Random Trains of Thought - 7/10/09

- So one issue of Judd Winick's Batman run is in the can and already DC has announced that after his first arc he won't be there for the second. Tony Daniel is doing both art and writing duties for an arc, but there's no mention of whether Judd will be back or not. All I can ask is this: Just what the hell is DC thinking? They just completely restructured the Batman line with great success considering the critical reaction and already one writer is being shuffled off for another.

Now, I'm a Tony Daniel fan and I'm not adversed to him writing some more, but this is kind of ridiculous. Judd is not the greatest writer around - even some of his supporters will agree that he's hit or miss - but he really does seem to get the Batman universe.

- Three months in and apparently the DSi isn't selling like Nintendo hoped it would. I don't know if I'm surprised or not. The system was basically just a DS Lite with GBA functionality removed and two crappy camera's added; logic should allow people to see the damn thing was a gimmick from a mile away. And yet, people are often genuinely stupid and are often hypnotized by any stupid, shiny thing tossed their way. So it's kind of a toss up.

Irregardless, I'm glad to see the public isn't eating up crap for once. The DSi really doesn't even have a reason to exist and it sure as hell isn't worth the money.

- Speaking of the DSi, I heard someone speculate once that the entire thing was an attempt to weed out pirating on the system or to at least discourage it. I don't really put stock in that kind of crap, being honest; Nintendo's notorious for doing whatever they can to curb piracy, but they've never been swift enough to actually make the hardware impenetrable. Still, I was reminded of that conversation recently when looking at something related to the system and I can only think that if that was what they were trying that they failed miserably. From what I've seen it took all of two months from the Japanese release for the card teams to crack it and release DSi compatible cards.

Hell, as it is Nintendo's either too lazy or inept to stifle the Wii's loopholes allowing homebrew, so I suppose it's always possible that they at least tried and merely failed miserably.

- What's with all the hate on Punisher: War Zone? The movie wasn't perfect by any stretch of the imagination, but does anyone really expect a movie based off a murderous vigilante with a skull on his chest to be cinematic genius? I thought it was certainly truer to the spirit of the character than the Thomas Jane Punisher flick from several years back; and I even liked that one. Blasphemy, I know.

But then, critics seem to absolutely abhor anything these days that isn't on the level of Citizen Kane or The Godfather; I think it's in the job description to be jaded, cynical, intolerant and generally abusive in their reviews. Then there's comic fans in general and that's a whole 'nother pot of crap and dog piss.

- Internet comic message boards are really starting to piss me off. I actually have my most pleasant and fun comic discussions outside of comic focused forums. Everyone seems to hate everything these days and absolutely no one can critique a book without resorting to childish insults against the creators. It's disgusting. When are comic fans going to grow up? The hobby is supposed to be fun, but internet comic fans take the hobby way too goddamn seriously.

I've literally stopped going to just about every general comic site I've ever been around. I barely even pop up on Comicbloc anymore. To tell the truth, I don't miss it either.

- God I hate alternative rock. Listening to the radio some days can be just painful. Some crap came up several times recently that just made me cringe; the lyrics used crap like a girl sucking on her thumb and then lyrics about how she looks cuter with something in her mouth. The suck sounded like every other bit of trash floating on the airwaves these days; sometimes it's hard to even tell bands apart anymore when it comes to that genre.

I'll stick to the good old fashioned rock and heavy metal, thanks. Some of the crap around latey is just embarassing.

- A rumored PS3 bundle packaged with MGS4 and Killzone 2? 80 Gigs? For the standard four hundred dollars? Dammit. I wish I had that kind of money, because that's the kind of bundle that would get me to take the plunge on the system.

Of course, people are still whining for a price cut for some ungodly reason I can't fathom. Two of the systems best games - one of them still sixty dollars - with the system for the standard four hundred. For three hundred I got a piece of shit 360 that's already giving me problems and two mediocre kids games. Guess which sounds like the better deal? I really don't get people sometimes.

- I just checked Gamepro's website. Seems one of their related blogs got nailed for one of their writers plagiarizing IGN of all places. Sweet jesus. IGN for christs sake. I mean, it's bad enough the dude plagiarized, but IGN? That's like cheating off the dumbest kid in class. Thankfully, as soon as Gamepro was made aware they had the blog fire the writer; he wasn't a paid employee or anything, so there's that. Still, it sadly reflects badly on the site in general. I feel sorry for them; Gamepro recieves enough flack from the petulant as it is

I think what's saddest is the reaction across the internet. It's kind of pathetic. The internet really allows the cynical, whiney losers to get their worthless opinions out, doesn't it? "Oh gaming journalism what a laugh". Feh.

- Speaking of Gamepro, they need thier editors to step up their game. I picked up the most recent issue and damn are there a lot of mistakes. I don't really blame the writers or anything - that kind of thing happens and I don't even get all the mistakes in my stuff on here - but the editors need to really get on the ball. It's getting pretty glaring.