Guy In Rubber Suit

Yeah the mixing in that live show is fucking terrible. I'm not impressed by them. Wow they can blaze a 1000 notes per second but there's no real hook or musicality or anything interesting. I'll take Blind Guardian or Angra over them.

Well I feel better that it's going to be a reimaginning and not a remake. I hope it keeps some of the satire that Paul Verhoeven put into the original. I'm causiously optimistic about this film.

I forgot to mention Nevermore. A fantastic power/thrash metal band from Seattle. Jeff Loomis is a monster on guitar. I highly recommend the albums Dreaming Neon Black all the way to This Godless Endeavor. You don't have to worry about growling here. Warrel Dane delivers a great performance with a wide range but stays mostly in the mid tones. Judas Priest's Painkiller is an essential shred album. Just straight up balls out metal that has some killer leads and riffs. Of course there's Yngwie Malmsteen and if you like Dream Theater check out Liquid Tension Experiment which has John Petrucci, Mike Portnoy and Jordan Rudess of the previous said band in addition to Tony Levin of King Crimson (fantastic band in their own right if you don't know them). They're an instrumental band that incorporates a fair amount of shred in their music.

Opeth doesn't have much shredding. Great band just doesn't seem like what he's looking for. Into Eternity is a fantastic band that combines great shredding and has growling/clean vocals. Arsis is great though again the death vocals may put you off. Behold...the Arctopus is a chaotic shredfest instrumental band that is definitely worth checking out. I second Angra. One of my favorite power/progressive metal bands. Control Denied you might want to give a shot. It's Chuck Schulinder's other band after Death. It was formed after Death was dissolved though it has more of a power/progressive sound to it. No growling vocals. Jason Becker I'm sure you'll love especially if you like Vai and Satch. Firewind is a great band The Human Abstract has a lot of shredding but the vocals are screaming. Not really death style, but more hardcore standard throat tearing shrieking.

The issue at hand is through a tangled mess that is Copyright protection and Intellectual Property Rights. If a group of people successfully created a port of Chrono Trigger, or a spin off or a sequel or even a preview or any manner using the Chrono Trigger characters then there is the potential to damage the name brand. If any of the games or any other derivative mediums were to be of substandard quality then any future work involving the original copyright holder could be in danger. This could be caused by people who are now weary of anything with the Chrono Trigger brand despite the derivatives being from another company. There is great chance that many people will not recognize that Square Enix was not involved with the spin off games. Copyright laws are in place to protect the person(s) who created such a thing. It's in place so no such plagiarism or unauthorized work occurs, or at least kept to a minimum due to the punishments involved. We can all cry foul and be pissed off about it until we turn blue but that is the nature of the game. In some regards it is not fair but the laws are meant to be fair to copyright holder, not everyone else.

It had its enjoyable moments but I definitely felt it dragged and relied too much on deus ex machina. Of course I guess since the being was technically a god then that would have been fine. Or something. Bender's Game looks like it'll be a great movie.

No Sigourney Weaver was the ship's computer i.e. the voice you heard announcing the rogue robots. Auto was done with MacinTalk, at least according to Wikipedia.

There were a few messages that the movie had. One was definitely global warming related. And the other was about robots taking over our lives. Another was consumerism. I pretty much agree with them and I didn't feel like it was painfully obvious. It definitely didn't overshadow the characters. It didn't make me think any differently because I pretty agree with what the movie is saying. I don't know if it changed the minds of others, or made them think about what was going on.

I just came back from the movie. Thanks THQ for paying my way in and for me getting paid to see it! It was a great movie and I had a bit more vested interest in the film since I tested the game based on it. The animation was spectacular. The pacing was well done and they did a great job telling a story with such little dialog. I'd love to see it again and it definitely ranks up as one of my favorite animated films as well as film in general.

One thing I've been reading from various professional game designers via Game Developer magazine, Edge, etc is if you're going into programming get a computer science degree. It'll teach you more and it's basically the same thing as game programming. So far not many game design specific schools have the programming aspect cut out with the exception of maybe DigiPen. Regardless it'd probably be best to get into an actual computer science class. Oh yeah and any ads from Collins College, Westwood, UAT, etc are generally bullshit and crappily done. I've heard a lot of things about Collins screwing people out of money and such from the guys I work with. So just do your research carefully when picking a school.

Some of the teachers are cool. But most of them unfortunately teach via giving you an online tutorial, one that could be found at home without going to school, and using that as the teaching assignment. Most of them know their stuff, just don't know how to really teach. However you do have a ton of software at your finger tips such as Unreal, Neverwinter Nights, Torque, Source Engine and more. They might've added more software since I've been there. I haven't been there since December 2006 so quite a bit might of changed. That said, the best thing for you to do is find some dedicated students, that could be tough and do a mod project. A simple one. The best thing to have on your resume is a finished mod regardless of how small. I have the unfortunate fortune of being on a few unfinished projects but I did get on board a couple of finished ones as well. Granted it won't be your fault all the time if they fail, companies just love to see that you see things through to the end.

I've never experienced that. Or rather, I've never noticed it.

I'll just buy the full version when it comes out.

University of Advancing Technology? I went there. Yeah for game design you want to pad it out with something like level design, some knowledge of programming and/or scripting or maybe some art of some sort. Depending on the size of the company you might wear many hats. At a smaller company it'd be expected that people know several disciplines whilst at a larger company it'd be best to specialize in something. And while it's good to do some scripting with an exciting game engine, a lot of companies will have their own proprietary software to work on. But in general it's good to know the fundamentals of programming and scripting.

I'm a QA tester for THQ out in Phoenix. I was originally on assignment through Acro, an outsourcing type of firm, and recently got hired for a permanent QA position. About damn time as I've been there for a year and four months. However it's thus far been my favorite job. There is also a QA Test Lead position open and I'm applying for that. A cool thing is that we are in the same building as Rainbow Studios, they're in the floor below us so we generally get their titles and interact with the developers far more than usual. I went to school for 'Multimedia' which basically boils down to that I didn't know what I wanted to do at the time. I thought I wanted game design but then realized that it's not what I really wanted, it's harder to get into it and it's extremely specific which would decrease my chances for any other sort of work should that fall through. I started focusing more on animation, which in retrospect I wish I focused on that earlier and went to a more art centric school. I do have strong art skills that I'm trying to improve more and more. I know modelling, basic textures and basic rigs as well as animating in Max and Maya. I also do some character animations for a MMO, Infernal Worlds from Forever Interactive. One thing that I would suggest to artists wanting to break in, having strong traditional skills would help tremendously. I've noticed on a lot of job postings that companies generally want a traditional art background. Granted if you have a demo reel that knocks their socks off and can do the work in a timely fashion then it won't be much of a concern. The good thing about the game industry is that it's growing which means more job opportunities, you just need the skills for them. One day I hope to do is own my own company, preferably remain independent but whatever. Right now it's in the back of my mind and I'd like to gain more industry experience before I make that plunge. I know it would more than likely end in failure, it'd still be a fun endeavor to do.

Eternal Champions is pretty bad ass but definitely had hard fighting game to get into. I should just probably spend a night with a FAQ to get into it.

Shit I wish Liquid Tension Experiment would come to Phoenix. Upcoming concerts for me are: Abysmal Dawn, Origin and Misery Index - July 30 (Glorious brutal death metal. Abysmal Dawn was pretty awesome when I saw them open up for Emperor.) Judas Priest, Motorhead, Heaven and Hell, Testament - August 28 (I've never seen any of these bands so I'm stoked. I should get some more of their albums to become familiar with their catalog) Sigh, Zimmer's Hole, Unexpect - September 9 (I'm mostly going for Unexpect, a great avantgarde metal band that mixes theatrical themes and has some really bizarre and almost atonal melodies.) Overkill, Toxic Holocaust, Warbringer - September 30 (I've seen Warbringer before when they opened up for Arsis. They did a fantastic job especially for being so young. They really had the 80s thrash spirit and sound. I saw Overkill on Gigantour a couple years back they were pretty cool.) Just recently I saw Dark Tranquillity, and Dethklok. Those were some great shows. Firewind was at the DT show and they were awesome. They were followed up by Divine Heresy and it was just pure garbage. Typical metalcore trash from Dino Czareres. I also got to see Iron Maiden which was fucking incredible. That was the first time I saw them and they put on a fantastic stage show. Just simply amazing.

Strapping Young Lad is overrated. To really hear Gene Holgan in action, listen to Death - Symbolic. He really shines on that album. Maybe you should just have better concert taste. Seriously? Rockstar Mayhem Tour? Mastodon is awesome and Machine Head is good from their debut and previous two albums. Beyond that it's just garbage. However the upcoming Judas Priest/Heaven and Hell/Motorhead/Testament concert is going to fucking rock!

Yeah that's common, but so is a four band member set up such as Deicide, Death, Nile, Necrophagist, Abysmal Dawn, Morbid Angel, Decapitated, Anata and many others. So it really depends on what the band wants.

How so? A lot of death metal bands have a four member set up. It's setup either two guitars, bass and drums and one or more of the members pulling double duty of vocals. Or it's just vocalist, guitars, bass and drums with the occasional member again pulling double duty of vocals. I came back from the show last night and it was pretty fun. The place was packed and I have never seen the venue, Marquee Theatre that packed before and I've been there numerous times. Soilent Green was ok. They're sludge metal so they have a very blues based metal influence. I personally liked them more than Chimera which was standard metalcore chugga-chugga fodder with some minimal keyboards thrown in for atmosphere. Dethklok themselves played flawlessly with the live band playing in tangent to the animated background. Some of the footage was previously seen and some of it was brand new like the footage for Mermaider, which was fucking awesome. At the end of the set, Brendon Small, co-creator of the series, did a little interlude performing the voices he does for the show; Nathan Explosion, Skwisgaar Skwigelf and Pickles. Basically it was standard show banter saying how great we were and how awesome the other bands were and would you like another song to be played. Either way it was cool to hear him transition between the voices so seamlessly. The downside was that it was fucking packed, hot and sweaty. And dissent started to set into me. I felt that a lot of the people there were just posers curious as to why other metal bands, better metal bands weren't seeing such packed venues. Of course Dethklok has the advantage of having their own show and being featured in video games, it still bothered me a bit. Hopefully the popularity of the cartoon band will have people seeking more metal and see the attendance increase at shows. Especially for Arsis, they kick ass.

I'd say it's really not fair to compare the systems as they are different in design. If you take a look at a lot of third party games that have multiple console releases you'll see that the 360 tends to stand stronger because developers develop for the 360 first and port over to the PS3 and Wii second. This creates problems because of the way the consoles are set up. The 360 is set up like a traditional PC whilst the PS3 has multiprocessors that few developers have programmers who are experienced enough to take advantage of the multiprocessors. With the Wii, it's just underpowered and leaves a lot to be scrapped. Now if a developer were to develop for the PS3 first and then the other consoles there would probably be a more equal footing. At the very least, less headaches for the developers in terms of getting bugs nailed and features working. However when looking at first party games who take every advantage of the consoles as possible we see some incredible things. Granted, as far as the 360 and PS3 are concerned they could run any of the games. The only exception at this point might be MGS4 but that's mostly because they are using uncompressed audio so it won't fit on a DVD. At this point the hardware strength becomes irrelevant because it boils down to what the developer can do and we know developers can achieve a lot with very little.

That's pretty awesome to know that old folks aren't just interested in Wii Sports and other 'casual' games. Oh and that he is into OCRemix. At least I hope he gets into it.

Didn't the singer or another member of the band get stabbed a few years back? Stratovarius is an alright band. I heard a couple of songs from them but Blind Guardian and Angra will be my favorite power metal bands.

Any fans of melodic death metal out there? The defunct Eucharist has their entire discography available for download on their website. http://www.artnoir-productions.com/eucharist/mp3.html Check it out, it's very solid metal.