The Gamer's Quarter

Lestrade · Posted: Mon Feb 12, 2007 8:48 am Post subject:

Wait, why?

I want to get all the two-disc, remastered re-releases of all the Cure albums to date. I don't have legitimate copies of most anything, so I would like to start anew! Damn things are near-$30 each though.

There are other things, too, but I need to be good with the cashish.

Nana Komatsu · weak sauce Joined: 17 Jul 2006 Posts: 1293

Since like there's three or four people living in Japan who post there regularly.

Are there used copies of the new Cure albums out yet? I buy a lot of CDs used from half.com and the amazon marketplace.
_________________
resetbutton.net: videogames for unattractive people

Lestrade · Posted: Mon Feb 12, 2007 3:26 pm Post subject:

I have been Photoshopping teenage girls' skirts for three hours. I— I don't feel so right.

SuperWes · Posted: Mon Feb 12, 2007 3:39 pm Post subject:

Lestrade · Posted: Mon Feb 12, 2007 3:49 pm Post subject:

Scratchmonkey · . Joined: 02 Mar 2005 Posts: 1439

Lestrade · Posted: Mon Feb 12, 2007 3:57 pm Post subject:

I am also adjusting socks, if you know what I mean.

P.S. Is there a Tokimemo game for Super Famicom? I'm trying to think of some fun stuff to hunt for whilst in Japan.

Shapermc · Hot Sake! Joined: 14 Oct 2004 Posts: 6279

Yes there is a TokiMemo game for the SuperFami. It also used the mouse function!
_________________
“The average man has a secret desire to be a swaggering, drunken, fighting, raping swashbuckler.”
-Robert E. Howard in a letter to a friend circa Decmber 1932

"There is no place in this enterprise for a rogue physicist!"

Nana Komatsu · weak sauce Joined: 17 Jul 2006 Posts: 1293

Ketch · . Joined: 17 Sep 2005 Posts: 420

http://www.crunkgames.com/?p=86#more-86

My Summer Vacation, this game sounds pretty neat.

Lestrade · Posted: Mon Feb 12, 2007 9:00 pm Post subject:

Random photo post! I'm still learning how to use my wife's camera, so pardon me if these are terrible.

Current A/V setup:

SF2T on SFC:

Current workspace (with TGQ stuff!):

Workspace close-up:

Nana Komatsu · weak sauce Joined: 17 Jul 2006 Posts: 1293

Ketch · . Joined: 17 Sep 2005 Posts: 420

NanaKomatsu. Yes, I heard about it from the obsessive lunatics at Insert Credit.

Lestrade · Posted: Tue Feb 13, 2007 9:15 am Post subject: Re: Boku no natsuasumi

Lestrade · Posted: Tue Feb 13, 2007 10:46 am Post subject:

Keeping myself busy so I don't fall over and vomit. I drew this a while ago:

Shapermc · Hot Sake! Joined: 14 Oct 2004 Posts: 6279

SuperWes · Posted: Tue Feb 13, 2007 3:31 pm Post subject:

Or you could do what I did and just buy a TV that has 9 inputs...

-Wes
_________________

Shapermc · Hot Sake! Joined: 14 Oct 2004 Posts: 6279

List the 9 inputs. Mine has that many as well: 2 HDMI, 1 DVI, 1 VGA, 2 Component, 3 Composite. I still can't hook everything up, and only the HDMI has digital audio input.
_________________
“The average man has a secret desire to be a swaggering, drunken, fighting, raping swashbuckler.”
-Robert E. Howard in a letter to a friend circa Decmber 1932

"There is no place in this enterprise for a rogue physicist!"

Lestrade · Posted: Tue Feb 13, 2007 5:27 pm Post subject:

Cock fight!

Wes, I'll buy a new TV if you give me the money for it.

aerisdead · . Joined: 03 Dec 2006 Posts: 254 Location: Toronto, Canada

Lestrade I bought a Phillips switch box (with 1x composite, 3x component/composite and 1x out) from Active Surplus on Queen West (literally 2 minutes from your door) for about $25. Output cables came to about $5 more.

I have my Xbox, Wii and PS2 hooked up to it with component cables - It is very good!

I suggest you check it out - they had shitloads when I bought it in January.
_________________
aerisdead

SuperWes · Posted: Wed Feb 14, 2007 11:31 am Post subject:

SuperWes · Posted: Wed Feb 14, 2007 11:40 am Post subject:

I just looked at Matt's list of systems he's got hooked up and I think it's a little silly to rig it so that all of those are hooked up at once. It's hard for me to believe that he plays his NES, N64, or Xbox enough to really justify keeping them hooked up all the time.

My Saturn, Xbox, Japanese PS2, and SNES are hooked up in the other room on my old TV. My NES, N64, Genesis, GameCube, US PS2, Dreamcast, 3DO, Master Gear Converter, and TurboGrafx, and whatever else I've got are in the closet only to come out when I'm so inspired.

-Wes
_________________

ApM · Posted: Wed Feb 14, 2007 12:38 pm Post subject:

Right now I've got ten systems hooked up at once too: SegaCD, Atari 7800, Wii, SMS, Dreamcast, NES, Intellivision, PS2, Saturn, TG-16. I don't play most of them very frequently, but having them there means that when I've got an itch to play Ninja Golf or Astrosmash with the vibration turned up on my Gamepod, I'll actually do it. Systems in boxes seem to get no love at all from me. I've had cable guys laugh out loud at my setup -- five RF switches daisy-chained to my VCR, composite switchbox sitting on top of it. Does the job plenty well for me, though!

PROTIP: If you've got your NES, N64, Genesis, and TG-16 hooked up, Virtual Console purchases of games you already own are basically impossible to justify!

Matt, I wonder how an $80 switchbox could possibly be of poor enough quality that you would notice. ESPECIALLY for digital input; it's not like that stuff degrades gracefully if there's a signal problem -- I'd think you would find it basically unusable if there was. What sort of problems are you seeing?

Lestrade · Posted: Wed Feb 14, 2007 12:52 pm Post subject:

Shapermc · Hot Sake! Joined: 14 Oct 2004 Posts: 6279

aerisdead · . Joined: 03 Dec 2006 Posts: 254 Location: Toronto, Canada

[quote="Lestrade"]I was there last week but they had different ones, I think. Was it silver and black and kind of bulbous? Does it have optical in/out?[/quote]

Silver with big bally black buttons - maybe the same one you saw?

It's just what I said - 1x composite (useless) but 3x component. Nowt else. It's a snap to install and they sell audio and component cables right there. And no signal degradation that I could tell, not that I particularly worried there would be. Better than switching cables, and cheap enough to be useful even if you want a giant fuck off super special switcher later in life.
_________________
aerisdead

aerisdead · . Joined: 03 Dec 2006 Posts: 254 Location: Toronto, Canada

Lestrade · Posted: Wed Feb 14, 2007 3:16 pm Post subject:

Okay, that is the one I saw. I guess I will pick it up. I'll have to do a bit of fudging, but I do now, and like you say, it's better than unplugging stuff.

Actually, I might be able to daisy-chain one box to the next to support my older stuff (VCR, Super Famicom) if I run out of room. Thanks for the review!

Lestrade · Posted: Tue Feb 20, 2007 9:57 pm Post subject:

FOR CANADIANS ONLY (MAYBE) FUCK YES

ApM · Posted: Tue Feb 20, 2007 11:59 pm Post subject:

The best part of that picture is Julian's rum and coke.

Lestrade · Posted: Wed Feb 21, 2007 8:50 am Post subject:

God dammit I want a rum & coke now, and it's only 9:50am (and I'd totally do it too, fuck it).

Lestrade · Posted: Fri Feb 23, 2007 3:37 pm Post subject:

I think I have an ear infection :-( :-( :-( :-(

Scratchmonkey · . Joined: 02 Mar 2005 Posts: 1439

Man, I had one of those that then spread to elsewhere in my sinuses about 3 weeks ago and I'm only now getting over it.

The short version: get yoself to a doctor and get some antibiotics hella quick.

Lestrade · Posted: Sat Feb 24, 2007 8:24 am Post subject:

Yeah, I went to a walk-in clinic after work yesterday and I'm on the 'biotics now, yo.

Nana Komatsu · weak sauce Joined: 17 Jul 2006 Posts: 1293

Man my neck is killing me. ;_;
_________________
resetbutton.net: videogames for unattractive people

Lestrade · Posted: Sun Feb 25, 2007 9:53 am Post subject:

I AM FINALLY FINIIIIIIIIIIIIISHED

Dracko · . Joined: 10 Oct 2005 Posts: 2613

Congratulations, man. It was a pretty great story.
_________________
"This is the most fun I've ever had without being drenched in the blood of my enemies!"

Persona-sama · Posted: Sun Feb 25, 2007 3:01 pm Post subject:

Lestrade · Posted: Mon Feb 26, 2007 7:01 am Post subject:

Interestingly enough, as Martin' Scorcese's The Departed was winning Oscars I was watching the DVD with my wife. After the film my wife check a website to see if the film had won anything (neither of us care about the awards show), and sure enough, it had.

The question is, why? I've seen the original movie on which it's based, Infernal Affairs—hell, I've seen all three of them—so The Departed certainly didn't seem like anything new or exciting (though perhaps it did to new Western audiences). And without sounding like a film snob, the original is so much better.

The Departed won an Oscar for editing, which blows my mind; this movie had some really obvious, really bad editing. The story is convoluted, yes—and of course being an American remake, it was made even more so.) There were scenes that just dropped in and ended with no resolution; it was as if the film stopped rolling so they just moved on to the day's next scene without worrying about it. Despite being an overly complicated movie already, there were scenes that didn't even make sense (Frank with the women and coke), that were left in as if to muddy things up on purpose!

But despite all this (and let's face it; the original Infernal Affairs was convoluted as all hell too), the two things that bothered me the most about the movie were the extreme violence and hammy dialogue. I just don't understand the need to watch two hours of people getting shot in the face! The original film was a classier (and still not great) tale of two parallel games of cat-and-mouse. This version was an exercise in watching people shoot each other point-blank and call everyone "cacksuckas."

Do we really need to see every time someone gets shot in the face? I mean, really? With everything that goes on today, that we see in the news and read in the papers, are people really jonesing to watch other people get shot in the face?

So, yeah. I like how at one point, Jack Nicholson is basically playing The Joker again. That brought back some memories.

Dracko · . Joined: 10 Oct 2005 Posts: 2613

The Departed was better than Infernal Affairs. Hong Kong acting is stiff as all Hell, and the only reason to watch the first two films is to contextualise the last one, which is brilliant.

Also, Mark Wahlberg.

I can't say I much care for the extreme violence argument. The headshot frenzy towards the end of the film was perfectly appropriate and worked very well.
_________________
"This is the most fun I've ever had without being drenched in the blood of my enemies!"

Lestrade · Posted: Mon Feb 26, 2007 8:30 am Post subject:

We'll have to agree to disagree on this one, as I'm 100% in opposition of everything you just said.

Scratchmonkey · . Joined: 02 Mar 2005 Posts: 1439

Yeah, ditto here, although The Departed might have had a better soundtrack. I'll give it that.

Lestrade · Posted: Tue Feb 27, 2007 2:55 pm Post subject:

Shit, anything featuring The Dropkick Murphys gets freaking bonus points, yeah. I joked around with a coworker this morning. "Here, let me give you the three-second version of The Departed." Then I made my hands into guns, and yelled, "Cacksuckas!" repeatedly while making shooting sounds. It was beautiful.

In travel news: looks like while I'm Tokyo I'll be staying in Akihabara. Jesus Christ.

Shapermc · Hot Sake! Joined: 14 Oct 2004 Posts: 6279

Lestrade · Posted: Wed Feb 28, 2007 11:25 am Post subject:

It's a good thing I'm good with my money...

Lestrade · Posted: Wed Feb 28, 2007 10:36 pm Post subject:

While looking for something to play while I relaxed and listened to some music, I decided to download the Alien Hominid HD trial. Man, it was a lot of fun. I instantly took to the art style—it's amazing how grateful one gets for playing a game that's not anime-inspired. It was like that one day, a few years ago, when I was playing some game or another that I absolutely hated, but was forcing myself to trudge through. A beam of like pierced the clouds, illuminating my very soul, and I just turned the game off and sold it that very day. I felt so free. This was what booting up Alien Hominid feels like.

After a couple of runs of the first stage, I realized how much fun I was having. "Buy full game?" the screen implored. My thumb hovered over the "A" button; I was thinking about Symphony of the Night. "Hell, why not?" I muttered eventually, and purchased the full version. Yeah, this game is so refreshingly fun.

Despite the great presentation, tight controls, and creative sound design, my favourite part of the package is the PDA mini-game. It's like a wonderfully hand-drawn version of Mario Vs. Donkey Kong, without all the distractions and tutorials. (So, more like Donkey Kong for the Super Game Boy, then.) I just love going through the stages in that, much like I love picking through a dozen or so stages of Puzzle mode in Tetris DS from time to time.)

(I'm listening to BGM 04 of Super Castlevania IV on repeat, through my surround sound system, because I just can't get it out of my head. The minimal, haunting piano; those strings. I think this might seriously be the best piece of game music of the entire 16-bit generation, if not of all time. It's like SNES Beethoven.)

I learned something important this evening; if you have any super-hero comics from the mid-nineties kicking around, do not—do not—read them. They are shit. Give them to someone or sell them on eBay. Just don't open them, for the love of all that is holy. You will feel like an idiot for ever having read them before.

There's something about super-hero comics—the real ones, where Stan Lee is introducing each issue with such build-up and enthusiasm—that even 40 years later it's easy to get excited about them. Reading reprints of old Spider-Man comics is still a blast, and the comic book form as it existed then—those bright blasts of serial adventure—are still meaningful, still relevant, even today.

But man, super-hero books from the mid-nineties? They're just depressing. It's like comparing the old Star Wars to the new Star Wars; back then the original trilogy tried only to be exciting, straightforward adventures in the classic serial vein. The new movies, however, take themselves way too seriously, and are devoid of that Saturday-afternoon-with-your-friends fun. They are laughable because they try to turn Buck Rogers into 2001: A Space Odyssey. So to is it with mid-nineties super-hero comics. Oh the drama! The intrigue! Freaking Superman dies, man!

If Alien Hominid and some trashy issues of Spider-Man have taught me anything, it's that sometimes, straightforward and simple is the way to go.

Nana Komatsu · weak sauce Joined: 17 Jul 2006 Posts: 1293

http://mdn.mainichi-msn.co.jp/waiwai/news/20070301p2g00m0dm046000c.html

I DEMAND pictures of this Takarazuka-revue-like cafe.
_________________
resetbutton.net: videogames for unattractive people

Lestrade · Posted: Thu Mar 01, 2007 1:27 pm Post subject:

TO BE PERFECTLY HONEST A DOCTOR PRESCRIBED SOMETHING SIMILAR SO YOU MAY JUST GET YOUR WISH

Nana Komatsu · weak sauce Joined: 17 Jul 2006 Posts: 1293

Oh doctor doctor, mister em dee, can you tell me what's ailin' me?
_________________
resetbutton.net: videogames for unattractive people

Lestrade · Posted: Thu Mar 01, 2007 5:40 pm Post subject:

I asked my local record shop to hold this for me, so this is how I got it:

It's goooooooooooooood.