Can you spell: "G-O-O-D, L-U-C-K, F-U-K-K-O" ?

If you read this within 2 days of me posting it, you'll have the limited time opportunity to plunk down a minimum bid of $25,000 bones for some dude's 20 some-odd year collection of time-well-wasted.

That's right, for merely the price of a couple year's tuition at one of BC's prestigious post-secondary institutions, you too can have your name in the running for a relatively respectable collection of video games assembled throughout the last couple of decades.

But wait! 25 G's not enough for you to blow? hell... for an additional 50, you can have you're very own unopened Nintendo Wii! Why wait a couple weeks for the opportunity to pick one up at Best Buy for a mere $279 (CAD) when you can add $50,000 to the initial $25,000 you just parted with, and have one this week!
(please allow 2-3 weeks for delivery)

But don't let my super-smooth words move you into a bidding frenzy. Hear it straight from the owner's mouth:

"As this collection is invaluable to me, I'm starting the bidding at $25,000 (Since I bought everything when it was brand new, I'm estimating that I've spent well over $30,000 over the years in gathering this collection)."

Apparently the beginning of the end for an "Invaluable" collection starts at $25,000.

Still no bids as of 5:00 pm on December 15th, 06.

PS3 Boss gets "Shuffled"

Looks like Sony's finally figuring out what I could have told them months ago. The PS3 is gonna end up costing them more money than they can ever recover before the bean counters begin calling for the axe.

In a move Sony says will "strengthen" their management team, Playstation brainman, Ken Kutaragi found himself laterally promoted, as the higher ups decided some fresh blood should take over their gaming division.

Here's a few reasons why this spells desperation on the part of Sony.

• The PS3 hasn't yet been out for a month, and already the key stickhandler has been sidelined
• Kutaragi isn't just your average game-illiterate, business-savvy Playstation executive. He's essentially the founder of the Playstation. It was good ol' Ken who after nintendo pulled the plug on the Sony-produced CD add-on to the Super Famicom (Super NES,) tirelessly hounded his conservative exec-set to carry on with the project. The eventual outcome was the original Sony Playstation.
• Kutaragi has commanded Sony's gaming division on all three systems since their entry into the market. He's in many ways, the reason Sony unseated both Sega and Nintendo as industry tyrants at a time when there was no other competitor.

After a record like this, you don't simply move Mr. Playstation to another department and say you're "strengthening" you management team in doing so. This is a guy who was widely favoured to take over Sony's entire operation. And now he's been tossed out of the house ken built.

If this isn't a sign that Sony's on the ropes, then I don't know what is.

So far, no new shipments of PS3's have been made available, and Sony has barely been able to get out half of what they projected was necessary for this period.

Nintendo on the other hand, is claiming it's on track towards it's 4 million unit target by the end of this year. Nintendo president, Reggie Fils-Aime was quoted last week as saying, "We sell everything we make, so it's simply a manufacturing thing now." If Nintendo is able to hit the 4 million unit mark by Xmas 2006, they will have sold over half of what it took the Xbox 360 over a year to do... in just over two months!

Meanwhile, Sony lurches on with major financial losses from their gaming division, added to a $180 million loss from last summer over their faulty battery pack fiasco. Only their cellular phone manufacturing division, 'Sony-Ericsson seems able to keep them afloat.

So will Sony eventually leave the gaming hardware industry with the PS3 as their last system?

Gamers like me can only hope.

It sure would be just cookies for bullying Lik-Sang into submission like they did.

No, I'm not always playing video games

Sometimes I even take the skytrain. I prefer not to lately, only to justify the money I spend on gas and car insurance... but the recent snowfall in Vancouver, which is just now beginning to melt away, made it impossible for our snow-tire-lacking car to emerge from the driveway.

As such, we were forced to take the skytrain to the BC Fed convention being held down at the Canada Place convention Centre. Apparently everyone else in Vancouver had the same idea, as six trains passed before we were able to force ourselves onboard. One station down from us, Broadway, Skypigs were holding people down on the ground level because the number of people on the station platform was reaching unsafe levels.

Each previously automated train had to be run by a driver since the snow on the tracks had short circuited the computer-control.

Here's is the view from behind the operator's head as we chugged along at half-speed towards our destination:


And for those of you who really like Sky-trains and snow... here's an extended video to music by some other Vancouverite I'v never met.

Sony is Satan

Sony's given me a few reasons to hate them in the past... most too trivial to put into words. But now the bastards have gone too far.

By suing the Hong Kong's online retail darling of the gaming industry (Lik-Sang) out of business for the most hypocritical reasons imaginable, they've cemented their position in video game history as the nastiest, most mean-spirited game-corporation of this decade, (perhaps all-time.)

Real video-game histiographers, (I totally just made that word up) might argue that Jack Tramiel's treatment of his Atari staff in the early eighties, or Nintendo's hard-nosed retail-exclusivity tactics later that decade, provide strong competition to Sony for the coveted title of: Sludge-Sucking Game-Rat of All-Time; but when you type the words: "Sony Sucks" into a search engine... you start to realize that Sony really is in a class all to it's own. And it extends past their video game department.

I've assembled a few articles with which you may pass the time.

• Reasons why Sony's Audio Division sucks
• Reasons why not to buy a Sony Computer
• Reasons why Sony's Customer Service is a Farce
• Reasons why "Warranty" in Sony-speak means: "You get to pay for it again fukker!"
• Reasons why the "Sony" name is no longer associated with "Quality"

and best of all... what you can expect after plunking down a cool $700 for Sony's new "state-of-the-art" system.



Combine the above video with many of the experiences consumers have had with Sony's unique definition of "warranty," and it becomes clear how buying a PS3 is paramount to putting $700 worth of toonies (Canadian $2 coin) into a gigantic fruitcake in hopes that it'll taste better at christmas time.

This isn't to say that Nintendo's hardware is perfect and without flaw. It's just more realistically priced. After paying under $300 for the base system, I began experiencing a few hiccups in the Wii's operation, (see here for system review.) After a week of minor load problems, and strange disc drive clicking, I phoned up Nintendo and explained the problem. The operator agreed to send me a new console in the mail, no questions asked... and then explained that they would allow me 21 days to transfer data between the consoles, and send the defective one back. Ironically, all of the earlier malfunctions in the initial console have ceased, and I wonder if it was just experiencing some settling pains out of the box, and has since found it's groove.

In any case, here's a photo to prove Nintendo sent the console, (which arrived on my doorstep 3 days after I requested it)

I'll certainly post an update if the replacement process doesn't go smooth with Nintendo.

In the meantime... sign this petition titled The Case Between Sony and Lik-Sang.com