Dr. Rated-R

I've never really played part 2. I played the first one a little, shortly after it first came out, but I honestly don't remember having much of an opinion either way. A friend of mine loaned me part 3 yesterday, and I've been trying to get into it, but something about it just irks me. It's what inspired this topic. How similar is 2 to 3? If they're considerably different maybe I could get that, next time I'm not broke. EDIT - That was a response to CSAMH, of course. I had no idea Stranded Kids/Survival Kids even existed. IGN rated it 9/10. =|

I'm looking for games like Lost in Blue, but, y'know, better. Being stranded on an island seems like such a fun concept for a game, but I wasn't too fond of the execution in the Lost in Blue titles. Is there anything worth playing? I'm not too fussy; it doesn't matter if it's an old abandonware title or something that came out last week.

My apologies. For some reason, I thought you were responding to apsham and I, about a storage card solution for the DSi. I was kind of thinking you were writing off the cards themselves as nothing but a vehicle for piracy, which isn't all they're good for. I didn't mean for the response to come off as some kind of hate-filled diatribe, or something, if it did. I was just trying to clarify.

I haven't kept up with the homebrew scene in a while. I got my card in late 2007 and haven't ever had any problems with it, so I never gave much attention to goings on on the hardware side of things. I did some reading on Wikipedia, though. It would seem you're right. Legitimate R4 cards are hard to come by, these days. So, I guess advising against "counterfeit" R4 cards isn't right -- at least in the semantic sense. It would be more appropriate to advise anybody looking for a DS or DSi card to research their card of choice and the site it's coming from thoroughly. That should be a given with purchases like this, anyways, but the chance of inadvertently buying garbage is inordinately high, in this instance.

Stealing games? Let's be fair, sir. There is a lot more one can do with a storage card than pirate games.There are tons of legal applications available. Linux, painting applications, calendars, text-readers, organizers, calculators, audio players, video players, web browsers, dictionaries, address books, music creators, chat clients, and myriad other apps. It is pointless to continue listing them. The homebrew scene is also an absolute haven for indie game development. You could fill an entire memory card to the brim with nothing but free indie games. Or, if that's not your thing, there are ports of classic games like Doom, Quake, and Heretic. In the case of the latter, the ports only function if you provide your own .WAD files. Those can be acquired via several different means, legal or otherwise. Like anything else on the internet, really. Finally, the DS has the largest collection of good games in a portable system, ever. But it's still just that -- a portable system. Some people don't like having to carry their collection of 50+ games around with them, whenever they want to play on the go. A lot of people pay for their games, but use ROMs for the convenience and to keep their physical media safe. Especially the collector types, who spend exponentially more money on Nintendo products than anyone else. It's usually only 13-year-old imbeciles (or people of any age with similar intellect) who visit the scene forums and pop up with questions like "wer i dl MARIO cart LUZL!???" I'm not going to insult your intelligence and say that I've never pirated a video game. However, I am going to admit that I buy more games because of my R4 card. The DS is full of weird, innovative, unique titles. Take, for example, Cooking Mama. I never would have bought that without being convinced by a friend to give it a try, first. But, I did, and I found it strangely addictive. So, I payed for it. I'll try lots of games that I never would've given any attention before, just because they're available to me now. If I like the title in question, I'll order it. If I don't, I'll just delete it. I don't waste money on a title I can't demo legally; developers don't get rewarded for creating games that aren't good.

I don't know too much on the matter, because I refuse on principle to buy another Nintendo DS. But, to answer your question: yes, R4 and M3 both have DSi models. I'm sure there are other options, as well. I know there were some bumps on the road early on, because of firmware, but there are tons of videos of fully functional DSi cards on Youtube. If one wanted to purchase such a card, particularly an R4i, they should make sure they're not being sold a counterfeit. I introduced many of my friends to the original R4, and one of them wound up buying a fake card on accident. It was a little laggy, there were some game compatibility issues, his card wiped itself clean twice, and it ultimately just stopped working altogether. Counterfeited R4i cards are apparently popping up a lot now, and I imagine they're just as bad. Definitely make sure you're buying from a trustworthy site, before buying any kind of homebrew storage card.

Have a Nintendo DS? It doesn't get much better than the Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney games, for my money. They're a little different than your typical point-and-click adventure games, since they mold that format to fit in with the court room/investigation scenario. Doesn't matter, though; they rock. And, for another choice that goes against the traditional grain a bit (since the standard stuff has been covered, mostly), I thoroughly recommend Monster Rancher: Battle Card for the PlayStation 1. It may be that there's a nostalgic appeal to it for me, but it's the most fun card-based games I've ever played. The actual movement and story progression is structured like your typical point-and-click (admittedly, a very basic one), but with the added bonus of a genuinely fun trading card game, complete with total deck customization and the like. Really fun.

I've had an R4 for years, now. Keith's definitely correct. To delete a game, just take the MicroSD memory card out of your R4. Put it into the PC adapter that it came with, then connect it to your PC. When you open up the folder that contains the contents of your memory card, you'll notice that each game has two files. They might be, for example, "Mario Kart.nds" and "Mario Kart.sav". The first file is the actual game itself, and the second is the save file. Delete the .nds file; you can leave the .sav file in tact, if you want to backup your save data. To add new homebrew apps or whatever else to your card, just find and then add the proper .nds files to your DS.

Actually, there are at least one thousand different Christmas-related horror flicks. The original Black Christmas is good, but there is certainly something to be said for the ones that really take the Christmas motif and absolutely run with it. I do something similar to what GA is wanting to do, every year. As I'm a big horror fan, I've ran across an insane amount of Christmas-themed horror films that are sometimes part of my own Christmas Countdown. Christmas Evil, Santa's Slay, all five Silent Night, Deadly Night flicks, Jack Frost 1-2, To All A Good Night, Don't Open 'Till Christmas, Silent Night Bloody Night, Santa Claws, Elves. Those are just a few I can think of off hand, haha. Of those flicks, I already recommended Christmas Evil and Santa's Slay. Jack Frost and Silent Night, Deadly Night 1 are also REALLY fun watches. But, I tend to enjoy Kitsch.

Christmas Evil (aka You Better Watch Out) is an excellent, utter mindfuck of an experience, with possibly the best ending in cinema history. I love it so. Also, Hogan in Santa With Muscles has nothing on Bill Goldberg's wonderful performance in Santa's Slay. An unsung cinema classic, my friend.

I have an on-again, off-again interest in regular comic reading. I love the idea, in theory, but I stick mostly to TPBs. I've never been a big reader of monthly titles; there are just so many, and they're all being released so constantly. It's too much to process for a newbie, I think. I was reading Batman, Detective Comics, and Robin, for some time. I want to catch up from where I left off on those, and I'm doing that now. But, I also want to branch out into some Marvel titles, as well as maybe some Superman, and any decent Batman titles I'm not reading. Batman and his entourage alone seem to have, like, 10 regular books, though. I find it impossible to keep up with this stuff. I guess my question is, what are some decent news sites, preferably with RSS feeds and release schedules, that I can start following to get my finger on the pulse a bit better?

I am playtesting this now. Thanks a ton, guys! (Y) Ric Flair has a WWE deal. Remove that.Lance Cade has signed a new WWE deal.Mike Adamle's stats are all Fs. I'm not saying they should be great, or anything, but his microphone skills should be higher.

No, he should not. His resignation is effective January 1, 2010.

So does one have to have an Xbox Live Gold subscription to partake in CAW/CAS downloading, or will Silver suffice? I presume the former, but, I thought I'd ask.

Sucks, man. His filmography reads like a Best Comedy Films list. It's hard to believe that one man could be involved in some significant fashion (writer or director) with a list of films as awesome as Ferris Beuller, the Breakfast Club, Weird Science, Sixteen Candles, Home Alone, and Christmas Vacation. He was one of those rare guys who never really turned out anything bad. :/ RIP.

Entire seasons, in some cases the entire run, of Tales From The Crypt have been popping up at Big Lots' across the nation, for $3. A lot of horror-related message boards are full of different people either posting photographic evidence of their coup, or creaming their pants and saying they need to go to Big Lots soon. It's insane.

Not real, sir. That image made the rounds after somebody Photoshopped it from this image of Jackie Earle Haley from the movie, Little Children.

The aforementioned second image. Also, somebody Photoshopped the original and made Freddy's face more visible, if you look closely. Both look freakin' incredible.

Source: MySpace Trailer Park I'm necroposting a bit, but there's no reason to start a new thread when we've already got one. Today, Platinum Dunes released the first image of Jackie Earle Haley as Freddy Krueger, and though it's a tease, I think it's awesome. Brad Fuller's Twitter says that we'll also be getting a second image of Freddy via IGN at some point today.

It's a ridiculous reason to sue somebody. That said, I don't really think it's fair to flat out ban somebody from the online service. I'm all for behavioral suspensions, but stripping somebody of the ability to ever use the online service again is a bit harsh, when they (or their parents) shelled out the fairly large amount of money one needs to pay in order to own a PlayStation 3, whose free online service has to be seen as something of a deal sweetener when selecting a console to purchase. That said, as somebody who doesn't own a PS3 yet, I have a stupid question: can't the guy just make a new user profile, or whatever the PSN equivalent of the Xbox Live ID is, and then go right back to playing online?

For those of you who are talking about an updated version of No Mercy, it should be noted that some time ago, the word was leaked on 1UP Games that it would be coming to the WiiWare service in due time, complete with a mass roster update to reflect the current product. However, since that initial news tidbit over a year ago, I have heard absolutely nothing about it, nor did the news really go viral. Here's the news article in question. The actual tidbit is towards the bottom. Take that for what you will. 1UP isn't exactly the WrestleZone of video game websites, so I'm sure there was at least something to this. That said, the long amount of time in between that informal announcement and any actual news on it, is definitely worrying. Either way, I doubt you'd ever see No Mercy hit Xbox Live or PSN, since it was an exclusive. I know Banjo-Kazooie was too and it's on Xbox Live, but that was definitely a special case given Rare/Microsoft's new ownership of the character and Nintendo's ownership of the game.

The show Stella, with Michael Ian Black, Michael Showalter, and David Wain. I thought it was wonderful, and I never really heard a bad review for it, but Comedy Central passed on doing a second season. Sucks. Though they are starting a new show, next week actually, with the two Michaels that I'm excited about. Also, I got pretty into Human Giant halfway through the second/last season. I've since watched most of the episodes and I thought it was great. A little hit and miss at times, but I thought it had a lot of laughs. As far as I know MTV isn't bringing it back. Whenever it comes up, I was always pretty bummed that the cartoon Pirates of Dark Water never concluded properly. Loved that show when I was younger. Other than those three, mark me down for the usual Arrested Development/Pushing Daisies go-to statement.

I can vouch for Smodcast. I finally got into them about a month ago. There are around 90 total, and in that time frame I've listened to every last one. They're that entertaining. They usually run for about an hour, but sometimes (particularly the newer ones) run for much longer.

Have you seen the DVD that interview came from, "An Evening With Kevin Smith"? Actually, that clip might be from the second DVD, "Evening Harder". Either way, if you haven't seen them, check 'em out. Listening to Kevin Smith talk is sometimes more entertaining to me than watching films. Funny, because he's one of my favorite filmmakers. As for the clip itself, classic. I had never seen the that he talks about in the clip before, until I saw it linked there. Hilarious.

It was pretty easy in the Nintendo 64 Wrestling games. Which used extremely low resolution textures atop extremely low resolution models. Christ, that press release said a whole lot of nothing. Either way, I'm excited to hear more. 2009 was easily the best WWE game since Day of Reckoning, IMO. Still, can't be too hard to place all wrestler attires in Create-A-Wrestler and then allow the changing of said attires. You have to consider, though, that the wrestler's models are more than just "attires" now. In No Mercy and the like, you had a few size models and a bunch of clothes to put on them. If you stripped them all down to nothing, every wrestler looked the same. In the more modern games, little things like the freaky, bacon-esque muscle veins on Batista's arm, or Big Daddy V's ample mantitties, are applied to the individual models. Because of the tiny details like that, the wrestlers look as close to perfect as possible, but it also makes rendering custom attires for individual wrestlers an implausible, if not impossible, task. I don't really see the point of an attire editor, to be honest. A more realistic alternative would be multiple preset attires for workers. You usually get a few here and there, but I'd like to see everybody get two attires. Two pre-rendered, nice looking alternate attires would be a hell of a lot better than anything an attire editor could create, with the possible exception of, say, Kane in Kelly Kelly's attire or other shenanigans.