Point One:
Activision announced "Guitar Hero: World Tour" recently. It's the new evolution of the series after "Guitar Hero: Aerosmith" which I expect will suck fairly hard. So like that other game which they don't mention outright, it's designed for band-play with guitar, bass, vocals, and drums. Drums are "the most realistic drums ever" with bass pedal, 3 drum pads and 2 cymbal pads all stacked at a higher height. Also, they're adding a "music composer" thing with it as well. They have a trailer out and everything.
Annnnnnd . . . there's a lot of crazy negative sentiment coming from it, especially at Kotaku, where I read the news.
The general feeling is that they're copying Rock Band in order to compete, people who already have Rock Band don't have the floor space for another gaudy plastic drum kit, no one wants to spend $200 on one more drum pad, Considering how many Guitar Hero games Activision is currently churning out they're now just going through the motions, they've lost their passion for making these games, the name "Guitar Hero" just doesn't make nearly as much sense anymore, the music composer thing is going to be cheap and a little more tacked on than anything else, GH3 ruined the series for a lot of people with a really narrow window for strumming and overly-frustrating finger charts that feel more hard and frustrating for the sake of being hard and frustrating than for feeling like you're playing the song . . . like, very few people are actually excited about this!
Also doesn't help that the "trailer" is the lamest thing ever . . .
I gotta say, I rarely ever play Guitar Hero 3. I'm actually a little sad I bought it now, because the need for a guitar that can play both games is what's been keeping me from having a full Rock Band set with a bassist. Hmm . . . things to think about, I guess . . .
Point Two:
While on the subject of Rock Band . . . my cousin snapped my bass pedal yesterday. It was bound to happen, but it sucks for him that it happened on his shift. In any case, I called EA and they're shipping me a free (eventually) replacement now. Here's hoping this all works out smoothly and quickly so I can know that this won't be hard later in the future . . . y'know, when we break it again . . .
Point Three:
I SAW THE YOSHIDA BROTHERS YESTERDAY!!!
I'll write up a full review later, but I'll just say it was awesome and interesting. For one thing, the theater was filled with old Japanese people - like, until this point I don't think I had ever seen so many Japanese people in Vancouver all in one place before! And they were all here to see the Yoshida Brothers . . . themselves being rock stars disguised as traditional musicians.
Last thing I'll mention here before the main post . . . the atmosphere was very unique. Again, like I said, the theater was filled with old Japanese people. As such, there was not a lot of tapping/bouncing along, very little loud cheering (save for now and then when they played some songs that really cooked). However, when the songs would end, you would get some crazy-thunderous applause from the audience. I know "thunderous applause" is kinda cliche, but seriously! It was the loudest clapping I had ever heard for an audience of 600-650 people. It was nuts.
Writing Bit:
First grammar workshop seems to have taken well over at The Writers Bloc. This pleases me.
Now I need to start having some discussions with a couple other people to start planning out what and how else we play with this bad boy . . .
So that's that.
I feel like there was something else I really wanted to mention, but I can't think of it anymore. Oh! It was probably Indiana Jones 4 . . . yeah, later.
(EDIT: it's 2:06am, and I kept hearing a little repeating something-rather in the house somewhere, like maybe some music or a television show . . . snooped around a little, figured out it was coming from my brother's room.
So yeah. My room's in the basement, his is above mine more or less . . . and I could hear his snoring through the air vents. That's funny, but totally messed up.
So Saturday we had our Shinsengumi Rock Band meeting. Watched some anime, played some Rock Band . . . ate some pizza, watched some YouTube . . . it was a really good night.
And yes, I took some YouTube. And yes, everyone else in the group hates me for doing so now, probably.
Umm . . . other than that, Sunday I went out to see Forbidden Kingdom and had the theater sell out RIGHT when I got to the counter. Burn, huh? So I ended up getting a drink with my friend instead before coming home (where my brother had friends over playing Rock Band and who made me sing with them a bit).
As for anything and everything Rock Band related right now . . . all I can say is:
"This was a triumph! I'm making a note here: HUGE SUCCESS!"
All of that aside . . . look what I'm going to next month:
That should be fun, I bet . . .
I was up 'til past 5am last night watching the newer episodes of Smallville. Damn, a lot's happened since Christmas . . .
That said, my eyes feel baggy and now I gotta prep the house for Rock Band . . . peace.
"Still Alive". And it was a free download.
It doesn't get much better than that . . . well, unless they released a Bon Jovi pack, but that's probably not too likely any time soon.
In other news, "Hard Candy" has two commentary tracks which is awesome. I skipped quickly through the actor one so far (I love actor commentaries), and it's very amusing. Patrick Wilson and Ellen Page are fun to listen to, especially as she tortures him on-screen. One bit really cracked me up:
"...and this is all setup for Hard Candy 2," Wilson says, more or less at one point.
"No," Page responds, "that is not true. There is no Hard Candy 2." As he laughs, she continues. "This is 'Hard Candy: The Last Stand'..."
"Ahhh, I see what you did there..." Wilson says as they both laugh (Ellen Page played Kitty Pryde in X3, in case anyone didn't know).
So yeah, go watch it. Then watch it again with commentary. 'Cause commentary tracks are the best parts of DVD special features. Way the hell better than "other film trailers", at least . . .
First night back from house-sitting. My clothes will smell less like beagle now. Anyway, turns out I didn't break my brother's computer after all - it was already broken and I just didn't know the trick to making it work again (in this case, unplugging the keyboard, re-plugging, then "pressing F1 to continue"). So yeah, just as they got home I deleted Live Messenger and Firefox to hide the evidence and whatnot - all is well on their end now.
So . . . heck, a lotta people still aren't quite getting how Fan Word submissions work. I'm still getting a lot of single-chapters to stories, tons of personal blogs - the other night I even PMed two specific repeat-offenders to ask them to stop . . . I still think the system's a good one, but we just need to get more education out there. I mean, I'd hate to think I'll at some point in time I'll hafta write up an all-purpose PM of "You're doin' it wrong, read the rules!" to send out to people every time they don't do this right - mostly I just don't wanna hafta send out so many PMs every day. So I dunno, we'll see . . .
Other than that, I need this:
http://www.nyko.com/nyko/products/?i=130
('Cause I got a Shinsengumi Rock Band party comin' up next weekend!)
