PSP Import Titles

I've been looking over the list of Japanese PSP games at liksang.com. I have to say one thing: I can't wait to play with my colon. I mean Kollon.

Grand Theftendo

Just in case you can't wait until GTA: Retirement Home comes out, this should hold you over. Some guy made a GTA game for the NES console. It still looks better than most N-Gage games.

Ring 2; more like, Ring Poo

I went into Ring Two hoping it would be more broad and far reaching. I thought it was supposed to be more about the ring "virus" and how the tape spreads across the country and something big happens to everyone who's seen it, like they all become zombies or become republicans... wait, that's being redundant. Anyways, it was real lame. Pretty much a big letdown even though I didn't have any expectations of it being good. There were a few jumpy moments but it was really lame overall. The story pretty much revolves around Naomi Watts and little malnourished dude the whole movie and didn't really deliver on the creepyness like it should have. Sure, I could write it off as being a bad movie, just because it's a sequel, but I think it's really a no brainer.

• Make the movie scarier.
• Don't treat the audience like a freaking retard
• When people die of mysterious causes, at least acknoledge that they died in the next scene (or in the movie at all for that matter)
• Enough with the researching. Every time you leave your kid somewhere alone, something bad happens anyway.
• Either lay off the special effects and stick with eerie atmosphere or make the special effects look really good and believeable
• More Cowbell

It's not totally a terrible flick. I mean there's a really good scene with deers.

(Note: Above image NOT from Ring 2. This would have made it a good movie.)

PS - I almost totally forgot the best part. There was a tense, quiet, boring scene when I was trying to hold a fart, only it was too painful. So I decided to let it "pfffft" out. Well, the first part "pfffted", but the end of it must have caught the inside of my anus and punched the rest of the air that went past in the gut, because I farted really loud and I think all 20 people in the theater heard it. Especially the 14 year olds who talked on the phone during the movie.

New Batman Poster! New Batman Poster!

A new one-sheet has been release for the upcoming batman Begins movie.

War Of The Worlds Teaser Trailer 2 is out

The other night my awesome girlfriend Carole and I watched Minority Report at the beach. There's something about watching TV at the beach that brings back fond memories of my childhood summer trips to North Myrtle, most of which were spent inside whatever timeshare or condo my mom scored from some rich dude she worked with. Needless to say, the beach is effing hot. Nobody wants to be in the sun all day long playing putt-putt or getting sand in their butt-crack or having a combination of saltwater/sand/canvas raft sanding off your nipples while your back gets lobster red and your lungs fill with salt water. The best feeling after a long venture out at the beach is sitting down with leftovers and watching TV for a few hours. It makes whatever's on a million times better.

Back to Minority Report. I hadn't seen it since it was in the theater. I remember it being a good movie, but not as good as it was the second time. I had forgotten alot of the plot so it was like seeing it for the first time again.

Enter War of the Worlds. Spielberg & Cruise back in the saddle again. It worked once, why not try it again. In all honesty, I haven't really been too interested in WotW until now. Sin City is coming out in a few weeks and Hitchhicker's Guide to the Galaxy will be out a few weeks after that. Not to mention Episode III, which reminds me of someone's blasphemous comment "Minority Report is better than Star Wars!". Just kidding dude, we all know what you meant.

The second trailer is now available on the apple trailers site. It reminds me of Signs for a brief moment, except this has mass distruction (the first trailer just looked like a natural disaster film). The screen cap above is right near the end of the trailer and it looks like part of an alien craft (the only actual alien stuff you see in the trailer). It's just a split second so pause and advance frame by frame.

THX-1138, please report to the main building

I don't know what is creepier about this deal, the fact that Mellissa Ethridge looks like a cancer patient or the fact that I thought it was Billy Corgan for a moment. iTunes needs to warn small children before posting crap like that. Maybe these guys are recruiting.

Update: Apparently Melissa Ethridge is a cancer patient. I apologize to her and her bald-headed, borg-assimilated bretheren. Live long and prosper.

Happy Customer?

I had a business card come in today and the guy didn't have a logo. He wanted one and all he really wanted was a wave. So the above image is a rough I faxed over to him today. It will be printed on a pale green stock in thermography (you can't win em all). Not too bad I guess and he was willing to pay for a little bit of design time for a change.

Update: Client loved the card. It's being ordered today.

It works...

Slow but sure. Actually it's not too bad, unless you need to run something like Photoshop.

Nerds...

Today CherryOS was released to a firey flame of misbelievers and it was shot down, killed and old ladies spat on it's grave. For those of you who even care, CherryOS is a complete rip-off of PearPC, a Mac OS X emulator for x86 hardware. Basically some duders got their hands on the open source PearPC and went through tons of lines of code and changed a few things to make it look like their own work. Of course the nerds were on a full assault and found many examples of plagarism in code within minutes. Oh well, I'm planning on checking out PearPC tonight since there seems to be speed improvements since the last time I looked at it (and because Lost is a rerun tonight, damnit).

In the meantime, check out
this screenshot.

Xbox 2 specs

Joystiq has the specs on Xbox 2/Xbox 360...whatever it's called. It will be using three 3.0Ghz IBM PowerPC processors. Jesus H. Johnson. Let's throw a bunch of processors at the game developers and let them have at it. I wonder how much money Microsoft wants to lose per box this time around?

I only get carsick on boats.

I finally finished watching Midnight Cowboy last night. It's a pretty damn good movie. Who knew John Voight could act better than when he was in Anaconda? Dustin Hoffman's Oscar nod is well deserved but not what I immediately think of as far as the film goes. I like seeing places in different times and the movie is set in NY in present day 1969. I like seeing the cars and clothing people wore. I like the signage and the neon ads for products that don't exist anymore. It's like a time machine, or at least the closest thing I'll ever get to traveling back in time to see everything in its "natural" environment.

I don't really care for the halucenogenic party scene and the interviews with the "free thinkers". I'm sure it's there to make you feel out of place like Joe Buck (or at least that's what I think. If the scene is meant to be taken seriously, I have a problem swallowing the whole druggie pill.)

Some of the art house-ness gets to me too, but that's just a personal thing. I mean, I've seen "La Jetée", but I'd much prefer the Americanized "12 Monkeys". It's one of the few times I've seen someone take a good original movie idea and make it into a really, really great movie.

Back to Midnight Cowboy. There's a bit of predictability when it comes to watching older movies (at least for me, anyways). Not like I already know the ending because someone told me. It's more like I've seen parts of many films made since the film I'm watching and they stole the good parts and put it into their films. I guess there's nothing I can do about it.

I still enjoy older movies (more so these days). It's great when I "discover" a quote that I've heard a million times and even iterated without knowing where it came from.

"I'm walkin' here! I'm walkin' here!"

Diatribe

I was reminded again today of how much normal people know about design. I know I went through 5 years of design school and all so I'm probably out of the "normal people design acceptanceness" by at least 7 years (aka - what a normal, non-conditioned person accepts as "pretty" or "exceptional" design. This is a well known factor and I've dealt with it on a daily basis. I've also gotten mad at clients in the past for not accepting the fact that someone with a design degree might not use Times or Comic Sans because it looks neat. I've worked through it. I bite my tounge when a hideous business card crosses my desk when the client just wants us to scan it in and print it out on a color laser printer. I refrain from scolding someone who isn't willing to pay for half an hour of design time so they won't look like a total boob when showing their potential clients promotional material. (Those potential clients most likely have the same boring crap as well). This what I know.

On the other end, there is trendy design. Design that will be forgotten or old within a year (sometimes a few weeks). Like a trucker hat burning on top of a collar flipped polo shirt, modern design feels fleeting. Remember when grafitti got real popular for a while and everyone started using drips in their work? Graffiti fonts? Remember before that when everyone was vector drawing silhouettes and throwing type over it? (Apple can't seem to let this one go.) Remember before that when David Carson ruled the world and random type anywhere with zero readablity was king? I do. I haven't always been able to see it as a trend while in the deep of it (hindsight is a bitch) but sometimes you can just nail it. I'm kinda at a loss. I know what appeals to me in design and I know I'm guilty of taking from these trends just as much as the next guy. I think this tirade is due to my frustration in being unable to create my own voice. How can you be unique when everyone else has gotten there first and scrawled "fuck you" on the bathroom wall.

I've always been an Idealist when it comes to what I want. I realize later on when I can't get idealism, I settle for realism. It's what I'm good at. Wanting something grand and settling for something within reasonable reach. I'm tired of bad design and trendy design and accepted classic design. I'm going to patsy up for my paying job and take it like a man like I always have when it comes to bad design. I'm going to accept these damn kids and their trendy MTV flavors. I'm going to accept that I'm never going to be happy with my own work.

The point to this whole shpiel is that I am trying to motivate myself into doing independant work. I'm reluctant to do anything unless I'm getting paid for it, a bad habit I picked up in 4th grade when I refused to do my homework. I've been settling on just good enough for too long and now I want a new deal. I'm a quarter of a century old and I want to make a mark on this planet, even if it means "skidmark".

Oh, I'm also fat and lazy.

P.S. Newstoday has some interesting links to stuff that will probably end up being trendy, but it's worth a look anyways.

UGO Exclusive Hitchhikers Trailer

UGO.com has a new Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy Trailer. It has a little bit of new footage and they have some new screenshots I haven't seen before. Check it out.

Obey, Human

Don't ask me how I found this. Ahh, Rock Hill, I miss you so.