I am participating in another guest op-ed column with the New York Times Select called “Home Fires” that started running yesterday (and also looks very similar to “homefries” if you’re skimming something). In 2006 I wrote for a similar column called “Frontlines.” While Frontlines focused on what I experienced while deployed to Iraq, Home Fires will focus on homecoming, reintegrating, separating from the Marine Corps, and post-military life. While you must subscribe to the Times Select to read the articles, you can get a 14-day free trial if you wish. I also expect to repost the articles on my blog, but cannot do so until one month after they run in the Times.
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FASA says that the Shadowrun demo will hit the XBOX Live Marketplace this week. Wednesday June 6th is the target date although FASA says that it may wait until June 8th to release the demo.

Perhaps it has got something with the soon-to-be-ending HALO 3 beta. After all, we’ve discovered that Bungie is going to refer all of the beta participants over to Shadowrun.

Some people claim this is best first person shooter on the XBOX 360. However, some major reviewers have given this game scores less than 7.0/10. I personally think it’s the best FPS to be released for the XBOX 360. Gamespot users don’t agree with Gamespot’s review either.

I’m almost convinced to write a point-counterpoint article investigating why Shadowrun is getting low reviews. I do know the game has been knocked for having poor graphics, no campaign, and not being a role-playing game (yeah, Shadowrun has a huge backstory and a loyal fanbase that is displeased that the game wasn’t called “Shadowrun – the first person shooter adapted by Microsoft”. Seriously. Those guys are worked up over this game not having a subtitle). Of course, I think the graphics look great.

What say you? Try out the demo later this week and see. You’ll be playing a version of the game that’s very similar to the beta that several THX’s got to play.

Tip: Play Elf and buy Teleport to move around the map quick and Resurrect your team members. Elf too fast for you? Play Human and make sure some buys Tree of Life in the first round.

By the way: we hear you’ll be playing on Power Station:

Stay tuned for announcement about a Shadowrun LAN we are going to hold.
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currently playing: Shadowrun
on the back burner: Catan, HALO 3 beta, Guitar Hero II, HALO 2 (PC)
rest in peace: GoW, CoD3,
Shadowrun rocks!

The idea behind groups is similar to what you might see in other web communities–to bring people within Podtacular together based on specific interests or goals.

Up until now, we’ve been getting by with members posting in forum threads and attempting to keep things organized, but it can get clumsy and out-of-hand without the right discipline. So, the idea behind groups is to make it easier to build “teams” and be able to collaborate with each other, in addition to simple discussion.

For instance, the Podtacular Review Frenzy Team can use their group to carry on discussions about what games are up for review, who’s going to handle what aspects of the workflow and how reviews are scheduled for publishing, using things like polls, internal group messaging and event planning. This is just a test case for how I expect groups to work for Podtacular members, and so those are the current features available at the moment.

You’ve been invited to this group (and you can only see this message) because you’ve either shown interest in (or have already started) leading a group of members in working on projects for the Podtacular community. Whether it’s Review Frenzy, Pod TV, Halo News, Godtacular, etc., you’re welcome to help us test out this group system and see where we can really make use of it in producing more and better content for this community.

I’m sure you’ll have questions, so please post them here.

The idea behind groups is similar to what you might see in other web communities–to bring people within Podtacular together based on specific interests or goals.

Up until now, we’ve been getting by with members posting in forum threads and attempting to keep things organized, but it can get clumsy and out-of-hand without the right discipline. So, the idea behind groups is to make it easier to build “teams” and be able to collaborate with each other, in addition to simple discussion.

For instance, the Podtacular Review Frenzy Team can use their group to carry on discussions about what games are up for review, who’s going to handle what aspects of the workflow and how reviews are scheduled for publishing, using things like polls, internal group messaging and event planning. This is just a test case for how I expect groups to work for Podtacular members, and so those are the current features available at the moment.

You’ve been invited to this group (and you can only see this message) because you’ve either shown interest in (or have already started) leading a group of members in working on projects for the Podtacular community. Whether it’s Review Frenzy, Pod TV, Halo News, Godtacular, etc., you’re welcome to help us test out this group system and see where we can really make use of it in producing more and better content for this community.

I’m sure you’ll have questions, so please post them here.

The idea behind groups is similar to what you might see in other web communities–to bring people within Podtacular together based on specific interests or goals.

Up until now, we’ve been getting by with members posting in forum threads and attempting to keep things organized, but it can get clumsy and out-of-hand without the right discipline. So, the idea behind groups is to make it easier to build “teams” and be able to collaborate with each other, in addition to simple discussion.

For instance, the Podtacular Review Frenzy Team can use their group to carry on discussions about what games are up for review, who’s going to handle what aspects of the workflow and how reviews are scheduled for publishing, using things like polls, internal group messaging and event planning. This is just a test case for how I expect groups to work for Podtacular members, and so those are the current features available at the moment.

You’ve been invited to this group (and you can only see this message) because you’ve either shown interest in (or have already started) leading a group of members in working on projects for the Podtacular community. Whether it’s Review Frenzy, Pod TV, Halo News, Godtacular, etc., you’re welcome to help us test out this group system and see where we can really make use of it in producing more and better content for this community.

I’m sure you’ll have questions, so please post them here.

As a community devoted to the enjoyment and healthy lovin’ of the Halo franchise, we can’t help but be curious as to what Halo 3 will bring us. Thanks to Bungie, we’ve been able to enjoy a public beta of Halo 3 for a few weeks now and it seems that everybody is confident that the multiplayer aspect of Halo 3 will meet everyone’s expectations.

However, to find out what happens to Master Chief and the human race, the Covenant (and even those pesky Flood), the suspense is gonna be downright brutal in the coming months. None of us know what’s going to happen yet, but we’re all just as eager as the next guy to see it play out. So, here at Podtacular, we’ve taken it upon ourselves to not ruin anyone’s fun and discuss or spoil the single player campaign of the game until people have had a chance to experience it for themselves. We ask that you do the same.

That means in your blogs, forum posts, comments, etc. you should use a little discretion and not discuss spoilers. If you have some new information but aren’t sure if it’s spoiler material, please at least mark it with a SPOILER WARNING. We’ll do our best to keep Podtacular.com spoiler-free (at our own expense, of course), but it’s all in the interest of not ruining what new hotness Bungie has in store to melt our brains this September.

As a community devoted to the enjoyment and healthy lovin’ of the Halo franchise, we can’t help but be curious as to what Halo 3 will bring us. Thanks to Bungie, we’ve been able to enjoy a public beta of Halo 3 for a few weeks now and it seems that everybody is confident that the multiplayer aspect of Halo 3 will meet everyone’s expectations.

However, to find out what happens to Master Chief and the human race, the Covenant (and even those pesky Flood), the suspense is gonna be downright brutal in the coming months. None of us know what’s going to happen yet, but we’re all just as eager as the next guy to see it play out. So, here at Podtacular, we’ve taken it upon ourselves to not ruin anyone’s fun and discuss or spoil the single player campaign of the game until people have had a chance to experience it for themselves. We ask that you do the same.

That means in your blogs, forum posts, comments, etc. you should use a little discretion and not discuss spoilers. If you have some new information but aren’t sure if it’s spoiler material, please at least mark it with a SPOILER WARNING. We’ll do our best to keep Podtacular.com spoiler-free (at our own expense, of course), but it’s all in the interest of not ruining what new hotness Bungie has in store to melt our brains this September.

As a community devoted to the enjoyment and healthy lovin’ of the Halo franchise, we can’t help but be curious as to what Halo 3 will bring us. Thanks to Bungie, we’ve been able to enjoy a public beta of Halo 3 for a few weeks now and it seems that everybody is confident that the multiplayer aspect of Halo 3 will meet everyone’s expectations.

However, to find out what happens to Master Chief and the human race, the Covenant (and even those pesky Flood), the suspense is gonna be downright brutal in the coming months. Here at Podtacular, we’ve taken it upon ourselves to not ruin anyone’s fun and discuss or spoil the single player campaign of the game until people have had a chance to experience it for themselves. We ask that you do the same.

That means in your blogs, forum posts, comments, etc. you should use a little discretion and not discuss spoilers. If you have some new information but aren’t sure if it’s spoiler material, please at least mark it with a SPOILER WARNING. We’ll do our best to keep Podtacular.com spoiler-free (at our own expense, of course), but it’s all in the interest of not ruining what new hotness Bungie has in store to melt our brains this September.