Antonio Esfandiari - Reading Tells

Daniel Negreanu is one of the best poker players in the world. He is a fantastic hand reader, and he is also great at picking up tells from other players. But, as good as he is picking up on tells, he also has tells popping out of his wazoo. The main problem is, he likes to talk to much. Daniel's talking often leads to gaining information from his opponents. But its a two way street, and when your opponent is also excellent at making reads, such as Antonoi Esfandiari, Daniel runs the risk of giving away too much information when he opens his mouth, as you will see in the video above.

Without going into an advanced analysis, Esfandiari was relatively short stacked in the game, and after Daniel checked, Esfandiari's flop bet on the button looked like a rather standard positional continuation bet, so Negreanu put him all in with second pair. The problem was, Antonio waited patiently like an interrogator until his victim burst, spilling the beans that he didnt want a call with a blatant tell. Look at Daniel's face, and his body language, and listen to what he says. And then watch how fast Esfandiari calls. The audio and the video are all out of whack. But this offers us a chance to analyze the two elements separately. First watch it as a silent film, then listen to the audio only, then watch both. Good thing for Daniel not too many people will pin him to the wall with a jedi laser stare like Esfandiari. Watch Neagreanu melt down around 4:45-5:00.

The Bourne Conspiracy Impressions

The game everyone wants to know about! Yeah right! It pretty funny, that in the middle of all these huge AAA games coming out, Im picking things from the middle of the pack to play. Dont worry, young reader, I have donwloaded and installed Fallout 3 to my hard drive and Im going to give it the old college try. Im going to get Gears 2 tomorrow, Im still going to play through Midnight Club LA, and all the other good stuff like Dead Space and Resistance 2 and LittleBIGPlanet, so dont you worry, Padawan.

So, I can sum up if The Bourne Conspiracy is for you with a simple series of yes/no questions:

1. Do you like Quicktime events and interactive cutscenes?
2. Do you like The Bourne Identity film?
3. Do you like brawling and fighting games?
4. Are you good at getting headshots with a silenced pistol?
5. Do you like spy-action games and/or spy-stealth games?

Unfortunately, Ive already answered these questions for you, and we both know that the answer is a resounding no to most of them. Whats that? You said yes to all 5? Well, your gamertag must be James Bond 007. Hes the only person on my Xbox Live friends list I could say would enjoy the game - without reservation - for everyone else, theres caveats.

I have to say I thought the game was really fun. I made the slight mistake of going right for the hardcore Assassin difficulty setting, and although it wasnt impossible Im quite sure it made several parts of the game much more frustrating and "trial and error" than they should have been - its clear the game wasnt designed at this difficulty. That being said, if I didnt have to retry a few parts several times, I would have flown through the game even faster than I did. As it is, I beat it in around 10 hours of play, which is respectable but certainly not worth $60 - as this game does not feature multiplayer. As a rental, or a bargain bin find for $20 or so, I can certainly recommend this game.

In terms of film to game adaptations, its among the best Ive ever played, which I realize isnt saying much. The graphics and in particular the sound are outstanding - the game features an fantastic original score and soundtrack composed entirely by Paul Oakenfold - and you can unlock tracks so they are playable in the main menu by completing certain objectives in the game.

When I asked if you liked Quicktime events first, it was for a reason. This game features by far more Quicktime events than any game I have ever played, and this is coming from one of the biggest God of War franchise fans around. The QTEs in this game are not only way more frequent than in any other game (hundreds), they require lightning fast reflexes to trigger properly, and in many cases if you miss the event, Bourne is killed instantly and the mission ends. The fighting engine feels quite clunky at first, but once you get into it there is some nuance and subtlety to the controls, and some strategy to the boss fights. The guns dont feel or work like Call of Duty 4 or Rainbow Six Vegas 2, which is unfortunate, but they are still fun enough to form the basis for much of the gameplay. There are several achievements that reward you for headshots and high accuracy, and many of the enemies are wearing body armor - just to let you know - dont event think about aiming for the chest.

The story rehashes the events from the first Bourne film - The Bourne Identity, and even if you have absolutely no interest in playing a QTE-heavy-third-person-shooter-spygame, you should absolutely check out the film - its action moviemaking at its best. In fact, I would not recommend playing the game without having seen the film first, as the story is told in a non-linear fashion and would be quite confusing otherwise. But we all know you arent playing this game anyway, not with whats on the calender for fall 2008. I totally understand that, but its amazing to me how many quality games get overlooked simply because they get released at the wrong time - in the glut of AAA holiday releases, second tier titles get little if any attention. Also, they released it in between the 3rd and in-the-making 4th Bourne films, so there was no marketing presence whatsoever. Oh well, another game relegated to the dustbin of history. At least the developers can console themselves in the thought that even if nobody bought or cared about their game, they did a great job and gave the handful of Bourne fans who played the game exactly what they were looking for.

Yes We Can

"If there is anyone out there who still doubts that America is a place where all things are possible, who still wonders if the dream of our Founders is still alive in our time, who still questions the power of our democracy, tonight is your answer. Even as we celebrate tonight, we know that the challenges tomorrow will bring are the greatest of our lifetime: two wars, a planet in peril, the worst financial crisis in a century.

The road ahead will be long. Our climb will be steep. We may not get there in one year or even one term, but America, I have never been more hopeful than I am tonight that we will get there. Tonight we proved once more that the strength of our nation comes not from the might of our arms or the scale of our wealth, but from the enduring power of our ideals - democracy, liberty, opportunity, and unyielding hope."

Those are the words of a true patriot, and a true leader - the words of the 44th President of The United States of America. The question everybody is asking now is this: will Obama actually be able to solve these great challenges? Can he really make the changes he is promising? The real answer is that I dont know. Nobody knows. Barack himself doesnt know what he will be able to accomplish. The two tasks of steering the nation through an economic crisis of historic proportions, and cleaning up the mess we have made in Iraq and Afganistan, are incredibly daunting alone. Forget things like saving the planet and brokering a peace treaty between the Israelis and the Palestinians for now - if Obama does well enough to get elected to a second term, maybe he will be able to make real headway into greening America and making peace in the Middle East.

It is possible he can do it all at once - revive the economy with green jobs and start pulling troops out of the hundreds of military bases we have stationed around the world - its just not likely to happen overnight. There is so much money invested in the US military industrial complex that its impossible to erode in a few years, let alone dismantle it altogether. Moving America from an economy based on the military industrial complex and oil to an economy centered around green jobs and technology will be no small feat - it requires wholesale infrastructure changes and an entirely different philosophy of governing. Can Obama do all that? It will be extremely difficult. Talking about major policy change is one thing, actually getting the legislation passed through Congress is entirely different.

But after what I just saw tonight, is anything impossible? The significance of Obama's presidential election cannot be understated. This is the same country that 44 years ago had institutionalised segregation. Think about how powerful a message this sends to the rest of the people of the world. In America, anything is possible. In America, we can all decide we want to change how our country is governed, we can try to perfect our union. It takes time. It might take 8 years. It might take 25, 50 or another 100 years to get America right. Somebody has to step up and lead the country to change for the better. It has to start somewhere, it has to start sometime. And after witnessing the events of last night, I truly believe that time is now.

The Mind Killer

I must not fear.
Fear is the mind-killer.
Fear is the little-death that brings total obliteration.
I will face my fear.
I will permit it to pass over me and through me.
And when it has gone past I will turn the inner eye to see its path.
Where the fear has gone there will be nothing.
Only I will remain.

-Dune

Hamilton Wins F1 Championship

Lewis Hamilton won the Formula One Grand Prix Championship by a single point on Sunday in Sao Paulo, Brazil, exactly one year after losing the championship by the same margin - a single point.

Hamilton also roared into the record books as Formula One's youngest champion when he snatched the title in a last-lap drama at the Brazilian Grand Prix. The 23-year-old, needing only a fifth-place finish in the season-ending race to become Britain's first champion since Damon Hill in 1996, was seconds from failure for the second year in a row as Ferrari rival Felipe Massa swept to victory.

Hamilton entered the last lap in sixth place after a late shower forced a change to wet weather tires and saw Sebastian Vettel's Ferrari-powered Toro Rosso overtake the McLaren. With the title disappearing as fast as Massa's Ferrari approached the checkered flag, Hamilton had Toyota's Timo Glock to thank after the German stayed out on dry tires and was unable to hold on to his fifth place.

Hamilton powered past as the final corner approached.

Massa, Hamilton's sole title rival, won his home race for the second time in three years to chalk up a record 16th constructors' title for the Italian team. Hamilton, who missed out by a single point to Ferrari's Kimi Raikkonen in Brazil last season, ended the 18-race season one point clear of Massa.

"He scored more points than me, he deserves to win the title," said the classy, introspective race winner Kimi Raikkonen: "I know how to win, I know how to lose. This is another day of my life that I'm going to learn a lot from."

At 23 years and 301 days old, Lewis Hamilton broke the age record set by former McLaren teammate Fernando Alonso, the Spaniard who won the first of his two titles with Renault in Brazil at the age of 24, one month and 27 days.

"Amazing, I can't even get my breath back," said the astonished Briton, who embraced his father and brother before being mobbed by the team.

Games For Windows Live Gets Fallout 3

Microsoft's Games for Windows Live service is now totally, completely free to use - actually as of July 22 it had that status but its very likely that you didnt notice, because there wasnt one really big game out for the service that you could play. All that has changed with the release of Fallout 3 for PC - its the only truly first class, triple A offering to debut on the service. What this means is that if you have a PC with a broadband connection, your PC will function just like an Xbox 360 when you have a Games for Windows Live enabled game playing. You can text chat, voice chat, send and accept invites, and earn achievements for your gamertag. If you are on your 360, friends playing Games for Windows Live titles on their PC will appear with a small white computer monitor icon to the right of their gamertag in your friends list.

Assuming you have the 360 Wireless Receiver for Windows, you will be able to use your Xbox 360 controller and headset on your PC in these games, just like you would with your 360 console. Games for Windows Live titles can of course be played with a mouse and keyboard, if that suits your old school PC gaming taste. Also Games for Windows Live branded games are fully tested by Bill Gates to support wide-screen monitors with true HD widescreen resolutions like 1900x1200 - no fake HD 640P here.

The achievements overlap with your 360, so if you pop in Fallout 3 and you already have certain achievements from when you played the 360 version, you will see those achievements there. You cant unlock them again, but all the ones you never unlocked on the 360 will be unlockable on your PC version of the game. So, theoretically, you can be playing one campaign of Fallout 3 on your laptop, for when you travel, where you earn all the achievements for being good and save all the princesses from evil, and at the same time have another campaign going on your Xbox 360 where you are the blackhearted sum of all things evil and you get all the achievements for eating live puppies for breakfast. So basically, Microsoft has turned your PC into a giant, beastly Xbox 360. Currently only one game that I know of supports cross platform play - where PC gamers and Xbox 360 gamers can play together on the same servers - and thats Shadowrun, but expect more cross platform enabled titles to start shipping soon now that the service is free. Below is a list of PC games that currently support the Games for Windows Live service.

• Fallout® 3

• Battlestations™: Pacific

• The Club™

• Gears of War® for Windows

• Halo® 2 for Windows Vista

• Kane & Lynch: Dead Men

• Lost Planet™ Extreme Condition - Colonies Edition

• Shadowrun™

• Universe at War™: Earth Assault

• Viva Piñata™ for Windows

• Warhammer® 40,000™: Dawn of War® II

Left 4 Dead Trailer