Movie news: I guess Universal publicists put in an update at IMDB. Now it says the title is SCOTT PILGRIM VS. THE WORLD, which I must tell you is the accurate current title of the film. It may change in the future, but I'm pretty sure every draft I've seen has had that title on it.

I think it's an appropriate title for a done-in-one version of the story, don't you?

Anime: I watched that first episode of Macross Frontier, which I guess debuted in December (the full series begins in Japan later this week). It was awesome. Really. I was impressed. It got me unexpectedly excited. I've always liked Macross/Robotech... stories about huge numbers of people drifting in space do something for me, I guess. (I got it here.)

Video games: I started playing Etrian Odyssey (for DS), which I had been hyped about back when it was announced, but then I forgot about it! Anyway, it's pretty cool so far, in a curiously Eye of the Beholder-kinda way, but with adorable character art.

Music: I am rediscovering Daft Punk's Human After All, which most of us dismissed back in '05. Somehow it has improved with age (and with the release of Alive 2007, not to mention the Justice album). Good inking music, maybe.

Books: We are listening to Into the Wild in audiobook format, speaking of inking music. I haven't seen the movie, although I agree that Emile Hirsch is handsome. The book is pretty good. Somehow we keep listening to books about Man's Folly.

I haven't mentioned on here that I was given a Nintendo DS Lite for my birthday. I just went to the store and bought this amazing Nerf case for it. It makes it all fat and foamy, which is nice because I was having trouble gripping the damn thing.

So far I just have Zelda: Phantom Hourglass (bought for me) and Elite Beat Agents ($16 used). Zelda is kinda awkward to play in public, cause you have to do stuff like yell at your gameboy. EBA is hard to play on a plane because there's too much ambient noise.

I need some better time-killin' games as convention season kicks into full gear, so if you have any recommendations, let me know. I have my eye on Professor Layton, Hotel Dusk, and the Phoenix Wright games. Cooking Mama is enticing. I may have to get Puzzle Quest, since the PC demo addicted me. Stuff like the brain ages and french training and NYT crosswords is kind of tempting, too. Am I Penny Arcade's grandmother?

I honestly never would have bought a DS on my own initiative, but I think it'll be nice to have around for all the traveling ahead of me this summer.

Does anyone have a few minutes to play Super Mario Bros. 2 (NES) on an emulator and take me some screencaps of the slot machine mini-game?

Alternately you could play it on a Nintendo, on a TV, and take some photos?

Can anyone do it like, right now?

That'd be great thanks!!!!

*back to drawing*

EDIT: Thank you everyone, I think I got what I needed. And learned something along the way. Something about friendship, courage and... and something. The end!

I can't get to my server to update my website, just in case anyone was wondering. I was going to say on there something about how the t-shirts are sold out, and how we're going to APE in April (in San Francisco), and I was going to ask if anybody knows a place where I could pay to have good MP3 hosting so I can have my music online without having to rely on the unreliable bit-torrent thing.

Here's a page i scanned out of my sketchbook the other day.


What I'm up to in my spare time...

* playing Final Fantasy XII for PS2

* we're finally watching Arrested Development Season 3 on DVD

* reading The Maltese Falcon, sort of, slowly

* still reading Fabric of the Cosmos, but the entropy chapter kind of blew my mind slightly and I haven't really picked it up in a little while

* a comic, The Mourning Star Vol. 1 by Kaz Strzepek, is totally awesome and you should pick it up if you can find it. It's very small and square and thick. It's kind of a fantasy story in an unusual post-apocalyptic world, like a cross between Akira Toriyama's Sandland and, say, Jeffrey Brown.

* the D&Q release of Moomin: The Complete Tove Jansson Comic Strip is very great and a must-buy! Tove Jansson was a brilliant genius and I'm glad D&Q (Tom Devlin specifically, I think) is putting this out there.

* while I'm ranting about brilliant geniuses, I'm still very much fixated on Osamu Tezuka. The latest english release is Ode to Kirihito, which is like 850 pages for 20 dollars or something ($16 at Amazon), with the added value of being completely fucking insane! I'm also slowly working my way through Phoenix, which I love to bits. Even the stupid ones are perfect, in my mind.

what would it be like?

my ideas:

1. 2D pixel graphics
2. side-scrolling fighting (see: double dragon)
3. with RPG and food elements (see: river city ransom)
4. with a dating sim included (see: japanese dating sim games)
5. the dating sim parts would have hilarious dialogue trees (see: monkey island)
6. it would also involve "rhythm game" mechanics (see: parappa the rapper, space channel 5, etc)
7. it would be kind of like Alex Kidd or something, you'd run around and fight dudes and go into subspace doors to play minigames! ha ha ha!

Note: there isn't going to be a Scott Pilgrim videogame, so don't worry.

Note 2: i was just playing Ninja Gaiden on the xbox, and i think it sucked. I quit after I died the first time, on level 2. I've been having more fun with Sega GT 2002. i like games where you don't have to die. i read this gaming flow stuff yesterday (courtesy Penny Arcade) and it was very interesting. too bad almost no designers actually think about these conceptual things because they're too busy designing scantily-clad sweet kid-sister tomboy vixen badass warrior whores.

I was sick most of last week, so I didn't get a lot done. I finally sent out the (probably) 2nd-last batch of Scott Pilgrim orders. I am very close to done. I'm on something like #92, minus two people who got bumped back for dumb labeling reasons and stuff (my fault). I'll try to finish up on Monday.

OK, dreamtime. Feel free to skip this paragraph because it'll be stupid. Last night, I had a dream that I was watching the band Final Fantasy and was kind of in awe of the guy's crazy looping or whatever (this is because Chris used to rave about him; I'm really not even a fan) and then I had to go up and play a song after him for some reason, but I wasn't ready, etc, generic dream. All of my friends were there (on stage), etc. I told them we were going to play "you practically rock" and we played it but everything was bad and I kept switching instruments in the middle of the song, etc. OK, that's enough dreamtime.

While sick I actually found a copy of Shadow Hearts: Covenant (the PS2 game I have been fruitlessly, half-assedly searching for). The MicroPlay in Sackville is shutting down, and they're selling all their rentals. We just happened to drop by there one day (it's right beside a grocery store that we rarely go to) and I asked if they had it, and they did, and I just had to search through their random, disorganized mess of games to find it. It was only 20 bucks! The case is kind of messed up (stickers, etc) but the game is really clean, not scratchy or anything, and so far it's kind of fun. It's got so much retarded anime bullshit in it, and it's a really obvious Final Fantasy clone, but it's still fun. It's just like playing an alternate universe Final Fantasy game or something. With more cheesy anime garbage characterization. I seriously don't think any Japanese person who's ever worked on a videogame has ever even MET a woman in real life.

my hands are SO DRY lately! they itch and are horrible and dry and stuff! i've tried EVERYTHING! (not really. i've tried hardly anything.)

sorry for not posting much but, you know, trying to finish the book before it's too late and the monsters eat me.

In my free time (which does not occur every day) I have been very slowly playing Resident Evil 4, which I got for christmas. You know, actually, I vaguely remember Resident Evil 2 being more "fun"... this one is kind of dour and cranky and european. I do not like dudes with chainsaws cutting my head off, and on the boss I last finished, I apparently died 9 times (this is what I was told after finishing the level). So, not so great at this stuff.

( CONTENT! )

this weekend:
-dinner guests
-getting my hip-hop education (dr dre, snoop, wu-tang, public enemy)
-fiona apple, bloc party, british sea power
-obsessed with the new (forthcoming) ben folds album, despite myself
-disgaea
-almost done drawing
-when i'm done drawing i have so many great things i'll be doing!
-i have like 20 songs to record
-i have like 20 paintings to do, too
-i want to keep playing disgaea until i get bored of it
-that usually happens pretty quick
-but i kind of want to get to like level 1000 or whatever
-it's really goddamn cold in here