Hell in a Handbasket

So last night I was walking to class in the light rain when there was a flash of lightning and the rumble of thunder. Lightning and thunder. In Novemember. A thunderstorm in November. Is that wierd to anyone else? 'Cause I thinks it's pretty damned strange. Maybe I'm over reacting.

On another note I have to thank Activision and Neversoft for saving me $50. According to Gamespon, GUN clocks in at aroung 6 hours. This seems to be a trend in some recend games (from what I've heard F.E.A.R. was about 10 hours of gameplay), that I find disturbing. With more and more focus on multiplayer action it seems to me that deep, immersive single player gameplay is falling by the wayside. This trend is most obvious in the RPG genre where I can count the number of "great" single player games in the last five years on one hand; likely I'll have room to spare. The FPS genre suffers from a similar problem with generic gameplay that rarely if ever introduces a new and exciting element. All this becomes even more distrubing when you realize that despite the relative success of the gaming industry there has been little to no market growth. I'm not a doomsayer or anything but I think the game industry needs some kind of reality check lest it wallow in stagnation.

Don't get me wrong there are a number of new and exciting games out there. Some even with innovative and interesting features, but these represent a very tiny percentage of the market and the vast vajority of games are bland and unattractive. Take a look at Blitz: The League. Here one has an interesting and exciting idea in the creation of The League as kind of anti-NFL. Unfortunatley the gameplay was the same old Blitz garbage. So my message to you Gaming Industry is to get outside the box. Stop going back to what is safe and start experimenting with things that are new. The potential for for failure can often breed the greatest success.

Activision

So most of the weekly adverts (Best Buy, etc.) seem to be indicating that "Gun", by Activision, is coming out this week. So after checking out what some gaming websites have to say I decide to investigate the "official" website via Activision.com. Imagine my surprise when after navigating to Gun on the site menu when I get a message asking for my birthday and credit card number.

Let me get this straight. You want my credit card number to verify my age? How the hell does that work? Is that even legal? Well, sorry Activision ain't gonna happen. The PC version of Gun better have an autopatcher or there may be some seriously pissed off gamers.

By the way, to bypass this all you have to do is right-click on Gun in the game last, select copy link address and paste it in your address bar. Take that, biatches!

Passion of the Clerks

Apparently the crew is keeping a video journal of the film making process check 'em out over at http://www.clerks2.com/

3 Cup Week

Ugh....I'm having one of those weeks where I measure each day by the number of coffee cups it takes to get me going in the morning.

So what happened to Halloween Themed TV programming? Last light there was hardly any horror movies on, at least on regular cable (Encore had the Dawn of the Dead remake), no Halloween episodes of the regular program, in fact most episodes were repeats. It gets better, my mom went to the supermarket yesterday on her way to work (@ 6:30 in the morning) and the seasonal section was full of Christmas stuff. October wasn't even over yet and already we're dragging out the Christmas things. What the hell!? Sorry disapoint everyone but there will be no Thanksgiving this year.

If you missed your Halloween fix check out ScaryGoRound for a Halloween themed story that isn't over yet.