Philanthropy

This is ... just ... wow.

Metal Gear Solid: Philanthropy is a fan-movie created by Italian filmmakers, Hive Division, about one of Snake's adventures in Philanthropy, the anti-Metal Gear group that he and Otacon founded. Normally the term "fan-movie" suggests a few silly teenagers, a digital camera, and a Youtube account, but like Purchase Brothers' Escape From City 17, Hive Division's offering is a lot more impressive.

Simply put, the movie looks professionally made. The film work is excellent in its own right, but also pays obvious homage to the cinematography of Kojima's lengthy cutscenes, even to the point where you might think you're playing one of the games. Special effects are used frequently to full cinematic effect and provide some honestly breath-taking visuals. The score is perfect as far as I can tell, the post-production makes the film feel ever more professional, and the acting is solid. Pun intended.

There are some choppy bits: The special effects aren't the most advanced and I could easily pick out the shots where green screen was used. The animated models looked somewhat primitive too. Furthermore, since all or most of the actors are Italian, an English dub was commissioned and even though the actors DO speak English on film, the timing on mouth synchronization is off just enough to be noticeable. But actually, this is something of a historical practice used for decades' worth of spaghetti westerns. In any case, none of these technical hiccups are enough to distract from the enjoyment of the film.

Still, good production value can never hide bad fan fiction. Luckily, this is another of Philanthropy's strengths. Rather than going overboard on cameos from the author's favorite characters, Giacomo Talamini -- the movie's writer/director -- chose to create a story only loosely based on the franchise. Snake is the only recurring character, with a short cameo from Otacon and the mention of institutions like Armstech. Meanwhile, Talamini places Snake in command of a team of infiltrators, original characters every bit as intriguing as some of Kojima's best, who present a new challenge for our usually silent, solitary hero. Metal Gear fans will also recognize the necessary inclusion of memorably awesome villains, also original.

Unfortunately for us, only "part one" of Philanthropy has been released so far and the movie left me hungry for more. It's a wonderful watch for a Metal Gear fan and I highly recommend it.

Note: There no plans for the making of the second and third parts of MGS:P (reference). If you, like me, find yourself starving and unfulfilled at the end of the film, there are a couple of things you can do. First, stay through the credits and watch what happens after. And second, check out these interviews with the voice actors Phillip Sacramento, Lucien Dodge, and Laura Post.

No posts this month

oh wait

Internet politics!

If anyone happens to have frequented tv-links.co.uk, the website that links to tv shows uploaded to sites like Youtube, you may be wondering why it appears to be dead. The answer is: it IS dead -- because the servers were attacked by officials and the site manager has been arrested! The reason appears to be because he was sharing media electronically without authorization from the copyright holders. In reality, this is untrue: TV-Links only linked to media already uploaded to Youtube and the like. The man and moderators at the site are now facing ludicrous charges based on money figures that the feds claim the copyright holders (aka big business) should have made.

This is outrageous. TV-Links has committed no crime and has even gone out of their way to discourage pirating. They've provided a wonderful community tool and a site that I used habitually for reference when I couldn't afford to buy movies or when I wanted to watch an out-of-date or obscure TV show. I want it back, but mostly I want the UK government to acknowledge how ridiculous and antagonistic they appear right now.

If this ignites your rebellious nature within the caverns of your soul, then stand up, fight, and make a difference. SIGN A PETITION!!!

http://www.petitiononline.com/21212594/petition.html

More info can be found here: http://www.thenewfreedom.net/wp/2007/10/19/tv-linkscouk-raided-owner-arrested/

Yee...

essss.

Enter the Abyss

Behold the Zoomquilt II. This is an amazing art project that zooms in on an image and just keeps going and going through scenes and worlds and levels that seem to be remeniscent of Hell. It's just fucking sweet. Ah, the Internet.

Daemons!

This is a neat little activity from the website for the upcoming Golden Compass film. Answer a questionnaire and you're presented with your ideal daemon; your soul in physical form. It's set up so that friends can help confirm the choice of daemon within a 12-day time limit. Check it out and, if you feel so inclined, help ensure my daemon's the correct one.



I've got to read those books, now.

Samus FTW

Stealing this from Penny Arcade's news page today.

http://www.gametrailers.com/umwatcher.php?id=57998

Amazing choreography reminiscent of the animated Star Wars: Clone Wars. It's just awesome.

The Year in Review

Yesterday marked the one year anniversary of the existance of this blog.

And I can't remember anything particularly interesting that's happened during that time.

SPARTANS!

I probably shouldn't find this as cool as I do, especially since I haven't even played Halo 2...

http://youtube.com/watch?v=iFAIweoRzr4

Vote for me!

I entered a piece for a Sonic-themed best art contest over at the GHZ. So if anybody's reading this, sign up and vote for me! Or vote for whoever you want; there are some artists who are hugely better than I am. In fact, most of the works that were submitted for the contest are pretty great. BUT I WANT THAT FREE SONIC GEMS COLLECTION, SO VOTE FOR ME, DAMMIT.

If you're interested in actually joining to participate in the forum community, please, please, please read the FAQ. Also, refrain from being an idiot and taking anything personally.

Christmas Eve and the Internet

There are two hugely compelling reasons to buy the Wii (teehee Wii). The most obvious is Twilight Princess which is something I'd be willing to kill to get my hands on. But not really. The second is Rayman Raving Rabbids, and this collection of Youtube videos shows exactly why. My personal favorite, of course, is the MGS spoof -- complete with sound effects!

I should hope that everyone in the world is by now acquainted with the sensational music, artwork, and animation of Gorillaz. I've been browsing Youtube and watching their music videos, and the best word to describe them is spectacular. It is now a necessity for me to buy the Phase 1 DVD. Rumors have been spreading that there is now a whole movie in the works and that former Python and acclaimed filmmaker Terry Gilliam is contributing to it. Thus, I put forth this question: how could that not be awesome?

Another great band I've come across is that of hard rocker Danko Jones. The two US albums, We Sweat Blood and Sleep is the Enemy are great to rock out to in the car, by yourself or with a friend. Some of his music videos are pretty awesome, too and are easily found in the downloads section of http://dankojones.com/ I really enjoyed First Date and I Want You; Lovercall is pretty excellent, too.

Y'know, having a cable modem is fucking awesome. GOD. IT'S SO GOOD. It feels SO GOOD. It's pretty great.

How the other comic lives

My current job is heavens better than my last one. (Can heavens be used as a term of measurement? The answer is yes.) True, I'm still working in retail, which is only the second rung on the Ladder of Job Satisfaction (the first being the slime-encrusted Rung of Food Service), but at least I'm not working in a fucking HARDWARE STORE. How I ended up in that highly inappropriate element I'll never understand. Now I'm at an outdoors specialty shop, which is just as inappropriate, but at least I've adapted to learning about kayaks better than I have to brass nipples and ballcocks.

I was serious when I said the hardware store fucked.

The cool thing about my new job, though, is that, thanks to a relatively small profile outside of the local community, I get a lot of free time between the few customers that come in. This is free time I can use doing whatever I want, such as writing a post in my blog, like the one I'm writing AT THIS VERY SECOND. I hope that blows your mind, 'cause I know mine certainly just reached an orgasm. But writing stupid drivel with the occasional childish sex joke isn't the extent of the vast options at my disposal. I can utilize my time reading books, practicing drawing, studying my personal interests, or even EXPERIENCING THE HARDCORE SPEED THAT IS NOT DIAL-UP!!!! Yes, my work computer has broadband. And it, unlike my dismal ISP at home, is not dial-up. So it is hard to resist the call of human nature, which demands that I waste hours upon hours of my time exploring the vast reaches of the internet, which veteran (and nonexistent) readers will remember I have previously defined as pr0n and lol.

I like to pretend that I'm doing something that adds to my intellect and experience when I waste these hours, however, and the most appropriate way to facilitate that illusion is to read webcomics. If you don't know what a webcomic is, I think the term is pretty freaking self-explanatory. The medium is a pretty great way for artists to get their art, stories, and voices out there without having to deal with threatening and infinitely more discriminate print publishers; simply put, anyone can put their shit online for anyone to view. Webcomics apparently picked up steam back in the late '90s and early new millennium, especially in the vein of college kids. Since then a number of superb artists have risen in popularity, enough so that a few of them actually make their living off of people viewing their comics for free! All their money is made through their online stores, selling T-shirts and the like. Several comics have even attracted the attention of the real world, and you can easily find paperback versions of titles like Megatokyo and Penny Arcade in your local B&N. It's a completely awesome system that I've dreamed I could be a part of since I encountered the medium. Can you imagine offering your works to the public completely free of charge and have them basically donate money to you through an expression of their appreciation of said work? Sometimes I honestly love the opportunities that the internet offers.

Of course, with the good comes the bad. As previously stated, ANYONE can make a webcomic and this fact presents two negatives. The first is simply that a good number of them lack talent. This is evident nowhere more than in the realm of "sprite comics" which are comics (usually in newspaper funnies format) that simply feature sprites ripped directly from 2D video games. Sprite comics can be good for a chuckle sometimes, but far too often they act as a vessel for cringingly bad humor and panel layout. The second negative is that there are now an intimidating number of webcomics out there, each with its own monstrous archive. It's difficult to find a good webcomic that you know you'll enjoy and whose archive you'll want to dig through to follow the story. And it doesn't help that computer screen isn't the best reading medium (though it does help preserve the trees), and makes you want to cut your time with the comic short to, you know, eat or sleep or something.

So, here is a list (you knew it was inevitable. I bet you're asking yourself why you even bothered to read the last two paragraphs since you KNEW it was going to boil down to a list) of webcomics I've come across. Mostly, they are done in installments, usually one to three times a week, so many of them run like newspaper funnies. Others are actually plot-driven and are formatted more like a normal comic book. Some simply break conventional formats and do things the internet way. You'll understand what that means once you see it in action.

LISTSLISTSLISTSEVERYBODYLIKESLISTS!!!
8-Bit Theatre - Funny how quickly I'm about to take back my earlier statement about sprite comics. 8-Bit is one of the better examples of the style. Based on the world of the original Final Fantasy, Brian Clevinger leads the astoundingly stupid alternate versions of the FF heroes on a quest to vanquish evil. Or steal much money. Or chop up stuff with swords. Or blow stuff up. Something like that. Totally wacky, the comic (as much as I've read of the huge archive) relies heavily on the incompetence of its very one-dimensional cast. Very funny, but as versatile as Clevinger is with the sprites, I can't help feeling that the style is holding the comic back. Oh well, take it as it is.
Chip and Walter and Time Trouble - I fell in love with Jon Gray's art the moment I set eyes on it. Obviously inspired by the likes of Carl Barks and other cartooning icons, his characters are vibrant and flexible and his panel designs are impressive. I wish I could give as much praise for his writing, but the most I can say about as much of these two comics as I've read is that his gags are pretty funny. It'd be nice if his stories weren't so dark - they clash with the bright and chirpy characters.
Megatokyo - A long-running satire on manga/anime and video games. The first few comics are featured like funnies, but this hugely popular comic is famous for the superb character-driven plot, which is currently on its eighth chapter. Just as emotionally jerking as it is funny, Fred Gallagher has created a cast of deep characters in an almost Discworld-esque universe based on pop culture. This is simply a work of genius that, if you have any interest in Japanese-American pop culture, you must read.
Penny Arcade - If you've heard of webcomics, you've heard of Penny Arcade; it's easily the most popular gaming webcomic ever. Intimidated by the wealth of deep information on the happenings in the world of gaming and electronic media, I avoided it for years. I only just started reading it, and, unfortunately, there is no turning back. The two creators, known as Tycho and Gabe, are freaking monsters. Each comic strip is accompanied by at least one huge post, usually by Tycho, detailing current news. Actually, it's more appropriate to say that each newspost is accompanied by a comic, because you often have to read the post to get the joke. And somehow, between seeking out and commenting on obscure newsbits, these two titans find time to play video games of all things!
Sam and Fuzzy - In the dark and bold world of Sam Logan's impressive inking abilities, Sam (main character, not artist) is a slightly wishy-washy guy trying to find the easiest way through life. Unfortunately, this pursuit is made near impossible by his ever-constant companion Fuzzy, a happy-go-lucky teddy bear-like creature with tendencies towards greed, power-mongering, insanity, and the occasional bout of sadism. The pair pretty much speak for themselves, but throw in Logan's unbeatable wit, appreciation for slapstick, and (when he bothers with it) expertise with plot and you've got a real winner.
VG Cats - Sex and violence jokes abound. Good times. If you're experienced in video games, this is another great comic, but I hesitate to call it a satire on games as much as I would a series of craziness with a video game theme. Generally, the idea for a comic strip is for Scott Ramsoomair to throw the main characters, two cats named Leo and Aeris, into the major roles of a selected game then proceed to totally fuck things up for your amusement. Though frequently hilarious, the easily offended should avoid this comic since its wackiness often involves intense violence and sexual references. Any repetitiveness in its jokes are made up for by Ramsoomair's excellence in cartooning and coloring.

I'll probably post more impressions of other webcomics later, just to eat up my time. Which reminds me of how long it's been since I posted a review on any graphic novels. Expect that sometime soon, you nonexistent readers.

This is a Channel Senbei News Update!

If you're one of those pathetic people with too much time on your hands and who frequents this little section of the ether that I like to call my own, you may have noticed that the place has changed a bit. A bit sexier, I like to think. It's the kind of change that will make pretty girls who visit the page say, "Oh, this Senbei hunk, he's probably really sexy in real life," I like to think. It's the kind of change that will make them say, "Oh, this Senbei hunk, I should invite him to a sleepover with me and my equally pretty sister," I like to think.

The change is thanks to Blogger Beta, which I signed up for today out of sheer boredom, and which allows me to edit this page with little more than the click of a mouse. Much preferable to the wading through lines upon lines of html just to add one stupid link for one stupid tlpbaps or WeeZle. The most noticeable changes are the addition of labels, should you only be interested in reading the comics-themed blogs of the past or whatever, and the compaction of the blog archive into a sexually attractive drop-down menu. The kind of menu that will make pretty girls blush and start searching feverishly for an email address so they can invite me to a night in a hot tub followed by a round of naked Twister with their equally pretty lady friends, I like to think.

Oh, and I've updated my profile with some more geeky shit. No delusions there, though -- it's not sexy at all. In fact, it might REPEL people; not just pretty girls, but everyone. It's quite vomitrocious (yes, yes, I did just use a term that originated in PBS's Arthur) in its geekiness, so don't even bother to check it.

A post replying to a reply to a post

A couple of days ago I was shockéd to discover that someone had left a comment on one of my posts! Further shock was éd’d when I realized this comment was not spam, but that of the GHZ’s respectable admin, who I know as Segaholic2, and I was practically electrocuted when I read the comment and found he wasn’t flaming me for being a retard, as I would no doubt do in his position. Instead, his comment was interesting, critical, and encouraging.

As is probably obvious, this kind of thing doesn’t happen to me. Like, at all. So I wanted to just give him a little message. Just a thank you or something. But I was then confronted with this dilemma: how should I contact him?

Not “how do I contact him?” That I knew. I could say thank you through another comment, a comment on his blog, message boards, pm, im, email, chats ... the list goes on. The question was “how should I contact him?”

I just thought this was odd. I have a dozen ways of approaching this person, but none of them quite seemed appropriate for just a little thank you note. I wonder if this is an issue for anyone else. As communication tech advances, will it really become easier to speak to another individual? Or will it just be more confusing? I’m already having trouble balancing a home phone with a mobile plan, and I can’t even imagine what I’d do with text messaging or whatever. Not to mention having to manage two email accounts and a myspace page weekly, if not daily. It just ends up being a hassle. It makes me think that maybe we don’t really need all this shit that we have at our disposal. Then again, of course, maybe some people do.

Well, in any case, ‘Holic, if you’re reading this, I’d just like to say thanks, I appreciate your words. I hope this little exuberant episode of mine hasn’t caused any undue embarrassment; rather, I hope you got a kick out of it. And for clarification: as I understand it, Japanese individuals (certainly not the country as a whole) are generally expected to associate on the same wavelength as everyone else. If you’re different, you’re not part of the group. This isn’t always the case, of course, but supposedly there is more peer pressure in schools and even in offices to be just like everybody else. The nail that sticks out is hammered down and all that.

Eggs, Bacon, and SPAM pt.2

Comment spam. Motherbleeper. Like spam in emails and on forums aren't enough, not to mention those godsdamn pop-up ads.

Yeah, I've deleted them now, but there were some comments left on some previous posts. For the record, here they are:

What a great site, how do you build such a cool site, its excellent.»

Super color scheme, I like it! Keep up the good work. Thanks for sharing this wonderful site with us.»

Hallo I absolutely adore your site. You have beautiful graphics I have ever seen.»

Your website has a useful information for beginners like me.»

Notice the little links at the end of each that lead to some perverted idea of what an ad should be. What the hell's up with that, anyway? First of all, there is a total of no people reading this blog, so it's not exactly good advertising. But why do these links lead to a search engine with completely random queries already entered? This kind of weird underground piracy just doesn't make sense to me and you know, I don't think I ever really want it to. I'd prefer to just hate and judge it from a distance without knowing whether or not it actually works. You know, like any other guy who argues without knowing what the hell he's talking about. Like Xbox-hating Nintendo fanboys. Like, to steal a line from Craig Ferguson, FOX NEWS. Which is ironic, because I don't know anything about Fox News, so I really shouldn't be making a joke at their expense.

THE POINT IS that from now on, comments will have a Word Verification Thingy (tm), compliments of the wondrous service that is Google, that you'll have to go through to leave a comment. It's just one of those "type in the word that you see above" things that hopefully spammers won't be able to bypass without actually visiting my blog and posting a comment themselves. Which I would kind of like to see happen. It might convince me to leave the spam posted.

I've left commenting open to anonymous writers, so if you're a real boy like Pinocchio you can leave a comment without getting a Blogger account. Of course, considering that there are ZERO people leaving comments, which interestingly seems to be the number of people reading the blog, I don't think that this entire post was at all necessary.

I'm going to go die a sad, lonely death now.

Remember the Lego Maniac?

Whatever happened to him? I guess I don't really care.

Well, a recent forum chat lead me to a totally, awesomely, MIND-BLOWINGLY note-worthy website. http://www.ken-tucky.com/LEGO/works-e.html. That LEGO Force shit is flippin' sexy, and the tributes to Ghibli, Bladerunner, and South Park are heavenly. Damn, I wish I had that many similarly colored bricks.

Truly have I submitted myself to the swirling vortex of doom when I have started a blog. Nothing is more pathetic than an online journal, created with the hope that the number of readers will grow into such a substantial vastness that the writer will feel as if he is worth something to society. 9 times out of 10, we know, this is not the case. In truth, a blog will not contain anything more of use to society than a reminder of how sickeningly consistent Americans' poor grasp of their basic language is. For the writer, a blog is nothing more than a galactic waste of time and energy, like 90% of the Internet's content in general.

And yet. And freakin' yet. A blog, like so many other aspects of the Internet -- message boards, webcomics, photo albums, and pr0n -- induces an irresistible attraction to it. Yes, I'm writing mindless, pointless drivel that will go unnoticed by everyone except my two to four friends. Yes, this is a substantial waste of time that could be spent on furthering my career, meeting interesting people, improving my talents, and increasing my knowledge of the world in general. Yes, blogging isn’t really much fun, nor is it much fun to read.

So why am I performing this irrelevant waste of time?

Because it gives me a raging erection.

Yes, blogging gives me inexplicable sexual pleasure. As I sit here typing with my left hand, my right hand is doing unmentionable things in my underlying regions. Blogging makes me hot.

Now that I’ve destroyed all hope of sanity, I’d like to make this first post complete by showcasing my previous blog (http://blog.myspace.com/senbei35) on myspace.com. I was hesitant towards creating a myspace account, partly because I was afraid that they could claim ownership of anything I posted, and partly because I’m a stuck-up, fun-loathing, old fart, but mostly because of the Brazilian ninja terrorists. For these reasons, I chose to move to my old friend Google’s blog site, thanks to the advice of one of my two to four friends.

For continuity reasons, I’m going to keep the myspace blog open, but I probably won’t be using it anymore. Here I feel like I don’t have to worry so much about copyright or the reproach of inappropriate conduct. (For the record, Asians are bad drivers, Irishmen drink a lot, and Hitler was the man.) Of course, that’ll probably change after my first lawsuit.