Eeeek

11.09.2004

I made a discovery during one of my infrequent cleaning of the couches. I found a mouse in my couch. I dead mouse. A dead, flat mouse.

Evidently the dead flat mouse had found its way to the comfort of the part of the couch where the back and bottom come together. There were even lots of little mouse droppings underneath the cushion, so the mouse had been there a little while before becoming a dead flat mouse.

Thanks to a childhood experience (that oddly enough is centered around a family of dead mice, but I'll leave that for another day), to this day I have a little mouse phobia. So even though I knew the mouse to be dead, and flat, I went and found a pair of tongs to retrieve the mouse from the couch. Even with tongs, I'm pretty sure I was making an "oooh, icky" face while getting the mouse. But I got the mouse without incident, disposed of said mouse, and went about cleaning up the couch with my handy dandy Super Shark hand vac.

Now if only the other mice will stay away this winter since I'm known as the home of dead flat mice.

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Binary Wrestling Bliss, Part II

11.08.2004

I had completed my chores (well, enough of my chores). I had caught up with work. The weekend was here. It was wrestling game playing time.

The latest PS2 wrestling game: Smackdown Vs Raw was nestled within my PS2 ready for some cans of whoop ass to be opened. After playing it the majority of Friday, Saturday, and Sunday, I think I'm ready to tell the world my review.

It's ok.

This is the game I annually wait for the November update, and every year it gets a little better, except for this year. I guess after 5 years of getting gradually better I shouldn't be surprised that there's finally a little bit of a let down. Each year they add some new features and take away a couple of old features. I eventually don't miss some of the old features and come to enjoy the latest version better than the last, but this year something's lacking.

Don't get me wrong, it's a good wrestling game. Game play wise, it's the same game as last year. Same controls. Same moves. I'm good with that, I like the game play. It's the extra options that seem to be lacking. So what's the differences?

• Story Mode - It's still your basic "choose your own adventure" path, but this year it lacks the "randomness" of the participants. I'm in my 3rd virtual year, and I've already had the same feud with Chris Jericho and Randy Orton 3 times.
• Fewer Titles - Last years Here Comes The Pain let you fight for up to 7 titles. This years there's 4.
• Smackdown or Raw - Last year you could choose which brand to wrestle for, and if you didn't have a title you could switch between shows, which was good in case you got tired of fighting the same characters. This year, you're stuck on the show you initially choose.
• Legends Characters - Once again you can unlock legends. The choices between the 2 games is a little different, but the number seems about the same. The drawback (to me) is that in Smackdown vs Raw, the unlocked legends are only avaialable in exhibition mode. Being a story mode kind of guy, I liked adding the legends to the roster in Here Comes The Pain.
• Rosters - Here Comes the Pain had 55 wrestlers. This was about the best roster I've ever seen in a game. It had the big names form the WCW years like Goldberg and the nWo guys. Hogan. Booker T. It had the great WWE guys like Shawn Michaels, HHH, and the up and comers like Randy Orton and John Cena. Smackdown vs Raw has about 30, losing most of the WCW leftovers.

So, it looks like I'm a little disapointed in the new game. I still like it better than most other wrestling games, it's just not all that I had hoped it would be. Maybe I need to give chick wrestling a chance when it's released this week. game

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Binary Wrestling Bliss

11.04.2004

The latest Smackdown game had a release date of this past Tuesday. As I've learned from overhearing workers at various electronics stores over the years, that release date usually turns out to be the shipping date, and most stores won't have it on shelves for another day or two.

Today I went to my local Wal Mart to get some groceries. Well, all I was really going after was some tea. Ok, the truth is I was going after the game and groceries were just a back-up in case the game wasn't really out yet. I went back to the video game section, and there on the bottom shelf I saw Vince's red and blue, Smackdown vs Raw eyes staring back at me. A quick call to a clerk later and it was on its way home with me. And some tea.

Unfortunately, I've ogt too much going on to play right now. Work is in the way (damnable provider of my way of living!). After work will be taken up by TV/Date night. Then there's work tomorrow. It'll be tomorrow night before I can set free the wrestling gods encased in their plastic!

No, no. I'm ok. I can do it. Just a little longer. Circle Circle Left Right Up Down Up Down.

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Don't Be Playa Hatin'

11.01.2004

Like a lot of people, I found myself looking forward to last weeks release of the latest GTA game, San Andreas. After picking it Wednesday and loading into the PS2, I think I was a little overwhelmed with how big the game map is. It's freakin' huge! I was so overwhelmed I went back for a couple of days and played some football.

Well. Sunday I had some spare time between chores and miscellaneous goofing off, so I decided to load up the game and just wander around. Jer came by to help, and I think we spent hours just driving around (me) and randomly shooting people (Jer). I got familiar enough with the map that it's not so intimidating now, but it's still freakin' huge!

In the previous games, it was always good to complete missions to unlock other parts of the map. There seems to be a shortcut in the new game, but with a caveat. The locked sections of the map are always blocked of by a closed, impassible bridge, but thanks to the new ability of "swimming", you can usually get across. The caveat: Your wanted level jumps up to 4 stars once you cross into forbidden territory. I found this to be a fun challenge, to see how much of the forbidden territory I could drive through before being caught by the police. Sure, there's a game with missions to be played, but I'm doing something I'm not supposed to be doing. After all, isn't that the core concept of the GTA games?

So, now I'm more comfortable being a black guy, driving around jacking cars and pimpin' hoes. Ho's? Hos? Hoes. At least for a couple of days until the next wrestling game comes out.

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The Pigskin

10.30.2004

I know pretty much nothing about football. I've never been one to keep up with it, much to the chagrin of my Sports-watching grandfather, who I believe has the remote programmed to jump from one saports channel to the other. I'm up to date with most of the rules, but except for well known stars of teams, I couldn't tell you who was where playing what position. Although I don't keep up with the real sport, I have enjoyed a good football videogame from time to time. I haven't really gotten into a football game in years. I tried one of the Madden games around 2000, but it was just way to complicated for me. I was used to a game where either the QB would run the ball or have the option to pass to maybe 2 receivers if the game was really good.

This year I decided to try ESPN NFL game on the PS2. It's less intimidating than the Madden series, and with the difficulty cranked all the way down it's not to hard to pick up. I've been playing for a few weeks now off and on (and even managed to boost the difficulty up to give me a challenge!), and along the way I've noticed something peculiar. Playing as the Tennessee Titans, I'm learning the names on the roster. I found this out one morning while flipping channels during the commercials of getting my news/weather/traffic-update and pausing on ESPN. They were going over the weekend NFL games, and I suddenly knew who they were talking about. Chris Burman spouts off something about "Mason with a grab under double coverage" and I find myself saying "Oh yeah, go Derrick!" followed by a quick cock of head and a "hey, how'd I know his name was Derrick?" Oh yeah, I throw passes to him in a video game.

So maybe this Thanksgiving, while going for my annual trip to the grandparents to have lunch and see way to many relatives, I'll just strike up the oddest conversation my grandfather and I could ever have. Unfortunately, Tennessee isn't playing on Thanksgiving day, but maybe we can find a game on with a team I've thoroughly trounced and can still name some players.

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