Part of me wants to be cynical and say that this won’t be as revolutionary as the first.  Of course, there’s the other 80% of me that’s beating that part over the head and burying it in the desert.

Way way WAY back in the day my brother and I used to plop down and watch our early Saturday Morning Cartoons.  Yes, I capitalized them; they were that important.  The more obscure ones were in the wee hours of the morning, then we had the main staples between 7:30-10:30 AM.  After that, the baby shows came on or Fox would switch to American Gladiator.  If you went to PBS there was usually another re-air of The Mouse and the Motorcycle.

Back then, of course, we couldn’t skip commercials.  The commercial breaks were also shorter, so that helped.  But to really make things fun for the kids, most stations also had the old Public Service Announcements during commercial breaks.  One such PSA was a funny song about an alien who comes to live on Earth but instead of welcoming him, we treat him like crap.  He points out that if we (humans) come in so many colors, why should we treat him any differently just because he’s green.

The Call of Duty franchise of games has been around for quite some time.  While the buzz around Modern Warfare 2 might seem like it’s the first some people have heard of the game, it’s actually the sixth game in the series!  If we’re lucky, it might also be the last.

In case you haven’t been reading the gaming section of the news (OK, it doesn’t exist, but it totally should), Infinity Ward has just lost two of their head execs; Vince Zampella and Jason West.  Activision supposedly originally let them go for “HR Violations and insubordination”, however when it finally made a statement regarding the firings, the company made no mention of it.

Modern Warfare 2 was the biggest launch of any form a media EVER.  It’s one of the top FPS shooters of all time, and is critically lauded for (of all things in a shooter) its incredible writing.  So why should I feel that it should be allowed to die?  The answer is very simple: “Let’s end on a good note.”

What’s bad about a new Civilization game?  The answer is nothing.  I started playing Civ III a few years back and quickly became addicted which is odd since I’m usually not too big of an RTS fan.  I just learned that this fall, Sid Meier will grace us with Civilization V.  This news may not be welcome by some, but if you’re a fan of the series, I’m guessing that it’s the best news you’ve heard yet today.  (Since it’s still early, this is a fairly safe bet.)  Behold the trailer in all its glory!

I keep hoping to see Ronald Reagan, Hitler, and Mussolini make their way into the Civ universe.  Hopefully this is the time.

I just watched a trailer for the remake of the Karate Kid starring Will Smith’s son as Ralph Macchio, and Jackie Chan as Mr Miagi. I have no problem at all with remaking the movie. It’s over 25 years old, and it’s not like we’re talking about Casablanca, Star Wars, or Caddyshack. It was a cheesy movie that is due for a remake. Frankly I’m amazed it took this long for it to happen. After all it has been 16 years since we saw Academy Award Winner Hillary Swank in The Next Karate Kid.

You may ask then, “What is your problem?”. For starters it takes place in China, Jackie Chan is Chinese, and the boy is learning Kung Fu not Karate (the spiritual nature of Kung Fu seems to be a central theme of the film). As my friend can tell you Kung Fu is a Chinese fighting style that is very different from Karate. China and Japan are very very very different nations who historically don’t like each other very much.

If you ever get a chance, you should check out Ctrl+Alt+Del Comics.  It’s typically a nice gamer-centric strip, but every once in awhile they do just a page of artwork that isn’t really related to anything in the story.  Today’s was one of those!

Behold:  This Is How The World Ends!

Just brilliant!

Apple announced their iPad yesterday, a tablet-sized version of the iPhone. Other than the unfortunate name, it is an amazing little device. Considering how quickly we all got over the Nintendo Revolution becoming the “Wii”, I think we’ll forgive Apple soon enough.

If you remember my post Friday, I laid out some of the ways Apple could screw up such a product. I’d like to visit some of those points again and compare how they did.

• I mentioned I was worried they’d try and use parts from the MacBook Air (system board, screen, chassis, battery). Thankfully they didn’t even try. The battery life is supposed to be able to play video for up to 10 hours, and standby is rated to last a month. To be sure, the thing was probably in airplane mode (with all radios turned off) and screen brightness was way down, but it’s still better than the 4 hours I get on my laptop.

I hate clowns.  The creep me out in ways I can’t quite describe.  There’s just something about them that brings out a true primal fear in me.  People used to laugh at me, but I’m evidently not the only one to have this fear.  It even has an official sounding name (though I don’t think mine is bad enough to be called a phobia).

Scary clowns can be funny though, it seems.  A friend showed me the new Wal-Mart clown ad and I just about peed myself laughing.  So, below are some of the best clown ads I can find!

E-Trade Superbowl Ad

USPS Flat-Rate Ad

Newest Wal-Mart ad

Furthering my belief that tomorrow’s Mass Effect 2 is actually an interactive movie . . . here’s an interview with the stars.  And there are a lot of them!

Mass Effect 2 launches tomorrow.  I’m excited in ways you can’t even understand.  The first Mass Effect was one of those games that came onto the scene and really changed the way you played the RPG genre.  BioWare took what work they had done on Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic and just blew everything out of the water with it.

Ideally, I’d show you the launch video for the original game, but since the only one I can find has it disabled, I’ll just link it instead.

Of course, the game also had it’s share of controversy; some whacko at Fox News made claims in the media that the game was actually “An Alien Rape Simulator”.  Despite the fact that every person who ever played the game could attest that it was not and numerous experts in the field all tried to correct Fox, they have yet to retract their statements.  It didn’t keep the game from being awesome, though.