Jump-Starting ye ole Blog

Well folks its been awhile and that probably means that I've lost whatever meager viewership I actually had. Oh well. Easy come, easy go.

So what have I been doing?
Working, getting ready for the holidays, and playing lots of Call of Duty 4.

But you know plenty of stuff has been going on that requires comment:

First the ridiculous: The assertion that Mike Huckabee deliberately put in a subliminal cross symbol in his recent Merry Christmas ad. Did you catch it? Perhaps....since you were probably looking for it. The supposed cross is the bookshelf behind Huckabee....look folks, I am not a Huckabee fan (I don't "heart" Huckabees - that MOVIE SUCKED), but I think folks are going over the line trying to parse everything in every single candidates' lives.

And who the fuck is Ron Paul, and why is he even commenting about this? Get a last name douchebag.

Second, I found a great website for the old Commodore 64 - perhaps the greatest computer-gaming platform in history. Check out C64.com!

Third, a complaint. What game developer in this day and age creates a game with a fixed camera? Take Conan for instance.
Conan for the XBox 360 is pretty good, but implementation could have been a whole lot better.

Lets go down the line:

Graphics - a bit of letdown. I believe that the designers are trying to emulate the visual style of the many fantasy paintings done of Conan, and it sections it really works and looks outstanding. In other areas, especially the Queen/companion and other cutpieces - the graphics are laughable and the water effects are some of the worst this side of a PS1.

Gameplay - the fighting can be fantastically fun at time. The different fighting styles (two-handed, dual-wield, sword-n-shield) all have their own special moves. Lately I\'ve been partial to the Shield, which allows for some nasty Parry-then-attack death blows. And any game that tracks the number of limbs hacked off earns points in my book.

Voice-Acting - I didn't mind Ron Perlman and Claudia Black is good. The game definitely could've used a few more quips here and there and you'll hear every single one within the first 30 minutes of play.

Is it fun? - This is the real kicker, because at its core - hacking and slashing waves of itching-to-lose-limbs-enemies can be both extremely entertaining and satisfying. HOWEVER, sometimes the action gets bogged down by a truly dismal fixed cinematic camera. How any game designer in this day and age could believe that a fixing the camera and torturing players with some retarded perspectives is the way to go is beyond me. In many places you can forgive it. But when the came doesn't track properly and you forced to do one of the multitude of jumping sequences near-blind. Well, lets just say that the curses start to get dropped rather liberally in my household. It REALLY detracts from my pleasure with the game. Please game developers, listen to us gamers, give US the option to play the game HOW WE WANT TO.