2/hr. Big deal. I now have a desk three times the size of yours, my work varies, and I'm not chained to my cubicle all day doing the same old boring thing over and over to meet some ridiculous standards. Misery is not worth an extra $2/hr to me. The only downside is my new desk is right outside the Big Cheese's office, meaning I will have to be increasingly careful with my web surfing habits at work. Risky, you say? Nah. After going through so many layoffs here, I have developed a set of rules by which employees are obviously selected for termination. Allow me to share them with you.
1. Don't make yourself invaluable. If you know too much, you might stick out of the crowd enough for someone higher up the corporate ladder to notice and promote you. The very thought of this threat is enough for your immediate supervisor to put your name on the chopping block. Also, some upper management may mistake someone referring to you as invaluable to mean "not valuable", which will also get you canned for sure. So stay with the pack. The tall grass is the first to get cut.
2. Cubicle geography. Do whatever it takes to get your desk in the most densely populated area of the office. When trying to meet required numbers for a corporate layoff, often times management will simply resort to removing people from areas that would make the office more aesthetically pleasing. This generally means just removing everyone from the sparsely populated areas of the building and leaving a core center. So stick close to the pack.
3. Don't be seen with noisy Union members. If you work in a facility represented by any sort of union, you know what I'm talking about. There are always those two or three outspoken individuals who have to cause a ruckus at every meeting and wave their little union flag around, and go about encouraging everyone to file grievances against their employer for anything and everything. Even though there is undoubtedly a clause in your union agreement somewhere protecting union members from being singled out in layoffs, you can be sure that these people will one way or another be getting the axe. Associate too closely with these people, and you too will likely be joining them.
4. Brown nosing is bad. If you are a peon employee, do NOT brown nose. This will not save you. It only makes your name easier to remember when the Angel of Death and Unemployment (times are tough, even he had to take a second job) sweeps through your office. If you're a peon, just stay low and do your work. The perfect place to be is the good employee whose name no one can remember. That way you aren't hit when they cut the slackers or when they just start picking names they know off the top of their heads.
5. Management cliques are good. The only time brown nosing works is if you're in a management position. Find the management clique in your office and find a way to get in it. If you are one of the hardworking managers who comes in early, stays late, works to the best of your ability, and doesn't have the time to socialize, you will certainly be out the door when layoffs come. You need to take a good hour or two out of your day and waste it on chattering with the other managers instead of working to ensure your position.
That's pretty much everything you need to know about not getting laid off. Do your work, but don't do it too well. If you're an outstanding employee, make sure to waste a few hours a day to fall back into the pack. You could use that time to surf the net and look for a new job, just in case I'm wrong...
1. Don't make yourself invaluable. If you know too much, you might stick out of the crowd enough for someone higher up the corporate ladder to notice and promote you. The very thought of this threat is enough for your immediate supervisor to put your name on the chopping block. Also, some upper management may mistake someone referring to you as invaluable to mean "not valuable", which will also get you canned for sure. So stay with the pack. The tall grass is the first to get cut.
2. Cubicle geography. Do whatever it takes to get your desk in the most densely populated area of the office. When trying to meet required numbers for a corporate layoff, often times management will simply resort to removing people from areas that would make the office more aesthetically pleasing. This generally means just removing everyone from the sparsely populated areas of the building and leaving a core center. So stick close to the pack.
3. Don't be seen with noisy Union members. If you work in a facility represented by any sort of union, you know what I'm talking about. There are always those two or three outspoken individuals who have to cause a ruckus at every meeting and wave their little union flag around, and go about encouraging everyone to file grievances against their employer for anything and everything. Even though there is undoubtedly a clause in your union agreement somewhere protecting union members from being singled out in layoffs, you can be sure that these people will one way or another be getting the axe. Associate too closely with these people, and you too will likely be joining them.
4. Brown nosing is bad. If you are a peon employee, do NOT brown nose. This will not save you. It only makes your name easier to remember when the Angel of Death and Unemployment (times are tough, even he had to take a second job) sweeps through your office. If you're a peon, just stay low and do your work. The perfect place to be is the good employee whose name no one can remember. That way you aren't hit when they cut the slackers or when they just start picking names they know off the top of their heads.
5. Management cliques are good. The only time brown nosing works is if you're in a management position. Find the management clique in your office and find a way to get in it. If you are one of the hardworking managers who comes in early, stays late, works to the best of your ability, and doesn't have the time to socialize, you will certainly be out the door when layoffs come. You need to take a good hour or two out of your day and waste it on chattering with the other managers instead of working to ensure your position.
That's pretty much everything you need to know about not getting laid off. Do your work, but don't do it too well. If you're an outstanding employee, make sure to waste a few hours a day to fall back into the pack. You could use that time to surf the net and look for a new job, just in case I'm wrong...
4.08.2003
REVIEW - PS2 - Samurai/Ninja Showdown
During my time off last week, I abused my free rental privileges at Hollywood Video and rented every game I could find involving ninjas or samurais. Due to the current selection they had in stock and in order to keep the number of ninja titles vs. samurai titles even, this showdown will encompass four games. On the ninja side, we have Shinobi and Tenchu: Wrath of Heaven. Fighting for the samurai, we have Way of the Samurai and Kengo: Master of Bushido. I will review each of these titles individually and then compare the results, and the age old question as to which of these two mighty warriors holds superiority will finally be answered. Well, at least when it comes to playing one on a PS2, anyways.
NINJA
Shinobi -- I was not impressed with this game at all. It was amusing for the first level or two, but got really old really fast. If you are a big fan of old school games like Ninja Gaiden, then you will definitely find this game amusing, as it really holds onto that old style of gaming. It's the same style of running through levels and bashing stuff up, objects you destroy flicker and then disappear, and level bosses are ridiculously difficult. There isn't a lot of skill involved with this game, it's all about zipping and jumping around and mashing the attack button, and you'll still die all the time. Also amusing is the "Use Ninjitsu" button, which engulfs Shinobi in a fiery ball of death, killing anything within its radius. Wow. If ninjitsu really did that I'd so learn it. All in all, an amusing game for the first few levels, particularly if you're an old school gamer, but it wears out quickly.
Tenchu: Wrath of Heaven -- Definitely a better game than Shinobi, with added replay value with multiplayer mode. Multiplayer is unfortunately very limited however, with only a single level available initially, and a pretty boring one at that. The most strikingly annoying thing about this game are the cheesy sound effects, with cartoon-ish "ping!" noises when sword fighting and the like. The added element of stealth also makes the game more interesting, and a wide selection of weapons and items you can pick up along the way also add to the fun. Aside from the wider array of weapons though, the game is still quite basic. You are either sneaking around, or mashing an attack button. I'd say it is a fairly good game, but it didn't require much skill.
SAMURAI
Way of the Samurai -- I'll be perfectly honest. I never heard of this game before I picked it up off the shelf. In my search for ninja and samurai related games, it certainly stuck out with a title like that, so I decided to give it a try. And I am SO glad I did. Out of all the titles I picked up last week, this one was definitely my favorite. The game itself is really quite short, but there are half a dozen different endings to it. Your actions in the game determine the direction the plot will go, each to a different ending. This makes for excellent replay value, as you will find yourself playing it over and over again and trying out different things to see what ending you can reach next. On top of that, there are a huge number of swords in the game, each with different styles and attacks. Even after completing all of the endings, which will take quite some time as it is, you will find yourself still playing it over and over again in your search for those cool rare swords. You also gain points for each time you beat it, unlocking additional options and settings, which will also keep you playing. Plus, you can carry over your swords from one game to the next, so you don't lose those cool blades. This game also has the most sophisticated battle system out of any of the games in this review. If you like button mashers, you will be slaughtered in this game. You have to carefully balance style, timing, attacking, blocking, parrying, and dodging in order to be successful. Yet even with all this, the controls remain simple and intuitive. The sound effects are also quite good, adding to the intensity of your battles. I do have one complaint about this game. The learning curve is fairly steep, particularly in comparison to the rest of the games in this roundup. You will die often in the beginning, and it will not be until a good three or four attempts after the tutorial that you really get the hang of it. It can be rather frustrating in the beginning, as you have to start all over again if you die, and you lose any blades you were carrying at the time. This will not be as great of a concern once you get the hang of the fighting controls and learn where all the food is located so you can regain your health. There is also a multiplayer feature, in a classic fighting game style, which is somewhat amusing and a good way to hone your skills, but not nearly as entertaining as single player.
Kengo: Master of Bushido -- Another title I had never really heard of, but picked up anyways. Again, I'm glad I did. It's something of a fighting game with RPG elements. You start out as a student living at a dojo to learn the ways of the samurai. You go through various training exercises and practice matches to increase your stats and hone your skills. Once you have successfully mastered the exercises at your dojo, you can then go on to compete against other schools, raising your stats and earning new attacks and swords. You can eventually compete in an Imperial tournament, defeat your own master, and become head of the dojo yourself, defending your honor against challenging students such as you once were. The real beauty of this game comes in customizing your attack styles. As you play, you will learn new moves, which you can then piece together into your own custom attacks to use in battle. Also, each sword you pick up has a different special attack, so you can spend quite some time collecting and experimenting with them as well. This game also has the best multiplayer support out of all the titles in this roundup. If you and a friend each have a character developed in single player mode, you can face off against each other in multiplayer, or just play with one of the other characters from the game using their predefined styles and forgoing the customized attacks. This game also is not without its faults though. There is a total lack of music, which some might find disappointing, however I felt it added to the atmosphere. The thing that did bug me though, were some really cheesy sound effects. The blades clashing and slashing sounded solid, but the vocalizations of the warriors were rather weak, and there are some horrendously annoying background sounds on some of the levels. Also, you have to repetitively practice the same training exercises over and over in order to raise your stats until they eventually max out, which can get rather monotonous.
The score is plainly obvious. Ninjas: 0, Samurais: 2. But you don't have to take my word for it. Check them out for yourself. You too will soon find the obvious superiority of the Samurai.
NINJA
Shinobi -- I was not impressed with this game at all. It was amusing for the first level or two, but got really old really fast. If you are a big fan of old school games like Ninja Gaiden, then you will definitely find this game amusing, as it really holds onto that old style of gaming. It's the same style of running through levels and bashing stuff up, objects you destroy flicker and then disappear, and level bosses are ridiculously difficult. There isn't a lot of skill involved with this game, it's all about zipping and jumping around and mashing the attack button, and you'll still die all the time. Also amusing is the "Use Ninjitsu" button, which engulfs Shinobi in a fiery ball of death, killing anything within its radius. Wow. If ninjitsu really did that I'd so learn it. All in all, an amusing game for the first few levels, particularly if you're an old school gamer, but it wears out quickly.
Tenchu: Wrath of Heaven -- Definitely a better game than Shinobi, with added replay value with multiplayer mode. Multiplayer is unfortunately very limited however, with only a single level available initially, and a pretty boring one at that. The most strikingly annoying thing about this game are the cheesy sound effects, with cartoon-ish "ping!" noises when sword fighting and the like. The added element of stealth also makes the game more interesting, and a wide selection of weapons and items you can pick up along the way also add to the fun. Aside from the wider array of weapons though, the game is still quite basic. You are either sneaking around, or mashing an attack button. I'd say it is a fairly good game, but it didn't require much skill.
SAMURAI
Way of the Samurai -- I'll be perfectly honest. I never heard of this game before I picked it up off the shelf. In my search for ninja and samurai related games, it certainly stuck out with a title like that, so I decided to give it a try. And I am SO glad I did. Out of all the titles I picked up last week, this one was definitely my favorite. The game itself is really quite short, but there are half a dozen different endings to it. Your actions in the game determine the direction the plot will go, each to a different ending. This makes for excellent replay value, as you will find yourself playing it over and over again and trying out different things to see what ending you can reach next. On top of that, there are a huge number of swords in the game, each with different styles and attacks. Even after completing all of the endings, which will take quite some time as it is, you will find yourself still playing it over and over again in your search for those cool rare swords. You also gain points for each time you beat it, unlocking additional options and settings, which will also keep you playing. Plus, you can carry over your swords from one game to the next, so you don't lose those cool blades. This game also has the most sophisticated battle system out of any of the games in this review. If you like button mashers, you will be slaughtered in this game. You have to carefully balance style, timing, attacking, blocking, parrying, and dodging in order to be successful. Yet even with all this, the controls remain simple and intuitive. The sound effects are also quite good, adding to the intensity of your battles. I do have one complaint about this game. The learning curve is fairly steep, particularly in comparison to the rest of the games in this roundup. You will die often in the beginning, and it will not be until a good three or four attempts after the tutorial that you really get the hang of it. It can be rather frustrating in the beginning, as you have to start all over again if you die, and you lose any blades you were carrying at the time. This will not be as great of a concern once you get the hang of the fighting controls and learn where all the food is located so you can regain your health. There is also a multiplayer feature, in a classic fighting game style, which is somewhat amusing and a good way to hone your skills, but not nearly as entertaining as single player.
Kengo: Master of Bushido -- Another title I had never really heard of, but picked up anyways. Again, I'm glad I did. It's something of a fighting game with RPG elements. You start out as a student living at a dojo to learn the ways of the samurai. You go through various training exercises and practice matches to increase your stats and hone your skills. Once you have successfully mastered the exercises at your dojo, you can then go on to compete against other schools, raising your stats and earning new attacks and swords. You can eventually compete in an Imperial tournament, defeat your own master, and become head of the dojo yourself, defending your honor against challenging students such as you once were. The real beauty of this game comes in customizing your attack styles. As you play, you will learn new moves, which you can then piece together into your own custom attacks to use in battle. Also, each sword you pick up has a different special attack, so you can spend quite some time collecting and experimenting with them as well. This game also has the best multiplayer support out of all the titles in this roundup. If you and a friend each have a character developed in single player mode, you can face off against each other in multiplayer, or just play with one of the other characters from the game using their predefined styles and forgoing the customized attacks. This game also is not without its faults though. There is a total lack of music, which some might find disappointing, however I felt it added to the atmosphere. The thing that did bug me though, were some really cheesy sound effects. The blades clashing and slashing sounded solid, but the vocalizations of the warriors were rather weak, and there are some horrendously annoying background sounds on some of the levels. Also, you have to repetitively practice the same training exercises over and over in order to raise your stats until they eventually max out, which can get rather monotonous.
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The score is plainly obvious. Ninjas: 0, Samurais: 2. But you don't have to take my word for it. Check them out for yourself. You too will soon find the obvious superiority of the Samurai.
4.07.2003
COMMENTARY - How to take down laser tag cheaters without breaking the rules yourself.
I love laser tag. It's one of my favorite pastimes. Yeah, paintball is fun too, but with laser tag you don't have to buy any expensive equipment, and you don't typically walk away with welts. Everyone is on an even playing field with laser tag. With paintball, you are most likely going to be slaughtered with your cheesy rental handgun against the guy owning the custom $3000 paintball sniper rifle. With laser tag, everyone has the same equipment. Sure, you have the sucky players who say their gun wasn't working properly, their laser was misaligned, their hits weren't registering, blah blah blah, which is only very rarely true, but all in all everyone's equipment is identical. The one great fault of laser tag, however, is the unfortunate ease with which players can cheat. In paintball, there's no denying the glob of paint smacked over your face. You're hit. You're out. In laser tag, players have come up with a number of ingenious and frustrating tactics to cover their targets and thwart opposing players trying to shoot them. I spent a night out playing laser tag over the weekend, and got four rounds in. The first three rounds, I placed a solid first. (NOTE: This is largely due to the fact that the arena I frequent has recently cleared out half of it's arcade and turned it into a small concert venue for local bands, which has become a hub for the 14-17 year old crowd that can't go to real concerts, and has generated a rather congested, noisy environment swarming with annoying adolescents. This has apparently frightened off the majority of the geeky laser tag arena's members, whose only social interaction previously consisted of taking several hours away from playing Counterstrike in the depths of their Mom's basement to shoot people only somewhat more realistically with lasers in a large dark room. These geeks often referred to this practice as "exercise". Without the fanatic geek members present though, there's nothing in the way between me and first place.) However, with the fourth and final round, a large party of high school aged guys showed up to join the fray. I managed to eek out a second place finish, several thousand points behind first and a mere 30 points above third. This had nothing to do with superior skill. Only less respect for the rules. I have never been in a single game with more rampant cheating in my life, and am surprised I finished as well as I did. It was absolutely the most frustrating game I have ever played. After the night was finished though, I got to thinking of ways to thwart these cheaters without sinking to their level. I believe the game should be played with honor and respect for the rules, regardless of the other players' actions. Yet at the same time, these delinquents need to be brought to justice. So here are some of the solutions I have come up with.
Runners. In every laser tag arena I've ever been in, running has been against the rules. In a poorly lit maze, running around at high speed is a surefire way to smack into objects or other players, injuring yourself and those around you. Many cheaters do not heed this warning. So obviously the easiest way to take care of a runner is to trip them to remind them why this rule exists in the first place. If you're lucky, they may sprain something on their way down, or even knock themselves out, and the cheater will be removed from the remainder of the round and possibly the rest of the night as well. However, direct physical contact with other players is generally also against the rules, so in light of this technicality a tripwire is better employed. If you didn't happen to bring a length of rope with you, try unplugging your gun from your vest and use the cord across a hallway to fit this purpose.
Duckers. Also typically against laser tag rules is ducking or crawling on the ground. Out of all the types of cheating, I have the least problems with this one. After all, what's wrong with a 7 foot tall guy crouching and presenting the same target as one of the 3 foot ankle biters running around the arena? The only reason this rule is really in place is to prevent people from being shot in the eye with a laser, which in actuality isn't really a concern anyways, since the lasers are too low level to cause any damage to begin with. For this reason I often don't bother with duckers, and on rare occasion will violate this rule myself. However if some ducker is pissing you off by holing up in a corner and blindly shooting over a wall or something dumb like that, simply remind him of why ducking is against the rules. You could try shooting him repeatedly in the face, but it is far more effective to bring a laser pen with you and fire a constant beam into his retina while he's crouching there like the little cheater he is. He will be too distracted to continue his firing over the wall, and will likely get pissed at you in short order and come charging after you, at which point you have successfully flushed him out.
Cloakers. These are the punks who bring an extra shirt and cover their vest targets, or hole up in a corner and remove their vest entirely, letting it sit on the floor while they shoot freely over a wall. This is by far the most despicable form of cheating known to laser tag, and is what cost me my first place finish in that fourth game. The way to combat this is fairly difficult, and you have to be fairly proficient at disconnecting network cables to pull it off effectively. Most laser tag arenas make the guns easy to disconnect from the vests in order to facilitate easy swapping of broken units. The guns break far more often than the vests, so it makes more sense to just swap out the damaged part rather than replace the whole unit. This is typically done using an RJ45 connection, like your standard network cable. This connection allows you to deny these cheaters the ability to shoot others the same as they are denying others the ability to shoot them, by running up and disconnecting their guns. To be really effective though, you have to either swipe the gun entirely, or get both ends of the cable, so he's either left with no gun, or no cable to connect his gun. If you leave him with the gun and cable, he can always reconnect it, and you will have only slowed him down by about 15 seconds. It's even easier to nail the cheaters that remove their packs entirely. Again, disconnect their cable, but instead of trying to rob them of their cable or their gun, just take their whole pack, since it's just lying there on the floor. You can then dump it somewhere else in the arena, or if you want to really get them and don't have any qualms about cheating a little bit yourself to do so, toss their vest on top of yours and use it as a shield. Now you can still shoot people with your gun, but anyone shooting you will now be shooting the cheater's vest instead. Be sure to shoot the cheater's vest yourself as often as possible as well.
These are really the main forms of cheating I encounter. If you attend an arena with one handed guns you will also undoubtedly run into the "grab-and-shooters", who will grab your gun with one hand and point it away, while they shoot you in the chest with the other. I got tired of that trick. For that reason I only frequent arenas that require both hands on the gun to fire, via a heat sensor on the barrel. And camping, while cheap, is still perfectly legal. The only way to prevent players from holing up in certain spots in the arena is for the arena's layout to not provide any good spots to do so, which is virtually impossible to do. At any rate, if the arena you attend seems to turn a blind eye to these cheaters, take matters into your own hands and change the cheater into the victim.
Runners. In every laser tag arena I've ever been in, running has been against the rules. In a poorly lit maze, running around at high speed is a surefire way to smack into objects or other players, injuring yourself and those around you. Many cheaters do not heed this warning. So obviously the easiest way to take care of a runner is to trip them to remind them why this rule exists in the first place. If you're lucky, they may sprain something on their way down, or even knock themselves out, and the cheater will be removed from the remainder of the round and possibly the rest of the night as well. However, direct physical contact with other players is generally also against the rules, so in light of this technicality a tripwire is better employed. If you didn't happen to bring a length of rope with you, try unplugging your gun from your vest and use the cord across a hallway to fit this purpose.
Duckers. Also typically against laser tag rules is ducking or crawling on the ground. Out of all the types of cheating, I have the least problems with this one. After all, what's wrong with a 7 foot tall guy crouching and presenting the same target as one of the 3 foot ankle biters running around the arena? The only reason this rule is really in place is to prevent people from being shot in the eye with a laser, which in actuality isn't really a concern anyways, since the lasers are too low level to cause any damage to begin with. For this reason I often don't bother with duckers, and on rare occasion will violate this rule myself. However if some ducker is pissing you off by holing up in a corner and blindly shooting over a wall or something dumb like that, simply remind him of why ducking is against the rules. You could try shooting him repeatedly in the face, but it is far more effective to bring a laser pen with you and fire a constant beam into his retina while he's crouching there like the little cheater he is. He will be too distracted to continue his firing over the wall, and will likely get pissed at you in short order and come charging after you, at which point you have successfully flushed him out.
Cloakers. These are the punks who bring an extra shirt and cover their vest targets, or hole up in a corner and remove their vest entirely, letting it sit on the floor while they shoot freely over a wall. This is by far the most despicable form of cheating known to laser tag, and is what cost me my first place finish in that fourth game. The way to combat this is fairly difficult, and you have to be fairly proficient at disconnecting network cables to pull it off effectively. Most laser tag arenas make the guns easy to disconnect from the vests in order to facilitate easy swapping of broken units. The guns break far more often than the vests, so it makes more sense to just swap out the damaged part rather than replace the whole unit. This is typically done using an RJ45 connection, like your standard network cable. This connection allows you to deny these cheaters the ability to shoot others the same as they are denying others the ability to shoot them, by running up and disconnecting their guns. To be really effective though, you have to either swipe the gun entirely, or get both ends of the cable, so he's either left with no gun, or no cable to connect his gun. If you leave him with the gun and cable, he can always reconnect it, and you will have only slowed him down by about 15 seconds. It's even easier to nail the cheaters that remove their packs entirely. Again, disconnect their cable, but instead of trying to rob them of their cable or their gun, just take their whole pack, since it's just lying there on the floor. You can then dump it somewhere else in the arena, or if you want to really get them and don't have any qualms about cheating a little bit yourself to do so, toss their vest on top of yours and use it as a shield. Now you can still shoot people with your gun, but anyone shooting you will now be shooting the cheater's vest instead. Be sure to shoot the cheater's vest yourself as often as possible as well.
These are really the main forms of cheating I encounter. If you attend an arena with one handed guns you will also undoubtedly run into the "grab-and-shooters", who will grab your gun with one hand and point it away, while they shoot you in the chest with the other. I got tired of that trick. For that reason I only frequent arenas that require both hands on the gun to fire, via a heat sensor on the barrel. And camping, while cheap, is still perfectly legal. The only way to prevent players from holing up in certain spots in the arena is for the arena's layout to not provide any good spots to do so, which is virtually impossible to do. At any rate, if the arena you attend seems to turn a blind eye to these cheaters, take matters into your own hands and change the cheater into the victim.
NEWS - I'm back!
Please, try to contain your excitement, it's overwhelming. It would appear my weblog can maintain a small level of traffic on its own even in my absence, although it also appears that I've received some rather negative feedback while on vacation as well. My blog rating dropped from *gasp* 9.9 to 9.8, and it seems a good number of people responded to my poll with the opinion that my site layout is hideous. Ah well. That's soon to change anyways. As soon as I finish building my stupid computer. The Fates seem eternally against me in my endeavor to own my own PC though. Nevertheless, it is rumored that my missing parts are shipping, and the appropriate amount of money is now missing from my account, however I am lacking any sort of tracking number and am somewhat wary about taking MStar for their word. We'll see in the next day or two if the parts show up. Until then, I'm sitting on a computer with just enough missing parts to make it absolutely useless. Despite the continuing frustration of trying to get my computer built, I will be posting as usual this week. In fact, my vacation has provided me with a few new thoughts to post. Be looking for my first one later today, on what to do with laser tag cheaters.
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