Now for Nintendo: Holy crap! Nintendo wins E3 2010!

The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword
We all knew it was coming, Zelda with Wii Motion Plus control. I am a little disappointed that I can’t play with a control pad anymore. I didn’t like Twilight Princess on the Wii because I could never get the sword to swing the correct way and ended up reverting back to the Gamecube version. If what I’ve experienced with the swordplay games in Wii Sports Resort is any indication, then this new Zelda will have that problem fixed with it’s 1:1-ish sword swinging. The new art style looks perfect to me. It sits somewhere in between Wind Waker and Twilight Princess. I would compare it more to Super Mario Galaxy, cartoon candy but still beautiful.

Mario Sports Mix
More Mario sports? Well ok, I’ve generally liked the various Mario sports games and will give this a try. I like that they’ve crammed 3 (or 4?) games in to one.

Wii Party
Didn’t we already have this with Mario Party 8 on the Wii? And the numerous other party/mini-game games? I got tired of the party games a long time ago, so I’m not really interested in this.

Kirby’s Epic Yarn
Sure, it’s very pink and looks like a baby’s blankey, but Kirby games are always fun no matter how cutesy they look. And this will be the first Kirby game to take advantage of the Wii’s controls.

Epic Mickey
I didn’t really grow up on Mickey Mouse and Disney as much as some others might have. My initial reaction was “meh” when they showed it off during the conference, but after reading more in to it, the story is looking really interesting, giving Mickey some welcome darkness. I’m still not sold on the gameplay though. It’s not the first game to let you create and destroy the game world.

Donkey Kong Country Returns
Finally! A proper DK game, and from the same devs that worked the Metroid Prime series. I didn’t see it in any of the videos, but it was said that the game will use motion controls. Hopefully, they won’t be too imposing and lightly used like in New Super Mario Bros Wii.

Metroid: Other M
Just as last year, can’t wait for this one.

3DS
As far as the 3D aspect goes, I just don’t care. I one of those people that has misaligned eyes, so I can only focus on something with one at a time. Because of this, 3D just doesn’t work for me.
So it’s the power of the system itself combined with the line up of games that get me excited. However, I really hope they don’t repeat PSP’s mistake. They need to add a 2nd analog control under the face buttons on the right.

Kid Icarus: Uprising
I’ve never played the original Kid Icarus for more than a few minutes. I just never knew what I was supposed to with it besides jump around and shoot monsters with my bow. The game they showed at the conference looked good graphics-wise, but the gameplay lookeed very generic. And Pit’s voice sounded generic as well. Plus his one liners, such as “Bark like a dog!”, were just plain awful. I’ll have to wait until this is closer to release to decided if I want to give it a try.

Metal Gear Solid 3
I really hope this is going to be a real game and not just a tech demo for the 3DS. I would love to see MGS 1 (GC version), 2, 3, and the PSP games ported to the 3DS. MGS3 is a great start though. It, along with Naked Snake, is one of my favorites because it doesn’t deal with the nano machine and cloning bullshit that gets overly complicated in the other games.

The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time, Starfox 64, and other N64 remakes
Again, I hope these will be real, rather than just tech demos. We’ll just have wait and see what happens. I’m sure we’ll also see some other great new games that take advantage of the system’s power and new control options.

Child of Eden
Purdy. Not much else to say about it. I wonder if the shooting it automatic after you lock on to targets or if they guy was actually doing something to tell it to shoot.

Assassin’s Creed: Brotherhood
Hell yes. Assassin’s Creed II was my game of the year for the 2009. This direct sequel/spin-off is looking to be just as good, if not better.

Shaun White Skateboarding
If it controls like Tony Hawk, I might give it a try. I tried EA’s Skate a few times, but I couldn’t get used to the controls because I played the hell out of the Tony Hawk games to the point that their controls felt natural to me and I kept trying to play Skate that way without even thinking about it.

Battle Tag
Congratulations Ubisoft, you’ve made laser tag. Even Joel didn’t seem entirely convinced.

Innergy
It’s game about breathing properly that makes you wear a sensor. Joel didn’t look to enthusiastic about this one either.

Your Shape: Fitness Evolved
Copy and paste from my Microsoft post:
Maybe it’s because I’m getting fat in my gut and trying to work it off, but this actually looks really cool and much better than Wii Fit. I like how it has both the slow-paced yoga-type stuff, but also the faster-pace combat-ish looking stuff.

Raving Rabbids Travel in Time
Time traveling dishwasher = hilarious. As always these little trailers and movies are great, but they didn’t say anything about the game play.

Ghost Recon: Future Soldier
Shooter with a stealth suit? That totally has never been done before.

Driver: San Fransisco
I don’t get it. You’re playing a guy who’s in a comma, but thinks he’s a wake. Does that mean the whole game is a dream?

Project Dust
Still don’t really know what sort of a game this is. Looks like it’s about some tribes of people that control the elements.

Rayman Origins
This looks hilarious and beautiful. And made by only 5 people? That’s awesome.

ManiaPlanet
I’ve never tried TrackMania, but the QuestMania thing piques my interest. Seems like that will the last one to be released though.

Michael Jackson
We’ve known for a while that a Michael Jackson game was in the works, and Ubi’s presentation today didn’t add anything new. All we know is what we already knew: it’s a Michael Jackson game.

Beyond Good and Evil 2
Where the fuck is it Ubisoft?! You teased us with a trailer 2 years and then haven’t said a damn thing since!

Dead Space 2
I still haven’t finished the first one, but the new looks the same to me. And the guy demoing it looked like he was getting his ass kicked.

Medal of Honor, Battlefield Bad Company 2 Vietnam Expansion, and Gun Club
Blah. Blah. Military shooters. Call of Duty competitors. Whatever.
And I’m tired of having to sign up to developers stupid services after I’m already signed up on XBox Live or PSN. With EA its Gun Club, uPlay for Ubisoft, Social Club for Rockstar, etc.

EA Sports MMA
More games about sweaty men beating the shit out of each other. Why is this even legal?

EA Sports Live Broadcast
Lets say I were in to sports, why the fuck would I want to watch gamers pretend to play sports when I could watch real sports on TV or Xbox Live’s new ESPN thing? I don’t see this thing taking off.

EA Sports Active 2
A sequel to their Wii Fit clone. I think I’d prefer Ubisoft’s Your Shape as it doesn’t require me to wear sensors.

Madden 2011
Just. Don’t. Care.

Sims 3
Every time I try to play these games I start to feel like I’m wasting my time. Yes, they’re addictive, but I’m doing shit in a game that I could be doing in real life instead.

Crysis 2 and Bulletstorm
Just like with the military shooters, these shooters still boil down to one gameplay aspect: Shoot the bad guys. I can only seem to enjoy these games now and days if I’m playing with friends. Otherwise they feel flat and identical to other shooters.

Star Wars: The Old Republic
I already can’t wait for this game. The movie they showed was awesome, but they still didn’t reveal anything new about the game. No beta, no release date, nothing. Sure, there are going to be battlegrounds like in WoW, but that’s not that surprising.

Halo Reach, Call of Duty Black OPs, Gears of War 3:
Meh, meh, and meh. Neither of these over hyped franchises is the reason I own a 360.

Metal Gear Solid: Rising
The bullet-time slicing is pretty cool, but I hope there’s more to the game than that. Otherwise the hack-n-slash with occasional bullet time is gonna get old fast. But in typical Kojima fashion, the trailer didn’t reveal much detail about the gameplay or the insane story that likely goes along with it.

Fable III
Fable and Fable II has been excellent games that I’ve gone back and played again several times. One of my gripes about Fable II was that your choices didn’t seem to affect the main story much, unlike the first Fable. I hope we’ll see that improved in the new game. The trailer puts emphasis in the story of the 2 brothers, the one who inherited the throne, and the one who the player will be controlling to lead the revolution. But it raises a question to me: did they remove the ability to play as a girl? In games wiith a good/evil system, I typically play through with a good guy first, then an evil bitch second, just to see how the games plays in contrast.

Codename: Kingdoms
“Who can stand? Blah. Blah. Blah. Blah. Who can stand?” Shut up trailer guy. Geez.
Not enough info yet to go on for this one. The trailer was just a pre-rendered CGI of 3 gladiators covered in blood and soot and such.

Kinect
Gimmicky, but still cool. After all, it’s living room motion capture without the suit covered in a golf balls.
Controlling the 360 without the controller is nice, but it’s still a gimmicky thing. Most of the time that I use the 360, it’s going to be to play a game that uses a controller, so most of the time I’ll already have the controller in my hand after I’ve pressed the home button to turn it on. I have a separate htpc running XBMC to do my movies, music, and retro games. And even with the best internet connection available here (aside from buying your own expensive T1 or fiber line), trying to stream video with Hulu, Netflix, Zune Marketplace, etc is painful. Even if I could do it, I’d probably just use the htpc anyway. So controlling media on the 360 with hand gestures has no appeal to me. The video streaming video problem here also applies to Video Kinect, Kinect’s video chat feature. More on Kinect in the various games that will use it below.

XBox Live on Windows Mobile 7 Phones
Not enough to make me want to buy a Windows phone.

ESPN on Xbox Live
To quote @TychoBrahe:
“Hey! Microsoft! I don’t give a fuck about sports! I play videogames! That’s why I bought your console!”
http://twitter.com/TychoBrahe/status/16166929831

Kinectimals
It was cute and kinda funny until the little girl demoing it pretended that the cat had actually jumped on her and was pushing her back.

Kinect Sports and Kinect Adventures
Wii Sports, but with Kinect, which might not be a bad thing. One of the things that Kinect has over the Wii and PS3′s Move is that it actually makes you use your whole body. With the Wii so far, you could get away with sitting on the couch and moving your arms around a bit and keeping your feet on the balance board. Kinect will know if you’re sitting or standing, and also doesn’t restrict you to a small rectangle on the ground.

Kinect Joyride
Um.. how do you brake? Seriously, it looks like your car accelerates on it’s own and you only control steering and the occasional boost. What I found funny thought was the girl demoing it would stick her ass out towards the audience every time she needed to drift around a corner.

Your Shape: Fitness Evolved
Maybe it’s because I’m getting fat in my gut and trying to work it off, but this actually looks really cool and much better than Wii Fit. I like how it has both the slow-paced yoga-type stuff, but also the faster-pace combat-ish looking stuff.

Dance Central
Looks like a lot of fun. But like DDR, I wouldn’t be caught dead playing that in front of other people.

Star Wars for Kinect
Looks like an on rails slasher, similar to the Swordplay Showdown mode in Wii Sports Resort, but with the added functionality of force powers. I can’t see them making a full retail game out of this though.

Forza Motorsport Something-or-other
They spent an awful long time showing off the car with Kinect, but didn’t say anything about the racing.
I’ve still got music from the Dance Central demo stuck in my head.

Xbox 360 Slim
Quieter, provides power for Kinect, built-in N wifi and already out today. Cool… but I already own a 360. $300 isn’t worth it for the extra features. Now if I could trade in my existing 360 for a sizable discount off the new one, then I’d consider it.

GiantBomb_v1 is the first one I made. It gets the first images that are returned when you do a normal game search, but it’s not always accurate for games that have many releases or sequels.

GiantBomb_v2 digs much deeper to get as much box art as it can, but is much slower because it crawls through more data.

For example, with v1, “Mortal Kombat” returns various Mortal Kombat images and screenshots, but not the SNES box art that I wanted.

On v2, “Mortal Kombat” returns every box art for almost every Mortal Kombat game, including the SNES box art. But because there’s so many games, it takes longer to get the results.

So I included both versions in this zip file. I recommend using v1 most of the time, but switching to v2 when v1 fails.

Download: http://samutz.com/xbmc/launcher_giantbomb.zip
Both folders go in <launcher path>/resources/search_engines/

Tested on XBMC 9.11 using JustSomeUser’s r1 patch, running on Windows 7 Home x64.

Also worth noting that when you use the “Get Thumb” feature, it includes the launcher name in the search query at first (“Mortal Kombat Super NES” for example), which won’t always return results. When it asks you modify your query, just erase the laucher name and try again.

Or you can fix this yourself by editing <launcher path>/resources/lib/launcher_plugin.py and replacing this

search_string = "%s %s" % (romname, launcherName)

with this

search_string = "%s" % (romname)

(in the _search_thumb function)

Despite all the advancements in web APIs and interoperability, it’s inevitable that, at some point in your career, you will have to “scrape” content from a website that was not built with web services in mind. And, despite its sometimes less-than-stellar reputation, web scraping is usually an entire legitimate activity—for example, to capture data from an old version of a website for insertion into a modern CMS.

This book, written by scraping expert Matthew Turland, covers web scraping techniques and topics that range from the simple to exotic using a variety of technologies and frameworks:

To use it, download a playlist from Playlist.com.
You do this by clicking the “Export Playlist To Windows Media Player” link on the right side of the site. If it doesn’t prompt you to download a file, right click the link and select Save As.

Then upload the asx.wvx file here: samutz.com/playlist
The script will generate links from the playlist. You can then download them individually or use something like DownThemAll to get them all at once.

Source and more technical info after the jump.

Asx.wvx is basically just an xml file that Windows Media Player can read to play the songs in the playlist.

You can load it in to PHP with SimpleXML.

Here’s the source code for the page I made at samutz.com/playlist

<form action="index.php" method="post" enctype="multipart/form-data">
<input type="hidden" name="MAX_FILE_SIZE" value="1048576" />
<input type="file" name="file" />
<input type="submit" value="Upload" />
</form>

<?php
if (isset($_FILES['file']) && $_FILES['file']['error']==0) {
	$xml = simplexml_load_file($_FILES['file']['tmp_name']);
	foreach ($xml->entry as $entry) {
		$attr = $entry->ref->attributes();
		echo '<a href="'.$attr['href'].'">'.$entry->title.' by '.$entry->author.'</a><br/>';
	}
} else {
	echo 'Upload asx.wvx above.';
}
?>

The game is running great for me on Windows 7 via Steam.

You can find it here: http://www.samutz.com/blargh/articles/borderlands-custom-starter-saves/

I’ll contact each site owner/manager individually before I move their site to make sure I move them at a time that’s most convenient for them.