A Perfect Storm of Sports and Shakespeare

Some very clever writers over at The DCenters (a blog for the DC United MLS team) put together a starting 11 for Shakespeare's soccer team, plus the bench and managers. Pretty much the dorkiest thing going on the net as of 10:08 p.m., Pacific time.

STARTING XI
Goalkeeper: Brutus (Julius Caesar) – Your keeper should be cool, unflappable, like Brutus, who won't take a night off even if his wife kills herself by swallowing fire.

Full-back: Marina (Pericles, Prince of Tyre) – If she guards the right flank as well as she guarded her chastity, attackers will find the box difficult to penetrate.

Center-back: Henry V (Henry IV, Henry V) – After some shaky moments during Henry IV when his passion for the game was questioned, this young prospect demonstrates strong abilities to organize a back line and is great in International competition. Just elected captain.

Center-back: Titus Andronicus -- The great defender of Rome is stout on the pitch, but can occasionally make odd choices in his distribution. Makes up for it with great service (both on the pitch and at the dinner table).

Full-back Goneril: (King Lear) -- Confident in handling the part of the land allocated for her, Goneril may get caught ball-watching occasionally and never seems grateful for the role she gets on the pitch.

Right Midfielder: Falstaff (Henry IV, The Merry Wives of Windsor) – Aging star popular with the fans (think 2002 Marco Etcheverry), pops up unexpectedly in odd places and seems to defy time. Was supposed to be in the starting line-up for Henry V, but was stripped of captaincy and lead role by Hal, and may be on the way out as nights out with George Best catch up with him.

Center Defensive Midfielder: Shylock (The Merchant of Venice) – Opposing attackers find it difficult to charge through midfield when this Demo Kovalenko-esque midfielder takes his pound of flesh.

Center Attacking Midfielder: Iago (Othello) – What should your #10 be? Crafty, and they don't get much craftier than Iago, whose use of misdirection and playing others through is unparalleled. Sure, he's still upset that he was passed over for Othello for the Italian team, but professionals can get beyond that, right?

Left Midfielder: Duke Vincentio (Measure for Measure) – Excellent two-way player, both in dictating the attack and in performing the down and dirty work of tracking back and defending.

Center Forward: Macbeth – He can strike and finish, but plays withdrawn constantly checking back for the ball and looking for players ghosting out on runs. Occasionally overconfident, when he scores it's a dagger to the opposition.

Striker: Othello – Charges headlong on whatever Iago sends him to chase, occasionally acts too quickly for his own good, but that's what you want in a striker.

Manager: King Lear -- Replaced Polonius earlier this season. Emphasized simple play and tactics – "Divide we our formation in three!" May lose his cool towards the end of the season or in bad weather. If season does not end well, may be replaced by Propsero who supposedly retired, but is said to be itching to get back in the game.

Former Manager: Polonius (Hamlet) – Like Ray Hudson, he was quick to the quip in the locker room until the front office realized they had no idea what he was going on about.

BENCH

Goalkeeper: Cordelia (King Lear) – Biding her time on the bench until her father realizes she has something to offer.

Defense: MacDuff (Macbeth) – Need a steadying defense at the end? MacDuff can shut a game down and make opponents feel that their grasp of the game was "untimely rip'd"

Midfielder: Puck (A Midsummer Night's Dream) – Fast, mischievous, Puck'll do whatever it's told in order to sow confusion among the opponent's defense, and is clever enough on the ball to make any marker look like an ass.

Midfielder: Ariel (The Tempest) – Sometimes you need a bit of magic on the ball, and Ariel is a great choice. Excellent at winning midfield headers, like most Elemental Internationals.

Midfielder: Hamlet -- Transfer listed, he never seems to have settled in and lacks confidence in his decision making. May have been affected by the death of his father, it is hoped that a transfer back to Elsinore FC where he'll be closer to mother and girlfriend (Bianca.... er, Ophelia) will provide him the comfort level to flourish.

Forward: Lady Macbeth (Macbeth) – When Macbeth can't get it done, she'll come into the game and finish it off.

Forward: Ulysses (Troilus and Cressida) [on loan from Ithaca United] – Excellent at picking the lock of another team's impenetrable fortress, and popular for talking with other players and coaxing the best performance out of them. Many fans demanding he see regular starting time, but they're just a bunch of Homers.

INJURED RESERVE

Midfielder: Richard III – Leg and back problems plaguing this potential star, rumors of a bad attitude also surround him.

File This One Under Where Do You Even Find the Time

I should know better than to throw stones. My house is filled with nintendo products.

My Mii Video

One of the features on the Nintendo Wii is the "Mii Channel," in which you can make caricatures that can later participate in the games. For example, if I wanted to put together a boxing match of myself vs. Justice Scalia, it would only take a few clicks of the wii-mote and voila: I'm beating up on a 71 yr old man. In my modest opinion, I've been pretty successful at creating these little guys, so I've made a little video of them for sharing. Some are originals, some are lovingly plagiarized, albeit with some tweaks. I'm not one who sweats copyright lawyers.

Comments and criticisms are welcome. There's 50+ there and it goes pretty fast, so buckle up.

Wii-View Part Two: The Wii-Mote

This is part two of my four part review of the new Nintendo Wii ("We"). It's the first video game console I've owned since my mom bought my brother and I a Nintendo 64 in 1996. Gameboys have served as a bridge, but this is my official return to the Nintendo console galaxy. These are my thoughts.

After posting the picture of the Wii remote (Wii-mote) below, I realized that this could probably use its own review, considering its ingenuity. The remote looks like a small television remote, save for the trigger on the back. It rumbles lightly when necssary as well as has a small speaker on it that emotes when called upon.



























On the bottom of the remote, there is a port which allows other peripherals to be plugged in. The remote is pictured above with the nunchuck attachment. Nintendo has announced a light-gun attachment, as well as a Classic Controller which closely resembles the old SNES controller for playing classic games on the Virtual Console.

The key aspect of the remote is its motion sensing ability. The sensor bar above or below the television picks up on the wii-mote's movements, sensing a baseball swing in Wii sports, a sword slash in The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess, or the delicate movements of a scalpel in Trauma Center Under the Knife: Second Opinion. The Wii is clearly not trying to keep up with the PS3 or Xbox360 in the graphics department, so they tried to innovate in a different direction. This feature is what elevates what is basically a souped up Gamecube into a next-generation gaming system. The two questions that will determine whether the Wii is a winner: Does it work? Is it fun?

Does it work?
It does work, but with some caveats. First, it takes some experimenting with the sensitivity on the sensor bar to get the Wii-mote to work with your playing space. The ideal playing space is for you to hold the Wii-mote between 3'-8' from the television. The closer you are to the TV, the less sensitive the bar should be set to. Imagine holding a laser pointer in your hand and pointing it at the wall. It doesn't take a very big swing for the red dot to fly from one side of a room to another. If the Wii-mote is too sensitive, you'll see this kind of action reflected on the screen. Once you figure out which settings work properly for your space, the Wii-mote responds actively and accurately. It's amazing how it can accurate reflect the slightest movement, such as tilting the remote from side to side. This can take some getting used to, if you're accustomed to scratching your nose mid-game with the controller in hand. Doing so now can have sudden repurcussions for your game, especially if your character is teetering in a precarious position.

Is it fun?
The answer again is yes, with "buts." It's fun to use, but it certainly has a learning curve. Even video game button-mashing veterans will have to learn a new way to play, which is kind of refreshing. Two people can pick up a wii-mote and be on a level playing field in a game of Super Monkey Ball: Banana Blitz. This was a little frustrating at first. Having played video games on conventional controllers for years, complicated button-sequences are nothing new to me. Trying to figure out how to scoop a fish with a virtual fish net in my hand: that's going to take some getting used to.

The final answer to whether it's fun is going to be left up to the game developers. The motion-sensing capabilities of the wii-mote opens up the gameplay ideas for game developers to re-write the way we've known to interact with games. I've played some mini-games that have flopped with the remote, such as Boxing on wii-sports or some of the mini-games on Monkey Ball. On the other hand, when playing a game like Zelda where the right hand's swipes control the sword while the left hand controls the shield, you quickly forget how you ever could have substituted this virtual fantasy with button-pushing as a poor substitute.

My verdict would be so far so good, with reserved enthusiasm about what lies ahead.

Wii-View Part One: The Looks

This is part one of my four part review of the new Nintendo Wii ("We"). It's the first video game console I've owned since my mom bought my brother and I a Nintendo 64 in 1996. Gameboys have served as a bridge, but this is my official return to the Nintendo console galaxy. These are my thoughts.

The Wii's design is simple, small, and clean. Size-wise, it's been compared to the size of about 3 DVD cases stacked on top of one another. It can be positioned either sitting flat, like an external DVD drive would next to your computer, or positioned vertically on the included stand. It comes in white, but I've read that they will be releasing them in other colors later on.

It has a single open slot for loading either Wii discs or the smaller Gamecube discs. The slot illuminates a bright blue glow when loading discs and if there is a message waiting for you on your Wii while on standby, but can be turned off if it bothers you. If positioned vertically, the "top" of the Wii has two discreet covers that hide the Gamecube controller ports and the expansion slots for Gamecube memory cards. Right above the disc slot is a small cover which hides the SD card slot.

The Wii is very quiet in its operations. It has some ventilation on the the back and on the underside, but even when the fans kick up, it's works very silently and is easily forgotten once the game has begun.

Besides the aformentioned ventilation grate on the back, there are three connections on the back of the Wii. One is for the sensor bar, which rests either on top of your TV or just below it. The sensor bar is very thin, just bigger than a pencil lying on a table, and is about an inch deep. This is what receives the signals from the Wii remotes, which will be discussed in greater detail later on.

Besides the sensor bar, the A/V cables and power adapter are also plugged into the back. One negative is that the power adapter has a fairly large sized block that you have to find someplace to hide. It's not quite the size of a brick, but it's not far off. Another negative is that the Wii only comes with the standard compositet (red/white/yellow) cables, so if you want to use component cables, you'll have to buy those separately. There are also 2 USB ports on the back, although I'm not sure when they'll be updated via firmware to be operational.

The Wii remote will be discussed in further detail later on.

Overall, I think the system looks great sitting just next to or below the television. I was sort of having reservations of not waiting and maybe getting it in black, but the white is glossy, clean and at the same time inconspicuous. My favorite kind of gadget.

Pictures below courtesy of www.wiisworld.com.

Free 25 GB (!) of Online Storage

It's inevitable. It's going to happen. Your computer is going to get stolen, melted, or covered in ketchup. You should have a backup solution, but you don't. If you have 25 GB of stuff you need to backup, AMD Live! Media Vault is a nice, legitimately free solution. There are some limits (such as can only download 1GB of your stuff per month) on the free account, but it sure beats losing sensitive information. The accompanying desktop program is a little choppy at first, but works well for backing up specific folders or uploading multiple files at once.

The Wii has Wooed Me. For Now.

So I've decided to get a Wii. Or I've decided that I hope someone buys me one for Christmas.























It's a prodigal-son like return to nintendo, but I never really left as I've been a closet gameboy nut for a few years now. I love the DS and maybe I'm letting that cloud my judgment, but here are the reasons I've convinced myself it's okay to get my first console since moving out of my parent's house six years ago.

1) The Wiimote. I like that nintendo has gone out on a limb with the motion sensor remote that sounds fun to use. They're thinking outside of the box (like with the touch-screen on the DS) and I think that type of ingenuity warrants a try.

2) The price. Unlike its competitors in the PS3 and Xbox360, the price is a cool $250, which is nowhere near as close as the $400+ figures for the others. I'm not that interested in the HD stuff since my TV is most definitely not HD. The blu-ray technology doesn't interest me since I don't have blu-ray dvds and won't be buying any in the near future. I just want something fun for games and nothing more

3) Wii exclusive games. The only games I play anymore are RPGs and sports games, with some exceptions. The new Zelda game has piqued my interest, I love Trauma Center on the DS so the sequel sounds good, and I have a not-so-secret affection for Pokemon which will not go away. The new editions of Smash Bros and Mario Party will make for excellent multi-player fun. The wii might be lacking in FPS games, but those have never been my favorite anyway.

4) Potential for DS/Wii interoperability. It's been announced, but to what extent, it's not clear.

5) Virtual console. One of the coolest things is to be able to download the old NES/SNES/N64/Sega games onto the wii and play them. I'm looking forward to this very much, especially if I can figure out a way to not have to pay for it.

In the end, I'm not expecting to get my shoes knocked off. For high-res graphics and such, I'll just get the PC version of a game. I'm willing to take the risk that it stinks for under $300.