New Column: So That's Why...

Going by the history of this site, you'd probably expect (with good reason to) this column to be recurring for a week or so and then die off and never be heard from again. I will be doing my best to keep that from happening to this one.

Now, as for what the whole point of this. The point of "So That's Why..." is to explain some of the purpose of some of the more confusing things that this site covers. This week, I'll be explaining the reasoning behind Region Locking (with a little bit about Japanese Bonus Tracks).

Region locking - the annoying thing that keeps us from importing games (among other things), becoming an Otaku's major enemy, but also keeps us from playing games we buy somewhere else. Say I travel out to Germany, and while I'm out there, I see a great deal on Batman: Arkham Asylum and decide to buy it. When I try and play it back at home, it won't work.

In the old days, most TVs could only read the PAL or NTSC encoding systems, so companies would have to make separate versions for the different encoding systems.

Today, most TVs can read both. So that leaves many wondering why we still have Region Locking if there's no technical rational behind it. The cause for Region Locking is to keep people from buying cheaper games somewhere else. If there were no Region Locking, there would have to be one universal price for a certain game, which would not work.

One scenario is: The Halo franchise is infamous for selling pretty lukewarm in Japan. So, if there were no Region Locking, a few clever people would simply import Halo 3 from Japan where it would have a bargain bin price.

Because it kinda fits in with Region Locking, I'll explain the reason for Japanese Bonus Tracks.

Some of us may notice on "special addition" albums of our favorite musical artists we occasionally see a "Japanese Bonus Track". See, CDs have no real Region Locking on them and CDs in Japan tend to be a bit more expensive then other places. The bonus track is there as incentive to keep Japanese people from simply importing cheaper CDs from elsewhere.

Deal of the Month: Labor Day Madness

For the next two days, GoGamer is having a massive sale with some games going as low as $.01. You read right, a penny.

The sale ends soon, so get them while they're cheap.

More about Disney and Marvel

Earlier today, some of the folks from the Funny Music Project (also known as FuMP) made up a parody of Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious from Merry Poppins, talking about Marvel being bought out by Disney.

The Ballad of Gay Tony Trailer Released

Earlier today, Rockstar games released the first trailer for their upcoming GTA IV episode, The Ballad of Gay Tony. And I must say, it looks fabulous.



You'll play as Luis Fernando Lopez, a member of the Northwood Dominican Drug dealers and the personal bodyguard of Anthony "Gay Tony" Prince. And if the past game and episode are any indication, it will be the basic rag's-to-riches story, this time focusing more on the club scene and Central American Drug Trade.

Also, MOTHER-FUCKING SKYDIVING.

Disney buys Marvel

A few days ago, Disney entertainment announced that they would soon be purchasing Marvel for 4 billion dollars. Let me repeat that.




DISNEY PURCHASED MARVEL.

Now, let's not jump to conclusions. I'm sure this could end wonderfully. Let's just take a look at some of the possibilities...

• Next week on The Jonas Brothers!: The Jonas Brother's get a little help from billionaire Tony Stark when he builds them Rock and Roll robots to help them on stage! But when these boppin' bots get a little to into the beat, it's up to Iron Man to stop them!
  

Ummmm... that actually sounds awful. Well, I'm sure I can think of something better.

• Next week on Wizard's of Waverly Place!: The Wizards visit their Uncle Xavier at his Institute for the Gifted for a family reunion. Here, Jerry rekindles a feud between him and his brother, Wolverine! But when Magneto and his nasty friends try and crash the reunion, the brother's must lay down the hatchet and remember their family values.

Holy shit, that's worse. OK OK, c'mon, there has to be something!

• Hanah Montana dating Peter Parker.

May God have mercy on us all.

Gold 4 Jetpack

You know those annoying "Cash4Gold" (which according to my Earth Science teacher when I was a Fresheman, are scams) ads with the stiff acting you always see? Apparently Gamestop does, as they've done a parody of it for a perk for pre-ordering from them.

If you pre-order Dark Void from them, you will receive a special in-game gold jetpack that not only looks fancy but will give you unlimited boost.

Is it me, or does one of the guys in the ad look a lot like Vince Offer, of Sham Wow fame?

And sorry for no posts for the past week, we were having an unofficial, school-related hiatus.

No More Tf2

What I mean isn't that tf2 is shutting down. What I mean is someone on fpsbananna.com made a tf2 scout skin of No More Hero's Travis touchdown.