Saturday, December 20, 2003
Back to the 80s
I really don't know what bit me last night, but I suddenly had this nostalgic search for some 80s music. Yeah, I know for alot of people, and even some sectors of the music industry, the 80s were a strange moment in music history. I mean, these were the times when hairbands were the in things; all you could hear are cheesy electronica-laid pop-rock, Jane Fonda-ish tights are the hip fashion statements and Kyle Minogue was still dancing the locomotion. Well for me, I got the sort of unconscious icon; most of us know his songs, but didn't bother to know who he was: Rick Astley. Yeah, I was searching for him in the Kazaa network the other night. Luckily though, I did land with some of the popular songs he had back in the late 80s. I'm not really sure what circa of the 80s was his time, but he was quite influential to those people's hayday.
I really don't know what bit me last night, but I suddenly had this nostalgic search for some 80s music. Yeah, I know for alot of people, and even some sectors of the music industry, the 80s were a strange moment in music history. I mean, these were the times when hairbands were the in things; all you could hear are cheesy electronica-laid pop-rock, Jane Fonda-ish tights are the hip fashion statements and Kyle Minogue was still dancing the locomotion. Well for me, I got the sort of unconscious icon; most of us know his songs, but didn't bother to know who he was: Rick Astley. Yeah, I was searching for him in the Kazaa network the other night. Luckily though, I did land with some of the popular songs he had back in the late 80s. I'm not really sure what circa of the 80s was his time, but he was quite influential to those people's hayday.
Tuesday, December 16, 2003
The real deal with Nintendo
Been trying to convince myself out of procrastination and write something in my blog. Quite a bit of things happened within 6 days of not writing. Well, I was supposed to start things off with a comment on a recent Time article I read about Nintendo almost at the end of their rope battling it off in the console wars between Microsoft and Sony. The article went on saying that Nintendo is pretty much the underdog among the three, while they struggle with Microsoft for the #2 spot in the video game industry. Unfortunately, going head-to-head with Sony is the definite no-no; the consumer giant has a griplock of 74% with the PS2, while Microsoft and Nintendo half the rest in between with 13% each. Nintendo has been banking pretty much on the younger generation with their long-running titles of Mario, Pokemon and Zelda. Unfortunately, such franchises can't last for that long, despite the fact that it has worked for Nintendo for almost 2 decades. They once ruled the market with Sega (who eventually discontinued their console development with the Dreamcast), but tides seem to be against them unless they could come up with something great. Production was stopped for the Gamecube because of their production glut, and had to make drastic price slashes in order to jack up sales over this holiday season. Despite their longetivity in the market, their size isn't match for Microsoft and Sony who could take a good whipping in the financial red first before seeing the daylight of profits. On the brighter side, Nintendo does currently rule the handhelds with Gameboy Advance despite upcoming threats from mobile phone manufacturers turning their phones into gaming consoles as well, instantly converting users. I find that unlikely though, since most of the games embedded into the phone. Although defined the same way as games, the format doesn't seem to match the one the video game industry is patterned after. Mobile phone companies would have to reformat the way they push for game development for their phones if they would want a piece of the handheld market. As far as I could see, they don't really have strong push for 3rd party developers to actually write deep games for their phones. Unlike you'd really want to see a small-screen version of Finaly Fantasy Tactics.
I keep an XBOX in the house for most of my gaming leisure. Why? For one, it's Microsoft. One way or the other, I have been influenced with my experience as an MVP and in Academic .NET (see Stan! I added a space!). And it's a nice platform to work in. Imagine, just having Direct X and Visual Studio, and you're all set to make games!
Saddam Captured
Well, I thought Nintendo's woes were my personal headlines of the evening, until I watched BBC in Rachel's apartment the other night. It was quite a shocker for the world to see Saddam all bearded and dirty while he was being examined by a US military doctor. I really don't hold much opinion against / for this issue, I guess it's just a thing to reflect on America's role as the world's police against terrorism. It is a good reason to celebrate this time around and rally around this capture, but all this media hype makes us forget that the one reason why they invaded Iraq was to look for weapons of mass destruction, only to find nothing. Then the rhetoric went on saying that it's for the liberation of Iraq against the regime of Saddam Hussein for what? Perhaps to cover up the blunder they assumed in the first place. I'm not against this entire thing actually. I'm not a big fan of Saddam, if you ask me, but whether the ends of such issues are right, we just have to place ourselves within right bounds. I wonder how willl the aftermath of this capture would turn out... for or against the US?
Been trying to convince myself out of procrastination and write something in my blog. Quite a bit of things happened within 6 days of not writing. Well, I was supposed to start things off with a comment on a recent Time article I read about Nintendo almost at the end of their rope battling it off in the console wars between Microsoft and Sony. The article went on saying that Nintendo is pretty much the underdog among the three, while they struggle with Microsoft for the #2 spot in the video game industry. Unfortunately, going head-to-head with Sony is the definite no-no; the consumer giant has a griplock of 74% with the PS2, while Microsoft and Nintendo half the rest in between with 13% each. Nintendo has been banking pretty much on the younger generation with their long-running titles of Mario, Pokemon and Zelda. Unfortunately, such franchises can't last for that long, despite the fact that it has worked for Nintendo for almost 2 decades. They once ruled the market with Sega (who eventually discontinued their console development with the Dreamcast), but tides seem to be against them unless they could come up with something great. Production was stopped for the Gamecube because of their production glut, and had to make drastic price slashes in order to jack up sales over this holiday season. Despite their longetivity in the market, their size isn't match for Microsoft and Sony who could take a good whipping in the financial red first before seeing the daylight of profits. On the brighter side, Nintendo does currently rule the handhelds with Gameboy Advance despite upcoming threats from mobile phone manufacturers turning their phones into gaming consoles as well, instantly converting users. I find that unlikely though, since most of the games embedded into the phone. Although defined the same way as games, the format doesn't seem to match the one the video game industry is patterned after. Mobile phone companies would have to reformat the way they push for game development for their phones if they would want a piece of the handheld market. As far as I could see, they don't really have strong push for 3rd party developers to actually write deep games for their phones. Unlike you'd really want to see a small-screen version of Finaly Fantasy Tactics.
I keep an XBOX in the house for most of my gaming leisure. Why? For one, it's Microsoft. One way or the other, I have been influenced with my experience as an MVP and in Academic .NET (see Stan! I added a space!). And it's a nice platform to work in. Imagine, just having Direct X and Visual Studio, and you're all set to make games!
Saddam Captured
Well, I thought Nintendo's woes were my personal headlines of the evening, until I watched BBC in Rachel's apartment the other night. It was quite a shocker for the world to see Saddam all bearded and dirty while he was being examined by a US military doctor. I really don't hold much opinion against / for this issue, I guess it's just a thing to reflect on America's role as the world's police against terrorism. It is a good reason to celebrate this time around and rally around this capture, but all this media hype makes us forget that the one reason why they invaded Iraq was to look for weapons of mass destruction, only to find nothing. Then the rhetoric went on saying that it's for the liberation of Iraq against the regime of Saddam Hussein for what? Perhaps to cover up the blunder they assumed in the first place. I'm not against this entire thing actually. I'm not a big fan of Saddam, if you ask me, but whether the ends of such issues are right, we just have to place ourselves within right bounds. I wonder how willl the aftermath of this capture would turn out... for or against the US?
