VGX Sucked as Expected

When I saw the advertisement for VGX, Spike's Video Game Award show, I new it was going to suck worse than a crack whore with Parkinson's. Seriously, whoever could not smell the bullshit streaming from the concept alone really needs to evaluate their bias, because their being lead by bullshit delusions.

The primary reason why VGX was designed to suck was the same reason why it should not have aired (or streamed). While award shows work for TV, Movies, and (I suppose) music is because they have a plethora of material to cover. They don't just give awards to the titles, but to the director, to the actresses and actors. Even if these award shows come off as pretentious and unnecessary, they at least know what their intended audience wants to see, and they have a categories to cover (promote) the highlights of the respected industry. VGX did not have that. VGX will not obtain that, unless a reward show could actually handout rewards to individuals that develop heavy weight titles.

VGX had a few games to promote, a few games to nominate, and a few interviews (that were botched completely). Watch any other award show and ask yourself why they succeed, even with the blatant marketing and advertisements.

In order or VGX or any other video game award show to obtain success, they first need to a serious approach, know their demographic, and then do the work to treat developers like fucking rockstars. Without bringing more of a human quality to it, it just reeks of shallowness. The reason why Oscars work is because they don't just reward the movie, they reward the team, and stars in it. They have more to show other than one reward.

TL;DR VGX sucked because it had 5% real material and 95% bullshit and filler.

Finals Week and Tecmo Bowl

A gauntlet of finals awaits me, and I have prepped and readied for a glorious conquest, but not without help from Sunday NFL and Tecmo Bowl! Watching the Vikings almost secure a victory after watching the Eagles dominate through the heavy snow against the Lions, I ended with a grudge match between the 49ers and the Seahawks. Damn, some fine games back to back, but what eased my mind from the constant studying was dusting off Tecmo Bowl for the NES for some glorious blitz of my own.

And I can still recall all the crap I've been trying to cram. I think my finals are already done.

Castlevania SOTN: Cheap Tricks

I'm playing through this little title called Castlevania SOTN again (like for the 50th time), and while I enjoyed the aesthetics, feel, sound, and mechanics of the game. The difficulty, or the lack thereof, just made it seem all too easy. The only time enemies become a problem is like never. The enemies look so well designed and thought out, but they die within less of a second. The inverted library has a interesting Wizard of Oz theme with the Lion, the Scarecrow, and the Tinman (not sure what the shmoo is supposed to be), but it's silly that they put all that effort into something that will die from a nearly invincible Alucard. The reason?

Soul Steal.

This spell is learned pretty early in the game, and it will allow you to keep max health through most encounters. The only few times where soul steal did not matter was when encountering certain bosses.

Olrox was an interesting encounter. While you can corner him with cheap hits, you'll end up taking some hits yourself. No big deal, because is health gets too low you can just cast that cheap spell.

Galamoth: this beast is tough battle, even with soul steal. The boss has so much HP, that you're better off just attacking him with everything you have. Soul steal, I believe, only does 1 damage per hit for 8 hits. He, on there hand, can drop your HP faster than you can restore it.

So, really, only one boss in the entire game actually comes off as a challenge even with soul steal. My point is that Konami should have balanced the game with that in mind.