Unlike last year's Mew Day, this Pokemon Event was a piece of cake.

As hoped, the whole affair was run by WiFi download. Although most people showed up expecting a line, so they didn't know where to go. The largest clusters formed around this instructional sign and over by the RZone checkout (where they were handing out the $5 coupons.) Follow the Mystery Gift instructions and bammo, everybody gets a Manaphy. Then we all run right home and breed a Phione.
Obviously most of the people there did not have Battle Revolution (and Nintendo must know it, because there was Battle Rev signage EVERYWHERE) because the Mystery Gift menu was totally unknown. The whole Wonder Card thing is woefully under-reported. Where's the Nintendo Power two page spread explaining how you download, what kinds of gifts you can download, and where you have to go to download? Nowhere, that's where... because it would absolutely kill Nintendo to have to admit that they have all kinds of secret things hidden in these games, to be revealed only at special events to be named later. Or never.
Eh, I'm still bitter about Animal Crossing, leave me alone.

The Geoffrey birthday party stuff kicked off at noon. Yeah, Nickelodeon! Bend that air!

Free instruments for the kids. Clark picked the same kind as last year.
Here's the big bonus.
If you've ever been to any kind of organized Pokemon event, you've probably seen the little Pokemon Fan magazines they give away. They're cute little adver-mags, occasionally about selected Poke-fans, mostly about tips and tricks for the games (video and TCG), and always about the latest merchandise for sale.
The mag's article on Battle Revolution has a secret code in it to transfer an Electivire into your Pearl/Diamond. It's the same code that's on the official website, as if you check there with any regularity. I imagine this will show up in Nintendo Power as well. Since Battle Rev doesn't have any kind of obvious "ENTER SECRIT CODEZ HERE" screen, you have to input the code on your profile page.
And by the way, you can find the dash on the WXYZ button. Thanks again for not including a real bloody soft keyboard, Nintendo!
As with the Surfing Pikachu and Manaphy itself, the Electivire comes through as a Wonder Card, meaning that I now have the maximum of three. I assume I can just dump one of them, now that I have all of those guys in my game.
Can Battle Rev generate Surfing Pikachus and Electivires for other copies of Diamond/Pearl, other than the one that is paired to the game? I would bet not - why would Nintendo allow everyWii to become a Surfing Pikachu generator - but I'm definitely going to test it out.

Hilariously, both the website and Pokemon Fan promise to have a new code "next month"... and it's purportedly "hot." Guess what that will be. COUGH*magmortar.
Anyway, this sure is easier than finding those stupid rare items that evolve Electabuzz and Magmar. I figured that you'd have to play Battle Rev for a million days to generate enough in-game money to buy them.
This totally validates my Battle Revolution purchase, by the way.
So what are they going to give away at next year's event (assuming there is one)? Darkrai? Ho-oh/Lugia? Raikou/Entei/Suicune? Deoxys?

It's that time of year again. Time to pass judgement on the fall/winter release schedule and decide where to put my gaming dollars.
Let's just get excited about this right now.
This is just great. Every comics fan - and even pop culture fans in general - should check this out: "
The special covers Spider-Man, naturally, but also Ditko's other creations... Dr. Strange, the Creeper, Hawk & Dove, the Question, and Mr. A. When I was a lad, and we went to the local library, every summer I would check out the same History of Comics book and it had reprints of the seminal Spidey and Doc Strange stories. The original Ditko Doc has this horrid angular look to him that just fascinated me.

It was like the hardest decision of my life.
I had read earlier in the week that a new LocoRoco game was headed to the PlayStation Store. If I had a PSP, LocoRoco would definitely had been a purchase, so I was more than a little interested in a downloadable semi-sequel on the PS3.
released January 2007, received February 2007
released February 2007, purchased February 2007
released September 2006, purchased March 2007







Zatch Bell: Mamodo Fury (PS2)
Genji: Dawn of the Samurai (PS2)
High Stakes on the Vegas Strip (PS3)
Tony Stark as filthy rich warmonger. Very good. Nice modern update - he's clearly funding a Middle East-based war, as we'll see. He's slimy and arrogant.
He just gave an "American Might Makes Right" speech. This is going to play well in the Red State sticks, although they won't see the big philosophical transformation coming. Which is probably fine. I mean, the first half of this trailer looks like an embarrassing 9/11 revenge flick, but it seems plain that Tony will see the error of his ways and, by the end of the movie, change his weapons company into a defense-through-technology company.
And he's funny. This is more Robert Downey Jr than Tony Stark... but it's still good casting. And it's nice to see a super-hero movie that isn't about some impossibly gorgeous young CW dropout. Downey is old.
Then he does the cha-cha.
Oooohh... very classic. Stark, beaten and enslaved, secretly forging his battlesuit. I didn't bother with screenshotting the other guy in Stark's prison... the Careworn Scientist who delivers Worldview-Changing Advice yet meets an Untimely End.
Wow. I've always liked the original blocky gray Iron Man suit, and this is just a great interpretation. It's the bucket head that never fails to get me.
Yes, the bad guy has a suit too. Jesus, what else could you do? I'm sure it is called War Machine and I'm sure the movie ends with Jim Rhodes peeling it off of Jeff Bridges' broken body.
See? War Machine. (Wikipedia says it's the Iron Monger, which, once you remove the villains that are uncomfortable Asian stereotypes, must rank pretty high on the Iron Man nemesis meter.)
Super-sweet. More of this, please.
"Repulsor Blast!"
The trailer ends with eight minutes of Iron Man flying around doing nothing. WTF? I'm glad to see the guy in daylight - verifies that he's in the classy red and gold - but shouldn't the trailer end with something happening? Some foreboding dialogue? Something exploding? Downey saying something hilariously ironic from inside the suit, probably to children at a bus stop? "Stay in school, kids. And eat your iron!" BA-ZOOM!

























I decided that I wanted everybody right around level 60 before going after the League Championship, so I've been doing a lot of mindless training... initially up around Snowpeak and more recently just west of Sunyshore. Then I stocked up on Revives and HP healers. Although I bought a ton of Super Potions, I also picked up lots of those drinks cans you get at the top floor of the shopping mall. They're a better value.
Elite Four #1 - Aaron
Elite Four #2 - Bertha
Elite Four #3 - Flint
Elite Four #4 - Lucian
League Champion Cynthia






















