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Thursday, August 2, 2012
You Don't Need That Fancy Shit
August 2nd, 2012Top StoryYou Don't Need That Fancy ShitBy Hamilton Nolan
There is not one single product manufactured by Lululemon that you need to buy under any conceivable circumstances. You don't need to pay a personal trainer. That's right! You don't! Assuming you possess functional literacy, an even temperament, and a childlike level of credulousness, you can learn everything you need to know about working out on this or countless other less reputable sites. Or books, even. Cheapo used books, even. You only have to pay for them once. Later you can do tiny box jumps onto them. People often ask me* (*lie), "Hey, I'm thinking of going on down to the gym to get in a little 'cardio.' Should I purchase some Cleto Reyes Tae Bo gloves and some Asics Gel-Intensity™ trainers and some Puma warm up suits and a Nike™ performance training duffel bag to hold my Reebok ZigTech™ jacket and my Swiftwick performance compression argyle running socks?" And I'm like, "Well..." and then they hastily interrupt to add "and my Bolle training sunglasses and my TYR competitor Tri shorts and my Giro mountain bike shoes that you would think cost more than an actual bike until you learn that my bike cost $6,000?" No. You should not purchase that. You do not need to pay for an Equinox membership. Or even a Crossfit membership. Some of the baddest athletes in the metropolis work out on monkey bars in school playgrounds. You do not need to join a ridiculous "private training" gym catering to billionaires and their egos. Many of the world's best fighters work out in a small hot LA strip mall gym over a mediocre Thai restaurant. You do not need a tanned and smiling crew of motivational "boot camp" trainers to help you "accelerate your fat loss and body-toning goals." Go run up a hill. You do not need a "fitness app" to "share your progress" with your "virtual community." I'll tell you where to share your progress: in your head. While you're doing neck bridges, on a dirty towel that you found on the curb on trash day. Johnny Knuckles punches steel lightpoles in city parks until his swollen fists are impervious to pain. Soul Cycle can suck it. In order to "work out" to a hardcore degree you will need the following things: some old shorts, old shoes (optional), old t-shirt (optional), caffeine, and a will to achieve that burns like a fire unto your very soul. The total cost of these items is about five bucks, give or take. It's nice to join a gym, if you can afford it, because they have barbells and cages and hundreds of pounds of iron plates, which you probably do not have in your apartment. But if you can't afford it, you can carry some god damn rocks and sandbags and gallon jugs of water. You say that I need to pay a hefty fee in order to come into your "fancy" gym? I say that I'm right on the public sidewalk outside, doing pushups until I develop tetanus in my palms, absolutely free, until the police are called. Now who's fancy? You are. But I have fewer expenses. You do not need a motherfucking nine dollar bottle of juice. People in Thailand kick banana trees. You should be ashamed of yourself. The niceness of someone's gym outfit is directly inversely proportional to their hardcoreness. Do not get caught out there like a sucker in your too-white new shoes and too-bright spandex and too-sweet performance energy glucose glucosamine patented workout mixturade. Take your cues from the tiger: Solitary. Dirty. Naked. And fucking up anybody who comes by acting all ostentatious, especially monkeys—which are a lot stronger than they look, so you do the math. The archive for I of the Tiger, one of the internet's 50 Most Popular Fitness Columns (Cat Video Website division), is viewable here. [Image by Jim Cooke]  |
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The New Side Stuff In Pokémon Black and White 2 Might Be What Hooks Me This Time
August 2nd, 2012Top StoryThe New Side Stuff In Pokémon Black and White 2 Might Be What Hooks Me This TimeBy Patricia Hernandez
So, the setting was new: Unova, a locale based on the urban metropolis of New York. Naturally, the enemy was also new: Team Plasma, a surprisingly nuanced villain who sought to liberate Pokémon from humans. And most importantly, all 150 of the Pokémon featured in the game were fresh. The knowledge we had accumulated over the years could only take us so far in the new installment—it was as if Nintendo was responding to the constant criticism that the Pokémon games were too samey. So here was a game that shook things up a little, without changing the core formula that made the Pokémon games so wildly popular. Now, less than two years later, Nintendo is following it up with the DS games Pokémon Black Version 2 and White Version 2—the first title in the main Pokemon franchise to be a direct sequel. Why a sequel instead of a third color? Who knows. What's more clear is that Nintendo is less keen on reinventing the wheel and more interested in refining, if not adding to what worked in Black and White. Last week I sat down with some folk from Nintendo in San Francisco, who showed me where Pokémon is headed next. Turns out, we're still in Unova, only some things have changed. There's new locations and new gyms, since Black and White 2 takes place some time after the first game. Enough time for Unova to become populated with older Pokémon, like Evee Eevee. Old characters find themselves in new situations, all of which will be revealed to the player through vignettes. N, the old leader of Team Plasma for instance, has let go of their old Pokémon—and the player can capture them. Awesome. The game takes save data from Black and White to determine which of these vignettes to show, granting the game a sense of development. Oh, and Team Plasma is now pirate-themed instead of templar-esque. Yeah. One of the new locations is Pokéstar Studios, which takes inspiration from Burbank, California: otherwise known as the media capital of the world. Fame awaits in Pokéstar Studios, where players can create their own Pokémon movies—with green screens and everything. It seems like the logical progression of earlier Pokémon offerings, where players could enter Pokémon into beauty pageants. That sort of thing is too small town for a place like Unova though, right? Upgrading to movie stardom makes complete sense. Players are given scripts which they can follow (or not!), through something that resembles a choose your own adventure book. In one particular scene, my character was asked to respond to a villain's monologue about world-takeover. Feeling silly, I told my character to say "I'm scared!" The judgmental audience wasn't very amused—I was supposed to be a hero! Different movie genres can be unlocked as the player advances, and the movies can be watched after they're recorded, too. I was also told that an old gym leader gave up his profession to become a director—so players will be welcomed to a familiar face. Everything else I was shown seemed similar to Pokéstar Studios in that they are neat little distractions from the main game. There's Pokémon World Tournament, which seems similar to earlier games' Battle Zone. It's a special location where we can battle other trainers to earn "Battle Points" (or BP). These BP can be redeemed for special items if not Pokemon. What's new about the World Tournament is that it includes all previous leaders from older games—like Brock and Misty. Also noteworthy is the fact that real-life Pokémon champions will be uploaded to the game for players to battle against. Sounds hardcore, and great for those that want to see what their own Pokémon are really made of. And like all Pokémon games, there has to be a crazy shopping center—enter Join Avenue. Join Avenue is a social market where players can connect with friends and strangers alike over Wi-Fi. These folk will occupy the storefronts, which is neat. The stores themselves can level up, granting the player discounts. Gamified shopping and the pursuit of stardom? This is a modern Pokémon, alright. One of the new features I most look forward to is, surprisingly, the Pokédex. Normally Pokémon is the type of game where I refer to a FAQ often—what Pokémon can I find on this route and when? Which Pokémon am I missing? Now the Pokédex indexes the different Pokémon habitats, allowing you to see all the Pokémon living in any given route. You'll know exactly when you're done capturing all the Pokémon in an area without leaving the game. That's useful. And the most bizarre thing I was shown had to be a 3DS-only AR game called Dream Radar that is acquired through the eShop. Get this: you use the camera to capture Pokémon 'floating around' in the air. Uh, well, I guess this is one way of making my childhood dream of having Pokémon bleed out into the real world become true... Initially, most of these seemed like pointless additions to the game. Thinking about it more though, I realized that most of my time in Pokémon games was spent with 'frivolous' inclusions, like gardening. I wouldn't be surprised if I was sucked into making my Pikachu into the star he was destined to be, or in making sure my best friends commanded their own stores. It'll be a welcome breather from the main quest, at least. Though not branded under a color, Black and White 2 seems to promise what the third title in each Pokémon release offers: refinement and expansion. That might make Black and White 2 the title worth owning out of all three. We'll be able to properly access that on October 7th, 2012—when the game drops in North America on the DS. Import Preview: Pokémon Black and White 2 Is Neither Black, Nor White. It's Gray.There have been a lot of games in the Pokémon series but none has been a direct sequel to any other. Rather, they have each focused on a different region in the world with a unique adventure largely unrelated to any other one. More »  |
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![<em>Dragon Quest X</em>: The <em>Kotaku East</em> Live Stream [Completed]](https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/blogger_img_proxy/AEn0k_vmbs665Q2Aj8tpBvnqOjB9vMEVTgD1Aq0JW-AJrGUXO7mKS264H5TdU_xK9f4CW-ryTG2P-96KKnFthOsRu6cYrrU-bfzt-GRtMp4w5K63T4buFok7q6excy8TtNI=s0-d "<em>Dragon Quest X</em>: The <em>Kotaku East</em> Live Stream [Completed]")
How Two Guys Spent $1 Million On Cars In Manhattan
August 2nd, 2012Top StoryHow Two Guys Spent $1 Million On Cars In ManhattanBy Mike Spinelli
What is Jalopnik on DRIVE? It's a weekly show on YouTube that brings to video the awesome and sometimes bizarre characters from the pages of Jalopnik. It's also the home to a new, once-monthly Jalopnik live stream that'll let you meet Jalopnik editors (as well as those characters from the Jalopnik on DRIVE videos you'll be watching each week) and give them advice on personal grooming. There will be cars too, right? Yes, there will be cars, since cars — in some fashion — are the reason those characters ended up on Jalopnik in the first place. When is it on? Subscribe to DRIVE, our YouTube video partner, and you'll be updated on show schedules and air dates, or just watch for the post right here. For now, Jalopnik on DRIVE will "air" Thursdays at 3:00 pm Eastern. Are you sure this is a good idea? Yes. Thank you. Don't mention it. I won't. We don't need to talk about this any more. Wait, what's the premiere episode about? Oh, right. So, back in 2004 when Jalopnik was just a weird car blog with the picture of a bald guy with sunglasses with a lollypop in his mouth or whatever, we did a feature called something like "If You Had $1 million, What Cars Would You Buy?" No one remembers exactly what it was called because we were drunk and most of the commenters were high, but the great responses from commenters solidified our particularly skewed automotive worldview. I just wish we could remember what those responses were. (Yes, there were French cars on the list and at least one generation of El Camino.) Soon after that post ran, Michael Prichinello, co-owner of Classic Car Club Manhattan e-mailed to say he and co-owner Zac Moseley were doing that very thing, for reals. That is, they were shopping for a fleet of cool cars with which to populate the club's garage. Club members would be putting serious mileage on the cars, with the popular ones being booked solid for months on end, and so they would not only have to be cool, they'd have to run well. Thus began a long relationship between Jalopnik and CCC Manhattan (we held our very first party there), and so when we were thinking about New York car people to profile for Jalopnik on DRIVE, Mike and Zac were an obvious choice. The question we posed to them was equally obvious: How do you keep a bunch of quirkpot classic cars running, such that more than 300 members would be able to drive long distances on the weekends (and weekdays too) without getting stranding in the rain, in some one-horse town upstate? (Sometimes, getting stranded in the rain was part of the fun.) Upcoming episodes of Jalopnik on DRIVE will look deeper into the buried-Dino story, profile Alan Wilzig and his front-yard racetrack and follow around our old pal, the former "Lamborghini" Batman, Lenny B. Robinson. What do you think?  |
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