Street Fighter: The Later Years Ep4 trailer

Coming September 7 and we have a trailer. I can't wait!

I told you they'd do it!

This morning in my inbox:

Welcome to the Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare Multiplayer BETA!

Congratulations on being selected to participate in the public multiplayer BETA for Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare.

Your Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare Multiplayer BETA Token is:

XXXXX-XXXXX-XXXXX-XXXXX-XXXXX

To download the Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare Multiplayer BETA please follow the following steps:

1. Turn on your Xbox 360 entertainment console.
2. Go to the MARKETPLACE Blade.
3. Select Redeem Code from the available menu.
4. Enter the Token found above in the available field.
5. Select Download Now.

Upon completion of the download, you may choose to 'Play Now' to immediately start enjoying the Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare Multiplayer BETA, or for all future attempts, you can choose the Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare BETA in the 'Demos and More' menu of your 'GAMES' blade on the Xbox 360 Dashboard.

Any and All feedback and questions should be directed to:
cod4beta@infinityward.com or visit the Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare
Multiplayer BETA Forums at www.charlieoscardelta.com.

Note: The beta is 1GB in size so make sure you have the space for it!

Things To Keep In Mind:

Remember the Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare Multiplayer BETA has a Rank Cap. So you won’t be able to rank up past the rank cap noted in the Message of the Day box in the lobby. We’ll gradually be raising the Rank Cap throughout the duration of the beta to allow us to stagger our testing process.

If you have any further questions regarding the Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare Multiplayer BETA, please check out the FAQ located at: http://www.charlieoscardelta.com/beta.php

Enjoy,

Infinity Ward

Yipeee!

Hey Microsoft!

Don't you think it's time for a Windows XP Service Pack 3? I was doing a clean install of XP Service Pack 2 today and I loaded the machine with Office 2007. This is what it took to bring it up to date:

Installation of the active X control for Microsoft Update. Back to the home page for software upgrades, namely Windows installer 3.1 and Windows Genuine Advantage then restart. Back to the home page, 102 updates for a total of 244.2MB!!!!

Think that's bad? Wait! Restart then back to Microsoft Update and another 14 updates totaling 42.7MB this time.

And that's a third restart. Back to Microsoft update, behold! One security update for .NET framework. 8.8MB and we are done.

That's roughly 300MB worth of update and you have to reboot your computer 3 times.

Microsoft? Time for Service Pack 3, like now... But I guess you've already decided that it was for the first half of '08.

Bastards!

COD4 public beta update

I guess there was no need to panic yesterday afternoon after all. I calmly went back to the registration page this morning and after completing the process got the following message:

"Your name will now be entered into a random drawing for Tokens into the Xbox 360 Multiplayer Beta. At 7pm PDT tomorrow, Tuesday August 28th, we will be drawing names for entry into the Beta. Within 72 hours of this Drawing, we will contact you via email with news on whether or not you were admitted. Even if your name is not chosen in the random drawing, there will be more ways to get into the Beta, and we will continue to update you on the details as soon as they’re finalized!

If you are selected in the Drawing, please be patient and wait until you receive your token. We will be sending out Token Codes in batches to ensure the Xbox Live servers are ramped up at a safe pace.

If you use an email client such as Yahoo, G-mail, or Hotmail, please be sure to check your junk mail folder for news on whether or not you've been selected. Also, please add Cod4beta@infinityward.comto your address book. This will ensure that you don’t miss out on any of the action.

Check back into Charlie Oscar Delta for Updates, and don’t forget: this is a Beta! You can send us your feedback at betafeedback@infinityward.com as well as post your thoughts on the Charlie Oscar Delta Boards. We’ll be reading your Feedback, so please let us know what you think!"

I could swear it said the beta was on a first come first serve basis yesterday, anyway I'm keeping my fingers crossed.

Update: I'm not totally crazy. From the Beta page:

"Due to overwhelming interest in the Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare Multiplayer Beta, we will no longer be accepting entry into the program on a first come, first serve basis. To ensure everyone has a fair shot at getting in, the Beta Registration System will reopen shortly, and will remain open for 24 hours. We will collect names until 7pm PDT tomorrow, Tuesday August 28th, after which we will randomly select names for entry into the Beta."

The agony of defeat

I tried to sign-up today for Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare Public Beta, aka COD4 without much success. Before downloading the game from XBox Live you had to get a token code from the site starting at 3:00 PM EST today. I knew there was troubles ahead when the site started to slow down dramatically at 2:30. Since 2:55 that's all I've been getting:


In other words: It's down. Which left me wondering, who gets through on this kind of things and why? Oh well...

Update: After being down for over an hour, Activision finally decided to forward the registration page to the maintenance page. Bleh!

The magic wand

I've searched the land a long time for the Holy Grail of universal remotes and my quest is now over. The Harmony Advanced Universal Remote for Xbox 360 is the answer. Not only does it control everything I have at home that can be controlled with a remote (including the A/C) but you can also program macros called activities like "watch TV" or "watch DVD" or "listen to Radio".

What makes this remote special is the XBox 360 buttons. I generally agree with the CNet video review of the product:

But do not agree with the written review. I have no problem with the numeric keypad and I don't think the interface to program the remote is intimidating at all. As a matter of fact I thought it was really user friendly. As far as rechargeable batteries I'll have to see how fast I go through one set.

It took me about 30mn to setup all the devices and activities (installation of the software included) which I thought was really good. My main problem when it comes to universal remotes has always been the Scientific Atlanta 8300HD. Since it is my cable box but also my DVR it is by far the element of my entertainment center that has the most complex remote. I was shocked to realize that every single functions was there, I'd lie if I said it didn't take a bit of getting use to it, but it's all there.

I also love the "glow" button since I usually watch TV with the lights out.

My box of remotes is now in storage. One remote to rule them all.

$99 at Circuit City.

3 1/2 hours

Is the amount of sleep I had last night. I was playing Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion on the 360 and I've lost track of time. I am now at work feeling guilty and lousy. The end of the day cannot come soon enough.

Still... I nailed the rank of Protector in the Fighter's Guild. :)

I suck.

Memories, you're talking about memories

My God, this sure brings back some. I have watched the Temple of Doom teaser on my British VHS tape of Raiders so many times that I know every line, every shot and best of all I still have the tape :)

(Found on Youtube via Ain't It Cool)

What more updates?

I can't remember the last time we got an update for the Wii and now it's two in one week. This one seems to be addressing issues with the web browser I'm not using. There was also a warning message if you had a modded console not to accept the update, that's a little nicer than Microsoft.

Updates and downloads are great but occasionally I miss the time when I was just turning my console on and play. I'm getting old.

Goodbye Mozilla. Hello Seamonkey!

I've been using Mozilla for years and I don't mean Firefox or Thunderbird, I mean Mozilla. I've switched from time to time to Internet Explorer when a new version was released but I always got back to Mozilla at the end.

I had noticed for a while now that there was no updates to version 1.7.13 and since it was working for me I didn't see any reason to look further but since I rolled back from Vista to XP on my home computer, this morning it was time to re-install Mozilla and that's when I realized they stopped developing my favorite web browser in April of last year, the name of the new project: Seamonkey.

I don't want to sound ridiculously over-enthusiastic since I've been using it for half a day but it seems to be everything I like about Mozilla, only better. I started customizing the browser right after install with this spiffy splash screen and the blue-splash icons. I also changed the theme to iCandy Junior and I couldn't be happier.

Goodbye Mozilla, farewell Internet Explorer 7... All Hail Seamonkey!

Two updates in one day. What are the odds?

This morning when I woke up my Wii was glowing blue (Your mind IS in the gutter) and I was surprised to see there was an upate available. What does it do? According to Nintendo:

Wii Menu

The weather forecast will now be displayed on the Forecast Channel icon in the Wii Menu.

Headline news will now be displayed on the News Channel icon in the Wii Menu.

The current time will now be displayed in the Wii Menu.

The area around the Wii Message Board button will now flash when a message arrives.

Wii Message Board

You're now able to rearrange the order of your Wii Friends in the address book.

You're now able to go into the Wii Friends registration screen by pressing the A Button on a blank spot in the address book.

Envelope message icons will now appear on the calendar only on the dates when a message is received.

Your message sending history will now be displayed in Today's Accomplishments.

You can now scroll the message text by pressing the B button on the message screen.

Wii Shop Channel

The search function on Virtual Console has been enhanced.

And as I turn on my 360 tonight BAM! An update is available. What does it do? If we are to believe Major Nelson:

"this minor release will [...] prepare your Xbox 360 for the wireless guitars that are being released in a few months."

A freakin' Guitar Hero update... Damn! Oh well...

Anything to declare?

Curse you HP for making my life miserable. It all started with a Designjet 110plus printer Friday of last week, not that there was anything wrong with it, but you would think that for $1,000 you would get a printer cable with it, well think again. I had to go to Circuit City around the corner to get one.

I wouldn't even remember that incident if it wasn't for all the misery related to HP products that followed.

On Saturday I'm trying to slap a 500GB internal SATA drive into a Compaq Presario SR1403WM when I realize there's no SATA power on the power supply and I would need an LP4 to SATA adapter. The thing is most vendors seem to have this item as a web only so I'm thinking on one hand that I'm out of luck but then again since the computer is an older model I decide to cut HP (that's right Compaq is HP) some slack since SATA drive have only become widespread in the past couple of years. That was until we got our hands on a brand new HP Pavilion a6097c. Not only does the motherboard supports SATA drives it also comes standard with a SATA hard drive but again no SATA power. So how do they power the drive do you ask? By using the above mentioned adapter. At that point I was fuming.

This could be where the story ends but on Thursday someone walks into my office with yet another HP Pavilion this time still in the box right out of the store. I didn't need to do any hardware upgrade for this one but I was still so miffed over the events of last weekend that I decided to open the case just for the hell of it. I shook my head in disbelief and then I snapped a picture.

It's one thing to be cheap HP, but in order to unload your stock of old power supplies you have turned what used to be the simplest hardware upgrade on a PC into a nightmare. Congratulations!

"STARDUST" Explorer - 30 points

"STARDUST" Explorer:
Found all of the target marks in Mission 11.

And that's it for "Lost Planet". I'm shipping back the game tomorrow morning. The online part just wasn't entertaining enough or at least very uneven, I liked the game overall though. I expect gamefly to ship Resident Evil 4 for the Wii and either Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion, Forza Motorsport 2 or even possibly Dirt for the 360. I'm actually looking forward to play any of these games. I'll play some more Gears of War in the meantime, it's been a while...

"BLIZZARD" Explorer - 20 points

"BLIZZARD" Explorer:
Found all of the target marks in Mission 10.

Just like that guy in "Scanners"

My head is about to explode. I've been looking forward to "The Bourne Ultimatum"'s soundtrack since at least April. As fate would have it, as I'm picking up my copy at the Virgin on Times Square I notice a magnificent Collector's Edition for the soundtrack of 300.

I'm thinking what the hell, it's only 4 bonus tracks so I can give it a quick spin and still dedicate plenty of time to the latest Bourne score. I'm buying it as well.

Going back to the office I "stumble" on the "Mazeltov Records" bootleg of "The Fugitive" which I didn't even know existed. Here I am with 3 albums totaling 4 hours of music and I pretty much want to listen to all of them at the same time...

Does... not... compute...

"RAINBOW" Explorer - 20 points

"RAINBOW" Explorer:
Found all of the target marks in Mission 9.

Whatever happens I'm returning "Lost Planet" this week.