‘Apocalypto’ is no more Racist than ‘300’

Seems like Mel Gibson has been made public enemy number one, an Assistant Professor of Central American Studies at CSUN is claiming that Mel attacked her (which was true enough). Of course she leaves out the part of pushing Mel to his absolute limits, heckling him and trying to challenge him on the historical accuracies of a fictional movie.

When Iranians claim that ‘300’ portrays them in a negative light people get pissed off and yell out the old ‘it’s just a movie’, well yes, it is a movie, as is Apocalypto, yet it looks like some people just don’t get that.

In this video Alicia Estrada goes on and on about how the movie is inaccurate about how many Mayan scholars contest its factuality about how it offended the Mayan community, how it is wrong for it to portray the Mayan community in the way it did.

News flash, it’s a movie, Iranians aren’t ogre’s and ancient Mayans weren’t blood thirsty tyrants, the problem comes in when people start seeing fiction as fact and in that regard I completely agree with Alicia Estrada, that such movies may through fictional portrayals may influence hate against groups.

However, who will be stupid enough to buy into fiction and treat it as reality? Those who do are dumb enough already, they are the same people who want to hate for the sake of hate, who have a prejudice hard coded into their pea brains.

It isn’t nice having your culture portrayed as evil, believe me I know, but at the same time it isn’t nice heckling a short tempered film maker on the merits of something that’s fictional. Of course it doesn’t excuse said short tempered film maker from telling you to f off, but he sure had its reasons.

Zune is For the Long Term

People were quick to dismiss the Zune as just an iPod copycat, a product of Microsoft's greed to attain a monopoly in everything and a subsequent failure at that. Perhaps we were too quick to judge, just like how the original Xbox made the impression that Microsoft is a greedy monopoly and was a failure with consoles, now, a few years on, who knows where we would be with only the Playstation 3 to provide the HD fix many gamers yearn for.

With the announcement of the iPhone Apple is beginning to show the exact same symptoms that Sony has been showing as of late, a disconnection from the consumer caused by arrogance, the false impression of being the perfect company where all the consumers are devoted followers. This kind of arrogance comes from years of market dominance.

Every new generation of the iPod seems to be simple iterative improvements with no indications of any radical shift in philosophy or any major innovations and with the announcement of the heavily business oriented iPhone it is quite clear the market is becoming saturated with the same products over and over. This has created a desire for disturbance in the market and if a company can successfully capitalize on such an opportunity it would meet with a lot of consumer interest, i.e. they'll sell bucket loads of their product.

For Microsoft there are two problems, two problems it had once faced before with its foray into console gaming, that is, of its name and its goal. Lets face it, Microsoft thanks to its flagship product, 'Windows', has established a reputation of being a greedy monopoly and has as such created the general impression of being built atop cursed human souls. Microsoft's other problem is its goal, it is setting itself up very high, almost guaranteed failure. Microsoft is trying to beat the iPod with the Zune, Microsoft is trying to beat the iPod with the Zune, are we understood?

With the Xbox it took Microsoft a good three years before establishing itself as a viable competitor, an underdog, but a competitor none the less. How can Microsoft prove it can take it to Apple the same way it did with Sony? What did Microsoft do in those three years to establish itself as a viable competitor against Sony? It proved to the consumer that it could create good games for its console and that it could create experiences that you wouldn't get on other consoles, namely Xbox Live. That was Microsoft's disturbance in the video gaming world, now the competitors are stumbling over each other trying to catch up to it and match it.

The Zune's disturbance is quite clear, Web 2.0, sharing, personalizing, expanding, with the help of other Zune users. The first generation Zune's music sharing feature seems to be the only thing thats going for it in terms of socializing and web 2.0 philosophy, however Microsoft has plans to expand on that, from Xbox Live connectivity to podcasting, it is in Microsoft's intention to live up to its target of creating a social environment where all users can be a part of the marketing engine not just through passive word of mouth of how cool the Zune is but through actual interactions with the product.

Of course the goal is ambitious, but it is good, it is needed, because without Microsoft there would be no competitor against Apple, any market that is left to be dominated by one brand is an exploited market, love or hate Microsoft what they are doing is competing and giving consumers choices and showing them potential, whether they deliver on the potential is another matter entirely, that will be the cause of concern in the coming years, not days, weeks or months.

Nintendo Wii Harder to Find than Playstation 3 - in Australia

Well the Playstation 3 just launched, I guess it has sold heaps and heaps, but you probably know that isn't the truth, hardly, there are more Playstation 3's on store shelves than there are Wii's.

It's available at the following locations at the popular 'Dick Smith' electronics retailer:

NT:- Mitchell Centre DSE NSW/ACT:- Armidale DSE, Auburn Powerhouse, Bankstown PowerHouse, Batemans Bay DSE, Bondi Junction DSE, Bowral DSE, Campbelltown DSE, Chatswood PowerHouse, Chullora Showroom DSE, DSE Nowra (FRN), Eastgardens DSE, Erina PowerHouse, Fairfield DSE, Glendale DSE, Greenhills DSE, Hornsby DSE, Kotara DSE, Lismore DSE, Macarthur Square Powerhouse, Macquarie Centre PowerHouse, Mid City Centre DSE, Moore Park PowerHouse, Muswellbrook DSE, Neutral Bay DSE, Newcastle DSE, North Parramatta PowerHouse, North Sydney DSE, Parramatta Westfield DSE, Penrith PowerHouse, Queanbeyan DSE, Rhodes DSE, Rockdale DSE, Shellharbour DSE, St Ives DSE, Tuggeranong DSE, Warringah Mall PowerHouse, Woden PowerHouse VIC:- Altona DSE, Ballarat DSE, Bourke Street DSE, Box Hill DSE, Broadmeadows DSE, Carnegie PowerHouse, Fountain Gate PowerHouse, Frankston DSE, Geelong PowerHouse, Greensborough DSE, Highpoint DSE, Highpoint PowerHouse, Knox City PowerHouse, Melbourne Strand DSE, Mildura DSE, Niddrie DSE, Northland DSE, Nunawading PowerHouse, Preston PowerHouse, Ringwood DSE, Shepparton DSE, Southland PowerHouse, Sunshine DSE, Victoria Gardens DSE, Werribee DSE QLD:- Booval DSE, Brisbane City DSE, Browns Plains DSE, Kingaroy DSE, Kippa Ring DSE, Springwood Powerhouse, Underwood DSE, Yamanto DSE SA:- Arndale DSE, Elizabeth City DSE, Glenelg DSE, Marion DSE, Myer Centre Adelaide DSE WA:- Belmont-WA DSE, Booragoon, Garden City-WA DSE, Claremont DSE, Fremantle DSE, Karrinyup DSE, Midland DSE, Morley DSE, Perth City DSE, Rockingham DSE TAS:- Glenorchy DSE, Hobart DSE, Launceston DSE.

Thats OK I guess, plenty of stores have it in stock, and what about the Wii?

NSW/ACT:- Armidale DSE, Auburn Powerhouse, Bankstown PowerHouse, Batemans Bay DSE, Bondi Junction DSE, Bowral DSE, Chatswood PowerHouse, Erina PowerHouse, Fairfield DSE, Glendale DSE, Greenhills DSE, Hornsby DSE, Liverpool DSE, Macarthur Square Powerhouse, Macquarie Centre PowerHouse, Moore Park PowerHouse, Muswellbrook DSE, Neutral Bay DSE, North Parramatta PowerHouse, Parramatta Westfield DSE, Penrith PowerHouse, Rockdale DSE, Roselands DSE, Shellharbour DSE, St Ives DSE, Tuggeranong DSE, Warringah Mall PowerHouse, Woden PowerHouse, York & Barrack DSE VIC:- Altona DSE, Ballarat DSE, Bendigo DSE, Bourke Street DSE, Box Hill DSE, Carnegie PowerHouse, Dandenong DSE, Fountain Gate PowerHouse, Geelong PowerHouse, Greensborough DSE, Highpoint PowerHouse, Knox City PowerHouse, Malvern DSE, Mildura DSE, Northland DSE, Nunawading PowerHouse, Preston PowerHouse, Southland PowerHouse, Sunbury DSE, Werribee DSE QLD:- Booval DSE, DSE Bundaberg (FRN), Earlville DSE, Kingaroy DSE, Kippa Ring DSE, Noosa DSE, Springwood Powerhouse, Yamanto DSE SA:- Arndale DSE, Elizabeth City DSE, Marion DSE, Myer Centre Adelaide DSE, Westlakes DSE WA:- Belmont-WA DSE, Claremont DSE, Fremantle DSE, Midland DSE, Rockingham DSE TAS:- Hobart DSE, Launceston DSE.

I actually recall at about three weeks after the Wii launch only three stores had 'two or less' in stock, bare in mind the Playstation 3 has just launched here and more stores still have it in stock than the Nintendo Wii.

Must Have Firefox Add-ons

Sometimes you have this thing, and you love it, it’s simple, gets things done. The problem is, you somehow cease trying to get more out of it, you think you’ve seen all there is to see about it or are under the delusion that you should be content with what you have.

Obviously you are mistaken, you shouldn't be content with what you have, you shouldn't be happy with a bare bones browser called Firefox, you should want more out of it, Mozilla wants you to have more out of it, thats why Mozilla lets people make add-ons for Firefox.

Here are a collection of cool add-ons you will learn to love,

Cooliris Preview: Lets you load pages simply by rolling the mouse over the Cooliris logo next to links, saves the hassle of continually clicking on 'back' when looking for something on Google for instance.

Download Embedded: Download embedded flash content from websites (does not work for videos such as Google Video or YouTube, sorry).

Fast Video Download: Hah! thought the open source community was going to let you down? Never! Fast Video Download lets you download embedded videos from sites such as YouTube and Google Video.

Gmail Space: Allows you to use your Gmail space as an online hard drive for file storage.

Update Scanner: For sites that don't provide RSS feeds Update Scanner notifies you of updates.

Page Title Eraser: Hides the webpages title for greater 'privacy' in the workspace.

Session Saver: Restores your browser exactly as you left it, your tabs will be saved (at long last), even a crash won't break it. You can create several sessions for different reasons you use Firefox (one for social bookmarking sites and the other for work).

TorrentBar: Allows you to instantly search through several major bittorrent sites.

iMacros for Firefox: This add-on is apparently useful for lots of things, especially for web developers however I just use it for its automatatic filling out of webform (such as forum signups) and for the password manager.

Yoono: Web 2.0 in a Firefox add-on, users suggest websites you should visit from the current webpage you are on, for instance, if someone if you are on ign.com a Yoono user may suggest gamespot.com.

Oblivion PS3/Xbox 360 Side by Side Comparisons

Looks like the folks at Bethesda Game Studios done a good job enhancing 'Elders Scrolls: Oblivion' for the Playstation 3, the textures are crisper, both up close and off in the distance (thanks to a re-worked LOD system) the lighting on the weapons is far better and it seems like the pop-in distance has been upped a few notches.

These screenshots were taken from the HD video comparison hosted on GameTrailers.





There are some other small differences between images such as the slightly sharper resolution of the textures on the ground and the bigger difference is the way the LOD system gradually decreases detail over distance on the Playstation 3 version as opposed to the Xbox 360 which has a sudden drop in detail creating a distorted and ugly look.

Some of the screenshots come down to a matter of preference, the Xbox 360 has fuller colours but the Playstation 3 has a gray overtone making it look more realistic. On the whole it doesn't look like theres a significant difference between either versions.

The new Oblivion patch for the Xbox 360 has been released which is supposed to get the game up to the Playstation 3's level, the above screenshots were taken from a vanilla version of Oblivion. If you have Xbox Live and have installed the Oblivion patch you aren't missing out on much as the textures and slightly more advanced shader algorithms in the patch should also be bumped up sufficiently.

Playstation 3 Compatibility Results Are In

Full Compatibility List

If you're into 'going commando' you might as well just take your cyanide pill now and get it over with, but if you're an aspiring god of war then you may end up sitting on that throne in upscaled 1080p glory (pending the firmware supports it).

GRAND THEFT AUTO: SAN ANDREAS may be having a few problems, the compatibility chart says it will play with noticeable issues (most likely framerate and artificat problems). The Gran Turismo series should work with a few minor issues too.

In terms of RPG's you're out of luck, Final Fantasy's 10 and X-2 will both run with lots of apparent issues, 12 and Grandia will play with minor issues. Only the SCES-50971 Kingdom Hearts will run with no issues werein the other versions run with lots of apparent issues.

Devil May Cry 1 and 3 will work just fine but 2 may have some issues, God of War 1 and 2 will run with no known issues (yay). Resident Evil 4 SLES-53756 will run with a few issues and the other versions will run with with lots of noticeable issues.

In the world of Ratchet and Clank as well as Jak and Daxter you are completely out of luck, no titles from either of the franchises are compatible at all.

Still, espionage types should breathe a sigh of relief, Metal Gear Solid is fully compatible... that is if you have the Subsistence version, only the SLES-82032 of 'Snake Eater' is fully compatible and the other versions will run with noticeable issues.

If you're into pulling guitar strings you might want to consider quitting, nope, Guitar Hero isn't compatible either.

A Closer Look at the 'Precipice' Trailer

From the trailer and previous Penny-Arcade stories it is apparent 'Precipice' will center around giant robots.

Or just something really, really, big (original screenshots can be found here).


There is also an instance of multiple Gabe's appearing in the same screenshot, I don't know what this goes to say but we'll see when we see...


Finally, a potentially in-game screenshot suggesting an RTS/RPG mechanic.