What Made you Smile/What Ticked you off Today?

[noiseredux]

Trying to softmod my Wii to play backups, but...

I can't figure it out. I need something that'll allow me to boot ISOs from an SD card, as well as from USB. It should also play GameCube games along with Wii games.

couldn't be easier: http://www.joystiq.com/2011/08/19/how-t ... n-america/

[Key-Glyph]

: I was recently shopping on Nintendo's website and saw that they had old Pokémon manuals listed for purchase. I was delighted and dropped a $2.00 copy of FireRed's booklet into my shopping cart along with my other goods without second thought.

Flash forward to my opening the package. I find an office envelope containing the following memo:

"Although the manual is no longer available in its original form, we are able to provide you with a photocopy. Please find it inclosed. Due to the cost involved in making photocopies, we continue to charge for this manual."

Inside is a stapled packet of scans on glossyish, letter-sized paper, with each two-page spread of the manual centered on a sheet.

I mean, are they joking? Had I known it wasn't going to be a real manual, I wouldn't have bought the thing in the first place. They must realize this. I suppose it would have been a royal pain to contact me and ask if I still wanted to the item under these new circumstances, but really. Customer service will be getting a call later on in the week. I don't care about my two buck refund; I just feel deceived.

The kicker is that the spreads are in chronological order (as if you were flipping through an original, stapled manual) and the printouts are all double-sided, so there isn't even a way to crop the pages and put them together in proper sequence -- which I would have grumbled about, but been willing to do.

[Hobie-wan]

*bullshit manual nonsense*

BOOOOOOOOOO!

[TSTR]

Wow, that is some straight garbage. I would be pissed off too.

[REPO Man]

Trying to softmod my Wii to play backups, but...

I can't figure it out. I need something that'll allow me to boot ISOs from an SD card, as well as from USB. It should also play GameCube games along with Wii games.

couldn't be easier: http://www.joystiq.com/2011/08/19/how-t ... n-america/

This is so helpful... if you actually already OWN the games!

[Jmustang1968]

Well they arent really backus if you dont own the games...

[dsheinem]

I missed the discussion of that bullshit video yesterday, but that "things used to be so great - a facebook was an ACTUAL face and an ACTUAL book!! We went and found our friends OUTSIDE!" kind of sentiment irks me to no end.

Agreed: "Shut up, old man!"

The best part of that video is that it throws in a dig at video games and then ends with that thumbs up image of Valut Boy from the Fallout series. Dumbfucks.

...of course, we see the same kind of logic around here often applied to old video games ("In my day when we bought a game we got the WHOLE FINISHED game! And we spent months playing it!"). I am starting to see more of this coming from folks my age ("I remember when music was GOOD!") and even though I guess some of that is inevitable, it is no less disheartening.

Smile: Four days of wall to wall basketball! w00t! Go 'Cuse!

Frown: this is long and ranty and depressing and dear diary-esque, so I'll spoiler it for you and spare you the musings on why feeling helpless about big global problems sucks. tldr: oh poor me!:

I've been feeling like there's a lot of horribleness out there in the greater world that I wish I could do something about. Seriously. I saw a report a couple of weeks ago on the plight of the dying children of Syria (who are being targeted by both sides), a video last week about human rights abuses in Afghanistan, and for some reason I feel like a lot of what I've been reading and watching lately about the impact of global conflict, of food shortages and climate change, about discriminatory and hateful laws, etc. has been really getting to me. I've seen reports like this for years, of course, but of late I feel like if I was ever going to do something about it: this would be the time. I'm not getting younger. I feel like I sit in my ivory tower studying theory, writing and reading about specialized areas of interest, teaching public speaking, political communication, and media criticism to undergraduates and trying to tell them to think more carefully about the world and to make the world a better place - but that ultimately many of them just want to go into some field that they hope will pay well or allow them to have fun while they work (or both) and that the end goal for the vast majority of people I meet is about seeking contentment for self, not betterment of others. In any case, I feel like teaching and writing is just not as meaningful as going out and doing something myself, but I also can't really uproot my family and move to some global conflict zone and I am feeling increasingly at a loss.

I know that my angst on this isn't unique, in fact I think that many people feel this way at some point and their answer is to turn to community involvement of some kind - taking leadership positions in a church, Moose lodges or Rotary or Scouts and the like, getting involved in youth sports, getting involved in local charity work, community organizations, etc. That's all well and good, but to me a lot of that rings hollow and a lot of those organizations have core "values" that I find disagreeable at best or offensive at worst. Besides, at least where I live, there's no shortage of groups doing good work in the community and those needs are, by in large, met - especially compared to the needs of the places where all that horribleness is taking place. The problems of most of those around me/in this region really pale compared to the literal life and death struggles of people in other places in this world. I don't know what I can really do about it and that frustrates me quite a bit (raising and sending money is fine, but it feels like "paying away the problem" which is only slightly better than "praying away the problem" Neither is using any special skills or abilities that I may have that could help).

Two things that are wrapped up in this recent matrix of self-loathing: 1) I am giving a public lecture next week about my book research on video games/the industry and I think I have genuinely interesting and valuable things to say about the topic. I have some related seeds planted that, if they come to fruition, will be big for me professionally and set up some things that apply the arguments I make in the book in real, material, meaningful ways. That's all well and good - I am looking forward to see where this particular ride takes me - but at the end of the day I am expending a lot thought and energy and time on video games. I am not helping to solve any kind of problem that matters to anyone other than people who have enough leisure time to play a lot of games or people who make a living related to games. I am certainly not helping the people who's plight has been getting to me. 2) My son is starting to get interested in God and Jesus and said that he'd like to try going to church, so I took him. As someone who grew up going to church three times or more a week (my dad was a minister, I did half of my schooling in Christian schools) but who has purposefully "left the faith" and thus avoided church as much as possible for most of the past 15 years, being in church turned out to be physically painful. I sat there and felt my blood pressure rise and my stomach churn, and though I know that I am doing the right thing by letting my son explore spirituality a bit, I had the same sense of feeling like everyone there was wrapped up in their own problems and their own "spiritual walk" so much that they were able to push the real problems of the world out. Religion functions as a personal salve, not a material cure: it offers "eternal hope" and "inner peace," not actual solutions and real change.

That said, I could use some kind of inner peace. This recent moping and angsting has taken a physical toll on me - I am finding myself drinking a bit more then I'd like, unable to sleep very much (even worse than normal), and a bit more irritable than usual about most everything. Maybe I am winding up to some kind of mid life crisis (Hey, maybe I'm a year away from a Corvette and a hot girlfriend!), maybe this is just the long winter doldrums taking its toll, maybe there's something fleeting in all this and it will pass soon enough. But right now I feel like I'm sad and angry about a lot of things and helpless to find meaningful ways to address them (at a personal level or otherwise). I don't need reassurances that everything will be ok (or that I do some types of good work already) or defeatism that "that's just the way of the world" - I need some kind of way to see and know I am making a difference about things that matter to know that I am improving the human condition in some way.

But today I'll watch some basketball.

[noiseredux]

This is so helpful... if you actually already OWN the games!

what are you talking about? That guide shows you how to soft-mod your Wii using the LetterBomb method. No games required to do the softmod. I thought you needed a guide on how to do the softmod. There it is. That's the guide I followed. Takes less than 10 mins. All you need to do it is an SD card.

[pierrot]

Manuals

I tried ordering some GC manuals from the Nintendo store not too long ago. It's actually listed somewhere on the store that they could be photo-copies. I figured I'd give it a gamble for $2 each, and lost as well. Ended up just returning them. I can't remember if they refunded my shipping or not, though.

[prfsnl_gmr]

*discussion*

I often feel the same way, but I realize that (other than advocating for certain policies) there is not much I can do to affect events on the other side of the world. That said, you would probably be surprised how many local needs are not being met and how someone with your background and education can help meet them. Investigate some local, secular non-profit organizations (or start your own!) and see if any strike a chord with you.

Also...try to get some more exercise (or do some more manual labor). It will make you feel better and help you sleep.

Finally, try to remember that:

EVERYONE lectures about global conflict, politics, world events, etc. We need more academics to discuss video games. You are doing valuable work with regard to a developing medium, and - who knows? - maybe you will one day be remembered as the Emile Zola of your generation. (Also, discussing video games andf discussing global conflict, politics, world events, etc. are not mutually exclusive. I am certain that there are ways you can tie your current work into something about which you feel deeply and that doing so will give you both personal and professional satisfaction.

Manuals

I tried ordering some GC manuals from the Nintendo store not too long ago. It's actually listed somewhere on the store that they could be photo-copies. I figured I'd give it a gamble for $2 each, and lost as well. Ended up just returning them. I can't remember if they refunded my shipping or not, though.

This is true. The description for Pokemon FireRed manual states:

"This is the manual that was packaged with the game. The manual you receive may be a photocopy of the original manual."

I ordered some Gamecube manuals from Nintendo a while back, and half of them were photocopies. Itwas worth it for me, but I probably would not do it again. You are better off resorting to BRE Software or eBay to meet your manual needs.