behind

Yeah, so I haven't posted anything lately.

It doesn't matter. No one reads this.

I do though. So yay for me!


I've made a Gametype for Halo 3 based on the Die Hard action movies. The premise? One person as Bruce Willis must take down everyone else, who are terrorists.

It's working fairly well, although I haven't tested it yet in a game with over four people.

It can be found at my fileshare.

Have at it!

e to the power of love

(click picture to enlarge; window will close unless you right click, open in new window)

Here's a nice pic for you Valentiners out there.

and a bounty was had

So I went to wal-mart tonight, because I support both low prices and sweatshops. And, as the eponymous title would suggest, a bounty was had.

That is, I gots me a Yoda, General Grievous, and Darth Vader.

These figures are frickin' made of win (and likely, the tears of underpaid workers).

Grievous as a character is awesome: badass android, alien, 4 lightsabers, and so on. The Revenge of the Sith did not use him well at all (I mean, c'mon, he had an asthma attack and then Obi-wan pwned him).

Yoda. Yoda's frickin' Yoda. He's a midget. He's also a badass. He'll also steal your food and then hit you with his cane when you get onto him. Case closed.

Vader is cool. That is, Vader as a wicked Sith is cool; I was never a big fan of the walking-humidifier Vader was in the original trilogy. The idea that Vader is a trained, deadly agent of the Sith? Sweet. Very poorly executed in Revenge of the Sith, but sweet nonetheless.

I was also faced with a tough decision: buy Spider-Man 3, a movie that's wondrously hilariously bad, or Hot Fuzz, a movie that's wondrously hilariously good.

I picked Hot Fuzz because, in the end, there are only so many times I can watch a movie to make fun of it before it just becomes depressing.

education: it's all about the games

So my AP Government teacher is what we in the biz like to call "awesome."

He allows, nay, encourages us to bring videogame consoles to school. We skip lunch and play Super Smash Bros Melee, stay after school and play Melee, come earlier and play Melee, et cetera et cetera.

So the head count? We've got a Nintendo, Super Nintendo (mine), Genesis (also mine), a Nintendo 64, and a Gamecube.

Hell, I brought up an AV switchboard just so we wouldn't have to mess with all that cord switching anymore.

I can't say I love Melee. Well, I can but I don't like it. I love it because it's so much fun, but I don't like it because I keep getting my ass handed to me.

And that's not cool.

super mario bros. the lost levels

So I've recently picked back up Super Mario Bros. Lost Levels, thanks to the SNES Super Mario All-Stars cart.

For those not in the know, and those of you who aren't meticulous pop culture junkies, Super Mario Lost Levels is actually the real SMB2. Ever wonder why SMB2 (in America, and non-Japan) didn't have Goombas or Koopas or Bowser? Because that was fake SMB2.

Lost Levels is the real thing, the real sequel, featuring Goombas and Koopas and Bowsers aplenty. Of course, the level design sucks, enemie placement is horrid, and the game overall is terribly difficult; hence, Nintendo of America (or was it NoJapan? I can never remember) felt America was too weaksauce to beat Lost Levels, and gave us a different game entirely.

Now, I love SMB2, because it introduced Birdo to SMB, as well as Shy Guys, and they're hands-down pretty frickin' awesome.

But Lost Levels is like the Contra 3 of Super Mario. Difficult, frustrating, but unbelievably satisfying to see the congratulatory winning screen.

Most people can't beat Lost Levels, and so they just declare it a horrible mutation of SMB1 and move on; but for me, Lost Levels is SMB2, the best version, and the only one that should've been made.

Mostly because it's one of the only games I beat as a child.


That said, I think Nintendo is crazy. You see, the prize for beating Lost Levels is a second play-through, with slightly different worlds and enemies, and an even harder difficulty. That's fine, I'm enjoying the challenge, but the design choices just don't make any sense at this point.

World D-3 has a total of around 8 Hammer Bros, about 30 Bullet Bill cannons, and one power-up. Not to mention semi-random enemy placement and attack patterns. As well, Hammer Bros can somehow glitch to jump-through walls in ways which make my Luigi greener with envy.

As well, there are friggin' flying fish in Bowser's D-4 castle. Flying Friggin' Fish. I guess they're lava fish. Magic lava fish.

I hate Mushroom Kingdom; it's a terrifying place.

There are frickin' flying squid. Flying Frickin' Squid.

What I'm saying here is: Screw the Princess, and just go back to Brooklyn, Mario Brothers.