Now that half the country's already played it, last night I got my hands on Portal. I finished it last night, too. It's a pretty short game initially, but then there's the advanced levels I haven't gotten to. The "campaign", if you can call it that, is short, but then the individual levels of said campaign are replayable with changes. Those are the advanced levels. I think there's some extra levels that weren't part of the campaign, but I haven't given them a try yet.

So while Half-Life 2 Episode 2 and Team Fortress 2 are both included in The Orange Box, it seems that Portal is making the most buzz. Why is that? Well, the game has innovative, mostly non-violent gameplay. You don't have a weapon, you have a gun that opens portals. You don't really have any enemies to defeat until the very end. It's essentially a first person shooter that replaces malicious enemies with intricate puzzles. They're not gay puzzles like in Myst or something where the puzzles aren't actually relevant to the game, though. They're puzzles that make use of the physics engine of Half Life 2, and the whole portal opening idea. Aside from the gameplay, however, the game has incredible style, and a running sense of humor. All throughout the game, this AI system is guiding you through making remarks that are quite humorous. You may have heard some of the phrases, such as "Cake and grief counseling will be available at the conclusion of the test." And then, there's the song at the end, which seems to be quite catchy.

Unlike Half Life 2 itself, Portal has an appeal to women. Chicks dig the Portal. More and more these days games are appealing to women. World of Warcraft achieved this through easy to understand and control gameplay on top of cartoonish graphics (unlike the typical 3D MMORPG which goes for gritty realism). Then there's games like Katamari Damacy which are completely non-threatening in both gameplay and graphical styling. While Portal doesn't have cute graphics (aside from the hearts on the "Weighted Companion Cube"), it does have other elements that increase the feminine appeal. The humorous lines, for instance. Actually, I think the humor element is a large part of the viral marketing this game is getting. That, and the promise of cake.

The cake is a lie, though.

Today I learned about the game's predecessor, Narbacular Drop. Apparently, Valve hired the people who made it to make Portal. Narbacular Drop is a free game available for download here. I haven't tried it yet, but I don't recommend waiting on me to try it out yourself.

Back in 1996, Alex Lifeson of Rush put out a solo album titled Victor. About a month ago, I found out about this. I'm a pretty big Rush fan, but not so big that I know every facet of the band. I knew Geddy Lee had put out a solo album, which I also have in my posession, so one day I decided to check and see if any of the other members of the band had, and I thusly found Victor. It seems that Neil Peart has yet to make a solo album. It's probably because he doesn't consider himself a musical composer short of his famed drum solo he does every concert, and instead writes the lyrics for the band.

Victor is a pretty good album, actually. I guess that can kind of be expected. I don't really care for the song with the two crones badmouthing their men, but only because of the two crones badmouthing their men. I know that's the joke, but I just hate listening to their voices. The title track, Victor, is more of a story than a song, and the musical styling is not very interesting. For the most part, the album doesn't sound like a Rush album, which is probably why it's a solo album, but it still a good listen.

The put all kinds of crap along with chocolate to make candy bars. They've used peanut butter, caramel, cookie, wafer, nuget (whatever that is), peanuts, other kinds of chocolate, almonds, rice, coconut, etc. How come they've never used cinnamon? Cinnamon goes with chocolate pretty well, actually. Try some in your hot cocoa next time you have some. Not a lot, just a bit to enhance the flavor. Next time you make a chocolate cake, add some cinnamon. Basically, if you're making something chocolate, add some cinnamon, and see how it turns out. So far I only ever see cinnamon used for bread-type products. Oh, and in the Cinnabon cheesecake they have at Friday's, which is something I do not recommend (it's too sweet, and with the cheesecake's already overpowering richness, it'll make you vomit... and I'm not even sure you can taste the cinnamon). I think cinnamon should have more of a place in the confectionary arena. It's actually quite the healhty spice, so it wouldn't be like adding more sugar where you're making it worse. Shouldn't add more sugar, anyway.

So it seems lately I've been accumulating Internet pen-pals. These are all people I know in person, but they write me messages during the day and I respond. It's good stuff. I seem to be accumulating more and more of them, but I'm not yet at the point where I don't get bored while at work. I keep anxiously waiting for the next message. I write messages that attempt to get longer messages out of the people I'm writing to. It's actually kind of fun.

The problem I'm starting to run into is that I don't know who I've told what to, so I end up repeating stories to the same person, and not telling anyone else that story because I think I've already told them. I need to organize my stories and keep tabs somehow.

When I get home, I might check my messages a couple times, because I do want to hear from people, but it's not so much as it is at work. I'm hoping it will get to the point where I don't mind going to work because of all the social networking. That, and it will feel like I have a social life during the week. During work, no less!

Anyone who feels the same, start up a dialogue. You know how to reach me.