Join sisters NinJaSistah and Pandalicious and the rest of the ESH Crew each day as they discuss video games, tech gadgets, anime, manga... pretty much everything within the geek chic lifestyle.
From Xbox 360, PS3, Wii, and PC game reviews, previews, news, and gushings to audience questions and rumor mill seeding galore you'll find it here at ESH!
I was just surfing around and I found this site and I want each and every one of you browncoats to do your duty and check it out. (Browncoats refers to the army Malcolm Reynolds fought side by side with during the battle of Serenity.)
The movie Serenity started as a tv show named Firefly, which was unfortunately cancelled far before it's time. While surfing I found a site that seems to have found a ray of hope to a revival of the show. They are pushing for more than a single season of Firefly. If you love this show, or have yet to watch it and realize how much you love it, just click here to check this site out.
Now I love manga and anime, but every once in a while I come across something that really "chafes my ass", as Ninja would put it. Have you ever felt that way?
Ok, here it is. In Shounen/Shoujo (I'm not sure how to classify them) like Bleach and Naruto no one dies. That may sound like a horrible thing to say, but it bothers the hell outta me. There are long protracted battles to the death which are very exciting, but to the death just doesn't mean what it used to or maybe death isn't as perminent as our parents led us to believe. To the death apparently means to the hospital bed. You hear lines like "Oh noes, his spiritual energy disappeared" which means that the character is D-E-A-D, no longer on this mortal coil, pushing up daisies, has bought the farm, has gone to the big gay bar in the sky, breathes no more, has no heartbeat, cannot EVER come back, and yet a few episodes later they have healed, trained themselves with a cool new technique and are ready for more. This bothers me to no end. It's as if the creators were too lazy to come up with a character to replace the dead guy. At least in DB they had a magical dragon who granted wishes that brought people back, these days it's just "Oh, him? He wasn't really dead, just hurt real bad." They make no excuses for how a character comes back alive, healthy and un-maimed. Dead/Not Dead How do you fuck that up? Is the heart beating or not? I know for a fact that it's not rocket science, rockets don't have hearts. You wouldn't have any trouble if I asked if the radio was on or not, how is this any different? Is there a thump-thump-thump or not?
You may be reading this and thinking about that one character that truly died in episode 12 or whatever, but remember this. There is a character that dies in like the first 3 episodes of Naruto, and he comes back in episode 130 or something. You find out that he was in jail the whole time. So remember, just because they aren't back yet doesn't mean they're dead.
We have yet again updated our glossary of terms this time thanks to Pandalicious and her unwavering support of the site. Stop by and check out the new additions, make some suggestions of your own, or comment and let us know if we missed anything.
p.s. I promise more gaming terms on the next update.
I am a girl gamer. I enjoy many of today's popular games like Grand Theft Auto, Tomb Raider Legend, Prince of Persia games, you name it. But I find myself staying away from new titles more and more as I find myself playing a game where the female characters are void of anything that would allow me to be vaguely interested in them.
Take for example my abysmal experience trying the game Rumble Roses XX for the XB360.
Fighting games have been my passion since I first played Double Dragon on the NES. Action titles get my blood boiling; I find them not only entertaining but engaging. Give me an action title with simple mechanics but a storyline that is exciting and interesting on an emotional level and I'll pre-order the sucker and be it's biggest fan. So when I got the chance to rent this game I jumped on it. From some of the things I had seen it looked like a Dead or Alive clone, but with wrestling as opposed to hand to hand martial arts type combat. That was a huge misconception.
Rumble Roses XX is one of the worst games that anyone may ever play.
In DOA, the characters each have a somewhat intriguing back story so even though a big part of the game is the T&A aspect, you enjoy playing as any player character because, well, they have character. Kasumi has had a storyline full of tension with the other female ninja lead in the game Ayane. And though the storyline is weak at some points, it does tie all of the characters in the game together and allow the player to become vested [at least in some small way] with them and ultimately the game. I absolutely hate Rumble Roses because it lacks this fundamentally important thing. The game has no redeeming qualities at all.
As I started the single player mode I found no back story for my character. I was dropped off on a map to select a battle area. In starting a match I was "treated" to a ring entrance for my character that was bland at most, with some generic rock music playing in the background, and my nearly naked chick stumbling her way towards the ring. While the controls are pretty solid, most of the characters in the game are these vapid pieces of eye candy that just bore me. I found myself having to reassure myself that the game was going to get better, that I just hadn't found that character that resonated with me yet, but I was bound to do it. But then I started doing some "grappling" moves and noticed a recurring theme: See my panties? The more time spent playing the game revealed what the game really was: an excuse to have nearly naked CGI chicks squat, spread, and bare as much as possible to the player. First this made me mad, then it made me sad. While I have nothing against games being sexy, sexual, prominently featuring female characters with little or nothing on, I do feel that there needs to be a balanced reason for the characters being featured in this way. I love the sultry hot-looking female character that is obviously very smart and uses her appearance against her enemies, and I think a lot of girl gamers [and guys] like that as well. Hell, I'll go out on a limb and say that they prefer that kind of character because good looks and brains in a woman equals power, and power is always sexy.
I think that's what aggravates me most about this game, it could have been a very good sexy game. It could have had female characters with charm and backbone [wearing the same outfits] and been a more enticing game than it ended up being. In the form it's in now, Rumble Roses XX is just a farcical one line comedy bit that no one in the room finds funny. As the audience we look at it and kind of grimace, but really just want the better material to hurry up and start. For all the effort that you put in you don't get nearly as much, if anything at all, back in return.
Maybe developers and publishers will get the message if gamers made it clear that we want more than just bouncing big breasted babes in our games. What we do want is the same level of plot and character development that big screen movies get. We want to pop in a game and be so consumed by what is going on that we CAN'T stop playing it, we have to know what happens next, so we have no other choice but spending $60 bucks and 40 plus hours of our lives to get through it.
God of War has the fan base it does not just because it's a gory game. The story was emotionally involving. It drew you in from the moment the game first starting spinning your PS2. And though one of the first mini-games you play was a ménage à trois with some bare breasted and big nippled women, you kept on playing because the gameplay was solid, the visuals were gorgeous, AND the story was compelling.
The gaming community needs more games like God of War, and less like Rumble Roses XX
But that's just one gamer's [who happens to be a girl] opinion.
What is the missing link between anime and gaming?
I've come to realize throughout my quest to vanquish the evil demon that has possessed my soul [WoW if I have to spell it out] and my old time midnight lover anime, that something seemed to be amiss. But what could that be exactly? I had the idea that it might be something that many anime fans and gamers alike loved just the same if not MORE in some instances.
While I was battling through Searing Gorge [an area in WoW] I was talking with hello guildies [Hi Guildies!] and unlocked the secret that had been torturing my ever fleeting heart...it was Sci-Fi that I was lacking. But what would be my remedy? Star Trek? No. [though I did like Deep Space Nine] I have come across a series that many people seem to have a connection with. Maybe some of you share the same attraction. That series is Stargate SG-1.
I've only watched the first few episodes, and I'm filled with many questions, but I can't pull away...it's like crack in DVD form. I thought I'd share this bit of my revelation with you, my dear readers...and also pose a question to you.
Do you have a love for Sci-Fi as well? If so...what was your first?
I just got my hands on the Tokyopop release schedule for this fall. Over the next couple of months I'll list every title for the month and tell you guys which ones you cannot miss. This list is from 'Manga' a free quarterly magazine from Tokyopop. Manga was formerly known as Takuhai and I preferred that name, but since people can now pick it up at news stands they decided not to call it "home delivered" anymore. But honestly, who in their right mind names a magazine about manga Manga? Its just too complicated. I was feeling lazy so the manga descriptions are ganked from TokyoPops' official website, which may I say sucks. I absolutely hate their new site. Their manga list used to have a small thumbnail of a main character displayed next to it, but now it is just an eye blurring dance of text without a single image. Many of the menus are difficult to navigate, and the only thing the site has going for it are the colors [red/black my favorites] which are inappropriate for the company anyways. But this article is not about how much I miss their old site, this is about how much I love Takuhai and their manga.
Note: ! - Means that I have read a previous volume in this series and I liked it (the more "!" the more I liked it) * - Means that there is a review somewhere in the archives.
September Releases: Agent Boo 1 !+Anima 2 (The + is part of the title and as per my note doesn't mean anything) !*Ark Angels 2 !Atomic King Daidogan (From Rising Stars of Manga) Battle Vixens 9 Beck: Mongolian Chop Squad 5 Blade of Heaven 8 !Blazin' Barrels 6 Bus Gamers !Chronicles of the Cursed Sword 16 Confidential Confessions -DEAI- 2 !Dazzle 3 Dears: The Official Fan Book Death Jam 2 !D.N.Angel 11 !Dragon Hunter 15 !Faeries Landing 14 Girls Bravo 6 Grosse Adventures: The Good, The Bad & The Gassy 1 Hands Off 7 Heaven Above Heaven 6 !Hyper Police 7 Innocent W Kamen Tantei Laya:The Witch of Red Pooh Mitsukazu Mihara's RIP: Requiem in Phonybrian Mobile Suit Gundam: Ecole Du Ciel 4 Open Season: Cine-manga Peach Fuzz 2 Rave Master 21 !Rozen Maiden 2 !Saiyuki Reload 5 Seikai- Crest of the Stars: Queen of the Empire Shrine of the Morning Mist 2 Star Trek: Shinsei Shinsei 1 Suikoden III 10 Sukuyomi: Moon Phase 4 Vampire Doll !*Vampire Game 15 My Little Pony 4 (I dunno where this came from) Greatest Stars of the NBA: Dynamic Duos 7 (7? you mean they sold 6 others) Greatest Stars of the NBA: All-Time Dunks! 8 (AND they expect to sell an 8th too?) Your Eyes Only - Chobits Art Book
For September there are a bunch of good manga series that I have enjoyed in the past, but nothing I'm going to go wait in line for 3 days before the release. (Yeah so it'd be a one person line, so what) I do however HAVE to look at how bad the Star Trek manga is. Apparently the manga publishers didn't learn from Spawn the manga, which was terrible. People read manga because it is different from what you can find in America. Turning hokey old American TV shows into manga is not going to impress us, and is likely to make us ridicule the entire market, such as I am now-> Idiots what in the hell are you thinking. To anyone who is looking forward to reading this manga I apologize, you are mentally disturbed enough without me ruffling your feathers.
Other titles I know I'm gonna check out are Bus Gamers, Innocent W, Kamen Tantei, RIP and Vampire Doll.
Bus Gamers is by the creator of Saiyuki. It is about three guys Toki, Nobuto and Kazuo who all play the Biz Game. The Biz Game plays with company secrets and massive wealth at stake. Soon the guys realize that what they are really playing for is their very lives.
Innocent W is by the creator of Sengoku Nights (which I recommend.) The description reads like a horror movie. Someone has assembled a group of high school girls--rumored to be witches--and dropped them off in the woods. Among them is Makoto, a male 'witch' who has mysterious powers. The plot centers around people who have a grudge against the witches and who try to kill them in the woods. The story also focuses on the witches who are struggling to survive. Similar to 'Battle Royale' with characters violently dying one by one.
Kamen Tantei is by the Petshop of Horrors creator. This one is about a pair of young aspiring mystery writers who have weird incidents happen around them that need solving. Luckily for them, the Masked Detective inexplicably always shows up to help. The focus of the story is light-hearted comedy and not about solving the crimes but rather poking fun at the process. This series doesn't take itself seriously like Kindaiichi.
RIP - Transylvania Rose is a bored angel who descends to Earth to clean a few souls. When she witnesses a depressed undertaker slitting his wrists, Rose rips off one of her wings and gives it to the undertaker, trapping them both somewhere between heaven and hell - life and death.
Vampire Doll - Guilt-Na-Zan is a vampire aristocrat who was sealed into a cross by Kyouji's ancestor more than 100 years ago. Now Kyouji has revived him--although he was resurrected as a doll and can only transform into his real figure when he sucks blood from Kyouji's sister Tonae... But when you combine Goth clothes and hot vampires, slowly but surely everyone will start to feel like one big family!
All in all nothing super exciting is coming out this September, but if I have time I'm gonna go see what these new manga series' are all about.
Note: The Manga Magazine cover and Bus Gamers cover are not the right images. They are a previous cover image of the magazine and an image that popped up when I searched for Bus Gamers pics.
Talking trash to your opponent has always been a part of playing games. I have often told Pandalicious that she was about to receive an ass whoopin' beyond compare. We would be condescending to each other, impugn each others skills [or lack there of] and even egg each other on in hopes of flustering the other and making them lose. I would even go so far as to make extra music-type noises during an Amplitude match in hopes of throwing off her rhythm. Many of our epic bouts ended with one of us calling the other a cheating bitch, or dumbass, or making some "yo mama" crack that would make the other say, "she's your mother too..." and we'd laugh our asses off.
But are sisters; being related we can get away with saying things like that knowing what is in jest and what is not. We know the boundaries, and that it's all in good fun. Neither of us really thinks the other is a bitch or that the other should in reality suck on monkey testes; it's just a little harmless trash talking. But when does talking trash become something more negative and mean spirited? When do you cross the line and go from "harmless fun" to harassment or verbal abuse?
I ask the question because the more and more that I play games online the more I find myself caught in conversation that quickly goes from lighthearted trash talk to the kind of comments that people come to blows with other over. Take one of my last gaming sessions on DOA4. It was about two weeks ago and I was having a pretty decent winning streak for me. I'm still learning how to string combos together in the game, but this evening I was putting things together rather well and was about 1200 pts away from getting my rank up to a B-. [Which for my straight D having ass would have been huge.] I got an invite to play some people in another room and took it and while most of the gamers in this room were cool there was one gamer who seemed to just have it out for me. Every time we would have to fight each other he would proceed to call me a whore, a dirty bitch, a dumb skank, a motherless whore, and [my personal favorite] a weak assed c*nt. [Sorry, I hate that word so much that I can't even type it] I, in turn called the player a "junior high school reject who probably only used such large words because they were the only ones he could spell properly and write in cursive."
After making my quick little quip, the other gamers in the room laughed and began coming to my defense against the player; some even threatened to report him if he didn't stop his rowdy behavior. For their efforts, they got treated to the same string of filthy fucking language as I did. And this made me ask myself, "am I just overreacting? Is this guy just talking trash and I'm just too sensitive?" Had the almost gleeful "bitches" and "you suck" jibes that my sister and I enjoyed trading back and forth been replaced by whores and that other word? For a moment I really questioned if I had been wrong. The moment passed and I came to my senses.
Girl or guy, there is no situation where anyone has the right to refer to any player as a whore, or that nasty "C" word and it be ok or be considered "cool" period. When you have a familiarity with the gamers you are playing you know where the line is on what is just joking around and what is harmful or mean spirited fightin' words. Telling someone that you are about to kick their ass or that you are about to spank them I don't think is bad. Goading each other adds to the fun of being competitive. What I do think is wrong is how many gamers seem to go from trash talking to being crude because they can. There are no real consequences for players that exhibit crude behavior, so there is no reason for people not to be jackasses.
While this by itself normally would be reason enough for me to stop playing online altogether, I'm holding out hope that these experiences will become fewer and farther between. For each negative or bad experience that I've had so far, I have had 5 times as many more positive experiences and met gamers that I am proud to call friends. They help me have faith in that I am not alone in wanting a fun and fulfilling gaming experience that doesn't require me having to sit through a dirty dozens match.
Just because I can whoop your ass at DOA4 doesn't make me shit...it makes me DA SHIT. Deal with it.
Hey hey, guess what? It's site update time again here at ESH.
And we have updated our image gallery again with the help of one of our FRESH peeps from myspace. TVN was at the Ani-Jam convention over in California and got some great photos of some cosplayers that he was sweet enough to share with us. So pop over to the gallery and take a gander at the images.
Don't forget that if you have any images you'd like to share with us you can email them to us here at ESH. We'd love to feature your pretty mug on our site. Show us how FRESH you are!
Ok, sometimes I'm out of the loop. I admit it. I am now in the loop, and you will be too.
I had not heard about this game until the demo disc, but it wasn't until I saw who the voice actors were for the game that sold me on it. What game am I talking about? Yakuza for the PS2.
The game features the voice talents of Michael Madsen, Mark Hamill [Yes, Luke Skywalker himself], Eliza Dusku, and Rachel Leigh Cook. What the fuck more do you need to know? Alight, I'll sweeten the pot, add the hot ass dude that plays Lex Luthor on Smallville, Michael Rosenbaum. I'm ready to sign on the dotted line baby.
*SIDE NOTE* Michael Rosenbaum, I would be the henchwoman to your Lex ANY DAY...call me!
Watch this video, then mark your calendars for the 5th of September.
Don't say I never did anything for ya, because that would be a lie.
Is that a shuriken in your pocket, or are you just happy to see me?
I'm sitting here getting ready to try out the Lego Star Wars 2 demo and I have a thought: "where have all the cheat codes gone?"
I know that sounds like a very odd thing to have pop in your head as you are about to plop in a demo disc but I can't help it. Where have all the cheat codes gone?
Before you get all huffy with me and say, "NinJa, you've got GameShark, CodeBreaker, all kinds of cheat enabling devices..." I'm not talking about that. I have a CodeBreaker disc, and have put in all those hex based codes to get unlimited ammo in a game here and there, but those aren't what I miss. For the most part I hate using devices like the GameShark and CodeBreaker, but not for the reasons you think.
I take no issue with cheating. Like I said earlier, I've cheated before. I like cheating, infinite double jump makes the Hades level of God of War muuuuuuch easier to deal with, believe me. But what I miss, or say I missing are the days of actual cheat codes. Remember turning on a game, getting to the start menu and pushing left, left, right, right, down, right, down, hearing a confirmation noise and starting 5 levels up in the game? Or have 5 extra guys? Where are those kinds of cheat codes?
I miss the days where you didn't need a flash drive to download saved games off the internet, or spend money on a subscription to a website in order to get codes. Why has cheating become such a marketable market?. I think that by requiring a gamer to buy hardware and software to get extra lives or make headway in a game is unfair.
You used to have a buddy in class that would slide you a note for something you should try in your game when you go home and it was exciting. Now, there is no excitement, you just plug in your cheat device, pick a cheat, and if the game loads off you go. No sharing with a friend, no new exciting thing to see, just a code exploit that takes the difficulty out of the game.
But like I said, it was just a thought. Now off to try out this Lego demo.
Is that a shuriken in your pocket, or are you just happy to see me?
Ok, I heard about this but hoped it was a filthy lie...it was not.
So Warner Brothers [yes I'm talking to you] you had better not fuck up this Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles movie or so help me master Roshi I'll send you nasty letters and fart in your general direction.
Or at least, they let us regular folk know how much some of those fancy new peripherals they mentioned at E3 are going to cost us and when we can get our grubby lil hands on them.
Microsoft announced some prices and shipping dates for their new XB360 peripherals at the Games Convention in Leipzig, Germany. Among the announcements were the wireless racing wheel dropping in November at a $149 price point bundled with a force feedback version of Project Gotham Racing 3 [NICE], and the new wireless headset also making it's debut in November for $59.
No word on when and how-o mu-cho the HD DVD drive is going to set you back yet, so you still have time to rearrange your entertainment center to make room for it. Until then, check out this article over at Engadget, they even have pictures.
I like pictures.
Is that a shuriken in your pocket, or are you just happy to see me?
Meet me on the web, it's going doooooowwwwwwwnnnn. Anywhere you meet me guaranteed be going dooooowwwwwwnnnn.
Sorry, I have that damn Young Joc song stuck in my head because it was on one of my myspace friends profiles.
Okie dokie, I'm reading through digg and saw a link to this article about Nintendo sending out invitations to the media for a doin's they're a-doin' on September 14th. Now no specifics were addressed in the invitation other than Nintendo of America president Reggie Fils-Aime was going to be sharing the Nintendo lineup with those fortunate attendees.
Ah to be a fly on that wall. Why? Because most people believe that this is going to be the event at which Nintendo announces the Wii release date, unit price, game price, official launch title list...you know, all the goodies we've been hypothesizing about since E3.
Just thought I'd share the bubbling up Wii-joicing I'm feeling inside.
Join me in the fun, it's going dooooowwwwwwnnnnnn Buy me a new Wii, it's going dooooowwwwwwnnnnnn...
Damn, sorry about that.
Is that a shuriken in your pocket, or are you just glad to see me?
You read the headline, the Skypecast is going off this Friday Aug 25. You know you want to be part of the party.
If you have a mic, headphones, and Skype, then pop in on our Skypecast on Friday 25 AUG at 5pm EDT and get in on the podcast show.
Feel free to hit up our Skypecast info page to find out all the info you need to get in on the show. Just click here to find out all you need to know to be in the know. Ya know?
Is that a shuriken in your pocket, or are you just happy to see me?
My eyes do not deceive you, er, me I mean. Well they don't deceive you either, they making a live action DOA movie. And holy flying dragon kick does it look awful!
If you are one of the few gamers out there who is not familiar with the DOA series allow me to break it down for you. DOA is a fighting game that prominently features well endowed scantly clad female characters. There are male characters in the game but believe me when I say, you will hardly notice them. While the fighting mechanics of the game are very solid [not Virtua Fighter good though] if you are into fighters, DOA doesn't suck. Just be prepared for girls in cat-girl outfits and more cleavage than you can shake yer stick at. Did I mention that if you up your age in the settings odd physics get applied to the ladies jubbly wobblies? Moving on.
I enjoy playing DOA. If I ignore the boob and ultimately fan-service designed female costumes it's a fun fighter; kicking ass with my ninja chick is the bomb. :) But DOA never struck me a fodder for a movie...let alone a live action one. Over the years the "plot" if you want to call it that, has been very loosely wrapped around "project Epsilon" and the game characters of Helena and Ein. The first couple of games had to do with Ein figuring out who or what he was. When that panned out, the plot then went to Kasumi [one of the female ninjas in the game] becoming the focus of project Epsilon. All that I can gather is that the project had something to do with building an invulnerable invincible warrior.
How on earth Kasumi being on the run from her ninja clan, the opera start Helena somehow being in control of the company running project Epsilon, and Zack a black man with a green mini-mohawk [and passion for dressing up as a silver teletubbie] somehow came across as the perfect cast for a movie is totally beyond my whacked out imagination. If anything I could understand an anime movie of the series since there are a bunch of ninjas in the game and the Street Figther franchise did one...but they also were responsible for that awful Street Fighter live action movie with Jean Claude van Dame as Guile. So I guess I can't use it as a good example of what to do.
My point is, there was no real tangible storyline behind the DOA games to start. Tecmo did a beach volley ball version of the game that just had the girls in bikini's posing for you, and are getting ready to release the second DOA beach themed game shortly. I guess this game being optioned for a movie just proves beyond a shadow of a doubt that sex does indeed sell as the movie [from what I've seen of the trailer] struggles to find a reason for the female characters to interact with each other. While there are no weapons in the DOA franchise [and never have been] all the girls tote katanas in the movie posters, and in the first fight that you see in the trailer. This provides "WTF?!" moment number 1, followed by Christie being given the title of "Master Thief." Anyone that has played the game will be quick that senorita pokes a lot is an assassin, cold, and bad assed. Not a perky looking thief. And not for nothing, but to make a live action movie based on a game whose claim to fame is it's busty lusty lady fighters but cast members of the itty-bitty-titty-committee sure makes less than no sense to me. Yes I'm female, I'm not gay, and I said casting the titty-less crew was a mistake.
Don't get me wrong, I love Jaime Pressly [she plays Tina], but the character of Tina has always been depicted as a big bodied gal with the bodacious ta-tas. Jaime if you see this, girl I loves you like a fat kid loves cake, but you ain't no Tina. You are funny as shit on My Name Is Earl though. Keep that up girl, and stay away from projects like this. If you want to get into action films, try to get in on that next X-Men movie that is rumored to be on the table is possibly maybe happening. Shoot for the leader of the Morlocks position. But back to the topic at hand.
You don't have to believe me when I say that this thing is going to blow. They say a picture is worth a thousand words, so watch the video below now. Just be warned, the audio is dubbed in German and it's in flash format. It ain't my fault.
Is that a shuriken in your pocket, or are you just happy to see me?
Hello All, I apologize for the tardiness. I needed to regain a little bit of real life, and I've come to realize that my life is a giant anime!
I think I'm stuck in an anime-esque world but no one else knows it. Check this: Anime has influenced my life so much that I have adapted some habits that you will commonly see many different anime series, just like these...
-After meeting some of your significant other's friends you quietly bow. -Folding your hands in front of you while walking. -Sometimes walking a few steps behind your significant other. -Putting one of your hands behind your head while you laugh really loud when feeling really stupid -Cowering your head and imagining a giant "sweat drop" falling down the side of your face. - When trying to be "shy" about something suggestive taking your two pointer fingers and tapping them together. -When thinking about something really naughty and your friends have to tell you to wipe the drool from the side of your mouth and that really dopey grin off your face.
Maybe some of you do this stuff too. Some of you might do other things. If that is the case, feel free to share them with us here...hey if you happen to have photos of you doing these things, feel free to send them to us. Maybe we'll make a new gallery section depicting them.
But that is all Pandalicious has for you today! Show me some love ~^
I have been following the first expansion for World of Warcraft very closely since they first announced that there would be one. they have had a lot of information coming out in bits and pieces all over the interweb, so I figured I would make a little summary of everything that is to come and such.
The first thing that they introduced was to new races. the Alliance got weird blue squidish people and the Horde got the bad ass Blood Elves (No bias here! :) ). Each of these races have a massive city that Blizzard predicts will become the new hot spot of each sides. A good way to get a grasp on the size of these cities is to think that each city will have mutliple banks and auction houses. The Blood Elves will be bringing paladins over to the Horde side and the Drenai will be getting shamans.
The addition of the area of Outland is another new thing to be added. Outland is a third of the size of the existing map and will have all sorts of new things. they have releazed 3 instances in Outland so far, one full of demon orcses, one full of Naga, and one that they haven't really revealed much about. The last will be the main instance of Outland and it will require flying mounts to get too. Each of these will have multiple wings for people to go through as well as the ability to set the difficulty level of the wings. Blizzard has also announced that they will no longer be focusing on 40 man instances and the new number of choice will be 25. Blizzard will also be opening up the huge tower in Deadwind pass called Karazhan. It will be a multiple story 6 man instance of pain.
PvP will also be getting a HUGE overhaul. The present honor system will be completely removed, though you can keep any gear you have acquired thus far. Instead you will earn points that you can spend on sick gear and stuff like that. Outland will also have certain areas where you will compete to control a city and things like that. They will also be introducing arena combat. You can compete 2 versus 2 on up to 5 on 5. You can fight Horde on Horde or whatever for this one. Every 3 months the tier system will be reset and whoever is in the first few places will get leet gear.
There are a lot of people who are quite pessimistic about this new venture for Blizzard. I am thrilled about all of these new additions. I really like the idea of not having to join some hardcore raiding guild just to get some gear, and the new pvp system will be sweet as the most sultry sin. And I can't wait to start flying around!
If ya have any more detailed questions about the upcoming expansion, send an e-mail my way. :)
You know, as a rule, I try to turn a deaf ear to the fanboy rumor mill...but occasionally something so interesting pops up in fanboy conversation that I can not turn away.
It is one of many guilty pleasures that I have.
So when I came across this article at NextGen I just couldn't tear myself away.
What I am about to type is the speculation of an investment firm, so let that bit of information bounce around in your pretty little head for a minute before I proceed.
Ready? Analyst Soichiro Fukuda of NikkoCitiGroup has speculated that "healthy sales" of Xbox 360 titles might just may be the motivational poke in the ass Capcom needs to take currently PS3 exclusive titles and make them multi-platform titles. And what game title is among those that Capcom has announced as PS3 exclusive that I would fucking LOVE to play on the XB360? Yeap, Devil May Cry 4. It and Monster Hunter were mentioned by name in the article.
Again, this whole piece is and investment firm analyst guys' speculation...but it's a hell of an idea to put out there into the ether. We know that Capcom had been doing a great deal of restructuring lately, and with the success of Dead Rising, may want to open their flagship games up to a broader audience than the PS3 may initially be able to provide. At this stage in the game the XB360 has a fairly healthy installed based in the US that is just dying for a franchise like DMC on the system, and I'm fairly sure that God Hand and Okami would fucking ROCK on the XB360. But there I go again counting my eggs before they hatch a bunch of dragons.
You read the article and make of it what you will. Just make sure to share with the class.
Is that a shuriken in your pocket, or are you just happy to see me.
I DEFY you to watch this video and say that video games are bad for kids.
I got an email from our friend Douceswild and proceeded to watch the clip with my jaw affixed to the floor. Here's the setup:
Take 1 recently turned 5 kindertot add a Dance Dance Revolution Pad and game, sprinkle lightly with videocam coverage, et voila: proof that video games are good for kids.
Why do I say this clip proves games are good for kids? Well I'll put it like this: When I was 5 yrs old, I did not possess HALF of the coordination that this kid has obviously has. I barely had a solid grasp of right and left and the alphabet. The last thing I was doing was playing a video game that required I stay in time with music and repeat complex step moves on an input pad. I'm 27 now and can't pull off a high scoring DDR routine, let alone perform one FLAWLESSLY.
Can you say increased motor skills? If you can't say it, watch the clip. You'll see it.
Go ahead Mr. Thompson, try and argue this with me. I need a good laugh today.
Is that a shuriken in your pocket, or are you just happy to see me?
Pandalicious here, and I've got a quick question [yeah that's right, Panda's up in here with a quick question] for you.
Here goes: What kinda anime character would you want to be?
A character [guy or girl] who has a harem of either the opposite or same sex?
A Wholesome guy or girl who is striving for a dream?
or..
A brooding depressed lost soul who is really REALLY SEXY?
In RL I am a wholesome woman who is striving for a dream, so I think I'd want to be the brooding depressed hottie. You know, the one who has to go to therapy and is EXTREMELY SEXY...like Ritsuka from Loveless...
Well Let the comments come flooding in.
If you don't see a character type that you'd want to be, make up your own and share with the group!
Coud Van Giruet is a rookie sky pirate. After a raid he is checking out the loot and he comes across a girl packed away in a box. The girl is Reveric Metherlence, Ren for short. Ren has a green gem on her forhead called an erementar gerad that indicates that she is an Edil Raid. Edil Raids make contracts with humans and are capable of reacting with a their human partner, called a preja and transforming into a weapon. But Ren isn't just any Edil Raid she is a part of the Metherlence family and is extremely powerful, she is called the Seventh Scintillating Treasure Tree and everyone is after her.
Soon after Coud discovers Ren, mysterious ninjas and members of Arcaile show up to try and take her. Arcaile calls itself the Edil Raid Perfect Protection Organization and they collect Edil Raids in a so called perfect town where they can live peacefully without human interferance. Unfortunately they take a heavy handed approach and dislike it when Edil Raids do not wish to come with them. They often resort to kidnapping and forcing Edil Raids to come with them. In order to avoid being taken away Ren is forced to create a contract with Coud.
The voice of a mysterious girl calls to Ren in her dreams, pleading for her to come to the Edil Garden. Coud promises to help Ren find the Edil Garden, and promises to protect her until then. Of course they slowly start to fall in love, but they are both very socially awkward and find it hard to express their feelings to each other. Because their mission was to retreive Ren, the three Arcaile members Cisqua, Kuea and Rowen decide to tag along. Kuea is also an Edil Raid and her preja is Rowen, Cisqua is a gun toting maniac character. On their way to the Edil Garden they encounter humans and edil raids in all sorts of relationships, edil raid hunters, illegal fighting arenas and many many people who treat edil raids as nothing more than items or weapons.
There are also man-made edil raids called steam raids. Through a dangerous life threatening procedure humans are implanted with an erementar gerad. There is also a society called Chaos Choir that wants to use Ren to rule the world. They are determined to kill Coud, because as Ren's preyja he stands in the way of their plans for her. An edil raid can only react with one preyja at a time, so killing Coud is the only possible way for a member of Chaos Choir to become her preyja. There are some very pretty songs in the series, in order to react with their preyjas each edil raid has a song they sing to transform. Also every special attack has a song that charges it up (or whatever). This series is full of funny, exciting and occasionally tragic adventures as they quest for Edil Garden. (Note: I've also seen it spelled Erementar Gelad, Eden Raids and the Garden of Eden. Apparently Fansubs aren't perfect, oh noes my world is falling apart)
This is a typical shoujo anime, the characters are archtypes, the storyline is predictable and the transformations scenes are stock footage, but Erementar Gerad does have some aspects that help it stand out. I liked this anime because neither Coud nor Ren is the goofy head over heels in love type, they are both more of a quiet blushing type and it's really cute to watch. The songs the edil raids and their preyja's sing are beautiful, even if some of them are sung in terrible english. Also Cisqua faces emotional turmoil throughout the series as her belief in the ideals that founded Arcaile conflict with the mercinary methods that Arcaile employs.
I had to include these two last pictures. The one on the left is a edil raid bounty hunter, Worx, and yes his edil raid transforms into a giant squeeky hammer looking thing. The only redeeming factor to this ridiculous weapon is that each of the six sections can break off and work as a missile or form up together to make a shield. The picture on the right really happened in the series, sort of. Ren fell asleep in the middle of nowhere and when Coud woke her up she made this hilarious face and said "I was thinking and I fell asleep." It is her only real airhead moment and it was great.
I've got everything down to a science, unfortunately I was never any good at science.
Really, they are. Video games are an interactive media format and lets face it: we live in a digital interactive media world! Most interesting to me are the games that are created for education.
I'm not talking about the early child development games [i.e. Dora the Explorer Does Dallas...I mean Math] though they do have some very interesting educational points that I think a lot of parents miss. I'm talking specifically about games being developed for higher learning establishments like college. Douceswild sent me a link to a story that I hadn't picked up on and it touched me in a way that made me have to write about it.
The UNCD division of Continual Learning in North Carolina made an announcement the other day about a new video game they developed for college credit that will launch this fall. The game is called ECON 201, and it is supposed to help teach the principles of microeconomics. In the game, you follow around an alien species that has to learn how to survive after being marooned on a post-apocalyptic earth. I can't believe I'm about to type this, but that sounds interesting. [I don't know about you but the one ECON course I went to BORED the SHIT out of me...I think I fell asleep during the class more than a few times.]
Dr. Robert Brown, Dean of the UNCGDCL said that "...regardless of how skilled the instructor, it an be a challenge to teach complex concepts in a traditional classroom using standard lecture techniques..." and "...that's certainly true of economics, which is a highly theoretical subject. Online gaming techniques can bring that theory to life." From the article I read [which you can find following this link] the game was designed to present students with some of the principles of economics like sustainable growth and scarcity.
Now I won't post the article verbatim because if you want to read all of the specifics you should follow the link above to the document, but what I do want to say is this: It's about damn time. We all know that any form of media that requires interactivity will [most likely] work both parts of your brain. Studies have been done that show we retain more new data when both sides of our brain are working. Think of those times when you get TV commercials jingles stuck in your head and can't get them out, but with USEFUL data.
What I don't understand is why it's taken so long for schools to adopt this kind of thinking into their own educational courses. I'm going to guess that about 90% of students in k-12 grades have played a video game of some sort, have used a portable gaming system and or cellular phone. These forms of interactive media have been ingrained into their lifestyle, why not make it part of their educational lives? Why not use a Civilization game to help draw a clearer picture of the importance of the Roman Empire? Or the greatness of Mesopotamia? Have them use Rosetta Stone software in their language class to help aid in their conversational [insert foreign language of choice here] over the course of the year. The implementations are endless if you have a little vision.
Using a video game format can keep students engage with the materials being presented to them. In an age where it's so easy to tune out and turn on ones' private little universe, wouldn't it be a great thing adopt this technology into our education programs and raise our average national testing scores?
Just my 2¢
Is that a shuriken in your pocket, or are you just happy to see me?
Well you should damnit! The ESH crew has been hard a work building you a great merch merch store. It's full of t-shirt, hoodies, polos, buttons, and sticker goodness.
We call it FRESHware and hope you buy like a whole bunch of it!
Why FRESH? Because we are on the verge of starting a movement. [No, it does not directly involve the bowels] As you know FRESH stands for FRiends of Electric Sista Hood; because all of you fantastic readers, subscribers, and listeners are our friends...and our friends kick ass!
We figured we would call the line of merch merch we created for you after you, hence the all new [and mighty shiny] ESH FRESHware store. You may be asking yourself, "self? Why the 'ware', shouldn't it be 'wear'?" Aren't we picky? One might make a case for "wear" versus "ware" but seeing as how we are geeks, and we are talking about softWARE half of the time [video games is software if you didn't know] we thought it would be clever. If you don't think so, that's fine...go suck a duck
But as a member of the gaming community I do, and I plan on raising all holy hell about it...you should too!
More news on the "War on Video Games" front children...so grab your favorite blankie and binky [pacifier] because I have to talk to you likes little babies to tell you all about this or THEY might come and take me a-way.
Screw it, let them come! As a rule I stay away from reading things on about.com. [I find their site layout gives my eyes the heebie geebies.] But then I came across this article through my favorite website [digg.com] and just had to read it all the way though to the end. Why? Mostly because the article depicts the growing problem that the gaming community has with politicians: the gross misconceptions about violence in games being presented as evidence to the need for change in the industry.
I won't ruin it for you, but the article is based on the study done by Dr. Kimberly Thompson to gauge the effectiveness of the ESRB rating system. Dr. Thomson tested a bunch of games that got "E" ratings [Including greats like Galaga, Ms.Pac Man, etc.,] and oddly enough found a WHOLE lot more violence in these games than the ESRB did. According to Dr.Thompsons study, Galaga is 100% violent and by no means warranted an "E" rating from the ESRB. [Centipede came in with a staggering 92% violence rating]
Now this article proceeds to tear Dr.Thompsons study a new asshole as it points out all the flaws in the setup of the game trials; what actually constitutes violence, what Dr. Thompsons definition of death is; [personally if the enemy respawns, it didn't die, but that's just me] and that the study only evaluates games over a 90 minute play period. This last one interests me the most because using that as a game I can load up a game like Tomb Raider Legend and run through Croft Mannor for an hour and a half and get that game a rating of 0% violence. See how the hypocrisy starts?
In all of this the scary thing is that Dr.Thompson presented this study [done in 2001 btw] as scientific fact as she testified before the U.S. Senate on the effectiveness of the ESRB rating system in July of THIS YEAR. People this is just stupidity for stupidities sake. We need to do something, and we need to do it soon...else you will find yourself having to go through a psych evaluation every time you want to buy a video game above the "Suitable for Certified Sane Persons" rating the government will impose on games.
The War on Video Games has started people, are you going to sit idle or get up and do something about it.
We know what side Jack Thompson is on, which side are you?
Is that a shuriken in your pocket, or are you just happy to see me?
I was never a very big fan of the vibration function of the ps2 controller. It really kinda bugged me more then made me think it was cool. Especially when you set it on the table and the damn thing would start buzzing all over the place and then cause something to break. But it slowly began to grow on me for one reason and one reason alone.
I discovered the joy of playing a vibration happy game in my boxers with the controller sitting on my lap. I became addicted. I would place the limitless health cheat on in GTA and shoot some gangsta. The joy of having the controller rumble again and again until I was suddenly very tired and had the urge to sneeze was undescribable. I would spend ours in my room with clothes propped up against the door and training mode on DOA running.
This is why it saddens me so much to see that they are taking away my rumble function in the next system. Taking this function away removes the best play value of the playstation systems. I am so very disappointed in Sony for this poor poor call. Now if you excuse me, I am going to go play Magna Cum Laude for a few hours.
...Who am I kidding? It's only gonna take like 5 minutes....
I try to keep that crazy heffa in the back of my head under wraps, but Reggie Fils-Aime just keeps making it increasingly difficult.
Here I am, on the verge of picking up my copy of N3, when I see the news that the online gaming component [at least in part if not completely] of the Nintendo Wii will be completely free of subscription fees. Yes you are reading that correctly...FREE... F to tha R to tha double E free!
...when asked whether Nintendo endorsed the idea of buying a Xbox 360 and Wii for the same price as a PlayStation 3 - a concept popularly referred to as "Wii60" on the Internet and at least tacitly endorsed by Microsoft executive Peter Moore - Fils-Aime was less enthusiastic. "I'd much rather have the consumer buy a Wii, some accessories and a ton of games versus buying any of my competitor's products,"
from Gamasutra.com
You can read the whole article here, but basically it's just more good press for Nintendo, and another good reason to pre-order yourself a Wii ASAP!
Is that a shuriken in your pocket, or are you just happy to see me?
Last night I was watching Robocop 3 and for the first time it struck me how much it was a commentary on the American/Japanese technological gap.
There are two scenes in the movie where Robocop faces off against his Japanese counterpart. Robocop/Officer Murphy as played by Robert John Burke battles Otomo, a Japanese samurai robot played by Bruce Locke. These scenes show very clearly the differences in Japanese and American made technology.
Otomo appears to be a normal human and moves with a lithe grace. Robocop is a bulky metal man who moves incredibly slowly with herky-jerky motion. Japanese technology is small and sleek, it's all about finesse. American technology is bulky and slow and relies entirely on it's power. After Robocop destoryes Otomo, two more duplicate Otomo robots show up, reminding us all that the Japanese are masters of mass production.
I've got everything down to a science, unfortunately I was never any good with science.
I like angels, carnage and incest...in anime at least Hello All Pandalicious here bringing you yet again some anime that Im sure many have come across but may have never actually watched...
Now who here doesnt like angel? I mean come on seriously, they are usually very hot [yes I have never in my life seen an ugly ass angel.] And they generally do Gods will....[I am excluding the angels in Dogma- because even angels do misbehave] Thus to the point I want to address.
The anime in question...Angel Sanctuary. Many who have watched this [like myself] were distressed by the immediate and unwarrented ending of this three episode movie. I will get to that in a moment but first for the few who have never wanted or owned this , I shall bring forth a summary.
So...God is supposedly the ultimate force, and the Devil is the antagonist who has to go and ruin everything. But ...and I do mean but what if they had an alliance? And what if God switched the game and went and undermined the Devil? Well that question is the main focus within this movie.
God went and sent droves of angels into the hell region and slaughted many lowly demons. Which off set the balance between the two. On the Heavenly aspect of things there were two divine creatures, angel one of the inorganic and the other of organic. A brother and sister. Organic Angel Alexiel and Inorganic Angel Rosiel. A seal had been placed of Rosiel, and his resurrection starts off the show. And what became of Alexiel? Well She went against God and was then cast away to the human world to live as a human..to slumber within a young man. That young mans name is Setsuna.
If life wasnt hard enough for this fellow, he has urges of an unatural persuasion. He is in love with a very special girl. One so close to him, it would send normal people fleeing. He is in love with his younger sister Sara. [Yes ladies and gentlemen there is incest afoot ] Now with Rosiel back to his old tricks, Setsuna is slowly regaining his holy abilities. Demons and what not begin appearing all around him. He now must continue the overthrow that Alexiel started. The world is in the hands of a incest filled youth. Will he lead the world to salvation? Or to eternal damnation. Guess youll have to watch it and find out because Im not going to tell you.
On the WTFPS [Wow Thats Fucked Up Scale] I give it a 9 out of 10. Angelic battles [hell yea] Coming to terms with wanted to fuck your sister..[wow thats fucked up ] , Having crossdressing devils aiding you...[even more fucked up]
I actually came across this anime by complete accident and also by the divine sense of my mother, who saw that it was drawn pretty and assumed Id like it. Once again she chose right [Good job Mom ]
This is a short series released by U.S Manga corps and yes its odd because its an anime. It is also in circulation in manga form and can be found in the graphic novel section [Never really understood that...always thought that was where the porn would be..But thats another post.]
Id say...honestly that this is one the movies that should be in your anime collection. For more insight into the story line, pick up the manga. I havent had the chance[ and by chance I mean finances ^^] to pick it up. However, as with most mangas , things that dont make sense in the series will make sense there.
We got a message from one of our peeps and thought we'd share it with the rest of you.
Good news should always travel fast. I haven't seen the anime [or even heard of] series Douceswild suggested, so if you have it or have seen it, let us know. I'm curious to find out if it's as good as he thinks it is. :D
It was bound to happen. No, it was time for it to happen. No, that's not right...let me try one more time.
In a time where voices of individuality were being muffled by politics, one dude [along with 3 other chicks and another dude] began a quest to become a voice for their people... They were... ESH: The Crew
Ok, all silliness aside, we'd like you wonderful FRESHpeeps out there to give a warm and hearty welcome to the newest member of the ESH Crew: Monkey Doo!
Monkey Doo has been a friend to ESH for a long time [before we were even organized] so we couldn't be happier to have him aboard. Look for stuff from Monkey Doo dropping any day now. [hehe, I said Monkey Doo dropping...]
Is that a shuriken in your pocket, or are you just happy to see me?
Guess what? We have a new image in our Candy Bitches Gallery!
We finally got some extra love from our FIRST t-shirt winner Tooky as she sent us this photo of her wearing the kick ass Pandalicious shirt she won. YAAAY! You can see the shirt here, if you want to win the shirt [or a NinJaSistah, Evermore, or MagicMysticGrl version of it] you got to keep entering our weekly sweepstakes EVERY WEEK!
It's not hard people. Besides, you know you want one!
Is that a shuriken in your pocket or are you just happy to see me?
We have updated our glossary of terms once again, so you should check it out. We needed more gamer terms, so up went a few. Don't worry though, we are working on adding more. As always, suggestions and submissions are welcomed and should be sent to us via our form.
Is that a shuriken in your pocket, or are you just happy to see me?
Sorry I haven't posted in a while everybody, it's been crazy at my place. So in order to prove that I have not in fact fallen off the face of the earth I propose another quick question to you. We've been going heavy on the anime/manga questions so this one is for the gamers out there, the ones who play RPGs anyways. A while ago I was playing Neverwinter Nights and I came across this situation, I'm curious how you all would have played it.
Alright here's the set up. You are deep in a dungeon with limited healing supplies, no allies and the last time you saved was quite a while ago. You happen across a sub-boss in an unexpected place and have to fight him and his cronies all by yourself. There are 10 enemies, 3 of them are strong and are causing the majority of the damage to you, but there are 7 weak enemies who are also draining your hitpoints. The conundrum- It will take you longer to kill the 3 "Elite" thugs than the 7 weaklings, so do you take the time to kill the 3 and hope that you can heal all the damage that the other 7 cause, or do you go for the weak ones first to thin their numbers.
I've got everything down to a science, unfortunately I was never any good at science.
Guess what? We've updated the glossary again, so you should take a look.
A user submitted some terms, and some suggestions on organization and well, we took them to heart. So check out the glossary page and see what's new. You might even want to suggest some terms of you own...we are kinda lagging in the gamer terms department right now.
Also, we are starting to get submissions for an AMV gallery and we're damned excited about it! So if you would like to be featured in the FRESHvids gallery, send your AMV submissions to FRESH@electricsistahood.com. Here are some rules:
All submissions must be mailed to FRESH@electricsistahood.com. You may include links to your work so we can see it, but we must be able to download it in order to post it to our server.
All submissions must be in either windows media or quicktime format. I don't want to have to deal with real media player if at all possible.
Submissions may be accompanied by an image that you would like to used as the display image for the link in the gallery...otherwise I'll just grab a still image from the video you send and use it as the display image. [So if you have an "A PixelJerks Production" name and image that goes along with your AMV production, you can send it along in the email].
Don't forget, anyone that makes a submission that we post gets 4 weeks of sweepstakes entries. That's one entry per week people!
Is that a shuriken in your pocket, or are you just happy to see me?
The cast goes off tomorrow [Fri Aug 11th] at 5pm EST.
You need Skype, a mic, headphones, and a love of ESH, anime, and video games.
If you meet the specs and have a few secs [had to do it] stop by. Go to skypecasts.skype.com tomorrow at 4:48pm EST and search the ongoing skypecasts for ElectricSistaHood.
Or just look for the post on the podcast page about the LIVE show.
Is that a shuriken in your pocket, or are you just happy to see me?
Hey y'all Panda here bringing you her first..FIRST EVER Quick Question.
Well as we all know a good anime has many attributes, good visual, good dubbed and subbed capabilities, but one asset that many people try to emphasize is musical contributions. So with that in mind. I pose this question.
Out of all the animes or games that you've played and or watched in your entire lifetime, Has any opening or ending theme song just caught your attention? Just how alluring was it?
Of course I'd like the title of the song, and what game or anime it came from and obviously who sings it. Who knows I might have it myself.
So I'm calling you all J ROCK and J POP fans! ASSEMBLE!
Boy oh boy, can you feel the love from EA yet? Because they do love you, they just got a business to run. No, really, no one has ever made them feel like you do.
You're the best! But if you want to keep playing online you better dump that copy of Madden 05 and NFL Street 2: Unleashed and buy the latest versions b'cause EA is shutting those servers down.
Didn't see it coming? You should have? Did you think EA was going to float you forever? If they don't boot you off Madden '05 how the hell are they going to get you to buy Madden '07? What's that smarty pants? Don't have a snappy answer for that do you? Didn't think so.
You can check out this article from Joystiq to see the complete list of games that are going to have their servers snipped.
Seriously though, EA totally hearts you.
Is that a shuriken in your pocket, or are you just happy to see me?
Put the Controller Down, And Back Away From the Console
You poor, pathetic souls...now they say you're addicts!
NinJa here, and as usual, I found a little tidbit on ye olde interweb that I just had to share with you guys. Why? Because I nearly peed my pants from laughing when I read it. Evidently, games are additive...and not in the "I'm going to finish what I've started vein," no I'm talking like "crack rock" addictive. Think EverCrack...but seriously though. [No laughing] According to this article there are tons of parents and people in general seeking "professional" help in the forms of interventions in order to kick their or their family members console gaming addictions.
"I'm going into rehab, as soon as I finish this level mom! I just have to complete the battle of the 1000 heartless, OK? GAWH!"
Yes, those dry eyes you have don't have anything to do with allergies, your addicted son! You need a 12-step program, and to turn in your subscription service. Got erratic sleep patterns? Sure, you may have THOUGHT they were caused by stress, but in reality it's being caused by your body craving to save the damn princess...NOW!
Now, don't get me wrong: people with additive personality types can become dependent on any thing, including video games, and those people need help. But the generality of this article just made it impossible for me to take all that seriously. Except for the Warcraft addiction thing, because a member of my immediate family is fighting that addiction as we speak.
We welcome and thank you for all your prayers and support during these trying times.
And if any of you bitches try and throw me a gaming intervention, I'll cut you! :)
Is that a shuriken in your pocket, or are you just happy to see me?
We've done our first minor update to the glossary page, so you should go and check it out. We added some Japanese honorifics, if you have more, or want to suggest a term and definition for the glossary, just Hit Us Up.
You know, you could win some candy. :D
Is that a shuriken in your pocket or are you just happy to see me?
It's new features time again here at ESH, and because we like to give it to you til we're satisfied here's what we've added [and will be adding] for you because you're FRESH!
You may be asking, what does FRESH mean? Why is it all in caps? Just WTF in general. Imma break it down for you right now.
FRESH stands for Friends of Electric Sista Hood. Because that what all you loyal listeners and readers out there are: you're our friends. And friends take care of each other, look out for each other, hook one another up when they can. Friends effin rock! Ok, two questions answered...but I'm sure you have more.
Why FRESH? Why now?
Because of you wonderful FRESH people [FRESHpeeps] ESH is growing, so like a good friend we wanted to find a way to give back and thank you for being so kick ass. First off, we are thinking about creating an ESH street team for you to be a part of. You'll get first dibbs on new items we are going launch in our store pre-launch, and super secret emails detailing when we are going to be taping live shows. We'll send you some stuffs [stickers, fliers, and the like] so you can share your ESH love with your world and help to make it part of ours. [It's like a cult, only with no poison backwash]
We want to create galleries totally devoted to you FRESHpeeps, built by you. We want to see you COSplayers, fraggers, anime fiends and geek fanboys in all your glory! You send us the pictures, we'll build the gallery. Not only that, but ever time we post a new submission to a gallery or wherever on the website we will post about it with all the info you provide. So that all the new visitors to the site will just have to stop by your image and check it out...even comment on it. You can tell all your friends that the picture of you dressed up as Ed from Full Metal Alchemist was cool enough to make it onto the ESH site, and that people think it's HI-larious. Instant fame people...who doesn't like that. All you got to do is send us the photos here [in .jpg or .png format please] and we'll do the rest. We'll even email you back to let you know we used your image. And did I mention that you will get four [4] weeks of sweepstakes entries just for submitting a relevant image? Now how chill is that? Just sending any old image won't do people...we want to see you in anime/gaming related situations, not pictures of the neighbors dog, or some image you found on google.
We also launched our glossary today, and hope that you find it helpful. It's not nearly complete, just a start really...but you too can suggest terms and definitions for the glossary. We want to compile the best anime/video game/geek/sci-fi/fanboy-girl term page ever. So if you feel something is missing, send it to us using our form and we'll review it, check it, add it. Just make sure to use "Glossary Term" as the first line in your comment. And if we add your term you get [you guessed it] four weeks worth of entries into our sweepstakes.
Now, all sweepstake entries are only valid if your email address is valid. If you win with a bogus addy, we try to mail you on how to collect your prize and it fails, we give your prize to someone else, and ban you from entering to win stuff forever. [Which will suck because we are eventually going to give away a PSP and a DS Lite]
And before I go I have to mention FRESHtalk. See that lil widget over there on the right side of your screen. When it says Ninjasistah is online and is green, that means you can IM and talk to me right then and there: just one on one, me and you. So you can ask me about stuff I like, the website, how to be down with the street team [which still needs a FRESH name so if you come up with one, hit us up with it] or just chit chat in general.
::SIGH:: That's all the new FRESHness I can type about right now. My fingers are too tired to go on, but there is a lot more coming down the pike peeps...so stay in touch!
Is that a shuriken in your pocket, or are you just happy to see me?
Ladies, do you need a little help reaching "your happy place"? Well Heather Kelley [a designer with Ubisoft] has a game for you
As I was taking some time off from editing this upcoming week's podcast, I came across this article which just tickled my fancy. [Pun totally intended...enjoy it!]
As I understand it, by lavishing attention on Lapis [the little blue bunny featured in this game] through rubbing, blowing, petting, tickling, and stroking, you too can learn how to lavish said attention on yourself. I shit you not people, this is what I read. And don't get me wrong, the concept is interesting. Stroking a blue bunny in order to help him fly into the sky with lofty hopes of flying high enough to reach fireworks is just crazy enough to work. In a way. Being on the DS, the tactile elements of achieving orgasm can be mimicked using the dual screen/stylus/blow on mic inputs of the device. It's actually ingenious when you think about it.
I wonder if the game will actually be able to reach it's intended audience: the Animal Crossing, Tamagotchi toting, fantasy loving young ladies that may need a little "help" in the orgasmic arena. Or if it's subject matter will keep it out of the hands of our "impressionable" youths. Can you imagine what politician who are in the process of making video games their personal whipping boys would do if this game was available right now in the U.S.?
I don't know anything about the demo of the game because I could not get it to run on my browser, but the presentation is fun to look at. If you get it running, or can get me some footage of the demo running...I'd love to see it!
I'm very curious to see how this all pans out, and not for the reasons you think you pervs!
Is that a shuriken in your pocket, or are you just happy to see me?
Notice anything different around this web joint? You should.
Yeah, I've been bitten by the stupid coding monkey again and made some changes to the website layout. As you can see ESH is now 33% wider, with 33% more features for you. The next 34% is still in the works. We are testing the new MeeboMe alpha, so feel free to shoot me a message when you see me on to chit chat about games and whatnot. It'll be cool.
Oh yeah, I also put up a holder page in the place where FRESHware™ will reside as soon as it's ready to launch.
So take a look around and let me know what you think. ESH is growing...and we didn't even use Viagra.
Is that a shuriken in your pocket, or are you just happy to see me?
I for one have always been a fan of the PSP interface. It was the second thing I liked about the PSP when I bought it. [The first was the clarity of the video screen. And at that point, those were about the only things I liked about my PSP...
I found the games to 1) suck 2) be WAY overpriced for what you were getting and 3) don't even get me STARTED about how piss poor the movies for the PSP are: the system was a complete let down. Truly was. By now you are wondering what any of this has to do with the title; doesn't it read, "Sony Gets Something Right"? Yes Mr. Know-it-all it does, so here is how it fits: It looks like Sony has decided to learn from the KISS Book-o-Design 2006 and is implementing the XMB interface from the PSP on the PS3.
Yes, your mad crazy expensive PS3 with all it's intricate,and complex computing power within the box, is going to have the same, simple, easy to use, non-processor intensive, plain navigation system. While that may sound like a dig, it's not. Not really. Serious. Stop laughing, it's not. It's actually me saying right on Sony. Often when pieces of hardware get impressively powerful, developers tend to create interfaces that are way too bloated to be effectively functional for the end user. I have heard more complaints about the original XB360 interface than you could shake a stick at. So the fact that Sony has opted to use a very simple and refined navigation interface for this [supposedly] super-dee-duper monster of a computing machine.
Sony, you get +5 Hell Yeah Points from me. Just 30,000 more to go. But don't just take my word for it, watch this demo video I saw on YouTube and play judge n' jury for yourself.
Is that a shuriken in your pocket, or are you just happy to see me?
I'm going to call this question Harem Mayhem, try saying that 5 times fast. Everyone has seen at least one harem anime, its impossible to watch anime without tripping over one or ten of them. Harem anime is the genre that has one guy surrounded by a big group of women. They are generally the sillier anime rife with sexual misunderstandings. The guy is usually very wishy-washy and has no mind of his own. He usually just does whatever the women want him to without being able to stand up for himself. Inevitably the series will end the way it started, with the guy unable to chose one of the girls to stay with. I call upon you to change that, you will pick a woman for this guy. Think of this as the Dating Game or something. Bachelor No. 1 is Tenchi Misaki from Tenchi Muyo, Tenchi Universe and Tenchi in Tokyo. More recently Tenchi Muyo Ryo-Ohki! was released, but I haven't seen it yet. I don't know if it has the same characters or if it is a totally different story that takes place in the same world like Tenchi Muyo GXP.
Tenchi is an everyday highschool boy with an everyday life. He lives with his father and grandfather, and everything is bland. Suddenly a spaceship comes crashing down in the nearby lake and things get interesting. Tenchi is suddely neck deep in space pirates, princesses and police. (The spaceship crashing is just one of the scenarios where they all meet. Each of the Tenchi series has a different beginning.)
The Bachelorettes:
Ayeka- Sasami's older sister and the next in line for the Juraian throne. Ayeka is a pampered princess, she doesn't do any housework and demands to be waited on.
Ryoko- A notorious space pirate Ryoko is a rogue through and through. She drinks alot and is always bugging Tenchi to do something fun (and most likely illegal.)
Sasami- Ayeka's younger sister and a Princess of Jurai. Sasami is the most mature, despite being the youngest. She does all the cooking, cleaning and shopping for the whole group.
Washu- A mad scientist, she is the one who created Ryo-Ohki and she is always experimenting on the others. Tenchi is her favorite test subject and she enjoys siccing her projects on him. Washu can be a variety of ages, she is actually a mature woman, but usually appears as a young girl.
Ryo-Ohki- A cat/rabbit creature that can transform into Ryoko's spaceship, a suit of armor, a little girl or a beautiful young woman. Ryo-ohki can't actually speak, but she learns to walk in her human form in order to go on a date with Tenchi.
Mihoshi- A galaxy police officer, and the partner of Kiyone. Mihoshi is an airhead and is always crashing her ship and blowing things up.
Kiyone- Kiyone is the unfortunate partner to the walking disaster that is Mihoshi. She's a serious cop and would probably be quite sucessful in life if not stuck with Mihoshi.
Who do you think is the perfect match for Tenchi? You can also add any of the girls from the Tenchi movies if you'd like one of them better.
Do you have the current version of Skype on your computer? You do? Cool. Um, do you have a mic and some headphones that you can plug into your computer while you are using Skype? Seriously, you do? Double cool. Ok, how about this one: Do you happen to be doing nothing next Friday night [August 11] between 5 and 6:30pm? Get the eff out! Are you kidding me? Because I don't like being kidded. But if all of the above is true for you, you just might be able to be part of our SkypeCast Live [to tape] Show Beta! [You may insert your chosen happy dance of joy here]
We are looking for some volunteers to help us test out recording our shows in front of a live internet audience via Skype and their beta SkypeCast service. If you meet all of these criteria and know your way around Skype send us an email and let us know you'd like to be down for the beta run of the ESH live to tape shows. You'll be able to listen to us record the podcast live, and can even be part of the conversation yourself!
Keep it cool man, real cool. Or at least real cool-ish.
Over the past week I have been testing the Intercooler from Nyko. Nyko makes various products to assist you in your digital life from skins for your XB360 faceplates, cases for your iPod or iPod nano, to grips for your PSP. Yes, Nyko would like to have you covered. Which [due to some bad experiences back in the PSOne days that I had] I normally would steer far away from, but it looks like those cheap days are long gone as far as Nyko is concerned.
I recently received an Intercooler from Nyko for review, and I have to say, I was surprised at how sturdy the product seemed off the bat. The Intercooler device itself weighs next to nothing, and is basically just some extra fans that you can put on the back of your XB360 to keep it from overheatin like a bastid. Anyone who owns an XB360 can tell you that's a HUGE fear. The suckers get HOT man! Have you seen the XB360 power brick? Well have you? Sorry, I'm digressing, but that thing is freaking huge! Anyways, back to what I was talking about...the Intercooler.
In all honesty I didn't expect the thing to work. The premise was simple: put more fans on your XB360, and thus it should stay cooler. But the unit seemed so small, how much cooler could it make my XB360 in reality. Reality is, it did help. It wasn't like polar cold, but it did drop the overall temp of my machine about 9 degrees. Which is a big deal when you are running your XB360 for hours at a time. From what I can figure the Intercooler works with the fan that's already in the system in pulling cool air through the vents on the sides of the unit through the back to aide in the cooling process. I could be wrong, but all I felt coming out of the back of my XB360 was warm air [like usual] just much more of it faster than usual.
The Intercooler is neat in that it just snaps into your XB360 using the existing vent holes on the back of the unit. So there are no clamps, or bases that you have to have room for to sit your XB360 into in order to use the device. It's quite small actually. It does add a couple of inches to the back of your XB360, so if you have your system someplace where it's just barely fitting in there safely, you'll want to move it to a much more open space. [Which, as warm as this system runs, you should do anyways...what are you a pyromaniac?] The device lines up with the power port on the back of your XB360 and then you plug your power plug into the Intercooler and it gets power. So it gets a plus for not needing a power plug of it's own, but the cord does not sit as snug in the Intercooler as it does in the XB360 which is where I find a little fault with Nyko. As mammoth as the power supply itself and it's plug is, I'd feel much more comfortable if it were a lil more snug with the plug. Ya Dig?
So it comes down to this: Would I recommend this thing to my friends with XB360's? Yeah, yeah I would...especially if they had systems that would be running for 6 to 8 hours at a time constantly spinning a disc. For $20 bucks it wouldn't hurt to have some extra cooling power on your XB360, but I'd make sure that they were laying the system on it's side, and had a prop for the power cord coming out of the Intercooler.
You should definitely check out Nyko's website as it looks like they are [trying to] step their game up. Who knows, they just might help you step yours up at the same time. ;)
Is that a shuriken in your pocket, or are you just happy to see me?
Its hot hot hot, and historically enlightening too!
Hello, Hello everyone. I'm back in full swing to bring forth my latest adventures in Anime and manga alike. So what do I have for you guys today? Is it something so sweet it will drive people to skip through flowers in slow motion. Is it so fucked up that you guys would think I was in need of some psycho evaluation by some top crack job doctors?!
Thanks to Magic I have been given the opportunity to take part in a 4 DVD volume set entitled "Mirage of Blaze'' It has a rock-esque opening song and is a shonen. [Now remember a shonen is an anime geared towards the male demographic, they also tend to have much more action] Now just because it is a shonen doesn't mean that us females wouldn't enjoy it I mean me and magic are in fact women and thus far I have liked the general concept of this series.
However I have also heard speculation that this series can be slightly considered on the yaoi side. Since the primary characters are male and there does seem to be a tension between some of them that leaves much to the imagination. But I will address that later.
Now just so you [the readers] know, I haven't finished watching this yet, it is a work in progress but those things that are left progressing, usually become a masterpiece right?
The story proceeds as follows, the main character Takaya Oogi is the smart ass high school student. He kinda has this best friend complex with his friend Yuzuru Narita ...but almost instantly their lives take a turn when they are thrown into an ancient war which is still being fought in their modern time in Japan. [Doesn't this sound promising] Takaya has to fight between keeping the identity he has been living with or adapt the life that people inform him that he lead. Oh? Did I mention that there is a giant Japanese history lesson that runs in this anime? Oh I didn't? well yea it does.
The romantic tension is tantalizing, and should be enjoyed by the masses. It's put out by Anime works, is visually appealing and the background music is moving. I suggest taking a peak at it if you get a chance.
I was just surfing around and I found this site and I want each and every one of you browncoats to do your duty and check it out. (Browncoats refers to the army Malcolm Reynolds fought side by side with during the battle of Serenity.)
This bothers me to no end. It's as if the creators were too lazy to come up with a character to replace the dead guy. At least in DB they had a magical dragon who granted wishes that brought people back, these days it's just "Oh, him? He wasn't really dead, just hurt real bad." They make no excuses for how a character comes back alive, healthy and un-maimed. Dead/Not Dead How do you fuck that up? Is the heart beating or not? I know for a fact that it's not rocket science, rockets don't have hearts. You wouldn't have any trouble if I asked if the radio was on or not, how is this any different? Is there a thump-thump-thump or not?
Take for example my abysmal experience trying the game Rumble Roses XX for the XB360.
I just hadn't found that character that resonated with me yet, but I was bound to do it. But then I started doing some "grappling" moves and noticed a recurring theme: See my panties? The more time spent playing the game revealed what the game really was: an excuse to have nearly naked CGI chicks squat, spread, and bare as much as possible to the player. First this made me mad, then it made me sad. While I have nothing against games being sexy, sexual, prominently featuring female characters with little or nothing on, I do feel that there needs to be a balanced reason for the characters being featured in this way. I love the sultry hot-looking female character that is obviously very smart and uses her appearance against her enemies, and I think a lot of girl gamers [and guys] like that as well. Hell, I'll go out on a limb and say that they prefer that kind of character because good looks and brains in a woman equals power, and power is always sexy. 
I think that's what aggravates me most about this game, it could have been a very good sexy game. It could have had female characters with charm and backbone [wearing the same outfits] and been a more enticing game than it ended up being. In the form it's in now, Rumble Roses XX is just a farcical one line comedy bit that no one in the room finds funny. As the audience we look at it and kind of grimace, but really just want the better material to hurry up and start. For all the effort that you put in you don't get nearly as much, if anything at all, back in return. 
I've only watched the first few episodes, and I'm filled with many questions, but I can't pull away...it's like crack in DVD form. I thought I'd share this bit of my revelation with you, my dear readers...and also pose a question to you.
I just got my hands on the Tokyopop release schedule for this fall. Over the next couple of months I'll list every title for the month and tell you guys which ones you cannot miss. This list is from 'Manga' a free quarterly magazine from Tokyopop. Manga was formerly known as Takuhai and I preferred that name, but since people can now pick it up at news stands they decided not to call it "home delivered" anymore. But honestly, who in their right mind names a magazine about manga Manga? Its just too complicated. I was feeling lazy so the manga descriptions are ganked from TokyoPops' official website, which may I say sucks. I absolutely hate their new site. Their manga list used to have a small thumbnail of a main character displayed next to it, but now it is just an eye blurring dance of text without a single image. Many of the menus are difficult to navigate, and the only thing the site has going for it are the colors [red/black my favorites] which are inappropriate for the company anyways. But this article is not about how much I miss their old site, this is about how much I love Takuhai and their manga. 
For September there are a bunch of good manga series that I have enjoyed in the past, but nothing I'm going to go wait in line for 3 days before the release. (Yeah so it'd be a one person line, so what) I do however HAVE to look at how bad the Star Trek manga is. Apparently the manga publishers didn't learn from Spawn the manga, which was terrible. People read manga because it is different from what you can find in America. Turning hokey old American TV shows into manga is not going to impress us, and is likely to make us ridicule the entire market, such as I am now-> Idiots what in the hell are you thinking. To anyone who is looking forward to reading this manga I apologize, you are mentally disturbed enough without me ruffling your feathers. 
Innocent W is by the creator of Sengoku Nights (which I recommend.) The description reads like a horror movie. Someone has assembled a group of high school girls--rumored to be witches--and dropped them off in the woods. Among them is Makoto, a male 'witch' who has mysterious powers. The plot centers around people who have a grudge against the witches and who try to kill them in the woods. The story also focuses on the witches who are struggling to survive. Similar to 'Battle Royale' with characters violently dying one by one.
Kamen Tantei is by the Petshop of Horrors creator. This one is about a pair of young aspiring mystery writers who have weird incidents happen around them that need solving. Luckily for them, the Masked Detective inexplicably always shows up to help. The focus of the story is light-hearted comedy and not about solving the crimes but rather poking fun at the process. This series doesn't take itself seriously like Kindaiichi. 
RIP - Transylvania Rose is a bored angel who descends to Earth to clean a few souls. When she witnesses a depressed undertaker slitting his wrists, Rose rips off one of her wings and gives it to the undertaker, trapping them both somewhere between heaven and hell - life and death. 
Vampire Doll - Guilt-Na-Zan is a vampire aristocrat who was sealed into a cross by Kyouji's ancestor more than 100 years ago. Now Kyouji has revived him--although he was resurrected as a doll and can only transform into his real figure when he sucks blood from Kyouji's sister Tonae... But when you combine Goth clothes and hot vampires, slowly but surely everyone will start to feel like one big family!
You read the headline, the Skypecast is going off this Friday Aug 25. You know you want to be part of the party.
My eyes do not deceive you, er, me I mean. Well they don't deceive you either, they making a live action DOA movie. And holy flying dragon kick does it look awful!
How on earth Kasumi being on the run from her ninja clan, the opera start Helena somehow being in control of the company running project Epsilon, and Zack a black man with a green mini-mohawk [and passion for dressing up as a silver teletubbie] somehow came across as the perfect cast for a movie is totally beyond my whacked out imagination. If anything I could understand an anime movie of the series since there are a bunch of ninjas in the game and the Street Figther franchise did one...but they also were responsible for that awful Street Fighter live action movie with Jean Claude van Dame as Guile. So I guess I can't use it as a good example of what to do. 
My point is, there was no real tangible storyline behind the DOA games to start. Tecmo did a beach volley ball version of the game that just had the girls in bikini's posing for you, and are getting ready to release the second DOA beach themed game shortly. I guess this game being optioned for a movie just proves beyond a shadow of a doubt that sex does indeed sell as the movie [from what I've seen of the trailer] struggles to find a reason for the female characters to interact with each other. While there are no weapons in the DOA franchise [and never have been] all the girls tote katanas in the movie posters, and in the first fight that you see in the trailer. This provides "WTF?!" moment number 1, followed by Christie being given the title of "Master Thief." Anyone that has played the game will be quick that senorita pokes a lot is an assassin, cold, and bad assed. Not a perky looking thief. And not for nothing, but to make a live action movie based on a game whose claim to fame is it's busty lusty lady fighters but cast members of the itty-bitty-titty-committee sure makes less than no sense to me. Yes I'm female, I'm not gay, and I said casting the titty-less crew was a mistake. 
Don't get me wrong, I love Jaime Pressly [she plays Tina], but the character of Tina has always been depicted as a big bodied gal with the bodacious ta-tas. Jaime if you see this, girl I loves you like a fat kid loves cake, but you ain't no Tina. You are funny as shit on My Name Is Earl though. Keep that up girl, and stay away from projects like this. If you want to get into action films, try to get in on that next X-Men movie that is rumored to be on the table is possibly maybe happening. Shoot for the leader of the Morlocks position. But back to the topic at hand.
You know, as a rule, I try to turn a deaf ear to the fanboy rumor mill...but occasionally something so interesting pops up in fanboy conversation that I can not turn away.
Coud Van Giruet is a rookie sky pirate. After a raid he is checking out the loot and he comes across a girl packed away in a box. The girl is Reveric Metherlence, Ren for short. Ren has a green gem on her forhead called an erementar gerad that indicates that she is an Edil Raid. Edil Raids make contracts with humans and are capable of reacting with a their human partner, called a preja and transforming into a weapon. But Ren isn't just any Edil Raid she is a part of the Metherlence family and is extremely powerful, she is called the Seventh Scintillating Treasure Tree and everyone is after her.
The voice of a mysterious girl calls to Ren in her dreams, pleading for her to come to the Edil Garden. Coud promises to help Ren find the Edil Garden, and promises to protect her until then. Of course they slowly start to fall in love, but they are both very socially awkward and find it hard to express their feelings to each other. Because their mission was to retreive Ren, the three Arcaile members Cisqua, Kuea and Rowen decide to tag along. Kuea is also an Edil Raid and her preja is Rowen, Cisqua is a gun toting maniac character. On their way to the Edil Garden they encounter humans and edil raids in all sorts of relationships, edil raid hunters, illegal fighting arenas and many many people who treat edil raids as nothing more than items or weapons. 
There are also man-made edil raids called steam raids. Through a dangerous life threatening procedure humans are implanted with an erementar gerad. There is also a society called Chaos Choir that wants to use Ren to rule the world. They are determined to kill Coud, because as Ren's preyja he stands in the way of their plans for her. An edil raid can only react with one preyja at a time, so killing Coud is the only possible way for a member of Chaos Choir to become her preyja. There are some very pretty songs in the series, in order to react with their preyjas each edil raid has a song they sing to transform. Also every special attack has a song that charges it up (or whatever). This series is full of funny, exciting and occasionally tragic adventures as they quest for Edil Garden. (Note: I've also seen it spelled Erementar Gelad, Eden Raids and the Garden of Eden. Apparently Fansubs aren't perfect, oh noes my world is falling apart)
Last night I was watching Robocop 3 and for the first time it struck me how much it was a commentary on the American/Japanese technological gap. 
I'm going to call this question Harem Mayhem, try saying that 5 times fast. Everyone has seen at least one harem anime, its impossible to watch anime without tripping over one or ten of them. Harem anime is the genre that has one guy surrounded by a big group of women. They are generally the sillier anime rife with sexual misunderstandings. The guy is usually very wishy-washy and has no mind of his own. He usually just does whatever the women want him to without being able to stand up for himself. Inevitably the series will end the way it started, with the guy unable to chose one of the girls to stay with. I call upon you to change that, you will pick a woman for this guy. Think of this as the Dating Game or something. Bachelor No. 1 is Tenchi Misaki from Tenchi Muyo, Tenchi Universe and Tenchi in Tokyo. More recently Tenchi Muyo Ryo-Ohki! was released, but I haven't seen it yet. I don't know if it has the same characters or if it is a totally different story that takes place in the same world like Tenchi Muyo GXP. 
Keep it cool man, real cool. Or at least real cool-ish.
The suckers get HOT man! Have you seen the XB360 power brick? 
The Intercooler is neat in that it just snaps into your XB360 using the existing vent holes on the back of the unit. So there are no clamps, or bases that you have to have room for to sit your XB360 into in order to use the device. It's quite small actually. It does add a couple of inches to the back of your XB360, so if you have your system someplace where it's just barely fitting in there safely, you'll want to move it to a much more open space. [Which, as warm as this system runs, you should do anyways...what are you a pyromaniac?] The device lines up with the power port on the back of your XB360 and then you plug your power plug into the Intercooler and it gets power. So it gets a plus for not needing a power plug of it's own, but the cord does not sit as snug in the Intercooler as it does in the XB360 which is where I find a little fault with Nyko. As mammoth as the power supply itself and it's plug is, I'd feel much more comfortable if it were a lil more snug with the plug. Ya Dig?