4.2 Bricking Wiis

The new 4.2 update is now bricking Wiis, and you'd be surprised to find out whose Wiis are being bricked. Those that have no Mods whatsoever on their consoles are finding that they cannot do anything more than power up the wii.

http://techforums.nintendo.com/nins/board/message?board.id=wii_tech&thread.id=29914

This time it took less than 24 hours to find a workaround for the 4.2 update. Thanks to the HBC guys and to Waninkoko.

If you have a problem with the update from Nintendo, feel free to contact Nintendo Consumer Service at 1-800-255-3700 for assistance. If enough people call to complain, they shouldn't be charging the $85 bucks for something that is entirely THEIR FAULT.

Nintendo's 4.2 Wii Update to Homebrew "F--k Off"

Today Nintendo posted a new update on the wii, it esentially does nothing except replace the IOS and remove the HBC. What is HBC you ask? Homebrew Channel allows you to install applications, homebrew games, and emulators to your Wii. It's an amazing program that can allow you to do a variety of things. Now why the hell would Nintendo want to kill this program? Simple, you can run emulators of games they are trying to overcharge on the Virtual Console for. The problem is they don't offer you the entire library of their games right from the get go, you have to sit and wait for something you really want. I've been waiting for Earthbound for almost 3 years now. It's sort of like itunes, only you can't get as much crap for your money with it. And Wiiware is a sad, sad joke, nothing particularly useful or fun to play on the lot of it.

Now the IOS's are the more sinister lot of modifications as you can use these for "backup copies" of your games, or to load your games off a USB drive. Not a bad idea given that cd drives often fail after prolonged use, so cutting it out entirely from the process can be a desirable outcome. Nintendo however feels that this would cut into the profits of game sales so they try to rip it all out by the short and curlies, which only works if you update. Speaking for myself, until Nintendo actually gets off their ass and releases Earthbound to the VC, Homebrew Channel shall not parish from MY console. And I paid for it, I should be able to do whatever the hell I want with it.

A Hate Crime Against Every Car You've Ever Loved.

I've railed on DLC before, but this has to be the worst DLC, ever. No one in their right mind should even think about buying the Legendary Cars Pack for Burnout Paradise. The whole thing is an insult to fans of the movies and tv shows that this pack blatantly rips off. It's just another case of EA trying hard to nickel and dime everyone out of as much as possible. The most insulting car by far is the Cavalry Bootlegger. Slapping a Mexican Flag on something sacred to most every Southerner is blasphemy of the highest order. KITT just looks ridiculous. The Ghostbusters Car isn't supposed to be Blue, black might pass, but not blue, come on. The only car that passes just a little is the 88 special. EA and Criterion should be ashamed of themselves, but then, they never are. You don't tug on Superman's cape, you don't spit into the wind. And you sure as hell NEVER mess with the General Lee.

Disney Marketing And You.

Who came up with this? And why weren't they immediately fired? Anyone that sees the movie that's under ten would see the bag for this and start balling their eyes out. Trauma at your very own Kroger's. I mean hell, the kid has to shoot his own dog at the end of the movie, and if you didn't cry at the end of it, I'm sorry but you just aren't human. Because that's seriously messed up. Anyone who would dare feed this to their pets should never EVER be allowed to own another animal of any kind again.

However, they do need to put Old Yeller in Kingdom Hearts 3, his rabies attack would be bad ass.

Boom Blox Only Does 60k in sales.

Is anyone really all that shocked here? I mean come on it boils down to FIFTY BUCKS for a game that looks like a Jenga knock off featuring chickens. And hell, who wouldn't want a game where you shoot chickens at Jenga blocks?? But that's not the game and it's FIFTY BUCKS. And Spielberg really thinks his name has pull anymore? Comon this is the guy that made ET then started slapping his name on every Warner Brothers cartoon he could get his hands on, nobody cares anymore, especially when you put indiana jones on the back of a bike BEHIND the insanely annoying kid from TRANSFORMERS! And did I mention it's FIFTY F$%&ING DOLLARS?

Rootkits Keep Falling On My Head

Oh hell, not again. EA in it's latest bout of brilliance (read: complete incompetence) has decided to institute the latest form of SecuRom torture on it's legitimate customers buying Spore and Mass Effect. For those of you that don't know what I'm talking about Sony invented this lovely little program they call DRM and most PC users with two braincells to rub up against each other call a root kit. Yes this program installs itself, refuses to run the game if it finds legitimate programs like Nero, MICROSOFT'S Process Explorer, and Disc juggler, and to top it all off, proves irremovable unless you reformat your system. If that's not a root kit than you don't know what is. The game has to be online every ten days for reactivation, if you aren't online to bad, the game will lock you out. And it's also been reported that the activation limit is back, this time it's down to three. I hope before PC gaming completely croaks some game company has the balls to admit it's mistakes, and understand that the way to create loyal customers is NOT to treat them like criminals.

Above: A Tech Support Cat tries to pull SecuRom off an Infected PC

I have, in fact, learned my lesson with Bioshock and I will NOT buy any game that features SecuRom, that goes for everyone. I don't care if your game is the best damn game since Duke Nukem 3d, put a root kit on, and I ain't buying.

UPDATE: Bioware/EA has decided to remove the 10 day re authentication but they have still not committed to an entirely non-SecRom Disc. Basically they are now back to exactly what Bioshock had for it's DRM. And that just isn't good enough.

"Pirates are not lost sales... they were never sales to begin with." --michaelca Via the Bioware forums

A Message From GTAIV...

Don't drink and drive. Duh. The Parent Television Council (a.k.a. the people so morally stuck up their own ass that they want to dumb down television to the point that Elmo seems like Shakespeare) seem to believe that GTAIV advocates and "gives points for drunk driving." In reality the game WILL let you drive drunk HOWEVER there are severe consequences for doing so. I tried it one time just for the hell of it, your steering sucks, your vision is blurred and the cops are on your ass faster than half price day at Dunkin' Donuts. Its NOT a good idea to drive drunk in GTAIV just like it's NEVER a good idea to drive drunk in real life.

And parents get a grip. YOU are the ones who control what your child sees, hears, and does. That's why it's called parenting. Sit down with your kids play some video games with them. And when a clerk WARNS YOU THAT A GAME IS VIOLENT and you don't like that DON'T BUY IT. For f***'s sake don't buy a copy of GTA: Vice City for little 8 year old Jimmy only to come in the next day screaming that this game is so violent and you can have sex with prostitutes when I F***ING WARNED YOU TO BEGIN WITH. I was so inspired by this incident I created a T-Shirt in it's honor. Something I believe anyone who works selling video games for a living thinks every time something like this happens. That shirt can be found here.

Moving along to the game itself. The game is good, but hold your horses, it really doesn't deserve all those 10/10 scores it's getting. I remember back when review sites didn't worry about getting paid for game advertising so much. Otherwise known as back when they had balls, and they had balls enough to call a game's sequel out when it was just more of the same and lacking innovation. Don't get me wrong, more of the same isn't bad in the case of GTAIV, but its getting a little bland and a bit repetitive.

All my complaints from GTA San Andreas (mostly due to the fact that I hate micromanagement, "CJ feed your damn self or starve, I don't care about you.") seem to have cleared up but they took out a few features I actually LIKED from San An. For example, bikes are GONE, I actually enjoyed peddling around when I had the chance, it was faster than running and also a bit relaxing. Cliff jumping seems to be gone as well, and given that I would really love to jump Niko off the empire state building, only to be saved a few seconds before impact by a parachute, that hurts my feelings towards the game as well.

The graphics are superb, this is definitely the prettiest GTA we've ever seen, but that doesn't save the fact that by comparison to San Andreas the city feels really, really small. But I guess its really a trade off, either huge environment and shit graphics, or small environment and gobbstoppingly beautiful graphics.

Multiplayer is really the shinning force of this game as I find myself playing more of it than I do the single player game. Which the people that know me know that me getting addicted to multiplayer is completely unlikely. However I find myself actually wanting to pay *GASP* for a years subscription to Xbox Live just for this game *double gasp* and that's just not like me. But given that it's Rockstar's first real atempt at online, there are of course some drawbacks. After playing a complete round of Cop's and Crooks I find myself either dropped out into the "party area" or completely thrown back into the single player game. This is of course rather annoying.

If I honestly had to nail down a score for the game I'd give it a 9.5. Looking at the game itself it's more of the same GTA we all know and love with a few improvements and a bit of polish here and there. The improvements are welcome and this series is sure to live on, however there are still some minor and major setbacks that Rockstar will only be able to iron out with time. Here's hoping for another trip back to the 80s, oh how I love 80s music, I love it good.