gamesmanship

Rockstar Games, over the last ten years or so, has earned my respect -- and my dollars because well, quite simply their games are awesome.  I'm a big fan of the Grand Theft Auto series of games and have played every one since GTA III.  So it'll be no surprise that I eagerly anticipate the next one in the series, Grand Theft Auto V.  This one will be returning to the fictionalized California/Los Angeles area known in the GTA universe as San Andreas/Los Santos.  No release date has been set yet, but Rockstar occasionally releases a trailer or screenshot to keep the hype alive.  So far it looks phenomenal and has me excited about playing it as soon as it comes out.  It doesn't hurt that recently on the Rockstar blog they've released a number of screenshots with single word titles for the entries.  If you haven't figured it out, I'm a big fan of the single word title.  Check out the blog entries/screenshots here:

Leisure.
Business.
Transport.

So it's going to be a while before the game comes out and I am wondering if I should pick up something else to play in the meantime.  My gaming sommelier Ken has suggested I pick up Sleeping Dogs, a Square Enix title that started out as True Crime: Hong Kong and underwent some rebranding and renaming.  It looks pretty fun as well and has what I have always been wishing for:  an open sandbox type crime game set in Hong Kong.  I've been a HK noir film fan for many years so this may be right up my alley.

spartan

Construction has started on our new home and our current place is still up for sale -- no decent offers have turned up yet. In the meantime we are kind of resuming our normal life although with a bit more economy and restraint. I've hooked the PS3 back up to the TV so we can at least watch some Blu-Ray movies.

Recently I watched John Woo's epic historical drama Red Cliff which runs a staggering 4+ hours across 2 discs. The film depicts the historical Battle at Red Cliff from 208 AD. Although it's a long film, I thought it was a triumphant return to form for John Woo -- the only disappointment for me was that long-time Woo collaborator Chow Yun-Fat withdrew from the film early in its filming.
But his fellow Hard-Boiled alumni Tony Leung does a reasonably good job playing the charismatic and wily commander Zhou Yu. Some of the memorable battle scenes feature the fearsome general Guan Yu, who to this day is deified by Chinese around the world, as the god of loyalty and righteousness.

Now I'm wondering if I should pull the XBox360 out of the closet as well -- next week the free multiplayer beta of Halo Reach comes out for Halo3: ODST owners... that would include me!  But that would mean I need to renew my XBox Live Gold membership which I let expire, so I'll have to think about it.  Not sure I'll have time to play games as work picks up again this summer...

In the meantime, I did take more photos recently - check out the collection below.  And we have a weekend trip up to Yosemite coming later this month, I am looking forward to seeing (and photographing) some spectacular scenery out there.



-p.

homemade

Mmmmm ... tonight V. made my favorite noodle soup, and the namesake for this blog, cha siu tong mein. Sure, eating out is nice, but sometimes you just wanna sit at home and attack a sumptuous meal with no regard for manners or decency, knowing no one will see you...

aromatic

My coworker just came back from China and brought me this. Mmmm this might be the only non-vegetarian potato chip I've ever seen.