Wii Updates!

It's been nearly a year, but a reader has provided some new information about this old post.

Nintendo has setup a page that provides some basic information about Wii updates.

I figured that while we were on the topic, this would be a good time to talk about my Wii experiences so far.

My Wii gets weekly use at a minimum. I've got a full time job, a lovely (yet demanding) woman, and a host of hobbies and interests that take up my time so game play hasn't been a large priority. I still get time in to play Metroid Prime 3: Corruption, mySims and run through many of the Virtual Console games I've got downloaded on the system. It's also fun to spin the globe around in the weather channel and see what the temperature is at the poles.

My Wii qualms come in the form of lacking online play. I've got Mario: Strikers but so many of my games lag out that I've given up trying. My buddy has been rocking in Madden, but the scoring system online is tipped in the favor of quitting instead of losing, so it's near pointless to play.

We've got Smash Bros. Brawl on pre-order and hopefully the on-line play in that will be on or above par with other console ventures.

Online play aside, a big aside, the quality and fun of my existing Wii library is incredible. I think that's the main reason it still gets so much play.

In the past month couple months I've picked up an XBox 360, so it does cut into the Wii time. This is to augment the not-so-greatness of Nintendo's online capabilities. This also has taken time away from some Wii action. Although I find that the games on the 360 are much shorter to beat. I just finished up Ace Combat 6 on hard and I'm working my way through expert. The online play is what I was looking forward to, but there just doesn't seem to be many people on.

I got Halo 3, but the pace for an FPS is abysmal. I don't mean pace of the story, I mean the actual live gameplay, so I don't really play that anymore. If I want quality FPS action, I'll stick to Metroid Prime 3: Corruption or Counter-Strike:Source.

So that's my spiel about the Wii Updates and my updates about the Wii.

Enjoy the holiday season and hit me up if you're looking for some friend codes to play Brawl when it comes out. I also keep my DS with me pretty much wherever I go, so if you're looking for some unique pokèmon or want to get some mario kart action, lemme know.

DigitalLife Summary

There really isn't much new to report on the DigitalLife expo.

MC Frontalot was awesome as usual, his 2 sets were spectacular and drew a sizable crowd considering how sparse the floor was populated in general.

Here's a clip of the front performing the pr0n song recorded by a fellow fan:



And here's a clip I got of the front busting crazy dance moves on my cellaphone during the breakdown in Hassle The Dorkening:



I got some views of Guitar Hero 3 rocking, but there was far too large a crowd and far too little patience in me to wait. It looks and plays pretty much like Guitar Hero 2.

The counter strike tournament going on was interesting but mildly so. I could've sat and watched for hours, but I could do the same watching my bro play super mario bros.

There was some Halo 3 action kicking. I watched a little bit of that, but the game play is still very slow. I think coming from the fast paced world of PC FPS's, it will unfortunately always be so. I did pick up Halo 3, not at the convention... I didn't see anybody selling it there. It's fun, but not crazy good.

There was a decent sized free play area with some PS3's and 360's setup. I played some racing game on the PS3, not sure what it was called. It was surprisingly mediocre. The graphics weren't that fantastic, and the game play was standard.

The US Army was there showing off a new game, similar to America's Army, but for the 360, they also had a large simulator game, but while I was there, the line was far too long.

I think that covers all the interesting parts of DigialLife, I'll update this post it anything new shows up.

All my DigitalLife videos can be found here: On YouTube. While you're there, check out the young kid busting out some crazy DDR moves.

DigitalLife pre-summary

So much to write about from yesterday, but today is beer fest day and I'm too tired right now to cleanup all the videos and images I got.

Expect more later!

DigitalLife part 2

Word from on high has it that MC Frontalot will be performing at the DigitalLife expo on the very same day I am attending.

I urge anybody who has/hasn't seen/heard about the good MC to attend and witness glory. He's doing two short sets, one at 2PM and one at 5:30PM.

I've spread the word to some friends in the area about the expo, but it doesn't look like anybody else I know will be attending.

I will do my best to take some good pictures of what's going on.

I'll try to put up some YouTube footage from my celephone as well.

DigitalLife

I was lucky enough to manage getting a free 4 day pass to the DigitalLife Event at the Javits Center in NYC through 1up.com. Now I need to decide which day(s) to go on.

I think I'll probably take a half day on Friday and head over after lunch.

There are a lot of events going on there, but I have to say I'm most interested in the gaming side of things.

There is the Pro-Am Gaming tournament with a $100,000 prize.

There should be tons of yet-unreleased games to demo. I hear that Guitar Hero 3 will be on display. I'm hoping to take a shot at the multi-player action going on there.

All in all it should be a good time.

XNA

Last night I went through the process of installing all the software I needed to start deving on XBox 360. It took longer than I felt it should have to get all the download links for each part.

First I grabbed the XNA specific stuff and tried to install that. It wouldn't work with my copy of Visual Studio 2005 and requires Visual Studio C# Express.

After all that fun, I got all the specifics installed and fired up the IDE for the first time. Visual Studio C# Express has an annoying green tint to it.

So now that all the software is installed on my comp, I need a starting project.

I was thinking of pinball-ish type game. Should be simple enough.

We will see how my motivation turns out.

I picked up Drawn To Life for the DS for nak. Watching her play gave me a nifty game idea, that I may try to flesh out into an project.

What?!

Who needs this kind of help? BestBuy is a silly store.

Game Development

Some of my peoples know that I consider myself, very lightly now a days, a programmer.

It's always been a goal of mine to write some interesting and useful programs, but more specifically, I'd like to make some games.

I put out a couple small demo's to the Dark Basic community back in those days, but nothing too serious.

Currently though, there are some potential opportunities on the Horizon for me.

WiiWare was announced by Nintendo back in July, 2007 as a low budget, indie-developer solution for creating games on the Wii. I was ecstatic about this! I think of all the current consoles the Wii is my favorite. I've already had a few vague concepts floating around in my mind on what I could develop for the Wii using the unique control system.

On the Microsoft side, there's XNA. A set of tools and whatnot for developing games for the XBox360. I'm already familiar with Visual Studio and slightly so with DirectX so I've got a head start in that department, but I don't really have any motivation to dev anything for the 360. The Wii is clearly my preference.

Unfortunately, Nintendo is sparse on the info relating to WiiWare. Aside from the official announcement that it's coming, they haven't dropped any new info... cost, time frame, API's, etc.

The other problem is that I'm really a one man shop. Not terrible mind you, but it can be crippling when I come to a roadblock. I don't have many system programmer friends, they're mostly web guys. The ones that I do know aren't generally interested in doing this kinda work. I have found one, but I haven't really talked to him in ages (it seems anyway :))

Maybe the next step is to sit down and really flesh out a few of my ideas to see if they're truly feasible or if I'm just spinning my wheels on an unlikely goal.

Jam Sessions

Jam Sessions is coming out Sept 11th on the Nintendo DS.

I'm very stoked.

As some of you may know, I would very much like to play guitar. Unfortunately, I don't have the time or motivation to progress beyond anything super basic.

Jam Sessions is my cure.

I've got it pre-ordered from GameStop, but I recently discovered that if you get it from BestBuy you get 3 extra songs... good songs too!

The standard track list is as follows (from 1up.com):

* Beck - Jackass
* Blind Melon - No Rain
* Johnny Cash - I Forgot More Than You'll Ever Know
* Cheap Trick - Surrender
* Coldplay - Yellow
* Death Cab for Cutie - I Will Follow You Into the Dark
* Bob Dylan - Like a Rolling Stone
* The Fray - Over My Head (Cable Car)
* Marvin Gaye - What's Going On?
* Jackson 5 - Never Can Say Goodbye
* Janis Joplin - Me and Bobby McGee
* Avril Lavigne - I'm With You
* Bob Marley - No Woman, No Cry
* Nirvana - The Man Who Sold the World
* Rascal Flatts - Life is a Highway
* James Taylor - How Sweet it Is (To be Loved by You)
* Amy Winehouse - You Know I'm No Good

And the BestBuy additional tracks are:

* Jimi Hendrix - Wild Thing
* Brad Paisley - I'm Gonna Miss Her
* Tom Petty - Needles and Pins

Now GameStop purchases come with a 1 year subscription to Spin magazine, but who cares? I need to rock out some Hendrix.

1up.com has a ton of info on Jam Sessions including articles and videos. Taking Back Sunday even has a go at it playing one of their songs electro-acousticly.

You can get more info on the official page at Ubisoft.

I'd like to conclude with <school-girl-squeal>EEP!</school-girl-squeal>

Multimedia message

Dave!

He has returned.. For the weekend atleast.

Tired?

I know that ruth gets tired.

Fooding

Ruth is truly a food sculptor.

Fight!

Sisters battling for great justice!

Kitty!

Kitty needs love too!

Tonight

Tonight we prepare for glory!

Beer

Beer is my good friend.

My food!

I am eating this to celebrate erica's departure back to maine. Although it is more of a somber occasion as we will all miss erica.

Ruth!

Some people can't help but devour the meat.

Birthday

This is the aftermath of dinner from maria and my birthday. Yes, they had those fools sing for me.

Soup!

I love soup. I never have it enough, but it is very delicious. I need to eat more soup!

Kitty!

Kitty is getting old, but he's still kicking.

Let the mo-games begin!

I am gonna try out this mobile blogging thing. Maybe i'll start updating more regularly.

Translating Bush on Libby

President Bush made a statement today on his decision to commute the prison term of Lewis "Scooter" Libby. I have translated the original statement to show what he really meant. Such subtleties can be lost in such formal language.

Please enjoy:

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The United States Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit today rejected Lewis Libby's request to remain free on bail while pursuing his appeals for the serious convictions of perjury and obstruction of justice. As a result, Scooters will be required to turn himself over to the Bureau of Prisons to begin serving his prison sentence.

I have said throughout this process that it would not be appropriate to comment or intervene in this case until Scooters’ appeals have been exhausted. But since my buddy might actually have to go to jail to cover my ass, I believe it is now important to make sure he suffers no real consequences.

From the very beginning of the investigation into the leaking of Valerie Plame's name, I made it clear to the White House staff and anyone serving in my administration that I expected full cooperation with the Justice Department as long as they didn't reveal any important information. Dozens of White House staff and administration officials dutifully cooperated.

After the investigation was under way, the Justice Department appointed United States Attorney for the Northern District of Illinois Patrick Fitzgerald as a Special Counsel in charge of the case. Mr. Fitzgerald is a highly qualified, professional prosecutor who carried out his responsibilities as charged.

This case has generated significant commentary and debate. My allies have been critics of the investigation. They have argued that a special counsel should not have been appointed, nor should the investigation have been pursued after the Justice Department learned who leaked Ms. Plame's name to columnist Robert Novak. It makes sense. Why should he be accountable for his crimes after another person was guilty of another crime?

Furthermore, my friends point out that neither Scooters nor anyone else has been charged with violating the Intelligence Identities Protection Act or the Espionage Act, which were the original subjects of the investigation. Frankly, I believe that if you're not charged with one crime, you shouldn't be charged with any others either. It just doesn't make sense.

Finally, we say the punishment does not fit the crime: Scooters was a first-four-time offender with years of experience as crony. He's been with my pal Wolfowitz for the past 25 years. He was handed a harsh sentence simply because he was convicted of 1 felony count of obstructing a federal investigation, 1 felony count of making false statements to F.B.I. Investigators and 2 felony counts of perjury before a grand jury when we all know his only crime was love. Love for his country and for his fellow Americans. If that isn't a good reason to lie to the F.B.I. and a grand jury, then I don't know what is. Well, I can think of a few other reasons, but they're not appropriate for comment right now.

Others point out that a jury of citizens weighed all the evidence and listened to all the testimony and found Scooters guilty of perjury and obstructing justice. They argue, correctly, that our entire system of justice relies on people telling the truth. And if a person does not tell the truth, particularly if he serves in government and holds the public trust, he must be held accountable. They say that had Scooters only told the truth, he would have never been indicted in the first place.

Both, my friends and the American people have made important points. I have made my own evaluation. In preparing for the decision I am announcing today, I have carefully weighed these arguments and the circumstances surrounding this case.

Scooter was sentenced to thirty months of prison, two years of probation, and a $250,000 fine. In making the sentencing decision, the district court rejected the advice of the probation office, which recommended a lesser sentence and the consideration of factors that could have led to a sentence of home confinement or probation. I believe that while it's appropriate to imprison the brown or the poor Americans for minor crimes for far longer than 30 months, my friends shouldn't be subjected to the same standards.

I it's nice to say that I respect the jury's verdict, I don't. The justice system that all Americans are subject to just doesn't work for me and my friends. I'm sure the American people can trust me to dole out fair and just punishment for myself and my pals. Therefore, I am commuting the portion of Scooters’ sentence that required him to spend thirty months in prison.

My decision to commute his prison sentence leaves in place very little punishment for Scooter's. The reputation he gained through his years of public service and professional work in the legal community is enhanced by his ability to escape any accountability for his actions. His wife and young children have also suffered immensely. He will remain on probation. The miniscule fines imposed by the judge will remain in effect. The consequences of his felony convictions on his former life as a lawyer, public servant, and private citizen will be not matter much. I will likely pardon them at the end of my term anyway. He's already joined the Hudson Institute as a senior advisor.

The Constitution gives the President the power of clemency to be used when he deems it to be warranted, and frankly, I deem it warranted. It is my judgment that a commutation of the prison term in Scooter's case is an appropriate exercise of this power. Heck, I deem any exercise of my power warranted, constitutionally granted or not.

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Thank you for your time.