IGN has a 24 second teaser for the upcoming Cowboy Bebop game. As short as it is, I was still very glad to see it. Just hearing the opening theme, "Tank!" is enough to bring a smile to my face. There's not much gameplay shown but it looks as if the game will be a brawler-type, which will be fine by me if the story is worthy of the series.

The duty, civic

So I voted today which is no big deal, I've done it before and I'll most likely do it again. Not to mention that the presidential race was pretty much all sealed up well before we Illinoisans got our say.

But why I'm telling you is this: as I was going through the ballot I noticed that one of the men running for Judge of something or other was named "Michael J. (Yakov) Fox". What possesses a man to run for public office under the name of a sitcom star? Why would he think that people would equate the guy who played Alex P. Keaton with judiciousness?

He should have put "Redd (Yakov) Fox" on the ballot, then maybe I'd have considered supporting him. "Do you hear that Elizabeth? I'm coming to join ya, honey! It's the big one! I hereby sentence you to 50 years with no prospect of parole, ya dummy."

So I finally was able to give Twin Snakes a go this weekend and let me tell you, that’s some good Snakes. While this didn’t occur to me before playing the most notable differences between this game and the original Metal Gear Solid are the cutscenes directed by film director Ryuhei Kitamura and the new voice acting by the original cast. I agree with some of the reviews out there that state that the game feels too disjointed now, with the cutscenes taking center stage, leaving the game as a mere after thought. This is partly due to Konami’s will but it seems to me the game could have benefited from some more seamless transitions from movie to game. As for the complaint that you end up watching more than playing the game I say: “good”. The MGS story is incredibly engrossing and a pleasure to watch, the gameplay while ahead of its time is now merely passable, the greatness of the MGS gameplay has and always will be the inventive challenging boss fights. And that’s still all there. In fact I would venture to say that because of the advancement in AI some of the fights are actually a bit harder, I’m specifically talking about your showdown with Raven. All in all I’m pleased with the game so far and intend to play it some more as soon as I have yet more free time.

In an attempt to make good use of my Netflix subscription I watched “Perfect Blue” last night. I was annoyed with it at first and again towards the end but I ended up enjoying it. A good thriller with well executed dream/madness scenes and blurry transitions between them and reality.

Also if you’d be so kind as to check out Pajamo, you’ll notice that I have posted a “Final Impression” of Otogi. “Final Impression” is my euphemism for “half-assed write up of a game I didn’t complete and therefore have no real right to review.”

The Suits have been wondering what's been happening to the male 18-34 demographic during primetime. Most of us assumed that they were playing games. Sony goes one step further, telling us they're playing SOCOM online.

Rockstar has gone live with its GTA San Andreas website. There's nothing really there at the moment, but I'm giddy with anticipation.