Last weekend I traveled to Chicago with Aaron and a handful of my VS playing friends from St. Louis to compete in the Chicago VS Mega Weekend. I was one of 80+ players that had traveled to the Windy City to compete for a Playstation 3, a Nintendo Wii, and tons of other VS related prizes. People traveled as far as California to compete. I didn’t do so hot myself finishing 4-5 in the day one tournament, and 2-5 in the tournament on day two. My teammates had mixed results, finishing as high as 13th in the day two tournament. The weekend was a total blast, everyone had a great time and took home some free swag. On the way up to Chicago we stopped off and visited with Joe and Hilary, they provided us lodging for two nights. You can see some of the pictures of downtown Rossville on my Flickr. Or you can see some of the pictures from the Chicago tournaments here.

Aaron and I have been playing through Army of Two. Its a fun little game from EA where you take on the role of one of two private contract soldiers. The game is tailor-made for co-operative play and features many game mechanics capitalizing on having a friend there to help you out. One of the revolutionary new features is the inclusion of the “cover system.” Each player has an aggro meter that measures how much the enemy AI players hate you. The more damage you inflict the more your aggro meter will go up. This will cause the other player who is lower on the aggro chart to become invisible to the enemy setting up flanking and other combat maneuvers. The game is a blast and although it supposedly satires private military, the satire doesn’t really come across and it just seems to glamorize private contract military. The story is good enough, and the game play is a blast, its especially fun to upgrade your weapons and “bling” them out. At one point Aaron was carrying around a 4-foot gold plated sniper rifle, it was pretty hilarious. Check it out its on Xbox 360, and hopefully soon on PC.

I typically don’t go for romantic comedies, unless there are Zombies involved (Shaun of the Dead), but Run Fat Boy Run actually looks good. Maybe its the fact Simon Pegg (Shaun of the Dead) stars in it, and its directed by David Schwimmer that has peaked my interest.

Check out the video for Handlebars by Denver based hip-hop group Flobots. This group is cool because they seem to appeal to a broader audience than just the hip-hop crowd. I’m not sure if its because they include horns and strings in their live act, or if its the political messages they talk about with their music. Needless to say they’re buzzing up the Indie stations and you will be hearing these guys soon if not already.

Sometimes you see something on the web and it just blows your mind.  Such is the case with Sillof’s Steampunk Star Wars characters.  The way he customizes the original figures to fit into a completely different genre is just amazing.  If Steampunk doesn’t tickle your fancy check out Sillof’s World War 2 re imagining.   I love Han Solo as a 1942 Air Force captain complete with bomber jacket. This guy is a genius.