Oh gee look at that! I wonder how I got it?


:)

I tried for about ten minutes to think of a way to talk about the Anthrax show last night, but unfortunately all the words that came to mind are inappropriate for the internets.

Needless to say it was awesome.

Also, the only force in the world stronger than points (POINTS!) is the pull of World of Warcraft. Yes, yes, I'm back. *sigh*

I hadn't really been enthused about GAME, largely because I haven't had time to think about it...but with the kick off less than a workday away, I have to admit I'm finally getting excited.

Partially it's because I didn't have time at E3 to play the Zelda demo, partially because I really like big events where everyone stands around playing video games, and partially because I'm excited to meet some people that I've only known through the forums.

I'm doing a kind-of behind-the-scenes type of job for the show, but I'll try to be out on the floor whenever possible. If you're going to GAME and recognize me, please stop me and say hi. I'll be the one wearing the spoon.

For the past few weeks, I have been absolutely up to my ears in 360 coverage. It all started over a month ago, when I got the opportunity to go see the system at the post-X05 event in San Francisco. I had played it once before at TGS, but the only game I had played, or had even the time to look at, was an exclusive Japanese party game called Every Party. Obviously, that didn't really give me a good idea of what the 360 was going to be like.

At the X05 event though, I got to sit down with Kameo, Perfect Dark, DOA4, King Kong, Oblivion, and above all, Geometry Wars. I remember talking to J Allard just before interviewing him, and he was all excited about the two player version of Robotron, where you both control the same character. I remember telling Jeff about it, and we were both like... "What?" I mean how crazy is that? Well the answer is (as Jeff would say) "fully crazy", because it's perfectly thought up and executed, and possibly one of the best new ways to play Robotron (but still totally crazy). I mean we couldn't really fathom all of the things that we're now finding out you can do in the Xbox Live Arcade.

I have to say, after this weekend, I'm probably going to be more pumped about the achievement system and the Xbox Live features above anything else (until the truly insane games start coming out), but that's enough to make me seriously think about investing in this system and the HDTV to match, sooner rather than later. That's a little different than what you'll hear me say in our 4 Years Since the Xbox video retrospective, but hey, things change.

One of the things I didn't realize about the 360 is something Brad and I discovered after the Perfect Dark Zero multiplayer extravaganza today (Infected mode = awesome). You can jump into a chat with someone and then go about playing anything you want on Xbox Live Arcade while you talk to each other. That includes single-player games of Geometry Wars or multiplayer versions of Joust over Live.

Fully crazy.

I don't know what's more embarrassing, that I'm going as Terry Bogard for Halloween, or that none of the people I'm going out with tonight know who that is...

Anyway, hope everyone's teeth are safe for the holiday. If you need some Halloween cheer celebrate it GS-style.

Wow, I mean wow. Someone just told me that it's almost November, and I practically fell out of my chair. About four minutes ago, I was sitting at home in Virginia, reading GameSpot and posting way too much in the OTF.

Now, I'm on the wrong coast and up to my neck in video games, which has been a lot of things, one of which is absolutely time-consuming.

I wish I could have been around more during the site relaunch, but we all had to pretty much put our nose to the grindstone and blow through it. It seems like the dust has finally settled, but I still have no idea how some things on these forums work. It's kind of fun playing around (I added a brazillion games to my wish list today), but I still don't forsee having much free time in the near future.

Anyway, I can't really complain, I spent all weekend playing a game that shall remain nameless until my review goes up this week. The only games I'm beating these days are the ones I'm reviewing, but I still find a few minutes now and then to perform a surgery or kill a few ninjas.

I suspect I'll be visiting the forums and journals more and more as things begin to calm down, but if not, you know where to find me.

Faith in humanity, restored!

I had wanted to write about Japan, but the limited 24 hour day has had other things in mind for me. Instead, I think now about Japan as a symbol, for any country other than this one.

What a sad day.

I'm about to head out and grab a cab to Japan. Yes, that's right. A cab to Japan!

Seriously, there are a ton of us flying out today to meet up with those already there. It's kind of insane to think about how many people will be at TGS, but it's also a huge relief, especially considering that I'm probably the only one who's never been to Japan before.

For the record, TGS has been a lifelong dream of mine, so it's pretty awesome that I get to go. And also, I'm pretty excited for the feature that we have coming out of this. Wheeee!

Despite its flaws, the internet has one really big thing going for it: free-association. I've proclaimed countless times that I like to fire up Wikipedia and hop from one entry to another, pretending like my feeble little mind could retain all of that awesome information.

Another highly free-associative medium is hip-hop, particularly the kind I listen to, and I feel lucky that I can discover whole great new bands and albums just because one guy whose name I know goes off to work with someone else. It's how you can go from listening to NWA and Ice Cube to Del tha Funkee Homosapien, Kool Keith, Handsome Boy Modeling School, Deltron 3030, and the Gorillaz. And even if you're not a hip-hop fan, you should be able to recognize that the differences between NWA and the Gorillaz are many.

Anyway, I recently decided to give the Gorillaz second full album a shot, because even though my reasons for listening to the first one (Del Tha Funkee Homosapien and Dan the Automator) aren't involved with the project anymore, there are still some good (or maybe just interesting) people on board, like De La Soul and Dennis Hopper.

As I was reading about Gorillaz' Demon Days, I discovered that it was produced by DJ Danger Mouse who famously mixed up Jay-Z's "The Black Album and The Beatle's "The White Album" to make (you guessed it) the "Grey Album". After borrowing it from a friend, I can say it's highly recommendable, particularly if you're a fan of Jay-Z. So I went on to read about DJ Danger Mouse who is doing a project with my buddy MF Doom (called Dangerdoom), which is something else to look forward to.

And so forth. It seems like a lot of entertaniment mediums these days get their rocks off by cross-pollenating, and I'm all for it. I have a dream, that one day, we'll have no genres of anything, and Leonard Cohen and Dr. Octagon will be able to romp through fields holding hands, because in my head (and my iTunes) they already do.