The Blog for the Sports Gamer

• Peter Moore updated his blog. Even though it’s 6/30/08, the blog post is dated 7/1/08. Typical EA. Heh.
• Well it’s the halfway mark and the Orioles have started to implode — well mainly George Sherrill. Back to back blown saves, one loss to WAS and one loss to KC! Come on! Oh well.
• Picked up a great DVD about one of my favorite amusement parks that is now all gone: Rocky Point in Warwick, RI. It still pisses me off to this day that this park had to close.
• Memo to Jonah: Yes, Zohan is a funny movie. Go back to watching the Love Guru.

- I love the Doug Davis story, but watching him pitch a game is just painful.  He is one of the slowest pitchers that I’ve ever seen.  Of course the game isn’t much fun to watch since Dave Bush is throwing every pitch about belt high.

- Kotaku wins my most idiotic post of the day award.

Does the in-game XMB allow voice-chat? No. Can you browse the internet while playing a game? No. Can you access the in-game XMB while playing a PS2 game or watching a DVD/Blu-Ray? No. Can you change any visual settings while playing a game? No (sound settings, however, gets a “yes”). Can you access the PlayStation Store while playing a game? No. Does it let you invite a friend to a game who’s playing another game? No.

…If the in-game XMB forces you to quit the game to perform most of the functions you’d want to perform in it…then there’s not much point having it available in-game, is it?

Let’s just break all of these down.

• I’ll start with the voice chat.  Yes, that would be nice.
• Can you browse the internet while playing a game?  Are you kidding me?  You want to use your PS3 to browse the internet while playing a game?  The PS3 browser and Wii Browser are tied for the least used web browsers in my house.  Browsing on a console is just plain painful… and criticizing Sony for not allowing you to do it while playing a game, is well… silly.
• Can you access the XMB while playing a movie?  This is one of the most annoying features that I felt the Xbox had.  If I’m watching a movie, do I want to be bothered by everyone on my friends list?  Not really.
• Can you change visual settings while playing a game?   Changing resolution for a console game would be interesting, but considering the fact that it can’t be done on any console, I don’t know if it would work without causing in-game issues.
• Can you access the PS Store while in game?  Considering that Playstation downloads need to be installed before they can be used in a game, what good would this feature be?  You can see your downloads that are in progress though, which is something I guess.
• Can you invite a friend who’s playing another game?  This wouldn’t be bad… so I can see how this should be added.

The whole tone of the article was an incredibly negative one.  Yes, Sony should have had some of these features before, but picking apart every question that was answered in this Q&A is just mean spirited.  Don’t talk about the features that are added, just bash them for features that a great deal of gamers couldn’t care one bit about.

I’m guessing that he’d just rather they scrap the whole thing since you can’t look use the web browser while playing a game.  That seems like a fair trade.

Wow, quite the announcement day….. not what I would expect for a Monday.

- Rock Band 2 has been officially announced.  Coming to the 360 in September, other platforms… later.  Very odd.  Microsoft must have handed out the cash again for a slight bit of exclusivity.

- The 2.4 Firmware upgrade for the Playstation 3 comes out on Wednesday.  In game XMB.  Trophy Support.  Customizable soundtracks.

I only wonder if some of the older games will go back and create patches for Trophy support.  I’ll give Super Stardust HD a look to see how the trophy stuff works though.

- Jonah, you’re seriously thinking that Diablo III will be out this year?  Me thinks that you’ve been drinking.  No matter how long it’s been in development, there is no way that game makes it to stores before late ‘09… and that’s being generous.  Blizzard has a reputation of ‘when it’s done’ for when they release their games.  It’ll be a while.

- Burnout Revenge for the 360 is $12.99 in store today.  Not a bad price for a Burnout title.

- Man, the Cubs get swept and the Brewers can only get 1 win against the Twins.  I guess they consider themselves lucky that they got that, Minnesota has been one of the hottest teams in baseball of late.  Still 4.5 games back is better than where they were a few weeks ago.

- Blizzard is a very smart company.  People go absolutely ape-poop when they announce a new game.  They don’t even care that the game probably won’t come out until 2010.

I’m speaking of Diablo III, of course.  I loved the first and second Diablo’s and as a result of the announcement, I decided to give part 2 a whirl again… and by whirl, I mean ripping through the first Act in about 4 or 5 hours over the last day.  The game is just as great as I remember it being.  Nothing much better than just clicking like mad, looking for loot.  The nice thing is that the newest patch removes the need for the CD being in the drive.  Nice… funny that it took 7 years to get that done.  heh.

The only issue is dealing with 800 by 600 for a gaming resolution.  Man, things look very small when you’re accustomed to your desktop at 1920 by 1280.

- Disappointed to hear that the Top Spin slowdowns from the demo are also in the game.  I’m hopefully that I’ll see my copy of the Wii version within the next day or so.  I have quite a few friends interested in a more realistic tennis game on the Wii.

- Dan and I are getting another special guest for the next podcast, which we are hoping to record on Wednesday.  Should make for a nice show to listen to over the 4th of July weekend.

Picked up Guitar Hero Aerosmith. First song: Dream Police. I get 105 Gamerscore on it for getting 100% on medium. Dang, I’m good.

So far, ti’s like a Guitar Hero add on, and I’m thinking $60 for this? Still I enjoy it, and unlike the DS version, the guitar doesn’t come out of my hands and the game screen says “you rocked out too hard.” So there’s that.

In other gaming news, rented Dodge ball for the DS. If you liked the NES game you’ll love this. It’s pretty much the NES game .

I really, really, really thought today would be the day the Orioles broke the Sunday losing streak. Down to their last strike in the 12th, the Nats homer to win the game. GD it! Oh well, still the Orioles this year continue to be a fun team to watch/listen to.

1. Last night I went to see “Don’t Mess With The Zohan.” It has to be one of the funniest movies I’ve seen since American Pie. It was truly a laugh out loud, I had tears in my eyes sort of movie. It’s probably the movie Mike Myers wish he created. LOL.

2. They had a preview for the 25th anniversary one time showing of War Games. Also an inside look at the sequel ? WTF? Matthew Broderick, now 45, who’s upgraded to a Quad Core with full facial hair? I’m speculating here. Why a sequel? I hate that stuff.

3. Gonna go pick up GH Aerosmith today. Also, check out the Sunday game deals….

4. I hope you Season Pass SNL, because last night that had the very first one on as a tribute to George Carlin. Oh, and it was not all that funny.

California newspapers are reporting that Greg Kihn had a stroke. File under ‘rumor’ for now as I can’t find any confirmation other than a blog, but if it’s true, it’s sad.

In other news, sorry for the lack of posts — been a crazy week as I dive until my new ‘real job’..haven’t had as much time for gaming, and of course I’m still recovering from my surgery. Yay!

Let me show you my Xbox 360 console listing for licensing:

Console ID                        Game Licenses           Video Licenses 
#1                                       115                           0 
#2                                        69                           3
#3                                        39                           2
#4 (Elite #1)                       344                           10
Current  (#5)                         92                           0

Total:                                 659

Oh yeah, it’s great that we have this tool; it would be even better if I didn’t have to push “download again” 659 times. I mean true, I doubt I’ll grab that Madden NFL 06 demo again, but you know what I’m saying here. It’s completely annoying.

- What a disappointing Brewers loss.  Hitting 4 home runs, up 6-3 in the 5th and couldn’t put up another run.  Mota continues to show that he’s not the answer in the 8th inning, giving up the game winning home run.  Oh, well.  Still, would have been nice to make up some more ground with the Cubs and Cards losing today.

- I rented Mario and Sonic at the Olympic Games for the Wii from Gamefly this week.  I had really high hopes after reading what Bill Harris had to say about the game, but within about 5 minutes I realized that this wasn’t a game I could enjoy with my kids at all.  One of the first things that you have to do in the Mission mode is to play the Trampoline game.  Basically, it is the most annoying mini-game that I’ve ever played.  You flip the wii remote up and then have to press a sequence of A, B, and rotating the remote within about 2 seconds.  Incredibly frustrating.  I can’t imagine that anyone could enjoy that game.  The 100 meter dash and long jump could be fun with friends, but when you have to avoid one of the first four games that you play, that isn’t a good sign in my book. When I’m too frustrated to play the game, I’m certain that my daughter would be as well.

- You’ll have to excuse me… Snatch is on HDNet…

- First things first, the Microsoft DRM utility is out (about time.)  Let me be the first to tell you that if you are an average user without a lot of DLC, it wouldn’t be a big deal to run through the website to get your new 360 authorized for the content.  The issue becomes re-downloading the content.

I had over 50 items that had to be redownloaded, one after another on my new 360 to allow me to use them without being on Live.  It’s just a hassle.  They can see what you’ve downloaded… they’ve run you through a web wizard to authorize your content for that console, why do WE have to redownload everything, even if we already have it on our hard drive.  It’s just a pain in the butt.  It took me about 45 minutes to grab everything again, one item at a time until they were done.

Dan will vent to you all about this later, but he’s got 100’s of items that he has to redownload… not a happy camper.

- I grabbed the Top Spin 3 demo earlier tonight and gave it a whirl.

What I enjoyed:

• Impressive graphics.

I saw red clay dirt that appeared on your clothing when you play at Roland Garros.  It really looked like a guy who had been playing a match on clay.

• Nice animations.

I mis-timed one of my shots with Federer and he hit a behind the back shot to compensate for it (I only saw this once in 20 points, so I’m hoping it’s not over utilized, but still cool.)

• Tons of different shot options

Three face buttons equate to shots, as well as multiple shot types with the right stick.

What I didn’t care for:

• Learning some of the new shots

In the training area of the demo, they attempt to teach you all of the shots you can use, including ‘risk’ shots.  This part of the demo took far too long as I seemed to have perfect timing on every shot, but couldn’t ever aim my return to the location on the court that it wanted.

When I played an exhibition later, I found myself going back to just using the face buttons as the drop shots and other shots just seemed to have too much risk to make them worth while.  Perhaps that’s what’s intended, but when I abandon the new shot types as soon as I learn them… I don’t think that’s a good sign.

• Some slowdown

When I loaded up the exhibition, the camera that was panning around the court was a near slide show.  Hopefully that’s just a demo issue.

I did play the PS3 version, so your mileage may vary.  I should have the Wii version soon, so I’ll let you know my thoughts on that version when I receive it.

- I usually don’t fall for the pre-order gimmicks that they include with some games, but I do get a kick out of this one for We Love Golf for the Wii.

- Thanks again to the Orioles for taking 2 out of 3 from the Cubbies this week.  I think the Cubs had only lost 8 home games all year before that series.  Perhaps losing Soriano and Zambrano is affecting them a bit.  They do still have a 4.5 game lead on the Central though.  Plenty of time left though.

I am getting tired of hearing about what the Brewers need to do to get C.C. Sabathia.  I’d like to see them stay out of that race.  We already have one starting pitcher, Sheets, that wont be coming back next year.  I’d hate to see them spend a ton of prospects to rent a starter for a few months.

- Anyone watch the NBA draft tonight?  Any interest there?  I turned it on for a few minutes and nearly fell asleep.  Even with 5 minutes between picks it seemed to drag along.

The Bucks made a trade, I guess that’s something.

- I saw a new trailer for Blood Bowl today, figured I would pass on the link.  I have no idea what to think of this game… but people around here seem interested in it, so there you go.

- Ready for craptastic peripheral addons for EA Sports titles?  I hope so, because their on the way.

- Anyone try out the Top Spin demo yet?

Title says it all…kudos to 2K for releasing demos!

Dan was speaking of the game and today we’re able to bring you some of the screenshots of the WiiWare version of the game.  Take a look.  (Click on each image for a bigger image.)

From what we’ve heard the game is due to be released at some point this summer.

A few of my friends have the set up for this game and we play it at just about every summer party.  I really want to see how well it works with the Wii Remote.  If it feels right, it could be another fun party title.

Well, remember when we couldn’t believe the short development cycle of Madden NFL? Well it’s even shorter as EA announced the game has gone gold for a mid-August release. Why does it take six weeks to produce the game? I have no idea, but I can tell you the rosters are really going to be piss poor .

To answer Dan’s question, I’ve been working.  It’s been a crazy few days at work.  My boss put in a 23 hour day yesterday, so all of us have been in a lot to help out.

- I would have been excited about Bad Company coming out today except for the fact that I don’t know how the online community would shape up.  I played the beta 3 times, for over an hour each time.  Time one, I got some great squad mates and had a lot of fun.  On the 2nd play, my teammates were awful.  They had no concept of strategy and we got slaughtered over and over again.  Time three, made me abandon the demo as my team just kept blowing up each other.    I’ll be curious to hear how much better the online base is now.

- I’m really excited to try out Top Spin on the Wii.  I try to hold off on looking at any sports game reviews at this point, as I like to try and make up my own mind before hearing what other writers think…. with a few exceptions, present company excluded.

- I’m back to playing hockey tomorrow night and I can’t wait.  It’s been far too long of a recovery since my procedure and the ensuing infection.  That’s my first step toward getting everything back to normal… or as close as I can get.

- Still playing Mass Effect on the 360.  I don’t typically get around to RPG’s until they hit the $20 price point.  I just have a hard time spending $60 on a long game and then watching it sit.  If I spend that much, I don’t feel as bad about it.  Not great logic, but it works for me.

- The Brewers have been playing their butts off of late.  If the Cubs fall to the O’s tonight, they’ll get to 5 back.  The funny thing is that they’re 5 back and have the 3rd best record in all of the NL.  I guess the Central (well, the Cubs, Cards, and Brewers, at least) is better than people thought.

- Please post your comments on the Prizefighter demo… I’m curious to hear people’s thoughts on the collision detection.