Yesterware

The Final Fantasy series has enjoyed it's immense longevity for much the same reason that most other heavily-sequelized franchises tend to fade away into obscurity. No two Final Fantasy games are ever really alike. They're not even usually set in the same universe/reality as each other, but they do share some common elements - Chocobos, Moogles, people named Cid (FFXII actually has two!) etc... That being said, XII does not disappoint with its fresh perspective on console-based RPG gameplay, and thorough rejuvination of the Final Fantasy brand. Personally I prefer traditional console RPG's and it really gets my blood boiling when some reviewer starts criticizing a game for being traditional (see pretty much any review for the phenominal Dragon Quest VIII). And I would have liked to see a return to some of the older conventions in the FF universe - random encounters, four character (all at once) parties, stories surrounding crystals. Although FFXII doesn't really ha...

It's almost frightening how may parallels there are between the XBOX360 vs. PS3 battle and the Dreamcast vs. PS2 battle. Consider the following RELEASE Dreamcast vs. PS2: Dreamcast is released a full year before the PS2. Sony steals some of Dreamcast's thunder by releasing detailed specs for the PS2 days before the Dreamcast's 9/9/99 launch, thereby making the PS2 a little more real in the customers' eyes and causing some consumers to decide to wait for the spec-superior hardware. 360 vs. PS3: 360 is released a full year before PS3. Sony starts its thunder stealing in May by releasing detailed quasi-final specs on the PS3 to coincide with when stores start taking 360 preorders. Many consumers vow to wait for the PS3, confused at the 6 vs. 18 month difference. BACKWARDS COMPATIBILITY Dreamcast vs. PS2: Sony vows PS2 fully backwards compatible with PS1. Dreamcast is not backwards compatible with Saturn or Sega CD. In practice this is a minor issue as most people w...

Make no mistake, on November 17th I'll be plunking down $600 for one of these monstrosities, but that's because I'm a technology addict. I'm not going to be recommending this purchase to any of my friends. Sony's arrogance has reached unbelievable proportions. They attempt to hawk UMD movies which often cost more than the same movie on DVD and are less useful as they have lower resolution and can only be played on a PSP. Despite the fact that most retailers won't even carry the poor-selling movies, they still declare the format a success. They are poised to do the same thing with Blu-Ray as with UMD. The only reason we have a Blu-Ray format is because Sony refused to defer to the judgment of the larger consortium of manufacturers and studios who chose HD-DVD instead. They have set an obscene price point for the PS3, and have attempted to justify it by comparing PS3 to a meal at a fine resturant vs the competition which is fast. They seem to have designed the ...

www.transformerslive.com has become www.transformersmovie.com and they have posted a new teaser trailer dubbed an "exclusive announcement". It has been roughly a year since the movie was officially announced, and it looks like production is well on schedule. Some cast announcements have been made and it looks like they've respectfully reworked the Transformers logo, making some cosmetic changes over the original 1985 logo, but leaving it mostly intact. That gives me hope that this movie will be based more heavily on the original Transformers characters rather than one of the dozen other series' that have followed in its steps. Some things are almost a given - there practically has to be an Optimus Prime and a Megatron - very few Transformers series' have existed without at least some version of those two. My wishlist for this movie: Peter Cullen and Frank Welker doing the voices again. Bumblebee Soundwave as a stereo It's probably too much to ask, but I c...

…Fox News after midnight repeats the same crap so often it's worse than being forced to count the Coke Logo's for the 43rd time while you wait for your movie to start. ...the Google "current" channel is comprised of the trifecta of softcore porn affectionately labeled "National Geographic-type nudity", newslike segments singing the praises of group sex, and animated cartoons so offensive that they make Southpark look like the Care Bears. ...how to perform maintenance on a Compaq 1850-R server using a letter opener, my fingernails and a pocket knife. ...someone has developed ( I am not making this up ) a urinal that functions as a video game controller. ...Reggie Fils-Aime is not only a member of Nintendo of America, he's also the president. (Well he is now, anyway.) ...No one really knows what the new 2007 Camaro will look like. ...That it's okay to delete the contents of /var/tmp/portage and /tmp . ...That Microsoft almost bought Ebay. ...Not to a...

I saw two movies this weekend, but I'm only writing a review for one of them. A local theater specializes in obscure and older movies and was playing the first Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. That was the most fun I've had at a movie since the Lord of the Rings trilogy night. 99% of the audience already knew the movie forwards and backwards, there was cheering and shouts of "We love you Master Splinter!" Someone started humming Darth Vader's theme music when Shredder made his dramatic entrance, and Chief Sterns was immediately compared to Chief Wiggam from the Simpsons - half of the audience shouted a nasally "Nyaa" every time he was on screen. It's a classic that still holds its own - which is more than I can say for its sequels. But on to the other movie I saw: The Davinci Code This movie was somewhat of a disappointment in numerous respects. On several occasions, people have recommended the book to me, but I never got around to reading it. Aft...

It's been six days with nowhere to sit down in my house. My feet are still sore from standing up for 10 hours at a stretch. I've gone through 16 AA batteries to take nearly 1200 pictures. My dog and cat probably want to kill me for completely disrupting the order of my household. Thankfully my wife was just as excited to see just how much video game crap I have accumulated over the last 11 years as I was. I had no earthly idea how large and time-consuming that this project would become when I first decided to do it last week. But it sure feels good to get it done. Here are a couple of highlights of my collection. My complete collection of Working Designs games: My Final Fantasy VII Launch T-Shirt: My PS2 Linux Kit: My Grandia Cloth Map: I'm writing a database to archive my collection in OpenOffice.org Base, but for a little instant gratification, I put up a simple php gallery viewable here: Paladin's Game Collection It's not on the fastest server in the world,...

I saw a contest over at luv2game.com where users were encouraged to post pictures of their game collections. I saw one or two of impressive size, but I found myself thinking "that's pretty big, but mine's bigger." I've been collecting games since around 1995. I actually got my first game system back in 1989 but for reasons I won't get into, I started at basically 0 in 1995. I've been amassing this collection for some time, but I realized that I had never actually seen it in one place at one time, so I had this brilliant idea - my wife and I would create a visual archive of the collection. Three days into the project, I realize that it was much easier said than done. I have stashes all over the house, intertwined with Pokemon and Transformer collections. My back is sore, I've lost sleep three nights in a row; man this is hard work! Here is the state that my theater room finds itself in:

With all of the recent publicity Tom Cruise has been getting over his choice of fiancees and his aggressive pursuit of the futuristic Scientology religion, I thought it would be hard to separate Tom Cruise from the role he plays as Ethan Hunt. But once the action started...Tom Who? Gone is the stylized ultra-slick Metallica rendition of the Mission Impossible theme from MI:II, Ethan Hunt's cavalier attitudes about women, and motorcycle kung-fu. I couldn't help but be reminded of Lethal Weapon 4's approach to a maturing franchise, as the story opens with Ethan trying to finally settle down and start a family, taking a back seat at the IMF as a trainer. And of course, this is not to last. This movie really packs a lot of punch, bombarding you with intense action scenes as well as gut-wrenching drama. You'll hate the bad guys and cheer the good guys - provided you can figure out who is who. As any fan of the series should expect, it's filled with plot twists and false ...

A little more than seven years ago when the first Silent Hill game was released for the Playstation, curiosity and hype drove me to to rent it. As a rule, I don't generally go in for "survival horror" games. Resident Evil had failed to capture my interest in all but the most technical aspects. I remember being told by magazine reviewers that this game was extremely frightening and unnerving at times, but I didn't really believe it until I sat down and started playing it. The first 10 minutes of the game were some of the most mortifying that I have ever spent with a controller in my hand. The developers of this game really knew how to get under your skin and keep you jumping at shadows. I finished Silent Hill in one night - eager to bring the whole thing to some sort of closure so I could sleep a little easier. I have never picked up any of the Silent Hill sequels, but if they're anything like the first one, I'm sure they're intimately frightening. When I s...