The Broun Blog

I might be the only one interested in this, but I know I have talked to Jason about it some. This artice lays out how the press picked up the erroneous figure of $1 Trillion for Bush's space plan. It is a little long but informative.

Yeti Batting Practice
Click on the Yeti for the Pinguin to jump, then click again to swing.

Longest: 321
Shortest (not including 0): 69.2

Some of y'all will get a kick out of this

ok, first off thanks for suggesting that I just write my own post instead of chopping up my thoughts into about 4 different comments. Now I can actually afford to go into details.

First off, the article starts by saying that the novelty of video games have worn off. This can only be true when taken in the context of the examples given. The differences between today's game and tomorrow's might not be as obvious as in the days of yore...but the differences are still there nonetheless. The differences are in the game engines, gameplay, and hardware and that's just the main points. Gamers are NOT only interested in how crisp the graphics look or how smooth decapitations look on the latest FPS frag-fest. We are not just some group of mindless teenagers who look at new games and go "OOOH Shiney!!" Good graphics do not a great game make. Example: Who here still plays Tetris? Who here still believes Super Mario 3 to be the greatest in the series? Who here still gets the itch to go back and play your favorite games over and over again? Granted, better graphics are great, no complaints there, but to say that it's the only way to measure the growth of the industry is not only unfair but totally untrue.

I will say that he is on the mark when he says that simple button mashing games are almost wasting console hardware resources. However, that doesn't mean that they should be limited to portable consoles. Anyone ever play Super Monkey Ball? Mario Party? Very simple games, but very fun and actually use up many of the resources of the hardware. Total immersion games are the main meat of console gaming, this is very obvoius. To say that the only competition to that is Hollywood though is also making a very large assumption. That most people have either the option of a movie or game and that you must choose. Does he realize that there really isn't much of a choice? Personally, if I want to play a game, i'll play a game. And if I want to watch a movie, i'll watch a movie. THis is not some difficult decision nor is it and either/or choice. I can very easily do both. Also, why can't a person simply play a game or watch a movie simply to play or watch? Why does escapism have to factor into it? I'm not saying that it doesn't, but that's not the reason why I play games and I really don't know of anybody who uses either to escape reality either. Personally, if I want to escape reality...I'll read a book.

I really don't have much to say about movie games. You occasionally get a really good one, but as a general rule, you just avoid them. However, they apparently sell, but there's only so many times a person can blow up the Death Star or trip AT-ATs on Hoth. This constant remake of movie games may make money, but they do take away from other games. Case in point, LucasArts just recently canceled it's production on Sam & Max 2. Why...I don't know, but I can guess that pretty soon we'll get yet another Rogue Squadron game.

His whole arguement about the original gaming generation growing up and not continuing it's habits does have some merit....but not a lot. I know many old gamers who still lead normal lives with bills, jobs, family, the works, but still manage to game just as much as anybody. Do kids have more time, yes, but that doesn't mean taht the industry will crash because the weight was too much for a 12 year old's shoulders.

Now, here's where things get a little complicated. Waiting for the next big system? Waste of time. Don't hold out for the next big thing by not buying anything now. There's no telling when that day might come and if you continue to wait, you'll miss everything that's available to you now. In all honesty, I personally don't think that Gaming companies will be putting out new systems as fast as they use to. Mainly because they don't make the majority of their games. A lot of those are done by 3rd party companies who use development kits licensed by Nintendo/Sony/Microsoft. By developing a new system with new hardware and new capabilities, the 3rd party companies are screwed. Not only do they have to learn how to use teh new resources, but also how to get as much out the resources available as they can get. THis takes time. Time that would rather be spent churning out games they know how to make quickly and making money on said games. Experimentation has to give way to making money. THis doesn't mean that innovations are extinct though. Sony's move from a CD based system to a DVD based system allowed them backwards compatibility so that companies wouldn't lose steam making games, and could work their way into the new system at their own pace. (which is why many early PS2 games looked like really good PS games) It is my belief that innovations are still there and that it's still possible to get better, but because of the Almighty Dollar, things might be stiffled a bit. Those who suffer are the players.

As for online gaming, while I do think that online gaming is in it's own way fun, it plays off of the notion taht games are more fun with an audience. How many of us merely sit here and play our games alone? ANd how many people usually have somebody watching them play? I myself almost never get a chance to play alone, but I don't really mind. Online gaming is just another way of having an audience, only they're seeing it from their side as opposed to your side. Also, many of the "simple games" that mentioned above are what I like to call social games. Fighters like Smash Bros., Soul Caliber, MvC2, and so on and so forth...they all rely on multiple people playing. Parties and gettogethers are organized around playing a game. Personally, I feel that this trend will increase for non-online console games, but that's just a thought. THere are also many pros/cons about PC gaming as opposed to console gaming, but to be perfectly honest, I think i've written enough.

I apologize for the excessive length of this post and hope that the site doesn't explode when I try to post it. I didn't get to go into as much detail as I would have liked, mainly I was just commenting on the article and giving a few personal thought. The gaming industry isn't so simple that it can be categorized in a 2 page article and based on that determined to be either growing or failing. IF you just look at certain aspects of the industry, i'm sure you could make a compelling arguemnt for anything. Personally, I see the gaming industry sticking around for a long time with trends moving more towards online games, mobile gaming, and more social games which give the option for multiple players (i don't mean 2-4, but more towards the 5-6 range, but agian, just my opinion).

Ok, that's all for now...i promise...again sorry for writing so much, but like i said, i had a lot to say....and I still didn't get into heavy details...;)

hi, it's jessica hinds. brounie from 00-01, wherein i moved out and got my own apartment. this is my first post - as i told bubba, this will be one of maybe two posts between now and graduation (may 14th, 10 a.m.), because i've got about twice as many things to do as i have actual time.
*right now* i am working on the laramie project, which opens april 14. i am the dramaturg, assistant director, and assistant projectionist. i'm also working on my honors thesis, my senior project, finishing my minor, and sewing all the time because of a costumes class. oh, and applying for internships. i'm applying in washinton d.c. (2), philadelphia (3), new haven CT (1) and seattle (1). so we'll see what comes out of all this.
broun was, well - colbs and i got into a mess of trouble there my freshman year. but i made some good friends, several of whom i even still talk to today.
right. and i have an online journal at http://www.livejournal.com/users/purplehippos which actually does get updated semi-regularly. cheers..

ADMIN EDIT - Jessica, I went ahead and put a hyperlink in for your journal, since I figured you wouldn't mind, and didn't want to bother with HTML. Just let me know if you want it taken out. - Jason

The Pointless Waste of Time, a website perhaps most famous for its scathing summary of all the things wrong with the first Lord of the Rings movie, has a fairly compelling article predicting a crash of the video game industry. It wouldn't be the first time the industry crashed: it did so in the early 1980's, and the writer of the article gives good reasons for believing in the likelihood of another crash.

I'm not sure the writer's right. As Yogi Berra once said, it's hard to make predictions, especially about the future. I for one hope he's wrong, but...

It's an interesting read, regardless of the outcome and despite the occasional use of crass language.

It's a slow week at the Auburn campus as students and employees prepare for spring break. One thing that is going on is a blood drive sponsored by the SGA and the American Red Cross. It's being held on the concourse, and today is its second and final day.

Each pint of blood donated saves up to three lives, and many parts of the country seem to be in a perpetual state of shortage. I hate needles, so I'll be honest and admit that I don't find the process pleasant, but I try to give blood when I can. I encourage everyone who can to become a regular blood donor, at Auburn or wherever you live.

For those of you who are interested, and conviently located, the is going to be an Airshow at Eglin on April 3-4. It will be open to the public so everyone can attend. Let me know if you are interested.

Zaijian

I am finally getting around to posting on the blog. For those of you who don't know me, the name is Grant Shaw and I started "living" in Broun in 99 and actually moved my stuff in the following year. I then proceeded to live there until 2002. Now before anyone fills your head with viscious lies, I don't know anything about a water balloon launcher, pudding cups, or black muffins. Very, Very, Very black muffins. In addition, I have never, ever seen Maverick.
K, intro done.
Currently I am employed as a test engineer for the Air Force down at Eglin AFB. If you are unaware of where this is, it is right next to Ft Walton Beach, Fl. And yes, we do nothing but hang out at the beach all day. Come to think of it, why the heck am I sitting at a computer typing this up? Well, I am headed outside now, just one last plug. Any one is welcome to come visit and enjoy this beautiful weather *nudge nudge wink wink*.

Zaijian

*** Update ***
For those of you who notice that *nudge nudge wink wink* is backwards, I have this psychological block that prevents me from saying it the right way. Many years of counseling have yet to fix it.

Sunday, the Birmingham News had a feature on Genndy Tartakovsky, the creative force behind Dexter's Laboratory and Samurai Jack. The story focused on his work on the Star Wars: Clone Wars "micro-series" of 3-minute cartoons, whose second batch of ten episodes debuts this Friday on Cartoon Network.

However, the article's most interesting line is this, its conclusion:

And for fans of "Samurai Jack" the first season's 13 episodes are scheduled to be released on DVD in May.

I am a huge fan of Samurai Jack, and I recommend the show highly to all of you. It's very artistic, with gorgeous, epic action and the right doses of drama and humor. Together with the series of cartoons based on DC Comics -- Batman, Superman, and now Justice League -- it has helped assuage my fear that action cartoons reached a high-water mark in the 1980's. Honestly, Samurai Jack makes He-Man, Transformers, and G.I. Joe look like the work of rank amateurs.

A bare-bones DVD of the three-part premiere has been around for some time, but I've been waiting for a real DVD collection of the series, and this appears to be the start of just that.

IGN.com reports a May 4th release date of the two-disc set, with an MSRP of $30, though places like Amazon will surely have it for less.

And DVDDebate.com reports that the set will include "audio commentaries, documentaries and interviews," much to my delight.

The same page also features a rather large image of the cover art. Here's a thumbnail:



(The first image on the Broun Blog!)

Upon closer inspection, I believe that the artwork clearly implies that there is more to come. One listing of the Samurai Jack episodes counts the first twenty episodes as Season 1, but the episodes are released in distinct bursts.

• 1-13: Aug-Dec, 2001


• 14-20: Mar-Apr, 2002


• 21-31: Sep-Nov, 2002


• 32-40: Apr-Jun, 2003


• 41-44: Aug, 2003


• 45-49: Nov, 2003

If they release sets according to the year the episodes were produced, we should expect to see an 18-episode set for the 2002 episodes and an 18-episode set for the 2003 episodes.

(According to the invaluable book, The Making of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, the "magic number" for modern television is 65. If a television series has 65 episodes, the production company can sell it to syndicators to be shown every weekday for thirteen weeks. Samurai Jack is just 16 episodes away from that magic number, so I expect at least one more season for the show, after the Clone Wars cartoon is wrapped up.)

If you get the chance, rent or borrow the DVD with the 90-minute premiere episode. You'll see why I'm so jazzed about the upcoming DVD set, and you'll see exactly why George Lucas asked Tartakovsky to create the Clone Wars cartoons.

UPDATE: According to Amazon, the DVD of the premiere 3-part "movie" does indeed have a few extras, including a 10-minute documentary. Whether the material is also covered in the Season 1 set is not yet clear -- nor is it clear whether the 3-part episode will be presented differently, whether one will split it into three parts while the other will show the entire story intact.

Regardless, Amazon is already selling the Season 1 set for $21.

According to the Opelika-Auburn News, ESPN reporter John Saunders was to issue an explanation Sunday for recent comments that caught the ire of several Auburn trustees and their lawyers.

As the Plainsman reported last week, Saunders' on-air commentary centered on "the Feb. 10 fire that destroyed the offices shared by the Tuskegee News, published by Paul Davis, a frequent critic of the Board of Trustees; and Fred Gray, a prominent civil rights attorney."

In his "Parting Shot" segment at the end of the program, Saunders spoke about the fire and controversy over athletics at Auburn.

"Now, Auburn may be coached by Tommy Tuberville, but it's run by booster Bobby Lowder," Saunders said.

Saunders related Davis' allegations of receiving death threats after publishing articles investigating alleged improprieties in Auburn's football program and the Board of Trustees.

"Davis refused to be bullied, and the paper kept after the story," Saunders said.

"Last week, Davis's newspaper burned to the ground.

"Davis told me today he spent years fighting the KKK," he continued. "He says the Klan is nothing compared to the trustees at Auburn."

Saunders invited viewers to "draw your own conclusions."

For what it's worth, Saunders is perhaps best known for co-hosting a college football scoreboard show on ABC with former Auburn head coach Terry Bowden. Trustees Bobby Lowder and Jack Miller threatened to sue, and Saunders was to issue a retraction yesterday. From the O-A News:

On Sunday, Saunders will issue the following statement to avoid litigation: "At the end of the 'Sports Reporters' program on February 16, I commented on a fire at The Tuskegee News, a small Alabama newspaper critical of the trustees of Auburn University. That story engendered some criticism of its own. I would like to make clear that I did not say, nor did I intend to say, that the trustees of Auburn University had any connection to the fire, nor is there any evidence of that, or that the trustees were in any way associated with or sympathetic to the Ku Klux Klan."

After an interview with Tuskegee News Publisher Paul Davis, Saunders went on the air and told viewers that Davis said "the Klan is nothing compared to the trustees at Auburn." Davis has denied making the statement, attesting that he only said he received more death threats while covering the trustees than he ever did in his years covering the civil rights movement.

Davis, who writes a column for the Opelika-Auburn News, maintains that trustees use tactics of intimidation when faced with opposition -- a claim he says is reinforced by the trustees' threat of litigation against ESPN and its parent companies, The Hearst Corporation and The Walt Disney Company.

"I think it's a perfect example of intimidation techniques," Davis said. "That's how they operate."

I for one am not an apologist for the Board of Trustees. They need to be reorganized, their power needs to be reined in, and Lowder should step down or be made to do so. But arson is a serious charge. If the Plainsman is honest in its reporting, Saunders did imply that the trustees were guilty of arson, regardless of Sunday's clarification. That sort of accusation does demand proof, and the trustees' attorneys were right to suggest that the accusation was libellous without such proof.

We don't need to go overboard in our zeal to get rid of Lowder & Co. Their known acts are more than enough to condemn them as weasels, and we should not lower ourselves to hearsay and rumor-mongering.

Or, if there is proof that trustees are behind the fire, arson is a serious enough offense that we ought to take them to court.

Swimming. Saturday, Auburn won its third straight NCAA Women’s Swimming and Diving Championship in College Station, Texas. The Tigers deserve our congratulations for their recent dominance in the sport.

Men's Basketball. The Mobile Register reports that Hal Baird and the athletics office are open to hiring a black head coach to replace Cliff Ellis, who was fired late last week.

Baird said that hiring a black coach is "not a mandate. We're going to find the very best one regardless. If that happens to be a minority, all the better." Personally, I think the whole idea of needing even to consider race is silly, but if this helps lead to a truly color-blind society, great. In the meantime, Baird has his priorities straight: talent should be the primary consideration.

Baseball. As Jason predicted, the Tigers fell in the polls this week. In the ESPN/Sports Weekly coaches poll, Auburn fell from No. 8 to No. 13. The biggest factor in the drop must surely be Kentucky's 8-0 rout Friday, but a one-run loss Saturday and a one-run victory Sunday should give reason to hope that Friday's game was not a harbinger of things to come.

So the Montgomery Biscuits sold out all of their opening day tickets within two hours of having them go on sale to the public. There may be hope for Montgomery yet! Yes, I just said that. Stop staring. Here are some excerpts from the press release from the Biscuits' website.

The Biscuits opened the store at 9 a.m., and some fans had been waiting most of the night.

"We got here and found out there were only 100 standing room tickets left, so we figured it right by getting here early," said Greg Cooper of Prattville, who, with his friend Kevin Shirley of Deatsville, had been waiting since 2 a.m. "We wanted to be sure to get opening night tickets."

Only 100 tickets left? Standing room only? I thought "standing room only" in Montgomery meant that there was a monster truck rally in town. Wow. On an amusing note, here is the co-owner's response to those who couldn't get tickets.

We know that in addition to the 7,000 people who got their tickets fast, there are thousands more that would like to be there on opening night. For those people, we have 69 more games on the home schedule."

So, the official line is "for you slow people, we've got other games. So no whining!" Classy.

AUBURN - Auburn right fielder J.T. Williamson's RBI single with one outs and the bases loaded in the bottom of the 10th inning lifted No. 7 Auburn to a 3-2 walk-off victory over Kentucky in the series finale Sunday at Plainsman Park. Williamson's drove a 1-2 offering from James Rodriquez over the head of Wildcat right fielder Caleb Stewart to score Clete Thomas for the game winner. Full Story

So Auburn is now 1-2 in SEC play, and 17-5 overall. I doubt we'll still be ranked #7 when the next rankings come out.

I'll leave it to one of our resident NCAA basketball guys to post about how UAB upstaged UAT tonight.