As I was rummaging around Youtube in search of potential clips to use on this blog, I noticed that the interface and iconography of the site had changed.
Not only that, they changed A LOT.
Seriously man, I don’t know if it’s just me and my extraordinarily inflexible ways, but I took one look at the new landing page and said to myself:
“Goddamnit, now I have no fuckin’ clue where anything is.”
From a purely aesthetic standpoint, I don’t have much of a beef with the new layout… Other than the fact that it seems extremely Hulu-esque:
Pictured: An example of the Hulu interface.
Even so, the whole thing is very clean and decidedly “web 2.0” in nature, however it’s hard not to look at the landing page and feel it’s more than a little too cluttered.
Such is the nature of the “look at me/my shit matters” age of social networking.
In the eyes of one such as myself, who has been fortunate to have witnessed the rapid evolution of the internet since the early 90’s, design such as this seems loud and oversaturated with content.
To someone who fucks around with their Twitter, Facebook, Youtube, Southpark Studios, and World of Warcraft accounts all at the same fuckin’ time though, I’d imagine the new Youtube layout seems plain and/or simple.
Like I said, honestly, I’ve not problem with the new design scheme.
Mostly I’m just upset that the new landing page seems to feed me nothing but “trending” shit and sponsored videos.
I’ve always liked Youtube’s recommended videos on their landing page, but as of now, I’ve yet to find that feature in the layout.
All I see is a recommended topics section, and from what I can tell, using said feature requires visiting individual pages dedicated to extremely broad search topics, resulting in more results being yielded, but with less relevance overall.
Again, having 200 loosely relevant videos shoveled onto your plate might do it for some people, but personally, but not me.
As in most cases when familiar things are given major overhauls, my negative opinion of this new layout will likely pass with time.
I can remember feeling uneasy behind the controls of basically every single game in the Fight Night franchise, and yet with every successive release, I find myself acclimating to the mechanics to the point of being unable to go back to the previous iterations of the game.
My greatest hope this will end up being the case with the new Youtube, as recently I’ve had a pretty good system going for mining the site for blog worthy content.
For now though, I’m about 5 minutes from pulling one of these:
Part of me wants to say I never want to explore the depths of MANLINESS again.
Fortunately, the other, less fruity parts of me forced me to spend my first day free of the MANLIEST MAN MOMENTS list inevitably trolling the internet for more MANLINESS.
That being said, I really don’t have anything substantial to write about at the moment, so you guys’ll have to make due with the results of my search.
Ladies and gentleman, I present to you Sean Connery in song form:
Heavy Rain is one of those games that I’ve been this close to picking up for a long time now.
Essentially a long-form interactive cutscene/choose your adventure game, the game has always struck me as an intriguing, if not unique; gaming experience.
While I’ve heard many complain about Heavy Rain’s slow start, and distinctly hands-off approach to gameplay; based on the hour or so I’ve seen of the game, I feel that my personal opinion of the game remains mostly positive.
It’s taken me a long time, but recently I’ve come to realize that I tend to favor games that tell stories, even if said games can often be intensely linear or tedious.
I’m a completist, so open world games tend to intimidate me with the breadth of options they present to me.
At the same time, first-person shooters tend to bore me with their largely one-note gameplay mechanics and twitch oriented gameplay.
These days, story driven action-adventure games with a clear cut A-B-C progression seem to be my what appeals to me.
While it’s supposedly very far from a linear experience, the core concept and mechanics of Heavy Rain appeal to me for perhaps the simplest, and most base of reasons:
The objective of the game lies within unraveling it’s story, a story that I just happen to be somewhat interested in.
While I probably will in fact get around to playing Heavy Rain at some point, the real point of this post concerns a little blip I happened on Kotaku.com.
Apparently someone went out of their way to create a 12 hour playthrough of Heavy Rain, with the strictly gameplay oriented segments removed in favor of presenting the story in a straightforward cinematic fashion.
Think of it as viewing Heavy Rain as if it were a long-ass movie or TV series.
Here’s a link, and bear in mind this is a playthrough, so be ready for *EVERY HEAVY RAIN SPOILER IMAGINABLE*:
Anyway, while I myself won’t be viewing this playthrough, for fear of spoiling the gameplay experience for myself; it does in fact sound like the kind of thing I would watch after I’ve played through the game once or twice.
In any case, consider this post a heads-up for those who might be interested in checking out something like this.
One thing that’s kind of neat about a project like this, is the fact that the game is known to contain so many branching paths, making for a video compilation that very well may differ drastically from the gameplay experience of those who’ve played through Heavy Rain following a different route.
Anyway, that’s all I’ve got for tonight, see yah’ tomorrow!
You’ll have to forgive my laziness, as after spending 2 hours on the freeway just to get home from work; I really just can’t summon the strength to write anything clever or remotely interesting this evening.
Anyway, hopefully you enjoyed the video above, as I’ve found it always puts a smile on my face whenever I watch it.
Hopefully tomorrow I’ll get around to posting the Top 5 Jackie Chan Songs That Keep The Azn Badger From Stabbing People for yah’.
Such passion! How could anyone not like him?
Regardless, sorry for the retarded/non-existent post.
I played the original Final Fantasy as a kid, and simply couldn’t get into it.
Similar to my experiences with the Zelda series, I felt I never knew what to do, or where to go, ultimately resulting in me wandering the landscape for a time, only to run into a pack of imps and get my party of green-as-fuck level 1 heroes ass-fucked into oblivion.
That's a lot of Imps...
To this day, I haven’t played a new Final Fantasy since VIII, and I haven’t truly enjoyed any since VI.
Yeah, VI was the shit…
Name another game where you can Suplex a fuckin' Train. I dare you.
That being said, my lack of appreciation for the Final Fantasy series is what places “The Prelude,” a classic of gaming music history as old as myself; so low on this list.
It’s a beautiful, almost whimsical piece of music, that certainly still endures to this day, but to me; it’s just the title theme of a game I hated as a kid.
Did I mention all the fanboys can suck a big fat Blackanese cock?
Seriously man, the guys over at Technos deserve a fuckin’ Earth Badge for everything they put into The City of River Ransoming, ’cause the whole game is a work of genius.
Unlike this man, who is sadly, NOT a Real Genius...
You take Double FUCKIN’ Dragon, which is already BADASS as is, then throw in some AWESOMELY shitty dialogue and a leveling/shopping system, and you’ve got the AWESOMELY FUCKIN’ BADASS game that is River City Ransom!
Game writing at it's finest.
Excuse me, I think I just came in my pants…
*Ahem!* Anyway, River City Ransom was, and is, an awesome game that I spent hours upon hours playing in my youth.
That being said, though there are many great pieces of memorable music in the game, most notably the standard street brawling theme and the shopping music, I feel that the track that best represents the game, is “The Boss Theme.”
Full of energy and pulse-pounding drama, “The Boss Theme” invokes all of the emotions that a boss theme should.
The only other track that could possibly eclipse it, is the River City Ransom version of the Double Dragon theme, though that loses out by a hair due to the fact that, well, the Double Dragon theme actually sounds a whole lot better in the Double Dragon series than it does here…
#18. Snow Bros.
“Stage 1 Theme”
You knew they were gonna’ pop on the list somewhere, but did you really think the crack covered snow men would rank so low?
When forming this list, I did what I could to check my ego at the door and really try and place these tracks appropriately.
While I love Snow Bros., and all of it’s music, deep down I knew that, musically speaking; it’s far from a work of art.
Unlike THIS, which is... Probably the most terrifying thing I've ever laid eyes upon...
As mentioned in my Snow Bros. article, the “Stage 1 Theme” is a piece of music that I hummed throughout my childhood, such that my mother still knows the tune to this day.
It’s a wonderfully light piece of cutesy music that has a “rotundness” to it that really goes well with the chubbiness and slow-footed nature of the title characters.
I love the “Stage 1 Theme,” and it pains me to place it at #18, but sadly I simply can’t justify placing it any higher.
*Sniff!* Fuckin’ principles n’shit, makin’ me shit on Snow Bros…
#17. Battletoads
“The Battletoads Theme”
There are few 8-bit era themes as rockin’ and kick-ass as “The Battletoads Theme,” and by golly, I love every note of it.
It was tempting to put the stupid-ass “Pause Screen” music on the list as another joke entry akin to Skate or Die 2, however I managed to restrain myself.
Pictured: The Ninja Turtles for the UFC generation...
That being said, while very little of it actually came to fruition, the Battletoads were, at one point; in line to get their own cartoon, comic book, and action figures.
Because my brother and I had a subscription to Gamepro (back when it was actually good), we caught word of this very early on, and in fact were treated to a some of the early comics printed in the pages of the magazine.
Yeah, something tells me it was a GOOD thing this never got aired...
Needless to say, the Battletoads, despite starring in a series of games that were frustratingly difficult, were pushed on me pretty aggressively as a kid.
Whoever was head of the marketing department for the Battletoads deserves a pat on the back, ’cause despite having little to no positive memories of any Battletoads games, the ‘toads still have a place in my heart.
A lot of my love for the Battletoads though, springs from the awesomeness of their theme music, which is why it sits comfortably on this list at #17.
#16. StarTropics
“Dungeon Theme”
StarTropics was and is, a tremendously fun, rewarding, and unique game.
While I never actually beat it, (got close though) I have many fond memories of watching my brother play it day in and day out.
I loved the world map, and how it reminded me of Hawaii.
Heh heh, it's funny 'cause it's butt...
I loved the goofy noise the submersible made when it dived.
Most of all though, I loved the straightforward nature of the action levels and the “Dungeon Theme” that played over them.
The “Dungeon Theme” was unique in that, while most of environments that the action scenes took place in were scary looking caves, the music was very upbeat.
It had an island, almost calypso feel to it that really got you into the action, while giving everything a colorful and inviting feel to it.
It also did well to set up the drastic change in musical tonality that would occur when the “you’re getting close to the boss” music would transition over it.
Startropics is a game series that I could see myself sitting down and playing through someday.
It’s also a series that I sincerely hope gets a continuation or remake at some point.
Here’s to hoping for a return trip to C-Island someday…
Mike Jones: Adventurer, Hero, and Banana Holding Buffoon.
Thus concludes the slightly-higher-than-bottom tier of the Azn Badger’s Top 25 NES Tracks!
Check back tomorrow when we finally start getting to the good stuff in the middle-tier of the list!
Let it be known folks, I hate stage 5 of Contra III.
Don’t get me wrong, I love this game; but stage 5 can eat a dick.
And not in the fun way mind you...
It can put a penis in it’s mouth, chew it to shit, and swallow for all I care, ’cause stage 5 is a sack of fuck-sauce that I’d prefer not to touch with a 10 foot pole.
That being said, I had a little meltdown (or 12) during the recording of this video, so please excuse the harshness of my words.
Enjoy watching, knowing full well how much I was forced to suffer to produce it:
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