Articles by masterchief

It would be fair for you to assume that I am going to be supporting the desire of these camel huggers to become martyrs, but no, I am instead sending you to the good book to see what Jebus has to say.

Reading this security warning about mean people that use a virus to encrypt your data and then offer to sell you a decryption key got me thinking. How bout we start a Google Answers type service where people can donate for a “virtual” hit on these dirtbags. If you get infected with a nasty virus and you want to get even, throw $20 into the pool for the virus or exploit that got you, and when it gets high enough, someone will think it is worth their time to “disrupt” the life of the people that infected you. Sure, it is probably hard to track them down, but my guess is that for enough money, people could get pretty creative. Besides, how hard could it be to outsmart these guys (I hear they share a bed with their mother and are dating their neighbor’s goat).

We finally have 2 dorks to choose between.  How do you choose which one represents you best?  Simple really, just follow these steps and you will hardly even have to think or pay attention for the next 5 months. Start by making a list of the candidates you are considering voting for.  It should have 2 names, Barack and John.  If you have more and are considering a write in vote or third party candidate, good for you, that will show them (as well as waste your vote on a loser, which I am trying to help you avoid).  If you are a brainless drone voting the way your family or friends tells you, you are not really voting, but rather demonstrating your similarities with a sheep or lemming, so please just go read something else.  Oh, and if you are voting based on skin color, please find some moderately slow way to kill yourself, that balances pain and agony with adequate expedience to get yourself out of the gene pool before election day. 

So, how to vote?  My suggested method is as follows, after the break:  Read the rest of this entry »

Recently I started driving an electric car.  I pay nothing for gas.  It has a range of around 25 miles, but round trip to work and back is only 15 miles, so I charge it exclusively at work.  It has a top speed of 35mph and is classified as a “neighborhood electric vehicle”, but I drive on the back roads to work anyways, so no big thing.  It is far from roomy, probably not very safe in an accident, but short of a box full of puppies trained to hug kittens, it is probably the best way to meet chicks I can think of.  Being so small, you don’t even need a “no fat chicks” bumper sticker, cuz they look at it and realize they would likely get stuck in the door if they were to even try to fit in the tiny little passenger seat.  Funny thing is, the hotties that flock to it whenever I park it assume I am some sort of environmentalist dipshit who wants to talk to them about how Hitlery should drop out of the race or how much money we are wasting in Iraq.  I don’t bother explaining to them that I agree completely, but that it would be best if Obama joined her, and that a few nukes would save us tons of money in Iraq.  They also all assume it is a “smart car”… sigh.

See, my little electric car looks like a shrunk down smart car to people who haven’t seen either one in person before.  That isn’t a bad thing, but seriously, what is the point of the “smart car”.  Yes, it can drive at freeway speeds, but who would want to fight with semi for a lane in that thing?  The real issue though is that the little coffin only gets  a tad bit better milage than a normal sized car, and it isn’t exactly cheap.  Really, the only reason to buy it in my book would be for the chick magnet appeal.  

My plastic deathtrap uses no gas, and did I mention that I don’t pay to charge it!  If you want a new vehicle to combat the crazy gas prices, wait until they at least get 60mpg, or buy a motorcylce, because if you are going to be unsafe and you insist on still using gas like a cave man, you can at least look cool doing it.  Trust me, nobody looks cool in these micro cars.  If you are normal sized, you will look huge in them.  If you are above average in size you will look like Andre the Giant in them.  If you are a tiny little person that is comfortably scaled to something that size, everyone will just assume you are far away and always yell to talk to you!

I was not expecting AoC to live up to the hype, but it did.

I was not expecting it to be so gorgeous, and not just because you can see boobies. The youtube clips don’t do this game justice.

I was expecting it to be buggy and to have that “new game” feel, but the content I have seen so far is kicking butt. I have not yet gotten stuck, had a buggy quest, or had the game crash.

I was not expecting AoC to run as smoothly as it did, considering I am playing it on a Mac using Bootcamp, but the only thing limiting it is the steaming load that is Windows XP. I have 8 cores and 16gb of ram running on a 64 bit bus, most of which just sits there unused. I went with a slower processor and dumped the savings into upgrading the machine, but I have never used more than 35% of the CPU. The 8800GT is doing all the work, and all I can say is WOW (no, not WoW, not anything like WoW).

The fighting mechanics are still growing on me. I was one of those rare people that will admit to liking Oblivion, especially compared to the click on target mash buttons lameness that most classes in WoW utilize (sure, in raids they are now forcing you to move around to avoid hot lava, but the only reason this is hard is because many people don’t have the skills to actually watch their cast bar AND the screen). So far I have only played a barbarian, and the casting time for longer combo moves seems a bit off. Many times I think I initiated a combo, but my toon is just standing there getting beat on. Finally, the combo will pop up, and like some tard at the fair playing whack-a-mole, I excitedly mash the buttons in the order shown. Sure, I could have gone with the dance dance revolution comparison, but that would give away my winning idea of using a dance mat for controlling my toon!

Things I am not digging as part of the Early Access include the craptacular server maintenance schedules and lack of voice acting for the quests past the starting area, but maybe those will be fixed with the official launch. Of course, they are european, and expecting even half-assed customer support would be purely naive. Don’t believe me? Go try to find their phone support number…. nope, they don’t have one. Hopefully they can make up for it with adequate online GM support.

Should Blizzard be worried? Yes, they should. Not because everyone will be leaving WoW to play AoC,though some will, just for something new to do. Personally, I am not yet to the point where I am hooked, and I fully expect to go back to WoW some time before the next expansion. AoC may just delay my return for a few months. The real reason Bizzard should be worried though is that a bunch of weird Norwegians showed that WoW did not set the bar too high, and they are no longer the only real option for people wanting to get their MMO on. Two days ago I was still resigned to WoW being the best option for the foreseeable future, but now I can see that providing them competition is not only possible, but likely. This is good for gaming in general, and I look forward to seeing how the competition drives the genre in the future.

If you are in your 40s, male, wear a fanny pack, and have a corded earpiece for your cell phone stuck in your ear while eating dinner, please consider the possibility that you are a massive tool, and regardless of how enthralled with your inane conversation the tardfest you are eating with is, the rest of us really don’t want to hear your opinions, factoids, or ponderings. Talk in a quiet, indoor voice, not the one intended for sporting events. As a bonus, it may make your flock seem more interested in your verbal diarrhea, as they lean in closer to hear what you are saying. Even better, the rest of us will only know you are an idiot by your attire.

Maybe not 100% spoiler free like agent Bladerunner’s post, but I did the best I could. If you REALLY want to play it safe, just skip my inane babbling, like most rational folks do anyways.

It is to Bond what Batman Begins was to that pointless crapfest series of movies. Both movies dealt with the beginnings of their characters, not worrying so much about continuity with what had been done before/after them. This works for me. The latest set of Star Wars movies are a good example of why you don’t want to try to stick within the framework you already set up too much. Yeah, prequels are hard, but this one got it right in many ways. Is it a must see in the theater, I don’t know? If you have a nice home system you won’t loose too much, so if your schedule is full there may be other movies out this season that I would put before this, but definitely catch it on Netflix, as it really was quite enjoyable.

Problem is, I can’t exactly figure out what to say about it that is good. I have a few complaints I can start with, but I will try to come back to what is good. First, there seemed to be 4 different directors and writers, or maybe they broke up the movie between different production groups for style reasons, I am not sure Interesting, but I don’t know if it really works. The continuity between the different parts was just not there for me, and I didn’t feel like it was my fault because I am not sophisticated, but rather, I felt like someone was trying to demonstrate skills that they clearly had, but maybe they should have saved for another film. Maybe some of you smarter folks will appreciate that aspect of it more than I did.

Second, as many of you already know, for me casting is one of the most critical parts of movie making. In my opinion, this casting was brilliant…. mostly. Daniel Craig was amazing. He was nothing like any of the previous bonds, and that is fine by me. I enjoyed many of those films, but they really were becoming caricatures of themselves. The one liners and catch phrases were becoming more of what defined the movies than the story and action. This one dropped all of that (including sadly, some of my favorite stuff, but discussing that may be a spoiler to some of you purists, so I will talk about that at a later date). The few one liners where delivered with a completely different style and approach, that they actually worked. The bad guys were SOOOOO bad and the rest were all great, perfectly cast for their roles, with a few that really stole the show for a few minutes (Jeffrey Wright and the guy that played the banker both stood out to me). Judi Dench as M was superb. If she gets any better I might start developing a thing for much older women, which is good, because I seem to be aging myself for some reason. Which leads me to the leading woman, my biggest complaint. Ok, in a bond movie there are usually a few women, and there are here as well, don’t worry, but the main chick just didn’t do it for me. She was hot, sure, and seemed to be quite a talented actress, but I didn’t buy her in her role, and I didn’t feel any chemistry between her and Bond, though that may have been on purpose for story reasons that I am not smart enough to follow. Maybe she nailed her part, but if so, maybe that part needed a bit more refinement, but then again, they don’t let me make many big budget movies, so I may be missing something here.

So, what did I like about it? Well, it was just a great film. Despite its incongruous nature to us lowbrow types, it was enjoyable as hell to watch, even if you have to check your ticket to make sure you are in the correct theater. The intro was the best ever for a bond flick, in its own way. With a single exception (in my opinion) the casting was superb. The parts I missed about the old ones, I got over, and the new parts that would not have worked at all in the old Bond movies where a nice change of perspective to the series. I am truly looking forward to the next one. I wouldn’t suggest it for kids (nothing there for them) and I wouldn’t suggest it to my Dad, who is a big bond fan, but for the rest of you I would give it some witty affirmation of a positive nature.

Catchy tune, great video, and the Red Hot Chili Peppers are showing their long term relevance like few bands seem to be able to do these days . I enjoyed this song so much when I first heard it that I went to iTunes to purchase a copy, but sadly, my account info was garbled from a recent hard drive crash, so I didn’t buy it. I am oddly glad of this though, as it seems that this great song is destined to be overplayed on EVERY station I listen to, to the point where I will likely hate it before the full album is released May 9th. Hopefully the rest of the double album will live up to this single, yet somehow not get turned into jingles and get the Phil Collins era radio saturation that can ruin even the best album.

I love a good gyro, and I love Arby’s fast food, but damn, their new gyro is just not good. I am sure that there were some skinny people in California that used words like fabulous or delightful to describe it in taste testing, but they were wrong. It is none of these. Now, the cheese filled potato things with bacon chunks were GREAT, but I would probably enjoy cheese filled cat turds with that much bacon mixed in. Can’t understand how a place that gets so much on there menu so right could drop the ball on a gyro!

For some reason, I like this song. Could be because of the huge “wife approved” crush I have on Keira Knightly, another chick from the UK (though that is about all they have in common). You can find more info on her website, itunes, or whatever on your own.

As an added bonus, follow the link for more Masterchief musical mayhem!
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The marketing people at Gamefly probably are trying to figure out how to send me a check for that one, but anonymity is far too important for an ass like me to give up contact info on a public forum. Instead, I would ask that they donate the money to a young aspiring nurse, cuz the world needs more nurses. I suggest going to a local strip club, cuz I met a bunch of ladies there who were going to college to be nurses, naughty, sparkly nurses.

If you own an XBOX 360, with the exception of Call of Duty 2 and Elder Scrolls: Oblivion, I haven’t found a single other came that required more than a few days of my time to be finished with them. In the 3 weeks I had Oblivion with Gamefly I saved an assload of cash (though I am sure I will buy a used copy some day to play it again). For all the other games I got on Gamefly, there was not a single one that had any replay value in my opinion. Most of them I would have actually been quite mad about if I had purchased them at full price. Before Gamefly I researched purchases quite a bit, and was much more cautious with the games I tried, so on the plus side I guess, I tried some games that I would not have considered otherwise, and, of course, they sucked.

This is leads me to what really what makes Gamefly rock. See, most reviewers are soulless whores of the gaming industry. Then only decent reviews I have read in quite a while were at Penny-Arcade, while reading their comics. Seriously, their comics are one of the only sources of decent game reviews I have found, which is kind of like watching the daily show for news. For some reason, the idiots at all the major game sites figure you won?t remember the steaming pile of crap that they gave an 8.5 out of 10 to when you are reading their next ?review?.

The bottom line with Gamefly is that it saves a ton of cash. For $15 a month, I avoid buying $60 games. Simple math is that in 4 months I have spent what it would have cost for a single game, but I played 10 of them, which would have put me back $600. I would have played fewer games if some of them had been a bit better, but that hardly makes the service less compelling. The only ?downside? of Gamefly is that it is a bit slower than NetFlix, but then I live like 40 miles from a regional NetFlix center, so I usually have single day shipment from them (yes, I send a movie on Monday, it gets to them Tuesday, and I get my next one on Wednesday, which is pretty cool).

In the extended entry (if it works) are some mini-reviews from some of the games I played from Gamefly (not all were for the 360, but I need to fill in between their release schedule):
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Yep, I liked it, allot. I liked just about everything about it. Casting, cinematography, choreography, costumes, the way they were able to put together intelligent and interesting dialogue that had every letter starting with the same letter (they used V, not C like I was doing until I ran out of words). The dialogue was so good I was convinced that Kevin Smith must have been involved with the screenplay until I saw the credits. I think the reason I enjoyed V for Vendetta the most was because it didn’t feel like the regular Hollywood script written by a committee of idiots, steered by marketing monkeys and studio nitwits. Usually, in the process of dumbing down a script to feed it to the target audience, they ensure that there is a clear and simple message, yet in this case it wasn’t that way at all. Is the terrorist a good guy? See it and think about all his actions for a full day before you answer. It wasn’t complex or deep so much as fully developed in ways that are refreshing in modern cinema. Furthermore, the main ?non-spoiler? plot theme was that an oppressive government with religious overtones is bad (aka the big bad republicans if it had been written in Hollywood), yet I recognized a few quotes made by the good guy from NRA speeches and propaganda!

Of course, I LOVED Natalie, and not just in a venereal way (adj relating to sex acts or sexual desire). She rocked in at least 7 different ways that I counted. She should be in every movie that deserves her, which sadly is not that many. When she did that thing to that guy, damn, it was like, wow! (You try to write a review without spoilers.) Now, I know there will be some who will disagree with me here, but I actually loved her English accent, and I had watched Pride and Prejudice the night before (for her sexalicious clone, Kierra, who also was amazing, of course).

The actor playing the lead was also astounding. He was able to put more feeling and emotion in scenes while covered from head to toe in his costume, including the mask and hat, than most Hollywood ?actors? would be able to express if they were set on fire naked! Truly an amazing performance. Same with the lead antagonist. His speeches were scary good. I hope he never moves to Germany and runs for political office. Overall, I can’t think of the any of the main cast that wasn’t great. Bravo all around. I recommend the movie with all the credibility as a movie aficionado that I deserve.

I wish I could say that I am stunned that I haven?t heard anyone else calling the latest attack on muslims, specifically Arab muslims what it really is, racism. I am not talking about your standard run of the mill racial slurs, but rather the entire country getting their panties in a bunch about the possibility of a company based in the United Arab Emirates running some of our ports. Sure, this seems a little bit odd to me (is Halliburton too busy to take this contract?), but the blanket statements being made about ALL arabic muslims not being trustable are really quite stunning to me. I didn?t know we were allowed to distrust entire groups of people these days, but I guess I am not as progressive as I thought.

I doubt I will get away with making similar comments about all those Jews in Israel, or all those japs in Japan, and I still hold a grudge over what they did to pearl harbor (not the bombing, but the craphole they have turned Waikiki into). Seems like a holocaust or being nuked puts you off limits for some time period, I just can?t seem to find a copy of that memo. I think we are not even allowed to make fun of Germans anymore about that little mess they made of the first half of the 20th century. Our current allies though in the UAE are fair game. If the rest of us in the grand USA got blamed for every stupid move some jackass American makes overseas, it would probably piss us off?.. wait, that is kinda how it works, but I thought we were special.

Don?t get me wrong, I don?t really like muslims. Yep, I came out and said it, mostly to part of the ?in crowd?. The reality though is that I don?t like most people. I have yet to meet any group of people, be it an ethnic group, religious group, or even a bunch of idiots who happen to all live in the same country who really impressed me all that much (with the exception of exotic dancers, cuz someone has to stand up for them). I guess I am saying that I don?t really like humans as a whole, but until recently, I thought that it was not ok to pick on anyone for being a member of a specific group. I guess I was wrong. arab muslims are fair game. I am not calling for another crusade just yet, but I will say that I don?t trust them and that they should not be allowed freedom or business opportunities in our country. They should not be allowed to fly airliners in our skies or captain ships coming into our territorial waters. They should not be allowed to drive cars in school zones, cuz you never know when they may just decide to run little Timmy over as he is walking home, as part of some jihad (or maybe the little bastard was wearing a shirt with that stupid mohammad cartoon on it).

Most importantly though, muslims should not be allowed to provide security in our ports. I guess while I am at it, we should also make sure that there are no hispanics working to secure our borders, africans to be in our police forces, or red-headed firemen (come on, you know you were thinking it). Really, this should just be part of a bigger policy to not allow ANYONE to provide security of any sort in America unless they are white guys with no clear ethnic lineage (like I want to give a german a machine gun)!

Seriously though, next time some jackass makes a statement about how we can?t trust any arabic muslims, just replace those words with your favorite group and their stereotype crime against the world. See how it sounds when some idiot on the news says ?it is just stupid to trust the scandinavians to run those cruise ships after what the Vikings did to Europe?!

And yes, I know that most of those ethnic and national groupings are supposed to be capitalized, but how can I learn to hate someone if I use proper grammar in my rants about them? Kind of shows respect that I want to avoid for fear of being a sympathizer.