Random Awesome Mirror's Edge Stuff!

After seeing Midwest Gamer Blog's article about Mirror's Edge 2D, a 2D Flash version of the game made by the guy behind Fancy Pants Adventure, I started thinking of Mirror's Edge again. I have never actually played the full version of the game, but the demo had me hooked really badly. I still want to play the full game asap. For now, I will enjoy this music video.

Massive New PSP Announcements

Ok PSP fans your time has finally come. There were a TON of new announcements for Sony's portable platform made today. I just wrote up an article on this event on Daily Gamer Blog. Head there to get the full details.

Daily Gamer Blog

Some of you may know that I have previously written for some gaming sites, yet I came back to this personal blog. Well I am now lucky enough to have yet another chance at writing for a gaming site. Daily Gamer Blog, which I have written for before, will be relaunching soon, and I will be contributing as much as I can. I really recommend that you all check it out once we get things going. All the other writers there are very good as well. For now, you can sign up for the forums.

By the way, this will not keep me from updating this blog. I will continue to put any personal updates here whether they are gaming related or not. Again, please check out this site, you will enjoy it.

Ubuntu

Today I installed Linux on my laptop. More precisely, I installed Ubuntu and boy am I impressed. I have been tweaking it to my taste and installed Wine and everything is running great. Hopefully I will be able to continue gaming on this, but if not I can always reboot in Vista. The real problem is that Vista seems so slow now compared to this. Thank goodness for open source software!

College Visits

I just got back from the Winter Preview Program at Worcester Polytechnic Institute in Worcester, Mass. I have to say I am very impressed with the school, its programs, the people, the opportunities there, and even the campus itself. I am planning to go there for either the Computer Sciences or Interactive Media and Game Design majors. I really can't say how impressed I am with that college. Hopefully I can pull together the cash to afford the rather steep tuition, but I'm not going to let that stop me.

P.S. I'll get back to gaming talk later. I have this whole week off from school so I should have plenty of time to write.



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Now playing: Boston - Rock N Roll Band
via FoxyTunes

Bwah!?

Ok, quick post here, but this is just too odd to skip up. It turns out that the company that offered to buy Eidos several months ago was actually the famous Japanese developer, Square Enix. This comes as quite a surprise to me since Eidos has very western styled games and Square Enix has very Japanese styled games. However, this could benefit beoth comapnies. Square wants to expand into more western games, which Eidos can provide, and Eidos needs a large amount of money backing their games and advertizing, which Square Enix can more than provide. I actually hope this deal goes through because both companies would be stronger for it. The only sad part of this is that this situation shows just how bad the economy is getting. One of gaming's larger publishers is possibly being bought. Anyway, I wish both companies luck.

Burnout Paradise Cops

I love Burnout Paradise. I'll just say that right now. What I love most is how Criterion is constantly updating the game with more and more DLC. All of that DLC is actually useful and fun as well. However the most amazing Burnout DLC has just been announced and now has some screenshots, thanks to IGN. The new Cops and Robbers mode looks absolutely crazy. Just see for yourself.








The simple concept of a high speed chase with several cops on your tail going through Paradise City is worth it to me. My real reason for loving this concept for DLC is the prospect of being the aforementioned cops. I want to drive those sleek Paradise City PD cars! Well, that's all I have to say about that. No real insight today, just excitement. Enjoy.

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Now playing: Switchfoot - The Setting Sun
via FoxyTunes

The New EA

You have heard it all before. EA is the evil empire intent on destroying gaming by releasing a version of every sport game imaginable for every platform once a year. They never make anything original. Oh, and don't forget that they ruined several great old studios like Bullfrog. Pretty much anything with that insidious two vowel logo on it is the plague and should be treated as such.

Thank goodness that is over with. Let me say something (since this is my blog, that seems like a fair request). EA has become one of my favorite companies over the last year or two. Also, they are not the evil empire any more. EA is not itself anymore and I am glad for it.

First off, let's look at my blasphemous gamer-claim (that sounds so awesome!) that EA is one of my favorite companies. How can I love a company that is so obviously terrible? Well one look at EA's recent releases should give you an idea of how they have changed. Burnout Paradise, Dead Space, Boom Blox, Rock Band, Mirror's Edge, Army of Two, Skate, Crysis, and Battlefield Bad Company are all original games, even if they came from a previously existing series. Most importantly, they are fun. Taking a look to the future you will see games like Mass Effect 2 and Henry Hatsworth (this game deserves far more attention). Sure, they still have their yearly sports titles and crappy Need for Speed games, but the amount of original, fun content from EA is definitely on the uprise.

So they have some good games. There must be a new evil empire taking EA's place. It's Activision. Why? While EA has been becoming more and more original Activision has run everything right into the ground. Tony Hawk? Dead. Call of Duty? Every other one is useless. Guitar Hero? Dying very quickly. Then there is the whole situation of Activision buying Viacom, losing every good game that Viacom was working on. The real irony of the situation came out when Activision scrapped Tim Schafer's Brutal Legend which was then picked up by EA. How beautiful it is.

Now, I hope Activision can make a similar turnaround to EA's, but by the looks of things it's not going to happen very soon. That is why, for now, EA is one of my favorite companies while Activision has become the new EA.


P.S. Check this out. I got a Firefox plug in to add what I am listening to as my blog signature. I love little browser gadgets.
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Now playing: Instrumental - Horrible Credits
via FoxyTunes

Twitter Time

Just a quick update today. In keeping with being a good web user, I have set up a Twitter account. If you can't get enough of me here on the blog, hit up my Twitter here. It will have similar content to what appears here. I will hopefully update that more often than I do this. Sorry for not posting a beefier update, but that's all for now.