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Dec

Merry Christmas from Riskening!

By DGM-payne 0 Comments

Categories: The Misc things

I know I haven’t been posting much lately (sorry), but it’s Christmas Eve and I couldn’t leave the site high and dry during this wonderful time of the year. Not only because it’s the holidays (though that’s a big part of it), but because of year end sales and XP events as well. Here’s an update of my past week or so…

Got my christmas shopping all done in time, mostly thanks to Amazon. (and a free year of prime shipping definitely helps)
Picked up a brand spanking new 250gb for Xbox 360 from Woot.com’s deal a couple days ago. (my 120gb was getting filled)
Xbox Live year end sales!
Steam Holiday sales!

I would recommend checking out the latter 2 since they run different deals daily to the end of the year. There’s also the Humble Bundle of indie games, DRM-free and keys to add them on digital distribution sites like Steam, if you’re feeling charitable as well (or need a last minute gift). Get to it fast though since time’s almost up on that one! I mentioned XP events earlier too, games like Gears of War 2 and Red Dead Redemption are having XP multipliers until the end of the year.

Lastly (and most importantly), have a safe and merry Christmas with your family and friends!

– DGM-payne

Aug

Riskening’s “What to watch on the good ol’ boobtube” (Summer 2010 edition)

By DGM-payne 0 Comments

Categories: The Misc things

Ah television, what can’t you do? Screw going outside and stay by the TV’s sweet glowing warming glow this season. Gander at our recommends to check out before the fall season sweeps in.

1.) Top Shot – In a reality competition world dominated by cooking, fashion, singing, dancing, and so on it’s a good thing to see something as refreshing as a marksmen competition on TV. You don’t have to be a gun nut of any sort to appreciate the beauty of a good shot spanning various weapons that made our history. The first season is winding down at the moment, with only a couple left to be aired, so catch up on it any which way you can if you haven’t been following it. The competition is on every Sunday night.

2.) American Pickers/Pawn Stars – Both series have returned for a second season recently and since they’re both in the same block and have related material I group them together. Both shows deal with digging up those treasures of past, and by that I mean historic and collectible vintage pieces of all sorts. To be quite honest though, I prefer Pawn Stars over American Pickers this season. Pawn Stars seems to offer much more of a variety of historic material I feel. Maybe I’m just not that into all the sign collecting, motorcycle and car stuff in Pickers but either way some really interesting things often show up on these shows. Check them out Monday nights.

3.) The Glades/The Good Guys – Two new cops shows, which would probably be enough to fill anyone’s quota. Glades has a touch of Dexter, and by that I mean it takes place in roughly the same locale. Seriously though, as far as cop shows in the solve-a-murder-every-week genre with a cocky and well played main character goes this one will keep you watching. So far in the season body parts have been pulled out of a gator, a dead body in a plane involving some bird smuggling has been investigated, and a series of murders has been solved during a badass hurricane (among other things). So it’s pretty varied too, no? The Good Guys on the other hand is a buddy cop show and the comedy that entails (as usual) starring Bradley Whitford (remember that evil douche from Billy Madison?) and Colin Hanks (I’m sure you know who he is…or atleast his father). I’m sure you can figure the rest out. Tune in on Sunday and Monday nights (respectively).

4.) Futurama – It’s back alright, and about time too! After watching many years of re-runs on Adult Swim first then later Comedy Central I must say it’s good to see this Fox show finally living a new life on TV at last. I’m sure all fans can agree that having the old voice cast back is a very good thing as well. Whether it lives up to the old seasons or not it’s still a good way to spend a Thursday night.

5.) Tosh.0 – The internet has brought us many a crazy and unusual thing and comedian Daniel Tosh is supplying us a show where internet videos are king. With this new season it just seems to be getting better and better. Between web redemptions, video breakdowns, and spoiler alerts (see last week’s on Human Centipede in particular…priceless) among other things it never ceases to supply me with near endless laughs. I can’t say that about too many shows so obviously this has become an indispensable part of my Wednesday night.

September preview –

It’s Always Sunny In Philadelphia – This truly outrageous and truly funny (see above) show makes it’s return in September and I for one can’t wait for a surely awesome new season.
Dexter – Ah Dexter, why have you addicted me so? I’ll admit that I don’t even have Showtime BUT I did get hooked on watching the DVDs earlier this year and I still need to watch season 4 (which hits video release in just a mere couple of weeks now). Rest assured I will catch up completely when that DVD releases and when the new season starts next month well…I might just have to find a way to watch those episodes BEFORE the next video release (which will probably be another year from now).

What are your picks O dear viewers of the Riskening?

– DGM-payne

P.S. – I got into Starcraft 2 alot sooner than I expected, thanks to a surprise early birthday present from my brother. I only started it today but if the site becomes a ghost town again well you know what to blame it on this time…I WILL try to update. (Keep telling myself this…might work right?)

Feb

A further look at eco-box types… (aka the Good, the Bad, and the Ugly)

By DGM-payne 91 Comments

Categories: The Misc things

It’s been almost a year now since I first visited these nuisances to DVD (and occasionally video game) kind, and I figured I’d review some of the different types of cases I’ve noticed lately because obviously I have nothing better to do than ramble on about these types of things (if you don’t like it or don’t care anymore I believe Google can find you something else to waste your time, kthxbye). Why there are this many variations of DVD cases I don’t have the slightest clue, but here’s a few of them in what I like to call…

The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly…of Eco-boxes

The Good:

I would love to shake the hand of the person who came up with this design. It’s the best balance between cutting down on plastic and regular DVD cases I’ve seen thus far. Dubbed a “eco-lite” (or atleast that’s what it says on the spine), you should notice that there are rectangle-ish and square areas on the left and right sides respectively in the plastic that are cut down lower than the rest of the case. As far as eco-boxes go, I’m just fine with this type of case since it doesn’t risk the integrity of the case by punching damn holes in it. I haven’t run across that many of these ones yet which is a shame because these are the only ones that are completely A-OK in my book.

The Bad:

This one I really don’t know what’s going on. It’s like it’s trying to be a hybrid of the lite and regular eco-box cases that’s not quite at either side of the spectrum. I would also technically file this under Ugly because it just plain looks fuglier than the regular eco-boxes with the recycle symbols (in my opinion). In the words of my favorite Boris, “Better luck next time, slugheads!”. I also haven’t seen all too many of this type (thank God…).

The Ugly:

Well, these ones are just your run-of-the-mill recycle symbol type with holes punched left and right and every which way. These are by far the most common now (among any DVDs really) so I’m sure you’ve run across atleast a few of them. I already talked about them in my first post about the dreaded eco-boxes so I won’t bother posting another picture.

Honorable mention of annoyances in DVD cases – The case clasps…

These things have been around for God knows how long now and are among some of the biggest random annoyances to DVD kind. I don’t know what possessed anyone to invent these clasps in the first place but they must have been pretty paranoid about case security. If you haven’t seen them yet then you’re quite lucky to not have to be bothered by them. They’re just plain annoying that’s all for something that is just completely unnecessary.

That about wraps up this installment of eco-box ranting. If you’ve noticed any different types of the “eco-box” that I haven’t listed yet then I’m all ears to hear about them.

– DGM-payne

(P.S. – look for another Heavy Rain post soon…)

Last DVD watched:: Dexter - Season 3 (disc 1)
Last movie watched in theaters:: Daybreakers

Feb

Happy Groundhog’s day! (aka sorry for another couple weeks of no posts)

By DGM-payne 0 Comments

Categories: The Misc things and World of Video Gaming

For the record, I had been (for the most part) enthralled in the epicness of Fallout 3 for the better part of January as the game of the year edition was part of my christmas presents. About 121 hours of exploring and conquering later I was done with all the quests of the main game…BUT I haven’t tapped into the add-ons yet (other than getting over level 20 as part of Broken Steel). For the moment though I’m going back Assassin’s Creed 2, which I briefly started after christmas but hadn’t even played past the first sequence before moving into Fallout 3 among other things.

Second, last week I also made a pretty good killing with some cheap DVDs. The FYE location near here (which also used to be a Media Play before they closed down) is closing their doors soon and they were up to 50% off now. What better time than now to peruse their used sections, no? I did just that and found a nice load of movies/TV most as low as $3 or $4. You’d be surprised what you find sometimes at Big Lots too if you don’t mind digging through their $3 new DVD sections or even Best Buy with their different $5 DVDs every week. Blu-ray is gaining more and more influence but I’m still fine with DVDs thanks, so stop pushing them on me.

Lastly, I’d like to note that Zombieland hit DVD/Blu-ray release today. To anyone who hasn’t seen it yet I would have to say that it was a quite the good balance of humor and zombie killing (and I’m not just saying that because I love zombie stuff…or maybe I am). It also has quite possibly the best Bill Murray cameo of all time. There’s a standard single disc available everywhere and an exclusive “Nut up or shut up” 2 disc edition at Best Buy. Either way you’ll get relatively the same experience plus or minus 2 additional featurettes. Pick it up and you won’t regret it.

P.S. – Only a couple more weeks until the Resident Evil 5 add-on. Can’t wait…

– DGM-payne

Dec

Riskening 2009 : A Retrospective

By DGM-payne 0 Comments

Categories: Site Updates, The Misc things, Web hosting and World of Video Gaming

The new year is upon us and we should all be looking forward to the next and all it has to offer in entertainment…BUT let’s take a moment to look at the ups and downs of Riskening for the past year, shall we?

April –

Starting to get excited about Terminator Salvation… (and not disappointed regardless of what the naysayers have to say)

The Anticipated List is starting to take form. (it’ll grow in due time)

The 360 fails by way of the dreaded e74! (and the PS3 gets a little extra lovin while he’s gone)

I give my 2 cents about what was missing from RE5. (still a great game though, I forgive you Capcom)

May –

Tacos at Midnight Doritos disappoint me. (if I wanted to eat some taco seasoning I would’ve just ripped open a bag and chugged some down)

Atleast the Red Dead Redemption trailer picked my spirits up. (and the new gameplay one is even more exciting)

We recieve some sad news about the development team at 3d Realms. (but DNF will push on and maybe we’ll actually be able to play it…someday)

I give my opinion about digital copies… (you know, those things that come with certain DVDs that I’m sure they charge you extra for AND that you have to use before a certain expiration date)

…and the new Eco-box craze. (here’s a hint, they suck)

Japan continues to make awesome commercials. (Oh Japan, you so crazy!)

What better way to celebrate Memorial day than with the first major Modern Warfare 2 trailer? (answer: it doesn’t get much better than that)

We learn a thing or two about game shipping precautions. (this has been a Riskening.com PSA)

The Terminator Salvation game, unlike the movie, disappoints me. (rushing licensed games out the door doesn’t pay, kids)