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Beware your garden! and Tecnu

Over the last month or two I noticed some weeds growing in my front lawn. My lease requires me to take care of the lawn, which is usually a relatively easy task that doesn't take much time. A couple of weeks ago I decided to finally tear out the weeds. I grabbed my gardening gloves and went to town. After 5 or 10 minutes I glanced at the weeds I was pulling out and was reminded of the old phrase "leaves of three, let it be." I was pulling out poison ivy plants!

I was preparing to go out of town on a trip in two days and the last thing I wanted was poison ivy rashes. I immediately entered my house and went to the internet for advice. I followed the advice and took the following steps:

1. Swab all exposed areas with alcohol
2. Take a COLD shower and rinse thoroughly.
3. Wash all clothing including shoes

After following these steps I also headed to the store in search of "Tecnu," a product which is supposed to work miracles if applied early enough. I followed the instructions and thoroughly rubbed the tecnu into my skin. I also washed my clothes a second time just to be sure they were safe.

I can say with great success that two weeks later I have not had any kind of outbreak. My advice is to stay out of your garden!!! I never even considered the idea that poison ivy would be freely growing in my yard. All plants are evil and should be avoided at all costs. If you absolutely must go near those evil little things I highly recommend having a bottle of tecnu on hand in your house. I also recommend you actually look at the plants before you touch them.

Final Fantasy 13 Demo

So I forgot to mention this awhile back, but I got to play the Final Fantasy 13 (Japanese) demo. The demo is apparently the actual beginning of the game, and I must say, it does not dissapoint. The whole scenario has a very...Final Fantasy 7 feel to it. Different...yet similar. You start out in a "train" that is inbound to a Matrix-ish looking interior city with massive walkways / robots / etc. The main character, Lightning (Cloud's daughter? lol), and some other guy start causing a ruckus with the local resistance. A few other characters pop-up, yadda yadda yadda, it all plays out very nice and smooth.

The graphics are simply amazing, specifically the characters. Definitely some of the best ingame character models I've seen. The music also stuck out as being really good, most notably the fight music. So speaking of fighting (which from recent reports appears to have changed somewhat), you get to choose out of a few options to build up your "attack meter". For example you can choose a basic attack, a throw, and a fire spell, which uses up your three battle spots, and then you tell the game when to activate it. Syncing it with your AI controlled partners gives you bonus damage. Or you can go all out and use one spell that takes up 3 spots but does area of effect damage. In this basic stage it is fairly straightforward, but I've heard this is only like 10% of the complete battle system, so who knows how it turns out, but from what I've seen, I like it. The fighting is NOT like Final Fantasy 12 (good or bad), but it is different and unique. Now that I'm thinking about it a little bit more it has some similarities to Xenosaga 2 only you control 1 character and the others are all attacking at the same time as you (if you've played Xenosaga 2, don't be turned off it's not super annoying where you have to do throws to even win a battle - just trying to give a comparison).

So, yeah. Final Fantasy 13 looks, as expected, to be pretty damned sweet. I personally think the choice to put Final Fantasy 13 on XBOX 360 is a poor one, as it will be many, many discs, and most likely will not run nearly as smooth as the Playstation 3 version, but you know, money talks. I'm hyped.

Site Update: Bookmarks!

the RANDOM LoL just launched some cool new little features. The first, and most significant, is you can now bookmark articles in the Staff Article, User Article, and Lounge sections. You'll see the bookmark option in the top-right corner of each article page. You can view your bookmarks within your My Account page. You can also remove bookmarks from the My Account page.

Secondly, the My Account page has been updated and reorganized. It's pretty self-explanatory once you get there. A bit sleeker, a bit more compact, and overall a better experience.

You of course have to be logged in to enjoy these new features. These updates are designed to make reading and discussing your favorite articles a smoother process instead of browser bookmarking or trying to remember every article you have a discussion going on in.

Enjoy!

Official Contest #2 - DVD Collection!

That's right, the next contest is here just in time for summer! We've got another sweet prize for our winner. This time, the winner will recieve not 1, not 2, not 3, not 4, but 5 DVDs from our list of 6! And this time, the runner-up will even recieve a prize: the 6th DVD that the winner does not choose! I know I'd be happy to get any of them as they're some of my favorite movies.

This time around the rules are a bit different, though. This time users have to create their own topic article in the "User Topics" section, and get a strong discussion going. The user that spawns the article with the strongest ongoing discussion (chosen by our staff) will win! I guess it's actually pretty simple, the full rules can be seen on the contest page.

This contest would actually be perfect for a small group to tackle, and then share the prize since you get 5 DVDs. So get your friends, have some fun, interact with people! I know you ain't winning free shit sitting on Facebook or Twitter doing the exact same thing! Good luck to everyone!

Iranian Election Fiasco

So what do the rest of you think about this latest fiasco involving Iran? Incase you have no idea what I'm talking about, Iran just had their presidential elections, and it was "supposed" to be a very close race between their current president, Ahmadinejad, and his rival, Mousavi. Now I'll be honest I didn't even know there was an election going on until I read about it very recently. But it seems that Mousavi is very popular with the younger Iranian crowd, and apparently they are very into their technology such as promotion by websites and text messages. On the day of voting, all access to text messages and political websites involving Mousavi were blocked. Seriously, WTF LoL?

All observations and pre-polls showed the election was going to be very close, if not Mousavi having a small lead. So election day comes, a huge, historic turnout happens, and then first the shutdown of communication, and second, a landslide victory announcement by the current president Ahmadinejad. Apparently something along the lines of 60ish% to 30ish%. Again, WTF? Do corrupt governments like this actually think that the common people are so fucking stupid that they have no idea what's going on here? I don't know the truth, some people do, but common sense tells me: corruption at large.

So now there's street riots and all kinds of nonsense going on in Iran. So whatever, I hope the best for the Iranian people and I hope the truth comes out, and corruption is weeded it out. Will it happen? If you know anything about Ahmadinejad, then probably not.

What do you think about it?

Looking forward to the Fiat

In the wake of the U.S. auto crisis, there are some new things to look forward to. One of those things is the merging of Chrysler with Italian automaker Fiat. For years, America has been filled with bigots driving unnecessarily large SUVs and pickup trucks, which lack both style and sensibility.

I was shocked at how small the vehicles were when I first travelled to Italy in 2001. The cars were entertaining, efficient, and could be easily maneuvered and parked in small spaces. It made so much sense to me.

Of course, in America, bigger has always been better. This is no longer the case, as gas prices spiked to $4 a gallon last summer, and Americans realized how foolish their habits were along with the U.S. automakers' lack of innovation. Add President Obama's new emissions and mpg standards, which forced Chrysler to make changes.

Enter the Fiat: a stylish, practical, fun-looking line of cars ready to hit the U.S. next year. For those of you unaware of the brand, CNN has recently posted some pictures of its current line. Take a look!

Fiat: Chrysler's Italian Style

Nintendo E3 2009

In my opinion, Nintendo had the best E3 showing. I'm sure the majority will disagree with me, but this is the same Nintendo that has been shoving kiddy nonsense and trying to appeal to masses that we're talking about here. So you "core" gamers have to look at this and be somewhat impressed.

Nintendo started out with the announcement of New Super Mario Bros. for the Wii. You can play it with 4 people at a time, and it looked pretty fun. The DS version was awesome, so I imagine this will be good too.

Then Wii-Fit something or another was talked about, and then the Reginator came out onto the floor to talk about the new advanced wii-mote or some nonsense along with some new tech demos of it. Yay.

Then surprisingly Reggie went on a RPG rant, which I didn't expect at all. A bunch of RPG-Spingoffs were talked about such as the Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicles series. A new Kingdom Hearts, a new Golden Sun, and a new Mario & Luigi RPG. Overall it was some RPG Goodness for both the DS & Wii. And about time too.

More pre-teen game stuff was talked about. What really surprises me is they didn't spend most of their time on all the non-gamer fluff they usually talk about. And then some vitality sensor was talked about.

And then Mario Galaxy 2 was announced. Sweet. 2 main stream Mario games on a Nintendo system has been unheard of lately.

The best part of Nintendo's showing was the end of the show. I think it's a good sign when Reggie said he's reading blogs and looking at the feedback about Nintendo and how they're losing (if not completely lost) the "core" gamer crowd. I'll get back to this in a second. He then showcased 3 upcoming "mature crowd" games. The Conduit, Resident Evil The Darkside Chronices (shooter like Umbrella Chronicles), and the best of the three, a Dead Space game from EA's new universe called: Dead Space Extraction.

Finally you wouldn't think Nintendo would talk about anything else. I mean shit 3 hardcore "mature" games, a New Super Mario Bros. for Wii, a ton of RPGs, and a new Mario Galaxy game. Yeah well we got one more for ya. They announced a combined project involving Team Ninja and Nintendo. Yeah, Team Ninja, those Ninja Gaiden & Dead or Alive guys, combined with Nintendo, to make a new Metroid game! If you ask me, that's pretty awesome. Remember, this is NINTENDO that displayed all of these new, "core gamer" games. I think their showing was great, and I couldn't care less about Nintendo lately.

Truth be told, Nintendo's E3 conference was all nice n good, but what it really did was give me high hopes for their next system, and the things they're going to be able to do with it. Sony and Microsoft are just now trying to get some form of motion technology. Nintendo already did it. Imagine Nintendo with a High Definition system, 2nd generation motion technology (if not something else), and a vast lineup of developers not even including Nintendo itself. That's what I'm talking about. I want Nintendo to keep listening to the gamers, and not letting crap get pumped out for their systems. All in all, good show Nintendo. Maybe the Wii can do more than collect dust after all!

Sony E3 2009

Sony started out like they usually do at E3. Spew off statistics, tell us the 10 year plan, and generally put me to sleep. Then we got to see some Uncharted 2, which I only have a fleeting interest in. And then we got to see Sony's massive FPS game, MAG. This actually looks kinda cool. Each online battle is completely insane and has 256 players versing each other. So it's not quite AS chaotic, smaller squads make up each side. I think it sounds awesome and love large-scale battles like this. The live demo they showed of it looked all right, nothing TOO special, but this has some mass potential.

PSP's news was honestly pretty lame. They're makine a new PSP GO system thats slimmer and has no slot for UMD. Everything is done digital. You can look at the specs somewhere else cause I don't really care about it cause it costs $250 for something I already have. So that's that. Oh and you can get the new lilac colored Hannah Montana bundle. Sweet! And a new Metal Gear Solid game is coming ot the PSP also.

Ubisoft also showed off some Assassins Creed 2 stuff. Looks decent.

More new scenes from Final Fantasy 13 also appeared, more pretty video and gameplay. This game will rock, I'll have more info on this later.

Sony's "big" surprise was that Final Fantasy 14 XIV will be coming exclusively to Sony Playstation 3...in 2010. The same as FF13. How is this possible? Here's the kicker. It's another ONLINE Final Fantasy. So it's pretty much Final Fantasy 11-2. Yeah...whatever. I don't like the online Final Fantasy so I'll hold my reservations on this one.

Sony's comeback to Microsoft's Project Natal is there own motion controller. It's pretty much an advanced Wii controller. Looked like it had some potential. I'd much rather be holding something than nothing (as in Project Natal).

Some Little Big Planet meets Mario Kart racing game. Then The Last Guardian, which looked kinda cool. Seemed like a kiddier version of Prince of Persia combined with The Never Ending Story.

Finally we see what most people were waiting for. God of War 3. In a nutshell, it looked like God of War. Nothing that you wouldn't expect.

I give Sony 2nd place at E3. OMGOSH NO WAY...DOES THAT MEAN...CAN IT BE...THAT'S RIGHT...STAY TUNED FOR MY NINTENDO E3 ARTICLE

Microsoft E3 2009

So I didn't think too much of Microsoft's E3 showing. It started out with stuff I didn't care too much about, and ended with something I was just "blah" about.

Project Natal. I don't know...unless I'm in one of Star Trek's holodecks, I don't really feel like playing a game with no feedback whatsoever. Why would I want to control an invisible steering wheel when I can use a real steering wheel? I'm the ultimate controller? Wow I never knew! Shit why even play XBOX when I'm the ultimate controller! Anyways, I'm not too enthused about this one. Another reason is a lot of non-teens that play video games now generally also WORK, and don't always wanna come home and jump and hop around their living rooms. They wanna sit on their ass and be able to relax. So, again, meh on this one. I'll believe it when I see it.

That was really the big thing for Microsoft. Nothing special game wise. Apparently Facebook is coming to XBOX now. So now the people that stalk you in online games can also find your facebook and stalk you even more, hooray.

The best part of Microsoft's showing didn't even have anything to do with gaming. Pretty soon you'll be able to download 1080P high-definition movies and play them INSTANTLY. That's pretty awesome. Maybe they'll lower the price of these movies, now that'd be impressive.

Oh yeah Metal Gear Solid is making a spin-off game that will be on the 360 (and PS3 most-likely, they didnt say it was exclusive).

So, yeah. That was Microsoft's show. Out of the 3 showings I rate Microsoft in last place as far is my interests go.

Rumors of my Death have been Greatly Exaggerated

Where have I been? What have I been doing you might ask? That's...well...classified. Have I been busy working? Semi-addicted to online gaming? Enduring the great Star Ocean? Passed out in a dark alley? Stuck in an alternate dimension? Well some of that may be true anyway...

So yeah, I'm here. And I've got lots to talk about! So let's go go go!