Team J.A.F.

A friend and I were just discussing SOPA and the (exaggerated) possibility that it'll bring us back to the days of AOL.

But it won't stop there. The Internet will soon only be usable by the military and university scientists. Pretty soon, electricity will be gone, we'll be using horses for transportation, we'll forget agriculture and move back to hunting and gathering, and then we'll no long be able to use fire. By December 21, 2012 the entire history of human kind will have been reverse so that they never existed! It's what the Mayan's predicted!!

On the plus side, it means we'll be seeing Bionicle back again soon.

(Seriously, no discussion about SOPA)

So FINALLY went and saw the new Tintin movie. I read a few of the comics online first (at Phy's suggestion, I believe) and I would be interested in looking up the old 90s TV show. (I swear I watched it a few times when I was a kid.)

But yeah, the movie was excelent. The animation was great, as were the voice actors. I guess the 3D wasn't amazing; personally, I didn't notice it one way or the other, so I suppose it would be fun to just watch in 2D. But the plot was fun. Some of the pacing of the scenes in the beginning felt a little off (but I also felt the same way about the comics I read, so it must mean they stayed true to the source material. ) Yet it picked up and was pretty great. Lots of fun action sequences, and the chase scene in Morocco was absolutely amazing. Like, seriously, it could make my top 10 chases list. What I especially liked was how it all seemed to be done in one shot, so there weren't cuts focusing on different characters, ext. I know that filmmakers have trouble doing that IRL, but for an animated movie like this is must be easier to pull off, and man it was effective. I kind of want to see the movie again just so I could re-watch that chase.

So yeah, a decent movie. I also want to see the new Sherlock Holmes movie, but I just haven't been heading to the theaters recently. However, I did see the forth episode of the BBC series Sherlock, and I must say it was better than the second or third episodes from last season. Can't wait for more.

So, between sales on Lego Shop@Home and new sets I've found in stores, I've gotten a couple of products that I could share my thoughts on...

Magma Monster Board Game: I totally got this for the orange base plate, but it turns out to be a very fun game to play, much better than the others I've tried out (Robot Build, Pirate Plank, Frog Hop... although that one was cool too.) It can involve some rather intensive gameplay, which is more than I can say for the other games (Well, we got intensive on Frog Hop at BrickFair, but this one is better).

Construct-A-Zurg: I got this for the purple. Indeed, he is less imposing than Construct-A-Buzz, but he has some nice elements. And quite a large cape... for this, I would think that any big Bionicle builder would want him. (After all, who doesn't want big capes?)

Pizza Planet Truck: I've wanted this set for a while, but it was a little too pricy... until I could get it at 50% off. The exterior of the set is really awesome, with printed pieces and smooth shapes and everything. Th interior is a little plain, but I can look past that. The minifigure / character selection is great, but it's a shame they don't all fit nicely into the truck. (Also a shame we couldn't have gotten the full cast in there... but I suppose Lego couldn't get rights to Mr. Potato Head, and how would they even start to make a slinky dog?) The pizza firing mechanism is okay, but isn't as powerful as I expected it to be. Also, a lot of nice pieces, including some older style window elements.

Joker Figure: Again, I totally got this for the purple. In fact, the set stayed together for half a day before I parted it out and started using the armor on my custom Heroes. (Yes, I know, it was a long time for it to stay together.) Design wise, The Joker wasn't too bad if you removed all those awful gimmicks on his back. Still, he came with quite a few useful parts. Shame they just looked awful together.

Kendo Cole Bonus Pack: My first new Kendo Ninja fig. Turns out they have the same body pieces as their original versions (which were cool, so I'm not complaining). The shoulder armor isn't new, but the helmet is, and it's kind of cool. The set also contains two of the new daggers, another gold chainsaw, and three smallish silvery chains. Oh, and cards. I've amassed a small collection of Ninjago cards, now I just need to find somebody who'd be willing to play with me.

Also one other set but more on that later.

At first, I found myself jealous that all the new set reviews this week have been getting a ton of posts in the talkback topics. I never got any feedback from any of my reviews from this summer, except for the occasional "Oh, I didn't actually read it."

Then I remembered that I posted ALL my reviews during the downtime, so people really didn't have a way to leave feedback.

Oh well. Great reviews, Bfa, BTW.

I'm gonna have an argument. You can try to refute me, but then I'd just delete your posts!

Ha ha, just kidding. I'm not gonna let you post in the first place.

I WIN!!

First of all, this isn't an attack on anybody in particular. Just something I might as well post about, since I don't wanna bog down the voting topic.

So there was the one guy who submitted a virtual MOC for the latest contest. It was okay and all MOC wise. But it doesn't fit in with the rest of the entries. It can use more pieces, plus each piece can be in any color imaginable. Part of MOCing is dealing with what you have. Sure, some guys have more pieces than others, but I still feel it's an important part of the contest. (As well as being limited to released-colors for a piece) In the future, I don't think virtual MOCs should be allowed in traditional BBC contests.

To make up for this, there should be contests dedicated to virtual MOCs. Or it should be judged in a separate category, like how Artwork contests have computer generated and hand drawn portions that are each polled separately. So why not have hand-built and virtual built categories for BBC?

Or nothing will change. Whatever. Someday I should enter contests again, just for the sake of entering. I used to enter a ton of these contests (never did well) but nowadays I just don't seem to have the time and / or inspiration.

Happy Thanksgiving / Horrible Shopping Day. I'm suffering from bad allergies right now, so fun times.

I've probably complained about my computer running slow recently. I've had problems with internet browsers, picture editing software, games (although that was to be expected, since my laptop isn't built for games). I tweaked some of my start up programs a bit, and it's running fine right now, but I don't know if the problem will resurface again like it has this last week. Sure, it sounds like a software issue (probably some legit program I downloaded that the virus scanners won't catch but that's just hogging resources.) All the same, it got me thinking about getting a new computer.

Now, my laptop is a Toshiba Satellite laptop that I got nearly 4 years ago. (My second laptop really. I bought a brand new Toshiba for school, and then it got stolen. My current one was a step down from that.) As far as computers go, 4 years is quite a run, and it isn't completely dead yet. But I would like to have something a little more modern, with a little bit more power to it. That way I can use all these fancy web design programs I bought that are currently laggy on my laptop.

I'm looking at getting maybe a PC, because I can get one with lots of power for a relatively cheap price. (I'm looking at $300-$500.) That way I can have a powerful computer at home, but still use my laptop for mobile stuff.

However, although I currently have some money saved up, I'm still looking at another year of school. (I will be in college for 5 and a half years, and I'm not even getting one of those rigorous degrees!) So I have textbooks and gas and (cough*Lego*purchases*cough) that I need to save up for. And my summer job is over (finally, working and going to school full time is too tiring for me) so I have no more cash inflow. So I could blow a large portion of my savings on a new computer... or I could suck it up and deal with my current laptop and spend my money on life's other necessities; AKA education and plastic building block toys.

Curse this mature rational decision making!

Wait, The Three Musketeers movie is now in theaters? But when I looked it up this summer, I saw that it wasn't coming out until the end of October!

*checks calendar*

It's already almost the end of October!!?!!

Well, I guess I'll be heading to the local cinema tonight next weekend...

So Lego's making board games out of lots of their themes, like the Ninjago and Harry Potter ones, and more to come. But I have a new idea for a Lego board game theme.

Bionicle.

Yes, I know RoseArt made a good Bionicle board game back in the day (I still have it). But Lego could redo it; build the island of Mata Nui out of studs, and give us microfigures of the Toa. Instant hit!

And if that doesn't happen, I might as well go and build the island myself. Or y'know, with Swert, using all his boss's bricks, and making it awesome. It will be awesome.

But an official Lego Bionicle board game would be cool too.

In some ways, I kinda want the premier perks to go away so that the blogs aren't so busy. That way it can get down to the dedicated bloggers. And maybe people will look at my blog again. But as it is, the feature for looking at your favorited (followed, whatever) blogs is hard to get to and rather uninformative as to who has a new update and such. It was totally easier when you had the list on the front blog page. I guess I'm still too used to the old way of doing things...

But yeah, I guess no epic writing stuffs, not with this audience.