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| Posted by: Dream BBQ Child | Posted on: Monday October 31 2005 7:55pm |
| AH! PowerBBQ lives! And come Thrusday I'll buy about 20 pixels of the screen from the bank! Haha! | |
| Posted by: B_W | Posted on: Sunday October 30 2005 10:34pm |
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Just to clarify, 'the film' I am referring to is Serenity. Justin beat me to the post! B_W |
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| Posted by: Big_Whisky | Posted on: Sunday October 30 2005 10:32pm |
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Well, I don't know if any of you read EW, but all the coverage they gave to the film was an interview where they portrayed the lead as a nice geeky guy. They barely mentioned the film. It was sad. I don't know about ya'll, but the second this film comes out on the DVD I am buying it, at full price. Not because I don't think anyone else will have it, but I want to support this franchise. They tried to go a non-traditional rout to get a quality picture into the hands of it's fanbase, and I am proud of Joss for doing that and not 'selling out' for the $$$. (aka Georgie Porgie (sorry Peter), or the Shemale Twins) I also agree with Peter as far as the film's content goes. I think it was very true to the show, and for once a sequel makes total sense with the original timeline. I seriously think audiences have a problem with this. (I mean, that guy who berated Serenity's characters and such, did he also watch the SW series or the Matrices? Where are his rants about those? I mean this might not be perfect, but compared to the main franchises its PURE GOLD...SOLID GOLD if you will) I also think that when the common people, the vulgus if you will, see spaceships their brains switch off. They don't get it. They don't see what's different here. Steve for example said it was just like every other sci-fi film. So this is really a tough sell at the box office. I saw it twice, and with soda and such I laid down around $30, and I was happy to do so. No other film this year has given me such joy. So, anyway, that's my 2¢. B_W |
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| Posted by: nearscape | Posted on: Sunday October 30 2005 10:20pm |
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That Underworld II action is hot! That reminds me, I have to drop some hints to Pixel Magic about that one. I'm sure they've got some wires they'd like to get rid of cheap...and Kate Beckinsale (in black vinyl) is her own paycheck... Pete, is your neuro-biology guy working on the new one too? Really, the only movie reviews I've trusted for some time come in the Onion. avclub.com/content/node/41051 |
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| Posted by: CrowScape | Posted on: Sunday October 30 2005 10:01pm |
| Reason #1 is why I didn't rush off to see Serentiy. I had the battle raging in my head over seeing it once in a movie theater versus buying it as soon as it came out on DVD. By the time the theater side won the battle, however, the war was already over. I'm buying the DVD. Hope it gets released soon. | |
| Posted by: Peter | Posted on: Sunday October 30 2005 7:46pm |
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Unfortunately, Crow, your story is true for the entire nation. This Friday, Serenity lost 500 screens and is now only being shown at 300 theaters around the nation. Serenity has almost completely left the Milwaukee area except for the Marcus Westown (Waukesha). While I am extremely disapoointed, I am not surprised. Serenity has many things working against it. Here are the Top 6 factors why Serenity is doing so poorly as I see them: 6) It's a Sci-fi movie (albeit a Sci-fi western) which don't traditionally do well unless the words "Star" and "Wars" are in the title. Notable exceptions: "Star Trek" movies which don't attact more than $50 million dollars (but this is due to point number 2 below more than anything else). 5) It was released in the September-mid November death valley period, one of two times of the year when movies are released to die. The other time of the year is approximately Mid-January to Mid-April. None of the top thirty grossing films (non-adjusted for inflation were released during one of these periods. This is where movie producers still films destined to die so that they perform even worse than they would normally. Why do they do this? To give themselves the world's biggest joygasm when a film they predicted to flop actually does decent bussiness (For example, the goth-favorite UNDERWORLD exceeded expectations by bringing in nearly 22 million dollars in the first weekend and almost 52 million domesticaly over the course of its run. If this film were released during the summer blockbuster season, it would make 51 milllion in its first week. Therefore, how do you reward such a success? You make a sequel called UNDERWORLD: EVOLUTIONS and you release it on January 20th, 2006 (Right in the beginning of the second weakest boxoffice period of the year! As mentioned above)! 4) It was promoted heavily....except only on the Sci-Fi channel. There was very little promotion outside of the Sci-Fi channel. To be certain, this was a brilliant marketing ploy. Besides Buffy and Angel fans, who would be excited by a Joss Whedon Sci-Fi western? Sci-Fi geeks. The problem is, Sci-Fi fans were upset when the Sci-Fi channel started rearranging their critical Friday night schedule of Stargate:SG1, Stargate:Atlantis, and Stargate: Hot Blonde Chicks with guns, also known as Battlestar Galactica. Some fans apparently were very upset by this and complained to the Sci-Fi channel. 3) Outside of the Sci-Fi channel, few movie reviewers gave Serenity much attention. Trying to find the movie review for Serenity in the Journal-Sentinel was like a more annoying version of Where's Waldo. Even weekly news magazines like Newsweek and Time, which like to write more about the underdog movies, failed to even acknowledge the movie's presence. 2) Those who did review the movie seemed to have had their minds more on how much money they'll get for selling out to Cameron Crowe by hyping the #$#$%#$ out of Elizabethtowne rather than on the plot of the movie. Even movie reviewers like Roger Ebert who are typically fond of some of these instant cult-favorite movies does a lackluster job reviewing the film. While Ebert did give a glowing review, you have to get through 2/3rds of the article before you get to Eberts opinion. When Ebert does get into details of the movie, you have the feeling that he read them off of the press-release kit synopsis card rather than see the movie itself. To read Ebert's review go to: rogerebert.suntimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20050929/REVIEWS/50926004/1023 1)And the number one reason that Serenity did so poorly: The people who would flock to this film are not willing to plunk down $8 to see the film. People are more willing to go to the movies when the price of a movie ticket is not comparable to the price of a first week release DVD. Many people have commented to me that once they heard the premise, they were intrigued and wanted to see the movie. However, not intrigued enough to see the movie for $16 the cost of two people to see a movie. The thinking, why go to the movies when you can rent them four months later for 3 dollars? Thus the only people going to see Serenity in the theaters are the "Wheedonites" of whom I draw ranks as well. The rest will wait to rent the movie. So Serenity will probably gain a little more attention once they movie goes to DVD. But herein lies a second problem: Hollywood doesn't track movie rentals since they don't see a cut of that. They only track DVD consumer purchases. Sometimes the two relate, such as the case with Office Space. So many people were told to rent Office Space by their friends that they went out, rented it, enjoyed it, and finally bought a copy for themselves. However, I have the feeling that people will rent Serenity, get a giggle out of it, but will ultimately not buy the DVD. I could be wrong about this. Many people I know who have never watched an episode of Firefly saw Serenity (albeit under some cajoling) and liked it so much that they bought the DVDs of Firefly (which caused the Firefly DVD set to jump to number 3 in the best-selling DVD list on Amazon.com during the film's opening weekend (it has now dropped down again, unfortunately). I'm not saying that other factors weren't at play, just that these are the top six. Number 1 really has the biggest effect more than any of the others combined (and I don't blame people. The cost to see a movie is far too exorbitant (and Hollywood's reasoning for it all: The movies we made this year sucked! -They're not too far off on this...anyone see Stealth????). I predict this drought of poor boxoffice weekends will continue until they lower the ticket prices which have risen far quicker than the inflation which theater owners point to as the cause. Main point, the movie industry has to realize that you can't try to suck your consumer base dry and then expect them to return to get gouged again! |
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| Posted by: CrowScape | Posted on: Sunday October 30 2005 6:04pm |
| I was going to go see Serenity this weeken. Slight problem: it's not in any theaters near by... and there are a lot of theaters in this area. | |
| Posted by: nearscape | Posted on: Sunday October 30 2005 2:47pm |
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Indeed, Serenity was a masterpiece, which is why I'm struggling to understand why it flopped so miserably. I thought that review might be a partial explanation of that failure. Poor Joss...not enough changes to attract a general audience, and apparently too many changes for the hardest of the hardcore Firefly nuts. Talk about being stuck between a rock and a hard place. I've started downloading that WoW expansion teaser here... www.worldofwarcraft.com/burningcrusade/movies.html |
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| Posted by: Prime | Posted on: Saturday October 29 2005 4:40pm |
| Well as some of us WoW addicts know, BlizzCon is in full swing this weekend. Blizzard is show casing their WoW expansion and there have been some other rumors floating around too about some of their other titles. Found a little bit of information at this page www.wowguru.com. But to sum it up, their are talks of Diablo 3 being a MMO like WoW except heaven vs hell (which might be interesting) and also a rumor that "Starcraft 2 is in development for the PC." Just some tasty tidbits. | |
| Posted by: Prime | Posted on: Friday October 28 2005 7:57pm |
| I just want to toss in my 2 cents about the Serenity movie because this is the place to do it, and no one can stop me! But I totally agree with Pete and I thoroughly enjoyed the movie. | |
| Posted by: CrowScape | Posted on: Friday October 28 2005 5:43pm |
| While some people here apparently are able to care less about basketball and football, I could not care less about baseball. Now granted, for two days I was a White Sox fan, but simply because one of my professors promised to cancle class if they swept. The Bud Bowl, however, that used to be the one event related to sports that I ever cared about. In the great annals of sports history, will there ever be computer-generated, football-playing bottles of alcoholic brew the likes of the Washer, the Drier, and yes, the Kitchen Sink. Then they stopped making them... | |
| Posted by: nearscape | Posted on: Friday October 28 2005 4:18pm |
| I remember the year after Doom come out (1994 I think it was), there were these studies about how much it was sapping productivity and the billions of dollars missing from the GNP because of it. Fancy corporate bans were enacted. I wonder if them WoWs are having more or less of an effect. The Chinese Overminds are apparently concerned. Perhaps that's the ultimate measure of success in the industry...to make a game so good that governments must act! | |
| Posted by: Big_Whisky | Posted on: Friday October 28 2005 12:23pm |
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Oh Snap! China's cracking the whip on 't3h gam3rz'! www.livejournal.com/users/big_whisky/ |
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| Posted by: Peter | Posted on: Friday October 28 2005 12:18pm |
| Nearscape, thanks for posting that blog link on Serenity. It was an interesting read. I don't agree with anything he wrote, but it was interesting to read. I won't burden those of you who don't care about Serenity with a response here, but if you would like to read my rebuttal, click on the following link: obimickey.ebloggy.com/ | |
| Posted by: Peter | Posted on: Friday October 28 2005 10:59am |
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B_W, I don't think baseball is beneath anyone. Baseball unites everyone, both the rich (The players) and the poor (us). I would go on an repeat James Earl Jones' speech from Field of Dreams, but then I remembered that I would be quoting a Kevin Costner movie....now that would be beneath me. Growing up I could care less that the Bulls won the championship (I have never gone to a Bulls game in my life), I could care less that the Packers beat the Bears (I only went to a single Bears game since the tickets were free). But not a year has gone by that I haven't attended at least a single Chicago White Sox game. Because Baseball is the one constant (*Now I am going to the "Special Hell" as Shepard Book put it) As for the Lithuanian national sport, apparently it is Basketball. Lithuania has consistently been in the top three of the European Basketball League since its inception and have won a medal in basketball at every Olympics since they were first allowed to represent their own country in 1996 (before that, they were members of the Soviet basketball team which also consistently medalled in Olympic play). |
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| Posted by: nearscape | Posted on: Friday October 28 2005 10:40am |
| hey, man, don't you know the gaming never ends? | |
| Posted by: Big_Whisky | Posted on: Friday October 28 2005 10:11am |
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Peter? Baseball? I must say I am a little taken aback...and possibly a little disappointed. ;) Such a sport is not for the mighty Lithuanian! He must not 'root root root for the home team'. Isn't there some Lithuanian national sport you're better spending your precious brain cycles worrying about? I mean, baseball is so...1973...or in the case of the sox...1914...or whatever. Well, enjoy your corporate baseball if you must. I just thought it wouldn't be this way... *wimper* *sob* *wail* *gnash* *flail* Ok. I'm over it. Go SOX! And GO COLTS!!! ;) (inside joke) B_W |
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| Posted by: Dream BBQ Child | Posted on: Thursday October 27 2005 7:00pm |
| A response filtered through babelfish. | |
| Posted by: Peter | Posted on: Thursday October 27 2005 10:55am |
| I have seen Serenity of a different sort. My hometown heroes have fought the mighty Texans....and were triumphant. I have spent many a summer partaking in America's pastime as it unfolded before my eyes at Comiskey Park; eigerly hoping that the Sox would regain that honor of honors - The WORLD SERIES trophy. Whilst my northside counterparts must incessantly wait "until next year" for their chance at glory, I have at last found serenity. | |
| Posted by: nearscape | Posted on: Thursday October 27 2005 10:44am |
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Mostly for Peter per our previous discussions...but I found this to be an interesting read. (Serenity review and spoilers) www.livejournal.com/users/barkingdoc/13745.html |
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| Posted by: nearscape | Posted on: Wednesday October 26 2005 9:25am |
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The "Pteradeagle" project is behind me, along with some other things. When such endeavors are accomplished, I find it preferable to rock. www.pulgaritrap.com/wow/rock.jpg |
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| Posted by: intrigue | Posted on: Tuesday October 25 2005 11:49pm |
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matt was that a page response? anyways for complete decadent computer solution checkout www.savrow.com/ appairently he uses diamond dust thermal paste to add a few degrees of cooling to processors pcs can be custom engineered for the highest of requirements. |
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| Posted by: Big_Whisky | Posted on: Tuesday October 25 2005 11:47am |
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Detailed* Apple Service: 1. Send entire computer to SanFrancisco at tremendous expense. (if it didn't explode that is) 2. Cry *kidding (sort of, that actually happened to me...but I didn't cry...I just got a PC. ;) B_W |
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| Posted by: Dream BBQ Child | Posted on: Monday October 24 2005 5:19pm |
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The page is not found The page which is in the midst of searching is deleted and is high, or transitory cannot utilize there is a possibility where name can be modified and high. Coping method * Please verify whether or not [ address ] spelling of the page address which is inputted into the bar is correct. * Opening the following home page, please search the link to necessary information. * It accesses to another link, [ it returns ] please click. HTTP 404 - The file is not found. Internet information service Technical information (for support person in charge) * Detailed Microsoft Support |
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| Posted by: Big_BeatWhisky | Posted on: Monday October 24 2005 1:55pm |
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Yo! I'm gonna be ThERE! with the bellz on yo! B_BeatWhisky |
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| Posted by: darkNES | Posted on: Sunday October 23 2005 10:42pm |
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Here's the info for the big ol' to-do on Friday, if you're lookin' for something to do. www.wipzradio.com Also, the guy that normally does live stuff with Matt for Caustic can't make it, so I'll be filling in. I just got the call like an hour ago. It's going to be pretty messed up. |
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| Posted by: Big_Whisky | Posted on: Sunday October 23 2005 5:39pm |
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U just made all of that up right? That didn't really happen did it? I don't know anything about BlizCon, so I would not be totally surprized if that were the case... B_W |
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| Posted by: Dream BBQ Child | Posted on: Saturday October 22 2005 4:43pm |
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I just had the most amusing picture pop into my head. All the people are waiting to get into Blizzcon right? Well they're waiting so what do they do? Why, they begin to jump up and down! And the Con won't open so MORE JUMPING! Then some tool challenges another tool to a duel! And then announcement is made that the con has been canceled. And the party disperses to go FISHING! YEAH WOOO! BlizzCon, greastest WoW simulator ever. (For a the record I freely admit that I would likley get addicted to WoW if I played it but whenever I enter a room with people playing it I see the lamest shit.) |
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| Posted by: Big_Whisky | Posted on: Friday October 21 2005 2:58pm |
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Yeah, I've got a 'lamp-ray' right now. I get the 'lamp', then I hold my hands in lewd configurations in front of the 'rays' comming off the 'lamp'. Some how my 'lamp-ray' projects always get an NC-17 rating, I don't know why. They're just shadows. B_W |
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| Posted by: nearscape | Posted on: Friday October 21 2005 2:13pm |
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Happy Hallow's End. Whilst rendering this 3k Dataton element, I'm going to share the first in a series of party time pictures of my adventures in holiday Azeroth. First, after careful tricking and treating, I have finally acquired the <flimsy troll mask> I have long sought. Behold the perfect disguise! www.pulgaritrap.com/wow/mask.jpg |
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| Posted by: ultra lazer | Posted on: Friday October 21 2005 12:37pm |
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ultra violet will be the next disk format UVDVD dr. doom |
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| Posted by: Peter | Posted on: Friday October 21 2005 11:21am |
| They predict Blu-ray now, but wait until we launch our hidden weapon and superior competitor....lamp-ray! | |
| Posted by: intrigue | Posted on: Friday October 21 2005 11:10am |
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games.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=05/10/21/1324225&from=rss sony's blueray now predicted winner |
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| Posted by: intrigue | Posted on: Friday October 21 2005 12:07am |
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milwaukee's avalon theater has plans to be rebuilt for 2007 check out the article below onmilwaukee.com/scoops/articles/avalonunveiled.html and on an off note the movie avalon for all those soulus gamers out there if that twists your kettle visit one of these fine links www.imdb.com/title/tt0267287/ www.netflix.com/MovieDisplay?movieid=60032226&trkid=189530 www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0000D9PNY/103-7986549-9569420?v=glance&n=130&n=507846&s=dvd&v=glance |
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| Posted by: Peter | Posted on: Thursday October 20 2005 3:35pm |
| F.E.A.R. is the path to the darkside! | |
| Posted by: Big_Whisky | Posted on: Thursday October 20 2005 1:44pm |
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Greetings, I had quite an agressive day yesterday, so I decided to get me some F.E.A.R. afterwards. It is much better than the single player demo, and it provides some of the best firefights I have experienced in a single player game in some time. The only firefights that rivel it were found in Half-Life 1. I found HL2 to be lacking, and think F.E.A.R. is the rightful sucessor to the sweetness of the FPS franchise. DOD from Valve still takes the cake as far as multiplayer team action goes, but the F.E.A.R. multiplayer deathmatch action is pretty sweet also. When you shoot someone in this game...they know it. ;) B_W |
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| Posted by: nearscape | Posted on: Wednesday October 19 2005 8:39pm |
| holy shite, it's a Madhouse(tm) in Ironforge these days. They're running the Hallow's End holiday, and there's all kinds of wacky shit going down. I saw a Night Elf wearing a Flimsy Gnome Mask bobbing for apples. I watched a giant skeletal pirate get drunk on cherry grog. I'm also looking forward to participating in the Dark Iron events that Gabe mentioned at Penny Arcade today, such as the Deeprun Rave and the Naked LVL1 Night Elf race. | |
| Posted by: CrowScape | Posted on: Tuesday October 18 2005 8:39pm |
| In the storyline of Sacred, Dryads are supposed to be the good guys. Dryads are supposed to have free will. In fact, in the main quest, I am on a mission to help liberate the Dryads from an externally imposed isolation. So, can someone please explain to me why Sacred has me running around, killing every Dryad I come across? In fact, I'm not even sure how I got there. Last thing I knew, I was helping a group of pirates escape from the undead, then suddenly I'm thrown into murderous tree-hugging, bow-wielding hippie land all the way on the other side of the map. It's as if Sacred was planned out by a kid with ADD. | |
| Posted by: nearscape | Posted on: Tuesday October 18 2005 6:17pm |
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ok, the long dark of spooLAN appears to be over, we are back online. to help you recover, I bring fringe media! viknluda.com/foe/ make sure you click on the banner to view the video. And don't be afraid to let your body move. So on lunch break I went down and checked out your Milwaukee Public Market, which after much deliberation and delay is finally open. Perhaps of interest: one of the vendors at present is "Sushi A-Go-Go", which provides fine delights in the vein of Mitsuwa, including tasty seaweed salad. Many of the products suffer from the "Third Ward Pricing Syndrome" (fish sandwiches will run you $9), but it will be nice to have good fruit and such so close to work. |
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| Posted by: sysop | Posted on: Tuesday October 18 2005 6:09pm |
| testing...is this thing on? | |
| Posted by: intrigue | Posted on: Thursday October 13 2005 6:36pm |
| quick poll, who is going gencon 2006 dave has 2 rooms in the marriot and i will book one at the westin, if demand is there, the marriot is sold out it seems, the westin is the next cheapest that has a tunnel to the hall. | |
| Posted by: nearscape | Posted on: Wednesday October 12 2005 5:08pm |
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I enjoyed this one... www.geekculture.com/joyoftech/joyarchives/730.html |
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| Posted by: intrigue | Posted on: Wednesday October 12 2005 4:19pm |
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fear is a game now on to elixirs of truth www.ohmygoditburns.com/wordpress/index.php?p=4 see how to make them better, i think gin is a qualified test subject, i will get the filters!!! |
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| Posted by: adam | Posted on: Wednesday October 12 2005 10:42am |
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New "Joy of Tech!" is out... After my last dial-up experience, I think this kid has a case! www.geekculture.com/joyoftech/joyarchives/742.html -A |
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| Posted by: Yoda | Posted on: Wednesday October 12 2005 9:30am |
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FEAR! Fear is the path to the dark side. Fear leads to anger. Anger leads to hate. Hate leads to suffering. I sense much fear in you, Intrigue...or should that be DJ Cockthirsty the h@x0r? Yes...YES! This much I see! Yoda |
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| Posted by: intrigue | Posted on: Tuesday October 11 2005 3:33pm |
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I didnt post this article out of fear, but rather to inform our common man. it wasnt going to stop me from playing wow, infact, i would like to play tonight at my place after work, whos in. i am actualy impressed with how blizzard is solving this problem, any leet haxors will use a small c program to grab the mfc window class, and overwrite the window title, thus randomizing it, or maybe calling their haxor program "Internet Explorer." i bet i could get around this in like 4-16 hours of code, if i could see as much as this fellow has. Installing visual studio 6 might take more time as this install can take 2-5 hours. its just like that darn clone cd problem that we had with some of the new games, now haxors, are dynamicly relinking dlls in to non microsoft memory locations so that they can hide dlls from the system. infact i wouldnt be suprised if anti viral programs are doing the same thing. in the movie tron, the "tron" program was designed to just that, hide from the system by illegaly registering in memory, so that it could spy on the master controller program. it does give a clue as to how they look for script kiddies online and how they attempt to prevent cheating online. Microsoft is scared shitless, of xbox live cheaters. good old microsoft's jay alerad has admitted that the xbox 360 will be hacked and that microsoft has given up on trying to stop it, they are infact spending all of those resources instead on level 2 security protection agianst the xbox live community, they want your scores to really mean something, they think that is their meal ticket in carving out a bright future for the xbox division. on a side note, rumor has it that when the xbox division becomes profitable, that the company will divide into os, office, and xbox divisions. ms expects to be profitable in 2006, even with the release of 360, i think they learned one from nintendo. |
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| Posted by: nearscape | Posted on: Tuesday October 11 2005 2:35pm |
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That WoW article isn't conclusive either, apparently. If you read further... "If the only thing being transfered is hashes to your computer and positives of those hashes back, I don't really see this as a huge security issue. It's all client-side. Whoopdie do." "Agreed. Is there any evidence to prove that this information is being sent back to Blizzard? If not, then its no big deal really, and in such a case I wouldn't exactly call it "spyware". Blizzard have to protect their work in some way - I play the game myself, and it would be ruined in seconds if everyone was running hacks and able to cheat. One can only expect this sort of behaviour really, and if it protects gamers then i'm all for it. After all, I have nothing to hide. Obviously it would be a different matter if this information WAS sent back to Blizzard, but i'm sure they are aware of the consequenses should personal data be leaked and used in an inappropriate manner." |
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| Posted by: nearscape | Posted on: Tuesday October 11 2005 2:25pm |
| Has google always been able to read the contents of PDFs, or is that fairly new? And I'm talking about the ones that are made from scanned hardcopy. That's kinda eerie. | |
| Posted by: nearscape | Posted on: Tuesday October 11 2005 2:21pm |
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Better watch yourself on Steam too...some of those haxors are saying the VAC system uses similar spying techniques. This is the age we live in. You want privacy? Unplug your router. I'm not going to let such things prevent me from doing what I enjoy. |
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| Posted by: Big_Whisky | Posted on: Tuesday October 11 2005 12:16pm |
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Neato. Guess I'm glad I'm out now. Never coming back. I will let everyone know this spying is taking place. B_W |
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| Posted by: intrigue | Posted on: Tuesday October 11 2005 10:56am |
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WOW, is spying on you www.rootkit.com/blog.php?newsid=358 |
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| Posted by: Jokey Smurf | Posted on: Monday October 10 2005 3:44pm |
| It's about smurfin' time! Those mother-smurfers are really a bunch of smurfholes! They never laughed when I sent them exploding presents. Come on, who doesn't like a smurfin' exploding present? Those little smurfers got what was smurfing to them. And if you don't like it you can go smurf yourselves! | |
| Posted by: Big_Whisky | Posted on: Monday October 10 2005 3:32pm |
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Crow, That's so weird...and the message is a little misconstrued. Perhaps if the Smurfs were committing genocide, or Papa Smurf was 0FFing his political opponents 'Stalin Style' (he was wearing the red hat after all), or if brainey was cooking up some nerve agents, then they blasted those effing Smurf bastards into the stone age, but baby was left in limbo, too young to participate in the genocide, and he needed to be deprogramed and re-integrated into society, that would make more sense. B_W |
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| Posted by: CrowScapes | Posted on: Monday October 10 2005 1:13pm |
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Smurfs get the smurf smurfed out of them by smurfin' UNICEF: www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2005/10/08/wsmurf08.xml&sSheet=/news/2005/10/08/ixhome.html |
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| Posted by: adam | Posted on: Monday October 10 2005 11:07am |
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So y'all remember how I said my internet was down when I got to Milwaukee? Well.. It was still down when I got back to Rockford last night. Damn Insight had an equiptment failure! Fuck Insight! Anyway.. Had fun this weekend! Hope to be able to do it again soon! -A |
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| Posted by: darkNES | Posted on: Monday October 10 2005 10:07am |
| I actually got a lot of enjoyment out of the Delta Force game in that "so choppy and lag-ridden, it's fun" kinda way. If only Physics Defiance came standard in all motorcycles... | |
| Posted by: Peter | Posted on: Monday October 10 2005 4:14am |
| Thanks for the suggestion B_W, but the Odinson doth not require rubber pants to enjoy fine Battlefronting! | |
| Posted by: Rev. Fig_Whisky | Posted on: Monday October 10 2005 12:29am |
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Greetings to you all. This is the Reverend. It, of which I refer to the LANtastic endeavor, has concluded itself. In totality it has proven to be the some of the finest action in some time. We launched and repealed many an attack. We obliterated foe, and friend alike for 48 hours. It was as sweet as such a thing can get, and has left me both refreshed and rejuvenated. Forthright. Now and again! Let me recap some of the cut from the block action: 1. The Half Life 2 engine has made it's first official appearance. (it appeared 2 years ago, but not in mass) DOD source was the hit of the day, and Mr. Kumphhh and I lit up many an Allied combatant. We also lit it up oldschool with a little CS:Source late Friday eve, and found great joy in firing the machine guns. However I got assaulted in the most unnatural of ways by a couple of terrorists...silly terrorists. 2. We tried out Worms 4. Definitely the highlight being Mr. Kumphhh walking into a two inch puddle and drowning. I laughed. The game sucked. 3. in honor of MR. PLACAS, we tried out the new BATTLEFRONT II, and if PETER ever tries it he should wear the rubber pants...BECAUSE HE WILL PISS HIMSELF. I think I might be burned out on the star wars, but peter would dig this title. The open beta we played was over a gig, and BUGGY AS HELL, but very sweet. I played as a tie fighter pilot, and was given the choice of all of the TIE class fighters, and took the interceptor out for a drive. It was fun. I also played some new school action, which sucked...but looks cool. You can also play as a JEDI...and have force powers and everything. Nice. 4. The shocker of the day is the F.E.A.R. demo. The multilayer deathmatch and elimination were great. The weapons were thoughtful and each was useful. My favorite were the double pieces, but everyone else liked the penetrator...bunch of sickos. 5. Serious Sam II demo...sucked. Boo. 6. Delta Force Xtreme...awful LAN/WLAN play. Absolutely rotten. Make for some fun motorcycle driving though, and some ambiguous homosexual motorcycle riding action to boot. Kinda funky. The helicopters were a nice touch... 7. Armagetron made another appearance...fantastic! So, that's that. Thanks to all who came up/down/out, and a great big thanks to Matt Kump for putting up with us for a giant weekend of fun. Let's do it again soon! Later, Big_Whisky aka Rev. Fig_Whisky |
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| Posted by: adam | Posted on: Sunday October 9 2005 12:57am |
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this is how I am annoying Peter.. Damn it.. It's all Intrigue's fault too! -A |
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| Posted by: Intrigue | Posted on: Sunday October 9 2005 12:56am |
| ahh, peter, we have plenty of machines, come play tomarrow | |
| Posted by: adam | Posted on: Sunday October 9 2005 12:55am |
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So Kruger has decided that we now need to DOS the site.. Well, here's my help! -A |
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| Posted by: Intrigue | Posted on: Sunday October 9 2005 12:55am |
| ahh, peter, we have plenty of machines, come play tomarrow | |
| Posted by: Big_Whisky | Posted on: Sunday October 9 2005 12:52am |
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The action is hot...and fresh. The network is holding up...although my laptop isn't quite. That's OK though, becuase it wasn't designed for such a thing. We have beers and ales of many a variety, and we have 31337 gaming sweetness of all sorts. (yes, we are putting the 3 back into 31337. Bl330tches. Oh my this is outrageous. Some of the finest action thus far. The newest action seems to be playing games online, with a contingent from the LAN. I like to call it WLAN action or Wide Local Area Network action. Seems fairly 31337 to me. Well, it's been quite the day, so I will call it for now. We still have a little left in us for tomorrow. B_W out. |
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| Posted by: adam | Posted on: Sunday October 9 2005 12:51am |
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post -a |
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| Posted by: Peter | Posted on: Saturday October 8 2005 11:53am |
| This is my favorite time on Spoolan...fully aware that everyone who typically posts on this site is in the middle of a virtual marathon of impavid proportions otherwise known as a LAN party, it will be hours or even days until someone posts on this site again. So let's see how long it takes for someone who's at the LAN party to go to this site and post. I'm guessing our next visitor will chime in sometime Sunday at the earliest.... | |
| Posted by: Franz | Posted on: Saturday October 8 2005 1:42am |
| W3rd! I'm in saturday. But, I dont know if i'm bringing my box, i've cheesed it out recently. | |
| Posted by: i | Posted on: Friday October 7 2005 11:29pm |
| I made it! LAN 2k5! Mr. Kump is the solutions provider. And that saves the day. | |
| Posted by: Big_Whisky | Posted on: Friday October 7 2005 7:50pm |
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LAN is up, both wired and wireless. Full access. YEEEEEEHAHAAAAHAHA! COME AND GET IT!!!!! B_W |
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| Posted by: Peter | Posted on: Friday October 7 2005 5:05pm |
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Intrigue, I've got enough schoolwork to keep me busy for the weekend but if I do make it to said LAN event, it would have to be sometime tomorrow for a short while. However, with midterms coming up, my students are getting antsy about their lab grades! (And that means one busy weekend for me!). |
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| Posted by: intrigue | Posted on: Friday October 7 2005 4:35pm |
| good post peter, are you going to make it to the LAN event? | |
| Posted by: intrigue | Posted on: Friday October 7 2005 4:30pm |
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i wasnt trying to steel the venue burbs vs grove, at all you have all mentioned that you wanted to game at my place, i said i didnt know if it was possible, i reported that it was, it may not be next time kumps will be, in anycase the plan in is motion and i will be setting up later tonight for all of those dhcp advocates, you can learn how to be a network admin tonight, i have done it and i have gone through the toils i have been paid to set up networks, and so if you dont like how the pros do it, you can experiance why we do things the way we do, get your thinking cap on you will be in charge of network opps i am staying out of it!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! just so everyone knows, i am not fixing any ip/ network problems, dave has it figured out!!! |
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| Posted by: Big_Whisky | Posted on: Friday October 7 2005 3:02pm |
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Hulk, that was a good plan. I'm gonna do that...RIGHT NOW!!! YUMM!!! |
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| Posted by: Peter | Posted on: Friday October 7 2005 2:41pm |
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A helpful reminder from our friends at CNN.com www.cnn.com/2005/TECH/fun.games/10/07/korea.onlinegameaddic.ap/index.html How timely, an article on the dangers of gaming on the eve of the LAN party! |
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| Posted by: HULK | Posted on: Friday October 7 2005 2:35pm |
| Hulk have plan once. Hulk take 30 twinkees and shoved them into mouth as fast as he could. That was good plan....Hulk like plan. | |
| Posted by: Big_Whisky | Posted on: Friday October 7 2005 2:32pm |
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PLAN!?!?!?!??!?!?!?!?!! WHAT PLAN!?!! Your plan? Sorry. That's not a plan that has been: 1. discussed with ANYONE other than yourself. Just like you wanted to change the venue yesterday on a whim. I'm getting sick of this. ;) DHCP will work fine...and if it doesn't we will do something about it, but it has NEVER FAILED ME ONCE!!! B_W |
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| Posted by: intrigue | Posted on: Friday October 7 2005 1:30pm |
| what if the server ip changes because there is a reboot, or the dhcp admins an ip over the servers, argggghhhhhhh! yuck, just stick to the plan, please. | |
| Posted by: intrigue | Posted on: Friday October 7 2005 1:29pm |
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DCHP, can cause more problems than its worth when trying to debug things, for example dhcp lease times , each time someone does a release/renew there is a chance that your box releases, but the router doesnt, DCHP is for dedicated hardware like LINUX/WIN Server 2003 and in large corporations, static routes are much easier to diagnose!!!!! if you guys go DHCP, you have your own personal techsupport to rely on, i am not helping. |
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| Posted by: Big_Whisky | Posted on: Friday October 7 2005 1:07pm |
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Crow, From my place you could even call out for help with a moderate voice and recieve satisfaction. But you can't miss it. It's the AVARDA. First apt building after the now defunct ground round. Kruger, F-those internet settings. Why don't we NOT SCREW UP OUR BOXES and use the DHCP on Kump's router? Or better yet, why don't I just bring over my Cable Modem and set it up separate from Kump's that way he doesn't have to screw his up. I'm so smart! ;) B_W |
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| Posted by: CrowScape | Posted on: Thursday October 6 2005 5:15pm |
| God damnit I just figured out where the gaming is taking place and now Intrigue wants to change it? It'll take me another two weeks to catch on! No, venue stays Kumps. Besides, if I can't find Kump's I can always go over to Dave's and call for help (right Dave?). | |
| Posted by: intrigue | Posted on: Thursday October 6 2005 5:13pm |
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just talked with matt kump he is at his place now for setup options, and will be up till 11ish for setup tonight he plans to get off of work early enough to be home at 5pm tomarrow, that will give me enough time to bring some stuff down to matts place between 5pm and 7pm so that i can receive stan at my place at 7ish on friday stan and i will then proceed to the kump estates sometime shortly there after, i expect to be gamming and drinking by 8pm then please have your machines set up with these lan settings upon ariving tcp/ip should be enabled and on ip: 192.168.0.(the 8bit checksum of your ascii name, or some random number between 11-250, which ever is easier/133732, "69, and 42 are not random numbers") mask: 255.255.255.0 gateway: 192.168.0.2 dns1: 192.168.0.2 dns2: blank or your favorite dns server(mine are 64.81.159.2 or 216.231.41.2 these are speakeasy dns servers, but you can use them too) workgroup: spoolan if you have these basic settings you should be able to game on the lan, otherwise we might have to change the subnet[xxx in (192.168.xxx.###)]to get everyone access to matts internet. ### is the client ip for the gateway or your machine. if any of this is too confusing, call me and we will get it set up before hand, i want ot game ASAP on friday if that is what we are going for. wow playing will only support 1-3 on matts cable modem, i can support 1-2 with my verizon card, and nick will have his own seperate access, so that puts us at 6 possible gamers for WOW. the file/ game server will be agememnon and many of the patches, demos will be on USB hardrives for speed. I am hoping things go really smoothly. eric, and curly(nick) will be avalible for saturday afternoon/ sat eve, but that is all, eric has requested to only play games he owns and is set up durring that time, so i guess, he is bringing his new box. :) Nick will mostlikely need an alt box for anything other than WOW. smiles towards great gamming this weekend :) justin |
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| Posted by: Big_Whisky | Posted on: Thursday October 6 2005 4:53pm |
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1st and foremost: It's not KORPORATE GAMING! This has nothing to do with any of that. 2nd I'm setting up tonight, so I don't know where your getting your friday at 8:00. Also, all I have been hearing from nearscape is that noone is arriving before 9:00 on friday anyway so time wasn't a concern! (it is to me, i'll be rocking out at 5:01pm) 3rd Change the venue at this point? Are you high?!?! ;) We picked a location weeks ago, and just because someone wants to change it at the last second, that doesn't change anything. I mean, fuck if I care, but we had this plan in place for weeks. 4th Accuracy in driving instructions? Whatever. I've given my piece. Do whatever you want. 5th I would give Juneau a chance, if i didn't have to park there for three days. ;) If we are changing the venue someone better let Matt know...and he works during the day. So don't expect to get a hold of him until after 5:00. B_W |
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| Posted by: intrigue | Posted on: Thursday October 6 2005 2:10pm |
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i just found out this morning, that our house mates are not moving in untill tuesday, before that they are living in a furnished apartment. so it is an option for us to game all friday, sat, sund, and monday at my place. i just got two 20 amp lines installed for the basement and so power is plentiful, that puts us at 60 amps of gaming bliss. parking shouldnt be an issue at my place, and we have everything the grove has, including friday, and monday gaming. I have put in a call with kump to see what his schedule is so that the delivery of stuff can begin. I offer my place as most likely to have more total gaming hours as its looking like we wont be able to set up at kumps place until friday at 8:00pm, i might be able to get there sooner, but stan is going to come up from chitown for friday night and saturday morn. I honestly dont kare where the korporate gaming is, i just want a GREAT LAN EVENT, i havent gamed for more than an hour in a month or two. I am really looking forward to this event. Please post your vote!!!! asap. if i dont hear any replies i will asume we are still on for kumps place and we are looking at a late night setup tonight or tommarrow. otherwise, bring your boxes over to my place anytime between now and the gaming. later. justin |
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| Posted by: nearscape | Posted on: Thursday October 6 2005 11:11am |
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I'm down for 5:01 on friday. I'll be eating something at that time, it might as well be good. But I was trying to be considerate for our out-of-town guests and let them decide. In the interests of accuracy: I drove 894-100 4 days ago. Not ideal, but the great thing about 894 is the options of exits provided, and the fact there are lane lines clearly painted on the road. But, you know, just giving options. I thought maybe a warning would be useful. It's one thing to drive that stretch on a regular basis, and another thing to come in from out of town and not know what's in store for you (as my parents learned 2 weeks ago). And if you like options, Whisky, you should really give the "Juneau Nightmare" a chance sometime. No, seriously, give it a chance. Strangely enough, all those options apply, except where they are better (Fresche > Pizza Hut). |
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| Posted by: MILK and CHEESE | Posted on: Thursday October 6 2005 10:22am |
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BOOZE within a block! Why aren't we having the LAN party there? Gin makes a man mean! Everybody booze up and riot! |
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| Posted by: Big_Whisky | Posted on: Thursday October 6 2005 12:08am |
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"So when should we get the pizza? Late late friday, or a more reasonable time on Saturday?" That sounds like a leading question! ;) How about 5:01 on Friday, that sounds REASONABLE to me!!! ;) HA! Saturday sounds fine to me. Or BOTH DAYS! OOOOOOO! There are quite a few plus-es to this LAN event in the Kump estates. The most pronounced of which is having: 1. a great booze store within 1 city block 2. a jimmi johns right ACROSS THE STREET 3. a gyro place right ACROSS THE STREET 4. coffee across highway 100 (about three blocks) 5. eduardos and pizza hut within spitting distance 6. Taco hell, the Mongolian BBQ, Indian Food, and other such joys also within blocks. We can't go wrong here people. This is going to be outstanding, I tell ya. Not even when the LAN was at Landmark did we have these close of options. Oh, and don't fret about 94. If you're coming after 7:00pm, just take it, it's fine. 894 has a very hectic exit which I lovingly call the 'suicide exit' to get to the highway 100 exit, which is FAR MORE DANGEROUS and FRUSTRATING than 94 right now. If you haven't taken it, you wouldn't know. I know. I am a great driver, and love the 'action', but that even pisses me off on occasion. Also remember the source on this street info, the man who would rather scald his flesh with buring sulfer than burn the fossil fuels in his vehicle. ;) (although I did get a ride to a movie theatre last week from him...but I think he might have been high, on Serenity...) Saw it three times BTW, and it was SWEEEEEET! Laterz, B_W |
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| Posted by: nearscape | Posted on: Wednesday October 5 2005 11:09pm |
| no matter, I'll most likely be working until you and/or the DBBQC arrive anyways. So when should we get the pizza? Late late friday, or a more reasonable time on Saturday? | |
| Posted by: intrigue | Posted on: Wednesday October 5 2005 4:12pm |
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so, i feel at home with the new (comcast free) techtv (digital life, diggnation, systm) that is syndicated through rss feeds just like podcasting diggnation offered a link to this ad, that you just need to check out. www.sun.com/emrkt/rejected/ |
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| Posted by: CrowScape | Posted on: Wednesday October 5 2005 2:14pm |
| Oh, I am ALL about the garlic pizza. Just remember though, I'm not getting in until late Friday. | |
| Posted by: intrigue | Posted on: Wednesday October 5 2005 1:21pm |
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check out your old friends on tech tv here!!! digitallifetv.com/blogs/digitallifetv/archive/2005/08/23/80.aspx |
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| Posted by: nearscape | Posted on: Wednesday October 5 2005 12:44pm |
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yeah, that's the deal. I still suggest you take the 894 bypass though if you know how, as the stretch of 94 for 25 blocks west of the interchange is a warzone that you'll barely recognize....and it will be dark. Not recommended. If anyone is interested in the garlic pizza run, I'm still doing that, it's just a matter of when. So speak up if you want to be included. |
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| Posted by: CrowScape | Posted on: Wednesday October 5 2005 7:10am |
| Sorry, brain's fried. I understand all now. I need to pay more attention to who is posting what. | |
| Posted by: intrigue | Posted on: Tuesday October 4 2005 11:02pm |
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maybe, i just install macosx native on dualcore amd64 then ? ;-) you mean iluvator, crowscape |
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| Posted by: CrowScape | Posted on: Tuesday October 4 2005 7:13pm |
| So, if I got this right, I basically go the same way to Whiskey's estate, only Intrigue's comes up sooner on Bluemound (still on the right side of the road), correct? | |
| Posted by: nearscape | Posted on: Tuesday October 4 2005 5:50pm |
| Oh yeah, and those Unix-style file permissions...you know...if you're into that sort of thing........... | |
| Posted by: nearscape | Posted on: Tuesday October 4 2005 5:46pm |
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Intrigue, This will sound scary to some here, but it sounds like you could save yourself much hassle by just using a Mac as a file server. Some things to consider: - Easily create file management macros with Automator - Better integrated support for 1394b fast, expandable, portable storage - Spotlight searching and indexing of file contents, durations, etc. - Versatile file labeling, coloring, and associations (assign different handlers for different files, independent of extension - send some documents directly to Acrobat, have others stop at Preview first, etc) - Custom folder icons that are actually reliable - Working previews of far more formats, such as PDF and Quicktime - Hundreds of times faster than what's been developed by Microsoft (I regularly Spotlight for text on a full 500 gig external drive, and it takes about 1 second) - "No to All" button no longer necessary, because all prompts and dialogues are given immediately before file transfer starts, and your 100 gig transfer won't crap out on you while you're at lunch And that's some of what the OS does right out of the box. There are 3rd party add-ons that do more... Of course, there's that issue of getting around their fucking crap-ass hardware in a legal manner...maybe you can convince the guys at Mayfair to sell you an empty G5 so you can put your own Raptor drives and memory in at a fraction of the cost? |
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| Posted by: Peter | Posted on: Tuesday October 4 2005 4:21pm |
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****PLEASE NOTE, this post contains spoilers about the ending of Serenity. If you have not yet seen this movie, do not read!! **** Intrigue, I still don't see why you think that anyone who hasn't seen Firefly the series would think that Serenity is the end of the story. The whole scene between Mal and the Operative basically sets up the next story. This is where my Star Wars analogy does breakdown. Just like A New Hope, Serenity is a stand alone movie. However, in A New Hope, the future story was not completely laid out for us (before Empire Strikes back came out, most people thought that the Empire was defeated and not just weakend.....they underestimated the power of the Emperor!). Now we know that the Death Star was simply a single facet of the Empire. In the final scene of Serenity, the Operative clearly states that the Parliament is weakened but will strike back at Mal and his crew in vengence. Our heroes didn't ride off into the sunset at the end, they fly through a rain storm...This is no end...this is a beginning. Your arguments would be akin to someone saying that after we saw the Vorlons and Shadows end the Great War that the story of Babylon 5 ended after never having watched any of the B5 seasons prior to Season 4. You know that the strained relations between B5 and Earth will have to play out, you know that the Teeps are going to have a battle with normals. Same with Serenity...you know that the Parliament will try to enact vengence on Serenity and its crew. The story isn't over by any means and I don't think anyone can really say that. |
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| Posted by: Big_Whisky | Posted on: Tuesday October 4 2005 10:05am |
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Let's not confuse poor crow. After all, he's in school. ;) Here's the skinny, U know how to get to uncle Whisky's? Well, you have to PASS mr. kumph's to get there. Skip the Juneau parking nightmare, and take 94 west to highway 100. Once there, exit the road, take it to Bluemound Rd. (you might have heard of it), then go LEFT. About two blocks later you will be at the AVARDA apartments right off of Bluemound. Once you arrive and unload, we could take your fine ride out to the Whisky estates for safe keeping, or park it on one of the many roads within half a city block. Thats when the drinking begins. B_W |
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| Posted by: nearscape | Posted on: Tuesday October 4 2005 9:32am |
| Prime posted his address earlier, and coming from the south, you may be able to take that bypass (894 i think it is?) to avoid the interchange and save some time. Or, if you'd rather meet me downtown, it's 1009 N Jackson St. 53202. | |
| Posted by: intrigue | Posted on: Tuesday October 4 2005 9:32am |
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first I feel for ross, in regards to the craptard that took off, i was hit by a hit an run once, atleast i was in my cirrus, and a fellow dashed out of his house at 3am to come help. Lets see what we can do to help ross out. peter, i wasnt implying that i thought serenity was a failure, but i was implying that for someone that hasnt seen the series, this seems like the end of the story, just like the series always moved on even though it seemed like there were deadends, that is what made the series great, and that is what gives it hope above, all of the other epics out there. the browncoats fight for thier beliefs even though they are "out numbered and the sights are grim" or something like that. its the humour within striffe that makes the series and the show great, it has a very real fealing in a very unreal world. finally, i am pulling my hair out with all of this file management, so much so that i have begun looking for a file manager replacement, and if i cant find it, i am a. going to find an open source file manager and mod it to my liking, or b. start from scratch, i worked on simular stuff for PA once, i think i can handle it. so i am asking for a casting call of features that the rest of you might like in a file manager jb, i have yours, "no to all button" any others? |
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| Posted by: CrowScape | Posted on: Tuesday October 4 2005 7:07am |
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Oh, and if you guys want to go out and see Serenity over the weekend, I'm game. I haven't been able to see it yet. And can I get some final confirmation on where I should go when I get into Milwaukee? Possibly directions (and the full address so I can look it up on MapQuest)? |
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| Posted by: Big_Whisky | Posted on: Tuesday October 4 2005 12:19am |
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oh, and if anyone cares, I have a blog. I like it so far. www.livejournal.com/users/big_whisky/ B_W |
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| Posted by: Big_Whisky | Posted on: Tuesday October 4 2005 12:11am |
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BWWAHAH!?!? I heard nothing about this. OMG. That's outragous! Hmmm...can it get much worse for poor Ross? B_W |
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| Posted by: nearscape | Posted on: Monday October 3 2005 11:33pm |
| Next Thursday night (the 13th) at 9:20 the Times Cinema is doing a fund-raising event to donate to Ross Bigley's recovery bills, as some fucktard drove into him when he was crossing the street, shattered his ankle, and then took off. So let's see what we can do, eh? | |
| Posted by: CrowScape | Posted on: Monday October 3 2005 5:51pm |
| Flightplan... that was movie where the surprise was that the hijackers were the good guys and the flight crew were the bad guys, right? Why the hell would anyone go see that crap? Imagine if a movie came out during WWII about a Japanese attempt to stop the Americans from bombing themselves. | |
| Posted by: Peter | Posted on: Monday October 3 2005 3:08pm |
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Intrigue/NS: Who said that Joss Whedon started with "the end". In a web doc on Serenitymovie.com, Joss himself states that there are plenty more stories to tell and that one way or another he's going to find a medium to relay those stories. The Operative himself states that the Parliament's regime was only weakened, they haven't been fully destroyed. In a sense, Serenity is like A New Hope (Sorry to use a Star Wars analogy, but it seems to fit). Luke's destruction of the 1st Death Star crippled the Empire, but didn't bring it down. In much the same way we see similar events in Serenity. As for glazing over how they got to that point, LOTR did the same thing with Galadriel's prologue in Fellowship (or how we aren't fully informed about the Earth/Minbari war until the third season of B5). I don't think it was ever implied that Joss Whedon was hurting from this even if Serenity was a complete failure. Whedon has two current projects (and several more up his sleeve). His next movie is Goner which as Whedon describes, "It's the story of a young woman's journey that involves a great deal of horror and some heroics...It's certainly darker than SERENITY, and there are a lot of left turns along the way." After that he's set to write and direct the Wonder Woman movie. Whedon has the reputation of being one of the best scriptwriters in Hollywood (I believe Serenity is enough proof for you all of that). While the studios are "very happy" (I believe the article says that the Universal rep was "Satisfied" not "very happy" as Intrigue has posted) with Serenity, it's only because their expectations were set very low for the movie. Looking in the scheme of things, for a movie that has such a ravenous fanbase from the series, it was a little disappointing to open without claiming number one. Think about Star Trek Nemesis. Expectations were already low for the film; this was the fourth film with the Next Generation cast so the steam was already lessened; it has a similar (yet much larger) ravenous fan base than Serenity..... and it made 18 million in it's opening weekend at a similar point in the season (Nemesis opened in March, Serenity opened in Sept/Oct - both are troughs in terms of the revenue generating seasons of the film year). Nemesis is for all practical purposes a flop, making 43 million in its boxoffice life despite a 60 million production budget. Looking at that perspective, Serenity isn't doing so hot (despite the Universal execs being "satisfied" - "Satisfied" in the polarized terms that Hollywood perfers to deal in simply means that "we're upset, but not enough to say anything about it"). Regardless, I still feel that Serenity is a success in many ways. Not many cancelled shows can convince a major studio to make a movie based on the concept let alone a special effects-ridden science fiction epic western (what an odd name for a genre, eh?). Also, sales of Firefly the complete series on DVD have doubled on Amazon.com since the films release meaning that the film likely reached individuals who had never seen Firefly but enjoyed Serenity enough to want to see more and how the story developed to that point. Serenity is in many ways successful, just not as successful we would hope. (Come on, you have to factor in the fact that B_W and I saw the film twice over the course of the opening weekend not to mention the countless others that we brought along and the film still only made 10 million? There should be more men like B_W!). |
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| Posted by: intrigue | Posted on: Monday October 3 2005 2:13pm |
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i just got this from nick in an email titled "have fun" i think you should all do the same www.cyborgname.com/index.php?acronym=&robotchoice=governor2k3 |
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| Posted by: nearscape | Posted on: Monday October 3 2005 1:14pm |
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Though I called it so, this saddens me. I mean, who wouldn't want more Firefly, like so: mp3-postcards.com/listen/?1010 But I think Tycho said it best when he pointed out that if Whedon wanted to expand his audience for the long haul, he probably shouldn't have started his movie franchise at the end. "It's best to think of it as the culmination of threads already introduced. It was not the rambunctious introductory romp, not the grim cliffhanger. I got the impression throughout that I was watching the "third movie," with the broadcast season in aggregate comprising the first two virtual films..." But who knows? It certainly isn't a failure. With that script, it's pretty obvious that he wasn't trying to cash in and "go big", in lieu of giving the fans what they wanted. |
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| Posted by: intrigue | Posted on: Monday October 3 2005 11:35am |
| from what box office mojo states, they expected sales like these, and are happy with the results. it is expected that the dvd sales will cause a small profit on the movie, and i guess they only sold .5 million dvd copies of the series, i must have gotten bad data before. the studio is also very happy with joss, it seems they like his style, and that very well might be related to the tricks that you mentioned. at 40 million a movie, i dont know if it is going to become a scifi franchise. It seems like the movie finished the story for us, and that will be the end of this universe, so sad. :-( | |
| Posted by: Peter | Posted on: Monday October 3 2005 11:11am |
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Intrigue, Unfortunately, the first weekend was really Serenity's best chance to win the crowds. If Serenity was #1 at the box office, it would really catch the public's attention. Unfortunately, it's #2 rating this weekend was a death sentence. While it did make 10 million back from a 39 million dollar budget (I have to hand it to Whedon, he thought of a lot of great ways to save money on effects shots and keep the production budget low - i.e. storms obscurring views outside the cockpit so that you don't have to comp a CG background in), next week it will suffer the same fate as Corpse Bride which dropped nearly 50% this week compared to its strong opening last weekend. Because Flightplan was number 1, it took precendence in media coverage. Case in point: CNN showing the weekend boxoffice breakdown showed clips from Flight Plan and only briefly mentioned Serenity in passing without so much as a number or media clip. Same thing with TMJ4 and WGN news this morning. In print media, pictures of Flight Plan overshadowed the solitary reference to Serenity in a chart showing the top 10 grossing pictures of the weekend. Flight Plan is getting a lot of free publicity and Serenity is being doomed to obscurity. While Serenity will most likely not be the blockbuster Universal, Joss Whedon, and many of us Spoolaners hoped it would be, it will most likely still garnish enough in box office earnings to merit a sequel. With luck and strong DVD sales of Serenity, we may yet see Firefly become the next Science Fiction franchise. |
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| Posted by: nearscape | Posted on: Monday October 3 2005 10:48am |
| I'm sorry, that last bit should be "TFC on Steam", as TFC on Source exists only in my wet dreams. | |
| Posted by: nearscape | Posted on: Monday October 3 2005 10:46am |
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Flash back, way back, to fresh and clean 1998. As a young man, I enjoyed the Tribes with my O'Donnell Hall neighbors, playing until the wee morn. However, there were days when the mortar spam, the Rollercoaster map voter, the disc-jumpers on Broadside, and the skiing heavies got me down, as my techniques were crude in the early days. Being shutout on Snowblind was quite a hit on the morale of the troops. Fortunately, there was a refuge for the downtrodden, and it was called Team Fortress Classic. Being weaned on the much faster and harsher Quake version, schooled by the likes of Grimslade, I found that I was a giant among toddlers in the Half-Life version. Which always proved an effective salve for damaged egos. Now here in the 2005, I enjoy the WoWs until those same wee hours, playing just as crudely compared to the macro kiddies and epic farmers. After getting WTFPWND on Arathi Basin by the damn dirty Horde Shamans, I'm sometimes feeling a little low. I'm happy to report that playing TFC on Source is just as effective at rectifying that as ever. |
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| Posted by: intrigue | Posted on: Monday October 3 2005 10:39am |
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checkout the mojo on serenity www.boxofficemojo.com/movies/?id=serenity.htm i guess it will take a while to catch on. |
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| Posted by: BIg_Whisky | Posted on: Monday October 3 2005 9:42am |
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I really enjoy the HL2 Day of Defeat. I played it forth last eve, and the action was both 'hot' and 'fresh'. Buy it forth for the event young people, you can't beat the value. B_W |
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| Posted by: B_W | Posted on: Saturday October 1 2005 2:21pm |
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So far Scared Gold has taken into question the character of one of my friends. I'm going to cry. Wait, no, I think the real answer is 'drink'. Thats' better. B_W |
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