Graham’s March on Twitter

Ok!  I havnt actually updated this thing since the oscars, which was over a month away and I forgot to do this mainly because I well, forgot.

So here it is, March via Twitter

1:49 PM Mar 1st – “Well done Canada….now go back to being quiet”

My first tweet of the month. It was basically my way of telling Canada to shut the hell up about the Olympics already.Does anyone even remember them anymore? No. I can honestly say I didnt even watch one full event. Still, Canada put on a good show (from what i DID see) and fair play to them for that

9:20 PM Mar 5th -  “DAM, my ps3 has crashed on every new game ive got for the thing….not good”

I’m trying to remember what game this was. I think It may have been Heavy Rain. Yes! It was. I think ‘Splosion Man crashed as well as Uncharted 2 in February. Not cool Sony.

FREEZE!

9:34 PM Mar 8th – “Just completed Bioshock 2 (nice ending) which raised my gamerscore to 10,000……here’s to the next 10″

This was particularly epic for me, it means Ive completed 10 games fully!  Which is lies, because I’ve completed about 20-30 games part the way through. Anyway, I’m still striving towards my first PS3 platinum trophy, but its a nice milestone to reach nevertheless

Only Joking....I'll never get this one

10:34 PM Mar 10th – “ただ肉下さい”

for those who dont speak Japanese – it says “Free Meat Please”…..’Nuff Said

All I really want

3:16 PM Mar 14th – “right, lets see what all this FF13 hubbub is about then shall we?”

NEW GAME!  yes!  Final Fantasy XIII. Ive since completed it and found it to be a very good game however a lot annoyed me about it (mainly the leveling up system) but the superb visuals and quite charming story (despite some terrible pacing) made it worthwhile.

Coming at you like a smack in the face

6:35 PM Mar 16th – AC/DC bitches!!!! (@ 京セラドーム大阪 w/ 2 others) http://4sq.com/5wwZ1p

Oh Hell Yea!  Probably the best gig ive ever been to. AC/DC rocked Osaka for a good 2 hours and it was a spectacular show. They were definitly a band I needed to see before they split-up/fall over and break a hip.  Great stuff.

Just.....WOW

11:30 AM Mar 19th – “Last class at Kamisho elementary…..first time I’m properly sad to be leaving an elementary school..”

I was properly sad. his was the first school I really felt like nothing could go wrong at. Every class was a hit, I loved the teachers and the kids, and the vice-principle didn’t get pissed off when he caught me playing super metroid during down time. Good times.

I'm particularly fond of the photo bomber in the back

2:57 PM Mar 25th – “I know coming up with character names can be hard at times , but really?! #lazynames http://twitpic.com/1ari0b”

Just Priceless. I came accross this amazing name when I was playing Miles Edgeworth Perfect Prosecutor Ace Investigations. Great game. Not quite Phoenix Wright, but close enough.

Thats right, he's dead....

12:19 PM Mar 31st – “That was fucking AWESOME!!! #steeldragon2000″

Steel Dragon 2000, the longest roller coaster in the world. It was brilliant. Its up in Nagashima Spa Land by Nagoya. Not a great deal there and the whole place seems a bit behind the excitement of other parks, but it has two great coasters , the aforementioned “Steel Dragon 2000″ and the arse bludgeoning “White Cyclone.”(Tallest and longest wooden coaster outside of the US) It was a great day, and Id love to do it again.

It's loooooooooooooong

Oscar! What a guy!

So!  With little more than an an hour and a half till the “Christmas of movies”. I’m going to give my predictions and also my wishes for the awards.

Here’s the deal, What I THINK will be in RED

What I WANT will be in BLUE

If the both co-inside , it’ll be in PURPLE

When the winners are announced, I’ll post this :  WINNER

Best picture – Ive chosen 3 best pictures for what i WANT because I would honestly love for any of these to win
Avatar (James Cameron and Jon Landau, producers)
District 9 (Peter Jackson and Carolynne Cunningham, producers)
An Education (Finola Dwyer and Amanda Posey, producers)
The Hurt Locker (Kathryn Bigelow, Mark Boal, Nicolas Chartier and Greg Shapiro, producers) WINNER
Inglourious Basterds (Lawrence Bender, producer)
Precious (Lee Daniels, Sarah Siegel-Magness and Gary Magness, producers)
A Serious Man (Joel Coen and Ethan Coen, producers)
Up in the Air (Daniel Dubiecki, Ivan Reitman and Jason Reitman, producers)
The Blind Side (Gil Netter, Andrew A Kosove and Broderick Johnson, producers)
Up (Jonas Rivera, producer)

Directing
Avatar (James Cameron)
The Hurt Locker (Kathryn Bigelow) WINNER
Inglourious Basterds (Quentin Tarantino)
Up in the Air (Jason Reitman)
Precious (Lee Daniels)

Actress in a supporting role
Mo’Nique in Precious WINNER
Vera Farmiga in Up in the Air
Penélope Cruz in Nine
Anna Kendrick in Up in the Air
Maggie Gyllenhaal in Crazy Heart

Actor in a supporting role
Christoph Waltz in Inglourious Basterds WINNER
Christopher Plummer in The Last Station
Matt Damon in Invictus
Stanley Tucci in The Lovely Bones
Woody Harrelson in The Messenger

Actress in a leading role
Meryl Streep in Julie & Julia
Sandra Bullock in The Blind Side WINNER
Helen Mirren in The Last Station
Gabourey Sidibe in Precious
Carey Mulligan in An Education

Actor in a leading role
Morgan Freeman in Invictus
Jeff Bridges in Crazy Heart WINNER
George Clooney in Up in the Air
Colin Firth in A Single Man
Jeremy Renner in The Hurt Locker

Animated feature film
Up (Pete Docter and Bob Peterson) WINNER
The Princess and the Frog (Ron Clements and John Musker)
Coraline (Henry Selick)
Fantastic Mr Fox (Wes Anderson)
The Secret of Kells (Tomm Moore)

Foreign language film
Ajami (Scandar Copti and Yaron Shani, Israel)
A Prophet (Jacques Audiard, France)
The Secret of Her Eyes (Juan Jose Campanella, Argentina) WINNER
The White Ribbon (Michael Haneke, Germany)
The Milk of Sorrow (Claudia Llosa, Peru)

Writing (adapted screenplay)
District 9 (Neill Blomkamp and Terri Tatchell)
An Education (Nick Hornby)
Precious (Geoffrey Fletcher) WINNER
Up in the Air (Jason Reitman and Sheldon Turner)
In the Loop (Jesse Armstrong, Simon Blackwell, Armando Iannucci and Tony Roche)

Writing (original screenplay)
The Hurt Locker (Mark Boal) WINNER
Inglourious Basterds (Quentin Tarantino)
A Serious Man (Joel and Ethan Coen)
Up (Pete Docter and Bob Petersen)
The Messenger (Alessandro Camon and Oren Moverman)

Art direction
Avatar (art direction: Rick Carter and Robert Stromberg; set decoration: Kim Sinclair) WINNER
The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus (art direction: Dave Warren and Anastasia Masaro; set decoration: Caroline Smith)
Nine (art direction: John Myhre; set decoration: Gordon Sim)
Sherlock Holmes (art direction: Sarah Greenwood; set decoration: Katie Spencer)
The Young Victoria (art direction: Patrice Vermette; set decoration: Maggie Gray)

Cinematography
Avatar (Mauro Fiore) WINNER
Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince (Bruno Delbonnel)
The Hurt Locker (Barry Ackroyd)
Inglourious Basterds (Robert Richardson)
The White Ribbon (Christian Berger)

Costume design
Bright Star (Janet Patterson)
Coco Before Chanel (Catherine Leterrier)
The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus (Monique Prudhomme)
Nine (Colleen Atwood)
The Young Victoria (Sandy Powell) WINNER

Documentary (feature)
Burma VJ (Anders Østergaard and Lise Lense-Møller)
The Cove (Louie Psihoyos and Fisher Stevens) WINNER
Food, Inc (Robert Kenner and Elise Pearlstein)
The Most Dangerous Man in America: Daniel Ellsberg and the Pentagon Papers (Judith Ehrlich and Rick Goldsmith)
Which Way Home (Rebecca Cammisa)

Documentary (short subject)
China’s Unnatural Disaster: The Tears of Sichuan Province (Jon Alpert and Matthew O’Neill)
The Last Campaign of Governor Booth Gardner (Daniel Junge and Henry Ansbacher)
The Last Truck: Closing of a GM Plant (Steven Bognar and Julia Reichert)
Music by Prudence (Roger Ross Williams and Elinor Burkett) WINNER
Rabbit à la Berlin (Bartek Konopka and Anna Wydra)

Film editing
Avatar (Stephen Rivkin, John Refoua and James Cameron)
District 9 (Julian Clarke)
The Hurt Locker (Bob Murawski and Chris Innis) WINNER
Inglourious Basterds (Sally Menke)
Precious (Joe Klotz)

Makeup
Il Divo (Aldo Signoretti and Vittorio Sodano)
The Young Victoria (Jon Henry Gordon and Jenny Shircore)
Star Trek (Barney Burman, Mindy Hall and Joel Harlow) WINNER

Music (original score)
Avatar (James Horner)
Fantastic Mr Fox (Alexandre Desplat)
Up (Michael Giacchino) WINNER
The Hurt Locker (Marco Beltrami and Buck Sanders)
Sherlock Holmes (Hans Zimmer)

Music (original song)
Almost There, from The Princess and the Frog, by Randy Newman
Down in New Orleans, from The Princess and the Frog, by Randy Newman
Loin de Paname, from Paris 36, by Reinhardt Wagner and Frank Thomas
Take It All, from Nine, by Maury Yeston
The Weary Kind, from Crazy Heart, by Ryan Bingham and T Bone Burnett WINNER

Short film (animated)
French Roast (Fabrice O Joubert)
Granny O’Grimm’s Sleeping Beauty (Nicky Phelan and Darragh O’Connell)
Logoramam (Nicolas Schmerkin) WINNER
The Lady and the Reaper (Javier Recio Gracia)
A Matter of Loaf and Death (Nick Park)

Short film (live action)
The Door (Juanita Wilson and James Flynn)
Instead of Abracadabra (Patrik Eklund and Mathias Fjellström)
Kavi (Gregg Helvey)
Miracle Fish (Luke Doolan and Drew Bailey)
The New Tenants (Joachim Back and Tivi Magnusson) WINNER

Sound editing
Avatar (Christopher Boyes and Gwendolyn Yates Whittle)
The Hurt Locker (Paul NJ Ottosson) WINNER
Inglourious Basterds (Wylie Stateman)
Star Trek (Mark Stoeckinger and Alan Rankin)
Up (Michael Silvers and Tom Myers)

Sound mixing
Avatar (Christopher Boyes, Gary Summers, Andy Nelson and Tony Johnson)
The Hurt Locker (Paul NJ Ottosson and Ray Beckett) WINNER
Inglourious Basterds (Michael Minkler, Tony Lamberti and Mark Ulano)
Star Trek (Anna Behlmer, Andy Nelson and Peter J Devlin)
Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen (Greg P Russell, Gary Summers and Geoffrey Patterson)

Visual effects
Avatar (Joe Letteri, Stephen Rosenbaum, Richard Baneham and Andrew R Jones) WINNER
District 9 (Dan Kaufman, Peter Muyzers, Robert Habros and Matt Aitken)
Star Trek (Roger Guyett, Russell Earl, Paul Kavanagh and Burt Dalton)

Not too bad . I got 15 out of the 24 right , better than usual to be honest!  And that’s a wrap!

Graham’s February on Twitter

OK!!  I’m gonna start a new feature on my blog where I’m gonna look back at some of my twitter posts from the last month which I feel have defined my month and give a wee comment on them, I always like going back over crap I’ve said in the past and so now I’m gonna start to do it on a monthly basis (if i remember)

so : without further Ado – February

10:51 PM Feb 2nd – “holy flip, Nathan Drake just said a line at exactly the same time as I did…….just wow “

First tweet of the month, I spend a lot of time this month sampling Uncharted 2 and Nathan Drake’s one liners were one of the highlights , unfortunately I can’t remember what the like was that we both said. (probably one of his less witty lines)

1:08 PM Feb 3rd – “wait. NO Noms for 500 days of summer? Gah! Not impressed. Everything else is fair enough and bumping best picture to 10 is awesome. GO UP!  “

Kinda speaks for itself this one, Oscars nominations were out and I wasn’t happy, speaking of which I still have 3 movies left to watch in the best picture race before the big event on Sunday. (I shall post my predictions before the ceremony, for no real reason)

One of my favourites of 2009 cruelly snubbed

12:34 PM Feb 10th – “cold rice can fuck off  “

This is a recurring problem, I get my lunch in school about 10-15 minutes before the kids do, therefore I must leave it sitting out before I can take it to the classroom and eat with the kids, needless to say the rice (any anything else that’s warm) becomes cold and horrible, yet it has to be eaten!

Probably cold

11:44 AM Feb 13th  -  “The country is called the United Kingdom! Not Great Britain! Get it right Canada! #olympics “

I was annoyed that (like every Olympics) N. Ireland is somewhat disenfranchised from the games. We do have the right to represent either country, but it still doesn’t seem right that the country isn’t mentioned in any way. Anyway, this was one of only two tweets of the Winter Olympics…..I didn’t care much for it, so balls to it.

Quatchi is blatantly the best

7:11 PM Feb 15th – “Bioshock 2 , basically more Bioshock, but bugger me , playing in the dark is creeping me the fuck right out…also, hard mode is haaaaaaaard.”

Second new game of the month, Bioshock 2. I still haven’t finished the dam thing because to be honest, I’m not as impressed with it as I was the first, anyway I’ll let people know when I do finally clock it (P.S. Its hard).

These things are bastards

2:54 PM Feb 20th – “Windows 7 Professional here I come!”

Yay!!! I finally updated my RC copy of Windows 7 to a full version……it’s much the same.

10:09 PM Feb 25th    – “First impressions of Heavy Rain are good, little things influence the story in subtle ways, but I shoulda made the kid do his homework. “

Third new game, Heavy Rain, was bought on a bit of a whim, this I’m also still playing through, but it is a roaring success so far.

Taking care of the Kids

8:45 AM Feb 26th   “20ish foreigners coming to my school today to learn about Japanese life, and the staff are under the impression i can speak Japanese. yabai “

The school I’m working at decided to do this.They came from the center in Rinku-town. Before lunch the kids taught the foreigners all about Japanese games and afterward the foreigners told the kids about their countries, after which we all made and ate mochi. It was all good fun and it was nice not being the only foreigner in the school for a while. It gave the kids someone else to pick on.

I put foreigner and Japan into Google image search and this came up....

2:57 AM Feb 28th   “Go the emerald!!! Fuck you rosey!!! Whooooo!!!!   ”

My last tweet of the month , The tweet refers to Ireland’s epic win over England in the rugby, I was in Murphy’s when it went down and the atmosphere was pretty awesome and the result was the icing on it all.

Go Bowe Go!,

So there you go. Its more for me than you, but always nice to have a record.

Seeing Red (Rings (of Death))

Here I am!  Not dead or nothing! Here on a Friday to tell you about the week in general, because I do enough mirco-bloging on Twitter and Facebook.

The weekend started generally quiet with not an awful not going on. I played some games (as usual) and drank some beer (as usual) and all was well with the world. On Friday I decided to join a friend of mine, Lenny, online for my first ever game of Heroes of Newerth. This is basically a mod of Warcraft III, similar to Defense of the Ancients which was quite popular years ago when I was still a Uni child. The game lets you choose a hero and run around killing other heroes, leveling up and getting new skills as you go. There are around 689321§4890 heroes to choose from, but I’ve been playing with Nightwreinger Bow Woman (with skeletons) , as I was told she was a good starter. I did enjoy my game, speaking to my team-mates over Ventrilo and ultimately winning (probably the best bit).

Sunday came and I went off to a mates birthday party where fun happy talky times were had (mostly about games) and more beer was consumed. All in all I think it was quite a productive weekend.

I was back to school on Monday and another fun filled week of Elementary school awaited me. To be quite honest with you , I’m knackered now, but I was successfully able t make all classes go well without any major cock-ups or crying incidents. (Go me)

My Xbox....RIP

The Low-light of the week had to be the Xbox problem. When I mention that, any Xbox player should know what I’m talking about. The Red Ring Of DEATH(RROD)  I dont know why its always death. I mean, blue screen of deeeaaath! red ring of deeaaaath! Angel of Deeeaaath! None of them leave much to the imagination, it’s all death death death. Still, this RROD meant that my Xbox was rendered useless, like a biscuit that’s been left out too long. Hastily, I contacted Xbox service centre in Japan and, as it was RROD, they arranged a replacement unit to be sent to me within 20 days. Hurrah I thought, at least I’ll get it back safe and sound with no crazy charges. So Tuesday I sent the thing off to be exchanged and in the Xbox’s absence I decided to go out and get a PS3 game to fill the gap, this game was Uncharted 2 (despite not having yet completed the first game) which has been hailed by many as the game of the year, so that would keep me going.

On Wednesday I completed the original Uncharted and figured Id give myself a days rest before embarking on the new one. Then, the next day I got a phone call. My Xbox had been fixed and was being delivered that afternoon. I was very skeptical about this, thinking that stuff would be missing , or I’d just have my old one back or something like that, but no!  It arrived, my brand new Xbox, complete with my old hard drive and a months free subscription to gold. I hooked it up and then immediately turned it off again, and started playing Uncharted 2.  Well, i mean, I’m not gonna waste my money!  The Xbox will have to wait a few more days before I start to play it again.

Computer (usually) says no

So that was all fun. What amazed me about this whole incident, isnt the fact that I got my Xbox back in 2 days, it was the fact that I was so sure something was not right because it was ready after 2 days. In the UK, if  something like that happened you would not expect it to be such a smooth and hastle free process. A good mate of mine told me what he expected to arrive yesterday when I informed him it was being delivered, “how much you wanna bet it just comes back with a hammer through it? probably didn’t even bother removing the hammer either.“  Shows beautifully what we Brits expect from out customer service. I couldn’t possibly believe that a two day turnaround could be the case, especially when the man on the phone told me it would take 20 days. Anyway, when all is said and done, I have my Xbox back even though it’s been sidelined, and may be for some time with games like God of War III and Final Fantasy XIII coming out in the next few months.

Anyway, this weekend promises to be quite a big one, with mates from Kyushu coming up for a few days of fun and frolics. Then on Sunday I have a Gig which hopefully wont kill me. Ive also been promised a “special guest” will appear for the weekend in Osaka, so I’m VERY excited to find out who that is.

I’m Back (have been for some time)

So I actually figured I should write a proper entry as opposed to random video game and movie stuff. Though that’ll be a part of it , as always

I went home for christmas new years to much coldness, and despite some original problems with flights and the like, I got home successfully. It was weird being back at home, as it always is. This was actually the first time home in a year, and this also marks the longest time i’ve been away from home.I did get pissed off with people i didn’t know at home very quickly, those being the great british public who lovingly reminded me of why I needed to get the hell out of there in the first place. The lack of pleases and thank yous really pissed me off and more than a couple of times I commented on this to various peoples face, which is really the only way to deal with it I believe. Just made me appreciate Japan more where, even though it may be just a facade, people are generally kinder to their fellow man.

Northern Ireland wasn’t all that bad though, most of the time I spent with my family freezing my ass off. It was good, but I ate way too much, as is the custom. I do love Christmas, its philosophy of eat till you’re ass is full, realise the next day you’ve eaten WAAAY too much and then go out and go it again…..3 or 4 times is a classic one and , as I’m a sucker for the old turkey, potatoes and Shloer combo set. Still. It does mean I got eat some really nice food and not be stuck with a bloody KFC or some nonsense. Here in Japanland KFC seems to have become the food of choice for people at Christmas, I guess they feel like its as close to turkey as they can get without spending a fortune. I wouldn’t enjoy this too much. Saying that, even outside of the traditional dinner I did find myself eating more than my fair share of rubbish. Fish and Chips, Burgers and chip and Domino’s Pizza and chips (well, potato wedges, same difference)

So yea, adventures at home were just really fuelled with food, which I loved, but i reckon I needed at least a 10 mile run every day for the next year to work it off. So…fuck that, I’ll just have to stay fat.

So im back in Japan. Back at school. Im actually in Elementary schools every day now and its been going quite well so far. I thought Id be exhausted being here every day, but I only seem to have 2 or 3 classes a day, so Im sure Ill survive.

In Gaming news, and I have recently finished playing Bayonetta which ill write about later. It was pretty good though, every through all the hype I still found myself being impressed with it, but (with most action games) I wished for a longer experience. I’m also STILL playing through bleeding Blue Dragon. I guess I havn’t played a JRPG for a long time and I forgot how long these things can take.

As for the 250 list i’m getting on with, Im now unto 154 watched. I watched one thats been on a lot of peoples list of greats. Blade Runner. Now, Im not denying it was a good movie. To be honest though, I just couldn’t get into it in a way which made me really enjoy it. Everything was there, and everything was good, but I just never really got lost in it like some of the other brilliant movies I’ve seen recently. Maybe I need another watch through, but I really didn’t like it as much as people have told me I would.

Anyway!  New season of 24 for me tonight in a 4 episode/3 hour long marathon. Ill give my report on it and tell you whats going on. Im expecting this season for Jack Bauer to go to the moon to stop a clan of nuke infused america haters from coming to earth to kill the president, his/her/its advisers and everyone they’ve ever sent an email to. All the time while crying over his dead wife and then reuniting with her in a surprise comeback while his daughter gets herself into more trouble with the aliens strangely attractive bodyguard. Meanwhile I expect  EVERYONE to come back foam the last 7 seasons and, even though theres not enough time, Help Jack with electrical support  from CTFBUICSINBC while he finds new ways of “extorting information.” Your basic 24 fare really.

Seriously though, i wonder how much of that is right.

Movie Review : Avatar

I’d just like to point out before I start that there are 3 bloody versions of this movie out in the cinema it made me actually go to flipping London to watch the dam thing in its “greatest” form.  That being in IMAX 3D. This is also my first experience of either so my review may be biased based on the conditions I underwent. Okay, lets go!

Bloody Hell my head hurts.

Seriously though!  My head hurt. Not the kind of piercing hurt , but a more nulling pain in the pack of my head that kept up its nulling pains for 2 hours. Still!  At least the screen was so big that THERE WAS NO WAY TO ESCAPE THE BLOODY THING WITHOUT LEAVING THE CINEMA (and forfeiting 13 quid).  Still. What I COULD enjoy of this movie I did.

Jake (white) with Jake (blue)

I’m sure if you don’t know the general story by now you’ve been living in a cage in the belly of a Kraken for the past year of so, but I’ll tell you anyway. There’s this guy called Jake Sully, right? and he is on this planet, see? and (being American (if you couldn’t tell by his name)) he wants to bugger up the big blue people (the Na’vi) wandering around the jungle for oil or rocks or something. SO! The military (or whoever) stick him in a big blue suit (controlled by the POWER OF HIS MIND!) and tell him to wander into the jungle to befriend and convince the big blue people into getting off their land.  It’s OBVIOUS where this is going, big blue guy (who isn’t really big OR blue) falls for big blue girl(who IS really big and blue) and tries to save the big blue race, which the military (or whoever) don’t seem to take to and all hell breaks loose. There’s a little more than that (as if you couldnt tell) but if you’re that interested in finding out more , you’d have probably gone to see it already.

Ill be the first to say, I wasn’t a big fan of the main character, I wasn’t convinced of Captain no legs (oh yea, as a human he has no legs, as a big blue man he does) from the start but Dr. Grace Augustine being played by Ripley from the Alien movies more than made up for this. I did think she was great, it was just unfortunate she didn’t get to call anyone a Bitch while holding a flamethrower (which is what we all wanted)

Jake in "Macalania"?

I must then go onto talk about the world of Pandora on which the movie is set. Now!  I know James Cameron says he came up with this 10 years ago or whenever and I believe every word of it, but to me the world seemed like  it was straight out of a Final Fantasy Game. Mainly X (Macalina bears a strong resemblance to the jungles of Pandora at night), but still, it did look impressive. To have come up with, design and create so many creatures and different terrains and the like must have been an arduous task, and it is VERY much appreciated by the viewer. The world jumps out at you (head hurtingly so) and that is something that I did not stop being amazed by the whole film.

The other cool things are the machines, although they seem to be updated versions of stuff you’ve seen in the Alien movies 13-20 year ago. The big battle suit thing is back, this time being an actual battle suit and not just used for lifting shit. Handy. Also back are a nice selection of big flying ships, only here they are against the nice colourful background of Pandora instead of the Alien world which was mostly….uh…..gray.

The other leaps and bounds here are related to the CG of the big blue Na’vi people. They look awesome. Human enough for us to relate and yet alien enough for us to well…know they’re alien (being blue is the big giveaway here). Now, I don’t know if its just me, or just because I don’t know his face that well, but I wasn’t convinced for a second that the big blue avatar of Mr Sully looked like him at all, it WAS him, i know this, but i didn’t see it, maybe because I’m not all there…..seriously. Ripley did though!  Recognised her instantly! Jakey boy did not for me. It didn’t REALLY matter though, because all the Na’vi still looked great, although the freaky hair extension thing did weird me out a bit.

Oh yea!  The hair thing!  Right, so the big blue people have this hair thing, which basically allows them to connect and communicate with animals and trees and the like. It was interesting and made a good plot point, but it did seem a little bit dodgy to me, all this binding with an extension of yourself. Ripley even tells Sully at one point, “Don’t play with that or you’ll go blind.” so there you go.

Why, hello there!

The great thing about Avatar for me was the little things, the creatures that fly around, the nice little touches like the avatars

having extra fingers and the ground lighting up as the walked in the forest. It was this that made the movie really special for me and, even though I found it a little flawed in places, the good heavily outweighed the bad to make this one of the best movies of the year.

AH-HA!!  I just realised big blue people are in Final Fantasy X as well!  These guys !  Honestly! Cameron’s been playing too many video games, methinks!

hmmmm....suspicious....

iDrop, iBreak, iBugger the whole dam thing up

RAWR!  here goes this because I need something to Rage on!.

Mr. iPhone is dying a death. This is not a all helped by the fact that I have dropped him numerous times on his head and his arse, synced, cancelled and generally buggered about with the hard drive and also didn’t put him in a boiler suit at all. The result of all this tomfoolery can be seen here…yes….its pretty buggered. What you DON’T see in this wonderful picture of what the heck I’ve done to it, is the fact that the top button (lock button) no longer works, making locking the dammed thing a pain in the ass. Also not currently working are the silent button (kind of an important thing in Japan, as you’re reminded everyone on buses trains and everything else to TURN OFF YOUR BLOODY PHONE) and the volume buttons.(EDIT: The volume buttons do work if the screen is locked and the iphone itself is upside down – handy, eh?) I did wonder why my alarm was not as loud as usual this morning, but it woke me up just the same so no real worries on that particular front

All this comes at a time for me when I have no money whatsoever and now I’m basically going to go over all the reasons why a new phone is impossible in the foreseeable future.

Solution 1)  Get a replacement – Straight forward enough. The first time I went to the store , the only thing that was wrong with it was the lock button and I was told that It wouldn’t cost a lot to fix. Huzzah I though!  Lets get it of in a few days I gleed. Unfortunately Mr. iPhone then took a tumble off the edge of Mrs Table (who he has been having a dubious elision with (more on that later)) Because of the Table incident, I was unable to get a normal cheap upgrade as a nice big crack had appeared on the screen, meaning It would cost me over 2 man (150 quid) to repair. Balls to that! I figured I’d try my luck at solution 2.

Solution 2) Upgrade to the 3GS! – Now here I thought was a decent enough idea, pay a little more a month than I’m currently playing for another 2 years (all of which i will be in Japan) and get the new 3gs with its ability to point north. Another cunning plan, eh? Mrs store clerk said yes!  This was great!  I was not only gonna get it repaired but upgraded as well, happy days!  After filling out numerous forms and all that bollocks the time came for me to pass over my foreigner registration card for a check. I thought all would be well,but cock up it did. My Card is only valid until July 2011, the same as my visa.  Because i only had around 20 months left on the card I was unable to get a new 2 year contract. Boo! I said! Boo to you and your crappy systems!  ARGH I shouted ARGH to you and your wiley ways!  GOSDGAHJDSG I screamed….well, you get the point. I wasn’t happy, which lead me to…….

Solution 3)  Pay for a new phone……8 man (600 quid) Stuff that

Solution 4) Get a different phone……no

Solution 5 ) Wait and hope for the best – This is what I eventually settled on.

So I’ve waited and kept my iPhone clinging desperately to the hope that either the repair price will go down or they’ll offer a one year contract with the iPhone, neither or which are likely to happen anytime soon. In this waiting time, I’ve managed to reintroduce Mr iPhone to Mrs Table and create more jaw dropping cracks which prompt every person who sees the dam thing to say “its broken” I know its broken!! There’s a ruddy great crack down the centre of it for goodness sake!

ANYWAY!  thus ends the ballad of my bloody iPhone!  Let it be a lesson you any of ye who have one!  Put it in a case, and keep it away from naughty tables.

Last Days at Tottori

I’m approaching my last days in my current High School (Tottori) and I’m finally getting to do a “graham” class. i.e, one I get to do myself. I’m not doing my own though, I’m actually stealing a cool Mario Kart-esq game from a website…huzzah
I hope it firkin’ works in this school. It did in the last one well enough, however, that was a nice school where the kids are generally quiet. This one could be quite different.

In other news I’ve gotten back into Blue Dragon for the Xbox, a game I started a bit ago, but just never got into. Its decent enough, but hasn’t really enthralled me as much as other RPGs recently such as the quite awesome Lost Odyssey.

Other than stuff like this, I’ve only got a few more days here before jet off to the UK for my awesome Christmas holiday. This probably wont leave me much time for work/movies/gaming but it should be good anyway. I am very much looking forward to it.

Live for the Weekend (as usual)

Friday is here!  Happy Days!  The weeks been going all right, i guess. I’ve been having a kind of boring week in school simply because I’ve been in Junior High School all week. This leads to no interesting classes for me to participate in. Junior High school classes have me standing there and reading words from books. Just an endless list of vocabulary. Every so often I get great words to do, like MASTER! or BRITISH!  but often its not so fun words. Sucks really, but what can you do, this is the job, and I’m making money from it.

Its not that I don’t want to do better things with my time here, I do! I just don’t seem to get the chance at this school. Next semester I’m moving to an Elementary School, incidentally, one I was at last year, so I’m going to have to come up with new ways to keep the kids entertained. Not terribly looking forward to it, but its only for a few months and then I’m back on the JHS easy train.

This weekend I have a whole lot of nothing planned. Friday I have a mates birthday (Hey Cari!) and then band practice as usual on Sunday, but that’s about it.

Chris also recently turned me onto a great little game for the iPhone called Song Summoners which has been keeping me amused the past few days. The game is a tactical RPG and uses your iPhone’s music collection to create soldiers which you use to fight. The great part is that if you listen to the songs you’ve chosen for your soldiers, they level up and become stronger. Needless to say I will probably be listening to the same 5-10 songs over and over again ’till i get the game done.  I’ve only been playing for a bit, but at the start of the game, you’re introduced to a character called the Soul Master who says things like “AHHH” and “WAOH!” and “GET DOWN!” He is awesome and the spit of a certain godfather of soul who left us some years ago. Pity he doesn’t hang out with you very much.

Movie related, and I FINALLY got to see Inglourious Basterds. It was indeed awesome and maybe I’ll do a write up on it, but its been a few days now and haven’t got round to it yet, so maybe it won’t happen. I’ve also been watching some more films on my Top 250 list challenge. For those who don’t know, I’ve made it my mission to get all the movies on the top 250 list watched before September next year. It started well, figuring Id get all the ones near the bottom of the list done first. Not a great plan, as the bottom 10-20 of that list changes more often that David Bowie. So the plan has changed somewhat to just watching whatever I want. The last few days have been Some Like it Hot, Million Dollar Baby, Into the Wild and Planet of the Apes. All of which I recumbent, especially Into the Wild, I enjoyed that very very much.

So that’s all for today!  To the Weekend!!!!

Game Review : Assassin’s Creed II

Box ArtAssassin's Creed II

Now, this is a game Ive been waiting for since i got to the “what the hell” moment at the end of the first game, I wont ruin anything, but heck, it was a doozey. The game did suffer a bit from being stupidly repetitive but it was still a very fun game. The sequel is finally out and what we’ve got is exactly what we’ve waited for, it is indeed version 2.0.

You play Desmond, fresh from escaping the Organisation Abstergo (who held you captive in the first game) you’re whisked away to a secret base with Danny Wallace and some other woman and promptly put into the chair of the Animus 2.0, a machine capable of allowing you to relive your ancestors memories. Where last time we had Altair during the Crusades, this time, we’re transported to the world of Renaissance Italy where we take on the mantle of Ezio, an young man in training to hunt down and murder anyone involved with the killing of his family some years ago.

Sit back and relax

Basically what it boils down to you’re running around killing certain people on a list,  but not really, your actually sitting in a seat mindlessly drooling at the pretty images. The story is all well and good but it suffers from that of the first game, the past (or at least the parts represented in these games) just inst interesting enough for me. Now I realise that’s all relative, but this is my talking of a game dammit, so butt out. Anyway, for me the best thing of both games wasn’t the events in Italy, it was the underlying tale that spans the entire course of human history and as I uncovered bits and pieces of this conspiracy I genuinely was getting excited but what it all could mean. This is what got me, I honestly couldn’t give a llama in lederhosen about the which old Italian politician stole your lute, but tell me that every world leader or great man had an artifact that made them super powered up, whey hey!  you’ve got me again.

The mechanics work the same as the original, running , jumping, wall climbing, sword fighting and of course falling. Yes, the pain in the ass of the first game is back, with you jumping the wrong way off a building and flailing about only to be greeted by your good friend Messer Dirt. Only this time, you’re health doesn’t regenerate automatically. Oh no, that would be too easy, now wouldn’t it. You must visit a doctor and have him heal you or use medicine. At first this pissed me off because it was different from the first one, but then I realised most other games work on the same premise of medicine and health packs and the such, and it just made more sense that the regeneration technique that’s been introduced in so many games recently.

Insoluble Ezio!

The new stuff that’s been added into Assassins Creed 2 make the first one seem a bit like mild cheese, it was nice back in the day, but when Mr Mature comes along the original just feels like a lump of plastic in your mouth, reminding you of the days gone by, but not giving you the same “umph” that there once was nor giving you any reason to go back to it. There are, as you would hope, a lot more ways to kill people. New weapons are introduced like hammers, and spears as well as new moves such as throwing sand in peoples eyes…..OK, not so great, but you also have the chance to poison people (making them have a spasm and then soon after fall over with deadness) and smoke bombs are pretty handy turning you into some sort of Italian ninja as you run the heck away.

In there are a lot of “thank bugger” bits which catapult the game above the original. We’re introduced to  a quick travel system and also the ability to not run down the street and automatically be chased by around 100 heavily armed men Who are a lot smarter and won’t automatically beat the crap out of you for looking at them funny, or making them drop their hat. Oh! and swimming ! you can swim now! Last time round you just fell in the water, flailed around a bit and that was the end of you. Its a good job you can swim because one of the cities you visit is (SPOILER) bloody Venice!

Money Money Money

The games extra missions are also better, and unlike the first game, Theres not a good reason to do any of them. There are races, and assassination contracts, beating up targets and message delivering (not as cool). But the reason for doing these is to get money, which you will have tonnes of anyway thanks to the villa you rebuild during the course of your time in the game. Yes!  in between killing people, one of your other aims is to attract tourists to your villa so they’ll give you money in a renaissance reconstruction mini game. The more cash you splurge on upgrades for your town, the more money you get back in return to spend on new weapons and outfits and general mischief. A nice idea, but I ended up with an obscene amount of money by the middle of the game meaning that (as previously mentioned) the side missions weren’t worth diddly anymore.  It’s a shame, but there is enough in the main story to keep you going, so that they are quite arbitrary.

The game is a great one, just like the first, and this is a heck of an improvement. If the spectacular “what-the-hell-ness” of the ending is anything to go by we can definitely expect a third game. I’m just hoping they set it in a time period i have a proper interest in, but then again, if the first 2 games held me in the assassin’s web for so long, the third is bound to as well. Even if they transport us back to 19th century aristocratic England where we we spend out time flinging sausages at the rich.