Want to replay ICO

I've been wanting to replay both ICO and Shadow of the Colossus for a while now but I have to force myself to wait. They are being re-released on PS3 ( http://ps3.ign.com/articles/112/1120651p1.html ) in Q2 2011 in HD and they are gonna look great!

If you haven't played either of these games it's time to get excited soon because you are gonna be in for a treat. I can't decide on a favorite of them but they are both in my top 5 all time list

Game dev story

I bought Game dev story the other day to kill some time at work

And now I sit at home playing it instead of more "real" games for the PS3. It really is strangely addictive. You hire staff, coders and writers etc, and make games in  a wide variety of categories. Leveling up your staff and training them opens up new game combos and increases the quality of your game. It has a real good "only a few more minutes" factor and time seems to fly by when you play it. Old school gamers will get flashbacks to Rockstar ate my hamster :)

If you got some time to kill I really recommend this game

Dingoo A330

I think I found what to get my brother for christmas, the Dingoo A330, a handheld emulator. The controls for it aren't perfect apparently but I think it is a cool concept. He is a couple of years younger then me and missed a lot of the great games for Nes and Snes. You can hook it up to a tv and play with a wireless controller too, even though the resolution isn't the best. But he travels by train a lot an there is certainly a whole lot of gaming for the money with this machine and just reading about it made me wanna go back and play some of my childhood favorites like Secret of Mana and Chrono Trigger. Hope he likes it

Castlevania, a quick look

Picked up Castlevania: Lords of Shadow earlier today and it's already impressed me quite a bit. I haven't really played any Castlevanias since Symphony of the night for the PS1 and that was such a great game that I've bought it both for the PS3 and xbox, I suggest you do the same btw. Right off the bat I can say that it's a lot harder then God of War 3, starting at the highest diffculty level available at the start of the game I've already at chapter 2 had encounters I've had to try 10ish times to complete.

 Right off the bat I can say that it's a lot harder then God of War 3, starting at the highest diffculty level available at the start of the game I've already at chapter 2 had encounters I've had to try 10ish times to complete. It really is a good looking game too and some of the views are almost breathtaking. Now I just hope the game has the same quality all the way through.

Picking up programming again

A friend of mine recently started studying at university again, two years web programming starting with Java. Since I started working nights I have a couple of free hours at work every day so I thought that it would be a good idea to start programming again too. I was never really proficient at it, but hey, why not right?

So I recently got started using Objects First with Java,

and damn has my mind deteriorated or what!
It's gonna take some time to get the logical parts of my brain up to full speed again thats for sure. I wouldn't recommend the book unless you have someone you can ask some questions because I really think the progression in it is too fast without a teacher. The educational development environment Blue J is really good though, it gets you right into the concepts of object oriented programming without even writing one line of code.
All in all it's fun doing something that requires a bit of brain power again, hope it lasts :)

Thinking about getting into yoga

I really need to get more flexible and I figure yoga would be a good way to do it.

Bryan Kests power yoga has been recommended on a couple of forums
http://www.amazon.com/Bryan-Kest-Power-Complete-Collection/dp/B0001WTWYC
but I'm not sure. I really only want it for the flexibility since I do all my strength training with the convict conditioning program.
Anyone else have any good suggestions? Otherwise I guess I'll just give the power yoga a go and see how it feels.

One of my top three movies

I had some time to kill and decided to re-watch, for the umpteenth time, one of my favorite movies.

It may look like just an action movie, and I personally find the action in it the best put to film, possibly only beaten by the bank shootout in heat. But whats really great about this movie is the characters and the atmosphere. Every main character is multifaceted and has his own motives, the writing, directing and acting all shine here. In fact one of the reasons this wasn't more well received by the public, I think, was that the plot was a bit too complex for those just looking to be distracted a while.

Anyway, check it out on http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0202677/ and it it seems like anything you'd enjoy get to watching it asap and tell me what you thought.

Time to start training again

Having started working nights there haven't been many trips to the gym lately so I figured it was time to start some bodyweight training so I can get a workout done at home.

Convict conditioning came highly recommended for a beginner and having leafed through it I think I can see why. As usual you have to look past some grandstanding, and this being a bodyweight program he really bashes training with weights. I don't really care for that debate though, what interests me is the program, and CC really lays out a good way to progress through what "coach" call the power 6. 6 movements that supposedly train the whole body

Well I'll start out and then time will tell I guess, in any case doing something is better then doing nothing

The Witcher

Was surfing around a bit and came upon the dev diary for the Witcher 2
http://ve3d.ign.com/videos/68155/PC/The-Witcher-2-Assassins-of-Kings/Developer-Diary/Dev-Diary-Vid-2
which immediately made me want to play through the first one again.
They say there will be a save import also, which means it's time to agonize twice as much over every important decision since now it might effect things I have no clue about yet. I really liked their delayed consequence system on the first playthrough and now it was a while since I played it so hopefully I've forgotten enough for it to still hold some surprises.

Meditation

I've had it in my mind that I would start meditating for over a year now, it's just very hard to make a habit out of it. Somehow it's much easier dicking around on off-topic forums or playing some games than sitting down and doing nothing for 20 minutes.

I think part of the problem in trying to get things like this going is being overambitious and starting way to strong so this time I'll change tactics. Now everyday I will count 100 breaths and try to be aware in the moment, if I fail I start over again. When the threshold is lower and the time commitment less it's much easier to just do it, and once the habit is entrenched I hope it will be easier to step it up.

8 days and counting so far, wish me luck.

Scott Pilgrim

Just saw the movie and surprise surprise the books were better. 

Overall I liked it and thought they captured the feel of the comic, I just have a hard time understanding why they would focus so much on the fights. Cera doesn't seem like our next big action hero but he is good at playing the lovable loser so why not use the excellent source material and let him do just that.

Demon's souls, still glorious

Reading about Demon's souls servers possibly clsoing down in early 2011 made me pick it again and spend an evening with it. Made a new char and handicapped myself a bit to keep the challenge up. It's quite a different experience with a 2-hander and armor to heavy for dodgerolls.

The mechanics and atmosphere makes it as enjoyable as ever but if there is one game I wish I could play for the first time again it is this. I miss the terror of trying to make it through the tower of latria and the feeling of dread when entering the valley of defilement.

If you somehow have missed this game you really owe it to your self to pick it up.