John Woo on Metroid? Now there’s a film that really never needs to see the light of day. What’s next? Tony Scott’s Excitebike? Oliver Stone’s Kid Icarus?
Tag: Gaming
Examine Nunnery.
Though this be madness, yet there is method in’t. By way of my sis-in-law Lotta, the Hamlet text adventure game. How cool is this? I look forward to playing it through once I finish up my freelance work. Here’s a tip…don’t jump out of Ophelia’s window. Update: Ok, I got distracted and went ahead and beat the game. It’s pretty clever, except for one really dumb and annoying puzzle that involves screaming a word in a theater. I used the hint to beat it…and the author basically admits that he intended it that way. Oh well, other than that one hiccup, it’s great text-adventure fun.
Standoff in Alphaville.
As the recent banishment of a newspaperman suggests, the small towns of The Sims Online are less George Bailey than Old Man Potter. So does this make them more or less realistic? And what does Curt Schilling think?
Coming Up Aces.
With Celebrity Poker Showdown beginning tonight, CNN examines the recent rise in televised card games. Hey, I’m all for it.
Raise Ya a J-Lo.
They announced it a few months ago, but I only saw the ad for Bravo’s Celebrity Poker Showdown yesterday. December 2nd, baby…I’m so there.
Ender’s Games.
For you gamers out there, Day of Defeat 1.1 was released last night (over Steam.) I suspect it will conspire with Civilization 3.2 (Conquests), which I picked up while Christmas shopping today, to tempt me away from my increasingly necessary orals reading. A WWII FPS and a dominate-the-world strategy game counts as time spent historicizing, doesn’t it?
Fire in the Hole.
The source code of the much-anticipated Halflife 2 is stolen and pirated online, knocking back its release until April 2004. Hmm, that’s very annoying, and particularly if, as feared, the leak allows unsavory types to exploit further the myriad holes in Valve’s new STEAM launcher. As it is, the DoD servers I admin for are being overrun anew with h4x0rs, teamkillers, and other FPS annoyances, who’ve all received a new lease on life in the shift from WONID to STEAM. I shudder to think what will happen if the smartest of the bunch get their hands on the code and find ways to hack directly into players’ PCs.
Death of the Party.
More good news on the gaming tip – Apparently, gamers aren’t only more spatially aware, they’re social multitaskers, too. All this validation for gamers is going to end up getting me in trouble…the last thing I need right now is another Civ binge.
Pac-Man, Lay off the Dots.
An Albany congressman proposes a “fat tax” on junk food, video games, and TV commercials to combat NY’s growing obesity rate. Thinking outside the box, I suppose, but where would this end? There are very few items in American life these days that don’t contribute to obesity, so it seems a bit harsh to pin the blame on Grand Theft Auto.
Better Living through Death.
Meant to blog this last week but forgot: FPS games increase brainpower. Experienced players of these games are 30 percent to 50 percent better than nonplayers at taking in everything that happens around them…They identify objects in their peripheral vision, perceiving numerous objects without having to count them, switch attention rapidly and track many items at once. Glad to hear my endless logged hours of Day of Defeat have not gone to waste. And considering I rented Enter the Matrix over the weekend and spent an unhealthy amount of time beating it, I must be operating on a Zen plane right now.