Tag: Edge

Left 4 Demo 2

Gaming

If you are a Gold Member on Xbox Live (and seriously, if you are planning to play Left 4 Dead 2 as single player or local multi-player only, you are missing out on the best parts of the game), the Left 4 Dead 2 demo is out.

Personally, I’m not going to bother.  To me, a demo is something you play if you are not yet decided on purchasing in order to see if you enjoy the game.  For example, I played the demo of Mirror’s Edge because I wasn’t sure of the game, and I’m glad I did because it saved me money.  But from all accounts, Left 4 Dead 2 is going to be Left 4 Dead only with more awesome.  Considering how much I love the original, there isn’t a chance in hell I won’t love the sequel.  Valve just doesn’t make crappy sequels.

As a birthday gift this year, I was given a pre-order of Left 4 Dead 2.  So I will happily wait for it to show up and not spoil any of the game playing a mere demo.  But I won’t judge you if you do play the demo.  Have fun!

Moon over a Castle

Pictures

This morning’s doodle was my attempt at drawing in the negative.  I wanted to do an image set at night, but I didn’t want to draw in white on a black background, so I doodled with black on white and when I got the image to where I wanted it, I inverted the colors.  It came out well enough that I didn’t bother doing any touch ups after the invert.

Moon over a Castle
Moon over a Castle

Of course, my edge bleed to white works less well with this theme’s image border, but if not for that, I like the effect of the uneven edge like perhaps looking through a window in winter.

The Edge of Disbelief

Reviews

The wife and I have been watching the show Alias lately, on DVD of course since its been off the air a couple of years. I must say that I am really enjoying it. Overall, J.J. Abrams proved that you can do incredibly complicated multi-season stories where each episode is also satisfying within the whole, something he would later lose during season three of Lost.

While the show includes many quasi-realistic gadgets and situations, its normally just right at that line of believability without going over into complete bull shit… at least until the last couple episodes of season three. This may not be exact, but the scene is that they’ve just put together this machine and slapped a container of goo in it, and it begins drawing out these wavy lines, which are determined to be a brain-wave pattern, and the dialog goes:

SLOANE: Each individual has a signature brain-wave pattern as unique as a fingerprint. So to exploit this, the DoD’s developed an experimental satellite network capable of remote encephalography.
SYDNEY: Reading brain-waves from orbit.

See… I’d buy that perhaps brain-waves are as unique as a fingerprint, but reading brain-waves from orbit? I had been comfortably standing at the edge of the ocean, happily watching the waves hit the beach, and this exchange was like stepping into the water to find out that despite the sunny day and warm winds the ocean water is so very very cold. I was snapped right out of the show to turn to the wife and say, “Did they just say reading brain-waves from orbit?” Luckily, they didn’t dwell on it, they didn’t show the team calling the brain-scanner office to track down the pattern in question, they just said “Found her” and moved on. In fact, its unclear if they even used the brain-waves at all as they may have just had a hit on one of the identities they knew the girl had been using. Of course, season three ended shortly there after with the girl in question being on the loose again, so its possible that the orbiting thought police might be utilized in season four to find her again. I hope they don’t…

Anyway, I’ve heard that season five wasn’t so hot, but I plan on watching the whole thing. I’ll post a review of the entire run once I’m finished.

The Two Most Frustrating Things…

Random Thoughts

… while working your job…

The second most frustrating thing to run into is someone else doing a job that you think you can do better.

Seeing someone fumble and stumble when you believe you could do it faster, easier, and more effieciently is one of those heartbreaking, knuckle-whitening things that can drive you up the wall and over the edge.

The MOST frustrating thing to run into is someone else doing a job that you KNOW you can do better.

Seeing someone fumble and stumble when you are secure in the knowledge that you can do it faster, easier, and more efficiently, and more to the point HAVE done it in the past faster, easier and more efficiently, is one of those things that drive people to killing sprees.

I want to do my job well, but sitting here day after day, unable to do my job because someone less qualified than me can’t seem to get it together takes me from 0 to 60 on the frustration-o-meter in under 3 seconds of walking in the door.

Signs

Reviews

M. Night Shyamalan does it again.

I won’t ruin the movie for you, but Signs is another great movie from M. Night. An edge of your seat suspense story about aliens and a Pennsylvania farmer.

Go see it.