Towards Mecca

I know this is a silly reason to make a blog post but I was so happy with the MSN avatar my friend Hugo made for me that I just had to show it off!

Anyway, check out his DeviantArt page! He really is a talented guy!

When I heard the news that the new Iron Man movie was actually pretty good, I have to say that I took it with a grain of salt. To be honest, I don’t think much of the recent Marvel movies. Sure, they’re pretty much all better than Superman Returns, but none so far have been as good as Batman Begins (with the possible exception of the second X-Men movie). Coming from me, it might sound strange since I’m a huge comic book fan and movie enthusiast, but I started to believe that non-Batman comics and movies should not cross paths again. At least not when Hollywood is involved.

That was until I saw Iron Man. I think the best word to describe my thoughts on Iron Man is one I borrow from a friend. After I explained how I felt about loving and hating the Iron Man movie, he explained that I was conflicted. Good word. I think I’ll hold on to that one.

On the one side, I loved the movie! I thought the script, acting, directing, and special effects were brilliant! I can’t really find much wrong with the movie and I’m usually very perceptive! Nothing much except….

… being a Muslim myself, I’m very sensitive to Hollywood’s demonising of Muslims. I understand that United States is at war with some Muslims, and that Hollywood happens to be in the US, but it still irks me when I see Americans being portrayed as the heroes of the world and Muslims as their heathen counter-parts.

To be fair, the movie did only demonize some “bad Muslims” that were actually oppressing innocent Muslim. This, in itself, is admirable. Also, one Muslim is even shown siding with and befriending Iron Man. And last but not least, the movie did touch upon the topic of American Corporations selling arms to its own nation’s enemies. The actual enemy ended up being an American as well so it wasn’t as bad as with most movies out there that use Muslims as the new Nazis unapologetically.

All in all, the movie really was great and extremely entertaining. Its handling of Muslims as enemies rubbed me the wrong way, but was still handled better than most movies out there. I highly recommend Iron Man to anyone who hasn’t seen it despite my slight conflicted emotions about some of its content, and that by itself speaks volumes to its greatness.

On Saturday, my little brother (age 15) and I went to the EB Games near his house. While there I saw an inexpensive second-hand copy of Bioshock and proceeded to the cash register to pay. I was refused.

You read right, the teller behind the cash register refused to sell me the copy because I was with a minor who was not my child. He said I couldn’t prove that I wasn’t buying the game for my brother. If he were my son, then they would explain what the rating system was and let me decide, but since he was just my brother I couldn’t buy anything rated Mature.

Obviously, this ticked me off because I really was buying it for myself. Sure, he was probably going to play it once I was done, but my mother wouldn’t have minded. I know that. Hell, he watches movies with worse content than Bioshock probably has on a weekly basis!

I had stormed out of the store in utter confusion and disbelief, but when I let my rage subside, I realized that this wasn’t such a bad thing after all. Maybe if more stores had this policy the media would give M rated games a break! Well eventually I’m sure they will have to one way or another. Either they’ll be tired of beating the same old dog or their audience will be. Especially since, in a couple of years, most of their audience would have grown-up with video-games and see them for what they truly are: Interactive Entertainment. A co-worker also told me that liquor stores have the same policy for people who walk in with minors so it’s not totally unprecedented.

What this boils down to is that I was initially peeved at being turned down and sent home, but now that I’ve had the time to cool down and collect my thoughts, I see it as a positive move on the part of EB Games and I commend them for making it!

I just found out that Sony is now selling to Canadian in their own currency! So what does that mean? Initially, the Playstation Store’s prices didn’t reflect the newer, much higher, value of the Canadian Dollar. Now, Canadians will no longer overpay for downloadable content (well not more than their American counter-parts at least)! In my opinion this should have been a given from day one, but since the XBox Marketplace has been around much longer and is still using the misleading Microsoft Points currency, I have to hand it to Sony for having made this move.

Now, all that’s left is a decent exclusive title…

A few days ago, yet another new character for Street Fighter 4 was revealed. Rufus … a 500 pound tub of lard with a pony-tail and what looks like eye-liner. I kid you not, someone at Capcom actually thought this guy would bring joy to our hearts and smiles to our faces!

Actually, I think Capcom is too smart to think we’d like this character. I have two theories on way Rufus was made to begin with.

Another Dan

Capcom is notorious for coming out with joke characters. The best example is perhaps Dan from the Street Fighter Akpha series. The problem is, Dan is likeable! He’s a Ken and Ryu clone with a borrowed fighting style from Ryo and Robert’s looks (both from SNK’s Art of Fighting series). Dan was a character I would take against a weaker opponent to even the odds.

Rufus is no Dan by any stretch of the imagination. For starters, I don’t even know him and I dislike him already. With Dan, it was love at first sight. With Rufus, I’m just struggling to keep my lunch down.

A Diversion

I’ll be frank, I don’t like ANY of the new characters that Capcom has introduced in Street Fighter 4. D Viper looks too much like an SNK character, El Fuerte looks straight out of Virtua Fighter, and Abel looks like what my next door neighbor would look like on steroids. Still, as lackluster as those characters are, they’re a pure joy compared to Rufus!

Maybe that was the plan after all! I don’t know how most other people are reacting to the new Street Fighter 4 characters but my entourage seems to be in agreement that they generally suck. Maybe Rufus was thrown in the mix to make us feel better about the other three jokers. Seems to me this might be the most logical reason.

Either way, it seems like he’s here to stay so I’ll stop venting and just put another check mark in the “SF4 is gonna suck” column.

A British news site was asking for stories of how video games turned people to a life of crime.

If this isn’t ridiculous in itself, they are also offering money for these stories!

In response to what has to be one of the dumbest requests I’ve seen online, my co-worker wrote the following:

An X-Box killed my family, so I swore revenge, plunging myself into a dark life of loitering and jay walking.

Every night, I wander the streets, looking for streets to walk across.

That guy standing by the wall? That guy standing by the crosswalk — standing and playing his DS like a lifeless husk of a man who’s fell into the dark abyss? Yeah, that was me.

I’m not proud of it. No one ever is.

I’ve even joined a street gang. The Turtle Stompers. You’ve probably heard of us.

We play Mario Kart and stand in two parking spots at once on the weekends.

We are the lost.

We are the damned.

The road to vengeance is full of hate and tears. It’s lonely road. But it’s the one I walk every day.

Can I have my hundred bucks, now?

-Dan

The guys over at the Exploding Barrel wrote a great article about Console Knock-Offs! I’m embarrassed to admit I was actually surprised that such a thing existed. Why would I be? Everything else is knocked off with cheap ‘Made-in-China’ rips that have a near identical name and look. Why would consoles be any different?

So, are you a Chintendo fan-boy prefering the Vii? Or are you more of a Polystation kind of person?

Anyway, you can check out the whole article here.

Fans of the video game Okami? Or just fans of great video-game artwork? Hell, fans of any kind of artwork at all? Either way, the news that Capcom has just put an online Okami art gallery should put a smile on your face!

Go check it out, you’ll more than likely have a new wallpaper on your desktop before the day is done

Just thought you’d guy would be interested to know that the fine folks behind TFGBlog.com are holding a very easy contest that has Grant Theft Auto 4 as a prize!

See as how the site has only been up for a month, your chances of winning are probably pretty high! All you have to do is subscribe to their RSS Feed and post a comment. Easy as pie…

Finally buckling to years of pressure from fans, Capcom Japan has just announced the ever anticipated Street Fighter vs Care Bears game. Slated for a January 2008 release, this title promises to be the most anticipated VS title since Capcom vs the Muppet Babies. Experts are also expecting Street Fighter vs Care Bears to outsell all previous Capcom titles.

The delay in releasing this oft-requested game was primarily due to difficulties in balancing gameplay. Apparently, it was hard to make a level playing field between the Street Fighter characters and the Care Bear characters. The Care Bears are simply too powerful.

“We believe that the balancing is as good as it can get without us having to weaken the Care Bear characters to an unrealistic level” Said a senior Capcom game designer. Apparently, the biggest challenge came at the game-testing level. Capcom game testers simply refused to choose the Street Fighter characters preferring the loveable Care Bears. In the end, the design leads figure most players would also choose the Bears when the game is finally released.

Surprisingly, the game will not launch Worldwide upon release. Instead, Capcom opted to release the game in its two largest global markets; Iran and Madagascar. The Worldwide release is to follow a short 2 months later. The move has upset many American consumers who are now petitioning the US government to launch a “pre-emptive strike” against the government of Iran with the intention of annexing the country before the launch date.

Bad apples aside, the rest of the world is eagerly anticipating this title and are already sending mass e-mails to Capcom requesting a new Street Fighter vs My Little Pony game.