The Particle Knight

I am the model of a modern major geek

2008-08-03T00:31:00.001-07:00

Hey folks,

Call me a dork for posting this video, but I ran into it on You Tube and can't get the bloody song out of my head. Pretty much everyone has heard this song at least once in their lives and I really have to tip my hat to the people out there who have to memorize the whole song and perform it in front of everyone.

Anyway, enjoy Model of a Modern Major General from Pirates of Penzance. And yes, thats a young Kevin Kline in there.

-P. Knight

Sounds good!

2008-08-02T23:56:00.000-07:00

Hey folks,

So recently I have been toying with the game concept of sound. Lot of new video games recently have really been playing on the whole sound concept and many gamers admit that they do end up loving the soundtracks and music for most modern games and think that it really pulls them into the game. I also agree with that statement and find that good music and or soundtracks can really make a game and even helps players play the game better if they actually have good music to listen to as well as get into the mood of the game.

With that idea in mind, I was actually working on a game idea that allows you to actually literally surf music. I was always a big fan of the SSX game serious back in the PS2 days and I know many gamers out there like the idea of surfing/riding giant waves, objects and or pretty much anything else out there as well as doing really cool tricks. For the game concept, which I am going Soundwaves, I wanted to take that idea and apply it to music.

Instead of riding on snow, cement or water, players would actually be riding on music waves. Much like any other surfing, snowboarding or skatboarding game, the player would control a character from a third person persepctive and the character would be more or less locked towards the bottom of the screen much like other games of this type. You can move forward a bit, but the whole point is that the character isn't going all over the screen.

Now the real kicker would be the fact that players are having their characters ride music. Coming from a focused point way down the path from the player's character, sound waves would be coming out towards the player and the player would then be able to use his/her character to surf these sound waves. Now the waves would sort of looks like those pin art toys that were made really big back in the 90's thanks to the Sharper Image and science museums everywhere.

So bacially imagine the player's character standing on a surface in the game that looks much like the image above. Where the ground is all bumping looking. Now imagine the ground going up and down forming little hills and edges while coming at the character from a long distance all the way to the bottom of the screen. Like I said though, all those little hills and edges though would be based on music and or sounds.

In the game would be a program that reads music and then based on the rythem and beats of the music, the program would then create all the hills and edges in game and send them speeding at the player's character. In a way, its like Guitar Hero, but instead of having to play the music beats on your guitar, your character is having to surf over these "sound hills" all the while doing all sorts of crazy tricks to gain points.

Now the game itself would come with 25 different songs of course to give people a feel to the gameplay. But once they get use to it, they can download and or add their own tracks to the game since the game will have the hill building program already built into it. This way players can add whatever songs they like to the game and try to see what sort of scores they can get with the music they like.

Of course they can take the game online and there would be scoreboards for all the main songs that came with the game as well as scoreboards for user uploaded songs as well. That way other players from around the world can see what songs others are playing and may even decide to go check that song out for themselves. Since their are millions of songs out there of course, there will be lots of scores. But we can break them down into genre and rank them by how many scores were submitted for each song. That way people can see which ones are the most popular to play.

Art style wise, I was thinking of using something similiar to the manga series, Soul Eater. A light playful type style that is a bit sytlized and looks like a mix between Japanese and American art styles. I am debating about if the game should be very bright or very dark, but I think either could work really. Most likely dark backgrounds with light characters would work I think. That way the characters pop a bit more and people won't loose their vision trying to focus on things going on in the background.

Anyway, its just a idea I was toying with. I think it could be a cool little game since it would allow players to use their own music as part of the game and would have a highly stylized look to it as well. Music games have really become hugely popular as of late and I think this one could step up and be a good contender as well since it would be easy to make and fun to play.

-P. Knight

More of Northrend part 2

2008-07-28T12:25:00.000-07:00

Hey folks,

Here is the other batch of Northrend photos I promised. This time around, I got some shots from the other new starting area, Howling Fjord. Howling is on the opposite site od Northrend from Borean Tundra, but its also a second starting area for all you level 70's out there. I talked about this earlier, but Blizzard has done a smart thing here and has made two starting areas in Northrend for level 70's instead of just one like they did for level 60's and Hellfire Peninsula in Burning Crusade.

Howling Fjord is actually a very cool looking zone and is a bit of a throwback to more of the classic look of WoW with a touch of viking influence. The starting town for Aliiance is a place called Valgarde and is run by dwarfs who are trying to stop a viking race as well as local mobs from taking down the new city. The early photos are of Valgarde and the surrounding area that is all located at the bottom of a canyon. You can arrive at Valgarde by taking a boat from Menethil Harbor.

Once I got out of the town, I took the roads northwest and traveled through Ember Clutch where I ran into some dragons and trappers and then went up to Gjalerbron which had a ton of undead and spider mobs roaming around. After that I went east past a Horde town and then further north which took me down a mountain and into another new zone called Grizzly Hills.

Now for all you backpackers or outdoor types out there, you will get a real kick out of Grizzy Hills. The place is very much like a WoW version of the Yosimite National Park here in California. Huge massive trees and forests, all sorts of cute animals running around and of course lots of furblogs as well. The whole area has a very serene feel to it and you feel like you are gonna get lost in all the woods. You honestly never know what you are gonna find in Grizzly hills. Just walking around i found huge tribes of furblogs, massive earth giants, really mean stone golems as well as a several different humans who are trying to cut down all the woods. There are a few undead roaming around, but they are more on the outskirts of the zone instead of all the way in like most of the other zones in Northrend. I think people will get a real kick out of Grizzly Hills just because its one one the more normal looking places in Northrend and definitely gives you a breathtaking view once you get higher up in some of the areas.

Anyway, thats it for now folks. Gonna get some more photos later on and will post them on here as soon as I do. But for now, enjoy these!

-P. Knight

Pixar is on the up and up!

2008-07-28T12:10:00.000-07:00

Hey folks,

For all you Pixar fans out there, here is the brand new teaser trailer for their new upcoming flick, Up! There isn't a whole lot known about the film other then it comes out next year, but it looks like it will be a funny and cute little adventure just like most other Pixar films of course. So check out the teaser trailer below. Enjoy!

-P. Knight

More beta pics from Northrend

2008-07-27T18:04:00.000-07:00

Hey folks,

Well as promised, here are more pictures from the WoW:Wraith of the Lich King beta. These first batch of photos are from some places I had already been, but ended up going back to and was able to find some more cool parts to explore.

Most of the pictures are of Borean Tundra again. This time around I decided to explore the west cost of the zone and got to see one of the Horde starting cities as well as some familiar faces as well as the new siege vehicles. And yes, that is Kel'thuzad that I had targeted near a Horde city. Not exactly Mr. Friendly I tell you.

Anyway, once I got out of Borean Tundra, I went west again back into Dragonblight for a little bit. There I ran into a really huge stone mob walking around on "The Path of the Titans" as well as got to see undead mobs resurrecting dead dragons into frost wyrms.

Finally I went north from Dragonblight and wound up at the entrance way to Storm Peaks again. There are no mobs there yet, but the entrance way area, called "Crystalsong Forrest", was still amazing looking and I snapped a few shots there before I got ported back to Howling Fjord by Blizzard for going into a area that wasn't ready yet.

Enjoy the pics, will have a fresh batch up really soon.

-P. Knight

More Lich King Beta pics

2008-07-25T14:40:00.000-07:00

Hey folks,

As I said before, here are some more photos from the WoW Lich King Beta. The photos first start with the new Stormwind Harbor that will be fully build once Lich King goes live and is currently being build on the live servers. After the Harbor, all the rest of the photos are of the new continent Northrend where the Lich King is.

Unlike in Burning Crusade, Alliance and Horde players will take a boat from either Stormwind or Undercity to get to their own respective cities in Northrend. For Alliance at least, they will be starting at the southern tip of the Borean Tundra in the new human Alliance town, Valiance Keep. From there, Alliance characters will have all sorts of quests to explore Borean Tundra which has all sorts of new mobs as well as interesting terain ranging from red deserts to huge snowy plains and even massive geyser fields.

After Borean Tundra, I ran through Dragonblight which as the name may suggest, there were a good amount of dragons running around. There are these huge dragon shrines all over the place and all look really cool of course. Each has a different them ranging from plush gardens to total fire pits. Its interesting to see diverse landscapes in Dragonblight since most of the area is totally covered in snow. Along the way you will run into some undead, see the massive Lord of the Rings like gateway to Icecrown, run by massively huge dragon bones and deal with some very unhappy dragons. Also of note is that Dragonblight is where Naxxramas is now.

Going more northeast, I went into an area called Zul'drak. Here I went from the huge artic theme of Dragonblight to more of a freakish forrest undead area that contained everything from trolls to elementals to some really weird new undead. Right as you get into the zone, you are surrounded by very eerie looking trees that look more dead then alive. After running into Northrend's version of Durn the Hungerer, I went up a flight of stairs which led me to a new tier that was covered in water and decaying old walls and buildings and had tons of undead roaming around. After getting passed them and metting up with a offshoot of the Argent Dawn, I went up to the next tier which had friendly elementals fighting undead mobs. Getting past them and up another tier, I was at the entrance pathway to Gundrak which had tons of both undead and trolls wanting to kill me. In front was a large kodos who was a boss.

After getting out of there due to how many mobs wanted to kill me and the fact they were all above level 75, I went back to Borean Tundra to go far north and down into Sholazar Basin. Now many people may remember the plush location of Un'goro, well Sholazar Basin is like Un'goro, but on steroids. Its all very plush, looks like a massive jungle and has tons of new beasts to check out. One new mob who are actually good guys are the Oracles who are basically the next step in the Murloc evolutionary chain. They aren't as colorful as Murlocs, but are a lot smarter it seems and actually look rather nasty in a fight. And of course, even Hemet Nesingwary is there to offer you more quests.

Sholazar is really cool looking and there is a lot to cover in there. There are even certain spots where undead are more toward the south since the area is sort of connected to the Icecrown zone. So be on the lookout for armies of undead as well as another new mob called proto-dragons. You won't see to many of those guys, but they are very freaky looking and spit fire out as well. Based on some of the building that are in Sholazar, you can tell there use to be a higher race there. Seeing a Stargate type gateay there as well as the Maker's buildings make you wonder why this plush area is on a totally frozen continent.

As for the last photos with the really cool looking trees, they were taken at the entrance way to a zone called Storm Peaks. I didn't get a chance to check the area out yet, but those neon type trees were very cool looking to say the least.

So for now, thats all the photos I have till I log back on this weekend to get some more. Hope you liked them so far and be on the look out for some more of course. Enjoy!

-P. Knight

Death Knight Pics Part 2

2008-07-25T12:34:00.000-07:00

Hey folks,

Here are the rest of the Death Knights photos I was talking about from the Lich King beta. As you can see, lots of cool stuff.

For those who were wondering how it all may work once the Death Knights are able to leave the closed off area and rejoin the rest of the WoW community, its rather easy. At the end of the last quest in the closed off area, which is to take down Light's Hope Chapel, the DK is given a new spell that allows him to transport himself back to Ebon Hold which is the new city for DKs located about Light's Hope Chapel in Eastern Plaugelands. In Ebon Hold, all DKs can train new spells, but reagents and do other type city stuff there. Not sure if Ebon Hold has a auction house or not though and so far you have to transport down to Light's Hope Chapel in order to get a flight path back to any other major city.

Hopefully they change that a bit so that there are teleports in Ebon Hold back to the main cities or else DKs will have a lot of flying to do. And yes, DKs do get hearthstones, so they will have two types of transport they can use. Good news is that the Ebon Hold one only has a 15 minute cooldown so far.

Anyway, will add more pics from the beta later. All of them from Northrend which is totally badass looking. Some places have a very Tim Burton, Nightmare Before Christmas feel to them. So be on the look out for those as well.

-P. Knight

Lich King Beta Pics

2008-07-25T12:05:00.000-07:00

Hey folks,

As some may know, this past Monday I was able to get onto the World of Warcraft: Wraith of the Lich King beta that came out last Friday. Since then, I have been messing around with the beta and even tried my hand at the new Hero class, Death Knight.

Having tried out the Death Knight class for a few levels, who actually starts at level 55, I decided to take a few snapshots of the beginning quests that players must do to unlock the Death Knight class and take the character to the real "overworld" of Azeroth. Below you will find the first batch of pics showing some of the new quests as well as the brand new starting area for the Death Knight class.

Everyone who wants to play a Death Knight has to do these first few quests, which take about a hour to two hours depends on their luck, to do in order to finally get out of the DK start area and rejoin the real WoW world. The quests were all pretty fun actually with only a few having some bugs. I remember Blizzard said they wanted the intro DK quests to be something very cool and memorable, and I think some of these will be.

My only main gripe so far with the quests is that they are all way to easy. When you think Hero Class, you would think it would actually take some time and effort to unlock the DK class before you can really play them in the game. Here though, you just start the DK at level 55, as long as you have another character at level 55+, and just do these variety of quests and you are done. None of the quests were all to challenging and never really took much thinking to do them. Most where just kill certain mobs and that was it. There were a cool few ones though like being able to ride a frost undead dragon to kill off a city of Scarlet Crusaders, turn a bunch of miners into your own army of ghouls, steal a horse which had the great quest name of Grand Theft Palomino and the final quest which was one of the coolest ones I have seen to date where you and a army of other DKs fight the people at Lights Hope Chapel.

Overall it was still a fun quest series to do and it was cool to see a lot of the bosses from Naxx standing around helping you kill people and giving you quests. Even the Lich King was there giving you orders which was really cool since he is the big baddie this time around. I still wish they would of mad the quests more challenging, but this is the beta of course, so you never know if Blizz may make them more challenging or not.

Anyway, here is the first batch of photos for now. Will add more of the DK area soon as well as some photos of Northrend to boot. Enjoy!

-P. Knight

Justice is blind

2008-07-23T12:52:00.000-07:00

Hey folks,

So this week I am on call for jury duty. I didn't have to go in on Monday or Tuesday, but did end up having to come in on Wendsday. I am actually making this post on a computer in the Inglewood justice building oddly enough. Anyway, just wanted to post something a little funny that I saw on the way back from lunch as I had to report to some jury panel. Driving back from a local McDonalds I had for lunch, I saw two guys trading somewhat large packages of cocaine with each other right outside. The fact that these guys were doing this just mere minutes away from the justice buildings just seemed rather ironic to me.

Even one of the guys I am sitting here with waiting to see if we have to serve or not told me he stopped at a little dinner across the street for lunch and everyone was smoking weed. I just find this all a little funny where me and this guy are wearing juror badges and we are seeing all these illegal actions which are all happening just within earshot of the Inglewood justice buildings. Definitely a bit surreal I must say.

-P. Knight

Slacker

2008-07-23T12:49:00.000-07:00

Hey folks,

Sorry for not having posted in nearly a week. I haven't fallen off the earth nor have little green men looking like Ross Perot abducted me and started using anal probes on me. This past week has been rather busy for me oddly enough, but I do hope to make some new posts over the next few days. So be on the lookout for those cause I do have a lot I want to post on here. Sorry for being a slacker!

-P. Knight

Hit the road

2008-07-17T01:21:00.000-07:00

Hey folks,

Its been about 4 years since I last visited the folks over at JibJab.com, and I have no idea why I haven't been back till now. Well the fact that they got a all new political satire cartoon showing now may be one reason of course. Their new toon, Time for Some Campaignin', is a great take on the current 2008 Presidential election and will have you laughing your ass. If not anything, you will definitely be humming the song for sometime afterwards. Enjoy!

-P. Knight

Get the hell out!

2008-07-16T23:49:00.000-07:00

Hey folks,

When it comes to adapting comics into movies, there are the good, the bad and then of course the real ugly. This summer we have had a lot of comic book based movies ranging from Iron man to Wanted. Now before Dark Knight destroys them all of course, one of the big comic films that many geeks as well as movie goers were looking forward to was the new Guillermo del Toro directed flick, Hellboy 2: The Golden Army.

Honestly, I could write a very nice long review for Hellboy 2 and go on about how much fun the movie actually is. But at this point in time, I think many people pretty much already made up their mind on if they plan on seeing the film or not. Many will go see it since they saw the first one and actually liked it like myself. Others who may not of even seen the first one, but will go check it out since Guillermo directed a little film called Pan's Labyrinth between Hellboy 1 and 2. Either way though, I think many people will dig this movie as long as they will know what they are getting into off the bat and know this is a sequel film.

In the original Hellboy, we got a glimpse into the Mike Mignola world of Hellboy and the film was more or less a condensed origin story for Hellboy. Guillermo really could of made a better film I think for the first Hellboy film, but he was still a dark horse director, Hellboy was a bit of a under ground comic and Sony didn't want to loose a lot of money making the film. So you could tell Guillermo had to hold back a fair amount and even had to include a new human character not in the Hellboy comics because Sony execs were worried that audiences "wouldn't relate to the freaks". The film was still really good I thought, but we only got a glimpse into the Hellboy world as well as the directing and imagining skills of Guillermo.

Now with Hellboy 2, and thanks to the folks over at Universal now paying the bill, Guillermo's brain is basically on display here and he can really stretch his creative muscle. You can tell after the huge success of Pan's Lab., Universal just gave Guillermo tons of cash and told him to go hog wild here. Now of course that can be a bad thing sometimes since there are many films that could of been good went south due to the director deciding he was doing everything his way. Hellboy 2 on the other hand is the opposite of that and shows that there really are some insanely imaginative directors in Hollywood still.

You can really tell that Mignola and Guillermo had a great time with Hellboy 2 which in turn makes the audience have a great time as well. All the amazing monsters, sets and even the Danny Elfman soundtrack were all top notch and no other director could of brought us all this except Guillermo.

Of course what is a good director without a good cast? All the usual folks are back from the first film of course and Ron Pearlman once again really brings Hellboy to life. Everyone else does a great job like Selma Blair as Liz Sherman, Doug Jones as Abe Sapien and even Family Guy creator Seth MacFarlane as te voice of newcomer Johann Krauss. And unlike in the first film, all these great characters get a lot more screen time and Abe even has a bit of a love story instead of just being a small side character line in the first Hellboy. Hellboy is of course still the main character, but its nice that all we get more from the other characters as well since they all have some great personalities and stories.

Now many folks may criticize the film as only being a visual spectacle with nothing else behind it, but the movie does actually have some real heart in it. I will admit I don't feel that Hellboy 2 wasn't as story driven like the first film was, but there is still a better story here then in most other films that came out this year. I think the main reason behind this feeling is that there isn't a real main villain in the film. There is some bad guys of course, but even they have a good reason for what they are doing and there is a bit of a moral message as well along with why they do what they do. I think to many audiences and critics may miss that message and thats why they are saying there isn't a whole lot to this movie. Still, its actually cool to see a villain that isn't just a corny, over the top bad guy, but actually a person who has real reasons for what he is doing and many may relate to. Like I said though, there really something great behind this film and hopefully many get a chance to see what it is.

Anyway though, I really do recommend people check this film out. I give Hellboy 2 a 9/10 without even blinking. Guillermo gives us a really amazing visual piece of film making here as well as a story that will have you smiling, cheering and has a ton of heart behind it. Pretty much everything about this film works really well despite a few small story flaws here and there. Even if you have never read the comics and barely remember the first film, go check Hellboy 2 out. Everyone will have a hellishly good time I would say.

-P. Knight

You don't mess with the Norris

2008-07-15T01:54:00.000-07:00

Not much to say here due to all the millions of Chuck Norris jokes out there. If this game every became real, I know way to many people would download it just for the camp factor. None the less, a cool and funny video featuring our favorite Texas Ranger. Enjoy!

-P. Knight

Footpenis

2008-07-12T21:55:00.000-07:00

Hey folks,

So I decided to bite the bullet and check out the new Will Smith money making superhero summer flick, Hancock. Now I know many critics haven't really dug the film and there has been mixed feelings with most audiences who saw the film. Honestly, I can see why people haven't been to thrilled with the film. The movie is scattered all over the place and feels more like a trailer for a greater film then an actual film itself.

In Hancock, Will Smith plays a sullen and often drunk superhero who wants to help save the world but doesn't care how much damage he does in order to do it. This premise is actually a very good one in all honesty. Most the time we see superheros who are goodie goodies or all around good people. But in Hancock, we see what would happen if a Superman type superhero actually acts like a real schlub, drinks a ton and has some horrible people skills. The problem though is that after about the first 30 mins of the film, things get a little weird. The story starts jumping really fast, the characters are never really flushed out and all the scenes are like 2 mins long.

A few months ago, Hancock was tested with some live audiences and many didn't seem to like the film. Due to this, you can really tell that the executives had a major hand in reshaping the film to appease more people with a fair amount of last minute reshoots. The movie started as a light hearted comedy and went to a dramatic hero film really fast. The general story went to shambles really fast and it seemed like not a lot was really flushed out. Everything felt a bit forced and that these executives thought audiences would like something that even a 2 year old could understand. Even the general tone of the film goes from a bit comedic and lighthearted to a more dramatic, nearly emo type film that just never went anywhere.

Acting wise, Smith is decent at best. He has very little lines, not much of a personality and they never really flush Hancock out to much. They give him a small back story and we only get to see him fight crime a little bit. This is one of the few Will Smith movies where he actually doesn't have a lot of lines and doesn't really act. I usually like Will Smith and think he is a great actor, but all his acting in here just seemed forced and underdone.

Along with Smith we have Jason Bateman who plays a marketing guy who wants to change the way people look at Hancock and make him more of a hero. We also have Charlize Theron who plays Bateman's wife in the film. Both do the best they can with the material they are given, but the material is just really lacking. Bateman has the most lines in the film and is the heart here really. He pretty much plays the normal goofy guy who is more or less the comic relief of the film and is what makes Hancock act more like a hero then a ass. But even with that, you feel like Bateman could of done a lot more with the character if given the chance.

There is also Charlize Theron of course who was just a little too one dimensional most of the film. Once again, she doesn't really show any acting chops till the end of the film and even then it seems a little half hearted. She plays a major part in the film at the end and is part of the twist in the film as well. Much like Bateman and Smith, I think Theron is a great actress, but just wasn't given anything to work with in Hancock.

I really think Hancock could of been a great film. There were a lot of great ideas and concepts in the movie including Hancock's true identity and the big twist at the end , but none of them really panned out or came to fruition in a good way. Everything ended up just being forced and you can almost tell that that the actors stopped caring half way through the film. Even the big super villain of the film wasn't really a villain and more of a joke of a bad guy. There were some good moments here and there and the first half 30 mins of the film were actually really good and had some cool action to boot. To bad it just goes from hitting the pavement running to turning into a old man with a walker half way through.

I had some high hopes for Hancock and maybe they can redeem themselves with a sequel, but I don't really have high hopes there either. Overall I give Hancock a 5/10. This is really a rental film I would say. Its worth checking out when it comes out on DVD, don't get me wrong, but there are far better movies in theaters right now to check out. Forget kryptonite, tt really seems that a superhero's true weakness is movie execs gone amok.

-P. Knight

Feel wanted by Angelina Jolie

2008-07-12T20:29:00.000-07:00

Hey folks,

I got a chance to check out the comic turned film, Wanted, last weekend and thought I would toss up a review on here for anyone who is thinking about checking it out. Off the bat, let me say that all the people who are saying that Wanted is a cross between Fight Club and the Matrix and pretty much spot on. Take the inter-monologuing, pathetic loser from Fight Club and mix it with the world altering, high action story of the Matrix and you have Wanted. With that out of the way, lets get on with the review.

First off all, we got the story. As I said above, the story is basically about a pathetic office jocky who one day finds out he is the son of a legendary assassin, has these crazy adrenaline skills which allow him to slow down time inside his mind and that he has been tapped to be trained and take out the man who killed his father. Now the story has sort of been done a few times now, more so in the martial arts films then American ones of course. Still, this is nothing all to new really. As usual, the loser is trained to become a major badass and does so in only a few weeks time. The training though is a ton more brutal then I have seen in awhile and you actually feel bad for the main character, Wesley Gibson. He takes a licking and keeps on ticking. Still, in only a few weeks, he is turned into a huge badass and racks in a few kills before being able to go after the guy who killed his father.

I could cover more of the story like some of the weird story elements such as the "Loom of Destiny", the cure all wax treatment or the stereotypical side characters. But this is a summer popcorn movie folks and its not a flick that is suppose to be story driven. All you need to know is a guy becomes a killer and is sent to kill his father's murder. Thats about it. There are a few surprises of course and you will actually look back throughout the film to spot some things they talk about later in the movie and you will go "Ah, they are right!". But other then that, you can switch your brain off and have a good time.

As for the acting, I was actually a bit surprised. James McAvory does a solid job as Wesley Gibson and plays off the loser type really well. Even once he becomes a total badass, he doesn't act like previous big action stars who tend to throw out acting skills for more guns and action. Towards the end I think he plays up the badass type a little to much, but it still works. Till then though, you actually do believe this guy is Joe Schmoe who ends up having tons of crazy stuff happen to him and put in a situation where he has to seek vengeance.

Sidelining McAvory we have Angelina Jolie and Morgan Freeman. In Wanted, Jolie plays the insanely sexy Fox who has been assigned to train Gibson and make sure he kills his father's killer. There isn't a whole lot to her other then to be eye candy and to drive Gibson to make sure he is a killer, though you get a little glimpse into why she does what she does. I wish they would of fleshed her out a bit more, but I guess its good they didn't cause sometimes you don't need to dive into side characters. There are just there to push along the main character and thats what you need from time to time. But with Fox, it did seem like she could have some cool stories to tell. Plus, you get to see Jolie naked. Despite looking like a 1940's cartoon skeleton now a days, seeing Jolie naked is always a plus in my book.

Morgan Freeman though pretty much plays Morgan Freeman in Wanted. He is in charge of the major assassins group , called The Brotherhood. He is the one to gives the killing assignments to everyone and watches over Gibson. He doesn't have a huge amount of screen time and just pops up time to time to offer some advice much like with any other recent movie that had Freeman in it. It isn't till the near end Freeman actually opens up a bit and starts acting like a cool son of a bitch.

Now of course there is the action in Wanted. Sadly though, unlike the Matrix, Wanted doesn't have anything all to new or awesome in the action department. Don't get me wrong, there is some really cool action scenes in the film, but nothing that will really change how we look at chase or fight scenes. Gun-fu takes on a bit of a new meaning in the flim though since all these assassins can "bend" bullets and make them curve around objects including people. So some of the fights actually will have you sitting on the edge of your seat.

Overall, Wanted was actually fun for me. This is what a real popcorn summer movie should be and I think Wanted is worth checking out in theaters. It won't change how we look at action movies nor does it make you question everything around you. Still, I think most people will walk out of the film with a grin and have a bit of action buzz going when they do. I give Wanted a 7/10 and Angelina Jolie can bend my bullet anytime she wants.

-P. Knight

The 305

2008-07-10T02:28:00.000-07:00

Hey folks,

A friend of mine at work recommended I check out this video up on You Tube that is sort of a parody of the film 300. All I can say is that it had me rolling out of my chair. I am a big fan of parodies and this is some great stuff. Give it a look and see if you get a chuckle as well. Enjoy!

-P. Knight

David Hayter hates America and slept with Bin Laden!

2008-07-10T01:13:00.000-07:00

Well...........not really of course.

The real reason I made that freaky sentence the title of this post has to do with a recent incident Mr. David Hayter had with video game site, 1up.com. Now for those who may not know, David Hayter is the voice behind Metal Gear Solid main character, Solid Snake. Hayter is also a screenwriter and helped do the screenplays for X-men 1 and 2 as well as The Scorpion King and the upcoming Watchmen film. The main focus here though is his work with Kojima Productions and the fact that he has been the voice of Solid Snake for all these years.

This past weekend the annual anime convention, Anime Expo, was held here in Los Angeles and Mr. Hayter appeared as a special guest speaker since has also done many anime voice overs as well as well as video game voice overs. During Mr. Hayter's panel, which had thousands of people show up to, a fan asked Mr. Hayter "Has there ever been anything you disagreed with (creatively), during the course of the Metal Gear games?". Mr. Hayter answered the question by sighting two different times he felt that he disagreed with how the series was written including the ending in MGS4. Mr. Hayter just voiced what he thought about how Snake acted out of character and that he would have had Snake act a little differently had he been the one to write the story.

Now thats all Mr. Hayter said. But thanks to the power of human stupidity and the internet, many people started reporting that Mr. Hayter had slammed Kojima and didn't like the Metal Gear series. Now of course people taking stuff out of content is nothing knew, but here is the real kicker folks. Popular video game info site 1up.com reported what happened, but instead of just publishing the truth, they spinned it to make it sound like Mr. Hayter had a bone to pick with Kojima and crew. You can check out the article from 1up here.

Now after a few days of letting that boil and many fans now over reacting to the 1up article, Mr. Hayter actually sent a letter to 1up.com telling them how he felt about their article and wanted to correct them on a few things. Check out that letter here.

Luckily, I got to meet Mr. Hayter before at the MGS4 signing a few weeks back and he really is a cool guy and did a few Snake lines in his voice for me and my friends. I see what Mr. Hayter was getting at with his Anime Expo comments and its really sad that 1up.com took the story and made it sound like Mr. Hayter had some grudge against Kojima. Hopefully Kojima didn't see that article and Mr. Hayter didn't have to explain it all since that would be a bit awkward of course. None the less, I am glad to see Mr. Hayter defending what he said and writing a letter to 1up so they could try to straighten things out. 1up did respond to Mr. Hayter's letter of course which you can check out here.

Despite trying to sound apologetic, it still seems like 1up is still stabbing Mr. Hayter in the back and making it sound like the guy was being a ass for writing them a letter and calling them on their own shit. Go check it out for yourself and see what I mean. The person who wrote the response to Mr. Hayter's letter, who is the editor-in-chief of 1up, sure knows how to phrase things just right so that it seems like Hayter over reacted and that it wasn't their fault all this stuff is happening. Some very passive aggressive writing I must say.

Now the reason I bring all this up is that this isn't the first time gaming journalists have caused ripples in the video game community and its usually at the expensive of someone who actually works on making video games like Mr. Hayter. This past few years, more and more video game magazines and sites seem to be turning into the real news and taking comments out of context and creating mountains out of mole hills as the saying goes. I had honestly never thought the game industry would be faced with journalism such as this.

Some may say this is only a single case of bad journalism, but this has happened before actually. I wish I could dig through all the game sites out there for some more proof, but I will just give you folks to examples I have dealt with being in the game industry myself.

The first example I am going to show you folks actually deals with God of War creator, David Jaffe. Besides being a game designer and director, Mr. Jaffe is also a bit of a blogger as some may know. His blog usually has all sorts of interesting posts to read including what Mr. Jaffe things about current video games and the gaming community. If you head over to his site, you will see even recently he was posting his thoughts on video games that feature Marvel comic book character such as Spider-man. Now his post is very dead on about how the video game companies need to actually made a good comic book character game and stop with all the boring, repetitive games they have been spewing out as of late. Of course because he said this, the folks over at G4 thought this was news worthy for some reason and posted their thoughts on Mr. Jaffe's blog which you can read here.

Due to what G4 did, Mr. Jaffe got a ton of flaq for saying what he did and many people thought Mr. Jaffe hated Marvel for some reason. Of course Mr. Jaffe made a post about it all on his site and this caused G4 to tweak their original post as well so that it didn't make Mr. Jaffe look as bad as it did before. But the damage was still done by G4's original post that basically said Mr. Jaffe hated Marvel and Spider-man. So as you can see, gaming journalism is becoming just as sorted and trashy as real journalism. More and more game journalists seem to want to make things up to get readers or take things out of context so more people will buy their magazines or hit up their websites.

Another great example I was around for was back when the Playstation 2 game, Killzone, first come out several years back. With Halo and Halo 2 becoming the "it" games for the X-box, many had wondered how Sony would deal with these two power house FPS games. Was Killzone the answer? Nope, but game journalists sure made it out to be. Back before the game had come out, the American producers of the games were doing the usual media circuit and were interviewed by a few sites and magazines. Out of the blue one morning, several sites started posting that the producers were saying that Killzone was the "Halo killer" and that it was gonna rip a new one into the X-box. This of course caused the Killzone producers to freak out and started a rabid assault on a game that wasn't even out yet by Halo fanboys on several websites. Did the producers ever say anything like what the game sites reported? Nope, not in the least. Did the websites ever apologize for what they said or say who actually said those comments? Of course not.

Journalism to me is suppose to be reporting the facts and letting the masses know what is truthfully going on. Even video game journalism should be held to those standards, especially since there really isn't a whole lot to report to be honest. But of course, it seems game journalists seem to be following in footsteps of real journalists and now are publishing stories that will whip people into a frenzy, start some huge debate or even cause a rift between companies all so they can get a few more viewers on their sites.

Something many gamers may not know thought is that the video game industry is a very small and personal industry. Despite being spread out across the world, many people know each other, many people have to deal with each other and a lot of people will have to work with one another. So by slanding or doing bad reporting like some of these journalist have, it can cause lots of friction and or bad blood between people. So when stories like the Mr. Hayter incident pop up, Mr. Hayter has to worry about how it would effect his relationship with tons of people in the game industry including Kojima Productions and has to worry about how others in the industry will view him now.

Thats another reason why its bad that game journalists do this sort of thing. Bad reporting and blowing things up can really ruin people's loyalties, friendships and business partnerships. The power of the press is quaint amazing and hopefully these journalists don't go further down this rabbit hole because it could ruin many people's reputations and relationships in the industry. I think the normal press does that well enough to everyone else. I say we leave video game folks alone honestly.

It really has became sad that gaming journalism is coming down to this sort of thing though. There isn't a whole lot to the gaming industry and I never thought journalists would have to start pulling tricks like this to get readers. Many gamers trust video game sites and magazines and it just seems like they are using that trust for their own ends. I already wrote a post all about how corrupted game reviewers are getting and this just seems to be another reason to not trust video game journalists any more. Hopefully one day this will change, but probably not as long as people are greedy and journalists want attention.

O well, at least I have my little blog here. No one may read it, but at least I am not going gentle into that good night. I see what is happening to the game industry and it really is becoming a sad state of affairs. This may change in the future, but only time and lots of bad journalism will tell.

-P. Knight

Tropic Thunder or bust

2008-07-10T01:08:00.000-07:00

Hey folks,

Well it seems my universally know bad luck streak hit again today and I wasn't able to make the Tropic Thunder early screening this evening. My buddy and I made it to the theater about a hour before the showing and found out that all the tickets were gone and that there were still like over 50 people there who couldn't get in including us. We hung out for a bit and one of the people running the screening took down out names and email addresses saying that there is another showing next week in West Los Angeles and that she was gonna send us passes for then.

So hopefully next week we will get in this time around. Apparently people were getting there over 2 hours early, so we may have to do the same thing. So yeah, sorry folks, no review of course. But fingers crossed on the showing next week. I really want to check out Tropic Thunder since it honestly looks like the first real comedy of the year, so I do really hope I can get in next week. Either way though, will see it no matter what of course be it early or when it actually comes out next month.

-P. Knight

Tropic Thunder Screening

2008-07-09T12:24:00.000-07:00

Hey folks,

Yesterday I was able to score some tickets for a early showing up of the upcoming comedy flick, Tropic Thunder. I will be seeing the film tonight, a good month before its actual release. Due to this, I will be trying to hammer out a fast review of course since I know this is one of the bigger comedies people have been looking forward to. Plus, I will submit my review over to Ain't It Cool News to see if they will post it as well since I know they love getting early reviews of films.

Anyway, just wanted to give a heads up since I have been slacking on posts lately. Hope to have the review up tonight or tomorrow depending on how long the film runs. And for those who didn't catch it, here was the cool little promo vid the Tropic Thunder cast did for the Mtv Movie Awards a few weeks ago. Enjoy!

-P. Knight

And you thought the new ones were bad...

2008-07-09T01:39:00.000-07:00

Hey folks,

As a fellow comic book reader and movie lover like many geeks out there, the recent Fantastic 4 movies really made me cringe to watch. They took a pretty good premise and just totally made into a campy, commercial film that lost the soul of the comic series. Many fans voiced similar complaints and many still hope that Marvel may restart the series like they did with the Hulk series as well as the Punisher series. But before these two recent bombs hit, there was another Fantastic 4 movie which was made back in 1994 and was produced by legendary produce/director, Roger Corman.

The video for this post is the actual trailer for that movie. Give it a watch and just see what sort of real terror the newer F4 movies could of been. As horrible as the new films were, the '94 edition has them beat hands down I must say. See the Thing in blue silk looking undies will haunt my nightmares forever.

Enjoy!

-P. Knight

Robots are people to!

2008-07-07T00:09:00.000-07:00

Hey folks,

Honestly at this point in time, I really don't think Pixar can make a bad film. A few years back, they announced that they wanted to do a new movie every summer and stop making people wait 3-4 years for a new film to come out. With that announcement, many wondered if Pixar could keep up the same quality of film as they had with Toy Story, Monsters Inc., Finding Nemo and all the rest. Since that announcement, we have had Cars, Ratatouille and now Wall-e. Safe to say, Wall-e was able to meet the Pixar gold standard and is a bit better then it's two predecessors.

The general story of the film is about a little trash compactor robot named Wall-e who, 700 years in the future, is the last of his kind of earth which is now a giant trash bin which he is suppose to clean up. Over the years, Wall-e started to wonder about the things in the world he lives and now collects all kinds of items that gather his interest. The biggest problem for him though is that he is lonely and only has a pet cockroach to keep him company. Out of the blue though, a spaceship lands on earth and lets loose a brand new I-pod looking robot who is there to see if there is any signs of growth on earth. With this, Wall-e falls for the new robot, named Eve, and does everything he can to swoon her. Of course just like with my previous girlfriend, the giant spaceship returns to collect Eve and take her back to the main ship where all humans are living now in space. So Wall-e now must chase after her and ends up finding himself in a adventure that could effect all of earth and the human race.

Even though the story behind Wall-e is a bit simple, reviewing the film is a bit tricky. Much like other Pixar films, Wall-e has two layers to the film which will appeal to both adults and kids. The tricky part though is that there isn't a whole lot to this movie content wise. With other Pixar movies, there is always a lot going on, lot of talking, a good amount of characters and or a really in-depth plot. But with Wall-e, you feel like you are eating a big piece of cotton candy. It looks good, it tastes good, but there isn't a whole lot there.

Honestly, that is what amazes me the most about this film. Despite very little spoken dialog in the film, there is a lot of emotions and concepts expressed in the movie that will hit home with many viewers. The two basic concepts though are a cute love story about a goofy robot falling for a high tech, cutting edge robot and his adventure to save her while the other concept is about how humans are becoming total pigs and couch potatoes. The love story will make everyone from the youngest to the oldest smile while the social commentary will only stick to those over the age of 12.

No matter what you take from the film though, you will like it. I am not saying you will walk out and love it nor do I think its the best Pixar film to date, but its still one of their stronger films and is tons of fun to watch. There is a lot of great comedy in the film while the adventure part is fun to watch and the romance stuff is very cute. I think they get a little heavy handed with the social commentary type stuff, but its still done very well and makes a very good point about how humans now a days are really becoming giant slugs and letting everything around them do their work for them. But even with that, I really did like Wall-e and I give the film a 9/10. My only advice though is to catch a late show if you check it out in the theaters or wait till the DVD release so you don't have a billions kids in the audience always talking. Either way though, go see this film because I think its one of those ones everyone should see.

-P. Knight

I want to see his frequent flyer card

2008-07-06T23:46:00.000-07:00

Hey everyone,

I honestly have no idea why this video is so cool, why its spreading over the net like wildfire and why I like it. But its really fun to watch, put a smile on my face, has great music and some amazing locations. Its just totally random fun and hope you guys enjoy it.

And white boys can't dance.

-P. Knight

Where the Hell is Matt? (2008) from Matthew Harding on Vimeo.

Eyeshield 21

2008-07-06T19:42:00.000-07:00

Hey folks,

Like most people, I never honestly thought that sports could honestly translate into comics all to well. Sports always seemed to be the type of content that you needed to watch on a television due to all the action, announcing and atmosphere that goes along with watching sports. I think due to this, not to many manga out there are sports manga and honestly that is probably a good thing really. I say that because instead of having tons of sports manga to pick from, there are only a select few to really choose from and most are pretty good surprisingly enough. Plus this makes sure the market isn't flooded and people get tired of to many sports manga which could turn many of from the genre.

The current sports manga I am reading thought is the only American football manga out there right now that goes by the name of Eyeshield 21. The series is written by Riichiro Inagaki and drawn by the assistant and apprentice of Takeshi Obata (Death Note artist), Yusuke Murata. There series first started off in Shonen Jump in Japan back in 2002 and has since become one of SJ's more popular series spinning off a anime series and several video games.

As for the series itself, it starts off as the typical shonen, comedy series. Weak highschool student Sena Kobayakawa had spent most his life running around for others doing their chores and fetching things for them. One day though, he pissed off some bullies and was forced to run from them. While on the run, the highschool's American football quaterback, Yoichi Hiruma, sees how fast Sena can run as well as jump and now is on a mission to recruit him to become the team's running back. The big reason for this is that the football team only has 2 real members right now while Hiruma ends up having to blackmail other sports clubs to get players for each game. So seeing Sena, who is fast as hell and on no sports tream, is pretty much a wet dream come true for the QB.

So of course, Sena does end up joining the football team, called the Deimon Devilbats, and starts off as both the running back and manager for the teams. Of course since Hiruma is a strategy genius, he makes sure that Sena wears a eyeshield and gives him the number 21 while playing so that no other sports team tries to recruit him as well as use the eyeshield and 21 number as a way to scare other teams since Eyeshield 21 is a legendary player from Notre Dame in America. So of course Hiruma tells everyone that Sena is the highschool equivalent of the legendary Eyeshield 21 and that Sena is from America as well. Like I said, Hiruma is a strategy master since this causes many people to be scared of Sena and it builds him up as a legend. Of course since Sena can run the 40 yard dash in 4.2 seconds, which makes him faster then almost anyone else, many are scared of him as well.

Once you get past the intro to the series, it sort of turns into any other sports manga of course in the sense that the Devilbats start off as the underdogs, gain new and interesting team mates and have a goal of going to the national sports event called the Christmas Bowl. Even though these are all very common elements in many sports mangas, they do it really well in Eyeshield 21. There are a lot of good, cool characters in Eyeshield 21 and many actually come from the opposing teams. Unlike some other mangas where other teams are usually a bunch of bad guys or bullies, most of the other teams in Eyeshield actually have some really good back stories and characters that have real reasons for wanting to win instead of the classic "must beat the weak people" or "we want to win cause we are evil" type reasons.

The general story arcs usually go team training with some insight on a Devilbats team member, background on opposing teams and then the long actual game matche. Thankfully the matches are the majority of the series and are all very good, long and well done. So there isn't a huge amount of buildup to a match that lasts like 2 chapters. All the real matches are nice and long with some having some good twists to them.

Of course though what really drives the series are the characters. As I said before, there are a good amount of characters in Eyeshield and many of them all have great backgrounds and personalities. The characters don't feel repetitive and you almost feel yourself rooting for the opposite team from time to time since Inagaki makes sure that each major team has a interesting background. There is a lot of good character development in this series and many of the characters evolve and change as the series goes on instead of always staying the same throughout the entire series which would make the characters stale. So instead of just having the normal good guy team which all readers root for and like, you actually have a huge amount of other characters you will wish you could see more of which really shows how good of a writer Inagaki is.

Things can still be a little formulaic of course, but there are very few series now a days that don't follow some sort of manga formula anyway. The real key though is taking the formula, adding your own touches to it and producing something that makes you see past the formula and actually enjoy reading a series instead of trying to predict it. Throw in the fact that Murata's artwork is some of the cleanest and crispest I have seen in a manga series , and Eyeshield really makes for a great read.

Eyeshield 21 definitely does that I would say and I would really recommend the series to any manga fan who doesn't care if the main subject of a series is about football. Football is definitely one of the main subjects of the series though, but I think the comedy and the characters are what really drive it and make people come back for more. Right now there are about 20 books out here in the US and you can hit the link below to check out the series over at One Manga. Give it a read and enjoy!

Eyeshield 21!

-P. Knight

Eggman

2008-07-05T22:49:00.001-07:00

Hey folks,

When I was in Vegas last weekend, I got to see the new Cirque du Soleil show, Love. The show was all about the Beatles and featured most of their classic famous songs all done to some really cool stage performances. With that in mind, I bring you this new mini-movie that features old interview with John Lennon a little bit before he was killed all set to a really well done cartoon visual. The interview was done in Canada by a 14-year old who actually asked some really good questions despite his age while Lennon answered with his usual brilliant wit while talking about peace and world politics. Definitely a good watch I must say and something I suggest everyone checks out.

-P. Knight

Laughless laughs

2008-07-03T23:57:00.000-07:00

Hey folks,

As sad as this question may sound, who here remembers the good old days of when spoof and parody movies were actually good? In the last 15 years, all parody/spoof movies have basically become nothing but pop culture reference pieces of dribble that try to shove as many tongue in cheek down your throat as possible. The sad part is that these sorts of movies use to be good.

Back before Scary Movie kicked started this new generation of horrible spoof and parody movies, we use to have ones that were actually good. Not even going to far back, I can remember some of the good parody and spoof movies like Hot Shots, Naked Gun and the classic Airplane films. Hell, remember Mel Brooks? Remember Spaceballs? Blazing Saddles? Now those were great flicks and all had some great wit and humor which the newer flicks really seem to lack. Case in point, look at the new poster for a upcoming parody movie from the people who brought us Date Movie and Epic Movie called Disaster Movie:

See what I am talking about? The entire movie is basically revolving around how many references they can make and how many genres they can slap in the face. The worst part is that more of these types of movies keep being mad and its all due to the same people. Just because they worked on Scary Movie, they think they have the right to keep making this horrible films and don't feel bad at all for the dribble they are forcing onto our society. Seriously, what happened to the good comedies? It seems like as soon as 2000 hit, all originality went out the door and now we are faced with this wanna funny films that are making everyone in America think this sort of bland comedy is actually good.

I really wish someone would make a good spoof/comedy film again. The new Get Smart remake was a step in the right direction, but it would be nice if someone could come up with an original idea and not have to take it from old TV shows. Scary Movie did a great job re-introducing the current young generations to parody and spoof films, but now every movie since then has been a step backward. Judd Apatow and his comedic crew have also been making steps in the right direction as well with one of their recent films, Walk Hard. Once again though, Apatow is still jamming a little to much down people's throats and doesn't use as much of a light touch like many of the older films did with its comedy and spoofing.

That seems to be what really is missing from these films now a days, a light touch. Instead of always bombarding movie audiences with tongue in cheek jokes and pop culture references, the more classic films always had more of a wink, wink sort of style that was a bit more subtle then these new films. Don't get me wrong, the older films did reach out and slap audiences with a rubber chicken from time to time, but they knew when totally outrageous gags and parodies should be used in a film and never made the entire film based on those premises like this new films do. Instead of a rubber chicken though, current parody movie writers seem to want to hit movie goers with a large ACME hammer over and over so that audiences will get dumber and dumber. This way, these writers will have less work to do in order to make people laugh and they don't have to worry about writing something smart or witty.

At this point though, I don't have much hope to see a good spoof/parody movie anymore. Most comedies now a days are becoming more realistic type humor films like Knocked Up, Forgetting Sarah Marshall and Superbad. Now I love those films of course, but its a totally different type of comedy thats more based on situations then making fun of a genre of film or spoofing a certain film. Still, I will hold onto some shred of hope that Mel Brooks may make one last comeback film or that David Zucker will dust off his brain and try to go back to his classic humor and not keep going down the humorless road he is now with films like Scary Movie 3 and 4.

Anyway, a stupid rant I know. But I am just tired of hearing about this horrible new parody flicks. I feel like my IQ is beating its way out of my brain with a mallet every time I hear that another one of these films is made and that they actually do well. Is America's sense of humor really going down the drain? There is some hope here and there like I said, but even those films seem far and few between and still can't hold a handle to the classic films of old.

Hell, maybe even this rant of mine is parody of its own when you thing about it. A parody of all these recent movie critics saying how bad current movies are and that they miss the days of the classic films. But hey, I'm not that good of a writer. So lets just chalk this post up to me wishing that a somewhat dead type of comedy genre would make a comeback someday and leave it at that.

-P. Knight

"Tragedy is when I cut my finger. Comedy is when you fall into an open sewer and die. "

-Mel Brooks

My milkshake

2008-07-03T11:47:00.000-07:00

I honestly don't think I have watched a full SNL episode in like 6 years. Ever since the good people from the 90's cast left, most of the SNL skits just seemed really bland and like they were trying to hard to get a laugh. But a few months ago, they actually did a parody skit of There Will Be Blood and No Country for Old Men which actually had people talking about it on the net and had me rolling on the floor once I saw it.

So I present that skit to you fine folks. Glad to see that SNL still has a few good skits they can pull out of there asses. Enjoy!

-P. Knight

More Hellboy goodness

2008-07-02T12:59:00.000-07:00

Well yesterday I posted a really cool commercial for Hellboy 2 that involved Hellboy being interviewed on Inside the Actors Studio. Well this time around I got another commercial like that, but this time its with NBC's hit show main character, Chuck. I'm telling you, they really are doing a bang up job with marketing this time around for the movie. Check it out below for some good funniness.

Also as another treat for all you Hellboy fans out there, Apple.com has a exclusive prologue video that is a good intro into who the Golden Army is as well as who some of the main characters will be in Hellboy 2. The video is done as a animated comic and it definitely captures the Hellboy look and feel. So check it out so you can be set to go when you go see the movie next Friday. Enjoy!

Apple's Hellboy 2 prologue movie!

-P. Knight

Speechless

2008-07-02T00:34:00.000-07:00

A new poster and a brand new trailer for the Dark Knight all in one day. Both look amazing. 2 and a half more weeks till the movie finally hits theaters. This is going to be epic to say the least. Imax theaters as well as regular movie theaters are already selling tickets for opening weekend and all earlier reviews of the movie have been golden. Stop reading this already and go buy tickets.

-P. Knight

Marketing for dummies

2008-07-01T23:18:00.001-07:00

Hey folks,

I really gotta hand it to certain game companies that are beginning to realize that their marketing folks tend to not know what they are doing and are taking their game's marketing into their own hands. I am not saying that all video game company's marketing departments are bad, but who can honestly recall a really good video game ad in the last few years?

Thankfully the game companies noticed this in the last few years and are really getting into different forms of marketing that doesn't deal just with ads on TV. As some may of noticed, we are seeing more and more developer blogs, tons more viral marketing on the net as well as a lot more cool extras the companies are doing for the game like podcasts, fake commercials and even parodies of their own game. This sorts of new marketing concepts are what are really helping sell games now a days I believe.

I honestly believe this is the wave of the future for video game marketing or at least till many marketing departments pull their heads out of their asses and start realizing what they are doing. So far the biggest offender does seem to be the Sony marketing department who honestly market games they have never played or have no idea who they are marketing to. Both Microsoft and Nintendo have been doing pretty decent lately marketing wise with Nintendo doing the more family, wacky commercials and Microsoft going for the more epic feeling commercials that make their games seem like huge masterpieces. Both companies seem to know who they are marketing their games for and are actually making some commercials that make people want to check out their new games.

Sony on the other hand just seems to have hit a rut with their marketing I must say. Ever since the Ratchet and Clank live action commercials from some years ago, I have yet to really hear anyone say "Wow, that Playstation commercial was great!". I mean even the PS3 commercials had people scratching their heads. Melting plastic babies? Exploding rubik cubes? I mean seriously, did they just go down to Soho in New York and pick up some interpretive artists to design their commercials? Even their online ads tend to be very plain and drab and never really catch anyone's eye. Sony really needs to start taking a look at how other companies are doing their marketing and take some notes because they really have a lot to learn. The internet is going to be around for awhile and its where a major amount of gamers go for info so Sony better start to wise up on this fact.

Like I said though, game companies on all sides are realizing they need to take their marketing into their own hands and are hitting the net with all kinds of good content to get gamers talking and spreading the word of mouth. Even lately, there has been a lot of good marketing on the net thanks to game companies doing it their own way including recent huge hits like the Bad Company studio making parody commercials that spoof all the big action military games to Kojima Productions working with the Assassins Creed crew to make a crossover parody commercial that had everyone on the net talking.

I really wish marketing departments would pick up on these trends, especially the Sony folks, and start airing these great ads on TV. And speaking of which, marketing folks really need to learn who their game's fanbase is going to be and put it on TV during appropriate TV shows. If the game you are marketing is aimed for the teen and 20 something crowd, start airing the commercials more often on Adult Swim, late night shows like Conan O'Brian, Comedy Central and geek shows like Battlestar Galactica, Heroes and Chuck to name a few channels and shows that their targets audiences watch. Seeing a God of War add on CNN makes little sense to me. Know your audience, know what they like and then know how to advertise to them. I know I am making it sound simpler then it is, but its just sad seeing so many good games get a crappy marketing treatment.

Thankfully though, more and more studios are indeed taking their marketing to the net and we are getting to see a new age in internet marketing that is actually fun to watch. Hopefully more and more companies will catch on as well as game designers and directors. With that in mind, game designers and directors are also beginning to be thrown into this new age of marketing and are realizing that they can't just let other people market their game for them and must get involved as well. Thanks to developer blogs, podcasts as well as directors/designers getting their faces on the net with interviews and such, more and more gamers are becoming aware of games that are coming out thanks to the designers and directors themselves.

I honestly can not wait to see how all this new marketing turns out and what new content we expect to see from the studios themselves doing marketing this way. Like I said before, this really is the wave of the future for video game marketing and hopefully the major marketing folks who work for the game companies start to catch onto this great new concept. Anyway, sorry for the rant dear reader, it just saddens me as someone who works for the game industry to see so many great games go unplayed due to something so stupid as getting a good marketing treatment.

-P. Knight

A hellish week

2008-07-01T12:42:00.000-07:00

So next Friday we finally get to see the new Hellboy film, Hellboy 2: The Golden Army, hit theaters and I know many geeks can't wait to check it out. All the same cast and crew will be back for the second film including director Guillermo del Toro who was fresh off of directing Pan's Labrynith. Anyway, some new commercials have been popping up on the net and on TV and it looks like Universal is actually doing a decent job of promoting Hellboy 2 unlike Sony who did a half-assed job with the first movie. Thankfully HB2 is coming out before Dark Knight which means it won't be caught in the wake of the Batman giant.

Anyway, I know I can't wait to see the movie next Friday, the 11th, since I loved the first movie and have collected all the comics as well. Also, here is a funny little commercial they did with James Lipton from Inside the Actor's Studio to promote the new movie. Enjoy!

-P. Knight

Quantum of wierd nameness

2008-07-01T12:26:00.000-07:00

Hey folks,

A quick little treat for all you 007 fans out there. The first new trailer for the upcoming new James Bond movie, Quantum of Solace, hit the net yesterday. This is a follow up movie to Casino Royale, and takes place right after the events in CR. The trailer looks awesome of course and the movie looks to be even better then the first since the new movie doesn't have to set Bond up like in CR and we can get right into the story and action.

To check out the trailer, hit the link below. Enjoy!

Quantum of Solace Trailer

-P. Knight

Go with the flow

2008-07-01T00:06:00.001-07:00

Man, you gotta love those crazy Japanese shows. There are tons out there, but this hidden camera prank show one really had me laughing I must say. Honestly, what would you do if you had a crowd of people chasing you eh?

-P. Knight

See no evil, play no evil, review no evil

2008-06-30T19:57:00.000-07:00

Hey folks,

In the world of media and entertainment, there is always suppose to be a nice line between the creators of new content and the critics of said content. This is how it is suppose to be and in a perfect world its what it should be. Back when video games first started coming out and critics started to review them, this is how things were. However over the last few years, I have been noticing that this policy has been going out the door in the game industry in favor of the new policy game companies buying good reviews.

Currently the video game industry is a multi-billion dollar industry with Sony, Microsoft and even Nintendo bringing in near or over 1 billion dollars each year. What some people may not know is that its the games themselves that bring in a huge chunk of this money, not the systems and or accessories. Every game company, be it first or third party, rely totally on game sales of course and making games lately has become a somewhat costly venture due to the newer systems requiring a lot more tech be put into new games. With this is mind, game studios are scared to invest millions of dollars into a game that could totally flop and thus put them in the red. Because of this, major game companies have been trying their best now to make sure their multi-million dollar games sell well and one way to due this is to buy critics off.

Buying a good review from critics is nothing new of course in the entertainment world, but its something many never thought would occur in the video game industry. In the last few years however, many people both in and outside the industry have been noticing the warning signs of video game critics being bribed into giving good game reviews.

One major example of this was the recent IGN.com review of Grand Theft Auto 4. IGN had gotten a exclusive early review of the game a few days before the game's release date and their review of the game happened to be a perfect 10 of all things. Now if you read the review of the game, the IGN reviewer had said the game had several faults and even listed them. Yet with all these faults, he still gave the game a perfect 10. Do you think the fact that Rockstar let the IGN people play the game earlier and do a exclusive review only on their site causing mass amounts of people to flood their happens to factor into the 10? How about the fact that Rockstar had paid IGN a nice little sum to have tons of GTA4 advertisements on their site?

There are many other stories along the lines of the IGN one that have happened in the last few years. Ones ranging from the critic over at Gamespot.com who got fired for giving a game a horrible review while the game maker's company had payed Gamespot.com a large sum of money to promote the game on their site to reviewers admitting that game studios brought them to the studios and wined and dinned them while they got to play that studio's game.

Even recently in Electronic Gaming Monthly I was reading a review of Metal Gear Solid 4 that gave me a sneaking suspicion as to the merit of the review. EGM had three different people review MGS4 and all three gave the game a "A" while a better part of their reviews were spent it picking the game and saying the second half of the game was pretty bad. Now does that sound like a A game review to you? They barely spent anytime really saying how good the game was, yet went on and on about how bad it was yet they still all gave it it a A. During the review though, they did happen to mention that Konami invited them to their studio to let them play the game for as long as they wanted. Seem a little weird doesn't it? I mean don't you think that inviting a bunch of fanboy critics over to a game developer's studio to get to play a game early as well as probably get some free swag won't taint their opinion on the game? Where is that tfine line that separated critics and creators because it really has begun to blur as of late in the game industry due to things like this happening.

Like I said, there are plenty of other examples of things such as this like Bungie all but buying hookers for reviewers who went to their studio to play Halo 3 and review it or how about the fact that Game Informer is owned by Gamestop and gives every game good reviews so they will sell. This trend is definitely happening with the bigger games and studios right now, but who knows when every other game studio might do the same?

Mind you, I am not saying to stop reading all reviews nor think every critic is on the take. What I am saying is that you need to be careful now a days with what you read and who you trust. My advice is to check out what other games the critic has played and see if those reviews matched with your own experiences. Even then, it could still be a trap of course. Thats why my other piece of advice is to go outside the normal gaming review sites and magazines like EGM, IGN, Gamespot and 1up and start finding your own sites. Check out geek blogs, go to new sites like Evil Avatar or Zero-punctuation's page on Joystiq.com or even start reading gamer forums as well. There is a lot more you could do of course, but I wanted to get the ball rolling. Don't sit around and let the main sites spoon feed you their payed for by "insert name here" reviews. Go out and seek better reviews, read up on games and see if you would actually like it or even go out on a limb and take a risk by renting a game and trying it out.

This post isn't a call to arms by any means, but more of a indication of what sort of bad juju is going on in the game industry right now. With video games becoming such a major part of our society and culture, its really sad to see game companies take advantage of their fan base. One day this may change and hopefully we never reach a point where no gamer can trust a critic anymore.

Well thats it for now. I could dive deeper into the fact that many game critics have basically lost their way and are becoming frustrated wannabe game designers, but I will save that for another time of course. For now I just wanted to get the point out that don't always trust what you read.

-P. Knight

The future looks bad

2008-06-30T00:00:00.000-07:00

Hey guys,

So far we have had two new Futurama movies thanks to Comedy Central picking the series up from Fox and Adult Swim. The first film, which came out late last year, was the somewhat sub-par Bender's Big Score. The movie had some good moments and some of the old school Futurama smart wit that made the original series good, but overall it was just lacking and was more about fan service the anything.

Now the second movie recently came out, called The Beast with a Billion Backs, and all hope that the second movie would be better then the first flew out the door in a loud dry sucking sound. Actually that isn't fair, the second movie was a little bit better, but not by a lot really. The second movie takes place right after the first and the events that ended the first movie are what lead to the big events in this new flick.

Just like int he first film, the story in Beast could of been really cool but ended up being played out and way to hackney in the long run. The first movie dealt with time travel and cosmic events while the second movie deals with a giant cosmic creature who wants to unite everyone. Like I said, both sounded good on paper, but weren't implemented all that well.

Fan service one again seems to be the real drive of this movie just like the first since both movies are purposely trying to address things that happened in the original TV series and are using nearly every fan favorite character they can fit in the movies to give fans a smile. Now I do love nearly every Futurama character there is, but cramming them all together in this manner is like a elephant trying to fit in a Mini-Coop. They try to use every character they can and use them for to many forced jokes and you actually end up getting sick of seeing these great side characters since they become to played out and stale.

As usual though, Fry plays the main character in this movie as well and he seems to be getting stupider and stupider in these two movies. Much like with Homer in the recent Simpsons seasons, Fry seems to be loosing his main drive as well as character type. Instead of being the lovable happy go-lucky goof who is still getting use to the year 3000 and has many weird adventures, he has become a pathetic sap who wants nothing but love and acts so insanely emo when he can't find love. All the other characters of course act the way they normally do but tend to be there for more one liners then normal. But it just seems that in order to drive the story for these movies, they made Fry into this total one dimensional character who seems to have only one goal in life now and isn't the same guy from the original series.

Overall, I would give this film a 6/10. For those fans who have been watching Futurama since the beginning, its still worth watching of course. Just like in Big Score, there are some great comedic and funny moments that make me miss the old TV series writing even more and shows how could this movies could of bin. I honestly have no idea what happened in these years the Futurama crew was off, but it really seems to have taken a toll. Hopefully they can get over this comedic slump they are having and remember how to write the kind of comedy gold that made the original series so great. We still have 2 more movies as well as a new half season that Comedy Central will be airing next year I believe. So finger's crossed that the rest of the Futurama movies and episodes pick back up and regain the same wit and geeky humor that the original series had.

-P. Knight

Diablo 3

2008-06-29T19:25:00.000-07:00

Hey folks,

Well as many may know by this time, Blizzard announced that their next game after Starcraft 2 will indeed be Diablo 3 like many people expected it to be. They made the big announcement as well as released some more details about the new game, including the new Witch Doctor class they announced, this past weekend at the Blizzard International Invitational. To check out the pretty nifty looking trailer, just hit the video below.

Diablo3 - Cinematic Trailer from diablo-3.net on Vimeo.

Honestly, that was a pretty nice looking trailer though a bit of a cocktease much like the Starcraft 2 trailer. Some really nice CG as well as some teases with some of the characters from the first two games. Whoever made the trailer though watched to much Lord of the Rings though since I think the Diablo 3 trailer looks exactly like a trailer for the LotR trilogy trailer including giant castles built into the hillside, a old man as well as a young person having a nightmare about the big bad guy.

Anyway, some new game play was shown off this weekend as well and it looks very good. Much like how Starcraft 2 looked compared to Starcraft one. You can check out the new game play footage below.

Diablo 3 Gameplay-Video from mmozone on Vimeo.

As for more info on Diablo 3 as well as all the info that was released this weeked at the Invitational, just hit the link below:

Diablo 3 coverage at World of Raids!

-P. Knight

While you were gone...

2008-06-29T19:08:00.000-07:00

Hey folks,

Back from my little trip to Las Vegas. Had a great time, saw some good shows and ate a boat load of food. While gone, it seems I missed a few interesting things due to the Blizzard International Invitational. I will get to all that later and more. While in Vegas, I got to mull over a few things and have a few ideas, reviews and observations I want to post on here in the next few days.

Anyway, glad to be back. Got a lot to catch up on including weekly manga chapters like Eyeshield 21 and One Piece, some new anime to watch like Code Geass as well as all the new game info to catch up on. Hopefully everyone had a good weekend of course and caught either Wall-e or Wanted in theaters.

-P. Knight

Solid Snake shows Sony some selling skills

2008-06-27T01:49:00.000-07:00

Hey folks,

As many may know, Metal Gear Solid 4 hit the world 2 weeks ago. So far, over 3 million copies of the game have been shipped to retailers around the globe with over a million already sold. Now as impressive as those numbers may be for a game series that has always been more of dark horse game both here and in Japan, the fact that PS3 sells numbers went way up due to the game is what really has people talking.

Just a few days ago, PlayStation president Kaz Hirai announced during a Sony meeting that in the first week of launch of MGS4 in Japan, 8 times as many PS3 systems sold then in the previous week. There are no numbers yet on American sales, but that is still really impressive none the less. When I was at the MGS4 midnight launch, I remember they had about 50 PS3's in stock at the Best By on La Brea and all 50 sold out that night including none MGS related ones. So when they say a game is a system seller, this what they really mean.

Honestly, its really great to see MGS4 do so well. I have been a big fan of the MGS series since the first Playstation release, but always felt bad since it never was considered a huge "mainstream" game. The MGS series has always been known as more of a cerebral type series with more emphasis on sneaking around, light action, heavy story and cool adventures. Due to this, the series was always on the cusp of becoming mainstream and oddly enough the games always sold better in America then in Japan.

Finally though, the Metal Gear series is getting the real attention it deserves with pretty much anyone and everyone talking about MGS4 and even people who never played the other games wanting to check it out now. Its sort of ironic though that Solid Snakes last adventure is what finally gets people to check out this series.

One thing though that seems to have really helped MGS4 sell so well I think is that it had some great marketing behind it. As oppose to the previous three games, MGS4 was all over the place. Thanks to all the new game news sites popping up over the last few years, the growing awareness of the video game culture as well Kojima Productions getting involved in their own word of mouth and Sony actually really backing the game this time around, MGS4 is really doing well for itself.

I would get into how important internet and viral marketing has become for games now a days, but the proof is in the pudding. Despite MGS4 being the best looking PS3 game to date, I really think all the internet hype is what really helped sell this game and these new internet marketing ideas are the wave of the future. Hollywood has already caught on to this idea as evident with all the Dark Knight stuff that has appeared over the last few months. With developer blogs, videos made directly for internet sites and designers really making sure their face is out there, we are really seeing a new birth of marketing that is really helping the game industry I must say.

Anyway, I am glad MGS4 is doing so well and I hope that Mr. Kojima and crew are working on another great game for us to feast on. Till then though, I think I am gonna keep walking around doing my best Liquid Ocelot voice calling everyone "Brother!".

-P. Knight

Out fishin!

2008-06-27T01:38:00.000-07:00

Hey folks,

Despite the fact no one is reading my blog of course, I am still doing a post informing you all that I will be in Las Vegas the next few days. I leave mid-Friday and will be back mid-Sunday. I am going to be hanging out with my dad there and we are catching the shows O and Spamalot. I hear great things about O and I already saw Spamalot in New York a few years back, so I know it will be good. Other then that, a bit of gambling, checking out all the hotels and shops and trying not to die of to much eating at the buffets is what we have planned right now.

So everyone have a good weekend and don't forget in 1 more day, we will know what Blizzards big new announcement will be thanks to their splash page over at Blizzard.com as well as their international invitational which is happening this weekend. Have a good one folks and go check out Wanted or Wall-e this weekend as well.

-P. Knight

Roflmao!

2008-06-26T12:14:00.000-07:00

A instant classic and still being sung by WoW players all over the world, I give you the Roflmao video that took a classic Muppets song and made it even more geekier. Enjoy!

-P. Knight

When doing evil means doing good

2008-06-26T02:44:00.000-07:00

Hey kids,

Have you ever gotten tired of the good guys in manga and anime always being to wimpy when to defeating the bad guys. Don't you always wish that the good guy would just take out the bad guy already because of everything he has ever done instead of letting him go, try to change him or let the guy get taken away by the cops? Don't you wish these good guys would stop being such goody goodies and grow a pair? Yeah, I wish that to.

The good news is that I recently started a new manga series by the name of Akumetsu that actually has a good guy who is willing to go all out against the bad guys and isn't afraid to get blood on his hands. To do evil to better the world.

The general plot of the series is about a high school student named Shou Hazama who has the ability to "clone" himself. Using this new ability, he has decided to hunt and seek out the evil in Japan to try to help save the world from greed and destruction. Taking on the name Akumetsu and having all his clones wear a black demon like mask he made himself, he sets off to find these bad guys and bring them to justice.

The bad guys though are not your typical mad scientists or corny bank robbers, but more your industrial thieves and bank owners who rob people of their money. So off the bat, Akumetsu is looking to punish real bad guys and not your normal villains. These are the sort of guys who do actually exist in the real world and the sort of evil things they do have happened to people in the real world as well. The one catch though to having more realistic type bad guys like this is that there tends to be a lot of explanation of why these guys are bad and why they need to die. So be prepared for a bit of reading as well.

Now instead of doing the usual superhero bit and using his clones to bring the bad guys in, Akumetsu actually kills off the bad guys and usually ends up killing himself as well. But since all these guys are clones, killing themselves means nothing really. The way he tends to kills these bad guys is indeed a bit brutal, but even I found myself cheering for their deaths. Just as a example, the very first bad guy he takes out he uses a axe to split the guys head open. So like I said, not your typical heroic way to take care of bad guys.

There is definitely a bit of a social message in this series so far (only a little over 30 chapters have been translated into English so far while the series is done in Japan), and its nice to actually see a series tackle a few real world issues even though its all fictional. In a way, this series is a bit like Death Note where a single person wants to change the world by killing off all the evil in it. The real difference is that Akumetsu isn't in it for himself like Light was in Death Note and Akumetsu has a bit more comedy and explains more about how evil these bad guys are.

Art wise, Akumetsu has some amazing artwork and a very slick look. The art is done by newcomer Yuki Yogo with the story done by Yoshiaki Tabata. Yogo does an amazing job with the art of the series with the art style looking a little bit like Frank Miller mixed with the manga Berserk series. So it has a bit of a realistic comic feel to it. Its not your typical manga look and it really makes the series pop a bit and gives it a more adult feel.

Anyway, for anyone who wants a good solid series that has a bit of action, some really funny comedy (odd for a series with this much killing and blood I know), and actually tackles some real issues, give Akumtesu a try. To check the series out in English, just hit the link below to read the mass amount of chapters that are out now online. Enjoy!

Akumetsu!

-P. Knight

2 more days till the end

2008-06-26T01:39:00.001-07:00

Hey folks,

You gotta love how Blizzard teases it fans. For the last few days now, Blizzard.com has had a splash page that each day has been revealing a little bit more of what looks like a person or demon of some sort behind a ice barrier. This little teaser is what Blizzard is doing to announce what new game they are doing next and man are fans squirming in their seats to find out if its more Diablo 3 news, Starcraft online or something totally new.

According to many gaming news sites, the final image on Blizzard.com will appear in 2 days time which is when the Blizzard World Wide Invitational kicks off. So I guess we will just have to wait till then to figure out what this little teaser means. Also of not is that the splash imagine also has all sorts of hidden ruins as well which point to several different games including one from Starcraft. Here is the splash images from the last 4 days. Click on it for a bigger view of course.

Anyway, you gotta love Blizzard. Seeing this many gamers going this feverish over what could be a new game announcement really shows you what sort of power Blizzard has in the gaming community. 2 more days though folks, 2 more days.

-P. Knight

The sad truth

2008-06-25T15:21:00.000-07:00

Recently I came across a very interesting article over at 1up.com about how to make a perfect action video game that will sell well in todays market. You can check out the article below:

http://www.1up.com/do/feature?cId=3168258

Now that article is partially joking while also being a bit serious as well. The truth is, I do agree with the article for the most part. To sum up the article, they are saying that to make a successful video game you need the war torn bad ass main hero, some hot chick who serves no real point, sick weapons that blow things up and a story line thats sole purpose is to just get the main character to different areas.

Like I said, this isn't to far from the truth. If you look at the top 10 selling video games from the last 10 years, you will notice that all three Halo games as well as all three Grand Theft Auto games are on there. In a way, that is a sad state of affairs. I am not saying those games aren't great by any means, but they are very formulaic. Despite having lots of flashy graphics, big guns and decent stories, they are all still the same when broken down.

I could really rip into those games, but there really wouldn't be much of a point in doing so since even I think they are really well made games. But what really scares me about all this is that with these sorts of games, good story telling is getting thrown out the door.

Who here can tell me what all three Halo's were about besides blasting aliens? How about the background story for Kratos in God of War? What about the reasons behind what the main characters in the GTA series do? What the bloody heck is Gears of War about? Hell, can anyone tell me who Dante's father was in the Devil May Cry series?

Thats the point I am making here. Instead of players being apart of the game's story, the story for each game takes a back seat to the action. Most people I know who play these games tend to skip the cut scenes or cinematics just to get back to the action. Now I love action games as much as the last man, but I still think pure action can't be the only thing that drives games anymore.

I honestly do wonder if the directors behind these games actually care that people don't care about their game's story and that most people just want to kill stuff instead. Honestly, some of those great action games also have solid stories as well, but no one ever pays attention to them it seems. I think the problem is that the stories aren't included that much in the game play. The way these games are done are usually in a way so its get the main character from Point A to Point B and kill everything in between. Since that is how the game plays out, why would someone pay attention to the story?

Stories need to be more incorporated into the games I would say. Give a reason for players to actually want to know the story and care about what quest the character is on. After playing Metal Gear Solid 4 for a bit, I think Kojima is one of the few people who can actually do that. He does it very heavy handedly, but he still was able to get people to pay attention to the story and to the characters. Granted the story is all over the place and there are a butt ton of characters, I think my point still stands. If Kojima ever did another game with this sort of game play and story immersion and scaled back how insane and twisted he made the story, he would make a amazing game that had a near perfect balance of action and story.

I know I sound a bit bitter about action games, but I actually do love to play them as well. I just want something a bit more to them is all. I want to be apart of the story and not just see it sitting on the back burner like some bad stew. I miss the days of when action/adventure games actually made the players feel like they were apart of the game's story and not just waiting around for more action to happen. I partially blame this new mentality on many of the game designers out there as well as many of the video game marketing departments. Instead of actually trying to do their jobs and market smart or good games, they just want to market the big action ones out there that require zero marketing skills to do and know will sell well thus earning them a bonus.

So that is the sad truth really. I really wish designers would start to regain some of their former glory and create great stories and include them in their games, but it honestly doesn't seem like that is gonna happen. All these new action games are turning into Michael Bay movies and I swear I can feel the IQ's of my fellow gamers dropping every new release.

-P. Knight

So does he have a green thumb as well?

2008-06-25T11:30:00.000-07:00

Hey folks,

Recently I checked out the new Incredible Hulk movie in theaters and I must admit, I was pretty impressed by the film. Right off the bat I will say this is not a sequel to the the Ang Lee Hulk movie which was released a few years back. This is a brand new retelling of the story. So basically a restart. I know some thought the Lee version was decent, but pretty much most didn't like it and thought it was to "emo" and ato wordy for a Hulk movie. Well the good news is that Incredible Hulk actually delivers and is a good adaptation of the Hulk character.

As soon as the opening credits kick in, you know this is a retelling of the story since the entire credits are showing how Bruce Banner became the Hulk and that he is now on the run and that General Ross is now chasing him around the world and that he left his girlfriend in a hospital after the Hulk nearly killed her. Once that little intro is shown, we jump 5 years into the future to see Banner now living in Brazil, working at a bottling plan and trying everything to keep the Hulk from reappearing. The rest of the movie is spent with Banner trying to find the "cure" to get rid of the Hulk as well as avoid being caught by General Ross and his newly formed squad of hired guns that are hunting him down.

Since I don't want to ruin the rest of the story, I will talk about the actors for a second. Pretty much the entire cast in this new film is spot on. The biggest issue people had about casting though with this movie would be Edward Norton as Banner. Eric Bana played Banner in the last Hulk movie and looked more like the comic book version of Banner then Norton does for sure. But to be honest, Norton really pulls it off. Instead of being a wimpy emo scientist with parent issues like in the previous Hulk movie, Norton's Banner is more a Jason Bourne type scientist who actually thinks on his feet, learns karate and is actually pretty bad ass. Like I said, I like this Banner a whole lot more. He is still a little wimpy and is human, but he isn't the total self-loathing pathetic Banner from the previous flick which is good.

The rest of the cast is all very solid all around from Tim Roth as a hired military trained gun who is on the hunt for Banner to Liv Tyler who plays Banner's ex-girlfriend, Betty Ross. Everyone does a great job with Tyler probably being the weakest of the cast but still doing a solid job none the less. And yes, they set the movie up to have sequels due to some of the characters they introduce in this movie.

Now whats a comic book movie without action? Thankfully Incredible Hulk has tons off good action. There are about 3 massive fight scenes in this film with each being a little different. One being Hulk vs some humans in a dark building, one with Hulk vs a mini-army that has tanks, helicopters and even sonic guns,and then the final fight between Hulk and the new bad guy in the streets of New York. All three fights are really cool cause they aren't all the same and they are all how Hulk fights should be. So seeing this in theaters is really worth it since any good sound system will make these fights even more bad ass. Also of note is the CG in the movie is really spot on as well. I was afraid during most of the Hulk action scenes, the Hulk would look a little unrealistic or campy. But my hats off to the company behind the CG for the movie cause all the action and especially the Hulk flowed very well with the rest of the movie.

Overall, I give this movie a 8/10. Its not as good as Iron Man was of course, but its still really up there and definitely worth checking out for any comic book fan out there. So far Marvel is two for two with their new movies now and we still got another four more coming out in the next 3 years. And yes, Tony Stark does show up in here and I really wished they would of waited till after the credits to show him. Still, its cool to see Marvel setting up the Marvel universe in these films and actually connecting them all. I just really hope they can keep Norton on as Banner cause the guy does a great job.

-P. Knight

Playing with your food

2008-06-25T10:26:00.000-07:00

I find this video pretty amazing and a little disgusting at the same time. The person who did this must still smell like BBQ I swear. None the less, its amazing what he did with some just ribs and sauce. Check it out! If not anything, it will make you hungry.

-P. Knight

When E.T. comes to work

2008-06-24T23:37:00.000-07:00

So what would you do if aliens really invaded earth? Would you scream and freak out? Would you start praying? Would you hide your ass from anal probes?

Well one game idea I had is based on just that question. What would you do if you were at work in some huge skyscraper building and one day during work a "alien" invasion occurred. Imagine waking up to realize all the power in your building was gone and that the top of your building was beginning to crash down.

The basic premise of the game would be for the player to work his way down to the exit of the building and escape before the building collapses. There wouldn't be a timer or anything, but the threat of the building collapsing would still be there.

Game play would be very puzzle based with a bit of action here and there. The main character is your average schlub who gets thrown into this scary situation and must use everything around him to get out of the building. Imagine MacGuyver and you sort of get the idea. You won't be alone and there would be survivors near you, but end up leaving you alone since your escape plans seem to risky.

Since the building you are in is a mix of business and entertainment, other levels in the building would have different type of environments and puzzles. Everything to fighting off wildlife to figuring out how to escape from a mall jail.

Mind you, you will never actually see the aliens. They aren't really the threat. Its the building caving in on you that the giant threat in this game. I wanted a more "real" threat for the player to have to deal with then the already used and somewhat tired "killing aliens" concept.

Meaning I don't want this to turn into a third Half-Life game. Valve and Bungie got the whole killing alien thing down, so let them have it. I want a game where you end up having to fight other humans for survival and its about you escaping a real threat that was caused by something fictional.

I think this would be a good way to test out people's brains since the game would have multiple items that could be used to escape as well as a few different paths that could be taken out of each building level.

Anyway, thats it for now. Just a short concept since I haven't given it to much thought in a little bit. I just like the idea of a puzzle type game with a creepy atmosphere where its dog eat dog and you are just trying to survive against your fellow man.

-P. Knight

Dick reversal....

2008-06-24T22:24:00.000-07:00

Hey folks,

So one game design I have been working on in my head is sort of a mix between Cowboy Bebop, Dark City and Sin City. A bit of a noir-ish detective story but done in total reversal. Meaning the beginning of the game starts at what would be "the end" of the game for most video games. Its a strange notion I know, but I think it could be pulled off really well if done properly. Remember how the movie Memento was done? Something to that extent basically.

What I mean by all this is that the game first starts with the main character being beaten, shot and nearly dead when the player first sees him. He is near death and is having a flash back about his life. Each flash back would be a different chapter of the game and it would basically lead all the way back to how everything built up to the situation he was first in.

The game play itself would be either first or third person depending on how the player wants to play. It would be a action game of course with a few puzzles here and there to keep people's brains going.

The world itself is a bit of a mix of steampunk and Dark City where there would be new sorts of weapons and gizmo's while keeping to a noir-ish feel like in Dark City. So you wouldn't have our worlds type of weapons, but you would have really cool new ones powered by a new type of energy source that is in this new world.

The main character is a private investigator who was asked by a old man to investigate the murder of his best friend. I am a bit tired of the "dame needing help" idea, so I thought I would go with something a little different. The plot seems very basic at first, but when told in reverse, everything gets a little twisted.

I don't wanna go into full story here, but its basically going to be about the detective getting caught up in this whole weird web of lies while trying to find out why this old man was killed. Like I said though, this would all be in reverse. So you actually don't find out who the real killer is till the very end of the game which is the beginning of the story. Lets just say there would be a few twists here and there to throw players off the real trail of who the killer was.

As for general game play, this will be a adventure action game. There will be some car chases, lots of fist fights, some heavy gun fights and even fights on top of a zeppelin type air balloon. As the memories keep unfolding, the player would be getting more weapons as well. You don't buy the weapons like in MGS4, but you get them at the beginning of each memory and loose them at the end usually during a boss fight or chase scene. That way the beginning of the game you only start with the typical pistol type weapon (remember the beginning is the end).

This could be a sandbox type game for sure, but I think that would be a bit hard to pull off without having huge amounts of side objectives to do as well which wouldn't fit with this game I would say. So a straightforward action game would be best with each "memory" being a sandbox type level that presses the player to move forward.

I am still working everything out in my head, but I wanted to get the basics down in this post. Basically a detective story told in reverse with a noir/steampunk feel to it. Some good action, a really deep story and some cool characters.

Anyway, thats it for now. May come back to this later if anything else pops up in my head.

-P. Knight

WoW Lich King Alpha Info

2008-06-24T17:08:00.000-07:00

Hey guys,

I know a fair amount of people play World of Warcraft out there, me being one of them of course. With the recent Lich King expansion alpha going live a few weeks ago, many people have been wondering what new info from the alpha is out there. Recently I came across a great little site that had all the up to date alpha info and thought I would share it with you fine folks.

So for those wanting to check out the newest info on the alpha, hit the link below and enjoy!

http://wotlkwiki.info/index.php/Main_Page

-P. Knight

How your average geek gets into the game industry- Part 1

2008-06-24T16:50:00.000-07:00

Hey folks,

Having been in the video game industry for about 4 years now and being just your average Joe, many people always ask me how I got into the industry and how they could as well. Due to this, I wanted to get start a mini-series of posts about how your average geek can break into the game industry and what is needed of them. This way, people have a general idea of how to get into the industry and will leave me alone!

I kid of course, but I hope these few posts will give people a general idea of how to get into the industry and answer a few questions at least. With this initial post, I am going to be talking about skills. Basically what skills are needed and what skills may help when trying to get into the game industry.

First off, let me start with a few answers to some general question I have heard over the years. No, you do not need to go to college to get into the game industry. No, you don't need to have super programming skills or be a master of Maya or Photoshop either. You don't need to know the inter workings of computers, knows tons of different languages, know what a PS3 or 360 is made of nor have amazing drawing skills either. Having some solid computer skills, knowing how to communicate with others, keeping up to date on new info and making sure you soak up everything around you is what you really need.

For most geeks, this is some good news of course. Knowing all those things I listed before or even some of them will help of course, but they are all not totally necessary honestly. For your average geek, having good computer skills, a love for video games and a strong work ethic is all you really need. Good social skills are also required which is probably a concept which will scare some gamers out there.

But before getting more into that, let me talk to those who do have those skills and or more then that. For those folks who are going to college and or are learning how to use 3-d programs or are becoming artists, you already have a little bit of a lead then most average folks like myself. With more and more colleges lately offering classes about video game making, I would honestly suggest taking those as well. Lots of those classes are taught by people in the industry and you will definitely learn a lot from those classes. Even taking some night classes or community college classes on those subjects are a bit of a help for you average gamer.

Anyway, not all is lost for those of us who don't have those skills or never taken those classes. There are many ways to get in the game industry and not all of them require you to have flipping awesome skills to do so. Many people I know in the industry didn't have any skills in the beginning of their careers. They just loved game and had a strong work ethic and that is what really matters. They learned to do more stuff on their own like Photoshop, Excel, Word and Maya and that helped them get pushed further along in the industry, but it wasn't the original reason they got in though now they say it would of helped a bit more.

I am not saying don't try everything in your power to try to learn new software or even take some classes, I am just saying that its not the end of the world if you don't have those skill sets yet. Though without those skill sets, you of course are gonna start off at the bottom rung of the industry like many other have. So the more skills you pick up before applying to get into the industry, the better really. My goal here though is to show that people who don't have amazing skills can still get into the industry, so don't give up.

Kojima Productions' Ryan Payton put it rather well though in a recent interview with 1up.com:

1UP: If someone wanted to get into a role similar to yours in the industry, what would you tell them?

RP: I get this question a lot. Some people write in to tell me that they're taking Japanese classes or that they're watching anime. They're also playing a lot of games, and that's fine, but you need to give recruiters more reasons to sign you on than the fact that you love videogames. When I joined Kojima Productions, I laid out what I could offer the company -- not only that I knew a lot about games, but that I could speak Japanese and that I was a good writer and had experience in radio and international business. Also, I was fanatical about American history, and coincidentally, Metal Gear does pull a lot from American and world history.

Kojima was more interested in what I was into outside of videogames. If somebody wants this kind of job, and they just play games all day and study Japanese, they're not going to have much to say when they get asked that question. You really do have to give employers as many reasons as possible to hire you.

One thing I'd recommend now is learning video content immediately. Start cutting your own movies in Final Cut. Familiarize yourself with HD. What's the difference between 1080i and 1080p? The industry needs people who understand that stuff.

So like Payton said, you need a bit more then just being a good gamer or anime fan to get into the industry and move up. Work on getting to learn new skills and software. Trust me, it will really help.

For those who want to start off other then at the bottom rung, for those who do have some good solid skills already or even for those who just wanna see what skills it takes to get into certain jobs in the game industry, I found a really good write up you may want to check out.

The three part write up was done over at Gignews.com and basically breaks down each job position in the industry and what is needed to get into that position skill wise. Its a great read and will definitely help those looking to break into video game making. Check it out below:

http://www.gignews.com/crosby1.htm

That should just about do it for now skills wise. Next post will be how to find and apply to get into the game industry and some good started jobs to get your foot in the door.

-P. Knight

Invincible

2008-06-24T14:17:00.000-07:00

Hey folks,

I wanted to get some posts going under the subject of what I am currently reading. Since I am reading a lot both American comic and manga wise, I thought this would be a good idea to let people see what I am checking out right now and even throw in my two cents on what it is I am reading at the moment. These posts will come at a pretty good rate since I am usually reading something new every few days or so depending on what comes out.

First up though is the American comic series from Image Comics, Invincible. The series is written/created by Walking Dead writer Robert Kirkman and since issue #8, has been drawn by artist Ryan Ottley.

The series is a good mix of action, comedy, and a decent amount of teen angst and drama oddly enough.

Story wise, the series starts of pretty basic with main character, Mark Grayson, finally getting superhero powers in his mid-teens. Mark is the son of the worlds most famous superhero, Omni-Man, so he has been waiting for these powers for some time. After finally getting them, the story really picks up as we see Mark learn how to use his powers, find out where to get a superhero costume, fight some zany badguys, deal with friends who wonder where he keeps going as well as deal with other superheros he runs into.

I don't wanna go into full detail of the story so far since there are a lot of twists and turns that people should read about and not be spoiled to. Kirkman does a great job even setting up side stories that don't come into full effect until many issues later on. Overall though, the writing for the series is very good and despite a few corny moments and some weird heroes and villains. There are some very deep moments in the series as well and things do get a little depressing and sad later on. So despite mainly being a bit of fun and adventurous series, there are some really good serious moments as well that pop up a lot more as the series continues on. But those moments are done with a light hand, so you don't feel totally weighted down when reading them.

In general though, this is just a great series for pretty much any comic book fan out there who loves the idea of superheroes and wants something solid to read that has lots of good humor, some real life issues, as well as a few dark moments. Since Kirkman is going full steam with Walking Dead at the moment, Invincible has been slowing down a bit lately release wise. Thankfully the first 9 books are out right now and easily buyable at any bookstore. So give the series a chance I would say since it will definitely grow on you.

-P. Knight

Music fight!

2008-06-24T13:21:00.000-07:00

I was shown this video awhile back and have been trying to pass it on to as many people as I know since its just to funny to pass up on. Its a very creative video to say the least and will definitely have you laughing your butt off over the whole premise. Enjoy!

-P. Knight

Why some gamers should be level designers!

2008-06-24T13:17:00.000-07:00

Can't even how much time this took, but the people behind it have some real skill and put a lot of effort into this Quake 3 map I must say. Enjoy!

-P. Knight

It's a trap!

2008-06-24T11:37:00.000-07:00

Hey folks,

Lately I have been missing comedic games of old. The old classics like the Monkey Island series, Full Throttle, Sam and Max, Day of the Tentacle and Grim Fandango. Remember those? They were all great games with really spot on smart humor that actually had good gameplay to back it up. Those sorts of games aren't really around much anymore and the ones that are are either on the underground gaming networks or lack good gameplay which means it won't get played.

But with those games in mind, I recently started to work on a game design in my head that is sort of a throw back to those old type of humor games.

The general plot for the story is sort of the classic space exploration one. A small crew of about 5 explorers are sent out to space to check out a new anomaly in space that is in the shape of a triangle and appeared all of a sudden near the moon. Earth started getting weird unintelligible from the anomaly and now the crew was sent to check it out.

The crew would be the sort of stereotypical lot of people. The sort of badass captain everyone looks up to, the hot analyst who is a flirt, the know it all doctor and the war veteran hard as nails weapons expert. Lastly rounding the crew off would be the main character, Thaddius Guy, who is in charge of Operations.

Now not to get into to many details, the crew flies out to this anomaly to see what it is. As they get closer to the giant triangular thing, they notice they are getting pulled in by the anomaly and that they can't slow down. Next thing you know, everything goes black and Guy wakes up on the ship which is now all torn up after having crashed into the anomaly. As he collects his thoughts, he realizes he is alone on the ship.

Once Guy gets out of the ship, he realizes he is on land and now staring out a huge massive entrance way. Imagine an old Greek entrance way that look massive and epic with huge columns and you get the idea. As he gets closer to the entrance, a giant beam comes flying out and scans him and then disappears back intot he darkness. Dazed and scared, Guy looks up at the entrance way again and all of a sudden some bright lights start to flash and he sees something he thought he would never see in space. In giant neon lights and in English, he sees a new sign saying:

Welcome to the Universal Labyrinth!
Fun for the whole family!

Yes, ladies and gentleman, this giant space anomaly is actually a tourist trap!

The anomaly was built thousands of years ago by a alien race who wanted more people to come visit their solar system but had nothing to offer since all the planets in their system smelled weird and didn't have complimentary pillow mints to offer to guests. So they built this giant tourist trap in space to attract more people and now poor Guy is forced to figure his way through the Labyrinth to find out where the rest of the crew went, how he is gonna get back home and why the Labyrinth is now abandoned.

Since I haven't really thought everything through for the game yet, here are just a few little things that would be thrown in for some fun and laughs.

- A universal freakshow

-The main hub of the Labyrinth is the souviner shop

-The food at the food stands has evolved over time and are waging wars with each other

-The main person to be on the lookout for is the Labyrinth's "minotaur" , since now that someone is in the Labyrinth, he has to go back to work and is very unhappy about that.

-A complaints line that Guy must get to the front of but still has some very lively aliens.

Like I said, this is still just a idea bouncing around in my head. Most of this stuff can be taken out or changed of course. Just the main idea behind it all is what I really want to keep. That aliens created a giant tourist trap in order to get other life forms to come visit them. Imagine Halo mixed with Futurama and Monty Python would be the best way to describe it. Very Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy but with a more American with then British since that doesn't always go over so well here.

I just really like the idea of doing a epic space comedy since so many games lately that deal with space are either to serious or turn everything into a giant war. So I think its time we get a little bit of comedy in space and see what happens.

As for gameplay, that would be the tricky part. Personally I think going with a third person perspective would be the best. This way the player can see everything that is going on around him. The gameplay itself would be more adventure type gameplay where there are mainly puzzles the player has to get through with a bit of action as well thrown in for good measure. Its more likely using your hands and brain to figure things out then just running around shooting everything. The puzzles wouldn't be insanely hard and most would actually be a bit humorous to keep the player going and wanting to finish the puzzle. Stuff like having to figure out how to get to the front of the Complaints Line and finding a lost "child" to hiding from the "minotaur" and helping stop the great "Concession Stand Civil War"There wouldn't be a lot of back tracking in the game and different parts of the Labyrinth would have different themes as well.

There of course would be a slew off oddball characters in the Labyrinth ranging from the weird by helpful Universal Freakshow aliens to the out of his mind Souviner Shop caretaker who has gone nuts from staring at snow globes to long.

Basically I want the game to be a totally odd experience, but all the while a really funny one. With as many serious games we have out now a days, I think a bit of humor is needed now and then and thats why I came up with this game idea. Its nothing ground breaking of course, but I don't think a game needs to be groundbreaking to be good.

Anyway, thats it for now. Just something I wanted to get out of my brain and see written down on here.

-P. Knight

Getting Smart

2008-06-23T23:07:00.001-07:00

Hey kids,

So this weekend I decided to go see the new movie remake of the classic TV series, Get Smart. I decided to see it because I did like the original series and Steve Carell is always funny in these sorts of rolls. Plus my only other option was the Mike Myers abortion, the Love Guru.

In both the series and new movie of Get Smart, its the basic story of good vs. evil. After reading the reviews of Love Guru, I think the whole good vs. evil thing can apply to these two movies as well since they both opened this weekend and were both being named "Comedy of the summer".

Despite being a TV remake, the Get Smart movie was actually good. Not The Office good of course, but it still had me rolling and laughing most of the movie. There are a lot of throwbacks to the old series, but this is still revamp and origin movie. We find out how Maxwell Smart becomes a agent of Control and see him and his partner 99 first pair together to stop the agents of C.H.O.A.S.

As per normal Carelly, we get his very spot on dry humor and wit as he plays Smart in a bit of a different way then Adams did in the original show. I think thats good really since it means Carell wanted to make the character his own and give it his own touch then be a Adams clone. He does a spot on job and really pulls off the over confident goofball agent who always messes up, but manages to get the job done in the end.

The rest of the cast includes Anne Hathaway as Agent 99, Alan Arkin as The Chief and The Rock as Agent 23. Arkin does his usual great job as the Chief and you honestly want to see more of him since he is just does a great performance. The Rock plays the ladies man, super badass Agent 23 who Smart looks up to. Surprisingly, he does a pretty decent job in the movie and is actually funny. After making The Rundown, I wish we would of seen him in some better movies then all the kid friendly ones he did. The guy can act and is funny. He should really drop the Disney crap and start doing more flicks like this.

As for Anne Hathaway. Its Anne fricking Hathaway. She is hot, cute and sexy all at once and is great as Agent 99. Hathaway can actually act and pulls off sex appeal like no other actresses from her generation. Thats all I really need to say.

As for the rest of the movie. Its the typical good guys vs. bad guys story. Nothing groundbreaking, but its not suppose to be. Its suppose to be easy to follow and fun to watch and it was. Lots of great other actors in the film as well as a few celeb cameos as well.

So overall, I would give this movie a 7.5/10. Its worth seeing in the theaters since it has some good action as well and pretty much everyone in the family will find something to laugh at including your crazy drunk uncle who hugs you a little to long at family reunions.

-P. Knight

Pow....Right in the kisser!

2008-06-23T22:25:00.000-07:00

So in World of Warcraft, you get to meet a lot of interesting folks especially when you are in a guild. These folks usually have some interesting stories.

This is one of them.

In my old WoW guild, Still Life, we had a certain Warlock who's real name was Wayne and worked at a tattoo parlor on the east coast. Wayne had been a tattoo artist for many years and had seen some weird stuff.

Now one summer day, Wayne was doing a lower back tattoo for some hot blond girl who came in. While doing the tattoo, the girl had pulled her pants down a bit exposing a fair amount of her ass crack.

So half way through the tattoo, the girl started to freak out and began to have a seizure. Wayne didn't notice at first until the girl started to shake and next thing he knew, brown stuff came flying out of the girls ass crack and was landing all over his shirt.

Yes, you read that right folks. Poor Wayne was shit on at work.

Now normally you have to go to Germany and pay lots of money to certain women there to do that, but Wayne got it for free.

Thankfully the girl came out of her seizure and was ok while Wayne had to get a new shirt from his boss. The girl got the rest of her tattoo done and then left while apologizing for what happened.

So now when you think your job is shit, think of this story and smile.

-P. Knight

My night with Solid Snake

2008-06-23T21:30:00.000-07:00

Sit right back and hear a tale....

So about 2 weeks ago, Metal Gear Solid 4 was released. A joyous day for many gamers of course. A very joyous one for me personally as well since I was one of the people who went to the MGS signing they had here in Los Angeles.

They had 2 signing thats night here in America, one being the one I was going to and one in New York. The New York one has Kojima himself there as well as one of the models who was used for one of the Beauty and the Beast villains in MGS4. The signing I went to though had David Hayter (voice of Snake) as well as the American and Japanese Producers as well as the voice actors of Drebin and Liquid Ocolet. So some power players for sure.

Anyway, the day the signing was gonna happen (Wensday,midnight release), myself and a few of the studio animators decided to get together to head down to the La Brea Best Buy for the signing. Before heading down though, one of the animators came up with a great idea to take the latest game our studio had made and get it signed and take it down with us to give to the guys. Originally we thought only three people were going to be there for the signing, so we got three copies signed by everyone in the studio.

After doing that, we all seperatly headed down to the Best Buy for the signing. I had thought getting there about 10pm would be fine and that the line wouldn't be to bad. Of course, I was wrong. When I got there, about 200 people were in front of me and the other 2 guys had yet to arrive.

As I waited there, I got to see many people dressed as different MGS characters and got to shoot the shit with some cool geek folk. Soon after, one of the animators showed and we started to hang out while I held onto the signed copies of our game.

To make a long boring story a bit shorter. The next two hours of waiting consisted of us (the third animator showed up around 11:30pm) talking to lots of cool people, wishing we had chairs, and hoping that all the cops passing by didn't thing all the guys dressed as Snake with guns were robbing us.

We had found out we were numbers 227-230 in the line and that the Best Buy had 300 copies of MGS4 in-stock half way through the wait. Also found out thanks to a crazy David Hayter fan girl that the celebs would only be there till 2am to do the signing stuff. So we were sitting pretty really. Midnight hit and the line started to move. We kept waiting, moving, waiting and more moving. Some young hot girls handed out free power drinks that tasted like Minute Maid mixed with moose piss.

Around 1:15am, we had about 30 more people to go before we three got to the front of the line and thought we would make it in time. At 1:30am, a guy from Kojima Productions comes out and tells us the celebs are going to be leaving and won't do any more signings sides the people who already got the game and were in the separate line to get their covers signed.

So now the three of us were sad and depressed. The guys with me had the same thing happen to them when they went to a MGS3 signing years ago in Los Angeles at the City Walk that had Kojima there. As sad as we were, the Hayter fan girl in front of us was freaking out and nearly crying cause she really wanted to meet him.

As we make our way up the line and into the Best Buy, we saw the celebs at a special stand finishing up the last of the signings. We got our copies of MGS4 and started to leave when one of the animators asked me to give him one of the signed copies of our games. I handed it over and next thing I know, he is talking to a Best Buy guy who was guarding the celeb booth and telling him who we were and that we just wanted to give the signed copies of our game to the celebs since we are huge fans of the game series. Some Kojima guy cam up and argued with the Best Buy guy for a second, but next thing I know, they are lifting the rope that was around the booth and letting us in.

Wait.....what is happening now?

I was in shock. As soon as we passed the rope, all three of us were next in line in the signing booth and were talking to the Japanese producer. The animator who got us in was telling the guy who we were and gave him a copy of our game. Next thing I know, we are shaking hands with the guy, he is saying how much he loved our game and that our studio should be the one to make the new Castlevania game. As this is going on, the producer grabbed three blank game covers of MGS4 and started to sign them. After him, we got to talk to Snake himself, David Hayter.

Hayter was very cool of course. Once again the animator with us introduced us and gave him the signed copy of our game. We talked a bit with Hayter and he said how he loved our game and even did some Snake voice stuff for us. After that, we got to meet the voice actor of Ocelot who looked like a old biker guy who showed us his tattoos. Talked to him for a minute and then got to move onto the American producer as well as the voice actor for Drebin (looked like Chris Tucker a bit). We talked to them for a bit and the American producer gave us his business card since one of our animators gave him his. We gave the producer our last signed copies and he handed us the MGS4 covers signed by everyone there.

I nearly fainted.

In the blur of excitement, we left the store with everyone yelling at how we got signed covers while everyone else wasn't able to. We ran out, said our goodbyes to each other, and got to our cars. After nearly inhaling enough air to fill a new planet, I was able to drive home at about 2am with a copy of MGS4 and a signed game cover.

So that is my story. I need to get the signed cover framed of course. But below is a picture of what the cover looked like as well the the cool business card we got as well from the American producer.

Next time on Particle Stories, the time I ended up in a Mexican jail tied to a goat...

-P. Knight

1 geek, 1 blog, no cup!

2008-06-23T20:25:00.000-07:00

Hello folks.

This is my first initial post on this blog. I have blogged before, but that was many moons ago and saying that makes me feel old for some reason. Anyway, I wanted to start this blog because I have begin to noticed that I need some sort of outlet to post all my thoughts, stories and opinions that have been piling up in my head for many years.

I will cover many topics on this blog. Some good, some boring. All very geeky of course. One of the main topics outside the normal geeky type posts like anime and movie opinions will be posts about what its like to work in the video game industry as someone who is a bit of a sideliner and gets to view the industry from sort of a third person view.

Hopefully some people will view this blog and find it interesting or at least something to laugh at. If not, thats ok of course. I just wanted a place to sort of vent and post ideas I have.

Anyway, I will post on here as much as I can of course. So let the games begin.

-P. Knight