Halo 3 Beta – @#$% – An informal Review

So the time has come for me to tell you all about the Halo 3 beta. Before I do, lemme give a little background (check here for more posts about games):

Halo came out originally for the Xbox. In short it quickly became one of the most popular games of all time. It revolutionized first person shooting genre on consoles, it had a epic storyline, fantastic graphics, addicting gameplay. A perfect storm of a killer-app (a software so great it proves the value of the underlying technology, in this case the original Xbox).

Halo 2 came out something like 3-4 years ago, again on the original Xbox. It was a fantastic game in it’s own right. It brought Xbox Live into the Halo equation as well as the fantastic concept of dual wielding guns (FPS games are all about innovation nowadays). It was a great game but not much more (in my opinion at least). The story was a bit more boring than halo 1, the multiplayer was not as unanimously loved by everyone but overall it was still the same fantastic game as number 1. Don’t get me wrong, it IS a fantastic game.

Now, Microsoft is bringing us Halo 3 4 months early (September release for the final game at the moment) in the form of a public beta. You can get in buy buying Crackdown (another good game) and downloading it through the main menu in Crackdown. It’s available for about a month between middle of May to middle of June. Thousands are playing already and about a week ago I bought Crackdown to get in on the action and report back here! So without further ado, here is my thoughts:

Halo 3 Multiplayer Beta

Introduction

I love this game already. I’ve played only for about 3-4 hours or so but minus the first 2-3 minutes of initial awkwardness from my longtime vacation from Halo in general, I quickly got my bearings back. This game is the same thing we’ve loved for years but shinier and BETTER. Everything I’ve loved about both of the last 2 games are present…. except now in beautiful Xbox 360 renderings. The movement is smooth, the graphics are vivid and detailed, the controls are natural, and overall it just feels really polished. To think that this is not the final version is just even more titillating (whatever that means!). I think this game is an instant classic before it’s even released. Great job Microsoft. Now, onto the specifics…

Look and fee

The Graphics are nothing short of next generation. I think they aren’t as shiny/grainy as Gears of War and thus there are a few complaints about that but I think the look and feel is perfectly appropriate considering how many people would bitch and moan if they changed the style of the graphics. After all, its not always about the graphical prowess and more and more lately, its all about the style. Case in point in Grand Theft Auto vs Saint’s Row. Still, the graphics are GREAT! A huge step up from Halo 2 ( I even did PIP on my TV and did a side by side comparison). I think a good way to put it is that, Halo 2 had such a good sense of graphical style that you don’t really notice the graphics aren’t the best in the world. Instead you just fill in the blanks with your head. Halo 3 fills in those blanks; so right off the bat you see this game you’re like “Oh, this is Halo 3? It looks kinda like Halo 2!” Until you see Halo 2 again, then you’re like “WOW, thats a LOT better!”.

Sounds

Not too much to say about this, music and sound effects have always been perfectly good in the Halo series, and nothing in this beta suggests otherwise. I noticed some more new “Death Groans” – which are the sounds you make when you get killed in different ways. Some are pretty funny. Sweet new iteration of the halo ambiance music too, can’t wait to hear the whole theme on like electric guitar or something!!!!#@!#

Vehicles

The mongoose is the new vehicle that I’ve seen in the game. It is like a small warthog. Faster, more maneuverable and as far as I can tell, only fits 1 person. Great for running flags I imagine, but not too useful for the smaller maps available in the beta. Everything else seems about the same. The Ghost looks cooler than before, but maybe a little weaker?

Maps

We get to play 3 maps in the beta. They are all pretty cool. My favorite is the snow one and my least favorite is the huge Valhalla though I’d admit I haven’t played that one as much. They are all very pretty, detailed, simple (and yet complex enough as well) enough to memorize and have fun playing after just a few games. I’m sure all the improvements with Xbox Live since the last system will make any big map mistakes bungie makes a non issue with Halo 3.

Weapons

The weapons are not really the focal point of the game. I mean obviously you shoot and kill everyone with weapons and whatnot, but this game feels more like they fine tuned all the weapons rather than created any drastic new ones. For instance, the Covenant/alien side was missing a decently powered, dual wield-able gun (the human SMG) and now they have it with the Spiker (2 of which is an excellent combo) Most of the other weapons are more or less the same, the assault rifle from Halo 1 is back and much more solid of a weapon too. I’ve got absolutely no gripes with Halo 3’s weapons. Spartan Laser? Yes it is as cool as it sounds.

What’s New? Items, Stats, Ranking, MORE!

This is where Halo 3 really ups the stakes…

Items are what the mysterious X button now activates. So far there is the portable jumper, the bubble shield, and the energy dampener. They all do exactly what it sounds like they do (a portable “push upper”, a shield that blocks all fire but allows people to pass through, a field that kills all shields). I kinda think that these are things that are gonnna be a real treat for the advanced players when they start to really get used to having them around. When you suck, it’s not super easy to find great uses for these items right off the get go but after a while you definitely start to get a feel for how powerful these assets can be to your CTF team for instance or other gameplay modes.

Another really cool feature is the stats - in short you can go to bungie.com and see your ranking much like in some CS servers out there. You can see the games you’ve played, your score for those games, what weapons you used, games played, times played…etc. From your rankings you can also explore the rankings of other players which is really cool because it gives the game a much more involving feeling. It creates meaning to how well you do and allows you to see your improvement in numbers. Very cool. If they can really master this area, this type of feature could really revolutionize online gaming for consoles by stealing even more of the players’ mind share even when they aren’t on their console.

Ranking is similar from Halo2 but the user experience seems to be much improved. You are matched up much faster, the menus and pop-ups are all lightening fast, and the ranking system is very simple and clear. I didn’t actually do too much halo 2 on live but this is definitely nice.

Bottom Line

This game is awesome. It’s ready to be released as it is and including the few bugs and annoying factors it is probably already one of the best games on 360. To think the final game is going to look and feel even better (provided MS actually makes use of whatever data they are gathering from this beta) is very exciting to me. I play this almost everyday for at least like 15 minutes and honestly, its great fun! If any of you are on Halo 3 beta, FIND ME my gamertag is “AoKUSA Vash“.

Have fun all and enjoy the screens below!

Also a song with Halo in the title: OH YEAH!!
Halo by James D. Stark

8 Games that will turn the wheels of history!!

2007 is slated to finish very strong in video game releases. Several high profile games that have been shown off for the last 2 years the major conventions (like E3) are finally coming to release and will truly demonstrate the much touted power of the next generation consoles. For this reason I do not include any Wii games in this list as fun as they are (don’t hate me). The following games are games that will move the industry forward in some way or another. They aren’t “just another shooter” or cookie cutter RPGs. These are games will make HISTORY! Without further ado!!!:

#7 Blue Dragon

At first Glance Blue Dragon is nothing more than an extra shiny cartoon RPG. Take a look at who is behind this wonderful looking game you you’ll double take:

Hironobu Sakaguchi – Writer for the first 5 Final Fantasy games.

Akira Toriyama – Character designer of Dragonball cartoon and manga as well as Dragon Quest video games.

Nobuo Uematsu – God knows how many beautiful scores and soundtracks Nobuo has cranked out for the Final Fantasy series in his lifetime.

Still, the game is already released in Japan and has recieved tremendous positive feedback and can possibly be considered the sole reason for the 360’s decent performance n Japan. The WORLD CHANGING part however, is that this game will be the first good JRPG (japanese RPG) to be released on any Microsoft console and its success could begin the deterioration of Square Enix’s love affair with Sony and Nintendo/exclusion of Microsoft. Lack of lengthy RPGs has long been a major lacking in the Xbox department and Blue Dragon is here to change that.

Those of you with an Xbox 360 – Plug that baby into the internet and download the trailer for this game. It’s almost like 3 minutes long or something but it really shows off the artistic style of the game, the emotional voice acting, and all-star music. Check it out! In case you can’t here is one from YouTube!

#6 Half-Life 2: Orange Box

So this game already comes as a GREAT steal if it’s priced similarly to the other next gen games ($60) because its really like 5 excellent games in 1.

Half-Life 2 – Very commonly known as the best sci-fi shooter of all time, HL2 is making its way into both Ps3 and 360 consoles after living on PC (and original Xbox) for almost 2 years! This game is an instant classic as it incorporates an amazing physics engine with unprecedented graphics for it’s time.

Episode 1 – Don’t know too much about this game other than that it is the continuation of HL2. It incorporates a few new features (minor) and maintains the quality of the main series.

Episode 2 – Been waiting for this for ages as some of the movies show some new AMAZING uses of physics such as Farmhouses EXPLODING and whatnot. Looks cool! More episodic content through Xbox Live? Probably. Sweet.

Team Fortress 2 – Probably the longest delayed game in the whole world. Team Fortress was originally a fan favorite in terms of military squad/role based shooters. TF 2 surprised the world with it’s cartoony look and action packed game play. Get ready, this ones gonna be major.

Portal – Probably worth the whole $60 by itself, Portal must have been made by some of the world’s smartest people. I can’t quite describe the concept. Actually yes I can, but I cannot do it justice. Just watch this video. Portals GALORE! This part is probably what makes the Orange box on this list – Pushing existing game types to the next level, thereby reinventing an entire genre and bringing a completely unprecedented level of game play to customers. Thats huge!

#5 BioShock

Much more than your average shooter. From what I’ve seen BioShock combines an amazing first person shooter concept with a historical yet futuristic yet fantasy-esque scenery with the same demented horror an imagery as the Resident Evil series. I’ll try to paint a picture, with words….Mad Scientists escape to underwater refuge, create a utopia base on DNA alteration and scietific progress of the most horrific type. Society collapses, freakish mutants run wild in the underwater world. Enter you. Who knows who you are but you’re there for a reason. You fight anything from little girls, to massive monsters, to demonish mutants. Can’t kill a certain dude? Alter your DNA and shit, maybe make a living beehive out of your hand and use that to your advantage. Or any number of other awesome alterations. Or use your cleverness t reprogram security systems to help you or pit several enemies against each other while you watch an then finish off the survivor. It is an incredibly ambitious game and upon first hearing the level of ambition in this game I was incredibly skeptical but after seeing some of the game play footage, I am totally sold.

Disgusting…

#4 Lair

This game looks amazing. It is a ps3 exclusive. The premise you ask? Dragons. Killing people, killing other dragons, killing huge monsters, attacking castles. I simply cannot comprehend how the AMBITIOUSNESS of this game is even this generation. After watching some of the videos and seeing what the ps3 is truly capable of, I am truly convinced that Lair is going to truly next generation. The graphics are beautiful, the game play looks dazzling, involving, complex but not overly so, strategic, and vast. I mean I could just keep listing adjectives, or I could show you a video of this monster of a game in action. I can’t wait to play this on my friend’s ps3 and if the system ever gets enough of these types of games for me to actually shell out the dough to buy one, I’ll definitely pick this one up.

#3 Halo 3

What do I even need to say about this game? This is going to be the biggest drop of the entire year no matter what happens. Actually, between this and the next game on the list, they’ll probably make more money than the rest of these combined….Actually I have no data to back that up but I feel like that’s probably true? Lets take a quick look at what’s new with Halo 3 and what it brings to the “court”

New weapons: Between the spartan laser, the halo 1 battle rifle, spiker, improved needler? There should be a lot new stuff about this game that will make it even more fun than before. There’s a few weapons that are so big in fact that the camera shifts out of 1st person view and into 3rd person!!!

Graphics: From what i hear, they are simply beautiful.

New vehicles: Updated vehicles and one new mongoose! Its looks like the warthog but smaller and faster? I saw this video too of the car driving over this spot of light that makes it jump over this building!! Amazing. They can pretty much throw shit at the game and the players will love it.

Items: I’m not sure about the details but the commercials show Master Chief throwing down a gernade that immediately expands into a huge shield. It looks pretty. There was this huge mystery over what the X button would do but apparently it has something to do with all the new weapons they are putting in the game, which i know nothing about.

First Halo game on the Next Generation system!! – This is MAJOR!! First halo game on a console that is actually already good without halo! Microsoft is definitely on the right track

#2 Grand Theft Auto 4

There is very little information out on this game right now but given RockStar’s amazing track record at delivering games that take the system and the genres to the next level, I wouldn’t be surprised at all if this game turns out to be one of the best of all time. Best for me? I can still play on my 360 because for the first time Xbox is recieving GTA at the same time as a Sony product. This is big news. You can be sure to bet that RockStar will be edgy but lets hope that they don’t get carried away like with San Andreas, hot coffee anyone? I read a quote somewhere by someone on the GTA4 team saying that comparing GTA4 to GTA3 will be like comparing GTA3 to GTA2. That is quite a statement. Lets hope they weren’t participating in the Sony Attitude of “overpromising”. Nevertheless, Grand Theft Auto 4 will be one of the best games ever made. I’ll bet on that!

#1 LittleBig Planet

This is a strange one to make the list but is perhaps one of the most impressive games I have EVER seen. In case you are not keen on the video game market (as I try to be = P) , there has been a recent trend in focusing less on the technological prowess demonstrated with the game and more on the fun, simplicity, and originality that made us all fall in love video games in the first place all those years ago. The perfect example of this is the Xbox Live Arcade. Here is a library of over 100 original or remade games that all scream “I’m simple and fun, I don’t require 20+ hours to beat/enjoy, I’m inexpensive!” instead of “I am the newest thing that technology has to offer, I was made using a multimillion dollar budget, my FPS is slow even for a next gen system, I’m gonna charge 10 dollars more!!” Xbox Live Arcade is massively successful and has often been known for allowing the serious gamer’s kids, girlfriend or wife to play some low involvement games and thus get some good involvement in the gaming as well! I think its a fantastic trend.

ANYWAYS… LittleBig Planet takes the simple game, but also puts a present day spin on it. Keeping the extremely simple game, LBP incorporates social networking, the power of the internet, user-generated content, blahdy blahdy blah, and is a modern game with a simple concept with enough bells and whistles to keep players entertained for literally FOREVER. The same way YouTube revolutionized online video, LBP will revolutionize these mini games. It is only available for the ps3 through the marketplace… DOH!

So what the hell is this master concept I keep talking about? You and up to 3 friends play through a 2.5D world/level full of interactable objects and events. Your cute little characters have almost limitless possibilities in customization and the levels are completely user generated which means a double limitless game! OMFG. Like before, I won’t feebly try to describe the concept any further when I can show you right below!!!! This game is going to rule, and I may have to get a ps3 some day to join in the fun.

#0 Mass Effect

All the build up and now we are finally here…Unfortunately, I’m going to build up a little more. I’ve played a shit ton of games in my life but without a doubt my favorite of all time is definitely Star Wars: Knights of The Old Republic. This game is amazing in its own right in almost every way. The length is very appropriate, the story is epic, non linear, and original with MANY twists and turns to boot. You can choose to be good or evil which will completely change the way the game turns out at EVERY point in the game! BioWare is the company that created this game… They’ve been missing in action since KOTOR came out a few years ago and I think this is what they were working on.

Mass Effect.

“The game takes place in the year 2183, with the player assuming the role of an elite human soldier named Commander Shepard. The story revolves around an ancient alien prophecy stating that, every fifty thousand years, an alien race comes to the galaxy to harvest all organic life, and the time of their return is approaching. As the first human Spectre – sworn defenders of galactic peace – Shepard’s mission is to halt the advancing armies of a legendary agent gone rogue. Shepard will lead an elite team across hostile alien worlds and discover that the true threat is far greater than anyone imagined. “

This game looks and feels a little like Knight of the Old Republic when you first see the videos, but there is a difference. This game is TRULY next generation. Instead of conversing and choosing speech by reading text, you look at the face of your dialogue partner and read his emotions right off his rendered face. The dialogue is so fluid in fact I can hardly beleive that the whole game can be like this! The fighting system looks so unbelievably cool, and original. It seems to combine recent evolutions in squad based combat, turn based combat (?), and first person shooter elements all into one monstrously cool LOOKING game. I hope this area doesnt fall through as it is incredibly important. The graphics are truly incredible and are definitely the most beautiful I’ve seen on the web anywhere, for any game for any system! The world is enormous too as you can travel from solar system to solar system within your galaxy and from planet to planet in each solar system! I mean to tell you the truth the whole game is so damn AMBITIOUS that I’m a little afraid that EVEN BioWare won’t be able to pull it off though. However, I am an optimist so I’m sure it’ll happen.

Please take a look at some of these amazing videos and tell me what you think!

Well that concludes it everyone! These are the 8 most important games of the year according to yours truly. Please let me know what you thought of this article! I spent a ton of time on it but it came easily because its my passion . Enjoy and happy playing!

BTW Enjoy this magical music!
You And I Both by Jason Mraz

Some of the Best stuff on Youtube – Trailer Reduxes

Short introduction – Very creative and clever video editors out there take clips from a movie, make a movie trailer out of it but change the sound around to make it seem like a completely different movie. Some of these are pure gold! For your benefit, my accomplice Brian Yong and I, sifted through a ton of these and found the best. Here they are…

Anchorman

This one is not quite the same as the rest but by far the funniest if you’ve seen the 300 trailer #2 and Anchorman with Will Ferrell.

10 Things I Hate About Commandments

Most professionally done I’ve ever seen. So freaking clever!

Top Gun

Really well done!

Sleepless in Seattle

One of my favorites! Meg Ryan is crazy!

Mary Poppins

Probably the best one out there.

The Shining

Clever.

Enjoy friends!

I love thinking about 300. Here is the whole soundtrack ala Rhapsody.
300 – Original Motion Picture Soundtrack by Tyler Bates

Mother’s Day!

Hi everyone!

Happy Mothers day, in case any of my readers is a mother! Check out the mother’s day thing @ Rhapsody.com

It’s really cool. There’s a bunch of like relevant mother-ish songs that you can send in a card or dedicate using the Rhapsody dedicate a song feature, or with an actual hallmark card!

Rhapsody holiday page, mothers day today!

Dedicate a song page! Send it one page!

…Or do it through hallmark with a nice little ecard!

Hope none of you forgot about mother’s day!

Everyday Life at Phi Delta Theta!

This week I’ve decided to do a piece on Fraternity rooms at Phi Delta Theta. I’ve gotta admit that one of the reasons I joined a fraternity in the first place was the fact that you could make a room however you like. Want a sweet loft in your room? Make it! Want a swinging bed? Do it! Best friends with the guy in the other room? Make a door! You get the point I hope.

The sweet thing about fraternity life is that you can do that without getting in trouble with the RA’s or having your landlord take your security/damage deposit as a punishment. Obviously don’t join a fraternity for this reason, but you’ll never have another opportunity in your life (unless you are like ass rich) to blatantly lower the value of your room through personalization without any sort of financial repercussions!

Anyway’s, depending on popularity, I might make this into a series and go through everyone in the house but for now I’m going to do mini-MTV cribs-esque tours of certain guys in the house! We’ll start with us seniors, Me (Austin), Joe the president, and Tako/Josh. Enjoy and let me know what you think!

JOE!!!

Welcome to Joe’s room (ignore the heart, they’re from girls from valentines day =P)

Sweet air conditioning (the only one in the house) box spring and mattress on the floor, minimalistic beauty.

Nice lil bookcase full of complex scientific books!

The only remaining built in closet in the whole house. Niiiice!

Big bro paddles…tiny tv, white boards, and postits for remembering complex physics equations…

Computer desk, a little WOW maybe??

Tako!!

Amazing door poster found someone in the house….Adorned with tako chip bag cut outs! Great styles taks.

Nice lil papa san (tako started it), a sweet curtain that I lack, you can also see the bed in the back of the room. Mattress on the floor, simple. Clean! Sugoi Tako.

Tako and his “big rig”. Amazing 24 inch lcd from dell, the sweet dell flexilamps, Joshua Svidriface. Beautiful, just astonishingly GORGEOUS!!

Fridge full of healthy snacks, awesome sound system, nice lil 360 there in the back. Nice work tako, looks familiar.

Wow, after all that intense stuff you’d expect a break when looking at the clothing corner but no such luck. If you look closely you can see the towel that tako uses on his RIPPED body after showers. Lucky!!

Austin

My favorite X-Man on my door! Thanks HUB free color poster printing!

My sweet Ikea “Beddinge”, my sweet TV, my life plans on the left, movie posters galore!!

Extended view of the picture above…

I copied tako and got a popa san. Best decision ever! My cork board, my clothing racks, and whatever!

My computer station. Very comfortable workplace, I’m actually siting there right now at this very moment! Spectacular!

Well there you have it you all! Some rooms in the house! I love living here and I love customizing my rooms when I first move in. Its like a tetris challenge cramming all the stuff you want in your room in there and have it look good an be comfortable and its so much more “nice” living in it knowing you did it all yourself (or with your Frat bros!!)

Let me know what you think of the post and maybe I’ll continue the series!

My favorite Beer: Mac and Jack’s African Amber

Hi all,

You probably don’t know this but I’m actually a huge fan of beer! Last year I even considered starting a small home brewing company and creating my own beer but this idea was rather short-lived as I was still fraternity president of a DRY fraternity! I may still do this someday and I’ll keep you posted for sure! Anyways….As I’ve progressed through the last 4 years of University I have gone through an immense number of different beers and recently I’ve finally gotten a very firm idea of what the best one is…

First though! Let’s go through and see the history – These are all the different beers that I would consider important in my life. They’ve treated me well through the years, we’ve had some damn good times, and well, their not all top tier, but they all hold a special place in my heart….

Budweiser – Can’t go wrong with the king. This is the first beer I had at my buddy Jake’s cabin where I officially got drunk for the first time. It was a fun time. Never liked the taste all that much and don’t like to just drink this the whole night ever, still good though!

Budlight – I love Bud light. You can almost never go wrong having a cold one of these and they are available pretty much anywhere. Sounds a little weird but I would even prefer one of these over a Heineken!

Keystone - Ahh freshmen year…. You can get 24 16oz cans of these at the Dawg pound for like 11 bucks… The official “frat party” drink, pretty watered down but still tastes pretty good (progressively better if you get my drift).

Don’t be fooled, Keystone is never in a glass….

Natural Ice – See above…

MGD - Pretty good tasting beer. I really liked this stuff my sophomore year and I’d often just buy a forty of this and hang out but it was replaced by the following beer.

Mickey’s - Absolutely positively my second favorite beer. I love this stuff (only as a 40oz) and I’ve had a lot of good times with this particular beer. I know its “malt liquor” and therefore “not classy” but shit, it tastes great, it’s cheap, enough said. One bad thing: bad gas the next morning.

Alaskan Amber – My girlfriend bought me a six pack of this for my birthday. Super meaningful because she usually doesn’t like me drinking beer but she made me a delicious 3-restaurant picnic and a 6 pack of beer. What a darling! She knows the way to my heart! I still keep one of the bottlecaps in my car to remember!

HG800 – Also known as bum piss. This shit is digusting and probably the strongest beer that I’ve ever dranken. Drinking a 40 of this is almost like drinking 2 40s. Even at the height of my “drinking career” back a 2 years ago i thought this stuff was disgusting. My friend Xuan once drank some of this and got hives the next day….. and yet we always seemed to keep drinking it…….interesting…

The WINNER: Mac and Jack’s African Amber: Word’s cannot describe how delicious this beer is. I’m actually not like some sort of expert on all the fineries of tasting or drinking beer but I can just say that I love the taste! It’s REALLY like those beers where in the commercials the guy comes home has a beer and is instantly relaxed. It’s a strange but awesome feeling and I feel kinda like I’m finally starting to understand what the fuss is about with enjoying beer instead of just drinking for the sake of it. I think this particular beer is a local favorite or something so definitely go to a bar or restaurant and try it out!! It’s MONEY!!!

There you have it! A beer documentary from someone who loves his beer! Have a great mother’s day everyone! I’d appreciate comments as usual and btw, Go have a beer in the sun!

Beer by Reel Big Fish

Life at Microsoft! An update on my career…

Hi everyone, I was looking through the various categories in which I blog things today and I realized my career path has long been missing from this blog. Interestingly enough, I actually started this blog initially with the intent of documenting my career as I progressed through it in a really interesting time in my life (latter half of college) so I’ve decided to dedicate this post as a update to my career for those of you who don’t know yet.

I have been working at Microsoft for the last 6 months doing an internship in Microsoft IT. I began January 2nd 2007 actually so I’ve only actually been there for like 4 months with about 2 months to go. The internship has been a lot of fun, I’ve learned a HUGE amount about how large companies work as well as in regards to the work I actually do there which I’ll get into in a sec. I get to interact with a lot of extremely smart people everyday, the intern program here is very well developed, my manager and mentor are both awesome and very supportive, my team is super cool and very experienced and kind people, and my office mate Alex is an awesome dude as well. I have a lot of fun working at Microsoft, a lot more fun than I originally thought I would actually and it’s been a rewarding experience getting praise for the stuff I produce.

To be a little more specific, I work for the IT Showcase group. It is a content developing group within Microsoft that Showcases the stories of Microsoft best practices and dogfooding lessons learned. I do process optimization within the team which is pretty useful for any group as there are always redundancy issues in any large organization.

In terms of the future, Microsoft is definitely one of the companies that I am looking to work for, I’ve had a really positive experience in the environment, it’s been challenging but a great experience nonetheless.

Hmm, I guess I’m not really sure what other stuff to write about here? Please leave some comments if you have any curiosity about what I do or anything!!

God Must Have Spent A Little More Time On You by ‘NSYNC

Funny Video Tuesday!

Here’s some of the funnier videos I’ve come across in the the last couple days…

This is a spoof on the Behind the Music series on Vh1 about Luigi, the neglected brother. Pretty clever!

This is the funniest commercial I’ve seen in a while! Spider-Man working his way into our everyday lives. Excellent.

Lol…
Super Mario Bros. by Andrew Chae

Just went Running with my MOM!

I literally just got back from running for like an hour and a half with my mom around trains outside my house. Freaking awesome workout and damn, she is one healthy woman. She’s got like 30 years on me and is still killing me running up hill and barely behind me on flat ground. I hope I can remain that healthy when I’m her age. Good work mother.

The last 90 minutes…

Here’s one of my favorite running songs, actually one of my favorite songs in general…
Listen To Your Heart by D.H.T.
Its got that nice piano!

First Album Review! Rhapsody’s Front Page Tori Amos!

Hi everyone. I’ve been thinking to myself lately about the amount of exposure I get to outside influences of the artistic sort. Ever since I did PROJECT X (I’ll do a post on it later) I’ve been really inspired by a few of my fraternity brothers who are much more musical than I to let myself have more exposure to the “artsy fartsy” side of the world. What I mean by this is that I want to start listening to more different kinds of music and maybe reading more creative writing or looking at art or something. Ok, so I dont really know what I’m going to do precisely just yet but I figure it doesn’t get as easy as listening to an album of something I’ve never heard or heard of before.

Rhapsody does this cool thing on their home page where they have this fancy slide show thing that shows their newest and most featured artists and albums and tracks and stuff. I have NEVER actually used this but today, right now, I decided to click on what is most unappealing to me…Tori Amos… I have no idea who she is or what kind of music she makes so I figure, lets do it! Lets go!!@@!

Tori Amos – American Doll Posse

So in a nutshell (thanks to Rhapsody) this is some background info on Tori Amos.

“Tori Amos is a songwriter in the classic ’70s sense. Creating meaningful, emotional songs that incorporate acoustic guitar, piano, and strings into elaborate and evocative compositions, Amos’ fragile voice carries with it all the strength, emotion and sensuality her intelligent, poetic lyrics allow. Her complexity as an artist comes from her ability to display womanly vulnerability and subvert it with raw sexuality and intimidating, thick-skinned ire, embodying it all with startling honesty.”

I guess this is all true as the melodies are elaborate and evocative so to say, but the key question is, Do I like it? The answer is No, not really. Too bad too because I usually like what I listen to but in this case the music is just a little too “bouncy” and erratic for me to really enjoy listening to in my everyday life.

Example : Bouncing off Clouds by Tori Amos

Its not really good for relaxing, dancing, or working out to. There are a couple good slow tracks on this album…

Digital Ghost by Tori Amos …

Anyways, I listened to a bunch of the other songs and they pretty much all rubbed me the same way so I think I’ll pass on Miss Tori Amos next time I have the opportunity to listen to her music – Fat Slut by Tori Amos

Still though, I think this a good first new step in opening my eyes to more creativity and such in my life. Its nice that with Rhapsody I’m able to listen to all these things that are recommended by professionals and all for free and unlimited so I don’t have to download a bunch of software or buy a bunch of stuff for music I’m not wholly committed to. Thanks Rhapsody!

I’ll leave you with one of the better songs on the album….Good feeling, sad feeling?
Father’s Son by Tori Amos