She's missing her RROD.
Microsoft Has Weaknesses?! NO WAI!
Ya rly, nerds of the internet. Two high-level employees announced this week that they will be leaving in the fall;Â Entertainment and Devices Division Chief Technology Officer J. Allard and the division president Robbie Bach both saw Microsoft through the development of the XBox brand both turned in their resignations. However, insiders believe that this was not a graceful exit, but rather a pre-emptive strike to their impending firing. In addition to the XBox, they are also responsible for Windows Mobile, which is being vastly overshadowed by the likes of Android, RIM, and Sony, and we all know how Microsoft doesn’t like anyone else to be good at what they do. With any luck, their release this fall will bring with it a wealth of bitter words and leaked information, it already has from other sources. Former studio manager for Microsoft Scott Bayless made a statement this week that the upcoming Project Natal will fail miserably. He apparently was asked to review the plans for Natal in 2008, at which point he was told they would sit on this idea for a while, a decision he calls foolish. He sees the ultimate outcome of this will be “spending tens of millions on a game” while “the last thing I want to do is lose 90 per cent of my market.” Which makes sense, the hardcore Halo fan that breathes Microsoft’s bullshit like pure oxygen could care less about a moving controller and the impending poorly-designed Hello Kitty game that will go with it, he wants a new game that has been painstakingly developed with love and care. Despite this, leaked details say that Microsoft’s projections for the peripheral are high, expecting to sell millions to non-traditional gamers in the first year, despite the steep US$150 price tag. The leak sets Natal’s release date at October 26th, so by year’s end, we will see what level of turd Microsoft has pawned off on us.
I'm on a boat, I'm on a boat, take a good hard look!
Call of Duty Fanboys Rejoice
Playing at Soap MacTavish, Solid Snake, and countless other men of burly muscle and hairy faces has long given the bright-eyed youth of America the impression that war is awesome. Fighting is awesome, killing is awesome, let’s join the military because it will be awesome too! Yes yes, we are a nation of meatheaded retards. So to compound all of our retardedness into one grandiose force of idiocy, the Navy has begun toying with the idea of using the Wii Fit for basic training. No really, I wish I was kidding. Navy Surgeon General Vice Admiral Adam Robinson stated that the past few years have seen new recruits of poor physical condition, and that a program involving Wii Fit and Dance Dance Revolution could improve the endurance skills of the new meat shields. However, for those of you who are worthlessly lazy or those terrified of the Navy’s impending doom, keep in mind that Robinson added “this isn’t about starting with computers and stopping everything else,” but instead is a kind of gateway to the more physically intense training that sailors will need to perform. So to all our international readers, wait a few more years before attacking us and just throw actual exercise equipment at our soldiers, they will have no idea what it is and run away frightened.
Now you feel awful for destroying the adorable Death Star.
My Last Name, One Half of a Constant Star Wars Joke
I will sucker punch whoever is first to call me “Red Leader.” Furthermore, you will be able to do that soon enough anyway, with Bioware’s new The Old Republic MMO. The company made several statements this week about their perception of the current MMO and its lack of a substantial storyline. As Nate’s review earlier this week made clear, current MMORPGs involve lots of running and questing and more running and some gold farming and more aimless running and, as Bioware harped on, not much in the way of a plot. The Old Republic MMO has already been said to have earned the prestigious title of EA’s largest budget ever, a sum that requires the gain to earn at least one million subscribers, though they are aiming for double. Unfortunately, the massively expensive game is still incomplete, and is not expected to release in 2010 with no date in 2011 announced. If this is too long to wait until your next Jedi fix, then you will be happy to know that LucasArts has announced Force Unleashed II will be released on October 26th of this year for the DS, PC, PS3, 360, and Wii. You will again be playing as Angsty McEmopants Starkiller, now looking for his long lost love, which is of no interest to the fanboys in comparison to the announcement that—wait for it—you can now dual wield lightsabers. If you need more to wank to, you can go to Unleashed2010.com to go take a load of Lucas in your mouth.
Not all nerd dreams are really that great.
M. Night Shamalama Just Shat Himself
Yes, I know that is not his name, and no, I do not care. The cinematic king of the twist would be thrilled to know that studies have linked the ability to control dreams to a person’s gaming ability. There is such a thing as the Games for Health Conference and it has been held in Boston for six years now, and the study was revealed there this week. Jayne Gachenbach first became interested in this in the early 90s when her son repeatedly kissed his Nintendo… weird ass kid. In 2006, she ran two different studies involving non-gamers and hardcore gamers, asking them to report the frequency of lucid dreams, dreams where you perceive the dream in a third-person sense. While the gamers did report a much higher frequency of lucid dreams, she did find that in both types of dreams, all participants were not able to control anything but themselves. Interestingly, she also tested the theory on nightmares and found that gamers often were able to minimize the feeling of being threatened, or even in some instances, completely reverse it so they became the threat in their dream. However, even Gachenbach acknowledges that this study was not done in a controlled environment like a sleep lab, relying instead of self-reported and potentially biased data. Even so, early results are being looked at as a possible way to treat the PTSD symptoms seen in war veterans with nightmares. By giving a video game, a sense of control over what is going on, perhaps games could help heal the mental battle wounds of our soldiers.
Posted by Jenifer 