Thoughts of Al

One of the most iconic CEOs in history, the man who started a company of two men in a garage and grew it into a multi-billion dollar empire, not to mention re-invent animated films has passed away.

The directions taken by Apple under Jobs’s leadership were revolutionary. From the original Machintosh, the first computer to be controlled by a mouse, right the way through to the mobile devices that changed the way we access information.

Don’t forget Pixar, the movie studio that created ground-breaking CG animation. Films like Toy Story, A Bug’s Life, Cars and Monsters Inc. Some of the biggest animated films of all time.

He will be missed by many.

(This post was written on an iPod Touch. I love this thing.)

I haven’t blogged in about three months so I think it’s time I did a new post!

So, what have I done since June? Well, in July I went into Sheffield for the Tramlines music festival. Hundreds of musical acts all over the city over a weekend, all for free! A big highlight for me was seeing Los Campesinsos live on stage outside Sheffield city hall!

The following weekend I headed south to see the family. Long journey, but it’s good to see the folks.

August came along and I headed to the campus of Warwick university for the Ayacon anime convention. Four days of panels, gaming and socialising! The cosplay was superb, the panels informative, the nights in the club really fun! A great weekend!

Something that was not good was the cold I came back with. I hate convention cold.

The following month I headed to the campus of De Montfort university, Leicester for the ALcon anime convention. Yep, I went to two cons in a short period! Four days of the same! It was great to see all the same faces that frequent the con, some of them I’d seen the previous month at Ayacon!

Guess what I brought back with me. Yes, another con cold!

What’s next in my life, we’ll see. Until then, bye!

Well, E3 has been and gone for another year and i’m actually a bit disappointed. There are two reasons for this.

The first one: Lack of originallity. There was an endless supply of sequels this year, a lot of them were the third game in a trilogy. Battlefield 3, Mass Effect 3, Uncharted 3 and more.

The second one: Too much motion control. It seemed almost every game in the Microsoft press briefing had Kinect on it in some way. Playstation move was all over the Sony conference. Nintendo had… ok, they weren’t really talking about the Wii much, more the Wii U and its ENORMOUS controller.

So, that’s about it. Bye.

Okay, just watched the Nintendo presentation, so hyped up right now!

It started with the 3DS. New games include:

• Mario Kart
• Starfox
• Super Mario
• Kid Icarus (again!)
• And… Luigi’s Mansion! Nice to see that one again!

But enough about that, let’s move on to Ninty’s new hardware we’ve all been speculating about. Bringing in a new way to control games (how often has that been said in the past three years), they call it the Wii-U!

Not much was said about the console, it was all about the control device. 6.2 inch touchscreen, analog pads, accelorometer, there’s a lot in it! They showed some great ways to apply the technology too. But what really put the icing on the cake was the prospective game lineup! Titles mentioned were:

• Lego City Stories
• Batman: Arkham City
• Assassin’s Creed
• Tekken

In closing, Nintendo have put forward a press event better than Microsoft, but that’s not saying much Microsoft’s one was kinda boring! See ya!

Sony, what can I say? Quite a bit, it may seem. As I expected, it started with an apology. Good move, guys. Now, on to the games.

Uncharted 3, Street Fighter X Tekken, Bioshock Infinate, impressive 3D bundle, proper information on new handheld device. On the other hand, there was what I thought was a little too much 3D and Playstation Move still looks a bit daft.

That’s about it, no, wait. PLAYSTATION VITA????? What kind of name is that? At least the event had a big finish with taiko drums and Mixmaster Mike.

I’l be back later today once the Nintendo conference has been. Bye!

This one I didn’t see a lot of, due to technical difficulties.

Not much to be said really apart from:

• Driver:San Francisco
• Far Cry 3
• Assassin’s Creed: Revalations
• Rayman

And some other stuff I can’t remember/didn’t see.

I’ll be back when Sony have done their bit. Let’s see if they start with the word “Sorry”. See ya!

Back again, this time for Electronic Arts.

This press briefing was considerably better than the Microsoft one. Mass Effect 3, Battlefield 3 and Need for Speed: The Run really caught my eye. Insomniac Games announced Overstrike, an action game which, at the same time, looks hilarious! I was also impressed by the Bioware developed Star Wars MMO, The Old Republic.

At the moment I write this, The Ubisoft presentation is minutes away. I’ll finish here. See you later.