Repo men 2010 April 2

In the future humans have extended and improved our lives through highly     sophisticated and expensive mechanical organs created by a company called “The Union”. The dark side of these medical breakthroughs is that if you don’t pay your bill, “The Union” sends its highly skilled repo men to take back its property… with no concern for your comfort or survival. Former soldier Remy is one of the best organ repo men in the business. But when he suffers a cardiac failure on the job, he awakens to find himself fitted with the company’s top-of-the-line heart-replacement… as well as a hefty debt. But a side effect of the procedure is that his heart’s no longer in the job. When he can’t make the payments, The Union sends its toughest enforcer, Remy’s former partner Jake, to track him down.

Army of Two: The 40th Day was released January 10th this year and was anticipated to be an amazing game. The first Army of Two was a great game, full of incredible graphics and fun game-play, as you could customize your weapons, masks , and armor. The 40th Day, however, lacked somewhat of an ingenuity or craftiness for adding on to all that.

Some players of this game said that the makers of the game didn’t really take the fact that players wanted new plots and exciting new features. Although it is a truly fun game, it didn’t quite grab the attention everyone thought it was going to get.

Army of Two: The 40th Day Game Cover

According to Gamezone.com, they gave it a review with these categories and their scoring from 1 to 10, ten being the best:

Gameplay: 6

Graphics: 7

Concept: 7.5

Overall: 6

Overall, Army of Two: The 40th Day is a visually stunning, very fun to play, multiplayer shooter. The 40th Day is rated     ”

M” by the ESRB for Mature.

AFC Wild Card Matchup

It seems as though the era of the New England Patriots may be coming to and end, or at least a temporary halt.  The Baltimore Ravens, who were awarded with the sixth and final spot in the AFC playoffs, traveled to New England to take on the Patriots.  New England is known for being a dominant team in the playoffs, especially when they get to play in front of their home crowd.

It didn’t take long for the Ravens to get on the board.  On the first play from scrimmage, running back Ray Rice ran up the middle and busted through the middle and was off to the races for an 83-yard touchdown run.  Within the first five minutes, Baltimore was already up 14-0 over the Patriots.  New England had to wake up quick if they wanted any chance of winning the game.

With four minutes left in the first quarter, Ray Rice ran in for a one yard score to extend the Raven’s lead to 21 points.  Billy Cundiff then added three more points to the lead with his 27-yard field goal.  New England finally got on the board in the second quarter with a 6 yard touchdown pass by Tom Brady.  Cundiff hit a 23 yarder to push the lead to 27-7 midway through the third quarter.  The Patriots answered with a one yard touchdown pass to make it 27-14 Ravens.  The Ravens stuck the dagger in with a 3 yard touchdown run by Willis McGahee, they failed on the two-point conversion so the lead was 33-14, and that would end up being the final score.

The Ravens travel to Indianapolis next Saturday to face the top team in the AFC for a division round matchup.  The game will be played at 7:15 right after the Cardinals and Saints game.

Microsoft has finally released a device that could possibly compete with the iPod Touch, they have dubbed it the Zune HD.  The Zune HD came out on September 15th and is competing very well with the iPod.  In comparing the two, they are very similer, but the Zune HD does have several areas that it is superior to apples device.  Here is a list I have compiled comparing the two mp3 players.

Zune HD

• 16GB/32GB
• $219/$289
• 33 hours of audio playback
• 8.5 hours of video playback
• 3.3 inch display
• requires a $15 monthly fee for unlimited downloading
• HD radio
• 2.6 oz

zune-hd

iPod Touch

• 8GB/32GB/64GB
• $199/$299/$399
• 30 hours of audio playback
• 6 hours of video playback
• 3.5 inch display
• No required monthly fee, but cost per download
• radio only with external attachment
• 4 oz

32gb_ipod_touch

Take this as you will, use this to choose whatever device is better for you.  On another note, the iPod has over 75K apps and the Zune, a limited 10.  So decide what is more important for you, music, apps, or overall size.

As many of you have heard, Windows 7 and Snow Leopard have been out for a while now. From what I have heard, the initial launches of both products are pretty much over, I feel that a review should be written on their effect thus far. One important thing I would like to mention, I am both a Mac and PC user. Any quirks I may find in an operating system are strictly personal preference and should be treated as such.

First let’s talk about Windows 7, Microsoft’s latest addition to the Windows family. Compared to Windows Vista, 7 was designed to be faster, cleaner, and more functional. It certainly shows. From the moment you boot up a computer with Windows 7 installed, you get a sense of “this is just… right”. Boot-ups are faster than ever, programs open flawlessly, and little features allow you to be more productive. One of these features I have really grown fond of is the ability to put two windows side-by-side as shown below:

Windows 7: Windows Side-By-Side

The only feature about Windows 7 I struggle with is the new taskbar. I might just be used to the feel of Vista and XP with text labels next to the application icons.

Apple also released OS X 10.6 Snow Leopard, which promised the same as Windows 7. A large part of OS X was rebuilt for this newest version so that it could incorporate modern technologies such as multiprocessing and 64 bit. Nothing visually is too different between Snow Leopard and it’s older counterpart Leopard, except for minor tweaks such as Quicktime and stacks found on the dock. I personally found boot up times to be the thing I hated the most about Leopard, but that was improved greatly upon by Snow Leopard (my last boot was about 37 seconds from a full shut down).

My Snow Leopard Desktop

Snow Leopard isn’t as full featured as I wanted it to be, but the speed alone was definitely worth the upgrade. I also wished it had the side-by-side feature built in, although you can download an application that does practically the same thing.

All in all, both operating systems are a great improvement compared to their predecessors. I highly recommend upgrading as with either software you will see a significant boost in speed, allowing you to fully harness the power of your PC or Mac.

Farmville Logo

Surely you all have heard of the addictive game on Facebook, Farmville. If you haven’t, it is an application on the ever-so-popular social networking website, Facebook. In the game you plant crops, harvest crops, raise and harvest animals, and grow and harvest trees. Farmville is a role-playing game-for those who are not familiar with the term, it simply means that you play the game to gain levels. And if you have a Facebook profile, you most likely have been asked to be a neighbor or to send gifts to your friends.

We all know the popularity of the game is tremendous, but why exactly is Farmville so addictive? One reason may be because of the convenience of the game. No doubtibly, most people would agree that games such as World of Warcraft are much more in depth and would be a lot more entertaining to play for a large period of time; however, Farmville has a sense of convenience that other games cannot provide. While checking your Facebook, you can just click on a link that will bring you straight to your virtual farm in a matter of seconds-something that when playing a game like World of Warcraft is not possible. Also, Farmville does have the aspect of depth that some other Facebook games cannot provide. There are games on Facebook that are much more simple. Farmville seems to be the best of both aspects. The game can be loaded in seconds and is very user friendly.

Farmville has gotten over 11.5 million “farmers” and is thriving. Surely this highly addictive game will not go away for a long time.

Movie stores have been great for finding any type of movie you want, but do you really want all the hassle of finding the movie in the store? Or finding the box, but no movie?

A Redbox kiosk

The Redbox is outside of most convenience stores and other places, it is a great, more efficient way of picking a movie. Redboxes have really evolved the way people rent movies. You can simply go to the Redbox, find the movie, run your credit card, and out comes the movie for only a dollar! The only downside is that it costs an extra dollar for every day you keep it after the first. But it is less costly than say, a Blockbuster, which charges 6 to 7 dollars per movie rental per week, most people only watch a movie once in a week, so why pay 7 dollars for a movie you are only going to watch once?

The hassle of going to the movie store has been an ongoing thing with people. They have to go there, find the movie they want in the numerous aisles of movies, and after all that trouble, if it isn’t even there, you have just waisted about a half hour to an hour of your day! Not to mention the overpriced movies at the stores.

Blockbuster Logo

Redboxes also have a one-time-only deal, when you use a credit card for the first time at any Redbox, you get the movie for free. After the first time, however, you still have to pay the measly 1 dollar per day after. I prefer the Redbox because it is faster, cheaper, and easier to rent movies.

Left 4 Dead 2 is a first-person shooter developed by Valve Software. It is a four-player cooperative game that requires you to use team work to survive the zombie apocalypse. You start off in a safe room, where zombies cannot get to you.

Once you leave the safe room, though, the zombies spawn and are ready to attack you and your team on sight. You must fight them off with weapons you find around the levels. For example, you start off with pistols and have a choice of one other weapon, like a shotgun or an SMG. You can choose to swap your pistol for the game’s new feature, melee weapons. For close-quarters combat, melee weapons are a perfect choice to fight off the zombies. Later on in the campaign (set of levels), you will find more powerful weapons, like assault rifles and sniper rifles.

Left 4 Dead is great!

This is where Left 4 Dead 2 gets its re-playability. The weapons of each campaign are randomly spawned in the level. The same can be said for the zombies, zombies will be chosen at random by the “AI Director”. There are regular zombie, and then there are “uncommon-common” that have specific traits. For example, Hazmat zombies are invulnerable to fire.

There is also a group of eight zombies called “Special Infected”. The “Hunter” pounces on the survivors and rips them to shreds. The “Smoker” drags survivors away with his tongue. The “Boomer” vomits on the survivors to attract a horde. The”Jockey” rides on a survivor’s back and controls them, walking them away from the other survivors. The “Spitter” spits acid on you that hurts more the longer you are in it. Finally, the “Charger” chargers and grabs one survivor and starts pummeling them into the ground.

There are five campaigns that span 23 levels. Dead Center is a fight to get to a mall. Dark Carnival takes place in a carnival with clowns and all. Swamp Fever takes place in the swamps. Hard Rain take place in a city. Finally, The Parish takes place in New Orleans. The survivors are Nick, Ellis, Coach, and Rochelle. Nick is a gambling con-man who traveled to the south. Ellis is a mechanic with a heavy accent. He tells a bunch of crazy stories about his friend Keith getting hurt. Coach was a coach of a sport. He is big and muscular and loves chocolate. Finally, Rochelle is a newscaster that traveled south to report on the zombie outbreak.

There is also online modes. Versus pits four player-controlled survivors against four player-controlled special infected. Scavenger makes the survivors travel around a map gathering gas cans to power up a generator. The generator controls how much time the survivors have. The special infected must do everything in their power to stop the survivors from filling up the generator. Finally, Realism removes the outline around the survivors and removes the outline from weapons. This makes the game very difficult, even on easy difficulty settings.

Overall, Left 4 Dead 2 is a great game that improves on the original’s concept without changing what made the first one great. The game feels fresh and new and can be very addictive. If you like zombies, you’ll love this game.

New England Patriots vs Indianapolis Colts

The New England Patriots came into Indianapolis this past Sunday night to take on the Colts at Lucas Oil Stadium.  This game featured two of the NFL’s most elite powerhouse teams.  Also, two of the league’s best quarterbacks played in this game, Peyton Manning, and Tom Brady.

The Colts struck first on a 15-yard touchdown pass from Manning to Joseph Addai to take a 7-0 lead.  New England answered right back to tie it with a one yard run by Laurence Maroney.  The Patriots then went on to score 17 more unanswered points and took a comanding 24-7 lead with 7:19 remaining in the first half.  Then with 4:17 to go, Peyton Manning hit Reggie Wayne on a 20-yard touchdown strike to make it a 24-14 game at the half.

Both defenses stepped up in the third quarter as neither team managed to put points on the board.  New England opened the fourth quarter with a 5-yard touchdown from Tom Brady to Randy Moss, to take a 31-14 lead, this seemed to wrap up a victory for the Patriots.  The Colts responded quickly with a 29-yard pass from Manning to Pierre Garcon, making it 31-21 with 12:14 remaining in the game.  Then, with only 4:12 remaining in the game, Stephen Gostkowski split the uprights to extended the Patriots’ lead to 34-21.  Peyton Manning marched the Colts offense right down the field and on a third and one at the New England 4-yard line, Manning gave it to Addai, who ran it in for the score to pull within six points.

The Colts kicked it off needing a big stop by their defense to get a chance to win the game.  The Patriots started the drive at their 20-yard line and went three-and-out.  Now faced with a fourth down and two at their own 28-yard line, the Patriots were forced to punt it back to Manning and his offense, or were they?  Patriots’ coach Bill Belichick made an unthinkable call to go for it on fourth down deep in their own territory, a first down would win the game for New England.  It all came down to one play.  Brady took the snap and tossed it over to Kevin Faulk who bobbled the ball, caught it, and was crushed just a half of a yard short of a first down.  Belichick’s decision backfired and gave the Colts the ball with only 28 yards left to win the game.  In four plays, Manning drove down and on the fourth play he hit Reggie Wayne in the end zone to  score the game-winning touchdown.

With this win, the Colts remain unbeaten and move to 9-0 on the year as the Patriots fall to 6-3.  The Colts will play at Baltimore this week and the Patriots host the New York Jets.

Last friday, November 6th, Motorola released a new cell phone, the Moto Droid.  The Droid was released at all Verizon wireless corporate stores throughout the United States.  While only a week and a half earlier Research in Motion(RIM) released their new touch screen Blackberry, the Storm II.  While most people are saying the Droid is eating away at iPhone sales, they are truly taking away from RIM’s Blackberry sales.  While both phones are touch screens and are both on Verizon, they are completely different.

Storm II

The Blackberry Storm II uses “sure type,” which means that the screen actually needs to be pushed in, where as the Droid is “typical” touch screen.  The Storm II has a 3.2 MP camera, but the Droid had a 5MP camera with autofocus. The Storm has a strictly virtual key board, while the Droid has both virtual and a physical slide out key board.  Both of the phones require a data plan from Verizon, it costs an extra 30 dollars a month.  The Browser on the Droid is far superior to the one on the Storm, the speed test showed no comparison.

Moto Droid

I have used both of the Phones mentioned, and I do not want to praise.  But the Droid is a far superior to the Storm II.  The droid is faster, has a better camera, and is  overall a better phone.  While the Storm II may be lighter and cheaper, it is definitely worth the extra 20 dollars to have the better phone.