Good news to all metal fans. Slipknot has announced that original founding member Donnie Steele to replace the late bassist Paul Gray. A statement from the band reads:
"Donnie was in the band at the very beginning, and rather than get an outsider we thought it would be a fitting tribute to Paul to play with someone from within the family. Donnie was great friends with Paul, and we can't think of a better way to celebrate his memory than with someone who was there with us at the very beginning. The eight of us are looking forward to being onstage again and honouring Paul's legacy."
Donnie Steele This is what Donnie looked like when he was in the band sometime in 1996 I reckon. Hopefully he will something a little more...easier on the eyes in the near future.
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I'm sure many of you have seen or heard many games that received numerous game of the year awards, included in several nominations and voted by fans to be the best of the best, but for some reason, you've never played them before so what are they? Here are some games that I've never ever played before in my life:
(P/S: Please ignore some of the underlines below. They're glitches and I'm not sure how to get rid of them.)
I grew up with Nintendo but for whatever reason, out of all the games Nintendo has provided us over the years, I never touched a Legend of Zelda game before and this is one of them. It still puzzles me as to why I missed such a great big series when growing up. I guess it's because Mario, Donkey Kong and Metroid looked a lot more fun than Zelda. Can't really say why. Just in recent years did I get to play the Legend of Zelda: A Link to The Past on the Game Boy Advance and began to take interest from then on. The other reason was probably because after the Super Nintendo era, I sort of stopped playing games for a few years and by the time I started playing them, I went to the Gamecube era and missed the Nintendo 64 and Dreamcast era entirely so that was why I missed playing Ocarina of Time.
It's been called the best Zelda game ever made, which makes me pissed. I can't believe I missed such a great game when it was first released. I could play it right now but the impact wouldn't be the same, so for now I'll just read the infamous Legend of Zelda timeline theory, which I heard it's very VERY confusing.
2. Castlevania Like I mentioned earlier in my previous post at the forums, I've never touched a Castlevania game before so if I would to dive into the series right now, I'd be totally lost in terms of learning its storyline and characters. Poor me.
3. Goldeneye 007 Like I said before, I missed the Nintendo 64 era and instead skipped to the other consoles like the PlayStation and Gamecube, so to hear people talking about it and you can't relate to their praises, that's just not cool. There's a new Goldeneye coming out for the Wii but I doubt it'll be the same experience.
4. Sonic The Hedgehog Never own a Sega console and never played a Sonic game before. I've no regrets.
5. Mega Man It's embarrassing to miss such a great franchise from Capcom but what can you do?
6. Lara Croft: Tomb Raider I admit: I love video game chicks and games that have chicks in them but as to why Lara Croft: Tomb Raider is never in my list, I have no idea. Maybe it's because the concept of seeing a tom boy with guns shooting wild animals and going to countless tombs endlessly searching for some old treasures is not my idea of fun.
This is perhaps the only series in this list that I have a choice to play but I choose not to. I'm not a big fan of sandbox games. I don't like games that gives you too much freedom and a choice to explore areas and the people around you. Sure, it's fun blasting pedestrians with big guns, ramming them with a car and scare them with your big money but they never appealed to me. I like my games to be straightforward: just kill the bad guys, complete a level and move on.
8. Battlefield Not much to say except that when this game came out, so was Counter-Strike (roughly) and when it did, I just sticked with Counter-Strike and didn't bother with Battlefield at all.
9. Ultima I'm not a big fan of RPG so is there anything for me to say about Ultima? No. However, I've heard that some of them are pretty good like Ultima V so maybe I'll pick that one up some day.
I have a whole lot more but let's just keep it at minimum. So there you have it. A big list that I'm not quite proud of. What big titles haven't you played before?
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It's a day early but I just want a give a quick shout out to the legendary game programmer, John Carmack, who was born on August 20, 1970. Happy 40th birthday, Master of Doom! It's also worth mentioning that Fred Durst, the singer of Limp Bizkit who everyone loves to hate, was also born on the exact same date as Carmack. Isn't that amazing? Two people born on the same day, month and year, and one is a gaming guru and the other is a foul-mouthed, Nu Metal tattooed vocalist. Also in our birthday list is H.P. Lovecraft, the most influential horror and science fiction author who is best known for his work on the Cthulhu Mythos. He was born on August 20, 1890.
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For those of you who were born tomorrow on August 20, consider yourself lucky and happy birthday to you too!
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I'm proud to own the first three Resident Evil games (1, 2 and 3: Nemesis) including 4 and 5- all PC versions. The first trilogy is rare and hard to find but I managed to get them (still in their original packaging) but with an expensive price. However, it was all worth it and I couldn't be anymore happier. The only problem is playing them. Since 1, 2 and Nemesis were made during the late 90s, making them to work on a latest computer will result to a lot of compatibility problems, especially the first one. Depending on the type of graphics card you have, sometimes the game will work and sometimes it doesn't.
I had a lot of problem getting the first Resident Evil to work because during the installation process, it asks us to choose which graphics card to use and if you choose to wrong one, it'll result to a lot of complications such as audio problems, graphic glitches, and show stoppers. I did manage to install the game successfully on my Sony Vaio laptop and I was able to finish the game without any problems but when I tried playing it on my Dell desktop, it doesn't work.
2 and 3: Nemesis worked well but 2 seems to have problem with the saving system. 4 and 5 of course have no compatibility problems whatsoever since they're the most recent games to come. Once again, I'm very pleased to own all five Resident Evil games PC version but then I realized one game is missing: Code Veronica X, which is the only canon RE game that was not ported to the PC and it makes you wonder, why not? If they port all the other games to PC, why not Code Veronica X?
If there's one I wish Capcom would grant me is to port Code: Veronica X to the PC and make a compilation of all six Resident Evil games into one through retail or through Steam. And it's Windows XP compatible. That'll be awesome. Ok I know, that was two wishes but what the heck?
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Mainstream music nowadays is so boring and dull. They lack soul, meaning and good beats. Now it's all about money, fame, sex and gangsta wannabes. Today's music is dominated by all these clubbing and R&B artists, and they suck. I hate them. I basically stopped listening to the radio a few years ago because all I hear are just utter nonsense. Same goes with music videos. All I see on MTV are artists dressing like prostitutes, club scenes, sex scenes and again gangsta wannabes. It's just so revolting to look at. I mean, I'm fine with having sexy scenes on music videos because who won't want to see them...but there's a limit to it. And they say video games are bad for the kids.
What happened to all the alternative and rock bands? I don't see them or hear them anymore. They've suddenly gone underground as they are dominated by these foolish genre. At least that's how I see it. Last time there was Rage Against The Machine, Limp Bizkit, Korn, Three Doors Down, Evanescence, Red Hot Chili Peppers, Staind, Green Day, Sum 41, etc. Even though most of them haven't been active in terms of making new albums, what about the new rock artists? I'm sure they've been wanting to release some new rock tunes of their own but they can't because today's music is dominating the ring, making the rock genre fall on deaf ears. Does that make me only a heavy metal and rock enthusiast? No, not true at all. I'm a universal listener because I grew up listening to all kinds of music ranging from pop, dance, hip-hop, techno, classical, oldies, even R&B's. Toni Braxton, Boyz II Men, 2Pac, Coolio, Mariah Carey, Whitney Houston. They were all great when suddenly the genre slowly turned sour and the music became souless and meaningless.
So what do I do know? I go back to basic. Over the past few years I've been listening to old music ranging from the 60's until the late 90's such as Bob Dylan, Led Zeppelin, Duran Duran, Pink Floyd, Abba, Run-DMC, Beastie Boys, Ace of Base, AC/DC, The Beatles, Three Dog Night, The Police, etc. I never thought I'd be doing it but it felt really good. I find 80s and 90s boy bands to be more relaxing and fun to listen to than today's garbage. Oh, and let's not forget video game soundtracks. Akira Yamaoka, Masafumi Takada, Frank Klepacki, Koji Kondo, Nobuo Uematsu; they're simply the best.
It is with deep regret that I have been informed that Slipknot bassist Paul Gray has passed away today on the 24th of May. The cause of his death is yet to be revealed, which I am eager to find out real soon. He was only 38 years old. Slipknot has been a part of my life since their debut in 1999. Their music, energy, and image are truly inspirational to me and have affected my life in positive ways and I owe them for that. Even though regular musicians can’t appreciate his low end bass sounds due to the heaviness of their songs, we “maggots” are fully aware that without Paul, there can be no Slipknot.
I am not certain what will happen to Slipknot because the band members have quoted a few times saying that if one of them leaves the band or due to natural causes, Slipknot will be disbanded. No compromise. If they stay true to their word, then I have no choice but to respect their wishes. To Corey, Mick, Clown, 133, James, Chris, Joey, Sid and Paul’s family members, you have our deepest condolences.
This is something I've been thinking to myself: which games have the best shotgun ever? It can be pretty difficult to answer that question since everyone has their own experience with different games and we all have our own taste of what a real boomstick should be.
This is my personal pick:
Boom, baby!
Doom: What can I say? the shotgun from the original Doom is the best. No matter if the enemy is near or far, nothing can stand in the way of this shotgun. It's just so satisfying to pump those shells all around you without having to worry about reloading.
The House of The Dead III: Believe it or not, I think HoTD3's shotgun is mind-blasting because it's so fast-paced and powerful. The reload time is really fast and you can shoot hordes of zombies from every angle and distance.
Quake II: While the shotgun may not look that strong but once you actually start using it, it immediately becomes your best friend. One blast results to enemies being blown into chunks. I love this shotgun.
Left 4 Dead: It's a tough call but between Left 4 Dead 1 and 2, I would say that the first Left 4 Dead has the best shotgun. It's range is simply out of this world.
I admit, video game chicks rock and Rachel from the Ninja Gaiden series is no exception. Rachel is my favorite video game chick with Kasumi and Mai Shiranui being second and third respectively and for good reasons. She’s strong, voluptous, sensitive and simply hot! That being said, a japanese toy company called Kotobukiya made a few Ninja Gaiden figures to complement with the XBOX title way back in 2004 and Rachel was one of them.
I’ve been wanting to own this figure for so long but for some reason, this particular Rachel figure is extremely rare and it only makes a brief appearance on eBay and Amazon. I did find this guy from Japan on eBay the other day who was selling this figure but I declined the purchase because I found it to be quite expensive. I tried bargaining with the guy but he refused. Sadly, the bidding ended a few weeks later and what was left were some unpainted Rachel figures from Thailand. No offense to the Thai people but come on, who the hell wants to second-hand paint job?
If anyone is planning to sell this gorgeous Rachel figure or knows anyone who’s doing the same thing, please don’t hesitate to contact me. I must have it for my collection! The least I can do for now is to watch this cutscene of her from Ninja Gaiden Sigma 2. Sigh!
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