Netflix is Down

I just finished watching an episode of Torchwood (my latest TV series to watch). I finished the episode and now am getting a bunch of Error 324's from them.

For those of you that have no idea what a 324 Error is, it's the kind of error you get when "The server closed the connection without sending any data." No fun. How am I supposed to waste my time now! Oh, I know, I could blog some more.

I textured this pillar with cats...

No description necessary...

Dirty Minds

Dirty Minds will laugh their asses off:



Everyone else will just be annoyed.

Take your pick.

This count guy, he is impressive, must be a hermaphrodite though. Not sure how else you would F*******k yourself.

Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows (Part 2) - The End is Here

aSo, 10 minutes ago I stepped out of my car after watching a screening of the new Harry Potter movie. I figured that some of you Fan Boys and Fan Girls would like to here my opinion and learn about what is in store for you in this final installment to the Series.

First off, a disclaimer: This may or may not contain spoilers. If you read this you may learn things that could subtract from the movie experience and make the movie feel like you are sitting there being hit by the Cruciatus Curse. I don't apologize if you read this and find that to be the case. Additionally this review may contain non-spoilers. Non-spoilers being things not related to the movie, but nevertheless useful things to know. Finally, I am a human being, with that being said I have opinions and enjoy expressing them if you don't want my opinion and don't like reading what other people think then why are you here? Find something that interests you somewhere else. As a side effect of being human I am, albeit rarely, wrong, should this happen please close your eyes and flail at the sky.

And now for a few quick reminders: This is the eighth movie in the Harry Potter Series. Why their are eight movies and only seven books escapes me. Most likely, someone, somewhere, decided that they wanted some extra money. Second, I saw the movie in 3D. I Hate 3D...

For any who care, I have seen every Harry Potter movie early. Including one which I saw at the World Premiere. I am not a Fan Boy, I simply have a very nice uncle. If you want to see premieres of movies, get an uncle who works at the theater! Can't get an uncle? Find a new family!

On with the movie...

Special Effects:
I am placing special effects first in my list of critiques because of all things the special effects will be easiest to cover. Here goes: Boom! Bang! Pop! Zing! Kerpow! Crash! That about sums up the movie right there. The movie is packed with action and most of it is spent at Hogwarts. The castle is ripped apart by lumbering giants who tear through the castles granite defenders. Shrouded in a magical force field that glows in the night as hundreds of spells impact it. The effect is truly breathtaking. The special effects are masterful and done with perfection, the smallest details gleam with a polish that brings the visuals together with amazing beauty.

Humor:
The Deathly Hallows (Part 2) is filled with less humor then many of it's earlier cousins. This is a forgivable offense however, due to two things. First, for those of you that have read the Harry Potter books you will notice that the Rowlings humor diminishes with each novel. This finally becomes apparent in the dark conclusion of the series. With that in mind, the final chapter of Harry Potter is not about the good times and the fun that Harry and his gang have. It's about killing the bad guy and taking home the women! While their are a few quick smirks in the movie, it has few things that will get you, the audience, truly laughing.

Spells:
The Hallows is full of magic. From the summoning of the defenders of Hogwarts to it's defensive shield. The Deathly Hollows puts it's graphical wizards to the test to make sure that you can truly feel the magic. They do a good job to. Magic is everywhere in The Deathly Hollows, from the floating trays to the flaming rooms. The Deathly Hallows crosses into a whole new plane of magical powers.

Story:
What can I say about the story? It has been a proven success. While it has been a while since I read the Harry Potter books I can say that it does a fairly good job of following the books. Like all movies of books, The Deathly Hallows has it's differences, but in the end it gets from point A to B and that is what matters. Even if the road is a little different.

Corny Scenes:
Every movie has some scenes that are a little... weird. The Deathly Hollows is no exception. The specific scenes are fairly obvious. I have yet to see a (HUGE SPOILER ALERT) movie that has managed to depict the afterlife well. The Deathly Hallows follows this trend. From the ghost of Dumbledoor's past to the ethereal pillars of the train station the afterlife of Harry Potter is anything but grim. Shortly after this scene, another one, involving the Big Bad Mr. V includes an awkward hug that got the biggest chuckle of the night (trust me, you'll know when it happens).

Sexy Ladies:
It's the old advertising slogan: Sex Sells. Well, let me just let you in on a little secret. At the end of the movie, Harry has a kid. For that fact, so does Hermione. I think you know where I'm going with this.

3D:
As I said earlier, I Hate 3D. It hurts my eyes, makes the movie dimmer and has to be done perfectly. Unfortunately The Deathly Hallows was not done perfectly. While many of the effects look stunning in 3D and you feel like you can reach out and grab some ashes, other parts of the movie are not done with nearly as much care. Most annoying for me, was the subtitles. These where not in 3D and thus looked really, really bad. Imagine if this text was here, but also shifted 3 pixels down and right. That is what the subtitles looked like. Aside from the subtitles, their is little to complain about in the 3D department. However, I will note that edges get blurry and can even appear pixelated if you watch from any angle other than strait ahead. This annoys me.

Overall:
The movie is fairly good, but it was in 3D. Why the first part is in 2D and the second is in 3D confuses me, but thats Hollywood for you. I definitely recommend seeing the newest and final installment of the Harry Potter series. You won't regret it.

The Movie will be in Theaters this Friday the 15th of July. You still have time to catch up on the other Harry Potter Movies if you haven't yet.

I give The Deathly Hallows Part 2 a rating of 3.5 out of 4. Nothing can be perfect, but this was pretty close.

Now, if you don't mind, I'm going to go to bed, it's late and I stayed up writing this review for you. If you want more or have questions just drop them in the comment section below. I appreciate what you have to say.

Youtube, Things you should never do.

Including, 23 year old gum and car washes with Jeeps! Don't miss out.

Blast from the Past

Three years ago a friend and I discovered this wonderful software called Pivot. We happened to be in an English class together with two projects that required us to make an interpretive project for the books. These books were The Old Man and the Sea and A Tale of Two Cities.








Tell me what you think. Since this was an actual school project we had to keep things pretty close to what they were in the book. So, now that you've seen them both, SPOILER WARNING. Just thought that I should stick that in here somewhere.

Enjoy, tell me what you think.

Also, Pivot can be found here. Make sure to share your creations. If you make something cool I want to see it.

Remember you can post You-Tube videos in the comments so take advantage of this and post your crazy videos below. Go go go!

I must admit after the whole 48 hours let down I'm not sure I have much faith in you. Prove me wrong.

Metal Interpretations

Some people are insane. This guy is one of them. If you like some of the Metal gods then this is for you.















I don't know what is more scary. The fact that I can actually hear what these people are talking about in their interpretations or the fact that the people sound like this.

Also, this is my 199th post. The 200th will be worth it. Trust me. I'll think of something cool.

Hope you enjoy these as much as I do. Why did noone tell me about these years ago!

Troll

You can get the MP3 here.

Whopper Virgins

How do people not know how to eat a burger? Apparently some of these people have no idea, not even a little one.




I guess as an American I am biased, but still. It seems so simple to me.

Kung Foo Fighting Champion

Battlestar Galactica Online

I recently finished watching the entire Battlestar Galactica Series. It was... interesting. I noticed that a game was released for it called Battlestar Galactica Online. I decided to play it and have spent two hours playing on three different servers trying not to lag die.

Getting frustrated I wrote on their forums in a huge rage/suggestion/bug post. Here is what I said:

I am a big fan of MMO's. I am, however, not a big fan of browser based games. Their are many reasons for this and I shall explain the problems I have had just today with BSGO.

1. I was playing the tutorial (cause I'm a noob) and they said to shoot some target drones. Well, lucky for me the drones didn't spawn for a full five minutes afterward. Besides being annoying it is a complete waste of time.

2. A client side application would allow for better graphics and textures. This means that planets could actually look like planets *gasps*.

3. Would lower bandwidth requirements. With us not having to download every map every time we want to go there (well, at least most of the times) the strain on the server would decrease dramatically. This means that we would spend less time rage lagging and more time actually playing (this is a good thing).

4. Levels would actually load. While this may seem similar to number one this problem occurred on the first mission I went on (after the tutorial). While driving around a gray asteroid looking thing I noticed a bunch of scattered debri. I went to investigate and then a ship appeared around me. A client side app would mean that this could be avoided.

5. My latest reason for hating the browser based game is because it gets me killed. Allow me to explain. I was in a dogfight with three raiders. Me vs them. I took one down easily taking no more than 50 dmg. I turned on the next one and selected it. As I neared for my attack nothing happened. As I passed the raider nothing continued to happen. Annoyed I attempted to turn and try again. My Viper seeming not to listen continued moving forward. When I finally managed to turn my ship around the raider disappeared again to appear behind me. Luckily my Viper decided it was a good idea to fire backwards so I did get one shot off. This continued for another two passes. Then everything just stopped shooting and it got really peaceful. I was at about 200 health. Two seconds later I exploded.

6. Load Times would decrease. Besides the waiting 15 minutes to download BSGO every time I want to play it. Besides waiting five minutes to load a new room. Besides all of that it would be really nice if it didn't take ten minutes to undock from Galactica.

Now you all might be thinking: "Get a better computer." or "Upgrade your internet's" or any of the other miscellaneous comments that are similar to these. My computer is better than average with 4gigs of triple channel RAM, a 460 Fermi and a Triple Core processor running at 3 ghz. My Internet is also not bad downloading at about 300 kb/s. These are not the problems.

While I like where BSGO is headed it is not there yet. The servers are laggy, the graphics are less then superb and the controls are abysmal (though this might be due to lag). I can't see myself being a member of BSGO for very long without a client that I can run from my computer.

Also here is a list of some other problems and errors I have encountered along the way:

1. You can not change your side once you have joined a server.

2. The game continues to function even while in a background tab (I have clicked three buttons and walked across a room while writing this).

3. Enemies have a tendency to disappear and appear in different places. In other words their movement is hardly realistic.

4. Lag...

5. WASD controls are terrible and impossible to use. The Right mouse method is not much better.

6. Nebula clouds are blinding.

7. Lens flares are enormous!

8. You bounce off planets and ships.

9. The "Jump" button in the FTL Nav screen is hard to see.

10. If you haven't seen the show you are left wondering "WTF is a cylon?" (Luckily I have seen the show)

11. Ships you can dock with should have a special color assigned to them. At first I had a lot of trouble figuring out how to dock.

12. Asteroid's, Planets and Large Ships don't hurt you if you hit them.

13. You can't rotate the player model during creation and, since you are going to spend most of the time staring at the back and not the front of them, you should probably be able to do that.

14. Conversation's are flavorless and without sound (granted adding sound to a browser based game would slow it down ever more)

15. If an "Attack at X" or "A Large Force of Y" or something like that pops up in the middle of the screen you can't click buttons under it. This is most noticeable in character creation.

To finish it all up: Nice idea, fun game but, for the sake of the gods, fix the frakking servers and give me a frakking client!

If I had to rate the game I would give it a 6/10. Why? because it is full of holes. The idea is great, the game play is fun. But the servers lag, the graphics are annoying and it's simply not done yet.

If you want to see the replies you can go to the forum post here. If you are interested in playing the BSGO game then you can check it out here. It's free and you don't need to download anything.

If you haven't watched Battlestar Galactica yet I suggest you do that. It is a very well done show. You can buy the disks from Amazon or watch them from some other site:

 

Bowling with Heavy

I was browsing some videos and found this. Just want to share it because it is seriously messed up. If you are a Half Life/Valve fan I'm sure you will enjoy this.

The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy

For those of you that have yet to find the meaning of life or those still in search of it I have found the book for you!

The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy is perhaps the most amusing book you will read in a long time. Set in a galaxy not so far away among two Z's and another one of plural origin the book begins spectacularly with an amazing double catastrophy as the main character must stand before a bulldozer to keep it from demolishing his house.

From here the story becomes more and more queer as the plot unravels into a very long, very odd story that leaves the main character stranded on a planet making sandwiches for a race of beings that survive off of perfectly normal beasts that leap across the planes in a fashion that is all but normal.

While the final books ending is hardly satisfying much of the Hitchhikers Guide is a must read.

I would also warn you that watching theMovie is hardly worth your time as Douglas Adams explains himself that the movie was designed to contradict the books with as much ease as the books contradict themselves (Wheather Douglas Adams was attempting to write a relgious text is unknown).

Pick up your copy at Amazon today:

Harry Potter and the Deathly Hollows Part I

Yesterday I had the privilege of previewing the first part of the final Harry Potter movies. I will not say much here as I don't want to spoil the movie for anyone who plans to go nor to let you skip watching this movie.

The movie is very well put together and progresses at a steady pace compared to the break neck speed of many movies. The movie features some sweat special effects and CGI that make it look lifelike and, at the same time, magical.

All in all the movie is very good and I hope you plan to go check it out.

Their is one part that annoyed me and I felt like I was trying to do a 180 degree turn in two different directions while also swimming up a waterfall. I'm sure you will know what I am talking about when you see it. It is more or less a camera crew and the hero's running through the woods. Of course since the camera crew is running the camera is going everywhere and worse the angle is continuously changing so you have no idea where you are. I can't say whether this effect was intended or not but it annoyed me.

If you have not read the Harry Potter books you can still enjoy this movie and I must say the movie is surprisingly good for being only half a movie.

If you don't already own or haven't read Harry Potter yet I would recommend doing so as the books (especially the first few in my opinion) are very fun to read. Check your library or order from Amazon: Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows (Book 7).

If you plan to spend your Friday night/morning watching this movie you will not be wasting your time. It is well worth seeing.

[Movie Review] Repo: The Genetic Opera

This gothic opera film/play is a very amusing (although quiet bloody) rendition of the future. A place where organs are constantly failing those that they keep alive. Due to the amount of organ failures a company by the name of Gene Co. soon rises to power. They begin providing the organs that people need to survive... at a price. Soon Gene Co. passes a law allowing organ repossession. This law means that with the slice of a knife the Repo Man could end your life. He can take your organs that are being repossessed and return them to Gene Co. where they can be reused.

The story tells of the life of the Repo Man in the last day of his work for Gene Co. It also tells of his daughters terrible sickness that strikes again and again and a cure that could save her from her horrible fate.

The Movie provides twists around every corner and great, amusing songs to listen to at the same time. The movie is worth taking a look at and is worth watching  again and again as you watch the horrors at the opera occur and wonder: is this what the future holds? Is this where our greed will lead us?

Buy Repo! The Genetic Opera.