Ahead of me this week are three vacuums of time: essays. Two due on Wednesday and one due on Thursday. For me to distinguish these vacuums of time, I’m going to need to spend a night on each, starting tonight. What I’m trying to say is that you may not see me for a few days. Do not worry. I am alive. Not well, but alive.

I cannot wait for Thursday, for my exams to be over and done with by mid December, and I cannot wait to finally be able to just relax.

Prediction: If at the end of this week I was to rate out of 10 the amount of fun I had, I would surely pass out before being able to.

As many of you who have Xbox 360s and are connected to Live already know, the NXE update has gone live. One of the pretty cool new features is the ability to create an avatar, very akin to Nintendo Wii’s Miis. What’s awesome about the Xbox Live avatar feature, compared to the stale Mii feature, is that new clothes, accessories, and other details will be updated regularly. Think about it. You could end up with an avatar wearing a Master Chief helmet, with Marcus Fenix’s body armor, with, how about Lara Croft’s skimpy little shorts? I don’t think I’d dress my avatar in such a fashion, but it sounds like it will be a possibility in the future.

Other than the relatively pointless (even though I love it) avatar feature, the rest of the NXE update is very much welcomed. You can have a party chat now with up to 8 people, the blades are gone and replaced with a slick, shiny and extremely quick interface, and there are a bunch of other updates and fixes I still have to explore. I’m very happy with it so far.

That’s it!

Love,

Adam Sawicki.

A “pile of shame” in gamer-speak refers to the games a gamer has bought or still needs to buy that are unfinished or unopened entirely. On my list, you may see games that have been out on store shelves for months. This is because I just haven’t had the time to finish them yet. I know it’s no excuse. I should finish them if I really love them so much. Hence, pile of shame.

So here’s my Pile of Shame for 2008 (in alphabetical order):

• Castlevania: Order of Ecclesia (DS)
• Fable II (360)
• Fallout 3 (360)
• Farcry 2 (360)
• Gears of War 2 (360)
• Pixeljunk Eden (PS3)
• Left 4 Dead (360)
• LittleBIgPlanet (PS3)
• Metal Gear Solid 4 (PS3)
• Mirror’s Edge (PS3)
• Motorstorm 2 (PS3)
• Prince of Persia (360)
• Spore (PC)

A hefty list with an undoubtably hefty price tag. I’m actually afraid to calculate it. So I won’t.

That’s my list! I’d love to see everyone else’s lists up here as well. Write yours down in the comments section if you can or want. Let’s compare, shall we?

UPDATE: Heather and I just finished solving the Gears of War 2 game tape!

Presenting Flashback Friday, a feature wherein I’ll be looking back at an event that happened to me or around me and sharing it with my dear readers. The purpose of this feature is two-fold: 1) I help myself remember specific events by writing them down so that I never forget them, and 2) I hopefully supply my readers with some interesting reading material so they can know more about me and why I do things that way I do.

A Christmas Break In

Since it’s fairly close to Christmas, I thought I’d share a story with all of you about a very interesting night shortly after the 25th of December.

So it’s between 3 and 4 in the morning. Everyone in the house is sound asleep and probably dreaming about their presents and such. The house is warm, comfortable, and quiet. Quiet, until I wake upon hearing a loud thud.

Now, when I first heard this thud, I immediately believed it was something falling down. “Ah well, someone will pick it up in the morning. Time to go back to sleep,” I thought. Wrong. I heard yet another thud. Then another. I heard one of our speakers in the living room fall to the ground and then shortly after that I heard quick and clumsy running down the stairs close to my room, and then another set of stairs down to the basement. This is when I started freaking out.

(more…)

The movie has started. No more live blogging. You can still read the history below though. It’s awesome. Sort of.

So I thought it’d be interesting to try out live blogging. Heather and I have been really excited about this movie for weeks. So we’re at the theatre now. Let’s blog! Haha.

10:33 pm: We’re buying our tickets.

10:43 pm: Now we’re in the pre line up. There is only 1 girl here. And that’s Heather. The ratio is like 100:1.

10:55 pm: So there was no line up. We’re actually sitting in the theatre. More than hour before the movie and we’re already sitting. Better than standing, right?

10:58 pm: There are 2 dudes to the right of us that are super annoying. But damn I spoke too soon. A bunch of REALLY annoying and stupid loud guys just sat behind us. I’m going to quote what they say next: “I’m good at playing ball and hitting on girls.” NO JOKE.

(more…)

I’m not going to lie. I’m writing this in class right now. I’m still listening to the professor, because she’s very good at what she does. I’m just really tired. It might have something to do with me only sleeping for 3 1/2 hours. 

This, believe it or not, is keeping me awake. So…let me briefly point out a few things that happened to me today. Here we go:

• I got punched by a falling leaf. In the face. Twice.
• I told 15-20 people about my amazing 91% mark on my philosophy essay. It is worth 30% of my mark. It also took me 3 hours to write. 3 hours before it was due. I finished it 3 hours after finding out about it. 3 hours. Three.
• I have developed a man crush on Mark Wahlberg. Not a gay man crush. Just a man crush. He’s adorable.

Time to be a man again.

I’m out!

Hating you (in a very mannish, masculine, and play-fighting way),

Adam.

P.S. I’m in love.

P.S.S. With a girl.

So I REALLY wanted to share this amazing game with everybody. I love zombie movies and I love zombie games. The problem: there aren’t too many good ones…in my opinion anyway. This game though, holy shit.

So what is Left 4 Dead? It’s this gem of a zombie game developed by Valve in which you fight of plagues of infected zombies all vying for a piece of your brain. But they’re not slow-ass Resident Evil zombies, no no no. They’re super quick 28 Days Later zombies. They’re fast. Real fast.

The best part about this game? Its 4 player co-operative gameplay. The developers say that if you don’t stick together with your teammates and if you don’t play strategically, you will get nowhere. It’s all about killing zombies together. It’s sweet. Awww…

You may notice that it’s cut up like hell. That’s because I’m much more boring than the game. So, I cut it up to show just the crazy action parts, which are amazing. But even walking around with your teammates and exploring the environment is fun. So don’t get me wrong. I love pretty much every little bit of the game so far.

And yeah, you may also notice that the video quality isn’t so great, but whatever… If you want to see just how awesome it really looks, buy it and find out. It’s worth it.

Also, check out the intro for the demo. It’s equally as awesome:

Watch the intro in standard quality

Watch the intro in high definition

Love,

Adam.

Seriously.

I’m going to keep up a blog. How can I not? You may ask that. Yes, you may. Well, I think I should for the below two reasons:

1. I’m a New Media major
2. I’m also an English major

If I’m online all the time and I’m constantly thinking up of website ideas (even though I hardly follow through with these ideas), I should have something to work on that’s online and in regular need of management.

Oh and about the English major part… Well, I want to write dammit! Just don’t critique my spelling, grammar, and writing style please. Thanks!

You may also ask, “Adam, why a black and white picture?”

To that, I respond, “Oh hey! Thanks for asking. Well see, this is my first real post. When photographs were invented, what did they look like? They were black and white. So basically, I’m starting from the very beginning with my media. But no worries, the rest should be in colour. Yes, they should.”

Love,

Adam Sawicki

Hey beautiful people. It’s “sort of” my first post because I’ve had a blog on my personal site before…anyways, I’ll uh update this pretty often. 

And why not test video embedding? Watch the above video.