Elder Scrolls V: Dawnguard

The first DLC for Skyrim!  EEEEE...yeah...it's more Skyrim.

A majority of the reviews have been summing up Dawnguard simply as more Skyrim.  Which isn't a particularly bad thing considering how much fun I had until I discovered everything and couldn't restat my character and generally fell into boredom.  I started a new character, Crucifracture, who has turned out to be a fine character considering I know what skills I want and where to put points (I've actually been trying to save as many as possible) and what I can skimp on (and just get juiced on gear and performance enhancing drugs - e.g. Lockpicking).  I'm playing her as a summoner/destruction magic in one hand and shield in the other/heavy armor character which has been entertaining and frankly using magic in combat is a lot more natural than the suck ass melee system.

Dawnguard is centered around an infestation of vampires.  Do you join them or do you destroy them?  Does it even matter?  Fortunately there's not a lot of game breaking gear if you start a new character and begin the Dawnguard story arc.  The crossbows are pretty sweet.  You can use bows on horseback (which sounds awesome but is actually kind of lame and clunky).  There's some cool looking armor and some other gear you'll never see because you're always in first-person.  You can transform into a Vampire Lord (if you team up with the vampires) which is kind of cool and summon a gargoyle and you can force choke, sorry, use blood magic to choke enemies.  There are new enemies - I particularly like the Death Hounds.  Dawnguard is as much as an expansion as it is a new story arc.  In fact, Dawnguard might be one of my favorite Bethesda DLC (except for the fact I have problems with the whole DLC price gouging yadda yadda yadda). 

The reason why it might be my favorite is because the story is kind of awesome and there were a couple of set pieces that genuinely kicked ass.  It's much more a dark "gothic" fantasy - think Ravenloft (man, a Ravenloft game could potentially be a really good game) - and there were a number of areas that were a welcome change of pace from the now sadly over-familiar areas of Skyrim.  I finished one of the story arcs with Crucifracture.  I plan on going back and playing for the Dawnguard vampire hunters with Scoville. 

Worth $20?  Yes and no, considering the 8 to 10 hours it'll take you to get through the story (unless you're like me and have to explore everything and pick up every side quest - which put me at about twenty) and that's better than your average game length these days.  Then again for twenty bucks you could buy a whole shit ton of games during the Steam Summer Sale.  Plus, if you haven't picked up Skyrim, you can just wait until the GOTY edition comes out and save a bundle of cash. 

Assorted news and things und schtufz

Finally getting around to recovering from working the TIK TOK Productions event for which I made over two hundred shredded pork tacos.  It was a challenge and a learning experience but rewarding and I met some awesome people and they liked the tacos and no one got food poisoning.  There were a couple of problems I hadn't foreseen but no plan survives combat. 

I'm seriously considering this whole selling food to people or catering thing as something I could do (since I've done it a couple of times) and maybe make some money.  I like money because it lets me buy things (and I need new pants).  I also like feeding people.  We'll see.

In other news:

Uh...

Well...

I started watching Deep Space 9.  It gives me something to look at while I'm on the floor eating gummi bears.

Sherlock Holmes and the Game of Shadows was pretty forgettable, not bad just absolutely devoid of memorable qualities.  I liked the first Downey/Law outing but this one was just meh.  The cinematic equivalent of a white bread sandwich with baloney and yellow mustard.  It does what it is supposed to do but it's not really thrilling.

21 Jump Street did not deserve to be as funny as it was.  I laughed heartily at one or two parts and am turning into a Channing Tatum fan, though I'm still not a huge Jonah Hill fan.  Worth watching if you just want a comedy that actually doesn't suck or star Adam Sandler (or both).

Not much else to report.  It's summer in Texas.  Decided not to take summer classes so I'm working and putzing around the house.  Yup.

Hope you guys are doing well and not sweltering too bad.

Two homemade sauces for tomorrow.

Captain Riley's Verde ready for action (roasted tomatillos and citrus with a zesty  tang and tons of Vitamin C)

Moxie's Secret Sauce almost done (medium heat with lots of om nom nom)

Preview of the porkening mayhem

EVE Causality in Japanese

Because everything sounds cooler in Japanese.

The Secret World (2012) Funcom

I didn't know if I could write about my experience with the beta until the game came out or not since I agreed to a non-disclosure agreement.  Truth be told this was my first beta, which was kind of neat.  I had been following the press and videos for The Secret World and played the facebook game and was generally excited to play the game.

As we all know I am a pretty serious horror/dark fantasy/ghouls and ghosts kind of guy as well as generally am exhausted of damn near most "high fantasy" (elves and magic and assorted fantasy crap).  It also turns out I'm not really a fan of most Japanese or Korean MMOs or standard RPGs.  This leaves me in a strange kind of limbo where I just kind of play EVE (sometimes I think because I don't have anything else to play - which isn't true).  The Secret World is a horror game in a modern setting across the globe.  Boo-yah!  I was really happy when I got the chance to play the beta a couple of weeks ago for about a week and a half.

My happiness dissolved pretty quickly for an interesting reason: the game cannot match it's atmosphere, story (or at least elements), and quests.  It's an awesome game that handles like a box of turds on mismatched wheels.  I keep coming back to the term "counter-intuitive" when thinking or talking about The Secret World's mechanics (along with cumbersome, frustrating, and profanity-inducing).  It has one of the most crafting systems (apparently the crafting is "Minecraft"-esque) I've come across - there are no instructions on how to use crafting in-game and the forums were tits-on-a-bull useless.  You collect assembly parts and blueprints (okay) and then put them in the shape of the...item...on...a grid.  But you can't look at the blueprint/kit to see what the layout is for the item and (I think) the shape of the item changes with the type of parts you're using?  Whaaa?  I craft in games, I like crafting and collecting junk, and an extra step of think-y would have been a welcome change to the regular spam crafting of many games.  However, when combined with the mewling botched abortion of an inventory system I actually ended up yelling profanities at the computer and just threw all my supplies on the ground (after a few hours of failed crafting).  Inventory control is terrible for reasons that there are no excuse for: no auto-stack, no auto-sort, no way to change the icons or have text next to the items, and there's no way to hot-key items.  This last factor was the last straw for my playing experience.  It's a dynamic combat game (which is kind of cool) and you can't just stand and whack at stuff and spam a la most other RPGs.  Right on, however combat also requires a lot of movement (seemed like I was doing a lot of strafing and running backwards) and enemies are kind of brutal (awesome).  But when you need a health pack on the fly, you have to go into the busted ass inventory and get the right...oh fuck, you died.  This didn't happen once or twice because I'm a total cock-eyed n00b, I even tried to keep the inventory window open with the items I needed at the ready but in the time it would take to use one healy-bob I'd get my face holes gang-banged by gribblies.  I died again and again and again in some areas (and not because I was under-powered because my gear was shitty because I couldn't craft anything better...oh wait...).

Another big fuck-up is the counter-intuitive and clunky chat system.  Chat should be clean, simple, easy to use for general chat and group - right?  Maybe I was taking stupid pills for my time in The Secret World 
but I could not figure out how to chat easily to other players in my vincinity.  I kept ending up with random chat windows for areas I wasn't in and the few times I grouped I couldn't figure out how to isolate group chat in a new window whilst attempting to juggle dickhead inventory and combat.

I think a great deal of my frustration comes from the immense potential The Secret World has and the amount of love put into the game.  This was made by proper horror fans and not just Saw wanks.  The three areas I wandered around made me really happy: New England, Egypt, and Transylvania.  I spent most of my time in New England since I was too underpowered for the other areas.  One section is very Castle Rock-y with brilliant references to classic horror writers and their works.  Another is Miskatonic University and another a mining area.  The creature designs (and I didn't tangle with the big boys) are really creepy and have their own spin on themes (I particularly liked the autopsied cadavers/medical dummies).  There's a night and day cycle in game (fucking awesome). 

One thing I was overjoyed by was the game's puzzles.  Yes, a MMO with puzzles.  Proper puzzles for certain quests and a bunch of different styles.  There's no hand holding either.  You're given clues and then it's up to you to solve the puzzle (one of which I admit I felt like a fucking genius when I figured it out).  I wonder how many people are gonna just skip the puzzle quests.

After thinking about the game and writing this I realized I would pee my pants for it - if it was a single player or small group (a la Borderlands) game (or there are faction only areas).  Actually I wonder if the game wouldn't have been a much better game if it had been single player.  On the server I was on there was a great deal of bass-ackward playing, missions could be completed because players were lumped up in one area trying to complete a goal (I think a rotating group of about a dozen were swarming over this one area that was a story quest completion point for the last two days I played) and thus the goal couldn't be completed.  It's a shame really, I would have been willing to over look some of the technical flaws (e.g. toons are kind of weird looking), but as it is I ain't gonna pay for the game and then a monthly on top.  Made that mistake with WoW and SWTOR.  Check out The Secret World when it's free-to-play in a year.  

Blast from the past video game: Shadowgate (1989)

Many moons ago, when I was a hardcore Nintendo kid, Shadowgate was one of my favorites.  A point & click adventure that I seemed to be more suited to play than the rage inducing platformers and brawlers many of my peers seemed to excel at.  This was an era of what I affectionately call, "games that hated you".  Horrific, brutal, and genuinely malevolent games that beat you like a red-headed stepchild.  The sad thing is you always went back for more (even when your controller was held together with tape because you rage-spiked it into the 12" CRT during some bullshit Ninja Gaiden - p.s. fuck Ninja Gaiden).  I was also a big fan of fantasy and horror Choose Your Own Adventures when I was a kid so when I got my nerdly mitts on Shadowgate I nearly wet myself.

I loved Shadowgate (not as much as I love Shadowrun for the SNES) and whilst looking around youtube:

This game was madness and I blame it for several of my current RPG techniques. Torches would fizzle out and were a precious commodity. Any mistakes caused death after death after death. The thing was there was no gamefaqs.com, no IGN help guides to this bastard. Trial and error and intuition were all you had to rely on. Truth be told I don't know if I ever got to the end of the game even though I felt like I played it for a very long time and often (for some reason I have the memory of starting a new game every time I played).  I no longer own a NES but I might poke around the internet and see if I can find a ROM.  I kind of hope I can, just so I can do a review of it.

Another easy dish from the Haven

Spent my 4th at the Haven chillin' out and generally attempting to stay out of the sun - though I wandered with the group down to the Freedom Festival and got some pretty awesome homemade barbacoa tacos.  However, it being any month except November - March in Texas the weather was complete garbage and I was a sad panda because of the heat.

 

After the Freedom Festival some folk went on a grocery store run and brought back a metric shit-ton of gulf shrimp and the fixing for spring rolls and vermicelli bowls.  Everything was awesome except for peeling and deveining several lbs of shrimp.  If you have to wrangle with that much prepwork get an extra hand or two.  Just sayin'.

Amazonbutterfly made the spring rolls and did the veggie prep and I did the shrimp.  I think it was the first time I had homemade spring rolls and I think that they would a super easy thing to do when/if all the prep was done ahead of time (like sitting in containers in the fridge).  The shrimp while a bitch and a half to prep were simple to cook and I did a very straight forward garlic & ginger puree*/fish sauce stir fry with lime juice as a finish.  They turned out pretty good and kept their sweet shrimp taste with out turning into erasers.

 

I ended up eating most of mine for lunch today - cold - and it was an awesome thing to sit down to when the weather is so nasty out.

Here's the gist of the shrimp:

• 1.5 shrimp per spring roll so think 18 per dozen spring rolls.  That is two per person.  Actually this is kind of awesome because you can go for bigger shrimp but not have to buy a lot.
• For a vermicelli bowl, depending on how big of a bowl you wanna have I would say, maybe a half-dozen decent sized shrimp per bowl.
• For a small # of shrimp, peeling and deveining isn't a terrible chore, especially if you get them fresh from the market.
• Peel and devein the shrimp.
• Heat oil in a pan (doesn't matter what kind, and you don't need to over oil the pan - you're not deep frying the shrimp.  A good way to test whether the oil is hot enough put a quick splash of liquid in the pan.  If it sizzles and dances the oil is hot enough.  Just don't overheat your oil to the smoking point.  That's bad.
• Once the oil is ready, throw in a teaspoon or so of equal amounts of ginger, garlic, fish sauce, and then salt and pepper to taste.  Once you start smelling the ingredients, add your shrimp.  Don't overcrowd the pan - you'll drop the overall temperature of the pan - and keep the shrimp moving.  I add lime juice as a liquid while I'm cooking shrimp. 
• Shrimp cook pretty quickly, almost surprisingly so, don't walk away from the pan.  Should take, roughly five minutes-ish.
• Remove the shrimp from heat.  There you go, all done.  If you want to use them for spring rolls you might want to throw them in the fridge to cool them down before you cut them in half.
• Try not to overcook the shrimp.  Doing so gives them a gum eraser texture.

That's it.  Shrimp are one of the easiest things to cook.

 

Hope all of you are well and had a safe 4th of July.  "Party on and be excellent to one anothers."

  

*We used a tube of garlic puree and one for ginger.  I also mashed up some fresh ginger for the juice.  I know some folks might poo-poo a tube of garlic but sometimes you just don't want to fuck around with peeling and all that jive.  Next time I think I would use my roasted garlic paste.

A recipe that sounds fancier than it is:

Country Sausage with red onions, chiles, and sun-dried tomatoes on couscous with minced basil and lemon juice.

Ooo-la-la, Mr. Fancy Pantsy

Seriously folks, the hardest part of this is having the patience to brown up the sausage.  Also if you've never heard of or experimented with couscous before it's a grain primarily used in dishes from around the Mediterranean.  It's easier and faster to make than rice and in some ways I prefer it because I get bored with all the damn rice I eat.  Here's the directions for couscous -  1cup water.  boil.  add 1 cup couscous, stir, cover, remove from heat, check in five minutes.  Hell, I was lazy and just nuked a mug of water and added couscous and covered and it worked.

Saucisse avec des oignons, de piments, et tomates séchées au soleil:  (ain't everything fancier in French?)

1/2 lb Country Sausage - browned and drained
1/2 red onion - chopped

2 tablespoons minced sun-dried tomatoes

2 tablespoons dried chile flakes (or less if you are scared)

Salt & pepper to taste

1 small can chopped mushrooms (optional) - reserve juice for couscous

1cup couscous - plain

The juice from the canned mushrooms and add water to make a cup

1 lemon 

1 teaspoon of basil (I used dried)

1.  Cook sausage till it's done.  How do you know it's done?  If someone gave it to you, would you eat it?  No?  It ain't done.  Break it up as you stir, to normal human bite size-ish pieces.
2.  Put cooked sausage on some paper towels on a plate, get rid of excess fat and grease.

3.  Return pan to heat, saute the onion, chile flakes, mushrooms, and sun-dried tomatoes.

4.  After a few minutes, return the drained sausage (tee hee hee) to the pan.  Cook for a couple of minutes.

5.  Boil water for couscous.  Add couscous to boiling water.  Remove from heat and cover.  Wait five minutes.

6.  Fluff couscous with fork, add basil and juice from a lemon.

Cook and prep time is roughly 30 minutes.

Hope all of you are well and not sweating to death.

Actual news

Right out of the gate, thanks to the efforts of a dear friend the new url is: www.hooliganyouth.com

Yes, gone are the days of oppressive typing and excessive remembering of the old url.  Additionally it'll look cooler when printed on hooliganyouth related schtuff.

Maybe I shouldn't play pen and paper RPGs...

While I am a hardcore digital RPG fan and have been for a quarter-century I never got into pen-and-paper rpg's and LARPs.  I recall playing a handful of games during my youth but I was more of a Warhammer Fantasy Battle and 40K kind of youth (though now I just occasionally slap paint on a mini).  So I never got into D&D or Masquerade or any of that stuff.  Truth be told I think I just don't like analog games or the face-to-face social/competitive aspects of them.

That being said, a number of friends and acquaintances play them here and I do want to be more sociable and have friends so when I was invited to join in the Firefly rpg some friends are starting, I figured, "Shit, it ain't Masquerade".  I wrote up the first two-thirds of a fairly complex back story over the last week or so and set up a character I thought I would have fun playing with (I'll post the bio and character when I finish it).

I think I kind of bull-in-a-china-shopped the game and it almost immediately devolved into madness due to my character's refusal to cooperate with the suit and goons who came into my establishment with a forceful job offer.  Also I kind of demanded information on the job from the get-go.  On one hand I feel kind of bad for mayheming it but in my defense I was kind of put into the mix of it right from the get-go.  Plus, nobody bosses me around in my place, especially some suit who needs hired goons to weight his words. 

I'm a little wary of playing again, considering it might go a lot smoother if I just sit out and cook or hang out while they play.  We'll see.  Then again, I guess I could play sober. 

On the lamb...

I've had lamb on the brain for the past week or so but I really had no interest in most lamb recipes I was familiar with - mainly the roast leg o' with herbs and a mint jelly on the side. I also remembered having an aversion to the lamb-y flavor of the critter from when I was a kid. This venture was kind of uncharted territory in several ways: I've never made lamb, never made meatballs, and never made lamb meatballs. The recipe also called for cooking the meatballs with rice in them which required soaking the rice, then mixing with the meat, then boiling the meatballs. I found this recipe on Food & Wine – Moroccan Spiced Lamb-and-Rice Meatballs and it was a solid recipe (even though I only sort-of, kind-of followed the gist of it). I didn't add mint (frankly because I only really like mint in desserts) and I didn't have several ingredients either on-hand or in-stock at my place. I also plan to switch a number of the spices out for ones I prefer (e.g. ajwain seeds instead of cumin and Aleppo chile powder for the sweet paprika and cayenne, maybe add in some of this and some of that). One of the folks participating in the experiment doesn’t have much of heat tolerance but she does like flavorful. Fortunately I had a the last of a batch of Abuelita J’s spice mix in the freezer which filled the recipe’s call for Ras el Hanout (a Moroccan spice blend akin to curry blends/Latin American blends – it’s really not that complicated in the least).


The end result was quite tasty, it was a very successful experiment and I think will be an excellent dish for events (on my part) and for you folks at home who want to try something a little different but nothing too Martian.

However:

I’m/we’re also looking into sides and things to round out the dish. Personally I think the meatballs would benefit from more heat/garlic/spicing and possible blending with ground beef to a) stretch out the lamb, b) cut the lamb flavor, c) add ingredients with carminative properties – or plainly put, plants that keep the belching and farting down and aid digestion. Fortunately most of my favorite herbs and spices have that property, so I’ll just add more.

We’re planning another trial run of these, this time with a cucumber salad and a grain. I’ll post more as things progress.

Supper clubs and underground dining.

As many readers may know, I cooked for a "May the Fourth Be With You" event and had a great time doing it.  Over the last month or two I've had some ideas about other potential events and talked to a fair number of people about what they liked, didn't like, etc., etc. .  In the last week or so I had a conversation with one of the event organizers about what I would like to do or aim towards in the future.  Then I was tooling around on ye olde Web and did a search for "supper clubs".  A majority of what I found were aimed at a potluck type of set-up either with friends or a combo of friends and like-minded strangers found on sites like chowhound.com and the like.  These are pretty cool and I like the idea quite a bit, though with a limited social circle and the knowledge of conflicting schedules and RL folderol I realize that the idea has an untapped potential but in practical terms wouldn't hash out (I can also be terribly flaky and forgetful unless I Memento myself).

I poked around a bit more and came across "underground dining" and "secret supper clubs".  The first to catch my attention was the Cloak & Dagger Supper Club based out of Portland, Maine who began operations March 2012 (I'm also seriously considering moving to Portland, ME in the next couple years).  I poked around a bit more and found Supper Underground based out of Austin, Texas and has been in operation since the mid-00s.  I also came across Ghetto Gourmet from Oakland, CA who have also been doing their thing since the mid-00s.  Then I watched their clip on current.com:

And then I went a little pie-eyed (and might have said one or two profanities out of jealousy and for kicking myself for not being on the boat sooner).  Then I realized that in one DIY way or another I had been doing this and cooking for events (work-related) in one form or the other for years.  Definitely on not such a bad-ass scale until last month but since that party this is pretty close to what I've had in mind, daydreaming about for the last month.  Not catering or anything that would stray too close to "work" but I dunno, just kind of a relaxed, grown up-esque event.  I'm thinking about one or two of the conversations I've had recently and here's a rough concept sketch/list of what I would go for:

• Removing the curtain between diner and kitchen.  Not in a teppanyaki "Watch me make a volcano out of an onion!" kind of way but in a Yan Can Cook! You Can Too! kind of way.  Let people know that they can do whatever they want in the kitchen too.  Not that I'm Jacques Pepin by any stretch of the imagination but I want people to know it's not rocket surgery.  
• Also by using ingredients your regular citizen doesn't use or buy because either they just buy the regular stuff every time they go to a grocery store or just don't feel comfortable experimenting I'd like to turn people onto ingredients or dishes they might really dig.  Man that's an unwieldy sentence.
• Not just regular citizens but college kids too.  It makes me sad when I find out so many people subsist on ramen, weird microwave food, and Taco Bell.  Hell, I had one friend who lived off of canned food during her college career and when she finally got her own place was completely out of  her element in the kitchen.
• Having a rapport with people while I cook makes me happy.  Y'know, happy in a "Wow, I'm sober and don't hate myself." kind of way.
• I also love food history and foodways and learning about the background of what I'm cooking or what I'm cooking with. It'd be kind of cool to be able to just talk with people about not only what they are eating but where did it come from?  Why is it this way?  It's one thing to watch a show about it on Food Network or PBS or whatever but could you imagine eating and the cook giving you the 411 if you had any questions?
• Having a recipe for what I made (along with suggestions/tips&tricks) after the meal.  Cooking is not some kind of Buddha on the mountaintop secret recipe affair for me.  If I can't tell you what I did that's probably because I have no idea what I did.
• Remind people that eating just isn't jamming some food thing into your body for fuel.  If you wanted to do that you could live on MREs or astronaut food in a tube.
• Remind people that you don't have to be a professional to make good food.  Chances are your Nana wasn't a professional but could still cook anyone under the table.

For myself:

• Forcing myself to stop and think about what I am doing.
• Writing down recipes beyond, "I dunno, it's done when it looks done."
• Expanding my self-education about food.  None of that science jive.  If you want that go ask Alton Brown or read Harold McGee.
• Expanding my skills by cooking for others.  Lord knows I've learned a lot just by cooking for people who aren't chileheads over the years.
• Expand my repertoire outside my own comfort zone.  It's tough cooking for one person.  I eat a lot of meat and rice (or just rice) or salads or something cobbled together out of the regular stuff I have on hand.
• Wear comfortable boots for the next event.

Not exactly some kind of manifesto or grant proposal but hell, if I can be happy making people feel warm and good and full of noms then I guess that's not a terrible thing.

Hope all of you are well and not having a bag of chips for dinner (even if you're grown folks who can have chips for dinner).

Assorted things und schtuffs

Just a quick post to say that I've had nothing to post about worth posting about.  Summer in Texas has started and it's gonna be a hot one.  Haven't been particularly inspired to game and only putting in minimal effort into EVE.  Been watching The Killing  on netflix and it's pretty good.  I finished off Supernatural except for the last season and I'm kind of annoyed that season four and five were mainly about crap and then six and seven are all awesome.  Meh.

Had a really crappy sub from Napoli's.  It wasn't one thing that was bad, it was the whole thing.  Their sausage and meatball subs are awesome but their cold subs are terrible.  Avoid.

The local liquor store started carrying a Scottish beer from BrewDog UK I was recommended by a buddy of mine in EVE (an Englishman in Scotland).  The Punk IPA was excellent and more floral than most IPAs.  It's a fucking great beer, the only downside is that it's $10.99 for a four pack of 12oz bottles.  I also got their 5am Saint which kind of punched me in the face.  It was good for a red but it's definitely not a sit down and drink a whole mess of.  The 5am actually seemed hoppier than the IPA and when I pick up some more of their stuff I'll be going for the IPA.  Their high power beers aren't at the shop yet and I'm not sure I'll be picking up a 14% IPA - my experience with those isn't the best.  I think I lost sight in one eye for a week after my last experience. 

And that's the long and short for the time being.  Hope all of you are well and don't let the bastards grind you down.

Bookseller humor

Wreck-It Ralph Official Trailer

Beef and vegetable soup/stew with rice and Scotch Bonnets

So I overcooked my beef roast the other day, which kind of sucked.  I got kind of pissed and just poured a beer over it and put in a couple of teaspoons of beef stock concentrate and kept cooking it.  The next day I added more water and a bag of mirepoix.  It was pretty darned tasty.  Today I added two diced Scotch Bonnets and a cup of rice to the mix.  It's hot but it's pretty friggin good.  Sometimes the simplest things can salvage a potentially lost meal.

"What's your favorite movie?"

Chances are if you're a movie buff/geek/nerd/addict/snob/mouth-breather/any other subspecies, you have gotten asked that question.  Now, I dunno about you fine folks but I always have to ask what genre?  Like, do you mean decade?  I'm not splitting hairs, I just love categorizing stuff.  Then finally, when I pick something out of a hat the person goes, "Oh."

So I'm gonna do a top whatever of my favorite movies across all genres based on this qualifier, I can watch this movie anytime (at least once or twice a year) and enjoy it.  This is not in any order, and these might not be my favorite movies/films (those which made a strong impact on me or I deeply enjoyed/took an experience away but never rewatch are not included i.e. Suzuki Seijun's Branded to Kill) but they are the ones I have on regular rotation.

1. Master and Commander - I'll just throw this movie one while I'm playing EVE.  It makes me feel salty.
2. Rango - the newest addition to the rotation
3. Big Trouble in Little China - I don't need to explain myself to you
4. Altered - one of the best horror/sci-fi movies to come out in the last decade
5. The Lord of the Rings (Director's Cut) - usually on long cooking days
6. Braveheart - cleaning day movie.  Best line, "God seyz I'm fine but yer fooked."
7. The Skeleton Key - creeps the shit out of people.  I love it.
8. The Last of the Mohicans - I think I need to write about this movie and what I feel is a companion piece in another post.  I'm gonna watch this when I get home.
9. The Missing - Tommy Lee Jones in one of my favorite Weird Westerns.
10. (edit) The Dualists - I actually watch that far more often than Robocop - as awesome as Robocop is.

There, the ten movies I watch several times a year.  Truth be told sometimes I'll just put them on and watch with one eye while I'm on the computer or puttering around the house.

add: If I had Barry Lyndon on DVD I would proably watch that pretty often but I don't so I don't.

Watching cult movies with someone watching them for the first time.*

I recently struck up a friendship with a young man who is fresh off the boat when it comes a lot of the movies I taken for granted that people have seen.  It's not that he is disinterested in movies (he loves them) he just didn't have the opportunity or exposure to most of the stuff I've seen.  Also, during the 90s I didn't have access to the internet and so was constantly finding out about new stuff from friends - in particular my buddy Mike who introduced me to wild and wooly world of HK cinema and a slew of 70s & 80s stuff I had missed(1).

So my new friend and I are watching a documentary about Troll 2  last night titled The Best Worst Movie.  It's basically about the resurgent popularity of the movie among a demographic - mainly the Upright Citizen's Brigade/Alamo Drafthouse/Ain't it Coolers as shown through the eyes of the cast as they meet again after nearly twenty years to do openings and cons.  It's a pretty depressing documentary filled with failure and sadness.  He was asking me questions about what "cult" movies were (let me say that trying to explain what cult movies are by saying, "Uh, y'know - cult movies" isn't a good explanation).  Then we watched a martial arts movie Bodyguards and Assassins which had Donnie Yen in it and wasn't bad but wasn't great.  He had never seen a martial arts movie either (ay dios mio).

So I was thinking about it and I am putting this post together as a primer for the guy with a shout out for your input.  I know more about some areas more than others (weird action movies vs Pink Flamingo-esque) and different decades than others (classic 80s Hong Kong Action vs HK from the 00s).  So if we brain storm we can come up with a pretty good selection.  After all it takes a virtual village to educate a promising film buff:

I'm gonna start with a couple of categories and titles but I'm hoping you guys will pitch in, if not here than on the FB group.

Carpenter and Russell:  Lightning in a bottle

• Escape From New York (1981)
• The Thing (1982)
• Big Trouble in Little China (1986)

Cronenberg: Humans are made of meat.

• Scanners
• The Brood
• Videodrome
• The Fly

John Woo: before and after his stint in the US

• The Killer
• Hard-Boiled
• Better Tomorrow I & II
• Bullet in the Head
• Red Cliff

Tsui Hark: Wuxia Master

• The original Zu Warriors from the Mystic Mountain
• Once Upon a Time in China I & II
• The Blade

Ringo Lam:

• Destruction of the White Lotus Temple (aka Burning Paradise aka Burning Paradise in Hell)
• City on Fire
• Full Contact

Alex Cox:

• Repo Man
• Sid & Nancy
• Straight to Hell
• Walker (which is actually really fucking good)

John Waters:  You fans will need to help me out.  I only really like his one man shows.

Troma Pictures:  Mark - this is your area of expertise.

Martial arts movies of the new Century: need some reminders, preferably sans wire work

• Yimou Zhang
• Hero
• House of Flying Daggers
• Curse of the Golden Flower (boring but real nice to look at)
• Tony Jaa will fuck your day up
• Even though I hated it, Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon

I'm gonna kick off the bizarro road movie category with:

• Six-String Samurai
• Rubin & Ed
• Kalifornia
• Easy Rider (I'm not a fan but it is kind of an important movie in American cinematic history - overblown importance but still)

Similarly I am gonna kick the "WHAT THE FUCK ARE THE JAPANESE THINKING?" category:

• Damn near any Takashi Miike movie (except the monumentally good 13 Assassins)
• Particularly Happiness of the Katakuris
• Tetsuo & Tetsuo II
• Biozombie
• Mermaid in a Manhole
• Hanzo, the Razor
• Tokyo Zombie
• Lone Wolf & Cub (though the manga are excellent)

I realize this doesn't scratch the surface of 80s kids movies, sci-fi actioners of the late 80s/early 90s, 70s creature features (aka pollution makes animals kill people), giallo, and the insanity of the Corman empire. 

Guess I might have to unbox my VCR in order to rewatch some of these movies.  God only knows how some of these bootlegs of bootlegs are gonna look on a HD tv. 







*This headline was inspired by Spacemen 3's Taking Drugs to Make Music to Take Drugs to (1990).

(1) Additionally, during the late 90s I "worked" at the Key Theater in DC for a couple of years (by worked I mean was a useless, shitty snot of teenager) an art theater that showed all kinds of films.  When I moved into Austin I lived two blocks away from Vulcan Video and watched about a half dozen movies a week while ordering in books about Asian and Cult cinema at work.  Man, I watched a lot of crap.  During the late 00s I started being less hardcore about my movie watching and stopped reading most of the blogs and assorted sites.  Since living alone again I've been watching more movies.  Man, I'm watching a lot of crap.

Hooligan Youth Reviews: the facebookening

I'm working on getting a Hooligan Youth Reviews facebook page set up for all the random stuff I find on the internet that isn't a full blog post of bloggy-blogness (videos, pictures, snark).  Right now I have a picture of Tom Selleck being sexy and some assorted nibbles.  Feel free to stop by and validate my existence.  For the Love of Christ, just like me!

You'll have to type in Hooligan Youth Reviews for now.  Trying to figure out how to get a simple button to work is becoming a pain in my nethers.

The Woman in Black (2012) dir James Watkins

The reviews of The Woman in Black had been favorable for the most part - especially from reviewers I like and trust compared to the ones I don't (*cough* fuck the Austin Chronicle) - and I'll give any haunted house movie a shot.  My interest was piqued by the trailer and the setting more than the cast or director James Watkins, whose other directorial endeavour Eden Lake (2008) I haven't seen simply because it looks kind of boring - urban couple versus gang of kids (but it does star Michael Fassbender).  Watkins also wrote the script for The Descent 2 which was shockingly good as a sequel.  I know a lot of people made noise about Daniel Radcliffe being in a horror movie.  Not being much of Harry Potter fan I didn't give a shit.

So my one of my horror movie buddies came over the other night and we watched it.  I hadn't known that it was a Hammer Films production and that made me very, very happy.  If you're not familiar with Hammer Films then click the link and educate yourself.  Also Ciaran Hinds showed up and I'm kind of a huge fan of his.  Do yourself a favor and check out his performance in the Irish ghost movie The Eclipse (2009)

The movie is excellently produced and shot, a top notch old school Hammer Film.  In true classic style (and the mark of a quality haunted house movie) the house is a central character in the story.  There's a heavy sense of foreboding and menace over the entire film.  The scares are kind of refreshing in their simple classic style-remember the banging in The Haunting (1963)?  Yeah, that kind of scare.  There are a couple of jump scares but they work.  The eponymous Woman is the dark figure standing at the end of the bed.  If you let your munchkins watch this movie it will freak their shit out (if they have the patience to sit through it).  The suspense starts from damn near the get-go and really kicks into gear once Radcliffe's Arthur Kipps reaches the creepy British hamlet (again a classic set-up for English horror).  As a Hammer film The Woman in Black works well.  I look forward to more modern Hammer flicks.

If there's a downside to the movie, I'm afraid it's Radcliffe's vaguely twitchy performance.  Maybe it's because I kept expecting Peter Cushing to suddenly appear and say, I got this.  Go make a romantic comedy, kid.  A majority of the reviewers I read mention Radcliffe's age as a detriment.  I don't think it's Radcliffe's age - the role is made for a man approaching middle age, if not middle aged.  Imagine Ryan O'Neal in George C Scott's role in The Changeling (1980) - one of the best haunted house movies ever made.  It just wouldn't work.  I'm not saying Radcliffe (or any of the cast) turned in a poor performance.  I just think the movie could of had more of an impact with an actor who could have sold the role.

All in all definitely worth watching with the lights out on a dark and stormy night.

Hmmm...shippy shippy shippy ship...

I'm kicking the tires on a couple of boats.  Before my brief break from EVE I was considering the Proteus - the T3 cruiser which could be a pretty awesome project to spend the summer working on.  My other option is begin the long slog towards the Kronos.  The Kronos is made for stomping through solo missions without having to go grab the Noctis when you salvage.  The downside to the Kronos is I'm a drone monkey and would be better served by a Dominix.  A downside is the Domi...well, she's kind of fugly and lumpy (in-game nickname is "The Boot").  Not chopped down the ugly tree with her face fugly (*cough* Gila) but she's not exactly my cup of tea.

The primary drawback(s) to getting the Proteus, besides cost, is the simple fact I love my Ishtar.  Now that my skills have begun to do the boat justice I've noticed marked improvements in performance.  There are still some core areas that need major work - putting weeks of time into Drone skills have left me on the back foot in others (new EVE players - take the time to sit down and plan what you want to do in the long run before skilling willy nilly).  From glancing at the forums I noticed that the Proteus isn't comparable to the Ishtar as a PvE droneboat (I'll spend some more time reading because I'm sure there are plenty of folks out there who disagree).  I also have n00b level skills for blasters so fitting it as a blaster boat isn't a current option.  On the other hand it would take me a very short time to get into a Proteus, though I have made the mistake of jumping into a boat with substandard skills and paid the price.  Additionally there's the maxim, "Never fly more than you're willing to lose."  At this juncture my pride would take a stronger hit than my pocketbook if I lost my Ishtar.

The Kronos is not only over a billion isk (vs 240mil for the Proteus) but would take me roughly seventy-eight days to get into.  Well, that solves that problem.

The Dominix is 85mil and would take me an hour to get in (Battleship 1) - this doesn't include Large Hybrid Weapon skills though.  I could slap mid and low T2 gear on her from the get go.  Looking at her attributes for the first time I'm kind of impressed.  As far an armor tank/drone boat, well that's what she was made for.  With a 6/5/7 fitting (high/med/low) I could damn near slap everything and a kitchen sink on her.  Plus with a 375m3/125 bandwidth I'd be up to my ass in drones of every shape, size, color, and possible use (even that deep fryer drone I picked up).

Downsides, besides aesthetics, are mainly based on a couple of practical worries and some less practical. First, it would mean a shift in the way I PvE, which isn't necessarily a bad thing.  Right now I can dictate the flow of combat primarily through speed and range (the "they can't hit what they can't catch" principle) and judicious use of drones and rails.  I feel that the depressing speed of the Domi (base 109km/s combined with 420 signature radius and 0.1254 inertia modifier) would be akin to pushing a turd up a hill with chopsticks in regards to handling (opposed to an Ishtar's base 191km/s, 145 sig radius, and 0.560025 inertia mod).  The drastic change in these elements would potentially mean being at the mercy of enemy frigates and cruisers (and their ewar).  I suppose I could put my trust in blasters, though in truth I prefer to have the foe dealt with before they get into blaster range (hence my preference in railguns).  I have seen the Domi in action and she proves to be tough nut to crack.  Hell, she's built like a brick shithouse and can just soak up abuse.

I guess for the time being I'll keep on keepin on with the Ishtar and make some long term plans for getting into a Domi.  Still, I miss that new ship smell.
    

What to do in EVE flowchart

Not exactly what I was looking for but pretty cool nonetheless.

After a year of EVE...

"If you look long enough into the Quafe, the Quafe begins to look back through you."

I had my first in-game birthday about a week ago.  Nothing really special happened, I blew up some up some Serps and completed a few more certificates.  I've been finishing off my drone skills (which has been taking for-fucking-ever) and getting back my sea-legs on L3 milk runs.  There was a new expansion,  Inferno, which had a bunch of shiny updates (missles and rockets for what they are worth - I don't use them anymore) and a new Unified Inventory which I can't tell if I like or not.  It seems like a change to something that didn't really need to be changed.  However, EVE's inventory control is magically delicious when compared to SWTOR, WoW, or The Secret World, so I'll just have to get used to it or integrate it to the in station menu and get used to that (even though having it integrated makes me feel like I'm wearing my underwear backwards).

I've reached a strange point in my EVE career.  I'm not really sure what to do.  I still have a small mountain of skills I can put time into in order to make me really effective at soloing L4's and dodgier areas, at least in a cruiser class or below boat.  I'm not a miner.  The corp I'm currently in is pretty small and it's rare if any of us are online at the same time.  In a game that is very much a sandbox and your fun is dependent upon you sometimes it's kind of easy to be at a loss for what to do - especially when you've completed a set of self imposed goals and have to think about what the next set of goals you want to set for yourself are.  I don't need stacks of credits simply because I currently don't need to buy anything and everything I'm salvaging and looting is gravy.  I don't particularly want to risk my current clone (yeah I can get a jump clone) or my current boat in some kooky jaunt across the dark places of Eden.

I'm curious what other EVE players do when they find themselves at a loss for things to do.  Is it time for me to start thinking of going to nullsec?  Is it time to start thinking about getting into a battleship (not that I really want one)?  Time to join another corp?  Should I, gasp, learn to PvP?  Ideas and comments are welcome.

Fly safe, capsuleers.

Chronicle (2012) & Contraband (2012): mini reviews

Chronicle (2012) Y'know I kind of liked it.  The trailer pretty much shows almost all the movie and I spent most of the movie thinking, "Man, they could really make a live action Akira and do it justice."  The main character is actually kind of sympathetic and not just some mall-goth.  I'm not a fan of the first person camera angle thing that makes up most of movie but at least it wasn't found footage (because fuck found footage movies) or Cloverfield douches and waving iCameras.  Saturday afternoon or sick day watching.

Contraband (2012) A remake of Reykjavik-Rotterdam (2008) with Mark Wahlberg being all Mark Wahlberg-y.  I'll watch pretty much anything with him in it.  I don't care.  Other than that the movie was pretty solid action/crime thriller.  Beat the fuck out of Drive.  Another Saturday afternoon feature. 

Steampunk is dead, long live Cowpunk.

Steampunk lost its appeal for me a few years ago when it simply turned into brown goth (swap out ankhs for gears).  While I was glad to see the renewed interest in Edgar Rice Burroughs, H.G. Wells, dirigibles, and British Imperialism I rapidly became disgusted with this kind of mentality:

My own relationship with steampunk began in 1988 when I read about Frank Chadwick's Space: 1889 (GDW: 1988) in Dragon magazine.  Not long after I got hooked on Philip Jose Farmer's Dungeon series.  This series remains one of my favorite "fantasy" series and after rereading them a few years ago - probably not something I should have read when I read it for the first time (see also George Alec Effinger's When Gravity Fails).  I had forgotten about steampunk, for the most part, save for a manga here or there, Otomo's Steamboy (2004), and to a certain extent Moore's League of Extraordinary Gentlemen (the graphic novel not the shite movie).  In the late 00s the steampunk subculture went mainstream and for a brief period of time I thought it was pretty cool.  Then the subculture seemed to blow up and you couldn't throw a rock without hitting a top hat with shit on it.  I think DragonCon 2010 was the final nail in the coffin for me (though there were some slammin hot cosplayers in steampunk gear but then again those men and women would look attractive in damn near anything).  It wasn't even a scene I was "into" or directly involved with (apart from living with a borderline steampunk-former goth-super crafter-ubergeek) so I my disinterest did not stem from my "scene" being taken over by n00bs and kindergoths.  No, I just got over-saturated and that resulted in me turning into a crankasaurus.

Recently a dear friend, fellow Havenite, and longtime fan of steampunk declared that she was done with the subculture and was ready to move on.  In the ensuing snark we batted around other ---punk genres that could be gotten into.  Personally I'm tired of 99% of (insert term)punk including but not limited to dieselpunk, atomicpunk, cuttlepunk (enough with the god damn Cthulu stuff people.  Lovecraft's best works didn't even involve Elder Gods), and coalpunk.  My money is still on the Weird Western; that brilliant genre that ranges (in my experience) from the classic show The Wild, Wild West (1965-1969), horror folk tales I grew up with (some with historical roots - the Donner Party - and a lot of Native American things that go bump in the night) to some of the works of Joe R. Lansdale to Ravenous (1999), The Missing (2003) and The Burrowers (2008) to a great deal of bizzaro sci-fi and horror that shared the same bottle as splatterpunk (I can't forget Red Dead Redemption either).  A number of excellent (now out-of-print) graphic novels appeared in the early 00s that did the Weird Western bloody justice.  Hell, I might even call Preacher a Weird Western at it's heart.  I was recently skimming through the brilliant Too Much Horror Fiction blog (seriously, if you're a horror fan you'd do well to check it out) and found a brief write-up of Razored Saddles, a Weird Western anthology edited by Joe R Lansdale and Pat Lobrutto.  I found it on amazon and bought a couple of copies (don't give me that look).  I haven't started it yet but the list of authors is fucking impressive.  Besides Lansdale, it features Robert R McCammon, Richard Matheson (yes that Richard Matheson), Richard Laymon, and F. Paul Wilson.  There are quite a few authors I don't recognize off the topic of my head but their names look familiar from other anthologies (e.g. Chet Williamson).

What brought on the whole ---punk blog was when I was shelving the extra copies I noticed that Avon had categorized the anthology as "Cowpunk/Horror".  "Cowpunk"?  Nani?  So I took a look at wikipedia and found out that a good number of bands I am very, very familiar with bore the cowpunk moniker (including The Violent Femmes, Meat Puppets, The Cramps, The Mekons, and a number of bands I just thought were psychobilly -e.g. Nashville Pussy and Reverend Horton Heat).  Well, I'll be shipped in dit.  I didn't see any authors or mention of Weird Westerns on the wiki though.  I'm kind of curious how Avon came to slap cowpunk on the book and if there are other books drifting around in the sub-subgenre.  Mr. Lansdale and Mr. LoBrutto explain in the introduction:

But, the term Cowpunk is a joke, nothing more.  It is not the beginning of a movement.  No secret handshakes or code rings here.  It is a playful poke at such "movements" as Cyberpunk and Splatterpunk as it is anything. - xii

This makes me fucking happier than listening to Deadwood dialogue.  It's been a long time since I was genuinely "fat kid dancing with cotton candy" happy to read something.  Razored Saddles is also a little nostalgic for me.  This book reminds me of anthologies and assorted horror I cut my teeth on, starting around age 12 (most of which I should not have read until I was old enough to buy smokes).

I'll be making a follow-up/review post soon but in the meantime I'm gonna crack open a Lone Star and fresh pack of Pall Malls and get to reading.    

Red Tails (2012) Dir. Anthony Hemingway

I, like many people I am sure, wasn't paying much attention to Red Tails.  I had seen the trailer and thought, "Okay, a WWII airmen movie about black pilots.  That's cool."  I had been familiar with the Tuskegee program but didn't know much more about the unit or its exploits in the European air war.  Truth be told, I had shrugged off seeing it because Cuba Gooding Jr. was in it.  Plus from the previews I figured it would be an uplifting tale about men being awesome even when the odds are stacked against them.  Paint by numbers WWII airmen movie a la Memphis Belle (1990).  When it comes down to it, Red Tails is simply a paint by numbers flyboy movie (if you're familiar with the genre then you'll probably only be in it to watch the aerial combat).

What sets Red Tails apart from its ilk is that the film focuses on Black airmen and their struggles to be recognized as equals in the eyes of white servicemen, the brass, and a society that systematically denied opportunities for equality.  Frankly Glory (1989) did it better, with a more convincing set of characters, and better dialogue.  I certainly don't have a problem with the subject matter of the film or treatment but Red Tails felt, for lack of a better term, safe.  On one hand, I enjoyed the film and cheered at the right points and laughed the right points and teared up at the right points but on the other I kind of winced at some scenes of white and black pilots coming together and the moments of "fight with your mind, not your fists" dialogue.  While I wasn't expecting (or hoping for) some kind of Spike Lee polemic I didn't expect such a two dimensional film.  Then again, it didn't need to be a political race movie because it ultimately was about pilots being awesome.

Terence Blanchard's score was pretty lacklustre but Anthony Hemingway and his technical staff put together a great looking movie.  Having the backing of Lucasfilm definitely showed because the aerial sequences were pretty bad-ass and I had a good time recognizing planes that I grew up knowing the names and makes of.  Seeing the ME-262 (the German jet that appeared near the end of the war) in action made me really happy, because ME-262s are fucking awesome.  Seriously, look them up.  Jet fighters in WWII.  Awesome.

I don't know why everyone went googly-moogly about Lucas being one of the executive producers.  He didn't write the script or the story based on John B. Holway's book.  He didn't direct it or edit it.  The reviewer on imdb is right about lots of the fallacies and might be right about the Tuskegee Airmen deserving a better movie but I'm not sure why he (or other reviewers - positive and negative) are putting such import on Lucas.  There's a bunch of stuff about Lucas on the Red Tails wiki but I'm not interested enough in reading it.

Not world's most memorable air combat movie but not one of the worst either.  I guess the best thing about this movie for me is if some kid gets interested in WWII aircraft because of it or wants to learn more about the Tuskegee Project, that's pretty cool.  As far as making an effort to see it?  Wait until it's streaming on netflix or someone else wants to pay for the rental or you've run out of airplane movies to watch.

1v1 EVE Comic

It's funny because it's true.

Show Me Where Ya Noms At

The Witcher 2: Enhanced Edition (2012)

I am a big fan of the Witcher series (opening  & closing remarks) though I've not read the books or might not have nerded all over myself during my time with the first installment.  If that's the case then why do I call myself a "fan" of the games?  Because after playing through Witcher I still talk and think about it.  I recommend it to people.  I don't proselytize but I definitely talk the game up a bit.

When I found out that The Witcher 2: Enhanced Edition was coming to XBOX 360 I clapped my hands like a fat kid finding out he was having cake for dinner.  I still haven't gotten my PC up to the required specs for a game like Witcher 2 and looking back at my old posts (and in the interim playing other PC action games) I've realized that I kind of suck at using a mouse and keyboard for action games - thirty years of console controllers vs a few years of mouse and keyboard training, you figure out my handicap.

This is a first impressions post/review and, following a marathon gaming session yesterday, I'm roughly twenty-five-ish hours into the game (possibly near the end of Chapter One).  I'm going to try a list review with call and response rather than the standard pros and cons layout.

• Graphics/Load Times/Basics
• I couldn't have run W2 on my PC, or perhaps I could have but it would have been like trying to run the Iditarod with kittens.  On the 360 the game runs pretty smoothly.  I've noticed a few moments of tearing and voice synch has been off here and there.  In the area I'm currently quest/grinding in though the game looks and runs excellently.  There have been a few moments where there's been pop-in but those are rare (at best).  
• Load times are damned quick (enough for one swig of beer before moving on to the next area) especially in comparison to Skyrim (or any Bethesda game).
• I love that not every piece of crap is pick-up-able.  If you can use it or it's worth picking up you can loot it.  There's no, "I just picked up a plate that's worth fuck-all.  Wheeee!"
• Sound & Score
• Sound is solid, Dolby DTS, though I'll have to tweak my settings a bit.  Ambient sounds are well done, combat is crunchy, and dialogue is well channeled.  A downside is I wish there was a way to turn down Geralt's footsteps.  He stomps/sloshes/squishes around with no grace.  He doesn't need to be some kind of sissy stepping knife ears but there are times his walking sounds like a fat lady jumping in a kiddie pool of oatmeal.
• Adam Skorupa and  Krzysztof Wierzynkiewicz worked on the score and it is fucking brilliant.  "Assassins of Kings" is a good example - opening theme is much better.  Skyrim does have a "better" score (e.g. "Opening Theme") but in all honesty I prefer W2's score.
• That being said, the edition I was given had a cracked soundtrack CD otherwise I would be listening to it as I wrote this.
• Combat/Magic/Alchemy/Traps
• Combat is as smooth as fucking silk, especially since I unlocked a couple of basic swordsman skills (riposte & dodge distance).  You're going to face quite a few mobs in combat who will tear you apart if you don't manage to dictate the flow of combat in one of several ways.  You can spam attacks on some opponents but at my low level of skills right now even lumpen bandits will house me if I get swamped.  Higher level enemies require a combination of reflexes and skills (especially if you're playing on Hard) and it's easy to get caught with your pants down if you're just derpin around (I was looking to complete a side quest and just doing a bit of grindy grind and this beastie just knocked my dick in the dirt as I lifted up my skirts and ran shrieking).
• Magic is often one of the weakest links in games for me since I tend to take Conan's corner on spellcasters.  Geralt is a different animal than Conan though and magic - like his bladecraft and penchant for alchemy - is another tool for putting a whompin on foes.  You start off with all the spells unlocked - albeit at base level - and can only be used sparingly.  I'm sure magic gets more wicked awesome if you level it up but for my needs I just need stun.
• Alchemy.  Mmmmmmmmm...alchemy.  Crafting bombs, combat drugs, poisons, and weapon enhancements.  This is my kind of magic, good old fashioned grenades with AoE.  My favorite so far is the Red Haze - a grenade which releases psychotropic gas thus causing enemies to attack one another.  
• Traps, dirty dirty traps.  Combined with grenades and lures these can be brutal.  However, you can easily slaughter yourself since the traps can affect Geralt as well (I thought I was being all slick and bushwackery and a gribbly set off a combustion trap I got trapped in, then I burned to death).  Also you can't just spam traps and kite, foes have a limited engagement range (for the most part).
• Story and stuff
• W2 is a direct sequel to The Witcher but if you didn't play the first game then it's okay, W2 catches you up pretty quick.  The downside to just picking up this game without playing the first is the joy of meeting old characters again and there are a lot of inside jokes, quips, and asides which you'll just miss if you jump right into W2.
• I also wish there was a way to bridge my experience in the first game to this - a la Mass Effect.  One of the great things about ME2 (I haven't and probably won't play the third installment of that series) was the continuity of choices made in an earlier game.  That being said, in W2 I'm very conscious of my actions because I know repercussions can come sooner and later.  
• Consequences are (one of the elements) that set both games apart from other RPGs.  More accurately put, there is no way to gauge consequences.  It's not some simple BioWare be a dick or a nice guy choice.  If you try to work the middle ground some  NPCs will fuck with you.  In most (if I have the choice) RPGs I'm Yojimbo,  Playing this way has made W2 more difficult for me (especially since I'm not save/quit/reloading conversations).  There's an impending conversation I've put off for now because I want to think about how I'm going to play it.  I know things are going to come out badly either way I play the hand dealt but I feel I need to be careful.
• While you can just pick up and play W2 I wholeheartedly suggest picking up The Witcher.  Yes, it's only available on PC but if my piece of crap jerry-rigged machine can play it then I'm sure yours can as well.  If not, W2 does do the back story justice.  I guess.
• Misc. and a warning or two
• Misc
• If you're looking for Bethesda free-roam randomness then, sorry, W2 does not have that.  The exploration areas are bigger than they were in The Witcher but paths and areas are still limited (along the lines of Dragon Age: Origins but not the piece of shit sequel).  Some of the paths (in the area I'm in) double back on themselves and it's easy to get turned around and short-bussing.
• You are limited to 250kg of gear/loot but most everything has some kind of use and junk items are in a junk items folder in inventory control so they are easy to either drop or sell.
• You can reloot crafting items after a day or two (in game) meaning, you walk into a house and loot the place you can later reenter the place and get more loots.  Stupid NPCs.
• I know this is common sense to old RPG gamers but talk to all the NPCs.  There aren't glowing doodads above quest givers so it's easy to miss quick XP quests (or in some cases involved XP quests).
• Downside to some of these random sides so far is that you have to search for the end trigger.  I spent quite a bit of time looking for one woman all over hell and high water until I gave up, ran another mish, and found her by accident.
• Warnings:
• W2 is a game for grown-ass folk who don't get sand in their vaginas about adult themes, Hot Coffee, or the term "sand in their vaginas".
• It is not an easy game, unless you put it on easy but even then that doesn't impact story.  I'm playing on Hard and the combat is brutal.  Even crappy bandits and nekkers can shred me if I'm not on my toes.  Also on Hard, loots and pickups yield less, so I've been  more cautious about spam crafting and using items (aka I has a kajillion grenades and Clawers nerf nerf nerf).
• Seriously, Hard is hard, at times frustratingly so.  After dying during a side mission for the umpteenth time I almost rage-spiked my controller.
• If you're looking for some kind of JRPG or KRPG or Dragon Age simulacra then you might just want to avoid W2.  I don't have much respect for Asian RPGs anymore and BioWare and Bethesda just kind of disappoint me.  

I'm not totally in love with W2, I'm not gonna Whedongasm, but it is one of the best console RPGs I've played in quite some time.  I did realize that I'm taking a different approach to most RPGs I play/ed.  I feel like I'm playing a dual role with Geralt, seeing events through his eyes and limitations and not being some sort of omnipotent (bored) player.

We'll see if I feel the same way when the bloom is off the rose.

Fish Pl: Restaurant review

Fish Pl.

1302 North Street

Nacogdoches, TX

75961

936-564-2922

Delacroix's closed awhile back and a new fish joint moved in, Fish Pl.  Now, as many of you know, I used to eat at Delacroix's very often - at the height of addiction I think it was about three or four times a week.  The Sunday brunch was awesomely awesome with awesome sauce.  I was upset about the place closing and frankly kind of annoyed that another seafood/"Cajun" place would move in.  However, after Fish Pl. opened a few weeks ago I started hearing reports that it was indeed, "pretty good" and "delicious".  Last night I swung by there with some people.  Walking into the remodelled establishment felt weirder than weird - like wearing someone else's underwear awkward.

Frankly, I am not impressed based on my first meal.  They have a tiered combo menu ($6.50/$8.50/$10), a selection of po'boys, a couple of other salad/entree things, and tacos ($4.00 ea).*  I had heard good things about the fish & chips and I love fish & chips so I got the fish & chips (fish & chips Malkovitch).  With a small side of cole slaw ($2), tax, and tip it came out to be $16.  A little pricey but it was one the most expensive combo so it didn't come as sticker shock.

There was a sauce/condiment bar with ten (?) selections including creole mustard (had kind of a weird cream aftertaste which Zatarain's mustard doesn't have), cocktail sauce, a poblano ranch (which was sadly bland), chipotle mayo, and a couple of other things.  Shrug, they were okay. 

The fish & chips is not "fish & chips" with the light golden brown crust greasy British deliciousness or something panko encrusted.  It's the cornmeal enamel polisher that is often used with catfish (I don't understand actually paying for catfish in a restaurant).  To be fair the crust was well done and not overcooked and the cod was nice and flaky.  But the combo plate was far too much breading and starch (as is the case with most fried dish combo plates) since toast and hushpuppies are included as well (the hushpuppies were good but overdone and kind of bland).  I'm also not a fan of the cornbread breading.  The cole slaw was a dry-ish standard cole slaw blend that wasn't bad except it had an overpowering amount of black pepper in it - of all the things that should have been bland-ish the cole slaw had the most kick.

After taking my time and looking at the menu I think there are only one or two things I would try if I go there again.  The #8 red beans & rice with andouille or boudain balls ($6.50), a salad (which are the same price as at The Barn), or the Cajun shrimp po'boy. 

All in all, I'll go again if someone else wants to check it out but since I'm not a fan of cornmeal breading I won't be getting the fried fish again.  Plus, truth be told the Fish Pl. prices are the same and in some cases more than The Barn's (especially the lunch specials and sandwiches & burgers) so if it's just me then I'll walk over to The Barn.

*The menu online is different from the in-store menu (upon which they misspelled Nacogdoches).

Epic Gameplay Trailer - Assassin's Creed 3 (Xbox 360) - IGN Video

Epic Gameplay Trailer - Assassin's Creed 3 (Xbox 360) - IGN Video

I played the first Assassin's Creed and was disappointed, not by the score, story or premise but the fucking awful missions and god damn beggars. I think I rented one of the sequels and was amused for a weekend. This latest installment I was not particularly thrilled about until I heard it was set during the American Revolution. Then my ears kind of perked up. Personally, I'm a Royalist (that's a whole 'nother topic for another time) but I thought that this part of history - largely neglected by non-PC strategy games - would be kind of awesome for a setting. Last night I watched the preview and have to say, kick ass. I wanna Magua the shit out of some dudes. Be all like "TOMAHAWK, WHITE DEVIL!" I won't buy this right out of the gate (GOTY edition will work) but I'm looking forward to it. Now if only they'd release a kick-ass game set during the Napoleonic Wars or World War I.

More pics from Artist's Haven.

Is that supposed to be a "thinking" face?

With great steak comes great responsibility.

View from the balcony.  

Previously on, "Artist's Haven"

Artist's Haven "May the Fourth Be With You" Party or How to Cook for an Unspecified Large Number of People.

One of the most common complaints you hear about Nacogdoches is that there is nowhere to go and nothing to do.  A number of people I know and respect are working hard to change that.  Some of those folks have been working on an idea dubbed "Artist's Haven" - that is setting up a locus for like-minded people to spend time together.  It's not some fruity Cape Cod art commune knock-off where people swish around drinking chardonnay.  The idea is to create a space for art, sure, but also have somewhere to go that isn't a complete dump or college cesspit.  The lynch pin for the Haven is founders Heather and Ryan's monstrously large apartment.  The place is so damn big you could set up one of those kiddie choo-choos to get from one side to another.  The photo above is the kitchen, centered in the middle of the apartment, and has a gas fucking stove, multiple sinks, and counter space, lots of counter space.

I signed on/volunteered to make food for the event.  I had been onboard for a previously planned party but due to logistical bullshit fell through (which I was secretly glad because it was a zombie themed party and everyone knows I have a severe dislike of zombie pop culture).  No big deal except this May the Fourth Be With You party had less than a week to be planned.  Fock.  The hosts came through with an excellent DJ Keith "Fatbaby" Williams who did magic DJ stuff for about five hours and I can't remember disliking one track (which is surprising considering I'm such a cranky fucker).  The word was put out via social media.  I kind of kicked around food ideas (sort of, not really) but only really cobbled together a meal idea while shopping for the party.   Ryan had picked up stacks of sirloin earlier in the week so I figured, okay fajita-esque, that's easy.  Here's a run down of the pros and cons of the party and some suggestions for you folks if you're going to feed a whole bunch of people but you don't know how many or who eats what:

• Fajitas - or some kind of sliced meat thing put on tortillas - are an excellent option.  If you don't know who eats what or won't eat what you can easily make everything separate and on the side - I made the peppers and shallots apart from one another and bowled them apart so people could pick and choose.
• I didn't think of condiments like cheese and sour cream and that jive but frankly they weren't missed.
• Take the extra time to warm your tortillas (especially flour).  They stay warm a long ass time and don't have that weird gummy texture that tortillas out of the bag do.
• I was thinking there would be an early (smaller) group of people coming to eat so I also had a large salad and a couple of non-meat options:
• This would have been awesome if there had been the first round of guests.  As it was I think two people ate salad.  Stupid salad.  
• If I had been smart I would have put the food out in different intervals (again a time and unpreparedness on my part) or remembered to have dishes that can be keep warm over a long period of time - I've worked on food for events at the museum and forgot about that.
• The hummus got no love.
• The awesome pretzel chips I found on sale also got little love but people love the shit out of tortilla chips.  Have to remember that people go toward the familiar.
• Cooking at the Haven is fucking boss, especially since it's my dream layout for interacting with people.
• Roping off the business end of the kitchen was a good idea and gave myself some breathing space.
• Paper plates are fuckin sweet.
• Making a sauce out of rum, Dr. Pepper, butter, and Sriracha at one in the morning for a counter full of drunk hungry people was really fucking fun.
• Favorite interaction:  "Wait?  You're making a sauce?  Right now?" "Yeah, why the fuck not?" "Ooooo."
• Drunk people are easy to cook for.
• Jambalaya is absurdly easy to make in large batches.
• I actually barely drank any booze at a party and feel good about myself.  What the fuck is that about?  

Here are some random thoughts on what I need to do for myself for the next party:

• Bring my own gear.  I have a knife roll thanks to an old friend. There were a number of times I got kind of cross-eyed trying to look for stuff in an unfamiliar kitchen. 
• I also want to figure out how to make a crash kit for spices, salt (Samwise was a smart motherfucker), and assorted stuff I have at arm's reach in my house.
• Punk rock my chef's jacket so people won't think I'm a professional.  Fuck, put on a chef's coat and have cooking related tattoos and people think you're some kind of cook person.  Albuelita J is not a professional - he's just a guy who makes food.
• Have cooler of my own because BYOB means drink everyone else's booze.
• I'm definitely going to make a slow-cooked dish or two for the next event.
• Wear my boots.  My brogues didn't do shit for my footial comfortitude.
• Do as much as I can - prep, etc - the day before.
• Figure out how to make finger food.  
• Figure out where to get enough fingers to feed a large group.
• Buy a shit-ton more spices and work on blends to sell to folks.
• Find a hat that's kind of cool.
• Figure out the industry secret of keeping one's ass crack from going tropical.  I wonder if you learn that at the CIA?

So yeah, all in all, people were happy and said nice things about the food and that made me feel good about myself.  It was also awesome to be part of something actually kick ass.  Thanks to my friends who made this possible and thanks to the folks who showed up and got their nom on.

I have the antidote for sale to the highest bidder.