Sony PSP

Gamers and others alike, welcome to another post.
It's been a long week, rushing off to this place and that for this thing and that.
On Monday, I headed over to my friends house where I found out he had just received a PSP for free, because his Dad was pally with the owner of Download.com
So I got to play with that for a while. Let me say, that was my first experience with the new handheld, and I came away with a fantastic first impression. It left me deep in thought that night, as I went to sleep, as to how such power and insanely beautiful graphics could fit into the little thing.
The next day, Josh (my friend) and I headed over to another of my friends' party. Mark.
Great guy. We went to DarkZone (laser challenge). I got my ass kicked because everyone was wearing black, but I had to be trendy and wear white. Naturally, I glowed like a torch.
After that, we retired to his house for some Guild Wars, and also World of Warcraft, which I must say enticed me to subscribe. World of Warcraft is vast. Very vast. I learnt you can create a maximum of 240 characters over the 24 servers... amazing. The land is very detailed, and the character emoticons, and overall character development was to be marvelled at. However, a quick dose of PvP in Guild Wars cured the WoW fever, and now I'm good to go.
Sadly however, Guild Wars still pisses all over my laptop, which means until the end of January, I won't be on much. End of Jan = New PC --> Lots of GW.

So Christmas went pretty sweet. That's right, in Australia, we had Christmas hours before most in the world. I'd like to take this moment to say "Suck it up Americans! You may have a higher dollar value, but we get Christmas early, so there!"
I was frivolously unwrapping gifts at 7am this morning, when I picked up a golden wrapped box. I pondered what could be inside for a moment, and then ripped the wrapping off as carefully as all the rest (meaning not carefully at all, for you slow ones).
Lo and Behold, I had received the object of Monday night's dreams.
"Holy Shit!" I exclaimed in surprise and excitement. My very own PSP. And with it; Burnout: Legends, which is a beauty of a game, by the way. So lets talk about the PSP.

For starters, the basic interface is marvellous. You can play with it for several minutes before you need to put a UMD on, because you can just play around with the shiny lights and themes, as well as different settings. I quickly found that I needed a special USB Cable to transfer between PC and PSP (what the fuck is the IR port for, then? Why not use that, Sony? What's that? You want to make money by ripping people off, making them buy a commercially available USB cable? That's what I thought). Despite that rambling, the PSP is really really good.
So after figuring it out, I loaded up Burnout: Legends.
Firstly, let me say the depth of the graphics blew me away. Jesus, Burnout is one of the sweetest games I have ever played. And it's so simple.
Drive Fast --> Smash Cars. Perfect formula.
Not only are the graphics and gameplay great, but the music soundtrack is funky. Many tunes including Rock and Alt. Rock for you to listen to as you burn up the streets, littering car debris all over the US, Europe, and "Far East".
According to the "Driver Details" menu I have open before me, I have currently completed 18% of the game, completed 37/175 events, won 1/4 trophies, received 27 out of the 89 available cars, and made 6/20 signature takedowns (area and context sensitive takedowns that award you a little photo of a special crash in your scrapbook).
Burnout gets quite hard as you progress. Already I'm finding the World Tour mode getting difficult, but then again, it's been a long time since I've gamed on a handheld, and even on a console other than PC.
Also, Burnout has received many awards on several renowned websites, and in several Australian gaming magazines. Great prezzie.

One problem with the PSP is that after playing it for a while, not only do you end up with blisters on your fingers, but you discover your typing on a keyboard goes to shits, which is why it takes me so long to write this.

Apart from the PSP, I got a 51cm TV (Which doesn't have an aerial included... fucking swiss), chocolates, and some new clothes for my wardrobe. Pretty sweet haul, eh?

So, Wintereenmas approaches in a few days. My birthday is in February, so I'm gonna ask as an early b'day present for some of the CAD merchandise. You can find Tim Buckley's sweet merch here: http://www.zestuff.com/product.php?productid=98&cat=18&page=1
Seriously, what better way to celebreate Winter-een-mas than sporting some CAD merch?

If you don't know what Winter-een-mass is, you'd best start from the start: http://ctrlaltdel-online.com/comic.php?d=20030127
Read the comics there until the end of January. Then go to the 2004 in the comic archive, and read all the January comic strips. Then to go to the 2005 in the comic archive and read all the Jan strips, and that should bring you up to speed.
You'd think that a comic couldn't make such a change to the world, mais non, many I have talked to on the internet are celebrating Winter-een-mas. And if you're reading this, I expect you to celebrate it somehow also... or I'll find you... and I'll bring my fork.
Just found a good link to learn more about WEMas. http://www.wintereenmas.com/
Yes, it says 25-31st. But the season lasts all of January.

That's pretty much it for this week. Going out tomorrow with my Dad and Mark to see The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe. Should be exciting. I'm hoping to use the $100 Coles Myer card my Dad gave me to pickup some PSP accessories tomorrow as well.
Tune in next week, true believers, as we delve into the business of the Boxing Day sales, the event we call New Year's Eve/Day, and also, the beginning of WEMas season, and what you should do to celebrate. Hell, we might even discuss some upcoming games, too.

Enjoy your Christmas, I enjoyed mine :D