The Musings of Dale Dietrich
This week, Netflix launched its long awaited and much coveted Netflix Canada service. Unfortunately, the content selection cupboard is mostly bare. The limited offerings (and lack of DVD service) explains the $7.99 Cdn per month price. The minimum monthly fee that Americans pay for their Netflix service is $9.95 U.S.. For that they get a …
Continue reading “Netflix Launches in Canada–With the Cupboards Bare”
What are the cost components that make up the retail price of a typical video game? Put another way, how much does each participant in the video-game development / distribution chain get? I get this question all the time. In this presentation to Columbia University students, Steve Perlman, OnLive’s founder, both demos the OnLive system …
Continue reading “Cost Components that Make up a Typical Video Game’s Retail Price”
Sony’s 2009 E3 Press Conference can be viewed here. See also my 2008 Sony E3 coverage. Click on images below for larger views. Exclusive PS3 Games Shown God of War III: (demo’d – coming March 2010 ) Looks terrific! Except, that is, for Sony’s continued reliance on quick time events in boss battles. Grrr! But …
The Microsoft Press Conference can be viewed here. See also: My 2008 Microsoft E3 coverage. Big Announcements: Halo Reach: Bungie teased this new Halo game, set for a fall 2010 release. Whoo hoo! If its a Bungie shooter, and it has the name Halo on it, I’m in! Is ‘Noble 1’, Will Master Chief? …
Continue reading “Microsoft E3 2009 Press Conference Summary”
(3/5) – action – adventure Reviews: Metacritic 81%| Game Rankings 80.68% | zero punctuation Reference: | Achievements Walkthrus: Mahalo | WikiCheats | GameFAQs Developer: Ubisoft Montreal, Engine: Scimitar / Anvil Game Synopsis In Prince of Persia (“PoP”), an unnamed prince, who isn’t really a prince, travels with Princess Elika to each of the 24 regions, …
Data files on each of my web server, laptops, primary computer and iMac are regularly and automatically backed up to my networked Drobo. I also use the Drobo as a primary repository for 100’s of Gigabytes of centralized data – accessible from any device on my home office network, including my Apple TV, TiVo, PS3 …
Continue reading “Drobo Recovers from Drive Crash as Promised”
It’s time to create a whole new category for the Wii phenomena. Holy cow– more than 2 MILLION in sales in North America in November is crazy. Yet, to this day there still isn’t a single game on the Wii I’d want to play – not one. Yet you can’t deny those sales numbers. Video …
Three days ago I pulled the power chord on my TiVo Series 3. As I have done several times recently, I was taking my Series 3 to take it to a friend’s house to see how many over-the-air HDTV channels TiVo could receive in his neighbourhood. Embarrassingly, when I got to my friends house, plugging …
Continue reading “Had to Replace My TiVo Series 3 Power Supply”
In the early days of console gaming, about 25% or so of all games made me nauseous, dizzy or gave me headaches to the point where I couldn’t play them. A prime example was Deus Ex: Invisible War. I enjoyed the game and wanted to continue playing it. But I couldn’t play for more than …
Continue reading “Video Game-induced Nausea, Dizziness and Headaches”
Reviews: Metacritic 73%| Game Rankings 77% Reference: Achievements| Walkthrus: WikiCheats | GameFAQ | Mahalo Developers: Konami | Double Helix Games Genre: survivor – horror Status: Abandoned after escaping hospital As explained in my “Video Game-induced Nausea, Dizziness and Headaches” post, I had to abandon Silent Hill Homecoming due to nausea caused by the inability to …
Continue reading “Silent Hill Homecoming is Unplayable – No Y-Axis Inversion”
Reviews: Metacritic 73%| Game Rankings 72% | zero punctuation Reference: Achievements| Walkthrus: Mahalo | WikiCheats | GameFAQ Developers: Pandemic Studios | Pi Studios Genre: Third person shooter Status: Abandoned after first level As a shooter fan, I was looking forward to Mercenaries 2: World in Flames. Unfortunately, I had to abandon it after the first …
Continue reading “Mercenaries 2: World in Flames – Abandoned Due to Nausea”
Below are the fall 2008 video game releases that I’m most looking forward to, not sure of and two 2009 games that I’m chomping at the bit to play. Fall 2008 Can’t Wait Oct 17? – Max Payne 3 – Only Rumoured – but the Mark Walberg movie comes out Oct 17. Max Payne 1 …
Continue reading “Most Anticipated Fall 2008 Video Game Releases”
(3.5/5) Reviews: Metacritic 72%| Game Rankings 72% | zero punctuation Reference: Achievements| Walkthrus: Mahalo | WikiCheats | GameFAQ Developer: Lucas Arts Genre: Action-Adventure Engine: Ronin, DMM, Havok and Euphoria Pros: engaging story – music – excellent auto-save points – genuinely fun – first rate physics – achievable achievements – fair Cons: some camera issues …
(3/5) sci-fi, thriller While I enjoyed Vin Diesel in Saving Private Ryan (1998) and Boiler Room (2000), I became a fan after watching his unexpectedly good performance in xXx (2001). In 2004 I discovered, Vin Diesel’s cross-media Chronicles of Riddick franchise after playing the terrific Xbox video-game Chronicles of Riddick: Escape from Butcher’s Bay …
Continue reading “Chronicles of Riddick: Pitch Black (2000)”
Sony Movie and TV Service: The biggest ‘news’ of the Sony press event was the U.S. launch, today, of the previously announced (see here) video service. Sony, Fox, MGM, Lion’s Gate, Warner, Disney, Paramount and Turner Entertainment have partnered with Sony to provide movie and TV content for the on-demand download service. The system …
Continue reading “E3 2008 Sony: Movie-TV Service Launch – Not Much More”
And nothing happened. Nothing captured my interest and certainly nothing was announced to satisfy the hard-core gamers. New Products Wii Speak: A microphone that sits atop the TV that picks up all the sounds and voices from a room. This will be used in games in lieu of a headset. But the Wii doesn’t have …
Continue reading “E3 2008 Nintendo: Wii Music, Wii Speak, MotionPlus, Wii Speak”
(Click image to watch abridged version of Microsoft’s 2008 E3 press briefing) [Full Microsoft E3 2008 coverage is here] A new Dashboard Interface for the 360: It’s coming this fall. [ Watch demo here]It’s nicer than, but seems influenced by, the PS3 ribbon. It looks like it will be easier to use than the current …
Continue reading “E3 2008 Microsoft: New Dashboard, Netflix, Final Fantasy XIII”
Diary: Entry #1, Reviews: Metacritic | Game RankingsReference: GameFAQ | Developer: EA DICE, Engine: FrostbiteStatus: Finished “Welcome to Bad Company” (the intro level) Pros: Boat load of shooter fun – Immersive – Humorous – Destructible environment – Terrific death/penalty system – Save points therefore a non-issue – Very good graphics/character models – Difficulty Level is …
MGS 4 Diary: Entry #1, Entry #2, Abandoned!MGS4 Reviews: Metacritic | GameRankings.comReference: GameFAQ Walkthrus | As beautiful and cutting-edge as MGS4 is, after making it past the laughing Octopus stage in the second act, I abandoned the game, at least for now. This surprises even me. I have been waiting for years to play this …
Wimbledon 2008 starts this Monday June 23 and runs to July 6. I just discovered (ironically through an adsense ad on The Daleisphere) that Wimbledon provides a two week ‘Wimbledon Live‘ service where, for a flat fee of $24.99 (approx. £12.65) you can stream live matches to your PC or download up to 250 matches …
Continue reading “Wimbledon Live – Stream or Download Wimbledon 2008 Matches”
MGS 4 Diary: Entry #1, Entry #2, Abandoned! MGS4 Reviews: Metacritic | GameRankings.comReference: GameFAQ Walkthrus | Progress: I made it to Act 1 – Crescent Meridian (7th of 8 parts to Act 1) What a difference a day makes. Discovering that Weapons/Items need to be equipped before they appear was important! (See Update in Diary …
MGS 4 Diary: Entry #1, Entry #2, Abandoned! MGS4 Reviews: Metacritic | GameRankings.comReference: GameFAQ Walkthrus | Progress: I made it to Act 1 – Urban Ruins (4th of 8 parts to Act 1) This is the first video game I’ve played since slicing open my left index finger on May 15. I had to abandon …
Starting today (press release), Apple Canada is making movie (and some TV show) downloads available to Canadians through the Canadian iTunes store. Apple says 1200 titles are available at launch, including 200 ‘high-def’ titles. Despite Canadian dollar parity, as usual Canadians will pay more per rental ($4.99 for new releases, $3.99 for older titles) than …
There’s not much to love about this year’s French Open – so far. There wasn’t one memorable match in the first week. Two of my favourites, Davenport (not playing for ‘personal reasons’) and Roddick (out for a rotator cuff injury) are not participating. Three time French Open champion Gustavo Kuerten, one of my all-time favourites, …
GTA IV Diary: Entry #1, Entry #2, Entry #3, Entry #4 Key Stats: 43.45% done | 55 missions passed | 66 missions failed | $323,224 in cash | 37:47 Playing Time | 3rd & 4th safehouse It’s been a week since Diary Entry #3. My objective was to get to the point where all of …
