Snippets on The Two Towers Extended Edition DVD...

As with the first Extended LOTR DVD Set, The next extra-long version of the sequel The Two Towers will have new stuff that threshes out the story even more. This time, there will be 43 minutes of new footage added (compared to Fellowship's 30 or so). The new scenes will include a lengthy scene where Gondorian captain Faramir discovers the body of his brother Boromir (Sean Bean returns!), and a flashback which shows the brothers' complex relationship between themselves and their father, Lord Denethor (the steward of Gondor). Apparently, these scenes were intended for showing first in The Return of the King before.
Other scenes include the events that led to Theodred's death, more Ents, a scene involving some bad cooking by Eowyn (Yipe) and an Ent draught that makes Merry and Pippin grow a little taller.

Sounds great. The extended dvd set of The Two Towers is set for release along the same time as The Return of the King hits theaters at the end of the year. The regular theatrical cut DVD of TTT will hit stores in August. THis is gonna be good. Heh.

MORE GIRLS! MORE! MORE!


Introducing the Beach Blossoms!


Tomboy Ray shows off her beach babe body.

Meet my latest characters! They're the Beach Blossoms, a beach volleyball team that has a penchant for getting into weird, often dangerous mysteries. And they're the heroines of another story I am currently working on for ANOTHER manga anthology. The four are, from left to right, Sporty Amazon Jo, smart and sassy Claire, Cute ditz Gwen and silent loner Ray. I'm going to be working on the script for this over the weekend. Stay tuned for this DOAX-inspired story in the weeks ahead...

DAMN. I'm getting old.

On this very day, an infant named Marco Antonio de Guzman Dimaano was brought into the world. It's been quite some time since then. Whoa.

What am I today? Am I all that I can be? Nope. Nowhere close, but then again, who is? I've got some talent. A circle of friends I value and who value me. A family I'd be a part of even into Kingdom Come. A good job. Freedom. A new 80 Gig Hard Drive. Heh.
Life could always be better, but I am glad to be here. And I hope to be here for at least 30 years more. At least. Damn. Will Blogs be still here in 30 years? Far out.

I'll be spending the day (which is a special non-working holiday) at home, with the family, and with college friends. On Saturday I'll be with the Comic Quest gang for some good eats and chit-chat till the wee hours of the morning. I've already gifted myself with my PC upgrades, but if I have some money left over after all the wining and dining, I think a trip to Greenhills is in order. Heh.

Bloodletting

Got myself the latest issue of Blade of the Immortal (one of my few really regular titles) and a one-shot Noble Causes: Extended Family. The latter one intrigued me with the art... but since Dean and Nikki like it, the story must be good as well. Kept myself from getting the latest How to Draw a Manga Girl's Life and the latest PSM (Playstation Magazine); though I may get the mag eventually. Got a script for another comic project I will be illustrating; it's a Buffy-type story. Gotta start finding references for Goth girls...

Buy Only Original...

From some snippets I gathered elsewhere...

Someone who bought the original Animatrix DVD (Region 3, probably) commented that the special feature on anime with Japanese dialogue did NOT have subtitles. However, the bootleg dvd HAS subtitles.

Another friend bought the original Animatrix VCD, and was aghast to find part of it DEFECTIVE and unplayable.

The bootleg versions though, play perfectly.

Ironic, isn't it...

DOAXXX-posed!


See the DOA girls in a whole new way...

It's finally happened. Not a hoax, not a joke. A nude version of the sexy, best-selling Dead or Alive Xtreme Beach Volleyball exists and is starting to surface in some Asian countries. This game, known as DOAXXX, is a cracked version of DOAX which includes a fully operational nude patch, a money cheat which sets the prices of almost all the purchasable items in the game to about 1 Zack (Dollar) each, and the ability to view the various 'Gravure' movies (animations of the girls posing or lounging around the beach) in slow motion (of course, while nude).
This disc is, obviously, not supported or distributed at all by DOA's creators and publishers, Tecmo of Japan. In fact, the company has repeatedly sent out statements that they would pursue any such attempt to sell or distribute any such material that violates their product to the full extent of the law. Well, the nude cheat is here; anyone with a modded Xbox in Asia can probably get their hands on it if they know where to look. US and European gamers are on their own for now...

Heh. Ten years ago, we didn't care about nude codes (Pac Man and Mario aren't too hot in the buff), but these days... Wooh. You just gotta love these hackers and crackers. Heh.

Casting pebbles down a deep well...

... that's what it was like as I was installing programs last night on my new HD. I installed Diablo II: Lord of Destruction, Neverwinter Nights, Age of Mythology and Macromedia Freehand. After all that, I still had over 65 Gigabytes of space unused. More... MORE... (Agent Smith voice). Maybe I should install Baldur's Gate 2, Icewind Dale 2 and Starcraft while I'm at it. Heh-heh...
I'm going out for lunch in a while, and on the way I should look for a copy of Adobe Photoshop and additional RAM to boost up my present 128MB to 256 or more. Gotta have brains to go with the brawn, of course.

BELOW Expectations

Yesterday, after me and my friend Pot came home from Greenhills (where I bought my new Hard Drive and NO ANIME or GAMES), we plopped into the Sanctum to chill. As I was backing up all my data and files, he looked over my DVD library for stuff to watch. He eventually settled on Below, which was supposedly a very scary ghost movie set in a submarine during World War II. I hadn't watched the film yet, even though I had bought the DVD at least two months ago. Heh. That's why I like having guests in the Sanctum... they get me to watch and play stuff I usually don't have the initiative to. Weird, eh?
Anyway, in between watching my CD burner scorch away, we watched Below. Almost immediately Pot (who is something of a War movie buff) pointed out tons of inconsistencies in the production; like well-lit, wide corridors, push-button controls and a modern-looking console on what was supposed to be a World War II submarine. And a definite absence of any feeling of the crampness and claustrophobic atmosphere in such a setting. That pretty much killed the film for him, but we kept on watching it.
The film is also guilty of the horror/suspense film cop-out strategy of using shock tactics to jolt and scare- you know the type; establish a feeling of dread, then let it subside, then while your audience is inhaling again something HAPPENS or someone JUMPS OUT or APPEARS. This made us start a couple of times, but eventually it became so predictable we actually could tell when a "scare" was coming.

As for the story itself, when we finally found out what the hell was going on, it underwhelmed us. Below is strictly TV movie material. As for the cast, I can't remember any of them; except that the one female looked kinda like Saffron Burrows and had an english accent, which I find quite sexy. And Pot pointed out one of the guys was from Felicity. Whatever. From the reviews I had read, Below was supposed to be a cool, scary and atmospheric thriller and ghost story. Apart from some creepy moments at the start and some chilling but funny touches, this is a below par scary movie. Anyway, the saddest part is that after we turned off the DVD player, we saw that we had just missed seeing the MTV Spring Break Special. We gave up an hour or so of gorgeous bikini babes for a bad horror movie. Now THAT is scary. Sigh.

Around the World in 80 Gigabytes

I've succeeded in quashing the pop-up problem via a sweeping, long-term investment and solution. Over the weekend I decided to finally get a new Hard Drive for disk space, replacing my two or so-year old 10G HD with a brand-spanking new 80G Monster. NOW I can stretch! No more need to uninstall and reinstall programs since I've got space to burn and more. Last night my brother helped me put in the new HD, and early into this morning I was installing staple programs and data like crazy. I've been living with the cramped 10G's for all this time, the prospect of having so much room now floors me. Wanna install games like Diablo 2, Age of Empires, Age of Mythology and Neverwinter Nights just to have them there. Just because I CAN. Sad, right? Heh.
Anyway, it will probably take a day or two to make my new HD comfy, and this time I am taking precautions and extra security to prevent the resurgence of the POP-UP Menace. Then it's back to making art and comics and blogging like there's no tomorrow... The funny thing is, I was thinking of buying a mountain bike or something... some things just work out different from how we see them early on. But I'm not complaining. This is bliss.

POP-UP WAR ongoing...

Fricking pop-ups are as irritating and as persistent as those ants in my scanner months and months ago. I asked my more net-savvy friends Dean and Jason, and they told me that I probably downloaded some devilish thing that has exposed me to these NIGHTMARES from the net. Anyway, I have downloaded Ad-Aware to get rid of any spyware in my system. It has not totally taken out the problem, but I have eliminated quite a lot of scummy stuff in my registry, and it seems to have slowed the crisis to the point that I can now surf at least. DAMN pop-ups. DAMN you all to HELL!!!!