Lesson Learned

Okay I learned my lesson.  I will not tag my blog with the words “Blackberry” or “iPhone” anymore.  I got 30 new comments and all were spam.  Thanks Internet!

-Mike

thought I was popular there

iBerry?

According to the interwebz my Motorola RAZR V3xx l-m-n-o-p cell phone has a little quark.  When the SMS inbox reaches a certain point (around the 400-ish mark) it changes all SMS messages to MMS.  This weird little glitch is the final nail in the coffin for this phone.  I have been toying with getting a new phone for a while now and now it just became a necessity.  I have seen an uptick in my texting (hence the inbox glitch) and I really want a full QWERTY keyboard.  This pressing the “2″ key three times to get the letter “C” is for the birds!

And from there it snowballs.  A really web browser would be really nice.  My RAZR has what AT&T calls web access, but it’s bull!  A camera would be nice, but no phone has a good camera.  So I back to where I started before.  I’m not changing carriers.  I’ll agree that AT&T is one step above the spawn of Satan, but better the devil you know.  Over all, I have been pretty pleased with their service (unlike Nextel).

The Blackberry Curve or the iPhone are my two front runners.  The iPhone has been getting a lot of flack and I’m not above jumping on the Apple Hate Wagon, but the Curve has it’s issues too.  The big thing that was holding me back in the Data plans.  From what I can tell each one requires a $30 a month data plan and that doesn’t include text messages.  WTF?  Are those bytes different?  The whole thing screams rip off to me.

I hate the idea, but I need to look into this more.  Ugh.

-Mike

run around

Wanted: Wheelman

Thursdays being the one day of the week where I don’t have to be anywhere special, I typically sleep in and get caught up on where ever I neglected so far that week.  Today was that “neglected” thing was my Xbox and it had a few surprises in store for me.  The demo’s for Wanted and Wheelman were ready to download.

I played Wheelman first and I liked it.  After playing the first mission, my Pontiac G6 could barely keep it’s wheels on.  The game play was fast and fun.  The mechanics of the shooting were hard to grasp at first, but not too hard.  Using the right analog stick to slam into other cars was way more fun then it should be.  Like any game, there is a learning curve.  I found myself slamming into damn near everything.  Shooting and driving hard to do at the same time.  Then came the cut seance.

Look, Vin Diesel is not a bad actor.  I have enjoyed a few of movies.  But it doesn’t translate over in this game.  Who ever rendered his body either had Mr Diesel standing over him the entire time, or has some inappropriate feelings toward him.  He was rendered at the Capcom School of Make Video Game Character Design.  He looks ridiculous.  And the voice over for him and the female character down right awful.  The only other thing I have a problem with is the three minute limit on one of the missions.  Add the fact you can only play it three times, you only get nine whole minutes to play the game.  STOP IT!  Stop putting time limits on game demos.  I’ll admit, I only played it once.  That was all I needed.

On to Wanted.  I saw the movie, but never read the comic.  I’m a nerd, but not that much.  I liked the movie enough.  The game showed some promise.  The training missions were short and to the point, and completely optional.  Now, there are some good idea here.  Sure bullet time is like anti lock brakes, every game has to have it.  But it works.  You can’t just slow mo the entire game.  You have to build it up.  The aiming is not so good.  You’ll miss, a lot and lining up shots from behind cover is damn near impossible.  It does make it more realistic.  If you’re behind cover you really can’t see what’s happening.  But more realism from a game where you can CURVE A BULLET is complete garbage.  Also, it falls into the hundred shades of dirt that the Unreal Engine can pull off.  It’s dark, dirty and overly unimpressive.  Another peeve I have is, at one point your fighting on an airplane but you are limited to moving in the aisle and larger open areas.  Your character can’t move down each row of seats to get around obstacles.  I found it a tad annoying.

Bottom line, both games good, but not great.   Wheelman is fun, but the voice acting is subpar and I’m sure the plot will be a snore.  Wanted has some good ideas but the graphics were good for 2 years ago.  And I’m not sure but I think the voice actor had a differnt actcent from the intro to the ingame seances.  Granted, this could change between now and the actual release, but I’m still not going to buy either one.

-Mike

is that it?

No Time Like the Now

It’s only Tuesday?!  This week is taking too long.  After close to 6 months of not playing Call of Duty 4, I dropped the disc into the Xbox. I played a few missions to get back into the swing of things and then hit up the multiplayer. It didn’t take long to get my sea legs back, but damn was I rusty. I should have left it alone, but who am I kidding.  It’s cathartic.  I’m still amazed at how good some people get at it.  Really?  What do you people do all day?  Jezz.

Tonight I pick up my programing test that I took last week. I think I did alright, but that has come back to bite me in the ass.  The test not easy per say, but not hard at all.  I really like the class, but I wish there was more programing and less theory study.

With St. Patties day coming up my buddy wants to do St. Baldrick’s for charity this year. I’m going to do it. I’ve never shaved my head before, but it’s for a good cause. I think I’ll have to purchase a nice warm hat just in case.

-Mike

chrome dome

Netflix looks into Crystal Ball, likes what it sees

The times, they are a changing.  Think about, it all started back in the age of Napster.  College kids across the world would download their music for free with reckless abandon.  Then came the crack down.  TheRIAA put a stop to that fun (or so they wish).  Now the intertubz are bigger and badder.  Music is kid stuff, movies and video is where it’s at.  P2P is the new public enemy #1.  At least to theRIAA, news flash RIAA you’re losing…bad!  Now one would hope that the Movie Industry and the other Video Content Makers would learn a lesson from theRIAA.

That lesson:
You either live by the web or die by the web.

These newer tech companies see that.  Netflix, Hulu, and Youtube get it!  But the industry they are partnered with doesn’t.  Partnerships and syndication agreements muddy these waters way too much.  Here’s another lesson:  Make it easy, or risk losing…everything.

Here’s what I mean by that.  As a consumer, I enjoy visual media.  I have certain TV shows I watch and movie I want to see.  Good old fashion TV is great. DVR’s have made missing shows a thing of the past.  But these cost money.  Currently I don’t have one.  It’s a luxury I simply can’t afford.  But wait, theInternet has become more of a necessity then a luxury.  I can do a lot more with an Internet connection then I can with DVR.  Now I can get my content in a couple of ways.  I can hit up Hulu for the last episode of Life that I missed because I was in class.  I can go to Netflix and watch the entire series of The A-Team when I feel nostalgic.

What we are seeing is a paradigm shift in the way people get the things they want.  Now some of these companies are scared.  They should be.  They need to evolve with the times.  If people can’t get the content they want, they’ll find a way.  I don’t advocate theft here.  I buy my music and rent myDVD’s (or stream).  But what I have run into is best described at kind of a bait and switch.  One minute I can get something and the next I can’t.  Why?  I wish I knew for sure, but I can tell you this.  If I can’t get it from the that source, I know I can get it else where.  They may not like it, but that is the fact of the matter.  I could watch the last episode of Chuck on Surf the Channel for free with no adds if I wanted to, but I go toHulu.  I like it.  It works.

Netflix is looking into a strait streaming rate plan.  I’m sure they saw it coming, they had to.  It only makes sense.  They just need the content creators to get on board.  The NBC’s and HBO’s of the world could make this work for them.  Get this, the easier they make it for the consumer the more money they’ll make.  Trust me, that is going to win this for who ever does it better.  My gut is telling me that 2009 is going to see more changes then just ones promised by our President.  So gofigure this out guys.  Oh yeah, monthly subscription fees are a bad idea too.

-Mike

now we play the waiting game