I Hate Myself.

Why? Because I've started playing World of Warcraft. Again. Yeah, I've actually tried to play twice before, once with a Dwarven Priest, and then with a Dwarven Hunter, but I found both classes to be very boring. Well, I started playing again last week, this time with a Human Rogue, and this time I'm really liking it, and I've gotten to level 16 so far. God, I hate myself.

If you didn't watch X-Play tonight, then you might not know that they are giving out 2000 LittleBigPlanet Beta keys, and tonight they gave a URL to go to for a signup form. Man, I really hope I get one of those beta keys. LBP looks like one of the best games of the year. I wonder if I got one if I could put on my resumé that I was one of 10,000 people in a closed beta for LBP? Well, after I signed up, it said that if I got one, they'd send me an email somewhere between Friday and Monday. AHAHGHAGH I HOPE I GET THAT BETA KEYYYY

Updates on the New DS and Gang Garrison 2

Nintendo US and JP: No comment.

I've found a great "new" game called Gang Garrison 2. It's actually a parody of what Team Fortress 2 would've been like in 1982 (it's developed by Faucet(VALVe), and when you load it, it loads through Smoke (Steam)), and it's almost as fun as the 2007 game. Read more about this "demake" here, and download it here (the latest version as of now is "gg2b20.zip").

New Nintendo DS?

I just found out Nintendo will be coming out with a new version of the DS with, and I quote, "a camera, music playback and more modernized features, it will come to market in Japan this year at a price not far above the current model.", and the article goes on to say that it will be "under 20,000 yen" ($189 USD).

[Original article]

WHHHAAAATTT?

Man, I just remembered I used to have a soccer coach (actually, he was more like an assistant coach. Wait, no, he was more like a soccer dad who just wanted to be in the middle of everything) who looked a helluva lot like Kip from Napoleon Dynamite. He was really short and shrimpy, had those tiny little round glasses with lenses no bigger than a Quarter, and had that tiny little Hitler 'stache. I think he would look perfect in a Safari outfit. He was so annoying, I hated him. He knew next to nothing about soccer, so he would just make us sprint for most of the practice. God, I hated sprinting. Having Asthma didn't really help, either.

Oh, and I recently read that Russia is trying to pass a law (or something, I don't know how all that legal stuff works) to ban Emos, Emo music, and Goths from the country. Yeah. Personally, I think this is absolutely HILARIOUS. Russia must be more scared of Goths than I am (>_>) to go so far as trying to break out the Запретмолотка (That's supposed to say Banhammer in Russian, but I don't know how well Google Translator works). Morally, I don't think it's right, as it's really no different than racism or sexism, but just the thought of somebody actually trying to ban Emos is utterly hilarious

Pardon My Language...

But FUCK YEAH!! Jack Thompson has officially been DISBARRED! [link] I'm not usually one to take this much pleasure out of the misfortune of others, and I respect Jack to some extent (he was sticking up for the morals that he chose to believe in), but seriously, does that guy just not know when to stop? Could he not tell that it was just a lost cause? I honestly don't understand how that man passed law school in the first place, if he really is as dumb as I believe him to be.

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Posted via Pixelpipe.

Lucid Dreaming

Man, I wish I could Lucid Dream. That's the reason I've been logging my dreams here, because I read that it help somehow.

Last night, I decided to try something. I recorded a two-second clip of me saying "YOU'RE IN A DREAM", and imported and looped it in iTunes. Then, I got in to TextEdit (the Mac equivalent of Notepad, for all you Windows people) and wrote "PISS OFF THIS IS A FREAKING EXPERIMENT JUST CLOSE THE DAMN DOOR AND GTFO", because I knew my mom would hear it and come in my room to turn it off, so I wrote that and put it in huge bold letters and left that window open and got in the bed.

I don't know why I expected otherwise, but I couldn't sleep, so I asked my brother, and he said he couldn't, either. I eventually got up and turned it off. I figured it would have been burned into my brain, because according to iTunes, it had played 723 times.

Well, I woke up and hadn't dreamed anything, so I guess it didn't work. Maybe I should just read up on it some more. I just wish I could do it.

Oh, yeah, and The Office comes on tonight. EEEEEEEEEE!!!

Cortana

My cat.
Roxy

My dog, Roxy.
Posted via Pixelpipe.

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Posted via Pixelpipe.

PixelPipe

I got an iPhone app called PixelPipe, which lets me upload photos straight from my phone to my blog. Oh yeah, that's my brother in those pictures. Gah, I have to go to sleep now.

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Posted via Pixelpipe.

test

Posted via Pixelpipe.

EEEEEEEEEE!!!

My dreams of becoming Sam Fisher are slowly becoming more and more real!

Oh, and my mom did give me her old iPhone, so "EEEEEEEEEE!!!" to that, too.

Strange Dream #3

I had another strange dream last night, but this time about one of my friends (Well, I don't know her very well, but I certainly don't consider her an enemy) getting killed. I don't remember all of it, because I woke up for about ten seconds after I dreamed this, and then fell back asleep, although in my second dream, I was blogging about the dream, so I remember a little bit.

It all started out with me in a basement that I assume was old, because it had those really thin "wood" panel walls that they used in the 70's. Anyway, there was a TV in the basement, and I was getting ready to watch some big event on TV, then Cookiemonster, my friend from a different website, walked in. I don't remember the middle part, but eventually we got to the giant blender in the middle of the room. I think it was airtight, because there were oxygen tanks beside it. I don't remember what happened here, but for some reason, CM climbed inside the blender and closed the lid, but then when she tried to get out, it wouldn't open, and I couldn't get it open, either. I looked at the oxygen tank and saw that she was almost out of air, so I tried to hurry and get the lid open, but I slipped and accidentely turned the blender on, but when I did, the lid popped open, and pieces of CM went flying everywhere. It was then I noticed that she was wearing a mask, I guess because I don't know what she looks like or even know her name in real life. I don't remember much of anything else except for running to my mom to tell her what happened and she was just like, "Whatever" and I was like D: .

So yeah, not a very good dream, seeing as I woke up in a panic. It doesn't really matther how many Nazis I kill in WWII games or how many "fags" I kill in Counter-Strike, I can't stomach actually hurting someone ir real life.

Oh, I watched more of Spaceballs, and it's actually pretty good, other than Lone Star's voice being very calm and boring. *Looks up Spaceballs on IMDB* Oh, wow, I never would have guessed that Daphne Zuniga still did Princess Vespa's voice. Then again, she would be *looks her up* ...Wow, she's as old as my mom.

One more thing, I might be getting my mom's iPhone soon. Last night, she got a 3G, so I think I might be getting her older, albeit slower, phone. At least I don't have to buy one, which I'll probably end up doing eventually anyway, although she is making me pay the $60 monthly fee, but oh well, at least I might be getting an iPhone :D

:'(

This morning, I got on my Blogger dashboard, and it said I had two followers. I was like, "Hell yeah!", because I knew that Dr_Worm was following me, but I didn't know who the second one was, so I clicked on it, but then I remembered that the second one was me. Yeah, yesterday I tried to follow myself to see if it would let me, and apparently it did. So now, I'm semi-depressed. Meh.

Oh, I watched the SpaceBalls show last night (well, I watched one of the four episodes that came on), and it's actually not that bad, although I think they put more effort into animating Princess Vespa's bouncing breasts than most everything else. I'm not a pervert, but I'm still not going to say that was a bad thing.

O_O

Just when I thought it couldn't get any gayer...I just found out that they're making an opera based on Brokeback Mountain.

BAHAHAHA

In TV news, they premiered the TV show based on SpaceBalls earlier tonight, and I'm getting ready to go watch it in a minute. Oh, and I'm depressed now, because I actually listened to the commercial advertising the new season of The Office, and it said that it doesn't come on until Thursday. THURSDAAAAAAAAAY!!!

Planetarium (Planetarium)

Ugh. I just found out last night that my grandparents (My mom's dad, step-mom, and my 90-year-old great grandmother) were coming today. They are...quite annoying. I also found out just this morning that they were taking us to Nashville to go to the Adventure Science Museum. Spending the day with them is not my first idea of fun, but at least it was tolerable. Now, my grandparents are Church of Christ people, so I figured they would have been all defensive in a science museum where the theory of evolution is fairly prominent, but no, they didn't even say anything about it. Most of it was just basic kid-museum stuff, but after a while, we went into the new Planetarium, which is basically a theater with a dome-shaped ceiling, and the entire ceiling is the screen, so the chairs are set back in a 45° angle. It's actually pretty comfortable.

Anyway, after everybody finally piled in the room, some guy with a headset microphone came out and started talking (I think he was gay; he had that certain gay lisp) about stuff like all of the music being preformed by the Nashville Symphony and everything narrated by Mark Hammil (I would have never guessed it was him), then the movie started. The first thing I noticed were the graphics. It looked amazing, and with the dome-shaped-screen, it had a semi-3D effect. It was all pretty cool.

After that, we left, went to McDonald's, went home, and ate pie. Hells yeah.

Meanwhile Back in the City

I got tired of What More Do You Want From Me?, so I decided on a name change. For those of you who don't know, Meanwhile Back in the City is the name of a Presidents song, one that I've been listening to a lot recently. I mean, it was either MBitC, Toob Amplifier, Nuthin' But Love, or Mixed Up S.O.B. . None of them really make any sense, but MBitC is about the closest to a cool name as I could think of.

Chicken Pot Chicken Pot Chicken Pot Pie

Another Strange Dream

Yeah, I had another weird dream last night (which is good, I guess. I'm trying to learn to lucid dream, so I need to remember my dreams and write them down). It was a dream about The Office, I guess because all I did yesterday was read about it and watch webisodes that I didn't know even existed.

Anyway, in my dream, I was in the actual office from the show, and I think I was there for Thanksgiving or something (for some reason, it reminded me a lot of my cousin's house that I go to for Thanksgiving every few years) and there was snow on the ground, and there were something like five chihuahuas running around and they were all scared of me. Anyway, early on in the dream, I was talking to Michael(Steve Carrell), and then he was going to try to pull a prank on Christopher Masterson (who was inexplicably in the dream, maybe because I was watching Malcolm in the Middle before I went to sleep), so he ran out the door to hide but I never saw him again.

A little later, I went outside and I saw Kevin(Brian Baumgartner) sitting on the steps so I pointed to Kevin and said to my mom and sister "Oh crap, there's a skunk.", and they were just kinda unphased and kept on walking, so I went down to talk to Kevin (he's one of my favorite characters on the show). I don't remember our conversation, but I remember telling him about this cool shirt I had seen in the gift shop (?) that he might like. It was a t-shirt that had a hole in the chest so you could pull the shirt up over your face and vomit on people. Yeah. We went our separate ways, and I met my mom in what is the meeting room in the show, and she was sitting there playing Spore on a laptop. I remember being surprised because she had already gotten to the Space stage. Anyway, after a while, everyone got called out onto the deck outside to get ready to eat, and on the way out, I found Kevin. He showed me the vomit-shirt and another shirt (I can't remember what the second shirt did, but I remember it being almost as crude), both of which he had just bought. I told him I'd pay him $25 if he would put that shirt on and puke on my sister, and he said he "Yeah, sure." and did that hilarious Kevin smile.So we went out to where everybody was getting ready to eat, and Kevin went and sat down on the bed (yeah, there was a bed on the deck. Three, in fact. There may have been more, but I only remember three) next to Mallory, my sister, and started talking to her. I could tell he was getting ready to do it, but then I woke up and I was like "Aww, SHIT", but then I realized I had to pee really bad, so I went to the bathroom, and then went back in my room to start downloading the newly-released Fracture demo on my 360, and I'm getting ready to play that now. Man, I hope it doesn't suck.

Usual Crap

I wonder if too many people know that Jonathan Coulton did do anything other than Still Alive. I mean, Still Alive was a great song, don't get me wrong, but he's done some other great stuff, too, such as Tom Cruise Crazy and the theme song for Code Monkeys, appropriately titled Code Monkey. Actually, I think the song came first, but whatever. Another great song is W's Duty, where he took a bunch of voice clips from George W. Bush and spliced it all together and put it to music. It's quite hilarious, actually. Then, there's Re: Your Brains, which is about a zombie politely asking his coworker if he can eat his brains.

I'm debating on whether or not I should get a shower. I got one last night and I didn't really do anything today, but I played the drums in RB2 a lot, and that always gets me pretty sweaty. Meh, I think it can wait until tomorrow.

I've been thinking a lot about NaNoWriMo, and I'm not entirely sure whether or not to feel excited, intimidated, overwhelmed, or nauseous. I haven't really thought much about the story of the story(/stories?), but I've been thinking quite a bit on what should be in it. Oh, and I just realized that if I win NaNo, I can call my book an award winning novel. Oh hells yes.

AGGH I WANT IT TO BE TUESDAY SO The Office WILL COME BACK ON

Also: If anyone reads this, let me know if italicizing all of the titles of everything is as annoying as I think it is, kthxbai.

So What'cha Want?

God, I hate that song in RB2, "So What'cha Want" by the Beastie Boys. It really has no apparent beat, and the guitar just sounds like...I don't even know how to explain it. It's just terrible. I did, however, find a "cheat" for that song. Since it's practically a rap, and you don't have to control your pitch or anything, you can just hold the microphone up to the speakers and you don't have to "sing" anything. I got 100% Vocals on Expert just by doing that. That song is fucked up.

If you can't tell, I'm hurting for anything to blog about today.

Woah Woah Woah...What?

I just woke up from one of the strangest dreams I think I've ever had. I was with my dad and brother and sister, and we were out driving around the little west Kentucky town my dad lives in. My dad was driving, and Mason and Mallory (my brother and sister) and I was sitting on the tailgate of the truck while he was driving around. We normally sit on the tailgate when we go to places close, but never to town. That's not the strange part, though.

I don't remember where we went first, but after that, we went to what I think was a 7/11 (which is weird, because there are no 7/11's in town), but it looked like a gas station/convenience store full of wheels, like from a car, but without the actual tire on them, so it was just the metal thing. Anyway, we stopped there and he asked us if we wanted anything, we said no, and he went in. We sat outside for a minute, but got tired of waiting, so I got up to go see what was taking him so long. I got up and looked in the window, and he was standing in a pretty long line, so I stood and watched him for a minute. Apparently he had somehow gotten one of those huge 64 oz. sodas, and from his face, it looked like he had to pee, so he walked over to the trash can in the corner and started peeing in it.

I don't think I've ever been so dream-embarrassed before. Everybody was looking at him, and he was just standing there peeing in the trash can. He finished after a minute, got a refill for his gigantic cup, drank it all, then HE PEED AGAIN. I was so embarrassed, everybody was running out of the building, and I saw who I think was the manager calling the cops. Then, Cortana (who was fully grown in the dream) ran out of the building, across the drive-through lane, and into the grass on the other side, so I ran out and got her.

The next thing I know, I'm dreaming about blogging about all of this. It's like I can predict when I'll have nothing to blog about, so my dreams provide some material. It was so weird, in my dream, I was using real grammar and everything, figuring out where I wanted which sentence and where it should go.

Well, my back is killing me, but I guess that's the price of having something to blog about before I even wake up.

Damn You, Rock Band 2(But Only For a Minute)

Bah, Rock Band 2 has gotten Nine in the Afternoon by Panic(!(?)) at the Disco stuck in my head. Why couldn't it get a good song stuck, like Livin' on a Prayer, Lump, The Middle, That's What You Get, Carry on Wayward Son, Pretend We're Dead, or Conventional Lover? Although for every one crappy song in RB2, there's five that make up for it. RB2 has the best set list of any music/rhythm game I think I've played.

I got rid of this stupid ad-blocker Firefox add-on that I had (it didn't even work; it blocked the wrong stuff), so now I can see the PUSA website, and use the PUSAradio, which lets you listen to a lot of their full songs, so if you're interested at all in them, I'd suggest you check it out.

I'm still jotting down ideas for NaNoWriMo. I've almost decided to just make a book full of short stories, or maybe a single story, but told from several different angles, like Half-Life. Man, I love Half-Life for lots of reasons, but that's a huge reason. I'm a big fan of that different-angle stroytelling. LOST does it pretty good, too. Oh yeah, I just remembered I have LOST TiVo'd. I need to watch that.

It Doesn't Suck!

Yes! I went out and got Rock Band 2 earlier today (Oh, and I was an indirect asshole to somebody I don't even know...more in a minute), and if you know anything about me, you'd probably know that I'm a huge President of the United States fan, so I was ecstatic when I found out that Lump, one of their songs, would be in RB2. I played through several songs for about two hours before I finally unlocked it, but it was so worth it. It doesn't suck, thank God. I was so afraid that they would screw up that song, but they didn't, and I thank Harmonix for that (I actually sent them a "Thank You" email when I first found out that Lump would be in RB2). RB2 is also very good, much better than the first. I might end up writing a review for it.

Now to the interesting story. Anyway, this morning, I went and asked my mom if we could go get RB2, and she said no, and that she didn't feel like going anywhere. After some begging, she said that if I called them and they said they had it, then we would go. Now, I'm not a very social person, and I really hate using the telephone. It's like, every time I call anyone I end up having a really awkward conversation, and I really hate awkward situations. I finally got the balls, so I called them and the dude said "Well, we have two more copies, and some other people have called and are on their way down here, so I'd suggest you hurry" or something to that effect, so I went and told my mom and she got up really quick and we headed out the door. When we got there, I went in by myself, waited in line behind a few people, then when I finally got up to the counter, I asked the dude if they still had any, and I ended up getting the last copy, and I assume we had beat another caller there. So yeah, I guess it's good that we live five minutes away from GameStop.

One more thing: I'm thinking of doing NaNoWriMo this year. I've never done anything like that before, as I just recently got interesting in writing. I just don't have many ideas. I guess I can just write down random ideas until then and then try to fit them all into some sort of story.

Taken straight from the What is NaNoWriMo? page on the NaNoWriMo website:

Make no mistake: You will be writing a lot of crap.

Oh thank God.

Possibly the Greatest Theme Song Ever?

I think so.

It's the theme from the show Mission Hill.

EDIT: I just found out it's also a sped-up instrumental version of CAKE's other song Italian Leather Sofa.

How I Got $1656.36 in Debt

I've never had a PS2, and besides using the display consoles in WalMart, and this one time at my cousin's house, I had never really played one until last month when I got my PS3 (if that even counts). The reason I never got one is because I used to be a pretty big Nintendo Fanboy, and I even drew this terrible picture (according to deviantArt) in March of last year. Since then, I got my 360 (last November, actually), which, being said Nintendo Fanboy, I was pretty skeptical about. Turns out I absolutely loved it, and still do.

I'd been contemplating getting a PS3 for a while, especially after I found out how great the 360 was, and then after getting a PSP last July and loving it, too, and then after Metal Gear Solid 4 came out and everybody said that it was one of the best games of the year, I knew I had to get one. So, I was "surfing the web" (I hate that term) for PS3 prices, because I had heard something about a PS3 price drop, and I came upon someone's blog post that said that anyone who was planning on getting a PS3 with MGS4 should get it now, because in a few weeks, the MGS4 bundle would be gone, and then Sony would be selling a really bad PS3 with no backwards compatability. Backwards compatability was one of the main reasons I was getting a PS3 in the first place, so I knew I had to get a PS3/MGS4 bundle ASAP.

Up until this point, I had been using a debit card that my mom gave me to buy stuff. Since it was a debit, she would use it to distribute allowance and stuff, so I could buy stuff off the internet. I told her about my "I have to get it NAO" delimna, and to my surprise she was like, "Okay.", and I was like, "WTF? Why? What in the world has possessed you to just let me go out and guy a $600 PS3 just like that? I don't even have that much on my card." And she was like, "You got a credit card, too, so you can use that.", and I said something like "But you know I'd be going in debt, right?" and she said "Do you really want this?" and I said "Yeah, and I need to get it now if I'm getting one" and she said "Matthew, some things are worth going in to debt for.". Long story short, we went to almost every GameStop in the area until we finally found it.

I ended up getting the PS3/MGS4 budle and a used copy of Ratchet and Clank Future: Tools of Destruction, and it totalled up to right at $600 after tax and everything. I ended up paying about $400 off, but added about $200 back, so I was still $400 in debt. As you know, the other day, I got a computer, and she was basically the same way as she was with the PS3. It's extremely weird. I honestly don't think I've ever seen her so...understanding about anything like this. We went out and got the computer, and it totalled up to $1256.36. So now I'm up to my ears in debt. My mom actually likes it because she's making at least $200 payments, so it's helping her credit.

This story started out being about the good and bad of the PS2, but I didn't realize the story of how I got my PS3 was so long, so I think I'll just end it here for today, and maybe continue tomorrow, or possibly later today.

WHAT. THE. FUCK.

http://www.destructoid.com/the-worst-game-ever-made-animal-soccer-world-for-the-ps2-62712.phtml

9/11/08

It's 9/11 today. I should probably be sad about something, but I'm not. 9/11 never really affected me, and I don't know why. Yes, Osama was an asshole for blowing the towers up, and a lot of people died, but I never really cared. Is this a sign that I've been playing too much GTAIV? Surely not. Should I feel sad, though? I mean, I never knew anybody who knew anybody who was even directly affected by it, so it never really mattered much.

I have a question on the subject, too. Why is it that people want to remember such an awful event? I think it's fine to remember the people that died, and even the towers, but why the entire event? And even though it never affected me much, doesn't mean that I don't find things like this comepletely awful. Why would you use an event like this to make money? Who even cares about a freaking fake $20 bill? I think that commercial is almost as bad as the event itself. It's just so tasteless.

Hell Yeah

I got my new computer last night. It's pretty freaking awesome, other than not being able to use some software and stuff. Oh, yeah, and SPORE FUCKING WORKS! I was up all night last night playing Spore (I got to the Galactic phase and even met some of Dr_Worm's (Owner of Gridline Productions and all-around cool guy) aliens and made peace with them...and then abducted a few) and I went to bed around noon...only to wake up at 4 P.M. because I had to go get a haircut >_> Oh, well, at least Spore works (quite beautifully, I might add).

Fuck This Shit

...
After eight 4-12 hour downloads
...
After 3 different times trying to install
...
It works. Fuck yeah.

There's just one problem. My computer is shit. The game works(although on the lowest graphics settings, and then just barely), but not very good at all. It's crashed five times. Not the game, the computer. The computer crashed once, then when it powered up, it said "Windows has recovered from a serious error" and I'm literally screaming at the computer "NO SHIT!".

That's it. I can't take it any more. I'm getting a new computer, and I getting a new computer today. I'm looking on the internet right now. My mom said she would take me to get it tonight. This is just so fucking ridiculous.

God, I've been playing for two hours and I'm still on the Creature stage because it keeps crashing. I think I've saved 50 times. That's all I can do. It apparently isn't autosaving for me.

If I get my compy, I'll post later.

EDIT: It just crashed again, literally not even two seconds after I saved. I'm so fucking pissed right now.

OHMYGODOHMYGODOHMYGOD

OHMYGODSPOREFINALLYFINISHEDDOWNLOADING!! I'm installing it now! Oh, God, I hope it's worth it. I'll post later today (well, tomorrow) with my thoughts on it.


!!

JUST FINISH ALREADY!

God, I've been up for like, I don't know, but a long time. I'm tired. And testy. Anyway, last night I tried to get my mom to take me to the store to get Spore, but noooooooooo, she was too tired. I ended up downloading it from Direct2Drive on my Windows PC, and it got about halfway through the 3.8Gb download before MY FREAKING INTERNET CRAPPED OUT! It eventually came back on...on all of our computers EXCEPT FOR THE WINDOWS!

Long story short, I was pissed, and had to wait for my mom to get up at 5 A.M. to help me figure out why the internet wouldn't come back on. It turns out I had to router password wrong (don't you think that it should tell you if you type in the wrong password? Because it didn't.), so she fixed that and I started downloading it again...it got halfway through AGAIN, then the SAME EXACT FUCKING THING HAPPENED! I was freaking PISSED!

Guess what...yeah, it happened A THIRD TIME! Well, I started it back, and now it's going slow as HELL (something like 60kbps as opposed to the 290kbps I usually get), but I think it's at least working...I think it's at about 20%, so I'm going to bed praying that it doesn't happen again while I'm alseep.

"GOD, WHY DO YOU NOT WANT ME TO PLAY THIS GAME?! P.S. Did you make up the theory of creationism just for the lulz?"

Review: Mercenaries 2: World in Flames (X360)

Okay. I've never actually written a formal review of anything before, so you shouldn't expect a whole lot more than my regular dose of literary genius. Hopefully, if I think this review turns out okay (and if I get good feedback (wait, I need readers for that, right? Shit.)), then I might review other games (maybe Metal Gear Solid 4). Here goes:

Mercenaries 2: World in Flames Review

Every once in a while, a game comes along that looks awesome in the previews, and deep down you really want it to be awesome, but when you actually play the game, you find out it's crap. Okay, so enough about Super Smash Bros. Brawl (yeah, I hated it), let's talk about Mercenaries 2.

There are three Mercenaries to choose from, but most everybody will probably pick Mattias Nillson - the Swedish dude on the cover of the game - because he regenerates health a little faster (one of the other characters can carry more ammo, and the other one can run a little faster), but no matter who you choose, the story is basically the same.

The story, albeit short and rather unimportant, is where you're in Venezuela to do a job for a dude named Ramon Solano, then instead of paying you, shoots you in the ass. In turn, you blow up half of his house, forcing him to GTFO. Now, you can't just let a half-good mansion go to waste can you? No, you take it and use it as your base. Actually, it's a base for the whole PMC (Private Millitary Company) which consists of:

• You (whatever mercenary you chose to play as)
• Fiona, your "boss"
• Ewan, your Scottish helicopter pilot, used to pick up oil and bring you supply drops
• Eva, your mechanic. If you find enough of the 100 Spare Parts scattered across Venezuela, then she can build you custom vehicles, like monster trucks with the ability to jump
• Then finally, Misha, the perpetually drunken Russian airplane pilot. You need him for airstrikes

The story is very simple and at most times virtually nonexistent, just an excuse to blow shit up. It's just six factions fighting over all of the oil in Venezuela, and you go around helping them do various things like capture outposts. You'll want to do the outpost missions pretty soon, because when you do, you can use them as landing zones so Ewan can carry you across the island more easily.

The controls work very well. I especially liked the way helicopters controlled - much better than GTAIV, although maybe not as realistic. Speaking of helicopters, that's just one of the many, many vehicles you can hijack and/or have dropped to you by Ewan. Every time you try to hijack an attack vehicle (i.e. enemy tanks, helicopters, etc.), you go through a short hit-the-right-button-at-the-right-time minigame, similar to Time Gal or the arcade version of Dragon's Lair. Some people think that those add too many breaks in the action, but I think it's good to pause for a few seconds every once in a while. Plus, if you take long enough doing it, then you can possibly regain a few health points.

The gameplay is also quite excellent, although at times the AI can be a bit of a drag. There were times when some enemies would just stand around and not move, not shooting or anything. As bad as the enemy AI is, the allied AI is even worse. There was a mission where I had to fly into an enemy base, save two captured pilots, call an allied helicopter for extraction, and then continue with the mission. So, I flew in, released the pilots, called a chopper in, but nothing happened. The guys just stood there. The AI was too stupid to even realize that the extraction chopper had landed. Long story short, I died several times just because the AI was so stupid.

The graphics are also not quite up-to-par (although the explosions look pretty freaking awesome). They're decent and they get the job done, but I've run in to several graphical glitches (albeit nothing as bad as I saw in Alone in the Dark. Ugh.), but it wasn't anything major. There's also some bit of texture and object pop-in. When you're flying a helicopter, you can see land and water for several miles out, but at times it almost looks like crap because the textures don't get high-quality until you're pretty close (I would guess about 100 feet. It doesn't sound like much, but it's pretty noticable in a helicopter), and the same goes for objects, such as trees and buildings.

There is one huge thing that makes this game stand out from a lot of others, and that is all of the environments are completely destructible, and anything you destroy stays until you restart your system. Destroying things is probably 85% of the fun in the game, and you have plenty of options in how to destroy everything, the simplest being grenades, C4, and missiles from tanks and helicopters. My favorite, however are the airstrikes, and there are several to choose from.

My final complaint, although rather minor, is that the dialogue can get very, very repetitive. There's one line that Fiona repeats every time you leave the PMC when you're not in a mission that I've probably hear 200 times in my 25+ hours of gameplay, and I'm not exaggerating. There's also a few other lines that get old, but none like the one Fiona repeats over. And over. And over.

While this game has some ups and downs (and the way I see it, there are more downs than ups, although the ups are greater than the downs), there's definitely something to be said for a game as buggy and repetitive as this, and yet I still 100% recommend it to almost anyone. It's that good. 4 out of 5.

Note: I haven't even tried co-op yet, but from what I hear, it's even better.

EDIT: During my exploits on the internet, I've found an Official Mercenaries 2 Flash Game, the full version of the song from the commercial and a Making-Of video for the commercial.

Phew.

Today, I went back to my mom's house. Like I said in a earlier post, being at my dad's wasn't as unbearable as it has been in the past, but I'm glad to be "home". Plus, the internet is a lot faster at my mom's.

I'm pretty pissed that last night, my Macbook's power cord shorted out or something, I just know it's not working. Anyway, I'm borrowing my mom's cord for now, but maybe we can go get a new cord tomorrow(I need some more deodorant, a new toothbrush, and some more razorblades anyway).

One more thing, I'm in the process of writing my first game review(Mercenaries 2), so look out for that probably tomorrow, but possibly Monday.

Jack Thompson = ASSFACED N00B

I freaking HATE Jack Thompson. He doesn't know two shits about videogames, psychology, lawyering, or LIFE(not the board game).

Adam Sessler = FUCKING OWNAGE
I LOVE it when Adam Sessler OWNS Jack. I watch X-Play every day in hopes that Jack Thompson will be on to get owned by Adam. I think my favorite quote is something like "I believe that violence existed before even Pong". I'm paraphrasing that, but that's essentially what he said.

SHIT

CRAP I JUST MISSED TODAY'S POST BY LIKE 7 MINUTES

Gah, I just realized what time it was. My Macbook died, so even if I had realized it in time, I probably couldn't post fast enough.

We'll just say that this post counted and that will be out little secret.

OMGLOL

Bahaha...I was just sitting here watching America's Got Talent(I don't normally watch this show...it's almost as bad as American Idol), and this dude was singing a song that the Osbourne lady said was a song by Robert Goulet, and I said to my dad something like "Robert Goulet was a singer? I thought he was a wresting announcer"(if you've seen the Boy Meets World episode with him in it, you'd know why I was thinking that.) and he was like, "No he was a singer, just like Liberace was a piano player" and I said "I thought he was a painter" and my sister said something along the lines of "LOL UR STOOPID" and I said something like "Okay, if you're so smart, then who was Beethoven?" and she said right away without even thinking "A dog".

...

Maybe you had to be there.

w00t

Well, I got over being depressed pretty quickly, because last night I went out and got Mercenaries 2. And I love this game. It's not GTAIV, but then again, it's not supposed to be. This game is awesome. That's all you need to know.

Also, the explosions are awesome. And there are plenty of them.

Meh.

I'm depressed. We took all of out PS1 games in to Movie Gallery last night, and they cleaned them all. We took them home to try them out and all but one were messed up. Yeah, they messed up the ones that actually did work before(except for Spyro 3). I was pissed at first, but I got over it and now I'm just depressed.