Xbox Bannings, Judge takes off of work for Modern Warfare & More Mr. T commercials? – Welcome to the column that always claims at least one drumstick for themselves and then tries to blame it on the seven year old when it disappears known as Dare to Play the Game.
It’s the day before Thanksgiving. Truth be told, I am sitting here in my easy chair at home trying to bust this one out. I only worked a couple of days this week because there was very few people in the office and there wasn’t much to do outside of organization. Gaming this week has been some World of Warcraft (dinged 48 on my priest who is the only character I’ve been playing since I’ve reactivated my accounts) and some Grand Theft Auto IV: Episodes.
In Episodes, I simply am still trying to wonder where my PS2 favorite series went. It’s just not that fun to me. I kinda hate that, you know? Everybody else is raving about the game and I’m just not jumping for joy. It deserved its 3.5/5, I don’t regret that, I just wish there was more to do. My major concern is that it will simply be forgotten in a month and then I’ll be sitting there with a huge gap in achievements. Maybe at some point, I’ll go and pick up IV original to at least flatten it out some.
Since Madden Arcade is coming out this week, I figured I would go and find a picture of a cheerleader playing a game. This is Natalie from the New York Jets and the game that she is playing is All Star Cheer Squad for the Wii. In her interview, she mentions that she would love to play this game with her kids. Kids? Doesn’t every cheerleader know that you are supposed to mention kids? They are her cousins. That way, every guy can then imagine Natalie bouncing up and down in front of her television without some jock behind him with hounding eyes. Ra-ra, go team!
Call of Duty
“Will Statton” – not his real name – is 48 years old. And when Modern Warfare 2 was released, he was up at midnight to get an early copy, then took the next day off to play. Problem?
See, according to a report in Britain’s The Times, Will (guess he was spilling anonymously) not only bought the game and stayed up late, he called in the next morning and said he was “sick”, when really he was up to his eyeballs in knife-fights and dead Russians.
Harmless day off, you say? Would be, were “Will” not a judge. A judge of 15 years, at a county court in Britain.
Some will be upset at this. Think a judge is too important a man to blow off a day’s work for some video games. But you know what? Judge’s gotta play games too, man. Judge’s gotta play games too.
Honestly, I wonder if we won’t see an article someday that says president Barack Obama was found playing World of Warcraft and likes it. He’s now a level 80 Human Pally who participates in working the auction house. Well at least he isn’t a level 80 Night Elf Druid like Al Gore is. Of course all that character does is run through Stormwind complaining about Global Warming. Something about the Dwarven District being too hot for this time of the year. Yeah, well you were probably sitting too close to the forge.
Anyhow, the point is that any person can be turned on by the addiction of gaming, even to the point of calling in sick. As long as it is an isolated occurrence, I don’t see any real problem with any occupation skipping a day of work. We do have sick days for a reason folks. If our choice of a sick day is playing a video game or writing a video game column because the person doesn’t want to work another day on Thanksgiving week, then that is their choice.
I’d be more worried if he were playing this rather than Modern Warfare. Judge, jury and executioner indeed.
World of Warcraft
There’s something breathtakingly glorious about having Mr. T’s Mohawk scanned by fake imaging technology and declared perfection. Blizzard continues to make Mr. Laurence Tureaud the face if its brand.
2007’s World of Warcraft commercial starring Mr. T might have been a lark, but Blizzard is serious this time around, with not one but two Mohawk-themed ads airing on televisions across the nation. This is the second, in which Mr. T is determined perfect by advanced technology.
Unfortunately, we’ve already established in the previous commercial for the Mohawk grenades that Mr. T is indeed a computer hacker, so we can’t believe anything that computer says. Sorry, Laurence!
Some might wonder why I’m including yet another Mr. T / World of Warcraft commercial. Well, a couple of events are going on right now related to that MMO. It’s the 5th year anniversary of the product and Pilgrim’s Bounty is going on right now for the first time. Pilgrim’s Bounty is an in-world event where you cook a bunch of thanksgiving-related food for reputation and experience. In turn, you get clothes and a turkey shooter that you shoot rogues with. Seriously. But for the first time, you actually get an achievement for sharing food. Is this World of Warcraft or the Care Bear special?
Absolutely perfect. Really, how does one keep that good of a mohawk for all of these years? Is there such a thing as mohawk extensions?
Xbox 360
There are some out there who believe that during the recent wave of Xbox Live bannings, Microsoft kicked as many as one million people off their online service. It’s a belief Microsoft execs do not subscribe to.
“We didn’t release the number”, Xbox Live GM Marc Whitten told VentureBeat. “I cannot explain to you why people would think it was a million people. It wasn’t a million people”.
So, those who had money on it being one million, sorry. You’re out. Until the cold day in hell Microsoft actually disclose the figures, though, those with money on it being 999,999 or 1,000,001, you’re still in the running!
Microsoft’s response to a law firm’s attempt to round up Xbox Live users smashed by the recent mass-banning reminds everyone that the service’s TOS allow it to hammer pirates, anytime, anywhere, so STFU.
Well, not literally STFU, but one imagines that’s heavily implied with this kind of boilerplate, uttered by a Microsoft spokesperson on Friday to Canada’s Financial Post.
“Piracy is illegal and modifying an Xbox 360 is a violation of the Xbox Live Terms of Use. Microsoft is well within its legal rights to ban these users from Xbox Live.”
No suit’s been filed, remember. I think the firm involved in this saw the claims that a million XBL users were caught in the blast and went beating the bushes figuring at least some lucrative percentage of those were innocent.
While Microsoft hasn’t specified the total number of pirates banz0red, it’s cast doubt on rumors that it was, in fact, seven figures’ worth.
I’ve probably said this before. Okay, I know I have but it bears repeating. IF YOU HAVE A MODDED XBOX 360, DON’T GET ON XBOX LIVE. I guess there are those folks who have a modded box and think to themselves, I can get around their detection. No, you can’t. Besides, isn’t it enough to have a modded box and just play copied games? If I had one (which I don’t), I would have a unmodded one nearby if I felt the need to play Live.
Now, I do have some beef when it comes to the whole banning of Xbox live users and the fact that it renders the console unable to ever connect to the Live service. The problem is not banning the users themselves, ban them into the ground for all I care. It’s the console. Or rather the used console. The one that gets sold back to Gamestop and some unfortunate soul buys it as a Christmas present. How are they supposed to know? They are down on their luck and need to save all of their money but Jr. wants a 360.
The problem is Jr has no intentions to play a modded box, he just wants to play some Lego Indiana Jones 2 with a friend he hasn’t seen in a couple of years. Then Jr finds out he can’t play, Jr very sad. There should be a program that unbans consoles, honestly. You show a recent receipt from Gamestop or wherever, and they remove the ban. It should be a fairly simple process. Sure, you can buy a new console, but that isn’t always an option.
The laughable part about these two articles is that some group of lawyers saw dollar signs and decided to sniff around with a class action lawsuit. The chances of them getting anything are slim and none. In the miracle that they did win a class action suit, would anyone collect? That would be a catch crooks scenario with modders walking in one door and possibly walking out in handcuffs in the other. That isn’t exactly worth the 50 bucks.
It wasn’t enough that Madden makes a game every year, he wanted an arcade game this year too. This game features all of the 32 teams/stadiums and a 5 on 5 arcade play design. This is similar to Blitz all of those years. The problem is a lot of the rosters are already out of sorts and some will be darn near unrecognizable. Of course, they are also releasing this more than half way into the season. It looks like a cool game, but it will not do as well Electronic Arts is hoping for it to. Maybe we’ll get a roster update before the playoffs. One can hope.
This would be the third Bit.Trip game for WiiWare fans as once again we are taken back to the land of Retro shooters. In this game, your ship has complete freedom to move about the screen however they desire. They will interact with music in a lot of new ways. Color is again at the forefront but more importantly the absence of color. Four player co-op is included and if you were into the other ones, this is a no-brainer.
Hrmm, is it just me or did this kid bother this guy in the middle of a #2? The man looks constipated for pete’s sake. This is Clover Town. You are now in ownership of a farm and shop. But the town is dealing with a lot of hardship. It’s up to you to raise crops & animals and then sell it at your shop to the masses. There are lots of different activities to do and it’s up to you to keep your customers happy. Looks like a great game for kids (especially those who know the Harvest Moon characters) but you might want to be careful who you barge in on.
Here you play as a Prince or Princess and lead your team through numerous battles. This plays out like a RTS game where you have to plan and deploy your units while launching real-time battles. There are plenty of units with different powers and you can earn experience to progress in levels. There is single player tournament glory as well as challenging your friend in a 2 player versus match. Not exactly excited with the graphics but it might be better than what I think.
Everybody with 800 points around this week should buy this classic. If you don’t I’m liable to use a turtle shell and bonk you personally. Well, once the 2010 budget comes in. (we don’t get a budget, dang it, what do I pay you guys for then?). Anyway, this is the original Mario Kart. Eight characters are included from Princess Peach to Bowser. The power ups, the courses, all of this made this game quite the roller coaster ride. With 15 tracks, single player and battle mode included, there isn’t anyway a self respecting gamer shouldn’t download this for their thanksgiving holiday.
One of the most underrated games from the NES era, this was simply a Boy and his Blob who has come from Blobolonia who must save the world. There are treasures to find and an evil emperor to beat. Luckily, the Blob has an affinity for jelly beans which turn him into various objects which will help to conquer the various puzzles found on each level. It’s quite a fun game and one that is certainly worth a look if you haven’t heard of it before.
PSP
Tekken 6
PS3
Karaoke Revolution
Xbox 360
Karaoke Revolution
Wii
Your Shape
Scene It? Twilight
Karaoke Revolution
Marines: Assault on Terror
Cook Wars
Rec Room
Coldstone: Scoop It Up
Rogue Trooper: Quartz Zone Massacre
Dream Salon
DS
Hello Kitty: Party
Winter’s Tail
Hands On! Tangrams
Fighting Fantasy
No matter how you scoop it up this week, it’s a stinker. Yes folks, Coldstone Creamery, home of absolutely delicious ice cream has made a video game. Unless there is $40 of free ice cream in the package, I so want nothing to do with it. The only game that I am actually interested in this week is Karaoke Revolution which is a nice reboot for the series. This will be the first Karaoke Revolution game to feature masters. No more covers for this series, and thank goodness. I have played the first American Idol abomination and the covers were mostly awful. Furthermore, no more American Idol influence, just singing some good songs. Maybe when it drops about $15-$20, I’ll pick it up. Outside of that, just keep playing your Modern Warfare 2 and Dragon Age. Hopefully it will get better next week.
So, I took the opportunity to read the prequel book to Dragon Age: Origins: The Silent Throne. For the first 350 pages, I was actually loving the book. It had adventure, romance, and a good smattering of magic here and there. It was a fun book. And without going into spoilers, the last fifty pages stunk to high horse poop. They rushed through the final battle with an epilogue. Yes, arguably the most important battle was reduced to an 5 page epilogue.
They also made me absolutely hate the lead character, Maric at the same time. And the supporting ones as well. It’s funny how a book can do that. It’s gently nudges your heart and holds it close for a few hours and then rips it out and stomps on it. So I’ve taken a couple of days off so I can still enjoy the game when I start it this week. I don’t want the experience tainted. The world of the book seems like a deep and interesting one which is probably the best part. The one I will be playing in soon. Hrmmm, that copy of Dragon Age looks awfully lonely. Have a great thanksgiving and take care kiddoes.
As Always,
Kedrix of Aldrianian
(*The Forgotten One*)
