Monday mini-movies: Athletic hamster edition

I’m a simple man and, thus, simple things amuse the hell out of me.

Take, for instance, this hamster running a pint-sized dog endurance course.

No matter where my week goes from here, it’s unlikely anything will top the simple joy of watching that athletic little furball of awesomeness tackle that popsicle stick course. That either says a lot about this hamster, or very little about what this week has in store for me.

Thanksgiving blogcation

It's time for my annual one week cop-out wherein I explain that I'm taking a blogcation for the holidays.

With Thanksgiving just a couple days away and all sorts of other personal and professional jibba-jabba getting jumbled as a result, it's just easier to take this one thing off my plate for the next five days.

Speaking of plates, I plan on eating myself into a coma this year. Assuming said nappy-nap doesn't last too long, I'll see you back here next Monday for a return to your regularly scheduled bloggings. Expect reviews, a double dip of Joystick Division posts and buckets of love.

This week in Joystick Division

Check out the last link for my PS3 gift guide.

Another week, another batch of Joystick Division posts. I'll likely be out of town next weekend, so I'll play catch-up with a double dose of video game links in early December. Where did this year go?

Nov. 14-20
THQ says games too expensive
Bee Gees hit Rock Band
LEGO Universe MMO expands with new zones
Games get you ready for the GMAT
Dead Nation ready to launch
New Pac-Man ready to rock
EA brings Tetris to PSN
Nintendo shuns WiiSpeak
Hothead needs help naming game
VUDU streams HD movies on PS3
Dead Space composer returns for a second round
iOS features a ginormous games library
WiiWare finally gets demos
PlayStation 3 Holiday Gift Guide

UFC 123 reminder

Sadly, this is one of those weeks where I just don’t think I’ll find the time to get out and take in the fights. Unfortunate, since there are a couple on this card I would really like to see.

This week’s predictions are going to have to be abbreviated, too. The main card is listed below, with my predictions marked in black.*

UFC 123
George Sotiropoulos vs. Joe Lauzon
Phil Davis vs. Tim Boetsch
Gerald Harris vs. Maiquel Falcao
Matt Hughes vs. BJ Penn
Rampage Jackson vs. Lyoto Machida

*This way, there’s no chance I’ll miss a prediction.

Review: Jackass 3D

It’s kind of hard to review a Jackass film. There’s no acting or plot to speak of. There’s little in the line of a soundtrack and, while some of the camera work is pretty great, I wouldn’t exactly call it “cinematography.”

Fans will see Jackass 3D in hopes of laughing their butts off and being grossed out, and, for the most part, the film delivers. While this would be my least favorite of the series, there’s still plenty here to keep you and your friends talking long after the credits have rolled.

After so many years of watching these guys perform this shtick, it simply feels like 1) The gang is running out of ideas and 2) Most of their hearts just aren’t in it anymore. The closing credits leave one feeling like this film is being used as a sort of send-off to the long-running series, so let’s hope they stick by that and decide to go out while the welcome is still warm.

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Review: Due Date

I’m really scratching my head over why the critic community has such a hate-on for Todd Phillips’ Due Date, starring Robert Downey Jr. and Zach Reallyneedstogetanewlastname, also pronounced “Galifianakis.”


Resting somewhere around a 38 percent on Rotten Tomatoes, the general consensus seems to be that the starring duo lacks chemistry and the characters are so “out there,” it’s hard to root for them.

I’m gonna go ahead and disagree. Downey plays a seriously high-strung father-to-be while G-Town is the exact opposite, a flies-by-the-seat-of-his-pants man-child with abysmal social skills.

These two end up on a cross-country trek so, yeah, the film doesn’t exactly get major points for originality. But I thought the two played very well off of each other.

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Monday mini-movies: Great moments in middle school sports edition

Napoleon. Alexander the Great. That kid from Little Giants who orchestrated “the annexation of Puerto Rico.” All amateurs compared to whichever brilliant tactician came up with this play pulled off by a middle school football team in Texas.

Simple, yet brilliant. I can’t wait to see a professional squad attempt something like this off.

I can see it now: Down by five, the ball is spotted on the 50 yard line, and there’s 10 seconds left on the clock when coach uses his final timeout. In the huddle, he whips out his Blackberry as all the players gather to get a look at the tiny screen. “My grandson sent me this clip from youtube,” he says with a twinkle in his eye and a sly grin dawning. “I think it might just be crazy enough to work.”

Then...Pure magic.

This week in Joystick Division

This was a week of sheer randomness. Big surprise, right? Everything from an EyePet PSP review to Hulu and hockey on PSN to GemeStop's holiday shopping program can be found below. Enjoy.

Nov. 7-13
New update adds voice chat to PlayStation Home
What if video games were more realistic?
Hulu Plus available on PSN
Developer claims PS3 outsells 360
Audio from violent games Supreme Court hearing
A look at the Atlantis level cut from God of War II
Fan-made Scott Pilgrim DVD box art is rad
Video game aims to help kids cope with divorce
Spain street named after Super Mario
Mass Effect comic to tell story on PS3
NHL app available on PSN
Hilarious artwork shows how to slice and dice video game characters
New GameStop service makes game shopping a snap
EyePet for PSP review
More PS3 HD collections we'd like to see

Movies to miss in November

It's another light month for awful-looking cinema with only three films appearing so bad that I would preemptively recommend you just pretend they don't exist.

Skyline
Anyone know where this movie came from? Not that something so simple as late marketing should keep you away from a film, but when something that looks this "big" pops up out of nowhere with a no-name cast and a half-assed viral campaign, I tend to be sceptical. Early reviews are pretty much saying the same thing "decent special effects with a low budget, but poor drama and even poorer writing." I'm all for under-the-radar Sci-Fi flicks, but the consensus seems to be that this one is missable.

Faster
Dammit, The Rock. You had such potential. Unless this movie is actually supposed to be as bad as it looks, and the acting and dialogue are supposed to be god-awful for an ironic sort of throwback to classic revenge flicks, I can't imagine why anyone would want to see more than the terrible minute and a half of this film provided by the trailer. I honestly couldn't tell if the whole thing was meant to be tongue-in-cheek or if it was just doing a really, really bad job of taking itself seriously. If it's all in jest, then forget everything I just said.

Tangled
I'm usually all for a Disney flick, but this one just looks awful. Seriously, I'm one of those adults who can fall in love with a quality children's flick. Not a second of what I've seen of Tangled, though, makes me believe this film will have anything in it resembling "quality." Maybe I'm forgetting something, but I'm pretty sure this has been one of the worst years in a long time for family-friendly animated entertainment. Pixar, we're going to need you to ramp up production to about three movies a year. Thanks.

Games to get in November

The beginning of November pretty much shot right past me, leaving me to completely forget about the monthly game and movie posts. How will you ever know what to buy and what not to see if I don't throw my two cents in? So here's the late games post and, on Friday, I'll take a few minutes to make fun of craptastic movies.

November
2nd- GoldenEye 007 (Wii)
2nd- Ys: The Oath in Felghana (PSP)
2nd- God of War: Chains of Olympus (PSP)
4th- Dance Central (360)
5th- Knights in the Nightmare (PSP)
9th- Call of Duty: Black Ops (All)
9th- The Sly Collection (PS3)
16th- Split/Second (PSP)
16th- Need for Speed: Hot Pursuit (All)
16th- Assassins Creed: Brotherhood (PS3, 360)
21st- Donkey Kong Country Returns (Wii)
29th- Golden Sun: Dark Dawn (DS)
30th- Epick Mickey (Wii)

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Monday mini-movies: Synchronized walking edition

What do you do with your free time? These guys practice walking...To the extreme.

This week in Joystick Division

Nothing much this week. A case was finally heard by the U.S. Supreme Court on video games, gaming technology is being used to save lives and a tiny kitten tries to play Duck Hunt. You know, the usual.

Oct. 31-Nov. 6
Golden Joystick Awards...awarded
360 Dashboard officially updates
Bejeweled 3 on the way
Get sparkly glove with new Michael Jackson game
Watch this adorable kitten play Duck Hunt
Pussycat Dolls lead singer in GoldenEye remake
Recent study says games educational
Japan gets real-world shop channel on the Wii
Sony looking to bring Googlt TV to PS3?
Gaming tech used to speed up drug production
Supreme Court hearing on violent video games
Dragon Age Facebook game on the horizon
Dreamcast games we want to download
Atari Classics coming to PSN

Supreme Court considers violent video game law

It’s taken a while, but video games finally had their day in court yesterday. The U.S. Supreme Court, to be exact.


California, represented by Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, took on the Entertainment Merchants Association concerning a law that would make it a crime to sell “obscenely violent” video games to a minor.

Despite the fact video games are already voluntarily rated by the ESRB, which also provides information for why said game is receiving said rating right there on the box, and despite the fact parents already have a slew of control options for their televisions and gaming systems, and despite the fact most respectable establishments already refuse to sell such games to minors, the Govornator wanted more.

The truth is, yes, most teens can figure out their way around parental controls. And yes, even though mature rated games are not supposed to be sold to minors, some are getting out. It’s my understanding that some minors also sneak into R rated movies and the like from time to time, but California opted to focus solely on video games, something the Justices quickly pointed out during yesterday’s hearing.

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Monday mini-movies: People are awesome edition

It's amazing what we can do if we just put our minds to it. Some of those minds need to be crazier than others in order to think up and pull off some of the feats featured in this video, but it takes all kinds, I suppose.

Get ready to make "whoa" and "no way" your most-used words of the day.