That link is broken.  But if you youtube "Take Earth Back" you will get to watch one of the most awesome video game trailers of all time.

It's a bit cheesy, but the song is pretty amazing.  Skyrim: Modern Dovahkiin:




-b0b
(...wishes he could rock out.)

Origin was a complete crappity smack up for The Old Republic too.

Justin pre-ordered like 2 months in advance, and they only charged his card 5 bucks....he didn't notice.

The day the game launched they charged his card the other 55 dollars and bounced his account!  Who the hell does that with a pre-order on a card?  Never seen that shit in my life.

Origins response?  Your bad.

No mater what I did in ME2, Legion always died....

Heavy Rain has been sitting in my Amazon shopping cart for about two years now.  I played the demo when it came out and absolutely loved it, but I just haven't pulled the trigger for some reason.

My wife does the whole Zumba DVD thing.  Would you recommend the PS3 game?  I'm always looking for gift ideas!


-b0b
(...OMG MASS EFFECT!)

Heavy Rain is pretty great for both player and viewer. Rob played a lot of it, but it was actually one of the few games where I could be involved without playing because it played out like a movie. I had to keep watching it.

Zumba for the PS3 Move isn't quite everything I wanted it to be- it's definitely fun, definitely a work out but I have trouble keeping the controller in the game-provided belt and feel that it's one of the Move games with not-so-great movement detection. I'm trying to convince my friend with the XBox Kinect to get it for his girlfriend so that she and I can play it one day. Basically, so I can compare motion-systems.

Also, I should mention that getting a work-out game as a "gift" may not go over well in the lady-world. It may send the wrong message, unless she's been asking for that particular game. Lady-friendly games thus far: Katamari (anything), Little Big Planet 1 & 2 (love love love love LBP) and Indiana Jones Lego-version. That is, if she's an Indiana Jones fan. I think the lego games are all pretty charming and simple. But I guess that depends on her gaming style. For me, I like ultra-cute things.  And Heavy Rain (not very cute at all, despite the origami crane on its cover).

Rob and I are definitely having some problems with certain games more than others and we aren't sure if it's the size of our living room or if it's the game itself.  Does anyone else have a PSMove and if so, are you having the same issues?

Not that it matters, because the next time I will be playing with the Move is when Rob is done playing TOR. Apparently, this is an end not in sight. 


Cait
(....just worked one very long shift filled with very angry, pregnant ladies. sorry for the rambles)

hehe

I am at GDC in San Francisco right now, and I was in that talk where David Cage showed that video for the first time. I was really impressed because their focus was on story, and emotion first rather than creating a true tech demo. If any of you have played Heavy Rain, you'll know all about that. However he even admitted that they were still in the uncanny valley (the closer you get to a realistic cg human face, the more uncomfortable you get as a viewer) 

What was interesting to me was seeing the performance capture of the actress after seeing the cg trailer. She did an amazing job, but the whole range of facial subtleties that she performed were still not captured. They also recorded 2 other actresses with very similar voices to do the French and Japanese segments so they would be authentic. They then retargeted that animation onto the rig and cut in the different voices. Their goals were to test new believable facial animation tech, as well as tears, scarring, etc.

I would very much like to see this technology combined with Rockstar's facial video animation technology that they used for LA Noire. I think we are really getting to a point where the face alone in games can give a great read of emotion. But I also feel that we still need some form of stylization to the art style, because super realism can seem stiff or uncomfortable. I think it only worked really well in avatar because they were blue and catlike. If they were more human toned and shaped, they probably would have looked terrible. We are close though, and this video definitely pulled on ye ole heartstrings.

Very cool!

Well I'm 26 hours into the Single Player campaign of Mass Effect 3, and I have 3 level 20 characters in multiplayer.

At this point I'm willing to say that Mass Effect takes its place as the greatest video game epic ever told.  What an amazing game. (Although I think ME2 still holds as my favorite game of all time)