If you are like me, no doubt you will have a collection of electronic devices with wires for power, ethernet, speakers, scart, HDMI, component and that’s before I dare to look behind my computer. Quite frankly, the room becomes a sanctuary for wriggly wires looking for a good home and your instinct is to hide your charitable inclinations the best you can. Going through this tedious process of placing cables under carpets, rugs and anything else you can find to mask the mess, will soon have you losing the plot trying to remember what each cable attaches to. A nightmare if you ever have to move your equipment.

In the past you might have used good old sticky tape with ripped off pieces of paper acting as labels, I know I have! It is easy to lose heart as your spiffy new amplifier, with its LCD animating, rows of twinkling lights and sexy dials hides a hideous secret, a secret that reveals itself the next time you pull something out of its prized spot. No not the dust you couldn’t reach, I actually am referring to those hideous ripped paper labels that are now back to haunt you. Time for Stick’nGo labels…

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From episode 1 to 8, I hosted the Console Monster Podcast but due to lack of time and staff participation we all took a breather. Now with Rob Rymond at the hosting helm, I appear as one of the guests along with David Wriglesworth and Marty Greenwell to discuss the latest Microsoft Xbox 360 and Sony PlayStation3 news and reviews on the renamed Monster Cast.

Topics covered include:
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Podcast: Download (Duration: 55:55 — 25.6MB)

The first time I experienced Sonic the Hedgehog was on the legendary SEGA Megadrive (Genesis). Unfortunately if you wanted to get your 2D fix of our little blue spin-dashing friend, you had to either purchase the original classics from services on all the current gaming consoles or try out the portable hand-held versions. The 3D variants of Sonic the Hedgehog have been extremely hit and miss and although Sonic Adventure on the SEGA Dreamcast transitioned fairly well into this new perspective, the Xbox 360 next generation revamp was a total disaster.

I am sure many of us have been badgering SEGA and in fact anyone who would listen, to create a 2D or at least a close to 2D, modern version of Sonic that we could love and even adore from the comfort of our sofa and admire on our high definition television screens. Project Needlemouse has teased us for months with promises that has even made me giddy with excitement and now the latest news has been released stating that Sonic the Hedgehog 4 – Episode 1 will be released in Summer 2010.

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The media loves to carefully select the most brutal and graphic gameplay to try and prove to those who don’t have any interest in gaming that there is a lurking evil ready to pounce from your television screens into your soul, somehow taking over your will to control sensible thoughts and distort right from wrong. Of course this is extreme exaggeration, the usual scaremongering we hear many times on various subjects not just our gaming pursuits. Just like the word ‘crisis’ that appears out of news readers lips for almost every story, gamers like myself become numb to the effects of the constant assassination attempts on our passion for fun and entertainment.

Eventually you just stop reading the so called parents outrage when their child is playing a game that offends them, yet there are still those that stand in line to buy their cherished youngsters titles that are clearly meant for a much older audience. This is not a post to pass judgement or blame, rather an eye opener to those that condemn our interest on the basis of a few media reports that may have never picked up a controller in their life. I can only hope that a lot of the negativity has calmed down due to the influence the Nintendo Wii has achieved in the casual gaming market, but only time will tell.

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As someone who loves new features, I couldn’t help but exploit the latest perks of using YouTube. Captions (subtitles) were already supported in the past, however it was an extremely time consuming process as you are required to add time markers for when each sentence should appear. There is now an option though that allows you to upload a simple text file of what is read aloud in the narration and YouTube will cleverly match up the text file to the audio on your video, providing viewers the option of displaying captions if required.

Today I have made sure that all my gaming video reviews both in standard and high definition (HD) now support captions and you can see these below. Remember to select the lower right box and then the option [CC] within the YouTube controls to view the subtitles, which appears when the video begins:

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