The portals leaked a bit, it seems...
The Xbox version of Portal 2 found its way onto various unseemly parts of the internet over the weekend, no doubt due to some idiocy on the part of Wheatley the Personality Core (or, from what I can read, someone at a game store who 'liberated' an advance copy). Whatever the cause, I was able to get a sneak peek at the game before the relevant YouTube videos were yanked by Valve, and I have to say 'wow.' If you liked Portal, it goes without saying that you'll love the sequel. It'll no doubt spawn another round of geek quotes, as GLaDOS is still in top form. You also hear from Aperture CEO Cave Johnson, and it starts to become apparent that few at the company had all their marbles, or at least, few who were in any position to do anything to halt the inevitable. Without giving away any spoilers, you can look forward to talk of potatoes, testing, and a brand new closing song. It's well worth picking up just to find out more about this dystopian lunatic asylum masquerading as a corporation. If it's still hard to wait 'till Tuesday (or a tad earlier, if players on Steam earn enough 'potatoes' to get a slightly earlier launch), this song might help. Okay, now that I've heaped enough praise on that game, can I have Half-Life 2 episode 3 now?
Also released this weekend (though legitimately) was the first episode of "A Game of Thrones" on HBO. After seeing it, I think a great many people started clearing space next to their deluxe edition of "The Lord of the Rings" to make room for the eventual Blu-Ray release. The tabletop gaming industry will probably be a tad resentful, as any possible adaptation for board game enthusiasts will have to compete with (link updated after YouTube takedown) this stunning opening credit sequence. From that and the opening few scenes showing Castle Winterfell, the TV series helped to overcome a little nag I'd had in the back of my head from when I'd started reading the books: They've got history dating back over eight thousand years and they're still stuck in the middle ages? Sure, the seasons last for years at a stretch, the kingdoms are constantly at war, fantastical creatures rise and fall, often taking lots of people with them, etc., but I was looking for a sign a little more had been going on than in our own 'mundane' medieval period, and HBO delivered. Several elements, especially the architecture, have a sense of grandeur and skill that I can buy as the result of a few thousand years of stonecraft. The aforementioned towers at Winterfell, for example,are unlike any I'd seen outside of fantasy paintings or some of the offworld edifices on the original 'Stargate.' The money spent is in evidence, creating a believable medieval world. As someone who grew up on taking any live-action presentation of fantasy with a healthy helping of cheese, this is a great time to be into swords and sorcery.
The actors in "A Game of Thrones" are well-cast, overall: Geoffrey is unlikeable on sight, Rob Stark looks ready to lead an army in Narnia, Daenerys is suitably distressed, etc. I was surprised at how (accurately) young the cast was, and knowing what the future has in store makes them all the more tragic. The only two characters who don't seem to physically live up (down?) to their descriptions in the texts are Tyrion, who though a dwarf, isn't nearly as repulsive as his novelized counterpart, and Arya, who gets the nickname "horseface" at one point in the books. In the latter's case, she really just has to be less cute than her sister and then be able to be mistaken for a young boy when enough mud is dumped on her. This is an excellent start, and I hope the quality continues.
Last post I mentioned some egg decorating methods, and now I've run across a contest to win an Egg Bot Kit. All you have to do is document instructions on something cool to make that's egg-related and post it to Instructables. If I manage to come up with anything and win, the kit will be confiscated by my wife for her preschool class, I'm sure. Anyway, the kit put me in mind of a product from my misspent youth that I couldn't remember the name of for the life of me. All I could picture was cheapo plastic, an arm, and a clamp that held a marker. It also came with the usual disappointment associated with what the ads claimed the product would let you do (fine art on eggs) and what your actual results would be (an egg that looked like it was attacked by a box of Sharpies in an earthquake). Thanks to my brother-in-law, we figured it out: the device was called The Decoregger. There was even a version endorsed by corporate holiday mascot, 'Dudley.' Yeah, that's two egg-related items in as many posts, but that infernal plastic device has been rattling around in a lost sector of my brain's hard drive for too long to let it go undocumented. :)
I have to report that ps238 #50 was sent to press too late and was canceled by Diamond. I'm thinking it'll probably just go straight into the next trade, so look for that this summer. I'm putting the finishing touches on the script for the part that would have been issue #51, which will probably answer a few questions as well as raise some new ones. From there, I'm hoping to do some shorter trade releases that focus on individual characters and tell stories that while part of the ps238 universe, aren't wholly dependent on having read everything else up to that point. They'll also eventually appear on this site as well as via the iVerse digital comic service, so keep watching this space for more info as it happens. And as it happens, I happened upon these since our last get-together:
- Scott Adams committed one of the oldest internet mistakes around: trying to combat his critics on line by pretending to be a fan of his own work.
- This has to be the best resume ever. Not the most employable, but the best one to read.
- Since a lot of things that we once found to be satirical have kind of come to pass, I thought I'd give everyone a heads up on the future of cell phone use. :)
- Time Magazine lets us in on what that Olive Garden 'Culinary Institute' is really like. Not that it's a big deal, as long as the customer and restaurant both know full well what's going on. I mean, when I go see a sci-fi movie, I don't think the aliens are real, but I will enjoy the ones that are presented...
- In 1940, GM made some really cool-looking Futureliner vehicles that sound straight out of 'Popular Mechanics' or a 'Fallout' game.
- If you've got a lot of time to kill and a love of classic arcade games, here's the world's largest Pac-Man board. Wakka-wakka... forever!
- Apparently, penguins can be tickled. Who knew? Other than the penguins, I mean?
- So the next time someone says video games are bad for you, show them this next item where the pedometer that came with the latest Pokemon games is more accurate than most commercial pedometers.
- So the guy who made those miniature cannons that really work decided to do the same thing to the crossbow. Though if that's a mini, it should be called a ballista, right?
- As I mentioned 'Stargate' earlier, I should pass along this article with the accompanying blueprints should you want to build your own.
- It looks like this could be the plot for the next 'Superman' movie. It features yet another 'origin' story, which, even if presented well, is about as necessary as putting a "this end up" sticker on a missile.
- Fans of the ol' Sierra Online point-n-click games like 'King's Quest' should like I Have 1 Day. Break out of prison, figure out why you were locked up, and what it has to do with the coronation happening in the next 24 hours.
- But if medieval action games are more your speed, try Knight-Trap. It's kind of like a vertical platform version of "Frogger," where your goal is to 'rescue' the demented Princess Nectarine.