Controller Punch!

Mega Man bosses across the ages. Image courtesy of J.J. McCullough

Mega Man Bosses: Behind the Metal - Where Are They Now?

Mega Man bosses never really die, they just lie around for a while until Dr. Willy fixes them back up again. While he has made plenty of mechanical menaces, his early creations still hold the heaviest spot in his heart – for it was they who truly inspired his years and years of demented tinkering.  But whatever happened to these bosses?  What happened to them once Dr. Willy moved on, found new bosses and new mega men to battle?  Where in their 8-bit world were they going to find solace?  Certainly not from that asshole dog, Rush, from Mega Man 3.  Let’s find out!

Frosted Donut Man?

METAL MAN (Mega Man 2): We’ll start with the boss you likely started with – the redundant Metal Man. I mean, this guy had to be an early Willy prototype if the best the doc could do was give him the moniker “metal.” Shelley didn’t call the Frankenstein Monster “Skin Man” for good reason.  How about “Starsiege Tribes Man”?

It is true that Metal Man fell on hard times. In shooting a steady stream of over-sized gears at Mega Man, he inevitably began to take from his personal store – aka. the ones holding him together.  Addictions are hard to kick, and Metal Man fared no differently than a chain smoker, masochistically yanking out the gears from his internal machinery until he could barely function and sat around spewing grease everywhere.  His friends tried to help – Needle Man, Top Man – but he would have none of it, shouting, “If gears are so important to you, why didn’t you take some?” before opening fire randomly.

Eventually things got so bad that Willy had to kick Metal Man out of his Fortress. Other bosses had started to complain about his bad attitude and anger management issues. Low on gears and low on hope, Metal Man stumbled around Flash Man’s domain for a few years before he fell in Bubble Man’s level and rusted to death. Read the rest of this entry »

I laughed my ass off…I have the maturity of child. A brilliant, evil child. Enjoy this moment of the interweb.

Andy's City...she's sleeping.

The Toronto Public is seeking to get reluctant readers (ie. young boys) back into the realm of literature by offering video games across its shelves. The allowance of Manga and Graphics Novels in the classroom and library has significantly improved reading amongst young boys.

The program is already in full swing in other provinces in Canada and in New York  - while it is more like a rental service than anything else, it is the first step to video games becoming more accepted as “fiction” works.

The Toronto Star writes:

_{“Make room, Holden Caulfield and Huck Finn, Sonic the Hedgehog is moving in…There’s method in what sounds like madness for a library: Players can learn literacy and problem-solving skills through the games themselves, while the gaming programs will convert the library into a hub for youths who would otherwise never consider entering one.”}

If the program takes off the ground, the collection will start at a 150 titles. I hope they choose DS games as that will get younger kids into the library who have a chance of becoming life-long readers.

If the program was concerned about the “classic” video game experiences what would you choose? I got my list of five after the jump: Read the rest of this entry »

I would have never thought it but the embiggened version of the DSi is actually pretty boss. It totally makes the graphics pop and the text is now a 1000x times more readable.

Any concerns about graphics being overstretched and ugly are unfounded. For the most part the games look closer to how they were intended to be played…now I know that sounds strange but it is true.