Wii Official Review

It has been about one week since the Wii landed. I count myself pretty lucky that I have one. From the sites and blogs I have read it seems that these hot little units are in high demand and short supply. The latest I heard the only place you can get one is at the Toys R Us in Times Square, NY.

So is all this hype even warranted? Short answer: Yes. Long Answer: read on....

1. What does this thing cost and what does that include?

$280 CDN. It includes :1 Console, 1 Remote, 1 Nunchuk Attachment, all necessary cables, stand, sensor bar and a game, Wii sports ( Iz nice!)

2. Are the graphics a big step up from the gamecube? Not really, technically they are more polished but on the few games I have played there isn't a huge difference. The chip is faster however so we can expect to see some slicker games in the future as the developers learn how to tap into the Wii's graphical potential.

3. Does it matter that the graphics aren't Holy @#$@ that looks so real!!! No, it doesn't. You will be so engrossed with the gameplay and fun factor that the graphics will be unnoticeable. If you need to have cutting edge graphics I recommend an XBOX 360 or PC gaming. The Wii does not try to be about horsepower and so it's unfair to knock it for its inferior graphics in my opinion.

4. Will this console appeal to typical non-gamers? This has been one of the markets that Nintendo is hoping to access with the Wii. My fiance, who only dabbles occasionaly with games, loved it instantly. She especially enjoyed kicking my virtual ass in Wii boxing. Similarly my sister and her boyfriend, who are not serious gamers, came over last night and got into it right away. My sister who hasn't played video games since the Donkey Kong days said she would buy the Wii just for the Mii channel( where you make a cartoony virtual version of you) and the Photo Channel( where you can put your digital photos and MP3s to create a slide show). This could just be an exception to the general market but I foresee many non traditional gamers being attracted to this console's unique features.

5. Does the motion sensing control feel gimmicky? Nope, not at all. In fact, going back to my PS2 after playing with the Wii just felt unnatural and cold. I am sure I will one day go back to Final Fantasy 12, a great game by the way, but for now I am completely taken by the intuitive and fluid wii controllers. They are responsive, lightweight and work exactly how you would imagine motion sensing controllers to work. When you swing a forehand in tennis, your player follows. In bowling if you twist your wrist , you will get some wicked spin on the ball as it hurtles down the lane. Amazing and a whole lot of fun.

6. Is the new Zelda game any good? It's brilliant. Tough puzzles, excellent art presentation, great story and the controls are totally rad! You swing the remote to slash with your sword and shake the nunchuk to do a spin attack. Its fun, easy to figure out and, no, it's not tiring. I won't go too in depth with this game review as I have only played it for about 6 or 7 hours. When I get further I will definitely give an update.

I will continue to dissect and update the Wii experience as more of this delightful little enigma unfolds.

My final word: IF you can find one, buy it. I can't imagine anyone with even a minimal interest in video games, or fun for that matter, not liking this system. However, If you aren't interested at all in this system but you find one, buy it anyways and sell it for a profit on ebay. Easy money.

more images....

Ressurecting Old Books.

I spent most of Saturday at an altered books workshop with my art department and Lelainia Lloyd our instructor. Before this workshop I didn't know much about altered books. After 5 hours with Lelainia and a dynamic hands on workshop I was jazzed to get into it.

Basically, an altered book is built on the concept of taking an old hard cover book and converting into a piece of artwork. This is done through various image development techniques ranging from collage, embossing, weaving, painting, text manipulation and countless other approaches.

I recommend altered books to anyone who has a hankering to get creative visually but might not have the confidence to do painting or drawing. That's the beauty of mixed media arts. They are much less intimidating and put more demand on image placement and manipulation than on mastering a paintbrush or pencil. With the festive season just around the corner I think these could make great gifts too!

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Wii Review-Day One.

I am too tired to write much so I will let the photos speak for me. Will hopefully get a thorough review up soon.

Wii Photos

I got up this morning at 6:30 a.m. It's Sunday. WTF?!?

But it was with a purpose that I pulled myself out of the comfy warmth of my bed. Nintendo Wii Launch Day!!!. I put on my jeans, 2 jackets, a scarf and some gloves just in case it got cold. Conveniently the Toys R Us is right around the corner from our apartment so, within 2 mins, I was standing in line with about 18 other geeks.( I soon found out from the guy standing in the #1 position arrived at 3:30 a.m!

Surprisingly it wasnt just teenagers and college dudes. I saw a Dad with 2 kids, a few couples in their late twenties and an older couple that looked to be in their seventies. Kinda interesting.

I was hoping they would open the store at 8 a.m. but the sign on the glass doors read 10 a.m. Sweet Christ, I thought to myself. That's a long time to be waiting in line for something. But I told myself, hey, its the Wii!!!

At about 7:25 a man wearing dockers and a black "Wii" shirt came out of the store. He announced to the crowd, which had grown to about 35 by then, that he had 23 Wiis available. Great Success! I was # 15. Suddenly getting out of bed at 6:30 on a Sunday seemed like smart thinkin'. The craziest moment was yet to come though. Just minutes after Wii man makes his appearance I see a hooded figure walking towards the lineup. Its my girlfriend with a mug of hot tea and a big smile! Yep, I am marrying this woman.

I tell her that I've still got 2.5 hrs to wait but she's game. Then things get real good. Wii Man starts walking down the line and giving everybody a wrist band and a scan tag with the price and product number on it and then tells us we can take off until 10 a.m. when we are to come back and claim our guaranteed consoles! So all told, I had to stand in line for 30 minutes to get me a Nintendo Wii on launch day. High Five! Eeeesss Nice.

Technically, I don't have the Wii in my hands yet but within the next hour I'll be tearing it out its shiny white box. Hopefully by this afternoon, I'll have a full review on whether this new gadget from Japan was worth the lack of sleep.

Blue Man, Vigor Series 2006

Been doing a fair amount of my own work in the last few months. Blue Man, Vigor Series is an experiment in acrylic paint combined with transparent collage. Most of the work I'm into these days is fairly minimalist as in the line paintings I did this summer. I have traditionally always been obsessed with realism. And I found, most of the time, my painting skills did not allow me to achieve that. So getting away from that mindset has been refreshing and I think I'll hang around this style of art for awhile. See where it goes.


**The process for getting the transparent images is simple. Just take a piece of packing tape, adhere it to a photocopy or magazine article, burnish it with a spoon. After you have burnished the tape to the image place the image in water face down and lightly rub off the back of the paper. You will be left with a transparent flexible image.

Final Fantasy 12. Holy Ding Dongs is this game good.

It is almost painful to write this blog what with my numb ass and cramped wrists from playing this sizzling hot new RPG. But hot damn is it ever worth it. A few years ago I played Final Fantasy XI which was an online version of the popular RPG franchise. It was good but soon got stale as most Online games do with all the asshattery, ninja drama and leet speak that goes on. Not to mention the insane amount of time required to accomplish anything.

What Final Fantasy 12 seems to have done is take all the snappy elements from FFXI online and streamline into a graphically and content superior new package. Oh and its offline so I can just tap in and play for 10 minutes or 2 hours depending on the sitch. I could go on for pages about all the good gravy this game is swimming in but I'll try to sum it up in a few points:

1. Graphics- Warm, rich hues similar to many of the cityscape and desert scenes from Star Wars. For an old console the kind of fluid animations, expansive backgrounds and epic boss battles this game provides is friggin' impressive.

2. Sound- I'm no expert on Final Fantasy games but the music in this game is solid. It compliments the settings without being overwhelming. Mostly relaxing and peaceful and appropriately explosive during intense moments.

3. Combat System- This is the best part of the game. Usually i find combat becomes tedious and just gets in the way of story in most RPG's. In FFXII There are no longer random battles. Instead, just like in many MMORPGs, the battles happen on the same screen as you explore in. To add icing to this already great concept, there is a new system called Gambits. Gambits let you setup a set of actions for each character to follow. This way you dont need to click hundreds of buttons each time you engage in battle. Set it and forget it. Its the bees knees, really.

4. Story- Highly political and centered on a struggle of one country's loss of autonomy and the hero's journey to figure out why the empire who has taken over has become so powerful in such a short amount of time. Not a lot of sap or romance as in many RPG's. Half the characters appear androgenous anyways so maybe sex is not a big priority.

In conclusion, on a scale of 1-10, where 1 is bogus and 10 is radical, I'd have to give this game a 9.

It's official. Paint is back and it looks delicious.

Etienne Zack, Collision, 2006

Recently, along with my amazing art teacher colleagues, I had a chance to go check out the exhibition "Paint" at the Vancouver Art Gallery. We spent a few hours taking in the exhibition which was focused solely on the medium of paint. Never before have I been so aware of what is missing in our everyday visual experience. Lumps, streaks, mess, viscosity, raw energy. All things that the liquid and unpredictable nature of paint provides. All things that we are surely being deprived of in the increasing bombardment of the pristine, computer generated art and media in our daily lives.

I'm not taking a cheap shot at digital media or technology in general . I love technology. I am a supporter and user of Photoshop and strongly support its place in the world of art. I'm an avid Digg user and, later this month, will most likely be skipping and prancing around my apartement with a Wiimote. Yep computer technology is good stuff....

However, what this exhibition highlighted for me was two things:

1. We need to watch that technology and digitial media are not our only forms of expression, entertainment or interaction.
2. That although Paint is an ancient medium it still deserves its place in the forefront of visual arts both in education and in galleries.

Go check it out if you are in town or keep your eye out for painting exhibitions in your local galleries. I could be wrong, but it seems like this may be the start of a paint resurgence that will hopefully be able to exist symbiotically, rather than in direct opposition to digital art and media.

The time has come.

I was always late to catch on to current trends. Didn't even get me some cargo pants until 1994 when they were smokin hot all through '93. Anyhoo, Bloggin' is everywhere now. It's time to give this thing a try.

What's this blog about? Art, Funny stuff, Music, Games, Technology...... oh and important people doing things that need lookin' at.

The above listed topics are things I find myself most invested in during the fall and winter months. Its November in Vancouver, B.C. and that means rain, fog and more rain. Never a better time than now to blog about the things that keep me going during the drizzly months....