Endangered Gamer

yeah, I've given up on doing that ryu beadcraft thing . the lack of colors and the insane detail made me realise that i better work my way up to that level SLOWLY, and not warp to world 4-1 before i have the skillz .

via No Es Bueno

Finally, an alternative to Madden....... Imagine Rice, Unitas, Butkus, and Singletary. In their prime. On the same field. Maybe even the same team. Imagine preparing a precision squad of mercenaries—even building your own players. Imagine football action the way football is really played. Now imagine the best gridiron game coming back for more. Imagine Football Resurrected. This is All Pro Football 2K8. This summer… the legend returns .

i just got a email from Microsoft, and my new (or repaired) xbox 360 is on the way...... thank baby moses!!!!!!!!!

for anyone who's interested in doing that pearler bead stuff i was working on this weekend, here's a list of websites i used to get the sprites. PNG format works best to zoom in on the images with no (or very little) distortion, and most of the images are in that format already, so it's alot easier than using jpeg or gifs. This site has alot of fan-made sprites, and covers anime, fighting games and a huge assortment of videogame sprites. the users are a tad bit protective of their work, but i still took a shitload of images off them. dedicated not only to videogame sprites, this site has more general purpose art and design sprites, and a lot of really detailed stuff that's just nice to look at. This site is dedicated mostly to Nintendo, with a emphasis on NES and Super Nintendo stuff. the sprite sheets are HUGE, but it's mostly stuff taken directly from the roms or fan-made mods.

Just when you thought the Halo 3 beta's end would send all those people who bought Crackdown running to Gamestop to trade their copy in, Microsoft releases one, (count 'em) ONE screenie of a new vehicle. It resembles a dune buggy, and some speculation at Xbox 360 Fanboy suggests that there might be a bump in the amount of co-op players, from 2 to 4 just cause of the 4 buggies in the pic. Not sure about that, but any new content to keep the game out of the trade-in bin is welcome. now all we need is that freaking " reset the bosses " update.

I got Bust a Move, Price of Persia: Rival Swords, Sonic and the Secret Rings for the Wii , and Pokemon Pearl and Pokemon Diamond for the DS and 2 DS headsets today, in a ginormous box. I'd post some pics, but i'm too lazy. I played a bit of Sonic ( it's fast, and looks good) and Bust a Move (it's the same game, with 8 player multiplayer , can't wait to try that out....) but the jem of the bunch was Prince of Persia. Pokemon will have to wait till....i don't really know. forever, maybe. I'd go as far as to say it's the Best Wii game since Twilight Princess. the classic PoP gameplay from the Xbox and PS2 versions is all there, but the addition of the wii controls make the game surprisingly fresh and exciting. yes, i said EXCITING. the game does a great job of sensing what you're doing, deciding the context of your actions, and not getting in the way of having fun. for such a complex move set that the prince has, i never had to struggle...

let's see now.... sway-walking, nice explosions, not too diffrent than Halo 2, whoa, WTF???? this is Zanzibar?? they really made the base HUGE!!!!! anyways, the guy playing the leaked footage sucks, i'd totally pwn him. ( if i had a xbox 360......dammit)

here's the source image. I modified the few pieces near where his sword would be so that you can tell it's actually a sword, and added 2 purple pegs for the hilt. other than that, it's fairly decent. Note to self: make sure the pegboard is big enough for the piece you're trying to make. I had to get creative when i realized that the Ryu's foot wouldn't fit on the pegboard i had, so i had to Magyver a solution and iron the foot on later.

I finally took the plunge this weekend, and dove headlong into making Pearler Bead NES characters, after stealing the idea from this Flickr photoset. I've been wanting to do this for a loooong time, and Saturday i found myself in a hobby store, wandering around while my wife shopped for yarn. Inspiration grabbed me by the nuts, and i walked out with 2 sets of Pearler beads. after getting a sprite of Mario to try it out, i sat down to get busy. I bought bucket and a smaller package with the clear pegboard to make it a bit easier to copy stuff i print out. the ghetto bucket, with 6000 pieces the template i used for mario the finished mario piece. I'm going to try and make some more complicated characters once i get used to the process. that flickr photoset has great examples, but i really do want to make original stuff. we'll see how long it takes to get bored.

I started playing Portrait of Ruin a few weeks ago, but in small chunks. The game itself is pretty good, with a good amount of exploration and some evil bosses. so far, I'm about 5 hours in, and was getting my ass handed to me by Death. for some reason, i kept getting beat, and in frustration, my friend Gil ended up passing the bastard for me. One boss battle later, (the two creepy sisters) the castle gets destroyed, and THE GAME ENDS. just like that, the Game Over screen comes up and BOOM you're back to the main menu. What the Hell????? since when does a game end with such a lack of fanfare or even acknowledgment???? Never in my life have i played a game with such an abrupt ending. i was shocked and pissed. I called gil up and his explanation was that i got the shitty ending (o rly?) because i only found blah blah percentage of the weapons and i need to find some secret to fight another boss. FUCK THAT. even with that other shit, the game was only 6 hours long??...

I'm posting the results of the last poll early, because the asshats at Bravenet have been sending popups at this site ever since i added their shitty poll HTML code to the sidebar. fuck them, i'm going to find a new poll site, but for now, it's gone....

the official pot smoker's holiday.

a bunch of contractors in Iraq decided to get down, death star style.

this might be the most insane woman i've heard in quite a while. when you thought it can't possibly get worse, it does. possibly nsfw.

Even though my xbox is dead, i'm still following relevant news, and this Destructoid post revealed a super-talented artist and his blog full of 360 dashboard-worthy images in 1920x1080 glory. Seriously, some of these images are fucking awesome, and as soon as i get my 'box back, they're going up, Halo 3 theme be dammed.

I love nights like this. for the first time since 1991, a Sox pitcher threw a no-hitter in chicago . Mark Buehrle gave up just one walk to the northside pariah, Sammy Sosa. ( he picked him off a few moments later) . 2 Homeruns by Thome and a grand slam by Dye sealed the deal. After coming off a dismal season last year, he's back up to speed, and hopefully the Sox can make another run for the championship. and if it seems too early to talk October, you must be used to losing. by the way.....when was the last Cub no hitter???? 1972

seriously, the single best fan made film i have ever seen. don't forget to watch ALL the credits.

Hell yeah!!!!! i've been waiting so long for the feature film of everybody's favorite Yale dropout, Rory from Gilmore Girls!!!! Ever since that one episode that....wait, what? WHAT???? Rory's First Kiss is just code for the new Batman movie filming here in chicago???? dammit.

I know t his flash game is old and crusty as Gil's Halo skills, but it's still fun. anyways, the main story in this post is a article from GameSetWatch on ragdoll physics that had this choice quote.... Yates notes: "I think that the more people who aspire from a development standpoint for complexity, the more ways there will be to break stuff, especially with procedural animations. Everybody wants emergent results, but when you get that, you actually have a very hard time testing it. It's a very serious practicality issue that everybody is facing. Ragdoll and physics are the same way. You can stack things up and get out of a game's world! It's pretty wild. Somebody should design a game based entirely around that premise." I coulden't agree more. i LOVED how in halo 2 you had this explosive growth of the glitching community, and how every possible interaction with the enviroment was explored. Remember sword-flying? Greneade Jumping , and escaping ...

From old school to new school, TRANSFORM!!!!

considering all that's happened in the last few days , videogames have taken a back seat to all the madness in the world. When stuff like this happens, i find it hard to focus on this blog, hence the lack of posts. That's not stopping the predictable response , that videogames were to blame in the Virginia Tech bloodbath. I've heard reports that the guy played counterstrike, so if that's confirmed, it will add more fuel to the fire. Kotaku has posted a point-by-point dissection of Jack Thomson's latest rant on Fox News , and it's a must-read for anyone who even remotely agrees with this bastard. And what does Rush Limbaugh have to say???? You'll be surprised.......

fucking FINALLY!!!! a badass game on the VC !! Although it's been snipped of the frothing, wife beating-ear biting- child-eating Mike Tyson , it's still one of the best boxing games ever made. (yeah, i said it!!!) Just remember kids, when ending a game, hit the home button on your wiimote and power down, or your save state won't be saved, and you'll have to beat Glass Joe's ass for the millionth time.....

Hot off the IGN site are some pretty impressive shots of Too Human, a action RPG coming out later this year (hopefully) it's dismal showing at E3 last year notwithstanding, it's one of the better looking games on the 360. hopefully I'll get mine back in time to play it. (looks like the official site is down, check IGN for the full story.)

I've never played World of Warcraft. not being a big pc gamer, I've pretty much ignored everything after doom 2 and heretic. (yeah, i'm old....) that being said, i CAN appreciate the dedication that WoW players have in setting up raid times, joining and maintaining guilds with hundreds of members, etc. but everything has it's dark side, and WoW is no exception......

for the lucky bastards who have a WORKING xbox 360 and just happen to work for microsoft. bastards....

yay , Chicago was picked as the U.S. olympic candidate for 2016. now comes the competition against other cities in the world, like Madrid, Rome, Tokyo, Rio de Janeiro and Prague, Czech Republic. i personally think we have a great chance to beat these cities, with our corrupt-as-hell mayor and slap-happy police force . beat them down to a bloody pulp.

The first week's minipoll just so happened to fall on the eve of the biggest traffic surge on this site since last year, so the 112 responses won't be typical, but nontheless, here they are...... and for all you jokers out there, i know i neglected to include Super Mario World. I KNOW. it was my fault. suggest a new poll for next week in the comments.....

You've broken my Xbox 360. yeah, i'm blaming you. nevermind the fact that my non-gamer wife picked up Guitar Hero 2 for the first time in her life, and immediately afterward, my xbox froze. Nope, i blame you, and it seems like there's a shitload of other pissed off Xbox 360 owners who blame you too . the patch released Friday by red octane to resolve the issue with the whammy bar not working seems to be the blame for some, but i know for a fact that my xbox worked fine, just FUCKING FINE up until Wednesday of last week. Thursday and Friday i was only able to play XBLA games. Saturday came the Red Ring of Death. I have NEVER regretted buying a game this much. EVER. not only am i not able to download the new Halo 2 maps this week, but i swear to god if my xbox isn't back by the Halo 3 beta, I'm going to go batshit crazy......

click on image to subscribe on iTunes.... New podcast is up..... Endangered Gamer #14, now with Wii menu music!!!! My Xbox 360 just died on me, and i'm pissed.....rants on Gears of War, broken xbox 360s and the ShadowRun beta test. end music by the most exploited and overrated RPG series EVAR!!!! 9 but chocobos are teh shit!!) Direct Download

i just got it. fuck. FFFFFFFUUUUUCCCCCKKKKKK!!!!!!!! [UPDATE] I just got off tech support with microsoft india, and i'm sending my 360 in for repairs. it's painfully obvious that i won't be playing the new halo 2 maps any time soon, so i'm putting an embargo on all halo news till i get mah 360 back. dammit. i just got F.E.A.R. today from gamefly......I'm going back to paper mario......

there's been lots of traffic lately, since that post on the evil-ass mario mod went up. anyways, welcome to any and all new visitors, a few days late, i know, but what the hell, better late than never. work's been breathing down my neck for the last few days, so the posts slowed down from the flood on tuesday. Let's see.......Capcom have released some footage of Resident Evil 4 on the wii , but it's got to be a totally diffrent game to get me to play it for the 3rd time.... Since it's Friday the 13th, here's a video review from the Angry Videogame Nerd. i've said it before, this guy is the funniest reviewer out there. i hope he gets to the current gen games sometime this decade.... hello.... what's this!!! Manhunt's new trailer, and since it's coming for the wii, maybe i'll get to choke someone for reals!!!

I'm starting to get the nagging feeling that my xbox 360 is not doing too well... it's been freezing up on me, pretty consistently . last night, i gave up trying to play guitar hero 2 after 4 freezeups in a row playing ...killing in the name ... it's pissing me off, and will drive me abso -fucking- lutely insane if it goes down DAYS from the Halo 2 map's release, not to mention the beta test. I've yet to get the Red Ring of Death , but if i do, I'll go batshit crazy. then again, i do have my wii to play with...... heh .......

Via I can has a cheezburger???

it's been counting down fine for the last week and was supposed to end TODAY , and all of a sudden BAM!!!! it backs up 2 days.....bastards.....

it's because the Wii Internet channel is up. you must preform a system update first, and i'm too lazy, so i'll do it tomorrow. but you should do it now. NOW!!!!