'Tis Better To Play Silent Hill And Be Thought A Fool

Near the end of the year all sorts of Top 10, 50 and 100 lists start popping up. One of the more interesting ones comes from Wizard Magazine, the Top 50 fictional weapons of all time. A definitive geek list of must have side arms, melee weapons and magic devices from movies to comics to games. Some of them even have props made that you can buy, so it also makes a decent list of props. It's interesting to note that #8 is missing. I guess the weapons invisible and can't be spoken of. Lightsabers are so cool they made the list twice, as did Star Trek with the Phaser and a Sniper Rifle that fires rounds that beam in and out of people's rooms. Why the X-Ray gun from Perfect Dark didn't make I'll never know but it could fire through walls and the scope could pick out people instantly. Between the Star Trek Rifle and Eraser's Rail Gun I guess this weapon became redundant. A couple great classic sci-fi weapons appear, including the TRON's disc and the homing bullets from that chromed-out gun used in Runaway, that other sci-fi movie with Kirstie Alley. The movie was kind of a poor man's Blade Runner, surprisingly written and directed by Michael Crichton. It's a decent enough story but looks like a product of the 80's. Not quite an early Crichton classic like Andromeda Strain or West World. Maybe if the Terminator hadn't come out at the same time we'd remember this movie more. I have the movie poster of Runaway somewhere with Tom Selleck holding the special gun and it always bothered me that it was the bad guy's weapon and Mr. Selleck never fires it. BTW I "heart" 80s Spider Robots.

IGN also has top 100. Of course it's about video games and they are posting the list 10 at time for the rest of the month, damn them. I've only looked at the bottom 20 but I'd like to add my thoughts on their.. uhh... thoughts. 100 thru 98 I never played so I'll jump to number 97: Silent Hill 2. This game belongs higher on the list. I bought it for Xbox a number of years ago and it is everything the first game was and more. The story is more personal and the creatures are even scarier. Maybe its the next gen graphics (since the first game was on PSX) but almost every creature encounter was creepy. The game made you feel uneasy throughout and hit you like a wet brick when the Pyramid Head guy appeared. I almost crapped myself in the movie when Pyramid guy showed up, thanks to this game. He's not to be taken lightly. I never beat it but I left off near the end with some crazy cockroach things eating me or something. I hate the undead and look forward to killing a lot of the during the Zombie Apocalypse if it ever happens thanks to this game. I don't even like nurses anymore, or mannequins, or armless zombies, or little children, or dogs, or static-playing radios, or undead pterodactyls, or my crazy ex-wife in a wheel-chair. No, wait, that was the first game, sorry. I still have issues from that one. And now I hear there's to be a Silent Hill 5?

#96 is Wave Race 64. As a release title it was the other reason to own an N64 back in the day. Water physics were never prettier before the N64 and Wave Race had it in spades. I bought the game during the waning years of the system, but that doesn't diminish the game play. When ever someone plays a game and there's a water fountain or a lake, invariably they try to "play" in it. I'm guilty of this and I can even remember the first time water "wow-ed" me in games. Super Mario 64 had incredible water surface reaction that was just fun to run around in and Ico's water was so reflective and beautiful it made the game even more realistic. But this was just a mild distraction to those games, in Wave Race 64 it was the whole point. You raced on wave runners and had to time your movements with the currents. Brilliant stuff. It actually added strategy to a racing title without the need for "Kart"-racing style offense/defense item collection. There was even stunt mode mini games to add playability, and it had enough reasons to keep playing it until a larger library formed for the N64. It's hard to find a game this good today and it's even available for download on the Wii.

#95 is Bionic Commando. Games used to have gimmicks that totally worked for them because the technology could really only let you do one good thing at a time. This gimmick was the bionic arm that let you move, collect and kill. The arcade was the most fun for me (I'm an old-schooler) but I rented the NES version back in the day and enjoyed it just as much. I don't ever remember being really good at it, but like Ghost & Goblins or Rush 'n' Attack, it was loads of fun. A new version of this now has gone beyond the rumor phase. Now its a serious game where the main character is so badass that his arm is shipped separately from himself. I know how he feels. I wasn't allowed to have Vera when I flew to and from Kuwait. For those that don't know Vera is my Army issue M-16/M-203 grenade launcher. Think Arnold's weapon of choice in the beginning of Predator. That thing's like something out of Aliens.

I never played #94-93 (Ultima VII) but I did play Ultima Exodus for NES which furthered my desire for RPGs on Consoles. Luckily I'm not the only one who loves turn based sword fights. #92 is Wip3Out or WipeOut 3 or W3p3O3t 3 or something with "three" in it. Defining racer for the PSX and showed high-speed polygon "Kart" racing at its finest. I say "Kart" because there were items to collect during the race to even the odds you fall behind. The AI was always a challenge, except on the slowest speeds, and learning to turn/drift/maneuver was half the fun/difficulty. The music perfectly fit as well. This franchise was so well done it has become a defining graphic powerhouse on new Sony systems, like WipeOut Fusion for PS2 and WipeOut Pure for PSP. I found the PSP version a little hard to control but it just takes getting used to. Where's the PS3 version? In the works, but PSP is waiting patiently for WipeOut Pulse next month. BTW nice Euro techno soundtrack.

I also never played 91 so you're just going to have to go to the website to see what I passed by. I did come across a reference to a new Street Fighter game in the works, creatively titles Street Fighter IV. It should probably be Street Fighter LXXVIII but who's counting. The visuals of the trailer are stunning but I wonder how much of that is game play. It sounds to be a 2D fighter but you've got my vote if they keep the visuals in the "Okami" style. Here's this weeks viral video called Italian Spiderman. Tomorrow I will talk of 90 thru 81. See you next broadcast.

Crouching Human, Hidden Geek

Not since Betamax and VHS have we had to suffer through a format war. If you are a gamer, this makes picking between Xbox 360 and PS3 that much harder. (Let's not even mention the Wii which can't even play DVDs.) Not only are trying to pick a system with better games you are trying to predict the future. If HD-DVD wins MicroSoft can call all the gaming shots and rule from the Death Star they plan to build from the desicated shells of PS3s, and profits from Xboxes. If BluRay can manage to win, backed by Disney and Steven Spielberg, Sony finally gets the glory they lost with Betamax. And, nothing happens to MicroSoft because the Xbox 360 still runs on DVDs, but the add-on HD player just becomes useless, except for the massive library of HD-DVDs people will buy anyway. Luckily I am not a Disney fan and all the movies I like will be on HD-DVD.

Things like the Remastered Star Trek TOS. November 20th, TOS season 1 will go on sale. Aaannnndddd, at the Virgin MegaStore in Times Square, the first 400 people to buy said 10-disc HD-DVD spectacular, for $217.99, will get a free Tribble and a poster. Okay that's not the story. The best part is the first 120 (of the original 400) get a free Toshiba HD-DVD valued at $299. (You also still get a Tribble and a Poster.) I don't see BlueRay doing any such thing. If BluRay fails does this mean the end of PlayStation line? Or will a PS4 still be in the works? Would there even be a point for another Xbox? Maybe as a "worst case scenario" for Sony they could team up with SEGA and have a joint console release, a SEGA reGenesis Station. Just a thought.

With the three (3) consoles out (four if you still count the PS2) to choose from each have the own benefits and defects. An astute writer has 27 ideas game companies could do to improve themselves and help the gaming comunity in general. The writer paints an ominous picture of gaming that is overkill in my book, but many good points are raised. I keep coming back to issues with the PS3. The PS2 was released before the Xbox and the Xbox turned out to be a technical marvel for gaming. This time around the PS3 came after the Xbox 360, and it is the technical wonder. You wouldn't recognize it, though, due to the lack of games. In Sony's defense, the PS2 took a little time to come into its own because developers didn't understand the architecture at first. The same thing is happening, now. MicroSoft built an easy system to program for (on DVD's 8.5 GB no less) and the PS3 seems practically inscrutible to all but Sony themselves, but only because it is so advanced developers haven't figured it out yet. Sony could meet them part way and help train them, then some one can come up with a game worthy of BluRay's 50 GB. That would be a game, like Grand Theft Auto IV should be. They have started a new advertising campaign, so maybe they are on their slow turn around, like the Titanic trying to avoid an iceberg.

I went to my local comicbook store, something everyone should do at least once a week. Indulge yourself, with a superhero comic or some cards. The current issues of Iron Man and Submariner as well as a one-shot X-Men title called "Messiah Complex" and a Marvel Mythos title for the Fantastic Four. The Marvel Mythos is interesting, as they take the origin stories of their Superhero titles and give them what looks like an airbrushed overhaul in the retelling. Very nice. I also picked up some Magic cards to see where we are today with series; a pack of Ninth Edition Core (white border), pack of Saviors Of Kamigawa (got a foil), and a starter of the newest series Lorwyn (sounds like a lost land of Middle Earth).

When ever you go to a comicbook store be sure to talk to the proprietor, they tend to be fountains of hidden wisdom, or at least "knows a friend" who "knows a friend" to get you the exact comicbook you need. The pearl of wisdom I gleaned today was, "if you're writing a blog, you're a geek." No doubt a facet of a larger truth. Issue 7 of Geek Monthly (yes, there is a magazine) has an interview with Masi Oka (Hiro of Heroes). In it he says, "A geek is someone who is passionate about something. It can be about anything. It can be about musicals. It can be about computers. It can be about our show. And you can be passionate about more than one thing. I would rather be passionate about something than apathetic about everything. To be Geek is to be human." My passion leads me to share with others the true nature of what makes a geek a geek. I wish to expand on Masi Oka's description to say that geeks are passionate in one or two or more areas of expertise, but that geeks also have some peripheral or tangential knowledge of things outside their realm. You may be obsessed with Musicals, but odds are you also know the names of the people who wrote and acted in the best broadway musicals, as well as a working grasp of Movie Musicals (and those that populate them), books about musicals (and histories of people involved), TV musicals, play an instrument, have a mathematical background, and (if a fan of video games) play musical games, or a music mixing program on a computer. Hypothetical of course.

This one goes out to EmpTass. The PSP will be getting the new Star Wars Force Unleashed game, too, with extra gameplay the console version doesn't have. Sweet. That's all I got tonight, except I heard there is a plan for a Castle Wolfenstein movie. Keep your wireless charged and standby for my next broadcast.