Rant: Watchmen's Ending (the Graphic Novel one)

SPOILER WARNING!!!!!!!!!

Just a few days ago, I finished reading Watchmen for the first time.  Yes, it's a bit late, I suppose, but still.

I was so into the GN that I was reading it instead of doing my homework.  It takes a really good read to make me avoid homework like that.

The entire end of the GN was a disappointment.  I mean, the whole time up to then, there are a bunch of themes like being human and learning about oneself and political unrest and a few other themes- all of which were executed brilliantly.  None of the superheroes are your traditional heroes with powers, minus Dr. Manhattan.  In short, the GN brings a lot to the table than other GNs ever do.  It's a nice step into a world that you're not used to.

I wish I could have just finished my work without procrastinating.  That's how bad the ending of Watchmen is.

Really, Ozymandias somehow creates some sort of brain/squid thing with a brain so powerful that it causes an explosion upon its death.  What.  The.  Fuck.

Oh, and he catches a bullet as it's coming towards him.

I thought he wasn't supposed to have any powers!  Total, complete, utter bullshit.  Moore was probably drunk when he wrote that last chapter.  I mean really, all of that build-up and the ending uses just about none of that.  What were they smoking?!?!

I felt that everyone was out of character too.  Rorschach didn't keep trying to kill Veidt, and then he made Dr. Manhattan vaporize him, leaving Rorschach to just be some steaming pool of blood in the snow.  It just doesn't seem like Rorschach to give up like that, considering we saw him group of jailmates during the riot (electrocuted one of them, suffocated the other by shoving him down a toilet).

Or, Dr. Manhattan turning all lifeless and Terminator-like, or Nite Owl and Silk Spectre getting busy where anyone could see them (well, Veidt at least, the guy who threw a plate at Nite Owl, Falcon Punched Spectre, and wiped out half of New York City) (I mean, really, who wants to show their bits to a guy like Veidt?), then dying their hair blond (like Veidt's hair...) and all of that nonsense.  None of it felt true to the characters.  In the end, it was a major letdown that should have been much, much better.  The only good part was at the last page, where the kid at the newspaper place finds Rorschach's Journal in a pile of papers.  It had a feeling like Rorschach wasn't completely dead, and that maybe he is the ultimate winner in all of this instead of Veidt... who is a complete bastard, by the way.

From what I hear, the Watchmen movie has a different ending, one that is supposedly better.  I'm sure hoping it is.  I don't think I can bear to watch/read another bad ending (main offenders: I Am Legend, Push, Babylon A.D., Next, 

Rock Band's Serious Offenses: Songs That Should Never Have Been In A Music Game

I've had a lot of complaints about some of the songs in Rock Band.  Now, even though a lot of them are for DLC, there are a few that don't deserve to be in a game relating to rock music.  Here is my list, you will likely disagree with me on some of them.

Starting with the songs on the disk:

Any Song By Rush

Rush.  They suck something big.  I'd rather play some John Mayer instead.

Nobody that knows a classic when they hear it should ever, ever listen to Rush.  I mean, Guns n' Roses with just Axl is still leagues better than Rush.

I am baffled as to why there's a Rush DLC pack available...

"Epic" by Faith No More

This is one of the most horrible songs I have ever heard in my entire life.  It sounds like some white kids trying to rap in front of the mirror to some 80s music.  And then when you get to the chorus, it sounds like Chester Bennington doing that not-screaming singing (yes, it does exist) while holding his nose. Good luck trying to sit through that music video.  And this song definitely is not epic, that's for sure.  It is an abomination of the term rock, and the master track needs to be burned A.S.A.P.

Songs by Oasis

Yeah, some of it might sound nice at first, but when you listen to what is being sung you realize that it sucks.  Really, Oasis are the guys that get punched in the face at their own concerts.  Seriously, that's pretty sad by anyone's standards.

Songs by All-American Rejects

I'll be honest with you, I used to listen to these guys.  I sort of liked it, but I never thought of it as rock.  Seemed too soft-sounding and it sometimes got so girly (note: they are all guys) that I wanted to punch them in the face along with Oasis.

DLC: Naked Brothers Band

This is probably the biggest offense in the history of music games.  These are the kids that have a stupid little Viva La Bam ripoff television show on Nickelodeon.  Did I mention that they don't even try to hide the fact that the show is staged?  Anyway, they make this type of music.

Just the thought of playing that kind of music in a game makes me sick, in the sort of "oh, Harmonix, what the hell have you done this time, you fucktards?" kind of way.

Those are all of the major offenses that I can think of at the moment.  Sorry if I missed any, but it's just so easy to overlook a bad song when so many suck to begin with.  Hope you enjoyed another one of my rants!

My 360 Is Back!

You read that right.  My Xbox 360 Elite is back and better than ever.  I expected a much longer wait.

I decided to send my 360 to Microsoft to get fixed.  I followed the progress on the Xbox website.  Here is a timeline of what happened:

Friday, October 24, 2008- Red Ring of Death is discovered.

Sunday, October 26- I arrange a repair.  The shipping box is sent.

Thursday, October 30- The box comes, I pack my 360, ship the box with my 360 in it the next day.

Friday, November 7- Microsoft receives my console.

Saturday, November 8- My 360 is fixed!  Shipped back to me a few days later.

Friday, November 14- This is the day that I originally would have received my Xbox, but no one was home to sign the UPS guy's paper...

Monday, November 17- The UPS guy tries again.  Success!

Microsoft sent a letter of apology (of course, my name has to be 'Xbox Enthusiast) and a card for a free month of Xbox Live.  That was very generous of them, considering the entire process didn't cost me a dime- the repair and shipping were both free.  They even renewed my regular warranty!

As for how my 360 is performing, the few things that were changed were the most noticeable, in a good way.  Signing into Xbox Live is a lot quicker, and testing the connection doesn't take as long.

But the biggest difference is that the 360 is a lot quieter.  When it starts up, it doesn't sound like a leafblower.  Instead, there's this really quiet, soft noise that sounds like a Gonk droid.  It only does the Gonk noise twice, then if I want to hear it again, I need to restart the console.

The sound of the console is also a bit more pleasant.  It doesn't make that motorcycle... er, racket after 20 minutes.  Even though the fan is the loudest part of the console, the 360's noises aren't nearly as obnoxious and distracting anymore.

All of that said, I recommend sending RRoD-afflicted consoles to Microsoft for repair.  It's worth the wait.

The Red Ring of Death: A Pain in the Ass

The image you see above is my Xbox 360 Elite, plagued by the Red Ring of Death after a little over one year of use.

See, I'm pissed right now.  No hardware today should break after one year.  Hell, even Super Nintendos still work.  I know two people with working SNESs.  They're fucking ancient and still work.

It all happened like this:

Friday afternoon.  The end of a bad week in school.  I just wanted to relax.  After watching Law & Order for an hour, I decided to play on Xbox Live.

I turned on my 360 and tried playing the Mercenaries 2 demo.  The console did a weird freeze up while loading the game map.  There was some distortion in the picture.

I restarted my console and tried the demo again.  I got a little further this time: I got in the truck and after a few seconds of driving, the console did another weird freeze up.  Again, some picture distortion.

I restarted again, and this time tried the Need for Speed: Most Wanted demo.  It froze up before the main menu could fill up the screen.

I decided to restart again.  This time I tried playing Naruto: Rise of a Ninja.  As soon as the game map finished loading, the console froze up again.

So I decided to restart again.  I got the Red Ring of Death.

I tried one last time.  When I put the 360 on its side, I got a weird green screen.  I gave up after that.

So now I'm in the process of finding an easy solution.  I am trying to avoid sending my console to Microsoft, because I've heard that it takes weeks and that you might not get your hard drive back.  I don't even know if I'll get a 360 Elite back.

The warranty expired on June 14.  Fucking warranty runs out before I get the RRoD.  I sort of expected that to happen.

Any tricks that might help fix the problem are welcome.  "Get a PlayStation 3" is a legitimate answer.

EDIT: I decided to send my 360 to Microsoft for now.  I arranged a repair on Sunday, and got the shipping box on... Thursday or Friday.  I'll need to check.

EDIT 11/7/08: Microsoft has recieved my 360 and are fixing it.

EDIT 11/8/08: 360 is fixed!  Expect a post when I get it back.