Lots of Monkeys

Read the highlights of the Microsoft keynote.  Facebook, last.fm and twitter in the 360 dashboard.

I hate to say this, but if the 360’s integration of Facebook is compelling, it may be my killer app and I finally lose the “Don’t Join Facebook” game I’ve been playing for the last year or so.

Love the ability to browse the instant queue in Netflix.  This is something that has been needed ever since the service was released.  I’m one of those users that has a standing movie night and the 360 is always the “go to” device if I don’t know what I’m showing.  The ability to browse the queue and add items now brings it up to the first tier.

SONY is going to have to have a really impressive keynote today to keep up with Microsoft.  Just announcing the PSP GO isn’t going to validate the purchase of my Folding@Home Blu-Ray player.  (Okay, well, it plays inFamous, too.)

Note to SONY:  I hear that this “social networking” thing is going to be big.  Better get on it.

E3 starts tomorrow so there’s probably going to be a lot of post keynote announcement video game geekery.  I’ll try to throw a writing exercise in there every now and again, but please bear with me as I feed the addiction hobby.

Just finished up the first playthrough of inFamous and I’m not sick of it yet.  So I’m in my second playthrough.  Playing the boy scout and the game is definitely more challenging.

When I was playing the evil side, there was just destruction, chaos.  I would launch explosives at every opportunity.  If there was a problem, the solution was shooting it.  If there wasn’t a problem, more than likely I was blowing something up.  I could do anything I wanted, and no one could stop me.  Not the cops, not civilians, not the gangs.

It was awesome.

Now, as the boy scout, things are a little more challenging.  If I shoot a civilian, that’s an automatic karma penalty and I take another stop towards evil.  I can’t just shoot everything.  And explosives are right out in public places.  It’s annoying.  What’s even more annoying is when pedestrians run right into the line of fire.  It’s not frustrating, and so far, I still find it funny.  It’s just a little surprising when I’m hiding out behind cover and I pop out to take a shot at the guy that’s shooting at me and a civilian just jumps into the line of fire.

Ah well.  Can’t make an omelet without breaking a few eggs.

I figure the greater good is worth a few civilian casualties, as long as I make the effort to revive them later

Not surprisingly the solutions to all of the problems are still explosives and shooting, but now I’m shooting the bad guys.  Although I was still shooting bad guys the first time. I guess I’m doing it again.

Although in a good way.

The air is thick with solid beams of light, blues and greens and reds made manifest in the swirling fog.  The music is Rebel Girl by Bikini Kill and our lead singer is suitably drunk and loud.

I know she’s there because I can hear her, but I can’t see her through the fog.  I don’t have time to think about it because I’m playing lead guitar and it’s complicated.  Maybe we should have practiced more, but now it’s too late and we’re playing.

Then the strobes hit and I see the crowd, floating faces lit up by the light show and made bodiless by the thick cloud of fog that fills the too small space.

We finish strong and Lisa, our vocalist, voice raw from the performance asks if we can

Someone shouts Aqualung from the back of the family room.

Welcome to Rock Band 2, with the stage kit.