PSN is back up. Though there are tons of people trying to log in so servers are jammed.
Good luck logging in.
Will get back to more in-depth blogging soon.
PSN is back up. Though there are tons of people trying to log in so servers are jammed.
Good luck logging in.
Will get back to more in-depth blogging soon.
This story is a few days old but I figured I’d get it in there. Watson was beaten one-on-one recently:
Representative Rush Holt (D-NJ) beat Watson $8600 to $6200. Holt is a nuclear physicist and a 5 time Jeopardy champion.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/03/01/rush-holt-jeopardy-watson-_n_829672.html
(apologies for linking to the Huffington Post *grin*)
This country loves watching a train wreck, and there’s no bigger train wreck right now than Charlie Sheen. So, against my better judgment, I am posting a transcript of an interview he did on the Alex Jones radio show recently. Here you go.
———
Alex Jones: You don’t ever wanna go there, you don’t ever wanna defend yourself, but you’ve told me privately most of the stuff, names, it’s not true, but what is going on with the women in your life?
Charlie Sheen: The goddesses? Alex the goddesses, let me just say this about the goddesses, I don’t believe the term is good enough, but when you’re bound by these terrestrial descriptions, you must use the best choice available, right?
Alex Jones: Yes
Charlie Sheen: So if you think about it, dude, it’s like I’m 0 for 3 with marriage, with never an excuse, but like in baseball, the scoreboard doesn’t lie, never has. So what we all have is a marriage of the heart. To sully or contaminate or radically disrespect this union with a shameful contract is something that I will leave to the amateurs and the Bible grippers.
And I just gotta add this cos there was a whole firestorm yesterday about Brooke been a part of our crew and let me just say this, this is all I’m gonna say about it, where there were four, there are now three. Goodbye Brooke good luck in your travels, you’re going to need it, badly.
Alex Jones: So Brooke did go along with you but she’s not there now?
Charlie Sheen: No she’s not there now and we are and, I don’t know, winning, anyone? Rhymes with winning, anyone? That’ll be us. Man, didn’t make the rules. Ooops.
Alex Jones: Charlie, I’ve known you for six and a half years or so and I knew you when you were completely clean and I’ve known you since, but, the point is, now, I’ve never seen you when I was out at your house or talked to you on the phone, so energised as you are now – I mean you’re on fire as nails told the news yesterday. I mean I agree with that description.
Charlie Sheen: As I think it was nails that said, and I’m really really flattered, cos he got it right. I mean he might be nails, but I’m frikin bayonets, you know. I’m battle tested man. I’m tired, I’m so tired of pretending like my life isn’t perfect and bitchin and just winning every second and I’m not perfect and bitchin and just deliverying the goods at every frikin turn, because, look what I’m dealing with man, I’m dealing with fools and trolls, dealing with soft targets and its just, you know its just strafing runs in my underwear before my first cup of coffee because I don’t have time for these clowns. I don’t have time for their judgement and their stupidity and you know they lay down with their ugly wives in front of their ugly children and look at their loser lives and then they look at me and they say “I can’t process it” well no you never will stop trying, just sit back and enjoy the show. You know?
Alex Jones: Wow, well I am speechless. Later we’re going to get into Apocalpse Now, but what comes to mind is when we were there a few weeks ago watching it in your home theatre when Colonel Kurtz is saying “You can kill me, but you don’t have the right to judge me”
Charlie Sheen: Boom, that’s the whole movie, that’s life. That’s life, there’s nobility in that, there’s focus, it’s genuine, it’s crystal and it’s pure and its available to everybody. So just shut your traps and put down your McDonald’s, your magazines, your TMZ and the rest of it and focus on something that matters. But you can’t focus on things that matter if all you’ve been is asleep for forty years. Funny how sleep rhymes with sheep. You know. Anyway. We’re getting off topic. We don’t care anymore Alex, we don’t care. Let’s get to the work business because there’s been a lot of speculation, a lot of rumours. Imagine that with the media.
Alex Jones: Well sure, let’s go over that, because when I was there, two weeks ago at your house, you looked great, totally clean, you were working out super hard when I went and worked out with you at that private gym I mean they put you through an incredible workout, you know they’re exercising in the pool, and you’re saying “look, I’m ready to go to work. I’m ready to go right now” and then they add the lie that you don’t have a hernia, well I’ve seen your hernia, I’ve go thte same hernia in my belly button and your hernia was hurt, but again you don’t wanna defend yourself on that and, you know, tell folks the truth about it, but the point is, it seem that there are some people in your life that are trying to demonise you, they’re doing these vanity cards, you know talking about how they’re going to outlive you, it seems pretty darn aggressive.
Charlie Sheen: Yeah I didn’t care about that vanity card. In fact I went right straight home with that one and just dispelled that. And that was actually, you know, one of the few compliments that clown has paid me in freakin almost a decade. But I’m excited to get back to work and not to completely discount what you just talked about, if you bring up these turds, these little [inaudible] losers, there’s no reason to then, you know, bring them back into the fold because I have real fans, they have nothing. They have zero. They have that night and I will forget about them as my last image of them exits my beautiful home. and they will get out there and they will sell me and they will lose. And they will lose the rest of their lives as they think about me and my life the rest of their lives, so, bring me a challenge somebody, becuase, you know, it just ain’t there. Winning.
Alex Jones: But you’re ready to go to work, right now?
Charlie Sheen: Well yeah but I’m tired of being told “well you can’t talk about that and you can’t talk about that” BULL S-H-I-T. Let me just say this, there’s nothing. I just think it’s deplorable that a certain Heim Levine, that’s Chuck’s real name by the way, mistook this rock star for his own selfish exit strategy bro. Check it Alex, I embarassed him in front of his children and the world by healing at a pace that his uninvolved mind cannot process. Ok last I checked Heim, I’ve spent, I think, I don’t know, the last decade effortlessly and magically converting your tin cans into gold and the gratitude I get is this charlatan chose not to do his job, which is to write. Clearly someone who believes he is above the law. Well, you’ve been warned dude. Bring it.
Alex Jones: Charlie, Everybody that I know that knows you, and I know you well, talks about how, behind the scenes, you give incredible amounts of money to charity, you help people, you give things to everybody, you go out and help firemen and schoolchidren, you are genuinely a nice guy. But you always just let people attack you and lie and the years I’ve known you and the years that people who’ve known you for decades, they say, Charlie is on fire and when he came out of what he’s been in the last seven months, he is not putting up with people trying to push him around anymore, is that fair to say?
Charlie Sheen: It’s yeah, it’s an understatement, you know it’s, I’m sorry man I got magic and I got poetry at my fingertips most of the time and this includes naps. I’m an F-18 and I will destroy you in the air and I will deploy my ordnance to the ground.
Provided by: The Global Herald
I don’t have the time to copy and paste everything from the J! Archive, which archives all Jeopardy games, but I can at least give you links to every single question and answer in the IBM Jeopardy Challenge. You’ll see every question, every answer, who got which ones correct, and the wagers on Daily Doubles and Final Jeopardy. Roll over the dollar amounts posted on the questions to see the answer and who got what. Also roll over Final Jeopardy for the answer. In addition, the numbers in the top right corner of each question box indicate when that question was selected (1 for the first clue picked, 2 for the second clue picked, etc.)
Here ya go:
Watson Game 1 (Jeopardy round only)
There are only a handful of video games I have ever played that have actually managed to scare me.
Dead Space 2 gave me nightmares.
For those who haven’t played the first Dead Space, a quick recap: Dead Space is a horror shooter, with an emphasis on survival — making ammo pickups worth their weight in gold, and so on. In the first Dead Space, you were put aboard a ship with a planetary artifact known as “The Marker” on it, that caused an outbreak of “necromorphs” — dead people infected by a moth-like monster that reanimates them as monsters.
Well, if you thought you were done with The Marker in the first Dead Space, you’re “dead” wrong. Dead Space 2 follows an outbreak of the necromorph virus in an area on the moon Titan called “the Sprawl”. It’s different than the confined spaces in the first Dead Space, but not different enough to lose that claustrophobic, edgy feeling the first installment had.
You begin the game locked in a cell, restrained by a straitjacket, until a mysterious stranger comes and cuts you out of your prison. From that moment on, you’re running and gunning with necromorphs hot on your tail.
One of the biggest changes in Dead Space 2 is the quality of the AI. Necromorphs now play tricks on you — one will draw your attention in front of you while several move to flank you and kill you in seconds. You’re gonna die in this game, I promise you. But, on the bright side, the game is very good at keeping track of your progress, so after dying, you won’t have far to go to get back on track. Save stations are also more plentiful than in the original, which is a welcome development.
Another big change — your “powers” have been upgraded. I’m referring to kinesis and stasis here. Stasis slows down enemies and environment objects, and kinesis allows you to grab hold of an item and move it through the air — or shoot it at an enemy. You can now conserve ammo by picking up the sharp bits of dead necromorphs and launching them back at them, impaling them on them. Of course, you’ll still have to shoot off their limbs to get them to officially die.
Stasis also plays a bigger part. In that example of how the AI is improved that I just gave, one solution is to stasis-freeze the enemy in front of you while you back up as fast as you can so you’re able to take down the rest of the group. Also, stasis now recharges by itself over a slow period of time. You’ll still need stasis packs to use during intense battle, but in the interim, you’ll be able to save up a couple of blasts of stasis without resorting to a stasis pack or generator station. And, speaking of the stasis stations, they once again make a return, mostly found around a spatial-reasoning puzzle. These puzzles also make use of kinesis and are as clever as always — difficult without being impossible.
Another carryover from Dead Space 1 to Dead Space 2 — schematics, the store, credits, and power nodes. The latter allows you tu upgrade your equipment at various workbenches scattered around the Sprawl. Power nodes can also be used to open locked doors, usually leading to an armory — essential if you’re short on firepower and about to face a boss. Schematics allow you to buy new items from the store; make sure you explore all areas thoroughly to find them (the same goes with power nodes).
The visuals of Dead Space 2, combined with the soundtrack, deliver an experience that is genuinely scary. I highly recommend playing this game in the dark with the volume cranked as high as you can take it.
One truly great addition to Dead Space 2 is a “smart locator”. In the original Dead Space, you would hold down R3 to see the route to your objective. In Dead Space 2, you can still do that — but you can also use the d-pad to affect the locator so that it shows you the route to a Save Station, a store, or a workbench. This is extremely useful.
Zero-g action has also been slightly modified; you now have boosters on your suit that can propel you in any direction, along with a “turbo” button. The overall effect is to make Zero-g play more interesting and dynamic.

Improved Zero-g in Dead Space 2 -- just one of the perfectly executed upgrades to the franchise. (click to enlarge)
Some fans of the original Dead Space were a little wary of the fact that Visceral was talking to other first-person shooter developers to come up with a better experience. Fans were scared this would mean more mindless shooting replacing the unique puzzle-solving and survival horror aspects of the game. I am happy to report that these fears were unwarranted. The shooting mechanics are indeed more smooth, but absolutely NOT at the cost of any other aspect of the game.
Another quick note for PS3 players — I don’t *think* Dead Space 2 is in true 1080p, but you don’t have to force upscaling on it if you want to play in 1080p. Dead Space 2, at least for me (and my 42″ 1080p Panasonic Viera), runs with 1080p as the default setting. With all resolutions enabled, Dead Space 2 ran in 1080p for me. The only other game to do this for me so far is Gran Turismo 5.
Enough blathering, time to sum up: I absolutely love Dead Space 2. If it had been released in 2010, I could easily have seen it picking up Game of the Year Awards from the industry. The story is great, the thrills and chills are numerous and effective, the boss battles are extremely satisfying, and the graphics are absolutely top-notch. Buy this game. If you’ve never played the original Dead Space, *rent* Dead Space 2 and see if you like it, which you will, and *then* buy it.
Dead Space 2 is a masterpiece; I applaud EA and Visceral and everyone who developed it. I’m giving it a solid 9.5 out of 10.
(First, much thanks to Mateo Geoly for posting these IPs on Facebook).
Apparently — although for how long this will last, I do not know — you can get around Egypt’s block of communications/social networking websites by using the numerical IP address as opposed to the name (which has to be resolved by a DNS). So:
To bypass government blocking of website names, use numerical IP addresses:
For Twitter “128.242.240.52”
For Facebook “69.63.189.34”
For Google “72.14.204.99”
If you get the titled error (“Media is write protected”) out of nowhere and it’s driving you nuts, try the following:
Hit Windows-R and bring up the Run dialog box.
Type “cmd” in the box and watch the DOS-like screen pop up.
Type “diskpart” in the DOS-like window.
Next, select the volume you’re having troubles with (i.e. “select volume C”).
After it’s been selected, type:
“attributes volume clear readonly”
Give it a second, and that should do it. You should now be able to set permissions as you like on the selected volume.
I promised a New Vegas review, and dammit, I’ll deliver one.
If Dave Bowman had piloted his craft into a giant copy of New Vegas instead of a floating monolith, his final words would not have been, “Oh my God, it’s full of stars.”
It would have been, “Oh my God, it’s full of bugs.”
Check out any message board about New Vegas on any of the gaming sites and the following words jump out at you — glitch, freeze, bug, crash, and “argh”.
New Vegas is actually a very entertaining game to play, though. For those of you who played Fallout 3, I really don’t have much to tell you — the game is basically Fallout 3: 2 — We Kinda Screwed Up.
You take the role of a Courier for the Mojave Express who is shot in the head and left for dead by a mysterious little cabal. The main quest involves figuring out why you were treated this way. It’s not quite as engrossing as Fallout 3‘s “Project Purity” storyline, but it works pretty well.
The engine is the same. The graphics are the same. It’s nothing you haven’t seen before. For those unfamiliar with the Fallout series, the game takes place in a post-apocalyptic future, which was preceded by a sort of “alternate timeline” where society basically never emerged from the 1950s.
V.A.T.S. (Vault-Assisted Targeting System) returns, which makes the game play a bit more like the RPG it’s supposed to be than a plain shooter. It’s definitely more RPG than Borderlands is. Still, there’s a lot of fun action to be had.
For those of you hoping this game would take place amid the glistening glory of the Vegas Strip, I have bad news — you don’t even get to New Vegas without a good 20 hours or so of gameplay in the Mojave Wasteland surrounding it. And it’s not easy getting in, once you get there — I’m trying to keep this spoiler-free, however.
Fallout has often been described as “Oblivion with guns”, referring to Bethesda’s other epic RPG. It’s a bit more than that, it really is. It’s a whole different universe, carefully crafted, carefully maintained.
New things in New Vegas include: A more complex Karma system, standings with different “Factions” within the Wasteland, and here’s the big one — “Hardcore” mode.
Hardcore mode is not a level above hard. You can play the game on “easy” hardcore mode, or “hard” hardcore mode, whatever floats your boat. And you can play the game without hardcore mode altogether (which is what I opted to do). For serious Fallout fans, Hardcore mode is a lot of fun. It adds new meters to your character and basically turns you into a Sim of sorts — you have to get enough sleep, you have to get enough water, Stimpacks heal over time and not instantly…and so on. The game takes ample space to warn you before you choose to go out in Hardcore mode or not.
Other essential Fallout standards remain the same. Excellent voice acting. Some fun Easter Eggs, if you choose the “Wild Wasteland” trait (I said “trait”, not “perk”). The level cap has been set to 30, but you only get “perks” (carefully scripted enhancements to your character, RPG-style) every two levels, as opposed to every level.
As I said, it’s a fun game. Here’s what’s not so fun about it: Despite a patch out for the console systems, and two patches out for the PC already, the game is, as mentioned earlier, coded like a hunk of dung. What they seem to have done is overloaded the engine with simply too much stuff. For instance, one of the new things in New Vegas is the ability to take a companion with you. Unfortunately, a lot of the time these companions fall through the map, disappear, or otherwise get glitched. Quests are often glitched. When moving through the vast map, there is a lot of stuttering and occasionally a 2-3 second freeze, and, a little rarer, a complete and total freeze that will force you to reboot your system completely.
So here’s my advice: if you like Fallout games, get New Vegas, get the patch (or patches), and save every other frickin’ minute. Save all the time. Make sure you have multiple save files backing you up. Cuz this game will crash on you, mark my words, no matter what platform you’re playing it on.
I’m giving Fallout: New Vegas a 7.5/10. If future patches clear up more bugs, consider it an 8. If there were no glitches at all, I might even hazard to give it a 9/10. But this is a fundamentally flawed game and, unfortunately, you end up feeling a lot like Obsidian’s beta tester.
As happy as I am with last night’s election results, let me state the following: The Republicans have been given a second chance, and they’re on probation.
The polling showed that people are just as sick of Republicans as they are of Democrats. However, the Democrats happen to be in power, and happen to have passed a lot of unpopular (disastrous) legislation, so the country “threw the bums out” without flinching.
But, as noted above, that does not mean the electorate loves Republicans. It merely means that they’re giving Republicans another crack at things, since the Democrats have caused a mess. So mark my words, fellow Republicans — we are on probation.
If we do not move forward with an agenda that is focused on limiting government and reducing its role in people’s lives, we will get tossed out in two years. Whether Obama wins or not. So we need to deliver on our promises of restraint on spending, restraint on government, and as far as “the party of no” goes, we have to keep it up, in regards to good ol’ Barry. We need to put the brakes on his administration.
Charles Krauthammer has prononunced, “The Obama agenda is dead.” I certainly hope it is. But it could easily rise up like a zombie and start staggering forward again, moaning “TAXXXX AND SPENNNDDD!!!” (and “BRAINNNSSSS”, I suppose).
So every single one of you who got elected with an (R) next to your name, watch your ass. Barry wants an end to “partisan politics”. Interesting, since it was strict partisan politics that got his horrendous legislation passed. Put the brakes on Obama, Republicans, and start moving forward with a plan for job growth based on the private sector.
Or in two years there will be yet another bloodbath — this time as Republicans are voted out in droves and Democrats are given a second chance.
Let’s not waste our second chance. Let’s move forward aggressively. Let’s live up to what we promised in the campaign, every last iota of promises we made. Then we will deserve the respect of the people, and, consequently re-election. Or perhaps control of the Senate.
Either way, this is not the time for Rs to rest on their laurels, or, worse yet, reveal themselves to be RINOs.
Rant over.