There’s No Beer In Hell, But All The Pianos Play DOOM There…

Posted on September 18, 2013 by geelw

File this under “Now, I’ve REALLY seen Everything!”: OK, so it’s NOT Hell Paris again, but hell… someone made a piano that plays DOOM. Yeah, I want one now (and am kicking myself that I gave up on lessons as a kid), but I’ll need to steal a cargo plane, hire some some assistants and fly all the way to London’s Virgin Media Game Space in order to get this one of a kind hybrid machine/instrument. Of course, I’ll get arrested, tried and convicted and need to serve some hard time (boo, but I want to keep the film rights!), but at least I’ll have a story to tell at parties after I get out that will top the usual “I saw so-and-so coming out of a Starbucks drunk!” stuff you hear all the time, right? Hmmm… I wonder if Carmack, Romero or even Bethesda will ask for one of these to be made for them at some point. Hey, I say if anything, you can buy off that devil with a gift he’ll really flip over! You DO know he plays EVERY instrument, right? I got him a harmonica last year and he’s quite the expert at it!

The Backlog Continues (“Oops” Edition), Plus a Viking Wants Some of My Money…

Posted on September 15, 2013 by geelw

Yeah, yeah – I’m laaaaate to posting again, but I’ve been busy working through a bunch of games. One of which ISN’T Volgarr the Viking (now available on gog.com). Not that I don’t want to buy and play that awesome looking old-school hard as nails 2D action platformer, mind you. I’m actually OUT of space on all three of my hard drives and every portable drive I currently own. Ugh. Actually, I need to go through those drives because part of the reason I’m out of space is I accidentally backed up a complete drive onto another a while ago when I thought I was copying a few files and I don’t need everything I duplicated. I just haven’t gotten around to clearing out the drive because I’ll need to go through a load of files and that will take most of a day. Eh, one thing at a time, I suppose. I guess I’ll delete a few games I duplicated and add Volgarr and a few other things this week. I still have a few cheap indie bundles I spent a buck or two on that need to get added to my virtual stack of games to get to.

Saturday Night Fever, Ralph Kramden Style!

Posted on September 8, 2013 by geelw

(thanks, compukatz!)

I keep forgetting to remind myself to research if there’s a box set or something legal of The Honeymooners on a disc I can buy, as I miss that show and don’t have the stamina to sit through the marathon on New Year’s Day that WPIX here runs every year. That and I’d probably spend the time watching The Twilight Zone marathon on syfy (ugh, that illiterate renaming STILL offends me!) instead. Or find something else to do like play too many games I need to catch up on. So yes, that’s the primary reason for this post, ladies and germs. I like gentle and funny reminders to get stuff done and you needed a laugh on an early Sunday morning, so it’s a win-win situation, correct?

OK, that’s my good deed for the day – now go get some sleep. It’s going to be a long day tomorrow and you need to make it back home to catch Breaking Bad…

Return of the Fumetti! IDW’s Star Trek Annual 2013 Does Some Major Time Traveling…

Posted on September 6, 2013 by geelw

Wow. I’m ancient enough to remember owning a couple of Star Trek fumetti, so seeing this all-new page created by comics legend John Byrne for his upcoming Trek tale “Strange New Worlds” made me smile a wee bit too much. I hope the younger fan of the series embrace this photo-novel style, as it’s a real art form. Even crazier (in the best possible manner), Byrne created the panels for the series by carefully cobbling together “multiple pieces of film stills and manipulating them to tell the exact story he wanted”, according to the press release. That alone makes this worth checking out if you’re one of those folks who knows the original series inside and out. You’ll be picking out shots and testing your memory, that’s for sure…

IDW’s Star Trek Annual 2013 will run 48 pages and should be in your favorite comic shop the third week of December. I just may need to pick this up and take a time trip down memory lane…

GOG.com Gets A Harlan Ellison Classic (Finally)…

Posted on September 6, 2013 by geelw

Well, well, well… I haven’t played I Have No Mouth and I Must Scream in about 15 years, but it’s definitely one of those games that sticks in the corners of your brain long after it’s been explored. Based on Harlan Ellison’s 1968 Hugo Award-winning story, this is an adventure game geared for adults that’s pretty unsettling and requires quite a bit of brainpower to make it through some of the trickier bits. Ellison himself appears in the game as the voice of AM, a not so benevolent supercomputer (OK, more like a slightly too malevolent supercomputer) that decided to put the last few remaining humans through the wringer in more ways than one. Best of all, gog.com has it now for a mere $5.99 and yes indeed, you sure look as if you need to be scared half to death this weekend.

Look at the bright side, though… at least you’ll be safe at home when you’re freaked out of your skin…

If You Never Loved Lucy, Well… This Might Change Your Mind…

Posted on September 5, 2013 by geelw

(thanks, ItsNotYouItsMeblog!)

I happened to be flipping around the dial randomly again and TCM paid off, as usual with a film I hadn’t seen yet (but had heard of). This clip from director Dorothy Arzner’s 1940 film Dance, Girl, Dance of Lucille Ball doing the number “Jitterbug Bite” cracked me up because in another universe, she’d have been more famous for her sassy song and dance numbers and not trying to “splain” every week to Ricky about why the oven grew a twenty-foot bread loaf, why she stuffed too many chocolates into her face at the chocolate factory or got into a catfight in a vat of wine grapes with some stubborn grape-stompers.

The film itself is pretty funny, pitting Lucy’s burlesque queen Bubbles (what a name!) up against the cute gal played by Maureen O’Hara who does the opening act everyone boos until Lucy steps in to pull her showstopper number. of course, being typcast as a sexpot isn’t the best thing for any actress who wants to stretch her wings, so it’s definitely a great thing that Lucy didn’t let herself get trapped into these sorts of roles, right? But of course, if you never loved Lucy, it means you just never watched enough TV back in the day or sought out all those reruns that seem to in in constant loop on some channel somewhere in the world…

Random Art: And You Thought I Was Taking the Weekend Off…

Posted on August 31, 2013 by geelw

Well, I almost did, thanks to sorting laundry and the mountain of ancient crap from the art vaults I decided to pore through over the past few weeks before putting the bulk of back into storage most of today. Anyway, That goofy thing above is a semi-recent digital piece based on part of a dream. The other thing below is from 1987. Is it a man, a horse, A Man Called Horse or all of the above? Who knows? A horse is a horse (of course, of course) after all…

Hmmm… I guess some things never change, but I guess I’ll keep dinking away at this art stuff until I get something right. Back in a bit, as I need to move a few more pieces so I don’t have to sleep standing up tonight like Mister Ed. Whaddaya mean “Who’s Mister Ed?” Oh, OK, not all of you reading this are aged cheese like I am. Darn kids. OK, Here you go.

Welcome to Brain Battle MCMXI (The Struggle Continues!) Featuring Kirk & Spock…

Posted on August 19, 2013 by geelw

I have the most raging headache right now, but type away I must. Nothing particular brought it on, just General Stress, Major Pain and trying to wean myself off coffee (yeah, I know, I know…) on a Monday. Woo. Not a good idea, but I’ll try anything once (allegedly). Hmmm. Maybe the trip to the market to buy stuff to make soup with will ease my pain. If not… “Now, the Lerpa!” Ouch. Someone change the channel, please? I like Star Trek a lot… but not IN my head and definitely not “Amok Time” in my head. I’ve had that fight music blasting between my ears most of the day already!

And now you do as well. Either that or you’ll hear chimes all night from those shaky bells in that first video… ouch. Off to locate an aspirin.

Shout Factory Zaps Out Another “B”-Flick Sci-Fi Bundle…

Posted on August 16, 2013 by geelw

Nice. At a measly $6.95, these four sci-fi “classics” of assorted quality (mostly of the “so bad they’re awesome” variety) work out to a no-brainer “BUY ME!” price of $1.75 each, which is a BARGAIN if you love old cheese and don’t mind falling off your couch or chair in a heap a few times.

Of this new set of four, Reptilicus is pretty darn amazing as it fails on so many levels (to a jaw-dropping extreme, in fact) but makes for a surprising great visitor’s guide to Denmark’s nightlife (you’ll see). And of course, The Brain That Wouldn’t Die is completely mind-blowing in many ways for what it brings to the table. See it and you’ll get my stupid puns in that last sentence. I’ll make sure I’m out of town when you come to chase after me with a blunt object. The other two are also pretty awesome in that bad way, but it’s been a few years since I’ve seen either (which means I just may have to get this disc at some point)…

I actually didn’t know this the the second entry in this series of MGM non-masterpieces (calling them “classics” is a bit of a stretch that makes me smile and almost feel sorry for someone who grabs these thinking they’ve discovered solid gold in the trash heap). The first disc’s a doozy as well, but EVERYONE who considers himself a sci-fi or “B” movie fanatic needs to have seen Angry Red Planet and The Man From Planet X at least once before they flee this mortal coil.The again, if these are your bucket list flicks… you’ve either seen way too many movies or just not enough. Consider taking long walks (at least five miles a day) and drinking a gallon of prune juice a week. You’ll live longer than your buddies laughing at you for liking such lousy films.

“Why so serious?” You ask? Well, you might actually drop dead after seeing these flicks if you go in thinking they’re “great” and your brain rage quits on you, but hey, what’s life without a little risk, I say? Don’t choke on that popcorn either, stay away from diet soda and watch out for the cat when you plop down on the couch (it’s hiding under that big pillow again, me-ow!)…

GOG.com Wants You to Return to the Dungeons (and Yes, There Be Dragons Inside)…

Posted on August 15, 2013 by geelw

Back in April, gog.com had a very cool sale on an assortment of Dungeons and Dragons PC games and I think I was lamenting (with a really tiny violin solo in the background playing away) about not having enough time to play the games I already had in that lovely set to buy any more D&D titles. Well, I get a second chance (and so do YOU) as the sale is back with ten mostly massive role-playing experiences for a mere $26.40. The cool thing is if you already own any of these titles thanks to a gog.com purchase, you actually get a discount applied to your total. Nice.

Of course, given that the potential of a few hundred (if not THOUSAND plus) hours of gameplay lie in wait for you once you click that BUY NOW tab, you may want to invest in a few emergency rations and start e-mailing people you know to tell them you won’t be around for a while. If you really want to get them buzzing, tell them you’ve been summoned to a dungeon or something similarly vague yet eye-popping before you stop answering calls and emails. That should get them thinking about your extracurricular lifestyle activities, right? And by the way, I still have no time to buy any new epic until I clear through a few I’ve started already. I really need a TARDIS, people…