Things By Mike

So it’s safe to say I’ve neglected this blog lately. I’ve been awfully busy with other projects. I started a small business with a friend of mine and most recently I’ve been prepping my website, GrifballHub for the Penny Arcade Expo. A few of the folks that help with me with the site will be members of the media this year at PAX, on behalf of GrifballHub. We’ve planned a lot of fun things content-wise for the site while they are they (and after they return), so I’ve been pretty swamped working to make sure we can do everything we want to do.

One of the first things we’re doing to kick things off is running a quick Twitter contest. The prize is 1600 Microsoft Points. Entry to the contest is quite simple as explained here on GrifballHub. It’s not required that you be a fan of grifball, just a gamer who uses XBOX Live. One lucky winner will be chosen at random.

We’ll likely be running more contests throughout the weekend.

So over the past several months, I’ve swapped out all the crusty old tube TVs with shiny new high def televisions. It’s quite nice. The amount of space they require as compared to those old dinosaurs is quite minimal. I’m a happy camper. Well that has been until recently.

With the switch to HDTV, I of course had to make the switch to cable boxes which supported and output the high def signal over HDMI. All was well for quite a while until my cable provider decided to update the software those cable boxes use. From that point on it was nothing but irritation. From annoying error messages asking me constantly to push a button if I still wanted to continue to watch a channel (of course I do, I’m watching it aren’t I?), to error messages telling me my tv didn’t support HDMI (say what?!), it was really starting to drive me batty.

Turns out the cable box I had was known for being very buggy which explained the error messages and the thing about being prompted to hit a button to continue watching something? That’s just part of the software. Seriously? That’s insane.

So the decision was made to have a dish network installation. After a little research I discovered something fantastic – FREE HD receivers for up to 3 TVs. Perfect. I have three TVs. The price was also more than right compared to what my wonderful cable provider was charging.

So far so good. See ya cable and you’re annoying HD cable box. Hope we never meet again.

So the release of the very much anticipated beta for Halo Reach on the XBOX 360 is now less than a week away. Just recently members of the press were given an early test drive and video has been pouring out all over the web since. Here’s a look at the SWAT gametype in Reach.

If you’re not sure where it is, perhaps it’s time to start digging around for that Halo ODST disc you’ll need in order to access the Reach Beta. If you can’t find it, you can always head over to ARS Technica and attempt to be one of the lucky twenty to win a code giving you early “friends and family” access.