How to be a Bad Guy

If you're gonna be a bad guy in a video game, a movie or in a TV show, You're expected to be defeated eventually by the protagonist. While that is expected, I question how terrible some bad guys are so bad at being antagonists.

Bowser is a clear example of a terrible antagonist. I don't mean that he doesn't make a good rival. I mean he has these ridiculous plans to capture Princess Peach so that she can make him some 'cake' (which I swear is a euphemism for something dirty...). The guy is like 20 times bigger than Mario and yet Mario can still swing his tail around and throw him into a bunch of bombs in the field. Also, if Goombas and Koopas die by someone jumping on their heads, get them all to wear helmets!

And while on that, if you're going to take on someone where you have a massive advantage, don't give him an opportunity to let him beat you! In other words, if you have a specific weak point, cover it up! What clearly springs to mind is Star Wars: A New Hope where the death star blows up after a single plane flies in and shoots a missile into a hole and the whole thing blows up.... if that was a building in real life, the architect would've been hung, drawn and quartered for such a stupid error. (or in this case, Darth Vader would've probably been sacked.... but that just wouldn't make sense and would make the other 2 films obsolete...)

There are so many problems with bad guys. Including why bad guys always hire so many terrible minions. If they all keep getting beaten up by 1 person... You know something is amiss there. In fact, I reckon you've been hiring them from the wrong jobcentre and would probably consider looking for a new recruitment agency!

Also, when you have a list of demands, please make some sense, I'm pretty sure I've seen this in a lot of action films where 'If you don't give me £100 Million within the next 2 hours, I will blow up the earth!'. Because I'm sure blowing the earth will make them change their minds...

Another example is Dr. Robotnik from Sonic the Hedgehog. I don't know where he got his doctorate from but if you can't build a machine that can catch 1 hedgehog, then I begin to question where he got his Doctorate from... (most likely from University of Teesside. OH SNAP!)

*only jk to any person studying a Teesside uni, I'm only teasing :P

Voldemort's plan was to kill Harry Potter. You have a massive army of death eaters, you can control almost any wizard in the world and you are the most deadly wizard known to man...yet you couldn't kill Harry Potter with any of your spells... below is a list of possible items and solution that could kill him if you can't kill him with a spell:

* A Gun
* A Knife
* A frozen ice pick
* Poison
* An inch of water
* A machine gun
* A sharp object that could pierce human skin
* A rottweiler
* A knife disguised as a dildo
* A gun shaped like a banana
* Acid
* Throwing him into a pool of piranhas
* Throwing him into a pit of lava
* Disguising yourself as Dumbledore and killing him in his sleep
* Disguising yourself as anyone but yourself and killing him in his sleep
* Have I mentioned guns and knives yet?

etc. etc. etc.

To conclude, bad guys really need to shape up if they actually want to succeed in taking over the world/becoming rich/killing his or her arch rival/become a megalomaniac. By all means become evil and all but seriously have some common sense and you may actually get somewhere one day....

Would you really wish for Xmas to be every day?

Wizzard once sang the song 'Oh I wish it could be Xmas Every Day'. It was released back in 1973. Clearly at the time, Wizzard did not consider the massive drawbacks. Much as everyone loves Christmas, the point of it is that it comes once a year. Here is the list of the flaws in the song.

Constant Snowing! - This week's weather has been 'chaotic, and a catastrophic nightmare' as the news have been claiming it as. I enjoy making snow angels, throwing snowballs at annoying kids and building snowmen and then holding a funeral for it once it has melted. I don't think I'd enjoy doing that 365 days a year... Plus snow begins to piss everyone off once you realise you can't get the car out a week after the snow's started.

Santa would be working his fat arse off! - By that I mean Santa would actually have to work everyday! And in fairness, the lazy bugger only works one day a year so making him work over 300 times wouldn't work for him. This would also mean he would use more elves, slave labour, outsourcing to India, basically making a business.

The whole world will be constantly drunk and fat! - Lots of food + Lots of wine = Lots of food and wine.

The X Factor would go out of business! by the 10th series, you know they'll just pick any randomer off the street and make them release a single :P... (Oh hang on, they've been doing that since the 1st series! OH SNAP!)

And finally, Brussel Sprouts will be the world's most popular vegetable! although I still don't get why everyone hates sprouts so much. They're like mini cabbages! Maybe people just don't know how to cook them right...


On this note, I was doing a little research on Christmas everyday. And I came across this man:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Andy_Park_(Mr._Christmas)

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1088872/Man-celebrates-Christmas-day-scaling-celebrations-credit-crunch.html

This man has celebrated Christmas everyday since 1994. Everyday he has eaten turkey dinners and watched the Queen's speech over and over again.

"People do think I'm crackers [well you got that bit right!], but I enjoy treating myself and I'm the only one in the world who does it [And there's a reason for that!]."

Just one question popped up when I read this. "When did she leave you?!"

This is (Probably) the best blog about slogans in the world!

This is (Probably) the best blog about slogans. In the world!

It's surprising how advertising affects the world and many of us don't realise. It's one of the fundamentals of marketing and advertising, get a slogan stuck in their heads so that you get their money (err... I'm not a marketing expert so don't question me on that)

But some slogans are too ridiculous when they are taken literally or from a different perspective. Here are a few of them and my thoughts on them.

Good things comes to those who wait - from the Guinness Adverts. Now I can be a patient man and as an example, if I am waiting for England to win the World Cup (and I'm probably going to be waiting a while), It won't be a good thing when they win the world cup. It'll be me shouting to them 'IT'S ABOUT FUCKING TIME!'. Now that surely isn't a good thing.

Also, waiting for food at a restaurant that are running late is not a good thing. If I am waiting for a pizza at Pizza Hut and finding out that it took me an hour to get the food out, it's not necessarily a good thing and I can assume that it would've been better if it came early. Simple logic.

Fills you with Volcanicity - Volvic. Considering volcanos can be filled with lava that's over 1000 degrees, I don't think I want something that's gonna burn my insides :S

Have it Your Way . Burger King. I once asked a Burger King if I could have a Big Mac because I wanted it that way. Needless to say, I got kicked out.

Flash Kills 99.9% of Bacteria Surely they could've just rounded it up to 100 for advertising purposes.

'He who thinks Australian, Drinks Australian'. Fosters. The big irony here is that Fosters is brewed in the UK! Plus it's awful to drink.

'The longer you wait, the harder it gets' Tagline from the 40-Year Old Virgin. Sounds like a side effect of viagra. But apparantly, getting harder must be a 'good thing' since we've waited for so long. Although it is partially true for hardening cement, making ice, trying to down a irish car bomb (consisting of Guinness, whisky and Baileys) but that's another story)


Any other slogans that need to be criticised? Post them here :)

Plinky Plonky Plastic! Rock Band 3 is out!

I used to love games like Guitar Hero, Rock Band, Dance Dance Revolution (I've even played competitively at DDR for a short period of my life!...okay, well long period!) and I still do enjoy them in some aspects. But the fact that I am an expert at guitar hero and can complete a DDR song that goes 300BPM doesn't mean that I am a break-dancing, van halen imitating guitar genius no matter how long I try attempting to complete 'Jordan' (look it up on youtube).

Having said that, I am learning guitar and whilst I can't say I'm a secret Tom Morello in disguise (again, look it up on youtube if you haven't heard of him). I can play basic stuff on guitar and still learning. However on guitar hero, I am the equivalent of Tom Morello in Lego form with the ability to only move my arms up and down and only able to play guitar it can fit into my U-shaped hands!

I am well aware that being good at Guitar Hero doesn't make me a good guitarist. If video games do improve your life skills, then I'd have an amazing ability to pick up coins, eat mushrooms to grow and jump on turtle shells so I can ride on top of them!

When I first played Guitar Hero well over 5 years ago, I found it so easy since I played DDR nearly 10 years ago and the logic of hitting buttons with your feet as they approach a line is applied in exactly the same way except your feet are replaced with your hands instead. It was so easy that I jumped straight into Hard mode. no shit. I completed Hard and Expert all within a week. I don't think I've really played a Guitar Hero game for any longer than a week without completing everything.

Guitar Hero 2? Completed Expert in 10 days (but 3 days consisted of completing Freebird).

Guitar Hero 3? 5 Days (although it took a further 2 weeks and a few days recovery from RSI attempting to complete Through the Fires and Flames)

World Tour? A weekend! Guitar Hero 5? Rock Band? well you get my point. By the time I played Guitar Hero 5, I was so bored that I began learning to play with my left hand (This logic does apply to masturbation in some sort of disgusting way. Get bored of your right hand? Try your Left one instead!)

However, this all changes now that Rock Band 3 has come out. No more can people mock you by shouting 'Learn a Real Instrument!' while you get 5* on freebird. No more will I ever complain that these games are too easy. This is cos Rock Band 3 has just come out and it's now got Pro Mode!

Those of you who aren't aware, Pro mode is a 102 button guitar mode that actually teaches you how to play the real song in the game! I can imagine this is Harmonix's way of saying 'Fuck You!' to Chad Kroeger and Axl Rose who said kids should be learning real instruments. This mode is one step closer.

Also new is the new keyboard mode. You get 2 octaves and you apparantly play the [almost] exact notes that the real instrument plays. Although I do enjoy games that are benficial to life, keyboard mode isn't. Considering that songs such as Bohemian Rhapsody require a whole length of a keyboard and hand switching, I'm wondering how well they've translated it into 2 octaves. A game called KeyboardMania tried making a keyboard rhythm game before and that was ridiculously hard! (And I'm a grade 8 pianist!) Simply for the fact that sight reading on the fly by rolling 30 odd notes down is incredibly difficult to play out. I'm up for trying this keyboard mode out but I ain't hoping for much.

Much to my enjoyment of finding a new challenge to a stale genre, I'm questioning how long is it gonna take for me to complete 'Free Bird' with the real instrument. I'm gonna challenge myself to learn and complete FreeBird within 4 months of getting the game. As soon as I get the game, I'm gonna start (Free)Bird Watch with Will Ho!

First blog of November done. It's nice to get typing again :)

Happy Happy Joy Joy!

Apparantly, I am never happy, and just to prove I'm not always depressed about everything. Everything in this blog will all be about happy stuff.

...

Chelsea lost yesterday. :)

I paid ten quid to stare at hot women in the gym... is that wrong?

I've been going to the gym regularly since I graduated from uni since I have nothing better to do.

Ah Gyms, the greatest money making scheme since someone figured out you can make a fat person run if you hang a piece of cake in front of them! Unfortunately, this plan fails when the fat person manages to eat the cake, stops running, dies or has developed a skill to not run for the cake. This is where this concept evolved into the gym!

I've probably been going on and off the gym for nearly 7 years and the only thing getting lighter is my wallet! But not everyone is going to the gym to lose weight, perhaps not even to keep fit... perhaps it's so you can stay at the back and slowly stare at erm.... TVs.... and the other surroundings...

The weight equipment gym is the one lick of black paint. chains and straps away from becoming bondage equipment from the looks of things. putting hands and feet in wierd positions and everyone making grunting noises looking like they're about to drop a bombshell!

The big problem with going to gyms is the irony (and im not one to talk either) about going to gyms is getting there. if you drive there, you're classed as a lazy guy. Yet if you walk,nay, run to the gym, then youve defeated all the hard work you were going to use in the gym and you'd may as well go back!

And it's not like you're gonna cancel your membership or anything. for three reasons: 1) the hot men and women who work at the gym have a special sexy ability to stop you from quitting. and 2) there's that little niggling inside your head that says 'but what if you gain 2 stone and need to use it again?!' and finally 3) you have no excuse any more that claims you are not fat :P

plus the amount you work off cancels off what ur about to eat. a chicken mayo sandwich is about 300-400 calories, which is about an hour on the gym bike. a curry is about 800 to 1000 calories so burning that off requires nearly 45 minutes nonstop sprinting on the treadmill! it almost makes you wanna go 'fuck it! bring out the lyposuction machine and send me to the moon!'

right, that just said a lot of words...wow so...many...words....need to recover energy!

thats all for today. and dont forget, once you been to the gym, order your burger, fries, pizza and DIET COKE to wash it all down :D

The S Factor! (S stands for stale....) Part 1!

(And yes, the S stands for something else but I'll leave that to your imagination :) )

My most favourite show is back on(!)(sarcasm). More people who think they can sing try and prove that they can't sing and successfully doing so. I have probably hated this show since it started back in 2003, no wait, I did buy the G4 album... and Diana Vickers ain't too bad to look at.... but still hate it overall!

(I have now burnt that G4 album in a fire so no one ever realises that I have ever bought it...)

I hate this program so much that I decided to separate this blog into two parts! One for now and the other for when I decide that it's gone far enough!

There's a lot to say on why I don't watch it at all. I think every year I go on about how much I hate the show and everyone in them (okay, Cheryl Cole may be spared). If you're that good, do you really have to appear on it to prove that you are good? I mean yes some people are just shy at singing but appearing on TV in front of millions of people singing live isn't really going to cure it. Another thing I wonder is that are people actually serious in entering this or do they just want their 15 minutes of fame?

Since I don't want to sound like an absolute hypocrite/ranter/fool, I will force myself to watch some of the clips on Youtube and give a Simon Cowell-esque opinion on their talent. Time to put my trousers up, my hair slicked and my face all moodied up.

First up: Katie Waisal http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H48OwnS_NHw&feature=channel

Quote that stands out: "I wanna be huge! Not small. Freddie Mercury wasn't small. He was an idol!". Queen took about 3 years to actually hit the big time and it was only till the 3rd album that they hit the mainstream. No one becomes an idol overnight.

Anyway, on to the music, you get a pie on your face for forgetting the lyrics of 'We are the champions'. Especially if Mercury is actually your idol!. It's sort of like saying you love steak despite the fact that you are a vegetarian! It sounded pretty bland and dull...

And then you move on to the song she was meant to sing in the first place. One word: Meh. She sounds alright but the fact that you screw up Queen and then do well on her other song may mean that she is probably a one triok pony? Had I had the care to watch the next episode, then I might be proven wrong here. NEXT!

Next on the list: G&S (which i'm assuming means Goofy and Stupid) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pvSEpZEAqfY

Wth is with everyone murdering Don't Stop Believing lately?! Yes it's a classic and unless you're drunk, Steve Perry (or have at least the vocal talent of him) or asking for me to slap you silly, you do NOT sing this song!

I don't find these bad singers funny, I find them cringeworthy and embarrassing to watch. We have one guy who looks like he's intentionally trying to make himself like a fool by dancing like a fool, singing out of tune like a fool and singing out of timing like a fool! As well as that, we have one other lady standing still letting the auto tuner to all the work. I feel that this auto tuning business manipulates the actual talent of a singer. Auto tuning typically works when it's either subtle or if it's intentional. Unfortunately this was designed to be subtle but sounds clearly fake.

And they only auto-tune one side?! what? they thought the other guy had singing talent but the girl didn't? the guy was so far off key and timing that it was useless? or perhaps they wanted to enhance the fact that the guy sucked by putting a robotic clear voice behind him? Wrong, Wrong and wrong! This duo would even fail this song on 'Rock Band' on easy mode! Someone build me a trap door so they can both fall through it!

Next up: Gamu Nhengu http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DRG7N_koxF0

Wow that is heavily auto tuned! I'm not sure how to give an opinion on that one. Shoot the singer for not singing well enough to be auto tuned or shoot the sound guy for such poor auto-tuning? Sounds okay I guess but that's only because auto-tuned made it in tune. I'm not sure what to judge here. Maybe this girl actually can sing but behind the auto-tuner makes it hard for me to pass judgement.

This is probably why the X factor changed the format so that they can incorporate this AT thing. It's a bummer really and hard to tell what I'm listening to. They would be better off putting the mics on mute and let them mime it (ala TOTP) and they might be deemed passable.

And Finally: Shirlena Johnson http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ff7SkPF8IuQ&feature=channel

Comment says she was trained in opera singing. Then quote: "I've never done live, only karaoke singing". One of these facts seems VERY wrong and it's not the latter.

Again with the auto tuner! Can they use auto tuner to actually make someone sound crap for once?!

I get quite anal about people not singing the correct lyrics but this was closer to a remix than a rendition. Florence Welch singing 'You got the love' was a cover, Eminem rapping to 'Sing for the moment' was a rendition, Kurt Cobain's 'Man who sold the world' was a rendition, Muse's 'House of the rising sun' was a rendition...at a push. You get my point. This however was just a woman saying 'Thank You' in french over and over again. I hated the original and this version makes me want to hate it even more!

What is this? Improv? Lord have 'Mercy' on me and never let me hear this again!

Alright, I was a lil mean about this especially since she has a mental condition (so I've been told) but let her off easily! Don't encourage her by putting her through!


Right, I better take a breather and stop my endless ranting for the day. If you want me to criticise anyone else's singing, post a link and I will destroy it!


Ho is gonna go!