Disney to create Pirate MMO – Chris is dubious
Apr 13Disney has announce they’re doing a massively multiplayer video game based on Pirates of the Carribean – the game will be free to download and install, but there will be a monthly subscription. This is in the wake of Toontown, an MMO where you got to be a toon. I played Toontown and it was fun, but it has some catches. The first was names were heavily censored, which is fine. I didn’t need to see a cartoon rabbit named “j3w-h8r” running around (I actually saw that name – and H1tler. Because people are fucks.)
The second catch is that being a Disney game, they are very paranoid about people being able to talk to one another, their rationale being that this is a slippery slope to child molestation. And they’re not half wrong, though there’s certainly a large amount of protecting themselves from litigation behind it, not just protecting kids. So, the solution was that there was a fairly robust set of canned talk. I think if you were friends (a system I don’t properly recall – it was four years ago), you could chat, but here’s my point: talking to a handful of people normally while everyone else runs around going “Arr!” is fun for about 15 minutes, then it starts to suck. So, I’m curious how it’s going to work.
In the meantime, why not play Puzzle Pirates? Same idea, only you interact through puzzles. Jobs on a ship? Abstracted as a puzzle. Want to have a sword fight? A puzzle very much like Super Puzzle Fighter. It’s free to play (there’s more personalization if you play), and it’ll run on systems that will burst into flame if they tried to run a 3D game, I’m telling you.
Scorpy Alert!
Apr 13‘Scapers take note: the awesome Wayne Pygram, aka Scorpius, appears on tonight’s episode of Lost!
(A few small details about what he’s playing on Spoiler Fix, but don’t look if you don’t want to know — there are general SPOILERS for the eppy as well.)
Man, Lost is good at finding perfect geek god actors for the guest roles. I mean, Mira Furlan? Clancy Brown? Damn! How about a part for Armin Shimerman?
Return of the Grups
Apr 12What’s this? Within a week, I’ve come across two fairly mainstream uses of the term “grup” — yes, as in “grown-up,” as in Original Trek. First, the writer of this article used it to define a new breed of adult, also known as yupsters, yindies and alterna-yuppies. Then, April, Luke’s nerdy, kind of annoying plot device of a daughter used it on this week’s ep of Gilmore Girls.
Is “grup” the new hipster-nerd word (ie, used by people who fervently insist they are “nerds,” yet still know in their heart of hearts that they are way cooler than you)? Or perhaps merely the new insider nerd-cool word (ie, something nerds use to show they are in the inner circle of nerdiness — see also: frak, frell)?
The Life and Times of Juniper Lee
Apr 12Judd Winick has created a cartoon and no-one told me? It’s kind of like Buffy meets that Jackie Chan cartoon, only written by Winick, who writes some good stuff. I stumbled upon it by accident last Sunday. I may have to watch more. When the episodes have titles like “My Mind on My Mummy, and Mummy on My Mind” how can you NOT want to watch?
For those of you not in the know, Winick has written or does write a lot, A LOT, of comics, including Exiles, Batman, Green Arrow, Green Lantern, etc. I started reading his stuff with Barry Ween, Boy Genius (awesome stuff – a must read) and Blood and Water, a really good vampire limited series for DC/Vertigo. Apparently he was on Real World, so he plays some small role in the Reality TVpocalypse, but his stuff is too funny to hold that against him.
WikiWikiWhack: Judd Winick, Barry Ween
Linkapalooza: Puke and Piss Edition
Apr 12Just an assload of links piling up, and they’re not getting any fresher, so they’re starting to stink.
Isotope Comics has some neat PDF previews up of some pretty good indie comics. Very worth a look.
Remember the fat kid with the lightsaber you watched online like three years ago? Boy, was that funny. Funny to the tune of several hundred thousand Canadian dollars? Not really.
Mike Sterling writes a funny comics blog which I enjoy daily, and also does a column about managing a comic shop for another site. His latest column has both puke AND piss in it.
The Russian mob is online.
Thor and his posse throwing down a wicked awesome insult rap.
Project 880, also known as James Cameron’s next movie, also known as a geek wet dream, may be moving forward. Is it lame to be excited about this? I’m excited about this.
CSI: Miami with vampires. That is one HELL of a pitch.
