Preface: YES, this is about SPORTS. Don't like 'em? Don't read - don't troll. Simple as that.

Allow me to jump from my videogame-riddled mindset for a second and into the pool of NBA teams competing to get out of the first round of the 2007 NBA Playoffs. As one who sneers at the mere mention of the Dallas Mavericks, I have one thing to ask of Baron Davis and the Golden State Warriors:

Show up to work on Friday when the series shifts back to the Bay Area. For four quarters please.

My friend was convinced that Dallas' losing streak against the Warriors would continue - you don't lose that many games including a playoff game to a team for no reason, after all. Of course, the rest of the world - notably the basketball press - thought that the "best" team in the NBA would find a way to win.

Game 1 had me delighted, with Don Nelson's big-guard lineup and Avery Johnson's inexplicable decision to change his lineup playing right into the Warriors' hands. Baron Davis dominated the ball and used his combination of sheer bulk and speed to pull an '06 D-Wade on the Mavs. Head down. Ball to the basket. Initiating contact.

So what the hell happened? Besides, uh, the fact that the Warriors really don't have a great gameplan. I haven't seen them most of the year, due to the NBA's television schedule and understandable lack of air time given to them. When I saw them this weekend, pulling off the "upset" win over Dallas, I was amazed at the win not because I wasn't expecting it but because they took some of the most ill-advised shots I'd ever seen.

Well, I suppose it came to bite 'em in the balls this go round.

To be fair it wasn't so much their impetuous shot selection (they shot above 45% from the field, after all) as it was their equally impetuous handling of the ball. 24 turnovers? For chrissakes, Stephen "Whoo!" Jackson alone had eight of 'em before he decided to lose his temper and get himself ejected (after Davis himself got tossed). I can't count how many times I looked up from Black Powder Red Earth to see a Warrior jumping in the air, twirling around and then dumping the ball straight into a white uniform. How old were you when coach said to not leave your feet to make a pass?

Scramble. Chuck. Leap. Twirl. Throw away. Get mad. Get ejected. Foul, foul, foul.

And there's the other thing - in the span of a single minute in the middle of the fourth, Matt Barnes picked up three shooting fouls. Three fouls. From a single player. Resulting in five free Dallas points (Dirk actually missed one). And right after that, Josh Howard stole the ball (from - guess "Whoo!" - Stephen Jackson) leading to a score by Jason Terry. Right after that? Golden State's Andris Biedrins botched a pass ... then Jackson fouls Dirk... who makes a free throw, then a technical free throw when, Surprise! Jackson gets himself tossed!, then makes the third scheduled free throw.

And there it is: the score goes from a within-striking-distance 97-86 in Dallas' favor with 6:20 left to a 107-90 with just over 4-and-a-half left in the game. Well, way to practically give up a basket every 12 seconds, guys.

I'm hoping that, for Game 3, Baron comes to play. He's the catalyst for Warrior success here. And I wouldn't mind seeing a little bit of Jason Richardson and Al Harrington either. You know, guys who can ball but somehow chose not to yesterday. I have plenty of other teams to cheer on - Chicago looks magnificent this series, and seeing Kobe fuming on the sideline down 2-0 to the Suns just really makes my day - but what would make my day twice over is to see Golden State pull a Denver-Seattle. You know, the series where Dikembe Mutombo is grabbing the ball, howling on the floor after having just embarrassed then-Sonics coach George Karl.

So, Baron, bring your damn lunch pail to work on Friday. There are some Mavericks to destroy.

Preface: don't forget about today's previous update.

UPDATE: Video Uploader worked! Now you can stream from TEH GAMSPUT 

So, Gamespot's video uploader blorped out on me a few seconds ago. I'll have to try uploading it later, but for now, you can still download the video from our server. It's barely 9 megs in size, and just over a minute in length. What is Alex Navarro's sixth hall of shame nominee? You'll just have to WATCH to find out, boss.

Download Alex Navarro's Hall of Shame Nominee #6!

At long last, according to DailyTECH, we have benchmark results from a real AMD/ATi DirectX 10 product. Yesterday, on April 24th, 2007, the folks at the tech enthusiast site sat down with an ATI Radeon HD 2900 XT board pitted against its closest competitor, the nVidia GeForce 8800 GTS 640MB. [more from Trigames]

And if you haven't yet, go ahead and download episode 44 of the Trigames.NET podcast, with special guest Slunks again!

It's up, I'm tired, and Slunks was a special guest, helping us fill in the gaping hole that Ethan and Al left when they got a room together and went all hunky-dory with each other I mean what huh where some people think cucumber taste better pickled? Oh whatever. go download it. Breakdown and RSS feed updated in the morning.

EDIT: It looks like something goes wrong between the 1 hour 11 minute mark and the 1 hour 14 minute mark. Please standby while we fix this. It also seems as if Tony's voice clips in and out way too much. We are working on fixing this as well. However, we will first upload the fixed version that gets rid of the strange noises that Digi_Matrix noticed between the 1 hr. 11 minute mark and the 1 hr. 14 minute mark, as Tony's voice clipping seems quite minimal. Tomorrow you can expect to see a fully functional, UN-CLIPPING Tony version.

UPDATE: The distortion at the 1 hour 11 minute mark is fixed. However we're aware that Tony's voice clipping in a few spots might still bug the lot of you. We are fixing this tonight and expect to have a full working version tomorrow. In the meantime, we have re-uploaded the distortion-less version.

[video=JnQwwzSr5b4OvzLa]

Turok Evolution is a bad game. But somehow we manage to make it an enjoyable experience. Watch us critique God of War and Tony make sound effects at the Hydra, Al's first reaction to said Hydra boss battle (he'd never played it before), Al talk about Vexx condoms, and some bad gameplay footage of Turok Evolution as well as hugging volleyball players in Beach Spikers Volleyball for the Gamecube. It's all nonsense, and it's all awesome. If you haven't the patience to watch the whole streaming half-hour, download a copy from HERE. (If the link does not work, try back again after 10:15 EST.)

We got a press release, as I'm sure many other sites did, from Atlus USA that was practically gushing over Odin Sphere's option to play the game with original Japanese voice acting. I was intrigued by this, so I fired over four bite-sized questions. Atlus USA's QA Manager and Senior Editor kindly responded.

1) Is this the first game published by Atlus USA that features both English and Japanese voice overs?

No, this is not the first bilingual game we have published. Disgaea and SkyGunner are two examples of other titles we have published that include both the original Japanese voices as well as the English ones. Furthermore, Riviera, which is coming out this year for the PSP, will feature a language option.

2) What caused Atlus USA to go the route of providing both voice tracks?

Odin Sphere is a game that we believe will appeal to a wide audience, so we wanted to try and have something there for everyone... [more]

It's Episode forty-trey!

We are joined today by Gamespot community member, Guitar Hero II all-star, frequent mailbag contributor and special guest William 'Slunks' Boso. Listen in as we banter about games, the Guitar Hero II pricing, and the issues surrounding female gamers. Oh, and as (not) requested, a new theme song, courtesy of The Antipode.

0:00:00 - Intro and the Slunks-opotamus.
0:02:00 - What We've Been Playing
0:12:00 - Quicknews and Guitar Hero II Xbox Live Pricing Discussion
0:46:05 - Mailbag, and a Minstrel Sings his Song
1:09:51 - Discussion: "Girl Gaming" - Is Sexism an Issue or a Non-Issue?
1:45:01 - Encore

Musical interludes:

Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney
Guitar Hero II
Final Fantasy IV - Celtic Moon

Download here.
Total Size: 50.2 MB
Runtime: 1:45:15

Please - digg us, review us on iTunes, and tell your friends to listen and enter our Pirates versus Ninjas contest (hell, there will be no prize if we don't get enough people listening). Your support keeps us motivated. And don't forget - hit the mailbag with your questions!

NOTICE: The syncing issues between our voices later on in the cast should be mostly resolved. Please let us know if anything sounds too out of place.

TnA - what you all have wanted. TONY and AUSTIN. What were YOU thinking? Mind out of the gutter. We talks the talks about the newses, likes the Rocks Bands, Kansas Hatings Pokemons, Resiident Eviil 4 (get it? GET IT?), Metroiid Priime 3 (GET IT NOW!? ok I give up), and some corporate stuffings. And then, Why does the Wii's Early Lineup Stinks? Finally, the Mailbag offers some tasty morsels. And, a guest text-message appearance by Slunks! Who says you need Ethan and Al for fun, fresh content? Blargh.

As always, parental advisory: explicit lyrics. Also if you're very sensitive and easily offended, go 'way!

Breakdown (times approximated; had to re-edit podcast):

0:00:00 - Intro and What We've Been Playing

0:11:00 - Quicknews
- EA/Harmonix/MTV present: ROCK BAND (360/PS3)
- School bans pokemon for promoting evolution:
- Resident Evil 4... on Wii... and then a haphazard side quest that looks to be House of the Dead 5, only in the Resident Evil universe. Let's hope it doesn't suck:
- No Metroid Prime 3 in June... no duh! (From Al - maybe we do want to postpone so he can talk about this, or we save this topic for next week)
- Bruno Bonnell done @ Atari, shares rise
- Ousted Take 2 CEO Paul Eibeler gets MAD CASH for being fired

0:36:00 - Topic: So, great early Wii lineup we got, right? ...Right?

0:55:00 - Mailbag!

Music from:
- Ninja Gaiden (XBOX)
- Metroid Prime (GCN)
- Bravo Man (TG-16)

Download here.
Runtime: 1:42:30
Size: 49 MB

Please - digg us, review us on iTunes, and tell your friends to listen and enter our Pirates versus Ninjas contest (hell, there will be no prize if we don't get enough people listening). Your support keeps us motivated. And don't forget - hit the mailbag with your questions!

For previous episodes, please visit our Podcast Homepage!

I thought it would be the first post-launch Wii game from a third party that would have my heart pounding, my hands sweaty and my face grimacing. I thought I'd be having the time of my life - or, at least, a reasonably good time - playing this newest incarnation of a famous franchise that had lost its way. I thought that by doing what the mascot does best - going fast - the game would be a nice comeback, a small triumph at worst.

Oh Sonic and the Secret Rings , I thought wrong.

I bought this puppy on Friday of the week that it released, which was the week of February 20th. This past Friday, just barely a month later, I chucked it in the "Guitar Hero II for Xbox 360 Fund". (Humorously enough, the last time I sold a game back this quickly was when I got Sonic Adventure 2: Battle for the Gamecube.)

The easy guess?

"Wii's third party games sux0rs because they put stupid controls on thems that not works!!! omfgrofl."

Nope. Not even close. In fact, the use of the Wiimote's motion sensing is really well done - holding it sideways, all you do is tilt left and right to make Sonic veer to the left and to the right. When jumping, you jolt the thing towards the screen to make Sonic attack enemies. To bring the hedgehog to a screeching halt, you pull back as if you were yanking back the reins of a horse. It's intuitive, it's responsive, and it works.

The problem isn't even in the very basic, core game design - well, for the most part, at least. Sonic is on rails, really, and all you're responsible for is making him jump, veer left or right, or stop. His forward movement is taken care of, and when he gets going, he gets going. Thus, we're inclined to think that this game is really catering to Sonic fans of old - fast, fast, fast, fastfastfast and nearly on-rails gameplay

It works like that... at first.

Then Sega throws stupid goals at you - things like "Collect 30 rings" or "Don't break any urns" or "Kill 5 enemies". Ok, so "stupid" is subjective, sure. It's here where I realize that the entire thing either falls apart or comes together depending on who you are. Me? I liked and continue to like Sonic (in its most recent successful incarnation, Sonic Rush ) for the on-rails speed. Sure, I'd re-visit stages, slow down and try to collect rings to challenge myself - but that was at my leisure, in incarnations of Sonic that allowed me to manually control the dude.

What Sega does with Sonic and the Secret Rings is to give you a control scheme that's so awesomely suited to just blaze through levels with almost reckless abandon, then take away that sensation by cautioning you to - nuh uh! - not break some stupid @#($& urns. It's almost infuriating. Sonic, for me, has always been the counterpoint to Mario's careful, skill-based and precise gameplay: eye-on-the-ball reflexes and the ability to play carelessly then correct at the last moment ruled the day. You didn't necessarily have to be incredibly careful - just alert.

Here, it's like they want you to tip-toe around things. Hell, half of the obstacles that you're supposed to kill / not break / whatever are kind of sitting there to be discovered by trial-and-error. Instead of things being almost instinctual, it becomes almost a memorization game because of the 3D nature of the vantage point and the lack of direct control you have over Sonic.

And then there's just how it's all put together in the first place. The "Blasting through a Sonic Game" mentality should be applied throughout the game's design - that means not only in the core gameplay and level designs, but also with regards to just getting into the game. You start up the game. You see some silly cutscene. You start the first level, and just go go go go. Advance to the next stage, keep on going, maybe another cutscene or two, and keep on going.

Here? Not a chance. You beat a stage, or at least a "mission" in the stage, and you're booted back out to the Menu screen. Then you choose your next mission. Then you confirm, and choose your "equipped ring" which I won't even get into. Then you confirm that ring. Then you wait for the level load. The entire process from beating a mission/level and starting a new one takes about 15 - 20 seconds all told, which - on paper, doesn't sound so horrid. But when you're itching to just continue on, it gets really annoying. Let's not even mention the irritating pseudo-metal music playing in the background...

Could this have been fixed? Certainly. The core gameplay is sound. Pare down the stupid "missions" - if you want to set goals, limit them to speed runs and ring collections. Or, make things like the dumb urn-breaking goal optional for unlockable challenges or "experience point" boosts (yeah, there's an Exp. system in the game, which allow you to map abilities to your equipped rings - see above, particularly the "I won't even get into" part :P). Don't design stages that throw things at you every 10 seconds to bring you to a grinding halt - let Sonic run free.

Sonic and the Secret Rings is a c1assic example of when less can be so much more. All I wanted to do was to run, jump and blaze. It's such a shame - when the game does let you run free, it's awesome. It's got colorful, detailed graphics. The boss battles are actually really fun in that Mario/Zelda event-based strategic sort of way. The Wii control works quite well, too - you don't have to think about them. But it's all just smushed under the stupid weight of goal and mission structure. To be fair, if you want something other than just blazing through levels, then maybe this game is up your alley. Ain't up mine.

The worst part about it is that I couldn't even stand it long enough to finish and review it legitimately. So all you'se gets is this ranty blog post.

The best 3D Sonic, ever? Absolutely.

Is that saying much?

Well, let's see - that's like saying: "This is the least smelly pair of sweaty post-game gym shorts I've ever had the displeasure of wearing on my head!" Is that really a ringing endorsement? You decide.

Which one of you lame jokers had the audacity to either give Attorney Jac(queline) Thompson the last episode of our podcast, where Porpuswail made some more caustic comments about his wife, or the nerve to construct incredibly legitimate e-mail headers to make us believe he e-mailed us? In any case, this email and these headers look consistent with other lame things he's sent, such as this . But we're small time. We're small fry. Why go after us? Is he really that desperate to chase ambulances? We discuss this potentially legitimate but also potentially fake email and Porpuswail goes on a rant. No real names, because that's what he demanded of us in the email. It's not like he can't find it anywhere else anyway... in any case, this is likely legit. But if it's not, whoever did it, it's not funny. Yeah, we're sending Fastethanfelson after your butt. Literally. After your butt. And you know what he's capable of.

The email:

:shock:

I've listened to the recent broadcasts you put out talking about killographic games like Manhunter 2 and the sex simulator God of War II which is racist against Greek Sterotypes.

I am quite familiar with this terrotory. However, what I wasnot expecting was one of your members being guilty of slander and libel against me. It should be made clear that I have a healthy, faithful relationship with my wife. She does not cheat on me, and she does not play video games.

You deluded gamers are all the same. You want to criticize a man for doing his God-given duties because it interferes with the satanic rituals you basement dwellers- involve yourselves in every hour. Let me tell you what, my crusade against your sins will be victorious.

I demand to have the full name of the Trigamer that slandered my name and my wife. I will bring legal action upon you and your crew for this disgusting gamer incident. I am going to shut down your hate factory once and for all, so no more can you manufacture insults of mass destruction.

:shock:

Download here .
Runtime: 0:53:11
File Size: 25.5MB