Modern Warfare 2

Call of Duty 4 was nicknamed "Modern Warfare" but I guess they decided the changes were so drastic from the Call of Duty Franchise they may as well rename it.

I was originally not planning on moving to Modern Warfare 2 just yet. I was planning on waiting for the price to drop and the patches come out because the PC versions are always buggy. I have to admit, I think I'm starting to get swept up in the hype after watching the game trailer and I don't like Rap or the R&B Style, but that just doesn't matter I couldn't help but feel pumped after watching the trailer. And the Gameplay footage just looks spectacular Looks like they've got a true capture the flag style mission.

EDIT: Awww No... Just got back from Amazon I was about to buy the game. Saw the Xbox rating getting 4 and a half stars then saw the PC rating... ONE AND A HALF STARS!!! Wow, according to the reviews They royally screwed the PC version. Unfortuantly it sounds exactly like what I've feared about consoles. The game makers are forcing the move to consoles over PC's for DRM and crippled the PC version. Too bad the game looked great but I won't be playing it unless the PC version gets fixed. Hmmm... just noticed Left 4 dead 2 is getting 5 stars on the PC. Guess I'm gonna have to see how the }WTF{ Clan is doing.




This one is actual game play

Batman vs Batman

I'm a huge fan of Bruce Timm's Justice League & DC universe. Frankly I find his story arcs more compelling than anything I've read in DC. He started it off with Batman the Animated Series which took American cartoon animation to a new level. He was able to make compelling storylines and keep them kid safe at the same time.

This clip is from an Episode of Justice League called "A Better World." Arguably the best alternate reality story arc ever written. In it the "Justice Lords" were forced to bring down US President Lex Luthor to save the World only to become Tyrants themselves after picking up the pieces of World War 3. Anyway I just happen to think this is the best Mirror match in Comic Book History with Justice Lords Batman vs Justice League Batman and thought I'd share.

This Youtube Link does a better job of telling the overall story of the Justice Lords. I just can't embed it in the webpage.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pkyORXjYOsk

Android vs iPhone vs Windows Mobile

Just got done talking about windows Mobile and iPhone with a friend and well, I'm pissed. I just realized that I banked on the wrong team for the last 5 or so years. In the Mobile phone arena, I started with and stuck with Windows Mobile for the Apps. At first there were some descent Mobile quicken apps for Windows mobile but the OS itself was buggy and sucked ass. And slowly but surely the windows mobile apps died out a slow and painful death as the OS never improved, then suddenly the iPhone comes on the scene. I didn't expect it to get the app support it got. It just plain took off like a bat outta hell and took advantage of Microsoft's incompetence and bumbling along with user's desire for these apps was far larger than anyone anticipated. I still don't get how the coders are able to make get Apps to work under Apple when article after article comes out about how they are so incredibly closed source they border on being belligerent ass holes about letting anyone from the outside getting anything to work on their stuff. This was always the excuse game companies used for not making games for Apple stuff. While Microsoft has this reputation for being open and working with the coders. Now Android is on the scene and the one thing everyone keeps harping on is the fact that Android is Open Source and that's going to increase app availability. Well, I said the same thing about Microsoft vs Apple with Windows Mobile and iPhone. Apple shouldn't even be able to compete with Microsoft at all because they're so closed source but that history is not really hindering them so this huge advantage that Android supposedly has is kind of in the air as a maybe the way I see it.

I don't think it's so cut and dry and to boot when it comes to the apps, and most of all iPhone is still the only device out there with Multi-Touch. The pinch and other little goodies you can do. the only devices that come close to apples touch interface are Microsoft touch surface devices that have been all over trade shows making big empty promises but have not delivered jack shit in the real world.

Finally the last part of the equation. iPhone's exclusive agreement with AT&T. Out here on the west coast AT&T has issues mostly with it's Data network, most of cnet.com reports all kinda of issues with AT&T, those guys know there shit and they're where I get most of my info on the iPhone from many of witch have given up their iPhone for an iPod Touch, which is basically an iPhone without a Data network and can hook up to a normal home network wirelessly. I'm on Verizon, and I'm more than happy with their data coverage.

Finally I have to say this, having a great network and a crappy windows mobile device (the Verizon xt6900) sucks. The damned phone can't handle the basics but I now have a new Lenovo laptop/tablet PC with a built in Verizon wireless card. So I canceled the Data on my phone and started that up. It feels like I have Mobile Device on steroids. I kinda do I've been using it to run CAD at our coordination meetings lately, I'm surprised as fuck it can run it AND do all my network troubleshooting and mobile goodies. I'm planning on replacing the phone with one of my old ruggedized phones. This is working out awesome for me, but I'm still jealous of the iPhone, it's one sexy lookin device that delivers what it promised (instead of 2 devices like I've got,) it still has better apps than Microsoft or Google's Phones (their app store dominates over all others), and superior hardware (iPhone is till the only device with Multi-Touch) than everything out there. No one has built a real competitor device yet. The only down side is AT&T and I have friends from the midwest who say AT&T is great for them. So if your thinking about getting one I'd say pin down an iPhone user and make them tell you how AT&T's service is in your area. And for Gods sake don't ask an AT&T rep. They're just salesmen.

3D Pictures no gimics

Wow these are weird. It's a gif file, they're the animated picture files. All it is is 2 pictures switching back and forth and that's enough to create a stereoscopic view.

Finally saw Punisher: Warzone

Maybe my expectations where so low there was no where to go but up? I didn't think this was anywhere near as terrible as a lot of people made it out to be, I didn't notice any real holes in the script. Then again I didn't think the last one with Tavolta and Thomas Jane was that bad either. Ray Stevenson definitely felt more like the Punisher in this though, Maybe it was as simple as less character building and more killing bad guys IS more character building. Less is more? On another issue one of the main problem people had with this movie was the moral conundrum of Castle causing "Collateral Damage?" That must have been the big sticking point loyalists had. The Punisher doesn't cause "Collateral Damage." If your gonna be such a stick in the mud about being true to the character I'd like to point out Tim Burton's Batman killing the joker maybe? I didn't hear a lot of whining then. See Castle does his homework and only kills those who deserve it, in a lot of ways he is Marvel's answer to Batman when it comes to planning ahead he is prepared for just about anything, he just almost exclusively deals with the street thug scumbags partially because it's in his nature but mostly because no superhero team will have him. I always thought Batman was a cut above Punisher for a long time, until recently when Punisher pulled a fast one on the Sentry made me realize that Castle actually is on the level With Bat's. They also both have that one place they won't actually go, for batman it's killing anyone, for the punisher it's killing the a good guy, but they both want the badguys to think they're crazy and don't give a shit. And frankly anyone who's not totally into the character's could easily look at them at a glance and think they don't give a shit. Which has a lot to do with why Burton's Batman got such acceptance.

But it is what it is. Anyway back to Warzone. Now that I think about it some of the effects and combat sequences did feel a little silly. Spinning from the chandelier looks neat in commercials, but stupid in the movie and punching holes in peoples faces felt bad ass but looked silly looking back on it. In retrospect now... Maybe my expectations were too low. But I get the feeling this script with the last directer would have been a lot better or even with some good editing it might have been salvageable. Had they done away with spinning from the chandelier and literally punching holes in people it definitely would have been a much better movie.

Gonna make jump into openoffice.org & Thunderbird on Windows

I've got to get this off my chest because it's aggravating the fuck out of me.

I generally use GoogleDocs a lot as my backup to Microsoft Office but I think Google is missing a basic concept with Google Docs and cloud computing in general (actually everyone is missing this on cloud computing.)

A: I simply can not and will not totally rely on the Internet. I've got to be able to work and get my job done without Internet access. For multiple reasons.

B: I don't trust that Google isn't searching though everything I put on GoogleDocs,

C: I don't trust that my stuff won't be accessible to the public if you know where to look.

The only way to secure a document if it has any personal info on it, is to not put it on the Internet. That's impossible with GoogleDocs or any "Cloud Computing" system. I like the intent of cloud computing but not the real world practice I've seen so far, logically it's about as insecure as you can get.

Anyway In the last few weeks my The Microsoft Office "Genuine Advantage" popped up telling me that the copy of Office I'm running is fucking Pirated. My eyes about bugged out of my head and I doubled checked everything and sure enough I'm using the right ones everything checks out, they're legit. But you can't fucking contact Microsoft without getting billed $250 so your basically fucked, just talking with those fuckers costs the same as a new Copy Of Office?! Well Fuck You Microsoft! You lying fraudulent cheating sons a bitches! If I didn't have to use AutoCAD to get my job done, I'd be switching to Apple or Ubuntu in a fucking heartbeat.

I don't understand how Microsoft has this reputation for taking care of their customers. Well I guess they consider HP & Dell their customers. They get all the Hookers and kickbacks while us real customers just get raped.

Anyway I've tried Open Office in the past and trying to juggle the different file formats was a royal pain in the ass. But I found a helpful hint at Mydigitallife that shows you how to set all the defaults to the Windows defaults totally fixing that and that was my only real Beef with Open Office. So I'm a lot more hopeful. I also never tried Thunderbird Before. Just put in Thunderbird2 I'm running into a glitch with the Password.

Turns out they Didn't Cancel "The Incredible Hulk"

I remember reading a while back that when Jeph Loeb took over writing for the Hulk they canceled the Series called "the Incredible Hulk" and just renamed it "Hulk." Well I just had an eye opener. Not only is that series still alive it's got my favorite Hulk Writer Greg Pak. I am totally kicking myself for not noticing sooner, I really need to spend more time hanging out at the local Comic Book shop called Legacy Comics. This gives me hope for the future of the character, I still dislike Jeph Loeb's work with the Red Hulk, I like what could have been, but so far I'm less than impressed, no that's not true i'm disappointed. I think that he is so focused on the future story arcs "War of the Hulks" or the "Hulk Wars" or whatever he's going to call it he's clearly not paying attention to what he's writing in the here and now, because it's crap. All the BS about dragging out the secrecy about who the Red Hulk is has killed my interest in the story arc, it's just been dragged on and on for too damned long.

As for where the story line stands now, Jeph Loeb killed the Hulk, the Red Hulk as it turns out is not actually a "brick" He's a drainer but being a big red hulk looking brick is a nice side effect of his primary ability. He drained the Gamma lout of Banner effectively killing the Hulk. So that's where that's at. Man it's frustrating, Red Hulk is such an awesome villain but I just find his current story arcs more irritating than enjoyable.

So now Greg Pak has picked up a few of the pieces of Jeph Loeb's Mess and ran with it. And it's freaking awesome! He's basically turned it into a story of Banner and his son Skaar the son of the Hulk from Planet Hulk. So in this one Banner is now kind of the sidekick/trainer instead of the usual trying to cure himself stuff. I like where this series is going, but I don't think it'll last I think that boob Loeb has more pull with the management at Marvel than Pak.

That said I think Loeb has got some awesome creative ideas, like the Red Hulk, he's a fantastic idea for a villain but Loeb shouldn't have the reigns of implementing/writing the series. That series has absolutely killed the fun of it for me but it had awesome potential.

Ubuntu 9.10 "Karmic Koala" my 64bit experince

Well Canonical made another great OS that gets the job done and looks great. The Price can't be beat it's got a complete Office Suite for students or even business with Open Office. Craploads of Free games, but most of all it has Internet access that just works. The Driver models really seem universal and just work.

Unfortunately it still has the same damned basic fatal flaw that every Linux OS has. Making it work "to it's potential" is still a Hobby, it dosn't "Just Work." I was setting up the Dual Monitors and realized that it's not intuitive and frankly the method for making Dual Monitors work is a work around/Hack that I honestly don't think the average user would figure out. First you have allow the "Proprietary Drivers" and then you have to mess with the NVIDIA X-Server program by editing it in the freaking terminal, and the way they put allowing propriety drivers comes across like they're talking down at you like a bunch of elitist assholes, "Oh your going to use those corporate whores drivers." Don't be mad at me that's the way it comes across. Making it work was a royal pain in the ass to figure out, it requires ass loads of research or just grabbing one of the Linux Guru's to walk you through it. In my case I'm in it for the challenge so I went through the work of figuring it out but looking back on it while it was a great troubleshooting experience for me it's a very poor user experience. I'm also running the 64bit version of the new Ubuntu and was a little bummed to discover that the Adobe Flash equivalents in 64bit are still buggy as hell but there has been a slight improvement, sort of. They apparently removed the controls for watching flash video so you can watch it without crashing but now there is no pause, fast forward, volume change, ect.

All in all, it seems as solid, awesome, and bad as Ubuntu 8.10 now that I think about it in fact I'm not noticing much difference. The changes must be deep under the hood because I haven't noticed anything really different yet. To A point Ubuntu is still a Hobby not an OS that can be recommended professionally. In the hands of a nerd it's a great alternative, for the average user, it feels like it's ruined by the poor hand off of the proprietary drivers, that part actually has made several people I know who tried it quit.

EDIT: Wow suddenly one of my big gripes as a hobby OS went away. The Flash Video suddenly started working correctly and really seems a lot more stable. And WinE (the Windows Emulator) does seem to work a lot better. That could be potentially game changing if they can get the propietary games to work somewhat fluently.

Just did another reinstall of Ubuntu. Fixed a problem I was having with the Compiz Fusion but now I can't get the Nvidia X-ServerConfig to save the file for some reason. http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=1308868

EDIT: Well I guess I spoke too soon. It's been a few days and flash is just starting to stutter like it used too. Thinking maybe I'll try the 32bit version next week sometime.

The Last Day of Screamfest 2009

EDIT: Found the Perfect Mascots for when I review stuff.



Went to a movie event with a friend last night at the Manns Chinese theater at Hollywood and Highland last night. That was loads of fun. We didn't see all the movies just the ones we thought we'd like, they were a lot better than I was expecting.

The First movie was called "Mutant Swinger from Mars." and Oh yes it was B movie and the title is exactly what the movie was about. But obviously a B movie on purpose. Lets just say if they had a limited budget they spent nothing on effects and the rest on the script and the script made fun of that. This movie was clearly made by a guy with my sense of humor for his buddies to laugh at. This movie was an A+ fun time for me.

The Next Movie was a foreign film called "Before the Fall" or "3 Dias." This was my favorite movie of the 3 and The Writer/Director answered a bunch of questions for the professional bloggers in the crowd (don't even think of me as one of them) and he pointed out the fact that this was a very difficult movie to sell because you really can't categorize it. I disagree with him this is a drama it's not like there are any spaceships or hobbits. It is about a man in south America lives with his mother then one day the US Government is on every TV channel telling the world that for the past three years they and others have been trying to stop an asteroid five times the size of the one that wiped out the dinosaurs, but they've failed and we have 3 days until it hits the Earth and destroys the human race. RANT*Had the movie dealt with the missions to stop the asteroid, okay I can see calling that SciFi. Calling this movie a SciFi feels like you could have a soap opera and introduce one character who's an astronaut never actually deal with his job but suddenly Hollywood calls it's a fucking SciFi show, I just don't get what's with Hollywood's view of SciFi. I guess I just get annoyed by that. END RANT* Anyway There's a few scenes in this involving kids that had some governments up in arms but I think the only reason it was an issue is that movie was so well done. That said those scenes were tough to watch.

The Last movie was called "The 4th Kind" it's sort of a Blair Witch style alien abduction movie. This is easily my favorite Alien Abduction movie the problem is that's not saying much. It's well done and is easily the best of the abduction movies I've ever seen. I don't know why but alien abduction movies tend to come across as less believable than any other scifi genre even to SciFi junkies like myself.

I think I'll have to try this again next year.

A REAL Solution to Gay Marriage, too bad no one actually wants one.

Politics Left vs Right? Your both full of SHIT! Fuck you both with barbwire dick!


Just got done trying to have a discussion about Gay Marriage and it revealed to me just how stupid people are when it comes to their politics and and it really fucking got under my skin. See I support "Gay Marriage" but I realized something not too long ago and stumbled on the REAL solution to the gay marriage issue. Now say this to yourself slowly. " I need to ask my government, if I can get married." Requiring Government approval for a marriage sounds like something we'd give Communist Russia or China a load of shit over, and we'd be right so why the fuck are we doing it? Then it hit me like a ton of bricks, that's the real solution we've been going about this all wrong, not government approving gay marriage but remove the component of government approving ANY marriage! Now on the Surface the government need for approving marriage is to give help to families. If that's the case fine, beef up the child tax credits but remove government approval of marriage.

I mentioned this idea to a bunch of people and not only was I shocked at the resistance to the Idea but I pretty much received the same hostility that both sides give each other and I got it in spades from both sides. The problem with this solution is that neither side gets a stamp of approval for their views from the government. In fact in a way the message from this solution is that your both wrong, now knock off the petty bullshit! Which in a way is exactly the correct answer in order to do the right thing. That's why I got canned bullshit responses from Boxer and Feinstien my reps in California about how important the issue is ignoring the substance of what I said. I realized both sides are full of shit when it comes to civil rights or anything else. It's about forcing the other side into submission and making them say uncle, fuck the right thing to do. Gay Right's activists will not be happy until they force the catholic church to perform marriage for gays or religion is banned and The Evangelicals will not be happy until being gay is illegal. They just won't come out and say that's what they really want deep down, they lie to your face and most of all to themselves about what they really want. So fuck both sides the reality is that they're both Tyranical scumbags, it's just not Tyranny when they do it... Bullshit!


EDIT:
AHHGGHHHH
I feel better.
Don't take it personal that's just after talking to the people at fucking CNN! I don't normally rant on politics but the partisan cock smokers at CNN really pissed me off. I'll toss this idea at the Fox news people next see what they think.

Can't find an actual forum for Fox news, not surprised with that though, it'll just be a continual flame war. I'd imagine this would get loads of support from the townhall crowd though.

Ya know there's also a lot of money tied in this issue. Just more reason to suppress real solutions in government I guess.

Wow, Holy shit... My post on CNN's iReport is gone. Apparently enough people who saw my suggestion flagged it as offensive. The Post on CNN wasn't a rant llike this was. And the fact that it got removed for doing nothing more than pointing out the facts is pretty telling that my follow up rant here is dead on.

The future of Internet security....

There isn't any, all thanks to the new Evil Empire Google. Don't put anything you don't want copied and handed out to everyone on the Internet. It's as simple as that, money transactions, On-line Banking, Shopping, personal information and all that stuff as much I love the convenience of them and the broadened enterprises it's created I really do believe they need to be removed from the On-line universe unless the Internet undergoes a fundamental restructuring soon. See here's why, Google's new web browser chrome is a nice and solid product. At first I liked what I was seeing in Google's chrome it was Fast, Looked Slick, and was well packaged. Then I discovered something that's on it's own is really not that big a deal. The OmniBox that you enter your data into is a live key logger.

Here's Ina Fried's Blog pointing it out.
http://news.cnet.com/8301-13860_3-10031661-56.html

What they're doing is meh no big deal, it's not that much different than what they record whenever you do a Google search. Then it hit me, wait a minute my security suite is not picking up a live keylogger? Let me repeat my last statement because it's crucial to what I'm saying and people tend to gloss over it because what the Information that google is recording is trvial. My Security Suites are not picking up a live Keylogger. I use Norton at the office and NOD32 at home and use Superantispyware, Spybot, and Malwarebytes for antispyware. None of witch batted an eye and allowed chrome's logging my key strokes and sending that data out over the Internet. I have read lots of reports that Kaspersky was identifying chrome as malware but it was for a totally different reason and has since been taken off the malware list. So are security companies not bothering with keyloggers anymore? This makes no sense to me. "Common Sense" says any software that logs keystrokes and transmits that data on-line needs to be stopped, it doesn't matter if THAT data is beguine, it's the act that matters. It reminds me of fucking the Financial meltdown, a keylogger is an accepted application? Are you shitting me?! It doesn't matter why Google put it there, do you really think the bad guys won't find a way to exploit it and log ALL of your keystrokes with it? Or just emulate why security software is ignoring it?

My god people are stupid. This is going to end with a security disaster as large as the financial meltdown we just had and frankly mirrors it in a lot of ways because people in general are looking at what I'm saying going aww hell no that'll never happen in a million years. Never-mind this is not an issue of something fancy, it's about ignoring the bare bones basics of security. Just like the fiscal meltdown was about ignoring the bare bones basics of Banking, lending, and trading, this attitude of ignoring the basics can only end badly on a huge scale.

When I it happens just remember even if you remove your on-line profile. YOUR BANK HAS YOUR MONEY THERE! Unless you have all your money in cash stuffed in your mattress, you'll be feeling it.

I'm pretty convinced now that Chrome's Keylogger was designed simply to push the envelope to see what Google can get away with and see what the public will accept in terms of corporate in your face spyware. I don't get why people are so stupid and choose to ignore the obvious.

I may be wearing a tinfoil hat but when I happens all I can say is FUCK YOU I TOLD YA SO!

EDIT: Aww Fuck just thought of something... Kinda Scary er I dunno. Okay so I mentioned how the could explode as big as the financial meltdown... How can we really know for sure that it didn't? and it's all just been papered over so the sheep don't panic.

All Hail Octavia

Holy Shit the Onion if Fucking Awesome! I'm laughing so hard I'm crying right now.

Champions Online... You have failed me for the last time...

Well got back home at my place today and after doing a little clean up around the house n stuff I got online to get some gaming in. Logged onto to Champions Online and hit an error. meh saw the error last week and didn't give it much mind because the game is new, there's bound to be hick ups. Did some more digging and discovered that I didn't actually buy the retail version of the game with the package I bought and can't play it. I double checked all my stuff and looked at the lifetime subscription I bought from Cryptic and sure enough it includes a download of the game. Well that's some slick bait and switch, include a download of the game, just not the retail version and don't tell the customer. So after getting a bunch of snotty comments about it on the Champions Online forum boards I've decided to cut my losses and get my money back. I'll probably have to get belligerent with Cryptic to get my money but I've gotten used to that.

EDIT: It works out for the best anyway, I really wasn't enjoying the game at all. I didn't get to any end game content or anything so I'm not sure how really that bad it was in the end, but the poor mechanics and lack of social tools made the game noticeably bad enough that it got in the way of me enjoying the game and since the ride there is more important than the destination, that's not good. If just one of those were a serious problem instead of both I would probably still be on board. The creative effort that went into the game was great, Oh well. Incorporating some of the elements of the hero system would have fixed most of the game mechanic issues I ran across but that's pretty common with a lot of level based games.

Just got home, had another heart attack

Sort of it was actually a complication of the first one happened last Sunday because I'm an idiot and didn't take my meds as faithfully as I should have and pushed my truck about half a mile after running out of gas. I also think I must of misunderstood the importance of one of the medications. It's basically key to making the Harkonan heart plug permanent.

Champions Online is getting a little better

I did a complete Rebuild of Warhead (including the look now that I found an old pic i drew of him) and so far things are a little less frustrating. it's a matter of figuring out what the hell these guys at cryptic are doing. 1st thing to understand that what ever cryptic did with Power Armored Characters makes them suck ass as bricks, they're blasters. I'm working on figuring the rest of their system out but so far it makes the hero system look easy. They've even got stuff like a typical MMO style crafting system which appears required to gear yourself properly just like every other MMO I've played, I'm not liking that. So far everything about this game runs contrary to the ethos of the real Hero System. Anyway, I'm gonna try rebuilding him again later with the brick framework instead of powered armor and try and keep the look the same.

Once I hit the level cap I'll have access to a lot more stuff though and be able to better judge stuff. Dispite my issues with the game its starting to grow on me. I'm gonna stay with it I think.

Whaco Jaco Michel Jackson is getting buried today

And its very annoying. Why's the plot gotta be less than a block from where I live? Put it somewhere else and close someone else's street down.

GET OFF MY LAWN!!!

I feel better. ;)

I left for work this morning and as I pulled out there was a freaking army of cops blocking off Glendale blvd and all the nearby allys. At first I thought That must'a been one big gang fight. But once I left I turned out the radio and immediately found out what it really was about.

On another note, not sure what to make of that guy. I dunno I've got a gut feeling he was actually innocent of the pedophillia stuff and it was nothing more than taking advantage of a guy who probably belonged in a mental institution but his family was more worried about the gravy train than his mental health.

Well if he's innocent of that stuff hopefully he's singing in a better place. If he's not... I ain't sayin' what I think out loud.

Government Thieving Bastards

Went to the courthouse today to button up a ticket. Got all the crap done on time for the fix it ticket and was told all I'd have to do is show that I got it fixed before the court date and the ticket would get waived. But the fuckers are making me pay the ticket anyway. Typical government lying thieving bastards! If they were up front and honest about fucking me over I wouldn't care as much. I just hate being lied to.

Champions Online

I picked up Champions Online and paid extra to get into the head start and get started early before the official release. So far... Meh... I'm disapointed, I played City of Heroes/Villians and this pretty much feels exactly the same just with skinned with the Champions world. It's not at all a Hero system game like I was hoping for. The Customization and balance of the Hero System is one of the major reasons I loved Champions but unfortunately that won't be in this game. A more appropriate name for this game is City of Heroes 2: Champions. It comes across more like a City of Heroes Expansion to me than a stand alone game, although they did do a fantastic job creating this expansion. Hearing them bring Grond to life has been worth it Cryptic nailed the characters to a tee. The lines they give him are epic fun. In the low levels areas Grond randomly shows up and if he hits you, your dead. He's an Epic Character and your a lowbie. "You as exciting as some second rate MMO... Grond Leave now."

I got a kick out of that. The creativeness of the Dev team looks pretty good. Although buggyness has been an issue, but every major new MMO has massive bugs on release. I've managed to overcome them far far better than everyone on the Champions Online Forum has been complaining about, I think I've run into but have over come most of the technical problems. There is one major gripe that I have, the social grouping/pugging tools, there aren't any, at all. Granted the official release is next week. Hopefully they already have that done but need to do some polishing up before giving it to us, the idea that they maybe forgot those essential social tools bugs me. My other Gripe is that Grond is an Epic Character and your a lowbie... In the hero system, when you make your character he's ready to go, he's not first freaking level. He's not as powerful as Dr Destroyer but the Active Power Point system and all that other stuff makes you feel like you have created an Epic Character with the limited resources you start out with. There are other little things that could have been implemented but weren't. Like the Body & Stun System of the Hero, that would have been awesome to see that stuff and having automatically calculated by the computer is the way to go with it. Instead they're using freaking hit points? Oh well. I gotta be honest though. The more I play this game the less I like it, it was the same with City of Heroes. I think it's got to do with the Social tools, they're Anti-Social. there's so much creative awesomeness in this game it's frustrating. But there's no grouping up tools (whats the point of an MMO without social tools?) and so far PvP just plain sucks. There's one map and one game type for PvP.

Oh well, here's a clip of War Head, my Old PnP Champions Character resurrected for Champions Online. Unfortunately because they skimped on the Hero system game mechanics his supersonic flying body tackle will never make it into the game.

EDIT: On the subject of 'feeling' like you created an epic character here's a great Example of real Hero System Champions character I created for fun recently. He's a minion of the the Arch-Angel Gabriel Named Arzuthial called the "Will of Gabriel" Long Story short (I'll post his background later he's a great character) this Standard Heroic 250pt Hero System character with a 52 active point max can kill Dr Destroyer or Grond with one hit. No I don't mean beat them down I mean outright kill them as in yank their soul out send it to the other side, after all, that's his job. He has a few multi-forms one is the Arch-Angel form that is a standard superhero style brick fighting build (The more I got into it the more I realized I was building Thor) the other form is the"Angel of Death'" Skeleton in a cloak complete with a transformation power attached to his scythe that once it touches you, nothing will stop it from sucking your soul out. Now, As a GM myself Generally you don't allow characters with powers like that unless you know your players won't abuse it. In this case I felt the character HAD to have that. So he can't just use his scythe in a fight on a whim even though it's his most effective weapon because it means he's committing to more than just fighting. I just had an itch to scratch of how to implement the idea of a sentient creature in complete control of itself but at the same time lacks free will and felt I had to build the character and flesh it out.

Now knowing that I CAN make and play the "Angel of Death" out of the box under this system makes other characters I make FEEL a little more Epic.

Compare that to Champions Online knowing that I made a 1st level power armored character.... Meh. I think Cryptic missed the boat or more likely just plain didn't care about what makes Champions and the Hero System above the rest.

I think Heroes got thier Mojo Back

Found this on the Heroes website. Lots of little things in there that really come across like they've really figured out what fans like me want to see. Peter is the Uber Good guy again looks like. Sylar threatening Matt Parkmans Baby?!

Spiderman the "One More Day" Series

This potentially could have been a very cool series. But to be honest I have to agree with the Spiderman fan boys that Marvel botched it big time, although I disagree with them that it wasn't a great idea and wasn't almost great. It was well on the road to be a great storyline but Marvel completely scewed it up, here's the Guts of the Storyline. During the "Civil War" storyline Spiderman came out of the closet and announced to TV news crews that Peter Parker is Spiderman and of course did this promoting Iron Mans SuperHuman Registration Act. Of course now we cue the "Civil War"and all that goes with that including Aunt May getting gunned down by one of Kingpins hit men. Lookin' to me like this storyline has some potential.

Now Aunt May is hanging on by a thread and Pete is looking to get her healed because modern medicine isn't cutting it and turns to Dr Strange. To be honest I'm not certain because I couldn't get my hands on that issue but I'd like to think Dr Strange felt that she was ready too and wanted to move on and be with Uncle Ben, so he wouldn't do it. But what really happened is that Dr Strange couldn't fix her?! WTF?! That's pure BS he's Dr freakin Strange, chalk it up to botch#1.

So Pete won't take that for an answer and in his pain an vulnerability as he leaves Dr Strange Pete is approached by a little girl who turns out to be none other than Mephisto, a Reality Altering Devil and bad ass, Creator of the Ghost Rider, Enemy of Dr Strange, and enjoys using the Mantle of the Christian Devil in the Marvel Universe. As far as evil bastards go, he's generally done right in Marvel. He offers Peter the choice of saving Aunt May in exchange for his marriage, and altering history so that Peter and MJ never fell in love. Now normally it would be against Spiderman's character to accept an offer from the devil. BUT! MJ talks him into it. That's where I separate from the Spiderman fanboys on this. YES it's against the ethos of spiderman but MJ could get him to do it. And that made for some good drama, so the story arc is still pretty solid as far as I'm concerned.

That little touch at the end where Mephisto revealed the guise of the little girl he used was actually their future daughter as he forced them to break apart was freakin epicly evil. That's why I just hate and love this series, some parts are so spot on and nail it but... Now we get to the majority of where things go horribly wrong in this storyline. Mephisto gets them to agree and he alters reality. They loose the marriage and then the rest is almost happily ever after?! WTF?! Pete gets Aunt May AND his secret identity back (he never even asked for that!) AND then gets his friend Harry and his dad Norman Osborne back ?! WTF is with that?! Mephisto is NEVER that generous nor should he be. Usually Mephisto would have Aunt May get hit by a bus or diagnosed with terminal brain cancer the next day and give her a month to live right after curing her. Then put MJ with a guy that beats her. Damn that woulda been evil... But this just isn't his style. Where are the consequences of making a deal with the Devil? It would have been easy to make this series awesome because the backbone idea is fucking awesome at it's core, but they've got to be idiots not seeing so many obviously awesome way to go.

As it turns out the end of this series was just changes the writers wanted to make and are using Mephisto as the tool to make them. The way there was awesome but the destination they picked before hand not only didn't pay off it was so bad it resulted in Marvel fans rightly booing the whole series. I kinda disagree with that I enjoyed the ride there to a completely and totally botched ending, I suspect that the destination was decided by management more so than the writers themselves. I find that hard to believe that they'd be that they're dumb considering the great story arc they took to get there. And As far as I'm concerned the Marriage is cannon now. Right next to Reed Richards and Sue Storm, it's just part of the Marvel Universe.

Oh well, I'm kinda hoping that first some good writers get involved or these guys get out of their funk or Slap management upside the head with a frying pan for not letting the story go where it was obviously supposed to go. and that Thor gets involved in this one, he's got the juice by virtue of the nature of what he is, and can put Mephisto in his place. He's kinda like The Celestial and Holy Arch-Angel of the Marvel Universe to counter these demonic creatures. I'm kinda hoping Thor sets things straight and opens up a can of cosmic whoop ass on Mephisto and puts MJ & Pete back together and then Personally takes Aunt May to be with Ben. Now that would be awesome. Besides Thor is long overdue for a moment to shine as a Marvel Character this could be a good opportunity.

We'll have to wait and see how it all plays out. I have a feeling somehow Mephisto is tied in with the dealings with Norman Osborne and Ares as they are making major plays in the Marvel universe though, hopfully it'll lead to a Marvel reboot. You gotta do that once in a while so that writers can feel free to make major changes because it'll always get reset anyway.