Stilly

Alright, I agree, enough of being off topic. Right now, I'm fighting my way through Stubbs the Zombie.

Haha, and it seems your banner does most of your talking for you.

Listening to my angsty music. Marilyn Manson - Coma White

Wow...I slightly broke down the Skeet. Now I just don't know what to believe in...etc.

Well, we don't take kindly to folks who don't take kindly 'round here. Anyways, let me specify then. If Rockstar North takes over for Max Payne, all hope is lost for the series and it will become just another GTA-Clone (as that's all their North studio can do anymore, it seems). As for the rest of the company, I admit that they've put out some good stuff. If Rockstar Toronto takes over, I'll shutup and be happy.

Ew. I don't know how much I trust Rockstar with the Max Payne franchise. I suppose time will tell, but if you ask me, Rockstar is generally in league with Running With Scissors as far as their development section goes. I know Rockstar published Max Payne 2 (and the ports of the original, and what not)...but as far as developing Max Payne 3? I just don't know...

Have you heard that there are actually 2 Max Payne movies being worked on right now? One is an Indie film, and the other one seems to be an actual Hollywood production. And there's the possibility of Max Payne 3, but with everyone over there working on Alan Wake, doesn't look like we'll see more of Max for a while.

I actually rather enjoyed Max Payne 2. It's much grittier (compared to the first game) and it's disturbing look at the collapse of Max Payne as a person after the events of the first game. The dream sequences of the first game make their appearance and they're as bizarre as they were then. It's a good one to check out, in my opinion.

My game of the week has been one of my favorites. Usually when I have a week where it seems I'm just spinning wheels and getting nowhere in life (just like this week has been with a completely fruitless job search with only four days before rent is due), I tend to go back to my favorites for some good memories. Alas, as a PC gamer with a broken gaming PC, I had to head to the Xbox version of Half-Life 2 to get some good combine killing time in. Still one of my favorites out of all the "newer" games that have come out lately (even though it's almost 2 years old now, sheesh). Good times, good times.

I'd have to agree with lunchbox on this one, I rather enjoyed both films and thought they were breaking outside of what has become the norm of horror films. The norm, for those not paying attention, is big breasted girls getting slaughtered by some random force (be it a stalker, their boyfriend, trees, fog, aardvarks) for no apparent reason. Everyone looks like they come from an Abercrombie & Fitch catalogue (the killer included), and all the cliches are followed to a T. This seemed to go back to the gritty roots of gore-horror almost. Just come up with the most brutal shit you can think of and put it on film. Ok, rant over.

Imagine if PC games started doing the same thing. It's 2016, and Half-Life 3 just came out, so you rush down to the nearest Google Gamestop to grab a copy of it for a mere $75 dollars. Of course, you didn't buy the premium $125 dollar version, but you figure that there'll be no major change in your gameplay experience. You install the game (and pay a small licensing fee of $2.50 to help pay for the failing "Piracy Wars" of 2007-Present), and happily start the game almost salavating at the thoughts of the wonders that you've been waiting for for more than a decade. You start the game, and go through the basic training that's always there, and acquire your first weapon. The game becomes more and more difficult as you progress with that one weapon. About this time you begin to notice small kiosks set up throughout the post-post-apocalyptic world. Curious, you approach one of these kiosks to find that it's an in-game arms dealer. Cost of the next weapon up? Fifteen real world dollars. Sighing as you realize that you can't make it past the next area without that weapon, you begrudgingly enter your credit card number and purchase the weapon. Of course, being a single player game, you have no one to sell that gun to, and have in essence paid an extra $15 for the privledge of continuing the game that you just dropped $75 on (plus the $2.50 service charge to install). Where does it end? At what point do the content providers charge us just to turn on our bloody PC's or game consoles?

Not at all, I didn't even touch a vast majority of those cars, but it was the fact of having them. I know there'll be those nuts like me that will want to spend the money to get all of those cars and tracks, but they're a minority among gamers. Even though I feel that I must unlock everything in a game, there's no way that I'll be paying that much just to get another car that will collect (virtual) dust. I think that the majority of gamers (even the OCD ones like myself) won't pay for that kind of waste. Even if the sub-markets spring up, I don't see it being enough to make the kind of money $ony is looking for.

True, I hadn't thought of the various sub-markets. I know that in GT2 and so on, I had to have all the cars. Go for the damn 100%, you know? Of course, you know Sony isn't going to allow people to sell other people their cars. They're trying to destroy the used games market, why should they let you sell in-game product?

Muse - New Born Link it to the world Link it to yourself Stretch it like a birth squeeze The love for what you hide For bitterness inside Is growing like the new born When youve seen, seen too much Too young, young Soulless is everywhere Hopeless time to roam The distance to your home Fades away to nowhere How much are you worth? You cant come down to earth Youre swelling up Youre unstoppable Cause youve seen Seen too much And too young Young Soulless is everywhere Destroy the spineless Show me its real Wasting our last chance To come away Just break a silence Cause Im drifting away Away from you Yeah link it to the world Link it to yourself Stretch it like its a birth squeeze And the love for what you hide And the bitterness inside Is growing like the new born When youve seen, seen too much Too young, young Soulless is everywhere Destroy the spineless Show me its real Wasting our last chance To come away Just break a silence Cause Im drifting away Away from you

Welcome to the end of the Gran Turismo series it seems. The first three, IMHO, rocked...although the third wasn't nearly as good as the second. The fourth, however, seemed to me to be lacking in several areas that the second and third were extremely good at. This, to me, seems that they're trying to squeeze the last few dollars out of brand loyalty before dumping the series completely. If this tanks (and with the full game costing about $100 short of the system itself, it certainly seems like it will), then will they even consider a GT5, or just let the unfinished series rot in it's prematurely dug grave?

Yeah, Perplex City is an ARG...looks like it's going to rock, and I believe that they were able to strike a deal with Gamestop, so we should be seeing it in stores here shortly. I love Indie Games, and I don't really know why. Seems to be more of a chance to breed innovation when you don't have to pander to what the publishers want.

Has anyone else checked out the list of IGF 2007 games? There are some pretty awesome sounding ones in there. Check this out, gives a review on several of the games with links to demos and whatnot: http://forums.indiegamer.com/showpost.php?...amp;postcount=4 A couple of my random favorites in there: Virtual Villagers, and Kingdom Elemental. Penumba and Perplex City sound pretty wicked as well.

Man, I remember playing the demo of this off of live on one of my friends' 360's. Good lord, I need to just drop the cash on that console when I can...even if it's just for this game alone. Game of the year, anyone?

As much as I hate to admit it, I'm actually pretty excited about the Wii...even if it doesn't come with 2 controllers and has a launch price of $250. Sure I love all the nintendo classics, but this console just seemed like more of the same for a while. Another mario game, another zelda game, another metroid game. Sure, that might rock if you're a fan of those games, but how are you supposed to get people who are growing more and more distant from them back in? The Wii certainly seems like it'll be able to do just that, as well as get new people into gaming. Sure, it may not be a shiny as the Xbox360 or the PS3, but it seems like they're really going out on a limb to make an improvement in areas besides graphics.

Muse - Take A Bow

Eh, but homebrew innovation isn't going to flourish (by any means) in a Microsoft sanctioned arena.

Bishopcruz, if what you say is true, then I'm sure I'll slap down the cash for some of those retro titles...but I'm pretty damn sure that the homebrew scene is where the real innovation will take place when it comes to making the older roms look great in HD. Of course, the Homebrew scene could fail us all...joy.

The only part of that that wouldn't be considered "legal" would be the ripping the games to the xbox, the downloading of the roms for purposes other than "having a backup", and the downloading and installation of the firmware for the modchip (assuming you installed a modchip)...or any of the other software you put on the xbox (because it would have had to been compiled on pirated microsoft xbox development software). But besides that, it's completely legal. But yeah, I've done all that to my xbox, too.

Link to AP article Does anybody else think this is a total rip-off? I mean, $5 - $15 for pacman...for the convenience of being able to play pacman on your 360. Shit, I have fucking PONG on my Original Xbox...for free (well, after paying for the mods and whatnot)...and with mods for the 360 on the horizon, does M$ really believe they're going to make any kind of profit on the deal?! /rant