I'm assuming we have at least a few wrestling fans around here.  Sure, it's not near as entertaining as it was a decade ago, but I still watch it.  And for the last couple months, we've had a rebirth of the Monday Night Wars that made wrestling so great in the mid-to-late 90's.  So far though, it's not really living up to the hype.  TNA isn't getting anywhere near the ratings WWE is, and I don't think anyone expected them to do so.  Personally, I'm not completely sure I like the Hogan-ized TNA, but it's at least better than what TNA was the last year or so.  There was a time (about 3-4 years ago) that TNA was incredible, but thanks in part to Vince Russo, it had declined pretty far.  How many god damn "_____ on a Pole" matches can you have? 
 
Anyway, thankfully we have DVR's now.  I remember being in highschool with two TV's set up in my room with a cable splitter, often with a group of friends, all of us trying to watch both shows simultaneously.  It sounds ridiculous.  And it was.  But it was pretty damn fun and made a lot of great memories. 
 
Tonight is the WWE Draft, which is always interesting, as ever since the brand extension, the roster has been split.  There have been periods where the "exclusivity" of particular wrestlers to RAW, SmackDown, or ECW has been loosely defined, but who is on what show is pretty important to what storylines are available.  I was actually at the draft episode last year in Atlanta. 
 
So far it's still early, but we've had new tag team champions crowned.  Kelly Kelly has been drafted to SmackDown.  And just a moment ago, The Big Show got drafted to SmackDown.  I think Show gets drafted every year.  Or at least it seems that way. 
 
So, anyone else got any opinions on the current state of wrestling?

Funny how we have new quests going up to the site and I have 13 people on my friends list online.  Looks like everyone's having a good time with the system.  Some of the mod-related ones are pretty interesting.  I haven't received any bribes yet, which is nice. =) 
 
I can't wait til the next wave of mod quests go out though.  Those are gonna be fun to watch.

As if there was any doubt, Al Pacino was pretty incredible in HBO's Dr. Kevorkian movie.  Regardless of your views on "Dr. Death," I highly recommend watching it if you've got HBO.  i'm sure they'll be showing it repeatedly.  And John Goodman never disappoints (see previous blog entry).

Just about every single time HBO announces some new original series, my first reaction is "ehh, I don't know..."  Then, like clockwork, I end up watching it and getting hooked immediately.  Treme started out kinda slow, but by the end of the first episode I knew I'd be watching the whole season.  David Simon seems to be well on his way to painting a portrait of New Orleans in the same way he did with Baltimore in The WIre.  And much like other new HBO series, there's a great cast of HBO veterans like Kim Dickens, Wendell Pierce, and Clarke Peters.  Then there's the addition of Steve Zahn and John Goodman. 
 
So, maybe this time I'll learn my lesson.

So... this new furniture.  I knew I didn't have a whole lot of room, so I had them deliver it in stages.  The second piece isn't due til next Thursday, but it's clearly not going to fit.  What I've got of the new stuff looks nice though.  I just have to get rid of this old, bulky, brown, oversized chair that fucks up my back on a daily basis.  It doesn't match and it's just in the way.  My Animal Crossing self would be highly disappointed.  I think I'm going to go back to the store this weekend, cancel the incoming couch and just get a smaller recliner to cap this expenditure off.

So I bought some new furniture a few weeks ago and scheduled it for delivery today.  Rooms To Go called a couple days ago to confirm my info and tell me that they would be here between 12 noon and 4:00 pm.  I was hoping they'd get here early so I'd have time to arrange everything and put stuff back on the walls (mainly my newly framed, signed Marino jersey).  But now it's kinda late to get started doing that stuff since I've gotta be at work at 7:30am tomorrow.  Oh well, guess I've got a weekend project.

I know this isn't exactly news, but has anyone else come to the realization that Amazon is likely the best means for buying new games?  Just last week I purchased Splinter Cell: Conviction (Collector's Edition) for Xbox 360.  The price was originally $79.99 when I ordered it.  The price dropped right as it shipped, and Amazon automatically credited me the $10 back.  Also, "release day delivery" was free.  So let's break it down.  I got the game for a discounted price, delivered to my door Tuesday morning, never had to leave the house (to reserve it or buy it), and paid no taxes.  Why the hell would I ever want to go to GameStop again? 
 
On top of that, Amazon is constantly offering gift cards for pre-ordering games.  I'm currently slated to get back $50 in Amazon credit just for pre-ordering and purchasing Super Mario Galaxy 2, Super Street Fighter IV, Crackdown 2, and Halo Reach.  So, in addition to having the games brought to my door on the day of release for the same price (or less in some cases) that I would pay at retail, Amazon is actually giving me money back just for doing business with them.
 
Again, I ask.  Why the hell would I want to go to GameStop or any other retailer at this point? 
 
I've been buying most of my games in this manner for a while now, but I just thought it had to be said.  Anyway, thanks Amazon.

So over the last couple days I've been adding some reviews to the site that I wrote five or six years ago.  It's pretty weird reading through them again.  Some of them stand up pretty well, while I think some are pretty mediocre and long-winded.  The funny part is the references I use that are so completely outdated now that I had to add disclaimers to the bottom of the reviews.  I mean, who the hell is going to compare a game's original score to Advent Rising?  Tommy Tallarico's awesome, sure, but I'm pretty sure no one even remembers the best part of that game. 
 
Anyway, I think I've got 80 or so that I wrote.  So it'll take a long time to add them all, reformat it, and apply pictures.  Pasting stuff into the review editor is pretty wonky, even from Notepad. 
 
I've added some GBA and GameCube reviews so far, which you can check out here: http://www.giantbomb.com/profile/marino/reviews/

Before the Giant Bomb Xboxalypse celebration started last night, I threw Burnout 3 into the 360 and much to my surprise, there were several people playing.  Man, I really miss that game.  I miss the old Burnout games in general.  Paradise was great in its own way, but I hope they get back to something similar to Takedown or Revenge.  But if the rumors are true, and Criterion is working on an SSX game, I'll take that before a new Burnout any day.  And hey, we get more DJ Atomika either way! 
 
Then we tried out some Crimson Skies.  Still had 95% of the people playing as the Devastator.  Personally, I always used the Coyote.  The fireball worked well for me.  I have to agree with Ryan and Dave on the idea of Microsoft doing an new XBLA version of the game. 
 
Lastly, even though I was never really a huge fan of the game, we had to try out the ol' Halo 2.  I didn't know most of the maps, and got completely owned most of the time, but it was still fun.  Even though I hadn't played any of these games in years, it's kinda sad to think I'll never have the option of playing them online again.

Well, I was on a quest of eradicating all the useless collector's/gold/limited editions from the site.  Now I'm joining everyone else in this ridiculously awesome new feature to the site.  I'll get back to my own task later, but this is pretty damn cool.  The staff has really outdone themselves this time. 
 
Anyway, I'm gonna get back to making sure people aren't spoiling how to get the limited edition quest!