I am of the opinion that game innovation no-longer comes primarily from the game-play. I’m not saying there is nothing new to find or do in a game, just that it shouldn’t be the main focus.

I think todays progress with games lay in the story.
A first-person shooter is a first-person shooter. A Real Time Strategy is an RTS. That is not going to change, sure little things might add to it (like the recent spate of RPG’s combining with FPS’s [a good idea imho]), but they are not going to change much.

Role Playing Games have known this for years, they have not really changed. What keeps selling them is new themes and stories. Even “new” games like Fallout 3 and Mass Effect that are RPG-FPS’s, they still have the same/similar leveling system, tech trees, and idea of “mana” (or biotich power, or something like that).

Now, these games all feel different and play different, but that comes more from the lush, detailed universe they are based in. They take you to a whole new world, and throw you into a rich story. And they make you feel its real regardless of how primitive our 2D monitors are.

Now, this idea, I think could work even with a strait shooter. In-fact it DOES work with a strait shooter. Look at the Halo. Halo, as a strait FPS is nothing that hadn’t been done on any platform before or since its initial release. What made it so good, and why people still play its SINGLE PLAYER to this day (Multi Player is a completely different kettle of fish), was how rich, detailed the story and world behind it was, and is. Halo Reach is going to be released soon, expanding still more on the story. And its not the open world of it that interests me (been there done that), or the combat (been there done that), or to see what new weapons/items there will be (pfft, jetpacks were so 1996). Its the story, and how it expands on the Halo universe that has me wanting to play it.

The idea of story is what has kept me playing through what some would consider truly horrific or average games.
Shadow Ops: Red Mercury, is a truly average game. Nothing special about it. But it ranks up there as one of my favorite games, simply because of its story.
Take a look at the screenshot that I’ve put up. How average does the game look even for a 2004 game?

The controls are clunky, you feel like your character is running through sludge. On slower machines the audio doesn’t sync up, the animations are clunky, there is some weird bugs. Heck at about 3 or 4 moments the game yanks you out of control and makes you watch some pre-rendered cut-scenes.

But the story and characters were really well written, and I honestly can’t wait for my next play thru.

That’s why I don’t shun a game based on a bad review. I will shun a game based on a bland story.

Now, who can’t wait for Portal 2?!

Pulling upto where I leave my car for Uni, on a public holiday, and seeing no cars in the street at all. (Uni’s don’t follow public holidays’).

So-far I have had two lecturer’s that seem to know what they are about, I have run into many people who I can just talk to.

There doesn’t seem to be as stand-offish as other people who have been at Clayton longer than me. I remember when we made the move from Peninsula to Caulfield, everyone seemed VERY stand-of no matter who you were or where you were from. Even which faculty you were from seemed to determine if you were spoken to or not.

At Peninsula, it seemed everyone was able to make friends with and talk to anyone, regardless of faculty, year group, or study level. Everyone was jst generaly chatt.

When the move was made to Caulfield, I figured it was because it was a much bigger campus, and the fact we were out-siders who were not part of the smaller friends groups that are bound to develop.

That is why its so surprising here. Clayton is so much of a bigger campus than Caulfield, but holy-crap, as I’ve said, how wrong can I be.

I might just enjoy this year.

Well, I mean, its more than enough for playing in my bed room, but when around at Craig’s, or playing with my drummer aunty, I’m finding that a bit more volume would be nice.

Obviously, that would mean that Luke would need to use a louder amp as well (well he already does, 15w DSP hardly cuts into the mix at all), and Craig would actually need to use an amp for his keys.

The main reason I would like to go louder, besides it being, well, louder, is that it gives me a greater range of tone for my guitar.
At the moment, with the 30w DSP, some chords can come through a bit tinny, and just sounding thin, which can be quite frustrating.

For example, when playing American Pie, I KNOW it would sound best CLEAN (ok MAYBE a little Chorus), through a single coil neck pickup, however, the DSP makes this sound extremely tinny (even with all the high-end cut off). I know this to NOT be the case when played through tubes.
It would also make the distorted guitar sounds a-lot less harsh.

HOWEVER.

I could also achieve this by running TWO amps at the same time (with different EQ settings).

This presents a problem.

If I go two amps, its cheeper, but, I will then have TWO amps to transport, TWO amps to change volume on (this can change natural distortion, or even adding “hair” to your sound), two extra cables where line noise can come in, and completely scream up delay sounds, if I’m not careful.

The other option is getting a tube amp, which will really be too loud for when I’m at home by my self. And will cost more (really need to look at head+cab instead of a combo).

Atm, I think, once a new car has been purchased, I will start looking at a Bugera BC30-212.

I bet your expecting me to say Avatar aren’t you? Aren’t you?

Well you would be guessing wrong, my movie choice for last year is Up, by Pixar.

I don’t know what it is, but Pixar have released two awesome movies in two years (well technically three isn’t it? Monsters vs Aliens was Pixar right?).

Everything about this movie is awesome, from the story telling. The writing for the characters, vocal performances, and yes. Ofcourse Dougg is a big part of that too.

For those that have not seen this movie yet, I will warn you. The start of it is VERY sad (but not in the “not safe for children” way, altho young children might not understand why it is a sad moment).

So if you have not seen this movie yet, head out to your local store and buy it, or if it is available in your region, download it with iTunes.

Let me cast your mind back to the late 1990’s. There were games released almost on a weekly basis right across the PC, PS1, and N64.
Times were good, and it didn’t matter which system you were on.

Recently, I had been feeling that games weren’t being released, or in as good quality, as they used to be. I guess its an “old” gamers thing, where nothing is as good as it used to be, and in all honstly this past year, for me as a PC gamer, looked bleak.

Then Modern Warfare 2 came along, and the news that the PC version of the game was being gimped. I snapped. I went out and bought a tone of games that had been recommended to me, MANY released in the past 6 months.

It was like my eyes had been opened up. Gaming wasn’t dying, the focus platform had just shifted. I’m not going to say that console gaming is the way of the future, its just where gaming is at, at the moment. Will it come back to the PC? Will it become more focused on mobile platforms? Will there be a new generation of consoles that it will move to? Only time will tell, but I shall ride this games wave now I’ve discovered where it is.

Oh, and for those who go “FPS can only been played on the PC”, that’s wrong, you just have to learn a new technique. Its not better. Its different.

Music in itself can express many different emotions, and is designed that way. And good music’s meaning is open to interpretation for you to find your own meaning in it, sometimes separate to what the artist/artists were attempting to express. This is a good thing, both from a sales, and an artist getting the most people to experience their art.

For me, the song which has just the most profound energy, and is just always enjoyable to listen to is Rumble by Link Wray. Just the way it sounds and is preformed always brings a smile to my face. And yes, I’ll admit, its close to this.

Strangely for me, I don’t actually listen to sad songs when I’m feeling down. I havn’t found any songs that will be “me”. I guess this is where I’m lucky in that I have the ability to make/play music myself to represent how I’m feeling at the time.

Anger is always distortion for me. Always. Lots of noise and distortion. I don’t care what the lyrics are, but LOUD guitars with quick drums always does the trick for me. Oh, and the volume has to be on 11. Generally that takes me towards the likes of these guys.

Then I have the songs that just make me laugh all the time, regardless of what mood I’m in, if these come on, then I cna’t help but laugh. The Majesty of Rock by Spinal Tap are just a few that can do this to me.

This brings me to the music I have been playing lately my self.
It is all well and fun learning how to play some of my favorite songs on guitar, but in all honesty, its nothing compaired to being able to pick up that piece of wood, and use it to express how I’m feeling at the time.

And I have found that I am often at odds with myself when playing expressively like this. Its both more natural to play, and (generally) requires more concentration from me. I’m happy to use a guitar that’s not exactly in perfect tune, maybe the neck has a bit of a bow after a new string change, or I haven’t set the action yet, but that doesn’t bother me either. When I’m playing expressively I know it shouldn’t be easy, and I’m going to have to battle this thing in my hands. I’ll use techniques I’m not very good at. I’ll strip as many effects away from my playing as possible. And I don’t care if the “noise” I’m making annoys anyone.

Music is for you. Weather you make it your self or listen to it.

With TV, and Video, the Radio started to loose its popularity, but now with iTunes, and RSS feeding of pod casts (both video and audio), it seems that the idea of a radio show is back on the rise again.
The idea of pod casting a radio show after it has been broadcast in the normal sense, has seen a resurrection in the idea of a talk back radio show.
It can be seen plainly when looking at the top downloaded pod casts in iTunes, there usually isn’t any video based ones in the top 5 overall.

The Hamish & Andy show is a brilliant example of this, the popularity of the show has just kept growing since the decision to both broadcast it live, and offer it for pod cast shortly after this airing time. And that popularity has just kept growing. I’d even wager that their odd appearances on Rove didn’t have a great effect on the number of people listening in.

Another brilliant example is the Ricky Gervais show. That’s a pod cast that had minimal advertising, and as of the second season required payment to listen to it, and it still managed to reach the number of downloads and listens that alot of TV shows struggle to attain.

Personally, I welcome this change back to audio only broadcasting, it saves me from having to see poorly edited, shitty, videos on youtube, or people attempting to be funny for a forced 30 minutes on TV.

But recently, I’ve made a bit of a change to my gaming life. I’ve moved from playing all my games on the PC to most of my games on the Xbox 360.

Now, I’ve owned the Xbox 360 for quite some time, but I’ve never actualy played any games on it, besides Guitar Hero.
This was mainly because all the games I wanted to play were on the PC.

But recently, a lot of the games that I’ve been waiting for, or excited for, have been either crippled for the PC, poorly ported, or just delayed, and there’s also a bunch of games that just don’t make it to the PC.

So I’ve made the switch, and its been fantastic, I’m not being bored out of my mind with the one release in a blue moon, I’ve got a whole back catalog of games that I have never had access to that I can now play. I’ve been catching up on old titles like Assassins Creed, Prototype, Soul Calber 4, and the Halo series just to name a few (yes I know some of these are on the PC, but seriously, they are poor ports).

I’m also loving the fact that I don’t need Steam, or to enter CD keys, or sign up for a service to play my games. Just push my little X button, whack the DVD in the drive, and away I go.

Now, don’t for a second think that I’m thinking “oh the controller controls the game as good as a mouse and keyboard”. Because I don’t. For FPS the PC controls will always be more accurate. That doesn’t mean that the controller doesn’t work. After a little practice, I’ve found that aiming, and movement can be quite fluid in 360 FPS games (don’t know about PS3, I’d imagine it would be the same).