The Man Himself pointed it out before I got a chance but Dr Horrible’s Sing-a-long Blog reminded me of Skullcrusher Mountain and The Future Soon quite a bit. Regardless Whedon really nailed it with the musical adventure here. Today is your last chance to catch the fun for free to enjoy it while you have the chance.
Am I the only one that remembers waiting with anticipation for E3 and the plethora of news and announcements? Reading with glee the “hidden gems” and the previously unknown information about upcoming releases was one of those summer traditions that I, for one, relished. Sure E3 got a little over the top and, like a rabid dog, had to be put to sleep. Now we have a new puppy E3 and it really well…sucked.
Sure I appreciated the new Fallout 3 trailers/gameplay demo but the most I could muster in response to everything was a resounding “meh.”
Microsoft has the most interesting stuff, but nothing mind blowing. The Netflix deal has me interested, but I’m still stuck on DSL, so Lord knows if it’ll even be viable. Final Fantasy XIII is cool, but I’ve always been a hesitant FF fan; the last game I played through to the end was Final Fantasy III (or VI). Not to mention that there is zero information on a release date.
Nintendo was perhaps the most disapointing. I don’t even know what I have to look forward too in the coming months from them; let alone in the holiday season. New motion sensor? Cool I guess.
The most exciting thing out of all 3 days was likely the Rock Band 2 set list, damn nice set of songs there. But that’s it. Really.
Ach. Maybe it’s just me but nothing really got my heart pumping (well, save that posted Fallout 3 trailer, but I was already excited about Fallout 3) like it did in the old days. Makes me feel old.
I sit down I my computer. I open up my e-mail. I hit Ctrl+T to open a new tab and what is the first website I go to?
This week it’s Blizzard.com. Their daily changing splash image hyping their upcoming announcement of a “mystery” has me in its thrall. I have fond memories of the Diablo games, though I never actually managed to finish either, and kind of hope we say that announcement but only time will tell. Joking comment about a new Lost Vikings game would certainly fit with ice motif they’ve chosen but doesn’t jar the more serious vibe the splash image implies.
In the meantime check out the background images below to see the changes:
Of course the wonderful nerds over at Kotaku have been all a twitter discussing the various aspects of said splash image. Hype is fun, isn’t it?
Some notes before I begin, I am indeed still playing Bioshock. The game just doesn’t excite me, but I’m determined to finish it….eventually. I am also still playing Grand Theft Auto IV. It is still fun, I still like the story, but certain gameplay elements (save system…um the controls) make it frequently frustrating and slow progress. Other interests play a factor as well, I do love reading and certain other distractions have more than slowed my video game playing.
the IEEE
Spectrum has a Special Report on the Singularity up on their site. Wikipedia has a handy basic definition of technological singularity:
The technological singularity is a hypothesised (sic) point in the future variously characterized by the technological creation of self-improving intelligence, unprecedentedly rapid technological progress, or some combination of the two
A vague definition that only scratches the surface of the varied theories and ideas behind the Singularity, but suitable as an introduction. Popular films like The Matrix and The Terminator series reveal some dangers of the Singularity while Richard K. Morgan’s Takeshi Kovacs’ novels (Altered Carbon, etc.) focus on the immortality aspect of human consciousness transformed into something resembling a software program housed in hardware (i.e. our body).
In truth, at least as I see it, the concept (or theory if you prefer) is a weird intersecting of disparate sciences and philosophies that is fused into something that almost resembles religion; or spirituality at the very lest. Viable or not it makes for interesting discussion and even more interesting fiction.
I almost hate to bury my rant of several minutes ago but it comes to my attention that the PAX 07 DVDs are now out and ready for puchase.
Attendees of last year or the merely curious should point their browsers this way, credit card ready.
WARNING: This starts tame and mutates into a full on rant. Oops.
The U.K. gets all sorts of genre awesomeness before us yanks and I hate them for it. Oddly enough the Gollancz printing of The Necronomicon: the Best Weird Fiction of H.P. Lovecraft managed to receive a trade paper “export” edition, which I discovered at work yesterday. The book, with its black cover and Cthulhu cover set off the my sexy alarm. The store had only two copies left so I picked up, even knowing I’d end up importing a hardcover if it existed. It does, and I am now anxiously awaiting its arrival.
At just over 1000 pages it has all of Lovecraft’s classic which, while I already own in the fantastic Penguin editions annoted by Lovecraftian/Weird Tale scholar S.T. Joshi, are finally bound together here and bookended by a scanned version of Lovecraft’s “History of the Necronomicon” and what looks like a hand-drawn map of Providence. Just shy of a Subterranean level production quality.
To make matters worse I decided to preorder the other U.K. first titles including The Steel Remains (this August in the U.K. and February!!!!!! in the U.S.), Toll the Hounds (September trade paper in the States, July 1st hardcover in the U.K.), and Return of the Crimson Guard (August in the U.K., maybe September in the states).
Four books. After shipping and handling (more expensive because I want the books as they come out rather than all at once) that is roughly 72 pounds. At an exchnage rate just shy of $2 USD to 1 pound that is over $140. For four books. All of which, I should at, are discounted by 30-50%. Mostly I blame the weak US dollar, and my own nigh uncontrollable book lust, but is there someone out there in the publishing world that can explain to me why the fuck, in an age of near instantaneous communication, in countries that share the same fucking language, that fantasy books take so much longer to get here!?
I suspect it has to do with castles. There has to be some strange formula involving the number of castles. It certainly can’t be quality. Terry fucking Goodkind gets his shit here quick as can be (though still in the U.K.) first and gave up on that hack years ago. It can’t be do to author nationality. Richard Morgan is british sure, but Erikson is Canadian and George R. R. Martin was born in fucking New Jersey (Storm of Swords was released in August of 2000 in the UK, and November of 2000 in the States, A Feast for Crows was October 2005 in the UK and November 2005 in the States, close but not close enough). Someone really needs to explain this shit to me.
You know all those laws we have regulating consanguineous marriages? The ones that are designed to keep cousins from marrying and producing super-retard babies? Well apparently the same problem can occur in other species. Who knew?
I got a little busy at work, between filing a massive update to the NJAC (I hate being the newest hire!) and the NJLA Conference eating up my work day I have a bit of catching up to do. However, I do have some reviews/commentary that are in the works.
I finished Alan Steele’s Galaxy Blues, which was an interesting sci-fi novel. I’m not sure I’d call it space opera, but it was certainly enjoyable. A full review later.
I saw Macbeth at the Lyceum Theatre in New York on Tuesday with Patrick Stewart in the title role. A great performance with absolutely fantastic production. More on that later.
I managed to beat Crysis last weekend, I’ll have a more detailed commentary on that experience as well. I’m still struggling to find the worth in Bioshock (no Flaming please!) and I *deep breath* find myself have to cheat to actually enjoy the experience. I’ll stop myself before I start going into a detailed explanation of my problems with the game. Being the two single-player first-person games I’ve been playing the most lately I will likely end up rolling into one big post….again.
Last but not least I plan on seeing Iron Man, if not tonight at least sometime this weekend, so expect a brief commentary.
I’ve got some bigger other plans for a bit later down the line. Rick reviewed Worlds Collide by Apocalyptica before I got a chance to so, rather than double up the reviews, I may post more on their overall discography, a feature I’d like to do some other bands as well (Avenged Sevenfold at the least). I’ve also stayed mum about my impressions on the pending 4th Edition D&D heading out next month. With the first adventure (and quick play rules) coming out late this month, expect some commentary in that direction as well.
Last but not least I gave up on the current reads that’ve been up for a while now. Truthfully there is too much other good stuff out, or coming out, for me to go back and reread other things. I’ll return to the Valente book at some point in the future, but my interests have been running almost purely towards the sci-fi as of late so I’ll probably stay with that kind of stuff for now. As of today I’m about 50 pages into Ragamuffin by Tobias Buckell with Elizabeth Bear’s New Amsterdam and, hopefully, Gary Gibson’s Stealing Light down the line.
That’s it for now, keep an eye out for stuff sometime between tomorrow and Monday with more ahead.
