If you know me, then you surely know my stance on the whole console war. I want all 3 systems and refuse to dedicate myself to any particular console. I am, in no way, a fanboy. I am not biased towards one console or another. If it were up to me, the consoles would co exist peacefully without people constantly arguing over which one is better. It's sad to think that so many people deprive themselves of good games just because it comes to a system that they don't feel like supporting for whatever reason. As CTRL+ALT+DEL said, "And as an argument started among hte fanboys as to which console would be the greatest, and the prophet, knowing their thoughts, spoke, "He who would recognize that gaming is glorious and not prejudiced based on platform, is he who would know the love of the gods and the warmth of our heaven arcadion." That quote is from the series of comics where Ethan created the Church of Gaming. It may be part of a joke, but the basics behind it do ring true. Don't hate on any console. Love them all to get the full video game experience. Every console has great games. Why limit yourself?
That being said, the term 'fanboy' gets thrown around alot on video game related forums. I took note of this the other day when the PS3 was brought up in a Resident Evil 5 thread in a X-Box forum. People were trash talking it when they didn't own the system. I stated that, from personal experience, the PS3 is a great system. I defended it against an ignorant onslaught, and I got called a PS3 fanboy for it. Think about that. If I was a PS3 fanboy, why would I be on a X-Box forum? That doesn't make sense. Yes I do like the PS3. IT is a great system with some great games on it. Maybe it doesn't have as many as the 360, but that system has also been out for a year longer than the PS3 has. That gives it time to stockpile more games. Defending a console doesn't necessarily make you a fanboy of that console. IT just means you like it. It is easy to like a console without being a fanboy of it. People don't seem to understand this, which results in the word 'fanboy' being thrown around alot more than it should be. As I said, being called a fanboy got me to thinking. It is one of hte problems with internet forums. People think you are stupid, fanboyish or whatever for having an opinion that differs from theirs. If you ask me,. the people blindly attacking the PS3 were being a hell of alot mroe fanboyish than I was "Oh. X-Box reules. Screw PS3." Have you even played it or do you just say "It has no games. It sucks. I haven't played Resistance, Ratchet and Clank, Warhawk or Heavenly Sword, but they suck?" How do you know?How do you know the system sucks if you haven't played it? Look at me. I don't own a 360, but I don't trash talk it either. Infact, it is the only item on my Christmas list. I want one and I intend to get Mass Effect and Blue Dragon for it.
This is just one of the problems with video game forums now days. The sad fact is that most problems on video game forums can be solved one of two ways: by thinking before you speak or by doing your research before you make claims that someone could see as assanine. If the hatred and consstant arguments are going to stop, people are going to need to think before they type anything down. "How will this effect people? Am I going to piss someone off imminensely by saying this? Will someone be offended by my saying this?" If the answer is yes, it might be better off if it gets posts. There are exceptions to every rule, of course. Yoiu cannot please everyone and you never know what people are giong to take issue with, but there are some things that we all know for a fact that will anger people, yet we say them anyway. Doing so only contributes to problems like heated arguments over what console is better that, quite often, wind up being insult fests, which is just sad. If you are going to call someone a fanboy, fine, but don't do it for a stupid reason like "he disagrees with me."
I haven't updated about my life in quite some time, have I? I wil ldo so now. I eventually wound up hating my job. It wasn't the job itself. IT was the people that ran it. They had no business managing anyone. They never hired new people. We must have had 7 people quit and htey hired 2 people to replace them. They trained one of those two. For the rest of the shifts, they brought over someone from anotehr HMS Host owned store and had them help us. Yeah. That's great. LEt me work with someone that has no idea what the yare doing on a busy day so that I don't have time to train them instead iof hiring and training new people. I was having to do about 4 days work during the week day because they would have people there that didn't know what they were doing. I would get there and do a 4 hour shift and have more work than I could cram into 4 hours. I would get behind. Instead of coming over to help me, like they said they would, the managers got upset with me for falling behind. WELL, I'M SORRY! I cannot keep up with all of it. Yeah. Screw that job. I quit about a week ago. I no longer work at Sbarros. I am, once again, looking for a job. I hate job hunting. It is such a pain in the ass and it usually takes me a while to find a job. I know I should have waited to quit. It was stupid, but I couldn't stand just being at work it pissed me off so bad
I beat Bioshock. I liked the game quite a bit, but it is overrated. The game looks and sounds incredible. It is alot of fun to play as well, but it isn't as in depth as it was advertised to be. IT was advertised as the second coming of Deus Ex, and it's not. All of it's deepest elements are implemented in ways that are shallow. Want to upgrade your health? Buy it with Adam. Want to upgrade your weapon? Do it at an upgrade station. Want toinvent a new type of ammo? You purchase it. I thought that it was going to be you actually invent your own ammo, like mix different things and coat bullets in it or something like that. Liike addint a poison effect to a bullet or something. It wasn't. This was very disappointing about the game. It actually made me appreciate STALKER: Shadow of Chernobyl more than I already did. Taht game was ALOT more in depth than Bioshock is. The story to Bioshock was predictable as well. People rave on and on about how great it is. I must have missed something. It isn't a bad story, but it has one major plot twist in it. Just one. HAving two endings is nice, but the two endings are also predictable. In one you are a flower child. In the other, you would rip Satans heart out and show it to him as he died. There is no inbetween. It owuld be nice to have an inbetween some time. Last, but not least, the game has absolutely no difficulty in it. I died maybe twice in the 15 hours that it took me to beat that game, and it was always because I made some sort of mistake. Splicers were easy as hell and taking photos of them only made them easier. Speaking of the camera, it didn't expose a weakness like it was advertised to do. It usually did something like increase your damage against that enemy type. That was also a bit disappointing about it. I would rate the game about an 8.5. It is not GOTY material
As for something that is GOTY material, I got the Orange Box. What can I say about this game that hasn't already been said? You won't find a better deal that doesn't involve some type of garage sale or ebay in the history of video games. It is 5 video games for the price of one. That is sweet in and of itself. When you take into consideration that it is 5 absolutely masterful video games for the price of one, you can clearly see why the Orange Box goes above and beyond the call of duty. Let me start off with Portal. I cannot think of a single negative thing to say about Portal, aside from the fact that there isn't enough of it. Then again, I must wonder if it is possible for there to be enough of it. The game is that good. Portal is a mind bending first person puzzle game. You won't be shooting things, though tere are turrets that will shoot at you. Your only defense against them is a weapon that creates 2 portals, an entrance and an exit. There are a bunch of ingenious puzzles to solve in Portal. I expected this. What I didn't expect was the black humor. The entire game, there is a computer named GLaDos talking to you. It reminds me of Shodan, but it's not creepy. This computer is very funny. It's black humor, but wait until you hear the end song. It is great. Half Life 2: Episode 2 is even better than I thought it would be. It is the most revealing part of the HL storyline yet. You learn quite a bit. It has a shocking ending as well. It ends in a cliff hanger, but it is nothing like how the first two ended. It makes me want to play the third one NOW. The game is alot of fun. The new enemies will make your palms sweat and hte final battle is absolutely intense. There is a new weapon that you use the gravity gun to throw. IT is alot of fun to use. I qwon't spoil it for you, as it is part of the overall storyline. If you don't yet love the vortigaunts, you will after this one. Team Fortress 2 is the weakest link. That being said, it is alot of fun to play. The lack of maps is disappointing. Each map is specific to one type of game. IT i9s a shame that you cannot play all types on one map, though. The character classes are extremely well balanced and fun to play It is a fantastic online game. The design is great and it has some good humor to it as well, but the lack of maps is just disappointing. That being said. the Orange Box is GOTY material. Even if you have played and beaten HL2 and Episode 1, be sure to pick this one up.
I wish my comic had more readers. I enjoy doing it and Eric and I have put alot of work into it. We have 33 comics up now and a small selection of reviews. I intend to do more things to add more content to the site in the future as well, but I want more fans. No one ever joins our forum, which bothers me. We created it with the intention of creating a community arround hte comic. It takes time, but the forum has 8 memebers. There are more than 8 people that read the comic every week. Why have they not joined the forum? It seems that I advertise on more and more sites, but the fanbase will not grow. Why? Why won't the fanbase grow? It's kind of annoying. It is a comic about gamers by gamers for gamers. Eric and I think we are doing a decent job evolving the characters and trying to create a storyline that people want to read, We also think that hte humor is getting better as well, but it is disappointing that so few people read it. Please spread the word if you like my comic. Two people can only do so much toward having the fanbase grow. The comic is a source of pride for me. I like doing it. I do my best to get more readers. I work hard every week, but it seems like it hasn't gone anywhere in quite some time.
I finally picked my books back up. Reading is hard for me. It always has been. I havee a tendancy to get distracted by other things and quit reading for months at a time. I did this recently and have not finished Game of Thrones or Voices from Chernobyl yet because of it. I got distratcted mostly by video games. I do love to read, but, like I said, it is hard for me. I have a tendancy to read something, forget what I just read (my short term memory is shot to hell) and have to read it again. It is like I will finish with a paragraph and go "wait....what?" It significantly slows down the process of reading. I know why it is. I know why I have this problem, but I would prefer to not talk about that. Anyway, as I said, I started reading again. I am almost done with part 2 of Voices from Chernobyl. I have about 10 pages left in part 2. I will finish it tonight. This book is excellent. For those that do not know, Voices from Chernobyl is a book of collections of monologues from interviews of people that survivled the incident in Chernobyl 20 years ago. It is very raw and powerful. It may not be Tolkien quality writing (after all, it was, originally, just people talking) but it has raw emotions behind it all that really help to drive it home. IT is an excellent book and, if you have an interest in Chernobyl, it is well worth your time. You are sure to learn alot about things that went on there that people would rather not tell you about. Also, I picked up another book today. It is called Something From the Nightside by Simon R Green. It seems to be a macrabef horror mystery type story. I have read other 6 other books by Simon R Green (the Deathstalker novels) and they were all excellent. They wre all sci fi, but I figured I might give this one a try as well.
I think I have said enough. This turned out to be alot longer than I thought it would be. Maybe I shouldn't combine my thought provoking entries with my entries about my life. I don't know. They always turn out to be incredibly long when I do that. I don't write short journal entires anyway. When I write one. I always try to do atleast some planning in advance so that I have some idea of what I am going to say when I start typing. I usually wind up adding things that I think of as I type, though., so you are getting a mix of thought out things and on the spot comments that just occur to me naturally. Anyway, I am going to wrap up this post. Tomorrow I am going job hunting. I might go with my friend John if he wants to come. Wish me luck. It is the holiday season, so I think I may be able to find one rather quickly. I hope. I need one ASAP at any rate. I finally have cash register experience, so that's good. I'm out. Until next time, cya! (And you can't kill the metal!!!)
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