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As I have mentioned a couple times, I'm pretty sick and in pain. This sick and in pain business is keeping me from getting shit done. As a result, I'll have to push back the postings of the fanfics by one week. So here's the revised schedule:
July 31st, 2009 - Solace: A Zeo Tale
August 7th, 2009 - Turbo: The Final Duel
August 14th, 2009 - Star Trek: Confusion
More to follow... honest.
Having decided to revive the old Cogs of War concept and having decided upon a fairly easy format to operate on, I've started up a blog exclusively for this project... and yes, it looks cheap and plasticky.
Link's on the sidebar.
Effective pain relievers and herbal teas are helping with my recent episode of torture - and with two weeks off, I'll have plenty of time to get some personal projects done... because I'm apparently not well enough to travel.
In any case, to make up for lack of regular posts, expect a whole bunch of them in a very quick amount of time. Starting... now
You remember "Encounter At Farpoint", the pilot episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation? Remember when they're down on the planet and Deanna Troi is suddenly whimpering "Pain! Pain! So much pain!" Remember that?
Yeah, that's what I'm starting to feel like right now.
Pain... so much fucking pain...
Oy... just oy...
Okay, I don't know where to start. Really. I just don't.
Contrary to what a lot of people may believe, I actually enjoyed the old Street Fighter flick with Van-Damme. Was it a great movie? Not necessarily, but it was still a fun little action movie with a dose of camp. At the very least, a number of the characters at least resemble their video game counterparts in some form or another.
This... this is just something else...
The Legend of Chun-Li is a basic, cookie-cutter martial arts action movie with a pretty typical plot (girl fights off drug syndicate in order to avenge her father's... kidnapping - weak.) and your usual cookie-cutter action sequences common with kung-fu flicks these days. This is barely a Street Fighter movie - if you were to have changed the title, I probably would have thought it to be nothing more than another wire-fu movie that seems to be the norm with most Asian folks these days, but even at its most bare-bones level, it still manages to be lacking in many different things.
On a sidenote, some of the visual settings featured in the flick are, honestly, quite nice and gives you a nice feel of the cityscape. Sadly, most of the important stuff takes place at night, which really kills the beauty and splendor of many settings.
As a generic action movie, it's a worthwhile moment if you simply turn your brain off. But as a movie based on a popular video game series, it's severely lacking. Practically none of the characters taken from the game remotely resemble the source material and what personalities they do have seems very wooden and not the least bit awe-inspiring. And most of all, there's hardly any Street Fighter-esque fights involved - say what you will about the Van-Damme flick, but at least they were able to translate some moves to live-action celluiod - albeit poorly translated, but hey, they tried. Here, you only get a faintly-subtle Spinning Bird Kick and a fireball. That's it. Weak.
Overall, this just seems like a disappointment for what is supposed to be a reboot of the Street Fighter movie franchise. It makes you wonder why they were bothering to make a movie based on the video game if it's going to have nothing to do with the video game. If you really need your fix of live-action Street Fighter, I suggest tracking down the Van-Damme movie from the nineties instead... or even better, just go online and watch the Street Fighter: Later Years online show. Even that's a better product than this.
AVOID.
Figured I'd get this out of the way before all was said and done...
Here is the present timeline for the posting dates of the various fanfics I am currently planning on finishing and releasing on Fanfiction.Net (and eventually my own site when and if it gets done):
July 24th, 2009 - Solace: A Zeo Tale
July 31st, 2009 - Turbo: The Final Duel
August 7th, 2009 - Star Trek: Confusion
Just to clarify, these are the due dates that I'm aiming for to finish these stories. Once completed, I will be uploading them to the FF.Net page and hopefully, they will be appearing fairly quickly. Seeing as I haven't touched that account in years (literally), I can't say if the story will appear immediately or if there's some delay (presumably so), so I will inform you when you can access these works of fine reading... or not.
And if I absolutely miss the date, I'll let you know on that count as well. Hopefully, it won't come to that... maybe I'll make a deal with...
No. No, I won't go there.
Later.
Trekweb.com has posted an interesting tidbit on why William Shatner (old Kirk) has yet to see the new Star Trek movie. Here's the link for people who actually care...
So the guy wanted to be in the movie, they made a cameo role for him, he shot it down because it wasn't a major part, ended up not being in the movie, and he decides for whatever reason not to see it. And yet he holds out hope that they'll fit him in the new movie? Really?
So why am I wasting my time with this? Furthermore, why is Shatner giving his reasons for not seeing the new movie anything resembling news? Is it really that slow of a news day?
Look, if the guy doesn't want to see the movie, fine. I don't care. Nobody's forcing him... just do us all a favor and don't give this guy any more attention than he deserves. I mean, what's next? "William Shatner's toenail makes cameo in Star Trek 25?" Please.
On Canada Day 2004, I debuted two new things; the then-new version of the DTM Webstation site called "Webstation Black". Which didn't last long.
Also on that day, I posted my first blog post ever, beginning a strange and interesting journey along the way that has resulted in a flucuating mind and really, really, REALLY nothing to show for it.
So as of today, DTM Blog is five years old. And unlike Wrestlemania's recent anniversary festivities, my math is accurate. I started in 2004 and we're in 2009. Hence, fifth anniversary.
As to whether I have anything special planned?
Not really, but some neat stuff is going to get done here, I assure you.
In the meantime, enjoy your Canada Day, kids. I know I will.
I'm having developmental problems with the blog. Apparently, when I click on one of the topic lists, no entries show up. I'd try and figure out the problem, but I'm too damn sick now. If anyone else has this same problem, let me know and I'll try and find out what's going on.
Later.
Billy Mays, the energetic bearded pitchman who appeared in six hundred commercials to promote a whole bunch of stuff like Oxi-Clean and Orange Glo, passed away yesterday. The world has lost a talented salesman and a true, hard-working professional in a world that is lacking of such people.
Rest in peace, Mr. Mays. Hopefully, the afterlife will take heed of your loud sales pitches and buy the products you advertise.
Webstation will be dead soon
Replaced with something else
More to come...
Been a while, but might as well comment on this:
- Donald Trump "buying" RAW just HAS to be a desperate attempt at getting back the show's sagging ratings... even though Trump probably won't show up for the most part during the show's run and will probably assign a general manager person, thus making the whole experiment pointless. Bottom line, expect this to last a few weeks before Trump sells it back to Vince for five dollars or something.
- Really enjoyed the Triple-Threat World Title match as well as the Jericho/Mysterio match, while I pretty much slept through the RAW portions of the show. Seems like Smackdown is finally starting to become the better show... it'll be a while before it hits 2002 levels, but it's getting there.
- Speaking of sleep, Triple H wins another title shot against the new champion... Randy Orton. Wow, I honestly don't know what's going to happen in their match next week.
- Commercial-free RAW? Probably not here. I expect a couple Molson ads and more "greatness" from Jack Korpella.
Anyway, enough waffle. I'm going back to bed.
...before I'm due to post some stuff. In all honesty, things have stalled a bit, but it's been slow progress for the most part. While a couple old stories are being retooled and finished, new ideas pop up that seem like a good idea at the time.
In any case, it looks like I'll have a couple short stories ready to go next month and I'll be posted those weekly. As far as major fanfics go... that's another story for now. I'll let you know.
So Capcom released the specs for the PC version of Street Fighter IV. For those who don't have gaming consoles of the hi-def variety, this would seem like a suitable replacement. My only concern is the SECUROM protection that's going to be employed. I don't know if my love for the Street Fighter series will be enough to overcome my disdain of modern PC game security measures, a contributing factor to me not getting involve in PC gaming... well, that and the fact that the games are either too demanding for my rinky-dink PC or they just don't seem to be worth my money. But we'll see.
Anyway, courtesy of this site, here're the specs:
Minimum
OS: Windows XP
CPU: Intel Pentium4 2.0GHz or higher
RAM: 1GB or higher
HDD: 10GB of free space or more
Video Card: DirectX 9.0c/Shader3.0 or higher compatible, NVIDIA GeForce6600 series, ATI Radeon(TM) X1600 or higher or higher, VRAM i?š256MB or higher
Sound: DirectSound compatible, DirectX 9.0c (or higher) compatible
Input Devices: Mouse, Keyboard
Maximum
OS: Windows Vista
CPU: Intel Core2Duo 2.0GHz or higher
RAM: 2GB or higher
HDD: 10GB of free space or more
Video Card: DirectX 9.0c/Shader3.0 or higher compatible, NVIDIA GeForce8600 series or higher, ATI Radeon(TM) X 1900 or higher, VRAM i?š512MB or higher
Sound: DirectSound compatible, DirectX 9.0c (or higher) compatible
Input Devices: Gamepad i?šXbox360 Controller for Windows
...and I didn't go. Shame.
But in any case, some strange has happened as there are actually some games worth my attention these days. Go figure. Here're the ones worthy of my attention:
New Super Mario Bros. Wii
Seems to be a follow-up on the similarly titled DS version that was released years ago. Neat 4-player function with gameplay worthy of having Screwattack rename it Super Mario Assholes. Let's put it another way. Remember playing 2-player games in the original Mario Bros. and playing all sorts of dirty tricks to get the other guy killed? Well, almost the same deal here. Can't wait to play this one.
Metroid: Other M (Wii)
I'll be completely honest: I haven't really cared for the Metroid series ever since Zero Mission. I've tried the first Metroid Prime, but it really didn't do much for me and therefore I had no reason to pursue the rest of the series. Having said that, this game sort of peeks my interest, but I'll have to wait and see where this one goes.
Castlevania: Lords of Shadow (XB360/PS3)
Comments on this title has been refering to this as a God-of-War ripoff. While I can't really comment on that (I never really played God of War - I haven't been keeping up, have I?), it does seem like a nice, quick-paced and frentic action game - something I felt Castlevania really needed in its transition to 3D rather than the previous offerings. While I regret not being able to play this game - lest I somehow conjure up a PS3 or 360 out of thin air - I do look forward to what other people think. Who knows? This might be the game that has been going for a stronger machine.
Tatsunoko vs. Capcom (Wii)
So I don't need to import this game? Cool... I mean, the game looks really, really slick. Should be a frantic game indeed.
That's about it, really... Yeah, that's it. Bye.
From wwe.com:
World Wrestling Entertainment has come to terms on the release of Raw Superstar Mr. Kennedy (Ken Kennedy) as of today, May 29, 2009. WWE wishes Ken the best in all future endeavors.
So much for that big return, huh?
