The Digital Pulse 05.04.07: Up Against The Clock
Posted by Joshua Richey on 05.04.2007
Can Joshua Richey write a quality column in under 2 hours? You bet your ass he can. Also, Jack Thompson drops me some more mail (YAY!)
At the time that I finally was able to sit down and write this article – it was 8:20 pm. I'm fatigued, I'm tired, and I'm just a wee-bit cranky. Today I completed the remainder of my classes and finished up my final exams. I don't recall ever feeling this good afterwards, but I've put so many hours into studying in the last week that I'm just flat out exhausted. I was going to skip this week's edition of The Digital Pulse, but ‘nah' I'm on too good of a streak right now. I'd have a very good excuse for taking the week off, but I'm a soldier and I'm really interested to see if I can in fact write and code a column in a 2 hour span. See, it's now 8:23. I'm feeling good about this. I have no real topic for you guys this week, but I do have some really good ones in the coming weeks. But it's 8:24 now, which means that I have about 1 hour and 45 minutes until this article is due to 411Mania, and I have 3 and a half hours until I have to be down at the local theater to see Spiderman 3. So I'm just going to wing it.
I'm up against the clock this week boys and girls, if not successful, it should at least be fun. Let's get to it…
Another E-Mail From Jack Thompson; He Doesn't Like Me Much
After my last encounter with Jack Thompson, (see archives) I hadn't heard a thing. I just assumed that with the unfortunate events that happened at Virginia Tech that he was too busy trying to blame it on the gaming industry to take notice of me.
It's been a good month since I've last heard from Jack, but today I got this random e-mail from him.
To: Joshua Richey (MooshooGawd@hotmail.com)
From: Jack Thompson (amendmentone@comcast.net)
Subject: get a life
Message:
Jack Thompson, Attorney
1172 South Dixie Highway, Suite 111
Coral Gables, Florida 33146
305-666-4366, cell 305-588-3005
"Most people, when they stumble across the truth, dust themselves off and move on as if nothing had happened." Winston Churchill
The following was my response:
It's okay, Jack. Take your aggression out on me, tell me to 'get a life'. I can take it. I can understand that your probably a little frustrated these days being that you've become a joke among your peers, and now, after you making an ass of yourself on public television 2 weeks ago, not even the most die-hard members of the conservative media will take you serious. You poor guy.
Oh and by the way, if you're going to quote Winston Churchill, could you please try harder to do it correctly? The actual quote is 'Man will occasionally stumble over the truth, but most of the time he will pick himself up and continue on.' Easy mistake, I guess.
Anyways, have a good day Jack, and best of luck on all of those suits you got going. Your hard work is providing many of us with a level of laughing material that not even we could have conjured up ourselves.
Your friend
Joshua Richey
Now after sending that, I did find the quote of Churchill's that he was trying to copy... but he also failed at citing that correctly.
I really hope he e-mails me back… we could be such buddies, I can just feel it.
Jaffe Doesn't Like People That Don't Like His Games
Popular Video Game Director, David Jaffe, who is the man behind the Twisted Metal franchise, and the original God of War, had the following reaction on his blog to one gaming sites impressions of his latest game, Calling All Cars…
TO THE LAME ASS WEBSITE THAT SHALL GO UNNAMED- Fuck you, guys. Go fuck yourselves. What other developer makes a fucking change to a game when a review (IGN's in this case) has a good, valid point and is willing to open the fucking code up at the risk of more bugs to make the game better? Amazing. But hey, you guys are great, you guys rock. I hope Kotaku fucking puts your ass out of business, wanna be fucktards. And if you were actual journalists you would have read the motherfucking quote I posted on NEOGAF where I said because of the two bugs we needed to fix (not because I was afraid of the bargin bin) we had a window of opp. to fix the magnet problem. Assholes...total fucking assholes.
Luckily Jeff wasn't talking about our beloved 411Mania, but he was in fact referring to Joystiq. As a gaming journalist you'd think that I'd be inclined to side with Joystiq on this one – they were in fact only giving their honest impressions of his game. To rake them over the coals like that for not liking something does seem a bit bush league. However, I fucking love David Jaffe. I think that it's awesome that David has an open dialogue with gamers. He's one of the most, if not THE most, charismatic and interesting game designers today.
The guy has spent a lot of time making this game. He's gone through hours and hours of pain and misery for this game; we know this because he's kept us up to date on his blog (something that not many developers do). I can understand him being mad if someone takes a proverbial poop on something that he worked so hard on. He also gets mass kudos for using the word ‘fucktard'. I love that word.
TIME UPDATE: 8:42 – Sorry, The Office has me distracted… Best. Show. Ever? Yes!
'Slam Dunk' – WTF?
I've expressed how overrated I think that Devil May Cry is, right? Well a video of some new gameplay popped up online this week…. and well… see for yourselves…
Impressions: Well I was impressed. The game looks like a lot of button mashing – but I can't deny that it looks like a lot of fun to play. But you know the one thing that I noticed the most about it? ‘SLAM DUNK'… what the fuck? Hey previous Devil May Cry owners, is this standard or did they save cheesiness of this level for its debut on next-gen? Honestly, who says things like that when they're supposed to be a sword wielding badass that is carving up the undead? Is this how Capcom and the Japanese think we Americans talk?
TIME UPDATE: 8:50 – Back on track.
Superhero Movies Make Me Happy
Thank God! Now I can finally get that awful after-taste of Ghost Rider out of my mouth. The summer is here and there are loads of superhero related releases to make me happy once more. First off, we have Spiderman 3. I'm going to see the movie tonight at midnight, and I am so beyond jacked for it. I think the only way that I can be disappointed is if Kirstin Dunst is not roughed up in some way, shape, or manner. With the release of the movie also comes the release of the Spiderman 3 video game. I've not got the chance to play it yet. I don't think that I'm going to buy it, and when I went to Blockbuster today to see if they had it in – they didn't even have it to rent yet. So hopefully I can get my mitts on it between now and next, and then give you my thoughts.
Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer is also coming to theatres this summer. Now, for some reason, I didn't like the first movie very much. I didn't like the casting of Jessica Alba as Sue, and I didn't like the betrayal of Dr. Doom. However, although I didn't like the film very much, I did think that it had potential as far as the sequel goes. They are going with the story of the Silver Surfer and Galactus for the next film, and it's a very smart move on their part. I've thought that the Silver Surfer story was always one of the better storylines in the Marvel universe. The new trailer is online over at Apple.com/Trailers, and you should definitely give it a looksie. It looks awesome.
Finally, one of my favorite superheroes is headed to the big screen… but not until 2008. However, Iron Man's suit was unveiled this week courtesy of Entertainment Weekly.
I get goose bumps every time I see that. It's perfect, spot on, and very faithful to the comic. I loved the casting of Robert Downey Jr. as Tony Stark, and this film is well on its way to blowing people away come May 08.
TIME UPDATE: 9:03 – 57 minutes until deadline, 2 hours and 57 minutes until Spiderman 3.
Devil May Cry 4 – Identical On PS3 and 360
Hiroyuki Kobayashi, producer of Devil May Cry 4, told IGN this week that his game would look identical for both the Playstation 3 and the Xbox 360. Sony fanboys are probably going to be pissed about this, but they should actually be pleased. When you compare nearly every game that's been released for both consoles thus far, the 360 version has looked cleaner, sharper, and overall… better.
Unfortunately, this also probably means that Dante will say ‘SLAM DUNK' in both versions of the games as well.
Rockstar Having Problems Developing GTA IV For 360
Dan Houser, who is the Creative Vice President of Rockstar, said in an interview with Official Playstation Magazine that his team is having trouble developing for the 360 because of the lack of a guaranteed hard drive. He also said that Rockstar still didn't have answers for some of the limitations that they're experiencing with the PS3 and 360. But don't worry; these things happen all the time. In the end, everything will be worked out just fine.
TIME UPDATE: 9:15 – (In my best NBA JAM voice) HE'S ON FIRE!!!!!!!
Umm… Why Are They Making A BloodRayne 2? Oh, That's Right… Uwe Boll
I've still not seen BloodRayne yet… but I hear good things. And, of course, by ‘hear good things', I mean ‘heard that it's about as enjoyable as masturbating with Icy-Hot. (On an unrelated note: apparently I've been spelling the word ‘masturbating wrong all of my life… sometimes I really hate spell check). Anyways, for some reason, Uwe Boll is making a sequel to BloodRayne. Have a look…
LOLZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZ!!!!!!1 What the fuck was that?!?! ‘The Wild West just got Wilder'… are you kidding me?
TIME UPDATE: 9:43 - Time to wrap this up and submit.
Well I did it. Not too shabby, I think. I'll have more than 2 hours to dedicate to next weeks column, so I'll see you then.
