Kevin's Musings

I’ve been collecting some Stephen King themed comic books. I was in Midtown Comics early in the week to pick up the latest issues of Dark Tower Treachery and The Stand and saw they had passes for a sneak preview to the Mutant Chronicles movie. This isn’t a movie (or book) I had heard of, but I like a sci-fi / action / mutant film as much as the next guy so I picked up a pass. Despite yesterday being colder than teats on a Wiccan,  the missus and I ventured over to the theater after work. Happily the weren’t making folks stand outside. I picked us up some soft tacos from Chipotle while we waited (which were mmmm tasty!) and finally we were seated. I even got a free copy of the Mutant Chronicles book (which some Amazon readers found to be pretty atrocious, according to the reviews).

The crowd was pretty small for a sneak preview (probably due to the cold). One of the cast members was in attendance. We were told the movie was scheduled for an April release date, that the movie was still a work in progress, and that the final print would be about 12 minutes shorter than the one we were watching. The movie had some relatively big names: Ron Perlman, John Malkovich (small role), and Thomas Jane. Overall, I would say the movie looked slick, was decently written and acted, had a pretty interesting story, and good special effects. While it probably won’t win any awards, I wouldn’t have been disappointed if I had actually paid to see it. If you are a fan of the sci-fi / action / mutant film genre, I would recommend it.

I went to pick up my notebook PC a couple nights ago. I gripped it by the front corner and I guess with the weight of the machine I squeezed it a bit to hard right where the hard drive is. This combined with the running machine squeezed the hard drive and I heard a lovely scraping sound and wa-la, I crashed  the hard drive; they system doesn’t even see that there is a drive there. It doesn’t seem like it should be possible, but I guess the notebook housing isn’t quite stiff enough and the drive housing is also not quite stiff enough.

Happily, I had somewhat recently backed up most of the important stuff. We lost a few vacation pictures due to my own negligence (I thought I had copied them to the desktop machine) but not very many – most had already made their way to Flickr. I didn’t lose very much at all.

Since the rest of the machine is working more or less correctly, I just ordered a replacement hard drive. Like a few other million people I had already downloaded the Windows 7 beta. I had been planning to install it anyway, but had been putting the installation off – I decided “no time like the present”. I am writing this post from Firefox installed on Windows 7. I haven’t used Windows 7 long enough to form any lasting opinions, but, in general, it seems nice enough. I was able to easily restore my backups and get the missus’ iPhone syncing with iTunes like nothing had changed. My only hesitation with the Windows 7 beta is i don’t know what the “upgrade path” is. What happens when the beta times out? Will I have to do a completely re-install? How much will it cost me to upgrade to Windows 7 when it is actually released and will that require a complete reinstall? These are questions I just don’t have answers for a Microsoft doesn’t seem to be saying much about these things.

For backup software on the laptop I’ve been using Personal-Backup. It is actually very nice software and it’s free. On the desktop machine I have been using Handy Backup (not free, but somewhat reasonably priced – note this is Handy Backup from HandyBackup.net, not HandyBackup.com which is different software). I really like Handy Backup but I think for free Personal-Backup should meet most people’s needs. Note: both pieces of software are for file backups, not for “system images”. In any case, I have now used both programs to save my bacon. Thanks backup software!

Thanks to Netflix “watch instantly” on the Xbox 360 (or TiVo, pick your flavor) we started watching the recent-ish BBC show Doctor Who. We’ve watched the the first half dozen episodes of season one and are enjoying it so far.

Circuit City is (not very surprisingly) closing its doors. They started their “going out of business” sale where everything is a wopping 10% off (and a few things at a slightly greater discount). I stopped by the closest Circuit City expecting to find, well, nothing of interest. The place was packed. It appeared people were snapping up stuff left and right like 10% off of retail prices were the second coming. There were a few older 360 and Wii games I was looking for, but they were all marked at full retail. I can find better deals in moments by ordering online (which is probably why they are going out of business). Last night I was looking at a 7.1 amplifier which I can pick up at Amazon for about $210, or $170 if I am willing to buy “open box” (both prices are “shipped”). Circuit had the exact same model on the shelf, selling it open box (likely missing the manual and remote). The clerk informed me that the receiver cost $315 minus 10%. I confirmed “this is the price for a this non-boxed receiver?” which he confirmed that it was. Amazing. I looked for a few more minutes and found nothing – but even if I had, I would not have waited in the insanely long lines. Honestly, I doubt I will miss Circuit City.

Since I bought my “replacement” Xbox 360 last week I have been mulling over the “extended warranty” business. Not really so much an “if” question (all 360’s need the extended warranty) but “who’s”. It was between the Best Buy extended warranty at $40 and the Microsoft “service contract” at $54. I did some reading about these, and the deciding factor was that with Best Buy, if your unit breaks outside the manufacturer warranty, your extended warranty ends when they give you a replacement. With Microsoft, they will keep replacing the system until the warranty expiration date. Best Buy “might” just give you an immediate replacement when you brought in the dead system, but I think for the extra $14, the extended time on the warranty is more important. So, I called Microsoft to purchase their extended warranty. The call was time consuming as expected. At the beginning of the call the phone support person pretended not to have any idea what I was talking about . This may be because he calls it a “service contract” and I was saying “extended warranty” but ultimately he was able to write up the paperwork to put the contract into place – I had a similar experience when I bought my previous Microsoft 360 “service contract” – they tried to discourage the purchase. Hmm. So, should my 360 have any issues between now and January 2012, I can feel safe that it is covered

For our anniversary, I think I mentioned that I got Wii Fit for us. We aren’t using it enough yet, but it is a lot of fun and can actually provide a reasonably good workout if you use it right. Also for our anniversary the missus got me Professor Layton and the Curious Village for the Nintendo DS. This is a bizarre, very European feeling adventure / puzzle game with the emphasis on puzzles. Everyone you talk to in the game wants you to solve a puzzle. Some puzzles have you moving a couple matchsticks to transform one picture into another, other puzzle have you moving chickens and wolves across a stream. We’ve all done these brain-teaser puzzles, but this game collects something like 130 puzzles in one package and wraps them in a story. I have completed about 25 of the puzzles so far. The puzzle difficulties ranges from easy to devious. I am playing it during my commutes and am having a great time with it. All of the puzzles have hints, but to get a hint you must find and use “hint coins” which are in relatively short supply. I can easily imagine almost anyone of any age who enjoys puzzles would just love this game. The game imposes no time limits that I have encountered so you can take your time and think about the solutions.

This missus had trouble finding the game locally (the local Gamestop told her it was discontinued) but it is currently available on Amazon. If you have a Nintendo DS, I would put this game in the “must have” category.

We had a pretty quiet weekend. I played some Saints Row 2 and we watched a few movies and DVDs. We watched the first disc of season one of Love American Style. It is dated but humorous. We started watching Arrested Development Season 2, funny as always. We went to the theater and saw Gran Torino and Slumdog Millionaire, both of which were really, really good – we strongly recommend both movies. We are currently watching Hancock (good so far). All in all, it has been a nice, relaxing weekend.

On slightly sadder news, my 360 started locking up a few days ago. It had problems loading some games and other games would lock up during gameplay. I thought it was still under extended warranty, but it seems like I let the extended warranty lapse. Since the cost to repair the system is pretty close to just buying a new Xbox 360 Arcade, I decided to just pick up a 360 Arcade.  The new unit has the added benefits of having an HDMI video port and with the Jasper chipset it uses quite a bit less power. I will probably still get an extended warranty for it, as I still lack confidence that even the latest 360’s are completely reliable. I may try to repair my previous 360 – most 360’s just have heating problems which are pretty easy to fix.

I was so tempted to get this shirt.

The missus and I celebrated our dozen year anniversary and New Years by having a nice weekend of The Office (we’ve re-watched through season three) and Arrested Development (we re-watched season one). Both shows were just as funny with this viewing. This is at least the second time we’ve seen these The Office episodes, but it was fun to watch them serially. This is at least the third or fourth time we’ve seen Arrested Development and we’re eagerly anticipating re-watching seasons two and three. I firmly believe Arrested Development is one of the best comedies ever aired and I continue to be sad it ended after only three seasons, but I guess it is better to end something in its prime than to stretch the joke too far. There continues to be talk of an Arrested Development movie — we’ll see.

We also went out to see the movie Four Christmases which was a lot of fun. Sure, it isn’t the best or funniest Christmas comedy, but Vince Vaughn is always good for a laugh. If you haven’t seen it, there is always Netflix – I’m sure it will be on DVD in no time.

Remember, if you want to make fun of GW while he’s still on office, you only about 15 days to do it. Get together with friends and family for the inauguration to celebrate GW’s official departure! It will be like New Years came twice in 2009. Even if you don’t like Obama, surely everybody believes things will have to get better once he’s gone.

A few days after Christmas I stood in line at Nintendo World to pick up Wii Fit as an anniversary present for our 12th anniversary. I allowed the missus to open it a couple days early and we used it last night and I am a touch sore tonight. The regular workout stuff seems straightfoward but the “games” take a bit of finesse that I haven’t quite mastered yet. We are looking forward to using it more.

Last summer I spent a pretty huge number of hours playing the heck out of Grand Theft Auto IV (GTA4). I had played and loved the very first Grand Theft Auto game, but never got into GTA3, GTA: Vice City, or GTA: San Andreas. These were initially Playstation 2 (PS2) games and I didn’t have a PS2 at the time. By the time these games made it to the Xbox, the graphics and control seemed outdated to me, so I just never got into them. The first open world sandbox game I really got into was Crackdown, and I loved Crackdown. I anxiously await the announcement of Crackdown 2.

GTA4 was an incredibly fun game. It had a long, interesting story. The location (a slightly smaller version) of New York, er, Liberty City was very well realized. The characters were well crafted and the game had a good sense of humor. The gameplay had a few minor flaws, notably the lack in in-mission checkpoints, but you could really immerse yourself in the world. Sure, you played a criminal, but I didn’t (usually) go out of my way to be a thug to the citizens of Liberty City. The story-driven nature of the game along with the feeling of actually living in the city gave the game a sense of realism. I am looking forward to playing the upcoming downloadable content The Lost and the Damned.

There is no disguising that the Saints Row series are GTA-knockoff games.  They came in early in the Xbox360 life to fill the void that existed because GTA4 had a long development cycle. I didn’t play Saints Row (SR1), but everybody I know that played it really enjoyed it. At the time, I think the general consensus was that it wasn’t as good a game as the  GTA games, but it had nice graphics and was a lot of fun. Since I hadn’t played SR1, I wasn’t initially going to get Saints Row 2 (SR2). A friend admitted it wasn’t GTA4 but said it was a really solid game, so I went ahead and put it on my “Christmas Wish List” and behold, it appeared under my Christmas Tree (12 inches tall and glass, on the dining room table), thanks to my generous sister.

I am now about 5 or 6 hours into SR2 and have played enough to form impressions. Even from the very start, I could tell they weren’t trying to directly compete with GTA4. The game is far less realistic, far more “create havoc and mayhem” than GTA4. It often seems to subscribe to the blow sh*t up ethic of Mercenaries 2. SR2 is far less story driven, but there is a story. To play the story elements you are required to do lots and lots of crazy activities of questionable morals. I’ve seen people say SR2 is video game junk food compared to GTA4’s fine meal; both are great for different reasons and desirable at different times. This analogy seems “close enough”. 

Either way, I plan to play and finish SR2 – I am having a lot of fun with it.