Epic Default Productions

HOLY CRAP!

Why was I not informed of this sooner? This wondrous piece of technology. This little black box sent down by the gods themselves.

Actually I know why, because with my new DS Lite Black version…I have gotten little to no work done at work. DAMN YOU PHOENIX WRIGHT! WHY MUST YOU BE SO INTERESTING! AND MIA…WHY MUST YOU BE SO HOT…EVEN WHEN POSSESSING SMALL CHILDREN’S BODIES.

Wait…what?

Note: Yes I have known about the DS, I just finally got one one.

2nd Note: Is it wrong that actually do find Mia extremely hot…even in her sister’s body?

This post’s video…a messed up Halo level

Underdog isn’t here! Sorry, I just had to make that joke. The introduction is always the hardest part for me to get down on paper screen, and most of the time I go with something corny - like the example above. But once that is over, then I get down to business.

Greetings! As you can see, I’m not one of the Epic Default regulars that you guys and gals have been reading so far.  But I hope to change that. My plan is to come here once a week and write something and have my posts finish in 500 words or less.

And so far I’ve already blown through 1/5 of that amount, so I best get on with what I was going to talk about… myself. I thought it would be kind of odd if a random crazy person dude just appeared on the site without any warning and started shooting his mouth off.

So hello everybody, my name is Andy. But as you will tell from my gamertag on the bottom of this post, my username is Qs23 and most people just call me Qs. I can’t be blamed for the lack of pronounceability of it though. I created it for use on my older siblings’ BBS board that they ran in the basement when I was around 6 years old.

And that hopefully should give a clue to how long I’ve been around technology. I learned my ABCs on an IBM 286, was writing school reports using Word 5.1, and surfing the net at 2400 baud.

And video gaming was there the whole time as well. My platform ownership history is as follows: Atari 2600, NES, SMS, SNES, Dreamcast, PS2, Xbox 360 and Wii. And all but the Wii and SMS are still in my possession.

And let us not forget the PC. I’ve been gaming on it since text based adventures straight through Myst on the CD-Rom and now up to World of Warcraft, which thankfully was able to break the addiction to over a year ago and even the expansions have not gotten me back.

But that’s enough about the past, what about the future? Well, I just graduated from Eastern Michigan University with a BS major in Electronic Media & Film studies and minor in Graphic Communication. What does that mean? I can produce anything for TV, Radio, Magazines, Newspapers, Movies, Internet, etc.

A lot of good that is doing for me at the moment though, because Michigan right now has the second highest unemployment rate in the country at the last check and I’m part of the 8.7% who don’t have a job. BTW, Rhode Island is first with 8.8%.

So what does that mean for you? Well that means that I’ve got time on my hands. Enough throw my hat into this ring on top of doing my own podcast. (I just had to plug it once) So as we near the end, I guess I will see you next time.

Qs23 appears courtesy of rapodcast.net. You might remember him from the PAX Review episode of our podcast a couple of months back. If you’d like to join the staff as well (we’re still looking for a web guru) please email us at fanboys.podcast@gmail.com

And now…a freaky game variant from Halo 3. Shark Attack!

So, as you can tell if you have been following us for a while, we barely know what we are doing here. Read: Barely Update the site.

So here’s the deal, I’m throwing open the door to EDP. You don’t have to worry about breaking your foot. There’s a lot of things going on in the core of the staff’s lives, either currently, or possibly upcoming, that will even further hinder updating regularly. So if you ever wanted to have your voice heard, let your design skills flow, or just generally have fun making fun of geeky things, now is your opportunity.

Now realize this. Currently, we do not make money off of what we do. This is a labor of love. We are looking at Avenues in order to get some income coming, but more than likely, all that is going to do is pay the basic costs of keeping the site running. If we happen to become profitable, well then pay will be discussed. Just don’t come into this expecting money, more than likely…you will be disappointed.

Here is what our plan for the site is. We want to do blog posts that are news related, but isn’t necessarily news. It’s more editorial than anything. If we happen to stumble upon a tip, or a connection, or someone giving us an exclusive, we definitely will report on it, but mainly we’ll just be giving our take on what is going on in the news. We’d like to get it to at least a post per day, but maybe even up to Kotaku, Joystiq, Destructoid, Sarcastic Gamer standards (Read: multiple posts per day.) The podcasts are trying to get to a point where we can get an episode out at least every other week (currently, that is not happening…sorry). Video skits and content is trying to get out at least once a month. We want to have a store where we can sell shirts, stickers, buttons, mouse pads, mugs, bobble heads, vibrators, you know, typical merchandise. We also want to get a forum community up, and a site that is both good looking, but not confusing.

The thing is…the 5 people on staff currently are all learning as we go, which is cause for most of the delay. The writing is the only thing that updates regularly because hey, we are some literate motherfuckers, but we’re flying by the seat of our pants on everything else. So we need help.

He’s what we need:

Article Writers — People to write editorials about geeky culture

Video Content Writers–funny people who can come up with jokes or funny stories that can be filmed

Podcast Panelists–Opinionated people who would like their voice to be heard…literally

Article Editors–People who have a keen eye for typos, grammatical, and train of thought errors

Video Editors–People who like to sit in front of a computer for hours on end watching hacks try to be funny

Podcast Editors–People who like to sit in front of a computer for hours on end listening to hacks try to be funny, and have a good pod safe music collection. Or at least can find good pod safe music

Web Gurus–People who would like to design and upkeep our site. It’s currently Wordpress which works fine, except for a few code things that we can’t decipher, but you are welcome to design a site from the ground up if you would like.

Designers–People who can be funny with photoshop, design logos and merchandise for us.

Video Actors–People who think they can be funny on camera. Note: If you are not located in or around Houston, you must have your own camera as well.

The cool thing is that you don’t have to take on one job. Lets say you’d like to be apart of the videos, be a podcast panelist, edit said podcast, and write for the site. You can do that. Say you’d like to design the site, create post photos, write scripts, and be a part of the podcast. You can do that as well.

The one thing we pride ourselves upon at EDP is that it is a community effort. Everyone’s voice is heard, everyone’s ideas are welcome.

If you are interested or would like more information, please leave a comment here with an email address or send us one at fanboys.podcast@gmail.com.

We look forward to hearing from you.

And since this is a post…here’s a video! More Mario Kart! with an impromptu Bad Horsing

Why do I subject myself to you?

Why do I continue to watch a documentary on the world’s stupidest people? I basically watch each episode through my fingers because my palm is attached to my face for the duration.

This shows how much time I have to be checking my own website. Anywhoot, this posts video is some Mario Kart Wii for your enjoyment!

I had notes for a little rant (still do, technically) but Fallout 3 has completely taken over my life from the release date onward. I even got the Survival Edition, with Vault-Tec lunchbox, PipBoy 3000 wearable clock, and Vault Boy bobblehead. That’s why instead of an article, you get pictures of my new obsession, and I get to dive back into the Capitol Wasteland that much sooner…

Admin Note and Mini Rant:

….i hate you so much right now. For having Fallout 3, not for posting a cop out rant. I have no room to talk since OTRSPOD Ep. 2 and working the Renaissance Festival is delaying getting Episode 6 up.

The upcoming month and a half or so is going to be hell. And by hell, I mean glorious geeky, gaming, high def goodness. Games on Jonny’s list to play: Dead Space, Mirror’s Edge, Fallout 3, Left 4 Dead, Red Alert 3, Far Cry 2, and Fable 2. And they all are either out…or coming out in the next couple of weeks. Yeah, I’m not seeing sun for a while. I need another 24 hour marathon.

Speaking of segues…this post’s video is more Wii Bowling!

The prospect is seemingly simple; sit on your ass and play some games, unless of course you are talking Wii games or Sing Star which involve the frantic waving of arms and bobbing around while yelling somewhere near the note in question. That would be getting ahead of ourselves though. Where the challenge truly lies is the task of doing so for 24 hours. Now I know some that might consider this inviting. Others… well lazy at best. I originally considered it something that would have a potential of fun exponentially bordering partying with Hunter S Thompson and Johnny Depp for a weekend. Lots of fun at the time with some great stories but damn am I going to feel like shit for the next couple days afterwards on the come down. At a base level though, the thought of indulging one’s self in a multitude of gaming: computer, video, board, etc. It would send shivers down the spine of any true gamer.  What I’m left with… well, it was an experience to say the least.

Well I guess the best way to describe this whole shindig is to start from the beginning. After a hearty breakfast of Chick-fil-a and the setup of three televisions and five gaming systems, we were set. Some might consider this borderline technologic insanity while I would place it more along the lines of holding ourselves back a bit. We of course started with the standard Wii Sports. Bowling to be specific.  Nothing like an hour or so of yelling at digital pins to fall the fuck down to start a gaming fest. It’s setting the mood really. Then it went on to jumping back and forth between Mega Man 9 and the original Super Mario Bros. One might consider it blasphemy to be playing Mega Man 9 on the Xbox and Mario Bros on a macbook but I say that if the game presents itself, I’ll still play it. At the very least it presents me with something to make sarcastic comments about rather then going “Hulk Smash!” on the nearest squishy item in view while having long cursing combos spewing from my mouth because of constant fatalities on the aforementioned games. I decided to also fit in some DOTA to the mix just to add some flavor. Rampaging around as an undead and creating hoard after hoard of zombies is always a great way to relax the mind, body, and spirit to a point of inner peace and tranquility.

Of course then I’m still left with 20 hours of gaming so I decided to eventually say fuck you to inner peace in order to join my fellow gaming comrades in huddling around the warm glow of the 52” tv to get our Halo on. At this point I deem it necessary to point out the brilliance of two things: ustream and Xbox online. Jon had a brilliant idea to setup a ustream account to, well, stream online this gaming orgy. Having viewers adding conversations and commentary brought a whole other level of fun and a great way of adding further trash talking to an already messy vortex of testosterone and caffeine. Also, while I’m usually adamant in my hatred for Xbox online, I was infused with a reminder of a means in which it can be used for good. Utilizing Xbox online to play with fellow PAX IRCers was a brilliant concept in it’s ability to utilize a maximum of gamer population potential without diluting it with idiot fucks whose verbosity only stretches the bounds of creativity in cursing and who’s emotional maturity is somewhere near that of a 7 year old child. Playing online with a number of friends brought us multiple other Halo spin off games to try out and an end result of hours of gaming fun.

After this though, some relaxation was needed and a yearning to play a classic game had been tugging at my heart all day. Particularly with the presence of a NES and SNES, the urge to drop in a cartridge, possibly after blowing into it profusely for an undisclosed amount of time, and fire up the roots of my childhood could not be ignored. I eventually settled on something I knew I could pleasure myself for hours on: Super Mario World for the SNES. Indulging myself in the run around world with feather after fireball after Yoshi egg after haunting ghost nearly brought tears to my eyes. It was a wonderful experience to say the least. It’s at times like those that I truly do realize my roots and how far gaming truly has come… or fallen, depending on the person you talk to.

As evening settled in and a yearning for grub commenced, we eventually progressed to wholesome and maturing games like Grand Theft Auto. Okay, so not maturing exactly but amusing none-the-less. I also was able to fit in a rousing and hate-filled game of Scrabble. Honestly, I don’t think I’ve ever played a game of Scrabble with so much disdain being poured into every word. Stealing away triple word bonuses from people usually tend to lead to anger and frustration though. Afterwards I got my karaoke on through some Sing Star. Nothing like singing Time After Time to totally annoy the crap out of other people in the same household and across the web.

Eventually there were four of us reaching the tired time of 5 in the morning and with none of us capable of making a simple decision as to what game to play, we decided to leave it up to our insomnia-driven viewers to choose a game for us. After a multitude of terrible suggestions, we settled on Boom Blox and Castle Crashers to finish things out. On a side note, Boom Blox totally fucks physics up the ass and leaves it to cry in an alleyway bleeding and shivering with a vain hope to find peace at some point in the future. But we made it through tons of screaming and laughing. Fun times indeed. I also got to try out Castle Crashers, which is a cornucopia of humor and classic style gaming at it’s finest.

We slumped across the finish line in horrible gaming glory. We were packed with caffeine and in dire need of sleep but we were happy and felt like we accomplished something pretty darn good. Maybe it was because of being a part of the $100K+ contribution towards the Texas Children’s Hospital. Maybe it was because of actually completing 24 hours of gaming in it’s many forms. Maybe it was because we were horribly delusional and that was the only emotion we were capable of. But we were content with what we had done.

Hells yeah bitches!

The video this time…is a rare occaision where Jonny beats Anthony at Wii Bowling

What a whirlwind! I just got done taking a brief nap (I’m trying not to screw up my sleep schedule), and I thought I’d throw up a quick list of games I played:

• King’s Bounty: The Legend (PC)
  
• S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Clear Sky (PC)
  
• Exalted (PnP)
  
• Final Fantasy Tactics A2: Grimoire of the Rift (DS)
• Halo 3 (360)
• Hinterland (PC)
• Grand Theft Auto IV (360)

I played GTA4 with the Epic Default crew for countless hours (felt like at least 6) and I only wish I’d recorded it so I could cut out the highlights for you. Example: My friend Randomguy’s favorite tactic was to run past you, dropping grenades. I can’t count the number of times I gunned him down only to get blown up outta nowhere. Seriously, he plays GTA4 like most people play Bomberman. I’m sure Jonny will put up a summary later. Right, Jonny? *nudge*

Admin note: I don’t usually do these, but I’ve been nudged, so I must retaliate. I will not post up a summary, simply because Anthony wanted to do so for his article. It should be up tomorrow. I will however throw up all the recordings I made off of the live stream, so in case you missed it, you’ll be able to see.

I’ll put one up per post, starting with our little intro into the madness

Live video chat by Ustream

Here you are folks, watch us as we game for 24 hours whenever you want, starting very soon (we are heading out now to get supplies). You can also chat with us as we game! Please do so and keep us awake!

Game List for Possible Request

XBOX 360

Halo 3
Call of Duty 4
Gears of War x2 (networking ftw)
Bully: Scholarship Edition
Dead Rising
Mass Effect
Grand THeft Auto 4
Orange Box
BioShock
Ranbow Six Vegas 2
Mercs 2
Crackdown
Farcry
Megaman 9
Geometry Wars
Rainslick Precipice of Darkness
Castle Crashers
Ikaruga
TMNT Arcade
Duke Nukem 3d
Streets of Rage 2
Braid

PS2
Singstar 90’s, 80’s, and Rocks

PC
Warcraft 3
Warcraft 3 Frozen Throne

Wii
Tony Hawks Downhill Jam
Farcry
Red Steel
Mario Strikers
Mario Party 8
Super Smash Bros
Mario Kart
House of the Dead 2&3
Bomberman 95
MArio Kart 64
Super Mario Galaxy
Super Paper Mario
Boom Blox
Super Monkey Ball Banana Blitz
Wii Sports
Wii Play
Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess

Game Cube
Megaman Collection
Megaman X Colection
Double Dash

SNES
Final Fantasy II
Final Fantasy III
Wario’s Woods
Star Fox
Super Metroid
Super Mario All Stars
Super Mario World
Yoshi’s Island
Tetris 2
Street Fighter 2
Secret of Mana
Super Mario RPG
Super Mario Kart
F-Zero

NES
Castlevania 2: Simons quest
Double Dragon
Dr Mario
Gauntlet
Metroid
Final Fantasy
RBI Baseball
Super Mario Bros 3
Contra
World Cup Soccer
Blaster Master
Super Sprint
Super Mario 2
Arch Rivals
Battletoads
River City Ransom

Please sign into Ustream chat and make your request

Listen here

Subscribe here

After a month off (to you that is, I spent most of it trying to edit this as best I could), The Epic Default Podcast makes it’s triumphant return to the airwaves with a new member to the team as well as a couple of friends we met at PAX. And, just like the IRC chat this episode is named after, it spirals down to porn…on multiple occasions. We split this up into two episodes because we just can’t seem to stay on track with what we are talking about, and dammit, we like it that way. Cuzza’s track sounds weird because it was taken off of the Skype recording which was very laggy at the time of recording. Music Theme: the music of 8bitcollective.com

0:00 Untitled by .belville

2:03 Emancipation by Trash Can Man

2:32 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KYXjXjYZDiY

4:54 Airbase.NSF by Anamanaguchi

5:58 http://www.noobtube.com

6:32 HotSake is the courier in the Bad Horse Videos

7:30 Plug in Trance by Xinon

9:09 Valve is notorious for saying, “When it’s ready,” whenever it is asked about a game of theirs releasing…for you non-gamers out there

10:58 Bad Surge by Bit Shifter

11:25 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T6iZBi3Qneg

12:00 Power is back on…editing has yet to commence again. Anthony’s tower is out of commission.

13:22 http://extralife.sarcasticgamer.com

14:29 They didn’t join…I wasn’t sure who I was confusing them with at the time. And don’t worry about joining, I thought I would get this out earlier…didn’t quite work did it?

15:15 Come play with us! Keep us awake. We may even have a uStream going..please stay tuned.

15:30 amsterdam_01 by gameboyzz orchestra project (I’m guessing it’s autofire…this was the file name off of 8bitcollective)

15:42 http://www.childsplaycharity.org/ Support them as well!

16:14 1200+ now…still no clue on total amount of money

16:36 If I get to 2k I get a free sumo!

18:56 In hindsight, we really didn’t need to fill time…did we

19:18 Limb0 by Agent 2a05

20:31 Member of the PAX IRC, as well as Sokar from earlier (pirate porn guy)

21:27 Epic Default Productions does not take responsibility for people actually using this tactic.

22:10 And Beyond by She

24:15 “On My Lonley Way” by Tsu Ryu

25:29 The Robot Rock by Stochastic

28:19 Gaslon by Yoshida Cienda

30:04 http://img154.imageshack.us/img154/5664/japan641it.jpg

30:09 Meto by Alexor

31:26 http://www.frappr.com/

31:49 Homoemo by Rabato

34:34 http://www.watchtheguild.com

35:11 http://hackaday.com/2008/06/13/wii-fit-world-of-warcraft/

35:35 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jd3-eiid-Uw

37:20 Cellardoor by Dan Chaoot

38:55 Seriously…he could

39:36 Igor Mange Des Patates by Sidabitball

40:31 http://feeds.ign.com/ignfeeds/podcasts/xbox360/

42:10 Disko Boy by USK

43:38 I was pretty tipsy by this point…Demi was even further gone

46:22 Nes Mes by GOTO80

48:08 http://www.gamesradar.com/f/why-youre-actually-playing-as-the-bad-guys-in-gears-of-war/a-20080904103347781089

49:34 Birth by Trash Can Man

50:20 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Large_Hadron_Collider

50:36 http://i215.photobucket.com/albums/cc7/_D3MO_/1220699909412.jpg

51:00 http://hdgames.files.wordpress.com/2008/04/housefreehy4.jpg

53:07 Ready Steady Go by She

Anthony will be here on Monday with a review of Extra Life

If you haven’t donated yet, WHAT IS WRONG WITH YOU?!

Just kidding, but in all seriousness, this is an awesome cause, so you should donate if you can.  Even if it’s only $1 it will still help.  So please please please, help out the cause and empty your wallets to our team (especially Anthony and DJ…damn cheapskates :p)

For more info, please go to Extra Life’s home page

Donate to EDP

Donate to ClickPicTony (Anthony)

Donate to neenerheaddj (DJ)

Donate to Ekastoh (HotSake)

Donate to Jonny Nero (Jonathan)