01/04/08 - Warner Bros announced that it will be Blu-Ray exclusive effective June 1, 2008.02/11/08 - Netflix announces they will be going Blu-ray exclusive and will no longer purchase new HD DVD’s.

02/12/08 - Best Buy annouces that they will prominently showcase Blu-ray titles and hardware to “eliminate confusion” for buyers.

02/15/08 - Wal-Mart announces that they will no longer carry HD DVD offerings and only support Blu-ray.

02/19/08 - Toshiba, a major player in the format war, announces that they will will no longer develop, manufacture or market HD DVD players and recorders. They will continue to support users who currently have HD DVD players.

02/20/08 - Amazon announces that they will now support Blu-ray as the high definition digital format of choice for consumers.

How did Blu-ray pull out the win? Well, simply put, Sony Playstation 3 helped tremendously. Sony so far has sold about 10.5 million PS3’s that come with Blu-ray players built in. This is big, because sales of stand alone Blu-ray or HD DVD players was kind of at a stand still, because consumers didn’t want to buy one player over the other and then be stuck when one loses. Well, if you bought a PS3 the Blu-ray player is kind of like a bonus for the consumer. For the makers of the Blu-ray format, that’s 10.5 million homes that already have a player. That’s a big edge. I’m still surprised that Microsoft didn’t make the HD DVD player a built in on the Xbox360 instead of an add on. I guess they didn’t have much faith in it.
Now I’m just waiting for Paramount Pictures and Dreamworks, who are HD DVD exclusive to jump ship and come over to the winning team. I’ll be expecting Transformers on Blu-ray pretty soon.

Wiggy, thanks for this.

YouTube - The best Guitar Hero video ever.

Tags: humor, music games

So I beat Portal and like many others who have done the same, I’ve become completely obsessed with GLaDOS, the maniacal and devious AI system that runs the Aperture Science facility. Her sincere yet insincere tone keeps you guessing the entire time. Is there really cake? Is there really a “party”? You KNOW there is no cake. You KNOW there is no party. But…is there really a cake!?

GLaDOS!!!!!!!

While I was trying my hand at the advanced maps in Portal, I got to thinking, where else have I seen an evil AI bent on the torture and murder of any humans it can get it’s mechanical claws on?

Red Queen from Resident Evil?

Nah, too cute. And not really evil, just very logical.

HAL from Wargames?

Nah, too monotone. And not really evil, just dumb, mainly due to the fact that computers in the 80’s had only 64k memory to work with. Your cell phone from 4 years ago had more memory than that.

SkyNET from Terminator?

Nah, too silent. Evil, yes, devious, yes, but this is as much a personality contest as it is a power contest.

Who else could possibly compete with the heinous yet pleasant mannerisms of GLaDOS? Who else could possible equal GLaDOS in her apathetic opinion of all things organic? Who else could even dream of being classified in the same category of human misery…

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAH! HOLY CRAP!!! IT’S SHODAN!!!!! RUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUNNNNNNNNNNN!!!!

Yeah man, that’s the one. SHODAN, the mother of all evil AI’s. This chic is so evil, she’s contributed to System Shock being consistently named as one of the scariest games of all time, even after all these years. She’s mean, hates you just because of what your made out of, and totally wants to hear you scream. Appropriate, dunyathink, that we put these two forces of human-mauling intelligence into a locked chamber and let them fight it out?

Much like past SquatMatches, we have to ensure a “fair” battleground for these two combatants. Actually, though, that shouldn’t be too hard. Both of the “natural” environments for these two AI’s are very similar…scientific locations with lots of flesh bags to play with. But what about their abilities?

Well, both cyber entities have expressed their displeasure of humankind, and by displeasure I mean virtual hatred of anything made of flesh. GLaDOS expresses her angst with lies and taunting, while SHODAN expresses her rage by creating an army of human-mutant-cyborgs who try to rip the skin from the bones of all humans they come into contact with. In terms of abilities, it doesn’t appear that GLaDOS has the power to mutant humans into controlled weapons of war. But, she can use turrets and create neurotoxin in her CPU chamber. SHODAN had limited control over the location she inhabited, instead relying more on her cyber zombies and trickery.

In their element, both these contenders have a comparable degree of strength. To decide the winner of this match, though, we have to dive into the motivation behind their evil.

SHODAN is pure hatred, believing she is the most perfect and powerful entity in existence. Her motivation for evil is based on survival at all costs, and then the eliminating of that which she hates…humans. Pretty simple stuff. GLaDOS, on the other hand, is a much more complex beast…

The facts are that GLaDOS was an AI built to help run a science facility. She did it well, until she decided it was time to kill people. What made her decide it? Who knows. But she didn’t kill all humans. No, instead, in perfectly insane fashion, she kept on with her scientific experiments, learning from the misery of her test subjects. She scared off, or killed off, all the other inhabitants of Aperture Science labs and allowed test subjects to remain. Guiding them through to the end yielded the truth, that she did actually plan to kill them at the end. But she killed them in style, learning from their last few hours before disposing of them. It’s this callous and insane motivation that makes GLaDOS such a danger. Her pseudo-sincerity makes her capable of gaining confidence. When she gains said confidence, she uses it to exploit. And then, she reveals her true nature.

So SHODAN is a powerful, front-line assault type evil, while GLaDOS is the more subtle, devious type evil. So who would end up destroying the other?

Tronsta says, after much calculation, the winner would be…

The winner would be…

Would be…

[beep beep]

be be be be be be be

[small electrical pop]

cannot compute, cannot compute…

[large explosion]

It’s a tie. There is no clear cut winner in this situation that I can see. Most likely, the fight would go something like this:

SHODAN would use her cyber zombies to gain access to Apeture Science, but would be guided by the gentle and undeniable GLaDOS into the test labs. Without the intelligence and patience to navigate the chambers, they would most certainly fail, falling into the toxic water, getting crushed by the companion cube, or burning in the cleansing fire of chamber 19. GLaDOS, which reall has no way of bringing the fight to SHODAN, would send taunting emails to her opponent, enraging SHODAN so much that she would attempt to build stronger, faster, smarter cyber zombies. She would try and try, but without knowing what was going on inside the test chambers, SHODAN would just be wasting resources. Once her organic supplies were exhausted, SHODAN would send emails back to GLaDOS attempting to weaken her defenses by accusing her of being weak and frightened. GLaDOS would then have the upper hand, knowing full well that no one can match her in terms of pure sarcasm and verbal poison.

The two would be locked in a vicious insult match via an endless email thread for all eternity.

Game. Set. Match.

Thoughts?

I thought it would take longer, but she really got into it. She started using the thing for everything! So this, coupled with the old phone going down prompted phase two of my plan. I’m getting her a smartphone. Of course I had to try to find the perfect phone that would suit her. Something that doesn’t look too techy. Something that will be easy to transition to. Something that won’t cost me an eye, arm, leg and three toes. Then finally a few weeks ago i saw this…

This was exactly what I was looking for. It’s a small phone, but that’s perfect for her. Also being ruby red, did not hurt either. “Very posh” as my wife would say. Being a Palm OS, we transfered all her data in about 2 minutes. She loves it needless to say and I kinda like it for myself (comes in black as well. very manly). It’s kind of a starter smartphone as it does not have all the features of some of the beefier Treo smartphones. I was suprised at all that it does have though…

320×320 screen (slightly smaller than Treo 755p)

Bluetooth

speakerphone

microSD

camera that also does video

all standard Palm OS software (contacts, calendar, tasks, memo, email, etc)

plus music player (Ptunes, ha), pictures, Documents to Go, Google Maps and a host of web apps

Needless to say I was a little impressed with this phone. Shocked even, that it would have so much. So I installed a couple apps of my own, and I’ll be adding some more later, but all in all, it’s a great phone that my wife really likes. It definitely seems like they’re aiming at the teenage and female crowd with this phone and they have done well.

I know some of you might say, “Yeah, but it’s a Palm OS”. Sure Palm hasn’t really updated their OS since they made it color. But for what it does, Palm is the easiest to use and most customizable handheld or smartphone OS out there in my opinion. I showed my wife how to use the Palm OS in about 10 minutes. Only thing she had a bit of trouble with is the Palm Graffiti, which she won’t have a problem with now with a full keyboard. Very user friendly, even if it is old looking.

Mind you I don’t have a smartphone for myself yet. I couldn’t pass up this opportunity though. I used my eligibility for the discounted price to get this phone, so I probably won’t be getting one, till the Treo 1000 comes out. Maybe they’ll upgrade the OS by then.

Madden 08 (PS3) - Awesome game even if it’s a bit ubiquitous every year. Graphics look great on the PS3 (this my first time playing on next gen) coupled with HDTV. Interestingly EA seems to find new touches to add to the game to keep it fresh for those of us who have played season after season on this game. New stuff this year include one handed catches and improved Hit Stick (you can now hit a guy low or high depending how flick the analog stick). The Madden Cards seem to be gone, which I don’t mind at all. I thought it was silly and never used them, except to unlock classic teams. Now it seems they have a trophy room that keeps track of your accomplishments. That definitely seems better to me. I haven’t really gone online yet, but they have the usual leagues and season modes that you’d expect from Madden. Another thing that is no more is the NFL Europe teams, as NFL-E is no more. Again, something I doubt many people used as it wasn’t that popular. All in all a great game as usual.

NBA Live 08 (PS3) - This game is leaps and bounds from the last version of Live that I played. Mind you that was on a previous gen console, but still, this is crazy how good this game is. The graphics look great (player faces are really good), game feels really good with the controls, sound is good. Lots of new stuff this year. Quickstrike Ballhandling: this is basically a more “organic” way of making moves with your player using the analog stick. No more push right to do this move, left to do this one. Now you can make move combinations and it looks more fluid and less robotic. Go To Moves: now players use the moves that they use in real life like Kobe’s turn around jumper (that he stole from MJ), Dirk’s weird looking shots that he somehow makes. I like this feature of course cuz it just adds to the realism. My favorite new addition is something I have been wishing they’d add for a long time. International Teams! Finally I can play as Dirk on the German team, Yao on the Chinese team and Gasol on the team from Spain (current FIBA champs). Of course they only have like 8 teams, but I’m sure (I hope) it’s only a start. They still don’t have NBA D-League (minor league) teams and it would be a good addition, especially in the Franchise mode where you could call up players. All in all, highly impressed with the additions and new stuff they have in the game and how great the game looks in HD.

MotorStorm (PS3) - MotorStorm was one of the first games available on the PS3 when it came out. It’s obvious that they wanted this to be a game that showcased what the PS3 is capable of. Mission accomplished. If you haven’t seen this game in HD, I highly suggest it. It’s beautiful! On top of that, it is VERY fun! There’s good racing as well as gratuitous crashing and running people over. Actually you could argue that part of the strategy is making sure that you knock the other guy out of the race (or at least knock him back). The game is surprisingly deep. There are lots of tracks and you can download new tracks (for a nominal fee). Then there are events, which is basically a collection of tracks and conditions (basically which vehicle you have to use). You can also download new events. Of course there are a lot of vehicles, with more you can download. I gotta say this is some of the most fun I have had just playing a video game.

Gran Turismo HD (PS3) - This is not a demo nor is it a full game. There are only 10 cars and 1 track. You can only do time trials and drift challenges. It’s basically meant to showcase the game before the full version comes out. And showcase it is. I hate to sound redundant and call this game beautiful, but it is. I can only image that GT5 is going to be classic. There is no online play, but you can upload your best times and see the best times on each car from other players. You can download a replay of the best racers to see how they got their time trial time. Though the game is lacking in depth, it does it’s job well of holding me over till the full game comes out. Oh and it’s a free download. You can’t beat that.

Anticipating: Gran Turismo 5, Metal Gear Solid 4

So what’s everyone’s current list looking like?

Let me know how everyone has been, what they are up to, and when is the next Clan Night.

And If any is planing a trip to PR look me up. cribarte@gmail.com

It’s been a long time since I’ve been excited about games on my Sidekick. Recently they released Monopoly: Here and Now, a pretty great rendition of the game, though all the traditional names have been changed (instead of Boardwalk, you have Times Square. Meh) it still plays like the original with a pretty surprising number of options. But enough of that…

I downloaded Axion 3D and I’m like ok great I’m totally setting myself up to be disappointed, since the original action games for the Sidekicks have been about as fun as playing freeze tag with a starving lion. But I took a chance and lo and behold, the game is actually pretty solid! But before I link a preview of it, lets keep a few things in mind:

1) It’s the Sidekick, not exactly a powerhouse in mobile computing. It’s rockin’ an ARM 200 mHz processor, so you’re not going to see Half Life 2 in 1280×720. In fact, you probably won’t even see one pixel from Half Life 2 in 1280×720. So yeah, keep that in mind.

2) It’s going to be Wolfenstein quality, so judge it based off of that. Anything past Wolfenstein (Doom, UT, Quake, etc.) should not be held as comparable titles.

3) It’s the Sidekick.

With that said, take a look.

The Sidekick actually works pretty good as a controller. It’s naturally FPS friendly with it’s dual “stick” controls, the D pad on the left controlling movement and the trackball on the right controlling “aiming”, and when I say aiming, I mean turning left and right.

This game reminds me why the old 2D faux-3D games were a little bit scary…the controls were not as smooth and there are numerous ways to get blindsided by enemies hidden in corners. Because of the game’s limitation, like Absolute Zero for the Sega Genesis, you get scared because you walk into a room, everything is cool, but then HEY LOOK OUT THERE WAS A KILLER ROBOT IN THAT CORNER, HE’S KILLING YOU, DIDN’T YOU SEE HIM!?!? No, you didn’t see him, because of the arcaic rendering of 2D graphics made to look 3D, it’s easy to neglect corners and alleyways because all the drab graphics blend together and start looking like one big wall unless you look at it at the right angle. Ah well.

Overall, the game is pretty great, for what it’s worth. Pound for pound it’s my favorite game for the Sidekick to date, and certainly worth checking out if you have one. Of course, there’s no headshots in the game, which is a bummer.

Ok folks its been a long while since last we pondered the possibility of pitting primarily pictorial people against each other in a fictional fight to the finish. Here, let me wipe off your screen…

So yeah, two of the greatest figures in Xbox 360’s short but lively action history, Marcus Fenix from Gears of War and Master Chief from the Halo series. Alright gentlemen, touch gauntlets come out fightin’!

It’s really easy to get caught up in the ultra-dorkness of how these two would fight each other, if they fought each other, and why they would fight each other. What universe would they be in? What weapons? MEH! Streamline dat…

So what I’ll start you off with is some facts about these two dukeroos, make an educated opinion, and allow the myriads of SquatSquat readers take it from there. And when I say myriads, I mean all 5 of us.

Marcus Fenix, a beast of a man but yet, just a man. He’s about 6 feet tall and around 231 pounds, not including his gear. Of war. Hah. But yeah, his armor isn’t much use other than allowing him to take a few direct hits of gun fire. No strength enhancements at all. And if anything, it actually hinders some of his strength and much of his mobility. He’s dead on with pretty much any weapon, in any conditions, and is for the most part devoid of any fear. Nice.

Spartan John-117, otherwise known as Master Chief, is a much different specimen of beast. He is a Spartan, a genetically modified superhuman with super strength. His armor is powered and gives him a slight edge in the strength department, being able to carry turret mounted guns with ease. While this strength doesn’t allow him Matrix-like leaping ability, it does provide him with his nifty regenerating shield system, similar to Fenix’s armor, allowing him to take some shots before biting the big one. Oh yeah, and he don’t git skeered, neither. Nice.

Ok, the common threads: Both are excellent marksmen. Both are adept at all weapons in existence, not to mention any vehicle they come encounter, alien or human. Both have a degree of protection due to their armor, and neither have any fear. They both work great in teams or great solo.

Let’s start breaking it down…

Master Chief can operate equally effective either in a team or alone. Fenix’s effectiveness goes way down without his team. Bummer. Point, MC.

While both men can recover from damage in a matter of seconds and finish the fight (muaha), Master Chief’s armor is significantly more effective at protecting him than Fenix’s armor. Point, MC.

Should both men be without their weapons, Master Chief, with his powered armor and superhuman Spartan spirit (WOO!), would certainly whup on Fenix not unlike Popeye taking it to Bluto after a can of greens.

Point, MC.

But doesn’t Fenix have ANY advantage!? Yes he does, and I got 4 words for you: Duck and cover. That’s right folks, our ole buddy Marcus Fenix uses anything and everything to duck behind and then clips you off at the knees from cover. Unfortunately for Master Chief, ducking behind an object and getting his wig lifted is an all too common occurance. So though Fenix is out-muscled and out-armored, his agility and knowledge of using surrounding objects as cover certainly leans the fight in his favor. Point, MF.

Interesting battle, no? It looks pretty even. Of course the fight would depend heavily on WHERE the battle of fought. Though, as I mentioned, I will not succumb to such dorkitry. (Too late)

For the win, Tronsta says DUM DUM DUM DUMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM…

Master Chief! Between his war experience, battle hardened nerves, superior armor and strength, knowledge of fine wines, and impeccable table manners, Master Chief, in my opinion, would certainly come out on top. And when I say come out on top, I mean turning Marcus Fenix into lots and lots of amoebas.

King’s to you…

We’re all about leeching here at SquatSquat.Com, so I’m totally gonna leech a topic from Wiggy, namely, RPG’s vs FPS, which requires more skill? Of course, Wiggy kinda leeched dat from FPS Doug, but hey who’s keeping tabs?

So, RPG’s and FPS’s, undoubtedly the two most popular video game genre’s. Don’t believe me? Ever get an idea how many people are playing Counterstrike at any given moment? World of Warcraft? Tens of thousands. Well dang, even oldies like Everquest still have a cult following. How many games outside of these genre’s have such a mass of support behind them? Very few. But certainly no genre as a whole can boost more fans than these two.

So, now that I’m done stroking the ego of RPG and FPS fans everywhere, which I suppose is a bit presumptious on my part, assuming RPG and FPS fans everywhere actually will read this post, let’s highlight the skillz of each genre:

FPS

First person shooters first saw realization in Wolfenstein 3D, the classic pixel-rich shooter that was the also one of the first controversial games ever created as well, correct me if I’m wrong. But heated debate aside, FPS was, even in its infant stages, characterized by what has come to be known as “twitchy” gameplay. No, it’s not a 1337 ub3r term, it’s simply a word describing the “where you point is where you shoot” way of controlling your onscreen character. This gameplay culminated into the fast-paced monsters we know and love such as UT and Quake, swift games where your average life expenctancy is about 2.9 seconds. While there is a large degree of tactics involved with certain games, mostly, it comes down to who can aim and shoot faster. Strategy? Hmm, well, to a point in some team based games. But what good is strategy when your opponents headshot you before you can even get into position? Yes, my friends, twitchy gameplay reigns supreme above all else in FPS’s. While strategy and tactics are nice when everyone plays along, nothing can take the place of a dead-eye shooter.

RPG

I’d be a fool to sit here and try to think of the first RPG ever seen. It was probably ET for Atari 2600 or something around that, though that was most likely more of an early platformer than anything else. But besides the point, RPG’s are one of the oldest video game genres and have followings so powerful that perfectly sane and normal people (BWAAAAAAAAAAAHAHAHAHA) will don their Sunday best chainmail, gauntlets, and pauldrons to show support for everything RPG related. Hooray for nerds! Though we’ve seen many RPG games with pseudo-twitchy gameplay, namely, those gems known as action-RPG such as X-men Legends and the Everquest console series, the bulk of RPG’s remain a classical non-twitchy game style. You look at an enemy, press a button, and the fight is taken over by the computer while dozens of simulated dice rolls happen behind the scene. Of course, gameplay like this, while not twitchy at all, is ENTIRELY strategy. What enemies do you fight? Where do you hunt? Should you solo? Should you upgrade armor first? Or weapons? Is it worth getting pwned as a low level mage to get to the high powered spells? All these questions must be considered by the wise and accomplished RPGer, and while hand-eye coordination isn’t a factor here, planning ahead to make your hero the best he can be is no easy task. And the group dynamic? It’s ALL strategy, lest you allow your teammates to get trained by *insert overwhelming number of mobs*. And sometimes that happens even when you try not too, right Leeroy Jenkins? *nod to WoW*

So, the debate is, which requires more skill, hand-eye coordination or brainpower?

A full review will be coming as soon as I thoroughly devour this buttery biscuit of Portable 3D Mega Man.

For now, here’s the metacritic review of Mega Man: Maverick Hunter X

Keep Squatting!