My impressions of the third episode of the second season:

A big WTF. Just WTF were you thinking, JMS? I am completely amazed at this episode. No, not because Kang was a techno mage. Yes, a techno mage, these things apparently exist. Not like the dude Teknoman from the UPN cartoon. A techno mage, sorta like a ripoff of a ComStar adept I guess? Whatever, that was fine...

What was not fine was the terrible CGI they used to create this.. big ogre-like creature in the techno mage's dwelling. That was uh, pretty fucking awful. I dunno why they didn't just keep it shrouded in the shadows, that would've given us an impression of a big threatening hulk instead of showing us this really poor CGI creation that looked like something from Poser. A really early edition of Poser.

The real meat of this episode was the Drazi. The motherfucking Drazi with their idiotic green and purple ribbons. This is what we're supposed to be entertained by? Fucking Drazi fighting over two colors? Wow... way to treat your audience like children, JMS. This is humor that 6 year olds might find funny in a cartoon show. But... from what I've read, Babylon 5 is supposed to be some sort of deep, adult drama that happens to be set in a scifi universe? Did I get that right? From the man himself:

"Once I had the locale, I began to populate it with characters, and sketch out directions that might be interesting. I dragged out my notes on religion, philosophy, history, sociology, psychology, science (the ones that didn't make my head explode), and started stitching together a crazy quilt pattern that eventually formed a picture."

Really? So this gritty adult take on the human condition, cobbled together with your ponderings on weighty issues like religion, philosophy, sociology, and science... it's to give us scenes of idiot Drazi killing each other because of green or purple ribbons? Wow dude... just wow. I dunno what you're smoking, but it's something awful strong. This... this is just mindboggling. Why, why would you sabotage your own apparent magnum opus with this childish bullshit? Why subject us, the viewers, to this imbecilic display of vapid nonsense? Please... for the love of God, don't write anymore episodes like this. Drama is good, science and politics are good... aliens who wage war for colors and then follow the person who snatches a leader ribbon from the leader... that's fucking horrible and awful and BAD.

BTW, did anyone notice if those crutches Ivanova used were standard medical crutches, or were they made to look like futuristic scifi crutches?

Episode 1x4 - Blitzkrieg

"Since its conception, the Neosapien race has lived under the oppressive rule of a homo sapien regime. Forced to work and serve as slave labor, only to benefit Terran objectives. Today marks the beginning of a new and enlightened era and the history of your kind comes to an end. The future now belongs to Neosapiens. You as the representatives of the Terran Homeworlds must accept this reality. Your unconditional surrender to us, to me, is now a fact.
History will record the inevitability of your decision. Any form of human resistance will be met with immediate extermination. The tables have turned and now you, Terrans, will serve the Neosapien Commonwealth. And I, Phaeton, am now your leader. I now hereby declare this assembly dissolved, as your services are no longer required." -Phaeton

Episode 1x12 - Betrayal

"Been through? Been through?! You Terrans have never seen your brood mates sold, beaten, mistreated, treated as cattle and worse. Created as slaves, but with a will to be free. Forced to work, to suffer, to die in horrible conditions for Terran greed. Denied even the right to speak up against such tyranny. This is what I've been through. Speak not to me of loyalty. I am a Neo sapien. Created by Terrans, feared by Terrans, abused by Terrans, but no more! My place is with Phaeton, and yours is in extinction." -Marsala

Were any of the earlier Total War games buggy? Cause Empire Total War seems to be really really buggy, apparently their forum's been in quite an uproar over all the stability and AI issues. Creative Assembly did get bought by Sega. Perhaps that's had something to do with the recent drop in quality and polish. I just think it's pretty awful that the game got reviews of 9s and 9.5s when there were these stability issues. Just one more reason game reviews are increasingly irrelevant.

I don't really accept that because it's a pc game rather then a console game, we the consumers should put up with buggy releases. It's just not right. And sure, older games used to need patching too, but there's a huge difference from patching in a weird wall texture or a minor AI bug, to games just crashing at startup, or crashing to desktop once an hour.

And I do think a game can be profitably finished. People are much more likely to buy a game that they know is stable and will run well then one that's unoptimized and prone to crashing. See, that's part of the reason why so many people pirate games nowadays. Part of it's because it's simply not fun to buy a 50 dollar disc that doesn't run well, and no game store these days let's you return an opened game.

The whole reason PC games are so buggy compared to consoles is because of the plethora of hardware combinations. Well, I think the hardware people need to talk to the software people... form some sort of alliance, get some sort of standardization going. They both need each other. Nvidia and ATI create cards because of gamers playing new games. Game developers can't create new games without the better hardware. They depend on each other and they need to fucking get their shit together or PC gaming's just going to die.

I think a big part of the problem is that now games are a big business and the head honchos want to pump out at least one title every year to appease the shareholders. Whereas back in the old days, games were still a pretty small market and we were used to waiting a few years for a particular game to get developed.

Really, I wonder how long FreeSpace 2's development cycle was. Cause if ever there was a game that was perfectly polished and stable on launch, that's the one I'd point to. It got one patch, but I think that was just correcting some minor multiplayer issues.

Superman TAS was so goddamn weak. Like, there was this one episode where a helicopter with a minigun gave him a lot of trouble. Absolutely retarded.

You know, I wasn't crazy about JLU, mostly because they totally butchered Hawkman, but I always wanted to see them do "Identity Crisis." That sort of story would've been perfect for that format.

Season 4 of Batman TAS sucked ass. All the art looked worse then before because Bruce Timm decided to simplify the animation style, and Batman went from being a grim badass to just being an insufferable jackass. Avoid it like the plague.

Doomsday in the DCAU is not Doomsday. Doomsday in the comics killed Superman. Doomsday in the DCAU got fucking lobotomized by Serious Superman. Lawl. Utter fail.

Unless Serious Superman from the parallel dimension took the equivalent of Kryptonian steroids or something, there's no way that he could use just his heat vision to lobotomize something like Doomsday. It's moronic.

And no, I don't particularly care about Doomsday, but they royally fucked him up in that episode. Dini and co have a pretty good batting average with their body of work, and some ideas are certainly better then what the comics had (Heart of Ice, etc) but they lay some stinkers too. I'm more then happy to point them out.

In fact, the entire Justice Lords story was ridiculous. I mean, I like Wally West as much as the next guy, but his death causes the entire JLA to turn into a bunch of fascist super-dictators? Really? Cmon, you couldn't even convince most of fandom that the destruction of an entire city on some coast would turn a hero into a villain, the death of a Flash ain't gonna do it.

So yea... apparently Gas Powered Games and Stardock released a game without any DRM at all called Demigod. Unfortunately, it was pirated quite extensively and a quirk in the game's multiplayer mechanic led to all the pirated copies flooding the Stardock servers, leading to a release week with a game being virtually unplayable online. They've since patched it and fixed the issues, but obviously this is a pretty huge blow for Stardock, which has a good policy of not using any DRM on their games.

I think there are several problems with PC games and piracy right now. Not gonna go into the whole issue of torrents and the availability of warez since that's quite obvious...

First of all, many games now don't release demos beforehand for their games. That's just shooting yourself in the foot, as far as I'm concerned. With the rather draconian return policies for PC games nowadays, you can't really return anything that's been opened. Demos are needed for people to find out if their computer can run the damn thing. And of course, they're also great for helping gamers decide if the product itself is worth buying. 50 bucks is a lot to just spend on a gut feeling. If demos aren't available and people are stuck on the fence about a game, it's easy to be tempted by piracy.

GPG and Stardock had a pretty high hill to climb in order to sell this game to the consumers. First, they had to convince all the DotA fans if this 40 dollar commercial product was a worthy successor to their free Warcraft 3 mod. That's not gonna be easy. Then they had to convince all the other gamers who had never even heard of DotA that this was a fun experience. People don't just spend 40 dollars on a new IP based on some weird Warcraft 3 mod, with cover art that looks like some sort of Supreme Commander clone. They're gonna save their money, especially in this economy, for something familiar and reliable, something they know will be quality. That's gonna be something by either Blizzard, or Valve, or Relic. Not something quirky and new. They needed a demo, at the very least.

Now, the fact that it's a primarily multiplayer game should've led to higher sales. Games with multiplayer are inevitably seen as a better value and more gamers are willing to pay for a game that contains a good singleplayer component as well as multiplayer. You get more mileage for your buck, it's as simple as that. Whereas with some games that just contain a 6-8 hour singleplayer campaign with little replay value, it's harder to justify a 50 dollar purchase. That's about 7 dollars per hour. Prince of Persia and Mirror's Edge come to mind as examples. Don't get me wrong, I enjoyed both of those titles a lot as well-crafted experiences, but they were clearly a lot shorter then something like Dawn of War 2, which can last you about 15 hours for singleplayer and a few months or even years in multiplayer. I think in the future, there should probably be more of a variable pricing scheme for publishers. 30-40 dollars or so for games with quick singleplayer experiences, while the big titles with multiplayer like Call of Duty and so on go with 60 dollar price points. I mean, can you imagine how many more people would've actually given PoP and Mirror's Edge a try if they were priced at 30 dollars rather then the actual 50? Those were great innovative titles, but again the short playtime just didn't make it worthwhile for most.

Holy God, the cocoon's leaking some nasty liquid. Now I'm posivitely certain the Minbari aren't gonna get their security deposit back, that is just unsanitary...

Londo doesn't seem to like G'Kar's people. There seems to be shenanigans afoot. Ya know, it kinda reminds me of a similar relationship, between the Cardassians and the Bajorans. That was another show that took place aboard a space station. Fancy that, what a coincidence.

And the actor who plays Morden... he's really really good at being smug. Smugness, it must've been one of the qualities listed on his resume. It's sort of a smarmy smugness. Smug mixed with smarmness? Anyways, he's amazing at it.

Wow, Delenn's now a cross between Palpatine and the Elephant Man. And gained the rare skin condition of Killer Croc. That's not an attractive feature.

Hmmmm, transferring one's life-force energy to another? How the hell do these actors keep a straight face while delivering these lines? I certainly can't, I've just been laughing along.

Wow, they sure like keeping a close up shot on Garibaldi's nostrils.

Fuck, I can't believe half of this episode is about Sheridan talking to his goddamn sister, who's played by this terribly wooden actress. And what do they talk about? His dead wife. This is exhilarating stuff, guys. Keep up the good work!

This actress playing the sister truly is horrible though. Not all that attractive either. This episode is the pits so far.

Is that a nicotrol patch on Sheridan's hand?

"I just didn't want her to go without telling her I loved her... one last time." Wow... could you be anymore cliched? Who wrote this fucking dialogue?

Wow Doctor, haven't you ever heard you're not supposed to pick at scabs? Delenn really needs some moisturizer... in a 5 gallon container. What are you? Well, right now you're pretty butt ugly, that's what you are. But don't worry, I'm sure there's some sort of parable about an ugly duckling that's lurking around somewhere in this script.

Why that wacky Londo, so sneaky and treacherous. Of course it's a good idea to tell Morden about the ship going to Za Ha Doom, it's not like Morden works for the Shadows or anything. And G'Kar... what a trusting guy to inform Londo. You seriously didn't have to tell him the exact time the scout ship was jumping in, that's just stupid.

Woot, it's that hot CNN anchorwoman, only here she's some psychic.

Wow, that was actually a nice scene. Found out about the unknown assassin and caught him with the hijinks of Butterfly Delenn.

Hmmmm... President Clark just happens to want the suspected assassin and all the evidence turned over to him at once. This isn't suspicious in the least.

"It's a trap!" Wow, those Shivan lasers are pretty powerful. Or the Narn ship is really fucking weak.

Jeez, Delenn... could you be anymore dramatic? Who walks around with a hood completely covering their face? What, did she just talk to the council chamber by looking at the floor?

So she has hair now? Really? That's the big transformation? Some hair on her head? Someone should've just gotten her a membership to The Hair Club for Men, and saved the whole being-inside-an-icky-cocoon.

Huh. Apparently... Sheridan's wife was Tasha Yar's sister. Small world. And uh, what's with the poor quality of Babylon 5's monitors? They're all fuzzy and the color looks bad.

Well, started watching the second season of Babylon 5. Friend of mine said it was really good, so I said whatever, I'll give it a try. Started with the first episode "Points of Departure." That was the name of a custom FreeSpace 2 mission, now that I think about it. Pretty good one too, full of dogfights. Hopefully this isn't too bad.

Great... I start watching Season 2 and already Delenn's in a weird-looking cocoon. I wonder if you lose the security deposit on your apartment if you construct a cocoon inside?

The CGI's just how I remembered it, shit-tastic.

That's kinda humiliating... winning a war because the other side surrendered, even though they won every battle.

So... his brilliant strategy that led to the only victory in the war was... a minefield? Really? Wow. Do they call it the Sheridan Maneuver? It's just so innovative and daring. *rolls eyes*

So the Minbari are way ahead of the humans in technology, but their sensors can't detect a minefield? I think I'm trying pretty hard to like this show. But when something like that comes out, it's hard to suspend one's disbelief.

I would suspect that a race advanced enough to possess interstellar travel would have some sort of sensors to detect crude human fusion mines. Specially since they have a lot of other nifty tech like stealth fields.

And of course, it's not just that. If all you need to do is lay some minefields, why was this the only time a Minbari ship suffered a defeat? What were all the other earth ships doing during the way? Was the Lexington the only one that had fusion mines? Considering this is the single human victory in a war of total extermination, the actual Sheridan Maneuver is just wholly underwhelming.

Oh God, the CGI of that restaurant is fucking terrible. What the hell were they smoking when they came up with that?

It ends with him reading that boring speech in front of nobody? Fuck. Facepalm x100.