January 2007 Archives

Classic example of civic paranoia magnified by a national media that reports before investigating.

When the story first broke that Boston had a city-wide, large-scale bomb threat, it was understandably very serious. Then the update comes that it's a hoax, but most of the city is shut down as the hoax devices are being tracked down and removed. And you're like, jesus shit, why would somebody do that. Ah well, people are stupid all over.

Then it comes out that Cartoon Network was behind the hoax, that it's a marketing stunt. And you're like, holy crap, why would they make bombs and drop them around the city to promote the Aqua Teen movie?

Except they weren't bombs, were they? They're Lite Brites.

That's the missing bit that nobody talked about until it was too late to save Boston from a crippling scarefest and the rest of us from yet another terrorism false alarm. Remember those six minutes when we thought Al Qaeda was behind the NYC blackout?

After seeing Adult Swim apologize in tonight's bump (take that, "third party"!), I had to see what these stupid things looked like. And FOX Boston's TEAM COVERAGE did not disappoint. Here's some great screenshots if you'd rather not give them the web traffic.

This is fantastic. Mooninites! I love that some graphic artist in Boston had to make this for the evening news. Want to bet the artist is solidly inside the [as] demographic and smirking the entire time? Tell you what though, at this point it is inaccurate to call this a hoax. This was not intended to look like a bomb.

From Ignignot, To Boston, With Love.

Here's the "marketing" shlub getting arrested over the stunt. Poor sap. I can't wait to hear his company waggle between an apology and an explanation that it was just a bunch of advertising billboards.

Fun footage of the uber-dangerous Mooninite art sculpture being safely removed from the premises. This is so absurd. Somebody with huge balls should make these a hidden collectible in the next GTA game.

And what kind of town has signs for a 6 mph speed limit?

They actually blew one of them up! This whole situation is out of control and could have been avoided if anyone in the police department had spoken to any college student anywhere.

It's a Lite Bright, folks! And even a pixelized middle finger needs to be blurred. Thank you, FCC.

The Turner apology, slide 1.

Hey, wait up. These are in other cities? And have been for weeks now? I hope some forward-thinking kids in other locales went on a scavenger hunt immediately, because these babies will be pure gold on eBay.

Another great moment from a city that allowed 9/11 terrorists to board a plane. The whole thing sounds like Survivor's Guilt to me.

The real question is, if you walked past a light sculpture of a cartoon character stuck to a bridge in a major city where sillyass graffiti and starving artists have weird crap posted all over the damn place, would you assume it to be a freaking bomb? If Disney had done this with Mickey Mouse to promote whatever, would this have happened? The so-called investigation into this "hoax" should focus less on Adult Swim and more on the first moron to see a light up Mooninite and touch off a metropolitan panic.

This will certainly put the kibosh on any company's out-of-the-box advertising for a while. It's back to boring radio spots for you lot!

UPDATE: Lost Remote suggests that our nation's communal fear of witnessing a middle finger on television may have made the problem worse. Apparently images of the "bombs" were broadcast on local TV as early as noon, but stations blurred out the entire image due to the offensive gesture. Had the full Mooninite image been displayed, perhaps some 18-35 year old male (or even an entire fraternity) may have made the connection to Aqua Teen Hunger Force and placed a call before full chaos erupted.

Ah, who are we kidding. Males age 18-35 don't watch local news, and certainly not at noon.

I've never bothered to import video games before. Although there's certainly some stuff I'd like to try, I'm just not interested in modding a console to get it done.

Even with the rise of the GBA and DS - both of which contain no region lock and therefore require no modding to play foreign games - I haven't bothered. I've certainly looked into it, but anything that I would be interested in seems to be too dependant on the Japanese language. Like the Sgt. Frog DS game, dammit.

Until Elite Beat Agents, anyway. My copy of Osu! Tatakae! Ouendan, the spiritual precursor to EBA, arrived today.

It is happily import-friendly. Especially if you know EBA backwards and forwards, since many of the menu options are in the same place. I only had a moment of panic when I failed a level and realized that I had no idea which button was Retry and which was Quit. (50/50, I got it right!)

The title means "Go! Fight! Cheer Squad", by the way.

Obviously the vast majority of video games go through an extensive localization process, which turns Japanese games into English games. Why was Ouendan denied this treatment? Because every level is j-pop, that's why. Common opinion blames the storyline content as well. And many do contain blatant Japanese cultural elements (like those summer festivals with special outfits), but nothing that's sooooo Japan-centric that you couldn't fake it. I mean, current US pop culture has so much Japan floating around in it right now that I can't see that as a valid complaint.

There is one scene where a cat pees on the floor. That one might not have made it past US censors. I also sort of maybe think that one character references the (hopefully dwindling) practice of Japanese married men having a mistress. Of course, I can't read the dialogue, so what do I know.

Even with the culture barrier, you can see that the Agent did not fall far from the Cheer Squad. The core gameplay is completely identical. Four difficulty levels (including an all-girl team at the top). One super-serious story level. A big end-of-the-world finale. Characters from one story popping up in the background of another one. There's even some sound effects you'll recognize from EBA: the romantic harp chord, for one, and that humilated baby cry, for another.

Seems like the biggest changes added to the US/UK iteration are the hidden songs and the replay feature.

I played all the way through the easiest difficulty tonight, and I look forward to seeing the higher levels. Even with being completely unfamiliar with the songs, I managed no worse than a B throughout, and even scored an S-rank somewhere in there. Now, that's on easy, so I would expect some good scores... but it still felt good to walk cold into some brand new EBA levels and do well.

Now I'll probably have to buy a Japanese iTunes Music Store gift card so I can pick up some of these tracks for the iPod.

Since I just did that whole interminable two weeks of EBA song analysis (was that really worth it?), I found myself wondering if there are any connections between the storylines and the music. That inspirational feeling that EBA generated - as you watch a cast of characters find inner strength from an old Rolling Stones tune - that aspect of the game will have to remain lost to me. Then I reach the final level. Before I tap to play, the game(s) plays a little clip of the song...

And I know this one.

The big showstopper at the end of the game, where the characters unite to save the planet from annihilation by asteroid, is performed to the tune of the opening theme from Fullmetal Alchemist.

See what I mean about our crossing cultures.

Seriously? Score!! We are so pleased.

Kotaku reports that Katamari Damacy Online is coming... to Korea.

Details are scarce, but it's not being done by Namco... it has been farmed out to Windysoft, a game development house in Korea that specializes in casual games. Like, internet flash games I guess. It sort of sounds like a "we asked Namco and they said Yeah, Sure" kind of thing. No platform is mentioned, but everything else they've done looks online-PC-based.

I love that the logo has the big Japanese title of the game, but with little tiny Korean characters hidden in the lower left corners. And, of course, "online" is in English.

Via a translated page from another site, Kotaku mentions that KDO (oooh! Let's make that the official abbreviation!) will have Vs. battles similar to the multiplayer in We Love Katamari (hopefully better than, right?) The game will also have a community element to it, in the form of that customizable avatar junk that you get everywhere nowadays.

Everybody is assuming this is being produced for the Korean market, but Windysoft has localized games for Japan as well. Namco knows that the franchise is popular worldwide, and it's pretty obvious that we'll get some kind of new game in this generation. But I would not be surprised to hear that KDO will stay in the Pacific Rim.

Speaking of which, you have played this, right?

The annual Nintendo Power awards are a long-endured sham, but I still toss my votes in there to mess up the 100% response of the Zelda voting bloc. It's particularly asinine to even bother with the pretense of "reader voting" in a year that saw a Legend of Zelda release; Twilight Princess will win every award in which it is nominated.

To make it extra stupid, the contest associated with the voting offers the prize of the Games of the Year for Wii, Cube, GBA and DS. So, seeing as you're reading Nintendo Power, odds are that you already own Twilight Princess. So whomever wins this contest will end up with three copies. The one he or she already owns, plus the Wii and GameCube versions that will inevitably win GOTY in their respective console categories. Terrible.

Even winning a Wii in this contest is kind of a wash, since I'll wager a healthy proportion of Nintendo Power's readership already has one. It's like a TV station giving out a free TV set. Guh-whuh?

NP does seem to have some awareness that the Zelda sweep is going to once again grenade any attempts at an interesting awards article, not to mention cementing that obnoxious fanboy mystink. This year, they've added a Top Three category, which I presume they will use to add some additional copy to the inevitable Zelda Wins Again! paragraph(s). Of course, they included Twilight Princess in that list (no class!), so we could conceivably be accolading Link's latest as the Top Wii Game, Top GameCube Game, and Top Top Three Game.

So here's my votes.

Wii Game of the Year: Twilight Princess, Madden 07, Rayman Raving Rabbids, Super Monkey Ball, Trauma Center, Wii Sports.
We all know Twilight Princess is going to win. The competition is pretty crappy, but the Wii only had a month and a half to generate games that are applicable for voting.

I went for Wii Sports. TP is, after all, a sideways GameCube port and the neatest thing about the Wii upgrade is the slick aiming reticule and the ridiculous fishing controls. As far as Wii games go, Wii Sports does more to prove out the concept of motion sensing and accelerometers and ease of play. The integration with the Wii's built-in Channels shows early promise of how future games will live beyond the confines of their disk.

(And I'd love to see NP have to scramble to send out a copy of Wii Sports to the winner, manufacturing the instant collectible of the only boxed Wii Sports in North America.)

GameCube Game of the Year: Baten Kaitos, Chibi-Robo, Harvest Moon, Twilight Princess, Madden 07, Tomb Raider: Legend
Guess what's going to win this one. It was a lousy year for Cube games, and it shows. What, no Odama?

For the upset of the century: Chibi-Robo. "Game of the Year" does not necessarily mean the biggest game of the year, deepest game of the year, nor even best game of the year. Twilight Princess would handily snag at least two of those. But I'm 4/5s of the way through it and I don't find it particularly memorable. Maybe it's because this is largely the same adventure that we always get in these games. Maybe it's the continued lack of voice-acting, or the Hollywoodified generic look of the entire game. Looking back, I'm going to remember the new weaponry and the wolf junk more than the game itself. With Chibi-Robo, I've got instant access to a gleeful ensemble of j-randomness: the aliens lying ill in their beds, the girl who thinks she's a frog, the wooden pirate and his crew of hard-boiled eggs. It's just nuts. For introducing an entirely new IP while tackling the oft-boned GTA gameplay model, I say Chibi-Robo is the GameCube Game of the Year.

DS Game of the Year: Castlevania, Elite Beat Agents, FFIII, Metroid Prime Hunters, New Super Mario Bros., Starfox Command
I'll guess that the winner will be either New SMB (75% shot at winning) or Metroid Prime Hunters (60%). But it should be Elite Beat Agents.

GBA Game of the Year: Drill Dozer, FFV, Pirates of the Caribbean, Pokemon Mystery Dungeon Red, Summon Night 2, Tales of Phantasia
FFV will win. I give it to Drill Dozer.

Drill Dozer takes the basics of platforming and adds this intense complexity to it. It's a difficult game in a genre that everybody has given up on, on a platform that everybody has given up on. That earns some recognition in my opinion.

Best Graphics (Consoles): Baten Kaitos, Excite Truck, Twilight Princess, Rayman, Red Steel, Sonic Riders
Weird list. Four Wii games flanked by two Cube games. Twilight Princess will win, but Excite Truck would not be a bad bet.

First of all, you have to subtract the Cube games, because if they look better than three launch day Wii games, there's huge problems. Then take out Twilight Princess because it's a GameCube game in disguise. I voted for Excite Truck, based on all those sharp screenshots. I've never seen the game in action. But I hate that limbless Rayman freak and Red Steel should not win anything ever.

Best Graphics (DS): Castlevania, Children of Mana, EBA, FFIII, Metroid Prime Hunters, Resident Evil
Tough one. Talking about graphics on a handheld becomes a very tenuous discussion. Metroid will probably take this one.

And it may even deserve it, thanks to the uncanny mimicry of the GameCube Prime games. Nevertheless, I voted for EBA... because on a handheld, style can do so much more than pure polygons.

Best Music: Castlevania, EBA, FFV, Legend of Spyro, Twilight Princess, Rub Rabbits
This one is either going to go to Twilight Princess (pure fanboy vote; it does not deserve it) or Elite Beat Agents.

And I'm going to go on the record and say that games that feature 90% licensed musical content should not ever win a Best Music-type category. Jesus, give it to Tony Hawk or NHL 07, why don'tcha. Putting together what amounts to a mix tape should not win anybody anything. Other than Best Mix Tape.

Rub Rabbits all the way. Have you heard that game? The only thing holding it back is that a lot of the music comes directly from the first game in the series, Feel the Magic XY/XX. But what's the competition, Spyro?!

Best Sound/Voice Acting: Call of Duty 3, FIFA 07, Spyro, Rayman, Resident Evil, Tomb Raider
God, what is this, the decaying franchise category? I'll bet this is included largely to fluff up the list of third-party games that get mentioned. ("See, Capcom? You DO have a shot at winning something!") Because you certainly don't have to worry about Zelda winning this one, hyuk hyuk.

I voted for Rayman and I don't even know why.

Best RPG/Strategy Game: Age of Empires, Baten Kaitos, FFIII, FFV, Harvest Moon, Pokemon Mystery Dungeon (both!)
Final Fantasy III will win. I voted for Pokemon Mystery Dungeon. Eh. Not like Pokemon needs any awards; it will grab a million of them in next year's contest after Pearl/Diamond comes out.

Best Adventure: Castlevania, Chibi-Robo, Rocket Slime, Twilight Princess, Resident Evil, Tomb Raider
Huh? What? Why is this even here? Zelda is going to stomp all over this category. Why did we need to invent another award for the same team to win?

I voted for Zelda, natch. It really does have it locked this time.

I have to pause here to point out that the layout for the article absolutely sucks. If you don't follow the letters closely, you can easily mix up your votes on the included comment card.

And also because this is getting really long. More later.

More specifically, my last Day One pre-order PS2 purchase. There's still a few interesting rumors in the pipeline (KH2 Final Mix!) and plenty of games that I missed when they were new that I now intend to circle back to.

I pre-ordered Chulip solely because it doesn't strike me as the sort of thing that any store will have around in any kind of number. I'm pretty much counting on the local EBs stocking zero to one of it, and I want to make sure I get one. This is exactly how I felt about the first Katamari, by the way... the game is so stupidly obscure that nobody is going to have it around.

In fact, Chulip is an EB/GameStop exclusive, so if those guys don't have it, ain't nobody gonna have it.

As to why I want the game, well, that's solely on the strength of the ridiculous synopsis. I suppose it is akin to Harvest Moon, if Harvest Moon was all about kissing. I really have no idea. But after the kissing thing, I don't even care if it's awful. Some game concepts are so incredible that it's worth slogging through nasty gameplay to experience it.

To wit: Disaster Report, Mister Mosquito, Killer 7, and Resident Evil: Dead Aim.

Insert Credit describes the game like this:

Chulip, as you may recall, is a game where you have to kiss people at their ultimate low point, in order to cheer them up. It's also by Punchline, the developers who went on to do Rule of Rose (I talk about this a little bit in the interview I had with them). The graphics probably won't be very good, as the game was made ages ago, but should be somewhat wacky and enjoyable... maybe! If you think there was boy-on-boy kissing in Bully, well... there's a lot more in this.

Rule of Rose is also on my Let's Bide Time For The PS3 list, incidentally.

Daring Fireball turned me on to a new little app called Wii Transfer, which purports to accomplish one of the items outlined in my famous Wiish Liist a month ago. In fact, it follows one of my suggestions so closely that I must be pre-cog. Or these needs are so basic that every Wii owner in the world wants to see it happen. From my request list:

"[The Wii] should be able to find MP3s on my iMac and play them. It should be able to send save files over to the computer for backup. It should be able to share pictures and movie files."

Wii Transfer does all of that. Here's me listening to the Lightning Seeds via the Wii:

What it does is, it sets up a teeny web server on your Mac, with a barebones navigation system... you then browse to that LAN address on the Wii's web browser. You see all of your music (arranged by artist - not playlist - because it's just peeking into your songs as organized at the HD level), you can play one song, play all songs on a particular album, or shuffle all songs on a particular album.

This pretty much kills the need for AirTunes, or even physically jacking an iPod into the home entertainment center. Computer-based music now on your lovely stereo, without any old-tech middlemen.

Well, it would, if it worked.

I know it's just a $9 piece of amateur software hacking, but it is super flaky. In fact, before the 2.1.1 release, it barely worked at all. Now, I have about a 70% shot that any given song is going to play. Which I don't exactly consider a success at $9 spent. Here's hoping that it will expand and grow some stability.

I have no idea what causes the 30% failure rate... sometimes I click a song and it just does not play. The progress bar may look like it's loading; no play. It may load for a bit and then stop; no play. It may never show a moving bar at all; no play. (It doesn't always show the album artwork, either.)

I will note that any songs purchased through the iTunes Music Store simply don't exist in Wii Transfer. And - perhaps taking my request too literally - it only sees MP3s. So anything encoded in AAC or otherwise will not appear.

Wii Transfer jumps into iPhoto as well, displaying no-frills slideshows of whatever album collections it sees. This seems to work well enough, and certainly beats shifting files over to an SD card if you want to turn your Wii into a picture kiosk.

I have not tried the game save backup and movie playing features. The movie transfer thing is limited to using SD cards, though, not the WLAN... so it's not like you'd be doing a ton of that anyway.

It's a good idea, folks. Just needs a couple more $9 to fully bake.

Bonus 1: Aspire! Dancing to the Limelight!!
Featured Song: Cher - "Believe" (1998)
That Weird Electronic Effect: Is interestingly intentional.
Embarrassing Secret: If you still can't wrap your brain around how long Cher has been around, consider this: she dated Warren Beatty when he was in his 20's.

Stage Synopsis: A country girl is working as a waitress in the big city, serving platters while she plans on becoming a Broadway star. In the middle of her juggling practice and her work, her boyfriend Tex shows up, willing to take her home if she abandons her dream. The Agents provide the backup as she prepares for the audition of a lifetime.

Song Analysis: Cher is kickin' her dude to the curb. Bold and unafraid, Cher does not worry about ending the relationship. She is excited by the future, not intimidated, and certainly not lonely. In fact, she suspects that the guy she dumped may have the harder time of it.

How Do They Match Up? One word only. "Believe", the word by itself, is nicely appropriate for a tale about working hard for a difficult goal. The song's "I'm better without you" vibe doesn't do much, though.

Bonus 2: Here, Kitty Kitty! Baby Hijinks!!
Featured Song: The Jackson Five - "ABC" (1970)
Chiefly The Vocal Product Of: Michael and Jermaine.
Embarrassing Secret: The cover to "Victory".

Stage Synopsis: In a romp taken directly from any of a hundred Popeye cartoons, a curious infant escapes from the family home and explores a construction site. The baby is kept out of danger by a pet cat, who desperately attempts to get the child home before the song ends. The Agents are on hand to help the cat navigate the trials of such an endeavor.

Song Analysis: It's intended as a super-cute teenybopper first love song, but much of the song reads like somebody needs a restraining order.

Sit down, girl!
I think I love you!
No!
Get up, girl!
Show me what you can do!

How Do They Match Up? Zippo. The main connection here is that ABC is sung by (more or less) a group of kids, and the level has a silly Saturday Morning feel. Again, pop music's over-dependence on love songs would have made for too many identical EBA levels, so this sort of variance is to be expected.

Bonus 3: The Last Laugh! Just a Peanut Matter!!
Featured Song: Destiny's Child - "Survivor" (2001)
Group Now Known As: Beyonce.
Embarrassing Secret: Went through members faster than Menudo.

Stage Synopsis: A zombie infection is destroying a small town, and only one man can turn the tide. A tough-looking employee of a peanut factory, he takes to the streets with his peanut gun... the awful-tasting nuts instantly turn zombies back into normal people. The Agents dance in backup as the peanuts fly!

Song Analysis: The lyrics are probably the worst writing in the universe. The entire song is an infantile list of opposites.

Thought I couldn't breathe without you, I'm inhalin'
You thought I couldn't see without you, Perfect vision,
You thought I couldn't last without ya, But I'm lastin'
You thought that I would die without ya, But I'm livin'

Sadness #1: The song triggered a lawsuit between former band members when Beyonce started taking shots at her former partners ("You thought I wouldn't sell without ya, Sold nine million.")

Sadness #2: Rumors say that Beyonce wrote the song after hearing a radio DJ compare the Destiny's Child singer-shuffling to "getting voted off the island" in Survivor. There's layers of awfulness there, peeling like an onion about to die by its own hand.

Sadness #3: Perhaps the worst line in the whole monsterpiece is "You know I'm not gonna diss you on the internet." Not so much because of the intense stupidity of it, but because Beyonce does one of those tribbling voice tricks on the word "internet." She does one of those tribbling voice tricks on the word "internet."

I will say that the chorus is pretty kickass, and deserves to be in a better song.

How Do They Match Up? Chorus only. "I'm a survivor" makes perfect sense placed inside of a zombie massacre. Just ignore the nonsense inbetween.

Episode 13: Rags to Riches! Go East Wildcatter!
Featured Song: David Bowie - "Let's Dance" (1983)
Your Video Is A Non-Sequiter When: An Aboriginal couple fighting capitalism is the imagery you choose for your dance club track.
Embarrassing Secret: This song marks the precise moment that Bowie started selling out.

Stage Synopsis: A wealthy oil baron hits a run of bad luck and loses it all... much to the disdain of his trophy wife. So the former billionaire resolves to personally re-build his empire, and he takes to the desert with a shovel. The Agents are on hand to gently guide the eager magnate from one financial success to the next.

Song Analysis: It's a happy boppy little song (marred only by the obnoxious barbershop quartet crap at the open.) But, unlike Rock This Town or Canned Heat - tracks with similar Let's Have Fun Tonight themes - this one has this dark twinge to it.

Let's dance for fear your grace should fall
Let's dance for fear tonight is all

Most of the lyrics point towards an unhappy ending, as if this dance will be the last time ever enjoyed by Bowie and his unnamed partner.

How Do They Match Up? Nada. Despite being part of the super-rich elite, our oil baron comes off as a sympathetic character. His money-making efforts are a result of his own hard work, which is laudable even if his end goal is self-serving. None of which has anything to do with dancing or clubbing or running away together or perhaps dying tomorrow.

Episode 14: Batter Up! Home Run Hero Makes a Comeback!!
Featured Song: Good Charlotte - "The Anthem" (2003)
Falls Into The Trap Of The Conforming Non-Conformist By: Owning their own clothing line.
Embarrassing Secret: Bullied in high school. In Maryland.

Stage Synopsis: A once-famous baseball player has his best days behind him, and he currently works a lousy job at an amusement park. He is as surprised as anyone to find a young kid claiming to be a fan... but the ego-boost is interrupted when a giant lava monster ride comes to life and goes on a tear through the park. The Agents inspire the ball player to tap into his forgotten skills, as he saves the kid from the monster and his career from obscurity.

Song Analysis: It's about not conforming, a-duh, but it manages to slip this much above pure triteness by adding a self-referential overlay. IE: the end of the song where they refer to the whole concept as "another loser anthem." In a tricky way, they're playing both sides of the street.

How Do They Match Up? Complete inverse. The song specifically says "[I] don't wanna be just like you." And the story is about this washed-up major leaguer who finds the one kid who still idolizes him.

Episode 15: No More Music!? The Last Hope!! (Part One)
Featured Song: Hoobastank - "Without a Fight" (2006)
Newest Track In The Game Because: They thought it would do better.
Embarrassing Secret: Band name is just some stupid old high school in-joke and was originally spelled "Hoobustank." Kee-rist.

Stage Synopsis: An alien invasion force arrives on Earth to eradicate all music. Their evil armies get to work locking up all of the characters from the game's previous levels. Since the Agents very existence is to empower people through music, they are naturally at the front line of Earth's defense. Things do not go as planned.

Song Analysis: I feel like this song was written specifically for future licensing opportunities with movies and sports teams. The whole song could be shouted from the stands of the big rivals Central vs. Northeastern game, where increased violence will surely carry the day.

This is our time! Get up off the ground!
Take what is mine! We're not going down,
Without a fight!

It's a mob-rouser, full of aggressively inspirational platitudes.

How Do They Match Up? Great. Just short (only two checkpoints) and obscured with lousy voicework.

Episode 15: No More Music!? The Last Hope!! (Part Two)
Featured Song: The Rolling Stones - "Jumpin' Jack Flash" (1968)
Mick's Paradox Of Licensing: The Stones will allow you to use their songs in your movie or whatever, but you can't put it on the soundtrack album based on the movie.
Embarrassing Secret: Named after Keith Richards' gardener.

Stage Synopsis: With the Agents out of action, things look bleak. As all hope is lost, Lucy (the girl from "A Christmas Gift") starts slowly calling out "Agents. Agents. Agents." The crowd soon picks up the chant and their combined goodwill breaks the Agents free. Then everybody dances their way through the enemy ranks, forcing the aliens to withdraw.

Song Analysis: Like Let's Dance, Jumpin' Jack Flash is a dark song about things being okay now where they were formerly awful. The difference being that the Stones setup situations are far more horrible ("I was drowned, I was washed up and left for dead.") and the turnabout chorus ("It's a gas! gas! gas!") comes off as more sarcastic than successful.

How Do They Match Up? Surface. The Agents being knocked out of action is truly a problem for the planet, so if you assume that Mick is not doing this tongue-in-cheek, you're gold. Where it breaks down is in the detail of those bad times, where the song has people dying and howling and getting smacked around... which is a bit more explicit than EBA's world-without-music crisis. Although to be fair, you probably can't really understand the lyrics anyway. All you hear is "Jumpin' Jack Flash, it's a gas!" When paired with the cheers and clapping that accompanies a good play - not to mention the visuals of the game's cast working together and winning over the aliens - it melds into an exceedinlgly upbeat and inspiring scene.

Episode 9: Family Honor! Introducing the Secret-Weapon Ninja!!
Featured Song: Jamiroquai - "Canned Heat" (1999)
Not Likely To Appear In A PlayStation Game Because: Dude hates Sony.
Embarrassing Secret: That famous Napoleon Dynamite dance finale was actually synced to Canned Heat in post.

Stage Synopsis: A famous car company has lost their secret plans to a rival manufacturer... so the boss enlists his slacker son to sneak into the competitor's building and steal them back. The Agents' smooth moves provide the honorable sneak-thief with all the ninja skills he needs to stay ahead of the security guards and snatch the prototype car blueprints.

Song Analysis: About two thirds of Canned Heat's lyrics are missing from this cover, so we're left with only one major verse and a lot of repeated chorus lines. The point remains, however: everything may be lousy in the world, but tonight - tonight - I intend to forget it all through the self-hypotizing power of dance.

How Do They Match Up? Intriguing. You could conflate dancing with ninjitsu and be done with it, but, from the son's perspective, his life was better before this one particular night. To a longtime shiftless benefactor of nepotism, the demand to retrieve the stolen plans seems an impossible task. His story is almost the inverse of Canned Heat's message... although both have happy endings.

Episode 10: Survive! Celebrity Lives and Desert Isles!!
Featured Song: Madonna - "Material Girl" (1985)
Number of Times "controversial" and "controversy" appear in Madonna's Wikipedia entry: 23. (Interestingly, the phrase "boring old twat" never appears once.)
Embarrassing Secret: Never hit #1 thanks to REO Speedwagon's "Can't Fight This Feeling."

Stage Synopsis: Two vapid celebutantes find themselves stranded on a deserted island. Although they decide to make the best of it - and perhaps enjoy some solitude for a change - they have absolutely no idea how to survive without the conveniences of being rich and adored. The Agents act as a cheering section for the animals on the island who pitch in to assist the young beauties.

Song Analysis: You can see why Madonna moved on to deeper stuff, because Material Girl is as embarrassingly shallow as the title character. She only wants boyfriends who are wealthy. End of song.

The best you can say about it is that it's kind of an odd use of the word "material."

How Do They Match Up? Looks intentional. A completely appropriate pairing. The twins learn next to nothing from their experience and neither does the fictional Material Girl.

Episode 11: NURSE! Gold Medal Hero or Zero!!
Featured Song: Ashlee Simpson - "La La" (2005)
Other Childrens' Euphemisms For Sex : doing it, sleeping together, kissing.
Embarrassing Secret: Ashlee Simpson.

Stage Synopsis: A star sprinter falls ill right before a major event. He is convinced he can work through it in time, but his coach isn't as sure. The secret weapon is his white blood cells, which appear as a team of sexy female nurses. The Agents provide the energy to help the nurses stand against the onslaught of evil virus men.

Song Analysis: If you're a young girl with the goal of making it in the music industry, you need two things: an image stylist and a song where you talk about having sex with whoever is listening.

I have to confess that I like the bit where you hear a teakettle whistle. Some sound engineer in LA should pat him/herself on the back for that one.

How Do They Match Up? Whuh? OK, the nurses are sexy, the song is sexy. That's about it.

Episode 12: A Christmas Gift
Featured Song: Chicago - "You're the Inspiration" (1984)
You're Not Mentally Prepared For: This level.
Embarrassing Secret: After this album was released, Peter Cetera left the band to persue a solo career of even more schmaltzy ballads, including one with Wings' Crystal Bernard.

Stage Synopsis: In a warm family scene, a father leaves for a business trip, promising to return with a toy for his young daughter. An accident takes his life, but the little girl has trouble understanding the loss. On Christmas, the girl and her distraught mother busy themselves with routine holiday duties, all the while confronting memories of the lost father. The Agents soothing music helps the sundered family find closure for that terrible day when dad never came home.

Song Analysis: As far as love songs go, this one is pretty generic. It is probably most understood as a love for a significant other, but could be extrapolated to almost any loving relationship. You can even play with the verb tenses and turn it into a song about unrequited love. It's very flexible.

How Do They Match Up? Searing. You can't play this level and not connect it to the hopeful little girl. In fact, I doubt I'll ever hear the song again and not think that. It's amazing how a cheesy love song is lifted to a higher level when paired with a heart-wrenching story.

Episode 5: Magic Meets Madness! The Show Must Go On!
Featured Song: Stray Cats - "Rock This Town" (1981)
Desparately Trying To Bring Back: Swing.
Embarrassing Secret: Began as young guys playing your grandfather's music; Now grandfathers playing your great-grandfather's music.

Stage Synopsis: A performing magician has fallen on hard times, but just as things look bleak for his career, a gang of costumed thieves holds up the casino... giving him and his assistant a golden opportunity to wow the casino owner. With the Agents' support, the magician uses the full strength of his bag of tricks to capture the crooks one by one.

Song Analysis: Sort of a romantic comedy in song form, Rock This Town follows a couple through a crazy night of club-hopping. This couple obviously embodies the Stray Cats' rebellious retro attitude, as they discuss their styled hair and hatred of disco.

How Do They Match Up? Fair. Given that Rock This Town is a song about having fun, marginally in a dating scenario, it's a pretty good fit. The magician and his assistant are a couple themselves, and the level involves them working together to smack down another set of costumed characters... which seems like a good analogy to the Swing vs. Disco fight mentioned in the song.

Episode 6: A Pug's Life! 400 Miles from Home!!
Featured Song: Deep Purple - "Highway Star" (1972)
You Can Blame It For: Inventing speed metal.
Embarrassing Secret: The actual song is twice as long as the DS level.

Stage Synopsis: A dog is separated from his owner and needs to travel 400 miles to find him again. Along the way, his path is interrupted by various tests of valor. The Agents' provide the energy that keeps the pug moving on his quest.

Song Analysis: It's ostensibly about a man's love for his car, but, like most of the 70s, is probably more about sex. It's one of those songs where the delivery of the lyric is more important than the lyric itself, as evidenced by the theatrical chorus of "I love her / I need her / I seed her" with each line punctuated by by a musical hit... and, when performed live, a pelvic thrust.

How Do They Match Up? Eh. I mean, the dog does start out on a literal highway, but he quickly ends up in a small town and forested countryside... and anyway, he's in a difficult situation. He's not loving anything. In Highway Star, it's about a man's carnal love for something. The dog just wants to get home.

Episode 7: Ahoy, Mates! Sunken Delights and Adventure!!
Featured Song: Village People - "Y.M.C.A." (1978)
You're Humming It Right Now Because Of: Sporting events.
Embarrassing Secret: Most sports audiences still don't get it.

Stage Synopsis: A one-eyed sea captain is convinced he is on the track to an underwater treasure trove, but his fellow sailors don't buy it and abandon him. With the help of his parrot, this modern-day pirate dives into the ocean at great personal risk. The Agents' are on hand to help the captain determine the twists and clues on his treasure map.

Song Analysis:
RED STATE VERSION: It's about how nice it is that disadvantaged, perhaps homeless, youth can find a comfy cot, a hot bath and sustaining food at socially uplifting non-profit organizations like the YMCA. While there, these wayward souls may find solace in the counsel of trained volunteers, with the goal of getting their lives back together. Why not raise our voices in salute to those whose mission is to help others?

REST OF WORLD VERSION: It's about how easy it is to hook up with other gay dudes at the Y.

How Do They Match Up? Subversively. A song about the friggin' YMCA has scratch-all to do with a SCUBA-diving treasure hunter. But I'll hazard a guess that pairing up the sailor story with the gay anthem was no coincedence.

Episode 8: Cry Wolf! Meteorology and Parenting!!
Featured Song: Earth, Wind and Fire - "September" (1978)
Other Months EWF Rejected As Song Titles: January through August, October through December.
Embarrassing Secret: It took at least ten dudes to sing this song.

Stage Synopsis: A TV weathercaster has plans with her son to go on a picnic, but the forecast calls for rain. Rather than disappoint her son, whom she knows is watching at home, she predicts a bright, sunny weekend... a lie that could cost her job. With the Agents' help, she sets out to literally change the weather, so that her forecast is proven true and her day with her son is not ruined.

Song Analysis: It starts off as a reminiscence about a night in September, where the singer and his whoever fell in love. They sang, they danced, they watched the stars. What I don't get is this:

Now December
found the love that we shared in September.
Only blue talk and love, remember
the true love we share today.

What's December have to do with anything? I think EWF was just hard up for a rhyme.

How Do They Match Up? Very cute. The song contains a fair amount of nature mentions - chasing the clouds away, never was a cloudy day, golden deams were shiny days - which nicely dovetails with the pleasantly bizarre mission of the weathermom. And any song about love that avoids explicit sexual talk can easily be transferred to a parent-child relationship, so this mix ends up feeling very appropriate.

Episode 1: Trio of Mayhem! Love And Boyfriends!!
Featured Song: Steriogram - "Walkie Talkie Man" (2004)
You Probably Know It Better As: That old iPod song that sounds like it's sung by the Muppets.
Embarrassing Secret: On the Robots soundtrack.

Stage Synopsis: A teen girl wants to ask her football star pal to go steady, but the couple is continually distracted by babysitting duties. The Elite Beat Agents must help the teens get the kiddies to bed so they can have their romantic moment together. The level culminates in a hilarious screen where the guy equates the girl to football uprights. No innuendo there, no sir!

Song Analysis: Um, utter nonsense. The only recognizable lyrics are, predictably, the chorus:

He�s fat and he don�t run too fast
But he�s faster than me
Last night at the show we saw him
Going out of his tree

For some reason, it suggests to me a bouncer at a rock show, or maybe a guard at the mall, some scene where a fat dude has a brief moment of authority in private sector security. I honestly don't expect you're intended to think about it very much.

How Do They Match Up? Lousy. There's no connection here at all. It's a good opening level though; the song is recent enough to seem hip and quirky enough to let you know that the game doesn't care what you think of it. Perhaps more importantly, the song's speedy tempo and babbling lyrics make you think you're playing at a harder level, so it's a confidence booster.

Episode 2: Red Carpet Premiere! Smash Hit or Box Office Crash!!
Featured Song: Sum 41 - "Makes No Difference" (2000)
Your First Reaction Is: Huh? Who?
Embarrassing Secret: Classified as "Canadian Punk."

Stage Synopsis: The pressure is on for Chris Silverscreen, a famous director, to produce another hit, so the studio moneymen are watching his current project very closely. The movie, "Romancing Meowzilla," features action, romance, and a giant cat. The Agents' unerring rhythm gives the director the pacing he needs to call "Action!" at just the right moments to cut a perfect film.

Song Analysis: This is a song about moving on and getting over what may have sucked in the past. Happily, it is not a song about malice towards anyone, but more about accepting that things will always suck in some fashion, so why internalize it. There's some moderately clever rhyming hidden inside sentences, which I always like.

How Do They Match Up? Sort of. You could suggest that Silverscreen is trying to resurrect his career and thus get past bad times, but he ends up doing stuff that the studio loves (with $ eyes) and his final product doesn't make much sense anyway. It would be more appropriate if he thumbed his nose at the bean-counters, did his own thing, and THEN was a raging success.

Episode 3: Hey, Taxi! To the Hospital and Hurry!!
Featured Song: Avril Lavigne - "Sk8er Boi" (2002)
Worst Way To Justify The Inane Way Kids Spell On The Internet: Name your song in AOL-speak.
Embarrassing Secret: Somebody thinks this would make a great movie.

Stage Synopsis: A woman goes into labor in a taxi cab, and the need to get to the hospital awakens a dormant second personality in the meek cabbie. With his shades on, he will take any risk to get the woman there before the baby becomes a cliche. The Agents' dancing keeps the cab driver focused on his goal, avoiding cops and pedestrians in a very wild ride.

Song Analysis: Thanks to the distinct voicework, there's no confusion about this song's story: boy and girl like each other, girl's friends convince girl to reject boy, boy becomes super-famous on MTV. The only "surprise" comes near the end when you find that Avril is a second girl who eventually won the Sk8er Boi, and not the regretful chick.

The song contains absolutely nothing internetty in it, so the title is naught but a carefully chosen bid for cheap cred with kids.

How Do They Match Up? Mismatched. There is clearly no romance between the new mom and the young cabbie, and the plain sound of the lyrics drives home the disconnect. You'd think a song with such a blatant story would write its own level, but the downer ending probably nixed that idea.

Episode 4: Art and Beauty! Love and Happiness!?
Featured Song: Freddie Mercury - "I Was Born to Love You" (1985)
Creepiest Lyric: "If I was given every opportunity, I'd kill for your love."
Embarrassing Secret: The video.

Stage Synopsis: In 16th Century Italy, young Leonardo DaVinci is a ladies' man with his pick of women in Florence... but he is infatuated with Mona Lisa, who is not as certain in her return affection. The Agents' soulful rock moves ignite the fires of invention in Leonardo, who puts his skills into wooing the lady. He even has his own catchy exultation: "Volcanooooo!"

Song Analysis: This was essentially a solo work by Freddie that Queen later re-recorded several years after he died. This factoid explains why you won't find any casual Queen fans who have heard of this tune. Lyrically, it is a one track mind, as Freddie repeats his plea to the unnamed object of his love. Over and over again. He was born to love you.

How Do They Match Up? Brilliant. This is a love song that borders on psychotic, neatly fitting Leo's untameable obsession. And with DaVinci uniquely recast as a glamorous, lusty showman, the parity with Freddie Mercury's exaggerated stage identity is perfect.

If you had mentioned this to me a week ago, I'd have guessed this to be an "only in Japan" kind of thing. But no, I found this odd little bit of co-branding at our local US grocery store.

Several points make this really odd. The first being that it's not really a box of "Kingdom Hearts Fruit Snacks," it's just the characters temporarily shilling for a pre-existing Florida's Natural brand. Florida's Natural is the orange juice company that does those "as close to the grove as you can get" commercials. I'm sure I'm not far off in speculating that they struck a Disney deal based solely on their FL proximity to each other.

Secondly, KH2 came out a year ago, so either these are really old, or somebody is just sper late to the table of product placement. I could not determine any way to tell the age of the box. The snacks tasted fine, at any rate.

Thirdly, no big images Mickey, Donald or Goofy. I'm sure the complicated web of endorsement rights kept any and all major Disney characters off of the box... but the KH local team of Sora, Roxas, Kairi and Namine were okay. The only clues that this is a Disney thing (aside from the KH2 logo) are a tiny "copyright Disney" on the back and some small screenshots where you can make out Chicken Little and B&W Pete. (And if you look exceptionally well, you can see some little heads of Goofy, Tron and Stitch, from the game's HUD.) No Final Fantasy characters either.

I love the desperate "Best Selling Video Game" text on the front.

Each box has one of six cut-outs, one each for Roxas, Kairi and Namine and three poses of Sora. My store only had the guys in stock. Inside are the pathetic "tips" that you always get whenever a video game property appears on food. "Always remember to upgrade your team with skill points!", that kind of thing.

On this very same shopping trip, we discovered that this grocery store now has a video game section. And not just cheapie $10 GBA games either... it seemed like a valid selection of marginally new stuff. You could even buy a 360 controller, a PS2 headset, and some other not-total-crap accessories. Knowing how grocery stores typically handle non-food merchandise (read: poorly), my feeling is that this could be a weird way to find either overpriced games or killer discounts, with no in-between.

And yes, they had Kingdom Hearts 2 on sale for $50. Which is overpriced.

Every time you turn the page, it gets more and more random. This particular cartoon was probably made when Disney's Robin Hood movie come out. Anybody remember that Gumby revival series where one of his buddies is a woolly mammoth? That was probably done around Jurassic Park, in homage to that amazing mammoth bit.

He's fought Space Dinosaurs, captured gorillas, and helped both kings and Indians, but, as Gumby's last moments of lucid thought leak away, he's most fond of receiving mail.

That mailbox is freakin' huge!

Was there really no better shot of this? That could be anything inside that net. This must be a wink for the True Fans, those who would know that Gumby's Pops is orange with a Grecian Formula'd hairpiece.

Let's just move swiftly past the idea that a giggling, oxygen-deprived Pokey enjoys thinking of things that upset Gumby's parents. Nobody likes their in-laws, after all. What's more interesting is the detail that Pokey brings up super-casually:

They had a robot paint their house.

A robot. That's the life these guys live. It almost explains why this space trip has them bored out of their clay skulls.

Next time: Even better than getting mail!

Elite Beat Agents is the best DS game out there. Sucks that nobody bought it.

You'll have this. I've felt spoiled lately, because many of the recent games that I thought were fantastic but with the potential to end up undersold somehow broke through. Katamari, LEGO Star Wars, these are games that you play... and then you want to make sure that others play them. It makes you happy because you feel like things are right in the world; good games rise to the top. Elite Beat Agents is one of these games, but it's not rising.

I think Nintendo let this one slip away, perhaps expecting it to ride the viral wave that took Katamari to critical and commercial success. It should have. Considering the weak stuff that Nintendo has dumped adverdollars on, it's a double shame that this one really great game got nothin'. The one thing they did for it was to put it in their DS Demo Stations, which was what convinced me to get it. Without that, I myself may never have tried it.

I've decided that the box art does nothing for it. It looks like Men in Black: The Animated Series. I suppose there's a slight American Idol vibe, with the microphone and the blue background, but then again it's that time of year and American Idol is unavoidable at the moment.

You would think they could have included a "FEATURING THE MUSIC OF" blurb. I know DS box space is at a premium, but something in the style of a movie soundtrack album would not have hurt at all. Seeing as this is a Touch! Generations title (no, I don't mind typing that), I may have favored the moldy oldie artists. "Featuring the music of Madonna, David Bowie, and the Rolling Stones," say. I'm sure I'm out of touch, but a couple of the newer artists are complete unknowns to me anyway.

Although now they're all on my iPod. I snapped up most of them on iTunes and made my own EBA album. These games have a way of making me enjoy songs I would normally avoid. For example, I have hated Rock This Town forever, because I consider the Stray Cats an abomination. But now, instead of growing annoyed by the 1980s faux do-wop revival garbage, I think of a cute story with a Vegas stage magician foiling a robbery by the Royal Flush Gang.

I also find myself mentally adding the Agents' audio "Whoo!" and "Yes!" as I'm listening to the songs in the car. "You bet, kid!"

So I'm telling you, this is the best DS game to date. And it's one I would rank high on any list of great handheld games. It's fun, challenging, and a perfect portable title. I've beaten every song on every difficulty and, after reading stories of people finding the game so hard that they physically destroyed their DS, I feel pretty good about that. Really dude, Let's Dance is one of the harder ones? Pshaw.

I'm importing Ouendan, the Japan-only proto-EBA, as soon as I can score a coupon for Play-Asia.

This is the first time I've been in a store that had PS3s for sale. On a Friday night, perhaps two hours from closing, Toys R Us had three tickets and two big empty boxes just sitting in the main walkway. Not in the video game section. And yes, they were out of Wiis. I even witnessed a distraught old couple asking about the Wii and being told that the store "had no idea" when the next shipment would arrive.

I touched the PS3 tickets. I thought about it. But that price just is not going to happen. Maybe if they had some games out for it.

RELATED ASIDE: I think I'm going to have to buy Kingdom Hearts 2 again, because of the rumored US release of KH2: Final Mix. What makes this a very real need is the addition of a second disk containing a fully PS2-ified version of the Game Boy Advance game, Kingdom Hearts: Chain of Memories.

I've been through the GBA version, sure, and I even grew to really like the weird-ass card battle system... but I would not mind seeing it on the big screen. And I'll wager this hits at the $30 or $40 level, too.

That would be a nice way to spend the PS3-less times.

This is a classic example of Nintendo releasing something silly and fun that nobody cares about.

I mean, come on. We all knew that the DK Bongos would not be used for f-all else but this one line of rhythm games (We got two of them; I think Japan got three.) Nintendo managed to squeak out the innovative Jungle Beat in a surprise move, but, like the eReader before it, the Bongos' future strength was decided by the lack of present sales.

The Konga project was actually done by Namco, not Nintendo, who would later sideline a PS2 version (Taiko Drum Master) without any pretense of ever using the drum peripheral again. Donkey Konga and Taiko Drum Master are therefore bizarrely identical games, with Taiko just edging out with a better song list. Both games, however, include a terrible version of Love Shack.

Donkey Konga's biggest failing - apart from killing your arms in 20 minutes - is the decidedly low-fi presentation. The backgrounds are filled with Donkey Kong Country renders that amount to animated gifs, and the menu structure is obnoxious thanks to the Bongos' lack of a d-pad. Nintendo could have gotten a lot more mileage out of this one had they just worked with Namco to amp up the look to something more than SNES levels. (Perhaps not ironically, Taiko Drum Master arrived with a stylized, cartoony look far superior to DK's 3D renders of dancing banana chickens.)

Memory Score: Be fair... that "konga" pun was pitch-perfect.

It's one of the strongest Mario sub-brands, but the Paper Mario series doesn't seem to get the respect it deserves. I don't know anybody who played either game, on N64 or the Cube. And I almost never see anybody talking about it. Both games probably arrived too late in their respective console's life cycle to create much impact.

Whereas on the N64, where the case could be made that everything is made of flat "paper" because the cartridge could more easily handle the 2D graphics, the Cube sequel took the flat look and OWNED it. Mario was given abilities befitting a two dimensional character - rolling into a tube, folding into an airplane - and bosses showed up as complex origami-esque constructions. Paper Mario 2 also took advantage of the GameCube's power to spotlight sequences featuring hundreds of flowing and thronging sprites.

All around, it's a terribly clever game. The turn-based combat never gets boring; the RPG stat elements are streamlined and intuitive; the adventure offers a linear path but plenty of free-roaming sidequests. And for some reason, Nintendo allows this franchise of the Mushroom Kingdom to have a self-deprecating, inwardly sarcastic vibe... resulting in gags like Luigi fabricating his own amazing adventure because he usually never has anything to do.

Memory Score: I love the character designs on this series!

A letdown saved only by virtue of the easy-access multiplayer.

We're getting closer to the mythical Great Super-Hero Game, but X-Men: Legends is too similar to all of those awful arcade games where you fought endless streams of palette-swapped bad guys. Except now it has a worse camera angle.

The hook here is that you can CREATE YOUR OWN X-MEN TEAM from A ROSTER OF YOUR FAVORITE COMIC GREATS. But they're mostly the same, functionally. Wolverine punching with claws equals Colossus punching with fists. There's a half-assed RPG mode where you can push powers and stats by increments, but by the end of the game everybody is going to be maxxed anyway, so why bother. There's even an Auto toggle that pluses the skills for you, so that should reveal just how important it is.

The coolest feature is using the shoulder button as a shift to access a second set of attacks - your MUTANT POWERS - but even those are all samey. Toss in the usual nonsensical labyrinth level designs and typical boned camera motions (including dragging other players to their death), and you've got a nicely mediocre multiplayer game.

But when you're scrabbling for multiplayer co-op, you'll take what you can get. Why is that still so rare? Are we still beholden to the unfair characterization that video gamers are solitary beasts? I would have thought that online play and, you know, marriage would have killed that by now.

Memory Score: It just takes a few Morlocks to kill off every X-Men. Remember that.

Next time: another N64 sequel (not so great this time), a party you can talk to (a good attempt at innovating), and the GameCube's final trump card (you know what I'm talking about)

Background: Some chump takes umbrage to having spelling and grammar corrected in a previous post. Complete original discussion here.

Background: In a discussion about Metroid, this guy tries to make a really weird point about gender and race in video games.

Background: This discussion was about an article on 1UP about "Game Breakers"... or, things that wreck video games. The pull quote was this gem:

"Rumor has it that videogames are not, in fact, movies. This might seem obvious to anyone who plays them, but the entertainment industry � and even a few game designers � have yet to comprehend this. Developers like Metal Gear's Hideo Kojima insist on cramming their games with cut-scenes that are often inscrutable, occasionally entertaining, and almost never interactive. Sometimes, you can't even press the Start button to skip them."

I introduced Mike to the Wii this weekend. Predictably, Wii Sports has a big hit; he and I enjoyed some lengthy bowling challenges. Mike actually worked up to the Pro level when I wasn't looking and unlocked a sparkly bowling ball for his Mii. It was such a smart move on Nintendo's part to make sure that every US Wii owner walked away with Wii Sports (I won't call it a "free" game since a Japanese Wii w/o Wii Sports goes for about $210 American), because it sells the system. Now Nintendo just has to keep the momentum going with more stuff in the same vein. It ain't videos of people playing Zelda that are all over the internet... it's Wii Sports. Wario Ware Smooth Moves will be the next big Wii game that continues on this path, and it will generate similarly stupid/silly videos for YouTube. But then what?

The Wii and PS2 kept us plenty busy in the AM. We also did some Guitar Hero, Elebits, Bully, Trauma Center... and, of course, everything I've purchased to date from the Virtual Console. Chiefly: Toe Jam & Earl.

It's been about ten years since we last played TJ&E together. (Or at all, really.) And even back then, we considered it an "old classic." Which seems ridiculous now, as the game was just over five years old at the time.

(Sidebar: isn't it absolutely bizarre that Sonic celebrated his 15th anniversary in the same year - 2006 - that Pokemon celebrated 10? It seems like there should be worlds of time between the initial releases of those franchises, but it's only a five year gap. What screws it up is that Pokemon showed up in the US a few years later than in Japan, so by our reckoning it's seven years between the two.)

We beat TJ&E at least once back then (and I had beaten the game a year before that with my sister, back when the Sega Channel was waning... and you know what, I thought the game was old then) so it wasn't like we were walking in blind. Toe Jam & Earl is an obnoxiously difficult game. To clarify: it's not hard, it just terribly cruel at times. One bad encounter with a swarm of bees can run one player out of two or three lives in a row.

After losing all of our lives in stupid ways - and almost two hours of play - I checked online for any old secrets to the game, then finding those become our goal. Here is the spoiler for one of them.

Turns out there's a World Zero, the entrance to which is hidden way back on the very first island. You need to get to the lower left corner of the map, which will require Icarus Wings or something similar, because you'll just die swimming. We travelled through the boards until we got lucky and found some Wings (actually, I accidentally Randomized and that's how we got the Wings) and then we fell back down to World 1.

The hidden island on World 1 contains a hole that will drop you to the 0 island. Note the "0" bottom center for proof that I'm not bullshitting you. What's great about this is that it features a hot tub full of hula girls. Jumping into the hot tub replenishes your life. Standing by the lemonade stand gets you a free level-up.

We had never heard of this secret before, so we were pretty impressed.

Then we hit the code to get all the damn rocketship parts and ended the game.

Received my four New-Gen Wii wriststraps today. Nintendo had to pay 39 cents to mail them to me. That letter above is the stern upbraiding you receive along with your gifts.

The new ones really are considerably thicker:

The next obvious question is, How is the cord attached to the strap underneath that plastic sleeve? Somebody somewhere is going to find a way to snap this newly-impenetrable strap, and much internet hay will be made of Nintendo's "failure" and "continuing ignorance of real usage issues" and "if they didn't want us to swing them like a man in a gorilla suit, they shouldn't have hired sporty catalog models to demo them in all the still photography."

It all comes down to Suggestion Number Two: Do not let go of the remote during gameplay. You are not actually bowling.

One of my old straps is headed for the DS, but I promise not to hold Nintendo accountable should it snap when I decide to fling it across the room in an attempt to simulate the Frisbee minigame in Rub Rabbits.

We hustled out to Toys R Us today after reading reports of a cool video game clearance sale. And we did quite well.

But we had to walk in forewarned, because most of the games were not sitting under sale prices. Typical. Drill Dozer there still had a $30 ticket on it, but it scanned at $10. Metroid Prime Pinball was marked $20 but was actually $10. I did several trips from the game aisle to the nearest price checker before I settled on my purchases.

The big surprise was the appearance of Phoenix Wright at $20. I was looking for this one for a year now and had pretty much given up hope; it was under-produced and disappeared from shelves quickly. Came out close to Lost in Blue and Trauma Center, actually. Capcom did another run of the game sometime in '06 I believe, but I never saw any of those either. This miraculous sighting is probably an additional run to help gain some shelf mindshare in advance of the sequel.

I vowed to play each of the four games tonight for at least 20 minutes for some first impression notes...

Drill Dozer, $10: I'm thinking this will be the last GBA game ever for me. Fun platformer, with a strange control scheme that takes a bit to get used to. Far neater than the most common screenshots show. The cartridge is the weirdest GBA pak, elongated and cast in a rusty red hue. It's big because it has built-in rumble, which ends up being fairly pointless since it only rumbles when you're drilling, and guess what, you're drilling all the damn time.

Made by Game Freak, who is better known for the Pokemon GBA games, and one listen to the music will solidify the comparison. A Nintendo first-party game of entirely new IP that will no doubt be forgotten amid all the bawlbabies screaming about how Nintendo just milks their pet franchises.

Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney, $20: Did the first case, which is more or less a tutorial to the ins and outs of lawyering. Opens with a murder, which I thought was a nice T-rated touch. Definitely more of an experience game than a game game, since it seems like you could just blindly guess through the choice sections and muddle through. Maybe the first case is crap-easy.

I loved the cliffhanger ending to the tutorial. This is going to be a fun time, even if it's more of the game leading me than me leading the game. Really happy to have found a copy.

Metroid Prime Pinball, $10: Very nice pinball, lots of cool extras in the Metroid flavor. Could not figure out the Wall Jump bonus board though. I have a six-card carrycase attached to my DS that holds the six newest/best DS games, and I can see MPP staking a long term claim just because it's easy to pick up and play.

MPP came with the DS Rumble Pak, a GBA cartridge-sized vibration add-on. It sticks out of the DS Lite like crazy and the rumble effects really suck. So I doubt we'll see much use of that.

The Rub Rabbits, $10: The sequel to Feel the Magic, which I had forgotten just how much I liked. More of the same: silly, romance-driven minigames that run through all of the DS feature set. Love the music.

When I turned it on, the game said "Happy New Year!" which is great. It said it again on later trips to the start screen, but in a different voice. Which should prove how dedicated the game is to cool easter eggs.

The start screen also provided the coolest warning yet for low power:

Great deals all around. My DS is going to be busy. Even the ol' GBA is seeing some return action, since I prefer to keep my GBA games on the home front.

I'm still waiting for a price drop on Pokemon Trozei. Jesus.

Almost forgot to mention the Superhero Squad set up in the first pic. I love how you can buy cutesy pre-school toys of Ghost Rider and the Punisher, two characters fundamentally unsuited for cutesy pre-school toys. I wish they had done these guys for the defunct Spider-Man and Friends line (ToyFare once ran some concept art for a SM&F Ghost Rider, and he looked sweet as hell.)

While strolling past the stuffed animals aisle, I walked straight into this:

An official Nintendogs plush toy! When did they get into that!? Cool.

And at the checkout, I got one of those randomly selected survey codes, which I filled out online for a free $3 coupon. I dinged the store pretty hardcore for not having the video games priced correctly, and for the general dirt and mess those aisles are always in. The floor under the GameCube kiosk has not been swept since, well, the GameCube launch.

After the Toys R Us visit, we went to Target. I got one of those awesome glowing Wii gift cards. I remember seeing them when the Wii first hit, but never since. Rhon's idea was to buy the gift card back in the electronics section, then use it to pay for the rest of our bill up front. Smart, eh? The card sort of strikes me as a cool rare piece of Wii memorabilia, so I'm glad we found one.

In case you're interested, 2007 will be exactly the same as 1990 and 2001, numerically speaking. I look this up every year so I can re-use old calendars. I'm serious.

See, I have a lot of cool old calendars that I never threw away: Red Dwarf, Pokemon, Magic, Monty Python, Mickey Mouse-in-1930s comics. So when those years cycle around again, I get to enjoy them again. Typically, the "old" calendar is re-presented in the downstairs bathroom or in the computer room, depending on the coolness factor of the content. We usually get a new one for the other slot - a genuine 2007 calendar, in this case featuring Superman - so the pile of possible future contenders always grows. Unrelatedly, Rhon likes to have her own calendar in the kitchen that she can write on. J'accuse!

2007 will re-feature a Tolkien artwork calendar from 2001, which obviously was released ahead of the big movie trilogy. Quaint! Sure, some of the holidays will be on the wrong days, but if they're important enough, somebody at work will remind me that I have off.

This is about as much of a shit as I give about the "New Year" thing. Every December 31st, my sole wish is that the drunks will only kill off fellow drunks.