I just heard about the most F-Ed up Jewish tradition on NPR. Apparently in some orthodox sects after circumcising a young child the Rabbi fills his mouth with alcohol and sticks the babies penis in his mouth to disinfect the wound.
Seriously, you couldn't just use a cup for that!?!?
And now several herpes related deaths in infants has been confirmed due to this practice.
The clock is a-tickin' for the lame duck Congress to take action.
The Senate passed a bill to extend Bush-era tax cuts for 98% of families while raising taxes on families with incomes over $250k/yr. Obama said that he will sign it once it is passed by the House.
Speaker Boehner is outraged, but some House Republicans are softening up to the measure. Assuming all House Democrats vote the bill up, they will require at least 26 Republicans to defect in order for the bill to pass. I think they might be able to accomplish that. It's all a matter of bringing the Senate-passed bill to a vote in the House. If passed, the bill is projected to reduce the federal deficit by $1 trillion over the next decade.
Boehner does not believe in raising taxes on anyone, even the upper 2%. He feels that we should instead cut government entitlement programs such as medicare and medicaid for the disabled, the elderly, and the poor. 56% of Americans support the Democrats' proposal. Obama has expressed a willingness to put even his 2010 healthcare law on the table for budget cuts.
Open your eyes, Boner. Your approval rating is abysmal, whereas the president's approval rating is at its highest point in over three years. You cannot pretend to be the voice of the American people when the only people you're looking out for are the wealthiest 2%, all while trying to cut off benefits to those who really need them: the disabled, the elderly, and the poor.
So... what will the House do? The ball is in their court.
I mean, there's still a large selection of documentaries (ranging from highly dubious to David Attenborough), and a nice selection of foreign movies (an oddity: a Japanese remake of "Ghost" http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ghost:_Moui...kishimetai ; this exists). However, it's missing a lot. It's like film companies are ONLY putting their garbage on the service these days. This is most notable with series. It's got the terrible sequels of everything, but not the awesome original. For example, it has Land Before Time 2-13 and the series, but not the only thing worth paying any attention to at all, the first one. Oh yay, you have Superman 4: The Quest for Peace. Oh! Let's not forget you have Batman and Robin, but no Batman by Tim Burton. Hey! It's every Highlander except the first one! Oh nice, Aladdin 4: Jafar May Need Glasses.
Somehow Netflix lost all their Disney movie rights, but don't you worry, they have ALL the ripoffs you remember your parents renting as a "consolation" from Blockbuster when the "real" movie was missing.
"Sorry honey they don't have Brave, but they have Kira the Brave! You can't won't tell the difference! The Princess and the Frog isn't here, but look at this one! It's the Frog Prince! The princess is still black so you know it's legit!" I won't subject a kid to these terrible knockoffs. Even as a kid I could see how cheap and sad those thing were.
I was all over the whole transition to digital distribution for music and movies. However, only music has really made the full transition. Movies are still in this bizarre world where studios are terrified to actually give out their licenses for any length of time (note to studios: the correct length of time is "until the unmaking of the universe").
Now that's an amazing final cover. Here's hoping they interview the cast of Full House again.
I have that first issue. I haven't received Nintendo Power in a long long time, since the N64 days in fact, but I want this final issue to go along with my old wrinkled first issue. I hope the poster has a map of the Zelda Skyward Sword overworld on the flip side.
Anyway, what to do from here? I really don't feel too sad about the magazine's end. It's time has come. There's no reason for a paper based magazine like that to exist any more. However, Nintendo could go digital, and the best place to start would be the Wii U and 3DS. The Wii U community is an amazing concept which needs to get back ported to the 3DS. Once that's done, "Nintendo Power" becomes a central tower in that community. I envision "letters to the editor", preview columns, a showcase of fan art (the community is already a big showcase for fanart, but it doesn't stick around forever, an online Nintendo Power presence would keep it around), staff and player reviews, submitted tips and tricks, and even contests.
Then there's the other part of Nintendo Power, which is their guides and maps. These can be the part that people are charged to get. Due to it being online, these can be full guides for the big name games. Users can request the guides they want to see most, and they shall receive. The guide can be displayed on the bottom pad via the "home" interface in such a way as to not interfere with what's currently on the screen (even allowing the game to keep going while in that home screen), which would easily simulate one of the advantages of a magazine. Heck, let players pull up side by side pages and maps to compare and contrast, and even scribble extra notes of their own. Go all out!
Along those lines, Nintendo has a vast back catalog of Nintendo Power issues and guides at their disposal. Let's make these all available for purchase. Or, alternatively, sort the articles based on the games they are about and include all their material when someone purchases the game from the virtual console store.
This could be huge if done right, and would make Nintendo Power a truly community experience and a pillar of the Nintendo experience once again.
Posted by: Dark Jaguar - 29th November 2012, 10:23 PM - Forum: Tendo City
- No Replies
Crashmo just recently came out on the 3DS eShop. It's the sequel to Pushmo, a game I got last year but I don't think I talked about it.
They are puzzle games designed by Intelligent Systems, and fitting that pedigree they are both amazing games. The whole "feel" of it is something like a PBS edutainment cartoon, very warm and fuzzy. The "plot" of the first one is getting kids down from park rides (Crashmo involves getting birds back so a little girl can fly home). So yeah, very sweet.
Intelligent Systems basically has proven there is still a lot of life left in the "block puzzle" genre. The basic premise of Pushmo is that there is a completely flat panel at the "back" of each level, and you need to pull out "blocks" (as far as you want, it stretches) from these panels to form a platform to reach the kids at the top. They get incredibly clever by the end.
Crashmo instead has blocks of fixed shape falling from the sky. Pulling blocks from below causes blocks to fall down above and shoving blocks into other blocks will push them along. (There are exceptions to this with odd blocks like "flying blocks".)
In both cases, the games are amazingly addictive. Each stage can be quick or can stump you for a long time. One thing's for sure, there's really no temptation to check out "solutions", as solving puzzles is the entire game.
There is a puzzle builder mode in both games, and constructed puzzles can be shared as 2D dot codes (QR codes).
I'd highly recommend these games to anyone that has a 3DS. They're incredibly addictive and very fun.
Now, recent models of the Wii have already ditched Gamecube support so this revision's lack of it isn't surprising. It also lacks Wifi, but still has USB ports so it should still be able to connect online with one of those LAN adapters (I use one myself on the Wii U in fact, it's just a quicker and more stable connection, though not everyone has LAN ports run through their home).
Notably, this console has a very different design than either the Wii or Wii U, or even the 3DS XL. In fact, I'd describe it as EXTREMELY 80's, looking almost like the Famicom. It's been a while since I've seen that sort of very "rough" plastic (not just matte, very intentionally gritty), and that duel color thing it's got going, black and red, very 80's indeed.
Hopefully this thing will be labelled to prevent parents from buying it when they already own an older Wii.
