For the past 2 months, we have been reviewing 2011 and previewing 2012 over at our blog. We put a lot of planning and work into these shows and now they are all online. We did our predictions and resolutions for 2012 (for the resolutions show we picked wrestlers for each company/brand and picked one thing that they should focus on for the upcoming year). We also have the Best Of award show (The Shooties) and the Worst Of award show (The Colies).

So ya, just thought you Duders might be interested in what my show has been up to for the past month. Thanks for the support and let me know what you think.

Worst Of (The Colies)

Best Of (The Shooties)

Resolutions

Predictions

We are also on iTunes, just search for Shooting From The Hip.

It seems to me like the contrarian has taken the place of the fanboy from last generation. While we still get fanboys, I see many more people who seem to hate things because it seems like so many more like them. If I had never played a game before and decided to jump headfirst into it, and I came online, trying to use review scores and user reviews as a baises of what to buy (not sales numbers), I would think reviewers are crazy. I mean look at these metacritic scores 
 
MW2: Critics: 94 out of 100 Users: 60 out of 100 
 
GTA 4: Critics: 98 out of 100 Users: 70 out of 100 
 
Halo Reach: Critics: 92 out of 100 Users: 72 out of 100 
 
Halo 3: Critics: 94 out of 100 Users: 75 out of 100 
 
But look at these, this is where is gets real weird 
 
R.U.S.E: Critics: 77 out of 100 Users: 84 out of 100 
 
The Saboteur: Critics: 73 out of 100 Users: 86 out of 100 
 
Army of Two: Critics: 72 out of 100 Users: 83 out of 100  
 
 
I know metacritic is not the end all be all of ratings, and really, these numbers are based on a number of different factors, but they are still interesting. R.U.S.E. better than GTA: 4? Army of Two better than Halo 3? The Saboteur better than MW2? On top of that, we have the contrarian critics. In film these type of critics (like Armond White) are considered a joke. This generation, it seems as if we celebrate game critics like this (take Yahtzee or Jim Sterling for example). Other critics are guilty of this too. How many podcasts have you listened to or blog posts have you read where a reviewer sounded as if he didn't like a game he gave a good review to? 
  
I do not want to come off like I am trying to discourage people from having their own opinions, and I do understand that, well, haters gotta hate, but I am starting to believe that some people are annoyed by all things popular and that unfortunately affects peoples opinions the same way envy affected the fanboy culture of last generation.     

And I can't seem to sleep because of these damn quests. Anyone else having this issue? Damn you Giant Bomb!

King's Quest, 'nuff said.

So for my first blog post, I want to relate a story I went through last night, one most of us 360 owners have gone through. The dreaded support call.

I am on my second box, and this box has been "fixed" once, so this is my 3rd time sending it in. I was getting the disc unreadable error for almost every game (same thing that happen last time). So I call and after being on the phone for 45 minutes, they tell me it will cost $75 to get it fixed which pissed me off to no end since they never really fixed the problem the first time.

So I wondered what would happen if I said I got the 3 lights. I came on here, asked around and decided I was gonna try it. So I go fire up my system and low and behold, 3 red lights. So I call up my good friend Max (the automated MS help thing) and skip the steps by saying agent. I get "James" and start going through the steps. This is where things get weird. After unplugging it and plugging it back in, my system won't even turn on. I tell "James" and he actually laughed and fucking hung up on me.

So I call again, go through all the shit, and finally get "Erica" on the line. I tell her whats what and she keeps asking if I am getting the lights right now. i explain to her that I can't get the lights on a system that won't even turn on. She processed it as a power supply problem and asked me for $100 to get it fixed. I kindly explained to "Erica" that I had 3 lights, and she then asked my if I see the lights now, to which I said no because the system doesn't even turn on at this point. She again asks for $100. At this point I start getting angry and tell her the entire ordeal I have gone through. "Erica" puts me on hold. When she comes back, she says it will be fixed for free.


So the morale of this story? Sometimes getting pissed gets the job done.