Unwinding with an Assassin

I decided to try and decompress a little bit this week with all the craziness that's been going on, so I ended up picking up a copy of Assassin's Creed: Brotherhood for the 360.  Y'know, I realize that it's been a while since I bought a game solely for me to have fun with.  No work, no reviews ... just plain ol' pop in the game and unwind.

One down ... more to come?

Well ... I came, I saw, but I didn't quite conquer.

I got the word on Monday that I just missed the mark on the job I flew out for last week.  Did I "blow it" like I thought I did?  Hard to say, but it was a really close race.  And  if you ask any professional athlete, they'll tell you from experience that in a close race, even the slightest mistake can cost you the game.  Here's the thing, though ... we're all human and we all are prone to making mistakes.  The trick is to learn from them and push forward.

Aaannnddd .... we're back

In the last post I mentioned that I was flying out of town for a job interview.  The interview was up and out in Denver, CO and it was a beautiful place to visit.  But as much as I might have wanted to take in the sights, or even try my hand at a little skiing for the first time in my life, I was there with a purpose.  There were people waiting to see me, waiting to grill me over an open fire like a Cornish hen, and waiting to see if I had the "right stuff" to fill the position they needed.  So, how do I think the interview went?

In my mind, I blew it ...

Moving forward ...

In the last post, I told you about the situation with my mom, how it affected me, and an initial bit of advice for those of you that might feel a overwhelmed and out of options.  Well, it's time for me to continue with my update for the past few months ... but keep reading through the rough spots, there's another pearl of wisdom at the end of things.

It's been a long time ...

Hey guys and gals. Yeah, I know I've said time and time again that I'd be posting here more often, and I definitely have meant to. Unfortunately, it's been a hell of a year and with so much stuff going on, the blog kinda took a back seat to life. And believe it or not, at different times over the past eight months, I've actually been at the very point I am now ... staring at the "New Post" screen and trying to figure out the best way to talk to everyone about what's been going on, but never coming up with the "right words" in my mind. Today, though, I'm just writing the words as I see fit. Trust me, there's a lot to catch you up on. And while I don't know how many of you out there still read this, I do want to say this is probably this most heartfelt and (to me) important things I may ever write.

A hard day's night ...

And I've been working like a dog ...

Yup. It's been one of those days. Very little sleep last night due to a pulled muscle in my shoulder. But on the upside, I've been wide awake with a freight train of thoughts chugging along in my head.

2010 ... the redeux

Okay folks ... yes, it's me. Yes, I'm posting here again (dusting off cobwebs and everything). I've constantly popped in here and said "I'm back" and "More to come" ... and then disappeared for months at a time again. Honestly, I can sit here and make all sorts of excuses, and all have some validity. Issues, both professional and personal, kept creeping up and chipping away at my time. There's been a lot of chaos, as I try to get a couple of projects of my own going forward while juggling other work, and still balance having some semblance of a "normal" life. Then, thanks to quick and easy use of Twitter (which you can find me on here), I started doing updates there and just let this slide away. Eventually, Stacking the Deck just faded for me. After all, I didn't even know if anyone was still out there paying attention to this.

Okay, so where was I?

Despite being just a wee bit older now (and having had a few unusually chaotic evenings), I seem to remember telling you guys that next up on the blog would be some tips on writing. I've thought long and hard about this every time I get asked. Over time, I started to realize, I've usually answered with the same few things every time. Once I even went in depth and wrote it all down. I happened to be digging around in some files the other day, when lo and behold, I happened upon the old notes (which I'd already used once years back in response to Dan Hsu's blog over at 1-Up).

"So how the hell did YOU get into this?"

That's a question I get asked all the time. How did someone like me into this industry, writing about things like comic books and video games? Truthfully? Well, a lot of it had to do with luck. But you see, luck is a funny thing. Luck will have a habit of presenting you with opportunities in life. But what you DO with those opportunities? That's all on you.

Dusting off ye ol' blog

Okay okay ... yes, I've neglected this blog. It's been, what, six or seven months since the last time I came around here? I'm not going to toss out any bullshit excuses either. The truth is, I got wrapped up in my work at the time, and the longer I went without updating the blog, the less I thought about it. Hell, I'd almost forgotten about the blog (I said "ALMOST"). Anyway, I'm back, and I figured it's time to run a quick update by you guys and catch you up to speed on what's going on these days before, hopefully, getting back into the swing of things here.

Words of Wisdom from Raymond Chandler

From a letter Chandler wrote to the editor of The Atlantic Monthly about a proofreader who changed his text:

"By the way, would you convey my compliments to the purist who reads your proofs and tell him or her that I write in a sort of broken-down patois which is something like the way a Swiss-waiter talks, and that when I split an infinitive, God damn it, I split it so it will remain split, and when I interrupt the velvety smoothness of my more or less literate syntax with a few sudden words of barroom vernacular, this is done with the eyes wide open and the mind relaxed and attentive. The method may not be perfect, but it is all I have."

A couple of new pieces

Hey guys, just a quick update tonight. Two pieces over at Crispy Gamer:

• Final Fantasy IV (DS) review
  
  
• My "Dissenting Opinion" of the CG review of Too Human

Take a look and let me know what you think.

EP Daily debuts this week

Yep, that's right. Electric Playground is back with the debut this week of EP Daily. Reformatted into a sort of Access Hollywood for geeks, the show is available now for viewing at the newly redesigned Electric Playground website: http://www.elecplay.com.

Make sure you go over there, check out the new show, and let me know what you think ... especially since I've been working with Vic and the guys this season.

Later,
David

We can rebuild him ...

Yeah yeah ... I know I said I'd be more active on here leading up to Comic-Con and for the foreseeable future thereafter. Then, I disappeared for a bit. Well, here's the deal. During Comic-Con, I was running myself ragged working on the filming for Electric Playground (check it out when it goes daily next week) and still juggling some meetings I had to attend in-between shootings. As soon as I got back into town, I had to deal with TSA screwing up the bag I had with all of the goodies I picked up at Comic-Con. Then I found out my car's electric system had died on me somehow while I was gone. And finally, I came down with some sort of nasty virus and was part of the living dead for a few days. Now? Now it's time to play catch up.

So, if you're old enough (or geek enough) to pick up the reference of my headline here, then you've probably guessed some changes are in the works. For lack of a better term, it looks like it may be time for a little upgrade to yours truly ... a sort of WldCard v2.0, so to speak.

"Gentlemen, we can rebuild him. We have the technology. We have the capability to build the world's first bionic man. Steve Austin will be that man. Better than he was before. Better, stronger, faster."

While I won't be quite "bionic" and the price tag will run well under the Six Million mark, but by the time the year ends, I will certainly be running "Better, faster, stronger" ... and also a bit smarter as well.

"I hate the bands you like!!"

It's strange how the guys at Red vs. Blue can so eloquently point out how ridiculous some people can be. I'll admit, there are a lot of little things that drive me nuts in my industry, but one of the most irritating is what I'm deeming "rampant fanboyism".

We've all seen it at least once, particularly in this Age of the Internet. Usually, someone somewhere makes a critical comment about something ... be it a game, a band, a TV show, a movie ... whatever. Most of the time, it's not even a terrible criticism, but rather a valid point just saying that Product X isn't necessarily perfect. That's when the fanboys start foaming at the mouth, break out the torches and pitchforks, and take to the streets like they're hunting down Frankenstein's monster.

While I'm all for fans supporting their "teams", there's a right way and a wrong way to go about it. Personally, I'm sick to death of seeing zealots proclaim their way as the only way. Here's a few newflashes, folks:

• Final Fantasy XII coming to the 360 in North America and Europe is NOT a "betrayal" by Square Enix targeting PlayStation fans ... it's smart business.
  
• If a Nintendo game has the words "Legend" and "Zelda" in its title, that doesn't automatically justify a 9-10 score.
  
• Namco isn't playing favorites by giving PS3/360 owners Vader/Yoda in Soul Calibur IV. Yoda = Xbox 360 = Green. Vader = PS3 = Black. And do you REALLY think there won't be downloadable content that'll ultimately bring balance to the Force on BOTH systems?
  
• While good games, neither Halo nor Gears reinvented the wheel in the FPS genre.
  
• The Wii is a fun system, but not really "next-gen".
  
• The PS3 hardware is a powerful system, but it's a royal bitch to program for.
  
• The Xbox 360 is easy to program for, but the hardware should have been built better.
  
• Consoles aren't killing the PC gaming market ... a lack of solid titles is killing it.
  
• Just because a game works on the PC doesn't mean it'll work on a console.
  
• Just because you slap a number and/or a subtitle on a game doesn't mean I feel like replaying the same old experience.
  
• Just because I don't agree with your viewpoint, it doesn't mean I shouldn't be doing my job. It's an opinion, people ... everyone's got one and they aren't always the same.

Okay ... I'm cutting this short, because I have a lot of work to get done, but there's going to be more about this subject soon.

Comic-Con overview

As you can tell from the lack of detailed entries, I haven't exactly had a lot of free time at the show. Between meetings, filming, more meetings, and more filming, I've barely stopped to breathe. Today, though, it all comes to an end for another year. Interesting stuff this time around, as I got to say hello again to Thomas Jane, met Simon Pegg, and today will be meeting with both Grant Morrison and Deepak Chopra. By the way folks, definitely check out the interview we did with Simon Pegg, Edgar Wright, and Jessica Hynes for Spaced. I fed a great little joke to Vic in there for Simon referencing both Star Trek and Hot Fuzz. If you know me, you've probably heard it already, but the reaction was absolutely priceless.

As I've already alluded to (isn't that just a great word? Alluded?), aside from filming, most of my time has been taken up in meetings at the show. Found out a metric ass ton of information on future projects, in video games, comics, and in film. I'll be spending most of the week following up with people and hope to be able to tease some of you with more details soon.

Anyway, I'll try to write some more about the show later today or over the week. Right now, I'm getting all packed up, as I check out of the hotel this morning before hitting the show. Then it's a red-eye from San Diego back to Jax, so I can start the work week off bright and early tomorrow. I can already tell, the first order of business will be a fresh pot o' coffee.

Before I go, though, here are a few quick bullet points:

• Heroes Season Three looks to be awesome
  
• Activision's Ghostbusters game is a LOT of fun once you get the hang of it.
  
• Konami's Rock Revolution? Not so revolutionary.
  
• Be sure to check out NECA's toy line soon. Fans will be absolutely "Rabbid" for what's in store.
  
• DC's line-up may look strongest right now, but Marvel may still have a few tricks up its sleeve next year.
  
• Hollywood has MORE than its share of geeks ... Kevin Spacey, Milo Ventimiglia, Dennis Miller, Sam Raimi ... that's right folks, screw the Skrulls, we're the REAL "Secret Invasion"

Anyway ... I need to wrap this up. Gotta finish packing and get ready to leave. As always, more to come.

Show pics

Comic-Con Preview Night

Here's just a taste of the pics from the Preview Night of Comic-Con. If my connection was more reliable, I'd have 'em all up ... but they will be up soon.



Meanwhile, I got a few things I wanted, since it'll be hectic during filming. And it only took two hours of waiting in a ridiculous press line.

The new phone ...

As many of you know, I'm a gadget whore. I LOVE me some gadgetry. Well, recently I decided I was due to replace my phone. Ye ol' Dash just wasn't cutting it much anymore. So, out I went on a quest for a good phone and damned if I didn't find one that got me all geeked out again ... the Nokia N95-3.

This little guy is fully packed with all sorts of goodies.

• 3G Support
  
• 5 megapixel camera
  
• Video recording at 640x480 @ 30fps
  
• FM Radio
  
• Built-in GPS
  
• Music player (MP3, WMA, RealAudio, SP-MIDI, AAC+, eAAC+, MIDI, AMR, and M4A)
  
• Video support (via built-in RealPlayer)
  
• TV out
  
• Built-in Wi-Fi
  
• Accelerometer
  
• MicroSD support for up to 4G
  

... and a whole lot of other fun stuff I'm learning everyday (video calls? really?)

Now, this thing was a royal bitch to get set up the way I wanted it. Emails, text messages, web support, and everything took a while to get tweaked, but I'm almost there. I also loaded fring for the first time on a phone. For those of you familiar with Trillian, it's a lot like Trillian, but for mobile phones. My AIM, ICQ, MSN, Skype, Yahoo, Google Talk, etc. are all together in one convenient package now. And look ... off to the right of this very page. It's a fring widget so you guys can see if I'm online and drop me a quick message if I am. Ooo ... ahhh

I'd love to go into more detail about this thing, as I'm like a kid in a candy store right now ... but I'm under the gun getting a metric ass ton of prep work done for Comic-Con (see previous blog entry). But I'll be playing with this and using as many features as I can.

More to come ...

Comic-Con '08 coming up

Woo hoo!! Another year, another Comic-Con. Actually, it's going to be a busy year this year. I'll be at Comic-Con again, producing a host of segments for Electric Playground. Comics. Video games. Movies. You name it ... I'll be covering it.

I've been setting up interviews for weeks now, and there's still a lot that I'll be doing on the fly. Also, thanks to the new phone (more on that later), I'll be adding all sorts of pictures and videos from the show. I'll be organizing a lot of the coverage that EP (and Greedy Productions as a whole), and if all goes as planned, I'll be running around w/ my own camera. You won't actually see me in front of the camera on the segments, but I'll be one of the guys with the mic. Also, it looks like I'll be doing some extra coverage for some of the other outlets. I'll keep you posted here.

End of line ...