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Archive for August, 2007

For a long time, I thought the idea of Guitar Hero was silly. It was basically DDR with a guitar, and I don’t like DDR.

Playing the game a few times changed my mind. I played Guitar Hero II for Xbox 360 and really enjoyed it!

So now I have to make a decision: Guitar Hero III isn’t a cheap purchase, so I can only buy it for one system. Should it be Wii or 360?

Here’s a full preview of Guitar Hero III for the Wii.

I think if I buy it, I’m going with the Wii version, and here’s why:

• Guitar Hero is not about graphics in the least bit. Yeah there’s stuff happening on screen in the background, but it doesn’t matter. Wii doesn’t have great graphical power, but it doesn’t need it for this game.
• Rumble. Only the Wii will have rumble.
• Wiimote’s built-in speaker will play the squelch sound when you mess up. How cool is that!

Okay so I guess that’s a pretty minor list. It’s shaping up to be a great game on any system, and the new guitar looks boss! If nothing else, I recommend that you go get a Guitar Hero game and give it try. It’s more than just Simon in guitar form!

Missed the last Tuesday Tube? Head over to the tag search for ‘tuesday tube’ and browse through the archives.

This week is a double bonus of Tube. First, the latest three sample clips from RiffTrax. Then, a normal dose of insanity that you’ve come to expect from Tuesday Tube.

I really liked 300. That being said, the whole movie is great fodder for riffing.

I just don’t get the Bourne movies. I mean, they aren’t bad…I just don’t see why they have such a following.

If you are Kelsey Grammer, please don’t watch this clip.

And now, the insanity. First, here’s a video feed from my nightmares:

It’s actually kinda catchy.

I have a hard time believing some of these are real calls:

This guy can really get down. No wonder the chicks dig him.

Do you remember “Mena mena” from the Muppets show?

Well, here’s a parody of it called “ROFL MAO”.

And finally, this is the most insane thing I’ve seen all month:

So, you’re at the video store, browsing the new releases, and something catches your eye. You say, “Oh, hey, cool! The new Pirates of The Caribbean movie! But didn’t this just get released in theaters? Wow! There must’ve been a mistake at the distribution center! While those poor schmucks are waiting in long lines to see this summer’s blockbuster, I’ll watch it in the comfort of my own home!” But when you get home and watch it, it’s some B-movie knock-off starring Lance Henriksen.

Do they seriously expect some yahoo to mistakenly rent the title thinking it’s the current box-office hit? Who are the purveyors of such shady nonsense? The answer: The Asylum Home Entertainment. Here’s just a few of their knock-off gems:

Pirates of Treasure Island

While Pirates of The Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest was breaking records last summer, Asylum snuck this beauty onto the shelves. Yes, Lance Henriksen is the star. Yes, he rocked in Aliens and Millennium. The movie’s IMDB “goofs” page tells the tail: “Numerous times during the film, people are shot at close range by pistols. In many cases, there is no muzzle flash nor is there smoke.”

Snakes on a Train

This one was very convincing. It didn’t seem implausible to think Hollywood executives would quickly flood the market with Snakes on a Plane spin-offs, capitalizing on the movie’s buzz.

King of The Lost World

And you thought Bruce Boxleitner was unemployable. When a property enters the public domain, anyone can use it. You could make your own Sleeping Beauty or Hunchback of Notre Dame. That’s why you always see those Disney knockoffs in the checkout lines of grocery stores. Watch Tron get carried up the Chrysler building or something equally derivative of King Kong.

The DaVinci Treasure

Lance Henriksen’s a busy man. This time he’s joined by C. Thomas Howell. You know, the guy from Soul Man. The one where the white guy tries to get a scholarship by disguising himself as a black guy. It won an Image Award. Anyhow, if his pedigree wasn’t clear, here he is in a DaVinci Code knock-off, playing the Tom Hanks character.

Transmorphers

Asylum was hoping to transform some Transformers fans into Transmorphers renters. See what I did there? Couldn’t they have at least gotten the Go-Bots license? Are they that cheap? Yes.

And finally…

Dead Men Walking

“Honey, how about this one?” “Oooo. Dead Men Walking. This is the one Susan Sarandon won an academy award for.” “What’s with the zombie on the cover?” “Oh, just shut up and rent it, ya damn nag.” The real film was, of course, Dead Man Walking, which I believe was also about zombies.

You’ll notice that they spend a disproportionate amount of their budget on the cover art. There’s an information asymmetry (MBA mental masturbation term) at work whenever someone rents a video. You don’t know what’s inside until you watch it. Unless it stars Lance Henriksen. Then you know it’s… awesome! He was ripped in two in Aliens! He spewed his milky android blood all over the place! God, that was a good flick…

This is the Weekend Update for the weekend of August 24th – 26th.

Missed the last Weekend Update? Check out the Weekend Update archives.

It’s been an interesting week, and a relaxing weekend. Final(s) are over. I almost always feel like I completely bomb them, but things usually seem to work out okay. Next quarter is going to be very interesting. In fact, the next 3 quarters (9 months) left in my MBA will be…challenging.

Here’s a cool poem in German:

 Drei Drachen.

 Drei Drachen kriechen in meinen Schlaf,

 die Seele woll'n sie lebendig zum Fra

This week’s ROMs of the week are once again two NES games: Cobra Triangle and Bombliss.

Bullet Proof Software release a dual-game cartridge called “Tetris 2 and Bombliss” for NES. No one is really sure why they called it “Tetris 2″ because it is practically identical to Tetris. But anyway, Bombliss. Or as it’s sometimes known, “Tetris Blast”. This is a really fun variant of Tetris where you can set off bombs of varying sizes to destroy blocks instead of the old “row clearing” method. What’s even more fun is the ability to set off explosive chains.

I highly recommend this game to anyone who enjoys Tetris, especially the “puzzle” mode. This specific game may have only had a Japanese release, but there are many other variants on the name for other systems. You can probably find it on Google .

The next game is a somewhat obscure title from Rare for the NES: Cobra Triangle. This was released after RC Pro-Am, and has a similar style of play. However, this is less of a racing game and more of an action/shooter game. You race your boat around rivers and what not and have to fight bosses, like this one:

I remember it being a very short game, but apparently there are 25 levels. You can find this game on Google if you want to play it.

Missed the last Tuesday Tube? Head over to the tag search for ‘tuesday tube’ and browse through the archives.

This week’s Tube is all about the bane of television: commercials!

This is how game programmers really work: in ridiculous chairs with sound effects machines by their side, programming with joysticks.

Ladies and gentlemen, the esteemed Governor of California:

This next one isn’t a real commercial, but I wish it was!

There’s nothing manlier than a football field being reseeded.

This guy needs to stop getting high on his own supply. That being said, I would buy so much liquor from this guy.

I’m totally naming my son “Biff Jr.”.

In the fine tradition of Log

Amazon is now taking preorders for Bender’s Big Score, which is the first of the new Futurama DVDs.

I’ve just placed my order.

I suggest you do the same! For the low, low price of $19.99 for what is essentially 4 brand-new episodes, how can you go wrong? Go ahead! Use your Tricky-Dick fun bill and splurge! Or else he’ll come in to your house at night and wreck up the place, and no one wants that.

Hat tip to Can’t Get Enough Futurama.

Check out this quote from Ronald Reagan’s diary.

I’m not sure which is more hilarious: Reagan calling a future president a shiftless ne’re-do-well who’s never had a real job, or suggesting that he should be a contributing editor at The New Republic because it looks like easy work.

Either way, Reagan is still awesome.

One of the skills that my father taught me early on in life is the fine art of making pancakes. Because my whole family is proficient in this skill, I took it for granted. However, the more pancake-related interaction I have, the more I realize that pancake making is perhaps a lost art.

And it is for the greater good that I publish my “secrets” on excelling in your pancake creation. Note that these are just guidelines, and your methods may ultimately vary by taste.

First step: mixing up the batter. I find that this isn’t as crucial to making a great pancake as are the other steps, but if you have a lousy batter, you’ll get lousy flapjacks. You can buy a batter mix at any grocer. Most baking mixes (Jiffy, Bisquik) also have a recipe for pancake batter, or if you are really adventurous, you can also mix up your own.

The key to a good pancake batter is getting the thickness just right. Don’t be afraid to add water or dry mix to get it just right, but do so in small increments, because a little goes a long way to changing the viscosity. You want it be right around the same consistency as tapioca pudding (except not as lumpy, of course). You’ll really have to experiment multiple times to get it just the way you want.

Feel free to put in fruit, cinnamon, etc as you wish–I prefer a standard johnnycake myself, though I’ll never turn down apple cinnamon or blueberry pancakes. I’m not a fan of the chocolate chip cakes–too rich.

I’ve recently been experimenting with The Magic Bullet for quick mixing, but a wire whisk or even fork should work just fine.

Cooking the pancakes is by far, the most important and difficult part of the process. You will need the following equipment to do it right:

A flat, wide spatula, preferably with a nice beveled end. Don’t skimp on the spatula!

A nice-sized skillet…

…no, not that one. Get a nice big one. Don’t get the shiny stainless steel ones. Some people like the cast-iron, but do not use cast-iron skillets on glass-top stoves! I prefer the black ones (aluminum, maybe?) without teflon or any of that malarkey. I don’t know what they’re called, but they make a good “booong” sound when you bang on ‘em.

Okay, now that you have the proper equipment, here’s how you cook pancakes:

First, spray on some non-stick spray. The butter-flavored stuff is what I prefer, but then I’d eat my own arm if it was butter-flavored. Turn on the heat to around medium or a little higher, and wait for the pan to heat up a bit.

Next, pour the batter right into the center of the skillet. Keep your pour stationary until the batter has spread out to the desired radius. Sometimes I make ‘em huge and sometimes I make about 3 to a pan. If you are going to make huge pan-sized cakes, make sure your batter is thin enough so that it will chase itself all the way to the edge, or else you will have to use a non-stationary pour (which is fine too).

The next and most crucial decision is when to flip. This is possibly the most important step. As you watch the pancake cook, you can’t see the side that’s being browned, so you must take your cues from the visible side. You should start to see a number of tiny bubbles form and then pop slowly. After that, you should also start to see an outside ring of the pancake start to form where it appears the batter is drying. Somewhere between these two events is when you should flip the pancake.

You only get one chance to make a good flip, so make it count. A wide, bevelled spatula increases your chance of success. Be gentle, no need for an aggressive flip. The goal is for the flipped pancake not to slide when it lands. With a perfect slip, you should not be able to see any batter coming out the sides. Each additional cake you have in the pan increases the difficulty, so start with 1-per-pan until your confidence builds up. The best part of cooking pancakes is to check out the results after you flip.

Anywhere from deep golden brown to darkish brown is what all true pancakers strive for.

The other side should not take as long to cook, and will have a slightly different appearance because of the bubbles that I talked about earlier. It should have a “softer” look. Don’t be afraid to use your spatula to “check” on the pancake at this point.

Finally, when both sides are fully cooked, use the spatula to remove the pancakes and place them in a holding area. A designated pancake plate is fine. If you have a large group of people, you can even serve them sequentially if you like.

You should probably respray the pan with non-stick spray between cakes, or every other cake at most, because the cake will tend to absorb the spray, and you will lose some to evaporation as well.

A trick that I learned recently is to use a tortilla warmer to store the pancakes between cooking time and serving time. This does an incredible job of keeping the moisture and heat in.

Serve with butter and syrup. One of the things I like to do with butter/margarine is to put a small amount between each cake in my stack, and let the heat of the pancakes melt the butter.

If you have excess pancakes, you can freeze them for a later snack if you like. Next time you may want to consider a smaller batch of batter.

Thank you for reading, and I hope this makes your next pancake experience more enjoyable!

Missed the last Tuesday Tube? Head over to the tag search for ‘tuesday tube’ and browse through the archives.

I believe I was drunk most of last week, or possibly someone kept slipping me Forget-Me-Nows, but whatever it was, it was an odd week. As a consequence, Tuesday Tube was posted on Wednesday.

I realize that it probably shook your world from it foundations when you were deprived from sweet Tube goodness on Tuesday, but I think the bonus edition more than compensated.

I got some positive feedback from the bonus edition last week (actually just Sithlet), so I think I will be beefing up the number of videos from this point on. I’ll still try to keep them short because I know you all have a short attention span and/or a nosy boss.

First up, this guy has invented a real time machine. By “invented” I don’t mean “constructed”. It’s possible, just very expensive/unfeasible.

On the other hand, I just constructed my own Perpetual Motion machine by following the instructions in this video. It is currently powering this very laptop, though it is somewhat noisy.

And here’s a guy who ran a perpetual motion machine scam in olde times.

It’s a trap!

Not since the Nintendo 64 kid…

That’s all for this week!