Nearly two months ago, I joined Facebook.  I had low expectations, despite the fact that a few people whose opinions I value told me the same things I’m about to tell you.  I have to say, as a whole, Facebook doesn’t really suck.  I guess I was expecting something more like MySpace, which just kind of looks like the Internet ate too many gifs and had to throw them up as partially-digested ads.  Or something like that.  I probably stretched that analogy too far there.  Whatever.  The point is Facebook doesn’t suck, and it’s actually kind of fun, even for an antisocial computer geek like myself.

I was at home with the flu for a few days last week (not an experience I would recommend to anyone), and I did something I’ve never done before.  I watched a few episodes of Walker: Texas Ranger.  I had always assumed, based on the title I suppose, that the show was about your typical tougher-than-nails-cowboy-who-lives-by-his-own-rules-but-has-a-heart-of-gold type.  Turns out, it’s mainly about jumping out of helicopters onto people, and then proceeding to kick them.  A lot.  Like, I think there have been kick-boxing matches with less kicking.  Now I get all those Chuck Norris facts which set the internets abuzz a few years ago.

I also caught a few episodes of Ninja Warrior.  It’s kinda like Gladiators, only without the gladiators themselves (an improvement), and with the difficulty turned up about ten difficulty units.  And that’s on a scale of five.  You should totally check it out.

Now if only we could get Chuck Norris to compete on Ninja Warrior...

I mentioned not long ago that I sent in my copy of Guitar Hero 3 to get a replacement with stereo sound.  Yesterday I got my replacement, which was faster than I was expecting (only fifteen days).  Having heard the game in stereo now, I can say that the difference is huge, and immediately apparent.  And now that I know that, I can’t see how this got through QA.  You’d think some of the same people who were testing the Wii version would have tested or at least been exposed to the PS2, PS3, or 360 versions of the game, and would have said “hey, why does the game sound like crap on the Wii?”  I mean, it is a music game after all.  Oh well.

I’ve played a lot of games lately, so I thought I’d post some quick mini-reviews for anyone who cares.  Without further ado..

Metroid Prime 3: Corruption
All in all a pretty fun game, although something just doesn’t feel quite right.  Looking back on the Metroid Prime games, I think that the first one was the best.  But I’m not sure why, because I played 1 & 2 back-to-back last summer, and I thought 2 was far superior when played that way.  But when they aren’t fresh on my mind, I think the first one was better!  I can’t figure out why, since those thoughts contradict each other.  Some other thoughts: this is also the easiest of the Prime games, and the presence of voice actors was a little weird to me.  Finally, I have to mention the two super-cool unlockables.  One is ship bumper stickers, which means it looks at games saved in your Wii system memory and puts their logo on your ship.  So there’s a giant Zelda triforce on the top of my ship, and a Paper Mario head on the side of my ship.  And the other cool unlockable is a Samus bobble-head doll with your Mii’s head on it.  Normally I wouldn’t think seeing my head on a woman’s body was very cool, but I’ll make an exception in this case.  You can see both of these unlockables on your tubes.

Super Mario Galaxy
This game was just great.  I’m not sure how else to say it.  As you probably already know, the game takes place on micro planets that you can run around.  Playing around with gravity is incredibly trippy.  There are even a few places where a planet is small enough that a long jump can literally put you into orbit!  I wonder what Isaac Newton would say if he were alive to see this game?  Stephanie also enjoyed the commitment-free 2-player co-op.  She was able to help sometimes by freezing enemies.  In fact this was so helpful it felt like cheating sometimes, especially because she could just hold bullet bills in place, then I could take my time.  The game does have a few bad points.  Namely, Spring Mario.  Fortunately, you only have to use Spring Mario about 4 or 5 times in the entire game (in fact, I don’t think I ever used it until after the first time I beat the game).

Guitar Hero 3: Legends of Rock
I’ve played Guitar Hero games a few times, but this was the first one that I actually owned and spent significant time on.  I think my skill might have plateaued at can-beat-nearly-everything-on-hard-and-a-few-things-on-expert.  Unfortunately the Wii version of this game had some problems, like the fact that it only outputs sound in mono.  This is a music game, how did that get past the QA process??  Another annoyance is the lack of co-op quickplay feature (not that this is a huge deal to me, personally, since I only have the one guitar).  For the 360 and PS3 versions of the game, a patch was released to add that feature, but of course the Wii isn’t quite that capable.  Oh well.  I just put my disc in the mailbox this morning to get a replacement disc that does have stereo sound, but they said it could be 3-4 weeks, and I might be quite busy with other things in 3-4 weeks, so it may be a while before I get time to play GH3 again.

Prince of Persia: Rival Swords
As you may know, this is the third game in the Prince of Persia: Sands of Time trilogy.  (Well technically Two Thrones was the third game, and this is a port of the third game.)  The first game in this trilogy was just amazing.  One of the best video games I’ve ever played.  Unfortunately Ubisoft rushed out the sequels without giving them the same love.  The Warrior Within was a train wreck of a game.  In this game they’ve gotten back on course a bit, but it still seems to fall short of the first game.  But I have to admit I’m only partway through the game.  The Wii controls are a little tacked on, but they aren’t really bad.  They are comparable to Twilight Princess (where Wii controls were also tacked on).  Somehow the graphics seem worse to me than they were in the original game, but maybe I’m just not remembering it correctly.  I’ll have to go back and see sometime.

Okay I guess that’s all I’ve been playing in the last several months.  Until next time, take care America.

American Gladiators is back on TV.  (Or would proper grammar be “American Gladiators are back on TV?”)  In any case, Stephanie and I caught the show last night.  It’s kind of like you remember it, except with less stuff happening and more people talking.  In other words, just what you’d expect in today’s post-Survivor reality TV format.  I guess they want you to care about the contestants so they spend time talking about them?  I don’t—I just want to see people get jousted so hard their fingers come off.  And some of the gladiators are clearly trying to make names for themselves (ahem, Wolf, yeah it’s really cute how you howl whenever the camera points at you, but you look like an idiot).

Maybe I’m remembering American Gladiators through the rose-colored lens of memory.  In fact, I know I am.  I was, after all, twelve years old at the height of the show’s popularity.  Still, the new show isn’t entirely without its good points.  For one, the lady gladiators aren’t quite as scary (i.e. manly) as they used to be.  Another improvement is the updated Eliminator, which is now incredibly grueling.  Somehow moving the uphill conveyor belt to the end of the competition makes it a hundred times more difficult.  When the contestants finish, they are barely able to move.  I don’t think it will be long before someone finishing the Eliminator just throws up right on Hulk Hogan’s legs.  That would be hilarious.

I’ll probably keep watching, at least for a little while, although I’m not sure if I would be doing so if there were other shows on TV.

I just got back from my first ever business trip.  My company sent me to Seattle (technically Everett, WA) this week to visit our good friends at Boeing.  You may have heard, they are a little behind schedule.  But I can’t say too much about the business purpose of my trip here.  Fortunately I wasn’t flying solo, there were several others from my company (two others from the Charlotte office).  I was the only developer there; everyone else was support.  In any case, here are a few highlights in convenient bulleted form:

• The area is pretty.  Unless you happen to hate evergreen trees, in which I guess you wouldn’t care for it.  Because there are lots of evergreens.  When you look out the window of the plane, it looks kind of like you are about to land in a Christmas tree farm.

• The Boeing plant is big.  Really big.  The biggest building in the world by volume, as a matter of fact.  If you imagine a garage where you might get your oil changed, with about six garage doors in the building, it’s kind of like that.  Except the garage doors are big enough to hold full-sized airplanes.

• Security is tight there.  Since they couldn’t confirm that I was a US Citizen, I got a temporary badge requiring an escort anywhere other than the conference room.  Including the bathroom.  So I had to act like a five-year-old and ask people to take me to the bathroom.

• I got to visit my friend from the Amazon.  It was nice to catch up with you.

• Due to a layover in Phoenix, I got to see the Grand Canyon from the sky.  I think it was the Grand Canyon anyway.  In any case, it was a large canyon somewhere north-northwest of Phoenix.

• On the flights to Seattle, I got to experience first-class flight for my first time.  I didn’t think it was that great, until I flew coach on the way back.  Then I remembered what coach was like.

• Most of our nation is a barren wasteland.  That’s the impression I get from thirty thousand feet.

• It was my observation that there are no black people in Seattle.  Some quick internet searching seems to support this: only 8.44% of the population in Seattle versus 32.72% of the population in Charlotte.  That’s a pretty big difference.  And in Everett it is only 3.35%.  That was a little weird.

• There is some kind of circular farming that they do in the flat states, where they just don’t use 21.5% of the land in a square plot.  See many examples here.  This isn’t the first time I’ve noticed this but I thought I’d mention it.  I’m not sure how it is cost effective to waste so much of your land, but since there is so much of it done I’m assuming it must be more than 21.5% more efficient for some crops than traditional farming techniques.

• They still like grunge rock in Seattle.  At least the station I was listening to does.  In four half-hour drives (two trips to and from Peter’s house), I think I heard: 4 Nirvana songs, 3 Pearl Jam songs, 4 Foo Fighters songs, 2 Alice In Chains songs.  And then some new stuff like that terrible Finger Eleven song about clubbing.  I really hate that song.

• It didn’t rain all week.  Garrison had the same experience when he visited.  I’m beginning to think that “it always rains in Seattle” is just a myth.

• No signs of Sasquatch.  That also might be a myth.  But if so, then how do beef jerky enthusiasts mess with them?

I guess that’s all I’ve got to share.

A few weeks ago I started playing through Resident Evil 4 again.  This is just a quick post to say—regardless of my earlier comments—that I have enjoyed the game way more on my second time through (I’m about 90% through now..).  The factors contributing to this are probably:  a) I knew what I was doing and what to expect; and b) you get to start with the weapons you had when you finished the game last time.

There is also a weapon which is opened up after beating the game (I won’t spoil it), which costs a million pesetas.  About two-thirds of my second time through I had saved up enough money to buy it.  It’s actually so powerful it makes you feel like Kramer in that episode of Seinfeld where he was taking Karate with a bunch of ten-year-olds.  Or like Dwight that episode of The Office where he did exactly the same thing.

If anyone is picking up the Wii port who never played through the game before, my only suggestion would be to read the weapons upgrading FAQ on GameFAQs before you start spending money buying/upgrading weapons.

As someone who works in an office environment, I run into a lot of people with Dilbert comic strips tacked or taped to various cubicle surfaces.  After deciding that there must be something to Dilbert, I started reading the strips (posted online daily).  After trying for about two months to figure out why people find Dilbert entertaining, I’ve given up.  In fact I’ve come to the simple conclusion that Dilbert is not funny.  At best, it is highly overrated.  I guess if you draw 365.25 strips per year you are bound to hit on something funny sooner or later, but I’m not sitting through crap like this to get there.

you heard me

I had to devote a small part of my blog to spreading the word about The King of Kong: A Fistful of Quarters.  I wouldn’t be doing this except for the fact that you probably haven’t heard of it.  It’s a movie about Steve Weibe’s efforts to beat “Gamer of the Century” Billy Mitchell’s 1982 world record Donkey Kong high score, and the efforts of Billy and his posse to stop him.  It’s a documentary, but it’s still really entertaining and hilarious.  I won’t spend time repeating things you could read on various other sites.  I’ll just suggest that you go see it if you can find a theater that’s showing it (you currently only have two options in North Carolina..).  Failing that, save it in your Netflix/Blockbuster queue so that you can watch it whenever it comes out on DVD.

you’re the best around, nothing’s gonna ever keep you down

Not too long ago I posted about Budget and Time Warner not being very good at communicating what happens on their website to the real people who also work for them.  In order that none may claim me to be a negative Nancy, I’m going to post about one company that seems to have gotten it right: Papa John’s.

At first I was afraid to order pizza from a website.  It’s the kind of thing that requires instant communication to the human beings in the brick & mortar location.  If it’s not done right, your pizza could take hours to get prepared, or worse yet it might not get made at all.  If this required the manager to check his e-mail or something, it would not go well.  But after the time I called in an order for pick-up, and they decided to deliver it (and Stephanie called me from the apartment just as the cashier was trying to find my order in the computer), I decided I’d try to remove the idiot answering the phone in a noisy room from my pizza-ordering process.

I’ve now been ordering Papa John’s online for over a year.  That’s a whole year without hearing “Thank you for calling Papa John’s, please hold.”  In that time, I’ve only once had an order messed up, when I got pepperoni instead of pineapple.  Even in that case it was printed correctly on the receipt, so I think the guy making the pizza just didn’t read closely enough.  This is a problem that could easily be solved by replacing all the humans with pizza-making robots.  The kind which will someday take over the world.

My only real complaint is that I can’t use the coupons they send in the mail when I order online.  But usually they have the same deals or better online so it’s not that big of an issue.  On the plus side, you can take advantage of the system to some extent.  For example, Stephanie and I prefer to get pizzas with pineapple and bacon.  A large 2-topping pizza is $12.99.  Now, either through an unadvertised online promotion or a glitch in their system, a large Smokehouse Ham & Bacon specialty pizza is $11.99 (with ham, bacon, onions, and green peppers).  You can remove or substitute two toppings from a specialty pizza and still get it at the same price (I’m not sure if the rule is 2 toppings, or half of the toppings).  So if we substitute pineapple for onions and remove the green peppers (or substitute extra cheese), we now have the original pizza we wanted, with an extra topping or two, for a dollar less.  And when there are deals such as “free cheese sticks with a large specialty pizza,” which there usually are, we are able to take advantage of them (we technically have a specialty pizza).  So now we’ve got extra toppings and cheese sticks for a dollar less.  Funbelievable!