Here we go with some more complaining. I seem to be very good at that, eh? Anyway, I saw the recent announcement that Starcraft II is NOT going to have LAN support.

This is extremely frustrating for somebody who has spent countless hours playing Warcraft III and Starcraft at LAN get togethers with friends. Don't get me wrong, I understand where they are coming from with piracy control, but honestly, is it REALLY going to make that much of a difference? It will STILL be available on torrent, people WILL download it, and I'm sure it will take little to no time for people to figure out how to make a mock Battle.net to run pirated games off of (like they did with free WoW servers). In my opinion, Blizzard is only delaying the inevitable, not really solving the problem. They are more likely than not causing problems.

For one, I have heard practically nothing but complaints about this announcement. I mean, come on...all of us faithful fans that have shelled out money to play their games and really enjoy being able to sit in a room together and play LAN with eachother is priceless. Taking that away from us is inconceivable. Not to mention that not everybody is privileged enough to have internet quite yet. Last time I went to a friend's house to play some SC we couldn't get online because of issues with figuring out how to get internet from the router (it was quite complicated, which it should not have been) so we didn't get to play online like we wanted, and were stuck with just playing LAN. In situations like these, what will people do? We will be stuck with the inability to play. Is this what Blizzard wants? To lose customers?

I've met a number of people at the Gamestop store I work at who have cancelled their reservations and expressed no interest in wanting to buy SC2 now that LAN support is hacked. So in the end, I really don't think Blizzard is preventing piracy, they are encouraging and forcing people to resort to it instead. I will be one of the unfortunate few that still buys the game, but that is only because I want to play the campaign. If I were getting it for the multiplayer like so many are, then I also would not purchase the game.

If any of you out there at Blizzard actually read our comments, I suggest you rethink your strategy. There are other ways to prevent piracy without slapping your fans and customers in the face. Look at Sins of a Solar Empire. Fantastic game, sold well, has just as much piracy issues as any other game (even ones like Spore which have an install limit), and has LAN. That's a new game. So the added excuse of 'modern gaming' not needing LAN is balogna.

Don't forget about internet cafes. People go in to play LAN with a bunch of friends, without the disturbance of internet...now they are taking THAT away too. This is most definitely not heading in a good direction, and I hope a full-fledged SoaSE expansion is released around the time of SC2, so that I still have a good RTS I can enjoy LAN with my friends on.

Wolf! Yes, with all the big talk from my challenger, I beat him down. With my rules and his rules. He apparently practiced nonstop for 2 weeks. I practices 3 hours over a span of a week. I was quite proud of myself. And when me and my best friend played together, we were unstoppable. I beat everybody at the tournament except one person, who played as Fox. He was just too darned fast so I just couldn't react fast enough. It was a blast though.

Enough gloating though. On another note, I'd like to express my frustration with Bungie on ODST. I have been so excited about it being a nice short campaign for 30 bucks, and then they announce that it is still going to be a nice short campaign but now with the Halo 3 multiplayer for 60 bucks. WHAT?! I don't want to spend 30 more dollars for a bunch of content I ALREADY HAVE! I just needed to vent. Good day.

First off, I would like to make a recommendation. Play Polarium on the DS. It is only $5 used at Gamestop. I have a copy checked out from my store and I've done 30 of 100 puzzles so far and am loving it. It's genius, simple and fun.

Anyway, so one of my co-workers challenged me to SSBB. I told him I would beat him with ease and have been talking big all this time. The tournament is on Sunday (this Sunday) and I finally sat down to start training yesterday after not playing the game for 6 months. I discovered I may indeed lose this. I play as Wolf and he plays as Mario. It took me 10 matches before I could beat a level 9 Mario so I may have dug myself in deep this time haha. I'll tell you how it goes after all is said and done though. Wish me luck!

Oh, and I'm starting up a small independent game company. I'll keep you guys updated about it as time goes on. We'll have a website up and running within a few weeks. Keep your eyes open. What I want to do is make games that take classic formulas, and make them fresh, new and different. Hope for the best.