August 2004 News

Charlize Theron's bizzaro secret agent turn as Aeon Flux is being held up by a recent injury.

If you own a Playstation 2 and you haven't played the two excellent "Ratchet and Clank" games you need to stop what you're doing and go grab em. It's like crack without all the unpleasant weight loss.

Oh yeah, here's the newest category.

Added a bunch of Ratchets, a Clank, Ponch, a mime and The Dude from "The Big Lebowski".

Added two astronauts, Elevator Action agent, Ico, Puss in Boots, Riddick.

Also added four cuties from "Happy Tree Friends" Cuddles, Flippy, Giggles and Toothy. Oh yeah, added a new category for the oft tortured scamps.

Growing up I only caught a few episodes, but I remember Peter Falk's Columbo being the ultimate detective - funny, perceptive and half blind.

Years later I'm hooked on "Monk", a mini-revival of that great detective formula (except he suffers from OCD instead of a dud eye).

Those hardworking Valve folks have finally started the much anticipated preload of HL2 via Steam.

A nice little companion piece for this news item... Electronic Boutique sent me a message this morning informing me that my HL2 preorder is due to ship "November, 1st 2004".

I'll believe it when I see it.

The Craig of craigslist.org speaks out in the latest Wired Mag. Keep fighting the good fight bro.

Gone are the days when Barkley, Magic, Jordan and Bird trashed the Olympic competition by an average margin of 180 points per game (or something like that).

The Americans did not send their best and even if they did the fundamentally sound international competition just plays better basketball. It's that game where you pass a ball around the horn, set picks, close out on shooters and hit open jump shots.

USA Basketball sucks (MSNBC)

USA Basketball sucks (ESPN Magazine)

USA Basketball sucks (Dick Vitale)

USA Basketball sucks cause we're alllll racist. Nice theory prick.

Being a huge fan of "Day of Defeat" and "Battlefield 1942" I was totally jazzed when I read that the new "Call of Duty" expansion, "Call of Duty: United Offensive", will feature the best multiplayer elements from both of those classic World War 2 shooters.

Still no word on whether you can whack fools down with a shovel.

All sorts of classic cartoon mischief can be found here including an extensive history of everyone's favorite wabbit.

Sorry folks, Stimpson J. Cat wasn't part of the "Golden Age". Freaking elitists.

A humorous and brutal look at the Olympic games.

With the Olympics winding down it's time to start counting up the medals and declaring which country produces the best people. :)

Just finished the Best of Triumph the Insult Comic Dog DVD. The comedic interview has been elevated to a new level with Triumph and Da Ali G Show characters.

The Onion A.V. Club recently interviewed Robert Smigel, the mad man behind the crappy plastic puppet.

I hope JibJab gets a chance to counter-sue the dumbasses who tried to jack them.

Just stumbled across this thread on IGN Boards. There's a massive collection of screen captures including a sneak preview of the new multiplayer component. Goodie gum drops.

Added Ratchet, Captain Quark, two Halo marines (red and blue), the Spy vs Spy duo, Princess Fiona (Shrek) and Alexander de Large (A Clockwork Orange).

Added a couple Donkey icons and a Shrek icon to the new Shrek category.

Added Wakko and Dot to the brand new Animaniacs category.

I was trying out a new format for the pixel characters where just the top half of the body shows (Wakko icon to the left is an example). I think they look OK, but I prefer drawing the whole body for the pixel art miniatures.

Added Doom 3 space marine, a possessed child, a sad monkey and a happy monkey.

Getting rats addicted to cocaine sounds like a fun science project.

Is it just me or has the end of the Cold War really sapped some of the fun out of the Olympics? It was so cool having a bad guy rival super power to root against (USA or USSR depending on your point of view).

Rooting against France is always fun, but France represents perennial losers so it's just not the same. Zing! Take that you cheese sniffing moped jockeys. I kid, I kid... I know a lot of my mutt heritage is French. Besides, with Dubya in the White House the French have all sorts of valid insults to fling our way.

A choice quote from a National Education Association spokeswoman (Melinda Anderson) speaking about the MPAA's blatant attempts to sway children regarding copyright issues using prizes and freebies:

"We want to teach children to be thinking human beings. Not a parrot for some corporate agenda."

Amen sister.

Two high capacity disc formats, Blu-ray and HD DVD, are getting ready for primetime. The Blu-ray format was approved by a group of consumer electronics manufacturers yesterday. Microsoft is already on board with HD DVD for its next gen OS, but hasn't announced any plans for Blu-ray support.

Oh goodie, another confusing format war. Duck and cover.

"The Blues Brothers" came out on top in a recent BBC survey.

Some unexpected movies in the top 10... "Grosse Point Blank" and "The Royal Tenenbaums" suprised me. Kind of cool to see a Wes Anderson movie in there - his movie soundtracks are always interesting.

The Three Stooges DVD release is getting some attention for it's decision to offer a colorized version in addition to the original black and white version.

Reminds me of that great "In Living Color" sketch where Ted Turner "colorizes" old movies by using black actors in place of the original white actors.

So it's the movie "Alien" broken down into a 30 second Flash movie with bunnies in place of all the actors.

There's really nothing else to say. Seeing is believing.

While stumbling around ESPN's site I came across a fantastic section of Page 2 - sports movies!

They've got the top 20 sports films, top 10 best actors, top 10 best actresses, top 10 best moments and top 10 worst sports films. I'm a sucker for top 10 lists.

Ask yourself this - please answer honestly:

Should it be legal to make a backup of a piece of software, a movie or a CD that I have purchased legally?

If you said 'yes' Jack Valenti (the scum sucking maggot dropping), the judges in his pocket and the warped Digital Millennium Copyright Act are calling you a moron!

If you said 'no' please go goosestep back to Nazi headquarters and leave the rest of us alone.

No, not in a homoerotic way you perv.

Sandy Collora, the creator of that cool short film where it's Batman vs. Aliens vs. Predator, has done it again.

AFI's 100 Years...100 Songs list was really lacking in the original scores department and it didn't even include "Uncle F*cker" from "South Park: Bigger, Longer & Uncut". :)

I realize that a lot of the famous scores probably didn't get much consideration because there are no lyrics, but a great score can evoke so much emotion from us without us even realizing it.

Composers like John Williams ("Star Wars", "Jaws", "Raiders of the Lost Ark", "Catch Me If You Can", "Superman") Danny Elfman ("Batman", "Pee Wee's Big Adventure", "Beetlejuice") and Thomas Newman ("American Beauty", "The Shawshank Redemption", "The Road to Perdition") bring so much to a movie.

Admit it... you're humming the "Star Wars" theme right now, aren't you?

Even though I'm no real fan of the twitchy variety of first person shooters which accounts for most every game in id history (the Quake series, Return to Castle Wolfenstein, Doom 1 and 2) I just had to grab Doom 3.

Doom 3 is a superb horror game with an insane amount of detail. The graphics and sound effects are top notch and the story moves along nicely. Although the weapons are pretty standard fare, they all have a good feel and they look fantastic. I'm only about halfway through the game and I already feel I've gotten my money's worth.

After playing Half-Life mods (a Quake II engine game) and Quake III powered games like "Call of Duty" for the last few years I'm excited to see what games id's new technology will help produce.

Doom 3 isn't all roses... I know the focus of Doom 3 is the excellent single player game, but I can honestly say the multiplayer gameplay hasn't advanced much since the original Doom. I'm sure Quake IV will be the big multiplayer powerhouse for id - I just wish Doom 3 multiplayer had something to offer beyond 1995 era gaming.

One other minor speed bump... Even with the newest video card drivers installed and having a system that far exceeds the minimum hardware specs, I did have quite a few game crashes and actually lost a couple of quick saves. I understand these types of problems are fairly common for cutting edge games like Doom 3 - it just would have been nice if the bugs weren't there.

I was lucky enough to catch a couple episodes of "Monk" on a national network (maybe ABC?) a few months ago and I really developed a taste for this Columbo-esque detective show. Tony Shalhoub (Antonio Scarpacci form "Wings") is the perfect man to carry the torch for Peter Falk. "Monk" normally airs on USA Network so give it a whirl if you are into humorous detective shows.

Got a 2fer for ya. Download the black and white classic stars of old and the whole "King of the Hill" crew.

Go get em!

Get all your favorite Street Fighter pals in icon format while supplies last.

19 icons available for your twisted pleasure.

Doom 3 is finally here so there's a chance Half-Life 2/Counter-Strike Source will be close behind... right? In celebration of my uncharacteristic optimism here's a pack of Windows CS icons for the true believers.

So far I've only put up one collection, but I plan to convert several other collections from GIFs to Windows desktop icons. Unfortunately I haven't been able to find a solution for creating icons for the Mac. Sorry macophiles.

I also added a happy little elf icon to the Character category.

That's right Raider fans, Tim Brown and Al Davis are parting ways.

That nutty Austrailian, Eric "The Hulk" Bana, might be the next 007. Go Hoot!

Caught this one on ExtraLife!...

The robots in disguise will be coming to a theater near you. Can't wait to watch Optimus Prime bring da hurt on those hatin' Decepticons.

Check out the blow-by-blow first impressions of the game that launched a thousand computer upgrades.

Any little word spouted on a national network from the Commander in Chief should fall under the public domain, yes? No.

Indian evil-doers beware, the Amazing Spider-Man will be battling villains in a new area of the world.

Where do you think Spidey stands on the Kashmir conflict?

Check the Characters category for a couple of Afro brothers.

Pete the Dancing Cowboy, Surly Bear, Somber Frog, space trooper, Schmoozer Alien, four colored aliens, a lobster claw robot, a fuzzy pest and a muscle man added to da house.

New categories under Miscellaneous: Aliens, Animals and Robots.