For those familiar with the fine art of football simulators, we’ve been privy to some fine games coming out from the fine folks at Electronic Arts. Madden NFL allows you to steer the fates of a professional franchise as NCAA Football puts you in charge of a Division I program. Despite their similar base premises (i.e. playing football games), I’ve been a steady purchaser of both games for the last few years. My favorite aspect of the games is the behind-the-scenes construction of the teams, so I enjoy the difference between recruiting in NCAA and drafting/free agency in Madden. That’s usually enough to get me to play both even though the core of both is very similar.

I do rarely play both at once, though. It seems I have a pretty regular annual cycle of when I play each. In July, the new version of NCAA Football comes out and I play that pretty regularly until August when the latest Madden is released. When September rolls around and the college guys take the field before NFL’s Week 1, I put my NCAA disc back in the Xboxen and usually don’t take it out until after the Bowl games are done. During the NFL’s post-season and business season (or off-season to the lamen), I’m all about the Madden. Usually, around the end of spring, I’ll pop NCAA back for a few weeks but will put both football games away by the official start of summer. I use the time to cleanse my system in preperation of the cycle beginning anew with another new edition of NCAA Football.

Now EA’s putting another game in this already-crowded market: Arena Football. AFL has gotten so-so reviews but I still would love to play it at least once. I mean, look at that hit! It’s probably a rental unless I can use my connections to swing a free game. Does anyone plan on getting this game? Do you already have NCAA or Madden? I hear the game’s a little bit cheaper ($30 it looks like) than your standard new release. Does that help?

“You know, I vaguely recall seeing footage somewhere of something exactly like this, which leads me to believe this probably won’t work.”

The Cincinnati Enquirer had an article about my local comic shop and I only found it when I saw it at a comic blog, The Great Curve. How sad is it that I learned about this from a site that’s probably operated out of another part of the country? Well, I don’t get the paper so maybe it’s not that bad.

Anyway, scanning the article, it seems to be about comic books as investments. I wouldn’t suggest it since you’d have to shell out some money to get any that are worth a damn and continue to be worth something. Their value doesn’t shoot up very quickly so I don’t see it being a lucrative business. But, as an enjoyable hobby that may or may not return on your investments? It’s pretty darn good. Just don’t bank the house on it.

“Are you an authorized dealmaker in this establishment? Do you have the power to negotiate?”
“You wanna haggle over the price of your French Dip?”

I had a good time reliving some childhood (well, maybe young adulthood) memories with a Laser Tag outing. I probably shouldn’t be proud of the fact that I enjoyed shooting fake guns at pre-teen kids but it was a righteous fun time. It was good enough for How I Met Your Mother so it’s good enough for me, right? They say it might make a comeback. Anyone else play it recently or am I the only sad adult to step into a laser light arena?

“This birth is not proceeding as it did in the simulations.”

“It’s simply beyond words. It’s incalcucable.”

It’s been over a year and a half since I declared I was gonna be all about Fan Films, those products of love that fans make starring the characters they love. I had a decent run reviewing about 37 pieces, ranging from serious attempts to simulate a blockbuster to larks that were made by a group of amateurs over a weekend. Most of them came on the end of the work week and were dubbed Fan Film Friday. But, after a while, I gave the concept a rest and put FFF on the shelf for a little while. Part of it was due to my own laziness (no surprise) but another part was that the once-fertile pool of Fan Films were drying up. Now, we may have some to work with again.

Mike at Progressive Ruin has found a whole slew of Fan Films over at You Tube. This seems to be the new place for underground-type videos. Or maybe it has been for a while and I just noticed now. Although, someone did link to a video of Nick Lachey singing with Kitt so I have seen some crazy stuff there before. The point is, I’ll check out what they’ve got and probably let you know what’s worth checking out in the form of your old friend, the Fan Film Friday report.

“I’m not programmed to react to a girl’s smile. You on the other hand, are programmed to react to nothing else.”

I took last week off, but am back with some interesting tidbit from someone who’s smarter than me. Or, at least, they have more time. This item was pointed out in regards to last week’s episode where the castaways were trying to determine if a newcomer, Henry Gale, was an “Other” or if he was another victim of the island of crashed souls.

Henry Gale is from Wizard of Oz and that is the name of Dorothy’s uncle. The wizard uses a hot air balloon as a method of travel in Oz. Coincidence?

Seems to me that Sayid and crew definitely have an “Other” on their hands. Although, Gale wouldn’t be the first person on that island to have connections to fictional or historical figures. (Locke, Rosseau, etc.) But Henry does seem to have too many.

“Money’s very expensive these days.”

I’ve been seeing some good news lately on Adult Swim in regards to my favorite show on there, The Venture Brothers. I thoroughly enjoyed the first season and Cartoon Network waited a good long time deciding on whether or not to pick up a second season. Eventually, they did. But, it took a good long time to make that season. I had heard this spring but it looks like it won’t be until summer. A fan site, The Mantis-Eye Experiment, goes on to say June 25 will be the exact day. Boy, am I looking forward to that cause they kinda left us on a bit of a cliffhanger.

If you’re out of the loop, you can watch the first season on Saturday nights at 11. Or you can, like me, pick up the Season One DVD will be out May 30. I’m glad to see it will include the pilot, which was hardly ever rerun, and the Christmas special.

“You have to understand you can’t waltz into the middle of a delicate, high-stakes chess tournament and yell, “King me!” ’cause he bitched up your face.”

A new comic book movie is out this week. And some people have already had some questions for me. Being the comic book nerd friend, this is normal when a comic book expands beyond it’s standard format. Ultimate Avengers is based on The Ultimates, which is essentially an updated version of the Avengers. Ergo, the movie name which combines the two. Basically, the American government puts together a team of super-heroes. The comic book plays with the idea that maybe it’s not the best thing in the world for George W. to have access to weapons of super destruction. It’ll be interesting if this gets raised in a streamlined story that barely runs over an hour. The PG-13 rating makes it seem like some of the edgier content may stay in the animated version. The movie stars Captain America, Iron Man, Thor, and the Incredible Hluk so it should have someone you’ve heard of before in it. Also, the head of the elite spy organization is based on Samuel L. Jackson so that might some entertainment value.

Another question actually regards the format that the movie is being released on: UMD. I found that UMD stands for Universal Media Disc according to an evolution of the DVD article. Best guess? Sounds like the Playstation Portable discs, just by a different name. Apparently, the days of movies on PSPs discs might be numbered. So, enjoy your UMDs while you can, if you even knew what they were.

Hope these helped.

“You will buy your weather from me! And by God you’ll pay for it.”

My friend, Jeff, and I have been reminiscing today about a show we both enjoyed, even though we barely remember it: Voyagers! Yeah, you probably don’t remember it either. It aired for only one season on NBC back in 1982. It was about a “voyager” named Phinneas Bogg who travelled through time and helped nudge the past in the proper direction. Except he lost the guide book, his only source of how history is supposed to turn out, and has to bring a 12 year-old boy with him after accidently knocking him out of his bedroom window. Okay, that didn’t sound too good and should get this site plenty of visits from sick, twisted people. But once you get past the goofy premise, it came down to this kid helping a swash-buckling time traveller from the wrong sides winning certain wars to historically people being in the right place at the right time. Essentially, it’s like Quantum Leap with a kid instead of a hologram. Oh, and they could go all over history up until 1970. Don’t know why that was the cutoff. Maybe there was to be no fourth dimensional interference to prevent the Disco craze.

I found some good info about it at the The “Unofficial” Voyagers! Home Page which helps stir some memories and gives another fan’s perspective. Here’s another Voyagers! perspective. It was a kid-friendly show and could definitely be modified and updated for today’s audience. Here’s a look at what a Voyagers! animated show might look like courtesy of a strange animated characters page. It doesn’t look official so I doubt we’ll see a Voyagers! remake anytime soon.

I have such limited memories and the tidbits are odd. They’d essentially fall out of the sky everytime they time travelled and I think they almost always landed in a hay bail or something. I think Phinneas was emberrassed of his first name so he had everyone call him by his last name. They travelled by way of the Omni, a compass-like thing that would turn red when history was bad and turn green when everything was fixed. Anybody else remember this show? Here’s the opening credits to Voyagers! to help jog your memory.

“Ziggy says you need to work the shaft, WORK THE SHAFT!”

I read this article that had some good news/bad news for the folks at Sirius satellite radio. Revenue (that’s incoming money, right?) tripled but profit and stock prices took a dive. Things at XM haven’t been exactly rosy, either. Their shares are down, too, and “a director resigned on Thursday and warned of a looming ‘crisis’ if XM does not rein in spending.” I think the concept of satellite radio is a good one with a good consumer base. I’m wondering if these two just might implode before either of them can make some regular coin doing that. We’ll see if the pending Playboy Radio channel brings in another surge… of listeners. I’m skeptical a magazine famous for naked women could work on radio but it has to be better than Maxim’s crappy station.

“Talk hard, I like that. It’s like a dirty thought in a nice clean mind.”