CNN gets "street"?

Directed at me from Alex Leo, of the Huffington Post:



Note Kyra Phillips' hip-hop gestures and insistence on the fist bump at the end. Meanwhile, the subject matter centers around black culture being "more open and inclusive" and we're seeing that in the president's "swagga'". Is this supposed to be complimentary and progressive, this segment with a forty-something white woman pretending to "kick it" with her black co-anchor? Even positive mass generalizations about race are still mass generalizations. This is why I glare at people who like to tell me Mexican-Americans are hard-working and resourceful. F*ck off.

Uncool Flyovers and The Pig Flu

Ah, distraction calls. From MSNBC:

Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News, and News about the Economy

Call me a conspiracy theorist, but how did such a massive oversight get made? Were some of the recent improvements in the economy making the citizenry feel too good? Asinine.

Meanwhile, call me coarse, but these major news outlets need to find something else to talk about besides swine flu. I listened to NPR's Morning Edition for 45 minutes straight and they never strayed from the epidemic. I won't try to degrade the state of affairs for those affected, both living and dead, but such rampant coverage of a "plague" prioritizes profit over peace, even as every report features the message, "It's not time to panic...yet."

Posting Trickle

I'm in the last two weeks of my career as an undergrad. That's right, folks, in less than fourteen days, The Brute will become a real boy. But that's why this blog has been (and will probably remain) quiet for a time. Until I return from the caverns of rhetorical research dialogues and internship portfolios, valete!

Here's a fun video:

Think About This

Waterboarding still sucks, even if you know it's coming.

-John Stewart

Further Proof that Ahmadinejad is the Iranian Ann Coulter

From Rueters, via MSNBC:

Some European diplomats immediately walked out of the room when Ahmadinejad said Israel was created on the "pretext of Jewish suffering" from World War II.

Oh, Mahmoud, sometimes you're too much, like that time you said there are no gays in Iran.

Every little bit helps.

From Michael A. Fletcher of the Washington Post:

Veterans Affairs has canceled or delayed 26 conferences, opting for less costly alternatives such as video conferencing, saving nearly $17.8 million. The Agriculture Department is working to combine 1,500 employees from seven office locations into one facility in 2011, which the agency said would save $62 million over a 15-year lease term. Also, Homeland Security projects that it can save up to $52 million over five years by buying office supplies in bulk, officials said.

In a time when deficit spending is at all-time high, it's good to know that other efforts are being made.

Score One for Net Nuetrality

From Gamepolitics.com. Time Warner has lost a battle over tiered bandwidth. Thank Dog.

Lucas Endures in Final Fantasy Part II

Turns out I wasn't the only one who feels this way. Special thanks to Cat Cook for directing me to these, ahem, exhibits:

One
Two
Three
Four

Spookular.

Check the "Limp" Again

Jonah Weiner, of Slate, tells us why we should check out the Limp Bizkit reunion:

It's mook tragicomedy.

In some strange serendipity, I recently cued up the Bizkit back catalog because they were the world to me in my angry teenager days. I can't lie; Durst is a total idiot. But Borland's visceral riffage is (still) absolutely undeniable.

Lucas Endures in Final Fantasy

The Final Fantasy XIII demo has officially been ripped and leaked to the web--well, at least five minutes worth--and it looks about the way you would expect: bad-ass.

But the video highlights the strange visual trend that has sprung up in Square's vision of the Final Fantasy world in recent years: George Lucas, particularly the look and feel of his second trilogy of Star Wars films.

Memos to the Video Game Industry: Audience

Dear Nintendo,

How's it goin' ole' buddy? We've been friends now for what, more than two decades? Do you remember me, when you crept into my life via our mutual friend Nathan Stangle? We started out with Metroid and Abadox and, despite Abadox, I became an avid fan of your video game system. I lost countless afternoons to Contra, Ninja Gaiden, Mega Man, Solar Jetman, Battletoads, Shadow of the Ninja, Double Dragon, Castlevania, all of your generic sports games, and every iteration of Super Mario Bros. You hosted some of the best third-party developers and gave me some killer first-party apps as well.

Then the 16-bit era arrived and our relationship only improved. You introduced me to Donkey Kong Country, Street Fighter, Zelda, Super Mario Kart, and role-playing games that didn't suck. In the ongoing Super Nintendo Vs. Genesis "rivalry", you made Sega's machine look like it showed up to the wrong fight. You said, "Sorry Gen-Gen, T-ball meets on the weekends. But while you're here, check out this drive." *swing*

Then things got complicated. You started making promises, promises of CD-Rom upgrades, silicon graphics, and 64-bit ultra power. And while you didn't turn out to be the liars that Atari were, you started chinking your own armor. The CD-Rom upgrade became the Sony PS. The "silicon graphics" looked nothing like a Pixar movie; hell, they didn't even look like Reboot. The 64-bit ultra 3-D power was rendered in a blurry 320X240.

I didn't care. I carried a torch for Nintendo, the f*cking Lewis and Clark of video games, and became your number one apologist. When PS fanboys bitched about plastic graphics, single-digit frame-rates and kiddy games, I pointed to the innovations of analog control and rumble functionality and how blisteringly hard it was to get 120 stars in Mario 64. I dropped $70 on Goldeneye and got back every penny in get-togethers with my high school friends. Then I dropped over $100 for Perfect Dark with the RAM pack and played alone. A lot. I was happy with the N64, the weird workhorse that gave me three (or less) must-have games a year. I had a job, so I used what I earned to get my fill of other genres on the PS.

I didn't care, Nintendo, that you were shooting yourself in the foot by standing by your cartridge format. When the third-parties jumped ship, I just refocused my attention to whatever you (and Rare) had in the pipeline, the same way you did. Then the Gamecube promised to put an end to all this mess and, for a time, it felt like that might happen. You revived classic franchises and wooed third-party companies with your powerful new game system. Everyone stood in awe of Legend of Zelda: Wind Waker, Mario Sunshine, and Metroid Prime. But the third-party support, on the whole, didn't come and you insisted on releasing some games that outright mocked your most devoted fans.

And now you have given us the Wii, a game system built on motion control and last-generation hardware. As a gaming watchdog, I have to give you props, Nintendo, for building such an affordable, daring game machine. Every quarter you outsell Microsoft and Sony, especially in these trying economic times. You're finishing what Sony began with the PS, that is, bringing gaming to the masses with the Wii Fit and mainstream-friendly versions of your franchises. There's also no shortage of cool games to get on virtual console. Unlike most video game-lovers, I have little negative to say about what you're doing now, except that you seem to have abandoned the audience that built you entirely.

That's right, Nintendo, you've become the Disney of video games: once a life-affirming, all-inclusive media giant that is not even a shell of its former self. I don't care that you publish crap by the barge-load on all of your game systems. You've always been the company that publishes anything--no matter how banal--even in your best of times. But what makes you the anti-game company now is the fact that you have nothing, literally nothing, coming in the pipeline for the average gamer. Notice I said average gamer. I'm not talking about the always-ranting gamer-snob who thinks EGM had it coming back in 1999. I don't mean the dude that perpetually thinks gaming fell apart seven years ago. I'm talking about the gamer who just loves your games, who bought Zelda: Twilight Princess, Metroid Prime 3: Corruption and Super Mario: Galaxy and hasn't played anything of the same caliber on the Wii since.

We've tolerated much over the years from you, Nintendo, the game company that blazes its own trail, but that never apologizes for its missteps and willfully trips itself up. We've put up with crappy graphics, broken promises, vaporware, bad format decisions, a lack of 3rd-party support and, now the Wii, "the little white weirdo" (thank you, Heather Campbell) that arrogantly ignores the very gamer that made it possible. You don't even let us play it in 720p ferchrissake.

Remember where we stand, Nintendo. When the annals of history document you as the game company that began by saving the industry and ended by becoming the high-budget Tiger Electronics, remember that you abandoned us. You've had chance after chance to get third-parties back into the fold and rebuild your installed base. Instead, you've run the other way, right into my parent's living room, by dumbing down Mario Kart and making Super Smash Bros. a flagship property. While I don't mind getting in a game with Mother, I despair that the Wii gathers dust otherwise. And Super Smash Bros. sucks.

Much Love and Respect,
The Brute

Think About This

I think you might be confusing "tyranny" with "losing".

-John Stewart

Worst May Be Behind Us

The econopocalypse may have hit the bottom (from the AP, via MSNBC). Experts are reporting that we're in an uneasy peace, though:

Bernanke, however, has been quick to caution that this will happen only if the government succeeds in stabilizing financial markets and getting banks to lend money more freely again to both consumers and businesses. To that end, the Fed recently plowed $1.2 trillion into the economy in an attempt to reduce interest rates for mortgages and other loans.

I had a feeling that all the rhetoric about this being the worst economy since the depression might be misleading. I don't dispute how bad things are, but I think comparing now to the Great Depression is a bit like comparing the Appalachians to the Rockies.

Seriously, Though...

Would anyone expect Him to feel any differently (from filmaker Patrick Boivin, on YouTube)?

You And Me Both, Friendo

On his new album, Prince propositions the woman of my dreams (from Anya Streisman, of Huffingtonpost). I wish I had some witty, suggestive comment to tie it all up, but I don't. I'm just too jealous.

Greenpeace: Nintendo Least Environmentally Friendly of Big Three

Say it ain't so! (From Kris Pigna, of 1up.com):

But the biggest problem for Nintendo, as it was before, is that they don't provide enough information on the various categories Greenpeace rates each company on. Seven out of the eleven categories in which Nintendo received a 0 were based on either too little info, or no info at all.

Indeed. Reminds me of my younger days reading Nintendo Power, a game magazine that sometimes featured in-depth coverage of straight-up awful games. Sometimes Nintendo "forgot" to tell their readers a title for their game systems sucked.

Listen To This

DJ Shadow's The Outsider opens with an unnamed lounge crooner promising, "This time, I'm gonna' try things my way". Then the record plunges into 20+ minutes of Shadow-produced hyphy (San Francisco's answer to crunk) before starkly shifting genres across ten more tracks, making the statement the record's spiritual refrain. It's as if the SoCal dj got fed up with being known as the Jesus Christ of turntablism and decided to make something that wouldn't be expected to result in Radiohead's next great album. In Shadow's defense, he deserves to deliver this risky, uneven, self-indulgent mixtape. He is, after all, as responsible for Okay Computer as Radiohead is. The high moments--such as the crunk-done-right "Seein Thangs" and slow-smoldering "Backstage Girl"--definitely atone for the low ones, like the awful "What Have I Done". The difficulty with The Outsider has less to do with the record or the dj and more to do with the expectations of his fans. There are no OMG moments as on Entroducing or The Private Press. Instead, this is a record that's enjoyable for what it does right and wrong. It's also a record that may have been necessary to give DJ Shadow some much deserved breathing room for the second act of his career.

A nice distraction.

Think About This

It's times like these that you learn to live again.
It's times like these you give and give again.
It's times like these you learn to love again.
It's times like these, time and time, again.

-Foo Fighters, "Times Like These"

1up: Nintendo Thrives on "Good Enough" Gaming

Jeremy Parish, of 1up.com, celebrates the 20-year anniversary of Nintendo's Game Boy and points out how the technologically deficient hand-held reveals its parent company's business philosophy:

The secret of Game Boy's success was that it demonstrated Nintendo's uncanny grasp of "good enough." In fact, the philosophy creator Gumpei Yokoi employed in designing the system has been the key to all of Nintendo's greatest successes. Epyx (like most hardware makers) simply aimed to give Handy raw power and impressive specs, offering a portable machine with the muscle to rival a home system. But it seems they never stopped to consider the overall experience, the need to balance horsepower with the practical limitations of handheld gaming. When Lynx launched, it was twice the price of Game Boy and incurred a secondary cost consideration as well: it guzzled large, expensive C-cell batteries in a matter of hours. (Correction: it used AAs, but it burned through six of them in a couple of hours.) The fact is, Lynx was probably doomed to runner-up status from the start. Even before either system launched, Electronic Gaming Monthly called the race for Game Boy way back in the magazine's second issue: "With a rumored retail tag of around $160 bucks for the system and thirty dollar games, the Epyx unit appears to have priced itself out of existance [sic] in the face of Nintendo's competing Game Boy machine."

Not surprisingly, the Nintendo Wii--which is basically an enhanced Gamecube with reinvented controls--consistently outsells any other game system this cycle.

Game Cinema HD: Most Awkward Video Game Show Eva!

Former EGM Editor-n-Chief Dan Hsu and his girlfriend Raychul Moore, of GamerBabe.net, launched Cutscene at the end of last month. Of this year's current wave of online video game shows, Cutscene is the most "stripped-down". It features the hosts broadcasting from their apartment couch (sometimes with their cat on-hand) with very few cuts of game footage and/or music. On paper, the setup sounds sleep-inducing, but the pair's deliberate, sometimes awkward, musings on video games are entertaining and endearing. As of this writing, they have four episodes up.

Think About This

Us. And Them.
Over and over again.
-LCD Soundsystem

The Cost of Not Adapting (Or The Japanese Have It)

This is what happens when you ignore the EPA, efficiency standards and Paul Krugman (from Mark Gimein, of MSNBC):

Everyone now sees that what's in question now isn't the survival of Pontiac but the survival of GM — which at best will exist only in a substantially diminished form. There is no room anymore for three American automakers each building a full line of cars and trucks. And while the hopeful talk is about GM re-engineering for a new bright future of fuel-efficient and hybrid vehicles, the numbers tell a different story, with GM's total hybrid sales in one month running at a pathetic 1,087 cars and trucks, about one-seventh of Toyota's Prius sales. Sales for the new hybrid Sierra and Silverado hybrid models? Seven.

While the SUV was experiencing a boom/bust revival earlier this decade, Toyota had the foresight to build a new plant locally, while promoting the Prius nationally. Now, they are one of many Japanese automakers that will be supplying the U.S. with vehicles that meet both their economic and environmental needs. That is, unless you're one of the autoworkers lost in the all of this "restructuring":

What does the Obama plan hold for them? Only the most amorphous of promises. In his speech today, Obama announced the appointment of a new "director of recovery for auto community and workers" — a title as long as the demands of its holder are vague. His job will be to direct a "comprehensive effort that will help lift up the hardest hit areas by using the unprecedented levels of funding available ... to create new manufacturing jobs and new businesses where they are needed most." Comprehensive, unprecedented, jobs: the words are there, but the plan is not.

My hope is that the President is going to come through and help these people, but how much can we blame him if he can't? The Titanic comparisons fit in multiple ways: one being that the automakers have tasked the President with saving the sinking ship, not with steering clear of the iceberg.