XBox One Reveal

Initial reactions

So yesterday Xbox One was revealed and I joined BritCast for a reaction podcast,
It was the first time I was on a podcast as well.

Here it is



So there you have it .-)

E3 2013

I will be blogging it

This year I am going to do my version of coverage of it.
Mostly for fun but also to share my feelings and thoughts on the matter.

I will watch what there are of conferences and other coverage and do my take on it..

What will excite me?
What will puzzle me?
What will annoy me?
What will piss me off?

What will make my geek gasms go off like wild fire?

E3 2013 will tell me :)

Hope you'll join me in the week of June 11th to 13th.

The Optimists EP

Today The Optimists released their first studio recorded EP.

Visit the link below to support them.
The Optimists

Follow The Optimists on Twitter for more news on future releases and gigs.

I personally really like their music and purchased it day one.

PlayStation 4

PS Meeting 2013, My Thoughts

So at midnight on Wednesday (or technically Thursday) Sony held their PS Meeting 2013 where they announced PlayStation 4. I watched on GT since I like that they gives us the Spike pre and post shows streamed too.

I was a bit unsure if it would be called PS4 mainly because the number 4 is considered unlucky in parts of Asia (including Japan) much like 13 here. But it was.

They basically apologized to the developers for the difficult Cell environment and stated they PS4 is gamer and developer focused. They called their architecture a supercharged PC environment, built around the X86 processing (same as PC gaming) and 8GB of unified memory (a massive jump from PS3's 512MB). Also large storage.
In terms of network and download they have a dedicated chip for downloading, allowing you to background downloads, downloads while powered down and downloads of games and allowing you to start playing before the entire game is downloaded.
Also you'll be allowed to now do live streams of your gaming via their partneship with Ustream. (also Facebook integration) Also Gaikai will as time goes give you stream and play over the internet (much like OnLive has) They showed their new controller with the share buttons, headset jack and a slight modified form factor plus a touchpad. No show of actual console but I did not expect that.
Also harder PS Vita integration with ability to cross play with the PS4 games and stop and start gaming kinda like you do on Netflix with shows and movies.

I remain very positive to what I've heard, but will not jump on the hype train until Microsoft has said what their next box will be like. And until E3 has been.
But maybe I now get some use out of my Ustream account ;-)

I want to know more but I am getting the nerd tingles.

Games.

They showed real gameplay of Killzone: Shadow Fall (Guerilla Games)
While still having that floaty future shooter thing going and not the greatest jump in graphical fidelity it had a much larger scope than previous games, feeling much more open and great draw distance. AND bunch of colours. Not just brown, gray and red.

They announced InFamous Second Son (Sucker Punch), Deep Down {working title] (Capcom) and Blizzard is bringing Diablo 3 to PS3 and PS4. The Halo guys at Bungie showed up to show that tells us nothing trailer for Destiny and announced exclusive content for PS4 (now that could something as lame as a gun or a skin only) And Ubisoft came and showed off some more of Watch Dogs. And Media Molecule came and had a little cute Move demo thing with sculpting and pupped show and you know, them being them,

Square Enix in my opinion was the fail of the night, not only showing us something we saw like a year ago and telling us to look forward to E3 to hear something from them.

Presentation generally good with some issues. Best guy was Mike Cerny, that guy I really like.
Sucker Punch got too dark. Why did Destiny need four guys for that?

And Sony.. Next time demand NEW stuff from Square Enix or leave them out.

Final PlayStation 4 judgement comes after E3.

UFC in London this weekend (On Fuel 7)

I am getting pumped for this weekend! So many good fights lined up. I'll be doing my fight picks after weigh-ins.

This post will be updated with picks, how I did and FOTN, KOTN and SOTN from my perspective.

.....

Weigh-ins done and all fighters made weight.

Here are my picks:

#MyFightPicks #UFCLondon #UFC #MMA Gomez, Lee, Watson, Ogle, Sass, Etim, Mills, Te Hune, Nelson, Diabate, Swanson and McDonald
— Anneli Sørensen (@SubLevel28) February 15, 2013

Back with results
.....

Results:

Facebook Prelims

Phil Harris defeats Ulysses Gomez by unanimous decision (0-1 in picks)

Vaughan Lee defeats Motonobu Tezuka by unanimous decision (1-1 in picks)

Tom Watson defeats Stanislav Nedkov via 2nd round TKO (2-1 in picks)

Andy Ogle defeats Josh Grispi by unanimous decision (3-1 in picks)

Danny Castillo defeats Paul Sass by unanimous decision 3-2 in picks)

Renee Forte defeats Terry etim by unanimous decision (3-3 in picks)

Main Card

Matthew Riddle defeats Che Mills by Split decision (3-4 in picks)

James Te Huna defeats Ryan Jimmo by unanimous decision (4-4 in picks) (my FOTN)

Gunnar Nelson defeats Jorge Santiago by unanimous decision (5-4 in picks)

Jimi Manuwa defeats Cyrille Diabate by TKO via doctor stoppage between 1st and 2nd round (5-5 in picks)

Cub Swanson defeats Dustin Poirier by unanimous decision (6-5 in picks)

Renee Barao defeats Michael McDonald in the 4th via arm triangle sub. Defends interim bantamweight championship belt (6-6 in picks) (my SOTN and only Sub of the night)

That's it for a very fun night of fights and a rare sensible time to end for a European watching.

Next week UFC 157 with Women's first fight and title fight Ronda Rousey vs Liz Charmoche.
And co-main Lyoto Machida vs Dan Henderson.

Be back then :-)

My Fight Picks for UFC on FOX Seattle + Results

My tweet with them.

#MYFIGHTPICKS #UFConFOX Jorgenson, Phan, Trujillo, Cruickshank, Proctor, Easton, Edwards, Swick, Penn, Gustavson, Diaz. FTW
— Anneli Sørensen (@SubLevel28) December 7, 2012

Will come back to tell how I did.

Weigh-ins done. All fighters made weight except Herny Martinez who came in at 158,8 and forfeit 20% of his purse.

First off this event was great and full of action and some crazy stuff, You should have watched it ;-)

Results:

Scott Jorgenson vs John Albert
Jorgenson wins by Submission at very end of 1st round

Dennis Siver vs Nam Phan
Siver wins by unanimous decision

Marcus LeVasseur vs Abel Trujillo
Trujillo by TKO 2nd round

Daron Cruickshank vs Henry Martinez
Cruickshank by KO 2nd round

Ramsey Nijem vs Joe Proctor
Nijem by unanimous decision

Rafael Assuncao vs Mike Easton
Assuncao bu unanimous decision

Yves Edwards vs Jeremy Stephens
Edwards by KO 1st round

Mike Swick vs Matt Brown
Brown by KO 2nd round

BJ Penn va Rory MacDonald
MacDonald by Unanimous decision

Mauricio Rua vs Alexander Gustafsson
Gustafsson by unanimous decision

Benson henderson vs Nate Diaz
Henderson by unanimous decision

Kumite

MMA Commentary For Fans By Fans

You like fights? You like striking? You like grappling?
Then check out MMA; Mixed Martial Arts.

Do you want a more cerebral approach to coverage?
Do you want to get a more reflective approach?

Then I give you Kumite.
Two MMA fans that cover MMA from outside the media and the promotions.
Ross and Chris out of Scotland.

I personally find the writing very interesting to read and while I do I reflect over what I'm reading.

Also follow @TeamKumite on Twitter for event news and posts.

The Optimists

Discovery And Interview

This duo is unsigned but I think they have the talent to make a good album.

I discovered them via this tweet by Derren Brown:

Sorry, bit out of action. Some pals of mine 'The Optimists' wld love you to listen to their song, in open mic finals.bit.ly/Tarqjn

— Derren Brown (@DerrenBrown) September 2, 2012

I followed the link and discovered two lovely lads playing guitars and singing fine songs.
Benjamin Bellamy(21) and Nathan Blood (20)

My personal favorite is RainBows & Butterflies



Followed by Are You Coming Home?



Bringing some attention to them as they are talented and they have good voices and I feel lads like this needs to have more eyeballs and ears on what they do. I hope one day to go pick up a copy of their music somewhere.

They made the videos using an iPhone just to get it out there.

For more of their work visit their YouTube channel.

Interview

Me: Hello Benjamin and Nathan and thanks for the chance at putting an interview on my blog.
As you know I found out about you through Derren Brown's Twitter when he linked your videos. But could you provide a brief history on how you got started with music and as a duo

TO: We met at college in 2009 in Lincoln. We've both always been musically active; Nathan more with his vocals and Ben with guitar. During college we always messed about with songs and Ben started teaching Nathan basic guitar, from which he started to progress. Nathan came to Ben from living in a different town with lyrics he had written at work (a job which he hated), which were the lyrics for our song 'bright lights'. Ben loved the lyrics and concept of song and helped finish writing; which then became our first song together. From there we both started writing music on guitar and writing lyrics which meant something to us. We gradually started doing gigs and busking around town. We then decided together to give this a real go. Calling ourselves The Optimists.

Me: What is your main dream and/or goal with The Optimists?

TO: Our main goal would be to be successful; for people to be aware of our music and appreciate the lyrics we write. We don't care so much for fame/money, just to be heard. We don't want to be famous, we just want the world to hear our music, says Nathan.

Me: Who or what inspire you?

TO: True lyrics, true meaning inspires us. Music these days in just noise with shite lyrics about getting drunk and partying. Obviously, we love to do that, but we don't like to write songs about it. Music should have more meaning. We are deeply inspired by Mumford and Sons, they have a real depth to their music and lyrics. A big inspiration is the lack of faith and support we get and we just want to prove people wrong. Nathan's mum is very encouraging and we certainly wish to do her proud.

Me: Who does which bit in the song writing process?

TO: The process of writing a song is quite easy to us. We both make bits and when we get together we put our individual bits together to piece a song. Very relaxed about the writing.

Me: What is the most challenging part of being musicians?

TO: The biggest challenge for us is publicity; being heard. We try our best to promote ourselves but very few people are interested. It's really hard for us as we have a passion for this.

Me: Outside of the music what are your main interests and hobbies?

TO: Besides writing music and playing it we enjoy going out, having a few pints. Playing pool and football. Gaming and drinking a hell of a lot of coffee. Both have full time jobs which is a hard balance. We lead fantastic lives. We smoke a lot too.

Me: I want to thank you both for the time and wish for your dreams and ambitions to come true.

TO: Thank you for your questions and your support. We really appreciate. We will be sure to send you signed copies of our platinum album ;)

Follow @TheOptimists on Twitter and for the two lads' follow @nattasswfc for Nathan and @iWRNR3rd for Benjamin

Movember

This month men around the world are growing their mustaches to raise awareness and money to combat testicular and prostate cancer.

I can't grow one as I'm a woman but that don't stop us females helping the guys out.

I wish then you support my friend Marcus Beer in his effort for Movember,

Visit this link to donate on his behalf ->->  Marcus's Movember page
For more info on his effort go here ->-> Annoyed Gamer.com

I donated. Will you?

Hawken Closed Beta

Hawken is going into Closed Beta on 26th of October.

Come enlist in the fun.
Follow the link below.
Hawken site

I was in Alpha 2 so I'll see you on the battle ground :)

Their spot on GTTV: