Knuckles Dawson

So, having played the delicious demo of Burnout Paradise out on Marketplace, as well as the recent back compat update including Burnout 2: Point of Impact and IGN's mention of Burnout 3: Takedown coming to Xbox Originals made me crave playing it again. Plus, Stryker is a better Crash FM DJ than Atomika, in my minority opinion. So I popped it in and played through some of the Single Player World Tour (what with EA disabling online play, and all) for about 45 minutes. When I got back to my Dashboard on 360, I checked my games played list to look at some GRAW 2 Achievements and saw this:

 

 

 

What is that doing there? Sure, it doesn't show up on my xbox.com profile, but srsly guyz. Why is that there? Why does it show 0 of 0 Achievements with 0 Gamerscore? And why does it have to use the Xbox icon as placeholder. I mean, unless Microsoft is planning to automagically add Achievements to select Backwards compatible/Xbox Originals titles despite saying it won't happen, I know of no reason why that should clutter my Gamercard, only on my Xbox 360, and think it should forever be forgot.

 Oh, and BO3:TD? Still frickin' rad.

Posted by Knuckles Dawson at 09:35 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

While playing Dead Rising on Monday I changed up my wardrobe from the MegaMan Tights and Boots with the Lego head to something more akin to what you'd find on movies involving the 13th of the month that happens to be a Friday (but not the same Friday as one you should see Atonement on):

 

Yeah, I suppose the Heavy Machine Gun is slight overkill, but it sure looks intimidating. It also tears through psychopaths, so that's useful, but is a pain to lug around when dealing with survivors. I'm digging the outfit, and since it's persistent throughout the cutscenes, it adds extra humor. For example, after dispatching Steven, and saving Isabela, she takes off running. Jessie commented on that by saying "Can't blame her from running from someone with your looks." I personally wouldn't be too keen on entrusting my safety with someone that looks like an iconic mass murderer from a movie series, but maybe that's me.

 Oh, and yes, it's early, I know.

Posted by Knuckles Dawson at 04:50 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

So, I've been playing Dead Rising, which I actually stopped playing before I started this blog back in September of 2006, so I picked it up again after a year's absence of decapitating zombies with small cyan chainsaws lifted from the (cold and/or dead) hands of overly enthusiastic clowns with separation anxiety. Obviously, in order to justify such odd behavior, considering I have Rock Band, Mass Effect, Assassin's Creed and Call of Duty 4 all just sitting on a pile of games that I'm in the middle of playing, I'm going have to give you some context, and it actually involves the latter on that list.

 My buddies over at Roosterteeth, Burnie and Geoff, are both something of Achievement Whores as well. Anyway, they had an interesting internal contest with CoD4 where they both started playing the game at the same time and raced to be first to get the full 1000 Gamerscore, since the game was A.) new and B.) had Campaign only Achievements. The winner got to choose an Achievement that they've previously unlocked that they can have the loser go and get themselves.

In the end, it was a close match, but Burnie came out ahead, nabbing the "Mile Hile Club" Achievement and sealing the deal. Burnie had his side of the story on his journal, including a runthrough of the Airplane 60 seconds found in that last link as well as serving up his penance Achievement. Geoff gave his outlook, and eventually finished off the game, and now is working on getting hte "7 Day Survivor" Achievement on Dead Rising. Ironically, in order to get that Achievement, he's going to have to get like, 6 others. But, on the bright side, it's a fun game, even if the 14 hours of gaming required is a bit of a chore.

Geoff and I have played through games together for Achievements before, like Fuzion Frenzy 2, and more recently joining in on his conquest of GRAW 2. So, having played Dead Rising before then abruptly stopping for other gaming stuff, I decided his punishment would be a good excuse to pick it up again and finish off the Achievements, as he and I both agreed that since he's playing it, he might as well get the last Gamerscore remaining, and I felt that I should do the same, after all company and misery tend to go hand in hand, right?

Anyway, in the past week, I've unlocked 15 Achievements in it, and only have 7 more to go. Notably, over the weekend I got Frank The Pimp, Tour Guide, PP Collector, Gourmet and Clothes Horse. I also did some other extracurricular Achievements along the way, but those were some of the big ones. I also had to do Zombie Genocider again, and finish the playthrough to unlock arguably the best medium-long range weapon in the game. My next playthrough will focus on getting Saint, Full Set and Transmissionary, and by utilizing either of my memory cards, I can save a branching point to pick up Snuff Shots J and B. Then that'll leave me with just the two Surviving Achievements.

We've been looking over various guides, and finding the path of least resistance for the various objectives. The Frank the Pimp guide over at GameFAQs is pretty tight, and there's a photo album for all the PP Stickers, a nice list for all the pieces of clothing. I recommend going from Paradise Plaza down to Wonderland via the shortcut in the ladies restroom, then down through Al Fresca and finishing off at Entrance Plaza. For Gourmet, don't forget to drink all the mixed drinks, and you can eat 98% of the list in Seon's Food & Stuff anyway. I did all of those in one playthrough too, so it doesn't take much time if you've got the Small Chainsaw+3 books, Real Mega Buster, and a nice supply of wine, milk or OJ.

 Anyway, Geoff and I are probably going to do our Survivor run simultaneously, which will most likely happen on a weekend, since it's 14 hours straight and all. I may liveblog my experience, and he's got some ideas cooking for his coverage too.

 

 

Posted by Knuckles Dawson at 01:45 PM | Permalink | Comments (3)

So, instead of neglecting this site due to mywork over at X3F, I'm going to be supplying you guys updates, news and stuff in bite size chunks, similar to how twitter works, (even though I just started using twitter as well.) Maybe I'll pull a Major Nelson and and a twitter widget to my sidebar or something, since I tend to send stuff from AIM etc.

 Thinking about it, after the impending spring updatethis May, I might switch the twitter IM to MSN, so I can send updates straight from my Xbox 360...Hmm.. We'll see.

Saw 300 a couple weekends back, and thought it was great.

I also have been playing Guitar Hero II, having all 5 stars on Easy and Medium. I'm now just getting started with Hard, still working on 5-starring the first setlist.

Super Paper Mario and Twilight Princess have been getting some playtime over on my Wii, and it's good to finally sink my teeth into some Zelda.

On the PS3, I've been trudging through Resistance: Fall of Man, which feels more like a chore than a game, just because there are such better experiences available on other new gen consoles. I bought flOw on the PS Store, and find it to be very relaxing and...serene.

Day 500 of my Achievement Streak has come and gone, on the 5th, and it feels good to hit such a milestone. Now should I decide to stop, I'll still feel like I accomplished what I set out to do back in November of '05.

So yeah, that should bring you up to speed mostly. I hope to clean up the bots in the forum, maybe get another admin on board to assist in maintenance. Again, We'll see.

Catch you guys on X3F. 

Speaking of, our Pod/Fancast is 12 episodes strong, and my audio quality is finally up to snuff. Episode 10 and 11 were sub-par for their own reasons.

 

Posted by Knuckles Dawson at 06:04 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

• The gig at Xbox360Fanboy is going well, we even have a regular podcast and are 3 episodes into it. You'll notice my audio quality increase each progressive week.
• I got into the Halo 3 Beta's Rule of 3 thing. None the less, Crackdown's demo is amazing and I'm still getting the game regardless. 
• Today is Valentine's Day. But more importantly, is Rhett/iEyeCaptain's 18th Birthday! Wish him a good one.
• My achievement streak is still going strong and today is day 450. w00t, only another 50 days to go till the big milestone. Still planning on what to do for it. Any suggestions?
• For the first time since, aside from WhoIs information, I'll give out my email address foryou to contact me with. Although I'm enjoying the fact I'm not getting swamped with spam, it's MyGameretagsInitials@ThisDomainName.com. For those that can't figure it out, the initials are kd. 
•  I've been doing some achievement housecleaning, and I've even got requests from people who read OXM about whether or not they can help me get achievements in some games. If you wanna help, either drop me a line on XBL or the email clues above. Games I'm looking for assistance in are: GRAW, Need For Speed Carbon, Far Cry Instincts Predator and The Outfit for now.
•  I'll get the endeavour calendar updated soon, as the holidays have really kept me busy
• I saw Lucky Number Slevin the other day, and thought it was really good. Heroes is really good, and the new season of 24 is riveting as ever.
• Oh, and I'd like to thank everyone who's sent me kind messages after reading OXM, and sending me friend requests. I appreciate the support. Special mention of course goes to Darth Vader 350 (yes, 350), and ShadowSlayerGod for the help in The Outfit and GRAW respectively.
• In any case, thanks for the time and I'll keep you posted on anything major.

Posted by Knuckles Dawson at 02:49 PM | Permalink | Comments (3)

So, with the February issue of OXM getting into gamer's hands over the course of the week, and coming weeks for non-subscribers, I'm getting - ahem - plenty of random friend requests. Daily. Which is fine, because I'll accept those, but on a provisional basis. Here's how it works, I've only got 100 slots, and apparently those are divided into three categories: Friends, Contacts, and Fans.

Friends, as you may have guessed are people I have a "personal" relationship with. We play games together or private/video chat regularly. I like them for them and they like me for me. Simple stuff.

Contacts, are nearly as important as friends, and are people I have a "professional" relationship with. Usually they are important people in the industry or community, and we share a mutual respect for eachother, and even play together and are on the "friends" level as well.

Fans, are very nice to have, but are unique in their behaviors. They'll add you, and that's it. Maybe they'll send you a message saying "Hi, I saw you in OXM/heard you in such-and-such podcast.", but not often more than that. It's almost as if they want to be able to say, "Hey nameless peer, guess what? I have Knuckles Dawson on my friends list!". And while I'm happy I was able to facilitate your moving up a rung or two in the social ladder, please don't add me just for the sake of adding me and leave it at that. Make attempts to converse or play with me, then you may graduate to one of the other categories, and your spot will be more permanent.

Yesterday I played a game of Gears with a bunch of random people, some friends, some contacts, and mainly fans. It was great. One guy, Stillerfan82, felt I was the quintessential encyclopedia of Xbox 360 and picked my brain with a myriad of questions. Which was fine. I like being properly informed, and have no qualms sharing the knowledge.

In any case, I may start playing more player matches on Gears, that'll help me get to know new people on my friends list quicker and give you a chance to make your spot more likely to stay put. After all, the way I see it, if you're not going to try to get to know me, you're taking that chance away from someone else that will.

Brr, that sounds so cold. But seriously, if I take you off, it's nothing personal, which I suppose could also be why I did in the first place. Nyuk. Still, if you actually notice I did and send me a message or friend request back, I'll accept again, just make use of it, m'kay?

Posted by Knuckles Dawson at 07:38 AM | Permalink | Comments (4)

Welcome to 2007.

My Christmas and New Year was very nice, but due to the nature of our celebration I couldn't report on it in as timely a manner as I would have liked. My uncle (Doug) and cousin (Nathan) from England came down to go snowboarding for the holidays. You may have seen Nate's comments here and there on the site, as well a few posts on the forum. It was great to have them down here, and we had a lot of fun up at Whister/Blackcomb from the 24th to the 27th and on into the interior to Big White for the 31st and 1st. A great way to start off the year if you ask me.

Whistler was pretty good, it snowed for the first 3 days, although getting a Live compatible connection was a bit of a hassle. Apparently, Telus ADSL doesn't have a sufficient MTU to connect to Live for Xbox 360, while I had little issues connecting to Telus with my original Xbox. Which left me with having to hunt down a different internet cafe than the first one I tried. Thanks to Aidan for all of his help, though. He even let me try to connect directly into the modem to bypass the firewall. The Christmas Miracle would reveal itself to be the manager/chef of Gone...Bakery & Soup Co., Todd. After attempting to use the Shaw Cable at the bistro, he offered us to go to his humble abode and use his connection, also Shaw. Thankfully, it worked like a charm, although it timed out when initially trying to connect, so despite correcting the internal clock, and showing my friends and messages, it prompted me to "Test Connection". I signed back in after canceling the troubleshooter with no problems. So that covered me for the 25th. The 26th and 27th were a little more complicated. Unfortunately, Todd was unavailable to lend his services for those days, so I had to resort to measures of extreme inconvenience. Drive back to Vancouver, from Whistler (77 miles each way), log in at home, do my thing both before and after midnight, grab a 3 hour nap, and then return to Whistler for one more day on the slopes. My justification is that December 26th was day 400, so to end it on 399 would be a slap in the face.

Still, the time on the hill was nice, and on the 27th, it was nice and sunny, so that was a plus. The backpack continued to own and grab attention (93% positive), with no hiccups due to being in a cold, and potentially wet, enviroment.

The main gifts for this year were the snowboard trips, so the physical gifts were obviously scant. I received a set of high quality rechargeable batteries (for said backpack), and some nice Salomon socks for snowboarding. That being said, because of my primary hobby, and the timing of when it's major releases are, I did buy myself some things within the last month or so that could count as a holiday gifts. These would include:

• Five (5) Sumo Lounge Omni chairs, 3 grey, 2 black.
• A PS3, that among three others was just chilling at a local Zellers.
• Viva Piñata. Just got into it yesterday, and it looks to be filled with fun.
• Wireless Xbox 360 Steering Wheel. Played around with it a bit in PGR3, and I plan on giving it a shot with NFS: Carbon and when I decide to actually open my copy of Test Drive Unlimited.
• Resistance: Fall of Man. Wow, the textures look so bland compared to the rich detail found in Gears of War. Maybe I need to give it more time, though.

So it's not like I don't have any new toys to mess around with.

Big White was really nice, and the hotel's business center was compatible with Xbox Live, so that was handy. The first day saw a little sun and the conditions were alright. It was close to the end of the day when we found the preferred run ride on. The next day was snowing and a bit foggy at the top of the lift, but that just gave way to fresh powder to tear through. I was going excessively fast, and it showed. I'll post pictures later, you'll be amused.

So that was my Christmas and New Years, didn't really party too much, just plowed.

Posted by Knuckles Dawson at 11:50 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I just got an email from Mr. "Anonymous Microsoft Employee" from Shadowrun Playtest event, and he just confirmed I was, as promised in the first round of the Shadowrun Beta. I'd like to thank Tony Hynes for offering the chance to play this amazing game last month, as well as FASA Studios for being such a cool development team and hosting the playtest, and of course, Mr. AME for giving those of us there the chance to get to help out making this game as good as it can be.

So, yeah.
w00t!

Posted by Knuckles Dawson at 03:13 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Honestly, I don't know what to say to that, or if I should actually accept it yet.
Jester and I came across him while playing some Gears last night, and he was definitely unique.
I think I'm going to leave that one pending for a while.

Update: By the way, his motto is "dawsonnucklesiscokles", which I guess brings into question the availability of superior technology. You may notice that the motto is cut off at xbox.com if it's a long word with no spaces, well, you can select all the text and copy it over to a text field that can display it. I suppose the guys at xbox.com should get on widening the table so that these important morsels of wisdom can be visible to all those who peruse various gamercards.

Posted by Knuckles Dawson at 07:56 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

So, you may have heard about the heavy snow in Seattle over the last week. As you can imagine, Vancouver experienced more or less the same onslaught. Which is good news, because the North Shore Mountains look exceptionally frosted. Having been an avid snowboarder for the last 9 seasons, this, my 10th, is the first time that I've gotten a season's pass. This also is the first time that we've had a high enough body count to reap the rewards of the "Family Package", as opposed to the usual total of just two: my father and I. So, now with our party increasing 150%, and a Early Bird Family Package at Mount Seymour costing a mere 600 total, that comes to about $160 per adult. Definitely a sound investment.

So, this past weekend saw me at said mountain, for a short stint on Saturday, and a full day Sunday. Saturday was good to for getting my feet wet. Sunday, though, was awesome. A good full day of boarding, and honing my previous skills as an instructor, as I made serious progress teaching Skye how to carve after she got the hang of turning. Oly, my previous student has since "graduated" and more or less is going at his own pace.

I brought my Audio Backpack on Sunday, and it faired well, despite not being connected to my iPod. The music selection wasn't as robust as the 48 hours of music I have in a snowboarding specific playlist, but it served its purpose. I can hardly wait until I can go up with my iPod, as the volume, even on the runs, when cranked to 11, is easily audible, and others take notice.

The trip down the mountain wasn't as quick as the one up, as there was a couple trees that collapsed from the added weight of the heavy snowfall, and decided the most convenient place to not make a sound would be in the middle of the road.

Upon arriving at Delta Base, we shoveled the driveway, and rewarded ourselves with a double feature: Casino Royale and Deja Vu. Both were extremely well made and entertaining. CR being a much needed reboot of the James Bond franchise, and Deja Vu almost able to be interpreted as a loose sequel to Donnie Darko. Two great movies at one great price. Or something.

I cracked open Elite Beat Agents while waiting for Deja Vu, and really liked it. I played a bit of Osu! Tatakae! Ouendan at PAX '06, but didn't pick it up that well. That may have to do with not recognizing the music, and thus the tempo for the songs. EBA surprised me with a bunch of instantly recognizable tunes, and that helped me progress through it. Right now I'm just cracking through the 3rd difficulty's early songs.

On the 360 front, I've been playing plenty of Gears, and am trying to get back into Splinter Cell: Double Agent and finsh that up. Unfortunately the impending kickass snowboard season is hindering the time available for me to do so. I'll see how I manage. I played some more Twilight Princess Friday and Saturday before hitting the slopes, and beat the Forest Temple. After some fine tuning of my Wii-mote, I'm pinpointing enemies with incredible ease. Haven't touched it at all this week, though I did order a Component Cable at Nintendo's online store. I can hardly wait for that progressive goodness.

Well, I think that pretty much brings us back up to speed on what's been going on. Also, regarding the KD Experience, the next episode is currently indeed on the agenda, and should be getting a facelift in many respects.

Posted by Knuckles Dawson at 11:20 AM | Permalink | Comments (3)

Having never owned a PS2, I only ever played Guitar Hero once at PAX'06 until last weekend’s console launches. As you may have read, I had a day of chilling at Best Buy in line for the Wii, with not much else there but the demo of Guitar Hero II, I took to it to prepare for the impending Xbox 360 release.

I came back after the Wii launch on Monday and gave it a couple more tries. I did not score perfectly, only missing a couple notes here and there, but I got 104304 at the Best Buy. Armed with my cell phone, I took this shot:



Not bad for someone who doesn't own the game, and only had a days play with it. Mind you, I met a guy on Saturday who could play Expert on any song I picked and watch him kick ass. So, hopefully I'll get to that level some day.

Posted by Knuckles Dawson at 11:17 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

So, for day 365 of my achievement streak, November 21st, I finished Gears of War on Insane with APKJester. Apparently, General RAAM doesn't like being shot by the Torque Bow, especially in the knees. I would highly recommend both you and your buddy having full Torque and Sniper ammo for that difficulty. For those of you out of the loop, Jester and I met on PDZ on November 22, 2005, so beating the final boss of the flagship title of the Xbox 360, together on the 365th day of both my streak and our friendship, was a truly bonding experience.

Afterwards, I did some Warzone against a "fan-friend", Double Chinned, whose original Gamertag was Double Chin2. He messaged me after hearing my tag being mentioned on Major's Show #186. We talked for a bit, and I asked him why he had the "2" in his tag. He told me that it was because "Double Chin" was taken. I then asked "Why didn't you just choose 'Double Chinned'?" After about 5 seconds of silence, the next thing I heard was a string of expletives. After that, I told him to go change his gamertag to Double Chinned. Obviously, he did. And even for a while had his Motto "This GT © Knuckles Dawson", or something similar.

But, I digress. Anyway, Jester and I joined in, and on the first round had some lousy teammates, who were friends of Chinned, and one sounded like he was 8 year olds. The fact I was off by 7 years scared me. After a prompt thrashing in what was essentially 4-on-2 in Fuel Depot, I noticed some arrogant remarks from the COG side. Not in the mood to allow for such notions to be made under those circumstances, I asked if I would be able to get my friends on my team, so I could actually coordinate some semblance of strategy. I called iEyeCaptain, got him on, and got TheMan661 over as well, who was more than happy to be on my team this time. From that point forward, Double Chinned and his cohorts knew the true power of KD Enterprises. It was rather cruel. Once TheMan661 had to go, I brought in French Frye to mix it up, and he definitely performed at the exceptional level I expected of him.

Jester and Rhett seemed to hit it off quite well, discussing Wrestling to the nth degree. So much so in fact, that they ended up forming an impervious duo on WWE SVR 2007. Much to the annoyance of those foolish enough to face them in the online arena. At the same time, I finally caught up with Tree , another initial "fan-friend" who added me after my Major Nelson interview. He does the podcast for GotSpeech.net, and only got his 360 recently. So, aside from a friend getting him an achievement on Madden, he's never gotten one himself. We both thought that was due for a change, so I started up a campaign on Hardcore, and we played through the first chapter, nabbing him his first two achievements. Which, to remind you, was also on Day 365 for me.

On the Wii side of things, I played through more of Twilight Princess, completing the first expedition into the Twilight Zone. Heh. It was a lot of fun and the Wolf-Link's control mechanics are really intuitive and cool. This game is going to be great to plug away at. Still on the look out for component cables, though.

Posted by Knuckles Dawson at 09:14 AM | Permalink | Comments (9)

Yeah, I was in NYC for the Fall Showcase event on Monday. It was incredible, Peter Moore was there, he signed my launch Dreamcast+its respective jersey as well as my launch 360's faceplate+its respective shirt. Yeah, 4 items may be a lot, but the guy was CEO of Sega during the Dreamcast's era, so, an opportunity to pay respect to that console's legacy can't be ignored. And as my dad always told me: "Don't ask, don't get." Which is to say, you're not going to get what you want if you don't at least ask.

Anyway, I'm going to keep this brief. But, I'll leave you with this, I will go into full details on the happenings of this whole week in my podcast that will be going up this weekend. The name, naturally is KDE: The Knuckles Dawson Experience. Heh. So, until then, I'll catch you on the flip side.

Posted by Knuckles Dawson at 09:41 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Costumes

After work I biked to The Party Bazaar just down the street to see if I could find something to wear today. After some searching and checking out some candy for my eyes, I spyed a costume called "The Well Hung Man", which is basically a suicide by hanging thing, as well as a delicious pun. I guess one could argue that I need no costume in this case, but that's just stereotypical of a guy to stroke his own ego. Heh. Moving on. The package was open, so I asked the guy at the counter if that's normal. It's not. And the noose and rope for tying the wrists was gone. It was their last one. They had a spare noose, though, but no wrist rope, so I got it for $35 off, but the noose was $20, so whatever. I picked up some fake blood for slit wrists, as well. On top of that, there's a Home Depot not to far for my wrist rope. So I trekked over there with a tight fit for my aforementioned backpack, as while it wasn't going anywhere, my recent acquisition was poking out of the top and it was rather heavy.

At Home Depot, a cool twenty-something guy named Johann hooked me up with 3' of rope for like, $1.01, after tax. So I grabbed a bite at Harvey's, after I had them put the rope on the grill for a few seconds to singe it together, as Johann couldn't get the heat cutter to work. The nylon melted a bit, but another quick cut and it'll look really good. One Double Hamburger Combo later and I was off back home. It was suddenly exceptionally cold outside, and I had a big hill to pedal up that I wasn't quite exuberant about. While taking a shortcut, I came across a taxi-minivan, and was thinking, "Screw this, I'll just take the taxi." And so I did, and $6.25 later I was home and STILL under the list price for the costume.

Here's the unique spin for my costume, rather than the supplied shirt, I'll be wearing this one:

Problem Exists Between Keyboard And Chair

So, I'll be a suicidal tech support employee who couldn't handle the imbecility on the other line. And while I don't work with Tech support, I do occasionally have to deal with clients who know just enough to be dangerous. Anyway, I'll post pics of me in full costume tomorrow or Thursday.

Community

I plopped in some UNO, and was subjected to a Hentai movie (it's wikipedia, but has a thumbnail that may be NSFW), thanks, NEG. You're lucky you're on my friends list and a cool cat. I caught up with Ninjafish, and in true KD Style™, talked without breathing for 5 minutes straight in private chat for a bit. He appears to be kinda starstruck by the whole experience. And he's absolutely right, I did have to go to go talk to Bastelyon in video chat. And what did he have to say? Well, something so TOTALLY AWESOME that I can't even talk about it. Yet. When I get the green light, I'll post up a storm. Or something.

What I can talk about is what's not going to happen. Way back in September, when Bastelyon and I first Private and Video chatted, we talked about throwing a party on November 22nd for my completing a year's streak, and stuff. As time went on though, it was obvious that the Xbox Team was going to be very busy with all the holiday hub-bub and the attendees wouldn't be as spectacular as originally planned. The subject-that-can-not-be-mentioned easily makes up for it, especially since it's before the 22nd, and Tony and I were bouncing off some other dates that could be worth throwing a party for.

Carnage

After my exciting chat with Bastelyon, I saw that K4rn4ge was online, you may have heard of him before, I think he had a high score in game where you wage war against geometric shapes but the name escapes me. I think it's called "The Bus That Couldn't Slow Down". Anyway, I wanted to talk to him about what just happened. He said he was just about to pop in Saints Row since there was a supposed Software Update for the multiplayer and if I got it we should play. So I throw it in, and we hop in a room and chat about this site and my clan's Gears of War division. He may come on board as another member of the KD Entourage, and put in his two cents on whatever he feels like.

So we did some co-op and he and I worked together to unlock an achievement, which was a lot of fun (the playing co-op, the achievement was icing on the proverbial cake). After that we played Frogger to get the Co-Op Brilliance achievement, which we did with no problem, and we had an interesting side affect, when he completed Level 5 and the game ended, I got that achievement as well, which was cool, I guess, but I wanted to do it myself since I only made it to the end of Level 4 that game. Oh well, still fun times though.

Calgary

GeekesS and I proceeded to video chat into the night, talking about PAX '07, helping her find her cell by calling it while she rummaged through the room. Anytime I got her voicemail I'd leave a message like "I'm watching you!" in a stalker-esque voice, or "I think you're hotter than Rosie O'Donnell", since her Halloween costume this year is Betty Rubble, whom I was able to guess by only seeing the wig. We shot the breeze till a little past midnight, where she went to bed, and I went to download Ultimate MK3, and get an 8 G achievement before the update at 2 AM, as a precaution should anything go awry. There's a category that still doesn't have any posts associated with it, I'll let you do math.

Chaos

This morning I got up and downloaded the update, as soon as the console reboot. There was a collision between a fan and feces (read: baby mice, for you Donnie Darko buffs). The screen was blinking in and out, and the image was white, over exposed and grainy. Not good. The best way to describe it would be if I were a spy in nightvision in SC:DA multiplayer, and I got hit with a flashbang (that actually blinded spies). In a slight panic, I switched the HD/AV cable to TV, which worked, then I browsed around, and switched back to HDTV. It came up really good. Gave me a brief scare, though. It also shows why I'll always get an achievement before any Dash Updates or Server Maintenance, if possible. You never know how a system wide patch is going to do to your console. Especially since mine is still the original Xbox 360 I got at launch, with little to no hiccups, aside from games known to freeze. This may have been an issue with the TV handling the system's reboot.

Candy

My current obsession when it comes to treats would be Läkerol Cassis Pastilles. The Cassis would imply that they are Blackcurrant flavoured, and they are addictive and so tasty. IKEA has them in stock, and you get a discount if you buy them by the 24 pack.

Oh My!

Trivia about IKEA and me. When I was a really little I went to South Korea and stayed with my grandparents, while my Mom, Dad and sister went to Thailand (where my dad was born). The reason why I'm very caucasian is that my grandparents were Missionaries, and my dad was born while they were on the job just outside of Bangkok. In any case, South Korea was definitely in my vocabulary when I was 3 and 4 because of my grandparents working there, so I always called IKEA I-Korea. I guess since 1998 that would be spelled iKorea

Posted by Knuckles Dawson at 10:35 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

So, I was playing Time Pilot on XBLA, trying desperately to Survive to 2001, which I can do. I've completed each level individually without dying, but haven't done the four consecutively, obviously. I came so very close (within mere seconds of the 1982 "boss" coming on screen) a few times last night. If I get a good score going by the time I complete 1982 I'll keep going. And one time that I did keep rolling, I got a whopping 332,600, managing up to around level 11 or 12. In any case, that completely blew my 253,000 score I had prior (ranked 631). So much so that I got exactly 100th on the Leaderboards. Not a bad increase, and I plan on getting in the double digits, and the Perfection achievement, as soon as I can.

Posted by Knuckles Dawson at 06:25 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

So, I've been playing a bunch of Saints Row, and on the weekend I completed the main single player storyline. The ending(s) were good, but I'm surprised they don't have a 3rd ending for when you complete the game 100% and play the last mission. That would have made sense in the context of the game.

I'm still pushing through the activities now, having completed the Snatch and Insurance Fraud and currently working on the Escort and Hijacking. I recommend completing Snatch and Insurance Fraud as soon as you can, as the rewards for completing them are very helpful in making the game more entertaining. I have yet to play online yet, but iEyeCaptain and I probably will get some co-op/multiplayer on sometime this week. So far, the only radio station I've listened to is 89.0 Generation X, but I find its music to be quiet catchy.

In terms of a comparison to the GTA franchise, I find both have their advantages. Saints lets you save on the fly, and even lets you make the conrols more GTA-like (Scheme B for Walking/Driving is for the most part better, except for missions where you're a passenger with unlimited ammo, then switch driving to Scheme A). At the very least, this gives me a taste of how awesome a sandbox game can be on Xbox 360, even if its not in a mall infested with Zombies. After all, it's still another year until GTAIV drops. So, what do you guys think of Saints Row?

Posted by Knuckles Dawson at 11:19 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

So, after work on Friday, I come home to two pieces of mail. A Canada Post notice that I was not available to receive a parcel, (at 9:50 AM, no less, when everyone is chilling at home on a weekday.), and an express package from Redmond, WA. I'm not sure if you've heard of this "Microsoft Corporation", but it's this small, upstart company that deals with computer software and various IT/Entertainment related products. Anyway, I already know what's inside: An Xbox Live Vision camera. Free. From Microsoft, or more specifically, from Bastelyon, the Community PR Manager at MS.

We met at PAX '06, he gave me his card, and was rather impressed with this little streak I got going here, and was kind enough to accept my friend request. We talked a couple days after PAX ended on Live, and he asked if I had a camera yet. I told him I didn't, and he said he's been sending them to Community MVPs, so they can essentially show them off to everyone else and build hype. Then, get this: He tells me to email him (provided on the business card he handed me at PAX), and if they have any left he'll send one to me. And so I did, the next day. Then messaged him a few days later and he said he shipped it Friday and for me to expect it sometime this week. And so I did. And come Friday, it arrived.

I was fortunate enough to run into Bastelyon on the same day and thank him "in person", and he and I talked about another cool little idea that I'll save for another post. I then did some video chat with friends that got the camera at Toys R Us, and played Uno.

Saturday saw me Playing through some Prey and Saint's Row, taking advantage of the beautiful weather and biking around Vancouver/Stanley Park for about 4 hours, then checking out the parcel notice I got with along with the camera. It was billed as $15.06, so I figured it was for something I bought online. A pair of Soap Shoes were waiting for me, and I'll be messing around with them on Monday most likely, as I started to build a "training rail" on Saturday, but need another wood support in the middle before I can use it.

Finally, Sunday had me watching Donnie Darko, which is a great little film. It's similar in concept to The Butterfly Effect, but is its own story. I also finished the Vice Kings missions on Saints Row, and messed around on Uno. I relaxed most of the day because of the overcast/rainy weather, and my leg muscles were sore from yesterday's biking, which was good.

All in all a good weekend, and I even brainstormed some design things for my site, while getting the go-ahead from Bastelyon regarding my borrowing some "elements" on stuff. You'll see. And while I got you here, send him a message and thank him on my behalf for getting me a camera. He'll like that, especially while he's currently in Tokyo prepping for TGS. Still, I'll catch you all around later.

Posted by Knuckles Dawson at 10:19 PM | Permalink | Comments (4)