Well, that didn’t take long ...

Posted Jan 26, 2007 by TBO.com

Updated Jan 26, 2007 at 05:15 PM

Know anyone with a Blu-ray or HD-DVD player? Probably not. The fledgling high-definition technology isn’t even affordable yet, but hackers have already cracked the encryption used on both formats to protect the movie industry from illegal duplication and distribution.

In other words, you can now download (i.e. steal) high-def entertainment from your favorite BitTorrent site.

Big surprise, huh? Every time the movie and music industries come up with a new “copyright protected” format, geeks find a way around it—and usually without much delay.

When will it end? It won’t.

Like shoplifters, hackers are here to stay. Unlike shoplifters, they can perpetrate their crimes without fear of getting caught on a security camera.

But even at stores with no security equipment, an overwhelming majority of people tend to pay for the items they take with them. Breaking the law just isn’t worth it.

There’s a lesson there: If you make it easier for people to obey the law than it is to break it, there’s a good chance they’ll behave themselves. Right now, however, there’s no simple, convenient and affordable model for legally downloading movies online. Maybe the MPAA should devote all the energy it wastes griping about piracy to developing one.

Assuming it wasn’t as insidious as iTunes, I’d use it. Would you?

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Mortal Kombat: Armageddon

Posted Jan 26, 2007 by Doug Buel

Updated Mar 28, 2007 at 04:20 PM

System: Sony PlayStation 2

Also available for: Microsoft Xbox, Nintendo Wii

Publisher: Midway

Reviewer’s rating: C

ESRB rating: Mature

Game type: Fighting

Kind of like: As far as the fighting goes, this game is a vastly less sophisticated “Soul Calibur.”

Best feature: There are a ton of different characters.

Worst feature: Nearly everything is executed in a lackluster way.

The bottom line: They say this is the last “Mortal Kombat” game.

Well, we know how such things go. Maybe it’s the last game until someone else, years from now, says, “Hey, let’s bring back ‘Mortal Kombat.’”

For now, “Mortal Kombat: Armageddon” is intended to conclude the bloody fighting-game series with a bang.

There is one thing that this game does right—it has a lot of characters. A staggering number. It features every character from every one of the other “Mortal Kombat” games.

That much is done well. We also like the fighting arenas. Many are filled with cruel death traps and areas where you can knock opponents down to a lower level. That was fun in the other “Mortal Kombat” games and it’s fun again here.

But everything else about the game seems rushed. Different characters don’t have their own signature “fatalities,” those death moves that made the series famous. There’s just one fatality system, shared by all the characters.

Also, Blaze is the worst final boss we’ve seen in a fighting game. So, when you beat the arcade mode, it isn’t very satisfying.

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Lost Planet: Extreme Condition

Posted Jan 26, 2007 by Wes Phillips

Updated Mar 28, 2007 at 03:25 PM

System: Microsoft Xbox 360

Publisher: Capcom

Reviewer’s rating: B

ESRB rating: Teen

Game type: Third-person shooter

Kind of like: “Zone of the Enders” meets “Starship Troopers”

Best feature: The boss battles are epic and there are lots of them.

Worst feature: It’s hard to decide which is worse—the bad voice acting, the cheesy dialogue or the perplexing story line.

The bottom line: “Lost Planet’s” snow-covered landscapes are very appropriate. The winter months usually are a wasteland for video games, but this one is big. And that is meant in a very literal sense.

From big mechs to big bugs, “Lost Planet” doesn’t skimp on blockbuster thrills. The premise goes something like this: You are stranded on a frozen planet filled with pirates and large insects. You must continually collect heat units to stay alive. The hero, Wayne, blasts through the game’s levels on foot or by piloting a mech called a Vital Suit. Go ahead and skip over all the cut scenes and story lines, because they won’t make any sense. Just get to blowing things up—it’s the American way.

“Lost Planet” takes full advantage of Xbox 360’s hardware with some incredible looking vistas and explosion effects. Some of the levels are very short and the gameplay can get repetitive, but it’s all just a layover to another boss fight. There aren’t enough epic encounters in today’s games, so in that “Lost Planet” succeeds, even if it is a bit shallow in other areas.

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Unsolicited Gasparilla Weirdness

Posted Jan 26, 2007 by Kevin Walker

Updated Jan 26, 2007 at 11:32 AM

Yes, Gasparilla can be fun. I’ve certainly had fun there. You might have fun, too. Go Gasparilla!

But what’s more interesting to me is how, for one day, normally well-behaved people treat downtown and Bayshore Boulevard as if it’s one gigantic fraternity house. Oh, I’ve seen things, friends. Here are three examples (not the weirdest things I’ve seen, but the weirdest things I’ve seen that I can print in the newspaper):

1. Men openly and without shame urinating into the bushes of homes in Hyde Park.

2. A middle-aged woman hip-checking a little boy, then diving in front of him to catch beads from a float. The kid cried. The woman laughed.

3. An elderly pirate gentleman who grabbed my wife on the Kennedy Street Bridge and offered, without preamble, to suck her collar bone. Asked to cease and desist, he offered no explanation, simply stumbling off into the night.

Good times, indeed. So if you’ve never been to Gasparilla before, beware the collar bone sucker! And remember these two words of wisdom: designated driver.

THE “YOU MUST BE KIDDING” NEWS OF THE WEEK: Leonardo DiCaprio was nominated for the best actor Oscar for his work in “Blood Diamond.”

THE “MAKES SENSE” NEWS OF THE WEEK: “Little Miss Sunshine” was nominated for the best picture Oscar.

TREND WATCH: Pop culture has reached out to baby boomers since their childhood, the spoiled little buggers, and it won’t stop once they get their AARP cards. Latest case in point: “Because I Said So,” the upcoming chick flick for the over-60 crowd. Sweet. Might be time for a remake of “The Golden Girls.”

LISTENING TO: The Kooks’ “Inside In/Inside Out.” The usual disclaimer about my fondness for British pop applies.

HEADLINE I’D LIKE TO SEE: “Victorious Quarterback Praises Rationalism and Self-Determination.”

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Who Watches TV on a Cell Phone?

Posted Jan 25, 2007 by Walt Belcher

Updated Jan 25, 2007 at 03:00 PM

  I’ll admit it. I am not a technophile. It’s not an age thing. I know how to use modern technology. I just don’t have time for it.

  I had an MP3 player and took the time to fill it up with about 200 songs that I liked from Cole Porter to Asleep at the Wheel. I was playing it through the sound system in my Jeep until I accidently dropped the MP3 into a Big Gulp cup filled with Diet Pepsi. I haven’t started over yet.

  I had a cheap MP3.  I don’t want to spring for a iPod even though I could watch TV shows on the deluxe models.

  Apparently, I’m not alone. David Poltrack, head of digital research at CBS, recently told TV critics that less than 10 percent of the nation’s consumers have bought Video iPods.

  His research, involving more than 28,000 homes, found that price was a big stumbling block for most people.

  “Our research finds, basically—for a lot of people, the consumer, it’s too expensive a product,” he said.

As for viewing TV on iPods, about 30 percent of people who have a Video iPods never use it for that purpose, he said.

  “Also, the estimate in the United States is about 20 percent of the homes have a video-enabled cell phone. And
virtually—in the case of our research, 82 percent of the people said they have never used this phone for
any video product,” he added.

“So why aren’t they using it? Essentially because you have to buy a service to use it,” he said. “You’ve got to buy
V-cast. You’ve got to go into one of these services. It costs money. And they’re not willing to make that
expenditure.”

  “This is a good news/bad news situation. The good news is that 20 percent of the people now have it in their hand, a new medium, but
none of them are using it. And I think the bottom—what’s going to drive this marketplace in terms of
video-cell-phone usage is we’re going to have to get free, advertiser-supported content and high-interest
content to the consumer so that that they can start watching this content,” he concluded.

“When they do use their iPods. it’s more music-oriented,” he continued.  “If you look at the video cell
phone and the iPod, you can clearly see the differentiation between the two. The iPod, coming out
of a culture of music—even the video part of it is still being used for music. The video cell phone,
because it’s of immediacy, is actually being used more for news, sports, and weather information.”

  He said that news, sports, and weather (especially on the local level) is what will drive video cell phone use.

“Local information—this basically is going—this video product is going to be essentially a local medium, because it’s going to
provide up-to-date information and programming. “

  He said that there is very little content available for streaming on video phones, and there’s a charge for—if you want to
actually stream a program, they charge you on top of the subscriptions. So the pricing is what’s really
inhibiting this market. And I think, as advertising gets into this mix and as the popular programs become
more available, this is a market of significant potential.

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