Takedown

I've taken down all of my novels off of the Kindle store, mainly due to poor sales. I've sold maybe four copies in two years, without seeing a dime. To continue sales, I'd have to give all of my tax information, which I'm not about to do for a whopping $0 and 0 cents. Apparently, there's a deadline set for giving over all of my info to the U.S. government, despite not being an American, and despite the fact that the N.S.A. already has all that information and all of my dick pics, (I go by the name Carlos Danger on chat sites).

GTA Cover Chicks

 
GTA V is still weeks away from being released, but I'm going to go ahead and call it that the bikini chick is nowhere in the game. Why?

 
Lolipop chick wasn't in the game.
I
Martini girl wasn't in the game.
There were alway prositutes/bikini girls in the past decade of GTA games, but they were never true to the art in the load menus, promos, and covers for the game. Why? The series never shied away from overt sexuality. It even produced, "The Ballad of Gay Tony," expansion pack for GTA IV, which wasn't really about Gay Tony. Look at the cover for GTA IV. Everything else is in that game, including the gondolas, which weren't a big draw to begin with. (Do you even remember the gondolas? They were available.) The chick with the lolipop isn't. Apparently an NPC licking a lolipop was too much for the Next-Gen technology to handle, but gondolla rides weren't. .
Also, as for the selfie girl in GTA V: How is she taking that selfie? She's on a beach. There's no mirrors nearby, and she's using a cell. Is someone taking a pic of her posing as she taking a pic of them?It's GTA V, by the way, and she's flashing the peace sign, which is also the number, "2." What if she were flashing five fingers? No? Too stupid? What about three for all three playable characters in the game... What? I'm fired? Well FUCK YOU TOO! I SHIT IN YOUR COFFEE THIS MORNING!

De-Manning

Bradley Manning, after being convicted for 35 years for treason (instead of being executed like in ye olden times) now says that he's a she, and to call him Chelsea. The media is going along with it to such an extent that they no longer call him a "he" or, "Bradley," although he is still legally a "he" and named, "Bradley."

Cue, "Dude Looks Like a Lady."
I don't understand the sensitivity to a man who endangered countless lives and threw his own freedom away by leaking sensitive documents. If Bennedict Arnold had told everyone he wanted to be called, "Fanny McGina," and that General George Washington shoudl pay for his boob job and give him kisses, do you think the Founding Fathers would be on board with that? I know Jefferson would be all over that, but not the rest. Manning is essentially a less murderous Wild Bill.

The fact he pulled this gender card out of his sleeve after the trial is off-setting. Does he think he's a hero for people with gender issues? Heroes don't typically sell out their own country with Lady Gaga CDs. He also wants the government to pay for his gender reassignment when they're already paying for his room and board for the next 35 years. I'm not sure if he's trying to get sent to a different prison, or that he realizes he's going to be a fish and wants to make it as appealing as possible to the other guy. Either way, his genitals are in some trouble.

Explaining Ben Affleck Rage

The internet has imploded from the number of posts about Ben Affleck playing Batman in the next movie. People are angry and talking about breaking away and forming a new society. (If you haven't heard about it, you're not invited.) Why are people angry? Because it's Ben Affleck and because it's Batman. By law, these things are supposed to be kept seperate.

If you don't think Ben Affleck playing Batman will be a big deal, let me let you in on something that almost happened:

This is an image of Nick Cage in a moulded latex Superman costume. His hair is, quite possibly, a bird. Your arguement is irrelevant. This photo exists because Nick Cage was, at one point, going to play Superman, but he couldn't be bothered to take off the hippie necklace to take this tester. That's his level of commitment to playing the character. Still, Nick Cage is fucking serious about Superman. His son's name is Kal-El. He owns Adventure Comics #1 despite being broke. The only reason the movie wasn't made was because the production was run into the ground by terrible scripts and cokehead producers, which means Nick got the green-light.
Flash-forward into an alternate universe where Nick Cage and Ben Affleck play Superman and Batman in the same movie, together. That sensation in your stomach right now is fear.

Ben Aflek as Batman is the Worst Travesty of All Time

Did no one see Daredevil? Did anyone think it was good? It wasn't. Nothing about it was good. It even led to a worse spin-off movie for Jennifer Garner that was so bad I walked out on it... and it was a DVD. I walked out of my own house, still playing Elektra, just to get away from it.
I don't give a rat's ass if Aflek is now an Oscar calibre director. That has nothing to do with being Batman. He was already Daredevil: a costumed vigilante who uses ninja skills to avenge his parent's death by beating up dispondent street thugs. They both even have horns on their cowls and refuse to use guns and refuse to kill bad guys no matter how much sense it makes. They're the same fucking character, except for a trust fund and super-senses. There was evena plotline where Batman was blind like Daredevil. Aflek was Daredevil and he blew it. He even had Kevin Smith as a best friend who wrote a lot of the Daredevil comics. Those comic were conisdered good. Kevin Smith also wrote for Batman. Those comics were considered bad.Batman peeing his pant bad.

That's bad. Inexusably bad. So he's getting less valid pointers from his protege. Also, he has to portray Batman that's distinct from the other five other itterations. He can't be kampy or gritty.
Aflek as Daredevil had the bonus of playing a blind character, so he could stare off in the distance and not emote properly while saying things like, "I'm not the bad guy." He still blew it. Now he's going to rake in millions upon millions of dollars for getting buff and grumbling his dialogue, because, "Hollywood."
When will it all end?

Dog Bites Man

While playing Assassin's Creed III, I came across a "meme" of sorts that's been prominent in video games over the last generation. That is: wild animals and dogs can inflict more damage on your character than knives and bullets. 

In games that boast their, "realism," wolves can own you, while your character ignores bullet wounds to the head. I've had entire rows of soldiers line up and shoot me as one, only to walk away, or fight my way through while being stabbed in the kidneys. A wolf, on the other hand, can kill you in one or two bites to the arm.

This is a prominent feature of most games containing wild animals and hunting, like Far Cry 3 and Red Dead Redemption. In Red Dead Redemption, any wild cat can basically insta-kill you. Your super-macho character is less likely to survive an attack than you are in real life. 

The Call of Duty franchise is by far the worst offender, where in multiplayer unleashing the dog attack is second only to unleashing a nuke. Once you hear the dogs barking, you're screwed. If you see one, you have exactly a split second to aim and open fire at this scud missile with fur on it. 

 

On the other hand, in games like Skyrim, Fallout 3, and Minecraft where you have dogs and wolves as pets that can fight for you, those dogs are incredibly likely to be killed instantly by you with a misplaced blow. I don't know anyone that's accidentally shot their own dog... ever. Even Dick Cheney hasn't. In other games like Fable II and Fable III, your dog is basically immortal... until he's not. In Nintendogs, you have all the responsibilities of being a dog owner without any risks of mortality.

I'm basically just pointing out that no one has gotten dogs and animals right in a video game yet.

Two Kings

Now that the Xbox 360 and the PS3 are nearing the end of their cycles and soon to be replaced by the next generation, perhaps it's appropriate to look back at their biggest innovations, which incidentally were also their biggest failures.
In the beginning, there was little else to do on the 360 and the PS3 besides playing games. They both flaunted the next generation of home video, yet they chose rival formats. Sony put a Blu-Ray player into their system, back when Blu-ray players were otherwise expensive to buy on their own. In the eyes of some consumers, the PS3 became a somewhat reasonably priced Blu-ray player with a video game console attached to it. Microsoft chose the now extinct brand of HD DVD, which didn't come pre-installed with the system, but the hardware could be purchased at an additional cost, negating the early price difference between the two systems. Sony easily won this leg of the race, but flash-forward to today and try finding a Blockbuster. Nobody cares about Blu-ray anymore when there's Netflix, or computers. Discs are dead. Even physical video game stores are suffering and on the verge of collapsing.
That was the other odd thing about the two rivals was their "Elite" models that featured 250 GB hard drives. In the beginning, there was scarcely any use for these. The hard drive was necessary for downloading arcade games from their online marketplaces, but in the early days these games were little more than today's apps. There were even limits on the amount of MB these games could take up, meaning you were getting about 1/6th or less of the data a physical disc could take up. Theoretically, some people could upload their music collection onto the system as well, but at the time the biggest iPod held 80GB of data. It wasn't until the past couple of years that the market really opened up to 6 GB+ games and apps, and now 250 GB doesn't seem like enough.
Avatars evolved over the course of the two systems as well. The 360 issued cartoony looking avatars that served little purpose. They could be used in a small selection of games, as well as in your profile. The market for avatar items seems to have more selection than the indie game selection, and costs more. On the other side, the PS3 introduced HOME, which is like a pseudo Second Life using a personalized avatar. People seemed to largely ignore it's existence. Both these implementations trailed the also-ran Wii with their much less detailed, yet more iconic Miis.
The "motion control" push a few years back didn't do much. The Kinect seemed revolutionary... until it came out. People realized how clunky it was, if not outright annoying and useless. People went up in arms when they heard the upgraded Kinect was mandatory with the Xbox One, which should tell you how well it did. The games for the Kinect all seemed as though they were for little kids, and they were. Microsoft was absolutely committed to the Kinect, though, and remodeled the 360 interface around it. The most useful aspect of the Kinect seemed to be browsing the home menu if you were too lazy to find your controller. The price-point was high was as expensive as buying a Wii. The Move controllers for PS3 had the same fate as the Kinect. They were basically glowing microphone-shaped Wiimotes that could only be used on a handful of games aimed at kids. Unlike the stand-alone Kinect, you had to have multiple controllers for more people to play. Both entries seemed as if they were just trying to win over gamers from the Wii, which was largely collecting dust.
Before that, though, both systems had a camera attachment you could buy separately. The 360 had the Live Vision Camera, which could be used for capturing videos for apps and games. Same for the Playstation Eye, which never really caught on. These were both extra bells and whistles peripherals, and not part of the main line-up.
Strangely, the biggest failure for the 360 was the faceplate. On the original consoles, you could switch out and get custom faceplates, much like a case for a cellphone. It absolutely did not get off the ground. Few people probably ever realized it was even removable. They tried to create a secondary market that never came to be.

The Least Useful Assassin's Creed Skills

The Assassin's Creed video-game series has an underlying story focused on a modern-day character named Desmond, who experiences the lives of History's greatest Assassin's through the Animus.


Through the Bleeding Effect, he gains a measure of their abilities to train himself to become an Assassin like them. The problem is, they lived between hundreds and thousands of years ago. Some of those skills have no place in the modern world. Most notably:
The Leap of Faith:

Every single Assassin performs the same stunt, which involves leaping off of tall buildings and falling hundreds of feet into four feet of hay, because physics be damned. Hay, apparently, is magic. There is, however, a decisive lack of hay in today's modern world. The equivalent would be a steel dumpster full of syringes and dirty diapers, and I doubt Desmond would willing jump into one of those. Also, the Leap of Faith isn't exactly a skill. It's falling. That's a skill everyone has.
Tomahawks:

Tomahawks are BADASS. They're one of the most effective ways to tell someone how badly they've fucked up. They're also not standard issue in today's modern world, even if you're 1/32 Native.
Other Weapons:

About 20% of the Assassin's Creed games are sword fights. About 100% of today's modern fights with soldiers and police involve guns. There was a scene at the end of Assassin's Creed II where Desmond escapes and all the guards come at him with collapsible batons. That was the one and only lucky break he's ever likely going to have and he still doesn't have a sword to fight with. He's an Assassin in training and the best he has in the hidden blade. He doesn't even carry a pocket knife to defend himself. Also: Why do modern Templar guards only have batons? They work for the most evil corporation in the World, which is worth billions and controls every level of government. Why wouldn't they have guns? Desmond, on the other hand, is working for the Assassins, who use a plethora of weapons over the ages to carry out assassinations, from knives, to poison, to crossbows and rifles. He's basically their Golden Child. He's the Assassin that's going to save the world. All they give him is the hidden blade. They couldn't find him a gun, which he'd be more familiar with coming of age in the 21st Century. About 100% of the lives he has to take are in defense of his own, because he has the entire order of Templars looking for him. He doesn't need a stealth weapon.

I went to the fair today here in town. I walked into the main building and saw a dinosaur display, much like a museum, featuring realistic models and fossils. A second later, I saw the banner over the exhibit, reading, "Creation Truth Ministries." It was a travelling Creationist exhibit which tried to prove the dinosaurs only existed a few thousand years ago, as opposed to hundreds of millions of years. I kept walking. 

I went onto their website, which states, "By definition, no apparent, perceived or claimed evidence in any field, including history and chronology, can be valid if it contradicts the Scriptural record."

From that platform, I marvel at the impossibility of arguing with these believers. They reject both history and TIME itself.That's like saying you were never a baby, because doing so admits that history and chronology are valid and there's no record of you ever having been a baby in the Scriptures. CASE CLOSED!

I don't understand why some Christian groups get into an uproar about the "Theory" of Evolution and why they literally go to the ends of the Earth to try and disprove it. Looking at the site, that's literally what this group has done and is doing. They're searching high and low for any scrap of "evidence" to disprove the "theory." They're digging up fossils and they're searching through caves like actual archaeologists, only after they find their samples they instantly declare them to be fakes placed there by "God," or possibly time-travelling Jesus. CASE CLOSED!
They're using real fossils to disprove Evolution. I don't understand how that works. That's like using a gun to disprove the existence of gun violence. It's like a kind of crazy that you've only ever had described to you in a comic book. It's like the nutjobs who think the pyramids were built by aliens, only these people have Bibles.