"Lowpoints" or "George Lucas, why have you forsaken me?"

Today I have a few lowpoints to share with you. Aside from these, it was a good day, and not unlike most days.

1. Comcast DVR died (okay, to be fair, it died last Friday, but today I had the joy of taking it back and exchanging it, after spending way too much time on hold).
   
2. Xbox 360 died (okay, this makes me thing something's amiss... two pieces of hardware die at the same time? hmm... still, stranger things have happened!)
   
3. Speaking of stranger things: George Lucas, WHY HAVE YOU FORSAKEN ME? (caps definitely mine, for effect). I buy the stinking "Unaltered" versions of the DVD and find some things horribly awry:
   
   
   
   1. The Unaltered versions are Disc 2. Wait, I thought the title of the project was "Star Wars: UNALTERED." So why are the unaltered versions relegated to Disc 2-status?
      
   2. 4:3 Letterbox format (Aspect Ratio 2.35:1). Now, I'm not a swearing man on general principle, but this made even me go "what the f***?!?" Now, if BOTH disks were 4:3 Pan & Scan, I'd be willing to forgive and go back to the store and say, "Excuse me, apparently *I* am a bonehead and picked up the WRONG BOX. Please let me exchange this for the 'Widescreen' version..." But then I look at the first disc which contains the 'Special Education Edition' version and it says "Widescreen format enhanced for 16:9 TVs (Aspect Ratio 2.35:1). Even the front of the box says "WIDESCREEN."
      
      Excuse me, Mr. Lucas, but the ONLY reason I bought this version (I already OWN the version you included on Disc 1) was for the UNALTERED version. So when I see a box that says WIDESCREEN on it, I expect a WIDESCREEN (read: anamorphic, read: enhanced for 16:9 TVs) version of the original, UNALTERED film.
      
   3. It looks remarkably like the letterbox versions of the originals that came out on VHS over a decade ago. Seriously. At best, it looks like a laserdisc->DVD transfer that I bought off Ebay (out of sheer curiosity) 5 years ago.
      
   
   

So, there you have it. Despite it all, I still love Star Wars.

Darth Lucas would apparently like to change that.

Do Consoles Blog of Electric Sheep?

Will wonders never cease? Apparently even my Xbox 360 has a blog now. At this rate I wouldn't be surprised if my little workhorse of a console announced a cure for cancer within a fortnight.

In other news, I've been playing a lot of Dead Rising, whilst my cohort Aaron has been slaving away at GRAW.

I've also been playing some Battle for Middle Earth II with Rich and his cadre of capable junior combatants. We even found a bug:



It only happened once, but lasted so long I was able to fraps it. What happened was one of the members of the ringbearer "party" was unable to enter the town center for reasons unknown... and so it tried over and over again. The solution was sacking the town center, which ultimately released the ring. A second attempt to store it in a new town center worked fine. Still, this is a bug that needs to be fixed, assuming it can be reproduced in a development environment.

Here's the second attempt, just as evidence of what should happen, as well as to prove that the game wasn't totally bugged out. :)

It's MY island.

I just got back from visiting the Chappy, the Heather, and the Tom out in Lexington, Kentucky. I strive to make an annual pilgrimage to see Chappy and hear him go boom. This year's festivities:

• Introduced Frankentubby to the Lazarus Pit and witnessed the rise of Tubby al Ghul.
• Introduced Lord Mordak (a.k.a. Noah Bear, a.k.a. The Bear) to Superman in big-boy underwear form. Let's just say that ol' Sups can now shoot something new from his eyes if little Lord Mordak forgets about his throne.
• Acquired (1) copy of the Magna Carta Deluxe Box Set for Playstation 2 at the spiffy used price of $40 (originally it was $55 and was produced in such limited quantities that you could hardly find it new, let alone used). Score.
• Introduced Chappy and Heather to the joys of Ask A Ninja and Ze Frank.
• Played more Rise of Legends than advisable. At first I wasn't sure I liked the game (probably because Kruzen pwnd me in every match right out of the box. At that point I decided to quit while I was ahead to avoid universe implosion), but now i'm quite hooked on it. Gameplay tip: enable the "auto-place new districts" in the Options menu... it makes your life a lot easier when things heat up.
• Read devoured House by Frank Peretti and Ted Dekker. Yes, it's good. No, I couldn't put it down. First time I've ever gotten a hangover from a book.
• Acquired and read the Batman: Hush Returns trade paperback. Rather miffed that they omitted half a dozen parts of the series to keep it down to a single volume. Also rather miffed that Jim Lee wasn't involved... he ruled the roost int the first Hush.
• Still can't find a decent statue of Harley Quinn anywhere... rather a bummer. She's my favorite DC character.
• Started reading The Secret Message of Jesus: Uncovering the Truth that Could Change Everything by Brian McLaren. So far (about 1/3 through), it's challenging and compelling. I have a feeling this one is just might get a whole lot deeper.
• We took a day to see the grandparents and eat lunch at O'Charley's. Pepperjack Cheese bites: A+. Caramel Pie: A-. Chicken Fingers: C+. Three-Cheese Burger: B.
• We played Risk. I started in Asia, and I won. (They fell victim to one of the classic blunders!)
• We played Munchkin. Halfling-Cleric-Bard ftw! Oh, and for the record, an Orc with a Doppleganger is still "fighting alone."

My thanks go out to the gracious hospitality of Castle Chapula for another fun-filled adventure week. I brought home many pieces of P.J. the wonder-tongue. And I'd like to give a shout out to my main man Steven Rodriguez (scroll down), without whom I would have had a long midnight walk home from SeaTac. ;-)

Ain't no party like a Clockwork party 'cause a Clockwork party don't stop!