Well, here it is, the latest from me on The Goozex Report.

Check it out: http://thegoozexreport.blogspot.com/2010/01/what-is-it-about-achievements.html

You remember Goozex right? If not, read up on them on one of my previous posts at this link. Well, great news, I’ve been brought on as an associate writer for their member-run blog The Goozex Report. I’m very excited to be an even bigger part of their community, and wanted to share my first article with you. Give it a spin here, and let me know what you think.

Thanks everyone!

I’m proud and excited to announce my new pet project at http://the.gmailfilter.com. This is something I’ve setup in order to provide our web community with a more effective and powerful filter to use in conjunction with Gmail. To quote the site:

My philosophy is this: if I get a message that is obviously spam, I’d like the message to be sent to trash, and to be automatically forwarded to a spam reporting agency. I’m sick of sifting through the spam folder looking for legitimate emails. I’d prefer to use this folder as a intermediate between the inbox and trash folder, so, I’ve compiled a list of the most common words used in spam, and created a filter to do just this. As I further refine the filter, I’ll post changes which you’ll then be able to download and import into Gmail.

I’ve tested this filter against over 14,000 emails currently in my Gmail account, and am proud to report that I had zero false positives. I use my email for both personal communications and work, so, you can be assured that this works as it should.

Go ahead and give it a visit. Test it out. See what you think.

Seeing that one of my last Marilyn Manson posts remains to be one of the most popular on the site, I figured I’d write a follow up.  So, the album is here and has been with us for just over a month. Reviews have been mixed, but generally favorable, and now that I’ve had enough time with the album that the intoxicating effects have worn off, I’m now ready to give my (hopefully) unbiased review.

This stands as what is likely Manson’s most melodic and varied albums. It ranges from acoustic guitar and piano duets to ultra distorted hard rock. There’s a bit here from every Marilyn Manson era, and that’s great for those looking for a diverse album with each song offering something unique and different. That being said, it definitely doesn’t offer the focus of past albums, specifically Antichrist Superstar, Mechanical Animals, and Holy Wood. Much of what makes Marlyn Manson such a powerful artist is his ability to tell a story which creates parallels between his world and our own. I’m hesitant to say that this album is missing that attribute entirely, but it definitely takes a back seat to what has become more of an autobiographical piece than social commentary.

The album revolves around Manson’s breakup with actress Evan Rachel wood. It covers a progression of thoughts and emotion chronicling the process of despair to acceptance. It definitely hits home for those who have gone through similar situations and casts Manson in a more human and relatable light. I think we’d all agree that Manson has done a great deal to alienate himself over the years, and this very well may be him showing us that he’s not all that different. We find that he’s pretty much a normal guy with normal feelings and needs, something that’s not been shown to this degree in previous works.

This album also heralds the return of Twiggy, a long lost friend who we last saw on Holy Wood. Manson is great, but Manson with Twiggy is greater. Twiggy has again taken his previous role as album guitarist and bassist, and for the first time, will play guitar in the band’s upcoming live tour. Very interesting change, and most definitely something that will be great to see. I had the fortune of seeing these two together on the last bit of the Rape of the World tour, and have to say, they have chemistry, something that is very evident on the album.

I’m definitely being critical, but in the end, I love this album. It’s fun. It’s cynical. It’s addictive. Definitely buy it. Buy it twice even. There may be what I consider to be problems with the album, but in the end, they were by design, not accident.

Care to see your favorite gaming consoles and peripherals with x-ray vision? Your wish has come true. Check the following link for one person’s flickr gallery. Very cool.

X-Ray Funnies – a set on Flickr.

G4 has again been named the official broadcaster of E3 2009, and with only a month to go until keynotes, I’m definitely excited. Let’s just hope I don’t relive the fiasco that was E3 2007 on the same network. See my rant for more information on that.

G4 promises to provide over 22 hours of content, including five keynotes, hands on demos, interviews, and Steve Wiebe with another one of his live Donkey Kong high score attempts. If you’re unfamiliar with Steve, then be sure to check out the documentary: The King of Kong. It’s a great film. Other than that, additional details on the broadcast can be found at the following link.

G4 Named Official Broadcaster Of E3 2009 – G4tv.com.

And for those of you who wanted to check out the review from IGN, here you are. Sadly, they reviewed the game higher than the actual film.

IGN: X-Men Origins: Wolverine — Uncaged Edition Review.

I heard the rumors. I thought previews of the game had adequately described the game. They did not. I was wrong.

Those expecting a simple translation of the upcoming film are in for quite a surprise. A sweet one for some (me), and a sickening one for others. This game shows Wolverine portrayed, as well, more unleashed than in the film. This game is violent. Heads are cut off (by claws), heads are impaled (by claws), heads are pushed through chopper blades (with claws), and I’d imagine if the demo were a bit longer, we’d see them burnt and crushed. It just seems to be the natural progression for the content of this title. To see this happen with a licensed game is  stunning. I personally think it’s the right choice, I mean, Wolverine is supposed to be vicious.

As far as gameplay is concered, it’s pretty much standard fare for a 3rd person action game. Think Ninja Gaiden, with Wolverine instead of Ryu. I can’t say that I’ll be picking up the title based solely off its merits of violence, so we’ll have to see where reviews go, but definitely pick up the demo. You’ll be entertained in one way or another, and the only cost is bandwidth.

I spend a lot of money on games. I mean a lot. I buy 2 -3 new games a month easy. It’s an expensive habit, and it adds up, but hell, if you can’t enojoy yourself, then what good is living? I listen to a handful of gaming postcasts, and one day the topic was Goozex. I was intruiged, and looked into it further. I’m glad I did, because this site is awesome; something that anyone on a budget needs to take a good hard look at.

The idea is simple. Tired of getting ripped off at Game Crazy or Gamestop? Those unfamiliar, these companies thrive on giving you the smallest amount of money (or in store credit to be more accurate) for your game as possible. They then turn around and sell your game for the most they expect another will pay. The outcome? Sick sick profit. Goozex takes another approach. They use, what I refer to as, a lateral credit system. This means that when you trade a game, you get what Goozex deems to be the appropriate market value. No less. They have an algorithm working which takes the average value of a title, and adjusts slightly based off of demand. Using this information they then give each game a point value ranging anywhere from 100 – 1000 points.

Once you have some games you’d like to trade, you simply visit http://www.goozex.com, look up the game you’d like to dump, then place this in your offers queue. Goozex then adds your game to a list of available games. Once Goozex finds someone who wishes to purchase your games with their points, you accept their offer for your game, mail it off to them, and once they give you positive feedback, you’re credited points to your account. It sounds a bit complicated, so let me provide a quick example.

I had a copy of Silent Hill: Homecoming for my Playstation 3 which I no longer wanted (I purchased an Xbox 360 version for achievements… I feel so dirty). Goozex decided that it was worth 800 pionts (equal to $40.00), so I placed it into my offeres queue. After a few minutes, Goozex found a match, meaning someone had placed the title into their requests queue. I accepted the trade, shipped the title off using the shipping label I purchased from Goozex for $3.50 (the seller always pays the shipping), and once the recipient had received the game and found it working, they left me positive feedback, and 800 points were credited to my account. As a seller, I only paid for shipping in order to trade my game.

Once I had my points, I then decided that before trading any other titles, that I’d test the system just to be certain that it worked the way the site advertised. In order to buy games on Goozex, you first need to purchase trade tokens (your account comes with one token already). Each request costs you, the buyer, one token, which you purchase for one dollar. This means that for each game you purchse on Goozex, they make a total of one dollar. I found a couple games that I’d been meaning to test out, specifically F.E.A.R (350 points) and Tom Clancy’s Rainbow 6 Vegas 2 (450 points). I put the titles into my request queue, Goozex found a match within a day or so, and less than a week later, the games showed up in the mail. In the end, I spent two trade tokens, equal to $2.00, and $3.50 on shipping for a total of $5.50 to trade Silent Hill: Homecoming for F.E.A.R and Tom Clancy’s Rainbow 6 Vegas 2. Comaring this to what I might be able to get at Gamestop, and I think I came out far ahead.

Check it out. If you’d like, signup using this link, and you’ll automatically be added to my friends list. You can also check out my Goozex profile here, just in case you’d like to know what I’ve recently traded or purchsed on Goozex, as well as what games I’m playing, and some other interesting tidbits.

Enjoy.

Marilyn Manson again? Absolutely. I’d feel like I were doing myself, my readers, and Marilyn a disservice if I neglected to mention this. The release of The High End of Low is imminent, so much in fact, that pre-orders are now being taken for your convenience at the official Marilyn Manson store found at http://marilynmanson.shop.bravadousa.com/. Here, you’re able to pre-order yourself a copy of either the standard release, or deluxe edition, and either edition with or without a t-shirt. Do yourself a favor, splurge, and get yourself the deluxe version including a bonus disc holding six additional tracks including the very cool remix of “Arma-Goddamn-Motherfuckin’-Geddon” by the group Teddybears. Although we don’t know what the other five tracks are going to be, I have a sneaking suspicion that it’s going to be worth it. Speaking of tracks, we now have a complete track list for the new album:

1. Devour
2. Pretty as a Swastika
3. Leave a Scar
4. Four Rusted Horses
5. Arma-Goddamn-Motherfuckin-Geddon
6. Blank and White
7. Running to the Edge of the World.
8. I Want to Kill You Like They Do In the Movies
9. WOW
10. Wight Spider
11. Unkillable Monster
12. We’re from America
13. I Have to Look Up Just to See Hell
14. Into the Fire
15. 15

It’s interesting to see what appears to be the return of the number 15. Fans might remember this from Mechanical Animals. I’m very curious to see if this is explained. All in all, very exciting stuff. If you’ve not already done so, please be sure to check out the track “We’re From America”, free to download at http://marilynmanson.com/. As mentioned in the previous post, those of you who are more resourceful can find a fair number of tracks on the internets, specifically “Devour”, “Four Rusted Horses”, “Arma-Goddamn-Motherfuckin-Geddon”, “WOW, and “Into the Fire”. See what you can find, but remember to buy the album. Support the artists you listen to most.