Weeee

I haven’t done much blogging over the past few days because I was out of town for my parents’ anniversary party. I did bring my Wii, which had up until this point never been connected to anything because I still don’t own a TV, and it was a huge hit.

I can’t decide which was better: playing Wii Bowling with my grandmother or watching my parents have a Wii Tennis throwdown…

With cheering, rousing chorus… or not

EA Games inadvertently enters the Ireland-Northern Ireland thing by apparently neglecting to realize that the two regions are, in fact, sovereign states with different national anthems. But more than that, as Wired correctly notes, the correct national anthem of Northern Ireland is God Save the Queen and the country is largely pro-Britain. One of Amhrán na bhFiann’s verses, which isn’t included in the official Irish national anthem, refers to the “Saxon foe.” The chorus, which is the official anthem, refers to the Brits as “despots.”

The latter appears in UEFA Euro 2008 instead of God Save the Queen. Oops.

The company has apologized.

Clash Of The Titans – Handheld Console Edition

For a self-professed “gamer”, I’m terribly behind the times where games and consoles are concerned (but I’d never admit it out loud and would insist that I am simply “old-fashioned” or “traditionalist”). My console of choice for years was – and still is – my laptop, thanks to my GBA, SNES and NES emulators. Up until last December, I’d only owned an NES (it’s like that crazy ancient relative that just refuses to kick the bucket), a GBA that wasn’t technically mine to begin with (it’s Munchkin #2’s – not that she ever played it, or that I ever gave her a chance to do so), and an N64; on my 22nd birthday we (finally) added a PS2 to the mix. That opened up a whole new world of soul-devouring gaming action for me to explore – or at least it would have if first semester’s exams, a month-long trip to the Philippines, second semester, and other such important things hadn’t gotten in the way. Being out of school for the time being hasn’t helped that at all, as I spend what was formerly considered class time sitting in front of a computer scanning documents until my eyes fall out of my head.

But I digress.

With my financial prospects looking up for the time being, I’ve decided to invest in a new handheld console for several reasons:

• It’s another way to tune out my co-workers – I can’t vouch for whether or not “Frick, you just made me die” is a more valid admonition than “Frick, you just made me lose my page”, but it’s more likely to garner an apology than a command to suck it up, princess.
• I can retire the GBA – probably to trade it in or something, as it has a tendency to eat my Fire Emblem save files. And if I don’t retire it, I can give it back to Munchkin #2… who will probably trade it in anyhow.
• Although I’ve got emulators aplenty on my laptop, I can’t exactly whip it out on a whim if I were, for example, busing up to campus. It’s awkward. Believe me, I’ve tried.

I was eyeing the DS Lite originally; I’ve been known to borrow (read: steal) Munchkin #1’s DS on occasion, so there won’t be any of that awkward “where the frick are my buttons?!” fumbling that usually comes with handling a new console. A friend of mine recently proposed an alternative: the sleek, sexy, shiny PSP. “You gotta get one,” he says, in a way that subtly implies that if I don’t he’ll disown me. Decisions, decisions.

I did a bit of research, but as the original PSP vs. DS debate is a bit outdated by now, the following ramblings are based more on my personal experience and preferences. Ahem…