briancarl.com

A Blog about nothing by Brian Carl
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Archive for the ‘brian carl’

Who doesn’t like Free?

March 25, 2008 By: BC Category: South park, brian carl, streaming video No Comments →

Yesterday, i believe, Southpark studios finally has posted every episode of South Park online for free. It’s about time some people in the entertainment business seem to get it.

PEOPLE ARE GOING TO STEAL YOUR STUFF BECAUSE IT IS FREE and easier and faster than going to the store and buying it. A legal alternative that does the same thing is a great idea.

According to Mashable the site makes money off of ad revenue and that is split 50/50 between Comedy Central and the creators of South Park, Trey Parker and Matt Stone.

More on the Merger

March 25, 2008 By: BC Category: Radio, Sirius, XM, brian carl 2 Comments →

So apparently I heard yesterday that even if the merger is approved the radios are not compatible to receive both frequencies?!? So you can’t have both unless you buy a whole new receiver? That sucks.

Awareness Test

March 24, 2008 By: BC Category: brian carl, markerting, monkey, moonwalking monkey, seth godin 11 Comments →

When it comes to marketing I really am a fan of Seth Godin. I regularly read his blog and I have read a few of his books. He posted this video on his Blog and it really made me wow. I had to rewind the video to make sure it wasn’t fake. Then this same video was in another of my regular marketing blogs, hubspot, I thought maybe I will repost it.

Its pretty crazy huh??

Sirius / XM Meger

March 24, 2008 By: BC Category: Department of Justice, FCC, Radio, brian carl, satellite radio, terrestrial radio 5 Comments →

Today the department of Justice approved the merger of Sirius and XM radio.

I have said numerous times that I don’t think that this merer will happen, because of the FCC. Now the FCC is the last obstacle in the way of the merger, but with the DOJ approving it I think that it might actaully happen.

As all 3 of my readers know I work in Radio, but contrary to a lot of others I think this can be a good thing, assuming that they don’t screw it up. I like al la carte. If i can get Hard Attack, Left of Center, Sirius Punk, Fungus, and the Mets games, I would be happy guy.

But really what is that worth to me? Honestly not more than a few dollars a month, so the 7 dollar price point really isn’t for me. I don’t need 50 stations, I don’t even need ten. If I could get 6 for 3 dollars a month then maybe its worth it to me. Eventually it is going to go the way of cable and be integrated into all stereos so you can easily switch between satellite and terrestrial radio.

Now if only cable could go al la carte. I am tired of paying for lifetime and fox news.

Who needs an Emulator?

March 14, 2008 By: BC Category: Emulator, Nintendo, brian carl, nes 1 Comment →

This couldn’t have come at a worse time since I don’t have any time to play other video games since I am playing Smash Brothers non stop (as well as blogging about it), but  found the best website.

http://nintendo8.com/all/ has pretty much every original NES game on it to play. I know this isn’t something new, since emulators have been out for years now, but this is different. It requires no downlaod and is played using a java applet.

So you can Battle Bowser in your browser. har har har.

Every game I have tried so far has run extremely smooth and the website is separated into categories so it is easy to find what you are looking for.

The biggest flaw of the website is that there is no full screen mode, but i can deal with that for a free easy to use interface.

TRANSFORMERS!!!

March 14, 2008 By: BC Category: Transformers, brian carl 1 Comment →

More than meets the eye.

I just wanted to repost this in case you guys missed it

Real Life Transformers 

Smash Brothers Brawl Update

March 13, 2008 By: BC Category: Mario Kart, Smash Brothers, Smash Brothers Brawl, Uncategorized, Wii, brian carl 6 Comments →

Just a quick Smash Brothers Update. The problems with the online play seem to be universal. I hope this is something that will be resolved soon. Apparently this was a problem with Smash Brothers in Japan as well. I can’t wait for the pay-to-play model to finally come to the Wii.

Which Brings me to Mario Kart Wii. It is dated officially for April 27th. There are a lot of sweet things that this game has added from the past ones and Nintendo has yet to disappoint me on one of their Classic game series.

* The first awesome thing is Mii integration. Honestly I don’t see why more games don’t have this option.
*

Second 16 person online play. This is the first game on the Wii that handles that many players at once.

I have heard rumors Mario Kart will be the first game to use the pay to play model. I don’t mind throwing a few Wii points around if it means a better online play, because so far it has been really sub par.

And I will leave this post off with my favorite song from smash Brothers Brawl
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Xbox price Cuts

March 11, 2008 By: BC Category: 360, Uno, Xbox 360, Xbox Live, brian carl, video games, xbox 6 Comments →

MCV from the UK reports that Microsoft has cut the price of its Xbox 360’s. This is a pretty big deal since one of the allures of the Wii is that its the value system. I know it has way more than that, but price always comes into play. According to ripten the price is lower than the Wii (“Amazon.co.uk can now confirm the new UK prices. The Xbox 360 Arcade will drop from £199.99 to £159.99 (cheaper than the Nintendo Wii no less…”)

They both have their ups and down, but I am not going into that now. I am just hoping that this happens soon in America. I can really use an XBOX 360 to play some Golden Eye online. Or maybe even some UNO

Super Smash Brothers Brawl - Worth the Wait?

March 10, 2008 By: BC Category: Game Cube, Gamecube, Nintendo, Nintendo Gamecube, Nintendo Wii, Smash Brothers, Super Smash Brothers, Super Smash Brothers Brawl, Wii, brian carl 3 Comments →

  1. Well I got Super Smash Brothers Brawl yesterday. I played for about 7 hours give or take. (Yeah i know i probably had better things to do but ehhh). There are a lot of similarities from the last smash brothers title, but there are some big differences as well. The positives are…
  2. - The Adventure Mode.This is a huge difference from Melee. In Melee you chose a character and then played through a mode sort of like a Mario Brothers game and play through with your one character. Now in Brawl you don’t even get to choose a character at the beginning. At each section of the game you choose a character out of a choice of 2 to 4 fighters and you play with that one until you are knocked off the stage and then you move to the next character. St first this seemed a bit weird, but it makes sense because there is a running story line. Not to give our any spoilers, but the story is good as well.

- The Controller Options.There are 4 options for the controller. This was alluded to when they originally announced the game, and many players were worried about adding motion to the game. Lucky they did right by the gamers here. Now having 4 controller options isn’t anything new for the Wii. Every other fighting game has about the same, but they all seem to work in a way that is great for the game. Also the Gamecube players love the fact that you can play with your old Gamecube controllers, but I am personally converting to the classic controller. I think overall this feels the best for me, but it’s been a tough conversion process from the gamecube controller.

- Characters.Every Smash Brothers game thus far has been exciting seeing more and more fighters added to the game. This one antes up with Melee. Brawl has all of the good characters from Brawl, minus a lot of the clones, but adds some really awesome fighters to the mix. A short list of the classics that were added is

  • Sonic
  • Snake
  • Wario
  • Pokemon Trainer
  • Pit
  • Diddy Kong

- Create a Stage Mode. I haven’t used this much yet, but I am very intrigued. It is kind of hard to use, but it is still an awesome feature to have in a game. I might be lazy, but if I can find a few cool people to make stages for me to play then I am good.

- Assist Trophy Item. Everyone favorite item in Melee is the Pokeball. If you are saying the hammer, then you are way too competitive and need to calm down. This is just like the pokeball, but uses characters that didn’t make the game as playable, but needed to be in the game. There are other cool items in the game that were added, but this is really the highlight.

Beyond that the game-play is the same. I have to note here that I did not put the online play in the positive section. This is a huge positive for the game, but there is a lot of problems with it.

  1. There is no headset. This is not necessary, but it is nice to have. There is a place in the game where you can add taunts when your fighters taunts his opponent, but it isn’t the same as saying it to them.
  2. You really need to make a phone call or IM your friends to let them know you want to play online with them. There is no point of signing online if you don’t know they are online.
  3. I don’t have a feeling yet on the playing with random people yet. The day I got the game it seemed to be down. Multiple other people I know seemed to have experienced the same problem.
  4. The last thing maybe just me not knowing how to do it, but is there a way to play with your friend and other random people? I don’t think there is, which really isn’t cool, but I could be wrong on this one.

Overall I know there is a lot going on in this game and I am disappointed with certain parts of the online play, but I still feel this is the best Wii title to date. I would go as far to say this is the best game on all Next Gen consoles as of right now.

The Sims 3

March 06, 2008 By: BC Category: Maxis, PC, Sims, Sims 3, The Sims, The Sims 3, brian carl, gaming 3 Comments →

The Sims 3 has been announced. I Really don’t see what else they can do to make the game more realistic. My assumption based on absolutely nothing is that they are going to have more of an online component in this game.

Spore has all ready been announced to have the ability to visit other worlds that players create on the internet. That is cool for that game, but really won’t be much fun for the Sims. Seeing a whole new species and then dominating their poor pathetic race has a nice ring to it, but kicking over my neighbors lampshade, not so much.

I am hoping for an integrated Sims Online. The last Sims online failed miserably, but really that was kind of expected. Every time they change the fundamentals of the game it doesn’t work as well. If they just leave the game as is and let other players live in the same neighborhood, maybe actually let me walk down the block, thats pretty cool. Its not a crazy new idea, but it will have a huge impact.

On March 19th Maxis will release more info. Lets see if any of my predictions are right.