Ugh. WordPress. For a piece of software that I really like it is hard to imagine things being more aggravating. Somewhere upon the way to v2.3.1 the stupid thing has lost the ability to add categories. As maddening as that is at least it completely doesn’t work instead of the half doesn’t work like the WYSIWG editor. That guy takes it upon himself to strip out all the paragraph returns leaving one giant blob of text.

Anyhow, my problems aren’t why I’m here. Since I’ve been in a video posting mood lately I figured I would give out the links to the videos that I created for the Jolt Awards. The Surround SCM video even helped that product become a finalist this year. The TestTrack Studio one didn’t seem to make much of a difference since apparently no defect or issue management products were chosen to be finalist this year.

Oh well, he’s won two of the last five competitions anyhow and came in a runner-up another time. I suppose there’s no need to be greedy with the Christmas spirit and all.

To check out the videos make with the click-ity on the images below.

For the curious, all the animation was done using Apple Keynote, the screen recordings with SnapZ Pro, the voiceover with GarageBand, and all the video editing was a combo of QuickTime Pro and Adobe Flash. Oh, and there were about a dozen script edits that were done with MS Word. Or maybe it was a hundred. It all runs together after a while.

I remember when I was kid the thing I wanted the most in the world was a video game system. Atari, Intellivision, whatever, it didn’t matter. So long as I could plug it into my TV and slowly kill off brain cells via quickly flashing lights I was in.

I was even well on my way one year only right before we were supposed to buy it I somehow managed to lose my glasses. Now the video gaming money turned into Grant-needs-to-see money and a rather stern lecture about economics and responsibility and a bunch of other stuff that had absolutely nothing to do with Pitfall or Frogger.

Not even my well thought out argument of “It’s your stupid genes that got me into this long distance vision mess” made any difference.

Funny how that didn’t work.

Eventually we did get an Atari 128k computer that could run all the cartridge games as well as other computer-y stuff. That then beget a 386 with a VGA card, a NES, a Super NES, a 486, a Pentium-something-or-another, a PlayStation, a Nintendo 64, another Pentium-something-or-another, and finally an Xbox. It was around the time of the last Pentium and the Xbox that I knew the steam was running out for my gaming career though.

The part I liked about console games was making fun of your friends while playing. And even though Xbox Live kinda sorta allowed that to happen remotely it just wasn’t the same. (Like when a buddy is concentrating real hard on some jump/putt/shot and you hit him in the head with a football. You can’t replicate that one the internet.) PC gaming didn’t fair much better in that the unholy marriage between game designers and the video card makers had the look of something that would quickly lead me to the poor house.

So, long story only slightly shorter, I’ve more or less not played video games in the last five years. Sure there will be the occasional digging out of the Xbox for old times sake when the out of town friends come over but that’s about it. Through it all, however, I still like video game reviews. I think its because years ago a friend turned me onto to Old Man Murray and its, how to put this nicely, colorful method of writing. It was witty and sharp (and vulgar) and for some reason it just tickled my funny bone. Heck the site is still alive and kicking even though it hasn’t been updated in over five years.

Special note: If there is even a remote chance that you’ll get offended by, well, any of the usual stuff that people get offended by then just skip Old Man Murray. And dear god skip the upcoming site with the videos.

Imagine my surprise recently then when I got forwarded a link to the work of a guy who calls himself Yahtzee. If you’re skipping the videos from that link for fear of being offended reasons lets just say he reviews video games by making cartoon animations while reading a ten minute script in like four minutes. Oh and with a British accent. It’s brilliant.

And, to top it all off, he claims in his posts that one of his major influences was Old Man Murray. What could be better. Anyhow, here is his video about his videos, which should be pretty safe for everyone. Don’t blame me if you can’t stop watching them all though.