Ever since I purchased my iPhone I dreamed of jailbreaking it so that I could play some good old NES games. I can’t bring myself to do it though, I dread that something would go wrong and then my warranty would be void…

Every once in a while I do a search through the App Store dreaming that someone has ported a copy of the Legend of Zelda, or some other old School NES game to the iPhone. My dreams always take me to the same place: Mega Man 2.

Mega Man 2 for the iPhone makes me angry.

I have deleted the free version of this game from my iPhone so many times. I keep hoping that it will get better and fulfill my nostalgic dreams. The issue I keep having has to do with the controls. If you read the reviews in the App Store you will see a mix of people that either love it, or hate it (for the controls).

I think the main problem is that most people that would download the app are only used to playing Mega Man 2 on the Brick controller, and not on the iPhone.

It’s the combination of not having the tactile response and f@cking with nostalgia.

That is the problem. It’s not that the controls are bad, it’s that we remember a classic game in a specific way. The iPhone is similar in size to the Brick, but it’s just not the same. I think once you get over this aspect it becomes a pretty solid game.

Today I downloaded the free version of this game again and played through with out the anger, without the thought that this version of Mega Man was messing with my childhood. I played through the demo version a few times and decided that it was great game.

Mega Man 2 for the iPhone costs (at the time of writing) $0.99 while the NES cart currently sells for around $13.00 on eBay. It may not be a proper replacement, but for a person looking for a bit of nostalgia on the iPhone, I think a dollar is a great price for what it is.

The Mega Man iPhone Challenge

For those of you that have an iPhone,  download the free version of Mega Man 2 and play through the WoodMan level. Let me know if I am right or wrong.

I really think what made this game so rad was the characters and their quotes.  I know that among my friends Minsc was everyone’s favourite character.  He had the best quotes out of everyone.  Even after years of no longer playing the game at least once a month in one of our gaming sessions someone calls out “Go for the eyes Boo!” (at 0:30 in the video below)

Watch this video on YouTube.

I also seem to recall that Khalid reminded me a bit of C3P0 but was not able to find an audio clip of his quotes like I did for Minsc. In my searching I did get a bit distracted and came across a listing Amazon.com for a Super Pack of the Baldur’s Gate games plus a ton of other classics for only $19. Turns out it was just released a few days ago (Nov 15th 2011) worth getting disctracted for, but…

If anyone can find an audio clip of Khalid’s quotes please share the link!

So, what’s the best weapon to have, in case of a zombie apocalypse?

Oooookay . . . . . interesting question

Personally, my vote goes to the shotgun. Often venerated, never under-rated with more bang for your buck than anything ‘cept your sister, it’s gotta be a contender, right? Ordinarily, a shotgun would end most arguments, (and field testing at debate clubs confirm this) but we do have to concern ourselves with the question of ammo. Precisely, what you do when you run out. In this case, the answer is “get proper fucked.” You could use it as a club, which is more than what you could say for other guns. (I’m looking at you Glock. Plastic parts may cut it for Michael Jackson, but not for pistol whipping the undead hordes.) I suppose the crisis of ammo consumption would eliminate most firearms from the list, and probably knocks chainsaws off as well for the similar situation regarding fuel.

Damn, I was looking forward to those.

Anyway, that brings us to weapons without reloading requirements. A baseball bat seems reliable, but the custom jobs seem to break with alarming regularity in the major league. Oh well, you’re probably better off with a cricket bat anyway. You’ve seen “Shaun of the Dead” haven’t you? Could Simon Pegg possibly lie to you?

Could Simon Pegg even kick your ass?

Probably not. Who could? I know.

Toshiro Mifune baby.

So with the reference to cinema’s sovereign samurai, as our segue way into the suggestion of swords, the debate continues. You may lack the relevant martial experience, but do you really need it? Bruce Willis wasn’t a sword-slinger, but Zed is still dead. Availability of the katana might be an issue, so if you’re looking for some heavy metal to cleave with on a budget, you could probably make do with a fire-axe, available at most office and apartment building fire-stations. I guess the big issue with these choices is if you have enough force behind your swing to slice all the way through. If not, your sharpie is now stuck in a zombie, leaving you defenseless.

You know, this is a tough question. Just give me a minute to do some research, and reacquaint myself with the enemy.

From “thefullzombie.com” ”

This got me thinking about iPhones and Dungeons and Dragons.

I decided that I would research what was in my opinion the best apps for iphone that were related to Dungeons and Dragons. When I arrived at home I cracked open iTunes and started searching through the app store in search of the best iphone apps for DnD. Below is my list of the top (there are only 4!) apps for the iPhone related to Dungeons and Dragons.

The Dicenomicon: I found a lot of dice rolling apps. Most of them were pretty crappy looking and lacked any real aesthetic value. If you own an iPhone it seems obvious that aesthetics are important to you. The Dicenomicon was the most realistic looking iphone app. The best feature was the fact that you can give your iPhone a shake to roll the dice, and if you reroll the dice you can hold a die in place and roll the rest. There are a ton of different condition you can apply when it creates the total for you. For example: roll 4d6 and keep the highest 3 rolls. I think the Dicenomicon is a must have iPhone app for any DnD player, especially for those sessions where you forget your dice and have to borrow your friends crap dice. Check out the light version or the full version of The Dicenomicon.

Spellbook Master: If you ever play any kind of spellcasting class then you know how much of a pain it is to be constantly thumbing through your book to check out a few details of a spell, or if you are a DM and you need to quickly check and see if a spell requires a saving through even though your PC’s say “No it doesn’t require a save.” The Spellbook Master iphone app makes it easy to reference spells either by class, domain, school, element etc. all from your iPhone! It is the best tool you can have if you play any kind of spellcaster. for more details and screenshots check out the app page for the Spellbook Master

Quick Roll: This is another dice rolling iphone app, yet it is much different than the Dicenomicon. With this you can program specific dice roll variables into the interface and then quickly roll them. So you can have your initiative roll modifier added in, your fortitude save and so on. You can pretty much have every item that you need to roll added into the app so you don’t have to slow down the game by constantly adding in all your modifiers from all over place. I am sure we have all had a moment where another player (never us) rolls to strike and then begins to keep adding in the modifiers: I have power attack, I’m using the weapon 2 handed, and on and on. If you want to streamline your gaming then read up on the Quick Roll app

tCiMP Character in My Pocket: This great iPhone app allows you to keep your character and all of it’s information stored on your iPhone. Gone are the days where you can’t play because you forgot your character sheet at home.It has a built in rolling system so you can roll stats and create new characters. With this app you will never be without a character ever again! Check out the Character in My Pocket app

So those are as far as I can tell the best apps for iPhone that pertain to Dungeons and Dragons. If you are browsing through the itunes app section and find another great DnD app please share it with us in the comment section below, or help spread the word to other dorks by clicking that precious Stumble Upon or Digg buttons!

Mr.Bean – Heart Attack

Check this out

“He’s 8 years old and smells like Robert Downey Jr”

That’s right, as far as I can recall Robert Downey Jr is a washed up drunken hack. Taking a quick look at his career on imdb.com I notice that he got off to a great start in the 80′s and slowly was becoming an unstoppable force, and just when his stardom was on a major rise, it was promptly was kicked in the junk and fell to the floor like a moldy bag of tangerines.

Of course now it seems that he is on the rise again. With the latest success of Iron Man and Tropic Thunder and the upcoming heart-wrenching , make you cry and feel uplifted film The Soloist is Robert Downey Jr. on a comeback?

I seriously hope not.

When I think of comebacks I am always brought back to 1994 when John Travolta played Vincent Vega in Pulp Fiction. That was a deserved comeback. Johnny T is a respectable hardworking actor. Travolta deserved a comeback, Downey did not.

Even though I have a soft spot for the 1989 film “Chances Are,” I firmly believe that if Robert Downey Jr continues his journey to the top, or even one day gets an Oscar, this will signal the end of days.

Downey is a drunken junkie. Not a great actor.

Why should we take the time to praise our junkies? Maybe it’s time that I go to the apartment below mine and congratulate the junkie that lives there on creating successful meth lab. Maybe I should walk up to him and say: “Wow, I hear people banging on your window looking for drugs all night. Your more successful than a 7-11, keep up the good work!”

Robert Downey Jr is just like the guy who lives below me. A junkie. Let’s start treating him like a junkie. Don’t let him make a comeback.

Do your part and don’t go see any Robert Downey Jr movies, don’t rent any of his old movies, and if he ever wins an Oscar, throw a huge fit ( I know I will). Please help spread the news about the plague that is Robert Downey Jr and Stumble or Digg this post.

Conversation point: Do you agree that Downey is a piece of composted watermelon rinds, or has he done anything good for this world. Lets hear what the Downey lovers have to say…

When I was young, I preferred Nancy Drew to the Hardy Boys. I guess I’ve always had a thing for smart girl detectives. . .

On September 22, 2007, Veronica Mars aired for the first time on the now defunct UPN network. It was brilliant. Over the course of its three seasons, the few people actually watching it got to see television at its best. When it wasn’t picked up for a fourth season, I actually took the time to write to the network and tell them what I thought of their decision. Suffice it to say that TV doesn’t usually stir such passion in me.

I have to start with our firecracker title character. Kristen Bell was perfectly cast in the role, giving her a depth of character I rarely see in any entertainment medium. Veronica was complex. Sure she was witty and intelligent. Of course she was good looking and funny. Yes she was the girl I always wished existed when I was in high school but would have to wait much, much longer to actually meet. She was also overconfident, occasionally petty and insensitive, and very prone to trusting her gut when she shouldn’t, often to disastrous consequence. In short, she was very nearly a goddess. When her heart broke, mine did too.

The rest of the casting was also very good. While virtually all of the characters were standard archetypes (the steadfast best friend, the bad boy with a heart of gold, the sleazy PI, etc…), the actors brought something to make them special and memorable. Enrico Colantoni as Veronica’s dad and Tina Majorino as Mac are particular favourites of mine. Michael Muhney as Sherriff Lamb also deserves a special mention.

This show was densely plotted. There was a single overarching mystery that ran the length of the season, there were also smaller mysteries that would get solved over a three or four episode arc, and each individual episode would have a mystery that would be solved during the episode. The third season broke from this in that there was no season long mega-mystery. Instead, the writers decided that it would be easier to get new viewers into the show if they broke the season in half and had two smaller mysteries rather than the larger one. I’m sure that opinions differ, but season three, while being very good, was definitely my least favourite for that very reason.

I don’t know why Veronica Mars failed. Maybe playing in the same time-slot as Lost was its undoing. Perhaps the network didn’t promote it effectively. Maybe the continuity heavy serial nature of the show was its undoing, although programs such as the aforementioned Lost or Heroes are just as continuity heavy and seem to be thriving. I’m sure the reasons for its demise are just as complex as Veronica was.

I do know that I can see Kristen Bell in Heroes now, and though I like the character she plays (Elle) it isn’t the same. So raise those glasses again and toast Veronica Mars. Two amazing seasons and one really good one, at least she never got the chance to age gracelessly.

]]> http://dorkandbeans.com/eulogy-for-a-friend-no-2-veronica-mars/feed/ 6 http://dorkandbeans.com/eulogy-for-a-friend/ http://dorkandbeans.com/eulogy-for-a-friend/#comments Sat, 06 Sep 2008 07:06:14 +0000 Ken http://dorkandbeans.com/?p=75 I’ve been spending a lot of time lately thinking about a friend of mine that was taken too soon. This got me wondering why so many good things end before they should. That’s what this column is going to be about. Every week (or so) I’m going to write about something that I really enjoyed, be it a comic series, tv show, band, what have you, that ended before it’s time.

This first column is going to be about that friend of mine.

Stripes was shifty. Even his good friends could never shake the feeling that he would have sold them out for a suit of Plasticman armour and an NG-Super. He probably wasn’t even liked or respected by other members of his race. His fur was patchy and burned away in spots, he smelled bad, he had a double fistful of psychoses, he could barely speak any language, and he wasn’t very smart in general, despite calling himself Dr. Stripes and trying to charge you for his advice.

Despite all this, Stripes taught me how to be an adventurer.

No matter how poor an idea might have been, Stripes committed to it with his entire being. Assault on Chi-Town? Stripes was there with guns blazing. T-Rex eats all? There he is in the arena fighting for all he’s worth. Sell out the rest of the party for a cache of equipment? Stripes is balls deep into the scheme. He defined tenacity, proving that you may not get what you want, but you’ll have a dang good time trying to get it.

Stripes was resilient. He survived a fall from around 800 feet not once, but twice. And walked, okay limped, away to bark the tale. He survived more gunshot and laser wounds to his body than any three other people I know. I can’t imagine all the mental trauma and psychic pain he endured to end up with all those phobias and nervous tics. It just boggles my mind that he could endure after the sheer amount of punishment inflicted on him during his short life. He was a Wolfen legend.

So raise your bottle in toast to Stripes, an unparallelled adventurer and a friend without peer.

Maybe I have some problems with the part of my brain that identifies people. Maybe this part of the brain is limited to a handful of people. Of course I think this disability is directly related to Gary Oldman. I am really starting to think I have a condition, a condition I like to call:

Oldmanidentisis

There may be some of you suffer this very affliction. If you have the inability to indentify Gary Oldman when you see him, then maybe you suffer from Oldmanidentisis. For most of you it is not a debilitating disability, but for me, I pride myself on being able to notice actors and connect them with other actors and projects they have done. I pick up on all of the subtle nuances that a filmmaker adds to a film. As I like to say: “I watch the movie good.”

But for some reason I cannot identify Gary Oldman when I see him.

Last night I went to see “The Dark Knight” with a large chunk of my Dork crew. I am not going to ramble on about the film, or give my opinion, I will leave that up to another Dork to post about. As we were watching the film and the character Jim Gordon came on the screen, I leaned over to Robin and said “That dude looks like the Kokanee Ranger.” What I should have said was “Gary Oldman looks like the Kokanee Ranger.” [sorry to all of you that have not seen the Kokanee commercials you may not get this reference; it's a Canadian thing.]

It wasn’t until the end of the movie when I saw the credits and I realized that it was in fact Gary Oldman. I understand that he played the same role in “Batman Begins,” but again I must have not noticed him.

The actor Gary Oldman is an enigma to me (and to those that are afflicted with Oldmanidentisis).

I do not think there is any treatment for this condition. I am screwed. I am going to live my whole life not being able to identify Gary Oldman. I just hope that I am not the only one with Oldmanidentisis. Maybe it’s just me, but the images above do not look like the same person. Am I going crazy or is Oldmanidentisis really affecting my ability to watch Gary Oldman movies?

Please help create awareness for the debilitating disablitiy: Oldmanidentisis and Digg or Stumble Upon this article.

I have a really hard time understanding why, or even how someone can bungle the chords to a song SO badly. Its not like playing another artist music leaves a whole lot of room for change. You can play the same song in another key or something the like, or add in a few supplementary chords to spicethings up a bit. But YOU CANNOT JUST FKN MAKE SHIT UP. If someone is going to go to all the trouble of posting a song they figured out online, then they should make sure its correct. The purpose in putting it online is to provide an ACCURATE representation of the song for someone else to learn.

If I wanted to do a puzzle, the last place I would look to do it is on a guitar tablature site.

Figuring out a song, and writing it down can be good practice, and quite rewarding. But before you present it to the general public, play it a few times. Take a good look at it. Make sure it looks right, and is playable the way you wrote it. Someone once sait to me, “If a man cant be bothered to polish his shoes, imagine the other things he cant be bothered to do”. Like tune his guitar, or wipe his ass after taking a shit.

Point is ….. if you cant be bothered to make ‘educational’ material correct, then stop wiping your ass. Or someone else is going to have to do it for you. Only babies, and geriatrics should get that kind of special treatement.

The Duck

B===D —  –  -  ______      Spurt