Grand Theft Mario

Nice little video game mash-up.

via Robot Chicken, via kottke.

Cowboys Collapse, Bledsoe Out, Romo In, Cowboys screwed.

It's take me a few games to recover and talk about the Cowboys vs. Giants game from Monday night.

I was, literally, moaning in pain watching the collapse that "began" with T.O. droppping a 4th down pass that would have given Romo some confidence, the Cowboys a first down, and the city of Dallas some hope for the future.

Instead, the ball dropped to the ground, Romo collapsed, and Dallas weeps.

Via TFA

Short-term, the 3-3 Cowboys face a three-game road trip beginning Sunday at Carolina relying on an undersized panic button from tiny Eastern Illinois.

Long-term, they have lost the playoffs, Bledsoe and, ultimately, Parcells.

"I'm ashamed to put a team out there that played like that," says an emotionally vacant Parcells after the landmark loss at Texas Stadium. "We oughta apologize to the people who came out to watch."

It wasn't just the quarterbacks emulating soot and poo. In a pathetic performance that has us half-convinced a new NFL Internet hoax has been hatched, the Cowboys produce a prime-time pratfall. Safety Roy Williams trips over a referee in allowing a touchdown. Julius Jones totally whiffs on a block in surrendering a safety. Rowdy is allowed back on the field. Bradie James drops an interception. Owens muffs a fourth-down pass. And the organization even manages to cheapen the presentation of Hall of Fame rings to Troy Aikman and Rayfield Wright at halftime, providing a warm-up act of goofball fans racing remote-controlled pickups around a plastic track.

Says tight end Jason Witten, "We've got a lot more problems than quarterback."

Tetris : From Russia With Love

Here's a wonderful documentary on how tetris made it's way from communist Russia to capitalistic America.



[via kottke]

Tigers Even Series 1-1, Kenny Rogers' Hand Big Winner

I watched most of this game last night. Rogers performance was masterful, and even more so since he didn't have the advantage he's had for most of this streak.

...the 41-year-old Rogers warmed the crowd of 42,533 with another masterful performance. And because of Rogers, the Tigers will arrive in St. Louis with the Series tied, 1-1. The question is, did he cheat to do it?

Thanks to Fox's TV cameras, America — and likely the Cardinals watching in the visiting clubhouse — learned that Rogers had a brown substance just below the thumb of his left hand. The stuff was there in the first inning, when Cardinals hitters apparently noticed some of Rogers' pitches doing interesting things. Then it was gone in the second inning.
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But was it too amazing? On Sunday night, an ESPN video analysis of Rogers' left hand during his previous starts during the '06 playoffs appears to show a similar substance. If it was dirt, no problem. The MLB rule book has nothing against dirt.

The problem is, nobody actually inspected Rogers' hand. According to Palermo, the umpires "observed" the substance as dirt. Observing isn't the same thing as inspecting, but Palermo dismissed the difference. The umpiring crew, he said, could certainly tell the difference between dirt and, say, pine tar.

I'm not saying for sure, I'm just saying that I'll bet ole' Kenny was breaking out the pumice soap last night, in case any CSI guys show up at his door.

What an Amazing Weekend for Football

I got to see three awesome games this weekend. The first was a classic college football upset. On one hand you had the undefeated Missouri Tigers, ranked 19th in the country. On the other you had the once deafeated Texas A&M Aggies. Now...you've got two once-defeated teams.

Jorvorskie Lane ran for 127 yards and a touchdown and Texas A&M handed Missouri its first loss of the season by beating the Tigers, 25-19, on Saturday in a Big 12 Conference game.

Missouri, 6-1 overall and 2-1 in the conference, entered the day as one of nine remaining unbeaten teams in Division I-A and was trying to go 7-0 for the first time in 46 years.

[full story] I'm not much of a better, but knowing what it is like in College Station (A&M's home turf) I thought they had an excellent chance to pull off the upset. I won a drink on the game.

Next came Sunday and the cross-state professional rivalry between the Dallas Cowboys and the Houston Texans. The Cowboys have been waiting to break out in a game, and this was the first time they were really able to bring the T.O. hammer down.

"[Haley's] my coach and I respect him for that," said Owens, who ended a three-game scoring drought and recorded the 25th multiple-touchdown game of his career. "It's unfortunate that we had an argument and it was blown out of proportion. It's funny everything I do, it makes national news. But it's something I have to deal with. But I still love Todd, he's my coach and I'm going to go out there and play hard for him and hope we can still get some things done."

The Dallas defense got some things done by holding the Texans to 232 total yards of offense and quieting Houston quarterback David Carr, who completed 15-of-27 passes for 128 yards and no touchdowns with two costly interceptions. Carr was replaced by backup Sage Rosenfels in the fourth quarter, after compiling a 37.3 passer rating.

[full story] T.O.'s comments come after (like he said) a sideline spat became national news. Frankly, this T.O. stuff is totally ridiculous. The "suicide attempt", the sideline fight, the constant speculation about when T.O. is going to blow. It's all so incredibly silly...and very nice to get a big W and for the Cowboys to show that killer attitude and finally put a team away.

This was followed by the inredibly Monday night game pitting the Arizona Cardinals against the Chicago Bears. By all rights, Matt Lienart should have gotten the MVP and the W. He did everything you could ask from a quarterback, up to and including leading his team down the field in the final minutes to set up the winning score. However, the Cardinals still found a way to lose and keep the Bears perfect season on a roll. This game illustrated, in dramatic fashion, how much of football is a game of momentum as much as it is a game of power and skill. The Cardinals had to make a move after that utter and complete debacle and today they did.

TEMPE, Ariz. Oct 17, 2006 (AP)— Frustrated Arizona Cardinals coach Dennis Green fired offensive coordinator Keith Rowen on Tuesday and replaced him with quarterbacks coach Mike Kruczek.

The move came hours after the Cardinals blew a 20-point lead and lost to the Chicago Bears 24-23 on Monday night.

"I've known Keith for a long time. I have the utmost respect for him," Green said. "We are not scoring enough points."

[full story] IMHO, the problem wasn't that the Cardinals aren't scoring enough points, the problem is that they are losers. I'm not sure if Leinart is the one who can turn that around, but they need a complete and total change of attitude.

Football is, to a certain degree, about confidence. About expecting to win. About bringing the machismo of a winner onto the field and just making it happen. The Aggies showed Mizzou how to do it. T.O. showed the Texans how it was done. The Cardinals should get behind Leinart, and take a lesson from one of the most successful quarterbacks in college football, and learn how to win.

Monty Python Halo Remix

Good work on some classic comedy. Who knew MP predicted first person shooter strategy.

The Long Zoom

[login/password= 'cypherphreak']
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Some interesting reading the NYTimes from the U.S.'s resident "Video Games are Awesome" arguer, Steven Johnson. Some highlights

Most eras have distinct “ways of seeing” that end up defining the period in retrospect: the fixed perspective of Renaissance art, the scattered collages of Cubism, the rapid-fire cuts introduced by MTV and the channel-surfing of the 80’s. Our own defining view is what you might call the long zoom: the satellites tracking in on license-plate numbers in the spy movies; the Google maps in which a few clicks take you from a view of an entire region to the roof of your house; the opening shot in “Fight Club” that pulls out from Edward Norton’s synapses all the way to his quivering face as he stares into the muzzle of a revolver; the fractal geometry of chaos theory in which each new scale reveals endless complexity. And this is not just a way of seeing but also a way of thinking: moving conceptually from the scale of DNA to the scale of personality all the way up to social movements and politics — and back again.

Here's a good example of the perspective of our times.

Mr. Johnson goes on to say....a bunch more interesting stuff...mostly about the upcoming "Spore". It's a good, long read. I'd recommend using a printer.

The Coolest Driving Machinima Yet

Check out these bits of beauty.

You can get the engine that created it here. The demo is *highly* recommended.

Wow and CoD Featured on Southpark and the Office, respectively

It's been a big week for video games on network/cable tv this week.

First off, the tenth season of "Southpark" started by pwning kids getting sucked into World of Warcraft by using the four SP stalwarts as guineas pig (and, in fact, saving WoW from destruction at the hands of a fat, pimply, loser....by becoming the same type of person).

bOING bOING has more coverage.

I'm fairly sure this is the first time machinima has been used in a major animated sitcom.

Then last night we were treated to the joys of multi-player Call of Duty on "the Office" as Jim tried to fit in with the crazy cats at corporate.

TV Squad has more coverage of the episode.

UPDATE: The Southpark episdoe is here. [via waxy]

UPDATE: The short version of the episdoe is here.

UPDATE: Real world example of what it takes to really play Wow.

IGN: BioShock Trailer, Videos and Movies

IGN: BioShock Trailer, Videos and Movies

Nice look at what will be one of the best games of next year.

Cowboys v. Redskins

It's one of those timeless rivalries. The Cowboys of the West. On horseback and wearing leather. Packing heat and hat, spurs and saddle. The Redskins of the East. Bareback and bare-breasted. Coming to take our women, and rape our horses. The Evil, evil Redskins. Trying to destroy our way of life.

We must crush them, and send the hogs back home, unfed.

/yes, this blog is also about 'sports'.

Titan Quest : a.k.a. Diablo III

Titan Quest is, quite simply, Diablo 3 in 3D.

And it lives up to the comparison. I've been playing this one pretty much as much as possible for the last few weeks. It's been patched twice, and is now totally ready for prime time.

Remember is Diablo how good it felt to really smash the demons and undead? Well, in Titan Quest, the baddies bodies fly a certain distain depending on just way hard you just whacked up. The power-up "monoliths" really kick up the skills. The system is designed with such simplicity of access to basic information, that a quick click lets you know just how much the buffs just changed your stats..i.e...just like D2.

One of the other highlights has been the huge variety of characters you can play. Roughly, to see all the possible combinations, in full skillful glory, would take about 400 hours.

The skill trees are fun. I have a couple characters nearing 30th level, on 12-15 hours of gameplay, that haven't reached the highest skill tier yet.

I can't wait to turn my Juggernaut into a Colossus.

Actually, that's what I'm going to try to do today.

I'll let you know how it goes.

UPDATE: The Colossus thing is freakin' awesome. This game in an absolute blast, and with 36 differnt "classes" there's a great deal of fun to be had. The 1.2 patch isn't my favorite (it narfs the "Oracle" a bit, and makes the end-boss nigh impossible to beat), but stability is now awesome and the game runs more smoothly than before.

Played Games

On my gravestone it will read....

"Played Games".