And the Game of the Year (2008) Goes to....

Yes I know its a little too late to indulge myself in giving out "awards" to my favourite game of last year, you got to know it's just weird how I never really talk much about video games in my own blog... despite it being my no.1 life waster. I had been playing video games ever since the age of 4 with my first video game being Ice Climbers on a Nintendo Entertainment System rip-off called Micro Genius. I never stop gaming since then and when I come to think of it... it is just sad that my favourite life-waster had taken a backseat in my blog. So if you don't mind, let me indulge myself in giving out awards to my favourite games of 2008.

Surprise of The Year - World of Goo
I don't like to play puzzle games because they either make me feel stupid, or they are to casual for my liking. Then came Portal, a first person physics based puzzle game which actually made me feel clever and laugh at the same time and I thought I will never fall in love with another puzzle game again.... until I played World of Goo a physics based puzzle game in which you must lead a group of "goo" from point A to point B (kinda like Lemmings with physics... without the stupid lemmings). What impress me more is its size of 60MB!!!

If only physics class was ever this fun....

Biggest Disappointment - Spore
Ever since I first heard of Spore's development (circa 2004), I had been anticipating it. I was intrigued by the idea of a game that simulate life itself. How you start a creature from a cell and slowly evolve it into a race of galactic superpower. What makes it even more intriguing is how every single user created creature, buildings and vehicles is uploaded to a Wikipedia like server for all to see. After following the development phase closely for 4+ years I finally got to play it. Instead of a huge open world game which simulates everything in life, we got a multimillion dollar casual game. Every single aspect of the game is dumbed down to appeal to "casual gamers" so say EA. For a game which plays like Pop Cap game, I felt cheated for buying this for RM139.00 (US$40) .

Sadly, the creature creator is the only thing worth playing in this game

Games that I wanted to play badly but never had the chance to - Metal Gear Solid 4
Ah, Metal Gear Solid. One of the best and consistent gaming series that I had ever played. I still remember the first time I played Metal Gear Solid 1, it took me 1 and a half agonizing hours just to get past the first 2 guards. Yeah, I know... I suck but ever since then, every single minute playing it was an orgasmic experience. The wonderful cinematics, the great graphics, the awesome story of twists and turns and last but not least the fantastic stealth gameplay which was quite alien to me back then. Fast forward 3 Metal Gears later, I am still craving for more but unfortunately can't get some. Due to some unknown reason why Hideo Kojima still remains fiercely loyal to the overpriced piece of plastic by the name of Sony Playstation 3.

A video is worth a billion screenshots. Watch it!

Videogame of the Year - Left 4 Dead

Before you go, "WTF? Where is Fallout 3, GTA 4, Mass Effect, etc etc" on me allow me to explain why I gave this award to L4D. Though GTA 4 had a great story, it lacks the free form gameplay that its predecessor San Andreas has. Despite Fallout 3 being a free form epic RPG game, I do not have the time to truly immense myself in the epic-ness of this game. Mass Effect? If it is not for the story, the whole game itself would had suck.

So what's so special about Left 4 Dead you say? This game have what I call the "Diablo-factor". Which in laymen terms means "simple repetitive game but strangely addictive". The whole concept of the game is simple. You and 3 other people have to travel across the zombie infested city to escape from...what else? Zombies. In between your paths of the escape point and you are thousands of zombies including some special types which have special abilities. The hunter, who will jumped and humped you like a rapist, the smoker, a sniper-type zombie which can grab a person with his tongue at long distant, the boomer, an obese zombie which vomit bile on the survivors which attract zombies, the witch, a zombie bitch which will incapacitate you simply by touching you if you disturbed her crying and the tank, which like its name implies, a tank of a zombie that won't die until you empty several rounds of ammo at him.

Unlike all the AAA games that was released last year, Left 4 Dead is the only one with the most replay value especially with friends. Despite only having 4 campaign maps, the game is high replayable as every session is like Diablo. You never know what the game will throw at you until you are there. Best part of them all? You can play as zombies....

Another day at Petaling Street

Jebat oh Jebat.....

Ever since secondary school when I first came upon the story about Jebat vs Tuah in a 7 day iron-man match which ended with Jebat being killed by his best friend Tuah. This all started because Jebat tried to avenge Tuah's supposedly death on the hands of the Sultan of Melaka just because the Sultan heard a rumour regarding Tuah seducing his concubine.

Yes, Hang Tuah and Jebat put on such an epic Ironman Match that even these two men would be ashame.

Without any chance to defend himself whatsoever (ie. a fair trial), Tuah was put to death by the monarch only to be rescued by the Prime Minister secretly. Upon knowing his best friend that he had grown up with was put to death, Jebat rebelled and wreak havoc in the palace of Sun Wukong (Monkey King) proportions. The Sultan, the coward that he is, ran away from the palace instead of facing Jebat like a man. When he was told by the Prime Minister that Tuah was still alive and that he is the only man in the whole of the Melaka Empire that have a chance to beat Jebat, the Sultan immediately grant Tuah full amnesty and order Tuan to kill Jebat.

Instead of just stabbing the Sultan right there and be gone with it, Tuah actually accepted the proposal out of blind loyalty and was successfully his childhood friend. When I read this story during my sastera section of my Bahasa Malaysia/Melayu class, I was actually surprised how a dumbass like Hang Tuah could ever be such a great Malaysian legend? He helped a man who wants him dead to kill his childhood friend who rebelled all because of him for crying out loud!

Instead, such acts was glorified while the man who rebelled because the Sultan was a dumbass was defiled and brand a traitor. Poor oh Jebat. If he was born elsewhere he could had be a bigger legend his dumbass friend was and his quote " Raja adil raja disembah, raja zalim raja disanggah" (which roughly means a fair king one shall submit, a cruel king one shall overthrow) shall be quoted for revolutionaries and freedom fighters in history.

This could easily be Hang Jebat's face instead of Che Guevara's

After all the shit that had happened, what do you think about this? Are you the follower of Jebat's School of Thought by submitting and serving loyally ONLY to kings that are fair and cares for the people? Or are you the type that follows the Tuah's School of Thought which teaches you to be obedient to the king's order even if he tried to screw you over?

In other news.... some family member had given another great speech about fairness and justice. What a noble man indeed........

The screw: Rumoured to be Perak's newly proposed coat of arms

True colours revealed...

Guess now we know where the someone truly stands. Guess we had all taken for a ride by their "clean" and people-friendly facade. 5th February is the day Malaysian democracy is been raped and humiliated by the Barisan Nasional.

Anwar might deserves to be humiliated but not the majority of the people in Perak. They deserve way better than this shit.

Moral of the story is....

Here's what the political drama in Perak had taught us:

1. Despite maintaining a respectable image, by refusing to call for snap elections immediately, the Sultan of Perak had clearly shown his disinterest in wanting a state government which had won cleanly by the mandate of the people.

2. That smile in Najib's face had revealed his true colours. That bugger could barely hide his emotions.... perhaps this is a good time to make him reveal some stuffs **hint hint**

The smile that reveals all - Photo leeched from AFP

3. I would be very happy if BN wins back more states by corruption during this period of economic recession. You could only dump this much shit to the rakyat before they start running amok.

4. This event could only signify two things. Either its the beginning of the end for Malaysia or the beginning of the end for Barisan Nasional.