Last banjo to Clarksville

My review of Rock Band was published in the newspaper last Sunday, and you can see it at Techcetera here.

My son, who's quite good at Rock Band and Guitar Hero, downloaded "Last Train to Clarksville" on Xbox Live over the weekend. Actually, I was the one who wanted to download it, because Fortiscule didn't even know who The Monkees were.

As a follow-up to my review, I want to note that although I'm not such a strong Rock Band guitar player, I do practice on my banjo quite a bit. Thus it came to pass that I was noodling around on my banjo while Fortiscule was playing Rock Band this weekend. He played "Last Train to Clarksville," and I started picking out an accompaniment on the banjo. I started noticing which notes on the banjo corresponded to the little colored notes he was playing in the game, and we got it going pretty well.

Fortiscule agreed that the banjo sounded good with the Monkees. Looks like I made a banjo believer out of him!

Prestige or practicality? Rank in COD4

I've reached the top rank in Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare, which is 5-star general. To get any further rank I'd have to opt for "Prestige mode." That's where you reset your rank to zero, giving up all the weapons, accessories, perks and gun camo patterns you've unlocked.

I'm a role-playing gamer at heart, and one of my favorite things in RPGs is collecting weapons and armor and various treasure. That's why I like this collecting aspect of COD4. I like winning all the guns and stuff. The rank is almost incidental, a windfall for unlocking the guns. That's why I just don't see the point in me doing the Prestige mode.

That's not to say I don't understand Prestige mode. The fancy rank icon does suggest a certain amount of skill. My friend Fartknockker has "flipped" Prestige mode at least twice, and he's very skilled. But it took me forever to unlock all the stuff, and I still haven't unlocked the blue tiger and red tiger camo patterns for some of my favorite weapons.

Moreover, as one of my online friends pointed out during a match one night, "Sythbane is OLD, dude!" Indeed, I'm old enough to not be concerned with how much prestige I have in the eyes of a stranger. The guys I play regularly with know about how good I am relative to their skill level. For all the rest, I'd just as soon they don't know how good (or not good) I am. I don't feel the urge to impress anyone with the colorful prestige badge, although I salute my buddies who've earned it.

I'd be happier if "Prestige" mode consisted of more accessories and camo patterns for the weapons. I don't even like that red stripe pattern, but I want it because it's the highest one. That's prestige aplenty for me.

I got a little weary of COD4 the other night and popped in Rainbow Six: Vegas, which I haven't played in months. I'm afraid COD4 has ruined Vegas for me. I felt like my feet were bogged down in peanut butter, and everything was in one of those slow-motion nightmares. Vegas just moves too slowly. I hope Vegas 2 is speeded up, or it sure is going to be frustrating.

Gale Force Wins

Our friends HZG, HZG Extreme and ANT Pogo came over this afternoon for a tabletop game of the Star Wars Roleplaying Game, using Star Wars Miniatures. We've been playing this particular scenario for a pretty long time. It takes place shortly after Order 66, a few months into the Jedi Purge.

My character is an experimental clone trooper, an ARC Trooper who was given genes for Force abilities. He was being trained with Jedi, so he was in a dilemma when Order 66 came down: Should he side with his brother clones, or the Jedi with whom he trained? He opted for loyalty over betrayal and sided with the Jedi, after witnessing clones suddenly shooting Jedi in the back. He went rogue and joined a band of fugitive Jedi.

He grew his hair long to disguise his clone-trooper face and embraced his Mandalorian heritage as a bounty hunter. During a stop on Naboo, he picked up some mirrored fighter pilot goggles to further the disguise.

Here is Gale Owassa with his lightsaber and flame thrower gauntlet. I doodled this picture this afternoon on my character sheet while we were playing, and colorized it just now in Photoshop. I was playing using a miniature of Quinlan Voss for my character, and it gave me the idea.



Here's a picture of Fortiscule's character, Drace Ragbar, a Trandoshan pilot who carries a repeating blaster that looks like a SAW gun.

This game is a fun break from video games sometimes, and a lot easier on the eyes and nerves! However, it sure does whet our appetite for Star Wars: The Force Unleashed. Let's hope that LucasArts allows for lots of customization of a Jedi character for online multiplayer. It sure would be cool to construct video game characters that resemble our tabletop characters!

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A duty to customize

Speaking of role playing games ...

I recently completed the campaign in Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare, and this morning I ranked up to four-star general in the online multiplayer. The other day, I was looking at the COD4 site called Charlie Oscar Delta, and I saw an invitation to sound off to the developers what you thinking about the game, what it needs and so forth. I wrote a response that was about three paragraphs long, and when I tried to submit it the thing said it had to be no more than 500 characters.

Here are my suggestions for the game as I wrote them first and then didn't have room for, followed by the shortened version that I submitted to Infinity Ward. What do you guys think? What features would you like to see in the game?

Suggestions for COD4

COD4 is the best modern-setting shooter yet, but it needs more customizing options to make the player feel like an individual character inhabiting the game. COD4 stands to lose a lot of multiplayer participation to Rainbow Six Vegas 2 this year if multiplayer customization isn't improved. Here are my suggestions for free updates via Xbox Live:

• A. The ability to configure a persistent character's uniform in as many ways as can be, rather than linking the character skin to the weapon type. This feature should be more like Rainbow Six Vegas, except for making the uniforms more realistic than in R6V. Even being able to select from the existing character skins would be an improvement.




• B. The ability to affix multiple attachments to a weapon in multiplayer, once they are unlocked, such as a scope and silencer like you use in the campaign. A single attachment is an absurdly unrealistic limitation, considering the overall realism of the game. Perhaps an additional attachment could replace one of the perks.


• C. Team deathmatch and free-for-all modes that eliminate helicopters. Players able to call in helicopters are usually dominating already anyway, and helicopter kills allow them to build an insurmountable lead, often doubling the kill counts of most players in the game. This would level the playing field considerably.


• D. The ability to customize your character with a real-world unit patch (such as the Screaming Eagle patch of the 101st), or design your own embroidered unit patch, like you can design tattoos with the art system in Rock Band. Such colorful unit patches could be used to designate clans online, like the emblems can be used in Halo 3, instead of using tedious prefixes in parentheses. After all, real units have their own patches! Just make sure they have the embroidered texture to look real.


• E. COD4 needs a split-screen online co-op mode and split-screen multiplayer party mode, so my son and I could play together, like we can in Halo 3. Not having that option often means we turn off COD4 and play a different game, even when we both want to play COD4.

Shortened version that I submitted to Charlie Oscar Delta

• Add an ability to customize your uniform, rather than linking the skin to the weapon. Even selecting an existing skin would be better.


• Allow customizing with real-world unit patches such as the Screaming Eagle patch, or design a patch, like you can design tattoos with the art system in Rock Band. Patches could designate clans. Make sure they have the embroidered texture to look real.


• Multiple weapons attachments should be allowed once they are unlocked, such as a scope and silencer.

Be sure to tell them what you think, too! Go here to Charlie Oscar Delta to tell see the suggestions and offer your own. I think you have to be a "member," to leave a comment.

Dio, can you hear me?

Fortiscule is ready to be the next guitar hero with the ultimate controller, courtesy of Santa: a real Fender Stratocaster HSS in "midnight wine." As soon as he gets some lessons under his belt, he'll be well on his way to becoming a jukebox hero (with stars in his eyes).

Santa also brought him Guitar Hero III, but both Fortiscule and Santa were dismayed to discover that the Rock Band "Stratocaster" controller that we already have doesn't work with GH3. How stupid is that?

Merry Christmas to everybody from Sythbane Squadron!

A poignant moment in COD4

Every now and then, a video game brushes up against reality with the emotion it stirs. One of those rare moments occurred this morning while I was practicing my banjo and Fortiscule was playing a campaign mission in Call of Duty 4.

Fortiscule was playing the mission in which Marine Sgt. Paul Jackson is helping to rescue the downed Cobra pilot. As he fought his way to her, I played "Swing Low, Sweet Chariot," because it seemed appropriate for a rescue. As he carried her aboard the helicopter and they began to fly away, the scene shifted, and we all know what was coming.

I started playing "Amazing Grace" in a very gentle, sotto voice in a slow 4-4 time. As the nuke detonated and swept away all the life before it. I kept playing, and the song began to seem very poignant as Jackson staggered out of the crashed helicopter and looked around at the devastation in his last moments. As his vision faded to white light, it felt awfully sad, and Fortiscule and I were very quiet.

The images and music together evoked a feeling like the solemn sadness I feel when I see a picture such as the one above. Here are some real Marines, honoring a fallen comrade in Iraq. I found the picture at the Third Army site, which says the photo was taken by Marine Sgt. Jason L. Jensen in Barwanah, Iraq, on Oct. 25, 2006. I certainly don't mean to trivialize this dignified event by comparing it to a video game. The game did provide a reminder, though, of who the real heroes are who answer the call of duty.

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Bumbling with buttons

On a lighter note, last night I played several rounds of Halo 3 multiplayer with Batsak. It was the first time I've played Halo in more than a month, because I've mostly played Call of Duty 4 in recent weeks.



Consequently, my Halo man provided some slapstick comedy for Batsak's amusement as I was doing melee attacks when I tried to aim, reloading when I tried to throw grenades, throwing grenades when I tried to kneel, and zooming my scope when I tried to melee attack.

I starting remembering the Halo controls after a few rounds -- my controls are set to "Boxer" configuration because I have such a hard time making timely melee attacks in Halo. But overall, it was a sad night for the Sythbane Squadron in the Halo multiplayer madness.

And here's a mighty Sythbane Squadron Sun Crow Clan salute to Batsak for doing well on his exams!

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Recent reviews

If you're interested, my official reviews of Mass Effect, Call of Duty 4 , and the video game gift guide compiled by some other Sythbane Squadron members and me are now published on al.com's Techcetera. Please leave comments if you visit, so my bosses will think somebody on the planet reads my reviews!

My thanks to Fartknockker for his recent generous comments about my blog and reviews. Fartknockker is a good comrade and worthy adversary in COD4 and Rainbow Six Vegas, and a member of the no-frags cadre that plays with Big Daddy Ogre. Sythbane Squadron salutes you, noble Ogrerrati.

Hod Rod is funniest movie of 2007

All great men have mustaches, and Hot Rod is the funniest movie of this year.

It brought back for me the death defying stunts of elementary school, jumping my bicycle off a 4-inch-tall wooden ramp. I was going for distance, not height. It was pretty darned impressive.

Ray Park will be Snake Eyes!

Ray Park, who energized "Star Wars: Episode I -- The Phantom Menace" as Darth Maul, and made a frog-guy cool as Toad in the X-Men films, has been cast as Snake Eyes in the new live-action G.I. Joe movie. I saw the news on G4's "Attack of the Show," and now it's all over the Net.

This is fantastic news! What a cool choice. Ray Park's martial arts skill, athletic ability and physical grace will make him a superb Snake Eyes. Mark Wahlberg is supposed to be Duke, which is also excellent casting.

I hope the movie will be a realistic, gritty take on the whole G.I. Joe story, to the extent that they can make it realistic since it's based on a toy line and kids will be watching. I supposed by "gritty," I actually mean "not campy." An example of what I mean is in "Transformers," another movie ostensibly for kids (and their dads). The soldiers in "Transformers," while not the main characters, are depicted very well as real people who are also brave, determined and professional soldiers. They react intelligently to the incredible situations they face and are never silly or stupid. Let's hope G.I. Joe takes the same approach to storytelling, so the movie will appeal to be kids and adults.

In today's world, the G.I. Joe characters could take on a whole new dimension: They represent the courageous men and women who are, at this moment, putting their lives on the line in Iraq and Afghanistan. The G.I. Joe characters should be idealized versions of these real heroes. For the G.I. Joe characters to even catch our attention against the backdrop of real soldiers' exploits in the news every day, they'll have to really be spectacular -- both believable and heroic. If the characters are too cartoony, the movie will just be a joke that even kids will dismiss.

The flip side of the coin, and perhaps the greater challenge to the filmmakers, will be to make Cobra Commander and his henchmen into believable, scary villains. How can an evil genius bent on world domination and his mercenary henchmen even hold a candle to the bonfire of hatred cast by today's terrorists and religious fanatics, who torture and murder their own neighbors in the name of God? Cobra Commander will have to step it up to be that awful and evil.

Hasbro hasn't produced any of the cool 12-inch G.I. Joe toys like the Snake Eyes pictured above for a long time now. I expect the forthcoming movie means they'll blitz us with a mighty wave of merchandising, which is good news to me as a collector.

Ray Park already has been immortalized as a toy in a multitude of scales and poses as Darth Maul. Pictured below are Darth Maul and Fortiscule, when Fortiscule defended our home from a Sith attack.



Who else do you think would make a good character for G.I. Joe? Post your ideas for casting in the comments field below!