Let's get this party started right...

It means we were fortunate enough to get tickets to both games without having to give up our first born child. (remember the story of Rumplestiltskin?) Lucas Oil Stadium is an unbelievable building – not exactly the best place to watch basketball, but its so massive that you feel like you’re outside. That and it was filled with Butler (mostly bandwagon) fans, along with a Peyton Manning siting (and I swear I saw Nick Lachey as well!)

It was a homecoming of sorts for the Butler faithful – and Graham and I even had a chance to do some brainstorming on new projects in person for a change (and also do some drinking, eating, and screaming at the bulldogs.) It was a fantastic weekend that we may never get to experience again (not every day a school of 4,500 students gets to the final game in their own city.) Even if we make it back next year, you never forget the “first time” (yet this one lasted a whole weekend instead of 7 minutes.) We are extremely proud to be alumni and will gladly fork over dollars to the university should we ever get rich.

This makes me want to buy this year’s NCAA basketball video game – that way I can have the same team, and I will do what Gordon was unable to, make the half court shot to win a national championship. I don’t care if I have to play it 100 times…my dream will not be denied.

Can’ t wait for the next season – I hope the lot of you are now bulldog fans!

For those of you who aren’t familiar with the Club Trillion blog, this guy “plays” for Ohio State and write about what it’s like to ride the pine for a division 1 program. Being Butler grads and avid basketball fans, we’re pretty familiar with beating OSU and our old coach and former player, Thadd Matta. Regardless – this video has to be one of the funniest I’ve seen in a while (at least I hope that was his intention). For any of you who have ever been to a basketball camp, or have done drills of any kind, it really hits home. All he needed was a few more cheesy sayings on t-shirts - “Pain is weakness leaving the body” or “Hard work beats Talent when Talent doesn’t Work HARD.”

I think Mark should transfer – to a small school in Indiana where shooting and the bounce pass is appreciated.

Our next vid needs an 80’s song in it…and lightning…

Hope all our readers out there are having a great holiday! Put the controllers down for a second and eat something, say hi to the fam, and then listen to this song. Love it.

TheDuoGroup is takin a quick break until next week. But next week should be a good one – hopefully we’ll have a certain “project” completed.

BTW – Balloon Tower Defense 4 – on adddictinggames.com = a great time waster if you’re bored with all the holiday cheer.

PEACE

Straight Ballin'

Rockstar’s latest release, The Ballad of Gay Tony, became available two days before I left for a week-long vacation in Mexico.  This posed a bit of a challenge for me.  Ever since the first commercial for the GTA IV expansion blazed across our TV screen, with the irresistible beats of Eric Prydz’s “Pjanoo” building slowly in the background, I had been eagerly awaiting the day of October 29^th.  So when that day finally came, I was faced with a difficult choice: buy it now and get hooked, or resist the temptation and wait until I returned from my trip.

I figured that, given a normal weekend, I could probably play through the entire game pretty easily.  Of course, the weekend beginning October 29^th was in fact not a “normal” weekend.  That was Halloween weekend.  Which meant that I, along with my 5 roommates (sup Mitch), would be hosting a monumental party at our house.  This was the deciding factor in my choice to wait it out.  For if I were to take the plunge, there would be no turning back, and our group costume – Captain Planet and the Planeteers – would be without a key member.*

Anyway, back to the game.  For the sake of this review, I will assume that you have already played it.  If you haven’t, stop reading this immediately and go buy it.  If you are a fan of the GTA series, you must play this game.  Period.

As I have not yet delved into the multiplayer arena, I can only comment on the single-player campaign itself, but in my opinion Rockstar nailed this one.  From the action-packed missions and outrageous new characters, to the badass new weapons and vehicles (welcome back, Tank), this game is heaps of fun.  The plot may not be the greatest GTA story we’ve seen, but in terms of all-out, adrenaline-pumping fun, TBOGT turned out to be exactly what I was hoping for.

Perhaps my favorite feature of all is the ability to replay any mission you choose after completing the game.  This has long been something I desired in the GTA series.  Being able to replay the best missions without having to go through the entire game again is fantastic.  And with the addition of another first, the scoring/rating system for each mission, the perfectionists out there will have their hands full for many more hours than it takes to simply beat the game.

Finally, I would be remiss not to mention the pause menu music.  It is, for lack of a better word, beautiful.  If anyone can tell me where I can find this in a downloadable format, I will reward him/her with a free set of Captain Planet Planeteers’ rings, women’s size 5.

DSTU

* I was Gi (Water)

You may or may not have seen the “gameplay” trailer of Assassin’s Creed 2 yet, but I posted it today because I’m anxious to know your thoughts and to help drive home a point. The Duo has stressed over and over about how much music contributes to a trailer – and this is a perfect example. Gives the game a whole new feel – which is almost, well, GANGSTA! Reminds me of a GTA trailer!

It also reminds me of a vid we did a few months before this one – at least, in song choice…see if you can find it *wink*wink*

This may be our next quick project – taking an older game that has a well established brand and using different shots and music to create an entirely different feel to it.

Oh and I remember I saw the movie “The Matador” with Pierce Brosnan on an airplane once – a hilarious comedy about an old hit-man who is trying to get back into the game. Then when it was coming out on DVD – saw an ad positioning it as an action packed thrill ride with bad-ass assassin Pierce Brosnan – filled with explosions! Whoever bought the DVD based on that ad must have done a big WTF.

There are several ways to do this – and working in teams of two seems to be the most effective. See below – I’d be happy to know your variations.

Step 1 – find a jeep, usually near most bases.

Step 2 – put C4 on the jeep (one of you must be the sniper) and keep the pulger as your weapon.

Step 3 – your partner drives the jeep while you ride machine gun – picking off easy targets as you see fit.

Step 4 – once you see a cluster of enemies, a tank, or even another jeep, bail – driver keep driving towards the targets and say when – hit the plunger. Driver, you wouldn’t be harmed, nor will the jeep – but everyone else will be destroyed.

Step 5 – laugh – then repeat.

Going solo is similar, but you must “ghost ride the whip“ into enemies, which is much harder.

Duo Challenge – perfect the Death PLANE – you get the idea…but how?

If you get death jeeped – tip your cap and keep playing – and know that it was probably us…