After Chris dissed R.E.M. the other day, I thought about ways to get back at him... but then the perfect way came to me. Literally. I didn't have to make things up. It goes against my general credo of not judging people by their musical tastes, since music to one ear is noise to another, but this is just a little too crazy. Check this snippet from an IRC conversation.

<Chris> Yeah, I really enjoy the Backstreet Boys and N 'Sync. Not only are they great musicians, they have some serious dance moves. I'm going to get to the Backstreet Boys tour as soon as I can!

I think that says it all.

Cute. Droll, yet cute. Actually, I think Sega is aware of the fact that they're currently in a bit of trouble, and are taking innovative approaches to try to remedy that. The free system thing is a neat idea. Sony could stand to learn a lesson from that, and Square too. Buy the service, get the game. Or, they could take a different approach, buy the game, get the service. Either way, you're going to attract people. People love getting two things for the price of one. It's one reason socks became so popular.

Sega is in trouble, but not in dire trouble. Yet. With the Playstation 2 coming to America and the Dolphin in development, they're going to be facing some stiff competition from people with more technologically advanced systems. To be successful, they're going to have to try to saturate the market with systems (free Dreamcasts), leading to people buy the games. Software is where the profits happen, not hardware. The fact that Sega appears to at least realize what they need to do to survive is a good sign. I don't think they're dead yet.

You know, you might just be onto something I do believe. I've never heard anyone say they don't like Mega Man 3. I liked it. I preferred Mega Man 2, but 3 was great too. Could Mega Man 3 be the thing that unites the world, crosses racial and ethnic barriers, and brings world peace forevermore to the planet Earth?

To answer your question, quite possibly. Yup, yup, quite possibly. Even though I can't say that I'm against the FF Coke thing (see the next letter) or the X-Box. I know, I'll probably be lynched for saying that it, but I think the X-Box (could) be a great idea. Details I've read kind of conflict, but I think that a console that played PC games is a good idea. I personally don't like playing games on my computer for various reasons, the main one being that they never work out of the box. It always takes work to get the hardware stuff resolved. In theory, this would be a thing of the past with the X-Box. The reason PC games often don't work on computers has less to do with the Microsoft OS and more to do with the huge number of variables in the environment. What exact OS version is running? What set of hardware is installed? (Everything from video card to joystick is important, and no one's is alike.) Removing the variables would likely lead to better stability. Now, knowing Microsoft, this is all theory. They might find new ways to crash things.

As for Chris' singing, I haven't heard it. But I'm guessing it needs to stay in the shower, and in his car with the Backstreet Boys CDs.

On the one hand, I think it's kind of low that Square is pushing Coke. On the other hand, I think it's pretty good marketing. The more I think about it, the more I kind of like it. In one way, Square is pushing Coke, but in another way, Coke is pushing Square. I think that if Square has any say, the commercial will come to the U.S. Coke is such a recognizable icon that any association with it is likely to up awereness, especially here in the U.S. In Japan, I can see Square being almost as big an icon as Coke, but in the U.S., Coke has the upper hand. If people come to associate Square with Coke, that's as solid as marketing gets.

Besides, what harm does it do? None, really. And we get some spiffy CG.

A great question. And a good idea! Maybe this will lead to a Coke vs. Pepsi fighting game. Or perhaps an RPG where a dude just looks for a Coke/Pepsi because he's thirsty. The possibilities are endless. Just no more junk like the 7 Up Spot game, OK?

Well, here's an interesting observation, one that I had not considered. I think you make some good points, but Sakaguchi himself has gone on the record as saying FFIX is a throwback to the older FFs.

While it is a break in the trend, in a way, it's also a return, because regardless of the intent, the result was a super-derformed look. Take it up a graphical notch, and you have very cartoony characters. Interesting observations for sure, though.

Brilliant. Give your friend my props. Maybe sometime when I'm dreadfully bored I'll pull out my guitar and try to work up a tune for that little verse. Good stuff.

Closing Comments

As usual, there were a lot of good letters that didn't get printed simply for lack of time. To those of you that got the shaft, sorry. I don't like you any less just because I didn't print your letter. Until next time!

-Andrew Kaufmann