I can never get all three cats in a picture together

And it figures that the one time I actually did, it didn't come out well.

Calling myself out on my video game hypocrisy

Now that I've posted my impressions of Uncharted 3, I thought it would be an appropriate time to point out my own hypocrisy.

Uncharted 3 was a great game, there's no denying that. But one of my biggest problems with it was that not enough was changed. It felt exactly like the previous two games, aside from a few minor tweaks. It's basically the same complaint I had about Bioshock 2. If you haven't played the other games, you'll probably enjoy the newest installment more because the experience will be new to you.

Is this a valid reason to be upset with a game? Maybe. Maybe not. Either way, that's not really the point.

I've made no attempt to hide my distaste for the direction the Resident Evil series has gone in. Or how disappointed I was with Silent Hill Homecoming's turn towards more of an action game. Resident Evil 4 and 5 went through drastic changes. They don't even feel like part of the Resident Evil universe...Which is why I hate them. (Although I do think RE5 is fun to play with another person.) And here I am, complaining about games like Uncharted 3 and Bioshock 2 not taking things far enough.

The only sense I can really make of this is that maybe it's a genre based issue. I have no use for shooters in general. Fight a group of enemies to get to the next area, where you'll fight another group of enemies...That just never did it for me. What's the point? It's repetitive. Uncharted and Uncharted 2 had enough platforming and puzzles to where it felt like I was actually accomplishing something. The shooting was broken up. Uncharted 3 didn't seem to have as much of either and I think that's where it went wrong for me.

With games like Resident Evil, there was a lot of strategy involved. You had a certain amount of item slots to carry your guns, ammo, healing items, keys and any random puzzle items you might need later on. You really had to consider what you were bringing with you when you left an item box. Your survival depended on it. And you could never kill every enemy you came across. Resident Evil Remake actually gave you an incentive NOT to kill the zombies. If you weren't able to burn their bodies within a certain period of time, they would turn into Crimson Heads...Super zombies. Not only would you have wasted precious ammo to kill them the first time, but you now had to kill them a SECOND time while they're running at you and attacking you with their claws.

It may also be an issue of a dying genre. Survival horror never seemed to be as popular as shooters are. And Capcom, in an attempt to save their series, have decided to "get with the times" and turn Resident Evil into a [poorly constructed] shooter so they could make more money. Meanwhile, games like Uncharted don't go through significant changes because they already sell so well.

I guess my problem is that the changes to Resident Evil 4 and 5 were too drastic, while the changes to Uncharted 3 weren't drastic enough. There needs to be a middle ground. Innovation is good, it keeps games new and interesting. But most companies seem to miss the mark. Be ambitious! But don't destroy what you've created in the process.

Uncharted 3: Drake's Deception

I've been meaning to write this post for the past three days, but I was overwhelmed by the amount of notes I had written down. Here is my attempt at making some sort of sense out of them. (There are spoilers. You've been warned.)

He went a little crazy. Again.

He did open it. Got it alllll over the place.

He also tried to run off with his cat treats in his mouth. Picked them up, growled, and took off. Demon cat.

This says it all

Phantom of the Opera

Again. February 22nd. So excited. :D

I haven't had my SNES for a long time now

But I can't part with these games. Even though I have them on the Wii's VC.

The Beatles Anthology

I always forget I own this. I've had it for years and I still haven't watched it yet. I tend to watch the same DVDs over and over because if I've already seen them, I don't have to pay attention to them. I REALLY have to be in the mood to focus on something I haven't watched yet. If that makes sense. I'm very easily distracted.

And, while we're here. Look what else I remembered about today.

This will be Finnick's first Christmas

I bought this book a few years ago

Still have to finish reading it. I honestly forgot I even had it until today.

Because you can never have too many cat pictures

The best example of how Corpse Party gets to you on a psychological level

Massive spoilers regarding Morishige and Kizami. You’ve been warned.

The ghosts aren't the most disturbing part of Corpse Party

You can collect files in this game...This one is Victim's Memoirs 1/5. And I will probably remember it for the rest of my life, much like other people remember "4 itchy tasty" from Resident Evil.

But that's not all. There's more. Here is the complete file:

Victim’s Memoirs 1/5

I ate my friend today.

What else was I supposed to do? I was starving.

We both were. And there’s no food here. So we decided, together, that one of us should try to live just a little bit longer.

If I ever get home, I’m supposed to tell all the people waiting for us what happened.

We left it all up to a game of paper-scissors-rock. Loser eats winner.

And I lost.

I felt her blood going down my throat, quenching my thirst. And her meat was supple and satisfying.

But that blood and meat was once my friend. Up until just a few hours before, I’d been talking with her.

As I feasted, I just kept thinking, this food used to be a person. Before I tore it apart, it all worked together to sustain a life.

And every time I thought about that, I just started crying…and I couldn’t stop.

I wanted some part of her to be with me even after she died, so I decided to keep one of her eyeballs.

And I thought maybe I should write all of this down, to help preserve some small portion of my sanity.

The entire time I was in Florida

I just kept looking at my pictures of the city. It didn't really help. If anything, it made me more homesick.

At least one game still manages to be scary

I'm sleeping with the TV on tonight. Because I've been playing Corpse Party for the past few hours and it's managed to put me on edge.

The cannibalism made me sick. And the thing is, you don't even see a lot of the deaths in this game. You read about them. Or HEAR them while looking at a blank screen. It's still so effective though.

I hate the way the music cuts out any time I enter a stairwell. I don't mean that as a complaint either. There's just something about it that is so unsettling.

In Chapter 3, the lights seem to go on and off depending on your location, so your vision is limited to a few feet around you. It creates this feeling of paranoia because you don't know what else is in the room with you. You HAVE to move forward, but you don't want to because anything could be waiting for you in the darkness.

These aren't cheap jump scares. A lot of it is psychological. I expected, at most, an interesting story that would be fun to play through. I never thought the game would actually be scary, especially considering the graphics and the fact that I'm playing it on a handheld.

I would even say this rivals some survival horror games I've played. I never felt the need to sleep with my TV on after playing Resident Evil.

Corpse Party (PSP)

Sorry for the terrible picture. I'm in Florida and this is being done on my phone. Can't be professional when I have limited resources, you know?

Corpse Party was released on the PSN this week. It's a PSP game.

I haven't played through enough of it to give an actual opinion, but people have said it's like a visual novel, though the developers swear it's an adventure game with a lot of story.

Either way, from what I HAVE "played," it's creepy. The background music is very effective. The story is interesting. The voice acting...I have no idea. I don't speak Japanese, but it sounds good to me. The text is all in English, by the way. So you don't need to understand Japanese to play it.

There are over twenty endings, if I recall. Almost all of them are bad. You're meant to die.

Corpse Party is only $19.99. If it does end up being more of an adventure game, it's probably worth the price. If it's more of a visual novel...There are J-horror films I could buy for less money. But who knows. The story might actually be worth the price.

Anything Goes was incredible, but it left me feeling unsatisfied

Let me explain.

About six or seven years ago, I went to see Anything Goes at Rocky Point High School because my cousin was in it. I'd never heard of it prior to that, but I absolutely loved it. Those kids did such an incredible job. I'm definitely not a snob about venues. Whether you're on Broadway or you're in your high school's musical, if you're talented and you put a lot of work into it, and you're enjoying it...It shows.

When I heard Anything Goes was coming to Broadway, I was really excited. I definitely wanted to see it at some point.

In August, I knew I was going to see something on Broadway in October. I narrowed it down to Anything Goes, Catch Me If You Can and Phantom of the Opera. I'd already seen Phantom of the Opera, but I am such a huge fan of Hugh Panaro, I really wanted to go see him in it again. And I'm also a huge fan of Kerry Butler, so I wanted to see Catch Me If You Can...Even though I really had no interest in it. All I knew was that Leonardo DiCaprio was in the movie, and that didn't do much to pique my interest.

I ended up deciding on Catch Me If You Can and ordered tickets for October 15th. A few days later, they announced it would be closing in September. "Will I EVER get to see Kerry Butler in ANYTHING?" I had since looked up the rest of the cast (I had no idea at that point that Aaron Tveit was in it) and listened to the soundtrack, so I was incredibly disappointed, because it seemed SO GOOD. Then I found out that Tom Hanks starred in the film and Steven Spielberg directed it. You can't go wrong with them. I watched it. Loved it. Decided to read the book. This all just added to my overall disappointment in the show closing.

After that, I got a refund and bought tickets for Anything Goes instead. And I was happy with that decision. I had wanted to see that on Broadway to begin with. Colin Donnell was in it. I already knew it had a great soundtrack. When the day finally came to go see it, it was perfect. Talented cast, amazing songs, beautiful costumes, extraordinary choreography...Everything that makes for a perfect Broadway experience.

And I was happy with it. Really.

But since then, I've just felt...Like even though it was perfect, it still wasn't enough. I had seen it before, albeit not on Broadway. And part of me still would have preferred to see Catch Me If You Can. I wanted to see THAT soundtrack and story brought to life on stage. And as grateful as I am to have had the chance to see Anything Goes, I feel like I would have enjoyed Catch Me If You Can more.

It probably doesn't help that all I can compare it to is Phantom of the Opera, and nothing will ever live up to how amazing that was.

Oh. Cats.

I don't think I've discussed these books before

I've had this book for a couple years and the pictures in it are amazing. It's worth buying just for those.

I love the past, so as soon as I heard about Vintage L.A., I knew I had to own it. But this wasn't just some random find.

Jennifer Brandt wrote another book I loved. I think I bought it when I was sixteen...That WAS a random find. I was at some book store, and the pink, yellow and blue pages of Life Is a Movie Starring You jumped off the shelf and caught my attention. I didn't even look to see what it was about, I just knew I had to buy it.

As it turns out, this book was pretty life changing. My love of the past grew more because of Jennifer's enthusiasm for it.

It almost reads like an etiquette book, but it's not one. All she is trying to do is tell you how to be the best version of yourself while still BEING yourself, and giving advice for younger girls and how to live through high school.

I loved the way she wrote and the words she used. And I still do. Even though I'm older now, this is still one of my favorite books and I will never, ever part with it.

I need to go through it and type of some of things she discusses in it because this really is a brilliant book.

What a nice surprise

Just opened Life Is a Movie Starring You for the first time in years and this was inside. Don't ask why.

Demon's Souls outline

So. I don’t normally plan out an entire game playthrough BEFORE I play it. I usually just go along with things and figure out what to do when the time comes.

However, when I went to record Demon’s Souls, I actually planned the entire game out. Start to finish. And I found my outline last week. It’s a REALLY basic outline, just the order in which I wanted to complete the levels and some notes here and there about things I would need. But it’s seriously the easiest way to complete that game. I only died twice (and that was due to my own stupidity, both deaths could have been avoided).

1-1

2-1
Get bow from 1-2 first (bring Shard of Archstone to leave 1-2)
Bring piercing weapon, +200 arrows
Have 18 strength

1-2
Bring 350 arrows for dragon and Tower Knight (350 is probably excessive)
Go back and get items from 1-1 by dragon

5-1
Learn Flame Toss before entering
Bring Fresh Spice and arrows

3-1
Use Soul Arrow on cthulhus

4-1
Bring arrows to kill tutorial boss
Have 18 strength, 13 dexterity for Uchigatana

2-2
Take shortcut
Learn Water Veil before entering
Learn Soul Ray before entering
Bring Purple Flame Shield

2-3
Bring Steel Shield
Unequip everything except shield

1-3
Save Biorr and Yuria
Bring Soul Ray

5-2
Bring arrows

5-3
Have 18 intelligence
Learn Warding before entering

4-2
Learn Firestorm before entering
Bring 200 arrows

4-3
Bring Warding
Equip Thief’s Ring

3-2
Equip any bow EXCEPT Lava Bow
Bring 200 arrows

3-3
Bring Firestorm
Equip Large Sword of Searching

1-4
Bring 600 arrows (600? Seriously?)
Have 30 Intelligence
Bring Firestorm, Warding

End
Kill Maiden in Black

Well when you put it THAT way...

Of course it sounds like a disease. But Phase Three and Phase Four are such extreme cases that it seems silly to even include them. Then again, some diseases do have extreme cases, so…

(I’m reading this from Delirium, mind you. Not writing this up on my own.)

Phase One:
*preoccupation, difficulty focusing
*dry mouth
*perspiration, sweaty palms
*fits of dizziness and disorientation
*reduced mental awareness; racing thoughts, impaired reasoning skills

Phase Two:
*periods of euphoria; hysterical laughter and heightened energy
*periods of despair, lethargy
*changes in appetite; rapid weight loss or weight gain
*fixation; loss of other interests
*compromised reasoning skills; distortion of reality
*disruption of sleep patterns; insomnia or constant fatigue
*obsessive thoughts and actions
*paranoia; insecurity

Phase Three (Critical):
*difficulty breathing
*pain in the chest, throat, or stomach
*difficulty swallowing; refusal to eat
*complete breakdown of rational faculties; erratic behavior; violent thoughts and *fantasies; hallucinations and delusions

Phase Four (Fatal):
*emotional or physical paralysis (partial or not)
*death

Library of America books

I would like to start off by saying that these books are beautiful. And if they ever release another volume of Hammett's or Lovecraft's stories, I'll be first in line to buy them.

It's time to discuss how I came to find these men and their work.

I have no idea what this book is even about

These came in the mail today. I borrowed Before I Fall from the online library and I loved it. I don’t think Lauren Oliver knows how to write a book with a happy ending, but that’s fine. It’s more realistic if things don’t end perfectly.

Haven’t read Thirteen Reasons Why, but it shows up on the Amazon pages of most of the books I have read lately and I needed another book, so I figured, why not?

I’m going to spend all weekend reading 1984 and Catch Me If You Can.

I think there's a 24 hour recovery period involved here

I finished reading Before I Fall in two days...I read most of it yesterday.

And I planned to start 1984 today, but I just can't focus. On reading anything. I've had some short story sitting on my computer since last night, and every time I look at it, I just think, "Nope."

I'm good when I start reading something. But once it's over, I need a break.

Tomorrow. I'll read 1984 tomorrow.

Before I Fall

I finished reading Before I Fall by Lauren Oliver in two days. I could have easily finished it in one, had I not been so tired yesterday. That's how great it was. Even better than Delirium.

Before I Fall is about a popular high school girl, Sam, who relives the last night of her life seven times, until she finally gets it right.

My first thought was, this is so Mean Girls it's disgusting. And I found myself not being able to relate to it because my high school was nothing like the one in this book. You see all these movies, TV shows and you read these books...The students are always so evil to each other. And my school wasn't like that. There were individuals who had problems with each other, but it wasn't just an entire group of people determined to make someone miserable.

The Mean Girls vibe dies down eventually. Which is nice, because that's when the story starts getting better.

(My second thought, in case you're wondering, was, MAC is mentioned so many times, you'd think they sponsored this book.)

Nothing I say can do Before I Fall justice. So I won't even try. You should probably just read it.

It's about time I got around to this Resident Evil 4 post

Any time I discuss something, I try to be fair in my assessment of whatever it is I'm talking about. With Bioshock 2, I made it very clear that I didn't enjoy the game, but I pointed out that someone who had never played the first game might enjoy it more as it would be a completely new experience. When talking about Divergent, I said that since it's part of a trilogy, I can't judge it without reading the other two books as there's still room for improvement and the rest of the trilogy will expand on the original story. I rarely ever just come out and say, "This is BAD."

I feel like I've explained my stance on Resident Evil 4 so many times, but I've never put all of my thoughts into one post. I usually comment on one thing, leave it alone, come back later, comment on something else, etc. So I'm going to explain why I dislike this game so much.

A night of Broadway/Times Square failures

Yesterday was a huge fail overall.

I went to see Anything Goes. And this is what I saw when I looked in the playbill.

Laura Osnes had already left back in September (I think), so that was disappointing. But then to see that Sutton Foster wasn't going to be playing Reno for that performance and Joel Grey was MIA...I was a little upset. I quickly got over it though because Tari Kelly was amazing as Reno and Robert Creighton had such great comedic timing, he was perfect as Moonface.

Also, while I'm talking about Robert Creighton, I'd just like to point out that in the playbill, it says, "Co-author and star of CAGNEY!, the award-winning new musical about film legend James Cagney." So right away, I fell in love with this man. Anyone who would make a musical about James Cagney is okay with me. The musical has a website with the script and some songs on it.

http://www.cagneythemusical.com/

Outside the Stephen Sondheim Theatre

Souvenir book and playbill

I feel like I need a separate paragraph to discuss how incredible Colin Donnell was, since all I've done for months is go on and on about how excited I was to see him. And he was definitely incredible. When he came out disguised and in a wheel-chair for "It's De-lovely" and started singing in that weird old-woman voice, I lost it. It took me at least a minute to regain my composure because it was so funny.

That being said...Colin Donnell was not my favorite part of the show. No one was. With a musical like Anything Goes, it's hard to choose a favorite actor or character. Because they're all so talented and the characters are all well written and VERY funny. I actually forgot just how funny this musical was until yesterday. All the actors did a fantastic job.

Anything Goes, for those of you who don't already know, has a soundtrack comprised of some of Cole Porter's best songs. So aside from the great script, it also has a lot of fun music to go along with it. Add in the beautiful costumes and the extraordinary choreography, and you get a pretty great Broadway experience. The only complaint I have is that the first act is stronger than the second, but that's a very minor complaint.

Anything Goes was everything I could have hoped for. It was everything that came after that made the day a failure.

As soon as we left the theatre, we were surrounded by Occupy Wall Street protesters. I don't mind that they're protesting. If you truly believe in your cause, and you know WHY you're there and what you stand for, and you're going to be level-headed and have a peaceful protest, then by all means, go for it. But the people who are doing it and don't understand why, or are doing it because they have nothing better to do on a Saturday night...You guys suck. And this is why.

Times Square was insane last night. There were barricades all over the place, it was almost impossible to navigate. I literally walked around an entire block trying to find a way out, and then realized that the only way out was the way I came in. We had to go all over the place, completely out of the way of our destination, because everything was barricaded. I've never seen anything like it. There were more police out than I've EVER seen in my life. On every block. These people basically shut down Times Square. How the hell do you accomplish something like that? It's Times Square. That doesn't happen. Again, it doesn't bother me that people are protesting for what they believe in, but it's the other people who don't even know WHY they're protesting...You guys stay home next time. Maybe then Times Square won't be closed off and people won't have to go through a maze of barricades to find their way out.

When Anything Goes was over, we had a choice. We could either go to Comic Con, or we could go to Ellen's and then to the Majestic to meet Hugh Panaro. We chose the latter.

After we finally found our way to Ellen's, which wasn't easy when we weren't allowed through Times Square, we walked in and one of the waitresses was singing "Good Morning Baltimore" from Hairspray. That's always a good way to start things off. AND! They were decorated for Halloween. I was excited about that, I love Halloween.

We walked around until 7:00...Doing nothing, because really...There's nothing to do other than shop (which is boring to begin with) and all the stores are in Times Square...It was not worth even attempting to try to get to them with a protest going on.

So from 7:00 until 10:20, we sat in a hotel lobby. I'm not kidding. I don't get bored, but let me tell you...I was bored. I thought about leaving several times because as much as I like Hugh Panaro, that just didn't seem worth it to me. But, of course, we waited it out.

I brought my playbill from Phantom of the Opera with me, but then I thought...There's a lot of black on the cover, I don't know if this will work. So, not paying attention, I bought the souvenir book from Phantom...

...Thinking that maybe the inside of the cover was white. No. It's all black. (The rose came with it.) I don't mind, it's a really nice book.

Here's the front of the Majestic (the cast does not come out here, they come out of the back of the theatre):

We waited outside the back entrance for a half hour. I had asked one of the girls who works at the Majestic if the cast members come out after the show, she said yes, every night. I asked if Hugh was there, she said yes. This was earlier in the night, mind you, because I wanted to make sure we didn't stay all night for no reason. Anyway...We waited a half hour, and then one of the cast members came out and said Hugh left through the side door. Ohhhh really.

I wasn't even upset or disappointed. I was relieved. I already made a post on Tumblr about this. I feel very awkward meeting people. The only times I haven't felt awkward were the four times I met the cast of Legally Blonde with Lori. If my cousin had been there last night, I would have been fine, but she wasn't, so I really didn't want to do it. It's one of those things that's fun for us to do together, but is horrible to do with anyone else.

The only thing that bothered me was that we could have left right after dinner at Ellen's instead of staying in the city and being bored to death. That was unfortunate.

I wanted to mention that there were only about eight other people waiting for the cast to come out last night, which surprised me. Every time I was waiting outside for the cast of Legally Blonde, there was a huge crowd of people waiting in line, too. I don't know if people don't bother with Phantom because it's been on Broadway so long, or if it's because they don't know where the cast comes out.

When we were trying to find our way back to Penn Station, I saw this.

Never heard of it, not sure if it's new this October, but there are hands coming out of the doors.

There will never be a better Phantom

After I see Anything Goes on Saturday, I'm probably going to stay in the city for another five hours and wait for Phantom of the Opera to end so I can see him when he comes out. Because I didn't have time to do that last year and I don't know if he's going to extend his run again after...December? I can't remember exactly when he's leaving.

So many books to read

I still have to finish reading Catch Me If You Can. But that's going to be put on hold because I borrowed Divergent by Veronica Roth and Before I Fall by Lauren Oliver from the online library and I only have it for seven days.

I bought The Forbidden Game series (The Hunter, The Chase, The Kill) by L.J. Smith just because I loved The Secret Circle so much and I wanted to see if this series was good. Bought it on my Kindle...I don't normally do that. If it had been a book I REALLY wanted to own and knew I would love, I would have bought an actual copy of it, but since I'm not sure, this is fine for now.

And these books arrived while I was away this weekend.

I've already read Delirium. I borrowed it from the online library. It wasn't the special edition though, so I'm REALLY excited because this one has an excerpt from Pandemonium, which is the second book in the trilogy. It doesn't come out until March 2012. I think there's already a post about this book so I'm not going to get into it again, but I will say it absolutely crushed my soul. But it was so good I had to own it.

Zoo is a collection of short stories (all by the same writer). Horror stories, I believe. I haven't read it, but these are Japanese horror stories, so you know they're going to be creepy.

I'll probably post about these books as I get around to reading them.

This is part of the problem with the series vs. show

I've talked about The Secret Circle on here before. I'm about to do it again.

Just to give you an idea of how much I really do love this series, I have copies of the books. I bought the newer ones that contain one and a half books in each book...Hopefully that makes sense.

Now this is where I run into a problem. Aside from the fact that they changed the entire plot for the show, the casting decisions they made baffle me. Because these faces are the ones I identify with the characters (you can click the picture to enlarge it...At least, I hope so, I left it huge for a reason):

I read these books when I was younger, I've had these images in my head for YEARS now. And I can't get used to the cast on the show. Especially Diana...That one bothers me the most. Her appearance was not JUST an appearance, it was part of her identity, it was symbolic of her goodness and purity. But then again, Diana on the show doesn't strike me as terribly good or pure, so maybe it's just as well.

I don't hate the show. But I would have liked to see an adaptation of the books that stuck to the source material.

This week's inconsistencies

The Secret Circle is…I don’t know. I don’t want to hate it. On its own, it’s an okay show. But I can’t help but compare it to the books.

1. Diana and Faye may or may not be cousins. Diana’s father claimed to be dating Faye’s mother on tonight’s episode. This doesn’t sound like a big deal, but Diana and Faye’s relationship was a very important part of the books. One of the MOST important aspects of it, actually. Just like their appearances were important. Faye was dark and dangerous and Diana was light and pure. Complete opposites of each other in every way.

2. Nick is still sleeping with Melissa. He. Would. Never. Do. That. One of the girls described him as a lizard/reptile/something similar, saying he was cold. He didn’t even notice anyone until Cassie showed up. Nick was one of the best characters in the books and they are destroying him.

3. Cassie and Sally are friends. Sally is supposed to hate the circle. They push her (and everyone else in the school) around, she knows what they are and she resents them. And she was very jealous of Cassie.

4. Diana’s father was not evil. He was caught up in work, and that’s about the extent of his character’s involvement in the books. He never would have killed Cassie’s mother. (Cassie didn’t go to New Salem because of her mother’s death, she went because her grandmother was “sick.”)

5. And lastly, maybe the worst thing they’ve done to the storyline…Diana keeps trying to befriend Cassie, and Cassie isn’t having it. Meanwhile, in the books, she was DESPERATE to befriend Diana. She thought if she could just become friends with her, everything would be better. Then once they did become friends, all she did was worry about protecting Diana’s feelings (you know, when she wasn’t kissing her boyfriend). It doesn’t make any sense.

Like I said, this show is probably good on its own, but it doesn’t even come close to how amazing the books were. And I still don’t understand the point of buying the rights to something just so you can completely change the story around.

This happened...